Tears fall silently

Disclaimer: Paramount owns Voyager, in case someone still doesn’t know

Summary: J/C (what else?) They are home, no C/7 in my Alpha Quadrant. (PG 13)

Dedication: This one is for Jadie. Every chat with you makes a difference. A good one. Thank you, my friend.

Tears Fall Silently

By Gine

It was obvious that she hadn’t heard him come in. An unusual quiet occupied the captain's ready while the soft grey of the rainy San Francisco morning muted every colour there as if it were covered with a cloak. The light, no longer merely an artificial product of the engines, had taken a completely different quality. The normally refreshing brightness of this, her favourite working place apart from the bridge, had turned to what?

Chakotay couldn't find the words to describe the unique feeling that came to him. At one time, he would have called such a morning, depressing, but what he felt was far from it. He stood in wonder as he watched the tiny woman at the enormous window.

He watched as she moved her hand slowly toward the glass that looked on the world outside her ship. And for a second, he imagined that she was standing at the window in a room in a house in the middle of a waking Terran town on a rainy morning.

She didn't touch the cold inside surface of Voyager; her hand remained motionless in the recycled air. The silent gesture revealed her longing to feel the rain on her own skin as she stood listening to the soft drumming on the hull of the ship,.

The faint noises were barely audible. Maybe she was imagining all of this; maybe the raindrops she thought are washing over the view port were nothing but the tears brimming up in her eyes.

“It is real, Kathryn.”

She turned around slowly, apparently not surprised to found him standing close, watching her.

For a long time, she merely gazed into his deep brown eyes, not saying a word. However, she didn't have to speak since Chakotay had always been able to read her so well. Her unspoken feelings were reflected in her expressive, blue eyes.

“Yes, it is," she answered finally, "unbelievably real. Somehow beating the Borg, creating a wormhole with a quantum singularity, meeting species like 8472, the Kazon, Suspiria or my own older self, and all the other extraordinary experiences we made in the Delta Quadrant were easier for me to accept than this. I wish I could feel the rain again, Chakotay.”

“Don’t you feel it, Kathryn?” he asked her, while his hand softly brushed away the first tear from her cheek. “Let the rain come, don’t close your heart anymore. We are home.”

She took his hand and her thumb caressed over the fine lines that time had written there.

“I don’t know, if I can endure so much emotion," she whispered.

“You endured this too long, Kathryn.” His arms opened and she leaned into his comforting embrace.

Maybe they just imagined the noise of the rain. Tears fall silently.

Fin

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