Chapter Two – Baring the Soul

Tom was still dozing when B'Elanna left him at 0700 to head back to her own quarters. She needed to get showered, changed and report to sickbay before her shift began, and she was determined not to be late today - determined to show that she was capable and responsible. As sympathetic as Janeway had been, the Captain couldn't ignore the fact that her chief engineer had been availing herself of the holodeck for personal use during duty hours and letting her colleagues think she was in there working. Then there was the unauthorised removal of emergency medical equipment from engineering, unauthorised site-to-site transports to get from the holodeck to her quarters, and, even worse, erasing said transport entries from the logs. All that on top of deactivating the safeties. The EMH had really got her off the hook in there, explaining the breaches of protocol and deceptions as symptoms, not insubordination.

Sharing Tom's bed again had felt a little awkward at first, though they'd both slept well. B'Elanna had stripped to her Starfleet-issue base layers and climbed under the covers wondering if she should have clarified that when she'd said sleep, that was exactly what she'd meant. As it turned out, there was no misunderstanding. Once the lights were out and they'd both done their fidgeting to find comfortable positions, she'd had a solid five and a half hours of blissful unconsciousness, waking at the respectable time of 0640.

It was a marked improvement. The previous day had been exhausting but even so, in recent times, no matter how tired she'd been going to bed, she'd slept only fitfully, waking in the early hours every morning, unrested. The early waking had made the days seem endless.

She spent the day running routine diagnostics - nothing too taxing, but enough to keep her occupied. As far as most of the crew were aware, the chief engineer's need for a couple of weeks of restricted duties had been a result of the "accident" she'd suffered during the structural integrity simulation. Carey had taken the assignment rota off her hands and she was only interrupted a couple of times when something came up that required her input. Neelix fussed over her at lunchtime. It was a little irritating, but she was touched by his concern. She recalled the time he'd offered to be a pressure valve – someone she could take out her anger on. If only she'd felt anger lately. The best she'd managed was irritability. Except for on the holodeck.

Chakotay dropped by engineering on some pretence, but she knew he was checking up on her. Whether it was off his own bat or at the Captain's insistence, she didn't ask. But, all in all, the day went well, until her shift ended, her 'date' with Tom approached and a sense of foreboding descended upon her.

She didn't want to talk about everything that had happened in the last few months: her behaviour, her illness. Having been forced to admit what she had to Chakotay and, under further scrutiny, to the Captain, she wanted to draw a line under it. The Doctor had her on medication. It would take a few more days to fully kick in, but then she'd be back to her charming old self. She was feeling more motivated already. More social. She'd even allowed herself a few moments to think about Li Paz and the others, and she'd felt sadness. It wasn't a pleasant sensation, but it beat the numb indifference that it replaced. It honoured their memory, somehow.

Maybe she could deal with talking about their deaths now. But, as for discussing her inappropriate coping mechanisms - the crazy behaviour - how was dredging that up going to help her? Because the more she took stock of what she'd been doing, the deeper her sense of growing shame. Embarrassment. Dishonour.

Regardless of her own feelings, she knew Tom deserved some sort of explanation. But what could she say? What would he want to hear?

How could she to explain to him that being beaten up in the holodeck, or plunging three hundred thousand feet to possible death, were the only things that had made her feel anything? That she'd stopped taking any pleasure in his company, not caring if she set eyes on him from one day to the next. That, on some days, the Borg could have taken over the ship, and she'd have stood in meek surrender and let them assimilate her – and maybe him too. Surely he wouldn't want to hear that? But it was the appalling truth.

Back in her quarters, she changed out of her uniform and into practical beach attire. She struggled through a bowl of replicated potato salad, finding it tasteless and unsatisfying. Pacing the floor, waiting for the time to creep around to 1900, she wished for a crisis. Nothing major, just something that required her attendance. She tried to sit and read but couldn't focus on the words. Maybe the medication was disagreeing with her, making her agitated. The Doctor had mentioned that there could be side effects. No, more likely she was just being a coward. Again.

She took in the scene that surrounded her: the potted plant Kes had given her several birthdays ago, desiccated and dying, the soil in which it decayed had reverted to brown powder; dirty, crumpled clothes, strewn across the floor; a PADD under the desk, with its face shattered and tiny shards of plastic glinting in the light. At least the xerophytic Salusan wildflower Harry had given her for Prixin still thrived. It was time for a major clean-up operation. The state of the room would definitely not have passed muster with her Academy instructors. She busied herself, throwing the offending clothing into the replicator for recycling and picking up the broken pieces of the PADD. And still, there was time to spare.

Tom was already waiting in the corridor outside the holodeck when she arrived a few minutes early. They couldn't gain access right away and passed the time with mundane chatter. The doors eventually snapped open, and Crewmen Jones and Fitzpatrick emerged, a little after their time should have been up. Evidently, they'd been playing in a recreation of some old Earth game called rugby, and the match had gone on longer than expected. Something to do with one of the teams repeatedly collapsing something called a scrum in an attempt to waste time. Jones tried to explain the rules, but, unlike Tom, B'Elanna really wasn't interested. Whilst, on the one hand, more time spent in the corridor meant less time for "the conversation", on the other hand, with every drawn out moment the tension within her built. Just as she was about to say something viciously condescending about her own time being wasted, Fitzpatrick wisely took his friend by the elbow and guided him to safety.

B'Elanna was content to stand back and let Tom call up the program. Some small part of her still regretted that no blood would be spilled tonight and she wondered if this was how a recovering alcoholic felt, going into a bar. The last time she'd visited this holodeck, it had been under duress. At least today she wasn't being dragged in. The sight that greeted her as the holodeck doors swooshed open was in complete contrast to the dank, dark cave system, ripe with the stench of death and echoing with the distant sounds of phaser fire that she had created for the holoprogram Torres Zeta-1.

Tom had set the Samoan beach program to simulate the comfortable light of evening. The real beach, upon which this imitation was based, lay on the western coast of Savai'i near the village of Falealupo. Tom knowledgably informed her it had once been known as the last village in the world to see the sunset on any given day, until the International Date Line was repositioned in the early 21st century. This was holotechnology at its best, and the main reason that holodecks were installed on starships in the first place: to provide the illusion of open skies and solid ground in the midst of deep space.

B'Elanna stopped to remove her beach shoes and savoured the feel of the warm sand as it scoured her soles. A gentle breeze stirred her hair, the air fresh with the smell of the sea. A couple of deckchairs stood ready for them on the sand, an uncorked bottle of wine and two glasses on a table in between. Oh.

"I hope that's synthehol," B'Elanna stated, more bluntly than she'd intended.

Tom blinked. "Huh?"

She pointed at the wine. "I'm not supposed to drink alcohol. The Doctor's not sure how it might react with the medication." The Doctor had been insistent. It was unfortunate. She could have used a stiff drink about now.

Tom's face fell. "Oh, crap. Sorry. I didn't think." He swiftly ordered the computer to replace the intoxicating beverage with an appropriate alternative. The bottle dematerialised, and another took its place. B'Elanna picked the nearest chair and sat down. Tom stepped around her, poured the wine, handed her a full glass and then took the other chair, sitting back and closing his eyes briefly before opening them again and sipping his drink.

"This is nice," B'Elanna said, referring to the high, wispy cirrus clouds, and deciding to make the effort to praise his choice of setting. If only they could just sit for the next two hours under the deep blue sky and watch the waves. Hell, she'd have taken an episode of Captain Proton over what she knew was coming. The whole series of episodes, in fact.

"Yeah," Tom agreed before taking an audible deep breath that, conversely, arrested her own breathing. He turned to face her. "Chakotay told me about the program you ran, the day after he got that letter saying that your friends were dead."

B'Elanna tensed further. No preamble then. "Uh-huh." Just how much had Chakotay told him? There was no point in covering old ground.

"Do you want to talk about it? What . . . why you came up with it?"

She bit back the sarcastic retort on her tongue, swigged a mouthful of wine pretending that it was the real thing, rued that the placebo effect didn't work that way, and obliged him. "I got their physical parameters from the Starfleet database. From the arrest warrants. I thought if I could see them lying there dead, it might sink in. I thought I could accept that they were gone. Say goodbye. Grieve." She shrugged. "But I didn't feel anything."

"They were good people, Li Paz and the others," Tom said, kindly, when it was clear she wasn't going to add anything further on the subject.

"They didn't like you," B'Elanna snapped before her brain could kick into gear. Crap. Tom flinched. Why had she said that? Not helpful.

"No, well . . ." he stuttered. "I guess they had good reasons not to."

"If they knew you now, I think they'd respect you," she added, hastily backtracking. "If I could change my opinion of you, then anyone could."

He looked appeased by her attempt at a compliment, but then steered the conversation back to its original heading, expert pilot that he was. "So, when did you start running dangerous programs with the safeties off?"

She turned back to the ocean, soaking in the sound of the waves, trying unsuccessfully to steady her accelerating heartbeat. If she held the wine glass any tighter it was likely to shatter, so she set it down, before remembering that, with the safeties on, such an accident was impossible. She picked it up again.

"It was about four months ago, a couple of weeks before we found that Demon-class planet." She looked at him. He stared straight back at her, patiently waiting for her to elaborate. There was nothing for it, but to plough right on. She looked back at the water and inhaled sharply.

"I'd had a rough few days. You were working a shift in sickbay. I had some holodeck time booked, and I was going to go orbital skydiving. But when I got to the holodeck - I don't know why - I wanted to do something more aggressive. So, I ran the Klingon program we worked on together – the Day of Honour ceremony . . ." She stole a glance back over at Tom. A slight frown graced his brow. "Only I tweaked the program so it was just the bat'leth ritual." She omitted to mention the painsticks. If he only knew how close to the mark he'd been with that flippant comment in the mess hall that time . . . "It was too easy. So I turned off the safeties. I got such a rush knowing that the danger was real . . ."

Tom was now staring forwards, not at her. He had to be upset that she'd subverted the program they'd worked on together. Abused it. She really wasn't proud of that. It was a definite low point in the whole, sorry mess.

"I'm not sure you really want to hear this," B'Elanna cautioned him, hoping desperately that he'd agree.

"But I need to hear it," he answered quickly, turning back to her. "And you need to tell me." He faltered for a moment then added, "No more secrets."

His tone was gentle, but alarm bells rang at those last three words. To her over-sensitive ears, it still sounded like a threat. No more secrets or – what? It was over between them? Now that she actually cared again, felt something for him again, that wasn't an option she wanted to explore.

He reached over and took her free hand, his face grimly determined. "Whatever's been going on, I'd rather know the details than have my imagination fill in the blanks."

She gritted her teeth then forced her jaw to relax again, looking down as she did so at their joined hands.

"After my . . . experiment with the Klingon program, I tried a few others with the safeties off. I went rock climbing without the proper equipment. I went orbital skydiving. I had to try more and more dangerous scenarios to get the same feeling - to feel anything."

Tom's grip tightened. "And . . . the injuries?"

She shifted her gaze to her bare forearms, the site of many a bruise and laceration over the previous months, the skin now flawless and the bones underneath all healed.

"Some minor injuries from the rock climbing. I slipped a few times and-"

"They didn't sound minor," Tom accused before she could finish.

She snatched her hand back from beneath his and fought unsuccessfully to suppress a glare. "From the rock climbing, they were. Just bruises. The fractures and concussion were from a hand-to-hand combat simulation I programmed . . . against Cardassian soldiers." It had been a futile attempt at revenge, the soldiers programmed with personality subroutines based on the profiles of notorious Cardassian war criminals from the Federation-Cardassian war - by far her most unhinged attempt at escaping the chronic numbness. Seriously fucked up. Purged from the computer now, along with Torres Zeta-1 and the other programs she'd created explicitly for the extreme risks they'd provided her.

Tom's jaw had dropped. "You mean you wrote a holodeck program with the specific intention of hurting yourself?" he asked shakily.

She shook her head emphatically and slammed her glass down on the table, the dregs sloshing up and over the sides. "No! I didn't just stand there and let them beat me. I fought back. I fought hard. If I hadn't, I'd be dead now, wouldn't I?" The last quip was unnecessary, but it had slipped out.

Tom's eyes narrowed. "Didn't you . . ." He turned away and gathered himself. "Didn't you stop for a moment and think about the consequences? Your holodeck time would have expired and some poor bastard would have gone in there and found your mutilated corpse." She could see he was trying desperately to retain control, but his voice was getting louder, his posture more upright and his hands clenched into fists, knuckle bones starkly prominent, just like her own. His voice cracked. "Didn't you think about that? Didn't you think about what that would have done to me?"

"No. I didn't," she snapped, on the verge of getting to her feet. "Because I didn't care. That's what I'm telling you. I didn't feel anything, except for when I was in danger. I didn't enjoy anything, except . . ." She shook her head in disbelief at what she was about to admit. It sounded crazy. It was crazy.

His piercing blue eyes scrutinised her - oppressed her. "Except what?" he asked, in a much calmer voice that belied his demeanour.

She felt her skin prickle and redden from a potent mixture of anger and shame. "I guess I enjoyed getting hurt." Her throat had gone dry. To hell with it. She croaked out the next admission. "I enjoyed seeing the bruises on my skin, the visible damage. But it didn't feel like I was doing it deliberately, because I wasn't trying to get myself killed."

No, there was a difference between trying to get yourself killed or injured, and simply not caring whether it happened. She hadn't wanted to die; to want would have implied motivation, and she'd simply not cared either way.

She dared to look at him again. In contrast to what she imagined was her flushed appearance, Tom had gone pale. He ran a hand over his face – a face that showed a trinity of disappointment, confusion and concern. An expression she wouldn't have imagined possible. An expression that hurt her more than all the burns, the bruises, the lacerations and the fractures combined.

Suddenly, the waves were too loud, the sky too bright, the horizon too distant. The air that had felt clean and refreshing at first was now suffocating, as if all the oxygen had been sucked out of it leaving only inert, unsustaining gases. She had to get out. She stood up, the deckchair nearly toppling over as her foot got caught around one of the legs. "This was a bad idea."

Disentangling herself, she turned and stomped away from him - as much as she could stomp when the ground gave way beneath her every footfall. But as she was about to call for the holodeck arch, she realised she'd left her shoes behind. Cursing inwardly, she stopped, took a deep breath and turned back.

Tom hadn't moved from the chair, but his face now conveyed merely a simple sadness. He was making no attempt to dissuade her from leaving, and she wasn't sure whether that should make her relieved or terrified.

She bent down to retrieve her shoes, the change in posture exacerbating the headache that had been in the background all evening, probably stemming from the tension creeping up her neck from her taut shoulders, though possibly a reaction to the meds. Headache had been top of the list of side effects the Doctor had warned her about. She pressed her thumb into her right temple and rolled it around a few times for temporary relief, whilst deciding what the hell she was going to do next. To flee, or to fight through the panic and stay – two miserable options.

"Headache?" Tom asked, eyes narrowed as he assessed her in medic mode.

"Yeah."

With a single nod he said, "You should check in with the Doc," and he pulled himself to his feet, calling, "Computer, end program."

B'Elanna opened her mouth to protest, before realising this was her genuine excuse to escape. Yet another visit to sickbay, but a chance to pause and re-group. As the close grey walls of the holodeck replaced the wide tropical vista, Tom was before her in two strides. Cold, hard floor replaced sand, and she hastened in covering her feet.

"Come on. I'll walk you," Tom said, moving to grasp her arm.

She recoiled, an ingrained reaction that would now have to be unlearned. A reaction no longer necessary, now that all her physical wounds were healed. But still, she consciously raised a hand to ward him off. "I know the way."

And that awful look was on his face once more, amplifying the thundering of her pulse in her ears. "I'm sorry," she said, quickly, dropping her hand to her side and positioning herself between Tom and the doors. "Look, maybe . . . maybe I just need time to get some of these things clear in my own head before I can talk about them with you."

He peered down, his features reverting back into impassivity, waiting for more from her. She racked her brain to think of an out that would satisfy them both. The seconds seemed to stretch into minutes before she came up with a plan. The idea was a gamble, but at this point, what did she have to lose?

"Don't you have a day off on Thursday?"

He nodded, stiffly, tight-lipped.

"Me too," she informed him, her gaze oscillating between his face and the wall behind his head. "We could work together on the Flyer."

His eyes widened.

"Didn't you say you wanted to overhaul the power distribution grid?" she queried.

"If Seven and Vorik can solve the micro-fracture problems by the end of tomorrow," he pointed out in a dubious tone, which B'Elanna suspected was aimed more at her suggestion than to convey a lack of confidence in the Borg and the Vulcan.

"Well, they will, won't they?" It was a statement more than a question, delivered with an insolence that was abrasive, even by her standards. Oh crap. Her guts churned.

Tom raised an eyebrow and let out an exasperated sigh.

"Sorry," she repeated, palms raised as she waited in trepidation for him to speak.

"All right," he relented, after another drawn-out pause. "Thursday. We'll . . . take it from there."

She released her held breath. And now to part ways before she managed another blunder that might shatter this fragile interlude. Or the better option, if she could just keep her mouth under control . . . "I guess I could use some back-up for a trip to sickbay, if the offer's still open? You know the Doctor, safety in numbers . . ." Maybe she was pushing her luck a bit too far.

But then, after another protracted, painful pause, he visibly relaxed and gestured to the exit. "After you."