a/n: Merry Christmas Everyone! Sorry for the delay in posting this one; I've been home in Australia and the fires have been a nightmare. This chapter is also unbeta'd as I was too impatient to wait for Killermanatee. ;)

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2372: Initiations

The first time Kathryn Janeway truly acknowledges that she cares more than she should about the commander – about Chakotay – she's trying to save his life.

She's going through debris from a shuttle they've found floating in space, in a region close to where the commander was supposed to be. Only, they haven't heard from him in over six hours and she can't do any more than allow Tom to fly Voyager in an organised search pattern in the area that the ion trail - and their only lead – ended whilst she pours over the shuttle fragments with B'Elanna.

The knowledge that she has no choice but to sit and wait for answers is doing nothing to alleviate the sour taste in her mouth. Intellectually, she knows that none of this is her fault – despite her permission for him to go out on a shuttle alone and violate a few Starfleet protocols in the process. But then there are still moments where she blames it all on herself for allowing him to leave in the first place.

She wonders when she started to break the protocols she'd once held so dear.

So, here she is, tapping her fingers loudly on the console as she waits for the computer to finish its analysis and wishing that technology has advanced to the point where she can make time move faster, or simply make the commander appear by willing it to happen. She knows it's possible he survived the shuttle explosion – he does have a knack for getting himself out of trouble. It's also possible that whatever Kazon ship left the ion trail they are following has him on board; it's just a question of finding out where he is.

She just has to be patient, and above all else she's going to hold her head high and remain positive for her crew. Because the alternative is that he will never come home to Voyager and that's just not tolerable. She's accepted from the moment she made him first officer that she needs him.

Only she's severely underestimated just how much she would come to need him.

B'Elanna hovers by, watching her with an uncertainty that's thinly veiled and poorly disguised. She's probably trying to figure out exactly what the captain is doing in Engineering instead of on the Bridge, but Kathryn just can't sit up there, staring at the stars flashing by. Her thoughts are her own worst enemy sometimes, and she's been down this road before with bodies of her loved ones lying in a shuttle, the life gone from their eyes in a way that still haunts her memories.

She's quietly grateful to be away from Tuvok. She knows he sees right through her, and he is going to voice his concern over the mental and emotional state that's driving her determination to find her missing first officer. She doesn't want to face the reason why she feels this way.

"You're worried about him."

B'Elanna states it so quietly and assuredly that for a moment that Kathryn wonders if she heard it at all. Clear blue eyes glance up to the concerned face of the chief engineer, and for a brief moment she can see B'Elanna's resolve begin to waiver. Not for the first time, she ponders briefly what exactly those two went through before arriving on Voyager.

"Yes, I am."

And she really does worry about him.

But she's damn angry at him too for requesting that she break protocol and allow him to go off in a shuttle alone in enemy territory. She's hidden it well, playing the part of the neutral captain but there is a feeling in her gut that she just can't shake. She's tried to numb it with coffee and tried to distract herself with logic as she's shifted through the fragmented metal.

She turns away from B'Elanna, pretending to read the monitor instead if only so the other woman won't see her face.

Her emotions are so conflicting that she can't decide if she wants to force the anger or the worry. She hasn't thought much beyond the idea that the second he sets foot back on Voyager, she's going to reprimand him like a first-year cadet. She also hasn't thought much past the idea that they're going to have to find more resources to replace another shuttle.

Only now, she's beginning to realise that if he never comes back, she's going to miss him too. She'll miss his dry wit and his steadfastness beside her on the bridge every day. She'll miss the way he keeps his temper in check and his care for their crew – and the family they are beginning to make out here – and she's going to miss their attraction; never mentioned but a constant undercurrent that's there between them all the same.

She knows she isn't supposed to think like this, that no one should miss a fellow officer this much when it's not even confirmed that he's dead and regardless of what Tuvok would say, or the way that B'Elanna is looking at her now with quiet concern. But she also knows that this could also be a really, really big problem.

Somehow, somewhere, she's managed to start caring a little bit too much about her second-in-command during in the course of their short journey.

The computer beeps, and she turns her attention to the analysis that reveal absolutely nothing about his whereabouts. They're searching for him in the darkness of space with a tentative lead and an enemy that would see them dead before the year is out. She squares her shoulders and looks to B'Elanna, nodding as she swallows the hopelessness that she's beginning to feel.

"Well," she says. "I'll be on the bridge if you need me."

B'Elanna looks at her with something Janeway can't quite decipher. "Yes, captain."

As she leaves Engineering and enters the turbolift, her hand comes up to swipe across her face as she lets out a sigh. A few moments later, she strides onto the bridge and barks an order for them to continue to follow the ion trail as far as they can, and in the meantime, she hopes to formulate a plan for when the trail goes cold.

It doesn't matter if she cares more than she should about Chakotay; about the Commander. All that matters is that she's going to bring him home, and deal with her feelings later in the her quarters, away from prying eyes and from the light of day.