#1: The Folly of One's Youth (Star
Trek/CS crossover - complete)
Author: Liss, Location: RichmondPosted: Mon Mar 26, 2007
2:12 pm — I
actually started this years ago and it's bopping about in the archive, but I had
a rethink as to its eventual direction and decided to just finish it.
======================================
Kathryn Janeway had
fallen in love with Jack Maynard when she was eleven years old. He was tall,
blond and handsome, with an enormous sense of fun. He had cheerfully helped her
play pranks on her friends, and she, in turn, had adored him. Admittedly, he was
too old for her (at the moment, anyway) but time, Kathryn knew, would solve that
problem soon enough. She made excuses to spend as much time in his company as
possible, and even, on one occasion, faked a broken leg in an attempt to get in
the San. Her plan had backfired, however, and she had been left in the tender
clutches of Matey, who had shown very little sympathy for the young girl.
Her heart had been broken, quite suddenly, when she saw Jack talking to
Joey Bettany, an Old Girl of the school. Joey was good enough fun, though
Kathryn found her a little bossy, and her dignity had been sorely offended by
being called a ‘good kid’, as Joey had done. But that morning, loitering in the
corridor the better to catch a glimpse of her idol, Kathryn had seen Jack take
Joey’s hand, and smile at her, and bend his head to murmur a few words in her
ear. In that moment, with a sudden intuition, Kathryn had known that her love
was unrequited. She had never seen Jack Maynard again.
…
Captain
Janeway was miffed. She had just discovered that she was out of coffee, and
though her immortal soul tempted her to abuse her position and exceed her
replicator rations for the month, she held firm, and was thus reduced to what
passed for coffee in the mess. She had headed for the bridge, only to be
informed by a surprised-looking Ensign Kim that she was off-duty for the
morning. Cursing herself for not checking the duty roster more carefully, an
action that would have resulted in considerably more time in bed, Janeway had
returned to her quarters and was now trying to find a way to pass the time.
She spent the best part of an hour tidying up, and then, in desperation,
resorted tidying all the places that couldn’t be seen and were thus usually
ignored. In due course, she started investigating under her bed. She discovered
a uniform top that she had thought lost on an alien planet, two padds, and a
small box. Pulling it out, Janeway looked at it, confused. Where had that come
from? Then she remembered – her mother had given the box to her on the day
Janeway had left on her first – and so far, only – mission on Voyager. Mrs
Janeway had been clearing out the attic, she had said, and found the box. It was
full of Kathryn’s games and books from her childhood, and so Mrs Janeway had
decided it might as well clutter up her daughter’s life as her own. With
subsequent events, Janeway had shoved the box under her bed and forgotten about
it.
Suddenly feeling teary at the thought of her mother, so far away,
Janeway opened the box. It was full of the ephemera of childhood – a few books,
a doll that had seen better days, three old-fashioned exercise books filled with
scribblings and an old padd that had served as a diary. There were hair ribbons,
a pin from her first school dance and an old pair of sunglasses. In the bottom,
tucked under an old paper flyer advertising the Jefferson Elementary School’s
annual play, was a program disk. There was no label identifying the disk – it
could have been anything. Janeway racked her brains, but couldn’t think what it
might contain. Then she remembered – it was a holodisk. Forty years ago, when
holodecks were still a novelty, programs would be stored on these disks and then
inserted into municipal holodecks. Sitting back on her heels, Janeway held up
the disk.
“Now, what are you?” she asked.
…
Outside the
doors of Holodeck 2, Captain Kathryn Janeway turned to her companion.
“I
can't guarantee what this is going to be,” she said with a grin. “You could be
in danger of entering a teenage girl's favourite Heathcliff romance!” Chakotay
returned the smile.
“I'm sure I can handle it,” he replied. “Shall we,
Captain?” With an incline of her head, Janeway stepped forward, and addressed
the computer.
“Open programme Janeway-oh-one-seven,” she said, then
glanced at Chakotay. “Are you ready, Commander?”
“Always,” he said.
“Open doors.” The holodeck doors swooshed open, and Captain and Commander
entered, not a little trepidatiously. They found themselves on a lushly grassed
plateau, with bountiful profusions of colourful wildflowers. Behind them soared
majestic craggy mountains with heavy snow visible above the treeline. In the
bottom of the valley glistened a sapphire jewel of a lake, with buildings
clustered around the shoreline at several points.
“This is beautiful,”
murmured Chakotay appreciatively, breathing in the alpine air. “No Heathcliff
fantasy here!”
“I'd forgotten this,” said Janeway, turning in a circle
to inspect her surroundings. Her tone was almost surprised. “I loved this
programme when I was a girl.”
“What is it?” asked Chakotay, as he
gestured towards a narrow path. “Shall we?” Janeway started down the path, then
stopped. She cast a rueful glance at their uniforms.
“We're hardly
suitably dressed for the 1930s,” she said. “Let's go back, and I'll tell you
about it.”
…
Walking back towards the holodecks twenty minutes
later, Janeway explained the programme to her second in command. “It was one of
a series of children’s holodeck programmes from classical fiction from the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries,” she said. “This one was based on a series
of books about the Chalet School, set in Austria in the 1920s and 30s. I used to
play in it all the time when I was a girl, but I stopped when I was about eleven
or so – I can’t remember why now.”
“What’s the set-up?” asked Chakotay,
as they reached the holodeck doors and stepped through. Janeway shrugged, a
mischievous look in her eyes as she glanced up at him.
“We-e-ell,” she
drawled, “when I last came here, I was a pupil at the girls’ boarding school
down there,” and she pointed towards the lake, “but I’m not sure if you’ll
pass!” Chakotay raised an eyebrow, and she laughed. “I’ll check the settings,”
she promised, but a call for controls resulted in nothing. Both Janeway and
Chakotay adopted the look well-known to all Federation personnel as the
crap-the-holodecks-have-taken-over-the-ship look, only for Janeway to suddenly
slap a hand to her forehead. “Of course! I forgot! There aren’t any controls for
this – you just… well, see where it takes you. Come on!” She set off down the
path and Chakotay, still not quite recovered from the fear that mountain goats
may at any moment attempt to take control of Voyager, followed her.
They
had not progressed far when they found themselves face to face with a group of
school girls, all clad in brown gymslips with cream blouses and crimson ties.
They were led by a rather stern-looking lady in a smart tweed suit, with
chestnut hair swept neatly up under her hat. Towards the back was another adult,
though this one appeared little older than the girls, and was certainly not so
smart in appearance, as her hair was leaning perilously to one side, and she had
managed to rip her skirt.
“Gruss Gott,” said the woman at the front,
inclining her head politely.
“Gruss Gott,” replied Janeway, the
salutation familiar on her lips. She felt a pang of loss for her childhood – how
long had she played in this programme? She recognised the teacher now – Miss
Wilson, fearsomely sarcastic, especially with young Kathryn, the new girl who
had thought herself a regular know-it-all at Science, but whose knowledge was so
far in advance of her teacher’s as to make it useless. And the girl at the back
was Joey Bettany, with her perennial untidiness. Glancing through the ranks of
the schoolgirls, Janeway thought she recognised some of them, even now: red hair
and a saintly expression had to be Elizabeth… Elizabeth… Arnold? Arnett?
Something like that. And if Elizabeth was there, then… yep, there was Betty.
Small and dark, her expression was lively and curious at the moment, but Janeway
knew very well how quickly that could change. At Miss Wilson’s elbow was Biddy
O’Ryan, the most absurdly Irish girl Janeway had ever met, real or imaginary. It
was odd to see them, really; odd to see them looking so young, though hardly
surprising, for they couldn’t be more than thirteen or so. But to Kathryn
Janeway, who had just managed to scrape into the Lower Second, hampered by
knowing no other language than her own, they had been vastly more senior. Now
here they were, just little girls.
She and Chakotay stood to one side as
the girls passed with their escorts, and they were about to continue down the
little path, when a shout could be heard, and everyone turned, looking for its
source. Along a separate path that ran the other way along the plateau, a man
came running. He was dressed casually in the wide-legged trousers of the period,
shirt and a sleeveless jumper. Janeway smiled, unable to help herself, as she
recognised the idol of her youth.
“And there,” she murmured to Chakotay,
“you see the love of my childhood. Dr Jack Maynard – certainly the most dashing
doctor I have ever known.”
“Don’t let the Doctor hear you say that,”
replied Chakotay with a smile, watching the newcomer. Janeway returned the smile
absently as she took in her first true love’s appearance.
He was young.
Far younger than she had imagined. Thinking about it earlier that day, she had
supposed him to be in his thirties or forties, but Jack Maynard was younger than
that. Younger than Janeway herself, younger than Chakotay. Probably younger even
than Tom Paris. He was still attractive, if not handsome: tall, well-built, with
fair hair and blue eyes. He exchanged playful greetings with Miss Wilson and the
girls, but Janeway could see how all his attention was focused on Joey Bettany,
who did not seem to notice. Just for a moment, she felt an echo of the stabbing
in the heart she had experienced as a child, the horrible dreadful certainty
that Jack was not ever going to fall in love with her, and the unpleasant
humiliation of realising it was, after all, just a story, and she was being
inutterably stupid.
The school party moved on, and it took Chakotay’s
hand on her arm, for Janeway to return to reality – or as much reality as one
can summon in the midst of a holodeck programme.
“Are you all right?” he
asked, dark eyes concerned, and Janeway smiled at him.
“Merely reliving
the folly of my youth,” she said drily, then led the way down to the path to
show him the lake.
…
Janeway never shared the Chalet School
holodeck programme with the rest of the crew. It was too childish, she told
herself, too detached from anything any of them knew to be enjoyable. School
girls and shepherds, cups of hot milk and snowball fights, hockey matches and
summer rambles – it went beyond fantasy. But really she just couldn’t stand the
thought of anyone walking over her childhood.
#2:
Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, KentPosted: Mon Mar 26, 2007
2:21 pm — Awwwww,
and I wanted her to seduce Jack!
Thanks Liss.
#3:
Author: Elbee, Location: SurreyPosted: Mon Mar 26, 2007
5:52 pm — The
Chalet School as a holodeck program - perfect
Do you
think a Klingon could get away with joining the school
#4: Author: Fiona
Mc, Location:
Bendigo, AustraliaPosted: Mon Mar 26, 2007
8:33 pm — Being
the closet trekkie that I am I really enjoyed this
#6:
Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, WorcestershirePosted: Mon Mar 26, 2007
9:57 pm — I'm not
a Trekkie at all, but I loved that little glimpse of the school, and Janeway's
feelings about the fantasy that had been so important to her youth were very
poignant.
#7: Author: Carolyn
P, Location:
Lancaster, EnglandPosted: Mon Mar 26, 2007
10:02 pm — Love the
lines about the holodeck taking over!
#8:
Author: francesn, Location: away with the faeriesPosted: Wed Mar 28, 2007
4:43 pm — Oh
fantastic. I wanted her to get stuck.....
Thanks Liss
#9:
Author: alicat, Location: WiltshirePosted: Thu Mar 29, 2007
10:32 am — Fantastic!
Beam me up Scotty!
If only it were so
easy to get there......
#10:
Author: Alice, Location: London, EnglandPosted: Sun Apr 01, 2007
8:40 pm — That was
great, thanks Liss. There's so much you could do with a holodeck...
Janeway and Jack. The mind really, truly boggles....... H'mm.
It'd be funny to do a Spirit Folk send
up and transport Joey and Co from the 'deck to the Bridge.
Ha.
Janeway/Jack and Joey/Chakotay. The J/Cers wouldn't even need to change the
initials...*cackling*
Seriously, Liss, this was inspired.
#12:
Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UKPosted: Fri Apr 27, 2007
12:14 pm — Being
that I love both the CS and Voyager it was great to read a crossover of the two.
But she should have seduced Jack. Thanks Liss!