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"Kathryn, are you seeing this?"
"Yes," she breathed excitedly, eyes glued to the terminal.
The scanners showed a massive source of almost pure dilithium. This was too good to be true and if she was honest, she had only taken Chakotay on this scouting mission because she had expected to find only traces of the mineral, like Voyager's long range scanners had indicated. She had hoped it would be enough to get them to the next inhabited M-class planet where they could trade for the amount of dilithium they needed.
Had she known this source was so pure and so massive, she would have taken Voyager here, so B'Elanna could start mining right away.
"Should we get closer?" Chakotay asked, Kathryn's excitement quickly spreading to him.
"Yes," she replied while working her console, "We need to see if there will be any problems for mining. Take us into a lower orbit."
The shuttle smoothly went into a lower orbit and when they broke the thick layer of clouds the view was breathtaking. The whole planet was white, covered in snow and ice, with specks of a vibrant azures and turquoise.
"Kathryn, look," he quickly urged her so she wouldn't miss the beautiful sight.
She threw a glance to the viewport meaning to only have a quick look but then she found her eyes glued to the spectacle outside, her eyes open wide in wonder.
"It's beautiful," she breathed, her readouts quickly forgotten, unable to tear her gaze away from the sight before her.
"Yes, it is." Chakotay smiled, but different to Kathryn's, his eyes weren't glued to the spectacle outside the shuttle but the one inside.
It had been a while since he last saw her sincerely fascinated and utterly happy about something. But there and then, her face glowed and her eyes had a shine to them, like they used to have in the beginning of their journey, when all the wonderful sights, all the undiscovered miracles of space still moved her unhindered, when she could still give in to the sensations without the burden of her guilt crippling her. But the years and the losses had slowly stripped her of that and it had been years since she had simply enjoyed something without immediately thinking about the dangers it may hold. It was a rare gift for Chakotay to see her so carefree and happy and he was glad he had gone on this scouting mission with her.
Chakotay was so engrossed in enjoying the woman next to him, that he missed the dangerous spike in the readings on his own console. It wasn't until the shuttle shuddered violently and was thrown to the side, that he tore his eyes from Kathryn and concentrated back on navigating the space craft.
"Damn," he muttered under his breath, "we lost inertial dampers. It's going to be a bumpy ride."
"What happened?" Kathryn asked more to herself than Chakotay, while trying to make sense of the readings.
"I can't get us into a higher orbit." His fingers practically ran over his console trying to get the shuttle to move the way he wanted it to, "There too much atmospheric neutrino disturbance. I can't navigate through."
"Did you try an oscillating phase harmonic?"
Suddenly the shuttle lurched and they both felt it tilt forward and grabbed their consoles.
"We're not going to make it if we crash without inertial dampers," Kathryn warned as the got closer to the surface. Suddenly all that ice and snow didn't seem quite as appealing.
"I'll engage thrusters," he uttered, "if we crash down into open water, we can make it."
He looked at her for a moment, waiting for her approval, and when she nodded, he quickly engaged the thrusters and gave a couple of short bursts.
"Hold on," he said, stealing a glance at her now grim face, "here we go."
Chakotay had spotted a large body of open water and seeing as it was their only chance to make it without being crushed he steered the shuttle towards it as well as he was able to, while trying to gently get it closer to the ground, so the impact would be too hard.
"Brace for impact." It was usually her line. He looked at her as he crouched forward and saw her do the same. Their eyes locked as they waited for the shuttle to touch down. Endless seconds passed by and just when Chakotay wanted to lift his head and look outside, he felt himself being thrown out of the seat and heard the screeching noise of metal being crunched together. Before he could feel the full blow of the touchdown, his vision darkened.