Disclaimer - Paramount own the names...snicker... *
She walked onto the bridge speaking to no one, acknowledging no one, ignoring the "Morning Captain" sent her way from various sources. Heading towards her ready room she stepped through the doors and they hissed shut behind her.
Two seconds later Chakotay's com badge beeped. "Janeway to Chakotay. Report to my ready room immediately."
"Aye Captain," he responded, standing and informing Tuvok that he had the bridge. From what he could gather from the expressions of the crewmembers he could see, no one envied him at all.
Entering the ready room he waited at the opposite side of her desk, deliberately choosing not to sit. "Is there something wrong, Captain?"
She was on her way back from the replicator with a cup of coffee and instead of drinking it she thumped it down on the table and began pacing with her hands on her hips. "Yes, something's wrong. We have a problem. We have one *hell* of a problem."
He realised with certainty that she meant it. She wasn't annoyed at some prank Paris had pulled or some snide comment B'Elanna had made...this was serious. "What is it?" he asked, a little less hostile.
Finally standing still she faced him, closed her eyes then opened them again. Setting her shoulders back she spoke. "I'm pregnant."
There had been several occasions in the time he had known Kathryn that Chakotay had imagined what it would be like to hear those words from her. His imagined response had always been something ridiculously sentimental, like something out of a bad holonovel. As for their current situation - something he had never envisioned - there was only one response.
Thumping down onto the chair he uttered the only word he was capable of speaking:
"Fuck."
Fuck, fuck. Shit! This was just what they *didn't* need. This wasn't the kind of relationship that a child should be born from. Still staring straight ahead, he had no idea what he was looking at. "I...umm..." he shook his head, trying to reclaim some precious clarity, then realised how futile that was. It was something he'd been lacking for a long time. "I..." And suddenly he had to know something. "Are you keeping it?" He managed to look up then, managed to meet her gaze. "Please tell me you're keeping it." The child shouldn't have been born but it *would* be.
"Chakotay..."
And there was that tone of voice. Gods, that tone of voice. He recognised it so well that his stomach lurched and he had to close his mouth to stop anything from escaping.
"Chakotay, it's not even aware yet. It's just a collection of cells."
"We're all just a collection of cells!" He shot back, regaining the capacity to speak.
Her voice was matter-of-fact. "I know what you're thinking and this is not murder. It is not a sentient being. I am not taking away anything that it has yet. Besides, who are you - a former member of the Maquis - to get high and mighty about murder?"
"But not my own child!" He yelled and he thought that he actually surprised her. He couldn't believe she was comparing killing Cardassians to killing the child... "Computer: initiate a site-to-site transport for both myself and the Captain to my quarters."
Her eyes were wide in outrage. "What are you-"
-"doing?!" She finished as they dematerialised in the darkness of his quarters.
Giving her no time to reverse the order, he advanced towards her and ripped off her com badge, throwing it to the other side of the room.
"Just for the sex, right Kathryn? Why not - you're entitled to it. You've sacrificed enough, lost enough, dreamt enough. And your First Officer happens to be convenient and willing - a bonus. Lucky for you I guess that he didn't get too emotionally involved. It would be an inconvenience that neither of you needed. A tidy little arrangement you had there. Problem is, one of you screwed up, probably didn't take their booster. And now you're pregnant and fucked - because there is no way he is letting you murder your child."
Finished, he stood in front of her, panting.
Her eyes blazed. "Who the hell are you to tell me what to do with this child?" She pointed towards her stomach. "This is *my* child, you understand that?"
"Ours," he hissed. "I'm his father."
"And I'm his mother! You think that being the father gives you sole authority about what happens to it?"
"And you think being the mother gives you the same authority?"
"Of course it does!" She shouted, waving her hand through the air. "If I chose to keep it I would carry it for nine months. Nine *months*. It would nurture from my body to survive. That gives me a hundred times more the authority than you'll ever have."
He said nothing, perhaps having nothing he could say. There was plenty he could do. His absolutely fury driving him, he grabbed her shoulders and propelled her against the wall. Landing with a thump she managed to remain upright even as he threw himself against her and covered her mouth with his.
If it had been less than gentle before, it was absolutely brutal now. There was nothing nice or romantic about it; he ground against her roughly still fully clothed, humping her harshly against the wall. She said nothing except for the gasps that escaped frequently and he continued the biting and swearing and thumping. Somehow he managed to rip both their clothes off and even if she said "No" he would keep pounding and pounding and make her-
He stopped.
Some part of his sanity that was still intact stopped him and he pulled away from her flushed, bruised and as yet unviolated body. Gasping, he stumbled towards the bed with tears on his face but he missed his target and landed loudly on the floor. He remained there on his side, one arm resting next to his face, the other wrapped around his body.
"It shouldn't be this way," he whispered, unable to comprehend how they had ever ended up like this.
Sitting behind him, still naked, she rubbed a hand over his side, her apparent gentleness at odds with the passion of a few moments before. "So you keep telling yourself. But the truth of it Chakotay...is that you like it."
And that was the hell of it. For all the romantic illusions he'd ever had of them falling in love, getting married, having children...all the times he had told himself that all he wanted was her by his side in a beautiful, forgiving, breathtaking relationship...for all the times he had imagined it...he enjoyed this. He enjoyed it as much as she did.
Turning suddenly he grabbed her arms and stared into her eyes. Rolling her underneath him he fucked her with such ferocity that neither of them stopped screaming for a long time.
~FINIS