Star Trek Voyager characters are the property of Paramount Pictures.
Way The Wind Blows
Chapter Thirteen
Two Weeks Later
Sitting on a rock beneath a waking sky, Chakotay looked out at the golden lake. Above him birds soared, singing in dawn chorus, and lazy clouds rolled by. In the distance, Petunia ran around while behind him Kathryn tried to prepare breakfast on their camp fire.
"I'm pleased to say," Kathryn said, coming over to him with a plate of scambled eggs and vegetarian sausages, "that apart from some scalding, breakfast is in good shape."
Chakotay took the plate from her and saw that indeed breakfast was a great improvement on yesterday's efforts. "Looks good," he said.
Kathryn then loaded herself a plateful of food and sat beside him. "I used to hate camping as a kid," she said, "but I've really enjoyed the passed few days. In fact, if rain wasn't promised for this afternoon, I'd suggest we stay another night."
Chakotay made no reply, just ate in silence.
"But as it is going to rain, how about we try again to get a table at the Victorian restaurant?"
When Chakotay made no reply, Kathryn prompted.
"Chakotay..."
Slowly, sadly, Chakotay looked up at her. "I think the time has come for me to leave."
At those words, pain filled Kathryn's eyes.
"If my people were going to come for me," he went on, "they would have done so by now, I'm sure of it." Even if it took them a year to reconfigure the temporal transporter, it would make no difference to how long he had to be on Earth. All they had to do was set transport to the time he arrived. "That means I'm going to have to find my own way back." Tears then filled his eyes and he looked away. "I just don't even know where to begin."
Gently, Kathryn reached out and put her hand on his shoulder. "You don't have to. Stay."
"How can I? I don't belong in this time-frame."
"Maybe you do. The reality is your future might not exist any more. I really don't think it does. And if it doesn't, you have no where to go back to."
Chakotay made no reply, just looked out at the water.
"But you can have a life in this time-frame, Chakotay. You can have a life with me. We belong together, I feel it."
A tear ran down Chakotay's cheek. He loved this Kathryn every bit as much as he loved her older counterpart, perhaps even more because she loved him in a way he could only ever dream of her older self expressing, but in his future, or this future, a life together was impossible.
"There can't be two Chakotay's," he said. "If I'm stuck here then...then I'm not real. All I am is just...I'm just an echo."
"You are real," Kathryn said firmly. "Even if the future you're from doesn't exist anymore, it was real for you. Everything you are, everything you feel, it's real. And so is what we feel for each other."
Slowly, Chakotay turned back to her. "If I stayed, we'd have to live our lives in the shadows, always having to hide my existence. Your friends, your family, they could never know about me. And all the things you want...marriage and children...we could never have. What kind of life would that be for you?"
"I don't care about all that," Kathryn answered. "All that matters to me is being with you." A tear ran down her cheek. "Stay. I love you so much."
"I love you too," Chakotay replied. "But it would be wrong to stay. It would..."
But before he could finish his sentence, Kathryn silenced him with a finger to his lips.
"It would be wrong to leave," she said. "Without the help of your people, it's unlikely you're ever going to get back to your future. That's the truth. And in your heart, you know it too, don't you?"
Chakotay hesitated, but then nodded.
"So forget about leaving. Stay with me. I can get a research or teaching post here on Earth and we can live somewhere remote."
For a moment, just a moment, Chakotay was tempted. To love and be loved by Kathryn, to have a life with her, it would bea dream come true. But then reality bit. No matter how much he wanted to stay, it would be wrong.
"We can't," he said quietly. "I have to leave."
"You don't," Kathryn protested. "Why won't you even consider..."
"Because it's out of the question," Chakotay interrupted. "I have to leave, Kathryn. And I think I should leave today."
Tears flooded Kathryn's eyes and she unexpectedly got to her feet. "Then leave! Do what you want! Go to hell!"
Without another word, she turned around and began to run up the hill.
Chakotay got to his feet and called after her, but she was gone.
When Chakotay reached the cabin, he found Kathryn sobbing her heart out on her bed.
"I didn't mean to hurt you," he said, standing in the doorway. "I'm sorry."
At the sound of his voice, Kathryn turned her back to him. "Go away. Leave me alone."
But quite the contrary, Chakotay made his way over to the bed. "Someday you'll understand why I have to at least try to get back to my own time-frame."
"I said, go away!" Kathryn cried.
"We need to talk about this. You have to understand..."
At this, Kathryn sat up. "I understand," she said. "You'd rather die trying to get back to your future than make another future with me."
"That's not it," Chakotay replied. "I just..."
"Yes," she interrupted. "That is it." Tears streamed down her face. "You say you love you, you say I'm so special to you, but it's her you love, some older me. It's not me!"
"That's not..."
"Yes," she cried. "Yes it's true. If you love me, why don't you want me? The future you're from is gone. We both know that! If you love me so much, why don't you want to make a new one with me?"
Tears filled Chakotay's eyes. "Because a life in the shadows wouldn't be fair to you. You're an amazing woman, Kathryn, an amazing officer. It would be wrong for you to give up your career for me."
"Don't you get it," Kathryn snapped. "I don't care about my career. I don't care! Everyone else cares about it. Not me! All I want is to be happy."
"And I can't make you happy," Chakotay answered. "Not like this."
"How do you know? You don't know. Just be honest, Chakotay. Just say you don't want me."
Chakotay gently seized her, tearful himself. "I do want you, Kathryn. I want you so much that...that the thought of leaving is killing me. You say I want your older self, and yes, I love and want her too, but she doesn't want me. For years I've loved her, for years I've hoped that we could be together, but always in vain. I know all this is difficult for you but it's difficult for me too. In fact it's heaven and hell all at once. It's everything I've ever dreamed of to be loved and wanted by you, but absolute hell to know we can't be together."
"I wish you'd never come," Kathryn said, averting her wet eyes. "I wish I was dead."
"Don't say that," Chakotay replied.
"It's true," she said. "I hate my life. I hate it."
She wept painfully, every sob knifing Chakotay's heart. He softened his grip on her arms and tried to draw her close, but Kathryn pushed him away.
"Don't," she said, picking up her pillow and hugging it. "Just leave. Just go."
For a long moment, Chakotay watched her weep, his heart breaking at her pain, but then he got to his feet. He was going to speak, going to say that he only wanted to do what was right by her, that one day she would understand, but he had said those words already. The best thing to do was just to leave.
When he had finished replicating everything he would need for his mission, Chakotay stood at the dining table and carefully packed them into a bag. It was true what he had said to Kathryn, he had no idea how he was going to get back to his future, didn't even know if that future still existed to get back to, but even if his mission was hopeless, he couldn't stay here. Already he had caused too much pain.
"You're really going then."
The voice was Kathryn's.
Chakotay looked up in the direction of it and saw Kathryn standing outside her bedroom door, wrapped in a white satin dressing gown.
"It's for the best," Chakotay replied.
"I know you think that," she said. "And I have to respect that, but I really don't think your future exists anymore."
Chakotay made no reply, just averted his eyes. In his heart, he didn't think so either. Never had Kathryn given any indication of knowing him prior to Voyager. The Kathryn he had met when the ship was divided into different time-frames certainly hadn't met him.
Slowly, Kathryn closed the gap between them. "And if your future doesn't exist anymore, then everything you know might never happen. We might never meet and...and all this love you say you have for me will just go to waste." Tears welled in her eyes. "But I'm sorry. I'm sorry for how I behaved."
"It's alright," Chakotay said looking up at her.
"No," she replied. "It isn't. I was being selfish. All I was thinking about was myself...how much I wanted you to stay. But I understand that you have to try to get back to your own time." A tear ran down her cheek. "But I don't want my last memory of you, or your last one of me, to be one of pain. I'd like us to part with..." her voice fell to a whisper "a kiss."
Chakotay hesitated, so many reasons why they shouldn't kiss racing through his mind, but at the profound longing in Kathryn's eyes, all objections faded. Gently, tentatively, he put his hands around her waist and drew her thin body against his. Kathryn's arms found their way to his shoulders and then locked around his neck. She was trembling slightly and her heart was pounding. Slowly, Chakotay lowered his lips to hers and kissed her with all the sensual tenderness of his love. Kathryn kissed him in return, and they kissed softly, kissed long.
When at last they drew away, Chakotay picked up his bag and looked at her one last time. "Goodbye, Kathryn."
Kathryn made no reply, just watched tearfully as he walked over to the front door.
Slowly, regretfully, Chakotay opened the door, but just as he was about to step through it, something made him turn around. It had felt so right to leave, so necessary, but now, now that it came to it, it suddenly felt so wrong.
"I can't," he said. "I can't leave you."
A light filled Kathryn's tortured eyes. "Then stay."
Chakotay slowly put down his bag. "I'll stay."
He then opened his arms to Kathryn and she happily rushed into them.
END OF CHAPTER THIRTEEN