Amahl
a tale of romance
RATING: PG-13
DISCLAIMER: Paramount/Viacom own the characters and Voyager. No copyright infringement is intended.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: Gilly, for the brilliant artwork.
NOTE: 1) This story is pre-Voyager, when Janeway is still an Academy cadet. More I can't say at this point, since it needs a little of the element of surprise for this to succeed. Another note will be appended at the end of the story.
2) The picture you see here is a composite Gilly made from a picture I've scanned from one of my Voyager magazines, of Douglas Spain, the actor who plays the young Chakotay in "Tattoo". I owe Gilly wholeheartedly my grateful thanks for taking the specifications I've given and coming up with this picture, the only one of its kind on the 'net, I believe.
SUMMARY: Ensign Amahl accompanies his friend Ensign Matthews to visit Cadet Janeway in hospital. Can this be love at first sight?
*
AMAHL
PART ONE
"Are you coming?"
Jimbo pouted, batted his eyelids and held up the package like he was going to offer it to the gods.
"Only as long as you call me Amahl."
"Amahl! Where did that come from? I know you as my buddy, my colleague, as - "
"Will you?"
James's brow knitted together in his perplexity. The look changed to exasperation when Amahl wouldn't budge. "Oh, come on! The girl's not going to bite. You just have to stand near the door and look beautiful. After that you can go your own way like you usually do and no one knows where you are."
Amahl felt displaced, a little out of his depth. He didn't feel like being tagged along on an errand. He wanted see Grey Eagle in Mexico and absorb the old man's gentle if simple expressions on life. Jimbo was a great friend; they had been in many scrapes together, but seeing a girl...this girl... Amahl felt the old tenseness in the pit of his stomach. He had never been around girls much, and this one was a cadet, the daughter of an admiral.
"Why are you dragging me along?" he asked.
"Because you're my best friend and you have to come with me. Besides, I'm only hand-delivering her gift."
"Yeah. You know the girl's father who is a friend of your father who agreed that his son James Ellismere Matthews, accompanied by his friend Amahl will deliver Daddy's gift to the girl because Daddy couldn't do it himself."
"Amahl? Your name is - "
"If I go along, remember?" Amahl cut in.
"Oh, Okay," he muttered. Amahl smiled. Jimbo was cornered.
"Good. Now, about the girl's father who cannot make the time to see his little girl on her birthday - "
"Cut the man some slack, will you?" Jimbo said. "Admiral Janeway and my father are both on Grovad IV for talks. You know that. Now, are you coming?"
"No. I'm not playing nanny to you. Hell, you're pretty self-sufficient on that score."
"You just agreed if I call you Amahl, then you'll come along."
"I said if
I come along."
A look came in Jimbo's eyes that Amahl knew meant only one thing: he was going to do the lame dog act again.
"Look...Amahl," Jimbo began, "it's just this once. Next time the girl has a birthday, we'll be in deep space and long forgotten by her, and we'll never have to think about it again." Jimbo paused. He looked dramatic in his pause. He should have been an actor. "Please...uh...Amahl?"
Amahl shrugged.
"Okay, as long as I don't have to hold your hand...or the girl's and as long as I can just say 'hello' and leave..."
Jimbo's face broke into a wide grin. The tragic mask of a second ago gone like mist before the sun. He really should have been an actor.
"You strike a hard bargain," James said, smirking.
"I'm learning the art of negotiation. Now, where is the girl?"
"Didn't I tell you?"
"Strike one against James Ellismere Matthews, son of Admiral Edson Matthews. Sometimes you're the cagiest SOB in Federation space."
"No more than you are, Amahl. You're the most enigmatic man I know."
"Jimbo, we sound like two women discussing men over dinner."
"I mean it. We're best friends, but sometimes I don't know you. It's hard to know what you're thinking.."
Amahl shrugged again and looked at the sky. It was mild weather for late May. He wasn't bothered by the slight chill, although Jimbo's normally pale face was flushed.
"So, where's the girl?"
"Her name is Kathryn Janeway, first year cadet. She's at Starfleet Medical, though."
"Why do we have to go there?"
Jimbo snorted with disgust.
"Don't you ever listen to me? The kid got badly injured in a shuttle accident. They were on maneuvers, I believe."
"Poor thing. Tough luck. You're sure we won't have to stay long?"
"Yes. Just to deliver this," Jimbo replied, holding the colourfully wrapped gift up. "My father didn't want to tell me more about the kid's condition, only that Kathryn needed a little - "
"Company?"
"I guess so. Poor girl must be lonely."
"But you did say we'll only be going in to drop the gift, then leave. Right?" Jimbo gave him a jaundiced look, then smiled sheepishly. "Let me guess," Amahl continued. "You were instructed to keep her company for our whole two weeks' vacation."
"See? That's why we're best friends. You read my mind!"
Amahl gave a wry grin and shook his head. Jimbo had the universe at his feet. He was ebullient, never reserved, never at a loss for words, especially around women. That was the problem. Jimbo also never stopped talking about his women. Amahl thought how Jimbo could at times also be ungentlemanly in discussing the women he dated. There were at least three of them waiting for him, and even if Cadet Janeway was Admiral Janeway's daughter, Jimbo was clearly seeing his duty as a chore. A very boring chore.
They walked towards the transports that would take them to Starfleet Medical. Jimbo had already stored his luggage. He looked quizzically at Amahl.
"You only got one duffel?"
"You know me, Jimbo. I travel light."
"I'm not looking forward to playing nursemaid to an eighteen year old cadet while Clarice, Celestine, Cloris and - "
"Christine - "
"Yes, Christine, are waiting."
"I don't like where this is going, James."
Jimbo gave Amahl a sharp glance. Amahl rarely called him James.
"Well, I was hoping that - "
"Forget it."
"Please."
"No."
"Fine. Fine. Let's leave it at that, shall we?"
"Yes. Let's leave it at that."
**********************************
Kathryn lay on the high biobed. The doctor moved about efficiently, adjusting the settings on the visor that covered her face from her eyebrows to her cheekbones. She touched the broad metallic rim. She wished she could see the doctor's face. Her voice sounded brisk, no-nonsense. Kathryn thought her to be in her thirties. How could she know? She hadn't seen anyone since she had been brought in three days ago. It was pitch black. She felt again the momentary hysteria that surged through her when she had regained consciousness.
Regaining consciousness. What was that? The opening of eyes, to see a familiar face staring down at you, the great sigh of relief that you're alive? She had opened her eyes only to cry out when she couldn't even see shapes or the owners of the two voices she heard speaking to her. Darkness was a condition, someone said, or, perhaps she read it somewhere. Could books have been wrong? She had felt nothing, no impulse or glare on her eyeballs, even through the visor that was attached to her face. The momentary aberration into dementia was halted by the calm reassurance of the doctor's voice that her blindness was only temporary.
She moved restlessly on the bed, turning her head this way, then that way, following the voice of the doctor.
"Please, Cadet Janeway, you must lie still."
Kathryn's hand reached towards the voice, and a cool hand touched hers. It felt a little more comforting, the fact that there was something that she could touch. It was immediate and pleasantly real.
"When will this come off?" she asked.
"You know that you've been severely injured, Cadet Janeway - "
"Please...call me Kathryn..."
"Well, Kathryn, then. When your shuttle conn exploded, your optic nerves were virtually destroyed by the flare. We've done what we can, and the visor will do the rest of the work. It's emitting impulses that you won't feel, by the way, to complete the healing process. The optic nerves need time to rehabilitate on their own, you understand, Cadet Janeway?"
Kathryn nodded. They were five cadets on maneuvers around Mars. A miscalculation by Cadet Simms, and her shuttle was rocked by phaser fire and the conn exploded into an unbearable flare. It seemed shafts of white light bore directly into her eyeballs for the few seconds she had been stunned into immobility. Then the force flung her against the bulkhead and everything went black.
She knew they had informed her father and her mother had been to see her on the first day. The next day she had to go back to class at university, promising she'd be back by the weekend. Weekend was five days away. Soft footfalls, the click of a tongue, the whiff of air as someone passed her were the only signs that the doctor was with her in the ward.
"What is your name, Doctor Pulaski?" she asked suddenly. Kathryn heard the doctor give a little chuckle. She frowned and reached for the hand again. "Why are you laughing?"
"My name is Kate."
"For Kathleen?"
"Katherine."
Kathryn smiled, feeling a little closer to the doctor. Her hand touched the blindfold again. She gave a sigh.
"My mother...I thought she would come today. My sister is away on a school field trip..." She didn't know why she confided in Kate Pulaski. But her heart had been heavy since the early morning when she woke up.
"Perhaps they will call. I'm sure they will."
"Yes, I guess so," Kathryn said, unable to shake of the melancholy. The other cadets had been to see her on the first and second day, but they too, had classes to attend. Besides, she hadn't made friends easily and her stay in hospital was a mere inconvenience to them. She shrugged. She had never been close to anyone...
"Your father, Admiral Janeway?" Kate Pulaski asked.
Kathryn's hand left the comfort of the doctor's and her fingers clutched at the cover. She had so hoped that he could be here...today of all days... Her lips compressed and she turned her face away from the voice that suddenly sounded gentle. She promised herself she wouldn't cry. She was a big girl now. Big girls didn't cry. She stopped crying when she was ten.
"He's away, on a mission, as usual." Her voice was edged with bitterness.
"I'm sure he'll relay a message to you, Kathryn. Don't worry so."
"It's my birthday today..."
She could hear how Doctor Pulaski drew in her breath. A short, heavy pause. She felt her hands being held in the doctor's. They were cool, comforting. The heaviness in her heart remained.
"Happy birthday, Kathryn...." she heard the doctor say. Her voice was tinged with a little sadness. A hand touched her cheek. She had promised herself never to cry again.
"Thank you, Doctor..."
What more could Kate Pulaski say? There wasn't anything to say. The silence hung uneasily between them.
"Well, I'll leave you now, Kathryn. You can just hail any of the nurses or medical staff on this floor if you need any help. Tomorrow, you can get up..."
Kathryn nodded. At that moment the door chimed and she cocked her head. A wild kind of elation took hold of her. Could her father have made it for her birthday after all? Her hand clutched at the cover. She remembered to breathe, for she had been holding her breath. Then she heard the door slide open.
"Daddy...?"
*******
END PART ONE