Kathryn sat holding the cup with water as Chakotay left the room to take care of some task she wasn't aware of. Every movement she made seemed monumental, as if she was on a planet with gravity much higher than she was used to. She contemplated what she knew of the past couple of days. Most of her memory was patchy. She had some clear glimpses of Chakotay, standing over her, or sleeping in a chair, but the rest was a strange haziness of feeling hot and cold, her muscles burning with lactic acid from shaking so hard. Thinking back on it, she stretched out her muscles to see what the ill effects were. They were sore, and tired, like she'd just undergone a major workout, or run a marathon. As she stretched her body slowly one way and then the other, she remembered other things: a sense of fear, gratefulness and embarrassment towards Chakotay, trying to fight against something but also wanting more than anything to give in to the powerful pull of nothingness. There was also a lingering sensation of something else. Feeling secure, giving her body over to the Other, something she trusted completed, the feeling of being held, of a warm body next to her, cocooning her and relieving some of the burden. Warm skin against her cheek, a hand on her hair, a leg over hers pinning her to the mattress.
She flinched for a minute as that memory became more clear. She remembered being exhausted, so exhausted she couldn't do anything but lay there, letting the rigors have their way with her, but something held her down, relieving her muscles of their task, the warmth of the leg soothing her skin as well as her muscles. A small crease appeared on her forehead as she tried to place this memory into what she knew had happened. She was still sitting there deep in thought when Chakotay returned.
He noticed the crease on her forehead, the slight frown on her face. Hyper-attuned as he was to her physical state, it set alarm bells off in his head.
"Hey..." he said gently, coming to crouch near the bed at her side, "what's wrong? Do you have a headache?"
She blinked a few times, then looked at him with slight confusion. "No, it's fine. I just feel tired." A slight scowl passed over her features again. "Everything is just so hazy, I'm trying to remember what happened in the past two days."
"I'm not surprised you don't remember. You were pretty out of it for most of it." He gave an involuntary shudder at the memory of it.
"It was that bad?" she asked, wishing her would say no.
"Kathryn, I thought you were going to die right in front of me. I gave you every medication I could think of, and nothing stopped the fever," he admitted. "You shook so hard with the fever that you moved the bed over 4 centimeters." He looked down to the floor where the indentation left by the bed was at least 4 centimeters away from where the bed currently sat.
She looked up at him with large eyes, concern flooding her features. Something clicked in her brain and she asked, "Chakotay? Did you get in the bed with me?"
He looked up at her suddenly with a look of embarrassment that he couldn't get off his face fast enough. He looked away quickly. "Uhhh, I..."
Feeling bad for making him feel embarrassed she said "I only ask because I remember some things, but nothing really makes sense, and I don't know what's real, or if it was a dream."
Well, now his mind was racing. Was she in the habit of dreaming about being in bed with him? Is that more likely than him actually climbing into her bed in her mind? He'd had his own dreams, especially since seeing her wet from the bath the evening they'd met the primate, but he never imagined she allowed herself the same pleasure, or penance.
"Umm." He cleared his throat. "I'm sorry, Kathryn." He looked uncomfortable, but met her eyes without shame. "I did. I was desperate." Their eyes locked for another breathe before he went on. "The fever was so terrible, your body was wasting away in front of me. I had tried every single medication I could think of, that the doctors reports suggested, that the computer mentioned, and nothing stopped it. Your body was destroying itself and...and I thought you had given up. I didn't know what else to do, but thought maybe I could stop the tremors if I could hold you tight enough, maybe the body heat, or something... I don't know. I didn't know what else to do and I was afraid you were going to die and leave me." His dark eyes met hers and the honesty shown out of them like a laser. "I'm sorry for making you uncomfortable." He could see by her body language that she wasn't happy about the idea.
He had misinterpreted her however, as he usually did. She was uncomfortable, but not because of his actions. She was distressed by the idea of being so ill he had been afraid she was going to die and horrified by the idea of him being here alone. And as she contemplated that idea, the thought that perhaps the same would happen to him, terrorized her.
"Don't be sorry," she said firmly. "You did everything you could, and maybe that was what made the difference." She gave him a small small and reached out to grab his hand. She looked up at him almost shyly. "It's all very muddy, but it's not a bad memory," she said quietly.
The breath went out of him suddenly and he thought he might collapse. He leaned over and gathered her to him, embracing her in a hug. He clung to her and choked back a sob. After a minute he pulled back and held her face in his hands and stared at her.
Sunken blue eyes looked back at him, with smudges under them so heavy they looked gray. He cradled her head, feeling her slender neck between his hands and leaned forward, resting his forehead on hers and sighed heavily.
"Thank you for not giving up," he murmured gently against her cheek.
She closed her eyes as she rested her fatigued body against his. "I almost did, Chakotay. It would've been so easy to just slip away."
He pulled back and looked her her, keeping her hand in his. "Why didn't you?"
She didn't look up for a moment. He saw her blink several times, keeping her eyes closed for a long moment before she spoke. "You. I couldn't leave you."