Fan Fiction
TITLE: Chakotay's Holidays: Every New Beginning
AUTHOR: Brenda Shaffer-Shiring
RATING: PG
CODES: C. Future chapters will be C/T.
PART: 6/?
DISCLAIMER: Paramount will little note, nor long remember, what I do here. But
they still own the VOY copyrights, so they get a shout-out anyway.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: The equinox ritual Chakotay participates in is based on an
Ojibway ritual described in the blog "The Sacred Pipe." (I know Chakotay's
father's people are Central American, but his mother's may not be.) Thanks to
Diane Bellomo for betaing this story.
SUMMARY: Chakotay feels profoundly connected to his heritage when he celebrates
a Native American spring equinox ritual. But with whom can he share his
feelings?
His mother's people sang the season in, as they had done since time out of memory. This year, for the first time in all of his life, Chakotay sang the ancient chants with them. He sang strongly and surely, the words rising out of some cradle of memory, as if his mother had gifted them as his birthright. Perhaps she had.
Tobacco, the sacred herb, teased his unaccustomed nostrils, and sweat poured from his body as he sat there in the sweat lodge; he savored the heat, if not the smell. The beat of a deep-toned drum mimicked that of his heart, and underscored the chant. In those hours out of time Chakotay of Dorvan was no longer the former Maquis, the former Starfleet officer, the university instructor who taught cultures that his civilized agnostic students could never fully comprehend. Instead he was the son of his mother, the son of his People, the son of the Earth. Primal Human and primal Man.
He emerged from the sweat lodge cleansed and exalted. Someone offered him a cylindrical vessel, and he drank deeply, the sweetish tea strengthening and grounding him. Regarding the artfully arranged and carefully prepared foods, he selected some fresh spring greens, eschewing the roasted meat in honor of his own personal custom. The tender young plants were a little bitter, but he savored them anyhow, knowing that his ancestors had sampled the first fruits of spring in just such a way.
Some time later, showered and dressed in his everyday 24th-century garb, he walked through the cool evening air along a winding trail. A kilometer or so later, he reached the nearest transport station, where the familiar lines of the modern equipment seemed alien and out of place. Stepping quickly to the platform, he closed his eyes, the better to keep his mind's sight focused on the timeless place he had just departed.
Habituated to transport as he was, the sensations of it did not disrupt his thoughts, and he opened his eyes, unsurprised, as he reached his destination. Long strides brought him to his apartment in just a few minutes. Once within, he closed the door and his eyes, letting the sound and the sight and the feel of the ritual hold him a little while longer in their sway.
He felt...whole, complete, in a way he had not known in a long time -- in a way, perhaps, that he had never known. For so much of his life he had fought to reconcile the two sides of his nature: the 24th-century scientist and explorer whose heart was in the stars, and the man of the People whose soul was bound to the soil. But now, his seven years amidst more distant stars than most humans had ever known (combined, to be sure, with two decades in Starfleet and additional years with the Maquis) had sated his hunger for space, and his work at the University was enough to satisfy his yearning for knowledge. And here, on Earth, he could reconnect with the land and the People.
The only thing he could wish was someone with whom to share this: his wholeness, his happiness, his life. The tribal circle had welcomed him, but of course most of the men and women of his own age (and more than a decade below) were already married or partnered, a fact only emphasized by their very traditional plans to celebrate life and fertility after the equinox ritual. And in any event, people who had lived all their lives close to the land, much as they could -- and gladly had -- given him, could only understand one side of Chakotay: the son of the People.
Just as the women in his life had only ever understood the other side of him: the star-man. He called those women to mind easily, having thought of them during his time in the sweat lodge, as he sang the songs celebrating the Eternal Female, the Primal Mother. Sveta, who had loved and left him in the Academy, then returned to recruit him to the Maquis. Annalise, the brilliant scientist and fellow officer with whom he'd shared a brief, torrid affair in his first starship assignment. Seska, who had connected with his anger at the darkest time of his life, only to betray him when he sought to let go of that anger and that time.
Kathryn, to give her credit, had actually made an effort to understand the man beneath the officer, asking to learn more about spirit guides. He wondered if that interest in his faith had been part of what drew him to her, back then. But the interest had proven short-lived, and more intellectual than heartfelt; the only faith she truly cherished was in science. And he did not know if he ought to consider her in this company anyway; there were times when he suspected his romantic interest in her had been more one-sided than not.
As for Riley Frasier -- he spat as he thought of the ex-Borg who had tried to persuade him that a bond of sorts existed between him, but who had only wanted to use him.
Seven. In some ways, it was still hard to think about her. Despite their difficult start, by the end of Voyager's mission Chakotay had thought -- had hoped -- that there were the makings of a real tie, a permanent tie, between them. She had been willing to take risks for their relationship, including disabling a Borg device that protected her from the upheavals of love. Like him, she had come a long way from her beginnings, and along a difficult route. She had even demonstrated an unusual (for 24th-century humans, especially scientists) capacity for reverence, in her worship of the Omega particle.
For a while after their return to the Alpha Quadrant, shared adversity had provided another common ground between them: ex-Borg, like ex-Maquis, were not much loved of Starfleet Command or the general populace. But the union of feeling that had held them together through their respective legal travails had dissolved once those travails began to ease. He did not know if her dismissal of his particular form of belief ("a pastiche of primitive, nature-worshipping rituals and superstitions") had been the final straw for their relationship, but it had certainly not helped.
So he was alone. Well, there were worse fates; he would rather be alone and whole, than connected to another but fragmented in himself.
He was smiling in bemusement at his momentary descent into self-pity when he heard his commlink sound. Wanting to continue his ritual-based reverie, he let it go to voice-mail, and heard a familiar voice: "Hey, old man, I was wondering how the Equinox ritual went. Or did you forget, you promised to tell me about it?"
B'Elanna Torres. His smile widened as the voice prompted certain revelations. B'Elanna Torres, his longest and most trusted friend. Even more to the point, B'Elanna Torres, the brilliant 24th-century engineer who had once risked her life to honor the gods of her foremothers. Who, Chakotay knew, now celebrated the Day of Honor every year. Who had had a Klingon Naming Ceremony for her daughter in addition to the Human one.
B'Elanna Torres, who knew what it felt like to balance a life in the contemporary world with a faith in the timeless gods of one's ancestors.
B'Elanna Torres, who might not be Chakotay's lover, but who had long been one of the women whom he cherished.
Silently thanking the spirits for his blessings, he reached for the commlink and activated it.
