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Summary: A series of chance meetings reminds Janeway and Chakotay of the inevitability of their relationship. J/C Post-Endgame

Undeniable

By Mizvoy

Chapter 9(Chronologically)

September 15, 2380 (one year and four months after Voyager’s return)

Starfleet Headquarters, Admiral Janeway’s office 1800 hours

Admiral Kathryn Janeway sat at her desk watching as reports came in from the observation posts along the Romulan Neutral Zone, looking for something, anything, out of the ordinary. The Federation had been electrified by wild rumors about the entire Romulan senate being assassinated and the government being taken over by renegade Reman slaves who served under a leader named Shinzon.

While the newsvids speculated on the veracity of the early reports, Kathryn knew that there was a great deal of truth to this rumor. The information had been confirmed through a top-secret network of couriers, the original message allegedly sent by an individual close to Admiral Spock, who still worked undercover in the Empire. With the message came a warning to wait for further updates before formulating a Federation response.

Even so, Kathryn and the rest of the admirals and officers assigned to the patrol and protection of the Romulan sectors had spent the last forty-eight hours debating the proper type of action should the rumors prove true. Contact would have to be made with the new government as soon as possible in order to ensure that the treaties and routines along sensitive areas of the neutral zone would continue as before. Federation citizens living close to Romulan space were already clamoring for beefed up security, and every Starfleet vessel in the region had been put on alert and ordered to move closer to the border just in case quick action was needed.

Kathryn hated this part of her job, even though she’d learned that much of the work of a diplomat involved a calm demeanor in spite of excruciating tension. Sometimes she felt like a duck swimming on a pond, all smooth, graceful motion above water yet paddling like mad underneath. She reminded herself that it had been only twelve hours since the initial message had been received and that it would probably be a minimum of forty-eight hours more before they would hear any more news. She should go home and rest. If nothing else, she should let her chief of staff, Captain Watson, go home to her husband and children. Kathryn was more than willing to remain behind and hold down the fort.

“Is that you, Retta?” she called, hearing someone moving around in the outer office. “Why don’t you go home? I doubt that anything will happen before Tuesday at the earliest. I’ll call you if I hear something.”

Loretta Watson appeared at Kathryn’s office door wearing her uniform undershirt, a cup of steaming coffee in her hand. “I’ll go home when you do, Admiral,” she said in a no-nonsense tone of voice. “Didn’t you have a mini-vacation planned for this weekend?”

Kathryn winced and turned her chair toward the window. She didn’t want Retta to see the sadness the thought of her aborted plans created. “I cancelled that long ago.”

“I thought September 15th was your official ‘Voyager’s Really Home Day.’ Aren’t you going to commemorate it in some way?”

“With all that’s happening now, I can’t even think about taking time off.” She leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. “It was just a frivolous indulgence, anyway.”

“But you said yourself that we won’t hear anything before Tuesday.” Retta studied her boss’s face in the window’s reflection, seeing there the disappointment and despair she was no doubt trying to hide. She frowned, wondering what the admiral could be so upset about. Something personal? Or some fragment of intelligence she hadn’t shared as yet?

Retta had quickly learned that being an admiral’s chief of staff was nearly as challenging as being a ship’s first officer. Intimately involved with the admiral’s schedule and daily business, she was, nonetheless, something less than a friend and constrained by protocol from getting too involved her private life. To make matters worse, Janeway was a complicated person who sometimes shared her life openly and then at other times seemed unwilling to discuss anything personal at all. She’d talked to many other officers about this paradox, including some who’d served with Janeway over the years, but she was still searching for the right touch, the right blend of personal and professional that they could both tolerate. “Commander Chakotay said you’d be like this during times of stress.”

Kathryn spun around in her desk chair, her face almost white with shock. Had Retta read her mind? Had the woman sensed the identity of the man who was foremost in her thoughts? “I beg your pardon?”

“I talked to Chakotay about serving with you when I met him at the Voyager reunion last May. I thought he could give me some pointers about your work habits.” She could see the panic on the admiral’s face and suddenly feared that she’d invaded her privacy in some way. “I hope you don’t mind that we discussed you.”

“Not at all,” Kathryn smiled, trying to reassure Retta that she’d done nothing wrong, even though she could feel her pulse racing at the mention of Chakotay’s name. “You were smart to ask him about my idiosyncrasies. No one knows them better than he does.”

“He said that in a crisis you often become so focused that you fail to take care of yourself properly, and that I have to make sure you don’t get too tired or overextended.” She paused, letting the admiral realize that their current situation was just what he’d warned her about. “So, why don’t we leave together?”

“I give up,” Kathryn shook her head in resignation, standing up and stretching before she reached for her tunic. “Just remember that you have a husband and two kids waiting for you at home. I don’t even have a dog. What difference does it make if I wait here or at home?”

“Because at home you might relax or take a nap.” Retta smiled as she watched the admiral go through her end-of-the-day routine prior to leaving her office. “I thought you’d be meeting Admiral Wingate for a nice weekend celebration.”

“Randy’s touring the new conference center on Risa, remember? Tough duty.” She laughed. “He won’t be back for a month, at least.”

“Could you get to Risa and back by Tuesday?”

They laughed at the ridiculousness of her suggestion as they walked out of the building into the golden glow of the sunset. “Maybe I’ll go for a walk,” Kathryn said, taking a deep breath of the sweet fall air. “Who knows what’ll happen next week. We may all be on our way to the neutral zone in forty eight hours and miss the rest of this nice weather.”

“I’ve set the comm to contact me if there are any incoming flash messages, Admiral. I won’t bother you unless they need your immediate attention.” She put a hand on the small woman’s shoulder. “Why not go see your mom? Take in a play. Do something out of the ordinary to commemorate this special day.”

“Coffee. I’ll have a nice pot of coffee, take a hot bath, read a trashy novel, and go to bed.” She found herself looking forward to it. “But I may just stay in the city, close to the office. If you need to contact me, use my commbadge.”

“Sounds perfect. Room service would be divine. I’ll see you Monday, then.”

“If not before.”

Retta headed for the transport station, her mind already focusing on a rare evening with her family. Kathryn watched her disappear into the building before she decided to head into the city for the coffee served at her favorite café “The Night Owl.” She walked through the gates of the huge Starfleet complex and made her way down into the city, enjoying the excitement of a Saturday night in San Francisco, the buzz and hum of a big city invigorating her. She needed the exercise, she realized, as she settled into a steady pace, enjoying the sights and sounds around her. By the time she reached her destination, her blood was flowing and she felt much better.

“Admiral Janeway!” Helene, the Night Owl’s owner, greeted her when she entered the café. “What a pleasant surprise!” She turned to the serving bar, signaling for a fresh pot of coffee before she led Kathryn to a secluded booth in the back of the room. “We’re so seldom honored with your presence in the evenings.”

Kathryn relaxed, sipping her coffee and toying with a chef salad as she watched the café’s varied clientele at their meals, other lonely diners, couples on dates, families with children, tourists and diplomats. Through the café’s windows she could see the skyline of the city glowing in the sunset, the tall buildings transformed into spikes of gold. Among them was the Mark Hopkins Hotel.

She closed her eyes, fighting to keep herself from thinking about her cancelled plans, her selfish desire to repeat the rendezvous of a year earlier. In spite of her rash promise she’d made at the end of Voyager’s one-year reunion, she’d told Chakotay in no uncertain terms that she wouldn’t be meeting him there. She couldn’t deliberately meet him. Their tryst the previous year had been innocent and unplanned, and she tried to forget their second chance meeting in Monterey. To meet deliberately would be a declaration of sorts. An admission of an affair.

“Don’t you like the salad, Admiral?” Kathryn opened her eyes to find Helene standing over her, a concerned look on her face. “You look as if you’ve lost your best friend. Is there trouble coming?”

She smiled, wanting to reassure this dear woman before she imagined that the threat of another Breen attack. “Nothing serious, I assure you, and nothing to do with this salad.” She stood up. “I had a late lunch,” she said, looking down at the nearly untouched food. “And I’m overly tired. If you don’t mind, I’ll call it an early night.”

“Of course,” Helene replied, putting a reassuring hand on her arm. “You’ll feel better after a good night’s sleep.”

The transport station was at the bottom of the hill, so Kathryn started for it at a leisurely pace. She noticed that the windows of the Mark Hopkins glowed like sheets of pure gold in the reflected light of the sunset, reminding her again of her broken date. A sudden wave of desolation made her sink onto a park bench conveniently placed in front of a drug store.

It was too late to meet him, she realized, even though he and Seven were now living on the east coast. He couldn’t get here on time even if she changed her mind and begged him to come. It was too late for them. Perhaps it had always been too late.

Four months earlier, in the cabin at Monterey, Chakotay had emerged from the bathroom dressed in the clothing that had been dried and pressed by the ‘fresher. She’d wanted to run to him, to throw her arms around him and drag him back to bed, but she was afraid to do it for fear that she’d never let him go. Instead she’d gestured at the window and delivered an obvious weather report.

“It’s cold out there,” she’d warned him. “And the grounds are still soaking wet from the rain. You should probably take the long way around instead of cutting across the golf course.”

“Someone might see me if I walk along the street. They might jump to conclusions.” His eyes had been dark with restrained emotion—anger and disappointment. She’d heard all of his arguments, though, and he didn’t want to risk her annoyance by restating them. The evening had been an odd mix of bliss and antagonism. He waited on the other side of the room, reluctant to leave things as they were between them. “Besides, my shoes will dry.”

“My new chief of staff will be here any minute, Chakotay.”

“So this is goodbye, then?”

“Yes, goodbye,” she’d nodded, moving across the den toward the back porch, where she could see a faint glow of sunlight in the east. “The sun’s rising, Chakotay. If you don’t leave now, you’ll be a moving target for some retired admiral with an early tee time.”

He’d walked quickly across the room, only to stop as he reached her, his eyes fixed on the floor. “Are you sure about calling off September?”

“Yes. I wasn’t thinking clearly at the reunion when I mentioned meeting you. We aren’t free. Neither of us. And to deliberately plan . . . .”

He’d looked up at her in despair, and her heart broke to see him so sad. “We could be free, Kathryn. We should be free.”

“It wouldn’t work,” she’d insisted, scrambling to keep her head in spite of his intoxicating proximity. “You wouldn’t like my lifestyle—endless traveling, late hours, working weekends. You’d resent Starfleet. You’d feel guilty about Seven. She loves you and needs you in her life.”

“She’d adapt.” He’d smiled and taken her hand. “We could try.”

She’d wanted to try. She’d looked into his eyes, trying in vain to think of another argument against their meeting. The warmth of his touch was making her head spin. She’d actually leaned toward him, conscious of his large, solid body, conscious of how much she needed his warmth in the early morning chill. Her front door chime had stopped her.

“That’ll be Captain Watson,” she’d said, pushing him gently toward the door. “She can’t find you here.”

He’d stepped onto the porch, turning to give her one last look. “If you change your mind about the Mark Hopkins, let me know and I’ll be there.”

“I won’t change my mind,” she’d said as the chime rang again and she looked over her shoulder toward the front door. “But, I’ll miss you,” she whispered as she turned away from him and toward her duty, toward Starfleet and work and protocol. Toward loneliness.

Kathryn awakened from her reverie and realized that she was still sitting on the hard park bench, only now the last hint of warmth had disappeared with the sun. A cool breeze made her shiver as she huddled against the building, desperately fighting despondency.

Her life seemed to be nothing but a long series of melancholy events. The long separations from her adored father and her endless attempts to please him, to get his attention and approval. The trauma of his and her fiancé’s death when she was an impressionable ensign. Her own life-threatening injuries. Her future life with Mark Johnson torn from her by the Caretaker’s kidnapping of Voyager and her crew. And then Chakotay.

Of all of her Voyager senior staff, she’d felt as if she’d let him down the most. She’d never been able to give him what he needed from her, and she still felt guilty about that failure. So often, a captain’s job comes down to finding the physical and spiritual requirements that make the crew happy and then doing everything in her power to keep those necessities in supply. The basics are easy enough—food, fuel, medicine, a goal to work toward, a sense of accomplishment, of teamwork, regular communication with home.

It had been Chakotay’s intangible needs that had baffled her. She’d learned to tolerate and even encourage Tom Paris’s creative bent by allowing him unimpeded access to the holodeck. Harry’s music sustained him. Neelix had enough natural morale to supply the entire ship. B’Elanna was always happy with her engines; Kathryn had never met a purer engineer in her life. Tuvok? She knew he’d take care of himself. And Seven seemed energized by her exploration of her human individuality and then the parental role she played with first Naomi and then the Borg children. All of them, even Chakotay, found happiness by doing for and thinking of others. So did she, as she thought about it. She was happiest when she knew her crew’s needs had been met.

But Chakotay had needed more from her than she could give. She’d allowed him the time to explore his spirituality, allowed him to use the shuttle when he needed privacy, allowed him to beam down to many planets’ surfaces alone, in spite of the unknown dangers, for his periods of solitary meditation. He hadn’t seemed to need any other hobby or diversion. What he’d needed was a connection, a relationship. She’d offered him friendship, and he’d accepted that from her without objection. He never complained about her refusal to consider a deeper bond between them. Not once.

How she wished things could have been different. How many times in a lifetime could a person find someone so perfectly suited to her quirks and idiosyncrasies? She wondered, with a heavy heart, how many more chances she would have to find happiness.

She’d promised herself, when the admiral had brought them home early, that she would do nothing to interfere with Chakotay’s budding romance with Seven of Nine, and so she’d tried to move on, finding more than one gentleman to keep her company since their return. She’d maintained a familiar distance from her former first officer, communicating with him mostly through the public Voyager message board, speaking with him at the few promotion parties, weddings, chance meetings, and celebrations over the months since their return. She felt her stomach clinch when she realized that she’d only been alone with him twice, and that both times . . . .

She pushed the thought away. After all those years of denial on Voyager, it was as if their reserve of self-control had evaporated.

“Are you all right, ma’am?” Startled, Kathryn looked up and into the kind eyes of a policeman walking a beat. “Do you need help? Are you lost?”

Yes, she thought, I’m lost. But instead she said, “No, I was just enjoying the sunset. I’m on my way to the Mark Hopkins Hotel.”

“A wonderful hotel. Meeting someone?”

Her eyes misted. “No, not this time.”

“Too bad.”

She stood up and thanked him for his concern as she started down the street. She’d meant to spend this weekend alone a year ago, but fate had intervened. This year, she would spend the time rethinking her future, coming to terms with the mistakes she’d made. This time, she’d do things right. It was time to face the facts and get on with her life, and where better to do that than the very place where she’d veered off course a year earlier?

She’d walked nearly a block when her emotions overwhelmed her. Stepping into the shadow of a recessed doorway, she buried her face in her arms, hot tears dampening the sleeves of her uniform as she sobbed. He wasn’t there. How she longed to see him, to hear his voice, to snuggle into his body and sleep with his arms around her.

She knew that there could be no middle ground. She would have to break with Chakotay completely. They could no longer be friends if they couldn’t be alone together without succumbing the sexual attraction that seemed to overwhelm them.

As difficult as it would be, she couldn’t think about him that way anymore, couldn’t give in to those memories. The joy of their loving, the sweet release of years of emotional tension, the harmony of their passion had been like nothing else she’d ever known. She couldn’t get close enough to him, couldn’t get the memory of him out of her dreams. He intoxicated her. She’d become addicted to him like air or water or, she smiled to herself, like coffee.

But, he belonged to Seven of Nine, and because of that she would never again allow herself to touch him. She would get a deep space posting. Once the Romulan problem was resolved, she’d insist on the assignment to the Gamma Quadrant or a survey along the galactic rim. She’d be sure to be far enough away to make these meetings impossible, to avoid the lure of him, to resist her need of him.

She wiped the tears from her eyes and peeked out from her hiding place, hoping that no one had seen her, a Starfleet admiral, crying like a baby. She would grieve the loss of Chakotay for the rest of her life. She would never find another man to suit her as well. She would never be in love again.

As awful as the prospect of her loneliness seemed, it was better than the guilt she would always feel for hurting Seven just as she was finding her stride as a human woman, just as she’d turned to Chakotay for love and belonging. Kathryn had her years with Chakotay in the Delta Quadrant and their brief times together since their return to remember him by. She would keep those memories close to her heart, treasure those hours as the best of her life.

She took a deep breath and straightened her shoulders, putting the mourning behind her as she faced a solitary future with her usual determination. She’d experienced a love that was precious and rare, and the memory of that happiness would be enough, she told herself, to make her life worth living.

She had no other choice.