by Dakota

"I'll be in my ready room, Commander."

Chakotay looked around as the captain exited the lift and disappeared immediately behind the door. He let out a small breath as he turned back to the terminal next to his chair. Something was bothering the captain and had been for several weeks. He wasn't sure what it was now, but he did know it had all begun with the accident in engineering.

The captain had been helping with what should have been a routine diagnostic in engineering when someone sneezed and hit the controls on the warp field generator panel. For a fraction of a second, the warp field fluctuated wildly. Those closest to the core had been thrown to the floor. Vorik had slammed his arm against a door jamb and snapped two bones. The captain had hit her head on the floor hard enough to black out for a few seconds. A few others had minor cuts or abrasions. After a visit to sickbay, the doctor released everyone and told each of them to take the rest of the day off. Surprisingly, the captain had agreed without argument. 

Chakotay reviewed the doctor's report, checked that repairs were being completed in engineering and settled back in his chair to enjoy the rest of what hopefully would be an uneventful few hours until his shift ended. The peace lasted only a few minutes.

"Janeway to Chakotay."

"Chakotay here, Captain."

"Where are the children?"

A stunned silence fell over the bridge as all eyes turned toward the first officer. Chakotay was as confused as the rest of the bridge crew.

"What children, Captain?"

"Ours."

Chakotay took a deep breath then stood up. This was not a matter to handle over the ship's comm system.

"I'll be right there, Captain." He glanced at Tuvok on his way to the turbolift. "You have the bridge, Commander."

"Aye, Sir." As the lift door closed, Chakotay was vaguely aware that Tuvok had moved toward the captain's chair as Ayala made his way to the Tactical Station but his mind was on the captain's question.

Chakotay made it to the captain's quarters in record time and signaled for admission. He found a distraught and confused woman waiting.

"Chakotay, thank goodness you're here. I can't find the children anywhere. The computer says they aren't on the ship. Where are they? Are they all right?"

Chakotay put his hands on her shoulders. "Calm down, Kathryn. Take a deep breath." He watched while she followed his instructions. "All right. Now, start at the beginning. Whose children are missing?"

"Our children. I can't find Kyle or Kay anywhere. What happened to them?"

Chakotay studied Kathryn carefully. He knew she had hit her head and wondered if the doctor had missed something.

"We don't have children, Kathryn. Are you sure you didn't dream this?"

"We have children, two of them. Kyle was born after we were on New Earth and Kay was born two years later." Kathryn stopped talking abruptly and stared at Chakotay. "You don't know what I'm talking about do you?"

Chakotay shook his head. "No, but I'm going to help you figure it out." He slapped his commbadge. "Chakotay to Sickbay."

"What can I do for you, Commander?"

"Could you please report to the captain's quarters?"

"On my way, Commander."

"Why do we need him? I was just in sickbay."

"You hit your head pretty hard down in engineering. The doctor might have missed something."

"I didn't hit my head that hard." Kathryn stared at him a moment and seemed to make a decision. "I was waiting to tell you the news until tonight after dinner. I'm pregnant. We're expecting our third child in seven months. That's not something that can be explained away by a bump on the head."

Chakotay didn't know how to respond so he motioned toward the couch. "Let's sit down and wait for the doctor. He should be here shortly."

They had just reached the couch when the chime sounded and the doctor breezed through the door. "What seems to be the problem?"

"Could you check the captain again?"

Chakotay watched as the doctor ran the sensor around Kathryn's face and snapped his tricorder closed. "Just as I told you in my report. She sustained a minor bump on her head. All she needs is a good night's sleep. Now, may I return to my sickbay and clean up the mess Mr. Paris made while he was getting in my way earlier?"

"I told you my injury was not the issue." Kathryn asserted.

"A complete scan, not just her injury." Chakotay instructed. His request earned him an exasperated look from the doctor.

"If you wanted that, you should have brought her to sickbay." The doctor's comment earned him a glare from both his senior officers. He continued taking readings and checking them. One reading made him tap his tricorder and make a few adjustments. He looked up. "I'm sorry, Commander. This tricorder seems to be malfunctioning. You'll have to bring her to sickbay."

"I'm right here. Doctor. Now tell me what's wrong?" Kathryn spoke directly to the doctor.

"Nothing is wrong except a malfunctioning tricorder. I did a complete physical on you last week. These readings can't be right."

"Assume the tricorder is working, what does it tell you?" Chakotay insisted.

"It tells me the captain is about eight weeks pregnant which is impossible."

"What do you mean 'impossible'?" The captain demanded.

"Not possible." The doctor took one look at her face and expanded on his answer. "I mean it's impossible for you to be eight weeks pregnant now when one week ago you were not pregnant."

"Who's the father?" Chakotay demanded.

The doctor turned a cold glare on the first officer. "I think you should ask the captain that. Far be it from me to divulge confidential information."

"I did. I want to hear it from you."

"Captain? Would you like to finish this examination in private?"

"Just answer his questions. I'll let you know if I object." The captain was looking back and forth between the two men and for a second Chakotay thought she looked like a cornered animal. He watched her until she met his eyes, then he smiled and saw her face relax.

The doctor nodded and adjusted the tricorder to run a more detailed scan. He studied the results. "I don't know why you were asking, Commander, since you should already know. It seems you are the father." He snapped the tricorder closed. "Now, perhaps I'd better leave."

"Not yet." Chakotay stopped him. "Can you tell if she's been pregnant before?"

The doctor stared at a surprisingly silent captain as he studied the readings then answered. "Not conclusively from the scans I can conduct now. If she weren't pregnant, I could give you a more definitive answer. All I can say now is that there are a few readings that are consistent with this not being her first pregnancy.

"I told you this was our third child." The captain addressed her first officer. "Now do you believe me?"

"Would someone please tell me what's going on?" The doctor looked from the captain to Chakotay. "Captain? Commander?"

"The captain remembers having two other children, a boy and a girl, as well as being two months pregnant. I thought you had missed something when you treated her for that bump on the head."

"I didn't miss anything, at least not with her head injury. Beside, Commander, even you, with your limited medical knowledge, surely know a bump on the head would not result in pregnancy. If not, please report to sick bay at your earliest convenience for a lesson about the birds and the bees. Now, unless you have more questions that you've already answered, I'll be cleaning up the mess Mr. Paris made in sickbay."

Chakotay waved the doctor out the door before he lost his patience completely.

"Finally. You'd think this was the nineteenth century when doctors actually made house calls."

The door hadn't closed behind the doctor when Kathryn returned to her original question. "Where are the children, Chakotay? Tell me where they are. You're starting to scare me. What's happened to them?"

Chakotay sat down on the couch and pulled Kathryn down next to him. "You and I don't have children, Kathryn. I don't think anything has happened to them but something has apparently happened to you. We just have to figure out what. Are you up to a meeting with Torres and a few others to see if we can determine what's going on?"

Kathryn nodded. "I want answers. I want my children back." She glanced at Chakotay. "I want you back, too."

Chakotay remembered the meeting that followed all too well. They had gone over everything they knew about the fluctuation in the warp field and come up with nothing to explain the changes in the captain. They had finally asked everyone in engineering at the time to write down what they remembered seeing. Only a few were actually in a position to see the captain but both of the crewmen who mentioned her said she had hit her head extremely hard on the railing around the warp core.

"No, I didn't hit my head on the railing. I fell away from it and hit my head on the floor." The captain was adamant about her injury.

"I can confirm that, Commander. Her injury was caused by a mild blow on a flat surface, not the edge of a railing." The doctor concurred.

Tuvok cleared his throat. "I have a theory, Commander, one that I am unable to confirm at this time."

"Let's have it. It's better than anything we've come up with so far."

"I recall stories told by my captain on the Excelsior. One of his first assignments was aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise. One story was how the captain of his ship was sent to another universe. I believe they called it the 'mirror" universe. Perhaps something similar has happened on Voyager and the captain has been exchanged for her counterpart in another universe."

"You know, I heard rumors along that line while I was on DS9." Paris joined the conversation. "But this Captain Janeway doesn't sound like she's from that universe."

"It could be a third universe." Harry was quick to do the math but received no accolades for his efforts.

"I said 'another' universe, not the 'other' universe. The character changes reported by Captain Sulu do not appear in the captain. If there is one similar universe, it follows that there are an infinite number of other universes."

Chakotay glanced at the captain and knew she was too shaken to make decisions. "Commander, see what more you can learn about that 'mirror' universe and the circumstances that allowed people to move between it and this one. If it worked for one universe, it should work for them all. Torres, go back over every record we have on the incident with the warp field fluctuation. Paris, get us back to the exact spot in space where it happened and hold our position there. Tuvok, you have the bridge. I'll be with the captain in sickbay seeing if the doctor can confirm this theory." He stood. "Dismissed."

Kathryn remained seated while the others left. As the door closed behind the last to leave, she stood slowly and turned to Chakotay. "I might never see my children again." The tears welled in her eyes. "I don't even have you and you're standing right in front of me."

"We'll get you home to your family. I promise."

Kathryn smiled slightly and Chakotay knew she recognized his promise for what it was, words meant to comfort and reassure in a situation that could easily be hopeless.

Five weeks later, Chakotay stared at the same stars on the main screen that he had been watching when the warp field fluctuated. Voyager was stationary in space. It had taken the best part of four weeks to reproduce the events that had displaced the captain. They had recreated the fluctuation but to no avail. They had not succeeded in exchanging the captains again. The door of the turbolift slid open and Chakotay turned to see who had come to the bridge.

"Could I speak with you in my ready room, Commander?" The captain looked and sounded tired but determined.

Chakotay stood. "Of course, Captain. Paris, you have the bridge."

As the door closed behind them, the captain seemed to droop. "I can't ask you to keep the ship here any longer, Commander. There's nothing left to try."

"First of all, you didn't ask. There isn't a person on this ship who is ready to give up. In time, we might have to, but not yet. Tuvok and I went back over everything we could find on those 'mirror' universes. He thinks we have to wait until the other Voyager is in the same place it was before our efforts can succeed."

"It's been five weeks. They've probably been back and left by now."

"I don't think so. If the Kathryn from this Voyager hit her head as hard as they think she did, she could have been unconscious for several days. The doctor says there is also the possibility that she could have suffered memory loss. If that happened, she could have been in sickbay for several days."

"It's been five weeks; they'd have been back here by now."

"Not if she didn't regain her memories right away. Did your EMH know you were pregnant?"

Kathryn shook her head. "No, but he knew we were trying for a third baby."

"So there's nothing that would tip him off in the first few days." Chakotay thought a moment. "How soon before he would have been giving you a complete physical?"

"About a week or ten days ago unless he changed his schedule."

"Good. That gives us an outside time for the doctor to figure out what had happened. If he found out a week ago that you had been switched, it would have taken a couple of days for them to track down when it had happened. So, they may have just started their return within the last week. It could easily be another month before they arrive. Unless you want to pull rank, we'll stay at least that long and continue trying on a daily basis to make the exchange."

"I should just order you to resume course for the Alpha Quadrant, but I miss my children and my husband." Kathryn stared at Chakotay. "You are him but I know you're not the same person."

Chakotay pulled her into a hug. "I know. You love him and I love her." Chakotay held her until he felt the tension slowly drain from her shoulders. Then he loosened his arms. "And don't try to pull rank on me or anyone else because it won't work. No one is going to let you order Voyager out of this area until I tell them we've run out of options."

Kathryn smiled faintly. "Have I told you lately that you're a real pain as a first officer?"

"Not since yesterday." Chakotay grinned. "I'll fix dinner tonight. My place at 18:00."

"All right. Would you mind giving me a copy of those files and logs about the 'mirror' universe? I'd like to go over them."

"Sure." Chakotay walked over to her desk and punched in a series of commands. "There, they're waiting at the terminal in your quarters."

"Trying to get rid of me, Commander?"

"Just helping you to follow your doctor's orders. You're supposed to be resting in your quarters for at least two hours every afternoon."

Kathryn smiled more sincerely. "Like I said before, a real pain." She walked toward the door but paused before she left. "Thank you… for everything."

Chakotay stared at the stars slowly moving across the main screen. His patience had been rewarded. It had taken another three weeks before the other Voyager had returned but once it had, their efforts succeeded. It was almost anticlimactic after the weeks of tension. He sighed. That had been nearly five weeks ago and the captain had been avoiding him the entire time. She had spoken with the doctor enough to confirm the memory loss theory. Her memories had only started to return after they had realized she was in the wrong universe.

The doctor had insisted the captain not return to duty for a week but hadn't restricted her to her quarters. She had used the time to read the logs and various reports that had accumulated during her absence. After a week, she had returned to duty, and Voyager was for all intents and purposes back to normal.

Sometime in the following week, Chakotay realized that he and the captain had not eaten a meal together since her return. He hadn't noticed it earlier because a temporary change in the duty roster meant their paths didn't cross as often. Then she made an excuse to turn down a dinner invitation. When she turned around in the door and left the mess hall one morning when he was running late, he realized she was deliberately avoiding him.

Chakotay considered his options: allow things to continue as they were and wait until the captain was ready to talk or confront her now and hope it would relieve some of the building tension. He made his decision and stood up. "Commander, you have the bridge."

As he passed Tuvok on his way to the ready room, he spoke so only the Vulcan could hear. "Don't disturb us unless it's a red alert."

He keyed the door open and entered the ready room to find the captain staring at the stars.

"I wondered how much longer you would let me avoid you." Kathryn held up her cup. "Help yourself to a cup of coffee."

Chakotay retrieved a cup of coffee from the replicator and then sat on the couch.

"Did you sleep with her?"

Chakotay jerked his head toward Kathryn in surprise. Why would she ask that unless…? He pushed the thought aside along with the flash of pain that she even had to ask the question.

"Yes. She was lonely and missed her family. She was comfortable with me and fell asleep on my couch two or three times a week. A couple of nights, I fell asleep, too. But if you mean, did we make love, then no. We didn't. We both knew I wasn't her husband."

"I had a husband and a family. For over a month, I had a husband and family of my own. I didn't remember anything that got me to that point, but they were mine. At first, I was uncomfortable around the children but they were so worried about me even though they didn't understand what was going on. They were so young the only way to calm their fears was to hug them and hold them. I miss them terribly. I can only imagine how the other Kathryn felt when she realized she might never see them again."

"What about the other Chakotay?"

"He was a wonderful father. The children adored him. He was patient and supportive." She glanced speculatively at Chakotay. "He was also a lot more expressive with his feelings than you are, especially when we weren't on duty."

Chakotay cursed the shadows hiding Kathryn's face. She sounded as if she liked the other Chakotay's behavior but he wasn't certain; he could read her face far better than he could her voice.

"He seemed to know when I was getting to the end of my patience with the memory loss because he would come over and hug me and tell me that he loved me. The first time he did that, I practically jumped out of my skin, but he refused to let me go. He said he remembered we were in love even if I didn't. He never once asked why I never told him I loved him. It was so dreadfully unfair to him. I couldn't remember being with him or living with him. I couldn't remember how to say those words. 

"But I was his wife and the mother of his children so he told me about the children's births, their birthdays and all the trials and tribulations they had put us through on a daily basis. If I couldn't remember from personal experience, I would at least remember the stories." She glanced over her shoulder at Chakotay. "You both are wonderful story tellers."

"Did he tell you about your life together?"

"Yes. They had been together since New Earth. Kyle was born about a year after they returned to Voyager."

"It seems your counterpart had a slightly different interpretation of Starfleet's regs."

"Not from what he told me. I… she tried to end their relationship when they left New Earth but he refused. He didn't bother arguing with her, he just kissed her until she changed her mind. He told me it had worked on New Earth so he thought it would work on Voyager. It did."

"Did he kiss you?"

"Oh, yes. He kissed me in the mornings, at night, when he came home or left. It seemed so natural but so unfamiliar at first." Kathryn stared down at her cup. "Then one night, he started to get carried away. He regained control almost before I realized it had happened. He tried to apologize but I stopped him. I told him I didn't need an apology, that he was being incredibly patient with me. Then he told me that we'd been trying to have another baby and asked me if I wanted to delay it until I had regained my memories. The look in his eyes was so… tortured I guess is the word. That was when I knew I might have forgotten events but I hadn't forgotten the feelings.

"For almost a month, I was his wife in every sense of the word. We laughed and loved together, we shared jokes with the children at breakfast and whispered stories about the day's events in bed after we made love." Kathryn looked at Chakotay. "I was happy in a way I had never experienced before."

"It must have been very hard when you learned what had happened." Chakotay managed to keep his voice level despite the jealousy that flashed through him.

"It was hell." Kathryn sighed. "But it couldn't have been as bad as what the other Kathryn went through. She remembered exactly what she had lost. Once I found out what had happened, there was a part of me that wanted the attempts to switch us back to fail."

"Is that why you've been avoiding me? You think I'm going to judge you?"

"I know you won't judge me. You have an amazing capacity for understanding and forgiving. I've spent a lot of time on my own putting all this in perspective." She shook her head. "It just took me a while to remember that and a lot longer to forgive myself."

Kathryn finally left her spot by the view port and joined Chakotay on the couch. "I considered keeping the extent of my relationship with the other Chakotay a secret from you but I can't. One thing we have been over the years is brutally honest with each other. I'd like to know how you feel about it. Are you sorry he and I were involved?"

"No, I don't think I could ever be sorry about something that made you happy."

She stood and walked back to stare at the stars. "So there's nothing about the entire situation that bothers you?"

Chakotay followed her. "All right. If you really want to know how I feel, I'll tell you but remember you're the one who asked."

He turned Kathryn around so he could look at her. "I'm glad we got you back. I'm glad you were happy on the other Voyager, at least for while. I'm even glad you made love with my counterpart because it made you happy but I'm jealous as hell of that guy and wish it had been me." Chakotay took a deep breath and forced himself to unclench his fists.

"I wish it had been you, too. Don't you understand? I'm the one who can't accept what I did. Those feelings I remembered were for you, not him. You were the man I laughed with and loved for that month. As far as I'm concerned, I made love with you." She turned her back to stare at the stars. "Once he realized I wasn't his Kathryn and I started remembering you and this Voyager, he and I never made love again."

"What exactly do you want me to say?"

"I want you to tell me you told me so and we're going to try it your way for a couple decades."

Chakotay nodded and stared over her shoulder at the stars. "You know what the other Kathryn called me? She called me a 'pain' especially when I didn't let her have her way." He looked back down at Kathryn before putting his hands on her waist and pulling her against his body. He stared at her a full minute before he shifted his hands to pin her arms to her sides and kissed her.

"We're going to try it my way for the rest of our lives but I refuse to say 'I told you so' even if you want to hear it. It's just not my style."

Kathryn wriggled her arms free and stretched them around his neck to hug him. "Close enough."

Chakotay tightened his arms around her and pulled her even closer. "Not yet, but soon."
 

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