~~C~~
I have one hell of a headache, but that's nothing to the blanket of guilt covering my whole, aching body. What the hell had I been thinking, trusting them?
"How were they able to re-establish a connection?" she demands of the EMH, brusque and business-like.
"My best guess is that the residual neuropeptides heightened his telepathic receptivity."
"I thought their limited equipment made it impossible to form the link over great distances?" She doesn't sound convinced, and I don't blame her.
I'm just glad to hear her voice right now, to hear the inflections that are unique to her: the low husk that's like water running over parched, sun-crisped fields…even when she's angry.
"Apparently, once they repaired the communications array, they were able to magnify the signal from their neural transponder," Tuvok smugly interjects. In stark contrast, his voice is so much less than welcome right now.
If I were a less secure man, I'd say the Vulcan's presence in sickbay is a surefire confirmation that I've just slipped back into the number two position of men she can rely on, whose opinions she'll ever trust thanks to my latest screw-up. I can't even say I'd blame her for it.
Either way, Tuvok being here only adds insult to injury. She has to know it; I know she does.
Have mercy, Kathryn. Please.
"Would you two please excuse us?"
Mercy. Or maybe she's just giving me the benefit of ripping into me in private by dismissing the other two.
They leave, and I'm alone with her. Now's my chance.
It would be so easy to tell her how much of her was in my foolish trust: how she's the one who taught me how to do it again in the first place. How she's pushed me to seek other avenues of emotional fulfillment by maintaining the status quo.
To plead with her to understand that I'm not a fucking robot. That I respect our positions, agree with her on the Great Prohibition, but that I can't hold himself by for years on nothing. That I can only pour my heart out to her and have her simply smile mutely in return so many times before I break, go elsewhere.
It would be so easy to tell her all of it by wrapping my hands in her always-bound hair, pulling her down to me and showing her how deep she is inside of me, how I hurt because there's a hole I can't seem to fill because of her.
So easy, and yet so stupid. It always seems so easy even when it's the exact wrong thing to do. And now there's a goddamned mini collective running around out there, and nothing we can do is going to undo what I've just done.
"I don't know what to say except I'm sorry," is all I have. And I am. For all of it. Least of all being everything that always, forever goes unsaid.
"Based on what the doctor's told us, it's clear you were acting against your will."
She's giving me the benefit of the doubt. Pretending she is, anyway. I'm lucky for that, and I know it. We both do, and I doubt she'll let me forget it any time soon.
But was I? Acting completely against my will? I'm not sure either of us truly believes that.
I'm not sure how much longer I can continue to bang my head against the bulkhead of futility that is the two of us out here. I just know I have to find some way to shut it off, to accept and come to terms with the fact that an us, in that sense, isn't going to happen. That it never really did and that it probably never will.
~~J~~
He spends far too much time in sickbay, damn it…but then, don't we all?
"In short, Commander," the doctor informs him, "you've been subjected to a highly sophisticated form of propaganda."
"Then the Kradin don't kill innocent civilians? They don't desecrate the Vori's dead?" Chakotay asks, looking disbelieving, like he can't process what he's hearing. I can't say I blame him.
The Vori really did a number on him. And it's no compliment to me that all I can think about is that I'm so glad to see him that I'm not even all that focused on how rough it's really been for him. I should be, but I can't resist allowing myself one selfish moment of pure relief instead.
I glance down, unable to discount the notion of the Vori claims being true when I don't personally have knowledge to the contrary. "I don't know," I admit, uncharacteristically hedging, "but the Kradin accuse the Vori of the same kinds of atrocities."
He looks so lost. So tormented. "I cared about the Vori, but I hated the Kradin. I wanted to kill every one of them."
I gloss over it on purpose, don't want to focus on that chilling statement. "Evidently that was the point," I try to get him to see as gently as possible. We can work back from this, I know. As long as he's alive and physically well, we can–
At the absolute worst moment, the doors part, and Neelix barrels in with the Kradin ambassador.
"Captain!" He is, as usual, entirely oblivious to how not needed his presence is in this moment. "Ambassador Treen would like a word with the commander."
Not now, Neelix, I want to groan.
"I wish to tell you how pleased my people are to hear of your recovery. I'm only sorry we weren't able to rescue you sooner from our nemesis," Treen sleazes immediately, before I can run interference or try to postpone this meeting for Chakotay's sake.
Silence. Complete and utter silence. Chakotay stares at Treen like he's staring at a ghost. Admittedly, they're not a sparkling example of what the human eye would term beautiful, but we've seen stranger aliens before. He just stares, blankly, and it concerns me. Deeply so.
The ambassador swallows, and so do I as he glances over to me. To Neelix and the doctor, standing behind me.
"Have I said something wrong?" the Kradin ambassador finally asks, faltering.
It's a fair question. And I should be mortified that my first officer is behaving so rudely in front of an important guest, but I'll be damned if I don't know him better than that. There's a reason for it – I know that without asking him.
"I don't know," Neelix answers for me. He never does, it seems. Know anything, that is.
Damn it Neelix, I want to snap for no real good reason while eyeing Chakotay's obvious emotional distress. He is far from okay with this meeting. It's too soon.
Shocking me, he finally speaks, but only to mutter, "If you'll excuse me, Captain." Chakotay pushes his way past the ambassador and leaves sickbay right in the middle of the conversation.
I should stay. I should apologize for his bizarre behavior. My feet are already moving after Chakotay, out into the corridor – I can't just let him go. Not in this condition.
"Chakotay," I call out, almost afraid that he won't stop for me. I want him to tell me what to do to fix this for him, as he's so obviously tormented by whatever the Vori did to his mind.
He does stop – for me, and only me, I know. He turns and his eyes are so lost. So conflicted. "I wish it were as easy to stop hating…as it was to start," he says hauntingly.
That one line was all I needed to hear from him to understand.
He does leave, and I stare after him, at an utter loss for the right words. For the right actions. Everything in me is screaming at me to follow him. I haven't seen him this tortured in a long while. I know how he feels, I think – right now, I hate the Vori for leaving him like this, for opening old wounds and hatreds he's only just managed to put to bed not so long ago. I understand now, the source of his pain. His confusion and his turmoil.
I could tell him. Call after him and let him know that I still trust him, with my life, with the lives of everyone on this ship. That I'm here for him, that my private thoughts have been in turmoil for weeks while he's been missing and that I've realized more fully than ever before what his counsel, his very presence is to me by now. I could show him these things, and I could do it all so easily, but I–
Damn it, I'm not free to do that. I never am, for so many reasons, not least of which are core promises that I've made to myself. To Daddy, to Starfleet, to Mark. Most importantly, to everyone on this ship, including Chakotay.
I take a breath that feels like water inhalation, close my eyes. Count to ten. Then fifteen. And the urge diminishes. It always does. Reason floods back into me on the shaky exhale. There's an ambassador in my sickbay, probably highly disgruntled by now. Voyager needs supplies and he can offer them – or at least he might grease the wheels to see that it's easier to get them from his superiors.
I'll send B'Elanna after Chakotay. Maybe some time, some space is best for him. For both of us. Why tell him things, dredge up impossibilities that may only make it all so much harder than it already is on him?
Still. It would have been so easy. And shutting off from him, no matter how necessary, can be harder sometimes than others.
It should be easier, damn it.
~~JC~~