Title:   Colony
Author:  Jemima
Contact: jemimap@crosswinds.net
Series:  VOY
Part:	 5/20
Rating:	 PG
Codes:	 crew, J/C
Date:	 November 2000

Disclaimer:  Copyright has expired on the works of Alfred, Lord
	     Tennyson quoted herein.  Certain of the names below have
	     been trademarked by Paramount; be assured I am not
	     conducting trade with them.

*****

Part 5

*****

 Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reaping something new:
 That which they have done but earnest of the things that they shall do: 


Her XO looked like he was about to drop another bomb in her lap, and
there was no coffee for Janeway to brace herself with.

"Captain, I need to speak with you in your ready room."

She frowned, but stood and followed him.  At Ops, Harry carried on
looking nervous.

"What is it?" she asked him bluntly after the doors closed behind
them.

She sounded tired, bone-tired, but he wasn't about to protect her from
this truth.  The situation was only getting worse as time went by.
"It's the crew," he answered.  Could she see it?

"They're under a lot of stress," she excused them.  "We've all been
working eighteen-hour days since the attack."  How she wished they
hadn't had to stay in orbit around this devastated planet for so long.

"It's more than that.  They're dividing up."

"Are you saying the Maquis want to get involved in the war?" she
asked.  She would have been surprised, if she'd had the energy to
spare for it.

"Not the Maquis per se.  Half the crew wants to...I suppose 'get
involved' is as specific as anyone has gotten.  More Maquis want to
help than don't, but a large minority of Starfleet also want to do
something for the Leigi."

"What do you want to do?"

She really was tired - it wasn't like her to ask, but to dictate.  "My
personal feelings are irrelevant.  The crew--"

"You're a member of my crew as much as any of them.  I want to know."

"I want what the Captain wants, only I'm afraid she can't have it this
time."

"What does the Captain want?" she asked.

"Peace and good speed on her journey."

"Our journey," the Captain corrected him.

"If she isn't careful, there won't be an 'us' anymore."

She stared at him.  Whatever he might say, she knew he would jump at
an order to help the Leigi.  He was angry again - not at her, but at
the Periti - and she knew the days of her tame Maquis XO were over.

She had sensed the crew slipping out of her grasp - at first, she'd
confused it with her own loss of control on Leigus.  She'd put a good
front on it, but she'd thought they were all dead and Voyager returned
to her constituent atoms.  Afterwards, they were all worn down with
the delay in finding their scattered crew, the constant fear of the
Periti's return, and the slow pace of repairs.  It took her a while to
see what was happening.

They were slipping away from her, betrayed by the crippled ship and
the endless quadrant.  The tattered shreds of the seven-year dream of
returning home were worn too thin for them.  She couldn't blame them,
or expect a captain's willpower from ensigns and crewmen.  She wrote
off the few who hadn't come back aboard as lost already, and knew that
as the years passed, the toll would only increase.

If Chakotay was right, though, there might be an earthquake instead of
the slow erosion she'd come to expect.  Here he was warning her,
expecting her to ignore him as usual, but she knew she couldn't push
her luck this time.  This time things were going to blow up in her
face if she ignored him, possibly even if she listened.

"What can we do?" she asked.

"I'm not sure.  Something to unify the crew, something that will help
the Leigi and also help Voyager."

"You have an idea."

"I was thinking, we could send the Delta Flyer and another shuttle to
run the blockade on Leigus Prime.  The Periti don't have transporter
technology--"

"Neither do we, at the moment," she said bitterly.  She didn't like
the idea of risking their few functional warp drives on a mission to
the other end of the sector.

"The shuttles' transporters work - we could enhance them.  We can
transport the medical supplies to Leigus Prime, and retrieve the
dilithium we need."

He made it sound so innocent.  "What about the Prime Directive?"

"The Leigi are a warp-capable society."

"They don't have transporters."

"They won't afterwards, either."

"And who will lead this mission?" she asked.

"I'm the most qualified smuggler aboard."

Well, she'd seen that one coming a mile away.  If she couldn't spare
the shuttles, she certainly couldn't spare her first officer.  "Who
else?" she wondered aloud.  Who else would he take that she couldn't
spare?

"Paris, Dalby, Ayala, Neelix, Jenny Delaney..."  They were enough to
man the shuttles, and too many to lose.  He also planned to bring
along a few of the Leigi.

"There must be a safer source of dilithium."

"But not of unity.  If we get ourselves killed, you'll have unity as
well."

With that cold Maquis logic, so much more daunting than Tuvok's, he'd
hand-picked the most vociferous and influential of the pro-Leigi crew,
just to get them out of her hair for a while.  Or perhaps permanently.

"Don't get yourselves killed."  Somehow, she knew the Periti were in
greater danger than he was.  What would Starfleet say if - when - they
found out she'd let her Maquis loose on the Cardassians of the Delta
Quadrant?

As he stood to leave her ready room, she made one last request.  "Take
a look at that moon for me while you're out there, Chakotay."

"Yes, Captain," he replied, his face suddenly expressionless.

*****

 There methinks would be enjoyment more than in this march of mind,
 In the steamship, in the railway, in the thoughts that shake mankind. 


"Let me get this straight - did you just say you're going with
*Chakotay* in a *shuttlecraft* on a *Maquis* operation?"  B'Elanna
paced the floor of their cabin, looking ready to strangle someone.

"Right on, baby."

"This death wish thing has got to stop, Tom."

"I won't let him drive."

"Who's going to stop him once you've been captured and dragged off to
Periti New Zealand?"

"Ayala, I suppose."

"This isn't funny, Tom."

"Far from it, B'E.  Don't worry about us.  Fix the old barge and we'll
bring you the dilithium."

"I've had enough of this."  Her tone had changed; he didn't know what
she was complaining about - it didn't even sound like his fault this
time.

"Of what, B'E?" he asked gently.

"This whole death march through the Delta Quadrant.  All the time, 'Fix
it, Torres,' even though most of 'it' has been blown out into space,
vaporized or sucked into an anomaly.

"I can see it now," she fumed on, "Chakotay will manage to crash both
shuttles and come back flying a Periti garbage scow.  Then who has to
produce more shuttles out of string and nanoprobes, eh?  'Torres,
we're out of shuttles again.  Can you do something about it?  Thanks.'

"I want it to stop.  Let's settle down on a nice, deserted planet.  We
can build a real shuttlecraft factory so you and Chakotay can crash
all you want."

"Wouldn't you be bored?" Tom asked.

"Sure I would.  I want to be bored.  I'd already racked up a
lifetime's worth of excitement in the Maquis before Chakotay pulled
that kamikazi stunt with my ship.  Now I've had enough for several
generations."

"I didn't think you were tired of playing Starfleet," Tom reflected.

"She's tired, Tom.  It's rubbed off on me.  From me it infected my
staff.  It's going around.  Look at you, suddenly a Maquis again after
all these years.  It's not idealism, it's boredom.  You're tired of
playing Helm Boy and I'm tired of playing Mr. Scott."

"What would you do on an uninhabited world?"

"I'd build something."

*****