Part One

"No strippers."

Captain Chakotay had made his wishes emphatically known from the minute Harry and Tom had floated the idea past him.

"No strippers. No Orion dancers, no android comfort women, no Klingon rituals or Vulcan love slave holosuite scenarios."

Harry had protested. "Who do you think we are, Captain?" But the Captain had smiled grimly and continued as if Harry had never said a word.

"No porn. No anatomically correct anti-grav balloons, and no one — no one, do you hear me? — popping out of a giant cake."

"No fun, you mean," Tom had grumbled.

"Plenty of fun," the Captain had countered. "I'm counting on fun. I'm counting on being surrounded by my best friends and good beer and great food. But I'm getting married in the morning to the bravest, most beautiful, and wisest woman I've ever known. I've been waiting eight years to get to this day. I intend to show up tomorrow morning clear-headed and sober so I do not miss a single second of anything that happens. Tomorrow is the going to be the best day of my life. And I will not let anyone, especially not the two of you, jeopardize it. Understood?"

He'd fixed them with a glare that was worthy of the Admiral herself. And they had understood exactly what their boundaries were. They really, truly had.

Harry shook his head and wondered how everything had gone so wrong so fast.

Tom, leaning against the pool table where the Captain lay prostrate and unconscious, shoved his hands in his pockets. "Is there anything you can do, Doc?"

The Doctor glanced up from the Captain, who was now snoring lightly, and shook his head at them both. "Given that his current condition is more existential than physical, this is beyond even my considerable healing capacity."

"We broke Chakotay," Billy Chapman croaked. Eyes wide with horror, he backpedaled from the pool table until he fell into an empty chair. "I didn't think it was possible. But we actually broke Chakotay. We broke him, and she's going to kill us."

"Technically speaking, we didn't break him," Vorik corrected. "We witnessed the destruction in progress, perhaps, but we were powerless to stop it."

"You think that's going to appease the Admiral?" Billy wailed.

Harry sighed. "We better call her."

Every man in the room groaned, even Tuvok. "We are all gonna die," Ayala muttered.

If only Chakotay had stipulated "No omnipotent lifeforms with a grudge, a jealous streak, and the power to manipulate time, space, and the nature of reality" in his litany of parameters. Then they might have had a fighting chance, at least with the Admiral. Maybe.

Harry squared his shoulders. "Prepare to be murdered, boys," he said, and reached for his comm badge.

=/\=

A flash of blinding white light, and he slams back into consciousness. He sways on his feet, nauseated and disoriented.

"Professor? Are you all right?"

Bewildered, Chakotay takes in his surroundings. He's in a classroom, empty but for the twentysomething woman standing across the desk from him. "I'm a little dizzy," he admits.

The woman darts around the desk and eases him into his chair, her hands gentle but firm. "You should sit down," she says. She leans so close to him he can smell her perfume: Jasmine. "You've been so tense lately."

"I have?" He has no memory of being tense. He has no firm memory of anything before this moment. He frowns. "My head hurts."

She brushes her fingertips across his cheek. "Here. Let me help you." Her voice drops to a husky whisper. "I can give you what you need, Professor." She glides behind his chair and places her hands on his shoulders. "Relax."

And for an instant, he does just that.

She kneads the tense muscles of his shoulders and caresses the nape of his neck. He sighs and rests his head on the back of the chair. When she bends close to him, practically surrounding him with her body, a lock of her hair brushes the side of his face.

He strategically folds his hands in his lap … and feels the ring on his left hand.

He glances down at it. It's heavy. Black and silver. Titanium and carbon fiber. A tiny infinity symbol etched inside. He can't see it, but he knows it's there.

With a jolt, he leaps from the chair.

"You need to go, Ensign," he says, his back turned to her.

"But —"

"Class is over." He retrieves a stack of PADDs from the desk. "I'll see you on Tuesday."

"Professor, I —"

He finally turns to face her. "Tuesday. And if you have any questions about the material or the assignments, you can talk to my teaching assistant from now on."

The young woman pouts. "What does Admiral Janeway have that I don't have?" she whines.

He smiles. "Experience," he says. "Dismissed."

The young woman huffs, grabs her belongings, and stalks out the door.

A disembodied male voice booms through the classroom. "Too easy," it says. "That whole student/teacher ethics thing. I'll never understand why you humans are so concerned about power differentials when you're all equally puny."

Chakotay slams the PADDs to the desk. "Damnit, Q, you take me back to —"

The room disappears with a loud pop and a flash of blinding white light.

=/\=

"He did WHAT?"

Tom gulped. He couldn't remember the last time he'd heard that particular tone in the Admiral's voice. From the looks on the other faces in the room, no one could. "I said, he challenged Q to a drinking game."

"I heard you, Tom. I know what you said." She stalked toward him, eyes flashing. The rest of the men in the room shifted away from her simmering wrath like grasses yielding to the wind. "I just can't believe it. Chakotay is many things, but he's not dumb. Certainly not dumb enough to challenge an immortal to a drinking game. No one is that dumb."

Tom searched the crowd for an ally. The knot of women who had beamed in with the Admiral from the pajama party across town remained silent. Seven, clad in a comically baggy union suit, gave him a cold look and locked her hands behind her back. B'Elanna shook her head at him. Despite the gravity of the situation, he smirked at his wife's cat-covered flannel pajamas. She scowled and bared her teeth. No help there.

Harry and Ayala pretended to be very interested in the bar's wooden paneling. Billy Chapman looked like he might throw up. Finally, Tom caught Tuvok's eye. The Vulcan squared his shoulders. "Not dumb, Admiral. Proud."

Janeway whirled on her old friend, the edges of her black silk robe whipping around her knees. "Explain that, Tuvok. And make it a good one."

"Q taunted him about his relationship with you. He claimed the Captain was … not worthy of your affections. Which, if I am not mistaken, has been point of contention between them for some time."

Janeway stared at him long and hard. "I'm not sure how the hell you know that, but go on."

"The Captain became … emotional."

"Enraged, more like," Harry offered.

"Loudly enraged," Billy Chapman said.

"And violent," Vorik added.

Ayala stepped forward. "He actually wanted to fight Q, but we talked him out of it."

"But you couldn't talk him out of the drinking game?" The men all gave her sheepish looks. "Did it occur to any of you that Q might slip something dangerous into his drink? Something that might render him … well, render him like that?" She pointed across the room to where the Captain sprawled on the pool table, a thin line of drool trailing down his cheek.

Tom shuffled his feet. "We'd all had a few by then … "

"No one had a detox hypo?"

The Doc cleared his throat. "I do. I mean, I did. I administered it as soon as Chakotay slumped over. It had no effect beyond removing the alcohol from his system and he did not regain consciousness."

"Was that before or after Q snapped his fingers and disappeared?"

There was a momentarily silence, then Harry spoke up. "After? I'm pretty sure it was after."

Janeway pinched the bridge of her nose. "Somebody tell me every single detail of what happened from the second Q appeared in this room."

No one said a word.

The Admiral slapped her hand on the nearest table. "Thomas Eugene Paris, you report. You report right the hell now or so help me I will bust you back to Cadet so fast your head will spin."

Thomas Eugene Paris reported.

=/\=

A flash of blinding white light, and he slams into consciousness.

He opens his eyes. He is seated on a hard, plastiform chair that is vibrating slightly beneath him. There's a hum in his ears and the faint smell of industrial cleaner.

A public transport vehicle.

How did he get here?

He frowns out the window at the passing scenery. It's dark and flat and so nondescript he has no idea what planet he's on.

Something touches the inside of his knee, and he yelps.

"I thought you'd never wake up," the woman next to him purrs. She has her long legs crossed so that her left foot is dangling within a centimeter of his calf. She is slim and tall and has the markings of a Trill. She gives him a once-over that raises every hair on his body. "Captain Chakotay, if I'm not mistaken."

He nods. "That's right." He gives her a wary look. "And you are … ?"

"A fan. A very big fan. I was hoping you'd wake up before we got to the temple ruins."

"Is that where we're going?"

"Is that where you want to go? Or maybe you'd prefer to make a detour first?" She touches her toe to his leg again, this time a little higher. He squirms. "I'd love to show you the sights."

"I have my assignment. My evening is pretty packed." He raises the PADD in his left hand as if to demonstrate his busy schedule. Or is it to prolong the flirting — and the stroke to his own ego? He's not sure.

The ring on his finger shines in the transport's artificial lighting.

Black and silver. Titanium and carbon fiber. A tiny infinity symbol etched inside. He can't see it, but he knows it's there.

He stares at the ring for a long moment. It means something, that ring. Something more important to him than anything happening in this transport car. He shakes his head and shifts away from the woman. "I appreciate the invitation, but I'll pass."

The woman sighs. "Too bad. What does Kathryn Janeway have that I don't have?"

Chakotay smiles. "Discretion," he says.

The woman scowls at him, rises on her long, long legs, and moves to another seat.

A male voice booms through the transport car. "All right, that one was much too obvious. 'I'd love to show you the sights?' Even you wouldn't fall for a ridiculous line like that."

Chakotay lunges to his feet. "Q, if you don't make this stop I'll —"

There's a loud pop and a flash of white light, and the transport car disappears.

=/\=

End of Part 1