While
Commander Chakotay is discussing with
Icheb and young
Naomi Wildman where to hide a special stash of cider from
Neelix, the U.S.S.
Voyager is struck by a chronokinetic surge from a rift in space interacting with the ship's warp core. Chakotay is struck with a blast of temporal energy. He regains consciousness in Sickbay where
the Doctor has injected him with a chronoton serum to repair injuries from the temporal blast. As Chakotay talks with the Doctor, he finds the Doctor believes it is several years earlier. Chakotay goes exploring the ship, and discovers that various sections of the ship are experiencing different periods of time, a result of the chronokinetic surge. The chronoton serum enables Chakotay to see and travel between these periods, but not other members of the crew. He makes his way to the bridge, which is currently set a few days before
Voyager was taken to the Delta Quadrant and before he joined the crew.
Captain Janeway immediately identifies him as a spy despite his pleas, and orders him taken to the brig, but en route, they pass through another time period, which Chakotay passes into but not his captors. During his exploration he finds that Engineering has been taken over by
Seska and other
Kazon, and though captured, he managed to escape due to his ability to travel between these time periods. Chakotay returns to Sick Bay and has the Doctor create more of the chronoton serum, then returns to the bridge, injects Janeway with the serum, and takes her to another time period to avoid capture. Janeway is initially hostile towards Chakotay's actions, but he demonstrates what has happened to the ship and she becomes more trusting of him. They go to Astrometrics, which is set 23 years in the future and is staffed by Lieutenant Commander Icheb and Lieutenant Naomi Wildman, both adults, who are surprised by their appearance, as in their timeline Janeway and Chakotay had died 17 years earlier. The two are able to provide Chakotay with details on the chronokinetic surge and suggestions for how to restore
Voyager to normal, and Icheb implies that he never revealed the location of Chakotay's cider stash. Later, they encounter
Seven of Nine shortly after
her arrival on
Voyager, and her
Borg knowledge provides a plan for restoring the ship to normal—if Chakotay injects the chronoton serum into the ship's organic gel-packs, all parts of the ships will align with Chakotay's timeframe. As Chakotay and Janeway travel through the temporally-disjointed ship to enact this plan, Seska discovers their intent and decides to use the same plan to align the ship to her period, thus allowing her to control
Voyager using knowledge from the future to assure she maintains control. She takes Chakotay and Janeway prisoner, but during Chakotay and Janeway's tour of the times on the ship, they have been able to convince most of the other crew to work against the Kazon and they are rescued. Chakotay injects the serum in the ship and it is realigned to his time period, with all individuals returning to their proper times. He finds he has ended up moments before the chronokinetic pulse is due to strike. He quickly orders Lt. Torres to blow out the ship's deflector, which prevents the interaction that caused the time fractures. Later, Chakotay and Janeway have dinner together, where Chakotay tells Janeway he cannot reveal why he ordered the deflector blown out due to the
Temporal Prime Directive. He is surprised that Janeway knows of his cider stash, but Janeway refuses to answer, claiming she too is bound by the Temporal Prime Directive. == Continuity ==