Cracked Mirror (episode)

The Protostars reunion with Voyager has unexpected side effects, bouncing the crew between alternate realities – including the mirror universe.
== Summary ==
=== Act One ===
The drops out of proto-warp at the coordinates for the . Gwyns temporal discriminator seems to glitch, but Gwyn claims that she is okay when Dal R'El checks on her. Captain Chakotay, having cleaned himself up and donned a new Starfleet uniform, marvels at the sight of this new Voyager. While the crew beams over to Voyager, Hologram Janeway entertains Bribble with what is effectively a 20th-century laser-pointer.
Aboard Voyager, The Doctor welcomes them aboard, shaking Chakotay's hand. The Doctor says that the Admiral will be very pleased to see them, and Chakotay agrees that he'll also be pleased to see her, which confuses The Doctor. Admiral Jellico greets them when they exit the transporter room, and explains that Admiral Janeway, Commander Tysess, and Counselor Noum lost their lives aboard the , trying to rescue Chakotay from the wormhole.
The Doctor hypothesizes that the crew of the Protostar is experiencing a shared psychosis, but then asks whether they passed through any tachyon storms or cosmic anomalies. If that were the case, he realizes they might be from an alternate reality, and declares that it is his duty to reunite them with the Admiral Janeway from their reality. The Doctor asks them to meet him in Sickbay, and most of the crew take a turbolift. Zero and Rok-Tahk wait for another turbolift. As the turbolift ascends, Gwyn's temporal discriminator experiences another glitch, and Maj'el notices it displaying different coordinates.
The crew step out of the turbolift onto a dilapidated deck. Reaching Sickbay on Deck 8, instead of The Doctor they unexpectedly meet Thadiun Okona, who claims that the weapon on the Protostar destroyed every Starfleet ship in the quadrant. Zero and Rok exit their turbolift onto a deck unexpectedly populated by Enderprizians, who alert Captain Tuvix. Maj'el theorizes that they cannot communicate with Zero and Rok because they have all entered different realities.
=== Act Two ===
In a conference room on Voyager, Chakotay recalls a similar situation he faced before, and thinks that if they can find a way back to their own reality, they should be able to reunite with the others. The crew realize that when the Protostar proto-warped, it must have destroyed the fabric of the universe, opening a rift that causes different parts of the ship to be in different realities for the Protostar crew, who are all associated with the original temporal paradox.
Maj'el and Chakotay come up with a way to use the deflector dish to create a broad-spectrum warp field with an inverse tachyon pulse in order to seal the interphasic rift and return them to their reality. However, they need to be on the Bridge, eight decks above where they currently are. Instead of taking a turbolift and subjecting Gwyn's temporal discriminator to more alternate realities, they decide to ask Okona to beam them there. Okona doesn't really get the crew's reality-challenged situation, but does help them, and uses some percussive maintenance of his own to fix the transporter (after he had sold a few parts to the Andorians).
Chakotay, Dal, Gwyn, Jankom Pog, and Murf materialize somewhere that is not the bridge, and realize that Maj'el is not with them. When a strangely dressed Captain Janeway and Commander Chakotay greet them at gunpoint, Chakotay realizes that they're now in the Mirror universe. The group is thrown in the brig, and mirror Chakotay plans to use the Agonizer to figure out how the group made it to the Mirror universe, despite the safeguards they thought had been put in place. He chooses to start with the cute one and picks Murf, who surprises mirror Chakotay and knocks him unconscious.
Chakotay poses as his mirror universe double, and leads the crew as prisoners to the bridge. On the way they run into mirror Janeway, who quickly realizes what they are up to. The crew makes it to Cetacean Ops, where a mirror Gillian reports their location to the mirror universe crew. The crew are again captured, but Jankom creates a breach in the Cetacean Ops wall holding back the water, activating a forcefield that contains the mirror universe crew while the Protostar crew escape.
=== Act Three ===
Chakotay fools the mirror universe bridge officers into leaving the bridge and seals the doors, but as he starts to calibrate the deflector dish, the Loom appear. Gwyn remodulates the shields to slow the Loom's approach, but the mirror universe crew break through the door and surround them. The Protostar crew convince the mirror universe crew to fight the Loom and allow them to use their plan to escape back to their reality, thereby saving both crews. As Chakotay tries to activate the deflector dish, time slows down for everyone except for Gwyn, due to her temporal discriminator. She evades the Loom and manages to activate the deflector herself.
The entire Protostar crew materializes on the transporter pad, including Zero, Rok, and Maj'el. They are greeted by The Doctor, and exit the transporter room where Chakotay is finally reunited with Admiral Janeway.
== Log entries ==
== Memorable quotes ==
"Oh, looks like someone's ready to be sent to the admiral's ready room."
:- Dal, teasing Chakotay on cleaning himself up to face Janeway
"Ho ho, they really let this deck go. Jankom approves."
:- Jankom
"Remember how Wesley said the paradox created by the Protostar being lost in time weakened the fabric of the universe? Well, I think when we proto-warped, we punched a hole right through that fabric."
"And now, that interphasic rift is splintering through this ship."
"Oh, great, so all our past mistakes are coming back to haunt us?"
"Not mistakes, different choices."
:- Gwyn, Maj'el, and Jankom
"Perhaps we can use the deflector dish, create a broad-spectrum warp field with an inverse tachyon pulse, and-"
"Yes! That would seal the rift and untangle this mess we're in."
"I don't know what you're saying, but I like the way you're saying it!"
:- Maj'el, Chakotay, and Dal
"Ugh, please tell me Vulcans just have a hard time being happy..."
:- Dal, seeing that Maj'el wasn't overjoyed with the plan she and Chakotay had just come up with
"Pinch me. I'm seeing double."
"When did you get a twin?"
"With whiskers."
"What nightmare are we in now?"
"The mirror universe."
:- Mirror Chakotay, Dal, Jankom, Gwyn, and Chakotay, after the crew lands in a very unfriendly place
"This is the last dimension I wanted to visit."
"You know this place?"
"Starfleet's had run-ins with the mirror universe before. And it's always bad news."
"Mirror, like a reflection?"
"An opposite reflection. What's this place have to do with the Protostar?"
"We can figure that out once we escape. This dark universe is dangerous. Humanity is bent on galactic conquest instead of exploration. And the locals are anything but friendly."
:- Chakotay, Jankom, Dal, and Gwyn, about the mirror universe
"Never trust the cute ones."
:- Chakotay, after Murf (the cute one) knocked mirror Chakotay unconscious
"I was just growing used to Captain Tuvix's Vulcan-Talaxian fusion cuisine"
"That was highly outrageous."
:- Zero and Maj'el, upon returning from alternate realities to their own
"Oh, my stars! My young proteges. But you were gone. How? Captain Chakotay, I never thought I'd see you again."
"Good to see you, Doc."
"Chakotay?"
"Is it really you?"
"Oh, what's on your face?"
"I've thought about this moment for what feels like an eternity. But now, it's like I never left."
"Because you're home."
:- The Doctor, Chakotay, and Janeway, reunited at last
"You went to the mirror universe?"
"You're not gonna believe this. Even the whales were evil!"
:- Noum and Jankom
"Whatever our reality throws at us, I'm glad I'm in this one with you."
"Me too."
:- Dal and Gwyn
== Background information ==
=== Title ===
=== Story and script ===
=== Preproduction ===
=== Production ===
=== Postproduction ===
=== Promotion ===
* This episode will be screened on at San Diego Comic-Con. 
=== Cast and characters ===
=== Costumes ===
=== Soundtrack ===
=== Continuity ===
* In a glass case next to the turbolift on the alternate reality Voyager that Rok-Tahk and Zero visit appears to be a symbiogenetic alien orchid in a glass case. The orchid was previously seen in the episode and the episode .
=== Apocrypha ===
=== Reception ===
=== Awards ===
=== Releases ===
== Links and references ==
=== Cast ===
* Rylee Alazraqui as Rok-Tahk
* Dee Bradley Baker as
** Murf
** Terran Soldier
* Brett Gray as Dal
* Angus Imrie as Zero
* Ella Purnell as Gwyn
* Jason Mantzoukas as Jankom Pog
;And
* Kate Mulgrew as
** Hologram Janeway
** 
** Admiral Janeway
* Robert Beltran as
** Captain Chakotay
** 
* Robert Picardo as The Doctor
* Michaela Dietz as Maj'el
* Jason Alexander as Counselor Noum
* Billy Campbell as Okona
* Eric Bauza as Sool'U
* Ronny Cox as Admiral Jellico
* Bonnie Gordon as
** Universal Translator
** Mirror Ship Computer
=== Background characters ===
* Bribble
* 
=== References ===
admiral; agonizer; airlock; alien; alternate reality; Andorian; armband; Augment; Battle near Gamma Serpentis; black market; Brikar; cadet; captain; "Captain Ponytail"; Coalition of Madena species; commander; conquest; cosmic anomaly; counselor; ; deflector dish; doctor; dog; emergency force field; Enderprizian; exploration; fabric of the universe; fusion cuisine; hologram; Humanity; humpback whale; hybrid; ; interphasic rift; interrogation; Janeway, Kathryn; ; living construct; Loom; Medusan; Mellanoid slime worm; mirror universe; Noble Isle; paradox; parallel universe; pet sitter; phase variance; protégé; ; ; protowarp; quantum signature; recalibration; shared psychosis; sickbay; spacetime; spy; Starfleet uniform (early 2380s); Starfleet uniform (late 2360s-early 2370s); Starfleet uniform (mirror); Talaxian; tachyon pulse; tachyon storm; Tellarite; ; Terran Armada; Terran Empire; transporter; tribble; thorium grease; turbolift; Tuvix; Vau N'Akat; vice admiral; viper; voice authorization; ; ; Vulcan; water breach; wormhole
==== Meta references ====
=== External links ===
* 
* 
* 
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