Seven stood at her console on the bridge, one eye on the planet looming before her on the screen and one eye on Chakotay's back as he piloted the ship having replacing Tom who had gone to see his new daughter. Harry Kim's voice brought her back to being aware of her surroundings. "So Seven, when do you think we'll enter orbit?"

He could have figured that out for himself but she made allowances for his obvious elation. "When our current position is taken into account, we will enter orbit at approximately 0930 hours tomorrow morning."

"I can't wait!"

Seven smiled at him. "You have been waiting seven years; twelve more hours shouldn't make much of a difference."

"Yeah you're right of course, it seems that our seventh year was our lucky one, wasn't it…Seven?"

"I concur."

Chakotay approached them, putting his arm round Seven's waist. "Hey Harry, can I have her now?"

Harry raised his eyebrows and as realisation kicked in he almost laughed, Tom had won the bet. "Yeah sure, you were the one that waited a few years in the end weren't you?" referring back to the time when he himself had tried to romance Seven with awkward results and Chakotay had told him to wait a few years.

"It was worth it."

Seven couldn't decipher the latter stages of their conversation, so she turned to Chakotay. "You got someone to relieve you at the comm.?" She was somewhat surprised that any member of the crew was willing to work.

"Yeah, I told Crewman Okuda I would forget to put that incident with the Alterran actress on record if he relieved me until morning. We never had that dinner in my quarters; do you want to try again?"

"That would be acceptable."

As they were walking down the corridor to his quarters, they came upon Naomi Wildman. "Seven! Commander! They're throwing a party in the mess hall, why don't you come?"

Chakotay and Seven exchanged glances, before Seven replied "Perhaps another time."

"There won't be another time!"

"She's right Seven, you should go. We won't be in this situation again." They all turned around to see that it was the Captain standing behind them. "I need to speak to the Commander in my ready room anyway."

Seven saw from her expression that this was not a suggestion and acquiesced with a nod of her head. Chakotay felt irked, but let go of Seven's waist with a murmured "See you later." The Captain turned on her heel with no more ceremony and he followed her reluctantly, with unease in his heart.

Naomi turned to Seven, "Were you and the Commander on a date?"

Seven couldn't deny that and Naomi knew it. She uttered a squeal and flung herself at Seven for a hug. "I knew it! I'm sorry I interrupted you."

"Do not over excite yourself Naomi Wildman, and it's fine, we would have been interrupted either way." She glanced at where Chakotay and the Captain had gone, the Captain knew as well if not better than Naomi, she was sure of that.

"While you wait for him to come back, go to the party with me."

While Seven and Naomi made their way to the mess hall, Chakotay entered the Captain's ready room where she had already made herself comfortable. "What's this about Captain?"

"You know what it's about, your relationship with Seven."

Chakotay had been expecting that on some level, but it was still a blow to hear something which made him so happy, so passionate in way nothing had before, spoken of in such a negative aggressive tone. "What about it?"

"Everything. You're back on Earth now; do you really think you'll stick with the novelty act?"

Chakotay was gobsmacked, "What the hell's that supposed to mean?"

"Oh come on Chakokay, she'll have to adapt to living on Earth and I don't think you'll stay the distance with her. As soon as you get back to Earth you'll lose interest as always."

"I know what I'm getting into and so does she, who are you to say what we do?"

"She's a child! You're a forty eight year old man and she's barely twenty eight with the emotional maturity of a teenager! You'll hurt her and I'll have to deal with it!"

"I would never purposely hurt Seven! Your future self did that already with her manipulation!"

"If the Admiral hadn't told me that this farce was successful in her timeline, I wouldn't be allowing this at all!"

"Allow it! Kathryn you've never had the right to allow anything to do with our personal lives, not Seven's and certainly not mine!" With that he turned on his heel and left, leaving the Captain seething and dissatisfied.

Seven looked at him in surprise when he came in the mess hall, his face set in a tense frown. "What's wrong?"

"I'll tell you later."

She read his anxious agitated face and couldn't leave it like that. "Come on." She said taking his wrist gently and leading him into the hallway, where he sagged against the wall. "Do we need to a have a private conversation?" she asked frankly.

"Yes, we'll go to my quarters."

When they entered he immediately sank into the nearest chair, Seven stood in front of him where she absentmindedly stroked his face with her hand to soothe him. "What happened?" she asked quietly after he had relaxed slightly.

"The Admiral told her."

"I assumed as much."

"She didn't take it well."

"What did she say?"

"Nothing worth repeating."

"The abridged version?"

"She made some comments about our age gap…and other things."

"Why are our ages relevant?" Seven was genuinely surprised for this had never occurred to her.

Chakotay could see this from her face. "Well in human society, twenty years is considered an…unusually large age gap for a couple."

"I don't see why. As long as I find you attractive and you find me attractive…" she said the part referring to her attractiveness with less confidence, which made Chakotay hug her hard.

"Why do you think I stare at you all the time?"

"Then it truly is irrelevant."

"Yes it is." He said, kissing her.

Seven eventually pulled back, running her fingers through his hair. "The other things she said…it is perhaps better to forget about, you will hear much worse things about me."

"You're asking me to forgive her?"

"It will be easier in the long term; she will get over her issues quicker if we are magnanimous towards her."

He nodded in agreement and noticed several minutes later when she began to seem uneasy. "What's wrong?"

"May I tell you something which may further explain my behaviour in Astrometrics earlier?"

"You can tell me anything."

Seven paused, unsure where to begin or whether she was doing the right thing by telling him. "Do you remember when you mentioned me having a Borg switch for my emotions?"

Chakotay tensed in guilt and held her tighter. "Oh Seven, I didn't mean that, I was upset and angry…"

"I know. I did not bring it up to chastise you, only to say that until quite recently" she sighed, preparing herself for his reaction, "I did have such a switch as you call it."

"What? How it that possible?" he cried in mortified shock.

"Let me explain. Do you remember my involvement with Unimatrix Zero?"

"Yes." He stated.

"During that time I experienced some emotions I had not known previously, when it was over I felt an emptiness, loneliness I think you would call it, so in an attempt to alleviate this I began to run…simulations on the holodeck.

Chakotay tried to hide the fact that he was shell-shocked by this and tried to recollect himself. "That's why holodecks were invented I suppose."

"Yes well, during these simulations I became ill and the Doctor had to help as I required…resuscitation…" She could tell him she had been arguing with a holographic version of him at the time, but decided she was allowed to keep that to herself.

"Resuscitation! Why did you need that?" said Chakotay, his voice full of fear.

"The Doctor discovered that I had a failsafe device in my cortical node which would deactivate me when I reached a certain level of…emotional stimulation."

"Wait a minute! The Borg put something in you which would kill you if you got too emotional?" When she nodded in confirmation, he felt sick. The Borg were even more barbaric and ruthless than he'd thought. Maybe the Queen put that in her alone just to be sadistic. "The Doctor could remove it right?"

"Yes he could but…"

"But! Seven you're not telling me…"

"I didn't remove it then; I knew of its existence but did nothing for three months."

"Why in God's name did you do that?" he cried out loudly in exasperation.

Abashed, Seven looked at her feet. "I felt so guilty. My personal life was distracting me, interfering with my work, endangering the crew…"

"And?"

"I was afraid of what I would be able to feel without it." She stated heavily, close to tears. Maybe she shouldn't have started this.

"You don't still have it do you?"

"No. I got it removed before our forth date."

"What? We went on three dates and you could have died at any one of them? That was dangerous!" He said, holding her forcefully.

"Yes, it was unwise."

"That's an understatement. How could you take that risk?"

"I wanted to. I…wasn't afraid when it came to you, because I…am in love with you."

Chakotay looked at her, spying a tear running from her human eye and embraced her. "You understand?" she choked.

"Yes, of course I understand and I love you more than you'll ever know but…" he took her face in his hands, "that doesn't mean I'm not angry with you for doing something so life threatening, ok?"

"That sounds reasonable." Seven murmured, looking into his eyes.

"Good." He whispered, beginning to kiss her passionately and uncontrollably.

They moved to the bed, still kissing and Seven sat on its edge. Chakotay's senses came back to him and he pulled back, holding her shoulders. Seven saw the silent question in his eyes and answered by kissing him again and wrapping her arms round his neck, letting him go above her.

"Computer, lights." Chakotay muttered breathlessly.

A/n: And I think you can guess what happened next. Sorry if anyone is offended but this is rated T and I'll probably never go any further than that in this story anyway. A note on how I arrived at their ages, "Endgame" said Chakotay was born in 2329 which would make him 48 in 2377 and Seven was supposedly assimilated when she was six and was a drone for 18 years with four on Voyager which would make her 28. (Dark Frontier said she was four which would make her only 26 but I decided to ignore that.) Anyway, please review and I'll write more soon.