#i just really wanted seven to sing to janeway sorry it turned into a whole thing

[ellekathryns]

“The nightmares are just an illusion. I’m really here.” j7 🤠

she startles awake and is taken aback by the darkness. there’s someone next to her, but she can’t see. the relief she’d felt upon waking, upon the dream having ended, vanishes just as quickly as it had appeared. is replaced with a burning sense of suspicion.

“seven?” when she speaks, her voice is rough and uneven. she tries to pull away from the arms encircling her, to sit up, but she’s hit immediately with a dizziness that leaves her reeling. instead of seven, she sees the borg queen, looming over her. 

“kathryn,” seven’s voice is level and soft, “the nightmares are just an illusion.” 

she feels seven’s hand come up to cup her face, feels seven’s thumb smooth across her lips. her touch is cool. “i’m really here.” 

“prove it.” janeway challenges, pulling away from the contact almost reflexively. her words are slurred with exhaustion and delirium. “tell me something only you’d know.”

they’ve been through this, three times to be exact, in the past twenty-four hours. since the fever had risen above one-hundred-three degrees. each time, seven had recited a different fact. 

“your sister’s name is phoebe.”

for the first time, kathryn is not satisfied with her answer. 

“anyone could know that,” she says, and she sounds young and she sounds small. “tell me something only you would know.”

that is not the response seven was expecting. she thinks of all of the conversations she’s had with kathryn, all of the shared experiences, tries to choose something that will reassure her of her identity. that will leave kathryn without any doubts.

“of the thirty-two games of velocity you and i have engaged in, you have bested me thirty-one times.”

this seems to be what kathryn was scrambling for, this shred of tangible evidence. 

“you only won because i tore my shoulder,” she responds eventually, but she moves back so that her head is in seven’s lap. 

the previous days come back to her in flashes. the attack. the explosion. her and seven, running into the forest. the gash on her calf. the infection. the two of them, stumbling into the clearing. shared ration bars and barely any water and no medkit.

she remembers seven holding her when the chills wracked her body. she remembers telling her about home.

“how bad’s the fever?” she’s lucid now, seven can tell by the tone of her voice. 

“one-hundred-four degrees.”

she reaches out, takes seven’s arm and drapes it across her. seven’s other hand is already smoothing her hair back from her damp forehead. she has not asked seven to calculate the odds of their survival, but she is certain seven already has.

kathryn is silent for an interval, and seven thinks maybe she has fallen back asleep before her low voice cuts through the quiet.

“can you sing?”

if seven is taken aback by the request, her voice does not suggest it. 

“what would you like me to sing?”

kathryn makes a contented noise, pulls seven’s arm tighter around herself. 

“doesn’t matter.” there's a pause, then seven clears her throat, seeming to have made a selection.

“you'll never know just how much i miss you. you'll never know just how much i care."

kathryn recognizes the lyrics almost immediately. an old earth song from the second world war, something her mother used to listen to. she is reminded of the hirogen, of seven standing in front of a grand piano in a shimmering silver dress. mademoiselle de neuf. 

she thinks of how right it had felt, after the fact. how poetic. the two of them recognizing one another in some other life.

“and if I tried, i still couldn't hide my love for you. you ought to know, for haven't i told you so a million or more times?”

as seven continues, kathryn thinks her words sound like an answer to a question she might never get the chance to ask. sound like a promise.