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“If We’re Being Honest…”
By Dawn
It was another quiet evening on the starship Voyager and as usual, the two commanding officers were lounging in the captain’s quarters while going over reports and enjoying each other’s company.
Chakotay scratched his jaw and took a deep breath. Putting his PADD down, he said, “Kathryn, I want to talk to you about something.”
“Okay,” she said, still looking at her PADD.
“It’s…” He stopped. “Would you put the report down for a moment?”
She looked up and did as he asked. “Sorry, you have my undivided attention.”
“I’ve… ah…” He rubbed his thighs and blew out a long breath. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you.”
“So, I gathered.” Smiling sympathetically, she asked, “Why are you nervous?”
“Because this conversation could affect our friendship.”
“Oh?”
“And knowing that, I should probably drop it. So never mind.”
She furrowed her eyebrows. “I hadn’t pegged you as a coward, Chakotay.”
“Coward?”
Tilting her head, she smiled softly. “I’m just trying to get a rise out of you. Thought it might help you relax.”
“You think calling me names will help me relax?” he asked with indignance.
“It was worth a shot.” She picked up her coffee and cradled it with both hands. “Tell me what’s on your mind.”
“It’s about us.”
“I assumed. Is there a problem? Besides me calling you names, of course.”
“No, no problem. It’s more like an opportunity.”
“I like opportunities.”
“I’ve noticed that about you.”
“Hmm,” she said as she took a sip.
“I could beat around the bush all night or I could just come out and say it.”
“I vote for the latter.”
“All right.” He raised his chin and said, “I’d like to discuss the possibility of furthering our relationship.”
“Furthering?”
“Deepening.”
“Ah.” She stared at her coffee for a moment. “I care for you a great deal, Chakotay, but…”
“I don’t like buts.”
Her eyes flicked up to his and she smiled softly. “I can’t be in a relationship with you. Not the kind where you come into my ready room for a little pick-me-up on slow afternoons.”
“Is that all you think it’d be?”
“I don’t know what it would be. I’ve tried really hard not to let my thoughts go there.”
“So, you’ve never thought about us, together, physically?”
She licked her lips as she decided what to say. “I’m not going to lie to you. Yes, in my weaker moments, I’ve thought about us. How could I not? The sexual energy between us is strong.”
“I was hoping for something along the lines of irresistible.”
She smiled. “If that were the case, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. We’d have ended up in the sack years ago.”
“You have a point. Not a good one, mind you.”
Shrugging, she sighed. “I’m sorry, Chakotay, but I can’t.”
“Why?” he asked softly.
“Because I’ve got to command this ship. How can this crew respect their captain if she’s sleeping with her first officer?”
“What if they already think that?”
She groaned. “Chakotay, don’t.”
“Why does it matter what the crew thinks. They adore you.”
“That’s precisely my point, although I wouldn’t say they adore me. They respect me, and I’ve earned that respect by being the best captain I can be.”
“Lots of captains have relationships. Why would yours be any different?”
“Lots? Meaning men.”
“Women, too.”
“Give me an example.”
“Of a woman captain?”
“Yes, one who has dalliances with crewmembers.”
“I’m not talking about a dalliance, Kathryn.”
“Any sort of romantic relationship, then.”
Chakotay shrugged. “I haven’t researched it.”
“I have.”
“Oh? What did you find?” Chakotay sat forward a little.
“I found that male captains tend to have any given number of affairs. It seems to almost be expected and they aren’t shy about reporting them.”
“And the female captains?”
Sighing, Kathryn said, “There have been no female captains who have reported an affair with a member of her crew.”
“Doesn’t mean they didn’t have them. Just means they didn’t report them.” He pointed out.
“Which illustrates that there’s a gender bias.”
Chakotay nodded. “All right, I’ll give you that. But what about female captains who are married. Did your research give you any examples?”
“Yes,” Kathryn said. “But none were married to a bridge officer on their own ship.”
“Are there any male captains married to a bridge officer?”
“Yes, two.”
He raised his eyebrows. “What do you think about that, then?”
“Is that a marriage proposal?”
Chuckling, he said, “No.”
“But you want to know if I’d consider being married to a bridge officer on my own ship?”
“Yes.”
“First officer is different. You’re supposed to be able to stand up to me. How would you do that if you were in love with me?”
“Same way I do it now.”
She stopped short and noted, “You’re saying you’re in love with me.”
“Yes, I am.”
Kathryn rubbed her forehead as she frowned. “This is a problem.”
“I don’t think so. If it were, you would’ve called me on it a long time ago.”
“In love?” she asked. “As in romantic love? Not friendship love?”
“Both,” Chakotay admitted. “All the loves.”
“Even when I tick you off?”
“Might not like you as much then, but I still love you.”
Glaring at him a little, she pointed out, “There are some things that you do that I don’t like, either.”
“Such as?”
“Well, I’m not going to point them out. That would be rude.”
“I’m asking you to.”
She sighed and said, “All right. I don’t like how you dye your hair.”
“My hair?”
Tentatively, she explained, “I think you’d look more handsome if you let the gray show.”
“Don’t you dye your hair?”
She paused. “Yes, but…”
“So, it’s okay for women to dye their hair, but not men?”
“I didn’t say that. I just really liked your salt and pepper look, when it was more natural looking.”
“All right,” he said with a nod. “I do it so I’ll look younger, which I had hoped would attract you.”
“I also don’t like your dimples.”
“My dimples?” he asked with a laugh.
“They’re a little… disarming. As is your smile.”
Chakotay pulled on his ear. “I see.”
“And my replicator likes you better than it likes me.”
He coughed to cover a laugh. “All right. Anything else you don’t like about me?’
Kathryn was quiet for a moment and then said, “On a serious note…”
“Go on,” he encouraged.
“I believe that if we weren’t such good friends, that you’d disagree with me more. That you’d challenge me.”
“I see.” He scratched his cheek. “But when I disagree with you about something that’s important, it doesn’t work out well for us.”
“Because I take it personally?”
He nodded.
“I know that is one of my failings.” She took a deep breath blew it out. “But I don’t see how this could improve if we were in a romantic relationship. If anything, it would make it worse.”
“Or,” he posited. “You could realize that I love you and I respect you, no matter what may happen on the bridge. Perhaps being secure in that knowledge would allow us to discuss things more easily without fearing that we’ll hurt the other’s feelings.”
She looked out the viewport at the stars they were passing by at warp speed.
Chakotay continued, “Even now with our friendship as close as it is, I think we do a good job of leaving command decisions on deck one and leaving our relationship here in our quarters. We’ll need to keep doing that.”
“Is that even possible?” she wondered.
He thought for a moment and suggested, “What if we make a distinction between duty and home, and use our ranks and first names as code for that?”
“Such as?”
“I’m so glad you’re here Kathryn. The captain was a real pain in the ass today, and I could use a hug.”
“Nice,” she said with an eyeroll.
“Are you in love with me, Kathryn? Answer me honestly.”
“Well, the honest answer is that I care for you a great deal and consider you my closest friend.”
He stared at her, eyebrows raised, saying nothing.
“Would I be devastated if something happened to you? Yes. Could I send you into a dangerous situation if we were a couple? Yes. I would have to because my priority is the ship.”
“I know you would sacrifice anything for this ship, including yourself. I don’t doubt that for a second.”
She nodded, encouraging him to continue.
“You’d sacrifice yourself, first.”
“I would,” she agreed, resting her cheek on her hand.
“Kathryn, our duty to this ship, and to this crew, would not change if we happened to be in a romantic relationship.”
She studied him for a moment and then asked, “You really believe that?”
“I do, because we already love each other. We’re already a couple.”
“A couple without benefits, you mean.”
“Is it so wrong to want to kiss you? Hug you? Make love to you?”
“No,” she replied softly. “If you really want the truth… I already imagine that.”
Her statement took him by surprise. Delighted surprise, but still unexpected. He couldn’t help but push her. “You have an imaginary relationship with me, then?”
Loathe to admit it, she stretched and finally said, “Yes, I suppose I do.”
“Would you mind, then, if I made a holodeck character of you and had an imaginary relationship myself?”
“Yes, I would mind,” she snapped. “That’s completely different.”
“How?”
She glared at him. “Do you have one already?”
“No.”
“But you’ve thought about it?”
“Since we’re being honest, yes. But fantasizing is not the same as doing.”
“That’s the case for me, too. Fantasizing about kissing you is not at all the same as actually kissing.”
“The real thing would be a hell of a lot better.”
“You’re pretty sure of yourself.”
“Yep.”
“How do you know what I’ve imagined?”
He put his feet up and leaned back. “Because imagining a kiss is nothing like feeling the touch of warm lips and tasting each other. An active imagination may arouse you, but it won’t leave you breathless.”
She braced herself. “Dammit, Chakotay.”
“Nor is fantasizing about making love anything like actually feeling a warm body next to you. Having hands that aren’t your own touching you intimately.”
“Are you trying to seduce me?” she asked quickly.
“Is it working?”
She held up her index finger and thumb to indicate a little bit.
“Want me to come over there and invade your personal space? I’m sure that would help.”
She pointed at him as if she wanted to say something, but then changed her mind or couldn’t find the words, so she dropped her hand. “Look, say you’ve convinced me that we could do this without it affecting our command positions…”
“Mmhmm?”
“If we were to start dating, people would talk.”
“They’re already talking. We’re old news, Kathryn.”
She sighed. “But back in the Alpha Quadrant, what would they think of me?”
“Do you care?”
“Yes, a little. Some.”
“Say we got back tomorrow, and in about six weeks we were free to live our lives anyway we like. Then, would you date me?”
“Yes.”
“Wouldn’t the proverbial ‘they’ assume we were dating all along, then?”
She groaned. “It’s just not fair. This bias people have against women in command.”
“So, change it. Make it perfectly normal to fall in love with a crew member and even marry one.”
“Married crew members usually get split up,” she pointed out. “Unless one is a civilian.”
“Because someone thinks that love and passion, when out in the open, become a liability. I say that’s a bunch of targ shit.”
“Nice, Commander.”
“You… we… have the opportunity to prove that couples can flourish in command together.”
“If we got home tomorrow, they’d split us up.”
“I’d resign,” he stated easily.
“Just so you could be with me?”
“Absolutely. I’d resign right now if there were someone who could take my place, but there’s not.”
“I know.”
He got up and came over to kneel in front of her. He took her hands and looked her straight in the eye. “Kathryn, I love you. I want to marry you. I want to keep being your first officer, and that means I want to keep calling you out when you cross the line.”
“You’re in danger of crossing the line right now, mister.”
“Would you cross it with me?”
She looked away to think and then back at him. “No quickies on duty?”
“Not unless you ask.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re serious about marriage?”
“Completely.”
“Can we keep a tight lid on it until we decide if we want to pursue that? No personal logs, no records whatsoever?”
“Yes.”
“That way, if we date and decide it’s not working out, it won’t seem like there was a short-term affair.”
“I think you worry too much about appearances, but I’ll agree to that.” He added, “But that will also help if we decide this isn’t going to work out. I promise that if it doesn’t, we’ll set the relationship aside like two intelligent, reasonable people. I don’t want to lose your friendship, and that’s why I haven’t said anything before now.”
Kathryn nodded. “What if we go so far as the ‘to death do us part’ vow and then find that we can’t work together and be married at the same time?”
“I’ll train someone else to take over for me and I’ll find some other job on this ship.”
“Our marriage would be more important to you than your rank?”
“Without a doubt.”
She nodded. “Okay, then.”
“Okay?”
“Yes. Now, you mentioned something about your warm lips?”