Chakotay had awoken just scant seconds before Janeway's kiss, but his mind was still a blank. At her declaration of love and her heart felt kiss, the Commanders mind started to clear up. That which was violently torn apart days ago now mended stronger than before and his mind started transmitting data throughout his body at an extraordinary rate. Once thought lost to him, the memories started to surface of New Earth and how he felt there. All of the dinners they shared in either his or her quarters came back, the times they went to parties together and always danced at least once every time. He remembered his and Kathryn's conversation a few days ago and his sudden lack of love for her. He now remembered feeling like a zombie and how Kashyk attacked him in an attempt to stop him from having personal contact with Janeway. That which didn't matter or make sense to him before now came with great passion and clarity. The love that he thought might never come back for his lady Captain now burned with an intensity that actually scared him, but he would not try and hide from it. It was no longer hurting him, rather it was feeding him with power. He was about to open his eyes when he heard Kashyk speak.
After listening for a few moments, Chakotay squinted his eyes open just enough to see that D'vor had his back turned as he made Kathryn that 'offer of a lifetime,' and the First Officer nearly laughed when she told him to go to hell. At Inspector's final words to Kathryn, Chakotay slowly sat up and tapped him on the shoulder just as the phaser was about to be fired. Once unsuspecting man had turned enough, Chakotay belted him as hard as he could in the face and watched in satisfaction as Kashyk hit the floor and his phaser went flying only to be picked up by Tuvok.
Swinging his legs around, Chakotay hoped off the biobed and violently pulled the man to his feet before spinning him around and throwing him through the plate glass window that separated this area from the doctor's office. Walking through the door, past the shocked faces of the Kathryn, the EMH, and the double raised eyebrows of Tuvok, Chakotay silently strode into the Doctor's office. His limp was gone and his once stiff joints begged to be used now as adrenaline surged through him and demanded to be let out at the man who had dared to threaten the woman he loved. Once inside the EMH's office, the Commander promptly elbowed the man in the jaw after Kashyk threw a pathetic swing at him. Hearing the satisfying crunch of a jaw breaking in multiple areas, the rejuvenated man grabbed the now bloody Kashyk by the hair and pulled him out before Tuvok.
"Mr. Tuvok, please get this… thing… out of my sight before I stop playing and outright kill him." The voice voice, while still a bit weak, was no longer hollow, rather it crackled with intensity.
Tuvok snapped into action and he pulled Kashyk through the sickbay doors toward the brig but Kathryn stopped him. "Tuvok, order an all stop and contact the D'vor. Tell them that if they want Inspector Kashyk back, we will be beaming him off this ship in exactly six hours. If there is a ship here, fine, if not it will either be to the cold vacuum of space or some desolate planet of out choosing, whichever we decide at the time." Tuvok nodded and led Kashyk out of sickbay, his last words being something about perhaps bringing Kashyk back later for treatment. The Chief Security Officer didn't find it all that important that his prisoner be healed in the very near future.
Chakotay spoke to the EMH next, but kept his eyes fixed on the lone female. "Doctor, am I alright?"
The Doc glanced down at the chart and nodded. "Your cognitive activity is back up to normal range, if not the high end of normal, where it belongs. I want you to spend the next few days eating and sleeping to regain what you have lost in nutrients. Also, you are to report to me at least once every twelve hours, just too make sure that there is no relapse and that your body is sufficiently getting better." Seeing the Commander nod his head, but not take his eyes off of Janeway, the EMH wisely shut his program down.
Facing the still shocked Kathryn, Chakotay allowed himself to smile at her and, for the first time in days, Kathryn knew that Chakotay was going to be alright. His skin was almost back to normal, the proud tattoo over his left eye had darkened down back to indigo, and his eyes were bright and alive. His dimples were back with all of the warmth that once held and even his voice seemed more tone full that it had been in months, long before the whole Kashyk thing started. He was still thinner than he should be, but his spirit was back and the rest could be nursed.
Chakotay broke the silence. "Kathryn, I'm so sorry for what I put you through. I should have told you about the shared souls, but honestly I didn't want to scare you. I knew that you were my soul mate a long time ago, but I didn't know how you would have reacted to hearing that so I kept my mouth shut. I am also sorry that I told you that it couldn't be undone, but in order for it too work you had to figure that part out for yourself and you did."
Janeway nodded her head for a moment, but the look of disbelief still shown on her face. "The Doctor told us that nothing would permeate your mind so that nothing I said would matter anyhow."
"Yes, that would be true if not for one thing. You kissed me. When you kissed me you undid enough damage to help me understand what you had said. What's ironic is that by allowing you to say goodbye and then trying to kill you first, Kashyk sealed his own fate."
Kathryn nodded her head again at that, still something important that needed to be taken care before anything else. "You know Commander, you did resign from Voyager yesterday. What are we going to do about that?"
The man chuckled slightly. "First of all, don't call me 'Commander' while off duty. I know I told you not to call me Chakotay anymore, but as I see it, you confessed your feelings and effectively saved my life. The promises I made to you have been reinstated and new ones put into place. I belong to you Kathryn Janeway. My life is yours, as it has been for the past five years. As for being First Officer, I'll only retract my resignation if I know we can be together while I hold that position. Of course, that is if you'll have me." The last part was said with more than a small bit of trepidation and it reflected in movements as he lowered his head slightly and eyes took on a frightened look. Honestly, he was terrified that she would reject him again. Kathryn knew this and she felt her heart melt all the more.
"Well, I suppose that if nobody else will have you, I can find some sort of use for you. You never know when I might need another bathtub fashioned out of trees or someone to tell me ancient legends." After a small laugh from both, Janeway grew serious once more. "You really frightened me this time. I thought I was going to loose you for good."
Chakotay nodded his head sagely. "I wish that I could promise that nothing bad happen to us ever again, but the fact is, I just don't know. As for loosing me… the Doctor had figured another seven days, but after Kashyk attacked me, so much damage was done I was no doubt entering it faster than I should have."
At the mention of her former lovers name, Kathryn bristled with contempt, but choose to ignore it. "I don't exactly like the knowledge that if something were to happen to me, you would die shortly thereafter. I'm not comfortable knowing that I'm looking out for the both of us."
"Well, look at it this way, I have more of a reason than before for trying to keep you alive. Also, now you may have to rethink your occasional Maverick ways of just throwing yourself out there as a sacrificial lamb. Who knows? Maybe your sense of self-survival will become more enhanced." Janeway mentally demurred at that thought, but continued to think about the possible ramifications of all of this.
"What I don't understand is that why were you the only one dying before? If what was happening was like your grandfather, why didn't I suffer the same fate? I mean, I probably should have. I wouldn't have liked that, but it would have been better than having to watch you slowly evaporate in front of my very eyes."
"Well, you started to." At Janeway's look, he continued. "Kashyk had said as that you were becoming more and more distant lately. On the bridge, you still found yourself positioned in my direction and couldn't handle it when I started acting aloof. Every time you learned something new about what was happening to me, every time something else faded away, you took it impossibly hard. What would have no doubt happened if I had indeed died and Kashyk hadn't attacked me or you and Tuvok is that eventually your feelings for him would have unfurled and you would have become as despondent as I did. In the end, I think you would have gone down the same path as me."
Kathryn examined her own actions over the past few days and had to agree, even though she really didn't want to. "I remember last night at about this time, for the first time since starting my relationship with Kashyk, I slept alone and put my hand against your wall like I had always done before. I couldn't understand why. I really still don't."
Chakotay chose to ignore the implication that the woman he loved had sex with that bastard almost every night for probably the last week or so. "You did that no doubt because when I had cut you off from that connection, part of you was still searching for it. You knew on some level that Kashyk couldn't give you that. So you turned to the one person that you knew subconsciously could and for that one night at least, no substitute would have done."
A memory struck Kathryn and she almost started to sob. "That first day, I touched you and didn't feel anything. No spark, no life, just cold. I always have always felt a jolt whenever we touched and when I didn't feel it again, I felt lost."
They hadn't touched at all since Chakotay had beaten Kashyk, but now he held his hand up and she did hers like they had on New Earth after the 'Angry Warrior' speech. Before their fingers even touched, Kathryn could feel both the heat and electricity surge between them and knew that all was well. When they did touch, the shock had been so intensely missed on her part, she pulled him into a deep hug. Her body craved the energy he put off, something she had been starved of for so long. Her spirit seemed to be drinking in every bit of his essences it could.
Kathryn took a cleansing breath. After all she had done to this man and still he was here for her. He deserved the total truth. "Chakotay, I am so sorry. I lied to you that night in the Ready Room, I am in love with you and I should have never denied it. Kashyk was right about one thing though, I didn't acknowledge just how much I cared about you until you started to leave me. There were times before, I wished that your unresolved feelings for me would just go away, because I felt so guilty about not being able to have a relationship with you, but when I got that wish… when you stopped looking at me like a woman, I couldn't take it. I'm so used to feeling lightheaded when you smile at me, that when you would smile during the past few days, I felt cold and barren. When we touch, I feel something that courses between us and that wasn't there and my life just wasn't the same. I draw energy and courage from you and when you shut down I couldn't handle it. Nobody, not Kashyk, not Cheb, not even Justin or Mark, no one has ever made me feel like this and I can't lose it. I can't lose you."
Chakotay, deciding that maybe she was ready to feel it all, lifted her chin up and kissed her on the lips. The jolt from his fingers, while still enjoyable to Kathryn, became a distant second to this feeling of absolute bliss. It was like suspended animation as she felt her entire body light up with joy.
EpilogueKathryn Janeway awoke in bed in the dead of night for no particular reason. Looking at the ceiling pattern, the Captain of Voyager mentally reflected on all that had happened in the past week or so. Her and Kashyk's going public, Chakotay's near decimation, Kashyk's arrest… it was all too much. The Inspector who had tried to steal her heart, succeeding for a time, had been given back to the D'vor despite his protests and attempts at apology. The D'vor captain who had picked him up said little, but Kathryn had known that they were none to pleased with his defection saying only 'they had plans for him.' An irrational part of her almost felt sorry for him. Knowing how they dealt with telepaths, defectors most likely weren't given a whole lot of sympathy and she honestly didn't think that former Inspector Kashyk would be seeing too many more sunrises as a free man, if any at all.
One of her first orders of business was to have any and every trace of her and Kashyk's affair erased from her body and her quarters. She almost laughed at the memory of the EMH's expression when she had requested that he remove any trace of that bastards DNA from her body. She wasn't happy until no evidence remained of their tenure together and even after that, she found herself in the shower trying to scrub off the memory of his skin on hers.
Turning in bed somewhat, she looked at the wall that separated the Captain's and the First Officer's bedrooms. For so long she had feared crossing that barrier, and for what? What had been gained? If this past week had proved anything, the crew, and they themselves, just wouldn't accept it if the Captain and Commander even considered moving on without the other. If ever she needed proof, here it was. Lifting her hand up against the cold bulkhead, she felt a stirring beside her. "Kathryn, what are doing?"
She looked at the still sleepy Chakotay with love in her eyes. "Just and old habit of mine. I never felt the wall from this side before." Even though no part of Kashyk resided in her residence, they had both agreed without saying so that they would never sleep in the bed Janeway had shared with her former boyfriend.
Chakotay raised his hand to hers and softly covered it. "I used to do that also, now we don't have to." Leaning into each other, the two shared a passionate kiss. "You know Kathryn, so long as you remain an unmarried woman who Captains a star ship, men will always try to win your heart. I don't think I would ever want us to get into a fight and have somebody thinking that your fair game."
Janeway's eyes snapped open wide with that and she started to search his. What was he getting at? Her XO gave her no time to question him. "Kathryn Janeway, will you marry me?"
Kathryn was partially shocked, and partially amused. For all of the time she spent with Kashyk, she had never even entertained the notion of marriage. Living with someone was one thing, but marrying them was different. That meant that one just couldn't just leave the other high and dry if problems got a bit too heavy. It was both a legal and spiritual commitment that she had only considered twice in her life, and the second only because Mark had forced the issue. To her, marriage was the ultimate step in a relationship, second only to having a child. "Yes, I'll marry you Chakotay."
Once more they kissed. This time, the slight contact demanded more and more until they found themselves once more making love, but Kathryn of course didn't mind. After all, she knew that Chakotay would hold and talk too her afterwards like she had always wanted and like no man had ever done with her before him. He did that the first time they made love, earlier that evening, and he would do it when this was over in a few hours, and she knew he would do that every night the rest of their lives.
The End!
PS – Okay, okay. I know that it had a sappy ending, but hey… I needed to balance out for the rest of the angst in the fic.