September 1995

Remember way back when the crew of the Voyager liked each other? When they spent as much time interacting as living, thinking, feeling individuals as they did as co-workers? When Janeway and Chakotay smiled at each other occasionally, flirted a little, even talked together once in a while? When, in short, Voyager was fun to watch? Yeah. Enjoy.

AFTER "ELOGIUM"

"Man, you are in!"

Chakotay looked up from his study of the turbolift floor. "What?"

Paris leaned casually against the wall. "With the Captain. I saw the way she looked at you, Chakotay. If I were you, I'd do something about that."

"I don't know what you're talking about, Paris."

Paris rolled his eyes. "Come on, Chakotay. What was that crack about 'mating behavior?' She practically made a pass at you in the middle of the shift! Don't even tell me you didn't notice."

Chakotay lowered his eyes to the floor again. "I noticed," he said quietly.

"Well, aren't you going to do something about it?"

"What makes you think I want to, Paris?" He glanced up a little, just enough to gague Tom's reaction.

Paris frowned, confused. "I don't know. I guess I just thought..." He shrugged one shoulder. "Sorry, Commander. My mistake."

The lift slowed to a halt and Paris stepped out hastily. He gave Chakotay a puzzled backward glance, then disappeared down the corridor.

Chakotay leaned heavily against the wall, his chin on his chest, laughing to himself. Another confrontation narrowly avoided. He wondered how many more there would be, how many more he could endure, before the careful facade he had constructed would begin to crack and they would all know. Paris was an observant one, a watcher; of course he would figure it out before the others. But a brilliant sidestep and he was off the trail again, too. Chakotay shook his head. How much longer?

The lift deposited him outside the mess hall. He took a moment to compose himself before he entered. He glanced around quickly. The place was crowded, full with the sound of talk and infectious laughter. He gathered a tray from Neelix and sought out a table to himself, but B'Elanna Torres waved him over.

"Join me, Chakotay?" He hesitated a moment, then seated himself in the chair opposite her, reminding himself to tread carefully. B'Elanna knew him better than anyone else on the ship. She had probably suspected long ago.

"So," she mused. "Are you going to talk to her?"

"Talk to who?"

B'Elanna leaned forward and lowered her voice. "To the Captain?"

He stabbed a forkful of greenery, careful to look for stray hot peppers and beetles, and shoved it in his mouth. "'Bout what?"

B'Elanna actually growled. "I know what you were trying to do today, Chakotay. A policy about fraternization?"

He chewed carefully, hiding his smile. "What about it?"

"Make it against policy and you never have to face your feelings for her."

"My feelings for who?"

"For the Captain!"

He lowered his fork. "What? You think I have feelings for..." His eyes darted around the room. "You've got to be kidding."

"Don't lie to me, Chakotay. I know you better than that. You want her. I may be the only person who knows it, but you want her." She leaned back in her chair. "But if you had talked her into a fraternization policy, then you would never have to admit to your feelings, because you wouldn't be able to do anything about it anyway." She shook her head. "I never pegged you as a coward, Chakotay, but now I'm beginning to wonder."

He pushed his chair away from the table so fast it almost toppled to the floor. "You're way out of line, Torres," he hissed. "You don't know what I feel, and you never will." He turned on his heel and stalked from the room, leaving B'Elanna and the other diners looking after him in astonishment.

In the privacy of the turbolift, he collapsed in a corner and laughed himself out of breath.

"Captain? Can I talk to you for a minute?"

Janeway looked up from her computer screen to the open, earnest face of Ensign Kim. She smiled. "Of course, Ensign. Have a seat."

He hesitantly crossed the Ready Room and seated himself on the couch. She switched off her terminal and rose to join him. "What can I do for you, Harry?"

He shifted uncomfortably. "I have this friend," he began, then stopped.

She patted his arm. "Go on, Harry. It's all right."

He nodded. "I have this friend, who has this problem. See, he's in love with someone on this ship."

She gave him a wide smile. "That's wonderful, Harry!"

He shook his head vigorously. "It isn't me!"

"It isn't?"

"No! I have a girlfriend back home."

She nodded. "Ah, of course."

He searched her face, obviously unsure of her belief, then continued. "He's not sure she's in love with him, though. My friend, that is."

"I see," she said seriously. "I think he should tell her the truth, and find out how she feels. She's more likely to be honest with him if he's honest with her. And maybe she feels the same way. But if he never asks her, then he'll never know, will he?"

Harry let out a breath of relief. "Exactly. But that's not the problem."

"Then what is the problem?"

He hesitated for a long moment, then plunged ahead. "The problem is that she outranks him."

Janeway cleared her throat.

"Not by a lot," Harry continued. "Just by one grade. But she's in a position of...very high authority, and-- "

"Excuse me, Harry, but I need something to drink. Would you like anything?"

"Uh, no thanks."

"I'll just be a moment." She rose swiftly and crossed to the replicator, her back turned to him. It took a full five seconds before she could compose her voice enough to ask the replicator for tea, and another fifteen seconds before she could compose her expression enough to look at him again. "Now. You were saying, Ensign?"

"I was saying that she's in a position of very high authority, and thinks she can't...fraternize with the people serving under her. In her department, I mean," he added hastily.

Janeway sat down beside him again. "So she has no feelings for him, then?"

He shook his head. "No, she does have feelings for him. At least I think she does. And he thinks she does. We all think she does." He looked up at her. "At least, we hope she does."

Janeway pulled her brows together thoughtfully. "Well, Harry, I think you should talk to...your friend. I think you should tell him to be honest with her, and to remind her that this could be a very long trip. Tell her that we only have each other to lean on, and that he'd very much like to be there for her. Does that help you at all?"

He nodded once and smiled. "Yes, Captain, it does. I'm going to go talk to him right now."

She rose and placed a hand on his shoulder. "You're a good friend, Harry."

"Thank you, Captain." He turned and fled from the room.

Janeway barely made it back to the couch before she melted into a heap of hysterics. Moments later, the door buzzer sounded again. She took a moment to smooth her uniform and her face. "Come in," she called.

Tuvok walked stiffly into the room. "Captain, if I may have a word with you."

"Of course, Tuvok. Have a seat?"

"Thank you, I prefer to remain standing."

Janeway glanced up at him, a little alarmed, and perched on the edge of her desk. "Something wrong, Tuvok?"

He cocked his head at her. "I was somewhat...puzzled...by several incidents that occurred on the Bridge this afternoon."

"And what incidents would those be?"

"First of all, the reaction to my noting that, after we rolled into a submissive position and produced a color-changing effect, we had lost our sex appeal."

Janeway laughed softly. "It was funny, Tuvok. I know you were only stating the obvious, that Commander Chakotay's suggestion had worked. But it was the way you said it..." She looked down at the floor and shook her head, hiding her smile. "You made a joke, Tuvok, whether you did it intentionally or not."

"It was purely unintentional."

"I'm sure it was. You can be certain, though, that we weren't laughing at you. We were laughing at what you said."

"I see." He scowled; Janeway was certain he didn't see at all, but he wouldn't pursue it again.

"What else puzzled you, Tuvok?"

He shifted his feet uncomfortably. "Your comment to Commander Chakotay about...mating behavior."

Janeway bit her lip. "What about it?"

"I am certain, Captain, that a scientist of your skill and expertise has very few...questions about mating behavior. I am also certain that, should such questions arise, you would pursue the proper scientific avenues for further research and study."

She nodded, not trusting her voice.

"So why, Captain, would you go to Commander Chakotay for this information?"

Janeway sucked hard on the inside of her cheek. "It was a joke, Tuvok. I was only...teasing him."

Tuvok's frown deepened. "I overheard Lieutenants Paris and Torres speaking of it in the mess hall a moment ago. They did not refer to it as 'teasing.'"

"No?"

"No. The word they used was...'flirting.'"

Janeway drew back in horror. "Flirting? Me? With Chakotay? Surely you don't believe them, Tuvok? Tell me you don't believe them!"

Tuvok drew himself up to his full height and squared his shoulders. "I do not believe them, Captain."

Janeway turned away from him and paced a few steps. "I just can't believe anyone would think..." She stopped and looked back at Tuvok. "At least I can count on you, Tuvok." She placed a hand on his shoulder. "You've always been a good friend to me. It seems I need you now, more than ever. Stand by me, Tuvok. Be my strength, as you have been in the past."

He looked down at her with an expression she could almost have called proud and paternal. "I will, Captain. You can be sure of it." He bowed faintly to her and left the room.

Janeway didn't make it to the couch this time. She sank down on the coffee table, her face buried in her hands, and laughed until her sides ached.

She tapped in the code he had given her months before and, with a quick glance up and down the corridor, entered the room. The door closed behind her and she leaned against it, breathless.

"Hi," his voice said.

She looked up. He was in bed, covered only from the waist down with a thin sheet, idly reading a data padd. She leveled a finger at him. "You almost blew it today," she said.

He broke into a wide grin. "Me? How do you figure that?"

"All that talk about a fraternization policy..." She shook her head. "What were you trying to do to me up there?"

"What about your little crack about 'mating behavior?' Tom Paris is having a field day with that one."

She grinned back at him. "I thought he might. But what about you and your obsession with 'sexual rivals,' hmmmm? What was that all about?"

"That was to get back at you for throwing Mark in my face again." He laughed. "I kept thinking that was me out there, rolling over and turning blue."

She shook her head and crossed to his bed. "We're going to have to be more careful. Harry and Tuvok both came to me today with their suspicions about us."

"And Tom and B'Elanna came to me."

She looked sideways at him. "I bet they're all in Sandrine's right now, talking about us."

"Maybe we should make an appearance."

"Together, or separately?"

He lay back and pillowed his head on his folded arms. "Separately, I think. You just keep flirting with me."

"And you keep playing you're in agony over me."

She nodded. "You have a devious mind."

"And you don't?"

She poked him in the ribs. "Better put some clothes on before we go."

He grabbed her elbow and pulled her to him. "Are you sure that's what you want? Maybe we should just stay here..."

She turned her face up to him and let him kiss her, playfully at first, but then with increasing passion. A little shift and she realized just how thin the sheet was. "I bet they'll all still be there in an hour," she murmured, smoothing her hands down his chest and belly and under the sheet.

He gasped. "Let's make it two hours." He turned her slightly and nibbled down the back of her neck, slid his hands into the opening of her uniform.

She covered his hands with her own and shivered against him. "Why don't we skip Sandrine's altogether? I suddenly have a lot of questions about mating behavior to ask you..."