By Kay Shadow
Disclaimer: Not mine, Paramount's.... let 'em keep 'em.
RATED G
Author's note: Like I said to Sheri, this is just a little thing I had to write, because I have to deal with what happened myself and I guess in a way this helped a bit.
This is a UBER story, so no Voyager here. This is ending one. Ending two can be foung here.
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"Mommy, what's that?"
Kathryn turned to see her four-year-old sitting on the living room couch, watching the TV. "What's what, sweetie?"
"Why is that house on fire?" her son asked, now pointing at the screen.
Kathryn stopped in her tracks. What house? What fire? He was supposed to be watching the morning cartoons not houses on fire. "What are you watching, Alex?"
"I was watching the cartoon when this came on," he explained helpfully.
Kathryn walked over to where she could see the TV screen and gasped in shock at the scene. Taking the remote control she switched channels, hoping that what she was seeing was only a movie.
"Mommy, I want the cartoons!"
"In a minute, Alex. Let mommy look at this at first," she said, only half conscious of the words leaving her mouth.
As Alex fell silent he watched his mother switching from channel to channel, finding only one horrifying scene dominating them all. One of the World Trade Centers towers was on fire.
Chakotay.
Her heart lurched at the thought of her husband and she debated between turning up the volume and switching the whole damn this off. She glanced at Alex and saw dawning on his face.
"Mommy, is daddy at work?"
"Yes, honey, he is," she admitted, hating herself for not being able to lie to him. He was still so young and didn't deserve to be worried about his fathers safety.
"But daddy works in that building. Is he gonna get out?" Alex asked, fear creeping into his voice.
Kathryn stared at the screen, trying to understand what the man was saying, "�appears to have been a plane that collided with the tower. At the moment it is still uncertain as to what kind of plane are we talking about here, or even why this happened�"
"Is daddy going to die?"
Kathryn turned to look at him and wondered how she was going to tell him the truth; daddy worked in the 102nd floor and it looked like that part of the building was on fire. And even if it wasn't, how in the hell was he going to get down?
Feeling the need to sit down, she pulled Alex closer and indicated that he should take a seat next to her. As he did, Kathryn gathered her thoughts and took a deep breath before addressing him. "Alex, you know I've never lied to you. And I'm not going to start now."
Taking another breath she plunged forward, "to answer your question: I honestly don't know. I wish I could tell you that nothing's going to happen to daddy, but I can't. Can you understand that?"
Alex nodded.
"I'm glad. I hope daddy's okay, and I have to believe that he is, but I still can't promise you that," Kathryn explained, half listening as the news reporter was saying that the fire was in the floors from 94th to the 99th. Chakotay's office was higher than that.
"Daddy works high," Alex commented and Kathryn thought she understood what the boy was after.
"I know he does, but they just said on the news that the floor where daddy works is not on fire," she said, hoping he would accept it and not make the next logical analysis. Of course, she should have known better.
"But isn't daddy higher?"
"Yes."
"Then how is he going to get down?" the boy wondered.
Kathryn tried to smile encouragingly but knew that she failed miserably. "Well, you know daddy. He'll figure out a way."
Alex seemed to consider her words carefully before accepting them. "Then you don't have to worry, mommy. Daddy's gonna come home later after work."
Kathryn kept the false smile on her face, afraid to show what she was really feeling. If only she could know if he was safe�
The hours crawled as Kathryn had called work to ask for a day off. Her boss had not been too thrilled to hear she was staying at home, but when Kathryn had explained that her son was upset about the prospect of losing his father, even her boss couldn't ask her to dismiss his well being and so she stayed home.
She was making lunch for Alex and watching the news, praying that by some miracle her husband was among the survivors. When the buildings had collapsed, Kathryn had started to cry, being able to think only of the man she loved. She had scared Alex, who had also panicked until Kathryn had for the first time ever lied to her son, telling him that she was only crying because she was sad for all the other families who would lose loved ones.
"Alex, your lunch is ready," she called and then watched as the boy came running to her.
After seating him at the table and making sure all was to his expectations, Kathryn walked back to the living room to watch the news. As she entered the room, she noticed Alex's things spread all around the floor. She was about to remind him about leaving his things where others would step on them when she saw what he had drawn.
Two large towers amongst many smaller ones, both on fire with people halfway out of the windows crying. She looked at another drawing and saw ladders on one side of each building, with people on them. Her eyes stayed on one figure she recognized from her son's other drawings. Chakotay. He was helping what looked like a small girl down the ladders.
"Daddy helps them, see?"
Kathryn jumped at the sound and turned to see Alex holding his fork in one hand and a phone in the other. Holding the phone out for her to take, Alex stated, "It's daddy, he wants to talk to you."
Her heart beating wildly Kathryn snatched the phone from her son, fear and hope waging inside her. "Chakotay?"
"Kathryn, I'm okay. I wasn't in the building. I was taking some of Daniel's papers to the other office. I wasn't even in the building."
The end.