Chapter Text
I couldn’t sleep.
There was no enemy chasing us, no anomaly threatening to tear us apart, nothing that would wake me up at 0300. I just couldn’t sleep any longer.
It wasn’t an unusual state to find myself in; missions often found me either insomniac or exhausted. No in between. Only this time, I had no reason to get up. And it was rare that I didn’t have enough work to warrant getting up and starting my day early.
I rolled over and closed my eyes. Usually, a long workout before dinner would ensure I was tired enough to sleep until my alarm, but today was proving otherwise. I took a deep breath and attempted to relax back into sleep, but after finding myself only able to doze for another hour, I decided to give up.
I took my time in the shower and applied my makeup with more care than usual—there was no rush after all—but I was still early. I checked-in with the bridge and finding that all was well, decided to walk the ship. It was a practice I’d started when I made the switch to command. I said I did it to simply touch base, to keep myself involved in every department, to know my ship. It was for all that, and it was also to ensure that things were exactly as they were supposed to be. It was an odd way to comfort myself, to see first hand that things were in order, but when sleep proved to be elusive, often seeing, touching, knowing what was going on was the only way to calm my unconscious need to control everything and everyone around me.
The corridors were quiet. Engineering had shut down the warp core the night before for maintenance and the absent humming made for eerie silence. The crew decks were nearly deserted at this hour, everyone being either at their posts or still asleep. In a few hours though, it would be a different scene. One shift would be headed to breakfast, another winding down before bed. It was, by now, routine. I made my way through the ship at a leisurely pace, strolling through every department, passing by every workstation, and assuring more than a few nervous-looking ensigns that I was not there to evaluate them.
As we had neared this, our eighth week in the Delta Quadrant, reality had sunk its claws in. I had begun to notice the slow and subtle changes in my crew and myself as we gradually accepted that finding a shortcut home might not be as simple as stumbling across a wormhole within the week. As the hopeful optimism wore down into more pragmatic expectations, routine set in, as well as acceptance, which soon turned toward despondence.
Among the gasses making up Voyager’s atmosphere was a desperate yearning for home. It was clear every time I passed a crewman in the corridor, or caught one staring longingly out the viewport. In the Delta Quadrant, we were the entire family of man, and it had become clear to me that I needed to find a way to be more than a captain to these people. But I was uncertain how to begin. What could I say to them? How was I to be more than I was trained to be? More than I believed I could be?
What if they learned that I was just as scared and lonely as they were?
Out here, they needed to believe that I was larger than life. I just wished I felt larger than life.
Maybe, I thought, this is just the way it works. Maybe the distance I valued as Captain was necessary. Now more than ever.
I decided that a cup of coffee before I reported back to the bridge would do me some good, and I ended my walk at the mess hall. Lieutenant Paris and Ensign Kim were seated near the door.
Mister Paris had adapted to life on Voyager better than I’d expected. Some of the credit for that I gave to Ensign Kim. The pair had struck up a true friendship, and could often be found eating together in the mess hall, or leaving the bridge together with conspiratorial looks and laughter between them. Of everyone on the ship, Mister Paris it seemed was the only one not effected by the melancholy currently plaguing the crew. And that I supposed was because what waited for him at home was a penal colony. I was still waiting for the sexual harassment complaint I knew would be filed against Paris to come across my desk, and that it hadn’t, I attributed to Kim beginning to rub off on Paris. I could only hope that it wouldn’t go the other way.
Remembering my last attempt to mingle with the crew, I paused briefly on my way to their table. Since my interaction with Ayala and Torres, I’d only eaten in the mess hall by myself, with Tuvok, and once with Chakotay. I took a breath and reminded myself that I needed to find a way to get to know these people if I was to captain them for the next seven decades. And that meant getting comfortable with them outside of a command setting.
I continued to their table and greeted them. “Gentlemen.” Both started to stand before I stopped them. “As you were.” For a brief moment, I didn’t know what to say. Neither one of them said anything, waiting for me to say whatever it was I’d come over to tell them. I glanced at their mostly empty plates and, since I couldn’t think of anything else to say, asked, “So, has Neelix concocted anything interesting this morning?”
Both men shifted nervously in their seats before Kim said, “There's an ancient Chinese curse, Captain. May you live in interesting times. Mealtime is always interesting now that Neelix is in the kitchen.”
I laughed at both the subtlety of the curse and at the implication that we were cursed with Neelix’s “interesting” food. “We shouldn't judge him too harshly,” I said. “He is helping us conserve replicator energy.”
Paris tossed his napkin into his plate. “And I'm sure the gastrointestinal problems will go away as soon as our systems get used to his, er, gourmet touch.”
I chuckled again, but had nothing else to say. The momentary silence was awkward and I didn’t seem to know what to do with my hands. “Well,” I said, straightening. “I'll see you at duty call.” I quickly made my escape to the kitchen.
What a stupid thing to say, I chided myself as I walked. See you at duty call? Really, Kathryn?
There was a carafe on the serving counter and I made a beeline towards it. Coffee would make me feel better. It always does. I found a cup and saucer, and poured the carafe only to find it empty. I set it back down and looked for another. When I couldn’t find one, I tried the empty one again.
Nothing.
I looked around the corner for Neelix, but he wasn’t in the kitchen so I tried the carafe again. It was definitely empty.
I peered into the kitchen again. “Neelix?”
Frustrated, I set down the carafe and walked into the kitchen, cup in hand. I hadn’t actually been in the galley since I’d discovered it, and I found myself peering curiously into every nook and cranny looking for coffee. I spent as little time as possible in kitchens. As a child, my mother had forced me to learn to follow a recipe and I did nothing but complain. Why bake the cookies when you could just replicate them?
Because, Katie, my mother would say, there’s no effort or love involved in replication. Then she’d swipe a cookie or a spoonful of dough and say, Besides, they’re sweeter when you put the work in.
I didn’t see the difference, but I learned to do it mostly just to prove to her that I could. In sullen silence, I practiced until eventually I could bake the perfect cookie with my eyes closed. My sister Phoebe was the exact opposite. Her cookies would always come out flat or dense, and as a child, I could never understand why my mother always said they were just as good as mine. Phoebe said that baking was science and that’s why I could do it if I tried, but cooking was art. And that’s why she was good at that.
My mother’s kitchen was old-fashioned, like something out of a vintage holonovel, with an antique stove and oven, and copper pots and pans hanging on a brass pot rack. We owned a replicator, but my mother hardly ever used it for food, preferring to use vegetables picked fresh from her garden. Back then, it was embarrassing how antiquated it all was. Now, I longed for the warmth of that kitchen, the smell of bread baking on a Sunday morning, or a pie cooling on the counter.
By comparison, Neelix’s kitchen was sterile, yet eclectic, a hodgepodge collection of things I’m not sure were ever meant to be in a kitchen. But I’ll admit, I wouldn’t know what half of the utensils and gadgets were for anyway. Unless it was rehydrating field rations or adding water to the heating element of an MRE, I didn’t cook. Mark found my efforts in the kitchen amusing and I was more than happy to leave the cooking to him. Personally, I could hardly ever tell the difference between replicated food and prepared food (unless I was making it). But I always preferred the reliability of the replicator: every dish was the same every time you ordered it. And you didn’t need to worry about altitude or humidity with a replicator. It was a harsh lesson, learning just how much I’d taken replicators and Earth’s endless supply of energy for granted. Out here, relying on replicators would kill us all.
On the stove was a large stock pot, its contents bubbling audibly but hidden beneath a blanket of steam that hung low and thick around the pot, like dry ice in a bowl of water.
I leaned closer to the rim and blew carefully. The steam curled away to reveal what I hoped was soup but looked like a mad science experiment. Floating in the boiling liquid were what looked like shrimp and mussels. Wondering what exactly they were, and, more over, where he’d gotten them, I cautiously reached for one.
“Captain!”
I drew my hand back and jumped away from the pot like a child caught with his hand in the cookie jar at the sound of Neelix’s voice, though his tone was one of delighted surprise, not chastisement. The spotted Talaxian was wearing a garish apron and matching chef’s hat, and carrying a large bowl of vegetables, no doubt just harvested from the hydroponics bay.
He set the bowl down on a shelf. “May I say, you look beautiful this morning.” He motioned to his lips. “Is that a new color lipstick?”
Uncomfortable and now self-conscious about my lipstick, I looked away and ran my tongue over my teeth, then dabbed the corner of my mouth with my finger. “No. No, it's the same color I always wear.”
“Well, perhaps it's just the way the glow of the food heater lamps hit you, but you look wonderful. Not to suggest you don't always look wonderful.”
“Neelix,” I said, exasperated and praying my tone would get him to stop. “Do we have any coffee left?”
“No,” he replied automatically, “but we have something even better.” He turned to open a cabinet and pulled out another carafe.
“I don't want something even better. I want coffee.”
He lifted the carafe to show me. “It's made from a proteinaceous seed I discovered on an expedition—”
“Never mind,” I said before he could begin recounting the expedition in question. “I'll use one of my replicator rations for coffee.”
I turned to leave the galley, but I only got a few steps before Neelix said, “That would not be appropriate, Captain.”
His words stopped me in my tracks, and I turned very slowly back around to face him. “I beg your pardon?” I asked, my voice laced with steel.
Undaunted by my tone, Neelix explained, “You need to set an example for the crew.”
“Well, thank you for reminding me,” I said, but the sarcasm was lost on Neelix.
“You're welcome. After all, if you want the crew to begin to accept natural food alternatives instead of further depleting our energy reserves, you need to encourage them by your own choices. Don’t you?”
I could see there was no arguing with him. And, having just defended his cooking to Paris and Kim, I would be a hypocrite if I didn’t at least try his coffee. “Fine. Give me your ‘even better than coffee’ substitution.”
Neelix stepped towards me, carafe poised. “And how about some Takar loggerhead eggs with that this morning?”
“Just coffee.”
I watched, horrified, as the brown sludge Neelix called better-than-coffee begrudgingly glopped from the carafe and into my cup.
“It’s a tiny bit richer blend than you're used to, but you'll learn to love it.”
A tiny bit? Hypocrisy be damned, there was no way in hell I was going to drink that tar. I’d find some other way to set an example for the crew. Perhaps a shift scrubbing plasma manifolds.
“Bridge to Janeway.” When Chakotay’s voice mercifully sounded over the comm, I pressed the cup into Neeix’s hands.
“On my way,” I said without giving Chakotay time to say otherwise. “Janeway out.” I walked as quickly as possible without actually running from the galley. “Tomorrow, maybe,” I threw over my shoulder to Neelix before the doors closed between us.
When I was safely out of Neelix’s presence, I slowed to a walk and proceeded to the bridge.
“Yes, Commander,” I said when I stepped onto the bridge. I felt rather than saw Lieutenant Ayala’s eyes tracking my movements as I passed in front of his station at Ops and down to the command level where Chakotay was seated. After eight weeks, I’d almost gotten used to the feeling, but I still didn’t know what he was watching for.
“There was no need for you to come to the bridge, Captain,” Chakotay said, a hint of question in his tone.
Remembering Neelix’s proteinaceous coffee plopping into my cup, I said, “Yes, there was.”
It looked like he suppressed a smile at my tone. “I just wanted to alert you to a nebula we picked up on long range sensors.”
“Put it on screen.”
Ayala followed my order without comment and a pinkish-purple nebula was centered on the screen.
“Magnify,” I ordered.
When the colorful cloud filled the entire view screen, Tuvok reported, “There are unusually high levels of omicron particles within this nebula, Captain.”
A flutter of excitement rose in my belly, and I turned to face Tuvok, wondering if he was thinking what I was thinking. “Are you thinking we could collect these omicron particles to provide an additional antimatter reserve, Lieutenant?”
“Precisely,” he replied.
I smiled. Omicron particles equaled antimatter reserves. Antimatter reserves equaled more energy. More energy equaled extra replicator rations. Extra replicator rations equaled coffee—real coffee. Therefore, omicron particles equaled not having to drink Neelix’s sludgy coffee in order to set an example. I opened a comm channel and took my seat next to Chakotay. “Senior bridge officers, report for duty. Commander, set a new course. There’s coffee in that nebula.”
Chakotay made a sound like a choked cough. When I turned my head, he was leaning his elbow in the arm rest, fist over his mouth, eyes crinkled at the corners. At my look, he cleared his throat, sat up straight, and ordered the new heading.