Null Space Catapult

In 2376 Voyager encountered an alien named Tash who had constructed what he termed a "null space catapult". Like Voyager, Tash had become lost far from home. In his case he had been exploring an unstable wormhole when it threw his ship across thousands of light years, leaving him with a journey of ten years to get home. Rather than engage in such a voyage Tash built the catapult.

The device consisted of a large framework on which were mounted eight graviton projectors powered by a tetrion reactor. A ship would station itself close to the catapult and allow itself to be encased in graviton surge, which would then catapult it into null space. Mr Tash said that the ship should emerge a few hours later hundreds or even thousands of light years away. When Voyager arrived he was having some difficulty with the catapult - a test conducted earlier had been partially successful, throwing a probe some six hundred light years away. Unfortunately, the catapults core had been destabilized in the test and Tash had been unable to fix it. Voyagers captain offered to help by using well timed graviton bursts from the ships main deflector to correct the problem. In return, Tash offered to allow Voyager to use the catapult once he was gone.

Tash was able to use the catapult shortly afterwards, achieving results well beyond his expectations; his ship was thrown five thousand light years closer to home. He had to adjust his shield system in mid flight as the stresses involved in using the catapult almost tore off the outer layer of his ships hull, but he was able to transmit the modifications to Voyager and the ship used the catapult itself safely. Voyager was thrown across thirty sectors of space, coming three thousand light years closer to home in less than one hour.

Voyager has only encountered one other species which uses tetrion technology, the Ocampan's Caretaker which kidnapped the ship in the first place. The rarity of the technology indicates that it is unlikely that Voyager will be able to construct another catapult in the near future, if at all.1

References

#	Series	Season	Source	Comment
1	VOY	6	The Voyager Conspiracy

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Last updated : 1 Jan 1970

Series:	VOY Season 6 (Disc 3)
Source:	The Voyager Conspiracy