Star Trek Voyager characters are the property of Paramount Pictures

Warning: This is not my usual type of J/C story. I'm not even sure it can be called J/C, but the idea came to me and I thought I would explore it briefly in a short-story. Not everyone's cup of tea, or maybe I should say coffee ;)

Soulmates

Trebus, 2379

From across a candle lit table, Chakotay watched as Kathryn Janeway topped up her glass of Cabernet Sauvignon. In the soft copper glow of the candles, the wooden cabin around them was lost in dark shadows, and it was easy to imagine that they were back on Voyager enjoying their weekly meal. As much as he was glad to be home, Chakotay missed those days. He missed being part of the family they had all become to each other and he missed the adventure, but most of all he missed Kathryn. They had only seen each other once since Voyager's return over a year ago, and this time together would be all too short. In two days time, after only a brief stay, she would be leaving for her new home on Tarina Prime, a colony on the edge of Federation space. It could be months before he saw her again. Tarina Prime was only five hours away at maximum warp, but in a few weeks time he would be returning to Earth to teach at the Academy.

"I don't think I've ever had such a delicious meal," Kathryn said, putting down the bottle in her hand and picking up her glass. "You'll have to give me the recipe."

Chakotay smiled. "Feeling adventurous?"

"Oh not for me to whip together," Kathryn replied, "my replicator."

Chakotay laughed. "I should have guessed."

Kathryn laughed too, but then their laughter faded as they looked deep into each other's eyes. As they gazed at each other, Chakotay could hardly breathe, but then Kathryn broke their gaze and shifted uncomfortably. "Well, now that dinner's over, how about we go outside? The stars are in full glory. I'd like to see that star-horse you once promised you'd show me."

For a moment, Chakotay made no reply. Then he spoke. "Before we do," he said, "there's something I have to say. If I don't say it now, I might not have the chance again." He paused, took a breath, summoned his courage. "I..."

But before he could finish his sentence, Kathryn interrupted him. "Don't," she said, her face suddenly pale. "Don't say it. Don't spoil our time together."

Chakotay lowered his eyes, his pain visible.

"I do care for you," Kathryn continued, tears welling in her eyes, "very much, but a future for us...together...has always been out of the question." She paused. "I'm not who you think I am."

At this, Chakotay looked up at her. "What do you mean?"

Kathryn opened her mouth, as though she was about to answer, but then shut it again and got to her feet. "It doesn't matter. Just forget about me, Chakotay, and find someone else to make you happy."

Chakotay stood up too. "I don't want anyone else. I've tried, I have...I've tried to move on, but everything always comes back to you and me. I love you, Kathryn. I've loved you since the first day I met you."

"That's just it, Chakotay," she replied, "you haven't. You only met me five years ago."

Chakotay stared at her in confusion. "I don't understand."

"The Kathryn Janeway you knew is dead," she said. "She died five years ago. My name is...was... Erincayta. I'm a scientist from a planet in the Delta Quadrant called Yanrix. I was collecting rock samples on Zartori Moon the same day as your captain and B'Elanna were. They couldn't see me or detect me because I was wearing a cloaking device. I always did when I worked alone. I could see them, though, and was collecting close by them when the rockslide happened. The next thing I remember is waking up with rocks on top of me. I couldn't move, couldn't see, and could hardly breathe. Our race has the ability to leave our bodies so I left mine to better assess my situation. When I did, I saw that there wasn't much hope for me, at least not without immediate medical care, and that wasn't going to come. I wasn't scared, or if I was, I didn't have much time to think about it as B'Elanna's cries distracted me. She was trying to revive your captain, yelling at her to wake up, but to no avail. Then there was a transporter beam and the next thing I knew I was in sickbay. The Doctor was frantically trying to save your captain and then...and then I woke up in her body. How it happened, I don't know, but it did. And once I was in her body, I couldn't leave it."

Slowly, painfully, she walked over to the window and looked out into the darkness.

So I became Kathryn Janeway. There was nothing else that I could do. Through no fault of my own I had acquired her body, her life, and it seemed only right to live her life. It wasn't difficult, at least not overly. I had access to all her memories, so I knew everything that she did, and I also had a sense of her personality. It was like she had become a part of me, and yet I was still myself. I still had my own thoughts, my own memories, my own passions." She paused. "I should have told you what had happened, and so many times I've come close to telling you, but I believed it was better not too. I thought it would do more harm than good. It's not as if there was anything that could be done about it, especially as I was always back in her body after transport. So I just tried to get on with things, tried to make myself more like Kathryn Janeway and Kathryn Janeway more like me. I cut her hair, changed her quarters, deleted old holo-programs, and pursued more of my own interests. It helped that Seven was so new to Voyager. All the focus was on her so it was much easier for me to fit in. It also helped that she and Kathryn had never had time to get to know each other, not like she and Kes, which meant that we could build a relationship virtually from scratch." She paused again. "I dedicated myself completely to her mission, vowing to do whatever necessary to get her crew home. And I didn't do it just to make myself like her. I did it out of a sense of duty. Because when I became her they became my crew, my responsibility, and I was confident I could be just as good a captain as her. I'd served on many starships and won many prizes for my astro-research, although my reputation for brilliance was somewhat marred by my reputation for impetuousness. Kathryn was much more disciplined than me, much more controlled. I tried to follow her example, but sometimes I lost it."

With that she turned around and looked at Chakotay. He was standing still, like stone, a terrible agony in his eyes.

"So now you know," she said quietly. "And now you know why we can never be together." A tear ran down her cheek. "But I do love you, Chakotay. I want you to know that."

Chakotay made no reply, just stared at her with infinite pain.

"And I'm sorry," she went on. "I'm sorry that it happened and I'm sorry for your pain." With a trembling hand, she wiped away her tear. "And I think the best thing I can do now is leave for Tarina Prime."

Clumsily, she picked up her cardigan from behind a chair.

"If you think Starfleet Command should know what I've told you, then tell them. If not then...well, I'll get on with my life...Kathryn's life...whatever life...and not bother you again."

She started to walk towards the door, but as she passed Chakotay, he caught her arm.

"I don't want you to leave," he said quietly.

Kathryn's eyes looked into his, a spark of hope filling them. "You don't?"

He shook his head. "Even if you're not..." he couldn't say the words. "You're still the person I've known for five years. We're still friends."

"But friendship isn't enough for either of us, is it?" she said sadly. "To stay would only serve to hurt us both. You love the woman whose body I inhabit while I love you. In each other we can only ever know pain. It's better for both of us if I leave."

Tears filled Chakotay's eyes. "Not tonight. I don't know what to think right now, don't know what I feel, but the one thing I do know is that I don't want you to leave. Please...stay. Give me time to get my head around this. Please..."

The woman before him hesitated, but then nodded. "If that's what you want."

"It is," Chakotay said sincerely.

"Then I'll stay," she answered. "But I'll sleep in my shuttle. That'll give us both space."

Chakotay's silence implied his consent.

"Well, then," she said. "I'll be off."

This time Chakotay let her go, but when she reached the door he called out.

"Promise me," he said. "Promise you won't leave."

"I won't," she assured him. "I promise."

Then, before he knew it, she was gone.

The following morning, Chakotay found the woman he had always believed to be Kathryn Janeway, sitting at the edge of a silver stream that ran passed his cabin. She was gazing at the water, her arms hugging her legs, and the loneliness in that image was haunting. Slowly, Chakotay walked over to her.

"Hi," he said.

At the sound of his voice, she turned around and got to her feet.

"Hi," she replied quietly.

Chakotay noticed she was wearing her Starfleet uniform but before he could say anything, she spoke. "I've always tried to keep my promises," she said, "so I didn't want to leave without saying goodbye."

At those words, Chakotay closed the gap between them and tentatively put his hand on her shoulder. "I meant what I said last night. I don't want you to leave."

Tears filled Kathryn's eyes. "But I need to go. I can't do this, Chakotay. I can't be around you and feel all this pain."

"You are still you," he said gently. "And I love you. What I had with Kathryn wasn't real, not like it is between us. I loved her, very much, but her heart was already spoken for. But what we have is real. We have a real friendship, fostered over years, and we have a mutual love. We can't throw that away because of something that...that you had no control over."

"But I can never be myself, Chakotay. As long as I'm in this body, I will always be Kathryn Janeway. And now that I've been her for so long, I don't know how to be myself anymore. What kind of relationship would that be for us? Everything that I am is a lie. Being Kathryn in a professional sense is one thing, but in a personal...that's so different. I've never been a deceptive person, I can't base a relationship on a lie. That's why I took up a command post on Tarina Prime. It was too hard being around her family. "

"It's not your fault what happened," Chakotay argued. "And I knew Kathryn long enough to know that she'd be proud of everything you've accomplished in her name over the past five years. I also know how difficult it must have been keeping this secret all these years, and how much courage it must have taken to tell me. You didn't have to, I would never have known you're not Kathryn, but you wanted to be honest with me. How then could a relationship between us be based on a lie?"

A tear ran down her cheek. "Because I'll always have to pretend to be her."

"If you choose to look at things that way. But I don't. You have Kathryn's identity and you have her body, but I don't believe an identity and a body make who we are. I believe who we are lies in our soul. Plenty of people have had to change their identity, but that doesn't change who they are inside. You can either see yourself as Kathryn's imitation, a feeble shadow, or you can see yourself as yourself with a new life. No one needs to know the truth except us."

"But how can you look at me, knowing the truth, and feel the way you used to? How can you see anything but a shadow of the woman you loved? How can we be happy betraying Kathryn's memory? Because while I never knew her, she is a part of me, and I respect everything that she was. It would seem wrong to her memory to be with you."

"I don't think we have to see it that way. If I died, and someone else found themselves in my body, then I wouldn't want them to think of it as my body anymore, but theirs, even if they had to live with my identity. Would it be wrong to love you if you only had Kathryn's heart or eyes and not her entire body? Looking at you then I would see her eyes, and yet not her eyes, because they would be the window to your soul, not hers. Or what if you were Kathryn's twin? Kathryn was engaged, it was a life with Mark she really wanted, not with me. Would it be wrong then, if her twin loved me, for me to be with her twin if I fell in love with her? I don't think so."

"But it isn't me you fell in love with, it was Kathryn. That's the difference."

"Maybe it was her I fell in love with, but maybe I loved her as a way to love you. I do believe that where love is real, there is a connection of souls as well as a physical attraction. Soulmates, some would say. We have that connection. I don't know if Kathryn and I ever did. Sometimes I thought we did, sometimes we would look at each other and everything around us would fade away, but I don't know if she felt the attraction too or if I just imagined it."

"I wish I knew," she answered. "I wish I knew exactly what she felt for you, wish I knew what she would want me to do, but I don't have her feelings, only her memories."

"She would want you to live your life to the full. Some things are out of our hands. If you hadn't of been around that day, it wouldn't have made any difference to her fate. She still would have died. And you would have died too. But you not only lived but you completed her mission. She would be grateful."

For a moment the woman before him didn't answer, then she turned back towards the river. "But what if I took her place? The thought of that has haunted me. Even though she was dead, her body was not beyond saving. Her consciousness could have been reunited with her body. But instead, my consciousness somehow ended up there. That makes me responsible for her death."

"To be responsible," Chakotay reasoned, "you'd have to be culpable. But you didn't plan any of it, it just happened."

"I guess," she conceded. "And if things had been the other way around...she had found herself in my body...then I would want her to be happy. But I don't want a relationship with you founded on the echo of a lost love. Like everyone else, I want to love and be loved for myself." She paused. "I love you, Chakotay, not as Kathryn but as me. But I can never know if you would have loved me for myself. You even call me by her name. I know so would anyone else, but at least it would be me they had fallen in love with."

Chakotay gently turned her towards him. "I can call you whatever you want. Tell me your real name again."

"Erincayta," she said quietly.

"Then how about Kate?" he suggested. "It's short for both your names."

A ghost of a smile crossed her face. "I like that."

Chakotay then took her hands in his. "I'm not saying that things will be easy. We've both got a lot of adjusting to do. But I believe that what we feel for each other is too precious to throw away. We can take things slowly. I can apply for a research post on Tarina Prime and we can spend as much or as little time together as we want. There's nothing to lose, but everything to gain." Tenderly, he brushed his fingers against her cheek. "Please, give our love a chance."

Kate looked deep into his eyes and in their dark depths saw only the love that had always been there.

"I will if you will," she smiled.

Chakotay smiled in return. "Then we have a deal."

They gazed at each other for a long moment, then Chakotay broke away.

"I don't know about you," he said, "but I'm starving. Fancy breakfast?"

"If either you or the replicator are cooking," she teased.

"Me," he smiled. "I've made a plateful of pancakes."

Kate took his arm. "Then what are we waiting for!"

Chakotay laughed softly, and then they walked arm and arm to the cabin.

THE END