Disclaimer: Roses are red, Violets are blue, I don't own, So you don't sue.

A.N. I actually can't believe how long it's been since I updated. The time has flown by. I swear that coursework distorts the linear properties of time. It really does. Anyway, I'm back, briefly, before exams start so I hope you enjoy this update!

Chapter Two

Seven of Nine was procrastinating.

Seven of Nine never procrastinated. It was a pointless endeavour during which the participant rarely got anything of value completed, meanwhile leaving tasks of a higher priority needlessly unfinished. It did not make the task that one was avoiding go away, nor did it decrease the time that must be spent on the task. Instead in increased the time the individual had to focus their attention on it. It was highly inefficient and if there was one thing Seven of Nine could not tolerate, it was inefficiency.

Nevertheless, Seven of Nine was procrastinating. She tried telling herself that the task that she had to complete was a recreational activity, meant for relaxation, therefore she could not technically be procrastinating because her method of procrastination was also relaxing. Somewhat. But Seven wasn't experienced in deception, even the deception of herself. And deciding what colour of biosuit to wear was not even a truly effective method of distracting her from her intended task.

She grabbed her brown biosuit with a weariness that any other member of the crew, except perhaps Vorik or Tuvok, would have denoted with a sigh, and sealed the Cargo Bay doors with her own Borg algorithms. Once upon a time she hadn't cared whether she locked the doors to the Cargo Bay whilst she changed or not, but after an incident where a young ensign had walked in, expecting to find isolinear chips and instead found a half naked former Borg, the Captain heavily suggested and had barely fallen short of ordering her to lock the Cargo Bay doors when she was, 'indecent'. At the time she had tried to ask Captain Janeway what the purpose of modesty was in human society but the Captain had not been inclined to answer.

Still, today she took more care with her appearance as she redressed that she normally would, double checking that all the smudges of grease from working in Engineering had been removed, even though she already knew that they had been. She then proceeded to recycle the soiled pink biosuit before unlocking the doors and heading in the direction of Holodeck Two. Her internal chronometer told her that it was exactly 1558 hours and if she walked at her present pace she would arrive there at 1602 hours. Yet she did not increase her gait or speed.

Apprehension churned in her stomach as she took the turbolift to the correct deck and she found her steps slowing as she came closer to the holodeck. And yet, she was still travelling towards it and drawing out the process of getting there was only increasing her trepidation. She came to a complete halt just outside the doors and before the tension she was causing herself could increase any more, she keyed in the code to open the doors.

The Doctor transferred his program to Holodeck Two, tuning fork in hand, five minutes before he had agreed to meet Seven. Sickbay was in Tom Paris's capable hands for the time being and should any emergencies occur, he was only a call on the combadge away. Normally he wouldn't have the freedom to set up the program prior to Seven's arrival but due to the double shifts the majority of the crew was pulling the holodecks were not in as high demand as normal on Voyager.

Now, the old Paris Opera House, or La Scala de Milán? Each had their own appeal but weren't quite perfect. A concert hall of his own design, perhaps?

In the end, he decided on Sandrine's, with the pool table removed and replaced with a Baby Grand, of course.

"Computer, what's the time?" he asked, pleased that his modifications had been finished before Seven's arrival.

"The time is 1601 hours."

That was odd. That was very odd. Seven was nothing if not punctual and if she was delayed or prevented from coming she would always notify him.

Since he had handed his report to Commander Chakotay earlier that day, the nervous tension that had invaded his gut had subsided somewhat. Now it returned with a vengeance. He had been foolish to believe that along with handing his report over to the Commander he was also handing over his responsibility to deal with any problems the situation might have initiated. His relationship with Seven was damaged, perhaps irreparably so, no matter how much he tried to ignore it.

Just as his own guilt threatened to engulf him, the holodeck doors hissed open and Seven of Nine strode in with all her usual confidence and poise. "Doctor," she greeted him, "I apologise for my tardiness; I was delayed in Engineering."

Of course she was, the Doctor thought with relief. They needed all the help they could get, putting the ship back together.

"I admit, I'm surprised you were able to get away from Engineering at all," he professed. "I thought Lieutenant Torres might try and keep you there all evening."

Seven was showing no signs of discomfort, he noticed. "On the contrary, Doctor, I believe she was glad to be rid of me, if only for a few hours."

He laughed at that. The open hostility that B'Elanna had once shown for the ex-drone had long ago mellowed to something of a grudging respect. But that didn't stop Voyager's two most powerful ladies, barring the Captain, of course, from waging a war of words from time to time. The last time the Captain had called them both into her ready room in an effort to put an end to the antagonism, Torres had confessed that while the two women most definitely had a serious difference of opinion, half the reason behind the aggression she displayed in the arguments, as opposed to Seven's unwavering composure, was to keep the crew of Engineering on their toes.

"Shall we begin," Seven suggested, approaching the piano.

The Doctor took a seat on the stool, Seven at his side. "We shall," he agreed. "Let's see who's really singing out of tune."

She was sure that if he were to scan her with a tricorder, the Doctor would be most concerned with her blood pressure.

They started by performing a few vocal warm-ups. It was just as important, the Doctor stressed, to warm up the vocal chords before doing any serious singing as it was to stretch the muscles before performing any kind of physical exercise. They would repeat the sound, 'la', several times, each time moving through a scale. Next they would work on diction, usually by repeating numbers in a pyramid fashion. The Doctor would start, "One, one two, one, one two, three two one, one two three four, three two one," before Seven would join in, several octaves higher in pitch. It was an exercise she enjoyed- it focused her attention on keeping count, on keeping in tune and on perfecting her diction.

And then, the real singing began.

"Light she was and like a fairy, And her shoes were number nine-"

Seven had sang flawlessly through the first verse and chorus but on the forth measure of the second verse, she choked. A wave of panic spread through her, inexplicably chilling the blood in her veins. Beside her, the notes from the piano faltered and she barely met the Doctor's concerned gaze. Excusing herself, she procured a glass of water from the bar, focusing on it as she gathered herself again.

She returned to the Doctor's side at the piano and they made it through the song faultlessly before they descended to the usual debate over which version of the last verse was the correct one. They even sang several other ditties of the Doctor's choosing before calling it a night.

But Seven's hesitation during Oh My Darling Clementine did not go unnoticed by the Doctor. Nor was the way his fingers fumbled with the keys on the piano for the rest of the evening, overlooked by Seven. When they departed the holodeck, both were sure that they would never sing Oh My Darling Clementine, ever again.

After receiving Seven's and the Doctor's reports, Chakotay had retired to the privacy of his quarters to review them. Four hours later he emerged, decidedly troubled and, to some extent, dazed. It was only when he found himself gravitating towards the Mess Hall that he realised he hadn't eaten since breakfast. But when Neelix placed a plate of... something- down in front of him, he found that his appetite had deserted him. He spent the next hour or so wandering the decks aimlessly, nodding and smiling to members of the crew as he passed, but his heart wasn't in it.

He was disturbed by what he had read in the reports. And what he hadn't read. Seven's report was the polar opposite of the Doctor's. Seven had described everything up to the moment when the Doctor's ethical subroutines had been deleted and she had been strapped to an operating table in perfect detail, as was consistent with her usual method of writing reports. But after that instant in time, her report, while still detailed, in her references to Ransom in particular, seemed somewhat vague.

The Doctor's report, on the other hand, had possessed the flamboyancy he had come to expect up until the same point where Seven's report had become vague. Instead, he had detailed his report so carefully and conscientiously that it actually resembled something that Seven would have written.

And then there was the matter of what each report actually said.

If it hadn't been so serious he would have found it ironic. That Ransom had ordered Seven to be tortured, at the risk of her life, in order to learn encryption codes for power relays, on board the Equinox, whilst on Voyager, Janeway had done almost the same thing to Noah Lessing for a tactical status.

But it was serious. It was very serious. As he approached his quarters, Chakotay analysed everything that had occurred in his interactions with Seven and the Doctor earlier in the day. The Doctor, certainly, had been lacking his usual high spirits and Chakotay was sure that the, operations, for lack of a better word, he had been forced to perform on Seven, so contrary to his original purpose and programming, were lying heavily on his conscience. And Seven- she hadn't gone pale due to a bump on the head, oh no, that particular occurrence had been due to his mention of going to Sickbay.

Of course, this was all speculation. Both the Doctor and Seven in particular, had a habit of bouncing back from traumatic events with an ease that was almost disturbing. He could be reading something in their reports that really didn't exist at all.

But he doubted it.

Settling down with a mug of tea he picked up the first pad again and began to read, this time not only the words on the screen, but what was written between the lines, and perhaps what was written beneath them too.

Chakotay didn't sleep that night and the next morning he could have been mistaken for the Captain with the rate he was drinking cups of coffee. But it was the Captain he needed to speak to, and urgently so.

When he entered the Ready Room, she actually looked worse than he did. "What can I do for you, Commander?" she asked him, gesturing to the seat across the table.

He took it gratefully. "I've reviewed Seven of Nine's and the Doctor's reports on what happened on board the Equinox." He paused, trying to predict her reaction. "I think they deserve your attention."

Janeway gave a rueful laugh, laying down the pad that was clasped in her hand and for the first time Chakotay noticed the extensive number of reports that littered her desk. "I seem to be getting a lot of those, Commander. Think you can give me a summary?"

Chakotay froze. He actually froze, completely motionless in his seat. But Janeway was either too distracted or too tired to notice. His mind whirled, frantically trying to come up with something that would appropriately display the seriousness of what had happened to Voyager's two officers. But somehow he didn't believe that declaring, "The Doctor was turned into a modern day Mr Hyde and was forced to torture your protégée," would be entirely fitting.

Instead, he said, "Not really, Captain. All I can really say is that it's important you read these as soon as possible." He placed the pads in front of her.

She gazed at them for a moment before placing them on top of one of the stacks that beset her desk. "I will, Chakotay. As soon as I find the time." And with that, he was dismissed to Bridge Duty for the remainder of the Alpha Shift.

As he sat, with little to do except monitor repair teams, he considered the situation. Captain Janeway was going to do one of three things. What he hoped for, but considered the least likely, was that she would read the reports and deal with the fallout of the mission, most of which seemed to have landed on the Doctor and Seven. Seven was, after all, Janeway's pet project. She would want to make sure the young woman was alright, not just physically, but mentally too. The two women had a bond unique to them on Voyager and the Captain was in the best position to truly understand Seven and what she was going through.

The second possibility was that she would not read the reports until a time when the damage could not be undone or it had already been resolved. By that point, it would be too late for her to do anything about it.

The final possibility was that Janeway would read the reports and see the similarities between what she had done to Lessing and what Ransom had done to Seven and simply not be able to help Seven and the Doctor as she would be too consumed in her own guilt. Captain Janeway had demons of her own and he doubted she would let anyone help her with them.

He slumped in his seat as he realised what the only option left was.

He would have to confront both Seven and the Doctor. He would have to ease them through the trauma that had been inflicted upon them. He would once again be called upon to act as Voyager's unofficial councillor, all the while hoping and praying that he wasn't causing more damage in his inexperience.

He closed his eyes briefly. Well, he mused, he had already lost one night's sleep over this particular crisis. What was a few more?

A.N. Wow, 2500 words and three hours later. That was fun! I missed writing something that wasn't computer code. I hope you liked this chapter! Please let me know how I'm doing so far!

~Sweetdeath04