Keeping their heads down turned out to be easier said than done. When they walked into the dining hall for breakfast, the heckling started instantly.

"Ahh Tom Paris, Auckland's favourite fucktoy" a man blocked Tom deliberately. Chakotay suppressed a wince. He had tattoos and scars covering his arms, and two distinctive looking knife scars that only just missed his left eye. "I've missed you so much. Did you miss me?"

Tom wore his look of cold indifference which Chakotay wished he could master. He knew the contempt was showing as plain as day on his own face.

"Peters." Tom shook his head. "The past few months have not been kind to you. Just when I thought a person couldn't get any uglier."

"I hear you found yourself some temporary protection. Don't kid yourself, Tommy boy, you have enemies in high places. Next time I'm pinning you to the floor and you're screaming and begging for me to stop you're going to wish you'd been a little nicer to me."

Chakotay repressed a shiver. He knew from Tom's example that the less he expressed his feelings the better. He would think about it later. He bit down on an urge to punch the man, knowing it would make matters worse. While he was getting more and more tense, Tom just smiled mockingly at Peters.

"Or you could get yourself a better hobby. Have you considered crochet?"

He shook his head. "Always did have a mouth on you. Never learn do you?"

A large muscular man butted in. "If you think I've forgotten about the dislocated arm you gave me, Paris, you'd better think again."

Then another from out of nowhere, "You and me have got unfinished business. There's a pound of flesh you owe me and I intend to take it"

"Everything all right here?" Blake stepped into the fray with an unmistakable air of authority.

There was some tension, but Peters shrugged. "It won't take long for the commissioner to give us back our favourite toy. We can wait." Peters spoke with the cold precision of a psychopath but the look he gave Tom was one of open lust. Chakotay felt physically sick.

It went on like this all day, micro aggressions and threats, Haig's boys keeping an eye on things, just reining in a tension that was taut to breaking point. Chakotay was exhausted trying to catalogue the threats and enemies, trying to figure out the tone to take, the attitude to adopt, the motivations of the other prisoners. Tom had kept up an attitude of arrogant nonchalance throughout, no matter how vulgar the threats or graphic the descriptions of previous traumas, he looked completely at ease.

It was a relief to get back into their cell and to have the door safely locked.

He let out a breath that it felt like he'd been holding all day. He looked at Tom and found him against the wall next to the door, shaking like a leaf, head down, eyes closed.

"Are you all right?" He asked, knowing it was a stupid question. The adrenaline had worn off.

"Yeah I'm fine. Sorry. I just can't seem to stop..." Tom looked at his trembling hands in frustration and disgust. Chakotay wished that he could take this all away from him. He shouldn't have to relive this, shouldn't have to be so strong against a nightmare of this magnitude.

"Tom." he said, and put his hands on Tom's shoulders to steady and reassure him. Tom flinched and closed his eyes as though he expected to be hit.

"We'll get through this." He said gently. "Just stay with me Lieutenant."

"I know things are bad when you're being nice to me." Tom said with a half smile.

"You seem to have enough enemies in here already."

Tom looked away. "I'm sorry you had to see all of that. I don't much like the person I turn into in prison"

"Do whatever you have to to stay alive. That's an order. I can only imagine how hard this must be, but you're doing fine, Tom. You're doing fine."

Tom looked him in the eyes then, and nodded. There was something in his eyes that Chakotay had never seen before... trust. It was just a moment, just a flash of something that made Tom look so vulnerable, and in that moment Chakotay thought of the violent onslaught of threats and descriptions of things that Tom had lived through. The image of Peters pinning Tom to the floor, raping him, sent him over the edge and he had to look away and focus on breathing or he'd risk throwing up.

"Spirits Tom. How did you survive in here on your own?"

"One day at a time." Tom said, running a hand over his face.

"You were never tempted to end it all?"

"You mean ...kill myself?" Tom clarified, surprised by the frank question. He shrugged. "Of course I was. I thought about it every night."

"What stopped you?"

Tom shrugged.

"Was it the fear of disappointing your father?"

Tom looked distantly at the wall. "My mother died when I was 10. She had Tycho Fever- nothing they can do about that, it just kills off each of your internal organs one by one until you die. It's a slow, painful death."

Chakotay nodded. He knew it.

"The doctors asked if she wanted to take something to speed things up. My mom said to them 'If death wants me, he'll have to come for me himself. I'm not making it any easier on him.' ...I don't give a damn what my father thinks. But I can't stand the thought of letting her down."

Chakotay looked at him as though for the first time. He couldn't recall why he was supposed to hate the man. It was Tom's next words that reminded him.

"Of course, when the opportunity presented itself, I bailed out of here faster than you can say coward and traitor. You were my ticket out of here and I took it. You have far more right to hate me than any of them."

There was a hint of a question in the statement. Chakotay looked away, unsure why he felt so ashamed of that evaluation. He thought of Tom's defiance and resilience in the face of anyone's worst nightmare. Being stuck, for life, in a maximum security prison where everyone hated you and wanted to make every hour of every day one of pain, suffering and humiliation. Where he had been raped, beaten, things Chakotay couldn't even dare imagine or think about... but still put on a brave face and shot back insults and sarcasm. Still held on and persevered.

One thing he knew for sure was that 'coward' was not a word that could be applied to Tom by any reasonable measure.

"No. You have every right to hate the maquis for the way they treat you in here."

"It's not just maquis who treat me like that. Besides, they don't represent the maquis cause. It was you I betrayed."

"What's your point?"

"Just remember it."

It took a second for Chakotay to realise that this wasn't about Tom betraying him, this was granting permission for him to betray Tom if, or when things got worse. He chose his next words carefully, making the choice to gently confront Tom with the situation head on rather than give him any semantic wiggle room.

"You were raped, beaten, tortured, dehumanised, treated like a thing to be used and abused." He paused, Tom had flinched slightly at the words and flushed with embarrassment. "You survived. You have nothing to apologise for, and nothing to be ashamed of." Tom looked up at him quickly at that, the look in his eyes was one of genuine surprise, as though checking that Chakotay was actually serious. Obviously no one had ever said it to him before.

"Get some sleep." He said, noting how exhausted they both were from the tension of the first day.

He thought, with relief, of Haig putting them in a cell together. At least when the cell door was locked on them, they were safe, the tension could relax just for a little while. Knowing that the commissioner had wanted to put Tom in with Luke made him worry about what else he might have in store for them. Tomorrow he would focus on building up relations, and protection, with Haig and his gang.

He drifted off to sleep.

He woke to muffled cries, like the sound of someone in great pain who had to remain silent for some reason. He looked over to Tom's bed and found him in the throes of a nightmare. He slowly sat up, prepared to wake Tom if it became necessary. It soon became redundant though as Tom fell onto the cell floor with a thump, waking himself up with a start. Chakotay blinked and missed the movement that sent the pilot to the corner but he stood up and found Tom facing the corner, crouched down, hands up as though protecting himself from blows.

"Tom." He said gently, giving the pilot space but approaching him slowly. "Tom wake up."

Tom turned cautiously to him, with his back to the wall, and sat with his arms wrapped around his legs. He was shaking and at first Chakotay thought he was shivering from the cold, which might also have been true, but then Tom angrily wiped away tears with frustration and helplessness

He whispered "I can't do this. Not again. Not again."

Chakotay felt his heart breaking to watch the torture the young man was being put through, a punishment completely out of all proportion with his supposed crime. This was something no one should have to face once, let alone twice.

"We'll get through this. One day at a time." He echoed Tom's words from earlier. Tom rubbed his face with his hands and said nothing for a moment. He grabbed the bedsheet and wrapped it round Tom's shoulders carefully.

"Thanks." Tom said "and-"

"Don't even think about apologising."

Tom looked speechless for a moment, then laughed slightly, breaking the tension.

"Ok, then I'll just stick with Thanks." Tom smiled, tiredly.

"Try and get some sleep."

Tom nodded. "Don't worry, you won't have to babysit me forever. I'll get back into the swing of things soon enough." he said as he climbed back into bed and closed his eyes.

Chakotay frowned...wondering what it looked like for someone to resign themselves to a life like this. He went to sleep with a picture in his head of when he and Tom had met on Voyager. The insults and anger he had hurled at the pilot, and the the cold, dead look in Tom's eyes that he got in return. He shuddered, before letting sleep overtake him.

Tom got 'back into the swing of things' with alarming speed. The next day he walked out of the cell with an energy and confidence that belied the physical and emotional exhaustion underneath. Chakotay didn't know how, as for himself, he felt surly and had a dull headache he couldn't shake off.

They stepped out of their block, taking a moment to watch the pouring rain on the concrete. Peters was standing outside the food block, staring at Tom with single-minded intensity. A couple of others were watching them. The guards watched on with unconcealed indifference.

"Ah. Another day in paradise." Tom said with mock cheerfulness as he stepped out into the rain and across to the food block, Chakotay following.

The inmates were given repetitive, mechanical tasks to do and they did these for most of the day with a break for lunch and exercise. Before dinner they were allowed free time, after dinner they had another hour and a half of free time before being locked back in their cells at 9. The manual labour was tedious, but relatively safe and predictable. Blake had taken to hanging around them, on an almost full time basis...he obviously thought the micro-aggressions could escalate at any moment.

The man who sat next to Chakotay at lunch was twice his size, all muscle, with no hair on his head except for a trimmed beard.

"If you ever get lonely chief, there's a dick with your name on it." He said casually. It was the first time Chakotay had been personally propositioned, after watching Tom brush off countless, similar, crude comments. He felt a hand moving up his thigh and for the first time realised how easy Tom made it look, but how difficult it really was to stay calm and flippantly reject the offer without causing a scene. The man groped him as though he had every right. A sense of sudden vulnerability and panic blanked his thoughts and he reacted with instinct rather than good sense.

"You better take that hand off me before you lose it." he growled out.

Before he knew where he was, the man's hand was gripped around his throat and his feet were barely touching the floor.

"Think you can do better than me huh?"

"Hey!" he heard Tom shout, and before he knew it all hell was breaking loose, a full on fist fight in the middle of the food hall.

He woke up in Medical with a pounding headache and sat up slowly. In the next bed over was Blake, who eyed him neutrally. "Hey. How's the head." he asked.

Chakotay groaned slightly.

"Yeah I figured." Blake chuckled. "You certainly know how to create a scene. Been a while since we had a whole lunch room go down like that."

He remembered the fight vaguely, but had no idea how much time had passed.

"Where's Tom?" He asked, suddenly worried. To some extent, focusing on Tom was kind of a project that kept him sane in here. It meant he didn't have to evaluate too closely just how bleak their situation really was.

"He's back in the cells. You and me are the lucky ones they want to keep overnight."

Chakotay looked at the door of medical. He didn't like the idea of Tom being out there alone where he couldn't keep an eye on him...

"Don't worry. Haig'll watch him." Blake said, reading his thoughts without looking at him. Chakotay raised an eyebrow at him.

"Believe it or not, Haig has always had a kind of respect for Paris."

"Why's that?"

"Think it dates back to a kid who came in here, Nicky Caldero. Nicky was out of his depth the moment he stepped through the door, mouthing off at the wrong people. He got into it with DK on his first day, probably would have got himself killed if Paris hadn't stepped between them."

Blake glanced sideways at Chakotay "Say what you like about Paris but he's got guts. Anyway. Paris dislocated DK's arm pretty badly. Kid starts following him around like a lost puppy, trying to learn the ropes. But on the third day this kid, Nicky, he pulls a knife on Paris in the lunch room in front of everybody and stabs him."

Chakotay frowned, not sure he was following. Blake continued: "Of course, Nicky's cred went up overnight. He got automatic respect and as soon as Paris got out of Medical, they were never seen near each other again. Haig thought..."

"That Tom engineered it deliberately." Chakotay finished for him, quietly, knowing instinctively that it was true. Blake nodded.

"Bingo. Figured he'd made a deal with the kid before hand, or more likely provoked him into it. Of course back then Haig wasn't in charge, Luke was. "

Chakotay nodded, thoughtfully. "Where's Nicky now?"

"Ah he got out, he wasn't in for anything major."

He lay back on the bio-bed gingerly to protect his head, and tried not to feel the sensation of a hand moving up his thigh, and words threatening to violate him as though he were no more than a disposable toy. The feeling was oppressive, and it weighed him down to think of the endless days ahead, given that this was only day 2.

The next day passed much the same as the first, with Tom more skilfully avoiding conflict than Chakotay had done. As they were leaving dinner, a man coming up behind them put his arm around Tom and started caressing his torso.

"Come back to mine and I'll show you what a whore like you is really good for" The man gripped him more violently. Chakotay tensed, ready for a fight.

"Why don't you go flirt with someone in your own league Victor?" Tom said lightly. "Like I don't know, a toilet brush?"

"I'll put that smart mouth of yours to better use, whore." Victor said, but Tom took his wrist and held it bent back on itself so that Victor was forced to let him go.

"Manners, Victor." he said as Victor growled in frustration and stalked off. Chakotay couldn't help being impressed by how Tom handled it, but also a little saddened to know that it was through so much experience.

When they got back to the cell, Tom didn't seem shaken, in fact he hadn't let go of the calm exterior, which somehow disturbed Chakotay more.

They had been three of the longest days of his life, and he thought how interminably long eight months of it must have felt.

"Did anything happen while I was away?" He asked.

"I told you Chakotay, I don't need babysitting. I can look after myself." Tom said, with just a slight edge to his voice

"Tom." he said, meaningfully, the hint of command in his tone. Tom looked at him defiantly but after a moment, his look wavered and he looked away with a sigh.

"I'm sorry." he said, with a dull quality that worried him. He waited expectantly for Tom to say more by way of explanation. Silence was often the most useful tool in encouraging people to talk, and it worked on this occasion too.

"Like I said, I don't much like the person I turn into in prison."

"Out there is one thing, but in here I need you to be...you." Chakotay said, hoping Tom understood that he needed it for both of their sakes. He needed an ally in here as much as Tom did. Someone he could rely on to have his back, as well as a safe space to drop all pretences and remember who they were. When they returned to normal and remembered Voyager, it made it easier to justify persevering...at least it did for Chakotay. He was afraid to lose Tom behind layers of defences that would lock him out.

Tom looked up at him slowly, and nodded. He said "yes sir" without mockery. Chakotay knew that Tom would try his best to be one person in here, and another out there, no matter how difficult that would be for someone used to doing all of this alone. The last time he was here, the only safe space he'd had was locked inside himself.

"I guess it could be worse. Since we got here I haven't seen a single leola root."

Chakotay chuckled. That link to Voyager, Tom's apparently irrepressible spirit in seeing the lighter side of things, without them he too would be forced to become a robotic endurance machine, suppressing all feeling, deadening all emotion. So long as they could stick together, he felt certain they would make it.