Disclaimer: This is a disclaimer! Does it need more clarification?



Chapter Eleven



"B'Elanna! She's been eating earthworms again!"

B'Elanna looked out the window to see her grimacing husband trying to pry a rather large worm from their daughter's grubby hand. It had just rained, and despite the damp and cold K'Athra loved to be outside, even if she did have to wear shoes and a jacket. There was many a worm to be had on such days.

"So? It can't hurt her. As far as she's concerned, it's all gagh," she replied through the screen. "And it's your fault for not watching her."

There was a feigned retching sound. "How can you be so calm about it? She's eating worms. It's disgusting."

She made an incredulous noise, turning back to her work, which at the moment happened to be the kitchen replicator, which was wedged tightly between an old range and an even older dishwasher. The kitchen had been built long before the advent of the newer appliance, and it showed. The replicator itself was also rather dated, and was known to stop working with no advance warning on occasion.

She laughed a little at Tom's disgusted noises. Not that she particularly relished Terran earthworms herself, but it was hardly fair to bar K'Athra from a bit of harmless gastronomic exploration. It was also impossible to make even a quarter-Klingon be sick, not even a young one it seemed. The doctor two towns over had noted that K'Athra had a constitution that many a humanoid could envy, redundant stomach and all.

So what if K'Ath liked worms? Tom should be thankful that she wasn't into spiders.

The little girl giggled hysterically as her father bodily hauled her inside. Their daughter as active as any toddler, a few leaps ahead of her human counterparts. She still wasn't a master of good grammar, but she was getting along.

It was funny, but B'Elanna was sure that K'Athra's first words had been "escape parabola" or a baby rendition thereof . . . due to Tom's constant rambling about flying this and that. Somehow, she had the forbidding feeling that her daughter was going to grow up to be a pilot. Tom and K'Athra Paris up in a shuttle together was an intimidating prospect to any conscientious engineer.

Tom retrieved a face cloth from somewhere and was dutifully trying to wipe the dirt from K'Athra's face and hands. There was dirt in her dark hair as well, if its mussed condition said anything. The girl continued to giggle at him. She was a good-natured kid, though she could pull tantrums to put any equivalent toddler to shame.

"Okay, so maybe it's not the worms," Tom said suddenly. "Maybe it's the dirt! I think she's probably digesting five hundred kinds of soil microbes already."

B'Elanna poked at the old circuit board. "Isn't 'digesting' the pertinent point? She can handle it, why can't you?"

"My baby daughter is eating dirt and worms, B'Elanna."

"Sounds like gagh to me. Besides," she said, shrugging and rising from her crouched position, satisfied that the replicator would work again, "it's probably good for her. You're a medic, isn't it good to be able to tolerate weird organisms? Not that any Terran organisms were ever that special."

He looked at her with hooded eyes. "It's nasty."

"Oh, get a life. She's enjoying herself. Quit being so overprotective."

"B'Elanna, I just saw her dig for and eat about six fat, wet and wriggling worms! Agh!" He let K'Athra go and threw his hands in the air, turning away from both of them and retreating to the couch in the living room.

Their daughter watched him go, rather wide-eyed and probably wondering what his problem was. There was still some dirt on her hands, and she looked up at her mother, all the while trying to shrug her jacket off.

"Your father's delicate stomach is getting to him," she murmured, as if the girl would understand that explanation in all its contexts.

K'Athra freed herself of her little blue coat and held up her hands for inspection. "Ma," she said with great importance. "Dirty."

"Yes, I suppose so."

"Up, Ma!"

B'Elanna relieved the child of her shoes -they were dirty also, and she was known to kick- and picked her up. She was getting a bit heavier these days, but it was nothing she couldn't handle comfortably. The real problem was that K'Athra was just bigger, which made her a bit hard to manoeuvre through doorways and such. As was her wont when her hands were dirty, she buried her hands in her mother's hair. B'Elanna sighed resignedly.

"Did you get that replicator working?" Tom asked hopefully.

"I think so . . . no thanks to you, Mr. Handyman."

He made a noise. "Hey, I'm not the one who fixes things. If I tried repairing that replicator, we wouldn't eat for a week. I'll just operate it, thanks."

"Yeah, and bust it again before the week's out."

He moved over on the couch as she made to sit. K'Athra, who was still holding on to her mother, extended a slightly dirty hand towards him, burbling. He shied away accordingly, unwilling to be touched by a hand that likely had worm viscera on it. He could be so squeamish . . . and at the weirdest of times.

Instead of objecting, he nodded. "Probably," he agreed, "but I'm sure you can fix it."

Upon having thought of the likelihood that K'Athra had gotten the aforementioned worm guts in her hair, she moved the girl off of her lap with a slight grimace. She gave Tom an oblique glance. "Ah, now I know why you keep me around."

He grinned at her . . . the wicked sort of grin that drew her even while she wanted to smack him. Still smirking, he shuffled closer to her, a precarious position, because he was known to be free with his hands on occasion.

"Oh no," he murmured close to her ear. "I keep you around for more than that."

She gave him an appraising glance. "You want something broken, Lieutenant?"

"Depends on what you mean by it."

She pushed him away, laughing even while she was slightly irritated. Eventually she'd get around to telling him of course . . . some opportune time when it would catch him off-balance, so she could watch his expression and laugh. At the moment, he was sprawled over the opposite end of the couch, feigning some great injury.

"Ugh!" he cried. "Spurned! My heart is breaking."

Now was as good a time as any. "Apparently I don't spurn you enough, Helmboy."

He jerked upwards, blinking. "Pardon me?"

She pulled her loose shirt tight over her stomach. "Notice anything?" she asked innocently.

This time he fell over with no real help from her, somehow ending up in a heap over the arm of the couch. He scrambled upwards again, his blue eyes showing some strange combination of surprise, joy and fear all in one. She supposed the fear was at the prospect of having to handle her mood swings again . . . alone. B'Elanna almost laughed at him . . . and would have if that strange look hadn't turned into one of abject reverence. That sort of thing could go to a woman's head if she wasn't careful.

"Holy hell," he breathed, climbing back onto the couch. "How didn't I notice?"

"You were too worried about worms. And what kind of a reaction is that?"

His hand strayed forward, as if to feel the slight thickening of her waistline. Then he drew back. It struck her that the admonition "I don't bite" didn't apply to her. He held up his hands helplessly. "What would you rather?"

"I don't know, but something other than 'holy hell.'"

"Well, what did I say the first time?" he asked vaguely, his mind off in other places as he stared fixedly at her midriff.

"I don't remember. Probably something like that too."

"Wow," he said with complete awe. This time he did touch her, and she couldn't contain her smile.

"Why wow? This is what happens when you-"

"Oh, shut up, B'Elanna," he muttered, pulling her to him and kissing her possessively.

For a moment she forgot how to use her brain for anything but nervous response, so she just held on and enjoyed herself, knowing that it was this sort of thing that had provided the object of this conversation in the first place. It got a little out of hand, for her part, and she had to push him away before she dragged him bodily into the other room.

Tom looked down at her, visibly trying to contain himself. He glanced guiltily over to where their firstborn was trying to put the TV converter into the VCR Tom had procured since. Of course she did it with great conviction. K'Athra was always serious about such things, and of course, she was paying no attention to her amorous parents.

She patted his chest affectionately, still in his arms. She grinned. "Do control yourself, Dad."

He looked back to her, pure mischief in his eyes. "I am trying, Mom. The same goes for you."

"Touché," she said, drawing away.

"Wasn't that what I was doing?"

She stood up, looking out the window to the damp green forest beyond. "I went to the doctor's just to be sure. He got it confirmed, but he admitted that he doesn't know much about hybrid pregnancy, at least not of my description. We should probably go see the original family physician."

Tom groaned dramatically. "Ah, sure! The walking text book has once again become my doom! Are we going to have to live in California now? I don't think I can take it yet."

She gave him a sour look. "No, we do not have to live there, but we should at least go spread the good word. They'd never forgive us if we didn't tell them, and the Doctor would probably yell at me and kick you all the way around the city for not demanding his expertise immediately . . . And you know it."

"You'll have to protect me."

She rolled her eyes. "You need the protection of a pregnant woman? If that doesn't bruise your ego, I don't know what would."

"No, no, a pregnant half-Klingon woman!"

She directed a long look at him. "Do you want to fight or something?"

"That also depends on what you mean by it."

"Will you think above your waist for a moment?"

"I told you, I'm trying," he said with an irrepressible grin.

"Well, we're going to San Francisco, so there. We were going to go anyhow."

"Huh?"

"Do you honestly think I'd miss the birth of Chakotay's children?" she demanded.

"Uh, well . . . no, I didn't."

"Good. Start packing."

He rose from the couch, saluting her. "Aye, Chief." It appeared he couldn't resist grabbing her and pulling her into his arms again as he passed. He tangled his hands in her hair, and she suppressed a giggle as his expression changed from one of warmth to one of chagrin.

"B'Elanna," he said in an uncertain voice. "What is in your hair?"

"Whatever was on K'Ath's hands," she said. This time she did giggle.

He grimaced. "Oh, God. Kids really know how to kill a mood, don't they?"



To be continued

***