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Chapter Ten



I do not know which to prefer,

The beauty of inflections

Or the beauty of innuendoes,

The blackbird whistling

Or just after.

--Wallace Stevens



If ever there was a puzzling situation, this had to be it. Seven stood to one side with enough suddenly assumed ice in her demeanor that there was almost a draft in the room . . . and then Kathryn was leaning against her desk and crying unabashedly.

Clearly, the question here was, what had Seven said?

Yes, puzzling. Despite her sometimes too-literal manner, Seven rarely set out to say things that she knew would hurt people. If she inadvertently did so, she generally tried to apologize for it, but there was no hint of apology in her at that moment. The drone in her had resurfaced once again, like it had been doing off and on for a long time. She could not detach herself from her detachment, and it pained him.

Pained him? The Captain was hiccuping in her attempts to control herself as she gazed at him with such anguish that he almost recoiled from her. When had Kathryn ever let emotion show so openly on her face? Certainly few enough times to have him fumbling for a precedent. He came up rather sort in that moment, and merely managed a concerned frown, wondering if it was anything she could tell him about.

She continued to look at him with a deep and abiding sorrow that tore some part of him. Kathryn lifted a hand, as if to reach for him.

"Oh, Chakotay," she breathed, tears streaming. "I'm so-"

Seven made a sharp gesture, frowning alternately at both of them. "No, Captain."

This belayed Kathryn's words, and she looked at Seven with pure shock in her eyes. Her brow creased in consternation as she and Seven engaged in a meaningful staring match . . . until, strangely, the Captain gave in, placing her hands on her abdomen and shaking her head slowly. Tears ceased, and she merely looked somehow resolved.

Seven still chilled the room.

He wanted to know what had passed there, and why Kathryn had uncharacteristically given ground almost immediately. That was not like Kathryn. It was like Seven to challenge, but any argument between them -that he had witnessed- had almost invariably ended with Kathryn the victor. There was no jot of submission in either of them, but here he had seen Seven of Nine quell Kathryn Janeway.

That was something he'd never dreamed of seeing, and he wasn't sure he liked it all that much.

The silence was uncomfortable, and though it was probably entirely crass, he decided it needed breaking whether they were going to tell him anything or not. Thus, he cleared his throat. "I was looking for you, Seven. I wondered if you'd like to come out for lunch."

Her lips twisted ambiguously. She managed to look apologetic. "I am afraid that I will be otherwise occupied. Sorry," she said quietly, somehow suddenly exuding a subdued sort of affection. It was better than aloofness, even if he didn't understand the slight despondency behind it.

Chakotay changed tactics. Something needed to happen here. "Kathryn? How about you?"

She attempted a smile, but didn't do too well. She looked out the window, and apparently saw that it was no longer raining "All right. I think I'm due for a meal anyhow." She looked up, some vestige of her old implacability coming back. "Don't look at me like that, Seven. I'd like to think you have more faith in me than that."

Things went in their right order again and Seven acquiesced with a curt nod.

He couldn't shake the feeling that there was a conversation going on right above his head. An odd sensation, and for lack of a better expression -his ears were burning. Something was going on, and it involved him. Seven apparently had willed Kathryn to keep her mouth shut. Quite a feat, but now did not seem to be the time to mull over things like that.

Seven excused herself with uncharacteristic haste, barely pausing to even kiss him goodbye. Oh yes, something was up. Seven was "efficient" to the point of aggravation, but she never rushed anywhere. Another point to wonder about.

Kathryn muttered something under her breath and turned to retrieve her coat from the hanger that stood tall by her desk. He'd often wondered where she'd gotten that particular piece, it was almost too tall for her, especially now that she probably couldn't stand on her toes for fear of overbalancing herself. A pregnant Kathryn embodied incongruity.

Captain Kathryn Janeway waddling?!

The thought made him laugh every time, a carefully dignified sort of waddling though it was. She did not appear to be in such a mood that even allowed her to ask him what he was grinning at. She attempted a smile, still slightly red-eyed, and came up somewhat short again.

"What are you smirking at?" she asked.

He supposed he wasn't going to be let off that easily. "You, of course."

"Glad someone around here has the mood for it," she grumbled, shrugging the coat on. She mumbled again, something that distinctly sounded like "enjoy it while you can."

She started forward, brushing past him in a sort of haze and not noticing his proffered arm. There was a serious frown on her face, and Chakotay was suspicious.

"What did Seven have to say?" he asked, following her into the hall. Deja vu at its worst, even if she was pregnant. How many times had he followed her out of swishing Starfleet doors and into equally Starfleet halls? Incalculable times.

Kathryn made a cryptic noise. "I'll leave it to her to tell you, when she does."

"That's not an if?"

She made another, no-so-cryptic noise. "It had better not be."

"Or?"

She paused, looking back at him and frowning. "Or? Well, or nothing, I guess, but she had just better get around to it . . . or I'll do it, and to hell with what she thinks."

"I take it you're not going to tell me now."

"No, so drop it until one of us tells you to pick it up again," she commanded, starting up the austere corridor again, intent on the building lifts.

"Aye, Captain," he replied quietly. "So what were you doing before we interrupted you?"

"Talking to Erin . . . about how living on ships for extended periods of time can get to you. What it's like to grow up with Starfleet in your face the whole time. I always thought that ends up giving you one of two types of children. Either you get a Tom Paris or an Erin Lange. Fortunately, Tom sorted himself out. Others are not so lucky."

"So lucky to be stranded in another quadrant and given a field commission out of necessity?"

"Yes," she replied without hesitation. "Where would we all be without it, hmm?"

"I'd either be in jail or still kicking Cardassian faces in."

"A noble occupation," she said suddenly, obviously referring to the latter.

"Kathryn! How very un-Starfleet of you," he admonished with a slight smile.

"Huh. Write it down somewhere. It might be the last time."

He laughed at her, shaking his head. "Sometimes I wonder if you're really as fond of protocol as you'd like us to believe."

"That wasn't protocol. That was maybe a little less than PC . . ."

"I still wonder."

"Rules are malleable, sometimes, as you certainly know. Who am I to ignore that?"

She'd ignored it pretty spectactularly in the past. New Earth leapt to mind, even if he didn't want it to. He did not voice this, and shrugged in reply. "So where do you want to go for lunch?"

"Oh . . . I don't care. As long as I don't have to climb hills."

He snorted as they entered the lift. "That pretty much rules out the whole city."

"I still think that if the Federation and Starfleet were going to stand on United Nations precedent, they should have stayed in New York. That was where the UN was after all, but no . . . they had to come here and found it where they founded it. Sometimes tradition is annoying," she complained, punching her index finger at the panel on the wall.

"At least it doesn't snow."

"You don't like snow?"

"I can live without it. I'm used to warmer climates . . . or ships."

She managed a half-hearted smile, still looking distinctly unhappy with what had passed earlier. "If you ever go visit Tom and B'Elanna, don't go in the winter."

"I know my geography, Kathryn."

"Do you know about dealing with a metre of snow?"

"No, nor do I plan on learning."

She made a sudden face. "Imagine if I had to slog through snow like this? It'd be murder. I'm as wide as I am tall."

He gave her an oblique look. "Well Kathryn, it's not to that point, I don't think . . . but matching your height is no great feat. You're really not that big though."

She looked incredulous. "Yeah, from your angle. And it's mostly your fault. Big parents, big babies. I should have anticipated that. I haven't seen my feet in five months!"

"They're still there," he assured her, tilting his head.

She rolled her eyes. "Have you figured out a name for Acoya's sister yet?"

"No. Seven was saying that maybe you should name her."

Kathryn was silent, pursing her lips together and almost looking upset by that. Her brow creased and she cast her eyes down. She could have been described as looking at the floor, but her stomach was in the way of course. She sighed shakily. "Well, Chakotay . . . I hadn't thought about it. But now that I do, I'll turn around and say Seven should name her."

"Why?"

Kathryn winced almost imperceptibly. "Because . . . there isn't much time left."

"Babies have gone without names after they're born. What's the rush?"

She did not reply.

***



Seven walked briskly out into the somewhat chilled air, shivering a little. She had never been given to wearing heavy clothes on any occasion, though Chakotay had convinced her with meaningful looks some time ago to at least wear apparel that did not fit so closely. At least not in public.

Smiling slightly, she stepped over the curb, oblivious to the people around her, some of whom turned their heads as she passed in recognition of one thing or another. She looked down at her hands once, her still-superior vision noting the yellowed cast of the skin.

Weak, weak, weak . . . allowing mere blood toxins to kill her. And for what had happened with the Captain. She should have kept it to herself, but some fractious impulse had led her to . . . to do what? Make provisions as the Captain had said, like in a will? It had only caused hurt, and the Captain's odd behaviour would put Chakotay up in arms, which would put her to skirting questions when he finally asked them.

That was, if the Captain hadn't told him to leave it alone.

Seven found it hard to feel her own sense of foreboding. It was there, but hard to touch on nonetheless, the greater part of her willing her to ignore it. She still had trouble with that. Despite the somewhat tired cliché, she was not "in touch" with herself. So she ignored it and lived vicariously, putting her energy into straightening everyone else out when it was she that needed it. The Captain's fear became her own, because she did not want to evoke such a reaction from her or anyone again.

Because it was painful, and ultimately pointless. Wouldn't they all know in the end?

So she tired to make such ends meet, knowing that she wouldn't be here to make it work afterwards. She wanted order where there would be chaos, at least on some level. They were all so attached to her. How had that come to be? It would be easier if she had made no such friends.

Chakotay was a lingering question, and her own pain surfaced there, undeniable. She knew what the answer was in a roundabout way, and she had laid the foundations as best she could. He would resist. Resistance was futile? Somehow, she wanted it to be, yet she did not.

She made a face, baring her teeth in nothing sort of a challenge. She was a living paradox, Human and Borg. She had tried to be rid of the latter, yet it detached her from everything still. Was it somewhat similar for B'Elanna Torres? She hoped not. It was difficult.

So she favoured neither, and made out her will despite both sides, even if only in her mind.



To be continued

***