AN: Here we are, another chapter here.

Just letting you know that I did write one yesterday that I'm not sure many people read. You might want to see if you missed that one before reading this one.

I hope that you enjoy! Let me know what you think!

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Daryl winced when Chakotay hit the orange alien hard enough to slam it into the ropes and down to the mat.

"Hey! You wanna—talk about it or…somethin'?" Daryl asked, coming closer to the ring. He'd meant to ask Chakotay about becoming some type of official-sounding crew member, even if it was simply a position created for someone who came from three hundred years in the past. That was how he'd ended up here. Chakotay said he had the morning off, and Daryl had the morning off since B'Elanna was on the same shift as Chakotay and Daryl always shadowed her, so Chakotay had invited Daryl to follow him on his recreation time.

He'd brought him to what was, apparently, the ship's gym. It was complete with a boxing ring, though, and an orange alien had been there, waiting on them, to fight with Chakotay.

"You want to have a heart-to-heart, Daryl?" Chakotay asked, clearly with some amusement. He smirked to himself even as he prepared to land another solid punch on the sorry orange bastard that should have stayed down but chose to get up instead.

"If it's gonna stop you beatin' the shit outta that guy—yeah," Daryl said. "Fuck—I'll listen to whatever the hell you got on your mind. Ain't gonna braid your hair and shit, but I can listen pretty damn good."

"Computer, delete opponent," Chakotay announced. Almost immediately the orange alien evaporated.

"Did you kill him?" Daryl asked.

Chakotay laughed.

He crawled out of the ring. He gestured to some benches and Daryl followed him to sit with him.

"He was a simulation," Chakotay said. "He wasn't real. These are the holodecks. We create and run programs here for training or leisure. You can create a program with anything you want. B'Elanna could help you. She does a beautiful job with holodeck programs."

"So, none of this is real?" Daryl asked.

"It's real as in—you can interact with everything here. You can touch it. You can eat the food and drink the beverages. It's like your imagination has come to life," Chakotay said.

"Can you get me an ashtray?" Daryl asked. "With your imagination?"

Chakotay laughed to himself.

"Computer, produce an ashtray," Chakotay offered into the air. The computer was much more obedient to Chakotay's commands than it tended to be to Daryl's. It produced an ashtray on the floor near them. Chakotay bent over, picked it up, and offered it to Daryl. Daryl turned it over in his hand. It seemed as real as any ashtray he'd ever used before. He lit a cigarette, resting the ashtray on the bench between them, and offered Chakotay a cigarette. "I don't smoke," Chakotay said.

"Maybe you should," Daryl said. "Takes the edge off with what the hell you call a heart-to-heart." Chakotay hesitated, but Daryl pushed the pack toward him again and laughed. "You makin' me feel like I'm teachin' you to smoke out behind the damned school. Just take a cigarette. I'd tell you to conjure us up a few beers, but…I don't know how I feel about drinking imaginary shit."

"Computer, two glasses of beer," Chakotay said.

His command was granted. Daryl eyed the drinks as Chakotay offered him one of the glasses.

"It ain't real," Daryl said.

"It's real," Chakotay said. "Just try it."

"And what about when I go into work and B'Elanna has a fit because I drank a beer before she has me learning about her bio-neural gel packs?" Daryl asked.

"If you've learned that much already, you'll be fine in a few hours when we go in for our shift. But—do you want one without alcohol?" Chakotay asked.

Daryl tasted the beer. It was cold and perfect. He couldn't remember the last time he'd had a cold beer.

"This'll do fine," he said. "So, what the hell's got you beatin' the shit outta the damned orange imaginary friend you made?"

"I come here almost every time I have a break. It's my place to blow off steam," Chakotay said. "From—anything."

"I used to do that," Daryl said. "Not come here. Not even fight. I just mean I had a place. My brother—I feel like sometimes he used to pick fights to blow off steam. He'da done better to have imaginary people to fight with. I used to like to—go outside. Go to the woods. I liked to hunt, but…really? I weren't always hunting when I was out there. Sometimes I just liked to go and be out there. It was like the world made sense in the woods. It was nicer out there. Maybe because there weren't that many assholes around to piss me off."

Chakotay laughed at Daryl's joke and Daryl laughed, too.

"My father would have loved you," Chakotay said. "He was always disappointed that I didn't connect with nature, the way that he wanted me to, while I was young. He took me out so often to try to teach me about our ancestors. Our people. I didn't really respect the lessons and honor him properly until he'd passed. I was a disappointment to him in some ways, I know."

"Hell—if we're gonna talk about shitty old men—or disappointin' old men—I might need another beer or twelve," Daryl offered.

"You were a disappointment to your father?" Chakotay asked.

"From the first time my mama even knew she was pregnant, probably," Daryl offered. "But—is it an asshole thing of me to say I'd rather leave that shit on Earth?"

Chakotay laughed to himself.

"We're in the Delta Quadrant," Chakotay said. "I'd say you get to make the choice to leave it on Earth. If only it were really that easy, sometimes, to leave our pasts behind. But—my father would say that the past is vital. You should learn from the past."

"Can I ask you a—well, a kinda maybe asshole question?" Daryl asked.

"Only if I can return the favor sometime," Chakotay challenged.

"Fair enough," Daryl offered. "You talk about your people. Who were they? Like—Cherokee? Navajo or somethin'?"

Chakotay smiled to himself.

"My people were descendants of the Rubber Tree people of Earth's Central America," Chakotay said.

"That's where you got the tattoo?" Daryl asked.

"I got it to honor my father," Chakotay said.

"I wanted to forget my old man, not tattoo a memory of him on my face," Daryl said with a laugh. "No offense, man."

"None taken," Chakotay assured him. "My father would have appreciated having you as a son, if it's any consolation."

"Yeah," Daryl said, accepting the words for what they meant—a kindness offered. "My brother used to say we were like—like descended from Cherokee. Like a grandpa or somethin'. I don't know if it was true, but I really wanted that shit to be true. I used to read about 'em. Watch documentaries about 'em. Learn their stories, you know? Legends. I liked learning about their art and how they like—just did shit. Like everyday shit. How to make arrowheads and…" He stopped. Chakotay was listening to him very intently and he stopped. "That probably sounds pretty bad to somebody like you who's like—like a real Native American, right? Some asshole shit to say."

"On the contrary," Chakotay offered sincerely, before he took a long swallow from his drink and lit the cigarette that he'd been holding until then. Daryl bit the inside of his mouth at the displeased expression that the man showed over the cigarette. He continued to smoke it, however, perhaps as a show of solidarity. "There is no shame in wanting to learn the ways of other people and cultures. It's what helps us grow and learn about one another. It's what fosters peace and understanding. It's one of the reasons that I became a xenoanthropologist."

"A what?" Daryl asked.

Chakotay laughed.

"I dedicated a lot of my time to studying other cultures," Chakotay said. "In search of—something I'm not sure I ever found."

"The hell's that?" Daryl asked.

"Peace," Chakotay offered blankly.

"Three hundred fuckin' years in the future and we don't have peace—it's 'cause we won't never. Not like—not on some big scale."

"I think most of the time I've just been searching for peace for myself," Chakotay said. "Something personal that—I needed."

The comment struck Daryl. It resonated with him in a way that he might try to blame on the beer, but there was no need trying to lie about it.

"I hear what you're sayin'," he offered, not bothering to elaborate on it more.

"I've turned to my father's teachings in search of guidance to find that peace," Chakotay said. "And to try to reach out to him and seek his forgiveness and guidance."

"Does he give it to you?" Daryl asked.

"Sometimes," Chakotay said.

"Then he's a good old man to come through for you from—from like beyond the grave or whatever," Daryl said. "Personally, I'm more than happy to leave my old man where the hell he is. Still—if you ever wanna, you know, talk any about your people or whatever? I'd like to hear some of it."

Chakotay smiled at him.

"I'd be happy to share with you what I know," Chakotay said. "My father would be happy to know I'm sharing it, as well. His hope was always that my sister and I would share it with our children. If I ever had children, I would want to share the ways of my people with them. I would want to honor my father's memory, but I don't think that I would want to push them in the same way that he pushed me. I wouldn't want them to feel like—like I disapproved of them if they weren't exactly like me. Like I imagined them to be. I would want them to always think of me as someone who supported them. Who—made them learn and made them strong, but who supported them and who wasn't ever disappointed in them."

"I think we all do that," Daryl said. "I mean—imagine how we'd be different than our parents." Chakotay hummed. Daryl searched for something to say. He felt like there was still something on Chakotay's mind. He didn't feel at all that Chakotay had just come down here to engage in some kind of practice that he must have done a thousand times before. "You and Kathryn gonna—you know—do that now?"

"Do what?" Chakotay asked, furrowing his brow. He looked like Daryl had snatched him out of a pretty deep daydream.

Daryl laughed to himself. Maybe he shouldn't have brought it up, but it was too late now.

"You know—she announced last night that havin' kids is like important to the ship," Daryl said. "A new generation or whatever."

"Having children—producing a new generation—is crucial to the ship," Chakotay said. "We won't make it back without another generation."

Daryl hummed.

"That's what she said," Daryl said. "So, I mean—I was just askin' if you were gonna do that now. Have kids and all to help produce the new generation. It seems like you might be open to it, so…hell, I was just askin'. Forget it. It really ain't none of my business."

He drank more of the beer in one gulp than he meant to drink, but he suddenly felt like he needed to wash down his embarrassment. He couldn't quite explain the severity of Chakotay's expression other than to imagine that he'd overstepped some boundary of their newly budding friendship and offended the man.

But, then, Chakotay laughed.

"Are you asking about—the captain and me?" Chakotay asked. "Having children—together?"

Daryl laughed to himself.

"Who the hell else would y'all be havin' 'em with?" Daryl asked. "Or is that somethin' that's real popular these days?"

Chakotay laughed to himself a moment. He seemed to really enjoy the laughter, so Daryl let him have it, even though he was a bit annoyed that he felt like the man was laughing at his stupidity when he really had no way of knowing how things worked in this particular day and time.

When Chakotay got his laughter out, he shook his head, made a face at his attempt to take another draw off the cigarette, and snubbed out the cigarette before he washed his mouth out with beer and spoke.

"The captain and I are not in a relationship," Chakotay said.

"What do you mean?" Daryl asked.

"I mean—we're not in a relationship," Chakotay said. "Is there some other terminology from Earth? We aren't together. And—if Kathryn Janeway has anything to do with it, we probably never will be."

From the slightly bitter tone in Chakotay's voice, Daryl immediately understood what it was that had him down here beating the shit out of orange aliens. Instantly, Daryl felt his stomach respond—his gut telling him that he was right.

"You ever been together?" Daryl asked. "We thought you were married."

Chakotay laughed, some irritation coming through in his voice.

"We're not married," he said. "We're—I guess we're nothing. I'm her first officer. She's my captain. It's strictly business."

"She turned you down?" Daryl asked.

"To turn me down," Chakotay offered, "she would have had to listen to my proposition and refuse it. She doesn't even grant me that."

"Shit's rough," Daryl offered after a moment of silence passed between them. Chakotay hummed in agreement.

"How long have you and Carol been married?" Chakotay asked.

Daryl laughed to himself. He scratched at the back of his neck.

"We ain't," he said. Chakotay looked at him and furrowed his brow in confusion.

"But you're—together?" Chakotay asked.

Daryl laughed to himself, anxiety suddenly gnawing ravenously at his stomach.

"I guess. Maybe you could say that. Thanks to your solar flu or whatever."

"You mean—just now?" Chakotay asked.

"Been a couple hours now," Daryl offered. "Not to get too damned personal. Good damn thing, though. I mean—I been thinkin' about it for years. Couldn't figure out how or…when…or even if she would, you know, want that with me."

"But she did?" Chakotay asked.

Daryl hummed. His heart beat wildly in his chest. He smiled to himself, his face growing warm, as he thought about it—truly thought about it—for the first time since they'd been together.

"Yeah," Daryl said. "She did. Even—this morning."

Chakotay laughed.

"Even this morning," he mused.

"How long you—been wantin' Kathryn?" Daryl asked. "If—that's not too personal to ask. In light of—what the hell I just told you."

"Almost two years now," Chakotay mused. Daryl laughed and Chakotay pressed him to tell him what he was laughing about.

"I waited like ten fuckin' years," Daryl said. "So—hell, maybe no don't mean no for good. Maybe it just means no for right now." He laughed to himself. "Maybe the right fuckin' flu ain't come along yet."