by Choirboy
---
© February 2002
Feedback please.
As usual, Paramount own all the characters. This may be offensive to
religious readers, however, I would stress that I am a practising
Catholic. My apologies if this offends anyone, this was not my intention.
---
Tom sat in front of his computer, waiting for the numbness to go away,
praying that he might feel. . . something. Anything. Since Harry's
death he felt as though he had been drifting through his time on Voyager.
He had tried socialising, throwing himself into his work, meditating
– nothing worked. Chakotay had eventually suggested that Tom try to
write his thoughts down, as though committing them to text might awaken
the emotions that were stirring under the surface, tantalisingly just out
of reach. He had tried this in the form of letters to Harry, but to no
avail. He tried in the standard format of a Starfleet report, but this was
too constricting. On the other hand, an outpouring of words and ideas held
no structure at all, and didn't solve – or resolve –
anything.
He sat at his desk and prayed for a miracle.
As his mind drifted, he found himself going back over the last years of
their life on Voyager. Events that he and Harry had witnessed together,
stories that Harry had told him during those late nights when neither of
them could sleep – or had not wanted to sleep. Eventually he
realised that his subconscious was recalling key points of this journey,
linking them into a loose format. His eyes slipped closed, and his fingers
moved towards the keyboard as if by intuition.
---
1) Condemned
Harry stood before the Akritirians, unable to believe what he was hearing.
A group he had never even heard of, Open Skies had just convicted him of a
terrorist atrocity. He wished Tom were here. Tom would have fought this,
protesting vehemently. But all Harry could do was to meekly accept his
fate. Life imprisonment. It would have been better to be sentenced to
death. Tom pictured this image in his mind, as Harry was pushed out to
face the waiting crowd, an expression of acceptance on his face. I wish I
were there, he whispered to himself.
---
2) Carrying The Burden
Harry slumped against a wall, sheer exhaustion refusing to allow him to
stand upright. Two guards grabbed him under each arm and tied him to a
post. From the corner of his vision, he could see a man in a white
surgical gown approach with a small tray. From this he removed what looked
like an old fashioned hypodermic needle. Harry braced himself, but was
unable to hold back the scream as the needle forced its way into his
skull. The pain was exquisite. Every nerve ending was on fire as the pain
spread around his head and settled into a band of iron around his temples,
through which spikes of pain pierced his brain.
Tom watched from behind a pillar, unable to go to his friend. The fear
that prevented his throat from crying out at the injustice also refused to
let his legs move. Instead, he listened to his best friend suffer this
agony. I wish I were there, he whispered to himself.
---
3) Falling/Failing
The clown whirled and snapped his fingers. Harry suddenly found himself
back amidst the horrors of the radiation hospital he had visited with his
parents as a child. Unable to stop the cry, he found himself strapped to a
bed that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Only the timely
intervention of the doctor had saved hs brain from believing that he had
been sliced open with a scalpel. I should have been able to fight back, he
told himself. But I couldn't. I was too weak, and I fell. B'Elanna
had told Tom of the mindgames that Fear had played with Harry and the
scientists they had found in the AI environment.
Tom had listened with fascination, but had never really experienced the
fear that Harry and B'Elanna had suffered, until now. He could almost
feel the wood rubbing his neck as the blade shimmered, waiting to slice
down and sever his head. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
---
4) Remembering The Mother
Harry and his spots. Tom and B'Elanna had joked endlessly about this
one. The Tauresians and their bizarre method of procreation had tricked
Harry into believing that he had never been human, and had tried to
persuade him to leave Voyager. Harry had told Tom one evening of the
dreams he had had, of the Mendakan pox, and how his mother had comforted
him. Tom had always been aware of how important family was to Harry. As an
only child, he was the miracle child that his parents had wanted for so
long, and they had lived their lives again through him. And then to die,
thousands of light years away from his mother, who had protected him
through his early years, but was unable to be there at the end.
---
5) Helped to Carry The Burden
Harry squirmed under the ferocious glare of the Ferengi barkeep on DS9.
"Oh, no no no no no no no!" he spat. "You can tell your
commanding officer that they can expect a written protest. . . "
"How much for the entire tray?" blurted Harry, aware he was
lost, and completely out of his depth.
"Beautiful, aren't they?" asked a new voice.
Harry whirled to see a tall blond man in a Starfleet uniform but no pips,
leaning over his shoulder and giving him a helpful wink. Suddenly the
young ensign was aware that this newcomer could help him out of this
mistake, and if a Ferengi protest was inevitable, then at least he might
help shoulder the load.
Tom smiled as he remembered their first meeting. Harry's thankful
expression that had subtly changed into. . . what? Desire? Even back then?
Tom had done nothing to deserve that gratitude. Simply helped out a
friend. But that was where it had all started. Come on Harry, it'll be
fun.
---
6) The Wiping of The Face
Tom lay back, blood seeping from the gaping wound through his stomach. He
was dimly aware of a cool cloth being placed on his sweating forehead. Too
weak to even speak, he looked up at Harry's concerned face and smiled
in thanks. The Chute had been one of the worst experiences of their lives.
And yet out of the horror, something good had come. Their relationship had
entered a new level from that away mission. And it had all started with a
cool cloth. This man is my friend.
---
7) Falling/Failing Again
Harry crouched in the Jeffries tube, frantically crosswiring the intricate
connections of the Delta Flyer's warp drive. In the cabin, Tom and
Chakotay were playing a deadly game of cat and mouse with a Borg cube. The
fact that this cube had turned out to be populated by children had not
altered the situation one iota. His friends were depending on him. A huge
jolt shook the Flyer, and Harry felt himself slipping into unconciousness.
Fight it, his mind screamed at him. But he couldn't, and fell.
Tom was aware of how much Harry still felt like the baby of the crew.
Although he had been forced to do a lot of growing up on the roller
coaster ride through the Delta Quadrant, the young ensign took far too
much on himself. He pushed himself constantly, knowing that his friends
relied on him. Failure was not an option with Harry. Through his
mind's eye he could sense Harry's frustration as he lost
consciousness. Resistance is futile.
---
8) The Woman
B'Elanna screamed in frustration as she felt Harry's hand slip
through her fingers. The vacuum of space sucked him away from her, and she
knew that she would hear his dying screams in her mind till her dying day.
The unexplained explosions that were ripping the ship apart had already
claimed casualties, and although she didn't know it yet, poor
Samantha's baby was one of them. She was a Klingon, she reminded
herself. She would not cry. Not for Harry, not for the baby, not even for
her ship.
Harry's sudden death had ripped through Tom like a rusty razor,
wounding him and leaving an infection that he thought would never heal. He
had wanted to cry, to mourn his friend, but there had been no time. The
Vidiian attack had overwhelmed the few able bodied crew left, until the
alternate Janeway had destroyed her own ship and taken the invaders with
it. Accepting the alternate Harry had taken some adjustment, but at least
he and B'Elanna hadn't broken down and bawled at the funeral
service. We're Starfleet officers. Weird is part of the job.
---
9) Falling/Failing for A Third Time
Tom had long since passed out. Harry stood over his friend, defending him
to the end. He swung the now useless length of pipe in threatening
circles, holding back the crazed prisoners who circled like jackals,
thirsty for blood. Help me, he pleaded silently. As if in answer, missiles
began to rain down on him. He dodged most of them, but a huge piece of
rock caught him in the back of the head, and he fell in agony. Tom
didn't remember much of those final desperate minutes in the prison.
Harry had saved his life, he knew that. He had been prepared to lay down
his own life in order to save him. And yet he had fallen, unable to do it.
Only the timely intervention of the captain had prevented their deaths.
And yet, Harry had been prepared to try. That was the important thing.
This man is my friend. No one touches him.
---
10) Stripped of Everything
Janeway looked down at her youngest officer, lying on the biobed. The
gashes across his face and chest flared horribly, as the wounds inflicted
by Species 8472 spread across his body. What a waste, she raged. To die
like this, stripped of all dignity, pride and beyond help. The hate that
Kes had experienced through her mindmelds with the aliens had held no
emotion. Just cold, unthinking hate. Following orders.Harry's near
brush with death during the first encounter with Species 8472 had reminded
the crew of their mortality. His mute acceptance of his fate had raised
his stature immeasurably with Tom. He could still recall the moment when
Harry had returned to the bridge, shaken and battered, but with a quiet
sense of dignity. The Borg collective is like a force of nature. You
don't feel anger towards a storm: you avoid it.
---
11) Preparation for Death
Harry was dragged up to the brightly lit courtroom on Akritiria. This is
it, he thought frantically, his mind whirling. I'm going to die.
I'm actually going to die. Not in some battle, or on a secret away
mission, but on shore leave. Shore leave with Tom. "Trust me, Harry,
it'll be fun!" Well, this wasn't fun. But there was no way he
was going to blame Tom for this. How could he blame Tom, who had actually
brought him alive? Before they met, Harry felt that he had been
sleepwalking through his life in monochrome. Tom had put colour into his
world. And if he was to die here, then he would die for Tom too. Let them
do their worst. He could accept it. He had lived, at last.
Tom watched as the guards dragged Harry into the box for the accused. He
had already been found guilty, and now he watched with that same sense of
frozen horror as the guards spread Harry's arms and attached them to
the chains on the wall. He hung there, stripped of all pride, as the
sentence was read out. Help him! His mind screamed, but he was unable to
move. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
---
12) Death
The cenotaph was close, claustrophobic. Harry shrugged off the ceremonial
shroud and listened to the muffled chants coming from the outside world as
e prepared to gamble everything on his one chance to return to Voyager and
his friend. Unable to turn his head far enough, he could sense two blue
charged poles extending towards his throat. He lay back and surrendered to
the inevitable, as he prepared to die. There was a moment's agony,
then peace.
Tom had breathed a huge sigh of relief when the news had filtered through
to the bridge that Harry had returned. There was no word of his status,
though, and it was only later that he heard of Harry's actual death.
He was unaware that he would later lose his friend in a much more final
way. Had they really gone through all this, he thought, only to die again?
---
13) Burial
The service was over, the eulogy emotionally read by the captain. Tom had
stood mute throughout, the sense of numbness that now gripped him
spreading its caressing fingers over his soul. Harry was dead.Harry was
dead, and the universe had shifted on its axis. This is the moment when
the hurt and the loss should have poured out. But there was nothing. At
the end, he hadn't been with Harry. His friend had died alone. He
couldn't protect him, the way Harry had protected them both on
Akritiria. Had it all been for nothing? This man is my friend. No one
touches him.
---
14) Resurrection/Remembrance
Tom gazed out of the messhall window as the modified torpedo casing slid
smoothly from Voyager's starboard launcher and moved gracefully off
into space. There was nothing left. Harry was gone, and nothing would ever
be the same again. The captain came over and put one caring hand on his
shoulder. "You know," she said quietly, "as long as we
remember him, he's not really dead." Tom turned to her and
smiled politely.
What did she know? Tom's eyes fluttered open as he recalled this last
moment. What the captain had said made a perverse and yet somehow
comforting kind of sense. He carried Harry with him wherever he went, from
the bridge, to the Flyer, even to their quarters. He talked to him aloud,
as if Harry were in the room with him. No, Harry wasn't dead. He would
always be with Tom.
---
End
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