The BLTS Archive - The Eighth Alternative Fourth in the Crisis Team series by Blue Champagne (rowan-shults@sbcglobal.net) --- Hi, B.C. here. Paramount, Desilu, Viacom,whoever; you own everything, especially the money. We only own the fun. Same to Warner UK and the good folks at Bushmill's whiskey. Julian reprises the song he sang Molly to sleep with in "Diamond Wall", the one called "Athair ar Neamh", a Gaelic tune from the Enya album "The Memory of Trees". This time, I translated it. My Gaelic is not exactly perfect, and there was a word I went to look up and couldn't find, so I had to extrapolate from the meanings of the components of the word in question and work it in. To Enya: sorry about the snafu (I only know about the one improvisation, but I probably made other mistakes; idiomatic language and like that). --- "THE EIGHTH ALTERNATIVE" Or: "WELL, ALMOST ANYTHING" --- Miles freed up his mouth enough to say "Julian..." "Mmh?" "Put your arms around me." "Why?" Julian smiled, eyes closed, nuzzling into Miles's neck. "Isn't enough of me touching you?" "Just shut up and bloody do it, all right?" "Whatever you say, milord." Still smiling, Julian slid his arms under Miles and began a slow, progressive tasting of the other man's throat and collarbone, and the delicate spot just under Miles's ear that drove the engineer insane. Nearly as much so as Julian's quip. "You've a specially active mouth on you this morning," Miles muttered. "And where would you be with--" he paused to slowly and thoroughly kiss the spot under Miles's ear. "--without it?" "In the shower, going through the soap with a will, probably. Kiss me. While you're doing that, you can't talk." "Oh. A challenge." "NO. I literally can't believe you sometimes. Can't even shut up long enough to--blast." The computer alarm had gone off. "Looks like the shower after all." "We'll be quick." "Julian...oh, God..." "Yes, Miles?" "You bloody--oh..." "Do you want me to stop?" "You'd better not. But I can't keep showing up for duty looking like I'm in yesterday's...mmh...uniform, which I'm going to be again, your replicator being the piece of Cardassian rubbish it is..." Julian refrained from asking whose fault *that* might be and instead paused long enough to say "Start keeping some things here." He returned to business. "Won't that be a bit of a tipoff?" "I didn't say to keep them on the tea table." "Well for you to talk...oh...you always look perfect." "I've gone rumpled to the infirmary as often as you've shown to work in an unfresh uniform." "You'd look perfect in an oh God piece of duranium foil and a smile. You're beautiful. I'm not so lucky." Julian moved up Miles's body, facing him and kissing him, his hand busy between them, to say "I don't want to have that conversation, Miles. Even if you're not beautiful to yourself, you are to the people who love you. And I'm not *always* at my best; I doubt I'd have turned any heads when I was dead." "Crikey, don't mention that. But you're right, you looked a fearsome corpse." "Still...wasn't all bad," Julian whispered idly, as Miles began to move beneath him, holding Julian firmly in one arm, the other hand sliding between their bodies with a definite goal in sight. Well, not sight, exactly. "And just what was *good* about your getting blown nearly into Tir na n'Og and my breaking your ribs to keep you alive?" "You said you loved me." "I do. Now stop oh *God* going on so and kiss me." Julian did. They moved together, each holding the other now with both arms, pressing themselves against each other, sliding in the clear fluid that the pressure squeezed out of them in a steady rhythm...Julian began to moan softly, and Miles embraced him with his whole body, whispering his name--their mouths crushed together, tongues plunging deep, Julian moving faster, anxious and urgent against Miles's body, against his mouth, hands clenching Miles's shoulders with all their supple strength. They had mastered the art, in many varieties of lovemaking, of climaxing at the same time; Julian had most of the responsibility for this, being younger, stronger and preternaturally sensitive to the signals Miles's body gave him, but Julian didn't mind the arrangement in the least. That Miles didn't mind it went without saying. After they'd done, Julian had slid half off Miles as they panted with the remaining effects of the sudden, violent exertion and its results. "Oh," Julian groaned, squeezing Miles in his arms and rubbing his face catlike against Miles's shoulder--he didn't know what had prompted him to start doing that, it'd been spontaneous, but it turned out Miles loved it, "--I wish we didn't have to be quick." "Mmm. Me too. But--oh my God." "What?" Julian opened his eyes and rolled them up toward Miles's face, but he didn't lift his head or release his hold. "Neither of us need worry about puzzling our respective staffs with our appearance. We've both forgot what day this is." "Ahh...our one-month anniversary?" "Don't be glib. The transport. We're leaving in--" he craned his neck to see the clock. "--a little less than two hours for Bajor." "Oh, my God." "Like I said." Julian lifted his head. "How *could* we forget that?" "Too much preplanning. All our gear was packed and set two days ago." "But it's all we've been thinking of for nearly a week. Until this very morning. We're such idiots, Miles." "That's what Keiko and the Commander'll both say if we miss the flight." "Remind me to personally thank Admiral Juneau for tying up the last available runabout one day before our departure." "I will. Especially since even the private cabins were all booked. Come on, we've got to clean up and have the gear sent to the lock. Didn't you say you had a crate in the infirmary that'll need special handling?" "Yes, I did, it's a live sample case with a special environment in--oh, I'll tell you on the transport, it'll give us something to do. Come on, then; shower." "Not both of us. We'll miss the transport for certain." "Good point. You go first; I'll call and set up having our equipment taken to the lock...blast it, I *know* I left a towel on the floor here last night..." "Sorry. Threw it into the laundry chute. I'll get you another, just roll off onto your back...I'll only be a moment." --- "Bajor is pinning a lot of hope on the potential refinement and sale of this mystery commodity your wife has discovered; so, do enjoy yourselves, gentlemen," Sisko was saying as the lock rolled open and began disgorging arrivals. "Just...remember to get your work done, too." "Don't worry, sir," Julian said. "I'll be alert for any attempts Miles might make to steal off somewhere with Keiko." "Ha." Miles chortled. "More likely I'll have to grab you by the hair and keep *your* attention focused. Maybe I should bring someone else, sir. He'll be useless, I'll warrant." "Your wife asked for him, or I probably wouldn't be parting with the station CMO for more than a week; although the reports Starfleet has had from Professor O'Brien's associates would seem to indicate that this project is important enough to Bajor and Starfleet both to justify the extravagance. But losing you is bad enough, Chief. My coffee will be tasting like spoiled prunes within two days. Give my love to Keiko and Molly." "Will do, sir. Come on, Julian, they won't hold the flight for us--" "--and if a runabout becomes available," Sisko added quickly, "I'll send someone to retrieve you for your trip home. Have a good flight, gentlemen." Doctor and Chief of Operations thanked the Commander in unison and stepped into the lock. As they got situated in the main cabin, Julian leaned over and muttered "Did you *really* mean that about my hair, or were you just teas--" "Sst. Not here; you know the rules." Julian said nothing, merely smiled and settled back in his seat, relaxing his long person as far as he was able in the compartment's confines, as the transport undocked and began to move away from the station. When Miles glanced over at him, he saw that Julian was still looking at him, smiling speculatively, eyes half-lidded. "Miserable bloody sadist," Miles growled, crossing his arms and legs and sinking farther down in his seat. "Insatiable bloody sa--" Julian started to correct him at a near-whisper, but Miles smacked him in the arm. "Ow!" the doctor complained, rubbing the offended shoulder. "Who's a sadist." "Shut up, Julian." "Chief. Wake up." People were moving about, collecting carry-on baggage and lining up in the aisles to disembark. "Mngh." "Chief." Julian slid his hand under the back of Miles's head where it rested on the back of the transport seat and lifted gently. Miles was going to have a hell of a crick. Julian's offer of a shoulder had been met with a snort and a semiaudible remark involving the word "daft". "Wake up, Miles. We landed a minute ago. If you can call it a landing." He heaved himself up on his other elbow. The bumpy arrival had given Julian a new appreciation of runabout design. Miles blinked, realized that Julian was holding his head up and pulled away almost hard enough to cause the strain Julian had been trying to keep him from. "We're there?" "We're there. Let's go see who's come to meet us." "Mm," Miles agreed, hauling his person out of the seat to collect his share of the luggage. He paused, rubbing his neck. "Let me get that," Julian said, appropriating one of the heavier cases Miles was holding. "Here, I can take my share." "I don't have a crick in my neck." "Why not?" They stepped into the aisle, heading for the nearest egress. "You weren't awake for the whole trip, were you?" "Yes, actually. I spent the time going through the Starfleet Physician's Desk Reference by memory." "That kept you *awake*?" "The fellow across from me was an Andorian surgeon. He happened to have a copy of it with him, and we made a game of it." "Must've been quite a tranquilizer for anyone within earshot." "Your snoring stimulated them out of any such reaction. Those Ferengi traders were laying bets on how many entries I could manage before my next slip, and how much time, if I didn't slip, it would take me to actually remember the entry. I felt a bit like I was playing--good gracious!" They had stepped out into the day, and the port was drenched in deep golden morning sunlight. Outside of the pavement and buildings, hills rose green and inviting, with a range of blue mountains in the distance, their snow-caps pink and white in the early light. Groves of heavy-limbed, thickly-leafed deciduous trees populated the hills, more slender, white-barked trees waving and trembling in the breeze. Wildflowers too distant to pick out individually created swaths of bright and pastel color. Julian could just see the river that wound into the hills, grey-silver under the shade of one of the heaped cloudscape mountains that drifted across the sun, illuminated; then passed, and let the sun shine on the river, turning it to a lazily meandering ribbon of gold. Miles shoved him between the shoulder blades. "I take it you've never been to Arilavah Province." Lurching into startled motion, Julian proceeded down the ramp. "Ah...no, I hadn't. Quite lovely." "Isn't it, though? When Keiko first came to work here, she had me out for a short visit, and we stayed here." "Have they worked especially hard at restoring this area?" "No, it was never plundered as badly as most of the planet. It didn't contain anything the Cardassians wanted--can't send a nice view back to the homeworld." As they reached the bottom of the ramp and stepped onto the pavement, Miles continued "And while the soil's arable, the Bajorans keep the area as it is for its value as a place to guest important visitors, send their own military for vacations, like that." "Makes sense." Julian looked around and saw a team of uniformed Bajorans bringing their gear from the cargo hold. A woman in a blue Starfleet uniform seemed to be directing its handling and loading onto the antigrav cart. "I wonder if we should--" Fortunately, he was no longer directly in front of the ramp when a small projectile slammed into his legs, causing him to drop half what he was carrying to retain his balance. "What--" "Daddy!" Molly's small face was peering up at him in high excitement, which quickly metamorphosed into an abashed expression. "Oops." "Daddy indeed," Miles laughed, picking her up and squeezing her. "Hi, sweetie!" Then Julian was being embraced from the side, rather higher up, and as he heard Keiko's laughter he set down his remaining burden and turned to put his arms around her and lift her off her feet. "Hi, sweetie," he grinned, and kissed her forehead. "Hi, David," she replied, and he nearly dropped her in a convulsion of suppressed laughter. As he set her down, she added insult to injury by wondering "How's Mike lately?" Julian contemplated revenge as Miles handed Molly to Julian and enveloped Keiko. "Darlin' love, how are you?" "Great," she assured him, patting his back; the looks on both their faces demonstrated, at least to Julian, how loaded with subcontext both the question and response had been. Molly was hugging Julian's neck. "Hi Jh'lian!" "Hello, miss Molly, sir!" Julian swung her through the air, narrowly missing Keiko and Miles, the latter of whom was on his way to speak to the woman in the Starfleet uniform; the woman's helpers were approaching with the cargo pallet, on which they quickly loaded the personal bags and the rest of the carry-on gear. "How's my favorite commanding officer?" Julian continued, twirling the girl in a gleefully thrashing and squealing circle. "You're so *big*! Be picking *me* up soon, I shouldn't wonder. Come here and give us a kiss." Keiko was rolling her eyes as they started toward the slideway. "Julian, every time she sees you on a visit, she won't talk about anything else for days. Sometimes I think Miles and I should just marry you and get it over with. Miles!" The Chief had emitted a strangled noise and tripped on the featureless pavement. Keiko caught his arm. "She was joking, Miles," Julian murmured to the Chief in a sincere, confidential tone. He couldn't keep the hilarity completely out of his expression as he noted the effect of his reassurance--Miles was thinking that in a perfect world, he could now be taking Julian's head off with one swing. "You won't be able to hide behind a little girl forever," Miles growled as Keiko held a hand over her mouth to hide her grin, composing herself as the Starfleet- uniformed woman came within conversation range. She lowered her hand and said "Ensign Blaymare, you've met my husband, Miles; this is our friend Julian Bashir, the station CMO. Julian, this is Rilla Blaymare. She's one of my graduate assistants." The small, dark woman exchanged a cordial nod with him, then turned to Miles. "Chief O'Brien, the team's Bajoran engineers are waiting at the Professor's lab. She told me that you wanted to meet with them and be briefed on the industrial side of her discovery while she shows Doctor Bashir the primary site she's using to work with the lichen we're concerned with." Miles, obviously rocked, stopped. Julian plopped Molly into his grasp as a buffer. "She said that?" Miles wondered in a faint tone, arranging Molly in one arm, as the cargo continued, on its cart, to the transport loading platform. "You did say that's how you wanted to do this, didn't you, Miles? And then we'll all meet for brunch." Keiko's gaze was steady, her tone light. "Oh, yes. Forgot. Brunch. Long flight and all. Well, then--oh. I see it's being taken care of." The pile of boxes and containers that were in Miles's jurisdiction were being loaded onto a separate car. "I'll be your driver," Ensign Blaymare said, "and your wife's given me the address at which to drop Molly until brunch as well." "I'll see you in just a few hours, Miles," Keiko said, and yawned. "I know you two have been on that transport for quite a while, but I'm just barely awake. We'll meet back at our apartment in...three hours. You DO still remember the access code--?" "--of *course* I remember the access code! You go on, Molly and I'll visit and I'll meet with the project industrial specialists." He kissed Keiko and squeezed her soundly, maneuvering Molly around it with the ease of long practice. He eyed Julian strangely, then followed Blaymare. "Well? What was all--" Julian was forced to galvanize himself to catch Keiko as she beelined for a second car, the one Julian had seen his own contribution to the equipment pile being placed in. Keiko went around to the pilot's side and Julian climbed in the near side. The car was a sturdy and elderly-looking thing, plenty of cargo space, and reminded Julian of university issue. Or military. "Nice of them to--" he yanked his legs in as the door slammed down with emphatic speed and locked with a screeching hiss. The safety field seized him like an ardent lover. "Good God." "Watch out for that door," Keiko said, flicking switches. The car rose easily into the maglev queue that would take them out of range of port-controlled airspace; she was angling for the due south branching. "I'll bear it in mind. What was that all about?" "Miles." "It was about...Miles." "And his overprotective streak. I do remember you saying you'd been rappelling, right?" "As part of the Academy physical training course, yes. Why?" Julian, as their car bumped through the force field into the correct tube, maglifted, and began to pick up speed--greenery and blue sky flashing by on all sides through the windows and the transparent tube--began to feel a shred of misgiving. Every time Keiko took charge--and Keiko *always* took charge, being better at it than Julian or Miles either one--something radical and unexpected took place in his life. "We'll just have time to see the whole site before we have to meet with Miles and the engineers," Keiko said serenely. And nothing about rappelling. All right. "Kei...I brought everything you asked for, including my own notes in four cases." She smiled briefly up at him, but was distracted by the approaching free air. "Hold on one minute, okay?" Julian gave in and flopped back, bracing one boot on the blank panel in front of him and folding his fingers across the uplifted knee. He had to work a bit at it through the safety field. They rose smoothly on shooting from the tube, Keiko following the signals and safeties on her boards. Taking an old aircar out of high-traffic port space, in the absence of the automatic functions Julian was used to from Terra, might give him a bit of a pause; but Keiko seemed right at home. They climbed through the sky, jewel tones refracted through the heavy-but-isolated cumulus heaps they flew around and sometimes through, Keiko merely assuring herself they were on her preprogrammed course. Though from what he'd seen, if the programming failed, Keiko could get them down without much incident. "Can we talk now, my Keiko?" "Of course. I'm sorry to surprise you with all that, Julian," Keiko said, laying her near hand on his left knee. "It just didn't occur to me--how to handle this--until yesterday. And then when it did...I hope you don't take this badly, but I've taken you into my confidence more than I've taken my husband on several occasions, and it bothers me." "I can see why. Our present sleeping arrangements for starters." "I did ask for that." "I know. But how is Miles's confidence betrayed by your showing me a botanical research site?" "You'll recall I mentioned his overprotective streak?" "Yes." "I also mentioned rappelling." "I was wondering about that." "You're about to have that question answered." "You *didn't* detail the engineers to distract him, did you?" Julian said this last in a quiet monotone. "Of course not. Don't be silly. The engineers, and Miles, are going to be doing exactly what they do. And you and I are going to be doing exactly what we do." "You and I? Are you saying there'll be no one else at this site?" "Not for a while yet." "And we'll be...?" "Rappelling, at first." --- "Down *there*?" "You have been rappelling before." "It's not that at all. When you said low light, I assumed something akin to a polar exposure, not caves. This *is* a plant, it *does* photosynthesize?" "Yes, it does! That's one thing that's so exciting about it--here--" she handed him the small pack she'd finished making up, and helped him buckle it on. "I'm not saying that there's an astronomical light array growing in a cave on Bajor, but it gives anything that requires light to function a run for the title. We won't *need* to go down to levels where there isn't any light our eyes can see at all--" 'That'd be a long way for some of us,' Julian mused, helping her with her harness. "--but I was sort of hoping you'd want to. It's even green, chlorophyll-using." "So this...plant isn't a lichen at all." "Well, yes it is. I had to call it something, and it does have attributes in common with thallophytic and saprophytic plants. But it also makes use of light at levels lower than can filter to the deepest ocean plants." "That explains why you wanted the samples and tools I brought, but why me? I assumed a pharmaceutical application?" "I think there is, but I needed you to help me verify it. My assistants and I are sort of at a standstill there. Are you ready?" "As I'll ever be." "At the first stop, we'll want to take our wristlights off and put on the goggles. The light from one handlight will kill every cell of this species--for an area about the size of the transport you came in." "That's sensitive, certainly. I'll go first." He attached his harness to one of the top pitons and began to descend. There were signs of recent use of the route, handholds fired into the rock where the smooth black stone didn't provide any, and of course the pitons. "I assume these caves are watery?" "Not very. That's another amazing thing about the plant--" "What is your team calling it?" "It's got an official name in Krizhia now--the Bajoran equivalent of Latin, isn't it?" Echoes resounded; Julian fancied he felt a pebble bounce past. "I think of it that way." "--a Latin name, and a Japanese name, but no name in standard. My team calls it Keiko's lichen." "I suppose that's flattering in a way. " "In a way." He could hear the smile in her voice as she swung over the lip of rock above him and commenced her descent. There was little dust, or rubble. "The amazing thing I was getting around to is that the moisture from the air--even here--these caves are volcanic--seems to be sufficient to sustain it. It doesn't need a heavily saturated atmosphere or direct watering." "Neither do some cacti." "Cacti can't grow in the dark, and most of them flower." "So it can make use of light at a level of only a few photons per, it needs virtually no water, it grows on rock...you said it had features in common with fungi, lichen, et cetera. Watch out for that basalt lip." "Yes, that one nearly impaled me the first time I came down here. That's why I wanted to go first, I know the land." "What things, then? Is it heterotrophic? Reproductive similarities?" "It reproduces remarkably like single-celled organisms, or some hermaphroditic lifeforms. A single bunch of it is a contiguous plant, and it can bud off from itself. But if it encounters another plant, they exchange DNA rather like mammalian egg fertilization is accomplished." "Keiko, help. I'm getting a mental picture." "Julian, grow up. They're not puffballs, but they don't need a liquid environment to reproduce, either; they also don't scatter seeds. The plants come into physical contact and cells exchange DNA through what looks like a viral method--you'll have to tell me if what I'm looking at is, really, comparable to messenger RNA in a protein shell. If so, instead of a mutual infection, what occurs is they simply start producing a third plant that incorporates both plant's DNA, through a rather unconventional medium." "For true plants, at any rate." "Yes. It'd be a...more elaborate, maybe just more complicated, method of chromosome exchange." "In terms of 'true' plants and animals, these botanical wunderkinder wouldn't happen to be in that grey area between plant and animal, would they?" "Maybe they are, but if so, it's in a way I've never seen before and am not prepared to classify. Honestly, Julian! Did you think I just wanted you here so your staff could have a chance to mess up your files?" "Got a copy made with a lockout even Dax won't be able to crack." "I should have known. In any case, I needed expert help." "That could rappel down and climb up several rock faces." "That's right. Antigrav units of any kind seem to be very disruptive to the plants. I don't know how--all I know is, I trucked some gear down on a spare pallet, and my scanners went crazy. I had to shut off the pallet and have it hauled out by hand." "How do your scanners affect the plant?" "It's all dependent on the frequencies and types of scans. I'll show you what I've determined is safe, but I'm betting we'll have to go outside definite safety limits--for the plant, I mean--when you start your investigations." "All right. I can see definite food plant and industrial applications in the offing, though I'm expert at neither. But what's this pharmaceutical application you were wanting help with?" "It wouldn't make much of a food plant, I'm afraid. But one of my grad students, getting a specialty in pharmaceutical exobiology, says she believes that's true for the same reason nightshade doesn't make a good food plant..." "But did make several excellent antispasmodic drugs. What application does she see? Why's the plant poisonous?" "Because if you eat it, you'll immediately contract a particularly virulent form of an opportunistic cancer that was cured long ago--but the same substance that causes it might be used to make a drug that could do, at least in part, the same thing you can do with your regeneration chambers." "That *would* be quite the innovation. Where's this aide of yours now?" "She'll be asleep for three or four months." "Ah. Linsentauran. Is her name pronounceable?" "No, she goes by Siral. She read it in an old Vulcan fairy tale and liked the sound of it. She wanted to stay awake, but I insisted a week ago that we could manage without her. Her eyestalks could barely move by the time we got her to bed; she's very dedicated. I've got all her notes and reports at my lab." --- When Miles managed to get the full story of the site's location and depth--the engineers detailed to help Keiko hadn't known she hadn't told him, and filled him in when he asked, though not until most of the briefing was over--one of the engineers, a man named Enlelan Shia, had offered to accompany him and Blaymare to the site, seeing as how Miles had drawn the meeting to an abrupt and explosive halt until he got out there to see if his wife, or Julian, were lying in the bottom of a rocky crevasse. Once there, Miles leaped from the aircar under a full head of steam, followed by Blaymare and Enlelan; when he got hold of Keiko and Julian, he was going to-- As they rounded the car those two had arrived in, they were all three nearly run down by Julian, who stampeded through their quickly-dodging bodies with Keiko in his arms. "Get back!" he was shouting. "Chief, get back, behind the cars, get everyone back--" Blaymare and Enlelan didn't need to be told twice, but Miles hesitated, briefly stunned, until he heard Keiko scream "Miles! Come on! It's going to ignite--" he began moving very quickly indeed then. There was a muffled boom, the ground shuddered, and then a roar and a blast of light, apparently from the cave entrance, sent everyone to the ground, Julian catching himself nearly flat over Keiko's supine form. Two packs were strapped to his back, or rather one was strapped on and the other fell off him as soon as they hit the ground. "Stay down!" Keiko was screaming over the doctor's shoulder. "Everybody stay down! There could be more--" And right enough, there were--this time the burning gases (Miles had seen enough different types of combustion to know what he was looking at, at least that far) flumed out of the cave entrance and shocked into the side of Keiko and Julian's car. The old beast jolted and swiveled a bit, but stayed upright and in one piece. He elbow-crawled to Julian and Keiko. "Julian, what the hell--oh damn your eyes, you're not dead *again*, are you?!" the doctor's body was prone and inert across Keiko's, and she wasn't moving, either, eyes closed. He rolled Julian off Keiko as Blaymare and Enlelan rushed up with a medical kit procured from its compartment in the other car. Miles shouted hoarsely over the noise "They're both out, I don't know why--but he was moving pretty damn sprightly a moment ago, and we all heard Keiko scream--" It was a fleet-issue kit. The blue-uniformed woman scanned Keiko first, then Julian. "Chief, turn the Professor over, please, carefully." Miles did, and his heart nearly stopped when he saw the ripped and bloody condition of the back of her jumpsuit, jagged cuts and bruising all across her shoulders and arms, and down one side of her back. "Spinal injury?" "No, she's badly bruised, and...one rib cracked, not severely...and her left arm's broken. No mentionable internal injuries. The arm's a simple fracture. I can stabilize all that right here, and they can do the touch-up work at the hospital. Here." She handed him the tricorder and started working on Keiko with the osteoregenerator. "Scan Dr. Bashir, find out why he's unconscious, and I'll see to your wife." Miles did, starting at the top and working his way down. "Bloody couple of *idiots* coming out here all alone and you'd *better* not be dead, y'blasted excuse for an overeducated pry pole because I *told* you I'll not be--" he broke off as Julian's eyelids fluttered. "Julian! Julian, answer me! Open your eyes!" "Mm...hello, Miles," Julian graveled, his lyrical voice shattery and rough. There was another rumbling boom from behind the car in whose wake they sheltered, and bits of grit and pumice rained down around them. Ash and dust billowed skyward, bathing them in a storm of dark grey flakes. Miles protected Julian's face as Blaymare quickly leaned across Keiko. "Lovely weather for our arrival, isn't it? Ow." "Ow what? Where are you hurt?" "I'm...mgh..." Julian was struggling upright; Miles moved to assist him. "I'm not. Thanks to Kei." "What the BLOODY hell happened down there?" "Did you know your wife can fly, Chief?" "What?! Julian, if sense doesn't start coming out of you damn quick, I'm gonna pound some in." "When the last blast rocked us, Keiko saw a rockfall with my name on it before I did. With one running jump, she was three meters from her starting point, with enough momentum left over to knock me sprawling out of the way." "So she could take it herself? Doesn't she know by now you're practically indestructible?" "I don't think she intended that part. I think, from the position she landed in, that she'd meant to be beyond damage range as well--good thing she thought to cover her head anyway--but she didn't have quite enough mass to knock us both that far. Only me." Miles bent his head into one hand, covering his eyes. "Holy Aine." "No, I doubt she was involved. I...ah...pulled the rocks off Keiko, and found her broken arm. I could tell barehanded that that was her worst injury, so I...ahm..." "You what, damn all, WHAT!?" "I slung her over my shoulders and made the last climb out to the cave entrance. I'm afraid I quite ruined the climbing harness in the interests of getting it off quickly so I could run, and here we are as you see us." "You climbed a rock face with Keiko over your shoulders?" "Well, I needed my arms." "How? How far did you have to climb?" "Only about...thirty meters? There were a lot of handholds, and there were the pitons in, of course." "My GOD." "You've become--ahem (cough) very religious all of a--" Julian coughed again, then seemed unable to stop, and Miles, who had been on his way to needing some support himself, had to calm down and hold Julian up as the spasms racked him. "It's the gas," Blaymare was saying. "The same stuff that's burning back there." "You were in a cave that contained combustible, toxic volcanic gases without any breathing or fire gear?" Miles's voice rose to a near-shriek. "Not at first," Julian said tentatively, half-gasping. "We've discovered another property about what Kei's botany team has styled 'Keiko's Lichen'." "What? It explodes? The engineers would have noticed any tendency to that." "Not necessarily. The tendency has nothing to do with the industrial applications projected for it so far. It's the pharmaceutical aspect of it, you see." "So it'll make a drug that blows up. Fat lot of--" "No, no. It won't blow up if it's not suddenly subjected to a combination of--for it--high light levels and certain of the gases we encountered back there. From what data I gathered, I think a few simple modifications to the molecular structure will make it quite safe to handle in the light, particular combination of gases or no." "Speaking of those..." "When the atmosphere composition monitor went off, we realized a fumarole somewhere farther down from our lowest position--exactly where we're not sure--had opened up. The air was coming something nasty--not that we could smell anything but a little sulfur, but the equipment gave the lie--and we were removing ourselves from the area with all possible speed. I felt speed justified the need for extra light..." Keiko was coughing suddenly, and Blaymare quickly injected her with something that made the other woman quiet and glaze-eyed. "I haven't healed her cracked rib yet. I gave her tri-ox and a mild sedative," Blaymare explained. Julian nodded wearily, touching Keiko's dirty cheek, and continued. "Keiko didn't want to leave her samples, so we sealed the cases, and I pulled off my goggles and put on my wristlight--without consulting her--and when I happened to shine it directly across a patch of the lichen in my path, well...up it went." "And you bloody nearly with it." "Yes, unfortunately. I shut off the light at once--nobody said I didn't have *that* much sense--but the damage had been done. We were outrunning a chain reaction of lichen explosions, fueled by the gas and the light from each last, nearest explosion, until the last stop--the first stop on the way down, where we got a little breathing space since there was none of the lichen near--except, apparently, for a small patch up near the light from the cave entrance. Still nearly pitch dark to us, but combined with the gas, light enough for the little plant to go boom--and knock loose that rockfall that Keiko, bless her valiant soul, thought she could save us both from." "And you're saying a chemical that has potential as a medical drug was causing these explosions." "Until a couple of hundred years ago, an explosive chemical called nitroglycerin--that's a--" "I know what nitroglycerin is." "It was used, in a carefully prepared form, as a medication in the treatment of some sorts of heart disease. This chemical in question is also poisonous--so is foxglove, a plant that yielded the drug digitalis, used for many years to strengthen the heart--again, properly prepared." "Well, if this stuff is supposed to be so useful, I hope your handlight didn't just destroy the entire species." "Oh, no," Enlelan put in, then paused while another rumble shook the area. "It grows in lightless areas in many places on this continent. Speaking of lightless places--Ensign Blaymare, can we move Mrs. O'Brien now? I hope otherwise, but it is possible these explosions will trigger a...volcanic event of some kind. Most likely not, but..." "But let's not wait to find out," Blaymare agreed; she was running the tricorder over Keiko again. "Yes, I've got all the fractures healed, we can pick her up. Chief..?" Miles gently gathered Keiko in his arms, wincing in sympathy as her weight rested in his arms across the bruises and cuts. "Enlelan, would you give Dr. Bright Idea a hand?" Julian protested "Keiko won't want what's in the car left here--" "We'll see if we can tow it, but I doubt that car's going anywhere under its own power, and I'm not getting in it where it's sitting now. You just get yourself in back with Ensign Blaymare and I'll try to salvage the car--Keiko'll have my head if I don't at least try." Julian got in the back of Enlelan's car with Keiko and Blaymare, taking Keiko face-down half in his lap while Blaymare healed the worst of the bruises. Enlelan and Miles fought the car's power supply, the tow field, and the car containing Keiko's gear and the equipment and samples she'd asked Julian to bring, not that there was any assurance any of the latter were in functional shape. Finally Julian felt them lifting--to an altitude of about ten meters. "It'll be a near thing," Miles was saying, fighting the control panel while Enlelan rode herd on the tow field, "but if we stay low I think we can move this tub and that one both loaded." Out the window, Julian saw the other car rise--slowly, and with an uncomforting whine from their own car's engine--to the same altitude as they'd attained themselves. "Come on, now....and we're...moving." And so they were. Julian let his head fall back and his eyes close. Nothing to see outside but a dirtied landscape in hazy light, anyway. In moments, he was asleep. --- "No, sir, Keiko and I are fine, honestly." Julian weaved before the computer console in Keiko and Molly's apartment. "You don't look fine, doctor." "I haven't had a wash. There was quite a bit of ash, no more than there was to get burnt. But as I said, we've discovered important new properties and possible applications--" "Excuse me, sir, but I'm laying him down before he falls." "Be my guest, Chief." "Miles--! I'm talking to--" Julian found himself propelled down the hallway and into Keiko's bedroom, where she was lying on the bed, faceup, with her eyes closed. She slotted one just open when Miles dumped Julian next to her, then closed it again. Miles left the room, returning to the console out front. "You're getting ash on the bed," Keiko muttered. "So are you, and dried blood on top of it." "Better than brains." "Better that you should have let--" they both silenced instantly as Miles's voice resumed out front. "Yes, sir, the doctor at the hospital said to bring them on home, that a night's rest will likely put them right, now. And we did save the data they gathered, after a fashion; between them, they remembered most of the relevant aspects and re-entered them on a couple of padds. The gear Julian brought is all right, though the live samples are dead. The containment was breached when the gas flume hit the car." "Can Keiko manage without them?" "I don't know that, sir, I don't know what she intended them for. I can ask her, but I think she's asleep." "Don't disturb her, then. She can call the station tomorrow if she has any serious problems as a result of their loss. Do you expect to be gone any extra time as a result of this...mishap?" "I don't know that yet, either, sir. Perhaps a day or two more, but not longer than that. If even that. How's the coffee holding out?" "Fine so far, out of the replicator in my quarters. But Jake says the orange juice isn't right." "Blast, thought I had that fixed. Tell him to switch to grape 'til I get back." "I'll do that. And Chief..." "Sir?" "Don't let your wife and the doctor go off alone together again. I've found that scientists, as a group, won't notice Armageddon unless it's interfering with their research. Just a suggestion." "Count on it, sir." "DS9 out." "Here it comes," Julian barely muttered, and Keiko made a noise of nauseated concurrence as they heard Miles heading for them down the hallway. She barely whispered "No. We're asleep." "Mm." Miles stumped in, and, confronted with their apparently sound-out presences, made a frustrated noise and stumped out again. "We can't put it off forever," Julian whispered. "No, but we can put it off until we feel better." "There is that." In a moment, they heard the front door whish open and shut as Miles left to retrieve Molly from the sitter. Julian turned his head to Keiko, raising a hand to her face. "How do you feel? Hit by a pile of rocks?" "They would have brained you, Julian." "I have ears. You could have yelled and pointed..." "Which would have been just enough time for you to look up and get your face erased. Honestly, they might have broken your neck. We didn't have time for that sort of thing." Julian sighed; by Keiko's lights, her reasoning was perfectly sound. And she had taken that load of basalt for him; the least he could do was be gracious about it. But not serious, necessarily. He smiled slowly, stroking her cheek with a finger. "My hero." "Flatterer. But I can overlook it, since you're sleeping with my husband." "Interesting logic." "It's a pretty interesting situation, though not at the moment. I think we ought to get some sleep." "I can't; I'm filthy and this uniform reeks of sulfur. I'm having a shower." "Feel free. Just don't wake me when you come back." Her eyes closed and, near as Julian could tell, she fell straight to sleep. He rose carefully, leaving ashy handprints on the cream-colored adobe-like walls, and made it to the bathroom before he injured himself, which he accomplished by tripping on the heavy braided rug and falling against the sink. Then the door closed on his boot. It immediately opened again, but not before leaving bruises on his ankle. Lying face down in the floor, he reflected he'd better speak to someone about that door, what with there being a child in the house. Eventually he mustered the ambition to start getting undressed, decided that horizontal suited him just fine, and started drawing a bath. Not too hot, though; he was still feeling a bit scorched. Psychological, perhaps, but scorched nonetheless. He entered the tub in a controlled fall, getting gently steaming water all over the floor and his uniform, which stinking rag was heading for reclamation anyway. 'I'd best be careful,' he thought, 'or I'll be falling asleep in the water, and wouldn't Miles just have a field day with *that*.' He fell asleep in the water. He woke up with Miles hauling on his shoulders. "Are you just DETERMINED to kill yerself today, y'nitbrain?" "Ow! I'd've woke up if I got a snootful of water, Miles, I was only asleep, not in coma. And I'm not done washing, so unless you're planning to help, let go." "All right, but I'd like to bathe my daughter, so don't be forever about it." He left, with Julian's discarded uniform, tossing back the comment "And rinse that grit out of the tub. Or I will, if you're too weak." "I can do it." And he did, once he felt he'd got rid of enough mineral stink. When he emerged from the bathroom, swathed in a towel, hair still dripping down his neck, he heard Miles and Molly in the girl's bedroom and skedaddled to Keiko's room; damned if he was going to flash the poor child twice, though Keiko still assured him Molly'd thought nothing of it last time. He wasn't sure how to feel about that. His bag was in the bedroom, on a wooden trunk at the foot of the bed. Keiko had turned onto her uninjured side in her sleep, and Miles had covered her with a quilt bearing a distinctively Bajoran geometric motif. The last light was filtering through the round, thick-glassed windows. He pulled on some undershorts and a light cotton undershirt and crawled under Keiko's quilt with her; he folded his long-fingered hands around Keiko's small, outstretched one with the dirt ground under the nails and into her callused little palm, and fell asleep again. When he woke, it was moonlit and dim in the room, and he was feeling substantially better, and substantially alone. There was only an ashy smear where Keiko had been. Seized with irrational fear that she might've taken a turn for the worse, he rolled onto his feet and was at the door when it slid open and he banged into Keiko, who was wet and naked. She grabbed his shoulders, steadying them both. "Are you okay, Julian? You look like you've seen a ghost." "I...ah...I was afraid...something might have happened to you." "Something did." She sidled past him and let the door close, and waved her hand across a panel in the wall, raising the light level slightly to augment the moonlight streaming through the windows. "I woke up and grossed out. I *must've* been tired to fall asleep in that condition. Yuck. Oh, ick, look at the bed. We'd better get under the sheets. Unless *you* want to lie in that." "No, the sheets sound like the way to go. Where's Miles?" "Asleep in the front room. It's a couple of hours past midnight. Put a hold on the sheets; let me get something on and we'll raid the kitchen. I could eat a horse." "Um..." he sat back down while she toweled her hair and got a robe out of the curtained closet. "Is there any word about the havoc we wrought at your site?" "Sort of; the word is no word. There was no significant seismic disturbance after you blew up my primary site, but the seismologists at the institute were NOT pleased. They said we could have set off what they called a 'cold flow', lava nearest the surface welling up and flowing into the caves. Wouldn't have been much in itself, but they're touchy since Mount Heshkein blew in the southern hemisphere a few months ago. Probably because of one doctor with an unauthorized handlight." "Haven't I already apologized about that?" "No. You haven't." "Well, I'm sorry. We *did* save your specimens." "I was conducting a controlled experiment down there; now I'll have to set it up again at one of the other sites. I want natural conditions, not laboratory ones, at least at first. And I sure could have used those live samples you brought. Though maybe..." she halted in front of him, tying her belt, and held her hands out to him; he took them and stood. "...I should be thanking you for finding out what might happen in the next volcanic cave, if I'm not careful. And carrying me up the cliff, that was awfully impressive. I've only got one question." "And what would that be?" "There was a piece of basaltic rock half as big as I am lying on my arm. You flipped it off me like it was pumice. How did you *ever* manage that?" "Heat of the moment. Very common for people to experience sudden bursts of strength in an emergency. Flipping rocks, flying a couple of bodylengths through the air to rescue people from rockfalls..." "It was just a jump. You make it sound like I levitated." "You made it look like you did." "Thank you for getting me out of the cave." "Thank you for taking that rockfall for me. Are we even?" "Not quite." She grabbed the back of his neck, pulled him down to her and kissed him hard. He stumbled slightly as she released him. "Now we're even. Let's see what there is in the kitchen." They tiptoed past Miles, who was on his back on the sofa, snoring like an avalanche. Fortunately for everyone concerned, the kitchen was a separate room with its own door. "I'm NOT in the mood for Bajoran," Keiko muttered, waving the lights on. "I feel burned enough. How does sashimi sound?" "Delicious. As long as it isn't too spicy." "I promise you sashimi rolls that'll bore you to tears. Here, you open this." She reached up into a cabinet over the stove and pulled down a bottle of wine, handed it to him, and said "The corkscrew's in that drawer." "Extravagant, aren't we? This is Earth stock." He took a second look and said "Claret? With sashimi?" "Chateau Picard," Keiko further clarified, getting some wine glasses down. "Captain Picard sent me that when I got my doctorate." "Oh." He started trying to get the bottle open, wound up having to clench it in his thighs to hold it fast enough to pull the cork out. "You correspond with the Captain, then?" "I correspond with Deanna Troi, like I said a while back. She must have mentioned it to him. He sent it with a little congratulatory note. After today, I'm in the mood to see if we can kill it." "Lovely! Race you to the bottom." An hour later, Keiko was spinning the empty bottle in the middle of the table, chin resting on her hand, which was also on the table. Her legs were stretched under said table, her ankles just reaching Julian's lap. He was massaging her feet. "Oh, that's great," she was sighing, still trying to follow the bottle's gyrations with her eyes. "Can I hire you?" "Why bother? You have me for free." "Good point. So. D'you and Miles ever do anything with your free time but have sex?" Julian smiled at the blue-and-green fingerpainting masterpiece he'd been staring dreamily at. "Of course. As we arranged. Everything looks perfectly normal--holosuite games, lunches with Garak...Miles and I even try not to touch each other when we're alone together, if we haven't arranged the time and privacy to finish anything we might start. Didn't our last chat satisfy your curiousity?" "My curiousity, but not the rest of me." "We'll see what we can do about that while Miles and I are here." "Yeah. I've been trying to come up with a good reason for you to be staying here. Past tonight, I mean, which looks reasonable. Then again, you're a family friend. Nobody has to know how much of a family friend, or where you're sleeping, specifically." "True...had you already arranged quarters for me?" "There's a bunkroom at my lab. I've been telling people you planned to sleep there, cut down on the commute time." "That'd cut down on a few other things, too." She made a face. "Tell me about it. Miles gets you all the time. It's so unfair." Julian actually felt himself blushing, even through the heat the wine had brought to his face. "Not as often as he'd like, he doesn't." "Julian Subatoi Bashir! All this work and you've been playing hard to get?" "No, just hard to get to. Between our work and keeping everything looking normal...sometimes the only way we can get any privacy together for any length of time is for Miles to site-to-site transport into my quarters in the evening." Keiko looked up suddenly, her eyes lighting. "You're kidding!" "Haven't either of us mentioned that to you yet?" "No! Oh, you two are evil," she cackled, sliding back in her chair. The bottle rolled to bump gently against the wall, but she'd lost interest in it by that time. "Thank God he's Chief of Operations or you'd never get away with that! He must be covering his tracks to his own people, even." "Actually, Miles had to think fast when Dax asked him what was up with all the transporting about he'd been doing; she noted the extra activity in her laboratory when she tried to site-to-site some components she needed. He told her he was making sure the emergency systems were all in working order." "Dax is pretty smart. Did she buy it?" "If she didn't, she hasn't said a word to anyone that I know of." "Mmm..." Keiko was eyeing him explicitly, and he abruptly had to move her feet a little farther out toward his knees. "Let's wake Miles up," she said suddenly. "Are you sure that's wise?" "You don't really think he'll mind, do you?" "Probably not, my little hedonist." He released her feet, stood, and cocked his arm to her, half-bowing in a courtly gesture. "If Madame will accompany me...?" He laid her hand across his arm and they proceeded to the door, where the effect of their game was ruined by Keiko taking an unmarked hard left and crashing into the lintel. "Heavens, Kei," Julian started, grabbing for her, but he smiled when she broke into giggles. "That looked like a real buster." "So what. Come on." She tottered through the door, Julian behind her trying not to giggle too loudly, but when she fell full length onto the coffee table and laughed so hard she had to hold her sides he gave up and plopped down next to her, lost in the relief of hilarity. Miles, being only asleep and not dead, had woke up by this time. "What...good night. What're you two on about, then?" "We're drunk," Keiko explained reasonably, then collapsed laughing again when Julian did. "That's certainly what it looks like," Miles agreed, sitting up. "On claret," Julian elaborated. Keiko sniffed a couple of times, wiping her nose. "Um, that pottle, um, bottle Captain Phic--pph--the Captain gave me." "Then you can't be very drunk. A bit tipsy, perhaps. You're simply in hysterics," Miles surmised. "What's the joke?" "No joke," Julian said, eyes wide and innocent. "We wondered--would you be in the mood to join us on some quilts in the bedroom floor?" Keiko collapsed anew at this. "Kei, I just thought...your bed's not as large as yours and Miles's on the station." Julian noted with satisfaction that as a result of his innocently couched invitation Keiko was on the verge of falling off the table. (He *did* still feel rather bad about blowing up her research site.) Miles smirked. "And whose idea is it, then?" "Hers," Julian said, pointing. "But it sounds like a lot of fun to me, too." "Come on, Miles, let's do it like weasels," Keiko got out, and gave up, rolling off the table to climb, hyperventilating, into Miles's lap, with his assistance. "Well, at least try to calm yerselves. We go to make it at this point and you'll both suffocate. Not to mention give me...security issues..." He was trying to stay straight-faced, but as they laughed even harder Miles lost it and cracked up, too, enveloping Keiko in his arms. "All right, now, we've got to quiet ourselves or we'll wake Molly." They all sniffed and choked and tried to work their faces into at least semi-sobriety, succeeding more than they might have expected to, though they all still had grins lurking in the corners of their eyes. Miles stood up with Keiko in his arms and gestured with a toss of his head toward the bedroom. "After you, Gaston." Julian grinned and led the way, only having to pause and regain his balance once. Miles was right--they weren't that drunk, especially Julian, being larger. Miles set Keiko on the bed and casually shoved Julian down next to her, saying "I'll get a couple of quilts that don't have ash and dried blood on them." "Good idea," Keiko said, shifted onto her knees and yanked her robe off in one tug, then pitched it toward the closet curtain, which it passed through. "Lift your arms." Julian obediently did so and she pulled his t-shirt off, then slid her hands into his shorts and with a quick jerk had them down to his knees, from whence she easily drug them the rest of the way off. "Heavens, Kei. Perhaps you should consider more frequent visits to the station, if this is the state you're usually--" "Shut up, Julian," she said, and silenced him with her mouth. Miles came back in with a bundle of material in his hands, which he proceeded to cover the carpet with. "...*had* it with rug burns...excuse me, could you two slow up?" Julian, flat on his back on the bed with Keiko lying on him full length as she kissed him deep and hard, made a helpless shrugging gesture with one hand, then put the hand back around Keiko's body, stroking her soft golden skin from her thick gleaming hair to her small round buttocks. "Well, well, well. SOMEone looks to be needing a bit of attention, doesn't she?" Julian heard a rustle of cloth, then a rush of air flowed over him as Keiko suddenly ascended off him, in the grip of an external motive force. Julian nearly got his lips sucked off before she released them. Miles had her, of course, and he said, laying her on the quilts as she giggled softly, "Come on, Julian. I think this is going to take both of us." "With a will," Julian agreed, sliding off the bed onto his knees next to them. Keiko reached for him, and he lowered himself with his elbows to either side of her shoulders to kiss her again, this time putting as much energy into it as she was. He felt her knees bump gently into his back and shoulder, then hold firm there as her whole body shuddered and she sucked his tongue farther into her mouth, biting at him gently, moaning. In his peripheral vision, Julian watched as Miles worked the folds of her sex with his lips and tongue, gently pushing them farther open with his hands. Julian was aroused enough now to be shuddering a bit himself. He shifted his weight off his right arm and began caressing her small, soft breasts, and her back arched, and her soft cry released his mouth for a moment; he lowered his head and took her right nipple into his mouth, alternately sucking gently and lifting his mouth to blow soft circles of air around it, over the tip, then back into his mouth again... Keiko was panting steadily; as Julian lifted himself to shift his attentions to her left breast, taking the right back into his hand, he saw that Miles had at least two fingers sunk into the warm, wet depths of her body, and moaned himself as he took as much of Keiko's breast into his mouth as he could, stroking her hardened nipple with his tongue. Her fingers pressed desperately into his back, twined in his hair, ran over him with an urgency that drove Julian even closer to the state she herself was in. After only a few more minutes of this, Keiko gasped "Miles..." Julian shifted again, out of the way, as Miles moved up over her, and he watched as Miles entered her, easily, with a single thrust of his hips that she lifted to meet, pushing back with a groan. Julian gazed at them in the dimmed light, his breath coming hoarsely, as the two settled into a hard, steady rhythm, Keiko clutching at the quilts, Miles with eyes closed and mouth slightly open, on his elbows down over her supine body; he lowered his head and whispered to her, something that made her moan in response and nod her head, whispering "Yes..." she nodded again, eagerly. Without a break in their motion, Miles leaned back, up on his hands, sliding his knees up so that he could almost sit on his heels; Keiko turned her head and kissed Julian's shoulder, taking his arm and tugging at him; he started to move back up over her, and as he did so she grasped his waist and lifted, pulling at him firmly until his knees rather than his elbows straddled her shoulders. He thought he was prepared for her touch, but when she reached up and caressed him with both hands--stomach, thighs, buttocks, groin--slow and firm, stroking in time with her rhythm with Miles, he was suddenly shaking, letting his knees slide out farther, lowering him closer to her. She slid one hand up onto him, between his legs, encouraging his movement with gentle pressure, and took his painfully hard member in her other hand, her thumb spreading the single clear drop of fluid that trembled at its tip over the delicate skin, then squeezing gently and stroking once with every panted breath she took--rapidly, as she and Miles, if anything, had increased their pace. Julian groaned, his hips moving of their own volition, as light, shivering spasms racked his overheated body. He was no longer thinking, only aware, intensely aware of the heat of Miles's body behind him, the familiar warm smell, and he seemed almost as conscious of Keiko's and the other man's feelings and sensations as he was of his own, the love, the fierce desire-- Keiko took him into her mouth, and a rough cry broke from him as he collapsed to his elbows and she raised both hands to his hips, caressing and then gripping him to lower him further, guiding him. He bit his lip, hoping the pain would help hold back his body's insistent demand for release, clutching at the quilts as Keiko had been. On and on...and on..."Oh, Gods, Keiko--my Kei--" the words were barely whispered, hardly audible. But he knew what the muffled cry he heard Miles emit meant, and used every ounce of willpower he had to pull out of Keiko's sucking, caressing mouth and roll to the side, just as Miles lost the ability to remain upright and fell back across her, moaning, hips heaving, Keiko matching him shove for shove as he came, hard, and as long as Julian had ever seen him do. He lay exhausted across Keiko for only a moment; as small as she was, the dead weight of another body on top of her was oppressive rather than comforting. She was trembling as he raised his head and moved back, gently pulling out of her, and looked up. "Julian?" "Julian," Keiko repeated, with a note of desperation in her voice, holding her hand up to him as Miles moved out from between her folded, upraised legs. Breathing hard, Julian rolled to his hands and knees and moved down and over Keiko, kissing Miles on his way by, and fell over onto her, and slid into her with such a sense of relief and tenderness he felt his throat close, and when she put her arms up around him and began to rock her hips, he clutched her tight and moved in rhythm with her; she was warm and wet and open inside-- Keiko started to shake, ramming one fist against her mouth to stifle her cries, and the clenching and squeezing of the muscles inside her, moving and clamping around him, the feel of her body spasming in his arms, her fingers digging into his back--it pulled out the last stop and he came too, both of them shoving against each other almost to the point of pain, extending the experience as long as they could. He was weak and trembling as he backed carefully off of her, kissing his way gently down her body, to find himself in Miles's arms and without the strength to hold himself up. Keiko had slid her legs down and was lying on her back with one knee bent, head turned to the side, where she still had one hand to her mouth. She looked boneless, panting for breath, and Julian realized they might have overexerted themselves a tad just as Miles said "You two aren't as completely recovered as you thought, I suspect." He tenderly lifted Julian's head to rest against his shoulder, kissing his forehead. "It seems so," Julian whispered. "The gas...we probably aren't getting as much oxygen with each breath as usual. But nothing serious...right, Kei?" She didn't answer. "Keiko?" Julian started trying to move toward her, but Miles restrained him gently, laying him down on the quilts and moving to Keiko's side himself. He took the hand she had to her face, though she foggily tried to turn her head away to prevent him. He looked at the hand and her face a brief moment, quickly raised up kneeling to wave the lights to a slightly higher level, then sat again on his heels next to Keiko, saying "Julian, did you bite my wife?" "What do you..." Julian rolled up onto his elbows. Keiko's fingers were all blood, and her face was liberally smeared with it. He quickly hauled himself up to her other side and turned her face to him, trying to see past the blood to its source. She had let her hand fall, and smiled slightly with one side of her mouth. She said thickly "I guess that buster was worse than I thought." He carefully pried her upper lip away from her teeth, and said "It's split. In another few minutes it'll be the size of an apricot. Why on earth, Kei?" "I didn't know," she said breathily, shrugging. "It hurt a little, but I didn't know I'd split it." "The pain must have been detained for questioning by the claret," Julian murmured. "And the damage intensified to this point by our pas de trois. Odd I didn't taste any blood, though. Miles, would you get the medkit out of my bag? It's stocked more completely than the usual household model." Miles did so, and muttered "It's a good thing for you two that these things are stashed practically everywhere." "Although in just the wrong place on the Ypphat." "That's a point. You *can* fix her up?" "Oh, easily. And I'll give us both another shot of tri-ox." He was holding a small instrument over Keiko's face; it was emitting a barely audible whirr and a beam of soft red light. "She'll still have a bruise. I can't repair the cell damage completely with only a medkit. But the split will be closed, and the swelling minimal, if there's any at all." "Well *that's* a relief," Keiko slurred through Julian's ministrations, and he said offhandedly "Shut up, Kei." "No wonder you couldn't say 'Picard'," Miles mused. --- Julian sipped his juice, enjoying the shelter of the shade trees as he watched Molly running across the grass after a large sky-blue ball; two other children from her day-care group converged on it at the same time she did, and the ball, nearly as wide in diameter as any one of the children were tall, rebounded them all gently in three directions. They all fell into the thick grass with high-pitched screams of laughter as the ball took off again in a different direction. Too large for any single child in the group to hold, it led them a merry chase, the object of the game being to gang up on it and trap it, which took at least three of them to do; this game was about teaching the value of cooperation, not competition. The ball could be set for other games, too. Keiko and Miles hadn't arrived at the Parents Party yet; Miles had called Keiko and Julian at Keiko's lab to inform them that he wasn't going to make it until later, and Keiko had fretted, not wanting Molly to feel the odd one out, since she wasn't going to be free herself for another hour at least. Julian had volunteered to stand in until they could get there, to effusive and rather physical thanks from Keiko. He'd had to straighten up just a bit in the car on the way over; he'd taken the back seat and didn't think that the technician Keiko had asked to drop him at the center had noticed. The other adults were all chatting in small groups, and in one larger group over by the refreshment table. Julian was content to lounge under his tree and keep an eye on Molly, though he'd introduced himself to her care providers when he arrived, tendering the O'Briens' apologies. Molly had greeted him with a grin and a mute arms-out request for the requisite swing around. Now the sun was on its way down; a clear warm day in Arilavah Province. "She's lovely," came a voice from above and to his left; he opened his half-closed eyes and looked up. A Bajoran woman with night-black skin and smooth dark hair clasped at the nape of her neck was standing next to him, holding, to judge by the color, a cup of the same sort of juice he was sipping. He blinked, trying to get his bearings--he'd been close to dozing--and when he didn't answer immediately, the woman continued "How old is she?" "How old is...oh, Molly, of course--she's getting on for five now. Five of our years, I mean, not Bajoran." He got to his feet and the woman held out her hand. As he took it, she said "I'm Kylir Luma. That's my girl, there, with the red playsuit on." Julian followed her pointing arm to spy a small replica of Kylir trying to dodge in front of the ball. She made it, but there was no one on the other side to help hold it, and it escaped again. "Charming. And quite dexterous for the age." "Thank you." She smiled. "Is your girl's mother coming today?" "My--? Keiko will be here later, yes, and her husband, Chief O'Brien." "Oh--you *are* Molly's father, though?" "No, the Chief is. I'm just a family friend. Name's Julian Bashir." "You'll have to forgive me, I only recently began bringing Taelan here for daycare; I don't know all the parents." "Quite all right. I'm flattered, actually. Molly's a lovely child, as you said." "You're not...an uncle or anything?" Julian laughed. "Only by courtesy, I'm afraid. Why do you ask?" "When I saw you with her, I thought there was a family resemblance, that's all." Kylir sipped her juice. "My girl's father can't be here; his wife is having surgery." "Nothing serious, I hope." "The doctor doesn't expect any problems. You probably don't know this, but Bajoran women only carry their children for...oh, about half the time your people do--" "Is she having trouble vascularizing? It can be very draining for some women." Kylir blinked, then smiled. "You're a doctor?" "Yes, I am. What do you do?" Julian sat back down in the grass, patting the springy patch next to him, and she smoothed her simple dark tunic under her and sat down. "I'm a transport shuttle pilot," she said, and her eyes widened and she leaned back slightly as Julian made an odd noise and nearly lost his grip on his juice before managing to swallow and still himself, stifling laughter. "What's so funny?" "Um...It's just the reputation that transport shuttle trips have with the O'Briens and me." "A little primitive next to Federation transports, I take it?" She smiled and waved away his apology. "Don't worry about it. Even a lot of Bajorans don't care for the trips out to the belt, or to the space station. We still don't have the resources to keep the shuttles in top condition. They're perfectly safe--that's where all the resources go--but I'll admit they're not very comfortable." "Ouch," Julian muttered as two children bombed into either side of the ball only to have it slide out and leave them to crash into each other. "I'm glad there's a nosebleed kit under the refreshment stand." The children in question teetered a moment, then both fell over, looking stunned, but dry-eyed and unhurt. In a moment they were climbing to their feet and wobbling off after the ball again. "They are amazingly resilient, though, aren't they?" Luma observed fondly. "They certainly are." His mind wandered back to his own early childhood and he clamped the usual shut-up-and-sit-down box around the thought. "I don't have children myself; the O'Briens are kind enough to loan me Molly now and again." They chatted amicably, watching the children, as the sun continued to descend; Julian suddenly realized it had been about an hour and the care providers were gathering the children, fishing out the exhausted ones for delivery to their adult representative(s), and changing the game to a Bajoran version of dodgeball, judging by the ensuing activity. "What exactly are they playing?" "It's called second chance. After the ball touches you three times--it'll light up from inside at the third touch on any one of the children--you're out, and the last one up running from the ball wins." The words rang oddly, for some reason, with some obscure significance, but Julian said only "It sounds fun." he realized he'd sounded definitely wistful, and kicked the box in his head, with another order to shut up. "Missing your childhood? Though you look hardly out of it." "Missing *their* childhood," he replied, gesturing to the crowd of raucous sub-meter-high beings scrambling like mad within the boundaries of the game's ring, and they both laughed. Just then Julian spotted Keiko and Miles emerging from the yard door at the back of the daycare building, and said "Excuse me, there are Molly's parents now. Wait just a moment, I'll introduce you. Can I get you another?" He held his hand out for her empty cup and took it and his own toward the refreshment table, where the O'Briens were greeting Molly's caregivers. "Julian," Keiko smiled, coming around the table to where Julian was filling two cups with fizzy juice. "Thank you so much for doing this for us. Are you *too* bored?" "Not at all." He exchanged a nod with Miles, who was going to greet Molly; she'd broken out of the main mass and was heading for him at a gallop. "It's a gorgeous day, isn't it? I've just been relaxing, watching the children, talking with Luma." "Luma?" Looking down, Keiko noticed he had two cups in his hands. He could have sworn he espied a bit of tension drawing her brow. "Yes, Kylir Luma. She's a shuttle transport pilot, believe it or not." Keiko smiled briefly, then pointedly looked around; Julian said "Over there under the trees on that little rise. She's only been bringing her daughter here since her friend started a touchy pregnancy. Come on, I said I'd introduce you." Keiko nodded, firmly looped one of her arms through Julian's and they headed back toward the knoll, Julian shortening his steps a bit for Keiko's shorter legs. As they approached, Luma saw them and smiled, starting to get up. "Oh, no, please," Keiko said in her best social voice. "Don't get up." Julian handed Luma one of the cups. "Kylir Luma, mother of Taelan, meet Keiko O'Brien, mother of Molly." The two clasped hands as Keiko seated herself next to Julian, retaining her hold on his arm, saying "It's a pleasure to meet you." "Oh, the pleasure's mine. I don't know if Julian has mentioned it, but Taelan and I are new here, and I don't know the parents well. When I saw him with Molly, I assumed he was her father, and I came up to him and started asking all sorts of questions." Luma laughed. Julian said "Oh, you weren't nearly so forward. She was very polite, Keiko. And here comes Miles." As the Chief reached them, he wondered jovially "Can anyone join this party?" He gave Keiko and Julian the briefest puzzled glance--Keiko seemed to be ignoring her own injunction about public displays of physical affection; Julian surmised that was what he was wondering at. Julian introduced Miles as the Chief found a spot a little farther down on the knoll where he could lean on his elbow and roughly face both the three other adults and the play group running itself en masse to exhaustion. "Keiko," he said, "Chelri, the young fellow I was speaking with there, he's new; he thought Julian was Molly's father--and he thought they looked alike. Can you beat it?" Keiko looked off toward Molly as Luma and Julian chuckled. Miles smiled and said "What?" "Luma can beat it," Julian said. "She's new as well; she thought I was Molly's father, too, for the same reason. Or at least an uncle or something." "Really?" Miles pondered this a beat, then said "You're...sure it's not because he's human, too?" he asked Luma. She shook her head, swallowing her current sip of juice. "No, there's a resemblance--the color and texture of their hair, and the color of their skin and eyes, mostly. But looking at the two of you," she added, "I can see she's just a blend of you. That's my daughter, in the red." "Cute," Miles offered, though he looked a little uncertain of what to say next. "Luma is a shuttle transport pilot, Miles," Keiko said, and Miles controlled a laugh. "Really now," he said, folding his left hand with the one attached to his bracing elbow. "It's all right," Luma sighed, "Julian's already explained about the history you three have with the space station-Bajor shuttle." "You're on that run?" "Not right at the moment. My friend Erelte Namaera got pregnant recently, and it's been a difficult one so far." "Trouble vascularizing," Julian said. "Not that uncommon, but this sounds like a fairly serious case. Luma says the doctor doesn't foresee any problems with surgical correction, though." "I'm glad to hear that," Keiko said politely. "You're staying here to be with her, then?" "Her husband and I are, yes, for the moment. Suryn--her husband--he's Taelan's father, and he and I are switching between staying with Namaera and taking care of Taelan. But he'll have to be going back to work soon--he flies for the military, various transports, mostly. Depending on how Namaera's recovery goes, I'll be leaving Taelan with her and taking my regular runs again. But we can't say if or when Nae'll be up to caring for a small child twenty-six hours a day...I've started bringing Taelan here so she can get used to it while Suryn and I are both still here. Taelan loves Namaera, of course, but she's still so young..." "I understand," Keiko said in a maternal tone. "I live here with Molly on Bajor, doing my work, and Miles is Chief of Operations on the station." "I see--that explains why you're not enamored of the Bajor-station shuttle. You must see a great deal of it." "Oh," Keiko sighed expressively. "And with Molly along...it's a long trip for a four-year-old. The best I can hope for is that I can manage to tire her out right before we leave. I'm lucky if she'll sleep most of the trip." "And so is everyone else, right?" Luma grinned. "Taelan has an I-want-out-of-this-seat repertoire that only begins with screaming at the top of her lungs." Laughing, Keiko released Julian's arm to accept Luma's wordless offer of a sip of juice. "Thanks...Molly's usually not that loud, she's sort of a proto-intellectual, but oh, can she *whine*. An ambassador with a frustrated maternal streak was taking the same shuttle with us once--we're all acquainted with her grown daughter, Miles and me personally. I let Ambassador Troi stuff Molly full of sweets and entertain her--I'll admit she did that well--just to stop the badgering, and as soon as we walked through the lock Molly threw up on Miles." "Not one of my favorite memories of fatherhood," Miles muttered as everyone else smirked and/or giggled. "Though I should have been used to it by that time, if you ever do get used to it. Ambassador Troi made that visit memorable for us all, didn't she?" "But that's rather a long story," Julian leapt in as Keiko appeared about to elaborate. "So, Luma! Tell us about Suryn and Namaera..." --- "'Tell us about Suryn and Namaera...'" Miles, rolling his eyes, squirmed again in patent muscular discomfort. "I wasn't about to go into everything concerning that visit just then. And you have to admit, Suryn and Namaera sound like interesting people." "The Ambassador's visit...I had hell's headache, Keiko threatened to leave me--and you and Major Kira got the--" "I *know* what happened! Now hush or we'll wake Keiko. Hard enough trying to rub these kinks out of you without bouncing her off the bed. It's a matter of personal record that Kira and I nearly shredded each other, and at any staff party where she might not murder the joker, I'd laugh as hard as anyone else. But with Luma was not the time to discuss it and--" he paused, consciously lowering his voice. "--certainly neither is now." Julian held a prohibitive hand over Miles's mouth. Miles squirmed a little closer to Julian on the bed, jerking his head aside to whisper "We really ought to move." "I've a better idea. We'll move Keiko." Miles, it proved, had washed the quilts. He climbed over Keiko to retrieve them. Julian slid carefully down the bed from Keiko's somnolent form, kissing her shoulder with a softness he could have wished was more infinite, since she yawned and squirmed up, muttering "I can...ahhhh...." she blocked her yawn with the pillow. "Sleep on the sofa..." She draped her arm over his shoulders, still mostly asleep. "Let's make you a bed in Molly's room." "Mmmm...." Keiko smiled. It only took Julian a few head-tosses and word-mouthings to get Miles to build the soft pillow-and-quilt bed in Molly's floor; the Chief started to carry Keiko there in a few minutes, but Julian got a shoulder under his and appropriated the nightwear-clad Keiko, bearing her into her temporary boudoir. Back in Keiko's room, Julian sighed in frustration. "You know better than to lift anything in this condition. And you're going to have to relax a bit for this to work." "Oh." Miles snapped his fingers in a "silly me" gesture. "Of course, 'Doctor'." Julian leaned down over him and whispered in his ear. "'Why don't you just call me by my first name?'" "All right. 'Julian'." Julian smiled at the old joke. "How many years have you been calling me that?" "Too many. Since those idiots in that Bajoran village thought I was the new messiah or whatever it turned up being." "Then don't you think," Julian wondered reasonably, digging the heel of his hand into Mile's upper shoulder and eliciting an exclamation from the Chief that Julian muffled with a pillow, "that you should be relaxed enough by now not to scream when I rub your back? I saw you come in this afternoon. You have help out on the site for a reason, and you've a child to carry about at home. And you haven't been this tense since our first session with Telnori." "I'm used to giving massages, not getting them." "To Keiko, at least." "And quite a few other pregnant women in my family. S'a tradition with our menfolk OW--" Julian shoved Miles's head into the mattress and said "That's it. You're taking a muscle relaxant." "D'rather have a shot of Bushmill's." "I'm sure. But you're taking a muscle relaxant." He rummaged in his kit. "Pill or injection?" "Mmm..." Miles growled. Julian smirked. "Pill it is. Here--Chief--blast it, shall I hold your head and ram this down your throat like a horse or will you take it like a civilized being?" Dourly, O'Brien swallowed the pill and set the glass on the table. "You're the doctor." "And I *told* you to let Keiko be on top." "That sort of thing isn't under my control. My body knows what it wants, and then *I* know what it wants." "And so does everyone else. Lift up, let me slide this pillow under your stomach." After a time--he could feel Miles slowly unknotting under his hands--Julian essayed "*Is* anything wrong, Miles?" "Beyond the usual?" "Of course beyond the usual." Miles sighed. "I suppose...I don't really know. I've just been feeling a bit odd about the whole thing lately. Our whole thing, I mean, you and Keiko and I. And there's Molly..." "There's Molly...?" Julian prodded gently. He paused, then added "And are you feeling odd, or bad?" "Not bad. I suppose I've been feeling a bit queer since the parent's party. I couldn't really say why. Ordinarily I'd refer you to Keiko, but I don't think she's paying attention." "And that'd be bothering you, as well, wouldn't it?" "I suppose. Perhaps I take too much advantage of the way she manages me." "And me?" "Of the way she manages you, or the way you manage me?" Julian laughed softly. "I don't know. Both." He paused, changing the focus of his therapeutic touch from deep penetration to a gentle smoothing of the muscles along and out from the spine preparatory to deeper work. "You and Keiko are getting on well," Miles offered. "That tone implies that you didn't expect us to." "*All* I *meant* is that she's damned pleased to have you around after having called you...uh..." "It's all right, you needn't go into detail. She thought she was losing you. Now she knows she isn't, that she never will. Of course I don't frighten her now." "To say the least." They were quiet for a time, and Julian finally said "Are you feeling left out of what Kei and I have?" "Don't be silly. It'd be hypocritical in about sixteen different directions. I was desperate for you two to get on, and now you do--with a vengeance--and I'm confused again. Bloody, Julian, I'm just maundering. Pay me no mind." "I wouldn't, if I didn't think it were important. Perhaps you can't describe what it is that's bothering you; that's just you. But there is something not lying right with you--beyond, as I said, the usual." "Aye. You're right, I suppose. Ow. Just a little lower. Right there. Thanks. Right now I'd like to concentrate on getting this damned spasm out; I have to be on site in the morning." "Your wish is my command." Julian kissed Miles's back softly and continued carefully stroking the older man into sleep. But sleep, as it turned out, took a back seat to what became uppermost in Miles's mind. He turned under Julian's body, taking the younger man's shoulders and pulling him down. Julian let his elbows slide off to either side willingly enough, and made a soft murmur as their lips met, then whispered, in the lowest register of his throaty baritone, "I am definitely on top this time." "That's the thing with you, though, see. We don't have to pick one or the other nearly as much." "Don't exactly *have* to with Kei..." "No, of course not, but it's simpler sometimes. And sometimes the only way we can manage, depending on how tired any of us are." "Mm..." They were kissing again. "True," Julian whispered. As he was trailing kisses down Miles's collarbone, he reached up to the other man's face and stopped. Miles turned his head abruptly, but it was too late, and the dampness trailing from his eyes just trickled down the side of his face over Julian's fingers. Julian pulled himself back up, trapping Miles's face in his hands. "My..." he hesitated, then just went ahead and said it. "Miles, my love. Whatever is wrong?" There was a long pause, but Julian didn't push further. There was only so far you *could* push with Miles if you were looking for a real result. Finally, the Chief whispered "You...really enjoy this, don't you?" Julian stopped himself from thundering at the older man barely in time. Of COURSE he enjoyed this, of course he hadn't gone to all this trouble all this time and endured a vicious storm of confusion and neurasthenia to pursue something he hadn't en--but he bit it back, breathed, and said softly, into Miles's ear, "I love you. However we decide to love each other, you're stuck with me from now on. And yes, I do enjoy this, emphatically I do. Am I making myself clear?" Finally Miles whispered "Thanks. I do, too. You, I mean." Julian was quiet, then said, honestly and with some surprise, "It means a great deal to hear you say that." He kissed Miles again. --- Miles made it to the top of the stairs outside the apartment, sighing; it'd been a hell of a day. Not physically exhausting, but nerve-wracking--they'd been finding what combinations of the pharmaceutical compound, and the various volcanic gasses, in what concentrations, would cause explosions under what conditions. "Like a bloody firefight," he sighed. He hadn't seen Keiko or Julian; they'd been at Keiko's lab doing much the same thing as he and his team, but from a different angle of research. He waved the door open--he knew they'd be home; they'd been about to leave to retrieve Molly before he'd been able to wrap up his own day. They'd left the house late, too; Keiko'd been feeling a touch queasy and off, and Julian'd stayed to give her a palliative and take her in to work. He looked around for Molly as he walked in; she almost always came to greet him-- He stopped dead, staring around. Sure enough, Molly showed in a moment, saying "Daddy!" "Hi sweetie--" he scooped her up, kissing her forehead. "Where are Mommy and Uncle Julian?" And what the bloody hell went with our furniture? "Miles," Keiko greeted him, smiling as she came in from the hallway. "What do you think? I saw it in a store window on the way home and it just grabbed me." "It just...grabbed you?" Miles said weakly, still looking around. The whole front room had been redone in shades of seafoam green and sand, with azure accents. The shutters at the windows were replaced with long, complicated drapes in a modern Bajoran style. The carpet was gone, and the apparent-adobe floor was padded here and there with embroidered rugs featuring ocean and shoreline scenes. "I've missed the ocean, you know, for a long time, and--well, isn't it beautiful?" "Oh, it's that, darlin'. I just...it's a bit of a surprise." "You're not angry?" "No, not at--" he realized his throat had been closing up, gulped, asked "How are you feeling, then? This morning's crawlies all chased away?" "Oh, Julian gave me one injection and my stomach settled right down. I ate more breakfast than he did. I'm still feeling bloated. Speaking of him--" "Miles! Gangway!" Setting Molly down, Miles turned to see Julian standing on the porch holding a chartreuse loveseat. "Crikey, Julian! Let me give you a hand with that--" "Miles, your back--" Julian began, but Miles cut him off with "How did you get this thing up the stairs? Love, you sent him to carry this himself?" By main force, he appropriated one end of the couch. "*No* I did *not*," Keiko said severely to Julian as both men staggered in with the piece, "he was just supposed to call and tell me if it was at the pad and I'd come help him with it. It goes under the other window--yes, there." With a final palpable thump, the sofa was placed, and Julian stood and stretched, blowing like a draft horse and shaking himself. "That was quite a haul. So, my Kei--" Julian crossed the room to put an arm around Keiko and survey their work with her. "Pleased with it?" "It's beautiful," she grinned, squeezing him back around the waist. "Thanks for your help, Julian. Miles, you look a little out of it." "I am, me darlin'. S'all right, I'll get used to it...just a bit sudden, as I said." He took an abrupt seat on the couch he and Julian had just positioned. "Comfy." "I *did* think about your back when I tested everything," Keiko assured him. "But go change, honey, your uniform's so dirtied and this is all brand new." She lifted Molly as the girl started running toward the larger sofa. Chuckling, Julian went to give Miles a yank up from his all-too-brief resting place. "Come on. I'll give you a hand." "You'll give me a hand changing clothes?" Miles gave him a disturbed look. "No, idiot, I meant standing up. Come on." But he did accompany Miles back to the hallway. "I'll get your uniform in the laundry if you want to take a shower. Supper'll be ready soon. Keiko and I are making it with minimal help from the replicator, so it might be a good idea to prepare yourself as much as possible." "You're right." Miles was stripping off his uniform, handing the pieces to Julian as he went, and digging out fresh clothes. "Keiko's vegetarian cuisine is always..." "Palatable," Julian supplied, throwing Miles's discarded underwear across the arm holding the rest of the Chief's clothes. "Yes. Thanks. But it took me some getting used to." "She says the same thing about your potato casserole. Incidentally, she can't stand capers." Miles stopped on his way out the door toward the bathroom, staring. "She never told me that." "She says she never got around to it. I'll just get these into the laundry for you." "Thanks, love," Miles said as the bathroom door closed behind him. "Not like capers...?" He shook his head and raised a hand to start the shower. --- "How long haven't you been able to stand capers?" Miles wondered, swaying Molly on his knees; he had her prone on his legs with his feet on the low table, as they watched and listened to a performance, on holo, of the Bajoran a'Maira convention--sadly reduced to seventy-eight barely-qualified members, but those members, with their musical skills, were still mesmerizing enough. The performance was nearly hypnotic in quality, especially judging by Keiko and Molly. The child was asleep, largely; Keiko was sure to follow soon. "I've never liked them," Keiko said quietly, her head rising and falling with the rhythm of Julian's breath. "They hurt when you bite them." "You're not supposed to bite them." "You're supposed to bite little round things in food. They're berries or seed sacs or beans." Keiko yawned hugely. "Do you want me to sleep in Molly's room?" Miles was taken aback. "Do...you expect to?" "I just wondered. *I* feel like going right to sleep, and if you two don't, then we should put me in Molly's room...how long are you going to juggle her, Miles? She's been asleep for a couple of hours." "But she likes to sleep out where we are." "All children do. Put her down." "I'll be right back," Miles said, rising, and as Molly's soft cry of "'Night'" was heard by Keiko, she and Julian roused up enough to kiss Molly's face as Miles lowered the girl enough for it. Then he took the small comatose human off for bedding down. "Miles is worried about something," Keiko yawned again. "I know. I can't imagine what." "Me neither. Mm..." Keiko snuggled more deeply against him. "Though I don't think he liked the riloche et planktonnera." "He ate enough of it." "He was hungry. You'll have to learn to notice the difference, Julian." "I suppose." He kissed her head and ear, then worked his smiling way over her nose, through her giggles, to her lips. They kissed for a bit, listening to the soft harmonics of the a'Maira convention, until they heard Miles's even softer voice; "Can anyone join this party?" "Miles," Keiko was smiling as Julian lifted his head to smile too. He said "Hello, my love. Do join us." "Julian, he lets you ca--?" She was interrupted by another yawn, one that nearly broke her face, then seemed to pass out completely. Miles stared, alarmed. "Julian--?" "I'm sure she's all right. Probably some remnant from her feeling ill this morning. And she did say she was going to pass right out. Did you make the bed in Molly's room?" "When did that get to be *my* job?" "When she started falling asleep on *me* such that I can't get up to do it. Did you?" Miles hadn't, but it didn't take long, and Julian tucked her in next to Molly's bed in the womblike, low-ceilinged room. "Sleep well, my Kei." "She always seems to, when you put her down." Julian stepped out far enough for the door to close behind him and Miles and said "Keiko, or Molly?" "Either." Miles chuckled softly as they started for the front room. "You know, the last time I saw Keiko fall asleep that quick, she was pregnant." Both men stopped walking. Miles started to speak and stopped about three times. Julian's eyes were locked wide in horror, to outside observation on the laundry chute. Miles muttered "She *was* sick this morning..." "Is that what's been bothering you...?" "No, I--yes. I suppose it has, but the why's only just occurred to me now." "She's not," Julian said definitively, and Miles immediately responded. "No. I mean, yes, no. I mean, we both...we're *all* sterile reversible at the moment, right? I mean, Keiko and I are." "I know. So am I." "I knew that." "Of course you did." "That doesn't ever fail, does it? No, it doesn't. Does it?" "No. It doesn't." "Still...with the furniture and all...remember I told you the last time she--" "I'll get my tricorder." "And get it fast, man." Miles stood in the hall nervously as Julian darted into Keiko's room, out again with the tricorder, and into Molly's room. He was back out less than ten seconds later, leaning on Miles with a sigh of dead relief. "She's not." "Thank you, Danu." Miles collapsed against the wall. "What a fright..." Julian staggered back into Keiko's room, dropping his tricorder on the medkit, then practically falling on the bed. "My heart's still racing. Don't SAY things like that, Miles!" "I didn't do it a'purpose, y'know. I was just as scared as you. Worse." "NOT worse. I think I can say *that* with some assurance." After a moment, Miles added in disgust "And it blew the bloody mood out the window, too, didn't it." "I'm afraid so. And I didn't think *any*thing could--after the ah, the thing with the...after last night, I mean." "Me either. We might as well turn in, anyway. Got to be on site with us, where all the fun is, tomorrow, don't you?" "And I'm not looking forward to it." "You'll get used to the explosions." "Heavens. I certainly hope I won't have to." --- Sisko's face on the comm, dark and serene, slowly registered his disbelief through the widening of his eyes. Finally he blurted in an emaciated falsetto "You WHAT?" "I know it's...a bit difficult to believe..." Julian bit his lip, looking anywhere but at the screen. "How many people are hurt?" "Um, I am, as you see, but I'll be all right. No one else. And fortunately Keiko's had the foresight to keep a staffed trauma unit on site since we began conducting the tests to determine--" "How did it happen?" "Um...I...didn't quite notice that the warning light was on outside the gas chamber at the field lab...I was thinking of an experiment I'm running--" "And you opened the door." Sisko's eyes closed in frustration. "And a lot of light got in...there were so many samples...I *was* aware I was the only one in the building, I'd've been far more attentive if--" "Doctor Bashir, *what* am I going to do with you? Enter an official reprimand into your record for being a nitwit? I'm not sure regs allow that." "I don't know," Julian muttered miserably, staring at the desk, "but I'll wager I'm not going to like whatever it is you settle on." "How do you feel? I take it you're no longer in any sort of danger, or you'd still be at the hospital." "Physically--have you ever had a radiation burn, Commander? From a star or anything else?" "Nothing severe." "Take the worst you remember, multiply it by two or so and cover your entire body with it. In other words, I look worse than I feel. Except for feeling like a spectacular fool, that is." Sisko sighed in irritation. "You have a way of making a superior feel pretty *damn* vulnerable, lieutenant. I don't know whether to apply the burn salve and tuck you in bed myself or--" "Oh, honestly, Commander, I'm not your son." "For which fact I have recently begun to understand I should thank God. Besides, Jake knew better when he was three than to--where are Keiko and the Chief?" "Miles is out picking Molly up. Keiko is right here." "Let me speak with her. You're in no condition for what I feel like saying to you at the moment. Of all the addlebrained..." Sisko subsided into muttering behind his hands as Julian, privately agreeing with the Commander about his condition, looked over at Keiko. Keiko raised her head from the coffee table, where her brow had been reposing on her folded arms. She picked up the large flagon of ale sitting at her elbow and got laboriously to her feet as Julian vacated the desk chair; she came over to the comm screen and sat. "Hello, Commander," she said in a dispirited tone. "Has our friend the gumbo starter wrecked your second site as well, Mrs. O'Brien?" "Only the back of the one building," Keiko said, burped silently behind her hand, and continued "And like he said, he's the only one who was hurt." "Thank God for that, too." "I have. Several times. Gumbo also says that all he remembers is reaching for the latch, a shock, then cold, then he started stinging really bad, and then he passed out. Several people saw him stagger through the blown-out wall and fall over like a brick. His head and shoulder hit something hard when he went flying and it was enough to have knocked him out, even leaving the burns aside." Julian thought, 'Well, really, it could have been far worse, after all'. He considered reiterating this point, then decided to drop it. He was certainly as content to have missed the flaming out of the burnt-out nerve endings and to have succumbed to the knock on the head before the coming pain of the less-burnt areas could get a serious hold on him. "Do you want me to recall him before he blows up your apartment?" "I think he's grasped the concept of following instructions now, Commander. Being burned over eighty-five percent of his body got his attention. Though I think he's more worried about trashing yet another set of experiments than about himself." "Professor O'Brien, I don't mean to disillusion you, but we're talking about a man who ignored your husband's instructions in performing an act of extremely misguided samaritanism and was actually *killed*. If *that* didn't focus his attention..." "I'm assigning him an assistant. A large and perceptive assistant. Who will never be farther than two steps away should she be needed." "An excellent precaution. Is there anything I can do to speed things up? Send you any more help for a few days? I'd send you another doctor, but--" "I know you don't have one available, Commander, but thanks. If you would, let me extend Miles and the doctor's stay here for a week. That should cover at least part of the delay all this has caused, plus Julian's recuperation time." "The least I can do. I hope that assistant you mentioned has a short temper and an inclination toward overcaution." Keiko smiled faintly. "She does. Though there doesn't seem to be any such thing as too cautious where Julian is concerned." "An apparently telling point. When the Chief gets home, please inform him that I would prefer the doctor not spend much time unsupervised, particularly not in the kitchen, for the remainder of his stay." "I understand, and I'll tell him. Thanks for the extra time, Commander." "Of course. And if anything else should happen..." "I'll be sure to call you at once. I know you'll want to send word to his family and prepare something to say at his funeral that has more than one syllable in it. Because if it doesn't kill him, I will." Sisko nodded tiredly back to her as she bade him farewell and shut the comm off. She continued sitting where she was, staring at the blank screen, until Julian said, very softly, from a chair in the corner, "Would it help at all to say I'm sorry again?" Keiko slowly turned her head to look at him. His bandages covered the worst of the healing burns, but what was visible looked like hell, especially since he could bear the touch of very-little-to-no clothing at the moment and was dressed only in said bandages and a pair of undershorts, donned for the occasions of calling the commander and Molly's return home. He'd managed to keep about half his hair, and had evidently instinctively tried to protect his face from the flash; in a couple of days he could, she'd been told, get the new-grown follicles stimulated and not look so defoliated. Over most of the rest of him, the new skin was sleek and tender as melon flesh. There'd been precious little deep burning, even of his hands; the flash had been hot, but brief, and he'd been blown half out of the building and made it the rest of the way clear within a few seconds. Deliberately, her face blank, she got up. She approached to stand directly in front of him. She proceeded to stain the window hanging he was sitting in front of by flinging the contents of her ale flagon full in his face. He shrieked, but the pain was brief, and the bandages wouldn't absorb liquid from the outside. Dripping, he stared up at her, speechless. "No," she said very distinctly. "It would not help. Do you have any idea how I'd feel right now if you were dead? Burned to death in a building full of flaming gas? In an accident at *my* research site?" "Not very good," he admitted with quiet resignation. "That's right, Julian. Not very good at all." She turned and marched to the replicator in the kitchen to procure another ale. Calling after her, he expostulated "At least I didn't get *your arm* broken this time--" "You think I wouldn't rather have a simple broken--" "--and it's not as though I'm deliberately ignoring safety procedures," he protested as she folded back up in front of the coffee table, setting her tall flagon with a clunk thereon, "I've been unusually absentminded, I'll admit, but really, do I look like I'm enjoying this?" "You look like the main course at a lobster feed." He sighed, and reached up to relocate a tendril of hair that was dripping into his eye. "I walked directly into that. Look, Kei--" "Don't talk to me." Julian fell silent. After a minute, and a long guzzle of her beverage, she drummed her fingers on the table and growled "I know what I said a while back about whatever it is that you're covering for inside--whatever it is that makes you so driven and hard on yourself--but dammit, Julian, is this your prescription for whatever it is that's ailing you in there? 'Plenty of rest and get yourself killed a couple of times a year'?" He could only stare. Was that what she really thought? It certainly wasn't what *he* thought...no. It wasn't. But there might still be an ulterior subconscious motive..."I'm not dead, Kei. And as Miles observed, I'm practically indestructible." "Miles probably believes that, but the only way you'll convince *me* is to stop dying, you diatom-brain!" "Please. I have no plans in that area for quite some years yet." She sighed theatrically. "Oh, for..." she took another few swigs of ale. "Lord. How much of that are you going to drink?" "Enough so that I don't see you lying on the ground on fire every time I close my eyes! I can't decide if you're unbelievably lucky or unlucky--your eyes *'should* be ruined, according to the doctor who treated you. You should be in the hospital in a regeneration chamber for at *least* a week. How do you keep surviving these...these deaths?" He didn't know what to say to that, and sighed again, getting up--extremely carefully--and going to gingerly blot the ale off with the softest towel he could locate. Dropping the towel in the laundry chute, he could feel her eyes boring into his back. "I hope you didn't take what the Commander said seriously. About my being unsupervised, I mean. He's always popping off with such lines when he's frustrated." "Even if he hadn't said it, until Miles is here to take over, I'm not turning my back on you again." He rotated carefully in place to meet her eyes. "You haven't turned your back on me since I've met you, and I am *not* deliberately negligent of myself unless it's to save someone else. I've taken an oath to do no harm, you know; that includes myself." "Maybe you're just stupid, then." "Now, *that* is possible." No it's not, he reflected, but schooled his face to stillness. "Great. You're a flake. My husband and I are in love with a flake." The front door opened, admitting Miles and Molly; judging by the sound of it, Miles was preparing the child for the sight of her Uncle Julian. Keiko gestured to Julian to precede her down the hallway and they went back to the front room. As Miles set Molly down, the girl took in Julian's appearance, and her face immediately crumpled into tears. Keiko rushed to kneel next to the child while Julian changed his mind about the advisability of suicide and Miles glared at him, taking the development personally. "Molly..." Julian didn't try to get back into her line of sight, but he laid his hand on her back and added his efforts to Keiko's. "I'm going to...I'm fine. It doesn't even hurt. They took care of me at the hospital. In less than a week every last bur--I mean blotch will be gone, you'll see. I did a very silly thing; it was my own fault. For not listening closely enough to your mother. Always listen to your mother, Molly; she's a very wise woman." Molly sniffled, quieting, then turned her head on Keiko's shoulder to look at him again. She appraised him a moment, then said "It doesn't hurt?" "Not at all. Look." He slapped a puffy red arm and kept smiling, through sheer willpower blocking the curse that leaped up his throat and the tears trying to well into his eyes. Over his shoulder, he felt Miles wince. Molly reached out tentatively, and he moved his hand under hers. She lightly stroked the mottled skin. "Soft." "Yes. It'll feel like this for a day or so more." "Come on, honey, let's get you some cobbler and ice cream." Keiko lifted the girl up, muttering in a low, dangerous voice to her husband "Don't leave him alone. The Commander's orders." "I can just imagine." Left alone with the Chief, Julian sighed and sank down at the desk chair. "Your turn, Miles. I've had it from Commander Sisko, Keiko, and now Molly. The only one left besides you is maybe Garak, and he'd die before he'd say a word." "Oh," Miles said, in a curiously mild tone, "I'm not gonna say a word, either. If you want another lecture, call your mother. I haven't the heart for it, the way you look." Miles sank to the sofa, running a hand through his hair, and waved the holo on, asking for a recording of the other night's performance by the a'Maira. He leaned back and closed his eyes. "I'm told I owe you my thanks yet again." "I threw some sheeting on you. Anyone who was there might've done it." "I was told it was your spelunking vest, and then yourself." "Wasn't any sheeting around. What with all the dust, you'd about gone out by that time, anyway. "If this keeps up, I'm going to start feeling beholden." "No problem. You weren't dead yet. Just remember; I told you, die on me once more and you'll be staying dead if it's left to me to recover you." "Oh, I take that quite at face value." --- I'm going to have to take that blasted sedative, the doctor thought, flopping with timorous care on his pallet of soft flannel-like blankets in the front room, on the large rug by the coffee table. Keiko had decreed that they should stop stowing whoever was extra, if anyone was of a given evening, in Molly's room; she didn't want the child getting used to it and having to readjust to sleeping alone after the arrangement was no longer necessary. 'And if she woke up and saw me,' he thought, 'it'd scare her to death, poor mite.' He'd just decided to get up and take a sedative/painkiller shot when a shadow moved out of the hallway and Miles entered the room. The remaining moonlight must have picked up the glint of Julian's eyes, because Miles immediately said "Aren't you asleep *yet*?" "I'm a little uncomfortable, I'm afraid." "I can imagine. I once caught a sunburn back home that kept me up for a couple of nights. Regenerator at the beach cabin was powered out." "So you've come to visit me, then?" "It's getting to the point that I wake up twice a night to go check on Julian. Haven't done this since Molly was bottle feeding. This is really stupid, y'know. You shouldn't be sleeping alone." "I told you, I couldn't bear to lie in the same bed with someone else at the moment, and in any case my condition is now about as serious as a bad sunburn, as you say. All right, a *very* bad sunburn." "You should still be in the bedroom." "Keiko's still too angry. It'd give me fever dreams. I'm in straights enough as it is. Going to have to have that pain shot I turned down earlier." "I'll get your kit. Where is it, in the bedroom?" "Unless you've done something with it." Miles was back in a moment, scanning Julian in the dimness--the younger man was now clad only in bandages--for a patch of skin that wasn't swollen, reddened or scorch-blackened. "Where the hell do I give you this?" Julian turned his head. "Right carotid's got a free patch over it, I think." Miles couldn't find it, and Julian had to point; the hypo hissed. "There. Your antibiotic shot was in that, too." "Not time for another of those already. I hope I don't feel sick on top of everything else." Miles was quiet, and Julian eyed him and smiled. "No jab about how I'd deserve it if I did?" "Not necessary, really, at the moment." "Then you'd better kiss me, or I'll decide you don't love me any more." Miles gazed at him a brief moment, then said "Sure I won't hurt you?" "You *can't* hurt me. I thought you'd come to terms with that." Miles smiled back at him, then leaned down and kissed him...and continued kissing him...until Julian started moaning, whereupon Miles disengaged and pulled back at once. "That was *not* pain," Julian panted. "Even worse. You won't be up for any of *that* until we can take those bandages off without you fainting." "Oh, what's a few bandages...seriously, my mouth is one of very few parts of me you *can* touch *without* my fainting." "Nice try. I'm taking no chances with you, believe it." "Spoilsport. It was such a nice distraction from the pain..." "If I'm right, that painkiller should have kicked in by now anyway." "How can you tell?" "Easy. Your eyes turn black." "Really?" "Black as a Betazoid's." "Hm. That also happens when humans are aroused, though, you know." "I know. I've seen your eyes bigger than Night herself more than a few times. D'you think you can sleep now?" Julian closed his eyes a moment, and replied "I think so, yes. And there's no need to check me again tonight; I'll still be here in the morning." "If it's not me, it'll be Keiko. Take your pick." "I'll see you later." Miles kissed Julian again to forestall any more possible argument and got up to return to bed. He paused at the hall doorway and said "You are, verily, enough to make anyone insane; but I'll give you this. You're never boring." He vanished into the dark. Julian stared at the ceiling for a while. 'Maybe I *am* just a flake', he thought. --- Almost two days later he was sitting in the dirt, back in uniform if thoroughly treated with topical anaesthetic, listening to Miles say "Ten seconds." Julian sighed anxiously behind their personnel shield, scratching his head furiously. Miles slapped his hand, and incidentally the back of his head. "Stop that." "Ow!" "You're not supposed to scratch." "Newly regenerated hair always makes humans itch." "I'll give you an anaesthetic booster when we get home. Five seconds." Julian sighed again. "I hate this." "I'll be here." "And I appreciate it, but I still hate this." "Two seconds. Come here." Miles went down on one knee next to the seated Julian, wrapping him up protectively and covering his ears with his hands. "I'll be *so* glad when this part is--" A deafening blast shuddered the area, light and dust shooting by on both sides and overhead of the particular shield they were behind. Julian, his eyes squinched shut, his ears blocked and covered, still twitched violently. He didn't remember anything too graphically horrid about getting blown up himself, but he'd reacted very badly to the first explosive test he witnessed afterward and since then Miles had asked Keiko to reassign his watchdog until this part was through so he could give the doctor a bit of reassurance. "--over," he finished sourly, lifting his head as Miles let go of him. The Chief tapped his badge. "Enlelan? Anything?" "This explosion was at least twenty percent less powerful than the last one. We're on to something, all right. Should I increase the hynochtrinal concentration another fifty parts per million?" "Right, but keep the compound level constant for the next couple of tests. Time enough to increase it if we can get one complete negative." "Yes, Chief." Julian stood up and peered around the shield. "It didn't *feel* twenty percent less powerful." "Are you sure you didn't feel that fireball?" "Well, my memory is very nearly eidetic. I told you; shock, cold, some pain, and then I was unconscious until I woke up in the hospital. Remind me to thank the trauma team again." "Sorry I brought it up. We'll be out of here soon. We've only time today for two more tests before the light goes--" Keiko had wanted full, natural sunlight as a trigger at first, before they got on to various levels of moonlight and multitudes of types and levels of artificial, "--then you and Keiko and her people can run the results." "Right. I'm fine, really. Just tired. Regeneration is rather draining." "And you should bloody well know. Come back; we're about to pop the lid on the next sample." Julian came back behind the shield, thinking that the blast grounds were mostly floating in the air by this time every day and they were about to lose the light for that if no other reason. 'Barren as the Earth's moon out there,' he thought as he sat down and covered his head with both arms. "Five seconds...and..." Julian waited. And waited. Miles lifted a hand off the doctor's back to tap his badge. "Enlelan?" "Chief, complete negative! We've got our first chemical disarmer." "Dead sure on that?" "We're sure, Chief." "Great," Miles said, squeezing a wilting Julian, "that's *great*! Use our last setup for the double check." Less than a minute later, the success was verified. "Someone call Keiko. Time to halt for the day, anyway." He asided to Julian as the comm link ended "And just think. If you hadn't flash-fried yourself we wouldn't have that reconstructed data from the hospital and it could have taken another couple of weeks to get that result." "I hope Keiko remembers that." 'And I hope no one ever discovers how I fudged the data.' He purely detested doing that--it was against all scientific principles--and he usually found himself forced to think of it as correcting a slant. 'But then if I *will* keep getting myself in a state and putting myself in the position...' "I thought you said she apologized." "Not exactly. She let me know that she was over her temper, but I don't think she's especially sorry." "She told *me* she is." "I'm sure she'll get around to it. Thanks." Miles had given him a hand up and they started back to the main field lab building while Enlelan and the engineers working on this problem gathered data and materials to bring back for analysis. "Chief. You're staring at me again." "I don't think anyone will read anything into it at the moment. I'm glad you've the rest of your hair back. You looked like a scorched baby ostrich." Julian chuckled. "You're such a comfort." "No problem." --- After supper, over which they discussed the new findings and Keiko was so conciliatory Julian, not that he'd been expecting one, decided he could easily live without an apology, she decided to call the station and share the good news. While she was chatting with Kira, Miles went over Julian--who'd decided he could make it through supper--with the topical disinfector/anaesthetizer back in Keiko's room. "God almighty..." Julian muttered. "What?" "Just feels wonderful." "You look a sight better as well. Those grey places under the first few layers of skin aren't always going to be there, are they?" "No, but it will take longest for them to fade. They were the deepest burns, and healed more thoroughly and quickly in the hospital than the ones I brought out with me. The more healing is artificially hastened, the longer it takes the body to completely return things to normal." "But they don't hurt?" "No, they pull a bit, but that'll be done with soon, too." "Good." Clicking the device off and returning it to the medkit, Miles added "I'm out of patience." He grasped Julian's bare shoulder, rolled him over on his back and descended on him. "Oh--Miles--blast it. Molly. Close the door," Julian reminded him and Miles leaned out to wave the door shut, then resumed where he'd left off. In a couple of minutes, Julian had Miles's jumpsuit down as far as his waist and Miles had pulled his arms out of it, but Julian couldn't get him to break their lip-lock long enough to pull his turtleneck off, and he wasn't in a position of advantage. So he grabbed the shirt's hem and with a sudden jerk pulled it up over the Chief's shoulders, immobilizing his arms. "Hey!" Using this moment of shock to good purpose, Julian yanked the shirt's collar over Miles's head and then freed his arms from it. "There. Wasn't so bad, was it?" "Unscrupulous." Miles started working his way down Julian's neck. "And you're still overdressed. Don't make me get rough." Miles pulled back and stared at him, and they both broke up laughing. Their eyes flew wide as Keiko's voice said cheerily, then desperately, "Sounds like you two are having a *Molly* why don't we go out front and set up that holo you brought home from daycare--" Her voice cut off abruptly. "Oh *God*," Miles groaned, collapsing on Julian. The doctor patted him distractedly, trying to see over his shoulder to the door. "She'll have us both--" "Not this time, I don't think. She really should have checked." "We were laughing! We didn't sound like *this* from out there." "Plus she knew what we came back to do and she knows how I feel about your daughter seeing me naked. Only fair if she has to do a little fast talking. If it's any comfort, if she was carrying Molly, Molly wouldn't have been facing this way, and Keiko would have made sure she didn't until the door was closed again." "You've a point there." "Right. So get your blasted pants off, will you? I'm short on patience too." "Think I should lock the door?" "I hardly see where it matters now. And kick off those boots, I can't get anything over them. There. Oh. *Much* better..." Molly, it turned out, had seen everything. At the very least, Julian thought, he himself had been covered by Miles, but still...Keiko had not said anything to the girl about the scene--but reported that Molly had acquired an instant grin--the tone of voice she described it with made Julian suspect it was more of a smirk--and hadn't lost it for over an hour. --- Miles was asleep; due to the limited space, Keiko was lying on top of Julian, her arms folded across his chest with her chin resting on them. She was replying to his report of the fright he and Miles underwent concerning the behavior she'd exhibited that seemed to have only one explanation. They were both giggling softly. "You know, it's odd you should mention that, funny as it is. I'd had a late period, and I was a little confused." Julian's head came up. "Your menstrual cycle's off? Don't you get treatments, if you've got that tendency?" "Yes. I don't like the idea of having them stopped, but I do get yearly regulatory treatments. But one didn't show up on time, for the first time in years. I didn't think it was possible, but it hardly seemed enough to complain about. I wasn't having any other symptoms." "Not according to Miles. He said you evinced a positive plethora, for you, and I was forced to a bit of a panic myself. Until I scanned you, which put an end to that." Keiko chuckled. "All my treatments are up to date." "The delay must have been...psychological," Julian murmured. "I suppose. I wonder what'll be next. A big belly? Speaking of which, I'll be right back." She climbed over the somnolent Miles and headed for the door. Julian lay completely still a moment, then realized he had to get out and clear his head. Wrapped up with Miles and Kei like this, he simply couldn't think straight. He got up and dressed, and when Keiko returned he kissed her and said "I'm going for a walk. Won't be long, but go ahead and join Miles." "All right--Julian, are you okay?" "Just need some fresh air. Been having disquieting dreams." She made a face. "I can imagine. I'll see you in the morning, if I'm asleep when you get back." The moons were all down, not that that was giving him any trouble as he wended his way under the stars. He could see well enough for footing, and the river gleamed in sky-light from the city. The meadow he presently traversed was smooth, the grass unclumped. He stopped, sliding his hands into his pockets, and raised his eyes to find the Bajoran constellations he'd learned during a few minutes of his lunch break a day or two ago. Wheel. Birth Lady. Lawkeeper's Hood. D'jarra Ladder... 'Way too close, Bashir. This is no different than anything else, and really, why did you think that it was? Were you thinking at all? What I suspected.' Julian smirked. He lowered his eyes to the light off the river and took a few steps that way, found a convenient patch of gravel and crouched, gathering a handful of tiny stones. Then he stood and started flinging them into the water in a precise splash-pattern rendering of the geometric motif on Keiko's favorite quilt. 'What did I think that look on her face was about? Why did she clamp on to me like that not only in front of all the parents and providers, but specifically to be introduced to a pretty young woman I'd been chatting with? 'Why did she relax so much when she learned that Luma had lovers already--was the lover of a married couple? 'And why did Miles get so tense? 'Miles...you big painted Celt. You're the most vulnerable man I've ever known. You only know your feelings are there--you don't know what they mean, or why you have them, and you don't much care. That they're there is enough. Kei and I never meant to confuse you so badly. You trust us to take care of you...we just didn't see how something that felt so perfect to us could be wrong, and if I wasn't who I am...things might have been different. Or not. In any case, there you were, and we made you cry, and that *wasn't* what we meant to do. Your feelings were a perfect reason for what we wanted to do--but only with you, Miles love. Not without you.' He watched the final ripples shimmer away in the current. 'Paste gems. I can be so theatrical. I wonder where I got *that*.' He smirked again, and went to one knee to gather another handful of rocks. '*Why* didn't we realize it'd be damn near impossible for you and I to have it out of ourselves through immersion? We can't be together like that often enough. And we're never so sick of one another's simple company that an afternoon apart won't have us thinking of splendid ideas and hilarious stories we simply *must* remember to tell each other...Keiko, it was a good idea. We just didn't count on the blasted logistical problems. Dax, are you the only one who noticed all the transporter activity?' He rapid-fired his rocks into the water, forming for a brief instant the discernible outline of a tennis racket. 'I suppose it's too late for us to go back that far... 'Damn. Stop it. Go away and let me be...' He dug his nails into his palm, just for a second, then released them. When he did, his eyes were clear and dry, and they would stay that way. After all, this was no different than it had ever been...a little deeper. Stronger... 'Neither of them will ever be able to do it,' he thought absently, a conclusion he'd drawn a bit ago already. 'They think they love me. Put that another way; they're certain they love me, and they have no way in the world of knowing that they're wrong, because I purely cannot explain. Not as long as any of us live. Far, far *far* too dangerous. Besides, I'd rather they continued to believe as they do. I couldn't bear it if I found that they felt I didn't deserve to wear my uniform, practice medicine...be human with other humans. Happy in my ignorance as they are in theirs. We're not so different. I wish all of me believed that... 'But if all of me believed that, I'd tell them the truth. Paste gems and coronas, so pretentious. What would Keiko say if she knew I'd learned classical Japanese in her honor? "Really, Julian. A little over the top, don't you think?" Even if she knew the whole truth. 'I don't want to drive them away from me. I can't do that to them. And I've got to start paying attention to my surroundings and stop blowing things up and getting myself killed. Or there's going to be a scan done on me eventually that could be hard to explain...shut up, hindbrain, motives are irrelevant at this point. Although that might explain why I've been such a bloody blunderbuss ever since the accident on the Ypphat. I haven't been so clumsy for so long since...' he dropped the thought like a rock and returned to his earlier ruminations. 'There has to be a way to...let it all be all right again. There will be. It will happen.' He sighed. "It has to." 'If there were some way to make them think it was all their idea...*without* being an alienating bastard to them...' He thought for a long while. Then he closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. He sang the song in Gaelic, as he did for Molly and all the children he sang it for, but at those times, his mind usually didn't pay attention to the lyric's meaning. Father in heaven bless you, love; father in heaven care well for you. On my soul, on my deepest heart, and by my glory, All praise to you, love, and to God. Long is the daylight until my ease of sleep; Long be your night without sorrow. For the bliss that you gave to me, my beloved, All praise be to you, and to God. And I shall celebrate you, from sunrise to sunrise; I shall celebrate you, love, night to night. Father in heaven bless you; Father in heaven care well for you. The moon, the sun, and the wind I give you to now, and to God. Julian wondered where Siubhan had found that song, thinking that his old roommate had spoken better Gaelic than she ever realized, dated or not. "All done, Bashir?" he whispered. "Time you got to bed. Busy day tomorrow." He stuck his hands back in his pockets and started back toward the city lights. --- "Miles, would you come off with me for a bit?" Miles put his cup down. "Sure. Something on your mind?" "You know me too well." "No, it's that brow. Turns into a granite cliff when you've got anything bothering at you. And your eyes turn yellow." He stood up as Julian closed his eyes and shook his head, smiling. They strolled off toward the bank of the river, leaving Keiko and Molly setting up the picnic comestibles. Rather, Molly was doing it, and Keiko was trying to keep up and minimize any possible damage. "Miles...I thought I should mention a few things to you, and ask if you considered it wise that I mention them to Keiko as well." "What sort of things?" Julian paused, then essayed "You could say we get on well. All of us." "You could say a plasma stream is 'toasty'." Julian chuckled. "Just my point. You and Kei have never had any interest in a permanent arrangement with someone else, correct?" Miles was silent a moment, and Julian added quickly "You needn't worry about making me uncomfortable. I've known it since the beginning." "Yes, it's true, I'll admit it." Miles looked worried, and Julian knew why; he was afraid Julian was feeling hurt. "You've been worried that I won't take it well when our intimate liaisons are over, haven't you?" Miles sighed. "Yeah. So's Keiko." "Something puzzles me, Miles. If, considering you and Keiko are decided in your plan to keep your family between the two of you and your issue..." Julian didn't have to work too hard to feign a look of embarrassment. "It's difficult to know how to put this. You and I don't seem to be getting very tired of each other." "I'm not. If you're not, I guess we're not." "And Keiko...seems less than impatient with the arrangement as well." "Bloody. Say *that* again." "Perhaps it does bear repeating...in fact, she seems to be getting more used to the situation all the time." "Did catch that bit with the young shuttle pilot--Kylir, Kylir Luma, Taelan's mother. I've never seen Keiko get that look over anyone but me." "Did it bother you?" "Confused the hell out of me, more like." "And you've been feeling confused enough as it is, haven't you." They had stopped; the sun was behind them, and Miles stared down the length of the river, arms folded. "I don't...I love Keiko, and I want to be her only husband and have her as my only wife. And that's clear as glass to me. And I love you, and I never want to lose your friendship..." "...and...?" "Oh, you know the 'and'. And don't give me that look, or I'll be throwing you onto the grass right here. I may not be able to say it very well, but that feeling is clear as glass too. And there they both are, and I don't know what I'm supposed to do with them. You and Keiko are supposed to tell me that." "Miles...Keiko's a bit occupied with her own feelings at the moment." "Naturally, but...what exactly do you mean?" "Kei's a very well-balanced, self-aware woman who seldom has a feeling she can't explain and quantify. Not that she isn't emotional; she simply understands her emotions better than many of us." "Maybe left over from that fling with Counselor Troi." Julian smiled and continued. "What I meant is that I don't think you can look for Keiko to shepherd you to the places it's best for you to be in this instance. For the first time in what I suspect of being quite a while, I don't think Kei is aware of what's going on in this part of her mind--and I think that when she realizes it, she's going to be...rather shocked. I'm willing to bet that's why she hasn't realized it yet at all." Miles looked over at him. "Same reason as me, you mean? Two sets of desires that are completely at odds and yet seem completely natural?" Julian's eyes widened. "There, you see? You *can* do this, Miles, when you put your mind to it." "When I haven't got a choice, you mean. I think you're right about Keiko, looking back on things." "Does it make you jealous?" "You asked me that once already, and I still don't know. Maybe. If it does, it's not anything overwhelming..." Miles found a convenient rise of ground and sat, folding his hands between his knees. Julian had a seat next to him. They watched the deep currents, emerald green in this light, flow along the contours of the river bank. "No, I don't suppose I'm jealous. I'm *stunned*," Miles continued in a decidedly complaining tone. "I never would have expected...not only what she's feeling, and doing about it, but that she wouldn't see it at once as she did it." "Keiko's not used to conflicts of this nature; as long as she was only going along as a way to try to solve what we were looking at as a problem, she was clear-eyed and understanding. Now that she's having at least as much fun as we are..." "Really, though, Keiko's not a controlling woman." "Not of others--you, as far as you want her to control you, I suppose. But otherwise only of herself, and deep down, she knows she can't add up and summarily deal with what her feelings are now, and she's turning a blind eye." They were quiet again a bit, until Miles said "What now, then? Did you just want to tell me what you'd been thinking?" "I think..." 'Here we go, Bashir. Let's step carefully now.' "...or rather, have *you* thought...of reconsidering what you and Keiko decided? About your marriage. Just the two of you." 'Hope that sounded shy and sincere.' Miles was motionless a moment. Then he said very slowly "What...Julian...how do you mean? Exactly." "Perhaps you two were a bit hasty in that proclamation. It might be what you've been expecting, even wanting, both of you, since you were old enough to consider such things. But situations do change. People change." Julian stopped and waited. Miles was quiet so long Julian nearly pulled his nerve together to throw some more bait out, but finally the Chief said "Are you saying...you want to..." "I'm *only* saying that maybe you should think about it. After all, our present method would seem to indicate that...perhaps it's not so impossible an idea after all." "The three of us, you mean." "That's what I mean, yes. Keiko, instead of getting more frustrated, has seemed, over time, to be...relaxing quite nicely, and you...well, Miles, to put it bluntly, you're ravenous. Just before we left the station we were getting barely any sleep at all." The merciless tease in Julian wriggled with glee at the serious, deadpan tone of the last statement. 'If *that* doesn't get a rise...' "Also," the doctor continued, "as I said, I was rather wondering if you thought I should mention these things to Kei. I'm just afraid that if she's too shocked at the idea, she'll be even more resistant to understanding what's happening at her end of things." 'Actually I'm rather counting on that,' he thought, and continued "You've known her years longer and far more intimately than I have. I'll defer to your judgment." "Let me get this straight," Miles said, sounding a bit dazed. "You're asking me..." "I'm not asking anything except that you think about what I've said." He thought, 'Bless you, you idiot, I'm proposing! This is your cue to back off about a hundred kilometers and reconsider this whole arrangement. And I've still got Keiko to deal with, if I can't get you to do it. Come on...catch up with me...' "If this is going where I think it's going," Miles said, causing hope to leap in Julian's breast, "I think I'd better talk about it with Keiko." "Don't worry now about where it might or might not be going. But if you want to talk with Keiko about it, make sure not to extrapolate on what I've said--tell her I said just what I've said, all right?" "Of course. I wouldn't put words in your mouth." "I didn't think you would, love." 'The hell I didn't'. --- "JULIAN!" Julian hastily retucked his clothing at the sound of Kei's bellow and the accompanying crashing through the underbrush. Miles had certainly spent no time shillyshallying. He got himself together and started toward the commotion approaching him from the edge of the meadow, found Keiko losing a fight with a huge bush, helped extract her and took her shoulders. "What's wrong? Is someone hurt?" "Is it true?" Her eyes were like saucers. "Did you ask Miles if he thought we might marry you?" Julian feigned irritation, throwing his hands in the air. "Everyone jumps to such conclusions. All I said was that you two might want to think about your decision to keep your marriage monogamous, in light of information you did not have when you made that determination. That was *all*. I didn't try to lead his thinking, and I certainly didn't propose." "It sure *sounds* like you proposed." Trust Keiko to have no truck with intermediate steps. "Oh, Kei, really, look at this. Are either of you pleased at the prospect of touching me only in greeting?" "Um...no, not really." "Am I right in saying that this situation is getting more intense rather than less?" Keiko wandered off a few steps and hooked a hand over a tree branch level with her head, leaning on it. "Now that you...point it out...I guess you're right." "Well, then. I'd say it was time we at least considered--only considered!--that we may have to make a radical change in our strategy. What I suggested Miles turn over in his mind a bit, and mention to you, was only one idea. I'm sure there must be others." "Seven others. They were all awful, according to you and Miles." "They were. But the situation's evolved. There may be possibilities now that didn't exist then. Or, perhaps...I, and Miles, and you, may have to consider possibilities that we wouldn't have at that time." 'That should get quite a response', Julian thought with satisfaction, keeping a smirk off his face with some difficulty. She turned to face him. "I...Julian," she began, with what looked like great effort to control her own expression, and her voice, "I want you to know that I didn't...know this was...I love you too, but I didn't expect...this isn't what I was planning. I didn't want anyone hurt. I'd never hurt you. Neither would Miles." Realizing with a cold stab in the pit of his stomach that Kei was feeling something akin to what he'd been feeling himself last night, he quickly approached her and took her hands, saying "I know that. I came into this knowing it was going to end, remember? I've assured you repeatedly that you'll all have my love as long as I'm alive, whether we show it one way, or another. Don't worry about hurting me--you aren't going to refuse to see me, cut me completely loose, are you?" "Julian! We'd *never* do that, either of us!" "Then stop worrying about my getting hurt. As I keep telling Miles, you can't hurt me. Accept it and evaluate our situation on that basis, all right, my dear?" Keiko bit her lip, staring into space vaguely in the area of his chest, then looked up at him. "That doesn't mean...that you don't care for us like we do for you?" "My Kei. You know better. It means I feel lucky to have what I have with you, and I don't feel I have a right to anything beyond being treated as a beloved friend. I love you both." He gave her his best significant look, and said slowly, in the lower register of his voice, "I want anything you want. Both of you. Whatever you want." At the look in her deep eyes he hoped to God this worked; if it didn't, he'd never be able to forgive himself for putting her and Miles through this. But if it did, it would save them both a great deal of pain he'd have had to inflict otherwise--finding some way of driving them away from him, a ploy he'd used before. 'But not this time. Never with Miles and Kei.' 'Good thing I'm so bloody clever', his thoughts continued dourly as Keiko sighed and leaned against him. He put an arm over her and patted her; then they started back toward the meadow together. --- "Doctor? Doctor Bashir." Julian muzzily realized someone was gently shaking his shoulder. He opened his eyes and lifted his head to focus on the countenance of his watchdog--assistant, he reminded himself wryly--Amir Lupiza. She was peering at him in mild concern. "You ought to get some rest. Most of the scientific staff has gone, and the Chief has come to take Professor O'Brien home. You've both been here for two days, and tired people..." "...make mistakes," Julian concluded dryly. "Of course you're right, Amir." He unfolded himself from his lab station chair and rubbed his face. At least the time had been well spent; they now knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that with enough research and development the discovery could be made into a viable regeneration-aiding drug, and should someday provide Bajor with another precious commodity for trade. Much remained to be done, but Julian's specific contribution would not be necessary again for some time. He and Miles weren't due back at the station for several days, but there was no real reason they couldn't leave now if they wished. They didn't wish, of course. "Pried him away from that console, Amir? Good job. I'll take him over now," came Miles's voice, and Julian turned to see him at the door, a yawning Keiko held against him in one arm. Julian could tell that the other arm had his own name on it and Miles was restraining the impulse. The Chief had been sleeping regular hours the past two days, and was far more coherent than any of the science staff. "We'll be off for a bit of rest for these two." "Good night, Chief. We'll see you day after tomorrow." Miles dumped them in Keiko's car and got into the pilot's seat. "Pleased with how it's going at your end?" He asked Julian, who had been transformed into a crash pad for the semiconscious Keiko. "More than pleased. My part of the work is through. Oh, they could certainly still use my help, but they'll get by fine without it now, and when they do need the help of a doctor again they likely won't need a Starfleet surgeon. Even Keiko is in for a bit of a break--there'll be a lengthy period of standard tests and experiments that she'll only have to oversee from a distance, read and sign the reports, that sort of thing." "Engineering teams are progressing right along as well. They're a bit sorry to lose me--same reason they're sorry to lose you, I imagine, training and experience--but I'd have to call the whole business a complete success. Albeit with a few setbacks." "Would these setbacks have anything to do with photon-generated explosions?" "Now, now. Did I say that?" Julian smiled out the window, then yawned fit to rival Keiko's face-cracker. At the apartment, Miles drug them up the stairs and conducted them to the bedroom, then commenced putting together the spare bed in the floor next to them. Eyes closed, Keiko got up and threaded her way accurately through this activity to reach the bathroom. Julian plopped over on his back on the bed with a sigh. They listened as she started the shower, heard a muffled bonk as of a skull contacting a shower door and a soft curse, and Miles half-smiled. "Why don't you go on with her, Julian. You could stand a shower, too, and she could use some help, sounds like." "Mm. I'd rather been planning to sleep in my own filth, but unless I take the floor--" "You and Keiko're taking the bed. You need sleep a lot worse than I do. And no, she won't much like sleeping with a smelly doctor and a bump on her head both." Julian bestirred himself, held himself up against the wall while Miles helped him get his uniform off--'who designed this blasted footgear, anyway,' he wondered, clinging to the doorframe as his second boot was wrenched off--and waved the bathroom door open. Letting it close, he rapped on the shower door. "Mind a bit of company?" "More the merrier. But don't be surprised if I slip and both our tailbones get broken." "Actually," he informed her as he sidled in next to her and shut the door, finding her shoulders in the wet dimness to help get them situated, "Miles requested that I come along to prevent just such an occurrence, and to save you the experience of sleeping with my unlaundered person." "He's so thoughtful. Wash my hair, would you? I don't have the energy." "My pleasure." As he was stroking her hair back from her upturned face, rinsing the slick mass plastered to her shoulders by the spray bathing her head, the rinse turned into a light neck massage, then a heavier one, then he thought what the hell and just washed the rest of her, slowly and with a great deal of mutual satisfaction. 'Sometimes I wish she *would* hire me,' he thought, lost in appreciation. She laid her hands on his shoulders, and he stood full up again, and she kissed him, pressing his erection firmly between their water-slick bodies, and whispered "That was wonderful. Your turn, now." As she appropriated the sponge, he couldn't think of a good reason to object. And probably would have ignored it if one had occurred to him. Besides, she started with a scalp massage for the benefit of his newly regenerated follicles and regrown hair, and what with the infernal itching he'd been enduring lately he thought he'd died and gone to wherever people like him went when the gods were pleased with them. She worked her way down, with the same dreamy, half-sleeping slowness and thoroughness he'd demonstrated with her. Finally he couldn't take it and raised her to her feet, then bent slightly and lifted her in his arms. She raised her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, and murmured "Are you sure you've got the energy for this position?" "*Very* sure," he moaned, and they began kissing; her head fell back for a moment as she groaned when he slid into her, but she raised it again, clinging to him with sudden fierce energy and their mouths met again as they moved together. They tried to be quiet. They really did. That was one reason they kept kissing, though it posed a minor encumbrance under the circumstances. But when Keiko came, she gave an unmistakable cry and sank her nails in Julian's back, which pushed him over the edge and made him stagger, inhale a jet of water and collapse to the shower floor with a good deal of noise, fortunately ending up with Keiko still in his lap. She pounded his back vigorously until he stopped coughing water. They remained wrapped close, panting, as the water swirled down and around them in the warmth and soft light. Finally she said "Miles knew *exactly* what he was doing, didn't he?" "But he'll still have some smart remark or other to make, I shouldn't wonder." "Maybe. But if we fall asleep in here, we'll never know." They managed to get up and have a final rinse, then stumble out and, together and severally, get themselves dry. The cool hallway air actually brought them both to a brief shocked halt, Julian bumping Keiko's shoulder; she steadied him and they made it through the bedroom door, which swished shut behind them. The lights were down. There was no moonlight, and Keiko said uncertainly "Miles? If we don't turn the lights up, will we step on you?" "Turn them up," came an amused brogue from the darkness. "I've got to see this." Keiko waved the lights up slightly to reveal a quilt-covered Miles wearing only an expression that hinted he was holding his lips shut over a mouthful of feathers. "Wait, don't tell me," Julian sighed, sinking to the floor next to the smirking Chief. "You thought we were drowning." "Oh, my, no. There were several points I thought you might be remodeling, though." His hissing chuckle started up, and Keiko suddenly flipped the quilts off him and shoved him toward the bed. "Get up there, Miles Edward O'Brien. We'll just have to be cozy. I'm taking the middle, though." "You're both damp." "Stop complaining and climb in." When they were reasonably arranged and Julian had waved the lights back down, he whispered over Keiko's drowsing head "So. Now you know for certain?" "I'm certain. I'm not jealous. That isn't why...why I..." he sighed in confusion and Julian jumped in. "*Definitely* you're not jealous of Kei and I, by the looks of it." Miles swallowed a laugh. "Glad it's so obvious." --- The sun was well up when Julian woke; he was, unsurprisingly, alone with Keiko. Outside the bedroom door, he could hear Miles's and Molly's voices and some sort of breakfast-related activity taking place. He slid out from under the covers, careful of Kei, and found some shorts and a light shirt to put on before leaving the bedroom. In the kitchen, he stopped short. "Delvan fluff pastries!" "Hurry up and eat before Keiko wakes up. If she finds out I'm feeding you two these things I'm for it. Have a raktajino." Miles thrust a steaming mug into Julian's hand as the doctor had a seat. Molly was still in her sleeper, but seemed to have been awake for some time, judging by the animated conversation she included him in as soon as he'd picked up a pastry. The topic of conversation seemed centered around what Molly was deciding to do today with everybody home from work. Julian had a thought. "Molly, sir, I've been wondering; is there a swimming area in the river near here?" "Uh-huh! And it has a rock wading pool and sand to make castles and und'water nets to keep the fish out and if you lie on your back you can just float along for a kil'meter almost! It has trees and the water's really clear 'cause not much grows in it around here but some little tiny plants and it's fun. You have to take a pill before you go in case you swallow any water, but Mommy took me once and it was fun anyway." "Well, then, how would you like to spend a few hours there this morning with your uncle Julian? We can let Mommy and Daddy have a little time alone, what say?" "Can I Daddy? Can we go? I wanna go swim with Jh'lian!" "You've shanghaied my child again." "Oh, be generous. I see her even less than you do." "I know what you're doing, too." "That's only part of it. You know how much I enjoy Molly." "Can I *go*?" Molly insisted. Miles grinned, shaking his head in defeat. "Yes, you can go. Let me get your things together. Julian, Bajorans swim naked a fair amount of the time, but I assume--" "You assume correctly. I'll have to come up with some trunks." "And don't forget waterproof sunscreen. You shouldn't be so exposed under a sun with--" "Damn all, stop your nagging, man. If I'm in condition to guard the life of a child in deep water, I'm in condition to be there myself." "You've a point." "How long should we be out?" Miles paused a few moments, then said "Give us a few hours, as you said." "No problem. She'll keep me busy at least that long." "You two finish eating," Miles said, "I'll go unearth Molly's swim gear." It turned out Molly was right; one could float an amazing distance with very little effort on the gentle current of this section of the river. Holding Molly's hand, he drifted with her, listening to the distant splashing of other visitors to the swimming beach and the gentle hum of the current in his ears, eyes closed, the sun making patterns of red and gold in his vision. Molly spurbled. Julian was upright and open-eyed in an instant, but Molly was already lowering her body in the water herself, paddling in place. "I think I went to sleep," she said, and snorted water again. "Perhaps we should take a rest, then. Here, roll on--I'll take us to the beach." She rolled up over onto his front cooperatively, and he commenced kicking them back toward shore, but she said "I wanna go to the hot rocks." "Oh. Very well." Near the artificial rock-bordered wading pool was a slant of broad, flat stones that soaked up the sun's heat. Molly seemed to like to lie on them until she got too warm, then go back in the water, then splash waist-high through the pool looking for interesting rocks, then back to the sunning stones...eventually she would want to go to the beach and build unidentifiable lumps of sand art, then maybe over to the climbing trees, then back to the rocks...Julian altered their course slightly, taking them to the sunning stones. They had clambered out thereon and collapsed, Molly on her back and Julian on his face, when the sun at the edge of Julian's vision was obscured and Molly said brightly "Hi! I fell asleep so we came back here." Julian went up on one elbow; Miles and Kei were standing between him and the sun, and he added "She means in the water. We were backfloating. Before you ask, yes, I was holding on to her." "Oh, we know that," Keiko dismissed the assurance with a wave, sitting next to Molly and saying "Your hair's going to dry like that, sweetie, let me straighten it up a little." "Come to join us?" Julian asked Miles. "Are we dressed for it? We thought you'd had enough sun for one day. Do you know how long you've been gone?" "Um...a couple of hours?" "Try five." "I see. No wonder Molly fell asleep." "We came to pick you up and save you the ride in a shuttle bus." "Considerate of you. And no ulterior motives about making certain I hadn't blown up your child. How perspicacious." "Hush or I'll dunk you. Keiko and I want to go out this evening to a place called Terra Two--got a diverse Earth menu. And we have to get you and Molly home and cleaned up before." "Making an early evening of it?" "For Molly's sake. Also, to coin a phrase, it's later than you think. Past midafternoon. Come on, y'pile of kindling." He held his hand out to Julian, who was grateful for the help; he was a bit tired, and the rock wasn't easy to get up off of without bruising knees, elbows and whatnot if one was dressed only in a swimsuit and assorted dark blotches. "That was the best potatoes au gratin I've had in years." "Tasted a bit off to me, Chief." "How long's it been since you've eaten real potatoes?" "I'm not sure I ever have, now that you mention it." "Then your palate's probably been ruined for them. Real cheese, too." Keiko, hanging up her own wrap and divesting Molly of hers, went slightly wide-eyed. "Real, like, from cows?" "Tasted like it. Besides, they promise all-natural at that place; anything replicated is labeled so." Keiko made a face. "I'd've turned down that bite of them if I knew that." "It won't kill you." "No, I'll just wonder all night how well the milk was sterilized. Come on, Molly, time for bath--" "*Had* a bath!" Miles chuckled. "The river doesn't count, sweetie. Here, let me--" "I Want Jh'lian!" Keiko rolled her eyes. "Of *course* you do. If you wouldn't mind, Julian..." "Not at all," Julian sparkled at her. 'Thank you, Molly, you're helping the cause nicely.' "Bath detail, Miss Molly, sir. Let's hop to." Julian paused to discard his clothes, in favor of the swim trunks he'd been wearing earlier, before starting the bath and assisting Molly in the diurnal ablutions. He always wound up sopping when he did this. Especially, he thought as he frantically defended himself, tonight, owing to the water fights they'd had every fifteen minutes on the river that afternoon. "Sir! Really, this is--" he broke off and spat suds out of his mouth onto the floor, "--conduct *most* unbecoming an officer. Bleahg." He wiped his face with both hands. "So what." She slapped both arms into the water palms down, soaking the entire area, and Julian started laughing; he couldn't help it. "Come along then, you vicious creature," he chuckled into her shoulder as he carried her to her room. "Let me just get your sleeper on and the superiors in here for inspection before a song, right, sir? Good." As he headed back along the hallway, he heard scraps of conversation that made him slow his pace. Keiko: "...but have you been listening to them? He's so good with her. This almost seems..." Miles: "Aye. But he'll still see her, he'll still be close to us. And how she demands him whenever she sees him...it might be best for her, too, doing this before things go any farther." Keiko: "Aren't you afraid he'll be hurt? Though he keeps telling us he can't be." Miles: "A'course I am, but I don't think he will be, now. Maybe while he was still in a tizzy over that revelation he had in Telnori's office, but I think he's accepted whatever it is he needed to accept, and...I'm to where *I* think I can handle things. We do love him. We just have to make sure he knows that." Keiko: "Miles...if he hadn't said what he said to you...do you think we might have, eventually?" Miles: "Asked him, you mean?" (A pause.) "Yeah. I think we likely would've. And we'd not have felt right about it for long. It's a mercy he pointed up what was happening before that." Julian sagged in relief, catching himself on the closet doorframe and making the slightly-bent door screech open. He almost didn't care enough to cover, so profound were his thanks that his gamble had paid off. He snatched a couple of towels and continued to the front room, saying brightly "It's inspection time, you two. I'm going to try to divide the bathroom from the waters. Let me know when she wants her song." Both of them had started on hearing his voice, and now both nodded, Miles saying "Right," and they got up and hurried down the hall to Molly's room, looking like repentant and justly furtive felons. Julian swabbed out the bathroom, trying to prepare himself for the acting stint he had coming up. It would be difficult for more reasons than the obvious; he did feel sad that their "intimate liaisons", as he'd phrased it to Miles, were coming to a close. He didn't feel he could ever get enough of either of them, but he also knew that he had been prepared, most of his life, never to get as close to anyone as he still would be to them, even now. Plus the memories would always be there, perfect and undegraded. He'd never thought there would be such memories--not of closeness like this. He'd never dared such a soul-baring situation before, and didn't know if he ever could again. But there was them to think of, after all. He still had the things that had always been the lifeblood of his existence, and they'd been enough before; medicine, primarily, in all the many forms he'd invested himself in it, and other things. He allowed himself a moment of melancholia, but he'd been preparing himself for this ever since he conceived the plan. He was soon industriously cleaning up the sudsy soak over all the horizontal, and a couple of vertical, surfaces in the bathroom. "Julian! Sweetie wants her song." "Coming." He wrung the towels out in the tub/shower and tossed them into the laundry chute, then took a second to pull on some dry shorts and an undershirt before sidling past Miles and Keiko in Molly's room and taking the spot next to her bed. "You want the same song, Miss Molly sir?" "A Hare Nam," Molly nodded, rubbing her face. He sensed Keiko and Miles fading out of the room slowly as he sang the song, again twice, which was what she had come to expect, in the soft Gaelic dentals and muted consonants. He lightly kissed her cheek, and waved the low gold nightlights on as he slipped silently into the hall. --- That night he was awakened at some indeterminate dark hour by being clasped in a pair of fairly brawny arms and lifted up sitting. "Mm...Miles?" "Keiko and I were talking, and...we're not trying to play with you, Julian..." "Play with me?" He squeezed Miles back as though out of reflex, then said "Oh. Are we supposed to be quite this affectionate?" "Um...Keiko thought that there was really no reason to start being so standoffish right away, and I thought she was most likely right." Julian's forehead thunked into Miles's shoulder. "After everything we talked about this evening? That...let's see, the condensed version...you both need to stop it now before it goes any farther and we *do* make things official, which, because of both your convictions, is bound to end badly for us all?" "Not...well...we still believe that, yes." "And I understand and respect your choice. So why am I in your lap?" Julian chuckled to let Miles know there was no anger in the question. "We thought perhaps...a less abrupt approach..." "You mean..." Julian smiled slowly in the dimness. "Wean ourselves off of each other?" "Something like that. Also, Keiko was going to be sending a few of her people back to the station with us to organize the data in the infirmary, biolabs and Starfleet engineering section, and to file the reports and make the presentations to headquarters. She's decided she'll be coming along herself and stay for a few days to make sure things go smoothly." "Which things?" Another smirk. "All of 'em, y'scrawny git. Get that look off your face." Julian slid his arms up around Miles's neck. "And I assume I'll be working closely with you and Keiko for the time she's at the station. Closely enough to warrant my sleeping in your spare room." "That was the impression I got. She seems to think there'll be a few late nights put in, all right." "Starting tonight?" "If you're up for it." "I thought you'd never...oh, bother it." He gave Miles a piledriver kiss, until they were in danger of losing their balance, then Julian pulled back and said "We always do fall off sofas, you know..." "I know. Besides, Keiko's waiting." "Is there a reason she didn't come with you?" "She wasn't sure how you'd take our idea to let all of us down easy instead of quitting cold turkey. She was afraid it might make you angry, feel as if you were..." "...having my chain yanked?" "Yeah, like that." "Let's go reassure her that I'm not at all put out by the idea." Two hours and a bit later, Julian was contemplating growing roots into the floor beneath the quilts and never moving again. "I may never move again," Keiko sighed. "Except to stretch occasionally." "My thinking exactly. Is your back holding out, Miles?" "My back hasn't been this relaxed in a year." He kissed Julian's forehead, and Julian contentedly rubbed his face against Miles's shoulder. Keiko stirred slightly. "We forgot the towels again." "Use the quilts. We'll have to put them back in the laundry anyway," Miles suggested. "I'm going to need warm water, and I know for a fact that you two do." She stirred slightly again, then sighed and sat up, laying Julian's arm gently aside. "I'll be right back." "Here, you needn't go," Miles started to say, "I'll--" "You have Julian on top of you. All I have to fight is gravity." She tottered to her feet and left the bedroom, walking very carefully. "Think it'll be a difficult transition?" Miles wondered quietly. "Going back to being like we were?" "Like...brothers, aye, that." Julian pondered a few seconds, then said "It helps that it's going to be a transition, not a truncation. But I'm not sure...I've never had a brother. I'm an only child." "Well," Miles whispered, "you'll have one now." "You mean 'soon,'" Keiko said, re-entering and dropping a warm wet towel on Julian's back. "Not to mention a sister, even though she'll be away a lot of the time. And God knows you already have a confirmed niece. Just ask her." Julian smiled, telling the pressure in his throat to go away and bother someone else. It wasn't going to help the generally-held belief--true though it might be--that he was all right with this if he burst into tears or some such ridiculous thing. He disengaged from Miles and sat up, mopping him caressingly with the towel. --- They strolled into Quark's to various greetings from patrons and employees--and a wave from Morn, who hovered somewhere between the two. As they were sidling to the bar, preparing to order, Julian felt his shoulders grabbed from behind and he was spun in place. Miles and Keiko, on either side of him, turned to look, and Miles grinned. "Leeta! Hello," Julian said, but the Bajoran was saying anxiously "You're all right? You're all right! Oh, your skin..." "It was a lot worse a week ago," Keiko supplied reassuringly, "he's almost completely healed." Leeta seemed to have finished her examination, and hugged the stuffings out of Julian, who comfortably hugged back while Miles smirked in a told-you-so fashion. "How did you know anything had happened?" Julian wondered as Leeta released him far enough to meet his eyes. "The Commander told Lieutenant Dax." "I'm really going to have to have a word with Jadzia," Julian sighed, lips twitching in annoyance. "Or with the Commander." "You really think I wouldn't have found out without Benjamin to tell me?" Jadzia had taken her winnings and dealt out of the Tongo game wherein she'd been fleecing several suckers. She exchanged a one-armed hug with Keiko. "It's good to see you. And congratulations! I'm really looking forward to that data. My lab's all shined up and waiting. Did you get specimens and researched samples back here without Julian blowing them up?" While Julian rolled his eyes, Keiko snickered and said "They're in the infirmary at the moment." Dax frowned and took a swallow of her black hole. "Then he can still get to them. That might be dangerous. I've got a great stasis field chamber in my lab, and he'd never be able to reach--" Julian interrupted "Jadzia. Please. Do you think I couldn't get through one of your encryptions?" "Can't say for sure," she said, her mouth curving up in a puckish smile, "but I got through yours." "You *what*? Why break into my locked copy?" "Because we had an emergency shutdown of all nonessential systems. Turned out to be a false alarm--Chief, it would never have happened if you'd been here--but when power came back up..." "I encrypted the current-case backup banks," Julian sighed, "and no one..." "...could figure out where anything was in the current-case files. The medical staff were at their wits end, so I took pity on them and broke in and reordered everything in a standard system." Julian reflected that he really had to stop underestimating Jadzia's abilities. She might not have a few of the advantages he did--which, he realized, he rarely thought of as advantages; he'd have to find some anonymous way to thank her for that turn of thought--but she was a formidable technical mind nonetheless. Leeta, he realized, had asked him a question, and he refocused his eyes on her, but Miles and Keiko asking for, respectively, ale and Bajoran spring wine made him realize what it must have been. "Pale sherry. Thank you, Leeta." "No problem. There're a lot of customers tonight, but I think I can make a few stops now and then to hear how everything went." "Oh, sure," Miles nodded, and Keiko grinned "Of course, Leeta." As the Bajoran woman walked, with her typical energy, away to procure their drinks, all four of the others admiring the view as she mounted the steps to the other end of the bar (Julian briefly wondering how long this licentious mood of Keiko's would last), the doctor felt a hand on his shoulder and turned again, to be confronted this time by the to-him-at-the-moment severe countenance of Commander Sisko. "Doctor," Sisko said. "I *am* glad to see you looking yourself again." "Thank you. Really, it wasn't that serious. I was in no real danger, what with Keiko having the sense to--" "Shut up, Julian." "Thank you, Chief," Sisko nodded with one of his ever-so-slight smiles. "And Doctor, I've finally decided what I'm going to do with you." Julian froze. So did everyone else, except Dax, who just slurped her drink, grinned and waited. "I think you're overdue for some leave," Sisko pronounced stentorily. "As soon as you've finished helping Professor O'Brien and your staffs with the new data and presentations to the Bajoran Commerce and Resources Commission and to Admiral Piper at headquarters, you'll take some R and R. Perhaps your recent absentmindedness is due to fatigue." "Tired people make mistakes," Miles volunteered, and Julian managed to grind the heel of his boot into Miles's toe without anyone noticing, though the Chief suddenly experienced a coughing spell; he waved away looks of concern as Leeta returned with their drinks. "Commander!" Leeta smiled. "How nice. Can I get you anything?" "Thank you, I'm just stopping by to speak with the doctor," he demurred. Leeta nodded, with a brilliant smile at them all, though mostly at Julian, and departed, heading for the Dabo tables. Empala looked up at her approach and ceded the wheel to her, apparently, judging by the way she took her shoes off as soon as she rounded the corner past the bar, heading for a break. "And by the way, you three," Sisko continued, "I apologize for not meeting you at the lock, but the Major and I are negotiating with the Provisional Government concerning immediate applications of the new commodity you've provided." "It's a little soon for that, Commander," Keiko cautioned, her brow knitting. Sisko nodded. "I know. That's what I've been trying to tell them. Kira has just about convinced the subcommittee assigned to this project that it's too soon to risk cultivating the lichen, as dangerous as it may potentially be--since they assumed, fairly logically, that the most cost-effective place to do so would be in caves where it already exists." "I'll second the potential danger," Julian muttered, sipping his sherry. "Many of those caves *are* volcanic," Keiko nodded, "besides the ones Julian destr--" "Keiko! How many times must I apologize?" "Don't be so sensitive, Julian, she was just making an observation," Jadzia admonished him. "So, Keiko, did you bring Molly back with you?" "She's with Jake," Sisko supplied. "Whose idea was that?" Jadzia wondered, tipping a smile to Sisko. "Jake's," Keiko said. "He was there to meet us--the Commander asked him to convey apologies--and he offered to watch Molly when we were talking about going out to relax for a while. Oh, Major, hello." "Chief O'Brien, Professor." Kira ran a hand through her short hair, which sprang immediately back into place, and continued "Congratulations, good job, you and the doctor. Good to see you up and around," she added to Julian, then turned toward the bar and barked "QUARK!" Everybody twitched and/or jumped except Dax, who grinned again. The summoned individual appeared at high speed from the back of the bar. "Ah, who else could produce such dulcet tones. Major, what can I get you?" "Spring wine. Double order." "Not going well?" Sisko wondered, eyebrows lifting. Kira growled and climbed onto a barstool. "We've declared a recess of sorts. I think we all need to reorder and resize our...well, the word I'd use is 'demands', but..." "Constable! Good to see you," Miles said. "And good to see you, Chief. If I have to deal with one more misdirected complaint involving malfunctioning systems, I'm going to resign. Congratulations on your find, Mrs. O'Brien, and your work." "What brings you by?" Kira asked, managing a smile and taking a swig of her drink. "I wished to commend the O'Briens and the doctor, of course...and I thought, since Doctor Bashir *is* present, that it might be wise to ascertain the general state of this establishment now, prior to any...untoward alterations that might cause criminal charges to be pressed." Julian let his head fall on his arm on the bar. "Is anyone left? The entire infirmary personnel roster popping round to offer a comment? Doctor Andelghi wouldn't miss it for the world. Neither would nurse Akula." "Stop feeling sorry for yourself," Jadzia said, rubbing his shoulder. "You did a wonderful job, despite...everything. And I'd bet your attention to detail will be focused to the angstrom for quite a while." Julian swallowed sherry, thinking of ordering something considerably stronger next. Chatter continued amiably around him while he devoted his attention to his glass and the powerful grace in Leeta's well-muscled form as she laughed with the customers and, with fluid theatrical gestures, spun the Dabo wheel. "Quark. Let me use the replicator--I've a toddy program that requires my voice clearance. Got a bit of something extra in." Quark seemed to consider a moment. "Well...ordinarily, as you know, I don't permit customers to operate the replicators, but this *is* something of a triumphal occasion for you, doctor," he acceded graciously. As Julian nodded sour thanks and rounded the end of the bar, Quark finished "Of course, the surcharge for special orders--any number!--is twenty percent of the total bill. But we *have* been having a few minor problems with that particular replicator, so the charge will only apply if you procure your desired beverage." "Gouging, conniving..." Julian muttered, but Quark was already occupied serving a pair of Vulcans, who seemed to be wearing some sort of exercise gear. 'Altair water all around,' Julian thought vaguely, then said "Computer. Bashir Banellian toddy program one." The tall ceramic mug shimmered into existence, steam rising reassuringly out of it. He picked it up and took a sip. 'Mm, not even too hot this time.' He turned to start back down to the others. As he reached the main floor of the bar area, something tickled just at the edge of his hearing range; his brow furrowed, and he set the mug down, looking around, but Quark and the other Ferengi waiter behind the bar were already staring at the replicator. So were the two Vulcans. Quark, with widened eyes, asked quaveringly "Ah...Doctor...that drink doesn't by any chance contain vegetable esters from the Banell world...?" "I suppose it might, it's a Banellian drink, but--" Quark was already approaching the replicator--which was now whining more audibly to the Ferengi, the Vulcans and Julian--mumbling something, and Julian began "Look, if there were a problem with a specific substance, you should have--" Rom suddenly came around the opposite corner behind the bar and grabbed Quark. "Brother! Get down--EVERYBODY get DOOOOOWWWWN--" The O'Briens dove like porpoises. The Major and the Commander, startled, observed the O'Briens and joined them below the bar. Odo's eyes narrowed--literally-- but he remained standing, arms folded, watching. Jadzia had started toward the replicator in question, but Quark and Rom came stampeding past, each grabbing one of her arms as she protested "I fixed that programming component once already--!" Julian, dumbstruck, could only stand there while Rom bellowed his warning, and Leeta and the other employees were rushing everyone back and up to the second tier toward the gaming tables. So he saw the flash a fraction of a second before the malfunctioning programming circuit--still powered, since no one had had time to shut it down--blew, in a discharge of white with sizzling multicolored sparks. By the time any bits of electronic debris or power charges could reach him, he'd just made it under the bar. Silence. As everyone either relaxed from their position outside of the explosion's range or emerged from cover within it, there was a brief quiet--which was broken by Keiko's warm alto voice, raised to a volume at which few had ever heard it. "Ladies and gentlemen! To thank for this evening's entertainment, I give you Doctor Detonator, Physician of Fireworks, Surgical Master of Pyrodisaster--Julian "Boom-boom" Bashir!" As the chuckles swelled toward an entire bar's worth of full-throated laughter, Julian turned his scanner-beam gaze on Keiko, who was just standing up from her sweeping, Julian-indicating bow. As her eyes focused on him, her grin faltered, and Miles said "Me darlin', if you start now, you'll have a couple lengths on him--" She didn't need any more encouragement. She shot for the stairs that led to the upper level through a clear corridor of clientele, the right wall of which served to block Julian's path for a crucial few seconds. That much lead was all she got, though. Julian started taking the stairs two at a time, and Keiko was forced to put on a burst of speed she wouldn't have thought she could muster. Miles chortled. "He'll not catch her. Scared as scat runs faster than mad as hell." Examining her wine for fragments of replicator console, Kira picked a couple of floating objects out of the glass, tossed tham onto the bar, and raised the glass to her mouth just after saying threateningly "If Quark starts calling for bets--" "Right here, ladies and gentlemen! Who will be victorious? The Speeding sprite or--" Miles supplied "Daddy longlegs." "--or Daddy longlegs?" Quark shouted on cue. "The house offers five to one!" "That's a little steep, isn't it?" Jadzia wondered from her position in front of the blown out-replicator, passing tools and observations back and forth with Rom. "Not this time," Quark mused. "The doctor looks serious." By this time, predator and prey were making considerable noise crashing through one of the upper levels, and Miles shouted, after another casual swallow of ale, "Julian, you bruise my wife and I'll hold you responsible for getting me another! That one's hardly used. If you follow." There was a disbelieving shriek from Keiko and a muted thud as Julian collapsed after tripping on a chair leg, but he was up again in a trice. Quark worried, as one of his waiters accepted wagers on a PADD, "I hope the house takes enough on this to cover the damages." "So do I," Odo graveled, "because any suit *you* press, whether concerning events leading to this situation or the situation itself, will be thrown out of my office almost as hard as you'll be. It's a good thing I came by," the constable further commented, having a seat on a barstool. "I do hope Mrs. O'Brien doesn't cause any actionable damage among the patrons." "What about Julian then?" Miles wondered, waving at Quark for another ale. "I hope the same, but not for the same reason." He touched his badge and muttered something, then lowered his hand and continued observing. At that point, Garak came in and, seeing Miles, came up to the bar next to him. "Greetings, Major, Commander. Chief, I was under the impression Doctor Bashir was with you; Commander Sisko's charming son told me you and your wife had come here with him." Miles pointed toward the upper levels with the hand not occupied with his ale. "He's up there, with Keiko." There was a clatter from on high and Keiko squeaked; Julian, or half of him, appeared briefly, long limbs flailing as he balanced himself on the fulcrum of the guard rail before getting his feet back under him and disappearing again. "Ahm, Chief," Garak said, gaze fixed on the upper level they'd just seen Julian at, "The good doctor appears to be attempting to murder your wife." "Old Boom-boom? He wouldn't hurt a fly," Miles said, waving concern away. "They're just having a bit of a--oh. Danu. Good one, me darlin'." Keiko, at the spiral stairs nearest the door, had employed the timesaving device of swinging over the handrail and dropping more than a bodylength to the floor; from there she lost no time making for the exit. She was laughing like a maniac, but it didn't slow her down. "It's a good thing she's wearing trousers," Garak observed. "Cut's a bit tight for this sort of sport, though." Julian couldn't jump the stairs without risking the bodily integrity of innocent bystanders, but he did take them two at a time down just as he had up. As Keiko vanished into the crowd on the Promenade, Julian reached the door, where he ran smack into two brown-suited security officers who grabbed his arms, braking his forward momentum and suspending him between them. They looked at Odo for instructions. "If you're quite through creating this disturbance, doctor, I'm willing to dispense with the legalities and deskwork...?" Odo offered. Half the bar seemed to be hanging on Julian's answer, much as he was now hanging between the two guards. He glared at Odo, then closed his eyes and sighed. "Uncle. I give." Those who'd bet on Keiko let out pleased exclamations and gathered round the designated waiter to collect their winnings. While this was going on, Keiko reappeared, having taken in the sight of the guards, and zipped past to the leeward side of the long-suffering Commander Sisko. "Professor O'Brien," Garak greeted her while she peeked past Sisko's arm. The guards were just letting Julian back on his feet. "Nicely run, I must say." "Thanks," she panted, desperately trying to stop giggling. Julian found his Banellian toddy, miraculously unharmed, being pushed into his hands by Quark. "On the house, doctor. We broke much better than even." "Oh, my pleasure," he sighed. Leeta had come over and was leaning on his shoulder; he shifted the mug to his off hand and put a casual arm over her shoulders, saying "I suppose I should have known you'd have the advantage in a crowd, Keiko. Hello, Garak." "Greetings...Boom-boom." After a frozen moment, Julian started laughing. Then so did Leeta, followed by everyone else. "Looks like you're for it, me laddo," Miles cackled. "It appears I am." "But I suggest we all remember," Sisko added, "who's holding the hypo at our next physicals." "Thanks, Commander," Julian said, winked at Keiko and grinned at Miles, then killed the rest of his toddy in one draught. --- The End