Snow - A Voyager Lullaby

Kathryn never understood why she preferred her ready room to her quarters. The latter were only a deck away from the bridge; she couldn't justify spending such late nights in her office simply on the grounds of availability. But she frequently slept on this couch, stretched out under the starfield and staring at the curve of the window until she drifted off. Maybe half a dozen people knew she kept a spare uniform tucked away for the mornings after the nights she failed to go home. She could remember racing to get dressed, taking hair pins from Tuvok as he offered them and cursing herself for not setting an alarm. The shorter hair was better for that. It was only from habit that she still kept bobby pins and claw clips in her desk.

By the Earth calendar, it was deep winter. If she were in her bedroom at home, the cold would still be seeping through the windows. It would still be silent and dark and she would still be wrapped in an afghan on the edge of sleep, too lazy or too tired to get undressed. But if she were at home, the sun would eventually come up. In space, the sun didn't come up in the morning.

The door chimed, and she thought she called them in, but nothing happened and her brain resumed its drifting. Sleep and snow, waking in the morning to find it was still dark and burrowing back under the covers and refusing to get up. Downstairs, Molly was whining. The dog should really go out for a few minutes, but Mark would do it if she didn't. He must have, because the whimpering stopped. And then he came back and was moving around in the bedroom, sitting by the window and watching the snow, getting hit by the worst of the draft, but surely at his age he could take care of himself. It was comforting just to have someone else in the room, watching over her. Those sharp, abrupt blue eyes.

"Mmm. Seven. How long have you been in here?" Kathryn groaned and pulled herself into a semi-sitting position.

"Approximately ten minutes, Captain. You indicated that I should enter, but when I did you appeared to be asleep. I was . . . unsure as to an appropriate course of action."

"Well it was nice of you to knock first. We'll civilize you yet."

The look she got in return was pinched and slightly offended. Seven of Nine was, for a change, sitting - cross-legged on the floor in front of the couch. She seemed a little rumpled, but Kathryn thought it might just be her imagination. A few blond strands out of place and very small dark circles pressed close again the nose hardly qualified the girl for dishevelment.

The difficulty Kathryn had in getting to her feet must have been a sign of old age. Several muscles and joints protested vehemently. Kathryn shook herself out, shedding the creases in both body and uniform, padded in her stocking feet to the replicator and asked for tea. Lemon with honey. "So, what brings you here at this time of night, Seven?" The cups were anonymous Starfleet issue. She handed one to Seven and sank back onto the couch.

One metal-traced hand fondled the cup. Whisper of cybernetic joints.

"Seven?"

Seven dipped her head to the rim of the cup and tasted the tea. She was cautious, at first, wary of the steaming heat, then curious of the smell. A pale pink tongue-tip darted out and collected a few drops, precise as a scientific measurement. Pale eyelids and blond lashes were all Kathryn could see.

"Come on Seven. What's the matter?" Using her 'Mother Janeway' voice. "Want to tell me?"

Still this silence. Kathryn found she was massaging one of her hands with the other, working out a strange warmth and tingling. She had been sleeping, dreaming of something, of home, of Mark holding her hand while she dozed. She'd had it outstretched to him. Off the bed.

That was it. The strangest thing: Seven of Nine had been holding her hand.

Kathryn set her tea down and came to crouch on the floor in front of the girl. Gently, she extended her index fingers and traced the dark smudges pooled under Seven's eyes. "Where did you get these?"

"I have had difficulty maintaining my regenerative cycle," Seven said, still focussed on the teacup. "The computer had given me to understand that you were in your ready room; I thought you might still be awake. I am . . . sorry to have disturbed you."

"No, no." Kathryn paused and rolled her shoulders, wincing as she heard the joints crack. "I shouldn't have nodded off. It's all right. Are you saying you can't sleep?"

"I do not "sleep," as such. I am . . . restless. I regain consciousness at unscheduled times and find myself behaving irrationally."

"How so?"

"I find myself looking for things which I do not possess. I feel as if I am missing something, but I do not know what it is." The next words were very human. "I miss . . ." Confusion in the blue eyes.

"What, Seven?"

"I miss my mother."

No tears. Just a shuddering that rocked the remains of her tea. Kathryn wrapped an arm around Seven's shoulders and marched her to the couch.

"Sit."

The brush was where she'd left it, at the back of her desk drawer. Sitting behind Seven, she pulled out the individual pins holding that blond hair in place and held them between her lips while she shook the mass of it free. Around Kathryn's fingers, it felt damp from sweat and shower moisture that had never evaporated.

She wrapped one arm across Seven's chest, feeling the collar bone against her forearm, and with the other she started brushing. Long, deep strokes, massaging the scalp and pulling bristles through the thickest blond hair she'd ever seen. Kathryn could remember letting her mother do that for her, she could remember doing it for herself when she needed to relax. The constant hair brushing of storybook princesses had very little to do with boredom and a lot to do with comforting fears. No devious wizards, no dragons, no dungeons. No monsters or abandonment.

"Shhh. No, my Seven should never have to be lonely."

Seven's two hands clasped the supporting forearm in a grip that gradually relaxed into gentle contact. There was no resistance left in that hair. Leaving the brush on a cushion, she eased Seven back against her shoulder and rocked them gently back and forth. Her free hand measured the wide cheekbones and the straightness of the nose.

"That's my girl," Kathryn whispered, letting single hairs catch between her lips.

How long had it been since she'd held someone like this? It felt good. It would be too much to imagine that she felt a kiss when her palm brushed Seven's lips on its way down to cup her chin and cradle the line of her throat. She'd rock this girl until they both relaxed enough to sleep and walk her back to bed if it meant she could wrap her arms around this body one more time and hold her tight for a minute before she said goodnight.

Seven's hair and body smelled warm. The girl had relaxed enough to doze again and Kathryn was drifting back into her fantasy. They could as easily be at home, on Earth. Twenty years ago, before she vanished, Seven could have seen winter. She was always so pale, she could have been made out of ice, the Snow Queen from a fairy tale, wrapped in Kathryn's arms because she wasn't willing to let this crystalized child go just yet.

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The End