Tom looked around the room and saw that the guard in front of him was not the only one with a phaser rifle trained on him; simply the closest.
"Put your hands on your head, or we will fire" the guard ordered.
Tom did as he was told. "What's going on?" he asked.
"Identify yourself," was the reply.
"Ensign Tom Paris, chief helmsman, USS Voyager," he said, confused.
His eyes were drawn to the door as it slid open. Kathryn entered, followed closely by Chakotay. And, he noticed, Chakotay was dressed in off-duty clothes, not a uniform, and his tattoo looked different, although he couldn't quite put his finger on it.
"Captain," Tom started. "What's happening here?"
"Do you see four pips anywhere on my uniform?" Kathryn questioned. Tom looked at her neck and saw only three pips, but that didn't say much as her hair partially obscured his vision. Then it dawned on him, her hair, like Chakotay's tattoo, looked different too. "How did you get a Starfleet uniform and commbadge?"
"What?"
"Commander, he says he's a member of this crew," the guard told Kathryn.
"Commander?" Tom said in disbelief.
Kathryn eyed him suspiciously, not believing him and ignoring his comment. "Now who are you?"
"Run that one by me again?" Tom asked incredulously.
"Who are you?"
"Commander," Tom turned to Chakotay, "I'm really sorry about the toothpaste, I never would have done that if I'd have kno..."
Kathryn was glaring at him, never a good sign, and so he shut up again.
Kathryn turned to Chakotay. "Take him to the sickbay, have him checked out. Then confine him to the brig."
"Aye, Commander," Chakotay said.
Tom felt a sharp tap in his back and guessed he had been prodded with the butt of a phaser rifle to get him to move. He stepped forward.
"I am a member of this crew," Tom repeated as he was pushed into sickbay and forced roughly onto a bio-bed.
The Doctor approached. "10ccs of Citrazone," he called out. "That should calm him down, and hopefully sedate him," he explained to Chakotay.
Tom looked up at him, still thrashing wildly, as the hologram injected the drug into his neck to sedate him.
"I want to speak to Commander Tuvok." He was hoping the stoic Vulcan would provide him with some answers.
"You mean Captain Tuvok," Chakotay said.
"What?" Tom exclaimed, trying to break free, but feeling himself slowly going under.
There was no reply, and the last thing Tom saw before he passed out was a small blonde girl, with pointed ears and elfin features, talking to the Doctor. It was undeniably Kes.
Consciousness came slowly for Tom. He opened his eyes. He was in the brig – he'd know those walls anywhere, they were marked indelibly in his mind ever since his 30-day confinement about a year ago. It had been all there was to look at.
He rose slowly and walked to the forcefield. He touched it with the corner of a pillow and it shone blue with energy and fizzled. "I want to talk to somebody!" he yelled. The guard, a tall dark man he didn't recognise, ignored him. "Please, let me talk to someone."
Tom kicked the wall beside him in an attempt to attract the guard's attention, but all he succeeded in doing was hurting his toe.
What Tom didn't realise was that the guard had informed the Doctor of his condition as soon as he woke.
Suddenly the doors to the brig slid open and Kathryn Janeway walked in. She was followed by the same girl as Tom had seen in sickbay walked in. It was Kes. He was confused. People didn't know him, there were some crewmen he didn't recognise, like the guard in the brig, ranks were different, clothes were different, and Kes was still here.
Kes. Tom had missed the young Ocampan very much when she had left, she had been a friend to him ever since she had met him, one of his only friends on Voyager for the first few months, and he had always appreciated that, and had a strong affection for her. "Kes?" Tom said incredulously.
"You know me?" the elfin girl asked.
"Of course. You don't know me?"
Kes cocked her head slightly.
Kathryn looked down at a padd she held, and then she spoke. "Thomas Eugene Paris – son of Admiral Owen Paris, dishonourable discharge from Starfleet, New Zealand Penitentiary, charged with murder. I ran your name through the ship's database; this is what it came up with. How did you get here?"
"How did I, what? What's going on here."
"When you beamed aboard you were wearing a Starfleet uniform and communicator. Where did you obtain them?"
"You, here, this ship. I beamed down to the planet on an away mission with you, the one we were orbiting, this morning, a few hours ago."
"What are you talking about, you have never been here."
Tom's eyes widened. "Five years ago you came to me in New Zealand and asked me to go with you to find Chakotay's Maquis ship in the Badlands because you're security chief and friend was on that ship as a spy. I said yes, I went with you, and helped you find it; Voyager got stranded here in the Delta Quadrant. So unless the past 5 years have been some wacky, wacky dream, I am a member of Voyager's crew."
Kathryn regarded him strangely; this stranger was not making any sense.
"I went to you five years ago, you gave us information that helped, admittedly, but you refused my offer."
"I did?"
"In fact, you were very cocky."
"I was."
Kathryn looked down once again at the padd. "The Doctor's scans confirm you are who you say you are, according to Starfleet's medical records," she said.
"Can I see Lieutenant Torres?" Tom asked, hoping that maybe she could come and explain what had happened.
"B'Elanna Torres?" Kathryn asked.
"Yes," Tom confirmed quickly, relieved something seemed familiar.
"B'Elanna's not in Starfleet, she's an engineer. She's attending to more important matters at the moment," Kes informed him softly, always caring. Tom's heart sank, it wasn't familiar after all.
"Don't you have any explanation for why you're here?" Kathryn asked.
"God, no!" Tom exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air. "Captain!" He forced his voice to a normal volume. "I mean Commander. This doesn't make any sense. I know you. I belong here!" He turned to Kes. "You don't."
"Excuse me," Kathryn said, shocked.
"2 years ago, you evolved to a higher state of consciousness and reality, you were forced to leave us, you threw us 10 000 light years closer to home, beyond Borg space." He turned to Kathryn again. "Closer to Mark."
"What?" Kathryn asked.
"The man you we're engaged to marry when we left Earth."
Kathryn stared at him. Not many people back on Earth had known they were engaged – together, certainly – but engaged, it had been a recent development in their relationship, and Tom Paris should certainly not have known.
Continued in Part 4