As you all know, this is a repost.

First of all, i'd like to thank Steph P--now known as LadyMaquis--for the wonderful beta she did for all the chapters of Remember. Steph, not only are you a great writer, but you're an excellent beta-reader. If she hadn't kept on the beta and pushed me, I wouldn't have the strength to finish this.

Second, for those who sent me email--even when the story was removed from ffnet--asking when I was going to finish it or even repost it. I am flattered that you cared enough to look for the story, or ask for it even when it seemed like I was never going to finish it.

To all those who read the story before, I feel the need to apologize and to explain. What happened was that I accidentaly replaced the rating on the story from PG to R, and since ffnet had banned that category, I was effectively locked out of my own story. I was going to repost the whole thing again, but decided to hold off for two reasons: 1) I was approaching a certain aspect of the story that I didn't know how to write and 2) the whole thing was getting beta'd, so I might as well post when it was done anyway.

Suffice to say, the "thinking" got to be way longer than I thought, and in the interim I wrote a fanfic for a whole different genre. For those who had me on alert, i'm sorry for flooding your box with updates of a different story.

I hope this makes up for the lost time. I will be posting--time permitting--a chapter a day of Remember, until we get to the part where I left off, and continue the story. Me and steph have made some changes, and I clunked some chapters. Otherwise, it's still the same story as before.

Thanks again to those who asked for this!

--kat

The forest floor felt damp and uncomfortable, and something-a piece of twig-was digging into his spine. There was nothing more that he wanted to do than to get up, but something kept him from moving.

A voice penetrated his sketchy vision, invading the fog that was building inside his head.

"Tom," B'Elanna said.

He caught a sense of urgency in his voice, but for some reason he couldn't care. He wanted so much to close his eyes., He was so tired.

"Tom please, look at me."

Cool hands touched his face, bringing a moment's relief to his fevered brow. Somehow, he managed to direct his thoughts to B'Elanna, willing himself to understand what it was she was saying.

"You need to stay here, wait for Voyager. I've placed the beacon near your location; they should be here in a few hours."

"B'Elanna?"

"You're in no condition to move, much less fight. They won't find you here. I'll do a much better job of distracting them if I keep moving, draw them away from you."

"No."

Despite his semi-delirious state, he didn't like what she was saying. Distraction? Separating? Bait?

"Tom, listen to me."

There was a stinging sensation on his cheek, and he realized that she was gently slapping his face, getting his attention.

"When Voyager arrives they'll get our distress call, scan for our lifesigns, then beam us out of here. But until they reach us, we have to keep these them away. Do you understand?"

His throat felt raspy, and somewhere in his head he could hear himself begging for her not to leave him.

"You need to stay still Tom, you need to do this so we can stay alive."

"No." he pleaded, but he was too exhausted to raise much of an argument.

He struggled to keep his eyes open, but the poison was beginning to work on him. His vision was blurry, and he could barely make out her face…but hear the urgency in her voice. "Just lie down, Tom."

"Don't go"

I won't. Just close your eyes. Sleep for a bit."

He knew she was leaving as soon as he fell asleep, but he couldn't do anything., couldn't feel anything, except for the big ball of weight resting on his chest, on his eyes, on his head, his hands.

He could feel himself slipping,and just when he thought he was going to die, his body bolted upright while his hands clawed at something that wasn't there.

"B'Elanna" he murmured, his voice came in short, ragged breaths, painfully loud in the darkness of his room. Instinctively, he reached for her, only to find that her side of the bed was empty. His heart constricted in pain. B'Elanna was gone, and even though a year had passed since her disappearance, Tom still refused to believe she was dead.

The events of that terrible day played through his mind again. Everything had started out so well. But then, they always did.

The ship had just finished its quarterly overhaul, where nearly everyone had pulled double-shifts to cut down time. But even with the round-the-clock repairs, it had taken them nearly three weeks to get done. Tom had barely seen B'Elanna in those few weeks, forcing him to spend lunch in engineering just to see her, and that was if she allowed herself lunch.

He told himself that as soon as the last relay was fixed, and everything was calibrated and realigned, he was going to ask Chakotay for a vacation-even if he had to drag her to the holodeck just to take it. But just when they thought that things were finally done, another problem had presented itself: They were low on fuel. No one, of course, was more frustrated than B'Elanna. After three straight weeks of practically living in engineering, she was gnashing her teeth at not being able to declare peak efficiency simply because they "ran out of gas".

Despite the bad news, Tom felt ever so proud for seeing the influence he had on his love's lingo.

They were a week into gray mode when they stumbled on a deserted M- class planet, and every engineer on the ship nearly dropped on their knees out of sheer relief at the news. Having a grumpy chief engineer was bad, a grumpy one with nothing to do was worse.

"I've detected large amounts of gallacites in the mountains, Captain, as well dilithium in a rock formation near one of the forests." B'Elanna reported. "Most of it is still raw, I'll need to analyze some samples before I can determine how much work needs to be done."

The captain nodded, the grim set of her features hidden in half illumination. The conference room was lit by two emergency lamps, the lights occasionally flickering as it squeezed out energy from its power cells.

They had come to the planet just in time. With the ship in gray mode they could survive for another two months, but Neelix had warned that they were approaching a region of space that was scarce of needed minerals. Considering their luck, it would be unwise to let Voyager travel nearly defenseless.

As Janeway looked down at the information in front of her, an idea formed in her head.

Ship's morale was at an all time low. They could use something to cheer them up, starting with two crewmen in particular…

"Assemble a mining team B'Elanna. We're practically dead in space at the moment, so you can take as many people as you want. I'm sure a lot of them are eager for some shore leave."

Harry's face broke into a huge smile, and Tom almost let out a whoop. Even Tuvok seemed to be happy about the situation.

"I'm not going to need a lot of people for the initial scan Captain" she said, not blinking as Tom kicked her under the table

"I'm just going to need one of my engineers to go down with me. When we're sure that we can mine it, then we'll see about work rotations. I don't want to waste any of the power in the shuttles ferrying people. I'd even go alone if I didn't think it was against procedure."

This time it was the captain's turn to have a smirk in her face. B'Elanna had said that just to get a rise out of the young Lieutenant, and it was evident in Tom's incredulous face that B'Elanna's maneuver was successful.

But Janeway had a soft spot for young pilot and the workaholic engineer as well. Besides, there really was no doubt in her mind that they were perfect for this mission: Tom was a capable engineer and both needed the vacation. But just for fun she waited until he flashed her his patented puppy dog expression.

"You can take the Flyer, B'Elanna," she said with a smile, "and have Tom fly you." This time, Tom did let out a whoop.

"That was sneaky," Tom told B'Elanna from the helm of the Flyer.

She'd just checked their equipment from the aft compartment when Tom swiveled in his seat.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she said, hoping to start a comfortable banter.

She hadn't seen him in weeks! The week before the repairs he'd spent most of his time in the holodeck. , hiding from some argument that both of them could no longer remember.

At first, Tom thought that B'Elanna announced the repairs as a way to get back at him, maybe avoid seeing him. It was only when his sonic shower tried to render him deaf did he realize how much they needed to stop and give some of the ship's less critical systems a tune up.

"She would have taken you up on your offer to go down on your own, you know," he told her. "It's a good thing I was there for a save, otherwise you would have been stuck on this trip bored and lonely."

"Are you kidding? First of all, it's against protocol to go on an away mission on a planet on your own. And second of all, have you seen how much there is to do?" she shot back lightly. "I think you need to brush up on those Starfleet regulations Tom. I think we have a manual here somewhere…"

Tom didn't say anything as he hit the autopilot and went to drag her back to the helm with him. After a brief yet satisfying kiss, B'Elanna settled into Tom's lap, calling up her plans on his console and momentarily forgetting about such things as "protocol on away missions". Tom smiled at her as she shot him a guilt-free grin.

"You're right about one thing, Helmboy" she breathed, leaning in closer to his lips. "This trip would have been boring and lonely without you."

The few hours in the shuttle may not have been enough to compensate for the past few weeks, but it was certainly enough to release some of their frustrations.

Everything else could wait until they get to Voyager,and this time they were going to make some time. But simply being together was enough for now. For now.

B'Elannachecked her tricorder as soon as they landed while Tom was checked her out.

His mission was to fly her here, and now that he was done he would let himself indulge.

Normally B'Elanna would have been pissed, but their time apart made her temper lax.

She just sighed and tried not to smile as she made an effort to berate him.

"You know, things would go faster if you helped me out."

"Hey, my orders were to drive you here, and we're here. And didn't you say that you could do this all by yourself?" he teased

"Tom! If the Captain found out—"

But Tom simply walked over and put his hands on her shoulders.

"I missed you, " he said.

And dammit, if she didn't almost melt. Almost… She'd nearly shut her tricorder, but a sense of duty—not to mention the smirk forming in Tom's face—kept her resolve.

But that didn't make her angry.

She sighed and looked up at him. "Tell you what. As soon as we finish up, we'll stay a while to…ah, make sure of things…before getting back to Voyager."

Tom was now massaging the crick on her neck, "Uh-huh…"

"We'll tell the Captain that the scan took, um, a bit longer than expected, seeing that we have this big, beautiful…isolated…meadow and not to mention an equally enchanting forest to get through."

He bent down and let his lips graze her forehead, his hand already palming his own tricorder.

"Sounds like a plan," he breathed.

"Mmmhmm…"

"Maybe afterwards we can-"

His words were drowned out as they heard the soft whine of an engine come from the skies.

They looked up and saw a shuttle breaking through the clouds, about to land next to the Delta Flyer.

"I thought you said this planet was deserted."

B'Elanna shrugged. "It is. Maybe they're also here for dilithium, this planet has a pretty large deposit."

They watched as the shuttle touched down next to them and waited for the hatch to open.

"So much for isolated." Tom sighed. "Oh well, the more the merrier."

It only took a moment, but something immediately felt wrong as soon as the scraggly looking aliens came out.

B'Elanna took an immediate step back, one hand gripping his arm as the other palmed her phaser.

"Tom" she said quickly

He'd barely reacted when he felt the world around him explode in a sea of bright lights.

Tom tugged on his uniform jacket, watching as the doctor replaced his tools.

They were worried about him, and perhaps a little scared. No one besides the senior staff had even looked him in the eye, and even they were feeling a bit awkward talking with him.

He'd been jumpy lately, certainly tired. The poison that invaded his system had done a pretty good job at banging him up. The doctor had explained how they almost lost him, worried that he would never wake up from his coma. Now he wished he never did.

B'Elanna was gone.

He knew something was wrong as soon as he woke up, but it took them another day to tell him what had happened.

B'Elanna was gone, captured. Voyager was just two hours away when they had heard the distress signal, but they still couldn't get there fast enough to prevent the Dalians from taking her.

"They're mercenaries," Neelix had told them. "Slave traders and bounty hunters. They're mostly nomadic, though they rarely travel with more than two ships."

But one ship had been enough.

Tom and B'Elanna were doing a scan from one of the mountains when the ship came down from the orange sky. Neither of them even had time to react as two aliens materialized. They had looked human, with no visible markings except for the raised bony eyebrows. But the look in their eyes offered no friendship.

The aliens wanted to enjoy the game. They'd let them go, thinking that they had nowhere to run: two aliens, defenseless, the make injured. How far could they get? Tom could still remember the strange alien laughter as they ran, threatening to hunt them down as soon as they finished their business.

His recollection got hazy after that, he remembered very little details and could not come up with anything except in his dreams.

"Mr. Paris, Mr. Paris! Tom!"

He snapped to and saw the doctor watching him with a critical expression, tricorder already beeping and ready.

"Mr. Paris, when was the last time you had any sleep?"

He grunted and zipped up his tunic. "I got a full eight hours last night doctor, just like you ordered. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going back to the bridge-"

"Don't bother, you've been relieved of duty."

"What!"

"We know about the dreams Tom," the doctor commented before he could say anything. "I know that you've been having them since you left the planet."

Tom's face clouded as he moved to get out of sickbay.

So they knew about the nightmares, big deal. He'd suspected as much. Not that it was hard to miss; the lack of sleep had long ago taken a toll on him. It hadn't affected his duties yet, but it showed. He'd lost a couple of pounds and he looked tired. All the time. He knew that the captain would call him on it sooner or later.

Apparently that time was now.

"Where are you going?"

"Astrometics, I'm restricted from the bridge right? I'll be there and stare at the stars for a while."

"Seven's there-"

"I'll stay in my quarters then" he said, not wanting to deal with the biting skepticism of a Borg

The hand on his shoulder kept him from moving. The doctor wasn't one to show his brute strength but his programming allowed him to have extended physical abilities.

"To do what? Look at more star charts? It's been four months Tom, we're two systems away. She's gone. You have to accept it. At least let me give you a sedative."

"No!" The force of his shout shocked the both of them. "No. Those dreams are the only way I can remember what happened, without them any chance we have of finding her will be gone."

The doctor looked sympathetic, but was otherwise undeterred.

"B'Elanna is dead Tom! We've searched for months, she is gone."

"We haven't located a body!" Tom lashed out, his eyes slowly growing wild. "You might have given up, but I haven't dammit, and I will not let her go!"

He wrenched his arm from the doctor's iron grip and stalked out. running blindly, desperately to his room.

His instincts were screaming for him to just go out. Head to the shuttle bay and break into the Flyer, or any damn craft that they had. He'd take Neelix' battered transport if he had to, anything just to get to her.

He wouldn't let her go, he couldn't. Everyone was telling him to let go, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn't bring himself to do it. How dare they ask him to do such a thing!

A life without B'Elanna, he couldn't comprehend it, much less try to believe it.

The door to his quarters hissed open and he threw himself to his bed.

I can't B'Elanna, I can't, not without you, he thought, forcing himself to sleep.Not without you.