TITLE: Chakotay's Holidays: Back to Back
AUTHOR: Brenda Shaffer-Shiring
RATING: PG
CODES: C/T
PART: 17/20
DISCLAIMER: (tune: "You Are So Beautiful (to Me)")
Trek's owned by Paramount, you see
Trek's owned by Paramount, you see
Not by me
The scenes here that I've written
Are what belongs to me
The rest is Paramount's
You see
AUTHOR'S NOTE: A relatively slight entry, and probably not, of itself, worth the wait – but the good news is, it's beginning to look as if I just might finish this series!
SUMMARY: Chakotay joins his sweetheart, B'Elanna, in a Day of Honor ritual. Let's just say it could have gone better.
Chakotay woke with a groan and a splitting headache. What the hell was I thinking of when I agreed to go through the Day of Honor ritual with B'Elanna?
The answer (though multi-part) was actually easy enough to come by. He'd wanted to show that he honored her customs and ancestry as he honored his own, of course. He'd wanted to impress her with his fighting prowess, also of course. On some level he'd wanted to prove that, though past the age of fifty and long since retired from the Maquis, he still had what a warrior would define as "It." Of course again.
And then there was the unspoken "of course," the one that wild targs or his father in vision-quest query couldn't have dragged from him (though Kolopak, at least, would certainly have guessed): he'd wanted to prove he was as good a man as Tom Paris. B'Elanna's ex-husband had participated in Day of Honor rites with her every year since their courtship, had in fact been the one who encouraged her to begin celebrating the Day again, after more than a decade's hiatus. Even in the rocky last year of their marriage, Tom had picked up his bat'leth and joined his half-Klingon wife in running the annual gauntlet, and apparently he'd managed to do it with some credit to himself.
The last, obviously, being more than Chakotay could say. He'd been taken down before he and B'Elanna had even actually had a chance at the gauntlet. Which meant that, despite his best efforts and intentions – and we know too well where that paving leads, don't we, Chakotay? – he had undoubtedly ruined her first post-divorce Day of Honor.
Well, at least he hadn't been foolish enough to try his luck with a bat'leth! Years of self-defense training, and more years spent putting that training to practical use, had been sufficient to teach him the folly of trying to master a new weapon in the space of a few months, especially against fighters who'd trained with it since childhood. Instead he'd used what time he'd had to practice a weapon he'd learned in his own childhood: a fighting staff. His Klingon mentor and colleague, daChut, had practiced sparring with him, in a series of early-morning workouts that had often left Chakotay feeling a) oddly invigorated, and b) every minute of his age. They'd had their last session yesterday, and – with the aid of a metal-cored staff – Chakotay had held his own in most satisfactory fashion. So he had actually joined B'Elanna in the Hall of Judgment this morning with some confidence.
Note to self: outfighting a middle-aged professor of anthropology – even a Klingon one – really isn't any proof of martial ability.
He didn't think he'd have to write that one down.
He and B'Elanna had walked into the building's lobby, when a booming voice somewhere to his left had called out what Chakotay didn't have to understand spoken Klingon to recognize as a challenge. B'Elanna had growled, turned, and raised her bat'leth in response – Chakotay swung his staff into a defensive posture – and the hall erupted in melee.
Back to back with B'Elanna in a plasma storm of brawling Klingons, he'd wheeled, crouched, swung as if by instinct, even using his boxing skills to dispatch one opponent who'd been foolish enough to close within his reach. He'd relished the surge of adrenaline, and was once again the warrior he'd been in his younger days.
For perhaps a minute. He'd lunged forward at full extension, driving his staff into an opponent's armored gut, when something flew into his peripheral vision and his consciousness shattered with the force of impact.
Note to self, two: there's a reason fighters in Earth's earlier centuries invented helmets.
He didn't think he'd have to write that one down, either.
He opened his eyes then, squinting against the sudden brilliance of unshielded light, when he was startled by the sound of a familiar voice. "Well, it's about time," B'Elanna Torres said, and he turned his head to look at her, wondering whether his injury had brought on the uncharacteristic mildness.
He didn't have long to wonder, for no sooner had his eyes focused on her welcome visage than said visage contorted with what certainly looked like anger. "Chakotay," she said, voice sharp, "you're an idiot!"
Well, that was more in character. "I love you too," he said drily.
"Don't give me that!" B'Elanna flared. "How dare you let me think you were ready for the Day of Honor when that was all the better you could do? Don't you know you could have gotten killed? I thought you said you'd practiced, you idiot!"
"Hey!" He struggled up to his elbows, holding her outraged gaze with his own as best he could. "I did practice. I've been practicing for months."
She snorted. "Yeah, right. Pull the other one, Warrior Boy."
"You can ask daChut!"
She looked, just looked, at him. "DaChut?"
"DaChut! He was my sparring partner."
There was a hint of disbelief in her eyes. "You hadn't worked with a fighting staff since you were a teenager, and you sparred with a college professor? For the Day of Honor?"
He could sense that this conversation was going about as well for him as the melee had. But there was no way to answer other than with the truth. "Yeah."
She laughed. It could have been worse, for the laugh was simply merry, and devoid of further anger. But it was most certainly a laugh. When it subsided, she said lightly, "Chakotay, you know I do love you. But sometimes you really are an idiot." She raised a finger, in admonishment that looked to be only half-kidding. "All Klingons aren't created equal – as you should very well know. If you ever want to do this again, I guess I'm just going to have to spar with you myself, so I can make sure you're prepared."
His turn to snort, with sarcasm at least partly born of his bruised ego. "Are you telling me an engineer is so much better at hand-to-hand combat than a college professor?"
"The crowd in the Hall of Judgment seemed to think so." Her tiny smile had a hint of pride in it. "After you went down, I had to protect you, didn't I? So I clobbered the one who'd knocked you down, and then I just stood over you, and clocked anyone who got too close to us. I honestly didn't think I could fight them all off. But I was afraid that if I couldn't, even if no one else hit you intentionally you'd get trampled, the way fighters kept pushing back and forth all around us. And do you know what? No one touched you. Or me either, come to think of it." Now there was nothing small or faint about either the smile or the pride. "Best I've ever fought.
"Anyway, by the time the security team settled the crowd down – mainly by bashing a whole lot of heads, big surprise – apparently the guy who challenged us was so impressed by my so-called 'warrior prowess' that he decided he didn't care if I mated with humans, Romulans, or sentient tribbles. That's what he said, anyhow. And the marshal counted up the number of people we'd downed – he counted in your three too, by the way – and decided I didn't have to do anything else to prove my honor. Not this year, anyhow. So all we need to do is check you out of the infirmary, and we can get the hell out of here." She helped him to a sitting position.
"Wait a minute." He shook his head, in a reflexive attempt to clear it; stopped when the motion sent a sickening flach of pain through his temple. "I got my ass kicked – "
"Your head bashed."
"B'Elanna, believe me, I know where I got hit," he said with some asperity. "Anyway, I got my head bashed and as a result you got to prove you had enough honor for a whole year?"
She smiled again. "The irony kind of gets me too, but not enough to make me want to prove any more honor than I have to." Strong hands drew him to his feet. "Can we go now?"
"Wait a minute," he repeated, staying where he stood. "What I'm trying to say here is, I got my ass kicked, head bashed, whatever – and it turned out to be a good thing?"
"Well, aside from the part where I didn't know how bad you were hurt, or if those assholes did any permanent damage – I guess. Yeah."
Now it was his turn to laugh, if ruefully. "Maybe I should take a dive every year."
"Don't you dare!" But her eyes were warm with amusement and affection. "Come on, hero. Let's go have a feast or something."
"Okay by me." They were on their way to the infirmary doors when another patient on a biobed caught his eye. "Just a minute, B'Elanna." He stepped closer, looking down at the battered face of a fighter who was just beginning to regain consciousness.
"Need a ride home, daChut?"
END
NEXT: "The Things We Do For Love" (Chakotay's Birthday)
