Second Chances: Chapter 59

A/N: First, a moment of silence in remembrance of Aron Eisenberg, who played Nog on DS9 and died yesterday. May he rest in peace in the Divine Treasury.

And now, back to the story.

Stardate 52324
June 2375
Hawaii, Earth

As soon as Crewman Maule was off the comm, Nicki turned to Sydney. "Get me on that ship," she demanded.

"What?" Sydney asked.

"The Veracruz," she explained. "You shuffle assets, so shuffle me onto the Veracruz."

"The point of shuffling assets was to get you away from the Dominion, not send you into a contested system!" Sydney exclaimed.

"You're sending B'Elanna into a contested system," Nicki pointed out.

"The CRC is," Sydney argued. "Not me."

"But you shuffle assets, so you could shuffle her away from it, if you wanted. But you won't."

"B'Elanna's an expert in Dominion tech!"

"And I'm an expert in hybrid medicine!" Nicki shot back. "You are sending a Klingon/human hybrid engineer into a war zone. Sounds like a good place to be sending someone with experience in treating hybrid injuries. You know, in case that expert in Dominion tech is injured."

"I'm not planning on needing medical attention," B'Elanna interjected. Both ignored her.

"Mom will never speak to me again if I put both of you on the same ship heading into Dominion space," Sydney pointed out.

"You know that's not even close to being true."

"Will both of you just stop for a minute?" That got their attention, both women turning to face B'Elanna. "I don't care what ship you put Nicki on," she said to Sydney. Nicki opened her mouth to protest, but B'Elanna's raised hand stopped her. "I need to get on the comm and get ready for this mission. Keep arguing if you want, just make sure my daughter doesn't wander off or drown." Both sets of blue eyes went to Izzy, clearly having forgotten that the preschooler was there, but B'Elanna was already halfway to the apartment complex.

She threw a shirt on over her bathing suit on the way to her office and immediately got Commander Harkins on the comm. *Sorry to have ruined your Sunday afternoon,* Harkins said. He was in uniform and at work at—she checked the comm; 2000 San Francisco time—so his evening was clearly more ruined than hers. *There's been a crew holding AR-558 for a few months now. They've tried sending engineering teams from Starbase 371 to access the relay station, but the few times they've been able to get people or supplies to the planetoid, they've been overrun by Jem'Hadar before they've been able to access the data in the comm node.*

She nodded; they've been able to piggy-back messages through the Dominion network, but as far as getting anything out of it—including the messages the Dominion sends through it—they haven't been able to do remotely. This was the only relay station that the Federation-Klingon Alliance had managed to gain control of, and the constant bombardment around it had made it impossible to do anything with it since it had been taken. "What's changed?" she asked. She hadn't heard anything about the Dominion backing away from Chin'toka or the relay station, but she also hadn't been looking for it, especially after they lost the Hirogen network and were no longer depending on the Dominion network to talk to Voyager.

*A lot of tactical movement I don't fully understand,* Harkins admitted. *Enough so that the Defiant is on its way to AR-558 now to drop off supplies. With any luck, that'll sustain them long enough for the Veracruz to get there with replacement troops and your team.* He frowned. *Holding the station isn't your concern,* he said. *There'll be a few hundred ground troops for that. Your team will be responsible for accessing the station and tapping into the Dominion comms.*

"How many on my team?" she asked.

*As many as you need,* he replied promptly. *Admiral Huang at Operations has stated that this is his top priority. You can pull from anyone at Pathfinder, the CRC, anywhere you need.*

She frowned at the name of the Chief of Starfleet Operations. "Sir, Commander Wyland is at my house now. She didn't say anything about this."

*She might not have known yet,* Harkins said. *I think things are moving really fast on this one. I was notified about thirty seconds before I told them to comm you.*

Torres glanced at her office door, even though she assumed Sydney was still down on the beach, and then back to her monitor. "I'll get you a list of names within ten minutes," she promised, then paused. "I want Cadet Nu on this one."

*I'm not sure ground combat is the best place for a cadet,* Harkins said with a frown of his own.

"She's taken both Dominion Tech and Advanced Communication Networks," Torres reminded him. "She's more qualified than half the officers either Barclay or I has."

*She doesn't have combat experience,* Harkins replied. *Is she even phaser qualified? And isn't she working with Reg on the transwarp probe?*

"Fewer than half the officers and crewmen at Pathfinder have combat experience," she pointed out. "I don't know if she's qualified on the hand phaser or rifle yet, but she can get qualified on the Veracruz on the way if she's not. And they're at a good point in the transwarp probe project that Lt. Barclay can run experiments without her. It's not as if I'm taking him on a ground combat mission."

*That's a good call,* Harkins agreed. Barclay was a great engineer; a soldier he was not. *If you think Nu is the best person for the team and you can get her combat ready in the time it takes the Veracruz to get to Chin'toka, I'm not going to stand in your way,* he finally said. *Get me the rest of the names as soon as possible. I'll see you off tomorrow morning. I'll probably be here all night, so don't hesitate to reach out if you need anything.*

"I appreciate it, sir," she replied before signing off. She went through her mental directory of the officers, techs, and mechanics she had worked with on Dominion or communications projects and quickly compiled a team of twenty-nine people, hoping she'd be able to get at least twenty of them.

She sent the list to Commander Harkins, then headed back outside to talk to Sydney about the mission. She was surprised to see the entire extended Paris family—and Navi—gathered in and around one of the public gazebos. Most of the kids, under the supervision of the teenagers, were down by the water, with both Ainsley and Kajsa shooting occasional concerned glances back at the adults. Owen was the first to notice her. "Did you get everything arraigned with Commander Harkins?" he asked. She nodded.

"I sent him my list for the team," she replied. "I hope he can get hold of everyone tonight."

He nodded in reply, and then Alicia spoke. "What time are you bringing Izzy by in the morning?"

"Probably between zero-nine and 10," she replied.

"Kajsa and I take off on the Berlin tomorrow at zero-eight," Sydney chimed in. "We'll be gone by the time you get there, but Steph and Alex will be there. Jens comes in on Wednesday night and will take the kids to Norway for the rest of summer holiday."

"I'll be going with you on the Veracruz," Nicki added, looking meaningfully at Sydney, who gave a heavy sigh and rolled her eyes. Owen's face didn't register any surprise at the suggestion, so Nicki had probably outlined her arguments for changing ships while B'Elanna had been in the apartment. Alicia's eyes still narrowed, though, and she turned to Jason.

"What do you think about Nicki going on the Veracruz?" she asked. B'Elanna guessed that she had already outlined her arguments against and was now trying to draw Jason into the fight.

"She's one of 38 board-certified physician hybridologists in the Federation and has advanced training in trauma support," he commented. "From a medical standpoint, she'd be the physician I would pick to go along if you had a diverse crew in a potential trauma situation, especially when that diverse crew includes a hybrid officer in a key position for mission success. I don't think Starfleet has anyone else who meets her qualifications."

"And from a personal point of view?" Alicia pressed. Jason shook his head.

"She's out for a 90-day deployment regardless," he pointed out. "Whether she gets on the Gettysburg or Veracruz, I'm going to have to cut back on my hours at the hospital, reduce my call schedule, and do the work of two parents by myself. And I know you're not trying to suggest that I would ever tell Nicki what to do in her professional life," he said emphatically. "I am damn proud to have such a brilliant and driven wife, and I would never dream of holding her back. We're partners and we support each other's careers and decisions. That's the way it's been for 17 years and the way it'll be until she drives me to an early grave." He looked over at Nicki and gave her a wink before turning back to his mother-in-law. "Quite frankly, I'm just happy that she actually made a decision," he said dryly. Nicki smacked him playfully on his thigh, but her hand remained there after he stopped talking.

Sydney sighed in defeat. "I'll go to the office and make the change," she said reluctantly. "But that means you'll be stuck on the Veracruz for the duration of the 90 days, regardless of how long B'Elanna's mission at AR-558 takes," she added warningly.

"Thanks, Syd, I wasn't able to figure that out on my own," Nicki said sarcastically. She turned to her mother and sighed. "I'll be fine, Mom."

"For the record, I'm not happy about where any of my children are going," Alicia said. "Sydney going to the Neutral Zone, Nicki and B'Elanna heading into Dominion space, Jens coming back from Dominion space, Tom's somewhere in the Delta quadrant, but we don't know exactly where at the moment. Jason, you're the only one I don't have to worry about for the foreseeable future!" B'Elanna remembered their conversation on Mars while they were waiting for the Borg to attack and felt a pang of sympathy for her mother-in-law. Marrying a Starfleet officer was one thing, but would she have done it if she had known that that would mean that she would be raising Starfleet officers as well, that she would someday have to sit at home, watching the grandchildren, because her children were off fighting a war or lost in a far-away part of the galaxy?

"Save a little bit of worrying for Jason," Nicki said wryly. "Our kids are assholes. I'm going to be getting so much rest for the next three months."

"I heard that!" Christopher called back to them.

"You were meant to!" she called back in reply.

Sydney rose. "Well, I'm off to the office to send my sister to war," she said dryly.

"My console is connected to Headquarters," B'Elanna offered. "You should be able to access your work station from there."

"Thanks, but I should touch base with others in the office. I'll be back soon. I hope."

By unspoken agreement, they were done talking about work. B'Elanna turned on the simulated fire pit in the middle of the space and brought down some synth beverages and the rest of Izzy's birthday cake. The smaller kids gradually began heading up to where the adults were sitting, the bigger ones as the sun began to set, Ainsley playing with her holoimager all the while. Sydney returned an hour and a half after she left and handed a PADD to Nicki without interrupting the conversation.

There were stories, there was laughter, and it would have been the perfect evening if the pending missions weren't hanging over all of them.

After the Parises had all beamed back to their respective houses, Navi helped put Izzy to bed and helped clean up. Before she left the apartment to head to the transporter station, she surprised B'Elanna by giving her a tight hug. She didn't like physical contact—Vulcans were touch telepaths, and even casual contact affected Navi—so such physical shows of affection were rare. "Be careful," Navi said as they separated.

"You, too," B'Elanna replied to her half-sister. "Be patient with your grandfather's family. They're probably not accustomed to being around people who are part-Betazoid, part-Vulcan, and part-Human, and have no experience suppressing emotions." Brown eyes studied black ones for a few seconds; she almost didn't believe that this young woman, a year away from being a Starfleet cadet, was the same person as the seven-year-old girl she met at her grandmother's house so long ago. "I'll see you when you get back from Vulcan." Navi gave a single, emphatic nod to that, and walked out of the apartment.