Please send comments to pt4ever@yahoo.com

Disclaimer:  Paramount did, does, and will always own these
characters. (Except for the ones I make up.)  I just play with them a
little.  :)

Daddy's Little Girl (post-Voy, P/T, PG)
by JoAnna Walsvik
part 2/?

        "My little angel,"  B'Elanna Paris whispered, tenderly stroking
the soft curls atop her sleeping daughter's head.  She could see plainly
see the tearstains on Katy's rosy cheeks, and it made her heart ache to
look at them.  She remembered all too well another little girl who had
cried herself to sleep for months after her father had left...a little
girl, a
woman now, who still woke up in the middle of the night and
wondered where her father was...and why he had gone away.  
        B'Elanna had grown up without a father, and she didn't want the
same thing to happen to her daughter.  However, unless a miracle
occurred, it seemed that history would repeat itself, and another child
would be left fatherless.
        She hadn't told her daughter the worst of what had happened. 
Not only had Tom been shot, but he had been tortured brutally by a
group of vicious terrorists.  B'Elanna had hardly recognized her
husband when he had been beamed to sickbay.  His face and body had
been such a mass of bruises and blood she had nearly thrown up at the
sight.  As it was, she had become dizzy and turned away, hating herself
for not able to look at him.
        Kathryn Janeway had been extremely lucky.  The terrorists, it
seemed, didn't torture women or children.  Just men.  It didn't matter if
they were husbands or fathers, this group of horrible and unfeeling
aliens did their best to break the wills of their captives.  
        They hadn't broken Tom's will, though, and B'Elanna was
fiercely proud of that fact.  He had refused to give them an particle of
information right up until the time Voyager had rescued him.
        It seemed the terrorists had been after information about
Voyager's phaser banks and photon torpedoes, trying to improve their
own stock of weapons.  Tom hadn't budged, and as a result of his
stubbornness--and of the alien's fury--Tom had almost no chance of
living whatsoever.
        As of yet, he was still in surgery with the doctor doing the best
he could to patch up most of his body--or what was left of it.  The
doctor had told B'Elanna that Tom's prognosis wasn't very promising. 
All she could do was wait--and hope.
        She was waiting and hoping with all her might, but the hours of
anxiety and fear were quickly taking their toll on her.  She hadn't been
able to deal with Katy's temper tantrum; thank the gods the captain had
come when she did or B'Elanna might have burst into tears right then
and there.  Usually she had no problem calming Katy down, mainly
because her daughter's temper was exactly like her own, but today she
just couldn't face it.  B'Elanna now had an overwhelming sympathy for
her mother's experiences raising her temperamental daughter.  And
L'Terra Torres hadn't even had a loving husband like Tom Paris to help
her.
        And maybe B'Elanna wouldn't, either.  The thought brought
tears welling into her eyes, and she wiped them away with her hand lest
Katy suddenly wake up and see her mother crying.  The last thing the
child needed was more unhappiness.
        "B'Elanna?  Are you all right?"  a tentative voice whispered
from the doorway.  
        B'Elanna smiled through her tears.  Chakotay.  He had insisted
on sleeping on the couch tonight, just to be near in case she or Katy
needed something.  He was such a good friend.  She didn't know what
she'd do without him.
        "I'm fine," she called back softly.  Standing up, she dropped one
last kiss on her little girl's forehead before tiptoeing out of the room.
        "How's she doing?"  Chakotay asked in his quiet way.
        "She cried herself to sleep," B'Elanna sighed, dropping into the
same chair Katy had occupied just an hour before.  She picked up the
PADD and glanced at it for a moment, grinning slightly.  "Has Kathryn
been teaching her multiplication again?"
        Long ago, shortly after Katy's birth, Captain Janeway had
ceased to be "the captain" and had become Kathryn--at least, off duty. 
On the bridge it was still the formal "Captain Janeway" or "ma'am", but
off duty she insisted that she be called Kathryn.
        "We're a family now," she had declared after Katy, the third
child on board Voyager, had been born.  "Families don't call each other
by titles."  So, despite Tuvok's obvious displeasure at this breaching of
protocol, Captain Janeway had become Kathryn to everyone.  The
transition had been awkward for everyone but Chakotay, but eventually
they adapted to the change, and now the name was so familiar B'Elanna
barely thought about it anymore.
        "Katy's doing pretty well for a girl only three years old," 
Chakotay said with an obvious amount of pride.  "She's mastered the
multiplication table up to the sixes."
        "She's so bright,"  B'Elanna agreed with pride of her own.  "I
look into those big blue eyes of hers and I can just see the intelligence
in them."  She paused, slowly turning the PADD in her hands over and
over again.  "Her eyes are so much like Tom's.  I look at her and I can
see *him* staring out at me."  A tear slowly trickled down her pale,
wan face.  "And I'm so afraid..."
        "Afraid that she'll be all you have left of him?"  Chakotay
finished gently.
        B'Elanna nodded, not trusting herself to speak for fear the tears
would come rushing out.
        Chakotay enclosed her white, trembling hand his big, strong
brown one.  "We've been friends for a long time, B'Elanna,"  he said
sincerely.  "And you know that I can't bring myself to lie and tell you
not to worry because everything will be all right.  Because I know, and
you know, that it's a possibility that Tom may die."
        She nodded again.  "I know."  Her voice was barely above a
whisper.  "And then all I'll have left of him are my children."
        It took Chakotay a slight second to realize that she had used the
term in the plural sense.  "Yes, you'll always have Ka--"  He stopped in
the middle of his sentence and blinked, startled, as her words sunk in. 
"Did you say *children*?"
        B'Elanna managed a slight, wavery smile.  "I'm pregnant."
        "You are?"  Chakotay sat back, astounded.  "Did--does Tom
know?"
        For the third time, she nodded.  "We were going to tell Katy
tonight.  But now I--I don't know *what* to tell her.  I don't want her
to think that this baby is coming to replace Tom."
        "Don't worry about that,"  Chakotay said reassuringly.  "The
important thing is for you to rest and take it easy."  He was, B'Elanna
knew, referring to her pregnancy with Katy.  Early in her third month,
B'Elanna had come dangerously close to miscarrying, the unborn Katy
saved only by the doctor's expertise.  The hologram had immediately
put B'Elanna on an extremely light duty schedule with strict instructions
not to overwork herself, and six months later a strong and healthy
Kathryn Elise Paris had arrived, seemingly unscathed by her slight
brush with death.
        "Believe me, I will,"  B'Elanna said emphatically.  "This baby is
more precious to me than all the dilithium in the Alpha Quadrant.  As
for Katy--Chakotay, I never believed in angels until she was born."  She
paused to look lovingly at her daughter's bedroom door.  ""And Tom. 
Oh, gods, Chakotay.  Do you have any idea at all what's it's like to love
someone with your whole heart and soul and mind?"
        Chakotay thought of a certain redhead who was very dear to
him.  "Yes.  Yes, I think I do."
        "Then you know how much I love him.  And how much I'm
missing him right now."  Her eyes filled up with tears.  "And how much
I'll miss him if he dies."
        "I know."  Chakotay didn't know what to say to comfort her, so
he didn't try.  "Look," he said simply, "why don't you go to bed and get
some rest.  You're tired, and it's been a long day.  I'll be right here if
you need me."
        B'Elanna smiled at him.  "Thank you, Chakotay.  I honestly
don't know what I'd do without you."
        He grinned bashfully.  "Go to bed, Lieutenant.  That's an order."
        "You'll call me immediately if--?"
        "I promise.  Good night, B'Elanna."
        "Good night.  And thank you.  For everything."
        "You're welcome.  Now go to bed."
        "Yes, sir."  And she went.

*****************************************************************************

Remember, send your feedback to pt4ever@yahoo.com!

Copyright 1997 by JoAnna Walsvik.  All rights reserved and most of the
lefts, too. :)  Archive, distribute, etc. to your heart's content, but
leave my name and the disclaimer attached.


                        Love and other indoor sports,
                                =/\= JoAnna
                                Official Parisite
                                Star Trek: Voyager