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Chakotay is being watched. He can tell by the way the hair on the back of his neck stands up, by the way that every muscle in his body is telling him to turn around, but he ignores them. He continues his match in the ring, strategically keeping his back turned to the woman he knows is standing behind him. He is not ready to face her, not yet. Not until he sees this round to its finish, not until he is feeling the full force of his anger.
He dodges a punch and hits his opponent in his weak spot, taking him down for that round. He straightens up, breathing heavy, and finally turns around to face her. She’s still in uniform, standing with her arms crossed, her eyebrow raised, and her hip cocked to one side. She’s clearly pissed off, but it’s okay, because so is he. He calls for his opponent do be deactivated, and he shimmers out of the holodeck.
“Are you going to just stand there, or are you going to say what you came here to say?” He asks, wiping his brow with his forearm. “I have a match to finish.”
“It doesn’t look like it’s a fair match, you’re clearly besting your opponent.” She says, stepping closer to the ring.
He scoffs. “Why are you here, Kathryn?”
“Because we need to talk.” Her hands move to rest on her hips. “We need to discuss what happened over the last few days.”
Chakotay looks down at her from the ring. Her face is pulled into her Captain’s mask, one he knows so well, and one he knows that he should be intimidated by. It only serves to make him angrier. He does not want to talk about what happened, not here, not now. He does not want to acknowledge the things that they have both done recently to hurt each other both intentionally and unintentionally.
But it is not his decision to make. It never was. In truth he’s been waiting for her to come to him to talk about it. In some ways he knows that they will not be talking about just the Equinox. They will be talking about them and how they hate that things between them have become ugly and hostile. They hint at it, but they don’t ever have time to fully work it out.
And now it’s come to this.
He is not sure how it’s going to end. It could end with them screaming at each other, or it could end with them screaming each other’s names. Either way, he cannot tell what he wants. Maybe he wants neither.
“Alright.” His arms cross against his chest, although the position is awkward with his boxing gloves. “If you’re here to tell me again that I was out of line, then let’s get this over with.”
Kathryn bristles at his words. He thinks for a moment that he must be right, and that he will have to sit and take another berating about rules and regulations, as if he hasn’t memorized all of them over the last five years.
“Actually, Chakotay,” Her voice is low and dangerous, and he knows instantly that he was wrong. “I came here to apologize properly, but if you want to me to berate you again, then I will.”
He forces himself not to react. He reminds himself that he is still angry, that he wants to fuel this anger, push it to its limits. Chakotay spreads his arms wide in an inviting gesture, a sneer on his face. “By all means, berate away.”
It is silent as he watches her gather the words in her head, ordering them into a speech meant to hit all his weak points, not just about what happened in the last few days, but what has happened over the last few years. He unfolds the armor he keeps hidden for these moments, lets it wrap around his heart and his mind. He waits patiently, letting his arms drop down to his sides and sliding his gaze to rest just above her head.
“No.” Comes her eventual reply.
He quirks an eyebrow. “No? You seemed so eager moments ago.”
“You already know what I would say,” She steps closer to the ring, forcing his gaze to follow her. “We’ve done nothing but go around in circles these last few days about what to do first, contact the Ankari or track Ransom. I’ve told you that you were out of line with Lessing. Hell, everyone who lives near me knows that I yelled at you for it. I’m surprised they didn’t call security at our screaming match.” They both let out a dark chuckle at that. Then she continues. “The point is, I don’t think yelling at each other is going to get us anywhere. If you don’t want to hear my apology, then fine. We’ll save it for another day when we’re both not pissed off. But we need to get this sorted somehow.”
Chakotay narrows his eyes. “What are you getting at?”
A glint of challenge reflects in her eyes. “I know you want to take a swing at me after everything that’s happened, and lucky for you, I’d love to get a few punches in too.”
“Alright Kathryn. You want to fight? Put on a pair of gloves and get in the damn ring.” He points to where the spare gloves rest.
Chakotay tries not to stare as Kathryn removes her jacket and turtleneck, revealing more skin than he usually sees. He watches the muscles in her arms as she ties her hair back and wraps her hands, and eventually sliding the gloves on. He ignores the way his breathing seems to pick up, ignores the sense of unease settling in his stomach and tries to bring forth the rage that he felt so acutely just moments before. He holds the ropes open for her and she nods her thanks as she stands up, her face steeled for the fight ahead.
“We’ll treat this like open sparring.” Chakotay declares, as they get in position.
“What, you don’t think I can beat you in a match?” Kathryn’s tone is trying for teasing, but it’s just angry enough that it misses its mark.
He scoffs. “Please, Kathryn. I know you’re more than capable of holding your own. A match would get us nowhere, though. One of us would win and hold it over the other, as if that was the ultimate declaration of who was right. This way we can just blow off steam.”
She nods her head in a resigned gesture. “Fine.” There is a pause before she speaks again. “But if we’re going to do this, we’re really going to do it. We need to hash out the things we’ve done that have hurt us.”
“While we’re fighting?” Chakotay stands momentarily. “Are you crazy? What happened to us not yelling at each other?”
“Call me whatever you want.” She shrugs, motioning for him to come at her. “But I wasn’t kidding when I said we needed to sort this out.”
“Fucking hell.” He mutters under his breath. Then, he makes his first move.
Kathryn dodges it easily, leaning her upper body away from the punch he sends at her. She ducks down and throws a punch that lands on his stomach. Then she backs away from him, never taking her eyes off his. He aims a hit at her stomach in return, which she blocks, and he manages to get a hit to her face. He knows he should feel bad, and part of him does, but part of him doesn’t. He’s also no fool, and knows she can handle this. She’s fought bigger opponents than him and taken them down.
“Breaking the alliance with the Borg.” She calls out, as she lands a right hook on his face. He stumbles, but rights himself.
“We resolved that,” He responds blocking her next punch.
“It still hurt.”
It fall silent as they continue their fight, dancing around each other, the sound of the gloves meeting flesh echoing in the otherwise empty gym. Chakotay can’t help but think this whole situation is a bit ridiculous, them fighting and re-opening old wounds at the same time. He fights down the sense of unease, that one of them will say something that they can’t take back, and it will hurt them worse than any of the physical blows they are dealing. He knows that at the core of all these things is the obvious issue: their mutual anger at the fact that they cannot do anything they really want to. It has twisted into something ugly that consumes them and lashes out. It scares him to think that if it continues on like this, the promises of a shared future will disappear into the stars.
“Kashyk.” He grinds out, rage boiling inside him.
Kathryn laughs darkly. “A tactical decision.”
“He intended to kill the telepaths we were hiding on board, including members of our own crew.” Chakotay’s voice is on the cusp of being a yell.
“I let him think he was fooling me,” She ducks a swing from him. “And that meant letting him think I was interested in him. It meant playing into his clear liking of me for reasons that had nothing to do with the fact that I was the Captain.”
Anger courses through his veins for a completely different reason, mixed with shame for not seeing it before. But this is not a time for apologies, so he tucks it away to apologize for later. This is the time for letting the ugliness out into the open, and letting it dissipate into the air in hopes of fixing the broken mess between them.
“Equinox.” They say at the same time.
“You undermined my authority.” She growls.
“You almost murdered someone in cold blood.” He counters.
“You were willing to let Ransom get away.”
“You were getting blindsided by your quest for vengeance.”
“He had Seven and the Doctor on board! Did you really think I was going to let them get away?” She yells, throwing a punch that he blocks.
Chakotay allows her that point. “I never doubted your desire to get them back.” He grits out. “I simply doubted your motivation. You judgement was clouded by your desire to get Ransom back.”
“Fuck. You.” She launches at him, a flurry of limbs, kicking, and punching until he is backed up against the ropes.
For a moment he is scared, but he quickly regains control and blocks most of her incoming hits. He sees an opening and takes it, getting his leg between hers and tripping her to the floor. The look she gives him is murderous, and he returns it. This is the upside to him being nearly as stubborn as her, he thinks ruefully, he is able to butt heads with her with (almost) no hesitation.
“Enough.” He undoes his gloves and takes them off. He helps her up and takes her gloves off for her as well.
Kathryn is silent, and will not meet his eyes. Chakotay is fine with that, since he is unsure he is ready to truly face her either. He sighs and takes her hands in his own.
“This isn’t just about the Equinox.” He says quietly.
“No.” She murmurs. “It’s not.”
“I’m angry about it too.”
“It feels like there’s nothing we can do. It feels like there’s nothing left to be said that we haven’t already gone around in circles about.” Kathryn finally looks up at him and his breath catches in his throat. He has never seen her like this before, not even when they were preparing to leave New Earth. There is both nothing and everything in her eyes, a void that seems to reflect every single thing he has felt in the last three years.
“Then we need to change something.” He runs a hand through his hair. “No formalities at weekly dinners anymore. No flirting with the line that we’ve had to draw.”
Her eyes widen in shock, and he sees fear pass through them. “Chakotay, we can’t. All of our work to get back to here will be for nothing, I can’t let us—”
“Look where that work has gotten us, Kathryn.” He interrupts her, irritation mounting. “This moment, right here. It’s not good for either of us, and I’ve resented every moment of it.”
“I can’t let us be compromised like that!” She throws her hands up in exasperation. “For fuck’s sake, Chakotay, I resent this just as much as you have but I cannot let us have an intimate relationship that would get in the way of the decisions that we have to make.”
“We’re both miserable.” He counters. “We can try it out once, and if it goes horribly awry, we can stop and go right back to where we are now.”
“Don’t you get it?” Kathryn’s eyes are wide and Chakotay feels as though she’s looking directly into his soul. “The second I let you in again there’s no stopping.”
All the anger and indignation he had been feeling rushes out of him as though she had punched him in the stomach again. She walks around him and steps through the ropes, down onto the gym floor, and reaches for her undershirt and jacket. He watches, stunned, as she starts to walk out of the holodeck, clearly trying not to look back. His brain finally catches up, though, and he slips from the ring and catches her arm just before she reaches the door.
He pulls her in wordlessly, folding her into his arms and holding her close. He feels her body shaking with tears, and feels tears of his own slide silently down his cheeks. He does not know where they will go from here, nor does he know what would be best.
No.
He knows what would be best, and he knows what would be reckless.
He is foolhardy enough to want what lies between the two.