Title: Reactions
Author: Ky (venom69)
Fandom: Star Trek: Voyager
Rating: ADULT. (ish)
Summary: Generic plot #46 for Coda episode additions. Sorta.
Character/Pairing: Janeway/Chakotay
Spoilers: None… the shows ended!
Warnings: Sexual Situations.
Prompt Number for fic101: 12 - Frame
Author’s Notes: Song belongs to Patti Smyth.
Disclaimer: Usual guff. Not mine, promise to put them back where I found them.
Date: 02/01/07

***

There's a danger with loving somebody too much
And it's sad when you know
Its your heart you can't trust.

***

Streams of moonlight beat down on them, coating the lake in a translucent glow.

Chakotay knows nothing of sailing, so he sits on the deck at the bow of the boat as Kathryn manoeuvres herself around, tightening ropes, pulling pulleys and ensuring that the sails will catch the slight breeze that she had programmed.

The moonlight creates a frame around her and when she is on the opposite side of the sails, he can only see the outline of her body so Chakotay sits and watches.

Lake George is beautiful, he decides.

The water is black beneath them, the darkness punctuated only by the bright light of the moon. The boat is larger than he had expected, but she struts around, completely at ease with it, exactly as she does through the halls of Voyager. There’s a cabin on one of the banks of the shore, complete with its own dock and Kathryn tells him that it’s a replica of the house that her family own.

“Nothing inside though,” She says when he asks to take a look. “I couldn’t get it to look right so I left it as just a shell.”

“Fair deal.” He nods, once. "Kathryn?"

She is making some sort of complicated knot with the ropes in her hands when she looks up at him again, continuing to manipulate the length of rope without looking at it. "Yes?"

"Can we talk?"

"About?"

"Today."

"Oh." She sighs, dropping the rope to her feet. "I had hoped you wouldn't bring that up."

"Isn't that the point of our sail?"

"I thought the point was to celebrate the fact that I cheated death."

"You can't run from this, Kathryn."

"Again, we're celebrating the fact that I cheated death, how is that running?"

Chakotay frowned. Damn woman had an answer for everything. "You're tyring to forget what happened."

Kathryn threw her hands up in the air and Chakotay watched the anger rise through her. "Of course I am! You think that I would want to remember my own death? Do you think I like that I saw you crying as you tried to revive me?"

"I didn't know about that." He muttered quietly, looking at his hands. Chakotay could imagine how he would have reacted if she'd stopped breathing.

Kathryn breathed out and moved to sit next to him, her back against the railing of the boat as it rocked on the water. Her shoulder brushed his lightly and she sighed. "I didn't mean to yell at you."

"It's OK."

"No, it's not. I wasn't going to tell you about it, you know."

"About me reviving you?"

"Yeah."

"Kathryn, you can always talk to me."

"I know, it's just..." She sighed again. "If I tell you about it, I have to think about it and I don't want to think about it." She smiled crookedly at him. "You were right, I am running."

"Are you getting anywhere?"

"No." She gave a little laugh. "Seems pointless, doesn't it?"

"A little."

"My father was there."

"What?"

"The alien took on the form of my father in order to convince me to go with him. He was there when I was trying to communicate with everyone. He was there at my funeral."

Chakotay touched her hand lightly. He didn’t normally touch her - she was the tactile one - but his hands have been itching to make contact with her skin since he brought her that peace rose.

"You gave a lovely speech, if it makes you feel any better."

He huffed. "It really doesn't."

"Me either."

They sit in silence, their only movement coming from the water beneath the boat.

Chakotay wanted to say something - something profound, preferably - but all that would come to mind was that she was his best friend and he couldn't even hug her without permission to try and make her feel better.

He wanted to pull her into his arms, hold her tightly and lie to her that everything would be OK. That she would be OK - which wouldn't have been a lie - and that he would be there for her always - again, not a lie.

When she eventually speaks and breaks their silence, her voice is quiet. "Chakotay?"

"Yes?"

"Thank you."

"For what?"

"Everything."

He nods once and curls his hand around hers, lacing their fingers together.

***

Chakotay doesn't know how, or why - thought he doesn't need a diagram for the 'how' part - it happens, but he has the distinct feeling that he's blacked out for a good twenty minutes.

She is sitting beside him as they glide through the water, the holographic moonlight still casting a frame around her, almost like an ethereal glow, with their hands twined together and then he blinks and she is in his lap with her tongue in his mouth and his hand down her pants.

It's not that he doesn't want this - that is so not the case - but it's right about the time that he slides a second finger into her that he realizes that this is a bad idea.

It doesn't matter which one of them started this, he knows that he has to be the one to end it - and it's not the ending that his body wants, either, damnit.

He pulls back from her, his fingers still tightly sheathed inside of her body with his thumb on his clit.

Kathryn's face is flushed, her hair slightly disarrayed and she makes these little sounds that make him want to kick his consciousness out of his mind, bend her over and fuck her until they scream and/or die.

"We have to stop." He says, panting.

"Why?"

"Because you're reacting to what happened today."

She wiggles on his fingers. She actually wiggles. "And?"

"It's is not the way that this should happen."

"This?"

"Us." He replies, pulling his hand from her pants.

He can smell her - God help him he can actually smell her - and Chakotay imagines the ass kicking that his conscience is going to get.

"Why not?"

"Kathryn?"

"It could be a one time thing."

"Do you really believe that?"

"No." She sighs and moves herself from his lap, sitting beside him once more. "I guess not."

Chakotay stands and calls for an exit with as much grace as he can muster with an erection the size of the ship.

He, now, had a date with a cold shower and/or his right hand, it seems.

Leaning down, he kisses her cheek sweetly. "If you still want to do this in a week, call me."

***

End