The girl of fifteen stood on the cliff looking up at the space above her, a sky without logic to those who had grown up on a planet but to someone who understood the sky to be a great expanse of black with stars, the nebula's and planets in the distance sparkling. This sky made sense to her, it was a comfort to her. She looked up into that sparkling ocean, the red rock beneath her feet seeming alien and yet familiar at the same time. There she stood, her dark hair spiraling in the wind as she held a smile on her lips, her green eyes sparkling with serenity. "Amelia." A voice called from over her shoulder making her turn, her eyes seeming to reflect the sky above her, stars moving through the bright green shine, nebula's swirling in the blackened pupils. His voice was familiar and yet she didn't know who he was. Her blue dress fluttered like the wings of the butterflies she had seen, her bare feet scrapping over the reddened rock while she moved towards the shadows.
"Hello?" Amelia asked without opening her mouth. She cocked her head to the side, her smile changing to a look of innocent curiosity. "Do I know you?" Her feet moved with grace over the red rocks, her hands clinging to the wall that seemed to separate herself from the stranger.
"I know you." The voice replied, his tone almost ethereal, unlike the voices of those on Voyager, her mother's voice, her fathers voice. "I am Teth."
She paused in her place and took a step back down the rock wall. "I know you. I remember you, you tried to take away my powers." Her tone went from one of innocence to annoyance. "I need them, to protect Voyager, to protect mommy and daddy."
"But they won't protect you." He spoke up from the shadows again not showing his face nor his form.
"Protect me from what?" The sky above her grew darker, the wind picking up as Amelia turned to see the blackness engulf the sky and swallow the sparkling light of the stars.
"From him." The wind hissed in her ears, the sky bleeding a red light, like a fire dripping from above threatening to scorch the earth around her.
Amelia turned back to the shadow that had been speaking to her. "Teth?" There was no response. "Teth?" Quiet whispers caught her attention, whispers that moved with the wind brushing against her ears and turning her attention back to the blackness. "Teth I'm afraid, I want to go home." Her eyes remained fixed on the darkness, her fists clenching shut. "I want my mommy and daddy." Amelia turned back to the shadow where the comforting voice had come from, her feet carrying her closer again. "Teth answer me." A figure shifted, moving from the darkness. Taking a step back Amelia's eyes grew wide with fear, the figure looked burnt. A body that had been engulfed in flames with black chard flesh that cracked apart. The smoldering of flames leaked out from between the cracks in the flesh. It's Chard fingers stretching out to her as empty hollow eyes light up with that same haunting red glow above her. Amelia stepped backwards again letting out a scream. Her heels brushed against the edge of the cliff making her stand rigid against the approach of the burning man. Whispers continued to fill her ears, hundreds of words from the same voice rambling together causing waves of confusion. He was almost close enough for him to touch her but Amelia had no where else to run, her eyes looked up into his as he opened his mouth, flames erupting from his throat. Amelia screamed again pushing her hands out to stop him.
Opening her eyes the baby started crying, her face soaked with tears already. Since Q had found her on the holodeck she had been plagued with nightmares every night, finding it impossible to fall asleep and stay asleep with memories she had tried to forget and the memories that did not belong to her clawing at the inside of her head. Tonight it had been her mother to come to her rescue and pick her up out of her crib. Her head falling onto Janeway's shoulder. "0400 hours? Good morning to you too Amelia." Amelia whined and grabbed onto the closest thing to her which unfortunately for Janeway happened to be her long auburn locks. "Oh, no, let go, ah." Janeway uncurled the baby's tight grip and tried brushing her hair back. "You don't look like you are going to be going back to bed anytime soon are you." Amelia looked back up at Janeway with bright shinning eyes. "I'm going to need coffee, black coffee." This had become a common thing for Amelia in the morning. Her mother drank black coffee by the gallons, it was so bad the smell of coffee actually made her feel comfortable as it reminded her of her mother. When she was particularly fussy for Q he would replicate some coffee and set it by her joking Janeway had made her an addict.
Laying Amelia back in her crib so she could get dressed Q finally managed to wake up, sometimes he woke up from the sound of someone three decks down sneezing. Other days he could have slept through a red alert and woken up not having noticed half the ship was gone. "Where are you going?" He asked still trying to wake up, his arms wrapped around his pillow as he tried to fluff it back up.
"Amelia's awake and doesn't look like she will be going back to sleep any time soon. I'm going to go get coffee in the mess hall and work on a few things before morning shift starts."
Q shifted in bed rolling over and taking up her side of the bed too, that wasn't anything new, he was a bed hog. "I'll come with you." He yawned and glanced over at the crib.
"I said I wanted to get work done." She laughed, it was nice she wasn't so angry anymore, not that it had been her fault. They had been experimenting on them. Q just wished he could say the same about his condition. He was still not back to 'normal'. "You do nothing but cause a distraction."
"Well there won't be anyone else to talk to this early in the morning." He argued with her pulling a partial smirk across his lips when she called him a distraction. "Am I a good distraction?"
"Is there such a thing as a good distraction?" She raised her brow acting as though what she had said was negative but Q knew better when she was playing with him. She had this cute way of always pretending he annoyed the hell out of her and he had a funny way of playing into that. One the outside their relationship didn't look like it was going to work for the long run but between the two of them they sort of just enjoyed each other. They were both intelligent and determined, both equally as stubborn, and both enjoyed a little chaos even if Kathryn would never admit it.
Rolling off the bed Q scrambled to find a shirt, not because he had misplaced a shirt during some more exciting activity the night before. More so because he did what Tom did and replicated a shirt, wore it for a few days straight, forgot to replicate a new one, and ended up wearing the same undershirt for almost a week. Yes, it was problematic when you shared quarters with the captain and she threw a clean shirt at your face giving you the glare. That's why it was better he bunked with her, he would get away with too much if he didn't. "I need my shirt." He looked under the bed then crawled over to Rowley pushing the dog over to see if he was laying on it. By the time he had looked back over the bed Janeway had tossed a shirt at him letting it hit him in the face. "Thank you." She nodded crossing her arms over her chest. Pulling it over his head he fixed his hair with his fingers, straitening out his locks and smiling at a little thought that crossed his mind. Being human made him realize his hair was a bit unruly, at least he knew where Amelia's curls came from and why it was impossible to make some of them stay down. Every morning she had at least three strands of wild hair that stood on end making her look like she had horns, Q's hair had a habit of doing the same thing. Once he had his shirt tucked in he walked over to Kathryn kissing her lightly on the neck and making her turn her attention to him with a quirked brow.
"Q, you are aware the baby is awake." Dammit, she was right, why else would they be awake this early. "Besides, I need coffee before I start dealing with you." She shook her head, who didn't need coffee to deal with him? Amelia whimpered as if to prove her mothers point. Kathryn pulled her hair back securing it with a clip. "I'm thinking of cutting my hair short."
"Why?" He liked her long hair, it was so thick and soft until he woke up in the middle of the night choking on it.
"Well you try having long hair and a baby. It wasn't so bad when she pulled on my hair before because she didn't have her fine tuned motor control but now that she has started to develop a vice like grip it's not as pleasant. I think she pulled some of my hair out this morning."
Q snickered to himself but Kathryn wasn't quite as amused. Walking over to the crib he looked down at his daughter, she already had a blanket in her mouth as she looked up at Q and whimpered again. "Hey, and maybe before you finish zipping up your jacket you might want to consider feeding Amelia, I don't think she has yet to figure out how to absorb nutrition through blanket eating yet though she makes a fine attempt at it." Amelia choked a little as she gnawed on her blanket, Q carefully pulling it away from her face and cringing at the amounts of baby slobber she had managed to cover it in. "You are as bad as Rowley." Amelia squeaked at her father clearly displeased he had taken away her 'chew toy'. "Yes Amelia, blankets are for keeping you warm not for eating." He argued with her. "Despite what the dog thinks."
Getting to the mess hall was a task of it's own with a baby in your arms and a dog under foot. Rowley normally wasn't allowed in the mess hall only because he enjoy watching people eat and resting his head in your lap when you didn't share. Without anyone else in there the only problem he caused was the problems to Q. Q attempted to eat his toast in peace while Rowley set his head in the mans lap and whimpered quietly to himself, his eyes shifting between Q and his plate. "That's what you get for feeding the dog off your plate." Kathryn smiled and took a sip of her coffee. It was cute to feed Rowley food from your plate when he was a puppy but as an adult not so much.
"I have fed you off my plate and you don't come begging to me every time I get food." He commented. Though did force feeding the captain really count? She was always on the run, too busy to sit down and eat something. Sometimes Q just showed up in her office with her lunch and tried spoon feeding her only to get that death look.
"I'm not a dog Q." Her tone was a little more hostile now.
"That wasn't what I meant by it." He bit his tongue feeling like he had just taken a hose to a wasp nest. "So, since we are bypassing Krenim space how much longer do you think it will take?" He was desperate to change the subject now.
"Another four months." She didn't sound pleased about it but they had been given fair warning the space was in the middle of a dispute. Still, she couldn't shake the funny feeling she had traveled through Krenim space before. Almost like a horrible dream where Voyager was falling apart around her. Perhaps it was just that, a dream, a nightmare really.
"Well, Amelia will be almost, nine moths old by then." Q leaned forward looking over at the little girl in Janeway's arms. "You are growing up quickly Amy, stop, stop growing up right now."
"I'm looking forward to when I can hold a conversation with her." Janeway shrugged a shoulder.
"She holds conversations now." Q argued leaning back in his seat. "You just can't understand anything she says. She's like...a little drunk person. Rolls around on the ground dribbling making primitive sounds and wetting her pants." He started to laugh but it seemed Amelia was the one not pleased by his teasing. Her green eyes flickering over at him with that intelligence human children lacked.
"Don't make fun of her, she might start picking up other nasty Q behaviors and put you on the nearest deserted primitive planet." That was an uncomfortable reality, especially after Q had found Amelia screaming on the holodeck with the dead alien. The energy burns had likely come from the holoemitters blowing out, Amelia could shield herself from something like that. After all the ship had nearly been torn apart thanks to Kathryn but it still never did sit well with him. Something about the look on Amelia's face, she had shown fear before, she was afraid of the dark which is why they suffered with a night light in their room, she was afraid of Rowley sneezing which was why she burst out crying when he sneezed near her, she was even afraid of banana peels being flopped around, an interesting discovery in the mess hall one evening during the lunch rush. But that look on her face hadn't been fear, it had been terror. Since that day she hadn't slept very well either, he had even watched her try to fight sleep off. Where she had become so tired she would start drifting off, looking peaceful for just a moment and then shake herself awake. Amelia yawned looking like she was going to drift off again only to look back at Rowley and smile. "You would start getting sleepy when I have to start my shift in half an hour." Amelia turned her attention back to Janeway and smiled at her mother.
"Well I don't know about you but I would give up sleep to see that cute smile for a couple extra hours a day." He paused taking her cup of coffee and taking a sip out of it. It was awful but it was effective in keeping you awake and energized. "And Amelia's smile too." He joked finally getting her to lighten up a little this morning. Reaching his arms out Q tried to put on a more serious tone. "Permission to take Amelia with me today? You got to coddle her all day yesterday. Time for some father daughter bonding, I have to teach her how to cause mischief on this ship after all. What good is a Q without mischief?"
Janeway looked back down at her daughter feeling a little reluctant to give her up but it certainly helped when she didn't need to worry about Amelia while on the bridge. "Permission granted." Even just handing her off to Q was a little difficult but necessary. God forbid when they got back to Earth her mother would take Amelia away for a few months if she could. If her mother was still alive when they got home. "Just, try to keep the mischief to a minimum please."
Q took the baby and snickered at the captain. "I can't make promises Kathryn, especially if it's her idea." Amelia yawned again fighting the urge to close her eyes. "And maybe later you can go play with your friend Naomi." The baby didn't have much in common with the older child yet but Naomi always appreciated the visit. They were the only two children on Voyager, if they didn't become friends it was going to be a very long and boring trip back to Earth.
