IN THE BLEAK MIDWINTER
Disclaimer: Paramount owns Voyager, Janeway, Chakotay.
PART SIX
"You're pregnant, Captain," the doctor said as he snapped the scanner into the tricorder and closed it.
Blood drained from her face.
"I can't be. It's not possible. I'm – "
"I'm sorry, but the scans don't lie. A girl…"
Her heart felt like it would burst from her ribcage. It couldn't be true. They messed her up. They messed her up so badly she could not have any children. Then they screwed up her mind to hate whatever formed inside her.
"They messed me up, Doctor. I can't have this baby, you understand? There's not supposed to be a pregnancy."
She looked away from the doctor, tried to force the history of her life from her brain and hack it into pieces like they hacked her insides. But the horror persisted - faces of doctors who hovered over her, spread wide, naked, for their perusal and impersonal probing of rough fingers.
"Then you have to tell me about your medical records that are classified – "
"No!"
"There's no doubt about it, Captain. You're carrying a baby girl. You have only one uterine tube and one ovary, so pregnancy might be a little more difficult, I grant. But you are carrying. Here, on the screen – heartbeat, already eight weeks – "
"What?"
"Eight weeks."
"Terminate it, Doctor. Right now."
"What?"
"Just what I said. It's impossible for me to be carrying anything now. I can't go through this. We're in hostile space again, under attack. I have to be on duty every hour. Every hour."
"Captain, you're not rational right now – "
"Then tell me how I can be pregnant when I believed – "
"As I told you six years ago, Captain, there were signs that you have been pregnant before. At least four times. Did you carry them to term? Where are the children?"
His words blinded her. She wanted to strike him, then realised it would have no physical effect.
Another blinding flash. Ten blinding flashes. A thousand blinding flashes.
A large room… Laboratory for Testing Interspecies Union.
Laboratory.
Cardassian doctors hovering. The last few days they made her listen and watch as they tortured Captain Paris, to get her to comply.
She was an ensign, never been touched. Now, she lay naked on a table, her legs spread. Probes had already been inserted into her womb and all activity seen on a large screen. She could see the ova.
Their voices…
She
is ovulating, Brogd. One egg only this time. She is ready for fertilisation…
A soldier stood ready.
Koleg,
I see you are erect… Mount her.
We shall monitor the journey of your semen.
She screamed that first time at the forced, emotionless entry, the extreme pain, the rocking, the grunting as the soldier moved above her, the way the two doctors kept their eyes on the screen. The soldier ejaculated. In a crazed haze she saw the semen move towards her egg.
Shock out of her wits, she was unable to cry. The soldier pulled out of her and left.
Then a doctor came, wiped her with a damp cloth. Her legs were caught in restraints, spread as wide as possible on the bed. It was impossible to fight, humiliation gone in the face of pain. He injected her, pushing the syringe deep into her passage, so far that part of his hand forced its way in. The pain blinded; she screamed, almost lost consciousness, the doctor's voice floating to her.
I
have accelerated the production of the
ovaries again, Brogd. The left ovary should produce more ova within the next two
hours. Please monitor the subject for this period…
They left her, lying naked on the bed. She was exhausted, fell into a restless slumber until she was awakened by the movement of a penis in her. A Cardassian soldier's face contorted as he worked furiously, his long nails scored deep furrows. She never looked at him, but screamed when his teeth bit into her breast. Then he ejaculated with a high scream.
The doctors watched the screen. Her mind whirled as she followed their eyes, saw with horror that there were at least seven ova, all being fertilised. When the soldier pulled out of her, he grunted, then walked away.
"No
more of this please… no more…" she pleaded.
But they kept coming. They scraped her, damaged her, removed one tube when that became damaged beyond repair, removed one ovary and transplanted it in another woman – Cardassian - , an experiment that was aborted because the ovary was rejected. They produced multiple ova and impregnated her, removed the fertilised ova, transplanted in other Cardassian women. Their bodies rejected her ova. No Cardassian-human hybrids manufactured in the laboratory. So they kept experimenting.
Sometimes they took the soldiers away and simply injected her with their semen. Kept her ovulating to produce more and more ova. The hours she was released she cowered in the corner of her cell, left naked and bleeding, her torn skin and breasts only tended to the next day in the laboratory before they started experimenting again.
Finally, complete breakdown of her system. Again brought in soldiers. Thrice allowed one fertilised egg to latch to the uterus, waiting four weeks until she could see the heartbeat on the monitors. She willed herself not to look. Cardassian soldiers impregnated her to make a baby, first time a boy, second time a girl, third time a boy, fourth time, fifth time, sixth time… to see…
Take
it out! Take it out!
Spontaneous expulsion of fertilised egg.
Scrape uterine wall, repeat procedure. Remove uterine tube.
Fingers probing, digging deep, insert new probes, find undamaged areas of uterine wall.
No more humiliation. Remain detached. They're not my babies. Not my babies…not my babies…
Doctors hover over her.
You
are an anomaly, Janeway. You reject all foetuses.
I am dead, Cardassian bastard. You have killed me.
We
have here the semen of Captain Paris. Inject her.
No…no…no…no…
Two weeks later foetus aborted. Scraped clean.
Explosions heard from far.
"Captain! Captain Janeway!"
She was lying on the biobed, mercifully in the light after the prison darkness, the Cardassian faces, the soldiers, the experiments.
"Doctor…?"
"How long were you in the prison, Captain?"
No more humiliation, Janeway. Answer the doctor. Voice low, hollow, emotionless.
"Seven months…"
"You were rescued, eventually."
"Yes. The man who became my fiancé. Justin Tighe. Died with my father on Tau Ceti Prime."
"Your menstrual cycle has been erratic since then."
"Yes. One ovary left."
She was beyond any tears. Those had been shed many years ago. Many years. The trauma remained. Counselling didn't help. She remained in the darkness. Slowly, her body refused to listen to her brain anymore and it healed, became supple again.
No man touched her again after that.
Not even Justin.
Everyone wondered about Justin.
Mark was good to her. She went through the motions of the act of sex. He didn't mind. Or, he never noticed. Soldiers had come and lain on her with the sole purpose of impregnating her. No feelings, no repercussions for them, no result. She had built up a revulsion against anything in her womb, or what was left of it. They allowed her no time to have feelings about being pregnant, carrying multiples, scraping them away without any thought.
What
about me? What about me?
"Captain, I cannot tell you how sorry I am. Forgive me. I understand how this had to be removed from your medical records."
"I cannot carry this foetus, Doctor."
"Commander Chakotay – "
"Need not know."
"I beg to differ."
"Haven't you understood a word I just said?"
"You must rethink this, Captain."
"We are at war with the M'rath, Doctor. This must be terminated."
"Captain, I have examined you. Perhaps upon fuller – "
"Doctor, I can't carry anything, you understand?"
"Think about it."
"I have."
"You should tell Commander Chakotay. Perhaps I should inform him of your medical - "
"Upon your oath, Doctor. If you say anything, I'll put Tom Paris on permanent sickbay duty."
She saw how grave he was. What she and Chakotay shared… It was an aberration. It was stupendous, hardly what she had been ready to expect. She had always been…cold… Then, she wasn't supposed to get pregnant. Always, what had been done to her, allowed a mental block against such a thing, such a responsibility, and then the extreme fear that…
"Give it just one day then, Captain."
"I will. Tomorrow, I will be here, Doctor, and I will instruct you to terminate."
She strode out the sickbay, ignoring the doctor's outraged exclamation.
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END PART SIX