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Seven approached Harry and said, “So far tonight I have had an enjoyable time with you.  Would you like to continue that time by accompanying me in this ritualist movement?”

Harry laughed and said, “Sure Seven.  And I’ll even dance with you.”  She grabbed his hand and led him to the dance floor. 

Once the lady’s choice dance was over, Janeway asked Doc to escort her back to her temporary quarters.  She explained that she noticed Chakotay leave.  “Well that doesn’t sound like the commander.  I can’t imagine that he would leave you here alone.”

“He had his reasons.”

As Doc escorted Janeway out, he nudged Tom and gave him a thumbs up sign.  Tom tried to smile and shake his head yes.  Tom looked at his wife and said, “Harry and Seven are still dancing.  Let’s call it a draw and go home.”  B’Elanna agreed. 

***

As soon as Chakotay got home he started to look at his new orders.  Starfleet would promote him to Captain and let him choose a crew that would find the problems in an experimental starship that he would co-captain.  His role would be to find the defensive weaknesses of a ship that would live in the cargo bay of a larger ship.  He would be the captain of one crew and there would be another captain and crew as well.  It would be a deep space assignment that would last for an unknown period of time.  They gave him a choice of whether or not he wanted to take the assignment.  Next to the computer that he read his orders from, was a small box.  He looked at that as well.  He was about to send a communication to headquarters, when his door chirped.  He wasn’t expecting anyone, but decided that he was presentable enough in his Starfleet T-shirt and ragged shorts.  When he opened the door, there stood Kathryn.  She didn’t say a word, she just reached up to his face and brought it down so that his lips met hers.  After the kiss, he ushered her in and smiled.  When the door closed, she said, “May I have this dance?” and held out her hand.  He held up a finger and punched a few keys on his wall console.  The Bajoran ballad played for them as they held each other close and moved with the rhythm of the music. 

Once the song was over, Kathryn led Chakotay to the couch.  “I miss my best friend.  I miss spending time with you on the holodeck and in my ready room.  I miss our weekly dinners and conversation.  Most of all I miss you.  The rest of the stuff doesn’t matter.  A time line that ended a year ago doesn’t matter.  All that matters is that I love you.”  Chakotay smiled and kissed her. 

***

Seven and Harry were last to leave the party.  Harry offered to take her home.  She said that would be enjoyable.  As they walked, Seven ran her fingers over Harry’s three pips.  “How did that happen so quickly?” 

Harry smiled.  “The Captain put in for a promotion for me immediately when we got home, so I got promoted to Lieutenant during the first round of celebrations, no questions asked.  Later, Starfleet looked more closely at everyone’s record because of the trials and debriefing, and were impressed.  It turns out, of the crew, I broke the Prime Directive the least number of times.”  Harry laughed as did Seven. 

“What did you put in your logs about your stint on the Nightingale.”

For a second Harry looked guilty.  He looked down, then he looked up and finally he said with a smile, “As little as possible.”  The couple started laughing again.  Once they gained control of themselves once more, Harry reached for Seven’s hand and intertwined their fingers.  Once he was pretty sure that she wasn’t going to pull her hand, he asked, “Are you in a hurry to get home?”  She shook her head no.  “Well, I know this great little bistro just a couple blocks from here.  It’s open all night and closes at dawn.  Would you like to go?”  She agreed. 

***

B’Elanna woke up early and went to the communicator in the dining area.  She wanted to call Chakotay to make sure he was alright.  When he answered, it was obvious that he had just woken up.  It was also obvious that he wasn’t alone.  Chakotay wouldn’t say it directly, but between what he did say and what she saw, B’Elanna knew that the captain stopped by the previous night and they patched things up.  When they disconnected, B’Elanna turned to start breakfast.  Tom heard the fire alarm start to go off, so he decided to rescue his wife.   When she saw Tom, she said, “Did we end up with the captain’s replicator or something?” 
 

Tom laughed.  He said, “well at least our daughter sleeps like a Klingon.  Nothing will wake her up.”  He decided to try to make the dish she was having trouble with, “Computer, toast, butter and grape jelly.”  Immediately two perfect pieces of toast appeared.  Tom turned to his wife and said, “You just have to know how to talk to it.”

“Well, at least I know that you didn’t expect a housewife.”

“No, absolutely not.” 

As they finished making breakfast, B’Elanna got a playful look in her eye.  “Same bet as last night over who will attend Miral’s party together.”

“Come on B’E, didn’t we learn anything last night?”  She continued smiling.  “What do you know?”

“Lets just say I called Chakotay and it appeared he had a guest last night.”

***

Chakotay tried to go back to the couch where he and Kathryn fell asleep, but didn’t want to take the chance of disturbing her.  Instead he decided to start making breakfast.  He figured that once he made everything else he would replicate her a mug of coffee and that would wake her up.  Before he did that, he just watched her sleep and then went over to look at the mission Starfleet had for him.  Once he knew what he was going to do, he started breakfast.  Just as he planned, when the coffee was replicated, Kathryn woke up. 

When she opened her eyes, Kathryn wasn’t sure she knew exactly where she was.  She heard someone moving around behind her and when she looked, she remembered.  She got up, still dressed as she was the night before, except that she had taken off the uniform jacket.  She saw Chakotay motion to where she was supposed to sit.  Besides her coffee, she saw a plate of food.  Waffles, eggs, baked apples with cinnamon.  “Chakotay, you outdid yourself.”  Chakotay smiled in response. 

After a lengthy breakfast, they cleared the table and Chakotay said, “well its almost 1030 why don’t we talk?”

Kathryn was confused.  “I thought that we figured out all the important stuff last night.  Remember we were up until 0300 talking and then we just kind of fell asleep.” 

“Well there’s one more thing that I think we need to discuss.  When I got back to Earth, after all the initial celebrations, my sister came by and gave me something that my father had given her.  He wanted to make sure that I got it.  She gave it to me and told me to make sure I save it for someone real special.” With this he opened up to her the box that sat next to his next orders from Starfleet, while getting down on one knee.  “Kathryn, will you marry me?”
 

She looked at what she believed to be the most beautiful ring she had ever seen and she grabbed for the box.  As she looked at it, Chakotay said, “I can put in for a transfer so that we will work in the same part of the universe, you won’t have to leave your job.”

He was about to tell her all the ways he thought of to make this work and she smiled at him.  She put a finger up to his mouth and said, “What about the deep space mission they want you to go on?”

“How did you hear about that?”

“I have friends in high places.  I know certain things.” 

“I was getting ready to contact Starfleet to turn it down.  I never cared about becoming captain, I only cared about you, and frankly, I don’t see you being a dutiful captain’s wife or us being able to reverse our former working relationship.  Besides, I don’t know how well working as a co-captain would work.”

“Well, what I was thinking was we would split the crew down the middle.  You would take B’Elanna and Harry and I would get Tuvok, Tom, and Seven.”

“You were going to be my co-captain?”

“In a traditional command structure there is no fraternization between the ranks.  I insisted on this plan so that we could fraternize.”

“So does that mean you accept my proposal?”

“Yes, captain.”

***

Seven and Harry went to a park and spread out their lunch they just got like a picnic.  Harry looked at Seven and said, “You know, with Miral’s party tonight, we really need to  get some sleep.”

“Why?  Are you tired?”

“I don’t feel tired, but since we stayed at the Bistro until they closed and then took a walking tour of San Francisco before ending up here, I am sure I am due for some sleep.”

Seven responded by stroking his cheek.  “You are probably right.  We can each go home after lunch and then we’ll see each other at the party.”

“Well I was thinking I could pick you up and we could go together.”

“That would be an acceptable plan.”

***

Tom got B’Elanna to let him wear a Hawaiian shirt with a Starfleet motif.  She chose to wear a matching dress.  While Tom entertained the baby, B’Elanna asked him one last time if he wanted to bet.  Tom declined, knowing that he would have to bet against his friends’ happiness, and that bet wasn’t worth a lifetime of diaper duty.

Tuvok, T’Pel and the Doctor all arrived at about the same time.  Then came Harry and Seven and finally Kathryn and Chakotay.  After celebrating the baby’s birthday, the adults stayed and visited with one another.  Seven was the first to say that she noticed a ring on Janeway’s finger.  Kathryn took Chakotay’s hand and said, “This is a family gathering right?  Well, we wanted you all to know that Captain Chakotay and I are getting married.”

Taking advantage of the stunned silence, Chakotay spoke up.  “Starfleet has given us a unique deep space assignment.  Kathryn will be the captain of a ship, The Journey,  that will house a smaller, experimental ship that I will take command of.  We will share a ship’s counselor, doctor, mess hall, among other things, but each have our own engineer, and bridge crew.”

Janeway took over from here.  “We know how well you all work together and we would like for you to join our crews.  We have already started negotiating who will serve on each crew with the hopes that you will be interested.” 

Seven put her hand into Harry’s and asked, “If we are on different crews in the same ship, what will be the policy on fraternization between ranks?”

Chakotay looked at Harry and said, “No first officer of mine is going to be stopped from having the love of his life because of some barbaric principle in Starfleet’s regulations.” 

Tom looked at Harry and said, “From Ensign to Commander in one year Harry, that must be a record.” He then held up his glass and said, “May I propose a toast to The Journey.”

Together they all raised their glasses and said, “To the Journey.”