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The conference room seemed deserted as Captain Kathryn Janeway strode through the doors. It wasn't until she was seated behind the massive table that she became aware of the solitary figure outlined in the shadows by the furthest window. She started to speak, but then hesitated, opting instead to study Commander Chakotay in thoughtful silence.

Janeway couldn't begin to fathom what must be going through his mind. No matter how much time had passed, it seemed that Seska's betrayal had shaken Chakotay to the core. Like herself, he was stranded at the top of a chain of people who sometimes blamed them both for their situation, stranded out here at the far edges of the galaxy. At least she had Tuvok and a crew she'd worked with: Chakotay, she realized, had nobody, not even Tuvok or Torres, the people he'd counted on for the last several months.

"Are you all right, Commander?" she asked softly. Turning sharply toward her voice, he visibly relaxed when he saw who had spoken.

"Captain. I'm sorry, I didn't hear you come in."

"At ease, Chakotay." She hesitated slightly before asking, "Is there anything I can do?"

Hearing the faint edge of sympathy in her tone, he straightened his back. "I was just stealing some quiet time by myself," he answered curtly.

"Seems like you've been doing a lot of that lately. I hardly ever see you except on bridge duty."

"Well, I haven't felt much like socializing," Chakotay answered with a hard laugh that held no humor.

"I wasn't suggesting that you throw a party. But I do think you need to be around people more."

He snorted in derision. "Getting too close to the crew--that's where I made my first mistake."

"Seska was a traitor to all of us," Janeway said, rising and crossing to the window next to him. "She played me for a fool. B'Elanna thought she was her friend. She even fooled Tuvok, and that's saying a lot."

Chakotay turned away, wincing. "You can't possibly understand. Maybe you think you can, after what Tuvok did to get the space-folding technology, but it wasn't the same."

He fell silent, but she sensed the direction his thoughts had been moving. "I heard what she said to you in sickbay."

"You only know part of the story." His voice was harsh. "I trusted her. I thought she understood what my home meant to me, she'd experienced Cardassian occupation herself. She may have said she loved me, but she didn't know me." It took several moments for him to gather his thoughts, and he would have become lost in them again had she not placed her hand on his arm. Her steady touch brought him out of his reverie. She stood silently next to him, waiting for him to continue.

"We met not long after I left Starfleet. I was running along the Cardassian border, and Seska appeared at one of the ports of call. She had certain information we had been looking for, so I agreed to take her along. Convenient, wasn't it?" he asked wryly. "I fell for her story, hook, line and sinker." Janeway smiled at the old Earth saying, moving away to give him the space he needed. She couldn't ever recall Chakotay opening up like this; she considered that things might be even worse than she'd thought, since he was.

"We worked together for almost a year before Tuvok showed up." Shaking his head, he grinned ruefully. "Mistake number two. But not as careless as becoming involved with Seska." He sighed. "It was what you would call a crunch situation. We were in the middle of a series of dangerous missions, she was there, she was solicitous and made me forget how bad things were for a little while. But I knew almost immediately that I had made a bad decision." He paused, running a hand through his hair and over his face. "I told her it wouldn't work--two people serving under those circumstances had no right to be involved with each other. But I don't think she ever gave up. You saw how easily I was able to set her up, I hated that I could do that to her, even if she was a traitor. It's one of the most dishonorable things I've ever done."

Janeway waited for him to continue, then realized that he expected her to say something. She thought carefully. "I don't like asking my officers to go against their better judgment, but--"

"No 'but's, Captain. We both did what we had to do. I just don't like the taste it left." With that comment left hanging in the air, Chakotay brushed past her and headed out of the room, leaving Janeway standing in silence.

Later, trying to focus on her reports, Janeway's thoughts kept returning to Chakotay. She'd known almost from the beginning that Seska was trouble--something had set off alarms in the captain's head--but there had been nothing outward to confirm them. It wasn't because Seska was Maquis; so were Chakotay and Torres, and Janeway had trusted them implicitly ever since their first encounter. Shaking her head to clear it, she returned to her work, but her concentration wandered. It was very late when she finally decided to abandon the reports for the evening. Glancing at the chronometer on her desk, she realized that she had missed dinner. Exiting her ready room, she looked around at the staff on the bridge--apparently a shift change had occurred, also. She shook her head in mild annoyance, entered the turbolift and headed for the mess hall. Surely Neelix would have something left over; if she missed a meal, it had become his habit to put something aside for her. Secretly, she thought he did it to prevent her from using her replicator rations.

She decided to take a quick turn through engineering on her way. The departure of Seska had left them short-handed, and Janeway felt a need to see how things were going. She entered the engine room on the upper deck, the catwalk overlooking the warp core. Pausing momentarily, she allowed her gaze to settle on the console where B'Elanna was usually stationed. Seska had been friendly with the chief engineer, but the Klingon woman didn't seem as affected by her betrayal as Chakotay. Maybe her Klingon heritage has something to do with it, Janeway thought, continuing along the walkway.

As she passed down the first steps, she had a sudden recollection of a conversation with Chakotay here in engineering, right after she had made him her first officer. With that ever-present glint in his eye, he had given her a cockeyed grin and innocently asked, "If things had happened differently and we were on the Maquis ship right now, would you have served under me?" She had been tempted to respond with a similar double entendre, until she caught a glimpse of the ship behind him, a stark reminder of her responsibility to its crew. She remembered her answer--"One of the nice things about being Captain is that you can keep some things to yourself"--and how she had turned and strode off, hopefully before Chakotay picked up on what she wasn't saying. She shook her head, trying to quash the embarrassed grin that crept over her features. He had no business asking her such a thing even off the record, even if he had meant the question seriously. But she had not been able to prevent her second in command from haunting her dreams...before she could suppress it, she was reminded of a nocturnal image of the two of them alone, of what it might be like to, well, serve under him...

Arriving at the dining hall, Janeway was relived to see only a handful of personnel scattered about. Neelix had indeed set something aside for her; she found it in its usual place, along with the standard note from Kes reminding her that she really must take better care of herself. Smiling wryly, she wavered between eating alone in her cabin or eating here, still alone.

As Janeway was finishing, the doors opened with a barely audible swish. Lost in her thoughts, she kept to her meal, her back turned toward the late arrival. Placing her cup to her lips for the last of her...what was this?...she heard a voice behind her say, "Captain?"

Not expecting to be addressed, she jumped, and in doing so succeeded in spilling her drink down the front of her uniform. Standing quickly, she pushed away from the table and backed squarely into the solid front of Commander Chakotay. Dabbing at her uniform with her napkin, she turned as his barely concealed chuckle turned to outright laughter.

"I'm glad you find this so amusing."

"You said I needed to get out more, but it looks like I missed the crowd. Would you like some help?"

Janeway started to say thank you, no, but made the mistake of glancing up at him. His eyes were focused on her chest, where she was still rubbing the wet spots. Turning away, she tossed her napkin down and picked up her tray to leave, but not before Chakotay saw the color that started in her cheeks and crept over her throat, and grinned again. What a fascinating paradox, as Tuvok might say--here was a woman in charge of the fate of hundreds of people, who could face off with a new alien race every day, yet she blushed under scrutiny, and he was still looking...

"Commander, if the inspection is over, I'll go hunt up a dry uniform."

Chakotay had the grace to look embarrassed as the captain caught his unabashed perusal. "Well--goodnight. I'll see you on the bridge tomorrow."

Nodding in dismissal, Janeway returned to her cabin.

Chakotay watched her escape through the doors and picked at his meal in silence. There was something about her that put him at ease. The way she kept touching him, maybe. He couldn't remember ever being this open with a captain he was serving under. Chuckling to himself, he remembered asking her if she would have served under him had the situation been reversed, not realizing until she turned away that one could read another meaning into the question. She had skillfully maneuvered her way out of answering, but his thoughts had been twisted by the most provocative fantasy of his new captain--eyes shining, mouth turning up into a smile, whispering, "What did you have in mind...?"

Chakotay abruptly remembered his original purpose for seeking out the captain: he had wanted to thank her for hearing him out. He hadn't realized until that moment in the briefing room just how much he needed to talk about Seska. Janeway had been there for him last night just as she had from the beginning of their forced alliance. No--not forced--mutual. After all, she could have thrown him in the brig. He made a mental note to speak with her in the morning.

The early shift change was accomplished smoothly. As each post was vacated, the arriving crew member slid effortlessly into place. Chakotay was already on the bridge when Janeway arrived. "Good morning, Captain," he said with a trace of leftover deviltry.

Janeway shot him a glance that said volumes without speaking. "Good morning, Commander. Anything to report?"

"Actually, yes. The night crew reports what they believe to be a class-M planet, several sectors away. Initial readouts show dense vegetation and severe, localized weather systems, but no humanoid life forms. We'll know more as we approach orbit. Shall we proceed?"

"By all means. Set course, Mr. Paris." The possibility of a new source of supplies always drove the previous thoughts from the Captain's mind. Chakotay rose from his seat and began making the necessary preparations.

Voyager settled into orbit as the crew began their scans and Janeway assembled the senior officers in the briefing room. "Lieutenant Torres, report."

"Sensor scans show that the storm systems we picked up earlier are heavy, but mostly contained in the outer regions of the main land mass." Torres called up a schematic of the surface and proceeded to point out the most likely places for a landing party to beam down. After some discussion, it was decided that B'Elanna would go, along with Chakotay, Kim, and Neelix. The latter couldn't be avoided, as he was responsible for identifying anything remotely edible. Within minutes, the away team was assembled.

While the turbolift whisked him away towards the transporter room, Chakotay remembered his promise to speak with the captain. Well, he thought to himself, it will have to wait. He set about calibrating his tricorder and pushed thoughts of Kathryn Janeway from his mind.

The bridge crew had failed to anticipate that mere atmospheric disturbances could disrupt transporter locks, communication, and almost every system the away teams depended on. Several hours passed with only sporadic communication between Voyager and the away team; when contact was made, the static and gaps made the them difficult if not impossible to understand. Janeway fought down the urge to rise from her chair and pace the length of the bridge, so she did the next best thing--"Mr. Tuvok, report."

Frowning at the display before him, the Vulcan proceeded with an observation that no one wished to hear. "Captain, I am picking up a high concentration of electrostatic particles in the lower atmosphere."

"Location?"

"Moving toward the landing party."

Giving in to the urge to stand, she called out, "Janeway to transporter room one. Get the away team back here. Now."

Torres was surprised to find the transporter pad beside her empty. "Where's Chakotay? He was right there--"

The comm panel chirped. "Janeway to away team. Report."

"Captain, we just..." Torres began.

"Lieutenant, where is Commander Chakotay?" B'Elanna registered the captain's surprise but dismissed it as she turned to the transporter chief, who was frantically adjusting controls. She moved quickly to the other side of the transporter console with Kim, and the three began to work. "He didn't make it back with us, Captain. Attempting an emergency beamout now."

She barked orders to the transporter operator, called for enginerring backup. But it was no use. Not only could they not get a lock on the commander, they couldn't even trace his comm signal. "Captain, that storm is interfering with all our systems--communication, transporters, everything. We're going to have to wait until it passes to beam him out of there."

On the bridge, Janeway's expression darkened. "We'll take a shuttlecraft." She jerked her head up to look at the chief of security. "I'm leaving you in command, Mr. Tuvok. You're going with me, B'Elanna," she added into her comm badge, her voice warning the Vulcan not to bother to debate the wisdom of having three senior officers absent from the ship at the same time. She whipped around to find Kes walking off the turbolift, an expression of concern on her face, and smiled gratefully at the Ocampa. "I'm glad you're here. I think you should come too. Bring whatever medical equipment you might need that we don't normally store on shuttlecraft, just in case. Let's go."

They separated on landing, Kes going with B'Elanna, Janeway searching alone. The landing party had set down on a rocky beach less than fifteen meters from a dense forest; Neelix and Kim had gone into the undergrowth to scavenge for edibles, while Torres and Chakotay had set up equipment to take soil and mineral samples from the rocks near the shore. The tricorders and shuttle scanners were disrupted by the storm, but it was nevertheless clear that Chakotay had not remained anywhere near the beamup site.

Janeway had entered the dense forest while the others searched along the shoreline. After a brief time, her comm badge twittered. "Captain, I think I've located the commander."

Torres had picked up a tricorder signal, faint but unmistakable, once the storm front cleared the water's edge. They moved on foot, not trusting the shuttle's transporters in the wake of the atmospheric activity; it took almost half an hour to reach her first officer, during the course of which Janeway had to fight the urge to break into a run and leave the others behind. She marched along the water at her fastest clip, straining against the inertia of the sand. When her first officer's shape finally came into view, she raced over the rocks ahead of the others. "Commander!" she shouted across the distance, and then, when he did not turn, "Chakotay!"

He glanced slowly in their direction, but his eyes registered no recognition whatsoever.

He knew the names for all the objects he could see--the trees, the water, the sand, the sky. And he knew the names for his feelings: he was free in the open air, he was lonely, he was glad to see others. He remembered that somewhere an animal with dark fur and bright eyes looked after him. But he did not remember his own name, nor where he came from, nor how he had come to this place. And he did not remember these people, at least not in any meaningful way.

He wanted to say "little sister" to the thin dark woman with the ridges on her forehead, but he did not know her name. Although the tiny blond pixie felt comforting on some spiritual level, she did not look familiar. And the sight of the woman with the golden hair made his stomach tighten. He had the impression that he had known her for years, perhaps on another plane of existence.

"Captain..." the pale girl said. Something wasn't right, or not quite right, about the word. The golden woman turned. "I'm reading internal injuries, possibly brain damage. Some bleeding on the cerebrum, possible hematoma, definite concussion, I can't tell how serious without an internal scan."

"I don't think that there's anything further we can do here, Captain." The dark woman had spoken, and once again the last term made him jump. The syllables shifted in his mind. He did not realize that he was thinking until his voice told them all.

"Kathryn."

Her head whipped around to him. "What?" she demanded.

"Isn't that your name?" He was bewildered again; he knew that it was what he called her, and also that it was not. But after a moment she nodded, smiling in relief.

"You know who we are. You looked so blank..." Her voice trailed off as he looked at the other two, the confusion returning. He wanted to tell her that he remembered her, but he was nervous in front of the others, and she suddenly seemed to sense what he was feeling. She turned sharply to the two women. "Get back to the shuttle," she ordered. "Prepare it for departure. We'll join you in a few minutes." They both regarded her, then one another, with wide-eyed expressions, but obeyed her orders silently.

She--Kathryn--moved slowly beside him, letting him fall into sync with her as they moved across the sand. "We have to get you back to the ship, Commander," she said earnestly. "I realize you must be disoriented--"

"I'm not leaving," he interrupted firmly.

She stared in shock into his somewhat unfocused eyes. "Why not?"

After a long moment he replied. "I remember you. But I don't remember those others. I don't remember any ship, and I'm not going anywhere until I know what's going on."

"Listen to me, Chakotay. You're the first officer on the starship Voyager. You serve under me, and we have got to return to the ship before the storms return here and we're both out of communications." He watched her blink, turn to the horizon, then look back at him. "I don't know what happened to you, but the storms caused it. Do you remember anything about that?"

"No," he answered, twisting his face in concentration. "I remember the rain, I remember that there are thirty-two names for clouds in a language that's different from this one. I don't remember very much about me. I don't remember very much about you either, Kathryn."

"Well, you remember my name. That's a start." She reached out as if she were going to touch him, then caught herself. "You're going to have to stop calling me that, though."

"Why?"

For a moment Janeway almost relented; if her name was the one thing he had to hold onto, let him use it. On the other hand, she needed to jog his memory, remind him of the terms of his everyday life. The captain did not know what to say; she felt a familiar pang of blind frustration at not having a counselor on board.

"You never call me Kathryn," she tried to smile. "It isn't proper protocol. I'm your commanding officer and there's a hierarchy we follow. Don't you recall anything about that? It wasn't always your strong point anyway." She had the sudden impression that he was playing with her, that he remembered everything and simply didn't want to deal with any of it.

He echoed her smile; he looked as if he did not believe she was telling him the whole truth. "What do you mean?" he asked.

"It's a long story, and we don't have time right now." She hit the trefoil bauble on her chest. "Lieutenant Torres. Report," she snapped.

"We'll be ready to depart in approximately five minutes, Captain. I suggest that we not wait any longer, as another storm front could form at any time."

Janeway glanced sharply at Chakotay. "You heard what she said," she nodded to him. "We've got to go. We'll talk about it on the ship..."

"I'm not leaving." He sounded almost like a child, voice filled with both unhappiness and stubbornness, as he turned to the sea and wandered slowly toward it. "I remember how to swim," he added abruptly, and started down the rocky shore.

"Don't go in the water..." She fled after him, catching up and placing her body between his and the sea. "No," she ordered.

Something in her voice made him meet her eyes. He pulled her toward him, away from the ocean, lifting her up slightly over the sharp pebbles that littered the sand. "Kathryn," he began again.

"Please stop calling me that!" She glared as he pressed closer, gripping her upper arms. "Commander, I'm sorry if you don't remember why this is inappropriate..."

His eyes bored into hers. "I know what you said," he interrupted. "Protocol, command. But I think I don't believe any of those reasons and neither do you. Why don't you want me to say your name?" She opened her mouth to respond and found that she could not repeat the litany she'd offered him earlier: they were only excuses. As if he took her parted lips for a sign, he moved still closer to her. She stiffened. "I'm not trying to make you do anything you don't want to do," he murmured, his eyes clouding. He slid his fingers down her arms and cupped her elbows in his hands. "I just want you to tell me what's going on. Can't we sit down and talk about it?"

"All right," she agreed, "We'll talk. But first I want you to tell me something."

"What?" His expression had softened noticeably--she turned her face quickly to the ground, studying her feet as they prodded at the stones. She had a wrenching idea of what he thought she was going to ask him to tell her. His hand stroked her arm and she jumped: she was always touching people like that herself, she would have to remember that it could be upsetting as well as comforting. Her own hands felt suddenly cold despite the moist heat of the trees behind them and the warm wind off the sea. She shook her head.

"Let's walk instead," he said. "I don't think it's going to storm for a little while." He turned and started down the beach. As she caught up to him, he broke into a jog, forcing her to do so as well; then he began to run in earnest, and she had to use all her strength to keep up with him.

"Chakotay!" she gasped. "I don't think--you should be doing this--straining yourself--"

"Feels good, though, doesn't it?" he called back to her, slowing enough for her to catch him without having to break her stride. "I feel like I've been in a cage." She tried to focus on his face to see if he meant the ship, but she was having trouble reading through the exhilarated grin; she'd never seen him with such an expression of glee. He dropped his pace, kicking at the sand, and she turned her trot into her usual fast walk. "You should see how you look when you run," he smiled. "Like catching anything depends on whether you concentrate hard enough. Not like you're just enjoying the chase."

"The chase--is only fun--if you have an objective," she panted, looking out at the water as she tried to catch her breath and her thoughts, and could not react quickly enough when he unexpectedly put an arm around her. He turned her toward himself, looking lost; she instinctively put her hands on his arms, so she had no one to blame but herself when he dropped his free hand to her hip and pulled her against him.

"Kathryn. I wish you'd tell me what's going on," he sighed. "You're telling me I have to trust you about everything--who I am, how I know you--even though my instincts are telling me that you're holding out on me."

She thought quickly before replying. "I'm trusting enough in who I know you to be that I'm here alone trying to protect your position rather than taking you back to the ship." Flashes of conversations they had had echoed in her head: perhaps one of them would stir his memory? She thought about telling him a story from before she met him, or telling him her reactions from the few times he had shared his own background with her. A sudden sense of unreality closed about her; she almost felt as though she were speaking to an image of the man who had done those things rather than to the actual Chakotay. "It's going to storm. Soon. It makes me nervous being this close to the water." She started to move away. He caught her by the arm, turning her towards him while he put his hand on her other shoulder. "What is it?" she asked.

A ferocious gust of wind came off the sea, blowing her hair across both of their faces and into his mouth as it tilted her toward him. She slapped her comm badge and heard only static. Large, scattered drops of rain began to fall around and on them. "Let's go," he shouted above the sound, catching her and tugging her to her feet as they stumbled toward the dense trees.

She imagined what the storm would feel like when it came, drenching them even within the shelter of the jungle, her hair falling soaked and heavy in the heat, her body streaked with water where the clothes clung moistly. If she were alone she would take them off, strip down to her underwear, let her wet hair cover her torso. She suddenly wished she could curl up against him and ride out the storm, her face cupped between his shoulder blades, her arms wrapped around his back to rest on his chest. Or the reverse, his arms circling her waist and his face pressed over hers, keeping the rain out of her eyes.

"Do you want to stay here?" he asked. "Or do you think you should try to get back to this mythical ship of yours, just to be safe?"

"The crew can't beam us out during the storm." They had reached the perimeter of the trees. "Chakotay. You must be able to remember some things about
what the real you is like."

"I don't like that phrase, 'the real me,'" he growled. "I can only be who I know myself to be, and that's me, right now." He looked at her seriously as he pulled her under a huge palmlike leaf, trying to make it arch over them like a tent. He moved closer to her as the sound of rain pelting the leaf increased. She thought about telling him that his smile alone was proof that he wasn't himself--the Chakotay she worked with never smiled at her with such unrestrained ease, and he was talking more than she'd ever heard him. "Kathryn," he continued; she let it go this time with a raised brow. "You realize that because I don't remember who you are, you're probably not acting like yourself?"

A sudden gush of mud swept her sideways. He caught her with his legs and dragged her up with his hands on her arms, toward him, his look telling her that it was up to her to stop him; she wrapped her legs around his and let him pull her in, they held each other as the huge frond they had been using for cover bent under the weight of the mud and water and the warm flood spilled over them both. His question had stopped her breath for a moment. What she would normally do, of course, was to tell him that this was all out of line. Politely but firmly, she would put on the captain face and remind him of his duties and her own...and then later she would go back to her quarters and conjure him in his absence...was there some sort of psychic resonance?

Chakotay met her eyes, and too late Janeway realized why she was holding out the possibility that he was lying--because she needed to believe it, since if he was telling the truth, then it meant that the feelings he was showing her were sincere. She tore herself away from his body, sticky and solid against her own. It was impossible to talk to him when his skin was making her acutely aware of her physical reactions, exaggerated by the dozens of fingertips of rain that stroked her every second, mud sliding down her thighs, heat rising from the jungle and from both of their soaked bodies.

"You really don't remember? Then promise me that when you do remember, you'll forgive me for what I'm about to do." Her Chakotay, the man she had come to know aboard Voyager, had a constant glint of humor sparkling just under the surface. How many times had she turned in his direction, only to find him watching her with that subtle look on his face? But it was no longer there, as if that part of his personality had been wiped clean. "I'm going to take you back to the ship. Right now. I'm not giving you a choice. You belong--"

"I belong with you, I know that." She considered rebuttals, affirmations, consequences, while he reached for her hands, looking embarrassed. "I don't really remember you, but I feel deep within my spirit that we're--more than crewmates. I don't know if you're using my present state as an excuse or if you only feel guilty about what happened to me. Please--just tell me the truth."

"What truth?"

"About us."

Realizing what he was asking, she was shocked beyond speech for a moment, and as she worked her jaw, seeing his expression grow more confident at her reaction, a wash of desire flooded over her like the storm. Her sensible side finally won out. "It's not what you're obviously thinking. We were never involved that way."

"I don't believe you. I know how I feel, and I know you feel it, too." Chakotay pulled her closer, very slowly. "Look at how you're--"

Her comm badge chirped. "Torres to Janeway."

"Janeway here," she answered sharply.

"Captain, we can no longer delay departure. Sensors show a severe weather system, sector one-four-oh, heading toward this region--"

"Captain," Kes interjected, "given the current condition of Commander Chakotay, it would not be wise to remain any longer. The variances in atmospheric pressure could have an adverse effect on the head injuries he sustained. It would be in his best interest to have the doctor assess his injuries."

"Getting back to that ship means a lot to you, doesn't it?" he asked quietly.

She looked sadly at him. "You can have all the privacy you need. There's no need for you to see anyone else or have contact with anyone on board unless that's what you want."

"Will I be able to see you?"

"Yes. But not until the doctor has thoroughly examined you and you've gotten some rest."

Smiling with just a hint of his former self, he replied, "I'd rest better if you were with me."

"Nice try, but I don't think so," she weighed her answer. "Once we're back on board Voyager, all command protocol must be observed."

A lengthy silence ensued. Chakotay finally said, "I'll live with your conditions. But this can't go on forever, Kathryn."

Wincing, she turned toward the shuttle.

As Janeway conferred with Torres, Kes silently observed Chakotay's reactions to his surroundings. With her soft-spoken voice, she asked, "Does any of this seem familiar, Commander?"

"Not a bit."

"Well, I wouldn't worry too much. My initial scans show nothing that appears to be permanent. As your injuries heal, your memory should begin to return." Kes kept her level gaze trained on him, mentally gaguing his responses.

"You said should begin to return. Is there a chance--"

"Yes, Commander. A very slight chance the damage could be permanent."

The flight proved uneventful, if a bit unnerving. From Chakotay's viewpoint, this was his first trip. As the shuttle began its approach to Voyager, the Captain turned to find his eyes studying her from behind. "I've made arrangements to have you beamed directly to sickbay after we dock. The less contact you have with the crew, the better. You are at an extremedisadvantage. They know you, but you, on the other hand, have no recollection of them. I don't foresee any problems, but after what happened with Ses--well, after our recent problems, I think it's better if they think of you as very much in control." Her momentary slip left him wondering what she was so anxious to cover up.

The transfer was accomplished smoothly. Kes accompanied Chakotay to sickbay and Janeway and Torres headed for the bridge. B'Elanna was the first to break the silence. "Captain, I don't mean to be out of line, but might I ask your reason for isolating Chakotay?"

Janeway glanced at the younger woman; Chakotay was her friend as well as her former commanding officer, she reminded herself, the lieutenant was just looking out for his interests. "I'm a little wary of letting the crew know the extent of Chakotay's injuries. You and I both know that some of the former Maquis crewmembers are staying in line primarily because of him, and after the incidents with the Sikarians--" Torres blanched "--and the Kazon, I'd prefer to keep the appearance of as much order and stability as possible. It makes sense to buy some time, give the Doctor a chance to see exactly what is wrong."

"I understand." Torres opened her mouth, closed it again, and then abruptly blurted out, "Captain, it's probably none of my business, or even yours, but about Seska--I know that amnesia can be caused by trauma, and there are some things about her and Chakotay that maybe you should know..."

Janeway held up a hand to silence B'Elanna. "He told me some of it. I don't think that Seska's betrayal alone would have had such a devastating impact on him." She looked curiously at her junior officer. "I know you and Seska were friends, B'Elanna," she added quietly. "Has it been difficult for you, coping with the discovery that she was..."

"Not at all," Torres said a shade too aggressively. "Captain, the person I thought I was friends with wasn't ever real. A lot of things I took for granted in the Maquis turned out not to be real, and that's just one of them. Starfleet, for instance. I didn't think there were any captains I'd ever want to serve under."

The lift had reached the uppermost deck. The captain of the Voyager touched the chief engineer briefly on the arm and smiled warmly; she didn't have an adequate response.

Janeway had no desire to remain on the bridge. What she really wanted was to be in sickbay, probably in the way but close enough to see for herself what was transpiring. Finally, she was able to turn the helm over to the next shift and make her escape. Entering the med unit, she was horrified to see her first officer unconscious on a biobed, attached to monitors. As had become usual of late, Kes was right there with the answers.

"It was necessary to sedate him, Captain. We needed to run neural scans that are extremely sensitive to movement. He'll be fine." Seeing the look on the captain's face, she continued, "You're welcome to stay with him for a while if you like. Other than the medical staff, you are the only crewmember with authorized access."

"Thank you, Kes. I suppose I'm overreacting, but--"

"But you care about your crew. I know. That's been apparent ever since you agreed to keep me and Neelix on the ship." Smiling, she returned to her work.

Janeway wished that were the whole truth. It occurred to her exactly how much she had come to depend on Chakotay's silent assistance. Now that was hanging in the balance. She gently placed her remaining hand on his shoulder. She wanted to scream at the transporter chief who had failed to retrieve him during the first beamout, she wanted to return to her ready room and bury herself in work, she wanted to stay here and hold onto him, she wanted-- "Captain, I want you to rest." The Doctor had come to stand by her; she was so involved in her own thoughts that she hadn't even been aware of his presence. "There's nothing you can do here. The Commander will be out for most of the night, and quite frankly, you look like hell."

With a wry smile, Janeway said, "Well, Doctor, I see your command of the vernacular is improving. Call me if there's any change. No matter what time, I want to be informed immediately. Understood?

"Understood, Captain," he replied and turned to his work.

"Kes to Janeway."

"Janeway here. Go ahead." The captain sat up and attempted to get her bearings. The chronometer read '0400', but where was she? Oh, yes, the sitting room of her quarters. Within seconds, all of the events of the past several days replayed themselves in her head. Shaking it, she waited for Kes' report.

"I thought you'd like to know, Captain. Commander Chakotay is showing signs of regaining consciousness."

"On my way, Janeway out." Even as she spoke, she was heading for the door,trying to repair the damage done to her hair by her nap on the couch.

"Doctor, report." Wasting no time, she crossed to the biobed where thecommander was still unconscious. Without thinking about it, she rested the palms of her hands on his shoulder as if willing him to open his eyes.

"His neural responses are improving. He should have come around by now, but I suspect his extended sleep was more a product of exhaustion than any of the sedatives he was given." The doctor continued his scans as Janeway gritted her teeth. Of course Chakotay was exhausted. He'd been under inordinate stress for months, like herself...no wonder he was wiped out. Unwittingly, her fingers tightened their grip on Chakotay's shoulder.

"Ah, Commander. Good. You're awake." The doctor's pronouncement caused her to turn, and seeing Chakotay's dark eyes boring into her, she could not stifle a gasp of relief.

As if they were the only two people in the room, Chakotay caught her hand in his and demanded, "Have you been here all the time?"

"No. The doctor made me leave. Threatened me with sedation, too, if I didn't rest." She chuckled softly.

"I'm glad. You probably needed the rest."

"You remember?" she whispered.

A pause and then, "No, I don't. I don't know where that thought came from. I wish you'd tell me what's been going on around here."

"Excuse me," the doctor interrupted. "If this can wait till later, please? I do have a patient to examine. Captain, if you insist on being here, may I ask you to please release the Commander's hand and wait in my office?"

Dropping Chakotay's fingers as if they were on fire, she said, "Of course, Doctor." She turned and walked stiffly to the office.

Turning as the doctor entered, Janeway met him with a thousandquestions on her face, but asked only one. "Well?"

"The commander appears to be recovering adequately from his trauma. However, it will be several days yet before he is able to return to active duty--if at all."

"What do you mean, if?"

"I can find no explanation for his loss of memory, Captain. The neural pathways are healing nicely, the subdural bruising has been repaired. There is no apparent physical reason for his amnesia."

"You mean he doesn't want to remember?" Janeway was completely takenaback by this possibility.

"Not precisely. But his subconscious mind may be blocking out events too complex to process at the moment." The doctor wore the smug look that seemed to say Very good, human. Now you've got it. She ignored the look as she considered the ramifications. What would his brain want to forget? Was the injury so traumatic? Or was B'Elanna right, did Seska do this to him...or had she done this to him, by making him put on a Starfleet uniform? If only they had a ship's counselor... Janeway realized that the doctor had been speaking for some time. "...in his quarters, familiar surroundings will assist him."

"You're right, Doctor." The germ of a plan began to form in the back of her mind. "How soon can he be released?"

"I see no reason to hold him here. I expect to see him at 1100 hourstomorrow for a follow-up examination, though."

"I'll see him to his quarters, and make sure he reports to you. Thank you, Doctor." Striding toward Chakotay's biobed, she tapped her commbadge. "Lieutenant Torres, please meet me at Commander Chakotay's quarters."

"Aye, Captain," came the sleepy response. Janeway winced as she remembered what time it was. "B'Elanna--belay that order. Meet me at 0800 hours."

"Thank you, Captain, I'll be there."

Chakotay was sitting up as she approached him. "The doctor says you're free to go. I'll show you to your quarters. Perhaps being among your own things will help your memory. I've asked Lieutenant Torres to meet us there later, she's an old friend."

"My old friend, or your old friend?" he asked with a grin.

Smiling back, she said, "Your old friend, but fast becoming one of mine, Commander."

"I wish you wouldn't call me that, Kath--Captain. I don't feel like a commander." The softness of his tone conveyed the seriousness of his comments.

"I know that. But we agreed to abide by Starfleet protocol while we sort this out. It has to be that way."

"What happens if I never regain my memory? Will you be content to see me as just myself?" Having no sensible answer, she simply turned and led the way out of sickbay and to his quarters. She left him alone there, looking stranded like a child in a strange place, not knowing how to ease the transition and not trusting herself to remain.

Having spent much of the last day sedated, he felt no need to sleep, but alone in the strange room, Chakotay could not settle into any kind of relaxation. He learned quickly how to use the replicator rations he'd been given in sickbay, but could not remember what he liked to eat, and he wondered at the sparse possessions in what were supposedly his quarters: a handful of carvings, a few drawings, a book, a bundle of animal fur containing some kind of electronic device, a piece of skin pulled taut over something magnetic with some accompanying stones...he did not remember any of them. He sat and stared at one of the stones for a time and felt his mind begin to wander: he saw an almost familiar terrain, a large wolf staring at him from glittering eyes... That thought snapped him back to himself, alone in the dim room.

His door buzzed after what seemed like forever and Kathryn Janeway entered, followed by the dark woman with the raised bumps on her head which made it look as through her brows were furrowed in concentration. "Are you in trouble?" he asked, surprising himself, and the two women stared.

"No, Commander, you're in trouble," the black-haired woman replied, and he saw Janeway almost smile. "Since you've told me some things about your tribe's traditional ways of focusing your spirit, I thought maybe I could help."

"You mean you know what all these things are?" He held out the black feather which had been bundled in the animal skin, and she took it and nodded.

"A black bird's wing, a stone from the river...and this acts as a replacement for psychoactive drugs," she nodded at the electronic device. "I think we'd better sit down for this, Chakotay, so I can explain a few things you might need to be reminded of."

Janeway watched with a pang as B'Elanna moved across Chakotay's quarters and he followed. A strong desire to involve herself in the proceedings warred with the knowledge that she might only interfere--and Torres had known him for years, learned his customs, might be able to reach him on a personal or spiritual level which she herself could not access. She wondered how much Seska had known of Chakotay's disciplines, then decided that that line of thought was not worth pursuing. "Well, I'll leave you to your...meditating," she said lightly, and turned to go. "I'll be on the Bridge if you need me. The Commander is due in sickbay at 1100 hours, B'Elanna."

"Captain, Engineering is working on rerouting some plasma flow inducers which might cause a slight variation in our warp signature. I told Lieutenant Carey to report to you if there are any anomalous readings." Torres looked annoyed for a moment, as if she wished she were down there working on the problem herself.

"I'll let you know if anything critical occurs, Lieutenant. And, Commander, I'll speak with you later."

Chakotay's voice arrested Janeway as she turned to go, stopping her for a moment. "B'Elanna? Remind me where we met?"

"Sabotaging a ship like the one you were in yesterday," the engineer's voice followed the captain out the door.

Chakotay was still a little dizzy when he arrived in sickbay two hours later. With Torres' assistance, he had had several visions. He was in a village of wooden houses, but hundreds of snakes dropped of the trees and swarmed out of the skies and took it over. A large wolf led him away from the village and onto a ship. When he reached the command center, B'Elanna and a dark man with large ears were waiting for him. The stranger pressed a button, and then they were standing in an unfamilar room which Chakotay suspected must be Voyager's bridge. "Traitor!" he shouted and pulled a weapon, but Kathryn appeared and took it out of his hand, saying, "He did it for all of us," and then led B'Elanna and the man with the pointed ears away, leaving him alone.

A woman with glittering green eyes and a wrinkled nose came forward, but as he watched, thick scales grew out of the gray skin of her neck, and deep snakelike furrows rose across her cheeks. "If you follow that she-wolf, you'll make yourself a prisoner," she hissed. "Just remember where your real loyalties lie." He turned to the viewscreen and saw the village burning as dozens of people in Voyager uniforms stood and watched. He saw Kathryn emerge unscathed from the flames and hold out her hand to him: "Come join me, Commander, and leave this behind you." He stared past her at the fire, where he witnessed the ship he had been on earlier exploding. As the shattered pieces flew into the air, a howling wolf leaped up with them. "What do I do?" he begged, but the animal vanished off the screen, over his head and out of sight.

B'Elanna seemed uncomfortable when he began to tell her what he had seen. "Commander, I'm not sure, but I think you're not supposed to discuss these visions with anyone, or you'll make your animal guide angry," she told him.

"But how can you help me interpret them if..."

"I think only you can interpret what you see in a trance state," she replied. "Chakotay, maybe you should talk to Kes. I've heard that she has some mystical powers, and she won't be biased like I will from knowing you this long. I mean, you're the one who stopped me from stopping the captain when she made the decision to keep us here in the first place."

"On the ship?" he asked, confused.

"In the quadrant." B'Elanna sighed sharply. "I'm not a psychiatrist, I don't know if it's right for me to tell you these things or not. Let's get you to sickbay and see what they say."

Kes, whose serious smile and musical voice made him comfortable, offered two suggestions. "Maybe you should listen to your own personal logs, Commander. And, I don't know how to go about broaching the subject, but maybe we should ask Tuvok about a mind meld. Perhaps if he entered your thoughts, he could reach your hidden memories."

"Who is Tuvok?" Kes pulled up a picture out of the personnel reports onto the viewscreen. Chakotay was shocked when he discovered the identity of the figure in his vision. He did not wish to open a past he could not recall to a man with no emotions, especially not a man whom he had accused of betraying him. Whatever secrets lay hidden in his mind, not only his own privacy but that of everyone he knew would be open for scrutiny. "I'll check the logs. Maybe something there will make me remember."

"Commander..." The young woman smiled reassuringly at him. "I can't be sure, but I sense that--your soul, I guess you'd call it--is intact. It's like there's something sitting on top of it that's keeping it from getting free, but no part of you has been damaged. I think you can trust yourself." He waited for her to elaborate, but she turned back to the padd she had been studying.

Janeway was in her ready room reading reports on fuel consumption when her communicator chirped. "Chakotay to Janeway."

She jumped a bit: she did not think he had called her by her last name since his memory had failed. "Yes, Commander, what is it?"

"I was wondering whether I could see you when you have a moment. There are some things in my logs that aren't completely clear to me, and I thought maybe you could explain them."

She could not read his voice: she thought he sounded amused, but his regular speech was warm and secure and often sounded as though he were smiling even when he was quite serious. "I'll meet you in your quarters as soon as I can."

"I want to know exactly what I said to you when you first suggested that I become your first officer."

The statement took Janeway completely by surprise.

"I mean, I must have been grateful, right? Seeing as you could have tried to arrest me. Was I grateful? Or was I furious when you first suggested that I wear this uniform?"

"You took it pretty stoically." She was shaken. On the one hand, this was her opportunity to find out what Chakotay really thought about his situation, serving under her on a ship that claimed allegiance to the government which had sold out his home. On the other hand, when he did remember, he might never forgive the violation of privacy...

"I think it bothered me more than I let on, then." His voice interrupted her musings once he realized that she was not going to say more. "Apparently I must be a pretty private person, there's a lot I don't say even in my personal logs. I've been trying to read my face to see what I really think." Chakotay smiled inscrutably. "I did research all afternoon. You didn't tell me how we met, Kathryn."

"I did tell you. We met on the bridge of this ship, we joined forces to combat a common threat."

"Yes, but you failed to mention that you represent an organization I despise, and that I'm only following you because I haven't got a better plan."

You don't want to know, she told herself, even as she asked, "Is that what you said in your personal logs?"

"No." He cocked his head to the floor. "That's what someone named Seska said." His eyes locked on her face. "I found out about the Maquis from reading my criminal record from your security profiles, and then asking Lieutenant Torres a few questions. B'Elanna said you're the only person on board who knows the terms under which we agreed to merge the crews. She also seems to think that I resent those terms more than I've let on to anyone, even to you. And this Seska said some things to me about working under you which seem to have...upset me."

Choosing her words carefully, Janeway said, "Seska was trying to sow dissent on this ship. She might have thought that accusing you of capitulating to me would hurt you, and that might have caused you to fight me."

Chakotay's stare was unyielding as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Well, apparently it worked. Every place she shows up in my logs, there's some problem: she's stolen supplies, or I suspect her of collaborating with other officers to use some kind of illegal technology..." Janeway gasped slightly. Of course Seska would have been involved with B'Elanna and Tuvok in the Sikarian incident--and Seska hadn't trusted Chakotay any more than Torres had-- "...but apparently none of that had much of an effect on me, because I was angry with you for making me use my relationship with her to unmask her. And even more angry when it turned out that you were right. Or at least 'angry' is the word I used in my logs, I can't tell from my face. I gather you were present when she said those things to me, right before she took off?"

"It's really none of my business..." she began, but Chakotay cut her off, grabbing her by the shoulders.

"Well, make it your business, because I can't sort any of this out by myself," he snapped. "She left. I must have told you something, because I logged that I was annoyed at myself for talking to you so much. It was a very strange report, that final one, I made a dirty joke about serving under you. It's the last entry. Must have been quite a day." Janeway tried to step out from under his hands but he held her in place. "Anything you want to add that might jog my memory?"

Was she being selfish, merely afraid to embarrass herself by telling him what had happened that night? "I spilled a drink," she said. "We were--socializing. Nothing serious."

"I see." He looked hard at her. "You say you care about me, but at the same time you're using me for purposes of your own--which have to do with this Federation of yours that I was at war with before I met you," he said in a low growl. "There are all kinds of undercover games going on, Tuvok and Seska on my ship and now the whole lot of us on yours. How do I know that B'Elanna's really an old friend?" Chakotay glared directly into her face. "How do I know that someone didn't fake all these logs for some reason? Kathryn, the only instinct that I trust is the one telling me that I can trust you, yet every piece of information at my disposal says the opposite."

Hadn't he told her that his people believed in life debts?

Janeway swallowed. "What you asked me on the planet yesterday--I can only tell you what I thought, we didn't talk about it." She took a deep breath and his fingers clenched slightly on her upper arms. "I was telling the truth when I told you there wasn't anything between us other than command protocol. But--that last night, we were flirting. I wasn't sure what to do about it, so I was trying to get some distance. I don't know how you felt. But you might have noticed..."

Afterwards she knew that she had noticed him leaning down toward her as she spoke the words, waiting for her to confess, yet at that moment when his arms lifted her up in his arms, she did not stop him. "I knew it," he murmured, nuzzling her forehead. "There had to be a reason..." She forced herself to remain passive, not to fight but not to respond, until he finally gave up and withdrew, his expression darkening. "What is it?"

"You understood then, Commander, it's why we never talked about it. This would be putting the entire ship at risk. You saw the logs, you know about Seska and what that relationship almost did to this crew. And it's more complicated--neither of us can afford to get distracted from getting home. That has to be our primary focus--"

Her communicator chirped. "Bridge to Janeway," Tom Paris' voice came between the two senior officers. "We're getting some very strange energy readings, Captain, from within the ship."

"On my way. Janeway out." Her response was automatic, ignoring the look in Chakotay's eyes. "You see? I have to go. Commander...I want you to do something. I want you to go to the holodeck and program a scene you've been in before, something that might be familiar. I'll send Kes to accompany you there. Maybe you'll remember."

Janeway was halfway to the bridge before she remembered B'Elanna's warning about the rerouting of power in engineering; whatever they were reading was probably nothing. Nevertheless she knew that it would be better for her to be up there. They both needed time to think. She exited the turbolift and was surprised to find Torres and Kim poring over the engineering console, looking displeased. "What's going on, Lieutenant?"

"I'm not sure, Captain, but whatever it is, it has nothing to do with the plasma flow." The Klingon woman's brows were knotted in a fierce scowl. "It's not a radiation signature I've seen on the ship before. It looks almost like..."

"...almost like the pattern from those storms on that planet back there," Kim finished almost in sync with her. "That's why they look familiar. Something on the ship must have picked up some kind of energy trace..."

"We'll have to decontaminate everything we brought back." Torres snapped upright angrily. "Harry, why didn't the transporter pick this up when we beamed aboard?"

"Maybe it was something we brought back on the shuttle. We were in a hurry to get Chakotay to sickbay, we didn't do a thorough sweep." Janeway cursed herself inwardly. "Can you pinpoint the source of the radiation?"

"Not yet. We'll have to do a magnaton scan." Torres turned to look across the bridge. "Tuvok, I'm going to need your help configuring the scanners."

"Get on it." Janeway hit her comm badge. "Janeway to Neelix. I need you to take everything you collected on the planet we left yesterday and turn it over to engineering. There may be a problem with radiation..."

"Captain, I've just begun to serve tea!" Neelix sounded outraged, as was to be expected, and Janeway moved her mouth in imitation of the Talaxian's hyperbolic anger; then, seeing the expressions on her bridge crew's face, she had to break the connection for a moment, fearing that they were all about to dissolve into giggles. She looked carefully at the ceiling as she tapped the badge again. "Neelix, this is very important. We believe that we brought back some kind of contaminant from the surface. Please, let someone else serve tea and get to work on this right away. The safety of the crew is at stake."

A long pause followed, and then Neelix said, in somewhat more subdued tones, "I'm sorry, Captain, but I believe that I've already used some herbs from that planet in tonight's mixed greens."

"Then you'll have to make a new salad, Neelix." Janeway no longer bothered to sound placating. "I want this done immediately. Or I'm going to have to order the crew to keep out of the dining room until the senior staff decides that you can be trusted with food safety. That will be all." She turned back to Torres. "You and Tuvok go set up the scan, and I'll send someone down to the mess to make sure he does it. Harry, keep an eye on those readings and let me know if there are any changes. I'll be in my ready room looking over the shuttle's sensor logs."

"This is Earth?"

"It's someplace called Chichen Itza, on the continent I understand your ancestors were from. I've never been to Earth, so I can't really tell you anything about it, other than that it's an important archaeological site. You once told Lieutenant Torres that you'd been here."

"Can I go closer to the ruins?"

Kes looked amused. "Since it's a holodeck simulation, you can do anything you want, Commander. The real ruins have been closed to visitors for centuries, but tourists can view the site from approximately where we're standing in relation to them. Is it at all familiar?"

Chakotay shook his head. The scent of the warm air and the trees was familiar; the scene before him was not. Apparently he'd forgotten thousands of years of Earth history--even his ancestors--as well as his own past. He started to walk towards the towering stones, then stopped and shook his head. "This isn't going to help me. I don't remember any of it. Kes, do we have a program of the planet we just left?"

"I don't think we had time to make a thorough recording, and I doubt it's been processed even if we did," the Ocampa said gently. "But maybe we can reconstruct it from your recollections. It might help strengthen your neural paths if you force your short-term memory to piece it together. Computer, end program."

Abruptly they were standing in a black room with grid lines crossing the ceiling, walls, and floor. "Computer, new program. A beach made up mostly of pebbles and larger rocks, leading to a churning sea. There should be dense forest about fifty meters back from the water's edge. Daylight. Begin program." The room transformed again: they were standing by the edge of an ocean, with a rainforest behind them silhouetted against a blue sky. "Computer, please raise the temperature in the room about five degrees, and add a sea breeze. Create a storm environment--no rain, but clouds and thunder in the distance. There should be steam rising from the trees."

There was a pause as the hologenerator struggled to keep up with the changes Kes ordered, and then the atmosphere in the room shifted again. "This is just a start. Your turn, Commander."

"Computer...? The trees are too tall and not dense enough," Chakotay added. "The water was much rougher, and there were plants growing in it." He paced a few steps with Kes following closely; he turned to glare, then looked apologetically at the petite Ocampa's startled face. "I'm sorry," he said gently. "I keep--almost remembering things, maybe I need to be alone right now to figure anything out. Do you mind? I promise not to do anything that's not safe."

"You couldn't if you wanted to, Commander. The holodeck has built-in safety parameters." Kes began to back off. "Computer, show door. I'll leave you alone, then."

As soon as she was gone, Chakotay began snapping orders. "Computer, make the leaves on the tallest trees about three times bigger, and take away all those little brown plants growing near the ground. Put in some two-meter-high stalks with red flowers..."

"From the holodeck?"

"That's what the scan revealed, Captain." Torres did not look pleased with what she had to report. "But I don't understand it. We didn't make a recording from the planet's surface, we didn't have enough personnel. And there shouldn't be any material brought back in the holodeck unless someone brought something to eat in there, and everything we checked from Neelix turned out to be clean anyway. We should find out who's using the..."

"Janeway to Chakotay." The captain cut the chief engineer off abruptly, following B'Elanna's line of thinking as she remembered her last orders to her second-in-command. A moment of silence ensued; she hit her comm badge again. "Janeway to Chakotay. Please respond, Commander." Nothing. She jerked her head at Torres to indicate her desire to exit the ready room as she came around the desk. "I'm going to get him. Contact sickbay with your findings, tell Kes to meet me there." She strode across the bridge, nodding at Tuvok who already sat in her chair. "I'll let you know as soon as the Doctor can tell us anything."

Janeway paced in the turbolift and walked briskly to the holodeck, keeping her eyes straight in front of her. Bursting through the doors, she was startled by the spectacle of the planet they had just left behind--the forest, the sea, the pebbles--but Chakotay was nowhere to be seen. "Commander!" she shouted across the rocks, then hit her comm badge to try that once more. He should be able to hear and respond to the communications summons from anywhere, unless he was unable to reply...if, say, he were underwater...

"Stay calm," she said aloud. There was no way Chakotay could drown on the holodeck even in an underwater environment. If he were under the surface, he would still be protected by the failsafes. She strode toward the water's edge, fighting back a ridiculous surge of panic, and started to wade into the sea. Only when she was soaked up to her knees did she realize how foolish she was being. "Computer, end program!"

The angry bark reverberated as the room reverted to the familiar black grid, and a drenched Chakotay stared up at her from the floor. "What the hell did you think you were doing?" she demanded.

"Kes said I couldn't drown, so I wanted to swim," he replied, mystified. "Why did you shut the program off? I was remembering things about the planet."

"Well, right now you need to get to sickbay." As her preposterous fear drained away, it was being replaced by a fury almost as unreasonable. "Get up." She reached out a hand to assist him. "Chakotay, we picked up some kind of radiation down on the planet. Or I should say you picked up some kind of radiation. We've been reading it on the ship's scanners. You have to come with me to sickbay, right now, so we can figure out what it is."

He looked around the room in frustration, then sighed. "I want to come back here later. Did you save what I was doing before?"

"I didn't tell the computer to delete it, so it should still be there. Computer, save last program as Chakotay Omega One. Think you can remember that?"

She regretted the words at once, but his face was a mask. He nodded and she called for the arch.

Janeway did not like the look on the doctor's face one bit. "The radiation pattern almost resembles an REM sleep brain wave. Look at the cycle of the radiation, on this chart..." He brought up a graph on the computer screen "...and this is a normal human brain, in the dreaming stage of sleep." Whatever's affecting his memory is not only made up of some kind of energy--we must also consider the possibility that it is sentient."

"Sentient?!" The captain could not keep the horror out of her voice. "You're saying that that's the reason for his amnesia--that something else is controlling his brain?"

"It's too soon to say for certain." The doctor had several padds in front of him and was manipulating information on his computer screen. "How much do we know about the nature of the electrical impulses in the storms?"

"I don't know. I'll have to ask Lieutenant Torres whether engineering has analyzed the readings."

"At maximum warp, how long would it take us to get back to the planet?"

She stared at the doctor. "You think...it's that serious? We should go back?"

"The only way I can make a diagnosis is to have all necesary information at my disposal. I suspect that whatever is affecting the Commander came from that planet."

A long moment passed, and then Janeway hit her comm badge. "Janeway to Bridge."

"Paris here, Captain."

"Alter course. Turn the ship around. I know it will take us off course for the Alpha Quadrant, but we're going back until we know what's happened to Chakotay, Lieutenant, and what's causing the radiation."

There was a pause, and then, "Understood, Captain."

They arrived back at the planet in less than half the time they had traveled away from it, courtesy Torres' fine-tuned engines and Paris' skillful flying. Janeway had not slept well in days and could barely keep her head up on the bridge, yet when she tried to rest in her ready room, her eyes would not remain closed. Chakotay spent almost the entire trip on the holodeck, sometimes with Kes, more often alone.

The first away team sent down was caught on the planet's surface for almost six hours while a storm made transporter activity impossible, even though they had beamed down a pattern enhancer. Once they returned, the Doctor contacted Janeway with a tone of disgust in his voice. "The plant samples have all been cut," he complained. "I need live samples to do any real tests. Can you send down another away team?" Since it appeared that no storms would pass beneath their orbit for an entire forty-five minutes, the captain agreed.

The bridge had not felt quite right since Chakotay had first vanished, but it felt even emptier than usual when Janeway strode out of her ready room. "Where's Ensign Kim?"

"Transporter room one," Tom Paris announced. "Waiting for Chakotay, I imagine."

"Tom, what are you talking about?" She glared at the helm officer, then hit her comm badge. "Janeway to Kim. What's keeping you from the bridge, Ensign?"

"I'm sorry, Captain," Harry's voice came over the communication system, loud enough for the entire bridge crew to hear. "Commander Chakotay ordered me to stay right here. I assumed he'd informed you..."

"Ordered you when?" A terrible suspicion gripped her.

"Right before he beamed down, Captain."

"I'm on my way down there, Ensign. Janeway out." She nodded at Tuvok as she strode for the turbolift, trying to look as though she weren't running. Nevertheless she burst through the transporter room doors and practically flew at Kim. "Are you telling me that you beamed Chakotay off this ship?" she barked. Her arms folded automatically across her chest. "Ensign Kim, how could you let him beam down when he..." Janeway's voice trailed off as she realized that Chakotay must have fooled Kim; none of the bridge crew knew the commander's condition, and Chakotay apparently had picked up enough from her and from his logs to convince Harry to beam him off the ship.

"I'm sorry, Captain, is there a problem?" Kim looked distressed. "He ordered me to meet him here, then told me that he was going down to the surface. I told him that we might not be able to retrieve him right away, since there was a storm front coming in, but he insisted. I assumed you knew..."

Shaking her head, it occurred to the captain that she had to cover for Chakotay before he lost credibility with the crew. "I didn't realize he was going down so soon," she snapped, hitting her comm badge. "Janeway to Torres. I need you in transporter room one, now." She apprised the engineer of the situation tersely when she arrived. As she was speaking, Kim looked up in her direction.

"Captain, we have a narrow window available for transport," he reported.

"What time frame, Ensign?" Janeway asked with terse impatience.

"Based on the pattern and size of the atmospheric disturbances, another window will not appear for approximately two hours."

"Can you get a lock on Chakotay?"

Kim's fingers banged at the console. "No. I'm sorry, captain."

"All right, then. I'm going down there. We don't have the luxury of waiting two hours."

Kim and Torres exchanged a look. "Which one of us did you want on the away team, Captain?" Kim asked finally.

"Neither of you. I need you both here. Lieutenant, get to engineering, I want you to work with the doctor on finding the significance of that radiation signature. Mr. Kim, I want you right here until I'm back. I'll beam down alone."

"Captain, I strongly recommend another approach," Tuvok counseled when she contacted him on the bridge. "It is unwise to have the two commanding officers away from the ship in this situation."

"I understand your concerns, Tuvok, but this is something I have to do myself." Janeway counted on the years she and Tuvok had known each other and his implicit trust of her, as well as whatever Vulcan responsiveness to human emotion might be telling him. Stepping onto the transporter pad, she broke the link. "Ensign Kim, be ready to beam us out as soon as the transport window is available again. Energize."

Janeway's form materialized on the pebble-covered beach just in time to see Chakotay's head disappear under water, several meters off shore, as lightning crackled in the air around her. She broke into a run. Calling his name was an exercise in futility. Without hesitation or thought for her own safety, she stepped into the water and swam for the approximate location of her first officer. Swimming parallel to shore, she searched methodically for some sign of another body, afraid that if she strayed off course, she might miss him.

Finally, a movement attracted her attention. Momentarily forgetting that this wasn't another holo-simulation, she tried to call out. Choking on the briny water, she surfaced, and, gagging, caught her breath as a loud crack of thunder seemed to split the air around her. She pulled herself up on the rocks, out of the water, trying to inhale normally as she scanned the churning surface. A bolt of lightning split the sky, struck the water a few feet in front of her...

When the explosion of water and heat died down, Chakotay was floating on the surface, utterly still, face down in the water.

Janeway plunged in after him, caught him around the waist, tugging him up toward the surface. She had thought him unconscious and was astounded to find him helping her onto the rocks, out of the water, as they sank onto the shore. The wind had increased measurably while they were underwater. Lightning leant an eerie glow to the darkening sky. Instinctively seeking shelter, Chaskotay pulled Janeway behind him as they stumbled toward the cover of the trees. Breathing raggedly, they leaned against a trunk and fought to catch their breath.

Janeway's eyes fluttered open to find Chakotay's piercing gaze studying her face. As if from a great distance, beyond the pounding of his heart against her ribcage, she heard him whisper, "That wasn't very smart, you know."

"What? Saving your life or following you down to this miserable place?" Looking incredulously at him, she exploded into anger. "How could you not have known that I'd follow you? Earlier, when I couldn't find you on the holodeck, I panicked. I forgot about the safety parameters."

"I'm sorry. But I had to come back here," he whispered urgently. "I couldn't go on in limbo--not remembering my past."

"Nothing--not even your memory--is worth your dying for. If I have to make you move on without your memory, it would be infinitely more bearable than spending the rest of my life without you there at all."

"Even if I couldn't be your first officer?"

"Under any terms. I want you to come back with me."

Chakotay was staring at her with an almost childish expression of delight. "The lightning. Something in my brain...I remember," he whispered. They stared at one another, listening to the storm moving slowly into the distance, each waiting for the other to speak. When he remained silent, Janeway thought she'd misunderstood his last words. But when his lips quivered into a smile and he said, "Is the inspection over, Captain?", she knew it was him. Then her comm badge beeped.

They didn't talk again for hours, until after the doctor had thoroughly examined Chakotay and B'Elanna had scoured the ship for any trace of the radiation signature, which was gone. Janeway had collapsed in her quarters before either were finished, too exhausted to think.

She awoke hours later, knowing vaguely that she'd had a nightmare with a happy ending. Then her memories slammed back into her and she felt a wave of gratitude that she could remember. How horrible it must have been for him, to have feelings disconnected from facts. He had been flooded by emotion in absence of any history or connection, while she had at least had recollections to bolster her, the understanding that her feelings arose from a temporary situation. Whatever had happened on that planet, whatever had happened in the months before with the crew and the ship and even that first afternoon in engineering, she knew her place and his place, she was the captain, she had limits...

The truth rose unbidden in her mind.

After several minutes of living with it, she rose and crept down the corridor to his quarters. The door slid open before she could buzz; either he had forgotten to lock it, or he'd been expecting someone. She moved through the darkness, whispering his title, then his name; he was not in the living part of his quarters, and as she moved toward his bunk she realized that he was lying on his back across it. "Are you awake?" she whispered.

"Am now," he murmured, his voice thick with sleep. "Sit down. Are you all right?"

She sank slowly down on the edge of his bed, looking over his head and out the viewport. "I want to tell you something, Chakotay."

"Uh-oh."

"What?" She turned at the warm humor.

"You never call me 'Chakotay.'" Janeway nudged him in the gut as he raised himself up on an elbow. "I'm serious. It's always 'Commander.'" He rolled onto his back, looking up at her, lifting an arm behind his head. "I'm listening," he added.

Taking a deep breath, she looked past him out the window at the stars. "One of the first nights after you came onto the ship. I had a dream about you." She gazed straight in front of her as if the memory resided there. The sense of unreality that had unnerved her on the planet closed about her again, despite the clarity of the moment.

"What about me?"

"We were making love," she admitted, and he laughed without a trace of self-consciousness. "Right after you made that crack about serving under you that day in engineering. I thought it was symbolic of trying to merge the crews." Without looking at him she reached out to shove his arm while he continued to chortle, making him tip. He overcompensated as he rolled back against her, knocking his shoulder into her hip. "Actually, I thought it was funny too." She finally met his eyes, which gleamed in the darkened room. "So I tried to pretend it meant something other than what it now seems obvious I knew all along."

His expression was unsurprised. "You know when I knew? When we found that wormhole, and that Romulan asked if we wanted him to warn Starfleet to stop Voyager from launching." She squinted at him, confused for a moment. "Once we realized that he was from the past and we couldn't go back, he asked if we wanted him to tell the Federation, when it was time. I said some nonsense about the Prime Directive, and I couldn't believe you bought it--I didn't even know what I was saying, I was so panicked. All I could think about was that if you never came after my ship, I'd have been stranded out here without you. And after he had gone, I realized that I didn't even know if I wanted to go back."

"Do you mean that?" she asked in shock, and he sighed.

"Seska, Tuvok, Federation, Cardassians, Maquis, I don't know who my people are anymore, I don't know who I can trust. Except you."

She looked at him for a long moment. "Chakotay..." she began passionately, and then a smile exploded across her features, lighting her face in the dusky room. "You want my ship," she exclaimed in an impish, breathless voice. "I should have known." Her laugh spread to him contagiously as she continued, "You fantasize about taking over Voyager and making me..."

"...serve under you," they finished in tandem. "I didn't realize it was going to sound like that until after I said it, and then I couldn't get the image out of my mind..."

"Neither could I!" she spluttered. "I should have thrown you in the brig, right then." He grinned, reaching for her. "Report, Commander," she warned. "I want to know what the doctor told you, and what Torres found out."

"As they suspected, the electrical storms aren't just electrical storms," Chakotay paused. "There are sentient beings that live in the radiation stream. They work almost like antennae, communicating with intense bursts of electro-neural energy, which registered as radiation on our sensors. They were probably trying to make contact when they trapped me." He looked soberly at her. "It might have been easier with me than the others in the landing party, since I'm more accustomed to mental emanations, I've practiced vision questing for most of my life. Or...the doctor said that it might be easier for them to control less-established neural pathways. So since I was...confused about a lot of things..."

"And then since we assumed you had some kind of psychological amnesia and we shouldn't tell you too much, that probably made it worse..."

"It wasn't your fault, you didn't know. At any rate, that was what was driving me back to the planet. The lightning actually gave me some sort of jump-start."

"So you're all right?"

"I'm all right. Amazing how amnesia can clear the mind." They both chuckled halfheartedly. "Are you all right?"

She huddled closer to him, letting her thoughts wander over the possibilities. "I'm...someplace else, I think. I've been taking it for granted that you'll be sitting next to me on the bridge forever. I never let myself worry about what it would mean for you not to be there until I thought I might lose you. We might find a way home tomorrow--or it might be in a month, in a year, in forty years. When I force myself to be realistic, I know that we may not even be the ones who eventually pilot Voyager into spacedock." She let out a long, slow breath. "I'm tired of being alone, Chakotay."

Chakotay buried his face in her hair and silently thanked his spirit guide. "Well, I don't want your stupid ship anyway," he said in mock petulance, sensing her smile. "There must be something right with my instincts. I didn't want to trust you, but I did, from that first minute on the viewscreen. I listened to you when Seska and B'Elanna told me not to, and I've never regretted it."

"I'm glad," she whispered. "Because I've been thinking the same thing. That no matter how many questionable decisions I've made out here, I was right about you, and that was the most important one." Her voice was firm as she turned her face to him, leaning her chin on his chest to look at his face. "Now, where does that leave us?"

"I think it leaves me serving under you," he replied, and they both laughed.