N2U VOY: Options (1/2) J/Q, rated R
Alara Rogers
Author: Alara Rogers
Contact: alara@...
Series: TNG
Rating: R
Part: 1/2
CHaracters: J, Q, Suzy-Q
Codes: J/Q, C/7
Warnings: F/m bondage, but no actual sex
Disclaimer: Characters owned by Paramount.
Summary: Set in the alternate timeline of "Endgame". Janeway is upset
that Chakotay has proposed marriage to Seven. Q offers her options.
Options
Chakotay wanted to marry Seven.
Chakotay wanted to marry Seven.
Kathryn Janeway had been trying, for a day and a half, to distract
herself with reading endless, seemingly pointless reports, and doing
paperwork, and wishing for something to come up -- nothing life
threatening, maybe just a vigorous trade negotiation or an interesting
spatial anomaly to study -- so that she would not have to dwell on
that particular fact. It wasn't working. Over and over she kept
hearing Seven say, "Commander Chakotay has proposed marriage to me. I
am unsure whether it's acceptable for me to agree to his proposal, as
we have been engaged in human courtship rituals for only three point
four months, and it is my understanding that generally human courtship
is supposed to last longer than that before a permanent pairbond is
initiated. Can you advise me?"
She had been unconscionably snippy with Seven, replying with "I really
can't take the time to discuss your romantic life with you right now,
Seven. I'm very busy." She hadn't been busy at all, but at least,
Seven hadn't known her schedule well enough to call her on it; Seven
had simply acknowledged and left. Janeway had to remind herself that
this was not Seven's fault; there was nothing to blame the younger
woman for, here. Janeway hadn't been romantically involved with
Chakotay. The fact that she'd *wanted* to be was something Chakotay
knew, and probably Tuvok because he knew her pretty well, but no one
else was even supposed to know. And maybe people like Torres and
Paris and Kim could figure it out, because they had grown up around
humans and were fairly adept at reading people... but Seven was a
former Borg and romance was irrelevant. She had all the empathy of a
teenager -- point out someone in pain to her and she could be very
compassionate, but her default was to never notice anyone else's
personal drama, because she was too busy figuring out her own.
Janeway had never said anything to Seven about her "dating" Chakotay
because she'd thought it wasn't serious. Seven was emotionally a
teenager with a crush, and surely Chakotay agreed with her that a
sexual relationship with direct subordinates was wrong. Right? He
was humoring Seven, letting her play with romance in a safe
environment, being a mentor to her. It was a *good* thing, given that
Chakotay hadn't originally even wanted Seven on the ship. And so on
and so forth. But... marriage?
Why *marriage*, so soon? Seven wasn't mature enough for such a
commitment. For that matter... why Seven? Was it just that she was
blonde and beautiful and young and available? She liked to think
better of Chakotay than that. Was it Seven's strength of will and --
for all that she didn't have the most personable one -- personality?
Seska had had that... as did, well, Janeway herself. But so did
B'Elanna Torres, and Chakotay had never acted on her crush on him, so
there was more to it than that. Was it that Seven *needed* someone,
and Chakotay needed to be needed?
The thought occurred to her that maybe it was precisely because Seven
was her protégé, and he was trying to get back at her for stringing
him along for years. No. She wasn't going to believe that. That
speculation wasn't even worthy of her, and she should be embarrassed
for thinking it. She was just lashing out mentally because it *hurt*,
that was all.
And the hell of it was, she couldn't even necessarily blame Chakotay.
She'd *known* he didn't fully agree with her belief that romance with
subordinates was necessarily exploitative; he'd spent enough time
trying to talk her out of that point of view that she shouldn't have
blithely assumed that he agreed with it enough to keep waiting for
her. Like her, Chakotay was in everyone's chain of command, and he
shouldn't be romantically involved with anyone on the ship; all but
her were his direct subordinates. But Seska had been his direct
subordinate too, and that hadn't stopped him. Life in the Maquis
hadn't been like life in Starfleet, but life in the Delta Quadrant
wasn't much like life in Starfleet either. She should have seen this
coming. She should have known he wouldn't wait for her.
(*Marriage?*)
But what was she supposed to do differently? She *did* believe that
officers had no business being romantically involved with
subordinates. What happened when things went wrong? Hell, right now
she was suffering from an overwhelming desire to stick Chakotay with
every dull, boring task she could realistically put off on him, and
they hadn't even *been* romantically involved. She could tell herself
that Chakotay didn't owe her anything, that she didn't have the right
to feel jealous or betrayed, and control the urge to take it out on
him. What would have happened had they been in a relationship, and it
had gone sour somehow? No, she was making the right decision.
Which meant she would be alone until they found the way home. And she
had been bearing up with that when she'd known that Chakotay was
sharing that burden too. But if he wasn't... if he had a lover, the
comfort and affection of someone special to care for him... (*sex*,
with a sentient being, not a solo activity or with a non-sentient
hologram)... and she didn't...
Tuvok didn't have anyone either, she reminded herself. T'Pel was
still thousands of light years away.
Tuvok was a Vulcan. And, not to put too fine a point on it, well into
middle age. He looked much younger than he was -- even in Vulcan
terms, Tuvok was aging fantastically well -- but he didn't have the...
*needs* of a younger Vulcan. Or a younger human. In terms of the
human life span Janeway was still younger than Tuvok. And besides,
Vulcans were experts at overcoming emotional needs. Humans...
weren't.
She was alone. She was the only human on this ship who was *doomed*
to be alone. Tuvok was faithful to T'Pel and the Doctor might have
difficulty finding a mate given what he was, but Tuvok was Vulcan and
the Doctor, while far more human than she'd ever expected him to
become, *wasn't* human and probably didn't have quite the same
emotional needs. She had thought Chakotay was in this with her, that
they would get together when they finally got home and consummate what
they both clearly desired. But he hadn't waited. And he didn't owe
it to her to wait. Which didn't make it hurt any less; it just made
her feel guilty about snapping at people because she was hurting.
At this point in her dark reverie, a coffee ice cream sundae with
chocolate sauce and colored sprinkles appeared in front of her in a
bright flash of light.
Janeway looked up, angrily. "Q!" she snapped.
"I have it on good authority that chocolate sundaes cure bad moods in
humans," Q said from behind her, where he hadn't been a moment ago.
"And you look like you're in an absolutely *miserable* mood. Was the
coffee ice cream okay? I knew you loved coffee, so I thought perhaps
swapping coffee ice cream for the traditional vanilla would be a
better idea."
"What would be a better idea is you going away and leaving me alone,"
Janeway snapped, getting out of her chair and standing up so she could
face him, knowing she was handling him all wrong, and not caring.
"I'm in no mood to help you with whatever your problem is today, Q."
"Oh, you mistake me, Kathy. I'm not here about *my* problems. I have
no problems! *My* life is a glorious cycle of song, a medley of
extemporanea. I'm here to help you out with *your* problems." He
snapped his fingers, making all of her paperwork vanish, and sat down
on her desk, next to the sundae. "Why don't you try it? I guarantee
it's a hundred percent non-fattening. And since Neelix is *finally*
off your ship, you needn't fear that tasty food will ruin your
appetite for yet more leola root stew. Go on!"
"I don't want ice cream. And I don't want your help with my
problems. Unless you're here to warn me of an imminent Borg attack or
something of that nature, in which case I'll accept your advice. But
if your mission here is personal--"
"No imminent Borg attacks, Kathy," he said, and looked
uncharacteristically somber. "Not that I could warn you if there
were. The Continuum has forbidden me to give you any material aid or
assistance, and warning you of impending assault would qualify."
"Didn't you end up as one of the leaders of the Continuum, after the
war?"
"Compromises must be made," Q said. "Much as it pains me, I did have
to agree to the conditions demanded by a majority of other Q, since
the last thing I want is for war to break out again."
"Well, if you're not allowed to give me any aid or assistance, and
you're not here to ask for *my* help, then you have no business here.
Go back to take care of your son. I thought you said you were going
to stay with him."
"When did I say that?" Q looked puzzled.
Janeway sighed. "The last time you were here? When you wanted my
advice on raising the poor kid?"
"Oh, don't tell me! Spoilers!" He made a tsking motion with his
finger. "I haven't gotten to that part yet."
"...That ...part?"
Q sighed. "Do try to keep up, Kathy. The timeframe of the Continuum
runs only very loosely parallel to yours, and of course we can move
about in your timeline as easily as we move through your space. If
I'm going to come to you for child rearing advice, I haven't done it
yet; plainly I'm going to visit you out of temporal sequence for some
reason. So don't tell me anything about it! I'd hate to ruin the
surprise."
"When was the last time you *did* come to me?"
"The war, of course. How many times am I going to have visited you
already by the time I arrive today?"
She took a moment to parse his tenses. "Just the once."
"Oh, that's not so bad, then. Just forget about anything I will have
told you at our last meeting, and everything will go swimmingly."
She sighed. "So if you haven't got a problem you need my help with,
and you can't help me, why are you here?"
"Oh, I didn't say I couldn't help you, Kathy. I can't give you
material aid or assistance... but I *can* help you with more, mm,
personal problems." He got off the desk and moved toward her. "Been
feeling a bit... frustrated lately?"
"If I did, what would that have to do with you?"
"Don't be coy, Kathy. You know what I'm talking about." He came into
her personal space, looming over her. "You... and me."
"There is no you and me."
"There's you, and there's me, so why not you and me?" Q took her hand.
Janeway yanked it back.
"We've been through this before. I have no interest in having your
child."
Q rolled his eyes. "You *are* aware that birth control exists, right,
Kathy? I mean, you have been keeping up with your shots, I presume."
*God* he was infuriating. "What is it you're really after, Q?"
"I'd thought I was being fairly obvious. But if you really need it
spelled out--" His arm went around her back, pulling her close. "I
want *you*, Kathy."
"Unfortunately for you, I don't want you." She pulled free. She didn't
believe him. Up close she could see his eyes, and if anything they
were amused -- no dilated pupils, no faster heart rate, no quicker
breathing. Q's physical form might be an excellent imitation of a
human male, but it wasn't perfect. He wasn't showing any of the signs
an actual human man who wanted a woman would be showing. Q was playing
some sort of game, but she didn't know what.
"Ah, but as you've recently had so dramatically pointed out to you...
you don't really have a plethora of choices, do you? By your own
rules, you can't date anyone on *Voyager*, and while you could, of
course, enjoy a night or two of passion with a delightful stranger on
some planet... you'd have to leave him behind, as *Voyager* continues
on its endless quest through the stars."
She looked at him with narrowed eyes. "Are you actually suggesting
that I should have a sexual relationship with you because I don't have
any other choices?"
He grinned sheepishly. "Well, I like to think I have numerous
attractive qualities of my own... but it does seem to me as if you're
overlooking the obvious, when you reel off one of your knee-jerk
canned rejection scripts. I may be the only being you know of who can
be with you any time you choose, *without* being part of your crew,
and since you've declared yourself off-limits to anyone under command,
surely it can't have escaped your attention that that's a significant
advantage."
"And yet I'm really not interested in you."
"Why not? The form I use is a reasonably attractive human male, of a
type you generally like, and I could change it anyway if you'd find
something else more appealing. And while you were holding out for your
loverboy on Earth the last time we met, I know you know by now that he
moved on. So did your *other* top contender. So... why not me?"
"We've been through this before, Q. I don't love you."
He snorted. "Whereas you were madly in love with your soulmate the
*hologram* that you programmed." Janeway couldn't help wincing inside
at that, although she managed to keep it off her face. She thought.
"Or what about that dear fellow on the planet where you had amnesia?
Since you knew absolutely *nothing* about him, or yourself for that
matter, I'm going to take any declarations of your eternal love and
devotion for *him* as a little hollow. And then there was the fascist
who liked putting telepaths in concentration camps-"
"I *never* had sex with Kashyk."
"No. But you wanted to. And you *most* decidedly did not love him."
He leaned forward. "I don't, as a general rule, choose to read
mortals' minds," he said softly. "It tends to spoil the surprise. But
I can see your physiological reactions as easily as you can see the
color of my hair. And I *know* you aren't as unmoved by my presence
as you claim to be. The last time I checked, you didn't despise me as
you did Kashyk, so why flirt with him and turn me down?" Q looked down
at her. "I'm not asking for your eternal devotion, or for you to have
my child. Frankly, one was more than enough. I'm not even asking you
for babysitting services, as tempted as I've been on occasion. I'm
just looking for some friendly, mutual fun. Are you morally opposed to
that?" He said it as if the idea of a person being morally opposed to
that would have permanently marked them as an inferior being, worthy
only of sneering at.
The truth was that Q's physical proximity and the offer he was making
*was* distracting, in exactly the way he intended it to be
distracting, but there was a principle at work here. Q was entirely
too convinced of his own worth. There was nothing humble about his
manner, nothing that acknowledged that she could possibly have good
reasons for refusing him; he expected her to give in, and given the
way he was presenting himself, it *would* be giving in. For all his
talk about friendly mutual fun or about his desire for her, he hadn't
once mentioned *why* he wanted her, what *he* saw in her -- it was all
about how wonderful he was and how she had no better choices than him.
The arrogance and high-handedness made her grit her teeth.
And worse, he showed no sign of actually *being* interested in her --
with Q, one had to ignore what he said in favor of what he did and how
he acted, and while many of his words and actions seemed scripted
straight out of some romantic holonovel, she couldn't *see* any spark.
It wasn't that hard to tell if a man really wanted you or not; Q
seemed to be entertained rather than aroused. Maybe he was confusing
the two. Or maybe he had decided to experiment with human sexuality in
a directly hands-on way, and wanted her to be his guinea pig. It was
infuriating, because *yes* he was physically attractive, and no, after
over seven years of deprivation (Jaffen and Michael didn't count...
really, they didn't), she was *not* wholly unmoved by that fact. And
he was right -- he wasn't a member of her crew, didn't have to travel
with her, but could catch up with her on a regular basis, and that
made him more accessible than Chakotay or any other man here on
Voyager *or* anyone she might meet in the Delta Quadrant. If he
actually wanted her and he weren't such a supercilious asshole, she
might be tempted.
But she couldn't explain any of that to Q. Getting it through his
thick, entitled super-alien skull that she didn't *have* to fall at
his feet just because he was a Q had been hard enough last time, with
something as big as having a child at stake. And telling him that she
could see that he wasn't attracted to her because he had no
involuntary physical reactions that betrayed arousal would only tip
him off to start including those in his performance. She needed a
reason that he'd accept without days of arguing about it.
And she thought she had one. "I'm not morally opposed to friendly,
mutual fun... with friends who haven't committed to any other
obligations. But I don't think you fall in that category. What about
Q?"
He waved a hand impatiently. "She's really not a consideration."
Interesting that if he wasn't reading her mind, he still knew exactly
who she was talking about. "Oh no? Because from where I'm standing it
sounds like you want me to agree to cheat, with you, on your
*omnipotent* girlfriend. That doesn't sound like it would be
particularly healthy for me or my crew."
"What, you think she's Hera or something? Q's not going to be jealous
of you, Kathy."
"That's really not what it looked like the last time she was here."
He sighed. "Yes, well, things change, and besides, she was
exaggerating. I've been spending so much time running around after a
toddler I hardly think she can begrudge me a little bit of rest and
relaxation."
"By having sex with another woman? I don't care how dedicated a dad
you are, Q, most women are not going to consider that an appropriate
way to relax."
"Q isn't a woman. She's a Q." He looked frustrated. "Look, I know
where you're getting this idea and I knew it was going to backfire at
the time, but the Q don't practice monogamy. Eternity is far too long
to spend it shackled to one person; Q doesn't have any claim on what I
do with my life, and she only pretended she *did* to be irritating."
It was hardly beyond the realm of imagination to consider that a Q
might do something solely to be irritating, but Q was not exactly a
credible character witness in this case. "That's awfully convenient
for you, isn't it?"
"You don't believe me."
"Honestly? No."
Q made an exasperated noise. "*Fine.* I'll have Q come by in person
and let you know that she is *not* going to fly into a fit of insane
jealousy if you sleep with me."
"That's really not necessary. I'm not--"
"Actually, she'll probably think the whole idea of her being jealous
of *you* is hilarious."
"Q, how am I supposed to know that someone claiming to be your friend
isn't *you* impersonating her?"
Q actually looked offended. "I would *never* impersonate another Q.
Not only would it be morally beneath me, but she'd be far more furious
with me for pretending to be her than she'd ever be for me having sex
with a mortal."
Well. That actually made sense. "That may be so, but it's hardly
necessary to disturb her. I wouldn't--"
"Great, it's settled. I'll have Q drop in on you and have a little
girl talk." He grinned at her. "Do let me know what she says about
me."
And he vanished. At the same time, her PADDs of paperwork came back,
scattered all over her desk.
Janeway felt a headache starting behind her eyes. But at least she
wasn't focusing on Seven and Chakotay anymore.
She picked up the coffee ice cream sundae and tossed it in the waste
reclamation hopper.
****
The next day, when Janeway saw the flash of light in her ready room,
she felt the headache coming back, even stronger. She looked up with
an expression of long-suffering patience, and was not completely
surprised to see Q's mate.
"Hello, Q," she said, tiredly. "What can I do for you?"
"What can *you* do for *me?* I truly doubt such an inferior life form
as yourself can do *anything* for me," the female Q said. "But I
understand from Q that I can do something for you."
"I don't think there's anything I need from you at the moment, no,"
Janeway said, trying to be polite.
"Q said that you wanted me to come reassure you that I would not lower
myself to being *jealous* of a pathetic mortal life form like yourself
if he began a sexual relationship with you."
Janeway took a deep breath. "Actually, it was Q who wanted--"
"So I'm here," the female Q interrupted. "And I assure you, I am
completely above the emotion of jealousy, *especially* for a creature
with the intelligence of a gnat and the lifespan of a mayfly. You can
do whatever you like with Q. In fact, go right ahead, have him all to
yourself. I don't even *want* him anymore."
"I don't really want Q," Janeway said. "I actually never have. I don't
know what he's told you, but--"
"You don't want Q?" The female Q sounded quite skeptical. "Really.
Whyever not? He's certainly a better catch than anything you could get
on *this* ship."
"For a Q, I'm sure he's wonderful. But I don't--"
"If you consider a Q wonderful who lets his child run wild, ignores
the brat half the time and sabotages my best attempts to instill some
discipline in the boy, while at the same time doing nothing whatsoever
about the fact that the majority of the Continuum despise his so-
called best friend for saving *his* life while adulating *him* for
stopping the war, despite the fact that I was actually the one who
stopped it, well, then I'm sure he is wonderful." Her face twisted in
a sour expression. "But why should you care about any of that? I'm
sure it doesn't matter to you that *you're* persona non grata in the
Continuum as much as I am, because he's too much their blue-eyed boy,
the war hero of the freedom faction, for the rest of the Q to take
their loss out on *him*."
"I'm sorry if you've suffered some sort of consequences for helping
*Voyager* save Q and me, during the war," Janeway said sincerely. "But
there's nothing I can do to help you with that. And I'm really not
interested in Q."
"Of course not. He's too powerful for you. You prefer your men to be
lap dogs. Holograms, weak-willed scientists, amnesiacs... your pet
Noble Warrior, who was quite the revolutionary until you got your
hooks into him and surgically extracted his spine... why would you
have any interest in a man with power?"
"It's not that Q has power," Janeway snapped, getting a little tired
of the entity's sarcasm and insults... not to mention her habit of
constantly interrupting. "It's that he uses it completely
capriciously. And worse than that, he's smarmy about it. He might
even be remotely attractive if he didn't approach me as if he expects
me to fall at his feet in worship because he's a Q."
"Well, you really should."
"No, I really shouldn't. Humanity has evolved beyond worshipping
powerful beings simply because they're powerful, and if Q has some
sort of fetish for being treated as a god, he can go find some more
primitive species and get *them* to worship him--"
"Except he doesn't," the Q said sharply. "Q has never wanted worship.
He wants you creatures to be his *friends*. It's pathetic beyond
belief; he should simply smite you all and demand you sing his praises
if he wants to interact with you that badly, or else hide among you
and pretend to be one of you. The fact that he wants it both ways,
that he wants to behave as if he is one of you while keeping his
powers, is utterly ridiculous and I shouldn't even humor him in it...
but it's what he wants, not worship, and I won't have you accusing him
of something he'd consider slander even if the rest of us would
consider it just good common sense. " She scowled at Janeway. "If he
truly wanted you to worship him, don't you think he could get you to
do it?"
"No," Janeway said decisively. "Humans have put aside those sort of
superstitions."
"Which is why your ex-boytoy cavorts with imaginary animals in the
world of make-believe, and why you humored him to the point of going
and getting yourself an imaginary pet gecko."
God, she was irritating. "I respect other people's cultures, including
Chakotay's. But I know that Q is an alien, not a supernatural being,
and--"
And then she felt a sudden sense of profound oneness with the
universe, like her mind was opening a door she had never stepped
through before, and the woman before her was the personification of
the universe, her Mother, a glorious being of light and wonder, and
Janeway went to her knees in awe, gasping at the beauty of the entity
before her and the feeling of spiritual completion, of belonging to
everything everywhere and being a part of a vast tapestry and tears of
joy came to her eyes at the heartbreaking delight of it, that she had
gone her whole life rejecting this and now she saw, she saw the truth
and she would do anything, anything at all that her Goddess asked of
her, and—
Her mind cleared. The being in front of her was a Q, a powerful alien,
nothing more. The loss she felt was a kick in the gut, and she pressed
her hand to her mouth in sudden grief. She was not one with the
universe, she no longer felt any sort of spiritual revelation or
oneness with reality, and the person in front of her was not a loving
mother goddess of splendor and divine glory. Tears stung her eyes
again. She channeled it into fury. "What the *hell* was that?" she
demanded, getting back to her feet shakily.
Q smirked at her. "You were saying? About human evolution?" she
prompted.
"You... you mind-controlled me!"
"There's a part of your brain that's actually evolved to create
religious experiences, Janeway. You didn't evolve out of a damn thing.
It's still there, and it can be exploited by any entity with the power
and desire to do so. Your atheism didn't save you from worshipping me
for a moment there. I've only ever met one human who resisted that
pull, and to be completely honest, it's because a head injury he
suffered during his career actually broke the God sensor in his brain,
so when a being who specialized in making mortal creatures like you
fall to their knees in worship tried to trick him into handing over
his starship, he successfully resisted. Your brain doesn't have that
protection. If Q wanted you to worship him, you would. You would do
anything he asked of you, joyfully. But he doesn't want that. He wants
you to like him for himself, not because you worship him."
Technically, she was right. Janeway hadn't originally meant that Q
expected her to *literally* worship him; it was probably a poor choice
of metaphor, in talking about a being who could, in fact, be
worshipped as a god and have it be reasonably accurate. "Fine, I'll
grant you that Q has never interfered with my free will. Bullied me,
dragged me off to your Continuum against my will, and acted as if he
was some sort of irresistible romance hero that I couldn't help but
want to be swept off my feet by, as if his power *entitled* him to my
affection, but no, he's never mind-controlled me or tried to make me
worship him."
"And you don't see what a tremendous concession he's made for your
benefit in doing that?" the other Q demanded.
"I'm really not interested in being with a person who considers not
mind-controlling me to be a tremendous concession."
"Well, then it's good for you that *I'm* not interested in you. Q
doesn't consider it a tremendous concession; he doesn't like mind-
controlled mortals and he doesn't like worship. He *wants* you to
stand up to him. He thinks it's attractive."
"That's fine for him, but I don't think *he's* attractive, so the
point is moot."
"Not even slightly?" The entity stared down at Janeway. "I'd consider
that an insult to my good taste if I didn't know it wasn't true. You
find him attractive. Physically."
Janeway was not about to admit to the female Q that there were times,
after nearly eight years in the Delta Quadrant without a lover, that
she'd find a turnip attractive if it were in a roughly masculine shape
and had a penis. She had chosen this celibacy because a captain
couldn't afford to sleep with her crew. Technically, the first officer
shouldn't be doing so either, but she couldn't actually point that out
to Chakotay without sounding like she was jealous of his relationship
with Seven. Which she was, but that was beneath her and she was trying
to get over it. "Perhaps I do, occasionally, but then his personality
intervenes. Q is overbearing, obnoxious and acts as if he's doing *me*
a favor by throwing himself at me, and he doesn't even actually seem
to find me attractive. He says things that sound as if he borrowed
them from a romance novel; I've almost never heard him sound sincere
about a romantic interest in me. And he doesn't even *look*
interested."
"No?"
"Men who want women have... physical reactions."
"So you'd be more reassured that he wants you if he was parading
around naked with an erection?"
"*No!"* The thought was more than slightly appalling. Also, very
slightly, intriguing... which was itself rather appalling. Didn't she
used to have standards? "I don't mean that. Of course that's a
physical reaction too, but I mean other, more unisex reactions.
Dilated pupils, increased heart rate... *looking* infatuated or
attracted. Q has always acted as if he finds human sexuality more of a
hilarious game than anything else."
"And you would find him more desirable if he reacted as if he
genuinely found you attractive?"
"I don't know as that I would find Q more desirable under any
circumstances. And why are you trying to throw him at me? I thought
you loved him." When Q had appeared looking for advice on raising his
son, he had claimed that his mate had disowned their son and left them
both. But Q claimed that that whole incident was yet to happen for
him, still far into his future, and from what he'd said, it sounded
like his son was the human equivalent of a toddler now. Which meant
that this Q hadn't left him yet. Which made her behavior
incomprehensible.
"I told you, I don't want him anymore. And even if I did, I'm not
threatened by a creature whose lifespan can be measured in
nanofractions of my own."
"That's really not what you implied the last time you were on my
ship."
"The last time, he wanted to *mate* with you. That implied a rather
more permanent relationship. He was talking about bringing you to the
Continuum, perhaps even making you a Q someday. I don't believe he has
any such interest in you now, and why should I care if he wants to
ignore me in favor of pursuing a mayfly creature? There are other non-
Q beings of power who can appreciate me, and now it's no longer
against our laws to pursue such a relationship. I can have my pick of
thousands of entities. I don't need him, or any Q."
The bitterness in the entity's voice was unmistakable. "Q, I'm sorry
you're not getting along with others of your kind, but you shouldn't
feel some need to matchmake me with Q. He's really not my type. If you
don't want him, that's fine, but you don't need to find him a new
lover before you can break up with him, if that's what you want to
do."
The Q laughed. "Find him a new lover? Why would I need to do that?
He's the hero of the war. He can have any Q in the freedom faction for
the asking. If he has a ridiculous obsession with *you* and other
mortals like you, that's his problem."
"So why are you here?"
The Q abruptly put something down on Janeway's desk, hard. It
clattered like metal. "Take this," she said, and moved her hand so
Janeway could see what it was. It was a glowing key.
Janeway, somewhat reluctantly, picked it up. "What does it unlock?"
"You'll know soon enough," the female Q said. She smiled. It wasn't a
very nice smile. "I'd keep it on my person if I were you. You never
know when you'll need it."
And then she vanished.
Bemused, Janeway picked up the key. It was warm to the touch. The
thought occurred that it might be a trap... but why would the female Q
need to trap or trick her, when she could annihilate Janeway with a
thought at any time? She decided that she would, in fact, keep the key
on her person, at least for the moment, until she found out what it
belonged to. Or at least until morning, when she could in conscience
have B'Elanna analyze it for her. Miral might be sleeping through the
night now, but that didn't mean that having the baby wasn't taking its
toll on Torres' sleep schedule, forcing the chief engineer to actually
go to bed at a reasonable time at night. Unlike Janeway herself. And
if she'd retired hours ago like she should have, perhaps the female Q
wouldn't have had the opportunity to come bother her. Q himself might
come annoy her in her bedroom (or bath, although he claimed that he
hadn't done that yet), but Janeway thought the female Q would try to
keep it more professional.
It *was* rather late, and she was stressed from this. There had been a
time when she could have called up Chakotay, no matter how late it
was, and he'd come over and they could talk shop, or simply have a
conversation unrelated to work, over herbal tea. Those days were gone
now, she thought with sudden pain, and then was angry at herself for
letting it hurt. Of course Chakotay had moved on. Of course he wasn't
willing to wait for her indefinitely.
None of this was Seven's fault; Seven didn't know that Janeway had
found Chakotay attractive, had considered him her best friend, had
wanted desperately to love him but thought it was too much a risk to
the ship. When they were home, she'd thought. Once they were no longer
serving on the same ship, once Chakotay got the promotion he really
deserved, then they could be together without rank getting in the way.
But Seven had fallen for him, and Chakotay hadn't waited for Janeway.
He'd taken what Seven offered, and she really shouldn't blame him for
that when who knew if they would *ever* make it home, but that didn't
stop it hurting.
No. She couldn't go to bed yet. She was tired, but not tired enough
that her mind would stop jumping back to Chakotay's proposal of
marriage to Seven. Janeway looked around at the reports that still
needed doing. Her head hurt and her eyes were starting to unfocus, but
her mind, having drifted to the thing she had been trying not to think
about, couldn't get off the topic. She went to the replicator and got
yet another coffee. To be able to focus on something as boring as
these reports long enough that she could stop thinking about Chakotay
and Seven... or about the fact that inevitably Q was going to show up
and harass her again... she really needed another coffee.
Alara Rogers
> Title: Options
> Author: Alara Rogers
> Contact: alara@...
> Series: TNG
> Rating: R
> Part: 1/2
> CHaracters: J, Q, Suzy-Q
> Codes: J/Q, C/7
> Warnings: F/m bondage, but no actual sex
> Disclaimer: Characters owned by Paramount.
Whoops, this header is incorrect. it should read:
Series: VOY