The BLTS Archive - Lifewish
second in the Tom, Dick and Harry series
by Emma Woodhouse

---

Disclaimer: Star Trek, Star Trek Voyager, and the characters herein
are the property of Paramount. The story is my humble own, copyright
1996 by "Emma Woodhouse".

Warning: This story is rated NC-17, which means a lot more fun than
anything you could see on prime time. The pairings depicted are
exclusively male, and particularly feature two quite lovely young men,
and one ageless Entity.

Once again, Miss Woodhouse picks up her quill to continue the
adventures of Tom and Harry. This is a sequel of sorts to both my own
'Tom, Dick, and Harry' fanfic, and the Voyager episode "Deathwish".
Reading/viewing these predecessors is helpful, but not necessary. I
call this little piece "a P/K/Q, with a Special Guest Star". . .

---

Nobody ever said much about it, but most people realized by now that
Lieutenant Paris and Ensign Kim were lovers.

How that information seeped into the general consciousness of the ship
isn't clear. Certainly, the two officers were always highly
professional on Voyager's bridge. And it wasn't even as if they held
hands in the mess hall or at Sandrine's.

But it was common knowledge that if you were looking for Ensign Kim
after a certain time at night, you could be sure of finding him in the
lieutenant's quarters. And then there was the way they looked at one
another in unguarded moments.

Lieutenant Tuvok once overheard an extremely interesting conversation
at Sandrine's, and considered it his duty to brief Captain Janeway on
the information he had gleaned. In his estimation, there was simply no
such thing as a captain with too much information about her crew.

So when the call came from the away team that day, Janeway knew it was
trouble, bad trouble.

Paris and Kim had been scouting for duranium in a cavern system on a
planet Neelix called Releos Three. He had warned them that the
planet's crust was charged with radions, so the scouts would be out of
communications range while underground. Three away teams had already
made their way back to the surface and been beamed back to the ship.
Paris and Kim were overdue to report back in.

Finally, the bridge crew heard a faint, crackling hail. "Paris to
Voyager." The voice was edged with panic.

"Voyager here," Janeway responded, motioning to the Ops station to get
to work on the beam-out signatures.

"Captain, Ensign Kim has been injured - are we within transporter
range yet?" Paris sounded out of breath, the connection was becoming
clearer.

At Ops, Crewman Ayala shook his head.

"Not quite, Tom," Janeway said. "Where are you?"

"I'm almost back to the surface now. I'm carrying Harry. He was hit on
the head, and lost consciousness a while back. As soon as you can lock
on, beam us directly to Sickbay."

"We'll do that," the Captain said, and went over to Ops to worry over
Ayala's shoulder.

"The signal is clearing up now, Captain," the crewman told her. "Just
about got it - there! Transporter room, lock on to the comm badges and
transport to Sickbay."

"Transporting now," came the word from the transporter chief.

Ayala looked up from the Ops displays, and reported hesitantly,
"Captain, I picked up two comm badges. But only one lifesign."

"Commander, you have the bridge," the Captain said. She didn't have to
add that she would be in Sickbay.

In Sickbay, the Doctor certainly did everything he could. More than he
could, actually, since his initial scans indicated that it was already
too late. Ensign Kim had apparently died about ten or fifteen minutes
before transport, and the tissue degradation had already begun.

But after one look at Lieutenant Paris' face, the Doctor went back to
work, and found himself experiencing a new human emotion, the one
called "hoping against hope".

But there really was nothing he could do.

And eventually, he didn't have to inform the lieutenant. That became
clear to him, and his better-than-human hearing and faster- than-human
reflexes stood him in good stead, as he whirled suddenly and grabbed
for the phaser that Lieutenant Paris had drawn behind him.

The phaser had been aimed at the lieutenant's own head, but the Doctor
managed to turn it around before it discharged. So when the Captain
entered Sickbay, it was to be greeted by the sight of the Emergency
Medical Holographic Program taking a phaser blast to the chest, while
shouting, "Kes! Sedative!"

Lieutenant Paris, forgetting momentarily that the Doctor was not
human, dropped the phaser in horror. The young Ocampa ran up with the
hypospray which she jammed at Paris' throat, and then Paris was on the
floor.

The Doctor flickered briefly and then readjusted his projection, and
assisted Kes in moving Paris to a biobed. "Computer, level three
restraints," he said, and then turned to the Captain.

Captain Janeway had been watching the scene with astonishment,
wondering what was going on. The Doctor turned to her and shook his
head sadly. "I regret to inform you that Ensign Kim was dead on
arrival, Captain. And I request your countersignature to place
Lieutenant Paris on suicide watch."

Janeway nodded. "You have it."

She turned to look at the two biobeds. The dead ensign and sedated
lieutenant lay side by side. "As if asleep," she thought tritely, and
for a moment it seemed that every particle of youth and humor had
seeped out of the ship, forever.

Janeway patted Harry's hand. Gone. He was really gone. The serious
young man with the clarinet and the inexhaustible scientific
curiosity, and the gentleness and strength of character to love wild
Tom Paris.

She knew she was going to miss him. But missing Harry would be the
easy part. The hard part was going to be keeping Tom alive.

---

Tom Paris was walking in darkness, and refusing to admit he was
walking alone. It was a nightmare replay of the escape from the
Ocampan underground, only this time Harry was much more seriously
wounded. And infinitely more dear.

It had been Harry who had first heard the rumble of the approaching
avalanche, and pushed Tom into the side corridor and followed him -
almost in time. He had only been hit by one rock, but it was a big
one, and it hit him in the head.

Now Tom was retracing their steps to the surface, with Harry slung
over his shoulders, keying his communicator every few steps in case
Voyager was finally in range. And he kept telling himself that Harry
was breathing, just too faintly for him to hear, that Harry's heart
was beating, just too faintly for him to feel. And that he wasn't
alone in the dark.

But now he was standing on a road. A road made of some black sticky
substance that clung to his boots. Along the road ran a line of wooden
poles, with wire strung along it.

It looked a lot like Earth. But an old, dreary patch of Earth, with
parched weeds eking out a dusty living, and an old building in the
distance. For want of anything better to do, Tom headed toward the
building.

It looked like an old country store, circa mid-20th century. It was
run down and depressing, the gas pumps out front rusting in disuse.

Tom had never seen this place, but he recognized the description. He
remembered when Voyager had become a battleground and then a courtroom
for two beings who both called themselves "Q". The Captain had
presided at that bizarre hearing, about the rights of the individual
against the will of a society.

The society was called The Q Continuum.

At lunch one day in the mess hall, Captain Janeway had talked about
the depiction created for the mere mortals to give them a feel for the
Q Continuum. And this was the place.

There was the front porch, the ancient pinball machine, the croquet
field, the scarecrow -

As Tom approached the building, a young woman came around the corner
of the building. She looked like the stereotypical "farmer's daughter"
of the Depression era, and she was carrying a step-stool.

The young woman took the step-stool over to the scarecrow, and stood
on it, putting her arms around the dummy and kissing it passionately.
And Tom was surprised to see that the scarecrow put one arm around the
woman, while the other hand, clad in an old gardening glove, moved up
her leg and under her skirt.

The young woman began to moan, and pushed her hips against the glove.
Tom thought, just wait till I tell Harry I saw a lady being
finger-fucked by a scarecrow! But then he remembered that he wouldn't
be telling Harry this story, or any other.

"Things have changed a bit since your captain visited us last," said a
lazy, slightly sarcastic voice.

Tom turned, and saw a man in a Star Fleet uniform sitting negligently
on the porch swing. It was Q. The one he remembered looking in the
viewscreen, when the Voyager had been - a Christmas tree ornament? Q
was dressed, with typical arrogance, as a captain.

"I guess they have," Tom said to Q. "She said it was a pretty boring
place."

"I'm afraid I have been causing a bit of trouble around here," Q
admitted, rather proudly. "Q over there is doing some experiments in
physical sensation."

"Which one?"

"Why, both."

A middle-aged woman opened the screen door, pushing several
quarrelsome puppies out onto the porch. "This is your fault, Q," she
told the man on the porch swing.

"Oh, of course, Q," he said with a sigh. "Everything is always my
fault. Poor little me."


A rhythmic thumping sound drew Tom's attention, and he looked around
the corner of the house to see how the girl and the scarecrow were
getting along. The girl now had her skirt pulled up and her legs
around the scarecrow's hips, and the pole holding up the scarecrow was
rocking madly.

"They're going to have that pole down," Tom said idly.

"Naturally," said Q from the porch swing. "They always do. In fact,
knocking that pole over in mid-coitus is quite an experience." He
paused, and added, "Or so I've been told."

Tom leaned against a porch pillar, and stared out over the dreary
landscape. "What am I doing here?"

"Oh, I thought we could talk. It's not as if you have anything else to
be doing right now."

"Oh?" Tom asked defiantly. "What do you know about it?"

"I know, my brave young lieutenant, that you are currently sedated,
under restraint, and on round-the-clock suicide watch."

"I am?"

"And Harry Kim is dead."

"No," Tom whispered.

"Oh, yes, well and truly dead. And then you drew your phaser, and if
Voyager had a human doctor, you'd be a murderer right now." Q's voice
was indifferent, relentless.

Tom sat down on the steps. He wasn't going to talk to this Q any more.

"So," Q went on breezily, "that's why I chose this particular milieu.
That's why I thought of it, you see. The great Q trial onboard
Voyager. We once had a Q that wanted to die. But he was millennia old,
and his argument was something like this - he had already done
everything and said everything and there was nothing left to do. I
argued against him then, though even I must admit he had a point."

Tom still wasn't saying anything.

"But here we have a man, not even thirty of your puny little years
old, who decides in a second that he wants to die. So I was curious."

"So you were curious. Big whoop," Tom said dully. "Glad I broke the
monotony."

Q leaned forward. "No, really. I need to understand this. I've gone
back and studied your life, you know, and this seemed to me like an
unusual time to decide life wasn't worth living."

"You got a better idea?"

"I would have thought New Zealand - "

Tom turned and glared at him, and Q nodded. "Yes, New Zealand. Don't
you remember? - your Star Fleet career was over, ruined by your own
carelessness, you'd tried the Maquis and got captured immediately. You
had no career prospects, no friends, and your daily life seemed to
involve serving as a party doll for some very rough individuals. Why
did you stick it out then?"

No answer.

"Today, on the other hand, look at you. That's a Star Fleet uniform
you're wearing, unless I'm mistaken, and you have quite a few friends,
a Captain who respects you, a job you love. The only thing missing -
is Harry."

Tom drew in a deep breath, like a sob, and put his head on his knees.
Q watched him silently for a few moments, and then moved from the
porch swing to sit beside Tom on the steps. Putting his arm around the
young officer, he said softly, "I've decided to study this 'love'
business, and you are going to help me."

Tom rudely shoved the arm away. "No, I'm not. Go away."

"Oh, don't be so hasty," Q said, not a bit disturbed. "I haven't yet
told you how I can pay you for your assistance."

"Whatever you've got, I don't want it!"


"Not even when it's - Harry?"

Tom turned to face Q, suspicious. "Oh, come on. Even Q can't raise the
dead."

Q sighed. "You humans, so linear. Such a limited view of time. I can
change what happened, you know."

Tom's eyes widened. Did he dare to hope? "You can?"

Q smiled and gently stroked Tom's cheek. "Of course I can, my young
beauty. I've done it before. If we were in the Alpha Quadrant, I could
refer you to a captain who could give me quite a glowing testimonial."

Now Tom grabbed Q's hand. "Yes, but will you?"

"I will. If you help me. What would you do to get your Harry back?"

Tom laughed. "You know the answer to that." He left the steps to kneel
gracefully in the dust at Q's feet. "I'd do anything."

Q took a deep breath, and beamed at Tom with satisfaction. "I was
hoping you'd say that." He took both of Tom's hands in his, and began
to speak, but was interrupted by a blare of confusing noise.

Two vehicles were approaching on the road, from different directions.
One was a brand new Model T, from which blared the nasal croonings of
Rudy Vallee. The other was a battered old Dodge, giving voice to the
Andrews Sisters. The cars met on the road, and the drivers got out and
began to argue. The music droned on.

"Gridlock comes to the Continuum," Q murmured. "Why don't we go
someplace a little more - private?"

He stood, and offered his hand to Tom. Tom stood up as well, taking
Q's hand, and Q said, "I hope you'll like it - I've reserved the
honeymoon suite for us," and then they were somewhere else.

Tom recognized the clearing by the cave entrance immediately. He would
have recognized the configuration of rocks and trees, even without the
faint traces of a checkerboard drawn in the dirt, and the small pile
of stones which once served as checkers. He and Harry were here once,
and the name 'honeymoon suite' was perfectly apt. Tom sighed sadly,
remembering - the first time he'd kissed Harry, and knelt before him
and offered himself to be penetrated. . .

Then he turned to Q, and couldn't help laughing.

Q was still in a Star Fleet uniform, but he wasn't a captain anymore.
Now he was an ensign, wearing a yellow shirt. And he was barefoot,
with one foot bound with bandages.

"You know, Q," Tom said, "you may put on an  ensign's uniform, but you
still look like a Roman emperor." He  thought about it for a moment,
and added, "One of the sadistic ones  that went crazy."

Q patted Tom on the shoulder, saying, "Flattery, flattery. I know I'm
not dear Harry, but I do my humble best."

"So," Tom asked, "what do you want to know?"

"Oh, first things first, my dear boy! First, I'm going to fuck you."

"And you think that will teach you something about love? Oh, come on,
Q, even I know better than that!"

"Oh, it probably won't," Q admitted, taking Tom's arm and leading him
into the cave. "I'm just being self-indulgent. So humor me, and we'll
fuck like mad minks."

Tom looked at Q suspiciously. He had never believed the Q claim of
omnipotence. In fact, the other Q, the suicidal one, had even said it
wasn't true. But omniscience? Maybe. Because the phrase 'fuck like mad
minks', had a surprisingly romantic association in Tom's mind, it made
him think of Harry, and wild firelit lovemaking, and laughing with
your best friend right before entering his virginal young body.

The fire was already burning, and the bedrolls were smoothed out. It
was just the way it had been before, except for the company. Tom
thought, oh well, I said I'd do anything, and this guy isn't bad
looking, and he's probably not as brutal as old Henderson was.

Q was seated on the bedding, and turned to Tom and said, "I could be
just as brutal as old Henderson, but that's not what we're studying at
the moment."

Tom thought, oh SHIT! If he can read my mind -

And suddenly he was naked, and face down on the bedding, and Q was
hovering over him stroking his shoulders and chuckling softly. Tom
relaxed and closed his eyes, and then realized that the bedding
smelled like Harry, and said gratefully, "Mmmm."

He felt hands lifting his hips, and a tight pressure in his ass, and
then the penetration, and the mocking voice said, "But I'm not really
Harry, you know."

"Damn it, Q!"

"Sorry."

The slow thrusting began, and Tom felt himself beginning to respond, a
slow swelling, a quickening of his breathing, and he wondered why he
was enjoying this.

"Romantic associations," Q said, over his shoulder. "It was right here
in these very circumstances, that you gave yourself to Harry." He
kissed Tom on the throat, thrusting gently, and went on, "And you
didn't even realize yet that you loved him, did you? No, just good,
dear friends, isn't that right?"

Oh, this did feel good, even if it wasn't Harry, it felt very, very
good, and Tom was totally aroused, panting and pushing back against
the alien who was exacting payment for his lover's life.

He was lost in the sensations now, and had no idea how long it went
on, before he heard an astonished exclamation behind him, and felt a
warm wetness trickle between his legs.

Then the weight was off his back, and strong hands turned him over and
pulled him back against a broad damp chest. A hand slid down his belly
to grasp his erection, and he moved against the hand, as the lips
beside his ear whispered, "This is what Harry did, isn't it?"

Tom nodded, and looked up into the face of the sadistic, crazy Roman
emperor, and put up a hand to pull down that face and kiss it. He
eagerly sucked Q's tongue, as he was being skillfully masturbated, and
let go just in time as he felt the eruption begin, and he howled as he
shot like a geyser all over himself and the alien.

"Well!" Q said. "With Harry, you came into the fire - my aim must be
off." He pulled Tom onto his lap, and tightened his arms around the
young man. "That was nice, don't you think?"


"Not bad," Tom said weakly.

There was silence for a few moments, and Tom's heartrate gradually
slowed, and his breathing evened out. Q was stroking his shoulder and
chest, and Tom didn't mind a bit.

"Q?"

"Hmm?"

"If you can read my mind, why bother talking at all?"

"Well, there's mindreading, and then there's  mindreading."  Q looked
down into Tom's face and saw that he hadn't quite communicated what he
meant to say. "Humans are  very verbal. You don't even know what you
think until you can put it in  words."

"Oh." Tom supposed that made sense.

And he thought he'd better at least be honest, since this Q had some
sort of mindreading ability, so he said, "You know, I might not be the
best person to help you with your studies."

"Oh? What makes you say that? Who should I get to help me?"  Q was
still holding Tom, and moved back to lean against a rock. His hands
continued to move gently over Tom's body.

Tom thought about the question for a moment. "I don't want you to
think I'm backing out of the deal," he began. "I said I'd do anything,
and I will. But it just seems to me, that if you really want to know
about love, you ought to find someone more - typical. Maybe a nice old
couple who've been married for fifty years, with a bunch of kids and
grandkids. You know, the kind you see holding hands in the park, and
you see them and think, Aww."

"Thank you for the suggestion, but I don't think that would help me,"
Q said.

"Why not? And why are you studying love, anyway?" Tom asked.

"None of your business!" Q snapped. He looked down at  Tom's face, and
said contritely, "I didn't mean that the way it sounded." He kissed
Tom remorsefully on the lips, and they  didn't say anything else for
several minutes.

Finally, Q said, "That old married couple, one could say they were
merely following a biological imperative to reproduce, and invented a
bunch of emotions to go around it. It would make evolutionary sense.
You interest me, because it doesn't make sense, either evolutionarily
or personally, that you would love Harry Kim."

Tom started to pull away, outraged, but Q didn't let him go. "It makes
lots of sense!" Tom said angrily.

"Look at it from an outside perspective," Q said imperturbably.
"You've always been a ladies' man. From puberty on.  Isn't that
right?" Tom nodded. "Then you find yourself in a  prison environment,
where your extraordinary good looks make you an  irresistible target
for a lot of sex-starved men. Do you even know how many men fucked you
during that time?"

Tom shook his head, and then hid his eyes in Q's neck.

"Well, I could tell you," Q said, "but I imagine you really don't want
to know."

After a pause, Q went on, "So when you got the invitation to take part
in this Badlands mission, what's the first thing you do? You make a
run on the female pilot taking you to the ship. And you then proceed
to do everything in your power to work your way through the entire
female complement of Voyager's crew. Now, this might be due to the
absence of female companionship during your incarceration, but surely
some of it had to do with convincing yourself that you really were
heterosexual."

Tom was shaking, and Q stroked his shoulders tenderly. "You really
are, you know. Then, of course, your experience with same- sex
relationships was horrifying enough to ensure that you would want to
remain heterosexual."

Q kissed the top of Tom's head, and pulled him closer. This was the
most interesting research he'd done in quite a while. "So, it seems
apparent that every biological and personal psychological instinct
would argue against your loving Harry. And yet you do. And that's what
I find interesting."

Tom pulled away and looked Q in the eyes. "If you could meet him. . .
Get to know him. . .  How could I help but love him?"

Q patted Tom affectionately. "I'm sure I'll meet dear Harry. You're
being most cooperative. But I have a question for you, Tom. I'm not
going to ask you for an answer right now, because I believe it will
require some reflection."

Tom looked wary now. "Okay."

"Is is really 'better to have loved and lost than never to have loved
at all'?"

Tom stared at Q. "You're asking me?"

"That's why I'm giving you some time to think about it," Q replied
serenely. "A bit of background. The quote comes from Tennyson. He
wrote a poem, called In Memoriam, when his best friend died. The poem
took Tennyson twenty years to write. Perhaps that sort of
reflectiveness comes later. I'm not sure. Anyway, I'll want your
opinion on this, when next we meet."

"ME?" Tom almost squeaked. "I'm a PILOT, for  god's sake, and you're
asking me about POETRY?"

"No," said Q patiently. "I'm asking you about love."

Tom was scared. "What if I get it wrong? Does Harry stay dead?"

Q sighed in exasperation. "This isn't a test. I won't know if you get
it wrong, because I can't look up the answer in the back of the book!
I'm asking for an opinion."

"Oh."

There was a pause. Q took the opportunity to kiss Tom, and pull his
tongue deep into Q's mouth. For this research, he was using a
thoroughly human body, and the sensation was most interesting.

Tom said, "Q? Is this a dream?"

"Oh, no. This is very real."

"How do I know that? You said I was sedated in Sickbay. How do I know
this isn't a dream?"

To his surprise, Q grabbed him around the waist and pushed him back
down on the bedding. Then he felt a heavy weight as Q landed on his
back, and a piercing pain as he was roughly penetrated. I must have
made him mad, he thought vaguely, as Q took him with thoroughness and
a complete lack of gentleness or consideration. And yet he felt
himself growing hard, and Q reached beneath him and grabbed his
erection, pumping him roughly until they both came with animalistic
shrieks.

Q rolled off Tom, and said between gasps, "When you wonder whether or
not it was real, my young beauty, just try sitting down - you'll know
I was there."

---

Tom's eyes were closed, and he couldn't move. The sounds he heard were
female voices, and they were arguing.

After a moment, he recognized the voices. It was the Captain, and
B'Elanna Torres.

The Captain was saying, "It's my decision, B'Elanna. We can't keep him
sedated any longer. We simply must let him go to the funeral."

Tom opened his eyes. He was in Sickbay, of course. He must have made
some slight movement, because the Captain and B'Elanna came over to
the bed and looked down at him.

"How are you feeling, Tom?" Janeway asked softly.

The medical environment, the restraints, the two lovely women hovering
over him looking concerned, it was all so much like the beginning of
an old fantasy (Wild Nurses of Risa!), that Tom almost laughed out
loud, out of sheer hysteria.

Instead, he whispered, "Do I really need to be restrained?"

Janeway turned and gestured for the Doctor, and the restraints were
removed.

Sitting up, the first thing Tom noticed was that the other biobed was
empty, and that was a pain as sharp as any he'd ever felt. But then he
felt another pain, a physical one, radiating inward from his ass, and
he thought to himself, it was real! He closed his eyes, feeling dizzy
with gratitude, thinking, not lost yet, not yet.

"Where's Harry?" he asked.

Nobody said anything, but the Doctor gestured slightly toward the door
leading into the morgue.

"I want to see him."

"Tom - " B'Elanna protested.

Janeway waved her to silence. "Take a few moments to sit and rest,"
she said. "You've been sedated for over twenty-four hours."

Tom nodded. He'd sit here gladly, cherishing the pain, knowing that
wild fucking was real and so the promise was real, the hope that Harry
might return.

He cleared his throat. "Uh, I heard somebody say something about a
funeral?"

"It's tomorrow, Tom," B'Elanna said.  "We've taken care of everything.
If you feel up to going - "


"Of COURSE I'm going!" he said savagely, and she shrank back. He put
his hands to his eyes, and took a deep breath. "B'Elanna, I'm sorry. I
know you're trying to help."

He slipped off the biobed and stood up. "Let me see Harry."

So they let him enter the morgue, and there was Harry, or at least
what was left of him, his lover, his best friend - Tom walked slowly
over to the slab, and no, Harry didn't look like he was sleeping, he
was too pale, too still, too obviously dead.

Tom took the limp hand and held it for many long minutes. Janeway,
B'Elanna, and the Doctor stood clustered right inside the door.
B'Elanna felt a strange dampness in her eyes, almost as if she had a
cold, and told herself sternly that Klingons don't cry. And on the
other side of the room, someone else was watching, but none of them
could see him.

Tom stroked Harry's cheek, and noted the coolness of skin at
unexpected room temperature. Then he bent, and gently kissed Harry's
lips. Nothing. He kissed him again, his most demanding, passionate,
skillful kiss, a kiss that Harry could never fail to respond to,
however deeply asleep.

And there was no response, because Harry was gone.

Tom sobbed, once, and pulled Harry into his arms, cradling his head in
the crook of his elbow and kissing him again and again, and there was
nothing, there was nothing, nothing!

B'Elanna turned and fled, because she was half-human after all, and
humans do cry. The Doctor followed, to make sure she was all right.

So only Janeway heard Tom tell Harry, "You hang in there, Harry,
because I'm going to fix this, I'm going to figure it out." And that
worried the Captain, it worried her very much.

In the corner of the room, Q was thinking, so this is the end of
mortal love? No, thank you!

Janeway allowed Lieutenant Paris to check out of Sickbay, but she
still worried.

"I can monitor the Lieutenant anywhere on the ship," the Doctor
reminded her, and the Captain, who had once chastised the Doctor for
his snooping, now gave him carte-blanche to snoop as much as he
believed necessary.

She was pacing the Doctor's office, saying, "Let's see, the phasers
are locked in the armory, you have all medicinals under control, but
what about sharp objects?"

"Captain," the Doctor said patiently, "it is my opinion that Mister
Paris is not suicidal."

"But the phaser - "

"That was a momentary lapse, surely you can understand that? The
sudden death of a loved one - "

Janeway sighed. "You may be right, Doctor. But I still want
round-the-clock monitoring, and he's grounded until I feel more
comfortable with this. And something else that concerns me - " She
told him what she had overheard in the morgue.

"Not surprising," the Doctor said. "Denial is one of the classic
stages of grief."

"What's he doing now?" she asked.

"He is currently in his quarters, sitting at his desk, reading."

"Oh? What's he reading?"

"In fact, it's poetry. A poem by Tennyson. A very long poem, I might
add."

"That's odd," Janeway said thoughtfully. "He never struck me as the
type to go in for poetry." The only thing she could remember about
Tennyson was that he did some stuff about King Arthur.

"The title is 'In Memoriam: A.H.H.'." The Doctor said helpfully.

"Oh. Perhaps Tom did a database search."

The Doctor didn't answer, since the Captain didn't phrase the remark
as a question. In fact, Lieutenant Paris had gone directly to the
computer, requested 'In Memoriam' by Tennyson, and downloaded it into
a PADD. He had gone about it in a most businesslike fashion, and now
it seemed to the Doctor that the lieutenant wasn't just reading, he
was studying. It was curious. But he saw no need to worry the Captain
more than she already was.

---

The funeral was hard on everyone.

It was held in the cargo bay, with a torpedo casing for a casket, and
the Captain spoke, and the First Officer offered some kind of tribal
prayer.

Tom wasn't listening. He was staring at the torpedo casing, but not
really seeing it. He remembered - the game of checkers, and the field
rations, and the fishoids. The offer and the acceptance, and the
loving. The beautiful, beautiful young man who had accepted him, and
befriended him, and loved him -

B'Elanna was watching Tom, and feeling her throat tighten up. She was
remembering the morning after her interference in the Tom and Harry
relationship, and her clumsy attempts at matchmaking, and she'd always
wondered if they had gotten together because of her efforts or in
spite of them.

When they came into the mess hall for breakfast, she had looked at
Tom, and all she could do was gasp. Before Harry, she had always been
able to tell when Tom had 'scored' the previous night, because he
couldn't help grinning, almost a smirk, and she really hated that. But
that morning, he wasn't even smiling. He looked thoughtful, and
unusually serene, but when he looked up and she saw his eyes, she
caught the full force of that unbearable radiance and thought - if you
look at him too long, you'll go blind!

There was no threat of that today, since Tom's sun had gone out. And
Tom - was he even here?

Tom was in a bar, on Deep Space Nine, listening to a Ferengi spiel,
and cringing when the young ensign was dumb enough to say, "We were
warned about Ferengi at the Academy." And he had thought, well, Jesus,
kid, if you're going to be that dumb! He almost left, but then
thought, come on, Paris, when was the last time you did a good deed?
And just like that, he had a friend of life -

- friend for life. Which turns out not to be saying much.

When the torpedo casing was ejected from the ship bearing the mortal
remains of Ensign Harry Kim, Lieutenant B'Elanna Torres didn't even
try to hid the tears streaming down her face. But Lieutenant Tom Paris
didn't cry. Alabaster statues never do.

---

Tom stood at the entrance of the cave, and said, "No, dammit, it's too
soon!"

He stormed into the cave to find Q sitting quietly by the fire. "It's
too soon!" he repeated. "I haven't even finished the poem yet!"


Q looked up. "It is fairly long, isn't it? But I told you, Tom, this
isn't about poetry, it's about love."

"Well, I don't have an answer yet," Tom said. He looked fearfully at
Q, wondering if he'd screwed everything up. "I'm sorry," he added. "I
really am trying."

"Of course you are," Q said soothingly. "But I really wanted to talk
about something else right now."

Oh, the relief! It wasn't over yet. Tom sat down beside Q, and said,
"Okay."

Then he was naked, and that was starting not to surprise him, and Q
pulled him onto his lap, and whispered, "Why do you blame yourself for
Harry's death?"

"I don't!" Then Tom bit his lip, and said, "Yes, I do. Of course I
do."

"Explain that."

"If I'd heard the rumble of the avalanche - "

"So, it's your fault that your hearing isn't better?"

"Well, no. But if I knew more about medicine - I had some training
with the Doctor, and after a while I stopped paying attention, and
kinda started screwing up because that wasn't what I wanted to do."

Q was thoughtfully stroking Tom's shoulders. This kind of
self-criticism was new to him, and it seemed perfectly bizarre. "Well,
even if you had an MD, Tom, did you also have trepanning equipment
that would enable you to relieve swelling of the brain?"

"Well, no. But I could have at least got him to the surface faster!"

"Oh, I see. Then you dawdled along the way? Took sidetrips? Took rest
breaks?"

"I went as fast as I could," Tom said, his voice breaking.

Q sighed. "But still, you weren't smart enough, fast enough, just
generally not good enough, is that what you're saying?"

Tom nodded.

Q murmured thoughtfully, "Some people shouldn't be allowed to have
children."

He put his hand under Tom's chin, and lifted his head. Tom looked him
in the eye, and Q could see the distress there. "Do you think you
should be punished for Harry's death?"

Tom nodded.

"Easily done," Q said, and then they were somewhere else.

The walls were gray, and the bunk was gray, and Q was dressed in gray.
Tom, of course, was naked, and kneeling at Q's feet. Tom knew where
they were immediately. New Zealand Penal Settlement. Where else would
you go to be punished?

Q unfastened his trousers, and said to Tom, "Get to work, little
whore." And Tom took Q's erection into his mouth, and began to suck
it.

After a few moments, he felt a heavy hand on his shoulder, and a
well-known and well-hated voice said, "Hey, Tommy, if only your daddy
could see you now!"

Tom closed his eyes briefly, then looked up in resignation. Of course,
it was Henderson. Henderson was only a petty thief, but he had status
in the prison due to his size and sadistic personality. He had also
had a brief stint in Star Fleet, just long enough to make him hate it
before they kicked him out, so the admiral's son was his favorite
target.

Henderson grinned at Q. "Hope you don't mind," he said perfunctorily,
as he dropped to his knees behind Tom and unfastened his trousers.

Q said frostily, "Feel free." He was watching Tom's face. As Henderson
slammed into Tom, Tom's hands tightened on Q's  thighs, and he looked
up at the alien with eyes bright with pain and  humiliation.

Q felt a momentary compunction. He had chosen this venue because he
knew that these experiences were the most painfully humiliating ones
in Tom's memory, the requirement to service two men at once. But he
said only, "Back to work, little one," and Tom nodded and bowed his
head again.

It was extraordinary, Q thought, the skill the young man brought to
this, that he could give such pleasure while being used so brutally.
For a few moments, Q stopped thinking at all, allowing himself to
experience what his human nerve-endings were transmitting. He was,
however, beginning to feel disquieted, wondering - what am I supposed
to be learning here? He was beginning to question his own motivation.

But something was different now, and reaching out through the waves of
pleasure, Q turned his senses to the thought processes of the young
human. He'd gone beyond pain and humiliation, and Q was surprised to
feel from him a sense of triumph. Q reached out mentally, and Tom was
thinking, - I can do this, I really can, oh, Harry, it's going to be
all right!

Feeling that triumph, Q came in Tom's mouth, with strong convulsive
jerks like none he'd never felt before.

Henderson grinned at Q over Tom's shoulder and said companionably,
"The kid's talented, ain't he?"

Q glared at the disgusting creature, and slipped to his knees in front
of Tom and put his arms around him. Tom gratefully embraced him and
hid his face in Q's neck, and Q stroked his golden hair, looking at
Henderson and thinking - when I was trying humanity I should have
brought this man in as exhibit A for the prosecution; let's see
Jean-Luc defend that!

Henderson was grunting and sweating, and finally the filthy pig was
done, and standing and fastening his trousers. "See you around," he
told Q with a wink, and Q thought - I doubt that. And then they were
back at the cave.

Q looked down and realized that instead of changing his prison grays
for his Star Fleet uniform, he had materialized completely naked. He
was starting to think he was losing control of this situation. The
young human, of course, was kneeling in the dirt, waiting patiently
for whatever was next.

It made Q angry. "That's not what this is about!" he shouted.

Tom looked up at the alien, wondering what he'd done wrong.

"Do you think that all you have to do is suffer enough, and you'll get
your Harry back?" Q raged at him. "That wasn't me, that was you, that
disgusting scene was what you wanted, not me - this isn't about how
much torture you can withstand, and it's not about your deep-seated
complexes either!"

Now Tom was getting angry, too. "I said I'd do anything, and I meant
it, so why the hell don't you just tell me what to do?!"

Oh, the impossible child! Q shook him by the shoulders, shouting,
"Make me understand!"

But Tom just shouted back, "I don't know how!"

Q turned away and stalked to the other side of the cave. "Oh, go
away," he snapped, and started to wave his hand.

But Tom said, "Wait!"

Q turned back. "What?"

Tom reddened and looked down at the ground. "You didn't - mark me. . .
you know, to prove it wasn't a dream?"

Q walked over to Tom and lifted his chin. "Good heavens, little one,
wasn't Henderson enough punishment for you?"

Tom looked away. "I used to dream about that a lot," he admitted. "It
doesn't prove anything."

"Oh, very well."

And then Tom found himself pushed against the rough rock wall, and Q
pounded into him, and Tom thought with satisfaction, there's proof!
And there was no pleasure in this at all, but only pain, and that was
good too.

When Q was finished, he turned Tom around, and said, "This isn't about
torture, I told you that. This isn't about withstanding pain. Do you
really think that suffering is all you have to offer?"

Tom shrugged, and Q stroked his face, and the scratches there
vanished. Q looked at Tom's body, and the sharp rocks had made
scratches on Tom's thighs and chest and belly, and Q started to reach
out, and then said, "I'll leave those, since you seem to want them."

He thought for a moment, and then went on, "I don't like the way this
is going. The next time we meet, I don't want to have to deal with all
your feelings of inadequacy. It's getting in the way."

"Well then, find someone with less complexes," Tom said sullenly.

"Unfortunately, my dear, despite the complexes, you are still the
person who matches the criteria."

Tom looked up, interested. "What are the criteria?"

"Never mind. That's my business." And Q raised his hand.

---

And Tom was back in his quarters. His computer was chiming
insistently. "Mister Paris? Mister Paris? I demand that you answer!"

He looked around. Back in uniform, thank god, but when he moved, he
could feel the scratches on his thighs. Tom went to the computer and
open communications. "What is it, Doc?"

"I was asking if you were all right. You entered your quarters, and
then just stood there."

Interesting. "Stood there for how long?"

"About forty seconds."

"Oh, I was just woolgathering, I guess."

"Well, all right, then. If you feel the need to talk to someone -"

"Sure, Doc, I'll let you know." And Tom closed communications.


He remembered now, he was just back from Harry's funeral. So the
entire trip to the cave, to New Zealand, and back to the cave - all
took place in forty seconds? Or less. Apparently, Q didn't have to
worry about linear time.

It was also interesting to note that the Doctor was apparently
monitoring him.

---

Tom was trying to be patient. It had been days since he'd heard from
Q, and the scratches faded to faint red lines. Five days after the
funeral, Captain Janeway allowed him to go back to work, and he was
grateful for that.

And in his off duty hours, he had a lot to do, as well. Next time,
he'd be ready.

---

Two weeks after Ensign Kim's funeral, Captain Janeway was in the
Doctor's office, discussing Lieutenant Paris. "They tell me he isn't
seen at Sandrine's much anymore," she said.  "What is he doing with
his free time?"

"Studying," the Doctor told her.

"Studying! Studying what?" That was not how Janeway expected  Tom
Paris to spend his time.

"His studies have covered a wide range. Some philosophy, a great deal
of psychology, and even more poetry. Mostly love poems, from my
reading of the download files."

"Hmm. He seems to be trying to handle his grief on his own. Has he
sought your help? Or Kes? Or B'Elanna?" The Captain wished  there was
someone for Tom to turn to; well, there had been, of course - Harry.

"Not that I know of. And, I must say, Captain, though I am certainly
no expert on human emotion, that I don't see any evidence of grief in
him. More like - determination. Frankly, I don't know what to make of
it."

"Neither do I."

---


It was not till three weeks after the funeral that Tom met Q again.
This time, it was on Voyager.


Tom was in his quarters sleeping, when Q appeared. The young man was
nude, and sleeping on his stomach, and Q thought to himself, how can I
resist?

In an instant, Q was naked in the bed with Tom, leaning over him and
slowly entering his body. Tom began to wake, and felt a moment of wild
hope. "Harry?"

"No, little one, just your old pal Q."

While disappointed, Tom was relieved that Q was back, and relaxed and
spread his legs wider, and lifted his hips to allow Q to go deeper.

"How sweet," Q whispered. Now his human organ was completely buried in
the young man, and he lay on Tom's back and enjoyed the sensation.

Tom enjoyed it, too. Oh, it had been so long! Q was tickling the nape
of Tom's neck with his nose, and Tom could feel Q's legs the entire
length of his own, and Q's arms were covering his own, and Tom was
holding Q deep, deep inside him, and it all felt good.

Then Q laid his cheek against Tom's, and whispered, "Tom? How can you
bear to love someone, knowing that they're going to die?"

Tom thought about Q's question. "I think the true answer is, I never
even thought about it. I've kind of daydreamed sometimes, about
growing old with Harry. But dying? I don't think it even crossed my
mind."

Q sighed. "So young!"

Tom pulled his hands from under Q's, and took the hands in his own,
stroking them gently. "Uh, Q? Maybe I should mention that the Doctor
has been monitoring me."

But Q just chuckled. "I'm well aware of that, my dear, but the only
thing that intrusive piece of machinery will see right now is a
sleeping beauty. I can molest you to my heart's content."

"So what's keeping you?"

"Getting anxious, are we?" Q ran the tip of his tongue lightly around
the inside of Tom's ear, and Tom shuddered and Q felt the shudder
throughout his entire body. This was the part of the research Q liked,
none of those knotty questions and puzzling emotions! Tom turned his
head as far around as he could, and Q kissed the side of his mouth.
Then he put his lips to Tom's ear, and whispered, "What's your
pleasure? Gentle? Or rough?"

Tom moaned, "Oh, please, make it rough!"

"I was hoping you'd say that." And Q pulled out just enough to allow
him to thrust into the young human with force, and Tom groaned aloud.

Q's research with Tom was the first time he had experienced sex with a
completely human body, unaugmented by his powers, and he was still
astonished at how overwhelming the sensations could be. It wasn't just
the sensations he was receiving from his penis, but also the senses of
the rest of his body, the feeling of the moving muscles and the sweat,
and the smells and the tastes, and the sounds of an aroused young
animal moaning and crying out. Oh, yes, this was the fun part, and he
pumped that lovely young ass for many long minutes.

Q reached beneath Tom, and took a firm grasp on Tom's erection, but he
wasn't going to let Tom finish, not yet, and the feel of that strong,
hot organ in his hand pushed Q past the limit of his endurance, and he
came with strong spasms deep into the young man's body.

Still panting with exertion, Q quickly turned Tom over, and spread his
legs and lay between them. He again took hold of Tom's erection and
began to jerk it roughly, while rubbing his body against the human.
Tom was in an absolute frenzy now, unable to hold still, writhing
against the alien, and he pulled Q's body closer and fastened his lips
onto Q's mouth, capturing his tongue and sucking it with painful
intensity until he threw back his head and came screaming.


Then the two lay gasping in each other's arms, covered with semen, and
Q was so enthralled by the human experience that it never even
occurred to him to wave his hand and clean it up.

"Now then!" Q said at last. "Feel like talking?"

"Hey, I said I'd do anything," Tom said, capturing Q's hand and
kissing it.

Q put his head on Tom's shoulder and said, "Explain to me how you fell
in love with Harry. And why."

"I wish I could. It kind of sneaks up on you, I think."

"Sneaks up on you," Q said thoughtfully. "I can see how it would."

"Harry was just always - there." Tom said. He was frustrated, trying
to find words.

"Just - there? Oh, there must be more to it than that, or everyone
would be in love with everyone else!"

"I don't mean just there, I mean - THERE. As in, there for me, there
to help, there to be a friend. I think that's what I mean."

"So being friends for a significant period of time was a factor," Q
summarized.

"I guess so."

"But surely not," Q argued. "There's the issue of the alternate
timeline arguing against that."

"Oh, yeah. Harry told me about that. I'd forgotten about it." Tom
considered the alternate timeline.

"The timeline," Q said, "brought about, I might add, by a very
powerful but scatterbrained species - I would advise you to avoid them
if at all possible."

"Don't worry about that!"

"Anyway, in that timeline, Harry was never assigned to Voyager. You
never made it past Deep Space Nine. The first time you met Harry was
when he came into Sandrine's bar with a wild story about the Delta
Quadrant and altered reality. And he called you a loser and a drunk,
and the two of you parted on unfriendly terms. And yet! And yet, you
followed him halfway around the world, helped him steal a shuttle, and
then remained on an exploding shuttle in order to help him right the
timeline. In that timeline, you bet or sacrificed your life based on
the word of a man you had known for several hours."

Tom nodded uncomfortably. "Like I said, Harry told me about it, but I
sure don't remember any of that stuff. But maybe I didn't love him in
that timeline, I mean, just because I helped him out - "

"Helped him out by remaining in an exploding shuttle? Come now,
'greater love hath no man - .' The alternate timeline bothers me, my
young beauty, because it seems as if there is something else at work,
something, oh - kismetish, if you know what I mean."

"And - you don't know either?"

Q hated to admit that there might be something he didn't know. "Humans
are just so unaccountable sometimes," he said grudgingly.

Tom was gently stroking Q's hair, thinking to himself, this guy's not
so bad. He wondered why Janeway had such a hissy just because a couple
Qs showed up. Of course, the guy likes to play tricks, but he's
basically decent. Tom liked him.

Q raised himself on his elbow, and asked Tom, "Well, you've had time
to think about it. Would you rather have never loved Harry at all?"

And Tom knew the answer to that, knew it positively. "No! I'd much
rather have had what I had with Harry."

Q studied his face seriously for a moment. "So the joy of loving is
worth the pain of loss?"

"Definitely."

Tom was surprised when Q shouted at him, "You're lying!"

"What do you mean?" Tom was getting angry. "I am not lying! That's the
truth!"

"But how would you know? You're just telling me what you think I want
to hear. What do you know about the pain of loss, when you don't
believe you've lost anything? You're just waiting for me to bring your
Harry back! Well, just for that, my arrogant young human, I won't do
it!"

"What? No, Q, you can't! Please!"

Q was standing now, in full uniform as a Star Fleet captain, glaring
down at the naked young man on the bed. "Sorry, Tom," he said in a
softly sinister voice, "you lose."

"But you promised!" Tom pleaded desperately.

"I lied," Q said with supreme indifference.

"Wait! I'll do better! I'll do ANYTHING! Please, Q, don't leave - let
me try again - PLEASE!"

But Q was gone.

---

The Doctor didn't understand it. He had discontinued the continual
monitoring a week ago, it was putting too much stress on his
multi-tasking abilities. But he did glance in at Lieutenant Paris
every five or ten minutes or so.

When he checked last, the lieutenant was sleeping peacefully in his
bed. But now, a mere five minutes later, the Doctor opened one-way
communications, and the young man was curled up on the floor, sobbing
hysterically.

"Don't leave me! Please - I'll do anything, please don't leave me!"

Damn these holoemitter limitations anyway! The Doctor called Kes. When
the groggy young woman appeared on the viewscreen, he snapped, "Get
down to Mister Paris' quarters stat, and take your medkit. Administer
a sedative, and call me from there."

Kes nodded, now wide awake, and went into action.

The Doctor checked the time. Two in the morning. Oh well, the Captain
would want to know.

"Janeway," the Captain said in a grumpy tone.

"Captain, Mister Paris appears to be having some sort of breakdown.
I've sent Kes with a sedative - "

"I'm on my way," she interrupted him, and broke the connection.

Janeway threw on a robe, and ran down the hall. Meeting Kes in the
corridor, she went to the door of Tom's quarters and gave the security
override code.

The two women entered cautiously, unsure what form this breakdown
might be taking, but saw that Tom was no threat to them or anyone
else. He was curled up in a ball, moaning, " - don't leave me, please
don't leave me, please don't leave me, please - " Janeway knelt and
put her arms around him, pulling his head to her shoulder and rocking
him like a troubled infant.

Kes knelt beside them, and their eyes met. "I guess the denial stage
is over, wouldn't you say?" Janeway said sadly.

---

Once again, Lieutenant Paris was sedated in Sickbay. The Doctor was in
consultation with the Captain, who was pacing his office restlessly.

"Actually, Captain," the Doctor said, "I must say I consider this a
good sign. He's finally accepted the fact that Ensign Kim is really
gone. Earlier, I was worried, but now, well, now all we have to deal
with is grief."

"Oh, is that all?" Janeway asked with a crooked smile.

"At least it's something familiar. Humans have been dealing with grief
for thousands of years. Earlier, his denial seemed so powerful I was
worried about his mental stability. Now, we'll all just have to pitch
in and do the best we can. I have texts on the grieving process
available on the medical page of the shipwide bulletin board for
people to download."

The Captain patted the Doctor on the shoulder. "You're right, Doctor.
We'll just have to do the best we can."

And within a week, Lieutenant Paris was back at work. Pale and quiet,
but functioning. And, as the Doctor predicted, everyone did the best
they could.

---

There were plenty of women, and quite a few men, who would have been
happy to offer the tragic young man comfort, comfort and whatever else
he might wish to take from them. But no one succeeded.

It wasn't as if Paris were rude to them, simply uncomprehending. As
Chakotay told the Captain in the privacy of her ready room, "I've seen
them try, Captain, and you'll think I'm crazy - but Paris doesn't even
recognize a come-on anymore!"

Janeway sighed. She remembered a few hair-pullers in the women's
locker room back before Tom became involved with Harry. Right now
she'd give anything to hear word of another cat fight over the
lieutenant.

---

It had been a long day, and the Captain was tired and grumpy. Looking
forward to a good book, a little brandy, and a little peace and quiet.
Problems in Engineering, the First Officer wanting to talk about
personnel issues, oh, everyone just leave me alone!

But there was already someone in the Captain's quarters, the sanctum
sanctorum, and that someone had gotten into the books and the brandy,
and was sitting curled up in the most comfortable chair, a book in one
hand, and a brandy snifter in the other.

"Q! What are you doing here?"

Q looked up. "Oh, hello, Jean-Luc. Just popped by to borrow a book."
He held up the book in question, an old-fashioned book with leaves of
paper between hard covers. "I thought you'd have Tennyson. And you
didn't let me down."

Picard eyed Q warily, and went to the decanter for some brandy of his
own. "Just had the urge to dip into a little Tennyson, did we?"

"That's right. I'm taking my own advice for a change." Q turned a
page, and then looked up, as if startled. "Oh, do forgive me! I'm in
your favorite chair, aren't I?" He moved himself, his book, and his
brandy, over to the sofa.

Picard was highly suspicious, but decided to play along. He got his
own book, a new translation of Homer that everyone had been talking
about, and sat down and tried to relax and read.

He actually managed to read a few pages, before curiosity got the
better of him, and he put down his book and asked, "Q, really, what do
you want this time? And - " he felt silly asking, but it was driving
him crazy, " - why Tennyson?"

Q looked up. "In Memoriam. Loss, and recovery, and all that whatnot."

"But why on earth?"

"We're not on earth, Jean-Luc," Q teased.

"Q!"

"Oh, very well. The subject interests me at the moment, because a
young friend of mine has lost his lover, and it's quite devastating
for the boy. I'm just - curious."

"Lost a lover - how?"

"To death, of course. I'm not a bigot, Jean-Luc, not all my friends
are immortal."

"Oh." Picard thought about this for a few minutes. "Must be hard on
the young - man? What species is this friend of yours?"

"Human, of course. You know humans are my specialty."

For some reason, it came as a shock to Picard to hear Q talk about a
young human friend, someone that Picard didn't know about. But he
supposed it made sense. If Q were really a student of humanity, he
surely wouldn't confine his attentions to one ship and one crew. For
all Picard knew, Q might spend all his time flitting from one human
society to another, stirring the anthill to see what came boiling out.
It was an unnerving thought.

"Well," he said at last. "Damn shame. How did she die?"

"HE died in an avalanche, poor boy. My friend seems lost without him.
It really is sad." Q sighed.

Picard was puzzled. Q didn't sound sarcastic at all, he sounded
perfectly sincere. He wished he knew what the powerful and capricious
being was up to. But obviously, Q wasn't going to tell him. After a
few moments of reflection, Picard returned to his book.

---

Tom began to spend a lot of time with the Doctor. He was starting to
rely on the Doctor, as someone he could talk to, someone he could say
anything to, someone who was never shocked.

And the Doctor began to spend part of most evenings in Sandrine's and
discovered that he got to know the crew a lot better this way. When
Mister Paris was there, they would sit at the same table and talk,
usually about inconsequentials.

The Doctor even tried pool once. But he was a holographic program
designed for surgery, a highly intricate manual procedure, and once he
grasped the rules of pool, he turned out to be incapable of losing. So
he gave it up.

If Tom knew the Doctor still monitored him occasionally, he never
mentioned it. And the Doctor certainly never mentioned the number of
times he saw the lieutenant weeping and masturbating over a photo of
Ensign Kim.


---


The months passed, and Voyager continued on its way toward home.
Several wormholes were discovered and turned out to be either
unstable, or lead to other galaxies.

Tom Paris actually cracked a few jokes on the bridge. Captain Janeway
entered each one into her personal log. She hoped he would get over
Harry soon and find some nice young woman or man to comfort him,
because she  was starting to have some very disturbing ideas of her
own about how she  would like to comfort the poor boy.

B'Elanna Torres was having similar thoughts. She would never actually
make a pass at Tom, because she was so firmly convinced that she was
ugly. Her childhood spent in an all human colony, where prejudice
against Klingons ran deep, had drilled that thought into her head, and
now when some of the men on Voyager looked at her appreciatively, she
thought, they must be feeling pretty desperate.

So she would never run the risk of showing Tom she thought he was
attractive. But she could play pool with him at Sandrine's, and she
found a number of scientific curiosities to distract him, and if she
could get him interested in a bit of research she felt she had really
accomplished something.

No one ever saw Q, but that didn't mean he didn't see them.


---

The command staff on the Enterprise didn't know what to make of it,
but Q showed up at least several times a week, these days. Picard
briefed his officers, but there was really nothing to report. Q seemed
to be just - hanging out.

During all these months, Q never played a single trick on anyone, and
except for his sudden entrances and departures, might have been
mistaken for any other human who happened to be on the ship. Of
course, he was always dressed as a Star Fleet captain. That used to
irritate Picard, but he was used to it by now.

Occasionally, Q would make some remark about the progress of his young
friend. Piecing together the remarks, Picard gathered that the unnamed
young friend was a Star Fleet officer, on a ship far from the
Enterprise, who was a pilot and a pool player, and according to Q
"most incredibly goodlooking."

Picard actually put together all these facts to conduct a database
search, but of course Voyager was listed as "missing, presumed
destroyed", and when the ship left the Alpha Quadrant, Tom Paris was
not a pilot at all but merely an Observer. So the avenues Picard
followed all turned into dead ends.

He didn't know why it mattered to him, except that it seemed to matter
to Q.

---

It was a form of living, Tom thought. Certainly better than New
Zealand. He had a function (and not a nasty one), he had friends (good
friends who worried about him, he thought guiltily), he had an
important role here. The self-destructive urge was gone. But so were
the light and the fire.

But, oh, while it had lasted! So bright and hot and brilliant! He knew
he could warm himself on those embers for the rest of his life.

---

When Picard entered his quarters, he saw that Q was visiting again. He
no longer felt that start of tension and suspicion; Q was such a
frequent visitor that Picard didn't even log his visits anymore. And
although Q always seemed to help himself to a brandy, the level in the
decanter never seemed to diminish.

Picard would have trouble admitting it, but he was actually beginning
to enjoy having Q around, someone outside the chain of command that he
could talk to. Perhaps it was the captain's uniform that made Picard
think of him as a peer, but for several months now he had been talking
to Q about issues on the ship. Hesitantly at first, but when Q didn't
respond with derision, Picard realized how nice it was to have someone
he could really talk to.

And Q would listen and try to come up with helpful advice. Sometimes,
his advice would be totally impractical (like the time he suggested to
LaForge that they merely had to "change the gravitational constant of
the universe"), but sometimes he could be surprisingly sharp.

It was the outside view, Picard thought. When I get too close to a
problem, Q can give an outside view. It was a bit of a shock to
realize that he was thinking of Q with something that felt a lot like
affection.

But today Q didn't want to talk about the problems aboard the
Enterprise. He was thinking about his young friend again, and asked
Picard seriously, "What would cause a heterosexual man to fall in love
with a man?"

Picard laughed. "He wouldn't."

"What do you mean he wouldn't?"

"By definition, Q," Picard said, in what he thought was a patient
tone. "If a man falls in love with another man, then he's not
heterosexual."

The tone Picard considered patient sounded to Q like condescension.
"Maybe he's just not as narrow-minded as you are," Q snapped. And he
was gone.

---

Tom Paris sat down near the pool table at Sandrine's. He was out of
the pool tournament now, knocked out by none other than Captain
Janeway. He had grinned at her and pretended to cringe in terror as he
backed away from the table after his defeat.

Sandrine brought a fresh beer over to him, and he turned to the Doctor
and said, "What about it, Doc? Why don't you challenge the Captain?"

"Because I only look stupid, Mister Paris," the Doctor said crisply.
Tom laughed at that. The Doctor's wit was on the acerbic side, but Tom
was used to it by now.

A hand on his shoulder made him jump. Turning, he saw Lieutenant
Nicoletti. She was out of uniform, with her long hair down, wearing
something soft and clingy and a pale mossy green. Quite aesthetic, in
fact. She smiled at him.

"Tom, I was just wondering if you'd be interested in a new holodeck
program I've designed? It's a holonovel, actually, and I'd like to get
some input on it."

Tom smiled at her mechanically. "Maybe sometime, Susan."

She gave him an exaggerated frown of disappointment, but patted his
shoulder, and said, "Sure. Let me know," and moved on.

The Doctor watched her departure, and said thoughtfully, "You used to
be rather interested in her, if I'm not mistaken."

"Huh? Yeah, I suppose I was."

The Doctor noticed the past tense, and sighed. "When are you going to
start - socializing again?"

"What do you mean, Doc?" Tom asked innocently. "I socialize a lot,
look at me now, I've been playing pool, and now I'm sitting here
having a beer and talking with you - "

"You know very well what I mean! It's been ten months now, and in the
past few months I've had five women and three men ask me if I knew how
long the mourning process was supposed to last. I'm getting tired of
telling them that there is no set time, that I don't KNOW."

Tom answered flippantly, but there was a slight tremor in his voice.
"Oh, really. Five women and three men, eh?"

The Doctor snapped, "I'd give you their names if I thought it would do
any good."

Tom closed his eyes briefly. "No good. Sorry, Doc. Not yet."


Ten months, Tom thought, as he entered his quarters. It had been ten
months, hadn't it? He picked up the photo of Harry that stood on his
desk, and gently stroked the pictured cheek. . .

---

. . .  And he was standing in a clearing. By a cave entrance.

Tom was shocked. Was he having another flashback to those delusions he
had right after Harry's death? Or - had they been real?

Slowly, he entered the cave. This time, he was smart enough to be
afraid.

Q stood there waiting for him. He was dressed today in a judge's robe,
and his expression was a stern frown. Tom silently confronted the
powerful and capricious being, amazed that he had once liked him, had
held him in his arms and stroked his hair.

"You have been suffering," Q said coldly.

Tom shrugged.

"You have," the entity went on. "And you have helped me in the past,
or at least attempted to help me, in your limited way. I feel I should
alleviate your suffering."

Tom knew better, but said softly, "Harry - ?"

"NO!" Q responded. "Q will not return the dead to you. It is against
the Rules."

"Well, then, I don't see how you can help me," Tom said with finality.

"Oh, but I can," Q answered, and his voice was softer now. "I can
remove your suffering altogether."

"How?"

"I can remove from your memory all traces of Ensign Harry Kim. His
memory will be gone from all the minds onboard Voyager, and erased
from the ship's computer. It will be as if he had never existed, and
then you will not have lost him, and you can be happy again."

Tom was horrified. "As if he had never been? No! No, don't you dare!"
He was backing away from Q, knowing that he really couldn't get away
but trying nonetheless. "NO! I won't let you, please don't!"

Q advanced as Tom retreated. "Really, I don't understand you. Would
you rather keep the memories, even though they cause you pain?"

"YES! Don't erase Harry, please, those memories are all I have!" Tom
was close to panic.

To his surprise, Q smiled broadly, and in a flash was transformed from
a judge to a Star Fleet captain. "I knew you could do it!" Q told Tom.

"Do what?"

"Why, my brave silly boy, you ANSWERED the QUESTION!"

"I did?"

"Yes, you just did. It is better, you're telling me, to have loved and
lost."

"Oh. Yeah. I guess it is." Tom stopped backing up, but was still
apprehensive. "Does that mean I get to keep my memories?"

"Much more than that! Because I really do keep my promises."

And now Tom was standing in a much larger cave, with pathways and
traces of old Talaxian mining works around him. In his mind, he could
heard Q's voice. "You had to believe he was lost forever in order to
answer the question." The voice seemed to be getting farther away. "
'Against the Rules'," the voice said scornfully. "I'm Q - I don't DO
Rules." And then so faintly it was barely discernable, "But I'll be
wanting one last favor. . . "

Another voice, this one outside his head, made Tom jump. "That last
lode has all the duranium we need, but let's see if this other reading
is more accessible."

And Tom turned around, and there was Ensign Harry Kim, holding a
tricorder and scanning the area. Harry looked up, and saw the look on
Tom's face, and said, "Tom? What is it? What's wrong?"

Tom advanced on Harry and took his arm firmly and pushed him toward
the side corridor. "We're getting out of here," he said positively.

"But why - Tom?"

"Don't argue with me, Harry!" Even though Tom knew that this corridor
was safe, he had pushed Harry a hundred yards away from the large
chamber before the rumbling started. And even then, he pushed Harry to
the ground, and placed himself protectively over the ensign, holding
Harry's head against his chest with trembling hands. This time, he was
going to be sure!

As the rumbling faded and died, Harry pulled away from Tom and looked
up into his face. "Tom? How did you know that was coming?"

"I - thought I heard something," Tom answered, looking intently into
that beloved face, thinking, I heard the echoing loneliness of ten
months without you, dear heart.

Harry sat up and laughed shakily. "Whoa. That was pretty close, wasn't
it?" And then gave a squeak of surprise when Tom pulled him into his
arms, kissing him passionately on the lips, and then pressing his head
to his heart.

Tom's voice was muffled by Harry's hair, but Harry heard every word
perfectly. "Harry, I know you don't approve of fooling around on duty.
But I have to fuck you. I have to. Right now."

Harry nodded.

Tom's hands were shaking as he unfastened Harry's jumpsuit, and pushed
it down around his ankles. He gently stroked Harry's penis, and
reached behind him to fondle his ass, fingering his tight hole. "Oh,
shit, no lubricant. I'll be as careful as I can."

But Harry quickly knelt at Tom's feet, opening Tom's trousers and
taking Tom's erection into his mouth. He licked Tom again and again,
and looked up with a smile. "Boy, when you said you had to, you really
meant it, didn't you?" he asked, feeling that incredible hardness.
Then he stood up and turned away, leaning forward and bracing himself
against the wall. He spread his feet, and looked over his shoulder.
"Well?"

Tom took a deep breath, and stroked Harry's soft young ass, thinking
to himself, this is real, it's real! Then he gently parted Harry's
cheeks and drove into his lover. Harry gasped, and then moaned, "Oh,
Tom!"

Tom reached around Harry's hip, taking Harry's erection into his hand,
and he thrust into his friend and pumped him at the same time, feeling
the warmth, the rushing blood, the sweat and the LIFE. . .

He kissed Harry's ear and neck, pushing down below the line of the
turtleneck, because he knew that today he'd be leaving marks, he
couldn't help it, and he moaned Harry's name over and over, and heard
his own name from Harry's beautiful lips and the voices got louder and
louder until they were both shouting and Tom came convulsively in
Harry's body just as Harry shot all over the rock wall.

They leaned against the wall gasping for a few moments, and then Tom
knelt down to clean Harry with his loving tongue. While Harry was
pulling up his jumpsuit, Tom went over to the wall, and dipped his
finger in Harry's semen to write "T.P. + H.K." Then he dipped his
finger again, and drew a heart around the inscription.

Harry grinned at him. "You romantic fool!"

Tom pulled him into another deep kiss, and said, "Let's go home,
Harry."

After the two men had left the corridor, Q approached the inscription
that was drying on the wall. He looked at it thoughtfully, and said to
himself, "Well, that was a lovely little scene, wasn't it?"

---

Three away teams had reported back in. Only Paris and Kim were still
out in the field, and Captain Janeway felt a chill of dread. Something
had happened, she just knew it. Something awful had happened.

"Paris to Voyager."

"Voyager here." Janeway sat up straight. Tom's voice sounded a bit
shaky.

"We found some duranium on level three, Captain. It's kind of hard to
get to, but we just missed an avalanche on level five, so I'm voting
for level three."

"An avalanche! Are you both all right?"

"We're fine, Captain, we just missed it." Now she could hear the giddy
relief in his voice. "I think we should be in transporter range any
time now."

Janeway sat back with a sigh. That odd premonition she had just a
moment ago! She wasn't used to getting feelings like that, and she was
glad it turned out to be a hoax. She would hate it if she were
suddenly to become psychic.

After turning their tricorded coordinates over to Torres' Engineering
team, the two men reported to Sickbay for their post- away team scans.
Lieutenant Paris entered exuberantly with Ensign Kim right behind him.
"Hey, Doc! Look who's back!"

The Doctor turned and sighed, "Yes, Mister Paris, like the proverbial
bad penny, here you are again."

Tom was about to say, no, I mean Harry's back! But he caught himself
in time. They were back to the day of the avalanche, and he and Harry
had just been off on a four hour away mission, and the Doctor had not
spent ten months gradually becoming a valuable friend. So he just
grinned at the Doctor and said nothing.

As the Doctor examined Paris, he asked, "We heard something about  an
avalanche?"

"Oh, nothing to worry about," Tom said nonchalantly. "Missed us by a
mile. We were out of the chamber well before the thing started."

"Hmm," the Doctor said, moving on to Ensign Kim, and silently noting
the evidence of recent anal activity. "My psychology databases tell me
that many people react to a close brush with death by a sudden
compulsion for sexual activities." He turned to the lieutenant, and
asked, "Should I dust him for prints?"

Harry blushed, but Tom laughed out loud. "Leave him alone, Doc," he
said, and Harry grinned reluctantly.

As the two officers were leaving Sickbay, Tom turned back and said,
"You know, Doc, you ought to stop by Sandrine's some evenings. It
would do you good to get out of the office every now and then."

The Doctor eyed him suspiciously, looking for a punchline, but saw no
evidence of humor in Tom's expression. "That's a definite thought,
Mister Paris. Thank you. I will consider it."

---

That evening was a delightful whirl of romance and sexuality. Harry
wondered what had gotten into Tom, but he sure wasn't going to
complain. Right after dinner, Tom hustled Harry back to his quarters,
and immediately locked the door and undressed his friend.

Then he just stopped, and sat down on the bed, and stared at Harry,
and stared some more. Harry was puzzled. "Tom?"

Tom shook his head, and gestured for Harry to come to him. "Sorry,
Harry. Got lost there for a minute - you're just so damn beautiful - "

Now Harry was in his arms and they were kissing. Harry managed to
undress Tom without detaching his lips from Tom's eager questing
mouth, and that was a significant achievement.

They collapsed onto the bed, still kissing, gently at first, then
harder, almost painfully hard, and Tom sucked Harry's tongue into his
mouth, and groaned deep in his throat as Harry's tongue caressed the
roof of his mouth.

Tom put his hands on Harry's ass and pulled it closer in to him, and
as the two men pressed close together their erections met, and it was
like completing an electric circuit, and they were both caught in the
charge, jerking convulsively, and they cried out against each other's
mouths as they came in unison.

Harry said sadly, "Already?"

But Tom laughed, and said, "That's only the beginning, my friend." He
rolled over onto his back, pulling Harry with him, and Harry lay on
top of Tom, and oh, the feel of him! He ran his hands gently over
Harry's back and shoulders and ass, so warm and soft, and alive.

Harry's cheek was pressed against Tom's chest, and he loved that. Tom
was his first and only male lover, and the tickle of chest hair
against his nose was almost unbearably erotic. Harry turned to nuzzle
Tom's chest, saying happily, "Mmmmm!"

Then he fastened his mouth onto Tom's nipple, sucking hard and biting
gently, enjoying Tom's hiss of pleasure. He could feel Tom beginning
to harden beneath him, as he thoroughly moistened the hardened nipple,
then took it between his fingers and rolled it vigorously as his mouth
moved over to the other. Now he was rolling and pinching both nipples
as he moved up Tom's body and licked Tom's lips. Tom's mouth fell
invitingly open, and Harry attacked it with his own, capturing Tom's
tongue and sucking.

Tom was writhing beneath him, and Harry felt powerful and infinitely
desirable, to think that this experienced and sensual man wanted him,
only him and no one else! Tom's hands were all over his body, moving
restlessly, almost frantically, and Harry moved his mouth to Tom's
ear, licking it and then whispering, "Do you want to fuck me -
Lieutenant?"

"Yes, Harry, you know I do, YES!"

"Oh, you do?" Harry murmured invitingly, his lips right at Tom's ear.
"You want to drive that quivering cock into my tight little ass?" And
added with exaggerated aspiration, "Sssir?"

"Yes, please Harry, let me fuck you!"

"Well!" Harry kissed him hard on the lips. "Since you asked so nicely
- " He moved off Tom and lay beside him on his stomach, running his
hand up and down Tom's body. "Why  don't you take what's yours?"

He closed his eyes luxuriously, and felt the trembling fingers pushing
lubricant deep inside him, and spread his legs wide. He felt the
weight on his back, and then the familiar feeling as Tom entered him.
Harry was expecting a frenzied coupling but to his surprise, Tom
entered him slowly, deeply, and then stopped, buried deep inside him
and lying on his back.

For many long minutes, Tom didn't move at all, lying on his lover with
his cheek pressed into Harry's soft neck. Then Tom said softly, "Oh,
god, Harry, I love you so much, I can't even tell you how much." Harry
trembled beneath him, trembled with love and desire, and Tom thrust
slowly in and out a few times, and then stopped again. He didn't want
it to be over, he didn't want to leave Harry's body, so he took him
gently, stopping often to whisper his love. He spent over an hour on
Harry's beautiful back, inside Harry's beautiful body, making sure,
making positively sure that he expressed all his loving feelings to
the best of his ability. And when he finally came inside his beloved,
his last words were sobs and Harry's back was wet with his tears.

Tom moved slowly off Harry, too overwhelmed to speak, and Harry rolled
over and pulled him into his arms. Harry was completely aroused, he'd
been hard for so long he felt like he had been born with this
erection. He wiped the tears from Tom's face, and tenderly brushed
back Tom's sweatsoaked hair, and kissed his friend on the forehead.

He felt like he was floating, in some higher plane where the only
purpose of life was to love and be loved. And he would love this man,
and try to deserve him.

He gently moved Tom over onto his stomach, and stroked his back and
neck, then moved his hand down to lightly caress Tom's ass. Tom
moaned, and spread his legs. He felt Harry's lips caress his thighs,
as he was gently lubricated and tenderly prepared for penetration.

And then Harry was inside him, and this was the act of love that meant
the most to Tom. It felt like a sacrament to him.

So many men had fucked Tom in the past, and none with love. A few had
actually felt a mild affection for the bitter but lovely young
convict, but most took him with feelings ranging from indifference to
contempt. And many were brutal, for these were angry, hopeless men,
and the sight of Tom Paris, coming from a life of privilege and almost
indecently goodlooking, filled them with nothing but rage, and they
wanted nothing more than to degrade him.

He had taken that degradation to heart, and believed himself tainted
beyond redemption, trying to find enough women, enough admiration,
enough approval, but there was never enough - especially not when the
earliest lessons of his childhood had taught him that whatever
happened to him was always all his own fault.

Beyond redemption, until one evening he had offered himself to his
best friend, to alleviate his loneliness, and Harry had accepted him,
had turned an act of degradation into a perfect expression of love,
and that acceptance had cleansed him.

He felt Harry inside him, and on top of him, and heard Harry groaning
and realized that he was groaning too, and reached over his shoulder
to caress his lover's cheek, shivering at the feel of lips on his
palm.

Harry was stroking Tom, stroking him inside and out, loving the feel
of him, the taste and sound of him, assuring him of his love, because
he knew that Tom needed assurance and Harry loved to give Tom what he
needed. Tom was his angel, his fallen angel, and he would love him all
his life.

And when he came inside his lover, he felt the spasms taking him again
and again, and it felt like dying, and Harry thought deliriously, what
a way to go!

Finally spent, he rolled Tom over so they could hold one another. The
two men lay in one another's arms, speaking only to murmur nonsense.
Tom's hand slid down Harry's belly to gently cradle his penis, and
Harry's hand crept over to Tom's penis, and they stroked one another
gently, not really masturbating, just petting and caressing.

And then there was a third man in the bed. And Q was also naked, his
head on Tom's shoulder. He took Tom's hand from Harry's penis and
placed it on his own, and reached over Tom to take Harry's penis in
his own hand. Then he beamed at the two astonished young men, and said
silkily, "Isn't this sweet? A circle jerk!"

"Hello, Q," Tom said with a sigh.

Q! That's who this guy is, Harry thought, looking at the arrogant,
handsome face now nose to nose with him, his head on Tom's other
shoulder. Harry had been on the bridge that time, and remembered the
great battle of the Qs, and the incredible powers of these beings.
Jeez, a Q had the power to reduce the whole ship to the size of a
subatomic particle! And this was the one who wanted to confine one of
his fellows to a comet's interior for all eternity! And now, here he
was in bed with them, with his hand around Harry's -

Harry thought it would be a good idea to get out of here. He started
to pull back, but Tom's arm was around his shoulder, and Tom stroked
him reassuringly, and now Harry noticed that Tom was also gently
stroking Q. "Don't worry, Harry," Tom said softly. "Q has been helping
us. I think everything is going to be all right."

"Of course, everything is going to be all right!" Q said with
exuberance. "Well, well, I see that everything has been put back in
order, do my humble efforts meet with your satisfaction?"

"They sure do, Q," Tom said, smiling at the alien. "And I really am
grateful."

"I'm so glad." Q raised himself on his elbow and kissed  Tom
passionately on the lips. Tom's lips parted, and Q thrust his tongue
into Tom's mouth, a possessive invasion. Then he broke contact with a
sigh, and saw Harry watching them in horror. He smiled apologetically,
and leaned over to kiss Harry, too. Harry didn't know what to think
about this, but he was starting to get an erection.

Q smiled happily at them. "When I saw you two lovebirds having such a
wonderful time, I just had to join you. SUCH beautiful young men!" He
ruffled Harry's hair affectionately, and then Tom's.

Hesitantly, Harry asked, "Could somebody please tell me what's going
on?"

"Well, Q sort of - fixed a timeline for us, Harry," Tom said. He
couldn't bring himself to tell Harry that he had been dead.

"Oh." Changed timelines and altered realities were things that Harry
was becoming used to. When he left Star Fleet Academy for his first
tour of duty, he had expected adventures, but life on Voyager was
turning out to exceed all his expectations. "What was the other
timeline like?"

"You wouldn't have liked it," Tom said evasively.

"Oh, you truly wouldn't have," Q agreed seriously. He turned to Tom,
and said, "I'm sure you recall that I said I would want one last
favor?"

Tom nodded. "Hey, I said I'd do anything."

Q beamed at him, and then stroked Harry's cheek. "I want to fuck
Harry," he said tenderly.

Harry stiffened, and felt Tom's arm tighten around him. Tom said
angrily, "Hey, Q, I said I'D do anything. I didn't make any promises
for Harry."

"Well, that's what I want," Q said obstinately.

"Look," Tom suggested, "you could fuck me."

"I already HAVE fucked you, my young beauty. Several times. With
incredible thoroughness. Don't say you've forgotten already!"

Harry was trying not to tremble, and pressed himself into Tom's side.
Part of him was remembering that wild trip back to the dawn of the
universe and thinking, don't argue with him, Tom! But another part of
him was screaming, he wants to do WHAT?

It didn't reassure him to realize that Tom was trembling too, and
Tom's hand had drifted down protectively to his ass. Tom said
pleadingly, "Please, Q. He doesn't want to." He stroked Harry's ass,
and said in a choked voice, "No one has ever been there but me."

"Oh, and that what's so attractive about it!" Q said with an amorous
sigh. Then his face hardened, and he said ominously, "Of course, I
could just put everything back the way it was - "

"Q! No! Please don't!"

Harry was alarmed to hear a trace of panic in Tom's voice, and thought
it was time to intervene. "This other timeline," he asked, "what was
wrong with it?"

Tom said softly, "We - weren't together, Harry."

"Like that time I was stationed at Star Fleet Command instead of
Voyager?"

"Something like that," Tom said.

Q added, "But in this timeline, you were assigned to Voyager."

Harry was thinking furiously now. He looked at Tom and saw the fear in
his eyes, and he had never seen his friend this afraid. Then he
understood, or thought he did.

If Harry was assigned to Voyager, and he and Tom were not together,
then... Tom must not be on Voyager. Which must mean that Tom didn't
get a conditional parole for the Badlands mission, and that meant...
that Tom was still back in prison, the horrible place where he was so
brutally abused!

Harry gulped once, and then tried to sound decisive. "All right,
then," he said, and detached himself from Tom's side and rolled over
onto his stomach. Both Tom and Q were staring at him, and he said,
"What are you waiting for, an engraved invitation?"

Q chuckled. "Oh, I do like you!"

Harry thought for a moment, and then positioned himself at an angle,
so that he could lay his shoulders and head on Tom's chest. Tom's arms
came around him, and Tom said lovingly, "I'm right here, Harry. I'll
be right here."

Harry raised himself up for a moment to stroke Tom's face and kiss his
lips. "It'll be okay, Tom," he said, trying to smile.

Q was behind Harry now, and said, "Oh, it will be more than okay! It
will be WONderful!"

Harry placed his head on Tom's chest, and gripped Tom's shoulders, as
he spread his legs and raised his hips for the alien. Q gently stroked
his thighs, and kneaded his ass, and thought that there was something
really quite moving about this. He knew that Harry thought he was
prostituting himself to save his friend from further abuse, and had
not the slightest idea that what he was doing was really to save his
own life. Apparently, young humans really did find the prospect of
their own deaths inconceivable.

He slid a finger into Harry's anus, and whispered, "Think of the
kismet of this, my dear. If you hadn't met that ex-convict in that
Ferengi bar, you probably would never have known how to position your
attractive little hips to allow me to fuck you." And then he drove
slowly into the lovely boy, and began to thrust in and out.

Harry's arms tightened around Tom, and Tom gently stroked Harry's
hair, telling him over and over that everything was all right, that he
was right here. The two men's eyes were locked on each other, never
wavering. It hurt Tom to see Harry receiving even a small part of the
kind of treatment that had left Tom feeling so contaminated, but he
remembered that still, cold form in the morgue, and told himself that
anything was better than that. He hoped Harry wouldn't be too
traumatized by this.

But Harry smiled lovingly at Tom, and unlocked one of his clenched
hands to stroke Tom on the cheek. He whispered, "I've always wished
that there were some way I could show you just how much I love you."
Now tears were rolling unchecked down Tom's cheek, and Harry brushed
them away.

For a moment, Q felt piqued, seeing the two lovers so engrossed in one
another, unable to recognize the honor of being fucked by Q. He wanted
to ask them, what am I, chopped liver? Instead, he reached out to
sense their feelings, to see what in the universe could be so
compelling.

"Oh! OHH! I can FEEL it!" Tom finally broke eye contact with his
lover, to look with concern at the powerful alien who was fucking his
Harry. "Feel what?"

"His love for you!" Q gasped, and then almost screamed, "I can FEEL
IT!"

Tom smiled, and reached over Harry's shoulder to stroke Q's face. He
thought that feeling Harry's love for the first time must be
overwhelming, even for a being that believed itself omnipotent. "Gets
to you, huh?" he said teasingly, and ruffled Q's hair.

Harry no longer felt frightened, no longer felt degraded, he felt
powerful and giving and completely aroused. He was showing this
arrogant alien something he'd never seen before! Then he felt the
mighty spasms of Q's orgasm, and he was filled with the warm fluid as
Q collapsed on his back.

Tom's hands were busy, caressing Harry, caressing Q, as the three lay
tangled together on Tom's well-used bed. Then Q moved up beside Tom,
and said weakly, "My research just keeps getting more interesting all
the time."

Tom was surprised when Harry, his shy, gentle friend, reached over him
to stroke Q's face and hair. "Did you like that?" Harry asked, but he
spoke proudly, as if he already knew the answer.

Q seized his hand and kissed the palm. "Very much so, you splendid
creature, and you well know it."

Harry's erection was digging into Tom's hip, and when Tom felt Harry's
other hand drift downward, he said remorsefully, "Oh, Harry, let me do
that!"

He rolled Harry onto his back, and sat up to assess the situation.
Harry's shaft was swollen and throbbing with need, a single teardrop
weeping from the tip, and Tom leaned over and lapped up the drop,
causing Harry to jerk as if shocked. He parted his lover's legs, and
settled himself confortably beside him on his knees, because he
planned to take his time, and placed Harry's erection gently on the
palm of his hand.

But before he began licking and sucking, Tom kissed Harry's penis, a
trail of hot, ardent kisses from base to tip, and then kissed the tip
several times more.

Harry was stroking Tom's golden hair, his eyes almost closed, giving
himself up to the sensations and emotions, but Q was watching the
scene with eyes wide open, thinking in astonishment, what a romantic
this boy is! He felt a surge of affection, and a sharp pang of
white-hot lust, and Tom's unprotected ass was positioned so
invitingly!

So Q got up onto his knees, and got behind Tom and began to caress his
ass and thighs. Tom looked over his shoulder, his eyes twinkling, and
said only, "Opportunist!" But he spread his knees a little wider,
which was all the invitation Q needed to drive into Tom's body until
his shaft was buried completely in the young man's flesh.

Tom was licking Harry's erection now, and gently rolling Harry's balls
in their velvety sack, and Harry was moaning with pleasure. He looked
at the two of them, his angel Tom all white and gold, and the dark
handsome alien caught up in their passion, and saw that Tom now was
also aroused. Harry reached down to take Tom's penis in his hand, and
now all the connections were complete.

Q wondered when Tom would realize that he was serving two men at once,
participating in the nightmare scenario that had caused him to wake up
so many nights in a cold sweat.

But Tom was flying. His whole body tingled as he gave pleasure to his
resurrected lover, and to the blessed alien who had given him so much.
He knew they were enjoying him, enjoying his body, and they were
touching him everywhere, and he soared.

Q could feel Tom's emotions now, the depth and strength of his love
for Harry, and he thought to himself, Q, you old fool, if you wanted
to know what love was, all you had to do was bring them together! And
in his human body, he could feel the physical pleasure and enjoy their
incredible beauty, and he understood now that it was much better to
have this, even if you know it will one day be lost. His most
successful research project to date, and one that would have the most
important outcome.

He looked fondly down at the two beautiful young men, lost in their
lust and their love, and thought to himself, I wish I had a picture of
this!

(And of course, since he was Q after all, the wish became an instant
reality, and the picture Q desired was immediately front page news in
the Q Continuum, causing a scandal and an uproar. The result of the
uproar was to promote Q from being a minor irritant to the powers of
the Continuum into a powerful opposition figure, leading eventually to
the ouster of the repressive and stagnant regime. And this is how two
naked Star Fleet officers caused the overthrow of a government, which
is a definite violation of the Prime Directive. Fortunately, Star
Fleet Command never found out.)

At this moment, Q had no idea of the stirring times ahead for him, but
he felt a shift, an actual movement in a continuum that abhorred
movement, and he threw back his head, shouting triumphantly as he came
in Tom's body.

Which caused Tom to spurt all over Harry's chest and belly, and that
caused Harry to come in Tom's mouth. The two humans and the Q
collapsed into a heap. Tom immediately seized Q's head and pulled him
into a deep kiss so that he could taste Harry, and then Harry pulled Q
to his chest to allow him to taste Tom. And then they all reclined in
a tangle, each with arms around the other two.

Finally Tom spoke. In a weak voice, but with a hint of suppressed
laughter, he asked, "Are we having fun yet?"

"I think so," Q admitted.

And then Q was standing beside the bed, a Star Fleet captain once
again. "I must be off, little lovebirds, destiny awaits!" And he was
gone.

Harry said, "Weird!" And the two men drifted off to sleep.

---

The cave? Again? Tom looked around the clearing, wondering what was
different, and then entered the cave. And there was Q sitting beside
the fire. The fire was going out.

"Q? Something's different. What is it?"

Q looked up with surprise. "You're more perceptive than I thought.
What's different is that this really is a dream." He smiled at Tom. "I
just didn't have the heart to pull you from sweet Harry's arms."

Tom sat down beside Q. Finally Q went on. "I just wanted to talk with
you again. Try to explain what this was all about."

Tom didn't say anything. He thought to himself, About Time!, and Q
arched an eyebrow at him.

"I was assigned to study humans some years ago," Q said. "And after
observing them for a while, I manifested myself in human form to a
Star Fleet ship. I met humans and got to know them, and they got to
know me. They didn't like me very well, all those tests I put them
through, who could blame them?"

He stared into the embers for a few moments of silence. "I kept
returning to that ship. There was a man there - well, the captain - he
... interested me. And I started feeling strange feelings, and Q
hasn't had feelings for millennia. I didn't understand it. And I began
to think... I thought I cared about the man."

He looked at Tom, and Tom's eyes were dancing with barely suppressed
glee. Because of course, Tom had been weaned on space gossip, and he
knew very well which ship had been visited by Q, and who commanded
that ship.

Q looked at him with a sigh. "I forgot for a moment that you're a Star
Fleet brat. Pretend you don't know who I'm talking about."

"Gotcha," Tom said agreeably.

"It worried me to think that I cared about the man," Q went on.
"Because of course, he would die. They all do. So I had two questions
I asked myself. Did I love him? And should I love him? And I had
complicated the issue by first appearing in the form of a male; gender
is a very unQ concept. It didn't matter to me. But perhaps it would to
him."

"The criteria!" Tom exclaimed.

"Exactly." Q nodded. "You are quick, aren't you?  You are a man,
previously totally heterosexual, who fell in love with another man.
That was one thing I was interested in. And you were a man who had
lost your love, so I could discover whether this transitory love was
worth the eventual grief."

"If you're asking my opinion, I'd say go for it," Tom told him
seriously.


"I'm inclined to agree with you," Q said. "But do you think I should
switch gender? It would be easy enough."

And suddenly Tom was looking at the most exotically beautiful female
Star Fleet captain he had ever seen. And even for a thoroughly
committed guy like himself, well, she just took his breath away!

"Wow!"

"You like it? You think - he would like it?"

Tom thought about it, thought seriously. "Well, I think it would
really turn him on, but if he's used to you the other way-"

And Q was back to his familiar form. "Really? He's so proper, you
know. Could he - love me like this? Gender seems so important to you
humans."

"I don't know," Tom said. "Harry was my friend for a long time, and I
knew I would have died for him. But I don't think I realized I loved
him until he kissed me."

Q stared at Tom for a long moment. "My dear, I think you've just said
something profound."

Q stood up, and said, "Well, there's one way to find out." He took
Tom's hand and helped him to his feet. "I'll be off about my business,
and let you get back to your little whore."

He was secretly amused at the instant flare of fury he felt from the
young man.

"Q! What right do you have - !"

"Oh, do pray forgive me! Perhaps my command of the language is less
accurate than I had supposed. But surely the correct term for one who
trades in his body for goods and services, or other considerations - "

"That's different!" Tom raged at him. "Harry didn't have a choice!"
And then stopped, open-mouthed, realizing the implications of what he
had just said.

Q watched him with an amused smile. "Did I just see a light bulb turn
on?" He stroked Tom gently on the cheek. "Harry didn't have a choice -
and neither did you."

---

Tom awoke with a start. He was in his own bed, with Harry nestled
sweetly in his arms. In his mind, he heard the echo of a voice, fading
away, "And that insight is my gift to you. . ."

And finally, finally, Tom forgave himself.

---

Picard entered his quarters in a foul mood. An absolute temper. All
these ridiculous people! Then he saw that Q was there, and felt an
instant lightening of his spirits.

"Oh, hello, Q. I'm really fed up with the human race right now."

"Oh?" Q put aside his book. (This time it was Ovid. Ars Amatoria.)

"I tell you, Q, if Counselor Troi comes to me with one more problem
from our civilian complement, just one more, I'm stopping at the
nearest Star Base and dumping every civilian onboard into the lap of
Star Fleet Command."

Q stood up. "Jean-Luc?"

"What?"

"Shut up."

"What?!"

That was all Picard had a chance to say before Q pulled him into his
arms and kissed him. Kissed him thoroughly, passionately, and
completely.

Picard froze for a moment, and struggled for another moment, and then
to his own surprise, his arms slowly went around the body of the
exasperating alien.

Q chuckled. He had gone to the right source for advice, he thought.
Still kissing Picard, he maneuvered them into the bedroom, and when
they landed on the bed with Q on top of Picard, by the power of Q they
were both naked.

Picard started to say something, but Q's fingers covered his lips.
"Now, don't argue with me, Jean-Luc. I love you and I want you, and I
won't take no for an answer."

Picard's lips moved under Q's fingers, but they formed, not words, but
a kiss. Q carefully moved his hand from Picard's mouth, and Picard
said hoarsely, "I wasn't going to give no for an answer."

Then they were kissing again.

---

Tom Paris lay in his bed, his arms around Harry Kim, once thought lost
forever, and now returned to him. Harry slept peacefully, but Tom's
thoughts were spinning, crazily and humorously, and he stroked Harry's
silky black hair as he thought.

Tom was remembering the time Captain Jean-Luc Picard had attended a
party at his father's house, and the teenaged Tom had thought Picard a
remarkably stuffy individual, even more so that most of his father's
crowd.

And now that stuffy old guy was going to get a sudden introduction to
Q Love! Tom couldn't stand it, he just couldn't stand it another
minute, and he started laughing uncontrollably.

His laughter woke up Harry. "Tom? What is it? What's so funny?"

Tom grinned at his best friend. "Oh, nothing really, Harry. It's just
that - "

He rolled over with Harry beneath him, kissing him exuberantly, and
then he smiled into Harry's loving eyes and asked, "Isn't it great to
be alive?"

---
"I hold it true, whate'er befall;
I feel it, when I sorrow most;
'T is better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all."

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

---

continued in the third story in the Tom, Dick and Harry series 'B'Elanna's Reward'