More Than This
By Laura Schiller
Based on: Star Trek: Voyager
Copyright: Paramount/Kirsten Beyer
She tracked him down on the Voyager holodeck, running the Sandrine's program with the characters deleted. In the empty, wood-paneled, warmly lit room, his Starfleet uniform stood out like a splash of black-and-blue ink. He slouched on a bar stool with his elbows on the counter. He hadn't returned her coms, and for a moment, she was strongly tempted to leave him alone.
Cowardice is irrelevant. She stepped forward. He had taught her himself that problems needed to be addressed openly before they got worse. If she didn't talk to him now, she might never get the chance.
"Hugh … "
Counselor Hugh Cambridge jerked the chair around, lost his balance, and thumped to his feet. He grabbed the edge of the counter for balance. "You – what the – you're supposed to be in Sickbay!"
"Dr. Sharak has cleared me for light duty."
Seven of Nine had a harrowing couple of weeks behind her. Commander Jefferson Briggs, once she'd discovered the truth about his engineering of the catomic plague, had taken his revenge by infecting her, Axum, and the Arehaz Collective with it. Sharak, Samantha and Tom had made sure that Briggs was arrested and sentenced to prison, and his private research accessed to reveal the cure. Too late, however, for Axum, who had died first from the plague. After everything the former leader of Unimatrix Zero had suffered, it had simply been too much.
Seven grieved for him, but that was only the proverbial tip of the iceberg. Hence her presence, obviously unwanted, in this bar.
"Hugh – Counselor – I must tell you … "
"Yes?" His hazel eyes narrowed.
"I have … betrayed our relationship," she forced herself to say, staring at his jacket collar instead of his face. "I was intimate with Axum. Later I realized that it had happened in an imaginary collective world created by our catoms while we were in stasis, and that he had been controlling this world without my knowledge. But at the time, I was not aware of this. I … consented."
That was the worst of it. She had come so close to forgetting everything that mattered: stopping the plague, her Voyager shipmates, Sharak, Icheb … Hugh.
A sharp intake of breath forced her to look at Hugh's face. He was shaking with fury, his hazel eyes glittering like small warp cores.
"Bloody hell, Seven … "
She took a step back, ready to leave the room.
"That bastard!"
She paused.
"I could murder him. If he weren't already dead, I'd do it. And you're blaming yourself?"
She had expected anything – shouting, quiet disappointment, a cool psychological assessment of all the ways their relationship had gone wrong, one or even more new women in Hugh's life – anything but this. She was considerably bitter about Axum herself, but she didn't hate him. She couldn't if she tried.
"He was severely hurt in ways we cannot even imagine," she said. "He lived among the Borg with his individuality intact. The Borg Queen tortured him. He tore out his implants with his own hands. He refused the perfection of the Caeliar for my sake, only to discover that I belonged to another man. His judgment was compromised. Do not condemn him."
"That's an explanation, but no excuse!" Hugh snarled. "Your life has hardly been a pleasure party, has it, Seven? And I don't see you committing sexual assault."
"I told you, I consented. I … enjoyed it."
She flushed. Even now, the memory of feeling a lover's desire as if it were her own made her hot and light-headed. She hated herself for it. And Hugh was right there, so fierce on her behalf, and if she just took three steps forward and took his face in her hands – stop it now!
"Every first-year psychology student knows that consent entails the knowledge of what you're getting into!"
His logic was undeniable. Her painfully mixed emotions about Axum ran up against it like a stormy sea against a dike.
Her first love, the hero of the Borg resistance, the man who had promised her a hundred beautiful places to see together, her only source of complete mental harmony, the man whose heart she had broken by leaving him three times now … had abused her. There had been something deeply wrong with him, before or after his severance from the Collective, perhaps as far back as his assimilation. She hadn't noticed.
She'd been a victim. Again. How many times would it take?
She sat down on one of the bar stools and cupped her head in her hands, feeling as if it had been stuffed with lead.
Hugh's hand on her wrist made her jump.
"Quite frankly," he said, sitting down next to her, his dry British voice achingly gentle. "I'm amazed that you came back to me – to Voyager – in the first place. That degree of mental manipulation would have been almost impossible to break."
"It nearly was."
"I know." He cupped her cheek to turn her face toward his. "But you have a stronger sense of self than almost anyone I've ever known. You defended it from the Borg for all these years, then the Caeliar, and now this, and you've been defending others as well – Mr. Icheb, Dr. Frazier's people, the Full Circle Fleet. You're magnificent, Seven. I wish you knew that."
Her heart was pounding. How she had missed his touch – so tenuous without the catomic bond, and yet so much more meaningful. She had thought she'd miss being able to sense her partner's love for her, but why would she need to? It was written in every line of Hugh's face. It shone in his eyes.
Most of all, it left her free. To escape, all she'd have to do was knock his hand away and run – but she had no intention of doing so. Instead she reached up, linked her fingers with his, and lowered their hands to the counter.
"Is that your professional opinion, Counselor?"
"Lord, no." He smirked. "I never thought I'd say this, but you're one case I don't feel capable of handling. At least in that capacity."
"Clarify." She caught herself smiling back at him, for the first time in days.
"As you wish, my lady." He squeezed her hand, then straightened up and looked serious. "I recommend that you take some time off on Earth.. I'll refer you to my old friend Austen. She's the finest counsellor in Starfleet."
"That means … " Her heart sank.
"You'd have to leave, yes. I'm not happy about it either." Judging by the deep crease between his eyebrows, that was an understatement. "But you need help, professional help, and for obvious reasons," he gestured between them with one thin, elegant hand, "It can't come from me."
"I understand."
"And just to clarify a little further … " He leaned in closer. "I'm a stubborn old codger, Seven. It takes more than this to discourage me. I love you, and I will wait as long as it takes for you to decide."
"Decide what?"
"Whether you'll come back to me. It's entirely up to you." And he meant it. Despite the pleading look he couldn't keep out of his eyes, despite the pain of uncertainty he'd gone through already in missing and worrying about her, he was sincere. Once again, he was leaving her free.
She smiled through a most inconvenient flow of tears.
"For such an intelligent man, Counselor, you can be downright foolish. Of course I will come back to you."
He held up a warning finger. "Don't promise. Therapy changes lives, I've seen it all the time. You may decide the most healthy choice for now is to stay single - "
"It takes more than this to discourage me," she declared firmly, and pulled him in for a kiss.