When the buffeting from their sub-space surfing trip stopped, Janeway stood from her chair and turned to Ensign Kim.

'Damage report, Mr Kim.'

'Minor damage to the outer hull on decks five through twelve. No casualties or injuries reported. Looks like we got off lightly.'

'Sensor sweep, is the anomaly still there?'

'No, Captain,' replied B'Elanna. 'Just some residual subspace interference. The anomaly and the Compromise have both vanished... Wait a minute. They haven't gone. We have, Captain.'

Janeway's stomach contracted into a tight ball.

'What?'

'According to sensors and navigation, we're approximately... seventy thousand light-years away from our starting point.'

'Meaning?' Janeway all but whispered.

B'Elanna looked up as she spoke. 'Meaning,' she said, pointing out at the screen, 'we're back where the Caretaker left us. Where we were five years ago. No.' She read from her console again. 'Two years ago.' She faced the captain. 'We've been pushed back in time again as well.'

The bridge crew stared at the familiar planet, the familiar system. Neelix, who was also feeling rather dejected, felt that his role as morale officer should come before his personal feelings of despair.

'Well,' he said, as brightly as possible. 'At least we're all in one piece.'

The blow caught him fully on the chin, and he was knocked sprawling. Janeway looked down at her reddening knuckles and down further at the recumbent Neelix.

'I'll be in my ready-room. Mr Chakotay, you have the conn.'

'Aye, Captain.'

Clifford decided that sitting dejectedly on the ground wasn't really going to help him much, so he opted for the far more productive notion of walking dejectedly along the road. He'd tried all he could think of to try to get a message back to Gallifrey, but the High Council was hardly listed in the Yellow Pages.

There had to be something more he could think of.

Actually, later. Right now, he heard the call of nature that not even a Time Lord could ignore.

Fortunately, it seemed there was a toilet unit not far away from him.

Wait a moment.

He didn't remember seeing the toilet when he'd come here the first time.

Hardly daring to hope, he ran towards the booth. As he might have feared a moment before, it was locked. But as he hoped now, it opened to the spare key from his pocket.

'Baby,' he said. 'You came back for me. Now, which kind soul told you to do that?' He smiled to himself and entered the booth, closing it behind him.

Shortly afterwards, there was a familiar groaning sound, and Clifford and his TARDIS were gone.

'So how's Emma?' Ratbat asked as she and Leila made their way down the corridor.

Leila shook her head. 'Uhhh, don't ask,' she told her.

'That good, nee?'

'We had to sedate her again,' the counsellor replied sadly. 'And we're going to have to leave her sedated until we get back to Titan.' Anger or sadness - something like that - crept into her voice. 'After all that time I spent with her...and all the work they did in the hospital. That bloody alien just had to go and wreck it all! Wasted all my time!'

'Oi. Less of that...if you hadn't spent all that time with her, she wouldn't have been around to ever make it to Titan. Dinna sell yerself short.' Where the hell did I come up with that? she thought.[53]

'You think?' came the glum reply.

'I think. Now, cheer up. It's New Year's Eve.'

At the doorway to the turbolift, Ratbat stopped.

'What's up, Sig? Not coming to the party?' asked Leila.

'Nah. I've been invited to a private party at Ruth's.'

The counsellor smirked. 'Ooh, decided that you go for girls after all, have you?'

Ratbat grinned sheepishly. 'No. I've decided that I don't go for anybody. I never got a real finger on what I completely made of any of the experiences...which makes me think that to me it's just not what it's all cracked up to be, you know?'

'What, sex?'

'Aye. Besides, it's a bit like Bobbi changing back to her normal self at the Epicentre. I should take being me as a given, never mind any of this squishy business that humans used to define themselves by. Anyway, Ruth's just asked me around for dinner and drinks, so I thought I might go. As long as she doesn't want to kill me, I think it might be nice.'

'Fairy's nuts.'

As Ratbat stepped into the turbolift, she too pondered Ruth's mysterious invitation. It wasn't every day that the security chief asked her to dinner; in fact, it had never happened ever before. Maybe Ruth was hoping that she's decided to go for girls... but Ruth had been in the sixteenth century for the duration of the experiment, and was unlikely to know about it.

Ratbat shook her head and sighed. With any luck, she'd find out what was going on.

Fourth Rendezvous (synthesiser) - Russell B

Graham and Suzy accosted Leila as she entered 10-Foreplay.

'So!' exclaimed Suzy. 'What's the verdict?'

'Huh?'

'What does Ratti like better?' asked Graham. 'Boys...'

'...or girls?' completed Suzy.

'Well...uh...neither. She's just the same as she was before.'

Suzy and Graham glared at each other a moment, then turned back to Leila. 'What?'

'You mean, as in...nothing?' added Suzy.

'That's right,' nodded Leila.

'Well, I'm not surprised,' Graham suddenly put in. 'Look at what half she had to work with was.' He punched Suzy's shoulder.

'Hey! If you're so great, how come she didn't end up hetero, then?'

'Oh, going with you probably coloured the whole thing for her! She'll probably enter a monastery now!'

'Hey, if you were any good, she wouldn't have had to go to Val in the first place!'

'Crap! That's not how it works!'

They glared at each other a moment more.

'There's only one way to settle this,' said Suzy.

'I know,' said Graham. 'But we'll need someone impartial to judge.'

They looked at each other, then at the third they were talking to once more.

'Come on, Leila,' said Graham as they whisked her out the door. 'You can get back to the party later.'

'But, guys, I—urk!' Then the door slid closed behind them.

Chaedy had witnessed the whole exchange, then turned to Niki, who was at the bar beside her, flipping through the calendar Graham had passed out. 'Hey!' she exclaimed. 'Didn't you see that?'

'Fecking yeah - I'm not till October!'

'No!' protested Chaedy. 'Your wife's just gone off to have sex with Leila!'

'Really?' mused Niki, looking towards the door. 'Darn, and I wanted to talk to her, too.'

Chaedy spluttered. 'Hello? What about the whole infidelity thing?'

'Oh, I don't think Leila will cheat on her.' She shrugged and returned her attention to the calendar.

Smegging modern relationships, reflected Chaedy. 'Oh, hey - while you're here, can I ask you something?'

Niki grunted, hoping the question was 'Do you want me to go away?'

Chaedy leant over conspiratorially. 'Well, I've decided to try to make a bit of extra-Federation funds. And so...' She lowered her voice. 'So I've actually designed a new kind of vibrator. But I'm not sure if anyone would like it...what do you think?' She shoved a padd in Niki's face.

Niki gave it a cursory glance, then handed it back to the deputy chief. 'If you build it, they will come.'

Nearby, Matt had a matter of his own to concern him. So Batti picked neither? Cool, Mark owes me twenty strips!

'Guys!' Terri, Colleen by her side, leapt for the sound system. 'Turn that musak crap off!'

'What are you doing?' asked Val.

'It's almost midnight!' Colleen shrilled. 'In less than...half a minute, it'll be 2376!'

The ever-present synthesiser music shut off. 'Tony!' called Terri. 'You ready?'

The Piano Man lined up his music. 'All set!' He gave them the thumbs-up.

Colleen checked her watch. 'Then, let's go...ten...nine...eight...'

'...seven...six...' joined in Terri.

'...five...four...three...two...one...

'Happy New Year!'

Auld Lang Syne

And so began the Year of Our Lord twenty-three hundred and seventy-six.

Ruth was waiting at the door when Ratbat pressed the chime. The first officer was quite surprised to find that the normally very self-possessed Ruth was shaking with nerves.

'He-he-hello,' she managed. 'Please come in.'

Ruth had prepared a simple but appetising meal of crêpes, and was quite keen, for some reason, to see that Ratbat ate them all. It was odd, Ratbat reflected; she'd actually put on some weight since Neelix's banquet, and it wasn't really necessary for her to eat everything on her plate before being allowed dessert.

As they ate, Ruth stared glumly at Ratbat; at her eight-hundred-and-twelve-year-old daughter. She had lived so much of her life without a mother, was it really fair to come barging in at this late stage and try to be the mother that Ratbat seemed to neither miss nor need?

She smiled miserably as Ratbat gave her a questioning glance.

'So, Ruth. Feel like catching up on what's been happening?'

Ruth tried to feel glad that Ratbat had given her a leg up in the conversation, but couldn't shake the sinking feeling in her stomach.

'I, er...'

Ratbat tried again. 'Whereabouts in the sixteenth century did you go?'

'I, um. I went to.... it was...'

What was she going to say? And what would Ratbat say in return? 'Mum, you owe me eight hundred and eleven years in back birthday presents.' Was there any way that she could really tell her? And why did she feel that she needed to? It was for her own selfish needs, wasn't it. She didn't want Ratbat to have a mother, she wanted her to have a daughter.

Ruth tried to compose her features into an expression of neutrality. 'It was 1559 when I got there. The Compromise pulled me back in 1561.'

Ratbat wondered why Ruth seemed to sag after telling her that. She tried to make the most of the situation.

'Well you know, Ruth, I was born about two years after that. So you're now the Evil Bunny who has been furthest back in time.'

Ruth gave a sickly smile. Ratbat was looking at her funny, almost as though she somehow sensed the inner battle Ruth was having with herself.

A peculiar though hit her. She was Ratbat's mother, and then Ratbat had had a daughter. That meant that she was a grandmother.

Somehow this realisation just made her feel crankier.

A ship presses on through space.

Pre-Menstrual-class. Like so many of her kind, she is garish pink in colour - a proud round head leading off from a central junction, branching out to two pairs of warp nacelles.

Over three years ago, the people on board were part of an experiment, to see a working crew form from an old social melée...and they've never looked back.

Her name is Compromise, and this is her story.