Synopsis: Captain Janeway is determined to repair Voyager and travel out of Krenim disputed space.
This episode, just like “Year of Hell, Part II,” can be seen as an illustration of what desperate means the Logos-driven rational conscious ego may take when confronted with material from the Eros-driven irrational unconscious. But it also shows an alternative way this meeting of opposites can be handled.
In “Year of Hell, Part II” Voyager, with a skeleton crew still remaining aboard, is taking refuge in a nebula, hiding from Krenim forces. When she enters open space before being fully repaired, Voyager is damaged by micro-meteors and Captain Kathryn Janeway risks her life running into a compartment engulfed in fire in order to raise shields, and is gravely injured. The Doctor tells her that she is suffering from Traumatic Stress Syndrome and tries to relieve her of command. Janeway tells him he will have to shoot her to relieve her. Meanwhile, on Annorax’s ship, Commander Chakotay and Lt. Tom Paris have been kept in isolation for two months. When Chakotay and Paris are allowed out of confinement Annorax explains his actions. He tells them that he has just been trying to restore the life of his wife. Paris, much like Janeway, has no patience for him, but Chakotay listens. Chakotay tries to find a way to bring back Annorax’s wife to him and restore Voyager without causing harm to anyone else. Chakotay is forced to admit that there is no way to do this. Paris communicates to Voyager a plan to stop Annorax’s ship, but when it is unsuccessful. Janeway rams Voyager into the weapon ship, and when it is destroyed, the timeline is restored.
If in this episode, once again we can consider Janeway as an embodiment of the conscious ego and Annorax and his weapon as symbolizing the forces of the unconscious, and analogize Janeway’s increasing desperate acts to how the rational ego will struggle to keep itself safe from bits of material from the unconscious. Chakotay on the other hand can be seen to represent what is possible when the conscious ego at least acknowledges bits of unconscious material, even if it is not yet able to integrate them into itself. The ending of the episode, when the ships collide and destroy each other, and somehow a temporal wave restores the prior timeline can be seen as an illustration of what happens when the unconscious material breaks through to the conscious ego and forces change. It can be dangerous when change is brought about so abruptly, but, change did occur.
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