The Instant Made Eternity
By Michele Masterson
**See Part I for disclaimers.

Part III

She ended the program shortly after that, but found she didn't want to go back to her quarters just yet, nor her ready room. There was a lot to think about suddenly - just when she thought everything had been irrevocably settled. But that, she surmised, was how life always turns out - in the end, we choose our despair or happiness; we choose our traps, we choose our escapes. Claiming that one's life is fated for doom was like taking the easy way out, willingly relinquishing all control or responsibility - and she never did that. Well, at least she tried hard not to. So she remained inside the shut-down holodeck, sitting with on the floor with her back against the black and gold wall.

But good god, she had a headache and just didn't want to think for the time being. As a diversion, she lit another cigarette, but found she didn't really want to smoke it. So she just propped her hand on her knee and watched the smoldering paper and tobacco slowly consume itself. The gold ember wound its way around the tip of the cigarette in a languid line, scorching the paper, incinerating the dried leaves, everything winding up a thin line of smoke snaking toward the ceiling of the holodeck. And all this was going to occur whether or not she smoked the cigarette - for once lit, it would burn. The only variable within her control would be how fast, how long, and when it would finally stop burning - either she'd put it out, or it would just stop one way or another, taking its own course.

Well, Kathryn, she thought to herself - you know you've hit rock bottom when you start making up smoking metaphors. She put the cigarette in her mouth and braced herself to stand. There were still issues to resolve, and she would resolve them - after she slept. After she'd had some coffee. After she knew she could think with better clarity than she'd thought this night.

As she was standing the doors of the holodeck opened suddenly - and there he was. Stopping just inside, a look of vague shock on his face as he regarded her. She remembered after a moment that she still had a cigarette in her mouth, feeling something akin to being caught by her parents doing something illicit. Feigning casualness, she took a last drag from the cigarette and dropped it to the floor, crushing it with her boot.

"You've caught me again, Commander," she said, opting for inappropriate humor rather than dwelling on her own embarrassment. "Holodecks seem to be bad luck for me these days."

He didn't laugh, and neither did she. So they just stood there for an indeterminate amount of time, staring at each other as if over a great chasm. Nothing to say. Everything to say. Nowhere to start.

When the urge to say something - anything - gripped her, she bit it back and instead gathered her things.

"Chakotay, I know we've got another talk coming," she said. "Hopefully one with considerably fewer four-letter words on my part. But not tonight. I think it would be a mistake, and we… I need time to process everything."

She took a step toward the door when his voice stopped her.

"May I just say one thing?" he asked, his voice much quieter, much more controlled than before. She nodded. "I came because… I don't even know. I think because I'm so shocked. With myself. I… I can't even believe it. I can't believe those words came out of my mouth, and were directed at you. I don't think I've ever said anything like that to anyone whom I've called a friend."

She shrugged her shoulders - there was no easy answer to this, and she truly was not going to get into another discussion tonight. "Well, perhaps I bring out the worst in you," she joked, and again not a smile, not a chuckle. Just horrible, complete sadness evidenced in his visage.

"Look, Chakotay," she conceded. "You know and I know that this has been building for a long time. And I will take my own responsibility for not addressing it when I should have. Months ago. Years, maybe. I've been cowardly." She turned away from him then, moving slowly to the door. "But don't try and say that you didn't mean any of that. I know you pretty well, and I know when you're speaking the truth. And that was straight from the heart. So. We go from here. We'll figure something else out."

Well, good. That sounded reasonable, like an ending to a conversation that would be continued at a later date. Yet she didn't expect the next words out of his mouth.

"I just wish it was me," he said softly.

She halted. "What?" she whispered, though she'd heard him perfectly well.

"I wish it had been me… with you… on that holodeck. Stupid, I know."

Her legs seemed to be rooted in their position, and with a start she was suddenly aware that she'd been practically holding her breath this entire time. Strange that such a small statement could undo her -- the pressure in her chest became suddenly suffocating, her throat constricted so rapidly that she had to force a breath, loud, shuddering. And though she clamped her hands over her mouth, biting back any further noise, the tears came nonetheless, quickly, dropping loudly on the floor of the holodeck. She damned each one, damned herself, damned him for reducing her to this, but he continued, apparently unaware.

"That's it. That's the whole problem," he said, and he too was so close to tears that he could barely speak. "I've tried to stay angry at you, but I realized that the only reason I was angry because you expected me to be. The truth is, I'm so… god, this sounds ridiculous, but I'm so insanely jealous of that guy… that Miller. And the worst part is I can't remember any of it. Only the last couple seconds. I practically beat the doctor up to try and retrieve those memories, and I don't have any of them. I'll never have them back."

She turned around then, and he ran his hand wearily over his face. "I know I've said some terrible things, and I don't expect you to forgive me. I doubt I'll forgive myself. But I wanted you to know." He looked at her finally, as he hadn't looked at her in months, all honesty and earnestness. "My problem is not you. It's me. I wanted you to feel the same way toward me. And I understand that you don't. I'm sorry I've been blaming you for not feeling what I want you to feel." He sighed shakily. "I just wanted it to be me."

She dropped her head, feeling suddenly dizzy, disoriented, realization crashing mercilessly over her. He must not have heard her. Must not have heard her voice crying out his name, not the name of some imaginary American soldier in a made-up simulation.

There are moments in life, rare though they may be, when the diverging paths of one's future can be seen with luminous clarity. Choose one, choose the other; but know that the choice will be abiding, immutable. There is no going back. There are no second chances. Sometimes actually making the choice is excruciating. And sometimes it is clear which path to take. In this case, Janeway was shocked that suddenly her choice was so simple, so obvious, that she wondered why she'd never seen it before.

"It was you," she said, and walked slowly toward him, until she stood directly in before him, meeting his gaze, which had moved from anguished to startled. Then, softer this time, she said, "It was always you, Chakotay."

He seemed to lose his breath for a moment, his eyes growing wide. "I don't…"

She gripped his shoulders firmly, silencing him. "I am so sorry." And she put her arms around him, pulling him into an embrace that he didn't immediately return. But when he did, it was crushing, forcing all the breath from her body, lifting her from the ground. He was choking back small sobs now, partially out of relief, partially out of total confusion.

"You had turned me down," she said when he had quieted some. "You had told me that as much as you wanted to be with me, you had your men to consider, and you couldn't get distracted."

He set her down then, looking at her quizzically.

"And it made me mad," she said with a small laugh. "And then we were attacked, and we ran away and got separated. Then there you were, behind me, holding on to me… and I couldn't help it. I don't think anything would've made me stop." They still had their arms around each other, and both of them were beginning to breathe rapidly, her hand was touching his face as she spoke to him. Familiar, but unfamiliar. The same, but not - this was real. This was the two of them.

"What did I do?" he whispered against her cheek - she'd had no idea when he'd gotten so close, and still it wasn't close enough. But she would give this to him. She would give him the memory that he'd never had.

"Turn around," she whispered into his neck, and he turned in her arms, his back now pressed against her. But he was too tall, and she moved him so that he stooped a bit, getting one arm over his shoulder, another wrapped around his waist.

"The Hirogen were running by, and you'd startled me, so you put your hand over my mouth." She placed her hand lightly over his lips, which immediately parted. The feeling of his tongue on her palm nearly sent her to her knees, and she groaned into his shoulder blade.

"Then what happened?" he whispered into her hand, pressing small kisses there. They could barely stand, either of them, leaning against each other for support. She moved her other hand up his chest, pressing the indentations of his ribs, brushing against his nipples. That caused him to inhale sharply, throwing his head back and catching up her hand against him.

She was kissing his back as she spoke. "You touched me, and I turned my head and I kissed you once." He did so, just touching his lips to hers, but the tiniest contact causing them both to moan. He turned back around then, his hands at her sides, smoothing them along her waist, her hips, pressing her fully against him.

"I think I remember the rest," he said with a slight smile, and then suddenly her back was pressed against the wall, and they were wrapped around each other, breathing raggedly, their lips just centimeters apart. She recognized his look of trepidation when he backed off a bit, and loved him for it.

"Kathryn," he said, his voice strangled. "This isn't going to solve everything."

"I know," she whispered, bringing her hand up around his neck and pulling his lips to hers, not caring how quickly this would be over, only wanting to hear his voice as he came, only wanting to feel his body reacting to her own. In an instant they were ravenous with wild, open-mouthed kisses, using teeth and tongues, groaning loudly, and she would think later that they were trying to assuage every longing and need they'd ever felt over the past four years. His lips and teeth were torturing her neck, and she vaguely realized that she'd been lifted from the ground a bit, his legs between hers, the friction from their frantic movement causing her to cry out and buck against him.

And somehow they were on the floor, only the necessary clothing removed, and when he paused before entering her, panting, giving her one last out, she curled up and grasped the hair on his head painfully hard, surprising both him and herself by whispering hotly, "I want you inside me." He pressed into her with a near-sob, and she arched back to meet him, crying out as she and he came almost instantaneously, shuddering and slamming into each other with a violence and intensity that would leave them bruised and sore later. He collapsed over her, both of them panting, and she gripped him with arms and legs, exhausted, expecting to feel the regret but only wanting to do it all again. She told him so when they had caught their breath, and he raised his head to kiss her gently.

"Oh, by the way," he whispered. "I love you. Telling you that was my original intent when I came here tonight."

She laughed, heaving up against his chest with the joy of it. "Oh, well I'm sorry I ruined your plans," she said.

He nuzzled her neck, kissed her collarbone, the beauty, the gentleness such a stark contrast from their earlier frenzy that she was becoming aroused again. "Yeah, that's okay. I think I'm all right with how things turned out."

She placed a small kiss in the hollow of his throat. "I love you, Captain Miller."

That got her a firm bite on her bicep, and she howled as they squirmed and wrestled each other for a while. Eventually he ended up on his back, she half over him.

"I do, you know," she said softly. "I've loved you for so long that I don't always think straight when I'm around you. So I guess I figured this," she grinned and gestured to their prone bodies, "would at least solve something. I've been wasting too much energy trying to fight it."

He ran his fingers through her hair. "I feel like I should be more worried than I am. Like we really should be charting out how this will proceed over the next 60 years or something. But I'm not that worried. Are you?"

She rolled over on her back, and probed her consciousness. Was she? Could she even recall what had worried her to begin with? Yes, she probably could, if she thought enough about it.

"Oh," she sighed finally. "I think it's in my nature to worry. But not now. Not tonight. And I'll admit that, at least in the immediate future, I don't see anything troublesome on the horizon. Will that do?" She sat up again and he smiled, rising up then and kissing her passionately, thoroughly, until she was on her back and groaning again. Yes, that would do. That would do very nicely.

Later that night she lay awake in her quarters, both of them having finally made it to her bed after stops on the living room floor and on top of the dining table, and she was surprised at how easily he fit in here, how comfortable it was to hold him in her arms, how much she enjoyed hearing his breathing close to her. Like he belonged here. Like he'd always been here.

When she had allowed herself to think of it, her biggest fear about beginning some type of relationship with Chakotay, had not really been the effect it would have had on her authority, nor about the potential reaction of the crew, and after a while had not even been about Mark. Her real fear, when she was truly honest, had been that she would eventually not care if they made it home. That she'd be so happy with him, with her life, that getting the crew home would become secondary.

She had been wrong. To the extreme. For now, as he slept, his solid, warm weight on her shoulder, across her waist, she knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they would get home. She had faced her future, caught a glimpse of her eternity, and she had not wavered. Had not avoided the responsibility, had not allowed fate to dictate how her life would proceed. She chose it. She would choose it again. And if fortune was on her side, Chakotay would be with her, along side her, for each choice she'd ever make in the future. Her eternity, if she was lucky, was sleeping in her arms this night.

And she was nothing, not a damn thing, if not the luckiest sonofabitch in the quadrant.

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