"Why?" Janeway groaned as she pulled away. The captain had been doing her best to ignore her symptoms, but the sudden, intimate contact exacerbated them.

Chakotay cupped her face with soft hands. "Because you are strong-minded and brave and you give me peace and I love you," he slurred, a cheesy sort of grin on his face. Janeway grasped his wrists. "I am not brave," she told him, uncharacteristically emotional. "I wasn't brave enough to stand up for my crew and demand that the caretaker send us home then and I'm not brave enough now to tell you that I love you too because I'm afraid of being caught in a compromising position and-" She was cut off by another searing, slightly sloppy kiss, pressing her against the console. This time, it was Chakotay who ended their embrace. He clutched her hands and pressed his forehead against hers. They shared a contented smile, all prior urgency regarding their rather dire situation completely forgotten. "I love you," he repeated soppily.

"I love you too, Chakotay. Zo much." Janeway slurred, an equally-goopy grin on her face. Abruptly, Chakotay paled and pulled away from her, now wide-eyed. "Kathryn," he muttered. "I don't feel so we-" Then he sank to the ground in an dead faint.

The surprise effectively snapped Janeway back into the moment. She suddenly remembered there was something she had to do, something very important-but what was it?! Her head reeled, mind fuzzy and slow, her limbs didn't seem to want to cooperate. Joining Chakotay on the floor and shutting her heavily-lidded eyes for just a moment seemed like a good idea…but no, NO, there was something she had to do!

Janeway turned and stumbled towards the console. With her very last ounce of strength (and clarity of mind), she pounded the button and released the photon torpedo.

The orange flash hit the closest asteroid the same time as the dying planet finally blew, resulting in an explosion of cataclysmic, awe-inspiring proportions. Great yellow-green flames leapt up to meet the relatively tiny starship, scorching the smooth metal underbelly. Voyager was flung helplessly, flipping over and over through the void of space, until it finally corrected itself to hull-side down, dragging to the left a little. All lights flickered out.

The dead starship came to a halt.