Star Trek: Prodigy

On the Tars Lamora prison colony in the Delta Quadrant, a young alien named Dal dreams of escaping. The colony’s leader, The Diviner, sends his robotic enforcer Drednok to capture a problematic prisoner, “Zero”, who causes an explosion that allows Dal to get away. Dal is captured before he can escape and is interrogated by the Diviner’s daughter Gwyn, who gives him one day to locate Zero. Descending to the deep core mining level, Dal is partnered with a Brikar who speaks another language and grows angry at Dal’s attempts to search for Zero, accidentally causing a rock collapse that reveals the abandoned Federation starship USS Protostar. The starship’s translator allows the Brikar to introduce herself as Rok-Tahk. Zero watches this happen and introduces themselves, while the group is expanded to include engineer Jankom Pog and indestructible blob Murf. When they are confronted by Drednok and Gwyn, they take Gwyn hostage and escape from Tars Lamora in the Protostar. They are greeted by a training hologram with the likeness of former USS Voyager Captain Kathryn Janeway.

Janeway, under the assumption that the colony escapists are Starfleet cadets, begins to train them on how to operate the Protostar and explains to them the purpose of the Federation and Starfleet. While Zero, Jankom, Rok-Tahk and Murf are eager to join the Federation, Dal—who has appointed himself Captain of the ship—dismisses Janeway. When he unknowingly directs Zero to fly the Protostar into a dying star, Dal is forced to ask for Janeway’s help to save themselves and the ship. Meanwhile, Gwyn is held prisoner but begins to plot an escape so she can gain control of the ship and return it to her father, who is already in pursuit with Drednok.

Dal and the crew find an M-Class planet and decide to land the Protostar on its surface to investigate it. Using the ship’s exploration vehicle the Runaway, the crew finds the planet to be very hospitable and decide to split up. Alone, each of them sees the thing that they each desire most, which for Dal is a representation of the parents that he does not remember. He soon realizes that these illusions are not what they seem and races to save the others from the planet. On the Protostar, Gwyn escapes captivity and takes control of the ship. She is able to get out with Murf before the planet attacks the ship and throws it 10 kilometers away.

The group find Murf and an injured Gwyn, and Janeway activates a beacon to direct the team to the ship while defending it from the planet’s attacks. After they spend most of the day traveling in circles due to the planet changing its terrain around them, Dal and Gwyn devise a solution together to navigate towards the ship using the stars. The Diviner and Drednok soon arrive, but the young crew are able to make it to the ship when the Diviner is tricked by the planet into thinking the ship is somewhere else. When he and Drednok return to their own ship, they pursue the Protostar but lose it when the young crew, including Gwyn, activates the special “proto-warp” function.

The Protostar comes out of proto-warp after a 4,000-light-year jump into the Gamma Quadrant. Janeway introduces the crew to the holodeck, which can simulate virtual environments, and Dal uses it to take the Kobayashi Maru, a Starfleet captaincy examination. After unsuccessfully taking the test many times, even with a simulated crew of famous Starfleet officers, Dal learns that it is a no-win scenario and a good captain accepts some situations as being out of their control. Meanwhile, Gwyn uses her knowledge of languages to decipher a section of code in Janeway’s memory bank that reveals the Protostar’s original crew was boarded by an unknown enemy.

The crew responds to a distress signal that turns out to be Nandi, a Ferengi smuggler who raised Dal. Nandi has cloaking technology on her ship that can be powered by the chimerium crystals on the Protostar, and she offers to give the technology to the crew if they help her retrieve a remalite crystal from a nearby, unexplored planet. Janeway warns that interfering with the young civilization on that planet would violate Starfleet’s Prime Directive, but her concerns are dismissed and the crew help Nandi steal the crystal. When they realize the damage that they have done, the crew steal the crystal back and return it to the planet, but Nandi escapes with their chimerium.

Nandi contacts the Diviner and gives him the location of the Protostar. It will take months for them to reach that location, but the Diviner is able to hack the ship’s shuttlecraft replicator to form a copy of Drednok. After the crew fail to work together to solve a riddle, the Protostar goes through a tachyon storm that splits each of them into different streams of time where each experience the speed of time differently. Janeway moves between each crewmember and helps them all contribute to a plan to save the ship. Experiencing time the slowest, Rok-Tahk finishes the plan and reverses the anomaly. A partially completed replication of Drednok survives the event.

The Drednok replication displays a message from the Diviner offering to free the miners of Tars Lamora if the crew return the Protostar to him. They are eager to help the miners, though Dal is hesitant about returning to the prison. Forming a plan, they proto-warp to Tars Lamora and give the Protostar to the Diviner, who departs with Drednok and Gwyn after destroying the Tars Lamora power source. He soon discovers that the “proto-star” that powers the proto-warp engine is missing; the indestructible Murf consumed it as part of the plan, with the others preparing to restore Tars Lamora’s power so they can escape with the miners on the Diviner’s ship.

The Protostar returns to Tars Lamora where the crew destroy Drednok and restore power. The Diviner reveals to Gwyn that he was sent from the future to prevent the destruction of their people after first contact with Starfleet caused a civil war; he plans to destroy Starfleet with a computer virus onboard the Protostar. Zero reveals their true form to the Diviner, driving him mad, while Gwyn sees Zero’s reflection and loses her memory of the Diviner’s plan. The Diviner is left in exile on Tars Lamora, the miners leave on his ship, and the crew of the Protostar fly towards Federation space where they are tracked by the real Janeway on the USS Dauntless.

The Protostar crew seek asylum at a remote Starfleet communications relay station manned by Lieutenant Frex. In biometric scans, Murf is revealed to be a Mellanoid slime worm and Dal’s race is said to be known, but the information is restricted to Starfleet Command. Gwyn uses the station’s sickbay to restore her memories of the Diviner’s plan, but she is too late to warn Frex who connects to the Protostar’s systems and activates the virus. The station destroys itself, Frex escapes, and the young crew return to the Protostar. Meanwhile, Vice Admiral Janeway and the Dauntless trace the Protostar’s path and find the Diviner on Tars Lamora.

The crew find the construct that holds the virus in a hidden sub-deck on the ship, and are unable to destroy it. Coming across a dormant Borg Cube, they wonder if the Borg could help disarm the weapon. On the Cube, Zero connects to the Borg collective to search for information and is assimilated. The others are captured, but Gwyn is able to break Zero away from the collective and they return the Borg to dormancy. The crew return to the Protostar learning that the construct cannot be disarmed or removed. Meanwhile, the Dauntless finds the wreckage of the relay station. Admiral Janeway has the Diviner revived but he does not have his memories.

The Protostar crew responds to a distress call from an M-class planet, except for Murf who is unwell. They discover an alien race called the “Enderprizians” who revere and imitate Starfleet. A mysterious disease is afflicting the villagers, and also infects Dal. They track the disease to a cave holding a Federation shuttlecraft that crashed on the planet with Ensign Garrovick of the USS Enterprise long ago. The shuttlecraft is leaking plasma and poisoning the environment. The crew and villagers work together to dispose of the shuttlecraft and seal the cave while Zero devises a cure. When the crew return to the Protostar, they find Murf encased in a cocoon.

Dal und seine Freunde verlassen die Protostar, um auf einem Raumhafen ein anderes Schiff zu finden, mit dem sie zur Föderation fliegen können. Doch dort halten sich auch gerade Admiral Janeway und die Dauntless-Besatzung auf, um Frex zu verhören. Als sie aufeinanderstoßen, gelingt mit Hilfe des Schmugglers Okona die Flucht zurück zu Protostar. Aber die Dauntless nimmt die Verfolgung auf, so dass die Protostar in der Neutralen Zone Zuflucht sucht, wohin ihnen die Dauntless nicht folgen kann.

Okona führt die Protostar zu einem Raumhafen, um die Schäden zu reparieren, die das Schiff beim Beschuss durch die Dauntless erhalten hatte. Die dortige Genetikerin Dr. Jago erkennt, dass Dal ein Augment ist, ein genetisch optimierter Mensch mit DNA von 26 anderen Spezies. Er lässt sich von ihr mittels eines Chips optimieren. Als sie von Agenten des romulanischen Geheimdienstes Tal Shiar angegriffen werden, die ihn zwingen wollen, ihnen die Protostar zu übergeben, wehrt er sie mit seinen neuen Kräften zunächst erfolgreich ab. Doch er kann die neuen Kräfte nicht dauerhaft kontrollieren und erleidet körperliche Qualen. Murf setzt die Angreifer endgültig außer Gefecht. An Bord der Protostar kann Dal der Chip wieder entfernt werden.

Durch effektive Zusammenarbeit aller Besatzungsmitglieder kann die Protostar erfolgreich repariert werden. Jeder erzählt den anderen seine eigene Lebensgeschichte. Rok musste in fingierten Showkämpfen als gewalttätiges, aber stets verlierendes Monster auftreten, bis sie auf die Idee kam, selbst mal zu gewinnen. Zero erkundete mit anderen Medusen den Weltraum und wurde von Kazon in eine Falle gelockt und in eine Kapsel eingesperrt. Jankon flog mit anderen Tellariten im Kälteschlaf und wurde durch eine Fehlfunktion zu früh geweckt. Nachdem er alle Schäden repariert und dabei zu viel Sauerstoff verbraucht hatte, verließ er das Schiff, damit die anderen überleben konnten. Währenddessen erzählt Asencia dem Deviner, woran er sich nicht mehr erinnern konnte, dass die Vau N’Akat die Protostar gewaltsam von Chakotey und seiner Besatzung erobert hatten, welchem es jedoch gelang, das Schiff per Fernsteuerung entkommen zu lassen. Es sei ihre Aufgabe, die Protostar zu finden und für die Vau N’Akat zurückzuerobern.

Als die Protostar-Besatzung nach mehreren misslungenen Holodeck-Übungen resigniert und nicht mehr zur Sternenflotte fliegen möchte, wird sie wegen einer vermeintlichen Fehlfunktion im Holodeck festgehalten. Erst wenn eine bestimmte Aufgabe gelöst wurde, kann das Holodeck verlassen werden, was auch gelingt. Es stellt sich heraus, dass das Janeway-Hologramm das Holodeck absichtlich so programmiert hatte, um die Besatzung dort festzuhalten und das Schiff doch noch zur Sternenflotte führen zu können.

Die Protostar versucht, dem Sternenflottenschiff Dauntless mit der echten Admiral Janeway zu entkommen. Als das Sternenflottenschiff die beiden Warpfelder miteinander verbindet, versuchen Dal und Zero, telepathischen Kontakt zu ihr aufzunehmen. Dabei werden unabsichtlich die neuralen Muster vertauscht, so dass Janeways Bewusstsein sich in Dal und Dals Bewusstsein in Admiral Janeway befindet. Nachdem Admiral Janeway ihr eigenes Hologramm repariert haDauntlesst, findet sie mit der Protostar-Besatzung einen Weg, den Körpertausch rückgängig machen. Dal dagegen weckt das Misstrauen der Dauntless-Besatzung. Kurz nach dem Rücktausch landet Admiral Janeway deswegen in einer Arrestzelle.

Die Protostar steht einer Flotte von Sternenflottenschiffen gegenüber. Als ihre Schilde zusammenbrechen, beamen der Deviner, Ensign Asencia und Drednok auf die Protostar und überwältigen die Besatzung. Gwyn gelingt es zwar, den Deviner auf ihre Seite zu ziehen, aber Asencia tötet ihn und öffnet einen Kanal zur Flotte: so infiziert die Superwaffe alle anwesenden Schiffe. Janeway sitzt in der Arrestzelle der Dauntless. Sie kann ihre Bewacherin überzeugen, sie freizulassen. Doch sie kommt zu spät auf die Brücke, denn der Erste Offizier hat bereits die Kommunikation zur Protostar aktiviert. Alle Sternenflottenschiffe schießen aufeinander. Zusätzlich funktionieren die Universalübersetzer nicht mehr, so dass die Angehörigen unterschiedlicher Spezies sich gegenseitig nicht mehr verstehen. Gwayn, die von ihrem Vater die Sprachen vieler Spezies gelehrt bekam, kann zwar Hilfe organisieren, doch es kommen auch immer mehr Sternenflottenschiffen hinzu, so dass immer wieder neue Kämpfe ausbrechen.

Dal findet einen Weg, um die gegenseitige Zerstörung der Sternenflottenschiffe zu stoppen. Dazu muss die Protostar auf Proto-Warp gehen und sich gleichzeitig zerstören, so dass die Detonationswelle breit gestreut wird. Die Besatzung kann zuvor mit einem Shuttle entkommen, nur das Janeway-Hologramm wird zerstört. Ein Monat später kommt das Shuttle bei der Erde an. Admiral Janeway spricht auf der Erde für die Überlebenden der Protostar. Sie dürfen sich daraufhin dem Kommando von Janeway anschließen, das nach dem verschollenen Captain Chakotay suchen soll. Nur Gwyn hat eigene Pläne und wird auf ihren Heimatplaneten zurückkehren, um dessen Bewohner zu vereinen, wie es ihr Vater gewünscht hatte.

A year after the Protostar crew’s aversion of the destruction of Starfleet, Admiral Janeway recruits Dal, Rok Tahk, Jankom Pog, Murf, and Zero to join her aboard the newest incarnation of USS Voyager. At first excited, the recruits are disillusioned because as cadets, they are not allowed to work alongside Janeway, and are snubbed by Nova Squadron, an elite Starfleet fighter pilot squad, led by a young Vulcan named Maj’el. After some unauthorized spying, the cadets discover that Janeway is mounting a secret rescue mission to find Chakotay with a cloak-enabled ship called the Infinity. Janeway swears the cadets to secrecy, but Maj’el overhears Dal discussing this and tries to stop the cadets from moving the Infinity. During the melee, the craft is accidentally activated and sent into the wormhole prematurely. Meanwhile, Gwynn’s attempts to win the trust of the present-day Solum fail as she discovers that Ascencia has manipulated the leaders into believing that Gwyn is a threat, prompting them to order her capture. Gwyn escapes and reunites with Ilthuran, the Diviner’s younger uncorrupted self.

With Ilthuran’s support, Gwyn challenges Ascencia to a duel. Dal, Jankom, Zero and Maj’el are captured by the Diviner’s men and find themselves in the same holding cell with Captain Chakotay and his first officer. In spite of his best efforts to not disrupt the original timeline, which could result in Gwyn never being born, Dal ends up dropping a phaser which Chakotay uses to get into the Protostar to escape, causing Gwyn to physically phase in and out.

Dal, Zero, Jankom and Maj’el receive a strange message reading “Save Gwyn”. Dal, Zero and Maj’el find Gwyn who’s phasing in and out and in great agony. The group deduce that Gwyn had been displaced by time due to their actions disrupting the original timeline. Zero suggests they build a time machine and Dal gets a hands-on lesson in Temporal Mechanics as they convert the Infinity into a time machine. Ilthuran finds Gwyn and comforts her. While phasing in and out of time, Gwyn hears a voice from beyond saying, “You Must Stay Together”. Dal’s group manages to find Gwyn and bring her back to USS Voyager, where the Doctor places an interphase armband to keep her stable in the present timeline. Meanwhile, Murf is shown communicating with a stranger.

Gwyn puzzles over the voice she heard in her vision and blames herself for not preventing the civil war on Solum. Murf creates a mural that appears exactly like the spiral Gwyn saw in her vision. The group tries to understand Murf’s continual incoherent babbling by converting the universal translator, which fails humorously. After several attempts, they turn to Rok for help. Rok is reluctant but is persuaded by Gillian the humpback whale in Cetacean Ops. Working with Rok, Murf dives in the water and sprouts a tail and fins, which enable him to swim. Gillian translates “Find Me” and a set of coordinates from Murf’s words. Gwyn experiences another phasing attack, which finds her floating in space and seeing a spiral and the voice from her previous vision saying, “Find me before they find you”. The vision is followed by clinking screeches before Gwyn is pulled back to the prime reality. Gwyn tells the others of her vision and discoveries.

Dal and his friends create holograms of themselves to take their places while they attempt to take the Infinity. Trouble ensues because their holograms are programmed to believe they are real. Rok and her hologram decide to work together rather than against each other to find a solution. Dal and friends manage to board Infinity. Unknown to them, their holograms have switched personalities due to a glitch.

The Protostar crew take the Infinity through a Borg conduit, which transports them to an uncharted planet inhabited by a Kazon. The Kazon has Dal, Rok, Gwyn and Jankom captured while Zero and Murf stay behind. Dal/Jankom and Gwyn/Rok are pitted against each other in a rigged and dangerous rat race around the planet’s core. Dal saves Gwyn and Rok but discovers that one of the Kazon’s racers is a robot. Meanhile, the Kazon’s erratic behavior leads Zero and Murf to uncover a mind control device on him, which they disable. The Kazon then reveals that the planet was a pilot training facility, until the computer became sentient and went rogue, arranging pilot deaths one at a time until only he remained. The computer reveals itself to Zero and further explains its warped agenda, before arresting Murf with a mind control device and capturing the others. Zero declares that they are all biological beings and reasserts faith in the others before crashing into the computer’s core, causing an explosion that destroys the entity. Zero’s containment suit is severely damaged, making independent movement impossible, so Zero is carried and they all continue on their way. On board Voyager, a suspicious Maj’el follows holographic Gwyn to her quarters, where a strange entity tries to destroy the hologram, mistaking it for the real Gwyn. The creature vanishes after realizing its mistake and Maj’el enters the quarters to find Gwyn gone.

Zero makes contact with another Medusan who offers to give Zero a new body. Gwyn convinces Dal to help Zero and the group detours to Ovidia IV, where the message came from. There, they discover that the resident Medusans and other non-corporeal beings have been using carbon-based matter from the planet’s surroundings to create physical bodies for themselves, providing them the senses of touch, smell, and taste. Since this also will allow Zero to interact directly with other corporeal beings without harming them, Zero agrees to the transfiguration. The operation is a success and Zero takes delight in experiencing newly given senses and participates in the Feast of Senses – a celebration and rite of passage on Ovidia IV. At first happy for their friend, Dal and Gwyn learn from the Medusan leader Ion that because their bodies degenerate outside Ovidia IV, no one wants to leave and give up their senses. Dal and Gwyn discover that Zero is participating in the “Running of the Nazamon”, in which participants experience the sense of fear while feeding and fleeing from the Nazamon, a manta ray-like creature. Dal, Gwyn and the others manage to find Zero and tell him the truth. When Dal is snatched up in the Nazamon’s gaping maw, Zero bravely jumps to Dal’s rescue. Trusting the Nazamon to use its senses and their friends down below, they ride the Nazamon to safety. By the time they reach the finish line, Zero thanks Zion for the experience and ultimately decides to risk leaving Ovidia IV with the Infinity crew as they had risked their lives to reveal the truth. Ion respects Zero’s choice and wishes them luck. Meanwhile, Janeway, The Doctor and Commander Tysses discover the holographic imposters and hunt down Gwyn’s hologram, who tells them about the possible message from Chakotay. The Doctor discovers that the ship’s computer log has been altered and holographic Gwyn tells of the clicking noises from the creature that tried to erase her. Fearing the worst, Janeway sets a new course to find the real Gwyn before the creatures do.

The Protostar crew arrive at their destination, the planetary Time ziggurat headquarters of the Travellers, where they meet their mysterious benefactor – revealed to be Wesley Crusher. Wesley explains that he has found a way for the kids to repair their unravelling timeline. He also explains that the “hole in time” the kids created are attracting The Loom – monstrous, parasitic creatures who feed on dying timelines and manipulate time to hunt their prey. Just then, the Loom arrive, causing Dal, Rohk, Zero, Jankom and Murf to freeze in time. Gwyn and Wesley (who both have temporal stabilizers) are not affected. The duo hurry to find more stabilizers for their friends, with the Loom in hot pursuit. After placing the stabilizer armbands, Gwyn, Dal, Zero, Jankom, Rohk, Murf and Wesley jump through the vault to escape the Loom. The vault sends them to a safety bunker in the style of a Earth apartment in the 1960s–1970s. Meanwhile, Admiral Janeway tracks down the Infinity’s warp trail, ignoring Admiral Jellico’s orders to return home. The Voyager-A arrives at the Time ziggurat, unaware of the danger that awaits below.

While waiting out the Loom, Wesley reveals his plan to work out coordinates for the kids to find Chakotay and repair the timeline. The group also learns from Wesley that the Loom will not only kill them, but erase the fact any of them ever existed. At the same time, Janeway’s Andorian first officer, Commander Tysess prepares to beam down with his landing party. Maj’el joins Commander Tysess, insisting her telepathic link to Zero will help the team locate the Protostar crew. Janeway agrees, only after Tysess declares to protect Maj’el at all costs. Armed with temporal arm bands provided by the Doctor, Tysess, Maj’el and Ensign Middleton beam down the planet. There, they are ambushed by the Loom who kills Middleton. Tysses orders an emergency beam out back to Voyager, but Maj’el determined to find Zero, removes her badge to stay behind. Back on Voyager, Tysess discovers Maj’el missing and reveals to Janeway what happened. Tysess is also surprised when Janeway and the Doctor don’t recall Middleton and (correctly) deduces the Loom’s ability to erase their prey from existence. Back in the Time ziggurat, Maj’el manages to telepathically locate Zero. Maj’el in cornered by the Loom, but is rescued at the last minute by Dal. Maj’el literally falls into Zero’s arms and is amazed by the Medusan’s new appearance. The reunion is cut short when the Loom manage to break into the safety bunker, forcing the group to evacuate back to the surface. The Loom destroys the Inifinity and is surrounds the group. In the nick of time, Janeway saves Wesley and the Protostar crew by firing at the creatures. The Loom respond by attacking Voyager and a battle ensues. Janeway turns the tables for everyone by boarding a shuttlecraft and setting the shuttle’s weapons to the Loom’s phase variance and manages to kill one of the Loom, creating a diversion to the other Loom. Wesely prepares to set the Protostar crew into a time portal to find Chakotay. Disreguarding Wesley’s warnings, Dal risks looking at his future and is disappointed to see a vision of him refusing the role of captain in front of Gwyn. The group begins to panic, but Maj’el manages to calm them down. Maj’el’s wisdom prompts Wesley to discover that Maj’el also part of the solution to correct the future. Janeway arrives and finds the kids, who are relieved to see her. Janeway is shocked to see Wesley and initially protests against Wesley sending young members of her crew across the galaxy, but relents after Dal and Gwyn tell her it’s the only way to save Chakotay and the timeline. The Protostar crew and Maj’el are sent through the portal. With his time manipulation powers, Wesley sends Janeway back to safety onboard Voyager and manages to wipe out the remaining Loom as they storm into the Time Room. The episode ends with Dal, Gwyn, Rohk, Zero, Jankom, Murf and Maj’el finding themselves on a sandy planet and spot a rusty Protostar and it’s equally weathered captain, Chakotay.

The kids discover that the Protostar has been marooned on Ysida for ten years with a broken Chakotay who had ejected the ship’s antimatter and proto-core, leaving the Protostar running on emergency power. Hologram Janeway explains that losing his crew broke Chakotay’s spirit with the disappearance of his first officer Adreek being the final straw. The crew begins attempting to help Chakotay to no avail until Dal goes missing during a storm, causing Chakotay to spring into action to find him. After evading giant eels, the crew discovers that Dal has found Adreek’s body along with the antimatter that Adreek had collected to repower the ship. With his spirit restored, Chakotay finally agrees to launch the Protostar and help fix the paradox.

Chakotay reveals that the ship needs deuterium from a maelstrom on the other side of the vapor ocean before they can restore power so the crew transforms the spaceship into a makeshift sailing vessel. While crossing the ocean, Dal clashes with Chakotay, before admitting that he’s questioning his purpose after seeing his future in Wesley’s machine. Chakotay offers Dal some advice based on his own experiences and Dal later saves Chakotay’s life after he falls into the ocean. Despite some difficulties, the crew successfully collects the deuterium, restoring power to the ship’s impulse engines and warp drive, allowing the Protostar to leave Ysida. However, Voyager is 3,000 light years away, meaning that they will need to build a new proto-core before the two ships can rendezvous.

The crew hunts for bosonite on a planet overrun by genetically modified giant tribbles. Zero breaks their leg and learns that their body is breaking down and won’t last much longer. Rok works with the Klingon scientist who accidentally created the creatures to successfully reverse the change, but Rok inadvertently creates a bribble hybrid in the process whom she adopts as a pet. With the bosonite, the crew manages to create a new proto-core and sets course for Voyager 3,000 light years away.

The Protostar successfully proto-jumps to Voyager’s position, only to arrive in an alternate reality where Janeway and Noum died trying to rescue Chakotay and then in one where the Federation was destroyed by the living construct. The crew discovers that their jump has torn the weakened fabric of the universe and splintered Voyager into a number of different realities which also has a negative effect on Gwyn. While Rok and Zero get trapped on a Voyager commanded by Tuvix, the others – aside from Maj’el who is accidentally left behind – land in the Mirror Universe where they face off with Janeway and Chakotay’s evil counterparts. With the Loom threatening her universe, mirror Janeway reluctantly allows them to use her ship to emit a pulse that closes the rift. Arriving on the correct Voyager, Chakotay is finally reunited with Janeway.

After returning to Voyager, Zero learns from The Doctor that there is nothing that can be done for their failing corporeal body. However, The Doctor suggests upgrading Zero’s new containment suit with sensory inputs so that they can continue to feel, a task that Zero asks Jankom to do. Jellico orders both ships back to Earth where Voyager’s crew will be reassigned, the cadets reevaluated, and the Protostar mission taken over by the Department of Temporal Investigations. Ilthuran contacts Gwyn to reveal that Asencia has taken over Solum armed with mysterious new temporal weaponry. Asencia sends the Rev-1 to destroy Voyager and the Protostar. While the others return to the Protostar, Dal flies with Nova Squadron into battle and Zero remains behind to help The Doctor. Following a failed attack on the enemy ship, Voyager is left defenseless.

As the battle continues, the Rev-1 disables the Protostar and hits Voyager with a temporal weapon called the Incursor which threatens to age the ship to dust. Zero sacrifices their failing body to retarget the Incursor onto Maj’el’s fighter, allowing Nova Squadron to lure it into destroying the Rev-1 using the Boothby Supernova. In the aftermath, Zero introduces their friends to the new containment suit that Jankom built for them and Janeway announces that Starfleet Command has ordered Voyager and the Protostar to Solum. Asencia is revealed to be holding Wesley Crusher captive, having stolen her temporal technology from his mind. Asencia tells Wesley that the battle proves that Starfleet is spread too thin to be ready for what comes next.

With the Federation and the Vau N’Akat on the brink of war, Gwyn proposes sending the Protostar crew – who are not Starfleet personnel and thus are less likely to escalate the situation – behind enemy lines to rescue her father and find the source of Asencia’s new weaponry. Joined by Maj’el, who chooses to resign from Nova Squadron, the team learns from the younger version of Asencia – who has sided with the rebellion against her older self – that Wesley Crusher is the source of Asencia’s weaponry and Gwyn has them split up to rescue both. Alarmed, Wesley reveals that they have altered the course of events because Ilthuran was never meant to be rescued and would’ve escaped to overthrow Ascencia. Wesley had purposefully allowed himself to get caught so as to manipulate Ascencia into building the technology that they need to fix the paradox. Cornered, Dal beams Wesley and Ilthuran to Voyager, removing them from Asencia’s clutches. Wesley warns Janeway that they’re all in danger and he doesn’t know what happens next.

The Doctor treats Wesley’s injuries, but his Traveler powers are put out of commission for the time being, leaving Wesley struggling to adapt before Janeway reminds him that he was a great Starfleet officer first. Janeway, Chakotay, The Doctor and Wesley launch a daring rescue for the Protostar crew as Asencia tries to feed them to a captured Loom. The rescue is successful, liberating both the crew and the creature. Ilthuran urges his people to rise up against Asencia’s tyranny, and Solum descends into civil war. Having been reminded that boldness isn’t only for the young, Janeway agrees to help save Solum from Asencia despite intervening in the civil war violating the Prime Directive.

With the Vau N’Akat in open rebellion against her, Asencia begins to launch a fleet of ships equipped with temporal weaponry at every major Federation base. Voyager and the Protostar attack the fleet to buy time as Wesley, Rok, Zero and Maj’el figure out the calculations to open the wormhole to Tars Lamora, and Dal, Gwyn, Jankom, Murf and Ilthuran beam to Solum to hijack Asencia’s technology. Gwyn battles Asencia, ultimately defeating her after the other Vau N’Akat lend Gwyn their strength. Murf destroys Asencia’s Drednok, allowing Dal and Jankom to open the wormhole which collapses the open rifts onto Asencia’s ships, destroying them and saving the Federation. However, the Loom swarm out of the wormhole to consume reality.

With time running out, the crew launches the Protostar into the wormhole, guarded by Voyager. The launch proves successful and before beaming out, Chakotay has The Doctor copy Hologram Janeway onto an EMH backup module. The Protostar lands on Tars Lamora in the past where its eventually found by Dal and Rok, resolving the paradox and causing the Loom to return to their own dimension. With the danger over and the future where Solum is destroyed in a civil war changed, Janeway leads official first contact between the Federation and the Vau N’Akat before deciding to go into early retirement, leaving Chakotay as the new captain of Voyager. Wesley privately tells Dal that the important role the crew is to play in the galaxy’s future is yet to come and visits his mother, meeting his little brother Jack for the very first time. The kids finally get into Starfleet Academy, only to have the attack on Mars drastically change things. Returning to Starfleet in the wake of the attack, Janeway has the new Protostar-class vessel, the USS Prodigy, turned into a training ship and gives it to the former Protostar crew along with field commissions to the rank of ensign. Accepting that Gwyn is the rightful captain and recalling some advice that Chakotay had given him, Dal chooses to serve as her first officer instead while Hologram Janeway is upgraded to become the Prodigy’s Emergency Command Hologram.