A/N: See Chapter 1 for Disclaimer.
Chapter 2: Luke's Potential
It was terribly difficult, but Dr. Luke honored his wife's request to give her some space, and he mostly avoided Sick Bay over the next couple of weeks as Dr. Dexa, Mr. Paris, and Kes gave Captain Janeway the physical therapy she needed to help her walk normally once again. And after three weeks, she was officially released from Sick Bay and given clearance to walk the corridors of Voyager without the aid of a walker. And even though she would be on maternity leave until her daughter arrived, which would be in just over two months from now, she still chose to wear the red Starfleet maternity uniform when she left Sick Bay. In her mind, it was her way of trying to reassure her crew – and admittedly, herself – that no matter what weird, unforeseen circumstances she found herself in, she would always be there for her crew as their Captain.
On her first day after leaving Sick Bay, the Captain went to Holodeck Two and began watching the ship's recorded logs of hers and the Doctor's time and activities aboard Voyager. She watched right from the very beginning, right after they were rescued from the Hierarchy aliens, how she and Dr. Luke began having coffee on the Holodeck together, and how their friendship slowly grew and blossomed into love. She watched how, shortly after the Doctor got born-again, both the Holy Spirit and his shipmates refused to let him get away with whining and complaining about the crew missing his piano recital when they'd been fighting a virus spreading through the ship's gel packs, and how a verse from the book of Proverbs, as well as some well-deserved admonishment from B'Elanna and Neelix, had put him in his place. And then, she watched how concerned he became about her and how protective he became over her when he finally began to realize that everything he'd gone through aboard the Idora was only a tiny taste of what she had gone through as the Captain of Voyager over the years.
She watched as they started spending more and more time together, as he began monitoring her meals and her recreational activities on the Holodeck. And as she watched it all play out, she slowly came to understand why and how she'd finally allowed the Doctor to break through all her defenses and allowed herself to fall in love with him. The egotistical hothead he'd been as a hologram never could have won the heart of the magnificent Captain Kathryn Janeway. But the person God had made him into, the person in His image, with His humility, graciousness, generosity, patience, and very deep concern for others, that truly wonderful man the Doctor had been transformed into by Christ, Himself, was a man Kathryn could easily love. But allowing him to love her? That was a whole different ballgame.
After watching so many of the ship's files of the Doctor and herself and their children over the next week, she knew she really needed to pour her heart out to someone who really understood her. Or at least, to someone who really understood the person she'd been thirteen years ago. Someone other than her husband. So obviously, she went to the person who'd understood her the best back then. That evening, once his shift on the Bridge was over, Captain Janeway used the ship's computer to locate Commander Chakotay in the Mess Hall, and she went there to find the man who, for a very long time, had been her closest friend on Voyager.
"Is this seat taken, Commander?" the Captain inquired.
"No. Take a seat, Captain. Please," Commander Chakotay replied with a friendly smile, holding the cup of tea he was drinking. He was still wearing his red Starfleet uniform, and of course, she had donned the red Starfleet maternity uniform.
"Thank you," she said as she sat down at the small table across from her First Officer.
"What's on your mind this evening, Captain?"
"That funny, witty, outrageously talented, intelligent, brilliant, artistic genius of a man I cannot remember marrying."
"I know it hasn't been easy for you. I can't imagine what it must be like, suddenly waking up in Sick Bay one day with a thirteen-year gap in your memories, right in the middle of a completely different life from the one you remember before. With someone you probably never imagined you would ever be married to."
"I know that I'm his wife legally and officially. That I've been his wife for over ten years now. But even though I've been his wife legally for a long time, I can't be his wife emotionally, Chakotay. When I look at him, oh yes, my heart is so moved by his constant thoughtfulness and consideration and love and concern towards me. Towards the children. Towards the crew. And I do love him, Chakotay. I love the beautiful man that he's become. Any woman would be blessed beyond words to get to have a man like him for her husband and the father of her children. And yes, I want to look at this situation, look at him, from that perspective. I want to let myself feel love for him. I want to let myself become emotionally attached to him. I want to bond with him in that way. As a wife. But I can't."
"Why not?"
"Because even though I am his wife, I'm his captain first and foremost. As you all know, I've been in the Holodeck this past week, watching the ship's video files of everything he and I have done together over the past thirteen years. And after watching all the files of us together that I've watched, I get it. I understand how I ended up falling for him. I understand how I was able to allow myself to have a relationship with him and marry him and build a family with him. But I became selfish, Chakotay. Not knowingly or willingly. It happened without me even realizing it. But nonetheless, as a Starfleet captain who is responsible for every single individual member of my crew, I became so horribly selfish. I chose to have a relationship with my crewman, I chose to marry him, and I chose to have and adopt children with him, without the slightest thought as to whether or not doing those things was ever really in his best interests. When I think of how he's living his life today, it hurts my heart, Chakotay. It really does. Luke has got one of the greatest medical minds ever to exist. Literally. And he's a highly gifted and passionate artist and musician. He's a genius in multiple fields. And what, what, is that extraordinary man doing with that extraordinary intellect the good Lord has gifted him with, Chakotay? He's replicating my meals for me. He's singing nursery rhymes. He's stopping temper tantrums and chasing after five-year-olds and mopping up after them. Waiting for me to come home from my duty shift on the Bridge. And he's getting ready to start doing three A.M. feedings and start changing diapers all over again when this baby gets here. He is more than this, Chakotay. He is better than this. Marrying me…oh yeah, it's been very helpful and beneficial to me. But it was one of the worst things that could have happened to him. And I think it's pretty obvious that I cannot approach this situation as a wife. I have to approach it as a captain. As his captain. I have to do what's right. I have to act in the best interests of my crewman, no matter how much it might hurt."
"I understand where you're coming from, Kathryn. I understand you wanting to act in what you believe to be the best interests of a member of your crew. In many ways, being a Starfleet captain is very much like being a mother or a father. There are a great deal of similarities. But sometimes, I think the very best captains – captains like yourself – tend to get so caught up in trying to protect and care for their crewmen that they inadvertently start treating them a little bit like children. Dr. Luke is not a child, Kathryn. You never twisted his arm to make him marry you. You never twisted his arm to have a family with you. And you certainly never twisted his arm to make him resign as your C.M.O. and become a stay-at-home husband and father. Dr. Luke has said it himself several times over the years that that was entirely his idea."
"Maybe so, but I never should have agreed to it or encouraged it. When I watched how tenderly he'd cared for our children through the years, on the one hand, yes, it was beautiful to watch. But on the other hand, it was heartbreaking, watching this remarkably gifted doctor and surgeon, this living, breathing, walking medical encyclopedia, wiping runny noses and mopping up apple juice off our kitchen floor. This man shouldn't be cleaning up our kitchen! He should be in Sick Bay performing microsurgery! He's not operating at anywhere near his full potential anymore, Chakotay, and I am to blame for that. He used to sing and play the piano and even practice medicine with such unrestrained passion. Now, his greatest passion seems to be trying to help me get the kids in bed as soon as possible so we can go to bed early and get a little extra sleep. It almost feels as though I've neutered the poor man, Chakotay!"
Commander Paris came walking past their table then, carrying his tray, and he stopped walking for a moment and said, "Actually, I'm the one that neutered him, Captain. I was the one that performed the vasectomy a few months ago."
Naturally, both Kathryn and Chakotay laughed out loud and had a good belly laugh, and then Kathryn turned her gaze towards her helmsman and told him, "Thank you, Mr. Paris, for that very helpful contribution to the conversation."
"Happy to be of service, ma'am," he kidded, and then he walked over to the nearby table where his wife was waiting and joined her. Having overheard what he'd told their Captain and First Officer, naturally, B'Elanna gave her husband a playful punch in the arm before he sat down.
When they stopped laughing and settled down again and things turned more serious, Chakotay locked his gaze with Kathryn's and asked her, "What are your plans, Kathryn? What do you intend to do?"
Kathryn took a deep breath, let out a long sigh, and replied, "I don't think I have any choice. As his wife, naturally, I want the beautiful marriage we have to last for as long as we live. I want to stay with him right until my dying breath. I want to have this baby with him. I want to keep raising our precious little ones with him. I want to grow old and gray with him. Or perhaps I should say, I want to grow old-er and gray-er with him than I already have. I want those things more than oxygen, Chakotay. But as his captain, I see just how horribly selfish that would be. I can't stay in this marriage with him, Chakotay, no matter how badly I want to. I can't keep his wings pinned like this. I've got to cut him loose, for his own good."
"Why do you think ending your marriage would be a good thing for him, Kathryn? What do you think would happen? Do you think that all of the sudden, he would just stop wanting to be at home with his children every day and want to start working in Sick Bay again? Kathryn, because of your memory loss, I've known the human version of the Doctor a lot longer than you have. And even if you do end this marriage, I can promise you, he is not going to stop wanting to be at home with your little ones. Luke loves being a stay-at-home father ten times more than he ever loved being a doctor or a microsurgeon or an opera singer or a musician. And he loves being a part-time schoolteacher just as much, which should come as no surprise. You know as well as I do how excited he is, how excited he's always been, about learning and teaching new things."
"Yes, I do know that," Kathryn agreed.
"You joked about feeling like you'd neutered him of his passion in life, but I can promise you, you haven't. I know you've been watching the ship's video records of the time he's spent with you and your children over this past week. Now, I'd like to encourage you to watch the records of him with all of the children on our ship during school hours here in the Mess Hall. He used to drive us all completely up the wall with those lectures about humanoid anatomy and physiology he'd make us attend out on the Holodeck all those years ago. But even though he used to get on our last nerve, I know you recall how much of himself he poured into those lectures. How passionate he was about trying to help others learn new things."
"Now that I think about it, you're right. He has always been very passionate about teaching, hasn't he?"
"Of course he has. So if he was willing to pour so much of himself into teaching something new to a room full of disinterested adults, just imagine how much of himself he pours into each and every class he gives to a room full of young children. He's molding and shaping new young minds in ways few people can, and I can assure you that that, in his eyes, will always be his greatest and most meaningful accomplishment. Far more meaningful than any painting he might paint or statue he might sculpt or song he might sing. Far more meaningful than even microsurgery. You say you're afraid that you've cut him off from his passion by letting him give up his medical career to be a stay-at-home husband and father and a part-time schoolteacher, but I say that by capturing his heart and letting him learn from you and letting him fall in love with you and marry you and have a family with you, you've opened him up to a whole new world he never would've known otherwise. You say you're afraid you've kept him from reaching his potential, but I say that you are greatly responsible for unleashing oceans of potential within him that likely would've remained completely dormant had he not had a family with you and remained a doctor instead. You say being married to you is one of the worst things that could have happened to him. I say it's one of the very best things that could have happened to him."
Greatly moved by Chakotay's words, Kathryn reached out and touched his hand, and she whispered, "Thank you, Chakotay. You've really given me a lot to think about."
"I just hope I was helpful."
"You were, Chakotay," she assured him. "You were."
She then got up from the table and walked out of the Mess Hall and began heading for the turbolift to take her to Holodeck Two.