The summer is definitely taking too dang long, and I can't help wondering how much time they're going to take dragging things out next season, so here's my version of the ever-popular Paris and Torres story. It takes place after they've gotten out of their trouble with the Borg and the 47's, it's rated PG (or PG-13 since I still haven't figured out the difference), and is solely intended for non-profit enjoyment by Voyager fans.

All hail Paramount, who owns everything and shouldn't mind me at all.

And if you do like what you see here, please visit my home page.

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Not your kind of romance? Go to Treklove instead.

Waves

The merpeople offered seafood. What else could they do?

The two landers were wore black cloth of strange feel which had dried quickly on the rocks. Watching as the man and woman chattered unintelligibly and tore into the fish, Eree and Keer made sure not to get too near and waited for word from the Center to arrive.

"Still no sign of a ship?" Eree asked Aol as she glided up to their side. Eree's fin splayed out as he spoke, releasing the prism.

"No," she said, tossing her long red hair back in a slow wave that drew attention to the smooth white of her shoulders. "Nor any of those zeppelins they fly in."

"It's too far out for that anyway," Keer said, turning her jade eyes back to the landers. One of them was watching them closely right now, his own eyes a nice jewel shade.

"That woman is the oddest looking lander I've ever seen," Aol remarked.

"They all look odd to me," Eree said, curling his fin tightly before releasing it again.

"I think she's beautiful," Keer said. "Those ridges made her look like a teeva fish."

"What's she doing now?" Eree wanted to know.

They watched as the woman played with her strange machine again. It wasn't like a lander machine. That and her unusual appearance were giving them all ideas.

"I think they must be frightened," Eree pronounced after the discussion wore out. "Landers are always frightened."

"They're not acting frightened," Aol noted, twisting her torso to allow the luminescence of the cave walls to ripple down her submerged fish tail. Keer and Eree liked the effect and tried it themselves. "I think they look curious about us. We should try to speak with them.

"You'll wait for the Center to speak, like the rest of us," Eree warned. "Those look like uniforms to me, and lander uniforms mean wars, and that means sea battles."

"You're putting the wake before the fin," Keer snorted. "These have got to be the most well-behaved landers we've met. I think we --"

Keer's opinion was lost in a roll of thunder.

******************

"What was that?" Paris asked, looking up in alarm as Torres adjusted the controls on their only salvaged piece of equipment. They'd brought down quite a collection of survey gear and food containers, intending to join Neelix' scavengers. Seconds after their wayward beam-down it had almost all been lost.

"It sounded like an explosion, but it wasn't," Torres said, trying to retune the tricorder one more time. It was giving her all sorts of readings she didn't understand, though nothing it registered seemed dangerous. At least it had been able to tell them the fish was safe to eat. She looked over to the merpeople, and was disturbed to see that they had disappeared, their heads and bare shoulders no longer floating ten yards away in the cornflower sea of the cave.

The cave itself was enormous and encrusted with glowing lichen. Except for the sounds she and Tom were making and the slight, abating noises of the water, all was silent and all was still. She couldn't shake the feeling that this place was artificial, and yet she could find nothing with her eyes or the tricorder to support that feeling.

"You know," Paris said. "The way the...merpeople talk sounds like us. The high-pitched noises of surprise when they found us, the soft sounds when they were trying to reassure us about this cave and the food..."

"Yeah?"

"That noise sounded to me like...an announcement. Like something or someone important is coming." Paris ran his hands through his hair and did not wince as his fingers encountered sore spots. He had really hit the rocks hard. The riptide which had been strong enough to wrench off their combadges had also left what felt like a pint of water in his lungs, and his voice was raspy and weak.

"I just don't understand how our transporter beam could have been diverted to the middle of the ocean," Torres said, her own voice betraying strain and water damage. "We had four days of sensors readings of this planet. No advanced technology and no atmospheric anomalies."

"Finding intelligent merpeople isn't quite what we expected either," Paris noted, looking back at the now-empty waters where the creatures had watched them wake up. Beaming down to this planet for a little food-gathering and exploration (i.e., a chance to breathe some real air and feel some real sun) had seemed like a great idea at the time. Now here he was living out one of his favorite dreams -- getting stuck in yet another cave with B'Elanna -- and nothing was going right.

"You are a surprise to us as well," a musical female voice said, and they both turned quickly -- wrenching sore muscles -- to the source of the sound.

One of the mermaids they had seen watching them stared up at them from the blue water of the cave. Her gold hair gleamed in the light from the walls, while the porcelain skin glowed to translucence. Her eyes were emeralds, and in her upraised hand glinted one of their combadges.

"Where did you find that?" Torres demanded.

"Where you were. We found many of your things," the mermaid said. Finding things floating in the water was not the challenge to her people that it was to most humanoids. "They have been taken to the Center."

"The Center?"

The beautiful emerald eyes frowned. "Yes. You are to go there as well."

"And where is this place?" Paris asked.

"At the Center."

The lieutenants exchanged glances before Paris spoke. "The center of what?"

The mermaid giggled, the noise ringing inside the cave until it almost echoed. "No, the Center."

"Is it underwater?" Torres asked, enunciating clearly.

"Oh!" The pale face expressed understanding. "Do not worry. We have taken landers to the Center before."

Without warning, and still holding onto the combadge, the creature slipped under the water line and was gone.

"Wait!" Torres shouted. The small ripples the mermaid's departure had made lapped at the edge of the rock.

"How do you think they recognized the combadge for what it was?"

"I don't know," Torres announced grimly, "but I'm beginning to understand what may have happened to our transporter beam."

"I don't know," Paris said. "They seemed awfully surprised to see us."

"And yet wasn't it convenient that we materialized..."

The sucking rush of the whirlpool, slowly forming for the past few minutes and now finally reaching the surface, cut off the rest of her sentence as they turned to gawk at the water, which swirled majestically around as if someone had pulled the plug out from the ocean's floor. The noise grew and grew until they were holding their hands over their ears, moving instinctively towards each other until they were pressed side-to-side on their now very small-seeming rocky ledge. On and on the water twirled and drained, the level dropping twenty, fifty, a hundred, two hundred feet until it finally could be seen no more. Only the continued sound told of the violent churning below them. And then even that dwindled to nothing. And there was silence and a vast empty chasm, perhaps a mile across, perhaps more, dripping with the final rivulets of the sea.

Paris and Torres swallowed and thought about moving apart, or not.

"It is impressive, isn't it?" that musical voice said behind them. "I've never actually seen it myself, before."

Beginning to feel permanently off-balance, they turned to this new sight. The face and torso were the same as that of the mermaid's, but now her fishtail had turned to legs...kind of. They were not typical humanoid legs, but glittered with colored versions of Cardassian-like scales. Her feet curled out almost like fins, and yet when she walked closer towards them her movements were graceful, as though she were still under water.

She was also completely nude, except for the combadge, which was now suspended from a pewter-colored chain around her neck.

"I am Keer. Central has instructed that I am to be your guide."

"I'm Lieutenant Tom Paris, and this is Lieutenant B'Elanna Torres of the Federation Starship Voyager. We need our combadge back so that we can talk to friends of ours."

"Central says that you are not of this world, and that I am not to return your equipment until she understands what you are doing here. She wants to see you in person, and with your permission I am to take you there."

"Our permission?" Torres snorted.

Keer seemed insulted, but hid it quickly. "We have not abducted you. If you wish merely to be returned to the landers' world, we can arrange that instead. However, if you have come to this world for help, we may be able to provide it for you. We too are not indigenous to this planet, though we find it perfect for our needs. Perhaps we may even be able to help each other."

And with that she stepped to the edge of the rocky cliff and put one fin-like foot on what Paris and Torres quickly recognized was a path down into the seemingly endless depths of what only a few minutes ago had been the sea.

*****************

Torres smiled grimly at herself, well aware that she had purposefully put herself in front of Tom to keep him from being able to keep a close watch of Keer. Mentally, she shook her head. Tom on a planet full of naked mermaids and her without a blindfold. Ah well, being chased by Tom was definitely one of the most flattering things that had ever happened to her, but she knew she wasn't pretty enough to compete with the creatures here. But then, she wasn't pretty enough to compete with several of the women on Voyager, and Tom had been steadily chasing her for months now, sitting with her at dinner, loading her down with compliments, fooling her into that stupid bat'leth program on the holodeck. If these creatures turned Tom's head she could take it. It wasn't like any of them would be coming with them on the ship.

Torres fought down a growl of disgust. This sort of thinking was precisely why she stayed away from Tom. She wasn't sure what he wanted, but she didn't want to give it to him. Kahles forbid she should ever grow dependent on Tom's attention. Thankfully she had kept herself from feeling anything more than a mild pleasure in his company -- Vulcan mind melds notwithstanding -- and if he never chased her again, she'd feel nothing but the vaguest disappointment.

What was more important by far was their transporter troubles and the fact that they hadn't gotten Keer to give up their combadge. They needed to contact the ship. They needed to get away from this place.

And yet, Torres knew Voyager could not pass up an opportunity to make a friend of these people. If they came from another world and had the power to drain off the ocean, who knew what they might know about wormholes or other ways home? Voyager was in desperate need of repair materials, not to mention other sorts of supplies. They just didn't have the luxury of turning down any friendly offers.

But Torres didn't like this, not a bit, and with the feeling that she had to do something to control her situation, she kept her body between Tom and Keer and thought once more about how little the helmsman meant to her.

In fact, once he had gotten over the initial shock, Paris barely noted Keer's lack of clothes, and had thought when he saw her walking towards them that her body compared unfavorably to B'Elanna's. She was not as muscular nor as trim, nor did her skin invite touching with its smooth texture and rich color and -- Whoops! better not think about such things right now. If Torres had made anything clear to him, it was that he was going to have to take it slow, and while he wished that she would let him step up the pace slightly, he was prepared to wait for as long as it took. As long as eventually, sometime...

Paris fought down a sigh and sneered a bit at himself. Walking down a chasm that had been the sea, following in the mysterious wake of a real live mermaid, cut off from the ship and perhaps facing the greatest friend or enemy Voyager had yet encountered, and all he could think about was when he could get B'Elanna into just the right kind of cave.

*****************

"The last of the away teams is aboard," Tuvok's voice told Janeway as she paced the bridge.

All but one, the captain thought wearily. It had been almost ten hours now since Tom and B'Elanna had disappeared, and they were no closer to finding them.

If they were to be found. If there hadn't been some sort of transporter accident that meant they really were lost for good. Voyager had been away from a proper space dock for some time now. Accidents that weren't supposed to happen might indeed start happening. As Tuvok would say, it was only logical to take the ship's current state into account.

But Janeway wasn't a Vulcan, and she wasn't about to think the worst yet.

"Captain," that same Vulcan announced suddenly, "there's a ship approaching us at warp three point five."

"Hail them."

"No response, Captain."

She met Chakotay's eyes, his concern and her orders instantly conveyed. Incongruously, in the midst of this new threat, she had to fight a smile. She and her first officer might have their problems, but she wouldn't trade him for latinum.

"Red alert!" Chakotay snapped out, his eyes now returned to his console. "Raise shields."

The Cradel ship came out of warp almost directly in front of Voyager, and then held its position with pin-point accuracy. Janeway couldn't help wishing that Paris were at the conn instead of Batehart, if they were supposed to match the ship before them in combat.

"Still no response to our hails, Captain. But they have not powered their weapons array."

"They just want to stare at us?" Chakotay muttered.

"Well," Janeway grated out, "if they're waiting for us to flinch, they've got a long wait."

And then Chakotay was fighting a smile.

***************

Torres came to a halt so suddenly that Paris stumbled to avoid colliding with her. Keer turned back with a pretty frown.

Several hours of climbing down the chasm wall had brought them to the bottom, but where they had expected sand, there was only more rock.

Not that they walked on the actual bottom of the chasm. Keer and the path turned before that into a tunnel in the wall.

Torres frowned back at the mermaid. "I'm feeling a draft. There's air coming through the tunnel."

"Yes. We keep this ready to be ventilated for landers. When we first came here, a few thousand years ago, we often had to negotiate with them."

"And you've kept this tunnel up all that time? When did you last have 'landers' visit?"

Keer shrugged. "Not in my lifetime, B'Elanna Torres. We're very excited by your arrival, I assure you." Smiling, she turned and lead the others down the long, now quite dry passageway through the dark stone.

Torres' frown did not disappear. She couldn't help remembering the last time someone had addressed her as "B'Elanna Torres."

"I wonder how much of this is artificial," Paris' quiet voice commented.

"All of if, I'd say, and it's not a technology they've shared with the land-based humanoids, that's for sure.

Paris nodded, thinking over the sensor readings they'd taken of a society roughly comparable in technology to Earth's 18th Century. Had the 'landers' been savages when the merpeople first arrived here? Why had the civilizations merged so little? And why had none of this shown up on the sensors?

"Ah," Keer said with satisfaction. "Here we are."

In disbelief, Paris and Torres glared at the small ground transport. It was low and sleek and looked used but well-maintained.

"Er," Paris said. "We were under the impression that you lived in the water."

Keer laughed, and again the sound echoed like a bell. "We do. But the care of our community requires work on dry land as well. We must live in the air as much as in water and dreams." With that, she motioned them aboard the transport and sat herself behind the controls. Paris watched closely until he was certain he could operate the simple controls himself, then looked about them.

In truth, however, there was little to look at. The tunnel continued for kilometers of roughly hewn rock, giving the impression that they were indeed traveling to the Center of this world. But Paris knew from the sensor scans that this planet wasn't that odd. It had as molten a core as any world. Yet it was clear they were very deep below the surface.

"When we finally get our combadge back it might not be able to reach the ship," Torres said with grim quiet in his ear. The transport made little noise, but the wind rushing past them as they sped along almost washed her words away.

He turned to look at her and couldn't help feeling warm at the way her hair was being blown about. Her eyes were shining a bit, and he smiled at her, hopefully betraying nothing more than friendship. She gave him a measured curl of the lips in return, and he turned back to look at the rock walls...just in time to see those walls fall away as they were suddenly hurtling through water.

Both he and Torres gasped as their transport continued to move through the sea without drowning them. They were in a transparent corridor, a tube made of some sort of macropolymer like transparent aluminum. All around them the green sea was filled with aquatic life: fish and plants and things that might be both fish and plant swayed about them in the ocean currents. Scattered everywhere, in patterns, were bright lights, and ahead of them were tall structures of a mercity.

And everywhere there were merpeople. Swimming, speeding along in aquatic versions of their own transport, and just floating in groups as people gathered in the street.

And everywhere there was color. The bright lights made everything shine and sparkle, and the plants and animals were blue and green and red and yellow and orange and pink and black and white and purple and dull and luminescent and opaque and translucent.

And everywhere there was movement and life. The water brought everything into a motion which created a wake which rippled back and through until it met some other wake to dance in the protozoa.

And everywhere Tom and B'Elanna looked there was some wonder to gawk at, some incredible sight they both knew they would not do justice to in their reports. Finally, they both gave up trying to memorize what they saw, and just let the panoply and palette swirl around them, on and on, until they reached the first of the merbuildings and the tunnel turned opaque once again. Now the walls were smooth and almost metallic as Keer pulled the transport to a stop beside a portal in the wall.

"Your city is beautiful," Paris managed to say as they climbed out.

"Thank you," Keer said simply, her eyes wandering to Torres. "You should see it when the teeva fish are migrating."

Whatever the others might have said to that was drowned out by the abrupt blare of a klaxon. Keer blanched at the noise, turned, and quickly headed for the portal. Manipulating the controls at its side -- Torres managed to note the pattern -- she opened the portal and they walked through a lushly carpeted passageway to yet another portal. During this time, the klaxon was softened, as though now that it had everyone's attention it needed only to remind them of danger.

"What's going on?" Torres demanded as soon as her voice could be heard.

"The Cradel have returned," Keer said, her tone making it clear this was the worst possible news. "Your ship may be in danger. We have to hurry."

"When are we going to learn what's going on?" Torres snarled.

And in answer the second portal opened and they saw a wondrously vast cavern that made little impact on them at all, dwarfed completely by what was inside the cavern.

The lifeform was completely black, and seemed to reflect no light. Hundreds of tentacles reached into every crevice of the cave, pulsing with the life-force of the creature's plasma. In the Center (or Center? Paris wondered) of this mass was a sort of body, though there were no markings or features upon it. The air was filled was a spicy odor that oddly reminded them of Neelix' kitchen, while the warm humidity suggested that the cave had recently been full of water. Keer led them a short ways inside, her body betraying a few nervous tremors, and then a sweet female voice spoke.

"We have not had visitors from outside for some time now."

"Central," Keer spoke. "I bring you Lieutenant B'Elanna Torres and Lieutenant Tom Paris of the Federation Starship Voyager."

"The Voyager is about to be destroyed by the Cradel," the voice said. "But you may request asylum with us."

"What?" came from Paris, forestalling Torres.

"Give us back out equipment," Torres demanded instead. "And let us return to our ship!"

The voice sounded puzzled. "But then you will be killed as well. There is safety here...at least for the time being."

"We do not want your safety!" Torres snarled.

And then they were on Voyager's bridge, fists still clenched, still smelling the strange spice of the Center. The scene was chaos as the ship took another direct hit to the forward shields and bucked wildly with the impact. Paris ran to relieve Batehart at the conn while Torres sprinted to her engineering console.

Janeway noted the return of her two officers with the part of her consciousness she could spare for surprises, than called out, "Tom, we need to keep our forward shields to them."

"Yes, ma'am," Paris responded as he looked over the console and Batehart made his grateful way to the bridge's second substation. He was a fine and competent pilot, but it had become his person nightmare that Voyager would be destroyed while he was at the controls. Then in the afterlife everyone he met would feel that they would still be alive if only Paris had been there instead.

Paris quickly ascertained that they had lost warp power, half their impulse drive, and the photo torpedo array. The controls were sluggish and the enemy ship was quick and crafty. But he kept the forward shields between them.

Torres' fingers blurred over her console as she rerouted power, coordinating her commands with Carey in engineering and Tuvok at tactical.

"We have photons available, Captain," Tuvok announced.

"Give me a full spread! Fire as soon as you have a target lock!"

"Firing, Captain."

The torpedoes burst out without warning towards the enemy, which was evidently caught by complete surprise.

Not used to people firing back?" Janeway thought with contempt. She didn't know how the enemy ship had managed to fire at them without first seeming to power their weapons. Now, if only they turned out to be the type that relies a little too heavily on the power of surprise...

"Direct hit to their weapons array," Tuvok announced. And then the Cradel ship was gone.

"Moving away from us at warp two," Tuvok reported.

Cowards, Janeway thought with contempt. And like all cowards they'd be back when they again felt they'd have the advantage. After checking through her command team for damage reports, she turned a raised eyebrow to Paris and then Torres.

And watched them both disappear.

*************

Back at the Center, Torres and Paris blinked and looked around. Keer rose from the seat she had taken on a small rock and smiled at them.

And then B'Elanna noticed...her.

Tall and shapely, with long, flame-red hair that seemed to give off both heat and light, pale skin and deeply green eyes, Aol strode forward with her eyes fastened on Paris. When she smiled, the room seemed to lose its dark dankness, and when Tom smiled back, Torres felt something sour in her stomachs.

"I am Aol," the mermaid said, holding out a pale hand of long fingers to Paris. The lieutenants both noticed then that she too wore a combadge on a chain around her neck.

"I'm Tom Paris. And this is B'Elanna Torres."

"The Center says we are to serve you," Aol told him, ignoring the teeva fish. "You are strong against the Cradel. We have been waiting for you."

Paris frowned and looked generally uncertain. Half of his attention was focused on getting his hand back.

Keer stepped forward almost impatiently. "We would like to know what you need, what we could trade you for your help."

"What sort of help?" Torres demanded, half her attention focused on watching Paris hold Aol's hand.

"Help with the Cradel, of course," Keer explained. "It was to flee them that we came here thousands of years ago."

"You were at war?"

"No. But they may have thought so."

Paris managed to get his hand back without resorting to wrestling. "What does that mean?"

"We had no wish to fight them. That's why we left our world for them. It did not matter as much to us that we stay as it seemed to matter to them that they be the sole sentient species there. So we left."

"And we have lived in peace and prosperity here ever since," Aol took over, tossing her thick hair back over her shoulders as she spoke, the movement showing off curves from her head to her curled toes. "But we never thought they would pursue us."

"Why are they?" Torres asked, stepping forward slightly.

"We don't know," the Center's voice said, making both the lieutenants start. "We only know that they have come here after us, and are threatening this world in an attempt to hurt us."

"You understand," Aol said, pressing a little deeper into Tom's personal space while her eyes glittered so brightly they might have held tears, "we are not simply afraid for ourselves. The landers here deserve to be protected as well."

"I'm surprised you settled on an inhabited world," Paris said, addressing the Center as best he could.

But it was Keer who spoke. "We had hoped to help these people. They were not well, and their world was suffering from tectonic instability. Coming here steadied this planet and gave them someone to be company to them."

"But you don't seem to spend much time with them."

"We found that too much interaction with us...distracted them from their own evolution. We hope in time to be their partners on this world."

"Why did you take us off our ship like that?" Torres broke in.

"You wanted to be with your people in battle, an admirable show of courage. When the danger passed, I thought you would wish to continue our conversation. We can do much to help each other."

At this reminder of Voyager's neediness, Torres bit back the retort which beat in her heart, and an uncomfortable moment of silence responded instead.

"We pride ourselves on being an hospitable people, Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres," said Keer finally, "and the Center has made it clear that you are to be our most honored guests."

"And you still haven't told us what you want," Aol said, undulating just a little closer to Paris.

"We'd really need to speak to our captain about that." He smiled and moved back just a little bit.

"If that is what you need," Keer said pleasantly, though her eyes wandered uncertainly towards the Center. "In the meantime, let me show you to your rooms."

"We want --" Torres began.

"That would be great," Paris interrupted, stepping towards Keer and then moving smoothly on to the portal as she opened it for them.

Outside, in the passage, Paris braced himself for Klingon rage, but Torres restrained herself from comment, verbal or otherwise, as she climbed back into the transport.

Keer took them through a short series of tunnels as both Paris and Torres stared around them and memorized the route. Aol sat in the transport as well, next to Paris, and when Keer stopped before another portal -- both lieutenants wondered how they told the portals apart when they had no special markings to be seen -- Aol alit before the others and keyed open the door.

"You are free, of course, to wander our city and access our databases in order to learn as much about us as you like," Keer was saying. "You will find that our computers will translate for you, though the Center does to wish as yet that you should talk directly to our people. She fears you may be...bombarded with questions and there is no time to be lost.

"And you will be able to contact your captain from your quarters," she continued as they walked into a large and luxurious room obviously designed for "landers," with wooden furniture and bright, soft light. Their second tricorder and much of their survey and food-gathering equipment had been piled in a corner. Paris saw that there was only one phaser, and it looked damaged. "We will bring you refreshments and wait for your call. When you have worked out what you would like to ask from us in return for your help, the Center will speak with you immediately. Tomorrow I will arrange for you to see our city. I am sorry that we must keep your combadges, as the Center does not feel it wise for you to speak with the others yet."

"If you prefer," Aol said from the Center of the room, her eyes glistening as she looked over Paris. "We can get you separate quarters."

"This will be fine," Torres said firmly, and Paris had to suppress an excited grin at the firmness of her tone. She didn't mean what he'd like to think she meant by that. "Thank you for your hospitality."

"Here is the communicator," Keer said, then showed them how to operate the simple device. "We await you," she added, then left with Aol.

*****************

"Captain," Tuvok said. "I have an incoming signal from Lieutenants Paris and Torres."

Everyone looked at him, then at Janeway.

"On screen."

The faces of Torres and Paris showed clearly on the viewscreen as Paris announced, "The natives are rude but friendly, Captain. It's an unsettling combination."

"I understand the rude part," Janeway said. "Tell me the friendly."

"They want to trade, Captain," Torres said, "for our help against the Cradel."

"Is that the ship which attacked us?"

Torres nodded and then relayed the entire conversation with Keer, Aol, and the Center. Paris described the mercity while Torres hazarded estimates on exactly what level of technology they were dealing with.

"So they really do have things we could use?"

"I'd say they have many of the materials we need and they certainly have no shortage of power and food," Torres agreed.

"Since they traveled here they must have starcharts of the area," Paris added. "And they have tactical information about the Cradel."

"And you feel certain you're in no danger from them?" Chakotay asked, standing next to Janeway.

The lieutenants shrugged and looked at each other before looking back. "As certain as we could feel, considering."

"Well, between the two of you you know all this ship needs," Janeway said. "Survey what they have to offer. But I'm not making any offers on our side until I get a better idea of what they want."

"Understood, Captain," Paris said. "We'll report back in six hours."

Janeway nodded and they broke the connection.

Torres and Paris immediately set to work, bringing up a diagram of the city and several manifests of the city's operating requirements. Lists of materials constructed and imported from other areas of this world were available, as were descriptions of the transportation and distribution of goods.

The set-up was unerringly close to Earth in many ways. The people here all seemed to pursue their own personal career goals: administrative, artistic, engineering, architectural -- in short, this was a thriving and cooperative community highly responsive to its members' needs.

There were a few odd parts, however. The political system was completely absent except for the unquestioned, unchallenged and unexplained absolute power of the Center. There didn't even seem to be any sort of hierarchy regarding aides or regional governors -- and the city was certainly big enough to warrant both. While everything ran very smoothly, all the real decisions seemed to be handled automatically by the Center.

Which left both of the Starfleet officers wondering what sort of control the Center had over the merpeople, who called themselves the Tkee, and what the Tkee did with their own needs for control over their lives. But there was almost no data available about the personal lives of the people here, what they did for fun or worship or what sort of challenges they created for themselves.

When it was time to check back with Janeway, they had assembled an extensive list of materials which the Tkee had available and which Voyager needed desperately, not so desperately, and which would just be nice to have around.

But they still had no idea what the Tkee wanted from Voyager, other than "help" with the Cradel.

"There's been no sign of them since their little 'Welcome,'" Janeway drawled when they had finished their report. "Repairs to the ship are almost complete." She stopped to smile with tight sincerity at Torres. "You've a well-trained team, Lieutenant. They only complained three times about how much they missed you."

Torres kept herself from visibly swelling with pride. "Thank you, Captain," she got out instead.

"I've sent most everyone to bed for some much-needed rest," Janeway told them. "I suggest you do the same, then try in the morning to find out what you can that they aren't so willing to tell us."

"Understood," Paris said. "We were told we could see the city, and I think it's a good idea."

"Just don't open the wrong door and drown yourselves," Janeway said, and there was a trace of a yawn behind the words.

"Yes, ma'am," Paris replied with a grin, then terminated the connection.

They got up from their chairs in front of the console with stiff muscles, empty stomachs, and more than mildly painful tension headaches.

"More seafood," Torres said, looking over the dishes that had been laid for them on the table. She wasn't just talking about fish. Seaberries and kelp and all sorts of things they couldn't really identify had been diced and sautéed and marinated. Much of it looked appetizing, and the tricorder again told them it was safe to eat, but Torres found that despite everything she had little appetite.

Neither of them had made any mention of the fact that they were soon to sleep in the same bed. There was no need for them to, after all. Away teams had to make do with what they had, and it would be foolish of them to split up into separate rooms in unknown territory when they didn't have to.

Paris looked down at his empty plate, impressed with the technology of the low-level stasis field over the table which had kept the food fresh. He was turning to say something about it to Torres when his mouth dropped into a huge yawn. Torres blinked at the warm breath on her face.

"Sorry," Paris got out through his embarrassment. Then they both turned to look at the bed. It was certainly big enough for two, and there was no couch or other place that could allow one of them to sleep in any comfort.

Silently, they both used the facilities and pulled off their boots. It was hardly the first time for either of them sleeping in their uniform. They climbed into the bed from opposites sides and made almost no eye contact.

Thumbing the button he'd found while Torres was in the other room, Paris turned out the lights.

"My God," Paris breathed as both he and the woman by his side stared in amazement.

The wall to their right, the one opposite the portal, became instantly transparent with the loss of the light, and they were staring, both having raised up to sit on the bed, out over the mercity. Off in the distance lit the towers of the city rose up into the dark green water of the ocean at night. Again they were struck by the beauty of the sea's metropolis, and for many long minutes they did nothing but watch in silent appreciation.

They realized the city responded to the changes in the day, as reliant upon the sun's light as a city on land would be. While there were the lights of the towers, there was considerably less movement than before. In fact, they could see no sign of actual Tkee habitation, and there were only the swirls of the ocean's own currents to move the seascape about.

Slowly, without conscious intent, Tom's hand found B'Elanna's and held it tight. She leaned slightly against him, watching the ocean and feeling incredibly comforted, until they both felt their eyes closing and they lay back down to sleep.

*******************

Paris felt the water moving around him like a warm rushing caress of unseen hands, tickled by the swirls and eddies his own undulating body was creating. His scales glimmered and danced in the ocean's light, and with a gathering joy he headed for the surface, breathing in the water deeply as his spirit sang and all was motion and current and strength. He was aware only of freedom, of endless and boundless possibilities. He was light and life, and as he broke through into the air he almost began to weep with the perfection of his existence.

And then water was a caress, and the perfect hand upon his scale-covered hips compelled his soul to attendance.

"Is this not good?" a warm voice asked. And he could only agree, wanting more, wanting all that this could offer. If it could not be his, he knew he would die.

******************

"Tom?" B'Elanna asked. She had woken up to find him drawn up against the side of the bed, as though seeking to be as far from her as possible, and, while she told herself he was only being considerate, there was a hurt note in her voice when she called his name. She got rid of it as she repeated herself, touching his shoulder lightly.

"Wha -- ?" Tom asked, rolling suddenly on his back and looking at her with wild blue eyes.

"I think you were having a dream," she said, watching those eyes return to normal and then watching a one of his pale hands dragged itself through that golden hair. She frowned at her own appraisal, and realized it was more than just her own jumpy nerves. Tom looked slightly different this morning, almost glowing with health.

"I think this place agrees with me," he said, echoing her next thought. "I feel great. How'd you sleep?"

Torres let her frown deepen. "I had odd dreams."

"Me too. But I guess that's only to be expected in this place." He sat up and looked at the wall to their right, which still revealed the vista of the city. The morning's light was filtering down somehow from the surface high above them, and the water was filled with movement of merpeople and their transports: morning rush hour. None of this came close to the wall itself, and there was no feeling of lost privacy, but it was still somehow a relief when Torres pushed the button for the lights and the panorama was lost to their view.

Both of them had hearty appetites for breakfast, and they were still eating when a chime sounded at the door.

"Come!" they said together as the door opened to reveal Keer and a merman at her side. They were as nude as ever, except for the combadge around Keer's neck.

"I hope you have found what you are looking for in the database," Keer said as they walked into the room. "This is Karw. He will help me answer your questions on your tour."

"Now?" Torres asked, looking over this Karw with his broad chest and muscularly lean torso. She was amazed at the unself-conscious way he allowed her gaze, even when it strayed a bit to places she didn't want to be caught staring at, and found herself automatically, if somewhat shyly, returning the warm smile he gave her.

"You do wish to see the city?" Karw asked, moving the rest of the way towards her to stand before both lieutenants as Keer walked about the room, a good host, making sure they wanted nothing. She noted which food seemed to be most to their guests' liking and which chairs were being used, and realized with pleasure that these people had clean and tidy habits.

The Center was right, Keer thought to herself, hardly with surprise. Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres were perfect. It was an honor to be chosen. She turned surreptitiously to look at those teeva ridges.

"What do you wish to start with?" Karw was saying.

"Well, considering that you're under attack, we'd like to see your defensive systems," Torres responded bluntly.

Karw nodded sagely. "Of course. If you are done with your morning meal?"

Torres and Paris nodded back, moving with Karw towards the door even as it opened for their approach. Outside in the corridor, they found the transport waiting for them and climbed aboard, Keer once more taking the controls.

Eleven hours later, overwhelmed and exhausted, they returned to their room and collapsed in the nearest chairs. The Tkee had encouraged, even demanded that they ask questions regarding each new wonder that they saw, then answered those questions with a thoroughness that left even Torres feeling impatient with technical schematics and interactive algorithms. Everything they saw was artistically expert, aesthetically breathtaking, and ingeniously functional. They both knew they could spend their lives here, studying this place, and never run out of things to learn.

They had even been allowed to meet some more of the Tkee themselves. The people were beautiful and ingenious and friendly. In fact, there was a certain voraciousness to their hospitality and an openly bottomless curiosity. The lieutenants found themselves answering questions and then elaborating on every detail, trying hard to betray nothing of tactical value as they told stories of Neelix' cooking, Kim's clarinet playing, Carey's tales of his children, Chakotay's spirit guide, everything personal and (they hoped) relatively harmless they could think of.

But that hadn't been the worst of it, Torres acknowledged to herself. Actually, the day had been quite pleasant, if tiring, until Aol had shown back up. Never taking her eyes off Tom, she'd hung around them for hours, making up little reasons to touch him, constantly calling his attention to things that somehow centered around her, and making little jokes and politenesses they all had to smile at until Torres felt in great danger of falling upon the merwoman and tearing her to bits.

Thank Kahles for Keer, Torres thought wryly. Somehow she had managed to keep Aol in something like line, and had often interposed between them all to answer one of Torres' direct questions. She quite liked Keer, in fact, and wondered idly if she would be allowed to call her as a character witness when she was put on trial for Aol's murder.

"We're going to fall asleep in these chairs," Torres finally groaned, then looked up to see that her prediction lagged behind the times. Paris was completely out, his body slumped into the large chair and his mouth dropped open to let in and out soft little breaths. Torres found herself once again battling the all-too-familiar desire to touch him, and, in fact, allowed herself to do so, gently, slowly, not wanting to wake him. One hand went on his shoulder, then other on his back, before she pulled him slightly forward and got her arms around him to pull him up from his chair.

He wouldn't like this, she thought to herself with a smile she didn't bother to conceal. The great Tom Paris -- who was a lot stronger than his slender frame suggested -- getting carried by a woman. What was it with men, anyway, that they were so bothered by such things? Well, in the morning she'd tell him he got to the bed under his own power.

Of course, she considered with a little forced honesty, she didn't much care for the idea of being carried herself. When Tom had suggested it once, in that stupid ice habitat, she'd almost hit him despite being half-way to unconscious.

But it wouldn't really be so bad, she thought as she finally set him down on the bed and gently worked off his boots before tucking him in. She entertained a vivid mental picture of herself in Tom's arms. Tom carrying her to this bed, bending his head down to kiss her, telling her...

"Pah!" she said aloud, though very quietly. What would he tell her but the same old lines he used on other women? Let Aol have him, if she wanted him that bad.

Torres wound up in the bathroom where she took a quick hot shower and then crawled back into her uniform before joining Tom in bed. She really was exhausted, but she found she couldn't sleep until she turned off the light and could see the mercity before them once again.

Only when she was almost asleep did she feel that they had forgotten something, but she pushed the thought away and slid into the darkness of her mind.

*********************

The warm water filled him as it lifted him up, inundating himself completely with color and light. The joy was almost unbearable now, and as he laughed he felt the whole of the world's delight in his body.

Her warm touch was back, and the shivers of her went down and around and through him with delicious arousal, setting his nerves alight and making his fingers tingle even as it began to build in that one spot. He could smell her next to him in the water, see wisps of her hair as she swam about him, her fish's tail catching a hundred prisms among its fine scales. He ran his own hands over her smooth shoulders, and moved to pull her close, wanting to connect with her completely, to carry her with him forever.

Her lips opened beneath his and he felt a sudden and heedless rush throughout his whole body that turned the warmth into urgent need. He had to have her, and, twisting their bodies around in the current that swept them along, he pulled her close, pressing himself against her. She moaned in the water, filling everything with her own pleasured desire, and he knew he must join with her quickly or they would both be lost.

"Tom," she murmured in his ear, urging him to hurry, as her body flicked it long and graceful tail, pressing them even closer, as he moved to just the right angle and screamed her name:

"B'Elanna!"

*********************

"B'Elanna!" Tom's voice called hoarsely, almost a whisper, into her ear just as his body moved atop her own.

In her sleep she had wrapped herself around him, and when she awoke her lungs were full of his smell, her palms sensitized to the feel of his skin...which she wasn't feeling right now. They were both in their uniforms still. A good thing, the rational part of her mind was thinking, for if they hadn't been...

Even as things were she found it impossible to move away from him immediately. In addition to the fact that he was pulling her close with considerable strength, her own body was responding to him fiercely. In fact, she couldn't remember being aroused so much since that ridiculous mind-meld.

Images of throwing herself at Tom in the cave assaulted her. It was a fortunate memory. Tom wasn't suffering from some Vulcan affliction, but he wasn't acting like himself either. She could no more take advantage of him now than he could have of her then.

And as she began to pull his arms from around her, she couldn't help thinking wistfully, One day we're going to go sex-crazy together.

"B'Elanna," Tom groaned in protest, trying to get her back into his arms while his hips ground against her. She reached down to push his legs away, and gasped in alarm. That didn't feel right at all. Where there should only have been the smooth feel of his thigh muscle, there was something else...some sort of...she tried to feel it better without letting him hook that leg around her body again. She was a woman, after all, and this was starting to affect her deeply.

There. It seemed to be some sort of pattern of ridges on his skin, almost like...

"Tom!" she shouted, then grabbed both his shoulders to shake him. She stared at his closed eyes even as she twisted away from his kisses. "Tom, damnit! WAKE UP!"

With a groan he opened his eyes, the blue clouded, the lips frozen in mid-kiss. Only by degrees did he seem to realize that he was on top of her, his fingers wrapped in her hair, his body straining to touch her.

"B'Elanna?" he asked, his voice incredulous and alarmed.

"Quick, Tom, take off your uniform," she ordered.

His eyes grew brighter and bigger by a factor of ten, but then she touched his leg again, running over that pattern of ridges, and his face drained to white.

In a second he had the jumpsuit pulled down to his knees, and together they stared at the thin line of scales forming on his skin, just slightly discolored and raised from his pale thighs in double lines from his knees to over his hips.

"Oh, God," he whispered into the dark room, and with a slow move that held a strange, unnatural grace, he turned to look out in the ocean that was one wall of their room. "What are they doing to me?"

"We didn't call the ship when we got in," Torres said, running from the bed to the computer console. "How could we have forgotten? What are they doing to both of us?"

When the console made no response to her commands, she turned back to Tom, who had pulled his uniform back up, as he stood at the foot of the bed, his eyes staring at her legs. With a tight fist grabbling at her stomach, she slid down her own uniform. But her legs were unchanged, and it would be hard to say who breathed the deeper sigh of relief.

"We have to get out of here." She pulled her uniform back up.

"They still have our combadges," Tom said, moving to their gear. Odd that apart from the single damaged phaser they hadn't noticed before now that while almost all of their gear had been saved intact, that which was missing or damaged would have been helpful for an escape. They had their tricorders, but now they had to wonder if the maps they had downloaded into them were really accurate.

"The power cell in the phaser is still charged," Torres reported. "With a little work, I might get it firing again."

"We have to get out of here," Paris urged. "Whatever they have planned must be scheduled for the morning."

Torres nodded, not trusting herself to speak as she took in the look of deep panic on Tom's face. The emergency medkit had been with Neelix, and the tricorder she ran over his body told her little except that his heartrate and temperature were up.

Carrying only the gear that might help them escape and survive in this world, they moved to the door, which refused to open with the command Keer had taught them.

"Damnit," Torres growled, while Paris' eyes strayed back to the transparent wall and the night-time sea beyond it. She used instead the command codes she had seen Keer use when they were first brought here, and then watched in surprise as the door slid open.

"It may be keyed to an alarm," she muttered, looking around the empty hall and finding -- Yes! -- the transport. The Tkee didn't have much sense when it came to keeping people prisoner. Despite what she'd said about the alarm, she felt almost certain she and Tom were not supposed to have woken up when they did and that the Tkee had been so assured of that that they hadn't taken other precautions to keep them secure. It reminded her somewhat of the Cradel's poor battle strategy. Well, they were from the same world.

"Where are we going?" Paris asked vaguely, his eyes blinking as he felt a deep need to plunge into warm saltwater.

Torres brought up her tricorder. "I noticed several paths to the surface on these maps before. Even if they're not right where they're supposed to be, we'll find them."

Paris nodded, leaning into the strength of her voice, and felt himself steady on his feet. Concentrating on the danger B'Elanna was in, and on what might be done to her if they didn't get out of here, he forced his legs into a straight path to the transport and climbed behind the controls. The almost silent motor seemed to scream down the corridor as it awakened under his touch, and when Torres was settled in securely beside him, he sped at full throttle down the long hall, back the way the had first come, until she told him to turn right, then left, then left again, on and on, both of them terrified by what they might find, by who might be waiting for them as they turned each corner.

But their flight was hardly random or ostentatious. Torres kept them to what the map said were maintenance corridors. Still, they were increasingly worried by their good luck that absolutely no one was around, until Paris exclaimed: "In dreams!"

"What?" Torres shouted above the rushing wind

"Keer said they had to live in dreams as much as in the air and water," he shouted back. "And my dreams, the one I was having right before I...attacked you. It was so real and full of...it made me feel energized. What if they somehow get something, some sort of necessary energy, from their dreams? Think of the city, how still it is as night. Maybe they all have to go to sleep."

"If you're right, then we have until sun-up to get out of here." She consulted the tricorder. "That should give us eight-six minutes."

"Will we make it?"

"We should, if this map is accurate, if we don't run into anything or anyone we can't get around."

Paris nodded, thinking now of his dream. He'd never had a vision that had felt so real. It still called to him, as did the thought of being in the water. His skin felt so dry, his body heavy with the weight of the air. He felt the call of that incredible joy...and then forced his mind away from it, forcing a little more speed out of the transport as the smooth gray walls of the corridor echoed each noise back at the unfathomable threat which was surely following them.

With eleven minutes until sun-up they made it to the first portal.

"Damn!" Torres grated out as Paris pulled the transport to a stop in front of the barrier. The tricorder could read little of use to them, and the pattern she'd seen Keer use did nothing.

"We have to hurry," Paris said, and Torres was about to snap at him that she knew when a look at his face reminded her of the incredible strain he must be under. The didn't even know how to reverse the effects of whatever was being done to him.

You'll pay for this, Aol, Torres thought, forcing her eyes back to her tricorder as she ran through decryption algorithms. She didn't know how, but she was certain the red-haired siren was to blame for Tom's state. Let her get her hands around that bitch and then...

Around, Torres thought, seeing again the pattern Keer had made on the portal's controls. She'd seen her unlock a lot of portals the day before, and there did seem to be a pattern...

Quickly, Torres keyed the patterns she remembered into the tricorder and cross-referenced them with the map. Just as she had suspected, the codes directly corresponded to their proximity around the Center.

In another moment she had the portal open and then she and Tom were aboard the transport once more. The second and third portals opened with slightly modified patterns. Torres' maps became useless as soon as the gray walls of the corridor were replaced by rough gray rock.

They were again in a cave, large but not as vast as they one they had woken up in two days ago. It was simply a cave, full of boulders and lit by a source directly ahead. Once they were beyond the portal, the transport couldn't travel over the uneven floor. Without hesitation they abandoned it, grabbing each other's hands as they ran to the light ahead.

"Yes!" Paris shouted as they hit the open air. Gray-blue sky above them, plain old grass below, nothing but more grass and trees all around them.

"I second that 'yes,'" Torres said with a heartfelt smile and turning to see Tom in the dim, slightly rosy light of the dawn.

They walked a good two miles from the cave before they called for their first rest, settling down beside a small stream they found that had somewhat clean-looking water running through it.

"I don't think we should eat any of our food," Tom said, looking over the rations he'd brought with them. "They had it. Who knows what they've done with it?"

Torres frowned. "Can you think of anything you ate down there that I didn't?"

Paris shook his head, looking at the water in the stream and feeling an ache inside himself for the sea. He was aware of the dream calling to him, and he could not rid himself of the feeling that the air was too dry.

"We've got to find a lake or something," he said without meaning to, and then felt his companion look on him with concern.

"B'Elanna," he whispered, not able to meet her eyes. "I feel so thin, so...there's nothing here. I can't breathe."

"Hang on, Tom," she said, reaching out for his hand and holding it tight. "Rest now and we'll find something to help you. You're going to be all right. You've got to be all right. Captain Janeway will never forgive me if I let something happen to you."

He smiled as he lay down on the cool grass beside the stream, wanting rest, dark and sweet and free of dreams.

***********************

The Cradel ship had returned with friends. The battle had lasted a few moments only. Engineering reported that repairs would take three days. There was no sign of Torres and Paris. Attempts to hail the Tkee had come to nothing, and there was still no sign of the mercivilization on any sensor scans.

Janeway sipped at the her third cup of coffee in as many hours and wished once more that she had someone besides her crew to talk to. More to the point, she admitted, she wished she had a friend to talk to, a woman, perhaps, who liked a little gossip and wasn't even remotely in her chain of command. She had Tuvok and Chakotay and Leonardo for counsel, but she had no one any more for a good old-fashioned gripe and grumble and bull session.

There was no need for such a person, she told herself sternly, as far as being a captain went. She didn't need a gossipy pal to tell her to be worried about Tom and B'Elanna. Nor did she need a "girlfriend" to warn her that the ship was in danger, and that any minute Chakotay was going to point out that the lieutenants' lives might not be worth the risk of staying here any longer.

Well, too bad, she thought with satisfaction. Nothing, absolutely nothing in the universe was going to get her to abandon two of her best officers. She actually thought out the words through as a dare to whoever might be listening as she looked over the rim of her coffee cup out into the stars.

Hear me? You can't have them..

********************

The water was so clean and full of life. Being part of it made each breath tingle throughout and within. There were hands here, and the joy of a community. And the need for joining.

Bending back, the fishtail caught the light and the current, and there was a rush of movement, a thrill of connection that dazzled the mind and then wouldn't let go. Another thrust of the fishtail and their bodies were wrapped around each other, seeking out the other, wanting more and more. And then a rush of feeling, and a word to call it:

"Tom!"

********************

The water was cold and felt all wrong. Neither of them could breathe properly as they thrashed around each other in the bottom of the stream. Both had their eyes open, though they could hardly see, and only their uniforms created any space between them as they clung, partly in desire, primarily in terror, to the other.

"Tom!" she called again. Somehow they had to get out of the water. Good thing it was only this pathetic stream. If they had been in the sea, she knew, they both knew, they would be completely lost.

Blindly, calling each other's names, they clawed out of the water and flopped onto the muddy bank, gasping.

The sun was hot and high overhead, and as their uniforms dried their bodies began to seem less alien, more responsive to their conscious directions. In time, they could actually see again the lines and colors of the other's face, and soon they could help each other sit up, trying not to scratch at their dry skin, or breathe in too deeply the heavy air.

"Looks like it just took a little longer to get at you," Paris said in fear.

"My Klingon DNA again," she gasped back. All of her muscles hurt, and her heart was pounding so loudly she could barely hear Tom's voice.

"Hang in there, B'Elanna," he was saying, because it always made him feel better if he could make her feel better. "We're away from them now, so whatever they were doing has got to stop."

"That's debatable. But I hope you're right." Slowly she was easing out of her uniform and pulling the suit down around her legs. There were those damn scales all right. Her light brown skin was rippled with them in three lines from her knees to over her hips, and light blue and gold tinged their edges.

Tim had pulled down his suit as well, and saw five lines of them now, reaching past his knees.

"Oh, God," he said, somehow keeping it from being the whimper it threatened to become. He couldn't look at his feet, didn't want to see the rest of his body.

"Tom," B'Elanna's urgent voice brought his eyes to her frightened face. "Turn over and lie on your stomach."

No, he wanted to shout, but, closing his teeth until his jaw popped dully, he turned and let her look at his back. Tentatively, he felt her fingers run along the slightly raised ridge down his spine. It felt horrible, and yet he found himself laughing.

"I always thought how lovely you looked with your ridges," he said softly. "Now I've got some too."

"Tom," she said, voice shaking around what wanted to be a sob. That he could compliment her body now, in the middle of this... She shook her head and then slowly lowered her head to place the softest of kisses on his back, uncertain what she wanted the touch to mean except that she wished she could make him better, comfort him and fix him as though he were a broken engine. She kissed him again on his tortured spine, then trailed another set of light kisses to his shoulder.

Tom sat up and stared at her, then leaned forward and kissed her properly. "We're going to be all right," he said quietly. "We just have to stick together and we'll be fine."

"I hope you're right about that one too," she responded, and then they helped each other slide their uniforms back in place and stand up. Paris immediately found that his balance was off.

"I'm starving," Torres announced, sounding quite surprised. Now that the shock was wearing off, she felt both incredibly weak and ravenous.

Tom nodded and retrieved his tricorder from their small assortment of gear. Ignoring the mud and their sore, mutilated bodies with a detachment that would have done Tuvok proud, they followed the readings to a grove where berries and nut-like roots grew and then ate everything they could find.

Feeling much better, they went looking for more of the nut-roots and gathered them into their bag before discussing that they hadn't really made a plan of action beyond simple survival.

"I don't think we should trust anything the Tkee told us," Tom told her. "We don't know if they're really from another world, or what the Cradel want with them."

"Do you think we can assume they were going to use us to get the rest of Voyager's crew down there and then do the same to us?"

Tom felt the same doubt at that he heard in B'Elanna's voice. "They'd be stupid to...alter us before getting the others down there, if they wanted to assimilated the entire crew. And then why take just us? There were over twenty Voyager people on the planet when they deflected our beam. If they deflected our beam."

"Okay. Let's start with what we do know. Relations between the landers and the Tkee don't seem to be doing well, for whatever reason."

"And now that we look like we might be Tkee we'd better stay as far from the landers as possible."

"Right. And we know that the alterations to our bodies are sped up by sleep, perhaps specifically by dreams."

"Well, we can't stay awake forever. I still think being away from them has got to help us." Once more he ran the tricorder over both their bodies and once more he learned nothing but that their temperature and heartrates were up.

"What do we know about the landers?" Torres asked, watching him.

Tom frowned. "Not much. Humanoid, roughly 18th century level. Janeway forbid any kind of close study."

"I find it hard to believe the Tkee have been here all this time and not had a significant impact on them."

"Agreed."

"Energy."

Tom blinked at her.

"When I was in the water in my dream, I felt energy, all around me. Was it like that for you?" Tom nodded. "From what we saw, it looked like the entire population has to sleep at night, so maybe, like you said, they get that energy from the dreams as well. For us, the energy enhanced the changes in our bodies. Perhaps for them it sustains some sort of special bioneural power."

"That's why Keer said they have to live in dreams, as much as in the water, or in the...air."

"What is it?"

"The air. We looked over the entire city structure they gave us, and while there were tunnels they were ventilating with air, there was nothing vital about them, nothing to explain why they would be as necessary as water or dreams."

"So maybe they didn't want us to see just what was so necessary?" A thought hit her and she grabbed up her tricorder. "Look," she said, running it over them again. "These aren't medical tricorders, so I can't get a neural scan, but I can read the level of neural energy itself as a gross amount...and it's not normal." She waved over them once more. "It's high in both of us, and highest in you."

"So then I guess we'd better try not sleeping after all."

"Whatever's causing the elevation isn't likely to be covering the whole planet, or the landers would be affected by it as well."

"But it reached us last night."

"Yes, but..." Torres ran a hand through her hair and felt it clumping with sweat. Her human half manifested so many signs of fear. "We just got out of there, and we're still very close to the entrance."

"Then I say we can't go wrong getting some distance between us and the Tkee," Tom pronounced, and she agreed, quickening her stride across the uneven ground before them.

"Do you think there could be a transmitter?" Tom asked a long hour later. "A conduit for the neural energy enhancement?"

"We never saw anything like that there, so it might be among the things they were hiding from us, but I don't see why they'd need one unless...unless somehow it simply works better in the air than in the water."

Paris actually stopped and turned towards her to see better the look that come over her face. "What?"

"Tom, what if these aren't actually merpeople?"

Tom frowned. "They looked like it to me."

"I mean what if they've done to themselves what they are trying to do to us?"

"That would explain why they have an interest in doing it at all."

"Aol wanted you."

Paris didn't pretend to misunderstand her. "She was a little obvious about it."

Torres frowned at the note in his voice. "You didn't seem to mind too much."

"B'Elanna, don't even joke about it! She was a barracuda! Besides, you know you're the only woman I'm interested in."

Torres looked away from him, feeling ridiculously warm all over.

"Besides, Aol was nothing next to Keer," Paris went on. "Honestly, I thought I was going to have to challenge her to a duel or something."

"What are you talking about?"

"Oh, come on. Don't tell me you didn't notice how she hung on every word you said, and fetched you everything you asked for, and kept getting you to look at her..."

"You're insane, Paris."

Tom narrowed his eyes at her and, for the first time in a long while, looked truly angry. "So you must have liked all the attention from her."

"She was being attentive to both of us, Tom."

He spun around then, and continued walking in silence. B'Elanna opened and shut her mouth several times as she fell into step with him. Carefully, she replayed the last two days in detail.

"If I didn't notice," she said finally, "it's only because I was so busy watching Aol paw you."

That got Tom to stop, she saw with satisfaction. Slowly, he turned to her, and then reached out to take her into his arms and plant a long, deep kiss on her surprised but quickly responsive lips.

In fact, they both responded a bit more than they had intended, and ended up tearing away from each other, breaths ragged, eyes wide with the shock of it. It was as if the dream were there, just at the edge of their consciousness, urging them to...

Torres couldn't help laughing in derision, though she could see Tom didn't understand it. She had gotten her wish after all.

"We're neither of us ourselves," Paris said finally, giving Torres the out she knew he would offer. "Is there any way we could find that transmitter?"

"If it exists," she said, hands shaking as she drew out the tricorder once again. "It would have to be an incredibly strong power source. They've doubtlessly hidden it, but perhaps the hiding place won't be enough if we just keep looking."

And so they did, both of them adjusting their tricorders and keeping their legs moving, putting as much distance as they could between themselves and the Tkee portal before sleep would claim them again.

**********************

"They're powering their weapons arrays," Tuvok announced as the bridge crew stared at the five Cradel ships which came out of warp directly in front of them.

"Evasive maneuvers!" Janeway snapped out, and Batehart did his best to make the ship a poor target. "Lock phasers on the lead ship and fire."

A hit rocked Voyager, but not badly. For some reason, the Cradel were sending the same ships against them, and they weren't repairing them fully. Their enemies' weapons weren't packing the punch they had in the first three encounters.

"They're targeting our right nacelle again," Chakotay called out, and Batehart rolled the ship left as Tuvok fired again and again.

"Janeway to Engineering: now!"

A half-second elapsed before the holographic ship they'd prepared materialized outside the ship -- a holdover tactic from an encounter with the Kazon that once again fooled their aggressors. The Cradel ships wheeled away from this new foe as Tuvok got off several shots which did considerable damage.

Almost immediately, the Cradel ships retreated into warp.

"Damage report!"

Janeway and Chakotay listened to the anxious descriptions of battle damage that would once again use up valuable resources and precious time to repair. They still had no idea what had happened to Torres and Paris, and the Cradel, while still retreating, were relentless in their skirmishes. Soon Voyager would simply be beaten down.

Letting the tight fist of tension in her gut grate out through her voice, Janeway ordered Batehart to assume once again a geocentric orbit in the planet's magnetic pole. It wasn't a perfect camouflage, but it was all they had.

*********************

"We've got to stop, B'Elanna. We're not doing anything but tripping over our feet. We're going to hurt ourselves."

"You stop if you want to, Paris."

"B'Elanna!" He grabbed her shoulder and spun her around so that her eyes glittered at him in the faint light from the small double moons. Both of them were sore from walking and bruised from falling in the darkness. "We're exhausted and we're not making any sort of progress. And we could really hurt ourselves. We've got to remember Doc's not going to be able to help us down here."

Torres looked ready to attack him, or at least snarl seriously, when she forced herself to relax, closing her eyes and nodding. Tom breathed out a covert sigh. That one had been close.

"We're going to fall asleep on our feet anyway," she said gruffly. Normally, both of them could go without sleep for much longer, even with the exercise they'd gotten, but whatever was happening to their bodies was draining them deeply. She could hear the slur in her own words almost as easily as she could hear it in Tom's. They were far from the portal now, and filled with food from the surface. It would have to be enough.

They found a place to sleep under trees that smelled faintly of lavender and orange juice. Laying down not too close to each other and piling leaves over themselves for warmth, they didn't speak further, not wanting to discuss their mutual terror that they might not be themselves when they awoke.

*********************

"I've completed my analysis, Captain," Kim reported in Janeway's ready room.

It was late. There hadn't yet been another Cradel attack, but repairs were slow, and the captain's eyes felt as though someone had been at them with a wad of sandpaper. She tried to smile when she looked up at Harry's lined and slightly gray face, but had little faith in her success. No one on the ship had gotten any real sleep for days now.

She looked over the padd Kim handed to her and felt energy sluggishly return at the information there.

"You're getting the same energy readings from the Cradel ships as you are from the planet?"

"Yes, but it's more than that, Captain. I'm also getting a precisely timed correlation in energy spikes between the ships and several sources below the surface. Whatever dampening field they're using down there is enough to keep me from pin-pointing those sources, but I'm getting a clear reading on the energy itself."

Kim stopped to swallow, the dryness in his throat making him wince just slightly, before he concluded, "They're definitely in synch. The ships are being controlled from below the surface."

**********************

It was the best thing about prison, being able to swim at the beach.

Tom had been amazed by it at first, not realizing, along with all his fellow newly arrived prisoners, that the primary purpose of Federation prisons really was to rehabilitate, not shame, the prisoners.

That didn't mean there weren't moments. He'd been beaten once in the woodshop by some Maquis-haters, two of his ribs broken before the distracted guards could get to him. And he'd learned how to watch his back and keep from talking to the people around him unless it was necessary.

But primarily he'd been to counseling sessions until he could recite how he felt about Caldik Prime in his sleep, he'd learned how to repair a broad variety of equipment, and he'd swum in the sea off the New Zealand coast, never going too near the forcefields that stretched down through the water, never staying out past his allotted exercise schedule. The water had been warm and clean and sometimes, in the middle of it all, he had almost forgotten that he was a prisoner. Only the chafing of the anklet as his legs moved through the water had reminded him of where he was and what he had become.

But now that harsh reminder of his failures wasn't there, and his body felt completely free as he cut through the gentle swells and tasted the salt of the sea.

"What is this place?" B'Elanna called out from his side. The water of her arms flashed and glistened in the bright afternoon sun and his heart sped up as he turned to watch what parts of her he could see rising from the water line. Her breaststroke was efficient and powerful, like her, and he knew the expression on his face was pure admiration.

"Prison."

"Oh," she said in some dismay, stopping to tread water. He turned towards her fully, kicking out lazily and letting his arms swirl in gentle circles. The need to touch her was almost overwhelming.

"Does it bother you so much that I was in prison?"

Her eyes grew sad. "It bothers me that anyone ever treated you so poorly, Tom."

"No, it was correct for me to go here. I acted like a jerk and I broke a lot of laws. I hated it here, but it gave me time to think. On Voyager, when I'm about to do something really stupid, I remember this place and what stupid things lead to, and I can stop myself." He smiled, and Torres was having difficulty keeping her breathing even. "In fact, it was part of that strength that kept me from jumping you in that cave."

There was no need to say which cave, of course, even though this was their first time discussing it openly since the turbo-lift.

Torres bit her lip and almost lost her treading rhythm. "You had to think about prison to...keep away from me?"

"Worse than that...I had to think about my fellow prisoners, and really old admiral friends of my father's, and my grandmother, and --"

It was hard to stay above the water when they were kissing passionately. Tom reached out for B'Elanna's body and ran his hands along the tight slickness of her bathing suit until her found the bare skin of her shoulders. Pulling her closer, he kissed a path down the right side of her neck to her collarbone, and then out along the strong smoothness of her, gasping a bit as her hands came around to rub along his back.

His smooth back.

"Tom!"

*********************

They had moved together during the night, of course, and between their bodies were their uniforms and quite a few crushed leaves. They moved apart immediately in the morning light and ripped down their jumpsuits.

The scale ridges were there, still, particularly on Tom, but there was no question that they had receded and diminished. Tom rolled over on his stomach and B'Elanna traced his smooth back for him, running her fingertips over the quite human spine several times as she felt the tension ooze from his body. Finally, she leaned down once again and kissed the slight bumps of his vertebrae. In a second he had rolled over to top her, pressing a deep kiss onto her lips, and then going deeper still, bringing all the skill his considerable kissing experience had given him to bring her as much pleasure as possible, until her breathing was nicely ragged.

And then she flipped him, easily, and was kissing him back with more aggression, growling just a bit, and he felt his whole body respond with joy and desire.

And then they both felt it: a hint of something out of place, a dream of energized water and the dryness of their skin. Whatever the Tkee had done to them wasn't gone yet, and it rose up between them like mocking torture. Quickly they let each other go, turning away to pull up their uniforms and dig the leaves out of their hair. Then they stood and faced each other.

"I love you," Tom said, just to reassure himself that she wasn't ready to hear it yet.

She wasn't, biting her lip and looking away.

"I figure maybe one more night's sleep and we'll be back to normal," he went on. "Then I'm going to make you believe me."

She flushed slightly, and he itched to take her back into his arms. But he kept them straight at his sides and kept his face open, no smirk, no shields.

"All right," she murmured finally, then opened her tricorder and went on briskly: "I was thinking about what would be needed for the transmitter."

"And I was thinking there's a lot more than just transmitting going on." She frowned at him. "Don't you feel better? I don't just mean going back to our real bodies...don't you feel...energized?"

Torres didn't want to admit that what she primarily felt right now was turned on. But thinking about it, she had to admit that she felt more refreshed and alert than she had since they had woken up from their wayward beam-down. The dream she'd shared with Tom, swimming with him and...being with him, had given something to her instead of taking. A strange thought occurred to her.

"Perhaps the landers are getting something out of this as well," she said. "It really would help to know more about them."

Tom nodded absently, his thoughts going in a different direction. "Do you suppose the changes in our bodies are keeping Voyager from picking up on our lifeforms? Or could we still be under some sort of dampening field like what kept us from detecting the Tkee city?"

"Transmitter, energy collector, dampening field...that's starting to sound like quite a lot of equipment. If it's above ground, it would need a hell of a hiding place."

"Energy collector?"

"Well, that might not be the right term for it, but something has to be manipulating the energy which is changing us and making us share dreams." Her eyes widened.

"What is it?" Paris asked in alarm.

Torres stared at him. "Tom, just who is sharing whose dreams, do you suppose? What if the landers, and the Cradel..." She sighed.

"What?"

"I don't know. But somehow this is all connected, and we've gotten in the middle of it."

Tom smiled gently and ran his fingers over the faint ridges along his thighs. "That's for sure."

*********************

Janeway looked around the conference table with an expression to freeze ice, not noticing how everyone except Tuvok avoided making direct eye contact. She would have been surprised if someone had shown her the expression on her face right then. Fortunately, her officers were confident that her anger was not directed at them.

"So there's no question that the Cradel ships are drones?"

"No question, Captain," Kim reported. "They were able to fool our sensors for some time, but we've cut through the dampening fields enough to be certain there are no lifeforms aboard any of them. And someone is definitely controlling them from the surface."

If a single one of my crew had been killed in these battles, or if they've hurt Tom or B'Elanna..." Janeway didn't let herself finish the thought, unaware that little fires were now kindling the eyes even Tuvok wasn't looking into anymore.

"Would it be possible to block the transmissions from the surface to the ship?"

Kim nodded, looking intently at his data padd. "The dampening field is on a carrier wave of a type we've never encountered before, which is why it took so long for us to detect it, but it acts like dampening fields we can generate ourselves. We need to find a way to enhance their field with our own jamming noise. A piggy-back signal or one which could meld with their own transmissions -- they're designed to be interactive, after all -- should do the trick."

Janeway nodded, placing her hands on the table to signal that the meeting was about to end. "I want everyone we can spare working on this. The next time those ships come around, I don't even want to have to fire on them."

**********************

Torres solved the puzzle of the transmitter when she realized how many of them there had to be.

She had been looking for variations in energy readings, anomalies that would lead to distribution or collection center. But there was nothing but stability, nothing but the same levels everywhere she could reach with her scans.

And so she realized that was the problem. The artificial monotone was being maintained not by a few powerful transmitters, but by thousands of interconnected transmitters being maintained at a uniform level (and therefore being controlled from a central location). With a few careful adjustments to her scan, she was able to find the closest energy source within fifteen kilometers, and, after stuffing themselves with nutroots and berries and a few leafy plants that tasted a little like cabbage, they were on their way. For the first time since coming to this world, the two of them began to feel back in control of their lives.

But then the dead bodies took them by complete surprise.

It was not the site of a battle, nor was there some temple or marking other than the bodies themselves. There wasn't much sign of struggle. But there were a lot of dead bodies.

Many of them were naked Tkee, their scales shining in the afternoon sun, the places where their once doubtlessly beautiful faces had been now exposed bone and tatters of flesh. The rest were landers, clothes torn and bodies equally scored by scavengers.

The smell of the carnage had been kept from Paris and Torres by the wind, but now they were choking on it as they tried to see the story behind this violent tableau, neither of them willing to reveal their desire to turn and run from this place at top speed.

When Paris finally thought to scan the bodies, however, not even the scene itself made sense.

"I can't get a reading on any of this," he said, showing Torres the tricorder so she wouldn't have to readjust the fine-tuning on her own. "It's like there's nothing there."

Chin up, Torres moved closer to the bodies and felt the cloth of a lander's tunic. It was solid to her fingers, and roughly textured.

"There doesn't seem have been a winner," she said finally, stepping back and unconsciously wiping her hand off on her pant leg. "They just killed each other and died."

They spent several more minutes looking at the bodies, then moved on, walking quickly to escape the smell, concentrating fiercely on the energy readings around them to chase out the images of torn and decaying bodies.

The next set of bodies, however, wasn't as easy to forget.

Voyager's bridge awaited them beyond the next grove. The walls were not there, and the floor raised up out of the grass-flecked ground until it formed the smooth metal plating which supported each station. Paris' eyes went immediately to the conn, where Batehart's body was slumped over the controls. Torres was busy looking from the empty engineering station to the command chairs, where Janeway and Chakotay sprawled out in death. Not meeting each other's eyes, they circled the half-formed scene and again found none of it registering on their tricorders. Paris stared longer than he meant at the lifeless form of Harry Kim, and they both found the half-burned corpse of Ensign Wildman too painful to study completely.

Thirty minutes later they left the bridge no wiser. Nor did they learn much of anything from the cluster of dead birds surrounded by a ring of small, griffin-like beasts in the next clearing. And then there were more dead Tkee and landers and animals until the various still scenes became indistinct morbid groupings they no longer bothered to study. As they neared the power source they were tracking, the corpses become more and more thickly arranged, until they were almost constantly stepping over something dead, dodging around what they could only think of as "scenery," trying not to ask each other what it could mean.

Nauseated by the constant stench and weary to the near breaking-point of looking at the corpses, they stumbled into the bottom of a mountain.

Somewhat surprised, they looked up the cliff before them and the back down to each other.

"Oh, this has got to be artificial," Torres said. She shoved her now unreadable tricorder into its pouch and crossed her arms tightly. "It has to be hiding the transmitter station somehow.

"Impossible to tell with all these trees how big around it is. And we won't be able to climb it if it stays this sheer."

Torres sat on the ground with a frustrated grunt. "The Tkee can't fly. There must be a way up."

Paris frowned up at the sky. "B'Elanna, have you noticed anything in this world that could fly?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean not counting those things we saw back there, have you seen one bird on this planet? Or any sort of animal at all?" Torres began to looking around them as she realized he was right.

"I've seen small insects," she said slowly. "But nothing larger. What about it?"

Paris shrugged. "Just...this place is as quiet in the daytime as the Tkee city is at night."

Torres stood up. "We scanned this planet and found evidence of a civilization on the brink of the industrial age."

"Right."

"But we've never actually gotten a look at the people here. And we only have the Tkee's word that landers actually exist. We know our scans can't be trusted..."

"And we know the Tkee are full of it as well."

"So..." Torres frowned. "So what does it all mean?"

"It means somehow we're going to find a way up this mountain, because it must be what we're looking for."

The obvious repetition of Tom's words made her frown. "What are not telling me?"

"Think about it, B'Elanna. The technology here is changing us -- first to what the Tkee wanted, and now back to what we want. I don't know what's given us control of the changes, but anything that could make us transforms so completely logically -- as Tuvok would say -- might be able to create things as well."

"You mean those dead bodies that aren't real, but seem real..."

"That's right. Gathered here by the transmitter, as though this is some sort of waste zone. The Voyager's bridge, we're both worried about the ship. That could have some from either of our dreams."

"And the others thing from the people who live here."

"Right. If we could consciously control that sort of power, we could certainly contact the ship, maybe even get ourselves back there the way the Center moved us."

Torres thought a long moment, then looked at the mountain with defiant determination.

It took a solid hour's walking to find the first roughness in the cliff face, and another hour after that to reach what might be called accessible territory. They tried three times climb the side before they made any progress, reaching what might be termed a kind of accidentally formed path among the boulders and cracks of the mountainside. The terrain was rather sorry and plain, with scraggled brushes of twining weeds and gray rocks. The ground began to radiate the sun's heat back at them, and the constant climb up to more pitted rocks and apathetic flora made both of them feel their currently weakened condition acutely. In fact, the afternoon had grown late and their bodies quite tired before they found the portal.

Sunken into the mountainside like the portal of an ancient submarine, half-hidden by scrub, the entrance had a simple locking mechanism it took Torres only a few minutes to open. Once they had pulled the door up, the cool dimness of the mountain's cavernous center almost pulled them down the ladder which clung to the inside of an obviously artificial corridor.

"It's the same smooth gray walls of the Tkee city," Paris said, running his hands over the unseamed surface.

"Of course it is," Torres said, though Paris knew the sneer in her voice wasn't meant for him. Obviously, the Tkee had lied considerably about their relationship with the landers. They walked quickly down the corridor to another portal. The engineer continued to expand on the pattern she'd used on the portals to the surface the day before, and found the right sequence on the fourth try. "This should be the control room..."

The woman's voice trailed off as they crossed into the room. Instead of the panels and displays she was expecting, there was a sort of gallery. Large paintings covered the walls, little statues on ingeniously lit pedestals littered the floor. And all of them were of her and Tom.

There was a painting of Tom in his climbing outfit, a red bite on his cheek. There was B'Elanna in her bathing suit, taking a towel from a holostud. There were the two of them fighting Klingon style in the holodeck. There was Tom rubbing her cold hands, and there was the human B'Elanna talking about her father's abandonment in a Vidiian prison. There was Tom in his genie pants, and B'Elanna in her tropical print dress. And there they were kissing in a dusty cave.

The statuary was more abstract, the simple lines and enticing curves of their bodies, in uniform, out of uniform. And there, in the Center, was a rendering of them swimming together in the waters off Auckland, twined around each other, mouths met in a kiss.

And then even as they stared together at this last piece, it changed, and they saw themselves standing together, in uniform, talking without looking at each other, Tom's arms held stiffly down at his sides.

They didn't speak for along time, looking at the perfectly rendered likeness one by one. Then, finally, they met each other's eyes.

Tome said it first. "What is this place? How can this be here?"

Perhaps images of things are made here before the more 'real' ones are created elsewhere. Perhaps these are matrixes, taken from our dreams, before energy is converted into matter."

"But if dreams are just turned into matter, you'd get chaos," Tom said definitively. "Any advanced civilization would know that."

"So we must be dealing with some sort of directed dreaming, some sort of...why are you looking at me like that?"

"You really like me in my climbing gear."

Once, when Torres still believed her father was going to be in her life forever, she had loved it when he held her high over his head, then swooped her down as though she were falling, then lifted her gently back up, over and over as she laughed and laughed. Nothing bad in the world seemed as though it could touch her then. Life was some sort of great amusement a child could only perceive as constant fun and games. In all her life, she'd never been as happy since.

She'd had lovers. That was hardly a secret. She'd learned how to get her pleasure from the men who had come into her life like little tests of strength or with offers of friendship, and she'd nodded and taken them and been taken. She had nothing to regret, except perhaps a knowledge that she was never adored, never really special to any of the men in her past.

Oh, they had found her a challenge, unique, a mystery, a lover they cherished, but none had found too difficult the need to say goodbye and move on in their lives. She had learned to take her pleasure where she could find it and keep her heart out of it. She was never with a man in her bed who wasn't also important and even dear to her. But she had drawn a line at certain types of sharing, at a certain level of affection, certain she wasn't really going to be that important to someone, that loved and beloved.

And she knew that most of all there had been little tenderness in her life. The Klingon half of her almost didn't care, but the human half did, deeply.

And now here was Tom Paris, with a teasing smile upon his sculpted lips that promised her tenderness and devotion and love...and frightened her out of her mind. Even her Klingon half was scared of that smile.

And so she faced her fear, smiled back, and said, "Well, it is a little tight," and enjoyed the sight of his wide eyes. She looked around almost carelessly. "I see my bathing suit is high on your list of favorites."

"I love everything you wear."

Damn him. Damn him for being able to say that so easily. And yet, as she looked into his jewel-blue eyes, wasn't she seeing there some of the fear she felt? Was it really so easy for him after all? Tom's life was full of its own horrors. Why else had he dreamed of Auckland? Why else did he know to wait until they were both back to normal before proving that he loved her?

Anticipation was making a warm spot inside her as she turned from the paintings and statues to search for another portal. She knew there was a control room somewhere in here.

"But you seem to enjoy the sight of me in my bathing suit," she shot back finally.

"What warm-blooded man wouldn't?"

She shivered slightly at that, then grew angry at herself. In fact, she was becoming infused with rage. She wanted to claw and bite at something...something like a certain blue-eyed lieutenant, perhaps? She was so...pathetic and predictable. And her timing couldn't be worse. There, hidden in the wall behind the largest of the paintings (of herself lying on top of Tom in the cave right before she accused him of playing hard to get), she found the next portal.

All business, she met Tom's eyes before she keyed open the entrance and rushed forward to find, at last, the control room.

***********************

"Bridge to Captain Janeway!"

She sat up in bed, jolted from her half-sleep. "Janeway here."

"Signs of approaching Cradel ships, Captain," Chakotay's voice told her.

She was already peeling off her nightgown with one hand while the other reached for her uniform. "On my way."

***********************

"I can't override!" Torres shouted as the power of the generator buried deep beneath the mountain rose to maximum. "They're coming right at the ship!"

"I can't reach Voyager!" Paris shouted back from his position at the communications console. He was fairly certain this wasn't an intelligent terminal, just a relay station and perhaps message storage unit.

"The controls aren't even being relayed through this station!"

Torres finally just began keying the controls on pure instinct. She suspected it was what most of her colleagues thought she did anyway. The viewscreen above her, so far reflecting nothing but the gray walls of the room, abruptly turned into stars and ships.

Voyager was banking as five ships approached at a right angel -- Paris couldn't help thinking the maneuver should have turned inward just a little bit sooner -- and phaser fire spat from the Cradel ships...and missed Voyager completely. A second passed, and then it was clear that the Cradel ships were drifting in space. They were still firing wildly, creating a random course of energy pulses, but they had no plan, no direction.

"Of course!" Torres crowed. "They're just another part of the play! The Tkee want us to think they're under attack!"

Paris nodded in response, unable to speak as he watched Voyager face danger. His entire universe had become that ship. He tried not to curse Batehart in his mind, aware that the man was a fine pilot and --

"Faster! You've got to roll that faster!"

Though she was watching her ship face terrible danger, she couldn't help smiling. Then she scowled deeply with fury, the plan suddenly clear. To a coward, who would expect cowardly behavior in her opponents, it would seem like a good way to get Voyager to leave for good, attacking them repeatedly while turning her and Tom into Tkee. Well, the Center didn't know Janeway very well, if she thought that tactic was going to work.

And then the Cradel ships stopped firing, stopped moving at all. And Voyager turned around to take deliberate aim at each in turn, blowing them to bits. They watched in triumph until the last bits of the last vessel drifted away from their own ship, then turned to each other with rather foolish grins.

"I can't wait to hear how they did that," Torres said to break the tension.

"If they did it."

"Now, what's that supposed to mean?"

"B'Elanna, think about what we saw out there, the people and animals, all some sort of fantasy, and then what we found in the next room, those paintings...How do we know this wasn't some sort of fantasy too, something both of us wanted to see?"

Her shoulders slumped. "We don't know." She began to jab at the controls in front of her. "We've got to figure out..."

"We have figured it out, B'Elanna. This is just a relay station, one of thousands. Commands to the central control center aren't processed through here."

"But --"

"Let's see if we can observe what we can't control," Tom said gently. "Can we get some landers up on this thing?" He gestured to the viewscreen.

For five hours they tried and failed to call up any images other than Voyager calmly circling the planet. The also failed to send any messages, understand how any bioneural power was being channeled or siphoned, or understand what half the controls in front of them were for.

Torres was so surprised by the hands rubbing her shoulders she almost whipped around with her hands in fists...almost. Tom's touch was becoming quite familiar now, and she leaned into the sensation instead. He was really good at this...hardly a surprise.

"Tom, have there been a lot women?" She was horrified by her own question, but the hands on her shoulders kept her from tensing up.

A moment passed. "More than there should have been, but I didn't date a planet, or anything. I had something to prove for a long time, and women were a great way to show how Starfleet and then the Maquis and then prison hadn't gotten the best of me. But I can still remember all their names, still think of them fondly. They treated me better than I treated them. I really need to write them all a nice letter or something."

B'Elanna started to laugh. "You make it all sound so...cordial."

"That's exactly what it is when you know there's no love involved. Everyone on their best behavior." A bitter note crept in. "I was charming and they were lovely, and I'm absolutely sick out of my mind with it, now that I've found what I've wanted all this time." He moved closer, his breath warm on her neck. "I can't believe how long it's taken to find you, how far away you were hidden from me. I can't believe life has been good enough to let me find you. Sometimes I think about going to that chunk of quartz in Sickbay and bowing down to it, to thank it for bringing us together."

She wasn't breathing very well any more, but rather than drawing her closer, Tom's hands released her. She knew why and she approved, but it was still so hard to turn from him and look about the room for some sort of reasonable place to sleep. She walked towards one rather dim corner and felt the trace of scales on her legs against her uniform. Perhaps Tom was right. Perhaps one more night would do it.

**********************

"No more signs of activity, Captain," Tuvok reported.

Janeway knew it was more than a little self-indulgent to keep staring at the fragments of the Cradel ships so long after they'd been shattered by Voyager's phasers, but she did it anyway. And now it was time for Mr. Kim to speak up.

"Captain."

Yep. Right on cue.

"Yes, Mr. Kim?"

"I've analyzed the energy signature which was controlling the ships."

"And what have you found?"

He smiled, a strange little smile for the ensign. He really was starting to fill into his position at ops most efficiently, she thought.

"It's almost identical in nature to one of our own replicator energy signatures."

Janeway nodded. Most efficiently indeed.

******************

Up and down. Up and down. She would have grown dizzy with it were she fully human. The long voyage up to the ceiling of the kitchen and then the sharp drop down to just above the hard floor. Her father's hands were strong and she feared nothing.

But then the hands weren't there to catch her anymore. She was lost in nothingness, cold and angry...until there was someone beside her, not trying to toss her towards the ceiling or make her laugh when she really just wanted to be held. She felt warmth and life and utter, utter tenderness...

"Tom?"

******************

"B'Elanna."

After so long, both of them were frightened that something would have to happen to keep them apart yet again. Even as they pulled off the thick cloth of their uniforms and felt nothing but smooth skin underneath, even as her hands told him his back was smooth, and his hands traced delicately each lovely Klingon ridge of her back, even as they came together without anything between them, they waited for something to happen and keep them apart.

Giving in completely to a desire he'd had literally for years, Tom rolled B'Elanna on her back and kissed delicate patterns across the ridges of her forehead, muttering the one Klingon poem he'd committed to memory in a husky and broken undertone that probably mispronounced half the words. Then he rolled her on her stomach and continued kissing down her back, each rise and fall of her Klingon form an erotic call to each of his senses. He could smell her and taste her and see her and hear her and feel her and he was drowning in her and he wanted nothing, absolutely nothing except that this should continue.

B'Elanna was lost. Everywhere Tom touched her felt better than anything. And yet she knew exactly what she was doing, rolling back over to run her fingertips over Tom's smooth legs, tracing patterns on his bare chest with her tongue, nipping lightly at the skin whose taste and scent she remembered so well, so very, very well...

"You're so beautiful," he was saying now, and he had been right. For this moment, she did believe it. How could she doubt anything that was announced in so desperate a tone? With each syllable he was pressing his body, so warm and real and strong, against her own. "So unbelievably lovely. Don't stop touching me. Please don't ever stop touching me."

"Tom!" she gasped, because there was nothing else for her right now. Then she forced her eyes open and clear. It was more than time to tell him: "I love you."

His body stilled for half a second, then his arms gripped her more tightly than ever and his teeth closed on her neck, and she arched in delirium from the pure wave of pleasure that washed through her. She lost her ability to be gentle, to restrain the desire that pounded the fire in her blood. But the man she grappled and then joined with matched her at each moment, screaming his love and being there for her, with her, as their pleasure built and built.

And when it was over -- after the screams and the need and the explosions of pleasure and the release of a tension she'd felt perhaps since the day she was born -- Tom's arms held her with a gentle pressure that made the first real, half-Klingon tears since childhood slide down her face. She waited helplessly for scorn, for triumph, for smugness from the man who had become her lover. But instead, Tom Paris rolled her once again on her back and, one by one, kissed the drops from her cheeks, whispering each time, "I love you."

Until, finally, she whispered back, "I believe you."

********************

"Sensors have detected one human and one half-human, half-Klingon lifesign on the planet, Captain."

"Bridge to transporter room."

"Transporter room here."

"Look on to those lifesigns and beam them up!"

"Aye, Captain...Captain, the lifesigns have disappeared."

Chakotay watched her eyes glitter and checked over the weapon systems one more time.

*********************

"Your captain will pay for the loss of my ships!" the Center's voice hissed.

"I don't think so," Torres told her, arms crossed and head back as her drawl filled the dank cavern. Odd that she hadn't realized before how pathetic an existence this must be. Inside her uniform moisture was beginning to bead on her skin in this dank place, and she doubted that Aol and Keer, standing beside their tentacled ruler with expressions of rage and trepidation, were much for company.

"After all, it wasn't much of a loss, was it? You can produce more ships in your sleep...literally."

"You know nothing of what I can do."

"There are some points we're not sure of," Paris admitted, his tone a match for the woman beside him. "Do the landers realize you're using their neural energy to make your city and your ships? Do they know you use their dreams to entertain yourself? Do they appreciate having you use their bodies to increase your population?" Aol's eyes narrowed. "What do you suppose they might do if we told them about your little set-up, maybe gave them some help in getting rid of you?"

"You couldn't do that. I wouldn't allow it."

Both officers smiled at the anxiety in that musical voice. "Did you really think you could just drive Voyager off while we calmly turned into fish?" Torres demanded.

"How many other ships have you looted of their personnel?"

"What are you planning to do when the landers advance enough to fight back?"

"It isn't like that!" Aol screamed.

Tom and B'Elanna blinked at her.

"They know about their dreams," Aol continued, her poise lost and, for once, her manner sincere. "They...we Tkee made an arrangement with them thousands of years ago."

"An arrangement? To loot their neural energy?"

"We allow them to share all they like," Keer said, "and to create whatever they wish, as soon as they wish it."

"So you've turned this whole world into a sort of holodeck. Then why are they living at such a low level of technology?" Paris asked.

"It is what they have chosen. The...their world responds to the needs of the people, not the person."

"So you have landers down here must more often than you say, don't you?" Torres said. "And when some of them really like the look of your city, do they return to the surface at all?"

"Why us?" Paris wanted to know. "If you've got such a cozy relationship with the landers, why involve us?"

A long moment passed, both Tkee women looking at the Center uncertainly. Finally, the voice spoke. "Millennia of having everything they wish for has...weakened the landers. You, the two of you, what you feel for your lives, your ship, for each other...you have been so good for us."

The room full of their memories, Torres thought, sickened. Was it just at that station, or was this world filled with images of their dreams?

"Stay with us," the voice continued. "When you have gone all that you are will be lost to us. Aol and Keer will love you, or I will find you others. You can have --"

"All we want is to be gone from this place and back on our ship!" Tom snarled, feeling the rage from B'Elanna stoking his own considerable fury.

"Please, you must stay."

"You'll have to kill us," Torres said. "Because we're figuring out your technology even now. We know you made those Cradel ships, we know that proximity to a transmission station gives people power over the use of that neural energy, and we'll only keep learning things until we figure out how to destroy this world, if that's what it takes, to get out of here." Only she and Tom knew she was bluffing about that last part. And the thought of Tom beside her allowed her to draw out the side of herself she usually feared, the part he had convinced her he loved along with the rest of her.

Almost crouching, she snarled in open rage, "Janeway will never leave us here, and we'll just keep picking apart your technology until there's nothing left here for you to rule over but a cluster of homeless Tkee."

"If you even have that," Paris added, speaking in a cold detachment that made a perfectly chilling companion to Torres' rage as a ruthless smile formed on his lips. "Tell me, Center, do the landers sometimes dream of mermaids and a city under the sea?"

And then they were standing on the bridge.

***********************

It took some thought, but Janeway decided not to pursue the Tkee further. She was glad to have her people back, glad to hear that the Tkee weren't simply parasites to the original inhabitants of this world, and glad to know that it really wasn't her place to interfere further with either species.

"So you believe the Tkee themselves may be a manifestation of the landers' dreams?"

"Some of them had to come from the landers themselves, changed as we almost were." Paris kept from his voice all trace of his continuing horror at what he and B'Elanna had been through. "And the Center is such a different kind of lifeform from the Tkee, while the landers looked very similar. I can't help but wonder whose original idea the merpeople are."

"In any event," Janeway said, "repairs to the ship are almost complete. We did manage to gather quite a lot in food supplies before we called up our away teams. And, most important, the Doctor says neither of you will suffer any lasting effects of what happened to you down there. She had placed her hands on the table before her helmsman cleared his throat and said:

"I don't know about that one, Captain."

She raised an eyebrow at him, then raised both as, with one of his rare, genuine smiles, Tom reached across the table for B'Elanna's hand. She gave it quickly, easily, and nodded in encouragement before Paris told their startled colleagues: "B'Elanna and I wanted you all to know, we're engaged."

THE END

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