by Bingley
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Archiving: PKSP, PK Elite, ASCEML. Elsewhere, please ask me first. I'm unlikely to say no.

Feedback: gimme, gimme.

Disclaimer: Paramount owns Voyager and all who sail in her. This is just for fun, not to infringe on their copyright or make a profit.

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"Ow! Bugger!" The cry of pain was followed by the clatter of a dropped tricorder.

"Harry! I didn't know you knew words like that," Tom grinned.

A rather ruffled and irate ensign backed out of the Jeffries tube.

"You startled me." Harry glared. "I also know words like bloody, and fuck, and cunt, so stop bloody patronising me, Mr. I've-seen-and- suffered-so-much Paris. Just because I haven't killed anyone in a shuttlecraft smash or been to prison." With that he turned and stalked off.

Tom gaped after him and made his way to the mess hall mulling over the possibilities of there being an alien on board masquerading as Harry. As he passed the turbolift, B'Elanna almost crashed into him as she stepped out.

"What's up, Paris? Can't you look where you're going?"

"Sorry, B'Elanna. Are you going to the mess hall?"

She nodded.

"Can I talk to you over something to eat?"

"So long as it doesn't take too long. I've got some gel packs still to check before we bring the new relays on line."

They continued towards the mess hall together. Tom looked dubiously at Neelix's latest dinner offerings. "I sometimes wonder if Neelix has got hold of the wrong meaning of mess," he said. B'Elanna gave a short bark of laughter.

They took their selections over to an empty table in one of the quieter parts of the mess hall. They ate in silence for a while until B'Elanna said, "I meant what I said about not having much time, Paris. What's on your mind?"

"All right. Do you think my behaviour to Harry is patronising?"

"Yes, sometimes. But then we all tend to treat him like a kid at times, I suppose. It's difficult not to when he looks as if he's barely finished high school, let alone graduated from the Academy. Why?"

"Well, the strangest thing. Just now I called out to him while he was in one of the Jefferies tubes and startled him. He must have hit his head or something, and swore. I teased him about using bad language and got a mouthful in return, followed by the comment that I'm patronising. Come to think about it, it's almost like he's been avoiding me for the past few days as well."

B'Elanna frowned. "I suppose he has been a bit offhand recently. Offhand for Harry, that is. If only I could get what he gives on his worst days out of some of the half-witted petaQ I've got down there." She shrugged. "Whatever it is he'll get over it."

"I suppose," Tom said, but he didn't feel very convinced.


After B'Elanna left, Tom made his way to his quarters lost in thought again. Going in, he found a bottle of wine sitting on the table with a note propped up against it. The note said, "I'm sorry, Tom. I shouldn't have said that. Harry."

Tom hit his comm badge. "Paris to Kim."

"Kim here."

"Come on over, Harry, and drink this with me."

"On my way." Tom could almost hear the beam on Harry's face.

"Have you eaten?" Tom asked when Harry arrived.

"No. I was on my way down to the mess hall when you called."

"OK. Let me replicate you something. How about some fried kwaytiau?"

"Sounds good."

After Harry had eaten, they sprawled on the sofa facing each other across the corner. They were on their second glass of wine each, when Tom asked, "Do you really think I'm patronising?"

Harry's face fell. "I'm sorry Tom. I shouldn't have said that I especially shouldn't have said that about, you know, the accident and prison and everything." As he leant forward to emphasise his contrition his hair flopped forward, taking another couple of years off his already young features.

"No, Harry. I'm sorry if my teasing upset you. It's what I do, tease. You should know that by now."

"Oh, I know Tom, it's just. . ."

"Just what?"

"Most of the time everybody on the ship treats me as if I were a teenager away from home for the first time. It gets a bit wearing sometimes."

"All right, sensitive subject. I'll try and remember."

After another glass, Harry said, with his head cocked on one side and glancing sideways up at Tom, "Tom, can I ask you something?"

"What?"

"Remember last week, when that distortion was coming towards us in Sandrine's?"

"Yes," said Tom cautiously.

"What were you thinking about?"

Tom exhaled noisily and slumped back looking at the ceiling. Now there was a question. "Ummm, well, mainly what god-awful timing it was. My life was actually coming together in a pretty good way. I had a good job doing something I love. I had a captain who trusts me. One way or another all the bad things in my life had got left behind." He paused wondering whether to go on or not, and then finished in a rush, "and that I've got one of the best friends a guy could have, who I'd do anything for." He glanced over to see what effect that had had. Harry was staring at him open-mouthed.

Tom poured them both another glass of wine, using the movement to shunt along the sofa closer to Harry.

"What about you, Harry? What were you thinking about?"

Harry took a great gulp of the wine. "It's funny, I wasn't thinking about Libby, that I'd never see her again, which is what I would have expected. I was thinking about you, that if I was going to die at least I was with you right to the end." He was almost whispering when he finished. He put down his glass and looked straight at Tom.

"That's why I've been so ratty these past few days. I realised then that I love you, Tom, but you treat me as if I was fourteen rather than twenty-four, so what's the use?" He stood up as if to leave. Tom took advantage of Harry's slight unsteadiness to pull him down next to him on the sofa. He leaned towards him and kissed him on the lips, softly at first and then harder. Tom moved one hand round Harry's back while he moved the other slowly but steadily down to Harry's groin. Tom's eyes widened as he felt Harry's hard-on through the material of his trousers.

He pulled away to breathe, and then said somewhat shakily, "Unless kids are maturing a lot earlier than when I was fourteen I think we can safely say you're at least fifteen. But I think a closer examination of the evidence is necessary here."

Harry rolled his eyes, but said nothing, just shifted enough to allow Tom to pull his trousers and briefs down. Tom stared at the length of Harry's cock and said "Maybe sixteen." Then, Tom bent down to lick it tentatively. "Tastes more like seventeen," he pronounced.

With a fluid movement Tom knelt down on the floor between Harry's feet and started sucking, while cradling Harry's balls in his hands. As Harry's hips started to jerk, Tom let Harry's cock go, and sitting back looked up at him. "Oh, I'd definitely say you were a fine specimen of an adult male, Harry."

Harry just moaned and pushed back into the sofa with his hands so that he could thrust more with his hips. Tom licked the head of Harry's cock, his tongue circling it once or twice and then took it deep inside his mouth again. He had hardly done so when he felt it swelling and Harry called out, "Tom, I'm going to come."

"No kidding," Tom thought as he swallowed and swallowed and still Harry came. When Harry had finished, Tom carefully put the flaccid but still large cock back where he'd found it, and then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He sat back on the sofa next to Harry, and gently kissed him again.

Harry's eyes fluttered open and he put his arms round Tom, who grinned, stroking Harry's hair and said, as if thinking out loud, "Of course one test result is not conclusive. I think for the sake of science we should see if we can duplicate the results in another location."

Harry slid his hands downwards as he replied, "Perhaps we should, and with another test subject for comparative purposes."

"That sounds like proper scientific procedure to me."

"Not too proper I trust. I'm hoping for some very improper procedures."

"I think that can be arranged," Tom said.

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End