Chapter 2.

I don't own them, just playing for a lil bit.

He continued to stare at the stars.

Kathryn and Edward were playing one of the clapping games he had taught them, the one he always saw his sisters playing when they were young. Doe in the tree, breeze in the air, one two three four, braid my hair! Sun will shine, rain will fall, always hear the eagle's call! He decided to teach them that instead of Miss Mary Mack. One of the boys at the Academy had a little sister who would visit and sing it all day long. It was irritating.

He wondered if Kathryn had played Miss Mary Mack. He had never asked her, and now he regretted that. It was the little things he didn't know about her that drove him insane. He didn't know what her first word had been, for instance. Little Kathryn's first word had been 'tree', and Edward, who was much quieter than his sister and hadn't started talking until he was three, had started out simply with 'daddy'. Chakotay's first word had been 'baby', since his sister was born only a year after him. But he had no idea what Kathryn's first word had been. And that really bothered him.

But they had talked about her childhood, quite a bit actually. He was grateful for that, grateful that he'd be able to tell her children about what she had been like as a girl. He read her favorite fairy tales to them, fairy tales that Kathryn herself had composed from her memory while she was pregnant. He remembered the first time they had talked about it, when they had first taken the boat out on the lake, testing it before they took it down the river. It had been a beautiful day, and the comfort between them was starting to increase into something just a little bit more than friends. And he knew that slowly, her walls were starting to come down.

Seven years ago…

Kathryn had never looked more beautiful.

Of course, he knew she was beautiful. He wasn't blind, after all. But he had always equated her beauty with a sort of strength, no so much femininity. But here, as she lounged in the rays of the mid-afternoon sun, her long hair flowing around her like a cloud, she looked every bit the woman that she was and nothing at all like the Captain.

She opened one eye and smiled lazily at him. "What are you looking at?"

He grinned. "You look so relaxed. I've never seen you look so lazy."

She laughed. "That's because until recently, whenever you saw me I was preparing myself for the inevitable red-alert. Not much a chance of that here." She let a hand trail over the side of the boat into the water. "This boat is spectacular, Chakotay."

Chakotay leaned back and looked around. He was actually very proud of this boat. He had worked so hard on it, making sure the backrests were sanded to silken smoothness (he knew Kathryn's back was sensitive), that the wood didn't have any tiny holes that could become a problem, that it was aerodynamic and buoyant enough, etc. He had decided not to paint it, opting instead for a high gloss which made it look more natural. He was pleased to see how it complimented the auburn in Kathryn's hair, and the flush on her cheeks. Then he mentally kicked himself for being so sappy. What was happening to him? She was just a woman, after all! It wasn't like he had never been alone with a woman before.

"She is a beauty. The only thing missing now is a name."

"Well, we haven't named the monkey yet, either."

"I thought he was a primate," Chakotay teased.

She shook her head ruefully. "I've decided to succumb to monkey, no matter how…imprecise it is." She swirled her hand in the still lake. "But I have been thinking of a name for him, actually." She grinned. "What do you think of Abu?"

He snorted. "Abu! How did you come up with that?"

"It was the name of a monkey in an old holovid my mother used to put on for us. Have you ever heard the legend of Aladdin?"

Chakotay quirked an eyebrow. "I can't say as I have."

"It's and old Arabic tale, about a poor street urchin who finds a genie. There have been so many different versions of it. In some, he finds the genie in a ring, but the most common version had Aladdin finding the genie in the lamp. The version we watched had that. It was a Disney vid…I guess you don't know about Disney, either."

"Didn't have holovids at all, Kathryn." He said, amused.

"Right. Well, Disney was this huge conglomerate hundreds of years ago. They didn't shut down until the third world war, and once the dust settled from that, after First Contact, they began to rebuild. Disneyworld still exists on Earth." She grinned. "My parents took us there. It's an amusement park. Anyway, they produced thousand of movies between the 20th and 21st centuries, and Aladdin was one of them. It was my favorite. Well, besides The Little Mermaid." She blushed. "And…Sleeping Beauty. That was my absolute favorite." She covered her face. "I can't believe I'm talking about this! It's so childish."

Chakotay laughed and pulled her hands down from her face. "It's kind of cute. You hardly ever talk about being a kid. I bet I would've liked you as a kid. And actually, I have heard of Sleeping Beauty. I saw a production of the ballet in Russia while I was at the academy. The score is beautiful."

Kathryn laughed. "You went to see a ballet? I'm sorry, I just have a hard time imagining it. I can't see men being anything other than bored at ballets. I know my father hated them, and Mark said they were an absolute waste of time. Admiral Paris would beg me to come up with plausible excuses whenever his wife wanted to go."

Chakotay sniffed. "Well, I suppose I'm not like other men. I actually enjoyed it."

She smirked. "Is that what you told the beautiful young lady who made you go?"

"For your information, Miss Know It All, I went to see it with my cousin and his wife. They were the only family I had on Earth from my mother's side, and they invited me one night. I admit, I was dubious about it at first, but really, I thought it was wonderful."

"You never mentioned you had relatives on Earth."

"Yeah, my cousin lived in Ohio. And since…" he swallowed. "Well, since. My mother and sister spend a lot of time visiting them. Or, at least last I heard they did."

Kathryn smiled softly. "Well, would you like to know the legend behind Sleeping Beauty?"

"Is the version I saw not the original?"

"Oh, no, not at all. That's a more recent incarnation. Sleeping Beauty goes as far back as…well, the 15 or 1600's. And it's a little different from the modern version."

"Well," he grinned, glad she had switched the subject back from his family. "You had to listen to my Angry Warrior tale. So go ahead. Tell me a story."

She smiled. 'Well, if you insist…There are several different versions. For some reason, roses also seem to show up in these stories, but roses are usually featured in a lot of fairy tales. Anyway, generally, there was a princess who was much waited for. At her christening, the fairies who were invited blessed her with many gifts, such as beauty and wit, but there was an evil fairy who hadn't been invited. Enraged, she placed a curse on the baby, saying that she would prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel and die. This was supposed to happen when she was fifteen or sixteen, so until then, her father ordered all the spinning wheels in the kingdom destroyed. But it all happened as the evil fairy said; the princess found a spinning wheel in the castle, usually said to have been put there by the evil fairy, and she pricked her finger, falling into a deep sleep. A wall of thorns or deep woods surrounded the castle, and the whole kingdom fell into a deep sleep like the princess. After many years, a prince came, and the princess woke up when he entered her room."

"Sounds like the tale I know."

"Then they went to live with his mother and had twins. The mother was an ogre, and she demanded the children be made into her dinner. So they were substituted with animals, and hidden so that the queen wouldn't know."

Chakotay's eyes widened. "These are the kimnds of tales you learned as a child?"

Kathbryn laughed. "No. I researched it myself when I got older. I wanted to know where it came from. That version was written by someone called Perrault, I believe. Of course, it ended with the prince retunring from his travels and saving his wife and children. Always a happily ever after." She thought a moment. "But there is another version I always found interesting. I don't remember who it was from…I think it may have been a related tale by someone called Basile? I'm not quite sure. In this version, the prince came to her when she was asleep, and he either raped her, or he had someone secretly marry them and then consummated the marriage, all while she was asleep. She became pregnant, and gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl. She didn't wake up until one of the babies sucked whatever she had been pricked with out of her finger. So she wakes up, the prince shows up, and of course, they live…"

"Happily ever after." Chakotay said with a grin. "Yeah, I get that part."

"That version is actually one of my favorites."

"Let me guess…because it wasn't the prince who woke her up?"

She tossed a towel at him "As a matter of fact, yes. I liked that it was her children who pulled her out of her sleep. It was something for her to live for,"

"She didn't want to live just for the charms of her handsome young rapist?" he asked, flashing his dimples at her.

She smiled wryly. "I'm sure that wasn't one of her motives. She only woke up when she gave birth. To me, that's pretty signifigant."

"So you're saying that if you happen to fall into…I don't know, a magical coma, you'll only wake up if I impregnate you?" He nodded. "Note to self, impregnate Kathryn should she ever-"

Then there was the sound of a splash, and of Kathryn laughing as he flailed around in the lake. "You pushed me in!" he shouted in disbelief.

"Serves you right," she giggled. Taking on him, she helped him back into the boat, and handed him a towel. "Sorry, it was just too tempting."

"You do realize that I am the captain of this vessel."

"Well I guess you'll just have to throw me in the brig." She said sarcastically. "Anyway, it's what you get," she said primly. "Even Snow White wasn't treated this disrespectfully."

He groaned. "Okay, who the hell is Snow White?"

"Kind of the same as Sleeping Beauty, actually. Only instead of a evil fairy, it was an evil step-mother, and there were seven dwarves who hid the princess. She was poisoned by her step-mother, and they all thought she was dead. They put her in a glass coffin, until a prince came and begged the dwarves to let him take it, because he found her so beautiful." She handed him a sweatshirt she had in her bag. She could see he was starting to get chilly. "As they were carting her off to his castle, they knocked the coffin, and the thump made the piece of poisoned apple fly out of her throat. In other versions, like in Sleeping Beauty, the prince kissed her and she woke up. And they lived happily ever after."

Chakotay rolled his eyes. "Of course. You know, I like that version of Sleeping Beauty you talked about, the one where one of her babies sucks out whatever it was stuck in her finger, and she wakes up. That's really inspiring, that her baby saved her life."

Kathryn grinned. "One can only hope that one's child is that enterprising."

"I have to say, I'm seeing a whole new side to you today. I would never have guessed you were so into fairy tales."

She shrugged. "It's my secret indulgence. I guess I didn't want anyone to know I liked them because they portray women as such useless creatures who always need a man to rescue them. But I'll admit, there was always a part of me that wanted to live a fairy tale." Then she grinned wickedly. "And might I remind you, sir, that there's a lot you don't know about me?"

He smirked and held her gaze. "Well, I'm willing to find out."

Now, as he listened to his children, and searched the stars for her ship, come too late to take her home, he couldn't help but think that their lives here had taken a grotesque spin on her favorite fairy tales. Only this time, it had been the twin babies who had put her to sleep, not woken her up. And he was certainly no prince to be able to give her the kiss of life.

Although Kathryn had gotten her wish...she had become a fairy tale...Sleeping Beauty…laying in eternal slumber inside Snow White's glass coffin.

But there was no happily ever after in this story.

TBC

Sorry to be so gloomy! I promise to make the next chapter a little upbeat.

So, what do we think? Hate it? Love it? I know the fairy tale stuff was a little tedious, but I got a little carried away. I promise the next one will be better!

But now at least you know the stories behind some fairy tales. Perrault and Basile actually are responsible for versions of what we know as Sleeping Beauty, so I guess I disclaim them. Credit to them, credit to them! The other fairy tales obviously don't belong to me, I make no profit off any of this, yadda yadda yadda.

So review!