Changing Parameters: Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Close Encounters

by Lelila

Outwardly, nothing much changed between the Captain and her First Officer over the next few months. Inwardly, privately, the line between them began to soften. Alone in her quarters with Chakotay, Kathryn began to feel a bit like she did the last few weeks on New Earth: relaxed, happy, creative. She sensed a change in him as well: the stiffness and hesitancy they'd both displayed during quieter moments after their return was fading, and at times Kathryn didn't feel it at all.

Chakotay would show up at her door a few times a week when it fit into both of their schedules. Officially she always worked Alpha shift, though finding her in her Ready Room halfway through Beta shift was not uncommon. Chakotay's shift rotated; he made a point of working Beta and Gamma shifts on a regular basis. But he would always seek her out, if only in an official capacity.

Most of the nights that they spent together were actually spent working. She'd sit on one end of the sofa, he on the other, and they'd go through their respective reports. The comfortable silence would be broken now and again to discuss points they'd read, or simply to take a break. Kathryn found herself looking forward to his visits; when he was around she was always calmer and less stressed.

Their weekly dinner nights were different. They'd discuss ship's business over the meal, but afterward, they had an unspoken agreement that they wouldn't talk about work. Sometimes they would talk about other topics, sometimes they would play chess or a similar game, but most often, one of them would read aloud.

This was a ritual they'd started on New Earth. Usually it was Kathryn who would read while Chakotay would carve or sand-paint. Since they'd taken it up again, they split the reading duties pretty evenly, with the understanding that whoever was doing the reading would choose the literature. Kathryn preferred classic novels, which they often shared reading duties of due to their length. Chakotay frequently brought poetry of all different types and origins.

Kathryn quickly discovered that he had a lovely speaking and reading voice. She'd always unconsciously been aware of the soft gentleness of it, even when he was giving orders on the Bridge. But it had really caught her attention the first time she'd heard him speak her given name.

It was the third morning they were on New Earth. She'd emerged from her sleeping area to find Chakotay making pancakes for breakfast with some berries they'd found growing nearby. He'd looked over his shoulder and smiled, greeting her with "Good morning, Kathryn."

The way he said it…it was reverent, almost like a prayer. And he'd said it that way ever since, no matter the circumstances, it was always like he was paying homage to her when he said her name. And always her full name too, even once they'd become quite close. Granted, that's what she'd asked him to call her, but she'd been Kathy, Katie, and Kath at various points in her life with different people, and she'd never had a problem with any of those nicknames. But somehow, those monikers would sound wrong in his voice, and secretly she hoped he would never call her anything but Kathryn.

She was musing on this one night as she listened to him reading a Bajoran love poem cycle. She watched him the soft light: his large hands cradling the small book, the way his lashes danced as his eyes swept across the page, the sensuous way his lips formed the words.

And the words themselves; they were so beautiful. The poems told a story of lovers that longed for each other but could only steal moments together. They made Kathryn's heart ache, and the way Chakotay read them…it was as if he'd written them himself.

Chakotay came to the end of a poem and made a comment that Kathryn, in her reverie, didn't catch. "Kathryn?" he prodded. "What did you think?"

She cleared her throat, snapping herself back to the here and now. "It was…lovely. Very…emotional." She swallowed, a shy smile creasing her face. "And you…you seem to be the perfect reader for this text."

Chakotay looked away briefly, an embarrassed grin pulling at his lips. "I doubt the Bajorans on board would say that, especially considering this is a translation."

"Well then, you're lucky I'm not Bajoran." She'd meant it as a jest, perhaps a bit flirtatiously, but it came out sounding much more earnest.

"I am lucky," he responded, his voice serious. He paused, the sentiment hanging in the air, before he asked, his voice practically caressing her: "The next poem is from the woman's point of view. Perhaps you could read it?"

Her cheeks burning, Kathryn looked up at him, finding a smoky look in his eyes. "Well, I suppose you would sound silly reading it," she managed to rasp out.

He grinned. "I don't know that 'silly' is the word I would have chosen, but I do think it would sound better in your voice." His face softened, but the look in his eyes intensified. "I'd like to hear you read it," he said softly.

Again, it took her a few moments to get her voice to work. She was suddenly very aware of how much effort it took to breathe. "Alright," she finally whispered.

He closed the book, keeping his finger in place, and offered it to her. She accepted it, her fingers brushing over his as she inserted one between the pages he held. Pulling a deep breath, she opened the small tome to the marked place and began to read.

She attempted to keep her tone even and her inflection literary, and for the first stanza or so, she succeeded fairly well. But as she read on, telling in beautiful language of the speaker's desire for her lover but inability to be with him due to propriety, her own emotions began to swirl and push their way to the surface. The object of the poet's desire started to look more and more like Chakotay in Kathryn's mind. As the speaker lapsed further and further into despair and longing, Kathryn's voice cracked as a lump in her throat formed.

She managed to make it to the end of the poem before a sob escaped her. "Kathryn?" Chakotay nudged, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. She looked up into his eyes, realizing her soul was laid bare before him; the woman in the poem could have been her, could have been either of them, really. The smoky expression that had been in his eyes previously had returned, but it was tinged with sadness now.

An errant tear slipped down her cheek, and the smokiness in Chakotay's eyes softened and tempered with kindness, but the sadness remained. He raised his other hand to her cheek and smoothed the tear away with his thumb.

They sat there for what felt like forever, Kathryn feeling like she was both falling into and being embraced by his warm brown eyes while he continued to gently caress her cheek. It was taking quite an effort to breathe again. Something in the back of her head was telling her she should move, or speak, or do something, anything but sit there hypnotized by this man's gaze and touch, but she couldn't. She felt both incredibly terrified and perfectly safe at the same time, and she didn't know what to do in the face of that.

Sometime, eons later, Chakotay dropped his gaze and looked away, his fingers slipping from her cheek. "I...I should go," he murmured. He started to stand.

"No," she said before she realized she was going to. She grabbed his wrist. "It's alright. We just...we just need to do something besides reading these poems." She set the book on the coffee table and hazarded a look up into his face.

The look he returned was quizzical. "Kathryn, I...are you sure?"

"Yes, of course." She popped to her feet, suddenly a ball of nervous energy. "We could...we could..." she paced a bit, trying to come up with a suggestion. "I know!" She snapped her fingers. "We could play Kal-toh!"

"Kal-toh?" Chakotay looked befuddled.

Kathryn started to rummage through the drawers in her desk. "Yes. I replicated myself a board not too long ago in the hopes that I could get some practice in and actually present something of a challenge to Tuvok at some point. Aha!" She pulled the board from her desk, shutting the drawer with a resounding slam. She set the board on the dining table and activated the small holographic device.

Chakotay rose to join her, his expression still dubious. "I've only played a few times, and I recall being pretty terrible."

"Well, you're in luck," she said as she settled herself in front of the jumbled ball of rods. "Because I'm terrible too!" She laughed, and that finally brought a faint smile to Chakotay's face.

They spent the next hour and a half puzzling over the would-be sphere. The tension between them quickly melted away and they were able to enjoy each others' company even as they became more and more frustrated. Eventually, Chakotay eased a rod into place only to have all of their progress collapse between them.

"Chakotay!" Kathryn protested good-naturedly.

"I told you I wasn't very good!"

Kathryn laughed. "I suppose I wasn't much help."

"No, actually, you weren't." He smiled at her.

Kathryn chuckled and shook her head as she shut the device off and rose to put it away. As she did, she caught sight of the grandfather clock that stood in her quarters. "Oh, good heavens, it's 0130 already!" She balanced a hand on her hip. "I hate to throw you out, but we do have that tactical exercise tomorrow morning..."

He stood, waving a hand in dismissal. "Don't worry about it, I need to get to bed too." He walked around the table and took both of her hands in his. "Thank you for a lovely evening, Kathryn." The smoke began to appear in his eyes again.

Kathryn's chest started to get tight, but she managed to keep her breathing even as she returned his smile. "My pleasure."

He squeezed her hands and then turned to go.

"Good night, Chakotay," she called after him.

"Good night, Kathryn," he smiled over his shoulder as the door opened for him.

After the door shut behind him, Kathryn heaved a deep sigh, feeling herself deflate. "What the hell are you doing, Kathryn?" she muttered as she bustled over to the sofa to gather up their coffee mugs. On the table she found the book of poems; Chakotay had left it. "I shouldn't be reading love poetry with my First Officer, that's what," she answered her own question.

Still, something made her sit down and ponder the small book. She picked it up and it easily fell open to the last poem. The page was a bit dog-eared; Chakotay had obviously read it many times. Kathryn scanned over the words. She quickly surmised that the lovers in the tale never were able to be together, and the poem spoke of the things their love did afford them: seeing each other smile, making each other laugh, a fast friendship that could never be broken.

She re-read the poem, again easily picturing Chakotay as the speaker. As the book fell shut, the irritation she felt with herself faded, only to be replaced with sadness and longing. Was friendship really enough?

She sighed again, placing the book back on the table and taking the mugs over to the replicator. It would have to be, she told herself again. There was too much ice on that road, no matter how tightly they held on to each other. She had too many other responsibilities to hazard falling.

She told the computer to extinguish the lights in the living area and went to get ready for bed. Before she called for the lights in the bedroom, she paused. In the darkness of her own sleeping chamber, she could still feel his hand on her cheek. She pressed her own hand to the spot and felt her heart contract with loneliness.

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Kathryn did not sleep well that night. She kept waking up feeling Chakotay's fingers on her cheek, her deepest feelings for him foremost in her mind. She'd forcibly push them back down and attempt to go to sleep again, but her internal struggle made her very restless.

She got out of bed before her alarm and inhaled two replicated cups of coffee before making her way to Holodeck 2 for the scheduled tactical exercises. She was spoiling for a fight when she got there. She didn't bother to even attempt diplomacy with their simulated adversaries, she just told Tuvok to disable their weapons. When Chakotay questioned her, she snapped: "It's an exercise, Commander. Of course they're going to be hostile!"

Unable to argue that logic, the simulation continued. The little alien ship turned out to be much more robust than it initially appeared, and the two ships played cat-and-mouse as the smaller ship buzzed around Voyager. They were finally able to disable it thanks to some fancy flying by Tom and a hit-and-fade orchestrated by Harry.

"Good work, everyone," Kathryn congratulated her crew. "Now, on to the real bridge and the real work for the day."

That was met with some fake groans, which finally brought a touch of a smile to Kathryn's lips. Still, between the turmoil of the night before and the stress of the simulation, she was not in the best of moods.

The Alpha Shift Bridge crew had barely taken their stations and Kathryn hadn't even crossed her legs after sitting down when Harry announced there was a vessel on long range sensors.

"Onscreen," Kathryn called. A mere pinpoint appeared and she called for magnification. It was a medium-sized vessel, a freighter by the looks of it. "Anyone recognize it?"

After a few moments of silence, Tuvok supplied: "It does not match any known configuration in our database."

"Hmmmm," Kathryn acknowledged, waggling her foot in the air as she thought. After a few moments, she tapped her comm badge. "Bridge to Neelix."

"Neelix here, Captain."

"We've run across an unknown type of vessel. Report to the Bridge to see if you can identify it."

"On my way!"

"That was rather short," Chakotay commented to her in a low voice. Kathryn responded with her Death Glare. Most men shrank from that look, but Chakotay just raised his eyebrows.

As they waited for Neelix, the mystery ship came about and started towards them at a rather high velocity.

"Speedy little thing, isn't she?" Tom commented.

"The faster the delivery, the higher the profit," Harry intoned.

"Studying the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition, Harry?" Chakotay asked with a smirk.

Harry shrugged. "I glanced over them when we ran into those Ferengi last week."

"Time to intercept?" Kathryn clipped into the banter.

"Approximately seven minutes," Tuvok replied.

Neelix arrived on the bridge just then, bustling down to the lower level. "Good morning, Captain," he greeted cheerily.

"Mr. Neelix," Kathryn acknowledged. She gestured to the viewscreen. "Know anything about this type of vessel and who might be piloting it?"

Neelix studied the screen for a moment. "Well, um…I believe that's a Lu'ushen freighter."

"Lu'ushen?" Kathryn questioned. She'd not heard of that race before, though that was not an uncommon experience during this voyage.

"Yes, they're from a small system quite a ways from here, actually. I've never been there. But they are active travelers and traders and they can be found throughout most of the quadrant. There are a small band of them that are basically nomadic; they live on their ships."

"Do they pose any kind of a threat?"

"No, I shouldn't think so. Generally they're friendly, or at least cooperative. Although I have heard stories of the occasional rogue ship attacking for no reason, but I think those are more legend than truth. My dealings with them have never been anything but cordial."

Kathryn nodded, but gestured to the screen again. "Do you have any idea why they would be approaching us at a high rate of speed?"

Neelix looked dumbstruck for a moment. "Well…no. That's really not like them at all."

Kathryn pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. "Open a channel." Tuvok nodded and she launched into her standard greeting. "This is Captain Kathryn Janeway of the Federation Starship Voyager to the unidentified freighter off our port change your approach vector; you are risking a collision."

"No response," Tuvok said after a moment.

"Have we got any readings on them?" Chakotay asked the next logical question.

"Forty humanoid life signs aboard, minimal weapons, basic shielding. They pose no real threat," Tuvok answered.

"Tell that to them," Tom said. "She's comin' in pretty hot!"

Kathryn shifted her attention back to the viewscreen to see the freighter barreling towards them, its thrusters leaving a bright white tail behind it.

"They're gonna ram us!" Harry yelped.

"Shields!" Chakotay barked as Kathryn spit orders to Tom. "Evasive pattern Delta six!"

Kathryn dug her nails into the upholstery of her chair as the inertial dampers struggled as Tom swung the ship into an arc. "Tuvok, disable their propulsion!" she snapped. Her mood took another dip as she saw the freighter loop over them, punching through the space they'd just occupied.

"Firing phasers," Tuvok replied evenly and two well-aimed red beams connected with the aft section of the alien ship. The glowing thruster section blew up and broke away, but, inertia being what it was, the rest of the ship still sped towards them.

"Tom!" Kathryn cried.

"I see it," Tom grunted as his hands flew over the console. "Hold on; this is going to be bumpy!"

The ship lurched again as Tom attempted to roll it out of the way. Before they were able to recover from that, the ship shook violently, tossing the crew around. Kathryn was pitched forward from her chair, landing on her hands and knees. Looking up, she saw Chakotay fall from his seat and land hard on his behind. "Are you alright?" she asked as the red alert lights and alarm came on, indicating the ship had sustained major damage.

"Other than a bruised tailbone, I think so," he answered, rubbing his lower back. "You?"

Kathryn pushed herself back onto her knees and shook her hands. "I'm fine. Report!" she shouted as she climbed to her feet.

"We have hull breaches on decks four, five and six," Harry's hurried voice answered. "Force fields are holding. Injuries reported on those decks as well as two, seven, eight and fourteen. Shields are down."

"What the hell happened?" Kathryn demanded as she took in the viewscreen again, this time seeing only debris. "Did they fire on us?"

"Negative," Tuvok replied. "They were unable to maneuver without their thrusters and thus remained on a collision course. I would hypothesize that impacting against our shields caused catastrophic failure of their hull, which in turn overloaded our shields. They then crashed into our hull, causing the current damage to us and destroying their ship."

Kathryn pulled a deep breath, the agitation she'd been feeling replaced with regret. Forty lives. She turned to Chakotay, seeing the same remorse in his eyes.

She swallowed and put her command face back on. "Commander, get repair crews started. I want reports on all of the damage and wounded by 1300 hours. Mr. Tuvok, Mr. Kim, scan the debris field to see if you can find something, anything that might explain the motives of the people on that ship. Neelix, you're with me," she gestured towards her Ready Room. "Commander, you have the Bridge," she called over her shoulder.

"Aye, Captain," she heard as she entered her office.

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Two days passed, and repairs were ahead of schedule. Tuvok and Harry's scans of the debris had turned up nothing of any real interest and Neelix's only explanation was that maybe the stories of the rogue Lu'ushens weren't so apocryphal after all.

Things were getting back to normal, and Chakotay decided he would visit Kathryn that evening. He stopped by his quarters to gather some things to take with him. He'd barely touched the first PADD on his desk when his door chimed.

"Come in," he answered absently as he plugged a PADD into his computer terminal and called up his list of reports.

"Can we work in here tonight?" Kathryn bustled in, her arms full of PADDs that she dropped with a clatter onto his coffee table. "The repairs they're doing to the inner hull are causing an unholy racket to travel through the environmental ducting straight into my quarters." She paused, holding up a finger when he started to say something. She stood a moment, obviously listening for something. "I'm surprised you can't hear it in here."

Chakotay shrugged. "No racket, unholy or otherwise, that I've heard. Make yourself at home. Can I get you something? Coffee," he said at the same time she replied.

She looked up from where she was sorting through her PADDs and grinned. "Am I that predictable?"

"When it comes to your beverage of choice, yes." He returned her smile and turned to the replicator. "Computer, one black coffee and one lavender tea, both hot."

"Won't that put you to sleep?" she asked as the cups appeared.

"No, lavender's just relaxing." He delivered her mug to her waiting hands. "It's chamomile that puts you to sleep."

"I'll stick to black tea, thanks."

"You always go for the hard stuff, don't you?" he teased as he scooped up a handful of PADDs and his teacup and moved to join her on the sofa.

"I could drink you under the table," she smirked as she started to scan through a report.

Chakotay frowned as he settled next to her. "I thought you said you could just keep up."

"That was alcohol," she glanced up from her PADD and grinned wickedly. "I'm talking about caffeine." She pointedly took a long pull from her mug.

Chakotay laughed. "I have no doubt."

They eased into their now comfortable routine, mostly reading in silence but occasionally bringing up a point to discuss from whatever was in front of them. An hour and a half later (during which time Kathryn had two cups of coffee and a cup of lavender tea while Chakotay had consumed only a cup and a half of tea) found Kathryn's boots under the table as she curled into the corner of the sofa. Chakotay had moved to the center of the sofa and had propped his still-booted feet onto the coffee table. A calm, friendly silence was currently settled over the room.

They were both absorbed in their respective reports, so Kathryn didn't see Chakotay frown. "You're a scientist," he stated into the quiet.

"So are you," she replied without looking up.

"True, but archeology and paleontology usually don't involve math like this."

"Math like what?" Kathryn tossed her feet over the edge of the sofa and scooted next to him, peering at the complex equation on the PADD he held in his hand. "Not up on your interstellar calculus, hmmm?"

"I think I learned it long enough to pass the course."

Kathryn chuckled, leaning over his chest a little to better examine the figures. After a few moments, she grabbed his hand and turned the device ninety degrees.

"Kathryn?" Chakotay laughed in surprise.

"Sometimes I understand these things better if I look at them vertically," she explained before turning his hand back the original way. "Not this time though."

"Does it make any sense?"

Kathryn shook her head, a few stray hairs tickling Chakotay's chin. "No. It's almost like…ah, that's it." She tapped the screen. "They forgot to list the radiation constant. No wonder it didn't make any sense."

"No wonder."

She looked up and grinned. "Send that one back to be corrected."

"Gladly." Chakotay dropped the PADD onto the cushion next to him.

"As long as we're explaining reports to each other, maybe you can help me with this one," Kathryn dug for a PADD on the table and then sat back, still dangerously close: hip to hip, her head hovering over his shoulder. She held it up for him to see, and like she had before, he didn't take it from her but instead held both it and her hand at the same time.

He grinned. "Oh, that's just Yacobian's inventory report. Sometimes when he knows it's going to be dull, he'll compose it in rhyme. He's got quite a talent for it, actually."

Kathryn gave him a look over her shoulder. "And you let him get away with it?"

"All the information is there, and he only does it when they're routine. And…" he looked away, a little sheepish, "…we have the understanding that if it needs to be by-the-book, all I have to do is ask and he'll re-do it quickly and without complaint."

"Oh…" Kathryn wrenched her hand and the PADD from his grip and swatted him with it.

Chakotay shrugged. "It breaks up the monotony, both for him and for me. Go on, read it."

Kathryn paused a moment, looking dubious, but started to read the report aloud. She chuckled almost immediately at the inventiveness of it. The longer she read, the more she laughed, Chakotay joining her after a bit. By the time she reached the end, they were both in hysterics, Kathryn's temple leaning against his shoulder in an attempt to stay upright, his arm loosely around her, fingertips absently stroking her shoulder.

"Oh, goodness!" Kathryn gasped, leaning out of his embrace to take a drink of tea. "You must be sure to send future reports like that my way."

Chakotay grinned. "Is that an order?"

"Yes!" Kathryn enthused as she settled back against his side.

"How did you get that anyway?" he asked. "Yacobian's reports come to me."

Kathryn shrugged, flashing a precocious smile. "Must have grabbed the wrong PADD."

He elbowed her playfully, which she returned before settling down again to read the next report, though she didn't move away at all.

Chakotay swallowed, suddenly finding himself a bit nervous with her proximity. He pulled a deep breath in an effort to calm himself, but in doing so, he unintentionally caught the scent of her hair. It was floral with some spicy notes to it and the undertone of coffee. The fragrance seemed to be a perfect complement to her and it warmed him in more ways than one. He looked down at her, studiously reading her PADD, a few errant wisps of hair glinting in the low light. She was lovely, and so, so close.

There had been a few precious times like this on New Earth where they'd sat close to each other on a log by the river or lay shoulder to shoulder under the stars. She'd smelled differently then: cleaner, more earthy, but still exactly the way he'd expected. He remembered openly watching her as she made up a story about a constellation they'd just named. His desire to kiss her and hold her had been almost irresistible that night, and that ache was beginning to fill his chest again.

He took a long pull of his tea in an effort to get her scent out of his nose and forced himself to pick up another PADD.

They again lapsed into silence as they worked, though Chakotay was afraid to move. He managed to get through three reports like that, sitting stiffly in the hope that she wouldn't pull away. He realized, however, that her head was lying pretty firmly against his shoulder again. He looked down at her to find her hands in her lap, still lightly holding her current PADD, and her eyes closed.

He smiled, his heart warming again. "Kathryn," he said softly, reaching across his chest to grip her shoulder. "Kathryn, wake up."

She woke with a start, suddenly sitting up ramrod straight. "Huh? What...?"

Chakotay chuckled. "It's alright. You fell asleep."

Kathryn's hands started to shake and then she was quickly gathering up her PADDs, muttering to herself. "I should...I should go. This isn't right...I should..." She dashed for the door.

Chakotay chased after her, concerned. This wasn't like her. "Kathryn, wait! It's alright." He grabbed her arm just as she reached the doorway; another centimeter or two and she would have triggered it to open. He pulled her around to face him. "It's alright," he repeated softly.

There was a frantic, almost frightened look in her eyes. She swayed as if she were about to lose her balance. "Chakotay, I..." she started but trailed off.

"Kathryn? What is it?" He put both hands on her upper arms now to support her, both physically and emotionally.

She didn't reply. Her eyes continued their agitated dance, but her gaze didn't waver from his. After a few moments, some of the tension eased from around her eyes, and, to Chakotay's surprise, she rose up on her toes. She swayed a little again and he held her steady. Before he could question her, her eyes slid shut and she leaned in to brush her lips against his. She held them there, pressing a bit more firmly when she met no resistance.

Utterly surprised, Chakotay's mind went blank and he could do nothing but close his eyes and return the affection, letting her take the lead.

After what seemed like forever and no time at all, Kathryn's balance gave out on her and she fell back on her heels, the height difference between them forcing their lips apart. The fear returned to her eyes and she turned away from him.

"Good night, Chakotay," she mumbled as she rushed through the door.

"Kathryn!" He stepped out in to the corridor after her. "Kathryn!"

But she was already gone.

Everybody that wears a Starfleet Comm-badge in this story belongs to Paramount.