Title:  Twice Again P3
Author:  Cheryl Forbes
Fandom:  Star Trek:  Voyager
Pairing:  Chakotay/Tom Paris
Rating:  NC 17
Series:  3 of 3
Email for feedback:  forbesc@skyia.com
Disclaimer:  Voyager and her crew are the property of Paramount and
not me.  Whatever.

Summary:  In answer to Isa and Leone's 30 day challenge.  Tom's 30
days in the brig have devastating consequences, so Captain Janeway
goes back in time to suspend the sentence and hoping to correct what
went wrong.  Unfortunately events don't go as planned the first time
around.  Will the second?
 

It had been good to see him.

Sitting alone on his heels on the dusty ground by the portal, Tom
cocooned himself in the memory of seeing Chakotay again.  With his
eyes flickering closed he remembered the male scent of him, the touch
of his smooth skin and the taste of his lips.  He should get up and
go back to base camp but he needed just a little more time on his own
to savour the brief encounter.

Idly he wondered what the big man would have done if he had increased
his advances.  Would Chakotay have allowed him to march him to the
bedroom and make love to him?  He hadn't seemed frightened of him,
well at least not at first, so there might have been a chance however
there was an equal chance he might have been rejected and that was
one memory Tom didn't want to have, even if he was going to forget it
later.

Tom touched his lips softly to the inside of his wrist.  Faintly in
the palm of his hand he could still smell Chakotay.  He let go of a
low moan and kissed the smooth surface of his forearm, using only the
barest hint of tongue in remembrance of his bronze skin.  Wrapped in
his own private ecstasy Tom let his other hand roam down the tight
bulge in his jeans and with a twist of his fingers released his hot,
hard cock from its confinement.

With his thumb he spread the pre-cum that leaked from its tip down
his shaft, encased its length with quivering fingers and started to
pump.  As the heat in his groin started to rise, he covered his mouth
and nose loosely with the hand that had lain on Chakotay's chest.
Breathing deeply and thinking of his deep brown eyes Tom came
quickly, his passion and love spurting out in ropey streams onto the
hard packed floor of the planet.  He sat there a moment trembling
with his head thrown back and tried to bring his erratic breathing
under control before attempting to stand.

"I love you."  He said into the howling wind while wiping his hands
on the thighs of his jeans.  Finally standing he did up his pants and
squinted into the indistinct horizon.  Feeling closer to Chakotay
than he had in years, he sighed deeply and headed for base camp.

He wasn't sure what he was going to tell the doctor and Kathryn other
than this was it.  If it didn't work, he didn't want to know and he
didn't want to try again.  He'd had his shot.  All he wanted now was
to go back to winery and continue on with his life in blissful
ignorance.

With the doctor's eidetic memory he supposed he could come back and
try again.  Maybe document what he'd said or done and try a different
tactic the next time.  But he didn't want to spend his life chasing
after something that quite likely was improbable and throw away what
he had now.

It wasn't a great life but it was the one he'd been dealt and this
manipulation of the timeline sort of felt like cheating or stealing
if he really thought about it.  The beautiful commander he'd just
left belonged to a love struck kid in Voyager's brig and not an old
man like himself.  Tom's laughter echoed through the ruins as he
walked.  Cheating on himself?  The honest and upright commander would
have appreciated that thought.

Besides, things could only get better from here, right?

In one lifetime he'd died and this in this one he survived albeit in
loneliness but based on that upward trend he was bound to get lucky
in the next.  Third time was the charm, wasn't it?  If not, well he
really didn't want to think about that.  He intended to play the
rules even if he wasn't winning the game this time around.

With his mind made up, Tom decided they would not contact Memory
Alpha before they left, he did not want these good memories tarnished
with possible disappointment and he would gain the doctor's solemn
vow not to mention the Guardian to him ever, ever again.  What he
gotten today was prize enough, he didn't want to tempt fate.

Seeing and oh god touching Chakotay had been a miraculous gift and
although he knew he'd forget that wonderful memory once they left
orbit, he hoped someway, somehow that he would retain part of it
subconsciously.

Maybe his dreams would be sweeter.

********

"The guardian of what?"

Kathryn was glad to see the doctor's presence at the harvest fest.
She saw little enough of her old friend, what with him jumping from
one end of the quadrant to the other in the name of research, and his
attendance at this joyous function was a rare treat.

She sipped her wine, an excellent Pinot Noir from a previous year's
harvest and admitted that the doctor wasn't the only one at fault in
this situation.

Her return to the Alpha quadrant ten years previous had been a busy
one.  After Voyager's refit at the Utopia Planetia shipyard, they'd
been considered the unofficial SWAT team of the Fleet.  Because their
unprecedented experiences in the Delta quadrant, they were called in
frequently to investigate and deal with any and all anomalies
occurring the Alpha.  Most of her valiant crew, with a few notable
exceptions, had reupped preferring to continue their service on the
great ship and the only time she saw the doctor now were at family
events such as these.

"Forever, now will you please keep voice down?  I'm not supposed to
be talking to anyone about this, up to and including the captain of
Starfleet's flagship."  Growled the doctor.

"Then why are you?"  She replied in an over dramatic whisper, making
a display of shifting her eyes back and forth over her wineglass as
if looking for enemy agents.

The doctor raised his eyebrows in exasperation and gave her one of
his famous `looks'.  It showed borderline disrespect but it was a
façade.  This was one of her closest, dearest and yes, oldest friends
and she knew him better than that.

Hiding a smirk, Kathryn allowed the doctor to steer her into one of
the more quieter and secluded corners of the large garden.  When he
bundled her behind a large oak tree cloak and dagger style, she had
to bite her bottom lip to keep from laughing aloud.  The only thing
that stopped her was the dead serious expression on his holographic
face.

"Do you remember Tom's thirty days in the brig?"

The mention of her former helmsman's incarceration was like a
thunderbolt to her heart.  It had been a long time since anyone had
brought that mysterious time of her life up.  To hear it now after
all these years especially coupled with the Guardian, oh she knew
perfectly well what that was, was too coincidental and a little
dangerous.  She wondered how much he knew.  Suddenly all the fun went
out this game.

"What of it?"  She replied with a calmness she didn't feel inside.
The doctor, damn him all to hell, didn't buy it.  He reached out and
pried her fingers from the stem her shaking wineglass and set the
crystal on the ground.

"I see you do remember."  He took both of her trembling hands in his
and held them to his chest.  "It's over."

"Over?  It hasn't even started yet."

"You can't go there."  He pleaded without explanation but he didn't
need to.  She knew `the there' he was talking about.

As part of a select expedition Voyager had been recruited to
reinforce the quarantine buoys around the planet of the self-named
phenomena known as the Guardian of Forever, only at the time of the
mission she hadn't been aware of the phenomena's existence.  That had
come later.

The fact that project was classed P-119, which meant it was more than
classified; it was a locked and sealed highly guarded secret had
intrigued her.  Normally she would have left it at that, a curiosity
but at this time in her life, this special time in her life she was
unable to let it go.  The woman she saw everyday in the mirror
refused to let her.

She'd been waiting a long time on tender hooks for something out of
the ordinary to happen and this had to be it.

Three times in her past while on Voyager she had been visited by an
older version of her self.  The last time she'd been a woman in her
late sixties but the first two she'd been younger, the age she was
now and she had made two very unusual requests both to do with Tom
Paris.

30 days or not 30 days.  That had been the question but unfortunately
she had given the wrong answer.  By trusting her first self and
refusing her second's plea of releasing Tom Paris from his sentence,
many Devoran refugees had died and Chakotay had suffered a terrible
unnecessary guilt.

"But I'm have to go back.  I do go back."

"Yes I know Captain, twice."

"How could you know that?  You couldn't know that.  I told no one."

"It's a long story and one I'm bound by a promise not to tell but may
I remind you Captain, I'm a hologram and as such, have eidetic
memory.  I forget nothing and I remember."  He cleared his
throat.  It was an affectation the EMH had acquired when he wanted to
make a point.  "I saw what could be," He paused and cocked an eyebrow
at her.  "And it wasn't pretty."

"But I made a mistake."  Kathryn managed to eek out.  Her throat
constricted and became as dry as a Vulcan desert.

"You didn't."

"But so many people died."

"And more than that lived."  Still holding her hands he led her from
behind the tree to the edge of the party.   "Do you see all this?"

Filling the large courtyard decorated with grape vines and colourful
ribbons were her crew, their families and friends.  Laughing, eating
and drinking the bounty of the small winery they congregated around
large tables telling stories and reliving memories.  Even in her
distress, Kathryn smiled.  She loved them all so much.

"If you go back a third time to the Guardian, you could lose them."

"But haven't even been once yet."  She replied still gazing
affectionately at the most important part of her life.  He was
right.  She couldn't lose this.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw the doctor tip his head to the
side and smile.  "I know.  Funny that."

Something he had said previous struck her and she gave him back her
full attention.

"You said you made a promise?  To who?  To me?"

"Can't say."  The EMH's smile turned mysterious.  He was enjoying
this Kathryn realized and thinking of mysteries she realized
something else.

"To me then.  I didn't want you to tell me what happened because I'm
not supposed to go back, right?  The first time you did tell me
because I did make a mistake didn't I?  I thought I could go back and
save the refugees but I only made things worse.  The second visit or
was it the first, corrected my interference."

"Something like that."

"I'm supposed to let it go, aren't I?  Be thankful for what I have
and just let it go."  As she said the words, Kathryn knew she done
just that.

Time was suppose to be linear, and the past, solid and unchangeable.
That was what she'd been taught and what she'd always believed.  Oh
she'd had her share of tangles with temporal dynamics, what with the
number of rifts and alternate timelines Voyager had encountered on
the journey home, but those events had been beyond her control.  They
had just happened and she'd gone with the flow.

It was time to that again.

"Now Captain shall we join the others," He released her hands and
retrieved her wineglass from the ground.  "And get you a refill."

She took the doctor's arm.  "The Pinot Noir?  It's my favorite you
know."

"I know Captain, I know."

*******

Déjà vu.

The long cream sheers billowed softly in the wind caressing his bare
shoulders gently as Chakotay stood at the full-length window of his
bedroom considering the phenomena.

A sudden feeling of being someplace or thinking a new experience had
occurred before.  New brain, old memories or something like that.
Whatever the definition, Chakotay had had that feeling in the back of
his mind for years now and lately it had increased.  He wasn't
surprised, he'd been expecting for some time the shadowy feeling to
reach its apex, just a little thoughtful.

"Babe?"

Chakotay turned at the sound of his lover's voice.

"Damn Chak, you're not even dressed."

Tom was though, looking amazingly boyish for a man of his years in a
pale blue tee, jeans and of course, his favorite white windbreaker.

He wore the love-weathered coat everywhere.  Ever since he'd found it
hanging in his closet on Voyager, Tom had adopted it and claimed it
as his own and in a way Chakotay supposed it was.

"I'm working on it."  He said grinning to the blond who had no right
to look so good after being up at the crack of dawn arranging the
yearly party.

"Well work on it a little harder, would ya?  We've got a hundred
people out in the courtyard, and as much as I like watching you walk
about the place in your boxers, it's not something I'd like to share."

"Jealous?"

"Hell ya, now move that sweet brown ass and get dressed."

Tom walked over and popped a quick kiss on his temple before
disappearing back out into fray.  The scent of fresh air and sunshine
wafted through the air in his wake.  Chakotay breathed deeply of it
as he walked over to the tall wooden armoire on the other side of the
room.

Opening the wardrobe, he pushed aside his shirts and Tom's multitude
of tees to retrieve a small wooden box hidden under his old
Fleet uniform.  Chakotay wandered over to the big four-poster bed
that was the real star of the room, leaned back on the sturdy
headboard with his legs outstretched, placed the box in his lap and
opened it.

Inside were two PADDs, one older than the other but of the same make
and style.  He pressed the power buttons worn black from countless
use, on both his treasures and compared the script.

The same hand penned the beautiful handwriting and their contents
spoke of the same undying love but as much as the two slim
instruments were similar they were also very different.  One had
given him pause upon receiving it and the other had changed his mind
completely.

Twelve years ago he'd been ready to give his life to atone for the
innocent ones he had taken.

He had wanted to die, looked forward to it really and the obscure
ritual had seemed the perfect escape.  It was a way to end his pain
and guilt honourably.

It had all been sorted out in his mind until one night when he'd once
again been awakened by nightmares, an angel had come to him with a
message.  Chakotay leaned his head back and smiled.  A tanned angel
in a white windbreaker.

The puzzle of the older blond's appearance had occupied his mind and
while he still planned on suicide, he had pushed back the date to
ponder it.

The stardate on the note had helped and after analyzing the metal
alloys of the instrument for molecular degeneration he had come up
with an answer, time travel.  This mature version of the man, who
occupied his pleasant dreams when he had them, wasn't derived from
his delusional mind but had come from the future.

Ironically it had been almost easier to believe that first Tom's
message than it had been the second from the real one when it came.

It had been late one night and he'd been relaxing in sweatpants on
the lounge reading and rereading the loving missal when Ensign Paris
had arrived at his door.  Chakotay was more than acutely aware that
this was the younger man's day of release from the brig and had been
surprised to be one of his first visitors.  However, he recalled
fondly it seemed the pilot had been equally surprised to be greeted
by a half dressed senior officer.

Behaving like a nervous teenager, Tom had accepted his offer of a
drink and had settled on the lounge with his uniform jacket tucked
tight between his knees.  Once upon a time Chakotay would have been
equally nervous to have the young blond alone with him in his
quarters but with the receipt of the message he had come to terms
with his obsession.

It no longer seemed like an unattainable dream to think that this
divine beauty might come to love him.  The older Tom with his
passionate words had shown him it was possible that his feelings
might not go unrequited forever, that this Tom could feel as wildly
as he did.  He had found some comfort in that.  Enough in fact to
bring Tom Paris down from the pedestal and stand beside him.  All he
needed now was a sign of confirmation.

"I have something for you Commander."

His heart had stopped beating when he saw the data PADD in those long
delicate fingers.

"I've been working on it for awhile and I need your opinion."  The
young blond had said his pale face flushed red.

That was the night his mind had changed.  The night he had scrapped
his plans for suicide and had celebrated life with Tom Paris in his
bed.

His lover had never known how close he'd come to ending his life, nor
had Chakotay told him about the visit from the future.  He had seen
no point.

"Babe?"

Chakotay looked up from his treasures to see his lifemate peering at
him with undisguised concern from the bedroom doorway.

"You okay?"

Putting away the PADDs and setting the box on the night side table,
he held his arms out.  Tom gave the box a cursory glance before
joining him on the bed.

"I love you."  He whispered once his arms were full of Tom.

This was his long ago angel and his golden young god all finally
wrapped into one.  His life had come full circle.  No more déjà vu.
This was it.

"I love you too babe." Tom returned as he cuddled up to him.

Chakotay ran his fingers through his sun spun locks and kissed his
tawny forehead.  "I'm glad I waited."

Tom bolted upright.  "Waited?  You're scaring me here, what's up?"

"Nothing."  He pulled him back to his chest.  "Get naked with me."

"Now?"

"Yes.  You did tell me to move my sweet brown ass and I'd rather be
doing that while my cock was ramming up your sweet white one."

He rolled Tom over on to his back on the mattress.  Once his lover
was pinned beneath him, Chakotay began rolling his hips.

"Oh fuck,"  Tom moaned as his blue eyes turned indigo.

"That's the idea."  He growled into Tom's neck, tasting and smelling
his natural sweetness.

Sunshine and fresh air.  Light and brightness.  Love and passion.
Spirits he was glad he waited for this.

Because now he doubted he'd be alive without it.

THE END