STAR TREK VOYAGER: WHERE NO NOSE HAS GONE BEFORE
 by Liarliar

PART ONE

         "Captain, we are approaching an unknown vessel.  The ship wishes to
transmit under priority code alpha five.  Shall we respond?"  Tuvok's
emotionless Vulcan voice emitted through Captain Janeway's
communicator.  "All right Tuvok, I'll be on the bridge in a moment.
Call Seven as well.  If the unknown ship turns out to be Borg, we may
need her to reason with them.  Janeway, out."

        As Captain Janeway made her way down the corridors of Voyager, she
thought hard about their present situation.  Voyager had been damaged
badly in their latest battle with a rogue fleet of Klingon warriors,
and the ship badly needed repairs.  She had steered Voyager into this
unknown quadrant of space in the hopes of finding a technologically
advanced race that could aid them in repairs.  If this mysterious ship
was friendly, perhaps they were in luck.

        "Captain, why was I summoned to the bridge?" Janeway turned to see
Seven, already present in the command center of Voyager.  "I believed
my duties to be in engineering repairing the damaged warp core."
"Right now we need you up here, Seven.  We have encountered a
mysterious ship, and if they turn out to be Borg, we may need you to
communicate with them."  Seven gave her an emotionless stare and began
to activate the communication system.  "Now let's see who or what
we're dealing with here," said Janeway as the transmission began to
appear on the view screen.

        The face on the screen was like no other they had ever encountered.
The being had no hair, huge pointed ears, a thick ridge running over
its eyes, and an absolutely huge nose.  "Greetings, crew of Voyager.
We are an alien race known as the Quid, and this is our area of the
galaxy.  Before you say anything, know that my people are genetically
unable to tell a lie, for in this quadrant, there are no secrets and
no ill feelings.  To ensure that you comply with our laws of truth, we
desire that you choose one of your crew to be a spokesperson for all
of you, and we will only communicate with this person.  Who among you
will represent Voyager?"

        All eyes on the bridge turned to Janeway.  "Very well, then, I will
represent Voyager."  The Quid alien smiled in approval.  "Then we will
speak to you, and you alone.  There is, however, one precaution we
must take.  We have developed a genetic lie-detection system to ensure
that beings we encounter are telling us the truth.  Will you agree to
be subjected to this system?"

        Tuvok leaned over to Janeway.  "Captain, this is unwise.  We do not
know what this process involves, or even if they will help us at all.
I must ask you to reconsider."  "It's all right, Tuvok.  Once I
undergo this lie-detection process, we will get all the answers we
need.  After all, they can't lie, can they?" Janeway added with a
smile.

        Suddenly, a small vial of fluid appeared on the console in front of
Janeway.  "Inject yourself with this, and the lie-detection process
will be adopted into your body."  Janeway injected herself, wincing at
the feel of the needle.  "Good.  Now we can talk freely, " the Quid
alien added.  "What do you need in our quadrant?"  "Our ship is badly
damaged, and we need supplies for repairs.  We thought you might be
able to help."  A smile crept across the alien's lips.  "Oh, yes, we
will begin beaming supplies aboard within the hour.  There is one last
thing we must have you do, though.  We need to ensure the serum has
done it's work, and successfully activated the genetic lie-detection
system in your body.  Please say something untrue, so we may see if it
worked correctly."

        Janeway thought this was very strange, but complied.  "Very well
then...something untrue...how about 'my eyes are red'?"  As soon as
the words escaped Janeways lips, she felt a tingle in the tip of her
nose.  Reaching up to scratch it, she found that her fingers touched
her nose sooner than they should have.  Something was definitely wrong.
She quickly glanced around the bridge looking for a mirror, only to be
met by strange looks from her crew.  "Tuvok!  I need a mirror.
Something is..." she stopped short as she caught her reflection in a
blank television monitor.

        Her nose had grown outward an extra inch!  Janeway grasped it in her
hand to make sure it was real, and her fingers met with solid skin.
Her nose was a total of two inches long, from her upper lip to the
tip.  The gentle slope of her nose descended downwards until the very
tip, where the extra growth had occurred.

        After getting over her shock, she turned back to the Quid alien.  "I
must confess that I didn't see this one coming," she said
sarcastically, gesturing to her nose.  "That is the lie-detection
formula at work.  Every time you tell an untrue statement, your nose
will grow longer, so I advise you to watch what you say until our
business is done.  We will contact you soon to see how your repairs
are coming."  With that, the screen went blank.

        "Wow!  Did you see that, Seven?" Tom Paris asked, smiling slightly.
"I guess Captain Janeway NOSE what she's doing!"   Seven looked at him
coldly.  "Mr.Paris, all that has transpired here is that the Captain's
nasal area and reach has increased due to the injection of alien
nanoprobes into her bloodstream.  I find no amusement in either her
situation of your attempt at humor."

        "I don't find much humor in it myself," said Janeway, still feeling
her nose as she approached their console.  "I forgot to ask the Quid
if this was permanent or not.  Normally I'm not the vain type, but
this is just a bit too much.  If this is an ordinary repair procedure,
then I'm president of Starfleet command."  The tingling feeling
returned to her nose, and she suddenly realized what she had said.
"No!  I'm not--"  but it was too late to take back her statement.  She
watched as her nose began to extend further outward, much to her
dismay.  The growth took only a few seconds, but it had added another
inch and a half to Janeway's nose, for a total nose length of three
and a half inches.  "Oh...oh my..." Janeway stammered as she felt her
nose, shocked at the length of it.  "I have a feeling this is going to
be a long, long repair session," she said tartly.

PART TWO

        "Ouch!!" Janeway awoke in bed with a start as her face flinched
sharply in pain.  Sitting up, she realized that she had rolled over on
her nose in her sleep.  Groggily, she sat up in bed and looked in the
bedside mirror, stroking her aching nose and trying to reduce the
pain.  "Lord, I look ridiculous," she mumbled wearily, examining her
long nose in the mirror.

        Janeway rarely thought of her physical appearance, but there was no
way around this...she was embarrassed by her new nose.  A few
accidental slips of the truth the previous night, however harmless,
had added two more inches to her already elongated nose.  It now
stretched five and a half inches, or so she had estimated.  She
gingerly held a ruler along the length of her nose, and the
measurements confirmed her estimates.  Sighing, she attempted to make
herself as presentable as possible for her next transmission to the
Quid aliens.  The supplies they had beamed aboard Voyager were
helping, but the repairs were going slowly, and she was very tired of
being their contact, and suffering under their lie-detector formula.
She applied her makeup as carefully as possible, trying to work around
her nose, but bumping into it every now and then and having to correct
mistakes.  Finally, she decided to check up on engineering to see how
the repairs were going.

        When she arrived, B'Elanna Torres was clearly upset about something.
"Captain Janeway!  We seem to be losing a great deal of power in the
warp core.  At first it wasn't noticeable, but now our power levels
are lower than ever!  It's like something is sucking out our power, no
matter how many repairs we make!"  Janeway immediately contacted Tuvok
to run a complete outer shell scan of Voyager to see if anything was
attached to the ship.  Sure enough, there was a cable running from the
Quid ship to Voyager, draining their power.

        "So that's what they're up to!" Janeway thought.  "The repairs were
just a diversion so they could drain our energy.  They're probably
stranded here, and need our power core energy for their ship!  We have
to pull out of here!"  Torres shook her head.  "We'll need at least
fifteen minutes to cut their cable and power up the warp engine, and
the Quid are demanding that you speak with them right now!"  Janeway
thought about the situation.  "If I can keep them busy for a fifteen
minutes, can you and Tom sever the Quid's energy cable and get us out
of here?"  Torres agreed, and Janeway went to the bridge to transmit
to the Quid ship.

        "You are late for transmission!" the Quid yelled angrily.  "What is
your reason?" Janeway glanced at the time on the control panel.  She
needed to hold his attention for fifteen minutes.  "I...I was
repairing a broken circuit on the holodeck."  She once again felt the
tingling in her nose, and watched as it shot forward another inch.
"Your nose does not seem to agree with you, Captain Janeway.  Now tell
me the truth!"                  Janeway thought hard.  "I was in sickbay...and the
Doctor needed a sample of Borg nanoprobes...so I told Seven to report
for a skin tissue sample...and then the lights went out on deck
nine...and..." Suddenly, the itching in her nose became unbearable,
and her whole body shuddered.  With both hands rapidly scratching her
nose, she felt the skin beneath her fingers stretch as her nose shot
out even further.  In the reflection of a blank view screen, she
watched as her nose expended a full foot and a half in length, now
almost two feet long in total.

        "So, you think you can just say whatever comes to mind, eh Captain?
Well let me ask you this...have you scanned the outside of your ship
lately?"  Janeway glanced at the timer.  Four minutes left until they
could escape.  "No, " she replied, and the familiar itching returned
as she added another twelve inches to her nose.  The tip of her nose
bumped a crew member working at the console, and Janeway turned red
with embarrassment and anger.  This was becoming more than she could
take, but there were still three minutes left.

        "So you admit to having no outside scans of your ship?"
"I...I...no." Janeway stammered, filling with more rage as her nose
extended another foot in front of her, causing the same crewman to
duck as her nose jutted out over his head.  Janeway actually began to
feel tears welling in her eyes, but refused to let them out.  Then she
thought of something.  "Let me ask YOU something.  Why did you even
decide to help us in the first place?"  The Quid looked worried, then
replied.  "We...we...um...were just trying to be civil, that's all."
Suddenly, the Quid's nose swelled up to gigantic proportions.  There
was a loud exploding sound, and the view screen went black.  "Well,
I'll be." Janeway thought to herself.  "They really CAN'T tell a lie!"

        The explosion had destroyed most of the Quid ship, and Voyager was
now ready to take off.  The Quid ship was about to explode, and the
crew had to rush to their positions to prepare for the impact.
Janeway tried to run to her captain's chair, but her almost four-foot
long nose kept bumping into walls and hitting other crew members.
Finally, she made it to the console, and Voyager took off just in
time.

        "Well, I successfully removed most of the lie-detection formula from
your bloodstream, but the effects are not totally reversible," the
Doctor informed Janeway, as he handed her a mirror.  Most of the the
growth had been reversed, but her nose was still about three inches
long from her upper lip to the tip of her nose.  Janeway looked
sullenly at her reflection.  "Well, I suppose I had better get used to
it," she sighed as she felt the length with her fingers.  "If we ever
get back to Earth, I suppose I could get it fixed.  If not, well...I
suppose I could get used to it."  The Doctor nodded in approval.

THE END