There is a weight of suspicion hanging over them all, hot and frantic and filled with a tension that is threatening to split them all in two.

There are security guards, two, stood beyond the entrance to the private room, unable to see inside the closed screens, who have been told nothing of why they are there, and so brim up on one half of the feeling - a readiness to uncoil like springs and fight without cause.

Then there are nurses, two, bumbling like extensions of Beverly herself, so it is the woman has three brains, and six arms, all of them armed with the same information as there is on offer, and so they spill over in the other half of the feeling - the curiosity, the pursuit of knowledge, pure and simple.

It is a terrible dichotomy to be caught between.

Deanna is playing with the ties of the gown she has been changed into, and her eyes find themselves lingering over the pointed ends atop a tray of needles. It all seems just a little too medieval to her, but she has been told it is necessary - for analysis.

And that's a terrible thought to have, given how she has tried to run from it with a desperation she has not known before, that she is something now which needs to be examined, monitored, to be watched over by armed guards.

Beverly is not happy that they are there, but for some reason this situation is not covered in any number of Starfleet Protocol Manuals, and so the Captain had no choice but to send just two men, in case something, anything, should go wrong.

They have had to wait approximately 12 days since she first became pregnant, to allow enough time that the foetus is nearly 3 months in development, and therefore contains enough genetic material for full, biomolecular analysis.

And that is where the needles come in, looking at her distrustfully from across the room, gleaming their anticipation.

She begins to wish that she had not brushed off Will so quickly when he offered to be with her, thinking perhaps she may now need a hand to hold.

"Are you ready Counselor?"

Alyssa's hand is cold over her forearm, and all she can think to do is nod, even if it follows with no sincerity, at least she has the presence of mind to do so.

"We're going to numb the area with this analgesic gel-"

The woman indicates a small metallic tube between the fingers of her other hand.

"But you may feel some pressure once the needle begins to draw fluid,"

A surge of panic rises within her, and she considers what would have to happen for her to be allowed to back out now.

Across the room, Beverly's voice moves to try to calm her.

"You have nothing to worry about, I've done this procedure plenty of times and most women tell me they feel nothing at all,"

Somehow, most gets lodged in her throat, and it really is no comfort at all.

Alyssa leaves her side with a tight smile, and returns to the counter she had been working at, her actions concealed by her body, as though there is something there that they do not wish for her to see.

And if she wished, she would simply force her way into their minds and see it anyway.

But that is a terribly destructive thought to have had, and in shame, Deanna manages to blame it on the hormones, as if she is no different than anybody else.

The bed begins to lower down mechanically, and the Doctor descends upon her, separating the centre portion of her gown to expose the milky, unblemished skin of Deanna's stomach.

A prickle of cold sends all her hairs on end.

Something even cooler is spread around one small area just below her belly button, and her skin has not lost its tightness, but somehow, her stomach is no longer as concave as it maybe used to be when she lay down.

There is a distinct solidity to it.

And then, she can feel nothing much at all, but she can see that there are fingers still against the surface of her skin, like phantoms, as though her eyes are deceiving her.

"Are you ready?"

She is asked again, and Beverly is already moving to draw the needle tray closer to the side of the biobed; an arm raises up and above her head beside the padding cushion, and she nods again with no sincerity at all.

At the point where the Doctors hands begin to manoeuvre the tip of a 3 inch long needle to the surface of her skin, eyes focused more on the moving image of the foetus on the wall panel behind her, Deanna has to shut her eyes, not willing to carry on watching something so intrusive, if she has the luxury of not having to feel it either.

But there are only a few seconds of numbness, and then pressure, aching in her muscles, then right in her centre where she is more, lasting for more than just a few seconds.

She can feel cramping that begins lightly to knot her up, and then the longer the pressure continues without relief, the stronger the feeling that she is being wrung tightly on the inside.

In a feeling that is almost like a rush of air, she is left empty, and aching only a little, and through one slightly cracked eye she watches as Beverly hands the filled vial at the end of the needle over to the other nurse in the room.

"You did great,"

She is telling her, but it is a terribly tedious thing to try to listen to when adrenaline is burning out her eardrums, replacing the sound with just rushing blood.

Beverly is wiping again at the point where the needle had gone in, and the area looks only a little aggravated, but for the small bead of blood that collects at the very spot before being swept aside patiently.

"Some light cramping is perfectly normal,"

The doctor adds, as though she is the empath, and Deanna realises very quickly that she has been silent this whole time, and not even her discomfort has left her mouth.

"How long,"

Her voice is only a little hoarse.

"How long until you know?"

Beverly tapes a small bandage over the incision sight, closes over the gown and wheels on her stool up towards Deanna's head, understanding too what it is to have broken this silence.

"Not long at all, the computers can run a baseline genetic analysis in a few minutes, we should know in just a moment"

She soothes, indicating to where Alyssa and the nameless nurse work against their panels still, and then looking back above Deanna's head to the scan on the wall.

"You've got a strong kid in there,"

The doctor nods upwards at the image, tracing the swaying movements of what appears to any ordinary person to be an awkwardly shaped bundle of cells.

Deep inside her mind, Deanna knows it is real because the second heartbeat has begun to live beside her own, but the image stirs nothing of a loving feeling in her.

"Doctor Crusher,"

Nurse Ogawa turns from the workstation with a newly loaded data pad in her hands, and she moves in several hurried strides over to them.

"The preliminaries,"

She says, pressing the pad into Beverly's hands and returning to her post with just as much speed as she had left, shy and feeling somewhat as an intrusion to whatever it is that is about to happen for the Counselor they have come to care for.

"What does it say?"

Deanna asks, and in one short burst of cynical humour that must have come from that other nurse, she is adding further comment before she can stop herself.

"Am I even having a baby?"

The nameless nurse throws a horrified glance over her shoulder, the woman's words a perfect mirror to what she had asked in her own mind just a second before; a deep shame overcomes her.

Beverly is too focused on her reading to really notice any of this, and she looks up eventually to meet Deanna's eyes, something of relief and joy lighting her up.

"Early genetic markers suggest the baby is made up from 99.8% recognised patterns in the computers database, 50% Betazoid and 49.8% Human,"

"And the rest?"

Deanna presses, not so quick to relief as the Doctor.

"That's negligible Deanna,"

One of her hands reaches out for the girl's forearm in compassion.

"We're obviously going to conduct a much more in depth analysis to work that out, but this means you don't have to worry so much anymore, we know that it's just a baby,"

Beverly emphasises, maybe more relief to her than there is in Deanna, and the whole situation remains far too peculiar to shift the feeling that there is something more deeply incongruent than 0.2%.

There is a lot that could be wrong in that small space, and in its confines, the possibilities are endless; despite Beverly's reassuring smile, it is impossible to feel much better at all. Because does this not raise more questions than it answers, or even than they started with almost two weeks ago?

Beverly is smiling encouragement at her, but in the confusion, the questions she needs answering, Deanna cannot even lie to herself, and force a fake joy onto her face.


There are three men waiting for him in his ready room, he knows as much because Will has told him, standing from his own seat, when he finds himself back on the bridge.

He'd been taking a long lunch, clearly too long.

"Is there a problem number one?"

The Captain asks, descending the curve of the ramp to where Will is waiting for him, his shoes firm and supple against the carpet.

"They wouldn't say, just that they'd only talk to you about it,"

"Oh,"

Picard breathes out, stalking away from him and towards his ready room door, he turns when the man's voice slows him.

"Brace yourself Sir, it doesn't look pretty,"

Riker warns, sitting himself back down in the Captain's chair with as much importance as he has in him, and so Picard grimaces, wishing that it were possible to delegate even all the duties of Captaincy, so that he maybe could just sit back in that one chair and watch all the stars go by.

His ready room door opens up, and here he was thinking his day was uneventful, ordinary.

There are three men sitting in front of his desk, and he hadn't realised there were even three chairs to be sat at, let alone room enough in the space for three to fit.

But they are there nonetheless, each in a different colour uniform, each men, each human. He has a feeling he knows what this is about.

"Gentlemen,"

Picard greets, and they stand all to alert immediately, the chairs scraping backwards loudly on the carpeted deck; the grimace still has not left his face.

"Captain Picard, we wondered if we might have a word?"

A man he recognises as Lieutenant Holt stands firmly in their centre, and he speaks as though he himself is a terribly important person; he wears a red command uniform and a smirk that he has accomplished such a meeting.

"Might?"

Picard finds himself echoing as he skirts around the desk and to his own seat, gesturing the three men to stand down, and retake their previous positions. They all three seem tense when they sit.

"I'm told you all but demanded to speak with me, and me alone?"

He sits down heavily, places his hands in a clasped knot on the surface of the desk, and fixes Holt with his best searing gaze.

The man seems irritatingly unfazed.

"That's true Sir, we were worried Commander Riker would be biased against our point of view,"

"Oh?"

Holt swallows down against his urge to become argumentative, and Picard's impassibility could grate on anybody after long enough. Beside him, a science officer, Rogers he thinks, puts a hand on his shoulder to quiet him.

"We just thought it would be easier to speak directly with you - to avoid any misunderstandings,"

He explains, clearly the more level headed of the three, and he turns to the third in the group, a man in a golden uniform who seems only to be there for numbers, his eyes harshly downcast. Or perhaps, he is the most easily intimidated; Picard cannot remember his name.

"Misunderstandings about what, what was it you wanted to discuss?"

He asks after a brief pause of speculation that has not served him well, growing tired already at whatever petty dispute it is he is being made to solve.

"We just have some concerns we wanted to voice about - well - about Counselor Troi,"

Rogers says, stumbling over his words only a little, his indelicacy laced throughout his pronunciation of her name, as though she has become something taboo. The Captain finds himself taken aback, lost himself for words, biting at the tip of his tongue that he does not bite out with something that is not professional, something that is made up from a reflex of her defense.

He tightens his clasped hands.

"Yes?"

He forces out neutrally, relinquishing his hold on himself just enough to free one syllable, hoping it will be more than enough to pull an explanation out of the men.

Holt, the hot-head, breaks back into the conversation.

"We've heard about this pregnancy she's entertaining, as well as it's inception, and we feel that she's being given undue special treatment which could put the entire ship in danger,"

Diplomacy forces its way out of the man, but even then, there is something of disgust to him, something of revulsion.

"Well,"

Picard breathes out, raising his eyebrows to the new tension in the room.

"That's a lot more than a simple concern, crewmen,"

He says, making sure to label them as a group so that he cannot be accused of singling one out, reminding them of their place at the same time.

"He doesn't mean it like that,"

Finally, the third man speaks, his voice slightly hoarse as though he is struggling with a cold, and yet still soft with something of compassion. He is recogniseable now as Ensign Kravitch, his blonde hair and agreeable demeanor reminding him of a conversation they had many months ago, when he had asked for time off after finding out his wife had suffered a miscarriage.

Picard lets a smile of sympathy light him up for a second, understanding his individual plight.

"Do you Holt?"

Kravitch adds, digging the man in the ribs to try to check him, though it seems too late.

"No, that's exactly what I mean, we discussed this guys, the woman needs to be removed from this ship!"

His exclamation is harsh, and suddenly full of a fire that is not appreciated.

"Lieutenant, I remind you that that woman is a valued officer serving aboard the bridge of this ship, and as such she is of a higher rank than you - you will afford Counselor Troi the respect she deserves,"

Picard orders in a voice that is rising away from his usual calm, and hanging just slightly below a wire that will break him in two; he wishes she were closer by to calm him, and not on the other side of the ship helping somebody else through problems much less than her own.

"All due respect sir,"

Sentences started that way never seem to end well.

"But the Counselor has shown no respect herself to this vessel in allowing an alien lifeform to breed aboard it, so why should I respect her?"

Holt is not asking a question, and again, the hands of his comrades are hovering over his shoulders, each on one side of him trying to pull the anger away by simple human contact.

But therein lies the problem, they are simple, and human.

"Richie, please, don't be crass, we said we'd be calm about this,"

Kravitch tries to calm him, and a deep and creeping shade of red begins to scale the man's face.

"I still don't quite understand what it is you're hoping to achieve here gentlemen?"

Picard asks, unclasping his hands and resting them instead atop his thighs as he reclines slightly in his seat, trying to act as though he is unphased.

"Sorry Captain, we wanted to just make our concerns known - that Counselor Troi is putting the ship in danger by not terminating the foetus, or, or that she ought not be allowed to remain aboard, if she is determined to keep it,"

Rogers explains for the three, his words ostensibly those of a science officer, measured in reason that ought not exist of a young human male.

"Hold on,"

The Captain halts discussion with a raised hand, still sitting back in his chair, and the taste of his words are bitter at the root of his tongue.

"Are you suggesting I order a member of my crew to terminate her pregnancy, or abandon her planetside if she refuses?"

The men are silent in their seats.

"Have you forgotten your humanity?"

He asks of them, disgust rising like bile in his throat. Urgency has him sitting up straighter in his desk chair.

"Have you forgotten how she's helped each of you with your problems, selflessly, how she's single-handedly been responsible for saving this vessel on more than one occasion, have you forgotten that she's suffering the most with this?"

Picard demands of them, fighting the urge to stand and slam his fist on the desktop, instead urging his words on with a calmness he admires of himself, a calmness she would praise him for in this situation.

"No sir,"

Kravitch is the only one left with words in his mouth, and compassion perhaps in his heart.

"My wife wouldn't have been able to go on after we lost the baby, if it weren't for Deanna,"

And finally, someone has had the nerve to call her by name.

"We're just trying to say that… that -"

"That it's unnatural!"

Holt, again, cannot contain his fire over this, somehow feeling as though he is entitled to some greater opinion than he has been afforded.

"She's a liability to the ship, and we aren't the only ones who think it!"

He is standing up in his own aggression, and it is unprecedented in him, hot and furious and completely out of order.

"Lieutenant, take a seat before I have security come in here and remove you, I appreciate your concerns but I will only entertain them if you can rein yourself in!"

Picard snaps, his demeanor giving away none of the rage he feels slowly rising at the back of his teeth, and all his energy has gone into keeping his voice level and his hands steady.

The man is pushed down by his friends hands still on him, and for a few moments, a deep hush descends the room.

"Now, gentlemen, why have you come to me and not Commander Riker, is there something specifically that I can do to help you understand,"

Once again, the Captain reaches his restless body forward to clasp his hands on the desk, more tightly than before, the muscles in his shoulders tense now with the effort of holding himself in restraint.

"We think a lot of people would feel better if - well - if the medical report was made available to personnel,"

Kravitch says, as though he hates his own mouth for speaking, and Picard has to try hard not to let his eyes bug out of his head.

"You -"

He tries to start, but stutters over the disbelief that has lodged itself in his throat.

"You want me to release her medical records?"

There is a deep and affirming hush.

"Her private medical records?"

Picard reiterates, the disgust just now starting to crawl across his spine.

"I'm sorry but that is something that I just won't authorise,"

He says, and finally his voice has started to rise his outrage, legs itching to stand.

"But Sir-"

Roger's butts in, but he is cut off before he can even argue his point.

"No, I've listened to your concerns long enough, have you any idea how archaic this sounds?"

Their heads are downcast in a shame that he thought they might never feel.

"Three young, white, human males sit in my office trying to tell me I should order a woman what to do with her body,"

He scoffs at the absurdity of it all.

"We might as well call ourselves the Trump administration and get it over with!"

Kravitch's eyes lift to meet the Captains in a moment of shock, perhaps realisation even, being a history buff himself, but they fall back down very quickly, and nobody can say a word at all.

"I think the Counselor has been violated quite enough already without me releasing the intimate details of her care to the entire ship, and she deserves more from us than to just be abandoned because of any decision she may or may not have made regarding her own body,"

Picard stands now, rising like a changing tide, and beyond him through the viewport window, it is possible to see the moon that changes him, suspended perfectly in the blank space between.

"She deserves more than this witch hunt,"

He plants the palms of his hands firmly on the surface of his desk, if only to stop him from balling them into fists that he will be unable to control.

Still, even Holt can say nothing at all, two hands firmly over his shoulders to prevent him even if he had words enough in him; he is shaken now by the fear of reprimand, demotion.

"Your concerns have been noted, gentlemen,"

The Captain emphasises, holding down over the sound of gentlemen, trying to accent how he has tried to treat them fairly even as they have gone after a member of his crew, one who he cares for deeply.

"You are dismissed,"

He tells them finally, and there is no room for argument, they simply stand like pups with tails between their legs, and leave his ready room, in a troop that ends with Kravitch, the ops guy, and his sorrowful smile, as though he is the only one to have learnt anything at all.

Picard, deflated, falls back into his chair with all the mass of a whole planet pushing him down, a terrible realisation dawning on him that there is unrest in his crew, unrest he had been blinded to by love for her.

A second realisation dawns as suddenly as the first: that he loves her, in whatever capacity that he has, not romantically - the thought shakes him- but deeply, and sorrowfully, and unprecedented in the speed with which it has gripped his throat.

The thought makes him dizzy, and he has to sit down for longer than while.


"No,"

"But, why not?"

She turns over her shoulder and calls back to him from the bedroom, the softness of her voice taken by her certainty.

"Because, Will, I do not want to,"

It doesn't take empathy to feel that he is disheartened, and suddenly, he is standing at her back, and the need to shout is lost.

"What about names then?"

He whispers down her ear, and his hands follow the patterns of her own, taking the towel from her and folding it in the air out in front of them.

Deanna sighs and turns in the small space afforded her between his extended arms; he sets the towel down atop the pile.

"No,"

She murmurs into him, looking up and into his eyes, tracing the desire she finds there.

"I do not want to know if it is a boy or a girl, nor do I want to talk about names,"

Small hands land on his chest with a thump, their palms out flat, and she pushes him lightly back from her so that she can walk away.

"Can we please just find something else to talk about?"

Deanna asks him, and he turns away from her bed to watch her go, the sway in her hips so delightful, regardless of whatever emotion may be looming - he will always appreciate that sway.

"Sure,"

He responds, turning to follow her, putting off pushing her too far for another day, because the easy domesticity of this is too precious for him to let go. She feels like his best friend again.

"The Captain had a visit on the bridge today,"

Will tells her, following where she has gone to. He finds her sitting now on the futon, a blanket over her legs.

"I know,"

She responds tiredly, and he does a double take as he comes up behind her, kneeling down on the ground at the back of the sofa; his fingers start to tickle at the tiny baby hairs loose at the nape of her neck.

"You know?"

A shiver runs down her spine at his touch.

"Yes,"

Deanna turns around against the cushions to face him, and their faces are very close together, his fingers still mid-air and grazing ever so lightly against her jaw.

"They made him very angry, he did well to control himself,"

"Angry?"

Will pulls a little away from her to regard her with that same awe he is always filled with, a pride even that she has such a reach, that she is so keen to the feelings of others.

"Do you know what they wanted, because they sure as hell wouldn't talk to me about it?"

He asks her, and she smiles at him with mirth, her black eyes softening with the thought that maybe he believes she had been purposefully listening in - the though that he wants her to use her empathy to gossip.

"I'm not sure,"

Deanna tells him, and it is impossible to be sure of her truth, because however soft her eyes may have become, they are still black, deep and unyielding.

"Richard was there, he was very angry also,"

He nods and pushes up back onto his feet, speaking as he moves over to the replicator.

"Holt? Yeah he seemed like he was in charge there,"

There is bitterness to him, and he orders something of the computer without saying a thing to it, instead tapping fast at the wall panel. When he turns back around, there are two mugs in his hands.

"Couldn't even look at me straight,"

Will says, appearing in front of her to place one mug on the low table, then sit down slowly in the armchair behind him, eyes wary at the sight of almost spilling hot chocolate from his own drink.

She smiles her thanks, but does not reach forward for it.

"There is a lot of hostility in him, but I'm sure he has his reasons,"

Deanna comments, reaching for a pad on her right and lighting it up to read what is written there.

"Crew evaluations?"

She is asked casually, and she simply nods yes, then proceeds to scroll until she reaches whatever she is looking for.

"Here -"

The scrolling stops, she looks up at him knowingly.

"He just put in for transfer, I'm supposed to order an assessment before he is allowed to move to a new post,"

She reaches forward now to pass him the pad, and on the way back into the cushions, she grabs up the hot chocolate, her eyes becoming greedy at the sight of it.

"Wow,"

Will blows out a shocked breath, blinking away his own surprise to keep scanning the text. He looks up at her, and she is hidden behind plumes of steam.

"His problem is with you?"

And his words, they have a way of looking at her too - she tries not to dwell on it.

"He is entitled to his opinion Will,"

There is something irksome about how calm she is, and he can't help but feel that she's making a concession, that she is rolling over.

"I've assigned a member of my staff to his assessment, once they are certain he's of sound mind then I will be more than happy to sign off on his transfer,"

Will scoffs.

"Can't say I'll miss the guy!"

He hands her back the pad, leaving it on the table as her hands grasp at the steaming mug still, bringing it up to her lips to take small, grateful sips; he imagines she is testing the water, trying to set her stomach up for sudden fullness.

Deanna hums into the depths.

"Some cause happiness wherever they go, others whenever they go,"

He frowns, his free hand playing with the rim of his own mug where it rests on the arm of the chair.

"Oscar Wilde?"

Will queries, impressed even at himself when she nods her affirmation, between sips.

He can't help but regard her with awe, because her mind is full of so much he wonders how there is ever any room for coherent thought; he thinks maybe he would be driven insane.

An ache forms in his chest at the realisation that she isn't his to be in awe of, not anymore, and he finds himself half out of his mind with love, hoping not to die this way.

Deanna's eyes meet his over the brim of porcelain and steam, knowingly, and they are two perfectly blank orbs of obsidian, so dark that they must contain the stars themselves.

He wonders if maybe one day he won't find an entire universe there.

"Are you ready for the meeting tomorrow?"

Will manages to ask, his throat not quite closed up over the feeling.

She drops the mug back into her lap, where her legs are tucked tightly into her body.

"Why would I not be?"

A question for a question - and she is terribly good at this game.

"I thought, after your appointment with Beverly, you might be a bit nervous for the senior staff to know,"

She smiles tiredly at him.

"I already told you it went fine, I have nothing to be nervous about,"

It is too convincing, and her hands push the mug out from her centre slightly, as though she has just been reminded of what's there.

"If you're sure -?"

Will knows by now that it is pointless to push her.

"Captain Picard has already rescheduled to accommodate me, I do not want to be any more of a problem,"

Something does not sit right in her stomach, and she reaches to set the hot chocolate back down on the table, still almost full to the top. The motion is not lost on him.

"Hey,"

Will leans forwards to put a hand over her knee, to pat gently at her exposed skin there, where the silk of her gown has slipped away.

"You can't help getting sick,"

It is a simple snapshot of domesticity.

Her hair falls loose from her ponytail as she shakes her head again at him, and it might be impossible to make her see sense.

"How about some dinner then, you can't sleep on an empty stomach, you know it only makes it worse,"

Will takes his hand away and runs it over his growing beard, still fighting the urge to shave off where it is sharp and uneven. That small part of him wants to wait for her opinion, though she has yet to make any comment at all.

"I'm not hungry,"

She tells him, exasperated already because she can tell that this is a topic he will push her on.

"Please don't make me,"

Deanna asks of him, preemptively perhaps, and even her plea could be enough to stop his heart beating in his chest, but he continues to hold onto this easy monotony with the very tips of his fingers.

"We can eat anything you want, I swear, but I won't take no for an answer,"

He smiles his lopsided grin.

"That would make me derelict in my duties as best friend and live-in nurse,"

A small tinkle of a laugh breaks free from her, full of the image of him in one of those archaic 'sexy' nurse uniforms from one of his own stupid holodeck programs; he finds himself proud that he has made her laugh.

"O- okay, but only for you, and only something small,"

She stutters, laying out her conditions in a way he might threaten to call aristocratic, but really just charms him all the same - he wonders if she knows she's pouting when she does that.

So he leaves Deanna on the sofa, readjusting her blanket to cover the skin that is cold now that he has left her, pulling her hair loose completely from it's elastic constraints.

He wants to look back and watch her motions, because delight is in everything she does, even the simplest of everyday tasks make him feel like he could go insane loving her. The other half of his mind tries to hold on very tightly to him.

"Soup?"

Will calls back over his shoulder, and the sudden raised voices after a period of murmurs has her slightly startled.

"Surprise me,"

He raises his eyebrows at nobody in response, and starts to play with the controls of the replicator, cycling through a list of flavours, consistencies, temperatures, thinking there must be something, at least one thing therein that she will be able to stomach.

His decision begins to materialise on a tray in the bessel, and the smell reaches him much sooner than he reaches out for it. Deanna can smell it too, so it seems, and she is sniffing tightly at the air around her, half intrigued and half repelled.

Will presents the tray to her as though it is a cushion with a tiara on top, and she smiles at the thought he has put into it, the way he has arranged a series of plain crackers to resemble a Jenga tower, and the herbs on the surface of a bowl of chicken noodle soup into a smiling face.

"An excellent surprise, thank you,"

Deanna praises him, and she takes the tray with his guiding hands still hovering, placing it down onto her lap.

"Not a problem, Miss Troi,"

He has put on an old English accent, and it reminds them both of their Captain.

Laughter and mirth fills the space for a few pure moments.

Tentatively, she reaches to skim a thin cracker over the surface of the soup, and a delightful chicken broth clings to its end.

She nibbles at it with small bites and pulled back lips, and something changes inside her.

"My compliments to the chef,"

Deanna continues on the joke, but her English accent is much better than his somehow, being perhaps slightly closer to Betazoid inflection than Will's goofy americanisms. He beams now, so relieved that he has won this time, and lightened her mood at the same time.

It is two birds - so they say.

"Anything else I can do for you?"

He asks, maneuvering back to the armchair where his mug still waits for him, and he sits with crossed legs and the base of it against his knee, still hot enough to spread its warmth.

Deanna is swallowing down the last of the cracker when they meet eyes.

"No, thank you, this is quite enough hard work for one night,"

She tells him, still with that same humour, thoroughly enjoying the pretence now that they do not have to discuss more difficult things, enjoying the fact that - with him - she can be silly.

"Sure I can't… rub your feet or something?"

"I'm sure, Commander Riker,"

They eye eachother up for a moment, before breaking again into delighted smiles as she continues to eat, slowly but surely, and soon she finds herself slurping at spindly noodles. Blue eyes soften at the sight of how focused she is on the task, like a child, and it is easy to forget that she is royalty, truly, that she is possessed of royal blood.

"I thought,"

She breaks her way through his reveree, maybe purposefully he cannot be sure, and there is a single noodle suck in the corner of her mouth; she plucks it free before continuing.

"I thought this was a human custom for when one is ill?"

Will smiles at the eloquence of her speech, still stuck on the thought that he has a princess in his presence, struggling like a child with the things he takes for granted.

"Chicken noodle?"

He clarifies with her, and she nods, chewing on the stray noodle thoughtfully; perfectly done nails scratch at her face where it has been.

"Uh yeah, I guess, it's good for having a stuffy nose or something,"

Will reasons out, watching eagerly as she takes up another cracker and dips it straight into the bowl without any hesitation.

"And you know I'm not ill?"

She mumbles before taking a bite, her face turning upwards in pleasure at the taste.

"Is the soup good?"

He counters pointedly, and her immediate nod and groan around a mouthful is enough to answer him.

"Stop over-analysing it then - it's just food,"

And thank god you're eating it.

A fall in her expression and he's sure she heard his finishing thought.

She swallows slowly.

"I heard you talking in your sleep last night,"

One half of his mouth curls up as if to smile, but stops just short, in case this is not going to be something he enjoys hearing.

"Oh really, what'd I say?"

She raises her sculpted eyebrows at him, her face perfectly dry, and he can feel that there is something sarcastic and familiar rolling at the back of her mouth.

Instead, she just shakes her head, and takes another bite from the cracker, catching it's crumbs with her free hand - delicately.

"Nothing filthy, I hope,"

Will comments, only a half joke, given how he hasn't had any sex at all this week, and that really is restraint when he considers what he'd be doing right now if it weren't for her.

Deanna regards him suspiciously from behind the back of her hand, covering her mouth.

"I didn't give away my access codes did I? Any of Starfleet's biggest secrets? My mother's maiden name?"

He guesses, hoping to elicit a smile, maybe distract even himself from how his mind now won't leave the topic of what strains in his pants; being with her, it is an inevitability, only he hopes she has not noticed.

She swallows again, harder this time against the humour, distracting herself from what's in his pants.

"You told someone called Sharon to 'put the cat back in the bag',"

Deanna struggles to tell him, and a wide smile breaks out across her face again.

"In fact, I believe you made it an order... and she was Ensign Sharon,"

Wiggling her eyebrows suggestively, she dips the spoon down in her bowl of soup, toying with the idea of more than just plain crackers and stray noodles. Another thought occurs to her, and she looks back up at him.

"Then you said something about mustard, but of course I could be mistaken, it was very muffled,"

She tells him matter-of-factly, and his face just now is registering his confusion, a smile they now share, and a frown that tells of difficult recollection.

"I'm allergic to cats,"

Will muses aloud, and she can contain her laughter no longer.

Suddenly, it is raining and the war is over, her face has broken open into pure joy, the look of incredulity on his face simply too much to ignore, his comment so not what she was anticipating in response.

"I don't know any Sharon's,"

He adds, and she continues to laugh with the same intensity, the spoon rattling against the bowl along with the shaking of her body and the tinkering of her voice as it rings like a callous bell.

She is beautifully out of place in amongst all of it, he thinks, a goddess among mortals, like the moon during the day.

Between stifled giggles, she manages a sentence.

"I did not… dare try to do any… personal research,"

Her phrasing is peculiar, and impressed upon, and he is just glad she didn't, because God knows what she might have found in his mind.

God knows what Sharon would have been up to.

Deanna laughs a little harder again, and it seems she might never stop.

"As far as I know, I've never said anything in my sleep before,"

He tells her, maybe even to try to help her calm down from her laughter, because she is breathing heavily, and he thinks that's probably a bad thing for her pulse ox' levels. Or something.

A final breath out that seems like a squeal of joy, and she begins wiping the corners of her eyes.

"It's, um,"

Words will not come easily to her now.

"Usually brought on… brought on by stress,"

He delights in watching her try to be sensible again, try to be composed again as always, and he is grateful for the opportunity of having seen her in more easy pieces of herself.

"It's called somniloquy,"

Deanna tells him, digging through piles of useful knowledge to find it deep in her mind, part of a treatment program for a face she has not seen in a very long time.

"Somnimnokly? Isn't that a Shakespeare thing,"

Will asks, confused, his pronunciation absolutely monstrous, enough to pull another giggle from her, girlish and charming.

"That is soliloquy, Will,"

Gently, she corrects him, and he tips his head down to the right, eyes like two crystals that attempt to freeze her. Memory grips them both, and their time together rushes back like a burst pipe, everything of fantasy, of sweating flesh and roaring flame.

"How'd you get to be so smart?"

It is the perfect mirror to where they had been years ago, and he had rolled over atop a pile of blankets to look at her smooth, naked back in the firelight, to the sound of her reciting somebody else's words from somebody else's world. She had been as endearing then as she is now, and his question just the same.

But she is even smarter now, smart enough to know not to give him the same answer.

"I do have a PhD, you know,"

The spell is broken.

"I know that, but you wouldn't be able to blame me for not,"

She smiles more reservedly now than before.

"You also know that I do not like to brag,"

Will hums in response, his eyes narrowed, biting back a comment about how it isn't bragging to go by Dr if you've earned it, and at such a young age.

She goes back to her soup, running the spoon deeply through it and pulling it back out in a still-steaming broth that brings a look of trepidation to her eyes.

"So, got any insights for me?"

Around a full mouth, she frowns in question.

"The mustard,"

Will clarifies, gesturing with one hand to his head before reaching to take a drink of hot-chocolate, fretting all of a sudden that it might have gone cold.

She gulps, and dips her spoon back in the bowl more slowly this time.

"Oh, well I suppose - unless you're abusing alcohol or illicit substances - then it's probably down to emotional stress,"

Deanna cannot meet his eyes as she explains this to him, knowing that it's probably her fault, that stress has borrowed her name for a while. She busies herself with taking another spoonful of soup, blowing away the steam from its surface so that a cloud lives in front of her for a moment, obscures her.

"Well, lucky I'm friends with a damn good Counselor then,"

He says, then immediately berates himself for flirting at a time like this, and so just settles on watching her thoughtfully chew and swallow, her jaw working more and more slowly than before. Deanna swallows it down, harshly, largely unchewed, and a newly sour expression comes upon her; he is quick to react.

"No more?"

It is clear her stomach has turned.

She shakes her head now with the back of her hand against her mouth, the spoon clinking hard against the bowl where she has dropped it down.

Will moves in quickly then, to stand and cross to her to take the tray from her lap, pulling it away from under her nose and over to the recycler; it is a route he has well down by now, given that she can't seem to stomach much of anything at all anymore.

And maybe he ought to talk to Beverly about it.

He returns to her with a glass of water, but she shakes that away too, swallowing several times with a lump down in her throat. Instead, she is holding out her hands for him to help her up, and he does once he's put the glass down and straightened out enough to stand squarely.

"Thank you,"

Deanna says meaningfully, leaving the blanket behind for him to sleep with, and she steps fast from his embrace, like a skittish creature caught in bright lights.

"Going to bed already?"

He asks, and she throws a glance over her shoulder where she has started to turn her back to him, full of a look that asks him if he's being serious.

"It's been a long day,"

She reasons, thinking of how she had barely slept the night before, her conversation with Keiko, the appointment with Beverly and the three patients she had seen afterwards. A hand finds itself sweeping past the tender skin over her stomach, where a plaster still sits atop a blooming bruise.

"Well I'll be here all night if you need anything,"

Will tells her, and she nods like it's obvious.

"I know,"

They trade in smiles and tired glances before she turns to walk away again, swaying from him again and towards her bedroom, the door still frozen open and inviting her in to the darks.

"Sleep well, Imzadi,"

He calls sweetly after her, and she doesn't turn at all in response.

"And you,"

Deanna yawns, and a heartbeat gets stuck in his throat that she maybe doesn't care, but as she disappears into the darkness, breathing deeply, he swears he can hear her add:

"Imzadi,"

He wants to say I love you, but thinks it's best to leave it to goodnight.