A/N: This is a short little one-shot that's been sitting on my computer for a while. I wrote it after thinking about Chakotay's line from Resolutions and the whole Endgame fiasco. Hope you enjoy! :)
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
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"I'd be willing to believe you if I didn't know Chakotay so well. There is no one on this ship I trust more."
She'd said those words once and actually believed them. She had trusted him like no one else on the ship, like no one else in her life before and he had thrown it all back in her face.
Everything he had ever told her, everything he had ever promised. It had all been a lie.
"Three years ago I didn't even know your name... today I couldn't imagine a day without you."
She could almost kick herself for saying those words to him, how he must have laughed at her for her feelings. The great Captain Kathryn Janeway admitting that she needed someone, not realising that the someone she relied on would one day betray her.
"I can't sacrifice the present waiting for a future that may not happen."
Looking back on those words now she wonders why she never took them to heart. Never took the time to think about the hidden warning in those words, or perhaps it was simply circumstances that made her see the hidden meaning behind them.
Because he hadn't sacrificed the present for a future that might never happen.
Regardless of any understanding she thought they had, he hadn't waited until they returned. He'd moved on.
What hurt the most was that he hadn't even told her. Hadn't bothered to mention that he was seeing anyone, she had thought she meant more to him than that. That he had valued their friendship, at the very least, more than that.
It hurt to find that he hadn't valued her presence in his life as much as she had his. She wondered now whether it had only been their close proximity on the ship that had made their friendship possible.
They had been back now for a month or so now and she hadn't heard a single thing from him. They had lived next to each other for seven years and he had been able to leave all that behind without even a backwards glance.
To leave her.
"Then I guess I am alone, after all."
The last time she had uttered those words he had taken pains to prove her wrong, now she doubted he would even notice. Or care.
She had survived many things in her life, but nothing had brought her to her knees as easily as his betrayal had.
For regardless of the circumstances, he had betrayed their friendship by keeping something like this secret from her for so long.
That he didn't want her as a lover she was sure she would eventually get over. That he held her friendship, and subsequently her, so cheaply she doubted she ever would.