“We have, but I like to get a more personal perspective when I can. The evidence always comes first, of course, but it can be informative to compare multiple interpretations of the evidence.”

Tuvok raised a brow, acknowledging Jaza’s logic. “Very well. I will tell you what I can. Keep in mind, however, that my analyses of the cosmozoans Voyagerencountered were shaped more by tactical considerations than scientific curiosity.”

“That’s a useful perspective as well. If politics can be a science, as my friend Cadet Dakal would have it, then surely tactics can be as well.”

Lieutenant Pazlar smirked. “I’ve certainly known enough people who treated scientific debate as a form of combat.” She entered a set of commands into her handheld padd, and the holographic field of view began to move with disorienting speed. She and Jaza moved to hover alongside him, and the three of them ended up facing a projection of the Delta Quadrant, positioned as though they were looking “down” from galactic north. A familiar jagged line appeared, one which Tuvok had seen many times in debriefings, lectures and documentaries about Voyager’s seven-year ordeal: a representation of the starship’s course through the quadrant, beginning at the outer rim of the galactic disk in Kazon territory and progressing through leaps and bounds to the Borg transwarp hub in the Three-Kiloparsec Arm, adjacent to the Central Bulge.

They proceeded through Voyager’s cosmozoan contacts sequentially, beginning with the nebular life-form encountered on stardate 48546, not long after Voyager’s arrival in the Delta Quadrant. “It was sevenAUs across?!” Pazlar asked in amazement when he recounted that fact.

“That is correct. At first it appeared to be a fairly ordinary nebula aside from the presence of omicron particles and certain organic compounds. Once inside the cloud, we discovered an internal anatomy and biochemistry which indicated it to be a living organism.”

“No reason a spacegoing organism, particularly a nebular one, couldn’t be that large or larger,” Jaza observed. “It’s been theorized for centuries that the organic molecules inside the right kind of nebula could potentially be triggered by EM radiation or electrical discharges to organize into life; so the size of such a creature would be largely a function of the size of the original nebula. Seven AUs is tiny as nebulae go.”

Tuvok proceeded to the next account, the discovery of a photonic-matter life-form in a protostar on stardate 48693. “I’d discount your ‘Grendel’ as a cosmozoan,” Jaza said. “That species seemed native to its protostar the way we are to planets. We have no evidence it could exist in interstellar space. Let’s move on.”

Tuvok spoke with some reluctance. “The next relevant encounter was shortly thereafter on stardate 48734. The Komar, a race of trianic-based energy beings inhabiting a dark-matter nebula.”

He paused, until Jaza filled in the gap. “According to the reports, one of these beings took you over personally, Commander, and attempted to hijack the ship so its people could feed on your neural energy.”

“That is correct,” Tuvok admitted. “Fortunately, the Komar inflicted no permanent harm.” Despite my own failure to protect my ship,he thought.

Pazlar stared. “How could they have a name?”

“Excuse me?” Tuvok asked.

“They were energy beings, right? No mouths. Where’d the name ‘Komar’ come from?”

“I cannot say. I was not privy to the entity’s thought processes. Perhaps some earlier race they contacted gave them the name. Is this relevant, Lieutenant?”

“No. Just curious.” She turned to Jaza, and gratifyingly returned to the topic. “But they were native to the nebula, right? So shouldn’t we rule them out like the photonic creatures?”

“I don’t think so,” Jaza said. “The gravity of stars and planets somewhat insulates them from interaction with the interstellar biosphere. The same wouldn’t apply to nebular life. I’d count it.”

Tuvok recounted what little more he knew about the Komar, and then moved on to the swarm of flagellate organisms encountered on stardate 48921. These creatures, comparable in size to Voyager,had employed a form of magnetic propulsion, with their flagellating motions creating the dynamo effect that drove it. But Jaza was more interested in their behavioral patterns. “These were the only cosmozoans in which Voyagerobserved complex social behavior,” he explained. “Please tell me all you can remember.” Tuvok complied as best he could, while trying to respect the privacy of his then-protegée Kes, in whom the flagellates’ EM emissions had induced a premature reproductive cycle.

But Pazlar provided a distraction—fortunately, perhaps, but still annoyingly—by her interest in the creatures’ own reproductive behavior. “The big creature thought Voyagerwas trying to matewith its partners?” she laughed.

“Correct. It reacted to us as a reproductive rival. We managed to pacify it by mimicking the submissive behavior of its species.”

Pazlar laughed harder. “No wonder I never heard that story. Who’d want to admit a Starfleet ship backed down from a fight?”

Tuvok merely looked at her icily until she subsided. Mercifully, the list was nearing its end. Voyagerhad not encountered any further cosmozoans until the fifth year of its journey, when on stardate 52542 it had been briefly ingested by a two-thousand-kilometer creature which lured in its prey by telepathic projections of their greatest desires. Then in the seventh year there had been two encounters: a gaseous life-form that Voyagerhad inadvertently removed from a J-class nebula on stardate 53569, and the dark-matter entities encountered in a cluster of class-T substellar bodies on stardate 53753.

“That is all I am able to tell you,” Tuvok said when he was done. “I am not sure if it will be helpful in tracking the astrocoelenterates.”

“It might be,” Pazlar said. “Look.” She manipulated the padd so that markers appeared at the locations of each of the encounters Tuvok had described: three close together at the outer rim, one in the Crux Arm near the Devore Imperium, and two in the Three-Kiloparsec Arm near the quadrant border. “Look at the regions where you encountered all those creatures. See any common pattern?”

Tuvok studied the display, but was unable to see what she was getting at. “No, I do not, Lieutenant.”

She worked the padd to generate three insets which magnified the regions under discussion. “There. See it now?”

He examined the insets, but again had to say no.

“You’re kidding. Come on, it’s staring you in the face!”

He glared at her. “Clearly it is doing nothing of the kind, Lieutenant, as I do not see it. I suggest you explain.”

Shaking her head, she highlighted a cluster of blue stars near Voyager’s starting point. “The star-formation region. See? You spent much of your first year in the DQ passing through a long, narrow OB association. It formed a sort of border between Kazon and Vidiian space. A star-formation region that far out on the rim, away from the arms, it’s surprising to find. I can’t believe you missed it!”

Tuvok was beginning to find her impatience and condescension tiresome. He strove to remain stoic. “As I remarked, Lieutenant, my training is not in the sciences.”

“And of course down here in the Three-K Arm, deep in the inner disk—that’s the busiest region of star formation in the galaxy. And out here in Crux, where you found that ‘pitcher-plant’ creature…not only star formation, but subspace ‘sinkholes’ and ‘sandbars,’ chaotic space—that’s got to be the craziest region of space I’ve ever seen.”

“I see,” Tuvok said. “And we are also currently in a region of active star formation.”

“Well, near one,” Jaza said. “The Vela OB2 Association isn’t too far away. And this is the common thread of most of the other cosmozoan contacts—they all took place in the approximate vicinity of star-formation regions or other turbulent zones. The star-jellies first encountered by the Enterprisewere at Deneb—very far from here, but close to a stellar nursery called the Pelican and North American Nebulae.” He manipulated his own padd, and the field of view moved to highlight it. “It’s actually one nebula with a dark cloud subdividing it as seen from the Federation core worlds. A later survey by the Hooddetected a few more jellies near there, though they didn’t seem interested in communicating.