Written for the VAMB Secret Drabble 09. My recipient, Cori Mariee, wanted J/C with no unhappy endings or deaths, and provided me with a rather cryptic first line ... That is, until I googled it! I'm hoping the fic takes a different direction, as row equals boats, equals a fic either about Coda and Lake George, or New Earth and the boat trip that never was.

Thanks go to the almighty Google *bows*, Memory Alpha, and Memory Beta.

Time

Row on, row on, another day

May shine with brighter light

Ply, ply the oars and pull away

There's dawn beyond the night

Kathryn dangled the antique pocket watch by its chain as she read the inscription on the inside of the front case, taken from an old Earth folk song. She thought back to the day, three years previously, when Chakotay had given it to her on her birthday, and found a myriad of emotions all running through her at the same time.

Voyager's sudden arrival back in the Alpha Quadrant two weeks previously had unsettled her in more ways then she cared to admit. Like any routine which had suddenly been interrupted, Kathryn was trying to regain a sense of balance in her life that debriefings, counsellors sessions, reunions, and celebrations didn't seem to allow for. Her schedule had been so hectic that she hadn't realised she still had to pack up her quarters on Voyager until she had spent a whole hour looking for a book that she finally remembered was still on board. So, somehow, she had managed to find the time to beam up to Voyager and retrieve her belongings before the team from Starfleet Engineering came onboard and stripped the ship of anything with technological value.

She felt a tear rolling down her cheek and her hand quickly wiped it away as she wondered just what had made her lose control of her emotions. Perhaps it was the realisation that the daily struggle for survival was over, or that she wasn't going to see everyday the people who had become an intrinsic part of her life. Or maybe it was that she had to pick out new colours for her Starfleet apartment in San Francisco. She debated mentioning it to her counsellor in their next session.

The door chiming startled her. She sighed and briefly entertained the thought of ignoring it, before realising that as one of only three people currently on board whoever was bothering her wasn't doing it by accident.

"Come in," she called, hearing the door in the other room swish open at her command. Footsteps quickly followed, but stopped soon after.

"Kathryn?"

She quickly dropped the watch into the box in front of her and placed a few nearby books on top of it. "I'm, uh, in here, Chakotay."

Her First Office - former First Officer, she mentally corrected herself - stuck his head through the doorframe of her bedroom. "Still packing?" he said with a big grin on his face.

She forced a smile. "I'm getting there."

"Need a hand?" He sat himself next to her before she could protest, and began to rummage through the open storage cabinet in front of them. "Is there much more after this?"

"You don't need to help," she said as she leant back against the bed. Her hands went straight to her eyes, rubbing at them in a futile attempt to relieve the tension in her body. "I'm getting there, eventually."

Typical Kathryn, Chakotay smiled to himself. He turned his attention to the box she had been packing when he came in. She never admits when she needs- he stopped when his hands brushed against a metallic object underneath a stack of books. With a quick tug he pulled it out and found himself staring at an old birthday present he had given her, and one of their many arguments came back to him:

"What the hell are you doing?" Kathryn looked up from her PADD to see a clearly annoyed Chakotay standing in front of her desk with a box of various items in his hands. She knew the reason why he was here, and she returned her gaze to the morbidly depressing Engineering report in her hand, sensing the oncoming argument but hoping by some miracle to avoid it.

"Need I remind you of our deuterium levels, Commander?" she said with authority.

He dropped the box onto the desk in front of her and, despite herself, she flinched at the noise. "Why was all this is in the Recyc Facility?"

Kathryn raised her eyes to meet his. "We can't afford to waste energy on non-essentials."

He picked up the object on top. "Kathryn, I replicated this months ago."

She looked at the beautiful antique-style watch he had given her for her birthday, and felt a pang of regret at what she was about to say. "That watch represents a meal, a hypospray, or a pair of boots. It could mean the difference between life and death."

Her blasé opinion of a heartfelt present stung more than he wanted to admit. "If our deuterium runs out I doubt a few recycled trinkets will make the difference," he said bluntly.

She slammed the report down and quickly rose from her seat. "This crew has given up too much over the past few weeks - replicator rations, holodeck time, hell, even their quarters. What kind of Captain would I be if I asked this crew to make sacrifices if I was unwilling to do the same?"

The stress of their situation was taking its toll on both of them, and Chakotay decided to back away from the argument before it turned personal. It was a direction many of their arguments seemed to be heading in recently. "Understood, Captain," he said quietly, picking the box up. "I'll return these to Recyc."

"Dismissed," she ordered angrily, sitting back down in her chair with a large sigh after he had left. She rubbed furiously at the headache that throbbed behind her temples, and allowed herself the brief luxury of wondering just how long it would take for them to recover from this latest disagreement.

"I thought you recycled it," he said quietly. Kathryn opened her eyes to look at Chakotay, a mixture of emotions displayed on his face as he looked at the item in his hand. She was tempted to lie, to say that it had been overlooked, that the crew never finished recycling the items. For some reason, she decided to go with the truth.

"I couldn't go through with it," she admitted, her gaze shifting to the watch as the conversation took an uncomfortable and emotionally revealing direction. "An hour after you left my Ready Room I went back down there and rescued it."

Chakotay sighed, feeling slightly disappointed. "Why didn't you tell me?" He shuffled back to sit next to her, and the two of them stared at the watch in his hands as he turned it around and around. "I was mad at you for weeks afterwards," he said after a short silence.

"I'm sorry," she apologised. Of its own volition, her hand crept across to his and gripped it. "I know there were times when I wasn't exactly sympathetic of your feelings. If I ever did anything to hurt-" she cut off, swallowing deeply, "-hurt you …" Her free hand flew to her mouth and she used it to physically restrain her emotions from exploding.

"Kathryn?" He had never seen her so emotionally unguarded before. Almost instinctively, without thinking, he wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close to him. He gently let the watch fall to the floor and used his now free hand to stroke the back of her head, whilst his other hand held on to one of hers next to his chest. Words escaped him as he held her in his arms, feeling the suppressed sobs shuddering through her body. He wriggled his hand free from hers and placed it on her cheek, encouraging her to pull back from him slightly. He looked upon the face of Kathryn Janeway, her face flushed, her eyes red and puffy, and he realised he'd never seen her looking so beautiful.

Before he could stop himself and consider the consequences, he brought her lips to his and kissed her tenderly. Her whole body tensed and she inhaled sharply, his actions being the last ones she expected. Chakotay thought briefly she would end the kiss and push him away, but her body soon relaxed against his. They kept it simple and sweet between them; Chakotay's fingers mingled slightly in her hair as they stroked down her face, and Kathryn's hands crept up to rest gently on his neck and over his racing pulse.

Soon after it had begun, it was all over. They pulled apart at the same time and their foreheads moved to rest gently together. Kathryn kept her eyes closed, licking her lips once and feeling a tingle race through her body as she tasted him on them. "That was ... unexpected."

"Unwanted?"

"I didn't say that." She pulled back from him to look him in the eyes, and her gaze took a more serious tone. Chakotay didn't need words to know what she was telling him.

"I need to talk to someone," he admitted. He hadn't officially told Kathryn of his relationship with Seven. He knew she was aware of it, but he had been unsure how to bring it up in conversation. Looking into her eyes, he now realised why.

Kathryn gently bit her lip, feeling the tears threatening to return once again. "Once that's all smoothed over ... I think we need to get to know each other again. Away from all this."

"I agree," he smiled. "There's a Kathryn in front of me I've never met before"

"Tell me about it, my emotions are all over the place. I think it's that damned councillor they're making us see." She wiped at the tears now running down her cheeks.

"Hugh Cambridge?" he asked her, getting a nod as a response. "He's a jackass."

Kathryn laughed and choked on her tears at the same time. "He's good though," she countered.

"You know, I think I've only ever seen you cry once." Both of them thought back to a night over five years previously, on a planet nearly 70,000 light years away. Their hands intertwined just like they had done then, after he had told her a story of an angry warrior and the woman who gave him peace.

"Ensign Watkins to Captain Janeway," a female voice interrupted over her commbadge.

Kathryn ran a quick hand over her face, as if the young Ensign were about to see her dishevelled appearance in person. "Janeway here," she responded after tapping the insignia on her chest.

"Admiral Paris requests your appearance at 0900 hours tomorrow morning at Starfleet Headquarters, and I have a dozen messages from Captain Scott awaiting clearance to begin work on Voyager."

"Acknowledged, Ensign. Confirm my appointment with the Admiral, and inform Captain Scott that Voyager is all his as of tomorrow morning."

"Yes Ma'am, Watkins out."

Chakotay chuckled slightly. "Your assistant?" Kathryn nodded, rolling her eyes. "I get the feeling I'll be seeing a lot of her."

"That's if she stops calling me 'ma'am'." She looked at him and for the first time in what felt like a long time, she laughed. She stood up, encouraging to Chakotay to do the same with their still-joined hands. "I'd better finish packing."

"Do you want me to stay and help?"

Kathryn looked at him squarely, taking a few seconds to choose her next words. "I think you have some things to take care of," she said diplomatically. "But, when you're done with that, I should be finished here."

A shy smile spread across Chakotay's lips, and he resisted the urge to tug on his earlobe. "Are you free for dinner?"

She smiled. "That sounds nice." He pulled her hands to his lips, and placed a separate, lingering kiss on each of her fingertips.

"We have plenty of time," he mumbled before detangling his hand and walking out of her quarters. Kathryn bent down to pick the watch back up, and she lovingly caressed the metal casing.

"Plenty of time," she repeated.