The name of the game

vanhunks

Disclaimer: Paramount owns Janeway, Chakotay and Velocity.

Rating: PG

SUMMARY: Chakotay challenged Kathryn to a game of Velocity.

NOTE: This story has lain hidden in my hard drive until I discovered it yesterday. I can't recall that I've ever posted it to the net. If I did, it was gone. Written circa 4 - 5 years ago.

 THE NAME OF THE GAME

"You want to play Velocity? Against me? Do you know who I am?"

Chakotay snorted. It was time to pay Janeway a lesson. What better way to do it than beat her at his best recreational pastime? She was far too demanding, way too feisty, and far too indisputably bossy. Well, she was his boss, but he'd forgiven her that little game the fates played on him when he offered to trash his Liberty in the name of freedom. There had to be something he could do better that this calamitous Janeway.

Look how she looked at him. Look at the way she stood. Like someone who'd already won the bet, for heaven's sake. He wasn't going to cave in. It was decided. He was a champion Velocity player and she…she was a champion anything.

But not his game.

"You're Captain Kathryn Janeway of the Federation Starship Voyager."

He wanted to add, "You're also a first class little pain," but kept his tongue. She looked at him with those eyes that melted his insides. He had been a goner from the first moment he stepped on Voyager's bridge. That was two months ago. She was the Captain and he was her lackey. That's the thing. He was too used to bossing the likes of B'Elanna, Tuvok, Ayala, Chell, Dalby and Gerron around. They didn't mind the occasional left hook he gave them when he was angry - well, leave B'Elanna out. That's the way he settled things. He would have liked to settle the bet in the holodeck boxing ring with Boothby as umpire, but Janeway being a woman... Well, it wasn't that she was a woman, because females boxed these days. He had a definite weight and arm reach advantage. He couldn't pulverise a bantam-weight in the ring.

Velocity would have to do. He wasn't into playing tennis.

"I was my high school's champion parrisees squares player, two years in a row, Commander. I sharpened my Velocity playing all the boys on my team."

"You can see me shaking in my boots -”

She flashed him pearly white teeth and a mocking smile.

"If I win, Commander, you'll be scrubbing the floor of the transporter room with a toothbrush for the next seventy five years."

Chakotay whipped something from his pocket and brandished it like a trophy in her face.

"And if I win, you will marry me tomorrow."

***************************************

At 2100 that night they exited the holodeck and made their way to the mess hall. Janeway looked chagrined and Chakotay looked mocking as they arrived.

"No one here to witness my victory," Chakotay said musingly.

"It's after 2100. Don't mind them," she said as she walked to the replicator.

"Well, Janeway, I've got to tell you I wasn't looking forward to scrubbing the transporter room for the rest of my life."

She returned, carrying two flutes with something pink in them and handing him his glass.

"You don't want to play the best of three?" she asked

"No way."

"Best of five?"

Chakotay took a sip, put the glass down and whipped the ring from his person like magic.

"Tomorrow, Captain...Kathryn, I put this on your finger. I promise to love and obey you forever."

"Forever, huh?"

"Aye, forever. You love me, I love you and that's the end of that."

Kathryn watched as he downed the rest of the contents of his glass in one gulp.

"I'll replicate a beautiful dress when I get back to my quarters."

"Don't forget a tiara," he added. Chakotay looked confused for a moment when he realised he was slurring his words.

"No, I won't forget. A tiara will be beautiful..."

The mess hall began to swirl around him; he felt he was falling into a bottomless pit. He couldn't speak now, for his tongue seemed to have grown ten times its size. Then everything went black.

Kathryn hit her commbadge and minutes later they were transported to sick bay.

"Captain! What have you done with the Commander?" the EMH asked.

"Keep him here for thirty six hours, Doctor. Keep him sedated."

"Captain!" he crowed his outrage again. "Did Commander Chakotay win the match?"

She gave the EMH death glare.

"Just...keep him here, will you?"

"Fine. No questions asked. At your service, Captain, sir," the EMH mocked. "What was it they said about black widow spiders? Why would she sink her own prospects? She's a dangerous woman. A queen spider. Everyone should be shaking in their boots. The woman is devious. Devious! Oh, why did she activate me two months ago? I was happy being a thought."

Kathryn made her way to the sick bay doors with the doctor's diatribe ringing in her ears. What did he know? She wasn't ready for a wedding, much less a marriage. Maybe in a year's time. She had feelings for Chakotay. He was right about that. But what was he thinking with his outrageous proposal? He'd have an almighty headache when he woke up in thirty six hours, that's for sure…

Tomorrow, he said, they would marry.

He said nothing about the day after tomorrow, or the day after the day after tomorrow.

His offer only stood for tomorrow.

                                                                                                          ***********************

There was a storm brewing on Voyager. Every crewman, ensign and officer knew that by the way the ship appeared to tremble as if it were caught in a wind shear. They were nowhere near any ion storms which always ravaged some homeworlds or evil nebulas about to swallow the ship whole. They were very far from any star system in a sector known - thus spake Neelix - for its dead space. In fact, it was quite possible that the ship could even be dead in the water, to use twentieth century maritime jargon Tom Paris was so fond of.

So why did Voyager tremble?

The first time they knew for sure that there was trouble, was only minutes after they felt the first trembling of the ship, when all the vid-coms and viewscreens of Voyager lit up and replaced instantly all images that had been on them seconds before.

On the bridge, Commander Chakotay appeared larger than life on the main viewscreen. His face was red, but those who were there could see the puffed eyes - the result of deep and prolonged sleep. Did the man not wash his face after waking up? Tuvok concurred that after thirty six hours' sleep any human's first course of action should be to wash. Given the look of rage on Commander Chakotay's unwashed face, the crumpled jacket and bad breath he was certain that Chakotay had not seen a bathroom in days.

In fact, if Chakotay had been standing right there, he was sure to have smelled the stale breath of thirty six hours' sleep on the first officer.

The Captain jerked up from her seat.

"Commander Chakotay, how dare you!"

The Commander was in breach of security measures, and it was only right that Captain Janeway address him on the issue of overriding the codes of every computer on an intrepid class starship. Tuvok was ready to abet the Captain on all Starfleet regulations regarding such infractions.

A finger rose from the screen and pointed menacingly at the Captain. Commander Chakotay could have jumped from the viewscreen, so mad he was. Were his eyes rolling in his head? Was he about to asphyxiate on his wheezing and barely visible palpitation?

The voice trembled from space and rolled on the bridge of Voyager.

"Kathryn Janeway, this is war, you understand? This - is - war!"

**********************************************************

Now the entire crew knew of the spat between Janeway and Chakotay. Most were disturbed by the Commander's forceful outburst, knowing him to be a fair and good man, one not normally given to angry diatribes against anyone. He could look you in the eye, and the next moment you're staring up at him where you're lying on the floor wondering what hit you. The man spoke with his fists. Now his mouth was moving just as lustily as the way he could swing a left hook…

"But he's not a doormat, get it?" B'Elanna warned Joe Carey whose nose seemed a little too close to her fist.

"And the Captain won't take things lying down, okay?" Joe retorted, and then beat a hasty retreat away from B'Elanna's flailing fists.

For once, in a good way, Maquis and Starfleet were on opposite sides of the fence. They defended their respective leaders with all the loyalty and fierceness they could muster to fight to the death in Janeway's honour or Chakotay's honour.

Tuvok and Tom Paris concurred on this. Other than the irate Commander himself, they were the only two officers who had been in the Maquis and Tuvok always maintained he was there only as a watchdog. No one believed him and if Commander Chakotay so much as tried to snuff his lights out as Tom Paris would say, then he'd send Chakotay to oblivion for a lot longer than thirty six hours with a simple Vulcan pinch. Still, they were impatient yet enthusiastic to see who would emerge the victor.

"Why couldn't they just kiss and make up?" a junior crewman asked peevishly.

Chell blustered, poked his forefinger against the crewman's chest and punctuated his words thus:

"Because they like to fight. They thrive on it. They live for every day that they could best each other in words or deeds, you hear? That's why."

The berated crewman looked like she would burst into tears. She ran off into the dark corridor and was not seen again for several days.

Janeway entered the mess hall one day.

Chakotay got up and brushed past her.

The storm clouds had not abated. The Captain looked at last like she wanted to stop the fighting. Only the previous night half of the crew in Stellar Cartography overheard the Captain and First Officer who, for a reason they couldn't fathom, chose Stellar Cartography as their latest battleground.

"You're little itch! You couldn't stand losing! You can never stand losing! You drug me senseless to avoid marrying me on a technicality, now you want to play Velocity again?"

"I asked for best of three and you wouldn't give."

"I beat you, and won my bet fair and square, and then you cheat me out of my earnings."

"I - am - earnings?!"

"My prize."

"Prize?"

"Dammit, Kathryn! You know what I mean. How could you welch on a debt like that?"

"Listen, mister – I’ll pay you back…in my own time…"

"I'm not 'mister' and I'm not listening, Janeway. I take any promise I make very seriously."

"And I don't?"

Their voices were rising, pitched angrier and angrier, floating away and bouncing off the star charts until they realised that Megan and Jenny Delaney were staring open-mouthed at them. Then they saw how the two exchanged sly looks; Jenny held her hand to her sister expecting a few credits to fall into her palm.

"See Megan? I told you she'll not give in to him. You owe me."

That's when they realised Tom Paris and several other crew were betting on their bets.

And so Chakotay decided to avoid Kathryn and speak to her only in the course of their duty, which didn't seem to be very often since Kathryn decided not to enlist his opinion in matters of the running of her ship.

"For that, he can grovel," she declared as she huffed out of the mess hall, her bun flying loose and golden coils of hair bobbing behind her.

"And for that, I might as well live in the brig!" he shouted after her, but she was already gone.

****************************************

AND NOW, ENDING 5

The crew preferred having their commanding officers spat verbally and loudly for everyone to hear rather than the silent treatment they were getting. The ship went quietly quiet, its hull cast in darkness - why couldn't it be, since they were traveling through dead space? Some called it a void, and others, a little quicker on the uptake, referred to the latest silence as "void avoidance" or something equally degenerate.

They didn't like it at all. In the mess hall a hush descended when Captain Janeway deigned to grace them with her presence. Then Commander Chakotay would scrape his chair and walk past her without as much as a how-do-you-do. At other times, it was the Captain who cold-shouldered the Commander.

Most crew now happily repeated the Unfortunate Crewman who had innocently asked that day "Why don't they just kiss and make up?" They were ready to forgive her impulsive blurt now that they too kept asking the same question. They figured if the couple kissed and made up, that the ship would return to its normal boisterousness and a command team that occasionally gave them a floor show of their lovely spats.

The Chells and Dalbys and Gerrons would have preferred being on the receiving end of Chakotay's left hook than the sudden and overly didactic verbalising of his admonishments. The Careys and Rollinses would have preferred the bun being wound tighter than the new-fangled little ponytail the Captain sported, as well as seeing her spit venom at them. They didn't like the "Yes, Mr Rollins, you do that", or "Mr Tuvok, you may exercise your authority without my permission, didn't you know that?" They would have preferred "Tuvok, in my office, now!" or, "Mr Rollins, I expect you to carry out my orders, since they are my orders and I'm the Captain."

The truth was they were all confused.

The confusion increased when they noticed something that made Tuvok raise an eyebrow, Chell, with red blotches in his blue cheeks, bluster his unhappiness to the Unfortunate Crewman, and Tom Paris shake his head in a "No, no, no! This cannot be happening" kind of way.

Chakotay closed up like a clam. Anyone close to him could see the clenched teeth, the nerve that twitched in his jaw and the way the hands balled into fists in a 'put 'em up!' kind of way. Who knew whether Commander Chakotay would have reacted differently had the male crewman involved not been his best Maquis rebel, down-and-out but completely dashing renegade father of two little boys, Ayala?

Kathryn Janeway was seen more and more in the company of Ayala. They laughed together, their heads bent low in a conspiratorial and exclusive way. She would walk away smiling, looking back to wave to him as she left the mess hall. Those days on the bridge when Ayala took Harry's shift, there would be eye contact whenever Kathryn got up to leave, or escape to her ready room.

Ayala told everyone, "The Captain's one mighty fine lady," in a voice that suggested things they didn't want to dare entertain.

No one disagreed with his assessment of the lady Janeway, except that they felt the words shouldn't have come from Ayala's renegade motor mouth. They considered it sacrilege.

Chakotay sat next to her on the bridge, morose, uncommunicative and stewing like hell. Kathryn sat next

to him on the bridge, smart, attractive and sometimes casting Ayala a glance. Then she'd look at the main viewscreen as if the heavens opened up.

Chakotay didn't like it one bit.

A crewman - Maquis - told him he had seen Ayala leave the Capptain's quarters late one night.

Chakotay wasn't going to ask her what Ayala did in her quarters. He was too refined to display his jealousy. The woman was his; he had won her fair and square by beating her at Velocity. Now he wondered if the looks she had given him, the little touches, the smiles had all been in his mind and was the bet he won a figment of his imagination?

He wasn't going to wonder anymore.

A crewman bumped into him late one evening as he left the holodeck to go to his quarters.

"Oh! Commander! Oh! Oh! It's You!"

Good heavens! So much saccharine!

What was the woman thinking? She had stars in her eyes and she blushed rose-red. She was breathless with admiration and adoration. She was also the Unfortunate Crewman who had a run-in with Chell, the angry Bolian, but this time, despite the blushes and the rushes, she stood her ground and panted like a little puppy.

The Commander touched her shoulder.

"Crewman Morientes, right?"

Her head bobbed furiously up and down.

"Well, you have work to do, haven't you?" he asked, smiling down at her with his magnificent dimples.

"Yes, Commander. Aye, sir!"

Then she sped away from him and vanished down the corridor. Commander Chakotay stared after her until he couldn't see her anymore. A slow smile grew and softened his features, marred into austerity by the Captain's avoidance of him and her reluctance to honour a bargain.

"Sweet little thing…" he said reflectively as walked to the turbolift and made his way to his quarters. On his bed later that night, he lay with his hands tucked behind his head, thinking about Crewman Morientes and how she didn't look like she would deny him anything.

**************

And now for the finale...

The observation lounge was packed. All eyes were on the couple standing before Tuvok. Commander Chakotay looked commanding in his dress uniform. He had taken extra time to polish his tattoo and make his dimples a little deeper. He wanted to brush his teeth about thirty strokes longer, then remembered Kathryn's end of the bet about using a toothbrush to scrub the transporter room floor. That thought alone almost made him puke but it was more because he stuck the toothbrush right against his uvula. He looked extra tanned so that the red jacket was striking.

The bride looked…overwhelmed. Selena Morientes was young, pretty and foolish, if the looks of the congregation were anything to go by. But, it was happening and there was little they could do, save locking Chakotay in the brig and, well, save locking him in the brig. The Unfortunate Crewman - a name the young Selena would have to endure for the rest of her life on Voyager, even as the wife of the ship's first officer - had been boasting that she had caught the Delta Quadrant's biggest fish and almost brought the ire and fist of Chell, the irate Bolian again on her. Chell had been hard put to keep himself from throttling her, a state that had been much desired by the rest of the crew, except that it would have been a serious crime.

Selena couldn't take her eyes off Chakotay. Tuvok's voice droned darkly in pure Vulcan tradition while he read them Verse 2 of the Vulcan Love Song Canto III. Considering that there were ten more verses to read from Canto III, the bridal couple held up well. B'Elanna looked angry and flustered, Tom Paris looked unusually energised and Ayala's nose looked out of joint, a result of a scuffle with Kenneth Dalby earlier the day. The man had been warned by Dalby and Chell not to go to sickbay or he'd have something removed from his person. Ayala only had to visualise how he would look minus that part of his anatomy, before retreating away from Chell the angry Bolian, and Dalby, the angry Maquis who was ready to change his features to Cardassian.

When Tuvok droned the last line of verse twelve, Chakotay barked, "Get on with it, Tuvok."

Tuvok cleared his throat.

"You have the ring, Commander?"

Chakotay turned to Dalby, who handed him - after a little hesitation - a gold band of intricate design. Chakotay took a deep breath.

"I have the ring. Now get on with it."

Tuvok lingered, and then cleared his throat again. He looked at the congregation, paused dramatically.

"Well?" Chakotay asked irritably.

"If there be any among you who object to the validation of this union, who by lawful means declare that this marriage not take place, speak now."

A voice, clear as a bell rang out.

"I do."

All eyes turned in the direction of the voice of Kathryn Janeway. There she stood, at the entrance to the observation lounge. Selena Morientes gave a little cry of consternation. Several loud gasps went up as the captain stepped forward slowly.

She didn't walk. She floated was what B'Elanna would tell her children years later.

And, she was dressed in a gown of shimmering ice white that seemed to mould to her body as she swayed forward and make the onlookers think it was the dress that  walked. The shimmer turned to the palest ice-blue as the light caught it. A vision, if ever there was one. Her hair was loose, hanging in long golden bronze tresses down her back.

She also wore a tiara of brilliant diamante.

Chakotay's jaw had dropped the moment he swung round to see the owner of the voice. Now he found he couldn't swallow, neither could he speak. He saw no one else as Kathryn reached him and took the ring from his trembling fingers.

Kathryn turned to the Unfortunate Crewman and didn't feel one bit sorry as she placed her other hand on the girl's shoulder and pushed her gently to one side. It seemed Selena Morientes didn't mind moving to one side.

"Little girl," Captain Janeway said as she held the ring between thumb and forefinger, "Commander Chakotay gave this ring to me. It is mine and I intend to keep it. My place is here, by his side forever - "

"Kathryn, what the hell is going on?" Chakotay asked, finding his voice at last and not looking a bit displeased at the turn of events. But in defence of all men on board Voyager, he thought to voice it anyway. The woman was transformed into a vision of beauty such as he had never seen. Now she wanted to take his - her ring, for good too! Poor Unfortunate Crewman, who didn't look overly put out by the turn of events either.

"Chakotay," Kathryn started, handing him the ring so that he could slip it on her finger, "you gave this ring to me. Now, Tuvok shall continue the ceremony."

"Kathryn…"

"And pronounce us husband and wife - "

"Kathryn…"

"Chakotay, will you stopped blustering? I lost the bet fair and square. Now marry me like you promised."

"Aye, Captain!"

"Kiss me first."

"Aye, Captain!"

**

In the Captain's bed later that night, where the Captain and Commander lay together playing footsie....

Kathryn's palm lay trustingly on his chest and his hand rested over her hand. She looked like a cat that got a lot of cream. He looked like he enjoyed giving her a lot of  cream.

"You want to say something, my love?" he asked.

"Did you sleep with the Unfortunate Crewman?"

"No."

"I didn't think you would."

"I thought only of you."

"You were going to marry her."

"I was hoping you'd break up the happy party."

If B'Elanna hadn't read her the riot act...

"The Unfortunate Crewman didn't look too unhappy to be rent asunder."

"Did you sleep with Ayala?"

Kathryn sat up slowly. The hundred percent illumination lit up her body. He stared at her, still bemused that he could making her body sing and writhe, the way she did with him. She touched the bruises, the marks on her breasts that grew darker against her creamy skin; she touched the hickeys, low enough in her neck that the turtleneck of her uniform would comfortably conceal them in the morning. All the red weals where Chakotay's hands and teeth marked her. His body didn't look much different either. He still winced when he moved. Long furrows down his back… It had been good.

"See all these marks you made, Chakotay? They still ache. I'll have the aches and the discoloration for days. I love them. I won't be removing them with a regenerator…"

Chakotay traced some of the bruises on her skin with infinite tenderness and with great awe. He still could not believe his good fortune.

"I see them," he answered, his voice filled with deep emotion.

"I take this kind of bruising from only one man - Chakotay. My man. You. Get that?"

He understood.

Giving a loud growl he pulled her into his arms and kissed her hard.

**********

Much later that night...

Kathryn lay awake, her fingers idly twirling a hair on Chakotay's chest.

"Chakotay…"

"Hmmm?"

"You don't have much chest hair."

"I treasure them all," he replied drowsily.

"I'm your wife now. You won't mind if I pull one out."

"Don't you dare, Kathryn Janeway. They're all mine."

She began to tug at the hair. Chakotay winced.

"I won't, if you promise me something."

"Anything, anything," he said fervently, trying to prise her fingers away from his skin.

"Once a year, you will clean my bathroom floor."

"What?"

"With a toothbrush."

"What?"

"Say yes."

"No!"

Kathryn tugged suddenly, hard. Chakotay screamed:

"Yes! Yes! Yes!"

*******************

the end

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