Thomas and Bell Anna

by Harriet Vane

Tom and B'Elanna have a baby, Harry dies, Captain and Chakotay get married, and they get home . . . twice

PROLOG

"Computer," Tom Paris said as he leand back in his seat. "Play something romantic, ahhhh, Frank Sinatra."

A rich voice filled the small cabin as B'Elanna pulled a bottle of champagne out of a knapsack. "You call this music romantic?" She asked as she pored it into two glasses.

"He was *the* most popular singer in the latter half of the twentieth century, twenty million women can't be wrong."

B'Elanna handed him one of the glasses as she slid into his lap. "Actually, Tom, I think they can."

Tom chuckled, "I never liked him that much eather, Computer play a medley of Andorian Mandalins."

The music changed from the deep smooth voice of Sinatra to a moor intricate tingling of a half a dozen Madaelins. "Much Better," B'Elanna purred.

"I can't believe we had to get assigned on an away mission together to have some time alone."

"It has been hectic hasn't it?"

"Hectic would be putting it mildly."

Tom could feel her mussels stiffen in his arms, just the memories made her tense up. He leaned forward and started nibbling on her neck. "It's not hectic here," he mumbled between kisses.

"You're right," B'Elanna said as she moved her head so he would have to nibble somewhere she could nibble back.

Unfortunately for the lovers, before they could truly appreciate their solitude, the shuttle was jerked violently. B'Elanna pulled away. "What was that?"

Tom let out a quick, frustrated, breath as he leaned away from the beautiful woman so he could look at the shuttle's instruments. Once he saw what they had to say, he turned in his chair and practically pushed B'Elanna off. Ordinarily she would have been miffed, but she could tell by Tom's subtlest movements that what he saw worried him. She promptly took his champagne glass and got off his lap. "What is it?" She asked.

"We're caught in a Tractor beam," his voice was clearly confused.

B'Elanna set the Champagne down and quickly went to her own controls. "It's not Voyager," She said, "The beams band width is too wide."

"But who is it?" Tom asked, just because he felt the question needed to be voiced. "The sensors can't find anything else able to create a beam like this withing two light years."

"If I emit a gravimetric pulse it should disturb the beam," B'Elanna said, but as she reached for the controls to put her plan in action she felt herself caught up in a transporter beam, she quickly looked over to Tom, to discover that he was looking at her, caught in the same bluish shimmer. They stared at each other as their molecules were disassembled and sent across space.

Mama's Boy

They rematerialised on Voyager's transporter pad and almost instantaneously they were rocked off balance as the ship reverberated from some alien assault.

"What's happening!?" Tom demanded, bolting off the transporter pad, B'Elanna was on his heels.

"Some alien ship tried to steal the shuttle," the transporter chief reported. "We got you out of there."

"And so they attacked?" B'Elanna asked.

"Apparently."

The comm line chipped, "Mr. Paris, we need you on the bridge," the captain said. Her voice was tense, but not overly worried. B'Elanna and Tom both knew that Voyager would get out of this with hardly a scratch, as long as everybody did their job at the ususal 110%.

"Yes Ma'am," Tom said, but before he mad good the order he turned to B'Elanna.

"I'm sorry," he started.

"It's not your fault."

"Tonight?"

"I hope so."

Tom smiled and then jogged out of the room, B'Elanna followed before the doors could shut. She ran to engineering only to find that Vorik had everything under control and that there was nothing to worry about. The engines had undergone more stress in simulations. The attackers retreated in short order, clearly outgunned, and Voyager tractored in their lost shuttle. As she oversaw the re-routing of power after the battle, she idly wondered what the clean up crew assigned to look over the shuttle would think of the, all but forgotten, bottle of champagne.

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

"You don't have to scream so loud," Tom muttered under his breath. "I'm right here."

"Well, maybe if I had actual *lines*," B'Elanna replied pointedly.

"You have lines," Tom said, as he pulled a knife that looked a little too ceremonial for its surroundings out of his flight jacket and started cutting her bonds. "Just not many."

"Next time I'm going to be a villain, they have all the fun."

Tom managed to cut B'Elanna out of her bonds with the knife. He slipped it into her hand, and before she was able to demand what he was doing, he said. "Head's up, here comes one of those lines."

B'Elanna would have much preferred to keep complaining about her bit part, or demanded why he had used that particular knife (and especially what he thought he was doing, giving it to her) but she had only a hand full of lines in this little performance, so, she intended to make the best use of them she possibly could.

"Oh, Captain Proton, I thought you had abandoned me," she said, with anger, not despair or relief. They were supposed to kiss after that line, but she made it abundantly clear that that little scripted act would not happen.

"I would never abandon you." Tom said more defensively than the line was intended.

"A flaw," the oily voice of Chaotica dripped from the holo villain holding the blaster behind them. "Which has lead you to your doom!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!" B'Elanna screamed, she didn't have too, she just thought it was an in character response to, well, anything. She didn't actually see Tom wince, but she was sure he had.

"It has been a pleasure, Captain Proton, Mrs. Goodheart, but now it is time to say goodby, FOREVER," his voice dripped malice. He leveled the weapon and was about to vaporize them both when the wall behind him exploded into dust and pebbles and Chaotica was buried in the debris.

"Side Kick to the rescue!" Harry said boldly, as he climbed over the rubble and saved the day.

"And not a moment too soon." Tom said, waving the dust away from his face. He turned around and looked at the baffled B'Elanna. "Ready to go?"

"All that build up, and it's resolved this quickly? It seems a little anti-climactic."

Tom only shrugged and grabbed B'Elanna's hand, the one that did not have the ceremonial knife in it, and all but dragged her over the rubble and out of the, still smoking hole.

"Shouldn't you kill him?" she asked as she stepped over Chaotica's body.

"No, we're the good guys," Tom said casually.

B'Elanna looked over her shoulder at the corpse. "But he could come back and do more evil."

"She doesn't get it does she?" Harry asked as he led them to Captain Proton's rocket ship.

Tom just shook his head, smiling broadly.

The holo deck played annoyingly over dramatic background music as they ran a very short distance back to their rocket ship over rocky terrain.

Once they were safely in the rocket ship, there was equally suspenseful music as they struggled to get the ship off the ground. Of course Chaotica's ground troops, who had appeared out of nowhere, were surrounding their ship. For B'Elanna, it was rather boring, Harry and Tom played with little pretend instrumentation that was more laughable than feasible, not to mention believable. She did however get to scream one last time right as the hatch opened, granted all she saw was smoke from dry ice, but there was the threat. With a final minor cord, the scene froze and the Imagizer showed the sneak peek for next week. B'Elanna could tell that Constance Goodheart would do a lot of screaming, if her determination not to join Tom and Harry for their next little adventure had wavered, it did so no longer.

The preview ended and the walls of the rocketship dissolved to reveal the Holodeck, they were in color again and all the props were gone, with one exception. The ceremonial, but not unfamiliar, knife. B'Elanna knew what it meant, she wasn't sure if Tom knew what it meant, but if he did, he was in trouble, and if he didn't, he was in trouble.

"So," Harry asked casually, totally unaware of the intricate Klingon mating ritual he was in the middle of. "You guy's up for dinner?"

"Ah, actually, B'Elanna and I already have plans," Tom said, not actually looking at B'Elanna.

"We do?" she said, making it clear that they didn't.

Tom looked at her, glanced at the knife, and then set his eyes on hers. "Don't we?"

B'Elanna licked her lips, "I guess we do."

There was no one on the ship who understood Tom and B'Elanna better than Harry. He could see the interplay between the two of them, and he found it very amusing. "Okay," he said chuckling, "I'll see you two tomorrow."

"Bye Harry," Tom said.

"Bye," B'Elanna echoed.

Once the Holodeck doors were safely closed behind him B'Elanna was ready to attack, but before she got a chance Tom called out, "Computer, run program Paris-gamma."

There was a series of beeps as the computer accessed the program and suddenly B'Elanna found herself standing in Paris. The were on the point-neuf with Notre Dame behind them and the Eiffel tower in front of them. They were still wearing their Captain Proton costumes, which meant that B'Elanna was in a sleeveless silk gown on a mildly chilly Parisian night. Accordingly, Tom took off his flight jacket and placed it on her shoulder.

"So," he prompted.

"So," B'Elanna replied, not giving him an inch.

"Do you like the knife?"

B'Elanna held it in front of her so they could examine it more closely together, "A Mat'Cha knife, where did you get it?"

"I replicated it." Tom said excitedly, he was very proud of B'Elanna's Klingon heritage, even if she wasn't. "I was looking through the ships database and I found the story of Cara and Jartel."

"Tara," B'Elanna corrected, Tom didn't acknowledged the correction.

"It was the most romantic story I'd ever read, ten times more romantic than Romeo and Juliet. So . . ." He hesitated, B'Elanna obviously knew the story, and the significance of the knife there in. He was mystified by her apathy.

"Tom," She said pointedly, "Did the cultural database tell you what the gift of a Mat'Cha knife *means*?"

"It's a romantic symbol."

"So is a diamond ring."

Tom's enthusiasm dropped just a little, "What are you saying?"

"The gift of a Mat'Cha knife is usually accompanied by a proposal of marriage."

His enthusiasm was quickly striping into dread, "Really?"

B'Elanna found herself oddly disappointed, she didn't think she wanted to make the marriage commitment, but she was somewhat annoyed at Tom for not asking. "That's not what you were intending, was it?"

"Ah," he said nervously, unsure which answer would leave him safe on the bridge and which would find him being thrown into the river. "To be perfectly honest, no."

B'Elanna looked relived, which in turn relived Tom. "Good," she said, then quickly added, "Not that someday . . ."

"Someday," Tom said, understanding perfectly, "but not today."

Tragedy averted, B'Elanna smiled at him, inviting Tom to get just a little bit closer and keep her warm. It was an invitation he took and within minutes the holographic-Parisians were looking on with interest at the lovers making a display of themselves on the bridge.

Tom and B'Elanna consumed each other, they always had. B'Elanna understood him better than he understood himself, and vice versa. They weren't two halves of the same soul, they were both quite individuals, but they were two individuals who would have sacrificed their own soul for the other. She could love him whole heartedly because she had hated him. And he had won her over, because he had not given up on her, ever; because he believed in her when she did not believe in herself. She thought the same was true for Tom, but she didn't know. She understood his soul, but how his mind worked was alien ground to her.

She clawed at him, trying to get more, and he never pushed her away. That was one of the most appealing things about him, he never pushed anyone away. They could have stayed on that bridge all night, but it was cold, and the mummer of the onlookers, holographic though they might be, was disturbing. Finally B'Elanna found it in herself to push away, "Maybe we should go someplace a little more private, like my quarters."

"Mine are closer," Tom said, lustfully.

"Good idea," B'Elanna purred.

"Computer," Tom said, never taking his eyes out of B'Elanna's "End program."

Paris faded away and left the lovers standing in the gray room.

B'Elanna slipped her hand into his and started pulling him away. "Let's go," there were promises of wonderful things to come in her eyes.

Tom smiled ruefully in anticipation but didn't move, "Hold on just a second," he said as he knelt down and picked up the knife that had been forgotten. "We wouldn't want to leave this, now would we?"

B'Elanna laughed and started leading him out again, this time Tom didn't hesitate.

"So, where were we?" Tom said as they sat down on his couch. He threw the Knife casually on the coffee table and put his hand on her cheek. B'Elanna didn't answer with words.

They fell into each other again, with passion and playfulness. The odd thing was that the passion was almost fully Toms, and the playfulness was almost fully B'Elanna's. In their public lives, Tom was the playful one, holding nothing sacred and joking about everything, while B'Elanna was the serious one, ready to fight and die for something she believed in.

There was giggling and caressing and eventually the couple rolled off of the couch and onto the floor, hitting the coffee table in the process.

"Ouch," Tom chuckled, as he hit the floor.

"You need me to kiss it better?" B'Elanna asked, without waiting for an answer before implementing her medicinal technique.

They remained on the floor, enjoying the other's 'company'. They were wrapped in each others arms when B'Elanna felt Tom clawing at her back. Being Klingon, she found that very alluring, she purred like a tiger and continued to kiss him. He for some reason, was not kissing back, and the intensity of his scratching was weakening. She was about to pull away and ask what was going on when she tasted something that wasn't Tom, or more accurately, was too much Tom; his blood. Her eyes snapped open and she pushed herself off of him.

He was incredibly pale, and by now the blood was leaking out of his mouth, there was also a growing puddle underneath him. He was gasping for breath but not getting it despite the abundance of oxygen in the room. But the thing that frightened B'Elanna the most were his eyes, they were screaming in pain without making a sound.

B'Elanna was frozen in shock an horror for a vital second, finally she realized she had to do something, and quickly.

She taped her combadge, "Torres to Sickbay, medical emergency in Tom's Quarters."

B'Elanna felt numb. She was holding the Mat'Cha knife in her hand, it was covered in Tom's blood. Somehow he had managed to roll onto it and impaled himself. He was dead by the time the doctor got there. Presently, she was watching the doctor place a sheet over the dead body. It was an odd tradition, he was just the same covered with a sheet as he was not. But somehow it helped, it gave a sense of finality. He had, after all, been very much alive, playing on the Holodeck, only an hour ago.

"B'Elanna," the soft compassionate voice of Chakotay said from behind her. He didn't say anything else, he wanted her to guide the conversation.

"He gave this too me, tonight," she said softly.

"He gave you a knife."

"A Mat'Cha knife, it's a symbol of undying love," she choked on the words. There was nothing Chakotaty could say, and he knew it, so he held his tongue. They stood there, in silence for a long while, finally B'Elanna found some words, "O Happy dagger. This is thy sheath - there rest and let me die."

"Romeo and Juliet?" Chakotay said, slight panic in his voice.

"Not quite," she whispered. Her voice threatened to break and tears were forming in her eyes. "I'm sorry, I . . . I've got to get out of here."

She left sickbay quickly and once out, broke into a run. She could feel the tears flow down her cheeks and her breathing was hampered by sobs. She ran all the way to Tom's quarters, which were exactly as they had been when B'Elanna left them, only ten minutes ago. Tom was dead, but his quarters were still alive, conn reports were lying on his table, his tacky jukebox was glowing in the corner, the Captain Proton jacket was thrown recklessly on a chair. The place still smelled like him. The only real difference was the large reddish brown spot on the carpet. B'Elanna walked over to it, almost as if she were caught up in a trance, and knelt down. The blood was still warm, she could feel it seep through her silk, Constence Goodheart dress, but she didn't think about that at all. She just thought about her and Tara, Tom and Jartel.

"Death has claimed thee," she muttered quoting from the Klingon epic poem, as she closed her eyes and felt on her back for the spot where Tom's mortal wound was inflicted. Once she found it she closed her eyes an whispered, "I do this so I might know your pain, and share your joy, in Stobicor."

She was about to rake the knife across her back and let her blood join Toms on the floor when she herd the door open and Chakotay shout, "B'Elanna!"

Within seconds he was kneeling next to her on the floor holding her wrists and looking at her with a mixture of anger, grief, and compassion in his hawk-like eyes. "What were you doing?"

"What are you doing?!" she demanded, frustration finally pushing out the tears that grief alone could not.

"Tom wouldn't want this."

"Tom! Tom doesn't want anything, Tom's dead!"

"What would you accomplish by joining him?" His voice was deep and fatherly.

Suddenly, B'Elanna understood. "You thought I was going to kill myself."

"You've struggled with depression before."

She laughed mirthlessly and looked away. Her bout of emotional deadness was not something she liked to dwell on. After a moment she said, "I was performing a Klingon right." her voice dropped too barely a whisper, "Tom would have liked that."

She relaxed and Chakotay let go of her wrist, convinced that, while she might have been planing to do herself bodily harm, this grief stricken lover was not about to commit suiside. He put his hand's on her bear upper arms and practically lifted her up off the floor and placed her on the couch. "Tell me about it," he invited softly.

B'Elanna closed her eyes and leaned her head against Chakotay's shoulder. "The knife," she said softly, "Is the Mat'cha knife. It was a common weapon a long time ago, in the third dynasty. During that time two houses were fighting, the house of Sentor and, ah, the house of Marchee. The eldest son of Sentor, a boy named Jartel, met, and fell madly in love with, the youngest daughter of the house of Marchee."

"Romeo and Juliet."

"There was an epic battle, between the two houses, every man died, as did most of the women. Tara was too young to fight but she watched it all, despite strict orders from her father not to go near the battle field. Afterwards she wandered around looking at all the fallen warriors, she found her lover. He wasn't dead yet, but badly wounded," her voice dropped, it was barely audible, but frighteningly intense. "He died in her arms, she was so bereaved that she pulled out his Mat'Cha knife and started cutting herself, everywhere her Lover was cut, giving herself the same wounds so she could die the same way. The Gods looked down upon the battle field and saw what she was doing. They knew that if she died then the honor of those in the battle would be lost, as would the story of her love for Jartel. They couldn't let these things die, so they didn't let her die, but she lived with the wounds, to prove the story was true. Since then, if a man falls in battle, his lover cuts herself with at Mat'Cha knife." She paused for a long time, letting the significance sink in.

"That's what I was doing," she said softly. "Living with the wounds of my lover . . . so I wouldn't forget."

"You won't forget," Chakotay assured her. "No one on this ship will ever forget."

B'Elanna took a deep breath, and then burst into tears. Chakotay put his arms around her and held her close as she cried on his shoulder.

The door chimed, and B'Elanna managed to grown, "Come in."

The door slid open and Harry Kim popped his head in the door. He was wearing a smile that B'Elanna could tell was forced. He always smiled when he was around her, he was trying to cheer her up. It was sweet, and usually the very fact that he made the effort made her feel a little better, but today her problems were not emotional, they were physical. She felt nauseous and the room seemed entirely too stuffy. She felt as if she got out of bed she would through up, despite the fact she had no breakfast.

"I heard you called in sick this morning, I wanted to make sure you were alright."

"I'm fine." B'Elanna said, in a tone of voice that betrayed she was not. People had asked her if she were alright, and how she was doing, almost consistently for the three weeks since Tom had died. She hadn't been fine for any of that time, but B'Elanna was not about to let people know that. It was worse when people were overly kind and compassionate, because then she couldn't pretend that everything was fine, she was reminded that Tom was dead.

Of course, the very fact that she had to lie about being fine was a good thing, according to Chakotay. It meant that she was feeling something. And, oddly, she knew he was right. To feel pain and guilt and notice his absences meant that his memory was still burning brightly in her. She could close her eyes and hear his laugh and smell his hair and taste his lips and feel his presents. And that hurt, because she knew it wasn't real, but it helped too. She relished the pain, maybe a little too much but it was something close and intimate and real. Had she ignored or suppressed the pain, it would only have gotten worse. This way it was able to give her strength, not take it from her.

"You look kinda pale," Harry said, sitting down on a chair across from her.

"I must have had some bad fruit last night at dinner, I feel a little nauseous."

"Maybe you should see the doctor."

B'Elanna's heart rate doubled, she didn't want to go into sickbay. The last time she was in sick bay she had watched the Doctor cover Tom's body with the sheet. That was not a memory she could face just yet. "No," she said, fright was a little too apparent in her voice.

Harry's eyes became soft with compassion. "I bet I could get the Doc to make a house call."

"I'll feel better in a few hours," She said.

"How do you know?"

"I've felt sick like this the past few days. It goes away around ten. It usually isn't a problem, but today I have an early shift."

"I'm calling the doctor," Harry said in an inarguable voice.

B'Elanna took a deep breath and looked away.

Harry taped his comm badge. "Kim to Sickbay. Doctor, do you think you could make a house call?"

The Doctor sighed in annoyance before he answered. "What, may I ask, is the emergency?"

"B'Elanna doesn't feel well, she might be too sick to make it to sick bay." All three of them knew that was a lie, but none of them said anything.

"I see," The Doctor's voice was much softer. "I'll be down there in a few moments."

True to his word, in less then a minute, the doctor was standing in B'Elanna's quarters scanning her while she sulked.

"So," Harry said, trying to keep the mood light. "What's the prognosis?"

"Well," the doctor said, hesitating slightly. "It would seem that you are suffering from morning sickness."

B'Elanna looked up, thoroughly shocked. "What?"

"It is not serious," the doctor said, totally missing the point of her question.

"You not saying that B'Elanna is," Harry stuttered, "is . . ."

"Pregnant," the Doctor said conclusively. The room was silent for a moment, while the sheer shock of the situation washed over them.

"Pregnant," B'Elanna muttered softly.

"Congratulations!" The Doctor said smiling broadly.

"It's Tom's?" she asked softly.

The mention of Tom threw a wet blanket on the Doctor's enthusiasm. He missed his former medic more than he cared to admit. And he, like B'Elanna, blamed himself for the young man's death. If he had been there a that much sooner, if he had tried a that much longer, if he had been that much better of a Doctor; Tom Paris would be alive. If . . . if . . . if.

The Doc scanned her once again, even though they all knew no one else could possibly have fathered the child.

"Yes," he finally said nervously, not quite sure how that would affect B'Elanna.

"How is that possible?" Harry stuttered. "I mean weren't you and Tom . . . I mean, I don't know but I assumed that you would . . ." He was obviously horribly uncomfortable with the question he was asking. He motioned vainly in the air before finally giving up.

"Yes," The Doctor said somewhat annoyed at the ensign's prudishness. "They did. But there is always a chance that such treatments won't work."

"A point zero-zero-zero-one chance!" Harry said, displaying a surprising bit of knowledge.

"Well," the Doctor shrugged. He didn't have an explanation. Maybe Tom had forgotten an injection, maybe it hadn't worked with B'Elanna's unique genetic make up, maybe the treatment had somehow been flawed in it's replication. Maybe B'Elanna really needed a connection to Tom.

Despite the fact that she still felt nauseous, her face started to gain color and she managed to smile. It was a week smile, but it was genuine and it made its way into her eyes, which was more than could be said of any smile she had managed in the last few weeks.

"Tom's Baby," she said as she pulled her knees to her chest and hugged them. "I guess he's not really dead."

"Mommy," the three-year-old Thomas Torres groaned. The ship was rocking and the lights were dim and, although he didn't quite understand red alert, he knew it was something unspeakably scary, even for grownups. Add to this his mommy always left during red-alert times, which made them even more scary. "Mommy," he cried again.

B'Elanna ran up to her son, holding a sipper cup filled with milk in her hand. "Here Thomas," she said softly. No one ever called him Tom, they didn't dare muddle the memories. Still, even at the age of three, Thomas reminded everyone of his father. They had the same eyes, like a sea after a storm and when Thomas was day dreaming he looked just like his father.

She kissed him on the forehead and handed him the cup. "Drink this and stay in bed, Mommy has to go to work."

"Nooo," Thomas moaned. "I'm too scared."

"It'll be Ok," she reassured him. "But I'm going to have to go to Engineering to make sure."

"But I want you here!" the little boy said, tears filling up his eyes.

"Shhhh," B'Elanna cooed. "I have to go to engineering to make sure that Voyager isn't damaged."

Thomas thought of Voyager as a person, not as a ship. She held, for him, an almost god like status. In his mind, Voyager was the one responsible for rationing the replicators and for keeping him warm at night. Although he never voiced it, he believed that if he was good, Voyager would be good to him. He saw his mother's work on Voyager as some sort of religious duty, and the words that she spit out around other adults when the were talking about Voyager, such as 'anti-matter inversion field' and 'warp coil' and 'dilithium matrix', were sacred holy words. Words he dare not use, unless Voyager heard him. And he knew Voyager would hear him, because the computer, who was connected to Voyager but who interacted with people (Thomas was still unsure how that worked) heard everything. Thomas felt he had to put on a brave face, for the sake of Voyager, not realizing that that is exactly what his mother and the Captain and the Doctor and Harry and Chakotay did every time the ship went to red alert. Had he known that, he wouldn't have felt so brave, "You gotta go make sure that Voyager doesn't get hurt."

"Exactly," his mother said, pulling his blanket closer around him.

"What would happen if Voyager got hurt?"

B'Elanna was not about to tell the three year old that they would all die, but nor would she lie to her son. "We would all get hurt."

"I don't want to get hurt."

B'Elanna smiled sweetly. "I don't want you hurt either, so I have to keep Voyager from getting hurt. But to do that, I have to go to engineering." Thomas looked up at her with his blue-gray eyes. He could see that what she said made sense, but still it upset him.

"Ok?" B'Elanna prompted, not wanting to leave her child too scared.

"Ok," he muttered, looking down at his milk the way a drunk looks at an empty whisky bottle.

B'Elanna's combadge beeped. "Bridge to Torres," the Captain's voice was strained, "We need you up here."

"I'm on my way," B'Elanna said, standing up and heading towards the door. But before she left she turned and said. "Now, remember, don't move an inch."

"I won't," the boy grumbled.

"And I Love you."

"I know," he said, almost grudgingly. His opinion was that if she really loved him, he would be going with her to engineering, not locked up in their quarters. After all, he loved his blankie and he never went anywhere without it.

He didn't realize that 'I love you' was something precious in B'Elanna's mind. It was a rare and prized phrase. A phrase that she had not heard enough during her childhood. A phrase that had never escaped the lips of his father, despite the fact that by the time it became bizarre that he had never actually said it, he had proven it in so many ways it didn't need to be said.

Little Thomas didn't recognize the significance of the words, but he had no trouble telling his mother, "I love you," right before she slipped through the door, partially because he had been trained that that was the correct response but mostly because he did love her and he, at the age of three, unlike both his parents, wasn't afraid of it. He may have been fatherless, but he was only three and he didn't know how it felt to cry yourself to sleep because the right people had neglected to say 'I love you.' B'Elanna had sworn, almost the moment she discovered she was pregnant, that their son would never suffer that. And so, even if 'I love you' was cheap to him, B'Elanna considered it much better than if it were too precious to posses.

"Does it hurt to be dead?" Six-year-old Thomas asked. It was a cliched question, one B'Elanna had always assumed only children in poorly written Holo-novels asked. But as Thomas stared at the Torpedo casing that doubled as Harry Kim's coffin he couldn't help but wonder. Thomas may have been six, but he was astute. He noticed the haunted look on his mothers face when she told him about Harry. And he noticed the way she stared at the coffin. She could see the body through the protective tubing, even if it was dark and black.

B'Elanna wasn't sure how to answer her son. Death had hurt Harry. He wasn't in pain now, but he had been. She could still hear the echos of his screams as the plasma burned through his skin, feel the helplessness as she watched him die. She couldn't have helped him, she knew that empirically. The plasma would have gotten her too if she had tried to pull him out of the stream. So she watched her best friend die. And now she had to paint a pretty picture of his death for the sake of her son.

"Harry is in Heaven," B'Elanna said, running her fingers through her son's dark brown curly hair.

"What's Heaven?"

"It's like Stovicor, only for humans."

"So it dosn't hurt?"

"No."

"Daddy's in Heaven?"

"Yes, he is."

"And Harry's in Heaven?"

"Yes."

"Can they visit people in Stobicor?"

"I'm sure they can," B'Elanna's voice choked. She'd lost Tom, now she had lost Harry. She had watched her lover and her closest friend die, at this point in her life, she needed to believe in Heaven and Stobicor as much as her confused son did.

"So Harry's in that torpedo cover?"

"Yes,"

"And when we shoot him into space, we'll send him into Heaven?"

B'Elanna laughed, "In a way."

"Can he come back from Heaven?"

"No."

"Ever?"

"Never."

"Just like daddy didn't come back."

"Just like that."

Thomas was silent. He had loved Harry. Voyager was Thomas's home, and its crew was his family, and Harry had been his favorite uncle, almost a father, without daring to actually take that role.

"Mom," the young boy asked out of the blue. "He's not going to be back for my clarinet lessons?"

"Ah, no."

"Or to play Captain Proton?"

"No."

"But we were in the middle of chapter thirteen. We didn't finish it."

B'Elanna swallowed hard, "You'll have to finish it yourself."

"But, I'm Buster, I'm the side kick!" Thomas said, just a little too loud. He was beginning to understand that death was not so much one big thing as a hundred thousand little things. Harry being dead was understandable. Harry not coming over for breakfast was incomprehensible. "Side kicks can't do it alone!"

"Shhhhh," B'Elanna said. She was getting angry at her son. She didn't want to be reminded of how wonderful Harry had been for Thomas, and for her. "Calm down."

"Harry promised me that he would finish chapter thirteen on Friday!" Thomas gaspt. The boy was trembling, and shouting at the top of his lungs. "He promised! He has to be there on Friday, he wouldn't break a promise!"

By this time, everyone at the wake had noticed the young boy's reactions. B'Elanna could feel the looks of pity and she hated it. She knew that none of them blamed her for Harry's death, or for Thomas's lack of decorum. But B'Elanna Torres could never stand being pitied, it made her sick to her stomach. She needed Tom or Harry to come over and pull her out of the pitying eyes, but neither of them was there to do that and those things never occurred to the engineer. "Be quiet!" she said, a little harsher than she meant too. Her mothering instincts had definitely tempered her Klingon impulsiveness. It had been a gradual change, no one had noticed it, except in retrospect. But it was by no means gone and after losing Harry, she did not posses her usual self-regulation. "Thomas! Crying won't make Harry keep his promise," she practically yelled at her little boy, trembling almost as much as he was.

Every person in the room looked at the mother and son, and B'Elanna suddenly felt a thousand times more self conscious. She quickly dropped on her knees and embraced Thomas. "I'm sorry." She whispered, "I want to cry too."

A warm hand fell on the young mother's shoulders and she looked up to see the Captain looking down at her with an unspeakably sad expression on her face. "How are you two doing?"

B'Elanna stood up, shakily. "Captain," she said with a formality that was out of place on Voyager. The two women looked at each other and understood immediately how much the other had lost. "I'm sorry," she said softly, apologizing for a hundred and one things, not being able to save Harry, having a crying child, and yelling at said child were just the three on the top of the list.

Janeway smiled, effectively saying, 'it wasn't your fault.' Then she turned to Thomas, who was trying very hard not to cry in front of the Captain. "And how are you Thomas?"

"Sad and scared," the boy said with a straightforwardness that accompanied childhood.

"Everything will be all right," The captain said, kneeling on the ground to look at the boy in the eye. "You don't need to be scared."

"What about sad?"

Janeway took a deep breath. When she looked into the boys eyes, it was like looking into the eyes of her former piolet. She loved every child on the ship, they were, in effect, her grandchildren. But Thomas was special. Janeway was not so arrogant as to say she reformed Tom Paris from childish self centered criminal to mature responsible officer, but she knew that she had given him the opportunities to reform himself. And nothing had ever made her prouder than watching him take them. She loved her former pilot because he had been brave enough to change and had been humble enough to admit it.

Thomas wasn't Tom, even if they did have the same eyes, but Janeway could continue to love Tom by loving his son. So while all the other grandchildren were given their fair share of the Captain's affection, Thomas would always be her favorite.

"Its good to feel sad and cry when someone dies," Janeway explained. "That's how you know you loved them."

"Then I want to cry forever," the boy declared boldly. He did not want there to be any doubt.

B'Elanna knelt beside her Captain and her son. As someone who was very acquainted with grief, she was terrified that her son was getting the wrong impression. "No," B'Elanna said, forcefully. "You can't cry forever you have to move on."

Thomas gave his mother a confused look. She kicked her lips and decided to try again. "Think about Harry," tears welled up in Thomas's eyes. "If Harry came into our quarters and saw you crying, what would he do?"

"Try and make me smile," the boy said, as he wiped his nose on his sleeve. B'Elanna, like a true mother, pulled a handkerchief out of nowhere and made him blow his nose.

"That's right," she continued. "Part of you will always be sad about Harry, that way you know you love him. But you have to show him you love him by trying to smile, even though you're sad."

Thomas thought about that for a moment. "I don't want to play the Clarinet any more."

B'Elanna nodded, "you don't have to."

"Well, maybe I do, just not for a while."

"That's Ok," she said. Hugging her son. The Captain looked on, and was very pleased.

"Torres to Thomas," B'Elanna clipped into her comm badg. "I need you to bring me a padd."

Thomas put down his Clarinet, "Right now?" His voice dripped with gripes.

"Yes," B'Elanna said in a motherly voice that she had honed to a tee after nine years with a son who managed to push her to the edge at every chance he got. Her only explanation was that risk taking was genetic, no sane child would put his Klingon mother through what Thomas put her through.

"Where is it?"

"It's in the top drawer in my dresser. It's labeled plasma converters."

There was a pause, then in a moment Thomas replied. "Yha I got it," he said slowly, "Hay mom, what's in this box?"

"Box?"

"Really dark, reddish wood. It's a pretty box."

B'Elanna's heart suddenly sunk, and apparently it showed on her face, because the section of engineering where she stood was suddenly vacant. She thought of a hundred of things to say to the boy, everything from telling him the whole truth over the comm badg to yelling at him for finding it. Finally she managed to say, "I'll tell you about it when I come off this shift."

"Ok," Thomas said, it was obvious that his mother's hesitation had made him suspicious, but in under five minutes he was in engineering, handing over the padd.

"Hey," B'Elanna said sharply. "Where do you think your going?"

Thomas turned around nervously, he didn't remember doing anything wrong. "I was going to finish practicing my Clarinet and then I have a shift with the doctor."

"And you're going to do all this without kissing your mother goodby?"

Thomas slumped, "I kissed you this morning."

"That was this morning." B'Elanna said making it clear that no was not an option. "It's worn off."

Thomas begged his mother not to have to kiss her in public with his blue-gray eyes. She didn't give him an inch. Reluctantly he walked up to her and planted a kiss squarely on her cheek, she smiled down at her son and hit him on the arm. "Now, get out of here."

"See you later Mom,"

"Later," B'Elanna said. Her voice was trembling. She couldn't help but think of Tom as she watched him walk out. And she knew that Thomas was not going to forget to bring up the box and then she would have to explain to Thomas just why he didn't have a father.

"Lieutenant?" Vorik's clear, unemotional voice cut through her ponderings.

"What?"

"You now have the information we need. I suggest we start."

"Right," B'Elanna said, collecting herself. "Let's get at it."

They remained 'at it' for four hours when B'Elanna didn't think about Tom or Thomas or a box with a knife in it. As soon as her shift was over, however, she realized that she had to face the music. She didn't dally to run one more scan on the plasma manifolds, like Carey wanted, or plan the next days work, like Vorik wanted. "Sorry boys," she said as she stormed out of engineering. "The two most important Men in my life are waiting." Her underlings wanted to question her, but they didn't get the chance.

B'Elanna headed straight for sick bay. When she got there, she didn't bother walking all the way in, she just stuck her head in the doorway, hoping to scoop Thomas up and then take him to her quarters where they could talk. Instead she found a very annoyed hologram.

"AH, B'Elanna!" The Doctor said, in a tone of voice that made it quite clear that he was not at all happy. "Perhaps you can clear something up for me . . ."

"Not right now, Doctor," she said, stepping all the way into sick bay, scanning the room for her son. "Where's Thomas?"

"Funny, that's just what I was about to ask you."

"What do you mean?"

"Your son, didn't show up for his duty today."

"He didn't?"

"Now, I understand that he is just a child, but when he volunteered to help me in sick bay, I assumed that he would be more diligent than his father."

"He didn't show up at all?" B'Elanna asked, annoyed.

"No."

"Did you page him?"

"He refused to answer."

She sighed. "Computer, locate Thomas Torres."

"Thomas Torres is in his quarters."

"That boy," B'Elanna muttered under her breath. She hadn't liked Thomas volunteering to work in the sickbay. Tom had hated that regiment, and quite frankly she didn't like the thought of her little boy seeing all the accidents that happened on the ship. Blood and broken bones, she couldn't help but think that Thomas was too young. But he was getting to the age where he was wondering about his father, and if he chose to seek out that connection in the sickbay instead of in the delta flyer, she was not going to complain. Still, she was not about to let Thomas pick-up his father's irresponsibility. He had made the commitment, he was going to keep it.

Of course it could be that he did not answer because he was hurt. But B'Elanna couldn't bear to think that, so she cursed Tom and his genetic disposition towards irresponsibility.

"Thomas!" She called out in her Klingon/mom voice. "Thomas!" She started looking around and eventually found him in her room sitting on the floor with an open box, a bloody knife and a tricorder. "Thomas!" She yelled furiously. She looked down at her son she was so mad at him that she didn't have words. She took a few breaths while she paced. Thomas knew his mother well enough to know that he was in real trouble.

But he was a quarter Klingon himself, and maybe it was just the knife, but he felt that blood burning in his veins. "Mom, what is this?" He demanded, not getting off the floor.

"You are in no position to ask questions Thomas!" B'Elanna said, still trying to figure out what to say and where to start.

"I thought this box was wierd, then I opened it and I saw the knife. That's really wierd, mom. And the blood . . ."

"Thomas, I told you. We would discuss this when I got off duty."

"You're off duty now!" Thomas said, angrily. "So why don't you tell me why you have a knife covered in dad's blood?"

"You had no right to look at that!"

"Dad's blood! I did the scans myself, I did them a thousand times!"

"Oh, a thousand?" She said sarcastically.

"A lot. Dad's blood!"

"I KNOW!" B'Elanna yelled so loudly the ensign next door could hear.

That was enough to get Thomas on his feet. "I just want an explanation."

"Right now I care very little about what you want." B'Elanna said, her voice was low and trembling. "You disobeyed me and you ignored your duties in sickbay. You deserve to be punished not enlightened."

"I deserve to know why a ceremonial Klingon knife is covered in my father's blood to the hilt. I'm not stupid, I know what that means."

"Thomas, I'm not going to discuss it right now."

"No! If you don't tell me, I'm going to go ask someone else."

"Thomas."

"Mom, Dad's blood!" He couldn't get past that one point. "Someone would tell me. Tuvok and the Doctor and Captain Janeway would all have to know, and a whole lot of other people too. Someone will tell me, if you won't."

Somehow, seeing her son's passion tempered B'Elanna's. "Thomas," she tried again, much softer. "That is a Mat'CHa knife."

"I know what it is," Thomas clipped. One look from his mother and his passion was tempered too. They sat on the bed simultaneously, Thomas's eyes where downcast, staring at the knife. "I thought you two weren't married."

"We weren't." B'Elanna chuckled. "He gave it to me, thinking it was just like a bouquet of roses. I guess he was not as good of a researcher as you are."

"And how did he die?"

"How do you think?"

"I didn't, I didn't want to," he admitted. "But I don't know. I just have really started to think, I don't know, think that it would be neat to see him other than those pictures and really hear his voice. Mom, I want to hear him say my name."

"I'm sure we can find an audio clip of him saying Thomas."

"Not his name, Mom, mine."

B'Elanna was silent for a moment. What could she say to her son? Finally she decided to tell him the whole truth, or at least most of it. "He died the night he gave it to me. I had set it down, thoughtlessly, and, while we were kissing . . ." B'Elanna found herself trapped in the memory again. She hadn't had to face it for a long time. The Box, which had been originally placed in her top drawer so she would see it constantly and not forget, had become common place and no longer a center of contemplation. That helped her move on. But ten years later, she was forced to face the whole thing again. It was almost as hard as the first time. "He, fell onto it," her voice was trembling. Thomas got very afraid, he had never seen his mother like this before. "He died right there, in my arms, gasping for breath as blood filled his lungs. I didn't know what to do. I . . . yelled at him. I tried to force him not to die by sheer will power. I told him that I loved him." She paused, tears were streaming down her cheeks, but she didn't notice. "He didn't . . . couldn't . . . answer me."

This was the first time Thomas had ever heard the story of how his father died, and he understood why. The pain in his mother's voice was almost incomprehensible to him. He didn't know what to say, so he just leaned forward and hugged her. She didn't return the hug, but she did lean her head on his and kiss him, in the middle of his dark curly hair.

"I'm sorry mom," he finally said softly.

"It's ok," she answered.

Indiana is filled with little country chapels. They're absolutely beautiful; quaint and clean, with stained glass sending colored shadows over the white washed walls. There was the lofting sent of earth in this chapel, which reflected the open fields it was plopped in the middle of. It was simple and traditional and bright and joyous. In a word perfect.

"Oh, Chakotay," B'Elanna said softly as she stood next to her commanding officer in a light blue dress. T[hey had discussed using dress uniforms, but once they saw the chapel it was quite clear that dress uniforms were utterly inappropriate. "This is wonderful."

"I hope Kathryn thinks so," the Commander said nervously.

B'Elanna chuckled, she had never seen him this on edge before. He had faced the borg with less anxiety. "Cold feet?"

"I just want this to be perfect for her," he said, never taking his eyes off the doorway to the chapel where, in a few minutes, his bride and his Captain would walk through.

"She'll love it," B'Elanna assured him, however, she knew that the Captain would not look at the chapel or the guests. Her eyes would be on her groom the entire time, just as his eyes would not move from her.

Suddenly the door opened, but instead of the wedding procession, Thomas came in and walked rather solemnly around the sides of the chapel instead of going down the aisle. B'Elanna temporarily abandoned her post beside Chakotay to find out exactly what was going on. "What's the matter?" She asked very quietly.

Thomas was twelve, and technically a little two old to be a ring-bearer, but the Captain and Chakotay had decided to bend tradition in that department, and a few others. "There's a problem with the Doctor's holographic parameters," Thomas explained.

B'Elanna should have expected the worse possible thing to happen only moments before the ceremony was to begin, but she had held the false belief that, just once, everything would go perfectly on Voyager. "Can't Vorik handle it? Or Seven?"

"Well Seven's back there, and she doesn't see what's wrong. And Vorik said he's not familiar enough with earth's mating traditions," his faces squeezed into an 'ick' expression as he repeated Vorik's words. "To fix it."

B'Elanna was thoroughly confused. "What's wrong?"

Thomas shrugged, "I don't know, Captain said his clothes were inappropriate for the occasion."

B'Elanna sighed, "I'll be right there," she turned and stepped up to Chakotay to report.

"What's the matter?" He asked nervously. He had no reason to be frightened, the Captain would never go back on her word.

"Something with the Doctor," she whispered. "It should take just a moment."

"Hurry back," he said, "I feel pretty foolish standing up here alone."

B'Elanna smiled and then turned and followed her son back to, what in a real chapel, would have been the coat room, but had been transformed into the bride's ready room. The Captain stood in the middle in a simple, traditional, wedding gown that made her look absolutely stunning, but she still had her sharp Janeway edge. Seven of Nine was standing next to her, dressed in a light blue dress identical to B'Elanna's and they were both staring at the Doctor who was dressed in full Cardinal Robes.

"I brought my Mom," Thomas announced as he walked into the room. Of course her presence was also announced by her exploding into laughter.

"Doctor, I think you're a little over dressed," She finally managed to get out.

"I was under the impression that the Captain requested a traditional wedding cleric," The Doctor said. He was obviously annoyed, but that stemmed from frustration and shame over messing up the most important day in his Captain's life. "My research led me to believe that this was . . . Traditional."

"Sure," B'Elanna said nodding. "If your getting married in the Sistine Chapel."

"B'Elanna," Janeway said, she may have looked like the budding bride, but she was still the Captain. "Do you think you could . . . tone it down a little?"

"What were you thinking?" B'Elanna said, opening up a draw to display the Holodeck controls.

"A Reverend, maybe," She said, walking around the Doctor and his crimson robes. "A black suite and a white collar."

"Ah, hun," B'Elanna said, pushing a couple of bottons. The doctor crackled, and when he regained his form he was standing in front of them wearing the plain black ensemble that suited the situation. "Better?"

"Much," the Captain said, looking very relived.

"This does seem more appropriate considering our present surroundings," Seven said dryly. "However Doctor, I must admit I preferred the other outfit. Red suits you." (How's that for a crossover!!!!!!)

"Well, Thank you Seven." The doctor said, smiling like a fool.

"If that's all Captain, I should get back out there."

Janeway nodded, for the first time showing the expressions of a nervous bride. "How's Chakotay doing?"

B'Elanna smiled coyly, "Well, Sir, you'll just have to come out and see."

The wedding proceeded beautifully. Thomas performed perfectly, as did the bride and groom. The Doctor somehow managed to talk for ten whole minutes without mentioning himself or insulting anyone. Every guest became misty eyed when the two highest ranking officers exchanged vows. The Captain and Commander were too happy to shed tears.

After the formal ceremony there was a reception in a nineteen-twenties speakeasy. There was music and dancing, good food and good drinks. Chakotay recited one of Shakespeare's sonnets to his wife, Thomas played a duet with Susan Nicalety, and The Doctor and Seven sang a very romantic, perfectly harmonized, rendition of 'maken' whoopie'. It was a wonderful reception, but during the middle, after the bride and groom had slipped away and before everyone became a little too drunk, B'Elanna crept out and walked up the dingy steps that should have lead to a back alleyway. Instead she found herself in the clean, white chapel, with the light of a stained glass window reflecting down on her.

She sat in the chapel for a while, enjoying the beauty, simplicity, and quiet, before she heard soft foot falls on the stairwell behind her. She turned around to see her son's sharp blue-gray eyes and childish smile. "Hey Mom."

"Hey."

"You should get down there," he said as he walked over and sat down on the pew next to her. "The party's starting to get wild, Ayola is doing the tango with Naomi and I saw Doctor and Seven kissing in a dark corner."

"Hum," B'Elanna mused, "I thought she wasn't going to drink, and he's a hologram, he can't get drunk."

Thomas's smile doubled. "I know."

B'Elanna laughed. "She did catch the bouquet."

The conversation fell in to silence for a moment. Finally Thomas asked, "Why don't you go down?"

"Oh, you can go. I'm too old for wild parties like that."

"Mom, most of those people down there are older than you."

"Most of those people aren't mothers."

"Your saying mother's are older than other people, the same age."

"Yes."

"That's not very logical."

"You can't tell me that until you grow pointy ears."

Thomas laughed, but immediately became serious. "No, really mom, what's the deal?"

B'Elanna looked at her son, and he could feel her searching him. Whatever was on her mind was an extremely personal, grown up thing, she wanted to make sure he could handle it. He straightened his posture and tried to look solemn yet caring in order to prove to her that he was grown-up enough. It must have worked, because his mother took a deep breath and started talking.

"I was just thinking," she said, her eyes had moved to the chapel walls, the stained glass, and the candles. "How I wish I could have had this."

"So you were thinking about Dad?"

"In a way, I guess," she admitted. "Not so much him as the act of a wedding, and a honeymoon. I wish I had the chance to share those things with Tom. To see him look at me with the expression Chakotay was looking at the Captain with. Excited, happy, hungry, slightly afraid." She laughed as she played it out in her mind. "It would have been nice," she said wistfully. Then she turned on her son with a frankness that was fueled by good humor. "But, then I would have had to dance with him."

"Dad couldn't dance?"

"He thought he could," B'Elanna said shaking her head.

Thomas laughed, he loved it when she talked about his father. When he was younger, the subject was avoided, without ever really being taboo. She would answer questions, but she would not give anecdotes or speak frankly. But after he had found that knife three years ago, she had opened up. Thomas didn't know this for a fact, but is seemed to him, since then, she had been a lot happier too.

"I'm a pretty good dancer," he said, standing up and offering her his hand.

She looked at him, eyebrows raised. "Really?"

"I inherited my mother's grace."

B'Elanna shook her head and giggled. Then, taking a breath and his hand, she stood up and started walking towards the stairwell. "And your father's charm."

Voyager landed in the middle of Arizona's desert. They wanted to land the ship, and they wanted to do it on Earth, but many sights were acceptable. Starfleet had sent Captain Janeway several landing plans, one where they landed in a field in Indiana, only twelve miles from where she grew up. But she chose Arizona. She didn't tell Chakotay about the multiple plans, because he would have insisted on Indiana. As they got closer to Earth, he looked at her expectantly, knowing that she was keeping something from him. But Kathryn wasn't talking so Chakotay just had to wonder.

As they flew past Pluto, Chakotay was wondering out loud to B'Elanna in engineering. "This isn't like her you know."

"I know Chakotay." B'Elanna said, annoyed. He had been going on and on about it for nearly three weeks. By this point B'Elanna was the only one on the ship who would listen to him. Thankfully, for everyone else, they were the only two in engineering as she slowly turned off the ship's Warp drive and other systems, getting it ready to be examined and picked apart.

"She's not secretive." He said, pacing back and forth. "I don't know what could possibly be happening at starfleet command that she feels she needs to keep from me."

"It's not necessarily a bad thing," She said, Then her eyes shifted to the ceiling. "Computer, vent the plasm in the warp nacelles at a rate of 200 grams per second."

The computer blipped.

"She's probably just trying to surprise you."

Chakotay had heard that a thousand times, but that didn't satisfy him. "She keeps looking at me with anticipation. I don't know how to respond."

"Here's an idea," B'Elanna said as she taped a panel and started to disassemble the Dilithium matrix. "Relax."

Chakotay looked at her baffled.

"You've been running yourself in circles ever since we reached the Alpha Quadrant," she said. "At first it was excitement, but now it's apprehension, even fear. This isn't like you at all, Chakotay. You're seeing things were there isn't anything."

Chakotay looked at her inquisitively, "really?"

"Um-hum," she said, not looking up from her panels.

"Hey!" Thomas's voice echoed through the empty engineering as he walked up to Chakotay and his mother. He was fifteen and his voice was finally starting to change, get deeper, and his awkward stage was almost over and he would have been a mirror image of his father if it wasn't for the small ripple on his forehead and his dark curly hair. "Gosh, this place is spooky without people in it."

"I know," B'Elanna siad, her voice hollow. "It seems dead."

"Sickbay is just as dead." Thomas said, as he pushed himself up to sit on the railing around the warp core. He had always wanted to do that, but his mother had always insisted it was too dangerous. The core was off now, a dull mono-tinted blue, and totally harmless. He wasn't scolded off. "Doctor went to Cargo Bay Two to pickup Seven. I guess they're going to go to the party down in the shuttle bay." Thomas said it with an edge in his voice, making it clear that he wanted to be at the party as well.

"Feel free to join them," B'Elanna said distracted.

Thomas sighed, he didn't want to go alone. It was a party, but a party about getting back to Earth, a place that Thomas had never seen. He was excited in an adventurous way, but this was a home coming party, and Thomas was not going home, he was leaving it.

B'Elanna's comm badge tapped. "Janeway to Torres,"

"Go ahead, Captain."

"How's the shut down going?"

"It's almost done, I should be able to join you on the bridge shortly."

"Good, do you think you could drag Chakotay up here with you?" The Captain's voice was playful, she was in an uncommonly good mood.

"I'll try," she said, the good humor catching on.

"Great, Janeway out."

"Why didn't she tell me to report to the bridge herself?" Chakotay wondered out loud.

B'Elanna ignored him. "Computer," She took a deep breath, "Shut down the warp engine, Authorization Torres beta-three."

There was a dropping sighing sound, and the room got noticeably darker as multiple panels turned off. B'Elanna felt like she was going to cry. "Warp engine shut down." The computer informed them, not quite realizing what had just happened.

"I guess we'd better get to the bridge." She choked.

The two most important people in her life looked at B'Elanna compassionately, "You gonna be Ok, Mom?" Thomas asked.

"Sure," she said, forcing a smile. "I'll be fine."

Thomas tagged along as they went to the bridge, his first glimpse of earth was from Voyager's viewscreen, and he was far less impressed than everyone else on the bridge. It was a class M planet, like a hundred and one he'd seen before.

"Home," the Captain said softly.

"It's beautiful," B'Elanna muttered. She hadn't realized how much she had missed the planet until returning was eminent.

"It's just a planet," Thomas said, a bit resentful that the Captain and the chief Engineer, the two people who were supposed to love the ship more than life itself, were suddenly eager to leave it.

The bridge crew ignored the boy's blasphemy. "Chakotay," the Captain ordered. "Why don't you take the helm and get ready to land."

"Yes Ma'am," Chakotay said, relieving the ensign seated there so he could scurry to the shuttle bay and join the party in its last few minutes, leaving only the four highest ranking officers and Thomas on the bridge.

"Take us down Commander," she said, her voice teeming with elation.

"Where are we landing?" He asked.

The Captain smiled broadly, "Arizona," she said, "At coordinates eight-three-five-seven-two."

Chakotay turned in his chair and looked at his wife. Her smile made it clear that this was her secret. His eyes made it clear that he appreciated it. They didn't speak a word, but they said volumes.

Voyager set down smoothly, in the Arizona desert, where almost a thousand people were waiting eagerly for the crew to come out. Friends, relatives, colleagues, and members of the press all waited for the shuttle bay to open and for everyone to exit the ship that had been thier home for so long. By the time the five who had been on the bridge made it to the shuttle bay and out of the ship, most of the reception party had found the crew members they were looking for. A host of starfleet admirals, the Captain's Mother and sister, Tuvok's wife, and about half a million photographers were the only ones to greet them as they walked out into the hot Arizona sun.

"Any family?" Thomas asked his mother nervously looking out at a sea of people and a place that meant very little to him.

"Not my side," she said scanning the crowd for Klingons, the only human relative that would have made an effort to be there was her father's mother, but she had died before B'Elanna went to join Starfleet, not to mention the Maquis or the crew of Voyager.

"How about Admiral Paris?" Thomas said nervously.

B'Elanna shifted through the group of admirals, she hoped she didn't see him. She had never met the man, but she had a very solid opinion on his character from what Tom had told her. She couldn't imagine him embracing his grandson. The last thing she wanted was for Thomas, the offspring of the Admiral's failure of a son and a half Klingon Maquis, to be hurt. On the other hand, she had never met the man, people can change after twenty years and Thomas was Tom's only child. He might be glad to have that connection.

"I think that might be him," B'Elanna said uncertainly, pointing towards a man that was talking to Captain Janeway. The man looked more or less like Tom, and accordingly, Thomas. The same nose and ears and hair line. His eyes were a blue-gray but more like an ice-field than a summer sky before a storm. He spoke like Tom had, using the same sorts of inflections, but while the tones were the same, B'Elanna found the admiral's voice a thousand times colder than Tom's ever was, even at his worse.

The Captain answered the admiral cordially, but as she glanced over to Thomas and his mother several times, the admiral didn't look over once. Finally, The Captain hooked her arm in the admiral's and started walking him over towards the Torreses, much to the distress of Chakotay who found himself alone under the fierce scrutiny of not one, but two Janeways.

"Owen," Janeway said, smiling with a big enough smile to make up for the admiral's grimace, almost. "I'd like you to meet the best engineer I've ever known, B'Elanna Torres."

"Pleased to meet you," he said in a diplomatic voice with a diplomatic smile.

"And this," The Captain said proudly. "Is her son . . . and your Grandson, Thomas Torres."

The admiral's diplomatic smile dissolved into amazement, fueled by indignance. "What did you say, Kathryn?"

"Tom Paris was my father," Thomas said overeagerly.

"His son," Admiral Paris said slowly.

Captain Janeway, believing the introduction to have been a success and not wanting her husband to be eaten alive, said, "I'll leave you to get acquainted," and walked off.

The admiral looked over his grandson very critically for a moment, trying to see if he measured up to some unknown standard. "He leaves, and twenty years later you're what comes back."

Thomas suddenly realized that his Grandfather wasn't going to be everything that the grandfather's in holonovels were. "I guess so," he said meekly.

"And you're his mother?" The admiral asked B'Elanna.

She could feel him trying to shrink her, lessen her with his stare, as he had just done with her son, and she imagined, a thousand times with Tom. She wasn't going to stand for it. "Yes," she said proudly.

"So you're the one that killed him."

B'Elanna felt like she had been shot with a phaser. She didn't know what to think or say. He was right, she had killed him but she had loved him too. Even if that didn't mean anything to the man standing in front of her, the fact should have counted for something.

Thomas understood that. He had read his father's personal logs several times. He knew that Admiral Owen Paris had hurt his son more then helped him, and he knew that B'Elanna had been the light of his life. Thomas had hoped that the Admiral would change, mainly because his father had desperately hoped for the same thing. But those hopes were dashed, and Thomas's Klingon blood did not react well to that. "How dare you?!" he demanded of his grandfather. "She loved him!"

"Don't talk you your elders that way boy," the admiral said, with more than a little warning in it. "It's unbecoming."

"What do I care?" Thomas asked. "I'm not in Starfleet, you can't command me."

B'Elanna finally found her tongue. "Thomas, he's your grandfather," She reminded him sharply. "Respect him."

"I don't see why I should." The boy replied honestly, anger making him a little too bold. "He hurt dad a lot more than you ever did."

"Thomas," her voice held a warning, but he was at an age where motherly warnings were noted, but rarely followed.

"I grew up on a starship thousands of lightyears from anywhere close to home, we where constantly under attack, and people died. I had to go to school in the holodeck because there weren't any other children, and at the age of seven I was assisting the doctor in sickbay because somebody had to be. My childhood should be considered horrible compared to my dads, but I know for a fact that it was happier because my mother, and the whole crew, loved me, unconditionally, and I knew it. You never did that for him, and in the end that's all that matters."

Tom-boy

When the tractor beam released him, Tom found himself and B'Elanna on an alien transporter pad surrounded by purplish aliens dressed in white, starel robes holding what might have been weapons and might have been scanners pointed right at the pair. Tom was so shocked that he wasn't able to get out his, 'we're just explorers, we mean you no harm, put us back!' speech so the aliens spoke first.

"One female, one male." One of the half dozen aliens said.

"Warm blooded" another one said.

"Acceptable cranial capacity."

"Nine month gestations."

"Acceleration is necessary."

"Both fertile."

"Hey!" Tom said, finding his voice at last. "What's going on?"

He was ignored. "Single cell fertilization."

"One fetus at a time."

Tom looked at B'Elanna, who had a queasy, sick, expression on her face and his male-protective instincts took hold of him. He took a defensive step forward reaching discretely for her hand. Much to his surprise, she reached out, took it, and pulled herself closer to him. "Who are you?" Tom demanded.

"Resistive tendencies."

"Compliance unlikely."

"Can't they speak in complete sentences?" Tom muttered to B'Elanna, trying not to let the fear get to him. Talk of fertilization and fetuses had not shaken him as much as it had her, but the fact was that they were being analyzed and ignored, and that terrified him.

"We should try and contact the shuttle," B'Elanna whispered.

"Good idea," Tom said, his eyes never leaving the aliens who were disjointedly conversing about the biochemistry of human procreation.

They never got a chance, almost before Tom got the words out of his mouth, they were both grabbed from behind and restrained. They both tried to pull themselves free but their struggles seemed futile.

"Prepare injection."

"45319"

"What are you doing?" Tom demanded. He and B'Elanna continued to struggle fruitlessly against there captors. "Talk to us!"

Tom's anger and frustration suddenly tuned to fear when he saw one of the aliens approaching them with what could only be injection 45319. It was a horrific needle, something which seemed more appropriate in Dr. Chaotica's lab, not real life. The alien advanced purposefully towards B'Elanna. She kept fighting; she was terrified. Tom's captors somehow decided that it would be better for him to be else where while they applied their injection. They dragged him off of the transporter pad, away from B'Elanna. "No!" Tom said, struggling against the aliens and reality in general. "No!"

He heard a short scream, a scream that was cut off by loss of breath, or something worse. The kind of scream that was worse than a prolonged scream of agony, because it left the hearer guessing. Tom fought his captors with new vigor. "B'Elanna!" He yelled over his shoulder. He managed to catch a glimpse of her dark form, collapsed on the transporter platform, with a group of sterile aliens standing over her.

"B'Elanna!"

"Tom?" Her voice was a mixture of disbelief, shock, relief, and just the tiniest bit of shame.

The aliens let go of him and in less than a heartbeat they were in each other's arms, using all their senses to verify that the other one was real.

"********** levels are dropping."

"Satisfactory results."

"B'Elanna," Tom muttered, not daring to let her go. "Are you all right?"

"Fine," she stuttered after a moment, not daring to look him in the eyes. "I guess." She glanced down at her stomach, which was bulging ever so slightly. "You?"

"Fine . . . now. I was so worried. The last time I saw you, you were lying on the floor. I didn't know."

B'Elanna laid her head on his shoulder, but remained silent. Tom looked down at her stomach and understood why. He didn't know what to say either.

They had been on the planet for almost a month, waiting for a rescue party that never came. Tom, at least, had been used as slave labor, more or less, fixing minor mechanical problems thought the ship, or station, or colony, or whatever they were on. His hands had been, and were still, covered in oil that could never quite be washed off, which was not as bad as it seemed because it kept him from knowing just how bruised and battered they really were after being caught between gears and springs and other mechanical trappings. Why a culture advanced enough to have tractor beams, and transporters, and medical scanners, and medically impregnate and accelerate the pregnancy, still used mechanical devices (he wasn't quite clear on what they did), was beyond him. He had collected little parts here and there, only that which he knew would not be missed, in hopes of using them to enhance his comm badge signal. But every night, by the time they let him go to sleep, he was to exhausted to even start thinking that way.

After a few moments, Tom managed to pull himself away. He drew her clean hands into his oily ones and led her over to her bed. From the day they had been captured he had tried to get back to B'Elanna, he had tried to run away, tried to talk his way, and then beg his way, to seeing her. He didn't know why, but suddenly they decided to grant his wish. They came into his little cubicle one night after he had worked on getting a vermin's carcass out of a set of gears and they had hauled him, half asleep, nearly a mile until they reached another, non-descript cubicle. But the person in it was anything but non-descript.

"They didn't hurt you?" Tom asked gently, stroking her face with the back of his hand, urging her to look up at him.

"Not . . . not really. What happened to your hands?" she asked as she started examining the oil coated appendages affectionately, because then she didn't have to look him in the eyes.

"Oh, I've just had an opportunity to apply all those skills I picked up on the hollodeck."

"Working on the Chevy?"

"More like a model-T."

"A what?" She asked with mild curiosity before the unusualness of the situation struck her. "They have mechanical systems?"

"Real barbaric stuff, too, I can't imagine what they could use it for."

Another awkward pause.

"Ummm," B'Elanna said, wincing ever so slightly.

Over reacting just a tad, Tom quickly asked "What's the matter?".

"Nothing," Tom's gaze made it clear he didn't buy that for a second. "She's kicking."

"She?" Tom threw some enthusiasm into the question. She may have been impregnated against her will, but this was still B'Elanna's baby, and he didn't want her to be ashamed of it.

"If the aliens can be trusted," She grumbled. "They don't talk to me."

"Oh, I hear you. The gears are better conversationalists."

"Why do you think they let us see each other?"

"Well, they said something about our," he chuckled, "probably your, ************ rates lowering. The brain produces that chemical as a response to or result of extreme stress, I forget which."

"That couldn't hurt the fetus, could it?" There was genuine concern in her voice. She may have been ashamed of the baby, but it was hers and she was going to protect it.

Tom felt himself smile. "No. I mean it shouldn't. But this is hardly a normal pregnancy."

She leaned her head against his shoulder, and he leaned his head against hers. They sat quietly for a moment just enjoying the familiarity of each other.

"Tom," she said after a while.

"Humm?"

"Will . . . will . . ." She took a deep breath while Tom waited patiently. "Will you be her father?"

Tom suddenly felt his chest constrain. Neither of them had had particular luck with fathers, add to this Tom was not, genetically, the father of this child. It was a bigger request than it should of been, and B'Elanna knew it. But she knew that if the child was part Tom's, in some way shape or form, even if it was all psychological, then there would be no need to be ashamed.

"Are you sure you want me?" Tom said, forcing a joke out of desperation. "I'll probably be a bad influence. I'm an ex-con, a picky eater, in a dangerous occupation . . ." B'Elanna moved her head, forcing him to move his and look her in the eyes. It was the first time B'Elanna had been so bold, and Tom could see the pain and fear and anger and determination in her eyes. They almost overwhelmed him. "B'Elanna, I'll do whatever I can for you, and your baby."

"Tom, for once answer the question."

The pilot nodded, "Yes . . . at least, I'll try."

She smiled up at him, understanding that trying was probably the best anyone, not to mention Tom Paris, could ever do. It was more than her father had done. She closed her eyes and put her head on his shoulder, he put his head on hers, closed his eyes as well, and they drifted off to their first moderately content and restful sleep in weeks.

"Damn," Tom muttered under his breath as he pulled his hand away from the twisting gears. His fingers were numb from being caught so often in the machines, and they were caught so often in the machines because they were numb. He knew that once he got home B'Elanna would put an ice pack on them, but that was still over eight hours away. He just shook his hand in the air and continued to try and work in the machines.

"You know!" he called out to the aliens, although at this point he didn't expect an answer, so he was more or less talking to himself. "If you stopped this machinery, it would be a lot easier for me to fix it." He laughed without humor. "What if one of my fingers really got crushed? Huh? Who'd be your grease monkey then?"

"I expect," a very clear, almost monotone, voice said from behind him. "That they would use their advanced medical technology to heal your hand."

Tom placed the voice, but he didn't quite believe it.

"And so you would still be their," the unmistakable voice paused for emphasis, "grease monkey."

"Tuvok?" he asked, not daring to turn around just to see they were not there.

He felt a strong and heavy hand on his shoulder, and much more gentle voice said, "Come on Tom, we have to find B'Elanna and get you two out of here."

"Chakotay?" Tom said, his tongue felt too big as he almost tripped over the name.

Tom managed to push himself off of the floor and stand shakily before his two commanding officers. He stared at his saviors, continually expecting them to disappear. He had dreamed and day-dreamed about rescues for so long that he couldn't help but suspect that the reality was nothing more than a dream. "Are you? . . . Uhmmm, . . . This isn't . . . this isn't a *dream*," he asked nervously, "Is it?"

Chakotay smiled understandingly and kept his hand on the young man's shoulder, almost if he could physically draw Tom out of the confusion pained so clearly on his dirty face. "No, it isn't," Chakotay said, kindly and firmly, almost as if he were talking to a child. "But we have to get you out of here, now. And we have to find B'Elanna."

If it was a dream, it was a wonderfully realistic one, and Tom was more than willing to play along. He nodded, "Follow me."

They twisted their way through the guts of the huge machine that Tom had been working on for over two months, trying to get back to the cubical that he and B'Elanna shared. Tom didn't see the multitude of alines that had seemed to be everywhere when he had tried to escape before, but he didn't think about it much. If there were extremely lucky, then he wasn't going to press it, and if it was a dream, Tom was game. "What took you so long?" He asked conversationally, he was far to excited to be annoyed.

"The Tetchiani hid you two well, they didn't want to give you up."

"Tetchiani? The aliens?"

"They never told you their name?" Tuvok asked.

"They never told us anything." Tom grumbled, "Except what gears to fix . . . and what they would do if those gears didn't get fixed."

There was a silence for a few meters as the frustration and anger washed over him. Helplessness is a horrible feeling for most species. But as Tom journeyed though the Delta Quadrant, and observed aliens that were almost inconceivably distant from humans, he had to wonder if, genetically, humans could not be helpless. There seemed to be something that made helplessness and victimization absolutely abhorred to the human spirit. They couldn't accept it, as other races could, it was a desperate struggle just to live through it.

The only way to deal with such situations was to fight. And when physical fighting meant death, then the fight turned inside, and again, ended in a death of another kind. Tom had excessive knowledge of captivity and helplessness, having been one or the other for most of his life. But he never really adjusted, and he always came out scared. But it wasn't just him, humans caged were not the same as humans free. He couldn't help but wonder if there were other species out there like that.

"Once we get B'Elanna," Tom said, trying to get the conversation going again. "Can you beam us out?"

"No," Tuvok said. "The radiation levels in this section are too high, it will be necessary for us to reach the upper levels of the compound before beam-out is possible."

Upper levels? Compound? Radiation? These were all new ideas for him. He wanted to ask questions, but they were getting close to B'Elanna's cubicle and he felt he should explain a few things before Tuvok, and even more so Chakotay, saw her. He tried to address the subject of B'Elanna's condition a couple ways in his mind, before finally deciding to approach it in a roundabout manner. "You see, the thing is . . . B'Elanna might not be able to make it up to the, ah, upper levels of the compound."

"Is she injured?" Chakotay asked, concern filtering its way through his voice.

"No, not really. She's just . . ." Tom suddenly found himself in the acquired position thousands of over-passionate young men had found themselves in throughout all of time. How do you tell a father that his daughter is pregnant? Tom had no guilt in it, no part in it, but still, he was B'Elanna's lover and he was breaking the news. He couldn't help but fear that Chakotay, in turn, would soon be breaking his neck. He took a big breath and reminded himself that Chakotay was, more or less, a pacifist, if you forgot that whole Maquis freedom fighter thing. "B'Elanna's pregnant."

"Pregnant?" the Commander said with a weighted voice. He didn't sound as surprised as Tom had expected him to be, but he was too relieved that the commander had not immediately tried to kill him to think much about that.

"Yha," Tom's voice was soft, slightly afraid but he quickly tried to amend and explain. "It's not just that, but she's sick too. The aliens, Tetchianicans, they injected her right after we got here. They somehow accelerated the pregnancy. Physically, she's about six months along. My guess is that a body can't handle that kind of change that quickly. Even a half Klingon body."

In his minds eye, Tom could see B'ELanna as he left her that morning. She was lying in bed, begging Tom for permission to get up. Tom refused to grant it, she had had a series of fainting spells that frightened him more than they scared her. She was ordered to bed rest by the ship's Medic, as biased and mediocre as he might be. Her body was weak and she was often sick, but her eyes were still sharp and, truth be told, he bet she had more fight left in her than he did. But maybe that was because she was more helpless. It probably wasn't medically sound, or maybe even physically possible for her to get to those upperdecks, but she would make it through sheer force of will.

"The radiation could also be affecting her," Tuvok supplied helpfully.

"This is the second time you've mentioned radiation, Tuvok, what are you talking about?"

"This compound is powered by a poorly guarded nuclear fusion reactor."

Tom looked at Tuvok, not quite believing his ears, but knowing that the Vulcan would not lie. "That's crazy. They obviously have the technology to produce safer energy."

"Mr. Paris, I'm sure you've realized by now that the Tetchiani do not replace obsolete technology, they merely find ways to live around it," Tuvok said in a mildly condescending manor. It was so familiar that Tom actually enjoyed it.

"Yha, but why?" He said gamely. "It seems to make more work than it saves."

"Not if you can get some hapless aliens to do the work for you," Chakotay said. "While we were looking for you, we found hundreds of these compounds, all the same."

"Do you know what they're used for?" Tom asked.

There was another pause, eventually Chakotay said "You don't know?"

"No one told me anything."

"Procreation," Tuvok said in his clipped Vulcan way.

Tom stopped, they were only a few meters away from the door, but he needed to understand this before he took another step. "You're saying that they kidnaped us just to get B'Elanna pregnant, and . . . as soon as she gives birth, they're planing to do, what? Take the baby?"

"Yes," Tuvok said, because Chakotay was too disturbed by the very notion to talk. "It would seem that the Tetchiani's continued exposure to the radiation has made it impossible to procreate through natural means."

Tom thought of the big, black, needle containing injection 45319 and the way B'Elanna wouldn't look him in the eyes the next time he saw her. "They're not getting this one," he swore, "Come on, they're right in here."

They entered the cubical to find B'Elanna asleep on the little bed. Tom approached her quietly with Chakotay on his heels. Tuvok stood at the entrance keeping an eye out for the oddly absent aliens.

"B'Elanna," Tom said as he gently shook her awake. "B'Elanna, wake up."

She opened her eyes, looked at Tom, smiled ever so slightly, then became very suddenly awake. "What time is it?" She demanded sitting up quickly, obviously believing she had over slept. "I was going to . . ." she suddenly noticed Chakotay looking down on her with an expression that was part concern, part relief. "Tom, please tell me I'm not hallucinating."

"That depends on what you see."

"We're real," Chakotay informed her with a smile. "We have to hurry and get you out of here."

With some help B'Elanna managed to pull herself out of the bed and start to make good their escape. At first it wasn't too hard, gentle inclines at a slow, but steady pace. But then the oddly absent Tetchiani started popping up all over the place, they had to take harder, longer routes, and pick up the pace.

"You all right?" Tom asked B'Elanna as they jogged down a corridor eight levels above where they had been kept. Things were much cleaner and newer higher up, but still, the radiation levels were too high to permit a beam out, they had to go up another five levels and then they'd be safe.

"Fine" B'Elanna gasped. Her voice proved otherwise, it was laced with pain.

Tom looked at her with his medic eyes and saw that she was perspiring and gasping for breath. "No you're not," Tom said authoritatively. He quickly glanced around looking for a plausible place to hide, finding none, he called up to Chakotay that they needed to stop.

"As soon as we find a good hiding place . . ." the commander said.

"No, we need to stop now." Tom insisted, and as if to prove his point he stopped in his tracks and grabbed B'Elanna's arm, forcing her to stop too.

"Tom," she said, she would have been angry, but she didn't quite have the energy. "I don't need to stop."

"As your doctor and the adopted father of your child, I think you do," Tom said forcefully. Before she could respond he put his hand under her chin and checked her pulse. "B'Elanna, your heart is racing."

"It's just from trying to get away from the Tetchiani," she insisted. Tom might have believed that if she hadn't said anything, but he could tell she was lying.

"B'Elanna," he demanded.

As if on cue, her muscles relaxed and her heart rate slowed and she started to breath normally. "Tom," She said, her voice much calmer. "Really, I'm fine."

"No, you're not!" The medic yelled at her, he was just a little panicked. "You're going into labor."

"Tom, keep your voice down," Chakotay warned. He was as panicked about B'Elanna's state as Tom was, but he also had to keep in mind that if the Tetchiani found them, B'Elanna's health would definitely not improve.

"Calm down," B'Elanna said, unconvincingly. "I've made it this far, I can make it the rest of the way."

"No, putting yourself through stress like this right now is not only harmful to you, but it could harm the baby as well."

"Well what do you want me to do, have her right here? Right now?" She demanded irritably.

"She is right," Tuvok said with his usual dispassion. "It is dangerous to stay here."

"It's dangerous for her to run!" Tom pointed out.

"I could carry her."

All three humans looked at the Vulcan disbelievingly. "No," B'Elanna finally said, with half a laugh. "I'm really fine. I can make it."

"With all due respect, Lieutenant, as Mr. Paris has pointed out, you cannot. Furthermore, we cannot stay here. The only logical solution is for me to carry you out."

"I could carry her," Tom said, claiming his right as lover.

Tuvok would have rolled his eyes, but he was Vulcan. "In your condition, you could not carry her far," he returned his attentions to B'Elanna. "If you do not comply willingly, I will be forced to give you a direct order."

B'Elanna tried to laugh it off. She couldn't; everyone around her was serious. So she looked to Tom for help. He was too worried about her body to give a damn about her pride.

She turned her gaze to Chakotay, who approached the situation with an attitude akin to Tom's. "I'm sorry B'Elanna, but we have to get out of here and you're in no condition to run."

"I can't believe this!" She said angrily, because anger was better than fear.

"Lieutenant . . ." Tuvok said, making it quite clear that another word from her and she would be given an order.

She sighed, "Fine."

Tuvok picked her up, and they continued their journey upward at a more rapid pace with Chakotay in the lead, Tuvok and B'Elanna following, and Tom bringing up the rear. Tom watched her very carefully, noticing when she would wince from the pain of a contraction, trying to keep track of how long they were, and how long there was in between them. He suddenly wished he had spent more time reading those boring pointless medical texts the Doctor had told him to, he might be able to do more for B'Elanna. All he could think of was that scene from the twentieth-century motion picture, Carried off by the Wind, or something like that, he hadn't really liked it. There was a scene where a little servant girl had cried out in anguish "I don't know nothin' about birthin' no babies," it described Tom's position perfectly.

She was in the middle of a particularly long and, apparently painful, contraction when Chakotay suddenly stopped.

"What?" Tom asked breathlessly. Tuvok must have been right about his physical state, he was having trouble keeping up, he might even be slowing them down.

"The radiation levels are still high, but this should be good enough."

"Great," B'Elanna said, "now, put me down."

The Vulcan did so dutifully, allowing her to keep the majority of her dignity. Unfortunately, she wasn't able to keep it long. As soon as she was left to support herself, B'Elanna's body decided that it couldn't. She almost collapsed, but Tuvok's Vulcan reflexes and Tom's fret, caught her.

"Chakotay to Voyager, beam us out!" The Commander said, his own fret showing.

"Commander," the transporter chief's voice crackled, Tom started to wonder just how much radiation there could be. "We're having trouble getting a lock, do you think you could . . ."

"No!" Chakotay said. "I don't care what you do, just get us out of here."

"Ahh," The chief crackled. "Yes, sir."

They waited nervously for another jittery moment before the warmth and security of a transporter beam grabbed them and then the heavenly cleanliness and brightness of Voyager's transporter room materialized before them. The doctor jumped up onto the pad, scanning B'Elanna and Tom before their eyes adjusted to the light. Chakotay jumped off of pad to brief the captain.

"Humm," The doctor said as he scanned B'Elanna, who had started having another contraction. Then, without explaining his humm to either of the lieutenants, he looked up to the transporter chief. "Transport us directly to sickbay."

"Aye, sir," the Chief said.

Tom looked at the doctor with eyes that demanded an explanation. The Doctor didn't offer him one. When they rematerialized, B'Elanna was in the middle of a full blown contraction, her eyes were wide with a pain she didn't voice. "Get her to a bio-bed," The doctor ordered Tom as he ran over to get his surgical kit.

The medic started leading her towards bio-bed one but he couldn't help but looking at the doc over his shoulder in a panic. "She's going to be all right, right?"

The doctor didn't bother answering, he had questions of his own, "How long has she been pregnant?"

"About two months, they injected her as soon as they took us."

"Two months? That's impossible."

Tom helped B'Elanna onto the bed, he let his gaze linger on her, let their eyes meet, and then moved to go help the Doc.

"Tom!" She managed to gasp. Her voice was hushed, but intense. "Tom, don't leave."

The fact of the matter was that Tom wanted to leave. He wanted to go far away, to hop in a shuttle and fly away from all the fear that was building up on him. The doctor's refusal to answer questions and the distress in B'Elanna's eyes told him that something horrible was about to happen, and he didn't want to be there to see it. A mere five years ago he would have left, he had no real bond to B'Elanna and her child, and he was a pilot, not a doctor. But not now. He was determined to not only face it, but fight it. If he only knew how.

"Mr. Paris!" The Doctor said angrily, "I need your assistance immediately!"

"Tom," B'Elanna pleaded. All the Klingon boldness had somehow bleed out of her. She was frightened and helpless as the world seemed to spin around her. She needed him there, someone solid to cling to. Tom licked his lips, he had the distinct impression that no matter what he did, he would let B'Elanna down.

Thankfully, a saving grace slid into the doors of sickbay in the person of Captain Janeway. She summed up the situation in a split second and started throwing out commands, like a good Captain. "Tom, stay with B'Elanna, keep her calm. Doctor, I'll assist you." No one challenged her orders.

"Tom!" B'Elanna pleaded desperately.

"Shhhhh," he said, leaning forward and pushing her hair away from her face while he slipped his other hand into hers. "I'm right here, everything's going to be fine."

"I'm so scarred."

"There's nothing to be worried about," Tom cooed, speaking as much to himself as B'Elanna. "We're back on Voyager, the Doc's gonna fix you up. Everything's gonna be fine."

B'Elanna suddenly suffered another contraction, she gasped for breath and almost crushed Tom's hand. He hardly noticed. "Doc!" Tom called. "She needs pain killers!"

The doctor ignored him.

"DOC!" Tom yelled angrily.

"Mr. Paris!" The Doctor said, as angry at Tom as Tom was at him. "You worry about her mental state, I'll worry about her physical state, understood?!"

Tom didn't say anything, he just nodded meekly and returned his attentions to B'Elanna. "I guess all that play with Klingon pain sticks in the holodeck payed off after all, huh?" He said lightly, trying to brighten the mood.

"I think . . . If I ever . . . have another . . . day of honor . . ." she said in between gasping breaths. "I'll . . . do well. . . . Klingon . . . painsticks are . . . nothing compared . . . compared to this."

Tom laughed softly assuming, correctly, that this was a joke on B'Elanna's part. There were a few more seconds of excruciating pain, and then her face relaxed and she took several deep breaths.

"B'Elanna," the Doctor's voice cut clearly through the sickbay. "On you're next contraction I'm going to need you to push." His voice was all business, no excitement about the new baby, no compassion for the woman in pain. That would have struck Tom as incredibly odd, but his attention was focused elsewhere.

"We never picked a name," he said, smiling down at her.

"We could name her after your mother?"

"Why?"

"Just a suggestion."

"How about your mother?"

"No."

"Just a suggestion."

"Ahhh!" She gasped.

"B'Elanna!"

"She's going into labor!" The doctor said hastily. "Remember, B'Elanna push!"

"I'm trying!" The half Klingon said with surprisingly little vigor. As Tom stood by and watched helplessly he became very aware of the fact that everything was not right in the world. It wasn't anything that Tom could put his foot on, it just felt like there was a shadow in the room. The shadow had taken the vibrancy out of B'Elanna, and had put an angry edge on the doctor, and it just continued to get darker and darker. He tryed to smile, hopeing that small bit of brightness would somehow lift the shadow, but it wasn't nearly strong enough.

"You can do this B'Elanna," he said, trying to find her beyond the pain in her eyes. "And then just think . . . you'll be a mother."

"I never wanted to be a mother," She was using the conversation to escape from the pain. Tom inwardly cursed the doctor for not giving her any medication. "Both my parents . . . were such failures . . . I never wanted to . . . put a child through that."

"No, you'll be a wonderful mother."

"I . . . Tom . . . I don't think I'm going to be a mother."

Tom tried to smile again, and failed. He could feel tears start to build in his eyes. He forced himself to convince himself that the shadow was all in his mind and the sense of dread was nothing more than pre-fatherhood jitters. "What are you talking about?" he laughed softly.

"You have to promise me."

"Promise you?"

"You'll take care of her, won't you?"

"We've talked about this . . ."

"No, Tom," she gasped. In the background he could hear the doctor say something about the baby coming out. Objectively he knew he should be happy, but he couldn't find anything more than horror. "You'll have to promise me you'll take care of her."

"We'll take care of her," Tom said, the tears escaped his eyes, he didn't even realize it.

"Tom, promise."

He tried to answer her, but his throat suddenly contracted. Instead he nodded his head.

Somehow, she managed to smile. It was her last.

Tom stared at the ceiling. Which ingenious starship designer had planed his quarters? To have something glowing brightly over his bed was truly annoying. It was bright enough to keep him up at night, but not bright enough to wake him up in the morning. And Orange? Who had chosen that color? It was more irritating than relaxing. The lines of light started to blur as his eyes became teary. He took a deep breath and blinked several times forcing his eyes to focus and stay dry by mere force of will.

That's when the baby started to cry. It was an eerie cry, melodic and in some strange way, Tom found it soothing. But it was a cry, nonetheless. He would be in very deep trouble if he didn't respond within two minuets. The Doctor was monitoring the baby, to insure that Tom did not practice the negligence that was usually expected of him. No one had said that, but Tom could hear the undertones in the way the doctor talked. He didn't blame them, he didn't trust himself with the baby either. After a moment of listening to her soothing cries Tom somehow managed to push himself off of the bed and walk over to the half crib/half incubator the baby was in.

"Hey," he said softly, looking down at the infant. She was so weak and helpless, her cries were not so much demands as pleas for attention. "What's the matter?" The baby didn't answer him, she merely continued to cry. Tom new next to nothing about how to take care of children, being the youngest member of a small family it never quite seemed appropriate. He was under the impression that babies cried if they needed something, but what a baby would need was beyond him. Food maybe? A change of diapers? A mother?

Tom took a sharp breath and pulled out his medical tricorder. With one scan he saw she was hungry. "Ah," he said softly. "You're hungry, huh? Well, lucky for you the Doc prepared some special bottles just for you. . . . If I could just find them." Tom banged around in the dark for another minute before he found where he had placed the bottles. He silently chastised himself for not putting them in a more convenient place. The thought that he would have to totally rearrange his quarters slipped into his head for a second, but it slipped out before it registered. A hundred and one thoughts and memories slipped in and out of his head, most of them were just a little too painful to face at the moment so he let them pass fleetingly.

"Ok, shhhhh," Tom said softly as he awkwardly picked up the baby and tried to figure out how to hold her with one hand and feed her with the other. "Here you go," he popped the bottles nipple into the infant's mouth while it let out a particularly musical cry. The music stopped and was substituted with a softer suckling sound. "Yeah, drink up."

Tom found himself rocking the infant slowly. He wondered if humans rocked babies through some genetic programing, or if it was a learned behavior. Even with his limited knowledge of child care, he knew rocking would help.

She slowly drifted off to sleep. Tom tried to take the bottle away a few times but that just woke her up and she started sucking again. "You're hungry, aren't you?" He asked softly. "I guess you have a reason. When did you last eat? Doc probably fed you in sickbay, still, that's a long time between meals." His eyes started to water again. He had no idea why this kept happening. B'Elanna had died nearly two days ago, there had already been a funeral, he had already cried and cried.

He looked down at the infant, she was asleep again. He pulled the bottle away and she didn't resist anymore, she was sound asleep. "Yeah, there you go," he muttered softly. "That's better."

Tom was amazed by how much she had changed over the past few days, how much he'd changed over the past few days.

When he had first seen her, she was white. A sickly ghostly white. She almost died in the same moment she was born. Thankfully, the best starfleet doctor in the quadrant was focusing on keeping her alive. Of course, at the time Tom's attention had been fully focused on B'Elanna, or her body. B'Elanna was gone. "Mr. Paris," the doctor had said, trying to pull him away from the dead and towards the living. "Congratulations, you're a father."

"What?" Tom had stammered.

The doctor had tried to smile, and failed. Tom never thought that his beady, hollographic, eyes could look like they were about to cry, but somehow they did. "I couldn't help but hear your conversation with B'Elanna . . . I'd like you to meet your daughter. Would you like to hold her?"

Tom looked down at the baby, she had looked like a maggot, white and wet with red eye. "No."

That's when the Captain decided to step in. "Doctor, I think you need to treat Mr. Paris before you continue."

"Treat me?"

"For radiation poisoning."

"Radiation poisoning . . . Is . . . is that what killed B'Elanna?"

"In part."

"Then why didn't I die."

The doctor looked at him sadly. "The radiation, coupled with the accelerated pregnancy was too much for her body to handle. There was nothing I could do."

"So she killed B'Elanna?" He said, nodding to the maggot.

"Tom!" Janeway said sharply. "I refuse to let you place the blame for B'Elanna's death on an innocent baby."

"With all do respect, Captain, you have no control over who I blame." His voice had been cold and insolent. Under normal circumstances, she would give him one of the most violent and demoralizing speeches she could come up with. But she knew him well enough to understand that Tom was not himself. He had gone through two months of hell and come home only to see the woman he loved die.

She showed him mercy and merely instructed him to succumb to the docter's treatment. "But remember, you're not the only one in this room who's lost something."

"I know." Tom said, harshly. He knew the whole ship had lost B'Elanna. She was the best engineer they had, but she was so much more than that to so many people, Harry, Chakotay, Neelix, not to mention the Doctor and The Captain.

"I don't think you do. This little girl just lost her mother. She can't afford to lose a father as well."

Tom was speechless. He just looked at the baby not quite registering who or what she was. The whole situation was not real. He kept expecting to wake up, or for someone to yell computer-end-program. But it didn't happen.

The doctor gave the baby to the Captain, who put her in a makeshift incubator/crib before returning to the bridge.

"Mr. Paris, get on a bio-bed." The doctor ordered, professionally. Tom didn't respond. The doctor repeated the order, this time a little harsher. Tom continued to stand and stare at nothing. Finally, the doctor put his hand gently on the young man's shoulder and lead him over to a bio-bed, the one farthest from B'Elanna's body.

Tom lay on that bed for what seemed like an eternity while the doctor treated him for radiation sickness and practically re-built both of his hands. Tom didn't remember any of that, he did remember staring at B'Elanna's body, and feeling astutely everything that he had lost.

The baby cried, and the doctor went over to tend to her for a moment, and Tom's attention was transferred from the dead to the living. When the Doctor came back, Tom's thoughts and eyes were fixed on the baby.

"Why did she live?" Tom asked, his voice was harsh and dissident.

"Excuse me?"

"Why did the baby live, and B'Elanna die?"

The doctor was silent for a while.

"Doc?"

"I could give you a long list of medical reasons, but I don't think that's what you want. . . . Honestly, I don't know. Some things just happen."

That would not seem to be a poor answer, but somehow it was right. Tom knew that sometimes things just happen. His own mother had just left. His shuttle had just crashed, and his friends just died while he just lived. He had just been caught on his first mission with the Maquis. And Voyager had just been pulled into the Delta Quadrant. Maybe it was fate, or providence, or dumb luck but it wasn't anyone's fault. It would have been easy to blame the infant and hold a grudge for his entire life. But the Captain was right, he wasn't the only one who had lost something that day.

Now, three days later, he had somehow developed a fatherly instinct. The baby no longer looked to him like a maggot, in fact he couldn't ever imagine drawing that comparison. She wasn't white any longer, she had a nice purplish tint to her skin, and the veins in her eyes had stopped swelling so that their natural, royal-blue cast was revealed. She had a remnant of a Klingon crest on her head that made her look consistently worried. When she smiled, it was as comical as it was endearing. She was as beautiful as B'Elanna, in a different sort of way. If B'Elanna had to die, Tom was glad that she had left part of herself with him. He looked down at the sleeping baby and didn't even consider putting her back in the crib. It felt good to have the warmth and softness in his arms. He sat down on his couch and closed his eyes, just enjoying the simple sensations.

The computer beeped, signifying that there was someone at the door. Tom opened his eyes, then decided to ignore it. The door beeped again. Tom ignored it again, whoever it was would go away eventually. There was a knock on the door, an actual knock, and the captain's voice could be heard through the thin wall, "Tom, Tom are you all right?"

He opened his eyes and managed to sit up. "Come in," he croaked before clearing his throat.

The door opened, letting more light into the room than had been present in days. The Captain entered, smiling. "I just came to check on our newest crew member, and her father."

Tom forced a smile, "We're fine."

Janeway didn't ask for an invitation into the room. She stepped in and the door swished shut behind her returning the levels of light to the normal, lacking, state. "I can see that you two are getting to know each other."

Tom's smile became a little more genuine. "She's not much of a conversationalist, but she has a great smile."

"Do you have a name for her yet?"

"Almost."

"Almost?"

"What do you think of Bell Anna Paris?"

"B'Elanna? You're naming her after her mother?" The Captain couldn't keep the surprise out of her voice. She didn't know why, but she hadn't expected Tom to do that.

"No, her first name would be Bell, her middle name would be Anna."

"Bell Anna Paris," Janeway said, trying the name out on her tongue to see how it felt. "It's very French."

"She gets that from my side of the family."

It was a very small joke, but it made the Captain feel infinitely better. "Bell Anna sounds wonderful. You know, she looks like a Bell."

Tom didn't say anything, he just looked at the baby contentedly. After a moment of silence Tom started talking to everyone in the room and no one in particular. "You know, I really love her. . . . I . . . I never told B'Elanna that."

The Captain looked at Tom curiously, "Surly, you must have . . ."

"I never told her. It was sort of a freak thing at first. But then, after a while . . . I should have told her. I should have said it."

"That's a mistake you can fix,"

Tom looked at her curiously.

Janeway nodded towards Bell, "With her."

"Yeah," Tom said softly, looking down at the baby girl nestled in his arms.

Smiling, secure in the knowledge that those two would be fine, the Captain walked to the door, looked back to say good night, and then left them to be alone in the darkness. Tom sat a long while, thinking about his father and B'Elanna and Bell and Captain Janeway and other, less significant people. He drifted in and out of memories and meditations. He cried a little and slept a little until he opened his eyes and realized that his room was dark.

"Computer," he said hoarsely. "Lights."

The room was suddenly inundated with bright white light and Tom was momentarily blinded. The change in illumination also affected Bell, who started to cry again. This cry was still beautiful, and melodic, but it was more afraid than mournful. Tom pushed himself off of the couch and started rocking her, and, for no apparent reason, singing softly into her ear.

"Hush little Baby don't say a word

Papa's gonna get you a Mocking Bird

If that Mocking Bird don't sing

Papa's gonna get you a platinum ring.

If that platinum ring is brass

Papa's gonna get you a looking glass

If that looking glass gets broke

Papa's gonna get you a velvet coat

If that velvet coat is rough

Papa's gonna get you baaaa'th'lith

If that Baaaaa'th'lith's not sharp

Papa's gonna get you a star chart

If that star chart is ripped

You'll still be the prettiest baby on the ship."

"One two . . ."

"Buckle my shoe." Bell said as she attempted to do just that. It was hard considering the rocking of the ship and lights flashing on and off, letting everyone on the ship know, if they hadn't already figured it out, that they were indeed at red alert.

Tom was crawling around on the floor in Bell's bedroom looking for her blanket. She refused to leave their quarters without it, and Tom would not leave her alone in an emergency, no matter how desperate. He found the blanket and scooped it up, an action he repeated with her as he bolted out the door.

"Three four,' he muttered as the door slid shut behind them.

"I didn't finish with my shoe."

"That's ok."

"Out the door."

"Five six,"

"Off real quick."

"Seven eight."

"Be real great."

"I'm going to ask the Doc about that one."

"I'm always good."

"Ah, ah, ah, that's not true. Last time you hid the medical tricorder Seven of Nine gave him. He loves that Tricorder, you know."

"It was a game, I was going to give it back. I just forgot where I hid it."

"Yha, well, no games this time. Red alert is not a fun time."

"I know, I know." she grumbled.

"That's my girl. Where were we?"

"Nine, ten."

"Ah, that's right. Nine, Ten."

"You'll come back again." Bell didn't quite know why she said that every time, she was only three, and while she understood that everybody was scared during Red alerts, they always came back.

"Papa, why do I say that?"

"Say what?" Tom asked, the ship rocked and he nearly lost his balance and fell, but he managed to find his feet and continue heading to sickbay.

"That you'll come back."

"Because, I will."

"Why do you have to say it?"

Because I might not, Tom thought, but he didn't say it. "Because it rhymes with ten."

She looked at him skeptically, Tom could see she didn't buy it, but she wasn't quite sure why she didn't buy it, so she stopped asking questions.

They reached the doors of sickbay and Tom practically flew in. "Hey Doc! Got a delivery for ya."

The doctor walked out of his office and scowled at the pair entering. "Mr. Paris, I thought I made it quite clear last time that . . ."

"Tell me later," Tom said, kissing Bell on the cheek and running out the door, before the Doctor could say anything more. Almost an hour and a firefight later Tom came back. He burst into sickbay, which was thankfully empty, with a hungry look in his eyes. "How's my Bell?" he asked the entire room, as if he expected every piece of equipment to answer him.

"Papa!" Bell squealed as she ran into his arms.

He gathered her in his arms and hugged her, just a little too tightly. "Where you good?" He asked when he loosened the hug so they could look at each other.

"Considering her parentage," The Doctor said, walking out of his office in a slow, irritated way. "Yes."

Tom had just outmaneuvered twelve battle ships half Voyager's size. He was in too good a mood to let a Hologram get him down. "Great," he looked away from his child, "Thank's doc." He turned to leave but the hologram's sharp voice stopped him in his tracks."

"Hold on just a minute Mr. Paris, I'm a doctor, not a babysitter."

"Think of this as . . . expanding your program."

"This has nothing to do with my personal growth, this has to do with the safety of the entire crew, and your daughter."

Tom became a little more serious. "What are you talking about?"

"This is a sick bay, meaning that if people get sick or hurt, they come here."

"Doc . . ."

"Consequently I have many sensitive, and potentially dangerous pieces of equipment within easy reach, in case I need them."

"Ok, ok."

"So, the morel of the story is . . ."

"Stay in the office during red alerts," Bell cut in.

Both men looked at her curiously. Then Tom broke into a smile. He turned to the Doc and his expression seemed to say, 'Isn't she smart?'

"Please?" she said, begging with her big blue eyes. "I really like to hear you sing."

The doc sighed a holographic sigh, "Fine, but, Bell, you're going to have to promise me . . ."

"Cross my heart."

Tom smiled, fatherly pride painted across his eyes.

Tom looked at the door to his quarters and wondered how on earth he was supposed to enter. And once in, how could he tell her. Unfortunately, Starfleet doors don't give their owners the option of pondering on their stoops. It slid open and he could hear the six-year-old Bell giggling.

"Bell," he called, trying not to sound crushed. "Bell."

"Come and find me!" she growled in Klingon.

Tom took a step into their quarters and looked around, she was well hidden. "Bell, I have to talk to you."

Tom poked his head into a few corners and didn't find her. It was a game they had played often, but Tom wasn't in the mood. "Bell, come on."

Suddenly, his quarter Klingon jumped out of the woodwork with a toy Ba'th'lith and rambunctiously yelled, "It's a good day to die."

Tom froze. He was pale and Bell could see her father's hands tremble. Her Ba'th'lith and smile slumped just a little. "Papa, what is it?"

He licked his lips, tried to talk, failed, licked his lips and tried again. Finally, he managed to say, "Harry's dead."

Bell's smile evaporated entirely. "What do you mean?"

"I mean he's dead!" Tom said, just a little harshly. Almost as soon as he said it he bit his tongue. Harry might have been his best friend, but he was also Bell's favorite uncle. He had designed a holodeck playground for her, he had taught her how to play clarinet, he had baby-sat her a thousand times, and given her her favorite doll. He had instructed Tom on how to be a good father through anecdotes, and at time, examples. He had been the best friend Tom had ever had, and B'Elanna, and Bell. And he was dead. It couldn't be real. Didn't Harry realize that he and Bell still needed him?

Bell's lower lip was trembling and she held her toy Ba'th'lith close to heart, as if the blade could fight off the seriousness in her father's voice and the tears in his eyes. Tom fell to his knees and wrapped Bell in his arms. "I'm sorry," he whispered.

"What do you mean?" She begged.

Tom almost smiled. "You know what death is."

"Like Mum?"

Tom nodded.

Bell started to fall into panic. More than her lower lip trembled and her beautiful voice became choked with sobs. "Really dead, forever dead?"

"That's the only kind of dead there is."

"But," she said slowly as the idea sunk into her brain. "He's Harry."

"That doesn't make him immune. I wish it did, but it doesn't."

"What . . . what will happen next?"

"We'll have a funeral, and . . ." Tom tried to think of a life without Harry, he couldn't conceive it. Harry was such an integral part of both of their lives. When B'Elanna had died it had been hard, nearly impossible, but his life had changed so dramatically he had not had to go back to normal life because he didn't ever expect his life to be anything close to what had been normal before. But with Harry being gone he would be doing all the same things, only doing them without Harry. "After that I don't know."

They were silent for a long, clinging to each other for support. Finally Bell found her voice, "Can you make me a promise?"

"I can try," Tom whispered.

"Nine, Ten."

"I'll come back again."

"Lt. Paris," Seven of Nine called down the corridor, stopping Tom in his tracks. He turned and looked at the Borg, she was walking rapidly to catch up to him. He waited patiently and smiled when she reached him, "Hey Seven, what's on your mind?"

"Your daughter." Seven said, her voice making it clear that this was not a good parent teacher meeting.

Seven had been teaching Bell music, singing in particular. Unbeknownst to her, Seven had a real way with children, Bell absolutely loved learning music from the former Borg, and Tom knew that the subject matter was only partially responsible for that. Seven never lost her temper, she never talked down to the children, she expected them to do well, but she didn't shame them if they did not rise to the occasion. Tom didn't know why that was, he suspected it was because she never grew up herself. She was a child when she was assimilated, and then she was expected to be an adult when Voyager disconnected her. In retrospect, she had acted very childish when she had been integrating herself into the crew. She had been trying to figure out the 'intricate social structures' of Voyager, and Tom couldn't help but notice that Bell was doing the exact same thing, only, as a child, she was given a lot more grace. It hadn't seemed to Tom at the time that they were being inconsiderate, but they had been.

"What about her?" Tom said lightly.

"She did not attend her music lesson this morning."

Tom was surprised, Bell loved singing as much as she loved learning from Seven, but he was not bothered. "She's a kid, she probably just forgot."

"That is irresponsible."

"She's nine years old," Tom explained, "Cut her some slack."

"By doing so you will never teach her discipline."

The fact of the matter was that Tom had vivid memories of discipline from his own childhood, and he could remember B'Elanna talking about her mother's version of discipline and he didn't want Bell to ever have to experience that. There was probably a middle ground, something that Harry had experienced, for instance, but Tom wasn't quite sure how to find that middle ground, and he was terrified of the low ground, so he chose to discipline less and hope for the best. "She will never achieve perfection with her attitude," Seven said cooly.

"No one expects perfection from her!" Tom snapped, with a little too much fire in his voice. Someone had expected perfection from him, and he had never lived up to the mark. And he had never been forgiven for that.

"She should expect perfection from herself," Seven said, not reacting to Tom's overreaction.

"Did you call her on the Comm?" Tom asked, avoiding the issues.

"I did. She refused to attend her lesson."

"Did she give a reason?"

"She did not."

"Why didn't you tell me that in the first place?" Tom demanded, but before Seven could answer him Tom started jogging down the hall. Seven watched him curiously, but didn't move to stop him. She had observed that his behavior often became erratic when Bell was involved and she had long ago learned that trying to enforce efficiency or logic to their relationship.

"Bell!" Tom called as he entered their quarters. Usually she was hiding, after nine years she still loved to play that game. Not so much because it was fun to find hiding places, which it was, but because it was tradition. The finding made both of them feel better. But today she was sitting on their couch looking intently at a pad and blinking frequently, as if she were about to cry. Tom took another step in so that the door closed behind him and they were alone.

"Hi papa," she said softly, "Welcome home."

Tom walked over to her and leaned over the couch so that they were parallel. "Seven told me you skipped your singing lesson."

"I didn't feel like singing."

"Really?" Tom said, sounding casually surprised. "I thought you told me you know a song to fit every mood."

"I was wrong," she grumbled. It took a lot for Bell to admit that, she had inherited her mother's headstrongness.

Tom had found that with Bell, just as with B'Elanna, the only way to deal with this kind of problem was confront it head on. That usually lead to an argument, but with Bell, unlike with B'Elanna, Tom usually won. He didn't mean to win, per say, but Bell was naive and short tempered. Her father usually defended his positions flawlessly. It was her pride that fought his love, and of course the love always won.

"You mind telling me what changed your mind?"

She held up the pad she had been staring at for him to talk. "Genetics."

Accepting the pad, Tom pushed a few buttons and looked at the data. "Strings of DNA," he noticed a few familiar patterns, "Are they yours?"

"Could mum sing?" Bell asked, sniffling just a little.

"What?"

"Mum, did she have a nice voice? Could she sing?"

Tom licked his lips, "I certainly thought her voice was nice, but sing, no. Your mother didn't sing."

"And you can't sing."

"Couldn't carry a tune in a bucket."

"But I can sing."

Tom was starting to see where this was going, "Yes," he said softly. "You can."

"Hand eye coordination, that's genetic too, isn't it?"

"To a point, there is some practice involved."

"I could practice for hours, I still wouldn't be able to play ping-pong."

"You can play," Tom assured her, then adding. "You just couldn't beat anyone on this ship."

"And Mum wasn't purple. And you're not purple."

"No."

"In fact, I don't look anything like you, and only a very little like mum."

"Yeah."

"So I shouldn't have been surprised."

"I guess I should have told you."

"The Doctor was showing me how to mark DNA, and as I looked at it I realized that I was only a fourth human. And that that fourth didn't come from you."

"I'm sorry Bell. It's just . . ."

"Oh, I know the story papa. Doc'll tell anyone any story." She laughed nervously, a trait she had picked up from Tom, regardless of Genetics. "What I want to know is why didn't you tell me?" She turned to look him in the eyes, he didn't meet her gaze. "I know all about earth and humans. I know all about Kronos and Klingons. I'm only a quarter each. But you didn't tell me *anything* about the rest of me."

It was Tom's considered opinion that she should not know about her other half, but he knew he couldn't tell her that. "We don't know much about the Tetchiani, I can tell you what I do know, but Bell . . ."

"You and Mum spent two months in one of their compounds! You would have to know something. My real father, for instance, you would have to know him. What was he like? Did he love my mother? Would I have liked him?"

Had anyone on the ship told Tom that morning that Bell was going to break his heart with four sentences, he would have laughed at them. But she had. Tom didn't know what to do, he had never reacted well to pain, and very few things in his life had hurt more than those four sentences. Waking up in a sick bay and being told that his best friends were dead, and it was his fault. The look in his father's eye when he had been caught with the Maquis. Captain Janeway saying 'I reduce you to the rank of ensign'. Even B'Elanna and Harry's death didn't come close to those things.

Tom's jaw trembled just a little. He exhaled sharply and blinked a few times and then said something that was entirely true, and entirely uncalled for. "Your genetic father was a black needle filled with injection 45319. The Tetchiani injected her and the next thing we knew she was pregnent. They used her as casually as you and I use a replicater. Only instead of getting a cup of tea, they got you."

Bell's head shot up and she looked at him with shock and horror. "No," she said, slightly misusing the word, the way Tom always did. She was trying to negate reality but it never worked. "Papa," she pleaded shaking her head. "No."

Tom licked his lips, how could he have been so stupid. "Bell, I'm sorry." He whispered honestly.

She looked at him, with tear-filled sapphire eyes, almost said something, but instead pushed herself off the couch and ran out of the room.

Tom pushed himself off the couch and half way out the door. "Bell!" Tom called after her, but she didn't pay any attention. She continued to run down the hallway and she didn't even look back.

Taking a shaky breath, Tom forced himself to return to his quarters. "It's a small ship," Tom muttered to himself. "It's not like she can run away, back to the Tetchiani space." He laughed shallowly, "She couldn't fly a shuttle to save her life, not to mention steal one." But Tom knew that, while he could not physically lose Bell, emotionally and mentally he could. She knew he wasn't her father, as he had always presented himself. His happy home had been lost, presumably forever. "Damn," he said softly as he collapsed onto his bed. It didn't come even close to describing how horrible things were.

After about an hour the comm chirped and Chakotay's voice cut through the silence of the quarters. "Tom,"

"Yeah?"

"Could you report to my quarter's, please?"

Tom sighed. "I'm sorry, Chakotay, I haven't gotten around to analyzing those tactical reviews."

"Don't worry about that," Chakotay said, not betraying anything. "Just come to my quarters."

"Aye sir." Tom said, pushing himself off of his bed.

His relationship with the commander had changed drastically over the past nine years. Chakotay had been as crushed by B'Elanna's death as Tom had been, only in a different way. Chakotay had lost a daughter, and Bell, in a way, filled that hole in his life. She was Tom's daughter, Chakotay didn't contend that. But he had been like a grandfather to her, and then, in some twisted way, like a father to Tom. He never disciplined Bell, and rarely scolded her, but he often told Tom how to be a good father. And Tom was usually so uncertain of his actions that he took the Commander's advice gratefully. The relationship stemmed from a short exchange they had had right after B'Elanna's funeral. Chakotay had gone up to Tom to offer his condolences.

"I'm sorry for your loss," Chakotay had said kindly.

"And I'm sorry for yours." He wasn't being coy or sarcastic, just honestly sad.

"It's going to be difficult," Chakotay observed. "Raising her daughter on your own."

Tom smiled and blinked a few times to keep back the tears, he didn't succeed, but Chakotay was kind enough to ignore it. "Are you kidding?" Tom had asked. "On this ship? Everyone will raise her."

That might have been a slight exaggeration. But Chakotay had done his part to raise B'Elanna's baby and both Tom and Bell were eternally thankful for that. It was not consistently manifested, but it was always there.

"Come on," he muttered, annoyed as he stood outside of the commanders door waiting to be let in. "You called me here. You'd better have a good reason."

The door swished open and Tom was about to dig into his commanding officer, when he noticed the person standing in the door was not his commanding officer.

"Hi," Bell said softly, looking at the floor.

"Hi," Tom responded, a bit confused.

They stood there, in the commander's door way for a second before Bell suddenly remembered something. "You're supposed to come in."

Tom's eyebrow's shot up, but Bell didn't notice. She would have had to have been looking at him for that. "Really?"

She nodded and stepped aside so he could enter the commanders quarter's. Chakotay was standing next to his couch, smiling pleasantly. "Is there anything I can get for you Tom?"

"I wouldn't mind an explanation."

Chakotay nodded, "Why don't we all sit down." He motioned towards two chairs opposite of his couch which were arranged so that when everyone sat down they would all be able to see each other. Bell made a beeline for the chair on the left, Tom had a feeling that the two of them had rehearsed it. Tom, who was forced into improvisation, meandered over to the chair on his right and sat down, his gaze shifting to Chakotay, who seemed a little too eager to look him in the eyes, to Bell, who wouldn't meet his eyes to save the ship.

"So," Chakotay said once they had all sat down. He turned to look at the little girl, obviously, wordlessly, encouraging her. "Bell?"

"Papa," she said softly, looking in his general direction, without actually looking at him. "I'm . . . I'm sorry?"

"What about?" Tom asked, truly baffled.

"Commander Chakotay explained what it was like, when Mum was pregnant." She said, choosing her words very carefully. "And, what Mum asked you to do, and what you . . . did do." She glanced up, not intending to look him in the eyes, but he was looking down on her and their eyes met. She quickly glanced away. Regardless, Tom was smiling kindly at her. He had forgiven her without her even asking for it, but he was so glad she had asked. "And, and so I wanted to say," she took a deep breath. "Thank you." She looked up again, this time nervously, but sincerely, meeting his eyes. "You're, um, not *really* my father, but you're my Papa, and you didn't have to be . . . so, thank you."

Tom's smile wasn't huge, which was good. The emotion was so deep and so genuine that it couldn't quite make it to his lips, but it shone through his eyes. "It was my pleasure," He said honestly.

At that moment Bell suffered from one of those spontaneous bursts of affection that little girls are prone to. She threw herself out of her chair and attacked her father with a huge hug. He had lived with Bell for nine years, and this sort of thing still surprised Tom. "I love you, Papa." she whispered into his ear.

"I love you too," he said, with hardly any hesitation. He could see Chakotay past Bell's shoulder, the Commander was beaming.

The three of them talked for about an hour. Chakotay deftly guided the conversation, leading it to places where all of Bell's questions could be addressed truthfully but delicately. Tom, oddly, found himself very willing to tell stories about that time, and about B'Elanna in general. The bad memories had lost their sting over time, but the good memories had become that much sweeter. Bell sat in his lap and mostly listened, her head was on his chest so she could hear his voice as much as feel it. Tom's body and arm's felt very warm secure around her as he laughed with Chakotay about her mother's quirks, she realized that the Voyager family was an adopted family. She was an adopted daughter, which was perfect for where she was. She had been silly to think that family and identity came from genetics.

The wedding was as traditional and almost cliched as a wedding could get, in other words, it was perfect, everything a wedding should be. The Indiana sun beamed through the stained glass windows and projected rainbows onto the Captain's wedding gown. Bell was radiant, but she didn't even come close to outshining the bride. Tom, standing directly to Chakotay's right, didn't see the Commander's expression, but he could imagine what it was. He found himself getting a little teary eyed as he watched them finally, publically, admit that they loved each other. It had taken about 17 years, but it was worth the wait. Everyone on Voyager wanted to be happy, most of the crew got to be happy, but these two genuinely deserved to be happy.

"All I can say," Tom said as he lofted a champagne glass during the reception, "is it's about time." There was a general murmur of applause and 'here here's and about half the crew raised their champagne glasses to their lips, but Tom didn't let them drink. "Wait, wait, I'm not done yet." He looked down at his Captain and his Commander and smiled. "Commander, as the best-man, I'm obligated to do my best to utterly humiliate you in front of everyone here with some anecdote or privileged information." Tom hesitated just long enough for Chakotay to search his memory banks and try and determine what kind of information Tom could possibly have. "But," Tom continued. "I couldn't. The fact is you are the most honorable, noble, and moral person I've ever met," Tom looked down into his champagne. "Even during those times when I hated you, and you hated me, I wished I could have been like you." He looked back up again, his heart on a platter as he tried to regain his composure with a little humor. "You lucked out, no humiliating stories, just respect and admiration, for both of you. So," Tom sighed, lofting his glass. "Here's to you, both of you. If any two people ever deserved to be happy, it's you two." He paused for emphasis, "Cheers." The phrase echoed thought the speakeasy as about two thirds of the Voyager crew, all those not on duty, toasted their Captain and their Commander.

Tom took a drink of the champagne and sat down in his chair. Seven was supposed to toast the captain next, an event that he had been anticipating since the day Janeway had asked her to be the maid of honor. He had been sourly tempted to start a betting pool on such factors as how many times she used the word 'Individual' and how many minutes it took for her to mention efficiency. But Tom was the best man, and as such was expected to show some restraint. He almost suspected that Chakotay had asked him to be the best man for that reason alone.

Seven stood and started giving her speech. She called Captain Janeway and the crew of Voyager inefficient in her first sentence, and in her second sentence started talking about individuality. It was a touching point, for Seven. Anyone who didn't know the former Borg would probably have found it slightly disturbing. After that there was dancing and drinking and more dancing. Tom got a chance to dance with the bride, which was somewhat unusual, he also danced with Seven, and she was good. He danced with a few other Crew-women, both Wildmens and Both Delainies for example, but he danced the most with Bell. She might not have been able to play ping pong, but she could dance. Tom expected it had something to do with her uncanny musical abilities.

"Papa?" Bell said, during one of the slower dances.

"Hum?"

"You and mum never married."

Tom paused for a moment. B'Elanna had been in the back of his mind all night. He couldn't help but imagine what she would look like in a white wedding dress and the way she would look at him, with her wry smile. As happy as he was, these small regrets made the day just a little sad for him. He took a deep breath and looked down at B'Elanna's daughter. "No, we never got around to it."

"Why not?" she asked, too excited about the wedding to notice the melancholy in her father's voice.

"I don't know. I guess we didn't feel we had too."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"We were young. We assumed things wouldn't change." He laughed humorlessly. "We were wrong."

"Do you wish you would have married her?"

"Yes," he said without hesitation.

"Did you ever think about marrying anyone else?"

Tom looked up, searching the ceiling for answers. How had a simple dance with his daughter turned into a review of all he had loved and lost? "Yes," he said at length. He could feel her stiffen in her arms.

"Papa?" she asked, just a little offended. She wanted to be assured that her mother was the love of his life, which she was, and that there had never been, and there would never be anyone else.

"It was a long, long time ago." Tom explained. "Years before I met your mother, before I even came to Voyager."

"Oh," she said, relaxing a little. She still would have preferred that B'Elanna was his one and only, tragically lost love, but she could forgive him a childhood romance.

"Why didn't you?" the question was more of a test than it sounded.

"She died."

"Oh," Bell fell quiet. All her jealousy, which she felt on her mother's behalf, melted away. "Can I ask how?"

"In a shuttle crash."

"Oh," she didn't ask any more questions, which was a great relief. He didn't want to explain to her how the shuttle had crashed and what happened after the crash.

The song ended and Tom and Bell pulled away from each other.

"'Nother dance?" Bell asked, wanting to make amends for bringing up his dead lovers.

"Not right now," He said kindly. "I think I'll get a drink."

"Oh," she said, disappointed. "Ok."

"I think I see Freddy Bristo over there. He's a pretty good dancer."

"Yeah Papa," she said, looking over her shoulder, obviously uninterested in dancing with him. "Thanks."

Tom hated seeing her disappointed, and he couldn't help but think that her disappointment was at least in part his fault. "You really want to dance?"

She nodded, "I really do."

Tom sighed, "Anything for you," he said with a resigned tone in his voice. Bell giggled, grabbed his hand and pulled him out onto the dance floor. All the sadness that had been hovering in the back of his mind fell away with every dance step, and by the third dance he didn't even need to be talked into it anymore. After the fifth all his melancholy had evaporated and all that was left was a subtle joy produced by the enjoyment of the immediate moment and knowledge that the reason for that enjoyment would last a grate deal longer than the immediate moment.

Bell's eyes were huge, Tom didn't blame her. He felt like standing and staring too. As the pair strolled down the promenade with the Doctor and Seven of Nine. Bell, Seven, and the Doctor had all, to some extent, been brought up on Voyager, they didn't realize how huge and open and diversified the Alpha Quadrant (and probably sections of the Delta Quadrant that they didn't stumble across) really was. He had to restrain himself from spontaneously naming the spices of every person he saw, just because he could. There was something warm and familiar about Romulans and Cardassians and Ferangi and Klingons. They may have been characterized as 'bad guys' in his black and white brain. But they were familiar bad guys. They were predictable and comfortable.

Bell, Seven and the Doctor were used to seeing aliens they had never seen before, so while Deep Space Nine was impressive, it was not more so than any of the nicer space stations they had visited in the Delta Quadrant. They were impressed by the unfamiliar, which all humans usually were. Tom was impressed with the familiar, and it was almost overwhelming.

"If I remember," Tom said as he lead them through the circular Promenade. "The sick bay is right up here, to the left."

"Tom," Seven said dryly. "You have not visited this station for twenty years. How could you possibly remember where the sick bay is."

Tom chuckled, "This isn't just any station. We met up with Voyager here."

"So you are claiming that, because a significant event in your life happened on this station that you have the ability to recall the station more accurately."

"Exactly." Tom said. "And I can prove it. Here's the infirmary." They rounded a corner and found themselves in front of a doorway that lead right into the infirmary.

"Why do they call it an infirmary, not a sick bay?" Bell asked.

"It's actually quite an interesting story," a crisp, quasi-British, voice said from behind them. All four of them turned around to see the station's chief medical officer looking down on them. "It has to do with ancient earth military traditions."

"Fascinating," Bell said sarcastically.

The Doctor, by comparison, was very enthusiastic. "You must be Julian Bashir, the chief medical officer."

"You've found me out," Bashir said with a smile. "You must be Voyager's holographic doctor."

The Doctor was surprised at being recognized by such an acclaimed physician. "How did you know?"

"You have a mobile emitter attached to your arm," Seven said dryly. "It is not hard to deduce."

The Doc's mood would have fallen if Dr. Bashir had not spoken up. "I've been reading your medical logs since you came in communications range, and I must admit I'm only half through them, but I've never been more impressed with a college's writings."

The Doctor was already made entirely of energy and light, but such a high complement from such an esteemed college practically made him glow. "Why, thankyou."

"I was wondering if you could answer some questions I had about the macrovirus you discovered."

"I would love too," the Doctor said, "If you would be willing to give me a tour of your infirmary."

"Of course," Bashir said, leading the way. The Doctor walked in, wide eyed, and Seven followed with only mild curiosity. Tom looked down at Bell, who was obviously as uninterested in the infirmary as he was. You can put the pilot into sick bay, but you couldn't put the sick bay in the pilot.

"Doc, we'll catch you later," Tom called after him.

There was a vague nod on the holograms part, but no other acknowledgment was given.

Tom chuckled and turned around to look at the promenade behind him. One establishment in particular stood out as having not changed in twenty years.

"Bell, how would you like to see where I first met Harry?"

"It was here?"

"Yep, I saved him from buying some cheep Lodi crystals, he saved me from a bar fight."

Bell smiled, "Buy me a drink?"

Tom smiled back, "Sure, but just one. You don't want to lose your wits in a place like this, you don't know if you'll be able to find them again."

"Papa," Bell said as she rolled her eyes.

The pair was about to enter Quarks when a rough, Klingon voice shouted from across the Promenade, "Bell Anna Paris, Daughter of B'Elanna Torres, Daughter of Mira.!"

"Who was that?" Bell said, just a little spooked.

Tom licked his lips as he scanned the masses of people for Klingons. He saw a group approaching and the leader, a not-quite-matronly female with gray hair, had a very familiar forehead, very much like B'Elanna's only more pronounced. He was sure he knew who they were, but he had hoped he wouldn't meet them until after they got to earth, if ever. "I think," Tom said slowly. "It's your family."

To Bell, the people on Voyager were her family. "What?" Before she could ask any more questions, or Tom could answer any, the Klingons were upon them.

"Are you Bell Anna Paris?" Mira demanded. It was affectionate for Klingons, but Bell's Klingon side had never had a chance on the entirely human ship to manifest itself, despite Tom's efforts. Her blood was watered down and her heritage was muttered. The full blooded Klinogns, who were the only true relatives she had, frightened her. She leaned a little closer to her father for support.

Tom took his cues from Bell. Taking a protective step forward, he answered, "Yes she is."

"I am Mira, daughter of Serara."

Bell inched forward, obviously still frightened, but also eager. Tom took a deep breath and tried to convince himself that she wouldn't leave him for them. "You're my grandmother."

Mira smiled, displaying a row of sharp Klingon teeth, "Yes. I am."

Bell stepped fully away from Tom and his fatherly protection. "Really, you're really B'Elanna Torres' mother, you're really my grandmother?"

"Yes, child. I've come to take you home."

"Home?"

"To Kronos!" Mira said. There was a general grunting of approval from the row of Klingons behind her.

"Kronos?" Bell asked.

"The Klingon home world," Tom supplied. His throat had tightened and his mouth was suddenly dry.

Bell seemed confused, "But Voyager's going to earth."

"Earth? You are Klingon, you belong with us."

"I'm as human as I am Klingon," Bell said baffled. "I don't to belong one place more than another."

"We are your family," Mira said, with surprising amount of patience. Had it been anyone but the long lost daughter of her own estranged daughter, she probably would have drawn a knife to punctuate her point right now. "You have no family on earth."

"Maybe not yet," Bell said, starting to feel a little heat from her Klingon blood. "But I will."

"Bell," Tom said softly.

"Be quiet human P'taq," one of Mira's entourage said forcefully.

Bell's Klingon blood suddently started to boil. "Hey!" she said angrily. "I know what that means! How dare you call him that!"

"Who is he that we should respect him?" Mira demanded looking at Tom with disdain.

"He's my father!"

"Your father," Mira scoffed. "Lieutenant Tom Paris."

Tom took a deep breath, "Yes," he said defensively.

"You have the gall to claim to be her father?" Mira challenged.

Tom was about to justify his participation in her life, when Bell spoke up passionately. "And you have the gall to claim that he's not! H took care of me when I was sick and he sang me to sleep if I was scared. He kissed my scraped knees and looked over my school work. He never let me do anything stupid, no matter how much I faught him." The anger in Bell's eyes was so feirce that it acctualy seemed to intimidate Mira and her Klingon cohorts. "Family isn't genetics, it's love. And my Papa has loved me."

Big Red Restart Button

"He's returning to consciousness," a cool, unfamiliar voice said.

"Tom?" The captains soft voice said. "Tom, can you here me?"

"He can hear you, he should be able to respond in eighteen seconds." Another dispassionate voice said.

"Tom, it's time to wake up."

"Chakotay?" B'Elanna moaned as she struggled to focus her eyes. Everything was bright white with the exception of the dark blur in front of her with the red shoulders.

"Welcome back."

"Back?"

"You have been unconscious for thirty-seven hours," A sterile voice, vaguely attached to one of the humanoid forms floating around her and Chakotay, said.

"Where are we?" B'Elanna finally managed to ask.

"A laboratory," The Captain supplied as she looked down at her frightened and confused piolet. "These aliens, The Skii, performed an experiment on you."

Tom didn't ask the question, but it was painted plainly on his face.

"They've, somehow, simulated fifteen years."

"You're saying the last fifteen years of my life were all inside of my head?" B'Elanna asked with a mixture of horror and disbelief.

"Yes," Chakotay said compassionately. "I'm sure that this is a shock. But you'll be alright."

She was silent for several minutes as she tried to register the fact that her life was nothing like is had been, or perhaps exactly as it had been. Finally she managed to say one word, "Thomas?"

"B'Elanna?" the captain asked.

Tom looked absolutely crushed, "No, *Bell*."

"Bell was the name of his daughter," one of the aliens who were monitoring a half a dozen medical-like instruments said.

Tom looked over towards the alien and was about to demand how they knew that Bell was his daughter when the Captain put her hand on his shoulder tenderly. "Tom, she was part of the simulation."

"What?" Tom said utterly baffled. What he considered reality was all a dream, and reality seemed like some sort of twisted nightmare.

"Bell doesn't exist, she never did," the captain said, "I'm sorry."

"But," B'Elanna said struggling to adjust what she thought she knew to be true with what Chakotay was telling her. "I can see his face, hear his voice, smell his hair."

"It was all in you're head. Nothing you think happened in the last fifteen years actually happened." Chakotay paused to see how she was accepting the information. He couldn't tell. She was looking at her hands, but her eyes were focused internally. "I understand that this is hard to accept, do you have any questions?"

"Why?" Tom asked. He wanted the aliens to answer him, but they didn't.

"They wanted to understand," Janeway paused, she couldn't think of how to tell Tom this. "Parenthood."

He smiled, because it was such an absurd statement. "You're kidding, right?"

"Your captain is serious," one of the aliens said, never looking up from their medical equipment. "Our society decided to abolish the family structure fifty cycles ago. Since then the basic structure of our society had been slowly disintegrating. Things we traditionally held as values became disregarded and sometimes mocked. Most of our culture regards this as progress, but we can see it for what it really is, the disintegration of a once noble culture."

"What does this have to do with me?" B'Elanna demanded. She was too bereaved at having lost Thomas, even if she had never truly had him, to give a damn about their dwindling cultuer.

"We needed to learn about how a family structure worked. We analyzed you're neural pathways and discovered that you had extensive experience with a Mother, so we created a scenario where you were a mother yourself so we could study the phenomenon."

"This doesn't seem possible," Tom blinked, disbelieving.

"We used a neural-stimulator so that you're reaction to your child would be entirely your own," the alien attempted to clarify.

"I don't mean the technical procedure. But . . . fifteen years, Bell." He set on his captain with a thousand questions. "Harry isn't dead?"

The question surprised the captain. "No."

"We're nowhere near earth?" B'Elanna asked.

"No," Chakotay responded

"I didn't get promoted?"

"No Ensign."

"Naiomi Wildman isn't a piolet?"

"No," Chakotay said, smiling.

"You and Chakotay," Tom hesitated.

"What?"

"You're not married, are you?"

The Captain tried not to smile. "No, but I'd like to hear that story."

B'Elanna shook her head. "This isn't real," she laughed. "Computer end program!"

"B'Elanna, you're not on the Holodeck," Chakotay said with heartfelt sympathy for his friend. "I know this is hard to accept . . ."

"It's not hard, it's impossible!!" She screamed out of pure frustration. "Fifteen years can't just be dreamed up. People can't just be imagined. *This* can't be real!"

"B'Elanna, you have to trust me."

"Chakotay, I want to, but I can't."

"What do you need to be convinced?"

"I don't know," B'Elanna answered honestly.

"Perhaps," one of the aliens said, her voice was not quite as sterile as the other alien interjections had been. "I have a solution."

If Tom and B'Elanna had been tempted to consider the situation presented to them when they woke up as reality, they were so no more. Seeing each other, alive, after watching the other die, after raising the other's child, after moving on, was enough to convince the both of them that this was a pure flight of wonderful fancy. But neither of them wanted to turn away because there was always the hope.

The Captain, Chakotay, and the aliens all stood at the side, letting the lovers pick up where they left off, fifteen years ago.

Tom found words first. "Hi," he breathed.

"Hi," B'Elanna echoed. The sight and smell and sound of him almost overwhelmed her.

"You're alive."

"So are you."

"Yeah."

There was a moment of silence while the two lovers tried to process each other. Finally, B'Elanna found the boldness to take a step forward and put a hand on his chest, just to make a connection and assure herself he was real. The touch sent shivers down both of their spines. B'Elanna was about to pull her hand away when Tom took a step of his own forward and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her closer. B'Elanna let herself be drawn in and laid her head against his chest, where her hand had been a moment before.

"I thought I'd lost you," Tom said, voice choked. "I missed you so much."

"Every night, for fifteen years, I'd dream about you." B'Elanna said, holding him as tightly as he was holding her. "Then I would wake up and you were gone."

"But," Tom hesitated, it was obvious that the next words were hard to say, "That wasn't real."

"And this is," B'Elanna finished. She was crying from the grief of losing Thomas, and the joy of finding Tom. For his part, Tom didn't actually cry, but his throat constricted and his eyes watered and he felt the emotions as strongly as B'Elanna.

They had both been forced to trade a lover for a child, and then, been forced to give that child back. It would have been crushing if not for the return of their lover. As B'Elanna felt the rise and fall of Tom's chest and Tom smelled the sweetness of B'Elanna's hair, both of them realized that, for better or for worse, they were in reality. Not necessarily a better or a worse reality and not necessarily a reality they would have chosen. But it wasn't a dream, and after fifteen years of nothing but dreams, it felt good.

Epilog

The fire crackled and danced and projected it's warmth to the two lovers who were cuddled together in the empty ski lodge. The intent had been to go skiing, doing something normal. But skiing required energy and enthusiasm, and not even Tom Paris could force that.

So they had been captured by the fire and after other skiers had tried to lure them out to the slopes, Tom deleted all the holographic characters so that he and B'Elanna could be alone together.

"Thomas loved this place," B'Elanna said after about a half an hour of silence. "When he was eight he started going through all your old holo-programs. This was his favorite."

"He didn't like Sandrien's huh?"

"He might have," B'Elanna said turning to look at Tom, "if I didn't spend so much time there."

"The first, and last, time I took Bell to the klingon B'ath'lith program she was eight."

"She didn't like it?"

"She was playing with a toy B'ath'lith when Harry died. I don't think she ever quite got over that."

"Harry used to take Thomas to play captain proton. That was the only one of your programs he wouldn't re-open."

There was another bout of silence.

After one of the holographic logs snapped and holographic sparks scattered harmlessly over the hearth, Tom managed to voice one of the questions which had been bothering him for days. "Why did this happen to us?"

"We were in the shuttle craft together, if it had been two other people . . ."

"But of all the people to pull from Voyager," Tom said, looking for a deeper, cosmic answer. "Your mother, my father. Both of them were horrible parents. We had no idea what we were doing. Like we were working from scratch."

"Maybe that's why it was us," B'Elanna said, "The Skii didn't have any idea either. They needed to start from scratch, just like we did."

Tom swallowed hard. B'Elanna was right, he had started from scratch and he knew he had been a less than perfect father in millions of ways. But somehow, she had turned out beautifully. "I can't imagine a life without Bell."

B'Elanna was silent, trying to imagine her life without Thomas, suddenly, something struck her, "Can you remember one?"

Tom looked at her curiously. "What do you mean?"

"Exactly what I said. Can you remember your life before Bell?"

"Of course."

"That's real life," B'Elanna said just a little excitedly. "We won't be living in the past, we'll be living in the present. But we'll know enough to live without regrets."

Tom almost smiled. "Do you know what I regretted the most?"

"No."

"Never telling you, I love you."

B'Elanna smiled, "Oh, believe me Tom, I know."

"No, this plagued me for fifteen years, you're going to have to sit through this." Tom closed his eyes, took a deep breath and collected himself. When he opened them they were as intense and focused as they ever had been. "I love you, B'Elanna."

She had known that for a long time, but had not expected how much better it was to be told straight out. She pulled herself a little closer to him and whispered, "You picked a great time to tell me."

Tom laughed and looked a way, When he turned back his eyes had softened, but they were no less earnest. "This is like a dream come true," he said as he leaned in and kissed her.

After a moment, B'Elanna pulled away, "You'd just better be there when I wake up."

Tom smiled, "I'll try."

The End