One more thing:  I use technically correct geological terminology in this piece: caprock, slickrock (which is a particular type of sandstone formation) etc. I also use term desert garden. I was reluctant to use it since to most people a garden implies a cultivated place. A desert garden is not an artificially cultivated place, but a place of wildness and startling abundance in the desert. The desert is  harsh place which parcels out life parsimoniously, but when reliable water is added to the picture.......A desert garden overwhelms.
 

A Place of Abundance

by ragpants

Chakotay lay wrapped in his sleeping bag with his right arm folded under his head.  He was watching a wedge of light slowly move down the smooth curved rock that sloped above him.  He had chosen this rock alcove ten feet above the canyon's floor for his campsite four days ago, and had chosen it, in part, for the very fact of this light.  The cave faced southeast and caught the early morning's sun, which warmed away the coolness lingering from the desert's surprisingly cold nights.  The overhang was deep enough to shade the back of the alcove from the full brunt of the afternoon's sun and its melting
heat.

It was a good site, well-chosen, and would have met the approval of his Anasazi ancestors.  He watched the sunlight creep ever lower on the rock ceiling overhead.  In a few minutes, he would call Voyager for his morning check-in.  Today was his last full day of leave, a respite earned after a week of long and drawn-out trade negotiations.  He had received the permit to camp in the park as a parting gift from the assistant to the Undersecretary for Trade, and Chakotay had welcomed the chance to get completely away from the real world problems of Voyager and its crew.

He had slyly suggested to Kathryn that she was welcome to come along on his camping expedition, but she had declined--no surprise there--saying she preferred her vacations to include "long, hot baths, art galleries and an unemptying cup of cappuccino."

The light smoothed further down the pink-tan wall until it was nearly in his eyes.  Local dawn.  Time for morning check-in.  He turned onto his elbow and scrabbled through the outer pocket to his backpack until his fingers found his comm badge.  He rolled onto his back and shrugged the bag up around his shoulders-it was still cold.  He squeezed the pin and it chirped, signaling an open line.

"Chakotay to Voyager."

"Voyager here. Good morning, Commander," came the reply in a soft-spoken Coventry accent.

"Is that you, Rose?" he asked, surprised to find the ship's Information Services Officer, in essence, the ship's librarian, answering his hail.  "What are you doing on the Bridge?"

"Right now?  Baby-sitting the comm board and six....no, seven very junior Ensigns, all new to their posts.  I believe it has something to do with the ship's XO's last fitness evaluation.  He said I had 'command potential' and should be assigned a 'Bridge rotation' to 'expand my leadership skills'."

Her voice was calm and deathly funny.  She had him spot on.  He could even hear the quotes.  Chakotay laughed.  "Well, for whatever reason you're on the Bridge, Lieutenant, note that I made morning check-in."

"Already done, Sir," she stated efficiently.  "Anything else?"

He was about to say no and close the link when a small movement caught his eye.  On the curving sandstone over his head, a small black-speckled lizard had emerged from a crack in the wall and now clung to rock, sunning itself, about a foot above Chakotay's face.  It pumped its body up and down, looking for all the world like it was doing push-ups.  Chakotay smiled and an idea presented itself to him.

"Has the Captain checked-in yet this morning?"  It was a reasonable question.  One a First Officer might want to ask.  It was his job, after all, to make sure the Captain was kept safe.

"No need, Sir,"  Lt. Hallowell's voice returned,.  "She came back aboard last night saying she had enough shopping for one shore leave.  She's in her quarters, Commander.  Want me to transfer your call?"  There was a trace of insinuation in the last question, but it was subtle and not something Chakotay cared to make an issue out of--at least not right now.

"No, thank you, Rose. I'll manage it myself, Chakotay out."

He held the commlink in his hand and debated momentarily, then pressed it to open another channel.  "Chakotay to Captain Janeway."

"Janeway here."  Her voice sounded groggy.  Damn.  He had forgotten the time differential between his locale and ship's time.  He hoped he hadn't woken her up, but it was too late now.

"Good morning, Kathryn.  Sorry, if I woke you."

"...'S all right, Chakotay,"  she yawned.  "I have to get up soon anyway."  That part was a lie. "What can I do for you?"  She sounded awake now.  He plunged ahead with his proposal.

"I have one day left on my park permit and I thought you might want to come down and spend the day with me.  It's lovely here.  And quiet.  I could show you around."

There was silence for a long moment over the link while she considered her answer.

"I suppose I'll need to wear hiking boots."

Cocooned in his sleeping bag, Chakotay grinned.  "That would be wise.  I plan to hike you all over the place."

She groaned dramatically.  "Somehow I figured you would."

"Kathryn," he said mildly, with amusement, "how did you even make it through basic fitness at the Academy?"

"That, " she answered, drawling out the word, "was a long time ago.  And I am *not* going to discuss it.  Now," she said, taking the opportunity to change the topic, "Is there anything I should bring?"

"Hmmm." he mused, "How about lunch?  Unless you're in the mood for some dried pack rations?"

"Not on your life," she chuckled.  "I'll bring lunch. I'll beam down at your comm signal location when I'm ready."

"Sounds fine.  Chakotay out."  He turned over on his side.  The little lizard was still there.  He nodded toward it.  "Thank you."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chakotay sat on the edge of the overhang enjoying the sunshine and a cup of his morning tea.  The sound of the transporter beam fizzed behind him.  Damn!  Kathryn was arriving sooner than he had expected.  He put the half-empty cup down and watched as she shimmered into solidity about six feet farther down the ledge and beneath the overhanging rock.  She was dressed for warm weather and the morning cold  must have come as a shock to her.  Her arms lifted immediately to wrap around herself and her nipples poked stiffly through the thin fabric of her sleeveless blouse.

Chakotay took a moment to appreciate the view.  He hoped he wasn't being too obvious about looking at her chest.  It was a moment before he stopped wondering if she was wearing a bra and noticed that her comm badge was missing.  That meant she was *officially* off duty.  He allowed a small smile to curl up the edge of his mouth.  That boded well for this day.

"Come over into the sun, Kathryn, you'll be warmer," he said as he uncoiled gracefully to his feet.  He felt only a slightly bit self-conscious about being caught wearing nothing but his gray, Fleet-issue skivvies and ragg socks.  He reached over and tugged her arm until she was standing where he had been sitting moment earlier in the full light of the morning sun. When she was situated, he stepped behind her and pulled his jacket from his pack and wrapped it around her shoulders.

"Here. This should help."

"I wasn't expecting it to be this cold," she half complained, "I thought this was supposed to be a desert."

"It is," he explained genially, "But the desert can get damned cold at night. Especially here it seems." The dramatic temperature drop of his own first night here had come as a bit of a surprise. It was much greater than what he was familiar with on Earth and he had been very glad of the reliable warmth of  StarFleet regulation issue. "Give the place a few hours and  I'm sure it'll get warm enough for you. In fact, it'll probably get warm enough to make even Tuvok feel right at home." He chuckled lightly and moved with reluctance away from the pool of warmth that Kathryn and the sunlight made.

He bundled his clothes together and gathered his boots. "Give me a moment to get dressed," he said as he carefully picked his way around a scraggly evergreen tree at the east lip of the alcove and into a boulder field which he knew would screen him from Kathryn's view.  He returned a few minutes later to find Kathryn imspecting the orderly arrangement of his small neat camp. She had returned his half empty cup to the flat rock he had been using as a his "kitchen". Chakotay gulped a mouthful of the now tepid tea and belatedly remembered his manners. He extended the cup toward Kathryn, "Would you like some? All I have is tea, I'm afraid, but I can boil some more water."

She shook her head. "I had my caffeine fix before I beamed down." She moved over to examine the clothes line strung partially across the mouth of the cave, fingering the tied bundles of herbs and grasses Chakotay had hung there to dry, while Chakotay loaded and arranged his own daypack. Ready now, he slung his pack across his back while Kathryn did the same and he led her down the dozen or so sandstone steps from the alcove to the bottom of the arroyo.

Together they walked the length of the wash until they reached a rockfall near the head of it. They climbed the rock tumble until they stood on the smooth, worn stratum that was the caprock of the formation. Chakotay touched Kathryn's arm and directed her attention to the west and the scenery there.

"It's beautiful," she gasped as the sun rose behind them, illuminating the drapery and crenellations of the towering deep red sandstone monoliths that stood in the valley before them.  They sat together in reverent silence, watching as the morning's light glided over the monuments, gilding them with sunlight.

 After a time, Chakotay rose and extended a hand toward Kathryn.  "Ready?"

He led her over the undulating caprock to the upper end of a box canyon, then around to the side where they picked their way carefully down the slickrock and over the jumbled rockfall to the bottom.  Once down inside this canyon, Chakotay led her down the dry creekbed to the main canyon and turned upslope.  A  hundred feet farther up the main canyon, he entered the mouth of yet another small canyon.  The canyon's walls narrowed precipitously until they were barely two feet apart and Kathryn laughed  delightedly when she saw that Chakotay had to turn sideways to fit through one of the narrows, yet she hadn't.

The narrow stone walls rose a straight up above their heads, exposing different layers in the rock,  like a sandwich sliced open and its fillings exposed.  As the canyon widened, their pace slowed and they took turns pointing out geological formations in the canyon walls and the interesting odd rock half- buried in the gravelly streambed they strolled along.  There were preserved ripple marks in some of the  mudstone layers and once Kathryn pointed to a fossil embedded in the siltstone of the canyon's wall.  They followed the canyon upstream for several kilometers until it reached a pour-over that permitted  an easy scramble up and they took the opportunity to climb out of the canyon and back onto the caprock.  The thin air, the day's increasing heat and the steep climb all contributed to Kathryn and Chakotay  both breathing hard by the time they reached the top.  With unspoken agreement they sat on the smooth pale gray stone and caught their breath.

"Did I ever tell you that I found a fossil once--on Mars?  I was very lucky.  My first major scientific discovery.  The first and, as far I know, the only, notochord ever discovered on Mars.  I'm a footnote in all the textbooks."  Kathryn laughed softly at her own pretensions.

He chuckled with her.  "When? How?"

She grinned and accepted the water bottle he handed her. "Been to Mars?"

He nodded.  "Dozens of times--I piloted the Jupiter run for awhile--but I never got any farther than the spaceport."

"Well, when I was nine, my father took me to Mars for the first time.  The shuttle pilot told  me that there were a series of underwater tunnels linking the quarries--- left-overs from  Mars' terraforming days."  She shook her head in remembrance. "I just couldn't stay away.  Got myself grounded a time or two.  Anyway, for my high school graduation trip I wheedled an underground exploring trip out of my parents.  Ch..... A friend and I went.  We got as far as the first of the underground caverns---that's where I discovered the fossil.  It was embedded in the wall and plain as day.  Anyone could have found it. I was just lucky enough to be the first person to spot it."  She shrugged dismissively.

"I doubt that, Kathryn. Not 'anyone' would be looking.  What happened on the rest of the trip?  Find anymore scientific discoveries?"

Her mouth twisted ruefully.  "No.  My friend and I had a disagreement and he wanted to go back.  It wasn't safe to explore alone so that was the end of the trip."  She looked off into the distance and lifted the bottle to her lips and drank.

"Do you miss it?" he asked.

"Mars?" she replied, sounding puzzled.

"No.  Science."

Her eyes took on a distant look, unfocused., and she was silent for a long moment.  Thoughtful, Chakotay decided.  "Sometimes," she admitted, then sighed.  "There are times when I wish the most difficult decision I have to make is which grad student to hire for the summer and the biggest problem I have to handle is convincing the Resource Allocation Committee I deserve a bigger budget."  She sighed again, wistfully, and continued, "That was the plan, you know.  Justin and I would be married and I would get on staff someplace.  MIT. Zurich.  Maybe a few years at the Vulcan Science Academy."

Her faraway look faded  as she returned her attention to the present, pushing  the stopper into the mouth of the water bottle and screwing the cap on over it.  "That's exactly what I would be doing.  Research in a lab......And I imagine I would be bored to death by now."  She looked up with a sly, self-depreciating grin at the man who sat beside her.

 He grinned frankly back at her. "With Justin or the research?"

Her smile widened and kinked up to one side.  "With both, I imagine."

He rose and offered a hand to help her up.  "Ready to walk some more?"

She groaned dramatically.  "Haven't you run out of places to show me yet?"

"Nope.  Just one more.  And it's special.  I promise."

Kathryn shouldered her pack and grabbed at his hand to pull herself up.  The trip across the mesa top had grown hot and uncomfortable.  The temperature had risen with the sun.  Kathryn had long ago stripped off the jacket Chakotay had lent her and stuffed it in her pack.  Now they both sweated in earnest as they trekked across slickrock and expanses of wheat-flour fine white sand spotted with low unfriendly bushes that seemed perversely determined to snag their legs as they walked. After about an hour, Chakotay pointed to a draw in the sand that lead to a cliff's edge.  "We'll go down here."  And with that he disappeared over the edge.

Chakotay stood on the ledge just below the cliff's lip and waited. Kathryn's anxious face appeared a heartbeat later, peering,  grim with consternation over the edge.  There was something like real fear in her eyes and he immediately felt gulty over tricking her. Had she really believed him capable of such momumental carelessness as jumping off a cliff? In partial atonement, he reached up to help her down the rockface, but she resolutely pushed his hands away and slid over the gritty sandstone lip on her fanny. Standing on a level with him, she scolded ,"That wasn't the slighest bit funny,"  but the effect was ruined when a small grin twitched at her lips.

Chakotay grinned to himself and wondered what payback Kathryn would invoke later as he once again lead the way across the undulating sandstone.

They reached the bottom of the canyon and Chakotay turned unhesitantly to the right.

"Don't you ever get lost?" Kathryn wondered aloud in exaperation as Chakotay turned  again certainly and set off.

"Nope." He grinned like a little boy showing off.

"Really?" There was a bit of uncertainty in her voice, as if she thought he might be teasing her again.

"Really. And if you promise not to give away my secret I'll tell you how I know I'm not lost."

He had her intrigued. Unconsciously she leaned toward him conspiratorially. "All right, I promise."

Chakotay pointed. "There. See?"

Kathryn shook her head impatiently. "What? I don't see anything."

Chakotay walked over toward a scrubby evergreen that struggled into existence in a crack in the sandstone and pointed at a seemingly haphazard pile of rocks. "Trail markers," he explained, " I marked the route myself after I found it. Took me the better part of two days to figure at how to get to where we're going. I wanted to make sure I could find my way back."  He laughed easily at her disillusioned look."What were you expecting? Some sort of Indian trick?" He laughed again at her slightly guilty look. "Hope I haven't disappointed you too badly. If you'd rather, you can pretend I didn't tell you and I can make up a legend for you."

The last coaxed a sheepish smile from her. "No," she answered, " I guess I was just expecting something...um...more exotic than a pile of rocks, but I'll survive my disllusionment. And I guess I'm relieved that we're not just wandering around at random."

Chakotay clapped his hands over his heart in mock shock. "Don't you *trust* me, Kathryn?"

"Oh, *I* trust you, Chakotay, with my life, " she answered sweetly as she began to walk on, the cairns easily recognizable now that they'd been pointed out, "It's your piloting that scares me."

~~~~~~~~~~~~

 The trail rose steadily upward and the heat of the sun beat mercilessly down. It was hot. Hot and dry. Hot and dry and dusty. Isolated. Empty. Desolate.

They trudged on for what seemed like hours when the smell of the water rose in the air.  A greenness.  The scent of life and growing things. The hikers stepped up their pace, hurrying to reach the oasis that lay hidden ahead of them. Chakotay lagged back, allowing Kathryn to outpace him. He wanted to be able to see her face when she discovered his secret place.

The low rumble of falling water was audible now and the formerly dry creekbed had turned damp and muddy in spots.  Kathryn cocked a quizzical eyebrow at he companion as if to ask "Water? Here?".  Nowhere in their travels across the vast and empty land had there been any water. Chakotay gave a single nod and Kathryn's eyes widened in a kind of primal excitement.

The vegetation thickened. Instead of the sparse gray and thorny scrub that was common elsewhere, here were green shrubs and small clumps of long stemmed grasses that grew in damp sand-filled crevices. Abruptly, the streambed veered to the left around a sharp bend and, following it, the hikers entered another world: a desert garden.

Kathryn stopped, completely still save for the slight motion of her breathing, taking in the unexpected beauty of her surroundings. Halfway up the soaring cliff a stream cascaded into existence. It dropped dizzyingly down, bouncing off the deep red sandstone wall, exploding into a spray of rainbow mist, coalescing, and falling down to explode all over again. The stream finally subsided into a wide worn stone basin in the canyon's floor.

The abundance of water had worked its magic here. The air was cooler and moister here, somehow softer and more welcoming. It was a balm on face and skin. The hikers stood, filling their lungs with the promise that the cool air of the canyon made.

The oasis was green with vegetation, a startling contrast to the red, gray and dun rock surrounding it. Life seemingly sprouted from every crack and crevice capable of holding even a spoonful of sandy soil. Mosses and delicately fronded ferns clung to the sheer rockface around the falls, bathed in its constant mist. Sturdy pale-barked trees with large golden green leaves lined both the sides of the canyon, sheltering the smaller plants growing there: a kind of bright green chin-high shrub with tiny round leaves, a dozen or so different species of herbaceous plants, two varieties of narrow-bladed grass marked with white stripes along their lengths. Kathryn reached her hand to touch the bushes,  as if she expected them to be a mirage, but they remained real under her fingers. The garden's promise held: there was water here, and life. And that joyous fact was announced in the trill of birdcall that  reverberated in the canyon.

Chakotay stood a little back from Kathryn, intensely watching her reaction and vicariously reliving his own first encounter with the garden, its feeling of life and serenity filling him.

Quietly, he walked up behind her. "Worth the walk?" he asked softly.

"Yes," she breathed, not bothering to hide the awe in her voice. "It's beautiful."

The water with the mindless patience of ages had worn a hollow in the rock, forming a smooth bottomed pool in the canyon's floor. The water looked clear, cool and inviting.

Chakotay unsnapped the waist strap of his pack and dropped it to the ground. "Told you it was worth the walk." His words were smug, though his tone wasn't. "I thought we could have lunch here. Take a swim and wait out the afternoon's heat before heading back to camp." He was sitting on the ground releasing the bindings of his boots.

Kathryn's head snapped round to meet his eyes as his words penetrated her contemplation of the scenery. "I didn't bring a swimsuit."

"Neither did I," he admitted with a dimpled, mischievous grin, "But that hasn't stopped me yet." He yanked his shirt out of his waistband and was proceeding to unbutton it. He watched as her eyes followed the movements of his fingers. "Don't tell me you've never gone skinny dipping before?" It wasn't quite a dare and if she seemed uncomfortable at the prospect, Chakotay had decided he could always just wear his briefs. The day was hot enough that any wet clothing would dry fast enough. The decision proved unnecessary as her eyes flashed at the implied challenge and she reached for her own blouse.

He had a head start on her and was the first to wade out into the water. It was just as cold as he had remembered and he paused with the water swirling around his thighs before taking the step into the drop off in the bottom of the pool.

The hole was nearly two feet deeper than the rest of the pool. Chakotay stepped into it, sank, then leaned back, submerging his head underwater. He popped up again, blowing and slicking the water out of his face and hair with his hands.

"Water feels wonderful."

Her voice was so close that for a moment it startled him. She was standing at the rim of the drop off behind him and and slightly to the right. She was as naked as he and Chakotay felt his groin tighten and was glad for the mindful coolness of the water. She edged her way carefully around the deep part walking carefully to avoid the slippery patches of algae and mud and sat, knees drawn up and forearms resting on them in the shallows just deep enough to let the subtle rippling of the water lap at her upper arms and breasts. Chakotay watched Kathryn settle herself and moved to his own favorite spot: a niche carved out of the sandstone that fell straight into the water offering  back support like a chair. They sat in  comfortable silence, too far apart for conversation to be possible without shouting over the steady grumble of the falling water. After a time, Kathryn rose and began wading back toward where they had left their clothes. "Time for lunch," she called out over the water.

Chaktay watched in amusment as Kathryn deliberately walked past her own clothes to where he had left his clothes piled by the pool's edge, watched as she picked his shirt from the pile and fastened it around her.  Its rolled sleeves hung below her elbows and its hem brushed the middle of her thighs. She grabbed her pack by a strap and moved to an area of dappled shade beneath of the golden leaved trees. Here she spread lunch out on a small cloth: a  round loaf of crisp-crusted bread, a crock of soft cheese, some eggplant pate, a cooled vacuum pack of crunchy vegetables, and  a flexible thermal flask of white wine with two memory plastic cups which popped into tumblers under the pressure of her fingers.

Chakotay, now dressed in his shorts, dropped down to sit across the cloth from Kathryn and added his own contribution to lunch:  a pouch of purplish black tart dried berries and a some spiced native seed clusters he had purchased in XXX'x capital. He raised an amused,  quizzical eyebrow at his companion's attire. "Nice shirt," he commented drily, "Know where I can get one?"

"My First Officer, "Kathryn replied without looking up from her task of unpacking lunch, "He owed it to me for stepping off a cliff........Damn." She sorted through her pack. "Can't find the knife." She looked up slightly apologetically.

Chakotay reached into his pants' pocket. "Will this do?" He produced a a folded pocket knife.

She nodded. "Are you prepared for *everything*?" she asked with amused exasperation.

"Yes." His tone and expression were much more solemn than the question deserved, and there was something possessive and guarded in his eyes.

"Indian scout?" Kathryn asked, bending her head toward her task of slicing bread.

"No. Boy scout."

The laughter exploded out of Kathryn and rolled unrestrained and uncontained off the surround rock She laughed harder than Chakotay had even seen her laugh and every time her hilarity started to subside  she merely looked over at his face full of feigned incomprehension and she began giggling all over again. Finally,  she was able to breathe again and she gasped, "Well, *that* does explain alot."

He allowed the mischief to show in his eyes while Kathryn finished slicing the bread and handed him a piece topped with a large dollop of eggplant.

Lunch was leisurely and desultory. The heat, the exertion, the  food and the wine combined to lull them both toward sleepiness. Chakotay leaned back under the shade of the tree, placed the crook of his elbow across his eyes and drowsed, stretch out on top of the picnic cloth. Kathryn lay back as well, but she didn't sleep. Chakotay listened to the restless rhythm of breathing and felt her small fidgety movements. After a few minutes, she got up and walked along the edge of the pool.  He watched her from under his arm as she stepped into the water then left a trail of rapidly drying footprints in an arc as she wandered farther along the edge of the pool. It was almost as if she were conducting an experiment to see how many footsteps she could take before her first wet mark disappeared from the stone.  How like her! She possessed a true scientist's soul. Chakotay rolled to his side and watched her through slitted eyes. She had reached the waterfall now and held her hands out to feel the spray that floated out away from the canyon wall.

He watched as she looked back toward him, then slipped the shirt from her shoulders, dropping it on the rocks.  She walked deliberately under the cascading waters and began to smooth her hands over and along her body, washing and caressing herself. She cupped her hands together in front of her to fill her palms with water and then dribbled it down the curve of her throat and across the tops of her breasts. She repeated the action, this time smoothing the water across her pale stomach and abdomen. Kathryn stepped back slightly into the cascade and let the water slide down the front of her, letting the water curl around her breasts, flow down her belly and funnel between her legs.

From his viewpoint beneath the tree Chakotay groaned in frustration. Did she think he was asleep? Or was this a deliberate provocation on her part? He didn't know what to think. He closed his eyes to blot out the vision of her under the waterfall, but  found that no matter  how honorable his intentions might be he simply couldn't take his eyes from her nude body.

 Her wrists were crossed now, under her breasts, and she balanced one soft mound in each hand while she her thumbs stroked across her nipples, her head thrown back and her mouth open in the pleasure of the moment.

He couldn't take anymore. Even he had his limits. Chakotay rolled to his feet and stalked off into the thicket.

When he had cooled off and regained his composure, he returned to the canyon garden. Kathryn lay curled partially on her side and apparently asleep on the smooth  surface of white sandstone with his shirt again wrapped around her. He leaned over her, intending to kiss her but drew back. What if he had misinterpreted her actions? They had seemed pretty obvious...still she not said a single word to him. He sat back on his heels.

"Aren't you going to kiss me?"  Her voice was sultry and amused.  "I felt your shadow on my face," she explained when he was silent.  And then he did kiss her.  Softly, gently, though there was nothing tentative about it.  He lifted his face from hers.  She smiled and he leaned back toward her to touch her lips again and this time when he did, he reached down under the shirt to feather the soft thatch at the junction of her legs.  His touch in both places was leisurely, sure and exploratory.  She moaned softly in disappointment when he withdrew from her.  He leaned toward her again and this time he parted her, her lips with his tongue and her sex with his fingers, and penetrated her depths. Satisfied with his explorations,  Chakotay leaned back and waited until she realized he wasn't returning and opened her eyes.

"You have to tell me what you want, Kathryn."

She rolled to a sitting position, her knees drawn up to her chest and leaned her chin on her crossed arms.  She traced gentle fingers along his cheek and across his lips.

"I want what you want, Chakotay. I want what I can't have."  She looked away from his eyes, shook her head slightly as if in regret, then looked back into his eyes again.  "You have given me a wonderful gift today.  Something precious.  Today I can remember who I really am.  Who I am without the uniform.  And I would like to give a gift to you in return-or rather share one with you.  But first I need to know that you will accept it in the spirit that it's given.  A shore leave romance: passionate, intense, achingly sweet and......over in the morning.  Can you do this?"

Anger flared hotly in his eyes.  "Can you?"

"Yes," she answered.  Her voice was firm and  filled with surety. "Yes."  He searched her face and read only resolve there.  He closed his eyes against her face, hating her, hating himself for loving her so helplessly he couldn't refuse her.  He opened his eyes and looked at her face, waiting and half-afraid.

"Yes," he whispered. And damned himself for her sake.  They made love in a warmed hollow in the sandstone and when she came her cries echoed off the canyon walls like birdsong--wild and sweet.  Afterward they slept, deeply, wrapped in each other's arms against the cooling breeze that wafted down the canyon.

When Chakotay woke again, her mouth was on him.  He groaned with pleasure she sucked and stroked him to full tumescence.  He welcomed her weight when she swung her leg across him and surrounded him with her heat.  He drove deeply into her urging to her toward her peak, and past it, through the trough and toward another crest.  He drove her relentlessly onward until she slumped, exhausted onto his chest.  He allowed her to rest there for a moment before sliding her to the side and pressing himself behind her.  Her nudged her knee forward with one of his own and guided his thigh between hers.  He wrapped his left arm around her waist and pushed his erection deeply into her.  His right hand slipped lower on her belly until it parted her labia and found her clitoris.  He pinched it between his thumb and first finger, then began an insistent massage until she began to shudder at this combined assault.  As she convulsed around him he pressed forward and deeply, flooding her with his gift of life and spirit. Her chaotic breathing slowed, and Chakotay eased his arm from under her.  His finger lightly traced the contour of her shoulder blade and he leaned forward to place a lover's  kiss against the nape of her neck. The words that she had forbidden him to say burned in his mouth, but he had given her his promise and so remained silent.

He knew that he had marked her in some way, as surely as if he branded his sigil upon her tender skin.  That for as long as there was breath and memory in her body she would judge every man who ever touched against him. Finding some measure of peace and consolation in the thought, he lay against her and slept.
 

When Chakotay awoke again the sun had sunk lower against the canyon tops. He rose reluctantly and dressed. He was unwilling to wake Kathryn yet. He watched her sleep, at ease and at peace. Turning away from the sight of her, he took his empty waterbottles to fill near the head of the spring. As he climbed up the jumbled rocks to get nearer the water source, he brushed against a fern growning in a niche in the red sandstone wall, watered by the mist from the falls. It was a beautiful thing, the fern, so delicate and unexpected in the desert, deep-rooted and tenacious to survive in adversity, much like the love a Maquis freedom fighter might feel for his former oppressor.  Chakotay brushed his fingers against the fronds and said a prayer for its survival.

He filled his bottles and return to crouch beside Kathryn and, touching her lightly on the shoulder, woke her.

"Time to go," he told her, "We have about an hour's walk to get back to camp."

She stood and stretched and waded into the pool where she began to wash the remnants of their lovemaking from her thighs. He watched her and felt a sense of terrible loss, as if she were washing away him too. He handed her her clothing when she was done and then turned to gather up the remains of their lunch.

When she was dressed, he shouldered his pack and with a single look backwards led Kathryn out of Eden and down the creekbed. He took her along a different route than the one he had used to bring her here. This one climbed steeply out of the canyon and switchbacked frequently. Kathryn quickly fell behind and he waited patiently for her at every turning, urging her to rest, only to have her past him with grim determination. Even after they had reached the top of the caprock and the trail became more level, Kathryn kept lagging behind. He wondered if she was already regretting their Faustian pact, was already  regretting her actions of the afternoon past. Was already regetting him.

Chakotay allowed her to fall behind and catch up a half-a-dozen times before he noticed that she was carrying her pack with its straps wrapped around her upper arms instead of across her shoulders. He stopped in the shade of a boulder and dropped his pack, signaling a rest. She also slid her pack to the ground. Something was wrong and he was determined to discover what it was.  He came close to her and invading her space, leaning down toward her as if to kiss her. At the last moment, though, he shifted his stance and pulled open the front of her blouse. She gasped in surprise as the air touched her sunburned skin. Chakotay stared, caught between horror and  fascination at the glowing fuschia her blouse had hidden. His hand darted forward of its own volition to touch it but drew back at her wince of anticipated pain. His fingers  traced bare millimeters above her chest, outlining the slope of her breast from collarbone to nipple, feeling the heat radiate off her damaged skin. He wanted to touch her everywhere, to run his hands all over her pink and sensitive flesh. It aroused him and he was ashamed.

"Kathryn," he breathed, and his nearness of his hot breath to her damaged skin caused her to gasp.  "You should have told me." For the first time, he lifted his gaze from her ravaged breasts to meet her eyes.

"Why?" she asked, a bit sharply, "Do you have a dermal regenerator in your pack?"

"No," he answered gently, "But I do have one in my med-kit back at camp. And maybe...." A thoughtful look came over his face as he tried to remember something. He dashed off into the thorny bushes, ranging back and forth like a hunting dog on a scent, returning with his hand full of slimy green gunk. Chakotay plucked at the front of Kathryn's blouse, peering at her breasts, then pulling the shoulders down to better assess to damage to her  back. His hand hovered near to her breasts, but with sigh of decision, he smeared the goo across her shoulders.

Kathryn gasp and sputtered a protest. "What do you think you're doing?"

"That's right," he responded, busily spreading the sticky mixture thinly as possible, "You  didn't get the lecture. You spent your holiday in the city." Kathryn threw  an impatient look at him. "The Doctor's decided to take up ethnobotany as a way to pass the time in the Delta Quadrant. He's hoping that some of the local plants will prove useful as medications for the crew and the Federation when we get back. The Doctor asked everyone who is taking leave in primitive areas to bring back specimens for him. He thought that this one might prove useful as a topical analgesic." He spoke mostly to calm her and keep her from moving while he administered his makeshift first aid.  Now he finished his ministrations and stepped back. "Help any?"

"Maybe some," she conceded.

He took her pack and added it own his own. They set off again toward the wash where he had made his camp.

Under the shelter of the rock, Chakotay tugged Kathryn's blouse off and she slid down her shorts. He took the regenerator and carefully played it over her shoulders until the unnatural color faded to a more normal shade. Carefully, slowly, he made his way down her back, over her buttocks and along the back of her thighs. She had burned ferociously everywhere she had not protected with sunblock before leaving the ship--and she obviously had not planned on nude sun-bathing. The healing completed, he ran gentle, barely touching fingertips over every square centimeter of her back, checking for any spots he may have missed, for any changes in the texture of her skin. And because he wanted to touch her once more before she retreated forever beyond his grasp.

He circled around in front of her and the dermal regenerator hummed as Chakotay began ministering to her burns there, starting with her breasts.  His large hands gently cupped first the left breast, running the regenerator over the nipple, which puckered to attention under his touch.  Kathryn stood with her eyes closed. She looked both pained and intent, though by what he wasn't sure. He moved on to minister to her right breast.  Both breasts now back to their original hue, creamy white with rose colored nipples standing erect.  Continuing his work, Chakotay's hands worked their way down her abdomen, carefully guiding the regenerator over the damaged areas.

And when he had finished, just as he had on her back, Chakotay began to trace his fingers intimately down from her shoulders to linger on and pass over the fullness of her breasts, the narrowing of her waist, the flare of her hips. The he knelt and continued his track along the muscled roundness of her thighs. He felt her tremble beneath his touch and impulsively he leaned forward to place a soft kiss on her belly just below the navel.

As his lips touched her skin, Kathryn's hands reached forward to grab his head. They tried to guide his face toward the hot scent of her that rose from her center.

"Don't tempt me, Kathryn," he whispered huskily, rising to stand against her. Then he pushed her slightly away so he could look down at her eyes, "You'll miss check-in and so will I. Tuvok will be worried."

She stood eyes closed and trembling, unmoving. Frozen. He was tempted. So tempted.  But he had given his word, so with every bit of resolve he could muster, he stepped away from her, turning to pick up her clothes from the rocks where he had laid them to keep them out of the dirt. Tenderly, he helped her to dress and fastened her communicator badge over her right breast.

He wanted to say something meaningful and memorable, but couldn't think of anything so he settled for a sad smile and "I'll see you in the morning, Captain."

He watched as she tapped her badge and rippled into nothingness. Kathryn was gone. Perhaps forever.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chakotay settled into his evening routine. He filled a pot with water and heated to it to cook his solitary dinner, then heated more water to wash his dishes and make an evening cup of tea. He sat with his cup as he had in the morning, with his legs dangling over the side of the ledge. He had deliberately held all thoughts of this day at bay, submerging them in the familiar routine of camp, but he now was alone with them in the early evening stillness. They circled round and round in his brain, crowding out any final enjoyment he might have felt on his last evening here.

The sun was nearly down and Chakotay rose restlessly to his feet. Abandoning his tea on the ledge and eager to be away from his memories, he climbed hand over foot up the side of wash, deliberately choosing a difficult route to the top, concentrating only on the placement of his feet and fingers or his balance against the cliff. Once he had reached the canyon's rim, he stood, watching, as the sun slid down behind the mesa, painting the sky a dozen shades of rose, salmon and gold. Following some impulse whose source he couldn't identify, he lifted his hands toward the sunset and began to chant an evening prayer. The last time he had prayed like this he was 8 years old and standing beside his grandfather on a canyon rim beneath a sun halfway across the galaxy. Nevertheless, he felt a rightness as his voice rose and fell in the remembered cadence and he thanked wholeheartedly this alien sun and this land's unfamiliar spirits for the gift of this day. And in return, he felt a sense of peace envelop him.

The light was failing with the characteristic rapidity of the desert and it made climbing more dangerous. Chakotay was not foolhardy man. He climbed down from the mesa top by a less precipitous route than he had climbed up. Back at the alcove, he lit his lantern and placed it in a niche in the wall. Chakotay set about straightening his sparse camp in preparation for his departure in the morning. He nested his  stove and pots and loaded them into his pack. Then he checked and carefully stowed the plant samples he had collected for the Doctor. Chakotay also had a large bundle of a plant which smelled like the sage he burned during purification rituals. This too was carefully tucked away. It was quickly growing cold--another characteristic of a desert night. He seached through his backpack for his jacket. It wasn't there. And then he remembered. He had given it to Kathryn to wear this morning and doubtlessly she had forgotten about it in the confusion of her departure. Oh well, it wasn't critical. He finished the busywork of packing and stripped out of his light daytime clothes in favor of the warmer long underwear he slept in. With nothing left to occupy him, Chakotay opened his sleeping bag and slipped into it. It was early yet and he suspected that sleep would be a long time coming. He turned restlessly on his side and wriggled around in hope of finding a more comfortable spot for his hip bone.  He lay there eternal moments waiting for sleep which would not come despite his body's fatigue. He reached for the communicator and held it between his fingers. He wanted to call Kathryn. In fact the urge to do so was nearly overwhelming.  Where was she? What was doing now?  What was she thinking about? In the end, he laid the commbadge down on the rock floor beside him and shrugged deeper into his bag.

The tenuous peace he had gained on the clifftop was gone and  his mind jittered with memories of the day's events and second thoughts. He would never get to sleep this way. Consciously he slowed his breathing and carefully blanked his mind, but perversely his consciousness refused to cooperate and repeatedly summoned up the image of Kathryn Janeway. Here Kathryn asleep and at peace; or,  wet and laughing under the falls; or silent and entranced as the sun rose behind her; or flushed and passionate as he held her in his arms and made love to her.

So this was how it was going to be, he thought bitterly, and cursed himself for the fool that he was.  She had always haunted his sleep even when they were only shipmates, friends and occasional confidantes. Now that they were lovers-- or rather ex-lovers, he reminded himself mockingly--he might never sleep again. He rolled over irritiably and lay with his his knees and forehead pressed against the rock wall, thinking unhappy thoughts.
 
The chirp of the communicator sounded unexpectedly in the small space of the alcove and startled Chakotay so violently that he knocked his head against the wall. He rolled over, reaching for the commbadge with his right hand while rubbing his forehead with his left.

"Janeway to Chakotay"

"Yes, Captain," he answered formally.

"Kathryn," she replied, signalling that this call was not ship's business.

"Kathryn," he acknowledged, erasing the formality from his voice.

"Chakotay, I...." She faltered, uncharacteristically at a loss for words. " I accidentally took your jacket when I beamed up. I just found it when I emptied my pack. I hope I didn't cause you any inconvenience. I can have it beamed down if you need it."

This was not what she intended to say and Chakotay knew it. She was filling the space between them with words.

"No. It's not a problem."

He allowed her silence, to find her courage, or not, to speak her truth, or not. As he had allowed her so many things.

"I wanted to thank you too. For the day. It was wonderful. All of it. I never knew the desert could be so beautiful.  It's not like Indiana, or any other place I've ever been. So quiet. So empty. Yet so full of life. Thank you for sharing that with me."

The commlink went silent after that and for such a long time that Chakotay began to wonder if it had malfunctioned.

"I lied. " Her voice was low, yet she had found her courage and her truth. " I lied about you being a shoreleave romance. You are many things to me, but not that.  Never that.  I wanted you to know................I don't know what I want to do about this...or even if I should do anything about it. But I wanted you to know."

How does one answer a lover's confession when she is a hundreds of miles away with nothing but the unfeeling vacuum of space and the faint vibrations of  subspace connecting you? Chakotay hadn't the faintest idea. This was not how he had ever envisioned it, their admission of their feelings for each other. He had always thought that at least they would be in the same room together. He needed to find the right words to make her understand, to reassure her. And he had to  do it fast. Kathryn was waiting at the other end of the commlink and she had never learned, as he had as a child, how to practice patience.

But she surprised him, as she had so many other times this day, by speaking first. " Is there a desert on Dorvan?"

He smiled, maybe words didn't matter. "No, but my grandfather always said the prettiest place he ever saw was the Black Mesa in the spring after the rains. Want to see the desert in bloom, Kathryn?"

" Yes, I think I'd like that, so long as you don't make me walk 15 kilometers before you make love to me. "

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chakotay lay in his sleeping bag with his arm folded underneath his head, watching as a warm wedge of sunlight slipped down the rock wall of the alcove. Local dawn. It was time for him to leave and return to the duties and strictures of life aboard Voyager. A week ago he had been eager to get away from the ship; yesterday he would have departed the desert only with regrets. Today he looked forward to resuming the difficult journey back to Earth, no matter what the future might bring. He rose and dressed and packed away the last of his clothing and equipment, tying his sleeping pad and bag securely to his pack frame. He shouldered his burden and clambered down to the streambed below to begin his long walk home,  but not before Chakotay had stopped to thank the lizard for allowing him to share his home.