Beside Herself

By Auriel Stone

ST:VOY - J/7

All things Star Trek are ©Paramount Studios. There's no such thing as a copyright on work derived from and including someone else's copyrighted material, but if you plagiarize my stories, I will hunt you down. I'm just saying.

There's no such thing as absolution, Captain. There are only learning experiences, and, if we're very lucky, forgiveness from those we love.

Upon entering the placidly appointed, soothingly lit room, it was plain that there was something out of place on Tuvok's well-known and well-loved face. Something that Admiral Kathryn Janeway hadn't seen in long enough that its reappearance now was almost a physical shock: recognition.

"Captain, how long have I been here?" He sat tailor fashion on an ornately woven rug before a meditation lamp, facing the entrance to his room. The flame guttered and then recovered itself as the door slid closed behind this latest visitor. Paper sheets covered in a chaos of scribblings and equations sat in a tidy stack on one corner of the rug. An elegant if archaic ink pen anchored the pages against further disorder.

The Admiral's expression softened and her eyes grew suspiciously bright at the crisply precise diction of the question, the use of her former rank, and at Tuvok's long absent sense of acetic cleanliness having asserted itself upon the room's normal state of disarray. The sound of years slipping past, of soul-deep comradeship and of profound loss whispered in the air between them before a drawn breath resettled her composure, "About six months, Tuvok. Why?"

"I do not remember coming here. I only remember brief periods of lucidity, however long ago those occurred, and being in Voyager's sickbay." His eyes slid upward to take in her once chestnut hair, now streaked with silver, and then dropped to her collar, noting the change of insignia and drawing the logical conclusion with the brief lift of one brow. "I take it we have succeeded in returning to the Alpha Quadrant."

Janeway gave a brief, affirmative nod, moving forward and crouching on the rug to bring herself nearer to eye-level with the Vulcan. "We've been home for almost a year." The inexorable hiss of hourglass sands washed over her again in that moment. "I gather though that you didn't call me here to discuss the passage of time."

Tuvok visibly drew himself together and straightened his seated posture, "Indeed, I did not," he confirmed. "I called you here to deliver a message before I am no longer able to remember it. When I awoke lucid two hours ago, I recalled the promise I made to deliver it to you for the first time since my illness began to advance aboard Voyager."

Janeway's expression barely registered a change at the news save for a single raised brow given as leave to continue. Once upon a time, the merest word from Tuvok would have sent her hurtling across the galaxy on whatever cause he deemed important enough to bring to her attention… but he had been ill for so very long now and the line between reality and delusion was both transient and evanescent for this oldest of her old friends.

"It concerns Seven of Nine," he dropped, studying her face closely.

That got her attention. She caught herself on the verge of leaning involuntarily away from Tuvok, away from the automatic stab of searing heartbreak that lanced through her at the sound of that name even all these years after Seven's death.

Tuvok continued, undeterred by the sudden absence of color from the Admiral's face, "There is an isolinear chip among my belongings from Voyager that was intended for you. My wife will have it."

Janeway shook her head slowly, dismissively, mentally backpedaling from what was almost guaranteed to be a painful experience. With effort, her tone remained even, "What's on it that's so important after all this time?

"Seven's final moments," Tuvok was having none of Kathryn Janeway's patented brand of denial and avoidance, not now when time was so short.

Janeway did draw back at that, shaking her head emphatically, hands coming up before her as if to ward off the blow of his words, "Tuvok, I can't watch that. You of all people know how long it took me to—"

He cut her off, the crack of command entering his voice for the first time in a decade, "You must! It was Seven's final request."

The Admiral's jaw set at that, clutching her annoyance at the well-deserved order like a drowning woman clinging to a raft and using it to force the lump in her throat back down, "Why didn't you give it to me then?" she demanded faintly, her voice a dry rustle of parchment.

Tuvok had known this woman for most of her life and did not begrudge her the settling effect of her brief flash of irritation. Having given her the required moment, he finally replied, "It would not have improved your state of mind at the time. To be honest, Captain, I was concerned that you might take your own life in the weeks following Seven's death. I felt that her final words might have been the pivotal stressor to push you over the edge... so I copied the recording, erased that time period in Sickbay from the security logs, and concealed the chip, intending to give it to you after some time had passed. I apologize for the deception and for tampering with the logs, but I felt that it was an action of utmost necessity."

Janeway narrowed her lips to a thin line and dropped her gaze to the meditation lamp's reassuring flicker. A long plastic silence drew itself out as pain and profound affection for this man rose again in her throat, quicksilvering her eyes and stilling any excuse or justification that might have been on the tip of her tongue, "You always did look out for me, old friend."

"As my mental state deteriorated," he continued, normally stoic features creasing with consternation, "I forgot about both it and my promise to Seven of Nine."

"It's okay, Tuvok. Really it is." Small, elegant hands reached out then, grasping the Vulcan's broad shoulders in familiar comfort.

"I forgot... forgot my promise." Tuvok shook his head sharply, drawing back from the Admiral's touch as though she were a stranger. "Promises are forever," he informed her gravely, then shook his head again, his eyes clearing from the moment of confusion. "I am sorry, Captain. I seem to be slipping."

At this, the shimmer along her lower lids beaded and streaked liquid trails of grief down her cheeks. Reaching to him again, Janeway drew his head down to her shoulder, wrapping thin arms around him, "Oh, Tuvok."

Not reacting to the embrace, words began to fall from his mouth with no seeming connection to anything but disjointed memories. "Slip. Slipstream. Captain, the Slipstream drive will not work. The ship's hull will not withstand such forces." Abruptly, Tuvok's head rose from the Admiral's shoulder, dark eyes finding blue with desperate intensity, the man inside the damaged madness scrabbling for purchase on a fleeting moment of sanity. "Captain, I will not remember this conversation."

"Relax, Tuvok. I've got you." She soothed, drawing him back down to her shoulder and stroking his graying head with a trembling hand. Glancing over, she retrieved his latest stack of insensible writings and placed them in front of him, "Just relax, old friend. Here's your pen. I'll remember for us both."