Title

Tapestries

Wesley watched as the tapestry unraveled.

It wouldn't be so bad if it were due to poor craftsmanship--after all, it was only his first try. He had expected to spend months working on it, instead of the mere weeks it took to mentally weave it. But no, the tapestry's unraveling was due to something much more sinister . . . and much more dangerous. Like the tapestry, reality it self was unraveling.

Wesley turned to one of the sacred wall hangings that the Traveler had made. They were much more complicated than Wesley's simple tapestry, but they functioned on the same basic principle. Like space and time, the strings of the tapestries were interwoven.

Like Wesley's tapestry, however, the Traveler's wall hangings too were unraveling. He stared at them, knowing that even before the tapestries finished unraveling, the indescribable force would hit Darvon V as well, and he would fade from existence.

The Traveler had gone to face the force, to try to stop it. Wesley knew that he had been destroyed in the process, or at least that the Traveler's mind had been severed from his body.

Wesley looked at the tapestry. All hope was not lost. Often, the Universe could right it self on its own, like a body fighting off a disease. But Wesley feared that this virus would be just too strong.

He ran his fingers along the hangings, surveying the lost. All of this would cease to exist. He reached out with his mind, and touched a part of the tapestry--touched a thousand minds, his mother and friends among them, on the new Enterprise-E. Starfleet had hundreds of ships just like it.

He let his mind wander, touching them all, until he reached one that made him start. There shouldn't have been a starship there; it was on the other side of the galaxy, in what Starfleet designated the Delta Quadrant. Suddenly something jogged Wesley's memories, and he remembered reading the Starfleet bulletins many years ago. A starship, Voyager (how aptly named!), had been lost, thrown across the galaxy by an arcane technology.

Wesley stared at the threads on the tapestry, and simultaneously at the Starship Voyager. He had a feeling, some instinct that he couldn't name but had learned to trust, that it was this ship that the fate of the universe rested in.

Janeway sipped her steaming mug of coffee as she stared at the padd. She had to read the entire thing. It didn't tell her anything she didn't already know--but ah, well. At least everything was going smoothly. The ship was in top condition, a somewhat rare occurrence, being cut off from Starfleet and constantly in need of supplies.

Suddenly, the ship lurched.

She had her hand on the comm badge practically before it beeped. "Janeway here," she said, cutting off Ensign Kim. "Red alert. Commander Chakotay and I will be right there."

The familiar red-alert klaxon immediately filled the Mess Hall, and Janeway watched as Chakotay broke off the long-winded conversation he had been having with Neelix. She nodded to him, and they made their way out of the Mess Hall, through the corridors, and into turbolift.

"Bridge," she ordered.

Kim nodded to them as they stepped out of the turbolift. "Maybe you can negotiate with him," he told them, doubtfully. On the screen was an extremely fat alien.

Janeway was sure that Kim had gone through the pleasantries with the alien already, so she opted not to go through them another time. "Stop firing on my ship," she ordered the alien in her most authoritative tone.

"When chukha freezes over." The alien turned around and spat out a command to his crew. "Puchawf!" An alien officer, not quite as fat as his commander, hastily punched a code into his console, and a bright beam of energy shot out of the ship.

Voyager's bridge lurched again.

"Get out of Cazore territory and maybe there will be something left of your precious kaluch starship!" The alien laughed. He definitely thought he had the upper hand. The problem was, he probably did.

This was getting nowhere fast, and Janeway had had enough. "End transmission. Fire at will, Tuvok."

The Vulcan nodded. "Firing phasers."

Janeway tapped her communicator. "Janeway to Engineering. B'Elanna, how long can we keep this up?"

Janeway heard B'Elanna's Klingon sigh. "I don't know, Captain. A few minutes at most. We've already been hit pretty hard."

"Shield structure at seventy-three percent, Captain," said Ensign Kim, as if to affirm B'Elanna's statement, "and losing integrity rapidly."

The ship in front of them fired again. "Captain, we've lost warp."

Janeway cursed to her self, silently. That was the last thing they needed.

Then the Cazorean ship disappeared.

"What the hell happened?" asked Paris.

Janeway turned to Tuvok. "A cloaking device?"

"No, Captain. There are none of the signs of a ship engaging its cloak."

Ensign Kim shook his head in bewilderment. "They just disappeared from our sensors. Their ion trails, all the traces that they ever existed--it all just disappeared."

"Except the information in our sensor logs," Tuvok clarified.

Janeway shook her head. What the hell was happening?

If there was one thing Janeway didn't like, it was feeling like she was being duped. They had been working on the puzzle of the vanishing ship for two days, and they still hadn't solved it. Her entire complement of senior officers was gathered in the conference room. They all had the same thing to report: the only evidence the Cazorean ship ever existed was in the ship's sensor logs and the crew's memory.

"Look, it wasn't just some type of mass hallucination," argued Paris. "We have sensor data to back us up--that ship just vanished!"

"It is possible that the ship's computers malfunctioned," said Seven.

B'Elanna shook her head. "If so, it affected over twenty different systems. That's practically impossible."

"But not totally impossible," Tuvok intoned. When Janeway looked up at him, he added, "If you really must know, Captain, the odds are 3,452,578 to one."

"Which means, in short, that it's impossible," B'Elanna said.

"Semantics, semantics," said a voice, one that belonged to none of her officers. "It's all a question of semantics. It's a result of your primitive human language being so imprecise." Janeway turned around to see the most nauseating man (if you could call him a man) she knew. Suddenly, she realized she had a headache.

"Q, why are you on my ship?" Janeway demanded to know. Then, thinking better of it, "Actually, I don't care why you are on my ship. Just get off it."

"Unfortunately, my dear captain," intoned Q, "I am not here for the immense amounts of enjoyment I always receive from my visits on Starfleet's fine vessels, but to both warn you and to ask for your help."

Janeway didn't budge. "You've asked for my help before, Q."

Q sighed. "This is no time for your petty human grudges, Captain. The universe, as you know it, is in danger."

Tuvok asked, "In danger from what?"

Q shrugged. "You couldn't understand it."

Janeway looked at him with a gaze of steel. "Then give us an analogy we can understand."

"Very well," Q said. "The best analogy, I guess, would be anti-matter. An incompetent member of the Q (now, of course it wasn't me) accidentally opened a. . . portal, let's say (your human language is so limited, you really need a new one, perhaps Q-ese?), and unleashed the anti-Q. The substance is rushing out of this portal, and, whenever it comes in contact with a Q, it completely obliterates him."

"Good riddance," B'Elanna muttered under her breath.

"Careful, Lieutenant, or you might find your self stuck in a shuttle full of tribbles."

Janeway rose. "I think B'Elanna has a good point. You told us that you came to warn us. I assume that it was not to warn us that we will be missing your jovial charm?"

"You Starfleet captains never appreciate me. The Q do more than antagonize humans, ma capitine. We are custodians of the universe. Without us, your universe would . . . cease to exist. Already your universe is beginning to dissolve."

Tuvok raised an eyebrow a fraction of a centimeter. "The vanishing ship."

"Yes, and it is only a matter of time until the anti-Q gets me. Then Voyager vanishes."

"How much time do we have to work with?" asked Janeway.

"Less than a half hour."

Janeway sighed. Q never had good timing. "What are we supposed to do in that amount of time?"

Q shrugged. "An inverse karokian fluctuation pulse would seal the portal."

"And what is . . . whatever you said?"

Q shrugged again. "I probably could describe it to Tuvok here in a matter of minutes. The rest of you might never get it."

"The question is, how do we generate this thing?"

Q's face took on an expression Janeway had never seen on it before: genuine concern. "I don't know. Your physical world has no such equivalent - it exists only in the world of thought."

Janeway frowned. "Why did you come to us if we couldn't fix the problem."

Q looked ashamedly at the other officers in the room. "The truth is, you humans can have a unique outlook on things. You were my last chance."

Janeway's day was getting better by the minute. She would actually have to help Q. "Very well. Explain the concept to Tuvok. Let's see if human intuition saves the day today."

Janeway watched as Tuvok exited the conference room after being briefed by Q. "Well?"

"Captain," Tuvok said, in carefully monitored tones, "he wants us to do the impossible."

The force had finally hit Darvon V. Wesley existed only by reaching out with his mind, sending it out into the far reaches of the Universe. He was part of the Universe, and as long as it existed, so would he.

Unfortunately, he had bought him self only a matter of a few hours. Soon the force would finish unraveling reality, and the entire Universe would cease to exist. Until then, he wanted to watch the tapestries, see them unravel. It would be his last lesson.

Only a few strings held the tapestry together. All the Starfleet ships, including the Enterprise and Voyager, had unraveled. He looked at the threads that used to be those ships, unraveled, on the floor. Then he saw something that made him start; not all of Voyager had unraveled. A few strings were still woven together. . . .

"Tuvok?" The Vulcan was all Janeway could see. Everything else was black.

"Yes, Captain?"

"Where is the rest of the crew?"

"I do not know, Captain," Tuvok answered. "You and Seven are the only ones here."

"Seven?"

"She is standing next to you. Do you not see her?"

"No, Tuvok, I do not."

"Fascinating." He stepped forward to her and placed his right hand on her face, covering her katra points, and placed his left hand on an invisible face, doing the same. At once, Janeway felt her mind merge with Tuvok's. She felt another mind, as well--he was melding with Seven at the same time. Tuvok was chanting in the background, "Your thoughts to your thoughts, your mind to your mind." She let her consciousness merge with Seven's, enveloped her very sense of being. Suddenly, Seven seemed quite tangible to Janeway. When Tuvok broke the meld, Janeway looked next to her, and there the ex-Borg was.

"Captain," she nodded, politely.

"Okay," she said, "where are we?"

Tuvok answered. "Judging from what Q told us, we are in no physical place."

Janeway shook her head. She hated these philosophical paradoxes. "Tuvok, do you have an explanation?"

"I do, Captain. It seems that Q was correct when he said the Q were the custodians of the Universe. When the anti-Q substance destroyed him, the physical world we resided in--Voyager--ceased to exist."

She still didn't understand. "Then why do we still exist?"

"Our bodies do not, Captain. It is our minds, our katras, that still exist. We think, Captain, therefore we are--by our own volition, not Q's."

Janeway nodded. "And since you experienced the thoughts of both Seven and my self, you were joined in our existence."

"That is the most logical explanation."

Janeway looked at him. "I assume you don't have any more of my crew in there?"

"I do not, Captain. I do not meld casually."

"Of course. With our crew I don't blame you."

Seven interrupted. "Captain, it is possible that I have another crew member in my mind."

Janeway looked at her strangely. "Have you been developing telepathic powers behind my back, Seven?"

"No captain, but I have been lately reviewing the Doctor's programming."

Tuvok nodded. "If the doctor is a conscious creature, then Seven should be able to break through to his mind."

"The doctor isn't supposed to be conscious."

"He is active several hours of the day," argued Seven. "His matrix has expanded considerably. He interacts with humans on a daily basis. He has explored facets of individuality his creators never intended."

Janeway relented. "It can't hurt. You remember his entire program?"

"I have a perfect memory."

"Of course." Janeway turned to Tuvok. "Will I be able to see the Doctor?"

"You should, Captain. The link between your mind and Seven's is still strong."

"Very well. Seven, try it."

Seven concentrated, remembering each and every line of the Doctor's programming. In all, it added up to all his thoughts, every slice of his being. "My thoughts to your thoughts," she chanted, reciting the ancient Vulcan words as an aide to her concentration, "my mind to your mind." Suddenly, the Doctor, like Janeway, seemed incredibly tangible to Seven.

Please state the nature of your medical emergency," he intoned, and then looked around at the void. "Then again, this seems to speak for it self."

"The material world has deteriorated," explained Tuvok. "Only our consciousnesses remain."

The doctor's features lit up. "That would mean I was indeed conscious, wouldn't it? We must celebrate."

"If we do not remedy the situation at hand," cautioned Tuvok, "we will have all eternity to do so."

"Do you have any suggestions, Tuvok?" Janeway asked. Eternity in this void was not a pleasing concept.

"Indeed I do, Captain. I suggest we generate an inverse karokian fluctuation pulse."

Janeway blinked. "You told me it was impossible."

"It was, Captain. As Q said, such a thing does not exist in the physical world. We are, however, no longer in the physical world."

"So what do we do?"

"We would need the resources of a ship."

Janeway frowned. "Have you ever melded with the ship's computer?"

"The ship's computer is not conscious. Melding with it would be illogical, Captain, even if it were possible."

"Then where are we going to get a ship?"

Seven spoke up. "We may no longer have access to Voyager, but we still have access to the Borg collective."

Janeway sighed. "Are you telling me that we have to commandeer a Borg cube to save reality?"

"Indeed, Captain."

Just great. That was the last thing Janeway needed. "Do we have any other options?"

"None," answered Tuvok.

"Then we do it."

Tuvok interrupted. "Captain, although the katra cannot die, it can be destroyed. We must be sure to proceed with caution."

Janeway nodded. "Noted."

Even now, when Seven was cut off from the Borg, they still existed in her mind. She had been part of them, and would always be. Every day, every moment, she fought them. It had become habit. Swiftly, she broke the habit, allowed her self to shift back into the familiar, almost comfortable mindset. The collective was real, tangible. She was Borg.

Janeway watched as Seven's normal outfit disintegrated, turning into the familiar Borg outfit. Her optical implant, most of which the Doctor had removed, was once again in place. And as Seven changed, so did the space around them. Instead of a blank void, it took on shape and color. Frightening shape and dismal color, but shape and color nonetheless.

Seven looked at the three, and walked away. Like the Borg she once again was, she didn't perceive the three to be a threat

"The Borg assimilate civilizations, not individuals," Janeway reminded her self, partly to keep her own fear in check.

"Granted," replied Tuvok. "However, once we begin to reconfigure their systems, they may perceive us as a sufficient threat to destroy."

Such was the bitter truth. "Agreed. How long will it take to generate the pulse?"

"Two hours at the most."

"Make it an hour," she commanded. "And even then we'll have to fight for time."

"Captain," Tuvok insisted, "I am not an engineer. I do not round up my estimates. It will take two hours to reconfigure the Borg systems."

Janeway looked at him. "Make it an hour, Mr. Tuvok."

The Vulcan realized persist would be illogical--he had lost. "I will endeavor to do so, Captain."

"Doctor, I want your help fending off the Borg."

"Captain, I must admit that my combat skills do not meet Starfleet regulations. I was not programmed to engage in hand-to-hand combat."

"I wasn't talking about fighting, Doctor. If I remember correctly, the Enterprise was able to place the Borg in a hibernation stage. I need you to be able to input a similar command on my mark. "

The Doctor said, "If I remember correctly, Captain, the Borg cube promptly exploded."

Janeway nodded. "The Borg should have adapted to such a command--I doubt they'll blow up this time. However, that means they'll have quicker reaction time. Compensate for both sides of the problem."

"Yes, Captain. May I inquire as to what you will be doing?"

Janeway pulled some type of power outlet right off the wall. Reconfiguring this thing into a weapon. Someone needs to stand guard."

Tuvok nodded at her initiative. "Captain, the Borg will expect these precautions--Seven knows us well enough to predict our actions."

"We'll just have to use something she doesn't know against her. Any ideas?"

"She was not present when I was briefed by Q," Tuvok answered. "She does not know the particular characteristics of the pulse or this void."

"And the characteristics are . . . ?" Janeway prompted.

"The rift spanned our concepts of space and time, Captain. Such are physical concepts, and they passed away with the physical world. If we seal the rift, the universe will revert to its earlier state."

Janeway caught on. "And we, as we are now, will cease to be--we will revert to our earlier state."

"Exactly."

Janeway considered this. "Damn."

"Captain?"

"That means we'll have to fight that Cazore ship all over again."

Tuvok had been working on the console for almost an hour when, suddenly, it started beeping. "They have detected my efforts, Captain," he said.

Janeway turned to the Doctor. "Now," she commanded, as Borg after Borg came down the corridor toward them, ready to fight.

The Doctor typed in a code. Suddenly, the Borg fell to the ground.

"How long will it last?" asked Janeway.

"Impossible to tell, Captain," the Doctor replied. "Anywhere between twenty and forty minutes."

"Tuvok?"

"I need approximately another half hour."

"I gave you an hour."

"And I told you it would take two, Captain. I am working as quickly as I can."

"Captain," shouted the Doctor, "the Borg are responding faster than I had anticipated."

"Try to stop them," commanded Janeway.

"I am, Captain," he said, his fingers flying over the console. Suddenly the Borg, turned around, and walked away to their alcoves to regenerate. The Doctor's fingers continued to fly over the console, and for about fifteen minutes the Borg continued to regenerate. Their slumber, unfortunately, was not to be eternal. It was only a matter of time until the Doctor called out, "I can't help it, Captain! They're starting to revive!"

"Very well," said Janeway, and picked up the weapon she had built. "It was going to come down to this sooner or later."

"And you knew it would be sooner," said a familiar, though frighteningly monotone, voice, "rather than later."

"Seven."

"Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix One. Your inaccuracy is excused. You are not yet Borg. You are, of course, Captain Kathryn Janeway, U.S.S. Voyager, NCC-74656."

"You predicted that I would order the Doctor to put the Borg asleep--that's why they reacted so fast."

"Yes. We gained all of her knowledge when she rejoined the Collective."

Janeway winced as she heard Seven refer to herself in the third person. "When you rejoined the collective, Seven."

The Borg didn't seem interested in fighting. "As you wish. I must correct the damage done to the console." The other Borg began to revive, but they didn't advance. They must have considered Seven able to conduct the repairs by her self.

Tuvok stood up from it. "I need a few more minutes."

Seven walked toward it. "I know what you have in mind. You will not succeed."

Janeway said, "It's necessary to restore reality, Seven. There's nothing to fight over."

"Reality is irrelevant. We are Borg."

Janeway sighed. She should have known better than to try to reason with the Borg. "I have to make sure that pulse goes off." She held up the weapon.

The Borg didn't budge. "You will not fire that weapon. You will be too worried about keeping my psyche for the return to reality."

Janeway smiled. She had been hoping for that response--sometimes, it was your opponent's ignorance that was the true bliss. "Don't bet on it," she said, and fired. An arc of energy shot out of the device toward Seven, but instead of hitting her, it hit the automatic shielding the Borg used whenever they adapted to a weapon's frequency.

Seven laughed. Janeway had never heard her laugh before, and she didn't like it. It was the terrible sound of the entire collective ridiculing her. "I was able to predict your order to the doctor, but I knew you would attempt actions that would be most unpredictable--and unorthodox. Therefore, I took the liberty of monitoring your conversation."

"Very clever, Seven."

"Stand back. Resistance is futile."

Janeway hesitated, but Seven didn't seem to mind. She simply grabbed the captain's shoulder and pulled her out of the way. As she did so, however, the Doctor came behind her and delivered a quick karate chop to her back. Seven dropped Janeway and blinked.

Tuvok, taking advantage of the Borg's surprise, rose from the console and used his Vulcan strength to throw Seven across the corridor. He then returned to his console and resumed working.

Janeway turned to the Doctor. "I thought you didn't know how to fight."

"I cannot fight well, Captain. Anyone can hit somebody when their back is turned."

Ignoring their banter, Seven pulled her self up off the floor as the other Borg exited their alcoves. They marched toward the three Starfleet officers.

Tuvok rose from his console at last, as it started beeping. "Pulse initiated," he said.

Janeway sighed.

Suddenly, the Borg cube faded, and Seven and the Doctor with it. Even Tuvok seemed misplaced in her thoughts. The cube, Seven, the Doctor, and all her memories of the adventure--suddenly, they all seemed extremely abstract, intangible. They had all been a dream. It had never happened.

Wesley watched in wonder as the tapestries reknit themselves. Against all odds, the Universe had survived, had bounced back against the devastating illness. Wesley felt the force being pushed back, the blackness receding. The Universe had won where the Traveler had failed.

Suddenly, the walled opened up in a flash of yellow light, and the Traveler stepped out. He nodded to Wesley.

"Remember what you have watched today," he said to Wesley. "It was an invaluable lesson. To us both."

Janeway sipped her steaming mug of coffee as she stared at the padd. She had to read the entire thing. It didn't tell her anything she didn't already know -- but ah, well. At least everything was going smoothly. The ship was in top condition, a somewhat rare occurrence for Voyager, being cut off from Starfleet and constantly in need of supplies.

Suddenly, the ship lurched.

She had her hand on the comm badge he had been having with Neelix. She nodded to him, and they made their before it beeped. "Janeway here," she said, cutting off Ensign Kim. "Red Alert. Commander Chakotay and I will be right there."

The familiar red-alert klaxon immediately filled the Mess Hall, and Janeway watched as Chakotay broke off the long-winded conversationway out of the Mess Hall, through the corridors, and into the turbolift.

"Bridge," she ordered.

Kim nodded to them as they stepped out of the turbolift. "Maybe you can negotiate with him," he told them, doubtfully. On the screen was an extremely fat alien.

Voyager's bridge lurched again.

This was getting nowhere fast, and Janeway had had enough. "End transmission. Fire at will, Tuvok."

The Vulcan nodded. "Firing phasers."

Janeway tapped her communicator. "Janeway to Engineering. B'Elanna, how long can we keep this up?"

Janeway heard B'Elanna's Klingon sigh. "I don't know, Captain. A few minutes at most. We've already been hit pretty hard."

"Shield structure at seventy-three percent, Captain," said Ensign Kim, as if to affirm B'Elanna's statement, "and losing integrity rapidly."

The ship in front of them fired again. "Captain, we've lost warp."

Janeway cursed to her self, silently. That was the last thing they needed.

Then the ship exploded. Arcs of energy burst through the hull, split it into half. The two halves flew into space, burning, even in the middle of space. Janeway stared at the sight on the viewscreen, trying to keep her mouth shut.

Her crew certainly didn't need the sight of the captain staring dumbfounded at a viewscreen with her jaw below her comm badge. Even when you are outnumbered, she thought, sometimes you just get lucky. She just didn't know how yet, but she was going to.

"Analysis?"

Both Tuvok and Seven had left their posts, and were assisting Ensign Kim with the scanners (more to satisfy their own curiosities than because he needed any help, she knew).

"The ship exploded, Captain," was all that Tuvok said.

"That much was obvious. What was the cause of the explosion?"

"Unknown, Captain. The obvious is all we have. The explosion was caused neither by them nor us."

Janeway hated these puzzles. "Then who did it?" she asked.

"I did it."

Janeway looked around to see the most nauseating man (if you could call him a man) she knew. Suddenly, she realized she had a headache.

"Q, why are you on my ship?" Janeway demanded to know. Then, thinking better of it, "Actually, I don't care. Just get off it."

Q ignored her. "Yes, I did it. It's relatively simple, especially for an omnipotent being. I could do it to Voyager in a matter of seconds."

Janeway sighed. Yes, she definitely had a headache. She would see the Doctor after this was resolved.

There was no reason not to believe that Q had made the ship explode; indeed, he probably did, as part of an elaborate prank. Janeway suspected his motives, not his methods.

"I did it out of gratitude, Captain," Q said, reading her thoughts (literally--he had a book in front of him entitled Janeway's Thoughts and he was perusing it with interest.). "As a thank-you gesture."

Q say thank you? Now Janeway knew it was a prank. "Thank you for what, Q?"

"If you don't know, you never will," said Q, with a smirk

If there was one thing Janeway didn't like, it was feeling like she was being duped by Q. They had been working on the puzzle of the exploding ship for two days, and they still hadn't solved it.

"There is no logical reason for the ship to have exploded, Captain," Tuvok said, as they discussed the matter in her ready room. "I believe that it is safe to say that Q did indeed cause the ship to explode."

Janeway nodded. She had come to the same conclusion her self. "The question is: Why?"

"Insufficient data, Captain."

Janeway sighed. The Doctor had give her four milligrams of neozine, and the headache still hadn't gone away. She knew it wouldn't until she stopped thinking about Q. "Well, we just have to be ready for Q to pull whatever prank he has in mind. Then we can see how it is related to the exploding ship."

Q pulled many pranks on the Voyager crew after that event, of course. But the crew never saw any relation to the exploding ship--an unexplained thank-you present from Q.

The end.