Disclaimer: See Part 1
Rated NC-17
Kathryn shifted under the viewport in Seven's illusionary quarters. There was another time too when she had accessed this program purely for Kathryn.
In the fourth year of their journey, Chakotay had been captured. The Vori, an aggressive race of aliens had captured him and brainwashed him into being an advocate and killing machine for their cause. In the days when he was missing, Kathryn had slept little. She was consumed with the need to get him back, the sick feeling in the pit of her stomach making it impossible to relax. She inhaled coffee to keep herself awake and ran countless scans searching for him. On the few occasions when she retired to her quarters, she would spend a few minutes, staring out at the stars, silently promising whoever, whatever, was out there, that if they would only give her back Chakotay, her First Officer, her love, her life, that she would tell him how she felt about him.
She visited him in sickbay on his return. She watched him from the door, counting the breaths he took, watching the slow rise and fall of the sheet draped over him. He was so still, so motionless. The Doctor had told her he would recover, but right now, she just needed to watch him.
She went over to him, and pulled up a chair. Resting her hands on his chest, she lowered her head to rest her cheek over his heart. The steady thud reassured her. She lay for a few stolen minutes, reveling in the warm yeasty smell of him, the soft skin over firm muscles and the shallow breaths he took that confirmed he lived.
"Captain." The Doctor's nasally tones interrupted her. "If you will move for a moment, I need to attend to the Commander."
Slowly she raised her head, and looked at the Doctor. The hologram regarded her, a slight curl to one corner of his mouth, a knowing light in his eyes. In that moment, she knew she could not tell Chakotay how she felt. To do so would leave her at the mercy of her crew. Respect, hard won, would be lost. She would be weakened in their eyes.
She left without a word.
Chakotay made a full recovery, just as the Doctor had predicted. She watched him, and once or twice came close to admitting how lost and bereft she had been without him and what it had meant to her to get him back. But the memory of the Doctor's knowing eyes held her tongue and she remained silent.
She couldn't tell Chakotay how she felt, but she could tell his holographic image.
She went to holodeck two, updated the files with the ship's log and Chakotay's personal log and launched the program.
The hologram turned towards her. "Kathryn." He smiled, that warm Chakotay smile, one that reached his eyes, crinkling their corners, a smile just for her.
It was her undoing. The control she had striven to maintain shattered, and she crossed the room to him, wrapping her arms around his waist, resting her head on his chest.
His arms rose and wrapped themselves around her, holding her close. "Kathryn?" This time the caramel-voice was worried. "What's wrong?"
The tears in her eyes threatened to spill. "Nothing," her voice quivered slightly. "I'm just happy to have you back. I missed you."
"I'm here with you." He rocked her like a child.
"I know. I just thought you might have gone and left me. We couldn't find you on the planet, couldn't read your life signs."
He was silent, absorbing her words. "Kathryn?" His voice was cautious, "You know I would never willingly leave you."
She raised her head to look at him. So easy to believe this was the real Chakotay. "I've never told you how much I would miss you if anything happened to you."
A gentle hand rose to stroke her disarranged hair. "I know, Kathryn. Believe me, I know."
She snaked a hand up to touch his face, without violation, it stole around the back of his neck, bringing his face down to hers. Gently she touched her lips to the hologram's, reveling in the new connection.
He shuddered and his arms enclosed her more tightly. His lips started to move, drawing her deeper and trying to part her lips with his tongue.
"No, Chakotay." With an effort she drew back, and stepped out of his arms, putting distance between them. "Nothing's changed. Not like that."
"Then why did you kiss me?" His face was dark with incomprehension.
"I was upset. I missed you." She took a deep breath. "I love you. And I can never tell you. Not the real you."
She realized her mistake instantly, but the hologram didn't seem to notice her slip. "Kathryn…" His voice was trembling. "I love you too."
He stepped towards her again, catching her to his chest. She allowed the embrace, reveling in the broad chest against her cheek.
"This doesn't change anything," she said into his uniform jacket. "We can't be lovers or even close to it. Not on this ship. Not in the Delta Quadrant."
"I know," he said. "But for now it's enough to know that you care."
Command decisions. A command team divided by an action. Her action, which when the violent haze of irrationality and hatred had lifted, she acknowledged to herself as morally and logically wrong. The Equinox was gone, Captain Ransome was dead, and once more she was combining two crews, potentially inflammable crews into one that had to work together without reservation to survive.
This time was almost harder than with the Maquis. Although she felt the guilt that it was her actions alone that had caused the situation, this time she had no justification to rationalize the situation. With the Maquis crew, she had Chakotay at her side, easing the transition, supporting her. With the Equinox crew, he withdrew and let her figure it out for herself.
She reacted defensively, letting her guilt overflow into aggression against the hapless Equinox crewmen. No rank, she busted them all down to crewmen. She let them know in no uncertain terms that they had to prove themselves to her. She was frosty to them, and they were cool to her on the few occasions that their paths crossed, preferring to seek out Chakotay to address the few issues they brought up. She sensed the restraint amongst the senior staff, but no-one knew of her unpardonable actions against Noah Lessing, no-one except Noah himself, Chakotay and her own conscience. Noah she could avoid, but Chakotay and her own thoughts were inescapable.
Their friendship was strained, he was cool and in retaliation she was cooler. She missed her friend, but she also missed her command partner.
The spiral downwards, once started seemed inescapable. She didn't know what she could do to bridge the gap between her and Chakotay. Tuvok noticed, and spoke to her about it, cautioning her not to let her personal feelings for Chakotay interfere with command of the ship. She wondered if he had spoken to Chakotay too, or if he knew that the fault was hers alone.
When she could stand it no more, and the chasm between them seemed unbridgeable, she went to holodeck two. Once again she updated the hologram's records and started the program.
She waited, behind her desk, fists pressed to the cool surface, waiting for the hologram to acknowledge her. Its silence scared her more than anything else. The parameters were still in place that suppressed any subterfuge on its part, here in the holodeck was the raw emotion she couldn't get from the real Chakotay.
When she could stand it no longer, she spoke. "Chakotay. Please, help me overcome this."
"Overcome what? " His face was an unreadable mask. "You did what you thought was best."
"I was wrong." She spoke the truth baldly, saying the words she couldn't bring herself to admit in reality.
He turned to face her and advanced towards her slowly, spitting words like nails through tight lips. "You were wrong. Fine. Want to tell me what part of that fiasco you consider to be wrong? Was it alright to blow up Ransome's ship but wrong to attempt to murder Noah Lessing? Or was that an acceptable part of a Captain's duty? Was it wrong to pursue your own narrow-minded vengeance to the danger and detriment of your crew?"
She gasped, a small sound that he noticed.
He half smiled. "Yes, Kathryn. Your crew, not our crew. You like to use the term, 'our crew' when it suits you, but it's not really 'our crew' when all is said and done."
She sank into the chair behind the ready room desk. "It is our crew."
"Really? I don't think so. Not at times like this. That peacock display of power was purely yours, Captain. I had no part in it, except to restrain you when you would have murdered an innocent man."
She was shaking with the truth of his words. "What can I do?" She whispered the words quietly. "I am asking you to help me. I don't want to become what you say I already am. I need you to help me."
He leaned over the desk towards her, and in the face of her fragility, his whole demeanor softened. "Kathryn." Her name, spoken softly carried a wealth of feeling. In that moment, she sensed that underneath his contempt, his unwillingness to trust her wholeheartedly again, and his simmering anger, that he wanted to rebuild the crumbling bridges of command and friendship once more.
"All you have to do is let Kathryn out. Don't let the Captain take over. You can be a woman and command, that is your strength. You need to admit weakness to be strong. Say you're sorry. Talk to Crewman Lessing. Talk to me. Let me in and let me support you. Tell me how you feel, what drove you to this. We can work it out."
She was shaken by his total support.
"You've done the hard part already," he said. "You've asked me for help. You have it."
She stood, and extended a trembling hand towards him. "Thank you," she said. "I thought I'd lost you."
He encased her hand in his, warm, and solid the photonic shape radiated the concern, support and love she had come to depend on from the Chakotay of old. Once again she had the answer to her dilemma. Talk to the real Chakotay like this, and he would once again give her his unquestioning support.
"I'm always here for you, Kathryn," he said.
She activated Seven's program the next day. With a twist of her mouth, she noted the off-duty casual clothing and the way the hologram's face lit up as it entered the quarters. Then he paused, puzzled.
"Kathryn?" His voice was curious. "Where's Seven?"
Kathryn sat on the couch and patted the cushions next to her. Chakotay sat, still studying her.
"She's not here. In fact, Chakotay, I don't think she'll be seeing you again, at least not in this setting." A wave of her hand encompassed the sterile quarters.
"Did you scare her away?" His tone was light, but Kathryn sensed the undercurrents. Did you stake your claim on something you never have any intention of claiming, Kathryn? Can you really not bear the thought of me with someone else?
"Not exactly." Kathryn hesitated. "But she was doing something wrong by being here, Chakotay. I can't expect you to understand,"
Not when you don't know you're only a hologram, she amended wryly to herself.
His open face was confused. "No. I don't understand. Seven and I were enjoying each other, I thought we were developing something meaningful. Why are you here, Kathryn?"
"Chakotay, Seven was living a fantasy with you." She picked her words carefully. "In here, with you, she was pretending to be something that she is not."
"No," Chakotay's voice took on a tinge of anger. "With me, here, she was more relaxed, more approachable than I've ever seen her. She was her real self. She cares for me. I care for her."
She interrupted him, holding up a hand. "Wait. Hear me out. Here, she doesn't have Borg implants does she?"
He nodded.
"Tell me what she looked like on the bridge this morning."
"She had implants. No uniform. Her hair was up." He looked at her wonderingly. "Why didn't I see that?"
"It's not your fault, Chakotay. She has… tampered with the settings here so that you would only see what she wanted you to see."
He stood and paced. "But when we made love, she…" He tailed off uncertainly, maybe realizing just what he had said and to whom. "Kathryn, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say that."
Although his words gave her a momentary twist of pain, they also gave her the opening she needed. "Why not? That's what friends are for isn't it? To talk to each other about things that are important to them, to share, support, comfort and share the happy times. Seven made you happy, I hope you can share your happiness with me."
He looked uncertain. "Yes, but…"
"But what, Chakotay?"
"I thought you might be upset. That once again, I've taken a lover."
"Why would you think that?" She watched his reaction.
He hesitated a moment then plunged ahead. "Because you know I love you, yet I keep taking other lovers."
Her mouth twisted up. "You don't keep taking them, Chakotay. You've had, what three lovers since we've been in the Delta Quadrant? That nearly makes you a monk."
"Five," he said.
She was surprised and suppressed insidious thoughts as to which crewmembers had lain with him. That sort of speculation would get her nowhere.
"Five then," she agreed. "That hardly makes you promiscuous."
"They are five lovers I wouldn't have taken if I had you."
There. He had said it. The words hung in the open, shimmering in the air between them. It's a hologram, she reminded herself. It's not really Chakotay, only a hologram. But it was a hologram with Chakotay's feelings and memories. A hologram that was painfully honest. She swallowed against the lump in her throat. The question she needed to ask was lodged somewhere in her gullet, an immovable block of words, too long suppressed for them to flow easily now, when she wanted them to.
When Seven had spoken freely to her in her ready room after the reprimand, her words had made her stop and think. In a secret folded corner of her mind, she had always assumed that Chakotay and she would find a way to be together. In the Alpha Quadrant maybe, but certainly at sometime, maybe at some point in time when the perspective of home had shifted to Voyager, wherever in space she may be. Seven's assertion that she had easily shifted the holo-Chakotay's romantic focus had made her reassess, and those dispassionate words had achieved what seven years of friendship and love with Chakotay had never achieved.
She realized that she did not have unlimited time, realized that she wanted happiness for herself as well as her crew. And she was damn well not going to lose Chakotay to Seven.
The hologram was looking at her, his face smooth, but his eyes reflecting his uncertainty of her reaction.
"Chakotay, do you still want me, or now will you choose Seven?"
She had surprised him with the question, she realized. He must be used to having his feelings ignored, his needs thrown back in his face unmet.
"Do I really have a choice?" He studied her carefully.
"Yes," she said. "You do."
He smiled and gave her the answer she had hoped for.
She left the holodeck and went to her quarters to change. The holo-Chakotay had never let her down in the past, she hoped that its integrity still held true. Fancifully, she thought that the answer she had just received meant more to her than any of the previous questions she had asked. Her oracle, the hologram. She chuckled to herself. Good thing the Doctor didn't know about it.
She checked Chakotay's whereabouts with the computer, and was pleased to find him in his quarters, alone. She changed into a soft green dress and replicated a bottle of wine. Then she walked the few paces down the corridor to begin her new life.
He answered the door with a smile. "Kathryn! Come in. What can I do for you?"
He took the wine in one hand, her hand in the other and led her further into the room. "Did I forget a dinner we had scheduled?"
"No," she said. "I just wanted to talk to you, about something."
"Oh? Sounds intriguing. What has Neelix done this time?"
"Not Neelix," she said. "Not any of our crew. This is about you and me." She had already decided not to mention Seven and the holoprogram. She would let Seven keep some small measure of dignity.
Something in her voice must have alerted him, as his hands stilled on the corkscrew. He met her eyes. "Am I going to like this? Or do I need something stronger than wine?"
She walked over to him. "I hope you're going to like this." The confidence she had found earlier, instilled by the hologram, faltered momentarily.
He sensed her hesitation and took her hand. "Kathryn. Talk to me."
His warm hand gave her the confidence she needed. "Chakotay, are you happy with our relationship the way it is? Do you ever want more?" She waited, relaxed, letting her face reveal her emotions, long hidden.
"You know I do," he said.
"What do you want? Tell me," she urged him when it seemed he would hesitate.
"Honestly?" he said, "or am I laying myself open for more disappointment?"
"I don't think so," she said. "Just tell me."
He searched her face one more time yet still he hesitated. She didn't blame him, after all, for years she had skirted this topic, deftly steered the conversation into safer channels if it ever threatened to rear its head and upset their carefully balanced tightrope. Now she was asking him to speak the forbidden. She knew she had to take the initiative, but it was hard, oh so hard. Why were difficult command decisions so easy, yet this laying bare of the heart so gut-wrenchingly difficult?
"Let me tell you instead," she said. 'I love you."
The catch of air in his throat as he hissed an indrawn breath was the only sound in the room.
She waited. Waited for him to return the words to her, for him to enfold her in his arms. He did neither. Instead he stood. She noticed a faint tremor in his hands as he extended a hand to her, and pulled her to her feet. He grasped her hand so tight that she could feel the bones grinding together. Still he hesitated.
Putting all her trust in his holographic reaction earlier, she leaned into him, sliding her hands around his solid body. "Chakotay," she said. "I love you."
He cried then, sliding to his knees in front of her, burying his head in her breasts like a child, wrapping his arms tightly around her waist. She rocked him, stroking the dark head pressed against her, feeling tears sliding down her own cheeks at his reaction. She dropped to her knees in front of him, and taking his beloved face in both hands, she kissed the tears that slid from his eyes, kissed his forehead, and finally, gently, sweetly and softly, kissed his lips.
He clutched her to him. "I love you," he said. "Spirits, how I love you."
She cried then in poignant relief and it was his turn to hold and soothe her. Eventually they both stilled, realizing simultaneously, that they were lying on the floor, clutching the other compulsively. Chakotay propped himself on an elbow and looked down at her, lying partially underneath him. He traced her upturned mouth with gentle fingers.
"Dare I ask," he said, "what happens next?"
"Ask away," she replied, smiling into his fingers.
"Will you stay with me tonight? Will you be here in the morning? Will you let me make love with you? And will you let me keep on loving you?"
"Is that all?" Her hands were tracing patterns on his chest, over his uniform.
"Will you grow old with me?" He asked the question quietly.
"A promise, Chakotay," she whispered. "I will grow old, gray, flabby and wrinkled with you. And I will never willingly spend a night apart from you. Starting tonight."
He kissed her then, sweeping her underneath him with a flamboyant gesture, taking her lips with an assuredness that was so different from his earlier hesitation. His lips parted hers, his tongue swept into her mouth, seeking out the soft moist corners with a thoroughness that left her reeling. She clutched his shoulders and kissed him back, laying out her heart for him to take.
They kissed for a long time, just lying together on the carpet under the viewport. She had never before realized exactly how much could be conveyed in such a simple gesture. How the meeting of lips could signify safety, passion, love and friendship all in a single touch. He raised up from her often, propping himself up on an elbow just to see her face. She touched his lips, his cheek, the crinkles at the corners of his eyes, reveled in the freedom of touch. And the sweet fingers of touch increased the need and the want.
"Will you stay with me tonight?" He whispered the words softly to her, even as his fingers ran around her collarbone, seeking lower with firelight touch across the swell of her breast.
"Tonight and every night," she vowed and let him draw her up onto unsteady feet and then lead her to his bed.
She let him undress her with uncharacteristic passivity, lifting her arms like a child so that he could remove her dress over her head. Having made the decision to let him fully into her life, she was content to let him lead as he took them to the next stage. She watched his face, watched the love in his eyes darken to passion as he studied her body, her pale skin and slender shape clad only in the dark strips of her underwear.
Chakotay bent his head, kissing the corner of her mouth, nibbling his way down the side of her neck. He lowered her to his bed, then swiftly stripped off his clothes, returning to her dressed only in his black briefs. She studied his golden body, much as he had studied hers earlier, committing to memory the lines and planes of him, reaching with questing fingers to his chest storing the tactile memories along with the visual. He was hot under her fingers, his skin burning and smooth.
He pushed her over onto her back and straddled her, his weight resting lightly on her thighs. He flicked open the catch of her front fastening bra and pulled it away from her body. His hands ran lightly up her sides to cover her breasts, his thumbs rubbing lightly over her nipples.
She watched him under lowered lids, and reached out her hands to his strong thighs, running her fingers over the hard surface of them, tickling the sparse dark hairs that covered him. He was hard. The cotton briefs left nothing to the imagination, outlining his thick length in the clinging material.
He shifted again, groaning softly as her hands crept up his thighs, and moved so that he lay next to her, his mouth descending to her breast. The touch of his wet mouth on her nipple brought her shuddering out of her passivity and she turned to him, pushing her breast further into his mouth, wrapping a leg around him to bring their lower bodies shockingly together. He swelled against her sex, she was very aware of the solid bulge of him against her body, sending ripples of sensation deep into her belly. She grasped his buttocks, raising her leg higher around him, pulling him tighter against her body as he laved and tongued her nipple. She held his head to her, fingers woven through the softness of his hair, letting her body float away on a nebulous cloud of sensation. His hair under her hand, his skin silky hot under her fingers. The soft cotton sheets under her back were redolent with the musky-sleep smell of him. The rasp of the hairs on his leg as he dragged it up, over her thighs and the swollen weight of his sex, pressing against her core had her electric with wanting.
He was intent on her breast, suckling like an infant, then licking, nipping and laving her breast into a turgid tender peak. His other hand walked its way down, over her ribs, around her navel, down to the waist of her panties, stretched taut over jutting hipbones. He pushed his fingers lower, through the downy curls that covered her, before curling up, stroking and slipping into her slick-oil heat.
Her orgasm started to build with the first stroke of his fingers. His touch. Through the white hot heat-haze consuming her, she knew exactly who was touching her so intimately and with such love. The knowledge that the past seven years of friendship, intimacy, anger, and tenderness were building to this overwhelmed her, and it all came together, the thoughts in her mind and his fingers on her body, pushing her over the edge. She grasped his hair as she came hard, shuddering underneath him.
He raised himself from her breast to kiss her, gently moving strands of sweaty red hair off her face. "Kathryn," he said, the timbre of his voice telling her more than his words, "I love you."
"Then love me now," she said, "love me completely." She ran her hand over his hip, struggling to lower his pants over the swollen ridge of his erection.
He groaned slightly as her fingers brushed the tip of him, and helped her remove his pants, his hands returning to grasp panties and pull them down and away from her.
She wanted to taste him, but his trembling told her he was close to the limits of his control. He moved over on top of her, one finger sliding once again into her slick, hot folds before he positioned himself on top of her.
She arched up, into his body as he slid inside her, the feel of penetration and fullness doubly satisfying, with the knowledge that it was him making love to her. Chakotay sheathing himself in her body, Chakotay moving slowly and intensely, his eyes on her face, showing her openly how much she meant to him.
His cadence was sure and rhythmic, his thrusts steady and deep as he moved within her. He was silent, watching her face as she gasped and moaned underneath him. She felt herself move towards another implosion, and he was right there with her. His thrusts became harder, fiercer as he moved faster, sliding in and out of her with ease.
"Oh, Kathryn…" The groan was torn from the back of his throat as he fell forward on top of her, his face in her neck as he spasmed and emptied himself deep within her. She clenched quietly around him, feeling him pulse and spill himself, the wetness of the two of them together mingling slickly on her thighs.
She lay with him on top of her, his mouth moving silently against her neck, his back wet under her hand. The room was quiet, the only sound the muted thrum of the ships engines, moving them ever closer to home. To Earth.
Her hands tightened on her lover. The perspective of home had shifted in the last few hours, now, home was truly where the heart was. She felt him raise himself up, his hand caressing her face as he moved off her and rolled to his side, pulling her tightly to his body.
She moved closer to him, dropping her head to rest on his chest.
She thought that in the morning she would delete his hologram.
Feedback? Please. Shayenne
© Shayenne, April 2001 Please email me to post/distribute elsewhere.