Disclaimer: I do not own Star Trek Voyager, it belongs to Paramount. However, I do own Raca Solar, she's mine!
Author's note: Read and review if you like but don't flame, I'll only use them to incinerate brownies.
Just in case
They had lost only one crewmember in the Kazon attack yesterday but Captain Kathryn Janeway felt it was one too many.
Her name was Raca Solar, a former Maquis and a talented Tactical Officer.
She was only one person in the long list of people they had lost over the period of time they had been in the Delta Quadrant and Janeway felt responsible for each death, as though it was her fault.
And in a way it was. If she hadn't insisted on blowing up the array they would be home right now, not wandering the galaxy on some strange quest.
The thoughts she had steadily been pushing to the back of her mind suddenly surfaced.
If she hadn't been so eager to be a hero would they be in this mess?
If she hadn't asked questions but instead just slipped right back through would all these people have died?
Did she make the right choice?
The chime to her ready room startled her from her mediation and she stared at it dumbly for a minute before finding her voice, "Come."
Chakotay stepped in and handed her a pad.
"Isn't it a little early for the crew evaluation Commander?" Janeway asked.
"It's not the crew evaluations; Ensign Jonas was clearing out Crewman Raca's quarters and found this. It's addressed to you."
Janeway took the pad from his hand and looked at him, 'Thank you Commander."
Chakotay nodded and went back out onto the bridge.
She rubbed the rim of pad, toying with the idea of opening it for several minutes.
Finally, curiosity won out and she activated it.
The words jumped out at her and she began to read:
Captain, you may think this is very forward of me and not at all fitting with Starfleet protocol but I had to do this.
If you're reading this, it means I've died somewhere along the journey home, not that I'm saying anything will happen but just in case something does I wanted you to know this.
When I first came aboard your ship I was resentful of all the rules I was required to follow and that we were a Starfleet crew instead of Maquis.
I had been born on an outpost on Tarliz II in the center of the Demilitarized Zone and neither the Cardassians nor the Federation laid official claim to us but the Cardassians frequently raided our planet and killed or captured our people while Starfleet stood.
Our bit of land was just a Bajoran refugee camp which was wiped out by the Cardassians when I was eight years old.
I was the only survivor and as I looked at the bodies of my dead family I knew one thing.
They had to be avenged and I had to do it, so at eight years old I joined the Maquis.
By the time I was twelve I could make and plant bombs. I bombed my first Cardassian office when I was fourteen.
I joined Chakotay's cell and the rest you know.
At first I thought I'd hate your ship, all the stupid rules and red tape we had to go through but after a time I started to like it.
Starfleet officers treated me as equals, not with the disgust and loathing I so richly deserved.
I belonged for the first time in my life and I liked the feeling.
You must think I'm nuts, some little Bajoran, ex-Maquis, pouring my life story out to you but I wanted you to know how much I admired you.
You've never weakened even when things looked bleak, you've never second thought your decision to blow up the Caretaker array and you've never doubted we'd get home some day.
I hope I'm alive to see it but if I'm not I want to tell you that coming onto this ship was the best thing that ever happened to me.
You gave me a second lease on life and I'm forever grateful.
May the Prophets guide you home safely.
Yours most sincerely: Crewman Raca Solar
Janeway leaned back, blinking hard to keep the tears at bay.
All her earlier thoughts of doubt vanished to be replaced by steely determination.
No she had not made the wrong decision, someway, somehow they would get home.
One crewman had restored her hope.
"May you rest in peace crewman," Janeway whispered to the stars that silently streaked past her window.
Fin.