DISCLAIMER: Paramount is the proud owner of Voyager, Janeway, Chakotay, Paris and Torres, other regular characters. It owns the Delta Flyer, Sandrine's, Romulan Ale. It certainly does not own this story, although I very graciously borrowed the characters to write this story. They will be returned. Same way as I found them. The Brenarian society and characters were created by the writer.

SUMMARY: Set somewhere mid-5th season. Kathryn Janeway has so far had to make so many decisions as Captain of Voyager, decisions which have invoked controversy and anger, and turned her into an implacable leader. It has made her lonely, alienating herself from her crew. Especially Chakotay. She leaves Voyager and seeks seclusion with a highly spiritual alien race. The crew , inspired by their First Officer, battle to get her back.

MUSICAL INSPIRATION: For most of the parts I have played classical music, as music inspires my writing. Since the episode "Counterpoint" aired, I have associated Mahler's Symphony No. 1 in D Major with Janeway and Chakotay. Most of the time I play this music when I write J/C, but in this story, I played other pieces as well for the other parts. I beg your indulgence. I have only very recently started writing for J/C. This is my most ambitious J/C project to date, and the story lies very close to my heart.

My sincere thanks to Jamelia of the PTFever List whose commentary on the episode "Latent Image" was the inspiration for this story. All members of the JetC16 Pond who encouraged and supported me while writing this story, and whose comments I really valued. Ghostwriter, my most ardent fan and critic of this story whose sustained feedback with every single part of this story kept me going.

It was a very large, almost draughty auditorium. More a temple to the eyes of those who stood all along its walls. Dotted evenly against the walls were rounded bulbs, the source of light which illuminated this hall, giving it a gold orange aspect. The figures almost as silhouettes, moved gracefully. They were very tall, lissome like with their faces, already a light bluish colour, now deepened as the light threw them into relief.

In front of the row of figures - about twenty of them, was an area, separating the front and the rest of the temple, with its wide panels and columns by a wide series of steps. At the top, centre, a long altar containing candelabras holding burning candles.

In all, a ceremonial hall, where many rituals and ceremonies are conducted, a place of worship to these peoples. Or more likely a ceremony of induction. Three tall men and one woman were standing, facing the group of men and women who were all dressed alike.

The four in front wore what could be described as ceremonial garments, long, flowing robes, the edges of the hems and sleeves bearing blue and gold designs like the garments worn by ancient Greeks. Their heads were bare, but all wore their hair very long. It was the one distinctive feature of the race. Hair hanging into the small of their backs. Their hair was white. Like a sickly grey.

The twenty initiates waited. Only one appeared different from the rest. She was much smaller, shorter although very slender. Her reddish brown hair hung shoulder length. And her skin was very light, creamy, and in stark contrast with the rest of the initiates. Her blue-grey eyes fixed on the four in front of her, she had a certain serenity about her. It was in her face, her carriage. The way her face was lifted. An aura of peace surrounded her, so completely, to have touched her in those moments would have been profane. An invasion.

She wore a white, long flowing gown, with the edges of the hem and sleeves patterned with green bars and lines. The robe was tied at her waist with cord, the knot at her left side, and the ends, hanging down, almost level with her knees. She wore no other adornments.

On a signal, she stepped forward, only two paces, which brought her up to the first step. Two of the priests - calders - proceeded down, and flanked her, then the three of them walked slowly up the flight of steps, till they were standing in front of the long altar.

A chant rose up from the audience, a low murmur almost, and in a strange way sounding musical. The head calder's hand rose slowly, showing six long tapered fingers, multi-jointed and the chanting stopped, leaving a resonating silence in the hall.

The two calders who flanked the woman, stepped away from her, leaving her now standing alone. Then the chief spoke, his voice thin and thready, but the woman understood what they spoke. For on her garment, pinned in front, was a badge, a universal translator.

"Kathryn Janeway, of the United Federation of Planets," the chief calder said. Your request has been granted. You are now a worthy member of this guild of calders. Your new designation is now Bren Darya.

Bren Darya bowed, and the chief calder turned to the table, and when he faced her again, held an amulet on a long chain, and gently placed it around Darya's neck. She looked up at him, bowed again, turned and resumed her original place. Thus the ceremony continued, until all twenty were inducted. The chant started again, from the rest of the audience, while the twenty initiates filed quietly out through an exit to the right of the wide stage.

Bren Darya, now alone in her room, of Spartan appearance, sagged on her bed, fingered the amulet which, strangely, held an embossed design of a space ship.

Her eyes misted over as she looked at the amulet, hanging on a heavy chain. A thousand images flashed by...they flashed by...and were gone. She closed her eyes, and a tear rolled out the corner, spilling hotly on her hand. Yet, she was suffused by a certain peace. Gone were all the old concerns, the duties, the pressures of command. Gone her past life.

At last, she thought. At last I can get on with my new life here and forget about the old one.

How did we get to this? Chakotay asked himself as Voyager remained in high orbit over the planet Brenar, seventh planet of the Brenar star system. Why did she do it? Sequestered herself in the highly organised yet covert society of Brenar?

The Brenarians admittedly, with their proclivity for spiritual meditation and seclusion welcomed their Captain into their fold.

"The Captain of the starship Voyager has requested asylum and has been granted a sanctuary with the people of our world, Commander Chakotay," the First Ambassador, Bren Hadar told him.

Chakotay experienced something like a cold chill going down his spine, felt Tuvok stiffening imperceptibly next to him, raising his eyebrow, and Tom...Tom Paris bristling with indignation as Bren Hadar looked him up and down, assessing...and finding probably the rest of Voyager's crew wanting.

"We can't leave her here, Commander," Tom said urgently, his face losing his old mask of hiding what he felt.

"I concur," Tuvok added, "and may I say, honoured Bren Hadar," looking now at the First Ambassador, "I speak for our crew."

Bren Hadar looked at them as though they were vermin, and he felt his blood boiling at the arrogant way this alien, tall and rangy, spoke to them.

"We have decided. The Captain Kathryn Janeway will remain with us. She has asked that you, Commander Chakotay, take command of the starship Voyager and guide the crew home. She believes the crew to be in capable hands."

"Ambassador, we'll not leave orbit without our Captain," Chakotay said, wondering if the conviction with which he said those heartfelt words got through to him. Standing there in the great hall of their first city, they were on unfamiliar ground. He was on home territory, and therefore had the advantage.

"Commander," Tuvok said, now looking at Chakotay, his eyes remaining inscrutable, "perhaps we should return to Voyager, and leave Brenar space - "

"Not until I have spoken to her first," it burst from him.

"She wishes to speak with no one from Voyager," Bren Hadar said imperiously.

"We'll not know that, would we?" Tom said, "until she tells us that ourselves."

"Ambassador, please inform Captain Janeway that I wish to speak with her, before we leave orbit," Chakotay said, hoping that his last attempt would galvanise her into some way of giving him an audience. It was a last ditch attempt to try and convince her to come back to Voyager.

"I will inform Bren Darya of your wishes, although I am certain she has made her decision."

"Who?" Tom asked.

"Bren Darya. That is Captain Janeway's new designation."

Bren Hadar looked at them, and with his two ministers left the great hall, leaving them almost gaping, standing there.

"Well, Commander, I think we should leave. We are certainly not welcome, it seems," Tuvok said with his usual perspicacity.

"No - ! We can't leave her here, I - ". Seeing how Tom looked at Chakotay, he thought he could see right through him. His hand on Chakotay's arm, he said softly, an understanding look in his eyes:

"I know, Commander. Now let's go, before we are made even more unwelcome."

Tom pushed Chakotay ahead of him, while the Commander kept looking backwards to where Bren Hadar had vanished behind some door. As if he expected Kathryn to appear anytime.

"We...can't leave...not without her..." he said again, a world of entreaty in his voice. His eyes almost fevered. "I know why she wants to stay...I know..." he said again, softly this time.

"Commander," Tuvok said, looking at Chakotay, his eyes piercing, "we will remain in orbit until we have our Captain back."

Chakotay saw in Tuvok's eyes the resolve. They had never gotten along particularly well, but Kathryn Janeway was their Captain, and they all wanted to have her back. All of them. Tuvok had, earlier when they were trapped in the void, pledged his support of Chakotay, should they find themselves in situations such as their present dilemma required.

That was the last they spoke as the three of them boarded the Delta Flyer and left Brenar, and to break the news to the rest of the crew.

Chakotay sat in the ready room, in the chair that had been hers. He felt like a usurper, stealing something precious, and although he was confident that he could command this crew, the crown sat uneasy on his head. It was not his. Not as long as he knew she was still somewhere down on that planet, not as long as he knew that a thousand questions lingered precariously in his mind. Not as long as he knew that a thousand questions wanted to be answered. He looked at the computer screen in front of him, at her picture, and it was as if the picture was alive. A smile hovered on her lips. And he almost smiled in return. The eyes that stared out of the picture at him, so direct, so challenging, so soft, so her. So like her. He could even imagine seeing that familiar knitting of her eyebrows whenever she was amused. The corner of her mouth lifting... It was written in her face, the strength, her unremitting resolve that spoke of one thing: her unswerving devotion to this crew, her "primary goal" setting Voyager on a course for the Alpha Quadrant.

She had been gone exactly one month now. One month too long, he thought. One month he longed for her presence, that smile, her eyes that sometimes, only sometimes, in unguarded moments spoke of messages of hope. That held a promise which flamed his entire being into quivering with longing in which he just hoped that for one second, one minute, one eon, she would open her heart. Just one eon...so that his own heart could answer in that long and hopeless yearning for her. For a few moments his eyes squeezed shut, experienced a pain so acute that he grabbed his chest. He opened his eyes again, his breathing coming in short gasps.

He had known something was afoot the minute they knew they were to enter a new star system. Kathryn had been introspective for a long time before that, preoccupied. And she wouldn't speak, not to him, not to Tuvok. He felt her withdrawal, and became concerned. He had lost that connection with her, one they forged way back when they were stranded on New Earth.

How well he remembered their hands joining, their fingers lacing.

How warm and comforting and trusting her hand was clasped in his! How his heart rejoiced then! He could feel then, how almost tangibly the current of strength flowed from him to her. Those precious moments they shared when minds and heart and souls joined, and became one. How he wished he could protract those moments for all eternity! And Kathryn? He had been so sure, beyond all doubt, that she...that she wanted that, even desired it. The need to have him always by her side. The need to be assured that he wanted to share her burden.

Always.

Always.

"That's the third time I said we should look into the latest crew evaluations, Kathryn," he said to her while they were enjoying a meal together.

"Huh?" she murmured, still picking at her food, not bothering to look up when he spoke to her.

"Have you been listening Kathryn?" he asked, his eyes never leaving hers.

"What did you say?" she parried.

"Forget it, Kathryn. Your mind is obviously not here," he said, sighing.

Only then she looked up at him. Her eyes a little clouded, he sensed something of a sadness, even her voice had become softer. Without the assertive manner with which she always spoke, even to him, even in private. Somehow, he always felt she carried her command voice with her, the one that he thought she could just never relinquish. That same command voice that, with just a miniscule lowering of its register, he knew was meant just for him. For the two of them. Now, it was softer. Different.

"I'm sorry, Chakotay. You're right. My mind was drifting a little."

"And where, may I ask?" he said in an attempt at joviality, thinking that this dinner was too, too quiet.

"Captain's prerogative, Commander." And it seemed to him that her words brooked no argument. That her words, the way they were uttered, established once again their parameters. He looked at her for long moments before he spoke, his voice a whisper.

"Certainly, Captain," he said, becoming tightlipped, and thinking: she's shutting me out again. She's not letting me see anything. He was filled with a sense of foreboding, that something was going to happen. She had that closed look again, and nothing he said the rest of that evening, could penetrate that thick wall of reserve she erected around her. There was a determined look about her, her message clear: don't pry.

It was not so much that she was drawn to the meditative lifestyle of the Brenarians, as that her decision to leave Voyager was further promoted by the protectiveness the Brenarians manifested the minute they set foot on the soil of Brenar. The two of them had been in consultation with Bren Hadar, and Kathryn seemed far too taken in with all the Bren expounded of their people's way of life.

The minute they beamed back on board Voyager, he knew Kathryn had something on her mind. Even then she never indicated her intentions.

But the following morning:

"Chakotay to Janeway," he tapped on his commbadge.

There was no response.

"Computer, locate the Captain."

"Captain Janeway is not on board Voyager," came the impersonal voice of the computer.

He felt his blood turn cold. And knew in that instant that she had to be on the planet.

Their first communication with the Brenarians ended in a deadlock, as did the second and the third and the fourth. The Brenarians were implacable, acceding only to Kathryn Janeway's wishes. They couldn't come within spitting distance of her. Until they were informed that she had been inducted into their society. With no further wish to see any of the Voyager crew. Not even him, Chakotay.

He was distraught. He didn't care whether Tom and Tuvok were witness to his distress.

**************

They were in the briefing room. Just after they were informed that Kathryn would not return, her new designation now Bren Darya.

Bren Darya.

Chakotay thought if anything could be a sign that Kathryn Janeway was set on her decision, it was that damned designation. Which Bren Hadar mouthed with so much haughty insolence to them. The inference in his voice and demeanour clear: Kathryn Janeway is one of them now.

"Our course is clear at this point in time," Tuvok said, "we must remain here until the Captain seeks to return to us."

"I suppose we can't just haul her out of there," B'Elanna said, her eyes and voice barely civil, the anger and indignation simmering just beneath the surface.

"We cannot force her to comply," Seven said, her own voice stony, revealing none of the apprehension she felt. She knew that the minute the Captain was fully assimilated into that society, they would not get her back. Assimilation is assimilation, whether it's the Borg or Brenarians, she told them.

"Yeah, and I suppose the Brenarians are just a little more sophisticated in their methods," Tom said, his whole stance wanting to take the Flyer down and convince the Captain her place is with them. Seven looked askance at him. He smiled his apology to her, and Seven nodded in acceptance.

"Not to say covert," Tuvok said again.

"Mr Tuvok, report your findings, please," Chakotay said where he had been standing behind the chair the Captain usually sat in. An indication to the group that he was not happy leaving her behind. But more than that, Tom thought as he looked at their first officer. He's taking it very hard. The Captain, if only she knew how their first officer was affected. Tom thought that the moment Chakotay sat in that chair, it would be a symbolic message: Kathryn Janeway was history.

Then Tuvok's voice broke into his thoughts.

"They are a covert society, although most of their ceremonies border on ritualism. They strive to reach a higher state of consciousness, through deep meditation. The Captain has taken the first step into being fully inducted. If we do not try to get her back, Commander, we may lose her completely," he said, without a shred of emotion on his face. "Under the veneer of their sophistication, lies a strange and mystic practice."

"So we need to know the nature of these practices and their function in order to get the Captain back," Tom said. Then added: "Eventually."

"Mr Tuvok, continue with your investigations. I am of the opinion that we may have to remove her from the Brenarians, even if it is against her will," Chakotay said finally.

"Aye, Commander," B'Elanna retorted fervently.

"Meanwhile, we remain on orbit until the Captain grants me an audience," he said, his voice filled with determination.

The others sighed. It's what they wanted to hear.

"I'm glad, Commander," said Harry. "I have a lock on her commbadge at all times. Apparently as I understand from Mr Tuvok, she still has it pinned on her. To communicate with the Brenarians." "Good," Chakotay said, feeling not much more relieved that when the meeting started.

***************

That was a week ago.

Now he waited. To see her and talk to her. Convince her that she has a loyal crew. That they wanted her back, that they needed her. That he needed her.

Sighing, he rose from the chair and went to the bridge again. They looked at him, the bridge crew, and respectfully turned their attention to their work. It pained and embarrassed them to see the first officer in such obvious distress.

He was deep in thought. He sensed from the start why she wanted to leave them, though he knew that he would never rest until he heard it from her, that she tell him finally of her resolve to remain with the Brenarians.

It had slowly built over the years, the heavy burden and responsibility of her task to get Voyager home. They faced so many adversities together, the crew placing its trust in her, remaining loyal to her even when she was at her most intractable. And intractable she was forced to be many times. Especially of late, when some of the decisions she made begged discussion, which she would not even allow him to be part of. They were controversial, sometimes inconsistent, but she was the Captain, as her demeanour so often reminded them . There was something that was ready to boil over in her, and that she wouldn't talk about it, even to him, hurt the most. And then there was that damnable guilt she felt "stranding them in the Delta Quadrant." He sighed.

Now, the starship felt her absence. Keenly. She was always such a presence, even if crew from the lower decks seldom saw her. She was there. And they missed her. From little Naomi to Neelix.

Oh, Kathryn, he thought with his heart thudding painfully, why didn't you trust your crew enough to believe in them?

"It's a decision I made for the crew, Chakotay," she told him not long ago in her quarters. "A decision that stranded all of us here in the Delta Quadrant."

And that, to sum it up, he thought, was the core of Kathryn's whole dilemma. One she thought she was alone in. Lonely. As if she didn't have a capable first officer, and a more than capable crew. Who pledged their support of her decisions, even if...

"You are not alone, Kathryn," he said on so many occasions.

"Are you with me, Chakotay?" he can still hear her, that evening in her quarters over dinner, the night before they made that fateful and abortive quantum slipstream drive.

"Always," he said then, with so much conviction.

But, he sighed. She believed no one. Refused to let herself trust him, or even Tuvok.

"Guilt is her constant companion," Tuvok said once.

Kathryn's guilt. A feeling she could just not let go of. She was adamant that there was no other recourse, no way to expiate that guilt. And no matter how many times he tried to make her understand that they were all in their plight together, she could not bring herself to accept that truth, or that assurance.

"Commander," Harry broke into his reverie. "There is an incoming message from Brenar."

"Visual?"

"Aye, Commander."

"On screen," he barked, his heart thudding.

Bren Hadar's face, it's bluish tint shiny, the grey hair tucked behind the elongated ears, hanging down his back, the eyes a pitch black, appeared on the screen.

"Greetings, Voyager."

Chakotay rose from his chair, and moved forward, standing behind Tom, his hands on his hips, in an unconscious imitation of Kathryn Janeway.

"I take it you have some news to relay."

"Indeed." And he looked almost displeased when he said that. The way his black eyes peered now at them, his thin lips pursed.

"Bren Darya - "

"Kathryn Janeway, to us."

"Very well then. Kathryn Janeway has agreed to grant an audience to one person only. She will speak only with you, Commander Chakotay. And you are to come alone."

The screen went blank again, too suddenly.

And for a few seconds Chakotay stood motionless, with the crew looking expectantly at him. But he didn't return their stares, just went slowly back to his chair, and sagged down into it.

Finally, Chakotay thought. Finally, I can see her.

Brenar's First City was abuzz. Word had filtered through to the common denizens that, of the new calders inducted into their Caulean Circle was a stranger amongst them. A human female, who came into their realm one lunar cycle ago, and pleaded for admission into this august body of calders. A woman who was the leader of a star traveler traversing the great skies on their way to their own habitat. They have seen visitors from other worlds, even granted many of them safe haven on Brenar. But a humanoid human, small, very fair with short red hair? This new calder became something of a curiosity to them.

Brenar is a society that possessed itself a high level of technology, that was secondary only to their cloistered way of life. Everyone aspired to the Caulean Crescence, their highest level of consciousness before they leave their corporeal existence. For millennia many who strove toward this zenith became beings of such revered and enlightened auras, that they came to represent all that was purification personified. That was what the people of Brenar believed implicitly.

The calders had to proceed through several stages to reach the Caulean Crescence, and this cycle, the twenty inductees had reached all but the last stage. It was the one feared by many. It filled those who aspired to the Crescence with a feelings of unease, doubts, apprehension; but at the same time with awe and veneration. They would be cleansed and purged of all that was part of their corporeal lives, leave their old lives behind, their bodies becoming now mere hosts of a new and different consciousness.

Those members who succeeded, forever leave all that had been familiar to them, home, family, loved ones, and a lifetime of memories, whether those memories were good or bad, or both. A family therefore, viewed with pride and concern at the same time when a loved one, brother, sister, son, daughter, parent, left the family fold to become a calder.

In a secluded house along one of the streets of the first city, one family huddled together to ponder over why their only and youngest son sought to become a calder. Theirs was not awe or pride or reverence, but a deep concern and fear, that they would lose their son forever, for the things they heard...

Now they heard that a woman, a captain of a very powerful starship was about to become a calder. But they also heard that her people were waging a battle to get her back to them. Their hearts were filled with hope, for could they not approach these star travelers and request their help? In only a matter of days their son, now Bren Prokto would lose all memory of them and the life he had, through the purging, which they heard was not an easy thing to go through. Not only that, they have heard of certain practices that were beyond the boundaries of what the general populace were made to believe.

Now if only they could speak to these visitors whom they knew, from rumours, had been seeking audience with Bren Hadar almost everyday since their leader had been given asylum. Asylum!

****************

Bren Darya sat in her little room, part of the complex of which she could only describe as a monastery. She had been here exactly one month. One month in which she had consistently refused to see anyone of the Voyager crew. Especially Chakotay.

She brought along that fateful morning, only the barest of her belongings. A few PADDs containing her personal logs, which she had accumulated over five years. A novel Tom had given her on her last birthday, not long after he served his thirty day sentence in the brig. 20 000 leagues... The watch on the fob chain Chakotay had given her, an eternity ago, it seems.

Chakotay. She was to see him in an hour. The last concession she wanted to make before going into total seclusion. He had been so insistent. She could not go on refusing to see him, after the fifth or was it sixth attempt? to see her. They would never leave. She knew that. They were, after all her crew, trained by her hand, so to speak.

But Chakotay.

It was going to the hardest thing to do. Letting go of her first officer. She closed her eyes, and reveled for a last time, in memories... A last time to savour everything he had come to mean to her. Yet...

"You picked a bad time to isolate yourself from the crew, Kathryn."

"They will die for you, Kathryn..."

"I stranded all of you here, Chakotay. It was a decision I made for this crew..."

"A selfish decision on my part..."

Her heart burned, as she brought into memory his familiar face, his image on her brain, before her closed eyes. That smile, that threw his whole face into such a carefree relief, his eyes that creased with his smile, and his familiar dimpled cheeks.

She sighed. He would have to take Voyager home. She wanted no more of it. No more. Because everytime she had to make a decision in which moral and ethical issues were at stake, she absorbed all for the rest of the crew, taking all responsibility on her...and made herself unloved. Unpopular. Hated.

Tuvix. She felt that old familiar burn again. The Doctor's refusal to take the responsibility for killing a man in whom two of her crew existed. For weeks after that she could not sleep. The face of Tuvix breaking through the swirling eddies of sleep, pointing at her, his wide eyes like a young doe that knew it was about to die.

No matter how much it satisfied her to see Neelix and Tuvok again, she just couldn't forget Tuvix. Or those eyes...

And everytime she took these decisions she faced the wrath of crew members, their anger, their outrage that she made decisions for them. And everytime, everytime without fail, something in her died. It broke her down. She lost something irretrievable, that she could never regain. And all those occasions she wondered whether to hope, was at all worthwhile. For everytime it, seemed, a little of that hope died. Breaking her. Wearing her down.

She didn't want to think anymore. Not want to face anyone from her familiar world of living anymore. She felt goosebumps rising on her skin, just thinking of the responsibility and the heavy burden of taking a hundred and forty seven people home. And its concomitant and ever ubiquitous decisions, moral issues, ethical issues and duties. Janeway's dilemma: How to be a strong and capable leader and be respected for her decision making. Why was it, when she had so many wonderful people around her, she still felt the pang of loneliness, of being alone? She didn't want to think that there were times when she was happy. Was she ever happy?

No, it was only all the travails, all their adversities, the deaths of crew, the pain of loss, of losing a crewman who had become a loving member of a family.

Family.

That was what Tom once said they were.

Seven.

"I am a part of the collective of this ship, Voyager. This is my home, and these crew my family."

"There is something about the community of pain, of loneliness that keeps us together, Captain," Tom said once.

"Why don't you trust me, Kathryn?"

Chakotay...

She took out of her bag of meager belongings the only photograph she thought to keep with her.

Chakotay.

Her fingers traced softly the smiling face, going over every line of his tattoo, resting at the curl of it just at his left temple. She almost imagined she could feel the heat of his skin under her fingers.

His eyes that always seemed to smile at her, the dimples that would form when he did so.

"Are you with me, Chakotay?"

"Always," he said then, with so much conviction.

Her eyes closed and she could feel the tears coming. Unable to stop them.

She saw again, how he bent over her prone body, willing her to fight to stay alive, screaming her name to the heavens, his agony then that he would lose her. Almost demented in his grief. His tears... She never did tell him that she saw that. A Chakotay stripped of all pretense, his feelings for her clear and raw... he never spoke of it again. All they did later was enjoy a bottle of champagne on a boat on Lake George... Nothing more.

Never did she tell him. Yet all of it recorded in her logs. Her emotional state still raw, still unable to come to terms that she had a near death experience and that she saw him fighting to keep her alive...

His face smiled out at her, a face that very soon, she will never see again, never remember...

"We could dance here all night, Kathryn," he said to her one evening when the crew celebrated Valentine's Day on the holodeck. He had been so relaxed then, and she...she melted away into his arms, just savouring his strength, feeling his hard chest, like a rock she could lean on...

"Dear, dear Chakotay, for once, let me forget," she whispered into his arms, and she felt his lips on her hair...

But when his mouth moved down to meet her lips, she withdrew... Why, she could never analyse, never explain to herself.

"I'm by your side, always Kathryn, remember that," he whispered again to her, after feeling her withdrawal. He wouldn't let her go then, but kept her gently still in his arms, and observed the old parameters...

It was never enough...

"I thought I could trust you..."

"You stoop to emotional blackmail, Kathryn?"

Bren Darya felt how her body almost rocked to and fro as she thought of these words of Chakotay. How she used him then. All he felt for her, all he wanted to be for her, used it to get her own way.

Sobbing, she threw herself on the bed. And lay there, crying softly.

I can't go back to that, she thought with agony. I can't go back.

Not to Voyager. Not to my old life. Not to him...

How long she had been lying there she didn't know. She must have fallen asleep. She woke slowly, hearing a soft knock on her door.

When she opened the door, Bren Hadar stood in the doorway.

"Bren Darya."

"Yes?"

"Commander Chakotay is here."

He was standing in an annexe of the main buildings housing the monastery. There were very high walls erected all round, and inside the verdant plant life of the planet abounded. Seats were dotted strategically, so that no one who sat down, faced another person sitting somewhere else. The idea of intense meditation even here receiving further encouragement.

He was reminded a lot of the nineteenth century monks who pledged vows of silence. It was quiet. Far too quiet, Chakotay thought. There were no natural noises here, like in the busy arcades and plazas of the First City with their colonnades, where one could even hear birds with their exotic plumage and the sounds they made. No, it was too quiet, and if truth be told, he thought, too eerie.

The silence lending an even more bizarre and secretive atmosphere to the setting. He felt a slight unease. He had sent away teams into the city to collect information, and by 1600 they should be back on Voyager with their findings. If he were unsuccessful here, they would have to resort to using methods he knew Kathryn would not approve of, going, so to speak, against her wishes. Already they have been made aware that all was not what it seemed with this...Caulean Crescence and the methods they used. He wondered whether Kathryn was aware of it, or any of the other new calders for that matter. But she seemed set on her decision to remain here. If only he could convince her...

He was in dress uniform, command red, since he had to speak with the City's First Ambassador, in his official capacity as the acting captain of the starship Voyager. The coat reached to just above the knees. He hated this, never liked dressing up. But if this small sacrifice was what it took to see Kathryn, he was willing to don ten of these coats.

He didn't wait long. She stepped from a doorway of the monastery, stood still for a few moments. When she saw him, he could see the hesitant step forward she took, stood still again, then proceeded towards him, where he was standing at the far end of the annexe, the furthest away from that door, and near a seat that faced the wall.

Chakotay, looking at Kathryn approach, thought that the image of her floating towards him it seemed, to be engraved on his brain forever. In spite of the precarious situation they were all in, Kathryn Janeway looked beautiful, her golden reddish brown hair so shiny, it caught the sunlight, the light playing in her hair as she moved. Her face had a serene look, although she didn't smile. His heart gave a sudden lurch at seeing her look almost ethereal in her beauty. Never had he seen her like this. Never loved her more.

She wore a long, flowing robe, with the familiar blue and yellow bands and patterns at the hem and sleeve ends. Tied at her incredibly narrow waist, the cord. There was already a certain untouchability about Kathryn Janeway, an aura about her. Chakotay felt his heart thud, his heart sinking as he thought: my task is going to be more difficult than I thought.

**************

Bren Darya stood in the door of the monastery leading into the garden annexe and spotted Chakotay immediately where he had been standing at the far end. He was in dress uniform, and she thought, almost grudgingly, and unwillingly, how incredibly handsome he looked. Of all the times over the last five years they had to wear dress uniform, it was Chakotay who, to a man, looked exceptional in it. Like now. The three quarter length coat sat well on him, his broad shoulders filling it to perfection. Inconsequential came the thought that he always did have finely honed musculature. How often in the last five years didn't she rest her head against his hard chest, reveled in the feel of his strength? She sighed. This was one audience she hoped would be concluded soon.

So she stepped forward and walked towards him. The soft sandals she wore made not a sound, giving the impression that she was not walking, but floating. She stopped within one metre of him.

"Chakotay."

"Kathryn."

They spoke simultaneously. Then she moved first.

"You wanted to see me."

"Yes."

Already Chakotay could sense it was going to a difficult conversation.

"Chakotay, I - "

"Yes, I know, you have made your decision. But hear me out, please Kathryn."

"Certainly. You have made enough representations to see me. After this..."

She paused, and he knew she meant that they would never see her again. He felt that strange physical pain in the region of his heart again. So sharp, he almost gasped with the intensity of it. But he was wont to let her see his discomfort.

"Kathryn, I speak first for the crew. Your crew." He watched how she blanched when he said it that way. "Our crew," he added softly." She nodded, and he continued:

"They need you. You are their Captain." She turned her face away. "Look at me please, Kathryn. They want you back," he said softly as she looked at him again. "I want you back, Captain."

"Chakotay, I'm n - "

"Kathryn, while you are here, standing in front of me, living and breathing, you are my Captain." So much more, so much more, he wanted to add, but he could sense her withdrawal.

"I have made my decision, Chakotay. I thought you would have respected that."

She gave him the perfect opening, and even if he knew how hard it would be for her - and for him - he pressed on:

"Then surely, as you yourself said before, a decision you made because you were selfish."

"How can you say that, Chakotay?"

"I - Kathryn... remember when we were in the void, and you said - "

"I know what I said then, Chakotay - "

"Then surely you must realise how your decision has affected the crew..."

She looked at him with a pained expression in her blue-grey eyes, soft as he had never seen it. And almost, almost he lost his resolve. But she spoke again.

"You...don't know how...difficult it is..."

This time his hand went out and held her shoulders and he drew her nearer. Please dear God, he prayed silently, let Kathryn relent.

"I know...Kathryn. You just would not share your burden with us... with me..."

"I - "

"We are alone in the Delta Quadrant, Kathryn, as you have pointed out so many times. And I know there is no one, no vice-admiral, no admiral above you to whom you could turn for some of the decisions you were forced to make. No Federation, no power higher than you. And I know how it has worn you down. But Kathryn I also know that while you have no other authority above your own rank, you've forgotten, it seems that you have people beside you. Who could help you, who are willing to absorb some of your burdens."

"Chakotay, I... always felt..."

"Alone, Kathryn? A loneliness of your own making, because you won't allow any of us in? Me? Your first officer. Your friend?" he said a little heatedly, then added: "Tuvok, an old friend?"

"You have no idea, don't you?"

"What, Kathryn? That you won't trust me? That you won't allow yourself to take one leap of faith and place your trust in me and the crew? Enlighten me!"

"No! There's nothing to say, Chakotay. This conversation is going nowhere. You had better go." With that she moved to the seat, clearly wanting to sit down, but he grabbed her again. His eyes were heated now, and she could see the sheen of angry tears welling in them.

"There is everything to say, Kathryn. There is a ship full of crew members who are dying to have you back again, who won't leave without their beloved Captain. A crew who would die for you, do everything for you, if you'll let them. They want you with them, don't you realise that? They feel you have deserted them. Regardless of whether I'm capable or not of taking them home. Home, Kathryn. Home. They want you to take them home. You. With me beside you," he added softly.

He had pulled her closer to him by now, into his embrace and for a moment she almost gave in to the comforting hardness of his chest. Then he started shaking her, his hands resting strangely enough lightly on her shoulders. But he was beyond reasoning now, knowing he was fighting for the very breath of his life. His existence.

"And what about me, Kathryn? What about me? Haven't we been through so much in the last five years? What of everything we have shared? The hardship, the pain? Do you know how often I thought of you lying on that damned planet dying, and I thought I'd lost you forever?"

"Let me go, Chakotay," she said softly, a little dangerously.

"Let me go."

"Then tell me why you want to stay here, and throw everything you have worked for, everything all of us had been through, away? Tell me!"

"Fine, then you leave me alone, do you hear? Alone!" She spoke heatedly, yet her voice was soft. "Everytime, Chakotay, everytime a crew member died, a part of me died. Everytime I made a decision of ethical and moral proportions, I made them, for the ship, and I absorbed all the stress and responsibility, taking away everyone else's sense of guilt. Not wanting this crew or that officer the shoulder blame and guilt. I took it on myself. It broke me down, Chakotay. It wore me down. I sometimes wished I could just dump all of us on a planet somewhere and let you all get on with your lives. But I couldn't..." and she started sobbing wildly for a few seconds, the tears spilling down her cheeks.

"I can't anymore, Chakotay... I can't..."

"Then let us share you burden, Kathryn," he softly. "And if guilt be apportioned, let it be apportioned where it belongs and deserves. By taking on the crew's guilt, as you say, you are not allowing them to grow, letting them go on wearing you down as you say, by spoiling them. Yes... They have talked about it, Captain. You have shouldered responsibilities that were theirs, that they wanted to take on themselves. That they were willing and prepared to take upon themselves." He paused, then continued softly:

"They are not children, Kathryn. They are adults, fully capable of taking responsibility for their actions, fully ready to be accountable.

"I am their Captain..."

"I'm glad you remember that, Captain - " he said a little acidly.

"You know what I mean, Chakotay."

"Then let me rephrase that. I want to repeat it. We will not leave orbit Kathryn. Even if it means we stay here, and wait. Because you are their Captain. And they want you to lead them. To follow your orders."

"I am not going, Chakotay. In a few days, I will have joined the -"

"Yes, we know that too, the Caulean Crescence. Kathryn Janeway, starship captain and scientist, going into seclusion..." he said a little acidly.

She looked at him, her eyes filled with anger, and the anger abated as suddenly as it appeared, replaced by a new resolve. He saw it, his heart burning. His hand touched her cheek. She turned away from the hand, then said:

"Leave."

"I can't. Not without you."

"Please."

"No."

"Chakotay..."

"I can't do it, Kathryn. Let you stay here. You have come to mean too much to us. To me..."

She pulled herself out of his arms. Then took a good look at him. His eyes, always so expressive, the tattoo that had drawn her so compellingly, his short cropped hair she always wished she could run her fingers through.

He was hurting. Hurting. She felt for a second like giving in to him. Like going back to Voyager. Assume command again. Then the pain hit her. Hard. Again.

She saw Tuvix's pleading eyes, the loneliness of the void. B'Elanna lying on a biobed with an alien creature sucking her life's breath from her, the EMH losing his memory subroutines, Tom...Tom's proud eyes when she sent him to solitary and stripped him of his rank. Even Kashyk. On whom she used her wiles to outwit him. How she hated that, knowing how Chakotay had been hurt then. And she hardened her heart. She didn't want to live through similar responsibilities again, knowing how she had already reached breaking point. How she had been eaten up by guilt. Knowing she would be lonely once again.

"Leave, Chakotay," she commanded.

"Don't do this to me, Kathryn."

"Leave."

"I can't, don't you understand? My life is empty without you."

He hauled her into his arms, held her so close to him, she could smell his aftershave, the muskiness. His hands stroked her hair, and he pressed his lips where his hands had been. Then his fingers stroked her neck, pressing her closer to him, wanting to kiss the top of her head. His eyes were full of tears, and the moment she drew back, out of his embrace, he knew.

He saw it in her eyes. Unmistakable. Her resolve. Seen over a period of five years. Kathryn Janeway negotiating, Kathryn Janeway bartering, Kathryn Janeway issuing commands that brooked no argument, Kathryn Janeway telling him to go.

No debate, Chakotay.

He knew.

He lost her.

He stepped back, on attention, hands stiff by his sides.

"That's that then, Captain Janeway."

"That's that, Commander Chakotay."

Chakotay looked at her one last time, his hand went out and he touched her tear-stained cheek.

"My love," he said very, very softly, his voice husky.

And all the time, looking at her, Chakotay raised his hand, brought it to his chest, and tapped his commbadge, and his voice now hollow, he said, finally:

"Chakotay to Voyager. One to beam up."

Kathryn Janeway watched as Chakotay vanished in the familiar blue shimmer of the transporter beam. He did not see her distraught look, her tears, did not hear her "I love you," she whispered softly.

There was a rustling behind her, and when she turned, she saw Bren Hadar. She straightened up, and said to him.

"I am ready for the purging, Bren Hadar."

Ensign Mulcahy looked at Commander Chakotay as the Commander materialised on the transporter pad.

He had, like most of the crew, expected to see the Captain beamed on board with the Commander. Like most of the crew, he had no doubt that the Commander would be successful in convincing the Captain that her place was on Voyager, with them, her crew.

The Commander's eyes - it was in his eyes - had a hollow, bleak look about them. And stepping off the pad, he could see a kind of hopeless and quiet despair behind that emptiness, which lurked there. His features were drawn, and he stared absently at the floor. His shoulders drooped, and he thought this man, Maquis, mighty warrior who always exuded the picture of quiet and controlled strength, was in a word, disheartened.

"You are to proceed immediately to sickbay, Commander," Mulcahy offered a little carefully, observing very strict protocols of non-fraternisation. He did not want to venture in further conversation.

"Yes..." Chakotay said, his manner distracted as he left the transporter room, leaving Mulcahy pondering on what he would tell his colleagues in engineering. Mulcahy had a thoughtful look about him, and his piercing blue eyes narrowed. He was certain, although the crew of the lower ranks, excluding of course a recently demoted helmsman, were left somewhat in the dark about the retrieval of their dear Captain, that there was a plan B. There was always a plan B. He was confident that in spite of the disconsolate way the Commander looked, they would have their captain back.

He remembered when they were in the void, and the Captain wanted to leave Voyager then. The Commander, in defiance of the Captain's express orders, apprised the senior crew of her decision. Then, having defied her, they could only do so while they knew they had a plan B.

He sighed. And hoped that things would work out, that the Captain would return and see how much they valued her leadership. She might even realise how much she meant to the Commander...

**************

He didn't go to sickbay.

He wanted to find a hole he could hide in. He wanted to engulf himself in darkness, and stay there. But he knew even there, even there her face would burn itself on his brain, etched in acid, never to be forgotten. The way he saw her a few minutes ago, so set on her course. So committed, even though he could see at times that she wavered. He felt sick, that he couldn't succeed in his task of bringing her back on chariots of blazing glory to Voyager.

And any other means they would have to employ now, he knew in his heart of hearts, would never be because he convinced her of her real place on Voyager. But that they coerced her back. Something that she would never forgive him for...

That hurt the most. He felt sick to his stomach. Sick and desolate and alone. And aching with the knowledge that whatever they did now, would for all time be tainted by the fact alone that they went against her wishes.

He walked aimlessly through the corridors of Voyager, ignoring the curious stares of crew members who passed him, just nodded their greeting and went on their way. It was clear to them that he was disinclined towards any conversation, any explanation. So deep in thought was that he experienced something of a mild shock when he found himself in the hydroponics bay.

He sat down on a little bench, something Kes arranged long before she left Voyager. Looking at the beautiful green leaves and plants, little shrubs and shoots, some colourful flowers, he remembered their time on New Earth. He stood up from the bench, walked to one of the trays, and fingered very gingerly the little tomatoes perched precariously on their stems. They were a blood red, quite unlike what they've always been used to back home in the Alpha Quadrant.

Kathryn had been here with him in the hydroponics bay when the first tomatoes from her original seedlings started growing.

"You may taste one, Captain," Kes said at the time, seeing how Kathryn looked with such pride at the little red blobs.

"Who wanted to muck around in the ground when you could study quantum mechanics..." were her words when he teased her playfully then.

Kes had sprayed two of it, for them to eat.

"Here, let me," he said, taking the tomato and holding it for her to bite on. It was a gesture of such intimacy, his fingers touching her lips as she sank her teeth into the ripe fruit, a little squishing sound as the fruit broke open between her teeth. How she closed her eyes savouring the taste of it.

How he loved her then, when she looked at him, and enjoying the moment more than eating the fruit. They shared something so close, so personal then.

"My turn," she said as she did the same for him. He closed his eyes as he felt even now, almost three years later, the exquisite feel of her fingers on his cheeks and his lips.

Chakotay sank his head in his hands where he was sitting, his shoulders hunched, a picture of abject despair. He was unaware of the flow of tears that rolled hotly down his cheeks.

I failed you, Kathryn. I failed the crew, came his thoughts in agonising pain, and he experienced once again that sharp stab in his heart. So acute, he started gasping for air.

"Commander?"

He looked up to see Samantha Wildman standing in front of him. He tried to mask his pain, rather ineffectually, as he saw her look of compassion, her eyes soft and kind.

"Forgive me, I'm sorry Samantha. I was - "

"Really deep in thought. I could see that."

"I failed to bring her back, Samantha."

"She will come back, Commander," she said with conviction.

"Yes..." he sighed. At what cost.

"I've been sent to make sure - "

"Sick bay to Commander Chakotay," interrupted the Doctor's strident voice.

"I'm on my way, Doctor," he said quickly as he rose and excused himself to leave the hydroponics bay, leaving Samantha Wildman staring thoughtfully after him.

**************

"Commander, I called you half an hour ago," Doctor complained.

"Yes, I know. I'm here now, isn't it?" he said, a little angry note in his voice.

"Well Commander, you know why you are here."

"Yes..."

"And what our next course of action will be."

"Yes..."

"How about answering me in full sentences, Commander?"

"I'm sorry, Doctor. Right now I'm not too congenial." He tried to smile, and the Doctor merely humphed.

"Fine. Now let me see your hand."

It was the moment Chakotay dreaded. Since the moment he beamed back to Voyager. He held out his right hand, and the Doctor turned it palm up, holding it there.

He looked at Chakotay's palm, and more specifically, his fingers.

"Hmmm... I see the implants had been successfully completed," the Doctor said as he fingered Chakotay's forefinger and thumb cushions. For there were the tiniest punctures seen only because there were stains of blood there. The Doctor cleared it up quickly with the regenerator. They had been quite deep in, and had been injected, once certain pressure had been applied, into Kathryn's skin.

"Don't for one moment think it made me happy doing it, Doctor."

"The end justifies the means Commander. It had to be done this way. We would never have been able to transfer the transponders under her skin the way you were able to do, Commander."

Chakotay had a thunderous expression on his face.

"I deceived her, Doctor. I deceived her. Yes, the transponders were successfully implanted. I pressed it into her neck muscles as we agreed. She didn't feel a thing. She'll never notice it's there, Doc. The miracle of 24th century technology."

He placed his hands over his eyes, trying to hold back the tears, not let the Doctor see his distress. Then he said again:

"I deceived her..."

"Commander, it's our only recourse now. If we can't get her to come back willingly, this is the way we agreed to do it. We know she..."

The Doctor saw Chakotay's pained expression, the tears in his eyes, and for two seconds his celebrated and recently acquired bedside manner kicked in, and he had the holographic grace to look ashamed.

"I'm sorry, Commander. You are aware of the Brenarian's, or shall we say the Caulean Crescence's, methods of purging. Unfortunately, the Captain will be going through with it."

"I know Doc," Chakotay said. "She will be purged of all her memories, and if the purging is not complete, she - she - "

"She will be tortured," the EMH added softly.

"Yes..." Chakotay said softly, feeling on the verge of tears. Oh, Kathryn come back, before it's too late... came his silent plea.

"It will take place in two day's time, Commander."

"Yes..." again in those monosyllabic tones.

"Are you ready to be prepped, Commander?" the EMH asked kindly.

"Yes..." he said, again distractedly.

"Fine, then you'd better get into the hospital gown, and take your seat there on the biobed," the Doctor commanded. He stood there with a hypospray in his hand.

**************

A few minutes later Chakotay was ready in Starfleet issue hospital blues, and lying on the diagnostic bed.

"Ready?" Doctor asked.

"Yes..."

"Now Commander, you are fully aware of the magnitude of what you are about to do. I should warn you again, but then I know, you'll just ignore me."

"Go ahead, Doctor. I can take it."

"I'll sedate you first. You'll be connected from this point on, continuously to the monitors." This he said as the Doctor pressed the hypospray against his neck. Samantha had quietly entered, and held a tray.

"Sit up, commander."

Chakotay sat up, and the doctor fingered the skin on the back of his neck. Then his hand went to the tray, and with only a mild sting, he pressed the two little receivers into the subdermal layer at the base of Chakotay's skull. Like when he transferred the transponders that had been just under the skin of his thumb and forefinger, into Kathryn's neck, these were larger, and were little receivers.

"We will be monitoring all her increased stress levels, through the receivers we are injecting into your skin."

"I know, Doc."

"There, transplant complete. It will itch for a few hours Commander, but it will go over."

The doctor moved so that he faced Chakotay. Then he spoke. There was compassion in his eyes:

"The away teams will be reporting their findings in about four hours. They will do so here, in sick bay Commander Chakotay, as you instructed them."

"Yes... they know." Chakotay looked at the EMH, already feeling the effects of the hypospray. He knew that in a few minutes he would be asleep. In the last month he slept very little.

"Now Commander..." the Doctor said, then hesitated, as if weighing his next words. "You know what should happen..."

"Yes," he sighed. "Kathryn won't feel any pain of the torture procedure."

"Correct, Commander," came the Doctor's soothing words as he saw the sleep about to overcome Chakotay.

"I will feel all her pain..." Chakotay said as his eyes closed.

Bren Hadar looked at Bren Darya, and if anything, his already narrow eyes, with their pupils black as soot, narrowed even further. He did not miss the interplay between her and Commander Chakotay. That man he could see, was a great deal disturbed by his former leader's behaviour and decision to remain with them. Darya appeared to be as troubled as the Commander.

"You are alright, Bren Darya?" he asked, from his immense height looking down at this very petit woman. She was now wearing one of their own units of communication after he advised her to relinquish her universal translator. They had already seen the power generated by such a small gadget, and knew it was possible that her people could retrieve her by using that device.

"Yes...I'm fine now," she answered him softly. "He will not bother me again," she continued.

He could see the soft aspect of her gaze as she turned again to the spot the Commander had been standing a few minutes ago. It will not do, he thought to himself. She must let go of all things that fettered her in her past, as will the other inductees. But Bren Darya he knew, appeared to have difficulty to let go of all that troubled her, and that included what he could see, her obvious regard for Commander Chakotay. They needed her pure and purified, so that they could achieve, with her as the sacrificium, the highest order.

They had not done this for a number of sun turns, when a stranger from another world also strayed into their domain, and after his purging, they attained the Sacrificium. Many of those not of their own race, were prepared for this. If Bren Darya at any time showed signs of unwillingness, they would have to follow their own alternative methods to achieve this.

"Then I would suggest you rest now, Bren Darya. In two days time the ceremony will take place that will finally make you one of us. It is what you wished."

Bren Darya sighed. Yes she wished it. This solitude. This peace away from Voyager, the crew, Chakotay...

"Yes," she said, on a wistful note. "It is what I wished."

But Bren Darya kept seeing the image of a face, almost bronzed, with a strange marking over his left eyebrow, with eyes that looked concerned at her. Then the face broke into a smile, and she saw how the dimples formed in his cheeks. She tried to shake off the image, but even as she tried to close her eyes, she saw him.

Red uniform...

Short cropped black hair. Unbidden the image in her mind of seeing... herself? run her fingers through that hair. I must forget him. I must try to drive him from my mind. He is too intrusive. I don't want it. It don't need it, she thought with some mild panic. If I can't do that, my purging will not succeed.

Bren Hadar had told her nothing of the nature of the purging. She felt suddenly concerned.

"Bren Hadar, you have to tell me what form the procedure will take. I would like to know - "

"No - Bren Darya...you do not need to know. But I can assure you that it will run smoothly. You need not fear," he replied, walking away from her as she left to go to her quarters.

"But - " Bren Darya frowned as she saw Bren Hadar turn and lift his six fingered hand, palm towards her, in an obvious gesture that their conversation had come to an end. Or was it because he did not really want to tell me, she thought, becoming pensive as she stared after him till he vanished round the building. She frowned for long moments, and wished suddenly Chakotay were here to comfort her. And that thought intruded on her mind unbidden.

Chakotay.

I must contact him again, she was thinking with a sense of panic. Hear his voice, see him smile at me. Hear his reassurances.

Then B'Elanna's body as she lay on the biobed flashed before her, Tom standing proudly before her, awaiting his punishment - decisions, decisions...and she felt again the old guilt, and a myriad of emotions, all negative she decided, crashing over her.

No. I will go through with this, she thought as she stepped into the cool corridor of the monastery and walked towards her room. There she sat on her bed with her knees drawn up and closed her eyes. Within minutes she was in a sort of deep meditative trance.

*************

"Great, Commander Chakotay has succeeded with the implants," Tom said where he was sitting in the Delta Flyer, with Harry next to him.

"Now we can also trace the Captain's movements," said Harry, as they watched the monitor trace the Captain's heart rate, and movement. "This way we'll also be able to scan for any increased stress levels. Are you and Kenneth ready?"

"As we'll ever be," Tom said as he looked at his clothing, similar to those worn by other alien races they had seen in the First City. Mostly traders, but some who had settled there. And that was how it had become possible for him and Kenneth Dalby to blend in.

Tom tapped his commbadge.

"Paris to Seven."

"Go ahead, Mr Paris," came Seven's reply.

"Prepare for the uplink from the Delta Flyer. Ready?"

"I have prepared the regeneration chamber for Captain Janeway as well as my own chamber for Bren Prokto," came Seven's reply. "All her memory engrams will now be uploaded in the computer here, ready for reintegration, Tom."

"Seven, as always, thank you. Paris out."

Tom looked at Harry, who just smiled a little lopsidedly.

"She likes you a great deal, Harry."

"Yeah, yeah Tom Terrific."

"Hey, don't blow it." Tom looked at where Kenneth Dalby had been busy donning the same type of clothing Tom was wearing. He looked at this Maquis loudmouth. The one who had given him a lot of grief when he was demoted to ensign. Their differences had been resolved, after three broken noses, fractured skull, twice ruptured spleen and liver, punctured lung, and any number of cracked and broken ribs. Ken spent more time in the brig than Tom, eventually.

"Ready?"

"Yes... we are to proceed to the home of the family of Bren Prokto, right?"

"Good. This is a joint Maquis Starfleet operation."

This had Kenneth Dalby smiling. He had, after Tuvok had taken him in hand, learnt so much in the last five years. And Tom... he was sorry that his old animosity surfaced and he took it out on Tom. Tom Target.

They left Harry with another ensign in the Flyer. They would be monitoring all the movements of Tom, Dalby and the family of Bren Prokto.

Tom sighed as he climbed down the ramp. He knew Commander Chakotay was not happy with what he had to do, deceiving the Captain. He also thought the Commander must be feeling pretty shook up that he couldn't convince the Captain to come back with him. But the captain, he knew, was in real danger.

**************

"Lady Prokto, your daughter has succeeded in implanting the transponders in your son's neck," Tom said as he looked at the frail looking woman who, for all that she appeared so tall, looked heartbroken. He tried to find the words that could reassure her.

"Your son, Bren Prokto has indicated his misgivings about the purging, and we will make every attempt to ensure that he does not suffer unnecessarily. He will, unfortunately, have to go through the purging, but we have technology which could reintegrate his memory engrams."

"I thank you, men of the starship Voyager. You have been kind to us these last few days. We have known for a while that Bren Prokto was not completely happy with what was happening. He said it was not in the true spirit of attaining the Caulean Crescence. I don't doubt that your captain is an enlightened woman who will come to this realisation herself."

"I - Thank you Lady Prokto. Our captain, or our species will not be able to withstand the purging the way we believe it will happen. But we have made plans that she will not suffer," Tom said kindly.

He looked at the seven members of Prokto's family. The youngest, his sister who was allowed to visit him. And complete the implants.

"You know now that you are not safe here," he continued. "Are you ready for transport?"

Bren Prokto's parents and sister and brothers looked at Tom, a grateful sigh coming from his mother. They had all their belongings which would be transported right after they themselves would beam to the great ship.

Bren Prokto's father nodded.

"Paris to Voyager."

"Yes, Mr Paris," came Mulcahy's voice.

"Prepare to beam seven members of Bren Prokto's family to Voyager. Samantha Wildman and Susan Nicoletti have been assigned to show them to their quarters."

Tom watched as seven of the Prokto family vanished in the blue shimmer of the transporter beam. Then he looked at Dalby.

"We have to go back to report to Commander Chakotay. Then we'll come back here with the Delta Flyer. Ready?"

"Yes. The Commander is about to make an amazing sacrifice, Tom. But then, that's how I've always known him. He - saved my life once, you know."

"That's Commander Chakotay alright. Ready to die...for a cause..."

***********

Chakotay was already dressed in his uniform and relayed the message that the away teams and the rest of the senior crew meet in the briefing room. As always Tom noted, Chakotay stood behind the Captain's chair.

From time to time his hand still went to the back of his neck, where he rubbed the points where the receivers had been inserted under his skin.

An action that didn't go unnoticed by those who looked at him. If truth be told, he was as good a commander as the Captain, and they would gladly accept his leadership as they have accepted Kathryn Janeway's. But Commander Chakotay would never rest until he had her back.

Not because of some outrageous notion that he wanted it to be a grand gesture in his so-called humility, bowing to her gracefully; not because he loved her to distraction. There was not a single member of the crew who did not have an inkling as to the depth of the Commander's feelings for the Captain.

No. It was because commander Chakotay believed implicitly that Kathryn Janeway was a leader, one with vision, who could take this crew home. It was because he believed implicitly that Kathryn Janeway was enlightened, broad-minded enough to know that she could if she let herself, trust them and particular the Commander himself and Tuvok. Find that peace and trust she was searching for so desperately, and take her rightful place in the command chair of this magnificent starship. The very one she entrusted him to fly.

"I'm am certain that she will come to that understanding, Sir."

He said this as Chakotay once again reminded them that when the captain was back on board, her feelings of desolation and guilt and the unwillingness to place her trust in the senior crew would probably all still be in place.

"Thank you. You all know what your respective tasks are. Tom, you will take a team down with you to the planet and remain there for the next forty eight hours."

"Aye, Sir," he responded, his shoulders erect as all of them realised the importance and enormity of their tasks. Chakotay looked at them with what he could only think as tired eyes. Then he said:

"Dismissed."

After all of the senior crew filed out, he remained behind, looking around him, imagining seeing her as she would sometimes prance around the room, walking from chair to chair, resting her hand on the back of it. That sometimes crooked smile she gave when she was amused, or happy, or...

He sighed deeply, and finally sagged back into Kathryn Janeway's chair. His elbows rested on the table, and he bent his head on his hands in sudden and silent supplication:

"We will get you back, Kathryn. Soon you will be with us again."

The quarters was in complete darkness. The figure moving around the room did not present even a silhouette, but it was possible to discern movement in the surrounding blackness. Perhaps it was in the heat that radiated from him, or perhaps it was that his eyes, in eerie harmony with the darkness that sat on him like a cloak, glowed like little coals. Like small beacons they guided the eyes of the onlooker to wherever the figure carried himself in cat-like stealth and grace around the room.

Then he sat down in the middle of the floor cross-legged, and spread his bundle in front of him. He placed his hand on the akoonah. His movements spoke of grace and reverence. The fingers splayed in a caressing gesture over the akoonah. His head was bowed and with his hand outstretched where it touched the akoonah, the onlooker would have felt with him the supplication in the gesture alone.

He closed his eyes, and sat still for long moments. There was in the air a sacred silence, with the only sound, the soft thrumming of the ship traveling at slow impulse. The slow, yet deep and even breathing as he began his meditation. He felt lifted, his mind clear as the akoonah's imperceptible vibration caused his fingers to tremble slightly. Somewhere from his depths he gathered and harnessed his strength and channeled his thoughts into one single plain.

He picked up the river stone with the strange circles on it, and covered it with both hands. With his elbows braced on his knees he brought his hands close to his face. His lips moved. He spoke softly, but his voice had a certain power, strength.

"Akoochemoya."

A light pause ensued.

"We are far from the sacred places of our grandfathers. We are far from the bones of my people."

He paused again, the moments becoming full and beginning to fill him with light, an aura.

"But I ask on this day of sorrow and uncertainty that the wisdom of my father...find me... and help me understand my dilemma..."

He waited a few seconds, his body relaxed as he prepared to transcend into the realm of dreams.

"Speak to me Father...speak to me in my dreams..."

***************

Chakotay walked through the dense growth of the forest. The leaves of the trees were very large, wet and shiny. There were giant ferns which never ceased to awe him with their size. There hung a deep humidity in the air, almost stifling him. His hair soon looked as if a thousand shiny raindrops had fallen on it, but he knew it was only the mist. He hadn't been here in a long time. He hadn't needed to be here.

"Something very deeply is troubling you, my son."

He heard the voice speak yet could not append a body to it. He waited. Then he heard a soft rustling a few metres ahead of him. He stopped, and watched in silence how a pair of hands parted the large fronds of the huge ferns.

He saw the craggy face of his father, Kolopak. He didn't wear his hat this time. The tattoo above his left brow, identical to that of Chakotay's. The smiling, beloved and familiar face. He smiled as he saw even in Kolopak's age, the same elongated dimples showing in the cheeks. I'll look like that, Chakotay thought as he found himself a place to sit on the ground, where his father joined him. This time he did not have his bundle of sticks, but a piece of wood, and a knife. He started carving, not looking at Chakotay.

"What is troubling you, Cha-ko-tay?" Kolopak asked as Chakotay marveled again at the way his father always spoke his name.

"It's Kathryn, Father. She has left the ship - "

"She will come back Cha-ko-tay?" Kolopak asked, looking at his son now, and noticing the flash of pain crossing Chakotay's face.

"Not of her own will, Father."

"Then I take it you will get her back?"

"Yes..."

"Against her wishes?" Kolopak said.

Chakotay looked up when his father said the words, not surprised anymore at he way Kolopak could always home in on the very core of his dilemma.

"Yes..."

"I see." Then Kolopak nodded his head in that manner that always made him think of the wisest of all sages.

"I seek your counsel, Father. In this matter which touches me very deeply."

"You love Kathryn."

"I - "

"But that is not why you seek my counsel."

"No...although..." Chakotay sighed. "My present dilemma goes deeper than that. She - she..." Chakotay stopped, not knowing how to say it.

"She wanted to experience a different spirituality, my son?"

How did he know?

"Yes...she has found a world, a race of people who aspire in their daily lives to a higher level of consciousness, to achieve spiritual crescence."

"The weight of her duty and commanding of your ship has been bearing down on her. She has reached a point where she has given up, is that so, Cha-ko-tay?"

"Yes..."

"And she feels guilty."

"Yes..."

"And you my son, you feel that you have failed her..."

Chakotay closed his eyes when his father spoke these words. He could feel the tears he didn't want Kolopak to see. And with an almost angry swipe of his hand, tried to wipe them away. Kolopak looked at his son, his eyes full of compassion. It seemed to him that Chakotay was bending under the strain of a heavier burden.

"Yes. Yes, I have..." Chakotay almost whispered the words.

Then he looked at Kolopak again, at his face that always seemed to me smiling.

"You can feel that the connection you had with Kathryn had been severed, Cha-ko-tay."

"I always thought that was what we had..."

"But she can't bring herself to trust you."

Chakotay sighed. It was the reason Kathryn left. The reason...

"She has embraced another spiritual order, Father."

"Each man is free - "

"I know that Father. I know that... It is that this particular circle she has entered, is not what it seems. We fear for Kathryn's life. Their practices are frowned upon even by their own people."

"Cha-ko-tay."

"Yes..."

"Your Kathryn - "

"My Kathryn?"

"Yes Cha-ko-tay. Even if you can't bring yourself to believe that anymore. Your Kathryn is not a fool. She will realise these things you tell me of herself. It will not be too late."

"She will still feel the same, when she is back on the ship."

"No. And believe me when I tell you that, my son. Believe me and trust that the day when she returns to you, it will be because she wanted to be back."

"Yes, Father."

"But I know that is not only why you sought my counsel. You want to sacrifice your life for her, so that she could lead her own people home."

Chakotay looked at his father in complete surprise. He had not voiced that in a single word, or allowed himself to let it dominate his thoughts in this quest. Yet Kolopak knew...

"She would suffer physical pain, Father. Enough that she would die of it. Now it need not be. I will feel all her pain, so that she will not die."

"Cha-ko-tay my son, what you are prepared to do, Kathryn will know. She will know of the sacrifice you made. It will rest in her heart for all time."

Kolopak looked at Chakotay now with some concern. He knew what it must mean to his son to go through this sacrificial fire ritual for the woman he loved.

"You will have your Captain back. And she will come to trust you and believe that you can make decisions together," Kolopak said finally, then he rose and left quietly.

Chakotay opened his eyes slowly, almost disoriented. He looked around him, almost expecting to see the giant ferns. He put the river stone down he had been clasping the entire period of the vision quest. But he remained seated. In a few hours he would be ready to take Kathryn's pain. Suffer for her. But he knew now that his course was clear ahead of him. They will get her back, and she...she would have greatness of heart to accept that she had those around her who would always be by her side.

And whatever displeasure she might harbour at being brought back against her wishes, he was now certain that she would be enlightened enough to let her reason and logic and most importantly her heart dictate her. Even if she never could have the feelings for him that he tried so desperately over the years to keep under control.

**************

She wore a different garment this time. It was long and black, with its familiar pattern at its hem, in gold and silver. Her hair had been brushed back, and a chain of beads adorned her crown, dipping slightly in front, over her forehead, with one long pear shaped pearl reaching to almost between her eyebrows.

The back of her hands had been painted, in intricate little designs. She was barefoot, with some adornments around her ankles. The men entering the Crescence looked the same. Bren Prokto spoke with her earlier. She had taken to this likeable young man, but did not question his reasons for the choice he made.

"Bren Darya..."

He looked at her from his great height. His eyes, black like most Brenarians, had a worried look about them.

"Yes, what is it, Bren Prokto?"

He moved her away from the others where he could speak without them being heard.

"I am...concerned...for you..." he said.

"You should not, Bren Prokto," she said. "I wished this. It was what I wanted."

"You do not understand," he said again, urgently this time.

"Please - no more..." she said, with her old implacability. He looked at her for long moments. He sighed, then turned away. He hoped sincerely that she would be alright.

Bren Darya went to sit down on one of the long benches. Her hands were folded in her lap. In a very short time she would enter the Temple of Caul, to take the vows of the Crescence. She was pensive. But she did not want to voice her concern with Bren Prokto. She didn't want him to feel that she was going to pull out of this like some coward. She suddenly wished for Chakotay and Tuvok's counsel. They would know and could give her...the best sound advice she could have imagined, she thought with belated clarity. Why had she never seen that before?

The answer presented itself almost immediately. She didn't want to. She wanted to be Kathryn Janeway of the starship Voyager, alone.

"This is my ship."

"Get off my ship."

"We'll get my ship back."

How totally and utterly possessive that sounded. And yes, it may have been "her" ship, it's crew under her command - but she didn't run it alone. And all those moral and ethical decisions which bogged her down, made her everybody's enemy...

Tuvok. Chakotay...

How was it she never allowed her deepest senses to tell her that they were there? That Chakotay was always there?

Bren Darya looked around her, at the other calders, ready to be taken into the circle, ready to attain that which everyone strived for.

I am here, Bren Darya thought with heartrending clarity, because I was selfish...

Who am I?

She closed her eyes, and for long moments she sat there. She concentrated and in moments she was transported to that favourite place by the sea. The place Chakotay had led her to the first time she made contact with her animal guide.

She remembered the exquisite sense of peace she felt then. Then softly, unnoticed almost, a little animal moved into vision. Her fur beautiful and satiny. Her eyes wide and luminous. Kathryn held out her hand to caress the little animal, but she looked at Kathryn with the kindest eyes. Suddenly it was as if sound invaded this little quest, becoming intrusive. Kathryn closed her eyes, and when she opened then again the little doe eyed animal lay on the ground, unmoving. She woke with a start, and gasped. The other calders looked at her strangely.

Kathryn Janeway was suddenly filled with alarm. Why was she allowed to see Chakotay's animal guide? Why was Chakotay's little beautiful animal lying there, dead? Could this happen? she thought with an acute sense of foreboding. Why suddenly do I wish to be back on Voyager, with her own people, with...Chakotay?

She mumbled only three words:

"I am afraid..."

Chakotay stood in sickbay, dressed again in Starfleet issue hospital blues. A moment earlier he felt a sudden lurch of his heart, an almost contracting of the muscles. And painfully so. It was too sudden he thought for it to have been his own.

He was standing next to the doctor at the monitor next to the diagnostic bed, and watched in alarm as the EMH ran the few scans again. It was Kathryn's heart beat, the graph rising and dipping sharply for a few seconds.

"My guess is that for a few moments she has experienced an increased level of stress which, and here I don't think I need to speculate Commander, that Captain Janeway is experiencing fear. Or a sense of it."

"In that case Doctor - "

"Yes I know, Commander. It is quite possible to assume that she may be having doubts."

" - it would make our task a little easier. But..." he sighed heavily, "let's not put our hopes up too much."

"Mr Chakotay, we know that the ceremony has not started yet. More likely they are in a waiting room or something. For her to feel this could mean that she may have doubts."

"It could also mean the excitement rising Doc."

"I'll not include that in my medical logs, Commander."

"I - I'm sorry. Right now, I feel I want to go in there myself and grab her."

The EMH looked at the First Officer, saw the dark expression in the eyes that never left him since the Captain left the ship. His face looked gaunt, drawn. He knew the Commander was going to experience extreme trauma to his system, so there was no way he could even suggest the Commander take a rest. In the next few minutes, the Captain will be in the great temple, and there would be no turning back then. When all this is over, he will suggest to their retrieved Captain to take the Commander off duty for a month.

"Ready Commander?" the Doctor asked, looking again at Chakotay.

Chakotay sighed again, the nodded his head.

"Then will you lie on the bed?" he said as he prepared a hypospray held it up.

Chakotay rested his head against the flat pillow as he lay back and closed his eyes while the Doctor applied the spray to his neck. Chakotay felt immediately how his body relaxed. To be honest, he had been wound tight like a coil the last few hours. Thinking about her, worrying, thinking about what he was about to do.

He had every faith in the away teams, and those senior crew on board. Tuvok was ready to take command and take the ship into warp the moment Tom has transported the Captain to the Delta Flyer. It was a difficult situation they were in. For all that the Brenarians were a spiritual race, they also possessed warp technology, and already in the last few weeks they have scouted Brenarian ships which appeared to be waiting for Voyager to make one false move. Or for the Captain to be rescued at the wrong critical seconds they needed. Speed and efficiency was now of the utmost importance. He will suggest sometime - when? - to the Captain to record Tom Paris's Delta Maneuver as new and original, giving that pilot credit for once again coming with some stunning suggestions. The Flyer was somewhere on the planet, hidden from the Brenarian sensors. The Brenarians didn't even know that the Flyer existed, thanks to Tom, again. Managing everytime they went down, to evade the Brenarian patrols.

So Kathryn and Prokto would be transported to the Flyer first. He sighed. Prokto's family could not thank them enough for the lengths they were about to go to to get their son. In a few minutes Prokto's father Manil be in sickbay to monitor their son's progress, along with Samantha Wildman.

Oh Kathryn, Kathryn, his heart pleaded. Don't hate me for this... he was still thinking as his eyes closed.

*************

There was a throng of people who filed through the giant double doors of the Temple of Caul. An enormous structure of rectangular shape, the length could easily have measured a hundred and twenty metres. Halfway down the length, on the left side, there were also two huge doors, but these were closed. On this special day, when so many people wanted to witness the purging, it was easier to control the numbers by having only the rear entrance open.

A long flight of stairs led to the doors of the temple. They were huge steps to accommodate to the long legs of the planet's own race, the Brenarians. But between the steps there was an intermediary step, one easily missed by the Brenarians themselves, but easier to maneuver by the other races now also living on Brenar. They were much shorter humanoid species with their average height of 1.90m. That is, if one was male. More often, the females of those species were much smaller, something like 1.65m.

Perhaps that was why no one noticed the two figures blending with the crowd as they made their way up the stairs.

They wore the long brown garments favoured by the émigrés - these were the peoples who sought refuge on this world - and did not look any different. The gowns resembled much the long gowns worn by old Franciscan, Dominican and Benedictine monks of nineteenth century Earth. With the broad cords wound around their waists, it was wide and billowy, allowing for the hands to be hidden at the waist under the first folds. They wore the very big hoods deep over their heads, so that no one who even tried to look, could see their faces.

If they could, they would have been surprised at the shock of the blue eyes of the one. Like bright sapphires they were. No one here on Brenar had eyes like that. The other had eyes a dark, brooding brown. Eyes that looked easily ready to engage in hostilities.

Just inside the wide doors they paused for a second. One looked to his right.

"This is where we stand," Tom whispered under his breath to Dalby.

"Right here, behind this column."

They moved behind the column, far enough that they could stand halfway between that one and the next. In the great Temple, there was a colonnade on both sides down the length. At the back, on each side of the great doors, there were two columns. Easily the most obvious trait of these peoples, Tom thought. They were everywhere the Brenarians could find an excuse to erect them. In most plazas and pavilions of the First City, these columns formed the central feature. Good for us for our purpose, he thought wryly.

He looked down, made sure that his boots were well hidden under his robe. They had on their uniforms, and beyond the fact that they needed to be incognito, the robes had a special purpose. Their tricorders, Tom's medical tricorder, phasers and the site to site transporter each one had, were hidden under this.

"Okay," Tom said as they moved behind the columns in the corner, "the first door after this column in the corner is the entrance to the women's monastery."

"I know. We just wait till there are tall ones surrounding us, then I'll transport into her quarters. I'll be fine from that point on, Tom. Good luck and take care," Dalby said as they reached the monastery door, which was situated a little deeper into the wall, giving him enough room to move inside. This way no one detected him moved inside the small passage that led to the door.

He was now unseen by the other people. Quietly, he vanished in a small blue shimmer of the transporter beam, and found himself in the captain's room. Hopefully no one was alerted as they were assured by Prokto's sister Kemple that it would coincide with the flashing of the lights in the temple. She had, the last time she visited her brother, used the tricorder to get a schematic of the entire complex. She was a quick learner as he and Ton found, having had to disappoint her that no, they could not let her have the tricorder. Federation rules had to apply. They could not share their technology.

It wasn't difficult to find what he was looking for. And fortunately, those Caulean bastards had not lain claim to it. The Captain's personal effects, which they knew included her personal logs, critical if they were to help her reintegrate her memories.

He moved his hand under his cassock and tapped his commbadge:

"Dalby to Lieutenant Kim," he said softly, urgently.

"Kim here," he heard Harry's voice from the Delta Flyer. "Prepare for transport of Captain Janeway's bag. Use these co-ordinates on my badge. On my mark. Now!"

In a second the bag vanished. Then he heard Harry's voice. "Got it. Susan is here to remove the PADDS. Good luck, Dalby."

"Thanks. Dalby out."

He sighed with relief. So far, so good. Then he left the room, walked stealthily down the long corridor right down to where he saw the other door. The one that led to the men's' monastery. Passing quickly through, he was grateful that all eyes were now probably on the first of the calders being purged. So he found Bren Prokto's room easily. Thanks to the transponders in their necks, they traced every movement of Prokto and Captain Janeway over the last forty eight hours. Where they were the longest, was probably when they were sleeping. Based on that assumption alone, they figured those were their rooms. He quickly found Prokto's personal effects and had them transported to the Delta Flyer.

Tom's idea that they transport the Captain and Prokto first to the Flyer had merit. The Brenarians had a fine show of strength in their own ships, and Voyager would have to have her shields up the minute Tom was at the Captain's side. Although the Brenarians were no match for Voyager, they weren't taking any chances. They were ready to jump into high warp. Brenarian ships were at the ready to engage in combat.

B'Elanna, bless her heart, had created for them a hole in the shields, starboard aft. And that was where Tom was going to take the Flyer through, on the fly and at high warp. He had faith in Tom's ability. He was a miracle worker with anything that could fly.

He took out a PADD, and began to go over their instructions again. He knew Tom was going to risk everything. He had, if it became necessary, to go into the Sacrificium, which Kemple found out for them, was situated underground.

But his job was to wait now for Prokto to be brought in. If necessary he had to stun whoever assisted him into the room. Then the two of them would transport to the Flyer. That was relatively easy. Because they could transport him to Voyager even as they waited for the Captain.

Sam would then prepare him for emergency treatment once he was in sickbay. And from there, Bren Prokto will go to the regeneration chamber and become just Prokto. So he sat down on the floor where it be easy to slide under the bed if he should be surprised by unwanted visitors.

***************

The moment Dalby had transported to the Captain's room, Tom moved with the throng slowly. Because he was almost unseen, he could edge his way slowly forward. He reached the last column, and moved in just behind it. It was so tall and wide, he could walk easily five or six metres around it.

The calders were all inside the short passage which led from the men's' monastery into the great temple. He stood almost next to these huge double doors. He didn't have long to wait.

The doors slid open and the calders - twenty of them - filed through, singly. He looked from under his hood up into each face, waiting to see first Bren Prokto. He was the fourteenth calder through. Tom guessed correctly that that would be the order in which the purging would take place. Strange that he hadn't noticed the wide screen in front, behind the altar against the wall, high enough that everyone could see.

It didn't take a fool to figure out its purpose. The calders' memories as they were purged, there for all to see. It pained him that the Captain's would also appear there. And although it would mean very little to those present, he would see them. He closed his eyes and felt a sudden pain.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw her. Last as he expected. They certainly had a different purpose with her. But several things struck him simultaneously.

My God, she's beautiful, he thought as he looked at her. Her hair smoothed back, the string of beads adorning her head. She wore a pendant on a chain, and even from this distance he could the the embossed picture of Voyager. She looked so small and fragile. She looked like he had never seen her. Like he never wanted to see her.

Because for a second she looked at the people, her gaze going to the humanoid sized figure standing next to the column as she passed him. And for an eon, suspended in time, Kathryn Janeway's eyes connected with Tom Paris'.

What Tom saw, made him shiver through his clothes, as she passed him.

Because there were in her eyes a wildness about them.

Perhaps a message.

But most of all, a look at once of great courage and fear.

The altar was on a raised level, so that a wide series of steps led to the top. At the base of the stairs, in a long row and facing the altar, stood the calders. They were all dressed in black, in long flowing robes tied at their waists.

The Temple of Caul was bathed in a glowing greenish-orange light, thrown from the bulbs attached to the walls along its length. It gave the Brenarians in the temple with their already light blue skins a deeper aspect, so that even the pale grey hair had a different colour. The low hum that had been in the temple from the time Tom and Dalby entered, had stopped. Now there was a deadly silence when the four Cauleans - three male and one female appeared as if from nowhere. To Tom they seemed to have risen as it were, from behind the altar, which from the floor level, would have been impossible to spot them. There were no other entrances where they could have entered, so he figured the huge altar had to have many other mysterious properties.

The Cauleans walked round the alter to the front, approaching it two from each side. They walked down two steps. The calders bowed low, then straightened up again. At the moment the calders raised their six fingered hands the congregation - it's the only way Tom could describe the mass of people who thronged the temple - started chanting. A low, sonorous chant which filled the temple, the music rising and rising, and all Tom could make out from the language on his communicator, were the words: pain is discipline, pain is discipline.

It was a chant that seemed to lull the congregation into some trance. Tom looked around him, up into their faces, and saw the mesmerised look in their eyes. They were not even looking to the front anymore, but their eyes were raised, to some unknown being.

Then the signal came again, and the singing stopped. There rested a deadly hush in the audience as the name of the first Bren was called, and she walked up the steps to the altar, until she was just one step below where the Four Cauleans stood.

One reach behind him, and from the altar, brought forward a metal grid, which he placed on the head of the calder. He pressed it down. Immediately, she appeared to be shaking, as the needles of the grid came out and sank deep into her skull. They touched the nerves, sending out new impulses.

She screamed in pain. The scream could be heard even at the back, as Tom heard the low rise of audience's sound again. Tom felt his ears almost sting as the sharpness seemed to pierce his eardrums. It was loud and pained.

The congregation started chanting again, very softly now, and maintained the low hum. This was the point, Tom thought where most of the calders were successful at the purging. The pain was so severe that they released all discipline, and slowly gave in to it.

It seemed when one Caulean turned around to the altar again, that he flipped some switch. Because immediately the screen at the back lit up.

Then the questions started as Bren Hadar stood now level on the step with Bren Suan.

"Believe you that the mind be freed, Bren Suan?"

"Yes, honoured Caul."

"Do you permit your mind to become free of its own entanglements, therefore your vile thoughts, memories and history?"

"Yes, honoured Caul," she answered.

"Then will you subject yourself to the new Discipline of Caul and purge your mind, so that it may be filled with the Crescence?"

"Yes, honoured Caul," she said again.

Then the low humming slowed, came almost to a stop as Tom watched in fascinated horror the woman beginning to writhe and scream in throes of agony as the pressure of the needles were applied in her brain. And the next most horrifying thing: her memories played out on the screen above the alter. Years of memories shown, then like clouds vanishing in the sun, dissipating slowly, so each major event played out and vanished completely.

Once he saw one particular memory, of an older woman crying and it appeared as if Bren Suan could not let go of it. Tom thought it could have been her mother. Then the excruciating pressure was applied, the poor woman collapsed to the flat stair, screaming and holding her head, until Tom saw the face of the old woman vanish from the screen.

She lay there, in a heap and was gently pulled to her feet.

"Rise, Bren Suan," came the heavy words from Bren Hadar.

"Yes, honoured Caul," she whispered.

"Prepare to be host to a new consciousness," he said now.

She bowed her head, the pain of the grid now gone, then straightened up again. Then the screen was filled with what Tom, already filled with nausea at the torturous treatment of the woman, could only describe as strange and mysterious creatures. One that kept on appearing looked to him much like a huge overgrown black locust. This procedure lasted for a few minutes until the screen went blank again.

Purge complete, Tom thought as he looked at the new Caulean now being led by one of the Four. They came right past him and entered the door to the men's monastery. She would be escorted to her room. Great, Tom thought. It meant they would have no problem retrieving Bren Prokto. Dalby was waiting for him to return to his room.

So Tom watched as one after the other the calders were purged, some giving in quickly to the pain of the metal grid stuck in their heads. Others it took longer and he wanted to cry with them. Winced and felt their pain as they screamed and screamed and screamed, until they collapsed to the floor.

He was still fascinated by the reaction of the congregation who seemed to take this terrible treatment in their stride. But perhaps it was because of their chanting, transporting them into some plane where they were led to believe that this treatment was normal. No one demurred, it seemed to him.

He watched as thirteen were escorted past him into the monastery. Then it was Bren Prokto's turn. Tom's heart started thudding. He moved away slightly from the throng, and whispered urgently:

"Paris to Dalby."

"Go ahead, Tom."

"He's on now. Prepare to beam him out when he's left in his room. Hide if you must, he'll be escorted by one of the seniors."

"Acknowledged."

Then Tom tapped his badge again. The crowd around him thought nothing of his strange behaviour, as they thought he was chanting with them.

"Paris to Kim."

"Kim here."

"Prepare for the upload of Bren Prokto's memory engrams."

"Acknowledged. Kim out."

Tom sighed with a measure of some relief. They were about to get their people out.

Some twenty minutes later Tom watched as Bren Prokto was led past him into the monastery. He had a dazed look about him, more than he had seen in the others who had been purged before him. It was clear that the longer they clung to their old life and all its precious memories, the more intense the torture became. He watched as Prokto's family was shown on the screen, staying longest on his parents, who looked exactly as Tom remembered seeing them two days ago. Concerned and unhappy. His brothers and his youngest sister. Though slowly, one by one, with a screaming Prokto trying to brave the pain, they dissolved. He collapsed twice, was brought up again, and the procedure repeated. Tom had a great admiration for this young man, who tried his best to suffer the excruciating pain of the needles stuck in his brain tissue, with slow electric shocks releasing the chemicals. Somehow, with Prokto, taking so long, he could see how slowly a dark brown liquid began to trickle from the little punctures caused by the needles. Like a crown of thorns the grid was pressed tightly against his skull, and his hands flailing as he tried to release it, to no avail. It only came off once Bren Hadar released him. Finally he saw the last of the figures and images dissolve from the screen. To be replaced be the strange demonic creatures that his body would now become host to.

The had been prepared for that, and Bren Prokto would be purged first of these new implants before his memory engrams would be reintegrated.

He looked tired, without any will as he walked past Tom. You'll be safe in a few minutes, my friend, Tom thought as Prokto walked through the door.

Five more calders were purged after that. Five more condemned to be hosts to Brenar's "higher consciousness", or whatever meaning they attached to that term. He wondered idly how Captain Janeway had allowed herself to be swayed by Bren Hadar's eloquent lyrical waxing of their highly ordered spiritual society. To him it was nothing more than brainwashing, something that had been common in their own worlds in the Alpha Quadrant, even on Earth. Where as well as here, it was camouflaged by many elaborate names. Here in Brenar society he had no doubt that its people did strive towards a spiritual existence, but the honesty and good meaning and intentions were marred by what he was seeing here today.

He saw how deep and spiritual Prokto's family was, and that to him was what most people tried to strive for. A purity of mind and soul in the most pure and honest understanding of spirituality.

"Bren Darya," he heard Kathryn Janeway's name called as the strident voice of Bren Hadar broke into his thoughts. Now he thought, the crucial moment.

He heart thudded with the apprehension he felt. He thought of Commander Chakotay, in Voyager's sickbay, ready to absorb the pain the Captain was supposed to feel. Granted, she would feel the prick of the needles into her skull and soft tissue of her brain as minor irritations, but he wondered suddenly if the Commander would be strong enough. Having seen the Brenarians with their different physiology barely able to withstand the agony, he was slightly apprehensive at the Commander being able to take such an onslaught at such sustained levels. But then again, Chakotay was a warrior.

But he had also seen the look of fear in the Captain's eyes.

"Do you permit your mind to become free of its own entanglements?"

"Yes, honoured Caul," came her voice firmly.

Tom felt the thudding in his ears; it throbbed dully as he watched the Captain answer to all the questions.

Then Bren Hadar took the metal grid, held it in both hands where he stood in front of her. Tom could see even from this distance the sparkle of the tiny needles already halfway out of their sheaths. Then he lowered the grid on to her head, and pressed down...

**************

The first wave of pain hit Chakotay so suddenly and with such force that he screamed aloud in agony. His eyes closed, and like a wounded animal howled when he felt the stab of a hundred needles right into his brain. He screamed again and again seconds later. He tried to open his eyes, but not even keeping them closed tight could lesson the flames that burned in his head. They were blinding, blinding pokers of fire that rained on him in unending constancy. So his screams continued unabated. He wanted to lift his hands to his head to try and drive out the pain, but it imprisoned him. Waves of nausea hit the pit of his stomach, and Samantha Wildman was ready to tend to him as he started vomiting. He was unable to keep still as his body rocked and shuddered.

The Doctor looked in alarm at the Commander whose face remained contorted but who tried desperately to remain alert and not give in to the pain. If he passed out now, Kathryn Janeway would feel it...and die... And there was little he could do to alleviate Commander Chakotay's suffering. Anything he tried now, would revert right to Captain Janeway's transponders, and she would be in grave danger of actually dying.

But over the next half hour the Doctor, seeing how the Commander's screams of agony never abated, wanted to stop it. It was not humanly possible he thought, to withstand such pain. But Commander Chakotay summoned the strength from deep inside him to discipline the pain. At one time it seemed as though he would pass out, but this warrior held on.

He looked at the monitor, at especially Chakotay's heart rate, which seemed to have slowed a little. Beads of perspiration settled on his already clammy skin. With the cortical stimulator he made sure that there was synaptic activity. He looked at the Commander's hands, surprised to see blood trickling from his palm as his nails dug into his soft skin. He was concerned as he saw Chakotay's eyes close, trying not to cry out, then letting out a long wail. It was clear to the EMH how Commander's system became more and more debilitated with each wave of stabbing and burning pain, with each bout of almost helpless screaming.

"Commander, I think we should - "

Chakotay half rose from the bed, grabbed the Doctor's arm and gasped painfully:

"If I stop, Doctor... she suffers. She... will have this..." and he pointed with his hands to his face and head, "you see on me. I...will...not...have...her suffer...this!" he shouted.

Then he lapsed into a bout of screaming again as he felt the needles pressed deeper into his brain. He became oblivious to those around him. The fire raged, lancing his brain into a million pieces, flogging him, punishing him. He saw no one around him, and from time to time he screamed:

"Kathryn!!!!"

"Kathryn!!!!"

His body was drenched in sweat, and the hospital gown soaked through. His heart was beginning to beat out of rhythm, it felt like to him. But the pain was everywhere. In every pore of his body, tearing him up.

Samantha Wildman looked on in compassion at the Commander. He was suffering such major trauma, she wondered if he was going to survive this ordeal. Her eyes filled with tears everytime his body arched from the bed and he lapsed into a bout of cries again. They could see a pattern emerging. Every few seconds there would be a lapse, then the sudden arching as he started again.

She was glad no one else was allowed to witness this suffering. It was the highest sacrifice she had seen any man was prepared to go to. His lips were parched, and from time to time she put a sponge to his mouth, and like a man with a raging fever he drank thirstily.

"Doctor, is there nothing we can do to alleviate his pain?" she asked, as she watched Chakotay almost pass out this time.

"Unfortunately Ensign, if I sedate him, his pain will subside, but then the Captain will feel all of it. I'm sorry," the EMH said as he placed a pacemaker on Chakotay's chest.

She turned to Chakotay again, and held his hand, which he clasped tightly as he cried out Kathryn's name again and again.

And the EMH could not have been sorrier as he watched in alarm the Commander's synaptic patterns failing. He's going to collapse, he thought, running the scanner over him, and watched in dismay as the Commander slowly slipped into unconsciousness.

**********

Tom looked at the screen and watched Kathryn Janeway's memories and thoughts displayed there for all to see. She had flinched only mildly when the grid was pressed into her skull, and he knew what pain Chakotay had to be feeling.

"Bren Darya, release your thoughts and subject them to our consciousness," Bran Hadar's voice commanded.

Then he would see flashes of incidents on Voyager, away missions, he saw his own father, her father and mother, Mark, the dogs. He saw so many things, and slowly as the pressure increased and as he surmised, the chemical that was in the needles took effect, she released them one by one. Each memory, each event dissolving like tired clouds from the screen.

But then he saw the Commander's face on the screen, the smile and his tattoo, their various meetings, sailing on lake George. And this was where Kathryn Janeway refused to relinquish her hold on what he could only imagine the one and only thing of great importance in her life. He wondered if she was at all aware of how she was fighting to let go of the commander. There was that one scene where they crashed on that planet and she had been dead. He saw Chakotay trying desperately to resuscitate her, the heel of his hand pressing rhythmically onto her sternum. Then holding her in his arms and howling his grief to the heavens.

He knew the longer Kathryn took to let go of these final memories, the more Chakotay had to be suffering. And he prayed suddenly:

Let him go, Captain. You have no idea what Chakotay is going through. Then as another picture emerged on the screen, the pressure on her brain increased and intensified. Everytime she flinched only slightly. Let him go, please...he begged silently where he was still standing, rooted to the ground. Finally the Caul stopped. Tom guessed it had to be an hour, with still no sign Captain Janeway was going to submit completely to the purge. But it was enough. She'd lost almost a lifetime of memories. A picture of the Commander still lingered on the screen.

In complete incongruous gladness he thought that Kathryn was one calder they weren't going to break that easily. Then the thing happened that he'd expected all along, and in painful irony: he couldn't make his move then. He still had to wait.

Kathryn Janeway's body, while the FOUR surround her, was lifted on to the altar and laid out straight, lengthwise. She was now surrounded now by the burning candles. But then the unexpected happened. He watched how on a given signal, her body arched, and saw in horror the thin long metal spikes coming from underneath her body, piercing her through her shoulders, her sides, her thighs and legs.

My God! he thought. Chakotay!

For Kathryn Janeway was now spiked at various points of her body to the bed. He could see the spikes rising and sticking about half a metre out. Even from this distance, and in spite of the black gown she was wearing he could see the stain of blood seeping through, and trailing in a bizarre manner over the edge of the altar, running in streaks down.

The section of the altar she was lying on then slowly sank down, until it vanished, into the altar itself. The FOUR CAULS then walked to the back of the altar where they themselves mysteriously disappeared.

This was the moment. He stood in the doorway of the men's monastery, and traced her signals, until he saw that it stopped. That was his cue. He vanished in a shimmer of light, and the next moment was in the dark Sacrificium. Looking at a sight he will remember to his dying day. There, in the middle of the darkened crypt, was the section of the altar with the Captain pinned on it. The FOUR were bending over her. One, it had to be Bren Hadar for they were all now unrecognisable, placed the back of his palm on her chest, and pressed hard onto it.

Tom had his phaser set on heavy stun, and in seconds stunned the FOUR, falling down where they had been standing. He had stripped his outer garment and was now in his uniform. He looked at the Captain, took out the medical tricorder and scanned her quickly.

"Paris to Kim."

"Kim here," he hear Harry's welcome voice.

"Prepare to transport the Captain alone. She is injured and has gone into cardiac arrest. My guess is the Commander has too. On my mark."

He quickly used the scientific tricorder to disengage the spikes that stuck through her body. He gave her one last look, then said:

"Now!"

He watched with satisfaction as she vanished in the transporter beam. Then he looked at the bodies of the FOUR CAULS. For when they were standing over the Captain's body, their shape had changed. They were those huge black locusts he had seen on the screens. There was no doubt in his mind what their intentions were. He looked around him, saw the skeletons of hundreds of bodies, males and females, by the readings on his tricorders.

He stuck his hand under the alter section, found what he was looking for.

"Now," he said to himself, "by the time you guys wake up, the whole of Brenarian society will see what you've been up to these years."

For there were the records of every calder who had died here in the crypt, their memories, the way in which they died, and he suspected, being locusts or locust like, the way the victims were eaten. He switched it on for the congregation to see on the screen inside. The mesmerising hold the FOUR CAULS had on them was broken.

"This is going to cause a riot, but for all the right reasons," he said as he tapped his commbadge again:

"Paris to Kim. One to beam out."

The EMH looked at the two patients lying in sickbay. The ship's commanding officers both suffering from severe trauma to the heart. The Commander in a critical condition after he slipped into unconsciousness. He watched in horror an hour ago how the Commander's body, even in his unconscious state seemed to lift from the bed. How even unconscious, the Commander appeared to have cried out his pain as his body, at various points along it's length started showing deep bruises. Some bruises broke, and the blood seeped through. He knew then that the Captain was experiencing some strange and mystic ritual she couldn't feel. The Commander's body sagged back and while he was treating Chakotay's wounds, another calamity fell upon them. The Commander's heart seemed to give one shudder then stopped.

With Samantha's help he tried desperately to resuscitate the Commander and wished for a second Tom Paris had been here. He had become swift and efficient in the last year, and could have eased the load considerably. But that pilot was virtually alone down there getting the Captain out.

He looked at Tom where he bent over the Captain in the next bed. All her external injuries had been healed, Tom still running the external regenerator over her skin at the shoulder. She had been resuscitated already in the Delta Flyer, and had been breathing by the time Voyager had jumped into high warp and out of Brenarian space. She was still under sedation although there were signs that she was about to wake up.

The sickbay doors opened and B'Elanna entered. She had a worried frown on her face which lit up when she saw Tom.

"How is she?" B'Elanna asked as Tom completed the regeneration.

"She's ready to wake up," he said as the Captain stirred. "Be prepared B'Elanna. She may not know any of us," he warned her as he looked at B'Elanna.

Kathryn Janeway moaned softly as she tried to open her eyes. Her eyelids felt as though they were glued together. With effort, and after some agonising minutes in which the Doctor, Tom, B'Elanna and Samantha waited in bated breath, she opened her eyes at last.

She looked at each one in turn, and Tom could see how the confusion set in, even as B'Elanna said:

"Good evening, Captain."

"Captain? I - my name is Darya. I am Bren Darya. I - have...been p-purged," she stammered.

"We know," the Doctor said, "but we'll soon have you back with us, Captain Janeway."

"I am Bren Darya. Where am I?" she asked as she looked at the blue-grey of the sickbay.

"You are on board the starship Voyager, Captain. Your ship," Tom said softly.

"Please," as she tried to sit up, and Tom held her as he gently lifted her to a sitting position, "why do you call me...Captain Janeway?"

"You've lost your memory, Captain," B'Elanna said softly, noting with some compassion the uncertainty in Kathryn Janeway's eyes. So unlike her. So uncharacteristic. Boy, she could rip the hearts out of those Caulean Priests!

"What is happening to me? Why am I here?" she asked again, becoming a little agitated. But Tom looked into her eyes, his own speaking of trust.

"Captain," Tom said finally, "please believe us when we say you are captain of this starship. B'Elanna here will be taking you to your quarters so you can clean and change into your uniform," he said kindly. His blue eyes rested on hers in earnest.

She looked a little longer at Tom. Tom wondered for a moment why, then realised she may be remembering something. Indeed. Kathryn, or Bren Darya as she still believed herself to be, got a flash of a fleeting image. Of her eyes connecting in the Temple of Caul with a pair of very blue eyes.

"I - think I may have...seen you," she said with a little hesitation.

"Where, Captain?" he asked softly, holding his breath.

"In the...Temple of...Caul," she said, then frowned heavily.

"I am Captain?"

"Yes..." it came from B'Elanna.

"Of this ship..."

"Yes, Captain. Come, let me take you to your quarters. There is something we'll have to do which will restore your memories," B'Elanna said again.

She was helped off the bed, then asked: "what is the nature of this procedure?"

B'Elanna and Tom both smiled. Relieved because the old command voice was there. She could just never mask that.

"It's a reintegration of your memory engrams, Captain," Tom said.

"I've been purged."

"That's correct, Captain," the EMH piped up.

"Then why - "

"We need our Captain back," Tom said with firmness.

She nodded, then looked to the right of her, where the doctor had just given way so that the patient on the other bed was in full view. Curiously drawn, Kathryn Janeway stepped forward, and experienced some blinding flashes, of this man's image played out in her memory. The most prominent feature the tattoo on his forehead.

"I - do I know this man?"

"You certainly do, Captain. He's the first officer of this ship. Your second-in-command," the EMH said.

"What is the matter with him?"

"He suffered extreme trauma to his brain and heart, Captain. Now, could you please allow Lieutenant Torres to escort you to your quarters?"

She nodded, looked at B'Elanna, then walked slowly as B'Elanna walked beside her to leave the sickbay. Tom and the Doctor exchanged some meaningful glances.

"Well, Doc. We're over the first hurdle. She seemed to accept us telling her she's the Captain."

"The Commander is in a far more serious condition than I let on to her. He slipped into a coma the minute his heart received that massive attack. You say the Bren Hadar pressed his hand on the Captain's heart?"

"It had to be more than that, Doc. There was some strange power at work there. He had the power to rip her heart from her without breaking her skin. It was the way he held his hand on the Captain's chest. And Doc...there's more. I haven't told anyone..."

The Doctor watched as Tom's eyes became serious. He suffered some trauma himself, the EMH realised with sudden clarity. Of course! He watched nineteen calders suffer the most extreme and excruciating pain. Everyone, including seeing the Captain's body being spiked. I must remember to talk to him.

Tom's face had been pale. It was as if the reaction was setting in only now. The horror of watching the tortures while he could do nothing. The rescue attempt. Any wrong move, any second later and the Captain would have been dead, and with her the Commander. He saw the slight trembling of Tom's hands.

"I-I'm sorry Doc. It was the...sight of the Brens in the Sacrificium. They didn't call it that for nothing. They - the Brens...they all turned into giant black locusts, with their humanoid heads and hands. With some alien power. I think...I think they were in reality locust like creatures who adopted the forms of the Brenarians."

"Mr Paris, if you'd rather not - "

"No - I must say it...Doc, that Sacrificium. There were the remains of more than a hundred people, all calders who, like the Captain, couldn't let go of all their memories, I think. They were spiked liked the Captain. The - the purpose of the Sacrificium - Doc, they were locusts, for heaven's sake. They meant to eat her as part of a ritual. I - I'm sorry."

But the Doctor had by that time filled and pressed a hypospray against Tom's neck, and pushed him gently against the bed he was standing at. He could see how reaction to the things he saw began to set in. No doubt he'd have nightmares about his experiences. As if he didn't have enough.

"Lie down, Mr Paris. You'll feel better in an hour," he comforted the pilot.

The Doctor watched as Tom's eyes closed, sighed and turned his attention to Commander Chakotay.

He hoped that the regeneration of Prokto which was in progress, would have no residual effects on that young man. Prokto had been brought into sickbay, in a cataleptic state. When he came to, he spoke of locusts...

*********

"Your code, Captain...we don't expect you to remember," B'Elanna said as she and the Captain stood in front of Kathryn Janeway's quarters.

"No...I don't...remember," she said, looking at B'Elanna in some alarm. But the half-Klingon woman's expression held assurance.

"Computer, initiate voice command for Captain Janeway," she said, looking at Kathryn and smiling. "Now, Captain, you can order the doors to open."

"Computer, initiate voice command of Janeway Lambda One."

"Captain?" B'Elanna exclaimed in complete surprise as the doors opened.

"Well, the doors opened, didn't they?" she said, giving B'Elanna one of those smiles which spoke of her humour. She remembered something!

And Bren Darya wondered for a second how she remembered something about Kathryn Janeway. Like the image that keeps on flashing of that man with the tattoo.

They stepped inside, Kathryn Janeway looking at the interior of her quarters as if she stepped in there for the first time. "This is where I lived? For five years?"

"Huh-huh," B'Elanna replied as she led the Captain further in. Kathryn Janeway was dressed in the hospital blue gown, after her bloodied black garment had been stripped from her in sickbay. B'Elanna led her to the bathroom.

"I'm to stay and help you here Captain, before we go to the cargo bay.

Kathryn Janeway merely nodded as she looked at the bathtub, and frowned.

"Captain?"

"I - the tub...it looks..." she frowned again, and shook her head.

"You apparently loved the tub, Captain. Commander Chakotay's words."

"Chakotay. The patient in sickbay?"

"Yes, Captain," B'Elanna said as she ran water in the tub. "Come, you can relax here, I'll be waiting for you in the lounge.

"Thank you...B'Elanna," Kathryn Janeway said, her eyes suddenly misty, and her throat working. "Right now, I'm not certain who - "

"Captain, don't worry, you'll be fine," and B'Elanna gave her one of her brilliant smiles, which made Kathryn Janeway smile in return.

B'Elanna was still sitting in the lounge when the Captain emerged from the bathroom. B'Elanna had prepared everything for her in her bedroom while the Captain had been in the bath. Now Kathryn Janeway looked at the underwear and uniform laid out neatly on her bed. It appeared strange to her. She was Bren Darya, wasn't she? Bren Darya. Then suddenly flashed an image again: of a man's face, smiling with dimples in his cheeks, a tattoo on his forehead...his black hair short.

Slowly she dressed, feeling a little uncertain as she started on the uniform. She dressed, and stood on front of the mirror. She looked at her face, her shoulder length almost red hair, the lips and eyes.

Kathryn Janeway, she murmured to herself. I am Kathryn Janeway... she said quietly, feeling the name on her tongue, letting it roll on her lips. It felt comfortable, she realised. She lifted her closed hand, then opened it, looking at the four pips lying on her palm. She pinned the pips to her collar, the same she had seen on...Tom. One by one clipped each one into place. Caressed the row of pips gently with her fingers. She felt a rush of emotion as a feeling of...home stole upon her. Why was she feeling like that? She was supposed to be in her room at the monastery... But she was brought back here. If that be so...

"B'Elanna..."

"Yes, Captain?" B'Elanna asked quickly as she strode into the Captain's bedroom. She stopped in her tracks as she saw the Captain stand at the mirror, looking at her. And was pleased when she saw the Captain after almost six weeks in uniform again.

"Why did I leave...Voyager?"

B'Elanna went still for a few moments. It was something they thought either the Doctor, Tuvok or Chakotay had to answer. Especially Chakotay... Oh God, she thought. I wish Chakotay could be here to answer this question. She felt a little sick, not wanting to look at the Captain. But she had obviously not relinquished her little mannerisms.

"Why, B'Elanna?"

And Kathryn Janeway gave B'Elanna one of her command looks that demanded an answer. She sighed.

"You didn't want to command Voyager anymore, Captain," she said, deciding to be direct. "You felt...lonely, and unable to..."

"To what, B'Elanna?" Kathryn Janeway asked, her eyes piercing. God, B'Elanna thought. It may not be necessary to reintegrate her memory engrams on her command behaviour. It's kicking in already.

"To trust your senior officers," she said finally. "Especially...

"Commander Chakotay?"

"Yes. You were racked by guilt, and felt you had reached...breaking point, Captain..." B'Elanna added softly.

"I...see," she said, a thoughtful look in her eyes.

She looked at their beloved Captain, her eyes suddenly filling with tears. "Are you ready?"

"Yes," Captain Janeway said.

*************

"Five more minutes," Seven said where she had been standing for the last hour at the computer in Cargo Bay Two. Prokto's reintegration had been completed an hour before, and he was ecstatic to see his parents and his brothers and sister. They were in the mess hall being entertained by the ever ebullient Neelix.

Kathryn Janeway was standing in the regeneration chamber, her eyes closed. The information on her personal logs had also been downloaded and these as well as the chip with data Harry collected in the Delta Flyer were being integrated into her memories again. Tom had come down to the cargo bay after recovering from his near collapse, glad to see B'Elanna there. She was standing now, her arms round his waist, waiting for the completion of the procedure. They had not removed the Captain's transponders, and she still didn't know they were there.

Doubtless, Tom thought, she'd going to asking a hell of a lot of questions soon. Like watching nineteen calders before her being tortured to near death and wondering why she, under the same conditions, didn't suffer any torture.

Damn! It was so good to see her in uniform again. Already that contributed to seeing at least a part of the Captain restored. He wished, in an almost illogical fashion that the look of fear he saw on her face as she walked past him in the temple, was what he hoped it could mean. That she had doubts. Not only about what was happening there in the Temple of Caul, but about her decision to leave Voyager for the reasons she did. His hope had flamed high in those moments their eyes connected and he saw the look in her eyes, as if she were pleading to be rescued...

By the time he had been transported to the Delta Flyer, Voyager had already gone into maximum warp. With its shields up. With the hole B'Elanna had created for them. Susan tended the Captain in those moments he took the Flyer at tremendous risk through the hole, and docked within seconds after that. It was just a matter of decompression for them, but the Captain had been transported to sickbay the second he had maneuvered the Flyer inside the protection on the shields.

"One minute," came Seven's voice.

And for the next minute all of them waited, and barring Tuvok stood there holding their breaths.

"Reintegration complete," she said, and a second later Kathryn Janeway stepped outside the chamber.

***********

Kathryn Janeway looked at the officers around her, Seven at the computer station, Tom and B'Elanna holding hands, Harry and Tuvok. They looked at her expectantly. She had been away a month and six days, and felt a feeling of warmth creeping into her heart. They risked everything, everything it seemed to get her back.

She was in uniform. She looked at her uniform, at her hands. Then she lifted her hand and touched the four oh, so welcome pips on her collar.

She didn't want to think yet of the consequences of her actions. Of her madness to have let her reject these people who fought so hard to retrieve her. She closed her eyes as her gaze fell on Tom.

"I saw you...Tom...down there in the Temple."

"Yes, Ma'am, that was me."

"You came to rescue me..." she said, then frowned.

"Yes, Ma'am," he said again, coming now forward to face her.

"You have - I...when I saw you, that was when I hoped that... that..."

"We were there, Captain. All the time. Looking out for you..." Tom assured her.

"I - regret... that I put you all through this ordeal," she said as she looked again at all of them. Tuvok merely nodded as well as Seven, who said finally:

"Our collective was not complete without its leader Captain Janeway."

"Thank you, Seven."

"Our Queen..." she muttered under her breath."

"What did you say?"

"She was referring to when you were Arachnia, Captain," B'Elanna said, smiling.

"Captain, I need to ask a question, to verify if the regeneration is complete," Seven said again.

"Fine," Kathryn Janeway said, walking now to the computer console.

"What do you remember of the last few days as Bren Darya?"

"Most of the things I want to forget, to be honest. I remember... Two days ago, I - ". A sudden flash of a man with a tattoo on his forehead, a fleeting image, but it was enough.

Then Kathryn Janeway looked around her again. Her gaze going to Tom, B'Elanna, Tuvok, Seven, one or two other junior officers standing there.

Tom looked at Kathryn Janeway as he saw her face change. His heart was thudding. It's the moment he was waiting for. The moment he dreaded when she looked straight at him and asked:

"Where is Chakotay?"

Kathryn Janeway sat in her ready room, going through the third cup of the strongest coffee she could replicate. It was a harrowing forty eight hours she spent keeping most of the time awake. It truth be told, how was it possible she could ever find the blessed oblivion of losing herself in the peace of dreamless sleep? How? She wondered. When Chakotay was still lying in sickbay, nowhere near coming out of his coma? His form so utterly still, unmoving, when not even her constant presence by his side, holding his lifeless hand in hers and pleading desperately for him to wake up could help?

Yes, how could she sleep? She smiled bitterly. Sleep is for the innocent. Not for those who knowingly and with prideful conceit and selfishness sent a man to be damned to the black void of unconsciousness.

She closed her eyes, trying to absorb again her shocked reaction to Tom's words when she asked, two days ago, down there in Cargo Bay Two:

"Where is Chakotay?"

All the time in those few seconds it took for him to respond to her question, the images of his face flashed like continuous beacons on and off, on and off. The smile, the tattoo, the incredible sadness in his eyes as he touched her cheek the last time she saw him in the Annexe at the monastery.

"Well? Where is he?" she asked again, very softly, already feeling a terrible sense of foreboding steal upon her as the others, even Tuvok, moved away discreetly, and left Tom standing, facing her.

"Captain, I - er...I'm sorry Captain, but Commander Chakotay, he -"

"What, Tom?" she prodded, feeling the cold creeping into her system, her hands at her sides and the clamminess in her palms as she felt the fear building...building...

"Commander Chakotay is in sickbay, Captain," he said finally, and quite simply.

That was when she pictured a man lying on the bed next to her in sickbay, realising now it was...

"You mean..." she tried lamely to get the words out, even as she started to move forward. "The man I saw..."

"Yes, Captain," he said, his eyes full of compassion as she felt his hand reach out to steady her. She composed herself, addressed the officers standing there in shocked silence.

"I'll see you all in the briefing room at 1600. Until then, I'll be in sickbay. Tuvok, you have the bridge. Tom, I want to see you in sickbay too."

They nodded and allowed her to pass them, with Tom walking next to her towards the turbolift. Her thoughts had been chaotic and turbulent. All the way to the sickbay. With a quiet and thoughtful Tom accompanying her. But she... in the next few hours she was driven.

"Captain," Tom said as he walked next to her, "I have to warn you Captain, that the Commander is in a critical condition."

She looked at him, and her already very pale face if anything, paled further. She saw him reach out with his hands again to steady her. They had just exited the turbolift on deck six. She strode out, with Tom trailing after her.

The Doctor had been bending over Chakotay, setting the cortical stimulator's setting to a higher frequency. She reached his side in a few short strides.

"Doctor - "

"Ah, Captain," the Doctor said as he swung round to look at her, "it's good to see you again, Captain."

But she didn't even look at the Doctor, as her gaze was drawn compellingly to Chakotay lying so, so still. There were dark smudges under his eyes and his normally tanned skin was pale and sallow. He was very sick, she realised. Very sick. He appeared not to be breathing, and on his shoulders, just below the clavicles, there were faint bruises. A pacemaker rested on his chest. What happened to him? was the single thought that she hadn't realised she voiced until she heard the Doctor speak.

"The pain proved too much for him, Captain," the Doctor said enigmatically as he held the hypospray to Chakotay's neck, and injected him.

"I - " She looked at Tom, confusion in her eyes, as if she expected him to have the answer ready. "I - I..." she stammered, "saw him two...days ago. He - there was nothing wrong with him, Tom."

"Yes, Captain," Tom replied and he gave an embarrassed cough.

"He - Doctor?"

Tom looked to the Doctor to help out. It was something he knew was inevitable. The Captain wanted to know, and damn if she wasn't in command mode when she looked at him with her eyes piercing through him. He felt again that loud thudding in his heart when she looked in that same way at him in the cargo bay.

It was the Doctor who rescued Tom from having to answer, and when he did Tom wished for a moment that he had answered the Captain in the first place. Because the Doctor, not one to turn down a dramatic moment of imparting pending doom with panache, said:

"Captain, there are two transponders at the back of your skull, one on each side of your spine."

He watched with satisfaction, smiling smugly as if Chakotay weren't lying there, dying. Looking at the Captain as if he expected her to second guess him. Tom Paris did not enjoy the look on the Captain's face when her hand almost without volition went to the back of her neck, trying to feel where the transponders were.

"Doctor, how did it get - " Then her hand snaked out, reached under Chakotay's neck, and she felt there, the faint little lumps of two receivers.

Tom tried to look away from the Captain as he watched the expression on her face change, the sudden paleness, the eyes that quite suddenly filled with tears, and through it, the blue-grey eyes breaking into a thousand shards of glass as she said brokenly:

"Oh, my God...Chakotay. What have you done? "

Then she wailed again:

Tom who had been standing with a hypospray in his hand, and who expected such a moment, caught her as she felt the buzz coming from a long way off. She felt the spurt of the spray against her neck and slumped into Tom's waiting arms.

Kathryn Janeway opened her eyes slowly. The room had stopped turning so alarmingly. She saw a concerned Tom bending over her, her hand held in his. She turned her head to where Chakotay lay on the other bed, looked at Tom again. She closed her eyes.

"Captain," she heard his voice, speaking softly, "I - the Doctor has taken himself offline. I...will inform Tuvok to delay the meeting until you're ready, Captain. With your permission," he added softly.

All she could do was nod her head numbly, and watched his retreating figure as he left sickbay. She looked now at Chakotay again, and rose from the bed. Almost in slow motion she moved to where he lay, and noticed absently that either Tom or the Doctor had placed a chair there.

She stood there looking at him for long, long moments. And finding her legs unable suddenly to support her, collapsed on the chair. Kathryn Janeway's arm went over his chest, and with her other hand cupping his head and resting her head against his still form, wept. For the first minutes it was an uncontrollable, wild bout of crying, which gradually, gradually turned into a quiet and desperate sobbing.

And all the time while she cried quietly, not bothering to check the flow of scalding tears down her cheeks, which fell in large drops on to his hands, his arms, his face. Everywhere she sought to hold or touch him. There her tears fell. Her hands trembling as they touched his face, his tattoo, his cheeks. Then she would throw herself against him and weep again.

Chakotay lay there. Not moving. Not hearing her desperate cries.

Even as she looked at him, the words and thoughts and realisations that tumbled into her brain, refused to become concrete utterings of despair.

They remained there, swirling around in her brain, a jumbled confusion of words she tried to speak, but could not. And all the time - the tears.

It was too much. Too much, came her thoughts. Too much.

Tom had been right, she thought as she filled another cup with coffee. I was not ready for a meeting. How like him to have been so diplomatic. He knew. The Doctor knew. Everybody knew...

She had been wakened hours later by the Doctor, where he gently shook her shoulders as she lay sleeping against Chakotay's still form.

"Captain, please...you require rest," he said kindly.

"Yes..." she replied tiredly, her eyes never leaving Chakotay. Her fingers going over the tattoo. "But I need to know first, Doctor..."

"Ask Captain, anything you want to know."

She experienced again those last moments in the annexe when Chakotay in desperation held her close to him. That was when he pressed the transponders in her neck, she realised. And with that thought, the stunning realisation:

"He didn't want to do it, Doctor. Implant the transponders..."

The Doctor gave her a surprised look. But she, she remembered the look on Chakotay's his face in the moments just before he disappeared in the transporter beam. It was...his last resort, she thought with insight. He didn't want to do it. He wanted her to decide for herself to come back...and she... She looked at the Doctor again and repeated:

"He didn't want to do it..."

"He had to, finally. You would have died, Captain," the Doctor said softly.

"I know..." she said and felt her eyes filling with tears again.

"I saw the others...suffering...one by one..."

"He didn't want you to suffer, Captain."

"I - Tom! My God..." she muttered, again distressed.

"Captain, please, you should lie down again."

"He - he was there..." she said, her eyes unhappy.

"Yes, Captain. Mr Paris witnessed everything you saw. Needless to say, he went through some trauma. I don't mean to make you feel - "

"I know...I wondered then why - why I...couldn't feel... anything..."

She reached up again and touched the back of her neck. Looked at Chakotay's still form and wanted to cry all over again.

"He...he..." she felt her throat constrict, the muscles moving, but no words came out again.

"He experienced all the pain. He wanted to do this, Captain. Knowing he might not survive. It...it was a very... difficult time."

She nodded, thinking of the screams of the other calders, realising now that everytime the grid was pressed tighter into her skull, intensified the pain a hundredfold. And then the spikes. She knew very little after that.

It was as if the EMH read her thoughts when he said:

"Mr Paris was there, in the Sacrificium when they were ready to... rip your heart out, Captain. You went into cardiac arrest then."

"So did...Chakotay," Kathryn Janeway said, her eyes not leaving Chakotay, feeling again the immense sadness folding itself like a blanket around her.

She went to sit on the chair again, holding Chakotay's hand. For the next twenty four hours she wouldn't leave his side, despite Tom's concern that she rest. Which she did as a concession, in short bursts. But even as she fell into a restless sleep, his face, his beloved image would not leave her. Just as it had been in the Temple. She realised now too, that her inability to let his memory go, every second, every minute of that hour, sent him closer and closer to...his death.

It was all that kept her sane the last few days as she realised the awful truth of what the Cauls were going to do. That was when...

She sighed.

When her eyes connected with Tom's in the temple, she had that wild feeling of elation. Someone from Voyager was with her. And for a few moments she wished that he had come to rescue her...

***********

Kathryn Janeway sighed. The meeting took place only yesterday. It was a difficult one. On the one hand, with the knowledge and worry of the Commander lying still in a coma in sickbay. On the other hand their reports. That was when she finally learnt the extent to which the crew went to get her back. And an elaborate scheme it was. Initiated by Chakotay, and carried out by the senior crew. Who worked in perfect harmony it seemed to her, as a team.

How could she not have seen it before?

And Tom...who took so many risks. He was always there. Never far away from her...

"Chakotay said he'd kill me Captain if I stayed more that ten metres away from you," he said in an attempt at flippancy, but she could see how he had been affected too. It was in his blue eyes as he relayed his part in the rescue operation.

But she knew in her heart that it was not just Chakotay's threat. He wanted to do it. For himself. For her... And that in spite of...everything that happened... months ago...

She looked at him intently in the briefing meeting, saw how his gaze moved away from her and he looked down at his hands and frowned. She realised that had he been seconds slower, he would have been too late. She needed to speak with him, privately, she thought. He was still in some kind of shock, she realised. She did not fail to notice the faint trembling of his hands.

"I find all your actions and your successful attempts to retrieve Prokto and myself commendable. I wish to say for the record that I am...relieved to be back on Voyager, and that whatever motivations prompted me to take the steps I did, now to lead this crew in the full knowledge that they are behind me when I make decisions for them. That they are beside me when I make them, and that when... when... leadership becomes a lonely place to be, you are there, without fail. To let me know that...that..."

"You are not alone, Captain," B'Elanna said softly.

"We are pleased that you have rejoined our collective in your rightful place as our leader, Captain Janeway."

She smiled then for the first time.

She could have sworn she heard a sigh of relief from everybody in the room. She looked at each of them in turn: long, long moments in which she took in their familiar faces, their oh, so familiar expressions, their voices, even the way they were seated. Harry's face carrying an earnest, open look about him. Tuvok, who seemed to have the merest whisper of a smile on his face. It could have been something else, but she preferred to think it was a smile. Tom sitting next to B'Elanna, and she holding his hand. She saw on their faces the trust they had in her. That was always there, whatever decisions were made, good or bad. She had, in a month of madness forgotten the family they had become. Their closeness, their unity which she realised now, belatedly so, transcended everything. Love, Kathryn Janeway thought in those moments as she looked at her people, really conquers all.

"It is good to be back. I feel though that I - "

"Captain," Tom said quickly, and she wondered how he sensed what she was going to say, "we are just very happy to have you back with us. Welcome back, Captain," he said with so much confidence in his voice, rising from his chair and holding his hand out to her. She took it gratefully, almost overcome at this gesture.

But she knew he wanted to field any discourse into the guilt she felt, the feeling that she let them down. And again. she admired Tom Paris for stating in a few well chosen words that she should not feel any guilt. They all looked at her then, and joined Tom by welcoming her back on Voyager.

And all of them followed her eyes as she looked at the empty chair next to her.

************

Kathryn Janeway clutched her cup almost painfully hard as she thought of the last two days. The hours spent with Chakotay. Her hopeless entreaty that he wake up. That she could tell him how...

She sighed. Those first hours by his bedside when she wept so bitterly, the only words she could get out in the stillness of the sickbay, were the desperate "I love you's" she whispered over and over.

In desperation.

His still form did not respond.

And in the meantime the other battle raged. Inside her. Of thinking he was lost to her forever. Of knowing that he could think that he failed her. Of having regrets. So many of them, she closed her eyes again, willing them to go away.

But they remained. Like dark, hooded figures, with long fingered hands that pointed to her in accusing fashion, the regrets stayed. Her refusal to come back with him, forming the vanguard of all she felt.

And for what?

To embrace a new spiritual order?

It was a month of madness. In which she reached to the of the road of her control, of buckling under the load of her responsibilities, of not wanting to believe in them. In him.

Chakotay was always, always there. She was just blinded for a short while, became slightly demented in her fears, her guilt which would just never let her go.

"Are you with me, Chakotay?"

"Always."

God...

The last forty eight hours she thought so much about her decision to embrace the Brenarians, and that burning and very painful conclusion she came to: that she used the Brenarian lifestyle to run away.

From what?

Her old life. The mistaken belief that there was no one whom she could trust. No one she could share her burdens with. Her inability to have faith in a crew, who by their very actions in the last six weeks, proved once again that she could have faith in them. Who by their very actions pledged their support of her even when...even as she rejected it. Not believing that she could share her loneliness, that God...what was it Chakotay always said? Grief shared is grief halved. Didn't that apply a hundred times over to what she thought were her unbearable burdens?

She shook her head, trying to dispel these thoughts, but they kept on crashing on her. She seemed to hear Chakotay:

"You underestimate the crew, Captain. You underestimate me. Certainly, some of the decisions you were forced to make were harsh. Very harsh in the face of great anger and opposition and controversy. Why do you think you are alone?"

"You picked a bad time to isolate yourself from the crew."

"I am a living being, Captain. Don't let me die."

"Kathryn, don't you know this crew will do anything for you? Die for you? They love you!"

She felt her hands shaking as she held the cup in her hand, and looked in fascination as it slipped slowly from her fingers, landing on the floor...

I love him, came the litany again... the words she whispered so desperately in his ears, willing him to make him hear her. Willing him to keep fighting. Willing him to do it for her... again...

She felt her chest beginning to heave painfully as she trembled, knowingly she was on the verge of tears again.

He's lying there because of me...because of me...

She looked at her hands, her open palms and covered her face, and for a few minutes sobbed again.

The voice, when it came, broke into her fit of weeping.

"Sickbay to Captain Janeway."

She rocked up in her chair, her heart thudding wildly as she brushed furiously at the tears that stained her cheeks.

"Go ahead Doctor," her voice quivered.

"Captain, I'm afraid it's the Commander." There was a slight pause, then the Doctor's voice again:

"You must come. It is urgent."

Music: For you Ghostie:

The moment Kathryn Janeway heard the doctor's words which sounded so uncharacteristically unsettled, there flashed that image of two days ago, sitting in the waiting room of the temple at Caul. Then too she had seen her, the little animal who looked at her with such big eyes, her fur soft and satiny to the touch. Her aspect almost pleading. Then the little animal lay dead. She realised then her foreboding she had. It wasn't so much the purging as that there was that subconscious fear that something would happen to Chakotay. Which made her say the words, so full of import:

"I am afraid."

Afraid of what would happen in the temple. Afraid. She knew now what she only sense then, of something that could happen to Chakotay. And all the time then, she had this immense fear in her heart she tried desperately to still as she entered the temple. Until the moment when her eyes connected with Tom's.

The fear.

As now, when she pictured him lying in sickbay. Her hands were shaking, and her heart beating so painfully loud, she could hear the throbbing of it in her ears, the vein in her neck standing out. Her palms were clammy, and she kept opening and closing, opening and closing them. Her breathing was erratic, and she wondered idly how she would get through the next few days, hours, minutes.

How she made it to sickbay in the critical minutes it took for her to get there, she will never know. But she knew, even as the doors opened and she stepped inside, that the Doctor and Tom were fighting a losing battle. They were hurried but controlled, not a movement wasted.

She was next to his side in a few strides, her heart pumping erratically.

"Doctor, report."

"Cardiac arrest, Captain. He's not responding. Mr Paris, again!" the EMH shouted at Tom where he was standing at the monitor, his fingers working the computer with furious haste. Chakotay's body heaved from the bed as shock after shock was sent straight into his heart.

"No response Doctor. It's no use!" Tom shouted as he pressed the console panel again, and Chakotay heaved, his body slumping against the bed. But there was no response.

"Doctor," Kathryn Janeway said as she watched Chakotay - or was it the Doctor and Tom? - fight for his life.

"A second, Captain. Again, Mr Paris," he commanded, while at the same time pressing the hypospray against the Commander's neck. He waited for a few critical seconds in which Kathryn felt herself almost hyperventilating. Chakotay was lying deathly still. Yet, Kathryn could see after a few seconds, a muscle in his jaw twitch.

"There's some synaptic activity now, Doctor," Tom said at last, as the continuous beep of the monitor changed into a graph of faint lines registering a minimal heart beat. It was enough. They had him back again, albeit it by a very thin thread. The Doctor gave a huge sigh of relief as he looked at the Captain, who stood frozen next to the bed, looking at the colour returning to Chakotay's face.

"Captain, we were losing him," him the Doctor said as he replaced the stimulator on the Commander's forehead. "I'm sorry, Captain. There's not much we can do here now." He looked at her, then away, almost embarrassed to see the distress in her eyes.

"I'll stay here, Doctor," she said to him, but looking at Tom too. There was a bleak look in her eyes. An emptiness. She sat down in the chair and took his hand in hers. The other hand stroked his forehead, her fingers resting on the tattoo.

"Doctor."

"Captain?"

"I take it you didn't remove the transponders from my neck yet," she said softly, not looking at him while she spoke, her eyes all the time on the very sick man before her. Who almost died now. Her face was very pale, the shock of the last few minutes still in her.

"Why yes...Captain? Are you thinking what I'm -"

"It may help, Doctor. Perhaps in the same way that he...that he... helped me..." she said, her voice now sounding a little lost.

"I'm ready if you are Captain," Tom said where he was still standing at the monitor, smiling for the first time broadly.

"Then get to it, Doctor. It could help."

"It will keep him alive, Captain, such as he is right now," the Doctor said, his voice now full of elation, not even jealous that the others came up with a suggestion that could, if necessary allow the Commander his tenuous hold on his life.

In a matter of minutes, through the transponders in Kathryn Janeway's neck, her heartbeat was used to regulate Chakotay's. He even seemed to be breathing more evenly, and it brought the tears to her eyes again. Tears came quickly these two days. But this was Chakotay... who was dying... for her.

"It means you'll have to be here in sickbay almost all the time, Captain so we could regulate your heartbeat as well."

Kathryn Janeway gave the Doctor an aggrieved look. Why was he even stating the obvious? Tom thought as he watched the Captain. There was no telling her to go home and rest, as they so glibly told families of patients whenever they didn't know how to answer or field difficult questions. Or when those patients were dying. For now, they bought Chakotay some time.

A reprieve.

"Captain, if you need anything, call me please. I'll be going back on duty," Tom said as he stood next to the Captain, her shoulders hunched, clasping the Commander's hand tightly in both hers.

"Thank you, Tom," she said softly, looking at him now. "I haven't th - "

"Captain," he said, his hand on her shoulder in a consoling gesture, "we would have moved mountains for you if it had to come to that."

"Tom, you did move mountains..."

"You're our Captain. There's no one on this ship realised that more than..."

"Chakotay..." she whispered softly. "Yes, I know Tom...I know..." Her eyes got that bleak look again. Tom almost cursed himself. He wanted to cheer her up. But it seemed to him - nay, it was clear to him she wanted no cheering up. So he gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze, and left the sickbay.

*************

Kathryn Janeway, her eyes tired, looked at Chakotay and felt anew the tears which try as she might, just kept on flowing. Like a quiet stream, the tears rolled down, although no noise or shudder or sob came from her.

She still held his hand in hers, her fingers laced through his, the other hand covering both. With her elbows resting on the bed it seemed as if his hand was raised too. So she held him, quite still the two figures were, one dying, the other hoping against hope for a sliver of mercy from the heavens that he may live.

Her hands together and so close to her face, to the onlooker she could well have been praying, the way it was only her lips that moved.

But she was talking to him. Again as before, quietly telling him of her memories. Of them. Always of them.

"I could see you, you know," she said softly to him, as if he could hear her, "I stood beside you there in the spirit. And you were hunched over my body, while I lay there dying. You tried so desperately to get me to breathe, Chakotay. Just to breathe." Her voice faltered a little as she paused, then continued:

"I never told you that, you know. That I could see how you loved me, even then. Even then. I never told you dear, dear Chakotay that when I danced on talent night, I danced only for you..."

She kissed his limp fingers where it was held through her own. Her eyes closed, the tears seeping through them. Long she stayed like that.

"Please live for me now, my love. Please. I know I did so many things I regretted, said so many things wrong, thought of so many, many things I imagined stood in the way of my of my love for you. I have been foolish. Foolish and too proud not to let my heart speak for me from the start. Not to let me trust you."

Kathryn Janeway closed her eyes for a few seconds, and scenes from their own Eden flashed in her memory. Chakotay outside their shelter building headboards.

"So that don't get uncomfortable reading your Pride and Prejudice," he said, smiling and her heart flipped at the dimples that formed in his cheeks.

Chakotay sitting at the wide table inside, with the glow of the light on his face, animated as he was working on one of his sand paintings. Chakotay standing at the tub, having just 'unveiled' it, the proud look on his face when she smiled her thanks at him. Chakotay holding her so, so close in the shelter while the storm raged. Her own final acceptance after that that they would stay there forever. Even then he observed the distance between them. He wanted to do so many things for her. Catered to every whim.

Listened, cared, loved, told her wonderful stories.

And she...

"Do you feel the beat of my heart, Chakotay? We're connected you know."

She smiled as she said that, then cried softly again.

"We were always connected, my love. I just didn't know it. I chose to forget it."

She thought of his words the last time she saw him in the annexe.

"They will die for you Kathryn. That is how much they care."

"What about me, Kathryn?"

"Come back with me, please. We need you. I need you."

Oh dear God, Chakotay, she wailed silently now. What's to become of us? Me? You paid such a high price. How could I ever, ever in my mind and heart and my soul forget what you've done? For me? Out of love?

She threw herself against his still form, still holding his hand and cried desperately again, this time her small shoulders shaking. Her face turned towards him so that she looked at his face, so still, her eyes fevered.

"Please live for me..." she pleaded again. Repeating her words like a litany, becoming softer and softer and softer until they petered away and her eyes closed gently.

***************

Tom Paris was sleeping soundly in his bed, with B'Elanna curled up in his arms. He awoke slowly, almost sluggishly. It was 0600. He tried to move, but knew B'Elanna would stir and wake up too.

"Shhh...go back to sleep, sweetheart," he whispered into her neck, but she was instantly awake.

"Tom..."

"Hey, I didn't mean to wake you..."

She sat up, and touched his cheek, seeing the concern now in his eyes again.

"No, it's alright. Chakotay...how is he? And the Captain?"

He sighed. What to say?

"The Commander had a relapse late last night, B'Elanna. For a while there I thought he...wasn't going to make it. He's holding, but just barely, sweetheart. I'm sorry."

"And the Captain, Tom? What about her?"

He sighed again.

"She - you know she hasn't slept much these last few days. Doc had to call her, thinking she should be there when he...when he..."

B'Elanna leaned forward and held Tom close to her. He had nightmares two nights in a row about what happened in the Temple. He suffered some trauma watching those people tortured.

"Shhh...it okay Tom," she soothed.

"She...she has to stay in sickbay. Not that we could extricate her from his side. She refuses to leave, B'Elanna. But you know, something else happened last night. I don't know what it was, but it was strange, I tell you. Maybe even stranger than the things I saw..."

B'Elanna looked for a few seconds nonplussed and quizzical at him. He was wide awake now, his eyes very blue and earnest upon her. He touched her cheek gently, then spoke again.

"The Commander went into cardiac arrest again."

He paused a long time. But she waited for him to speak.

"He died, B'Elanna. He died, I'm certain of it. I wanted to tell Doc to stop the resuscitation. But he kept on that we continue. It was no use, B'Elanna. There was no heartbeat for minutes."

"Then suddenly, I saw faint synaptic activity, again. it was very faint, but it was there. That was when I looked up and saw the Captain standing next to the bed. She was standing there, sweetheart. Just standing. And the next thing we saw was the colour returning to his face and he started breathing again."

He paused and looked thoughtful, not really seeing B'Elanna. But she knew he had to speak about it. She spoke, breaking into his thoughts.

"He loves her, you know."

"I know sweetheart. And the Captain...she loves him too. But I don't know, B'Elanna. He is lying there with the knowledge that she will never forgive him for forcing her to come back..."

"But Tom, didn't she..."

"I know, sweetheart," he said as he got up to prepare for duty.

"He doesn't know that she...wanted to come back. That she -"

"Tom, it's alright. You're going to - "

"Sickbay to Mr Paris."

"Go ahead Doc."

"I need you down here, Mr Paris, as soon as possible."

"I'll be right there, Doctor."

"I have to go," he said to B'Elanna, who almost reluctantly lay back against the pillows. It was going to a difficult day.

When he was ready, he bent down, kissed her and left.

*************

Tom very gently took the sleeping Captain by the shoulders, lifted her and put her on the other bed. Doctor was looking on, still running scans and apparently satisfied, said:

"He's hanging in there, Mr Paris. The captain," he said softly, "is actually keeping him alive. But soon, in the next few hours his heart should beat on its own."

So Tom and the Doctor again started on the tests they were running the previous night when the Commander collapsed. Tom wondered if it was going to help at all. There was still no reaction from Chakotay's still from, although he had a feeling that the minute the Captain left sickbay, he would become agitated. So he looked at the sleeping Captain who appeared to him exhausted. He covered her gently and quietly went about his other tasks. He left only at 1200 to go to the mess hall to grab something to eat. He left meaning to return in the hour.

*************

No pain.

That was the first sensation as images started to fill is head.

No pain.

The blessed relief from a hundred needles. Piercing every nerve cell, so that pain burned in every pore, every muscle protesting, protesting. Screaming without stop.

Unending.

Wondering if it would stop sending his body into realms of never imagined agony. Where pain became the furnace of hell. Wanting to break him, wanting him to give in to it. It spoke to him, in taunting cackles mocked him to withstand it. Challenging him to fight it, at the same time increasing even as the challenge became impossible, testing and trying him beyond human endurance.

Beyond his strengths.

Don't let go, Kathryn. I'll take away your pain...

Kathryn!

I can't...anymore...Kathryn...forgive me...

The images replaced the pain...

"Let's go sailing on Lake George, Commander."

"I'll have to put you on report."

"I'm sorry I disappointed you, Captain."

"Don't go dying on me, Kathryn..."

"Are you with me, Chakotay?"

"Always..."

Don't go away from me Kathryn...

"Did I say you looked beautiful in your blue dress, Kathryn?"

He saw so many images of her, they crowded his tired brain.

Kathryn holding his hand, smiling with a sheen of tears in her eyes. Is there really a legend? she asked him. No, he said. But it made it easier to tell you. Kathryn's fingers on his face as she put the tomato in his mouth. Her hand on his cheek. His eyes closing as he savoured the softness of her touch on him.

I love you, Kathryn...

I had to do it, Kathryn.

I failed you. Failed you. Failed you...

At first he wanted to move his eyelids to open them. They felt like lead, bearing down heavily on to his eyeballs, so much, it hurt. Move away from the pain, Chakotay. No, go to the light Chakotay, he told himself.

Tried again. Lift, lift. Pain. Close again. No, rest first.

Again. Lift the heavy lids, it's not as bad as the other pain. Come on, he told himself. You can do it...

Try. The light was blinding. Closed his eyes again. The light was softer now. At last, the eyelids lifted completely and his eyes opened. There was a soft buzz in his ears as he felt the first sensations of reaching to consciousness. Why wasn't the anyone in the room? Everything around him was one dark grey mist, a thick fog that slowly, slowly, slowly lifted. He could make out only barely some things. A door. Computer console. Something dark grey - a form of some sort in front of him. His heart thudded painfully.

He tried looking at the form, as if it were an oasis. His eyes hurt in the dizziness it caused him, but the form became slowly more appointed. Black. Yes. It was black, then his eyes shifted. Red. Yes, red...

Fuzziness.

His eyes never moved from the form, stayed on it until he could make out black and red. Up, up. What were those stars? Stars? No, they cleared, and he looked at four shiny pips on the collar above the red.

A Face. Hair the colour of...burnished...copper.

The picture at last clear.

Kathryn.

Standing there. Arms stiff by her sides. On attention.

The Captain.

"That's that then, Captain Janeway." His last words to her.

"That's that, Commander Chakotay." Her words...

At last he saw her clearly. Looked at her long, his eyes never wavering. His lips formed words he tried to say. His throat worked. She looked...so.. How could he face her? The words came out:

"How...you must hate me..."

She moved then, to the chair and sat down in it. She took his hand in hers, looked him deeply in the eyes, her voice soft and quivering,

"I love you, Chakotay. I could...never hate you..."

She threw herself against him, cried hopelessly again, like she did so often the past few days. His hand came up and cupped her head. He felt her body against him, her arm thrown across him. Her frail body shook with the sobbing that could not stop. He closed his eyes, and let the tears seep through, running down into his neck. He opened his eyes again. He caressed her hair. His fingers trembled, and though he could not move much, though he could not see her face that was buried in his embrace, he said hoarsely:

"My Kathryn."

A hand touched her shoulder softly, shaking her gently awake. She opened her eyes, and for a moment felt slightly disoriented. Then she felt the hard chest of the body against which her head rested.

"Captain...?

"Tom..." she said as she looked up and saw him standing next to her.

"Captain, he's sleeping now. Come," he coaxed her to get up, "you need to rest too. I promise he'll still be here when you come in here later." Tom smiled at her, hugely relieved that the Commander has come out of his coma.

"Thank you, Tom," she said as she rose from the chair. She looked at Chakotay, a longing look as if she didn't want to leave. Sighing, she leaned over and kissed him. Smiling she thought: my first kiss and he has to be asleep. But it was as if he sensed it, because his hand tightened around hers.

She left the sickbay, in a much lighter mood than when she entered. She had been there since the previous night, when she thought she would die herself watching Tom and the Doctor working with furious urgency to resuscitate Chakotay.

She walked towards her quarters, thinking of the events of some hours ago. She had woken up, finding herself on the bed next to Chakotay's. She remembered only vaguely that Tom lifted her early the morning and let her lie on the bed. She woke with a start several hours later, to hear the Doctor scurrying around.

"Doctor, what's happening?" she asked, her heart suddenly pounding with worry.

"Come Captain, I think the Commander is going to wake up," he said gleefully to her. She got off the bed, walked over to where he lay.

But she stood about a metre away from him, watching how he struggled to open his eyes. It was a long while after that that his eyes finally opened. Her heart was in her throat, it felt like. She was nervous, afraid. Remembering their last meeting down on Brenar. She closed her eyes. Wondering how he would react to seeing her here, on Voyager. After she had so...

He looked at her, for such long moments, she thought he was looking at someone else. She could see, if not in his movements, in his eyes the emotion playing, the remembrance of their last conversation. He thought she hated him, she realised with some pain. For bringing her back. Against her wishes.

How she loved him in those moments. Her tears that wouldn't stop flowing after she hurled herself in his embrace.

The wonderful feeling when his hand came up and stroked her hair, calling her "my Kathryn". Being held so close by him, feeling his chest heaving now with blessed normal breathing. Warm. Comforting. She knew in those words from him spoken with such longing, how blessed forgiveness could be. The Greeks spoke of it as "agapé", a love without condition, a selfless love. A love that would spur a man to sacrifice his life for another, to save her. She thought of the great friendship and love between Damon and Phintias. Damon who was willing to die so that his friend could be saved from execution. Such was Chakotay's love for her. She could have wished for greater love than that.

And almost, almost she threw away the most precious gift anyone could ever have given her.

Chakotay had fallen asleep soon after he came out of the coma. A welcome, blessed sleep. According to the Doctor Chakotay slept little in the time she had been away. She had looked at his sleeping form, so peaceful, his heartbeat normal, his colour blessedly healthy. She must still have been looking at him when her own eyes closed, until Tom woke her just now, a few minutes ago.

Still, she was apprehensive. What will he say? He was going to have questions, of that she was sure. But she sighed, this time she was not going to back out like before. She closed her eyes, thinking of that last meeting between them in the annexe, when she had been so adamant, so set on the course she wanted to take. The look in his eyes, a look that spoke of...what? Desolation? The disappointment that she knew now, or had some sense of, that he blamed himself for not being able to convince her to come back of her own free will. Of that she had to convince him now.

She opened the door to her quarters. The familiar surroundings of it now such a balm to her. She felt swamped by a peace she had not known in a long time. A long time. Not even going through the...she didn't want to think anymore about the calders. She prepared herself a meal, had a long soak in the tub. Lying back and thinking of their Eden. And the tub Chakotay made for her.

"You said you wanted one, didn't you?" he said to her as he unveiled it and smiled at her.

"They had no compunction to use me to their own ends, Kathryn," he said after his link with the Borg and Riley Frasier had been severed.

"But Chakotay, helping others - it's part of who you are." Her words to him in trying to comfort him then. She felt her eyes sting again.

Yes, helping others, helping me...it's part of who you are my love, she thought.

She woke with a start when she slid down and felt her head tilt forward into the water. She got out quickly and half an hour later she crawled into her bed and fell into a dreamless sleep.

*************

Six hours later she woke, refreshed. Thinking naturally of him lying probably still sleeping in sickbay. The Doctor was clairvoyant, she thought the minute she heard:

"Sickbay to Captain Janeway."

"Go ahead, Doctor."

"I'm pleased to inform you that Commander Chakotay is awake and," the Doctor sighed, "is asking for you."

"I'll be there, Doctor," she said, smiling with her heart beating faster.

A few minutes later she stood outside sickbay, took in a deep breath and entered. Her eyes going direct to where he was still lying, but wide awake at last. He looked at her with so much love in his eyes, she almost burst into tears again. She stood next to the bed, looking at his beloved face. He tried to lift himself into a sitting position, groaned and fell back again.

She leaned over, her hand now in his and kissed him. Her eyes closed as their lips touched, hers so gently on his. She could feel the warmth, the racing of her heart as his other hand came up, and pressed her head closer, deepening the kiss. When he released her at last, there were tears in his eyes.

"I love you, my Kathryn," he said softly.

She sighed, and hugged him again. That was when he groaned again slightly, frowning.

"What is it?" she asked, drawing away in alarm. "Doctor?"

"Well, Captain," the Doctor, who had been clearing his holographic throat all the time they kissed said: "If you hadn't dived into the Commander's arms first without consulting me as to his condition I could have apprised you sooner.

And that was when Chakotay, who rubbed his shoulder and pulled away the hospital robe to expose the area of the clavicle saw the deep bruise. He looked at the other shoulder and saw the same bruise.

"What's going on, Doctor?" he asked, a concerned look at Kathryn.

He was trying hard to sit up, but was too weak still.

"Captain, would you explain to the Commander?"

But Kathryn Janeway had a stricken look on her face when she saw the bruises there. She started breathing again erratically. But Chakotay looked at her, took her hand and said:

"It's okay Kathryn. You don't have to say anything - "

"They - they placed me on an altar Chakotay, and drove spikes through my body," she interrupted him. Her face and voice distraught. "I - I didn't... I - couldn't..."

"Kathryn, please..."

"I couldn't feel anything, Chakotay... because...you..."

"Kathryn, don't...please. Don't flog yourself so..."

"Commander," the Doctor piped up, "you were already unconscious when that happened."

"I...couldn't let go of all the...memories, Chakotay. That's why it took so long. I didn't...know. I...didn't know...you were..." He saw her eyes fill with tears again. "Forgive me..."

"Don't cry, Kathryn," he whispered, pulling her close to him, his hand coming round her shoulders. Saying in her ear: "There's nothing to forgive, my love."

She stood back again and looked at the Doctor.

Who looked at her and said: "The Commander collapsed at the height of the purging Captain. But at the same time the purging also stopped. Why did they stop it with you, Captain?" the Doctor asked.

"There...were some memories they couldn't purge." She looked at Chakotay and smiled sadly. He knew then why she smiled liked that. It was memories of him, and he understood now that because she couldn't let go of them, made him suffer the pain longer.

"Are you two ready?" the Doctor asked again. Chakotay looked a little quizzically at him.

"To remove the transponders. It's time it came out."

"Thank you, Doctor, it was beginning to itch. You know I never felt a thing when...when..."

"It's alright, Kathryn," Chakotay said. "It hurt me more to have done it," he said soberly. Then he turned to the Doctor, and asked:

"When can I get out of sickbay, Doc? I have work to do. How..." as a thought suddenly struck him, "long was I..."

"Three days, and last night - " the Doctor said, then checked himself.

"What about last night, Doc?" he asked as he looked at Kathryn.

"What's going on?"

"Commander, last night you went into cardiac arrest for the second time. It was touch and go, but then Captain Janeway came into sickbay and you started breathing again," he said smugly. "And that's not all, we connected your transponders again, so that the Captain's heartbeat could be used to regulate yours."

"Come here, Kathryn," Chakotay commanded, holding out his hand to her. Pulling her closer he murmured into her ear, "Thank you. I love you, Kathryn Janeway."

He wanted to go on kissing her when the Doctor cleared his throat again.

"Ready?"

"Ready," both of them said.

************

A week later Kathryn Janeway, going off duty proceeded to her quarters. It had been a week of soul searching, of opening up to him, of talking all her old fears away. Granted, he was still confined to sickbay. He could only get up two days after he regained consciousness. He became really distressed when told by the Doctor he had to stay in sickbay.

He was sitting up in bed and waited anxiously for her to come to visit him in sickbay. And when she did arrive, he would hug her convulsively, not allowing her out of his arms after that. And kiss her. He was getting impatient to be with her. His kisses were becoming insistent, and she was aware of how he controlled his desire. After all he was in sickbay, with any number of crew walking in and out.

"I love you," he would breathe into her hair everytime she came to him.

She would touch his tattoo and trace the lines, her fingers trailing down to his lips where his hand would capture her fingers and hold it there.

"I love you," he would breathe again.

She sighed. He had completely recovered, but the EMH wanted to run any number of tests on him.

"To make sure we have a healthy Commander on the bridge, Captain."

So it was with surprise when she entered her quarters and found him standing in the lounge.

"Chakotay?"

"Come here, Kathryn."

She walked straight into his arms. He folded her so closely in his embrace she thought she'd suffocate. But she felt so good, so warm being held by him with his hand on her hair, holding her close to his heart. She fitted so perfectly against him, her face buried in his neck. She breathed in his muskiness, becoming aware instantly of his desire.

When she lifted her face to him his eyes were on her, smouldering.

"I couldn't wait, my love. I wanted to be here, and hold you close to me."

He bent down to kiss her, and Kathryn felt his lips burning on hers. She moaned deliciously as tongue coaxed her lips to open and slid inside her mouth. There to probe and plunge, sending shivers down her spine, filling her with ecstasy. She heard him groan as she melted into him, feeling his arousal.

"Let me love you, my Kathryn," he whispered as he released her mouth and looked deep into her eyes.

With a sob she buried her face in his chest, and he felt her small frame shaking. He held her so close all the time she sobbed, making crooning noises, comforting her.

"Chakotay," she said haltingly, "I don't deser - "

"Shhh..." he comforted. "I love you, sweetheart."

He held her away from him. His hands touched her face, stroking her cheek, pushing her hair away from her face.

"It's behind us, Kathryn. Understand?"

She nodded, unable to speak. Her hand went to his forehead, touching the marking there.

"It was your face all the time, Chakotay. Everything went. Every memory of my life. Except your face. Your smiling face. I couldn't let go of that.

"I'm here now, my love. In the flesh. Love me all you can."

She hugged him then, lifted her lips to his to receive his hot and sensual kisses once more.

He picked her up in his arms and walked to their bed. When he put her down, he said: "ours, from now on..."

*************

His hands and mouth were everywhere on her hot skin. She thought she'd drown as he tasted her body, his mouth touching the spot just behind her ear, trailing to her collarbone and planting a kiss there. She held his head, ran her fingers through his hair, while her lips were parted, panting with each touch of his lips on her.

"I could suckle forever here," he said hoarsely as he looked at her milky breast before he captured one nipple in his mouth. She gasped with the pleasure of it. His elbows were braced on her sides, digging deep into the mattress. And lying snugly between her parted legs. She writhed under him as his mouth went to the other breasts, taking the aureole fully and sucking. He moaned with the freedom of worshipping her body. Feeling her give to him, pleasure for pleasure as her hands roamed all over him, her mouth on his tattoo, staying there for long moments before he bent to suckle and lick at her again.

Then he cupped both breasts in his huge hands, while trailing his mouth over the smooth planes of her stomach, his tongue darting into her navel, causing her to cry out. But she parted her thighs wider for him. He moved his hot mouth lower, licking her skin, traversing down, down until he reached her tuft of downy curls, already so damp with her juices.

"Chakotay..."

"Hmmm...?"

"Hurry..."

"I am...my love... I am..."

"If this is...hurry - " she gasped out loud as she felt his tongue on her soft folds at her centre, gently lapping them open. His tongue pushed into the sheath where he revealed the little pink nub which quivered as he teased it to its erection. Her body arched against him as he pushed his tongue so deep and suddenly into her slit and held it there. It was all she needed. The fire raged through her as his tongue plunged deep in. She felt her whole body on fire as it reached towards it's climax, her entire centre pulsing into his mouth. She had no more control. Her vulva with his tongue pushing and thrusting rhythmically trembled and seemed to comply to his every move and whim. She lay there, unable to prevent herself from exploding. She screamed as she spent herself in his mouth. He waited as he enjoyed her still pulsing centre, then he raised himself over her, his face close to her. He kissed her again, her face flushed. She groaned with need and went wild as she tasted her release on his lips. Her hands explored his broad shoulders, the strong muscles, trailing down to his buttocks.

"I love you..." she whispered over and over, her eyes filling with tears.

"Don't cry, my love...This is our beginning..." he whispered as his hand moved in between their bodies, and he held his erect shaft and pushed it against her centre. His tip just inside. She gasped as she felt its hardness. And the incredible heat of it.

"I'll not hurt you, my love..." he said brokenly as he pushed into her very tight sheath, filling her so completely. He waited for her to adjust to his size as he could feel his hardness in her almost painful. "I love you," he murmured. His hands cupped the sides of her head, his face watching her closely as he started moving, slowly, savouring the feel of being buried deep inside her. She moaned into his mouth where she pushed against him, her body arching and willing him to go faster. She was very hot and wet, her juices spilling liberally around him. He started his thrust, his breathing becoming hard and laboured, grunting with every thrust inside her sheath. It was a glorious feeling of the friction that was caused as her sheath muscles clamped around his shaft so tight, he could feel the ridges rubbing against the inner walls. She arched and bucked against him, and found a rhythm, moving with him as he began to pound in her, heaving and grunting. Her legs coming high around his waist and groaning as he went even deeper into her.

"I love you, " she whispered, a quiver in her voice as she felt her entire body contract painfully, a long wail expelling from her lips and coming from deep in her throat as she swooned over the edge, with Chakotay nor far behind as he gave one final thrust and spilled painfully into her.

They screamed each other's names, and when the throbbing of the bodies receded to a delicious aftermath of little shudders, she held his face, said again,

"I love you," and then burst into tears.

He was lying on the biobed in sickbay, his body drenched in sweat. The first wave of intense pain burned through him, lifting him right off the bed, and clutching his head. Then the second wave came, and the third. After a while he could no longer distinguish between one wave of the flames of hell and the next.

Then he felt the hundred needles dig deeper into the soft tissue of his brain. He felt himself going...going...screaming her name as the pain at last conquered him.

He felt someone shake him, hard. Then he screamed again.

"Kathryn!!!"

"Chakotay...wake up. It's only a dream. A nightmare," he heard a voice.

For several long moments he lay still, gasping as his heart pounded, then gradually it subsided. He was breathing normally again. Then he looked around him and his face fixed on her, looking at him with such great concern.

"Kathryn?"

"Shhh... it's over, Chakotay. No more pain. No more," she crooned as he threw himself into her arms, his face against her bosom. His body still racked with shudders.

"Forgive me... Kathryn...I'm sorry. I - "

"Chakotay, look at me, please."

He raised his face, shuddered again and held her close. Her hands smoothed his hair, caressed his face that seemed not to rest. She kissed him tenderly.

"No more pain, hmmm...?"

He simply nodded. Then he sighed as he pulled her down into his embrace, spooning her body very close to his. Like that they lay the rest of the night, he falling asleep again, his arm around her and his hand cupping her breast possessively. His face was in her neck, and from time to time she could still feel a slight shudder.

She lay awake. For a long time. It shook her just now, his whimpering cries breaking through her own sleep, watching him thrashing and holding his head. She felt again the pain. Remembered when he said to her earlier in the week:

"I felt that I failed you and the crew. Especially you. That I couldn't bring you back with me. I - I knew you would hate me for going against your wishes."

"Chakotay, will you listen to me?" she said as she stood in his arms in sickbay. He hadn't wanted to let her out of his arms everytime she visited him. As if he had been afraid that he would lose her. "The moment you left the annexe that day, I began to have doubts. When Bren Hadar refused to tell me the nature of what would happen. I sensed then. And I wanted more than ever in those two days your presence, your counsel which I only realised then I missed. Really missed. I wanted to come back, sweetheart. To take my command again. When I saw Tom...that's when I finally knew I wanted to be back here, on Voyager as it's Captain, and in your arms as... your beloved."

"I love you..." he murmured over and over into her hair then. His hand cupping her head. "Don't leave me, Kathryn..."

"I can't," she said, thinking to break the seriousness of their conversation. "You're holding on to me so tightly..."

He smiled, and her heart raced as she watched how his dimples became deeper as the smile widened. It was uncommonly beautiful on him, she thought. It was what kept her sane...

 ************

It was early morning. About 0500 when Chakotay woke, with the warm soft body of Kathryn snugly in his arms. He sighed. He could never become complacent about his new found happiness. He was filled with such peace now, such as he had never experienced. Kathryn meant so much to him, so much. Everything. All the old distances, walls and parameters fell away the moment she looked at him there in sickbay and said:

"I love you Chakotay. I could never hate you."

He knew in that instant that fortune smiled on him at last. That the angry warrior at last found peace. He was lucky, blessed. She is his now, for all time. His heart and his love.

"I love you," he murmured softly into her hair. She moved, and murmured back to him:

"Let me sleep..."

"Fine, I still love you..."

"What do you want, Chakotay..." came the muffled words from under his heart.

"You..." he said as he felt himself becoming aroused again.

"Go to sleep...."

"Not now, sweetheart..."

"Chakotay?"

"Hmmm...?"

"Love me..."

"That's better, my love..."

***********

In the briefing room Kathryn Janeway was in consultation with senior crew, all the familiar faces she had come to know so well. She looked at all of them, her heart swelling with pride. As each of them delivered their reports, she listened, noted. She rejoiced in the fact that she was back here on the ship. She felt renewed, rejuvenated, assured that her fears, the burdens of duty and command could be absorbed by those around her. Especially her first officer. That she felt at last free and ready to place her trust in him, not only as her second-in-command, but as the man she loved. Her eyes shone now, thinking of him.

And looking invariably to the empty seat next to her.

"Which brings me to the next point," she told the officers, all their eyes on her now. Tom smiled and B'Elanna looked with pride at her. Harry and Tuvok and Seven. All looking expectantly at her.

"I have pleasure in informing you that Commander Chakotay has fully recovered now, and will be back on duty - "

"Like right now," came his voice from the doorway where he was standing, so handsome in red, smiling at her. He walked to his seat next to her and before seating himself before a stunned group and surprised Kathryn, stunned them even more as he leaned over to her and kissed her. On her mouth, a long lingering kiss. Which brought some spontaneous applause from the rest of the group.

"I love you," he whispered - or mouthed - only for her to hear - or see. Her eyes shined, not in the least abashed at the brazen way in which he laid claim to her.

"Commander, as I was saying, you were only due to resume duty in two week's time."

"The crew needs us, Captain," came his succinct reply. What could she say?

"Thank you, Commander."

************

This was so much different, Kathryn decided, than the garden in the annexe at the Temple of Caul. There were trees everywhere, and huge, huge ferns. Some trees with leaves so broad she could wrap one round her waist. It was humid, and soft rain fell onto the broad leaves, making them shiny. Her hair was already covered with a fine sheen of tiny droplets. The rainforest, with its magnificent greens, the colourful birds of paradise. She could hear their calls in the stillness around her. But she pressed on through the thick walls of leaves and branches, until she came to a tiny clearing. There on its perimeter was an overturned tree trunk, and she gathered immediately it was to sit on. She walked towards it, and was about to sit down when she saw movement just ahead of her.

In what looked to her now like a small path leading to - or from - the clearing, she saw him.

And almost flipped over. For all that his face was weathered, he was an older version of Chakotay, dimples and all. She smiled tentatively, wondering what he'll think, seeing her here.

"Kathryn Janeway, Captain of Voyager," he said, with that air of old world knowledge about him. A sage, Chakotay once said to her.

"Yes..."

"The same Kathryn whom my son loves..."

"Yes..."

"And worships."

"Yes..." she said again as he came towards her, though not touching her, and sat down opposite her on what looked like a large rock. He had his knife and woodcarving in his hand.

She looked at him while he busied himself. His hair was long, hanging in his neck, but it was the compelling tattoo she stared at.

"Did you know Cha-ko-tay rebelled against his heritage when he was still a young boy?"

"N-No... I didn't know...yes, he did say something about the-the tattoo..."

"He adopted the ways of my people only many years later, Kathryn."

"He told me that."

"You love him, Kathryn Janeway."

"With all my heart."

"Cha-ko-tay said you left to embrace another order."

"Yes...yes I did. It...was...wrong...of me..." Her eyes filled with tears as she admitted these words to him.

"You have told him this?"

"Yes...I did, Kolopak."

"Cha-ko-tay felt that he failed you, Kathryn. But I told him that you are enlightened. You are back because you wanted to be back. Is that so?"

Kathryn realised what Chakotay meant when he said his father is too wise. She nodded, her eyes full of tears and her throat feeling thick.

"I used them...to my own ends..."

"Your spirituality Kathryn, it was always there, within you. You only needed to search within yourself."

"It is why I am here, Kolopak."

"You have resolved the conflict that raged in you for many years, Kathryn Janeway. I can see you are at peace."

She smiled, unable to say anything, then nodded.

"Cha-ko-tay has done what few men would do Kathryn, for love. He has aspired to the highest attainment of the purest love that is as vulnerable as it's strong, as sacrificial as it is selfish, as unconditional as it can sometimes be given with reservations. And you, my child, you are the blessed recipient of this wonderful gift."

She felt the tears falling on her hands as she looked at him and said:

"I know, Kolopak. I am happy."

"Then love him with as much love as he loves you..."

She looked into his smiling face. His kind eyes that never left hers as he spoke these words. Her eyes were swimming with tears. Before she could say anything, he was gone.

Kathryn Janeway opened her eyes, felt the river stone in her hands, and watched in fascination as the tears dripped onto it. She felt the strong body of Chakotay where he was sitting behind her and bracing her against him, his hands gently on her shoulders. She turned her face to look into his.

"Are you okay?" he asked softly.

She nodded. He rose, pulled her gently up with him and enfolded her in his arms. The light was at very low illumination. Almost completely dark.

In the darkness the two of them stood. Captain and First Officer of Voyager. She held by him, his arm around her small shoulders, his other hand against her head, cupping it gently and pressing it to him. His lips rested on her hair and his eyes were closed, as if in prayer.

Two silhouettes. In perfect harmony.

How did you like this story? Please let me know.

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