I think I was always afraid. Afraid of what might happen if one day she said yes. There is a lot of security in loving someone who cannot, and will not act on her passions. I’ve never been good a choosing women. My experiences in the Delta Quadrant have made it glaringly clear that I probably never will be. What a track record.

Seska. I never saw her coming. Looking back, all the signs were there. I just ignored them. Maybe I’m selfish, but it felt good to be the object of someone’s intense obsession. Turns out it was my position and not me that turned her on. Of course there was never any real depth to the relationship, but I’m a man. And no one likes to be used.

Next up: Riley Frasier. That isn’t an experience I like to revisit. Used thoroughly and completely. Again. Unlike my experience with Seska, where I was blissfully unaware until the end, I could see and feel my body doing her..  THEIR bidding and was powerless to stop it. Violation.

There were other incidences. But, not once did I cry out in rage over my anguish, not once did my closely guarded control slip. Because behind it all was my love for Kathryn. I knew that my love was safe with her, perfect, peaceful. I couldn’t hold her in my arms and love her, but I could hold her in my heart and comfort her. I couldn’t kiss her and become one with her, but I could carry out her commands and support her authority. Pure and chaste from afar. That’s me, a regular Don Quixote. I thought it was enough. Until today.

I was walking along the corridor after a run on the holodeck. As I was rounding a turn, I heard laughing. HER laughing, deep and throaty. And then I heard another voice, distinctly male. I pulled back before they saw me, but not before I saw them. He was holding her tightly in his arms, the way I really wanted to hold her. Kissing her, very thoroughly, in a way I’d refused to let myself ponder. That image was burned forever in my brain. I’d had no clue, no idea, no hint.

I was utterly unprepared.

I stumbled into my quarters, and here I sit. The room is dark and their sounds have quieted. I don’t know where we will go from here. Over the years I’d so convinced myself that heart and soul I belonged to Kathryn Janeway, that I’d come to believe that by extension she belonged to me. She now lies with another and despite the pain, I still breath, my heart still beats. There is something left that is mine. It is that part that rages at the unfairness of it all. It’s that part that screams that *I* should have been the one, that still wants to be the one.

Tomorrow he will be gone, and here I will remain.

I no longer care for security.

I’m no longer afraid of what will happen if she says yes