Disclaimer: I am not making any money of this fic, nor do I own Star Trek: Voyager, Deep Space Nine, The Next Generation or the original series, or anything else I make references to. If you saw the character on any show, then it is not mine. The same goes for ships, planets, cultures, et cetera. This story will depict a loving relationship between two women and there are no apologies to be made over this. Chapter 2 title is from "Hopeless" by Stabbing Westward and I do not own them (alas) nor their music. Song Lyrics in chapter are from the same.

Genre: Action-Adventure, Drama
Rating: M
Codes: K/7, T/7
Feedback: Please, reviews are the food of the muse…

Home, Chapter 2
Hopeless...

Past, 2373...

The first thing that Janeway noticed about the Aurora was the music. It wrapped around her like a blanket, traveling all the way into her bones. A woman sang in a language she couldn't understand to a beat that wasn't like anything she had ever heard. The music made her feel like she was floating and immediately she wanted to go back. She could not imagine how she was expected to think with the disorienting melody burrowing into her brain.

Before she could ask about it, the song ended. There was a second of silence, and then, before she could adjust, another began. She felt as if she was two steps behind everything. This song wasn't disorienting, however. It was haunting. A symphony of stringed instruments and unreal synthetics blended into the male and female duo that sang in an unearthly harmony in yet another language that Kathryn couldn't understand.

Jessica spoke, erasing Kathryn's fear that she had gone deaf. "This is deck six, our objective is deck one. Once we pass those doors, there is no transporting back. You're here, for better or worse. So, if you can't handle it, go back now, before we cross that threshold, into the dampening field that will keep us all here."

The Voyager crewmembers looked around at each other, searching the faces around them for any second thoughts. When they found none, they followed Jessica, who stood on the other side of the threshold, waiting. B'Elanna took the first step beyond that invisible line, followed closely by Janeway. As soon as she stepped into the dampening field, she felt a brief tingle, and then it passed.

"What is with this music?" Tom Paris asked, voicing Janeway's thoughts. Jessica grinned at him and explained.

"It's a virus. We place it in the computer systems of all our ships, so that if they're ever boarded, it will deafen our enemies so that they don't hear us when we recapture our ship. Or at least make them wish they'd never thought to steal the ship."

"Doesn't it deafen you, as well?" Kathryn asked as the song changed again.

"No. My race is telepathic, remember? We don't really need our ears to 'hear.' But technically, our hearing is about the same level as a Ferengi, so we can actually hear over this. Besides, we thrive on music."

"This would hurt a Ferengi." Kathryn said, wincing at the level, herself.

"We hear on a slightly different level. I'm not a doctor, I can't explain everything." Jessica grumbled. B'Elanna laughed at this. The music changed again, picking up in tempo and switching to English. Kathryn looked at Jessica, surprised to hear a Federation language, much less the Standard. "Hey, I was raised on Earth, so of course I'd like the music," she said, grinning.

"I've never heard this," Kathryn said.

"It's from the twentieth century," Tom Paris supplied. "I think that the genre is 'techno.'" Jessica nodded as the words changed language. "And I think that this language is German." Jessica again nodded in agreement, then proceeded down the corridor, moving as gracefully as a cat, almost floating. Janeway followed a short distance behind, watching as B'Elanna moved up to walk next to Jessica.

Without warning, Jessica froze, one foot suspended in the air. Then she shot forward and Kathryn followed quickly to see what had captured her attention. Kathryn stopped when she saw the young form lying in the hall. He was a boy of seven or eight years, with long, curling brown hair and large, almond shaped orange eyes.

His ears were long, thin and funneled like a cat. Seamless beige scales covered all the exposed skin of his body, except his ears, lips, throat and chest, which seemed to just sport a thick hide of the same color as the rest of his—skin. A set of black spots, like those of a Trill humanoid, ran down the right side of his body to the tip of his big toe. That very toe was thick with a two-inch long, curving brown claw growing out from the center. The other toes each had a tiny, sharp claw growing from it, all as wide as a human toenail. The other foot matched.

Jessica knelt by him and took his hand. He looked her in the eye and said something in a language that Kathryn didn't know. It sounded like the language that Jessica had spoken earlier. Kathryn saw the tiny little clawed hand reach up to Jessica's face and watched as Jessica pressed it there with her own hand. He smiled, and then Janeway noticed that his eyes had changed from orange to green and finally paled until they were white.

His hand dropped to the floor as the last of the color drained from his eyes and Jessica began murmuring in the same melodic language that she had spoken previously. Tears ran down her face as she did so and she closed his eyes. Jessica lay him on the floor and laid his hands on his stomach. The entire Voyager team stayed respectfully back during these proceedings and Janeway felt a surge of pride for her people as well as a pang of sympathy for Jessica.

Jessica stood and crossed her arms over her chest, standing alone, looking cold. B'Elanna stepped forward and put a hand on her shoulder. Jessica leaned into it and began speaking.

"His name was Jenzi. He was going to visit his sister. It was his first time off world. He was only seven." B'Elanna stepped a little closer and Jessica leaned against her for comfort. She drew in a deep breath, then let it out and continued through the ship, leading them to the first ladder they would be climbing.

Stardate 56730.9, Present...

B'Elanna glared down at the plate in front of her. Neelix had made some sort of green stew and she hadn't yet had the nerve to taste it. She poked it with her fork, moving it around, lifting and dropping it back into the bowl and examining the texture until she finally dropped her fork, admitting to herself that she wasn't interested in eating.

She rubbed the bump on her eyebrow, wincing as she accidentally touched the laceration and tried to forget that in only ten more minutes she had to return to Engineering. With... her.

B'Elanna stood abruptly and stalked temperamentally out of the Mess Hall, leaving her plate of boiled leaves uneaten and forgotten. Neelix cleaned it up and tsked at B'Elanna's retreating form, knowing better than to try and chastise her now. B'Elanna stormed into Engineering, determined that this time, the impulse engines would come back online, so Voyager could leave this godforsaken planet behind.

Of course, the impulse engines were only the beginning. The ship was floating in the lake it had crashed down in, taking on water through every hull breach that they weren't able to seal with force fields. B'Elanna watched as her staff scrambled out of her way, giving her a clear path to the main engine drive in the center of the room.

She placed both hands on the guardrail and glared hard at the big, blue cylinder. "Now, look you," she growled at it. "Today, we are going to get off this planet, do you hear me? That means, you're going to stop being stubborn and let me fix you. No more delays, or burnt out circuit pathways. Don't I give you enough attention as it is? Why do you have to give me a hard time?" The engine remained dark, refusing to answer.

"I do not see how berating an inanimate object will repair the engine, Lieutenant." Seven's voice caused B'Elanna to grate her teeth. 'Great,' she thought, 'That's the last thing I need. The Borg.' Despite the times the two had comforted each other and the hours spent together, their animosity still remained high. Misunderstandings were rampant between the pair and more than once their fights had escalated so that the captain had become involved.

And she was always on Seven's side. At least, that was B'Elanna's opinion. Seven saw favoritism reflected the opposite way and resented B'Elanna for all the times she was reprimanded for simply trying to maintain order and efficiency.

"It's none of your business, Seven. And if they weren't inanimate, I wouldn't need to berate them," she finished, confusing Seven with her immense lack of logic. Seven briefly entertained the thought of reaching out and assimilating B'Elanna. It wouldn't take that long and she would be so much more logical and easier to work with after... She quickly stopped that train of thought: it was far too tempting.

Seven and B'Elanna walked to the main reactor coil together, discussing different plans on how to fix the small burnouts that kept occurring every time they tried to reinitialize the drive. After the third discarded idea, they finally decided on a course of action that they both agreed might work.

"May I inquire as to how you injured yourself, Lieutenant?" Seven asked. B'Elanna's hand went to the welt and she grimaced.

"A console covering blew off right before I left for lunch and a piece of it hit me."

"It looks painful. You should seek medical attention at the end of your shift." B'Elanna nodded, turned to the coil assembly and froze.

"No." She tried to convince herself that she wasn't seeing what her eyes told her was there. "No!" Part of the coil hung from the main assembly, twisted away from the rest and looking for all the world, irreparable. If it couldn't be repaired, then Voyager would never get off this planet, or out of the lake, even. The engines would never work again. It was more than B'Elanna could take and she snapped. "God damn it! veQDuj jay'!"

B'Elanna flung her tool kit at the wall, where it broke open and Seven flinched away from her, marveling that the Lieutenant would call her usually beloved ship a 'Fucking garbage scow.' B'Elanna screamed and hit the wall as hard as she could. Seven winced as she heard the bone crack, but Torres didn't seem to notice. Seven watched B'Elanna storm out of Engineering, while knocking aside any hapless crewman who got in her way.

She flung one errant member of her staff into a console for trying to confront her before she made her way out the big doors into the rest of the ship. If Seven believed in such things, she would have prayed for the ship. As it was, she decided that it would be better to rescue the ship and its crew before further harm befell either.

She caught up with B'Elanna two minutes later in a turbolift. She mentally debated the wisdom of confronting the angry woman in such close quarters, but finally decided that she didn't have much choice.

"Lieutenant," she began, turning to her. "You are overreacting."

"Overreacting? Computer, halt lift." Seven immediately regretted having followed Torres and judging by the look in her eyes as she spun on the ex-drone, Seven deduced that B'Elanna was intent on making her regret even being born. "What right do you think you have, chasing me and telling me that you think I'm overreacting?"

"You flung Ensign Raines into a computer console." B'Elanna stood her ground, still too angry to think straight.

"Yeah, well, she shouldn't have gotten in my way."

"That does not excuse your assault on her."

"You really don't feel anything, do you? Well, right now, I'm pissed off. I don't give a damn about Ensign Raines or the fucking engines."

"Does using strong language relieve your anger?"

"No, but it's a damn good way to express it and warn people to leave me the hell alone."

"I doubt that you need to be alone right now. The probability of you injuring either a crew member or yourself is—"

"I don't want to hear any damn statistics!" B'Elanna shouted, then pressed the heels of her palm against her forehead until her arms shook. "If people would just leave me the hell alone, I could have time to think and cool off. Time to get myself under control. I don't need some goddamn Borg to tell me that I'm out of control. That's why I was leaving Engineering!" Without warning, the turbolift began rising and Torres shouted at it to, "Halt!"

"Unable to comply."

"Override, Torres alpha five zeta B."

"Unable to comply." The computer repeated, annoying the already frustrated half-Klingon.

"Why not?" B'Elanna shouted at the stubborn computer.

"Your authorization code is not high enough."

"Well, dammit, whose is?" Before the computer could respond, the lift doors opened and Kathryn Janeway stood before them, glaring at the two women.

"In my ready room. Now." Her voice was quiet and deadly, punctuating the first two words and rose commandingly on the last.

Janeway covered her face with her hands, trying to stop the headache from forming just behind her ears before she exploded. Four crewmen had reported their assaults in Engineering by their Chief, and one was in sickbay with a dislocated shoulder. That chief was standing in front of her, trying to explain herself, but all she was really doing was giving the captain a headache.

"I was angry. When we got to the coil drive, it was trashed. I don't know if it can even be repaired. I just suddenly snapped. I've been under so much pressure—" Janeway cut Torres off.

"Enough. What you did was uncalled for."

"If they had just stayed away—" B'Elanna began again, looking away and then back in the same second, but again, the captain interrupted her.

"You cannot expect the crew to make such allowances for your behavior. Just because you are frustrated and overworked does not give you the right to injure your staff."

"I already admitted that I was out of control. I was just trying to get away from it all. And they just happened to be in my way."

"That is not an excuse. Even Seven of Nine knows better than to strike another member of her crew."

"Seven of Nine. Your little pet Borg can't do anything wrong, now can she?"

"You are out of line."

"Whatever. Maybe if you'd open your eyes to any other member of the crew, you'd know that we're overworked, rations are low..."

"Lieutenant," Kathryn began dangerously, rising from her chair.

"You aren't listening!"

"Oh, I'm listening alright. I'm listening to a member of my crew that cannot keep her temper under control, who doesn't even act like she wants to try, nor does she seem to care about the people around her." During this, the captain walked to stand above and in front of B'Elanna.

"You're wrong. You think that I'd stay on this ship if I didn't care about the people?" Janeway started to interrupt her, but B'Elanna didn't give her a chance. "Damnit, let me finish!"

"You are out of line!"

"I'm always 'out of line!' I don't really even care any more. What are you going to do to me? Throw me off the ship? Confine me to the brig, my quarters? What does it matter? Throw me off the ship! I don't care! I don't have anything in the Alpha Quadrant to go to anyway!"

"What about your home?" Janeway asked, her voice quieter as she realized B'Elanna was closer to the edge than she had previously realized.

"What home? Kessik IV? I left that behind a long time ago. The only future I see for myself if I stay on Voyager, is prison for my actions with the Maquis!" Kathryn's expression softened as tears began rolling down B'Elanna's face. It wasn't that she didn't understand or care, but it would be impossible to maintain order or discipline among the crew if she couldn't even keep her senior staff in line. She knew that she was being hard on B'Elanna, but she was at a loss as to what else she could do.

"B'Elanna," Kathryn began, but B'Elanna broke down. The pressures over the last few months that had weighed so heavily on her shoulders finally won out. Kathryn caught B'Elanna on her way down and held her as she cried and spiraled down into the darkness of her mind.

Past...

"Innocence / Lost along the way / To anywhere or anyone who'll hold on to you / Innocence / Is hurt again / But is it really worth the pain?" Kathryn closed her eyes to try once again to block out the music, but with Jessica singing with it, she found the task next to impossible. It didn't seem to bother anyone else and Tom Paris even seemed to be enjoying every few songs, singing along with Jessica. Off key. At least the girl could carry a tune, she couldn't say the same for her helmsman. She wished that Jessica would just stop encouraging him.

She observed that wherever Jessica was, she was touching someone. A brush of their hand, leaning against them or, in the case of B'Elanna, she occasionally held her hand. She didn't touch Chakotay, Janeway or Tuvok, but she hung all over B'Elanna and Tom. She would occasionally act as though she was going to touch Chakotay, then look at him and trot off.

She also noticed that neither Tom nor B'Elanna had a problem with her touchy-feely nature and Jessica avoided the people who might. Tuvok: whose Vulcan nature was to avoid physical contact; Chakotay: who was still obviously upset with her, and the captain, whose position kept her from being as friendly as either B'Elanna or Tom. Tom seemed to be actually flirting, despite the fact that the girl was half his age. Kathryn kept her disapproval to herself, though.

Suddenly, Jessica froze again, as Janeway had gotten used to her doing. It was a complete stop, as if she turned into a hologram of herself. B'Elanna peeked around the corner, then walked back to the group. Kathryn took her own look around the corner, to see two brown-skinned aliens with no hair, but ridged skulls and muzzles. She ducked back around the corner and looked at Jessica.

"Don't any of you do that again," the girl said, looking a little scared. "Those are Dkorian assassins. They can hit just about anything with deadly accuracy and'll kill you just 'cause they're bored. They can smell the metal of a weapon before it can fire and they move faster than anything you've ever seen. It's the only thing they're good for, though. They're stupid, smelly, ugly and half-deaf. Their species never even developed cart vehicles. They were used by the Kazon 'til they revolted and killed all their captors, stealing the ship they were on. No one's ever been sure how they figured out how to pilot it, but they spread out in smaller ships throughout the quadrant."

"Then what are they doing working for the Cardassians?" Kathryn asked.

"Cardassians?" B'Elanna exclaimed, but Jessica waved her silent.

"There's only a handful of Cardassians on this ship, Captain. There's also Dkorians, Kazon, and a dozen or so other races in their... group. My people call them the Vorchen, which means, roughly translated, Terrorists."

"Like the Maquis," Kathryn said.

"No. These people aren't fighting for any cause or rights. They're just pirates—killers. They banded together for whatever reasons, mutual blood lust, I s'pose. They take slaves, attack small planets, steal ships, rape, pillage... Vaguely reminiscent of the Orions. We're not sure how many there are, but they got their hands on some Borg technology before I was born and they're too fast for us to catch 'em all."

"Borg?" Janeway asked, alarmed.

"Yeah. A couple of transwarp drives. They made more from what they salvaged and damned if we can't keep up now. Back in my mother's day, it was a far easier thing to hunt them down and either capture or kill 'em. The day I was born, it was the end of a week-long war that had been brought to Shaola, our homeworld. I was born in the aftermath, during which, a wormhole to the alpha quadrant opened up just above Shaola."

"A wormhole?" Kathryn began to get excited.

"It's a long story. Suffice it to say, the war was won, the Vorchen retreated and the wormhole collapsed three days after I was born." Kathryn's face fell.

"I don't suppose you know of any more."

"Wormholes are a random phenomenon. In the Torel system, you can go to warp near the fifth planet and you'll open up a wormhole to the Andromeda galaxy. Although it would really take a Constellation class starship for that, or one with similar engines. Voyager has weird engines."

"How did you know?" Janeway asked, taken by surprise.

"They felt odd. Peaceful or something. I dunno."

"Back to the matter at hand," Chakotay said, drawing their attention. "How do we get past the assassins, if we can't shoot them?" Jessica looked thoughtful.

"I might have a way that you can shoot them, but you'll have to hide."

"You have a plan?" Janeway asked. Jessica hesitated only a moment before nodding. Jessica quickly explained the plan and Janeway decided immediately that she didn't like it. But it looked like she didn't really get a say in that.

To be continued…