"It is what happened after … somehow Tom slipped through the cracks."
Matters of Discipline – Kathryn Janeway

"After I was kicked out of Starfleet, I let myself drift. It was pretty much downhill all the way."
Lessons Learned from Loneliness – Tom Paris

After 'Admiral, Father, Dad,' I realized that there was another story to be told. I still needed to reconcile the caring Admiral Paris from the end of Voyager with the man who apparently stood by while Tom's life spiraled downhill and he ended up in prison. This story is my version of what happened.

Falling Through the Cracks

Chapter 1

When Tom Paris was little, he'd sit by the front door to wait for his dad to come home. As soon as Owen Paris walked in Tom would jump up and ask, "Was today a good day or a bad day?"

Owen always considered the question seriously. Then he'd answer. "Now that I'm home, it's a good day."

That was a long time ago. Owen's relationship with his son had changed a lot since then,

Owen Paris stood beside his office window studying the view. He expected to see that it had changed. Buildings should be crumbling, the greenery in the common, withered and yellow. So much else in his life had fallen apart.

Yesterday, Owen and his wife had attended Tom's hearing. They'd known what the decision would be before it even began. Starfleet Command had to be able to trust the word of its officers. Tom had lied. Tom had to go.

Owen Paris had faced many challenges in his life, endured tough times. You didn't make it to the rank of admiral without being resilient. His capture and torture by the Cardassians was only the most painful of many trials. Owen had survived even this. With time and hard work he had made it back from that unspeakable horror.

But what had happened yesterday - that was beyond anything that he had ever expected to have to face. It was worse because it had happened to his son. It had happened to Tom. Yesterday had been a very bad day.

Owen tried to make sense out of the incomprehensible reality facing him. He reviewed his own actions to see what he might have done differently.

When Tom was attending Starfleet Academy, Owen had been so proud of himself for staying neutral, keeping his distance from Tom. Now he remembered the many times he'd summoned Tom to his office and given him unsolicited advice about what courses to take.

Owen shook his head. He should have known better. He'd seen his brother Cole stifled by the weight of the Paris legacy. It was only when Cole was on the Stargazer under the command of Captain Jean-Luc Picard that he finally blossomed into the officer everyone thought that he was capable of being.

Owen would never go so far as to say that what he'd done was responsible for Tom's choices at Caldik Prime. That would be stretching the facts. Tom was a man. He was responsible for his own decisions. But Owen could see that his interference hadn't helped. Tom should have been free to make his own decisions, to make his own mistakes and to learn from them.

Owen couldn't undo the past. But he could change the future. He'd step aside and stop interfering so that Tom could finally make his own decisions and live his own life.

Owen would make sure that from now on Starfleet's attention would be on Tom, not on whose son he was. To that purpose he'd attached a note to Tom's file informing the transition services department that there was no need for them to take it upon themselves to keep him up to date on the details of his son's program. Tom's case was a private matter and was to be treated privately.

Owen had already discussed this with his wife, Julia. She'd had her doubts, but the media circus that feasted on the story of the disgraced admiral's son helped to change her mind. She could see that the Paris name only made everything harder for Tom. He had enough to deal with without that extra pressure. So Owen would let events unfold as protocol dictated.

Starfleet would provide the counseling that Tom needed. The fact that Tom had come forward with the truth meant that there was a chance to salvage his career. Of course he'd first have to face up to the reasons why he'd lied and there were also other issues leftover from the accident at Caldik Prime. Tom still hadn't dealt with the full reality of those events. When Tom was better they could move on. Tom could start over again.

This morning Owen planned to meet with Tom to explain all this to him. Owen hoped that it would relieve some of the pressure on Tom if he knew that his father was finally going to let him have his own space. Decision made, Owen turned away from the view of the pleasant green square outside his window and returned to his duties.

The most prestigious departments in Starfleet were housed in buildings clustered around light and airy squares like the one in front of Admiral Paris's office. Less prominent departments were housed in utilitarian buildings farther away from the center of power.

The Civilian Transition Services, or CTS, was one such department. It served the needs of Starfleet personnel who were leaving Starfleet to return to civilian life. Some clients made a smooth transition out of Starfleet. Other cases were more complicated. Some clients needed ongoing support. It was not easy give up on a major commitment like a Starfleet career and leave it behind.

CTS supplied various services and provided accommodations for these clients. In one now infamous case, someone stayed in residence for over five years. After that CTS accommodations were redesigned to be less comfortable. CTS wanted to encourage clients to move on and leave the nest. Accommodations were now purely functional, more like sleeping compartments than rooms.

Like many service departments, CTS was staffed with personnel who had entered Starfleet expecting to live lives of adventure out among the stars. Instead they'd ended up in mundane office jobs. The problem was that among the 'best and the brightest' some were better and brighter than others. There were not enough ship postings for all academy graduates and even fewer promotions to captain or admiral.

On a lower floor at CTS, one disappointed ensign bit his tongue when his Bolian co-worker reemerged from their shared toilet facilities. He was relieved when she headed off for her break. Sharing a bathroom with a Bolian was a trial for human sensibilities. Ensign Kravik kept most of his caustic comments to himself.

He hadn't always been so circumspect. In his academy days, Kravik had joyfully dubbed Admiral Paris's son 'Admiral Junior'. Kravik was convinced that this nickname had cost him the Exeter posting that went to Admiral Paris's son and left him stagnating at CTS. Kravik firmly believed that he was the one who deserved the Exeter posting. Nothing could convince him otherwise.

In reality, there'd been no injustice. He'd sabotaged his own career opportunities. 'Admiral Junior' was the least damaging of the many malicious nicknames that eventually came to the attention of his superiors. They decided that a secondary posting was the best placement for an officer who clearly did not know how to play nicely with others.

The truth behind his situation did not stop Ensign Kravik from gloating over the fate of the person whose name was on the file he was processing. "Thomas Eugene Paris, how the mighty have fallen!"

The requisition for Paris was fairly routine. The recommended counseling period might be longer than usual, but nothing extraordinary. Kravik searched for the smallest room available to assign to Paris during his stay at CTS.

Scanning through the list of recommended services. Kravik found the attachment from Admiral Paris instructing the department to respect the privacy of his son's file.

Building on his personal grievance and his assumptions about how influence greased wheels in Starfleet, Kravik interpreted this to mean that the admiral intended to handle his son's transition period privately. Starfleet's services obviously weren't good enough for blue bloods. It seemed that the mighty rated a softer landing than ordinary folk got when they fell.

Kravik made the necessary adjustments and cancelled the requisition for CTS accommodations and services. There were no instructions about where to forward the file. Kravik decided that the best course of action was to set up a default holding folder. Its contents would remain secure until Tom Paris or his family got around to issuing instructions on where to send the file.

By the time Kravik's Bolian colleague returned from her break, the changes were all in place.

"Anything exciting happen while I was away?"

Kravik was telling the truth when he said, "It was pretty quiet. There's nothing much going on around here." It would have been a lot more fun if the Paris file hadn't slipped through his fingers.

Nobody ever said that Starfleet was perfect.

In his room on the other side of the grounds of Starfleet Headquarters, Tom was packed and ready to move on. He had nothing to do for the moment but wait. He'd thought about calling his mother. He got as far as retrieving her access code. The code was an inconvenience and a nuisance. But with more and more protests over the terms of the treaty with the Cardassians, Starfleet had decided to step up security for senior officers and their families.

Tom had stared at the screen. He couldn't think of anything to say. He couldn't come up with anything that would fool his mother into thinking that he was fine. He decided that it would be better to wait until he was settled into his quarters at CTS. He'd make a few jokes about the coziness of the room. That would distract her – a little. He didn't want her to worry.

Yesterday after the hearing, his father had stood staring at him, probably judging him and finding him wanting. Tom had hugged his mother and left the hearing venue to be taken to a small room where an officer wearing a mask of neutral distain removed the pips from Tom's collar. He gave Tom his discharge records and a copy of the procedures that Tom was to follow in his transition process.

The instructions were quite detailed. Tom was to remain in his assigned quarters until the next morning. An officer would escort him to Civilian Transition Services where he would be interviewed, assigned a counselor and a room. He could live elsewhere if he preferred. It was recommended that he use CTS facilities. Once he finished counseling and received a clean bill of health the next step was…. At that point the words blurred in front on Tom's eyes and his brain stopped processing information. He saved the rest until this morning.

Tom had been so tired. He'd spent so long with the heavy weight of guilt strapped to his back. He'd expected to feel lighter when he put the weight down, when he confessed. It didn't turn out that way. All he felt was exhausted. Last night, all he wanted to do was sleep. He lay awake all night.

This morning Tom was fidgety, full of nervous energy. If he wasn't ready to call his mother, maybe he'd check to see how many more of his acquaintances had blocked his name from their call list. Many had done so already in order to distance themselves from him. Tom didn't expect anything different, not from them. Those Tom counted as personal friends were off-world, on space stations, starships – or they were dead.

Tom pushed that thought away. He swiveled in his chair to stare at the uniform that he'd draped across the foot of the bed. The uniform was the standard two-piece, jacket and trousers. These were made of the same material that he had worn since his days at the academy. It was virtually impossible to wrinkle. Every year some cadet tried to find a new way to make a permanent crease in the material, usually after a late night party and usually using a roommate's uniform for the experiment. No one had yet succeeded.

The long sleeved sweater that was worn underneath the jacket was resting beside it on the bed. Each sweater was the same shade of grey. Starfleet didn't accept any variations in grey. The sweaters had small, raised collars to hold rank pips. This collar was bare.

Tom didn't know what he was supposed to do with the uniform. There was nothing in the instructions that covered that. So much for Starfleet thoroughness! Was he supposed leave it or take it with him?

Tom had worn uniforms for years. He'd worn this uniform to the hearing. He'd worn it back to his room. He'd never wear it again.

Tom had had spent years pushing back against the pressure on him to become the latest in a long line of Parises in Starfleet. There were times when Tom had resented everything to do with a Starfleet uniform. Now, that he couldn't wear the uniform anymore, he wasn't sure how he felt about it.

Tom had a lot of time ahead of him to figure that out. He had a lot of other stuff to figure out too. Anyone who'd lived with his crazy dreams couldn't just forget them and move on. So he'd listen to the Starfleet counselors. Maybe he'd even talk to them. When he was done, maybe then he'd know what he wanted to do with his life. He might even apply to the Federation Naval Patrol like he'd always wanted.

A buzzer sounded. It took Tom a minute to realize that the sound came from the door. He stood up, put his packed bag on the chair and opened the door. One more Starfleet officer with a carefully blank expression stood there holding a PADD. Tom fought back an urge to joke about leaving a trail of PADDs behind him. This officer didn't look like he had a sense of humor. "I'm all packed," Tom told him instead. "I'll get my bag and we can head over to CTS."

"We're not going to CTS. You're to report to Admiral Paris's office. He wants to see you."

The last thing Tom wanted right now was to listen to one of his father's lectures. "Well I don't want to see Admiral Paris. One of the advantages of being kicked out of Starfleet is that I don't have to see any admirals if I don't want to. So take me over to CTS and let me get settled into my wonderfully spacious quarters." Tom knew all about the accommodations at CTS.

The face frowned. "That's been cancelled. My orders are to take you to the Admiral's office and that's where we're going," he stated firmly. "The Admiral is taking responsibility for your transition out of Starfleet."

Tom's pent up stress exploded in a burst of anger. "Are you kidding? Don't I get a say? What do I have to do around here to get away from him? Don't I even get to mess up my own life by myself?"

The officer didn't answer or make any kind of response. It was as if Tom's questions were beneath his notice. Tom gave up, grabbed his bag and followed his guide out the door.

His escort delivered Tom to Admiral Paris's office and left. Nicole, his father's executive assistant, came around from behind her desk to greet Tom. She smiled warmly at him. Nicole had been with Admiral Paris for a long time. She'd known Tom since he was a boy. It was Tom who had first referred to her as his father's secretary. The title had stuck. It was now a kind of private joke between Nicole and the admiral.

"You can go on in," Nicole told Tom. "Your father is waiting for you."

Tom felt awkward about carrying his bag of belongings into the meeting. "Can I leave my things out here?" he asked.

"I'll keep your bag behind my desk," Nicole offered. She was puzzled though. "Why did you bring it with you?" She would have thought that he'd prefer to drop his bag off at his lodgings at CTS before coming over.

Tom grimaced. He assumed that she meant he should have sent his bag on ahead to the Paris home. "I didn't have much time," he explained.

Nicole nodded sympathetically. Admiral Paris's 'requests' for meetings tended to carry the weight of an urgent command.

Tom checked what was left of his temper. He steeled himself and entered his father's office. "You wanted to see me?" Tom kept his tone as even as possible. He'd give his father a chance to explain what he had planned and then see what options were open to him.

An admiral's office isn't designed to encourage informality. Owen stood beside his window so he wouldn't put Tom at a disadvantage by meeting with him while sitting behind his desk. Owen thought that Tom looked very tired, worn down. He had noticed the same thing the day before, at the hearing. "Well, Thomas, I can see that I don't have to ask you how you are doing."

Something in that simple statement rubbed against Tom's frayed nerves. His father had taken over, again, and cancelled his Starfleet transition program. Now, he knew how Tom was feeling without even asking him. Against his better judgment, Tom snapped. "Maybe you should ask me how I feel. It's just possible that you don't have all the right answers."

Owen frowned. He wasn't used to junior officers speaking to him in that tone of voice. He had to remind himself that Tom wasn't Starfleet anymore. He was a civilian. Owen decided to forgive the outburst and start over again. "I can see how you could take what I said the wrong way. That's one of the reasons that I wanted to see you today. I think that it will be good for you to have some time away from me."

Tom was confused. His CTS program was cancelled, but he wasn't going home? He was supposed to go away somewhere? Go where? What the hell was going on? Tom tried to make sense out of this. "When you say 'time away', what exactly did you have in mind?"

"I'm stepping back to made sure that you have the space you need to live your own life." Owen expected Tom to be pleased about that. He was caught by surprise when Tom reacted angrily.

"You mean you dragged me all the way over here just to tell me that you're cutting me loose?"

"Don't put words in my mouth, Tom. What I'm saying is that I now see that being tied so closely to me and to the Paris name has been more of a hindrance than a help to you. It will be good for you to break away from that, to find your own way."

"So I'm not good enough for the vaunted Paris name anymore, is that it? How far do you want me to go to 'break away'? Is being out on the streets far enough away from you?"

Owen was rapidly losing his patience. The rooms provided by CTS might be basic. But living there could hardly be described as being out on the streets. "You're exaggerating. Many people start out with less than you have, and are stronger for it. This is an opportunity to make something of yourself. I'm disappointed to hear you complain this way."

What Tom understood from his father's speech was that when he walked out the door, he was going to be homeless, jobless and alone. He had never been that alone before. Roughing it for a survival course was one thing. That was an adventure. This wasn't. This was life.

Nonetheless, he wasn't going to waste his time asking his father to reconsider his decision. "You're right," Tom said. The sarcasm in his voice was obvious. "I've heard that on some planets they don't even have streets to sleep on."

Owen turned his back. He didn't want to lose his temper. Tom was over-dramatizing the situation, acting like one the characters in the old stories that he loved so much. "I'm sorry that you're taking it this way, Tom. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to talk to you today. I think it will be better for both of us if you leave now."

Tom couldn't think of anything else to say. He mustered as much dignity as he could, turned, nodded to Nicole in the outer office, grabbed his bag and left. He found his way to the exit and began the long walk off Starfleet grounds.

Nicole could tell that the meeting hadn't gone well. She would prefer not to disturb the admiral right now. Unfortunately, the information that she had just received was time sensitive and couldn't wait. She signaled through to the inner office. A very tired voice answered, "Yes, Nicole. What is it?"

"Admiral, security has sent you new access codes for your family's communication system."

"Again?"

"A media reporter got through to Admiral Hayes' wife and badgered her to give him her husband's reaction to the latest Maquis activity. Security wants to prevent any further incidents. New codes are set to take effect at noon today."

"My wife won't be happy. This doesn't give her or my daughters much time to notify their friends about the new codes. But I guess it has to be done. I'll send the family codes over to Tom at CTS. Remind me send him updates if they change the codes again."

"I'll be sure to do that, Admiral."

"Thank you, Nicole." Admiral Paris sat down behind his desk to try to bring some order back into his day.

Tom found a bench in the city and sat down there. He couldn't believe what had just happened. His father thought so little of him that he didn't even want to be around him. His father didn't think he was good enough to be anywhere near Starfleet. Why else would he cancel his Starfleet transition program and send him away? Tom put his head in his hands and rocked back and forth, trying to think.

San Francisco was a Starfleet city. Tom didn't know anyone around who wasn't connected to Starfleet in some way. He already knew he'd get nowhere trying to get help from any of his Starfleet 'friends'. He was on the outside now with not even enough credits to get away.

Tom stopped rocking. There was no way he was asking his mother for funds. He wouldn't put her, or his sisters, in the middle of this. He did have enough credits to access local communications and local transport. He'd have to find a way to get more, enough to get to the one place where he was sure he could stay. He wasn't helpless. He'd worked hard on that survival course, even if his father had only given him a B-minus. He just needed to think this through.

Tom checked for the nearest travelers' center. Sometimes travelers got to San Francisco without their bags and needed a few things to tide them over. Tom found what he was looking for and headed over there. By the time he was finished, Tom had sold most of his clothes. He'd also traded his top quality bag for a smaller version and gotten extra credits to make up the difference. He now had enough to access the long distance transportation system. It was still early enough in San Francisco to call Marseille and reach Sandrine before she closed for the night.

Sandrine took his call. Tom didn't realize until he let go of the breath he'd been holding that that he'd had any doubt that she would.

"Tom, chéri, I've seen what the media has had to say. It is not good for you, is it? I hoped that you would call me."

"Yes, well, I'm afraid that things are even worse than I expected. Sandrine, I need a place to stay. I have some credits to pay for rent. But I don't have a lot, not right now. As soon as I get a job I …"

"Do not concern yourself with that. You have enough funds to get here? Do you need me to come for you?"

"I can make it. I sold some things. I'll tell you all about it later."

.

"Of course. I will make a room for you."

"This means a lot to me. I don't know if I can ever explain just how much."

"Shhhh, it is nothing. You are coming now?"

"I have one other call to make and then I'll come."

Now that he had a place to stay Tom felt better about calling his mother. She'd want to know where to reach him. Tom entered her access code. He schooled his face into a more cheerful, confident expression and waited for the call to go through.

But instead of his mother's face, a short message scrolled across the screen. "Invalid code - access denied." The words looped, repeated, and then looped again.

Tom stared in disbelief. He didn't think for a moment that his mother would refuse to speak to him. There was no way she would change her code and that could only be done by someone with access to Starfleet systems, someone like his father.

Tom picked out the individual letters as they glided across the screen. He reformed the letters into words and read them over and over and over, 'Invalid … denied'. The words were a sentence as well as a judgment. Tom sat for a long time. He finally realized that he had to touch the screen in order to terminate the call. He reached out and erased the link with his past.