Ratings: pg-13

Disclaimer- I do not own seaQuest DSV or 2032, if I did they would not have been cancelled when they did and had gone on for at least 3 more seasons.

Summary- AU Nathan and Carol not only had Robert, but a daughter as well. Meet Nicole Bridger and how her whole life changed the day Admiral Noyce came onto her father's island to get him to Captain the Seaquest.

Chapter 3

It had been a weird three weeks of getting used to living on the Seaquest. Nicole had started classes again, but with the help of Lucas she was able to submit her homework and papers and have her online discussions without anyone pin pointing the location of the Seaquest. Dr. Westphalen was appointed her advisor and by staying on the Seaquest she was able to gain college credit. That was mostly due to her godfather Admiral Noyce pulling some string at UCLA. Noyce promised her that he and Dr. Westphalen would sign off on all the paper work at the end of each semester because some of the stuff that the science department would be doing would be classified to the public.

Nicole was sitting at her computer having just finished an online discussion with her English class on the analysis of F. Scott Fitzgerald's works. She rubbed her eyes and opened a new window in her word document to start writing out the five page paper that would be due in a week.

She typed in her name and class number. She saved the document so that she could type at any time and decided to take a break and check out her email. She really wasn't all that thrilled at writing an English paper. Heck she would rather write a paper on the geological changes in the ocean sea floor than on an English author.

She pulled up her email account and found that she had several messages. She opened the ones that looked interesting and began to read. One of them was an invite from her high school friend Abby, asking her to come and visit her. Abby had moved to New York and was studying broadcasting at one of the universities. Nicole sadly wrote back that she would be out of the country for the next several months, maybe some other time but they always had email to keep each other up to date. She sent the email and then pulled up the other messages.

One message was a noticed to all UCLA students about a lecture/conference that was going to be held in San Diego in three weeks. The main topics were to deal with science and the ever-changing world that they lived in. Nicole thought that it looked interesting and printed up the information to show her dad. Maybe I can get him to let me go she thought. She grabbed the paper and went off in search of her dad.

Of course finding her dad really wasn't that hard. After all he was the Captain of the sub she was currently staying on. She went to his room but as she was walking that way she noticed Lucas standing outside the door.

"Is he in there" Nicole asked as she came closer to Lucas. Lucas looked up and noticed Nicole.

"No, and I just came form the science labs" he said with a frown. Nicole laughed. "Well that leaves only one place left to look." She grinned.

"The bridge" Lucas said. "Yup, lets go before he goes somewhere else." Nicole said.

The two teenagers made their way to the bridge and were happy to find it quiet and calm-meaning no general quarters alarm blaring or no clam doors shut. Nicole quickly made her way to her father who was sitting at his chair reading over some reports. Sensor Chief Miguel Ortiz looked up and waved his hand at them. Nicole waved back and stepped up to her father.

"Daddy" Nicole began. Nathan looked up and smiled. "Hey Sweety" he said to her. "What brings you here?" he asked.

"Daddy, I got an email from the science program at UCLA and it's an invitation to go to a conference in San Diego. Can I go?" Nicole asked. She handed over the email to her father and he began to look it over.

"See it's educational and I can get college credit for it." She stated. She brought her hand to her face and began to chew on her right hand's nails.

"I'll think about it" her father said. "Besides, you are already getting college credit for being here on the Seaquest." He added.

Nicole glared and took the paper. "Yeah, but did I have a choice as to staying here" she retorted and left the bridge and a stunned father and Lucas behind.

"I thought she was happy" Lucas said.

- - - - - - -

After Nicole stomped off the bridge, she made her way to the moon pool and sat on one of the metal bridges overhanging the pool. She found this place as a great place to sit and think about her problems. She sighed and looked over the email in her hand and crumpled it up. This isn't fair she thought. I'm 17 years old, I should be able to decide if I can go or not. Lucas is so lucky he has no parent on board.

Nicole sat there for a while swinging her legs back and forth. She heard the sound of foot steps and instantly thought her father. Nope instead it was Dr. Westphalen. "Nicole, is something wrong? You've been sitting her for a while now." She asked as she took a seat next to Nicole.

"My life" Nicole said staring at the water "Why can't I decide what I can and can't do?" she wondered out loud.

"Nicole, life isn't going to be fair" Dr. Westphalen stated. "Parents try to help their children as best they can."

"Yeah, but what if the child has no choice." Nicole mumbled.

"What do you mean no choice?" Dr. Westphalen asked.

"I mean ever since dad decided he was going to stay, he never really asked me if I wanted to stay. I thought… I don't know what I thought" she rambled.

Dr. Westphalen paused for a moment. "Nicole how old were you when you brother went missing?" she asked.

"10. We were in Pearl at the time. Dad was beginning the funding for the Seaquest." Nicole replied back.

"And when your mother passed?" Dr. Westphalen.

"I was 13, and I was away at boarding school." Nicole said sadly. "I didn't really live at home during high school. I spent more time figuring out ways NOT to go home."

Dr. Westphalen smiled at Nicole. "Your father is just trying to figure out how to care for you the best that he can."

"But it's no fair, Lucas gets to do what he wants. He has no adults telling him what to do" Nicole stated.

"Well, that's where you are wrong. Sure Dr. Wolenczak was able to get Lucas on board, but there were stipulations made for him to stay. First of all, Lucas needed guardians on the boat who could speak on his behalf if something went wrong. Authorize medical treatment and the such." Dr. Westphalen pointed out.

"Who are his guardians?" Nicole wondered.

"Your father and I are." Dr. Westphalen said with a smiled.

"Oh" Nicole said.

"So think about it, Lucas is in the same situation as you. Nathan has to authorize all the "fun things" as you would say." Dr. Westphalen said.

"So in a sense, I somehow gained another brother" Nicole said with amusement. "Does Lucas know this?"

"I suppose so" Dr. Westphalen said. "Well I need to be getting back to some things. You can help me if you want to." She added.

"I'll be there in a bit" Nicole promised.

- - - - - -

Nicole came up to the hatch of her father's quarters. She took a deep breath and knocked. She heard her father say to come in and pushed open the door. As she walked in she saw her father and Lucas going over some manuals.

"So I was thinking that if we added this lining of coding, then we wont have the same problem we did when Stark planted the virus." Lucas said.

"Good idea. Get the techs to help you install it into the mainframe" her father said.

Lucas nodded his head and gathered his things together and muttered a good bye to them. He patted Nicole on the shoulder as he walked by her. Nicole smiled and turned to her father.

"Daddy, I…I want to know why you never asked me if I wanted to stay here" Nicole said playing with her thumbs.

"I guess I assumed you wanted to be here." Bridger said.

"I do, but I just wanted to know why you never gave me the option to live at UCLA or to stay here." Nicole said.

"Well I guess the selfish part of me wanted to keep you close to me. When your mother passed away and you weren't around I missed you." Bridger said.

"I missed you too, but it was too hard to be at home with all the memories of mom around." Nicole said sadly.

"Well I had hoped to change that by having you here. We can make new memories to look back on" Bridger said.

"I'd like that" Nicole said with a smile.

"Captain to the bridge" O'Neill's voice came over the loudspeaker.

"I need to go Sweety, but let's make sure to have dinner together so we can talk more." Her father said as he got up.

He made his way to the door when Nicole spoke up. "Daddy, I love you" she said.

"Me too, Sweety. Me too" he said and walked out the door.

Nicole looked around her father's room and walked to the door and into the corridor. She made her way back to the science labs. She found Dr. Westphalen there and went up to her and asked her what she could help her with.

TBC…..

I wrote this cause I always wondered how Lucas was able to do all that stuff with no parental supervision. Then it hit me that the captain or the doctor would have to have guardianship over him in order to authorize some of the stuff. You can kind of see it if you watch all of the episodes closely.