As soon as the sound of his voice hit her ears Seven sprang up from the bed, her only reward for her speed a wave of dizziness. Leaning on the wall to steady herself she quickly dried her eyes and descended the stairs to meet Chakotay. He smiled up at her as she came down, "There you are! Have you been busy?" She stepped down into his warm embrace and he held her tight. "I've missed you…"

"As I have you…" she mumbled almost inaudibly as he leaned in to kiss her. Chakotay felt his initial happiness disperse as his heart told him something was wrong, Seven wasn't acting like herself, shifting out of his grasp, not looking him in face or even asking him about the conference.

Seven moved away from him in guilty relief but she could see from his expression that he knew something was abnormal. Trying desperately to seem untroubled she said, "Do…do you mind if we have a replicated meal tonight?" She was disturbed by how shaky and weak her voice sounded, but her hyperactive senses and churning stomach just couldn't face cooking.

Chakotay was caught off guard; he hadn't eaten a replicated meal at home for months. "Yeah sure, that's fine." He tried to fight his growing unease with rationalisation, she's just tried, and I'm getting too used to her spoiling me.

They sat down and began their meal in an uncomfortable silence. Chakotay ate little but noticed that Seven's plate lay untouched and only occasionally did she take a sip of water. Seven's dazed brain eventually realised that she should try and make conversion after so long of not seeing him. "How was the conference?" she asked in a strained high pitched tone.

"Fine." For a moment his mind drew a blank and he could think of nothing more to say. "The speech went well, like I told you on Saturday and the next day one man said the section on the Ventu was so immersive he thought I had help from a Vulcan and I said "That's high praise for my wife's skills, I'll tell her you said that." Chakotay looked across at Seven expecting a response but getting none, and then as if she felt his eyes on her she nodded slowly. Chakotay felt the knot of anxiety tighten in his stomach, if there was one quality Seven could normally be credited with it was attentiveness, but right now she looked a million miles away.

Desperate for her dreaded task to be delayed Seven cleared the table and began to hand wash the dishes at the sink if only to occupy her shaking hands. Chakotay sat watching her, wracking his brains as to what could have happened. "Has something happened at work?" he asked as gently as he could. She continued scrubbing as if she hadn't heard him and he tried again. "Did the Doctor find something amiss during your medical?" She didn't reply but instantly tensed and scrubbed the dishes harder. So that was it. Well he would need to get it out of one of them because if there was one thing that made him uptight it was Seven's health. He had never admitted this to her but it was only since they had become involved that he had realised how fragile Seven's outwardly robust health really was, one malfunction in those forever to be damned implants could kill her without warning and this scared the hell out of him. Finally his self control began to give way, "We have a dishwasher you know!" he told her sharply as she continued to ignore him. Still the silent treatment, Good God, it's like the argument in Astrometrics all over again. This thought made him jump out of his chair with a suddenness that made Seven jump. "Are you going to tell me what's wrong or not?"

Seven head dipped low but she said nothing and his anger made him come up behind her and take her arm. She swallowed hard at his touch and glanced down at the shine of her still new wedding ring, setting down the plate she was holding with a shuddering sigh. "Well?" Chakotay asked apprehensively.

Seven tried to form those life altering words but was unable to; it was as if the speech controlling part of her brain had ceased to function. She just stood there lifeless. Feeling his anger and anxiety go up another notch and he twisted her round to face him, but she turned her head away. "Seven, I want you to tell me what the Doctor told you, right now." He told her forcefully.

Seven couldn't meet his eyes, "I cannot…" she whispered.

A paralysing fear now froze the rational sections of Chakotay's brain before emotion took over. "I'm your husband! I deserve to know what's wrong with you!"

Wrong? Despite being very confused about how she felt about the situation it still hurt Seven to hear those words come from his mouth. Tears sprang to her eyes and the information came with them. "I'm pregnant with our child!"

Chakotay wasn't aware that his mouth dropped open and that he let go of Seven's arm allowing her to flee the room, his shock was too intense to register any of that. As shock released its icy fingers from around him thoughts flooded his brain. How had this happened? Well, he knew how but… It wasn't as if he didn't want children, quite the opposite in fact but he had always known that the Borg had stolen that possibility from Seven and that knowledge had never really affected their relationship for he had always loved and wanted Seven for her alone. Besides, surely he was getting too old for that sort of thing; he'd be fifty years old next March for God's sake. Despite these muddled thoughts a happiness of a sort he'd never known before began to filter into his soul and he came back to reality to find that Seven was no longer in the room. "Seven?" he called, receiving no answer. He walked to the threshold of the door into the living room and saw her sitting on the couch, for that was as far as she'd been able to go before her legs gave out. "Are…are we really going to have a baby?" The question was out of his mouth before he realised how redundant it was and he cursed his own stupidity. It seemed to go over Seven's head though for she sat looking at the wall instead of him.

He went to her without thinking, kneeling down on the floor and taking her hands, grasping for words that could convey what he was feeling. "You were afraid to tell me weren't you?" Her head drooped in confirmation. This hurt him but he kept going. "Look, I'm not going to deny that it was a shock…but that doesn't change the fact that it's wonderful…" he was surprised at the depth of the emotion in his own voice. He brushed her pale cheek affectionately with his fingers. "I know that this is daunting and as scary as hell…" he swallowed heavily, "…but we have months to prepare…everything's going to be fine…"

Seven choked back sobs, "No, it's not! The…the…baby…is…going to die…"

"The Doctor said that?" Chakotay couldn't believe he would just say that outright.

"No…but…"

"Then what makes you think our baby's going to die, my love?"

"I am Borg! You haven't seen as I have what assimilation does to pregnant women and babies, they die excruciatingly slow deaths, like the little girl we rescued from Icheb's cube…"

"This is different!" Chakotay cried in desperation, "The Doctor will give you the best medical care possible…"

These soothing words did not sink in with Seven however, who after days of stress with no sleep or regeneration was at the end of her tether. "The nanoprobes with cause miscarriage or stillbirth…the regeneration may cause brain damage…if I'm going to kill our child before it's even born I'd rather not get pregnant at all!"

This tear soaked near rant broke Chakotay's heart and he grabbed her shoulders. "Listen to me, even if we do…lose it, no one's ever going to blame you…"

"But I will!"

"Seven, we shouldn't be having this conversation, for all we know we might have a perfectly healthy baby in…" He realised then he hadn't even asked her how far along she was.

"Thirty seven weeks and two days." Seven helpfully supplied. Wow that makes it all feel a lot more real, thought Chakotay.

"How are feeling right now?" Seven shot him a look through her tears and he almost laughed, "Physically I mean?"

"I haven't slept or regenerated since you left and I have been unable to take nutrients because of the vomiting."

"Morning sickness already? Why haven't you regenerated?"

"I could not…I thought I was dying because it was the same symptoms I felt when my cortical node was failing…"

"Seven! You thought you were dying and you didn't call me and tell me to come home?" Chakotay practically shouted.

Seven began to shake again, "I was afraid…" Chakotay pulled her into his arms and held her like that for several minutes before she spoke again. "The Doctor has asked for us both to come to his office tomorrow morning…will you come?"

"No one could keep me away." In response she buried her head in his shoulder and didn't even protest when he lifted her up in his arms and carried her upstairs to their room, laying her exhausted body down on the bed and lying down beside her, wrapping his arms around her as she gradually relaxed and sleep finally claimed her.

Chakotay found he couldn't join her in the oblivion of sleep, his mind was wide awake as he took time to process what had happened. He scanned her slim body seeing no difference even though he knew there was and laid his hand on her still flat abdomen, he tried to picture the new life in there but couldn't. As sleep began to creep over him a dim image of Seven holding a baby swam happily round his brain and he fell asleep with a smile on his face.

A/n: Please review because I'm very nervous about this chapter. I hope you're not disappointed!