TEMPUS OMNIA REVELAT

(Time reveals all things)

CHAPTER ONE

You can stare at a face for hours and only ever see what there is to be seen by the eye. You see nothing more, nothing less than that which the naked eye beholds.

But there are other faces we see, faces that sometimes only the one person sees, no one else, and that is because the person looking wants to see more.

Such are the complexities of life that one person will see immediately what another will never see despite years of looking.  But then, these things are always so when the eye is acting as the agent of the heart.

And so it had been for Captain Chakotay, almost from the minute he had set eyes upon Kathryn Janeway.  Damn her!  The irritating persistence of that woman who had pursued him half way across the Alpha Quadrant, into the Badlands and beyond into the Delta Quadrant.  He had only wanted escape, had only wanted freedom to pursue his noble retribution against those who threatened his people, family and friends, but she had shown no mercy and pursued him with the tenacious tracking skills of his long dead ancestors.

He had tried to rid himself of her.

He thought back on how he would have had no second thoughts in blowing her out of the space she and her ship occupied had he been given half the chance, such was the intense anger he felt towards the Federation.  But that chance had never come, and instead, a whole incredible saga had opened out for both their crews, taking them all down the most incredible, dangerous, challenging, wonderful adventures of their lives – times that no one could ever have predicted.

And over time, he had learned to trust her, more than he had ever trusted anyone in his entire life.   And whilst he was learning to trust the brave, unassailable, sometimes invincibly strong woman, he had found that part of him, that which his father had defined as the spiritual soul, being drawn towards her like a magnet.  The rapidity of the growing bond had initially unsettled him, such was its ferocity of emotion.  But as he grew used to it and learned to trust his feelings, with that bond of deep friendship had come the most subtle and skilful understanding of the woman he had called Captain.

He had once harboured a deep desire that one day, Kathryn Janeway would fall in love with him and return the feelings he held for her but that he now knew would never be.  ‘New Earth’ had been the first real indication that there was no reciprocation of feelings.  And as time had progressed, whilst the friendship had grown and deepened, he became aware that whatever it was Kathryn was looking for in a life partner, he simply did not possess it.  Neither had Mark, even though the Captain had not realised that until she received the ‘Dear John’ message.  That letter had been the impetus that gave her the freedom to suddenly see that which she desperately needed, and right in front of her nose.

Chakotay fidgeted with the metal badge on his collar, the badge that denoted his acting rank.  He hated it!  It didn’t belong there, the crew knew it didn’t belong there, and he didn’t want it there.  But everyone acknowledged that someone had to be the captain of this star ship and the responsibility now rested uneasily on his shoulders.  He had waited as long as possible before accepting this heavy burden.  What irony, that a Marquis renegade would assume such a role, rise to such a challenge.  Star Fleet would be turning in their proverbial grave.

His heart ached for Kathryn.  He missed this woman like he would miss a part of himself - a leg, an arm.  He had lost something irreplaceable; something so keenly remembered and once loved.  He was incomplete without her presence.

He could still hear her voice, smell her scent, and feel the light touch of her tactile fingers on his shoulder, like a ghost walking the ship.  She had not loved him but he would never completely learn to ‘unlove’ her, some remnant of his affection would always survive, like that first adolescent, youthful kiss.

How could he ever give the order for Voyager to move on and continue the journey to Earth?  Yet, how could he continue to expect the crew to stay in this area of space, looking for a trail that had long since gone cold?  Chakotay could hear her voice in his head, the warm resonating tones giving sage advice and telling him that there was a time when you simply had to move forward.  Even now, she pursued him! 

Captain Janeway had disappeared during a planet-side expedition, from an environment all senior officers had assumed harmless, safe – and still did.  Four months later and no leads, no trace.  The crew, all the crew, were beginning to accept that they might never find the Captain, that perhaps she was lost forever, perhaps even dead.

But they had looked!  Not a particle of stardust had gone unturned, not a star left unstudied, not a grid of space not inspected and then re-inspected.  Nothing!  The crew had not rested, neither Marquis nor Starfleet, in the vigil to find their missing crewmember, and it showed in their faces.  The stressed, emotionally drained and haunted looks of failure. 

He turned his head as he sat in the Captain’s chair on Voyager’s bridge, and gazed at Seven of Nine who was working at a console.  They had become good friends in the months since the Captain’s disappearance.

The tragic loss of Kathryn Janeway was written all over Seven’s pale features, her eyes consumed by grief and guilt.  This was the woman who had completely captured Kathryn’s heart.  It had taken him a while to acknowledge this but he was no fool and could recognise true love when he saw it, even if Janeway had been slow – dense - in accepting the blindingly obvious.  So he had silently stepped aside to allow that love, between two headstrong women, to run its tumultuous, turbulent course towards the inevitable. The tragedy was that time had robbed both women of the ecstasy of that never-to-be completed journey.   

He heard her report to him. that her job was complete and she was returning to astrometrics.  He acknowledged her with a nod but had seen the pain stir in her eyes as she had addressed him as ‘Captain’. 

Poor Seven.  When the Captain had just disappeared into thin air during a routine beam-up from the planet’s surface all those months ago, and the time since, every crewmember had suffered the loss.  But Seven, then still very alone and emotionally incapable of expressing herself or reaching out for comfort, had very nearly died of despair.  This was no exaggeration.  Somehow though, good had been borne of bad, and through the patient nurturing of Neelix, Paris, himself and surprisingly B’Elanna, their compassionate ministerings had turned the young woman around and helped her make sense of the multitude of emotions she was to experience.

The outcome had been a further impressive step towards the woman Janeway had instinctively known could exist.  Enter a warm, compassionate, sensitive young female with so much to offer life.  But the loss had also ripped Seven inside out and left its dark, tall shadow over her.  Here you sensed, and would always sense, a tragic sorrow pulsing within her.  Seven would move on but bare the scars forever.

‘Forever,’ thought Chakotay.  Did he really now accept that the Captain was gone?  Gone for good?  Please, immortal spirits, no.  As of one hour ago, there was some apparent hope on the horizon, but these past months had taught him to no longer breed hope in his heart.  Previous expeditions into those waters had delivered too many false and empty promises. He acknowledged that this was the last chance, and if it failed, then the search was over – it had to be.

Chakotay’s train of thought was interrupted by Tuvok, standing resolutely at the station behind him.

“Captain, the Novena vessel is within range and the ambassador is requesting to come aboard.  What are your instructions?”  Tuvok’s voice was calm, controlled and Chakotay found some comfort in its emotionless timbre, even though he knew it belied the Vulcan’s own unseen frustrations concerning the loss of the Captain, his friend.

“Request granted.  Show him to the Briefing Room, I’ll meet you there shortly.”

Tuvok acknowledged the order and left but Chakotay sat a while longer, needing the time to mentally prepare himself. He flexed his hands in front of him, big ‘bear’ hands that were powerful and strong.  His father had always said he had the hands of a boxer, wide across the knuckles and with the athletic reflexes to knock his opponents to the ground.  Spirits, he wanted to knock someone, anyone to the ground right now!  Such was his frustration.  He felt so powerless to do anything, to find the missing woman.  He momentarily wondered whether, if it had been him that was lost, would Kathryn have had more success in tracking him down?

Negative thoughts!  Don’t go there.  Think positive, think like a captain!

He rose from his chair.

*****

Ambassador Silus was a tall, thin, elegant man who possessed an aura about him that oozed diplomat.  Here, one sensed a man of peace as he sat silently, unmoving in front of the also seated Captain Chakotay, only allowing his eyes to wander to the other two occupants in the room who stood, a dark haired woman who had a propensity for displaying an impressive and volatile temper, and a tall, thin, dark haired man with an equally impressive calm, analytical and composed nature.

The man called Chakotay breathed deeply into his hands that were steepled before his face.  He closed his eyes and momentarily rested his forehead on the tips of those fingers.

Silus felt the tension, “I have no hidden agenda, Captain.  I speak only the truth.”

Chakotay, with minimal movement, raised his head and fixed his eyes hard on Silus’s.

“The Sung Ti,” Chakotay stated, his voice sounding tired and irritable.

Silus’s attention was quickly diverted to the tall, dark haired man to his right.

“Based on the ambassador’s information, it would appear that when we went to the aid of the Brada Merchant vessel, we were engaging the Sung Ti.”

Almost as if he hadn’t heard Tuvok, Chakotay sought clarification from the Ambassador.  “You’re telling me that an incident that occurred over seven months ago is the cause of the Captain’s disappearance?”

“That is what I am telling you, Captain.”  His stilted tone of phrase and low voice could not betray the natural vocal power.  Silus leaned forward.  “You see, your noble act in giving protection to an unarmed vessel being fired upon by three Sung Ti vessels, though admirable to my people, would not have been viewed as such by the Sung nation.”

“Especially when we blasted one of their ship’s into neutron dust!” B’Elanna cut in.

“Indeed. And especially when that destroyed vessel contained two members of the Regent’s family.”  Silus voice dropped lower, the delivery slow.

“It was an accident.” Chakotay’s voice cut in hard.  He hadn’t liked Torres’s unfortunate response, it had come over as arrogant and flippant.  Not how he knew she felt.  “We had targeted their deflector emitters but there had to have been a leak in their propulsion system because the ship just exploded.”

“I don’t doubt you, Captain but you made a grave enemy that day.  You allowed the other two vessels to escape and they would have been quite detailed in their feedback to the Regent.”

“You’re saying they’re responsible for the Captain’s disappearance …some form of retribution?”  Torres could barely contain her anger. 

Silus noted the anger in the woman but did not take it personally, more, he understood its nature.

“In part, yes.  You destroyed their ship, you killed..”  he raised his hand to stop B’Elanna’s objection to the word ‘killed’,  “.. in their eyes, an entire crew, you spilt Regency blood.  You also attacked their honour with such destruction, showed they could be defeated, suggested they are weak.  I regret that I am in no doubt that they captured your Captain.”  The last sentence was said emphatically and with some passion.

“And have done what with her?” Chakotay wanted answers now.

Silus frowned, averting his eyes to the ground where he studied the detailed fleck in the floor covering around his feet.

“Captain..” His response was hesitant, guarded.  “This is, of course, all speculation because I have no objective evidence that this is what has happened to your Captain but the patterns are there.  This is what the Sung Ti do.”  Silus was about to continue when two voices rang out at the same time, throwing him questions.

“What have they done to her, where would they have taken her?”  Emotional questions, borne out of impatience, concern, desperation.  Chakotay could feel his patience and control slipping.

“Who are the Sung Ti?”  An analytical, probing mind trying to assess all the data to formulate answers.  The voice of the man, Tuvok.

Silus raised his hands to calm them.  “I will answer every one of your questions.”

He paused and turned to the Captain.  “Captain, if I am right, your Captain was taken to Krasus, home planet of the Sung Ti Empire where she would have been imprisoned in the Marchant holding units, and subjected to interrogation.”

“Would have been?  You mean they will have moved her?”  Torres’s eyes narrowed.

Silus’s noble features registered discomfort.  “Not quite. The Sung Ti are a warring, aggressive people whose Regent is a tyrant and whose acts of cruelty and subjugation of his own people are notorious.  His prisons are full to overflowing with political, military prisoners, those who have dared to speak out against his regime, or attempted to usurp, to overthrow him.”

Silus hesitated, almost as if he didn’t want to continue but then changed his mind.

All three Voyager eyes were on him, emotions hanging so heavy in the air, it was almost tangible.  Perhaps time for truth, although it would be painful for them.

“You need to know that he does not treat his enemies well, and those that enter his prisons seldom leave them unless dead or so broken in spirit, he can use them as propaganda tools.”

Torres visibly blanched at the words ‘broken in spirit’, her mind suddenly going off at a tangent, thinking demon thoughts that needed no airing.

Silus instinctively knew the affect of his words,  “Forgive me for my harsh words but I know the Sung Ti too well.  Your Captain would have been subjected to great unpleasantness.  Four months their captive?  She will not have survived.  If, by some miracle she has, she will not be the person you knew but some broken image of her former self.”

He drew breath and paused.  “They take their prisoners and break their spirits, their very souls.  They strip them of their history, their clothes, their home, their loved ones – all that was familiar and would hold a sense of attachment, of strength, of freedom.  They are beaten, drugged, forcibly robbed of their sleep to an extent that they become crazed with pain and fear.  Those prisoners whom we have rescued in the past, they are no longer our colleagues, friends, lovers .. they are wild, insane, crazy people who we have to lock up for their own .. and our safety.”

Silus’s voice became deeper, his eyes haunted, “I know this, my brother was once one of their captives.  I pray that your Captain died quickly.  To believe anything less would be ..”  Silus dipped his head and didn’t finish the sentence.

Tuvok broke the uneasy silence that permeated the room.  “Why are you telling us this?  Why now, when you will have been aware of our presence in this sector of space for some time?”

Silus smiled sadly.  “A good question.  Perhaps it is because you have stirred something in my people .. something called conscience and honour, a need to do the right thing and not for profit.”  He seemed suddenly very small, his thoughts far away from the room in which he sat.

“You helped the Brada when you could simply have ignored the problem and continued on your journey.  This area of space is not accustomed to people who do things for no monetary gain.  You see, my people are merchants. We trade.  That is what we are good at and it is what we have always done.  And we will trade with anyone for the right price.”

“Even the Sung Ti!” Torres’s spat.  She didn’t like this man.  She sensed an agenda, an ulterior motive for his coming here at such a late stage.

“Especially the Sung Ti.”  He met her eyes forcefully. “You don’t have to like a good payer!” 

Continuing, “I suppose technologically, all the planets within this sector, including Krasus, are all roughly at the same developmental stage.  But whilst the majority of planets are peaceful, though not always open to other cultures, there is this link between us based on trade, entrepreneurial business and commerce.  But the Krasus have always been different, given to excessive hostile and aggressive behaviour.”

Silus held the three officers attention.

“However, somewhere over the centuries, an acceptable co-existence developed.  They would leave us alone as long as we traded with them and shared any scientific developments .. for a price that is.”

“But they attacked an unarmed merchant vessel?”  Chakotay’s voice interrupted.

“Hmmn.  Yes they did and that is another reason why I am here.  The Brada are good, harmless people and they have always been fair traders.  On Krasus, the current Regent replaced his stable uncle who died some years ago, and whilst he is childless, there are members of his family who have, over the last few years, begun to disturb the acceptable co-existence between our worlds.  Of late, our ships have been attacked, our merchandise stolen, our traders captured and tortured…”

Torres spat “Right!  You want us on your side so you can even up the odds, eh?”  So this was what all this is about!

Silus turned and locked eyes with her. In a very even, cold tone “You have a very suspicious nature.  I question what it is in your past that would want to judge me with such negative vim before I have given you any cause or action to justify such a decision.”

“Your tardiness in coming forward says a lot!” she justified.

He wisely acquiesced.  “Yes, we are guilty of that.  But we are here now and hope to make amends in some way.”

“What way?”  Again Chakotay questioned.

“There is an alliance between the Volta, Brada and Novenian people, who have all suffered heavy losses of late by the hand of the Sung Ti.  We are, as I speak, about to initiate acts of infiltration upon the Sung Ti Empire.”

“War?”  Tuvok queried.

“I prefer to call it controlled agitation.  There is growing resistance on Krasus by its own people who wish to overthrow the current Regent and his cruel totalitarian regime. The alliance merely wishes to help the resistance along a little.  Give them back a more stable, safe existence and re-establish a better climate for trading again.  Put back the balance, the equilibrium, as it were.”

“And you need our help?”  Chakotay was beginning to think like Torres.

“No.”  Silus shook his head forcefully.  “I wish you only to delay any imminent departure you may have been contemplating.”

“Your reasons?”  The dry, unemotional Tuvok took the words right out of Captain Chakotay’s mouth.

“We are attacking the Marchant holding units.  If your Captain was imprisoned there, her body will still be there, kept for ..”  Silus was again agitated, “.. display purposes. Nothing deters a potential aggressor more, nor hinders their aggression, than seeing what their opponents do to their captives.  Makes the foe think twice.”

“What if she is alive?”  Torres’s voice was now quiet, apprehensive, her mind frightened to contemplate thoughts that Silus had planted there earlier.

Silus sighed.  “Well then, we will find her and will return her to you.  Either way, dead or alive, if we find her, we will return her to your ship.  You will wait?”

Chakotay nodded.  “What if you aren’t successful .. with your controlled agitation?”

Silus just smiled knowingly.  “Never sell your enemy the very best that you have.  Always retain something up the sleeve!   We will be successful, Captain.”

*****

“I walked a mile with Pleasure;  She chattered all the way

But left me none the wiser for all she had to say

I walked a mile with Sorrow and ne’er a word said she;

But oh, the things I learned from her,

When Sorrow walked with me!”

Seven finished analysing the data, saved the work then closed the file.  She was done for today, having already worked well into the next shift.  But now she would work no more.  Now the time was hers to do with as she wished and she simply chose to stand and gaze up at the screen in astrometrics, letting her mind drift back to events that had so changed her, so forced her to come to painful terms with her humanity.

The loss of Captain Kathryn Janeway had quite simply, and quite unexpectedly, ripped her apart. 

Seven could never again be seen as the apparent unemotional, arrogant woman she had been those months ago.  Grief had held her in its hand and squeezed her tight almost until the life’s breath went out of her. Then, at the bleakest moment, she had discovered comfort in those around her.  The crew of Voyager, themselves bereft, had quickly identified how the loss was affecting her, then reached out to her in the most unexpected ways, their compassion and tenderness reminding her so much of the one she had lost.  The almost nostalgic déjà vu allowed her to acknowledge the help they so freely gave and in doing so, welcomed her forever into the human fold.

She felt again what Paris had so rightly termed ‘the lump in the throat’, and sensed the threat of tears returning.  This emotion called ‘grief’ was apparently normal and yet so highly personal a response to loss. Seven analysed her situation. Grief was neither illness nor a pathological condition but a natural process that could lead to healing and personal growth.  Seven grimly smiled at the thought ‘personal growth’.   How proud Captain Janeway would have been of her now, to see how much Seven had grown and adapted to humanity.

Except the Captain wasn’t here to see it!  Seven felt the tears again well up in her eyes, the now familiar stinging sensation returning.

How ironic that it was the Captain’s death and grief, which had given Seven the doorway to all of this.  In such a short time, Seven had experienced a full gambit of emotional data first hand, finding also true friendship with so many crew.  Seven now appreciated Janeway’s sage advice that often you had only to ask for help, that others were ready to reach out but often hesitated for fear of interfering or rejection.

Gentle Chakotay!  He had been there to catch her when Janeway’s loss had caught her totally unprepared, had knocked her off balance and shaken her to the core.  It had all been painful beyond words.  Physically. Emotionally.  She had realised then how fragile and vulnerable she really was, still was.    She was still working her way through the pain … and the immense heavy weight of her guilt.

Guilt.

Seven felt the tears running down her face and glanced away from the astrometrics screen, choosing instead to look at the dull grey interior of the chamber.  The guilt she felt was so heavy, so oppressive.  Would this stay with her until the day she died? Or would the kindly spirits that Chakotay talked of to her in their quiet, shared moments, spare her and show mercy?  Would they eventually let her forget and move on?  Did she want to move on? 

This guilt, borne out of her then, immature, inexperienced ability to understand her own and others feelings, other’s fears, Janeway’s fear, had led her into a quagmire of false loathing and a desire to hurt the Captain, to return the hurt the Captain had so unintentionally done to her.

The incident could have been yesterday, it was so fresh in her mind.  Like a tape replaying, her Borg enhanced eidetic memory began to recall the events.  

She remembered.

*****

The Past

Things had not been ‘quite right’ between Captain Janeway and Seven for some time now, and Seven found this all uncomfortable and unacceptable. Ever since her disconnection with the Borg, the Captain had been a major – the major – part of her new life and now, some years later, things were changing, had changed, and Seven did not like it.

She found herself experiencing strong, disturbing and unsettling emotions which shredded her concentration and occupied her thoughts almost constantly, leaving her feeling ill at ease and unfocused on her primary function as Astrometrics officer.

What was wrong? What was ‘not quite right’?  Seven found the answers to these questions difficult to assess since her developing appreciation of ‘instinct’ was indicating this was a problem to do with human interaction, of deepening personal relationships, not some ordered systematic crises which could be analytically and scientifically diagnosed.   Regardless, it all left Seven in a highly agitated state, unable to identify the direction of how to resolve the problem, and keenly aware that she would have to rely on her less than well-honed human skills.  Yet something did have to be done since the ex Borg recognised that the balance of something had shifted between the two women. 

They still met regularly for games of velocity, they still occasionally got together for philosophical discussions, although on reflection, perhaps these occurrences were less and Janeway now tended to host these chats in her ready room where they were less relaxed and not so informal ... where the Captain was, felt, more in control?   Of course, Seven reasoned, the Captain had been exceptionally busy of late and, more reasoning, she still treated Seven with the same consummate respect both in and out of meetings.

However, Seven could only ascribe that whilst externally, Janeway conducted herself the same towards Seven, the Captain’s internal resonance towards her had altered.  These human behaviours were difficult for Seven to interpret but it felt like the Captain was emotionally backing away from her, becoming more isolated.  And that hurt Seven.  A lot. 

Where once, the petite Captain would have sought out Seven’s company on numerous, often inconsequential matters, almost as if she just needed to be with the younger woman, it was now almost the opposite. Instead of the countless impromptu surprises of the Captain just happening to turn up where Seven might be and to then spend time with her, Seven was now unable to count any such occurrences other than scheduled, routine arrangements.   Seven recognised that the Captain was simply cutting Seven out of her personal existence, as gently as possible, but definitely increasing the distance.  Yes, it hurt.

Seven had, of course, analysed and evaluated reasons for this unwelcome alteration in the Captain’s behaviour and her impressive well-honed analytical skills had suggested only one appropriate, rational hypothesis.  The Captain had developed intimate feelings towards Seven and was now attempting to keep them contained.

Seven had noticed on numerous occasions the subtle biological changes evident in the Captain whenever Seven was near her.  Whilst Seven had recognised them straight away - she had done extensive research into the mating rituals of Tom Paris and B’Elanna Torres - Seven had doubly checked to ensure those biological changes could not be due to other reasons.  The only other valid reason to explain some of the changes, but not all, was that the Captain might have an allergic reaction to Seven.  Insufficient answer.  Improbable.  Why an allergic reaction now and not sooner?  No, Seven’s hypothesis was correct.  Captain Janeway was developing deep and increasingly personal feelings towards her.  Further, Seven could pinpoint an incident where things had come to a head and where directly after, subtle negative changes in Seven’s and the Captain’s relationship began.

Several months ago, Seven had been experimenting with the downloading of high, intensive amounts of data whilst regenerating.  All had gone wrong. Seven’s cortical implant could not handle the excessive amounts of input and she had consequently made serious errors resulting in her allegations that both Chakotay and Janeway where guilty of heinous crimes concerning conspiracies against the general well being of Voyager and its crew in furtherance of their own ends.  Clearly, these accusations had not endeared her to the senior officers.

The outcome had been a very paranoid Seven stealing the Delta Flyer and escaping Voyager, with an equally emotional Janeway in hot pursuit.  This latter piece of information was, in itself, quite important towards the validation of her hypothesis.  Janeway herself had come after her, not some delegated bridge officer.  Curious.  One then had to consider all the other numerous occasions that the Captain had personally stuck her neck out to rescue Seven, beyond that of expected duty and care for a crew person.

Janeway had that day beamed aboard the shuttle and listened to Seven’s paranoid rantings about Janeway being on a mission for the Federation, sent to capture and then exploit Seven, a future defence against the Borg enemy.   Janeway’s face had registered such shock and anguish when contemplating that Seven could think such things of her.  Seven’s words had truly pained the Captain.  When Janeway had gained an opportunity to reply and reason with Seven, her entire body language changed, she had moved as close to Seven as she could do without hitting the force-field, her voice had become quieter, softer, and her beautiful hands had skilfully embellished the points she was so clearly desperate to get across.

And when simple star dates and facts hadn’t quite been enough, something far beyond the required behaviour of a superior to a subordinate had entailed.  What had then occurred had been the older woman laying her emotions on the line with no camouflage.  The Captain had reminded Seven of the bond that had grown between them, reminded her that she had never lied to Seven and had begged her to ‘trust’ her again. 

Seven had lowered the force-field and Captain Janeway had come forward to kneel in front of Seven, her eyes so full of affection .. of love.  The moment had been charged with intimacy, a depth of closeness that had nothing to do with mere friendship and both women had recognised it. Those precious short minutes had been full of words and actions oozing with subtext.  And in the few seconds before the two of them had beamed up, Seven had caught an expression on Janeway’s face, that of dawning recognition that something very strong had developed between them. That awareness had caused the woman’s face to flush, her body temperature to soar. 

Seven had been hyper aware that the Captain had only just resisted reaching out for her before they both disappeared into the transporter beam.  Seven was also strongly aware that her own brief reaction would have shown that the desire was mutual, and she knew that the Captain had registered this.

The arrival in the transporter room had been uncomfortable, with the Captain exiting rapidly and being unable to look at the young woman.

That was where everything had started to go wrong.

And that was why Seven now stood in Captain Janeway’s quarters, having requested an urgent need to talk to her about a serious matter that could not wait.

*****

“What’s wrong, Seven?”  Janeway’s voice was edged with genuine concern.  Seven’s request after their Velocity game had been nervous, full of anxiety and it had been crystal clear to the Captain that this was not just some routine desire for stimulating intellectual discussion.  Seven’s entire body language screamed that something was eating away at the young woman, and badly.  Janeway had immediately put herself into diagnostic/repair mode and reactivated the use of her own quarters to facilitate a more comfortable environment in which to counsel the anxiety- ridden woman on what ever the problem was that had yet to be revealed.  

Standing rigidly in her usual military stance, feet slightly apart, arms and hands locked together behind her back, Seven was however, shaking like a leaf.   “Captain, I must thank you for affording me this time.” 

‘Affording her the time? So formal.  What is going on here and why is Seven so nervous?’  Janeway stood patiently and waited.

“..  to talk to you privately.. in your quarters.”  Hesitantly.  “There is something wrong, very wrong and it is causing me great distress.”

‘Seven is admitting to great distress?  Not good’.

Seven was finding it difficult to look the smaller woman in the eyes.  Janeway picked up on it.  Her hand reached out and touched Seven’s arm, gently running up and down the thin, muscular forearm.  In a calming, soft voice, “Seven, it’s OK.  You’re allowed to breathe!  Take your time and tell me what’s wrong.  You know I’m always here for you.  Let’s sit down shall we?”  Janeway used the words to calm and started guiding Seven towards the couch but Seven resisted.

“I would rather stand, Captain.  I find it .. easier to proceed.”

Janeway removed her hand, whispering, “OK.”  She automatically stepped closer to the ex-Borg, her body empathically leaning forward in support, intimate support. This was not wasted on Seven.   Her eyes found Seven’s, sending out messages of understanding, compassion, that she was ready to listen and there to help.

Seven sighed, her voice tinged with pain.  “Captain, you say you are here for me but this is not correct… anymore. You have been avoiding me lately and I find this  .. distressing and unacceptable.”

The petite, wiry officer interrupted, “Seven, I’m not avoiding you!”  Oh God, is that what this is all about?  And Yes, I have been avoiding her. Talk your way out of this.

“We’ve just played velocity!  Plus you know you are always welcome to come to me when you have problems, just like you have now.”  The last statement was said with emphasis.    It masked the surprise and alarm she felt that the great distress Seven was facing had anything to do with her.  How could she not have realised that Seven would not notice any changes?  Changes as subtle as a sledgehammer!

Janeway’s heartbeat had risen a notch, she felt put on the spot and increasingly uncomfortable. Where might this conversation lead?  Could she contain it and keep it harmless?  Or was this suddenly going to move towards something that she felt very confused about and … absolutely not ready to handle right now.   

The emotional intensity and pain lodged in Seven’s eyes chilled the Captain’s blood.

“Captain, please do not insult me by pretending to ignore what we both know to be the truth.  You have, for the last 1.4 months failed to initiate interactive pursuits with me beyond those which are already routinely established.”  This brought a frown to the Captain’s face.  ‘Flawlessly accurate statement’, Janeway thought.

Seven continued, sad eyes focused on alert ones. “The change in your behaviour corresponds with the incident on the Delta Flyer 1.4 months ago when I attempted to escape Voyager having incorrectly accused you of conspiracy ..”

‘Ah, she thinks I’m harbouring a grudge.  This is good. Containment is possible.’  Janeway felt a fleeting surge of relief.   “Seven, that’s all in the past and I know you weren’t to blame ..”  Janeway interjected.

“Please Captain, I am not finished.  This is not to do with apportioning blame to the actual event.  It is more to do with what was said, and not said, on the shuttle .. what passed between us on that vessel.”

The temporary relief evaporated, Janeway’s false sense of comfort gone as quickly as it had arrived.  ‘What passed between us on that vessel?  Containment buggered.’  Janeway felt a sudden surge of panic.  This was going to be a conversation hinged around her feelings for Seven.  Her beating heart got louder.  

“I stated the bond that had grown between us ..”,  Janeway cut straight to the point and by way of explanation, “ the close friendship we have, Seven.  Important as that may be, I’m not aware of anything else passing between us.”

“I believe you are and it is that awareness that is the very reason why you have chosen to avoid me ever since.  Further, given what you said about the bond we share and our level of friendship, the evidence for that has been greatly lacking of late.” 

Seven’s voice was tinged with dejection. She brought her hands forward and clasped them in front of her.  “Please, this is not why I came here this evening, .. not to pass criticism.”  She paused before continuing, her voice taking on a tender tone, the speed of delivery slower.

“Your absence in my daily routine causes me discomfort.  I find it unacceptable.   At first, I thought my illogical behaviour had caused you to reassess my importance to you but having analysed what happened that day .. and previous events, I have come to the only conclusion that I find viable.”

“And that is?”  The Captain’s voice was deadpan as she bit her bottom lip.   She felt as if she was standing next to Pandora’s box and someone was about to take the lid off. Now she wasn’t breathing!

“ I am .. inexperienced in delivering the words I want to say, I lack the articulate eloquence and expression that humans desire at such a time.  But my words, .. I am genuine .. I feel these things here.”  Seven raised a hand to where her heart was.  “I would not tell you now if I believed I still had time, .. time to develop the optimal, most appropriate way of showing you that I…”  Seven hesitated, her level of discomfort rising.  “Your recent withdrawal from me dictates that I must share my feelings with you now before you close me off completely.”

In a contradictory, split-personality kind of way, part of Captain Janeway wanted to smile at the awkward and difficult manner in which Seven was attempting to explain herself, still so formal in her verbalisation.  The other part of her was on the defensive and had her frozen to the spot.  Years of experience told her what was coming.  She knew what Seven was about to unleash, she could sense it, could see it in Seven’s eyes.

Intimacy, true intimacy was never something Janeway handled well and certainly not when it was sprung on her like this!  Oh yes, she was good at the role-playing part of romance but this real baring of hearts stuff?  She was a scientist for Earth’s sake! This was something her sister would be better capable of handling. 

All of her affairs of the heart .. Justin, Mark .. had just happened in some simplistic fashion.   But this was different.  This was Seven’s first flutters of the heart and Janeway didn’t want to hurt the young woman.  It was also, in truth, the first time Kathryn Janeway had ever felt such deep emotions for another human being, even more powerful than the love she had had for Justin. And as such, Janeway was fighting scared.  She simply did not know what to do or how to handle the overwhelming strength of these intimate feelings she experienced whenever Seven was around her.  Hell, even when she wasn’t!

Seven had always had a disquieting effect on her, and yes, lately those feelings had been growing exponentially.  But there where bigger issues here which clearly, Seven was about to call her on.  She was going to have to do some fancy footwork now and think on her feet. 

“ You do not touch me anymore,” Seven stated flatly.  “I was unaware of what your touch meant to me until you stopped, and now it is gone, I am deficient, without nourishment.  Others touch me but I do not feel the depth of resonance I feel when you do so.  I miss your touch.”  The sincerity was overwhelming.

Seven was visibly shaking now.  “You do not look at me anymore. Not like you have done in the past.  Your eyes avoid mine .. as they are doing now, and I feel as one of many .. in a collective .. where I no longer have a special place with you.  And I know I have held a special place with you.”  The latter comment was spoken with such heartfelt tenderness.  “I feel as if I have been ripped from the inside out and I do not understand.”

Slow, calculating choice of words.  “I only know that when you are with me, I am connected.  I belong, and my life has meaning.  Because of you, of who you are and your importance to me, I begin to sense my humanity and all that it may offer. 

I begin to understand your words when you tell me of what I am capable.”  

Seven allowed a ghost of a smile to cross her ashen face.   “I am capable of love, I am capable of experiencing the desires of passion, of wanting to hold someone close and to not let them go.”  Seven looked into the Captain’s eyes to ensure the smaller woman was in no doubt that the someone was her. 

“Captain, I have always felt that .. my proximity to you makes .. made,” she corrected,  “you smile a lot.  I miss your smile.  You do not smile for me anymore and I find that hurts, though I don’t know why. I want to stop hurting but I don’t know how to.”

Janeway could now feel her heart hammering inside her chest.   Perhaps not the words or eloquence of the romantic poet or experienced suitor but to Kathryn Janeway of Indiana, these were the most beautiful words of love anyone had ever said to her.

Mark, another scientist at heart, had been very matter of fact about being attracted to her, loving her sharp intellect and wanting to pursue a relationship because they were of similar analytical natures.  His approach had appealed to her scientific heart.  But this? She felt humbled, proud, frightened … how could she respond to this?  How did she want to respond to this? She simply didn’t know.  Despite all the self-examination she had been doing recently – a lot – she was still so confused.  Whilst she had to acknowledge the force of her feelings for this beautiful woman before her, were they feelings of love, or very strong friendship?  If love, was she taking advantage of someone inexperienced, naïve, one who might later regret a romance with her Captain?  Janeway wasn’t sure that even if she could commit to an affair, that she could ever face giving herself to this woman only to be cast away in time as Seven matured and needed to move on.

Then there was the age thing, the command thing …the confusion. She felt her heart turning to the heavy weight of Kerndite vel-ore at her impending lack of ability to handle this.

Seven was talking again, “I feel your pain when you lose a crew member and how it affects you.  I see how you hide the burden of your responsibilities, how they consume and exhaust you, how you give your time to all and yet, there is no one who gives their time to you when you need it in your darkest moments.  I want to be that person, the one you can turn to, who can hold you when you need someone to hold.”

She paused before resuming, “ I want to have more with you Captain Janeway, more beyond the friendship.  I find myself consumed of thoughts of you when you are not with me. I am fulfilled and happy when you are. You make me more.”

A quiet, unsure voice now, “I know that I am not sufficient at expressing these things but I do know, Captain Kathryn Janeway, that with everything that I am, I am in love with you.  And .. I believe you reciprocate those feelings.”  

Seven now stood perfectly still and awaited a response which, at first, seemed remote as she stared into the face of the compact, petite woman before her.  Janeway’s face had gone as white as an Icelandic blizzard, completely drained and without colour.  It occurred to Seven that the woman was bolted to the ground because she made no movement at all, her hands hanging motionless by her side.

Though physically still, mentally the captain’s mind was on overload, her thoughts threatening to overwhelm her.

‘How can you respond to this woman when you don’t even know the answers yourself?  Do you love this woman?  Is that what your feelings are about or is it some delineation of deep friendship?  Face it Kathryn, have you ever had any friendship as meaningful as this?  No, you’ve always been a loner, pre-occupied with achieving, forging your career in Starfleet.  Can you really tell the difference?  And what if you do return her love?  Is it right to love her?  You’ll be jeopardising any future happiness she can have.  You are wrong for her.  You are too old for her.  You are in the wrong position for her. You are her mentor, her Captain.  For Earth’s sake, you are her friend!  Don’t abuse that trust!   You have too many responsibilities, too many pre-occupations.  How could you ever make her happy?  Sort this out now!  Be gentle.’

After what seemed like an eternity, the Captain drew a breath, forcing air into her lungs.  Then slowly and with great control but her voice breaking with emotion.

“Seven, you are so very special to me.  Over the years we have developed a bond, a friendship which I treasure immeasurably but .. your feelings?  They are wrong.”  She emphasized ‘wrong’.   “Whilst I acknowledge what you say and how you think you feel about me, you have misunderstood .. misinterpreted the fine line between friendship and love .. intimacy.”

This was killing Janeway.  She wasn’t sure that what she was saying was right or wrong, she just didn’t know. The confusion would not dissipate and she was, if anything, more confused now than ever before. 

“This complexity between friendship and love, well … it’s a common mistake to make.  All humans go through this at one stage or another, usually when we are young adults, learning to handle these intimate emotions for the first time.”  Nervous pause.  “It takes a long time to learn the difference between strong friendship and love, which is probably why teenagers have such traumatic times!”  She tried to rationalise things and give Seven a get-out clause.

“You doubt my feelings?”

“No, Seven.”  The voice adamant.  “I’m just saying that .. you have the pitch wrong.” 

Kathryn Janeway couldn’t look Seven in the eyes and chose the floor instead.  Cruel to be kind.  You can do this.  “You can’t possibly begin to understand the complexity of human interactions, you’ve only just begun to experience humanity on the most base level.  What you are experiencing is nothing more than a teenage crush .. on a teacher, a mentor.  Real though it may appear, it is just a passing phase.”    ‘What on earth are you saying?  Bluff or lie to Seven but don’t insult her!’

“I am no teenager!”  Seven was incredulous at what she was hearing the Captain say.

“Age, no.  But experience?  It puts you in the same playing field.”  OK, this sounds a little more acceptable.   Janeway expanded, “Also, sometimes a person gets trapped by the role model thing, the power attraction .. to the teacher, the mentor .. the captain.  Again, it may seem like the real thing but it’s just a passing phase, you’ll move on.”

‘You couldn’t insult her more if you tried!  I can’t believe I just said that.’

Seven of Nine listened to the words as they washed over her, the Captain had not heard a single word she had said, or at least had not understood their source nor meaning.  It made her feel sick to think that her most heart felt emotions were being brushed away as inconsequential.

Seven reached out and grabbed the captain by the upper arms in an attempt to get her to look directly into her eyes.  “You cannot believe that I genuinely love and desire you, that I would wish to spend my life with you, only you?”

Kathryn Janeway felt such a surge of energy spark through her body as Seven grabbed her arms.  It was a familiar sensation, something she had not felt for years.  Sensations felt once with Justin, though never with Mark.  Passion!  Was her body giving her the answers her scientific mind couldn’t?  She was in love with Seven?  How easy it would be to just give in to this most basic desire and need .. and how she suddenly wanted to give in to Seven.   She could see only Seven’s lips and found herself contemplating what it would feel like to just say ‘Damn it’ and step up closer and place her own lips there and to hell with all her reasons for avoiding this relationship.

But she was not a star ship captain for nothing, and resolve and restraint were upper most in her thoughts.  She needed to stop this conversation now before she couldn’t.   Her desires were not the issue here, Seven’s future well-being and happiness were and she could not be part of it.

Pushing herself out of Seven’s grasp,  “You’ve misread everything, Seven.  I’m sorry.  Perhaps we can talk about this later and examine what you are really feeling ..”

An agitated, desperate Seven, “I know what I am feeling Captain and I have just told you this but you seem unable to accept it .. for whatever reason.”

Janeway was now on the defensive.  “Look Seven, I can’t be clearer than I just have.  I think we should leave this for now, maybe discuss it some other time.”

“Do you not feel anything for me, Kathryn?”  Seven’s eyes implored her to answer.

“Of course, Seven.  We’re friends.”   Avoidance of the answer.

“That is not what I asked you.  What are your feelings towards me?”

“Seven, I think you should leave now.”

“Why do you not answer?”

“I want you to leave now.”

“Do you not love me?”

No answer.

Seven had no frame of reference for an occasion such as this and her vulnerability made her feel raw, unsure of herself.  She felt inadequate to continue the discussion, if that is what it could be termed since Janeway was clearly not going to answer any of her questions.

So she chose to leave but as she moved towards the door, she turned one last time towards the Captain, “I find it difficult, cruel, to believe that I can be so in love with you, Kathryn and yet you appear to harbour no such feelings for me.  Is this the wonderful fulfilment of humanity that you wish me to embrace?”  She paused and stared directly into the Captain’s eyes. 

“Goodnight, Captain.”   And with elegance and grace, she left the quarters.

Janeway felt as she had just imploded.  She had not handled the situation well.  She had been less than honest.  She should have simply told Seven the truth, whatever that was, however confusing and then let them work things out from there.  Had she not always told Seven that honesty was the best policy?  

And now, all Kathryn Janeway could see was the burning image of Seven turning back to her before she left the room, her blue eyes, her beautiful big blue eyes full of tears, tears rolling down her cheeks.  And the irony of the whole occasion hit her.  In her pitiful attempt to spare Seven pain, she who had once dared to call herself Seven’s mentor and friend, had been the first person to ever make Seven of Nine cry. She was in no doubt, she had just broken the young woman’s heart.

*****

Despite two requests, Seven had not reported to Captain Janeway, which is why the latter now sought Seven out in Cargo Bay 2.  She knew the young woman was off duty and was avoiding her.

‘This won’t be easy’, Janeway thought as she entered the storage facility. She knew she had hurt Seven with her reaction and ill thought out responses the day earlier, responses she still couldn’t believe she had made.  Where had all that life experience and star fleet training gone in tact, diplomacy and sensitivity during their conversation and why had she reacted so badly?   She stepped into the bay, heard the doors swish shut behind her and then ordered them secure using her command security authorisation.

Seven stood at the computer console close to the regeneration alcove.  Though she had obviously heard the Captain’s entrance and the associated security order, she chose not to acknowledge the older woman’s presence.

‘O..kay, not a promising start,’ Janeway took a deep breath and swallowed nervously.  With an outwardly commanding presence that was not mirrored by the way she felt inside, she walked purposefully up to the other side of Seven’s console and stood facing her, challenging the tall woman to at least recognise her presence.

“Seven, we need to talk.”  Good start.  Direct, to the point.

The immaculate, classically beautiful woman did not look up from her work,  “Your topic, Captain?” The voice was unemotional, uncharacteristically hard.

“Yesterday.”  No change registered at all with the elegant woman.  Janeway sighed. ‘OK, Seven has every reason to make this difficult .. just go with the flow and put this right.”

“Seven, I… I want to apologise for the way I handled our conversation yesterday.  I wasn’t … expecting to hear what you had to say and well, you rather took me by surprise.  I could have been a lot more .. understanding and sympathetic.  I could have handled it better.  I’m sorry, Seven.”  ‘This is good.  Keep it going’.

No reaction from Seven.   ‘Maybe not so good’.

“What we should have done is sat down and talked this through and I guess that’s what I’d like to do now, if you want to .. if you’ll let me.”  ‘I can beg’.  Janeway’s voice oozed compassion and gentleness but she was met with stony silence.  ‘Definitely not a good start’.

A tender, small voice, “Seven, I didn’t mean to hurt you, I would never knowingly do that.  I care too much for you to do that .. and I can see that’s what I’ve done.”  Janeway rested her slim hands on the top of the console, her eyes searching Seven’s face, desperate to make eye contact.

“Speak to me, Seven, please,” the older woman was begging, “I’d like us to try and work through this, I don’t like the way things were left.  You are my friend, and I so value that.  Friends should not ….”

“You state that the words I said were unexpected?”  The words were ice, “I don’t believe you.  You lie.  You refuse to answer my question.  I ask you again, do you love me?”  Seven’s stance had suddenly shifted and cold, piercing eyes locked onto the Captain’s. The voice of the Astrometrics officer was charged with anger, resentment, the voice grating and low.

 “I love you as a friend, as a ..”,  she was interrupted.

“That is not the question I ask.  Do you love me?”    

Desperation.  “Seven .. I can’t answer that question because you don’t understand what you are asking.”  Janeway was frustrated, this was not going the way she had hoped.

Seven’s anger continued to escalate and had Kathryn not known the woman better, she might have felt physically threatened as the younger woman stepped aside from the console to stand directly, towering over the smaller woman.

“Do not patronise me, Captain.  You compare my feelings for you with that of an adolescent with a crush on a teacher?  You insult me!  How little you understand me.  You dare to suggest that my affection for you is nothing more than a power attraction?  I was Borg and consider myself at least your intellectual equal, an intelligence I have never chosen to ill-use against you and yet, you dare to use your humanity against me as a pitiful attempt to hide your own feelings and emotions.”

Seven stepped closer and leaned down over the Captain.  Janeway could have felt intimidated. Hell, she was intimidated!

“Captain Janeway,” the voice so formal, with no sense of any friendship present, “you see my inexperience for more than it is.  Inexperience does not represent a lack of understanding, nor does it reflect that any emotions borne out of it are any less true or valid.  Those emotions are simply lacking the opportunity to express themselves. Opportunity the Borg did not give me!”   Seven paused momentarily and though Janeway wanted to respond, the words weren’t there.

“I am inexperienced. I do not deny it but at least I possess honesty and moral integrity which you appear to have abandoned.”  And then with a grave, cold voice,  “I have seriously misjudged you and I must thank you for showing me the true value of your friendship and potential as a lover.  It is better to realise such shortcomings now than to find out later.”

Captain Janeway swallowed hard.  “Now hang on, Seven..”

“You have lied to me.  You have not told me the truth.  You have not admitted that you have strong feelings for me. You do not answer any direct questions I ask you.  Yet you continue to call me ‘friend’.  I question this now.  I thought I saw something in your behaviour, your consistency to place yourself and the crew of Voyager in positions of great danger to rescue me, on what have been so many occasions.   I foolishly believed your actions were driven by some personal desire, some affection for me beyond that of friendship, something more but now I find myself questioning my own ill founded beliefs.”

Seven’s head tilted to the side like something examining a specimen in a jar.  Janeway’s comfort zone was well out of an airlock.

The tall, beautiful woman’s tone was now dismissive, aloof, her words as if stating the plainly obvious,  “Perhaps the truth has been staring me in the face all the time but I have been so distracted by my own inner struggles, my searching to find my own human identity that I have not been able to see it.  Indeed, perhaps the truth, though not disclosed, is dual natured.”

Janeway frowned, confused.  Where was Seven going with this?

“I am not good enough for you!  I have failed to live up to your human expectations and you do not see me as an equal.  Your words yesterday implied as much.  This reason alone would be creditable enough to explain the cessation in our relationship termed friendship. Friends spend time together and share.  We do not do this anymore.  It would explain your ‘cooling off’ and distancing yourself from me.”

The Captain could not believe that Seven would interpret any misunderstanding between them as this; surely there was enough between them to have cemented their friendship over the years?  Had their bond, their closeness really been this tenuous?

“Seven ..”

“Do not interrupt me Captain.  You will at least allow me to finish what I have to say and then this matter can be closed.”  Such cool detachment.

“I see something else, Captain, another reason, more powerful that explains why you could never want a relationship with me .. or anyone else on this ship.”  The words were almost spat at Janeway.

“And that is?”  Janeway asked flatly.

“Your obsessive addiction with your command role, too embroiled with the pips you wear on your uniform.  You cannot distance yourself from your role or professional objectives enough to pursue any personal relationships.”

Seven’s leaned her head down towards the Captain’s, ice blue eyes boring into the smaller woman’s. 

“Any relationship would detract from that career which you rate of greater importance.  I look at you and I do not see you surrounded by a plethora of people one would term ‘close friends’.  You do not let anyone into your world, afraid that it will detract from that to which you are accustomed and comfortable with. You even keep Chakotay at arms distance.  Your obsession with your career has hindered your personal and social development, producing this lack of balance.”

Janeway looked away, fighting the surge of anger rapidly rising up in her.  Sucking her bottom lip, her tone became dangerously low, the usual subtle warning to anyone who chose to recognise it.

“I don’t think … Seven .. that you have any credibility or experience when it comes to assessing why I do or do not live my personal life as I do.”  The Captain’s eyes narrowed in warning.  “Quite where you think you get off with all of this I don’t know but you have no right to question my personal relationships, either on this ship or before.  You know nothing about me and my past.”  Her jaw was tight and she was seething with controlled anger.

Seven’s voice momentarily lowered, “You do not like the truth, Captain, to have someone stand up to you and inform you of your weaknesses?  And yet you felt able to do this to me yesterday.  One rule for one and not for another?  How arrogant you are and how unappealing that trait is.  I find this part of your nature unacceptable.” 

Seven’s enunciation was crisp and harsh, like boots cutting through ice-frozen snow. 

Years of experience helped Kathryn Janeway to hold her temper but it wasn’t easy.

Despite all of her feelings, Janeway was able to recognise Seven’s emotional outburst as the age-old human trait of wanting to hurt someone who had hurt you, in whatever way they could.  And of course, Seven knew what buttons to push.  “Seven, you are angry right now but  ..”

“I am not angry, I am frustrated that one I had held in such high regard should turn out to be such a disappointment, that I should have allowed myself to be so humiliated and abandoned.”

‘Had held?’   The words hit Janeway hard and suddenly she had an impending gloom of just where this conversation was going.  It was going very badly … very badly.

The tall, blond stepped back several paces, “ My approach to you was based on inefficient assessment.  Your emotional declaration has, on further evaluation, proved to be of no consequence to me, as mine was clearly of none to you.  You are insignificant to me.  No further concern is necessary.  I have adapted, as will you.” 

Pause.

“And what exactly is that supposed to mean?”  The threads of anger still audible in the Captain’s tone.

“I denounce any measure of affection I believed I harboured for you and I decline your future friendship and mentorship.  In these areas I can and will do better.”

Janeway felt the blood pressure in her body plummet. 

“Professionally, you are unquestionably a consummate and most able star ship captain who possesses talents of exceptional ability and I will continue to work at optimum efficiency to assist you in your..”

“Optimum efficiency?” Janeway interrupted dryly.

“ .. assist you in your endeavours to return this crew home.  However, I find your social and emotional interactions with regard to intimacy sorely lacking.  I find it disconcerting that it has taken me this long to discover that you are deficient in this area and that you also have capacity for deception and deceit in regard to your treatment of me regarding friendship.  Since you are now not what I seek in friendship or otherwise, this matter is at a close.”

She stood and looked at the smaller woman, her own height towering over the other, her demeanour entirely arrogant and haughty.

“Now, you will excuse me. I have work to attend to.”

“You’re off duty, Seven.”  Janeway stated evenly, reminding her.

“Then I have better places to be, Captain.” 

 Seven turned and walked out of the cargo bay, leaving a completely stunned woman standing alone by the console, her hands still resting on its surface.

*****

Days turned into weeks, and the weeks into months, during which time Seven of Nine steadfastly closed herself off to Janeway, despite the latter’s forays to try and put matters right.  Seven had changed her shift to achieve the most efficient way to avoid the Captain.  She refused invites to Velocity games, often never even bothering to respond to such requests, refused invites to late night chats, or frequenting the bridge to work on astrometric charting there.  In short, wherever the Captain might be, you could bet that Seven would not be there.

Cold, detached and with casual indifference, Seven treated the Captain with professional respect but social disdain and distance. There was no hint of their former close relationship and all Janeway could do was watch what had once been, slowly fade into the past.

Seven treated the Captain as if she was invisible and had on one occasion actually passed her in the corridor as if unseen.  Janeway had bided her time, hoping that time and distance might thaw the ice between them but to no avail. 

For Captain Janeway, as time marched on, it began to feel like a bereavement.  She was now, on a social consideration, confined to those crewmembers that Seven deemed inconsequential, without importance, and irrelevant. 

Kathryn Janeway loathed this.  Never, in her entire life, had she ever been confined to some backwater anonymity. No matter who she had dealt with in her life, she had always evoked some emotion.  People either liked, loathed, loved or tolerated her .. whatever, but they never viewed her with indifference.  And for Seven to do this now?  Well, it simply aggravated, annoyed and hurt like hell.

It hadn’t taken the crew long to recognise the shift in the relationship and strangely enough, it concerned many who, whilst they may not have been members of the Borg Fan Club, they had recognised the depth and importance of the relationship borne between the two women. 

The breakdown of this special relationship proved of most concern to Chakotay and Neelix, both of whom had on separate occasions approached Janeway and offered to try and mediate in whatever way they could, to try and put something special back in place.

However, through it all, Janeway had held on to the hope that eventually, when Seven calmed down –because surely all this coldness had to be an act? - there might be an opportunity to slowly put things back in place, starting with the friendship and then? 

Then? Well, perhaps the great Kathryn Janeway did need to assess what depth of a relationship she wanted with the younger woman.  If the recent months were anything to go by, Janeway was not reacting to the loss of just a friend.  Even she could see that somehow Seven really had wormed her way into those areas of the heart which the Captain thought she had so successfully locked and bolted away for the duration of the journey.  Who would have believed it would be an ex Borg that would become a master locksmith?

But even hope was taking a severe thrashing of late and to be truthful, after a particularly painful incident in the mess hall about a week ago and then, what had happened at the pre-mission briefing that very morning, even Captain Janeway was beginning to feel that any revival of a relationship was over.  It had been a long time since she had felt this low in spirit.

Eight days ago, she had entered the mess hall for her usual early morning fix of coffee, had seen Chakotay, Kim and Seven seated together and had come across to join them.  Seven had made a point of deliberately rising to leave almost as soon as she had sat down, excusing herself to go and see to some inconsequential problem or other. It had been blatantly obvious that she was leaving because the Captain had joined the table.

Momentarily, their eyes had locked and Janeway knew her own would have unavoidably registered hurt and disappointment, but Seven’s were hard and cold, without any sign of emotion.  Simply a case of ‘I don’t see you, I don’t hear you.’

For a while later, whenever the Captain would enter the mess hall for breakfast and see Seven present, she would try her best to avoid the young woman, choosing instead to join some other group.  But after a while, the Captain just gave up and in most cases now, simply chose to take her coffee and leave.

Then eventually, the Captain stopped going to the mess hall altogether at the interchange of the early shift for fear that Seven would begin to avoid the place. Ridiculous as it all was, she wouldn’t jeopardise Seven’s opportunity to increase her social skills and make new friends – she had come so far and Janeway had recently begun to sense a break-through in the young woman’s ability to connect with other crew.    Regardless of their problems, she would not hinder the young woman’s progress.

Beyond Seven changing her duty watch, avoiding having to interact quite so much with the ‘professional’ element of the Captain, where on occasion Janeway would in the past have expected an astrometrics report by hand, now they came via some impersonal electronic route or by a junior crewman’s hand.

This particular morning had delivered a particularly low blow to Kathryn.  There had been a pre-mission briefing in preparation for the afternoon’s landing party mission to the recently orbited Excelda.  These pre-mission meetings were routine, to tie up procedures and objectives, check last minute preparations for the away team.  This one was to have been attended by Neelix, Tuvok, Ensigns Chargory and Bethan, Seven and with Captain Janeway leading.  As usual the team had been nominated by Chakotay as part of his first officer responsibilities.

However, during the meeting, Seven had unexpectedly thrown the proverbial ‘antigravity- spanner into the works’ by insisting that a project she was currently involved in had suddenly become a greater priority, and knowing how much importance the Voyager command placed on the findings, she felt that now was not the most appropriate time to be leaving the data and consequent analysis to attend some trivial and routine planet excursion.  She argued that perhaps someone else who better needed away-team experience might replace her?

Chakotay immediately recognised the excuse for what it was, a ruse to avoid being any where near the Commanding Officer.  He felt the blood rise to his face and was about to rip into her about issues such as unprofessionalism and inappropriate timing when Janeway, who really had had enough, put her hand up.  “Leave it, Commander.  Just find me another officer and get them briefed up.”

The remainder of the meeting had continued in muted discussion about requirements, negotiation and cultural awareness issues, and security aspects.

Chakotay had stayed behind on completion of the meeting and leaned against the conference table in front of the Captain.  He wasn’t completely aware of what had happened between the two women but he wasn’t a fool and knew it hovered around personal issues.  He suspected what those issues might be but at the end of the day, it was still just speculation and none of his business.

He felt desperately sorry for both women, as it was self evident that they were both suffering in their own ways. What annoyed the man was the manner in which the ex-Borg was letting off steam.

Most of all, he felt bad for the Captain who had clearly taken whatever the incident was between them, directly to heart. He had witnessed her desperately attempting to put whatever was wrong, right but to no avail.  He had had to watch Seven literally throwing Janeway’s attempts back in her face, often in front of others.  Janeway could do no right and was damned if she did, damned if she didn’t.  His commanding officer had enough problems and command weight on her small shoulders without this.  He was angry.

“You know Kathryn, Seven’s behaviour is now becoming an issue and I would like to approach her about this in my capacity as First Officer.  I know you and she have issues which need to be resolved one way or the other, but I can’t continue to have her messing the ship’s rota around like this.”

The auburn haired woman ran her hands through her hair and sighed, “I know Chakotay, I know.  I had hoped that today, away from the ship in a more relaxed planet environment, we might have been able to construct the framework for a little repair work, but I guess that’s not going to happen! Not in the next few days anyway.”

“I’ll talk to her while you’re away and explain a few salient points about being part of a team.”

Janeway was now rubbing her temples, “Don’t hammer her too hard, Chakotay.  She doesn’t have the emotional experience to fall back on, to help her in situations like this ..”

“You mean situations where she acts like a petulant teenager.”  Chakotay was through cutting Seven any slack.

Janeway stared over his shoulder into the vacuum of space beyond and pointed a finger from a delicate hand into the air as if at some imaginary object. 

“No, .. I think that’s where I made the mistake, ..treating her like a teenager, someone who doesn’t understand because they are too inexperienced, too young to understand.  I think she does know what she feels, what she wants.”

She paused as if mentally connecting thoughts and for the first time, making sense of something which had been confusing her for a long time.

“I think I was the one who didn’t understand, didn’t trust what I was hearing, seeing.  That’s my mistake.  Of course, her mistake is she doesn’t know how to handle …..”  The Captain’s voice tailed off into silence, she was loath to give too much away regarding the actual issues set between the two of them.

“Well, she doesn’t know how to handle it!” she inadequately finished off.

Chakotay smiled his gentle, crooked smile.  His eyes twinkling, “Well, thank you Kathryn for clearing that up.  Now I really understand!”  As clear as mud.  Janeway smiled coyly at his gentle humour.

His intuition elbowed him to push matters and try a little probing.  “Would I be so off the mark if I presumed this had something to do with wanting to push the boundaries of friendship?”

Janeway froze, staring into his brown, warm eyes.  Fractions of seconds passed but they felt like minutes.

“No.  You wouldn’t.” She spoke honestly, her husky tones quiet.

“Not mutual?” 

She went to talk, hesitated, then spoke.  “At the time .. I didn’t think so.”  She sounded unsure, lost. 

“And now?”  he continued to probe.

“Now?”  The voice sounded pained and desperate. “Now ..I can’t see the wood for the trees .. and I’m wondering if it’s too late.”

“What are you going to do, Kathryn?” 

“Honestly?  I don’t know.”  Then the smile returned to her face, she wanted closure now on the serious turn of conversation.  “For now, I think I’m going to get ready for the mission and just occupy my mind with that!  Maybe a few nights on a strange planet, the guest of some nice alien hosts, will give me a fresh perspective and evoke inspiring ideas.  But right now, Voyager needs replenishment of fuel and food!  Priorities, Commander!”

She rose and tapped him affectionately on the shoulder before leading them both out of the room.  

*****

 CHAPTER TWO

The Present

Time had not been kind to Captain Janeway.  It had not brought about a process of healing her old injuries, which instead remained open, infected and sore.  Nor had time stopped the almost daily ritual of beatings which brought about new wounds.  Time had not brought her crew to her rescue and that particular fact, as time had gone by, filled her with such increasing feelings of despair and fear, she now found them difficult to ignore.

She knew that Voyager would have searched for her but for how long could they continue to do this before accepting the fact that she was either dead or irretrievably lost, before they would have to continue their journey home?

How long had she been held captive by … whoever these people were?  Three months?  Four months?  Maybe more, maybe much more.  But Janeway had started to lose all sense of time.  In her increasingly rare, lucid moments, she recognised her failing abilities to reason, to rationalise, to make any mental sense of her dire circumstances.  She so needed all her powers of intellect now to fathom a way out of her captivity, but time had robbed her of that which she had always cherished most in life – her analytical and scientifically curious mind.  

No.  Time had not been kind to Janeway.

In the squalid dark, damp and filthy stone cell in which she was held, her mind flashed back to that last memory of normality.  She had been with the away team on Excelda, having successfully negotiated a mutually beneficial trade agreement.  In the market square, Neelix had been close by to her and in fine spirits since he had been able to replenish the food stores with high vitamin-yielding food.

In equally high spirits, she and the others in the team had just finally thanked Excelda’s merchants for their hospitality and trade, and preparing to leave, it had been Tuvok who had authorised the beam-up.  Seconds later, Janeway recalled witnessing her crew shimmer out of existence but how she had remained solid and still on the planet surface.  She then vaguely remembered a kind of ripping sensation throughout her entire body as she then dematerialised in some unusual and aggressive transport beam before loosing consciousness.

From that moment on, she had awoken into a nightmare of reality that was filled with pain, humiliation and senseless deprivation.

Nothing had made any sense to her at all.  Her captors had knowledge of who she was, referring to her as‘ the great star ship captain’ who had been brought to her knees by the superior Sung Ti and was now their prized possession.  They had demanded that she openly confess in public to alleged heinous crimes, the murder of some Princes and their escorts, of which she had absolutely no recollection.  Her initial attempts to reason with Dar’toth, the one she identified as the tyrannical leader of those who held her, had met with no success and he had responded only with unmentionable cruelty.

Dar’toth, a military man with an impressive array of smart uniforms, was short and bald headed with skin like leather, and who had a strange sickly body odour.  He would frequently parade her to his followers in the decadent Assembly Rooms of his palace.  She had initially put up spirited resistance but as time wore on and as the beatings increased, her body energy became scarce and her resistance dissipated.

Now, one of the few things that kept her conscious was a wound to her leg, which was becoming more and more painful.  During one of her recent struggles with the guards, one of them had plunged a ragged, sharp instrument into the lower half of her right leg, slicing through muscle and hitting the bone hard.  Without medical attention, and surrounded by filth and squalor, the injuries to that leg were festering.  If her captors didn’t kill her, the poison from her badly infected leg would, and soon.

And now she could hear the footsteps of the empirical guard approaching her cell.  For the first time in her life, Kathryn Janeway feared for her life, not so much for the loosing of it because that perhaps was inevitable.  But more for how she would lose it, with humiliation and without dignity or honour – without anyone she cared for ever knowing how she died, and when.  For the last time the guards had come, they had held her down while someone had injected some form of neural solvent into her body, something that had robbed her of her abilities, strength, and determination.  And now they were coming back.

The unlocking of the door mechanism was deafening and the piercing shaft of light that broke through the heavy metal door into the cell forced her to cover her eyes.  Once more, like all the times before, the guards dragged her to her feet and blindly, she was pushed out into the bright passageway.  Janeway was forced again to her knees, her arms shielding her eyes from the light, were pushed down and she was restrained forcibly against a cold, stone wall.

Fighting to accustom her eyesight to the light, she saw the same familiar military uniforms and then a man approaching her and roughly grabbing one of her arms.  Aware that she was about to be injected again, she fought against the restraining guards in an effort to avoid this hostile invasion of her body but they held her too well and seconds later she felt the contents of the serum force itself into her veins and rush, like something frenzied and ice cold, around her body.

The initial tingling sensation gave way to intense pain, her body felt like a thousand needles stabbing at her. She felt as if her head was going to explode.  And somewhere in the distance, she heard someone scream and in the last throes of consciousness, recognised that it had been her.

No.  Time had not been kind to Captain Janeway.

*****

Captain Janeway could not remember the last time she had slept.  Her hands were shackled behind her back with steel-like cable which was then attached to a ceiling hook leaving her pitched forward and almost suspended, only just able to make foot contact with the floor.  She had a choice of taking the weight either on her arms or legs, either position resulted in pain and stripped her of any chance to sleep.

The pain was excruciating, especially with her bad leg but then, that is why her captors had strung her up like this – deprive her of sleep in the hope of getting her to talk, admit liability for her supposed crimes and then be rewarded with a life of servitude, if she behaved herself.  Not the best bargain she had ever been offered.

The deprivation of sleep, food and water, plus daily ritual beatings, had taken their toll.  Janeway was now hallucinating so badly she had lost the ability to distinguish between reality and delusion.  Earlier, she had experienced a particularly vivid and distressing aberration of reality.  She had been ‘visited’ by several Voyager crewmembers in her cell who had accused her of betraying the Federation, being held to account and now rightly being subjected to what she deserved.

“Someone like you,” the image of Chakotay had said, “deserves no place in the United Federation of Planets and the senior staff have voted you be stripped of the rank of Captain and remain here to account for the atrocities you have committed.”

His strong face had no longer been gentle but had harboured her true ill-will.

Seven of Nine had visited her too.  The tall, slim woman’s elegant, classical beauty so intoxicating, she had approached Janeway, stared her in the eyes with her own ice blue ones and announced arrogantly, “You are small, weak, insignificant and no longer of importance to the Voyager collective.  You are fundamentally without honour, you no longer have importance in my life.  I was in error to ever think you did.”

Despite these manifestations being part of her confused, feverish ramblings, they had seemed so real and tangible, they had disturbed her greatly, to the extent that they left her with little strength to continue the fight.  She finally acknowledged what her captives had told her, that no one was going to come to her rescue now, that she was alone – that she would die alone.   If she had had the energy to weep, she would have done so.

Her thought processes were broken by the piercing shaft of light breaking through the opening of the cell door, forcing her again to shut her eyes.  She heard the rustling of guards around her and then felt her head pulled back by her hair, followed by a slap to the face to gain her attention. 

Struggling to open her eyes she could make out only the blurred shape of her interrogator but knew his scent, Dar’toth.   He spoke with a voice both lethargic and apathetic. 

“I am so tired of this, Captain.”  He sighed heavily and leaned in closer to her, she could feel his breath on her face, smell the sickly scent.

“ I ask you questions.  You do not answer. I have you beaten.  I ask you more questions which again, you do not answer.  I have you beaten some more.  We keep repeating the whole process over and over.”

Dar’toth let go of her hair and Janeway’s head immediately fell forward onto her chest.  Gone was the arrogant Captain ready to challenge him, to look him in the eye. 

He then placed both his hands on either side of her face, almost in a loving, affectionate manner and assisted her, lifting her face so that they were eye to eye.

He spoke quietly to her, as if speaking to a naughty but well loved child, “You do so try my patience you know, and I begin to grow so weary of this repetition.”  He paused for effect.  “Indeed, it is all beginning to depress me somewhat.  Do you not feel the same way, Captain?”   His voice held the inflection of mockery.

Janeway mustered what little energy she had left, “A little.”  She no longer recognised her own voice.

“Ah Captain, we are in agreement over this, and .. ” another pause for artistic effect,     “ if I might say so, you are looking a little worse for wear.  A little thin perhaps?  You really should take more care of yourself.”

His hands caressed her face, his fingers running over some of the dried gashes that ran across her brow.  “Your people have abandoned you.  Do you not think they would have been here now if they were coming?  No.  You are alone and no one is going to come to your rescue.” 

He allowed time for his statements to sink in.

“Save yourself!”  The timbre of his voice was almost filled with compassion.

“I know a valuable asset when I see one and you have value to me.  You are a scientist.  Share your knowledge and technology with me and I will see you treated well.  Just admit to your crimes and it’ll all be over quickly. You will then be treated better.  Choose to oppose me further and you will leave me with no other option but to destroy you … and I will!  But it isn’t what I want, you know?  No, you have to be an intelligent person to hold such a position of power in an Empire such as yours.  Use your intellect now and recognise that the game is over.  Join me.”

Louder in her ear, “Join me!”  Again he repeated the offer, a look of anticipation lighting up his face as he saw the woman start to struggle and respond.  He leaned in closer again to hear her weakened response.

With every ounce of energy and pride she could muster, Janeway responded.  “Go to hell!”

It was not the response Dar’toth wanted and he stood back slowly, an edge of flint crossing his hard face.  “It continues!” he spat at her. 

She didn’t see him beckon to his guards but she felt a blow to her face, fresh blood running from her nose, and then another blow to her head and instinctively knew that that one had done serious damage. 

Once more she felt a sharp scratch and stab to her upper arm.  Something was again being injected into her but she didn’t know what.  A voice, hard and unsympathetic, whispered, “I can break you.” 

Captain Kathryn Janeway of Bloomington, Indiana no longer cared.  All she wanted was for the pain to stop.

She wanted to scream out, beg for mercy, but she wouldn’t.  In her last breath, she would die with courage and honour, and she would meet her maker with distinction.  Her mind wandered and she wondered if whoever told her mother of her demise, would do it kindly?  She also wondered whether she would meet her father, and Justin?  Would her father be proud of her?  Did she believe in life after death?  She couldn’t remember. 

Another part of her shouted at her internally to not give up, to keep breathing, that something would happen to save her, it always had before, why not now?

But she couldn’t believe the positive voice inside her, it was too late now for rescue, she was dead already.  And she felt such cold fear racing through her body as she realised that she didn’t want to die here like this where no one would ever know who she had ever really been, where she had come from, the things that had been important to her.

Here, no one would ever grieve for her.  Somewhere, out in space or back on Earth, people would later speculate as to what had happened to her but never really know. Some people might even think she was still alive and travelling space.

Her family would have to grieve without a body, without real closure. She knew how badly her mother would take that – they had never managed to recover her father’s body, or Justin’s.  Her mother had said once, in a low moment, that the worst of it all was not having a place to go, a grave to weep at, there was no place to be with her husband. 

Her crew would grieve for her, hold a ceremony to lament her loss but would then inevitably appoint another leader, Chakotay, to get them home.

This had probably already happened.  So final. 

But the worse thing of all was the recognition that she would never be able to tell that one person who she now realised meant everything in life to her, Seven.  She would never be able to tell her that she was in love with her and explain why she had said what she had.  What she hated most was that Seven of Nine would never know that she had been loved by the Captain of the USS Voyager, and would now go on thinking of her as a liar and a disappointment.  Janeway hoped that this wouldn’t distort Seven’s views regarding future relationships.  She wanted the young Borg to have a happy life – she deserved that.

This wasn’t how it was all supposed to end, was it?  She had always thought she was immortal, untouchable, lucky.  Now she was going to die alone, in this God forsaken place.  

And as she passed out, a whisper fell from her lips, “Seven.”

*****

CHAPTER THREE

Pain. Torrents of pain.

Illusions.  Familiar faces.  Faces with bodies that wear uniforms, familiar uniforms – like her uniform.  Faces leaning over her, talking but she can’t hear, can’t make out their words but she knows their sentiments!  These faces have visited her before.  They are not real but demons donned in familiar guises to try and break her down.  Demons that would tell her, if she could understand them, of her uselessness and heinous crimes to which she must be held to account.

Struggle.  Push them away.  Shout at them to go away.  They are clever this time!  This time they have kind gentle faces – caring faces – one face with a tattoo is holding her hand in his - but she knows he isn’t real.  None of them are real for they are evil illusions. Hallucinations her own mind is creating.

Do not look at them!  Strike out at them.  Forget the pain surging through your body with every movement.  Push them away!

But the light is bright, too bright. This is not where she is normally kept. Why can she move her arms and legs?  She can’t remember being able to move with this freedom before.  Where is this place?  It is clinical, clean, .. it is familiar?  Good familiar?

Oh, but the nightmare demons are clever, they are trying new tactics to break her.  Now they show their true colours, they are pushing her, forcing her back down onto the flat surface, holding her, mouthing words she cannot hear or make sense of.  She has not been allowed to lie flat for such a long time.  What are they going to do to her?  Something is being placed around her, restraining her.  Keep struggling!  Try to keep struggling.  They will disappear as they have done in the past.  Still they appear as kind visions, people she knows but they aren’t.   They are malevolent illusions!

Something is being pushed against her neck, something cold against her hot neck.

Blackness is enveloping her.  The pain is dissipating, receding into the background, she cannot move anymore but she can still see the faces.  Something is running into her eyes and it stings – her own sweat?  The faces are now loosing contrast and shape, turning grainy and ill-defined at the edges.  They are fading into darkness.  She is falling into a dark pit. 

This is the end?

As long as the pain stops.

*****

The doctor wore the look of a worried and concerned man which was, of course, ridiculous since an EMH had no capacity for human emotions.  He was after all simply a complicated collection of specialised medical information, capable of retrieval, analysis, evaluation and diagnosis from data banks.

But nothing was simple in the Delta Quadrant and just as Voyagers’ crew had learned to survive and adapt in this hostile area of space, so had this hologram.  He had, over time, become a sentient being who had far surpassed what his original creators thought him capable of.

And as a sentient being, he now stood in his outer office facing a tense and equally worried Commander Chakotay, acting Captain of the Star ship Voyager and the calm, composed form of Tuvok.

“There is significant physical and psychological abuse of an excessive level,” the EMH began.

“On the physical side, she has numerous broken bones, a badly dislocated shoulder, a smashed kneecap, broken fibula and tibia of the right leg with a rotting gash in it that has obviously, deliberately never been allowed to heal, clearly in some perverse attempt to cause as much pain as possible. The muscular area around the wound is badly infected and the bone marrow is diseased.” 

Tuvok moved as if to stand straighter, interrupting, “Will she lose the leg?”  The question was precise, direct, and unemotional.

Tuvok knew that despite the fact that technology could give the Captain an artificial limb that would far surpass the capabilities of the existing natural limb, Kathryn Janeway would hate it and never entirely adapt to something she had not been born with. 

“Not if I can help it, no.  But it will be a challenge.”

Chakotay’s eyes momentarily gazed at the floor, recognising that when this EMH declared a challenge, it meant that things were bad.

He lifted his eyes again and met the doctor’s, “Continue, doctor.”

“She has taken severe blows to the head which have caused neurological damage and hearing loss.  There is a swelling on the brain that will have caused disorientation, possible blindness, dizziness and headaches. Her body is festooned with gashes, burns, scars from beatings and given the severe deprivation of food and water, she is almost one quarter under her normal body weight.  I think you get the picture and before you ask ..” , he paused, anticipating their next questions, “Yes, she will live and yes, I can put her physical body back together again.  As I’ve already indicated, I am confident that I can save her leg although that will take a bit longer and will be something of a painful process.” 

Tuvok stood immobile but Chakotay clenched both his hands together, the knuckles turning white, in barely contained anger and frustration.

 “I’m afraid there’s more,” the doctor continued.

“Psychological damage,” he abrasively stated.  “I am at a loss where to begin and only time will tell just how badly she has been affected.”  He moved towards the glass divider that separated him from the outer room where Janeway lay sedated on the bio-bed, as if to check she was still there, safe.  He turned to face the two men and continued.

“To say she has been tortured is an understatement.  She has been subjected to sleep deprivation, which is one of the worst things you can do to the human body.  The breaking of body rhythms are most effective in inducing derealization and hallucination through which the victim attempts to escape to another reality – a reality which is often difficult to return from.  The mental stress she will have been through plus her physical injuries are incalculable.”

“Her body is full of toxins, drug cocktails which as far as I’ve been able to determine fall into two categories; sleep inhibitors and truth serums. She has also been given regular injections of a drug clearly intended to produce massive addiction and uncontrollable cravings, such that would ensure the victim would do anything .. anything to get their next fix.”  His craggy face stared at the two officers.

“Fortunately, the drug is not so pervasive and addictive within the human physiology and I am pleased to say it seems to be passing out of her system with little damage done.”

“She did not recognise us.”  A cold, calculating statement emanated from the tall Vulcan Security Officer.  To anyone else, it might have appeared a callous and unfeeling statement but Chakotay picked up on its timbre, the way the man’s voice held back just a little in the throat.  Tuvok, against all appearances, was a concerned man who feared for the well being of a close and valued friend.

The doctor looked at the Vulcan, “Maybe, maybe not.  Who knows what was going through her mind.  She was high on drugs and running a fever.  We need to wait until the drugs are out of her system.”

“When will you bring her out of sedation?”  Now Chakotay asked the questions.

“Not yet.  I plan to keep her under for at least ten days.”

Chakotay blanched, his face registering shock.  You never kept someone sedated for that long, it simply wasn’t safe.

“Isn’t that harmful?”

“Lesser of the evils, Commander and I will be monitoring her very closely but I want to give her body time to repair physically. Right now she is in a lot of pain and that isn’t helping her mental state.” 

The doctor lowered his voice, “That last bout of consciousness showed her extreme disorientation and inability to make sense of her surroundings.  Regrettably, all her thrashing about successfully undid all the bone setting and regeneration I had done on her shoulder.”

“No ..”, he was adamant, “in about ten days, I’ll let her wake up naturally.  By then most of her physical injuries will be repaired, with the exception of the leg but even that should be much improved.  Also, the excess of the drugs, those I can’t neutralise, will be out of her system.  With luck we might find ourselves communicating with someone who resembles Captain Janeway.”

“Luck, doctor?”  Tuvok’s eyebrow arched as he probed the EMH’s rationale.

“Even I can’t work miracles, Mr Tuvok.  We now need luck and buckets of it.”

*****

Seven of Nine though invited, had not been interested in the briefing that the doctor had prepared and given for both Chakotay and Tuvok.  She wanted no part of it, choosing instead to sit at the Captain’s side, by the bio-bed, in the subdued lighting, watching and waiting for signs of recovery. Whatever she would hear, would not help the captain recover any the quicker and Seven wanted to be in only one place, here at this woman’s side.

She gazed at the lifeless body of the usually energetic Star Fleet officer.  Now it was so still, the features gaunt and the body so much thinner, the body lying like a dead weight on the bed.  It had always been a small and compact body but now it was fragile and broken in so many places.  The once beautiful, radiant hair was dull, lifeless and lay damp against the head and face, the latter the texture of wet pastry, and the colour of Borg drones. 

Feelings of hatred, revenge and anger flooded through Seven and she wanted retribution against those who had done this.  But new as these emotions were to her, she knew them for what they were, inefficient, since they were destined to go nowhere and with no one to vent them on.

On returning the captain to the ship, Silus had reported that most of the Regent’s family had been killed, including Dar’toth. The tyrannical regime was overthrown and at an end.  The Ambassador had done their dirty work, which was just as well, for Chakotay had not taken the captain’s terrible condition well.  He would have sought revenge, she could tell that.  Instinct!

Regardless, the fact that she recognised these negative emotions in her, could analyse their wastefulness and inefficiency, she could not make them dissipate or subside.

And so in the subdued lighting of the far corner within the sickbay sat this dazzlingly, strikingly beautiful woman who resembled more some hybrid Nordic Amazonian warrior than an ex drone, her form slim and toned. 

She sat very still, content to listen to the shallowest of breaths from the woman laid out before her, and to watch the minutest of rises from her chest as the air found its way into the fragile woman’s lungs.  Even though Seven had these two vital pieces of evidence that Captain Janeway lived, she still doubted what was there before her and constantly found herself reaching out to touch the still form, to feel for a pulse, to be sure. 

Fingers that once would have ruthlessly, savagely ejected nanoprobes into terrified victims, now gracefully, gently reached out to touch a still, lifeless hand, sliding up the wrist in search of the small but definite pulse confirming life in the heavily sedated form.

Sedated. 

The doctor had been exceptionally kind and thoughtful.  After his briefing with the two senior officers, he had taken Seven to the side and explained to her why he wanted to keep the Captain unconscious, that he wanted time to heal her wounds – atrocious, painful wounds.

And Seven had understood fully.  She had witnessed the Captain’s frightening hallucinatory episode in Sickbay where she had dug into what was left of her power reserves in some amazing last ditched effort, resisting all medical attention and pushing Chakotay and Tom Paris away as if they had been her torturers.   Only the EMH’s own computer enhanced strength had eventually bolted her back on the bio-bed and then hypo’d her into her current sedated condition.

At that moment, everyone in the sickbay had been so occupied with seeing to the Captain’s needs and resetting some of her wounds, that no one had seen Seven silently slip out of the medical facility, walk calmly down to the first unoccupied space she came to and then loose all control as she gasped for air in between the sobs she could no longer contain nor wanted to.  It had taken her precisely 28 minutes and 45 seconds before she could contain herself and return to the sickbay.

She had thought that no one had noticed her absence but the doctor had and later, he had gently, sensitively taken hold of her elbow and in a private one-to-one consultation, with great tenderness, given her a full account of the captain’s injuries and given Seven hope that the Captain would survive.  

When she had asked him if, after her duty and regeneration periods, she could come and sit by the Captain, he had been quick to give consent.  He had not granted this favour to others and many had asked, including Chakotay.

And so Seven chose to sit and guard her precious cargo for the remaining many days whilst Janeway slept, occasionally holding the woman’s still hand in hers, kneading the fingers between her own, studying the broken finger nails which had once been elegant and shaped.

It was only when the Janeway began to stir, the EMH allowing her to awaken naturally from the sedation, that Seven quietly slipped away so that the Captain would not know she had ever been there.  Seven could not hurt this woman any more than she regrettably already had in the past.  All she could do now was honour this woman’s bravery, her resilience and serve her quietly and efficiently.  Since Janeway would not allow her to love her, she could at least serve her well and hurt her no more.

*****

Kathryn Janeway felt as though she was surfing blindfolded on the top of a large wave that was charging up the shoreline and then receding back again rapidly.  Her body seemed heavy, turgid, out of proportion as the nauseous sensation of moving backwards and forwards rocked her.  In.  Out.  In. Out.

This was reflective of her conscious state.  One minute she was aware of her surroundings, the next completely oblivious, and somewhere in between these competing states of reality versus unconsciousness, time marched on apace.

But she was now aware that she was no longer a held-captive and had, by some miraculous intervention, been returned to the safe custody of the Voyager.  The familiar faces she saw now were indeed those of her friends and colleagues, and not vile misrepresentations sent to cruelly torment her during her hallucinatory periods.

Janeway was beginning to trust the reality around her again.

Somewhere she heard a sigh, her own? Regardless, the sound focused her attention and was pivotal in dragging her into a state of consciousness.

It was also what drew the face of her first officer into view, a concerned smile on his face.

“Kathryn?”  The word was said quietly as if sound might crush her.

She fought to get her eyelids open and to talk, she knew her lips moved but the words wouldn’t come.  So she tried to move a hand, to lift it but again, nothing.  Her limbs all felt like lead weights pulling her down into the soft, welcoming comfort of the bed beneath her.  All she could do was watch him.

“Welcome home, Kathryn. You’re safe now, back on the Voyager. ”  Such resonance and warmth in his voice, but tinged with pain, with sadness?  Suddenly a hand appeared, his hand, touching her forehead.  Involuntarily, somehow her body found the ability to flinch as if repulsed by his touch – she hadn’t wanted to do this but his movement had taken her by surprise and her body was clearly still in protection mode, on hyper alert.

It concerned her that she had reacted so negatively to what was essentially a kind, caring gesture but Chakotay seemed to understand and though he stayed close, he moved his hand, whispering something to her.  But she couldn’t hear him anymore and his strong, clean face began to fade into an all too familiar mist that was once more enveloping her, like a fog rolling across a meadow on a damp winter’s morning, bringing a chill to her bones.  She closed her eyes and everything was gone again, like floating out to sea.  In. Out. In. Out.

*****

Captain Kathryn Janeway lay slightly elevated against the backboard of the bio-bed, propped up with pillows.  Not much of an improvement but it did afford her a better view of the sickbay, which in turn, gave her something beyond the sickbay ceiling to look at when she managed to hold on to the still tenuous moments of consciousness.

The sickbay doors swished open and the strong, muscular form of Chakotay came into view, approaching her with a purposeful stride and a warm smile on his good looking, dark features.

“Captain,” he greeted her, “You’re looking better.”

“Liar,” she said flatly, trying her level best to force a smile but not succeeding.

He chose not to challenge her but sat down by the side of the bed and carefully making a show of his next movement for her benefit, he raised his one hand and slowly brought it down on her arm in friendship and support.

This time she didn’t flinch and acknowledged the tactile gesture with a hard won half smile.

She attempted some semi decent conversation, “Everything OK?” but the voice was raw, as if the user was recovering from an extreme attack of laryngitis.

“Ship and crew doing well, Kathryn and now we’ve got you back, morale couldn’t be higher.”  The genuineness of his words shone through like a beacon and some little place inside the woman experienced a touch of warmth where it was mostly ice cold. It didn’t matter how many thermal blankets the doctor covered her with, the deathly cold she felt inside her would not go.  It was like being dead but still alive?

She lay still and studied his face, the deep attractive mahogany eyes set against his natural tanned complexion, such a handsome man but she could see the concern in his eyes.

“You’re worried about me.”  No sense in ignoring the blatantly obvious, the statement barely registered a whisper but Captain Janeway felt a personal sense of elation surge through her body, the fact that she was now stringing more than two words together – she was coming on in leaps and bounds!

The man allowed his eyes to look away from hers momentarily, his smile vanishing.  “Now I would be a liar if I said I wasn’t!”  His grip tightened slightly on her forearm.

“I’m OK, Chakotay.”  Those deep brown eyes again returned to fix on her slate grey ones, showing clearly that he didn’t believe her. 

“That’s not what the doctor says.”

“Oh, the doctor, he fusses around like an old woman,” she made light of her first officer’s comment.

“No he doesn’t.”  The deadpan expression on the man’s face told her he was serious and wasn’t going to let her belittle her condition.  So she played along and tried to console him. 

“Really…just a little tired.”

He didn’t answer her.  If he had, he would have been forced to tell her the truth, that she was more than just a little tired, you only had to look at her.  Despite the doctor’s outstanding attention and efforts, the woman was still seriously ill and Chakotay still harboured a secret fear that she might not recover.  She wore a deathly pallor and sallowness to her face, the edges of her watery eyes were tinged red, with heavy dark rims beneath contrasting with the colour of her skin, like thin parchment paper.  The malnourished viśage completed the image of a very delicate and fragile, sick person.

Two large hands like hard wooden paddles took her small, fragile hand between theirs and gently caressed and kneaded the fingers, as if trying to transfer warmth and comfort, but the bearer of the gift doubted the transfer was anything less than impotent.

He breathed out heavily, loosing the threadbare control he had been fighting so hard to retain, “I can’t believe they did this to you!”   He spat the words with unexpected venom, shocking the Captain into a higher elevated state of awareness.  The unveiled anger and hate in his words sent an uncomfortable chill down her spine, as she stared at the hardness that had appeared on his face, as if from nowhere, but recognising it immediately. 

Though bone weary, she moved her other hand over and across the bed to lie on top of his.

“Don’t.  Don’t do this, Chakotay.  What is done is done.”  The words were laboured, the breath heavy.  Captain Janeway knew and recognised this anger in him – it was reminisant of the same anger and hatred he’d reserved for the Cardassians.  This man did not need another cause.

Some anger went out of his eyes but not all.  “They nearly killed you.”

“But they didn’t,” she tried unsuccessfully to utter soothing words but they just came out all the same, quiet rasping whispers.

Chakotay wanted to say more, but the conversation had already drained what precious energy the woman had, so he held back and simply nodded.  He felt her squeeze his hand.

“You just keep looking after the crew and keep this ship on a steady course home,” the eyes were locked onto his, the subtext crystal clear, don’t lose the key objectives, don’t waste time on things that cannot be changed,   “ and Chakotay, get us out of this area of space fast, .. please.”

*****

As time progressed, a slow procession of specially chosen visitors, mostly senior staff, filtered through to see her and Captain Janeway slowly became stronger.  She would spot the others who came to enquire about her progress but the doctor was tenacious in his filtering skills as to who he would or wouldn’t let through to her bedside.

Her senior officers had all been to see her and she had found it touching how many of them became ‘emotionally moved’ as they spoke to her, especially the first time.  Neelix, poor man, had actually had to excuse himself, returning a little later more in control.   This all made Kathryn Janeway feel very ‘humbled’ that these people should think so much of her.  What did she owe this wonderful crew who, she knew, had not continued on their journey home .. when they should have .. but chose to continue searching for her, against all the odds?

How painfully ironic, she considered, that through such adversity, she should find such humanity, such incredible quality in those she was so proud to serve with. She was a most fortunate woman.

On a more disturbing side, Janeway was forced to acknowledge that there was one of her senior staff who had not been to see her since her return.  Seven of Nine.

Kathryn Janeway had however, noticed from her sick bed, that Seven had visited the sickbay fairly regularly and engaged in often heated conversation with the doctor, but never once had she approached the place where the Captain lay, never once come over to enquire how she was doing or to just acknowledge her return.  She seemed not to care.

The Captain had initially hoped that it had been the enthusiastic and determined sifting skills of the doctor who had kept the young woman away from her, but when she had managed to frame this question to Chakotay, he had looked embarrassed, saying that Seven was taking time adapting to the Captain’s return.  Taking time adapting?  What the hell was that supposed to mean?

Regardless, Janeway had lay there, hopeful .. desperate, that Seven would eventually come and see her, but she never did.  And Janeway began to harbour the worst thoughts that Seven really had expelled her from her life.  The slow saturation of this situation depressed the sick woman, and at times she found it difficult to maintain her focus on getting better. 

On those days, she would be less responsive and struggle to hold conversation with the doctor who, as she got better, made it his duty to draw her into chat in an attempt to stave off her mental boredom.  On those days, he would look at her, his eyes narrowing, trying to assess what it was that was causing her withdrawal.  He probably thought it was to do with her recent treatment – how wrong he was.

She had selfishly prayed that perhaps time and circumstances might have bridged some reconciliation between Seven and herself.  The hope of reconciliation had been one of the major points of focus that had helped Janeway ‘keep it together’ during the blackest moments of her incarceration.  To have all this dashed and plunge into a bottomless abyss was just more than the captain felt she could take.

So Captain Janeway resigned herself to accepting that things looked hopeless and if this distance was what Seven wanted, then she would just have to accept it and learn to move on.   But this apparent recognition ‘of the facts’ didn’t make the captain feel any better. It just made her feel horrendously inadequate, to have so seriously hurt, and cruelly pushed away, that one person she now realised she was so desperately in love with but who no longer returned the sentiment.  Something died inside her.

*****

CHAPTER FOUR

Seven walked slowly back to the cargo bay, needing to regenerate. She did not walk with purpose and efficiency as she normally did because .. she did not feel like it. Perhaps the revitalising of her bodily functions would assist her in feeling better, lift her spirits, something the afternoon watch on the bridge had failed to do.

It wasn’t as if things had gone badly, they just hadn’t gone.  She had managed to get herself onto the same watch as the Captain, had managed to work out some ruse – the human term for deception – to get herself onto the bridge and work from the console there.  She had attempted to join in the usual bridge ‘banter’, hoping to gain the Captain’s attention but this had not worked, indeed she felt she had been treated with casual indifference by her.

The Captain had smiled three times whilst on watch.  Twice with Lt Paris and once with Ensign Kim.  She had not smiled at her, even though Seven had responded to two threads of ‘relaxed’ and non-professional discussion when bridge banter had prevailed. 

The Captain had, on one occasion, stood to stretch her legs and in doing so had dropped a tactical report padd she had been reading.  Seven had somehow managed to move with alarming efficiency to be the one who immediately picked it up and passed it back to the Captain who had simple responded, “I can manage.”

The worst part had been when Seven had completed her astro evaluation well ahead of schedule and had handed it personally to the Captain, who merely stated that in future, just pass any such data padds direct to Chakotay who filtered what she did and did not need to see.  The Captain hadn’t even bothered to look at her.

And standing now in front of her alcove, knowing she desperately needed to regenerate, Seven hesitated, not wanting to connect to the machine and simply switch off all these painful feelings coursing through her body.

Unusually, she chose to sit at the base of her alcove and wrapped her arms around her legs holding herself tightly, as if the position would somehow protect her from what she felt, would bring her solace.  But it didn’t.  Nothing did anymore, not now that the Captain was back onboard and safe .. and so close to her and yet so far away, so untouchable. 

Seven moved a hand to scratch a facial itch only to find she was wiping an errant tear.  There had been a lot of those lately.  Tears of anger, of guilt, of loss.  Then tears of happiness when Janeway was found alive and returned, tears of pleading to spirits .. whoever, that they would let the Captain live.  And now, tears of realisation, of a dull dawning of recognition that the woman she loved, still loved, did not return her feelings and worse, now resented her for her past manifest and ignorant behaviour.

The pain of being human was too much!  If only her acclamation back to humanity had had its limits, limits that would have restricted her emotional growth and saved her from such depth of pain as she felt now. 

She had heard the term somewhere ‘Heart of Stone’, had at the time questioned its validity, since how could the heart, merely a biological organ for pumping blood around the human body, be held responsible for emotional content?  The human brain is the area of emotional stimuli .. surely, a ‘brain of stone’?  Though she had analytically questioned the statement, she now knew exactly what it meant, even if the source organ was contestable.  Seven longed for that heart of stone … but then she would never have felt such joy in the Captain’s presence .. still felt … joy and pain twinned with each other.

She had confided in Chakotay many months ago, when the search for the Captain had been blackest, about her inappropriate behaviour, how she had gone about telling the Captain her feelings the wrong way, the reasons why she had behaved so badly afterwards, like a spoilt child.  Chakotay had smiled at her words but been very understanding and had helped her to appreciate the complexities of human interactions and resulting relationships.

He had also spoken to her at length about her behaviour since the Captain’s return, how she needed to try and at least talk to the Captain, how the latter had noticed and felt her absence. Seven had tried to explain, tried to put into words how much she wanted to do this but somehow couldn’t.  How she felt so ashamed for her actions and how she felt guilt for what had happened since, surely her fault because she had not been part of the landing party.  Chakotay had told her she was wrong, that what had happened on Excelda had nothing to do with her but she couldn’t believe him.

And as time had marched on, it simply became more difficult to directly approach the woman she still loved.  She couldn’t believe the Captain would want anything to do with her now, she had rejected Janeway so many times before.  And now the Captain seemed not to notice her, treated her as if she wasn’t there, wasn’t important anymore – like she had treated her!

Seven just longed to be close to the Captain again, wanted to tell her how she felt, how she wanted to be forgiven and would do anything just to be friends again, even if it took time to rebuild the trust they had once shared.  But all of this was complicated by the fact that the Captain was not the same person she had been.  Who would have been after what she had gone through?

But it was very obvious to key staff that Captain Kathryn Janeway was faking her way through normality – she was emotionally dead if you scratched beneath the surface.  How could Seven approach someone she didn’t understand anymore and when they so desperately needed help? She just wanted to hold the woman and tell her things would be better, like the Captain had done to Seven all those years ago.  She had never told the Captain how much she had needed those arms around her in the early days – something in their warmth had reminded her of .. other times, before she was Borg.

‘Be persistent,’ Neelix kept telling her, ‘Don’t give up, someone needs to break through and reach the Captain and that someone is you, if you really do love her.  Love never gives up, not if it is real.’ 

Seven believed Neelix to be a true romantic. He had an instinctive regard and empathy for others that went far beyond anything anyone else seemed to possess on this vessel.  He had told her that he always thought the Captain had a soft spot for Seven, something that was beyond mere friendship, he had seen it in the woman’s eyes, heard it in her laugh but he agreed with Seven that duty probably stood in the way.  ‘But if you chip away long enough, you eventually break the ice, assuming the feelings are genuinely reciprocated on their side.’

‘Does being human have to be so difficult?’ she silently asked herself as she stepped up into the regenerator and activated it.

*****

“Well, it’s an opportunity not to be missed,” Chakotay stated to the senior officers, sat around the conference table in the briefing room.  “Who knows when we’ll get another chance like this.”

“Agreed.  It’s been awhile.”  The slightly serious approach of Captain Janeway contrasted with the relaxed manner of her First Officer.  “Protomatter is a rare commodity in this part of the quadrant,” she stated flatly.

“I’d like to take a shuttle out as soon as possible – take Seven and Ensign Kim.  We can ..”  Chakotay was already making plans and appeared to have the entire mission wrapped up just a little too comfortably for the Captain.

“Hang on, Chakotay!”  Janeway eased forward a little in her chair, eyeballing her number one, a slow smile cut across her features,  “Since when do you get all the fun?  I seem to remember that you got to play with the shuttle last time we did this.  Personally, I feel a little excursion coming on.  Besides it’s been ages since I got to be in the driving seat and this little mission appeals to my scientific bent!”  Her voice had the lilt of playfulness but the eyes indicated otherwise.

Chakotay’s response was hesitant.  He was having difficulty getting the feel of his captain now she was back.

Face value, she was the same, albeit a lot thinner and clearly still getting over some physical issues.  He noticed how she had tucked her right hand under her left armpit.  She did this to hide the tremors, but everyone knew they were there.

No. It was more her mental state that gave him problems.  Not that she was behaving differently but it seemed to him it was as if she had turned in on herself.  There was a new aspect to the woman that gave her an edge of unapproachability .. and yet she wasn’t.  He had tried to quantify what he thought and could only turn up fairly useless descriptions such as ‘heavy, stern, untouchable …hard as nails.’

He replied,  “I just thought that …” 

The Captain knew what he ‘just thought’.  She could hear the concern in their voices, see it in their eyes and she didn’t help matters because they all wanted to help her but she couldn’t talk about what had happened to her – couldn’t even think about it.  It was all too raw, too painful.

“Captain’s prerogative.  You lose.  I win!”  The smile she gave him was warm but he knew she’d brook no argument so he grinned back at her, acquiesced to her wishes and shrugged his shoulders.

“Guess I’ll look after the farm then.”

“You do that,” she said with accompanying light laughter which relieved a tension no one wanted to admit to in the meeting and suddenly her laughter triggered something infectious, and quiet chuckles reverberated around the room. 

For all his concerns, Chakotay happily found himself comparing the high levels of morale now to how the spirit of the ship’s crew had been a few months ago when all had started to believe that the Captain was dead.

“Actually, I’d quite like to volunteer, Captain.  I do have a lot of experience in containing proto matter.”  Neelix’s keen enthusiasm rippled down the table.

“You nearly killed yourself last time you did it!” Torres butted in.

“Actually, you did kill yourself!” Paris added, then realised that perhaps this hadn’t been the most tactful of comments to make.  Neelix had died during what should have been a simple gathering of base proto matter into a containment cylinder.  But for Seven’s nanoprobes, the man would still be dead.  It had taken him a long time to recover from the episode.

Janeway sobered immediately, fully aware that tact and diplomacy was called for.

“Thank you, Neelix, but this time I’d like to give Ensign Kim a shot at the containment.  How’s that grab you, Harry?”

“I guess there’s got to be a first time for everything, Captain.”  His usual tone of youthful enthusiasm was evident.

“Good man!” Janeway nodded. “Oh, and actually, I’d like to take Ensign Torb along this time.  He’s been pushing for more exciting away missions. Seems he finds life in engineering dull!” Janeway threw a playful glance at Torres, “This could be right up his warp stream, get him out of engineering for awhile. Any objections, Lieutenant?”

“No, Ma’am. I’ll let him know but, well .. hasn’t Seven got the most experience where n…”

Torres didn’t get a chance to finish. 

“ Torb’s my choice.  See he gets briefed, Commander.”  Her tone was implacable, this was not something that was open to debate. She looked to Chakotay who acknowledged her order.  The Captain had reverted to full command mode, knew what she wanted and wasn’t going to waste time discussing it.

Somewhat quickly, perhaps too quickly, she continued.

“Any other matters?  No?   Dismissed.” 

The staff began to leave the room but Seven hovered in the background, eventually approaching the commanding officer.

“Captain.”  The voice was cool, respectful.  The young woman stood before Janeway, who had now also stood, her arms folded across her chest, a studious look of stern austerity written across her face, the eyes flint grey.

“As I was the one who discovered the energy field, I thought I might be best placed to take part in the mission.   The field is showing signs of volatility and sporadic power fluctuations …”

Janeway studied the other woman’s face and frowned slightly, “I’ve made my mind up.  I want Ensign Torb on the mission.  I’ve studied the readings and the energy fields are within safe parameters.  I think we can handle it.”  Seven wondered if the last few words hadn’t been delivered with just a hint of sarcasm.

The captain had moved to leave the room but then stopped and turned back to face Seven, the smaller woman’s face serious, resolute.

“There’ll be other missions, Seven.  Time to let someone else have a go.  Besides …”

the Captain paused, her tone commanding, unappeasing, “I’m sure you have more urgent matters to attend to in Astrometrics, some project or other, that requires your immediate and personal, undivided attention.”  The statement was rhetorical, demanding no answer.

Seven’s body posture immediately went rigid as she recognised the similarity of her own earlier wording being thrown back at her.  Unusually, she could feel the heat burning in her face, as she comprehended the fact that she had been very much put in her place and not so subtly reprimanded for her earlier behaviour on a mission she had backed out of many months ago. 

Seven’s head shot up, surprise and shock written across her face.  Before she could respond, the captain had turned and left.

Was this how Captain Janeway had felt all those months ago when she herself had been so callous and cruel.  Another lesson learned.

Chakotay who had remained behind with the Captain, had witnessed it all and his heart went out to the young woman who looked completely stunned and miserable.

He knew she had done her penance and had repented over her previous behaviour towards the Captain.  Unfortunately, the latter still had issues.

He didn’t say anything to her but simply, gently, tapped the young woman on the shoulder in sympathy as he followed in the Captain’s wake.

*****

The doors swished closed, leaving Seven alone in the Briefing Room.  Her legs felt like leaden weights and only served to match the way her heart felt.  How could things have turned so wretchedly bad? 

Captain Janeway had just coolly relegated her to an area that was usually reserved for those the woman had little time for, those she disliked or distrusted.  Seven recalled Tuvok’s discussion once of a man called Souter?  Janeway had apparently been icily unreceptive to the man, even when he had shown great leaps in moral integrity.

Yet Seven felt she deserved no less from Kathryn Janeway.  Seven had acted like a spoilt brat when she had not received the response she had wanted from the captain all those months ago.  And Seven had been quite accomplished in hurting and humiliating the senior officer whenever she had had the chance.  The woman who had never done her any harm and had only ever shown her compassion, understanding, friendship and given her precious time so freely. Who could blame the Captain?

But it didn’t make Seven feel any better, recognising why Janeway should chose to act like this.

All the former Borg could do now was serve Kathryn Janeway to the best of her capacity, not let her down in any quarter.  Make Janeway recognise and acknowledge her qualities again, and maybe, get the captain to like her once more?  See her once more?

With laboured difficulty, Seven lifted her head in accepting her own challenge.  She would be more efficient, more effective!  Janeway would have to take notice of her again!  Wouldn’t she?

*****

Chakotay had accompanied the Captain back to her ready room, to discuss final arrangements for the mission later that day.  He could see that the altercation with Seven had disturbed the fragile equilibrium of the Captain, who appeared worryingly frail. 

“Interesting staff meeting, Captain.”  Chakotay had a wry grin on his face and Janeway initially turned and scowled at him.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she challenged, immediately on the defensive, the body language stiff.  She knew where he was coming from.

He gently raised his hands in front of him in mock surrender, “Oh nothing.  Just felt you were a little harsh with Seven, that’s all.”

“I wasn’t harsh.  I made a command decision to take Ensign Torb instead of her.  Torb needs the experience.”

“Yes, he does.  I’m just saying that you were a little hard on Seven,” his voice had taken on a gentle, caring tone, “and you don’t need to be.”

For a split second, he thought she was going to pile into him with the third degree.  In the past he had been on the receiving end of more than one of her interrogation style one-way chats where she had shown she had the ability of a forensic examiner!

But her aggressiveness faded immediately as she stared up at the ceiling and sucked air in, and then out.  She indicated for him to sit.

“Oh, Chakotay, and I was supposed to be building bridges!”  Her hand went through her hair, a look of resignation flew across her gaunt features. Chakotay noticed the hand trembling.  She was better, but still not fully recovered.

He smiled at her and beckoned her to sit down beside him. “You might want to change the style!”

She grinned sheepishly, then sat on the couch beside him.

“I don’t know where that came from.  Not very mature of me, was it?”  The deep, sultry tones held an edge of despair.

Her first officer leaned back into the couch, “I think you’ve had rather a lot to put up with lately, Kathryn, so no one’s looking!  But I do think there are a few things you ought to be aware of.  Things you probably don’t know about Seven … that I think you really need to know.” 

The captain sighed out loud.  “Chakotay, I don’t think I behaved very well today but once Seven’s got over the slight, she’ll realise I saved her having to find some noble excuse why she couldn’t make the mission!”

Chakotay shook his head, “No, Kathryn, you’re wrong and that’s why I want to share a little information with you about our illustrious little Borg.  Things that, as a good First Officer, I have to let you know and that you, as a fair and just Captain really do need to be aware of.  OK?”  He was being a touch theatrical.

Janeway just flipped a hand forward, giving the man permission to continue.

“You don’t think she cares for you, do you?” he probed.

“Whether she does or doesn’t is irrelevant as long as she does her job well.”

Chakotay frowned at Janeway’s avoidance of the question, and didn’t mask his disappointment and anger. He resorted to the time-honoured trick of just not coming back at her response, allowing a silent pause to stretch a little.

Janeway tutted in recognition of his tactic and sighed, “Hell, I know she doesn’t. We weren’t exactly on the best of terms before the mission to Excelda, or have you conveniently forgotten that?”

So now the Captain was trying to throw him off the conversational thread by bringing him into the chain?   ‘Doesn’t work, Kathryn, I’ve known you too long.’

“Yes, the mission to Excelda .. she talked to me about that, and what happened between the two of you prior to that.”   Janeway blanched.  “Sorry, but she did. She was desperate to talk to someone and she chose me.”  Chakotay knew he was delving into personal relationships now and he knew neither of them were comfortable with this, but things had to be said.

“She was devastated when you disappeared.  She blames herself, you know.”

“For what?”

“For what happened to you.  She thinks that if she’d been on that mission, none of this would have happened.”

“That’s ridiculous!”  Her tone was sharp.

“Yes it is but try telling that to Seven.” 

“Well, I am genuinely sorry if Seven feels that but it doesn’t really change anything.  We’re not exactly the best of friends anymore.”   Janeway rubbed at her temples.

“Is that what you think?”  He was probing, pushing Janeway and she didn’t like it. She didn’t really want to talk about this right now.

“Honestly?  Yes.”  Pause.  “I mean, fine, she’s more approachable now and .. less hostile in her dealings with me but I don’t think she’ll lose any sleep, regeneration alcove or otherwise, over this.”

“Really?” Chakotay was frowning, only just beginning to realise how much both of these woman felt for each other and yet, how totally useless they were at apparently reading one another.

“Do I have any evidence to say otherwise?”

Chakotay took stock, pushed himself up to his feet and glared down at the captain.

“Perhaps that’s the problem, Kathryn.  You don’t have any evidence to say otherwise, because you either weren’t here or you were a little sedated at the time!”  

“Your point?”  The hard-as-nails attitude was back and it was beginning to annoy Chakotay.

“My point?”  he said curtly, sitting back down again, this time closer to her.  “Sit back, Kathryn and prepare yourself to hear things you may not want to know.”

He momentarily paused as if contemplating where to begin, then the words flowed.

“You won’t be aware that we got several ‘tips’ from traders suggesting where to look for you.  Most of them were useless, some even trying to lure us into traps to gain our technology.  One of these informants we chose to completely ignore – wisely – but Seven felt we were wrong and stole a shuttle.”

Janeway’s face was blank, as though the words were not registering.

“She stole a shuttle,” he repeated, ensuring the words hit their mark with the woman, “and so we went after her before she could get into any trouble.”

Now Janeway’s interest was piqued.  “Why did she disregard the senior management’s decision?”

“Because she couldn’t think straight. Because she wasn’t regenerating properly.  Because she wasn’t eating.  Because she was lost without you.  Because she was eating herself up alive with guilt and worry.  Are you getting the picture, Kathryn?”

Janeway’s face registered nothing. 

Chakotay continued.

“She shared a lot with me whilst you were gone.  Like how badly she was in love with you, how she felt she’d approached you the wrong way, how badly she had behaved towards you afterwards.  I guess we really are talking ‘major guilt’ syndrome here but she suffered.  She suffered so much, we thought she was simply going to shut down.  She refused to eat, regenerate or socialise.  Her work became erratic and what she was able to produce was of no value.”

Chakotay watched for the responses on his captain’s face. They were disappointingly minimal, but still he continued.

“I feared for her life, as did many others on this ship.   So, what am I trying to say?  Do not mistake her apparent distance with that of someone who doesn’t ‘give a damn’.  She cares for you, Kathryn – she cares a lot.  Seven did a lot of soul searching whilst you were missing and I can tell you this, if what she feels for you isn’t love, then I don’t know what is!”

Janeway smiled grimly, sensing the reprimand she had just sensitively been delivered.

“Always the romantic, Chakotay, but I can assure you she doesn’t have any measure of affection for me.”

“Really?  Then you tell me, Captain,” he leaned in towards her as if in conspiracy, “what measure of affection makes a person spend every waking off-duty moment by your side in sickbay when you were sedated for 10 days?”

“What?”  Now Janeway was registering emotion, the shock clearly evident.

“You didn’t know that, did you?  Apart from when she was either on duty or being ordered to regenerate by the doctor, she never left your side.  I honestly believe that if anyone had tried to get her to move, she’d have broken their neck!”  Chakotay was deadly serious.

“I don’t expect you to remember any of this, Kathryn.  You were seriously ill at the time but you’ll just have to trust me.  Don’t doubt for one minute the ‘measure of affection’ that Seven has for you.”

“But she never came to see me once in sickbay .. not after I woke.”  It wasn’t a question, more a statement of fact. 

“I know, and I don’t really understand that either.  She stopped watching over you the minute you started to regain consciousness, and for some reason …  she wouldn’t visit you.”   He glanced away, studied the flooring and then set his big brown eyes on grey ones.  “I think it’s guilt, Kathryn.  She really does blame herself for everything that has happened to you.  I don’t think she can face you.”

Captain Kathryn Janeway sat pole-axed and couldn’t think of anything to say.  A large masculine hand reached out and covered an elegant, delicate one.

“Just consider what I’ve said and maybe .. maybe, cut Seven a little slack and see what happens.  You said you wanted to build bridges?”

The small woman swallowed loudly, “I do .. very much.”  Her voice quiet and distant.

Chakotay now rubbed her hand between the two of his, “I don’t know what is going through Seven’s mind right now, Kathryn, but I can tell you this, whatever she thinks of you, it isn’t with disinterest or ambivalence.  And if you were to ask me my personal opinion?”

Janeway stared into his eyes, saying nothing but demanding everything.

“I’d say she was hopelessly in love with you .. still.  She just hasn’t got a clue how to proceed through .. all of this mess.  She doesn’t want to hurt you, or worry you.  She can see you’ve been through a lot and she doesn’t want to make anything worse.”  For Janeway’s benefit, he repeated a few words again, “Seven doesn’t want to hurt you anymore.”

There was something else the man wanted to say and he choose the words carefully.

“You see, she doesn’t really talk to anyone about all of this.”

Janeway arched her eyebrows.

“Oh, she feeds me snippets, Kathryn, and I piece the bits together.  But, you see, she can’t talk to her mentor, her friend because that person is you.”  He paused for effect, “Just make sure you know what you’re doing before you put her down again like you did just now.”

“Is that a reprimand, Commander?”  Janeway gave him a gently, genuine smile.

“Only if you can handle it.”   Warm, brown eyes never left hers.

“I can.  Thank you!”  For the first time, Chakotay felt that he was communicating again with the old Janeway, the one who had been impressively in touch with her own emotions. 

He rose.  “Welcome back, Kathryn.  You have been sorely missed … by everyone!”

Chakotay left.

Janeway pondered. 

All this information.  All this emotion which she felt entirely too incapable of handling just yet.  If only she could have time, time to just ease the wounds and get her breath.  All she wanted was to find her feet again.  But meanwhile, she had snubbed Seven in the meeting, which was an action not worthy of her.  She would have to fix this but how?  Why was nothing simple anymore?

*****

Janeway sat in her quarters and stared at her computer console, like she had done yesterday, the day before and the day before that.  Well, so much for another attempt to update her personal logs. The screen was blank, much like she felt.   No thoughts came into her head that gave her voice power, spurring recording activity.  She was like an empty, unwritten book full of empty unwritten pages. 

Rationally, her mind told her to take it steady, be gentle with herself.  She just needed time to adapt, time to heal.  Trouble was, she knew she wasn’t running on ‘empty’, she knew she had a lot of emotion bottled up inside her that wanted out.   All those emotions she had buried deep inside her during her imprisonment, done deliberately to stop her going insane.  But now?  Now, she just couldn’t access them.  She felt inhuman, without passion, incapable of deep feeling or sensitivity .. an automaton.

She accessed her last log, the one written the night before she left for Excelda.

“What a mess.  What a complete, bloody mess.  And who has caused this mess?  Me.

I don’t think I have ever felt as low and alone as I am feeling right now.  If I could change what I said, how I reacted to Seven that evening in my quarters those many months ago, I would.  My behaviour that night was unforgivable – how could I have reacted to Seven in such a callous and heartless way?  I see now that I panicked and let my fear drive me, and to what end?

I rejected Seven’s advances – even though I knew there was something happening between us, some awakening, and not just on Seven’s part.  I too recognised that my feelings for her were growing and beyond that of the caring mentor, the trusted friend.  I had recognised some time ago that my interest in Seven had long since shifted from any innocent interpretation.

So what did I do?  I threw her most genuine, heart-felt advances – sweetest advances - back in her face with no acknowledgement on my part of the sheer courage and grit it must have taken her to tell me those feelings.   I might just as well have pulled a phaser on her or handed her back to the Borg Queen – her shock at my behaviour wouldn’t have been any less diminished.  I can still see her pale face now, the wretchedness and despair written across it before she quietly turned and left my quarters.

But it was a shock for me too!  Seven making the first move. Seven forcing the issue before I was prepared to address it.  I should have done that.  I should have taken the initiative. But would I ever have done anything?  Who knows?  I was more focused on covering up my feelings and for every wrong reason I can think about.

And so Seven made the first move.  To stop me alienating myself, distancing myself from her.  She knew what I was doing and why.  Almost from the very beginning, she has had that instinct for knowing me better than I know myself.    I wonder if she knows what I’m feeling now?   My abject despair?

I was too full of doubts then.  Did Seven really love me, did she know what love really was or was it merely another facet brought on by her fact-gathering ventures regarding human intimacy?   Did I really rate Seven’s intellectual abilities to interpret her own emotions so poorly, when I’ve witnessed countless occasions where it has been her deciphering the most complex emotions and, at times, put me to shame?

What a fool I was that night and what have I now lost?  Seven has rightly cut me out of her life, allowing me only to function within the professional capacity and I have to witness her interacting with other crew members where she continues to grow and appears relaxed, more informal, ever more open ... but no more with me. 

Now she treats me with total indifference.  She does not ‘see me’.  She does not ‘hear me’.  She does not ‘speak’ to me.  She passes me, without recognition, as if unseen, in the corridors.  I am invisible to her now.

How do I make this stop? Make the pain go away? How can I make her stop ignoring me?

I recall, almost as if yesterday, my decision to return an astrometrics report to her personally but it did nothing to improve the situation.  She was aloof, cold and detached towards me – not even hostile any more – just casual indifference. No hint of our past relationship, our friendship.   There was no life in those beautiful blue eyes when they gazed at me, no recognition of times past, only some distant acknowledgement of my position … I have become just a rank to her.

 I did this.  It is my fault.  Intense relationships and I have always been uneasy partners … perhaps Seven is getting off lightly?  She wins, I lose?

What I did was unforgivable.  Unforgivable?  I hope not.  I think I might just be hopelessly in love with her! Like a hammer hitting the anvil, the dawning realisation and the jigsaw pieces finally fitting.   For all my so called ‘experience’, I am the one floundering in the dark and because of my inability to sort my own life out, I am hurting someone else .. someone special, someone I really do care for.

I’ve started dreaming of her now!  Sweet torture.  I see her as we were together in the past, open, caring …both of us unknowingly falling in love.  Other times, I dream of her as some dark, blackened avenging angel seeking to destroy me.  Those disturbing nightmares sometimes follow me into the day and I find it difficult to shake off the vivid feelings experienced.

I know now I have to do something.  I have to fight to win her back, even if it only gives me back a diminished thread of what we once had together.  I will accept anything beyond this vacuum of nothingness. 

I’m hoping that her apathy masks her anger.  Anger tells me she still cares for me, and I believe in time that the anger will fade and then, perhaps I can start to put things right. Get her to just like me again, maybe spend a little time with me .. or a lot.

Surely when you really love someone, you cannot switch those emotions off with a click of the fingers?  If the love was real, then it is still there? But I am dealing with matters of the heart here … and I plunged a knife into hers.  Have I soured her heart?

Tomorrow, I lead the away team down to Excelda.  Seven is part of that team .. perhaps I can start some damage limitation there. I will try.  All I ask is that I get a second chance.  Shouldn’t everyone get a second chance? Please, don’t let me lose this beautiful, wonderful woman.”

It was as if the words had been written by a complete stranger.  It wasn’t as if her feelings had changed towards Seven, it was her love for her that had kept her alive in those early days of her imprisonment, while she could still think.  But now, she was different.  Janeway was no longer the person for whom Seven had declared her love, she was nothing but a gutted shell.  She didn’t know where her ‘life anchors’ were any more.  Irony.  She lived but she was really dead inside, it was just that no one realised it yet.

Besides, Janeway reasoned, this log had been written before she had witnessed Seven pulling out of the away mission the following day and the look that had been so evident on the young woman’s beautiful classical features.  The frosty, hostile ice blue eyes had challenged Janeway to keep her distance. There had been genuine enmity there that morning.  It had sent a bitter chill through the Captain. Perhaps that is why she hadn’t been paying as much attention to the surroundings on the planet as she should have done?  Her thoughts had definitely been occupied with things other than bargaining and negotiation.  Well, all history now.

Janeway leaned back in her chair, her fingers resting lifelessly in front of her on the desk.  She pondered what Chakotay had told her about Seven still caring for her but somehow she couldn’t quite reconcile herself to those hopes. 

Seven had clearly moved on anyway, the Captain wasn’t blind.  She could see that Seven had formed deeper relationships in her absence and would never need her as a mentor, friend or … whatever … anymore.  So why bother even thinking these thoughts, the whole mess was now non sequitur.  

She had nothing left in her to offer the young woman anyway, she couldn’t even find the emotional output to record a personal log!  How on earth was she ever going to ‘woo’ a Borg?  All she could do was put the relationship on a better footing .. build those damn bridges!

But as a tired Kathryn Janeway acknowledged that the ache in her leg was starting to bother her and that she really ought to lie down, she failed to recognise the smallest emotional bubble float up from somewhere deep and lodge in her subconscious that she was not at all happy to be left on the fringes of any relationship with Seven.  Not happy at all. 

Tonight, in another restless sea of nightmares, she would dream of Seven of Nine.  

*****

Janeway stood in the shuttle bay.  She was early and took the time to survey the exterior of the Delta Flyer before Ensigns’ Kim and Torb arrived.

It really was a beautiful craft… sleek, streamlined.   A small smile graced the Captain’s pale features as she thought about the creator of the vessel before her.  Not wanting to demote Kim’s part in its building but there was a definite place for the maverick, Tom Paris in Star Fleet.  Whether they would like it or not, Star Fleet would simply have to accept the incredible diversity of the talented man.  Perhaps not outwardly like his father, but he was definitely cut from the same cloth.  ‘Captain Proton’, Warp Speed breaker, and builder of shuttlecraft .. debatably the father of her ‘slug’ offspring but hey, that was some time ago and she didn’t want to go there! 

Her chain of thought came to an abrupt end as the shuttle bay doors hissed open and Chakotay, Kim and Seven entered.

Chakotay positively skulked over to her.  “Captain, a slight change of plan.”

He moved up close to Janeway, anticipating her disapproval at what he was about to deliver.  “Ensign Torb has managed to break his wrist falling out of a Jeffries Tube.  He’s with the doctor now so I’ve re-assigned Seven to accompany you and Ensign Kim.  She’s been fully briefed.”

The Captain took a breath, hesitated but said nothing.  Not necessarily disapproval written across her face but definitely apprehension.  Chakotay decided to further seize the moment.  “You’ll have to move fast Captain, the concentrations of protomatter are beginning to break up and disperse.  I’m not sure how much time we have left to harvest it.”

She nodded, her eyes now fixed on the deck as if intensely studying the meter of space she stood in.  Then glancing up at the commander, Janeway looked him straight in the eyes, her head set slightly to one side, her face wearing the ‘Why do I feel I’m being manipulated?’ look.  However, she merely nodded again  “Thank you, Commander, for the quick and efficient change of personnel.”  A simple glance but with warp thrusters all the way behind it.

Chakotay felt his blood pressure rise a notch but ever cool, he wore his lop sided grin.

“Thank you Ma’am, just doing my job!”

He indicated to the other two to board the shuttle and once they had passed the Captain and were inside, Janeway leaned in close to Chakotay, “And how convenient that Seven was available with no other commitments.”   She arched an eyebrow at him.

“Have a good journey, Captain,” he grinned and gently tapped her shoulder before turning to leave the bay.

*****

Seven sat at the pilot’s station whilst Janeway monitored the science console to her left, analysing the data from the nebula.  Ensign Kim was in the rear of the vessel, ready and prepared with the containment cylinder.

“I’m picking up traces of the proto-matter.  Drop speed to impulse.”  Janeway’s voice was cool and controlled.  “Better get ready, Harry.  Nervous?”

Kim sat, perched on the edge of the seat, clearly very nervous!  He glanced over to the Captain and Seven sat in the front,  “Yeah, well …I keep remembering what happened to Neelix when he did this … I don’t think I want any of Seven’s nanoprobes in my blood stream.  No offence, Seven.”

“None taken, Ensign Kim,” Seven responded, smiling.  “They would, of course, make you more efficient and functional.”   She did not look up from her station.

Janeway caught the intonation and dry humour, looked up and back from her console and smiled a little at him  “Don’t worry Harry, we’ll do this nice and smoothly.”  She turned back to her screen, “OK people, there’s a concentration of protomatter directly ahead.”

“I see it, Captain.”  Seven’s voice clear, efficient.

“OK, set the transporter for 8000 AMUs.”  Janeway, predicting Seven’s thoughts, amplified her comments, “2000 less than when Neelix did this, and that .. ” she said with emphasis “is where I think Neelix had the problems.”

“Containment field is standing by.”  Kim straightened himself.

“In range.”

“Energise.”

Janeway immediately glanced back at Harry Kim.  He was grinning widely, “I’ve got it, Captain, and it’s stable.”

“Well done, all.  Let’s get out of here and go home.”

*****

Things were quiet on the Delta Flyer’s home trip.  Ensign Kim was sat in the back of the craft, quietly nodding off whilst Seven piloted the craft home to Voyager, ever efficient and with effortless activity.

But for all the calm emitted inside the small craft, the apparent picture of serenity, Seven was exasperated.  She glanced to her side, quickly taking in the woman sitting there.

The Captain sat quietly, seemingly lost and far away in some distant place and time, still mentally caught up in those recent past experiences?   Seven couldn’t tell what was going through the woman’s mind but regardless of how still she sat, her body exuded tension, like a coiled spring ready for release.

Never one for ‘easy’ conversation, Seven did however want to engage Janeway in some form of informal chat, just to break the monotony of the long journey back to Voyager and to begin to put flesh back on the bones of their old friendship.  But the Captain looked unapproachable and this made Seven hesitant to make the first move.

This was the primary difference between the Janeway of old and now.  The ‘old’ Janeway would have been quick to make irrelevant and unimportant conversation, probably sharing a joke or two about her early officer experiences et al, showing an abundant connection with them.  But not now.  This woman was reserved and inhibited by social surroundings and seemed only able to function comfortably when on duty, something she had thrown herself into with alacrity and which, Seven knew worried both the doctor and Chakotay.

Janeway had however, proved herself once more the consummate professional and returned to work with great success, all things considered but something was missing, and noticed by all the senior staff.  The warm spontaneous spark that was Captain Janeway was simply not there anymore.  This woman was dark, hidden and always on edge.  Even her eyes were slate grey with no trace of the blue that had once been there.

But Seven was tenacious and just desperate enough to want to pursue the Kathryn Janeway she knew was still inside this shell of a woman.  She also possessed a heavy amount of desire to re-establish that personal link between them and return to a sense of well-being they had once shared long before the Excelda incident.

“Captain.”

She saw the sound register with the older woman who blinked, and with minimal movement, turned only her head to acknowledge ‘the voice’.  Strong, penetrating grey eyes focused piercingly on cobalt blue.

“Yes?”  The head tilted slightly as if giving permission for the anticipated question.

“Captain.”  Seven repeated again with some audible hesitancy, almost as if she no longer wanted to open this conversation.  She recognised her own nervousness but having waited so long for this opportunity to both engage the Captain in conversation and have her almost undivided attention, she could not fail now.

“I wanted to say that .. it is good to have you back on Voyager.” There was no facial response from the Captain but Seven continued.  “You were .. very missed by everyone onboard.”  Seven couldn’t seem to find the right words and felt that the ones she did find, sounded trite and without meaning. There was an unaccustomed sense of dryness to her mouth.  “The morale of the crew has never been higher, and the ship functions better now you are back.”

“The ship now works at optimum efficiency,” Janeway’s muted response.

‘Optimum efficiency’ – those words came back to haunt Seven, returning from a conversation the two women had had so many months ago in a cargo bay when things had not been going well between them. 

“ I …”  Seven paused, temporarily thrown off track but then resumed, “Captain, you are responsible for freeing me from the Borg collective and for encouraging my re-integration into humanity.  You have consistently encouraged me to embrace my emotional inheritance, despite it all being so .. alien to me.” 

Janeway frowned in confusion, swivelled in her chair slightly to check on Harry. He was asleep.

Seven gave the Captain a cursory glance.  “I was … alone … but for your administrations and continual mentoring.  It is you who helped me connect with my individuality, you who helped me to express myself emotionally and to reach out and connect with people.”

With trepidation and second thoughts, Seven finally voiced, “I find it .. disconcerting that our fortunes appear reversed.”

For a while, Kathryn Janeway said nothing.

“You find me emotionally wanting, Seven?  Think I’ve lost my individuality?”

There was an edge to the response as if replying to a criticism.

Seven had not meant her words to be received negatively and yet that is how the Captain seemed to have perceived them. It worried her that Captain Janeway did seem to want to find ‘undercurrents’ in what she was saying, as if not believing the actual words could possibly mean what they meant at face value.  She frowned in frustration.

“I  ..you .. I was not implying any .. what I am trying to say is that it is good to have you back on board.”

Understatement. Understatement. Understatement.   The ex Borg’s frustrations grew.

The cool, restrained response, “Thank you,” came back from the Captain.

And then the shutters came down again as Janeway turned back to the forward view and continued gazing out.  Seven inwardly sighed. 

One more attempt.  Serious.  Important.

“ I was once Borg,” she blurted out the obvious, instantly recognising how much more she needed to master the art of conversation.   “Now I am not.  I am human.  I am capable of feeling and expressing emotion.”   ‘Very deep emotion’, Seven reflected momentarily on the pain she had felt when she believed this woman was dead.

“I am now an individual .. thanks to you.  I continue to feel guilt for what I, a human, did to others whilst I was Borg even though I am able to rationalise that I did such things with no knowledge, or control, of my actions.  Yet it does not absolve me of what I did, and some part of me will live with that guilt forever.”

The Captain did not directly acknowledge Seven but she was certainly listening because Seven saw the woman glance down at her own hands which were folded in her lap, and take a deeper breath than usual.   Seven chose to continue, leaning over, closer to Janeway.

“However … Captain,  .. I wish you to know that I would, without any hesitation, assimilate those who have done this to you.  There would be no guilt.  It would be justice.”   ‘Yes, I would do this for you.  If only you knew that now I understand what you mean to me, I would do anything for you’.

Captain Kathryn Janeway rapidly turned her head to face Seven and the pain Seven saw on the woman’s face, so raw and unguarded, cut her to her emotional core.

For just a brief moment, Kathryn Janeway had dropped the ‘untouchable’ visage and what showed on her countenance was inexpressible, but Seven thought she recognised vulnerability and despair.  She felt a tumultuous cascade of emotions rock through her and an almost primeval urge to grab this woman, hold her in her arms and never let her go. 

But something of unknown significance held Seven back, an instinct that Janeway wouldn’t be able to handle that level of emotion, not yet.  Chakotay had told her how he had touched the Captain earlier, during her time in sickbay, and how badly she had reacted, clearly recalling unpleasant memories.

Seven must wait.  She could do that for this woman.

And as Harry Kim stirred and asked how long before they were back on Voyager, Seven heard a quiet, sincere ‘Thank you’ emanate from the Captain.

*****

CHAPTER FIVE

Janeway leaned back in her chair, stretched out her legs, blankly staring at her ready room and not the data padds strewn on her desk, her mind clearly occupied on other things.

All in all, she surmised, things were going much better for her than she would have expected.  She was settling back into being on duty with almost relative ease, although she did get tired quickly and Chakotay was very insistent, along with the EMH, that she only did short duty periods to begin with.

This left her with time to fill which she had always hated but more so now because it meant she had time to think about things in the recent past when all she wanted to do was move forward.  But as the doctor had said “You can’t move forward successfully until you have come to terms with what happened to you in the past.”

Great words!  How could you ever come to terms with treatment like she’d received, and the countless others who had not been so lucky and made it home?  Well, she guessed she understood the sentiments somewhere within his lecture. She’d take his advice and go slow, for a while!

Other good things were happening.  She had taken to roaming the ship during the night shift, meeting crew she always felt she should know better, getting the feel of her ship again, visiting different departments. This helped her insomnia problems.  She refused to lie in bed studying the ceiling and the bulkheads all night long. Best to do something constructive with her time, and wandering the ship made her feel good.

It made others feel good too.  Word spread throughout Voyager like a contagious disease, that Captain Janeway ‘stalked the ship at night’.  She noticed how, for no apparent reason, and at some ungodly hour in the night shift, Engineering or the Weapons department would suddenly be full of crew who ‘just happened’ to be up at that time and wanted to ‘just check’ a few things in their department.  Rumour had it that morale was riding high too.  ‘I guess the ship likes having its’ captain back,’ she thought wryly. 

‘The Captain likes being back too!’

She had made a habit of finishing off her nightly tours in the mess hall and raiding the coffee pot, which Neelix now left conveniently for her.  Of course, the doctor was adamant that she was not to drink coffee again just yet as it acted as a stimulant which failed to assist her in sleeping and apparently slowed down her recovery process. 

Ridiculous!  He had even brought this up in ‘Any Other Business’ at a Management Board meeting with the Senior Staff, informing them that they were to stop her if they caught her imbibing! 

“You don’t trust me, do you Doctor?” she had demanded during the meeting.

“Not in the slightest, Captain,” the doctor’s acerbic response, “ which is why I’ve restricted your caffeine access on your personal replicator coding!”

Thank god for Neelix!  The Morale Officer was doing just fine in her books and the nightly infusion of caffeine was a godsend.  So she would end up in the mess hall, with her pot of coffee .. and a surge of officers who just happened to turn up for a quick snack at a time when all good officers should be tucked up and asleep in bed!

They would all gather around her and in good spirits, talk to her about anything and everything. There was always a great deal of laughter and happy banter, and Janeway began to recognise this as perhaps the greatest part of her healing process – the connection again with the crew, with those who mattered to her and who clearly felt she mattered to them.  Family.

And then the unusual started happening.  Strange little incidents concerning Seven. 

First, the behaviour of Seven towards her on the Delta Flyer.  She was still trying to work that one out. The change in behaviour seemed sudden to Janeway and she could only think it was merely Seven trying to re-establish a professional relationship.

However, then there were the things she had heard about Seven.  In particular, how the young woman had apparently stayed by her side all the time she was sedated in sickbay. For nearly two weeks!  Leaving only to carry out her duty and regenerate when necessary.  Janeway had to remind herself that this was the woman who had shunned her with the efficiency of a knife through butter.

In many ways, nothing had apparently changed since, with the exception that the controlled hostility and ice-cold responses were gone.  It had to be Borg efficiency ensuring professionalism was maximised. 

But nothing made complete sense.  Chakotay had informed her how Seven had almost ‘lost it’ when she had disappeared, how Seven had apparently suffered and become ‘closed-off’ to people, almost to the point of becoming ill?   The First Officer had spoken of Seven becoming increasingly vulnerable and ‘disassociated’, to the extent that concerned crew members – and apparently there had been many – had considered it their duty and responsibility to help her come to terms with the loss she seemed incapable of handling.

No.  Sorry Chakotay!  If you are trying to imply she has deep feelings for me, forget it.  Shocked, maybe.  Guilt syndrome, probably.  But that was it.  Had Chakotay forgotten how Seven had acted toward her those months before her capture?

What Chakotay was missing here was the fact that Seven had always been vulnerable.  It is what had drawn her to Seven in the first place, driven her to provide the friendship and guidance she so desperately needed.  Seven’s nature had always been, to some extent, ‘closed off’ regardless of her arrogant, self-assured demeanour.  These statements only served to irritate Janeway more, for it had always irked her that her apparently compassionate and feeling First Officer had been so incapable of picking up on these important facets of the complicated woman that was Seven of Nine. 

Okay, so now Chakotay and some of the crew were taking time to recognise these nuances but they were perhaps over exaggerating them. 

Bottom line, Seven had not gone out of her way to procure any deeper relationship other than that of crew to a captain.  OK, so the woman’s statements on the shuttle were .. unexplainable and didn’t quite fit into the Captain’s analysis. But that aside…

Captain Janeway did admit to herself that the subtle changes in their new relationship were welcome.  Even if the friendship was gone, it was good to have a better working relationship.

But Chakotay didn’t seem capable of realising that beyond the professional aspect of their working relationship, Seven still avoided her, remained aloof and kept her distance.  Nevertheless, Janeway just found the whole relationship thing confusing, probably because she wasn’t yet recovered, nor would be for a long time, but she wasn’t going to let the doctor or any of her crew know that.

Her ‘old self’ would have made sense of all of this but right now, she couldn’t.  Thinking about these things made her head ache.  Best to not think about them.

But she couldn’t stop thinking …

One very late night, again in the mess hall, at 0300 hrs, whilst Janeway had been surrounded by a group of off-watch engineering and geospacial staff, Seven had turned up and quietly seated herself at the table next to where Janeway was.  Seven hadn’t contributed to the conversation, but seemed glad to be part of the grouping and had been in no rush to leave.

The following night this occurred again, with Seven actually managing to seat herself on the same table as the Captain. Janeway hadn’t quite known how to handle this.  She desperately wanted Seven there but was afraid that if she said anything, even acknowledged the ex Borg’s presence, she would scare her off. That is, until what loosely became infamously known as ‘The Mess Hall Coffee Incident’!

Janeway had sat with her crew at a seriously early hour of the morning, a mug of steaming coffee in front of her, when without warning, the EMH had sped through the sliding doors with an emerging ‘whoosh’.

“Hah!  Caught you, Captain!  Thought you could circumvent my medical orders by partaking of coffee here in the …Oh?”  He had charged in like some avenging angel ready to catch the Captain ‘mug handed’ and in the act of the heinous crime but just as he was pointing the finger of doom, he stopped dead in his tracks, apparently confused.

The Captain, ready and prepared for the onslaught, frowned at his apparent loss of ‘firestone and vim’, and glancing down in front of her, quickly registered that the mug had gone and now sat before Seven of Nine opposite. 

The Doctor’s eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“Since when did you drink coffee, Seven?”  Straight to the point, his voice edged with the interrogation skill and tone of a Borgia.

Controlled, dignified, “I have been drinking this beverage for some time now in an attempt to widen my culinary experience.  I find it .. quite ..”,  Seven hesitated, “different from my usual liquid refreshments.  Does it concern you that I consume this?”  Deflect accusation with question.  Masterful.

She picked the mug up and discreetly swallowed some of the contents.

“Most .. stimulating.  May I pour you a mug, Doctor?”  Wide-eyed, light blue orbs stared at him in innocence.  Janeway glanced from Seven to the doctor with equally wide-eyed amazement.

“Since when does a hologram drink coffee?” He eyed her sceptically, knowing full well what she had done but that he was powerless to act without evidence.

“It is a shame that you do not know what you are missing, Doctor.”  Everyone in the room barely managed to restrain themselves from laughing, hearing the response of the young woman.

‘A shame indeed’ thought Janeway.  She could almost see Seven gagging on the liquid.

“Humph. I may of course hide my prodigious skills under the proverbial bushel and appear a simple little hologram but I wasn’t created yesterday.”  His eyes narrowed to slits, “ I know exactly what I am missing, Seven, and it’s called hard evidence.”

He was genuinely disgruntled and for one nano second, the Captain actually felt guilty but then she braced herself for what was surely about to follow. 

‘Here cometh the lecture,’ she thought, her eyes momentarily catching Seven’s, who immediately, almost shyly, broke the contact.

With pantomime flamboyance and theatrical flair, the doctor started strutting around the elite gathering, eyeballing each and every officer present.

“If I was an EMH given to paranoia, which we all know is a mental disorder based on intense suspicions,” he placed great emphasis on the words, “I might suspect that you are all in league and conspiring against me which of course, I being fully in charge of my mental faculties, know cannot be true.  Why?   Because before me sits a paragon of virtue.  Your Captain!”  He pointed at her elaborately.  “A person of high moral integrity, the consummate professional, the role model of all before her, the cream of Star Fleet ….”

He gazed directly into her eyes, before continuing.

“And she is surrounded by her ‘knights of the round table’, they who seek to follow on such hallowed ground and dare to be the leaders of tomorrow.”

Then he turned on the professional appeal.  “How could there possibly be anyone sat here who would not understand the basic importance and logic behind the astute medical direction of a hard working, gifted man of medicine, to have his advice thrown back in his face, his words of wisdom ignored and thrown to the wind?  Who could ever doubt that I would have nothing, nothing, but the Captain’s well-being in mind?”

Pause.  Complete silence in the room.  Anticipation of more to come.

It came.

“If I was paranoid, I would be smelling a rat.  A large, fat, hairy rat!  But of course such delusional ramblings are beyond my impressive programming.  Wouldn’t you agree, Captain?”

“Absolutely.”  Unemotional but vigorous.

“And of course, if I was for one moment delusional and chose to ask, I don’t suppose any one here saw the Captain consuming coffee against my express wishes and medical advice?”

A barrage of voices as everybody spoke at the same time.

‘Absolutelynot.Noway.Haven’tseenhertouchanythingsinceI’vebeenhere.Captainwho?’

“Your suspicions are without foundation, Doctor.”  Seven calmly spoke with the wide eyed innocence of a lamb, but the doctor was having none of it and leaned over to her whispering,  “Et tu, Seven?”

“I could insist on a mouth swab!”  He thrust a challenge at the Captain.

“You could try!”  She parried and met his challenge with steel grey eyes.

“Shouldn’t you be resting?” he continued his challenge.

“Haven’t you got some specimens to go dissect and analyse?” she retorted.

The EMH stared at her but eventually folded, deciding on the last word.

“There will be other occasions, Captain. The battle may be lost but not the war.” As he turned and strode out he said over his shoulder, “Watch yourself for I am watching you!”

No sooner had the EMH gone and the doors closed behind him than a riot of laughter broke out.

“Oooo .. scary.”  Ensign Moffatt waved his hands in the air, the others laughing.

“If he ever gives up his day job, there’s a man who belongs on the stage.” Janeway spoke, attempting to bring some order back into the proceedings.

“I thank you all for your support but I wouldn’t get too won over by this short lived victory.  He knows who we are and where we live!” She warned, her eyes twinkling with humour, the smile sitting naturally on her features.  “Just wait until the next round of medicals!”

Seven had pushed the coffee back in front of her, saying nothing and steadfastly avoiding further eye contact.  This was not the regimental, arrogant persona to which Janeway had become used to. 

Downing the now cold remnants of her coffee, she rose to leave, excusing herself to return to her quarters and get some sleep before her shift began.  Without exception every crewmember present wished her a good night, and just before she walked out through the doors, she hesitated and turned.

“And Seven, thank you for your quick thinking and initiative.”

Blue forget-me-not coloured eyes magnetically connected with the Captain’s and the older woman suddenly found herself straining to breathe.  This woman had such power over her, perhaps more so since her return and once again, she felt the utter emptiness and loneliness flood through her as she recognised that the feelings she increasingly realised she held for the stunning, deeply complicated younger woman were never going to go anywhere or be returned in any measure.

“I am .. glad that I was able to be of service, Captain.”  It was a quiet, composed response, much like the young woman had been throughout the ‘coffee incident’. 

Captain Janeway merely tipped her head in acknowledgement and left. 

*****

Janeway, Tuvok and several security guards converged as they walked quickly into Cargo Bay 1 to be instantly presented with a very noisy, aggressive little scene of raised, angry voices, waving arms and stabbing fingers – not exactly the picture of textbook diplomacy which Janeway favoured.

With only a split second to assess that the tension lay between the small group of Akbarian officials and Seven of Nine, Neelix immediately approached the Captain, concern etched across his puggy, multi coloured features, “Captain, I didn’t know what else to do,” he had hailed her when negotiations had suddenly turned sour, “but there seems to be an issue over what was agreed, at what exchange and it’s all turning a little unpleasant as you can see.  I felt we needed help … fast.”    The ‘we’ he was referring to was himself and Seven.

The 7 feet tall, very muscularly built Akbarian, Dasos Nada, had invaded Seven’s ‘personal space’ and was looming over her in a considerably threatening manner, whilst she was straining her neck, chin jutted upwards, to return his aggressive stare.  Janeway grimly thought that it was almost comparable to a classic ‘showdown’ scene out of one of Paris’s old western movie’s, ‘Gunfight at the OK Corral’, with the two contenders standing toe cap to toe cap.

It was an extremely menacing and maledictory scene, and one where the young Astrometrics Officer was the recipient of intense intimidation and bullying tactics by the imposing height and build of the ‘diplomatic agent’ of Akbar.  However, anyone could see that Seven had ‘dug her heels in’ and was not prepared to give an inch. 

Never a good sign.

Janeway’s stomach clenched as a bolt of panic surged through her, ‘If Seven tries to defend herself and hits out first …’  Janeway recognised only too well that if Dasos Nada chose to retaliate, Seven would not come off well, for all her Borg technology.

“What appears to be the problem here?”  Not bothering to acknowledge Seven, Captain Kathryn Janeway cut straight in between them, her height of almost comedic proportions when compared to the alien’s.

The man’s deep, gravely voice bellowed, echoing through the bay, “I was promised more for the trillesium sulphate and phenoghem.  This .. thing, this ugly Borg mutant reneges on the deal she promised!”  Janeway felt his spittle spray across her face.

“I did not promise him what he now demands, Captain. He has changed the bargaining position yet again.”  The response from the ex Borg was unemotional, hard and uncompromising.

Janeway continued to ignore Seven, looking over at Neelix for clarification. Just one look at Seven and the Captain knew she would lose her professional edge.  Dear god, whether she had chosen to have a relationship or not with the woman all those long months ago, it didn’t make any difference, she was involved anyway!  Everything the woman did affected her … everything! 

“I’m afraid I wasn’t present for that particular negotiation, Captain.”  Neelix desperately wanted to add however, that if Seven said Dasos Nada was changing the terms to benefit him, then .. well, he was changing the terms to benefit him!  But now really wasn’t the time to agitate the incident further, when desperately required commodities were on the negotiating table, and certainly not whilst the Captain stood right before the volatile alien.

Dasos Nada stabbed out over the top of the Captain’s head at Seven and blustered, “She is a liar and a cheat!  We had an arrangement for these supplies and I have negotiated my part of the deal in good faith, Captain.”

Tuvok’s concerns for the Captain’s safety had almost psychically transmitted themselves to Seven, who now recognised the threat to the smaller woman and so stepped back a pace, not wanting to escalate the situation anymore.

Seven’s mind was a flux of emotions.  She was angry that this supercilious, untrustworthy cretin was calling her on her own honesty and moral ethics.  She had not lied or cheated.  Far from it, she had been far more generous that necessary in order to ensure that Voyager would indeed secure these desperately needed resources, and for him to now call her on that!

She was also experiencing rapidly increasing feelings of disappointment and fear.  She so wanted to redeem herself in the Captain’s eyes, to make good for her previous, offensive and undesirable behaviour.  To let the smaller woman know that she was still a valuable addition to the Voyager crew and not someone to be ignored or looked upon as some form of awkward, trouble maker.  She did not know how to make things stop and nurture something better between the Captain and herself, and now this one golden opportunity was turning extremely sour.  Sour enough to jeopardise the whole deal and worse if the alien hit the Captain, which was definitely a possibility, given his agitation.

She had worked very hard and efficiently to negotiate with this species that changed the rules of the bargaining every time she and Neelix thought they had reached a deal.  She had been nice, and pleasant and cooperative.  Everything that Neelix told her a good negotiator should be whilst maintaining a quiet ruthlessness to drive home the bargain.  And now, she was being called a liar, his word against hers. 

Janeway reached out a hand and placed it on the tall alien’s upper arm in what was a friendly, calming gesture.

“Dasos Nada, I must apologise for all of this.  I agree that there is nothing worse than having to deal with a liar and a cheat, someone who cannot be trusted to sustain a deal once agreed.”  The voice was calm, composed but there was a chill of ice about it.

Dasos’s face lightened, his body relaxed, whilst behind the Captain, Seven’s posture straightened and went rigid.  Was this deal so important, was her existence now so superfluous that the Captain would chose to believe this man’s word over hers?  She felt vile rejection and humiliation course through her body.

“Which is why ..” the captain continued, “I must ask you to now leave my ship.”

“What?” Dasos scowled uncomprehendingly at the diminutive woman before him.

“I do not understand,” his voice becoming louder again.

“No, I expect you don’t,” the Captain replied evenly, her body posture starting to go rigid. “but this is not the first incident of your diplomacy skills pushing our potential agreements to the limit.” 

Dasos interrupted her.  “You are calling me the liar and the cheat?”

Janeway removed her hand, stepping back as several of Tuvok’s security guards moved closer.

“If a member of my crew informs me that you have lied, cheated and generally attempted to manipulate the bargaining process, I believe them, completely and without question.”

“Even this .. Borg Drone?” he spat dismissively.

“Even this .. crewmember, absolutely and without question,” she responded curtly.

“But we are negotiating a deal!”

“We were negotiating a deal.”

“You need these resources very badly, Captain.” 

“Yes, I do.”  Her eyes were deadly grey, the colour of British rain clouds.  “But there is a limit to what I will exchange in order to procure them and you have well exceeded those.   I am not going to ask my crew to continue to waste their time in bartering for what little you will actually end up giving us and of what questionable standard.  Not getting these provisions is a set back, but it isn’t the first and it won’t be the last.  Now leave my ship.  Commander Tuvok?”  Janeway beckoned to her Security Officer and stepped aside to allow the guards to escort the man and two of his aides to their vessel waiting in the hanger bay.

An interesting volume of expletives were fired at the Captain as he was led from the cargo bay but as the doors closed on him, the offensive words were gone and just history in another chapter of Voyager’s travels.

Neelix moved towards the Captain to speak but she raised her hands, indicating that now wasn’t the time, she didn’t want to hear. She looked very tired and hollow-eyed, her entire body posture was stiff with rage, her teeth clenched.

“Not now Neelix.  We’ll talk about this later.”  She fleetingly glanced at Seven, moved as if to talk but then changed her mind and all but marched out of the bay, her arms swinging as if on a military parade ground, leaving her two crew alone.  Neelix looked over at Seven’s haunted, ethereal features, standing like a lost child in a park, desperate to find its parents.

“I have failed the Captain.”  The ex Borg’s tone was flat.

Neelix wanted to allay her fears on the issue but wasn’t too certain himself of exactly what the Captain felt about the whole incident.  The fact that she hadn’t stayed behind and said anything was unusual in the least, although perhaps now on reflection since her return, not so unusual.  She had become emotionally remote and although she did her best to conceal this, it wasn’t always successful.  Captain Janeway had a long way to go before she was over what had happened to her on the planet.

Maybe the Captain did blame the two of them in some part, and he could only imagine how disappointed and worried she would be that they had lost the replenishments, both needed badly by engineering. However, ever the optimist and more for Seven’s sake,  “Don’t worry, Seven. I’m sure the Captain doesn’t think that.”

“I’m sure she does,” was all the young woman could say before she too left the bay.

*****

Leaving the cargo bay, Captain Janeway marched as quickly as she could without running and accessed the nearest turbo lift.  With quiet efficiency, she requested the level and destination of her own quarters, walked directly there, entered her code, accessed her rooms, went straight to the bathroom and threw up.

Twenty minutes later when she was sure she wasn’t going to be sick anymore and when the shaking had subsided, she returned to the Bridge.

*****

The next two days were spent hightailing it out of that sector of space as quickly as possible.  Dasos Nada had taken the decline to negotiate rather personally and had set the Akbarian fleet on the heels of Voyager.  Fortunately, the Akbar’s did not have the skill nor speed to match the star fleet vessel, and though Voyager was heavily outnumbered – the Akbars seemed to be everywhere – eventually, the ship cleared the area and was out of hostile space.

Janeway walked into her ready room with Chakotay, and headed straight for the comfort of the soft chairs beneath the viewport, sat down heavily and attempted to relax, rubbing the knots in the muscles of her right shoulder. 

“You alright?” he questioned.

She nearly threw back the simple ‘Yes’ and then decided better of it.

“Honestly? No!  I am so sick to death of all this, Chakotay.”  She beckoned him to sit beside her, “It seems to me that the whole concept of ‘friendly’ is a complete anathema around here.  What I wouldn’t give for a few amiable, non hostile aliens for a change.  Where are the Neelixs of the Delta Quadrant?”

“We seem to have had our fair share of problems in the past 12 months.”  Chakotay’s dark eyes gazed intensely at his Captain.  She looked raw, on edge and had dark shadows under her eyes, those still vacant inexpressive eyes.  The strain and stress of being ultimately responsible for some 150 crew and far from home was always an issue but since her return from Krasus, he worried about her more.  It seemed to him that she held her problems inside of her, only ever sharing some of the professional ones and never any of the personal.  If you asked her how she was, you usually got the automatic, recorded response, ‘I’m fine’. Today was a breakthrough in relationships!

“Understatement, Chakotay.”  Then the petite woman caught the look of uneasiness in her friend and colleague’s expression.  She leaned forward and tapped his knee,  “Hey, nothing a long soak in the bath won’t cure!”  They exchanged smiles.    

“Well, maybe this evening will lift your spirits .. along with the bath.” 

“This evening?” Janeway questioned.

“Lt Talbar and Ensign Galbraith?  The reception in the mess hall this evening?” he jokingly reminded her, knowing she knew full well that she was required to say a few words at the occasion.

Hell, yes.  Now she remembered.  During her absence, Captain Chakotay had officially conducted the marriage ceremony of Vero Talbar to little Sagi Galbraith. He had said it had been the one nice thing the ship had had to celebrate whilst looking for its captain, and even then, there had been no reception.  No one had had the heart.  So the reception had been put on hold ‘for later’.  Neelix and others now felt the time was right and there was an air of excitement rippling through the ship.  

“I hope you’re not going to leave me to deliver the speech, Kathryn?  Public speaking was never my forte.”  Although said with humour, Janeway caught the look of genuine fear on his face.

“Relax for heaven’s sake.  Anyway, aren’t you warrior types supposed to be capable of anything?”

“Not this one. Remember when I tried to light my first real fire on New Earth?”

She tilted her head and eyes towards him quaintly and gave a throaty laugh. “Now you mention it, not a resounding success. Do you remember the bow and arrow episode?” 

“How could I forget.”  Chakotay playfully put his face in his hands.

On New Earth, Chakotay had manufactured himself a bow and arrows from natural wood and twine.  It had been an impressive looking hunting tool – until he attempted to use it .  The expelled arrow travelled about two metres and then, perhaps a little exaggeration, had turned a 90 degree angle and gone straight into the ground.  Janeway had exclaimed that, if that was truly where the animal had been, it would have been easier to stamp on it!

She was about to tease him but decided to put him out of his misery, “I’ve got something prepared, don’t worry.  I’m looking forward to this, it will be nice to do something pleasant for a change.”

“Now we’ve got rid of our friend, Nada.” 

“I really thought he was going to hit Seven,” she confided, “and I was so afraid she wasn’t going to back down but thankfully she did.  I should never have put her and Neelix in that position, we were getting plenty of early clues about Nada’s true intentions.”

Janeway leaned back into the cushions, her head tilted back, “You should have seen her face, Chakotay.  She was so angry that he’d broken his word and then accused her of being in the wrong.”

“You did the right thing and got rid of him.”

“I was fuming.  If Tuvok hadn’t moved him fast I would have personally pushed him and his escorts out of an air lock!”  She expelled air slowly, rubbing the bridge of her nose with her fingers.  “I really need to speak to Neelix and Seven, make sure they’re OK.  I’m sure losing the deal has upset them both, they’d worked so hard.”  Then leaning forward again, “I should have done it then but .. I’ll try to talk to them both this evening.”

*****

The mess hall was completely transformed into a setting that could only be described as classically elegant, like something out of a romantic holonovel.  Neelix had outdone himself this time.  With some help, he had created a romantic, candlelit atmosphere that oozed an aura of warmth, relaxation and homeliness.  This was the perfect, if late, wedding reception for the newly weds, something magical that they would cherish for the rest of their lives. 

It was getting late into the evening and Janeway had said her few words before the buffet dinner, wishing the happy couple the usual token health, wealth and happiness speech with a few well chosen jokes. And now everyone had formed into little cliques, blissfully happy, the drinks flowing and all seemingly relaxed, temporarily forgetting where they still were.

These were the best times to be a captain, to see your crew happy, relaxed and enjoying themselves, moments that were so precious, so rare, to be savoured.

“More Selkenian wine, Captain?”  Neelix was at her shoulder holding the bottle to her nearly empty glass.

“I’d love some Neelix but I don’t think my head will appreciate it in the morning so I’d better say no.”  She looked at him again, “You know, Neelix, you have done a wonderful job here, first class.  We really are incredibly lucky to have you with us, I hope you know how much we appreciate you and how thankful we are for all your hard work and assistance.”

“Why, thank you, Captain, although Seven and I were a little concerned that we had angered you over our failure to drive home successful negotiations with the Akbarians.”  Neelix looked down at the front of his brightly coloured suit in an attempt to look anywhere but at the Captain. “You were very angry when you left the cargo bay.”

Janeway played with the glass in her hands, rolling the stem in her fingers. When she spoke, it was with utter sincerity and a genuine concern that two of her crew should think she was angry with them.

“Neelix, I was angry, very angry for the way Dasos Nada played us for fools, but my anger was never focused on you or Seven.  In fact, exactly the opposite. I felt I’d put both of you in harms way, especially Seven.  When I walked into the cargo bay, I thought he was going to attack her.  If he had, it would have been my fault.”  She lowered her voice slightly, “I’m so sorry if the two of you felt otherwise.  I really did mean to speak to you both afterwards, after my temper had calmed down but then we started coming under attack and well, the opportunity just wasn’t there.”

Neelix’s face lit up, “I’m very pleased to hear that Captain, thank you.” Then as an after thought, “Are you going to tell that to Seven, too?”

Her response was hesitant, “Yes, I suppose I will do.”  Neelix caught the flicker of nerves on the otherwise fearless woman.

“She misses you, you know.”  Five simple little words that instantly drew Janeway’s attention back to Neelix and unspoken, demanded more. She frowned, querying the statement.

Neelix nervously coughed a little into his hand as he was wont to do when dealing with a tricky subject that he was none too sure how it would be received.  “Seven.  She misses you … a lot.”

Janeway stood silent, somewhat taken back at the quick flick and change of the topic of conversation.  At first she wasn’t entirely sure how to answer, if indeed she wanted to answer his statement but then unexpectedly, she felt like talking to him, being honest with this wonderfully warm and genuine man.

Lowering and softening her voice, she leaned her head down a little as if to reduce the height differential between the two of them, knowing where he was coming from.

“I’m trying to build bridges, Neelix … I just don’t seem to be very good at it.”

Neelix moved forward, took the glass from her and topped it up with a little more wine before the Captain could object, “Never mind the hangover tomorrow, just relax more, Captain.  Stop thinking about it too much, and just do.”

“I really do want to put things right between Seven and myself.   I miss her too,” she admitted for the first time to herself as well as Neelix, “more than I can say but I seem to have lost the knack in communicating with her.  It all used to be .. easier.  All we do now is hurt each other and I don’t know how to stop that.”

“Well, Captain, I can tell you this, you won’t build any bridges whilst you’re over here and Seven is over there.  Maybe you ought to be a little more proactive and take the lead... make the first move.”  He gave her arm a slight tweak and a gentle, understanding smile.

Before Janeway could respond, several crewmembers interrupted their conversation to chat with Neelix, so the Captain chose the opportunity to go over and join Chakotay’s group, where Seven was. 

Janeway nestled into the group easily but Seven was diagonally opposite her and trying to initiate a conversation wasn’t possible because of the layout of the furniture but Janeway thought that if she held her position long enough, someone might move and she could then take advantage of that.  However, as time ticked away, it became obvious that this wasn’t going to happen and although the Captain was part of the group, she existed on the periphery of the conversation, choosing to listen rather than speak.

After a while she found herself catching Seven’s reflection in the viewport and used the opportunity to study the woman.  Seven had chosen to wear a light blue, silk dress that accentuated her trim figure.  It was one of the few times the Captain had seen her out of her standard bio suits. 

Standing now and watching her reflection in the viewport, Kathryn Janeway realised that Seven wasn’t just beautiful, she was exquisite, like some chiselled beauty borne of the hand of Michelangelo.

But studying her, she was aware that she was seeing something more beyond what was physically evident. What she could see upset her, but if anyone had asked her why, she would have been at a loss to explain.  She had always seemed to read Seven by intuition, right from the early days and had often seen things about Seven that no one else seemed able to pick up on.  And right now, what she was seeing she didn’t like.

The beautifully tall young woman had blossomed in the Captain’s absence.  She seemed to wear her humanity with more comfort now, getting used to its feel, but in turn that made her appear even more delicate and vulnerable in Janeway’s eyes.

The young ex Borg was not listening to the ongoing conversation and her attention seemed focused elsewhere, miles away.  There was sadness about the eyes that suggested an inner disquiet, and this perplexed Janeway.   It was like looking at Da Vinci’s portrait sketches – hauntingly beautiful but there was always longing in the eyes, something unspoken, that of a wounded person inside, slowly bleeding away. It is what drew the Captain to that particular maestro – his work spoke of considerable understanding, feeling and observation of people, of life.

Captain Kathryn Janeway found it difficult to contain the urge to just climb over the furniture and wrap Seven in her arms, but of course, that would probably be the last thing the woman wanted.  It wouldn’t do much for her professional image either!  Nevertheless, probable rejection or unprofessional behaviour didn’t quell the urge.

It was then that the Captain realised that Seven’s focus had shifted to her, that Seven was now watching her in the reflection of the window.  The recognition and knowledge that they were both watching each other didn’t seem to make either of them shy away or seem uncomfortable, and they chose to mutually continue watching each other recognising this tenuous link as a re-connection of some sort.

And then something in the Captain snapped and she found herself smiling at the attractive woman.  Her heart nearly burst, the breath expelled instantly from her lungs when a half smile was returned.

But then, almost as unexpected as the apparent milestone itself, Seven suddenly dipped her head, breaking eye contact, instead professing that there was something in her eye, explaining a reason for their watery appearance and further explaining her need to now retire and regenerate.

Astonishingly, everyone seemed to accept this excuse at face value but Janeway didn’t believe one word of it and instinctively went to follow her astrometrics officer until she was stopped by the newly weds who demanded her time to thank her for the wonderful words she had said and, blast them, enquire after her well being.  Once more, duty came between her and Seven.

By the time the Captain made it to Cargo Bay 2, Seven had initiated a lengthy regeneration period and thus rendered any follow-up on the older woman’s behalf, useless.

*****

CHAPTER SIX

Janeway sat in the Captain’s chair on the Bridge, fidgeting uncomfortably and read again, for about the fifth time, the padd report in her hand.  This was not working!  She felt hot and clammy, clearly wasn’t concentrating, was damned uncomfortable and she was obviously annoying the hell out of Chakotay sitting next to her.

Enough!

She turned to him, challenging.  “OK, say it!”

He turned and stared at her, concern written all over his handsome face.  “Why?  You already know what I’m going to say, Captain.”  Resignation clearly evident in his voice.

She sighed with impatience, and pushed herself fully back into her chair, stretching her arms out against the arm rests and flinched.

Chakotay leaned towards her in an attempt to keep the conversation private.

“Captain, you’re not well, and you don’t need me to tell you you’re obviously in discomfort.”

She looked beaten and felt like hell.  “It’s this damn leg, it won’t stop aching.”

Catching his critical eye, she held her hands up in mock surrender, “Alright, alright .. you have the Bridge.  I’m off to see the doctor.”  As she started to leave,  “Just don’t expect me back too soon, I just know he’s going to ground me. He still hasn’t forgiven me for cheating on the coffee.” 

“Now you’re being paranoid, Captain.”  His eyes emanated humour as he played on words.

“Don’t you start!”  Janeway wagged a warning finger in his direction, but had enormous affection for this man.

“Seven,” Chakotay turned behind him, “escort the Captain to sickbay.”

“That won’t be necessary, Commander,” Janeway corrected him.

“That’s an order, Seven.”   ‘Don’t argue with me on this one, Kathryn’ Chakotay’s seated stance boldly and openly challenged his superior officer.  She wisely acquiesced.

*****

Once in the turbo lift, Captain Janeway turned to Seven and relieved her of her duty.

“I can make my own way to Sickbay.  Return to your duties.”  Cold. No-nonsense. The voice of authority.

“No.” Seven imperiously replied, not deigning to even glance at the smaller woman.

Janeway stared at her, noted the typical militaristic stance with hands clasped behind the back and just knew she wasn’t going to win here either. Besides, she was too tired to fight, and she didn’t want to fight with Seven, not when they seemed to be tolerating each other a little better. There was hope.

So instead, she rubbed at her temple in a vain attempt to relieve the pressure that was building into the mother of a headache.

“This isn’t my day, is it?”  Annoyed.  Angry.  Frustrated.  In pain.

“Apparently not, Captain.”  Seven arched her eyebrow and continued to stare forward.

*****

Captain Janeway sat up on the main diagnostic bed, her legs stretched out in front of her. She rubbed at a bead of moisture trickling down the side of her face, watching the EMH examining his tricorder, developing his diagnosis, the usual professional frown slapped across his face.

Janeway felt completely powerless.  Chakotay had clearly briefed the doctor before she arrived, and to make matters worse, she could not get rid of Seven who now stood behind her patiently waiting for the doctor’s findings. She hated being vulnerable, weak – she had hoped the worst of times were now behind her.

“Well,” the doctor said in his most patronising manner, “I suppose I should be grateful that you actually acknowledge that you have a little problem,” using her own words on arrival.

“This crew fails to see the logic in ‘nipping something in the bud’.  You all cavalierly allow your injuries and ailments to go untreated and then when things worsen, you expect me to ‘pull bunnies out of the hat’ and make you all better again!” His eyebrow rose as he now examined the tricorder with intensity.

“Fortunately for you all, I am an exceptionally talented doctor who has to make do with little respect or acknowledgement of my immense abilities.”

Janeway merely stared at him.  Years of experience had taught her to just let him vent, it was quicker!

“Well, there’s good news and there’s bad news, Captain.”  Theatrical tone again.

“Really,” she said flatly.  She was so tired of this.

“The good news is you have some bone degradation in the fibula plus an interesting little infection in your tibialis anterior…. all of which I am pleased to say, I am perfectly capable of repairing.”

He immediately hyposprayed something into her leg, then turned to the Captain, looking suitably sympathetic.

Janeway felt an escalating chill crawling in a downward motion through her spine.

“But?” she queried.

“To stop that infection before it escalates, .. well, unfortunately you also need a direct infusion of tellicartas V10 serum which is best injected straight into the infected site.”

“Injected?  What happened to the hypo?”  The previous escalating chill that had originally crawled down the Captain’s spine, had now done an impressive u-turn and was rock-climbing its way back the way it had come, sending unwelcome tingling sensations through the woman, better recognised as apprehension and fear.  Janeway’s throat had suddenly gone dry.

The doctor moved uncomfortably, “Not the best implement for this job, I’m afraid.  For all of medicines advances, sometimes the old ways are best, .. if not primitive.” 

He elaborated the injection’s values, “By directly plunging this,” he waved an impressive looking needle in front of her, “directly into the wound, it targets the infection directly thus all heals faster, the fever will dissipate quicker, and we don’t want to burden your entire biological system with unnecessary drugs again.”

Janeway’s attention was fixed rigidly on the needle, “Er .. is this method open to negotiation?”

Remembering the last vivid experiences of injections received at the hands of Dar’toth’s henchmen, “I’m really not too fond of injections, Doctor.”

“I know,” the EMH knew where the Captain’s fear was coming from. “but I’m afraid this isn’t open to negotiation.  I really don’t want to put unnecessary drugs back into your entire system, we’ve only just cleared it and there might be a complication of side effects. This will be target specific, less evasive and faster acting.”

“Oh Joy.”  The words were just audible as the Captain muttered under her breath and she could now do nothing but sit still, trying to take in the ramifications of what the doctor was telling her.  She felt his hand on her leg as he positioned it, causing her to flinch in pain as he then moved forward with the needle.

He looked her in the eye,  “I’m afraid this might hurt a little.”  Pause.  “Sit back and relax.”    Relax?  The Captain blanched at his bedside manner.

She instinctively gripped the sides of the bio-bed, not doubting for one minute that she was not going to enjoy this.  It was then she felt a hand grip her left shoulder and squeeze it gently in support.  An unbidden wave of emotion flooded through her as she recognised and accepted Seven’s quiet support.  She then bit her bottom lip to hold back the outburst of pain as the doctor pursued the injury and accompanying infection.

“There we are, all done!”  The doctor declared smiling at his completed, successful ministering.

It took her a moment to reply.   “Thank you, doctor.”  Janeway fought down the urge to throw-up there and then but chose to sit very still and hope that the feelings of nausea would pass.  They did, but not before the hand on her shoulder had reassuringly extended its area of support, rubbing gentle circles on the middle of the captain’s back before eventually returning to grip the shoulder again.

Without thinking, the captain raised her right hand to touch the hand on her shoulder but as it neared its objective, Seven pulled her hand away. 

The sense of disappointment that flooded through Janeway was immense, and trying hard not to show the effect that Seven’s withdrawal had had on her, she took a few deep breaths to calm the last tenuous feelings of nausea, and then started to leave the bio-bed but was stopped by the strong, restraining arm of the EMH.

“Not so fast, Captain.  There’s the bad news.”

“I thought that was the bad news?”  Janeway looked despairingly at the needle still in his hand.

“What, that little injection?  After all you’ve been through?  Certainly not, Captain.”  The EMH looked her straight in the eye.  “No, Captain, I’m afraid I must insist that you stay here for at least a couple of days so I can keep an eye on you.  I would normally demand four days but I know I can’t expect miracles.”  Adamantly.  “Pick your bio-bed … and make yourself at home!”

“Why?” the captain challenged indignantly, “You said a minor infection, so where do these two days come from?”

Grim faced, “That little infection would never have got a grip if you had been looking after yourself better and obeying my sage advice. When was the last time you had a decent night’s sleep?”

The Captain thought back to her imprisonment and her captors’ regime of sleep deprivation.  Was he really asking her this?  Her face went stone hard and expressionless.  “Too many months ago.” 

The doctor instantly recognised his inadvertent gaffe, “Yes, well … I mean .. you need to sleep, Captain, and the only way I can be assured of that is if I have you under my professional eye for a while.”   

“Okay, Okay.  Look, how about cutting me a little slack here.”  The deep, husky voice carried just a little weary desperation, and the eyes mirrored the sentiments.

“Slack, Captain?”  The doctor studied her with an unforgiving professional eye.

“I’ll go to my quarters and stay there .. for a day.”

“Absolutely no deal, Captain.  I know you.  You will totally disregard my medical advice.  When I say rest, Captain, it means no work, no padds, no accessing the computer. No wandering the ship in the dead hours!” Heavy emphasis.   “For me to let you go back to your quarters right now, unaccompanied and unobserved, would be nothing short of medical negligence.  You would have to have someone with you, full time, for at least the next four or five hours … and I don’t have a long line of nurses at my beck and call.  So, absolutely no!”   The doctor folded his arms defensively, awaiting the backlash of vitriolic abuse.

But none came from the very dejected, miserable captain who sat in front of him on the bio-bed, totally defeated and with no energy left ‘for the fight’.

“Doctor, I could escort the captain to her quarters and stay with her for the requisite time if that would be acceptable?” Seven stepped forward from behind Janeway, her hands behind her back in her usual efficient, formal stance.  The Captain’s features registered ‘total stun’ at Seven’s suggestion, the two women’s eyes catching each other’s briefly before both looked away quickly, embarrassed.

The doctor’s eyes narrowed as he gazed at her, “Ah yes, partners in crime.  I should have expected no less from you, Seven.  The two of you are thick as proverbial thieves.”  He was still smarting over his failure to catch the captain breaking his dietary advice in the mess.  He was very prepared now to balance things a little and make the woman pay for blatantly disregarding his medical advice, but looking at her now, he felt she had simply ‘had enough’ and decided to show a measure of mercy.

He wasn’t going to admit it but if Seven would just take the Captain to her quarters and stay with her, it would probably be beneficial for both the women.  The doctor was only too aware of how much Seven was still desperately trying to regain lost ground with the Captain .. and wasn’t appearing to have much success.  Captain Janeway, for all of her miraculous recovery, was at best a pale imitation of her former self.

“Well, I suppose, if you were to stay with the Captain and ensure she took things easy, I could allow ..” 

“That won’t be necessary, Doctor.”  Janeway interrupted him.  “I’ll stay here for a little while, and when you’re content, I’ll return to my quarters.”

The doctor looked as if he’d been hit across the face with a Silurian kipper.

“Actually, Captain, I really don’t mind if Sev …”

“Well I do!”  Her tone was sharp and the words implied no nonsense, impatience was creeping in.

Seven’s head dropped. Janeway was doing a wonderful job of keeping her in the margins, despite Chakotay and the doctor’s efforts.  Even Neelix had acted as her ‘spy’, informing her of when the Captain would turn up for her late night, early morning coffee fixes in the mess hall.

The Captain had been back on board now for several months, and in that time, apart from their mission together on the shuttle, Seven had been unable to get anywhere near this woman, other than the usual routine meetings, briefings and bridge duties.    And she missed her company so very, very much.  She ached to be back with her, if only to regain ground as a respected colleague, and maybe one day, friend again.

Seven let go of the breathe she didn’t realise she’d been holding in, and allowed her hands to unclasp from around her back and fall to her sides.  She hesitatingly, nervously stepped closer to the smaller woman.

“Captain, I understand.  If you would like, I could make arrangements for someone else to accompany and stay with you.  I’m sure the doctor wouldn’t mind.”

Janeway turned and looked up at her with a look of total confusion on her face, a frown indenting her forehead, and then came the realisation of how Seven had misinterpreted what she had said.

Kathryn Janeway, without thought, instantly reached out and grabbed Seven’s Borg enhanced hand and held it tightly, her thumb rubbing the back of the metal encased structure.

“Seven, no!  I wasn’t trying to …..  I just feel I’ve put this ship out enough of late without having Chakotay lose two bridge officers during this watch.”  Kathryn Janeway stared Seven right in the face, desperately wanting the other woman to believe what she said.  She threw every ounce of compassion she had into her voice, still holding tightly onto the hand and rubbing the back of it.

The indomitable ex Borg found she couldn’t respond, for if she had, she wasn’t sure that the relief cascading through her body wouldn’t have come out as a sob.  So she just stood there and let her commanding officer massage the back of her hand, experiencing the strange tingling sensations emanating there and running all the way up and down, through her body.

Eyes were locked on each other’s and Seven saw again the warmth of a smile she had witnessed at the wedding reception in the viewport, such a gentle, kind smile.  How could she ever stop loving this woman?  Like it or not, this person before her would be a part of her life, whether in it or not, until the day she died.  This woman had done nothing but help and befriend her ever since she had freed her from the Collective, and all she had done in return was hurt her.

“A-hem.”  The doctor coughed tactfully, instantly causing the two women to drop hands.

“Since you’re obviously playing ‘house guest’ here for a little while, Captain, I suggest you pick a bio-bed and make yourself comfortable.”

Janeway allowed the doctor to assist her off the bed and guide her to another one where she would have a little more privacy, “I hope you’re through sticking needles in me.”  It wasn’t a question.

Deflated, the EMH replied, “Yes.”

Then, as an after thought.  “And time for you to disappear, Seven.  Haven’t you got an asteroid to go study or something?  I’ve seen enough of you lately to last a lifetime!”  Content that the captain was settled, he turned and walked into his office.

Janeway saw Seven actually blush and remembered what Chakotay had told her about the vigil the young woman had kept over her whilst sedated in sickbay.   Again, Janeway felt inadequate, not knowing how to deal with the emotional resonance she was suddenly feeling again.  But Neelix’s words came back to her from the night before last, about just doing and not thinking.  So to hell with caution and trying to second guess if Seven did or didn’t feel anything for her.

“Seven …I,” the Captain’s voice dropped a tone into that husky attractive level that always sent chills down Seven’s spine, “I want to tell you something, something I should have said a long time ago but I didn’t know how to, and perhaps it’s too late now but I want to say it anyway.”

Alone together in the room, there was a comfortable feeling between the two of them and Kathryn Janeway glanced up at Seven.  Seven’s attention was keenly focused on the captain, who paused, mentally formulating her words.

Sat upright but leaning against the headboard, she looked at Seven standing at her side, “It has never ceased to fascinate me, how an individual can say one thing and yet mean another … can appear to be in one emotional state and yet exist in completely another.  I guess it’s what they call the human condition.”    An interval to draw breath.   

“I’m part of that human condition, Seven.  What I think and what I say are sometimes so totally diverse.  I act and I do things that are so often the complete opposite of what I want to say or do.”  A pause.   “And yet I do it.”  The voice was raised slightly for the last few words, as if in self mockery.

Staring off as if intensely studying the whiteness of one of the sickbay bulkheads, the Captain continued, “It’s almost as if we humans are all schizophrenic, some wretched individual existing with a double identity.  I suppose it’s what makes us such an emotionally complex species and, in my opinion, one of the most fascinating, if not mentally fragile of life forms.”

Seven viewed a chair at the side of the bio-bed, momentarily thought about sitting but then changed her mind. Even now, years after being separated from the Borg, she still preferred to stand.  It made her feel … more relaxed.  It was strange that humans chose to see it as the opposite. 

Seven also feared that if she moved, she might break this magical spell surrounding them.  Of course, Seven didn’t know how the Captain was feeling but for the first time in a long while, Seven felt perfectly at ease and comfortable with this woman .. as she had once always felt.  To describe her current state as happy would be premature but she just knew she didn’t want this moment, with its feeling of well-being to cease.  She hoped the Captain was experiencing these feelings too.

It was like the hard, cold and bitter winter was over and the thaw had set in, heralding the advent of a welcome spring.

Old times also told Seven that the Captain was about to say something important.  So she stood and listened, and also chose to study the small framed, auburn haired woman, relishing the opportunity for full, uninterrupted licence to observe her, to savour her - a licence which usual social etiquette forbid.

Seven didn’t have to be concerned that her staring would be considered rude since the Captain was talking directly to her, and with no one else in the room, it was rude not to give your fullest attention both mentally and visually.  So she chose to attentively focus on the woman before her, feeling the thrill of this subtle intimacy play with her own desires. 

It struck her how very thin this woman had become.  Earlier in sickbay, an overly warm Janeway had removed her red tunic jacket, and sitting on this bed, with her sleeves pushed up her arms, Seven could see the too-slender arms, wrists and hands.  She had felt the bony protrusions of the shoulder under her hand, but for all the problems the Captain had recently faced at the hands of the Sung Ti, she never complained and made little comment about what had happened to her. 

The Captain’s face was lean and the skin, tight.  It was a .. beautiful, expressive face but still a little too thin, the cheeks a little too hollowed and shadowed, a jaw line too sharp.

An instinct almost uncontainable and difficult to ignore, Seven fought the urge, and not for the first time, to just reach out and take this damaged woman in her arms and wrap herself around her.  She didn’t.  Instead she found her own mental sagacity waging war between her increasingly human instincts to protect, to love, to cherish - against the sage advice of the doctor and others, to not push Janeway emotionally.  Allow her to heal in her own time.

“Seven, are you listening?”

“Yes, Captain.”

The Captain continued, “I was saying, if I hadn’t joined Star Fleet, I sometimes think I would have made a damn fine actress, playing the part of whatever was demanded, saying words and acting the parts regardless of my opinions.”

“And so there is this paradox of the Star Fleet Captain and the woman who plays her.  This continuum of existence ..” Janeway’s right hand drew an imaginary line in the air slowly, “.. at one end, what the person actually says and does, and at the other end, what that same person really thinks, feels and wants to do, but doesn’t.” 

Seven heard the Captain’s tone harden, heard the edge of bitterness cut its way through the words. She had never heard Kathryn Janeway speak with the edge of self-denunciation before.

“If you are lucky, Seven, the distance between the two ends isn’t too far.  Life isn’t too difficult to accept when the ends are close.”  The voice now tailed into the distance, suddenly quiet again and the Captain stared out into some unseen void for what seemed like an eternity to Seven.

‘What if the ends are not close?’ the tall, visually flawless woman longed to ask.

“That day, Seven, that day when you told me of your feelings towards me .. that was the day when the lines, my lines, reached their furthest point.”  Again, a thin hand was raised, sketching the imaginary line in the air.

Janeway’s voice actually trembled, something Seven had never heard before.  “My head went that way, the Captain’s actions,” the hand stretched far left, “my heart, my thoughts, the unspoken … went that way.”  The delicate fingers of the same hand arched back to the extreme right.”  She paused as if to catch breath.  Seven noticed the tremor in the right hand, the residue and constant reminder of the Captain’s imprisonment.

“The line became too long, Seven .. too apart and too distant between what was said and what was unspoken.”

The Captain’s hand remained in mid air for a few seconds before slowly returning it to rest on the bed.  Her face had lost colour and she closed her eyes, looking entirely drained of energy and emotion.

The silent observer could no longer remain silent, “What would the unspoken words have been if they had found a voice?” 

It was a gentle question with no tone of accusation but it was the one question to which Seven so desperately wanted an answer, trusting that it would tell her where their relationship really stood .. if indeed there ever could be a relationship anymore.  Seven’s heart pounded in her chest, so afraid of the answer she might hear.

“Love.”

One simple, most beautiful word.

A word said almost flatly, almost bereft of emotion but Seven had come to realise that in the short time the Captain had been back, though emotionally reticent, you took the small signs and magnified them for true feeling. The breath caught in Seven’s throat as she struggled to contain an involuntary gasp.

“They would all have been about love, Seven.” 

Janeway nervously looked up at Seven, one pointed glance and saw that residing there was the pain she felt as well.  One pair of haunted eyes on another. Both of them desperate for some measure of hope.

‘I mustn’t give up now’, the Captain thought, spurred on by what she saw in the young woman’s eyes, something that dared her to be bold and just spit everything out.  It was time to clear the air, time to find out where they stood with each other, even if the results mightn’t be what the other wanted.

“If I had been less of a coward, my words would have matched your words .. and more.  They would have been words that wanted to speak of longing, desire, passion, need  .. the need to just be with you, always .. to share ..”    Searching.  “.. share everything with you.” 

Another pause.  The woman looked exhausted.  “Words I would have said …”  ‘Still would say,’ she thought.

Seven frowned, “But you didn’t say.  Why?” 

Janeway closed her eyes, breathed in deeply and then focused on the other’s eyes .. beautiful, clear eyes.  A wry grin crossed her features.

“I thought I believed what I was saying.  The great Captain Janeway can be a very persuasive speaker.”  But there was no humour in the tone or modulation of her voice. “Though I had all the pieces of the jigsaw, Seven, I hadn’t quite put them all together or .. hadn’t quite seen the picture and recognised what it was telling me.”

A smile of immense affection lit the Captain’s face as she looked at Seven in earnest, “I was a little slow, Seven, a little dense.  I was also confused.”  Startling honesty.

But Seven wanted further explanation, clarification, almost as if she no longer trusted what this woman was saying.  It was after all, a startling turn around on the feelings that the Captain had declared she didn’t have all those months ago. Seven could not help the feelings that she didn’t want to be played for a fool.    “And now?”

“Not confused.”

“What has changed? Why now?”

Janeway sensed the edge of reservation in Seven’s questions, saw the cautiousness creep into the blue eyes and she began to experience a feeling that the opportunity to put things right was falling out of her tenuous grasp.  She could almost taste failure.

Janeway glanced up at the sickbay ceiling, her face suddenly quite blank and devoid of all expression.  She felt so very tired, to the point of exhaustion and those words she’d wanted to say, to get across to Seven that she really did love her .. well, they didn’t seem to be flowing right and Seven was becoming retrospective, less approachable again as she was clearly thinking back to when Janeway had denied her.  

“I don’t know what’s changed, Seven, and I know that’s not a good enough answer but it’s the only one I’ve got right now.  Maybe it’s time.  I’ve had a lot of time to think recently, to make sense of the pieces of the jigsaw, to put them all together and realise what has been in front of me for a long, long time.  Time to recognise that .. I .. I like that picture and would like to try and ….”

The EMH suddenly reappeared, returning from his office.  “You still here, Seven?”

“Evidently.” Seven’s exasperated and irritated response.  Janeway just mumbled something incoherent. 

“I’m afraid I must insist that you leave now, Seven.  The captain needs her rest and she isn’t going to get any with you here all day.”

The Captain narrowed her eyes for the benefit of the EMH, “You really pick your moments, doctor.  We’re in the middle of something important, if you don’t mind.”

“I’m afraid I do mind, Captain.”  There was obstinacy about the statement, “Your health is my top priority right now as I’m sure Seven appreciates.  Unless this conversation is of life threatening importance, which I’m sure it isn’t, it will stop right now .. unless you wish me to have you escorted out of here?”  His attention was firmly set on the ex Borg who merely raised an eyebrow.

Seven looked at the Captain who suddenly seemed very small.  There were dark rims around her eyes that had not been there when they had first entered sickbay.  There was also a strange and new air about the senior officer that exuded resignation, hopelessness .. of expectations that had not borne fruit.  Had Seven been the cause of these?  Her questions had been blunt, to the point and unexpectedly, she had experienced some measure of personal pain as she’d remembered her rejection by the Captain, but she had never meant to hurt the woman.

As much as Seven wanted to continue the discussion, she knew the doctor was right and that Captain Janeway desperately needed to rest, regardless of the importance of the conversation left hanging.

“Captain, I .. I have found the discussion .. of relevance and interest.  I would like to continue where we left off at another time. If this is acceptable to you?”  

A calm, measured response, “If you wish.”

“I do.”  Simple words loaded with subtext.  Seven left.

As the doctor checked over his patient one more time, he queried, “Is it me or are the two of you getting along better?”

*****

Much later that evening, Seven, having finished her duties, stood nervously outside Captain Janeway’s quarters, having been informed by the doctor that the Captain had been allowed to return there after a period of rest in sickbay. 

She hesitated as she went to touch the entry sensor, remembering all the repercussions that had occurred after she had last been in these rooms.  How she had so foolishly poured out her feelings of love, and how she had been rejected. She considered also the after-effects, culminating in the termination of a wonderful friendship.

But strangely, after today’s astonishing admission by the Captain that she too shared feelings for Seven, the young woman found herself shying away from the door.  Now she was suddenly wracked with feelings of inadequacy, inability, and inexperience.  Had Janeway been right in the first place?  Was Seven ready for this type of commitment, did she really understand what it meant.  Was she good enough for Kathryn Janeway?

The flashes of pain she’d experienced in the sickbay earlier had dissipated almost as quickly as they had risen, but she knew her questions had been blunt, sharp and had pushed Janeway back into those shadows she was fighting so desperately to leave.

Seven seemed to have a knack for bringing nothing but misery to this woman, this woman who mattered to her so much.  Seven only knew that she needed her back in her life, and more than just a captain / crewman relationship.  She wanted the friendship back but she also dared for something more but should she?  Perhaps friendship ought to be what she should settle for.  Oh, the illogic of these stupid human emotions!

She requested entry. 

Half expecting a ‘not to be disturbed’ response, Seven got nothing.  Good, she thought, the captain must still be awake.   She requested entry again. 

Nothing.

“Computer, locate Captain Janeway.”

‘Captain Janeway is in her quarters,’ the computerised female voice droned in response.

Seven experienced unease as she requested access a third time.  For a third time, she met with no response.  Her unease now turned to controlled panic.  The Captain had looked decidedly sick earlier in sickbay.  What if she had collapsed?  Or worse?  This time she flagrantly disobeyed orders and used the security access code to gain entrance into the Captain’s quarters.

The door hissed open.

Once inside, Seven had to adjust her vision to the low lighting but she immediately focused on the Captain who was sat on the couch beneath the viewport, her body leaning slightly to the left with her head slumped to her chest.

Seven’s controlled panic broke apart as she rushed over to the woman, calling out “Kathryn!”  In her rush, she hit the small coffee table before the couch, knocking a heavy solid metal ornament over which noisily clattered to the floor.

Janeway awoke, her senses springing into action and sitting upright, she saw the young woman before her come to a grinding halt, abject terror written across her unblemished, classical features.

“Seven!  What’s wrong?” the professional command mode voice.

“Captain … I’m sorry.  I requested entry .. you didn’t answer .. three times … I thought you were .. I..”  Seven was breathless and agitated.  Realising her error and forcing herself to reinstate a sense of calm, “I .. have woken you.  I am sorry.  I will leave.”   Embarrassment.  Mistake. 

Janeway immediately analysed the event and picked up all of Seven’s fears, as she saw Seven about to turn to leave.

“No.  Wait … Seven.”  She stood to move towards the woman, inadvertently treading on the fallen metal object, which caused her to stumble slightly, pitching her forward and down.

The Astrometrics Officer reacted with speed, grace and strength, easily capturing the senior officer in her outstretched arms and quickly, effortlessly, depositing her back on her feet.  The final manoeuvre left them both standing within a foot of the other, each with their hands firmly resting on the others forearms for support.  The pervading silence was deafening as forget-me-not light blue eyes met deep summer blue ones.  The connection hummed with electricity.

Janeway swallowed nervously.  They seemed to stand there for ages, neither of them willing to move or say anything for fear of breaking that connection.  Each could hear the other breathe. Each could see and acknowledged the desperate fear and pain in the other’s eyes. 

Eventually, Seven whispered, “Please, please do not ask me to leave.”   It was a gentle request said with humility, a memory reminding her that the last time she had been there, this woman had asked her to go.

Seven felt the ever-present tremor in the woman’s right arm. 

Silence.  Then a simple, “I won’t.”

More silence.

Still they stood as if both frozen in time.  Janeway’s inner voice was screaming at her, ‘Say something!’   Almost a whisper, the smaller woman spoke.

“Don’t let go.” 

“I won’t.”  A whisper back as Seven’s face relaxed, the earlier panic leaving her graceful, flawless features.

The Captain smiled very slightly, never once taking her eyes off Seven.

The silence became comfortable as it wrapped itself around them like a warm blanket.

“Seven.”  The name wasn’t spoken as a question, more as a statement, some form of confirmation to an unknowing test.  And Seven just accepted its terms, did not pursue its meaning or intention.  Her increasingly innate instinct told her to remain silent, to wait.

“I .. I want to …”  The Captain’s words went unfinished and trailed off into silence.

Seven watched the Captain studying her face.  “Are you going to talk to me again about lines of continuum and multi personality disorders?”

Seven’s eyes twinkled.  When Janeway didn’t respond, “Humour, Captain.  The subtle art of relieving tension.”

A ghost of a smile cut across the Captain’s face and then was gone.

“Have I left it too late, Seven?”

A familiar eyebrow arched.

“Have I left it too late, too late to be in love with you and have that love returned?”

Seven let go of the Captain’s one forearm and with a hand, reached up and ran it caressingly down the side of Janeway’s face who closed her eyes and allowed herself to lean into the warm touch, her face devoid of emotion. 

“Can you forgive me?”  Seven’s voice was a whisper.

“Nothing to forgive, Seven … nothing to forgive.”  The words were spoken with such love and gentleness, and when the Captain opened her eyes, she saw the unshed tears like pools in Seven eyes.

Seven drew in a breathe and as if trying to deflect the Captain’s scrutiny of her, “You should sit … your leg”.

Janeway just shook her head.

The smaller woman longed to reach out and pull Seven into her arms, to hold her close but something blocked her actions, something dark and heavy stood in her way.  And it was at that moment, that very instant that she came to accept and realise the full implications and after-effects of her incarceration.  Something inside her, couldn’t let her follow through her emotions.  It was like that first time you went to dive off the high board in the swimming pool, you wanted to do it but some inbuilt safety mechanism made you hesitate and question what you were about to do. 

Now all her emotions, those feelings that she had forced down, stopped herself from experiencing when held captive - they were still inaccessible except on the most surface level.  The safety mode was still on and she didn’t know how to turn it off!

In frustration, she lowered her head, closed her eyes and cursed silently.

 “Kathryn?”  A gentle, concerned voice.  “What is wrong?”

Janeway couldn’t answer, neither could she look at the beautiful woman before her, her eyes still closed.

“Please … don’t doubt me, Seven.  Don’t ever doubt my love for you, not now.”  The tension around the older woman emanated despair, inconsolable despair.

“I do not.” Seven believed Kathryn Janeway entirely but could not place the problem.

“What is wrong, Kathryn?” the concern evident in her voice.

No answer.

“Do you doubt my intentions?”  Was that it?  Seven had not told Kathryn Janeway that she still loved her.  Error.  To be corrected.

Seven slipped her hand from the Captain’s face and again found the other woman’s lonely hand. 

“I love you, Kathryn Janeway.  My feelings for you can never change, no matter what happens.  I will love you until my last breath.”  She slowly and gently tugged on the other woman’s hands, pulling her into a caress.  Her long arms wrapping round the smaller, fragile bundle in front of her.

Now Seven could feel the entire body of the Captain starting to tremble but she didn’t cry or speak.  Something was very wrong but Seven intuitively sensed it was not to do with them, with their re-connection.   

When she had released Janeway’s hands to wrap her own around the woman’s body, the Captain had simply let her arms fall to her side, to be supported by Seven. Sometime, maybe only a few minutes later, Seven felt the Captain lift those hands to place them tenderly, loosely on Seven’s waist.

Then there was a deep sigh from the older woman who, with a quiet but steady voice, spoke.

“On Krasus, I thought I was going to lose my mind .. the pain never stopped and at some time, it seemed like my own mind, my own emotions were turning against me.  So I had to close down my emotions, I had to drive them away, hide them somewhere inside my head.  I had to stop feeling, Seven.  It was the only way I thought I could survive.”

This was the first time that Janeway had spoken about what had happened to her on the planet and Seven recognised its importance in the recovery process of the Captain. Wanting to encourage the conversation and yet afraid to say anything, she chose only, and instinctively, to hold the smaller woman closer to her in support.

“My thoughts, my emotions .. my mental state .. these were the ways they could get to me.  In the beginning … I held out but I couldn’t continue .. what they did, they never stopped, Seven.  The pain never stopped .. and I learned the hard way that courage is will power and it’s not an unlimited stock.”

The quietness of the room had thickened to claustrophobic levels.

“I started to ..experience fear, real fear .. fear that I was going to die there, that I would never return to Voyager, never see my family again, that no one would ever know how I died .. that I would never see you again and be able to tell you the truth, that I loved you.  What I was feeling was worse than any pain they inflicted on me, so I stopped feeling.  I put everything that I am, into a box and bound it up tight and became inhuman.” 

Seven’s hand moved up Janeway’s back and caressed the back of her head, her fingers meshed in with the soft, silk-like auburn hair.  Seven experienced something she could only term as both humbling and an honour, that this woman should open up to her – her – after everything they had been through.  This was trust. This was surely love.  

“The trouble is, Seven, .. I can’t untie the box … I can’t seem to access my emotions any more.  I know .. I feel things somewhere because I know I love you .. but I can’t seem to express anything. It’s like I’m not capable anymore, like I don’t have the energy.”  The tone was even and flat.

More silence.  Seven waited patiently.

“And I don’t want to lose you, .. not now.”  

Seven gently pushed the Captain back from the embrace so that she could look directly into her eyes. “You will not lose me, Kathryn. I promise you.”

She moved both hands to cup the older woman’s face, her thumbs resting on the other’s cheekbones.

“The feelings will return, Kathryn. They will surface but you must be patient.”  Seven’s voice was empathic in its reassurance.

“Will they?  I think they broke me, Seven.”  There was an increased trembling in the voice.  The eyes which had now turned a strange mixture of blue and grey, looked away from Seven but the ex Borg moved the captive face to regain attention.

With confident insistence, “They damaged you, Kathryn.  They did not break you.  The damage can be repaired.  Together, we will repair you.” 

A fleeting ghost of a smile from the fragile form.

Janeway then just seemed to fall towards Seven, wanting ..needing to be held close in the warm embrace of someone who would, one day, spirits willing, become her lover.

She heard her name ‘Kathryn’ sweetly whispered in her ear as she nuzzled into the neck of the taller woman who had again raised a hand up into her hair and held her head close to her. 

“Just hold me, Seven .. please.”

Seven felt the fragile woman shaking in her arms and wanted to hold her so tightly, she feared she would squeeze the very life out of her.  And somewhere in that moment, realisation dawned that this was what it was like to love someone and to have them love you back.  To care more for their well-being than your own.  This was humanity.  Experiencing this, Seven recognised that what the Borg had once claimed of her as theirs, she had finally taken back and they would never possess again. Her journey home was complete – complete because of this woman in her arms. 

How could you explain this physical connection, the power it encompassed?  Seven felt as if her heart was going to expand and burst, the joy of it being almost painful.   If her life stopped now, holding Kathryn Janeway in her arms, she would die happy.  Happy?  Suddenly she understood the concept of that word too.   Being human suddenly made complete sense.  It was belonging; it was both being an individual but also being part of a collective, a collective of two.

“I love you, Kathryn, with all that I am, I am yours.”  An epiphany of truth.

She felt Janeway tighten her grip around her waist and in response, she rocked the woman in her arms.

“You are safe now, Kathryn.  You are safe.”

And Janeway knew she was.

*****

They stood there in the Captain’s quarters for a long time, holding each other, content to feel the others breath, to feel the warmth of each other’s body.

And Seven of Nine continued to rock the beloved woman in her arms.  It surprised her that her own actions had been so automatic, without analytical thought, and second nature.  She recalled a conversation with the Captain many years ago regarding the striking up of relationships.  Seven had questioned how she would know that she was indeed entering a relationship and how to proceed.  The Captain had merely smiled sagely and said that Seven ‘would know’ and that the heart ‘kinda took over, no planning necessary’. 

Yes.  This was all instinct and it made her feel good to think that the Borg had not crushed the essence of who she was, who she would have truly been if not assimilated.

Seven felt the woman sag a little in her arms.

“The doctor is right, you need more sleep.”

The woman ‘hummed’ into her neck.  “Resting makes me restless.”   Avoidance.

“You must regenerate, Kathryn, your body needs sleep to assist you in recovery.”

“I don’t want to sleep, Seven.  I don’t sleep well.”

“Have you tried?”  Seven questioned with gentle humour, her face comfortable, resting against the Captain’s hair.

“Sometimes, I dream I am back there.”  Seven knew the doctor was not aware of this fact.

Seven leaned back to look Janeway in the eye.  “You have nightmares?”

Janeway looked embarrassed, “Yes.”

“Unpleasant.”

“Nightmares usually are.”

Seven evaluated the response and with great compassion, brought her hands up to the other woman’s face, possibly too quickly this time, for Janeway momentarily flinched, remembering Dar’toth who had done this too many times.   Seven recognised this for what it was, a ‘bad memory’, but her hands remained on the other’s face.

“These hands will never harm you.  Let new memories replace the bad ones.”    She applied gentle pressure to the face and studied the weary Captain’s features lovingly.

“You will sleep tonight, Kathryn.  I will assist you.  You will not have nightmares.”

Janeway’s eyes looked into hers, disbelieving ones filled with doubt and pain.

“Come.”  And Seven guided the Captain by the hand to the latter’s double bed, and invited her to lie down.  “Trust me. You will not dream bad dreams tonight.”

Kathryn Janeway momentarily hesitated and looked at Seven, trepidation written across her features, clearly wondering what Seven had in mind and keenly aware that there were some things she wasn’t up to just yet.  But Seven, pre-empting the Captain’s genuine reservations, shook her head.  “Do not be concerned, Kathryn, you need time to ‘repair’.  First, you must learn to sleep again.”

Seven gently pushed the other woman down onto the bed and then removed her boots. 

Janeway just watched her in fascination.  She then instructed the Captain to remove her grey jumper, leaving only the grey tank top.  Seven, having slipped her own shoes off, lay down on the bed and positioned herself behind Janeway’s back, nestling up and holding her close.

She could feel the tenseness in the Captain’s body but chose to ignore it, “Close your eyes, and sleep.  Trust me.”

Janeway said nothing and closed her eyes, no longer able to stay awake, her resistance entirely gone. 

And she slept for 12 continuous hours, with Seven at her side.  Every time her body flinched, indicating an approaching nightmare, Seven would gently wake her and then immediately rock her back to sleep again.  This repeated itself many times.

*****

Captain Kathryn Janeway drew a deep breath and opened her eyes.  She felt at peace and rested for the first in a long time.  She had slept, and slept well.  There was a light weight on her chest and looking down, she saw Seven’s head resting there and found herself wrapped in the lean, warm arms of the long, slender, ex Borg.  A cascade of honey blonde hair was strewn across the younger woman’s face.

Janeway inhaled the scent of the other woman, smiling to herself. The mantra, ‘Resistance is futile, you will be assimilated’ went through her head.  Who would resist?  

She had no idea where this relationship was going but this felt so right.  Why had she ever fought it?  Why did she have to make things so difficult for herself?

She brushed some of the errant hair away from Seven’s face and in doing so, the other woman stirred and moved her head to look up at the other.

“Hello you.” Tones of deep affection purred from the Captain, who continued to stroke the woman’s face.

“Kathryn.”  Pause.  “You have slept well.”  It wasn’t a question, and Janeway nodded.

“Yes,”  Janeway stretched a little, “Perhaps the ‘repair process’ is starting.”  She smiled again.

Seven frowned a little and then quoted,  “We can become stronger – at the broken places.”

Janeway identified the quote, “Hemingway.”   She looked puzzled, “Since when did you become a reader of Hemingway?”

Seven looked away, her hold on Janeway tightening.  “I thought you were dead.  I used to come here and just sit.  Somehow it eased the pain.  I read your books .. they made me feel closer to you.  I could tell by the worn pages, those that you favoured .. the pages you frequently looked at and I read them.  I don’t understand all of them Kathryn, but some are beautiful.  I enjoy Hemingway.”

She glanced back at the Captain whose eyes had brimmed with tears, “Who else do you like?”  The voice was thick with emotion.

Seven moved off Janeway and settled herself at the woman’s side, her head resting against a pillow, turned to face the diminutive woman.  She quoted something,

“Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak,

Whispers the o’er fraught heart, and bids it break”

“Macbeth.” Janeway felt her stomach clench and reached out to hold Seven closely.

Several minutes passed in companionable silence.

“Don’t you have duty, Seven?”  Not an accusation, merely a simple question.

“No.  I am .. on vacation.”   

“This is hardly a vacation!”  Janeway eased back and stared at the blonde, incredulously.

The blonde gave the statement some thought.  “I am … relaxed.  I do not work.  I am with the one I love, in a different surrounding.  Is that not the purpose of a vacation?”

“Seven, remind me to develop your understanding of vacation later.”  Janeway said softly in mocked scepticism.

“I will.”

The two women smiled at each other, content to merely rest side by side, intoxicated by the others presence.

“Seven?”

“Kathryn.” 

“Seven, don’t ever let me lose you again .. I love you too much.”

Seven just held the Captain closer.

“And I, you.” Seven’s instant response.

The foundations of their future relationship were now in place and together they could both move forward.   Seven knew that time and love would heal this woman she cherished, of that she was sure. 

This time, time would be kinder to Captain Kathryn Janeway and Seven of Nine, and both of them could look forward to new beginnings.

FINI

TEMPUS OMNIA REVELAT

(Time reveals all things)

By Beacham

CHAPTER ONE

You can stare at a face for hours and only ever see what there is to be seen by the eye. You see nothing more, nothing less than that which the naked eye beholds.

But there are other faces we see, faces that sometimes only the one person sees, no one else, and that is because the person looking wants to see more.

Such are the complexities of life that one person will see immediately what another will never see despite years of looking.  But then, these things are always so when the eye is acting as the agent of the heart.

And so it had been for Captain Chakotay, almost from the minute he had set eyes upon Kathryn Janeway.  Damn her!  The irritating persistence of that woman who had pursued him half way across the Alpha Quadrant, into the Badlands and beyond into the Delta Quadrant.  He had only wanted escape, had only wanted freedom to pursue his noble retribution against those who threatened his people, family and friends, but she had shown no mercy and pursued him with the tenacious tracking skills of his long dead ancestors.

He had tried to rid himself of her.

He thought back on how he would have had no second thoughts in blowing her out of the space she and her ship occupied had he been given half the chance, such was the intense anger he felt towards the Federation.  But that chance had never come, and instead, a whole incredible saga had opened out for both their crews, taking them all down the most incredible, dangerous, challenging, wonderful adventures of their lives – times that no one could ever have predicted.

And over time, he had learned to trust her, more than he had ever trusted anyone in his entire life.   And whilst he was learning to trust the brave, unassailable, sometimes invincibly strong woman, he had found that part of him, that which his father had defined as the spiritual soul, being drawn towards her like a magnet.  The rapidity of the growing bond had initially unsettled him, such was its ferocity of emotion.  But as he grew used to it and learned to trust his feelings, with that bond of deep friendship had come the most subtle and skilful understanding of the woman he had called Captain.

He had once harboured a deep desire that one day, Kathryn Janeway would fall in love with him and return the feelings he held for her but that he now knew would never be.  ‘New Earth’ had been the first real indication that there was no reciprocation of feelings.  And as time had progressed, whilst the friendship had grown and deepened, he became aware that whatever it was Kathryn was looking for in a life partner, he simply did not possess it.  Neither had Mark, even though the Captain had not realised that until she received the ‘Dear John’ message.  That letter had been the impetus that gave her the freedom to suddenly see that which she desperately needed, and right in front of her nose.

Chakotay fidgeted with the metal badge on his collar, the badge that denoted his acting rank.  He hated it!  It didn’t belong there, the crew knew it didn’t belong there, and he didn’t want it there.  But everyone acknowledged that someone had to be the captain of this star ship and the responsibility now rested uneasily on his shoulders.  He had waited as long as possible before accepting this heavy burden.  What irony, that a Marquis renegade would assume such a role, rise to such a challenge.  Star Fleet would be turning in their proverbial grave.

His heart ached for Kathryn.  He missed this woman like he would miss a part of himself - a leg, an arm.  He had lost something irreplaceable; something so keenly remembered and once loved.  He was incomplete without her presence.

He could still hear her voice, smell her scent, and feel the light touch of her tactile fingers on his shoulder, like a ghost walking the ship.  She had not loved him but he would never completely learn to ‘unlove’ her, some remnant of his affection would always survive, like that first adolescent, youthful kiss.

How could he ever give the order for Voyager to move on and continue the journey to Earth?  Yet, how could he continue to expect the crew to stay in this area of space, looking for a trail that had long since gone cold?  Chakotay could hear her voice in his head, the warm resonating tones giving sage advice and telling him that there was a time when you simply had to move forward.  Even now, she pursued him! 

Captain Janeway had disappeared during a planet-side expedition, from an environment all senior officers had assumed harmless, safe – and still did.  Four months later and no leads, no trace.  The crew, all the crew, were beginning to accept that they might never find the Captain, that perhaps she was lost forever, perhaps even dead.

But they had looked!  Not a particle of stardust had gone unturned, not a star left unstudied, not a grid of space not inspected and then re-inspected.  Nothing!  The crew had not rested, neither Marquis nor Starfleet, in the vigil to find their missing crewmember, and it showed in their faces.  The stressed, emotionally drained and haunted looks of failure. 

He turned his head as he sat in the Captain’s chair on Voyager’s bridge, and gazed at Seven of Nine who was working at a console.  They had become good friends in the months since the Captain’s disappearance.

The tragic loss of Kathryn Janeway was written all over Seven’s pale features, her eyes consumed by grief and guilt.  This was the woman who had completely captured Kathryn’s heart.  It had taken him a while to acknowledge this but he was no fool and could recognise true love when he saw it, even if Janeway had been slow – dense - in accepting the blindingly obvious.  So he had silently stepped aside to allow that love, between two headstrong women, to run its tumultuous, turbulent course towards the inevitable. The tragedy was that time had robbed both women of the ecstasy of that never-to-be completed journey.   

He heard her report to him. that her job was complete and she was returning to astrometrics.  He acknowledged her with a nod but had seen the pain stir in her eyes as she had addressed him as ‘Captain’. 

Poor Seven.  When the Captain had just disappeared into thin air during a routine beam-up from the planet’s surface all those months ago, and the time since, every crewmember had suffered the loss.  But Seven, then still very alone and emotionally incapable of expressing herself or reaching out for comfort, had very nearly died of despair.  This was no exaggeration.  Somehow though, good had been borne of bad, and through the patient nurturing of Neelix, Paris, himself and surprisingly B’Elanna, their compassionate ministerings had turned the young woman around and helped her make sense of the multitude of emotions she was to experience.

The outcome had been a further impressive step towards the woman Janeway had instinctively known could exist.  Enter a warm, compassionate, sensitive young female with so much to offer life.  But the loss had also ripped Seven inside out and left its dark, tall shadow over her.  Here you sensed, and would always sense, a tragic sorrow pulsing within her.  Seven would move on but bare the scars forever.

‘Forever,’ thought Chakotay.  Did he really now accept that the Captain was gone?  Gone for good?  Please, immortal spirits, no.  As of one hour ago, there was some apparent hope on the horizon, but these past months had taught him to no longer breed hope in his heart.  Previous expeditions into those waters had delivered too many false and empty promises. He acknowledged that this was the last chance, and if it failed, then the search was over – it had to be.

Chakotay’s train of thought was interrupted by Tuvok, standing resolutely at the station behind him.

“Captain, the Novena vessel is within range and the ambassador is requesting to come aboard.  What are your instructions?”  Tuvok’s voice was calm, controlled and Chakotay found some comfort in its emotionless timbre, even though he knew it belied the Vulcan’s own unseen frustrations concerning the loss of the Captain, his friend.

“Request granted.  Show him to the Briefing Room, I’ll meet you there shortly.”

Tuvok acknowledged the order and left but Chakotay sat a while longer, needing the time to mentally prepare himself. He flexed his hands in front of him, big ‘bear’ hands that were powerful and strong.  His father had always said he had the hands of a boxer, wide across the knuckles and with the athletic reflexes to knock his opponents to the ground.  Spirits, he wanted to knock someone, anyone to the ground right now!  Such was his frustration.  He felt so powerless to do anything, to find the missing woman.  He momentarily wondered whether, if it had been him that was lost, would Kathryn have had more success in tracking him down?

Negative thoughts!  Don’t go there.  Think positive, think like a captain!

He rose from his chair.

*****

Ambassador Silus was a tall, thin, elegant man who possessed an aura about him that oozed diplomat.  Here, one sensed a man of peace as he sat silently, unmoving in front of the also seated Captain Chakotay, only allowing his eyes to wander to the other two occupants in the room who stood, a dark haired woman who had a propensity for displaying an impressive and volatile temper, and a tall, thin, dark haired man with an equally impressive calm, analytical and composed nature.

The man called Chakotay breathed deeply into his hands that were steepled before his face.  He closed his eyes and momentarily rested his forehead on the tips of those fingers.

Silus felt the tension, “I have no hidden agenda, Captain.  I speak only the truth.”

Chakotay, with minimal movement, raised his head and fixed his eyes hard on Silus’s.

“The Sung Ti,” Chakotay stated, his voice sounding tired and irritable.

Silus’s attention was quickly diverted to the tall, dark haired man to his right.

“Based on the ambassador’s information, it would appear that when we went to the aid of the Brada Merchant vessel, we were engaging the Sung Ti.”

Almost as if he hadn’t heard Tuvok, Chakotay sought clarification from the Ambassador.  “You’re telling me that an incident that occurred over seven months ago is the cause of the Captain’s disappearance?”

“That is what I am telling you, Captain.”  His stilted tone of phrase and low voice could not betray the natural vocal power.  Silus leaned forward.  “You see, your noble act in giving protection to an unarmed vessel being fired upon by three Sung Ti vessels, though admirable to my people, would not have been viewed as such by the Sung nation.”

“Especially when we blasted one of their ship’s into neutron dust!” B’Elanna cut in.

“Indeed. And especially when that destroyed vessel contained two members of the Regent’s family.”  Silus voice dropped lower, the delivery slow.

“It was an accident.” Chakotay’s voice cut in hard.  He hadn’t liked Torres’s unfortunate response, it had come over as arrogant and flippant.  Not how he knew she felt.  “We had targeted their deflector emitters but there had to have been a leak in their propulsion system because the ship just exploded.”

“I don’t doubt you, Captain but you made a grave enemy that day.  You allowed the other two vessels to escape and they would have been quite detailed in their feedback to the Regent.”

“You’re saying they’re responsible for the Captain’s disappearance …some form of retribution?”  Torres could barely contain her anger. 

Silus noted the anger in the woman but did not take it personally, more, he understood its nature.

“In part, yes.  You destroyed their ship, you killed..”  he raised his hand to stop B’Elanna’s objection to the word ‘killed’,  “.. in their eyes, an entire crew, you spilt Regency blood.  You also attacked their honour with such destruction, showed they could be defeated, suggested they are weak.  I regret that I am in no doubt that they captured your Captain.”  The last sentence was said emphatically and with some passion.

“And have done what with her?” Chakotay wanted answers now.

Silus frowned, averting his eyes to the ground where he studied the detailed fleck in the floor covering around his feet.

“Captain..” His response was hesitant, guarded.  “This is, of course, all speculation because I have no objective evidence that this is what has happened to your Captain but the patterns are there.  This is what the Sung Ti do.”  Silus was about to continue when two voices rang out at the same time, throwing him questions.

“What have they done to her, where would they have taken her?”  Emotional questions, borne out of impatience, concern, desperation.  Chakotay could feel his patience and control slipping.

“Who are the Sung Ti?”  An analytical, probing mind trying to assess all the data to formulate answers.  The voice of the man, Tuvok.

Silus raised his hands to calm them.  “I will answer every one of your questions.”

He paused and turned to the Captain.  “Captain, if I am right, your Captain was taken to Krasus, home planet of the Sung Ti Empire where she would have been imprisoned in the Marchant holding units, and subjected to interrogation.”

“Would have been?  You mean they will have moved her?”  Torres’s eyes narrowed.

Silus’s noble features registered discomfort.  “Not quite. The Sung Ti are a warring, aggressive people whose Regent is a tyrant and whose acts of cruelty and subjugation of his own people are notorious.  His prisons are full to overflowing with political, military prisoners, those who have dared to speak out against his regime, or attempted to usurp, to overthrow him.”

Silus hesitated, almost as if he didn’t want to continue but then changed his mind.

All three Voyager eyes were on him, emotions hanging so heavy in the air, it was almost tangible.  Perhaps time for truth, although it would be painful for them.