The Feather is Mightier
Disclaimers:
Firstly, this is a Xena/Voyager/VJB crossover spoof so if that ain't
This story involves romance, love and all that good stuff between women, so if love is illegal where you live you'd better find someplace better to live before reading this.
Xena and Voyager
don’t belong to me, and I’m not making a cent out of
Feedback: is welcome at [email protected]
Oh yeah. All characters (including the fish) are fictional and any resemblances to real people are purely intentional. *grin*
****
Part 2
After three trips around the ship, one shouting
match with the computer and numerous futile attempts at communicating with
Janeway through the comm badge, B’Elanna concluded that the Captain was
nowhere to be found. And neither was
Seven. It was also logical to
conclude, therefore (as Tuvok had pointed out), that the two had disappeared
together. B’Elanna wondered why
she suddenly experienced a strange twinge of something that felt suspiciously
like jealousy.
By now, all the senior officers were aware of
Janeway and Seven’s disappearance. They
were all seated around the conference table, wondering what to do next.
B’Elanna had told them of her scroll, but some were still extremely
skeptical of her story.
“This is not logical.”
Tuvok stated for the fifth time.
“No, it isn’t,” B’Elanna agreed.
“But what else is there? You’ve
seen what the scroll can do.” She
motioned at Tom’s green and spotty face.
“Well, you could have murdered both Seven and
the Captain in a jealous rage, threw them out of the airlock, and turned Tom’s
face green and spotty just for the fun of it,”
Chakotay said, thoughtfully.
“Waitaminute, what do you mean by ‘jealous
rage’?” B’Elanna scowled.
Further questioning on her part was forestalled
by Tuvok.
“Commander, I would like to point out that your
reasoning is as, if not more, illogical as that of Lieutenant Torres.”
Chakotay fell silent and decided not to talk
anymore, which made him seem ever more slightly wooden.
“Well, whatever the reason is, we still have to
find Seven and the Captain.” B’elanna
said, rising from the table. “I’ve
had enough talking, you can choose to believe me or not – but I’m going to
find some answers instead of sitting and squabbling all day.”
The half-Klingon left the room and a short
silence descended.
“I do not ‘squabble’.”
Everyone looked at Tuvok.
Tom smirked annoyingly at him.
“I do not ‘squabble’.”
Said in the same monotone, but slightly louder.
There was also a decidedly dangerous glint in his eye and nobody dared
dispute his squabbability any further.
****
Q was sitting on her motorcycle when five very flustered looking borg drones whooshed past her in small cube.
She whistled for them to come back.
The little cube reversed and screeched to a stop before her.
“Did the little half-Klingon scare the big bad borgypoos?” she teased.
“We are Borg. We fear nothing!”
“Yeah,” agreed Two of Five.
“We fight with the heart of a lion!”
The other four drones looked a little confused at why One of Five used this particular analogy, but were sure that there was a reason for that line.
“And you run with the feet of a chicken!”
Again, the drones wondered why they felt insulted by it (apart from the fact that Borg in general feel that the Gallus Domesticus is one feathered species that is unworthy of assimilation).
“Now, go back to Voyager,” Q ordered.
“Yes Ma’am.”
The little cube spun around like a top for a few minutes as the drones tried to decide which side was the front before flying back towards Voyager in a rush.
Q sighed and rolled her eyes. “Drones.”
****
B’Elanna sat in the mess hall feeling rather sorry for herself. She had tried for hours to find information about magic scrolls on the database and had come up with absolutely nothing. She sighed and wondered how Seven was faring. Then she wondered if Janeway was with Seven. Suddenly, she began to worry what the abundance of fish might do to Seven… fish was an aphrodisiac to the Borg, wasn’t it? She was sure it was. What if Seven… and Janeway… Kahless. She couldn’t finish the thought. Then an even worse thought struck her: Seven was stuck somewhere, with nothing but fish and Captain Janeway… and the Captain had no coffee! What would a coffee-deprived Janeway be capable of? The more B’Elanna thought about the situation, the bleaker it became.
“Hello B’Elanna,” it was Neelix approaching with a plate of food, “Don’t look so glum… I’m sure you’ll figure something out.”
Tuvok, Tom and Chakotay also joined them and B’Elanna assumed that they had finished squabbling.
“Did you find anything Lieutenant?” asked Tuvok.
“Nope.”
“Hey B’Elanna, how about writing this food into something edible?” Tom joked.
“Hmm, yeah,” B’Elanna agreed, “Any greener and it’d resemble your face.”
Neelix, who had been greatly hurt by Tom’s insensitive comment, chuckled at this. Tom’s face flushed an odd looking purple, which clashed badly with the spots that were still green.
“Lieutenant, changing the food would be a convenient way of proving to me that this scroll is magical,” Tuvok said tactfully. He too had no great wish to taste Neelix’s latest culinary delight.
“Good idea,” B’Elanna agreed, trying not to sound too eager.
She looked at the greenish sludge that would resemble Tom’s face except that it had fluorescent yellow splotches on the outer edges. Leaves of a strange vegetable, native to the Delta Quadrant, were immersed in the sludge and looked only slightly better than the sludge itself. It would take something short of a miracle to turn it all into something tasty, and B’Elanna decided that if the scroll could do it, she would be able to convince Tuvok and every other person in the mess hall of its powers.
Right.
/The food that Neelix cooked became irresistibly good to eat./
No sooner was it written than everybody grabbed servings of the sludge and began cramming it into their mouths.
“Urrgghhkkkk!”
“Yaarrggghh!”
“Ummmmffffggghh!”
Unfortunately, the scroll had not changed the taste of the sludge – only its appeal. People couldn’t get enough of it and it tasted terrible. The overwhelming urge to stuff your mouth with it did not abate until all of it was gone, and by then almost everyone in the mess hall had passed out from the horror of it all.
B’Elanna, who had been cursed with a more resilient Klingon stomach, was one of the unlucky people still conscious, and she was unfortunate enough to still be aware of the aftertaste in her mouth. Fighting the urge to throw up, she stumbled over to a replicator and began gurgling cold water. She felt minutely better.
Tuvok (who felt it was beneath a Vulcan to gurgle) had to draw upon all the willpower he had left to endure the aftertaste and not run to a replicator.
“Lieutenant,” he managed with difficulty, “I would advise you to be… more careful with… the wording in… future.”
He promptly fainted.
Two hours later, most of those who had passed out were awake again and there was a long line behind every replicator in the vicinity. A plethora of glares and disgruntled mutterings found their way towards the Chief Engineer of Voyager.
“Good one,” Tom had woken up and was now next to B’Elanna again, much to her annoyance. “This couldn’t get any worse.”
“Well, this wasn’t supposed to happen,” the half-Klingon said defensively.
Suddenly the five borg drones appeared in the centre of the mess hall, causing people to scramble out of the way in fright.
“It got worse.” Tom mumbled.
“We—are Borg,” stated One of Five proudly, “We will…”
B’Elanna hurriedly wrote something on her scroll.
“…go west.”
The other borg drones looked at One of Five in confusion.
“Yes,” he said, more sure of himself, “We will go west.”
The Borg disappeared as quickly as they had appeared and the crew breathed a sigh of relief.
“Lieutenant Torres, I believe they are heading straight for Earth.”
“Shit!” B’Elanna swore. “Okay… minor setback.”
She wrote on the scroll again:
/They turned East./
****
Somewhere in the Alpha Quadrant, One of Five suddenly had a hankering to turn East.
****
“B’Elanna, now they’re headed our way again.” Harry Kim spoke up.
B’Elanna set her quill to scroll once more.
“Um… ‘the borg drones disappeared from the galaxy!’”
****
Somewhere, One of Five had another sudden and startling inspiration to change direction.
“We will… leave this galaxy, and become the first drones to assimilate on an intergalactic scale!”
****
B’Elanna groaned and quickly thought up a temporary solution:
/The borg drones went to some caves on an uninhabited planet and fell into a deep sleep./
****
“Wait! To the caves! We must regenerate.”
The other drones did not question One of Five’s decision. Nor did they ask him just how they would regenerate in the caves of an uninhabited planet as there were obviously no alcoves there. They were all used to his highly erratic behavior by now.
****
“Good save,” Tom smirked that annoying smirk of his again. “So… what are you going to write now?”
B’Elanna glared at him. “I am not writing another word. We’re just going to have to find Seven and the Captain without the scroll.”
“And how are we going to do that?”
“Nearest fishing spot. Seven will be there, and probably Janeway too.”
Harry ran a scan for all the nearby fishing spots and came up with a total of 53 planets, each of which had an average of 45000 places where you could fish.
“F***!”
B’Elanna looked confused. “F***? Why am I saying a beep instead of f***? F***!!”
“Because the author only put a PG rating on this story,” an unnamed ensign piped up helpfully.
“Oh.” A blink. “Well f***.”
The senior officers decided that the mess hall wasn’t the best place to be standing around and swearing as they were gathering quite an audience, so they retreated to the conference room.
“There are too many possibilities where Seven and Captain Janeway could be,” B’Elanna decided. “I’m going to have to use the scroll.”
Chakotay snapped out of the trance he had been in for the last hour or two… or six (nobody knew the exact time – his face had the same expression whether he was in a trance or not).
“Now hold on a minute, Lieutenant. I’m the highest ranking officer here; don’t you think I should make this decision?”
“No.”
“Well, okay then.” The Commander fell silent again.
Tuvok raised his eyebrow again but did not comment.
Surprisingly
it was Tom who gave B’Elanna some sound advice.
“Well-- maybe it's too vivid. Maybe
it needs a little work-- editing, or something, you know?”
The half-Klingon snapped her fingers. “That’s it… I just have to be more careful about what I write,” she said, “I can bring them back – I just have to phrase it correctly.”
B’elanna thought for a moment, and then carefully wrote: /The cause of what has happened…/
She paused.
/…became apparent./
A distant yelling could be heard and the Doctor materialized a few feet above the conference table and fell onto it. /Splat!/
“Ow! … Wait, I’m not supposed to be able to feel things.”
The Doctor poked himself. “Ow.”
Poke.
“Ow.”
Poke.
“Ow.”
He happily prodded himself in the guts a few more times, amazed with the novelty of being able to feel.
“Uh… okay.” B’Elanna said. “I’m guessing the Doctor appeared because he’s the one who taught me how to write.”
“Try again, but phrase it differently this time,” Chakotay said.
“Hmm, okay, I’ve got it.”
/The force that enchanted this scroll lost its powers./
Another distant yelling sound could be heard, but this time it was distinctly female.
“Aaaahhhhh!!!” …. /Thwock./
Q had fallen onto the conference table and moments later, a motorbike clanged onto the table next to her, narrowly missing the Doctor.
A short silence ensued until the newcomer laid eyes on the dented bike lying on its side next to her.
“F***!” the until-recently-omnipotent being exclaimed.