AN: ok, so I admit this is kinda silly, however I actually really enjoy writing this story. If there is any romance in this story, it will be...hopefully tasteful and so totally between my own characters. Also, once again, like with most of my stuff, I apologize for any spelling or grammatical errors I have missed.

Worlds Apart, Galaxies Away: Perhaps I shall return one day

A young women sat at her post on board the Federation Starship Enterprise, staring at her controls and looking extremely bored. She was newly assigned, and still a rather unknown element to the captain and crew of the vessel. As far as Captain Kirk was concerned, she was competent and had a glowing record for a nineteen year old, therefore she would make a fine addition to his crew. However, that fact aside, Kirk was puzzled by her despondent disposition and lack of enthusiasm to be on the bridge. Actually, it down right bothered him. Something needed to be done about it. Rising, the captain moved causally across the bridge towards his new ensign.

He decided to address her sharply, in hopes of causing her to hop to attention. A bored ensign was a sloppy ensign, and sloppy personal were dangerous to the ship.

"Ensign Miles, report."

She shifted slightly in her seat, and then replied calmly without looking up.

"All systems read normal sir, nothing to report." Kirk frowned slightly. This was not the response he wanted. He glanced at her panel, and saw that she was correct, all readings were normal. But her lack of flustered response still bothered him. New crew-members almost always wanted to make a good impression on their captain.

"Ensign, is there a particular reason you don't care to sit at attention when being address by your captain?"

Turning a pair of dark brown eyes on him she responded with an unreadable expression. "My apologizes captain, I was unaware that I was sitting here at my post in a disrespectful fashion. How shall I sit?"

Now Kirk felt annoyed. She was acting like Spock, and one Vulcan on the ship was more than enough.

"How you are sitting is fine ensign, but in the future I would prefer if you looked at me when I speak to you."

"Of course. Is that all?" she said, looking him in the eye with what could almost be called defiant tolerance.

Nodding, Kirk walked back to his chair. "Yes, carry on ensign."

Spock looked at him with a questioning eyebrow raised. Kirk waved it off and then settled into his own thoughts. One thing kept coming back into his mind. He should remember to look closely into Ensign Julia Miles' file once more, and ask some questions about her. Only one week on the ship and already he found her to be a curious creature, so unlike most of the other females on board the ship.

For one thing she refused to wear the standard uniform and had written a formal request to be allowed to wear either a longer skirt or leggings with her uniform. Kirk was surprised. No one had ever had a complaint before. And McCoy had brought her up in conversation the other night. Apparently she had been ducking out on her examination. And then when he did manage to get hold of her, he found that she showed signs of several previous injuries and radiation exposure that had never been properly treated until six months prior. McCoy was furious because she wouldn't give him any information on how these injuries took place. To make matter worse she would only submit to the mandatory examinations, telling him he would have to get a superior officer to order her to go through with further scans. Since there was not immediate need for such things and the ensign was well in her rights to refuse, Kirk could not order her to do so since it would just be to satisfy his chief medical officers curiosity. According to Spock, who had also taken interest in the new crew member, she was an 'adequately talented young women with unique ways of doing things'.

Unique and valuable was a certain thing about her though. An incident involving 20th century tech earlier that week had revealed one thing about her. She was very well acquainted with old technologies, especially from late 20th century to the 21st. When asked about it she had only shrugged and said it was a hobby and that she liked old things.

Yes, an interesting girl...there was just something about her-

The entrance of a young man shook Kirk from his musings. Lieutenant Rogan L'Phuern was the first Palonian the Enterprise had ever had the privilege of taking on as a crewmen. They where a very intellectually brilliant race, with powerful diplomatic characteristics and generally understood to be a peaceful people. Although Palonians looked completely human, they possessed certain abilities that involved shape shifting and telepathy. The specifics where still a mystery to Kirk, and he made a note to look into the race further when he had the chance, or to have a long conversation with the young man.

L'Phuern held out a report to be signed, and then filled his captain in on what was being accomplished in engineering. The crewmen was well versed in multiple fields of expertise, and a huge asset to off world missions. Scotty was beside himself with glee in the engine replacements L'Phuern had helped to install, and together they had been working on a why to increase efficiency by another 65%.

By the time Kirk finished with the lieutenant, he noticed that Ensign Miles was gone, evidently relieved sometime during the conversation. Before he could wondering anymore about his puzzling ensign, Mr. Spock appeared by his side with yet another report. Signing, he took the data pad and set about signing it.

Elsewhere in the ship, Julia Miles walked slowly toward the mess hall deep in thought and feeling just as gloomy as she had all day on the bridge.

Six months...she thought, Six months and I'm still not any closer to finding my way home. Why did it have to be a reality where Star Trek was real? I hate this uniform! I would have rather been thrown into a reality where time lords existed...at least then the Doctor would have been able to help me get home. But no, I got stuck with James T. Kirk, Spock and 'Bones' McCoy. Not only that, I have to try and stay on this ship without them finding out about me. That didn't go so well last time. Really don't want to end up in a psyc ward again, it took ages to escape.

Julia sighed and entered the mess hall. It had be tricky navigating a world she only knew from the odd TV episode in her own universe. Her arrival was less than graceful. The Stargate she came through disintegrated and collapsed into an vat of green goop. After wandering around on a barren plant for three weeks before finding a crashed vessel and setting up a beacon and being found by a federation ship, she had not been in a healthy condition. They didn't believe her story of a Stargate malfunctioning or of alternate realities. Upon arrival back to earth, she was placed in a psyc ward. Surprisingly, by playing up her mental instability act, she found it easier to escape than if she had been acting 'normal'. Before leaving, she managed to erase her file and set a trace on the rather simple system to erase the same file and scramble the source. That had not been easy. She had very little knowledge of the computer systems and had found she was mostly just guessing and got lucky with how things turned out.

Once on the streets Julia evaded the authorities with some difficulty. She managed to befriend a rather shady group of humans who specialized in black market activities. One of the females in the group helped her get up to speed on the computer systems, and how things worked with the federation of planets, etc. Her name was Frian, she had been really rather nice. And to repay them, Julia hacked the police systems to lower Frian's wanted level to minimal criminal activity so she wouldn't keep getting flagged and followed.

Julia had rejoiced in her natural tech talents in those early days. The systems where so simple compared to wraith and ancient tech, and before long she had created a program that was untraceable through which she created her new identity. Her name she kept the same, just in case her own people managed to find a way to get to that reality and started looking for her. Then she put herself into Starfleet, created some crazy story that she had been posted on an outer rim colony that was destroyed with few survivors and then reassigned to the Enterprise. From what she knew of the USS Enterprise it did the most deep space exploring, which meant that if she wanted to find another Ancient outpost (since she came through a gate, there had to be more than one...or so she hoped) she needed to be on that ship.

And here she was, eating the most disgusting food she had ever tasted and bored out of her skull.

She missed Atlantis terribly. She missed John, Teyla, Ronon, Dr. Weir, Evan, even Rodney (even if it was his fault she got stuck in the first place). They were her family, the only ones who ever really gave her the chance to be who was. Homesickness set in even deeper as frequently considered thoughts re-emerged into the front of her mind.

Will I ever see them again? Are they even trying to find me? And if there are no other gates in this universe...what do I do then?

It had been a major overload at an ancient outpost that messed up the gate. Some sort of trap set by Michael or the ancients. Julia stayed behind to manually keep the gate stable so they could all go home. The plan had been to send the team back to Atlantis and Rodney be keep the gate stable from there so she could come through. Right after John sent the message that they were home safe the power levels started to spike. Rodney assured her it was safe to come through if she hurried, that he could keep it stable from their end, but she never made it home. There had been more in that Ancient lab, something that had made Rodney very excited, but Julia couldn't remember. She had in fact taken a blow to the head when she fell through. Pieces of the event were missing which caused her great frustration.

Picking at the brick shaped food on her plate that reminded her of playdoe, Julia noticed the Palonian everyone had been whispering about. He was looking about the crowded room for a place to sit. Spotting that Julia had no one sitting with her, he moved to her table.

"Do you mind if I join you? It seems to be very crowded in here." he asked almost as an apology, with a slight hesitation as though he expected her to refuse.

"Not at all, take a seat." Julia answered kindly, smiling slightly for the first time in several hours.

"Thanks. That is very good of you." he sat with a sign of relief and then grinned at her, "You'd be surprised how many people don't want to spend time in my company, since I am not human."

"Really?" Julia was surprised. "I would have thought they would be eager to spend time with someone of a different race, this is after all why we are out here isn't it?"

"Technically yes, but I'm afraid my people put others on edge a bit." he paused for a moment to consider her for a moment and then added, "I think maybe you don't actually know very much about Palonians?"

Julia raised her eyebrows at him, which caused the young man to become quickly flustered and quickly explain himself.

"I'm so sorry, I should really introduce myself first. My name is Rogan. I am a Palonian. We are empathic and telepathic creatures, although we can not listen to the thoughts of others without permission of said person. You may find many people will try and tell you we read everyone's minds and invade privacy. This is not true. The empathic abilities do allow for the tendency to feel what those around us feel, which is why I came to the conclusion you maybe didn't know any of what I just shared since you felt so confused and open to me..." taking a deep breath, Rogan gave an apologetic smile, "Where as now you are much less readable. Those are impressively fast defenses you have there. Not many people know how to shield themselves mentally like that."

"Like what?" Julia looked at her new acquaintance with slightly narrowed eyes. Rogan's eyes, on the other hand, widened in amazement.

"You don't even realize you are doing it do you?" he said softly, "That is absolutely amazing! Please tell me, have you had encounters with telepaths before?"

Julia flinched involuntarily. Various encounters with the wraith had given her a fair share of experiencing their mental abilities. It had not been pleasant, especially with that wraith queen...

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked that."

Julia glanced up at Rogan, who's face was stricken and looked genuinely concerned for her.

"Its alright, I'm ok. Just a few unpleasant memories." quickly deciding to change the subject. "Have you been enjoying your stay on this ship? I mean other than rude people being rude?"

Rogan chuckled softly, relieved that she had not been upset by his thoughtless question.

"I have. The chief engineer is very good to work with and my tasks are engaging. The 'rude people' as you so delicately put it, are manageable. I believe they just feel threatened by what they do not trust or understand. I do not blame them. My race does have other abilities that cause others to be wary for good reason. Not all of my people are good people and have done terrible things."

"So have mine." said Julia with a smile. She felt suddenly less gloomy and glad to be talking to someone for a change. Mostly she kept to herself because she was always on the move, but now that she was on the Enterprise and would hopefully remain for a long while, perhaps she would try and at least make a few general acquaintances .

The rest of the meal pasted with pleasant conversation. Julia managed to ask enough questions to keep Rogan talking about himself rather than give him the chance to ask questions about her.

She learned that he came from a noble house on his planet, a middle child. His race was a group of form changers. Each individual, when they reached adulthood, would begin to be able to take different forms. They primarily involved the forms of various animal creatures, and each individual normally only had three of four forms.

It was difficult to master the different forms, for in that shape the individual had to fight against the natural instincts of the creature they became. There was tremendous mental and emotional control involved with making the change. Different creatures were easier to control, depending on the individual. Generally, the more dangerous and powerful the creature, the harder it became to keep ones sentience. The emotional control was terribly important as often powerful emotions would be the trigger for a transformation.

In terms of culture on his world, Julia learned that the nobility would try and match their children with mates who had powerful forms. The kings and queens were selected from these powerful form takers by way of competitions.

Rogan shared that he was unusual even among his people because he took many forms. It was so many above the normal number that his parents advised him to stop registering them with The Records, for his own safety. He would be seen as a threat, or worse, forced into a bond with a mate he did not wish. It was because of this that he left his planet and headed for the stars.

"So what forms can you take?" asked Julia, truly fascinated by the whole thing.

"Oh...well, I have been known to morph into loveable earth dog, and on occasion Panther-bear." he said with a slow smile, "And I think I had better keep others to my self. The one I find easiest to control is not a very popular creature."

"Hmm, I'm not sure if I want to insist on you telling me, or if I should leave well enough alone." Julia mock pondered. Rogan gave a thoughtful smirk and re-affirmed that she would probably be happier not knowing.

"Well, it has been a surprisingly lovely conversation, but I think I should turn in for the evening. Early shift in the morning." said Julia finally.

"Yes, wouldn't want you to fall asleep while on duty." Rogan agreed standing up and collecting the trays leftover from their meals. "Thank you by the way. You company has been most refreshing. Perhaps we could do this again sometime?"

"Of course! I dislike eating alone. See you tomorrow?" Julia asked, to which Rogan smiled and nodded with obvious keenness before they parted ways.