Only Human by Alara Rogers  
  
Part III: Yamato  
  
With minor revisions to the parts posted before, here is all of  
Only Human Chapter III. 
  
Paramount owns Q and the universe; I own the original characters. 
No copyright infringement is intended.  Not to be sold for profit.   
 
ONLY HUMAN (for those who haven't caught the story thus far) is an  
alternate universe, based on the premise that Q lost his powers for  
good in "Deja Q."  In exchange for protection, he offered the  
Federation the benefit of his advanced knowledge, and was transferred  
to Starbase 56.  Three years later, miserable beyond endurance, Q  
attempted to kill himself.  
  
Dr. T'Laren, Vulcan xenopsychologist and former Starfleet counselor,  
turned up at this point, claiming that Starfleet had hired her as Q's  
therapist.  In fact, it turned out that she was really hired by the Q  
Continuum, in the person of the Q who got Q thrown out, whom T'Laren  
refers to as Lhoviri.  T'Laren persuaded Q to accept her help and  
allow her to counsel him through his depression.  To that end, they  
left Starbase 56 on T'Laren's ship Ketaya-- a gift from Lhoviri, with  
some surprising capabilities-- and headed for the starship Yamato,  
which was currently hosting a physics conference.  
  
Over the course of the past weeks of travel, Q has come to trust  
T'Laren, more or less, though they've had some knock-down-drag-out  
fights in the process.  At the end of Part II, Q decided that he no  
longer wanted to die.  Part III details 's adventures at the scientific  
conference aboard the Yamato, T'Laren's problems as her  
somewhat shady past comes back to haunt her in the forms of her  
young sister-in-law and her former lover, and the ups and downs  
of Q and T'Laren's relations with one another.  Section 14 also  
deals explicitly with sexual themes, though I consider it suitable  
for teens and mature Congresspersons (like Patrick Leahy, who  
opposed the CDA.)  
  
Note that elements of this chapter and previous ones contradict 
the Voyager episode "The Q and the Grey."  I remain convinced 
that my version of the Continuum is more interesting than the 
vision we were presented with in that episode, and so I have not 
revised to fit that episode, as it's too stupid to be canon. :-) 
 
Parts I - III are all available at the following sites: 
 
FTP: 
 
ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/al/aleph/startrek 
ftp://ftp.europa.com/outgoing/mercutio/alt.fan.q 
ftp://aviary.share.net/pub/startrek/tng 
 
Web: 
 
http://www.europa.com/~mercutio/Q.html 
http://aviary.share.net/~alara 
http://www1.mhv.net/~alara/ohtree.html 
 
Send comments to aleph@netcom.com. 
             *                   *                    *   

	This whole trip was in some ways proving to be a burden on 
T'Laren.
	The issue of Tris and Sovaz' presence was one thing, of course, 
but that wasn't the truly burdensome thing.  And Q himself was not the 
problem-- she expected him to be difficult.  But when he wasn't with 
her, which was a good portion of the time, she was bored.
	Oh, she could read, or exercise-- she had begun taking a Security 
training class in bodyguarding, since she was still certain that Q 
would do better if it were just him and her, without the added 
complication of a hired bodyguard or any other additional personnel, 
and that was something to do.  But it didn't take up a majority of her 
time without Q.  T'Laren was a fairly social being, and being in a 
place where her only friends were her patient, her ex-lover and 
possibly her former sister-in-law was taking its toll.  When she had 
been in Starfleet, there had always been friends to converse with, 
patients to see, paperwork to do.  Being alone on a starship, with 
nothing to do but work with Q and nothing to do at all when he was 
doing his own work, was leaving her far too much time to think about 
other things, like how utterly she'd ruined her life since the last 
time she'd been on a starship.
	She refused to think about that.  So T'Laren spent a fair degree 
of time meditating and a fair degree of time wandering aimlessly 
through the areas of the ship that civilians had authorized access to.  
This naturally meant she spent a good deal of time in Ten-Forward, 
chatting with total strangers and soaking up the starship ambiance.  
She had missed Starfleet more than she'd realized, and being here and 
not belonging was painful. 
	Today when she wandered into Ten-Forward, right about the time for 
late lunches, she felt a subliminal sense of discomfort immediately.  
Slowly, pretending there was nothing wrong, she scanned the room, her 
eyes roving over all the patrons... and finally alighted on the source 
of the problem.  Sovaz and four other Vulcans were sitting near the 
window, discussing physics animatedly.  T'Laren turned and started to 
walk back out, without acknowledging them.
	One of them called, a voice pitched to carry over the crowd's 
noise only if one had Vulcan ears.  "Dr. T'Laren!  Join us?"
	At this point it would be terribly ungracious to refuse.  Not 
quite sighing, T'Laren walked over to the table.  "You wished to speak 
to me, Doctor?" she asked neutrally.
	"As we are all possessed of doctorates here, perhaps we should 
exchange names.  I'm T'Para.  This is Stamor, and Soltan, and Toral, 
and of course you are acquainted with Sovaz," the woman said.  "You are 
welcome to join us, if you wish." Her tone of voice was one that humans 
would have found blandly unrevealing, but that T'Laren recognized as 
friendliness.  "It can be difficult to be isolated from one's own 
people for a significant length of time."
	"Your offer is gracious," T'Laren said.  "But I've learned from 
talking to Q that my ability to follow a discussion of physics is very 
limited."
	"We're discussing Federation politics, however, so I'm sure you 
would have as much to contribute as any of us," the woman persisted.  
	The others at the table were literally unreadable-- even T'Laren 
couldn't tell if they were made uncomfortable by the physicist's 
forwardness, or if they genuinely wanted T'Laren to join them.  They 
were probably curious, she thought, forcing down anger-- a Vulcan 
clinical xenopsychologist was as rare to Vulcans as to anyone else, and 
they probably wondered how badly her discipline would have to be 
impaired in order to want to be in her profession, let alone succeed at 
it.  "Regretfully I must decline," T'Laren said.  "I've lived in a 
certain amount of isolation for the past several months, and have very 
little knowledge of current Federation politics."
	"Indeed?"  Soltan raised an eyebrow.  "We are undoubtedly ill-
informed compared to many, so this isolation may not be a difficulty.  
Have you been working with Q all this time?"
	The question was, for a Vulcan, slightly rude-- but forgivable in 
an ivory tower academic, whose social skills were not his area of 
specialty.  Sovaz was hardly the only socially inept Vulcan scientist, 
though she was a rather extreme example.  "I have been concerned with 
my own recovery for considerable time," T'Laren replied evenly.  
"Undoubtedly Sovaz has told you I suffered from mental unrest for some 
time.  I have been engaged in study and meditation to restore my 
equilibrium."  That would shut them up.  No Vulcan would pry into the 
details of another Vulcan's mental illness, or a retreat to recover 
mental health.  And it was not a lie.  There was no better way to 
describe the months she'd spent with Lhoviri.
	"Your pardon.  No offense was intended."
	"I would certainly not take any.  Has the conference taken a 
recess for lunch?  I would wonder where Q is."
	"We called a recess," Sovaz said.  "Nothing productive was getting 
done-- Q and Dr. Yalit were calling each other names, and various other 
people were taking sides.  It was really incredibly disruptive."
	T'Laren's heart sank.  "What sort of names?"
	"In essence, he called her a Ferengi," T'Para said dryly.  "Are 
the details necessary?"
	"This is exactly the sort of thing I'm working with him to stop.  
A bit more detail would be of use."
	"He claimed that she had no business at the conference, because 
she had spent most of her research on profit-making instead of the 
disinterested pursuit of knowledge," T'Para said.  "He then added that 
she had supported herself through prostitution while at the 
Makropyrios, an assertion whose factual basis is suspect at best."
	"Actually, that's entirely in keeping with what we know of Ferengi 
society," Sovaz said.  "I spoke to a Ferengi at length once, and he 
implied that among his people, the exchange of female sexual services 
for money is the norm."
	"Yes, it's highly unlikely Yalit would consider that demeaning, so 
long as she was highly paid," Soltan said.  
	"Where is he now?" T'Laren asked.
	"In theory, he and Dr. Markow were going to have a discussion over 
lunch," Toral said.  "In practice, since he was still arguing with 
Yalit when we left, it's difficult to tell where he might be at the 
moment."
	"I'll locate him," T'Laren replied.  "My thanks for your 
assistance."
			*				*				*
	In fact, she didn't locate Q at the conference, as she'd planned.  
He had, apparently, finally taken off for lunch break.  Not that she 
could have done much, aside from attempt to break up any ongoing 
arguments-- it wasn't as if she could take Q aside and chew him out in 
public.  She would have to wait until after the conference for that.  
	Q showed up around 2000 hours, seeming obscenely cheerful-- 
probably because he had gotten to tear someone apart today, T'Laren 
thought, annoyed.  How did he expect to ever make positive connections 
with people when he spent all his time in groundless personal attacks?  
"What happened between you and Dr. Yalit today?" she asked.
	Q looked startled.  "What, have you got a network of spies?"
	"The Vulcan contingent of the conference apparently decided that 
there were far more productive things that could be done with their 
time than to listen to you and Yalit argue, and went to lunch.  I met 
them in Ten Forward, and they told me how you were spending your time."  
	Q shrugged.  "I was engaged in a power struggle."  He smiled 
ferally.  "I won."
	"A power struggle?  Exactly what sort of power are we talking 
about?"
	"The power to be taken seriously by our fellows, what else?" Q 
flopped down on one of the chairs.  "She impugned the accuracy of my 
work in general, so I pointed out that she really had no business being 
here, given that she'd spent all her energies on profit-making and 
little on science."
	"And that she was a prostitute at the Makropyrios?" T'Laren asked 
dryly.
	"Oh, that was beautiful.  I couldn't have *invented* something 
more perfectly designed to play to the parochial prejudices of ivory 
tower academics.  They might have forgiven her for spending all her 
time on her family business and her inventions-- one expects that of 
Ferengi-- but they'll never forgive her for whoring."
	"Why not?  Isn't that also expected of Ferengi?"
	"Of *female* Ferengi.  Who are considered to be fairly mindless.  
I don't know about the humans you say still engage in the profession-- 
I'm sure they aren't doing it to put themselves through the 
Makropyrios-- but nearly every developed race in this quadrant 
perceives an inverse relationship between the willingness of a being to 
sell their nether regions and the value of their minds.  Prostitution 
is just not something a scientist *does*.  Maybe a businesswoman could 
be forgiven, but not a scientist, who's not supposed to be a slave to 
the profit motive in the first place."  He grinned more widely.  "Then, 
after Markow managed to get the meeting back on track, she accused *me* 
of being obsessed with sex because I was too ugly to get a woman.  I 
hadn't said a thing to provoke her in twenty minutes-- it looked like 
she was so insecure she had to restart a childish argument just because 
she hadn't had the last word, *and* I'm so much better looking than a 
Ferengi that she essentially shot herself in the foot.  I mean, even 
*Klingons* prefer humans to Ferengi-- they think we're milquetoasts, 
but Ferengi are pond scum, or something.  It was wonderful.  She 
totally destroyed herself."
	"Wonderful?"  T'Laren raised an eyebrow.  "One might wonder about 
your priorities."
	"My priorities are protecting myself, T'Laren."  He looked at her, 
hard.  "You don't get it, do you?  She was trying to undercut my 
authority.  I told you this morning-- without my authority, I'm dead."
	"And I told *you* the Federation will hardly throw you out for one 
failure."
	"No, I agree.  They won't.  But if my reputation is damaged 
amongst the top Federation physicists-- some of these people advise the 
ones who pay for my upkeep, you know, and if they decide that all of my 
work needs to be audited for accuracy-- do you have any idea how much 
effort that would take?  And how badly it would damage the Federation's 
confidence in me?  My work is the one area where my reputation is 
unassailable-- I may be considered a social cripple, a coward, and a 
weakling, obnoxious, arrogant and self-centered, but I'm also as close 
to omniscient as a human gets.  If people's confidence in that is 
shaken, I don't *have* much else."  His expression had grown darker as 
he spoke, almost accusatory, as if any opposing opinion from T'Laren 
was a declaration that he should lose what little power he had.  "I'll 
do what it takes to protect that, and enjoy myself doing it.  I'm sure 
warrior races get a big thrill out of beating on each other to protect 
their positions-- well, *I* evolved for verbal combat, and I'm 
remarkably talented at it, if I do say so myself.  Now, not only will 
Yalit likely keep her mouth shut, but LeBeau and Christian and Morakh 
and all the other people who like to make cheap shots at me will likely 
think twice before taking me on."
	"Or they'll attack you physically.  Q, don't you realize that 
nobody else but you thinks that verbal combat is the ultimate form of 
self-protection?  Since you defeated them so thoroughly there, they'll 
find some other arena to assail you on.  Perhaps Yalit can't physically 
attack you, but what would you do if she accused you of attacking her?"
	"Explain that she's a liar, of course."
	"She's an old woman, and very small.  And she's also quite 
wealthy, and must have considerable connections on her homeworld.  
Despite your opinion of Ferengi, they are perfectly capable of 
deviousness.  And money and deviousness is a dangerous combination."
	Q waved a hand dismissively.  "Yalit won't dare come after me.  
She knows what I can do, now."
	"What *can* you do, aside from damage her reputation?"
	"Well, that's enough, for a scientist."
	"But as you yourself pointed out, Yalit is as much a businesswoman 
as a scientist.  And at her age, she may feel that her reputation is 
well enough established to be unassailable... or that you may be able 
to damage her reputation beyond repair, and that she must strike to 
prevent you from doing that.  A woman who's succeeded in becoming a 
physicist, despite not being legally permitted to wear clothes, handle 
money or learn to read, is by definition a formidable individual.  You 
have never encountered the kind of obstacles Yalit must have, and you 
have no way of knowing how those obstacles must have shaped her."
	"What can she do, hire assassins to try to kill me?"  He grinned 
sardonically.  "Like that hasn't been tried before.  I doubt anything 
Yalit could throw at me would be any more successful than attacks 
planned by far more advanced races."
	"I wasn't actually expecting anything so melodramatic... but it 
*could* come to that."
	"I'm not awfully concerned with it."
	"You should be," T'Laren said sharply.  "You're concerned with 
protecting yourself, but the only arena you can see is that of verbal 
interaction and status struggles.  Q, among many humanoid races, 
bright, witty clever children still end up being beaten up by the far 
less intelligent classroom bully.  When you demonstrate to people that 
they can't beat you on your terms, they'll shift to another playing 
field, one where you're far weaker.  It makes far more sense to avoid 
making enemies in the first place."
	"And so I should turn the other cheek, is that it?  That's 
essentially the best way to get smacked around, you know.  I don't 
believe in turning a blind eye when people are attacking me--"
	"I'm not arguing that you should.  I'm saying that you should 
avoid needlessly antagonizing people.  You made Yalit into an enemy by 
attacking her when she first came aboard.  It's hardly unreasonable 
that she would seek to humiliate you in return.  Of the others you 
mention, Dr. Christian-- she's the one whose son was on the 
*Enterprise* when you sent it against the Borg, isn't she?"
	"Yes."
	"I think she's the only of your enemies at this conference that 
you could not have avoided making.  None of the others are put off by 
things you did as a Q-- they're all concerned with things you did 
relatively recently, to them personally.  *You* made them into enemies.  
And now you may justify protecting yourself all you wish, but you 
cannot overlook the fact that you caused them to attack you in the 
first place-- and if you retaliate every time they do, it is likely to 
spiral downwards and eventually develop into an enmity intense enough 
to be dangerous.  You've already learned what can happen, with LeBeau.  
Do you particularly want to be slapped in the face again?"
	"If she tries, I'll press charges."
	"What if Yalit slapped you?  No one would take that seriously 
enough to *let* you press charges, given her size."
	"Oh, I could probably nail her on some obscure Ferengi law that 
says that if a woman hits a man her male relatives have to pay him a 
hefty fine, or something."
	"That's not the point."  She looked at him carefully.  "Is any of 
this getting through?"
	Q shrugged.  "I won't go out of my way to make enemies, but I'm 
not here to win friends.  I'm here to entertain myself.  It's hardly my 
fault that people like Yalit insist on being so entertaining."
	"I begin to think you're a lost cause," T'Laren murmured.  "Do 
what you like-- I can't stop you.  But there *will* be consequences, 
and those consequences may be more than you can handle."
	"I deal with people trying to kill me on a regular basis.  I'd say 
there isn't much I can't handle."  He yawned ostentatiously.  "Now, 
considering that I got about three hours of sleep last night due to 
your interference, and I've had a very strenuous day, *I* am going to 
crash.  I'm sure we can continue this silly argument at some other 
point."
	"A wise idea," T'Laren said.  He'd proven his ability to go 
ridiculous hours without sleep during the Borg threat, but she was sure 
he shouldn't overtax himself when he was recovering from being at 
death's door less than two months ago.
			*				*				*
	T'Laren stayed out in the main room, reading, even though she 
could just as easily have gone to her own bedroom.  One of the things 
she tried to do when she had enough rooms to make it workable was to 
reserve her bedroom for sleep and meditation as exclusively as 
possible.
	It was close to two hours later when the door chimed.  Startled, 
T'Laren went to the door.  Who would be coming here at 2200 hours?
	One of the Vulcans from the conference-- Stamor, the extremely 
quiet man she'd met today-- was standing there.  "I regret to say Q has 
retired for the night," T'Laren said.
	"He is not the only one here I wished to talk to," Stamor said.  
"May I come in?"
	"Why did you wish to speak to me?"
	"It concerns Sovaz."
	Reluctantly she stepped back to let him in.  "What is your concern 
with Sovaz?"
	"You are her older sister, isn't that correct?"
	The irritation at having to deal with a fellow Vulcan at all came 
out in her voice just a bit more than she wished.  "I was married to 
Sovaz's elder brother by blood.  However, we are divorced."  The term 
in Vulcan actually meant "severed", with all the accompanying 
connotations of a broken social contract and the remains of family 
ties, like bleeding severed limbs.  There would be no need to explain 
to a fellow Vulcan the discomfort of the situation.
	"I see-- but you are nevertheless the closest she has to a female 
relative, here."  He took a calming breath-- not an overt one like a 
human would, but T'Laren could tell.  "I am interested in the 
possibility of bonding with her."
	T'Laren's knee-jerk reaction was that Sovaz was far too young for 
that.  But she *was* 27-- old enough to make a choice based on logic, 
too young still for hormones to cloud any bit of her decision.  Most 
Vulcans were bonded by their parents, at the age of seven, for reasons 
suiting the parents' purposes.  Since Vulcan's greater involvement with 
the Federation and the outside races, many Vulcans had rebelled against 
the notion of entering the most important lifetime contract they would 
ever make at the age of seven and the bidding of parents, without any 
of their own interests factored into the decision.  However, it was 
still considered wisest to bond before the hormonal changes that 
brought increased interest in sex, bonding and reproduction-- Vulcans 
could indeed feel physical desire, and a young person just beginning to 
experience that transformation would not be experienced enough with 
such desires to filter them out as well as other, more familiar desires 
could be.  And for obvious reasons, a man could not wait very long 
after the changes began before he needed to be bonded.  So it was a 
popular custom for unbonded Vulcans to bond at Sovaz's age, when they 
were mature enough mentally to make a logical decision based on their 
own interests and not their parents', and would not yet have to make 
the effort of factoring sexual desire out of their decision-making 
process.  This was the ideal age for Sovaz to bond, and by tradition, 
the person seeking the liaison had to discuss it with a female relative 
of the person they sought before they could pursue the hand.
	"I see."  T'Laren took a calming breath of her own.  "Well, it 
*is* a propitious age.  Might I ask how old you are?"
	"I am 34, so you see that my concern is urgent," Stamor said.  "I 
have put off my time with the new drugs and meditation, but I sense 
that their effectiveness is drawing to an end."
	That seemed a little odd, for a man to baldly admit that to a 
woman he had just met, and an unbonded woman at that.  Even Sovaz and 
Soram's parents hadn't been *that* liberal.  But then, T'Laren had 
never played the role of the *ba'shel*, the female advisor to a suitor, 
before, so perhaps it was common in that position.  
	"Why Sovaz?  She is not fully ripened yet.  For a man in your 
position, wouldn't it be better to take a wife who had ripened 
already?"  A woman who had fully undergone Vulcan puberty, and was 
sexually mature before her husband's first pon farr, was far more 
likely to be able to share the pon farr with him-- which was considered 
a mixed blessing at best, as sharing pon farr spared the woman the pain 
her husband's brutal need would otherwise cause, at the cost of making 
her share that maddening need and irrationality.  A woman who hadn't 
fully ripened-- whose physical body was sexually mature but whose brain 
was not yet producing the hormones that governed the fertility cycle-- 
might not be able to share a pon farr with her husband, and this was 
not considered desirable, as it was supposed to be entirely up to the 
woman what she chose to do.  Of course, a woman would factor that into 
account before choosing to bond with a man if she thought he would 
enter pon farr before she ripened.
	"Your position has merit, but I... I have searched long for a 
woman who would be my intellectual equal.  It is difficult to find an 
unbonded woman in the sciences who shows such promise already.  Sovaz 
is not as knowledgeable as one who had studied only the sciences and 
never entered Starfleet, but her breadth of knowledge allows her to 
show a talent for synthesis that would be very valuable."
	T'Laren nodded.  "Her family is highly intelligent.  Her brother 
Soram is a well-respected engineer in Starfleet whose designs have been 
incorporated into several of Starfleet's newest engines; her mother 
T'Rafi is a philosopher, and her father Sodar is a professor of 
political science at the Vulcan Academy of Science."
	Stamor nodded eagerly.  "So genetically it would be a good match.  
I myself come from a lowlier pedigree, but I believe my personal record 
as a scientist speaks for itself.  In addition, Sovaz is a Starfleet 
officer, and I believe Vulcan's future will come from its interaction 
with the Federation.  A Starfleet officer for a mother would prepare my 
children for a universe where interaction with other cultures will 
become more and more important.  And in terms of personality, our 
interests are similar and I believe we would be compatible."
	He did not add that he was sexually attracted to Sovaz, but if he 
was as old as he said he was, and not a hybrid, that had to be taking 
increasing importance in his life.  Hybrids with most species, 
including humans, entered pon farr late, despite the fact that humans 
themselves matured sexually far earlier than Vulcans did.  An ordinary 
male Vulcan, however, entered his first pon farr around age 28-30.  To 
put it off to 34 with drugs and meditation meant one would be suffering 
from the effects of an active, heightened libido signaling that one had 
ripened for years before that libido settled down into the seven-year 
cycle of pon farr.  It would be almost as bad as a human adolescence.
	T'Laren nodded.  "Your reasons seem logical.  I will consult with 
Sovaz as to whether she desires a suit, and we can make arrangements 
from there."
			*				*				*
	Despite feeling better about what had happened today, Q was still 
plagued by nightmares.  In his dreams, the other scientists turned on 
him, declaring that Yalit and LeBeau were right, and nothing he said 
could be trusted... and he couldn't convince them otherwise.  Picard 
was there, saying, "I knew we shouldn't give him a chance.  We were 
entirely too kind."  Anderson was nodding, saying, "If we're not 
getting sufficient return on our investment, I guess we'll have to boot 
him out."  And then he was, of all places, in a classroom, drawn from 
images from his study of Earth history and his exploration of Jean-Luc 
Picard's mind as well as the conference here and places he had been 
before he'd ever heard of Earth.  
	An old mentor stood in front of him, looking like Commodore 
Anderson and dressed like a 19th-century Terran schoolmarm, complete 
with ruler.  Since Q's human brain could no longer quite process the 
nonhuman senses the Q used to identify each other, his dreams tended to 
turn all his former people into mortals he knew now, but he always knew 
in the dream who they were supposed to be.  "What have I told you about 
linear thinking?"  She rapped his hands with the ruler.
	"It's not my fault!"  Q protested.  "You people made me a mortal!  
How can I help it?"
	"You're still supposed to be better than that.  *Think!*  How can 
something exist if it can't exist in nature?"
	And then he woke up, heart pounding, both from the fear the dream 
had evoked and the sudden revelation it had granted him.
	*How can something exist if it can't exist in nature?*
	Answer:  Someone had created it artificially.
	He stumbled to the bathroom and splashed water on his face.  
"Computer, open connection to Lt. Sovaz."
	There was a delay of a few seconds.  "Sovaz here," the girl's 
voice came, sounding a little less perky than usual.
	"Sovaz, this is Q.  Listen, if I wanted to get time-series 
astronomical data on the anomaly, dating back, oh, say a few hundred 
years or so, what observatories would I need to contact?"
	"The only data you'd be able to get would be what's available in 
the real-time spectrum," Sovaz said, sounding puzzled.  "If you need 
that data I can get it for you, but it will be limited."
	"That's fine.  If what I suspect is true, visible light and its 
relations will be all I need."
	"What do you suspect?" A bit of the perkiness was back.
	"I suspect the anomaly hasn't been around as long as it thinks it 
has.  What's our range?"
	"Federation space covers 310.3 light years, and we have reciprocal 
scientific agreements with the Klingons and several non-aligned races, 
which extends our range by an additional 93 light-years.  From here, we 
can get about 250 light years' worth of data, more if there happen to 
be exploration ships out beyond the border of Federation space.  In 
addition, there is a scientific outpost in the Gamma Quadrant, but I'm 
not sure their telescopes can perceive the anomaly at all."
	"Let's get the 250 years, then, and we'll only try the Gamma 
Quadrant if we absolutely must."
	"I'll meet you at your quarters, if that's agreeable to you.  
There may be other queries you need me for."
	Q grinned.  Just this once, he'd let the girl play the role of 
teenage sidekick.  
	
	T'Laren was out in the main room reading, which surprised Q, given 
the hour.  Though actually it wasn't *that* late, only 0120 hours; he'd 
gone to bed earlier than he usually did.  Even better-- Sovaz' presence 
always discomfited T'Laren, and after  her totally unwarranted attack 
on him earlier, Q would enjoy seeing that.  He went to the door just as 
it rang, and pressed the button to open it.
	That got T'Laren's attention.  She looked up.  "Sovaz?  Why are 
you here so late?"
	"Was I expected to arrive earlier?" Sovaz asked, in her best 
confused voice.  "I came as quickly as possible."
	"No, I was wondering why you are intruding on Q at this hour."
	"Because I invited her, T'Laren dearest," Q said, patiently, as if 
speaking to an idiot child.  "How's my data doing?"
	"I've sent queries to ten observatories and starships in the line 
of sight, one approximately every 25 light-years, with an alpha 
priority.  The closest data should be coming in within five minutes; 
the rest will take a bit longer depending on how many subspace relay 
stations the query needs to go through and how far apart those relay 
stations are."
	All sciences had been revolutionized by faster-than-light travel, 
for every species that discovered it, as warp drive or its equivalent 
permitted alien races to speak to and learn from one another, but 
physics and astronomy had gained an even larger boon.  Faster-than-
light communications and travel allowed one to get astronomical data 
over time periods by allowing one to outrun the light coming from a 
star one hundred, two hundred years ago, and observe it as if one were 
looking through a time machine. Of course, the only data that was 
available that way was realspace data-- subspace data couldn't be 
outrun with a warp drive-- but the ancients, limited to their own 
planets and to realspace data, had developed all sorts of wonderful 
techniques for learning things about the universe based on only the 
electromagnetic radiation that reached their planet.  
	"Sovaz, I must speak with you briefly," T'Laren said.  
	"I have a small amount of time," Sovaz replied.
	"Have you considered bonding yet?"
	"No, why?"
	"I have been approached as *ba'shel* by a man who seeks to bond 
with you.  Are you amenable to such a thing?"
	Q tapped his foot ostentatiously.  Did they need to discuss their 
silly reproductive rituals right now?
	Sovaz cocked her head slightly, then made a slight shrug-- the 
Vulcan equivalent of one of Q's dismissive waves.  "Talk to my parents.  
If they concur that it's a good match, I'll pursue it.  Right now I 
haven't time to concern myself with such things."
	"Haven't time?  Sovaz, the decision to bond, and who to bond with, 
is the most important decision you'll make in your life.  You owe it a 
bit more than 'Let my parents make the decision for me, I haven't 
time.'"
	"Why?  That is exactly how most people do it.  You wouldn't expect 
me to concern myself with the question if I had been bonded in 
childhood, so why do you expect me to concern myself with it simply 
because I was not?"
	"Because the whole point to not bonding you in childhood was to 
let you make that decision as an adult."
	"T'Laren, we *do* have some work to get done here," Q pointed out, 
"so if you'd just go away and leave Sovaz alone like a good little 
Vulcan..."
	"Talk to my parents.  If they agree the match would be good, I 
will consider the decision for myself.  I don't see why I should 
concern myself with a match they don't approve of, though, so I don't 
need to concern myself until they've screened him."  She turned back to 
Q.  "What other data will we need?"
	Just for a moment, he was tempted to needle her, or T'Laren, or 
both, about the conversation they'd just had-- mortal preoccupation 
with reproduction really *was* very amusing-- but he was on fire with 
his idea and he really didn't feel like wasting the time.  "Let's 
assemble everything we've already got and take a look at it."
	T'Laren looked at the two of them.  "Q, are you aware of what time 
it is?"
	"I can read a clock just as well as you, T'Laren.  Inspiration 
waits for no man.  Now go away and stop bothering me."
	She turned and went to her room without a word.  "Well.  That 
worked rather well," Q murmured to no one in particular, surprised she 
was being so docile about it.  
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