My Dearest Friend,

Ten years. Ten years I have lived without you by my side, unable to hear your voice, ask your counsel or look in your eyes. I pray to spirits I do not believe in that somehow you are safe and happy, and, if by some miracle your spirit actually is present, I want you to know that this is my greatest wish for you. Even though I think that you will never hear these words, I feel compelled to say them. If my mission is a success, I will never have needed to say the things that I am about to say.

If you can hear me now, you know that Tuvok's mind is beyond repair. My heart breaks each time I see him. His impeccable logic, his stoic demeanor, his unwavering calm... it's all gone, ravaged by the disease which now consumes him. The knowledge that it was my decision that brought this terror upon him is almost more than I can bear. This is why I must go back. I must set right what I have done. Would you do the same were our positions reversed, or would you accept what life had dealt you and find a way to make the most of it? Sometimes, I think you would find a way to do that. I can't.

I think about her every day. When I wake up each morning, my first thought is of you. My second is of her - what she would have become, what she would have accomplished, the woman she could have been. I worked tirelessly to bring her back to humanity; I convinced everyone, even you, that she could be redeemed. Ultimately, she redeemed herself. But for what? A few short years? In the end, it was a wasted life. Because of a decision that I made. I know you would tell me that her life wasn't wasted, that she came farther than any of us could have imagined, and that so much good came out of her existence that to call her life a waste would be to trivialize it. But it still haunts me as it haunted you all those years.

I know that you wanted to die with her. I know that you only remained in order to keep your promise to me. You'll never know how much I wished that I could comfort you after her death. You'll never know how often during those last years on Voyager I wanted to take you in my arms and hold you close. You'll never know how desperately I wanted to ease your aching heart. You had told me once that I brought you peace; I thought maybe I could do it again. But I couldn't. I had grown too cold. I became so used to shutting my feelings away in a nice, neat little box that I didn't know how to let them out anymore. Our friendship waned after you started dating her, or maybe even before that, and I didn't know how to repair it. I didn't know what to say. I wanted to tell you... so many things... but I didn't know how. So I allowed things to remain as they were while we both suffered silently. The journey kept you going - the promise of home, the loyalty you felt to your crew, the loyalty you felt to me, the value you placed on the promises you had made. But I know that in the depths of your heart, you were simply waiting for the day you could allow yourself to rest.

When we finally made it home, I had hoped that things could be different for us, that we might somehow be able to return to the closeness we had once shared with the pressures of the Delta Quadrant behind us. But it had been too long. We were too far from each other in every way. We had become too adept at burying our feelings and accepting the status quo, and then your decline was more rapid than I ever could have anticipated. It seemed like one day we were talking and laughing together, and the next, B'Elanna was calling me, telling me I needed to come to Starfleet Medical right away. The moment I saw her face, I knew that something was terribly wrong, and I felt a cold fear in the pit of my stomach. I remember realizing how strange it was to feel that fear because it had been so long since I had felt anything at all.

I don't know how much you remember of those last two months of your life, but I remember every detail, every moment that we shared together. You didn't seem aware of most of it, but I came to see you every day. B'Elanna set up the medicine wheel over your bed to help you find your way home, but I knew that you weren't looking for home any longer; you only wanted peace. Some days, I sat by your bedside and reminisced about the past or filled you in on all the "family" gossip. Most days, I read to you from Austen or Dante or Shakespeare. Like as the waves make to the pebbled shore, So do our minutes hasten to their end...

In the final hours, you found my hand. Your eyes looked at me, and for a moment, I saw the spark of recognition. You said my name, "Kathryn." I replied, "Chakotay." And then, you were gone. When your breathing stopped and the doctors rushed into the room, I just stood there. Later, I was told that I had been in shock. I remember thinking, I should be doing something. Why am I standing here, motionless? It was the one time in my life that I was still, that I felt no desire to act and had no idea what action I should take. B'Elanna finally took me by the arms and led me from the room. I wanted so desperately to cry, to let it all go, but I couldn't, even then. I don't know how long I stood there, outside the door of the hospital room where you died, before Tom and B'Elanna forced me to go home. That was ten years ago.

Sometimes I feel like only yesterday we were throwing jabs at each other across the bridge, or you were walking into my ready room with a coral colored rose, or we were drinking Antarian cider in my quarters at 0300. Other days, I feel like that was a different lifetime, so many years ago that I can't even recall what it was like to be that person. But here I am, about to walk back into that time... At least I hope I am. What will it be like to see us all the way that we were then? What will it be like to see you? I can't even allow myself to imagine that. My one obsession for the past ten years has been finding a way to undo what I did to you, to Seven and to myself. Now, I've found it, and I'm going to do whatever it takes to make sure that history doesn't repeat itself. Every week that I've been on Earth for the past ten years, I've paid a visit to your grave. Today, I visited it for the last time. I can only hope that my actions will be enough to undo what had been done.

Chakotay, I have always loved you. In case I don't succeed, and if by some miracle you can hear me, I wanted you to know.

Alea iacta est

Kathryn