A/N: I will finish this story, it may just take a while longer than I was intending. If I go silent for a while, it's not through choice! Thanks for sticking with it, and to those who have reviewed, it really is much appreciated.

Twenty Eight

And these children that you spit on
As they try to change their worlds
Are immune to your consultations
They're quite aware of what they're going through

Changes - David Bowie

B'Elanna thumped the blade of her shovel into another mound of earth and then twisted it out again, leaving an even hole ready for planting with the displaced soil sitting at its edge. Over the past few hours she'd gotten good at this. Besides, doing something physical always helped take her away from the present, and it turned out that gardening was no exception.

"Do you feel as if you're helping to build a better world? Is that why you're doing this?"

That's what the journalist had wanted to know. B'Elanna had been shocked when she'd turned around and seen that the standoff with the gang had been caught on camera. She wondered what that meant – what extra level of vengeance the Crims would exact as a result of the encounter being captured digitally – but it barely seemed to matter. What more could they do other than kill her? And if that was what they intended, well – it was the least she deserved after what she'd let happen to Chakotay. Even so, B'Elanna hadn't intended to take a stand. It had just seemed the only thing to do at that moment. All it had meant was taking a step forward instead of a step back. You want me? Here I am. Come get me. After all, you back a rat into a corner and it will always fight. And that's what she was, right? Maywood vermin, born and bred.

She'd forgotten, though, that the same was true of every other person standing on that ravaged patch of land. With the exception of Tom, they were all Maywood residents. And if none of those rats were ready to abandon this ship, then perhaps it wasn't sinking after all.

B'Elanna paused, leaning on her shovel. For perhaps the first time ever, she saw this place from Chakotay's point of view, and from Kathryn's. Not as somewhere to escape but as somewhere that could take her on that journey itself if only she looked after it well enough and if only she could inspire others to do the same.

"Do you feel as if you're helping to build a better world? Is that why you're doing this?"

B'Elanna looked around the patch of ground at the small groups of workers diligently tending the new plants. She had answered that that was a question for Kathryn Janeway, whose vision this was and whom the journalist should talk to if she wanted proper answers. But the question had stayed with her, because it drew echoes of her first proper conversation with Tom, all those weeks ago, when she'd still been so knotted up with hate and fear that she couldn't see past either to feel anything else.

"You'd like to make things better. So would Kathryn. So maybe that's one thing you have in common."

Her first reaction in the wake of Chakotay's shooting had been to pick up a gun herself. To cause pain equal to the magnitude of the raw ache those phantom bullets had torn in her own self. But Kathryn had been right. Of course she had been right. That wasn't what Chakotay would want. It wouldn't change anything. It wouldn't make anything better, it wouldn't even make things even. It wouldn't change anything.

This garden, though. This place… maybe this could. Maybe it really could. Look at how everyone was working together right at this moment: people she'd never usually look twice at, people she would see through if she passed them on the street. They were here, now, together. Making something happen, just because they wanted to, just because they could. So if that was possible, what else could they achieve?

She looked over at the patch of ground that Kathryn had designated for her water reclamation unit. B'Elanna narrowed her eyes and built it in her mind, piece by piece, apparatus by apparatus, an assembly of individual parts that eventually created a new whole.

"Penny for them?"

The image dissipated and she turned to see Tom smiling down at her, the sun glinting off his hair.

"Can we keep that same patch free?" she asked, indicating where her mind had built her machine.

He nodded. "Sure. Does that mean you're into the reclamation unit again?"

B'Elanna nodded. "I was thinking that I might call some of the people that spoke to me at the gala – the ones that wanted to invest in my idea. I'm going to tell them that I want their help – but only if they'll agree to build the first unit here, in the garden. And we have to manufacture all the parts in Maywood, somehow, too. I don't know how, but there must be a way. And if we're going to employ people, I want it to be people from here, even if they need training to be able to do it. I'll go with whoever agrees to all of that. I want it to be something that came from Maywood. I want to show that good stuff can come out of a place like this."

Tom smiled. "That's a great idea."

She grimaced. "You don't think they'll tell me its impossible? Or a plain stupid idea? Or just refuse to help?"

Tom shrugged. "Probably. That's what happened to Kathryn right?"

B'Elanna looked down at her toes, her heart sinking. "Yeah."

She felt Tom's fingers on her chin. He tipped her face up, gently, until he could look into her eyes. "It didn't stop her though, did it? Can't see it stopping you, either, B'Elanna Torres."

The look in his eyes was one of such confidence that she felt her heart lifting again. She smiled. "You know what? I could probably do with a good fight right now. Pity the rich white guy who thinks he can beat me down from what I want."

Tom grinned, his blue eyes dancing with light and laughter. "And bingo! There's the girl I fell in love with."

B'Elanna felt her mouth drop open. From the look on Tom's face, he'd surprised himself, too. B'Elanna felt the rest of the world fading away, every little noise and movement around them curling in, narrowing and distilling until all she could hear was their breathing, as if they had been cast adrift somewhere together in a void where only they existed. She studied his face, wondering if he meant it, wondering if she felt the same, wondering if she should say so, wanting to close the distance between them but-

"Hey guys! I'm going to have to take the kids back to base now," said a cheery voice, somewhere back in the world of the every day. "But how about we make this a regular thing?"

B'Elanna snapped back to the present to find Harry Kim standing beside them, smiling broadly. She and Tom both took a hurried step back.

"Um," Tom said, "sure! That would be great. And hey man, thanks so much for today. It was a really good thing you did, turning up."

"No problem. It's what we Scouts do! Say, do you want to take my number? You can call me if there are any developments or you need extra help or something."

Tom dug out his phone. "Sounds like a plan. Oh-" he said, looking at his screen with a frown.

"What?" B'Elanna asked.

Tom was still looking at his screen. "I missed a call from Kathyrn, but it's OK, she sent a text." He looked up at her and B'Elanna's heart turned over. "B'E, she says Chakotay's awake. She's on her way over there now."

[TBC]