The Chamber – Still Believe In The Impossible? – Star Trek Fanfiction (The Reality Paradox #1)

“I sense great conflict within you. No one is fully aware of the greater conflict within. Most do not see it until what is missing is fulfilled.”

Kai Opaka’s words replayed in my mind over and over again as Aura and I stood facing each other.

Aura was busy running scans and calculations.

I was busy trying to make sense of everything.

I felt like I was right on the edge of finding it.

I let out a sigh and walked over to the bronze alloy wall, turned, leaned my back against it, and slowly slid down until I was seated on the floor, overwhelmed.

Once again, numerous images from our mission raced through my mind.

The disappearing anomaly.

Q.

EOS Prospera.

And the temporal distortion that still did not seem to have entirely left me.

I looked up at Aura at the thought. My movement to the floor left her unfazed. She still appeared focused on running scans and calculations.

According to her, the most recent events we witnessed in this trapped room — including Q’s recent visit — were caused by me.

Why me?

I shut my eyes and lightly started banging my head against the wall behind me.

As if that would actually help.

What a ridiculous human reaction to overthinking.

“Captain.”

I stopped and looked back up at Aura.

“Hitting your head repeatedly against the bronze alloy structure is highly inadvisable for your physical well-being.”

I chuckled softly, shook my head, and turned back toward the endless nothingness of our prison.

Aura tilted her head for a few moments, then silently returned to her scans and calculations.

The brief humor I had felt caused my stomach to rumble.

I suppose even the smallest distraction from impending doom reminded the body of its more immediate survival needs.

I stood, clutching my stomach as it growled again. I already knew I would not find anything, but I scanned the room anyway.

Nothing.

No windows.

No doors.

No food.

“Captain.”

I sighed and turned back toward Aura, already knowing exactly what she was about to say.

“It appears you are in desperate need of nutrients. If your nutritional intake is not restored successfully within the next forty-eight hours, delirium could occur. Beyond seventy-two hours could result in—”

I raised my hand to stop her.

I was not in the mood to hear statistical projections regarding my death.

“There’s not much we can do right now except find a way out of here.”

“Captain, I have been running scans and calculations continuously since our arrival. It still appears there is no viable solution for leaving this room, nor any explanation regarding our arrival.”

Of course there wasn’t.

I turned back toward the wall and ran my fingertips across the cold bronze alloy as I began pacing again.

“We must find a solution, Aura. Continue whatever you can regardless of what you’ve found so far.”

She nodded once before returning to her emotionless stance and continuing her scans.

I kept pacing, fingertips trailing along the alloy.

The room appeared to have stopped shifting not long after Q left. I had stayed focused on it this entire time and had not seen anything change.

Aura certainly would have said something otherwise.

Why did the room stop shifting?

As insane as it sounded, we were running out of time, running out of answers… and I could no longer 

ignore the question forming in my mind.

What had changed within me after Q left?

After I told Aura that things in this room were not here to make sense, something inside me shifted.

A wave of frustration disappeared.

I remembered suddenly feeling as though the situation was no longer impossible.

Maybe we had been approaching all of this the wrong way.

I looked down and noticed I had stepped over the drag marks again.

Which still made absolutely no sense.

I was having a difficult time believing they were even real.

Then the frustration I had felt earlier began creeping back in.

I understood things were not supposed to make sense, but my patience was rapidly running out.

Hunger and I did not get along.

Especially when your synthetic Mess Hall Officer was continuously monitoring your deteriorating condition.

My stomach growled again.

This time it hurt.

I stopped pacing, faced the wall, and pressed my free hand against the cold alloy, attempting to fight through the pain.

I gritted my teeth while my stomach continued to rumble violently.

I closed my eyes and waited for it to pass.

Then I felt the wall shift.

My eyes snapped open.

The wall slowly began moving outward away from me.

I turned toward Aura.

She had noticed it too.

She walked over and stood beside me while my hands still remained suspended against empty air where the wall had once been.

We both looked down at my hands before meeting each other’s gaze simultaneously.

“Captain.”

“I know. There’s no way this is a coincidence.”

“It would be illogical to assume otherwise.”

I lowered my hands and looked back toward the wall.

The shifting stopped immediately.

Definitely not a coincidence.

I looked back down at my hands just as Aura reached for one of them. She raised it gently back into the air.

“What were you just thinking about?”

“Honestly?”

She nodded.

“How damn hungry I was… and how badly I wanted to get the hell out of here.”

With my hand still limp in Aura’s grasp, the wall shifted again.

It was not my hands causing it at all.

Aura released my hand and immediately began scanning the wall.

I watched it continue moving while an intensely familiar sensation washed over me.

The exact same calmness I had experienced multiple times at EOS Prospera whenever I engaged with the anomaly.

Or with Q.

Calmness was the last thing I should have been feeling.

Yet somehow… I was.

I slowly closed my eyes.

All the separate overwhelming thoughts blurred together until my mind finally cleared.

I allowed the calmness to consume me entirely.

Every anxiety.

Every fear.

Every worry I had ever carried seemed to dissolve.

Everything suddenly felt clear.

No more stress.

No confusion.

My entire body became cooler, relieving me from the unbearable heat we had endured for however long we had been trapped there.

Then I realized even that thought was irrelevant.

I took a slow breath and suddenly felt lighter.

This was exactly where I was supposed to be.

And somehow…

I already knew that.

I opened my eyes.

The moment my feet touched the ground fully, a sonic boom erupted outward from my body, completely annihilating the bronze alloy structure surrounding us.

The explosion should have deafened me.

It didn’t.

The destruction should have torn my body apart as fragments of alloy shredded into thousands of pieces 

around us and disappeared into the distance.

It didn’t.

Was I just floating?

The thought vanished almost instantly as the sudden glare of a sun overhead stunned me. I raised my arm 

to shield my eyes.

Us.

I immediately turned toward Aura to make sure she had survived the sonic boom I had somehow 

unleashed.

She remained standing exactly where she had been before.

Untouched.

Just staring at me.

How exactly do you explain to an android that suddenly everything that never made sense to you finally did?

Thankfully, Aura broke the silence first.

“My internal chronometer continues producing contradictory temporal results.”

I was not surprised.

I looked around, trying to determine where we were.

We were definitely on some kind of planet.

A blazing sun hung overhead, yet somehow the heat no longer bothered me the way it had inside the 

structure.

My body remained perfectly cool.

There was nothing around us except dead grass and barren land stretching endlessly into the horizon.

An infinite empty field filled with shattered remnants of the bronze alloy structure.

I slowly approached one of the destroyed fragments.

It must have been part of the exterior.

The letters USS were engraved into it.

There was no possible way I could have missed that if it had been inside the structure.

I looked back toward Aura.

She was still watching me carefully.

Normally I would have expected more of a reaction from someone witnessing what had just happened.

Even from an android.

But Aura had known something for a long time.

Why else had she saved me at EOS Prospera?

“Aura… this place isn’t real.”

“Correct, Captain. It would appear it is not.”

At first I believed we were trapped inside some kind of outpost.

Outposts generally had doors.

I also had not seen any wildlife, insects, or any living vegetation beyond the dead grass surrounding us.

Of course, how could anything survive in a place like this?

Temporal distortions surrounded everything.

I stood silently, staring into the distance.

Then I closed my eyes and slowly inhaled the outside air.

Despite the barren landscape, my lungs filled with fresh, clean oxygen.

Why I was alive…

How we got here…

Where — or even when — here was…

None of it seemed important anymore.

“Still believe in the impossible, Captain?”

I slowly opened my eyes.

I knew exactly whose voice had spoken behind me.

Oddly enough, hearing it no longer irritated me the way it once had.

It felt as though whatever he had planned for me was no longer something beyond my ability to face.

I turned and saw Q standing behind me in his familiar Starfleet uniform.

Hands clasped behind his back.

That same arrogant smirk stretched across his face.

He stood in the dead grass beside the shattered alloy fragment marked USS.

I slowly approached him and met his gaze.

“What now?”

Q laughed joyfully before grabbing both my shoulders and squeezing them.

“I knew you’d get there, Captain. What happens now depends entirely on you.”

He noticed my expression remained unimpressed and released me, lowering his arms to his sides as he studied me carefully.

“You may not like it, Q, but I’m not in the mood for any more riddles.”

I gestured toward the shattered alloy nearby.

“I know this place isn’t real.”

Q glanced toward it, chuckled, and threw his hands dramatically into the air.

“What could I possibly not like? You’re finally beginning to understand.”

I frowned.

“Am I?”

I crossed my arms.

“Just because I concluded this place wasn’t real based on Aura’s scans, the drag marks that made no sense, and the USS engraved into ancient alien infrastructure that should not exist…”

I stepped closer and jabbed him directly in the chest.

“…doesn’t mean I understand YOU.”

Q instantly grabbed my hand and laughed.

Then, without warning, he spun me around as though we were dancing.

And somehow, I moved with him effortlessly.

He pulled me tightly toward him, wrapped his arms around me, and stared deeply into my eyes.

“You’re not supposed to understand me.”

His grin widened.

“You’re supposed to understand YOU.”

I pushed him away.

He allowed it without resistance.

Straightening himself again, he clasped his hands behind his back and watched me carefully while I slowly stepped backward.

Still smirking.

Still completely unfazed.

I pressed a hand against my chest as I spoke.

“I’m beginning to understand…”

Q immediately interrupted, practically delighted.

“And that… is exactly why I’m here.”