III.

His scent was intoxicating.

She moved in closer, exploring his neck and shoulders with her tongue and lips, moaning against the pull of that scent, so different from the smell of fear, so inviting and invigorating.

Her teeth sank into flesh and she tasted blood, pulling her on to full arousal.

Then she heard the laughter and, from somewhere in the back of her mind, panic threatened to swell. But this laughter was husky with delight, matching her own building desire, rather than mocking it.

She looked up into those eyes, finding them alive and sparking with intensity.

Blue eyes. Framed by tousled, sandy hair.

.

What the hell?

.

"B'Elanna? Are you in there?"

B'Elanna awoke to the sound of physical knocking on her door and Ries's concerned voice. She shook her head and blinked hard, trying to rid her mind of that final image from her dream.

What the hell was he doing in her head?

Taking a deep breath, she called back, "Give me just a minute," before pushing herself up and out of her bunk and crossing to the sink to splash some water on her face.

With effort, she brought her breathing back to its normal pace. Then, pulling on the couple of articles of clothing that she had bothered to shed before collapsing onto the bed still mostly dressed a few hours before, she moved to the door and keyed it open.

"Everything okay?" Ries asked, obviously worried. "I tried the door chime, but you didn't answer."

"Fine, Luca," she assured him, even mustering a small smile to which he responded all too readily. (...Would she really have preferred that her dream featured the dark-haired, eager young tech? Definitely best to banish that whole line of thought entirely...) "I just must have been more tired than I realized." She rubbed at her eyes, only partially for effect. "What can I do for you?"

"Chakotay's on base and wanted to talk to you before the Val Jean breaks orbit," Ries explained. "I offered to come get you."

Stepping into the hallway and letting the door close behind her, B'Elanna began to move toward the control room with Ries at her side. Only then did she notice the bag slung on his shoulder. "Going somewhere?" she asked, indicating the duffel.

Ries grinned. "I'm headed out on the Val Jean."

She paused mid-stride, blinking at him. "You're what?"

"Chakotay decided that since he'd be down both you and Bendera for the next few weeks an extra tech would be useful." The grin widened. "Maybe I'll finally get to see some action."

B'Elanna started moving again, unsure why the news bothered her so much. She was used to thinking of Ries as young, but he couldn't be any younger than she was herself. He just seemed so...innocent, perhaps? If it was possible for a Maquis to be innocent. The idea of him standing in the Val Jean's engine room as it shuddered and consoles sparked under a Cardassian attack, his fear and panic all too obvious... She shook her head and spoke more roughly than she intended. "That Cardassian missile wasn't enough action for you?"

His smile disappeared at her tone. "Well...yes...I mean..."

Sighing, B'Elanna checked herself and managed an encouraging grin. "Sorry – I didn't mean it that way. You're definitely due for some time off base."

That was apparently enough to satisfy him and his usual cheerful expression returned as they approached the entrance to the control room.

Chakotay looked oddly out of place seated in the command center of Alpha 441, and B'Elanna realized to what extent she had begun to identify him with the Val Jean itself – and before that the Liberty. While small groups of Maquis were often off-ship on various sorties and missions, the Captain himself almost always stayed aboard. In fact, she didn't think she had seen him off the ship since the Val Jean had launched from Alpha 441 weeks before.

He rose to greet her, giving a small, rare smile. "Kurt said you've made some progress."

She grinned back, glad to have good news to share. "I think we have, yes." Moving to the console, she pulled up one of the analyzed data sets that she and Kurt had been working on over the last couple of days. "Dreadnought appears to operate under several stages of alertness depending on its proximity to its target. Stage one is the highest level and then all the way down to stage five, which is basically a sleep mode." She looked back over to the Maquis captain. "Its failure to detonate seems to have led to some internal confusion, and it now appears to be cycling erratically through all five stages. If we can figure out how to freeze it at stage five, we should be able to beam aboard the missile itself." Her grin widened. "Who knows what we might find? Cardassian tech definitely, and likely tactical data as well." Then she folded her arms, looking back over the data with satisfaction. "Hell, we might even be able to throw this thing right back at the Cardassians."

B'Elanna didn't miss the tightening of Chakotay's expression, but his question was simple enough. "'Dreadnought'?"

"We needed a name for it. 'ATR-4107' was getting cumbersome," Bendera offered helpfully.

"It's still completely functional," B'Elanna jumped back in. "The only reason that it malfunctioned was the antiquated detonator that they used. We should be able to have that fixed up and have it ready to send wherever we want in a week or two."

Looking back down at the schematic, Chakotay pursed his lips and slowly shook his head. "No." He turned back to her, straightening. "Get whatever information you can from it and any tech that can be of help to us. But it's not worth the risk to use it offensively."

B'Elanna frowned, confused. "Risk? But that's exactly it. There wouldn't be..."

Chakotay cut her off with a gesture. "I need to get back up to the Val Jean. We'll be back in a couple weeks' time and you can update me then."

Hearing the clear dismissal in his voice, B'Elanna bit at her lip but nodded.

"See you in a couple of weeks then," Chakotay said, nodding to Bendera and then grasping her shoulder briefly before heading out of the control room with Ries trailing after him.

Once they were gone, B'Elanna slumped down in the empty chair.

"Doing okay there, Torres?" Kurt asked, eying her with concern.

She snorted, mentally working her way back through the brief conversation with Chakotay. "He didn't even listen to me – blew me off like some upstart kid."

Bendera considered that – and her – for a moment before leaning forward and responding carefully, "B'Elanna, I can tell you with absolute certainty that the Captain has all the faith in the world in your technical ability and absolutely trusts your judgment with anything related to his ship's engines or anything else mechanical."

B'Elanna raised an eyebrow, prompting, "But...?"

"But this may not be as black and white as mechanics and programming," Bendera finished.

She stood then and began to pace in the small space, a hand on her hip. "It's a weapon, Kurt. A long-range weapon that would allow us to gain an advantage with minimal risk – and no casualties." Her voice wasn't quite as steady as she would have liked on those last words. The additional concern showing in Kurt's eyes suggested that that had not passed unnoticed.

But he only held out a pacifying hand. "Let's get into the thing first, okay? Before we try to figure out what to do with it. One step at a time."

She took a deep, steadying breath. This wasn't the Academy and this wasn't another of her seemingly endless arguments with the professors there. This wasn't theoretical, and the stakes were too high for her pride to get in the way of the work that needed to be done.

Another deep breath. "Okay," she acknowledged, nodding. "What's next?"

.

.

The move from the ship's brig to an empty but comfortable conference room would have been enough to tip him off as to who his visitor was. The added offer of a full shower and a change into freshly replicated clothes ahead of the meeting only confirmed the suspicion.

Nonetheless, his mind stubbornly pushed the knowledge away, choosing to focus instead on the blue and green orb hanging outside the generous observation windows.

Earth.

Home.

"Thomas?"

He'd somehow missed the telltale swish of the room's door opening and turned to meet the eyes of Admiral Owen Paris across the conference table – eyes which mirrored his own in both color and impassivity. "Dad," he acknowledged.

Tom's arms had been lightly crossed as he contemplated the view of Earth from the viewport. Now he felt a sudden, ingrained impulse to drop them behind his back into a parade rest position. In annoyance, he tightened their cross instead.

His father, of course, noticed the posture and seemed to consider for a moment whether to comment on it before instead indicating the chairs around the table. "Shall we sit?"

He's trying, some part of Tom's brain insisted. Reigning in his more puerile impulses, Tom nodded and settled into a chair, just as deliberately uncrossing his arms and resting his hands together on the table.

He expected his father to offer the opening gambit and was thus surprised when the silence between them stretched, the thoughts behind the Admiral's tight expression unreadable.

"How's Mom?" Tom finally asked with a reasonable amount of neutrality.

"Worried about her son," was his father's response.

Which was enough to put Tom firmly back on the defensive. "Well, she should be relieved to know that I now find myself back within the warm embrace of Starfleet."

That sparked a reaction in the Admiral's eyes. "This isn't a joking matter, Thomas."

"I assure you that I'm not laughing."

A heavy sigh. "Thomas, I'm not here to spar with you."

"Then why are you here, Dad?" Tom's arms were once again folded as he leaned back in his chair.

Admiral Paris eyed his son steadily. "I came to tell you to make a deal."

Tom felt his stomach lurch and, despite his best efforts, he knew that some of his surprise must have showed on his face. His voice, when it came, was at a far more adolescent register than he would have preferred. "You want me to do what?"

"To make a deal, son." His father's own face was still impassive and unreadable.

At the confirmation, Tom's insides churned again, and this time he didn't even bother to try to keep the disbelief and confusion out of his expression. "You – you, of all people – are telling me to make a deal?" he stammered. "You are telling me to betray my shipmates? My crew? To hand them over in order to make my own life more comfortable?"

The Admiral waved his hand dismissively. "That's phrasing it a bit dramatically, don't you think?" he asked. "This isn't a Starfleet ship and Starfleet crew we're talking about. These people are engaged in illegal activities. Helping to bring them to justice would be the right thing to do and would begin to atone for your mistake of falling in with them." He even gave a small smile. "That's what these deals are supposed to do after all: atone for mistakes."

'The right thing to do...' For six weeks, Tom had sustained himself through isolation and uncertainty with the thought that he had in fact and finally done exactly that: the right thing.

And now, with a literal wave of his father's hand, he felt that bulwark crumbling.

"I still can't believe you are suggesting this," Tom tried again, mostly because he was at a loss for any other response.

His father's expression hardened ever so slightly. "This isn't the time or the place to play hero, Tom. These criminals aren't worth it."

"No honor among thieves, Dad?"

The Admiral eyed him steadily, his own expression still giving away very little. "I see you are not in the mood for this conversation right now, Thomas..."

"Yeah, a few weeks stuffed into starship brigs will do that to you," Tom interrupted with a smirk, pushing back now, determined to elicit some visible reaction.

"You chose to get involved with those radicals," the Admiral threw back and Tom was absurdly pleased to hear the real anger now edging his voice.

"That's right, I did," Tom agreed, now tightening the fold of his arms into a challenge. "What else would anyone expect from Starfleet's biggest fu...screw up?" Even without the profanity, the taunt was clear and his father stood up angrily, hands leaning on the table between them.

"Obviously it was a mistake to come here today," the Admiral still managed to keep his voice reasonably restrained. "I'll try again after you've had some time to rest and think about your options."

Tom raised an eyebrow ironically. "What exactly do you think I've been doing for the last month and a half, Dad?"

His father just shook his head, his lips now thin, his mask of impassivity effectively stripped. Pyrrhic victory, that.

With one last, obvious attempt to keep his voice controlled, the Admiral concluded, "I'll come again in a few days. Maybe a week if I get called away to deal with the flare up between the Anticans and the Selay."

"Don't rush back." Tom gave his own bitterness free rein. "Wouldn't want to disappoint the Anticans."

Starting to say something in response, his father apparently thought the better of it and, with a short nod, turned and walked out, leaving Tom sitting alone once more staring at the opposite wall and the display of models of earlier ships which had carried the Yorktown's name, each mounted in a glass case. The viewport's vista was imperfectly reflected in that glass, and Earth appeared oddly distorted and unfamiliar.

Welcome home, Tommy boy.

.

.

"Unauthorized entry detected. Initiating DNA scan."

That voice. So cold, even for a machine. Almost reptilian. Definitely Cardassian.

An unpleasant shiver raced up B'Elanna's spine as Dreadnought's scan flashed over her. Two times she had come face to face with Cardassians, heard those bloodless voices – and both times had escaped only by sheer luck of timing and with others' help.

"Identity confirmed. Torres, B'Elanna. Your presence has been authorized."

"So glad you approve," B'Elanna muttered to herself, shaking off the chill and moving to the nearest console. Opening her toolkit, she pulled out a tricorder, cursing lightly as it took two tries and a hard slap to get the thing to power up: the Maquis took what they could get in terms of technology and tools but even by their standards, this particular device was due for an upgrade. Once it was on, however, a quick scan gave her the confirmation that she needed, and she pulled out a hand-held communicator.

"Torres to Bendera."

:Bendera here. Had me worried for a minute there, Torres: Bendera's voice held both a question and an, albeit mild, reproach.

"Sorry, Kurt." She set the communicator down on the panel in order to work as she spoke. "I wanted to make sure that we didn't have a third party listening in." Carefully, she began to tap on the console, calling up limited power and functions. "But Dreadnought here appears to be frozen in stage five as planned."

:Did you have any difficulties with it recognizing your biosignature?:

"None at all." Another couple of commands brought up some working lights and access to a listing of the missile's basic systems. "Our remote hack into the maintenance personnel database seems to have worked. For once, everything actually seems to be going as planned."

:Glad to hear it: Bendera's voice left no doubt about the sincerity of his words; he'd been less than happy with the fact that she would be transporting to the missile on her own. :Do me a favor and keep an open comm line, okay? I know you aren't likely to be exactly chatty, but it would make me feel somewhat better about this whole thing:

"Sure, Kurt," she replied, but her attention was on the information that was now scrolling by on the screen in front of her.

Propulsion; operations control; defense; weapons; diagnostics -

...navigational systems...

Her eyebrow twitched upward. "Computer, access navigational systems and show this missile's route since its launch."

Silence met her request. Of course: there was no voice interface at stage five. "Kurt," she turned her attention back to the communicator. "I'm going to move Dreadnought back up to its stage four status."

A pause. :Are you sure that's wise, B'Elanna?:

She bit at her lip, hoping she wasn't about to make a mistake that would be catastrophic for both of them. "Stage four is still a stand-by level. But it will power up enough systems that I'll actually be able to make some progress. I can't do much in the power save mode."

Bendera's sigh was audible even over the less than stellar communications line.

:Just try not to get us blown up, okay?:

B'Elanna smiled thinly. "Don't worry, Bendera. I never did buy into the 'today being a good day to die' line." A few more taps on the console, and Dreadnought came suddenly to life around her.

"Establishing stage four status," the computer announced in that voice like nails on a chalkboard, and B'Elanna came to a quick decision that the navigational logs could wait.

"Computer, access operations control, specifically voice interface – let's see if we can make you just a little more 'user friendly', shall we?"