Season 1 - Episode 9: Ex Post Facto (part 4)
June 21, 2371 (3 Months, 6 Days in the Delta Quadrant)

The refreshing scent of recycled air, with just a hint of disinfectant, invaded my nostrils. The room was silent apart from my deep breathing and the soft 'beep beep beep' of medical instruments. What was I doing in a hospital?

I awoke with a start, eyes widening as I sharply inhaled at the flood of memories that rushed back. All I could remember was the fight. The curved knives coming at my throat or face, the angry snarls on bird-like faces as they charged at me, the muted pain of flesh and muscle parting like it was made from clay with only dull coldness. The spike of agony of the knife as it ripped through my arm, embedding it in bone, and the dizzying feeling of whatever they had injected into me...

Snapping back to the present, I glanced around as best I could without being obvious, and was surprised by my location in case I was in enemy territory. I was in Voyager's sickbay, laying atop one of the standard biobeds that rested along the wall and wearing a pair of blue hospital pajamas. In fact, I recognized that this was the same biobed I had woken up in when I arrived in this universe.

'Oh God, Odin, Q, whatever else is out there, please don't let this be a Groundhog Day situation where I die and then wake up again one week into Voyager's trip through the Delta Quadrant.'

I gingerly sat up, checking myself as I did to make sure nothing hurt. My eyes darted around and took in the deserted blue and grey sickbay. How long had I been here? Looking at my arm, you would never know that it had once had a chunk of metal sticking out of it.

'Huh, metal. In my arm. Maybe I should include a Wolverine protocol in the omnitool?'

A blonde-haired crewman stepped into view from the attached medical laboratory on the other side of the chief medical officer's office. The woman had the yellow shoulders of ops on her uniform, and an easy smile on her warm face.

I tried to put a name to the familiar looking face, but was drawing a blank, and that was putting me on edge. When she saw me she stepped over, grabbing a medical tricorder along the way, while saying, "Welcome back to the world of the living. I hope you enjoyed your nap."

I glanced at her collar to confirm the rank. "I'm afraid I can't recall your name, Ensign."

"Ensign Roberta Luke, Commander," she smiled, rolling the diode from the tricorder over my head before she placed it back in the device.

Luke checked the readings, then activated her omni-tool and performed the same test again by running her arm through the space above me. At my inquiring look, she explained, "I'm just testing the accuracy of this system versus our normal medical tricorders. It was curious if there was any difference."

"What are you doing in sickbay, Ensign?" I asked cautiously. Her name was familiar too, but I couldn't place it. Not a main character, or even a secondary one, but a named one nonetheless. I just wished I could remember why.

"I offered to take over Lieutenant Paris's medic training," she smiled at me, running her free hand through long hair while the other was brought around so she could read the results. "He was very grateful."

"I'm sure he was," I commented to myself. More loudly, I asked, "Where is the Doctor, or Kes, and how did I get here?"

The Ensign frowned at me for a moment, before brightening. "The EMH is currently in the Lab, he's the one who told me you had awakened. Asked me to check on you while he finished running some samples. Kes is at the Garden, tending to her primary duties. What is the last thing you remember?"

I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment, taking a calming breath, before answering, "I was on the surface. At a club, with Lieutenant Torres, just trying to relax after spending a few days haggling. I stepped into the restroom, and before I knew it, I was being attacked. One of them said…"

The memory of the taunt to get them to say something they shouldn't, their order to hurry up so they could grab 'the other one', filtered into my skull. Concerned, I demanded, "Where is B'Elanna?"

Roberta smiled warmly, relaxing a little. "Good to see your memories are mostly intact. To keep it brief, Ms. Torres called for an emergency beam out of the both of you at 0221 ship time. She's perfectly fine. You were the one who needed help, not her." She checked the device on her arm briefly, and added, "The current time is 2034. You should be well rested."

My mind boggled. 'Eighteen hours of sleep, I would hope I was more than well rested.'

Still, I breathed a sigh of relief knowing that Torres was fine and she got us both back to the ship safe and sound. I was already mentally berating myself for how things had gone down in that fight, and didn't need the idea of my friend being harmed added to the guilty conscious.

"What's my condition?" I asked after a moment, morbidly curious and in need of data.

The EMH took that opportunity to blink into existence next to my bedside, startling me. "I can answer that." He briefly turned to the Ensign, adding, "I'll take over from here. Please return to your duties."

After a brief "Yes, Doctor," and a nod of goodbye, Luke strolled back into the lab area. The EMH used his hands to check me, poking and prodding at various parts of my anatomy and leaving me grateful for the PJs.

"How bad was it?" I asked. I felt fine now, which was almost distressing, going from cut to pieces to whole and hearty in what seemed like an instant, but I knew I was likely in a right state when I got here.

The Doc looked at me like I was a small child asking why his stomach hurts when they eat too much ice cream. "When you arrived your blood alcohol content was at .14, you were dealing with a powerful anaesthetic, had a blade through your forearm, and was suffering from fifteen less serious knife wounds on top of several hairline fractures to your first, second, and fifth thoracic bones. This is on top of the numerous contusions. In short, you were a mess."

While I could do nothing but blink at the list of injuries, he continued, "I've administered coagulants, the poison has been flushed from your bloodstream, the knife has been removed and placed in an evidence locker at the moment, and your injuries have been sealed. You rested long enough for your body to deal with the after effects, and, so as long you manage to take it easy for a day or two, you should be back to your old self in no time."

I sighed, feeling grateful for the doc's work, used to field medicine that'd take days, if not weeks, to patch me up as well as he had in hours. "Thanks for patching me up."

"No need to thank me, this is what I'm programmed for." He countered, with just a hint of smugness, standing up and walking around the bed as he ran his own tricorder around me. "If a third of my patients had your physical fitness, I wouldn't have half the crewman coming in for things like dropping crates on their feet and other preventable injuries."

I shook my head. "Either way, but I'm grateful nonetheless. I'll try to stay out of trouble."

He simply nodded, "See that you do." After a moment, he added, "The Captain wished to be notified when you awoke. You should be expecting her arrival imminently."

I nodded, leaning back onto the bed and trying to relax. It made sense that Janeway would like to know what the hell happened down there. "Anything else I should know?"

"Yes. Ms. Torres has made a point of popping in and out of sickbay to check on you every few hours." He stated after a moment of consideration. "As well as most of your comrades in arms in Security. Frankly, they've been getting in my way."

A warm feeling washed over me while hearing that. It was nice to know others were concerned about me and worried about my well-being. Looking around the empty Med-bay, I asked, "Busy?"

"I could be," he sniffed. "Stay here, I need to run a few last minute diagnostics.

He retreated back to his office, and only a few moments later the doors to sickbay slid open for Hurricane Janeway. The expression on her face told me nearly all I needed to know. She wasn't happy, and was looking for an ass to kick. From how rapidly she arrived, I had to assume that the doctor notified her as soon as he'd taken over for Luke.

Still in the pajamas the sickbay issued me, having only been awake for a few minutes, the captain strode up to the side of my bed and ordered, "Report. Tell me what happened down there, Shepard."

I bit back my first response, took a deep breath, and slowly let it out, answering, "After completing our final trade negotiations, you issued us on the surface some leave. Torres and I went to a club that we had spotted the previous day hoping to just relax. Late in the evening we were preparing to leave and I decided to make use of the facilities prior to departure. While doing so five Banean males of similar dress and plumage followed me in, quickly and quietly cleared the facilities of everyone else while I was busy, then took up positions to surround me. Two at the door, two at the opposite end of the room, and a fifth that managed to slip in behind me and jab a needle into my neck."

"I'm not surprised," the Doctor declared without emotion. "With your blood alcohol level as high as it was you would have had difficulty seeing straight."

I pressed on, ignoring is comment, "I spotted the one who pricked me with the needle right before he struck. I was able to push him away before the full does of whatever they used could be applied."

Janeway frowned, and looked towards the EMH, "What did they give him?"

"A very strong anaesthetic. Fortunately for the Commander, it wasn't geared towards a human circulatory system, though in the amounts they likely tried to inject him with, if that was a partial dose, it would've been more than sufficient," the synthetic person replied. "I've been studying the sample we took of the Commander's blood, and it looks like it couldn't have been more than two cubic centimeters injected. Even that, mixed with the alcohol, should have been more than enough to incapacitate most people. It was fortunate he managed to not receive more."

"Yeah," I interrupted. "lucky me. Anyway, when the shot didn't work there was a bit of back and forth between them. They mentioned something about grabbing 'the other one' which I took to mean Torres. Trapped in there, I did what I had to do."

"Why didn't you call for help?" Janeway asked, and for the first time I thought I could see some hint of concern.

I shook that errant thought away. "I wasn't exactly thinking straight at the time, and there wouldn't be enough time for anyone to arrive. They didn't give me much more than a moment to act anyway. Maybe...five seconds of conversation, if that, where they revealed they were after someone else as well, before they drew out the knives and decided carving me up would be more fun."

A thought came to me, "I wasn't wearing my comm badge, but it was in my pocket for emergencies. It wouldn't have captured any video, but the audio should be present. It can confirm what I said."

Janeway stared at me for a few moments, almost to the point I was getting concerned, when she admitted, "I know. Once you were stable, Torres retrieved your omni-tool and collected the data for Tuvok and I." She let out a long exhausted sigh, and added, "A lot has happened while you were incapactiated."

'So was she seeing if I'd lie?' I wondered, but didn't think about it too hard. There'd been no reason to hide my action, though I was glad I hadn't tried to downplay anything. I considered Torres actions, wondered at the invasion of my privacy, and found it strange that I wasn't concerned about it. Instead I focused on that last sentence, sitting up straighter as I asked, "Care to bring me up to speed?"

There was a brief hesitation as the Captain stared at me, looking for something in my eyes, before nodding to herself. "You weren't the only one attacked last night."

I blinked, and she continued, "After you stumbled over to B'Elanna at the club, she called for an emergency beam up. While the doctor was working on you, we called down for Mr Kim, Chakotay, and Paris. Kim and Chakotay were both at the hotel, and alright, so after we woke Kim up made him aware of what happened, we told him to sit tight and wait for further orders."

"Mr. Paris," she paused, and then continued, "was attacked while he was talking to us. We could hear the commotion, and with the transporter room already on alert they quickly beamed him out of there. He arrived, full of drugs like you would have been. For whatever reason, Tom's omni-tool was missing, but a scan of his previous location found it and we recovered the device. It was damaged, like someone was trying to take it apart, the internal memory banks fried. He was wearing his combadge, and we would've had it on video, but the few seconds still on the device only show him in a scuffle without seeing the face of his attacker."

Made sense that she would be concerned about our missing technology. Tom being attacked on the other hand...did the Numiri agents attempt to grab both of us at the same time? I had hoped that the presence of Voyager in orbit would have put that particular fire out, or at least kept it manageable, not accelerated their plans. At least this time we wouldn't be arriving to find Tom reliving memories that wasn't his while secretly carrying information for the Numiri to decode.

Taking his omni-tool though. That was weird. The Mark 1 wasn't exactly cutting edge technology, and after getting a good look of the technology available on the planet, it would be ridiculous easy to recreate. Then again, we didn't use it very much while on the surface except for the map function…

'They took it from Tom because they thought it could track him.'

It made sense. Unless someone specifically stated the combadges also had trackers, any mention of the Voyager knowing our location would be assumed to be through our omni-tools. With our not using teleporters, at the Banean's own request, they'd never see us use our combadges to do so. If they removed the Omni-tool, they'd be thinking they'd also be removing the only way we'd have to find a disappeared crewman while he was quietly tried and found guilty without ever having to contact his ship.

Unaware of my thoughts, Janeway continued, "Professor Ren is dead. Minister Kray is insisting that Mr. Paris be turned over for his murder. He also insists that you be turned over for the murder of those five who assualted you."

That got my attention. "On what cause? With what evidence?"

Janeway's appearance softened. "They claim to have the technology to recover memories from the dead."

The Doctor exclaimed, "Preposterous! Short term memory is only between fifteen and thirty seconds. A person's cognitive processes haven't had enough time to store the information. Anything could have happened in that time. Furthermore long term memories are stored in such a way as to make their recollection subjective, which would never work as incontrovertible evidence!"

"That may be true for a human being," she countered, "but not for the Baneans."

"It is true for more than just Humans. Klingons, Andorians, Vulcans,..." the EMH snarked as he turned and began to walk away, the list of species growing.

The Captain ignored his rant, and told me, "They claimed that they have the neurological implants and have reviewed them. They are claiming you are guilty and without any video evidence of the altercation, there isn't anything to refute them."

"Gorn, Denobulans, Betazoid," the Doctor continued, not noticing that we'd both stopped paying attention to him.

"That being said," she added, "I'm not willing to hand you or Tom over to be convicted of something without any real tangible evidence of what occurred. All leave has been canceled and once the shuttles are back on board, Voyager will be breaking orbit. Luckily, all the goods you, B'Elanna and Chakotay managed to acquire have already been delivered, sorted and distributed."

I noticed that she didn't say she thought I was innocent, just that she wasn't turning me over without evidence. Not being sure how to take that, I decided to let it go for now.

"Chakotay to Janeway," the First Officer's voice erupted from the comm badge.

With a swift tap of the device she replied, "Janeway here."

"I've returned with the last shuttle, but Minister Kray is strongly objecting at what he is calling 'stalling tactics' from us. He is current calling to speak with you." he announced.

Janeway looked up, like she was praying to the heavens for them to give her strength, and answered, "I'll be on the Bridge in a minute."

"Understood."

With the line closed, she looked me over and asked, "Are you feeling well enough to walk?"

"Yes, Ma'am." I declared, nodding at her. I slid off the biobed, gingerly stretching my arms and legs to test them, before deciding they were well enough, grabbing the uniform bundled to the side and stepping into the private room at the back to change. I'd follow the Doctors advice and take it easy for a few days before hitting the gym once more, but no more than that. Couldn't let my habits get rusty.

As we exited the sickbay, I could still hear the Doctor still listing species after species behind us.

After a short turbolift ride up in silence, we exited onto the Bridge, Paris at his station, apparently no worse for wear. Considering he was drugged quickly and not beaten like I was, he likely just had a nice sleep and returned to duty. Kim was over at Ops, and was looking both curious and nervous, while across the Bridge Tuvok was as stoic as always. Chakotay was standing in the center of the floor, staring at the screen ahead and only turned slightly to see the two of us enter.

Up on the screen was the giant mug of Minister Kray, in all his dark grey feathered glory. His expression was easy to read as angry on his angular face, eyes that had been narrowed down at Paris darting to me when we entered the room. He was sitting behind a dark wood desk, with a pair of unknown men standing on either side of him in similar formal clothing.

"Captain Janeway," the Minister nearly hissed in rage when she stepped in front of him.

Stepping closer to the screen, she calmly retorted in an overly sweet voice, "Yes, Mr. Minister. Is there anything we can help you with?"

He focused on her, "By order of the Central Authority, Mr. Shepard and Paris are to be turned over to us for the crimes of murder. The trial has already been completed, and all that remains is to complete sentencing."

Tuvok asked, "You tried our crewmembers in absentia, without questioning them or collecting the evidence?"

"We collected the memories of the dead," the Minister retorted. "We collected all the evidence we need."

Pointing towards the screen at me, he added, "That man murdered five of our people. The other one murdered one of our most revered scientists. The memories recovered from the dead speak for themselves."

"I don't appreciate our people being arrested, never mind tried and convicted, without legal representation. It is against our people's laws." Janeway nearly growled at the screen. "We have a belief in due process, of collecting all the information and allowing the accused to defend themselves, and only then having those whom are unbiased pronounce guilt or innocence."

Visibly trying to calm himself down, the man stated, "This is our world, our people are dead, and so our laws take precedence. Captain, be reasonable. News of this has already begun to spread across the world, and our people must be seen taking swift, decisive action when six people of our own are dead."

That got my attention. I stepped a little closer to the Captain, whispering, "I was attacked by five, but I only had to kill three of them."

Janeway held up a hand, waving me off, and told the Minister, "Seems we have a bit of an issue. You say our two officers killed six of your people. I've got audio and video evidence that shows that my crew were drugged and attacked. Mr. Paris was transported to Voyager during the assault on him. Mr. Shepard was drugged and stabbed multiple times while unarmed, and yet you say he was the aggressor."

"I cannot," she went on to add, "in good conscious turn over to you two of my crew members to be punished for something when it isn't clear they are even guilty."

"The memories speak for themselves," one of the men behind the Minister snarled, but was quickly waved off.

"Now," Janeway tried to placate them, "if you can offer a retrial, using all the available evidence-"

She was cut off by the Minister who pushed, "The memories recovered tell us all we need."

"And those memories can't be falsified?" Chakotay interjected.

"Of course not," Kray dismissed contemptuously. "We wouldn't use them if they could be. Regardless," he pronounced, "the trial has already been concluded. They must submit themselves for punishment."

Tuvok asked, "And what is the sentence?"

"A long time ago," the Minister started, "the punishment for murder would be lethal injection. We have since moved beyond such unpleasant practices. Their sentences is to relive their victim's last moments periodically, by means of inserting memory engrams of the victim into their brain."

"That sounds barbaric!" Tom exclaimed.

The other man behind the governor shook his head, "I assure you, it has proven to be an effective punishment as well as a deterrent to more violent crimes."

"If you have the ability to extract and insert memories," Tuvok stated before I could, "then you obviously have the ability to also alter them. That makes using memories as evidence unreliable at best. Physical evidence from the crime scene would need to be used to collaborate what the memories show you."

Janeway nodded in agreement, and added, "I can't turn my people over when they have already been convicted without the ability to defend themselves."

"And I can't allow you to leave with those convicted criminals," the Minister countered. "Once sentencing has been completed, they will be returned to you and you may all leave. Until then, our defensive perimeter has been updated to list your ship as hostile and will fire if you try to leave orbit. I will give you some time to calm down and think about your decision."

The man cut the connection, returning the screen to its default view of the beautiful world below.

Silence greeted us on the bridge. Each crewman was lost in their own thoughts, and I had to admit that the Baneans had us in a hard spot. They already decided we were guilty, they had their weapons pointed on us, and could simply wait for us to do the only logical thing. Even if we managed to run past their weapons fire, we'd still have the Numiri to worry about, and it wouldn't be difficult for the spies in the government to pass along word to them. Even without the implanted memory to pass along information with, our ship might be damaged, and easier prey for the Numiri to pounce on.

Turning back to me, Janeway took a step forward and whispered just as I did to her a moment ago, "With your past, I'm not sure what to believe. But I would like to think you aren't capable of cold blooded murder."

My voice equally low, I answered calmly, "If you truly think I murdered those Baneans without cause, when it would do nothing but hurt Voyager, just throw me out the airlock and get this over with."

Chakotay appeared beside us, adding, "I don't know why they are presuming your guilt so easily, but I think we should remember that this is a species who is at war with its neighbor. There might be other factors at play we don't know about." He glanced at me, before adding, "And while Shepard might have a certain record, Paris doesn't, but they're equally sure that both committed crimes while overlooking a mountain of evidence to the contrary. I don't know about you, but something here doesn't smell right."

Janeway nodded along, adding, "Two attacks on our people, nearly simultaneously, in two different cities, halfway across the continent, with the same drug? This was a setup, all right. We just don't know for what reason." She looked at me, adding, "I think you are capable of it, Shepard, but from everything I have seen since you came aboard I don't think you would be willing. That, plus the evidence from your own Tool and the Doctor's blood work, as well as the timing of all this? It's all very suspect."

Louder, the Captain turned and spoke to the tactical officer, "Tuvok, what are our odds of getting through the defense perimeter?"

"Extremely likely," the Vulcan answered at once. "Since we have arrived, I have been analyzing the sensor net and believe I have found a way to shield us from it. We can prepare to leave without their noticing, giving us the time we need to leave their defensive envelope without damage."

Nodding sharply to herself, Janeway ordered, "Very well. Let's meet in my ready room to plan how to do this. I want to put as much space between us and these people as we can. Mr. Paris, Shepard, I'm ordering you both to take the next few days to rest." Paris started to respond, but she held up a forestalling hand. "We'll be taking a straight path out of this viper's nest, not fancy piloting. Relax, you two, and try to recover. Who knows what we'll find the next time we stop."

With a nod, she and Tuvok stepped into the Captain's ready room, leaving the rest of us to go about our business.

==/\==

'How could I be such a colossal idiot?'

After a long sonic-shower, I'd pulled on a pair of sweats and sat down on the couch of my living space. Blowing a long sigh of exasperation, I rolled both hands down the front of my face roughly and growled low in frustration.

I was a Section 31 agent for the United Federation of Planets, with a decade of experience. I was a person who grew up watching shows like Next Generation, Voyager, Enterprise, and watched the insane things that happened to those crews every week.

I was also the colossal fucking idiot who ignored all of that at the first opportunity that presented itself. I was finally off this freaking barge of the damned, and on a planet so similar to Earth - my Earth - that I felt like I was home. Murvi had a twenty-four hour day and night life, with lots of character. Theaters, philharmonics, commercial stores, and some damn good food. It all lulled me into a sense of the familiar and relaxed me to the point of suicidal stupidity.

It was the opposite on Voyager. Since the day I'd woken up on this damn ship I'd been on edge. I'd been busting my ass trying to make things better for everyone, focused on helping them learn new skills and training them to survive what was coming. I'd been trying to find ways to make this ship suffer fewer problems and crew loss. I'd been building connections and relationships with the people I would be working with and fighting a political game with the command staff that neither side could afford. Over the lifespan of this ship, if nothing changed, more than thirty of our crew would die, and we weren't going to be getting any trained replacements. That wasn't even counting all the crew who'd died when the Caretaker flung us out here. There was so much more I could be doing to make this ship into a fortress, unable to be sieged and strong enough to weather any storm, but I was limited by the rules and regulations and whims of a Captain who doesn't trust me.

Part of me wondered if I could just talk to her. Spin a lie about alien technologies, maybe the Caretaker downloading a database as a way to say sorry, but that would more likely than not end up with me brigged along with Suder, or worse as they messed with my brain to 'fix' me, standard procedure for what Starfleet normally dealt with when an unknown alien messed with the minds of the crew. If I hadn't seen Voyager, I might've done just that, using my credentials and arguments to help everyone, but I knew Janeway.

The woman made insane decisions that only worked because the plot required her to. The fear AI, those space whales that thought Voyager wanted to mate with them, hell, even ramming the time-destroyer in the Year of Hell, the second one. It all worked, not because she knew what she was doing, not because it was a good plan, but because everything always went right for her. The AI didn't wait five minutes and find out she was a fake, she guessed the intentions of a completely alien species with almost no data, she'd just find a site-to-site teleportation device the moment she needed it, everything always just happened to work out for her. it made me suspect Q bullshit, the number of times she succeeded, not through planning or tenacity, but sheer bloody minded luck.

No, I couldn't say a word, and after three months on this ship, busting my ass with no chance to unwind outside the relative safety of my quarters, I hadn't even noticed all the stress building on me. All the worry eating at my soul, sure she'd one day decide that it wasn't worth having someone who's very presence spat on her ideal of what the Federation was and maroon me on a habitable, uninhabited world. So the very first time I was on a planet that felt so familiar, so much like home, I let my guard down without even realizing it.

I should never have gotten drunk. Clubbed, yes. Danced with Torres, fine. Got drunk, fuck that. Then it got worse, I knew something was about to go down in the bathroom. I thought I was doing well enough just by checking my food and drink that I'd ignored the obvious ambush points in the facilities. As soon as I felt that tightening in my gut and rise in heart rate, I should've tapped out for an emergency beam out and avoided the whole situation, politics be damned.

Janeway might've yelled at me for beaming up when the Baneans explicitly asked us not to, but it would've been better than what'd happened. Maybe it was because I was used to operating alone, away from support like an entire ship of people who can pull me out of trouble, but I shouldn't have had to fight my way out of that bathroom.

Fists clenched in anger, directed at my own idiocy, I barely heard the tone at the door. It rang again, drawing me out of my self-deprecation, and I stood to open it.

Torres was standing on the other side, her face concerned and eyes wide with worry. They then widened further and cheeks reddened as she saw my state of dress, not that I particularly cared at the moment. I had to admit, I was happy to see her. "Come on in," I directed, waving an arm for her to enter.

She took a few steps in, and as it was her first time being here Torres took the opportunity to look around with obvious curiosity. Her eyes lingered on the desk and the computer display, so unlike anything else she had likely ever seen, and the Panerai-style clock screensaver it was currently showcasing. There were a few models of things I was working on atop the desk; a compressed air-powered pistol I was tinkering around with, a fifteen centimeter tall model of N7 armor from Mass Effect, a thirty centimeter long steel copy of the USS Enterprise-B that I'd made for fun. My quarters on this ship were clean, but I did leave a few non-sensitive files on my desk, and she picked those up and skimmed them while I moved back to the couch and gingerly sat back down.

"Hey, B'Elanna." I greeted, trying to sound nonchalant while ignoring the pain in my leg. While the injuries had all been fixed, the Doctor had cheerfully informed me that a particularly deep cut would still be tender for the next few days. "I'm happy you came by to see me, although I'm wondering why."

Torres smiled at me from the desk, looking up from one of the padds. "Well, I could say that I just wanted to check on you. After all, when you came back to me at the dance club you were covered in blood."

I waved it off. "It wasn't my blood."

"Oh, a lot of it was," she countered, still smiling at me. "But I checked in on you in sickbay a few times. I knew you were okay and just needed to rest."

I nodded along, half-closing my eyes and relaxing back into the soft cushions. "I heard. Thank you for looking in on me."

She nodded at that, her eyes lingering for a few moments, before going back to the desk. After a few moments she picked up the gun and asked, "And what is this?"

"Just something I'm working on when I need to clear my mind," I answered, "power cell works a miniature air compressor, which can then fire an eleven milimeter bullet around seven hundred meters per second. Unfortunately, I'm not done with it. It's more of a running project." Which was true, it was something that would never be done because I was always going to be working on it. Make it fire faster, get more power out of it, it was something I was designing for the inevitable conflicts we would have with beings that tend to laugh at phaser fire, but were paradoxically week to flying steel.

"And this?" she asked, gesturing at the small N7 model.

I stretched my arms over my head as I answered, falling back into my sofa, "Just an idea for some body armor. Something else I'm working on in my free time."

B'Elanna smirked at me, eyes running down my torso, as she moved away from the desk and walked around the room. Since I moved in, I'd gotten rid of the dull, grey coloring of the walls, creating the paints with my modified replicator. I wasn't averse to removing things that bothered me, and so much grey was definitely one of those things. I hadn't gotten around the floor, but I had painted the walls and bulkheads to a more fiery red with yellow-gold accents. Even the sofa had been refurbished with a burgundy exterior. It made the silver-metal table and my computer hardware stand out more, but I could live with that.

Standing with a wince, the leg hurting less as I used it, I wandered over to the replicator and pressing its activation button on the top panel. "Two mango smoothies."

The system stalled for a few moments while it worked, bringing me out of my reverie as sudden worry wormed in my gut. The humming delay as the Arc Reactor charged the internal buffer, something I'd forgotten about since it had become normal to me, would be odd to anyone else. I had a brief panic attack, but one look at the young woman in my room and I relaxed as she was moving over to the couch I had just vacated, not looking at me or the oddly functioning replicator.

I picked up both orange-yellow drinks in their narrow, tall glasses, with red straws sticking out the top, carrying them back to the couch and offering one to my guest. She accepted it with a warm smile, hand briefly brushing against mine.

We sat next to each other, just enjoying the drinks and the company. It was actually nice to be able to just be with someone who wasn't trying to kill you, or look to you for orders, or push you out of the way because they thought you were a security threat. Plus, Torres was just fun to poke at. She didn't put up with any crap, and could take a joke well as long as it wasn't personally directed at her. There were a few buttons I knew not to push with her, such as bringing up the topic of fathers or her Klingon heritage, but those were easy to dance away from and since her first response to those was deflection, it was simple to redirect the conversation back to safer topics. Like how Ensign Vorik got on her nerves, or how Lieutenant Wood, whom she was friends with on the Val Jean, was making a lot of friends with the security staff.

As the night went on, our chat idle and sporadic, she started to lean into me, and I found my arm around her shoulders. It was nice.

After a while of comfortable comradie and laughs at the expense of the people we are in charge of, Torres gestures at my computer with her empty glass and asked, "So, what do I need to do to get a set up like that?"

I smile down at her, part of me wondering what kind of mischief she could do with my system, and answered, "You could ask nicely."

B'Elanna made a show of tilting her head and thinking about it, but instead answered with, "Can I bribe you instead?"

"Oh? What did you have in mind?" I'm honestly curious.

"Well," she starts, suddenly acting less sure and more nervous than I had ever seen her. "How about...how about we finish what we started last night? If you still want to, that is."

I stared back at her, smiling softly at how much she was starting to act like an unsure girl fresh out of the Academy instead of the engineering Maquis badass I knew she was now. All thoughts from earlier, all those fears and concerns about who I am, what I could be doing, were erased from my mind as I looked this beautiful woman in the eyes and answered, "I'm sure we could work something out," as I leaned in for a kiss.

==/\==

I woke at 0500 the following morning, like usual. Or at least mostly like usual. Instead of rolling over in my bed, I found myself trapped by arms and legs that clung to me like some kind of spider monkey. It was actually pretty cute.

Running a hand across Torre's cranial fridges and through her hair, I smiled at the way she hummed in unconscious indignation and tried to burrow her face deeper into my chest. A chest she had scratched and bruised last night. Considering she was part Klingon, I suppose I should just feel fortunate I didn't have any broken bones or dislocated joints. It'd still be worth it, even if I did.

For whatever reason, amidst all the violence of the last few weeks, I finally felt safe. That was worth the price of any possible future complications.

Now, I had to consider a truly pressing question: Pancakes, or eggs and bacon?