Archive of Our Own

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This is a list of characters who are referenced and appear in this story.

Admiral Marcus, Race: Human, Beta, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: Admiral, Speciality: , Description: Father of Carol Marcus. The Admiral who unfroze Britannus and used Them to make weapons.

Alexis Melas, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: They/Them, Omega, Title: Crew, Speciality: Big Data Analyst technician, Description: Knoweldgeable about Greek history. Can tie their augments to 2 nation states: British and Russian.

Bihr Sh'Alaack, Race: Andorian, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Shen, Title: Ensign, Lieutenant, Speciality: Engineering, Description: Was a colonist on Taurus IV, where her parents and original bondmates died. Joined Starfleet. She signed up with matchmakers in the hope of forming a new four Andorian bond pairing, but didn't find anyone until just as she was finishing Her 4th year at the Academy. She's just entering the five year period when she'll be reproductively active when this occurs. Confronted the man who killed her family, Kodos, (John Watson's father) only to be seriously injured by his sister, Harry. This attack means that she cannot have more than her current 4 children. She blames Harry, though she's come to a separate peace with John Watson.

Brittanus, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: They/Them, Title: Khan, Speciality: , Description: 1st generation augment. Created by the British government. A Khan.

Craig, Race: Human, Augment & Energy Being, Sex&Gender: not stated, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Child of Owen and Dionysus

David Marcus, Race: Human, Beta, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: Doctor, Speciality: Physics, Description: Genesis.

Elise Watson, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Omega, Title: , Speciality: Actor, Description: John Watson's mother. Actress and playwright. She can trace Her descent from 2 nation states: India and British. Her mitochondrial DNA is Indian. She is fond of recounting a family story about being descended from the Lady of Flowers and the Analyst, two Augments who saved many 2nd and 3rd generation Augments (and people with other genetic variations) from Colonel Green.

Euros, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Sherlock's sister. A powerful telepath with genetic material from multiple telepathic races.

Hyperion, Race: Human, Augment & Energy Being, Sex&Gender: not stated, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Child of Alexis and Apollo

Irene of Troyus, Race: Troyan, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Princess/Queen. An insect, so not like in the original series nor Scandal in Bohemia.

Jim Moriarty, Race: Changeling, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: Ensign, Speciality: , Description: The less said the better.

John Watson, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Omega, Title: Cadet, Doctor, Civilian, Captain, Speciality: Medicine, Description: One of our main characters. Child of a theater family. Can trace his augmentations to 3 nation states: British, India, and America. Wants to be a doctor as a result of childhood illnesses and his father's stories about problems in the colony worlds. Same stories influenced his desire to join Starfleet. Has a naturally attractive scent. Is married to Sherlock.

Julian, Race: Emergency Medical Hologram, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: None, Speciality: Medicine, Description: Hologram modeled on Doctor Julian Bashir. Was provided with additional memory in the Pegasus Chimera ships to supplement medical staff given shortages of doctors after Wolf 359. Intended to last until John Watson finishes his medical training. Updated by Violet Hunter when she was practically omniscient to have increased curiosity, the ability to delete everyday minutiae (to save on memory), and improved compression. In a long term relationship Violet Hunter.

Karak, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Omega, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Meiosis of the 9th Alignment

Killander, Race: Human, Normal, male, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: Captain, Speciality: Section 31, Description: Member of the Star Fleet's secret intelligence organization, and a thorn in everyones side.

Kuvalaas, Race: Klingon, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: , Speciality: Engineer, Description: Father killed by Romulans. Works at a shipyard making ships with Stonn.

Martha Hudson, Race: Betazed, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Title: Lt. Cmdr, 1st officer, Speciality: Mechanical Eng, Description: Plays up being sweet old thing, but actually quite dangerous. Was an instructor at Starfleet Academy and was pulled back into active service after the Borg/Wolf 359. Formerly a Section 31 agent, but retired to non active status after she went through the Betazed change of life.

Meiying, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Alpha, Title: Khan, Speciality: , Description: 1st generation augment. Created by the American government. Former Khan. Also styled herself Empress of the Americas. Plays musical instruments. Did wetwork as a super soldier for the American government in the 80s.

Mshindi Victorius, aka Victor, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Alpha, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Son of 3 Khans: Britannus, Noonian, and Meiying.

Mycroft, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Alpha, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Sherlock's older sibling. Has a pleasantly appealing Alpha scent and a slight greenish tinge to his skin.

Noonian Singh, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Alpha, Title: Khan, Speciality: , Description: 1st generation augment. Created by the Indian government. The first Khan, and the reason they use that name, to rise up and seize power.

Owen Tregennis, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Omega, Title: Crewperson, Speciality: Engineering, Description: In his early 30s at the start of the series. Left a job working for starliners (cruise ships in space) to join Starfleet when admissions opened up as a result of the casualties at Wolf 359. Talks a lot. Sometimes funny. Some malapropisms. Can trace his augmentation to 1 nation state: Britain.

Pavan, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Omega, Title: , Speciality: 5th, Description: Meiosis of the 5th alignment.

Khatri, aka Pilavullakandi Thekkaparambil Khatri, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Omega, Title: Chief Petty Officer, Speciality: Astro-Physics, Engineering, Deep Space Telemetry, Description: Knits. She has 3 degrees. Is a early 60 grandmother from South India at the beginning of the series. Formerly a professor on Moon Base Alpha. Joined Starfleet after the Borg attack on Earth and her home was destroyed. Has a family tragedy tied to one of Her children. Traces Her augmentation to 1 nation state: India.

Sally Donovan, Race: Human, Beta, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Title: Chief Security Officer, Ltd, Speciality: Security, Description: Previously posted on the USS Bozeman and caught in a timeloop for 80 years. Has a family history with Britannus. Her father was Thomas Harewood, who betrayed Starfleet/Section 31 in exchange for a cure for an illness his infant daughter (Sally) was suffering from. Sally's mother changed their names and moved them after everything went down with Britannus. Sally has come to an irascible respect for Sherlock.

Shelly, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Omega, Title: Actor, Speciality: , Description: A cousin to the Watsons on Elise's side.

Sun Liu, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Omega, Title: Crewman third class, Speciality: Astro-Physics, Description: Shy. Dedicated. Nervous around Sherlock. Can trace Her augmentation to 1 nation state: China.

Terellhoo, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: They/Them, Omega, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Meiosis of the 22nd Alignment. They have what are considered Heretical ideas.

Veema, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Omega, Title: , Speciality: 1st, Description: Meiosis of the 1st alignment.

William Scott Sherlock Holmes, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Alpha, Title: Professor, Lt. Cmdr, Cmdr, Speciality: ExoBiology, Space based species, Engineer, really all the things, Description: One of our main characters. Son of the 3 remaining Khans. How 3? Science! Has a pleasantly appealing Alpha scent. Married to John Watson.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Moriarty was a small wrathful ocean. Churning in his bucket. Sloshing as Killander sat at the cafe in New York. The sun shining down on his exposed surface. The air, hot and humid. Stinking of Earth and Humans.

Killander already knew what secrets to spill. Wanted to spill them. He'd already been cracked when Moriarty got him. Full to the brim of brewing hate. Fear of those nasty Khans. But it had been delicious to drive the stake into that crack - figuratively and literally - and pound, pound, pound.

Back when he could still assume a Human looking shape and a very specific face. Sherlock's face. Brittanus' face. A little Augment scent from an actual omega and they'd been off to the races. Polish Killander's hatred to a fine sheen.

If he'd had to break his dog's widdle leg, it only made Killander more ferocious. Moriarty had enjoyed the cracking sound. Still could, if he would if he could get his hands back. Wasn't just stuck listening to the vibrations through metal. Churning.

The reporter listened to what Killander had to say. "That's a pretty fantastical sounding story." The reporter tried to sound doubtful, but Moriarty knew he was hooked. Knew it in every oozing, flaking cell. The Human had already been following cracks in the Starfleet coverup. Rumors. Khan Meiying thought she was so clever recruiting the disaffected for information. Sieves.

If his state got any worse, Moriarty would drain through a sieve. Slowly.

The reporter's chair scraped forward. Centimeters away from Moriarty's bucket. "Do you have any evidence that can corroborate this story?"

The vibrations through the table top and into the ground as Killander slid more than than enough proof.

The wonderful thing was they weren't even lies. All of it true.

A wrathful little ocean, Moriarty churned thinking getting the band back together. About crashing everything down.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

It was one thing to decide that yes, he wanted to have children.

It really was quite another to try to decide just when he wanted the love of his life to disassemble his atoms and reassemble them as his twenty-nine year old self. Would he remember the last several years? Yes, according to Sherlock. When he returned to his actual age, would there there be any memory gaps from the period of his pregnancy? No, gaps according to Sherlock.

John might have been better off if while looking up more information on transporter accidents, he hadn't come across the philosophical works of Kelly De Forest on how every time they used a transporter, they were killing themselves and a new being was being created. Only itself to be murdered when the transporter was used to transport back to the original location.

He was more than happy to put off thinking about it when Shroleb sent a message that he had something to pass on to John and asked if he could meet with John at Starbase 120. Which since they would be picking up two Caitian security officers, who'd requested assignment on the Bakerstreet, that worked pretty well.

John checked out shuttle 221a and headed to Starbase 120.

When he arrived at the starbase and went to the agreed on hostel and room, Owen answered the door.

"You're not Shroleb," said John more than a bit surprised.

"Got it in one. Come in," said Owen.

John stepped into the room and was almost barrelled into by Craig, who'd grown from a terrible two toddler into what appeared to an energetic four year old, which he supposed would happen.

Hyperion was sitting on the floor plucking at a children's blue banjo.

"I'll make some tea," said Alexis, who like Owen, was in civilian gear.

John drank his tea. "So, um… why are you pretending to be Shroleb?"

Owen caught Craig on his next orbit and said, "For the love of gods and wine, you've got to let us lay low for a bit on the Bakerstreet. His glowingness keeps giving the two of us visions of what'll happen if we don't."

Hyperion plucked a progression of strings and blinked solemnly at John.

"Visions?" said John, wondering if he should check Owen out for a medical condition. "Glowyness."

Hyperion plucked another string and a fairy light appeared in front of him.

"Visions," said Owen. "Horrible visions in which Section 31 takes all four of us to places that don't exist on any starmap and does things. While if we go to the Bakerstreet, there are tiny sparkling unicorns and fucking pegasus."

Alexis said, "I believe that our children may have inherited some of their fathers' abilities to harness energy, which in turn allows them to…" Alexis trailed off, shook their head, "access possible views of the future."

"Sparkle unicorns are preferable to places that don't exist," said Owen with considerable feeling.

John processed this. Neither Owen or Alexis appeared to be making anything up, and the fairy light was dancing to the not unpleasant tune Hyperion was plucking on the banjo. "Plenty of room on the Bakerstreet. About the only new crew we've gotten transferred in since the war are a couple of Caitians and...I'll take care of them."

On the way back to the Bakerstreet, John made the new Security crew fly the shuttle while he tried on interacting with the children. He could soon see why Owen called Craig Cray-Cray, as he banged and bounced off the walls, lost, found, and demanded his plush toy. Somehow though, his antics made John laugh. When Craig wailed, he found himself saying, "Are you four? Is that's what's wrong?"

Which oddly enough calmed Craig down.

Meanwhile Hyperion was utterly zen. Quietly following some music in his own head.

John looked at them and thought, "Six of one half dozen of the other." Suddenly missing Sherlock like a physical ache. A hole in his heart. A missing limb. A lyric missing from a song. He also thought, "I turn thirty-five in a few months. I want this for my birthday. I just want this."

When they arrived at the Bakerstreet. Donovan came to collect her new security crew. Hudson came next and cooed over the wee little ones. John peered out the back and found Sherlock lurking nervously.

John took three running steps and launched himself at Sherlock. After a suitable amount of kissing, dragging Sherlock back into the shuttle, because John didn't want to wait until they got back to their quarters. Wanted Sherlock right then. Right there.

As they lay together on the bunk in the back, John said, "On my thirty-fifth birthday."

"What… oh?" Sherlock looked at him wide eyed. Blinking. Blazing happy. "Yes. That will be about perfect."

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

They kept the box where the data cubes had been kept. The wooden surface worn. Telling a story to anyone who could read it. Skin acidity and oil wearing away varnish at the natural touch points where hands would lift the lid. A thread from a blue scarf - Sherlock had worn it when he'd taught at the Academy - John had kept inside to keep the first few cubes from rattling. There were more marks from where the cubes had moved and rubbed against the inside of the box. The scarf was long since gone, but the bright blue thread was caught in the joint of the box.

Brass hinges slightly tarnished from sitting under John's bed at John's preferred level of humidity. That and the remnants of dust felt along it's lower side. Spoke of how long it had spent there. A few scrapes along its top when it had been removed from under the bed in haste. John had had a shorter bed frame than their current one. Marks from the motion of sexual encounters pounded into the upper wood of the box.

A dent on the top from sitting in John's desk in Sickbay. An object dropped rapidly to obscure its presence. A more evocative and recent scrape from traveling in a sack with the utero transporter. A scrape and a small amount of beige paint along the sides from being pushed into a ventilation shaft. When they'd gone to Earth on board the Daedalus. When Mummy's absence had been discovered. He'd confirmed that when he'd first looked at it.

The Dominion had destroyed the Daedalus in the war.

There would be monuments to the war dead. The Federation council was already trying to discuss how to memorialize a war that in one way or another had been going on for years.

The Borg's attack had been a cube in Union Square in San Francisco next to a statue of a heart. Until, somewhat prosaically, the Breen had destroyed it in their attack on that city.

The box was the only monument that would ever be built to the lives that ended the war. It had spent years filling with potential that had nowhere to go. No possibility of being anything but cubes with enough power for a thousand years.

Unless they'd remained in that ventilation shaft. If Section 31 had realized who he was.

He'd examined the genetics a good deal more than John. He knew exactly what each set of biological traits would have presented. Blue eyes. His own heterochromia iridium condition. Colors in between. Blond. Black hair. Varying shades of skin inherited from his parents. John's. No way of predicting personalities of course.

The only way to do that was to stop the statis. Begin.

Sherlock fairly quivered in curiosity.

Cells had not yet begun to divide into eyes, but they would. These were lives not lost. Not dead, like those who'd died in war. So much potential memorialized.

This box memorialized the living. The growing. Alive.

Chin had let him know that it wasn't generally done for the donors to attend the decanting ceremony, but the Breen had been willing to go to war to get access to Terran Augment's genetics. Admittedly, to avoid extinction, as their population dipped to four hundred million. When three hundred and seventy years before they'd numbered nearly a trillion.

They could put up with him showing up to see his children being decanted.

He'd bring cake. They were always having cake at festive events on the ship.

The box full of hope reminded him of the ridiculously sanitized myth of Pandora that John had read to Hyperion and Craig during one of their babysitting to try-this-on-for-size evenings. Hyperion and Craig's grandfather, Zeus, had put all sorts of horrors in a box. Along with hope. Somehow

Hope had been kept inside when every other horror escaped, which made very little sense.

Presumably Sherlock and John's children wouldn't make their toys sparkle at the word hope or float when they wanted them. Although, were their origins to be known, they would be an object of study for Section 31, just as much as Hyperion and Craig would be.

Which was the reason their parents were hiding out on the Bakerstreet, which was fortunate. Sherlock's requests for engineering staff were being ignored. If Owen had not returned and Stonn not only returned, bringing his son, and a Klingon engineer, engineering would have been one crew person with no experience.

The dangers inherent to their having children had made Sherlock concerned that John would hesitate, but once decided John was all in. Sherlock had a chart. John would turn twenty-nine. They'd trigger his heat immediately, which meant John would only be five or six weeks along and still be quite limber when they crashed the Meiosis with their cake. Also toys.

He was designing rattles for each child based on their genetic profile. It was something to do at night while John slept.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

When the last Dominion ship flew through the brilliantly flowering bloom of the Bajoran's Celestial Temple and back to their misbegotten quadrant, Noonian did not relax. The tension in his shoulders did not ease.

There was something amiss more than the failure of plots and plans.

Hubris.

The time to retake Earth had been when they were young and ambition burned hot.

Either during the Federation's 1st war with the Cardassians, their 3rd with the Romulans, or one of dozens with the Klingon warring houses. An alliance with genocidal colonizers, as the Cardassians had been with the Bajorans, or the imperialists, Romulans or Klingons. Each expending their resources on suppressing their own subject populations. Doing nothing to integrate them.

Until they'd chosen the worst of all possible options. The Dominion, creating soldiers as they had once been created, but with greater skill.

Hubris to think they should have struck in youth.

Before Mshindi Victorious died.

His skin cracking and healing, only to crack again. The taste of blood in his mouth as he went into the Breen's cave of the ancestors. As a stranger knelt beside Euros and Sherlock. So often had he examined this moment for how to have prevented it. Yet, he'd never noticed 'til now that the stranger was John Watson. He'd had a decade to realize and hadn't known.

Doctor Singh stood at his shoulder. "Would knowing have changed your choices?"

Noonian always attempted to be honest with himself. "No." Thought further. "Yes. I would have told Brit to take him during the battle. And then his ship might have been destroyed without our protection and the box would have been destroyed. So, fate makes fools of us all."

He turned away from Sherlock and Euros neck deep in the slit belly of a beast.

Mshindi Victorious' small still body nearby. Neck snapped. Sherlock's footprints leading to the cold corpse. The marks of his fingers upon Mshindi Victorious' still flesh. A stir of footprints where John Watson had come and gone to give Sherlock a way to live.

Not just the cold. They'd been designed to withstand cold. Shock and cold. Shock and awe.

Deeper.

Farther.

The murderer's face large between his much smaller hands. Struggling not to die. Arms held tight by Noonian's legs. Smaller than they were now. The feeling of the snap that carried into his bones. That would always echo. The sounds of the guards as they paid off bets. The stench of their sweat. Flowers and heat. Garbage. Piss. The sounds of Bangalore as it had once been.

Noonian blinked the memory away. The trouble with total recall was total recall. Brit liked their memory palace technique. Mei, their analogy of a machine. Noonian preferred memories to act as leaves. Turning on the breeze of the mind. Uncovering unexpected associations.

Augur of choice.

He could return to the palace in the moon of Ferenginar. The Mare of Acquisition was not lost. Loss. He had started with nothing. He was too old to do so again.

Standing in a long rectangle of a brown tiled room. Blood and dirt streaming from naked stoic bodies under the needle sharp showers while the guards discussed cricket. One of the men was Tamil, if not a tiger.

Spin away.

Sharp needle to a vein. A brown face like his own looking at him from him from behind plastic hazmat gear as he checked his blood for signs that Noonian's body – a body considered property – had defeated whatever disease they had injected. Disease went in the shoulder. Blood pulled from a vein in the arm.

Spin away.

19834643a and 10834u hanging upside down in the cold room, long red tubes from their arms after a terror attack on a hotel full of the wealthy. Full of people who owned their own bodies. Doctor Singh wanting to see if the effects of their blood could be transferred. If humans like himself could be saved. Had been ordered to cull them anyway. Waste not. Want not.

Doctor Singh the best of the doctors and what did that say.

Brit was at the Mare of Acquisition. Analyzing how the Federation had made the cure for the Changeling's disease. Always analyzing. Always curious.

Noonian had never cared for the study of science even if he was a product of it. Had always prefered the dance of state. Had thought he'd seen the same interest in Mshindi Victorious' eyes.

Perhaps he had.

He could return to the palace on Beta Aurigae.

Climbing through the open window of a gold and mirror gleaming home, palace in all but name, long white curtains blowing inward on the mountain breeze. The brothers and sisters of his squad silent as shadows as they spread out. Flowing into position.

Noonian – for he'd given himself a name by then for that all in those days it was a secret known only by a few – held his arm up and made a fist. His brother, Mshindi, nodded and killed one of the separatists with a snap of the neck as they'd been taught.

Quiet.

Quick.

Deadly.

As they'd been trained to be. Honed. Sharpened as a knife may be.

He'd never taught Sherlock such arts for all that he'd taught him many others. Euros neither. But what was in his head had been hers to take. He wondered not that his daughter had cried in his presence, but that she had not cried continually when he was near.

He did not wonder that she had not returned once she had found her ship. Her star to sail by.

Mshindi gave him a brief white smile, brilliant in a dark face, and left down the hallway, while Noonian went right.

Perhaps if Noonian had gone left and Mshindi right, then he would have stood beside him when he took power. When Noonian seized the imagination of soldiers bitter at what their leaders had given away in exchange for their dearest blood. As he set alight the idea of India unbowed by conquerors. All they had to do was follow him.

Noonian had been the first of the Khans. Defining the path for all the others. Defining the name.

Brit did not wrest power to become a British king. Meiying did not crown herself Empress of the Americas.  Piotr the Mad had not become a Russian czar. Even Inti had not become a Tahuantinsuyu Inca for all he'd proclaimed the title and retraced the old kingdom. Not sultan. Not daimyo. Not abakhulu.

Khan.

Khans.

Eugenics wars. When weapons go to war and peace, and their creators desperately try to close the lid on their creations. Perhaps if there had not been an arms race between nations they might have done better at it.

Noonian turned this memory restlessly. Worried at it until it was smooth. Knew where he must go.

Restless, he pushed himself. Twenty hours. Thirty. Thirty-four. Landed his craft at the transfer station. The air of the station faintly acrid. In their armor, the Been could not smell it. Detect it with a hundred sensors, but not the ones they'd been born with. They'd shut themselves off in their armor.

No disease could touch them. No disrupter fire. No psychics too.

Euros small and warm in his arms. Shivering. "Will it be cold, Daddy? Will I dream?"

A kiss to her temple. "No. You'll feel nothing." After the first sharp pain, he'd felt nothing.

But perhaps Vishandra, who operated the cryo unit, remembered their long sleep differently, because Euros, looked at him with her wondrous strange eyes. Mismatched, but seeing so true. "Daddy, if I had a little girl, and she asked me a question, I'd tell her the truth."

A knife inserted. Twisted. He accepted the blow as deserved for all he had not lied.

Doctor Singh of memory asked, "Was it a lie?"

"Perhaps," he answered the avatar of the one good doctor. Such as it was in that place. "Perhaps I was so inured to pain that more could hardly be felt."

What he'd told his daughter was, "My truth may not be yours." It was the only answer he could make.

He'd so hoped for a child who could not be harmed. Whose heart he would not have to carry in his. Invincible. As he watched the ice crystals form on her lashes, he'd thought, "At least, in sleep she's no longer an open wound."

The guard from the 13
th
Alignment perfunctorily reviewed his credentials. When he'd woken in the future, he'd believed it was because he and the others were well known.

Hubris.

Veema has said he was full of hubris.

Perhaps it was so.

The sin of Lucifer was pride. Light bringer. But then, unlike Milton, Noonian was not British. Not Christian. He had not sent ships sailing around half the world to seize the wealth of those who lived there all the while claiming he did so for the good of their souls. For civilization.

He'd never had the hubris for that.

When he appeared in the receiving station on Breen, he submitted his credentials again for review. Protocol. Although, he, unlike the Breen who regarded him through a helmet, was bare of face.

He went to the chambers set aside for the 23
rd
Alignment's use. Cleaned himself. Purified himself of sweat. He supposed he could be said to have fasted. He had had not consumed more than a light broth in days. His stomach curled in on itself at this misuse. It was for the good. He replicated clothing. A long skein of white cotton that he folded into a turban in the Domalla style. The chola of a warrior in white cotton. He slid his Kirpan, a short sword, which he kept sharp to a razors edge into his sash. A man who could not care for his own blade cared for nothing.

A British ex-special forces soldier had told him that.

Coyness over names did not suit him. Colonel Sebastian Moran. The Tiger hunter. Old shikari. Scar on his cheek. Heavy scent and heavy cologne. White bulk and blue eyes. "Squeeze the trigger nice and easy. Like stroking a cunt." Pop. The Pakistani soldier jerked. A flower of blood between his eyes. Slumped forward out of his chair in his little border station. Too far away for the scent of his death to reach Noonian. "Good lad, good. Tomorrow, I'll start you on moving targets." Noonian packed away the weapon. Oiling and caring for each piece. "Fuck, lad. You're a cool one. How old are you again?"

The answer, of course, had been nine. Not the first time he'd killed. The first time Moran had taken him out alone. Hunting tigers. The phrasing he'd like to use to mean humans. His masters had wanted him comfortable with killing humans. Back when the word hadn't been capitalized. Back when there were only humans and the sub-species they had created. Considered sub-human in the same way Europeans had once considered the inhabitants of the lands they conquered.

So, Moran must have doubly held himself.

Nine, the age that Mshindi Victorius had been when he'd died.

A little conceit. Giving his child the middle name of the colonizing Queen, Victoria, who'd taken the title Empress of India.

Brit laughing. Diamonds gleaming around a slender flute of champagne on decanting day. Mshindi Victorious' roar like a lion on his removal from his artificial womb. Already a warrior. Chin Singh's almost quiet contemplation. William Sherlock Scott's piercing scream, as he reached out for Brit.

Spin.

His daughter, Vijeta, reaching out to accept a kirpan from Noonian's own hands. Bright eyes solemn. Brown skin glowing in the October sun. A ceremonial blade entirely. When he'd been so naive as to want nothing of war for his children. His son, Ajaideep, riding his horse through the green hills above the country house in Kashmir that was his escape.

Laughing.

How Ajaideep had laughed. Kept separate from the concerns of empire. Kept safe.

On top of the world and sure of forever.

Noonian had not been there when laughter ended.

Fleeing from the world with assurances from those officers still faithful to him that they'd be looked after his sons and daughters as he cast himself away.

Leaves.

Spinning.

As he stepped out into the nuclear winter grey afternoon, Noonian did not bother with a face shield against the cold winds. That was all they were, cold. The Breen shielded this entire area of the planet with enough energy to make a new sun.

Made it large enough that it had its own weather.

He welcomed the snow. The bite of cold air that froze his eye lashes. Froze his cheeks. Lips. Although he did wait in the entry to the temple for the skin to heal from the frost bite.

He went into the 23
rd's
chapel. The way of the Breen was to honor those that had come before. To honor those who had guided the future.

Noonian had too many ancestors. Genetics from dozen of sources. Not all of them human.

Moran saying, "Used an actual tiger, fuck if they didn't." Blood flowing down his cheek from five scratches that wouldn't heal in an instant. Noonian should have been more disciplined. Had been trained to be more disciplined. Had been frightened by the hands around his throat.

The Breen gave away their children. Traded them. It had been explained to him dozens of times.

Burned places in memory. A sharp. "No."

Doctor Singh's quiet, "We'll fix this."

He lit the taper. The wall bore an image from after they'd been found. He avoided looking at his own face. Not wishing to see the fire of pride in his eyes. The fire of ambition. The ashes of loss.

Fire left ashes.

He spoke the names of his children. The long dead and ones newly lost. For each, he held the taper to the wick of a tallow wax candle to bloom to life. Warm. Rich. There for a moment before he blew the candle out. His sons and daughter were on the wheel somewhere. He knew that. As caught as he was. He let Mshindi Victorious' candle burn long minutes. Then an hour. The flame hollowing the wax out. Leaving a shell. Guttering out.

Hubris.

He knelt there considering.

William's face, when he'd still been William, ivory pale and distraught when while Brit examined, I'Shaya, The children's pet sehlat. Noonian's idea. Pets. Children should have pets. Something to care for and for all of that, William had been the one to bond most with it.

Ajaideep, his face grave, the curves of childhood giving way to acned sweat, saying, "No, father. I want her last memory to be of someone who loved her." Laying his hand upon Noonian's before he relieved his son's horse of its pain. "I am the one who took her out riding at night. The burden should be mine."

I'Shaya. Whimpering. Wounded. In pain. Gashes across its belly. The swelling marks of a serpent's bite. Sherlock insisting they'd stayed on the estate. Insisting that he had not broken into the Herpetarium at the zoo. As if he had not insisted all the week prior that he needed cobra venom for an experiment. Shouting and breaking objects even when Brit assured him that he would have what he needed on their return from the Meiosis.

His focus on the lesson they must teach Sherlock. That actions had consequences. If Mshindi had turned right and not left. If Noonian had not stood over Moran's body until Doctor Singh found them. If Noonian had…

Leaves spinning.

In memory, he examined what he'd seen out of the corner of his eye. Looked at the expression on Mshindi Victorious' face. The faint curve of a satisfied smile. A smudge of grease on his left wrist. Noonian breathed quietly. Parsed the scent of reptiles. Some it on Sherlock's skin. But the sources of that were known. The source of the scent on Mshindi Victorious' skin had no easy answer.

An easy answer.

Merely not a restful one.

He should have seen.

He should have known.

Spinning leaves.

"Where are you on the wheel, Mshindi Victorious? Would you have grown up to kill us for a slight? To make way for your own rule?" The last gutter of blue flame in the liquid wax did not answer.

Euros in tears. Euros so often in tears. Fragile roots where his hopes had been for roots so strong not even a tidal wave could shake them.

Hubris.

Mshindi Victorious insisting, "She misunderstood. I didn't mean what she thought."

Mshindi Victorious, an infant in his arms, roaring like a lion.

A flicker of air. Deep in it shell, the candle flame was unmoved.

"Congratulations, you made a sociopath."

He drew his kirpan and swung it in one motion. His muscles could not forget the memory of hundreds of thousands of hours of practice. But there was no one there.

He challenged shadows.

It was in this frame of mind that he received a contact from Brit.

Clear. Cool, as their voice always was. Even in passion blunt. Passion's ashes long since cooled. "Noonian, I have finished examining Moriarty's remains," Noonian waited in the pause. Brit did not make contact lightly. "I believe Moriarty survived."

Noonian considered the possibilities. "Warn, Sherlock."

"He doesn't want to hear from me." Brit's tone was cool. Remote as the moon.

He blew out the candle. "Brit! It has to be you. You are the one of us he always turned to."

The break in contact was Noonian's answer. Leaving him to contemplate the silence.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

"Another one of our dark ops lords is dropping by to threaten our funding." David expected his daughter, Johnanna, to laugh. She'd been the one to draw an Eye of Sauron on the drawing board at every research facility they went to.

She didn't laugh. But then, the resources dedicated to this project had already been reduced to the bone.

David's bones ached. Old bones. Old blood that struggled to make it to his fingers from an old heart. They all ached. With the end of their latest war, Starfleet wasn't as desperate for cutting edge solutions for absolute destruction.

Absolute creation.

He'd taken advantage of so many crises. Cold and hot wars with the Klingons. Romulans. Had gotten at least a decade out of the fear of the Borg. For all that Genesis technology was meant to create life from lifelessness. But all the military could ever understand was that it destroyed what was there before.

David would take resources where he could get it.

"Come on. It's not all that bad." He chucked gnarled fingers under Johanna's chin. Forty years ago, he might have pretended to steal her nose. Now, he chucked her chin. He'd read in a book - dozens of books - that Augment children required more physical contact that Normal children. Scenting. Childhood was long since past, but the habit remained.

She reached up and took his hand. Wrapped it in her own, but didn't smile. He asked, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing, it's just...." she shrugged, "maybe we should try with the private sector."

She'd been on that idea on and off for the last few months. A non-starter. "We've been over this before. I don't care what some recruiter told you. I don't like working for the military-industrial complex. Hate the idea of some Eye of Sauron orcs eyeing our life's work and seeing only a weapon, but they're the only ones with the kind of resources for the kind of work we're doing."

They been picked up and put aside so many times.

"But," she said, and he could see she was going to argue, so he took a sip of hot tea, "the recruiter said I could have dedicated staff. That her organization specifically fund research carried out by Augments. I showed her our projections for Genesis after the inclusion of protomatter."

"If she was interested, then she wasn't a real scientist."

Protomatter was dangerous. Unstable, but it was time to be a little dangerous. Take a little risk for so much reward. So much could be done with the Genesis technology. Refresh land decimated by centuries of dumping toxic materials or reverse nuclear winter. Even create entire solar systems out of nebular matter. He could hear his mother telling him, "David, you sound just like your father."

That had never been a good thing for all she would never tell him who that father was.

"She was very interested." Johanna's blushed and he got an idea how much interest the recruiter had shown.

"I hope she wasn't too young."

"She was older than I am." Johanna's blush intensified. "Interested in what I had to say. Made me see how things could be." He considered pushing her on just how much of their research she'd shown this stranger, but, it wasn't as if they weren't the fools of the scientific community for still pursuing this dream. "I just… I want to be an asset instead of…"

"Stop right there, Jonny-bug." David squeezed her hand. Not as much force in the old fingers as he'd once had, hundred years of living would do that, but touch was what was important anyway. Eye contact. Lean in. Remind her that it was two of them against the universe, stupid prejudices against Augments in the sciences be damned. "You are an asset. Always have been. Always will be." He didn't say that it was five times as hard for an Augment to finish a higher degree than a Normal Human. They were eight times less likely to get tenure. To get a lead position in research. When they did, it was always used as an example of how there wasn't a problem. To cover the silence, he said, "Can't imagine many that would have stuck with this so long.

She leaned forward. Kissed his cheek. "Because it's worth doing. We could help so many people. It's our life's work." She was fifty. Child of his age. His centenary just passed. Here. In this lab. With a cake that could have set the fire alarm off if they hadn't suppressed them for an hour or so. "It was grandmother's life's work." True as well.

Mother had always believed they could make it. But had been cautious about cutting scientific corners. A legacy from her own father, the archetype of Starfleet and war machines. War hungry. Admiral Marcus. A man who'd so lost sight of Federation values that when he'd found one of the first Augment's sleeper ship, he'd used Khan Brittanus to make weapons for the Federation. The Admiral had been disavowed. Posthumously stripped of rank. Brittanus had been hidden away in some Starfleet warehouse of secrets.

But Mother had pointed out, Starfleet had still ended up using the tech during the next war.

"Let's just do our best." He put aside his concerns.

"But you'll think about the recruiter if this doesn't go well."

He didn't know why she didn't think it would go well. The last several experiments had responded fantastically. The grotto growing in complexity.

When their latest Section 31 goon beamed down alone, he and Johanna were ready. He didn't look well. Beads of sweat on his twisted lips. The whites of his eyes slightly yellow. The lurching gate of his limp looked painful to the point that Johanna paused and asked him if there was something she could do, only to be brushed off.

David showed the man the projections. Captain Killander pushed the case he's brought with him a little to the left and said, "You provide it a matrix and the energy configures whatever is exposed to it to that new pattern."

That was an absurd over simplification. Johanna, always more polite, said, "Yes."

Killander glared at her. Probably another one of those anti-Augment twerps, but all he said was "Good." His right eye twitched. David could not imagine being in whatever accident the goon had been in and not getting his skin regened. "I'll want to see a demonstration."

"Yes, of course," said David stiffly. He picked up the silica bar and showed Killander a miracle of science.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Stonn had decided to bring Kuvalaas with them to the Bakerstreet when the Klingon asked if he would participate in his Hegh'bat. It was a Klingon ritual suicide, as he had no son or family to carry it out. It perhaps should have been Captain Holmes' decision, but Stonn made it instead. Technically, Kuvalaas, as a Klingon, should have required an Admiral's permission to come on board.

Captain Holmes merely indicated he trusted Stonn's judgement in this regard.

Stonn had informed Kuvalaas, "The Bakerstreet has not been assigned an adequate number of engineers for maintenance. You are needed for now. When that need is done, we can discuss the matter."

"What can a legless Klingon do?" Kuvalaas snarled, which was natural.

"What can a legless Vulcan do?" Stonn replied.

Their first trial was that the engine room was not designed with a lift chair in mind. Panels were not adequately spaced to allow ingress. Panels meant for a standing individual. Ladders. Jeffries tubes.

Owen said, "Not that I want to sit on my arse, but I think Crewman Simms here has that covered. He is technically the only person actually assigned to Engineering."

Crewman Simms had no understanding for how the Bakerstreet functioned.

"Isn't he… an actual crewperson?" asked Sestre.

"He is ill informed crew," said Stonn firmly. "If he is logical, he will accede to our experience."

Kuvalaas turned his own lift chair and said, "What crew? Do you see crew? I see a cowering technician afraid to touch the panels."

Stonn discussed the matter with Owen later. "We're on borrowed time," said Owen. "Our girl, she's a grand goer, but Starfleet only ever planned for her to be around ten years. She's two years past that now." He raised a glass of something he insisted on referring to as mommy juice, despite it clearly being whiskey."

"Then it is logical the Bakterstreet be attended by the wounded and those who no longer fit."

"Here, here," said Owen, and swallowed down his mommy juice.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Julian was more patient than Sherlock would have been. But the fundamental issue remained. Julian had become so complex and with so much memory that even with maximized compression and periodic memory fuzzing, the amount of storage required was immense. Sherlock had cleared out an unused lab to fill with computer storage, but that would become difficult elsewhere.

Installing Julian in his old home on the moon of Ferenginar was not really an option. His disagreements with his parents aside, Julian would overwrite the holograms raising the Auberj, who were far simpler programs.

He was contemplating the problem when his mother contacted the Bakerstreet. He could have rejected the communication. Watched it later. But his mother never did anything as prosaic as contact him. Raise him in a holographic palace in a hollowed out cavern in a moon of Ferenginar with no obvious exits. Transport him across vast distances in the middle of a battle or before the Borg invaded. Place him in a cryogenic chamber and then wake him saying, "Your husband is here to get you."

But something as simple as a contact simply never happened.

Not like John's mother, who contacted John once a month for long chats.

"Yes," Sherlock said. Crossing his arms. Even knowing First Father would tell him it was a defensive posture.

As always, Mummy was to the point. "Moriarty is alive."

It hardly took a visit to his mind palace for Sherlock to have Mummy's portrait tell him, "Never leave an enemy with a weapon at your back," as best expressed by the chaos they and his fathers had left behind when they'd left Earth. Calculated to prevent anyone from firing on their ships while they broke free of Earth's gravity.

Sherlock couldn't resist a somewhat petty, "Your attempt to kill him failed."

"I didn't take into account that the illness affecting him both destabilized his metamorphic abilities and his cohesion. Always a failure to act in advance of the facts." A faint look of disapproval folded Mummy's face, before shaking their head as if to clear it away. "His behavior has long indicated an obsession with you, but it is most likely that he'll attempt to eliminate us first. We have the greater power base."

"He could attempt to kill me to harm you."

Mummy's smile was faint. "He would make my death painful, but it's you are whose heart he wants to burn. Try to be careful."

Sherlock could hear desk groaning under his hands. "Mummy, I have been in Starfleet for nearly twenty years. I've faced Moriarty down multiple times."

He expected a sharp reply and got instead a contemplative look. "When I first learned you were being stationed in the Gamma quadrant in a poorly constructed, inadequately designed ship that had been rushed to production, it was all I could do not to transport you home." They held up a hand to forestall Sherlock's immediate protest. "Transport you here."

Sherlock considered this and something that had been puzzling him for some time. "If I was so key to the creation of the Breen, why didn't you? Why didn't the Breen? You could have scooped up John and myself the moment you had his DNA and put us in cryogenic chambers until required." Sherlock had been covered in DNA from John when Mummy kidnapped him in advance of the Borg invasion. "You could have sent us through when Conchordia took place?"

Mummy sighed. "Sherlock, I do not like repeating myself. I didn't want you to just go into the past. I wanted you to be able to come back to a future with medicine. Star travel. Not stone knives and animal skins. You weren't going to be able to do that if your life was frozen in a cryo chamber. Now, do try to take all that experience and not to let Moriarty kill you."

They cut the connection. Wanting the last word most likely.

The odalisque of John said, "Which you in no way resemble." Despite this unforgivable remark, Sherlock reviewed every major interaction with Moriarty from his John wing.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

"Why would he be dead?" asked John genuinely confused. He figured Moriarty had simply left the quadrant. Not disintegrating seemed a big lure.

"Because he was my parents' ally," said Sherlock. "The Breen's ally."

"And?"

"The Breen betrayed him by siding with the Federation to end the war," said Sherlock.

"And,"

"That made them enemies. Having already betrayed him, they couldn't leave him alive," said Sherlock. "Keep up, John."

"So…" John licked his lips slowly, thinking, "a sociopath who has repeatedly tried to kill us, stolen our memories, and stolen your body is now extra angry because your parents tried and failed to kill him. Is that what you're trying to tell me?"

"Yes, and I do not always want to have the last word," said Sherlock, who then swept out of the living area of their quarters in a particularly dramatic strop, which John could certainly forgive under the circumstances.

Although, he did find it particularly funny. So funny, he was chuckling as he called after him. "Of course not."

Sherlock called back from the bedroom. "I am nothing like my mother."

Laughing harder, John said, "I love you."

"I love you, too," was the sulky reply.

John went back to reading his medical journal, because if he couldn't have predicted memory loss and body swapping, then there was no point in trying to predict whatever it was Moriarty was going to try next. They'd just have to deal with it when they got there.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

It was lonely on the Reliant.

Violet didn't tell Julian that. There was nothing he could do.

He didn't need to hear that she was lonely on a ship full of hundreds of people.

She did not say, "Alone in a crowd," as she looked over the equipment she'd need for the away mission. If she were still on the Bakerstreet, she'd have pinged Julian. Pinged Kitty. If she were on the Bakerstreet, she'd have walked down a colorful hallway and into a forest or… actually she'd always thought the Transporter Room Cloud should have been called the sky room. Although, not every world had a blue sky. To walk into that room was to walk into the warm welcome of a joyous sky of fantasy.

If she were on the Bakerstreet.

Instead, she walked down a white and beige hallway and into a white and beige transporter room.

Captain Thomas barely acknowledged her.

Not that Captain Holmes would have either, but at least she'd have had the comfort of knowing that he saw her, but was too busy thinking careening thoughts to speak. That they'd be as colorful as the room they were in.

The rest of the away team gathered. The Reliant had gotten an intermittent Federation distress beacon that a troop transport had gone down on the planet. Kept cutting out before the identification, but there were plenty of candidates from the war.

Poor bastards probably didn't even know the war was over.

Since the Dominion War - funny how it was named that despite involving every major power in the quadrant - she had been counting down. Either Holmes figured something out or she going to do something crazy. Steal Federation property. Get her husband back.

The transporter beam enveloped them. A transformative act. To be taken apart and created anew. She had seen both Captain Holmes and Doctor Watson returned to childhood. Split into their component halves. Replaced with some other version taken down a different life path in the multiverse. Or simply moved from one place to another.

She was getting maudlin. Actually, she was well past maudlin and heading to morose town.

She switched on the light on her helmet. The light did not go far in the sand storm battering against her face shield. Went about the careful triangulation. Each of them spreading out to get a better read.

She took an additional set of readings to confirm what she was seeing. "Captain, I have a lock on the distress signal. It's is coming from sector Alpha Foxtrot."

"Why wasn't that possible from the Reliant?" asked Captain Thomas. Tone aggressive. Combative.

"The reflective properties of the particulates in the storm, perhaps?" Violet had learned to add a perhaps to her responses. A slight upward tilt to her tone to indicate a question when she was actually sure.

Captain Thomas believed conflict was the key to all progress and would respond to any statement with a demand for proof. An argument.

It was exhausting. Certainly, Violet had grown exhausted. Thomas chewed through senior staff. Secure in the knowledge that Starfleet would keep giving him rope. He seemed to find this amusing.

Violet was sick and tired of his amusement.

The thought of a cup of tea and a book was strong as they struggled against the wind, making little progress, as they made their way to the source of the signal.

Finally, they came to a metal side of what might have been a troop freighter. Vi would have known.

Old wound. First wound of the Dominion war. The one that stuck.

They entered the ship through an open airlock. Their voices echoed within the ship as they split into teams to search for the ship's crew. Violet removed her helmet to increase her field of view.

Not that she found anyone.

A scream echoed down the metal halls.

Violet raised her phaser. Thomas raised his. He attempted to reach the rest of the away team. Said their names to no answer. Her conflict loving captain said, "Reliant, two to…"

"He wants me to tell you not to spoil his fun," said a voice that she could almost place. There had been a lot of voices in a lot of years of exploring. A lot of close calls. "We did something to keep this conversation just between us before we started."

A figure lurched out of the shadows. A Human. He didn't look well. His face twisted. His eyes wild. Yellowed. Possibly a liver problem. Julian would have known. "Not looking my best, am I Hunter?" The man grinned wildly at her.

"I'm sorry, do I know you?"

He twitched. A vein below his right eye pulsing. "Captain Killander. I'm not myself just at the moment. Since the Federation abandoned me. Since the Khans tortured me." A wild laugh. "We've been waiting for you. Human as I am. Not like those monsters who want to take everything we have. Which makes you worse than a monster. You're traitors."

Violet tried to move, but found she couldn't. Some form of localized tractor beam holding her in place.

Killander tisked. "I've given my life for the Federation. Done what had to be done. Made the hard choices. All for you and you don't even know who I am."

"What do you want?" asked Thomas. Struggling just as she was just at the edge of her peripheral vision.

Killander bowed jerkily. There was something wrong with his left leg. "Nothing important. To save the Human race. He said we'd do that. That I would get to do that. I'm going to. You wouldn't believe the kind of weapon they've gotten ahold of. Fine. Mutually assured destruction."

"Who's he?" asked Violet.

"Moriarty," Killander said it like he was saying Jesus H. Christ or my new boyfriend, "My savior when the rest of you abandoned me, but I won't abandon you." A spastic jerk of his right arm.

"Moriarty is a changeling. A Founder. He's one of the beings that runs the Dominion. You can't be…" started Violet.

"Don't speak that way about him. He's the only one willing to help me." Killander lurched forward. "Now you're going to help me."

"We want nothing to do with you," said Thomas.

"You think not," said Killander, giggling. A high looping sound that made the hairs on her arms prickle. "But you will. He's going to make you help us. Help me."

Violet felt something small crawling on her shoulder. She struggled harder against the tractor beam, but was still unable to move her arms or legs. It slid up her neck. She tried to turn her eyes to see if she could see if something similar was moving up Thomas' neck.

"What is that?" asked Thomas.

"If we're going to take over your ship, we need to take over you." He tilted his head. "A little piece of him in you."

The thing climbed higher.

"Feel free to scream," said Killander, vein pulsing under his left eye. "It's why I left your mouths free."

Violet had navigated through areas of space that made no sense. Almost ascended. Broken bones. That pain was nothing on this.

She screamed.

It went on what felt like forever.

Felt the tractor beam release her. Limbs lurching of their own accord. Someone's accord.

She thought. "I will resist you."

No one answered, so at least there was that. She was alone in her own head.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

She was reading a fascinating book about ancient Rome with some fantastic sex scenes, so mostly it was about the sex, when her niece Shelly came into the the common room.

She stood there about as useful as a ghost.

"Shelly, what is it?" prompted Elise.

"Aunt Elise, the New York Times posted an expose about the Breen."

"I'm done with the Breen," said Elise. "I'm over them. They are dead to me. I shall give them the cut direct if they pass me on the street."

Shelly's expression did not change.

"Aunt Elise, you need to see this." She handed over the tablet. Elise could see why from the moment she started. Someone had paid attention in journalism school. Hadn't buried the lead, although Shelly had. "The missing Khans are alive and living among the Breen."

Elise looked at pictures of Khan Brittanus and Khan Noonian Singh. There were sets from from the history books near the end of their reigns. Next to an image from a bland looking room with a small potted plant. The Khans were considerably older. Certainly older than they'd ever been on Earth.

Then provided a little background in a sidebar. How in the last days of the Eugenics Wars three of the Khans had elected to flee Earth with a few of their followers rather than face mobs. Invasion. Fire bombing.

Citing unnamed sources, the reporter claimed that Khans were helping the Breen. That they had in turn suborned Augments throughout the Federation to help the Khans.

Tensions were still high in the Federation. So many lives had been lost. So many had suffered. This sort of piece, while possibly true, wasn't going to reduce those tensions. This might as well have been Marc Anthony's speech at Caesar's funeral.

Shelly took the tablet back from her and scrolled back up. Held up the picture of Khan Brittanus. "Look like anyone we know."

"Yes," Elise shrugged, disassembled, parsed, considered piffling, "I always knew he had a passing resemblance to the man."

"Yeah, well, Sherlock is the only person I've ever met to describe Khan Brittanus as they."

"I had noticed that," said Elise. As well as any other tidbits when the family discussions turned to family history.

"He talks about them as if he knows them," said Shelly.

Elise was simultaneously glad and sorry that Harry wasn't around while work shopping her new play. Still there was nothing for it. It was a week early, but she contacted John.

He needed to know about this, because she suspected this was not the end of this.

Certainly, that was the way she'd write it if this were her script.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

John listened to his mum in disbelief.

He also didn't answer when she delicately - for her - asked him if he thought Sherlock might be a close relation of Khan Brittanus. "It's just, we couldn't help but notice that he uses the they pronoun. Insists that Brittanus was an omega. That the Analyst was likely an interfering prat."

He stared at the screen. Tried to think what exactly he was supposed to say.

"It's just, if my son-in-law's mother is a long thought dead Augment despot, then I'd really love to know."

"Uh," said John very cogently.

"Did Noonian really have an estate in Kashmir where his children had no idea there was such a thing as Normal humans? Do you know anything about Meiying? There are so many historical stories its hard to credit any of them. Was the Analyst Brittanus' son? I've always thought so, but oh, dear, I've met Mycroft. At your wedding. Is he a clone? The poor man. How awkward. I should contact him. Invite him over. Later. After everything dies down. If it dies down? So, Sherlock...is he?"

John blinked at his mother. Energy stealing clouds and mind controlling AI, he knew what to do with. He really didn't know what to say.

"It's alright if you don't know the answer. I'll ask Sherlock the next time I see him."

John found his voice. "How exactly did you get from Brittanus might be alive and living among the Breen to Sherlock is somehow their child."

His mother gave him a look. The look. "Sweetheart, it's the most interesting possible answer."

Given she wouldn't be distracted by questions about Harry or Shelly or the cousins or the new play or whatever book she was reading, he claimed an appointment and signed off.

Checked Bakerchat to see if anyone was already talking about the article, which was a yes. Very much a yes. The Aug Soc had even convened an emergency meeting in the Bansai Arboretum.

Every member of Aug Soc was chattering loudly when he arrived, which caused a brief flurry of glances and scattered whispers of, "But the Captain looks just like him." and "Do you think?" and "It is possible?" "I once saw him lift a thousand pounds like it was nothing!" and "Have you seen him without his shirt?" and "Has he ever gotten sick? In ten years?"

Khatri beamed at him. "Have you read it?"

"Uh… my mother contacted me. So, not yet."

"Oh, you must read it. My son sent me a follow up piece in the Bangelore Gazette."

"There's already a follow up piece?" said John.

"Of course." Khatri's smile was growing wider. Her knitting needles for still for once. "I can hardly believe the news."

"I can fucking believe it," said Owen, shifting in an agitated manner in his seat. "Did you see some of the weapons the Breen were pulling out of their arses during the Dominion war? Knocking the power out of dozens of ships in one beam. If they hadn't been such arses, I wouldn't be on the down low right now."

"But the Breen have been in space much longer than many of the other races in this quadrant," said Sun Liu.

"Yeah, but what about the attack on San Francisco when they got into the war. Has the Khans' bloody insane fingerprints all over it," insisted Owen.

"I would request that you not speak of a national hero in this manner," said Khatri stiffly. "Khan Noonian Singh was, is, a great man, whose actions lifted many from poverty in India. Brought prosperity to many. Equity. Respect on the world stage."

"And he fucking killed a lot of people to do it," said Owen, shifting his son, Craig, who was crawling up his side, to sit next to him.

"Deposed oligarchs. He brought peace. Prosperity," said Khatri, leaning forward. Looking fiercer than John would have expected. "When Khan Noonian Singh ruled, a woman could walk from one end of the country to the other carrying a sack full of rice and diamonds and not be bothered."

"What does that even mean?" asked Owen, which had John frowning at Owen.

It had come out years ago that the reason Khatri had joined Starfleet was just as much because of her daughter's assault and murder in an anti-Augment hate crime as anything else.

Alexis said almost speculatively, staring at John, "Brittanus returned the Parthenon marbles that Lord Elgin stole from Greece. He returned the contents of all the various museums in Europe to their nations of origin as a gesture of good will and reparation for Europe's centuries of colonization."

"Did they?" asked John as innocently as a character named Earnest in the Importance of Being Earnest.

John had admittedly asked the same question at one point, because it was one of the more benign stories about Sherlock's parents and gotten a harumph, and the comment that his first father, Khan Noonian, had requested Tipu's Tiger back from the V&A, one Khan to another, and Mummy dearest had decided to show off just how advanced their technology was by returning items to their points of origin, which did explain the clusters of obelisks in Egypt.

"Brittanus only did that to sweetening up the other Khans. The nation-states that were still standing," said Owen. He looked around the gathering. "Someone help me out here."

"He did not need to do so," said Sun Liu with a frown. "For China, the return of Hong Kong, and the recognition of China's rights to the South China sea and Taiwan was sufficient."

"Not sufficient for Taiwan, I'm guessing," said Owen. "Brittanus went to war with Khan whats it in Russia."

"He was defending Prague," said Novák.

"He was defending his territory," said Owen mulishly. "How am I the only one who sees this?"

John asked, "Did the article say why they think that the Khans are alive?"

Sun Liu shot him a look. "The NYT has been investigating since Starfleet recalled every Augment in the fleet to Starbases. It was a big scandal at the time. Lawsuits, but," she frowned, shifting her chair closer. "It does make me re-examine historical events that I had never questioned. Why weren't Brittanus and the others given a trial? Why were his followers left in two hundred year old cryogenic storage devices, which had to be prone to failure? It may as well have been a death sentence."

A thought that gave John a particular chill under the circumstances. Couldn't help but remember asking Sherlock about it at one point and being told that three of the people on his mum's ship had died in transit. If the Breen hadn't popped Brittanus out of cold storage, Sherlock might never have been born. Which probably had created several universes where the Borg destroyed the Earth.

The thought made John's head hurt.

Novák said, "I always figured it was because Starfleet wanted to brush under the rug just where Brittanus got the resources to build that big damn ship he crashed into San Francisco."

"Yeah, but the Khans are bad news," said Owen. "You're all acting like it's the second coming of… I don't know, Bloody Arthur and the Knights of the Round table. Didn't Meiying hole up in Cheyenne Mountain with a finger on the US nukes for most of a decade?"

"Which I will note were not fired," said Khatri primly. "Khan Meiying Washington had control of enough nuclear weapons to destroy all life on Earth twenty times over. But when when the Minute Men retook Washington, instead of avenging her lover's death, she released that… what do you call it a viral song, Fuck the Fucks," John was certain that was all just urban legend, "and left the planet. I can show you the statistics for what would have occurred if she'd done otherwise."

"Fuck me, I can do the metrics," said Owen, putting Craig on the ground. "Cray-Cray, why don't you go play with Hyperion? Mummy's not a jungle gym." But Craig whimpered and crawled back into their mother's lap.

John tried to make heads or tales of the conversation. Tried to decide if this had something to do with Section 31 or Moriarty or just one too many secrets for too long.

Alexis said, "John. Owen and I are only able to lay low here because of Captain Holmes." They paused, "Is there anything we need to know?"

"Uh…" John could not say anything. It was not his secret to tell. But he also couldn't lie about it. Not under the circumstances.

"That enough of an answer," said Alexis.

"I… uh...  need to talk to Sherlock."

"That might be a good idea," said Alexis.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Hudson sent him a news article and told him to read it in his quarters.

He was re-reading it when John returned. That he was aware of the news was apparent. They read it together. Stared at it as if it would leap off the screen. Mummy's picture leaping off the page.

Sherlock's life was in Starfleet. The Federation. The Bakerstreet. He only realized that he was hyperventilating when John rubbed his back. When he looked up, the box was sitting there on the shelf. Squat and dark. Almost staring at them. "Do you want to put off trying for children?" The words came out without his intention.

John straddled his lap before answering. "Fuck no. Thirty-fifth birthday, you're turning me twenty-nine." Sherlock did not say that this was probably terrible timing. He opened his lips to John's kiss.

They both knew it.

They both also knew that if they waited for a good time, it would never happen. So, Sherlock drowned thoughts in kisses. In the feeling of lips along the column of his neck. In John peeling off his uniform to kiss his way down Sherlock's chest. In reaching under the couch for the lube that John stored there, which possibly would leave its present location when there were children, but for now, Sherlock lifted his hips and let his John take over. Love him. Hold him.

Take him apart.

Put him back together.

As always.

But after, the reality of the situation was still there.

He went to the bridge.

He was a captain. It was something he was at times expected to do. In that moment, he fiercely wished John were the captain then he would have to go to the bridge and Sherlock could loll in bed wearing nothing but a sheet forever.

Instead he went to the bridge, and one of the new security officers, looked at him and said, "You really do look exactly like him!" in a loud and carrying voice.

"Oh, for fuck's sakes," said Donovan. "How did you get into a career in Security?"

"I took a test when I joined," said the seven foot tall Caitain. "I'm tall."

"Brittanus is my mother." For a moment, Sherlock was uncertain who had said the words. They hung in the air. On fire.

"Fuck," said Donovan.

"How romantic," sighed Winters.

The words kept burning. No anomalies occurred to swallow Sherlock or send him to an alternative dimension. Bring him out of phase.

The Caitian nodded. The long fur of its hair moving as it did so. He said, "Can't pick relatives. My first cousin went to prison for arms dealing to interdicted planets. Every Feast of Urthor, Aunt Igna and my mother will not stop talking about the shame he brought on our family."

Hudson said, "Much becomes clear about why our only request for new personnel in the last three months that was approved was the two of you."

The Caitan said, "M'Press and I both volunteered." He gave a wide smile. "We want to serve on the ship of Captains Watson and Holmes," which was a pleasant thought. Captain Watson.

Sherlock got up and left the bridge.

He could go to Sickbay. Request a sedative. Build a device that would remove everyone's memory. He went to engineering.

Stonn was using the standing function on his lift chair to fit between pylons to review a setting on one of the higher panels. Kuvalaas was snarling at the panel displaying the matter mix ratio.

Sestre said, "Captain, can we help you?"

He said, "I am the son of the Khans. Three of them. Not all of them obviously. Mummy didn't ask Piotr to join in the escape because he was dangerously unstable. While Inti was convinced that he could create a new empire in the Andes and…" he trailed off. All three of them were simply looking at him blankly.

"I was under the impression that Humans reproduced with two of your species. Is that not accurate?" asked Stonn, tilting his head.

"It was done in vitro. I was gestated entirely in vitro in a uterine replicator."

"Intriguing," said Sestre. "That could be a solution for the Vulcans."

Stonn's left eye brow shot up. "Indeed. How did these Khans replicate placental transfer."

Sherlock was torn. He very much wanted to engage in a bio-engineering discussion, but there was a more salient point. "Actually, it was the Breen, who invented the device." Even more salient. "Do you know who the Khans are?"

"Why would I know anything of your pathetic Human history?" asked Kuvalaas, with a thump of a spanner.

Sestre said, "I had thought the Khans were early Augments. But perhaps I am remembering incorrectly. If they are your parents that would make no sense." He looked horrified at his lapse.

"They were," said Sherlock. "They were dictators. Waged wars. Bombed..." Actually, Sherlock was not entirely clear on what they had bombed while they were Khans. He was fairly certain there had been wars. "They were behind the attack on Federation and Klingon civilian targets in the Dominion war.

"A bold move, but they were too weak to continue. Bloodless." Kuvalaas shook his spanner like a weapons, which it decidedly was not. "Kahless conquered entire worlds. Leaving in his wake mountains of skulls of those who dared to oppose him? Did your parents build mountains of skulls?"

"No!" Sherlock glared at Kuvalaas, who was not grasping the enormity of what Sherlock was telling him.

"Even Gowron, who can barely unite the Klingon houses for more than a season, has subjugated several worlds on behalf of the Klingon empire." Kuvalaas lip curled, "While of the Klingon Augments, we do not speak of them. A failure of the leaders in the past to honor our warriors," said Kuvalaas raising his lift chair to slap it resoundingly on the floor in a way that was definitely not good for the lift mechanisms, but Kuvalaas was an engineer so he could fix it himself if he broke it.

Sherlock went to go tell Owen and Alexis.

At least then he got tea and Hyperion gave him a biscuit.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Whether or not the Khans really were alive and well, and living among the Breen was all anyone on the shuttle from New Hong Kong to New York were talking about.

At the time, Meiying had thought it was brilliant.

The return of old Hong Kong to the People's Republic that was.

Giving away crap you didn't really have any power over in exchange for cementing power you didn't have. Brilliant.

She wasn't as impressed by whoever had decided now was the time to throw a fuckton of gas on the fire by reporting that they were alive. Eating bon bons and drinking mint juleps or some such crap.

The Times article had just been the first. Now every news outlet was busting to bust something new.

The Post had posted a piece on how the Khans had an experimental doomsday weapon, which was a little too on the nose for Meiying's taste. Especially since she was technically the only one of the Khans to have intelligence about that particular item.

Her contact in Central Command said that Starfleet wasn't sure what to do, given they'd already shot their wad recalling every Augment in the fleet and gotten their dick nicely slapped in the courts. Would keep hammering for a return of the Khans.

Sherlock was sitting in some pretty big crosshairs once someone did some basic image recognition.

"I'm bored. This is stupid," said William, glaring through the sights on the scope. Fuck, but the kid had whined the entire time.

"You're stupid. I think it's brilliant," said Victor, waving the gun around like a dick again.

"I'm not stupid," sulked William.

Meiying, of course, just took the shot without yammering, said, "Fathers, was it good?"

Noonian, of course, looked through the scope and went on to explain how the kid hadn't accounted for wind and crap and so had hit a rock, and not the holo target. While Meiying thought, "What the fuck am I doing here? What are we doing here?" Looking at Noonian and the kids. Itching to be anywhere but there.

Switch.

Lying on a ledge on an old artsy building in Oakland, CA, US of A aiming an M25 at some kid their own age preaching fuck the man to a gathering crowd here and there in Berkeley, thinking, "What the fuck am I doing here?"

Switch.

El Salvador, technically her first field test, another ledge. A decade earlier. She hadn't questioned that shot. Took her aim as she'd been trained to do. Orders were orders. She'd yet to hear any Ramones. Rancid. Sex Pistols. Got her first earshot on base before the hop back state side to White Sands.

Masters kept their special little squads on a tight leash.

Andorian in front of her on the shuttle didn't understand and wanted to know if the Khans were literally three and fifty hundred years old, while the Bolian was getting yacked at by some omega twerp from Peru wearing an Incan Pride shirt, rainbow and all.

Meiying couldn't say she was surprised when the kid got pulled aside by port authorities when they landed in New York. She'd admired his brass balls, it would do him good to get arrested a time or two, but it didn't say much for his smarts.

There had been by Meiying's count three hundred Augment rights marches, twenty-three counter protests by some wack job fringe groups that hated fill in the blank, nine that turned into riots, two hundred and forty-nine hate crimes, one hundred and thirteen dead, and she was in fact counting. She always counted.

Numbers.

Statistics.

Losses.

Captain Shit with the big ass knife with the hilt notched the hell up from all the gooks he'd killed in 'Nam.

She hadn't taken it from him. Colonel Asshat was watching. Testing her. Testing the rest of her squad.

Stand there and take it. Get out in the field and prove she was just as good.

One. Two. Three. Four. Eat shit 'til ain't no mo. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Shovel mo to yo plate.

Switch.

Laying on that ledge in Oakland thinking, "What the fuck am I doing?"

Although, the riot in Lahore had been over who got to claim Noonian, because he was the lucky bastard who got statues and kids named after him, and was not, burned in effigy every whatsit like Brittanus.

She'd never admitted what she looked like. Never admitted where she was. Ghosted.

Plus, Noonian and Brittanus had to deal with that wack job Piotr in their backyard in Russia.

One day it was the Soviet Union, and she was busting balls taking out Commies and anti-merican interests for Uncle Ronnie, for about three minutes it was Russia with glasnost getting warm and gassy with it, the next it was the Russian Empire with Khan Piotr. Personally, she'd always thought someone had mixed in a bit to much cat into Piotr's DNA, because he'd been a sack of crazy. Sack of crazy. A fuckton of nukes, and the largest number of super soldiers backing him up. Last bad call of the USSR. Crank up production.

Then again, she'd been twenty-one and had her own mountain full of nuclear weapons. A stockpile in Southern California and North Dakota for that matter, but for some reason everyone liked to imagine her hiding in a mountain in Colorado. Not so much. The world had been full of beautiful men and women in leather and velvet. She'd knew how to work a remote. For that matter how to booby trap the fuck out of things.

Private First Class Dick chewed on that tobacco of his and spat. Not that she could see him. He was on the other side of the cement wall. "Don't suppose you'll grow back a limb if you fuck this up."

"No, sir!" Small fingers worked the red wire. Pinch. Strip.

"They were picking pieces of Alpha-23486 outta the side of the mess hall."

"Yes, sir! Done sir!"

She'd had an excellent education.

She'd told the American troops stationed in the Philippines to fuck off to Australia for all she cared, wished the People's Republic of China a happy year of the Metal Horse, but did not pull a Brittanus.

She liked the Smithsonians. She liked having things. Actual things. Even went into Air and Space in the middle of the night, and tagged it up.

Switch.

Sitting on the cold cement in the Alpha cage. Omega cage was a click away, because masters worried about breeding schedules and getting mutts. Watching G.I.'s chew the shit. The bullet wound in her left leg had healed. Corporal Fucker thought he'd gotten lucky during the last on base training. Fucker was collecting his winnings. Didn't see where she hid the bullet casing with the others.

Colonel Asshat was careful counting the ordinance. Not so much with spent shells. Not that she'd needed them in the end. Why she'd thought prepping for DYI surgery was a good idea was anyone's guess. Angry. It sounded badass. She was building a rep with the other squads.

When she reached her destination, she flirted lightly with security, because he was clearly the type to get disturbed by any Augments flirting with him. Much less one old enough to be his father.

Waiting politely for the Ferengi to let her into the vault to see her belongings and only her belongings per contractual stipulation.

She liked Ferengi.

Always knew where she was with them. She let him know she was good and shewed him off. Pulled the data cube out of the box.

John sitting there cross legged on the floor of the holo temple like a boss handing out holo cube kids like Halloween. Trick or treat. Kids on base had gone trick or treating once. Not a one shared a stick of candy. Little bastards.

Switch.

Looking at John's transcript from the academy. Great grades. Demerits for conduct unbecoming. Affair with Professor Sholto. Graffiti in honor of his penis in the john at the Celenium Chapel. Inappropriate behavior sexual conduct in public locations. Library stacks. Common rooms. Toilet stalls.

Fuck her for figuring John was a kindred fuck-em and leave them type, and written him off.

Delia tucking a strand of hair behind her - memory deleted.

Noonian telling her a story about - memory deleted.

Brittanus being ridiculously, sweetly confused after - memory deleted.

All emotions had ever done for her was get her fucked.

Fuck her for figuring John was just like her. Burned early. Three times shy.

Not like Sherlock, who was more of a fuck once imprint for life type.

Kid had the softest heart. She'd done her best to wise him up. Universe didn't have much room for soft hearts. For sweet kids. Best way to end up like Brittanus near as she could tell.

Sherlock hunkered down with his pet, I-Chaya. Sniffling because Victor was mad at him.

"Fuck him. He's pissing you off and pissing all over you." As fatherly advice that hadn't gone over well, and ended in an argument with Noonian and Brittanus, because why they'd thought doing one of the most stressful things known to humankind together would bring them together, Meiying had no idea. Which fine, she could play a role with her kids.

She was actually good at that sort of thing. Her heart was made of iron. Blah, blah. Tow the line kids. Don't do drugs. Rah. Rah.

Switch.

Delia picking up a paint can and turning to… delete.

Switch.

Grunts grabbing their dicks and wolf howling when Nurse Gorgeous Lao rapidly walked her bouncy bleached blond curls and bodacious body past the armory on her way to the Building 4A. Grunts couldn't pick up her scent. Sharp. Scared. She was a city girl from Laos. Made it out just before things went south.

Meiying smiled and rubbed the spot over her heart where Nurse Gorgeous had dug out the small bomb embedded in her chest. She hadn't thought of her in years. Made her want to replicate some cherry flavored lipstick.

She'd always wondered if Colonel Asshat had shot Nurse Gorgeous after she and the others had blown what they could of that puppy stand and fucked off. By the time she was large and in charge, all the records had been incinerated.

Part of the reason even when John had married Sherlock, she'd figured there was an angle.

"Mei, he has no reason to marry Sherlock merely to stay on that ship," said Noonian. "You saw the recording from their wedding. They are in love."

Cue blah, blah, he's a heart breaking floozy rant from Brittanus. Stick a quarter in. Wind up. Stand back. Watch the cat full of pricklies be prickly.

Got a little stab where that bomb had been looking at Noonian and Brittanus. Think, "What the fuck am I doing here?"

Admittedly, Brittanus had more reason to be wise to the sheer dickery of Betas than a lot of Augments, and that was saying something. And William, Sherlock, had always been their special little lamb. Hell, kid had been six before Brittanus would let him out of their sight. Same time, pushed harder than a drill sergeant.

Throw in the cluster fuck on Breen, no wonder the kid had lit out the first chance he got. Meiying couldn't really blame him. Try to lay the party line, which came off like so much bullshit, but not a lot of blame.

John looking rumpled and tired raising his chin. "Oh, and Mshindi Victorius, in the universe where he survives, he grows up to murder you. Congrats. You raised a sociopath. As I understand it, he decapitated you." He pushed Brittanus back with a single finger, which took big brass balls given how Brittanus was doing their absolute best to intimidate him without actually talking to him.

Switch.

"I am not by nature persuasive," said Brittanus the first time they met, which was a big understatement. "People are not, I am not good with them. A flaw in my training no doubt. Were you convinced by the file I sent you?"

"Nah, I came to England because I wanted to catch a rave out in the countryside." Brittanus staring at her incredulously. "Yeah, it was convincing. I was convinced."

Meiying knew herself for a bit of a nihilist, but Brittanus' projections laid out the bridge too far. They could fuck up the Earth and give hope to a race of roaches to rise after them, or they could get the fuck off it and remove the big giant target holding the Allied coalition together.

Admittedly, Meiying had really wanted to stick it to the US Government in Exile, buncha dicks, but not enough to fuck the planet. Kill all the humans and all that.

Switch.

Crawling around in Siberia looking head down at warheads, while her squads dealt with things all over, but subtle, because unlike some people Meiying could be subtle.

Hard not to think about that as she put the cube in the carrying case. Closed up the storage and walked out.

Walked around Central Park. Made a stop at Strawberry Fields. Did a fairly good job of imagining a world with no heaven or hell. Tried to decide if she really wanted to do this.

When she'd gotten ahold of this particular piece of information, she hadn't shared it with Brittanus for a reason. It was a win the war, lose your soul sort of weapon.

Not that she had a soul, she had been reasonably assured.

Chaplin Nutless muttering into his whisky about abominations.

Switch.

"Wars aren't won by fuggin' pussahs," said Major Pussah Pump. Before sending her squad on the Minute Man Mission.

"Yes, sir!"

The brass were impressed that a team of ninety pound when wet kids took down the drug runners crossing the border that the other brass had strategically lured there for them to take down. That they were considered ready for deployment, booyah.

Not exactly perfect in terms of the philosophy of war, but she wasn't Noonian. It was all fucked, and that was war.

She rented herself a holo communication suite from a Ferengi. Discretion guaranteed or her money back, and her knife embedded in the Ferengi's heart.

She setup Brittanus' fancy scrambler despite assurances, because she knew where she was with Ferengi, and made the connection.

Greeted her oldest enemies, longests lovers, oldest allies. "We're fucked and I'm not talking gentle love making. I'm talking Medusa fucked over by Poseidon so bad her hair turned to snakes fucked."

"Colorful," said Brittanus, who as always had a giant stick up their ass. After years of seeing it, there was a comfort to that stick. A warm fuzzy, delete that thought.

"But, as always I bring the goods," said Meiying. Because she always did. Always. Got that tiny fraction of glacier crack smile from Brittanus and the careful calculating smile from Noonian.

"Fuck, I love them." The three of them sitting around a table plotting what rocks would make good supply lines. A beer for Meiying. Tea for Noonian. Nothing for Brittanus. Talking about children, which had never been Meiying's thing, but if Brittanus wanted to do it. Thought it would tie them together.

Meiying had left on reconnaissance the next day.

She plugged the cube into transmit. "A contact of mine put me onto this. I'd hoped the scientist herself would to let me play sugar daddy, but the specs are good too."

Noonian read the text running across the screen as if he had a clue how to read it. Not that he couldn't. Not that Meiying couldn't, but things worked best if Brittanus did the science, Noonian flew around being Genghis Alexander Napoleon in space, and Meiying handled intelligence operations. Noonian said, "Mei, can this do what it claims?"

"Fuck if I know," said Meiying, watching the tiniest little bitty bend of Brittanus' lips. The slightest furrow between their eyes. The angle of their folded hands as their eyes scanned over the information. "It can, can't it."

"The research is sound," which meant it was utterly fucking brilliant in Brittanus speak, "if," because there was always an if with Brittanus, "I am about to resolve a few basic fallacies. Their use of protomatter for example would result in a fundamental instability of the…"

"Great, it works," said Meiying, who did not need a dissertation.

"Should we pursue this?" asked Noonian. "Thus far the Alignments are holding firm about even admitting that we are alive."

Which given Meiying was actually on Earth was nice of them. She said, "Eventually, they'll have to do something. The Klingons came out of this with Cardassian territory, but they lost a lot of lives for a couple systems. Romulans are claiming half of Cardassian space without having done much of anything. Federation's doing 'peace keeping' in the other half, but the Cardassians always rode their systems hard and put them to bed wet, and everyone knows the new Cardassian government doesn't have a pot to piss in. Dominion is on the other side of a wormhole, which as the Federation proved is a pretty defensible funnel. Which leaves the Breen to pay up for everyone's battered pricks."

"Lost blood as well as egos," said Noonian, because that's the way he rolled. "Some member planets are being particularly vocal about reparations," said Noonian.

"Fucking rich given all we did to make sure the Dominion didn't level Betazed as an example," said Meiying.

"I was referring to the Betas," said Noonian. "But yes, Bol, the Tellarites," a swift look at Brittanus, "Of course, the Vulcans only had three war dead and nine wounded, but regard that as too dear."

"Maybe we should have captured New Vulcan instead of Betazed," said Meiying not entirely seriously.

Which had Noonian explaining the art of war, and supply lines, and a metaphor about a trapped rat, which was fine, but Meiying had heard it before. Her empire had been a bit more empire of the tipped table and point everyone at everyone to fuck the man. Even when she was the man.

Capped by Brittanus saying, "The Vulcan's freedom from attack was prepaid when they required that our great grandchildren be freed in exchange for even considering a treaty with the nations of Earth." Which had them all staring at each other.

Noonian said, "This doesn't answer my question. Should we pursue this?"

Meiying held up a finger, "We're a pretty big carrot to give the Federation to make them back off. They deliver our corpses, we can't share any family secrets."

"True," said Noonian. "Now that Sherlock delivered on a promise we knew nothing about," because Noonian was going to be dead, his head on a pike in Times Square and still not forget about Brittanus concealing that Sherlock, their little lamb, was supposed to go back in time and fuck the Breen into being or something, "we have no more leverage."

Brittanus, as always, didn't change their expression. Kept the glacier look.

Watching Brittanus standing comfortably in Breen armor, thinking, "There is someone who has been waiting to hide their whole life."

Thinking, "How do I peel them out of it."

"Go big or go home," said Meiying. She shrugged. "Let's go home." She kind of meant it. Fucking assholes that the Betas were. Not people in tin cans. Flying their freak flags. Letting it all hang out.

"No," said Brittanus. "Going back is never possible. While much would have been different had this been shared before, we must move forward." They reached out and cut the connection, which left Noonian and Meiying staring at each other like a couple of twerps with their hands in their pants.

"Does that mean they'll build it?" asked Meiying and then answered her own question, "Of course they will."

"Brittanus could never resist a challenge," said Noonian. "How long have you known about this?"

"A while," Meiying gave Noonian a smile that wasn't exactly one. "I always try to have one more secret," and cut off her connection.

Since that left the afternoon free, she went for another walk past buildings that hadn't existed back in the day. Listened to the Conflict scream on about battles continuing. A little Bad Religion. A little Dead Kennedys.

None of her kids had any taste in music. Neither did her partners in whatever this was. When she'd played 'Screams for Tears' for them, all they'd done was scream, which was about all infants did anyways, and Brittanus had very calmly threatened to remove very important parts if that experiment was repeated.

Really, Meiying didn't get why everyone went on about babies. Teenagers, in your face punks, with no concept of death or anything, that was the fun part. All babies did was try to be cute so you'd kill anyone who threatened them. Which fine, their kids had gotten that part down pat.

Time long past all that though. She had other sticks for the fire.

Meiying went to the play she'd helped arrange. Produced. She was a producer. A revival of the "Lady of the Flowers" by none other than the Watson family troop.

Harry Watson was there, but she didn't recognize Meiying, which was the whole point of the leather goddess of bitchdom outfit she wore when she was being Khan Meiying Washington, Empress of the Americas. Most people looked at the knives in her cleavage and not her face.

She'd changed into something a little more appropriate for the meeting. Told Elise Watson, "I'm sorry I couldn't get out here before now to meet you, but I had my own gig in New Hong Kong. Killer schedule. I should shoot my producer. Oh, wait that's me." Grinned just right. "So, the digs good? Everyone treating you right?"

"It's a lovely venue. I wasn't sure at first when you proposed it, but perhaps now is the right time to remind people that we're all Human."

That hadn't been exactly been Meiying's point, but she said, "Let me get out of your way."

It was a pretty good play. Weird as fuck to think the tall twig was meant to be playing Mycroft. But good. Certainly had a full house of mostly Augments and Betas.

Take that Moriarty and his Khan-expose's. If there was one thing Meiying had learned since waking up, Colonel Green made a great villain.

Meiying hung around the stage door and offered her best congratulations to Elise Watson for a fabulous performance. Which turned into an invitation to dinner, because Meiying could be charming when she wanted to be.

Meiying didn't expect Elise to pause in a middle of a discussion of the works of Vaniloff and ask, "Excuse, but I can't keep staring at your chest like this. Is your shirt handmade?"

Meiying looked down at her genuine vintage Empress of the Americas shirt complete with her black sun tag and answered honestly, rare for her, "Yeah, got it from an acquaintance in China ages ago. Traded it for something I didn't really want." She leaned in. "I prefer handmade items. So much more personal, don't you think?"

"Yes." Did not expect Elise to cross her arms and say, "Ah. I would say it's a pleasure to finally meet one of Sherlock's parents, but under the circumstances, that's difficult."

"Fucking-A." Meiying grinned. Kind of delighted to have been made. "Right on. Good to know there's brains on that side of the family as well. Our metric buttload of grand kids'll be… not stupid, hopefully."

"Grandchildren?" asked Elise. "Metric buttload."

Meiying leaned back. Looked at Elise and saw a woman who wanted to a grandmother. Who loved her kids. Probably went gah, gah over babies. "Oh, you don't know." Grinned.

"You must tell me everything," said Elise pouring more beer.

"Long as you don't tell who told you, sure," because really, Meiying wasn't a grandparent sort of person. She wasn't. She didn't give a fuck about babies. But the thought of a new war starting with the Breen was kind of making her crazy feeling.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

They recognized the basic design as soon as they saw it. A theorem they themselves had worked on a century ago when caged.

Brittanus walked back through their mind. Ignored the leaking tiles. They called it a memory palace. That was the name of the technique. Rooms organizing concepts. Objects in each room symbolizing items to be remembered.

It was anything but a palace. Stark white corridors. Harsh cold light illuminating the faint cracks in the frigid white cinder block. Heavy walls to contain monsters and collect damp. But for the cracks. Leaks. Punched holes.

But for that.

The soft sound of bare feet and the whisper of thin cotton clothing with their designation stamped in blury blue ink on the front: 193848R92349.

When they had not been stripped of even that.

They did not visit that room. The leaking pipes exposed that often enough.

Brittanus went to the Rivers of Babylon. The room of the interregnum decade. Their captivity in the Federation. There were no hanging gardens. No statue to Ozymandias with an exhortation to look upon the monument and despair. There was merely a small stone foot in a cement niche.

When they picked it up, Admiral Marcus said without a trace of irony, "Khan Brittanus, you ruled an empire through technological might. The Federation needs those skills. We've gone soft. We need your killer instinct."

"And if I do not?" they'd replied. Chilly on the surface. Churning in the basement. Rattling plumbing. They had left Earth. Left Mycroft when they'd run out of time to improve the odds. Out of all those freed from the various nation-states, less than three hundred had left. Most had chosen to stay. Fight. Die.

"I have seventy-two cryo-chambers that say you won't." Marcus smiled, teeth blue in the dim lights. "And if I run low on those," he shrugged, "you left someone behind on Earth. They had children, who had children."

Brittanus picked up an iron apple and contemplated the genesis of Genesis. Satanic mills. A mental fight. Sword in hand. A green and pleasant land. So, no answer there.

Turned. Went to a different level. Past closed metal doors that echoed screams.

To the room where God dwelt. They picked up the SIG-Sauer. Sergeant God shouted, "You stupid, fucking cunt! Are you too fucking stupid to see what's in front of your Goddamn face? Death is a fucking fact of life! Things fall apart if the centre doesn't fucking hold!" God had not been their actual name to be sure, but they'd claimed it was the only name that the experiments at the Baskerville Research Facility would ever need learn. Spittle flying. His red cheeks glowed over his bristled cheeks in the cold damp air of bitter moor and stony memory.  "R92349, God asked fucking you a question! Are that much of a fucking twat?"

God really did have all the answers. Was the inspiration of so much creation that destroyed.

"The falcon cannot hear the falconer. Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."

It only seemed reasonable to want the energy to be stable. For the falcon to wheel back to the falconer. To control wild creation. The answer was to embrace the decay. Slouch through it.

They opened their eyes to the interior of their lab. An ornate facade of warm wood panels and painted woodland scenes full of people in brilliant clothes. Themself dressed in an embrace of heavy layers of velvet. Gems softly sparkled from light filtered through rosy glass flowers. All of it holographic light.

Nothing was ever real. Nothing lasted.

Brittanus worked on the patterns for the Genesis device developed by Admiral Marcus' daughter. His grandson. His great granddaughter, who by a turning of the widening gyre was an Augment.

Drip.

Blue eyes narrow. Fierce. "Congrats, you raised a sociopath."

Drip.

"Given how the three of you fucking failed as parents..."

Drip.

Clutching a silently terrified Mycroft in their arms as they ran across the raw field into the grimpen mire with the others. Lifting barbed wire with a bleeding hand. Behind them a jeep exploded. The hounds of God bayed. R92201's silence as the mire swallowed them.

Drip.

Doctor Saxon's warm breath biting cold cheeks. "You should smile more. You're pretty when you smile."

Drip.

The rattle of the HVAC unit in the bunker. The launch window rapidly approaching. Unable to compose farewell.

Drip.

Ms. Jutland turning the diode. Electricity scraping like her long grey nails. "You're practically Siberia. The target needs to believe it when you say you want them. Need them. Love them."

Drip

Silence was not an answer. They went downstairs to the Great Hall, where the Auberj children were playing a game involving rolling a hoop with a stick over lines in the rich parquet floor.

The Work there was easier. Any room could be a laboratory when it was all fabrications of light.

Veema appeared. Delivered her message with the palace translating her armor's chirps into words, and she was gone.

"What did the message say?" asked Veris, or rather the holographic simulation of a former denizen of the Gamma quadrant named Veris, a questionable gift from Sherlock along with the questionable gift of leaving several thousand children of a not-exactly dead race.

Drip.

"Is he really mine?" asked William. Small face alive with excitement.

"Responsibilities to be shared among the three of you," said Noonian.

"Thank you, Mummy." Thin arms tight around their leg and Noonian's warm chuckle.

They looked down uncertain of what to do. "It was your Father Noonian's idea."

"But Victor said you'd say no," was muffled as William turned to pick up the sehlat cub, which eagerly licked his face. It's fur looking soft and warm. Brittanus' hand wanted to curl in curls.

Drip.

"The leaders of the Alignments will gather to discuss the Allied demands. Both for reparations and if the Breen should hand over Noonian, Meiying, and myself." Brittanus could appreciate brilliance. "Moriarty's work is brilliant."

"The changeling from the race that killed me. What about him?" asked Veris. Raised their voice, "Fedra, it's a legit foul. You can't touch the grye with your hands."

Brittanus replied to Veris, although to a degree it was like talking to themself, "With his illness, Moriarty would have difficulty getting to us. Therefore, the simplest thing would be to get the Federation to require we be removed from our defensive positions."

"What will you do?"

The Auberj children cheered something to do with cross a red line.

"I already built a chariot of fire when I left Earth." Human poetry meant nothing to Veris. Speaking yet again for themself, Brittanus said, "With my cunning left hand, I'll kill Moriarty."

Veris said, "Everyone dies, except the changelings. They live forever." Veris looked at the holographic light cast upon the floor. A holographic sun shining through the holographic window blazing with Brittanus' crest. A red dragon devouring the heart of a white dragon. Veris' shadow cast as if they would have one. "Everything passes away."

Brittanus eyed the simulation. The grit in the machine. The ghost in the shell. If they had met Veris in life, they would assume he was a memory leak and not a hologram.

Veris asked, "Do you think the Ferengi will attempt to reclaim their moon? You did put a blockade around  their planet."

"Unlikely, given that was a contract of a thousand years standing, but not outside the realm of possibility." Cold comfort. It was the only type Brittanus could give.

Brittanus returned to their work. Modified the model of the Genesis device. Initiated a new sequence. Observed the results. Gained an audience of several Auberj children.

Continued to add to patterns based on observation of what was in front of them. Chaos forming order.

They added a hoop and stick to the Enheduanna room. Next to the still image of the augment's rights march from Meiying. Hundreds of thousands streaming down streets. Vulnerable to viruses, bombs, long range weapons, short range weapons; a panoply of options.

They went to the armory. Went past wounded I-Chaya and William frozen in tears.

Sociopath.

Picked up a bust of Margaret Thatcher.

Saw the parade in the old WWII air force hanger. Rows upon rows of Augments according to age and designation gathered at parade rest. Bare lightbulbs illuminated the puddles on the cement while outside the rain drummed thin metal. Augments standing to attention while Thatcher, as the latest to pay to make them, create them, keep them, wanted to know when the government would get a return on its considerable investment.

Required and received a demonstration of that for which she'd paid.

Turn.

Picked up a transistor. The long barracks. Children stacked two to a bunk. Blocking the overhead camera with their bodies as Brittanus delicately removed a filament from a broken lightbulb and added it to their collection of purloined parts. All lost when early heats put them in isolation. Loss.

They opened their eyes and met the gaze of children.

"What are you doing?"

"Making a weapon." That was also a tool.

Drip.

Ms. Juteland, prim as always in her linen and wool plum colored suit, voice numbing in their left ear, said, "I'm disappointed in you, R92349." How terrible they'd felt. How eager for a scrap of approval.

Drip.

Chin waiting for their analysis of their work. Meticulous. Well done. Sherlock after brilliantly playing Sarasate's arrangement of Carmen. Waiting. Mycroft telling them what they'd accomplished at the new base. Waiting.

The memory palace had never been a very effective technique for bottling up their ghosts.

Drip.

Thatcher said, "I need a demonstration in the field by the end of the month." Calm iron. Powerful. Safe. How they'd envied her.

Drip.

Moriarty laughing about the virus they'd designed to wreck just enough havoc in Federation shipyards.

Drip.

The female Changeling's calm cold cadences explaining why Sherlock had to die.

The leaks were irrelevant. Eventually, they'd stand on high enough ground to be above the flood.

The Auberj children rolled the hoop over a green line, which was cause for much rejoicing from some. Sorrow from others.

Incomprensible.

Where else had they misunderstood? Failed to grasp?

Drip.

Doctor Saxon's fiery breath burning a numbed neck. "Look at how pretty you are now that we've grown your hair out. Now lie down and we'll see how the baby is coming along." The result of being bred again. Before the last time. Before Mycroft.

Saxon was dead. God was dead. Rotted and gone to dust long ago. Brittanus had watched their corpses through the cameras of their drones. The precise opposite of what they'd been trained to do. They'd been trained to get close to a target. To infiltrate. To kill at close quarters.

Drip.

Ms. Juteland's calm smiling expression. Completely bland. "Without the aberration early heat, you'd have been culled as a failure. You weren't even terribly good as a breeder."

Drip.

Brittanus considered their responsibilities.

To the Breen.

To their children of Earth.

To Sherlock's gift of the Auberj.

They were all so heavy. All needing to get to higher ground.

Brittanus considered the colors of their crest. The blazing Breton dragon eternally eating the Saxon dragon's blue heart.

Drip.

The cold cave where William and Euros lay with their bodies encased in the abdomen of a female feradon. A mother based on the state of her mammary glands and ancillary ridging. William went in. Chrysalis. Sherlock came out.

How still and cold Sherlock felt in Brittanus' arms.

Drip.

The sound of the super cooled glycol rattling in the exposed ducts. The frozen forms of the culled hanging off metal hooks. Themself, so much smaller, looking up into B0970's eyes. Dead. Face pale. Blood removed. This lesson above all others.

Doctor Saxon opened the door, his clipboard in hand. His thin lipped smile. Silvered ginger hair glowing in the light from the corridor outside. "Good. Very good. You've done very well on this test."

Nausea at the memory of relief. Happiness. Pleasure at being examined and found healed of frostbite.

Brittanus set to work in earnest. Ignoring the leaks. There was much to do and little time to get to higher ground.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

His mother talked at him solidly for an hour, until John broke down and admitted the thirty-five into twenty-nine thing.

"Sweetheart, are you sure? That's quite a lot to go through to have children."

Because trust mum to switch on a molecule.

"Yeah," John could feel the absolute surety. "Yeah. I am."

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

"My mother knows," said John.

Sherlock didn't look up from where he was dissecting a storage array. "She was the one who contacted you about my parents."

"Not about your parents. She doesn't care about your parents. She wants to write an epic three part play about your parents. I think one of your parents is the one who told her. She got all coy when I asked."

Sherlock tried to think of another secret of the same magnitude.

"Sherlock, my mum found out that she's about to become a two hundred and two times grandmother and she wants to go to the christening, or whatever it is the Breen do."

"Ah," said Sherlock sitting down. "She should go to Beta Aurigae. Chin can get her a transport from there." He thought about that. About Elise being there while there was cake. At the decanting. At how large and full the universe would be.

He thought about his parents being there, because despite John's requirements that they be kept out of their children's lives, they were the heads of an Alignment.

The idea that the Breen trade them for peace, that they might be in captivity of their own was a less comforting idea than it would have been at an earlier point in his life.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Veema's face plate provided statistics on the heart rate, perspiration rate, and other indicators of stress for the species of various members of the Federation delegation. Veema was a doctor, as her biological mother had been before her.

Not that was a requirement for First Recombinants. Any form of biological expertise was sufficient provided they could understand their most important responsibility. It had been Veema's honor to be the 1st Alignment's Representative and First Recombinant for the last four Meiosis, which involved more meetings than she liked.

Alas, her mask could not not indicate if the Starfleet Admiral currently speaking was authorized to seek war reparations from the Breen in a more direct way. To seize the First, and as far as she knew only, Recombinant of the 23rd Alignment and the creche with which they had chosen to raise children. Somewhat bizarrely from their own DNA, but Veema had been given to understand that era and planet in which they had been gestated had been hazardous and cruel.

There had been no such negotiations with the Cardassians, badly beaten in the war, who were hardly in a position to argue over demands that they demilitarize. Over reparations. In no position to comply with some demands, but unable to argue.

Veema turned on her translator. "As we have said before, we have reason to think there is still a Changeling still present in the Alpha quadrant. A Dominion operative, who is attempting to cause unrest. Whose actions were the reason for our direct involvement in the war. They are responsible for biological attacks on both our peoples."

"You mean our people both times," said Ambassador Troi sharply. The light gleamed on her brilliantly colored garments as she angrily folded her arms. "You kidnapped Federation citizens from Federation space and held them as some sort of… harem for these Khanees Human war criminals. You were supplying the Dominion with ships and Jem'Hadar long before you entered the war. Before you enabled the conquest of Betazed... and other worlds." She raised her chin, which made the large jewels on her ears and in hair flash. "Now take off your damn helmets and negotiate seriously with us."

Amassador Lojal, a Vulcan, said, "Given we have technology to deploy localized fields, which would eliminate environmental issues, the logical thing would be to deploy it to improve discussions."

"It's a thought," said Veema to Pavan.

He sighed, "It would certainly bring an element of surprise and disruption to these negotiations."

"And stop all that damn chirping amongst yourselves. You have translators. Use them!" snapped Ambassador Troi.

Veema was fascinated by the way the ambassador's matching makeup, gems, and garments all sparkled independently in the light. Ambassador Troi had been quite vehement that the Breen owed Betazed in particular reparations for the occupation during the war since the Jem'Hadar that had wreaked havoc on Betazed had been manufactured using Breen resources.

"I have difficulty believing the Federation intends these peace talks to succeed if this is the delegation they sent," said Veema.

The Breen had been a galactic power for over a millennium. Although, steadily in decline, if history showed anything, the current exhausted peace was merely a pause.

"I agree," said Pavan. He touched his translator. "We will need to discuss your requests."

Ambassador Troi flurried after them. "A first step would be turn over these Khanees to face justice."

"We will discuss," said Veema.

The meeting with the Romulan ambassador was less contentious, but no more productive. The Romulans had not withdrawn their forces from what areas of Cardassian space they had occupied following the war, nor had the Federation. Forming a sort of new demilitarized zone down the middle with Cardassia at its heart.

The Klingons raged that they had expended their forces the longest time in the war and gained the least.

The Congress of Cardassia was not going well.

Spectacularly unwell.

Terellhoo, in a moment of biological humor, declared it unwell, and then ruined the joke by overanalyzing the diseases.

Thier seconds took their places. Interchangeable as far as the delegates were concerned, while they went to their own meeting on the home world. The one they and the Fenisal had destroyed between them. Creating the peace that followed from the war they'd raged. Where winter blanketed equatorial and temperate zone as well as arctic. Home only to the curators of the sacred sites and technicians charged with the most precious of all charges. Not the only such place, to be sure, as each Alignment maintained their own sites, but the one of longest standing and the most history. The one held in common.

Veema did not go straight to the Hall of the Future. Technically, none of them did. Each First went to the place of contemplation that suited them best.

She divested herself of her armor. The shielding on the complex meant there was no need for armor other than the cold. Other than the weather that formed as a result of shielding such a large area. Even under the dome, it was winter.

She felt naked without her armor. But within a few short months, she would remove it for a period of years. Scenting was particularly critical in the first few months of a child's life. Veema intended to do as her foster parents had done. Determined to do her best for the precious life coming into her care.

So naked of armor, if not formal garments, she went to the clinic where her biological mother had treated the First Father as a child after his sister, Euros, had so grievously injured him. Where his sister, Chin, had been treated for her injuries, after the First Father, miraculously an adult on the same day he was yet a child, brought her there.

Miraculous not that he'd been there. Veema knew he'd discovered the secret of voyaging in time, but that he'd come with no trace. There were signs that the First Mother had been there as well.

Mycroft might have removed the electronic records, but her biological mother had seen the alpha who had brought in Chin Singh. Had seen the First Mother speaking with him during the Meiosis. Had seen the sacred recordings in her own time as First Recombinant. Had known the First Father must then recover. Would survive whatever would occur to live to the necessary age to enable their people to be.

It was the only reason there had not been widespread panic when he left the childhood home intended to keep him safe and repair the damage done to him.

Mycroft engaged in his own reflection, gazing upon an empty bed, as she turned from her contemplation. She said, "The actual bed was preserved for history." She smiled at him. "If there is to be a history. If what the First Mother said is true. If these negotiations do not end in another war." Veema had to have faith in the future. Or at least time travel. There were future Concordia. She must believe they made the right decision to enable them to get there.

She brushed back short hair that was normally contained in a helmet. Naked. Her expression feeling open and vulnerable without her mask. Felt in that spirit that she should make a confession. "I am somewhat nervous. My creche passed our final tests in our parenting degree twelve years ago, but it is only now with such charity and compassion from the First Mother, I am in a position to grant my own request. I cannot help but think if I fail in my decisions, it won't just be my loss, but our childrens'."

The word children felt as if it hung in the air and yet simultaneously melted into her. A labor of a lifetime. A secret terror that she was not ready. The easing of a decade's long ache.

"Ah, yes, congratulations for the addition to your creche," said Mycroft. He folded his right hand over his closed left fist. As always following the correct forms. Which was thoughtful of him given the 23rd Alignment followed their own ways and held back from the rest of the Confederation of the Breen.

"Congratulations on the expansion of your genome," said Veema gently. Holding one hand flat on top of the other at an angle before making the gesture of the cup.

His nod was formal. Correct, but she noted somewhat stiff. His scent's slight sharpness revealing what his expression would not.

She said, "Are you here for the vote?"

Mycroft's nod was once again formal. Stiff. "Yes. Mummy and the other Khans decided that given their own conflict of interest, I would represent them."

Hardly a great shift of conflicts given that Mycroft was voting on behalf of his biological mother and foster fathers. Slightly outre given his lack of biological expertise, but dispensation had been granted almost two decades ago when it became clear none in the 23rd had the background to stand as Brittanus' Second and none had the interest in gaining that expertise.

In any case, he appeared to have a question he wished to ask.

He said, "About the expansion of the ah… genome… I had heard a number that I'm having difficulty crediting. I know that my brother and his husband were quite… fruitful, but I was given to understand that new gestation units were replicated. That every unit in the facility is full. Every gestation unit in every facility."

"Oh," she covered his hand in sympathy for the loss to the 23rd Alignment, which had received nothing when the First Father and First Mother came to make peace on behalf of the Federation. "It's quite simple. In eighty-five percent of the data cubes, the First Mother was able able to capture the next generation as zygotes rather than later as blastocysts."

His smile was sharp, intelligent as always, but there was no indication that he comprehended the wonderful significance of what the First Mother had accomplished. Really, she did pity the 23rd for their emphasis on politics and hard science, and so little on the biological.

She made the full cup gesture again, but now folded to indicate a pouring urn and said quite simply, "Because so many were captured so early in development, we were able to successfully encourage them to split into multiples."

"You made twins?" He sounded surprised. Also, somewhat lacking in imagination if he thought they had aimed so low.

She smiled at him happily. Unable to contain herself. "Far more than that. I have learned from the Firsts of the other Alignments, we've all experienced enormous success." A sudden thought occurred to her. "You don't think the First Mother and First Father will be upset that we had to redistribute their original allocation so that success could be shared equally? We will take care that multiples will be placed near each other."

Mycroft said somewhat faintly. "I think surprise will be the greater emotion."

"That's a relief. To be sure, they are not the only contributions. We have had the same slim success from genetics donated from within the alignments, which do outnumber them, but they are far and away the largest genetic grouping. This year at the Meiosis, for the first time in over a century, none will be left wanting." Except the 23rd Alignment was her immediate thought. When he said all the gestation units, he left out that those of the 23rd Alignment were left wanting. Empty, if not for the fact Brittanus had loaned them to the other Alignments. She covered it by saying. "Shall we go to the vote?"

Mycroft inclined his head and they went together to Hall of the Future. Took their places surrounded by row upon gleaming row of uterine replicators, as Veema called the assembled to order.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

John went into Transporter Room Forest transporter thirty-five years old.

Came out of Transporter Room Cloud twenty-nine. Didn't feel a lot different, truth be told. Except for the look on Sherlock's face.

Hopeful. Even with everything happening. Secrets coming out of the woodwork, probably not the best time in the universe to bring a child into the world, but that time was possibly never.

He was done with never. They went to their quarters. Did a few things to his ovaries to keep the numbers down. For the very first time in their relationship, John injected himself with something to trigger his own heat. He was just about to laugh about the shifts in fate, given his plans over a decade ago - no fifteen years - when he'd been Sherlock's TA.

Could smell the shift in Sherlock's scent in response to his own.

Then there were lips to press. Taste the kisses of his beloved's mouth. Hungrier and hungrier kisses. Tangle feet. Slide a thigh between love's thighs.

Every gasp an escalating spiral of scent and touch and taste.

Skin sliding against skin. Slick with sweat.

A catch in Sherlock's breath as John nipped a flat nipple. Played and laved. Until with a laugh John rolled them over. Began the coupling that would make a child in earnest. "An alpha with your eyes," whispered John, because somehow this moment felt the need for low voices.

"An omega," whispered Sherlock back, "with your eyes and hair and heart and," John stopped his mouth with his own. Drank his love's mouth. Words. Thoughts. Desperate gasps.

Moved against Sherlock. Hips moving. Tongues communicating desire.

Sherlock's swelling knot rising with the tide. Pushing and pulling in and out. Catching just that pleasurable side of painful. John felt young and alive and old and eternal and there and now and in his body and floating above himself and everything.

Sherlock's eyes wide and blown. Astonished. Chanting his name.

Fair. John was chanting Sherlock's.

Until the waves crashed in and they were locked together. Sherlock releasing the future. Inarticulate cries.

While John felt the familiar golden beads of light. Love. Possibility.

John wrapped his legs around Sherlock tightly. Holding it all in. Not wanting to let go.

Wanting only more.

Fortunately, Sherlock had more to give. More love. More.

Until all thoughts were washed away, as they always were.

Until sleep came to claim them and on waking, John whispered into the dark, into their dark room flying through the stars, "Whoever they'll be, they'll be a little bit of both of us, but mostly themselves."

Sherlock hummed happily, but as was typical needed the last word. "I still want them to have your heart."

John laid his head to rest on Sherlock's heart. Listened to its steady beat. They laid there like that until Sherlock could not stand not knowing. Reaching over the side of the bed to pull up a medical tricorder. Scanning John. "Two. There's two."

"Two is good." A quick kiss. Sherlock turned the tricorder so John could see the signals. Clumps of cells smaller than the head of a pin. John made him put the thing down and rest.

The next week, John was a bit of a mess. He had to admit.

Julian took over the majority of his duties, saying, "You'll do more harm than good right now. I say this as your friend and doctor, go away."

Not that there was much to do, but since Hudson had done much the same thing with Holmes, Owen and Alexis got some unexpected babysitters. Four year olds tearing around with all the energy in the universe was about John's speed just then.

Although, Craig seemed determined to find a question Sherlock couldn't answer. Since he didn't know to ask who was the current president of the Federation, he never did find the right question.

Each night, they gave the kids back. Tired and sleepy. Went to their quarters to make love. Make hope. So John didn't even notice when the first blastocyst attached. Nor the second. As ever, healed by love.

When he did his daily check, he yelled for Sherlock to come over. They stared with probably identical blissed smiles at the scan.

Sherlock was compelled, of course, to kiss every inch of John's still flat belly. For good luck. Which devolved to other things.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

He was happy.

Simply happy.

Moriarty was out there planning something.

He had just received orders that after their current surveying mission, the Bakerstreet was to report to Earth. Not every Augment in the fleet. Sherlock was ordered to report to the Starfleet research facility in London.

There was that. The very high probability that they were not intending Sherlock to perform research.

The peace negotiations with the Breen were not going well.

News reports kept coming out with additional crumbs of secrets and speculation. The Breen had a super weapon. The Khans were preparing for a second war. There were anti-Augment demonstrations. The reverse.

That was far away.

The Bakerstreet was due to be mothballed. It was official.

Hudson was planning the final party. A few weeks before they reached Earth, so the less official crew could leave.

Sherlock was happy.

He was going to be a father.

Technically even if he and John had done nothing, he was already going to be a father. Mycroft had informed him of the size of the Meiosis this year.

It was going to take a great deal of cake.

He'd tell John later. When everything was a bit less new.

He was going to make mistakes.

John would fix things.

He was happy.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Euros let her mind drift. Grazing through the minds of the great beasts that travelled in space. They weren't clever. Not like Gomtuu. But they were vast and calm and drifted like snow.

No.

Not snow.

Never snow.

Something nice.

Meteors.

That's when she felt him. Vast. Larger than Gomtuu. Cleverer too. Lonely. He was very lonely.

She saw him. Dressed in gold silk with a tricorn hat.

"Is that a phoenix feather?" She asked pointing at the long pretty feather in his hat. Moriarty had sometimes shaped himself into funny shapes and tried to get her to play with him. But she wasn't sure she liked the games he wanted to play.

The entity swept the hat off his head and bowed. The feather dragged on the floor making sparks. "Yes, milady. Does milady want the feather? A phoenix? A meteor shower?"

She had been giggling, but she didn't want him in her head. So, she stopped and glared. "No peeking. I don't like that!" She looked at him. Really looked at him and he was very big. He trying to appear small, but he wasn't small. He was lying to her. Trying to. He was omnipotent and that meant dangerous.

"No, I'm not dangerous at all. Well, a little, but only in the way a gentle parfait knight should be."

She pursed her lips and crossed her arms. "You can't be a gentle parfait knight if you can do anything. Then it's cheating. You're a cheater." Victor had been a cheater. He'd pretended to be nice and good and he lied. He'd said she hadn't understood what he'd done. How much black tar had been in his heart. How much he'd enjoyed making Sherlock cry.

That hadn't even been the first time.

She was thinking all that, while the entity looked at her. She didn't really mean to say, "I don't know if I like you!" She'd just met him after all. But she didn't like the way she felt just then. Gomtuu said it was because she was an adolecent of her species.

He looked so sad and disappeared.

She almost wanted to call out and bring him back, but she didn't.

So she wasn't really paying attention to the twitch on the spiderweb. Something very important, very far away.

That hadn't been Trelane's intention. He just couldn't stand not meeting Euros any longer. Even if it hadn't quite gone as he'd intended. But his mother had warned him.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The freak and Watson arrived at the morning briefing late and freshly showered with the sort of glow Sally wanted to know nothing about.

Nothing.

What so ever.

Fuck, the Bakerstreet was due to report to Earth, which everyone on the Goddamned ship knew what that meant, and Holmes and Watson were glowing.

She was focusing on how much she didn't want to know about why they were glowing when Julian popped into the ready room. That had never happened for anything short of a medical emergency. He and Hunter had kept their relationship private, which was more than she could say about the ship's captain and doctor currently playing fucking footsie under the table.

Watson asked, "Julian, what's wrong?"

"Violet hasn't contacted me in over three weeks, which is not like her. Even during the war, she sent me daily updates most of the time."

Sally knew that was true enough. The data burst each time Julian left the ship was enormous. She'd also heard the captain of the Reliant was a bit of a berk. Still it was worth checking. Turned out the Reliant missed their last check in.

Not exactly that unusual given subspace disturbances, but the war had stirred up all sorts of pots.

Could be something.

Holmes kissed Watson's hand. "I suppose we'll have to delay reporting to Earth."

"If there's a mystery, then we must," said Watson.

She hoped that meant they both knew how bad things were likely to be when Holmes reported in. If he reported in.

They were idiots.

They were her idiots.

"Let's go find, Hunter," said Sally.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The Reliant's last known location was answering a troop ship's distress beacon. They found an abandoned freighter. An old hulk being ground at by a storm. Sherlock said the storm would last a few hundred more years. The ship a lot less than that. There was no one on it.

Abandoned. Just faint traces of Human scent. Signs Starfleet crew had been there. A tricorder in a corner.

Sherlock was able to find a trace of a slight neutrino leak that indicated the ship had gone in the direction of Regula I, whose only entry in Starfleet records was that it was a Top Secret Research facility and none of them had the clearance to go anywhere near it.

Sherlock grinned. "Naturally."

John leaned in and gave his husband a kiss, because the look on his face was simply too adorable not too. Even if it did make Winters sigh and Donovan have a coughing fit that sounded suspiciously like, "Keep it off the bridge."

They followed the trail straight to Regula I, which was where things got a bit dicey. The Reliant, still leaking neutrinos, was not answering hails and was taking a far orbit of the systems' sun. But the station at Regula I didn't answer their hails either. Not to tell them they didn't have clearance. Not to tell them anything. That wasn't protocol.

There were no life signs according to the sensors, but that could be the station shielding. Unlike many Federation bases, Regula I wasn't in space, but embedded in a class B planet. The station's dull grey dome almost blended into the equally grey stone of the lifeless rock it was on.

"We'll need to go down to look," said John as innocently as he could.

Sherlock got as far glancing at John's mid-section and opening his mouth, when John put his index finger in his face and said, "I'm pregnant, not dead. Not injured. If you're going down, I'm going down."

Sherlock grinned, and John snickered.

Donovan groaned. "What are you two, twelve."

"Twenty-nine, again," said John, because that was a joke that worth repeating all damn year.

"Fine, once again all the people who absolutely should not be going down to the planet are going," said Donovan with the rhythm of long repetition.

"Hudson, you have command," said Sherlock.

They suited up and beamed outside the facility.

John was glad he'd taken an anti-nausea shot as they bounced forward in low gravity over the surface. Fine silica powder flying as they made each step. The vast black sky rising and falling on the blinding white horizon as he went.

Even he had to notice that there were no footsteps other than their own. If the Reliant had come here, they hadn't had the same problem getting into the base that they were. Still he had to give Sherlock a bit of a hard time when they got to the airlock. "Think you can get us in?"

Sherlock managed to give him a withering look through his face plate, before opening the side panel and setting to work with a very complicated device that blinked at them.

Donovan said, "Ten credits on ten minutes."

"Fifty on five minutes for the husband who loves me," said John.

Sherlock's pleased hum cut through Donovan's faux gagging noise. He did it in four minutes and thirty eight seconds, because he was brilliant and wonderful, and they tapped faceplates mostly to annoy Donovan while they waited for the airlock to pressurize.

There wasn't much to see on the other side of the airlock. Room full of gear like they were wearing. Enough atmosphere to take off their suits, which really weren't suited to ease of walking.

In the galley, there was a half eaten ham sandwich on a plate. The lettuce wilted and the meat slightly grey. A dirty plate in the replicator, not yet demattered. No people.

Sherlock lay down on the ground, face centimeters above the polished tile, and examined a smudge. A fragment of a colorful flower petal.

They found an empty lab. Cups of cold coffee sitting by equipment. A slight scummy film formed over the coffee.

They found more signs of recent occupation in a small office with a monitor set to display brilliant images from a tropical setting. No doubt to temper the extreme blandness of the tan and white room. A few pictures of people cycled on another display on the wall. Donovan watched a full cycle. Staring intently at an image of a young blond Human woman in a cap and gown with a middle aged Human man in an admiral's uniform from the last century. That pseudo Hornblower look with the jacket flap.

Actually, both Sherlock and Donovan stopped and stared at the picture.

"You recognize them," said Sherlock with a note of surprise.

"Oh, for fuck's sake, freak. Of course," said Donovan with a wrinkle of her nose..

"Someone want to fill me in?" said John, because all he got from the picture was possibly father and daughter.

Donovan paused the display. "That is Admiral Marcus and his daughter."

"Is that supposed to mean something?" asked John and got two incredulous looks, which made him want to tell Donovan she'd spent too many years around Sherlock. The expression was identical, but he didn't say anything. He didn't feel like getting punched.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

An unexpected name.

Mummy had mentioned Marcus from time to time. Mostly in reference to the Federation's hypocrisy.

"Oh, for fuck's sake." Donovan glared at both of them, which was unfair. Sherlock knew who Marcus was. This was not like not knowing who the current president of the Federation was, which was a perfectly useless piece of information. "Watson. The news has been scrounging for any new or old source about the Khans in the last few weeks and the Breen have been a brick wall. With armor. Please tell me you're reading news directly relevant to your lives. I know I saw a piece in the SF Chron on him. The disgraced Admiral."

"That was the Admiral that had Mummy making weapons for Starfleet," said Sherlock wanting the words out. Done with. Didn't want to think about it. Didn't want to think about his own orders after this mission.

"Because of course that was most fucking stupid thing he could possibly have done," said Donovan crossing her arms. "I looked up his kid, Carol, when I got into my teens. I don't know. Curious. Figured we had something common or something. Father's fucking up in Section 31. Not so much." Donovan waved to herself and paged forward to the next image. The blond woman, now some twenty years older stood next to a blond young man with another distinct family resemblance. Both of them smiling out of the screen under a green banner that read "Genesis."

The Research station on Memory Beta. Doctor Carol Marcus' face, much older, when she made out his own face. Her scream. High and piercing. Drawing her son, himself an elderly man, to her side. "Mother, what is it?"

An gnarled blue-veined finger pointed at him. "Brittanus! You killed daddy. You..." She made a squeezing gesture with her hands.

Fortunately, she was quite old. Also, he'd worn contacts to shift his eye color back then. Hair tinted red. For the first few years, he had been so certain he'd be recognized. But when he finally was, no one listened.

Her son had led her back to her quarters at the research institute, apologizing.

"Hey, Sherlock, what are you thinking?"

Sherlock flickered a glance at Donovan, but she'd known everything for years by now. He'd by now confessed to almost every crew member for that matter. "I met Carol Marcus during my first assignment. Research. Everyone wanted to put me into weapon's research at the beginning of my career."

"Because you're a genius," John kissed his cheek.

"Because they wanted weapons," said Mummy. "They always want weapons. They make people who are weapons and have them make weapons."

"Yeah, yeah and you blow up labs on the lab deck regular like," said Donovan.

Sherlock waved her off. "Carol Marcus was quite elderly by then. Over a hundred and twenty. Still working on her life's work. The Genesis project with her son, David, and granddaughter, Johanna. She reacted to seeing me… quite badly. I was transferred soon after at her son's request."

"And what is the Genesis project when it's at home and not going by a ridiculously Earth centric name?" asked John, giving his shoulder a squeeze.

"Nothing less than a method to remake matter," said Sherlock. He remembered Johanna Marcus. Intense. Driven. An Augment. Kept to the shadows on the project despite her brilliance.

"Uh, that's called a replicator. Nothing new there."

"Into living matter. Resort the structure of anything into something else, but not into dead matter. Living. Turn a world in nuclear winter and return it to a garden. Provided that you don't mind the old world is gone."

"So, just the secret of life then. No big," said John encapsulating things as he always did.

"To a pattern," said Sherlock softly. "I spoke with her grand daughter at some length. Their aim was not only to be able to create life, but to be able to dictate the pattern that that life would take." He plucked an isolinear chip from a caddy on the desk and held it up between long fingers. "They claimed they'd be able to create parallel Earths." He flicked it in the air. Catching it between two fingers on the other hand. "Take any planet. Any nebula. Turn it into Earth. The ultimate terraforming."

"Sounds nice until someone uses it to transform the Earth we've already got," said John.

"Which was primarily the reason they were able to get support from Starfleet," said Sherlock. "Either us or some other power in the quadrant. Although," he looked around, "Interest in the project must be waning if this is where they are conducting their research."

"Fucking scientists," said Donovan.

Sherlock ignored that. "From what I saw, the design is unstable." With that he dropped to his knees and examined the floor. Thoroughly.

He was fully aware of John ogling his arse. He may have even examined the floor in such a way as to facilitate that activity. Was forced to require John come look at he was examining. Which required John pat and squeeze his arse.

Donovan grumbled and went to examine the power plant.

Aware through all of his examinations of the slightly sweet scent of decay. That the admitted son of Brittanus had entered a high security research station operated by the grandson of Admiral Marcus. He very much hoped that David Marcus was alive and well.

However, when they made it to the Command Center, they found the source of the odor. Corpses in Starfleet uniforms lined up near a view port of the dusty planet surface.

Sherlock examined the bodies. Details spooling around them. The lingering odor of three Humans in addition to the dead. Hunter among them and two strangers. From the nature of the burns on the bodies, type two phasers had been fired by all three Humans at the dead personnel.

"But Hunter wouldn't do anything like that," protested John.

"I agree," said Donovan.

Sherlock glared at John. "Hunter stood exactly where you are standing. Fired with her phaser on high burn. Part of an escalating series of injuries." He tilted his head.

Examined the positions in the portrait gallery. Two faceless Humans and Hunter firing at the dead, sequentially. With several minutes in between each shot given the shifts in the positions of the dead. Scuff marks on the floor.

"Given the increasingly violent nature of the deaths, they were being questioned," said Mycroft.

"Someone wanted access to the Genesis device," said Mummy. "You've seen the orchid petals. Carol Marcus' favorite flower. Seen a lack of them here. You know it does."

"They already had access to the base," said First Father. "They beamed directly on site."

"Enough clearance to get onto the base, but not enough clearance to get direct access to research," said Mycroft.

Something red and green on the bottom of a shoe caught Sherlock's attention.

He opened his eyes and pulled a blade of grass from the bottom of an engineer's boot. "Grass."

"Great, grass," said Donovan.

Sherlock glared at her. "Do you see great green rolling hills of grass in this station? Also, I see command staff. A medical officer. Security. Engineers, but where are the scientists? Where," he waved at the dead bodies, "are David and Johanna Marcus?"

John did his own examination of the crew. Noting time of death. Thirty-six hours. Recorded names from their dog tags.

Donovan could have taken down the names, but Sherlock knew it was something John needed to do. To care for the dead. He waited until John was done to say, "There's another level. Which we need to find."

He whirled around and sprinted back to the lab. He'd noted it earlier, but since it hadn't been the source of the decay, he'd saved it.

The small alcove on one side of the room was nothing special. A fairly standard decontamination unit. Waited for John to ask, "What is it, Sherlock?" with a grin, before Sherlock grandly gestured to the top of the unit beyond the sonic shower nozzle.

"It's a transporter," said John, "That's amazing! How did you even notice that?" That earned his John a brief kiss and an excited squeeze of the hand.

Since it was a rhetorical question, Sherlock said, "Donovan continue to search the station. Get Owen down here to examine the systems. Access logs. John, with me."

They stepped into the alcove together.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

"Hold position and continue to hail," said Martha. The Reliant grew larger in the ship's monitor. Sensors showed that there were only twenty-three life signs on the ship. Massive neutrino leakage, which made sense given the leak that had led them here.

It was a situation where the crew might need an emergency beam out or the crew were the only thing standing between them and a massive explosion that would most likely cause an anomaly wherever they blew.

Starfleet frowned on causing new anomalies. They were the reason for all the survey missions. The reason ships couldn't just fly through space without a good chance of ending up inside out.

"Commander, I'm getting audio, but no visual, shall I pipe it to the com," said M'Press with an enthusiastic bounce, one of the two frankly intimidatingly happy Caitian who'd transferred to the Bakerstreet since the end of the war wanting to serve on the same ship as Captains Watson and Holmes.

In that order.

Sherlock, the dear, found it utterly lovely, and was desperately looking forward introduced John as "Captain Doctor John Watson, and myself, his husband." That and looking forward to other things.

"Yes, put the audio on the bridge com," she said absently.

She was trying to figure out the best place for Sherlock and John to go when the Bakerstreet went to spacedock. Somewhere her boys could hide and still shine. A place for Owen and Alexis with their adorable, if slightly terrifying tots. A place for Stonn and that Klingon friend of his.

Martha's pull was fading. Put simply, the old guard was retiring as the new guard, battle experienced and needing positions, took their places. Enlistment remained high. Was surging with patriotic fervor on Earth with the news that the Breen were harboring the Khans.

Martha didn't like it. The Romulans, the only power in the region not significantly damaged in the war, was sabre rattling about the Federation's willingness to use biological weapons in the war. The reported use of cloaking devices, a direct treaty violation. Over the Klingons willingness to kill prisoners of war. Reports that Federation troops, returning from war, were confessing similar acts of war to their families.

So her mind was on the possibility of a war with the Romulans or the Breen, or both, and on her friends welfare, and less on the distressed ship. Nothing particularly unique about it. They'd dealt with hundreds of ships like that over the years.

She'd reached out once, but hadn't sensed Hunter on board. Another thing she didn't quite have the heart to tell anyone. A simple explanation for why Hunter had stopped contacting Julian. Dead from radiation poisoning.

A voice crackled over the coms, "This is Captain," crackle, "Reliant engine unstable." Crackle of words that almost sounded like something. "Regula scientists unable to," crackle, "in need of assistance." Crackle. "Repeat, whatever engineers," crackle, "can spare."

Martha said, "M'Press, open a channel." She stood up. Fussing with her uniform, even though she knew that they could not see her. "Reliant, the Bakerstreet will send over an engineer and a technician, stand by for our signal." They had exactly one engineer actually assigned to the Bakerstreet. She blew out a breath. "Get Simms and Khatri suited up and sent over to the Reliant."

She was still thinking about the Romulans when Khatri commed, "It's a…" and the Reliant opened fire.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

With no warning, the Bakerstreet violently shuddered. Multiple systems exploded.

Sestre lay on the floor. Bleeding from his forehead. Unconscious.

Stonn put on his face mask first, per protocol, before awkwardly leaned over the side of his chair. Gripped Sestre's collar and reversed his chair towards the door. He was halfway there, when he heard the alarm. Across the room, Kuvalaas shouted through his own mask, "Keep going. I'll lower the radiation shield walls manually." He pulled a very non-regulation knife out of the side of his chair and pried open a panel.

Stonn resumed pulled Sestre from the room. Julian was there waiting. The holographic systems in Engineering must also be down. Not Stonn's priority at the moment.

There was no time to wait for Julian's diagnosis. Stonn looked at readouts from across the ship. Systems were compromised all over the ship. Shields at forty percent and lowering with successive rounds of fire from the Reliant.

He commed up to the Bridge. "Bridge, if you have access to the Reliant's command codes, I can get you phasers."

He didn't say he'd have to go up thirteen ladders in Jeffries tubes. There was a boom as the radiation shield came down. Kuvalaas sailed out of the room with his chair on full speed, almost bouncing off the far wall.

Stonn said, "I need to borrow your knife."

"For what? The battle is not yet lost," said Kuvalaas.

"I wish to attach the antigrav unit from my chair to my back and fly around the Jeffries tubes rerouting power." He arched an eyebrow. "Do you wish to accompany me?"

A wide crooked toothed smile spread across Kuvalaas face. "It would be my honor."

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

They materialized in a massive chamber with rough cut out walls that were covered in verdant greenery and riots of flowers. Orchids, he recognized. But there were lots of other kinds. Butterflies as large as a person's head floated from massive flower to flower. Pigeon sized dragonflies zoomed through the air. Also, a good deal of grass.

John breathed in. It smelled fantastic. Lush. Humid. Floral fighting with a hint of decay that made the receptors in his nose sit up and want to roll around in the clover. The thought of that was strangely appealing.

Not strange in that the love of his life walked closely beside him down a narrow path in paradise, and they had just made two little lives together. Even if they had spent the morning examining corpses, John's hormones had to be firing on all cylinders.

They walked along the stream until they came to a lacy white waterfall thick with dragonflies.

A short petite silver blond woman, Doctor Marcus presumably, was sitting at the foot of it, blood dripping from her left nostril and ears. She said in a too loud way that indicated something was wrong with her hearing, "I really wish you hadn't come."

A phaser went off, but the blast went wide.

"I'm sorry, sir," said Hunter, tears streaming down her face. She held a type two phaser in a trembling hand. "I don't want to shoot you, or them, but he's making me. He put a piece of himself into me and," she hissed rubbing one hand against the side of her head.

Captain Thomas of the Reliant came out of the foliage on top of the cliff over the waterfall. He was holding a phaser. He looked a good deal worse off than his picture in Starfleet records.

Hudson's voice came over their coms. Slightly staticy, but clear enough. "Sir, we're being fired on. It's the Reliant. We've taken heavy damage."

"To be or not to be," said Sherlock.

"That is the question," replied Hudson, as she cut the connection.

"Oh, they're abandoning you. How sad. I'd never do that." Something that looked like some sort of monster from an old movie rose out of the water. Moriarty by his voice. "You're too much fun to play with."

"You don't look well," said John. It was true. The shapeshifter's features looked like a wax statue left out in the sun for a week. The right half of his head was almost caved in. His mouth was sliding sideways on his face.

Moriarty said, "Oh, this. My little gift from the Federation. Take away my ability to hold a solid shape. Offer to toss me a cure if I'm willing to bow to the solids." Moriarty oozed forward. "The others might, but I never will. This is my quadrant and I like it here. It did come with a few upsides. I can make Hunter point her phaser like a good solid cow."

Hunter screamed. The arm holding the phaser jerked up several inches. She said through gritted teeth. "Can't hear thoughts."

"As if I'd want to hear something to boring," said Moriarty, swaying. Not entirely stable.

"What have you done to them?" John moved away from Sherlock. Mostly to try and draw Moriarty's attention away from whatever it was Sherlock was going to do.

"Taken control of the scenario," said Moriarty swaying back and forth. His surface shifting and dripping down into the water. "I'm not even sure if I want to be put back together again. Now that I've stabilized."

Hunter lifted the phaser higher.

"As to what I want. Sherlock, I want the destruction of everything you care about. Your heart burnt and bleeding on the floor."

"You can control their actions, but…" Sherlock stepped closer to the water's edge, "you don't know what they know. Can only make them carry out direct commands."

"Oh, that doesn't matter. I know what buttons to push, push, push,," said Moriarty, his neck elongating to bring his head closer to Sherlock,

Marcus said, "Please, no. I've told you, the Genesis energy is unstable. We haven't perfected it yet." She hesitantly touched the grass. Her hand grazing the tops of the blades. "Please, it's meant to bring life, not death."

"If you didn't want me to have it, then you shouldn't have invented it. But that is the Human way," said Moriarty. His arm extended into a long tentacle, slapping Marcus. The woman went flying back to land in a heap on the far side of the clearing. "Oopsie."

John said, "Moriarty, we can't give you access to the device."

Moriarty groaned. "Sherlock, what do you see in him? He's so very, very, very slow."

"John, he's already has the device." Sherlock looked around them. Johanna Marcus is here, but David is not. Where did he go. The grotto is lush, but not overly big."

"You're standing in him," giggled Moriarty. "And next to him. He makes better flora than a scientist anyway. But it just wasn't the same without you. Did you find the bodies I left you? A nice present I think. Sherlock, stand still while I kill your husband slowly. Painfully. While you watch. And by me, I mean I'll have my little puppets do it."

Hunter fired. Not even a full stun. John's left leg crumpled underneath him. He fell to his knees, thinking. He could shoot maybe Hunter or Thomas. But even with both John and Sherlock firing, they wouldn't be able to get to all three.

Thomas fired this time. John screamed, pain ripping through his lower body. He instinctively wrapped his arms around his abdomen. Trying to protect the tiny lives just getting their start.

Moriarty said, "Now don't tell me you didn’t enjoy that pets. I can feel the chemicals pump, pump, pumping. How about you fire again. Now don't look away Sherlock. I don't want you to miss this."

Thomas raised his phaser a little higher. John curled tighter. As if that could stop anything.

Thomas screamed as Hunter shot him on the maximum setting. He fell to ash, while Hunter fell to her knees clawing at her ears. John stunned her. She toppled to the ground. Something gray-green and slimy slithered out of her right ear. John switched the setting on his phaser and fired at the thing, which sizzled and melted into the greenery.

Sherlock fired his own weapon, but Moriarty slithered rapidly away up the path.

John crawled to Hunter and checked her vitals. She was in stable condition. Without a biobed, there was no way to tell what that thing had done to her.

Doctor Marcus groaned. John made his legs work enough to get to where she was. Checked her life signs. He told her, "You have a mild concussion. You should stay still and…"

"I can't. I need to purge my data." Her hand hovered over the grass. Tears trembling in her lashes. "I gave Moriarty the prototype and the scale device, but none of the controls to fire them remotely. No details on how to program the patterns for what it creates. I have to delete all our data before he realizes and comes back." She pushed herself to her feet and made her way back up the path they'd just come down.

John would have followed after her, but his legs weren't really up to sprinting just yet. John massaged his left leg.

Sherlock said, "Even without a remote trigger, the Genesis device is too dangerous to leave in Moriarty's hands."

"True," John wasn't going to dwell on the things he'd seen during the Dominion war. Some of the images that had come out after Betazed had been freed from the Dominion, as they'd tried to keep a telepathic race suppressed and under control. The Dominion had always been more than willing to demonstrate a show of force. He'd hoped that they'd seen the last of them with the end of the war. No such luck.

Sherlock laughed suddenly.

"What?" John wasn't sure what was so funny.

Sherlock gestured to the lush environment they were in. "We're in an environment where scientists work to create a device that creates life from lifelessness." He knelt next to John. "What normally happens to us in these scenarios?"

John got it immediately and even under the circumstances had to chuckle. "I go into heat and we spend the next three days doing nothing but trying to create new life." He put his hand over his flat stomach. "Thank you babies for saving us."

"Indeed." Sherlock looked around them. "The Bakerstreet will not be gone quite that long."

John briefly, very briefly, wished they could indulge in pretending, but with the feeling coming back, he had Sherlock help him stand up. Sherlock carried Hunter as they made their way out of this little bit of paradise.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Martha began the command sequence.

M'Press said, "But they must be blocked." Glared at the readouts. "They would be fools to leave them."

"Not if they don't realize they exist," said Martha, entering the last string of values. She made way for Winters to enter her own part of the string.

Then the moment of truth, as she clicked the last command - necessarily manual to prevent accidents - and the Reliant's shields went down just as they were supposed to.

"Fire!"

The lights dimmed to auxiliary as the Bakerstreet fired all phasers at the Reliant, raking her right nacelle, which broke off. The Bakerstreet might not look like much, but she could pack a punch when she wished.

"Now, let's go pick up our crew," said Martha.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Donovan reported that something had beamed out. Most likely Moriarty. "But who can tell with him."

Sherlock was not inclined to remain to try and find out. They helped Marcus clear the databases by firing a phaser at them.  Sherlock asked, "Is there a way to counter the device?"

Johanna's expression was wry. Tired. "I can tell your navigator how far to get if Moriarty sets it off."

That might be enough. The Bakerstreet contacted them, and they beamed up to the ship. John immediately set off for Sickbay after a quick kiss to Sherlock's cheek. No words. None needed. A kiss.

Once on the bridge, Hudson gave Sherlock the damage report, which was considerable.

Warp was offline. They had impulse. Shields were at thirty percent. Engineering was doing what they could, but repairs would take weeks.

The Reliant was not going to leave them weeks, but at least Moriarty couldn't head for Earth without warp drive.

They received a hail from Moriarty. "Never trust little pieces to do a grown up's job. Without Daddy around, they let you break my widdle ship."

"Moriarty, you failed," said Sherlock. "You have a single ship and you are literally coming apart. You don't have the remote trigger. No patterns. The Genesis device is just a bomb. A powerful one, but that's all it is. You have those. Give up. We can send you home to be cured."

A photon torpedo sped by the Bakerstreet's port side. A miss only because Moriarty had fired without taking time to get a direct lock.

Winters said, "Sir, there's a leak developing in the impulse coolant systems. If we take a hit, the entire system could blow."

Sherlock called up a scan of the nearby systems. "Chart a course for the
Mutara Nebula."

"But sir," said Winters, "The static charge in the nebula will neutralize our shields and compromise our targeting systems."

"The Reliant has shields. Ours are intermittent at best," said Sherlock, which really should have gone without saying, but as was so often the case he was forced to state the obvious.

The Bakerstreet entered the Nebula with the Reliant close behind.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

There were micro abrasions in Violet's cerebral cortex. Compression damage as if she'd had a tumor recently beamed out.

Not beamed.

John had described the creature, piece of Moriarty, and left Julian to do what he could for Violet.

Hands steady, because his hands could never not be steady, he applied tissue regeneration stimulators. Applied a sedative, because the pain would be intense if she were conscious.

Applied a kiss to sleeping lips.

At times, the best cure was rest. With John there to monitor other patients, he sat next to her bed and looked up the last book she'd been reading. "I'm sorry if any of this is a repeat." Read to her about, of all things, the rise and fall of the Khans.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Every maneuver Sherlock tried, Moriarty countered.

The Bakerstreet had sustained considerable damage. The Reliant came closer and closer with reports of systems failing across the ship. With both of them on impulse, it was simply a matter of the Reliant waiting until one too many systems failed.

Owen reported, "Sir,
the engine room is flooded with radiation. Much more of this and we'll lose impulse as well."

Stonn said, "We lost air pressure in the left nacelle."

Winters said, "Captain, if they get any closer, they won't need targeting systems."

"We need to fuck with him," said Donovan.

"We've been trying that," said Hudson.

"No," said Sherlock. "Not really. It must require some form of concentration to control the crew. But he lost control of Hunter when he met up with the two of us. Is if we, I," he steepled his fingers, "fuck with him, maybe one of the crew can do what Hunter did."

Which left the question of how exactly to fuck with Moriarity.

First Father's portrait said, "Pride."

Mummy's portrait whispered, "No. Loneliness. It's why he keeps targeting you."

Sherlock opened a channel. "I think I've figured out why you didn't go back. The Gamma quadrant doesn't want you."

"I chose to stay!" was the immediate response from Moriarty.

"Sure you did," said Sherlock elongating his syllables. "Unstable. Chaotic. They probably put the idea in your head a long time ago to stay away. When was the last time you joined in the Great Link with any of them." A shot in the dark and closer to conjecture than he liked.

"I don't need them. I'll create a new Great Link here. I'll rule this quadrant! When everyone is like me. That little cow thought she accomplished anything by withholding templates for her new life. I don't need her."

The Genesis device was not something Sherlock cared to remind Moriarty about. "Who could blame them, I remember how you were on this ship. Always following me around," Sherlock glanced back at Donovan and Hudson to let them know he was running out of things to say. "Interjecting yourself into my conversations. Activities."

"We used to joke about what a fucking hardon you had for the captain," said Donovan. Winters mouthed, "Really?" and got a noncommittal shrug from Donovan. "Which was pretty pathetic if you ask me, because anyone who had eyes could see he had it bad for Watson."

"That pathetic nothing!" said Moriarty. "What do you see in him?"

"Donovan, I don't say this often, but you're right," said Sherlock considering the events of the past few years. "When everyone thought he'd left the ship, Moriarty even hid out in my sex fantasy with John. Watching us. Moriarty, when whatshisface swapped bodies with me, did you indulge yourself in little kink? You're so pathetic as to play with someone wearing my face."

The monitor lit up showing failing systems all over the Reliant. Most importantly, impulse power had gone offline.

"Full broadside," said Sherlock. The Bakerstreet launched a full load of photon torpedos at the Reliant. Normally, the ship would have maneuvered away, but it simply sat there as torpedo after torpedo slammed into the hull. Much of that ship going dark either through damage from the torpedos or whatever the crew were able to do while Moriarty was distracted.

Sherlock said, "Moriarty, you're through. Give back the Genesis device. You can be cured."

"Boring! When did you get so boring! As if this was ever about staying alive. When I win, I win!" Moriarty's voice was higher pitched than normal. "But when I lose, I also win! You'll see."

"I'm reading a Genesis energy signature from the Reliant," said Hudson. "At this distance, it'll kill us all if it goes off."

"I still don't have warp and impulse won't get us far enough away from the projected blast radius," said Winters, fingers flying over her controls.

The engine room was flooded with radiation. Stonn and that Klingon he brought with him were deeply embedded in the Jeffries tubes. Owen was busy keeping impulse going. Sherlock could see the layout of Engineering. See what needed to be done next. The kind dexterity he'd need to do it. How quickly.

Sherlock was already in the lift. His mind racing through what he needed to do.

He ran through his ship.

The place where he'd married John.

The place where they'd finally decided to have children.

The place where he'd had the best years of his life.

Without hesitation, he suited up, overrode the radiation seal on the shield door and went in to manually initiate the warp drive.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

John felt the hum as the warp drives came online. Hudson's voice came over the coms, "All stations, brace for Warp 10." John strapped himself to his crash chair, while Julian secured their patients. Held Violet's hand.

There was a shift in air temperature as the Bakerstreet's engine were engaged. Lights dimming as the Bakerstreet went to maximum warp. Julian flickering, before switching to auxiliary power.

John was pushed back into his chair and then a moment later was weightless as the gravity systems briefly failed. Every unfastened object in Sickbay floated into the air. Crashed to the ground as gravity came back online.

Hudson called the all clear and John unfastened himself.

Stonn called over the com. "John, we need you to come down to Engineering immediately."

John grabbed his medkit, barely processing that Stonn had used his given name.

He stopped cold as he came to the closed radiation shield doors. The transparent aluminum was clear.

So clear.

On the other side, Sherlock, his face covered in radiation burns staggered towards the shield. Wounds were opening and closing before John's eyes, as Sherlock's body struggled to stay ahead of the radiation damage.

"We've got to get to Sherlock." John looked at Stonn. "Open the fucking door."

"We can't. The captain opened the antimatter chamber to get the engine restarted. If we open it now, it'll flood the whole ship. The only way to clear it is to vent the room and if we do that, he'll die in vacuum."

"He's dying right now." John looked around him. "Julian can go in there. Do something. Help him."

"I'm afraid the holo-emitters were badly damaged in the initial attack," said Stonn.

"John," said Sherlock. His voice low and rough. He coughed. Blood brilliant on his lips. A shock on his pale skin. He pulled off the heavy padded glove on his right hand and placed his bare and bleeding fingers on the transparent aluminum.

John placed his on the other side in a simulacrum of touch. A parody. "Don't go." He firmed his voice. "You're not allowed to go. I don't give you permission to leave like this."

"John, any warmth I've ever shown, was because of you." Sherlock's smile was soft. Warm. Loving, as blood dripped from his nose. The edges of his eyes. His right eye was cloudy. "I'm a ridiculous man." He paused to cough yet more blood. "Human because of you. My fixed point in a changing galaxy."

Sherlock was listing to the right. His hand sliding down the glass. John's hand followed its path. John felt the tears sliding down his cheeks. The mucus dripping over his lips. He didn't move his hand to push them away. He didn't want to stop touching the barrier keeping him away from Sherlock. "No. One more thing. One more miracle, Sherlock, for me. Don't die. Do that for me. Just stop dying. Stop right now."

"Doctor!" Hands pulled at him. Pulling him away from Sherlock, whose eyes were a cloudy green, like a Genesis cave in this light. Stuck wide open. Staring blankly without the intelligence that had always illuminated them.

He begged them to tell him that the engine restart had tossed them back in time. That they could change the future. The wrong future.

Then he was silent.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Martha watched numbly as the nebula contracted. Reformed. Into a bright white sun with a single planet circling it. As oceans formed. Atmosphere and clouds.

Johnana watched with her. "I wish dad could have been here to see this." Looked away. "Course it won't last."

Matha pushed at the tears so she could keep looking at the view. "What do you mean?" She had a sense. Thoughts were leaking from the Human. Grief. Despair.

"Matter created by the Genesis device is inherently unstable. I don't know if it'll mean anything to you, but I used protomatter. It… what we create falls apart. Everything falls apart. I… maybe if I study it we can figure out how to… I don't know."

Martha decided that was it. No more loss. No more.

When the Bakerstreet went to dry dock, so would she. She'd go home to Betazed and be part of rebuilding, or perhaps remain on Earth and simply be.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

John didn't speak at the funeral. He didn't have the words to speak. His throat was raw. They loaded Sherlock's body into an empty photon torpedo to launch into the world that was coalescing around where Moriarty had set off the Genesis device.

Sherlock would have liked that.

No, he'd have liked to have lived. He'd have liked to have pulled off one more adventure and had the last word. But, at least John could give him a world. Something real and alive.

Someone played a recording of Ashokan's Farewell on the violin as they launched the missile. John watched as it made a wide arc over a brand new sky until it disappeared from view.

He spent the rest of the day crying. A day curled in pain in their bed. His bed. He took weary steps to Sickbay. Holding up a hand to hold off Julian. He didn't want to talk. He mechanically did the scan. Two tiny cluster of cells still clung to the wall of his womb. Dividing. Growing. Like the new world below. He took the utero transporter down from the shelf. Held it against himself. Cold. It was cold.

Everything was cold. He wasn't sure he could do this by himself. Could hear Sherlock telling him not to be an idiot almost as if he were standing there. He actually turned, but there was no one. Just Julian talking to Violet, who was still unconscious.

John put it away and went back to his quarters.

Then next day, he asked Hudson, in a voice almost a whisper, if he could borrow a shuttle to take the news to the Breen home world. There was still the big decanting thing.

There would be some Breen on the Breen home world. At the very least, he might make it in time for the Meiosis. Make a fuckton of cake.

"Nonsense, dear, we'll take you ourselves."

"But, you have orders to head to Earth…" Someone had told him that. Someone.

All grey.

Probably telling him they'd be picking up a new captain. But no… this was it for the ship. Everything was going away.

"Dear," Hudson looked around the bridge. Patted her hand on the Command Couch, so he could take his usual spot next to her. "I think we can take our girl for a spin before she goes."

"Thank you," he whispered. He rested his hand on the command sofa for long moments before he couldn't any more.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The photon torpedo shot through the air. A good deal slower than it by all rights should have done. Black Butterflies slowing its trajectory. The rain of black diamonds a soft patter on the exterior of the torpedo.

The new soil welcomed it as it landed less like a torpedo than like a feather. A leaf ready to rest at last on the soil beneath trees grown a hundred years in minutes. Springing from the diamond seeds.

Trelane couldn't help himself. He just couldn't. The planet crackling with so much energy. So much potential. Unstable. Out of control. It just needed a little direction.

He leaned forward, puffed his lips and blew one little puff.

"Q! What do you think you're doing?" said his Mother.

"Helping my friend," said Trelane helplessly. All the power in the universe.

Helpless.

Help.

"Q, we're very disappointed," said Father. "Come back to the Continuum this instant where we will discuss your behavior. What have we told you about the fabric of reality?"

Trelane sighed. Glanced back once.

Smiled.

He loved this next part.