Disclaimer: Paramount owns Voyager and all of its characters.
Chapter 2: An exact match
Twelve weeks and one day
Tuvok held a padd in his hand and monotonically he read through the list of breaches of protocol he had witnessed the crew making over the past seven days. Just when Kathryn had assumed he had come to the end of the list, he would scroll down and read out another section. The next time he paused to scroll down she held up her hand to stop him, and he looked up at her with a questioning expression.
"How many more pages are there?" she asked.
"Fourteen," he replied evenly.
"And are there any breaches of protocol on there that could be deemed serious?"
He raised an eyebrow, "I do feel that you should be aware of all of them," when she rolled her eyes he added, "but I could just summarise at this point if you would prefer…"
"Thank you," she said gratefully from across her desk.
"This crew is sloppy," he stated, "and unfortunately the incidents are not isolated among the maquis, but many are connected with members of our own crew."
"Our own crew?" she looked at him disapprovingly, "the maquis are part of this crew now."
"The original Voyager crew," he amended without missing a beat, "I'm not sure if direct discipline is going to solve this."
She sat back in her chair, "I have to agree with you on that point, but…" she trailed off when she heard someone at the door, "enter."
Harry Kim stood at the entrance of her office, unsure whether or not the report she had requested was urgent enough to warrant him interrupting her meeting with lieutenant Tuvok. "I have the EMH diagnostic report," he explained.
Kathryn smiled at the young ensign and indicated that he should enter. "Thank you," she said as he handed her the padd, and when he stood there for a moment longer than was necessary she looked up, "that will be all."
He nodded, his hair bobbing ever so slightly as he did so, and then with an acknowledging nod to Tuvok he exited the captain's office.
Not being able to help herself she glanced down at the first few lines of the padd, but instantly it grabbed her entire attention, and she seemed to forget about Tuvok completely. A slight movement from the man opposite her caused her to look away from the padd, and suddenly she remembered herself. "Sorry Tuvok, whereabouts were we?"
"We were discussing how to deal with the crew's breaches of protocol," he reminded her, noticing again that her eyes were drifting to the padd in front of her. "Is there something the matter?"
With force she looked back across at one of her oldest friends, "it's nothing," she said, a little too quickly to be convincing.
He put down his report on her desk, "I think we have exhausted the topic of protocols for now. I will make a list of possible ways to combat our problem and give it to you tomorrow morning."
Kathryn smiled thankfully, "that would be great," she admitted.
Although it was the Vulcan's cue to get up and leave, he stayed seated where he was. When she finally realised that he wasn't moving she shot him a puzzled expression. "I was wondering if you wanted to talk," he explained.
She shook her head, an expected reaction from someone who had known her so long, "I can't think about anything else we need to cover before the staff briefing tomorrow."
"I've noticed you have been distracted all of today," he explained, "through experience I know you are often able to focus better when you have 'bounced' your thoughts off others."
It was just like him to be so perceptive, and she knew that now he had sat down in her office and suggested a conversation he was unlikely to move. Unable to carry on the pretence that everything was fine she sank back in her chair and sighed, he watched her patiently and silently until she finally admitted what had been occupying her mind the past twenty four hours. "Mark isn't the father of my child."
There seemed an uncertain pause before the Vulcan responded, "so who is the father?"
"I'm not sure," she shook her head, "the doctor thinks that I must have conceived aboard the caretaker."
"The child is not human?"
She laughed ironically at that, "no, it is. Another of the doctor's theories is that the caretaker took the DNA from one of the other humans he pulled into the delta quadrant, and impregnated me."
"Does he have a theory as to why?"
Kathryn shrugged, "probably some sick cosmic joke."
He ignored her pessimism, "I'm assuming this is in some way connected with why you asked ensign Kim to run a diagnostic on the EMH."
"I thought maybe there was something wrong with his programming."
"And is there?"
"No."
Again there was a long pause, before Tuvok asked: "and what do you plan to do now?"
She let out a long breath, "what can I do? Either go through with this pregnancy knowing or not knowing who the father is, or feign a miscarriage."
"What do you want to do?" he asked patiently.
"I don't think that I can have this child. I had enough time accepting it when I thought Mark was the father, and it was my own doing that had resulted in my pregnancy… but to find out that I probably don't even know the father, and that I had no willing part in creating this life; there's no reason for me to have this child, and plenty of reasons not to."
"And your reasons against?"
Kathryn paused, "apart from the fact that I don't know who the father is and this pregnancy was forced unwillingly upon me; I have a ship and a crew that depend on me, and the delta quadrant is too dangerous to raise a child," she said reasonably.
He considered what she had said, "I think you are overlooking a major positive," he said at last, "there is a chance that the father could be aboard this ship, and maybe he would be willing to share the responsibilities of this child with you. As for the delta quadrant being a dangerous place… I must agree with you on that point. But your reasoning for this ship and crew is over exaggerated, as you have both myself and commander Chakotay to aid you with that, and we would both be willing to take on more responsibility to ease your workload."
Slowly she closed her eyes before opening them back up to look at him, "and your recommendation is?"
"Do you wish to be a mother?"
She looked at him for a moment, "I guess I've always thought I would be one day…"
"Then does it really matter who the father is?"
She nodded, knowing that he was right in his own logical way, "thank you," she looked him in the eye.
He realised that he had said all he could say to her at that moment in time and so he stood from his seat and bid her goodbye. She sat in her office for a long time after that before she re-emerged onto the bridge to finish the remainder of her shift.
/\
Twenty weeks
A distant part of Chakotay's mind could hear his combadge, could hear someone speaking through the small device, but chose to ignore it at first. Then when it interrupted his thoughts for a second time, he left his spirit guide to enjoy the rest of her nap in the sun and opened his eyes. "Chakotay here," he said as he picked up his combadge and activated it in his palm.
"Commander, could you please report to sickbay," the doctor requested, although politely the urgency in his voice did not go unmissed.
"I'll be right there," he said, ending the communication and standing from the floor. As the doctor hadn't said specifically that it was an emergency, he packed up his medicine bundle and put it in a draw, he then proceeded to pull his jacket back on and fix his combadge to his uniform as he left through the door of his quarters.
Arriving at sickbay two minutes later he was surprised to see the place almost deserted, except for the doctor who stood by a bio bed, and as he entered further into the space, he realised that it was his captain who was lying down unconscious on it. "What happened?" he asked, somewhat surprised at the sudden concern he felt towards someone who just more than five months ago had been his enemy.
"She collapsed in engineering," he explained as he administered medication into her neck, "she is miscarrying the baby."
"Spirits," he let out a long breath, "you can do something though, right?"
The doctor nodded, "four weeks ago I discussed a problem concerning the foetus with the Captain, and explained to her that this might happen."
"Is there a treatment?" he asked worriedly.
"Of course, it was discovered centuries ago," the hologram finished rushing around and stopped to look up at his CO, "the captain's foetus contains a faulty gene within its genome, this particular fault results in a miscarriage five out of six times, however, with gene therapy the problem can be rectified."
"Can you do that?"
The hologram nodded, "yes, however in this circumstance it will require a sample of the father's DNA."
"Oh right," he nodded solemnly, thinking that he understood, "but isn't there someone on this ship who's a close enough match."
"Actually there is," the doctor smiled at him, "that's why I've asked you here."
"I'm a close match?" he stared in disbelief.
With a nod of affirmation the doctor continued, "when I informed the captain about her child's condition, she said that she would rather take the risk than involve you, but currently she is unconscious, and as waking her up may cause the foetus further distress at this time, I must act on the best behalf of both mother and child."
Chakotay frowned, "why wouldn't the captain want to involve me?"
"Because you're not just a close match commander; you're an exact match." With that the doctor headed into his office, leaving the commander to stand there for a moment or two as the words sank in. Finally, Chakotay realised that he was more confused than anything, and turned to follow the doctor into the medical office.
"How can I be an exact match?" he questioned as he entered into the office.
The EMH turned on his console and started to search for something, "it seems that whilst you and the captain were aboard the caretaker she became impregnated with your DNA."
"Come again?"
He started to download something to a padd, "of course when she found out that her fiancé wasn't the father and you were, I did try to persuade her to inform you, but she insisted that you didn't need to know."
"How long have you known?"
"About two months," the doctor handed him the padd, "I will need you to place your thumb print on there if you agree to give a sample of your DNA, it will need to be extracted directly from your spinal cord, the risks are almost non existent, but one in a million are paralysed."
"Why didn't she tell me?" he held the padd loosely in his hand.
"I think she thought it was for the best; I'm not entirely sure, you'll have to ask her when I wake her."
Slowly he looked down at the padd in front of him, "I'm guessing I don't have much time to think about this."
"I could give you twenty minutes," was the reply.
Chakotay let out a long breath, four weeks ago Seska had defected to join the Kazon, two weeks ago he had been unconscious and disembodied for a number of days, and now he was being told that he was going to be the father to his captain's child; this was not turning out to be his month. "I don't have much of a choice do I," he stated as he placed his thumb print to give his consent, and then handed the padd back over to the doctor.
"You don't have to do this."
He considered the only medical officer's words, and although he was angry at his captain for having kept him in the dark, he wasn't a spiteful man. "It's okay," he replied. "Now what is it you have to do again?"
-
20 weeks and 2 days
It was a couple of days since he had been called into sick bay to be told that he was four months away from being a father. He hadn't seen the Captain since the doctor had neutralised the sedative, as she had been recuperating in her quarters. But he guessed that was a good thing, he needed to think things through before he saw her; he didn't want to say anything that he might regret.
The past few months, he and Kathryn had started to build on a basic friendship; one that would allow them to work together in harmony to show a united front for the crew. At first it had been force of will to come together and make decisions, to pretend that they agreed during briefings and to then politely disagree when they were alone. At first that was difficult, she infuriated him, with her rigid Starfleet ways and unwillingness to compromise, and he had felt like he was fighting a losing battle as he attempted to show her that there were many good officers among his maquis crew.
After the initial couple of months they started to work a little more harmoniously, and started to develop a respect for one another, their opinions and ideas. They had even started to become friends, and however much he wished that none of the accomplishments they had both made with their development of a decent command team would be lost, he got the feeling that the next time they both spoke they just might do that.
Almost on cue the bleep went at his door, and he looked up from the screen in front of him to see her standing in the doorway to his office, the bulge of her belly now very obvious at five months. "Do you mind if I come in?" she asked.
He waved her over to a seat opposite him, and pulled down the screen of his computer so that he wouldn't be distracted for this conversation.
"I wanted to thank you for what you did the other day," she said once she had sat down, absently placing a hand on her swollen abdomen.
"You don't need to thank me," he responded.
"I do need to apologise," she pointed out.
"What for?" he gave her an innocent look, but narrowed his eyes ever so slightly at her.
"The doctor told me that you knew," she sighed, "I'm sorry you had to find out that way."
"Was there another way that I was going to find out?" he asked sharply.
She hesitated, "to be honest I was hoping that you wouldn't have to know."
"So you were just going to allow me to see you raise this child without telling me that I am the father?" He couldn't hide the anger from his voice, "even if it meant endangering the life of my child?"
"This isn't your child," she cut in swiftly.
Chakotay looked at her incredulously, "I beg your pardon?"
"I can't have you involved in raising this child and this ship cannot find out that you're the father."
"Why not?" he thought he was angry at her before, but that was nothing in comparison to how he felt now.
"Because I barely know you and it's difficult enough with our two crews in constant conflict, imagine how they're going to react if they find out that their commanding officers are having a baby together."
"You're actually serious about this aren't you?" he looked at her in disbelief.
She bit her lip and took some calming breaths. Since the doctor had informed her that Chakotay had been told of his impending fatherhood, she had been thinking about how this conversation would go. She had imagined that he would be angry with her for not having told him, but somehow she had convinced herself that he would see the logic of her argument straight away and they could go back to how things were before. "I can't see any other way of doing this and preventing a mutiny; the maquis have to feel that you are on their side and in no way biased towards my decisions, and the Starfleet officers would probably assume that you raped me if they found out I was pregnant with your child."
"I can't believe you think I would be capable of such a thing!" he suddenly got up out of his chair, and put some distance between himself and his captain, this was not how he had expected this conversation to go. He had expected her to apologise, for him to accept her apology, and for them to work out how they were going to share custody of their baby and still continue their roles as commanding officers.
"I don't," she insisted, "but there are people on this crew who don't know you; only last month Tuvok approved all of your security access as first officer."
Chakotay had started to pace, but looked round in surprise, "I didn't realise that I was restricted."
"You would have if you had have attempted to overload the warp core," she said dryly as she remained seated.
Looking back round he kept his back to her as he tried to calm himself down, he knew she was right, but he didn't like the idea of not being able to share the news with his friends that he was going to be a father, of allowing his child to call him 'daddy', and to take on a role as a father. "Okay," he said at last, unable to think of counterarguments, "but I'm not happy about this."
Kathryn was somewhat surprised at his sudden turn around, she had started to think that this argument could elevate and go on for at least an hour, although she wasn't so surprised that she wasn't able to stand from her seat with the intention of leaving. "Thank you," she tried to catch his eye, but he was avoiding looking at her directly as he headed back over to his desk.
"You're back on duty tomorrow?" was all he asked.
"Yes."
"I'll see you then," he replied, and pulled up his console to continue with his work.
She realised that was the end of their conversation, and confident that what they knew would stay between themselves, Tuvok and the doctor, she left his office without saying anything further on the matter.
The moment she was gone Chakotay leant back in his chair, taking his eyes from the blank screen and closing them. He considered spending time with his spirit guide after his shift, but decided stealing someone's holodeck time and going on a boxing simulation would be much more therapeutic.
/\
7 months and 2 weeks
Kathryn stared out of her view port as natural sunlight streamed through it for the first time in the life of the ship. She had taken a walk outside of the ship earlier that day and junior had obviously enjoyed the fresh air as much as she had as the baby had been actively moving around inside of her ever since. She placed her hand on her belly and glided her fingers absently over the side of her swell, quietly delighted as the baby as usual joined in the game and kicked back. The game was interrupted at the bleep from the door.
"Come in," she called out not taking her eyes from the view port.
"It's almost seventeen hundred hours." She turned to see Chakotay enter into her waiting room.
She gave him a small smile, "we'll be fashionably late," he told him.
He nodded with a smile of his own, then proceeded to sit down beside her at a respectful distance. "I wish you'd change your mind," he pleaded.
"We shouldn't delay our journey any longer than we have to," she gave him the same answer she had before.
"Just two or three months," he attempted one last time, "you could have the baby planet side, have some time to adjust, and then we'd be off before the Kazon even knew we'd stopped."
She shook her head, "it's too long," then with an almost wicked smile she added, "besides, if I stayed here for long enough, I might not want to leave, and then you'd have to get this ship home by yourself."
He shrugged and gave her a wink, "who says I'd stay on Voyager?"
Grinning she shook her head, "are you telling me that I'm going to be saying goodbye to you when we go to the cargo bay in ten minutes?"
Chakotay gave her a deep look, "I'm saying that I'd go where ever you and my baby went."
All humour drained from the captain's face, and suddenly the light moment was heavy and strained; they didn't talk about that.
"I'm sorry," he apologised, realising his error in airing the words, "I," he stammered, "I guess I'll meet you in the cargo bay."
As he started to rise to leave she stopped him, "it's okay," she waved him to sit back down, and he did. "I think we need to talk about this."
He looked at her for a moment, trying to think of a way out of this conversation, knowing from previous experience of the last two and a half months that allowing her to hear him refer to the baby as his often resulted in an icy look or a chilling silence before she asked him to leave. He didn't dare to think about how this conversation was going to go. "Okay," was all he said, resigned to follow this confrontation where ever it led.
"I need to know you're going to be okay when this baby arrives," she started.
He nodded, "I intend to be the perfect first officer," then elaborated, "I'll wait several hours after you give birth before I visit; I will speak to you first, then see the baby, telling you how beautiful your child is. I'll go to the bridge and give them a report on you and junior. I won't offer to baby sit as I will be too busy doing both our duties. I will smile politely and keep a reasonable distance from you when we celebrate the birth in the mess hall. I will be so impartial no one will even suspect me as the father."
She looked at him; he had obviously given this a lot of thought, probably more than she had. Although she approved of everything that he had planned to do, she couldn't help her heart sink at his words knowing that the entire situation was wrong; seeing how excited he was at the thought of becoming a father, even if it was from a great distance, it was almost heartbreaking to see him cover it up, and pretend like it didn't mean anything to him. Before she even knew what she was doing she had reached for his hand and taking it in her own hands placed it on her belly.
The shock at her action lasted on his face up until the moment he felt the movement beneath his hand, at which point he shuffled himself closer to her so that he had to put his arm round the back of the couch to avoid their shoulders clashing. Her hand was still covering his, and she moved his hand slightly more to her side, "tap your fingers," she instructed when nothing happened. Chakotay did as instructed and felt a much more distinct response to his action. "Those are the feet," she explained.
He looked at her in amazement, "how can you tell?"
"I see them in the bath," she explained, "they're either feet or tentacles, and the doctor has assured me there's no DNA from the caretaker present, so I'm guessing they're feet."
"Can you see the hands?" he asked, trying to restrain his excitement at having felt his child move.
She shrugged, "no, but I can see the bum."
"Whereabouts?"
"Near to the top," she removed her hand from covering his, suddenly aware of how close he was to her, how the side of his thumb was against her back and his arm was slung behind her, she could now feel his breath against her temple, and the feel of his hand on her belly as they shared an intimate moment she hadn't with anyone else. He seemed oblivious to her new awareness, and moved his hand to the top of her swollen abdomen in an attempt to locate the bum. "You won't be able to make it out through my uniform," she told him.
At her words he rested his hand where it lay, now sharing her awareness as the indication that she had no intention of removing her jacket called him back to reality and reminded him of the barriers to their relationship; she was captain, and he was first officer. He could smell the soap of her skin, the shampoo in her hair, the feel of her knee lightly brushing against his, he was also made aware of the fact that he was almost embracing her on her couch, and the thought that he didn't care surprised him. He wasn't sure if it was the fact that he hadn't been with anyone but Seska in a long time, or the fact that she was mother to his child, but the proximity to her was suddenly intoxicating, and he had trouble quelling the thoughts that came to his mind, having to remind himself who she was, and that placing his lips to her neck would be wrong.
He didn't have to suppress such thoughts for much longer as she pulled away and stood from the couch, obviously now uncomfortable with the closeness and trying to put some distance between them. As if to remind him of the only reason she had allowed him to get so close to her, she placed her hand over her belly, "I think we should go to the cargo bay now," she suggested, "see if any of our crew plan to join the 37's on this planet."
Chakotay nodded, standing also, "I suppose it's too much to wish for the entire supply of Leola root to be there waiting for us to say goodbye?"
She laughed, and the tense moment was broken, "maybe," she replied, "but there's always a chance…"
To be continued.