My great thanks again to Mia Cooper for her incisive comments. Having a great beta makes all the difference.
Chapter 1
Kolopak Jnr stepped off the private transporter and walked to the kitchen, the light strips following his footsteps along the glass-wrapped corridor. Outside, tendrils of mist floated upwards from the barren frozen grounds surrounding the Indiana house.
Once upon a time he had run through those same wintry fields with little more than a shirt and pants on, having inherited the Janeway gene for loving the cold weather. Now he longed for lazy summer days to warm his aching bones. Getting old, he told himself.
It is with profound sadness…
He took the teapot off the shelf before choosing one of his father's favourite blends. Waiting for the water to boil on the old-fashioned stove, he slid his hand over the kitchen top. Decades ago, his dad had strode through the corn field, his young son and daughter proudly carrying a laser tape measure. A couple of years prior, a ferocious storm had felled some of the older trees and Chakotay had chosen the largest one for his next carpentry project.
…that Dr Kolopak Janeway Jnr and Captain Elizabeth Janeway-Paris (Ret)...
Together, they had counted the growth rings on the stump anchored in the fertile soil.
The giant White oak had seen the first footsteps on the moon, Chakotay had told Kol and Liz, showing them the dark coloured centre. His father's fingers had stopped a little further out – Earth's manned mission to Mars. Three hand spans towards the rim, Cochrane had soared to the heavens in his inaugural warp flight. The first contact between humans and an alien race coming from the stars had taken place the very same day.
It was therefore fitting, Chakotay had said, his eyes smiling, that the tree would end its days in the house of the first Starfleet captain to explore the Delta quadrant.
Liz had blabbered the whole way home about piloting a spaceship one day. Chakotay had ruffled her raven black hair, but said nothing. Four years older than his sister, Kolopak already knew of his father's weariness about space missions.
...announce the death...
It had been the middle of the night when Kol had left Starfleet Medical and the sun was not up yet, three time zones to the East. The vast house was silent although he knew his father would be awake, even at this ungodly hour when thoughts take on a life of their own, unconstrained, unbidden – another family trait which had come down to him.
...of Admiral Kathryn Janeway (Ret.)...
Kolopak leaned over the counter, his hands flat on the hard worn timber. Seventy years of coffee spills and hot cups had marked the wood as deeply as five hundred years of life under the sky. Now, another giant had fallen and the memories of the woman surrounded him everywhere he looked, like the ripples of age drawn on the old timber.
…who passed away peacefully at Starfleet Medical Hospital, San Francisco, Earth...
Over the next few days would come duties to fulfil, customs to observe. He had not sent the death notice out yet. He had to tell Chakotay before the world was to know. Despite the family lore handed down from kids to grand-kids, neither of his parents were telepathic. His father was not yet aware that his eighty year-old marriage had come to a sudden end.
He bent his head. Mom would want me to be there for Dad. There'll be time later to grieve for her.
...yesterday evening.
A couple of cups joined the pot on a tray. He walked up the stairs leading to the wing set aside for his parents. The study was bathed in shadows, but a thin light beam showed underneath the bedroom door.
"Father." Kolopak put the tray on the bed side table closest to the door.
Chakotay opened his eyes. "Hello, son."
Kolopak helped rearrange the pillows behind his father's back, then handed him the cup of tea. He brought the corner chair nearer the bed, and sat, facing the older man.
"It's Mom," he said. From the look on Chakotay's face, there was nothing more to be said, but Kolopak stammered forward nevertheless. "An hour ago. Just before midnight."
Chakotay put his cup down with an unsteady hand, tea pooling in the saucer. Something flashed in his eyes, so brief Kol would have missed it if it had not been for the light of the bed lamp falling on the old man's face.
He thought what he had seen in that glance was acceptance. After all, Chakotay had prepared all his life – as Starfleet officers must – for that moment when death would reach out and take what it wanted. Those who had been lost for seven long years in a savage part of the galaxy had learnt that fact more than most.
He had been so wrong.
Kolopak lifted the tray aside, making no comment. His father's physical health had rallied in the past six months, but he was tired, more forgetful of events and people around him as the days wore on, a mere shadow of the legend who had taken Voyager's reins after its return to Federation space. Truth be told, Kol feared for the man in front of him, without his soul mate at his side. He knew from bitter experience how wrenching such a loss was.
"Were you with her?" His father's voice was gritty, hardly more than a whisper.
"No, I'd gone home. She was recovering well from the operation. Then the Doctor commed me saying her blood pressure had dropped. By the time I arrived at Starfleet Medical, it was too late."
He lowered his head. "I'm sorry. I should have stayed."
Chakotay reached for his son's hand, his grip surprisingly strong. "I should have been the one to be there."
"The Doctor said it was too soon for you to be travelling. The infection—"
"The same Doctor who said the operation was routine and that she would be back tomorrow."
Chakotay leaned back against the bed head. "And now she's gone."
His short breaths filled the room, carving time into small broken pieces.
An owl hooted softly outside, breaking the silence.
"When she commed me yesterday morning, she said it was the first time she'd spent more than a day away from me for many years, but she did not feel alone. It reminded her of when she was on Voyager, with me so far and yet so close," Chakotay said, a small smile showing.
Kolopak got up and walked to the window, watching the suddenly blurry sky growing lighter. He cleared his throat and talked to the fields outside.
"I contacted Liz on my way here. She'll tell the kids and those within transporter range will be here soon."
He waited a few seconds before turning away from the pink dawn. "Do you want me to comm Uncle Harry?"
"Harry... He'll be... No. It's always been our responsibility to break such news. I'll do it."
Kolopak simply nodded. He had never quite grasped the power that bound his parents to Voyager's crew. When he was a child, the house had regularly overflowed with former crew members and their families coming for picnics and barbecues, or just for a lengthy chat with their former Captain and First Officer. Everybody had been an uncle or an auntie to him and his sister in those early years. But the village that had brought him up had felt more and more constrictive, as if he owed it to them to follow in his parents' footsteps in return for their unfailing loyalty.
While Liz had embraced a Starfleet career, he had rebelled, eliciting a well-known smirk from his mother and patient smiles from his dad. Trying to make his own future without the Janeway name provoking never-ending questions about how it was to live in the shadows of the famous command team, he had taken refuge in the academic world. Away from Starfleet and starships, he had found peace and a measure of well-deserved recognition, ever feeling like a mere bystander to the Voyager legend.
He had wondered many times since why he had ever tried to avoid his legacy in the first place.
"You should go and prepare the rooms. I'll be OK."
Kolopak picked up the tray. The tediousness of normal life was inescapable.
"Call me if you want anything. I'll ask the Doctor to come and see you, if you don't mind."
The sun was just showing through the dark trunks hedging the fields, the thin winter rays falling on the empty bed space where his mother used to sleep, by her husband's side.
Kolopak glanced back before closing the door behind him. Chakotay's hand was gripping the bare sheet, his shoulders shaking silently.