The man strode with great purpose down a darkened alley. The only illumination came from a weak moon that threw more shadows than light. He was tall, and the camel-coloured jacket he wore fit snugly to his large frame so that his muscles strained against it as he swung his arms. The jacket was tied at the waist by a broad belt. The only adornment was a dagger - a Klingon d'k tagh - attached at the side in its sheath and a phaser. He wore knee high dark brown boots, each tightened at the calf by two buckled straps.

Chakotay made his way towards the inn at the end of the alley. He rubbed his hands together and his breath steamed as he exhaled. The cold seeped into him and he wanted to get inside some place warm at least. He hoped it was the right place Dalby had given. The whole area had a seedy, run-down look about it, but he figured if someone wanted to hide, this would be a good place to come. Located near the Cardassian border, the planet was too small to be important to the Cardassians. Formerly uninhabited, it attracted mostly groups or bands of dissidents from all corners of the sector. Chakotay gave a mental shrug at the thought of 'corners' of the sector. He had been sent on a wild goose chase one too many times, but the Liberty needed crew, and that motor-mouth Dalby was eager enough to point him to Prema Copa. It hadn't been easy getting to this planet. He had been chased halfway across two sectors by a Cardassian vessel, and luckily, his own experience and wealth of evasive maneuvers won out as he successfully managed to elude the Cardassian vessel.

Getting back to the Badlands was going to be tricky, but once he found what he was looking for, it would make things easier. He had been on the run since he left Starfleet and teamed up with another Starfleet dissident before trading the small flitter they had for a larger vessel that could take a crew of forty five. He needed the best, and though Dalby was good, he was better at intelligence and Chakotay needed a better than passable engineer to have the Liberty up and running smoothly on an hourly basis.

Chakotay snorted. The Liberty was a collection of spare parts - an old converted Romulan hull with jerry-rigged Federation engine, running on mostly old and some new Federation communications signals. The Liberty was good for a few years and he needed to extend its life before its bulkheads collapsed spontaneously. He needed to cloak his signals so that it looked neither Federation nor anything else, especially something the Cardassians could pick up. The Cardassians were after him; the Federation wanted him and he needed to stay out of their way. Ken Dalby may be disgruntled, but he had been grudging about the contact he suggested to Chakotay. Dalby had rubbed his jaw idly when he recommended the new contact, who still had to be recruited. Dalby or someone Dalby knew must have had a run-in with the individual.

"The best damned engineer you could have, Chakotay. Torres spend some time at Starfleet..."

"And no doubt you got licked by Torres..." Chakotay had added two days ago when the Liberty's engines stalled and they were dead in the water for hours. Dalby had given a shrug and smirked, something that caused Chakotay to frown, promised to follow up, then forgot it as soon as the pressing problem of engines and communications made itself felt as they faced off the potential threat of a lone bounty hunter after his blood.

They needed crew and they needed them in dedicated areas such as engineering and medical technology. What they had was emergency field medics who could only do so much. Not only that. They needed medical supplies and that was even more critical.

Chakotay gave another shrug. With the war now on, many dissidents joined their organization, now officially branded by the Federation as traitors and renegades; most of the 'traitors and rebels' were former colonists along the Cardassian border whose homes and planets had been destroyed. Some, like himself, were former Starfleet officers...

Others, like that smart-mouthed Tom Paris needed to be booted out of their organization. Paris was a no-cause rebel, good only for the number of latinum bars he could trade for his services as a pilot. Chakotay knew of Tom Paris's disgrace from Starfleet, and his presence in the Maquis made him unstable given his proclivity for high-risk maneuvers borne out of his swaggering arrogant belief that he was the best pilot in the Alpha Quadrant. Tom Paris was the best pilot he could get, but Chakotay bristled at the man's attitude and womanising. The man had a job to do and had to do it well. Chakotay sighed. He wondered just how long Tom Paris would last before getting bored of principles and ethics and moral obligations.

Kathryn would have sorted Tom Paris out, given the chance, Chakotay thought. He knew Tom's parents well, and thought there was not a thing in the universe that couldn't be dealt with and sorted out and talked through. Kathryn had taught him that. He hadn't had much of anything with his own father, the spirits be with him, but Kathryn had shown him that pride was just another stupid hurdle that could be overcome. He had done that and had not been sorry. Tom Paris was just about the sorriest individual who didn't give his father a chance to speak and to voice his own feelings towards his son, however difficult that appeared to be. Paris could be good if he wanted to be. Chakotay had little time for individuals like Paris who had talent and who wasted it. Now, all he wanted to do, was knock the helmsman down in the first round in Boothby's gym and keep him knocked out. The man needed sense.

Chakotay's ears pricked as he heard sounds coming from the end of the alley. He surmised it was probably from the inn. He quickened his pace, his hand already on his phaser, the other hand hovering near his dagger as he ran. He wasn't going to use his phaser if he needed to defend himself; he had been careful about leaving trails from phaser fire. Still, he prepared himself as he hurried towards a shaft of weak light that filtered through a window.

Chakotay stopped short as he heard voices and a scream. The door was half open and he pushed it further open. The tavern was dark, lit by two or three lights, one of them near the bar, and Chakotay could only discern the shadowy patrons by the way they craned their necks or moved up from their seats to look at whatever was happening. In the far corner he saw the scuffle and heard another scream. Then one body hurtled towards him. Chakotay jumped neatly out of the way as the body thudded against the wall and slid slowly down until the man sat, unconscious, his torso pitching far forward so that his forehead touched his knees. Chakotay's laugh stalled in his throat as another scream made him rush forward. Someone was down on the floor, and five or six men were all over the hapless individual.

He had little time to assimilate the fact that the unfortunate wall victim was Cardassian or that the screams came from a woman. He pulled the first Cardassian away from the group with one hand, his fist connecting with the man's jaw. A loud crack, and the Cardassian sank to his knees. Chakotay's boot connected with the man's throat and a crack sounded in the tavern as his neck snapped. One Cardassian had the woman down, her legs spread as he forced himself on her. She screamed again. Before he could pull the man off her, a stiff arm squeezed the air from him; fingers gripped Chakotay's neck. He shrugged his opponent away, the Cardassian looking perplexed as he clutched his stomach a second later, blood oozing between his fingers. Not looking at him, Chakotay turned quickly to grab the Cardassian on top of the woman. Blood spurted over them as Chakotay, in one swift movement, slit the man's throat. Chakotay tore him away from the woman. The attacker fell one side, his body convulsing grotesquely. The woman rose to her feet, but Chakotay felt another hand clamp round his neck as he reached for her. He swivelled instantly, taking the Cardassian by surprise so that he lost his grip on Chakotay's neck. The Cardassian stared drunkenly at him and made a muffled sound as Chakotay lunged and twisted his d'k tagh in the man's belly. Dark eyes gleamed angrily as Chakotay watched his attacker's eyes widen; he made a gurgling sound as he gaped. Chakotay pulled the dagger from the Cardassian's belly and a moment later the man sank to his knees, blood already oozing from his mouth and the wound in his stomach. Two more Cardassians charged and his fist connected with a jaw while he kicked at the other, managing only to push the soldier about two metres away from him. The woman, Chakotay noted in his peripheral vision, pushed one aggressor away from her. She gave a primal scream as the man flew across the floor.

"P'taQ!"

"I'm here to help," Chakotay shouted at her as a thick-necked soldier lunged at him with a knife. Chakotay's hand moved swiftly and in the next instant lodged his dagger in the Cardassian's chest. A knife clanked to the floor as the attacker let go of his weapon before slowly going down.

"I can see to myself," the woman shouted back as she waded into another attacker and sent him flying.

"You're naked, woman. That's sure taking care of yourself," Chakotay shouted back as he caught another attacker close to her. Looking the Cardassian in the eyes, Chakotay gave an angry cry as he grabbed a clump of hair and pulled the man's head back. The grating sound of a knife cutting into bone could be heard as Chakotay slit the Cardassian's throat, then let go of the man. His body thudded to the floor. Somewhere Chakotay heard a patron applaud...

He stood breathing hard as he realised that all the attackers were finished off. They were drunk and it had given him an advantage over them. Only then he turned his attention to the woman who stood panting against the wall. He shook his head. The woman was small. Her appearance was Klingon. She looked completely dishevelled, bloodied and on the point of tears. Her clothes were torn from her body, and blood oozed from open wounds on her forehead and gashes to her breasts and legs. For one moment, in a blinding flash, Chakotay saw his sister as she must have appeared in her last moments. He saw his mother, helpless against seven Cardassians. He saw his father, forced to watch...

His rage, already near boiling point at the way the Cardassians cornered their victim like rutting dogs, boiled over. He rushed to her; she backed against the wall, but hissed nonetheless at him.

"You had better explain how you got to be alone in this filthy den of Cardies," Chakotay spat before he sheathed his dagger and untied the belt around his waist...

She screamed again.

He grabbed her shoulders and another scream followed. Chakotay froze a second, then relented as he realised what she had been thinking.

"I'll not harm you," he said quickly as he took his jacket off and pulled it around her. The other patrons in the tavern had come to life and went on casually as if nothing happened in the last minutes. Chakotay shook his head at the manner in which they panted and watched a woman being violated. He felt the bile rising in him, but forced himself to breathe to regain his equilibrium and temporarily shut out his outrage at their behaviour. A few shady figures moved silently about and removed the bodies as Chakotay pulled the woman close to him. He half pulled and pushed her towards the exit of the inn.

"Come, we must hurry. You need help," he commanded as the woman stumbled. Chakotay clicked impatiently then practically ran down the alley with her, pulling her along. "They've seen me."

"You killed five men in there," he heard her voice, now sounding a little stronger. Somehow, during her struggles she had lost her shoes and once cried out as she stepped onto a sharp object. "Damn," Chakotay said, his irritation clear in his voice. "I should have had a my site-to-site transporter."

"You killed five men in there," she repeated. "Who are you?"

"No matter. Get moving! I already busted my chances of getting my contact - "

"Who are you?" she asked again.

"I'm looking for someone called Torres. You know him by any chance? What the hell were you doing in there anyway?" Chakotay asked again without answering her, half pulling her off her feet as he neared the small shuttle - hardly bigger than a life pod - and opened its hatch. He bundled her inside quickly and minutes later they took off.

Once clear of the planet's orbit, only then Chakotay turned to the woman. He stepped closer and swore as she pulled his jacket closer round her. The blood to her head wound had congealed, but the deep scratches down her cheek looked raw. Her lips had a bluish tinge from the cold and she shivered violently. Her eyes shifted a little nervously, but not before he saw the angry fire in them. He reached to touch her, and swore again when she flinched. He gave a sigh and sat back on the small bunk, about a metre away from her.

"They got to you?" he asked quietly, his voice suddenly gentle, laced with compassion. He saw her blink once, twice, before a large tear rolled down a bloodied cheek. She tried to brush the dampness away and flinched when she touched the long gash in her cheek. "I'll not harm you," he added softly when he saw her reluctance to reply. Her eyes closed as she nodded.

"Only one..."

"One is one too many," he bit out, suddenly angry at her and wondering why he put his question in that way in the first place. Of course he had seen at least one Cardassian rutting over her.

She didn't respond and Chakotay moved instead to the tiny aft section and returned with a med-kit.

"Not the best in the circumstances, but it will do," he said as he removed a dermal regenerator. "Courtesy the Federation via Miss Yates," he added laconically when he saw her frown. He held her head, ignored her when she started up again as if he were going to attack her too. She growled all the time he ran the regenerator over the gash on her forehead and cheek. When that was cleared, he indicated she remove his jacket.

"No..." she said quickly, wrapping the garment tighter around her.

He sighed with impatience. He could yank the jacket off, but that would level him with her attackers and she could scream again as if he were going to violate her. Very gently he lifted her chin and made her look at him.

"I won't hurt you..."

He realised she was embarrassed - embarrassed and ashamed as she looked quickly away the moment he took his finger away from her chin. A frown marring her ridged forehead caused him to give another impatient click as he pressed her back to lie on the bunk. She turned her face away from him, looking instead at the bulkhead. She was in pain, but never cried out. He took the jacket away from her. The earlier uncensored view he had of her body when he pulled the last Cardassian from her was perhaps blurred by his anger and urgency to get them away from her. Cuts to her breasts and stomach and thighs that seemed superficial were...

"God Almighty..." he whispered. The woman gave a small cry. "It's alright. I'll do what I can," he assured softly.

The next few minutes Chakotay repaired a broken rib, deep cuts, long gashes to her breasts, her neck, her hips, thighs, inner thighs. He pursed his lips, tried to blank out the way his mother and sister looked and just carried on repairing damage. She said one Cardassian got to her...just one. The others must have held her down and, she must have fought them like a tigress. She was Klingon - perhaps half Klingon - and he knew what strength Klingons possessed. She could maybe have taken on a lone attacker, perhaps two or three, but six, seven... The woman lay still all the time he worked. There was no time for embarrassment or prudishness and when he was done, he made her sit up again and pulled the jacket round her shoulders. Then he moved to the aft section again and rummaged around in a cabinet.

"Here, clean yourself and put this on. It should do until we get to the Liberty..." She took the clothes from him. It was make-shift covering - a coarse fabric that was more functional than decorative. He sat at the conn and waited until she was dressed before he turned to face her again. "You okay?" he asked. She nodded.

"You killed five Cardassians," she said again, now looking him fearlessly in the eyes.

"They're scum, and you know that...now," came his curt reply.

"Yes..." she sighed. "I - didn't think they would attack me..."

"Forgive me for stating the obvious, but you were a woman alone, and no matter how much you think you could defend yourself, you're no match when a pack of dogs attack you. Besides, they smelled you..." His voice sounded a little unkind when he said that, but he remembered with bitterness the way Sedeka conquered him.

"I was with two friends. They left early. Those Cardassians...they were drunk. I though I had everything under control..." She paused, looked him in they eyes again. Her face still looked smudged and she fidgeted with her hands, twisting the fabric between two fingers. "You saved my life. Thank you. If you hadn't arrived... I - I was looking for - "

"And I came looking for Torres," he cut in, sensing she was about to direct blame at herself. "You know him by any chance, seeing you were in the same tavern I was told I could get hold of him?"

She gave a tight little smile, her first since he dragged her away from her attackers.

"I am Torres. B'Elanna Torres."

Chakotay blinked once, then recovered.

"B'Elanna Torres, Klingon - "

"B'Elanna Torres, half Klingon half-breed human - "

"What?"

"That's what those scum called me. Said I'm only good enough to...to - "

"Torres, B'Elanna, former Starfleet cadet, engineer who will work wonders with a decrepit 37 year old engine. Dalby said I could get you here. Good. I need an engineer, the best. He said you're the best. His word is good."

Chakotay's look challenged her, dared her to refute his claim or return to her self-deprecating view of how the Cardassians looked at her and treated her. He had no time for lapses into morbid self-pity,

although he had no words for what happened to her. All he could see was someone helpless against an overpowering might, a cowardly act as if she herself as a Klingon had stabbed someone when his back was turned. He knew the proud tradition of Klingon marital arts and the Klingon abhorrence of cowardly acts.

"Dalby lied."

"We'll see about that once you see the Liberty."

"Liberty?"

"My vessel. We're on our way there. You can look, then leave, if you want. But I'll make it very difficult for you to leave, if you can get the Liberty up and running again."

"I - "

Chakotay wanted to touch her chin again, saw how she moved imperceptibly away from his hand and he dropped it to his side. B'Elanna Torres looked fierce - embarrassed and fierce. He had seen her vulnerable and she was very clearly sending out signals to the contrary. She didn't want to be seen like that. He doubted whether anyone would see her lose control again. If she did, she'd probably make those on the receiving end believe it was the Klingon part of her that was responsible. A safety net if ever there was one in Torres's life.

"I have nowhere else to go," B'Elanna said softly, the words breaking reluctantly from her lips.

Chakotay understood and nodded.

"Fine. You can remain on the Liberty."

"Who are you?" she asked at last.

Chakotay stared at her and only then realised that he never introduced himself. Still, when he did speak, he felt stiff, the urge to smile dying as an image of his father flashed before him. He was quiet for several seconds in which B'Elanna stared at him, waiting.

"I'm Chakotay," he bit out at last.

***

B'Elanna Torres was bent in an unflattering position under the panel that housed the plasma conduit in the engine room of the Liberty. She cursed something in Klingon, then threw the wrench down in disgust. She fumed for a few seconds before picking up the tool again and resumed her work.

"Damned ancient pirate parts," she muttered as she tried to find something that could inject life into the engines again. "Where in the name of Kahless did he get this piece of junk?" She hit the conduit again. "Dammit!"

"You're talking to me?" a voice sounded from the narrow space between her, the warp core and the owner of the voice.

"Shut up, Ayala, and leave me to curse on my own."

"Not when you do it so nicely, Torres."

"What does he think? I can perform magic around here?"

"Torres, you came on the good recommendation of Ken Dalby, no less."

"Dalby, huh. I knew him once. The Cardassians - " She wanted to tell Ayala how the Cardassians raped Dalby's wife, but kept her mouth shut. Her own treatment at their hands made it for her something deeply private, and Dalby would appreciate her silence. Contrary to what Chakotay assured her, she should have listened to her inner voice. She had known the Cardassians... She shut her mind away from what happened to her. Dalby hated the Cardassians and Ayala seemed to be aware of Dalby's hatred. Word had spread quickly. She gave a little sigh. Chakotay would honour the privacy of her own ordeal, she knew. Her memories and her nightmares were her own...

Ayala peered at her with his body upside-down. He looked ridiculous. She wanted to laugh if it weren't that the plasma conduit wasn't listening to her. Ayala pointed finger at her.

"Then you know, Torres, Dalby is no fool. He's angry, very angry; he hurts like the devil, but he knows a good engineer when he knows one," Ayala replied in a placatory tone. "You've been good to the engines the last week, Torres. The Boss likes it." Then suddenly Ayala's face disappeared but B'Elanna could only see his feet.

"Chakotay? He's never satisfied, Ayala," she replied curtly, her voice laced with a mixture of awe and impatience. She hit the hapless conduit again and the console suddenly lit up. "Well, what do you know..." she exclaimed, her eyes suddenly gleaming with pleasure. She crawled out of her hole, stood up and looked at Ayala. He gave her a grin.

"See? Master Magician you are. Now, can we get this vessel to Alkorea?"

"Alkorea?"

"The other side of the Badlands..."

"We have to navigate through plasma turbulences?"

"We have the pilot to do that."

"Paris. Oh. Yeah." B'Elanna's response was dour this time and she almost hit the console again, her hand pausing in mid-air as she restrained herself.

"Yeah, Paris. The Boss isn't too in love with that one, either."

"I know. Chakotay can be...inflexible... But he must leave it to me. I'll kick the snot out of that Paris."

"But you gotta give it to him. He's good, Torres. Very good."

"P'taQ!"

Ayala had left the engine room, and B'Elanna was glad. She wanted to work alone, mostly. Ayala probably didn't hear her last expletive. She continued mending, her labour often accompanied by choice curses in Klingon. She had been rescued by Chakotay only a week ago, and still didn't know how to thank him properly for what he had done. It could have been much worse, she realised, if he hadn't happen upon them at the moment that he did. She gave a shudder at the memory of how her body protested as the Cardassian forced himself into her. A soft cry was the only sound she made before ruthlessly expelling the images from her.

What if Chakotay hadn't arrived at that moment? Only one Cardassian raped her. What if Chakotay didn't arrive there before the others... She gave another violent shudder at the thought of what could have happened. There had been seven or eight Cardassians who entered the tavern. Swaggering, loud-mouthed, they drank too much and she had thought... B'Elanna gave a sigh. Why did she challenge the one who called her a half-breed the moment he saw her? Why didn't she leave with her two acquaintances when they left the minute they saw the Cardassians? Why?

She had nowhere to go. She was a drifter, like they were. After the tavern, she would have gone to their abode and ask to stay the night. She would have travelled with her last few credits, to another world where she could find some work. She had heard on Vulcan they didn't turn away young scientists... She couldn't go back to Kronos, or to Kessik IV. She hadn't spoken with her mother in years.

Then Chakotay came.

He was a contrary blend of kindness and aggression. One moment his face could turn soft and the next, the planes were hard, edged, a perpetual frown marring the smooth lines of his tattoo. B'Elanna gave a shiver as she thought of how the Cardassians lay dead around them, with Chakotay hardly blinking when he slit their throats. She had felled holographic foes in the holosuites at the Academy the two years she had been there, but it was never the same. The holosuites and holographic fighting, even with the safeties off, still tended to lull one into a plane of the consciousness where she knew she was still safe, and her conscience would not be touched if she killed one or two Klingons or Cardassians, even accidentally. Funny thing, illusion and reality. She heard of women violated, killed, but in a certain way she remained detached from it, her empathy only mildly stirred since it didn't happen to her or someone close to her. Now, she experienced the horror of the reality and reality meant nightmares and memories that she doubted would ever be erased. Was fighting someone to the death in a holosuite not the same? Somehow, felling a holographic attacker - preferably a Cardassian - did leave her with a feeling that it wasn't real, that the moment she stepped outside, she could conveniently forget it.

Chakotay had killed her attackers in cold blood. It was real, horribly real. She had never seen something like that. The reality - their severed necks, their blood, her pain, her blood, caused her to wake up in a sweat in the middle of the night, praying for release from her tormenting dreams. Chakotay had calmly hauled her away from the scene before anyone stirred to stop him. That had been the strange thing about that wine house. The patrons had done nothing to stop what was happening, and now, thinking about it, she could even hear how they cheered. She growled her disgust at that thought. With hindsight she knew that she had been stupid to taunt the first of the Cardassians who sauntered into the pub and insulted her.

B'Elanna gave a sigh. She had almost finished cleaning up. She was pleased with her work. The Liberty's engines would be good for another three years, no more. Then Chakotay would have to find himself another derelict floating about in space and harvest its body parts to build a new vessel. What would he call it then? The Bald Eagle?

Who was Chakotay? Who was the fierce, mostly scowling Native American of whom his crew stood slightly in awe? On her second day on the Liberty she had seen him deck Chell with one blow. Chakotay smiled little, barked orders most of the time and never seemed to have time to relax. She had not seen much of him since she came on board, and if he didn't work somewhere on the vessel, he was secluded in his cabin. Ayala had been the first to tell her that Chakotay liked his privacy and never liked being disturbed. Dalby remained non-communicative on that score and Chell babbled about Chakotay doing strange things, like visit his father in a vision quest, or being in deep meditation.

The first day she had been taken into a small cabin that had, mercifully, a replicator. Before she had any time to comment on it, she half knew Chakotay was going to say "courtesy the Federation". She wasn't supposed to ask where he got it, or how. "Essentials" was the words Chakotay used when he ordered her roughly to replicate herself some clothes, after which he would disable the replicator in order to conserve energy.

"Come to my office when you're done."

She had given a little snort. She was still feeling sore after that faceless Cardassian forced himself on her and she needed a shower badly. A violent shiver which she couldn't stop, made Chakotay stop in his tracks. He had given her a long, hard look, then turned round to leave her small cabin.

In his office she stood on attention and it was the first thing he barked at her. He hadn't even given her a second look to appraise the outfit she was wearing. She was just Torres to him.

"At ease, Torres. This is the Maquis, not Starfleet."

She relaxed only slightly.

"I want to thank you - "

"Don’t thank me yet, " he cut in.

Chakotay looked down on the PADD, and she gave a mental shrug. The Maquis with equipment most likely stolen from the Federation and other races. She had heard of the Maquis, and now she found herself in the presence of one of its cell leaders, saved from certain death and degradation by him. When he faced her again, she shrank from the aggression in his eyes. Why did he have to look so as if he would drive a d'k tagh through her chest? She was comforted, however, by the fact that she sensed his aggression was not directed at her, but something else. There had to be some deep-rooted hatred of Cardassians that he could kill them so mercilessly.

"The engine of this vessel is old, but you can make it work, Torres. I need an engineer; I'll make no bones about that. You've indicated you have nowhere else to go, so consider this your home..."

Chakotay didn't have to tell her whether he meant the Liberty or the Maquis. Whichever way she looked at it, the Liberty was the Maquis and for her, the Maquis meant the Liberty. They were fighting for freedom, didn't they? She could empathise, since she'd been roaming about the sectors, making friends here and there and hearing tales of how people were dispossessed, oppressed, and subjugated with force.

"Then I will nurse your engines - "

"They're yours now, Torres," he said bluntly. "Make no mistake, we need to get in, get out, as fast as we can and as stealthily."

"I know. I'll not disappoint you, Chakotay." It was the first time she had said his name, the syllables falling clumsily from her.

"Good. First order of business, get the vessel up and running."

"It may take a few days - "

"Make it two. We have to leave then. We can't hide in here forever."

It was the first thing she had noticed when he piloted the tiny shuttle towards a plasma cloud. It looked like a puff - soft in various shades of pink. She had had no time after that to wonder whether it possessed properties that could destroy them. Her trust, after first fearing that he too might attack her in the tavern, had been instinctive. She had given him a nod, then stole a glance at the small photographs on his desk. He noticed how she looked, then said quickly "dismissed".

She had turned on her heel and left, proceeding towards the bridge where she sat at a console and studied the specs of the vessel Liberty. It wasn't a sleek starship like the Enterprise or the Melbourne or any of Starfleet's class vessels, but the Liberty was small and very manoeuvrable. The only fly in the ointment was its pilot, whom she disliked on sight it seemed to her, when he gave her a look that all but made her want to remain behind the mask of her Klingon scowl. Almost at the first, when Chakotay had introduced her to Tom Paris, she sensed the cell leader's dislike of the pilot.

B'Elanna thought of the photographs she had seen on Chakotay's desk. He had quickly dismissed her, but not before she had seen the softness in his eyes which had quickly been replaced by the old hard glint. A beautiful woman graced one photograph. A woman with long, bronze hair and a smile that turned up at the corners of her mouth. Her eyes were blue-grey. She wore a blue dress. B'Elanna had shaken her head. She couldn't reconcile Chakotay who killed her attackers and looked like he could drive a dagger through Tom Paris's throat, with the man whose whole face had softened when he looked at the woman in the picture. The other picture was smaller, the subject a little blurred, but B'Elanna could see it was a baby - a very, very tiny infant, probably just born, or something.

So, Chakotay was human after all. Barely hours after she reported for duty she had heard stories that he was married, but even Tom Paris, who knew him through his parents, didn't talk much. Were the pictures then of Chakotay's wife and daughter? It had to be. She couldn't dismiss the softness of his gaze when he looked at the face of the woman. There were many stories floating about, but she was still too new in the cell to make anything of it, or to discern what was truth and what was fabrication. It was quite possible as it went with rumours and word-of-mouth accounts, that little tails could be added to the fascinating tales surrounding one very angry looking Maquis leader.

Her heart gave a sudden lurch as she pictured Chakotay with that steely glint in his eyes. She would, if the situation called, like it happened that night in the tavern, probably kill in self-defence, for self-preservation and survival. She knew that she'd be blindingly angry as she imagined severing a Cardassian's head with her bat-leth. She knew that her anger would have justification, like Chakotay's aggression, probably, and therefore her action would have been borne out of the extreme reluctance to kill, but also the need to survive.

Chakotay...he didn't look so much angry as he looked driven, with a particular precision and such calculating intention when he struck those Cardassians down. What was his agenda? she wondered. He didn't happen to be in that tavern by chance, but his presence had been as if Kahless himself had ordered Chakotay to come in and help one of his warriors who was attacked in cowardly fashion. The manner in which Chakotay killed them, she could only afterwards wonder, when her first nightmare struck and she had woken up in the night gasping painfully, that he must surely hate them with a deep revulsion that was to her inexplicable.

She had given a sigh then. Chakotay had been nonchalant about his behaviour in the tavern, not wanting his actions to be broadcast; he played his own part down heavily, and told everyone on board that he found his contact. He had even joked - the smile was absent when he did so - about thinking he had to look for a man such as Ken Dalby led him to believe.

That day, after she had completed her ablutions, she started immediately on learning the specs of the Liberty; it hadn't been necessary for Chakotay to tell her when to start. She had done so out of her own volition and intention, wanting to put in that way, the terror of her attack behind her. B'Elanna had scrolled down the information of the Liberty's specs, all the time thinking of the look on Chakotay's face when he glanced at the woman in the photo. She couldn't decide whether it was a good thing or a bad thing that Chakotay had a softer side to him. It may be his weakness, ultimately, given the subversive nature of their work on the Liberty.

That had been a week ago. She liked working with him, working on this vessel that challenged her to be creative. She acknowledged the nobility of the work they did. Already, she knew that Chakotay had a strict dictum: they were never to attack any Federation vessel or any Starfleet officer or Federation official. He was adamant about that, yet their work entailed that they foil the Federation into parting with medical supplies, technology, even recruit from Starfleet men and woman who sympathised with their cause and whose expertise were valuable. Whatever else Chakotay had on his plate, he kept it strictly close to his chest. She had no idea what it was, and at this point, didn't think much of it. It probably had to do with the woman in the picture.

She got to know the crew, and liked Henley and Dalby from the start. Only Tom Paris seemed to rub her up the wrong way. He smirked altogether too much. A pig, if ever she saw one. He had taken one look at her and said something about making bets on when he'll see the real Klingon in her surface... If Chakotay hadn't been in the vicinity, she'd have knotted Tom Paris into a ball and kicked the snot out of him. But, she sighed, she needed a home, and to make enemies when they had to work so closely together, was a chance she didn't want to take. They had to learn to get on, just as long as Tom Paris didn't pry. Already she heard from the others that three officers died while he was at the helm of a vessel and got booted out of Starfleet for lying about it, and telling the truth afterwards. Still, that didn't endear him to her. He was nothing if not totally arrogant and snotty, like he couldn't learn from his mistakes or mature at least. Maybe he was hiding something, but right now she didn't care. Good thing he was away with Dalby and Henley on a mission. There'd at least be a few more hours before they returned, and she craved the short respite. The man just plain frayed her already jagged nerves.

She had worked tirelessly those first few days, with a new-found purpose to her life; she was driven to finish the work in the time Chakotay had challenged her, and she had done better than that. Oh, it did take working in double and triple shifts, but those few days it was all she could do to see him give one of his very rare smiles when she told him the Liberty could move again at warp five. Not only that, she had improved and made adjustments to its navigational array so that the ship could manoeuvre better than before - she had to take Ayala's word for it - in the Badlands with its turbulence and wave displacements. They were currently hidden in another cloud in a remote star system of Sector 469, and were waiting for Paris, Dalby and Mariah Henley to report and bring in the supplies they needed before heading for Alkorea where - so Ayala had informed her - they had set up a refugee camp of former colonists in the DMZ.

B'Elanna was tired; she made her way to her cabin and when she fell down on her bunk, she gave a long yawn and stretched languorously. Her shift of almost eighteen hours was over. Now she could lie back and just close her eyes and fall asleep on a positive thought. She thrived on pressure, relished her new tasks, talked to her warp core and built a relationship with it in the few short days she had been on the Liberty. Now, as Chakotay predicted, the warp core was hers. B'Elanna gave a tired, happy sigh. She was beginning to love it here on the Liberty

Positive thoughts...

It was an image of Tom Paris she saw last before the swirling eddies of sleep overtook her and she tumbled into a slumber.

**

Chakotay fumed.

Most of the time in the last two weeks he was either angry or concerned. He hadn't had any relief from those two emotions except when Torres looked at him with grateful eyes and thanked him for saving her life. That had been the only light in the constant dark avenues he had been walking in during the last three months. He still couldn't trace Winonah, although he had put Morrison, Suder and Dalby on the case. He gave a sigh. Although his niece was high on his priority list, he had been swamped by his monumental task of recruiting and fighting, becoming so caught up in his activities that he could only, when he had precious downtime, strategise on a plan to find her. His failure only made him more frustrated and the only comfort was the look of gratitude on the faces of those men, women and children who had been dispossessed by both the Cardassians and the Federation and taken by him to safe havens until the war was over.

It didn't bring Winonah back. He believed implicitly she was alive somewhere. If only he had time to initiate a thorough search for her. He gave a grunt of displeasure. The best Vorik, Suder and Dalby could do, was supply him with an extensive list of contacts, links, sectors, and even planets where she may have been taken. What they had searched, proved fruitless. The most obvious places like orphan colonies and labour camps led to dead ends. The locket he had given Winonah was lost too. Who knows, some Cardie... Chakotay shuddered. He tried to picture the five year old little girl, then closed his eyes suddenly. What he saw was extreme fear on Winonah's face. He had managed to shut out images that haunted him constantly in the first month after his family died, and giving in to picture a smiling, yet shy and diffident Winonah who seemed to come to life whenever she looked at Kathryn, caused the wound of his grief to open and bleed again. Hannah was going to look like Winonah, he realised suddenly when he pictured his own little girl lying in Kathryn's arms.

Giving a sigh of relief that his violent thoughts and frustration and anger were slowly edged out by something more comforting, he thought of the total surprise and secrecy with which Admiral Paris had sent him an update of Kathryn and Hannah's progress. It was only on his own personal computer in his cabin that he kept those images of them encrypted, hidden under a plethora of false signals and cloaked with a Ktarian array so that it could never be accessed. He remained in his cabin a full morning just looking at Kathryn's face, and marvelling at how much Hannah had grown in three short months. It had taken him a whole day's programming to find a way that his personal files would be deleted the second an enemy tried to access classified information. There were things there that could mean death to him if they found it.

Hannah at three months had a shock of pitch black hair, his colouring, dimples that made him want to cry and her mother's eyes. Hannah looked so much like Winonah from the pictures Roshana had shown them of Winonah as a baby, the two girls could very well be mistaken for sisters.

If only they could find Winonah.

But right now, the Cardassians were the most invasive threat.

The Cardassian stronghold they detected a week ago on the perimeter of the Demilitarised Zone had been the best lead they had had in months. While other Maquis cells were elsewhere engaged, he had to ferret out the whereabouts of smaller bands of Cardassian corps that could surprise the unsuspecting in this war, even the Federation. The Federation didn't know about it, of that Chakotay was convinced. There were a whole lot of strongholds of arms caches the Federation didn't know about. Chakotay shook his head. Finding the elusive arms and disabling the phaser banks of the mighty Cardassian war ships couldn't be done through by-the-book methods. It couldn't be done the Starfleet way of rigid discipline and protocol and order. There were no rules. The Maquis way was to engage in guerrilla type warfare that baffled the Cardassians and confounded the Federation. It was why the Maquis was sitting on information the Federation could just drool over. Still, the Maquis couldn't vanquish the Cardassians on their own, so in a backhanded way, the Maquis were helping the Federation.

If only the like of Hays and Nechayev could understand it that way. They had put a price on his head - that information courtesy secret subspace encrypted message by Admirals Paris and Ponsonby - and thought only of the glory of routing the Maquis. His only lifeline with the Federation was not his wife or daughter or mother-in-law, but Admirals Paris and Ponsonby. Through them he knew that Hannah was doing fine, that Kathryn... Chakotay closed his eyes.

He missed Kathryn.

But he had work to do.

It was becoming more and more dangerous to freight medical supplies to home worlds and refugee camps. The Liberty had taken severe knocks, and Torres's admission to their cell was a welcome relief. Within a week their navigation and shield harmonics had been improved and the engine was running smoothly. B'Elanna has set up a new communications system that was an improvement on the old Federation signals they used.

Now, his anger returned as he waited for Paris, Dalby and Henley. They were already three hours late. It wasn't like Dalby and Henley to be late. They had been with him since he himself joined and they were good, punctual and driven. It was Paris who proved to be an unknown factor. Chakotay had found him drunk on more than one occasion. But, he needed Paris to take the Limpet out to sector 467 and camouflage their trail.

Chakotay gave another sigh and stopped short as he approached Torres's cabin. The smile that slowly grew on his face froze as he heard a scream coming from inside.

"Torres!" he called out, already keying in an override code on her cabin door.

The moment he was inside, her saw her thrashing about wildly, landing on the floor as she tried to fight off her invisible foe.

"Torres! B'Elanna, wake up. It's a dream," he said as he held her shoulders and shook her awake.

"P'taQ!"

B'Elanna hit him and the next moment he thudded against the opposite bulkhead. He realised instantly that she was still in the throes of her nightmare and that he was her Cardassian rapist. He lunged forward and grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her again.

"Come on, B'Elanna, wake up!"

She lashed at him again but this time he was ready for her. He slapped her hard across her cheek. B'Elanna's eyes opened and she stared at him unseeingly.

"B'Elanna, it's alright. Shhh..."

Relief swamped him as her eyes focused finally and recognition dawned.

"Chakotay?"

He reached to touch her cheek. B'Elanna flinched, her breathing erratic as he made her sit on her bunk.

"It's alright, B'Elanna. I'll not hurt you. Do you understand?"

She nodded mutely.

"You had a bad dream."

"Y-yes..."

Her face puckered and B'Elanna gave a deep sob as she hurled herself into his arms. Chakotay held her until her sobbing subsided, her small frame shuddering in the aftermath of her crying. At length. when she became calm again, she sat back but looked away and he thought she was embarrassed at the way she cried. It surprised him that she did. She had been terrorised on the night of her ordeal, but that night she hardly shed a tear. He was seated on a low stool, and his gaze was level with hers as he pressed her gently so that she could look at him.

"It will get better," he encouraged her as she pulled the covering protectively around her body. She nodded and relief surged through him. "This the first time you had this nightmare?"

"I - I've had it almost every night," she admitted.

"We don't have a counsellor on board, B'Elanna. I'm sorry, sorry for what happened to you - "

"It will get better, you said," she iterated his own words. He gave a nod, not smiling in answer to her own tight little smile that formed round her mouth.

"I'm here, B'Elanna, if you want to talk about it, okay?"

She nodded again. "I was stupid - "

"No. You were robbed, Torres," he said, his voice suddenly terse. When he saw how she closed her eyes at his tone, he softened. "You were caught in a situation which was out of your control. You must understand that..."

"I should never have gone there. M-my friends, they left early, you know. And - and I..." she paused, her eyes misting, but holding the tears back with force as he saw her bite her lower lip. "I thought I could handle them. I'm Klingon - "

"You were alone, Torres. They cornered you like the cowards they were. Six - seven against one, and a whole tavern full of individuals prepared to watch someone get raped? Tell me you were looking for it and I'll kill you with my bare hands."

B'Elanna smiled, her face lighting up this time and he returned her smile.

"You wouldn't dare."

"Want to bet?" he asked.

"You don't want to kill the best engineer you ever had, and that's official, Chakotay."

"Good, I see you've got your equilibrium back, Torres. Just...don't go blaming yourself for what happened, will you?"

"That - that d'k tagh...it's a Klingon dagger..." she said softly as her eyes locked on the dagger in its sheath at his waistband.

"Don't worry too much about it, Torres," Chakotay said, his voice again terse.

"But - "

He sighed. "A dying warrior. His back had been turned to his foe, Torres. You understand that, don't you?" B'Elanna nodded. "He asked me to be the custodian of his weapons - "

"So you have his bat-leth too?"

Chakotay nodded. "You're tired, Torres. You've been on duty eighteen hours straight. Get some rest," he ordered her.

B'Elanna gave a sigh. She was a lot less strained, even looked like her fear had left her. When she lay back on her bunk, her hand came up to touch his tattoo. Another sigh and her hand fell back slowly. He smiled as her eyes closed, much as she tried to keep awake. But he needed her in engineering in eight hours. Morrison would have to do in the meantime.

"Chakotay..." B'Elanna's voice sounded too sleepy for her to be speaking still to him.

"Yeah."

"The woman in the picture..."

"What about her?"

"She's beautiful. Is she your wife?"

Chakotay was quiet for long minutes, glad that B'Elanna was already dozing when he sighed and rose from the stool.

"Yeah," he whispered very softly. "Yes, she's my wife and she's very, very beautiful..."

"You miss her..." B'Elanna said, her voice slurring, heavy with sleep.

"Yeah..."

*

On the bridge Chakotay was at the conn when he received a long range signal, coming through on one of his emergency bands.

"Dalby!" he said urgently. "Where the hell are you? You're four hours late!" Chakotay's voice was suddenly edgy, laced at the same time with worry.

Dalby looked fazed for once, and behind him Chakotay could see the face of Mariah Henley. Henley appeared bedraggled and in tears. Chakotay frowned heavily. Mariah in tears?

"Chakotay! Listen, we've got bad news - "

"Where's Paris?"

"He's been caught, Chakotay. I - we lost concentration, maybe for a second, two seconds. They had Mariah, but Paris, he - "

"Come on, Dalby! What happened? Speak up, man!"

"They were Federationists, Chakotay. We blew our cover, so Paris..." Dalby swallowed heavily. "I'm sorry, Chak. We've got the information and equipment, but he was caught red-handed. Paris, he said - he said he was alone...we heard him arguing with the Security Officer."

Chakotay raised his hand, feeling something grow cold inside him. He had not trusted Paris completely, but he had to get Dalby and Henley back to the Liberty.

"Look, just get in as fast as you can. We have to hightail it to Alkorea."

"We're there in fifteen minutes, Chakotay," Dalby promised. "Paris, it's his first mission. We screwed up, Chakotay - "

"Just get back, Dalby. We have to leave!"

"Aye, Sir."

"And God help Paris. The man's in deep trouble..."

*****

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