The forests on Space Doc were uniquely beautiful. The old growth trees were bigger than most of the foliage on the planet, and the wildlife was entirely tame. There was no light pollution in the biodomes, and no sound pollution, just a vibrant, bio-diverse recreation of the wonders of planet earth. He was currently in the Madagascar dome with a group of children watching a conspiracy of ring-tailed lemurs play a game of tag in a tamarind tree. There were starships visible through the dome overhead. Technically, they were there to watch the ships. But the children seemed uninterested in the gray hunks of metal floating in the darkness. After all, fuzzy-faced monkey-cousins were being extremely cute so much closer.

Jack and the children were in the biodome for a Frontier Day celebration. It was a special event hosted by StarFleet for the families of officers living on earth. The kids would watch their mothers and fathers fly the gigantic starships in a spectacular show of AI piloting, then they would be beamed onto the ships themselves and get to see their parents' posts on the Starships. The kids had been looking forward to it for weeks. It was going to be a perfect day.

The first sign that something was wrong was a scream. Jack turned to see a young woman who had been nursing a baby abruptly drop it. It hit the floor, writhing and crying, but she didn't move to pick it up. She stared at it and screamed.

There were more screams. Jack looked around in horror as all the children's eyes became oily and black and dozens of young voices said in unison, "Eliminate the unassimilated."

The ships outside the dome started firing on Space Doc, but no one in the Madagascar dome noticed. Those with small children tried to contain them, and subjected themselves to hitting, scratching, and biting until the larger children came to their aid. There was a teenaged boy, probably only 14, but already 1.7 meters of solid muscle. He found a stick and started beating the old woman who'd accompanied him to the party. It took three grown men to pin him down before he could beat her to death – but they were quickly accosted by a pair of pre-teen girls who pulled their hair, and scratched their faces.

Above them, a flash of light indicated that the Excelsior had just exploded, but no one noticed. The adults were outnumbered two to one. They were in an impossible situation, harm their children; or let their children harm them. No doubt, many of them would have rather died than hurt the children. Assessing the situation, Jack felt certain some of them would die.

"See how the little children love you, Jack," The Borg Queen's voice said from nowhere and everywhere. "Don't they all make you so happy."

"Nooo," Jack groaned.

"They will make you happy," The Borg Queen said darkly. Then Jack heard his own voice say "Eliminate the unassimilated."

As-one, they all turned to look at Jack; Black-eyes glistening, small, cubby faces deformed by black veins. "Eliminate the unassimilated," The children repeated.

"No," Jack said again, more forcefully. "I'm the voice. I say you stop and apologize to your parents and, and be good kids."

"Eliminate the unassimilated," they said again. They were almost to him, and there were so many of them.

"I never said to do this!" Jack yelled at them.

"Yes you did," The Borg Queen cackled.

"Eliminate the unassimilated," the children said again and then they attacked.

Jack screamed. His eyes shot open and he sat up, gasping. "Just a nightmare," he muttered into the pitch-back darkness all around him. His voice echoed off the bare stone walls.

It wasn't the first assimilation nightmare he'd had. He knew that he was likely to have them the rest of his life, especially during periods of extreme stress. But, he reasoned, that was a short-term problem, as he was likely to die of dehydration in the next few days. "Always a silver lining."

As he started feeling around on the ground for the chunk of rock he'd found yesterday - or, before he'd fallen asleep since he had no idea what time it was - he wondered how close to the truth that dream had been. He suspected that, often, his assimilation dreams were real. He'd had a particularly vivid and horrible set of nightmares about attacking Commander Seven on the Bridge of the Titan only to discover that some of the details he'd thought were fanticifal, like the ship cook in the pilot's seat, had actually happened. His father hypothesized that, since he'd been part of the collective, he had access to all the memories formed by the collective during the invasion. Once he was disconnected, those memories were pushed to his subconscious until something triggered them and they surfaced as dreams.

This dream had been different though. He wasn't a heartless drone destroying anyone in his way- he was a spectator of the mass assimilation, watching the Borg steal and destroy what they never should have been allowed to touch.

The brain did funny things, especially in extreme situations. His brain had, apparently, been trying to understand Officer Lambit's experience on Frontier Day: understand why she had forced him to confess and locked him in this dungeon.

It's your fault my husband is dead. She'd told him. It's your fault I cannot bear to look at my children anymore.

If her husband had died in the massacre, he must have been a Starfleet officer. Quite possibly, the officer's children had used a Starfleet transporter at some point. Jack remembered the vision of a chubby toddler with black eyes stumbling towards him on unstable legs from his dream. It was horrible, certainly, but could it really drive a mother to reject her children?

Possibly, Jack thought, if you were also crushed by the grief of losing your husband. And possibly if you could constantly feel the grief, guilt, and fear of your young children as they tried to process what happened.

Lambit had suffered terribly on Frontier Day. She was suffering still. But she had chosen to use that pain to hurt others.

"I did what you asked and confessed, " Jack had argued as she prodded him at phaser point, through an ancient door into a dark tunnel. "Wouldn't justice be served better if I was easy to find? Maybe they'll make an exception to the law and lock me up for the rest of my life . . . "

"I intended to lock you up for the rest of your life," Lambit had told him.

"Right," Jack had said, "but, wouldn't it help more people cope with the tragedy if everybody knew I was locked up. Or, or maybe I'd be sent to Keslovar and have my brain taken apart and put back together by a Vulcan. I mean, what could possibly be worse than that?"

"You don't think that would happen," Lambit had replied. "You think your powerful parents would protect you. "

"Powerful, yes, adoring, certainly, but not unreasonable, and not unjust," Jack had insisted. "If the Federation courts ruled that I needed to be locked up or de-borged, they would stand aside and let justice happen. But this isn't justice. This is . . . spite."

"The man who wanted to enslave the people and rule us all from the stars dies slowly, all alone, in the darkness," Lambit had said. "That's justice."

"Poetic justice, maybe," Jack had admitted. "But, not real justice. And poetry is a matter of taste, isn't it? Your poetic justice might not be someone else's. "

"Do you expect me to care about what you think is just?"

"Oh, I know you don't care about me, " Jack had said. "But, you weren't the only one to suffer that day. The Borg Queen made hundreds of widows and orphans. Don't they deserve justice too?"

She must have decided that the question did not bear considering, because the next thing Jack knew, he was waking up on the cold stone floor in pitch-black darkness with a phaser burn on his shoulder.

Jack found the rock he'd been looking for, and feeling around the ground, he found the small divot where the stone floor met the ancient iron bars. Logically, he knew that there was no chance of him creating a hole large enough to make a difference. It would take years of chipping rock against rock to make an opening he could crawl through. Of course, his rock tool would chip away to nothing long before that happened. And then, there was the fact that he would definitely be dead or rescued before his tool wore down.

Jack's right arm ached, but he tried to ignore it. He was fairly certain he'd given himself a sprained wrist last night as he pounded away, rock on floor. His left shoulder burned where Lambit had shot him with a phaser, but he ignored that too. When they found him, dead or alive, he wanted it to be obvious he'd resisted. His epitaph could not be 'he did nothing.'

"Officer Lambit has worked here for three years," Captain Allard of the Monaco Security Service said calmly. He was an older man, with a bald head and his white beard neatly trimmed into a goatee. "She has an impeccable track record. Frankly, I find your accusations ludicrous."

They were sitting in the Captain's spacious office on the second floor of the security offices. He sat at an ancient wooden desk, retrofitted to incorporate modern display terminals and communication interfaces. Behind him, a set of thick curtains hung, probably covering windows with an amazing view as they blocked the light from the Mediterranean sun so that the glare did not make the screen readouts illegible.

Geordie and Data sat in heavy wooden chairs across from the desk, looking serious and intimidating. Sidney stood behind them, at attention. Her heart pounded in her chest as she thought about how close Jack was - and how far away he still seemed.

"Ensign LaForge has given you her testimony that Officer Lambit brought her and Jack Crusher into this building," Data said coolly. "While we cannot prove that Ensign LaForge was drugged, as she suspects, these scans do prove that Jack did not only enter this building - but he never left"

"But our records do not indicate, " Allard began.

"With all due respect," Geordie said warmly. "You already admitted that your officers have full edit permissions on all official records - which makes them useless if the officer has something to hide.

"On the other hand," Geordie continued, "we have no reason to manipulate our data. All we want is to find this kid. The scan says he's here, somewhere - so stop obstructing our search. "

"Please be reasonable," Allard said. "What you suggest, an officer abusing her position and kidnapping a suspect, is beyond imagination."

"I assure you, my biometric scans are accurate," Data said calmly. "Jack Crusher is in this location, though likely several meters below ground level."

"Meters below ground level?" the captain asked. "In the basement?"

"The scans would indicate a sub-basement,"

"There are holding cells in the basement," Captain Allard said. "We can look and see if your friend is there. But the lower levels are prohibited."

"Then there are lower levels?" Sidney asked anxiously.

Captain Allard observed her sharply. Apparently, he did not think younger officers should speak unless spoken to.

"My dear," he said condescendingly. "Monaco has been a thriving city for over 3000 years. Every building was built on the foundation of the buildings that were here before."

"There must be a way to access these sub-structures," Geordie said.

"As I said, they are prohibited," the Captain insisted.

"Prohibited is not the same as inaccessible," Data observed. "If one were trying to hide something or someone, putting that person or object in a prohibited location would eliminate the possibility of accidental discovery."

"We will need to access these sub-basements," Geordie said forcefully.

"I told you they are prohibited," Captain Allard said.

"And we told you that our scans are conclusive," Geordie replied. "If you cannot act immediately due to bureaucratic restrictions, I can escalate this as far as the Federation President if I have to."

Sidney could feel the tension in her father's voice – she recognized it well. When her father spoke like that, you did what he said. If you pushed back, he was going to push harder. He was not going to relent. No cookies now became no dessert after dinner. No dog became no pet of any kind, including goldfish. A week of being grounded became a month.

"Your threat has unnerved your young ensign," Captain Allard observed. It was probably a ploy to divert attention and avoid a confrontation.

Geordie was not fooled. "She knows I'm serious," he said, pushing back his chair and standing, indicating to all that the time for conversation was over. "Now, are you going to show us the sub-basements, or am I going to be contacting Admiral Janeway?"

Commodore LaForge's show of fortitude seemed to be as insurmountable for Captain Allard as it had been for Sidney during her entire childhood. "I suppose it is prudent to verify the lower levels are, in fact, empty before we trouble others to do so."

"Exactly," Geordie said, not softening his tone. "The sooner, the better."

Presently, Captain Allard led them down a flight of stairs into a series of holding cells. Several of them contained groggy drunks, who had been collected from the streets in the wee hours of the morning and were still nursing their hang-overs. Jack was not among them.

"If memory serves," Allard explained as they approached the end of the hall, where there was a small break room for the officers assigned to guarding the cells. "There is a door in here that leads to another set of stairs."

It was a dull room with beige walls and dim yellow light. On one side of the room there was a small round table and two chairs and a wall-mounted replicator. On the other, there was an old couch and armchair, which did not match, set around a low table that was scattered with ancient PADDs. The room had four ancient doors – the kind with knobs and manual locks – two on the far wall and two on the right wall.

The first door on the right opened easily and led to a supply closet. The second door on the right was locked, as was the third door on the back wall. The fourth door was also locked, but next to it there was a hook with an old fashioned metal key.

"I am unfamiliar with the ancient technology," Allard said apologetically. "Do any of you know how to operate a key and doorknob?"

"I am familiar with the procedure," Data said, as he stepped forward. Taking the key off the hook, he inserted it in a slot in the door just over the doorknob and turned the key.

The old hinges creaked as he opened the door to reveal another, larger maintenance closet. However, this one was dark and musty. The light fixture set into the ceiling did not work and the items on the shelves were so covered with dust that they were unidentifiable.

"I do not believe this door has been opened for several years," Data said.

"That is obvious." Captain Allard said. "Perhaps now you will believe me that the young man is not on the premises."

"But we have not tried to unlock the other doors," Data said.

"There is only one key," Allard pointed out. "The others were, no doubt, lost ages ago. He could not possibly have entered the subterranean levels through this room."

"Data, why don't you try this key on the locked doors?" Geordie suggested.

"My thought exactly," Data said as he moved to the other door on the back wall. With a quick turn of the key and creak of the hinges, it also opened. But there was not a room on the other side. Instead, there was a short, dark hallway that quickly led to a spiral staircase going down into inky blackness.

"If this key is always hanging on that hook, any person could open these doors and descend into the substructure," Data noted.

"And take a prisoner with them," Sidney noted.

"Before we go down there," Geordie said, "I want to know what's behind the last door."

They opened it and discovered another hallway leading to another set of stairs.

"These tunnels would appear to go to different chambers," Data noted.

"Well, which one is Jack in?" Sidney asked anxiously.

Her father pulled out his tricorder and started fiddling with its settings, "It's hard to say now that we're closer to the deposit of tetrahedrite. It's really messing with our scans. He's definitely below us, but I can't get a read on where either of these tunnels lead. "

"So we search them both," Sidney said.

"Or we call Lambit down here and order her to tell us where he is," Geordie said pointedly, glaring at Allard.

"That strategy is likely to backfire," Data pointed out. "She has every reason to mislead us. Might I suggest that we follow the sound of tapping?"

"Sound of the tapping?" Geordie asked, baffled.

"I do not hear any tapping," Allard scoffed.

"I, I think I do," Sidney said excitedly. "it's faint, like an echo of an echo."

"Precisely," Data confirmed. "I believe it is coming from the tunnel on the left. While the tetrahedrite interferes with the tricorder's ability to read biological signals . . . "

" . . . It has no effect on the audio receivers. All we need to do is run a simple triangulation algorithm " Geordie said. "If he's making that noise, it will lead us right to him."

Jack's headache was killing him. Or, to be more precise, the dehydration causing his headache would kill him. The fact that he was creating a maddening din of rock on rock, and occasionally rock on metal, did not help. To keep himself from going completely insane he sang bits from old songs he'd learned when he was in prep school. He'd found them while doing a research paper on the development of unalienable rights. His focus was on the historical treatment of prisoners on earth. The prisoner's experiences had fascinated him. He identified with the descriptions of isolation and the sense of injustice. His research led him deep down the rabbit hole of human cruelty towards other humans- and as a result his report didn't document progress in the development of rights so much as the unfathomable depths of malice and persecution humans were capable of. He'd gotten a B-.

The old songs he'd uncovered in his research were meant to keep men in rhythm as they broke rocks in a quarry or hammered spikes to build the ancient railroads. They survived because they were unspeakably sad, and all people, in all times, knew what it was to be sad.

"Everywhere I—hanh!" He hit the rock against the floor with a crack.

"Where I look this mornin'—hanh!" Crack!.

"Everywhere I—hanh!" Crack!.

"Where I look this mornin'—hanh!" Crack!

"Looks like rain—my Lawd!" Crack!

"Looks like rain—hanh!" Crack!

"Ev'y mail day,—hanh!"" Crack!

"Mail day—hanh!"" Crack!

"I git a letter, My Son," Crack!

"Come home, my Lawd" Crack!

"Son, come home—hanh!"" Crack!

"Doncha hear yo'—hanh!"" Crack!

"Hear yo' mother callin', " Crack!

"Run, son, run, my Lawd," Crack!

"Run, son, run." Crack!

Singing while he worked made Jack breathless. He was not nearly as strong or fit as the unfortunate men on the chain gangs of old. He took a break to catch his breath, rest his arm, and nurse his headache. He expected to hear his ragged breath and pounding heart. But he heard more than that. Somewhere, someone was yelling.

"Aaaaaaaaaaah!"

It wasn't a scream, he didn't think. It sounded calm but persistent, like yelling a name. Probably, he thought, his heart racing, his name.

"Oi!" He yelled as loud as he could. "Here, I'm here!"

His call was rewarded with a louder, more excited reply. "AAAA. Old on we'er omming!"

Jack laughed as relief washed over him. If he hadn't been so dehydrated, he would have cried. He dropped his rock and pulled himself up, using the metal bars for support when the inevitable dizziness hit him. "Oi!" He yelled again. "Oi! Here!"

The anticipation seemed to last forever. With help so near, his body decided to remind him that it had been abused. His head pounded with a tension headache, his stomach twingeed with hunger, his muscles started to cramp with the cold and his throat was so dry his voice became raspy.

Jack ignored his discomfort and kept screaming. Soon, his efforts were rewarded. The pitched-back surrounding him was transforming into a charcoal gray, then ash gray, then a beam of white light was clearly visible and, for the first time, Jack could see the world around him.

He was in a small windowless cell composed of solid rock on three sides and old iron bars on the fourth. With the light he could see that his cell was just one of many in a long hallway. At one end of the hall there was a spiral staircase that twisted both up and down. That's where the refracted light was coming from. The other end of the hall was still lost to darkness. The floor, walls and ceiling were all made of cold gray stone, and it reminded Jack of a Robin Hood holo novel he'd loved as a child. He was in a medieval dungeon.

"Jack, we're almost there!" The voice called, much clearer than before.

"Sidney!" He replied in excitement. "Here, I'm here!"

A moment later, the light turned the corner and, for a second Jack saw his rescuers. Then the light source swung down the hallway and caught him in the eyes. He was blinded. Closing his eyes tight, he staggered backwards.

"Jack!" Sidney yelled again, her voice close and clear. "Oh my God, are you okay?"

"Bob's your uncle," he said. "Just dazzled . . . And dehydrated."

"Young man, how on earth did you get down here?" an unfamiliar voice asked.

Squinting, Jack looked up to try and see who was in his rescue party. His eyes still burned from the sudden overexposure to light, and he could only make out dark silhouettes beyond the iron bars.

Sidney's form was familiar and comforting. She seemed to be the closest, standing right in front of the bars. He could feel her large brown eyes looking at him with compassion. Next to her stood two stout figures, examining the door with a tricorder. Far behind them, as if to distance himself from the scene, was another portly man.

"This cell door appears to be locked," the prim, precise voice of Data said.

"And I don't see a key on a conveniently placed hook," replied the voice of Sidney's father, Commodore LaForge.

Jack's eyes were adjusting, he could almost see the red in Sidney's uniform. He locked eyes with her and stepped up to the bars.

"You found me," he told her.

"Of course I did," she said. Her mouth smiled but her eyes looked worried. Jack wondered how beat-up he looked.

"So, tell me there's a plan to bust me out of this clink," he said, turning to Data and Geordie.

"Having analyzed the structure of the lock and the inherent strength of its composite metals, I believe the most effective course of action will be to break it.

"Break it?" Jack asked. "Break the solid iron lock? That's the plan?"

"If we use the tricorder to emit a small electrical charge to the lock and ionize the rusted iron, we could then reverse the polarity of the charge to essentially disintegrate the rust and significantly reduce the lock's structural integrity," Geordie said.

"While this body does not have the physical strength of my previous body, it is significantly stronger than even the upper limits of human abilities," Data added. "With the ionized metal removed, the remaining material will be compromised. I am confident I will be able to exploit the inherent flaws in its structure and free Mr. Crusher. "

"This site is property of the Monaco Security Service!" The unknown man with a white goatee protested. As Geordie pressed his tricorder to the ancient lock and started pressing buttons. "You cannot just break it!"

"And you cannot just imprison someone in a primitive cell hidden down two flights of dark, twisting passageways!" Geordie snapped. As he spoke, a fine red dust was spilling out of the key hole, and something inside the mechanism made a clunking sound. Stepping away from the lock, he said, "It's ready as it'll ever be. Get him out of there Data."

"With pleasure," the positronic human replied with a grin as he placed one hand on a bar on the door, and another on a bar in the doorframe.

Jack watched, anxious and fascinated as the former Android tried to rip open the metal bars. At first, he approached it casually, simply yanking on the door. When that did not work, he started exerting effort, pulling on the door until the metal started creaking. Something gave way with a crack, but the door only shifted a millimeter or so. Jack was still trapped.

"This is more difficult than I anticipated," Data said, joyfully, looking from Jack to Sidney to Geordie, smiling ridiculously. "How exhilarating."

"Glad you're having fun," Jack muttered. "Meanwhile, I can feel my blood pressure falling and will probably black out in a minute or so."

"Point taken, Mr. Crusher," Data said. "Perhaps it is time to use excessive force. I advise you to stand back."

Jack stepped back, along the iron bars away from the door. Sidney stepped with him. Slipping her hand through the bars, she grabbed his and squeezed it encouragingly. He squeezed back.

Simultaneously, Data took several steps back until he was standing against the far wall. Then, with surprising speed and agility for a person who looked so old, he threw himself bodily at the cell door. There was a loud clang as he hit the door, and a grunt, then a crack and the door swung open as Data stumbled into the cell.

With the door open, Jack did not hesitate. He let go of Sidney's hand and bolted for the opening. As soon as he crossed the threshold, he found himself engulfed in a tight hug.

"I was so worried about you, " Sidney told him.

Jack was momentarily stunned. He had rarely received such an overt show of affection, and never from someone who was not his parent. Before he could fully process what was happening, Sidney slid to his side, wrapping her arm around his waist and positioning her shoulder under his. "Come on," she said. "Let's get out of here."

"Is that a hydro-hypo?" Jack asked, eyeing the hypospray in the medics hand.

"The scan says you're dehydrated," the medic said. He was a tall, skinny, middle aged man who gave the impression he would rather be anywhere else. "Hydro-hypo is the most effective treatment. "

"Yeah, but it feels like there are worms in your veins," Jack said with a shudder. "Couldn't I just drink a bottle of water?"

"I'm required to give the most effective treatment available," the medic said, pushing the hypospray into Jack's arm before he could protest further. "We'll give that a minute to work, then I'll start the dermal regeneration on that phaser burn."

"Great,"Jack choked as the medic walked away. Jack was sure he could feel the thick gooey substance make its way through his circulatory system, creeping down his arm and across his chest and, most uncomfortably, up his neck.

His meditation on his discomfort was interrupted by Sidney snickering. He shot her a disgruntled glare, but that made laugh more.

"I'm sorry, " she said, obviously trying to swallow her snickers. "But you should see your expression."

"I'm glad it amuses you," he said, not entirely sarcastically. "You know, hydro-hypos are only five percent more effective than drinking an electrolyte infused beverage, and only seven percent more effective than drinking straight water. If the patient expressed a clear distaste for a treatment, and a comparable treatment is available, any medic worth their salt should administer the alternative."

"You have a very decided opinion," Sidney observed.

"It's called the standard of care and it's non-negotiable," Jack said emphatically. "It's about seeing your patient as a person, not a problem."

He turned to look at Sidney and realized that she was looking at him with a goofy, affectionate smile.

"What?" He asked.

"I've been beside myself with worry for the past 24 hours," she said. "I'm just so relieved you're ok - I can't stop smiling."

The cold, slimy feeling in his blood dissolved as he met her gaze. "I'm relieved to see you too."

"I am so sorry I didn't listen to you when Officer Lambit first encountered us," Sidney said. "You knew something was off."

"Well, you did rescue me from the bowels of a back dungeon," Jack demurred. "So maybe we call it even. Though, the idea of you being in my debt does have appeal. "

Sidney laughed again, "Does it?"

"I'm sure I could come up with some way for you to make it up to me," Jack said playfully.

His flirtation was nipped in the bud when Commodore LaForge entered the room and snapped, "Sidney, shouldn't you be heading up to Space Doc about now?"

"Um," Sidney stammered. "I was going to request a short extension . . ."

"We found Jack," Geordie asserted. "And I promise you, I will not let him out of sight until we beam out of this city. What do you need to stay for?"

"Well," Sidney said, glancing at Jack.

"Please don't put yourself out on my account, " Jack said emphatically. "I've caused you more than enough trouble for today and it's not even noon."

"Ok," Sidney nodded. Jack thought he spied a hint of disappointment in her eyes. "But my bag is at the visitors center. "

"I'll make sure you get it," Geordie assured her.

"Thanks Dad," Sidney said.. "And thanks for coming. "

"Even though you didn't call me," he said pointedly.

"I love you, Dad," was her reply as she stepped forward and kissed her father's cheek.

Then she turned back to Jack, "I've got leave again in two weeks, maybe I could take you to the Uncle Rasti's coffee farm?"

Jack was genuinely surprised. "If I'm not on trial for crimes against humanity," he stammered.

"I'll set it up," she told him with a smile. "And send you details. "

"Thanks," Jack said. He felt like he should say more than that, so much more, but he was uncharacteristically at a loss for words.

She favored him with a wink, before tapping her comm badge. "Ensign Sidney LaForge to SpaceDoc- one to beam up."

A moment later, Sidney was surrounded by a crisp blue glow as she dematerialized. After she was gone, Jack's eyes rested on the space she had filled.

"So," Commodore LaForge said sternly, pulling Jack back to the moment. "I have a few questions for you."

"What are my intentions towards your daughter?" Jack asked glibly.

Geordie grunted in a way that communicated I am serious, and you'd better be too. Jack took a deep breath and sat up straighter.

After a moment of extremely uncomfortable silence, Geordie asked, "Well?"

"My intentions?" Jack asked, arching his eyebrows. "So, you really did want . . . ?"

Geordie nodded.

"Well, ah," he started uncertainty. "I mean, she's beautiful, of course, and brilliant. And, uh, up for most anything, which I find particularly attractive."

Geordie arched his eyebrow, and Jack thought that he should probably get to the point. "But as for my intentions, well, the thing of it is . . . I've, I've spent a lot of my life inside my own head and, well, it hasn't always been the, ah, happiest place to be. But, when I'm with Sidney it's like . . . It's like all the doors and windows are open. There is sunshine and fresh air." Jack glanced at Geordie to see if he was following the metaphor, but the Commodore's expression was still stern and disproving. "Which is all just to say," Jack continued, "I need Sidney's friendship right now - honesty, I'm, I'm not sure how I could . . . But I realize that she doesn't need me. I know she has other friends and a bright future. So, to answer the question, my intention is to do whatever I can to have a relationship with her on whatever terms she dictates." He met Geordie's disapproving eyes. "I hope you find that acceptable, sir, but even if you don't, I'm going to stay that course."

Geordie met Jack's gaze. He seemed to be considering his next words very carefully.

"You know," he eventually said, "Your half-brother Wesley was a very good friend of mine."

Great, Jack thought with a twinge of exasperation. Another comparison to Wesley. His mother was careful never to outright compare him to the half-brother he'd never known- but she would talk about him sometimes, and occasionally, when he was younger, he would overhear his mother talking to the other mothers about how her two sons had been so different. Wesley loved school, Jack was indifferent. Wesley was shy but longed for friends, Jack was charismatic but didn't like other children. Wesley was obedient, Jack was argumentative. Wesley was an acting Ensign in Starfleet by age 18, Jack didn't thrive in an institutional environment. Wesley was the son every mother wanted, Jack was a work in progress. The end result of all of these half-heard, half-understood conversations was Jack feeling very strongly that he could never live up to the memory of his brother. If Commodore LaForge was going to be comparing Jack to the venerated memory of the impossibly good and brilliant Wesley Crusher, he didn't stand a chance.

"Yeah," Jack said flatly. "I think I'd heard that before."

"One of the things I respected about him was his ability to stand his ground. People thought he was a pushover, because he was always polite and respectful - but if there was something important to say, he would say it, consequences be damned.

"Now, I'm sure I don't have to tell you that you are not like your brother. "

"No, you do not," Jack muttered.

"But I'm glad to see that, at least, you have that trait in common," the Commodore concluded.

No one had ever suggested that Jack was like his saintly older brother in any way. Jack was surprised by how much that complement meant to him. "Thank you, Sir."

"Sidney has always been a bit of a thrillseeker," Geordie continued. " And I can understand that- I was a bit of a thrillseeker myself at her age. Considering how you meet, I can't really be surprised that she finds you exciting. And, given who your father is," Geordie continued, "I know you are bound to get her into trouble. Just make sure it's good trouble."

"Only the highest quality trouble," Jack said with a playfully smile, which Geordie didn't return.

"Do we understand each other?" The Commodore asked.

"Yes sir," Jack replied seriously.

"Good," Geordie said, dropping a little, but not all, of his sternness. "Because when Sidney told me-"

Jack was dying to know what Sidney had told her father concerning him, but he was foiled by the return of the incompetent medic. "I've got the dermal regenerator, I'll fix up that shoulder now."

"Of course, " Geordie said, stepping aside.

"Now, if you'll just relax," the medic said. "This will only take a minute."

Jack leaned forward and gazed at the floor while the medic slowly regenerated the damaged skin on his shoulder. A clamor of thoughts and memories swirled through his mind; anger at the incompetent medic, the fear of dying cold and alone in an ancient prison cell, memories of borg-eyed children, overhearing his mother saying "I just don't understand him, sometimes, Wesley would never have done anything like that".

None of those thoughts were relaxing.

Instead, he picked a memory from the day before, when they'd had lunch at a café on the Rue de la Trubie. The ocean was behind Sidney, and the sea breeze was blowing her hair in her face. She was telling him a story about when she was sixteen and, how every time she crashed her speeder, her father would engineer a solution so that she could not crash it that way again. She made it her goal to find a new way to crash it.

He remembered her laughter, as she described the lengths she went to when she wanted to roll the speeder after her father installed shuttle quality stabilizers.

It was a hilarious story. As Jack focused his memory on reliving it, recalling her glee-filled expressions, laughing voice, the warm sunshine and the cool breeze, he felt himself relax.

It took hours for Jack to be released from the Monaco Security Offices. Three different officers took his statement. All of them challenged his assertion that Lambit had drugged and threatened Sidney, forcing him to confess and comply to protect her. But, the fact was Jack had been found, injured and imprisoned, in the substructure of the security offices. There was no explanation for that fact beyond what Jack provided. Lambit, it seemed, could not be found.

Captain Allard wanted to keep him in custody until they were finished with their investigation, but Data had taken the time (which, for him, was about 45 minutes) to read the entire Monaco league code as well as most of the case history over the last 500 years. With that knowledge, he was easily able to argue that Jack had already suffered unlawful imprisonment and, therefore, it would be illegal to confine him any further.

True to his word, Commodore LaForge had not left Jack for a moment, though he had needed to step aside and take a few high-level communications from Starfleet Headquarters. Jack was fairly certain that they were mostly reassuring his worried parents that everything was under control. As Data and the Security Force's legal counsel debated the conditions for his release, Jack marveled at how secure he felt. He'd been in similar situations before, desperately trying to slip through the sticky fingers of ambitious local security services. Sometimes his mother would rescue him, with bribes or a well timed beam-up. Most often, he'd have to talk his way out of whatever trouble he'd found himself in. But Data was doing all the talking- and Jack had absolute faith in him. And Commodore LaForge's presence was a constant reminder to everyone in the room that Jack was not alone and he could not be disappeared. He wondered how often his father had felt this confidence; believing wholeheartedly that things would work out because his crew was there, doing what they could do. Was that what he meant when he'd said Starfleet was the only family he needed?

When they finally left the security offices, it was nearly 5 p.m. "Did anyone tell Laris what's been happening?" Jack asked as they walked briskly away from the offices. "Or is she going to yell at me because I'm four hours past my time?"

"Sidney called her as soon as we got out of the dungeon," Geordie said. "And I cannot imagine Laris yelling at you."

"Well," Jack admitted, "It's more of a disapproving glare and a cold observation that she expected more of me - but that doesn't make it any more pleasant.

"However," Jack continued, "Since she knows what a harrowing day we've had, she probably put together a great dinner, and I know she'd be thrilled if you joined us."

"While your offer of hospitality is appreciated, I regret to inform you that it is not in your power to offer it," Data said.

Jack looked at the positronic man quizzically, "Why would you say that? Laris has said a thousand times that-"

"He means, there is an Admiral who wants to talk to you at Starfleet Headquarters," Geordie said. "And she doesn't want to wait."

"Of course," Jack nodded, thinking of how anxious his mother undoubtedly was. She would want to scan him to verify his hydration and blood sugar levels were normal, then she would want to look at his shoulder and verify the phaser burn had been treated properly, then she would want to sit down to breakfast, because it was still morning in San Francisco, and listen attentively while he told her everything that had happened over the last 72 hours.

"So," Geordie said, "You agree to beam to Starfleet Headquarters in San Francisco?"

Jack looked at the Commodore quizzically, "Why wouldn't I?"

"I don't know," Geordie sighed. "I just don't want to be accused of conscripting anybody."

"Conscripting?" Jack asked, but Geordie had already tapped his badge and requested three to beam out.

The not-so-perfect Mediterranean paradise dissolved into a sparkling blue haze, which in turn dissolved into a nondescript gray transporter room.