Deanna sighed as the door to his bedroom hissed closed. And Will thought taking the day off would be relaxing?

  "Hmm," Tom hummed in amusement. "Maybe I should be getting back. You seem to have your hands full."

  *****

  Captain Riker headed to Sickbay, dread dragging at his heels. Dr. Bashir was finished examining the former prisoners and requested to see him immediately. When he arrived, he found Julian and Ezri talking in the doctor's office.

  "They're going to need extensive counseling," she was saying from her perched position at the corner of Julian's desk.

  "They need to recover physically first," her husband stressed. "They're malnourished, except for the children. It's clear they all sacrificed to keep those kids healthy. And most of the adults have injuries that weren't treated at sometime or another. Some of them need reconstructive surgery."

  Dax nodded in agreement. The Maquis prisoners had suffered under Cardassian imprisonment. Greatly.

  "Did you find out how long they've been there?" Will interrupted.

  The two doctors startled and stood up quickly. "Captain!" Will waved his hand dismissively.

  "Sit down," he snapped. A covert looked passed between the couple as they retook their seats. Will flung himself into one of Julian's chairs. "So?" he asked again.

  "Some of them have been there more than ten years," Ezri told him quietly. She didn't have to say who, Will knew. "Others just since the war ended."

  "How long have they been there alone?"

  "About six months, from what Tom Riker told us," she replied. "The guards left without warning, destroying all the food replicaters and taking anything else that the prisoners could have used off the planet with them."

  Riker swore harshly.

  "They managed to get two of the food replicaters working and a small transmitter, but...," she trailed off.

  "Two replicaters to feed one hundred and eighteen people isn't enough with their limited power," Will finished.

  "No," Ezri agreed in a whisper.

  "The bastards couldn't even kill them humanely!" Riker stood up, his fists clenched tightly at his sides. "Left them all to starve to death. Even the children."

  Julian and Ezri said nothing. What could they say? He was right. Anyone could see it.

  "Arrange for their medical and emotional needs, Counselor," the captain instructed tersely. "No reports to Command about this, however. I want this kept on the ship for now, understand?" he asked them both.

  "Yes, Sir," they responded, again exchanging a covert glance.

  "Dr. Bashir," Will addressed the other man. "If I remember correctly, you have some pretty impressive contacts in the Cardassian government."

  "Yes, Captain," Julian nodded. He and Garak still maintained a close friendship. Well, as close as you could through interspace channels.

  "Can you trust him?" Riker wanted to know.

  He thought about this for a moment. "I believe so."

  "Good. Find out what you can. Use a secure channel. I don't want this off the ship just yet. Command was too quick to order me back when we first got the distress signal. I have the feeling they knew about this."

  "Yes, Captain."

  "We have a Senior Staff meeting at oh nine hundred, that gives you eighteen hours, Doctor. I want to know what the Cardassian government has to say about this before then." And with that, he turned on his heel and stalked from Sickbay.

  Ezri shook her head when the doors hissed closed behind the captain's rapidly retreating figure. "That is one angry man," she observed.

  "Yeah," Julian agreed. "I wouldn't want to be the next person he runs into."

  *****

  "Computer!" Riker snapped as he strode through the corridor. "Locate Ro Laren."

  "Ro Laren is on Deck Five, Section Eleven."

  Will spun around and headed for the turbolift. "Deck Five," he barked when he got there.

  Laren was walking straight for him when he rounded the first corner on Deck Five. She stopped and met his angry gaze head on, her head tilting up defiantly. Will gritted his teeth.

  "We need to talk," he ordered.

  She hesitated a moment. Tom had told her she wasn't to speak to his double without him present. Then again, Tom Riker may be her husband, but he didn't have the right to dictate to her. The captain was right, they did need to talk.

  "Yes, Captain Riker, we do," she told him steadily.

  "You're going to be court-martialed. You know that, don't you?"

  "Of course. I would expect nothing less from Starfleet."

  "You make it sound personal, Ro," he said silkily. "You are guilty of treason and desertion. Starfleet has every right...."

  "I asked to be relieved of duty, Captain Riker," she told him quietly.

  Will's head snapped back in shock.

  "You're lying!" he accused.

  "Am I?" She shrugged. "Ask Picard."

  Will reached forward and grabbed her arm. "Captain Picard wouldn't have sent you back if you'd asked to be relieved!"

  "Get your hands off her, Will," Tom Riker demanded angrily, stalking down the corridor.

  "Stay out of this, Tom," Will growled. "You don't know...."

  Tom walked steadily toward them, gently pulled Laren from Will's grasp and placed himself between them.

  "You're the one who doesn't know," he told his double. "I won't let you use her again. She's been through too much."

  "Tom," Laren began. "It's all right. Captain Riker wasn't the one...."

  "Dammit, Laren! I can't believe you're actually defending them! After all that happened!"

  "It was -my- choice, Tom. Just as it was yours. We -chose- the Maquis. No one did anything to us."

  "Picard -used- you! There's no excuse for that! You begged to be relieved. You told him you couldn't do it and he didn't -care-! He didn't give a damn about you. The only thing that mattered was the mission."

  "She was a Starfleet Officer!" Will asserted. "It was her duty. She betrayed us."

  "And, of course, Starfleet never betrayed us," Tom retorted sarcastically. "Never denied us the right to be heard when this all started. Never refused to listen to us when we -knew- the Cardies wouldn't keep the treaty. Never turned us into criminals when we only fought for freedom."

  "The Federation Council...."

  "Was bought and sold to the highest bidder, and you damn well know it!" Tom ground out. "I won't get into this with you, Will. Stay away from my wife. Stay away from me. When we reach DS9 you can wash your hands of us and keep your illusions. I won't defend myself to you. You should be defending yourself to me."

  With that, Tom took Laren's hand and led her down the hall to their quarters.

  *****

  "I think there are too many Toms running around this ship, it's getting confusing," Commander Paris said, leaning against the door jamb.

  Tom Riker grinned, meeting the other man's gaze.

  "What can I do for you, Commander?" he asked.

  "Got a minute?"

  "I seem to have several," Riker replied grimly. "Want to walk?" he asked, gesturing toward the hallway outside his quarters. He didn't want to disturb Laren and Marissa.

  "Sounds good to me."

  They headed out side-by-side. It was late and the corridor was deserted. A comfortable silence was enjoyed for a moment before Paris spoke.

  "You're not going to tell him what really went on, are you?" he asked the former Starfleet lieutenant.

  Riker stiffened. "Tell who, what?"

  "The only reason Will doesn't realize what took place ten years ago is because he's too blinded by his anger. Once he takes a breath and actually -thinks- about all this, he's going to figure it out."

  "You give him too much credit, Commander. He never did understand what this was really all about. He never will."

  "Tom," Paris stopped walking to face him. "If Will Riker can learn to accept -me-, I think you can manage to convince him your reasons were valid."

  "Maybe, I don't want to," he replied. "Maybe it's better he doesn't know. He's finally got what he worked his whole life for. If he knew the truth, he might risk that to be noble."

  "And maybe that's for him to decide."

  The guest quarters they'd been given were quiet when he returned. Marissa slept soundly in the second bedroom while her parents got ready for bed themselves. Laren dropped her newly replicated robe onto a nearby chair and crawled into the large bed, calling for the computer to turn down the lights.

  "How are you doing?" Tom Riker asked his wife when she'd finally settled down next to him. His arms automatically encircled her, pulling her into his warm embrace.

  Laren smiled sadly into the night. "It's difficult," she admitted. "I served with so many of these people and they all hate me for betraying Picard like I did."

  "Especially Will," he growled.

  "Captain Riker and I never really got along anyway, Tom," she reminded him.

  Tom chuckled softly. "He never could reconcile the fact that he was attracted to you physically when he disliked you personally."

  Laren would have liked to deny that statement, but she couldn't. The one time when Will Riker and she knew each other without the baggage of who they were, they hadn't been able to fight that attraction. When their memories had been altered during an encounter with an alien race, none of the animosity between them had remained. It had been an enlightening encounter. And a frightening one, for both of them.

  "Does that bother you?" she asked.

  "No. Yes. Sometimes," Tom sighed. "I don't want it to, but it does," he revealed. "It's really no different than me and Deanna, though. I think what bothers me isn't the fact that you were with him, it's the fact that he and I share -everything-! Right down to the women in our lives."

  She nodded into his chest. "I understand."

  "I love you." He kissed the top of her head. "Only you."

  Laren lifted her head and smiled at him. "I love you too, Thomas Riker."

  "You know...." His large hands grabbed her hips. He rolled onto his back, bringing her with him. "I've never made love to you in a real bed." He grinned up at her.

  "Well," she drawled with a knowing smile. "We're just going to have to do something about that, aren't we?"

  Laren straddled his hips and sat up, drawing her nightgown up and over her head at the same time. It floated to the floor in a cloud of silver satin. His grin broadened. It had taken years for her to become truly comfortable with him and the physical side of their relationship. Every time she made love to him, he was amazed at what a strong person she was. Knowing what she'd been through, it wouldn't have surprised him if she'd never been able to get past it. But she had, with his help, and his love.

  Reaching up, he threaded a hand into the dark, silky hair that spilled over her shoulders and fell around them like a dark curtain. He drew her down, capturing her mouth with his, parting her lips and sliding inside to taste her.

  Then, everything was forgotten. There was no Maquis. No Starfleet. No Will Riker or Deanna Troi. Only they existed. Two hearts beating as one.

  *****

  "You know what, Will Riker?" his wife asked scathingly, dragging a hairbrush though her hair. "You are the most obstinate, stubborn man I have -ever- known! Can't you, for one minute, accept the possibility that Tom is right? That he had good reasons for doing what he did? That maybe -we- were wrong for backing Starfleet so strenuously?"

  "Deanna, I know there were reasons...but he betrayed us all by acting as he did. When he used who he was to steal the Defiant...it made -both- of us look bad."

  "Ahh," she sighed knowingly. "So that's what this is all about. You're still angry at him for being -you-!"

  "He's not me, dammit! -I- would never do what he did."

  Deanna looked at him for a long moment. "But that's the whole point, Will. You did do it, didn't you? For all intents and purposes, you and Tom are the same man. Only a few minor details are different. He is you. And it just drives you crazy to know that you are this close," she held up her two fingers just a fraction of a centimeter apart, "to doing what he did."

  "No!"

  "Yes! How is what he did any different that what we did during the Baku incident? It's not! We disobeyed direct orders from a Fleet Admiral. We used the Enterprise to carry out Picard's plan when it was in violation of our orders. The only difference is...we were hailed as heroes because it worked. Tom was painted as a criminal because his plan didn't."

  "And what about this morning, Will?" she continued softly. "Did you or did you not disobey a direct order from Command to cease and desist with the search and rescue?"

  "You know," Will scowled. "You sound an awful lot like your mother when you use that tone."

  "Hmm," Deanna hummed, seemingly unfazed by the insult. "Speaking of Mother," she said lightly. "She's coming to visit next month. Wants to spend some time with me and the boys."

  Will groaned and fell back on his bed, flinging an arm over his eyes, as if to block out what she'd just told him. Maybe that was the approaching evil Q was trying to warn him about this morning.

  Deanna chuckled at the her husband's unguarded thought.

  *****

  B'Elanna smiled at the image in front of her. K'Leena had crawled into bed with them sometime in the middle of the night. She was curled up against Tom's back and he was half off the bed, his arm resting on the nightstand with one leg hanging precariously close to the floor.

  Tom sensed he was being watched. Opening one eye, he met his wife's amused expression.

  "Comfy?" she asked.

  He smirked and rolled off the bed. K'Leena took his place immediately. Growling like a little bear, she snuggled deeper into the mattress.

  "You've got to stop letting her in the bed, Tom."

  "But she gets scared," he defended his daughter.

  B'Elanna snorted. "She gets cold, you big marshmallow. I don't know how you get any sleep on ten centimeters of bed."

  Tom grinned wickedly and pulled her into his arms. "You know what I always say: If you're not living on the edge...you're taking up too much room."

  His hands found her hips and he backed her up toward the bathroom.

  "Where are we going?" she asked with a sly smile.

  "I wanted to show you something," he leered.

  "In the bathroom?"

  "Uh huh." He dropped his mouth to hers and nibbled lightly. The washroom door swished closed behind them. She squeaked when he unexpectedly tightened his grip and lifted her to sit on the vanity. Her eyes met his.

  "A counter?" The tip of her tongue darted out to moisten her lips, sending desire throbbing straight through him. He moved closer, his hands firm as he parted her thighs so he could stand between them. She chuckled when he grasped her bottom and pulled her hard against his straining erection.

  "The counter is just an added bonus." He grinned, moving rhythmically against her. "The best thing about this room is...."

  "What?" she breathed against his hair-roughened chest, taking a nipple between her sharp teeth and biting down just a little. His breath hissed out. Dragging her head back, his lips roamed over the smooth skin of her throat.

  "Computer," he rumbled against her heated flesh. "Lock the door."

  *****

  When Commander Paris arrived on the bridge for his duty shift, he was more than a little surprised to find three Federation Security Officers standing guard. His questioning look to the captain brought a sigh from the other man.

  "In my Ready Room, Commander," he ordered. To anyone else, the command sounded rather ordinary, almost as if the captain was bored with the new developments. To Paris, however, the barely restrained fury in the captain's voice was more than evident. He followed Riker into the other room without delay.

  "What the hell are they doing here?" Paris asked the second the door hissed closed behind him. Will didn't even bother to sit down at his desk. He spun around, raking a hand through his hair.

  "The minute we docked at DS9 this morning, they were waiting. More than twenty officers. We are to remain here at the station until Admiral Dyneb arrives.

  "When's he getting here?"

  "Two weeks."

  Tom's jaw clenched. "What's going to happen to the prisoners?"

  "For now," Riker sighed. "They will remain in quarters on board the Enterprise. They will have access to DS9 and the ship, but they cannot leave."