Cold Of Doom - Voyager

Title: Cold Of Doom
Author: Ky (venom69)
Fandom: Voyager
Summary: "Once upon a time, when tigers smoked tobacco..."
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Authors Notes: Short, silly and slushy. And I'm aware that I randomly change perspectives. Deal with it! Written at the ~~demands~~ request of

cassievalentine Hope you like it, Trouble.

***

"Once upon a time, when tigers smoked tobacco..." Whatever it was that he'd been planning to say - and he was damn sure it would've been something profound - was lost as a pillow connected with his face.

Removing a mouthful of lint and soft cotton- slight exaggeration possible - Chakotay looked across to the woman glaring at him.

She didn't look amused. In fact, she looked severely less than amused. Perhaps one could even say she looked about three steps away from homicide.

He wasn't particularly concerned though.

At least, not until she picked her coffee cup up and started looking at him as though she was trying to figure out exactly how much energy she'd need to hit him where it hurt. And he was under no illusions that she wouldn't do it, either.

Chakotay was pretty certain that he was going to end up in the Brig - or on the receiving end of that cup - but he can't help but ask. "Are you really going to throw that at me?"

"I should!"

He shrugged. "Sounds like a waste of good coffee to me."

Kathryn's eyes narrowed even further. She knew exactly what he was doing. He did it every time. And every damn time she swore that he'd never get the best of her. She could play these sort of reverse-psychology type mind games just as well as he could. And if he thought that reminding her of the potentially wasted coffee would stop her...

Sighing, she quickly drained the last of the liquid and then sent the cup flying.

Smug bastard.

It hit him squarely in the chest - should have aimed lower - and he winced. Kathryn briefly hoped that he'd have another bruise to add to his impressively large and on-going collection.

Chakotay just blinked at her. She knew what was coming.

"Do you want people to think I'm a battered husband?"

"I can make it look like you are, if you like?"

He always said the same thing, she always replied with the same offer. It was a habitual dance that they did at least once a week and Kathryn got some kind of sadistic thrill out of it.

They weren't like the other couples on Voyager. They seemed to get as much pleasure out of fighting with each other as they did making up. She didn't mind so much though, she had always know that they would be like that with each other.

It wasn't, perhaps, what one would call the most stable of relationships, but it was exactly what Kathryn wanted. She loved him just as much when he was angry as she did when he was sitting behind her in the bathtub washing her hair - and, really, the man probably got more pleasure out of that than she did, but who was she to complain?

Absentmindedly, her hands fiddled with her spoon, eyeing the bowl of soup that sat on the coffee table in front of her. Thin tendrils of steam rose from the contents and Kathryn was fairly certain that it was poisonous. It was an unappetizing green colour - something akin to a dirty river, she thought - and if she had a working nasal cavity then she suspected it would smell similar.

"Put that away before you take someone's eye out." Sometime during her musing, Chakotay had risen and recycled her lethal coffee cup, moving to sit at the opposite end of the couch with her.

"You mean yours?"

"Yes, mine!"

"You worry too much, you know that right?"

One eyebrow made a shot for his hairline and Kathryn had a brief flash of talking to Tuvok. "Says she who is holding the spoon."

"You think you're funny. That's so cute."

Kathryn was 99% certain that her glare would have been more effective if her words hadn't come out something akin to 'Du dink dor dunny. Dats doh dute.'

"You want me to tell you a story or not?"

Abandoning her spoon and the potential plans for galactic domination - which would have to wait until her head didn't feel like it was about to explode - Kathryn nodded and pulled the blanket higher under her chin and shuffled until a pair of strong arms wrapped around her. He didn't seem to worry about the potential of catching her cold of doom - which the Doctor swore couldn't be treated with a hypospray - and she was grateful for the additional warmth.

"Once upon a time, when tigers smoked tobacco..."