To The Journey
Disclaimer: If you recognize it, it's not mine. This is an AU story.
Chapter Thirty-Five: Family Trouble
"Hey. You okay?" B'Elanna couldn't fail to notice that Tom was crying, even if he was trying to hide it.
Her own news from home hadn't been the best. Though she hadn't gotten a letter of her own, Chakotay had let her know that pretty much all of their colleagues back in the Alpha Quadrant had been wiped out by some group they'd never even heard of. But she knew Tom never cried, that his father had taught him at an early age that it was a sign of weakness to show emotion so openly. Once she'd learned that, it had been a lot easier to understand why he so consistently pretended not to care. In the months since they had begun dating, she had had many occasions to realize just how deeply he cared about people.
She had pulled out his letter from his father just before they had lost the data stream, and the sensor network carrying it, altogether - a blow to many of them, to have lost their only link to their families. It had been racing the clock to pull out both the letter Tom now held in his hands and the one Harry Kim was desperately coveting, but she'd done it. She did feel bad about the others that had been lost - those she might have been able to get and those she had had no chance at - but Harry had been so devastated every time they told him they didn't have a letter for him, and even though the man in question had vehemently denied it, B'Elanna knew Tom needed to read what his father had to say.
"I never knew -" words seemed to fail Tom, at least his own words. "I want you to know, Tom, that I love you," he read aloud. "My greatest regret is that I didn't tell you that enough when you were growing up. I've been told about your accomplishments on Voyager, and I want you to know I'm proud of you - very proud. And I need you to know that it tore me apart to think I'd lost you.
"It hurts me that we've grown apart these past years. I guess I spent so much time in your life telling you what I wanted you to do better that I forgot to tell you what you were doing well. That even though I didn't approve of your coverup at Caldik, you did the right thing to come forward when you could have kept it up with no one ever the wiser. Maybe your mother was right after all.
"I understand if you can't forgive me yet for what I said the last time we spoke. It was cruel of me to say what I did. I hurt you, I intended to hurt you, and that's unforgivable. The only thing I can say is that it isn't true. You are my son, and nothing will ever change that. I love you, Tom."
His throat was too clogged with tears to keep reading aloud. B'Elanna put her arms around him tightly, letting him rest his head on her shoulder. A few tears slipped free, and she rubbed his back gently.
"I told you," she whispered, but there was no malice behind it, only her care for him. "I told you he might have changed."
"Are you okay?" he asked softly. "I'm sorry about the way I acted before."
She shrugged a little, but did wiggle deeper into his embrace. "I'm sorry too. I know how hard things are between you and your father. I shouldn't have belittled it like that. I wasn't angry at you."
"I know." He pulled her tight. "What did I ever do to deserve someone like you?"
xxxxxxxxx
Owen Paris' face was drawn when he relayed the news to Tasha that the relay network had, for reasons they couldn't be sure of at their end, lost its signal to the station they had been using to communicate with Voyager. After a few moments of hearing him talk about "the crew" and "their families", she'd had enough.
"What about you?" she interrupted.
"Sorry?"
"You've been talking in general terms about the way this is going to affect people. What about the way it's going to affect you? I can see by looking at your face that this is hurting you."
He looked away, letting the facade drop a little. "The last time I spoke to my son, I told him he wasn't my son anymore. Now I've lost my only chance to communicate with him - to tell him I didn't mean it."
"Didn't you write to him?"
"I did. But we don't know how much of the data stream, if anything, got through. I don't know if he read it or not." He shook his head. "I tried so hard to prove I didn't play favorites with my family that I overcompensated, and Tom paid the price for my need to keep up my looks."
Tasha raised her eyebrow a little. "You never seemed that way with me."
"What?"
It hadn't occurred to her before, but it seemed all too clear now. "You say that you were trying to make sure no one thought you were playing favorites, but Tom's not the only member of your family in Starfleet. You didn't treat me the way you did him."
"It's not the same." He was shaking his head. "When I met you, I had no idea who you were. You were just a cadet who dared to challenge my methods, and had the knowledge to back up her arguments. By the time we finally got our stories straight and realized you were Eva's daughter, you'd done just fine for yourself without any help."
"And after that?" she challenged. "You cut me breaks here and there, like during the incident with the Pegasus."
"You were right, and Command agreed with you."
"You let me argue with you, even challenge you. You never would have done that for Tom, and we both know it."
"It's not the same. Tasha, what you've accomplished is incredible. I've looked into your file; you came from nothing, and you're fourth-in-command of the Federation flagship. You don't think you need a little help now and then?"
"I've never asked anyone to cut me any breaks." She met his eyes squarely, her gaze forceful. "And I'm hardly the only one who's had a hard life. There was a girl in my Academy class who grew up in a Bajoran refugee camp. I doubt you'd have done that for her either."
"It's not the same," he repeated. "You should have had the same life Tom had. You come from the same roots. Instead, you spent the first years of your life just trying to survive."
"Everyone deserves that life! What's the difference!"
"Don't you understand? None of their lives - I couldn't have changed their circumstances. What they went through had nothing to do with me."
She opened her mouth to retort but stopped cold when she processed what he had just said. "That's it, isn't it? You blame yourself for the way I grew up."
"She begged me to help her." There was no need to explain who 'she' was. "She needed my help, she needed me to rescue her and her family, and I didn't help her. And because I didn't help her, you spent ten key years of your life living in hell."
"That wasn't your fault."
"Tasha -"
"You're not the only one who's done some digging. I know how hard you tried to save us. I know you tried to call in every favor you were owed and then some to get a ship to get us out of there but no one would even fly into the system. I also know that my parents had plenty of chances to leave, but my father thought they could fix it, that he could help them fix it, and my mother refused to leave him or send me away from her. She was selfish."
"How can you say that?" he demanded indignantly.
"Because it's true," she replied softly. "I love her, but what she did wasn't fair to you. She waited until there were no other options, and then she went to you, knowing there was little chance you could do anything for her, and she made you live with the guilt when you couldn't accomplish the impossible." Tasha reached out and tentatively touched his shoulder, knowing he wasn't really an emotionally demonstrative man. "I'd forgive you for her, but you've done nothing to require it."
He turned his head, and Tasha knew he was too proud to let her see the tears in his eyes. She spoke as though unaware of his incredible emotions. "You have to let it go. As you said yourself, I've done just fine without your help."
"No argument there." He gave a small smile. "What's it going to take to make you accept a promotion?"
She laughed, and the tension between them evaporated.
xxxxxxxxx
"Hey, Doc!"
"Mr. Paris! To what do I owe the pleasure?"
Tom waved the data PADD in his hand. "Got some news in my letter from home that might interest you."
He raised a holographic eyebrow. "Let's have it."
Paris grinned. "Well, I know you were interested in other artificial life-forms. I also know you were looking into Lieutenant Commander Data, as the only other artificial life form to have ever served in Starfleet. Well," and here Tom tapped the PADD for emphasis, "your Starfleet idol is now married."
"What? As of when? To who?"
"As of last week, apparently. To my second cousin."
"Is that so?" Tom had the Doctor's undivided attention now. "Tell me about this cousin."
Tom grinned. "Got a couple hours?"
xxxxxxxxx
Deanna might have been the only empath in the room, but it didn't take a sixth sense to know that the Betazoid councilor was upset. In seconds, Tasha had crossed the observation lounge to stand next to her. "Deanna? What's wrong?"
She just shook her head and sent a silent glance towards the Captain, who was standing tight-lipped at the head of the table. Tasha turned to him. "Captain?"
"I have bad news." He looked around the table at the assembled senior staff. "Counselor, if you don't want to be here for this -"
"Just go ahead," she replied, her voice edged with pain.
"Betazed has fallen to the Dominion," he said gravely, and Deanna gave a dry sob and buried her face in her crossed arms. The rest of the room was engulfed in dead silence.
Tasha's mind was split. Half of her was aching for Deanna, for Lwaxana, for all the innocent lives under Dominion rule. They had never taken a civilian planet before. The other half was in full tactical mode. How had this been allowed to happen? How could they keep it from happening again? And, perhaps most importantly, what other systems were in danger?
"How?" Someone - Will, Tasha realized after a moment of disorientation - asked one of the many questions that had been swarming in her mind.
"According to initial reports, the invasion force must have come from somewhere in the Calandra Sector," Picard explained. "Starfleet Intelligence had believed that Calandra was too far from Dominion supply lines to be a threat."
Tasha resisted the urge to punch a wall. She had known better than to assume any sector outside their own strongholds was a safe zone. She knew that they only had so much time and so many officials, but to completely overlook a sector? Starfleet had been at peace so long they had forgotten how to fight a war.
"What about the ships that were supposed to be protecting that sector?" she pressed.
The Tenth Fleet was supposed to be protecting Betazed and its outlying colonies, but it was caught out of position on a training exercise. Betazed's own defense systems were nowhere near up to the task. The planet fell in less than ten hours."
xxxxxxxxx
"This could have serious tactical repercussions. With the Dominion in control of Betazed, several key systems are at risk. We need to recalculate our tactical plans send additional forces to reinforce Vulcan, Andor, Tellar, Alpha Centauri, anything that the occupation of Betazed has made vulnerable."
"I sympathize, Commander," Admiral Ross replied on her screen, "but we're already stretched pretty thin. I don't know that we have additional forces to send."
"We would if we didn't have to spend all our forces plugging up the leaks around the Romulan neutral zone," she replied. "We need to convince them to stop standing by."
He shrugged. "We've tried, but they have a non-aggression pact they're not inclined to break. I'm open to suggestions."
"I'll get back to you. Yar out." She terminated the communication. "Computer, open secure subspace channel to General Makar, Romulan Fleet Command. Authorization Yar Theta Nine-Two-Five."
xxxxxxxxx
"Tasha." The Romulan general looked worn, but the smile on his face was genuine. "What can I do for you today?"
"You can tell me why your Empire is dragging its heels on getting involved in this war," she replied sharply. "You know as well as I do that this non-aggression pact is only a stop-gap measure to keep you from providing additional challenge to them while they fight the Federation and the Klingons. If they achieve that objective, do you really think they'll keep the pact? They'll turn around and take down the Romulan Empire next, once they don't have to divide their attention and no one else is there to stop them. The Federation-Klingon Alliance is already starting to lose ground. The only way to stop them is for all the major Alpha Quadrant powers to come together and present a unified front against them."
He raised an eyebrow a little at her tirade. "Tasha, Tasha, you know I agree with you. But my government doesn't agree with me. If they're going to break the non-aggression pact, they have to have a rock-solid reason to do it."
That might have sounded like an idle statement of frustration, but she saw a slight gleam in his eye. "What are you planning?"
He smiled a little. "My dear, you are far too perceptive for your own good." He lowered his voice a few decibels, as though someone might be listening in. "They'll have little choice but to break the pact if it appears that the Dominion have broken it first."
Tasha leaned forward a little. "How are you going to do that?"
"The Dominion believe that all of the Romulan army is honoring this pact. Their guard is down. But the next time they breach our borders, they may find themselves short a few ships. And when those same ships suddenly attack a Romulan stronghold, what is the government to think?"
"You think you can do it?"
"We've been working on it for some time, but we didn't want to tip our hand to the Federation - or much of anyone, for that matter. Only those directly involved know about it. With that in mind, I would appreciate if you kept this out of Starfleet Command's ears for awhile."
"I will." She smiled at him. "Watch yourself. If your own government found out what you were up to -"
"Trust me. We have every precaution in place to prevent that happening."
"Then - good luck."
"And the same to you. Makar out."
xxxxxxxxx
"More news?" Will asked. "Bad?"
"For once, no," Picard replied. "We may have finally gotten the shot in the arm we needed. The Romulans have joined the war, on our side."
"What?" Will gasped in disbelief. "Not that this isn't good news, but last week they were stubbornly refusing to get involved. What changed?"
"Several Dominion ships staged a strike against a Romulan military outpost. Once that happened, the Romulans considered the treaty voided. They're not thrilled about the alliance, but they'd rather defend what's theirs than let the Dominion roll over it."
"Thank God they did," Will said. "That little mistake may have just cost them the war. How could they slip so badly?"
Tasha turned her face a little to hide the smile she couldn't help.
The end of this chapter is written as a sort of alternative to In the Pale Moonlight, and some of the dialogue is borrowed from that episode.
The bit about Admiral Paris treating Tasha differently because he feels guilty over her mother is something I've been thinking about for awhile but couldn't find a place to fit it in. It did strike me that Paris treated Tasha with a little leniency he doesn't really give anyone else, and canon establishes that he doesn't believe in giving his family special treatment.
Please review.