Part 38 (1/2)
”Consider it kept.” She leaned back. ”So... did you come here to discuss everything except what you really want to discuss?”
”And what might that be?”
”Us.”
He let out a slow breath. She waited for him to speak.
”I don't know what's going to happen with us,” he said. ”I saw what my life was like without you... saw what I developed into. I can't say I like it very much. But... that was when you had been pulled from my life completely. We could continue in the way that we are now, and as long as you're there to be friend, confidant... soul mate... things could work out well for both of us.”
”I see what you're saying,” Deanna said slowly. ”Of course, on the other hand, if we become... or go back to being... lovers... things could work out even better for us.”
”Or worse,” he pointed out.
”Or worse,” she acknowledged.
He shook his head. ”I feel so ridiculous. Do we really have to wait forty years until we're ready to take a chance on the two of us?”
”No, Will”-she smiled-”we just have to wait until we're ready. It might take forty years. Or who knows? It might take forty days. We have to wait and see. But at least we have a chance. It's up to us how we use it.”
He nodded and then said, ”Oh... by the way... I made something for you. It's only an approximation, of course, based on my memories... memories which were filled, at the time, with the sight of a particularly nubile young maid of honor and her magnificent figure.”
Her face colored slightly. ”Will, what are you talking ahout?”
He brought his hand from behind his back. In it was a thin, white, gauze headband.
She stared at it, uncomprehendingly at first. But their she understood. ”That's... that's like the one Chandra wore!”
”So I did make it close enough so that it's recognizable, Good. Um... if you wouldn't mind turning your head...”
She angled her head around and he looped it around and back, pulling her hair through. She stood and presented herself for inspection. ”How does it look?”
”As beautiful as the woman wearing it.”
She felt her emotions turning to melted b.u.t.ter, and she went to him. He enveloped her in his arms, and their lips came together....
And for a long moment, all the confusion and complexity of their lives fell away, and they were once again the young man and woman hungering for each other; the couple shyly learning about one another and exploring the things that each of them lacked and each of them provided; the new lovers in the jungle, intoxicated with their environment and each other; she was the woman whose life he'd saved, and he was the man whose life she had made.
And they had all the time in the universe...
CHAPTER 44.
Mary Mac watched in astonishment as four people emerged from the swirling vortex of the Guardian of Forever: Admiral Riker, Commodore Data, Lieutenant Blair, and one more form that tumbled forward, clearly unconscious.
She went to them, rolling the body over to get a better look and confirm what she had thought. ”This... this is Mar Loc!”
Data looked at her, his head tilted. ”The scientist whom you said had departed?”
She nodded in silent amazement.
And then the Guardian spoke, in that vast and all-encompa.s.sing way that it had: ”All is... as it was.”
Data turned to face the Guardian. ”You mean that Admiral Riker did indeed restore the time line to its original form?”
”All is as it was,” repeated the portal.
And now Blair stepped forward, his long fur swirling. ”For crying out loud,” he shouted, ”if you knew that time had been tampered with in the first place, and you knew that the admiral's actions were correct... then why in h.e.l.l didn't you tell us that?!”
With utter serenity, the Guardian replied, ”You did not ask.”
There was dead silence, except for the howling of the wind, for about ten seconds. And then Blair managed to get out, ”We didn't ask?”
Riker started to laugh.
”We didn't ask!” Blair sounded positively outraged. ”You mean everything we went through, all the difficult decisions we had to make, all the... we didn't ask!”
”We didn't,” said Data in quiet amazement. ”That was very foolish of me. In my determination to uphold the Starfleet imperative of noninterference with time, I...”
And Riker, who had managed to calm himself down sufficiently, said, ”What you did, Data, is forget the very first duty of Starfleet... something that I started thinking about when I was spending time with Capt. Wesley Crusher, and remembering the hard lesson he learned back in his Academy days. The duty that supersedes all the imperatives and directives...”