"Be careful." (Chakotay & Doctor)

Author's Note: This story takes place after "Maneuvers", with references to "Projections".

/

"Careful, Commander. Don't try to move."

Chakotay came to with that all-too-familiar feeling of strong painkillers in his system, as if he were floating somewhere above his body, but he knew it would hurt like hell as soon as he returned. The last thing he remembered was being dragged onto Culluh's bridge and left to collapse like so much garbage. Seska's beautiful, disdainful face was still seared into his brain.

Since he was lying on a biobed, the voice overhead belonged to the Doctor, and so did the hand holding him in place when he tried to stand up, Chakotay supposed he must have been rescued. He would feel more grateful if he weren't so medicated.

"What … happened?"

"The Captain negotiated a prisoner exchange, but the Kazon gave you quite a beating first. You have a concussion and several broken ribs."

"A concussion?" That explained why he felt so out of it.

"Yes." The Doctor frowned as he scanned Chakotay with his tricorder. "Although I do have to wonder if there wasn't some previous brain damage already, before those barbarians got to you. From boxing, perhaps."

"What do you mean?"

"It's the only way I can account for the utter idiocy of going after Seska on your own!" The Doctor's voice rose abruptly enough to be startling, even through the painkiller fog. He replaced his tricorder on the instrument tray with a jarring clatter. "I would have expected this from a troublemaker like Mr. Paris, but not you! What in the galaxy were you thinking?"

Chakotay couldn't lift his head, but he could turn it far enough to give the hologram a forbidding look, despite - or rather because - of his outburst being justified. "You're a doctor … not Chief of Security, so … you'd better mind your own business."

"It's very much my business when my shipmates take needless risks and I have to patch them up!" The Doctor scowled at him, but looked away after only a short moment, as if torn between anger and compassion at the state Chakotay was in. His sharp voice softened considerably as he added: "Especially those I've grown to respect on a personal level."

That surprised Chakotay almost as much as his show of temper had done.

"I didn't know you thought that way."

"Commander … " The Doctor's hand came down rather awkwardly on Chakotay's shoulder, but not to hold him in place this time. "When I was trapped in that radioactive feedback loop on the holodeck, you and Lieutenant Torres worked for six hours to reach me. When my delusions were telling me that nothing around me was real, you were quite literally my only voice of reason. You told me I wasn't alone, that I had friends here, that my life mattered as much as anyone's. What I don't understand is why you never considered that the same applies to you."

Chakotay hadn't felt this humbled since his last reprimand from the Captain. He remembered how frightened the Doctor had been that day, how confused, and how close they had come to losing him. Chakotay never would have thought his few words had made such an impact. The way he remembered it, it was B'Elanna's computer skills that had salvaged the Doctor's program. He knew what it was like now, to watch a comrade heading for self-destruction and feel powerless to stop it. Was that what everyone had thought of him when he'd gone after the Kazon Nistrim ship?

"I wanted … to stop Seska on my own … without putting the crew at risk," he said, but he already knew that was a weak excuse. Voyager had gotten into a firefight rescuing him; he remembered that much from before he'd blacked out. He should have known that even a direct denial wouldn't stop B'Elanna or the Captain from fighting for him. "It was a bad call, I see that now. I'm … sorry."

"Be more careful next time, won't you?" The Doctor grumbled, smoothing his patient's blanket.

"Can't make any promises," Chakotay replied honestly, "But … I'll try."