The Way 'Fireship' *Should* Have Ended
(Captain's Table 4: Fireship by Diane Carey)
by  ragpants © Fall 1998 

Chakotay materialized in the middle of the cobblestone street. He looked around and frowned. There was Paris looking expectantly at him, but Kathryn was no where to be seen. Where the hell was she? She had called the ship and asked him to beam down after making some sort of cryptic remark about his having been captain of the Liberty. Chakotay stepped toward the side of the street where Paris was waiting, just as the Lieutenant moved forward to intercept him. Paris didn't seem to be upset that Kathryn wasn't there so Chakotay let his anxiety about her safety ease marginally while he notched up his irritation. He hated being kept in the dark--and the gods knew it had happened enough times.

Paris correctly interpreted Chakotay's frown and pointed toward an alley. "She went down that way. She said that you should follow her and that you'd know when you reached the right place." Chakotay glowered at Paris who threw up his hands defensively. "Hey, don't blame me. I'm just repeating what she told me to say. Said she wanted to conduct some kind of an experiment. And that's all I know."

Chakotay squinted suspiciously at Paris, sizing up the pilot's reliability. "What's down the alley?"

Paris shrugged. "Beats me what she found down there. We were walking when she turned down the alley and I kind of lost her for a minute. Then all of sudden she was back here asking me where I'd been. Like I'd intentionally ditched her or something. I don't know what's going on."

Chakotay stared down the alley for a moment, the considered the pilot's face again. Paris could be a damned fine liar when he wanted to be, but he looked honest this time. Frowning and still suspicious, Chakotay headed down the alley. If this was some kind of stupid prank on Paris's part, Paris better hope he didn't live long enough to find out just how miserable a First Officer could make his life.

The alley looked no different from the street--cobblestone paving, a few streetlamps to help dissipate the evening's growing dimness, brick fronted buildings with blank-faced windows and solid wooden doors. A few signs hung above the doorways-----Damn! He nearly missed it. A creaking wooden sign swung above one of the anonymous doors not much different from the rest save the notation was in Anglic, not the curliqued script that this planet used. Chakotay halted and carefully considered the sign. It read: The Captain's Table. There were four red dots on the sign, one in each corner. What the hell? Could this be what Kathryn had meant? You'll know when you get there-- and earlier the curious question about his having been a Captain. He reached for the handle and pushed the door to open. It stuck. Intriguied and more than a little worried since he hadn't yet caught sight ( or sound) of Kathryn, he shoved harder and the door popped open.

Beyond the thick door was a hallway so dark he could barely make out its contours. Chakotay navigated down the hall, followed its turn to the left and entered into another world. He stood still for a moment stunned by the what lay before him. Across from the entryway against the whitewashed plaster wall was a glass display case filled with rattlesnakes of all kinds. Chakotay looked down at his feet to see if he had somehow entered an hallucination or alien reality, but his boots looked just the same and the wooden planking of the floor seemed real enough. He looked back up. The case full of snakes remained. However, he realized sheepishly that the various looped, coiled and open-mouths rattlers had arrived in the case via the taxidermist and that one whole shelf was devoted to pieces of snakes: their rattles or heads. Still the six foot long diamondback skin complete with head and rattle that hung vertically next to the case was an impressive sight. To the right of the case was a polished oakwood bar complete with a brass footrail and a half dozen dark red leather backless bar stools. The two stools furthest from the door were occupied by a short hunchback male--a short hunchbacked human male-- dressed in black jack boots and a tailored dark khaki green uniform swagged with gold braid and a double row of gleaming buttons. On the other stool sat a tan felinoid dressed in a bolero and Turkish pants. She--and for some reason Chakotay was sure the being was female, perhaps it was her suggestive posture or the way she regarded the dwarf through half-closed and speculative eyes-- was the recipient of the small man's expansive and much gesticulated speech. Chakotay thought that perhaps she found the man's conversation less than amusing if the repetitive tic-tic of her claws extending and retracting against the counter were any indication.

Beyond the oddly matched pair hung a finely woven Burnt Water Navajo rug and farther to the right the roundly pregnant curve of kiva fireplace bowed out from the wall. A unkindled cedarwood fire was laid in the fireplace and Chakotay could smell the resinous scent of the wood. In the central portion of the room were a scattering of Saltillo inlaid tables each surrounded by a quartet or more of mismatched chairs.

It was the varied occupants of those chairs which now drew his attention. While there were one or two Delta Quadrant native species here, the majority of the individuals present were human and one of males at the closest table was clearly Vulcan. Chakotay wondered again if he had unwittingly fallen into some sort of alien mind-trap or spatial anomaly. The cantina was certainly of a familiar type and what else could explain the presence of so many humans so far from home. He stood unsure what he should do next. He had not yet found Kathryn. Could she be here? The place was certainly unusual enough that she would have wanted to investigate it. But where was she?

"Get something for you, Captain?" The rumbling basso voice had issued from behind the bar. Chakotay turned to see the bartender, a man so broad that if not for his normal height Chakotay would have assumed he was from a high G planet.

"No, thanks. Actually, I was just looking for someone. And it's Commander, not Captain." Chakotay explained courteously.

The latter remark caused an immediate silence to fall, then the buzz of conversation resumed at slightly louder intensity. A chair scraped, and very tall, thin humanoid in a red jacket stood and moved to tower menacingly over Chakotay.

"Then your presence here dishonors us all, " he piped as a crowd began to gather around the two men.

"Wait," came the measured voice of the Vulcan who too had rise and joined the fringes of the rapidly congregating crowd. "Your judgment may have been rendered in haste, Tobeth. Perhaps the Commander once enjoyed his own command, but time and circumstance necessitated his removal. Have we not all have heard of such cases even though we may not have experienced it thus at first hand?

Chakotay eyed the tall being, then raised his voice, grateful that the Vulcan had smoothed the way with his speech, "It was my privilege to be a Captain once, though I no longer serve as one."

"Then let that be your payment for your ale tonight," jeered Tobeth. "Tell us by what cowardly means you managed to survive your ship, then failed to earn a command again."

"You speak again too hastily, Tobeth," countered the Vulcan. "There are many ways to lose one's ship. Not all of them through cowardice. It is the Commander's choice. He may speak of it if that is his will, but a first tale told at the Captain's Table must never be coerced."

Chakotay sized up the group surrounding him. While several had returned to their private conversations, many still watched him appraisingly. This disparate group didn't seem intimidating now; rather they seemed sympathetic and understanding. These were beings who could understand his choice and the price it had cost him.

The crowd began to move generally toward a table and Chakotay allowed himself to be drawn along with it. He seated himself and accepted the open bottle of Cerveza Modelo Negro that the barkeeper passed to him. He poured the cold beer into the glass and sipped. He glanced around at the faces of his fellows and peers and wished that Kathryn were here. This was something they had never spoken about, his old ship, and he wanted her to know its story, to understand that part of him who was once a Captain like herself and why he chose to be the First Officer of Voyager.

"I was a captain once," he began, "Of a ship I named Liberty. As ships go, Liberty wasn't much of ship: more than 30 years old with rebuilt and underpowered engines. Pieced together from whatever my crew or I could steal or scrounge and kept intact mostly with space tape and the invectives of my chief engineer." A chorus of knowing chuckles echoed from around the table. " But the Liberty was ship with pride and purpose. It was not intended to be a fighter, not any more than most of those who crewed her, but it was, and we were--fighters. All of us. Forced to it to save our homes and our families. "

The words poured out. Chakotay told his fellow Captains how he had come to join the Maquis after the slaughter of his family. The struggles of the Maquis to defend their homes, caught in the middle of a political battle they had no part of. Of how the Liberty had been dragged across the galaxy by the Caretaker in his search for a compatible lifeform to perpetuate his guardianship over the Ocampan people. How Voyager, once his enemy, and the Liberty had joined forces to save the innocent Ocampa from the power-hungry Kazon and how he had, in the end, chosen to sacrifice himself and his ship to save those who had the better chance.

Chakotay ended his story and was surprised to find the glass in his hands was empty. He considered the bottom of it idly and wondered why he didn't remember drinking it, though he knew he must have.

"Your courage honors you, Captain," the reedy voice of Tobeth broke the silence. "It honors your ship and your new commander."

"I've always thought so." The warm, familiar alto of Kathryn Janeway interrupted the thin man. Chakotay looked up to see Kathryn maneuvering through the listeners to find a place closer to the table. She had been there all along. She laid a possessive hand of Chakotay's arm and swept her gaze over the crowd. "If you will excuse us, Captains," she announced, "I need to have a word in private with my First Officer." The group dispersed, floating off to their various interests and duties, leaving Kathryn and Chakotay alone at the tile-topped table.

Chakotay moved to get up even as Kathryn pressed on his arm in a signal to remain seated. She moved into the vacant chair next to him. Chakotay smiled sheepishly. "Sorry, Kathryn, I meant to find you, but somehow when I came into this place, I lost all track of time."

Kathryn smiled back, with equal parts bemusement and calculation. "This place does have a way of doing that, " she agreed.

"You've been here before?" Chakotay failed to keep the surprise out of his voice.

"Yes, in fact, quite recently, 'Kathryn answered, "Though it..." She waved her hand at their surroundings, "Looked quite different last time." Her smile became more obviously cunning and her tone more provocative. "In fact, it looks a great deal different this time and even has few features it didn't have before. Cap--he's the bartender here-- tells me there are rooms upstairs." Kathryn nodded past Chakotay toward the white-washed plaster stairs that rose up behind him. "I'm in Number 3. Stay, have another drink, then meet me there. There are some things I think we need to discuss--Captain to Captain." Grinning wickedly and with a pat of her hand against the tabletop, Kathryn rose and wandered over toward the felinoid who had grown tired of the hunchback's talk and cleanly sliced off all his buttons with the casual flick her claws.