Title:  Q Love P6
Author:  Cheryl Forbes
Fandom:  Star Trek:  Voyager
Pairing:  Chakotay/Tom Paris
Rating:  NC 17
Series:  6 of ?
Email for feedback:  forbesc@skyia.com
Disclaimer:  Voyager and her crew are the property of Paramount and
not me.  Whatever.
 

Summary:  Finally, the wedding.
 

"Harry you know I love you, right?"

"Ah yeah, I guess so."  Harry fidgeted in his chair.  Tom had been
acting weird all evening.  He hadn't wanted to play pool and now he
was going all touchy feely on him.  Harry did love Tom.  He just
didn't like talking about it.

"Just checking."  He took a sip of his apple juice, which was by the
way another whacked out thing.  Tom without a beer in Sandrine's was
like a Borg on a cube without an interface junction.  "And you love
me right?"

"Whoakay, what's up?  You're acting like you're pissed face drunk and
you haven't even had a drink yet."  Harry looked under his
chair.  "What is this a joke?  You've got my chair wired and everyone
on the bridge is listening to this right?"

"No Har, it's just you and me here."

"OK I'll bite.  Yeah Tom you're my bestest of best friends.  If we
were stranded on a deserted planet with no food, I'd give you my last
ration pack.  If we had a chance to get home but only one of us could
go, I'd bow out and let you.   If we both needed a transplant and
there was only one."

"OK, OK I get the idea.  You love me."

"Yeah I suppose but you're really freaking me out here.  If I didn't
know better, I'd say you were dying or something."

"Well."

"Oh, no.  I'm the one that's used up his nine lives, what with
flipping in and out of realities, not you."

"Harry."

"It's not fair, not after you've finally snagged Chakotay."

"Harry!"

"What!"

"I'm not dead yet!  I'm not even sure I'm going to!"

"But you're sick, right?"

"I'm something but not exactly sick, no."

"What then?"

"Have you ever heard of the Bynars?"

"Yeah, aren't they that unisex species that tried to take over the
Enterprise D that one time?"

"Uh-huh.  Well now in a way, they're taking me over."

"I don't get it.  You're possessed?  Like in that movie we saw with
the pea soup and the priest?"

"No, actually it's more like I'm the one doing the possessing.  I've
had sort of a organ transplant."

"A Bynar organ?  What kind?"

"A womb."

"A womb?  Like in where you have babies?"

"Yeah.  I'm pregnant Harry."

"Oh fuck no way.  You?  Knocked up?"

"Yep and Chakotay's the father."

"Isn't that dangerous.  I mean I've read it is."

"When you try implanting a fertilized embryo into a man's
pericardium, yes it can be but that's not what happening here.  If it
was, Chak would have never agreed to it."

"So now you have a uterus?"

"And a baby Harry.  I'm almost four months pregnant."

He peeked under the table at his best friend's gut.  Tom was wearing
jeans with a white denim shirt hanging out so he couldn't see much.

"You want a look?"

"Yeah."

Pushing back in his chair, Tom lifted his shirt.  The top button on
his pants was undone and his belly rounded up softy from his
waistband in a bulge the size of a bowling ball.

"Oh shit and I thought the hair was weird."

"My baby's not weird Harry.  It's, it's." His friend's crystal blue
eyes began to well up with tears as he righted his shirt.  Oh shit
now what did he do?  Harry had never had a best bud that was pregnant
before so he winged it.

"Did I say weird?  No, I meant unexpected.  It's cool Tom. Really, it
is.  Is it a boy or a girl?"

"We don't know."

"Why?  Can't the Doc wave his magic wand and tell you?"

"No his scans can't penetrate the uterine wall.  All we know is that
there's a baby there and that's about it."

"Wow, so you're going to be surprised."  Harry was glad someone else
would be.  Never in a million years did he think Tom Paris would
voluntarily get pregnant.  Shit besides his fear of anything medical,
the extra weight that would throw off his pool game in itself should
have been enough of a deterrent for the carefree pilot.

"It's all been a surprise Har."

"How?  If you had the transplant, you knew you'd get pregnant, right?"

"Yeah but there's been some complications.  I might not survive the
birth Harry."

"Oh no.  You just told me you weren't dying."

"I'm not.  Well not right at the moment."

"Oh sorry, did I get that wrong?  Forgive me.  You're fine now but
you're going to pop off in a few months.  What the hell is that
about?"

"Harry, please take it easy.  Don't make this harder."

"Fuck off Paris!  You're telling me you're dying and you want me to
be calm?"

"You have to be.  I need you to watch over the baby and Chakotay for
me."

"Arrrgh!  Damn, damn, damn."

"Harry."

"OK, OK, OK but I want to go on record right now to say this really,
really sucks."

"So let it be written."  Tom said with a small smile.  "And if it
means anything, I think it sucks too."

"What?  Oh, of course you do.  Do you want to go someplace and talk?
I promise to say I love you in between vows of fealty to your new
family."

"Naw thanks Harry but when I leave here, it will be to go home to my
husband."

"When did you get married?  Oh shit, I didn't miss that too did I?"

"No Harry.  It's not official yet.  I've just sort of gotten used to
thinking of Chakotay that way."

"Well maybe you should make it official before you ah, ah, you know."

"Pop off?"  Tom said with a familiar quirk to his lips.

Harry could barely believe the man wasn't a raving lunatic let alone
be his old charming self.  Well that was the difference between him
and his resilient friend.   Tom always could take the shots in the
gut life hit him with and come back with a smile as if to say, is
that all you've got?  His cavalier attitude had always made Harry
proud and was probably the reason he had befriended him in the first
place.  God, he really did love this man.

"Whatever.  Can I be your best man?"

"You already are Har."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence but I know Chakotay already holds
that post.  I mean at your wedding.  You could do it here, Neelix
could cater and I could program the decorations."

"Sounds nice.  When do you want to do it?"

"Me?  It's your wedding."

"But it's your party.  You're calling the shots.  Just tell us when
to show up and we'll be there."

It was a going away gift and he knew it.  Tom was giving him the
opportunity to show how much he loved him and would miss him.
Planning his wedding would give him closure and the solace he would
need after he was gone.  His eyes watered involuntarily at his
friend's thoughtfulness.

"Damn but you're a sap and now you're making me into one."

"All part of the service Harry."

"Thanks Tom."

"No problem Har.  Anything for a friend."

********

"Stop play with it."

"But it hurts."

"I don't care, it looks great.  So if I see your hands touching that
bowtie one more time, I'm going to rap your knuckles so hard that
Tom's going have to thread your wedding band through your nose.  Got
it?"

"Speaking of Tom, what is he wearing?  I bet it's not a tux."

"You know I'm not going to tell you, so why bother asking?"

"Kathryn I thought you were my friend."

"Shut up Chakotay and tie up your shoes."

"And that's another thing.  You know my father went barefoot when he
married my mother."

"Oh really and did he go naked too?"

"No he wore a loincloth."

"That's it?  Just a little isty bitsy piece of fabric over his
marital assets?"

"And some beads in his hair but yes that's about it."

"Hmmm. I bet that made for some interesting wedding pictures."

"You could say so."

"You know I've always preferred traditional ceremonies."

"Oh no.  I was only complaining about the necktie and the shoes.  I
didn't say I wanted to go bare assed to my wedding."

"Pussy."

"I'm not and you know it.  There are just some things that aren't
meant for public viewing, my butt being one of them."

"Did I mention the suit comes with a cummerbund?"

"What the hell is that?"

"A tight piece of coloured cloth that fastens around your abdomen.
It's not too bad really.  Unless of course you want to sit down."

"Bitch."

"Oooh aren't we the big man in our fancy black suit."

"Fine then, go ahead replicate me a loincloth.  But it has to be
buckskin with a full front `and' back."

"Like this?"

"What?  Oh you're evil Kathryn.  I bet you ordered my bowtie a size
too small just to get me to wear that."

"Details, details.  Now get out of that incredibly unflattering
outfit and into this."

"Turn around."

"Why?"

"Because it's my wedding day and I deserve some dignity."

"You're marrying the bravest man I've ever met, so you already have
that.  Now strip before I march out there and marry him myself."

"He's out there waiting for me?"

"Yes Chakotay, Tom showed up early and has been waiting the better
part of an hour."

"Oh spirits.  I have to sit down."

"Oh no, it's way too late to get the jitters now."

"He must really love me.  Did I tell you I love him too?  I do you
know, more than anything.  You remember that night in Sandrine's when
you told me to look at him and he looked back?  Spirits Kathryn, I
was so shocked and pleased at the same time I didn't know if I was
coming or going.  I know he'd already agreed to be my husband but."

"Shut up and dress!"

"What?  Right.  Are you going to turn away or what?"

"No never.  I'm with you all the way Chakotay through thick and thin,
so get used to it."

"You're a good friend Kathryn."

"Yes, more than you'll ever know."

********

The week before.

"Q!"

Kathryn paced one end of her ready room to the other repeatedly
calling out the omnipotent pain in the butt's name.  During her final
turn she saw a flash of white and ran smack dab into the being in
question's chest.

"Yes my darling of the Delta quadrant.  You rang?"

She stepped back.  "What the hell did your oversexed prodigy do to
Lieutenant Paris?"

"Junior?  I think the more apropos question should be what did your
Lieutenant Paris do to my boy?  You know he's being turning planetary
ecosystems blue from here to Antares just to match the colour of
Helmboy's eyes."

That was going to be a hard one to explain in the next data stream
transfer to Starfleet, Kathryn pondered momentarily before pushing on.

"Is he or isn't he going to die?"

"Paris?"

"Yes!"

"Hard to say.  The lieutenant's disposition has become something of a
topic of debate in the Continuum of late."

"How so?"

"My dear sweet Kathy do you know how many humans have captured the
heart of a Q?   None, zip, zero!  Well you've come close and so has
another starship captain who will remain nameless, but nothing of
this magnitude."

"So you're telling me the Continuum's upset that a human has power
over a Q."

"Of course not.  Helmboy is nothing but a mere distraction to us but
unfortunately he's an irritating one.  Do you know how long it took
me to restore those ecosystems?"

"You're a Q so I'd say in one snap of your fingers.  Big deal."

"That's not the point.  The point is that I had `do' it at all.
Junior should be concentrating on his responsibilities to the
Continuum and not playing with some bi-pedal with a quirky sense of
humour and nice ass."

"You do realize then that if you let Junior kill Tom in a fit of
jealously, he'll be moping around and neglecting his duties for
decades."

"Yes, yes so Helmboy will live.   I don't like denying my boy his
pleasures but I believe it's for the greater good.   Eventually he'll
forget his little pet and move on to something more interesting."

"And what about the child?"

"Oh that.  What of it?"

"Is it a Q?"

"Is it important?"

"Of course it is!"

"Why?"

"You don't know who the father is, do you?"

"It's not that I don't know.  I just haven't checked."

"Oh bullshit."

"The Q do not lie Kathy."

That was probably true since they didn't care enough to bother.

"You know I would consider it a personal favour if you found out."

"Pardon moi?"

"Both Chakotay and Tom are very important to me and I care about what
happens to them.  I'm just saying I'd be very grateful for any
information you could provide me with."

"Grateful?"

"Very grateful."

"Very well but it may take some time."

"Can't you check right now?"

"Believe me Kathy sweetheart with that offer on the table, if I
could, I would.  However, Junior isn't a sharing mood right now.  He
wasn't too pleased I fixed his planets you see."

"I don't understand.  Shouldn't you be able to tell on your own?"

"Not if he doesn't want me to know.  Remember Quinn?  He was able to
hide from us for a millennium before we finally located him."

"But you know where the baby is.  Its in Tom Paris."

"I don't have time to explain in the intricacies of time and space,
not that you'd understand anyway but suffice it to say it's a little
like that.  The child is here but not here.  Actually it's a pretty
neat trick.  Not all of us in the Continuum can do that.  What with
bringing balance to our plane of existence and saving the nature of
the universe as we know it, my boy's something special."

"Spare me the proud father routine Q and get me the information I
want."

"You'll be grateful?"

"I said I would didn't I?"

Q leered at her.  "Yes I remember.  You said `very' grateful."  He
straightened and then saluted.  "Then mon capitaine I will return
with the data or not at all."

Q or not, Kathryn knew that was a lie.

********

"Holy shit Harry, do you see what I see?"

"What, a naked commander walking slowly towards us?  Yeah, he's hard
to miss."

"Well he's not quite naked but I do have a good imagination.  Look at
those strong thighs and that hard stomach, oh man I could eat dinner
off that.  If I wasn't about to marry him, I'd propose.  Damn, and
he calls me beautiful."

"He thinks you're beautiful?  Funny, I don't see it."

Tom gave him quick glance and a bright smile.  "That's why we're
friends Harry."

As Harry watched the commander approach them, he figured the pilot
was probably right.  Tom had never affected him sexually.  The
dashing man was his hero, his comrade in arms and his drinking buddy
but never had he considered him for a lover.  He was attractive,
Harry gave him that, but given the choice, he would have taken
Chakotay's dark smoldering look over his fairer jovial one any day.

It wasn't love but a preference.  Like his friend, the tall dark
handsome type appealed to him.   Maybe that was one of the reasons
why he and Tom were such good buds.   They had spent a lot of nights
bonding while talking about how gorgeous the first officer was and
what it would be like to do him.   The only difference had been, Tom
had called it making love and Harry had made it a point to call it
sex.   Even way back then he knew the pilot was a goner for the
commander, and been careful not to sound like competition.

Tom was his bestest of best friends and if Chakotay was the only man
left on the planet then . . . well you know the rest.

********

Eyes like sapphires,
Hair of gold,
You make feel young,
Where I used to feel old.

Oh it was so, so bad but it was the most wonderful poem he'd ever
heard because Chakotay had written the words himself and had recited
them to him before their friends.  Later he would find out that it
had taken his new husband days of hard work to come with those four
simple sentences and feel even more honoured but right now all that
was important was the he meant them.  Tom could die a very happy man
knowing the man who was over by the buffet enduring repeated hugs of
congratulations from Neelix, loved him.

"Don't you look the happy groom."

Tom tore his eyes from his husband's well-meant torture to the slight
woman who had snagged a barstool beside him.

"I am Captain."  He knocked is glass of ginger ale to her flute of
champagne.  "And thanks for the wedding present.  I don't know how
you got him to wear it, but Chak looks great."

"You look pretty great yourself Thomas Eugene Chakotay."  Trying to
hide his blush, not many people outside his husband and his captain
could make him to that, he peered down and surveyed his outfit.

He had gone traditional and had selected a silk ivory white tunic
with a mandarin collar over loose fitting trousers. Along the
shoulders and neckline of the top and down the sides of the pants
were intricately embroidered symbols of Chakotay's native culture in
white gold relief.  The delicately woven garment flowed softly down
his body over the swell of his child making his pregnancy evident, to
the bare feet that in his embarrassment, he found infinitely
interesting.

"I got you one more gift Tom.  Actually, this time its for both of
you."

He peered sideways shyly at his captain.  "You've done more than
enough already Ma'am."  He was thinking of her promise a week ago in
her ready room and by the pained look in her hazel eyes, he knew she
was too.

"I talked to Q Tom.  He told me you would survive the baby's birth."

His head came up.  "J said that?"

"No his father did but he had the backing of the Continuum behind
him.  It seems that if you were to die, it would make them less
powerful somehow and I think that scares the hell out of them."  She
took his palm and squeezed it.  "This child will not be the cause of
your death Tom."

"Saved by ego."  He murmured to no one in particular and then
remembered who was holding his hand.  "And by you Captain.  I'm sure
you had a hand in this somehow."

"You life?  No, that was never in jeopardy.  I think J, isn't that
what you call him?  I think J just wanted you to think so because you
spurned him.  It was an empty threat Tom."

"Did you ask about the baby?"  He ventured weakly.

She didn't answer right away and it scared him.  Captain Kathryn
Janeway of the Federation Starship Voyager never hesitated about
anything.  This iron willed woman ate Borgs for breakfast and used
the tough parts to pick her teeth.  For her to take pause now chilled
Tom to the bone.

"I don't know about the child Tom.  I asked, but Q didn't have an
answer for me."

"He wouldn't tell you?"

"He couldn't but he did promise to find out."  She offered with hope
in her voice.

Tom placed a protective hand over the infant that had as of yesterday
had begun to make itself known.  In the excitement of his pending
nuptials he hadn't told anyone, but the dreadful flutterings that had
once ruled his stomach had transformed themselves in something
joyful.

Intermittently at the oddest times he felt the small life form in his
belly shifting.  While eating pizza at Harry's last night and during
Chakotay's recital it had felt as if the kid was doing calisthenics
in his gut.  A pulsing under his hand informed him that it was time
for another workout.  When a well place kick jabbed his bladder he
winced.

"Tom are you OK?"

The captain's face was white with worry.  Christ but he'd putting her
through a lot these last few months.  He'd been through hell but the
stricken look on her face told him he hadn't done so alone.  His
captain had been along for the ride every inch of the way, hurting
and hating as much as he had.  Well he was done with all that.  She
had told him he was going to live and he felt good, he felt beautiful
and he had hope.  Maybe it was time to repay her kindness by making
her experience those same wondrous emotions.

"I'm fine.  Here feel this."

Moving the hand that had been gripping his, Tom placed it over the
bulge under his silks and then covered it with his other.

"Oh my god that's him, isn't it."  Her eyes watered as she held her
hand still.  "Chakotay didn't tell me about this."

"That's because he doesn't know.  Besides me, you're the first one to
feel my baby move."

"Oh no Tom.  Chakotay should."  She tried to pull her hand away but
he held it firm.

Tom laughed.  "He's going to be feeling it in his back all night and
every night for the next three months so I don't think he'll mind if
you have the first honours.  Besides he isn't here, you are."  He
stressed the last two words hoping she would understand that this
gesture was payback for standing up for him with the Continuum.

"I wanted to be."  She replied with a catch in her throat.  They both
glanced over to the buffet where Chakotay was still wrestling with
Neelix's affections.  "And I think given the choice, he would be too."

"Aw don't' worry about that.  Chak could be on the other side of the
quadrant and I'd still know he was with me.  Can I let you in on a
little secret."  Tom leaned forward and whispered into her ear.

"I think he's in love with me."

TBC