Archive of Our Own

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

Admiral West, Race: Human, Beta, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: Admiral , Speciality: , Description: Arthur West's paternal uncle.

Arthur Cadogan West III, Race: Human, Beta, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: Ambasador, Speciality: , Description: Unpleasant and disagreeable with a taste for fine handmade things. Not really in the right profession.

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

Chin Singh, Race: Human, Augment, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Alpha, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Pretended to Soo-lin Yao onboard the Bakerstreet for reasons. Has a pleasant Alpha scent. Works for the 23rd Alignment of the Breen.

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

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

Garak, Race: Cardasian, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: , Speciality: Tailor maybe, Description: Has a tailor's shop on DS9 and a mysterious past he lies about...constantly.

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

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.

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.

Lwaxana Troi, Race: Betazed, Sex&Gender: She/Her, Title: Ambassador, Daughter of the Fifth House, Holder of the Sacred Chalice of Rixx, Heir to the Holy Rings of Betazed", Speciality: , Description:

M'Press, Race: Caitan, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: , Speciality: Security, Description:

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.

Mr. Brown, Race: Human, Beta, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: Administrator, Speciality: , Description: Administrator of errr... the Baskerville research facility. Yes, I named 2 things Baskerville.

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.

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.

Trelane, Race: Q, Sex&Gender: He/Him, Title: , Speciality: , Description: Member of the Q continum. Omniscient and Omnipotent. A romantic.

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 -----

Under the circumstances, Brittanus ignored the protocols. Chain of command being an abstract concept with the Breen anyway.

"What does chain of command do, slugs?" shouted God in his crisp uniform.

"Rule our lives, sir!" shouted the other Augments in their olive green clothing.The cloudy tors above Baskerville mocked that answer. Particularly when the rain needled down equally.

Turn a corner. Their memory palace was full of corners.

Picked up a beaker. "Mummy, I need it for an experiment!"

"You must learn to wait." Wanting to say yes.

Picked up a syringe. "Mummy, I-Chaya's hurting."

"It will be painless." It would. They had calculated the dose.

Picked up a brain scan. Sherlock was raging. Would be smashing objects, but light couldn't be smashed. Walls would only give way to his fists. "Why? Everyone else comes and goes."

"Because you cannot control yourself." Brittanus had tried everything. Polymeric energy. Neurotransmitter enhancing treatments. Entire families of drugs intended to modulate mood. Their own blood. The dark area in Sherlock's brain remained. Behavior shifting wildly between moods. "Your behavior puts yourself and others in danger." A thousand scenarios and Brittanus could seen none in which Sherlock would survive a trip to the past for more than a month. Certainly not if he must go through the portal unprepared for time dilation.

They restrained him.

Again.

Began again.

Turn to a tangled sheet.

"Hello, Mummy," Sherlock was wrapped in a sheet. The stench of what he had been about could not have made clearer what had just occurred. "I won't let me you keep me a prisoner again."

Pick up the tube of lipstick.

"You aren't a prisoner," said Ms. Juteland gently. She always spoke gently. Softly delicately. When teaching R92349 how to dress appealingly. Smile. Listen. Endure. "You could be a valued asset if you applied yourself."

Mycroft said, "I don't think this level is helping. Don't you think you should go higher."

The Breen homeworld filled the ship's monitor. Ice caps expanding to the equator. What could be seen of the land mass through the ever present storm clouds. Like radioactive pale hands enfolding the globe.

Veris, or rather the holographic simulation of someone who Brittanus had never met in life, said, "You're not going to abandon our people here are you?" His face was covered in red lesions. If he were alive, he'd be in the last stage of the plague that had killed most of his species.

Slowly. Over centuries. Generations.

Doctor Saxon said, "I'm going to peel back the dermal layer on your right arm. Four inches this time. As well as a layer of subcutaneous fat. Stop crying. That won't help at all. I'm only doing what I have to do. To see how well you can heal for me."

Turn.

William - because he'd been William then - crying as they plucked gravel out of his knees. Wanting to stop, but the flesh would close and the process of pushing it out would be be more painful.

Victor nattering that they loved William and would never want to tattle on him, but it was William's idea to use the hover boards Father Meiying - certainly the last gift like that to be allowed - had given them and Victor had known the physics of the downward slope was too steep, but William had insisted.

As if Brittanus could focus on anything except the removal of foreign objects. On the tears each plucked stone drew. "Stop crying. That won't help at all. I'm only doing what I have to do."

William buried his face in the children's' pet sehlat's neck. "It was Victor's idea."

"Liar."

Turn.

Ms. Juteland, pressed and clean her mauve silk suit, said, "The secret to a lie is to believe it. Again, R92349." She turned up the dial. Pain sparking along the electrodes R92349 failed again at the lie. Ms. Juteland never believed R92349 when she said, "I love you."

"Abandon, no." Brittanus disliked imprecision and lies.

They triggered the device that would interfere with the shield over the only habitable part of the planet.

As was reasonable, in response to signs of that the shield was failing, life signs disappeared from the planet. Transported by the long range transporters the Breen had created long before the Federation existed. Energy signatures too. The Breen had plans upon plans to protect the inhabitants of the facility.

Brittanus spared a moment to wonder why everyone wasn't reasonable. When everyone had evacuated, Brittanus staged their own variation of the Genesis device. When it was calibrated to their satisfaction, they fired. Waited to see the results.

If there had been more time, they would have done more extensive tests, but time was somewhat at a premium.

But still, they had tested in a cave of a moon of Ferenginar.

They'd already removed the holographic generators. Those would have a different purpose now.

The same and yet different.

A wave of green spread across the planet's surface. Sparkling oceans emerged from beneath receding clouds. Surrounding the energy shield the Breen had created. Washing green around it, while inside storm clouds still raged. An area that large had its own weather. Finally giving way with a final yellow crackle. Until green mountains spread like a girdle across the northern continent. Across the equator.

The template for the new world had been much like the old world. But the caves full of paintings would now be empty.

The ruins of civilizations were gone. The marker for their son's death gone as well. Mshindi Victorious' atoms were part of a new world.

Who had been the liar?

Mycroft said, "It would be hubris to think you'll ever know."

Ms. Juteland said, "You've never lacked that."

All the buildings eradicated as if they had never been. Including the long range transporter.

Their people, their many times grandchildren, would simply have to fly to their old home world to find out what had happened.

The temple was gone. The time travel device where Brittanus had waited so many hours - fretted over for so many years - was destroyed.

Looking through the monitor of their drones at the greasy wreckage of Baskerville.

The Breen had over three hundred years to work out how thousand year old technology worked to rebuild their time machine. They had the original designs. Brittanus had to presume they would figure it out.

Or not.

Brittanus was done with grand plots. All that were left were simple ones.

Veris said, "Where will we be landing? Where is our new home?"

Brittanus unbent enough to point to the Northern of the two massive continents. "That continent is full of poisonous and dangerous creatures." All to the original designs of what had lived there. They pointed to the southern continent. "Nothing there is lethal."

"And which continent are you taking us too?" asked Veris.

Brittanus smiled. Their children could handle the north. Set the coordinates to land the Botany Bay IV on the southern continent.

The first three ships of that name, of a vastly more primitive design, had been in a museum that they'd just destroyed.

Brittanus had never liked museums. Places of stolen things.

They liked the wild places.

Yet they'd spent so much of their life in doors. Perhaps that was why they had been so whimsical with the creatures that populated the southern continent. Non lethal, but whimsical.

They'd taken the doodles from the margins of years of planning. For weapons. For war. Conquest. Empire. Borders. Walls. Perimeter defenses. Segmentation. Safety.

All to the idea that eventually, if they were strong enough... Powerful enough... Controlled enough they would be safe.

Alone.

That that they were.

The Auberj children gathered around Veris and the other holograms of parents long dead. Brittanus did not point out fauna that would mean nothing to persons not from Earth. It would be illogical to do so.

Cats with hummingbird beaks and wings of eagles. Chickens with the heads of serpents. Insects that were also tiny horses. Small goat like creatures with a single mica infused horn. Bioluminescence in their fur and hooves.

Brittanus' heraldic symbol had been a red dragon perched upon the corpse of a white dragon.

Unicorns were the enemies of dragons red or white.

Brittanus turned on the machines that would build the initial settlement. Setup the holographic systems within compound, but didn't set foot on what they'd created.

Brittanus knew themself for a dragon.

They were almost done when Chin contacted them.

"Mother. Mummy. John contacted me. Sherlock is dead. Moriarty killed him."

Chin, small, fragile seeming, straining against her restraints. "I'll kill Yellow beard. He took my heart. I'll take his. Kill her. Kill the Ice Queen. Kill them both!" The injuries to her body had healed. If not the ones Euros had made to her mind.

Brittanus leaned over her, "William is dead! Euros can never hurt you again." Chin's hand was warm, when by all rights it should have been cold.

Brittanus had always been cold when restrained.

"It's a loss," said Doctor Anghel. "We couldn't save it. Bag it and tag it. Too bad. Six months lost for nothing." R92349 strained against their restraints as the doctor's took the red lump away for analysis.

Turn.

Moriarty laughing. "I know you told me to stay away from our Sherlock, but I just couldn't resist, and look, no harm, no fowl."

Foul.

Hubris.

Brittanus blinked. "And Moriarty."

"Dead as well. He blew up some sort of massive bomb and it… John wasn't making a lot of sense." Chin said, "He'll be coming to the Breen Homeworld for the Meiosis. His mother's here, too. We'll all be there. John wishes to speak with you."

God said, "If wishes were horses, beggars would ride."

God liked to ramble with his men when he had a whiskey or three.

They went higher.

Sherlock glaring in concentration in the microscope they had given him. Sherlock's wide smile. "Mummy, I see it. I see the cells dividing." His curling hair over his small forehead.

His still body. So still in their arms in that horrible cave.

Holding Sherlock's blood and vomit streaked body at the foot the Atavachron.

"Mother! Did you hear me."

"I won't be there," said Brittanus. They cut the connection. Chin would learn soon enough what Brittanus had done.

There was no need to go. No Moriarty to draw out.

Every need.

"Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing," said Brittanus.

"What was that?" asked Veris.

Brittanus transitioned the hologram to its new memory banks and had machines direct the Auberj children off the ship, before mechanically going to set the autopilot for the next destination.

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

"No world has ever been so battered. So bruised." Base hyperbole. Beneath him. Therefore earning him neither a kiss, nor a chuckle from Mycroft.

But then Elim had a room with a view of Lakarian City, or what remained of that city once the Dominion had finished razing it in return for an act of rebellion that only bred further rebellion. The wind smelled of ashes and what he preferred to classify as regret.

He was living in a prefabricated structure that Mycroft had provided upon a slight rise on a hill. Solar cells. Mass replicators that worked when the sun was up and the day was fair, which was not often, but then Cardassia's sun had never given up warmth or love easily. All the more worth the effort.

Each day, allocating supplies to those those who gathered there to rebuild what they could from the ashes. A far cry from his tailor's shop.

Although, a refugee had insisted on trading him a simply atrocious brown and green rug in exchange for a sack of rice and beans. He was fairly certain there was a folk tale in that.

Elim said, "I'm only using you for your resources. I'm a kept Cardassian. Maintained in splendid style by… what is your title by the way. Please, be as elaborate as you wish. Prince. Duke. First. Commander. Khan."

Which only earned a wince. The opposite of what Elim had been intending.

Mycroft's com chirped. A necessity given his position. Whatever that was. He went to take it in private, which by necessity meant the necessity, as there was only the two rooms.

Mycroft returned sat down heavily on one of the two chairs. The ugly rug beneath his bare feet. Hair askew.

"Let me guess," said Elim. "A tragic communication can only mean that your mother is visiting." He rather hoped so.

"Sherlock is dead." Mycroft looked up. Hollowed. Elim had no brothers. Well, the fellow killers in training at the little school he'd been sent to, but they hardly counted. He waited. Mycroft shook his head. "Moriarty killed him. I… I'll need to… Sherlock was planning on coming to the Meiosis, completely frowned on, but… now I should…" He ran a hand across his eyes. "It's like a string being cut. I worried so long, and now he's gone."

Elim fell back on his strong suit. Piffle. "Do you wish me to go with you? I mean, it's a bit much to be asked to leave this luxurious splendor, but I suppose if someone steals my little palace, my prince can always replicate me another one."

Mycroft looked at him. Hollow as a pitted nut. Said slowly, "No, you can't. They don't allow it. No. I should go."

"In the morning, after your kept Cardassian has completed relating all the splendid and fascinating events of his day." He kept up a steady rain of piffle for the next hour or so. Opened some of his hidden stash of Saurian brandy and piffled on.

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

Admiral Henry rambled on like a fool. "Captain Holmes was a war hero. He died preventing a Changeling from obtaining the Genesis device." He sighed tapped his fingers on his desk. "A great loss."

But Edward saw Admiral West's frown.

Edward had been the one to ensure that an old friend of Admiral West's nephew, the one who'd died on Captain Holmes' watch, ran into Admiral West. Nothing to obvious. Just a little reminiscence. Enough to remind him that Augments couldn't be trusted.

West said, "Of course his husband claims he died in a battle with a Changeling. But everyone knows that the crew of the Bakerstreet were insanely loyal to Holmes."

"But," said Edward. Still addressing Henry, but wanting West to hear what he had to say. "Isn't it more likely that Captain Holmes and the Breen staged the incident to gain access to the Genesis device."

"The Breen," said Admiral Henry cooly, "have other problems."

"Sirs," Edward leaned forward, certain of his truth. "I have reason to think the Breen placed Captain Holmes in Starfleet. A plant. All to get access to our intel. After all, isn't his brother a known Breen operative."

Henry looked unimpressed, but West looked thoughtful.

"I have reason to think he wasn't just an Augment, but that he is the son of Khan Brittanus. We can't trust any of them." He saw immediately he'd gone one step too far.

"Them," said Henry cooly. "I'll remind you that your previous decisions resulted in a considerable amount of egg on Starfleet's face. A considerable amount."

Edward forced himself to remain calm. Forced himself to consider the long game.

"I mean the Breen, of course. It was so difficult to escape. To get back here."

Henry's expression softened. "Captain, you've been through a tremendous ordeal, but the war is over. Looks like the Breen are beginning to see reason. Certainly, they agreed to restart negotiations. Said they had something to significant to say. Even offered to come our turf in San Francisco."

Edward did not scream, "You are an idiot." He did not yell that the war would never be over. He did not ask the Admiral to let him be there. To confront the Breen about what they'd done to him.

He said, "Thank you for seeing me, sirs."

He walked slowly. Until West caught up to him.

West asked, "Do you really think Holmes was a plant?"

Edward firmed his lips, determined to do his best for Humanity. For the Federation. "Admiral, I'm not even certain that he's dead. Whatever is going on, I know we can't trust the Breen or...." he gripped the head of his cane, "anyone associated with the Khans."

West frowned. "You may be right. Something's got the Augments all stirred up."

"Well, there you have it," said Edward. Leaning on his walking stick. Visibly battered by what the Khans had done to him. "Just. When we do bring in the Khans, I just want a chance to confront them for what they've done. I want to be of use."

"You've already given enough," said West, but Edward could tell he would say yes. Which really was all Edward needed.

If he could be there, look in Brittanus' face as he realized that the Genesis device was going off. That they had lost. That the Breen and the Augments would be blamed. That Edward Killander was the one to bring him down, it would enough.

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

He blinked awake. He wasn't sure who he was. He wasn't sure where he was. It was dark. He swept curious fingers over the smooth surface over him. Something hissed. The surface opened.

Bright. It was bright outside where he was. Green. Blue. Beautiful. He breathed in and smiled at the array of scents. All the sounds.

So much new.

He climbed down from the dark place. Dangling because his short legs couldn't reach the ground. He dropped onto soft grass. He giggled blinking at the sky.

"Hello, little brother," said a pretty voice. "I came as soon as I felt it. You're so little." He tilted his head at the pretty person with one blue eye and one brown. She said, "Do you want to play? I'm older now, but I think it's okay to play when you're older."

He didn't understand, but they looked soft. Nice.

"I have something of yours." Her hand twisted to cup and surround his own. "I caught it like a falling star." She leaned forward. She smelled nice. "But I don’t want to give it back." She laughed and laughed and laughed.

He laughed with her.

It felt good to laugh.

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

John would catch himself sometimes thinking of something that he should tell Sherlock. A joke. A story. Something odd or absurd. Then he'd remember and grow silent.

It was too early for the pregnancy to show. A perfectly normal set of twins, but he talked to the babies. It gave him someone to talk to on the journey.

The Bakerstreet made good time. If there was such a thing as good when Sherlock was gone.

As they got closer to the Breen homeworld, they were passed by a stream of Breen ships, each of them bearing varied markings. All of them heading in the same direction.

One of them hailed the Bakerstreet. A Breen with blue piping on their armor appeared on the screen and warbled at them. A computerized voice said, "We were sorry to hear of the great loss. Would you like to see? It's a complete breach of protocol, but perhaps that has no hold in this case."

"See? See what?" John ached. He ached all over.

Another warble. The voice repeated. "Several of the Uterine Replicators finished early. The decanting was last week."

"I… but there was going to be cake." John could hardly think. His head felt like he was thinking through a thick cloud. "Sherlock wanted to be there with cake and… I have rattles. He made designs for rattles."

"I'm not sure what that is, but perhaps, it would be best if we met."

Donovan said, "John, we're not letting you beam over there on your own." She looked him in the eyes. "I know what they are."

Normally John would have just gone. Jumped feet first. He had two little lives he had to think about. He sighed. "How about you come here. I'll give you the coordinates."

"I would prefer the shuttle," replied the Breen.

John felt like a failure. He'd been going to make cake. He could replicate cake, but that wouldn't be the same. He replicated the rattles. All the rattles. A giant sack of them.

He had no idea which ones he'd be meeting.

They waited for the shuttle to arrive. John stood in the shuttle bay and watched the doors open. There were a dozen Breen crammed inside. None of them were in armor. They were wearing light flowing robes in bright colors.

Donovan and her security team, ever suspicious, had laser rifles pointed at the occupants, but quickly lowered them when they saw what the Breen were carrying.

Infants.

John recognized Veema in front. She held a tiny human wrapped in green. His tiny human. His and Sherlock's.

She smiled at him. "It is good to see you again, if under sad and yet joyous circumstances."

He said, "That's…"

"A lot of babies," said Donovan, who maintained her distance, but M'Press holstered his weapon and waved at the infants. He was seconds away from playing peekabo.

"Yes, this set was very eager to be done. Their nutrient balances were shifting and we had to remove them or there might have been issues." Veema looked down at the baby she was holding. Her face glowing with happiness. "This is… the naming ceremony is not to be until we arrive on Breen. That is when their siblings will be decanted." She shook her head. "For the first time since that first generation, every gestational unit has been filled."

"Uh," said John. "I know there were a fair number of them, but you only had two hundred and two utero machine things? For all of the Been?"

Veema cradled the baby in her arms. The baby had a shock of black hair. They nuzzled at the edge of her robe. "We did have others making the attempt. Yours will not be the only genome decanted this year at the Meiosis. But," she rocked the child, "With only point seventy-five percent success each generation, we were only four generations away from one one Breen left. Mathematically speaking." She cooed down at the infant. "Yes, we were. Yes, we were. But with our success at encouraging division, we were able to increase your genome to point zero zero zero three percent of the Breen population. If as you say, their sexual partners will be freed of the curse, and they engage in sexual intercourse with at least three partners in their lifetime, and obviously we wouldn't want to force our children into… well, you know, then enough of our population should survive to repopulate"

M'Press, who was using one long clawed finger to wave at a baby, said, "If the future of your race depends on the prodigious promiscuity of your offspring, you need have no fear. For if these are the children of Captain Watson, their promiscuous lovemaking will be legendary. My brother M'Kalla left Starfleet and became a wandering bard after but one night of making joyous love with Captain Watson."

Veema raised her eyebrows at M'Press.

One of the Breen said plaintively, "That wasn't covered in the parenting degree."

"We will add ancillary courses on Augment sexuality," said Veema firmly. "First Mother, may we call upon you later to advise us on content. At a minimum we will want to confer with you on the treatment for Juvenile Heat Syndrome. Or for that matter heat. None of us have ever gone into heat. Is it pleasant?"

"Uh… yes," said John, who had gone a bit bright in the face. Not sure he actually wanted his offspring to get up to anything like he had or even hear about it. "Uh, I guess. Yes."

"Thank you. As well as being our First Mother. I cannot express how much joy you and the First Father have brought," said Veema.

"Uh," said John, who came closer. He looked at the bundle in her arms. The baby cooed up at him, blinking wide blue-green-gold eyes.

"I didn't have time before, but I want to assure you every one of them will be loved. Treasured. Will not be given to a creche of less than five to act as foster parents." She smiled back at her group. "You see before you representatives from each of the creches so blessed. More would not fit in the shuttle." A dimple appeared in her cheek. "It would be such an honor if you came with us on our ship to meet the other members of each creche. They would all like to meet you."

"I thought you all, beamed in or out or something to your home world. Not went by ship," said John.

"Something happened to the power units on the Breen homeworld. But we did have backups to transport everyone away. However, it is the place where by tradition the division and blending between Alignments occurs," said Veema.

"Praise be the blending of the haploid," murmured several Breen.

Veema dashed a tear from her cheek. "Sorry, I keep crying." She looked around the room. "It feels so strange to be outside of my armor."

John looked at the blinking infant. His mind flailed at asking just how many point zero zero zero three of the Breen population was. He said, "I need to speak with Brittanus. The other Khans too. Unless, wait aren't you supposed to be in armor? Isn't it a secret that you're you." Everything was a bit foggy, but he knew that the Breen were keeping their nature a secret.

Veema glanced at the security detail. "No. We had a vote. It is past time. Just as it is past time the 23rd joined us fully. They are such a strange alignment. So greedy with their genetics. Imagine, raising your own progeny." She shook her head. "That sort of thing led to the wars that decimated our ability to reproduce at all."

Another one of the Breen said, "Now, Veema. It's not as if we haven't gone to war since."

Veema cooed to the baby in her arms. "We are a waring species, yes, we are. But… no in answer to your question. No. After the Meiosis. We will go to the Federation as we are."

Infants gurgled. John spotted a shock of wispy red blond hair on one. Like his grandfather's in old pictures.

Veema said, "I want to assure you that we've all passed the mandated classes and are fully certified to properly care for and raise your genome."

John was beaten over the head with a sudden thought. "Khan Brittanus passed a parenting class!"

Veema rolled her eyes at him. "The Augmentum Superior, as they like to call themselves, aren't much for classes." She rocked the infant and cooed. "Your grand contributors are very strange beings. Yes, they are. But they belong to us."  She looked up again. "Oh, damn the protocols. Here, hold them." Veema held out the infant.

John took the baby. Cradled the infant in his arms. He could see the shape of Sherlock's eyes. Sherlock's cheeks. His own nose. He had a brief and powerful urge to take all the infants. All of them.

"Will I um… be able to see them?"

Veema looked puzzled. "We encourage relationships with biological parents once repossession anxiety fades. Although, in your case, First Mother, well, she giggled, "You will be quite in demand. Also, any of the Alignments would welcome you for your own person. The words that you spoke to the 13
th
Alignment echoed through all of us."

"Creating the peace that follows in the wars we fight," whispered several Breen.

"Uh…" he stared at her.

"We do not wish to embarrass you, but when I heard of your words," Veema smiled softly at the Breen around her, "I knew that we must put our faith in our ancestors to provide the way. Not to survive through war, but love. You gave us that. You gave us a future."

John spent an hour or so looking at the combinations of himself and Sherlock. Mentioned the rattles. Strangely, or perhaps not, Veema knew every child's genetic signature. There was a bit of a party handing out rattles.

Something not exactly eased, but it helped when at least three began an ear splitting wail, a little bald child vommited on thier Mother. Foster mother. There was a round of nappy changing, which en mass was a little intimidating.

He watched them load up. Watched the Breen ship keeping pace with the Bakerstreet. As it was joined by others.

That was not the only encounter. Not even close to the last. All the Breen kept telling him they were breaking protocol while they were breaking it. Kept breaking it.

Donovan unbent enough to allow for a sort of daycare visiting area in the shuttle bay.

M'Press murmured after the third visiting ship, "Tales of our prowess are not exaggerated. For as I was witness to your prowess in battle, witness to your great love for Captain Holmes that shook even a shuttlepod with its great vigor, I must admit, you are a prodigious Mother as well as fighter and lover."

John didn't really know what to say to that. He focused on a blur of infants. It would seem, quite a lot of his and Sherlock's children had been impatient to get out of their machines.

When they arrived, Breen wasn't at all what he remembered.

"Are we at the right coordinates?" asked John.

Hunter, who'd been cleared for duty, if not officially assigned to their ship, said, "It's where we picked you up last time we were here."

The planet he was looking down on was beautiful. Bright blue and gleaming. Wisps of rainbow clouds over green and gold continents. The lift doors opened and Craig barreled out followed by Owen. "Rainbow Unicorns!" shouted Craig.

"Sorry, sorry," said Owen. "He got away from me and I don't even know how he reached the buttons and," Owen caught Craig as he floated a few centimeters off the ground, "Fine I do know, but, sorry."

Alexis came onto the bridge more sedately, holding Hyperion.

Hyperion pointed at the planet. "Go south!"

"It would seem it's the end of the line for Owen and myself," said Alexis. They kissed Hyperion's cheek. "Are you sure?"

"Sure! Home!" said Hyperion decisively.

"I'm not reading any radiation," said Donovan. "But I am getting some energy readings. There's a small cluster of buildings in the center of the Southern continent, above the mountain range running through the middle."

John blew out a breath. "Time to go make sure the Khans don't do something stupid."

"Too late," said Donovan. He slanted her a look. "Fucking come on. It is."

When John beamed down to the cluster of small white stucco buildings with Owen and Alexis, he caught his breath just a bit at the beauty of the place. The sensors had picked up that there was a wide shallow lake. They hadn't picked up that the shores of the lake were absolutely covered in lupin. Blue and purple and pink and white. Dotted between them, resplendent poppies. Above it all, a towering snow capped mountain range.

Also, unicorns. Delicate little creatures with wide blue eyes and fragile limbs glowing silver in the sunlight. "What the ever living fuck."

Craig giggled. "Doc Watson said a bad word."

"Yes, a word for adults," said Owen looking around. "When I got the vision of sparkle unicorns I honestly wasn't expect actual sparkle unicorns. Are we sure it's not another vacation planet?"

"It's real," said an Auberj boy who John somewhat recognized from his admittedly brief visit to the moon of Ferenginar. "Brittanus said we should have a planet to live on. Not be inside all the time."

The girl next to him said, "And they weren't sure if the moon where we were living was going to be repossessed due to breach of contract."

"Yeah, um… could you take me to meet Brittanus."

"Um," said the girl. "Ummm… come with me."

He was taken into one of the buildings. The white walls were painted with designs he thought he recognized from Auberj, but it had been almost a decade and a lot of worlds since. Mycroft was sitting by a window overlooking the lake. Twirling a walking stick. He looked tired.

Of course.

John said, "You warned us, but… and now Sherlock is…

"Yes," sighed Mycroft looking out at the lake. "From hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at you."

"What?" It sounded almost familiar, but everything was upside down and sideways these days.

"Nothing, a line from a book that Sherlock once sent me and that Khan Noonian likes to quote." Mycroft sighed. "I'd have preferred Paradise Lost." He shook his head. Compressed his lips. "Paradise found."

They sat across from each other in silence. A high pitched bird trilled out a melody from a tree just outside the window. It's plumage made it look like it was on fire.  And possibly also somewhat fish like.

"What happened here?" because John was certain that Breen had not looked like this.

Mycroft tapped the ground with his stick.

Mycroft sighed. "Mummy obtained the plans for the Genesis device and decided the most fitting thing to do with them was to recover the Breen homeworld after determining how to stabilize the energy."

"And were unicorns, phoenix, and... " John waved at the deer bird things, "native to this planet."

"No," said Mycroft. "The northern continent has been populated with the few native species that managed to survive at the equator under the shielding. The Southern for chimera and flights of fancy."

"Huh," said John. Shook his head to try and clear it and go nowhere. He so wanted to turn and tell Sherlock. Show him. Then his brain caught up. "Your Mother has the Genesis device."

"Yes," Mycroft looked around them. "Technically, it's not the only thing they ever worked on that wasn't a weapon, but it's certainly the most spectacular."

"I think there's a scientist back in Federation space that needs to see this," said John.

They sat in silence. The birds trilling. Mycroft broke it saying, "How did my brother die? The report was confused to say the least."

"He died saving us all. Moriarty was about to set off the Genesis device and we weren't going to be able to get out of the blast range in time. Our warp engine was down." John knew he was telling this out of order, but couldn't help himself. Didn't want to organize the events. "Sherlock went into an engine room flooded with radiation to restart the warp core. Had to release anti-matter into the chamber to do it. It was just too much even for him."

Mycroft stared at him. "Is that all! I trust you kept the body refrigerated. There may be still be something we can do."

"Mycroft," John said gently, "he's dead."

"From radiation poisoning." Mycroft waved a hand. "It's possible we can fix that with a simple blood transfusion."

"You can't cure death," said John disbelievingly. Angrily. Ready to punch the wall.

Mycroft stood up. "Bring me the body."

It was the insistence that did it. The absolute surety in Mycroft's gaze.  "I, but, we, buried him in space. Shot him at the new planet being formed when the Genesis device went off. There was a nebula and then there was a brand new system. We," John set helplessly, "buried him."

Mycroft pinched his nose. "Start at the beginning."

John was about to, when his mother swept in and enfolded him in a hug. He gave her an extra squeeze, "Maybe back on the Bakerstreet."

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

There hardly appeared to be a point to the journey.

But Sherlock was not Brittanus' only son.

Not the first person that Brittanus had ever trusted.

They must go on.

God screaming above them, spit like rain, "Stupid fucking cunt! Too much of a fucking little girl to get it the fuck done!"

Doctor Saxon smiling. Always smiling. "I know you know how to attract an enemy's desire." Knuckles dragged over their cheek. "It's what we designed you to do."

In their memory palace, Brittanus went to room 2402. The metal bed in the center with thick leather straps commanded the gaze. The brass buckles dangling down to the white floor.

Brittanus touched the bed and smiled to remember, Mycroft. The first time they had met him. Not the womb bloodied infant. That they themselves were naked, tied down, all irrelevant. The last of many times. They let the words flow over them. As they had been. As they would be. Reassuring as the orange blanket they touched next. A heavy weight over flesh that could withstand prolonged exposure to cold without dying.

"Don't you think you should go to one of the higher levels?" asked Mycroft. "This level will not help you."

It was night when they arrived in Carassian. They did not approach the new Cardassian provisional government.

Soon.

This was a trickier proposition. This was not a largely uninhabited planet caught in a thousand year nuclear winter.

It was a planet that had been heavily, and repeatedly bombed by the Dominion. Jem'Hadar had destroyed large segments.

There were areas with open pit mines. A river that ran orange by rows of abandoned factories. The Cardassians had been no more kind to their own world than to any others.

They ran their matrix. Slowly. Carefully. Prepared to show the quadrant what a weapon - tired and weary - could do.

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

Elim was having an utterly delightful day. The sort of day where the urchins that he paid in food to manage the replicators were surely having a better time with the long lines than he was with endless meetings.

Still, every time the Klingon ambassador demanded reparations, Elim smiled and let drop a battle won through intelligence he'd brought to the table.

Some complete fabrications.

Others not.

The blood wine was a necessary embellishment.

The Romulans, well, Elim attempted to be absent during those negotiations.

So when he made his way to his tiny little fabricated hut on the hill, he was unprepared for a loamy rich smell on a heady breeze. Like beer brewing or perhaps particularly delightful meal.  "Whatever is that?"

He wasn't expecting a deep voice to say, "That's my work." Elim turned to look at someone, who could only be Mycroft's mother. In as much as Sherlock was the spitting image of them.

"I suppose you transformed the basin in which the Lakarian City once sat into a veritable paradise. Dancing waterfalls. Spilling pools. Flowers."

"I left the flowers at home. I made crops. The soil did require considerable reconditioning, and you should make sure some the grain is held back for the next growing season. I designed it to yield despite the low light conditions on your world. Consider it a… present. However, I have destroyed the device."

"How delightful," said Elim. "And given that you've achieved miracles, what shall you do for an encore?" He pondered just how to get to his phaser before a genetically enhanced individual incapacitated him.

"It's my understanding that Cardassia could use some leverage in negotiations. I have come to offer you some." Brittanus inclined their head slightly.

Elim was left to consider three things. One, he would have shot Brittanus and turned them in even if they hadn't been here to make such an offer. Two, this was likely to put a damper on his relationship with Mycroft. And three, he really was curious, "Given your stance, the way you've styled your hair, even the way you're dressed," Elim did not comment that the form fitting skin suit while suitable to combat was entirely lacking in flair, "tell me, were you raised in a hidden valley in a palace as the son of doting Queen where every need was met?"

"There was a Queen, and her image was in the place where I was raised," said Brittanus. They raised a bottle. "Mycroft mentioned you like Saurian brandy. It's real, if you're wondering. Let us drink and discuss what my price should be."

"Welcome to being my prisoner," said Elim, but I must apologize, "There's only two chairs, and I must insist I take the one that doesn't wobble. I don't have super healing and the other one does terrible things to my back."

"Of course," said Brittanus more agreeably than Mycroft would have led him to expect. But then, these were unusual circumstances.

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

He was playing the jumping game – he could jump high now that he was almost as tall as Euros – the word that meant the smiling lady - when the nasty ridge heads showed up.

They shouted. "Where is the living ship?" and "We claim this planet for the glory of the Klingon empire."

Euros smiled at them. She didn't like them. She said, "Karik, son of Lartord, your captain is weak. You are strong enough to take him in battle. He disrespected you during the Dominion War."

"I am strong enough to defeat him in battle," said the Karik, son of Lartord.

"Pfa," said another ridge head. "You are all pewling maggots. You are not strong enough to face me in battle."

"See how he disrespects his troops," said Euros. "He doesn't share any glory when the battle is done."

"I was denied my share of victory after the battle of Ko Bal," said another ridge head.

Euros said, "My brother and I will be over there while you work that out." As they climbed over the ridge, she whispered in his ear. "I lied. We won't wait here."

He smiled at her and squeezed her hand. He rested his head on her shoulder and rubbed the top his head against her. He was trying very hard to understand her. The sounds that she made had a meaning. But he had no point of reference to tie them to. Still, it wasn't her fault.

"Oh, you're right," said the smiling person. An image of a white wall flashed in his mind. There was an image of the ridge heads painted on it. She said, "Klingon."

"Kling-on," he tried.

"Close enough." She ruffled his hair. "I wish you could speak with your mind like I can." She clapped. "I know." She leaned in close. "We'll have Mummy change you. Make you like me. Then we can talk all the time while we travel outside this galaxy, just the two of us."

He said, "Klingon," to prompt her to show him more images and give him more sounds.

She giggled. "Silly of me." She tapped his chest, "Sherlock." She showed him what he looked like.

"Sherlock," he said to try the word meaning the person who was him and found that he liked it.

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

Beta Aurigae was as lovely as ever. The coastal district where Chin had chosen to relocate was lovely.

For all of that, the blue sky was as grey to him. The temperate breeze was bitter cold. His strong bones were weary. His healing blood was tired.

Noonian went to Chin's apartment. The door did not open as he approached. No better way to symbolize that he was unwelcome in his child's life.

Yet, he knocked on the door. Billy's son, Connor, answered. His eyes widened briefly. "Hello, I…" thoughts chasing across his face, "Chin's not here."

"Then I shall wait," said Noonian calmly.

"I don't think I should invite you in." Connor stood half in and half out of the door.

"Then I shall wait out here."

He knelt in a Virasana position, the hero's pose.

Hubris or hopeful.

"Are you just going to sit there?"

"This is pose is meant to bring enlightenment." Noonian looked up at Connor. "I have been told I need it. Certainly, there is much to think on."

"I...um… I'm sorry about Captain Holmes. He was nice. I liked him."

"We were not as close as I would have liked, but that was my own doing." A truth for a stranger. Someone, he would like to know better.

Connor sat down next to him. A Breen in the armor of the 1st Alignment passed them. Then another.

Eventually, Chin came home.

"Father." They were so formal. Always so formal.

Mshindi Victorious shouting, "Father, you should have seen it. I went hunting with William. I took down three pheasants with one shot and he hit nothing." Mshindi Victorious running boisterous up the stairs of the palace in the Gold District. So full of life, Noonian had not chided him for using a weapon that could take three pheasants with one shot.

Spin.

"Father, then what did you do?" Mshindi Victorious' face bright with curiosity.

Spin.

Mshindi Victorious, lying dead on the ice. Still.

Now too, Sherlock.

Vijeta smiling.

Ajaideep laughing.

Chin solemn. Serious. "Don't you think it's time you run away from home?" asked Noonian gently.

Even then Chin hadn't smiled. Even a little.

Not even on her return when he'd told her that he was proud of how she'd out maneuvered the Federation. Shown herself to be a true Khan's child. Had failed to see the meaning in her failure to be pleased by such praise.

"You are looking well," said Noonian. He could have winced. Covered by standing. "I came to speak with you about Sherlock."

She went utterly still. She said, "Of course, Father."

"But also I wanted to see you." Noonian wasn't sure if his time waiting had given enlightenment, but she needed to hear this truth.

Received one
in return. "I'm applying to become a member of the 1st Alignment. If they'll have me."

"I'm sure they would be lucky to have you," said Noonian. Helpless.

Chin looking so grave as she planned her run with the other teens during the Meiosis. Doing his best not to interfere in her plans. Wanting nothing more than to forbid her. That world had already taken one child.

She nodded. He followed her into the apartment. Connor left them alone.

Noonian found himself sitting on a blue couch overlooking a view of the sea. Found himself without strategy or tactics.

Chin offered him tea. He took the cup. He drank the tea.

"Did John Watson tell you how Sherlock died?" He had. Chin had told him what John had said.

"Moriarty," said Chin directly. Head straight. Eyes fierce.

She didn't say that if they hadn't made an ally of a monster, Sherlock would still be alive. She didn't have to.

She did sit next to him. She did drink tea. She did say, "For most of my life, I thought Sherlock was dead."

Chin, just a child. Strapped to a biobed. Struggling. Shouting. "I'll kill him. He stole my heart. He killed Victor."

Just a child.

Noonian had been younger than she the first time he'd killed a man and for less reason. He'd only done it because it was he was told to do. What he'd been trained to do. Not because he wanted to.

"Let the blame for that rest on me," said Noonian.

The marks from William's fingers on Mshindi Victorious neck. William had committed the murder. Woken Sherlock. It had been fitting. It made sense. Let William die and Sherlock live.

Now not even that.

As Chin's mind healed, as she forgotten. Her name stayed the same.

Spin.

John Watson glaring at them. "Congratulations, you raised a sociopath."

"Do you think he was a sociopath?" Noonian had not meant to say it that baldly. "Mshindi Victorious, not… Sherlock." The aching tooth of a thought. "Could he have killed your pet sehlat?" There a lie already. It had been William's pet most of all.

"I always thought you thought Victor was the golden child." Chin repositioned her tea on the table in front of her. "I thought he was perfect and everything I was supposed to be. A true Khan's child. That William came next. That he was the only one of us Mother loved. That I was extra." She glared at her tea.

"I am sorry if that is what you thought. It is not true." Noonian had lost the practice of embraces. Had grown used to armor. The children he'd left behind had been gifted with all manner of hugs and kisses and bedtime stories. He was fairly certain none of them would have sat so formally correct next to him. It was too late for more than a hand over hers. Than to say, "The fault was not that I was comparing you to Mshindi Victorious or Sherlock, but that… after leaving Earth, it was perhaps easier to think in terms of tactics. Strategy." Bury thoughts of what he'd left behind. "Behave as your general and so fail as your father."

He could hear Connor being carefully quiet in the next room. Probably preparing to report to their mother, which was only proper.

He said, "I think you will make a far better father than I have."

Chin nodded. Shifted her hand to face palm up with his.

It was what they were doing when there were a chime at the door. Soon followed by Veema and several other Firsts. There was a stain on her garment that indicated a baby had but recently vomited milk there.

He had not taken care of such a thing with any of his children. Past or present. A failure of imagination perhaps.

She said, "Brittanus has been captured by the Cardassians who have traded them for," she stopped visibly struggling, "some of their own space back."

"No," said Chin with the absolute conviction of a child. "That can't be. If they were taken," she shook her head, "they chose to be taken."

Noonian did not say that Brit now knew how to travel backwards and forwards in time. A secret Sherlock had unlocked. That they knew the secret of a weapon of immense power. That they had always held their own counsel. He said, "True."

"But, but," Veema scowled, her face incredibly expressive. Of course, she'd spent much of her life behind a mask. She'd never learned to hide her expressions. "This isn't what we planned. What we voted on."

"Plans rarely survive the battlefield," said Noonian. "Even my own." Hubris. "Especially my own."

"But Khan Meiying has disappeared. Mycroft as well. Chin is leaving your alignment…" Veema flexed her lips back and forth over her teeth. An odd expression, until he considered the faint signs of breathing apparatus from a long worn helmet. "Your alignment must be represented at the peace talks. Will you come with the delegation to represent the 23rd?"

"Do you want such a representative?" he asked mildly. Interested in her answer despite himself.

"You must be represented. You do not have the qualifications for a First, have not chosen to acquire them, but then neither did Mycroft. Dispensation once given, may be given again."

"What have you chosen to do about the Federation?" asked Noonian. He knew that there had been a vote, but had been too distracted to care. Even if the vote had been to offer them up to the Federation.

Instead of answering, Veema said, "Did you know Brittanus was planning to remake Breen with some… device? We arrived for the Meiosis and it was a transformed world. They had reversed the effects of the nuclear war. Remade it. I mean, we lost all the buildings, artifacts, but the world itself is now whole again."

All Noonian could do was shake his head in negation.

Chin said, "Really?" An odd note in her voice. She was perhaps used to only thinking of her mother preparing for war. Had no memory of the somewhat truly whimsical inventions or choices Brit had made in their youth on Earth.

Alignments of obelisks in rows in the Egyptian desert transported back from every European capital by millions of drones came to mind.

Pavan, who thus far had been silent said, "Yes. And they gave away a continent, which we couldn't use it so… they gave away a continent. The nice one with without the deadly animals."

"To who?" asked Noonian. Trying to imagine what deal Brit could have arbitrated.

"To the Gamma quadrant children who have been living under the Mare of Acquisition. For a new homeland," said Veema.

Chin's, "But that's not a strategic choice," echoed Noonian's own thoughts.

"I think it's sweet to give us a chance," Tellerhoo swayed side to side and looked thoughtful, "to learn share our world. As we should have figured out last time." Thankfully, that verbose soul faded into silence.

Noonian held his child's hand and contemplated that perhaps the failure of their plans had been what was needed all along.

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

As they arrived in planetary orbit of the Genesis world, Johanna Marcus hailed them from a shuttlepod orbiting the planet. "Bakerstreet. What are you doing here? I told you that matter created by the Genesis device is inherently unstable. I've been monitoring the system's progress, but it only has a few hours at most before it rips itself apart. Whatever you do, do not approach the planet. As it is, I'm going to need to be ready to warp out when the system's sun destabilizes."

Which was just great.

"We're ignoring that, right?" asked John. Wanting to simultaneously rush into danger, protect his mother, the little ones growing away inside him, and snatch up Sherlock, who hadn't been immolated on reentry, because he wasn't going to think that way.

"Fuck, when did we ever worry about danger," said Donovan.

"Too right, dear." Hudson directed. "Donovan, if you would, run a scan of the planet. See if we can find our Sherlock's resting place. None of them said anything about how it was very unlikely the torpedo had anything other than a hard landing.

"I've got it," said Donovan. "Wait no, that's a bird of prey. The torpedo is maybe a click from there."  She brushed back a wiry curl of hair, "Good. Good. Good. Looks like it soft landed on the planet." She blew out a breath. "Of all the fucking luck."

Mycroft muttered, "If my little brother has suffered irreversible necrotic damage because you launched him into space."

John gritted his teeth. "My husband, love of my life. Less talking, more beaming." They beamed down from Transporter Room Cloud. John barely remembered getting there. Mostly a blur of a race and then he was on the planet.

The ground where they landed was unstable. Frequent quakes shook the soil every few minutes. Jets of steam erupted from the ground.

The entire planet was unstable, so fine.

They found the photon torpedo. Empty. No body. No Sherlock.

Mycroft crouched down by the craft. "A small child, no more than four climbed out this device and went that way." He followed the footprints up the hill. "Another set of footprints. A Humanoid adult." He breathed in. "Euros." He shook his head disbelievingly. "The child is Sherlock. They moved circularly. Jumping. The child's footprints are larger here. Those of a pre-teen."

Something screamed. John ran through the ragged looking woods in the direction of the sound. A Klingon in full armor pulled a bloody dagger out of another Klingon's chest. There were several dead Klingons scattered on the ground. The Klingon said, "I, Karik, son of Lartord, am now the Captain." His lips curled as he saw John. "Pathetic human. I will rip out your hearts." He ran at them with his weapon upraised.

John looked around for a stick. A stone. Anything.

There was a quick blast of light from the tip of Mycroft's walking stick. The Klingon fell to the ground, dead.

Mycroft pointed up the hill. "The tracks lead that way."

At the top of the hill, there was a large rounded area, as if something had scooped up the dirt. "They were transported." Mycroft frowned at his scanner. "We should go back to your ship."

"What is it?"

"There's a very unique energy signature to the transport, which if it belongs to the ship I think it does, we should be able to follow its trail if we move quickly."

"What energy signature?"

"Gomtuu, the living ship that our sister, Euros, has been traveling about in." He closed his eyes as if what he was about to say pained him. "I believe that our brother, Sherlock, has regenerated as a child as a result of contact with the residual effect of the Genesis device."

Another quake shook the ground beneath them. John said it because it looked like Mycroft wasn't going to. "An unstable version of the  device."

"Yes."

"But your mother knows how to stabilize the energy."

"Yes."

"Where is your mother?" The ground shook more loudly. A huge rift sheared the soil of the ridge they'd just come down.

"We'll talk later," said Mycroft.

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

Edward hummed as he looked between the instructions and the device. Checked on the news feeds.

Everything was falling into place.

Moriarty had said that Brittanus would give themselves up. Said that the Breen would be forced to come crawling to the Federation. Earth.

Everything was going as planned.

All those Augments marching with their signs. Whining about how things were unfair. As if they weren't given homes. Food. Given every opportunity to succeed. Given extra advantages. As if real Humans weren't pushed aside to make way for them.

But soon everyone would see what they really were.

Parasites. Predators.

When the Genesis device went off in the courtroom where Khan Brittanus was being arraigned, when San Francisco was obliterated.

Then everyone would see.

With no remote launch code, but Edward was prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice. If it meant saving Humanity from itself.

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

The energy signature could only be traced a short distance, but it appeared to head towards Earth.

"Why would Euros go there?" asked John. It made no sense. Earth was densely populated with all sorts of minds to read.

Mycroft sighed wearily. "Who can say why our sister does anything? I did not understand her as a child." His glance wandered. "It has been years since I saw her."

John's mother cleared her throat and looked significantly at Hudson, who said, "Fortunately, while you boys were on the planet, I've been getting updates from… various friends."

She updated monitor to display a Federation newsfeed.  A talking head said, "Breaking news, Khan Brittanus has been turned over to the Federation by the provisional Cardassian government and is being transported to Earth for trial for war crimes. For our historical coverage on the Age of the Khans..." Hudson cut the feed.

"Brittanus is going to attack the Federation," said Donovan flatly. "San Francisco. London. He's done it before. It's a trap."

"Oh, I hardly think so," said Mum. She looked speculatively at the screen. "I'd never write it like that."

"This isn't a play," said Donovan.

Mycroft sighed.  "I don't believe that's what they intend to do."

"What do they want?" asked John, because what he wanted was Sherlock back. In his arms. Whole. Stable. A miracle.

"We'll see," was not the answer he was looking for. "Consider though, what they did to recover the Breen homeworld. Where they turned themself in. Do you think that I've not spoken with my mother since the end of the war?"

"I thought you and Garak," John waved his hand in a general way. Feeling, standing on the bridge, knowing Sherlock was alive out there somewhere, that he shouldn't quite refer to Mycroft's love life.

"One does not preclude the other." And that was all Mycroft would say on the matter.

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

He was learning more quickly now that he was inside the living ship. It was very friendly. Showing him images on its internal walls and singing chains of words in Euros' language, which was now his language.

Euros meant cold wind from the east, which was a point on a compass if the individual were on a planet, which was a large sphere of accumulated minerals and possibly water and possibly elements in a gaseous state, which was a requirement for wind, which could be rotating around a star. He really had no idea why he needed to know all that. Euros was enough. Also, she was his sister. They shared half the same pattern. Older. Although, by now he was her height and getting taller.

His voice was deeper. It crackled sometimes. That felt funny.

He felt funny. Something wasn't quite right in his middle and his arms and his legs. They cramped and spasmed.

He told Euros, but she said their mother would know what to do.

The seed ship went very fast, because as Euros explained, it slipped between spaces following an entirely other path. It had something to do with the glowing fungi, which was a type of plant that did not carry out photosynthesis, which was a process of converting carbon into oxygen and creating energy. The fungi grew in the seed ship's stomach, which was a digestive system that in this case produced travel.

The seed ship was Gomtuu, which meant empty-void-space-run-fly.

He was Sherlock. That meant a fair-haired, which made no sense, because his hair was black. Curling. Locks meant hair. Sher meant fair. He wanted to be Darklock, but Euros said that it was not up to him. He'd already chosen his name.

He felt queasy and splitting. As if something inside him was breaking and fixing all at the same time.

Euros said to hold on, because their mother would fix things.

He held on.

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

Elim did a thoroughly adequate job in trading them for concessions from the Federation.

"Thank you," said Elim with a deprecating smile. "I do wish I could sell you out to the Klingons and the Romulans too. I don't suppose the other two Khans will surrender to me as well." A little twist to his lips and around his eyes betraying the humor behind the suggestion. That was good. Mycroft deserved someone with a strong sense of the absurd.

"You may suppose not," said Brittanus, examining the white walls of the Federation holding cell. Some designs had not changed much in a hundred years. "But then only the Federation has reason to want us."

"I see your point. Strategist. Spy. There's always such a large home grown crop of those. If they were both like you, a fairly well known… innovative weapons designer, not so many of those. Also, you did transform devastated lands into instant crop land. Quite a few Cardassians are fairly happy about that. Turn of the worm and all that."

Drip.

The plump fat worm writhed in the mud. They felt like the worm. Saxon dangled Mycroft like a worm. A lure. Visits to be paid for in affection that was never good enough. They always reached out. Hooked. Snap.

Drip.

Saxon scrambling back as his arm broke. Mycroft, just two, on the floor in his thin cotton clothes, number stamped on the front, crying, while God and his men swooped in with tasers.

Drip.

William crying over the dead sehlat, as if he had not been responsible for its death. Brittanus did not know know what to do with those tears.

Elim was gone when they blinked. Replaced by a Starfleet Admiral - Human from Mars with an interest in philately -  and a Betazed of the Fifth House. Ring indicating she was a holder of the sacred chalice of Rixx, and Heir to the Holy Rings.

The Betazed said, "How could you force your child, any child, to kill their pet?"

An indicator that Brittanus' mental discipline was broken. The gates of the memory palace broken. Leaking. Otherwise, the Betazed would not have been able to read their memories. They said, "The purpose of the pet was to teach the children responsibility. Or so I was told."

Drip.

Noonian savoring a grape in the sort of naked enjoyment that Brittanus could not copy. "They'll be responsible for others one day. They need to learn responsibility." An argument with merit.

Drip.

The sehlat, it's belly distended from poison, whimpering in pain. William lying about taking it to the herpetarium. Perhaps a lie. Why had Victor been the one to tell them about the sehlat?

Drip.

Standing in the cave. Victor's neck broken. Euros crying. While William lay utterly still. Cold in their arms.

"I need to leave," said the Betazed, her hand flying to her mouth. She rushed out of the room in a swish of fabric.

The Admiral's lips curled. "How does it feel to be so monstrous you drive a telepath away?"

"Familiar," said Brittanus and was taken to a different and somewhat adequate cell. The panel by the door had security that could be bypassed in three ways.

Irrelevant.

Brittanus was where they were meant to be.

William returning from a hunting trip with Noonian and his siblings. Victor laughing about the great buck he'd taken down with his bow. Noonian chiding him that the hit hadn't been clean. That they must strive to cause as little pain as possible. Chin with a string of birds that required the superior shooting abilities.

William silent. Carcass free. When the whole point of allowing the expedition, in stocking the estate with animals for the purpose of hunting them down and killing them was so William would learn how to survive.

The shock when William ran across the room and embraced their leg. "Mummy!"

The pleasure at the touch that Brittanus did not know what to do with. The fear. William needed to learn. "Where are your dead animals?"

William shrugged. "It was boring. Can we go back to the photosynthesis experiment?"

A weakness, they knew to say yes, and yet they did.

Earth was not as they'd expected. Remembered. So many plots to regain it. Power over it. So many years. There were too many people. Too loud. The lights too bright. Scents from every direction.

They were assigned a lawyer. A Tellarite, but not raised on Tellar Prime. Old fracture of his right arm. The Tellarite put down a tablet on a polished white table in a polished white room. "There are a considerable number of charges. Some of them are..." he frowned, "considerably older than I'm used to seeing. Quite frankly, I think the entire Khanate can be dismissed on lack of evidence as to who did what. That it predates the modern era."

Brittanus looked through the list. "In any case, several of these are false." They tabbed. "Never happened. Never happened. Khan Piotr carried that out. Why would I detonate a dirty bomb of any sort in my own territory? My drones were equipped with sonic weapons, which were far more efficient for subduing crowds."

There was more discussion. The century old attacks.

Drip.

Explosions shaking the Vengeance. Revenge for the deaths of the other Augments receding from possibility as the ship spiraled out of orbit. Starfleet's gleaming towers in view.

Drip.

Mycroft asking, "Why did you use Ambassador's Spock's DNA when creating me?"

Why indeed.

The most recent actions during the war. They claimed those. After all, while strategy during conflict was not their area of responsibility, there did need to be at least one charge with some recent relevance.

The lawyer was very calm. Their heart rate slow. A beat faster when they said, "And what you did on Cardassia? What did you use to do that? There's been some discussion of an experimental weapon. If you were to turn over what you have, maybe anything stolen from Starfleet, that could be used in a plea deal."

The probability increased that their lawyer worked for Section 31 increased by forty-three percent. They said, "I'm not making any more weapons." Brittanus smiled. "I am the weapon."

Drip.

The first generation drones circling the abandoned building in London where they were hiding. Cobbled together. Creating a zone of defense. Little Mycroft watching them from his blanket. While on the television Grendel had set up, the talking head spoke of a military coup in India.

That was when Brittanus had a flash of insight, "If I was the government, we would be safe from the government."

Their lawyer left.

They were taken from their cell for their arraignment. There were a surprising number of people outside the courthouse. Milling. Yelling. Some were angry about the war. Very little of what they said was particular to anything Brittanus had done. Battles that occurred before the Breen entered the war.

A significant number of Augments, shouting questions. Offering support. Claiming descent. Claiming pride in being an Augment.

Too many sounds. Lights. To be endured. The failure of plans could only end one way. Must end.

It was a surprise to run into Spock in the gamut. Aged. Eyes still sharp. Given a place inside the line in deference to their age and past deeds. Spock said, "I met Mycroft. Why?"

A simple question with a complicated answer. "You defeated me. The Vulcans freed our grandchildren."

Drip.

Doctor Saxon's breath hot in their ear. "You really want it don't you? Beautiful." R92349 unable to speak or think beyond need.

Drip.

Spock's wild blows. Suppressed rage over all that Brittanus had done erupting in violence.

Drip.

They shrugged. "It made sense at the time."

They were seated at a table in front of the judge, an Andorian. Median age, but with indications of successful application of the Hebron-Homes treatment had resulted in child long past normal Andorian fertility.

Drip.

William's smile the first time he saw a cell division in a scanner.

Drip.

Their lawyer leaned over and said, "When we come to trial, I'm going to push for a non-human judge to be assigned to this case to ensure impartiality."

Irrelevant. Their lawyer went to discuss procedure with their counterpart.

A Human - previous fractures to his right occipital bone, femur, humorous over a period of time, likely torture, indications of liver and kidney failure, some indications of parasitic infection - leaned over the bar that separated the audience from the court. He said, "Recognize me?"

Brittanus considered faces in their memory palace. "No."

"So many, you don't even remember me." The Human hissed. "They're all going to see what you are."

"I suspect that is true." Brittanus would insist on a trial. Sherlock was dead. Moriarty was dead. But their machinations carried on. Plans in ruins. All that was left was to lance the wounds.

Too soon to tell if this would ease anything or only lead to more illness.

Then it was time for the arraignment to list their various pleas.

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

"Do you believe it?" said her mark, named conveniently enough, Mark.

Meiying said, "I believe nothing before I've had my first cup of coffee." Not true. With Meiying's metabolism caffeine did nothing for her, but it was an easy response. What was needed was food. Fuel. Not that she didn't want coffee bitter as her soul.

Mark levered himself up in bed. Tabbed through his ever present tablet. Reporter to the core. The reporter who'd broken the Khan story.

After talking to him, Meiying had a pretty good idea of who was spreading all this, "The Khans are alive and they want to kiiiiill you," bullshit. Mark had let slip during the second round of Manhattans that they thought their source had been a Human and a pretty messed up one at that, which made Meiying's ass twitch.

Her ass sense said Moriarty was behind this, and if Moriarty was alive, then Sherlock was alive. She just had to prove it. Find both of them. Spring Sherlock. Finish the job on Moriarty. If she finished the job on Moriarty with Sherlock, maybe that could count as a much needed bonding moment. Fuck if she knew.

The kids playing hide and seek in the obstacle course Meiying had set up outside the palace and Brittanus' resulting shit fit. It hadn't been that hard a course, and they'd been having fun.

Nothing like crawling through the mud in Honduras. Dropping out of the trees on the Sandinista in Nicaragua. Panama, taking a good long look and thinking, "Fuck this noise," but sticking it out, because Uncle Sam put a bomb in her chest to make sure she didn't fuck off when out in the field.

Finding the kids had been easy.

Kids were terrible at hiding.

"So, what am I supposed to believe," she prompted.

"Oh, Khan Brittanus turned himself in on Cardassia. He's being brought in for arraignment. Good for Tellinger for getting the scoop. Not that's anything on what I pulled off, but that's the news cycle for you." He got up and ordered a cup of coffee. Ass didn't get Meiying a cup, which was typical. But she could and did get her damned own cup with a food bar. Mark said, "I wonder if I could meet him. Getting his view out there could be an interesting angle."

She took a couple of sips of her coffee for show. Eyed Mark. "You're very blasé." Mind racing. Brittanus was a genius. If anything was going to flush Moriarty out, it was this. It was also a dumb ass move. Dropping down in a barrel and waiting to get shot was a good way to get shot. Sure they knew Meiying was probably lurking around with an even bigger ass gun, but dumb ass.

"Starfleet's been making a stink, but they're barking up the wrong tree if they push this too hard." Mark tapped a few keys. "Khans are old news. Three hundred and fifty years old. We've got pictures coming in from Betazed of the damage the Dominion did there. Pictures from Cardassia." He shrugged. "They want everyone to get excited about…" his brow furrowed, "Ancient history. Plus," he wagged a finger at her in a very annoying way, "Did you see the Dawn of the Augment's issue of the Galactic Geographic? Those pictures of Khan Brittanus and the others escaping that research facility. Not a one of them could have been more than sixteen. That little kid in his arms. That shell hitting a car not ten feet from him."

"I may have," said Meiying, who had fed the image from her personal stash. If Moriarty could stir things up, so could she. Back in the day, she'd thought of those kinds of picts as gathering intel on the enemy. After awhile, it had been one of her favorite pictures of Brittanus. Fierce. Instead of posed.

If she could save the idiot from their bad decisions.

Mark said, "Yeah, well, if the prosecution doesn't think any halfway decent lawyer isn't going to dig more of that stuff up to muddy the waters, they're crazy."

Because her current persona didn't say shit like, "Because you think they'll get a fair trial," she didn't. She hummed and sipped coffee. Chewed her food bar.

"And a hundred years ago," Meiying had slept through all that. She did have to wonder if she'd been awake if things would have come out differently. If that Marcus asshole had found her ship instead. He'd have gotten a lot fewer weapons.

"Not as ancient, but still history. People care about people they lost in this war. It's like urging people to stay mad because great-grandpa died in the 1st Romulan War. Or that Colonel Green is someone's thirteen times great something. Some do, but they tend to be…" he tabbed some more, "bit fringy. Hmmm...I understand Ambassador Spock is still alive. Wonder if I can get an interview."

That was Meiying's cue to get dressed. To slip off to another safe house. Wash out the dye in her hair. Gain thirty years back with the silver.

Open up the back panel to the back wall of this persona's apartment to consider her options, but who was she kidding. Disruptor rifle. Sonic grenades. Wrist activated stunners. She smiled fondly at them.

Brittanus had designed each of of them especially for Meiying, which did strange things to her heart. Right in the spot where the bomb used to be.

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

Mycroft contacted Noonian. "Do you know where my mother has been taken?"

Young Mycroft diligently constructing a small diode set. Silent. Focused  So unlike the children he'd left behind. The children currently screaming now that they were out of gestation.

To comment on the thing itself would have been to reveal ignorance. Hubris. Instead he waited to provide faint praise when the child was done.

Noonian said, "After they have turned themselves into the Humans as a sop. A stalking goat I could have understood. Draw out Moriarty, but…" Noonian shook their head. "Earth. They've been taken to Earth."

The monitor crackled. Wherever Mycroft was, the ship was moving quite quickly. Distorting transmission. He said, "Sherlock is alive. We think."

Noonian stared at the monitor.

William still and silent in the bio bed. Not yet Sherlock.

Sherlock vomiting blood in front of the Atavachron. Having to be restrained from going back into the past. Restrained from going back to die there.

Sherlock still in the cryo chamber.

Hubris.

"Congrats. You raised a sociopath."

Sherlock, far from that. As far from that as could be.

"How is that possible?"

"A variation of the Genesis device. A theoretical and unstable version. He's also headed for Earth."

Noonian was presently on Earth with Breen delegation. He was part of the Breen delegation. Not a First, Veema had explained because he had no medical background, but he would have to do.

"I will see if I can find out where they are being held."

"Yes, they should know that Sherlock is alive and needs their help." The static crackled. Mycroft hesitated and said, "Also, Euros is with him."

"Will it be cold, Daddy?"

"Bitterly cold, but you won't dream. You'll be as one dead." He could have told her that. He hadn't, but he could have been more honest. He could have worn armor around her too. Spared her thought and memory.

"Understood." He cut the connection and resumed preparations. He put on the armor, possibly for the last time.

As they made a confirmed site to site beam to a secured location within the buildings, Identification was not an issue.

Went into the Thomas Vanderbilt Conference Hall in the Federation Council complex. It was impressive. Intended to be. Designed to impress on visitors with the might and wealth of the Federation. Noonian would have been more impressed to visit a shipyard that could produce multiple battleships within a matter of months, but he thought that invitation might not be forthcoming.

Noonian and Chin went in first. They were, after all, wearing the expected armor. Veema and the other Firsts followed with their very fragile burdens. Blankets, disease shields for the infants that would need such, but otherwise open to see.

Admiral Phillips said, "What is the meaning of this? This is a closed session negotiation with,"

"Oh, do stop blathering," said Ambassador Troi. "It's the Breen." She clasped her hands together and beamed. "These are the leaders of the Breen and they brought babies." She looked down at the infant cradled against Veema's heart. "Aren't you an adorable little one. Yes, you are. Look at you. Look at that smile."

From where Noonian was, he could not see his grandchild's smile, but he was reasonably assured it was beautiful.

William smiling up from the crib. Arms reaching. Always for Brit, of course, who never seemed to know what to make of the gesture. Noonian certainly was always roundly rejected with a wail if he attempted to pick William up.

While, Mei, she had always been off somewhere doing something.

"What do you mean, these are the Breen?" asked Admiral Philips. "They're Augments. Humans. Whoever they are, they have no place in these proceedings."

But Troi ignored him. "Of course, I understand. With the negotiations going on so long, you couldn't be away from them for too long. No, of course," she took off her necklace and dangled it over the infant, who reached for it with a strong grip.

"Where is the rest of your delegation?" Admiral Phillips addressed Noonian.

He replied by unlatching his helmet and removing it. He smoothed the folds of his green turban before addressing Phillip's directly. "They," he paused and began again, "We are the Breen, and always have been."

There were whispers from the rest of the delegation. Ambassador Ahuja, their turban in the same style as Noonian's, said, "Am I addressing Khan Noonian Singh?"

"You are," he said. "I speak for the 23rd Alignment of the Breen Confederation. They," he gestured to the others, "speak for the other twenty-two. If you want to negotiate a lasting peace with the Breen, then we are the ones you'll need to speak with."

"Then I would have you know," said Ahuja, "that it is family lore that I am descendant of Vijeta Singh."

Noonian inclined his head in acknowledgement. "Then I would like to know what you know of what became of her. While I have images that I may share of her and her brother as a child."

"We can't have babies at a peace negotiation!" protested Phillips, frowning, looking disturbed at his co-negotiators.

"Why not?" asked Pavan. "It is already going several times better."

Veema looked at Noonian. "It is a pity that you're not a doctor."

"I for one think it's a marvelous idea," said Troi. "Remind us all of what we are negotiating for. If only I had grandchildren of my own to bring." She rolled her eyes dramatically.

Ambassador P'leck of Andor chuckled, "I'm trying to imagine my grandsons sitting still through anything as boring as this will be and failing."

"That's why babies," said Troi, sighing. At a whisper from Veema, she was carefully handed a child to cradle and coo at.

P'leck coughed. "Still, it would lighten the proceedings. In light of the new information, I would suggest a recess, until then."

Chin, had yet to remove her helmet, nerves perhaps, which Noonian almost chided her over, but on reflection decided that perhaps he should not. She leaned over to Noonian and said, "Father, I'm detecting an unusual radiation signature from the courthouse where Mother is."

"Surely, the Federation," said Noonian, but Chin cut him off.

"It's very low level. But," she turned her wrist so he could see the scanner, "it's the similar to the energy signature as what Mother used on Breen, but unstable. There's a proto matter signature."

Noonian turned to P'leck, "I would agree with your proposal." He took Veema's arm and whispered to Pavan, "Chin has something to show you."

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

The white-blue spores that connected the universes and were also kept in Gomtuu's gut sparkled out and took them apart. Put them back together again on the surface of a blue planet named Earth, which was in the Sol system. That felt a lot more queasy this time around.

Sherlock wasn't sure where the room they appeared in was or what it was. Gomtuu hadn't had time to explain, and now Gomtuu was in space and Sherlock was in a large room with a lot of people that he didn't know. People with scents and sees and information that he didn't know what it meant all coming at him from all different directions.

Euros slapped her hands down on a table where a silver haired person and a folded face person with short nose were sitting and said, "Mother, I need you to do something for me. For once it needs to be about me and not about the ghosts in your head."

"Who is this woman?" asked a blue person with white hair and little blue things sticking out of their head.

"Euros, I'm afraid that I am not in a position to help you just now," said the tall silver haired person, who then shouted, "Sherlock!" Flipped the table in front of them away, and threw the person who tried to get between them across the room, and wrapped their arms around him. Lifted him up. Held him tight, which felt good. Breathed into his neck, which felt very nice. This must be Mother. That was the name for someone who contributed to the pattern of himself. Gomtuu had shown him images of their own mother. Long since dead when a star exploded. Sherlock's mother looked nothing like that being a bipedal oxygen breathing lifeform and not a space faring lifeform that carried oxygen breathing lifeforms inside it.

Sherlock wrapped his own arms around Mother, because that felt good. The person felt good. Smelled good. It was good. Mother finally let go. A little. So Sherlock let go. A little. He smiled at Mother hopefully. He thought questions, but unlike Gomtuu or Euros, Mother didn't seem to understand that Sherlock wanted to know more. All they said was, "Sherlock, you're alive."

Which Sherlock already knew! There were still the rumbles in his belly and his chest and his legs and his arms that didn't feel particularly well, but he was alive. He frowned and glared, which for some reason made Mother laugh and then stop with their eyes very round, as if laughing was something they were not used to doing. The sound made him happy so he stopped his glare and smiled.

People around them pointed and shouted that Sherlock and the person looked exactly alike. Which was not true. There were at least fifteen easily identifiable points of variance that Sherlock could tell just standing there looking out of his own face. Certainly that Sherlock did not have silver hair and wrinkles was one of them.

Still, he traced Mother's face and prodded their wrinkles. They said, "You don't know me." That was accurate. He examined their hands. The person had blue veins that stood out on the skin, which was waxier than Sherlock's. Crinklier. He threaded his fingers through the hand and turned it, examining it. The person said, "I'm your mother."

He rolled his eyes at his mother, which made them smile. Water leaking out of their own eyes, which Sherlock observed were very like his own.

The blue person pounded something on the bench they were was sitting behind and said, "Security needed in..."

Euros said, "Bees. Lots of bees. Not intruders. Rare, endangered, but dangerous bees."

There was a hurry of motion as people skidded out of the room. Not everyone. A few people behind the low fence stayed where they were with very tightly shut eyes. Sitting very still.  The blue person on the bench was smiling and whispering about how lovely they sounded. The person Mother had tossed aside to get to Sherlock was sleeping. The folded face person was scowling. A crooked man was sitting crooked in a chair behind a low wooden wall that couldn't have stopped Sherlock was he was young and just learning to jump. A few others. But it certainly was quieter now that bees had happened. Whatever a bee was.

Euros looked at Mother. "You gave me so much, Mother. Why did you give me so much? If you'd given me only a little then everyone wouldn't always be chattering in my head. I wouldn't have to be alone except for Gomtuu. But I've had an idea. Now that Sherlock's new again and he likes doing things with me, you're going to make Sherlock like me and fix what not being dead did and then we're going to fly away to a galaxy far, far away where everyone is dead or quiet." She shrugged. "I haven't decided."

There was someone new in the room. He had no scent. None. It was like he wasn’t there. He was dressed in beautiful shiny clothes and had a pretty hat with a feather.

Euros turned to look at him slowly. Her head tilting to one side, which made her hair fall in a pretty straight line towards the floor. "You again. Who are you?"

"A helpless admirer. A galant who wants nothing more than to lay my cape at your feet lest they touch a puddle? It's a difficult choice I know, to eschew your brother's company for a relative stranger, but I want to lay my hat in the ring. Or this hat." He held out a gold box that was simultaneously round and flat on the top and bottom. It was a marvelous box. He held it out. "It's a gift, milady. From Trelane, Squire of Gothos, General retired. I propose myself as your gentile parfait knight. Utterly gentle."

Euros took the box. Sherlock peered at it, while still holding onto Mother, who he very much hoped would explain something useful other than things he already knew. The box was full of shiny copper round things that wove together in endless patterns. "Pennies, for your thoughts, milady." He held up a hand. "No trespass intended. Rather a thought bonnet. It's both fetching and will reduce the noise, without," he raised a finger, "rewriting reality!"

"You are very silly," Euros informed him.

"Who or what are you?" said Mother very ominously. Sherlock had learned about storm clouds from Gomtuu. They were a weather formation that occured on planets and were related to wind. He hadn't understood why he needed to know that until that moment.

"A helpless admirer of your daughter, the fair Euros. Who I could only wish to be the cold wind beneath my wings. If she wants me to have wings. Do you want me to have wings, milady?"

Euros giggled. "You are very, very silly." She brushed her cheek against her shoulder. "Maybe."

"Done," said Trelane, Squire of Gothos, General retired. He had giant feathers from his back just then. They sparkled and gleamed red. He turned to Mother. "I was admiring your work on Breen and couldn't resist the tribute."

"He's omnipotent," said Euros softly. She rubbed the tip of her nose with the back of her hand and then curled that hand behind her neck. "But not mean."

"No. Gentle," said Trelane, Squire of Gothos, General retired.

"I am not," said Mother very slowly, not letting go of Sherlock, "in the habit of being inspiring."

Sherlock was already feeling fairly rumbly in his belly and arms and legs and head, but that made him ache just a little more. So he kissed his mother's cheek and rubbed his head on their shoulder. Just breathed and tried to understand based on what little he knew.

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

While the Breen dealt with child care issues, Chin and Father Noonian transported to the steps of the courthouse. There was a sea of people out front. Reporters. War protesters. Augments. Certainly many more Augments than Chin was used to seeing without armor.

There wasn't time to think about it. There was time to follow the energy signature past a mass of people yelling about bees and into a courtroom. Chin stopped in her tracks.

Euros stood near Mother. Not a child anymore. A young woman in her early twenties. There was a roar in Chin's ears. She was yanking off her helmet before she even thought that it was the only thing that could protect her from Euros' influence. It didn't matter. She needed to see Euros face to face.

What mattered was vaulting over the low barrier in the courthouse and confronting Euros.

She yelled, "You!" Thoughts and words scrambled to get the right accusations out. "You're at the bottom of the Genesis energy." Not what she wanted to say. "You murdered Victor! You made me try to kill Sherlock. You came onto the Bakerstreet and murdered people there." Chin raised her armored fist to hit Euros.

"Chin, I didn't mean to. Really!" said Euros, holding up her hands.

"Not dead!" shouted, of all people, Sherlock. Chin stared at him stunned. He looked younger than the last time she'd seen him. The soft roundness of twenties rather than the sharply defined thirties.

"Chin," said Father Noonian placing his hand on Chin's arm. "She's not at fault. She didn't kill Mshindi Victorious."

Euros said, "Daddy, Mother, you have to believe me. I didn't mean for what happened to happen. Chin, I didn't know that you'd act like that. And Victor was very grindy in the middle. He'd have broken that way anyway."

Chin shook her head. Couldn't help but think of Father Noonian asking if she thought Victor could have killed their pet sehlat, which hadn't made any sense. Their parents had made Sherlock kill their pet after it was bitten at the zoo.

Victor laughing about I-Chaya's final pain. His frown when I-Chaya whined and moved behind William's body to be away from Victor. At the time, she'd focused on how large I-Chaya had grown. How intimidated she felt by something that was supposed to be their pet and somehow was only William's. Now, looking back, she could see the creature had been frightened of Victor.

Father Noonian said, "Daughter. I do believe you." He looked at Chin, naked pleading his eyes. Even more vulnerable than he'd been when she'd found him sitting by her apartment door.

Chin stepped back. Let her hand fall. Opened her fist. Considered memory.

Father Noonian smiling with wide white teeth at Mother. "That's wonderful that she's doing so much better." Looking at Chin and saying. "Your sister, Euros, will be joining us at the Meiosis."

She'd imagined herself pounding a drum with a skin of anger. Tried not to think of the ache underneath the skin. She'd heard about Euros. Knew that she had to be away from people, because she was special. In that moment, all she could see how happy Father Noonian and Mother were. Could only think about how everything was always about someone else.

Victor laughed in her ear. "One more person ahead of you in line."

That had been below every thought when she'd first met Euros. When they'd gone to Breen.

Euros only had eyes for their father. She looked so young. Chin was technically a year younger than Euros, but Euros had been placed in cryo. After what she'd done. Chin looked down at her own hands. She'd tried to kill William and Euros.

Mother was standing between Euros and Sherlock now. She saw them start when Euros said, "Sherlock and John came back in time to save Sherlock when he was still William and...Oh." Euros' eyes got big. I forgot about John. It's just… I was so happy to see Sherlock and he was happy to see me and…" she breathed out. "Maybe it's not a good idea to try and make him like me so we can go to the edge of the universe where there isn't anyone or they're all dead."

"Perhaps, not," said Father Noonian.

Mother said so softly that it required super hearing to hear it, "In any case, Euros, I couldn't recreate what I did when I created you if I tried. Hubris. I tried to add the genome that would send the Breen the message they needed so we could all be. To your detriment. So focused on the ends, I forgot how it felt to be the means." They looked up and away as if looking at something far away.

"Mother," said Euros, moving forward. She took Mother's hands. "God is dead. You killed God. You killed Doctor Saxon." She glared around the room. "Shush. They were very bad and they hurt a lot of people." Smiled back at their Mother. "But Mother, you've got to bury them. In your head. You've got so many people in your head. They don't help you."

Mother did not look convinced.

Trelane, wearing an ornate seventeenth century gold suit suit, said, "I can help with that."

"I don't think that's a good idea, because I think you mean rewrite reality, but thank you for offering," said Euros with a wrinkle of her nose. A relief, Chin had experienced enough of Trelane's offers to help to worry about them, and that had been during the two years on the Bakerstreet.

"As milady wishes," said Trelane with a soft smile. "Although, in that vein, you may wish to release your mental hold on everyone in the room and out. Not that it's not an utterly charming display of power that becomes your majesty, but perhaps there is such a thing as too many bees."

"You're right, I guess," said Euros.

The judge and everyone else in the courtroom sighed. All started speaking at once.

A very crooked man with a crooked face and a crooked arm and a crooked leg stood up just behind the barrier. He shouted, "Captain Holmes and this woman, they are the children of the Khans."

Captain Killander shouted down at her. "Explain your presence in London before your transfer to the Bakerstreet." Attempting to be intimidating, but Chin had been raised by masters of the art.

Chin stared at the very broken man in front of her. Could barely recognize his features. "Captain Killander?"

Killander turned at looked her. "You! Your escape is the reason..." He bared his teeth and pointed at Euros. "See what they are. Do you all finally see? They create monsters who can manipulate our minds. Control our bodies. Make us see things."

"I take umbrage at that remark, sir," said Trelane. "This lady, whether she should choose to grant me her favor, or indicate that she rejects my intentions, in which case I may go to dwell in the heart of a black hole to write poetry, is a no way any sort of monster."

"Then you're a fool." Killander pulled back his teeth in a very crooked smile. "Khan Brittanus is in possession of dangerous technology." He kept looking at Chin. "Genesis technology stolen from Starfleet." He turned to a Beta Human sitting several feet back. "I told you that you'd have a scoop if you came here with me."  He laughed a not entirely stable laugh. "The scoop of a lifetime. Yours and mine."

The judge tapped on their bench.

Chin looked down at her energy reading for the first time since she came into the room. The Genesis energy had increased in amplitude. She couldn't pinpoint it's location other than close. A good deal closer than she liked.

The reporter pointed his vid camera at Chin. "Are the Breen planning an attack on Earth? Is this trial a ruse?"

"Of course not," said Veema rushing into the room in her armor, but without her helmet, and also without an infant, followed by the rest of the Firsts, equally armored and infantless. "We've come to make peace with our brothers and sisters of Earth. To be honest with you about our nature." Then she and the others came to a halt. She held out her gloved hands in the cupped genome motion. "First Father, you're alive! Praise to our genome!"

"Praise to the recombinant haploid," said the other Firsts in response.

The reporter muttered, "I am going to get a Pulitzer," said more loudly, "Who is the first father? Have the Breen always been Human? Augments?"

"They have a bomb!" shouted Killander. "They attacked San Francisco once." He pointed at Brittanus. "Multiple times."

Euros drew in her breath sharply. "No, he's the one who has planted a bomb. It's set to go off. Soon. It's...it's hidden somewhere. His mind is very twisty."

"Milady. If you would do me the great honor of allowing me to assist," said Trelane, "I may be of some help."

"Yes, I think, yes," said Euros, who held out a hand, which Trelane kissed.

"In which case, Edward Killander," Chin braced herself, but all he said was, "I challenge you to a duel on behalf of my lady's honor."

The judge shouted, "Where is Security!"

The people who ran into the room next weren't security.

John with several other people from the Bakerstreet.

A woman in a lab coat said, "I have it triangulated." She went up to the judge's bench. Pulled out a silver device and set it down on the wooden surface. The woman looked horrified. "It's set to detonate." She looked up. Face tight and drawn. "We have ninety seconds to evacuate San Francisco!"

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

Several people had come into the room. Including one who smelled like light and jumping as high as he could and sweet and little salty.

The wonderful person rushed over to Sherlock, which was nice. Very nice. Sherlock could rest the bottom of his chin on top of the Sweet-Salty-Wonderful person's head and just breathe. Because if no one was going to explain what a San Francisco was or why it had to be evacuated, he was going to stand as close as possible to the Sweet-Salty-Wonderful person.

The blue person shouted. The person in the white coat shouted. Daddy and Mother shouted. The armor people shouted. He pressed his lips to the Sweet-Salty-Wonderful person's wonderful hair and took a little taste, which wasn't quite as nice he'd expected. Hair. Hair on his tongue.

"When they see what happened here, they'll know what you are!" Killander tensed and then looked very angry when nothing happened.

Trelane, Squire of Gothos, General retired said, "As you appear to have abrogated all rules of dueling as I understand them, I have taken the liberty of removing your weapons." He held up one hand with something swirly and white floating above it. He pursed his lips and blew. Silver sparkles scattered across the room before disappearing. "I say that for your use of a bomb in a duel. Most unsporting and..." he lifted his chin, "ungentlemanly."

Chin raised her arm and a light shot out at Killander. He fell forward.

Daddy caught him as he fell and said, "Possibly a bad strategic decision, but," he looked around the room, "perhaps the best for long term relations."

Chin came closer to Euros, who moved closer to Trelane, Squire of Gothos, General retired. Chin said,  "I've thought about killing you for a long time."

Euros nibbled on a strand of hair. Shrugged. "I know. I heard." She let the hair fall. Straightened her shoulders. "Sorry I made you think you were a pirate."

"No," said Chin, "I'm sorry. I..." she stood as straight as Euros, "think some of that might have been crumbly in me as well."

"Everyone stop," said a person in yellow clothing, followed by several more people in the same clothes. "Hands in the air."

"Hey," said one of them. "Is that Khan Noonian Singh?"

Euros glared at the foldy faced person. "It's not two for the price of one."

A yellow light flashed, and the people in yellow fell asleep. A silver haired person dropped down out of the ceiling. "Make that three." She was holding a very large stick thing. "As Khan Meiying Washington, Empress of the Americas, which since I never abdicated, I hereby declare that my family is made of idiots and we should get the fuck out of here. I brought transponders."

Sherlock kissed the top of the Sweet-Salty-Wonderful person's head and wrapped his arms around them. Squeezing. The person turned around and said, "Look at you. Look at you."

Sherlock didn't want to. He only wanted to look at the Sweet-Salty-Wonderful person.

There was more yelling by people not the Sweet-Salty-Wonderful person in his arms. That person was saying. "Love you. You can't die ever again. Ever. That's right out. It's not allowed. You're just going to have to live forever."

Sherlock had to admit, "I don't feel as if that's possible. It hurts here." He waved at his entire body.

"Meiying," said Mother. "I am here of my own accord. I have a plan. The past must purged. I am the reasonable person to take that step."

"Yeah, that hasn't worked out has it," said Meiying. "Because your plans have always been for shit."

Euros leaned over. "That's also your Dad. Father. Yours. Not mine. She's… not nicer than she seems. But I guess she… well, she's yours."

"Father," said Sherlock trying the word on for size. He liked the word.

"Brittanus," said Sweet-Salty-Wonderful person. "Sherlock is physically unstable. He was brought back to life by…" he cleared his throat, "Genesis energy, and I think you know what to do to stabilize that, yeah. So, as much as I think you probably deserve to be in custody, perhaps we should go and get on that."

"Great plan," said Father. "I like this plan even better than mine."

Euros said, "I'm leaving with my new being friend." She was holding hands with Trelane, Squire of Gothos, General retired.

Sherlock smiled at her. "Be happy." He had those words. Thoughts. Happy was good.

"Why are you so sweet? Fine. I borrowed your memories without asking." Euros flicked her fingers at him and everything came rushing back.

Everything.

All at once.

Even for him, that was too much.

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

One minute there had been complete chaos in a Federation courtroom and the next they were on the bridge of the Bakerstreet. A very crowded bridge with the entire Breen delegation, Doctor Marcus, the Khans, John's mother, Mycroft, Euros, Trelane, and last, but very much not least, Sherlock.

Sherlock. Alive.

"I'd get out of town if I were you," said Trelane, who was holding Euros' hand, which fine. That kind of worked.  "Or not. It's up to you." They both winked out.

"I think I'm a clone of myself," said Sherlock, looking at his own hands. "And I'm aging at an accelerated rate."

Brittanus took his chin in their hand. Examined his eyes. Took a scanner from Hudson and ran it over him. Said, "I don't know if I can…" Tears welled in their eyes. "There's not enough time. I need more time."

"Oh," said Trelane, his upper torso appeared, hanging suspended above the ground. "Almost forgot. Sherlock, you are a bit unstable." He tapped a finger on Sherlock's forehead. "There. Stable. On my honor." He disappeared.

They waited, but he did not reappear.

"Hmm… not sure about deus ex machina," said Mother, but at a glare from John said, "but under the circumstances, I'm glad of it."

Hails flooded in.

Winters said, "Sir, Starfleet Command is asking if we know where the Breen delegation, three Khans and Captain Holmes are. If they're here, they want you to remand them and yourself to custody." She swallowed. "They sound very serious."

Hudson removed her pips, one by one. "I've been eligible for retirement for the last five years. A forty-year woman."

Hunter dropped her pips on her panel. "I haven't made my twenty, but fuck it."

"I come with the ship," said Julian, who was leaning on the controls next to Hunter, who reached up to pat his hand.

"A marvelous adventure," said M'Press.

"Uh," said Ensign Winters.

"You don't have to stay, dear," said Hudson. She smiled brightly. "We might want to make a decision quickly if we want to keep the ship, which I'll remind all of you is due to be mothballed in a ghost fleet. A lovely ship like this with years left in her."

John looked at Sherlock. "Well?"

"We can drop anyone who wants to remain in Starfleet on Andor." Sherlock smiled widely. "We can be space pirates, John."

"We're not being space pirates," said John firmly, who knew he'd need to nip this sort of thing in the bud. "Except on the holodeck."

"No, we shall be pirates, and you will be the captain," said Sherlock. He looked around the very crowded bridge. "I am done being captain. I quit. John will be the captain and I will be his kept person. To be flaunted for my flexibility and..."

Noonian cleared his throat. "Son, perhaps fewer details about that, and… I think at least one of us needs to remain on Earth and I have the strongest hand. Madam," he said to Hudson, "if you could arrange to beam myself and the rest of the Breen back to the courthouse."

Chin crossed her arms. "And I as well."

"Fuck that noise," said Meiying, who had a very large looking gun over her shoulder. She winked at M'Press, who sighed.

Hudson said, "I'll take pirates as a yes, and yes." She tapped the contact. "Transporter Room Cloud, beam down the individuals in the ready room to the location of last beam down on my mark." There was a mass exodus in to the ready room and a soft, "Transport," from Hudson.

"Welp," said Meiying. "Now everyone knows what I look like and he's not rescued." She adjusted the gun. "Guess, I'll have to be a pirate." Groaned. "And I had a gig in London."

"I'm sure it was very retro-punk," said Mother, who didn't seem phased by all the Khans, but then she was in theater.

"Actual punk," said Meiying.

Hudson said, "Hunter, plot a course for Andor."

"Mother, from there perhaps back to Cardassia?" said Mycroft. "If it's your wish to not be a weapon. I have any number of ideas about places we could go to do that. All far better than Meiying having to break you out of Section 31's grasp, which I think we all know is where this is all heading."

"I would not have made any more weapons," said Brittunus with a sulky look that was pure Sherlock.

Mycroft said, "We all know it would be messy."

"Fucking-A," said Meiying, who then looked at Sherlock. "Oh, don't look so shocked. Just because I tried to be chill around you when you were a kid and Brittanus wouldn't stop going on about how fragile you were does not mean I have no flavor. I made of flavor." She tapped her fingers on the shaft of the weapon. "A nasty flavor, like Medusa with her hair up."

"Cardassia then," said Brittanus, taking Mycroft's hand.

John thought about it and said, "Fine. I'm the captain. Make for Cardassia. You," he pointed at Brittanus et al, "Donovan, find them a room to not be on my bridge in," which felt good to say.

"Aye sir," Donovan rolled her eyes. "Or is that argh, sir."

"We're not being pirates. We'll unload a few people. Be not pirates." John gave his mum an apologetic smile, and tugged Sherlock into the captain's ready room for a snog. A canoodle. A long slow snuggle on the chair by the fake fire. Minus a few clothes. Most of their clothes. All their clothes.

Sherlock inhaled his breath with kisses. His taste with licks. Abruptly pulling away. "You're pregnant!"  Brow furrowing. Examining the blooming red mark on John's neck. Groaned. "And my parents know."

John kissed the love of his life lightly. Sweetly. "So, um, you know how you're going to be a daddy."

"And a pirate," insisted Sherlock for Sherlockian reasons.

"No, we're not going to be pirates. But maybe, a bit more of the kinds of things we keep getting reprimanded by Starfleet for doing. I kind of think the Breen owe us some cover," said John. Licked his lips, because Sherlock had to know sometime. "But um, you know how we're having twins."

"Yes." Sherlock gave him the laser focus look. "And quite obviously the two hundred and two children that we fostered with the Breen." He leaned back in the chair. "I missed decanting! The Meiosis. I'll make it up. Lighting raids with gifts."

"Because you were dead, yeah," said John. Who really wasn't quite sure how to put what he had to say.

Sherlock shifted so John was sitting a little farther away, which was not on. However, since John was the captain now and Sherlock was his kept bit on the side, so he straddled his enormous bit.

Sherlock said, "There's something more."

"So, um… John sighed. "Computer. Display John Watson's personal Fertile as Turtle file." He kept his legs bracketed around Sherlock, because he was the captain and this was his captain's decision. Sherlock was staying exactly where he was.

"I have seen this file before," said Sherlock.

"Computer, filter for zygotes only."

The computer obliging displayed only the zygotes. John had already had a chance to gibber over the list. He pushed down lightly to distract Sherlock when he said, "The Breen encouraged them to split into multiples, because, you know, population problem. I told them that our kids would be able to help cure the next generation of Breen venereally, and it's not as if multiples are the same people, any more than siblings are."

"How many multiples on average?" asked Sherlock staring over John's shoulder at the list.

John bit Sherlock's neck. Sherlock groaned. They tangled together in the ready room for not the first time.

Sherlock whispered, "Quintuples."

John licked Sherlock's flat nipples. His beautiful skin unmarked by radiation scars. Sherlock's breath caught. In pleasure. Surprise.

"Septuplets."

John sucked on first one and then the other nipple.

"Ngh."

John shimmied down and took Sherlock's beautiful cock in his mouth. Swirled his tongue around the head. John swallowed him down.

"How many?" There was an incredulous note in Sherlock's voice that John sucked right out of him.

John applied some technique. Bobbing his head while fluttering his tongue.

John pulled off with a pop. Positioned Sherlock's gorgeous cock. Sherlock got the point of obeying his captain. Let John do all the work of moving slowly in the best ways.

John came first, but Sherlock wasn't far behind. When they were well and truly spent, John curled up on his Sherlock. He said, "They have to come up with a new name for it." He moved Sherlock's hand over his stomach. "Try average of twenty-three. We are, I believe the biological parents of the most simultaneous children in Human history. At three thousand two hundred and twenty-two, plus," he put Sherlock's hand on his belly, "two. And the Breen race."

"Ah," said Sherlock. His hand spread wide and he tugged the soft blanket on the chair over John, which pretty much said it all.

And because John was captain, he made a captain's decision. "You know that time travel equation thing."

"Yes," said Sherlock looking still a bit dazed, which was fair. He'd had quite a day.

"You said it's easier when hopping short jumps in time."

"Yes," said Sherlock. An indrawn breath. An idea blooming.  "Oh, yes I see. Yes, we could jump back just a very little and…"

"We would have to warn them not to tell… you know… us… that we popped by."

Sherlock shrugged. "What kind of cake shall we make?"

John tapped his nose. "All kinds of cake you like and I like and…" he sighed happily, "I'll have all the time I need to make them properly. In an oven. By hand. None of this replicator shite." Then a thought struck him. "Oh… fuck. I've got to talk to my Mother. She going to want to plan something for… whatever this will be."

Sherlock kissed him. "We have as much time as we need."

Which was true.

It certainly wasn't the end.

It was voyage on a new trajectory.