Strangers make lovers
And lovers make friends
And we're all expecting
A good thing to end
But don't we
Still have this feeling
Like something could happen, oh
Like it happened back then?

~Back Then by Two Neighbors

The unkempt haired humanoid tapped his pointer finger to his lips thoughtfully as he stared at a floating square of video in front of him. In it he watched Riker, who observed with a heavy conscience, the death of one of the brightest human minds Startfleet would ever know as he gave his life freely to ensure the Federation would be birthed.

He didn't startle at all when he felt a presence appear behind him.

"You know better than to meddle. Haven't you been punished enough for meddling with us? First the Borg, then poor Janeway in the Delta Quadrant?" a deep masculine voice drawled.

The man waved carelessly at his companion. "It's been quite a while since I've had my wrist slapped and I'm bored. Besides, my meddling only creates a new timeline. Doesn't erase this one at all. He'll still die here. The Federation will still come into being. I'll still get to piss off my dear friend Picard, woo my dear Kathryn, and it all will ultimately lead to you sitting here bitching at me about meddling Benjamin."

He turned around and gave a smirking Benjamin Sisko his own annoyed and amused smile.

"Besides, don't you have millions of Bajorans to meddle with freely now? Surely there is no reason to come here and torment me about not being able to meddle while you get to do whatever you please."

"Q…"

"Don't Q me. You know my meddling means nothing as long as I only copy him and not straight up remove him. I know his death was necessary, but it also feels…" Q stopped and it appeared that he was struggling to append a word to what he felt. "Cheap? Truncated? Abrupt?"

Benjamin smiled softly at the powerful being before him. "Your fellow Q will never understand you." He turned toward the scene playing out on the viewport, Jonathan Archer slumped against the wall of the closed body scanner, tears running down his face and openly sobbing as Dr. Phlox explained that Trip had flatlined, that there was nothing he could do to repair the seared tissue in his lungs in time to save him. "His death wasn't fair. It appears that you have gained an interest in the romantic tragedy that was Charles 'Trip' Tucker the Third. He… he never got his just reward for all the great things he did. Starfleet loved to paint him as an emotional and political disaster that should never have made it onto that ship as it's Chief Engineer. But reading the personal logs of his shipmates… He was so much more. If you, in your Q-ness, dug into the Vulcans, you will find tremendous respect for him. At least, you will find it in the Vulcans who adopted the true teachings of Surak once they were recovered. They view what was between him and T'Pol as the sign of being more than the sum of the parts. If he had survived...Spock may not have had such a rough time of it growing up." Sisko drew even with Q.

They both stood there staring at the floating viewport, each lost in their own musings. Finally Q spoke. "You won't go tattle on me will you?"

The former captain of DS9 chuckled. "You can easily remove me from existence. I'm rather surprised you allowed me here. But you have a soft spot in you when it comes to humans."

"I do. Don't know what it is. Your stubbornness? Your curiosity? How you persevere despite knowing you are but an infinitesimal blip in the turning of the universe? It appears that Trip is the epitome of what it means to be human. Impulsive. Emotional. Curious. Loyal to a fault. Full of wonder. Kind, even to those who may be undeserving. Forgiving. And all he got for being one of the best of you was an early grave. Imagine what he could have accomplished…" Q shook his head sadly.

Sisko shook his head sadly. "Bet it chaps your ass knowing he'd do it again too. Go to the early grave, despite having one of the first complete Vulcan mating bonds in a couple millennia, despite missing out on friends and family."

Q scowled. "It's not logical. To have the drive to survive at all costs, kicking and screaming, hanging on by your fingernails, then frivolously toss your life away at the first hint of someone you care about being in danger, all not saying a word. Humans are living contradictions."

Finally giving a full fledged grin, Sisko gave a hearty laugh. "We are. But we aren't alone in the universe in that trait. We just tend to...excel at it." He let his smile fade to a soft understanding one as he watched Q staring in consternation as he watched Trip's friends act like their whole world hadn't shattered with his death, sitting in the stands laughing and joking with one another. Ben placed a hand on Q's shoulder in a comforting gesture. "I won't tattle on you obviously. You wouldn't have let me in here otherwise. Just make sure he's happy in your little experiment. He deserves nothing less."

With that, Benjamin Sisko, Emissary to the Prophets, left Q to his well meaning machinations. Besides, it was refreshing to see a Q returning to their more baser natures.

His breath was stuck in his throat. He felt as his heart thudded in his chest, knowing he wasn't likely to survive his fool headed, stupid, half-cocked plan. That he would never drink whiskey with Malcolm or Jon ever again. That he wouldn't be able to travel to see *her* again. He was just happy that she wouldn't see him in the sorry state he was about to leave his body in. If Jon knew what was best, she would never see his plasma burned body.

Knowing it didn't matter who saw him, he let tears roll down his face in rage and sadness. He glared through them to the line up of mercenaries who had dared steal an innocent child from her family. He knew that pain too well. He'd lost his innocent child. Shran deserved to spend his life with his daughter, not get turned over just because Enterprise was in a hurry. He dropped his mental barriers, knowing she would feel it through the bond. He shoved every last ounce of love, respect, and regret at what became of the two of them into it. Then he screamed at them to go to hell as he slammed the two plasma relays together in his hands.

He closed his eyes as they made contact and waited for the searing pain to consume him.

Only to feel nothing. To hear nothing. No crackle and hiss of burnt flesh. No screams of agony from the mercenaries and himself. He opened his eyes in confusion to find that he was not where he had been.

Seated in a vast white space that resembled T'Pol's meditation space, he became doubly confused when the person he saw was, in fact, *not* T'Pol. He hurriedly wiped the tears from his face in confusion and a small amount of shame. Taking a couple shuddering breaths to steady his racing heart, he took in the average height and rather bland man with brown mussed hair standing near him.

"Who the hell'r you? What happen'd? Where's the baddies? Am I…" Trip's breath hitched again in his throat and he swallowed more tears. "Am I dead?"

The man just stared at him, as if judging every decision Trip had ever made in his life, weighing his worth, his lips pressed together in thought.

Trip ran his tongue along the inside of his cheek, apprehensive. He glanced around the vast empty space before focusing back on the man. "Is this heav'n?"

At his question, the man shook his head as if shocked by the question. Then he looked annoyed and crossed his arms defensively across his chest. "This is most certainly not your human heaven. Goodness, those entities are full of arrogance and spite. Not to mention that they think they have more power than they actually have. And their rebranding not too long ago was terrible. Their product never changed. Just turned the bold print into fine print. You deserve better than that. And I can give it to you, if you do desire."

Tucker's heart sunk a bit in his chest. The man had not refuted that he was dead. He sagged back to the sitting position he had begun rising from in hope. "O'course I'm dead… Wish it was the black nothingness that all them science types kept promising." He stared at his hands forlornly.

Without any warning or movement, the man just appeared in front of him, cross legged, with that focused, confused, thoughtful look on his face. "Is that what you really want Mr. Tucker, bonded of T'Pol of Vulcan? To just fade into the aether of nothingness?" He leaned in close enough that Trip was surprised to find there was no breath puffing against his hands or face.

This sensory information broke through his sad reverie. He narrowed his eyes as he looked the man in the eyes, trying to discern any information he could about him. He'd been so caught up in the fact that he was supposed to be dead that he had failed to question if this was actually happening. Despite the thoughtful look on his face, the man had merriment and good nature dancing through his eyes.

"Who *are* you? …Sir? If'n you aren't an angel… *what* are you?"

The man smirked and Trip saw a bit of arrogance and pride there. "Who and what I am is of little concern to you. You won't remember me anyways, as it's not for you to discover us. All you need to know is that I am…displeased… with how your end is. And because of that, I will grant you a single boon. You have no say in this boon except possibly for the when. But I had to snatch you right as you embraced your death so that you could make your decision knowing how you meet your end."

Trip's eyebrows furrowed, trying to make heads or tails of this strange situation. "I got more'n a couple marbles rolling around in my brain sir, but I prefer to not have to read between the lines if at all possible. Gets me in a right bunch of trouble when I do. Tell it to me straight."

The man chuckled and was instantly standing, as was Trip to his shock.

"I don't typically 'tell it straight' Tucker. But for you, I will do my best. You've suffered enough from what I've seen." The man gestured to his left and what looked like a screen appeared in mid-air next to him. The screen showed Trip facing T'Les as she straightened her dead husband's collar around his neck, a look that was the Vulcan equivalent of empathy crossing her face as her fingers brushed almost purposely against his neck under his chin. The barely contained grief at watching the love of his life marry herself against her will to a man she didn't truly know. The look of wonder and love on T'Pol's face as she held their tragic daughter, well before it was known that she would inevitably die. His own death in sick bay, Jon and Dr. Phlox looking worriedly down at him. It followed up showing Jon blocking a surprisingly visibly distraught T'Pol from entering sickbay.

He felt horrible now for shoving those emotions across the bond. She had finally found a balance for herself, gone back more to her logical roots and away from the messy business of emotions. He was content with their reformed friendship after his abysmal handling of their… relationship was too strong a word but involvement wasn't right either… he supposed connection was the best he could come up with. When their unasked for daughter tumbled into and out of their lives in the blink of an eye, shredding both of them to pieces with her beautiful face and tiny hands… his recovery from that grief was one of giving too much space back to T'Pol. After their initial sharing of grief, with him telling her that the genetics were intentionally botched in Elizabeth, he felt her turmoil through their bond. Her unchecked emotions causing her panic, his emotions just feeding through and making them worse in her. A veritable positive feedback loop.

He had opted to step back. Did his best to shutter his own broadcasting of grief to let her get her logical structure back. And he had never stepped back in. Never dropped those mental shields to her again. He even made sure to stay completely sober ever since so that he wouldn't accidently drop them.

They eventually got back to a good working relationship, became close friends. Because every time he thought about her leaving his life, something literally primal crawled up in him and screamed into his brain that he needed her near. Involuntarily, his hair would stand on end and he'd grind his teeth in something like rage and terror at the very thought of being away from her. But he didn't want to cause her pain by returning to… Whatever they had been. While Elizabeth had been alive. While they had been something like a family. So friends it was.

He had been content. But not happy. And now he was seeing that he had made her unhappy again in his moment of weakness, letting her feel him while he died.

"I am a stupid man. Stupid sonofabitch. Haven't got the sense God gave a goose. Now she has to live with the burden of knowing my feelings with no dumbass man to talk to, to reconcile them." He ran his fingers through his blonde hair, frustrated and angry with himself.

The man gave him a knowing smile. "You actually gave her a great gift. After Archer went out to sign the Federation documents, she went to meet your parents. She grieved with them. Made friends with them. As she had no more family on Vulcan, she stayed on Earth to teach at the Academy and often visited your parents until they passed away, then grieved with your siblings and your nieces and nephews for them. You gifted her with a new family in your death. She died surrounded by your family instead of with no one."

Trip didn't stop the tears that dripped down, burning hot tracks. "Why are you showin' me this? I'm dead. I'm happy she lived a full life, but…"

"But what Mr. Tucker? What do you want? What selfish desire lurks in you? Because you have very rarely acted on your selfishness."

"That's a load of bull and you know it. I was selfish. I ruined a perfectly good Vulcan 'cause I thought she was pretty." Trip sniffed angrily.

The man frowned at him. "According to this timeline, she was going to be ruined in the Expanse anyways. Trellium-D permanently made her less of a Vulcan in the eyes of the High Command and most other Vulcans. That damage was never going to go away. If anything, leaning on a selfish, raging ball of emotions human helped her learn to cope with how she was forever changed. Bonding with him gave her new framework to lean on to handle her Vulcan emotions. And though you thought yourself in the right, you mistakenly cut her off when she needed you most. And because both of you are stubborn to the core, neither of you asked the other what you needed to heal."

Trip was choking back sobs now, a burn of shame suffusing his soul that he could have thought for a second that he was doing the right thing by stifling their bond. "Again, why are you showin' me this? I'm still dead. Tellin' me changes nothin'!" He yelled, grief coloring every word. He desperately wanted to just vanish. To not feel anymore. He felt raw inside. Like nothing would ever be okay.

The man went blank and serious. "What if it did? What if telling you changed *everything*? What if knowing allowed you to change your whole fate?" He pointed a finger at Trip's face.

"What happens to them? To the Federation? What things will change just because I want something different for myself!?" Trip jabbed his finger angrily at the viewport that was frozen on T'Pol barely holding it together over what he assumed to be his casket in the spare storage room, surrounded by his crying crewmates.

The man smiled. "Nothing will change. You will still be dead there. But I can take you back and allow you to branch away to make your own fate. Things won't end the same. Because I can't see them yet. I have much power but a timeline that does not yet exist is not one I can see or influence."

"Why? Why help me?"

The man gave a long suffering sigh. "I'm really tired of hearing that one word question. Why can't you just accept the offer? Why, in your crass euphemism, must you 'look a gift horse in the mouth?' Humans…" He placed his forehead in one hand and rubbed his temples in frustration before seeming to catch himself and give a chuckle. "Jean Luc's habits are rubbing off on me. I need to go pester him again."

Trip decided to hold his tongue. He looked expectantly at his tormenter.

"Look, I'm going to toss you into a moment that I think will work out best, as it appears that you are going to fight me every step of the way. Looks like shortly after the loss of your ephemeral child is the best bet. You will only remember being here in the Continuum as a feeling that you need to do something different than walling yourself off from your shared grief with T'Pol. I will also ensure that Shran never loses his suspicious nature when it pertains to his family's safety. His daughter will never be abducted. But that is where my intervention will end. Everything else, you get to decide. But as with most mortal decisions, there may still be unintended consequences. I am not going to orchestrate the perfect life for you. I am merely going to give you this one chance to live with no regrets. I assume it would make you feel better to know that no one is pulling strings to make people do or feel things that benefit you."

Trip's heart was about to explode in his chest with hope. A chance to fix his mistake with T'Pol. And to ensure that if he lived to the flight back to Earth to sign the treaty, that he wouldn't die due to his inability to come up with a better solution than plugging two damn plasma relays together. That no one would die there. That it would unfold organically.

"Yer not pullin' my leg are ya? This offer is real? I won't be dead?"

The man smirked. "A matter of semantics. You will be dead in your original reality. But as the universe churns in its intricate dance of statistics and numbers and probabilities, you will still live in the one I am opening up for you."

"Are you a god?" Trip whispered to himself.

"No. I am a Q." The man waved his hand at Trip hurriedly, and as his world started blacking out he saw many people appear to surround the Q, looks of disapproval on their faces, and a statuesque, warm, smiling, kind, and one hundred percent human face appeared before him. He felt a hand placed on his forehead and heard strange words uttered into his ear, "Raka-ja ut shala morala... ema bo roo kana... uranak... ralanon Charles Trip Tucker the Third... propeh va nara ehsuk shala-kan vunek…" and heat flashed through him. Then the void took over.

Benjamin turned, his smile fading as Trip dissolved into nothing. He hoped his gift would help the man. Because it was looking like the Q collective had a bone to pick with their chaotic and mischievous brethren.

A woman designated herself as speaker for the group and stepped forward. "You must undo this. You must stop meddling in the affairs of mortals. We cannot predict what will happen if you keep introducing new variables."

Q frowned. "Why? What are we so afraid of? We're not running out of space here in our high and mighty realms. You had to gnash your teeth at dear Sisko stepping through the veil to be with the Prophets. You wanted to stop it." He wagged his finger at them angrily.
p

"He ascended thousands of years before his species was ready. The Prophets played a dangerous game. They are lucky we did not strike them down." The Q collective turned their eyes all at once to bear on Sisko, their disgust apparent.

Benjamin wisely remained quiet. He had no power here. In the cosmic balance, the Prophets -and by extension him- barely held a candle to the power of the Q. The Prophets were left alone because they stayed in their corner of the universe and had never strayed out of it. They also insinuated that they were of use to the Q.

His position as an ascended Emissary gave him the vital knowledge that other races and powers-that-be have perished at the hand of the Q. The last ones… The last ones to perish were in fact the ones that Trip had faced, the Sphere-Builders. Their meddling in the Expanse had come at the price of their lives. As soon as the sphere network had collapsed, the Q had appeared in their reality and with a wave of their hands, disappeared them.

He risked much by being present. But the Prophets allowed him here. Gave him the ability to give a precious gift. For though the Q were generally all knowing and all powerful, they lacked prescience in unfollowed, new timelines. They tended to snip off timelines that branched out, pruning the tree of time to their own designs and desires, their sense of order. But the Prophets… though distinctly Bajoran and nothing else… they could suss out where a timeline would go without it even existing.

A useful trait. But nothing was ever set in stone. Not here. Being mortal was so simple, thinking back on it.

The collective turned back to Q, as he had been prattling at them about how they were 'sticks in the mud' and that they could have a chat with the Prophets about where his little timeline would go. "We will allow this for now. But you know the dangers of new branches. We will not warn you again. Should we suspect it growing out of hand, we will terminate the timeline."

They popped out of Q's area quickly having delivered their rebuke. Turning around, Q gave Ben a suspicious look. "You did something. Lucky you, I'm a curious creature and not a stuffy rule and order abiding Q. I assume whatever you did will reveal itself quickly." He smirked at the Captain.

The Captain smirked back. "Very quickly. And he won't be the one who figures it out first."

"Then settle in Ben my friend, and let us see where our creation goes. We only have all the time in the universe." He conjured an old Earth theatre around them and plopped them into seats, pop corn and soda in hand. They watched intently as the film began to come into focus.