In Dreams

Part 2

“Doctor. There is something I need to tell you… about my dreams.”

With those words, Seven had pushed herself back up to sit on the bio-bed.

The Doctor stepped closer. “Please, Seven, you know you can tell me anything.” Proudly, he informed her, “My psychoanalytic subroutines were updated only two days ago, with Starfleet’s latest transmission.”

“And as my Doctor,” Seven said, her blue eyes directed up to him though her head still tilted downward in some distress, “All I say to you is strictly confidential?”

He only nodded, finding himself both concerned and excited at the prospect of helping Seven.

Seven began to relate the tale of her last dream. She described every last detail, and ended with the hands of the man on her body.

“It felt like violation.” She said. “I wanted him to stop, but was powerless to say. ”

It brought to the Doctor the incidence when Seven's mind was besieged by the memories of the millions she had assimilated as Borg. This, he believed, could be a similar situation, and he explained this to her.

She listened, and nodded her silent acknowledgment as the Doctor went on for a few minutes about possible therapies.

She interrupted him, “I do not believe this is the case. Not this time.”

The Doctor was open to hearing his patient out, “What do you think it is, Seven?”

She turned her eyes to her hand again, remembering the detail of her earlier surprise at the implant being there. “I don't think that I am in reality experiencing dreams at all, Doctor. I think he is here somewhere, in this area of space, and he is communicating with me.”

The Doctor watched as Seven's eyes seemed to draw inside.

“He wants me Doctor. He has been looking for me. And he knows I'm coming closer. He thinks… I am coming home.”

Were this almost anyone other than Seven sitting here and telling him this, the Doctor would immediately assume a psychosis at work… unless some other explanation could be found of course. This, however, was Seven, and she would not come up with this out of nowhere.

“Seven, if you truly believe this to be the case, then we must inform the Captain. We must keep you under constant observation, scan you for any unusual energy reading-“

“You've already scanned me. You found only increased dream activity. He is contacting me, and his method is through my dreams.” Seven stood again, restless as she turned in place and looked down at her hand again. “Of course, he is mistaken, and he thinks I am someone else.” Seven said it, though she didn't entirely believe it herself.

The Doctor said, “Well, there are steps we can take to prevent it from happening again.” He walked to his console. “I'm going to give you something to inhibit your REM state. If no one's home when he calls, perhaps he won't leave a message.” The Doctor smirked to himself, pleased with his little joke.

Seven nodded.

As the Doctor held the hypospray to her neck, Seven felt a rush of excitement. It reached from her throat down through her chest and into her gut, and filled her for just a split second with the unmistakable sensation of lust.

The biobed readings spiked for that same instant, and the Doctor immediately noted the readings. Seven's chest rose and fell with an intake of breath and she met his eyes.

He saw in Seven, for the first time, what looked to be hunger. What kind of hunger, he wasn't sure.
 
The full hypospray still in hand, the Doctor paused in his actions. “I'm holding you for observation, Seven. We must find out who this man is. We must make him understand this is unacceptable.” He set the hypo down for a moment and took up the tricorder again. “And I am very sorry, but I'm afraid this cannot be kept in confidence. I will have to inform the Captain.”

“You gave me your word.” Seven's disappointment and sense of betrayal quickly replaced the strange hunger from a moment ago.

“No, I nodded, but I am sorry.”

“As am I.” Seven said, and her hand was on the Doctor's mobile emitter.

He opened his mouth to protest and was gone.

She held the emitter in her hand, stared at it as if it might bite her, and was baffled that she had just taken the Doctor's freedom.
 
Her eyes closed as she felt what could have been the man's touch, had she not been awake. Seven immediately went the main console and went to work. The Doctor couldn't come back.

*

Kathryn was tired. She had lain in bed for the past two hours, reciting to herself that she wouldn't dream of Seven in any way; but then she'd drift into that place just before sleep, and Seven's face would be there, or her lips would be there, or her touch.

Kathryn sat up. Well, she had records to go over anyway.

As she slipped out of bed and stepped across the room to her table, her combadge chirped to life.

She returned to the bedside table to answer the call, as she attached it to her pajama top. “Janeway here.”

“I'm sorry to wake you, Captain.” Harry Kim's voice.

“No apology necessary.” Kathryn said, stretching her right arm over to the left of her head. “I'm awake.”

Harry paused before coming back with a response. “Chakotay asked me to inform you, the Doctor is missing.”

Kathryn stretched the other way, left over right and heard her back crack. “Missing?” She stood straight.

“His program has been deleted from the ship's computer.”

Kathryn would have expected to feel a sense of danger, anger, or something. But she imagined the Doctor was somewhere in the files, and they just needed to find him, “Who's working on it?”

Harry answered, “Seven and B'Elanna.”

“Very good. Keep me informed.”
 
“Yes, Captain. Kim out.”
 
The communicator chirped off.
 
Good grief, she thought. With the glitches on this ship, it was amazing they'd gotten as far as they had, in or out of the Delta Quadrant.

No, she corrected herself, and gave herself a proper chiding. The ship was fine; it was her own glitches that were the problem.

She'd get some work done for at least an hour, and then attempt again to sleep. In the morning, the Doctor would surely have been found, and he'd be testy about being misplaced. She would occupy him by requesting his assistance with a dream repressor.

She sat at her table, and put her feet up on a chair opposite her. She picked up the PADD that sat on the table, and went to work on the report.

Of course. It was a report from Seven, a report on this void in space and what they could expect upon reaching its edge.

A report from Seven.

Kathryn chose to skip to the next report for now.

*

End Part Two