The fact that Kathryn Janeway and Chakotay are soulmates is written into the very DNA of their relationship.
From The Cloud:
We learn her Spirit Guide is a lizard, and Chakotay has a cha-moozee stone in his pack.
In Tattoo: we learn, along with a young Chakotay that a lizard leads him to these very symbols.
And that the symbol means “a blessing on the land” and that it’s a healing symbol. It’s clearly deeply personal to Chakotay because he keeps it etched on a stone in his meditation pack. They discuss his finding together. Using the stone in his pack that only she (and B’Elanna) has seen.
Forward to Star Trek Prodigy, Chakotay is going back to the Delta Quadrant, and he leaves Kathryn his precious stone, telling her it will guide him home. Home has always been a very important part of Voyager, of their relationship. He gave her this stone that means a blessing to the land to her. She’s his home.
This symbol is incredibly important to them both at this point. It’s to this stone that she goes when she’s afraid she’s losing him.
All because her lizard guide led him to this symbol . That has become their beacon to each other.
Their home.
Them being soulmates is certainly there from the beginning.
And as I type this, my music has randomly shuffled to Storybook Love by Mark Knopfler and I’m a puddle of much right now.
If not soulmates, why soulmate coded?
Also, happy 30th Anniversary Tattoo.
In the Voyager episode "Cathexis," when Chakotay's consciousness separates from his body, he puts himself back together using a medicine wheel with spiral petroglyph stones as a guide.
So imagine my unholy squeal of victory when, on Prodigy, Chakotay takes his cha-moozee stone -- the thing that has canonically been used to guide HIS LITERAL SOUL back home -- and gives it to Kathryn.
"Soulmate coded" is an understatement.
And you’ve got the Prodigy connection to that with Chakotay saying it’s like he never left.
I hadn’t noticed the synced stones in Cathexis had etching on them. Gonna need to watch that again, but it is so very true.
