Kathryn had sat at the couch for a long time, before getting up and moving to her desk. All that time the lines from her letter kept coming back to her.

We were married four months ago. I'm so happy Kath, I never thought that I would stop grieving when you were lost and now to have someone to love and to share life with. It's my second chance. I hope that you understand.

One of Kathryn's wry smiles came to her again as she scolded her self for her disappointment.

What did you expect? For him to wait, for 60 or 70 years. Be glad that he moved on with his life. You would have done the same and he would have expected you to do the same in your position.

Kathryn's expression sobered

Except Mark could never really understand her position being the captain of a starship, it was the source of most of their disagreements, fuelled most of their compromises and one of the reasons that she loved him so much, he didn't have a Starfleet background and perspective and being with him was like exploring new ways of thinking and of being. She would miss him so much more, now that it was final and they were officially no longer together. But in a way in the midst of the pain, there was some relief. No hope to cling to mean that there was any uncertainty in their future. Kathryn knew it was murder now, but when the grief subsided, it would be much better than it was before.

Well, what now? In two years time, I had hoped to be having children, being married and settled. With Mark. Now that is not to be. So now I guess I start over when I get home. Assuming that the message had anything about getting home. Given what my first bit of communication from the alpha quadrant contains, I'm not holding out too much hope in the encrypted message.

The chime sounded.

"Come in"

Seven entered.

"Janeway to Chakotay"

"Chakotay here" Chakotay was on his way back to his office.

"The messages are starting to decay being lodged in the communication network. Tuvok and Seven have taken a shuttle craft and gone to the array to beef up the containment field. Please monitor the progress of the messages from Starfleet and let me know if there are any changes."

"Acknowledged. Chakotay out." Chakotay continued to his office. He would check on B'Elanna and monitor the situation from there, for some reason, he did not want to be on the bridge at this time. He couldn't really face himself and Kathryn. It would be good to bury his feelings in work.

Back in her ready room, Kathryn felt the same. It made no sense dwelling on the pain for right now, there were still messages and an encryption sequence that could be instrumental in getting them home. And an interesting phenomena in the form of the relay station to investigate.

She was still pouring over her readings when the chime sounded again.

Chakotay entered and gave her the update that B'Elanna had reported to him only moments ago. The message was coming in much easier now and it seemed as if Tuvok and Seven had done it. They would be back to Voyager soon. He was not surprised to find her at her desk studying the relay station that was harnessing the Quantum Singularity's power. That is what they shared the most, the scientific curiosity about the phenomena that they were encountering in space. The prospect of staying to study the relay station, almost made him forget what was going on in his personal life.

Almost

"Want a cup?"

Chakotay watched Kathryn walk over to the couch with her cup as he declined her offer. The one for the coffee, not the unspoken one that asked him to stay for she had something on her mind. Chakotay knew then that they were going to have to discuss the Dominion and how information about what was going on in the Alpha quadrant was affecting them in the Delta Quadrant.

"You haven't mentioned your letter, who was it from?"

With the answer, he knew that they were not going to be discussing anything political at this time.

"It was from Mark...The man I was engaged to. He told me about the litter of puppies my dog had--how he found homes for them how devastated he was when Voyager was lost...how he held out hopes we were alive longer than most people did...until he realized that he was clinging to a fantasy. So he began living his life again--meeting people, letting go of the past." She fills in the details like a witness to an accident--almost in shock. "About four months ago he married a woman who works with him. He's very happy."

"And how do you feel about that?" he asks softly, stepping into her personal space, but stopping just a bit short of touching her. The pain and disappointment being reflected in her eyes was so great that he was unsure what she would need at that time and he was giving her space to continue and define the moment.

"Well, I knew he'd eventually move on with his life." her voice drops to a desolate whisper. "But there was such finality to that letter..."

The last statement almost came out in a whisper and he saw that she was desperately close to ……something beyond tears, she looked so lost

"Kim to the captain. Can you come to the bridge?"

Kathryn did not move for several seconds and continued to stare at him as if she wanted to impart some of her suffering on him. That told him of the magnitude of her feelings and as she moved off silently without a word, he knew that she was going to take on her Captaincy once more when she reached the bridge, but this time because it was the only thing that she had left.

As he exited, he wondered if anyone got good news from the Alpha Quadrant.

It was over, really over. No more mail call, the network was completely disabled and that meant that for now, there would be no chance of getting any more news from the Alpha Quadrant. Somehow that pleased him. He knew he would have to face the situation again, but now with contact being severed, he would not have to do so right away.

Chakotay made his way to the ready room. He still had to tell the Marquis crew members what had happened. But that could wait until later. He had one more matter more pressing and it had to do with someone who seemed hurt beyond tears.

"Come in"

He stopped short when he saw that Tuvok was with the Captain and as he was about to leave, Tuvok excused himself. Chakotay joined Kathryn at her desk and gave her a verbal report on the condition of the ship. She looked a lot better than she had when she walked out on the Bridge at Harry's summons. He knew that one of the reasons for this was because they had retrieved Seven and Tuvok safely, but then as he knew Kathryn, there was still more, something that she wanted to share with him. Her face looked too hopeful when she looked up at him and asked:

"Want some coffee?"

This time, he accepted, after what they had been through, he needed it.

"Cream and sugar, hm?"

"Two sugars," he says.

"Two sugars?" Kathryn was aghast that he would ruin a good cup of coffee that way.

"You know, you drink too much of that stuff," Chakotay observed.

"Really?"

"If I'm not mistaken that's your third cup this morning."

"Fourth," Kathryn corrected him. "And on a day like today it won't be my last. Coffee: the finest organic suspension ever devised. It's gotten me through the worst of the last three years. I beat the Borg with it."

They share a chuckle at that. Both settled on the couch and Chakotay took his customary position, one in which enabled him to look directly at her. She seemed to relax a little more and put her feet up on the coffee table.

"Oh I'm sure Voyager will be fine, but I'm worried that the crew might be a different story."I think they were hoping mail call would become a regular part of their day."

"Neelix is putting together an impromptu party. He thought it might cheer them up."

"Good idea, when will it be?"

"As soon as he can get people together." Chakotay informed her

"Leave it to Neelix to come up with the right idea at the right time," Kathryn said with approval.

Again, running away, how had he become so adept in catching her doing it?

"How are you doing?" Chakotay asked "Oh I'm fine" came the fast reply

He snorted at that. "You'd say that if you just had your legs torn off by a Trachon beast."

"Look what you've been through in the last few days. We finally make a connection with home and it's ripped away from us." At that Kathryn rolled her head back, feeling some of the exhaustion of the day setting in.

"We manage to make another enemy who's going to try and hunt us down and destroy us." Kathryn rubbed her head as a headache began to come on with the correctness of his words

"And on top of that--" Chakotay wanted to tread carefully with this. Her head came back down and she looked directly at him.

"It's all right. You can say it. On top of all that, I got a "Dear John" letter."

The cavalier attitude, the smiles and the jokes were all gone in a flash.

Janeway sighed as she continued. "It wasn't really a surprise. I guess I didn't really expect him to wait for me considering the circumstances. It made me realize that I was using him as a safety net. You know-- as a way to avoid becoming involved with someone else."

"You don't have that safety net anymore," Chakotay says, letting the hope fill her, it was much better than what he had been seeing before

"That's right," Kathryn agreed.

"Then again, my life is far from uneventful here in the Delta Quadrant. It's not like I would have had a chance to pursue a relationship even if I had realized I was alone."

"You're hardly alone," Chakotay, picking up on her loneliness of command. Kathryn was one of the warmest individual he had ever met, and yet she embraced the distant method of being a Starfleet Captain. Chakotay assumed that her relationship was the way that she was able to shunt most of her warmth. She had let her guard down with the bridge crew as far as warmth and personal space and care was concerned, but never intimacy, and he knew that final leap may not be one that she would ever take.

"And to my way of thinking, there's still plenty of time." For her to let someone in and let someone love her the way that she needed to be loved.

"Plenty of time," she repeats, voice empty, lonely. 60,000 light years of travel time.

"Neelix to the ready room. The party's about to begin and there are only two people missing."

"We're on our way," says Janeway, pointing a finger upwards for nobody in particular. Suddenly she smiled. She had her family, her friends, her best friends here on Voyager. It was not lost on her that Chakotay had come into the ready room to talk to her, to see how she was feeling and to make sure that she was alright with what she had told him before. Kathryn chose to concentrate on the family that she had there waiting for her at the party. And it gave her hope in the midst of her loneliness.