|
Title: Next Time
Author: Ky
Notes: Song belongs to Split Enz. I admit to being a huge fan of academy fic and, apparently,
at some point (Early 2007 would be my guess) I decided to give it a go myself. Go figure.
***
When my baby's
walking down the street
I see red, I see red, I see red
***
When he was younger, Chakotay was once given
a rather lengthy - boring - lecture from his father about why he should marry someone from their people.
"Your attraction
to white skin will not serve you well." Kolopak had said.
Discussing sex with your parents when you’re fourteen
was wrong on so many levels - regardless of race/colour/species - and Chakotay had cringed but nodded to appease his father.
"They do not know our ways," The older man had continued. "And they do not understand that the true value in life
lies in all that surrounds us."
When the tirade had escalated from there - it had quickly became about Starfleet who
thought 'all that grey' was good for the 'soulless drones that served them' - Chakotay has simply nodded and made the appropriate
sounds of affirmation when necessary as he'd watched a group of 'soulless drones' that stood close together, examining their
strange devices. They were obviously down from the Orbiting Ship, perhaps taking shore leave from patrolling the borders.
Despite
what his father and his people thought, Chakotay felt a sharp stab of longing to join the world that those people belonged
to.
He silently swore to himself that he was going to get into Starfleet Academy.
***
When he did make
it in and left the colony, his father had repeated the warning about white women to him.
It was true, Chakotay was
attracted to women with fair skin. He liked the contrast of their whiteness against his own darks hands; he liked the soft
scent of their milkiness. There was something foreign and compelling about them that he wasn't able to resist.
Luckily
for him, they seemed to feel the same way.
For as much time as he spent in classes and training sessions, he spent
an equal amount of time with his peers.
"Socializing", their professors told them, "is an integral part of life as
a Starfleet Officer. You have to be able to interact with people from all walks of life, regardless of their beliefs, technological
status or the colour of their skin" - the Bolians in his class had appreciated that comment - "and the best way to adapt to
a life with people from all over is to start with the students that surrounded you."
Chakotay had passed that course
with flying colours.
He hadn't yet decided exactly what position he wanted to hold on a Ship - certainly not Captain
- but he had decided that he wanted to spend his life travelling
There was a galaxy of cultures and phenomenon out
there and he was going to learn everything that he could about them.
***
It wasn't until his final year - when
he was just shy of nineteen, thanks to his early placement in the program - that he met her.
She was walking through
the grounds, eyes focused on a PADD as she tried to navigate her way to, he assumed, either her new dorm room or her first
class.
Since it was the beginning of the school year, there were fresh faces wandering around like lost souls all over
the place. Chakotay helped them if they asked - though they were usually too nervous to approach someone from the senior class
- but he'd never actively sought out one of the new students to offer assistance.
She was different.
He waited
where he stopped, in the middle of a pathway, until she came closer to him. "Need help?"
Looking up from the PADD in
her hands, she smiled a little. "Perhaps. I think I might be lost." She admitted.
It had taken all of three seconds
of looking at her properly for Chakotay to know with absolute certainty that it wasn't white women he preferred, it was redheads.
Hands down. "What are you looking for?"
"Science: The Discovery Of Elements. Apparently it's in the Nalto Building,
Room Twelve. And I can't find the Nalto Building." Her skin was flushed, as though she was embarrassed to not know where the
building was.
"I'm not surprised." Chakotay grinned. "It was knocked down a few months ago."
She blinked. "But
the map..."
"It probably older than both of us put together." He interrupted, flashing another smile.
Rolling
her eyes, she shrugged. "OK. Where will I find my class then?"
"Department of Science. I can show you where it is,
if you like?"
She seemed surprised by the invitation, but nodded anyway. "Lead on."
Gesturing in the direction
she had come from, Chakotay pointed and they started walking. He watched her as they fell into step. She was looking at the
ground and her body was tense.
Deciding that he was never going to get anywhere while she inspected her shoes, Chakotay
touched her hand lightly. "I'm Chakotay."
"One name?"
"That's all they gave me." He shrugged.
"And that
was very rude of me." Stopping, she held out her hand. "Kathryn."
"One name?" He teased, holding out his own hand.
"There is more." She grinned at him and Chakotay thought that his heart may have stopped beating for the duration
of her smile.
"Well then, Kathryn, I appreciate the sacrifice of your surname to protect my feelings."
When
her small hand fitted into his perfectly, Chakotay mentally nodded to himself.
Definitely redheads.
***
Despite
his best efforts, he had only seen her a few times throughout that final year at the Academy.
He had quickly heard
that she was something of a genius among her peers - and apparently they weren't thrilled about that - and she spent most
of her time studying, but that had been the extent of his knowledge and he'd never really had the chance to speak with her
again.
There was a rumour of her walking out on a date with Will Riker, someone Chakotay had interacted with only
briefly, but he never received conformation on that one and no one knew of her dating anyone else.
Chakotay didn't
understand how his peers could be so stupid.
She had incredibly blue eyes that danced in amusement or hardened in
challenge. A lithe form, hidden beneath her uniform. Her hair was startlingly long, falling to some point low on her back
and it fascinated Chakotay endlessly. He woke often during the middle of the night, halfway through a dream about burying
his face in the softness of her hair.
When he did see her, it was usually in a crowded hallway. His breath would catch
in his throat and he would find himself smiling. When she noticed him across those crowded hallways - usually at the point
where he was staring at her like a complete idiot - she would smile at him and wave a little.
He would vow to himself
that 'next time' he would excuse himself from whatever group he was with and ask her out.
But then there had been
classes, finals, mission postings, the excitement of graduation, being offered the chance to serve on several different Ships.
Next time never happened.
***
Every single time a new student entered his classroom, Chakotay made
a mental note of their name and face.
In the years that he had been teaching, he had learnt that the students tended
to react more positively when they knew that their professor actually gave a damn about them. Knowing their names was a good
step towards that reassurance, he'd found.
Unfortunately for him, every time a redhead walked into his class, he immediately
thought of a young woman that he'd shown the way to years ago.
"Next time." he had always said and it had never happened.
Now,
several years later, he still regretted it.
Since her, he'd been involved with a few other women - a couple of redheads
and a disastrous stint with a blonde - but no one had ever quite lived up to the lost woman he'd spent half an hour with.
She was, quite literally, the one that got away.
Sometimes he thought it somewhat pathetic that he was, effectively,
pining for a woman that he didn't even really know - regardless of the memory of her long hair and sharp blue eyes still dancing
behind his closed eyelids with stark clarity and the slight tingle that he felt in his cheek when he thought of her kissing
it in gratitude for showing her to the building she had been looking for - he couldn't seem to get Kathryn out of his mind.
He’d thought of her often as he’d served on different ships, wondering if fate would be kind enough to assign
them to the same place.
Ignoring the voice in his head that screamed That's her! as another student with long
red hair entered his class, Chakotay faced the group before him and tried his best to smile.
"Welcome to Advanced Tactics.
I'm Professor Chakotay and you are all going to spend a lot of time with me over the next year..."
He never had learnt
her surname.
***
The Starfleet officer on his doorstep wasn't exactly a shock, but the look on the older mans
face was.
"Professor Chakotay?"
He nodded slowly, his face crinkled with confusion. "Yes."
"I'm afraid
I have some bad news." The older man handed him a PADD. "There's been an attack."
"By who?" He knew who the victim
was even before he saw the name on the PADD.
"The Cardassians."
Chakotay had a bag packed and was out of Earth's
atmosphere within the hour.
***
Captain Chakotay landed the small Ship and turned to face his crew. "All set?"
"We're
good to go." Torres nodded.
He hadn't known her long - she had come on board with several others just a few months
ago - but Chakotay had quickly learnt that the woman might be small, but her temper made up for it.
"Good." Turning,
he nodded to Ayala - who had been with him the longest - and Tabor. "We go in, get the supplies and get out, understand?"
They
both nodded and turned towards the exit.
Staying low to the ground, Chakotay lead them closer and closer towards the
Cardassian Camp.
He wasn't comfortable entering a camp of this size, but they had the supplies that his Ship desperately
needed. The nature of the Maquis meant that ‘desperate’ equated to destitute. He would have preferred to wait
until the opportunity for a raid on a smaller compound came up, but they didn’t have that luxury. They rarely had any
luxury.
It was only when they finally got inside the largest building, hiding from several patrols as they went, that
Chakotay realized exactly what sort of camp this was.
Torres, coming to the same conclusion, was the first to speak,
her voice a harsh whisper. "We have to help them."
Chakotay shook his head, ignoring the corresponding looks that Ayala
and Tabor shot him. "We're not here for that."
Her reply was cut off as several guard passed by their position.
They
hid, pressed in shadows as the Cardassian Soldiers walked by, discussing their latest 'victory.' Chakotay listened with half
an ear to their conversation as he tried to focus on the distant sounds. How many more of these bastards are there?
Once
their footsteps were completely out of earshot, Chakotay turned back to Torres. Her eyes said it all. "We'll do what we can,"
He promised. "But our mission still stands."
"I think a humanitarian mission is more important than the supplies."
For
a Klingon, he though, she can be a damn softy at times. Shaking his head in amusement, he matched her glare with
one of his own. "How the hell did you make it into the Maquis, Torres?"
She didn’t look offended. Then, Klingon’s
rarely did let you know they were offended. You were expected to know it when they tried to rip your throat out. "You recruited
me."
Huffing, Chakotay turned as they all made their way through the halls.
He'd been inside of enough Cardassian
structures in the previous year - since they murdered my family! - to know the basic layout of the complex.
He
had also been inside far too many of their 'pleasure palaces' and he knew with absolute certainty that if - when - they got
to the lower levels, they would find helpless captives chained in various positions, locked in cells and cages.
Pushing
aside the bile that rose in his throat, Chakotay led them towards the supplies. Loading their packs, he made sure that they
retrieved everything they'd come for before turning to find Torres staring at him again.
He sighed. "Tabor, take Torres
and the supplies back to the Ship. Ayala and I will be back soon."
"What are you going to do?" She asked.
"We're
going on a little humanitarian mission."
"Then I'm coming."
"No."
"Chakotay!"
"No." He
bit out fiercely.
She did not need to see what went on in these places.
He had no doubt that she could
stomach it if she had to, but part of him would always see her as someone that needed protection and, in his eyes, the word
protection did not include up close and personal visits to rape camps.
Apparently the look on his face was enough to
convince her. Taking the pack that he held out, she nodded her acceptance. "See you soon?"
"If we're not there in thirty,
we're not coming back."
"We wont wait."
So she is learning, then. "Good." He turned to Ayala. "You don't
have to come."
"Yes, I do."
Ayala's wife had been a 'guest' of the Cardassians a few years back. It was how
the big man had found himself in the Maquis and it was why he was often the first one to put his hand up for missions like
these. It didn’t help that his wife was pregnant - still in the first trimester - for the second time and experiencing
severe flashbacks.
"Let's move."
Scurrying back the way that they came, they managed to find an abandoned Lift
shaft to crawl down.
When they reached the lowest level, the smell - Oh God the smell - hit him immediately
and Chakotay had to fight a second wave of bile that tried to escape him.
He knew what that smell was.
Death,
destruction, burning flesh.
Ayala knew it as well, if the look on his face was anything to go by.
He hated
how this would work, but they didn't have much of a choice. Forcing himself not to sigh, Chakotay glanced through the metal
bars on the door closest to him. Inside was a woman, locked in a cage, naked and crying. "Only the ones that can get back
to the Ship. Quickly. Quietly."
"Got it." Ayala nodded and moved to the end of the hall. He peeked inside the small
window, nodding to himself breaking the crude lock on the door and entering.
No one really tried to escape these
places - there was nowhere to run to without a Ship and the Cardassians considered it sport to hunt anyone that thought they
could survive the rough terrain outside.
Security wasn't tight.
Following Ayala's lead, Chakotay checked and
entered the room closest to him and freed the trapped woman.
Once she was safely hidden in shadows, he moved on to
the second door. Then the third. Then the fourth, where it all went to hell.
Walking in, he held his palms up. "I'll
help you."
The sniffling woman trapped inside of her cage shuffled back. She was obviously expecting him to be an illusion.
The Cardassians were known for the hallucinogenic properties added to the drugs that they fed their 'guests.'
"I'll
get you out of here but you have to stay quiet." He inched further. He felt for her, he understood her emotional distress
at the hands of these monsters, and he hated how it had to be, but they didn't have time for this.
"No!" Her shrill
voice rang out and Chakotay knew that, while time had been short, it was now up.
He wanted desperately to help her,
but he knew that it wouldn’t work if she was unwilling. You don't have time! He backed out of the room and checked
on the other freed captives.
She was huddled with several other women that Ayala had liberated and he glanced at each
of them and nodded once.
Ayala came out of another door, helping another captive that clutched at him tightly. When
he reached the group, the woman eyed him carefully.
"We have to go." Chakotay told them.
"Already?"
"Last
one screamed, they'll be here any moment."
Ayala gulped. No one needed to say who ‘they’ were. "One more."
"Make
it quick."
He didn't like the idea of leaving anyone in this rat hole either, but liberating them would do them more
harm than good if a Cardassian caught them. They may have considered it sport to hunt down the runaways, but they considered
anyone that tried to help them fair game. If they were caught, not only would Chakotay and Ayala become guests in this establishment
as well, but they would be forced to watch them torture the women. And the women would be punished a thousand times worse
than anything they'd experienced in their captivity before he and Ayala would be skinned alive.
Moving to another door,
Chakotay looked through the window and almost choked on his own saliva.
It was her.
Kathryn.
She was
dirty, trapped in a small cage, her hair a complete mess, but he would know her anywhere.
Forcing his body to move,
Chakotay frantically worked at the lock, his hands shaking too much to be of any real use.
He was almost through when
he noticed the activity on the wall behind her cage. Pausing, he watched a small dot appear and grow larger, cutting into
her cage, before a man dressed completely in black entered and pulled her out.
Chakotay watched as Kathryn stood on
shaky legs, trying to fight his arms before she stopped, staring at the man with wide, surprised eyes, apparently recognizing
him.
"Admiral Paris..." She breathed. "Is he...?"
Her husky voice sent chills through him, but Ayala was by
his side before Chakotay could hear the strange man's reply. "Looks like someone else had the same idea as us."
The
loud echo of approaching boots rang in his ears and Chakotay looked to the group of women that they had liberated, all clutching
at each other and whimpering in fear.
They knew as well as he did what would happen if they were all caught.
Casting
once last glance at Kathryn as the man led her out of the complex, Chakotay nodded to Ayala. "Let's go."
***
Chakotay
sat, eyeing the man across from him. "What's your story?"
"I am Vulcan."
They were known for stating the obvious.
"So I see. Point?"
"I wish to join in your fight against the Cardassians."
"I thought war was illogical?"
"Illogical,
yes." The Vulcan cocked his head to the side, apparently considering the rest of his response. "But it is also unavoidable
at times."
He eyed Tuvok quizzically.
As reluctant as Chakotay was to bring more people onto the Liberty -
Spirits knew she was small enough as it was - he didn't have the luxury of knocking back willing and able men at this point,
especially since Starfleet were getting closer and closer to apprehending them.
Besides, what Tuvok had said made
sense and that was exactly how he felt.
"You're in."
***
"The Starfleet Vessel is hailing us."
Tuvok's
voice broke through his haze of confusion as Chakotay scanned the readings in front of him. What the hell happened to us?
"Let's see what they have to say, shall we?"
"Commander Chakotay. My name is Captain Kathryn Janeway."
Holy
crap!
He was going to die.
It was her.
How long had it been?
Swallowing the large
lump in his throat, Chakotay focused on the view screen. "How do you know my name?"
***
Flopping down on the
sofa, Chakotay sighed.
She didn't recognize him.
For a moment, when he first beamed onto her Bridge and she
put her hand on his chest, he thought he’d seen a spark of surprise in her eyes. She hadn’t said anything, though,
and he had wondered.
The time that they spent working on finding B'Elanna and then, after, when she offered him his
new job... nothing. She showed no sign of knowing him as anything other than the man she’d been sent to capture. He’d
often wondered if fate would play a hand in brining them together. He hadn’t expected it to be quite like this, though.
She
didn't recognize him.
Should he be relieved - he was certainly not the wide-eyed boy that she met all of those years
ago - or should he be hurt?
He didn’t know.
Chakotay sighed again.
***
Picking up another
part of the wall, Chakotay continued to assemble their new shelter.
Kathryn was going through the inventory of her
research equipment - no doubt getting ready to start work as soon as she could - and he glanced at her every now and then
as he worked.
She seemed to be in reasonably good spirits, but Chakotay knew that it wouldn't last. The reality of
their exile would hit her soon and he planned to be there to catch her when she fell.
He'd figured out a long time
ago - perhaps twenty years ago, even - that he was always going to catch her if she fell.
It was his job.
Finally
putting the last piece in place, he stepped back and admired the finished shelter.
"All done." He smiled.
Kathryn
stopped her inventory and looked at their new home. "Very nice."
"I did what I could."
"We should name it."
She decided.
"You want to name the shelter?"
"Sure.”
She seemed excited about the prospect and
he didn’t have the heart to say no. “OK, what do we call it then?”
“Let's call it Nalto."
Chakotay
stared at her as she returned to her cataloguing.
***
She hadn't mentioned anything since her comment on New
Earth.
He had tried to bring it up, several times, but each time he'd asked her about the comment or their first meeting,
she'd simply shrugged and changed the subject on him.
In the time since their three months on New Earth, Chakotay had
often found himself wondering what may have happened if 'next time' had eventuated and he had asked her out.
Would
they have dated? Married? Had children?
Or would she have walked out on him as she had on Will Riker? - a rumour that
she had finally confirmed one night after a few too many glasses of wine.
Chakotay didn't know and he didn't like wasting
time on ‘what if's’.
As much as he wanted to know, he couldn't imagine loving a woman any different to
the one that had lived in the Quarters next to his for the previous seven years.
He looked out the window and watched
as Earth spun slowly below them.
***
"How long had you known?"
"Known what?"
"That I was the
boy you met."
"Met when?"
"Kathryn."
An auburn eyebrow arched up at him as she lay on her side. "You’re
asking me this now?"
Chakotay shrugged as best as he could as he also lay on his side facing her. "You wouldn't
answer before."
"What makes you think I will now?"
He ran the tip of his finger along her smooth thigh. "Apparently,
I have ways of making you talk."
"Are you always going to be this smug?"
"Are you going to ignore my question
for another thirty years?" He shot back.
"Twenty eight."
"What?"
"I met you twenty eight years ago, Mr.
One-Name."
"So you do remember."
"I do."
Pulling her closer to him, Chakotay wrapped his arms
around her and examined the contrast in their skin colour. "Did you know it was me when I beamed to the bridge?"
"I
knew it was you when I read your intelligence file in Headquarters."
Wow. "You did?"
"You made quite
an impression when we met."
"So did you." Kissing the top of her head, he smiled. “You have no idea.”
***
End
|
