The List, Part Three

Oh-three-hundred. Again.

It felt like years had passed since she had enjoyed a proper night's sleep. This was unusual, surprising as it was, for her. As a woman with a coffee addiction who allowed stress and adrenaline to fuel her life, it would seem natural for Janeway to have trouble sleeping. But she took after her father in many ways, and was grateful to have his knack for heavy sleeping. Until recently, anyway.

It was all the damn doctor's fault. With days to reflect on the incident in the holodeck, she had come to several hypotheses regarding his motives for creating the program. But one thing she couldn't put a finger on was how he knew that she still harbored feelings for her sad sack of a first officer. Had he known that if she allowed herself to relax, to let her guard down, that she would let Chakotay wriggle himself right back into her thoughts? Or was his appearance in the program a fluke that the doctor hadn't planned at all? Asking him was completely out of the question, so she let herself dwell on the issue, focusing on who to blame rather than the problem itself. And she was self-aware of this fact, to be sure, but bringing herself to change her perspective was going to be difficult.

So she let it happen. Another night of waking up at oh-three-hundred, her mind plagued with unsettling thoughts, staring at the chronometer with resentment. A few more hours to dwell on her issues while her eyes burned behind her heavy lids.

It had been years since the angry warrior story, and she had trouble remembering the last time she allowed herself to feel something for him. He'd tried with her, over and over again, for months after New Earth. He all but begged her to reconsider, telling her he loved her and that the crew would understand. But she never let him in. She had made a vow to herself that her feelings for him couldn't leave that planet, that her ship and crew came first. So, as difficult as it was, she shut him out.

She'd become someone else in the months following that decision. A person the young Kathryn wouldn't have liked. She was focused and driven, but only for her work. She spent her few off-hours working overtime, and didn't allow even an errant personal thought to penetrate her focus. The balance between Captain Janeway and Kathryn Janeway began to strongly favor the former. She'd lost the woman who was capable of falling in love, and had decided that she would be gone for good.

But something about that damned Chakotay hologram made her feel different. And the fact that she could use the word feel again, well, that alone was progress.

Staring at the ceiling in the middle of the night wasn't going to get her anywhere. Enduring another night of it seemed impossible. So, she did something that only Kathryn would do, never the captain. Something that she'd be ashamed of the next morning. She went back to the holodeck.

He was waiting for her there. The program was just as she'd left it after the first night. The bar was empty and the lights were dimmed. The jukebox was playing some dim old jazz tune and stale smoke hung in the air. It was three a.m. here, too.

"Come back, have you?" he asked her, not getting up from his chair.

She smiled, holding herself back a bit. The captain in her was screaming at her to leave, but she didn't move from the doorway of the bar.

"What are you doing up so late?"

"I could ask you the same question," she replied.

"Come, sit," he offered, standing now, and offering her a chair.

It took more of an effort than she'd expected, crossing those last few feet to sit across from him. But the memory of their last all-night conversation propelled her the rest of the way. She sat quietly down, and he pushed in her chair behind her.

"I'm glad you came back," he said, sitting down across from her. "I was hoping you would."

"I shouldn't be here." Her voice was low, rough with lack of sleep. She absently wondered if it sounded sexy.

He laughed, and flashed the dimples that used to make her melt. "Too late, I guess. Can I get you something?"

She shook her head, and looked at him. Her stomach tingled with nervousness. She felt like a child.

"Okay," he said. "So why shouldn't you be here? Too late for a responsible lady such as yourself to be out on the town?"

"Hardly. Though I suppose that should have occurred to me. It's the 'meeting a man in a bar' business that's more disturbing."

"Are you saying you don't normally date?"

"This isn't a date," she snapped, spine suddenly rigid.

He laughed at her again, dimples flashing once more. "I guess not."

She eyed him seriously as his smile began to fade. "You're a bit of a mystery to me, Kathryn," a voice inside of her cooed at the sound of his voice saying her name. "You come here, and immediately say you shouldn't have. We're alone together and you seem shocked at the notion that it might be a date. I'm not quite sure what to think."

"Do you have to overanalyze? Can't I just be here for the conversation?"

He looked disappointed, but willing to negotiate. "Fair enough. We'll keep it simple then. How was your day?"

And then things were easy.

And she was late for work.

But something slipped passed Janeway's radar, and it was something that would royally piss her off if she were to find out. Her late-night holodeck visit didn't go unnoticed as she'd planned. In fact, it didn't go unnoticed at all.

There was a little light flashing on the control panel on the real Chakotay's desk the next morning. A very small, but very meaningful little light. It set his plan in motion.