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The crew tracks a Cardassian-designed
weapon packing a warhead capable of wreaking mass destruction.
While serving in the Maquis, Chakotay and Torres encountered the
missile, dubbed "Dreadnought," in the Alpha Quadrant. Back then,
Torres had reprogrammed it to assault its own makers, but the
weapon went astray and was thought to have been destroyed. Now
Voyager's scanners report that Dreadnought is inexplicably
headed straight for a heavily populated planet in the Delta
Quadrant.
As Jonas, a traitor in
Voyager's crew, informs the Kazon about this superweapon,
Janeway warns an official on the planet Rakosa about the
approaching missile. Torres beams onto Dreadnought, where she
gets the device's sophisticated computer system to stand down
from its attack plans. But a short time later, Torres learns
that Dreadnought has inexplicably resumed its deadly course for
Rakosa.
The crew learns that Dreadnought's computer does not "believe"
it's in the Delta Quadrant. It thinks Rakosa is actually a
Cardassian target in the Alpha Quadrant, and that Torres has
been coerced by the Cardassians into logging false information
into its navigational sensor array. Attempts to disable the
missile from Voyager backfire when Dreadnought blows out many of
the starship's main systems.
With two million lives at stake on Rakosa, Torres manages to
beam back on Dreadnought as the Rakosan fleet approaches to
intercept the missile. Under fierce fire from Dreadnought,
however, the Rakosan ships retreat. As a last-ditch effort,
Janeway orders her crew to abandon ship; she plans to use
Voyager to ram the missile and detonate the warhead before it
hits Rakosa.
Not a moment too soon, Torres manages to initiate an old
Cardassian program in Dreadnought's systems. The two programs
immediately begin to "quarrel" about the missile's target,
distracting it from her attempts to breach Dreadnought's
containment field and detonate the warhead. When Voyager's
sensors convey Torres' success, Tuvok beams Torres back to the
starship just as Dreadnought explodes.
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