DISCLAIMER: Star Trek: Voyager and the characters belong to Paramount. The events in the story and any errors are mine.

If I Had Known Then

Janeway found Ensign Kim sitting in the mess hall, trying to make sense of what had gone wrong during their brief slipstream travel. The drive was being dismantled until the technology could be perfected, and Kim was determined to keep trying.

The Captain sat next to him and informed him that Seven of Nine had found an encoded message embedded in the transmission she received through her neural transceiver. Apparently, that transmission had saved the ship from destruction and the crew from an icy death. Kim and Chakotay had survived in the shuttlecraft and made it to earth, but it was a future they could not accept. They spent years trying to change that future until they finally succeeded. Kim knew it was his calculation error that caused the disaster. He was having a hard time accepting the Captain's assurances that he had also been the one to alter time itself to save them.

Kathryn handed him a data storage device containing the encoded message. "It is from Harry Kim to Harry Kim." She left him at the table and started toward her quarters. She had a second device in her hand that she had attempted to conceal from the ensign. She had not told him there was another encoded message in the transmission, this one from Chakotay to her. In fact, she had not revealed its existence even to Chakotay yet. Seven was the only other person who knew about the second message, and Kathryn had ordered her to silence. Whatever was contained in the transmission, a future Chakotay had felt it important enough to piggyback on the temporal wave, encrypted to her and her alone.

Kathryn entered her personal quarters and placed the device on her desk. She removed her captain's jacket and laid it on her bed, then went to the replicator and ordered coffee. It had been a long, tension-filled day and even though it was getting late, she needed the comfort of her favorite drink. Finally, she sat in her desk chair and downloaded the message to her computer. Chakotay's face startled her when she began the playback. He was older, his hair peppered with gray, lines etched across his face and a hardness in his eyes she had never seen before. He looked worn, sterner, as if this future Chakotay had lived a much more trying existence than the gentle, kind face she knew in "her" Chakotay. When she recovered from the shock of seeing him, she started the playback again, this time listening to his words.

An hour later, Kathryn was still staring at her screen, her coffee almost untouched. Her mind was a storm of questions and uncertainties. The message was less than a minute long. She had watched it three times, and then played the words over and over again in her head as she paced the room from the desk to the sofa, around the table and back to the data screen. Finally, she decided there was only one thing to do. "Janeway to Chakotay, please come to my quarters."

The words came out sharper than she intended and they startled Chakotay. "What's wrong, Kathryn?" he asked with concern.

She tried to soften her voice, to slow the whirlwind of her thoughts. "Nothing is wrong. I will explain when you arrive."

"Of course," he answered. "I'll be right there."

He was at her door within two minutes. She heard the chime and called him in. He was in his uniform pants and blue-gray shirt, just as she was. "Good," she said to him. "You weren't asleep. I didn't realize the late hour when I called you here."

"No, I wasn't asleep," he assured her. "I guess I am still wound up from everything that happened today. I think we have crossed from late hour to early hour by now."

She was silent, seeming to stare at him and through him at the same time. Her expression was one of worry and contemplation, as she looked when about to make a major decision concerning the ship. He thought her eyes looked red, but maybe she was just tired. When she still did not say anything after several seconds, he broke the silence.

"Kathryn, you said nothing was wrong, but that clearly isn't true. What is it?"

She took a deep breath, opened her mouth, closed it again, then finally spoke. "You know about the message that Harry received embedded in the transmission to Seven. What you don't know is that there was a second encoded message."

He raised his eyebrows and questioned her, "What message? Who was it for? Or from?"

She looked away from him to the display screen on her desk. "It was from you. To me. I think you need to hear it. You deserve to know what it says."

She waved him to sit down in her desk chair and called up the message. She quickly stepped back to the couch, sitting down with one leg stretched along the cushion so she could look out the window, away from him. "Computer," she instructed. "Begin playback."

Chakotay saw his face, his older face, on the screen. He studied it curiously before the words began and he heard his own voice say, "Kathryn. I have to keep this brief. There is an old, earth saying that if I had known then what I know now, I would have done things differently. Well, I do know, Kathryn, and I cannot allow myself to live another life without you as I have had to do these last fifteen years. So, I am telling you this because I know that in your time frame, I won't do it. I am in love with you, Kathryn. Please give me the chance to tell you. I cannot bear another life without you in it."

That was it. The message ended. Chakotay was stunned and sat staring at the screen, the shock of his words reeling his mind. He felt betrayed. By his own self, no less! Why? Why did I do that to myself? To her? He wanted to scream. He felt tears welling up in his eyes and panic tightening his chest. He wanted to run, to get away from her and from himself, to escape somewhere the words were still unsaid. He found he couldn't move. "Great Spirits, what have I done?" he thought to himself.

Kathryn continued to stare out the window, allowing him time and silence to process what he had heard. After several minutes, she finally turned her head to look at him. She could see the same storm of emotions playing across his face that she had felt. She also saw the same tears glistening in his eyes. Quietly, she rose from the sofa and crossed the room to him. She came up beside him and placed her hand on his shoulder. "Chakotay," she said softly.

He turned his head away from her. Her touch on his shoulder only made it harder to blink back the tears. "What have I done," he thought to himself again. He had to say something, but what? What could he possibly say?

Kathryn pushed lightly on his shoulder to swing the chair around so he was facing her. Not wanting to loom over him, she knelt down and laid her fingers gently on his knees. She knew the answer to her question before she asked it. That answer was clearly written in the fear on his face, but she asked anyway. "Chakotay," she whispered. "Is it true?"

He slowly turned his head to face her, but he still wouldn't look her in the eye. He dropped his gaze to his lap, to her delicate hands resting on his knees, and took a deep breath. "I'm sorry, Kathryn," he said, his voice ragged. "I don't know why I did that. I should never have sent that message. I am so sorry!"

She reached up slowly and placed her fingertips under his chin, lifting his head so he would look at her. When he finally raised his eyes to her, she said, "You obviously felt it was important. You had lived fifteen years into the future, fifteen years of new experiences, new information, new knowledge gained, and a whole life we know nothing about. But out of all those years, all of the things you could have said to us, to me, this was the one thing you felt was most important of all. It's okay, Chakotay, just please tell me, is it true?"

He started to deny it, wanting desperately to keep his feelings locked away as he had struggled so hard to do for all this time. But when he remembered the image he had seen in the message, his face aged and hardened, and he tried to imagine what a life without her would be like, he couldn't do it. Just to imagine that life chilled him to the bone and filled him with dread. Obviously, a life without Kathryn was not a life worth living. He didn't trust his voice, so he simply nodded his head.

Kathryn squeezed his knees lightly and then stood up. She went to the replicator, intending to order another coffee since hers was ice cold. She decided they both needed something stronger, so instead she reached for the bottle of red wine on the shelf beside the replicator, poured two glasses, and carried them over to the sofa. "Come sit with me," she said. "We need to discuss this."

Chakotay fought the urge to turn and run out the door. No, he wouldn't do that to her. There was no escaping what had been said, what he had just admitted. He had to face it, to face her, and find a way to deal with the consequences. "Damn you, Chakotay!" he shouted in his mind as he went to sit beside her. He took the wine from her gratefully and downed half of it before setting it on the low table in front of him. He had his tears under control, but his emotions were another matter. Leaning forward, his elbows on his knees and his head down, he muttered again, "I'm sorry, Kathryn."

"Please," she said, "don't apologize. Not for this. Not for loving me."

"Did she really just say that?" he thought to himself. Having overcome the initial shock, he was growing angry with himself for sending the transmission, with her for showing it to him, with the whole situation and her insistence on protocol that had kept them apart for the last four years. He tried to keep his voice under control, emotionless. "I don't know what to say."

She slid over and placed her hand on his back. "Tell me why."

"I don't know why I sent that message."

"That's not what I mean," she said, leaning her shoulder into his. "Tell me why you love me." She felt him take a deep breath, his muscles under her hand tensed and tight. "And please look at me," she asked him.

He did look at her, and it was too much for him. He shrugged her hand off his back and sprang up, twirling to fully face her. "Damn it, Kathryn, what do you want from me? You can't tell me this is a big surprise to you!" He was shouting at her, but he couldn't control it. He didn't want to control it. "The whole damn ship knows how I feel about you. You know how I feel about you. Choosing to ignore that knowledge does not make it go away, no matter how much you want it to!"

Kathryn was taken aback by his vehemence. In the space of a few short minutes, she had managed to hurt him, and hurt him badly. She could hear it in his voice, see it in his face and the tautness of his body. Why hadn't she understood what would happen before she played that message for him? She should have known, but it had been his choice of words in the transmission that made her call him. "I… I don't know what I want. I don't know what I expected." She pointed to the computer on her desk. "I do know, have known, that you love me. But you said you were 'in love' with me. To me, there is big difference."

"Hell, Kathryn, do you think I don't know that?" He paced the floor from her sofa to the wall and back again. "I have loved women before. I can honestly say that until this, this whatever it is between us, I realized I had never been 'in' love. But it doesn't matter!" His voice continued to rise in volume. "That distinction makes no difference when you won't even acknowledge it, much less allow it. Well, I live with it every day. There are 150 other people on this ship, and you are the only one I ache to see every day. Yours is the only smile that can stop my heart in my chest. Your touch, no matter how brief, quickens me in a way no other's ever has. And I hate myself for it!"

Kathryn stood and went to him, and tried to reach out to his shoulder as she did so often. He jerked away from her, though, and stared down at her, the volatility of his emotions turning his eyes to black.

"Don't patronize me, Kathryn," he spat. "I am not one of your crewmen having a bad day and needing comfort. You wanted to give me the chance to tell you? Well, there you have it, all laid out nice and neat for you to play with like you have always done!" He spun on his heels and started for the door. She had been standing so close to him that he accidentally clipped her with his shoulder and she fell back onto the couch. He paused for a microsecond in sudden fear that he had hurt her, but when he saw her land on the cushion he kept going.

"Chakotay, wait!" she yelled out to him. "Please, wait!" He was already in the corridor, the doors closing behind him, when he heard the tears in her voice. "Come back to me!"

He found himself standing in the middle of the hallway in front of her door unable to make a decision which direction to go. His chest was heaving, his hands balled into fists at his sides. She had sprung this on him, forced this situation, with no warning whatsoever. He felt like a cornered animal. But something in the way she had touched him, in the tears in her voice as she pleaded for him to "come back to her," made him pause. He forcibly steadied his breathing and unclenched his fists, willing his mind and his muscles to let go of the anger and begin to calm. He had not meant to knock her down. What if she had been hurt after all? "Damn you, Chakotay," he whispered to himself again.

Kathryn was trying to untangle her feet and stand back up, but the tears wouldn't stop. The more she wrestled to get out of the awkward position she had landed in, the harder she cried. Finally, she managed to uncross her boot heels and spring up. With a sob, she swept up a wine glass off the table and hurled it at the wall. The crash came at the same time as her door chime. "Come!" she commanded.

Chakotay entered and stopped just far enough inside for the door to close again. They remained that way for what seemed an eternity, both of them breathing hard, her eyes a steel blue and his flint black as they glared at each other across the room. The tears still streamed down her cheeks but she did not even try to wipe them away. Finally, their breathing became more regular, her crying slowed, and their faces softened. Chakotay took a deep, steadying breath and looked at the shards of glass all over the floor. "I wish I had thought of that," he said. He managed a ghost of a smile as he asked, "Can I do the other one?"

Kathryn flashed him her infamous, mischievous half-grin. She flopped back down onto the sofa and put her head in her hands, then roughly brushed her fingers across each cheek. "Only if you pour me another glass first," she answered.

He went to the shelf and poured her another glass of wine, carrying the bottle with him to refill his own still sitting on the table. He went back to the doorway and began picking up the larger shards scattering the floor, putting them on the replicator to be recycled. He turned to her to ask where her vacuum was and saw her rubbing her collar bone where his shoulder had caught her. He quickly went to her and knelt down. "Are you okay? I'm sorry, it was an accident."

"I know," she said softly. She looked at him, her eyes back to their sparkling cobalt blue color. "I'm fine." He touched it lightly, wanting to make sure he hadn't cracked the bone since he had been so angry at the time, he could not remember how hard he had actually run into her. When his fingers touched the spot she had been rubbing, she winced and sucked in her breath. Chakotay was really concerned now.

"Come on," he told her. "We're going to sickbay." She tried to tell him it was just a bruise, but he wouldn't take no for an answer. He tended to forget how small in stature Kathryn really was, and his muscular build outweighed her by close to a hundred pounds. Finally, she stood up and allowed him to lead her toward sickbay. She was masking the pain, but he could tell she was hurting by the way she held that arm close to her side as they walked.

When they arrived in sickbay, Chakotay thanked his gods that no other crew members were present. The Doctor came out of his office and grabbed his medical tricorder as Kathryn perched on a bio-bed. "It's her left clavicle," Chakotay told the Doctor.

"What happened?" The Doctor asked.

Chakotay looked terrified, like he had been caught kicking a small dog, or maybe a small child. Kathryn spoke up quickly. "Just an accident, Doctor. Please, just fix it."

The Doctor scanned the bone and the tissue around it. "I don't see any fractures, but you do have a deep bone contusion consistent with a sharp blow. What, exactly, were you doing?"

Kathryn said in her Captain's voice, "Like I said, it was an accident."

The Doctor looked up from the tricorder readings at her and then at Chakotay. They both had reddened eyes, their heart rates and blood pressure were elevated, they had a small amount of alcohol in their systems, and Chakotay looked like a quiet "boo" would make him jump out of his skin. What was going on here?

The Doctor picked up the regenerator and began repairing the injury. While he was working, he told Kathryn in his own stern voice, "Captain, you know that I have to enter all injuries and treatments into my logs, particularly when those injuries involve you. I really must insist you explain."

Kathryn started to say something, but Chakotay cut her off. "It's my fault, Doctor." He put his head in his hand and continued, "We were arguing. I was angry and turned to leave, and when I did I accidentally hit her with my shoulder. I didn't know how hard I had clipped her. We didn't realize for several minutes that she was even hurt. Gods, Kathryn, I'm so sorry. All I seem to be doing to tonight is apologizing to you."

The Doctor looked back to Kathryn, concern evident on his face. "Is this true, Captain? Or did he assault you?"

Kathryn's eyes went wide at the Doctor's accusation. "No, absolutely not Doctor. He did not assault me! It was exactly as he said, as I tried to tell you. It was an accident."

Kathryn reached out and pulled Chakotay's hand away from his face so she could see him. "I'm okay. Really," she said reassuringly. He looked into her eyes, pleading with her to forgive him. She still had a grip on his hand, and he felt her slowly pulling it to her. She placed his hand on her cheek and leaned into his palm, her gaze locked with his. They stayed that way, lost in each other, until they heard the Doctor clear his throat to get their attention.

"It would seem that the argument is over," the Doctor said dryly. "I have healed the scene of the accident but you may feel some soreness for a day or two. I suggest you return to your quarters and get some rest. And Commander," he directed at Chakotay, "please be more careful the next time you decide to storm out of a room."

Chakotay was still so disturbed by what he had done that he didn't catch the joke. "I will, Doctor," he nodded emphatically. "Thank you." Both the Doctor and Kathryn smirked at his seriousness.

Kathryn slid off the bio-bed. "We can trust your discretion," she said to the Doctor in a part statement, part question.

"Of course, Captain," he assured her. "As I said, I do have to enter the incident in my logs, but I think I can do so in a way that will not compromise your privacy. Or the Commander's."

"Thank you, Doctor," she said. She took Chakotay's arm and led him out of sickbay and back to her quarters. They still had a lot to talk about, and a mess to clean up.