A/N: I forgot about the Borg "failsafe" device, which should have caused some problems for Tom and Laura. I'll try to address it in some future chapter. Since Picard, Janeway, Tuvok and Torres weren't affected by such a device after their breif assimilation, it's possible that it's only instilled in certain drones. (Maybe ones assimilated at a much younger age.)
I don't own "Voyager."
Annika Hanson watched the drama unfold in Sickbay with a strange detachment. Captain Chakotay was speaking to Kohlar, about his "mission" with B'Elanna. Tom and Harry stood some feet away, trying to console Linnis. Laura, Dr. Van Gough, and Annika were by the doctor's office, with little to do. Laura was doing a remarkable job not letting herself be bothered by a visit from Tom's dead lover and discussions about his late wife.
"Linnis," Tom came up behind his daughter, putting his hands on her shoulders. "Nothing B'Elanna said, none of it's real! It's a whole other universe! Those people aren't us. You probably wouldn't even recognize—"
"Like you didn't recognize B'Elanna?" Linnis snapped quietly. "Like she didn't recognize you? Our Voyager was identical to hers. Before…" her hazel eyes flicked to the Doctor. "…before the fourth year."
Even at the peak of her rage, Linnis Paris came across as remarkably calm. Annika doubted she herself would ever have such self-control, if she were in Linnis's place. It was a strain for Annika to bottle all of her traumas enough to get through an average work day on Voyager. Behind the closed doors of the Cargo Bay, she'd broken down to Laura and Xin over things that seemed downright petty now.
"There must be billions of realities," Harry urged, coming around to face Linnis. "There's probably a universe where I was never born. And you're married to Dr. Van Gough."
The Doctor looked over sharply, clearly as disconcerted by the idea as everyone else.
Linnis cocked her head at her husband, unimpressed.
Tom mumbled, "Not helping, Harry."
Linnis swallowed, and shook her head. "I'm gone over there. Andrew's gone. And neither of you notice. The captain doesn't notice, Dr. Van Gough doesn't notice..."
Dr. Van Gough muttered, "Technically there is no Dr. Van Gough on that Voyager. I'm just 'the Doctor.' The bald Doctor."
Next to him, Laura sighed deeply. "I wonder where I am."
Annika took a seat on a nearby biobed. By all accounts, she had suffered the least in the last hour. She was the only one in the room with no direct connection to this B'Elanna person. Annika wasn't receiving any visits from a dead loved one; nor having a relationship interrupted by such a visit; or learning that she'd come close to being erased from existence. With what Linnis, Tom, and everyone else were going through, Annika had no business feeling…anything. But in her own little bubble, she was having her own existential crisis.
She kept replaying B'Elanna's story in her mind. What the half-Klingon woman had told her about her counterpart, in the other universe. No Unimatrix Zero. Well, there had been a Unimatrix Zero, over there; but Annika didn't remember it in that universe, not until just recently. Her counterpart had come out of the Collective with her last human memories being her assimilation. Had spent almost four years on Voyager, with nothing but a Borg drone and a traumatized six-year-old to form her adult personality. And she'd come alone. No Laura. No Xin. No name. They called her "Seven of Nine" in that universe, or "Seven." Admittedly, the name could sound rather intriguing, if it didn't have such sickening memories attached to it.
How lonely was her counterpart? Annika thought she was lonely enough here, with no family. Without Axum. And most of her closet friends from Unimatrix Zero now out of reach (except when she chose to reenter that realm while regenerating). Annika had been doing her best to act professional on Voyager, but it was clear that she was the "baby" of the three former drones. She clung to Laura and Xin for companionship like a scared child at a new school following around the two kids she knew from the neighborhood. She was getting along well with Dr. Van Gough, due to their similar tastes; but she thought of him so much like a teacher, that friendship almost hadn't occurred to her. Icheb and Mezoti were kids; she couldn't show weak eyes to them.
But then, at the same time, B'Elanna had said that "Seven of Nine" was one of Voyager's strongest assets. She'd single-handedly saved the ship on multiple occasions, and acted as an invaluable advisor, with her bank of Borg knowledge. Annika could see how she fulfilled those roles here, too; but she did it as one of three such assets, and the weakest thereof. Laura had the same Borg abilities as Annika, plus experience in Starfleet (and the real world in general). Xin had the same knowledge from the Collective, plus ten other lifetimes worth of experience. Annika had nothing to offer her Voyager that someone else couldn't do far better.
The Klingon in the room was raising his voice.
"All I ask," Kohlar urged, "Is that you help repair my ship, and allow B'Elanna and me to be on our way."
Captain Chakotay kept his Starfleet composure, but an edge still crept into his voice. "You're asking me to send B'Elanna—a pregnant woman—after a ship full of rogue warriors. Surely you can understand my dilemma here?"
Annika noted how he'd said "rogue warriors," instead of simply saying "Klingons," like a lot of other officers probably would have. People were often so careless with words. Chakotay seemed to pick them very carefully. Axum had been the same way.
"Captain," Kohlar insisted, "B'Elanna and I have done this multiple times before, with virtually no trouble—"
"Virtually?"
Kohlar huffed. "What do you think they'll do to her? Klingons have codes of honor, especially regarding the lives of children and women."
"In your universe they do. But you have no idea what your counterparts may be like. Surely you've heard of the so-called 'Mirror Universe,' that Captain Kirk discovered…"
The famed "Mirror Universe." The Borg were aware of it. They'd assimilated plenty of individuals who'd heard the famous story. Odd, Annika thought, that no one had brought that universe up yet, in all these conversations. The Annika Hanson who'd gone out exploring with her parents would have been fascinated by all this talk of parallel realities. But the one sitting in Sickbay could hardly make herself care.
Watching the captain "negotiate" with Kohlar, Annika was reminded of how dead she was inside. Years ago, she'd probably have found him ragingly attractive. She wished she could be attracted to him. She wished she could get that rush of fear and excitement, like she had for her crushes growing up in Unimatrix Zero. Seeing Chakotay fight the Borg in Unimatrix Zero should have sent thrills through her. Seeing him take charge in front of this Klingon should excite her. Instead, all she saw was a pale imitation of the brave, soft-spoken man she'd loved in Unimatrix Zero. She was honestly sick of grieving for Axum, and wanted to just put it behind her. But for reasons she couldn't understand, she just couldn't wake up that part of her emotions again. She wondered if her Borg implants were preventing her emotions from fully "waking up." Or maybe this was some kind of human chemical imbalance, that Dr. Van Gough could treat. Should she ask? No, everyone would probably just accuse her of being a hypochondriac, and tell her she "just needed time."
"Annika?" Laura's voice derailed Annika's train of thought. "You alright?"
Annika emitted a barely audible laugh. "I should be the one asking you that, shouldn't I?"
Laura turned away. "I learned years ago not to waste time on envy."
Annika stared at her old friend. "Laura what are you talking about?"
"Tom just got to re-meet someone who died years ago. Everyone in this room is envious of that."
Of course the older woman was right. Beneath all the confusion and depression, Annika was seething with fury at the fact that the universe had chosen to dump B'Elanna here for Tom, and not Axum for her. It wasn't fair. And the worst of it was that her counterpart was separated from Axum too. She'd asked B'Elanna—casually of course—about the drones in Unimatrix Zero. B'Elanna knew that "Seven of Nine" had a "friend" named Axum, in Unimatrix Zero. B'Elanna had also known about Korak, and "a woman who'd been assimilated at Wolf 359." No word on how any of them were doing now, because in that universe, Unimatrix Zero had been destroyed, it's former inhabitants scattered across the galaxy with no way of contacting each other.
"I can't be with him, even over there. In that reality." Annika said quietly.
She knew Laura was too kind to say, "Then maybe it just wasn't meant to be," and too pragmatic to say, "love will always find a way." So instead the older woman just took Annika's hand and squeezed it.
It was good to know she had friends, at least in one universe.
"Where are you going?" Tom suddenly asked.
Laura and Annika glanced up, and saw Linnis headed for the door.
"Home," the half-Ocampan said, without looking back. She added bitterly, "I wanna make sure Andrew hasn't disappeared."
Annika watched the doors hiss shut behind Linnis, still lost in her own thoughts.
Seven of Nine. Saved Voyager from deadly space anomalies, starship-eating aliens, the Borg, and more…This was the same person as Annika?
After Linnis stormed out, everyone else in Sickbay began to slowly disperse. The captain stayed to continue speaking to Kohlar, and the Doctor remained in case he was needed. Harry went after Linnis, no doubt because he, too, secretly wanted some reassurance that his son still existed. Laura and Annika returned to the Cargo Bay.
Tom felt like he was being stretched in three different directions. He wanted to follow his daughter, and continue to comfort her, lest she think he cared more about his dead girlfriend than her. He wanted to follow Laura, and reassure her he still wanted her, fearful she'd conclude that B'Elanna was his real "true love" and that she herself was just a cheap substitute, and try to take the high ground by "admitting" that she and Tom "weren't' meant to be." And he wanted to go after B'Elanna, and find out as much as he could about her, before she left him again.
He wound up headed for Harry and Linnis's quarters, not quite sure what he'd do when he got there. Harry answered the door, and timidly told Tom that Linnis wasn't really in the mood to talk. Shamefully, Tom was relieved, since this narrowed his options, and he headed for the Cargo Bay.
Laura and Annika were preparing for "bed" (regeneration). Annika's green uniform jacket was hanging opened when she answered the door; apparently she'd been in the middle of stripping to her silver biosuit for the night. Behind her, Icheb and Mezoti were already "asleep" in their regeneration alcoves.
"Sorry," Tom stammered. "I just uh, wondered if Laura had a minute."
"Tom?" Laura's voice echoed from the decontamination chamber (which the former drones used as a washroom). "Hang on, I'll be right out."
Tom and Annika waited awkwardly in the doorway. Annika offered to let Tom come inside, but he declined, saying he was going to bed soon, and just wanted a quick word with Laura.
"So," Tom searched for something to say to Laura's roommate while they waited. "You going to Unimatrix Zero tonight?"
"No," Annika said. "I've only been there a few times since being freed, mostly to chaperone Icheb and Mezoti. I don't want to go back any time soon." After an awkward silence, she added, "Laura's gone a few times."
"So how does it work," Tom asked. "Do you have to pre-program the alcove to send you to Unamatrix Zero? Or do you just think really hard about it before going to—"
Laura finally emerged from the decontamination chamber. It was the first time Tom had seen Laura wearing only her biosuit, and she looked fantastic in it. He began wondering what B'Elanna would look like in the silver suit, then shoved the image from his mind. Annika left to take her turn in the washroom.
As she crossed the room to meet Tom in the doorway, Laura answered his question: "Dr. Van Gough figured out a way for us to adjust our cerebral implants to capture the Unimatrix Zero frequency, if we want to reenter. But we have to check up with him first before we do, since there are risks. You don't want to do it every night anyway; you wake up exhausted. No one should be quite that conscious when they're dreaming." She shrugged. "As drones, I guess we were 'asleep' when we were awake."
"Laura," Tom gapped. "Listen. With B'Elanna here, I don't want you to think—"
"Tom," Laura assured him. "We're grownups. We've both had," she hesitated, "previous relationships." She swung her arms. "It's not every day you get to say hello again, to someone you've lost."
It suddenly occurred to Tom that B'Elanna might not be the one who Laura was envying.
Of course. Laura rarely talked about her assimilation, or her adult life before it. She loved chatting nonstop about her childhood, her Academy days, and Unimatrix Zero. But the starship she'd served on, that she'd said virtually nothing about.
"I mean it Tom," Laura insisted. "Talk to B'Elanna, while you still can. If you don't I'm positive you'll regret it."
Probably far too casually, Tom said, "You lost someone too, didn't you. Aboard the Firebrand."
Laura responded with a weak laugh. "Goodnight Tom."
The Cargo Bay door shut in his face.
Tom stepped into the mess hall to find B'Elanna sitting near the galley, finishing a plate of banana pancakes. She was talking to Chell, who was running a sonic fan over the counter (vaporizing crumbs and spills). Tom wondered what Chell was doing in the mess hall at this time of night. Then he recalled how much time had passed since that distress call, and realized it might be morning already. Indeed, the Mess Hall lights were on, and the place had the sparse patrons it normally did at 0500 hours. Amelia Jenkins was at a table with Lt. Ashmore—one of the nightshift engineers—probably having supper. Tal Celes and Billy Telfer were on a couch in the back, having breakfast and coffee. Everyone was clearly watching B'Elanna and trying to catch her every word, without looking like they were staring.
"Just when I thought I was getting used to it," B'Elanna said to Chell, "I walk onto the bridge, and Daniel Byrd is at Ops! If I'd been holding something breakable it would've shattered."
"Shattered because of you dropping it," Chell asked, "or throwing it?"
"Both!"
Seeing B'Elanna not only alive, but laughing, and pregnant, it was painfully surreal. Still, Tom headed for her table, ignoring the stares from around the mess hall. B'Elanna began to say something else to Chell, but stopped when Tom came in front of her.
Casually, Tom asked, "You ran into Daniel Byrd on one of the other Voyagers?"
"That's right." B'Elanna said. "I guess Harry and I told you about Daniel Byrd?"
Tom pulled out a chair for himself, taking a seat across from her. "He was Harry's best friend at the Academy. And then, it turned out that you went to grade school with Byrd, twenty years earlier! You hacked the gyro-swing on the playground so he started spinning so fast he almost suffered permanent brain damage!"
"You failed to mention that!" Chell called from the galley.
"Must've slipped my mind," B'Elanna said. "Believe me, the p'tach had it coming." She had a gulp of orange juice before continuing. "Anyway, if you thought Harry and me both knowing Byrd was a crazy coincidence, apparently in one of those universes out there, Daniel Byrd got Harry's position on Voyager! Harry's back home on Earth, married to his old girlfriend Libby. And Daniel's Voyager's communications officer."
Tom's eyes widened. "I wonder what that reunion was like! A half-Klingon Maquis climbs aboard a Federation ship, and sees the guy who bullied her all through in grade school"
B'Elanna shook her head with an ironic laugh. "Well apparently my counterpart wound up developing quite a history with him. "
"I guess he'd changed a lot since elementary school."
B'Elanna gave it some thought, then shook her head. "No, not from what I saw." Poking at the ruminants of her pancakes, she added, "I think you two would've gotten along."
"Would have? You mean I wasn't on this Voyager either?"
"No. For some reason, you and Harry both got left behind on Earth. Amelia Jenkins is the conn officer over there, and Jor's the nightshift pilot."
Tom blinked, taking in the information. "Any idea why we got left behind?"
She shrugged. "Daniel got picked for the position, Harry didn't. Their Captain Janeway mentioned you almost coming aboard Voyager to help catch the Maquis, but you got into a brawl on Deep Space Nine and were held back from the mission."
Tom's jaw slowly dropped. "Hey! Harry said something about that once. Some kind of alternate reality he got stuck in."
"He told me that once, too," B'Elanna said. "Just like Kes told us about this…timeline. I guess somewhere, all of those realities came true."
Boy, was that a loaded thought.
"So what kind of 'history' did you and Daniel Byrd have, in that universe?"
"From what they told me over there, it was a lot like you and me." B'Elanna was talking about these realities with surprising calm, but was clearly still recovering from the shock factor. "Byrd and Torres butted horns, before eventually getting married. Byrd's the father, of my twins in that universe."
"Twins?"
"A boy and a girl. Miral and Tristan, after my mother and Byrd's father."
Tom blew through is lips. "Wow. Wait a minute, I thought you were only going to universes without a 'kuvah'magh'?"
"That, and universes where the kuvah'magh didn't accomplish her mission. In that universe, Voyager was just coming up on that Klingon crew. The timelines don't all line up perfectly, I guess. So Kohlar and I sort of helped her and Byrd from behind the scenes."
"That must've been awkward." Tom said.
B'Elanna agreed. "Especially since the twins were already born. With me, I was pregnant, so the ambiguity helped a lot with the mystique. Convincing a ship of Klingons that their saviors are two toddlers takes a lot more creativity."
Tom blinked widely. "I'll bet."
B'Elanna continued munching her pancakes and drinking her orange juice. Tom felt left out with nothing to eat or drink, so he ordered some coffee from Chell. While the Bolian went to fetch it, Tom asked B'Elanna, "So how many universes have you been to? Five, Kohlar said?"
"I think it was a bit more than that." B'Elanna set down her fork. "Let me think. There's the one with Daniel Byrd; one where the Federation never made peace with the Klingons; one where the Alpha Quadrant's the same, but Voyager never got lost; one where," she hesitated, "we tried using the slipstream drive to get home, but only Harry and Chakotay made it back. Another one where I was killed by Kes, right before she tried to unravel history," B'Elanna momentarily ignored the shock on Tom's face. "One where the Year of Hell happened, but not the one your crew experienced; a different one." She breathed deeply, and finished, "And one that's almost exactly like mine, but where I…had my baby genetically altered, to become a human."
"Hang on," Tom's hands rose just an inch or so from the table. "Back up. Did you say that Kes killed you in one of those timelines?"
"Yes. It was when she returned to Voy—" she stopped, and muttered, "I keep forgetting how different this ship is."
Chell arrived with Tom's coffee, and decided to jump back into the conversation. "How did Kohler rope you into this in the first place?"
"Well," B'Elanna leaned back in her chair. "It was pretty sudden. I was asleep, with Tom." Her eyes flicked to the Tom in front of her, but she continued, knowing she didn't need to specify which Tom. "We'd just lost Carrey the previous day. Tom and I, we both needed…we'd both been bothered by that."
"You're talking about Joe Carrey?" Tom asked, taking his coffee from Chell.
She nodded. "I worked with him in Engineering, and y—Tom, was with him when he was killed. I don't suppose Carrey's alive here?"
"We lost him in the Year of Hell," Tom replied, his eyes locked on B'Elanna.
She decided to hurry her story along. "Well we stayed up playing chess to distract ourselves, and then went to bed. The next thing I knew I was waking up aboard an alien ship, and there was Kohlar. He told me how his little empire had been doing, thanks to the kuvah'magh," she touched her stomach. "and he explained to me how other universes seemed to be missing their savior."
Chell seemed baffled. "And you just agreed to help him?"
"Not at first," B'Elanna defended. "I thought he was crazy. I still think he is."
Tom asked, "What did he promise you?"
She unconsciously looked down at her unborn child. "Honor. Honor for my baby. And for me."
Tom stared in disbelief. "You never cared about honor. Not until…"
"We were floating in space." B'Elanna finished.
Chell cleared his throat. "I've got other tables to get to."
The Bolian left them alone, and went straight to Jenkins and Ashmore, who'd been staring at Tom and B'Elanna. He asked if he could get them anything, clearly trying to send them a hint that they should stop eavesdropping on Tom and B'Elanna.
Tom made to take a sip of his coffee, then set the cup back down. "So let me go over this one more time," he said to B'Elanna. "Just to make sure I've got it. Our timelines diverged when Voyager was coming up on Borg space. When we were going to use that wormhole to try skipping it. But in your universe, Kes warned you about the Krenim on the other side, because she'd already seen the future."
"That's right." Staring into space, B'Elanna said quietly, "I never realized just how much I owed her for that."
"She sacrificed her family," Tom said, equally dazed. "Her daughter, her grandson…"
B'Elanna blinked out of her trance, and seemed to flounder for something appropriate to say. "Her memory of those events wasn't complete," she finally defended. "She only 'knew' bits and pieces of them, at least by the time she got back to us. To her it must've seemed like a strange dream."
"But you and the captain were real to her." Tom finished. "So she had to think of you two."
It was a sickening choice that was driving Tom mad. The thought of Linnis and Andrew never being born chilled him. But looking at B'Elanna's pregnant stomach, and knowing there was a child brewing between him and B'Elanna—the woman he'd loved more than anyone else—the thought that he'd missed that was also torturing him.
He finally decided to go for his coffee, before it got cold. "So that's why you did it?" Tom tried not to sound too harsh, but didn't hide how absurd he found it all. "You let Kohlar drag you through the multiverse, because he promised you honor? What if it has some effects on the baby? And besides, won't your Tom notice you're missing?"
"It won't. And he won't. No one will know I've been gone. When we get back to my Voyager, only a few hours will have passed. The different universes aren't perfectly in sync. Time runs at different speeds in each one. Kohlar proved it to me, after our trip to the first universe. We'd been there for two days. But when we returned to Voyag—my Voyager, less than five minutes had passed."
The coffee didn't taste quite right. Chell had used the fat-free creamer, when Tom had specifically asked for regular. He'd probably been distracted listening to B'Elanna.
Casually, Tom asked, "So I just slept through you and a Klingon talking about the timeline in our quarters?"
"We moved our conversation to the washroom to avoid waking you."
"How thoughtful."
Hesitantly, B'Elanna said, "I'm not just doing this because Kohlar promised me honor. I want to feel like I've done something…right. For the Klingon Empire. And I want my baby to grow up knowing she did something right, right from the start. So no matter what happens later on…Besides, how many people get to say they've been a parallel universe?"
"I have to admit," Tom said, "my curiosity would probably get the better of me. Why didn't you invite Tom to come along?"
"I don't know," she honestly seemed to be wondering the same thing herself. "It was happening so fast, I guess I just didn't want to wake you. And I think I was worried about you. The baby won't be doing anything reckless, I know that. But husbands are another story."
More people were arriving for breakfast, lining up at the galley. Tom was starting to get self-conscious about this conversation. He decided to lighten the mood.
"So, wanna tell me about some of the other Voyagers you saw? Or is there a prime directive about parallel universes?"
A few people in the breakfast line looked over. Some caught themselves, but others were openly listening, as if the conversation were a public lecture.
B'Elanna ignored them. "If there is I've never heard of it. Let's see," her eyes moved thoughtfully. "The first universe we visited was the one where the Federation was still at war with the Klingons. In that one, I'm alive, but I'm in the Alpha Quadrant. Captain Janeway was kind enough to look my counterpart up for me in her database. I'm serving aboard a Klingon vessel, with Colonel Worf, and Commander K'Ehleyr. Don't ask how Starfleet got that information."
Tom had heard of Ambassador K'Ehleyr, from his B'Elanna. Ambassador K'Ehleyr had been the most famous Klingon/human hybrid in the quadrant. She'd been about a decade older than B'Elanna, and the two had been long-distance friends, until K'Ehleyr's murder. But apparently in the universe B'Elanna was describing now, K'Ehleyr was still alive.
"So what was Voyager like?" Tom asked. "What was Captain Janeway like? What was I like?"
"Their Captain Janeway's pretty similar to ours. But she had a rougher edge. She was a lot more stern. And she's still got the bun." She drummed her fingers on the table, trying to think of more details. "She's married to Chakotay. Chakotay," B'Elanna's eyebrows rose. "is an atheist, with no tattoo, and his father is alive. They don't get along. And their Doctor's a little more Gothic in his literary tastes; he's picked the name Dr. Seward."
Tom squinted. "Dr. Seward…like from 'Dracula?'"
She nodded. "I'm not there of course. Carrey's alive, he's their chief engineer. Kes is onboard, and she's married to Harry."
Tom almost choked on his coffee. Kes? Harry? Admittedly, there had once been a time when Kes and Harry were both just two shipmates, around the sage "age," with similar personalities. Maybe it wouldn't seem so weird if his Harry wasn't married to his Kes's daughter.
"I'm afraid to ask who I'm married to," Tom finally said.
"You're married to a Betazoid woman, named Stadi."
"Stadi! She was—"
"Voyager's original conn officer." B'Elanna said flatly. "Who you tried flirting with. You've told me. Well, actually Harry told me, but you admitted to it."
Someone from the breakfast line—Mariah Henley—said, "So I take it there was no Maquis movement in that universe."
B'Elanna glanced up at her old Maquis comrade. "No, Mariah. In that universe, Voyager wound up in the Badlands when it was chasing a Klingon probe. I don't remember if you were onboard or not."
Mariah shook her head, like it didn't matter. "Wherever I was, I'm sure I was shooting at something or blowing something up."
B'Elanna shared a laugh with her old shipmates. Tom had to admire how well everyone in the Mess Hall was taking B'Elanna's visit. Granted, it wasn't like strange things didn't happen all the time on Voyager. Maybe everyone was being nostalgic, not just for the days when their old chief engineer was alive, but for when Voyager was constantly encountering bizarre anomalies like this on a weekly basis.
B'Elanna turned back to Tom. "Once they got to the Delta Quadrant, things seemed to play out pretty much the same. Compared to my timeline I mean. They got Seven of Nine, Naomi was born…"
"It can't've been the same without you." Tom said.
She smiled, somewhat uncomfortably. Of course she was feeling uncomfortable. Who wouldn't be a bit bothered, visiting universe after universe where they were dead or absent, and their husband was married to someone else?
"So tell me about some of the other universes." Tom urged.
"Alright." B'Elanna pushed away her empty plate. "The next one we went to, that was the one with Daniel Byrd. That one's almost identical to ours. I mean to mine." She sighed. "The next one was where Voyager never got lost. Kohlar and I got to that universe, and there was just no Voyager. For all we could tell, the ship might've been destroyed, any one of those times we were all almost killed."
Tom did his best not to dwell on that thought.
"Then," B'Elanna's voice took an edge again. "Kes showed up. But she wasn't like the we ever knew. She was somehow…evolved. She'd somehow sensed Kohlar's and my arrival to her universe, and tracked us down. She told us what Voyager had done. In her universe, Janeway used the Array to get Voyager home."
B'Elanna stopped awkwardly. She clearly didn't want to tell Tom anything about his late wife that might upset him.
"That doomed the Ocampa," Tom said, "didn't it."
B'Elanna nodded. "She had some pretty mixed feelings about that."
"I'll bet." Tom tried not to think about his beloved wife as an embittered, sub-humanoid entity. Then, another awful thought struck him."But if Voyager never got lost, then you and Chakotay—"
"Are probably dead." B'Elanna said quietly. "But who knows, Tom. We survived the Delta Quadrant, who says we didn't survive the Dominion."
But you didn't survive the Delta Quadrant, Tom thought sadly.
B'Elanna seemed to sense the irony of what she'd just said. She reached for her orange juice.
"Okay." Tom was determined to keep the topic rolling, before his emotions got the better of him. "So how many universes we got so far?" he began ticking them off on his fingers. "The Daniel Byrd universe, the no-Klingon-treaty universe, the Voyager-never-got-lost universe…Where'd you go next?"
B'Elanna swallowed her juice. "The next universe, the exact same thing happened; no Voyager, and we were found by an evolved Kes. But Harry was with her this time. They told us Voyager was in the Beta Quadrant, buried under twenty feet of ice. We'd tried an experimental slipstream drive to get us back to Earth, and it failed. That probably didn't happen in your timeline. But we tried it in mine, and it didn't work. But luckily no one was hurt. In that universe though, Harry and Chakotay made it back to Earth in the Delta Flyer, and everyone else was killed." B'Elanna rubbed the back of her neck. "I can't remember how, or why, but somehow Kes wound up learning that something had gone wrong—this was after she'd left Voyager remember—and somehow she got all the way back to Earth, to Harry and Chakotay. It was awful. Harry blamed himself for the miscalculation that killed the crew. But Kes helped him through it." B'Elanna grimaced. "I'm sorry to freak you out again Tom, but Harry was…with Kes, in this universe. He said if she hadn't found them, he would have probably gone insane."
"Kes can have that effect," Tom said. "She could be there for you when no one else could."
"You must've loved her." B'Elanna's sympathy was surprisingly sincere.
"I did." Tom admitted. "She wasn't the same as you, but I did." He cleared his throat. "So what, are Harry and Chakotay settled on Earth? Or are they running around the galaxy with Kes?"
"Chakotay's on Earth, teaching at the Academy. Kes thinks he's going to get married in his older years; apparently she's achieved precognition in that universe. She and Harry left Earth to explore the universe together. The Doctor's with them too; they salvaged him from Voyager. So, Harry, the Doctor and Kes helped Kohlar and me with our kuvah'magh mission. And then it was Universe…what number am I on?"
Tom quickly counted tem off. "Five?"
"Five. Right. The next one…that was the one where Kes returned to Voyager, after leaving to explore her powers for a few years."
Tom shifted uncomfortably. "You told us in Sickbay, something went wrong for her out there, and she blamed Voyager. Why? What happened to her?"
"We never found out," B'Elanna said regretfully. "But the Doctor thinks it has to do with her not being able to adjust to all of her new powers as fast as she was developing, because of that Ocampan lifespan." B'Elanna quickly assured Tom, "She was okay, in the end. She went home to Ocampa."
"But in one of those alternate timelines she created, she killed you."
B'Elanna looked back down, and nodded. "When she returned to Voyager, she tore the ship apart with her mind. She tried to do something with the warp core, and I wound up getting in the way. The Doctor couldn't revive me. Whatever Kes wanted to do with the warp core, it didn't work. She killed a few more people out of rage—including Sam Wildman. Seven was the only one who could get close to her, her Borg physiology was the only thing that could withstand Kes's powers. She managed to hold Kes off long enough for you to—" B'Elanna stopped.
Tom finished, "I killed her."
B'Elanna swallowed and nodded.
"How?" Tom asked flatly.
"Seven said you vaporized her with your phaser, set to the highest setting. After that you blamed yourself, for some reason. But you recovered. You're engaged to Megan Delaney now." Her tone shifted, back-to-business like. "But, no kuvah'magh. So naturally, Kohlar and I had to step in."
"Was that the last one?" Tom said. "The last universe I mean?"
"No. Before this one, there were two more. We visited one where Voyager had spent a year in Krenim Space, the 'Year of Hell' as you call it. But the captain and I survived that one. And Kes wasn't with us, Seven was. We lost Voyager, and a lot of the crew. Tuvok was blind for a while. So the main difference between that universe and mine was that they were a year behind in their journey, and had a new ship."
"If they were a year behind, how did you contact them to learn all this?" Tom asked. "You and Kohlar just appear in the same general area of each universe, right?"
"Right. We found out because a nearby alien race had technology for communicating across vast distances. I talked to my counterpart, gave her a heads up on what we were doing. Tried to help her be prepared, for when Voyager does go past those Klingons, in about a year."
"She didn't have a problem with you basically impersonating her, to these guys?"
"It's me Tom, of course there were problems. But we worked them out. I mean, I worked them out. With myself." She rubbed her forehead, then signed once more. "I like to think she's looking forward to meeting them."
"But she is pregnant?" Tom pressed.
"Yes. She's pregnant. And married to Tom Paris."
That news warmed him. Which was more than could be said for the coffee; it was lukewarm now.
"What's their new ship like?"
"It's an alien vessel, I don't remember the species. My counterpart said that an alien deliberately constructed it to resemble Federation ships, part of some ploy to lure them all to their deaths. That happened in my universe too."
Tom shook his head. "Never happened here. And if it had, Kes would've sensed the trap before anyone set foot on that ship."
"Too bad we didn't have Kes to warn us," B'Elanna said wearily. "It was a whole fiasco with us. And that Voyager too, from the sound of it. They were even more susceptible to his plan, because they didn't have Voyager anymore. They were traveling in shuttles and escape pods. But they outsmarted the alien, and reprogrammed the ship to make it usable. They named it the Odysseus."
Tom had to laugh. "Was that my idea?"
"Yours and Chakotay's, they said. You both were always big into mythology."
"I'll bet it was fun, figuring out how to fly that thing." Tom finished off his coffee.
"And how to run it," B'Elanna added.
Once again, Tom was painfully reminded that he and B'Elanna were together in another reality.
"Anything else different in that universe?" Tom asked.
B'Elanna thought it over. "Seven and Chakotay are together."
"Seven meaning Annika?"
"Annika, right." B'Elanna seemed to find it jarring, to refer to "Seven" by her real name. "A lot more people have families, it seems. Jenkins and Ayala are married, with a baby boy. Jor and Tabor are on their second child. Tal and Billy are engaged….I guess the Year of Hell had a pretty big effect on them."
The Year of Hell had certainly affected everyone in this universe, Tom thought.
"So that leaves one more Voyager, right?"
"Yep. One more." B'Elanna seemed to think this one was the most difficult. "It was identical to mine, but I'd…I'd changed my daughter's genetics. Made her human. So she couldn't be a kuvah'magh. I urged my counterpart to tell the Doctor the truth, and have him revert what he'd done. But she was convinced this was the only way to…to give her daughter a good life. I wound up doing the kuvah'magh thing without her. But I told her," B'Elanna's voice and face became more somber than Tom had seen all night, "that someday, her daughter's going to wonder what's missing from her soul, and she'll have some explaining to do."
Tom stared at the woman across the table from him. B'Elanna had changed drastically since the Year of Hell. She'd grown up, essentially. The B'Elanna he'd been mourning for three years was a spunky, young woman with short hair, conflicted and self-loathing. The one in front of him was…for lack of a better word, a mom. Oddly, she almost reminded him of Captain Janeway, in that regard. Well, of course she did; what other (female) role model would B'Elanna have had for the last seven years?
It made Tom happy—relieved—that B'Elanna was alive in so many realities. Alive and with him, and pregnant with his child. But by the same token, something else was bothering him, immensely. He looked over his shoulder, to see how many people were still eavesdropping. Not many, and none openly.
"B'Elanna," Tom lowered his voice, "it seems like in a lot of these universe, we got more time together. I like that. But you have to admit, it's a little weird; even when you're going specifically to the Voyagers without a kuvah'magh, there's still no…."
B'Elanna wasn't following him.
"Linnis and Andrew," he finished.
Her face changed. "I've only been to six universes," she offered. "There could be hundreds of Linnises and Andrews out there."
"But I feel like there's a reason you didn't find any." Tom became grim. "I noticed some patterns in the universes you described. A lot of those events almost came true in all the universes, but didn't because someone changed history."
B'Elanna was silent.
"All of this did happen, in most of those universes, didn't it. It just got undone, when Kes was sent back in time"
"Tom I, I'm sorry. I should never have told you about…that…with Linnis in the room."
Tom shook his head. "It's over. Just, please, B'Elanna, don't tell Linnis about this conversation. I don't think she'd like it. It's hard enough knowing she's missing from one universe…"
"I won't Tom. I promise. She'll never know."
Tom wasn't consoled. "She already suspects that I didn't love her mother as much as it seemed. Having you back, it's just rubbing it in her face. That you were my first choice."
B'Elanna's face melted into a sympathy that surprised Tom. "I know how she feels. That day you find out your parents don't really love each other."
Tom almost wished he could tell Linnis, just so she could see B'Elanna's sympathy. Almost.
Linnis lay in bed next to Harry, turned away from her husband. Her eyes were shut and her breathing steady, not because she was asleep, but because she was concentrating. She'd never eavesdropped on others thoughts before for more than a few seconds. But it was impossible not to breach that rule of telepathic etiquette tonight. She'd been waiting intently for any news of her son or herself in the other universes, from her father's conversation with B'Elanna on the other side of the ship. Those final words between Dad and the half-Klingon finally drove the point home.
Linnis decided she needed to use the washroom, and left the bed. Harry was still snoring. Instead of going to the washroom, she stopped to check on Andrew. His snoring pattern was almost identical to his father's. She still couldn't believe he was already a teenager. Even before that coma, even being half-Ocampan, it still seemed like Andrew had grown up in the blink of an eye. How many generations of this family had Kes erased, when she'd changed the timeline in that other universe?
And the sympathy B'Elanna had expressed for Linnis…normally Linnis would be impressed by that. Objectively she was. But emotionally it only upset her more. She'd sensed the general emotions along with Tom and B'Elanna's words, and traces of their thoughts; and B'Elanna was viewing Linnis's family like her own, and like dozens of others she'd seen and heard about. Like they were just another average, dysfunctional family. And Linnis refused to believe there was anything "average" about her parents' relationship. Tom and Kes's love had been perfect. They'd been the couple everyone else onboard was jealous of, the ones who never fought and never mistreated each other. B'Elanna's casual sympathy was patronizing, insulting.
She left Andrew's room and finally headed for the washroom, deciding that the sooner this B'Elanna Torres was off the ship, the happier she'd be.
A/N: This is possibly the longest filler chapter I've ever written for a story. I apologize for 16 pages of literally nothing. The next chapter will continue the plot, I promise.
I can't believe that I've gone this long without mentioning JBHart's story "One Possible Future." To my knowledge, it is the only story on the internet besides this one which deals with Tom and B'Elanna learning about the possible future of "Before and After."
I also highly recommend "The Folly of the Stewards" by Cojack, which deals with multiple universes for Voyager.
