Cruel and Unusual

By mizvoy

Part 2: Assumptions

January 2378 (one month after Voyager’s return)

Earth

“Are you saying that Seven’s family disowned her?”

Chakotay and Kathryn Janeway sat in Voyager’s ready room talking about the previous weekend when he and Seven of Nine had taken their first trip to Sweden to visit her father’s family. They had originally scheduled the meeting for first thing Monday morning, but ship’s business had forced her to reschedule three times and had ultimately resulted in a few minutes wedged into Tuesday afternoon. Chakotay suspected that she would have postponed this meeting, as well, except that she was supposed to meet with Seven that evening and needed to get his version of what had happened first.

“I think that’s pretty much what happened, although I’d call it a mutual disowning.” Chakotay shrugged, looking past her shoulder at the spectacular view of Utopia Planetia, where Voyager was located, caught in the claw of a dry dock hanger. “It was like witnessing a shuttle crash—dangerous and terrifying and yet impossible to look away.”

Janeway groaned with dismay. “I had no idea it would be such a disaster. Tell me everything. Start at the beginning.”

“The beginning?”

His mind snapped back to six weeks earlier when his association with Seven of Nine had begun. He desperately wanted to talk to her about how it had happened, but the few times that he’d brought it up, the captain had been uninterested in hearing any of the details, brushing the whole matter aside as a fait accompli. Now, as his mind grappled with the past, the chime of an incoming priority message sounded on the captain’s console.

“Damn.” She set down her coffee mug and got up to answer the hail with a weariness that spoke of another hectic day and another frantic week. “This shouldn’t take long. I swear, Chakotay, I don’t have a moment to call my own.”

While she was busy at her desk fielding another of a thousand details surrounding their return, Chakotay thought about how different his own life had been, a life not nearly as chaotic as the captain’s, yet just as stressful. He’d stayed busy going through his logs and reports and preparing for whatever happened next in his life, but his official duties had been severely curtailed. He hadn’t been able to provide her with much help.

Starfleet had relieved the Maquis of duty as soon as the ship entered Earth orbit and had been in the process of assigning them quarters on Earth when Janeway had intervened, insisting that her entire crew remain on board until they had come to terms with their return. Starfleet had grudgingly agreed, unwilling to do anything to tarnish the positive spin Voyager’s return was providing them after the disaster of the Dominion War.

She had also insisted that the Maquis remain in an advisory capacity during the debriefing. She pointed out that they would be an invaluable resource for the Starfleet officers who were studying the ship—especially Chakotay and B’Elanna Torres, who were members of her senior staff. Chakotay had been grateful for her loyalty, smiling in secret delight when she’d corrected a reporter who had asked her a question about Voyager’s Maquis crew members.

“They’re Voyager crew members. Period,” she’d snapped, giving the mob of reporters no doubt of her partiality as Admiral Hayes looked on in silence. “Where they served before they arrived on the ship is of no relevance today.”

On duty, she was same the confident, powerful captain he’d known for the last seven years, but privately, their friendship had suffered a serious blow. The intimacy and ease of their interaction had evaporated after the admiral’s visit, and Chakotay was at a loss as to how to repair it. As time passed, he wondered whether Kathryn was interested in repairing it.

She had learned of his relationship with Seven of Nine from Admiral Janeway, not from him, and his efforts to explain away the oversight had fallen on deaf ears. He argued that the relationship was hardly worth mentioning, consisting of four dates in just the last two weeks of their journey, but she had just smiled, focusing, instead, on what had happened in the admiral’s timeline, where he and Seven had become quite serious. She was convinced that they were ideally suited for each other and destined for marriage, and she refused to entertain any other outcome.

He was not so sure. The admiral’s arrival had changed their future, and he worried that his fledging connection with the former drone was too weak to survive. It was still just six weeks since his first “surprise” date with Seven, and he wasn’t sure that the whole idea had been a mistake from the very beginning. He still remembered the odd call from Seven that first night.

Voyager was passing through a relatively calm region of space, which meant that the crew had time to do the “nice-to-accomplish” repairs and enjoy some down time for personal interest and off-duty hobbies. The double whammy of Neelix’s departure and the gastric adjustment to Chell’s cooking had been the biggest challenge they’d faced in over a week.

Chakotay was enjoying a quiet evening in his quarters when Seven contacted him. It seemed that Captain Janeway had bowed out of their weekly velocity game, and Seven wondered if he would take her place so that the holodeck reservation wouldn’t be wasted.

Chakotay was more than willing to play. He had felt restless all day, and the prospect of physical activity appealed to him. Seven would be a worthy challenge, he knew. Janeway was one of the best velocity players on the ship, yet she often had to resort to extra discs in order to defeat Seven.

He agreed to the match and quickly joined her on the holodeck. It wasn’t until after the match ended that Seven dropped the “first date” bombshell.

Exhausted by the extended length and difficulty of the game, he stood in the middle of the holodeck toweling off and enjoying a cold drink before he headed back to quarters for a much-needed shower. They had been discussing the relative value of several velocity tactics when the conversation lagged and Seven suddenly changed the subject.

“I’ve found that Neelix is a better advisor on romantic issues than the doctor,” she informed him.

The non-sequitur caught him by surprise, and he barely kept from laughing out loud at the dubious quality of advice either of those two individuals might provide.

“Neelix?” he croaked, clearing his throat. “You’ve talked to him?”

“Voyager is still within communications range of the Talaxian colony,” she answered, looking so earnest that he was glad he’d hidden his true reaction. “When I spoke to him about seeing you socially, Neelix suggested that a physical activity like velocity would make our first date less awkward.”

For a moment, Chakotay simply stared at her in complete surprise, and then he repeated, “First date?”

“Yes, of course.” She was abruptly guarded, a blush of embarrassment deepening the ruddy tint that the game’s exertion had put in her cheeks. “Our velocity match qualifies as a first date, doesn’t it?”

She looked so awkward, so vulnerable and charmingly innocent, that he found it impossible to disappoint her by reminding her that he was simply a stand-in for her regular velocity partner. Rubbing his hair with a towel, he shrugged. “I suppose it does.”

She rewarded him with a brilliant smile and proceeded to ask him to accompany her to a concert in three days’ time as “an appropriate activity for date number two.”

“Date number two, hmm?” He grinned at the playful approach to dating and decided that there couldn’t be any harm in playing along. “Why not?”

That was the beginning, he realized, a simple decision not to hurt Seven’s feelings, yet it had grown into something much more than that, a dramatic, if unintentional realignment of his personal life that was turning out to be impossible to modify.

Across the room, Janeway closed down her computer with a huff and sat back in her desk chair, obviously annoyed by whatever had interrupted them. With a sigh, she strode back across the ready room, stopping to pick up her mug and frowning at the coffee that had chilled during her absence. She gave him a wink. “No need to put up with cold coffee now that we have unlimited replicator usage, right?”

“Right,” he answered, watching as she refreshed her coffee at the replicator. He thought to himself, Four dates. Two kisses. Yet, in the captain’s mind, I am destined to marry Seven of Nine.

She returned to the sofa sipping from one steaming mug and holding a second one out to him. “I got you a refill, too.”

“Thanks.” He cradled the mug in his hands, letting the steam warm his face.

“So. The trip to Sweden.” She relaxed against the sofa cushions and glared in the direction of her desk. “I turned off the computer. We shouldn’t be interrupted again.”

“We’ll see about that,” he replied with a wink. His thoughts turned to the awkward meeting with the Hansen clan, wondering how he could describe the way they had scrutinized Seven of Nine as a former Borg and looked down on him as a barely reformed traitor without losing his temper. In a moment of clarity, he realized that his presence had done little to help Seven fit in.

“You should have been the one who accompanied her,” he started, reopening an argument they’d had the previous week. “Her family respects and admires you as a Starfleet captain while the look at me as a criminal and a traitor.”

“We’ve already been over this, Chakotay,” she bit back, her anger flaring. “You know I could never have gone with her. I worked all weekend. In fact, I barely managed to spend two hours on Sunday afternoon with my own family in Indiana.” She leaned forward, rubbing her temples with trembling hands. “I thought she’d be in good hands with your diplomatic experience and natural charm.”

He snorted. “The Hansens aren’t as open-minded as I expected them to be, and I assure you that my ‘natural charm’ wasn’t enough to overcome their narrow-mindedness.”

“Explain.”

“What remains of her father’s family consists of Federation conservatives who detest both the Borg and the Maquis.”

“Her Aunt Irene didn’t seem ready to reject her.”

“Her Aunt Irene passed away just a few days before we returned.”

Janeway’s eyes widened. “I had no idea.”

Chakotay continued, “Even worse, she was the only remaining relative who remembered Seven or who had warm feelings toward her father, who, as it turns out, was the black sheep of the family.”

“Seven didn’t tell me any of this. Did she tell you?”

“Apparently, she didn’t feel it was significant.”

Janeway groaned. “I was counting on her Aunt Irene to help smooth her transition back into the family.”

“So was I. Apparently Magnus and Erin Hansen took Seven with them into deep space at the strong objection of most of the rest of the family. Magnus was notorious for doing what he wanted and defying common sense. Irene begged him to leave her in Sweden, but they left without even saying goodbye.”

“That’s hardly Seven’s fault.”

“No, and, of course, they know that. But it seems that Seven told them about seeing her father—as a drone—on a Borg cube and did nothing to retrieve him.”

“She saw her father?” Janeway sat up in surprise. “She never told me that! And she saw him after we separated her from the collective?”

“Apparently so—but she didn’t say when. Just another minor detail she failed to mention to us.”

“I suppose they feel as if she should have rescued him?”

“Don’t you think she should have at least tried?”

Janeway rubbed her face with her hands and sighed, finally looking up at him with a shrug. “I’d have to know when and where she saw him. It might have been at a time that she had no chance to help him. Dealing with the Borg is more complicated than they know.”

“That’s what I told them, but that wasn’t the only problem. Four members of the family were lost during the Borg attack at Wolf 359, and two others died in battles with the Maquis. You can see that the deck was stacked against us.”

“Why didn’t she tell us these things? Didn’t she know they would affect the way they treated her?” Janeway seemed genuinely confused. “I just don’t understand.”

“I guess she thought they would be as open-minded as Voyager’s crew was.”

“Too bad they couldn’t set aside their differences long enough to get to know you.”

“I wasn’t surprised by their reaction. They were just as prejudiced against her as the rest of the Federation is. She hadn’t read the letters from her Aunt Irene, nor had she done much research into the family, in spite of your suggestion that she do so.”

“I thought you’d make sure she did that.”

“I’m not her mentor,” he snapped, and then closed his eyes to regain his composure and escape the glare he was sure Janeway was giving him. He put down his mug of tea and gazed out the window. “You’ve been too busy to see how much she’s regressed, Kathryn, or how poorly the public has reacted to her. She isn’t as good with strangers as she was with the crew, especially when those strangers bring so much emotional baggage with them.”

“Meeting one’s relatives could include a lot of emotional baggage, I know that, but I can’t be everywhere, Chakotay.” She leaned forward and buried her face in her hands, and he remembered how heavy her burden was now that he was no longer able to assist her as consistently as he had before. She was right when she said she had no time to cater to Seven’s adjustment, and she wanted him to take care of that task in her stead.

The turnaround in roles was ironic, because Seven had always been a bone of contention between them. He’d initially wanted to jettison her out of the airlock with the rest of the drones, but Janeway had insisted on severing her from the Collective and taking her on as a reclamation project.

In her first years on the ship, Seven had been a thorn in the captain’s side and a complication in Chakotay’s work. Even so, the gamble had worked out, for Seven had proven to be a valuable member of the crew and had gradually regained much of her humanity, enough for him to look at her as a potential companion.

But that was in the Delta Quadrant, where Kathryn Janeway was out of reach, not here, where she might eventually be willing to explore the smoldering attraction between them—except for his entanglement with Seven.

She looked up at him and smiled, reaching to give his arm a reassuring pat. “It’s time for you to become her mentor. I’m too distracted with everything else that’s happening to give her the attention she needs. So, you see, it happened just in time.”

“What happened ‘just in time’?”

“Your relationship with her, Chakotay.” She pulled away, growing thoughtful. “I’ve wondered why the admiral timed her return when she did, and it’s occurred to me that she might have known how instrumental you’d be in Seven’s adjustment to the Alpha Quadrant.”

“Our relationship?” He stared at her in dismay. “It’s hardly a done deal, Kathryn. I told you that the admiral arrived just as our fourth date was beginning, and we haven’t had much of a chance for any dates since our return.”

“Yes, I know that, but the admiral told me how compatible you would be.” Janeway sighed and sipped her coffee, waiting for enough time to pass for her to change the subject. “Now, I want more specifics on the family disaster in Sweden. Tell me their names and their professions, and maybe I can find a way to mend the breech.”

Chakotay knew better, but he relented and told her everything in great detail-how the family had reacted to Seven’s visible implants and her inflexible bearing, how Seven had, in turn, become even more distant and arrogant, and how his efforts to bridge the gap had fallen far short of being adequate.

“I don’t think there’ll be a resolution of this falling out, Kathryn,” he concluded, suddenly tired and discouraged at her refusal to look beyond what the admiral had told her. “You can’t say the things they said to each other and just forget them later on.”

Janeway shook her head in dismay. “Well, she isn’t the only member of the crew who’s received a less than favorable reception, nor is she the only one who’s basically alone. Your family is gone, too, which makes it nice that you can be there for each other.” She gave him an indulgent smile. “It’s comforting to know that we’ll always have our Voyager family to fall back on, isn’t it? I don’t know how I’d survive without the deeper friendships and relationships that I’ve developed along the way.”

“I hope I can count on your friendship,” he answered, embarrassed at the needy sound in his voice. He’d hoped for so much more from her, and yet her current indifference at his liaison with Seven could only mean that she had never felt more than simple friendship toward him.

“Of course, you can. You and Seven both. Never doubt that.” She frowned when her door chime interrupted them. “Who could that be? Enter.”

Her newly assigned aide stepped in. “Captain, Admiral Hayes has been trying to reach you and keeps getting an out-of-office reply. Is something wrong with your computer?”

“I turned it off, Lieutenant, hoping for a few undisturbed minutes with the commander.” Although she glared at her aide in disappointment, she turned to Chakotay with a wistful sigh. “Chakotay, I’m so sorry, but we need to cut this short. Admiral Hayes has been waiting for an update on the ablative shielding, and I don’t think I can put him off any longer. Maybe we can resume our talk later this week? After I get back from Paris?”

“Of course, we’ll have lots of time to talk once the debriefings are over,” he replied, standing up and following her aide toward the door.

“If I live that long,” she chuckled in reply. “Tell Seven I’ll call her soon.”

He made his way slowly toward his quarters, trying to put a finger on what it was in Janeway’s attitude that rankled so much. She had simply put him aside. She had closed a door on their future in a way that she’d never done before, and he wondered if the blame belonged to the admiral’s indiscrete revelation or if she had simply never been serious about him.

Whatever the cause, their friendship was more formal and distant than it had been in years, more like it had been before their exile on New Earth when she was still engaged to Mark Johnson and still considered him a “temporary” first officer. Now she thought of him and Seven as a couple, a single entity, the same way that she thought of B’Elanna and Tom or Tuvok and T’Pel, people joined together in a permanent bond. In her mind’s eye, they were fated to be married, and she had no intention of doing anything that would change that destiny.

Despair and sorrow washed over him. He was broken-hearted that he was involved with the one person that Janeway considered a part of her family. She would never speak up now, no matter what her true feelings were, and he worried that their friendship would also wither away.

He was surprised to find Seven of Nine waiting for him in his darkened rooms and shocked that she had tears in her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” he wondered as he walked up and brushed a tear away with his thumb. “What’s happened?”

She gestured at the coffee table laden with the gifts that she’d taken to her family members that weekend. “It would seem that the Hansen’s have permanently rejected me.”

“Oh, they returned your presents,” he observed, feeling just as hurt and resentful as she did. His mind was no longer on his own problems as he sensed how much this rejection had hurt her. “I’m so sorry.”

“It would seem that my Voyager ‘collective’ is all I have left.” Another tear coursed down her cheek. “And I have you.”

His head snapped up and his eyes locked onto hers.

If Janeway was truly uninterested, what harm could there be in pursuing a connection with Seven of Nine? At least by becoming the husband of her protégé, he could maintain his closeness to the captain, and he would have a beautiful wife in the bargain.

In a moment of weakness, he gave up hope.

“Yes, you have me, Seven.” He embraced her, letting her tears fall on his shoulders as he comforted her. “We have each other.”