Ghosts in the Rain
by  ragpants © May 2004
 

Ghosts in the Rain

Chakotay thrashed and twisted in his bed, the violent motion of his limbs damped by the thrall of the dream.

It was an old dream, a familiar one, one with a thousand variations.

But they all ended the same way--with a scream.

No!

Chakotay sat up, throwing his legs over the side of the bed. He scrubbed at his face, trying to remove the residue of the dream from his mind. His fingertips rested against his eyelids. He pressed. The universe turned black, then red. A little harder and he would never again have to see how petty his world had become.

He was tempted, but refrained.

Blind men still dreamed.

*****

Chakotay eased out of the bed where his most recent lover, Mellissandra, still slept, her breathing soft and even, her blonde hair fanned out across the pillow.

He dressed silently in the near total darkness of the bedroom, then slipped out of the room. He paused in the entryway to retrieve his kit bag from the closet. The bag was light and nearly empty. He had long ago learned the futility of possessions. The only things he cared about, he kept close to his heart. He patted his chest pocket to make sure the outdated Starfleet communicator and the slim computer memory crystal still rested there.

He stepped out into the corridor. The lighting was dim and reddish--night cycle was still in effect in this section of the station. Good, that meant it would be hours before Mellissandra awoke. By then he would be long gone. Turning spinward, Chakotay headed for the docks and the common hand's berth aboard a freight carrier that awaited him there.

Chakotay parted with Rumian shipper at Claggett's Station. A local ferry's run carried him to Galisteo. There, he took a long term contract and a new lover. He left both with only vague regrets seven months later when a Numar cargo ship heading outbound signed him on as a third shift relief pilot.

He jumped ship at Anchee. The captain and crew were only mildly displeased to see him go. The ship was running on spec; Chakotay had left his share of the cargo and profits behind. From Anchee, he signed on as cook's helper on a supply tender serving the independent miners in the Fasbrook Sector. The tender went bust and stranded him on Grinnell's World. Grinnell's was a grim and depressing place filled with soldiers-for-hire and down-on-their-luck asteroid miners. Chakotay enlisted in a mercenary unit, first as common grunt, then later was promoted to squad sergeant when his combat experience and bold actions drew attention. He spent three years and two campaigns with the unit before he was cashiered for illegal fraternization and refusing to obey an order. The dismissal was opportune; he was planning to desert as soon as the unit reached port anyway.

The involuntary discharge left him on Harper's Colony. And that was fine. With the remains of his accumulated pay, Chakotay booked passage on a seedy liner to Gateway on Saluma. There he found a small independent trader willing to make a detour--for a price-- and drop him on Faladah.

He had come full circle now. He was back to where his future had ended and his nightmare present had begun.

******

It was the right place, the exact, right place. The beam down point. Chakotay turned in a circle, examining the gray granite spires that loomed above him. He recognized nothing. He could have been on any one of a thousand anonymous planets. But he wasn't. This was Faladah.

He began heading up the ravine, carefully picking his way around boulders and over scree falls that littered the narrow path. He scoured the landscape for any touch of familiarity, but found not a single reference point or landmark he could point to and recall. He'd walked this route four times before, but nothing called forth even a vague remembrance in him.

The trail narrowed to a slot. The rebels had used this chokehold to ensure the landing party entered the clearing in a single file. Chakotay walked three paces forward, squeezed through the crack and stepped into the open space. He stopped. This was where Ensign Santiago fell. Arturo was the last of the landing party to enter the clearing and the first to die, the signal for the rebels to open fire.

It all seemed so long ago, like a bad dream, but it was a dream that had haunted the rest of his life.

Chakotay ran his fingers head-high over the granite face on the west side of the clearing. He fancied he could feel the pockmarks left by the flechettes that had nearly killed him. Small regular depressions in the rock. Tangible proof that the day had really happened.

Suddenly the memories were all too real. He shuddered convulsively. An oppressive sun hung overhead, despite the clouded autumn sky, bright, beating down on the back of his neck, burning him just as it had on the day of ambush. Sweat beads roved like impatient ants across his scalp. Chakotay sat down abruptly on the very boulder that had once saved his life, his knees no longer supporting him.

It was all real. He could smell the salty, copper scent of blood, the putrid stink of Santiago's body swelling in the heat, the strong medicinal odor of the raw home-brew the rebels drank. He could hear Kathryn's scream reverberating in his head. It went on and on--like it did in his dreams, though in reality it had been short and sharp and over quickly.

Abruptly he was sick, nauseous. He put his head between his knees and vomited.

He sat there for a long time, his hands covering his ears, trying to block out the sound, the memory.

After a while, it stopped.

Chakotay drew a long breath and began...

"I've failed you Kathryn. I failed you here and I've failed you every day since. You told me to safeguard the ship and crew, to get them home, to protect them. I couldn't do it, Kathryn. I tried, but I couldn't… I'm not as strong as you.

"Carey's dead. So is Seven.  And Andressen. Vorik. Jenny Delany.  Irina...

 Chakotay spread his fingers wide, staring sightlessly at his palms and the blood he knew was there.

"Emily RoanHorse..…Too many. Every one of them too many.…

"Tom Paris. I failed him too., though he's not dead. Blind. The Nav board exploded in his face when the Pha-kek attacked. There was nothing the Doctor could do. Tom let a Carrik surgeon restructure his brain so he could perceive unfiltered input from the nav and sensor systems.…It changed him.… I don't think…

Chakotay's voice faltered, then strengthened.

"He's not human anymore, Kathryn. I'm not sure what he is, but he's not human.

"Harry Kim is alive. Or was, the last time I saw him. And Torres too. But Voyager is dead. A burnt husk. Harry thought perhaps she could be repaired, but under that idealism of his, I'm pretty sure he knows it's hopeless. Torres said it couldn't be done and I believe her.

"I failed you, Kathryn. I couldn't save the ship. I couldn't get them home. The crew that's still alive--they're scattered to the winds.

"I'm so sorry, Kathryn. I'm so sorry."


Chakotay fell silent now and waited, waited to hear Kathryn's voice, her understanding, her forgiveness.

But the only sound was high moaning of the wind as it blew across the mountain peaks and the cold pelt of rain as it fell.

******

Sonnet XLIII

What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply,
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in winter stands the lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.

Edna St. Vincent Millay