Ep 7: Eye Of The Needle
Production 107
Stardate: 48579.4
Airdate: 2/20/1995
Guest Stars: Vaughn Armstrong
(Telek), Tom Virtue (Baxter)
Written By: Hilary J. Bader
Directed By: Winrich Kolbe
Teleplay By: Bill Dial and
Jeri Taylor
Synopsis:
The discovery of a wormhole in
deep space raises the crew's hopes of finding a shortcut home.
When Ensign Kim finds a wormhole
that might lead to the Alpha Quadrant, the crew believes they may have
found a rapid route home. Although the opening to the tunnel in space proves
too small for Voyager to fly through, Janeway decides to launch a microprobe
into it to see what's on the other side.
To Kim's disappointment, the probe
gets stuck in a gravitational eddy before it makes it all the way through,
but he's surprised by readings indicating the probe is being scanned by
someone on the other side. Janeway suggests they transmit a message through
the probe, hoping it will be picked up by whoever is scanning it. Before
long, they receive a subspace response — from the Alpha Quadrant, 70,000
light years away!
In the meantime, Kes begins working
closely with the Doctor in Sickbay. She's surprised by how rudely Voyager's
staff treats him because he's "only a hologram." She asks the Captain if
the Doctor can be treated with the same respect as crewmembers. Janeway
agrees, and tells the Doctor he should begin thinking of himself as a member
of the crew. What's more, she's giving him control over his own deactivation
sequence, and his first taste of independence.
When Voyager finally succeeds in
achieving voice contact with the Alpha Quadrant ship, they are surprised
to find it's a Romulan vessel. The Romulan captain, a scientist named Telek,
is suspicious of the communication from a Starfleet vessel, thinking at
first that they must be Federation spies. But once they've established
a visual link and the two captains can communicate eye-to-eye, Telek becomes
more sympathetic to their plight, saying he'll consider relaying messages
to the crew's families back home.
Anxious to explore every avenue that
will facilitate getting home, Torres explains that she might be able to
"piggyback" a transporter beam onto the visual link, which theoretically
would allow the crew to beam to the Romulan ship in the Alpha Quadrant.
To test the theory, the Romulan captain allows himself to be transported
onto Voyager.
Regrettably, Tuvok discovers the
crew has actually beamed the Romulan from 20 years in the past, due to
a time rift in the wormhole. Knowing it's pointless to transport the crew
back in time because it would wreak havoc with the timeline of that era,
Janeway asks the Romulan to relay the crew's messages to their families
in 20 years. He agrees, and returns to his ship. Later, a database check
reveals that the Romulan died four years before he was able to deliver
the messages. Although disappointed, the crew presses forward.