Work Text:
“Computer… generate holodeck character based on Captain Kathryn Janeway. Use all available Starfleet video and images for physical parameters.”
Barclay watched as the computer fulfilled his command, and a three dimensional holodeck image came to life in front of him, a still life-size projection. She was unanimated, as initial holodeck characters usually were, staring into nothing. Barclay walked a 360 around her, noting the small details the computer was able to assemble. He appreciated the crispness of her uniform, as if fresh from the replicator. It was in the old style, because that was the style that was standard issue when Voyager disappeared. He found he preferred the old style to the current issue he himself was wearing - the top felt too thick, the color too grey - and it made him smile to think of one Starfleet crew out there still wearing it proudly.
Barclay appreciated how well the computer had captured her hair - a bun, which he knew a lot of women in Starfleet tended to favor as a hair style, he guessed because of its practicality. Her bun wasn’t so non-nonsense though, it was soft and had volume. Barclay allowed himself a moment to think of the captain in her quarters in the mornings, sitting in front of a mirror, carefully brushing and gathering up her hair, involving what had to have been some intricate twists and applications of pins to make it sit so perfectly coiffed. So much of their lives was automated and streamlined, but personal grooming was one of those things that was still personal to a Starfleet officer. He smiled to himself as he envisioned Janeway carefully selecting the hairstyle and learning how to do it. Had she chosen it once she joined Starfleet? Or perhaps once she became captain? Or was it a style from her youth, something she’d done before school in the mornings? Barclay liked to roll the possibilities around in his mind, examining each one carefully, as if he were analyzing an engineering problem.
He shook his head, breaking himself out of his reverie, and finished his 360, stopping to face Janeway once more. Her face was unmoving, as he hadn’t given any command to the computer yet to animate her, but the holodeck still infused life even into an unmoving model. Her skin looked warm and pinked, as if blood truly ran through her veins. Her skin had a texture to it, like his own, that looked as if it would feel soft, but real under his fingers, with pores and fine hairs. Her eyes were alight, with intelligence behind them. Whenever he’d looked at her Starfleet personnel photo on a padd or computer monitor, her eyes looked to be on the darker spectrum, maybe hazel. But up close, he could see they were more of a steely blue. Barclay smiled - that was one of the things he loved about doing this, about creating real people as characters. The holodeck was able to recreate the smallest of details to a perfect degree, that he could have gotten wrong if he’d done it on his own.
“Well, I think I’ve done it,” he said satisfactorily. This was a process he’d already gone through nearly 150 times, taking the care to oversee the creation of each member of the Voyager crew personally. He’d saved the captain for last. She was the most important member of the crew, after all.
He looked into Janeway’s face; the expression the computer had chosen for her was one of authority, but there was the slightest quirk of her lips at one corner. He’d seen that in other photos of her. Barclay imagined she was a person who could see the humor in many parts of life - something he himself tended to lack - though it seemed to be a quality that many of those who reached the upper echelons of Starfleet leadership possessed. Another reason he’d never make it higher than lieutenant, he thought fleetingly - not that he was sad about it. Would a commander or captain have time for this? To recreate a whole crew just to problem-solve an engineering issue? He liked having time for his hobbies.
“Computer, use all available Starfleet personal and mission logs, any personal correspondence on record, and video recordings of Captain Janeway or those that reference her to assemble into a personality profile for her generated image.”
The computer beeped its understanding, and not even a second later, announced the completion of the task.
“Computer.. animate the character of Janeway,” Barclay said, his voice just above a whisper. He’d enjoyed the process of getting to know the Voyager crew and recreating each one, even the Maquis adoptees (frankly, he understood the Maquis position better than the average Starfleet officer, and he had a certain empathy for them), but the captain was the most intimidating entry. He’d recreated Starfleet captains before, up to and including unwittingly unflattering representations, but that wasn’t his intention then, and it certainly wasn’t now. He respected Captain Janeway a great deal, and it was important to him to do her justice.
Barclay watched as Janeway’s eyes blinked, and looked at him, connecting instantly with his. He was the only other person in the empty, checkered holodeck, so of course she would look at him. But when their eyes met, he felt a small thrill of being seen by the captain. He’d read all her logs himself, up to everything before Voyager disappeared, and of course he’d read the accounting of information they’d gotten from the appearance of the ship’s Emergency Medical Hologram. He’d read it over and over, a thousand times probably. It’s what had sparked his interest in Voyager, and spurred him to join the Pathfinder Project. But none of the written words, even the ones in her own voice, could match the experience of being in Janeway’s presence.
“C-captain, hello,” he said nervously, stuttering. He wasn’t usually like this with his holodeck characters - they were safe, after all. They would never treat him like a real person would - like he was a refuse container full of spent plasma. His holodeck characters always treated him well. But something about Janeway had momentarily shaken his confidence a bit.
“Reg,” Janeway said warmly, her voice a mix between the typical authoritative captain voice they all seemed to have, but also open - inviting him into a conversation with her. He felt as if she were the sort of captain where you could come to her door in the middle of the night and she would make you sit down and ask you what was troubling you. She called him Reg, of course - because he always had the computer program the characters to be friendly with him. But the way she said his name made him smile.
Janeway smiled back at him, and as she did, he felt a kind of relief course through his body and his nerves melted away.
“We should get to work,” Barclay said. His crew was now fully assembled - it was time to address the Voyager problem.
***
It didn’t take long for Barclay to settle into a routine. It was normal for him - during the day, working on the problems set forth to him by his boss as well as fitting in research around that for his pet theories regarding the MIDAS array, and at night, spending hours in the holodeck, taking all the thoughts he’d collected during the day and bouncing them off his friends in the holodeck.
It hadn’t taken him long to start mentally using that term, friends. And less time after that to start throwing the word around to the Voyager crew, too. They all responded positively to his declarations, and used the same word for him. Once in a while he thought of who other people would call his real friends - Geordi, Deanna. And they were his friends; he thought of them fondly, exchanged letters here and there. But real friends always seemed to come with strings attached. And he’d found the biggest string was always other people’s interpretation of his holodeck usage. It was a topic that became exhausting to deal with, the endless explanations and justifications, and the way nobody else ever understood - and that’s why he had taken great pains to hide his current holodeck activities from his coworkers on the Pathfinder Project.
They knew he’d recreated the Voyager ship - it was just practical, and even some of his coworkers had used it during their shifts. There was no better way than to understand Voyager’s systems than to use them yourself. But it was also easier to hide a lie in the truth, so the Voyager ship program was above board, well known, and everyone had access - and the crew subprogram was hidden behind layers of programming and codewords, and of course, a personal access code. Barclay had found it much easier to hide his after-work holo activities while working on Pathfinder than ever before. It wasn’t a spaceship, it was a day job - and everyone went home after the day was done. The building would empty out, and he’d be alone, free to immerse himself in the one activity he knew would never upset him, would never judge him, or make him feel the slightest bit badly about himself.
So Barclay spent night after night with the Voyager crew, and he came to know them all better than he’d ever known the Enterprise crew. He was there for all of it - their ups, their downs. Their fears and worries. Their successes and failures. They confided in him like a true friend, and he found it easy to confide in them as well. For all intents and purposes, they became real friends to him.
Including the captain.
When Barclay had started sleeping in quarters on Voyager, he’d started eating breakfast there, and it was there he had the most personal interactions with Janeway. She came in every morning for a cup of coffee. He noticed her right away, getting a cup at the replicator while he was in the kitchen, cooking omelettes with Neelix. Barclay would look up from the eggs and see her sipping her coffee and greeting the crew, exchanging morning pleasantries. He knew the moment the caffeine would hit her system, as she’d roll her shoulders back and a large smile would cross her face. It was always entrancing, and Barclay found he could never look away from that expression on her face. She never caught him looking, so he never stopped, and it became something he looked forward to every morning - seeing that smile. Sometimes Janeway would leave immediately after that, for whatever holodeck-conjured issue was at hand - meetings or briefings, away missions, what have you. But sometimes she would take a seat at one of the tables and sip her coffee, poring over a padd or in conversation with Tuvok or Chakotay, her most trusted advisors.
One day, she came to him. Barclay was startled from his whisking when a mug was placed on the counter in front of him abruptly, and he looked up to see the captain, staring him down.
“Barclay,” she said, some urgency in her voice.
“Captain,” he replied, stopping his whisking. “Did you want eggs?”
She looked down at the bowl in his hands and smiled. “Not today,” she said. “Though I hear they are delicious.”
“You oughta try them, Captain,” piped up Paris from his usual spot nearby. He was normally in the mess in the mornings, hanging out with Barclay and Kim, the three of them having formed somewhat of a Three Musketeers type bond. Barclay had found Paris and Kim to both be personable, and so different from the usual Starfleet type. He especially admired Paris - someone that Starfleet had kicked when he was down, but he still showed up to do his best, every day. If Barclay really thought about it, he found it was no wonder he liked the Voyager crew so much. Most of them were nothing like the crews he’d worked with before. He found them so easy to get along with.
Janeway held up her hand towards Paris, bringing Barclay back to the current conversation. “One day, I promise,” Janeway said. “But right now, I need the lieutenant’s help with something.”
“What’s wrong, Captain?” Barclay asked. She was in captain mode, which he normally saw on the bridge or in the briefing room, so seeing it in this informal atmosphere was concerning.
“It’s the warp core, there’s been some instabilities lately,” Janeway said, sighing a little. “B’Elanna is doing her best, but she’s still not fully acquainted with Federation technology.”
Barclay nodded, absorbing the information. He’d designed the Voyager crew program to include these little interludes, as it gave him a distraction now and then, as well as provided a little variety to the program. “Of course,” Barclay replied. “On my way now, Captain.”
Barclay handed the bowl of half-whisked eggs to Neelix, and he heard Kim groan in disappointment.
“Neelix’s eggs are never as good as yours,” Kim whined as Barclay made his way around the counter, coming to stop between Kim and Janeway.
Barclay grinned and patted him on the shoulder. “Into each life, some rain must fall, my young friend.” The sounds of Paris’ laughter followed Barclay as he left the mess with Janeway.
He allowed her to take the lead to engineering, deferring to her as he would any captain, waving an arm forward to invite her into the turbolift first.
“Engineering,” Janeway commanded to the computer, and a soft chime indicated they were on their way.
Barclay stole a sidelong glance at Janeway. Despite noticing her movements around the ship, and sitting in on meetings and brainstorming sessions, he hadn’t had much chance to interact with her one on one. Normally he wouldn’t have minded, and it made sense that he spent most of his time with other crew members who would be working on the various engineering and physics aspects of the Voyager problem with him. He spent a lot of time with Kim, Paris, and Torres, and only gave the occasional report to Janeway when she checked in.
He realized he wanted to rectify that. He’d always seen his previous commanding officers as being at arm’s length - no matter how they professed their door was always open. Barclay knew that Janeway wasn’t like that. But it still meant crossing that line and starting a conversation, and that always was a near-insurmountable challenge to Barclay. But this was Voyager - and the crew were his friends. He didn’t have anything to fear here.
“How’s your morning been, Captain?” Barclay said after he found his voice, and did something he’d never done before - spoke conversationally to his captain.
Janeway grinned at him. “You never know how many little things could go wrong before breakfast until you become a starship captain.”
Barclay laughed. “The burden of command.”
“True, but the burden of a malfunctioning Tucker tube is preferable to a Borg attack any day of the week,” Janeway quipped.
They arrived at engineering before long, and Barclay found he was pleasantly surprised that Janeway stayed after they arrived, and Torres explained the instability issue. After breaking the ice with her, Barclay found he wanted to spend more time with her, to have more conversations. He couldn’t explain it - he just felt as if she was fulfilling some niche that had previously been empty. The three of them put their heads together and solved the problem at hand - the ejection system had developed a feedback loop thanks to a component failure. It hadn’t taken the three of them very long to troubleshoot it.
“Thanks Reg,” Torres said as she hit a few buttons on the console, confirming that warp core operations were back to normal. “I’m still learning how this Federation ejection system works.”
Barclay nodded knowingly. “It’s not your fault; Maquis ships often utilize Bajoran-based design elements. Sometimes it can be very different to Federation technology.”
Torres put her hands on her hips. “It’s been a learning curve, that’s for sure,” she replied.
“And there’s nobody better who could do it than you,” Barclay leaned towards her. He admired her greatly, and he felt a kinship with her. When Torres was in her element, on a Maquis ship, she was a star engineer. From what Barclay knew of the Val Jean, Torres had that ship completely under her thumb. But as a fish out of water, she was bound to run into problems that the average Starfleet ensign could fix on their own simply, and he knew firsthand how embarrassing something like that could be, to be at the mercy of life circumstances beyond your control.
“We’ll leave you to it, B’Elanna,” Janeway said, and tilted her head at Barclay, indicating he should follow.
“I wanted to talk to you,” she said to him once they were in the hallway outside engineering. “I’ve noticed lately how good you are with the crew.”
Barclay smiled. “Well, thank you captain.. I like to consider myself a helpful crewmate.”
“It’s not just that,” Janeway said, placing a hand on Barclay’s shoulder, causing him to stop mid-step. He looked down in surprise at her hand - it felt warm and real, as all things generated by the holodeck did, and the weight of it was comforting. She removed her hand after he stopped, and Barclay found he missed the contact for reasons he had trouble articulating. “Mister Barclay, you’ve become a good friend to many of the crew. As you know, we don’t have a ship’s counselor.”
Barclay nodded. “Seems like something of an oversight, in retrospect.”
“I’ll have to address it with Starfleet at my next opportunity,” Janeway said, her eyes twinkling. “But it seems as if you’ve become a de facto counselor for much of the crew. Of course, it’s not something I would ever order you to do, or to continue doing if you didn’t want to-”
“Captain, say no more,” Barclay interrupted, closing his eyes and tilting his head towards her. He was flattered by her comments. “Being a sounding board for the crew is something that comes naturally to me. It’s not a problem. I enjoy it.”
Janeway smiled warmly, in that way she had when someone lived up to every expectation she had of them. Barclay liked that smile - he would see it in meetings sometimes, when one of the members of the crew would come up with a brilliant idea to get them out of whatever predicament they were in. It meant you’d made the captain happy, and he understood exactly why every member of this crew wanted to make her happy. Himself included. That smile turned on him made his legs feel like jello.
“Watch yourself, Reg, or you’ll become indispensable,” she said, resuming their walk, and Barclay quickly hopped back into place beside her.
“I wouldn’t dream of it, Captain,” he joked.
They continued their smalltalk as they made their way back to the turbolift, and then said goodbye as they went to their separate destinations. But Barclay couldn’t get the entire interaction out of his head - her smile, the way she’d praised him for something he hadn’t even intentionally done. The touch to his shoulder.
Barclay laid in bed that night, in his simulated Voyager crew quarters, and thought of that moment in particular. He rubbed his hand over his shoulder where she’d touched him, almost still able to feel the slight pressure of her hand there, like an indelible imprint. He blew out a whoosh of air from his mouth and rolled over in bed, trying to forget about it. He knew now what it was. It was a crush - he’d had them before, many of them. He had made mistakes about it in the past, and he understood in particular how he had hurt Deanna - and he had resolved never to do that again.
And he hadn’t. Barclay had never again purposely recreated a real person in the holodeck for the intention of a romantic interaction. He hadn’t created Captain Janeway to be the object of his affection. But maybe - unintentionally - she had become that anyway?
Barclay buried his face into his pillow and tried not to think about it.
It was a crush.
It would pass.
***
Barclay pushed his crush-related thoughts about Janeway to the background of his mind starting the very next morning. He didn’t want to let himself get distracted. So he resumed his usual routine of Pathfinder work, then Pathfinder after-work work, sleeping on the holodeck interspersed with trips home to make sure he didn’t neglect Neelix. He did little else outside of that routine, no matter how much his Pathfinder coworkers tried to invite him out to events or over for dinner. He liked his coworkers, but.. they weren’t the Voyager crew. They weren’t Paris, or Torres, or Kim, or Neelix, or Chakotay - or Janeway. Those people were his focus, and saving them - the real them - had become his only goal in life.
Every day he felt a little bit closer to solving the real life Voyager puzzle, and every time he made a breakthrough in his brainstorming, he felt the need to celebrate. Which was how he found himself in the Voyager mess hall, cracking open a bottle of champagne. He’d made a mathematical leap regarding the cosmic field collector design on the MIDAS array, and he predicted that making the programming changes would increase its threshold by at least 250%. That was a big factor in his theories on how to maximize energy input, which in turn - he believed - would facilitate getting a message deeper into space. To the Delta quadrant.
Barclay was surrounded by his usual group of friends in the mess hall as they all lined up glasses to get some of the champagne. Barclay allowed himself this - what he knew others would call an indulgence, not that he would have ever personally used that word. Sure, he’d present his findings to Commander Harkins the next day, who would review it and tell Barclay “Good work,” dismiss him, and Barclay would go right back to his console to work on the next thing. There was never any celebration in Starfleet - making incredible, brilliant leaps and getting nothing more than a perfunctory ‘good work’ from your commanding officer was the default. Here on Voyager, though, he could allow himself the pat on the back for a job well done. His work mattered. It would - eventually - rescue the lives of this crew, he was sure of that. Didn’t that deserve a little recognition?
“You’ve done it again, Reg,” Torres said, laughing as she took a swig of the champagne. “It’s all I can do to keep up with you sometimes.”
Barclay shook his head as he poured his own glass, passing the bottle off to someone who continued pouring rounds. “Don’t diminish your abilities, B’Elanna,” he said. “Without your input on geomagnetic waveforms, I couldn’t have made the proper calculations.”
She shrugged, somewhat embarrassed, as the others congratulated her as well. He enjoyed receiving recognition for his work, that was true - but he enjoyed sharing the spotlight too. As much as his performance reviews often included phrases like “prefers to work independently,” it wasn’t actually true. He revelled in teamwork - as long as that team actually respected him. Barclay sighed happily to himself. This was a perfect day, he thought. The only day he could envision as being more perfect would be the day he finally made contact with Voyager.
“Do you think you’ll be able to make contact soon? With the lost ship?” A voice came behind him, and he looked over to see the Captain coming to his side, raising an eyebrow at him inquisitively.
Barclay felt an involuntary jerk go through his body at Janeway’s proximity. All that work pushing away his crush flew away on a warp trail in that moment. But he was glad she was there, and he couldn’t prevent the smile that crossed his features when she came close.
“There’s still several hurdles to jump,” Barclay replied. “But I already have some thoughts for the next step.. after this, I’ll probably return to astrometrics and work on some more calculations.”
Janeway had a concerned look. “Oh?” she asked. She furrowed her brow, deep in thought. “Why don’t you come with me for a moment, Reg?”
Barclay exchanged a look with Paris, who gave him a you’re in trouble now expression. He just shrugged as he followed the captain. She led the way to a couple seats under a window, and Barclay took a moment to appreciate the view of the stars before focusing his attention on the woman across from him.
“I’m worried, Reg,” Janeway said, leaning forward on the little table between them. “You’ve been working a little too hard recently.”
Barclay laughed and looked down into his drink, but he felt his cheeks warm slightly. The captain noticed how hard he was working? And - and she cared? “No, captain - I promise you, it’s nothing I can’t handle.”
Janeway tilted her head, and Barclay looked up to meet her gaze. She was staring at him - no, not at him.. into him. He felt as if she was taking him apart with that look, trying to get to the truth of his statement. He cleared his throat, not quite used to being the subject of such intense examination. “Captain?” he asked tentatively.
“Alright, Reg,” she said and she blinked, breaking the moment as her gaze softened. “I’ll believe you for now. But I’m going to keep an eye on you.”
Barclay felt himself blush again. Knock it off, he told himself. She would say this to any crew member. And that was probably true.. but he still couldn’t help how he was responding. “It’s completely unnecessary Captain, I assure you.”
“Humor me,” she grinned.
He smiled back. “Of course,” he replied.
“How’s the champagne?” Janeway asked, reaching for his glass. Barclay let her take it, somewhat surprised as she sniffed it then took a sip from his glass. “Not bad,” she mused. “Better than the replicator usually manages when it comes to synthehol.”
Barclay tried to think of Picard taking a drink from someone else’s glass and the image of it made him chuckle. Janeway looked at him, quirking her lip at his laughter. “What did I say?”
“No, no - nothing you said. You’re just the first captain I’ve ever had that I felt like - like I could be friends with.”
She smiled. “I think we’re already friends, Reg. I like to think we became friends some time ago.”
She passed his glass back and he took a sip, marvelling at the intimacy of sharing a glass with her. “I think you’re right, captain,” Barclay replied.
“You know, you can call me Kathryn, Reg,” Janeway said. “As long as I’m not issuing you an order.”
Barclay dropped his mouth open, then snapped it back shut. Her comment was unexpected. He hadn’t programmed any type of flirtation into her character - or any character. He’d let the computer assemble their personalities based on the input data as faithfully as possible and had made no adjustments. This was how the computer interpreted her to be - open, warm, friendly, playful.. a little flirtatious. He didn’t know if the real Janeway would ever act like this - but it didn’t matter. Short of finding a way to contact her and help the rest of her crew, he wasn’t interested in that Janeway.
He was interested in this Janeway.
“Kathryn,” he let the name roll off his tongue, and it felt natural. She smiled and turned to look out the window, the starlight reflected in her eyes, making her grey-blue eyes look a little bit lighter. He thought of all the photons involved in the tableau surrounding him - from the dim, far-off stars, to every strand of hair on Janeway’s head and every small skin imperfection and freckle on her face, to the people surrounding them, chattering and sipping champagne. The way photons came together in the holodeck was beautiful on its own, but it had also led to the creation of the character in front of him - Captain Kathryn Janeway. And she was as beautiful as every photon that comprised her.
“Can I show you something?” he asked, bringing her attention back to him. He had to admit to himself - he liked it. He liked the captain’s attention, especially if undivided. Did he really need to deny that to himself? This was the holodeck, and everything he did in here was nothing more than a silly fantasy. Nothing was permanent, and it could all be deleted with a few words to the computer. I’m not hurting anyone, he told himself, and he believed it. He would make sure the real Janeway would never know about this, because it had nothing to do with her.
“Is it work related?” Janeway asked. “Because I’m declaring the rest of the evening to be work-free.”
Barclay shook his head. “No, no work. Promise. And you know I’d never break a promise.”
“Never,” Janeway replied, smiling, and he was touched by her absolute faith in him. They got up from their seats, and Barclay offered his arm to her. She looked at him, surprised, but then took it, and Barclay couldn’t help but focus on the heat of her arm linked with his, and the occasional brush of her leg or side against him as they walked. He nodded at his friends as he and the captain left the mess hall. They made small talk as Barclay directed them towards their destination. Eventually, once they hit a specific corridor of a specific deck, Janeway knew where they were headed.
“Astrometrics? Reg, I thought you promised -”
“Ah!” Barclay held up his hand, forestalling the rest of her objection. “It’s not about work. But what I have to show you is in here.”
He led her inside, and they stood on the dais in front of the large screen that made up the majority of the wall inside the lab. Barclay started tapping rapidly on the console, fingers flying, as he excitedly pulled up what he wanted to show her.
“As you know, most of my theories and research revolve around wormholes. I’ve been utilizing a number of deep space probes and arrays to comb through space, looking for related phenomena.”
Janeway nodded, looking over his shoulder to the console. She was so close behind him, he could smell her subtle, unique smell - he couldn’t have described or quantified it unless he got a gas spectrometer involved, but that hardly mattered. It was Janeway, and he got so wrapped up in focusing on her smell that he’d forgotten what he was doing for a second.
“Reg?” came her concerned voice.
“Sorry, I uh - got distracted by a stray thought.”
Janeway chuckled. “That mind never stops running.”
“No, I suppose not,” Barclay smiled as he resumed his tapping on the console. Eventually, he brought up an image on the screen - a swirling mass of color, blues and purples, a coalescing group of hair-like strands, curling in on itself in a moebius strip-style fashion.
Janeway gasped a little as she looked at the image, taking up the entire wall in front of them, filling her field of view. “It’s beautiful. What is it?”
“A sub-quantum primordial wormhole,” he said, his finger tapping in the air to emphasize each word. “It’s always been a theoretical possibility, but, my team discovered this recently. It was visible for only a few seconds before blinking out of existence. It’s a minor miracle we were looking in the right part of space at the right time to capture this.”
“A primordial wormhole?” Janeway asked, whistling. “That’s an incredible discovery.”
“The colors are due to the waveform algorithm applied to the observational data from the array,” Barclay was unable to keep himself from rambling, pleased that she liked what he was showing her. “Of - of course it doesn’t look like this floating out there in space.”
“Sub-quantum.. well, it doesn’t look like anything at all to the naked eye, does it?” Janeway remarked, eliciting a laugh from Barclay.
“Well - no, good point,” he replied. Barclay stared at her as she observed the image, the whirling strands on a constant loop, the light reflecting off Janeway’s features. She was a striking woman, and he mentally traced her jawline, her nose.. her lips. Lips he suddenly found himself wanting to kiss. But it wasn’t just her looks - she was a charming, intelligent woman, the kind of woman he’d always preferred. Barclay was hit by the realization that Janeway was.. the perfect woman.
“Reg?” she’d looked over and noticed him staring at her. “What is it?”
“I was just -” Barclay started, but then took a breath, steadying himself. As confident as he was here, he was still nervous when it came to matters of love, and no matter what, she was still an independent holodeck program. She could always say no, and while it would sting, he knew there would be no lasting effects. Janeway could turn him down today, and tomorrow, she would still tell him he was a valuable member of her crew.
Be brave, he encouraged himself.
“I was just thinking.. that while this primordial wormhole is beautiful, it’s nowhere near as beautiful as you,” Barclay said, injecting as much confidence as he could in the statement, and he felt proud of himself that he didn’t stutter once.
Janeway blinked in surprise, then her face broke into a smile. “Reg.. that’s the nicest compliment I’ve received in a long time.” She looked up again at the screen, eyes taking in the sight. “Maybe ever.”
Barclay smiled, relieved that she didn’t immediately reject him. He felt another surge of confidence. He reached up and placed his hand against her cheek, pulling her face back towards himself. She looked up at him questioningly, and it wasn’t until that moment that Barclay even registered their height difference. Janeway always felt larger than life when he was in her presence - she was her own astral phenomenon that demanded the largest stage in any room. But here she was, looking up at him. Her skin felt impossibly soft under his hand, and he rubbed his thumb against her lower lip as he stepped closer, pressing himself against her.
Janeway opened her lips slightly, her tongue darting out to wet them. Barclay didn’t know a lot about women, but judging from the way she wasn’t pushing him away - and in fact, she’d brought up her hands to clutch onto his arms when he’d gotten closer to her - she was receptive to this. Outside of the holodeck, every kiss he’d ever had felt unsure, and even when the women reciprocated, he worried every second that she’d push him away. He wasn’t worried now. He wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her even closer, feeling her body conform to his as he did so.
“I’m going to kiss you,” Barclay said to her, not posing it as a question, because he knew it was about to happen. Confidence surged through him, a feeling he never felt anywhere outside of the holodeck; it felt like a warm, comforting blanket. A familiar feeling that he welcomed back.
Janeway just nodded at his declaration, seemingly unable to say any words, but one side of her mouth quirked up in that distinct fashion of hers - and he leaned in. When their lips connected, it was like a shock that ricocheted through Barclay’s body, starting from the connection point and bouncing around within him until it reached the tip of his toes. He could smell her fully now, his senses surrounded by her, and he closed his eyes as he deepened the kiss - their mouths opening and tongues darting, questioningly at first, then with more intention. It was a heated kiss, with Janeway making little noises against him as their fervor grew, and Barclay couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so swept away by a woman in his arms. After a moment, he pulled away. He felt his breath coming fast, and he was pleased to notice the same of the captain.
Captain.
He’d just kissed his captain, and it was the best kiss of his life.
“Reg, that was.. incredible,” Janeway said, her hands still gripping his arms. She seemed unwilling to put distance between them, and he felt the same.
“Incredible doesn’t seem descriptive enough a word,” he replied. She smiled at him and he felt his heart flutter.
“They probably haven’t invented a word that describes it well enough,” Janeway said.
“We’ll just have to come up with a new one,” Barclay murmured, unable to help himself from dipping his head down for another kiss, just as eager as the first.
Suddenly, Janeway pulled back. “What’s that?” she asked.
Barclay blinked and looked around, and the sound that had been going off for the previous fifteen seconds finally penetrated his brain. It was a soft, repetitive chiming sound.
His alarm. He’d spent the whole night in the holodeck, never even going to bed. He sighed.
“I have to get going,” Barclay said. “I have a meeting to get to.”
“I thought I declared this a work-free evening,” Janeway grinned.
Barclay reflexively tightened his arms around her. “I’m just too in-demand,” he remarked. It was morning, and in an hour, his Pathfinder coworkers would start filtering into the building. He needed to take a shower and try to look somewhat presentable before then. As much as he hated to, he needed to end this night in the holodeck.
“Well, your captain is demanding a little of your time, too,” Janeway said, but let him go. “My quarters? Tomorrow night? I have some replicator credits saved up and I’ve been in the mood for lasagna.”
Barclay grinned, from ear to ear, the butterflies swimming everywhere from his stomach to his head. He’d kissed her - and she’d reciprocated. And now.. she was inviting him to dinner. At her place. He was the luckiest lieutenant in Starfleet.
“It’s a date.”