DISCLAIMER: Everything of any worth belongs to Paramount.
NOTES: Episode Add on For Renaissance Man
Part 9 - Loneliness
" Computer, pause music. I didn't wake you, did I? "
The Doctor watched as the captain leant against the railing, her eyes bleary.
" That's all right, Doctor. Fifteen minutes of sleep is really all I need," Kathryn sighed as she forced her feet in the direction of the replicator. " Coffee, black".
Kathryn inhaled the burnt scent of the bean that lingered, savouring the soothing effect it had on her. She felt awful, and she probably looked worse she thought. She really didn't care. It was only her and the doctor and he was as resolutely unaffected by her coiffure as he had ever been. Talking of the doctor, she thought, as she turned to face the EMH.
" Maybe you should pay a little more attention to flying and a little less to singing," she reminded the hologram acerbically.
Equally as usual, it seemed to be like water off a duck's back.
" As a hologram, I can handle a variety of tasks at once. In addition to piloting the Flyer, I'm writing a paper on the physiological stresses of long duration space flight and taking holo-images of this Mutara-class nebula," the Doctor crowed.
Janeway felt her eyes trying to roll in their sockets but kept her best captain face on it all.
" With a hologram on board, who needs a crew? " She quipped cuttingly.
She was, she knew, thought of as the accomplished master of the witty cut down. She had always been quick when it came to the exchange of words, both in jest and in seriousness. But she would have to admit, that the true depth of her skills had been honed here in the Delta Quadrant, on the bridge, with Tom Paris as her unfailing victim. However today she failed to take into account the depth of the Doctor's ego. It hadn't been too scarred from his dealings with the publisher Broht. In fact quite the opposite. His ego seemed more swelled than ever now. As if on queue, the Doctor drifted into another diatribe on the holographic question.
" I'd never admit this to anyone else," he began, eyeing the captain conspiratorially, " but there was a time when I would have given anything to be flesh and blood, but I've come to realise that being a hologram is far superior."
" Really ?" Janeway arched an eyebrow as she looked at him.
Kathryn sighed inwardly as she sipped her coffee. She tried hard to be annoyed at the Doctor, but as she swallowed her coffee and listened as he admitted that a little time with her gave him such pleasure, Kathryn felt her anger ebbing away. For all his pomp and bluster, the EMH was a good friend. And right now she needed a friend.
If anyone had told Kathryn a year ago that she was going to be the one to run away from home, she would have laughed in their face and told them how ridiculous the concept was. Yet here she was, accompanying the EMH to a medical symposium. Running away.
Damn, Kathryn muttered to herself. Here she was, fifty years old, Captain of an Intrepid Class Starship 30,000 light years from home and she was running away. Perhaps not physically, but certainly figuratively. She had been the only taker of the offer from the doctor to attend a medical symposium, her colleagues all suddenly busy, with their calendars full. By the looks that she had garnered from the rest of the senior staff, she had perhaps a littler too eager a taker. But the thought of getting off of Voyager had been too powerful to resist. She had always thought of the ship as home, its environs as safe. Now it seemed claustrophobic and she felt like she was suffocating. She had over the years managed to lose herself in what had always seemed like the vast endless corridors of Voyager. She had, in the past, gone months without running into Chakotay socially and he only lived next door. Now he seemed to be everywhere she went. The corridors had become like ever decreasing boxes, boxes that she had felt powerless to find her way out of.
It was ironic then that her salvation lay within the even small confines of the Delta Flyer with a man whose persistence of ego had in the past almost driven her to despair in the past.
She didn't care now. It was just the two of them. No bridge, no reports. No Seven. No Chakotay
It was like heaven.
Janeway was pulled from heaven by the sudden jolt of the ship. If she hadn't spent the last seven years developing battle legs, she was certain that she would have pitched over and found herself sprawled on the deck, covered in coffee. She stowed the mug and attempted to re-take command from the Doctor.
" Sit down and relax, Captain. You've got a hologram at the helm," the Doctor announced as he kept his seat and returned his attention to the displays in front of him.
Somehow, Kathryn thought nervously as she sat beside the EMH, she didn't find that very comforting.
" As punishment, their law demands that our ship be dismantled. "
Chakotay couldn't believe what he was hearing. How the hell they had ended up in this predicament was beyond him. Kathryn had only gone away for a few days for heaven's sake.
" Obviously we're not going to let that happen," Chakotay replied earnestly, but he didn't like the look in Kathryn's eye.
" I spent three hours explaining our situation to their Supreme Archon, a thoroughly unpleasant man. I convinced him to spare Voyager, but at a price," Kathryn took a breath and Chakotay watched his eyes narrowing suspiciously. Sighing Kathryn uttered the 'but' that Chakotay was waiting for," We're going to rendezvous with their armada and surrender our warp core at a class M planet where they've agreed to let us settle"
" Settle! " Chakotay almost yelled.
He vaguely noticed the reproachful look, the slight glare and massive frown that Kathryn had given him. He could feel his temper rising. To him it sounded like she had already decided to do it.
" I didn't make this decision lightly, Chakotay," she continued in as level a tone as she could muster.
The sense of finality to that statement was unmistakeable. It was a tone Chakotay was very familiar with. He had seen it first hand many times when he had argued with Kathryn. But even in all those arguments in the past, there had always been an element of question to Kathryn's speeches. They were the moments where he latched on, gave her his opinion and at times, a piece of his mind too. Today her tone was definitive. There would be no consideration of question.
" We have to bring the senior staff in on this," he demanded," We can find a way to evade their ships, or adapt our sensors to their cloaking technology. "
" We could try that and we might make it past their armada," Kathryn countered," but we could lose a lot of people in the process. Maybe the entire ship. "
Chakotay definitely didn't like her tone.
" Kathryn, there's got to be another way," he implored her.
He watched as she turned away slightly, rubbing the bridge of her nose. He had noticed the change in Kathryn ever since he had asked her opinion of his relationship with Seven. He wasn't as oblivious to things as Kathryn sometimes thought that he was. She had said a few things that night that had worried him, and it seemed that despite her protestations to the contrary there was still a part of her that toyed with idea of putting down roots, especially since Neelix had left.
" I'm tired, Chakotay," she confirmed, as if hearing his thoughts. But before he could answer she continued," Tired of casualty reports, of continually risking my people on the slim chance that we'll make it home in one piece. "
" We've found our way out of worse situations," Chakotay almost pleaded with her.
Part of him wanted to reach out and guide her through her confusion, but he knew that was probably the last thing that Kathryn would want. She preferred seclusion when unduly burdened by command. And she had made it pretty clear to him the other week that although she considered him her closest friend, she didn't consider him more than that. She wouldn't appreciate him trying to speak to her as anything more than her first officer.
" Set a course," she broke the silence between them bluntly, blatantly avoiding the look of curious suspicion that he gave her.
" What am I supposed to tell the crew? " Chakotay asked.
" For now, I'd like to keep this between us".
Now Chakotay knew there was something wrong. Even when Kathryn was at her worst, she had never been ashamed of her actions to the point of hiding them from her crew. She had not shied away from the fact that she had been willing to seriously hurt Noah Lessing, even though she had later deeply regretted her actions. To hide something this momentous from the senior staff, it just wasn't Kathryn.
" It's not like you to keep your people " Chakotay began to warn her, hoping Kathryn would come to her sense, but Kathryn cut him off
" I'll make an announcement when the time is right," she cut in," Dismissed. "
Chakotay doubted that there was likely to be a right time to drop such a bombshell on the crew. He watched Kathryn, looking for some sign of reason in her, but her face remained motionless, her eyes cold and devoid of emotion, not even regret. She turned away from him, her moves stiff and controlled and after moments watching her, Chakotay left the room.
He fairly stormed on to the bridge and issued the course change Kathryn had ordered. Paris looked up from his terminal, but lost the urge to utter a pithy witticism when he saw the look on his friend's face. So things weren't too hot again between the Captain and the commander, Paris thought, and that usually didn't bode well or the rest of them. He exchanged a wary look with Harry before he returned his attention to his station.
Chakotay sat heavily in his chair and slammed up the console between his and Kathryn's chairs. The force with which he did so drew more than a few looks from the others around him, but he ignored them. He could feel Tuvok's eyes on him, and he briefly considered violating Kathryn's orders and revealing all to the Vulcan. But he knew that Tuvok would side with Kathryn before him, partly out of honour to his captain, partly out of a traditional antipathy between him and Chakotay. No, Chakotay thought, if he was going to get any support in the future, he would have to prove that Kathryn was acting irrationally, and for that he needed the Doctor.
Chakotay felt his stomach knot as he realised that what he was considering doing. As the hours passed, the knot seemed to tighten. He knew that when the time came, and if Kathryn carried on like she was, he would be forced yet again to betray Kathryn. Before he had time to dismiss the thought, he received a call from B'Elanna with some disturbing orders from the captain. Sighing heavily, he headed for Sickbay.
The Doctor decided that he was having a very bad day. He stood as still as possible as he heard Chakotay leave. He had observed enough of the Captain to know that when she was really angry, she had a habit of turning to stone, as if it was all that contained her fury. He had visibly sighed and felt his shoulders shrink as the doors closed and he was finally alone.
It had all seemed like such a good idea at first. At least, as good an idea as they were likely to get considering the situation that he and the captain had found themselves in. He knew the captain wasn't exactly pleased with his decision to go along with their captor's plan, but he had seen little choice himself. He had meant it when he had told her that he considered her his friend. And if nothing else, he had learned in the last few years, that friendship was one of the things that mattered most to him. He wasn't about to turn his back on his principles just because the going got tough. He had just returned to the ready room when the his own comm badge chirped.
" Chakotay to the Doctor. "
The Doctor's head snapped up straight as he heard the Commander's voice come across the comm.
" Go ahead, Commander," he replied in his best synthesised captain's voice, swallowing hard.
" Report to Sickbay immediately," the Commander barked.
The Doctor felt his eyes rolling in their sockets and his chest emitted a heavy sigh. Reaching down towards his boot, he keyed the buttons on his mobile emitter and the visage of the captain morphed away, leaving him looking at a more familiar and comfortable face. He couldn't help but feel relieved as he called for a site to site transport and emerged in Sickbay.
" Something wrong with the turbolifts? " Chakotay snapped as the Doctor materialised.
" You did say immediately," The Doctor replied, quelling a moment of panic with his usual brand of sarcasm. People rarely listened to him when it mattered and he hoped they would continue to ignore him now." How can I help you? "
" I'm concerned about the Captain. She doesn't seem to be feeling well," Chakotay lied.
The Doctor saw how difficult this seemed for the Commander and felt a brief moment of regret at what he was causing his commanding officer. He knew his reticence would force Chakotay into a difficult position, but the EMH had realised just how much this pained the Commander personally. The captain was his friend, he knew. And Chakotay prized his friendship with others more dearly than perhaps even the Doctor did. The Doctor had never been forced to place his existence on the line for his friends. Chakotay had done it many times, and the Doctor hoped that when the time came he would have as much courage. The Doctor voiced a silent apology to the First Officer as he the man began to speak.
" What's wrong? " the Doctor asked, returning his thoughts to the conversation.
" I'm not sure. She went to her quarters with a headache," Chakotay replied.
" I'll bring her an analgesic," the Doctor offered in as helpful a voice as he could muster.
" I was wondering if this could be related to your encounter with the aliens," Chakotay ventured nervously and the EMH knew that it was taking all the efforts the Commander had not give himself away with the tell-tale tugging of his ear.
" You think they harmed her?" the Doctor asked, doing his best impression of concerned innocence.
" You tell me," Chakotay asked, a little more steel in his voice than he had originally intended. " What did they do to her? "
The EMH turned to arrange the equipment on a nearby tray as he gave himself time to think of an answer. He was fast beginning to realise that the life of an undercover agent, as it were, was not one that he was really that suited too. He relished the challenge and was, he thought, rather adept at thinking on his feet. But the duplicitous nature of the job did not appeal to him. As Tom Paris often annoyingly told him, he was one to often call a spade a spade regardless of the consequences. Prevarication was just not something that he did well.
" I'm not sure, exactly." the Doctor continued eventually," The aliens took my program offline as soon as they boarded the Flyer. The Captain reactivated me a few hours later and told me she'd been interrogated. Naturally, I examined her to make sure she was all right".
Yes, he decided silently, it all sounded plausible. Chakotay wasn't so easily thrown from the scent though.
" Did you find anything unusual? " the Commander pushed.
" I suppose I'm violating Doctor-patient confidentiality by telling you this," the Doctor mused, hoping that his own fabricated report would be enough to dissuade the Commander from further questioning," but, she was fine. "
It didn't seem to work and Chakotay seemed as relentless as ever.
" I'd like you to give her a more thorough examination," he demanded.
" Gladly, but you know how she feels about physicals," the Doctor tried another tack.
"You can be very persuasive, Doctor," the Commander continued with one of those tones that stated that he would not brook any continued opposition,"Contact me as soon as you're done. "
" Aye, sir ".
Kathryn Janeway was wondering just how bad her day could possibly get as she watched Chakotay confront 'her' outside her quarters on the view screen. She remembered with a fond smile one of the first things that she had realised she loved about Chakotay; the fact that when he got the bit between his teeth he was tenacious. He didn't stop until he got the truth. She was never prouder of him than now as she watched him confront 'her' again outside her quarters.
" I'm concerned, " Chakotay said to 'her'.
And Kathryn was touched by the look in his eyes. She had thought that look gone. He saw suspicious too, the strange look that he had when he knew something wasn't right but he couldn't quite get a grasp on what it was.
Chakotay pushed a little further.
" I think you do. Fifteen years ago, you were the Lieutenant who was kept in the dark. If you hadn't questioned your Captain's orders the entire away team would have been lost."
Kathryn's head jerked up and she returned her wandering attention to the scene being played out on the screen. She'd never told him anything of the sort. She smiled as she watched Chakotay watch her, his eyes narrowing as he waited for her answer.
" This situation's entirely different," the Doctor brushed off.
Bingo, Kathryn cheered to herself as she watched the knowing look on her First Officer's face. Now this ridiculous charade would come to and end.
" You never told me that story. I made it up," Chakotay countered, as he brought his hand up to tap his communicator," Chakotay to Tuvok…."
Kathryn let out an involuntary yelp as she watched the Doctor attack her friend, felt her heart jump as she watched her friend rendered unconscious and then transported to the morgue. That was an image, Kathryn thought to herself, that she wished she would never see again.
For the first time Kathryn felt afraid. She had been furious, aggravated and even somewhat bemused over the course of the last 24 hours, but she had never been afraid. Fear was something that she just didn't do, something she rarely had time for.
But now she was afraid. Her hope had been Chakotay. The Doctor's charade was convincing; he was after all a master of observation. If any one was ever to know the difference though, it was Chakotay. He would know every foible and nuance of speech, stance, attitude. His first reactions to her and his visits to the Doctor had proven that he was already suspicious as soon as she had returned home. She was apparently even more transparent and readable to him than she thought he was. It was appealing and worrying at the same time.
And now he was gone. She felt a fresh surge of anger at the Doctor. She had been furious with him at first when she had awoken in this cell and he had told her that he had decided to go along with the Heirachy's plan. She had argued with him, asked him to think about what he would have done were he following his command protocols. But the man had truly looked pained at the decision that he was being forced to make, and so in the end Kathryn had eased up on him. Part of her had been sure that he would have said or done something to inform Chakotay, a subtle clue or a passed note. But he hadn't done anything of the sort and now the man she had been sure was her only hope was laying comatose in the morgue.
Slumping down on the bunk, Kathryn felt her hopes sink. Yes she thought, she was starting to become frightened.
Chakotay rubbed the bridge of his nose and tiredly looked at the screen in front of him. He was angry with himself. He had known there was something different about Kathryn, something not quite right. It just hadn't seemed like her to suddenly want to put down roots after so long fighting to get home. He should have seen the Doctor coming when he had attacked him.
" I'm getting old," he muttered to himself.
" Aren't we all," B'Elanna agreed as she waddled over to sit beside him.
" I should have seen this coming, B'Elanna," Chakotay sighed.
" Hey, don't beat yourself up," B'Elanna chided gently as she eased herself down into his chair and rubbed her stomach," It was the doctor after all and he knows us all better than anyone."
Chakotay raised a disbelieving eyebrow, but knew better than to argue with B'Elanna.
" She'll be fine, you know," B'Elanna finally whispered after a quiet minute passed between them. She had always known him well, knew what he was thinking and when.
" Who ?" Chakotay said, but they were mere words.
" The captain," replied B'Elanna, equally as nominally, " I know you. She's you friend. She's probably closer to you than I am."
" We've been through some battles together, " Chakotay smiled, and he smiled at the thought of the fights he and Kathryn had had together. Sometimes they had been against each other, most times they stood side by side.
" A wise man once told me, there are two ways to see a person and really know them, " B'Elanna mused," one is to watch them sleep, the other is to watch them fight."
Chakotay smiled as he looked up at her.
" Who told you that ?" he asked.
" You did," she grinned back.
" Well that just proves its not worth listening too," he sighed.
" Oh I don't know, " B'Elanna replied, her mind temporarily lost in thought, " I found I liked the way that Tom fought, I admired him for it. Made me pay attention to other things about him. Then I found that I still liked him when I watched him sleep. So I married him."
Chakotay smiled. He would have to admit that he had never seen B'Elanna so happy. She seemed to have found peace after so many years of being at odds with the world. He envied her contentment.
" So what are you suggesting ?" he asked, suddenly serious, as if everything in his future rested on the verdict that B'Elanna gave him today.
" It's not my place to suggest anything," B'Elanna sighed, reaching out to briefly touch his arm," but I'm here, we'll all be here for you when you need us."
Chakotay nodded. He had a feeling he would need them.
Kathryn Janeway wandered the corridors of her ship feeling a wonderful sense of peace and homeliness. Part of her now wondered how she had ever thought that she could run away from it. She had been forced, coerced and down right man-handled into a week's rest by her First Officer. Kathryn had indulged in a few lay ins, a day or so traipsing around her quarters in her sweats, catching up on nothing but reading.
But she had also had time to think. The Doctor was right. She had ignored friendships with others in order to spend time with Chakotay. They had been each others world for so long, that they had lost contact with some of the relationships that they had enjoyed in the earlier years of their trip. She didn't think it had been a bad thing, but she felt guilt over how easily she had thrust other relationships to the back burner.
Before she had had time to tell the Doctor that she had decided recently that the time had come to expand her social horizons, they had been rescued and returned to the ship, the Doctor had made his death bed confession to Seven and had then, when the excess personalities had been purged just before his matrix began to decompile, gone into hiding.
And it had been over breakfast this morning that she realised that he was the one person on board this ship who was probably lonelier than she was right now.
" Captain, do you, do you need medical attention? "
Kathryn smiled as she watched him walk around his desk and take a seat. She understood the symbol very well. There had always been something safe and supportive about her desk when she had felt less than her usual self.
" No," she replied gently as she watched his awkward posture.
She was still surprised, even now, that the person who had seemed nothing more to her than a program when she first had him activated had now blossomed into such a robust and profoundly important part of their lives. What she had wanted to call nothing more than a collection of photons, she now saw as a friend and trusted officer, who right now looked like he needed a hug .
" You've been keeping to yourself lately," Kathryn continued, watching as his shoulders shrugged, "Your friends are worried about you. "
She saw the Doctor stiffen slightly at the mention of his friends.
" After my deathbed confession, I wasn't sure I had any friends left," he looked at her, as if she were one of the ones that mattered most to him," I overstepped my bounds in documenting your command decisions. It happened a long time ago, before I considered myself to be a part of your crew".
He offered the apology, but he never expected her to take it. So much had changed over the years. He never thought that his reports would come to light again.
" Oh, I'm not here to make you grovel," Kathryn began," I'm here to punish you for your insubordinate behaviour. "
There was an element of truth to that, Kathryn thought. She wasn't about to make him suffer for making a log in bad judgement seven years ago, nor was she really going to hold his good intentions against him now. She had been angry with him over his poor judgement call in this whole situation for a while, but her enforced rest had given her time to really consider what she would have done in his place. The answer that she would have probably have done the same thing surprised her a little. This crew meant as much to the Doctor as it meant to her. In reality, it was the only family he had ever known. The same attachment to certain individuals that had made him act in such discordance with her orders was the same drive that drove her. She had realised after a lot of thought, that she and the EMH had a lot in common.
" I understand," the EMH replied bringing her back to the present.
Kathryn mustered her most official voice and turned to look at the Doctor.
" You're hereby denied the use of your mobile emitter for six days," she noted, seriously," Since you haven't left Sickbay for a week, we'll call it time served."
The Doctor tried his best to show thanks that he didn't feel.
" I appreciate the gesture Captain, but I've got a lot of work to catch up on," he replied, but Kathryn was familiar with that argument already and as much as it had already stopped working for her against Chakotay, it wouldn't work for the EMH.
" I'm sorry to hear that. I was hoping you might be free for a cup of coffee on the holodeck. I know a little sidewalk cafe in Buenos Aires," Kathryn offered ," You said you wanted us to socialise more. "
The offer seemed to energise the EMH.
" I suppose Mister Paris can finish this," he replied and Kathryn felt a strange sense of pleasure as the EMH accepted.
Smiling, she nodded with her head for him to follow.
" Now, when you're on the holodeck with the Captain there are two rules you have to follow," she announced as they exited the sickbay.
" I understand," the EMH replied, eagerly.
" First, leave your rank at the door. "
" Not a problem. The second? "
" No opera."
She saw the Doctor smile gently and nod as they left sickbay. They headed for the holodeck for coffee, engaged in what Kathryn surprisingly found to be rather stimulating discussions on a number of passions they shared in common. She was actually rather lost when the afternoon ended and they parted company, making firm plans to meet up again the following day. Life was perhaps not going to be as lonely as she thought.