A/N: Just a quick blurb to explain the flashbacks included here. It started as an argument with a friend about how P/T was sort of sprung on us, when I contend it was very slowly developed. My head fills in the blanks before the Swarm, when he first shows outright interest in her. In Deadlock, Harry is sucked out into space while she is trying to hold onto him. B'Elanna calls the bridge, and informs the captain that Harry was dead and Kes had disappeared. Tom hears that while he is at the helm, then offers to help in Sick Bacy before the bridge is evacuated. B'Elanna was already trying to get Hogan to safety, and would have proceeded to Sick Bay before going back to engineering. They would have seen each other for the first time, after they have both lost Harry, there in Sick Bay. We also see a gradual friendship develop in season 2--Dreadnought, Threshold, etc. Something had to have changed for Tom to suddenly ask her out. I contend the previous episode, The Chute, was a motivating factor.
July 3, 2386
Starbase 47
"Is there any sensor data from the time of the accident?" Harry asked Aaron, as they worked side by side at the main computer station in Ops.
"Internal and external sensors were non-functional for three hours after the explosion," Aaron confirmed with a shake of his head.
"But there should be data from before the explosion, correct?" Harry asked.
"Whatever wasn't damaged. What are you looking for, exactly?" Aaron asked, accessing the computer.
"The residue of tachyon radiation Admiral Janeway explained. Preliminary scans detected them, but specific sensor readings from inside the station would be more helpful, helping us pinpoint it better. I'm reading tachyon residue on the good portion of station components. There is no explanation and I can't trace it to a source," Harry said.
"Tachyons would have to have originated from somewhere off the station. We had nothing in production at the time that would have given off any kind of tachyon radiation," Aaron assured him.
"There was no scan made for cloaked ships, at any time during the crisis?" Harry asked. Tachyons were known byproducts of cloaked ships.
"No, Commander. We never detected the tachyons. Before Pablo picked up the graviton waves, all systems were normal." Aaron crossed his arms, reaching up and tapping his lip with this thumb.
"Nothing unusual that you remember at all before the explosion that might point in which direction we should look?" Harry quizzed.
Aaron sighed, scrolling back his memory to try and recall. So much had happened since that day, it was almost like he was searching his memory for evidence in a past life. Hochai had reported a problem during his test flight, Aaron remembered. It had occurred during gamma shift, but he had read the report the next morning. "Two days before the accident, one of our test pilots had a problem during a flight. He was unable to maintain a stable warp field at a specific set of coordinates, and once he changed vectors, the problem disappeared. Then that piece of sphere debris tripped the proximity detection system."
"Is that data available? In his flight logs? Station sensor logs?" Harry asked.
"That ship, and all corresponding records and data were destroyed when the reactor exploded. The station sensor logs are there, but they're damaged. Some of the data was irretrievable. And I don't know how much of the ship's internal logs were even transferred. The standard procedure has a deadline of 72 hours for record-keeping purposes. He wouldn't have known the lab would be blown apart before the deadline," Aaron explained.
"And that piece of debris is nowhere to be found. I've never been a believer in coincidences, Commander. But I'd bet if we can get enough data to examine, we'll find the source of the graviton waves that destabilized the station, and consequently the reactor, were related to that subspace disruption. Your debris' appearance as well as its mysterious disappearance," Harry told him.
"Admiral Janeway secured passage for that debris on your ship, I believe. No one could tell us what it was. It was classified information," Aaron explained. "It was in my report, Commander."
"I read it. I know most just glance it over, but I read it twice," Harry explained.
"I'm sure you did, Commander. Commander Paris spoke often of your….by the book approach," Aaron said with a smile.
"I've been the butt of more than one joke over the years because of that," Harry smiled back.
"You know, he once told me, seriously, mind you, that everything he knew about being a good officer, he learned from you. That's high praise, if you ask me," Aaron offered amicably.
Harry swallowed, pausing his work briefly, touched. "Tom always did a lot of crazy things, just barely made it by when it came to certain others. But he is one of the bravest men I've ever known. You said you read all the Voyager depositions. There was a time, way back, when Tom almost single handedly saved the ship from a group of hostile aliens called the Kazon. Another when he and I were wrongly imprisoned, thrown into this hellhole…." He stopped, shook his head, as if shaking off a bad memory. "He was badly injured. The Doctor didn't know how he survived. He'd lost almost a third of his blood volume. He was just too stubborn to die."
"That sounds like the Tom I know," Aaron laughed gently.
"He's not himself, really. Not any more. I don't think any of us would be in better shape, given the same circumstances. But it's very hard to watch. You've really been there for him. I'm glad he has a good friend here." Harry tried not to sound trite, but couldn't think of anything better. Adding in his own guilt, for constantly being away, solved nothing.
"I owe him pretty much everything. It's the very least I can do." Angling himself away, Aaron continued. "You were very close to B'Elanna, too, weren't you?"
Harry nodded, without saying anything. "I was the glue that got them together, at least at first. I was her friend and, separately, I was his friend. She thought he was an arrogant pig when she met him…which wasn't that far from the truth, actually. I sort of smoothed things over, I think, and they started getting along. Everything else just kind of happened on its own," Harry said.
"I'm sorry, Commander," Aaron sighed in sympathy. "I also owe her quite a bit. A debt I can no longer repay, it seems."
"Anyway," Harry said suddenly, clearing his thoughts. "There's nothing wrong with the system per se, but these readings don't make sense. I want to go through the entire system and see if we can find anything more. See if there's some kind of pattern or something that we overlooked."
"Let's start at the beginning, then." Aaron got to work.
March 18, 2372
USS Voyager
"I need help here!" B'Elanna screamed as she limped through the door to Sick Bay with Crewman Hogan's arm slung over her shoulder. His face was bloodied and burned and his uniform singed.
Sick Bay was dark, the lack of emergency lighting apparent. The room was overrun with wounded, and the Doctor, alone, was overwhelmed.
Tom Paris rushed up to her, relieving her of her burden, as he gingerly pulled Hogan away and guided him towards an area on the floor where he was treating patients who had no need for a bed. She grimaced in pain as the shift in weight caused her aching shoulder to throb, flashes of hot pain shooting down her arm and across her back, taking her breath away.
"You're hurt," he said gently, glancing quickly to make sure another technician was attending to Hogan as he turned back to her. She grunted, making an annoyed face, attempting to turn away from him when he ran the scanner over her shoulder. "Your shoulder is dislocated, Lieutenant," he said stiffly.
"I have to go–" she gasped.
"You can't do anyone any good with only one arm, B'Elanna," he argued. "I can set it and give you something for the pain. Come on," he urged, grabbing her uninjured arm and guiding her towards his diagnostic panel.
She felt the hypospray hiss against her neck. "There's no easy way to do this, I'm sorry," he said through gritted teeth. He braced himself against her, holding tight with one hand, while he forced her shoulder joint back into place with a hard jerk. She gasped, but made no other sound. He marveled at her strength, knowing how much pain she was actually in.
"I…I couldn't hold him," she whispered, gazing away from Tom as her eyes glassed over.
"What?" he asked, not sure if he'd heard her correctly.
"Harry," she sighed sadly. She saw the pain flash in his impossibly blue eyes. He would have been on the bridge when she'd called Janeway and heard her tell the captain that Harry was dead. "The forcefield failed and he didn't listen. He was…sucked out into space."
Tom closed his eyes tightly, feeling his stomach twist into a knot with that knowledge. It was a horrible way to die. She had tried to save him, and now lived with the knowledge of her failure. He knew what that kind of guilt could do to a person. "You did everything you could to save him, B'Elanna. It wasn't your fault."
"I can't believe he's gone," she whispered aimlessly. She felt another hypospray hiss against her neck.
"That should help with the pain," he said softly. He didn't look at her, couldn't look at her. She knew he was barely holding himself together, suffering from the same loss, and needing to work and help everyone else.
The physical pain anyway, she thought. Anything else would have to be set aside, and dealt with later. For both of them.
September 25, 2372
USS Voyager
Feverish delirium ever so slowly gave way to pain, and then darkness as the pain winked out. He felt a cold hypospray on his neck, a sharp pain that seemed to circle his waist like a belt. His scalp itched and burned in one particular spot. His tongue felt like wool, stuck uselessly to the roof of his mouth. He couldn't form words, couldn't even form coherent thoughts.
But the air smelled differently, wherever he was. Before, there had only been the musty, dirty, sickly smell of unsanitary living conditions and lingering death. This air was clean, almost antiseptic. He could just make out the blurry yellow lines on the walls around him. Sick Bay. He was in Sick Bay on Voyager. Wasn't he? Was this another dream? He had dreamt so many, he had no way of knowing what was real and what had only been a fabrication of his mind.
"Prepare for surgery, Kes. We need to remove these implants." It was the Doctor's voice, crisp and clinical.
Tom felt hands on his head, fingers sifting through his matted and dirty hair. They were familiar hands and fingers, but even as his rational mind accepted this, he railed against being touched. One hand balled into a fist and he swung upward blindly, screaming in breathy pain at whoever it was. In the blurry altercation, he could see the Doctor, plus the soft lilac color of Kes' tunic, and Harry's unconscious form on the biobed next to him.
"Mr. Paris," the Doctor admonished sharply. "Restraints," he added, murmuring to someone else. Tom fought, flailing, until he felt a warm hand on either side of his face. The intoxicating scent of spicy musk and night blooming flowers filled his lungs, a potent elixir for his agitation.
"No…no…no," he wailed helplessly, unsure himself who he was fighting and why.
The same hands on his cheeks reached up into his hair, holding his head firmly but gently. "You're safe." He heard the whisper. B'Elanna. Why was she here, like this? Was it from a dream or a memory…her voice, choking on emotion, telling someone she was staying…because the two of them were her friends and she wouldn't leave them. "They can't hurt you anymore."
He relaxed, stopped struggling, but she left her hands on his face, lingering perhaps a little too long on his cheek. He could see her face, her deep brown eyes pulling him inside. She was worried, and her face pinched in pain.
"Two more hours and I wouldn't have been able to save him. I honestly don't know how he survived as long as he did…septic and on the verge of bleeding to death." The Doctor again. "Although, Mr. Paris is far too stubborn to die," the Doctor added in his sarcastic deadpan.
He felt increasingly sleepy, the pain and agitation fading into the background. On the edge of his consciousness, he thought he heard the Doctor one last time, in a voice rich with compassion, "Don't worry, Lieutenant. He'll be alright. I promise."
He fell asleep, comforted to know she cared enough to need that kind of assurance from the doctor. The scent of her perfume followed him into his dark slumber.
July 4, 2386
Starbase 47
Aaron walked into the eating area of their quarters, adjusting his uniform. T'Mira had placed a plate of waffles opposite from where she sat, with a plate full of eggs in front of her. He watched her delicate fingers lift her fork to her mouth, then her delicate nibble as she chewed. Tenderness flowed from inside him, so new and blissfully wonderful, for the child of the woman he loved.
"Good morning, Commander," she said gently. "My mother had to leave early."
He smiled, sitting in front of his breakfast. "You can call me Aaron. It seems right, don't you think?" he asked.
She tilted her head, considering his request. "Aaron," she repeated. "It seems strange."
"Not really," he added. He started eating. "Thank you. How did you know I like waffles?"
"Whenever you ate with my mother in the cafe, this was your most frequent choice," she said flatly. He laughed at the sweetness of her. "She said eating only carbohydrates for breakfast is illogical."
Still laughing, he answered, "She's right, you know."
"She is a doctor," T'Mira replied. He swore she was teasing.
He put his fork down. Intently, he said, "You know, T'Mira, I love your mother very much."
She nodded, eating her eggs as if he had told her today was Tuesday. "She loves you too."
"I just wanted you to know that. And that I care about you, too," he said.
"I know, Com–Aaron," she corrected herself. She stopped eating. "My father died when I was a baby. I never knew him, except through my mom. But it's not the same." She looked at her plate, then back up at him. "My mom missed him. For a long time…I know she still does. But…you made it better. I'm glad that you did."
He swallowed hard, touched. "I am too. The both of you…you're like my family now. And that makes me happy."
"It makes me happy, too," she said softly. At his lone lifted eyebrow, she continued. "I know it sounds strange. You expect me to be Vulcan. I'm not, though, not really. My father was human. My mother is part human. I am actually 83.33% human."
"T'Mira, that's a very Vulcan thing to say, you know," Aaron countered. His brain was trying to catch up with her math, something not quite making sense, but his attention shifted back to her words.
"It's what everyone expects me to be. My ears aren't very pointed, even compared to my mom. No one sees that, though," she explained.
Troubled now, he responded, "That isn't true. You should just be yourself. Your mother knows that and I know she tells you that."
T'Mira's disdain was apparent, despite her efforts to remain neutral. "Miral was the only one who just accepted me the way I was. And now she's gone."
He knew the pain, realizing now how deeply it still affected her. "I know you miss her. We all do."
"I tried to talk to Commander Paris about her. He can't. He misses her too much," T'Mira explained. Without another word or explanation, she jumped up from the table and disappeared into her room. Just when he thought perhaps she had left because she was upset, he saw her emerge. Her face was still, but her blue eyes were sad. She had something in her hand.
When she approached the table, Aaron saw she had a small stuffed toy in her hand. She lifted it and presented it to him. "Commander Paris gave this to me at her funeral. He said I should look at it, when I missed her. This is Miral's toy, Toby the Targ. I think maybe he should have it back. Maybe it will help him. Can you give it back to him?"
Aaron took it from her absently. He answered her, unsure of what words he had actually spoken. He knew without a doubt Tom would want this. In fact, he had sent Aaron into their quarters looking for this not long after Miral's funeral. Because, Aaron thought in bewilderment, apparently, he hadn't remembered ever giving it to T'Lassa's daughter.
XXX
"What is it, T'Lassa?" Tom asked as she walked into his office. Her face was set like stone.
She stepped forward, clasping her hands behind her back. "Something that I must tell you, despite the potential ramifications. I believe it is imperative that you know the whole story. I believe we may be running out of time."
Tom paled. "Is this about the future again? Or whatever is classified–"
He looked down at his desktop as he heard the sound of metal tinkling. A pewter colored coin, about 25 centimeters in diameter, spun around its edges in front of him. She had thrust it there, and stood back wordlessly, waiting for him to speak. He picked it up in his hand, ran his thumb over its surface. The language on the coin was unfamiliar. "What is this?"
"A Xindi initiation medal," she said crisply.
"What does this have to do with anything?" he asked.
"I will explain to the best of my ability, Commander," she stated. "In order for Jonathan Archer to stop the Xindi from destroying Earth, he was tasked with convincing the Xindi that it was the sphere builders, and not humanity, that were destined to cause the demise of the Xindi people in the future. One of the primate members of the Xindi Council was named Degra. He designed the prototype that sliced into Florida and Venezuela in March of 2153. Archer was able to convince him that the sphere builders were manipulating the Xindi for their own gain. One way he was able to do so was with this coin. If you have it dated, you will find it is from 200 years in the future…from our current vantage point."
Tom turned wide, unblinking eyes up to her. She continued on in that same flat, urgent tone. "Archer gave it to Degra. Degra was killed by another member of the Council, a reptilian Xindi named Dolim. Dolim vowed to execute Degra's wife and children as well. Another primate council member, known to Archer, got word of this, and used this coin to convince his family to run, and stay in hiding from the reptilians. Archer killed Dolim, but the plan was known to the other reptilians under his command. Degra's daughters, Piral and Jaina, came to the Federation Charter signing in 2161. They presented it back to Archer as proof of their lineage, and as a way of showing their gratitude to him. When Archer was President of the Federation, this was on display in his office, though it was a somewhat controversial topic, and he never explained what it was. When he died in 2245, he left it to T'Pol."
Tom kept his eyes on the coin, confused but listening intently. "I still don't understand, T'Lassa."
She sighed heavily, her face pinched. "Archer was given this coin on the observation deck of the Enterprise J in 2567, at the Battle of Procyon V."
"What?" Tom asked, flabbergasted, fumbling the coin in his hand.
"This is why all the information you have is tempered, why much of it is still classified. A Temporal Agent from the 29th century known only to Archer as Daniels was involved in many of Archer's early missions. All of that has been redacted out of the official record. Regardless, not all of it is pertinent to this particular scenario. But the truth is–the sphere builders that were sent back into their trans-dimensional realm by T'Pol and Tucker had technology that allowed them to see the future, all future permutations of divergent timelines. This battle was the final confrontation between them and the Federation. They knew the Federation was to blame for their defeat. The Federation would never have existed without humanity…without Archer. They tried to destroy both. Daniels was sent into the past by his superiors to ensure no future damage was done to the timeline," she finished, taking a breath as she let her words sink in.
Tom still looked blitzed, uncertain. T'Lassa called into the air. "Computer, display holo photograph T'Lassa 254. This was taken at the signing of the Federation Charter in San Francisco in 2161, and left to me by my grandmother." The computer on Tom's desk flashed awake, quickly displaying the picture she had requested. "Magnify quadrant D5 times 50," she called again. He realized this was something she was expertly aware of, something she had always known.
Always indulgent of his interest in history, this image was well known to him. But she was looking for something specific in this photo, he understood. The generic photo of the rotunda, swarming with thousands of people and hundreds of Starfleet brass in dress uniforms narrowed, then narrowed again. Tom watched as the computer zeroed in on one spot. It looked to be a walkway, an observation port and a catwalk, far above and away from the seating and the ceremony down below. Tom's open-mouthed gape told her he could see what she knew was there. "On the left is Jonathan Archer, in his Starfleet uniform, circa 2154. You can still see the bruises on his face from a recent interrogation session with the Xindi. On the right is Daniels, in his temporal agent uniform. His face is blurry to you because he is genetically modified to not appear in photographs or holo photographs, due to the nature of his role. Now scroll down to the dais," she ordered. The vantage point changed, to show Archer, visibly older, in his dress uniform, with admiral's pips on his collar. The uniform was from the 2160s. "Show full vista," she said aloud. The image retracted to its original form, but Tom's eyes stayed focused on the tiny dots present in front of the large oval window. "This photo is in the National Archives, Commander. It is authentic. Jonathan Archer is in this photograph twice because he time traveled there with Daniels, who was aiming to prove to Archer his importance to history."
Choosing each word carefully, his mind reeling, Tom replied, "Well, then, I guess that explains all the classified stuff. But what does this mean, T'Lassa?"
"I told you the Federation believes that because of the actions of the crew of the Enterprise NX-01, the Battle of Procyon V never occurs. If that is so, then this memento would not exist. And I would have no memory of it, since I was not part of any altered timeline where any of this changed. And yet, it is here, and I do remember it. Because that battle still occurs. Daniels never told Archer it was changed…the Federation just simply chose to believe that. T'Pol never did.
"In the 22nd century, Vulcans still did not officially accept time travel as possible. She remained skeptical, despite having traveled back in time at least twice that she wrote about in her personal logs. She did much to convince the Vulcan High Council otherwise. It was only years later that she came to understand that if what Archer had explained had in fact been changed, that proof from that moment in time would have disappeared. She knew at some point in the future there would be proof that the sphere builders were attempting to reemerge into this realm. I believe we have seen the proof, here."
During his time on Voyager, Tom had dealt with time travel and temporal mechanics way more than he wished. It was headache inducing, mind boggling, and unreasonable. It made sense to him why so much of this was redacted, not available to the general public. Many instances of situations from Voyager's seven year mission were still classified for the same reason. Nearly every country on Earth had at least one landmark named after Jonathan Archer. Proof that some strange interference from the future had been contended with during his historic period was not information Starfleet or the Federation would want circulating, lest one of many enemies of the Federation were to find out.
Still grappling with the information, something occurred to Tom. "The Xindi attack on Earth…that…didn't happen, right? Until someone from the future interfered? Coerced the Xindi into attacking?"
He saw the very brief twitch of her mouth that told her admiration for his reasoning ability, his logical extrapolation. For all his better qualities, Commander Paris had little reputation for being logical. "Daniels first contacted Archer well before the Xindi incident. Actually within the first few months of their launch in 2151. But, I do know Daniels told Archer history had no record of that attack. The Federation temporal agents were able to exist outside the timestream with the technology they possessed. They learned of the attack when they examined history in real time. That was how they knew one of the factions had affected Earth's history," T'Lassa explained.
Tom rubbed his hands over his face. "T'Lassa, this is not common knowledge outside the old crew of Voyager, but we made it back to the Alpha Quadrant…after only seven years, because…of…temporal manipulation. I know Temporal Investigations was involved. Admiral Janeway was in depositions and debriefing for weeks and weeks after we returned. Why wouldn't these…temporal agents, as you refer to them, have been involved then?"
"Daniels needed special permission to contact Archer, and he told Archer he would be reprimanded for bringing Archer to the signing of the Charter, mostly because there was tangible proof of his interference, as well as time travel. Hence, the image I showed you. All I can logically deduce is that most of the time, the temporal agents work outside of our timestream, and we remain unaware of changes they have corrected. Whatever…manipulation that may have been done in order to bring home Voyager early…was allowed to stand, just as the initial attack on Earth was. T'Pol was assured after that mission, Daniels never contacted Archer again. But she knew, without a doubt, that the preservation of the Federation was always their primary motivational factor. Instances less…consequential…were sometimes ignored."
His brain was slowly catching up. It was strange, but not strange enough that he couldn't rationalize it. Weird was, as Janeway was so fond of saying, their business. "So, let me ask you this. If this battle is still going to happen, and the Federation still defeats them, what is the problem? If their reemergence was predicted by T'Pol, and now it's happening, that's to be expected, isn't it?" he asked. "History fulfilling itself?"
Her eyes darkened. "The timeline has already been tampered with. And the sphere builders know it is the Federation that causes their demise. They still have the technology required to examine all possible futures going forward. They would not be attempting to reemerge without knowing a way to stop the Federation again, a way to defeat them that is different than what has occurred in the past, because the sphere builders also know that we are aware of them, or at least we were. As I told you previously, there is no one with first hand knowledge of this alive. Starfleet Command is aware of historical facts only."
"So what comes first? The battle or the interference?" he asked. It was complex. "And if what you said is true, then the 29th century agents will intervene again, right?"
"My point, Commander. Those agents were able to stop the destruction of the Federation, but not the deaths of seven million humans on earth, seven million people whose lives had infinite ramifications for the future, that were irrevocably changed when it could not be undone. They may very well become involved again, but…what if more damage has been incurred?" she asked.
Tom's eyes narrowed. "What are you getting at?" He felt his stomach lurch at the thought that somehow time was being manipulated around them without their knowledge.
"I'm not certain, but it would seem the attack on this station was deliberate. Do you concur? Like something targeted the station with that graviton wave. Perhaps in an effort to destroy something crucial, something that has now changed the future outcome."
"So what am I supposed to do?" he asked helplessly.
"Tell Admiral Janeway what I've told you. I have a feeling, despite the directives and classifications, that she will be receptive." She paused, breathing slowly. "They may decommission this station, Commander, and everything will leave our control. We must act while we still have the access. And the time."
