Episode Fix for Stardust City Rag, I will not accept Icheb's death and neither will Q!

Minor appearance from Tom Paris.

Altering the Timeline

There was no way to explain the sudden stab in his chest. He's not even corporeal in that instance. No physical, let alone humanoid, form. And yet…

Q appears on a moon somewhere in the Beta Quadrant with curly hair and a lanky build. He hadn't been trying to look as he had when he'd visited his Aunty Kathy back in the Dark Days, but…well…when he thought of being human, that's what happened.

It's only once he's 'human' that Q recognizes the feeling in his chest - he's even got one now! - as an ache. A sharp, constant, throbbing ache. Q blinks a sudden onslaught of tears out of his eyes. He touches his cheek as the liquid slides down his flesh.

"What's…" Q shakes his head. The tears continue and his throat begins to itch. "Why is this happening?" Q looks around, half-expecting his father to pop up and explain some universal and utterly obvious Q trait.

The moon stays empty.

Another stab in his chest sends him to his knees and Q gags on a sob that racks through his body. He presses his palms to the ground, particles of dirt scratch at his skin as they haven't in decades.

Being corporeal, being human. It was always far too much…feeling…for Q. This was no exception.

With a scream, it tumbles into his mind. Icheb. It's Icheb. That's the pain. Icheb, his only friend, the only person in the whole of reality that Q had ever felt…fear…for.

Icheb was dead.

The cold, hard fact dropped directly into Q's head, as every other fact did when he wanted to know something, but it tumbled through his body to settle in his gut like a rock. A rough, pointy rock that wouldn't move no matter how much he vomited.

Q hadn't eaten in years. He'd been floating in a nebula for over a dozen years. He didn't comprehend how his stomach could find food to churn and force up his throat. It did though.

Because Q was alone. No friends. Nothing to tether him to this reality. No…Icheb.

Because Icheb was dead and when mortals died they stayed that way. They stayed dead. Icheb…would stay dead.

"No." Q wipes his mouth and glares at the puddle of sick below him. He sits up, he takes a breath. "No." Q shakes his head and snaps his fingers.

Seven aims a phaser at him as Q appears on Vergessen. He holds his hands up, unarmed as he always is. Seven is crying, her lips are trembling with sobs as she holds Icheb up to cradle him in her arms.

"Hello, Seven," Q attempts to smile, but his mind is too busy taking in the details of the butcher shop he stands in. The blood smeared plastic that hangs from the ceiling in some ironic attempt at hygiene. Borg parts hang like beef from racks. "I'm thinking of becoming a vegetarian, how bout you?"

Her brows furrow and Seven lowers her phaser, "Q?" She's still shaking, but her arms loosen slightly at her realization. Q is busy staring at the facial implants sitting in a metal tray. He'd recognize the metal bits even without the brow and nose ridge that they usually decorate.

"I'd never let Ichy ditch me," Q forces his lips up even as his human form screams in grief. Seven looks at him skeptically. Q snaps his fingers again.

Seven startles at her sudden appearance on a starship. She is quickly distracted from this teleportation when Icheb heaves a breath, coughing as he turns away from Seven. She grasps him firmly and holds his head between her palms as she kneels over her child.

The grey walls of the U.S.S. Coleman are lit only by constant green buzz of a regeneration station. Q stands beside it as he watches Seven's mouth open in a strangled sob.

"Seven?" Icheb looks up at her, his implants have returned. Seven runs her fingers over the metal on his brow. He flinches at the proximity of her hand and Seven retreats. He blinks frantically. "What happened?" He coughs put his words and attempts to sit up.

"You were…being dismantled…" Seven stumbles over her words. She sits back on her legs, kneeling still beside Icheb as he runs his own hands over his face and his eyes.

Icheb shakes his head, "No… I. I remember that Seven. I meant..." Icheb gestures at his face and then at the walls of his quarters, "…how is this possible?"

"Anything's possible if you're not concerned about messing with the timeline." Q pips up. He rocks backwards on his heels, hands stuffed in his pockets. He's wearing a Starfleet uniform, the same one as Icheb actually, not that he'd done that on purpose. "Which, ya know, I could never quite get myself to care about."

Seven chuckles, a watery smile spreads across her face, "Thank you, Q." He shrugs. He can see the rage behind her current joy. Icheb is back now, but someone still killed him. That part of the timeline at least will remain intact.

"Anything for Itchy." Q takes a flourishing bow.

Icheb raises a brow, the one without the implant, "You agreed not to call me that."

"Around senior officers!" Q stabs a finger into the air and then gestures out towards the room, "No officers, no refrain."

"That's a technicality…" Icheb states as he moves to stand. Seven helps him to his feet, rising with him. Icheb grins at Q as he faces him, eye to eye, "…Q-Ball."

The door of Icheb's quarter wooshes open. Two security personnel enter with phaser rifles at the ready. Q grins ear to ear as the captain of the vessel walks through the door.

"Stand down. They're friendly." Tom Paris looks from Icheb, with his color still peaky, to Seven, with her eyes ringed red and the blood on her hands, and then finally at Q. "This looks to be a very…interesting…entry in my log."

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