DISCLAIMER: Paramount (and Viacom) owns all rights to the Star Trek
Universe, but not to my imagination, warped as it may be.  Mild hanky alert
on this one.  And now for my usual admonishment: be kind, but please send
all comments and criticism (constructive, please) to AnnitaS@aol.com.


                    DEMON SOUL
                     by Neetz

     B'Elanna Torres sat next to the biobed, holding the hand of an
unconscious Tom Paris and pressing it against her cheek.  With all the
work that still needed to be done to Voyager in the wake of their most
recent crisis, she should probably be down in engineering.  But as she
gazed down at Tom's lax features, her need to be here outweighed any
lingering feelings of guilt she might feel over neglecting her duty.  After all,
she had worked until the doctor called to tell her that Tom was showing
signs of regaining consciousness.  Besides, engineering was in the capable
hands of Joe Carey, with the cool-headed Vorik to assist.  And, it had been
a major concession on her part to be away from Tom at all after what
they'd just been through.
     Her thoughts moved back--was it only hours ago?--to how it all
began.
                        ***
     They had been running dangerously low on deuterium.  So serious
was the crisis that the captain had ordered the ship to run in gray mode--with power consumption cut to the barest minimum.  It involved several
hardships for the crew, including abandoning their individual quarters for
the duration, sleeping together in larger rooms such as the mess hall.  For
B'Elanna, it had meant the shutting down of all nonessential systems. 
Determining what was really nonessential was the hard part.  In the past
four years, they had learned to expect the unexpected.  Traveling through
the Delta Quadrant, sixty years travel time from home, you never knew
what you might need in the next moment.
     In gray mode, it would take a lot longer than sixty years to get
home.  In fact, if they didn't find a source of deuterium within the next
week or so, they'd be dead in space.  Quite literally!
     Then, Seven of Nine located a planet with an incredibly high
deuterium reading.  But there was one major drawback.  It was a demon
class planet, the kind with the most inhospitable environment for humanoid
life.
     But they were desperate, and after it became obvious they couldn't
retrieve the deuterium any from orbit, Harry came up with a plan.  He and
Tom would take a shuttle with special shielding down to the planet, and
wearing modified environmental suits, they should have enough time to
locate and secure the needed element before the heat and corrosive
atmosphere ate away their protection.  Not exactly a walk in the park
mission.
     B'Elanna was waiting for them when they arrived in the shuttlebay.
     "I need to talk to you," she said pointedly to Voyager's pilot.
     "Uh, I'll go get the environmental suits ready," Harry said quickly. 
Tom chuckled, shaking his head as he watched his friend make a hasty exit.
     "What's so funny?" B'Elanna asked.
     "Harry," Tom replied, as if that explained everything.  When
B'Elanna continued to stare at him, he must have realized she needed a
better explanation.  "He was just explaining to me that he'd come to the
realization that he wasn't a green ensign anymore, that his experience these
past four years had given him the right to voice his opinion, to stand up to
people like Tuvok.  He did, you know, in the staff meeting.  But it seems
he still draws the line when it comes to crossing a certain half-Klingon."
     "Are you trying to say I intimidate Harry?" she asked, not believing
it for a minute.
     "Only when you have that 'don't-mess-with-me' look on your face. 
That expression would intimidate anyone."
     "Except you," she countered.
     He smiled.  "Well, I know ways around most of those moods of
yours."
     "You think you know me pretty well, don't you, hot shot?" she
challenged.
     He shook his head.  "If I live to be a hundred and ten, I'll never
know everything about you, B'Elanna.  That's part of why I find you so
intriguing."
     B'Elanna almost smiled before she realized he had just
demonstrated the truth of what he had been saying.  He'd diverted her from
her purpose when she'd first approached them.  Using her own experience
with Tom Paris, she effortlessly redirected the conversation where she
wanted it to go.
     "You won't live to be a hundred and ten if you keep volunteering
for hazardous missions!"  She punctuated her words with a stubborn
raising of her chin and a narrowing of her eyes at him.
     "Hey, I didn't volunteer!" he protested.  "Harry volunteered me!"
     She shook her head, determined not to be sidetracked again.  "Like
that matters.  You wouldn't have let him go alone even if the captain had
agreed to it."
     A hint of a smiled played at the corners of his lips.  "You're
probably right.  But isn't that one of the reasons you love me so much?  My
devil-may-care attitude and my adventurous spirit?"
     "No," she replied.  "I love you in spite of those and all your other
faults!"
     Tom grinned, and when he did, his clear blue eyes seemed to
sparkle.  That smile had always been his most potent weapon, and this time
was no different.  B'Elanna knew she was lost.  With a sigh of resignation,
she entreated, "Just be careful, and promise me you won't get yourself in
any serious trouble down there."
     "If I don't come back in one piece, you'll kill me, right?"
     "Damned straight, I will!" she replied, then she closed the space
between them with one small step and slid her arms around his waist.  She
closed her eyes as she leaned her cheek against his chest, hearing his heart
beating reassuringly as she felt his arms close around her.  She always felt
so safe in Tom's arms.  The first time she'd experienced the feeling had
been when they believed they were going to die alone together in the cold
vacuum of space.  Once she had finally told Tom that she loved him, a
feeling of peace and contentment had come over her.  She remembered
losing consciousness in his arms, thinking everything was all right.  If they
had to die, they were together, and Tom knew she loved him.  Ever since
that moment, his embrace had been like a haven--a sanctuary to her.
     Far too soon, Harry called to them that he was ready.  Tom placed
his fingers beneath her chin and turned her face up toward his.  Then, he
leaned down to gently kiss her.  It wasn't one of their more passion-filled
kisses, the kind that always seemed to leave them both breathless and
thoroughly aroused.  While she enjoyed the times when they allowed their
physical appetites for each other free reign, and while making love to Tom
was certainly among her favorite things to do, for B'Elanna, this was the
part of their relationship that she truly loved the most.  This kiss was
reassuring, a promise that everything would be as it should be.  A quiet
expression of something that went deeper than the fulfillment of physical
desires, it was something that touched her very soul--that made her and
Tom a part of each other.
     "Come back," she whispered with intensity as he finally drew back.
     "I will," he replied in the same quiet tone.  With one last brush of
his fingers over her hair as his eyes seemed to drink her in, he turned and
joined Harry.  B'Elanna watched them enter the shuttlecraft, then she
walked through the reinforced doors and leaned against the bulkhead as she
listened to the computer report the depressurization sequence and the
shuttle launch.  They were gone.  And when Tom left, so did the warmth
that had filled her when he held her close.
     At that moment, something cold and frightening seemed to creep
into B'Elanna's heart.  Forcibly, she shook herself free of the unsettling
feeling, pushed away from the wall and headed purposefully for
engineering.
                        ***
     Something was wrong.  Tom and Harry were long overdue, enough
to prompt the captain to take Voyager itself down to the planet's surface,
and B'Elanna could no longer hold back those feelings of fear that had been
nagging at her ever since she'd seen them off.  No matter how hard she
tried to concentrate on the life-threatening problems before her, her mind
didn't want to cooperate.  Finally, she drew on her time-honored method
for dealing with her own fears--anger.  Her first target: Vorik.  His
damnable logic only served to raise her temper to the boiling point.  Then,
he had to make that comment about "loosing our cool."  When he informed
her that he'd picked it up from Lieutenant Paris, she felt her anger die.  For
one brief moment, she felt that touch of Tom's soul within hers and she
found herself smiling at the usually annoying Vulcan.
     But with her anger dissipated, soon the fears crept back in.  She
closed her eyes, trying to will the negative thoughts away.
     "Tom Paris can get into more trouble than any man I know, but he
always finds a way to get himself out."
     Her eyes flew open at the sound of Joe Carey's voice and the
unexpected feel of his hand as it rested on her arm.  She turned to find him
standing next to her, an expression of understanding on his face.
     "He's a very resourceful guy.  And so is Harry."
     She nodded.  "I know that.  I just wish Chakotay had let me go
with him."
     "We need you here, Chief," Joe replied.  "And I hear the
commander took Seven of Nine with him to look for them.  I know she
wouldn't be your choice, but..."
     B'Elanna laughed.  "Actually, I asked Chakotay to take her with
him."
     Carey looked at her in surprise.
     "I'm not even sure why I did it."
     "Well, with her Borg knowledge, she's probably the closest thing to
a living, breathing databank we've got.  That's got to be an asset."
     "And she can certainly keep a cool head.  Chakotay said I was too
close to this."
     "He's right."
     "I know that, Joe, but it doesn't make it any easier."
     "Yeah, I know."  He considered for a moment.  "You actually
asked him to take Seven?  I mean, she's always seems to rub you the wrong
way."
     "I don't know, she just seems to bring out my Klingon half,"
B'Elanna admitted.
     "You know, I seem to recall a time when *I* brought out your
Klingon side."  Her one-time rival looked at her meaningfully as he touched
his finger to his nose.
     B'Elanna found herself smiling at him.
     "Look at us now," he continued, then reached out and patted her
arm.  "Think positive.  Tom and Harry will be okay.  But if we don't find a
way to extend life support..."
     "I know," she replied, "so you'd better get over there and help
Vorik while I work on the problem from here."
     "Yes, ma'am," he replied with a smile before turning to leave.
     "Think positive," she repeated to herself as she turned back to her
console.
     But what if they aren't okay? the little voice whispered inside her
head.  What will I do if Tom doesn't come back from this one?
                        ***
     For the second time in the past few hours, B'Elanna was headed for
sickbay.  The first time--when Chakotay had brought back what he thought
was Tom and Harry--she had been on her way to reassure herself that they
were indeed safely back aboard the ship in spite of the odds.  But the
captain had interrupted her, calling her to the lab to help investigate the
"problems" Tom and Harry were experiencing.
     Problem was putting it mildly!  In some kind of strange cosmic
twist, it seemed, according to the doctor, that the planet had bioformed the
two humans, adapting them to the otherwise deadly environment of the
demon planet.  Now, unless they could find a solution, Tom and Harry
would be forced to remain behind, unable to live for any length of time on
Voyager once it left the only source of the atmosphere that now sustained
them.
     B'Elanna needed desperately to see Tom, but that need had to wait. 
At that moment, his life--their future together--depended on finding a
solution to the problem.
     Now, just a few hours later, everything had changed.  Amazingly,
another Tom and Harry had been found on the planet!  And it seemed the
two beings everyone had believed to be Voyager's pilot and operations
officer were some kind of duplicate, created by Tom and Harry's contact
with a mnemonic life form that existed in a liquid metallic state on this
world.
     But that was something the captain would have to deal with.  As
soon as she had heard that the real Tom and Harry were found, barely
alive, she had turned control of engineering over to Carey and headed for
sickbay.  This time, nothing stopped her.
     At least, not until she had charged into the medical unit and was
confronted with the sight of Tom Paris, standing very much alone on one
side of the sickbay.  For a moment, their eyes locked.  His face seemed to
light up when he saw her and he started forward--until he bumped into a
crackling  force field.
     It wasn't Tom.  It was the duplicate, she realized.  He must have
seen that realization reflected in her features.  Suddenly, those familiar blue
eyes filled with sadness and longing, just before he turned away.
     A movement on the other side of the room caught B'Elanna's
attention, and she turned to see the doctor hovering over one of two
occupied biobeds.  She first made out Harry's dark hair as he lay
unconscious on one of the beds.  She moved toward them and soon she
could see Tom lying on the other as Doc ran a scan down the length of his
body.
     Quickly crossing to the other side of the bed from the EMH,
B'Elanna gazed down at Tom's sleeping face.  Without even realizing what
she was doing, she touched his cheek with her fingers.
     "He's going to be just fine," the doctor's voice seemed to break the
spell and she looked up to seem him smiling at her.  "They both will.  It
was touch and go for a few moments.  They were barely alive when we
transported them here from the surface, but they'll recover completely."
     "How long until they wake up?"
     "Probably a few hours," he replied.  "Their bodies need the time to
recover.  But they'll soon be up and around and back to normal."  He
offered her a crooked smile.  "That is, if you can classify anything about
Mr. Paris as normal."  Without waiting for her to reply, he headed for his
office.
     The remark had its desired effect.  For the first time since the
shuttle left, B'Elanna allowed herself to relax.  But the moment didn't last.
     "B'Elanna?"
     At the sound of Tom's voice, she looked down at the figure on the
bed, expecting to find him awake.  But she immediately realized the it
hadn't been the still-unconscious man who had softly uttered her name. 
She slowly turned toward his figure who bore his image standing behind
the force field.  The look of sadness still haunted his eyes.
     At that moment, the duplicate Paris cried out in pain as he doubled
over, leaning heavily on a nearby biobed for support.  The sight made her
rush toward him.
     "What's wrong?" she cried.
     He struggled to answer.  "What--the captain is doing.  It's--killing
us."
     Us? she thought.  "The nadian bursts?" she asked.
     He nodded as he pulled himself upright, still clutching at his middle.
     "I don't understand.  We're firing at the metallic liquid."
     "We are connected--a part of it."
     "The mnemonic properties we discovered!  Somehow when you--when Tom touched it, it took his form."
     His eyes locked with hers.  "Not just his form.  I am Tom Paris.  I
have all his thoughts, his memories.  His regrets.  His fears.  And yet, to a
part of me, all this is new.  We didn't know before.  We only existed.  Now,
we live."
     "You're not Tom."
     "Yes, I am!"
     She shook her head.  "You're some demon planet version.  You're
not *my* Tom."
     The eyes that duplicated Tom Paris filled with such pain and
sadness that it caused B'Elanna's stomach to lurch.
     "I want--to be.  I must return to the planet.  It calls to me.  And yet
to return there--for us to be alone..."  He dropped his head.
     Unable to bear the sight of his suffering, B'Elanna started to reach
out to him, then suddenly realization struck her.
     "That's what you--or this fluid entity wants, isn't it?  That's why it's
holding us here.  It wants--you want to keep us here with you!"
     "Yes!"
     She shook her head.  "But we can't stay.  We can't survive here any
more than you can survive on Voyager outside of the atmosphere inside
that force field.  We aren't compatible."  She held out her hand.  "We can't
even touch."
     He raised his head to look at her once more, and she could see the
tears rolling down his face.  "I know."  Once again, he started to turn away
from her, then suddenly, he blinked and cocked his head to one side, as if
hearing something she couldn't hear.
     "What is it?" she asked.
     "The captain," he replied.  "She's talking to Harry in the transporter
room.  She wants to understand, but how can she when we don't even
understand this ourselves.  We only know what we feel."
     B'Elanna could see his frustration.  "If you have all of Tom's
memories, then you know the captain.  If there's a way to help you, she'll
find it."
     "How can she?  What can any of you do but leave us here--alone. 
We cannot live alone--I cannot live--without you."
     B'Elanna's heart ached for the man before her.  The man who was
and yet wasn't the man she loved more than anything.  She could see how
much he was suffering, torn between the instinctive needs of the entity that
created him and was still a part of him, and the newly discovered feelings
that he inherited when he took on the form of Tom Paris.  Not just the
form, she reminded herself.  All of Tom's needs, his desires, surged within
this being.  How much of "her" Tom had been duplicated in that moment of
creation?  Was it possible to duplicate a soul?
     "I'm sorry," she whispered, feeling the sting of tears in her own
eyes.
     The duplicate Tom's eyes suddenly brightened.  "Yes!"
     "What's happening?" a voice asked.  B'Elanna turned to find the
doctor standing just behind her.  She wondered how long he had been
there.
     "The captain will try to help us."
     "How?" the doctor asked before B'Elanna could voice the same
question.
     "She will ask the crew if they are willing to allow us to duplicate
them.  We won't have to touch you.  We only need a sample of your
DNA."  He looked at B'Elanna "You will not be harmed.  If you agree, we
won't have to be alone."
     The blue eyes that were identical to the ones that could always melt
her heart pleaded with her now.  But how would the crew react to such a
request?  The idea of allowing yourself to be copied, right down to the
innermost part of your being, was almost unthinkable.  Humans held on so
fiercely to their individuality.  To know that another being held all your
thoughts, all your feelings.  And to then leave that copy of yourself behind
forever...  In a way, it was frightening.
     And yet, when she looked into the eyes of the man before her, she
had no doubt whatsoever of what her own answer would be.  She glanced
over her shoulder at the real Tom Paris, lying asleep on the biobed,
unaware of the drama being played out as a result of his and Harry's little
adventure.  She looked at Harry, her first friend on Voyager.  If only Harry
had been duplicated and not Tom, would she be as sure of her decision? 
She knew that answer, too.
     After four years aboard Voyager, as the captain had remarked on
more than one occasion, this had become more of a family than just the
crew of a starship.  Could she leave such a perfect duplicate any of that
family behind to live alone?  Somehow, she believed she knew what the
answer would be not only for her, but for the rest of the crew.
     Raising her hand and holding it as near to the force field as she
could without touching it, she smiled at the face she knew so well.
     "You won't be alone."
                        ***
     B'Elanna lowered Tom's hand back down to the bed, then, closing
her eyes, leaned over and placed her ear to his chest.  The strong, steady
beating of his heart once more gave her that sense of contentment she had
felt in the shuttlebay when this whole adventure began.  As she listened,
she felt Tom begin to stir.  She opened her eyes in time to see his flutter
open, close, then open again.  After a moment, they focussed on her face.
     "Hi."  His voice was weak as water, but it was a beautiful sound. 
B'Elanna, however, was determined not to let her relief show so quickly.
     "Don't you 'hi' me, mister!"
     "You're mad," he concluded.
     "Damned right, I'm mad!  You promised you'd come back."
     Tom glanced around to ascertain his location.  "I am back."
     "Not on your own, and very nearly not at all!"
     Suddenly his eyes grew wide.  "Harry!"
     B'Elanna's hand resting lightly against his chest was all it took to
keep him from rising.  "Harry's fine."  She glanced behind her.  "He's still
asleep, but Doc says you'll both be okay."
     Tom looked toward Harry, then finding the reassurance he needed,
he asked, "What happened?"
     B'Elanna sighed.  "That is a *very* long story."
     Tom shrugged.  "Doesn't look like I'm going anywhere."
     This time, she allowed herself to smile.  "What do you remember?"
she asked.
     "Passing out in a cave on the demon planet," he replied.  "What
happened after that?"
     Taking a deep breath, she began relating the story.  She watched as
Tom tried to take in all the ramifications of what had happened to him and
Harry, and the consequences for the rest of the crew.
     "So, what happened when the captain spoke to the crew?" he asked
when she'd reached that point in her narrative.
     As she looked into the eyes of the real Tom Paris, B'Elanna recalled
the smile on the face of his twin just before the call came from the bridge
for the entire crew to assemble in Cargo Bay 1.  She had been right.  She
had watched the faces of her crewmates as the captain explained the
situation and put the awesome question to them.  She saw the same
feelings she had felt reflected in their features as they considered all the
implications of this decision.
     "I'd already made up my mind before I went to the Cargo Bay, so I
was the first to tell the captain I was willing to donate a little DNA.  But I'd
barely got the words out of my mouth when Neelix agreed, too."
     "Neelix?" Tom asked, then smiled.  "I guess it's really not all that
surprising when you think about it.  He may be the only Delta Quadrant
native and therefore is arguably the most alien among us, but Neelix
accepted this crew as his family a long time ago.
     "And he thinks of you and Harry as his closest friends."
     "Yeah," Tom sighed.  "We've certainly come a long way from those
early days when we were rivals for Kes' attention."
     There had been a time when Tom's mentioning Kes might have set
off a spark of jealousy in B'Elanna, but those days were long gone.  Kes
had proved to be a true friend to both of them.  B'Elanna knew Tom
missed her.  So did she.
     "What happened after Neelix said yes?" Tom asked.
     "Tuvok was next."
     Tom laughed.  "Let me guess.  He considered it a logical solution,
right?"
     "Almost a direct quote," B'Elanna confirmed, then she described
how Chakotay had stepped forward, casting a smile in her direction as he
voiced his assent.  Joe Carey had been next, but only slightly ahead of
several others.
     "In the end, no one refused."
     Tom looked at her in disbelief.  "No one?"
     "Not everyone said yes right away, but the captain told the
undecided to think about it and let her know in the next few hours.  By the
end of two, everyone had agreed."
     "Wow!" Tom exclaimed.  "I'm not sure... I mean..."
     "Why?" she finished for him and he nodded.  "Everyone had their
own reasons.  I can only tell you why I agreed."
     "Tell me."
     She touched her fingers to his cheek.  "Because I couldn't leave you
here alone."
     "He wasn't me.  He was some kind of demon planet clone of me."
     "Demon or angel, who's to say.  All I know is that when I looked
into his eyes, I saw someone I loved."
     Tom's hand reached for hers.  "If he really was an exact duplicate of
me, you were looking at someone who loves you--with all his heart."
     B'Elanna felt the tears in her eyes again as she smiled down at Tom. 
It took only a slight tug on her hand to pull her down into his embrace. 
Once again, she'd found her refuge, the warm, safe place that only existed
in the arms of Tom Paris.
                        ***
     "All stations report ready for lift off."
     "Code Blue status confirmed."
     "Take us up, Mr. Paris."
     "Aye, Captain."
     As the ship rose from the surface of the demon planet, the tiny
figures on the viewscreen grew smaller and smaller.  The turbolift doors
opened and B'Elanna stepped onto the bridge in time to see them disappear
as Voyager's crew left behind over 140 copies of themselves.  She stepped
down, all but unnoticed by the rest of the bridge crew whose attention was
still riveted on the fading image of the planet as they climbed away.
     Tom's hands flew over the controls, setting their course toward the
Alpha Quadrant.  But a part of each of them would never leave this place. 
Their duplicates would live out their days and create whatever kind of
civilization was possible on a planet where they themselves couldn't even
survive.
     B'Elanna stepped up just behind Tom and rested her hand on his
shoulder.  He looked up, already recognizing her touch before he saw her,
and smiled.
     "I wonder," he said, almost to himself.
     "What?" she asked.
     "If they can really find happiness in such a desolate place."
     It was Chakotay who answered.  "The duplicate Harry said to their
eyes, this planet was beautiful--full of vibrant colors."
     "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," Janeway quoted.
     "To them, it isn't a demon planet," Harry added softly.  "It's
heaven."
     Tom's hand moved from the controls to touch B'Elanna's fingers,
and he whispered, "I'm glad Tom and Harry won't be alone."

     B'Elanna Torres held tightly to the hand of Tom Paris as she
watched the ship that had been her home for almost five years rise into the
sky and disappear.
     "I hope they find the kind of happiness they've given us."
     She turned to look at the tall, blond man who had spoken those
quiet words.  His eyes followed the ship's path long after it was gone. 
Finally, he turned toward her and his eyes held no regrets.
     "They will," she told him.  "No matter what happens."
     They stood looking at each other for a moment before Tom pulled
B'Elanna into his arms.
     They were two souls who belonged to each other.  And whether
here or out in the vastness of space, B'Elanna knew she and Tom had found
the one place that was always warm and safe.
     The place that was was--for them...
     Home.