A/N: Thanks for all the lovely reviews :)


The room reeks of fear.

It's dark, and the walls are alight with flickers of shadow and slivers of light. Patterns that conjure up nightmares slice across the walls, staking their claim in this madness.

Chakotay is bound to a chair, the sole piece of furniture adorning the room. He tries to keep his breathing even and cast panic to the farthest corners of his mind, but his heart has other plans, announcing them with a furious beat within his chest.

He notices a glint of color in the darkness beyond him, twin pearls that glare at him. They draw closer, billowing into large fuchsia eyes. They are perched on limbs of darkness, stalking him like hungry jaguars. The shadows conform to shapes, wrangling their chaos into order before him. The guard now wears the same armor as the one he saw earlier, an exact mirror of the guard who threw him in the cell.

Chakotay steadies himself, his lungs billowing with the dry air before releasing a calming breath. He only has a vague idea of what to expect, but if it is anything like his experience with the Kazon, it will be far from pleasant.

"Where is your ship?" the guard asks, skipping any introductions.

"I don't know what you're talking about," he responds quickly, keeping his eyes fixed on the D'Chasther guard.

"That's a lie," the guard replies, marching up to him. There is no warning for the fist that makes contact with Chakotay's jaw, sending an inferno blazing up the left side of his face and into his temple. He coughs once, spitting red onto the floor nearby.

"I don't like lies," the guard replies, cracking what Chakotay surmises are its knuckles.

"If you want cooperation you aren't going to get it by beating me or my captain," Chakotay quips.

The fuchsia in its irises glimmer, narrowed to slits by slanted eyelids that peek out from beneath the armor. Silence fills the room, giving way only to the heavy breathing of the guard. The armor creates an echo around it, deepening the tone severely; it reminds Chakotay of a rhinoceros waiting to charge.

"You take yourself far too seriously, human," its voice grumbles beneath the armor, rumbling with a storm of fury. "I do not want your cooperation; I want answers," he turns away, armor grinding fiercely and disappears into the blackness again.

Chakotay hears his footsteps continue on for a moment…another. Then a pause, swishes of a curtain between acts of a horror show. He hears his breathing, rapid and uncontrolled in this room. He can't stop it.

The footsteps start again, accompanied by another sound. Something in that darkness crackles and snaps viciously, accompanying the feet that make their way back to Chakotay. He sees the D'Chasther's eyes first, the fuchsia bright like a poisonous flower. A blue glow hovers nearby, and as the forms take shape once again Chakotay sees what it is.

It makes his stomach fall to the floor.

Kathryn's words come flooding back to him at that moment, words about an electric shock device. He can reach no other explanation for the device the guard holds before him now. Spindles of metal lash together and narrow to a point where a fearsome ball of energy writhes and crackles. Veins of angry aqua hiss and slither through the air, hungry iridescent vipers.

"I want answers," the guard repeats, "and you will give them to me."


The ground rises to meet him, saluting him with a hard smack to the face. Chakotay groans, a thousand agonies swarming his veins as he pushes himself off the ground.

He vaguely hears Kathryn say his name, and then there is a pair of hands beneath his one shoulder helping him to stand. His vision is peppered with spots and his muscles spark with bursts of painful fire. He somehow manages to stand and makes his way over to the bunk on the far side of the room. He feels Kathryn's hands release his shoulder as he settles himself on the bunk, his mind fuzzy and full of air.

"Hold still," she says to him, her hand grasping his chin gently as she turns his face slightly. His vision evens out a little, enough for him to see dark crescents blooming beneath her eyes. He hasn't been able to count the hours they've been here, but he thinks that it must be a fair number by now.

He tries to move and winces; Kathryn's hand lands firmly on his shoulder. "Easy," she says. "You need to rest for now, Chakotay."

"And what about you?" he asks, remembering the injuries that she sustained earlier. "I'm not the only one who's been subject to the D'Chasther's violent xenophobia; you can't push yourself too hard."

"I'll be fine," she repeats, the crimson gash above her eyebrow flexing slightly.

She doesn't ask him about what happened, about the shock weapon or the questions. He wonders if his body speaks for itself, covered with enough bruises to paint an entire canvas relating what he went through in that interrogation room. He closes his eyes for a moment, taking in his injuries. His entire body aches, but that comes with little surprise. He's slightly shocked that out of all the feelings rushing through his mind, the sensation of dying is remarkably absent.

He knows that he has to hold on a little longer, because with any luck Voyager will be here soon, hopefully bringing hell to the D'Chasther's front door.

"How long was I gone?" he asks after a moment.

"I wish I could tell you," she replies sincerely. "There are no chronometers, no natural sources of light anywhere in here." She throws her hands up in futility before her expression becomes grave, startled by something that Chakotay can't quite place. "I'd say that while you were gone it felt like a few hours went by, at least."

Chakotay sighs, bring a hand up to his forehead. He finds the skin there to be damp, and when he brings his palm away he finds sweat flecked with blood on his palm. He brushes it off on the black of his uniform, discarding the possibility of injury in favor of something a little brighter. That is, if such a thing were even acquirable in a place like this.

"How are you holding up?" he asks, treading carefully. Kathryn moves to sit next to him on the bunk, keeping a respectful distance despite earlier events. She folds her hands in front her, clasping the fingers together with a sigh the falls with the weight of lead.

"I'm… alright," she admits after a moment, her voice even like smooth titanium. She turns to him, her expression gentle yet reserved. "You?"

"I've felt better," he admits.

There's a pause that draws out into uncomfortable silence, amplified further by the haunting echoes of unidentifiable sounds that drift down the corridor outside the cell.

"We've got to..." she begins, her voice sharp like a knife. Then, she pauses and that sharpness wanes. "We've got to hold on until Voyager gets here."

He knows that she's right, and he envies her slightly for such an unabashed hope. She operates on a mindset of musts, not possibilities. He can imagine that from her perspective, there is no chance of them not being rescued; she expects it. It's a facade meant for the both of them, and he's seen her use it before. He cannot help but cast a shade of doubt onto her infallible determination. Even if Voyager did find the ion trail of the D'Chasther ship and followed it, there were thousands upon thousands of ways for things to go wrong. He doesn't want that; then again, no one would. Yet he has to keep realism close in times like these.

"I know," he says, the words feeling tight like a taut elastic band. Caution is evidently prudent in a situation like this, but they can't just go around pretending like everything is going to be alright for the sake of their own sanity. This place is a haven for demons and death, and if they want to survive this prison, they must keep in mind what it may take.

"Kathryn," he says, reaching a hand out for hers. He clasps his hand over hers before she can pull away, and her eyes fall first to their joined hands before turning up to his face.

"What?" she asks briskly, the shadow of a captain's face haunting her expression.

"Even if Voyager is on its way here now, we have to consider the possibility that they aren't on their way here as well," he says grimly.

Her expression changes instantly, morphing from stern curiosity to a sharp disappointment. Her infamous glare returns, grazing against Chakotay's skin like a knife. He knows that she'll dislike the notion as much (if not more) as he does, but it's not something that they can simply ignore in a place like this.

She stands, brushing his hand away and places her own on her hips. "Then what would you have me do, Chakotay? Give up all hope of a rescue to the fate of dying in this wretched place? I won't accept that."

"I want out of here just as much as you do, but if we want to make it out of here then we have to start taking a more realistic look at things. Take the lack of water, for instance," he points out. "We've been here at least a day; our bodies won't be able to cope much longer without water."

"But why would they do that?" Janeway asks, accentuating her words with gestures of her right hand. "We are their hostages, and if what they want is information, they won't be able to get that from us if we're dead."

"Unless they already have the information they need," Chakotay says dryly.

Janeway's face pales, her skin taking on the hue of cold steel. The look on her face gives the impression that she's just been slapped. It makes Chakotay realize the implications of his words, and though he never intended to, they have a touch of truth to them. He can only guess by her expression that Kathryn thinks that said information came from a source other than their captured shuttlecraft.

"You didn't," she hisses, her fingers curling tightly in the air.

"I –"

"I gave you an order," she interrupts, her voice laced with venom.

He's almost offended by her tone, her words carrying the same attitude that she's always had: orders, orders, orders. This isn't a starship, and orders will do them no damn good here.

"That's what you always say," he retorts, his voice growing in the confines of the cell. "You always narrow every choice down to matter of orders and protocol; I'd like to be like that too, but sometimes it just isn't possible!"

"Then why didn't you lie?" she asks, encroaching on his space, her face close to his. "Why didn't you tell them something just to satisfy their violent rage? They have nothing to compare our information to for any verification. The shuttle's logs are encrypted and the stations sealed; I made sure of it."

"You don't think I tried that?" he replied, meeting her gaze. His words hold a morsel of truth, but they still taste like ash on his tongue. "The D'Chasther seem to have some sort of ability to sense lies."

"You mean they're empathic?" Kathryn asks incredulously, her hand reaching out to grip his shoulder.

"I'm not sure," he admits with a shake of his head, feeling the lies circling him like vultures awaiting the demise of their prey.

Kathryn shakes her head, her hand leaving his shoulder and coming up to her temple to ward off what Chakotay suspects is a headache. She steps away from him and paces around the cell, rubbing her forehead with the palm of her hand. She stops beneath one of the fluorescent lights and brings up her other hand to her face. She runs both over her face, pausing when her fingertips reach her lips. Her eyes drift up to the light, casting her face in a mosaic of flickering luminescence as she whispers to the air.

"This changes everything," she says, dropping her hands and curling them against her chest.

"I never said that I was certain about the D'Chasther," Chakotay replies quickly, trying to put Kathryn at whatever ease he can in this sort of situation.

"I'm not talking about the D'Chasther," she snaps, her voice returning to the tone she reserves for situations gone sour, and Chakotay knows that this one must seem like a particularly rotten lemon to her.

"I'm talking about us," she says. "About the trust that I had in you when we were first brought here. We cannot afford to just give away information for the sake of our own lives; we have a crew of over a hundred people counting on us to maintain that glass wall that exists between them and this uncharted vacuum of space. If we give that information away so carelessly… how can we protect them?" Her shoulders fall, pulling her expression down with them. "What does that make us, Chakotay?"

"Human," he replies.

She scoffs. "Human? How can we afford to let our own humanity show out here when we're facing species like these?" She gestures outward to imagined D'Chasther guards. "As Starfleet officers we cannot always afford the luxury of humanity. There are times where protocol is the only option."

"There you go with the damn protocols again," he replies tersely, his patience falling like sand through an hourglass. "You've allowed yourself to be more human than you think. Remember all those times when you were merciful to other species because you thought that they deserved a chance, like the Ocampa? Or what about when you liberated Seven of Nine from the Collective and began helping her to re-discover her humanity? I'd say that's one of the most human things that you've done on this entire journey. You're a human being, Kathryn, and you cannot deny what you are."

Her gaze meets his with a steel ferocity, anchoring her determination in the stone beneath their feet.

"Is that what it comes down to, Chakotay?" she asks, her voice deadly in its softness. "Do we boil down every decision, every action to a matter of humanity? I can't afford to question every single implication of my actions because it's not convenient." She raises a hand off her hips, casting an ominous shadow on the floor. "Those few seconds that I take to question an action could be the difference between life and death; I have to follow what I know, and what I believe to be right."

"What about the times when you're wrong, Kathryn?" Chakotay responds, the words flying from his lips on a will of their own. "Don't you ever just stop and ask yourself if what you're doing is right?"

She recoils from him, her expression icy and distant beneath the fluorescence of the lights above them. "Of course I do," she snaps. "You don't think that I question the scenarios that I put the crew through? There are choices I'm not fond of, Chakotay, but sometimes there are no favorable choices."

"Is that what you tell yourself? That it was the best option that you could find. You've said so yourself that there is always an answer; you just have to find it."

Janeway sighs, running a tired hand through her hair before turning to the exit. "This is ridiculous," she whispers into the stale air. "We're trapped in an alien holding cell and all we're doing is wasting energy fighting over protocol." Her shoulders dip as she lets out another sigh, turning back to him after a moment of silence. "This has to stop."

Chakotay nods, his muscles clamping slightly in response. "I agree."

She approaches the bunk again, stopping just a few paces from him. "We need to focus on surviving. I know we can make it through this, Chakotay. We can, and we will."

"I hope you're right," he answers as realism gnaws on something in a far corner of his mind.

She bends her knees and brings herself to eye-level with him, her expression solemn and lacking any lightness. "We'll get through this, Chakotay. We've done it before and we will do it again." She places a hand on his shoulder, gripping it gently. "Trust me," she whispers.

He doesn't answer, amazed that she's asking him to trust her when only moments ago it seemed that her trust in him had been shattered by his apparent betrayal.

"How much did you tell them?" Janeway adds after a moment, disrupting Chakotay's thoughts. He's caught a little off-guard by her comment because she says with such a calm tone that he imagines a storm of anger brewing beneath her frosty expression.

He doesn't want to admit anything, but for both their sakes he must play this game a little longer.

"I –" he begins, but stops when he hears footsteps pounding through the corridor beyond the walls.

"Chakotay," Janeway says. "How much did you tell them?"

He's frozen in that moment, lost between loyalty and lies. He knows that the truth will have to be said, but he had planned to reveal everything to her once they were back on Voyager.

"Kathryn," he whispers, the footsteps now thundering outside their cell, "I lied."

Those are the only words he manages to say to her before the guards take her again.

When she disappears, Chakotay resolves himself to resting and lies down on the bunk, hoping to conserve any of the strength remaining in his body. As he lies there, he thinks of what lies ahead of them now and looks to whatever Spirits may be listening that Kathryn returns. Fatigue soon reaches out for him, and though he tries to resist, it takes him, blocking out the screams of the less fortunate beyond the walls surrounding him.