A/N: Wow, it's been a minute, huh. My writing brain was completely disconnected, couldn't think anything but Star Wars, blame the Kenobi show. Anywho, I have my writing brain back, and I wanted to throw this out there for you guys. This chapter was supposed to be The Host, but we encountered a plot twist. Thanks for your patience! Canon, farewell :)

"Elle, honey, when you talk to Wesley next, ask him if he needs help with Ancient Philosophies," Beverly said.

Elle sipped at her breakfast tea. "Why?"

"Because he needs help in his Ancient Philosophies class."

Elle cracked up. "Yeah, okay, I can do that. I can't believe he was on this ship with Captain Philosophy for four years and didn't absorb anything."

"That's because he was scared of me," Picard said, hiding a smirk behind his croissant.

Elle snickered.

He pointed the croissant at her, mock-scowling.

"Don't play with your food, Jean-Luc," Beverly said placidly.

"Yes, dear," Picard said.

"So married," Elle whispered to herself.

"Yes, speaking of which," Picard said casually.

Elle's head snapped up.

"Speaking of which?" Beverly echoed, a smile starting to form on her face.

"Will you marry me?"

Elle almost had an aneurysm trying to keep quiet in the presence of history.

"Of course I will, Jean-Luc."

They shared a brief kiss over the pot of tea, and Picard removed a ring from his jacket pocket. "This belonged to my grandmother," he said quietly, sliding the ring onto Beverly's finger. "She was a lovely woman. Would've loved you."

Elle's eyes widened in realization. So that's why she'd gotten a letter from Marie Picard just last week. It had all come in the same long-distance package... letter, pastry flour, ring!

"Breathe, Elle," Beverly said, smirking at her.

Elle let out a half-strangled screech of joy and threw her arms around both of them. "This is the best day of my life," she said, kissing Beverly on the cheek. She turned to kiss Picard on the cheek, too. "Congratulations," she said. "You two are the best." She gasped. "Did you tell Wesley?"

Picard smiled. "I did tell him, yes. He gave us his blessing."

"Nice."

Picard laughed and tugged at her ponytail. "Go on," he said. "I expect the news to be out by the end of the day, understood?"

"Yes, sir!"

Beverly called her back, laughing. "Wait, wait, who won the pool?"

Elle grinned. "Data did. He's gonna win a fortune." She raced out the door, breakfast forgotten. She knocked on Data's door anxiously.

The door slid open. "Elle, good morning," he said, Spot dangling from his arm like a purring football. "What's happened?"

"Good news!" Elle said, hugging him. "The captain just popped the question! They're getting married!"

Data started to smile, then grin, and then he laughed. "Wonderful," he said, "and that means I've won the pool."

"I know! This is great!" Elle bounced on her toes, overjoyed. "I gotta go tell the others. The captain wants it out by the end of today so people don't start more rumors than they're going to anyways."

"Considering the general speed information travels onboard this ship, you simply have to stand in the middle of Ten-Forward and talk to Guinan at a moderate volume," Data pointed out.

"Yes, but that's not as fun as running through the ship telling all the people that need to know," Elle pointed out.

"True."

It was, in fact, the best day ever. "Take that, irrelevant plot device relationships!" Elle hollered into the universe. "Season four, peoples!"

"Who are you hollering at so early in the morning?" Riker asked as she entered the turbolift.

"Guess what," Elle said, bouncing on her toes.

"Uhhhh, there's homemade brownies in the mess hall?" Riker asked. "Or you overdosed on caffeine?"

"No! The captain and Dr. Crusher are engaged."

Riker choked on air. "What?! For real! Yes! Geordi owes me so much holodeck time."

Elle laughed.

By lunchtime, the entire ship was buzzing with the news. The captain and Dr. Crusher were getting married! The engagement party was already in the works, according to the twins' mom. "We've been waiting for this day for like six months. Of course, we've already got plans drawn up for the party and the ceremony itself," Yeoman Harcomb said, pulling out a PADD marked with a gold sticker. "See?"

"Nice," Elle said, making grabby hands until Yeoman Harcomb handed it over. She scrolled through it quickly. "This is perfect."

Harcomb grinned. "Well, go on then. You're basically Dr. Crusher's other kid, go discuss arrangements."

"Yes ma'am!" She hustled down to Sickbay, where literally everyone, including the engineer with the sprained ankle, were hanging around gossiping. She grinned at them and went into Dr. Crusher's office.

Dr. Crusher was staring into space, a small smile on her lips.

"Enterprise to Dr. Crusher," Elle deadpanned.

Dr. Crusher blinked and then laughed. "Elle? What can I do for you? Sore throat from shouting the news?"

She held out her PADD. "I have party arrangements for you to review."

Dr. Crusher laughed. "That was fast."

"Considering your TV timeline was another ten years? Absolutely." Elle bounced on her toes as she watched the doctor scroll through the list of things. "Eh? Eh? They did a good job, right? Wait, who's gonna marry you if Captain Picard is the one getting married?"

"I'm sure we can find an admiral," Dr. Crusher said dryly.

"They'd jump at the chance," Elle agreed. "In the Klingon war timeline, you were engaged, too. It was a tossup between Admiral Hanson and Admiral Paris, whoever could get out to the border first. Even thought about having the ceremony over a conference call. Except you guys died before you could tie the knot."

"Not this time," Dr. Crusher promised and hugged Elle to her side. "Now help me choose flowers. I want ones grown on the ship."

"Ooh."

After wedding planning with Dr. Crusher, Elle went to her quarters and put in a call to Earth. Wesley Crusher's face popped up on the screen. "Wesley!" Elle said. "I can't believe you didn't tell me."

He grinned at her smugly. "So this is how it feels, to know future events before they happen."

She scowled playfully. "Tell me everything."

"Okay, okay." He shooed away his roommate and leaned forward in his chair. "Captain Picard called me a few days ago. Scared me to death, but then he told me he wanted my permission to ask mom to marry him."

"And?" Elle prompted.

"And I said yes, duh."

"Oh come on," Elle said. "That's it?"

"Yeah, that's it." He smiled at her. "You asked me almost two years ago if I'd be all right with them getting together and being married and all that, so yeah. I just said, go for it."

Elle raised an eyebrow. "You told Captain Picard 'go for it'?"

He turned red. "Well, I said, 'no sir I don't mind, Elle told me this was going to happen and if it makes my mom happy then I'm happy too.'"

"Aww. Except you're a terrible storyteller. How did he ask, though? Was he nervous? Was he grim? Did he actually express an emotion?"

Wesley sighed. "He was really nervous, and it was really funny and awkward," he said. "But he's like my surrogate father anyway so he might as well actually be my stepfather." He paused. Wrinkled his nose. "Ew. I'm gonna have a stepfather."

Elle cackled. "Now you think of it?" She grinned. "You could always ask him to adopt you."

"Elle!"

She laughed at the expression on his face. "I'm kidding, I'm kidding." She sobered slightly. "Jack Crusher is your father, and that's how it should stay."

Wesley nodded. "Thank you."

She leaned forward. "So you're coming for the wedding right? To give your mom away?"

"If I can get time off," Wesley said.

Elle's eyes narrowed. "Who's your advisor?"

"I'm not telling you," Wesley said. "I can advocate for myself."

"It's your mom. They have to let you," Elle said. "At least for the ceremony."

"Yeah. It'll be fine. I'll be there, even if I have to stowaway."

Elle laughed. "I'd pay to see that. But don't do it, we need you non-demerited so you can graduate early and come back to the Enterprise."

Wesley huffed a laugh. "Bored?"

"Not really. Just missing the random explosions."

"Oh, come on. I wasn't that bad."

"Au contraire, mon frere," Elle said, "you were worse. May I remind of the nanobots incident-"

"Okay, okay, never mind," Wesley said hastily. "Hey, speaking of worse, let me tell you about this girl in my engineering classes. She's half-Klingon, half-human, and you wouldn't believe her temper. She almost took some kid's head off when he messed up her fractal progressions-"

Elle's jaw dropped. This sounded very familiar... "What's this girl's name?" she asked.

"Uh, B'Elanna? Torres, I think. Her dad's human."

Elle choked on her own spit. "I knew it," she wheezed, coughing. "I knew it was close."

"Knew what?" Wesley asked warily.

"Nothing," Elle wheezed and then cleared her throat. "Nothing," she repeated in a normal voice. "Don't even worry about it. Just, don't do anything stupid like get in a fight with a Klingon."

Wesley huffed. "I would never."

"Good." Elle did a quick headcount. Tom Paris was still in the academy, too, probably a senior. B'Elanna was weeks away from getting kicked out. Oh, Great Bird of the Galaxy. That means... She cleared her throat again. "Hey, quick question. Is there a Commander Chakotay teaching tactics right now?"

Wesley frowned. "Uh, yeah. Advanced Tactics. I think I'm taking that next year. Why?"

Elle grimaced. "No reason. Hey, how's Nova Squadron?"

Wesley lit up. "It's great! We do rotating teams, so this semester our squad captain is Nick Locarno. Well, he says Locarno, but I'm pretty sure his dad's Admiral Paris but he's hiding so he doesn't get special treatment."

Elle nearly choked on her own spit again. "I knew it!" she screeched, maxing out the microphone pickup. "I knew it! I knew it. Ha! Yes, ha." She pointed at the screen. "I knew it."

"Okayyyy," Wesley said. "How many cups of espresso have you had today?"

"None," Elle said. "I'm just experiencing a generational collide in real-time."

"A what?"

"Don't worry about it." Elle frowned. If Wesley refused to do the stupid thing Which Shall Not Be Mentioned then "Nick" would never get thrown out which meant Chakotay would never hire him into the Maquis... would there even be a Maquis? Not if Elle could say anything about it. Did her chaos-stirring powers extend to averting a war? "I wonder if I start hollering spoilers Q will answer me," she mused.

"What?" Wesley asked. "No! They're getting married, don't bring him into it!"

"Not for that," Elle assured him. "Never mind. I'm sure it'll all work out. The timeline is very resilient."

"The timeline?"

Elle waved a hand. "Don't worry about it."

"Too late, I'm worried."

"Well, how's this. A fleece test. If B'Elanna punches out a professor, everything's gonna be fine."

Wesley blinked at her. "Are you serious?"

"Deadly."

"What if she doesn't?"

"I don't know. All roads lead to-" She was going to say 'the Delta Quadrant,' but she caught herself at the last second. "Fixed points," was what came out instead, which wasn't any better. "Rome," she said hastily. "Anyways."

Wesley sighed. "You're making me homesick, shut up."

"Oh, by the way, your mom asked me to ask you if you need help with Ancient Philosophies."

He squinted. "Did she say that in front of Captain Picard?"

"Yeah, like two seconds before he proposed, why."

Wesley groaned. "Because he asked me if I was doing well in all my classes and I told him yes I had all A's."

"Ha! That's what you get for lying."

"Be quiet."

"You be quiet."

They grinned at each other.

"Since I have you here," Wesley said. "What's the deal with Diogenes?"

Elle grinned. "He would've had a great Tumblr account."