Harry looked at the chronometer on the wall. 1928 hours. She'd be here in two minutes. 'Well, Harry,' he thought, 'better make the most of it. Tom and Chakotay were right. You have to talk with her. Tell her how you feel.' He still worried about how she would respond, and he wavered between expecting a firm 'no' or a polite 'maybe' in response from Seven.

He looked around his cabin to make sure everything was all right. Dinner - check. Dress shirt and slacks - check. Illumination - check.

Confidence - maybe.

The door chirped. "Come in!" he shouted.

Seven of Nine walked in. He had to stop his jaw from dropping - she was wearing her silver catsuit, the one he hadn't seen in nearly a year. It was his favourite of the clothes he'd seen her wear, although her velocity outfit, which he had seen one day after running into Seven and Captain in the hallway after one of their matches, was a close second.

"Hi, Seven," he said, composing himself. "I'm glad you came. Please, sit down. I figured you'd be on time, so I have dinner all ready."

"I am always punctual, Ensign."

He smiled. "I know, Seven. Well," he said, gesturing to the table, "Let's eat!"

Seven noticed the artificial illumination in the Ensign's cabin was low, and the table was lit by candles. She raised an eyebrow. "Candlelight, Ensign?"

"Please call me Harry tonight, Seven. You have twice already this week." She nodded in response. "I just like candlelight. It makes the room look nice."

Seven ran through a checklist in her head. Low illumination, dilated pupils, personal conversation, and a meal. She thought back to their altercation in the mess hall a year ago, where she had asked En- Harry - if he loved her. She had learned enough about human behaviour since then not to ask the same question. She was certainly not going to ask him to copulate. Every time she mentioned that he seemed to leave the room.

His attempts to create a 'romantic' mood pleased her, however irrational it might be. She gave him a small smile, and responded to him, "Yes, it does look 'nice'."

He smiled back at her. This evening had begun better than he thought. "Well, for dinner, we're having - "

"I have studied the databases on Alpha Quadrant food, Harry. Let me guess." They each had a bowl of vegetables, the most predominant of which was lettuce. "Tossed salad." The 'main course' was long, thin strips of pasta in a white, rich looking sauce. "Fettucini alfredo, correct?"

Harry smiled at her. "That's it exactly, Seven."

She was pleased at this, but then frowned slightly. "This meal is missing something."

"What? What's it missing, Seven?"

Seven looked at him. "For a candlelit dinner such as this, would not a bottle of wine be appropriate?"

Harry was surprised she mentioned this, but said, "Yeah, it would." Then a sheepish grin. "But I ran out of replicator credits."

It was Seven's turn to give a slight grin. She seemed to be doing that a lot this evening. "I have numerous rations, however." She walked over to the replicator, and asked Harry, "What would be an appropriate wine, Harry? I lack any experience in choosing wines for meals."

Harry wasn't an expert at it either, so he said the first thing that popped into his head. "Uh, try a Beaujolais, 2371." He would ask for a 2373, the year he met Seven, but they were of course deep in the Delta Quadrant, and so the computer would have no idea what a 2373 wine would be like.

She replicated a bottle and two glasses, and brought it over to the table. She pored them each a glass, and said, "Now I believe it is appropriate to offer a toast." She looked at Harry, clearly expecting him to do the honours.

'Think, Harry. Something safe.' Then the answer came to him. He raised a glass. "To our friendship."

She gave him a genuine smile at that. "Our friendship," she repeated.

They ate their meal in silence. When they were done, Harry asked, "So, how did you like your meal, Seven?"

"It was nutritious and inoffensive to my palate. Thank you for inviting me, Harry."

"So..." he started nervously. He tapped his fingers together, trying to think of something to say.

Seven looked around his quarters while he was trying to find something to say. There was a black musical instrument sitting on his coffee table which was likely his clarinet. It was also likely that was what he had been playing when she came to his quarters the night of their argument with Lieutenant Torres. He had played beautifully, and she resolved to ask him to play for her sometime.

On his dresser were a number of pictures of people. One of the images leapt out at her.

It was a picture of her. She got up and walked over to it. It looked recent, as she was wearing her blue outfit in it. She was looking directly at whoever had taken the picture. Then she realized it must have been taken at Mr. Neelix's Prixin celebration three weeks before. Harry had brought a holoimager to the party, and had been taking pictures of everyone there. Hers was the only one from that party on his dresser.

There were three other pictures there. Unlike the one of her, each contained multiple people. One was of Harry in a Starfleet dress uniform, with a proud looking older couple beside him. The older man looked vaguely like Harry.

She held up the picture to Harry. "Are these your parents, Harry?"

Harry got up and stood next to her. "Yeah. That was taken upon my graduation from the Academy." He looked lost in memory for a moment. "Mom said she was so proud of me... That was taken a few weeks before I was assigned to Voyager. It was one of the last times I saw them." He wiped a tear away from his eye.

The other two pictures were of people familiar to her. One was of Lieutenants Paris and Torres playing pool at Lieutenant Paris' 'Sandrine's' holoprogram. The other was taken at Mr. Neelix's 'Talaxian Resort' program. It was of Harry, the Captain, Chakotay, Tuvok, Neelix, Paris, Torres, and a pretty women with long red curly hair. It took Seven a moment to recognize her as Kes, the Ocampan woman who had 'evolved' off of Voyager soon after Seven had joined the crew.

"Why do you have pictures of these people?" she asked.

"All of them are people I care about, Seven."

"The picture of me is the only one with a single person in it."

"Yes, well..." Harry didn't really know how to reply to that.

Seven turned to look at him. "Why had you been avoiding me, Harry?" she asked, completely changing the subject.

"Well... uh... in Astrometrics, when you and B'Elanna and I had that argument, I didn't know how to react to what you said."

Seven was confused. "Exactly what did I say that made you unsure?"

'No time like the present,' he thought. "When you told B'Elanna about what happened in the mess hall last year... I was embarrassed. And when you told her that you were certain that I didn't have a crush on you, it was like you were rejecting the idea out of hand. I didn't know what to say after that, so I just didn't." He went to sit down on the couch.

Harry patted the cushion beside his, indicating that he wanted her to sit beside him. She did not normally sit, but realized from her studies of human interaction that it might put him more at ease if she did. The last thing she wanted was for him to get uncomfortable again, leave and start avoiding her again. Even contemplating that possibility made her feel saddened.

"I was not 'rejecting the idea out of hand'," she said, sitting on the cushion he indicated. "Your actions last year indicated to me that she was mistaken. In addition, you made no other attempts to 'set a romantic mood' until this evening. That evidence contradicted Lieutenant Torres' assertion that you were in love with me, and so I gave her my analysis."

"Well, uh..." he stopped. Then he looked directly into her eyes. "You were mistaken, Seven."

Her eyes went wide. It was one thing to hear Lieutenant Torres, or even Lieutenant Paris, claim that Harry was in love with her. It was quite another to hear him say it. Sounding more unsure than she would have liked, she asked, "So you are in love with me, Harry?"

He took her hands into his. She had not been expecting this. She hadn't had much contact with other people's bodies, and certainly no contact in as tender a manner as with Harry's hands. It felt pleasurable. She had no urge to pull away.

"Yes, Seven, I am. I have been since the day we met. You were so alone, and so vulnerable, yet at the same time so strong an independent. You were a breath of fresh air. And I could tell that even underneath all that Borg armour, that there was a very pretty woman underneath." He kept looking straight at her as he said this. It was a struggle to maintain eye contact, and not to avert his gaze downward, but the assertive side of him he had been trying to show over the past six months paid off.

Seven smiled at that. "The day we first met, Harry, I beat you unconscious with a blow to the base of your skull. You were in love with me then?"

Harry chuckled. "Well, maybe 'love' is the wrong word for when that occurred, and when I first met you, but I certainly liked you. It became love shortly afterwards, though, I'm sure."

In a very low voice, she asked him, "When did you know you loved me?"

Harry took in a deep breath. "Honestly, Seven - that night in the mess hall. When I asked you to see the Ktarian moonrise with me. That's when I knew I loved you."

Seven was extremely surprised at this. She had hoped she wouldn't need to discuss the evening with him - it obviously made him very uncomfortable - but she had to know. So she took the risk that he wouldn't leave the room, and asked, "But you said you weren't in love with me! You didn't want to copulate!"

Harry shook his head. "Seven, you're making the old 'sex equals love' mistake. It doesn't."

"But love is often used to describe - "

Harry cut her off. "It's a different use of the word love than I'm using. I'm talking about romantic love. I'm talking about caring for, and longing to spend time with someone. I'm talking about a feeling of oneness, of being a half of a whole unit. I'm talking about love in the sense of wanting to build a life with someone."

Seven looked confused. "You wish to spend your life with me, Harry?"

Harry paused before answering, "In all honestly, Seven, yes. Someday I'd like that. When and if you're ever ready." Another pause. "Seven -"

"You never said how you knew you were in love with me, Harry," she interrupted.

Another deep breath. "When you asked me to copulate, all I could think of was that it would be using you. That you would later resent me taking advantage of your ignorance about human sexuality. That by having sex with you then, I would be ruining any chances to have anything lasting with you.

"Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't just have sex with anyone that way. But when I realized that I didn't back away just because it was the right thing to do, but because I didn't want to ruin any long-term chances with you, that's when I knew I was in love with you." He looked at her hopefully.

"It is a very confusing method of thinking," she said. "I can see the logic in it, however." She continued her questioning.

There was something else she needed to know. It had been nagging her ever since her talk with Lieutenant Paris the night before. "Why are you in love with me, Harry?"

Harry thought about this for a moment before answering. "Well, a number of reasons. The easiest to see is that you're extraordinarily beautiful - "

"You think I am beautiful, Harry?" She found that hard to believe. She knew that he found her physically attractive - his pupils and respiration when he looked at her told her that. But she had been around humans enough to know there was a difference between attractiveness and beauty. Borg drones, even former drones, did not usually fall within the standard human definition of beauty.

Harry shook his head at this. "Seven, you are the most beautiful woman on the ship. At least as far as I'm concerned. You have a stunning body, a lovely face, and your Borg implants just serve to accentuate that. You also have an air of confidence and grace about you that only adds to the effect. You're actually the most beautiful woman I have ever met - and I've met some very attractive ones.

"Your beauty isn't the only thing that makes my love you, though. It's not even the main one. I love your strength and independence, your drive and determination. I love your confidence in yourself. I love your intelligence. I love the wonder you show in your new individuality, even if you do try and hide it, and hide your emotions. I also love your sense of humour, which I'm proud to have been the first one to see.

He went on. "A lot of what I love about you is how you relate to me. I love that I can talk to you about technical problems longer than I can with anyone else. I love that I seem to be the first one you want to work with on any problem. I love that you trust me, and feel comfortable around me. And I love that fact that you smile around me, more than anyone else.

"Finally, what I love about you is that you're unique. A lot of people want you to become more human, but I just want you to be able to experience your humanity. I don't want you to become more or less anything. Your Borg past is part of what makes you unique, and thus part of what I love about you. Don't get me wrong - I don't love the Borg Collective. But the one former member of it that I'm with at the moment, I do love, especially in the state she's in, of being human as well as part Borg. It's what makes you *you*.

"Even if I could, I don't think I'd change a thing about you. Well, not really anything," he said smiling. "You've always said that the Borg strive for perfection. I honestly think that you, Seven, have come as close as they could get. There's always room for improvement, of course, but not much with you, I don't think.

"That's why I love you."

Seven was speechless. She had no idea what to say. What Harry said to her was the most beautiful thing she'd ever heard. The only way she could think of to react to it was one she had seen certain crewmembers used occasionally.

She wrapped her arms around him, and took him into a fierce hug. "That is so beautiful, Harry. Thank you." She closed her eyes, and could feel moisture coming from her eyes. Tears.

Harry was in heaven. Feeling her warm body enveloped in his arms was something he had dreamed about many times. His dreams were usually more sexual than this, but this was sweet in a way he thought he would never experience again after Voyager was stranded in the Delta Quadrant. Still hugging her, he asked, "Well, Seven, I've done all the talking thus far. How do you feel about me?"

She pulled out of the hug, and looked at him. "Harry... when I'm with you, I feel comfortable in a way I don't with anyone else. I look forward to working together, and I have looked forward to our meals together recently. When you stopped talking to me, I felt an emptiness I hadn't since I was separated from the collective."

"I'm so sorry, Seven," he said sincerely. "I didn't mean to hurt you."

She continued despite his interruption. "You were the first on the ship to befriend me. You always treat me fairly, even when I am impolite or rude to you. After the fight with B'Elanna was the first time you were not."

"Seven-"

She held a finger to his lips. "You care about me, Harry, in a way that no one ever has. I don't feel as strongly for you as you do for me- "

Harry looked crestfallen at this. Seven continued anyway.

"- but I do have feelings for you." Harry brightened immediately at that. "I would like to explore them with you, Harry. I believe the term for what I would like is 'dating'."

He smiled the warmest smile she had ever seen on his face at her. Considering the warmth of the smiles he usually gave her, that was quite an achievement. She smiled back - a smile so wide that she showed her teeth, something, Harry had never before seen on her.

"Oh, Seven," he said taking her hands in his, and beginning to stroke the backs of her hands with his thumbs. Her right hand immediately relaxed under the attentions of his left thumb, but as he began to stroke her Borg hardware on her left hand, she pulled the hand back.

"I'm sorry Seven, did that hurt you?" He was immediately regretful he'd done that without asking what kind of reaction he would get.

"I am undamaged, Harry. It was a reflex action. I am unused to being touched there - the Borg do not touch one another, and no one has rubbed the back my hand since I joined Voyager."

"It tickled, perhaps?" Harry said, trying to help her along.

"Yes, that is likely it." She smiled, and he took her hand again. He tried stroking the hardware again, and this time, her urge to pull back was less, and soon she got used to it. Yes, she could like this a lot...

"What do you think of holding hands, Seven?" He asked her.

"It is very... pleasurable. It is inefficient, however, from a biological standpoint. Why would holding hands be a necessary step for procreation?"

Harry was a little flustered by that. "Well, I supposed it's probably not biologically necessary, although pleasure is designed to encourage living organisms to do what is biologically necessary. I suppose the pleasure from touching one another's hands is meant to lead to... pleasure in other ways."

"You mean copulation," she said.

"Yes, I suppose. Anyway, even if it's biologically inefficient, holding hands is culturally quite important. Especially if you want to show affection in public, which I'm going to want to."

"Ah. Marking you territory."

He sighed. "Partly that, Seven. But mostly just to show you I care."

"That could be done just as easily with verbal communication," she countered.

"Oh, possibly. But isn't my doing this," he stroked her Borg-enhanced left hand again, "a more effective means of showing you that I love the whole Seven, not just the human bits, as telling you?"

Seven considered this. "Yes, I suppose it is. Most people are afraid of my Borg hardware. You are showing that you are not. I had not thought of physical contact as another form of communication."

He smiled. "See? You're learning about relationships already. Another example. What's a more effective way of saying I love you. Verbally, or this." With that he leaned forward and met her full lips with his, giving her a gentle, tender, lingering kiss.

After he pulled away, she said, "Yes, I see your point, Harry. Would you care to demonstrate other examples?" She had a gleam in her eye that could only come from one thing - lust.

Part of him wanted to 'demonstrate' right then and there; the woman beside him was so damned beautiful, and looked eager, but the rational part of his mind, the part that turned down her offer to copulate a year ago, was in control.

Summoning his reserves of self-control, he said, "Sometime, Seven, but I think we should take it slow, at least here in the beginning of our 'dating' relationship. We have lots of time, if you want to, but let's take it slow so far. When we're sure we love each other - then we'll see."

She sighed. "Very well, Harry." She leaned in for another kiss, this one open mouthed. The interplay of their tongues as they kissed was ample demonstration of the principle Harry had talked about, as well as being extremely pleasurable, but Seven knew that would be the limit for now. She didn't particularly mind, although a part of her had the urge to rip Harry's shirt right off of him and pounce on him. She too had to exercise self-control.

They broke apart after what seemed like an eternity. Gazing at his companion, Harry asked, "I have to know, Seven. Why the silver outfit tonight? I thought that was only a healing outfit for the beginning."

She smiled. "It was originally, but I had the Doctor alter it today. I told him I wanted another clothing option."

"Is that why you wore it? Another option?"

This time she broke into another toothy grin. "No, I wore it because I noticed that when I wore this outfit, your pupils dilated more than either of my other two suits."

"You wanted to impress me?" Harry asked.

She nodded, still smiling.

"It worked."

She settled back on the couch, and he wrapped his left arm around her. "What happens next, Harry?"

"Well, Seven, we talk. Get to know each other better. And we go on more dates. I'd really like to get to you try a few holodeck adventures with me."

"Holodeck adventures are irrelevant," she answered instinctively.

"Ah, but that's what you would have said about pleasure yesterday, or romance a year ago. You have to give things a chance, Seven. If you still find it irrelevant afterwards, that's fair. But you have to try, first," he said, looking intently at her.

"Very well."

They sat together on the couch in each others arms for a few minutes in silence.

"So Seven," Harry asked, "what was it like being in the Collective? Tell me about your time as a Borg."

Seven turned to him, surprised. "I find most people are horrified when I speak of my time with the Borg, Harry. Are you sure you want to hear?"

"I want to know all about you, Seven. Your years with the Borg are an important part of who you are. I'd like to hear about them, if it's all right with you."

Seven was genuinely happy at this, and started touching his hand again. "Thank you, Harry. I have had no one to talk to about this since I came on board."

Harry smiled at his friend. "Well, if ever there's anything you'd like to talk about, no matter how irrelevant it seems, feel free to come to me. I'll always want to hear it."

She leaned over and gave him another kiss. Breaking free, she said, "Being Borg was like being part of something greater than yourself. But there is no 'self' in the Borg..."

The sat in each other's arms and talked well into the night about their lives, their pasts, and their hopes and dreams, getting to know each other well. It was well into the early hours of the morning before Seven left Harry's quarters to return to Cargo Bay 2, and each fell asleep with the satisfaction of knowing with absolute certainty that someone out there really cared about them.

All in all, it had been the best day in either of their lives.

The first of many such best days.

Finis.

[Author's Terminal Note: As I said, I wrote this in 1998, in the beginning of Season 5. At that point, the Kim/Seven pairing, while obviously being de-emphasised in comparison to Season 4, was still a possibility, at least in my mind if not in those of The Powers That Were. This was before the Derran Tal in "The Disease", and before the Seven/Doctor pairing, which became so popular (although it never did much for me, being a K/7 shipper). Obviously this story isn't canon, and was superseded by events. This troubles me far less in 2014 than it did in 1999, before I got supremely dissatisfied with the show in the second half of Season 5, especially in comparison with Deep Space Nine, which was (and remains) my favourite Star Trek series.

Anyway, hopefully you've enjoyed this story I rescued from the memory hole. It's not exactly what I'd write now - it's so very earnest - but I think it holds up well enough for something I wrote while trying to avoid studying for the LSAT. Thanks for reading.]