I Used to Have a Son

by Kath Tate

Disclaimer: Star Trek Voyager and its characters are the property of Paramount. This story is not meant to infringe upon the trademarks or copyrights of Paramount.

Kath's Notes:  This story popped into my head after Tom didn't get his message from his father.  I think it would have been very hard for the families and other loved ones who had mourned the Voyager crew to suddenly know the crew was alive -- but beyond reach.  I was also curious about what Tom's father might have been telling him in the message.  My apologies for any inconsistencies with the Paris character.   Nothing is meant to be canon; it is merely here for your enjoyment. =)

*****

I used to have a son.

Very sharp in my memory is the feeling of being a proud father of a boy. The day of his birth, his first cognizant look into my eyes, his first steps - they are all burned into my head as moments of pure joy. Too bad I didn't know it at the time. Or if I did, I didn't cherish them as I ought.

I was probably one of those obnoxious fathers who heralds his child's exploits to the stars, quite literally, boring the socks off of my colleagues in the process. Prominantly displayed in my office was a photograph of my family, my beautiful wife Evelyn, my beautiful son Thomas. The photograph changed, over the years, but the frame was the same and the location on my desk was the same. Only one, only them, only until I could no longer bear to look upon his face.

Tom was very much like his mother. She didn't think so, but I could see it. He certainly wasn't like me! Strange how the features I so loved in my wife could be the ones I so resented in my son. His seemingly easy going nature, his ready smile, his lack of cold ambition and drive. He was talented, he was focused, he was immensely capable. But he didn't seem to care too much about a career with Starfleet. It was just something to do; something to fill his days. Something that allowed him to fly.

Caldik Prime. When I heard of the casualties I remember looking to the photograph. His cocky grin and challenging eyes. He was going to live forever. Then I heard he'd survived, but others had not. It was relief tinged with sorrow.

Then the bitterness of a court martial. The disgrace brought to our name. I couldn't stand the looks I got, some with pity, some with disgust. I put the photograph away.

Evelyn was at her wits end with Tom. He didn't seem to have any direction without Starfleet and worse, he didn't seem to care that he had nothing to do with himself. Did he think he could live off his mother and me for the rest of his life? It was time for him to take control of things. She thought, and perhaps she still does, that I was too hard on him, that I turned him away from us. She doesn't understand that Tom made his own choice to leave.

It was Jacobs who brought us the news. I was grateful for that. I wouldn't have wanted Evie to hear about it over a comm link. Tom had disappeared in the DMZ and was presumed to have joined up with the Maquis terrorist group. What on earth had he been thinking? Was he trying to get himself killed? Couldn't he have considered what this would do to his mother?

Jacobs' assistant, a brash young man with shocking red hair, made the callous suggestion that if we'd known about Tom's plans we could have used him as a mole. Idiot! Wasn't he aware that Tom no longer served Starfleet and that was at Starfleet's request?

I used to have a son. Where is he now?

Evie went to the trial. I couldn't. I had too much work to do. She didn't plead with me to go, but I could tell she was disappointed. That sense of disappointment has never left her eyes.

Like a true mother's heart, Evelyn was glad that Tom was back, even if it meant he was in jail. She visited him in New Zealand regularly and once even asked me if I wanted to go. I told her Tom and I had nothing to say to each so there wasn't any point. She didn't ask again.

When Kathryn contacted me I was pleased to hear from her. She'd been a fine officer for me. She surprised me by mentioning Tom. Few people acknowledged him to me now. She had some crazy idea that Tom might be able to help her find a missing Maquis ship. I told her I didn't think Tom could find his own head if it wasn't attached to his shoulders. I remember her expression of surprise. I suppose it was expected, after all, she'd been one of the people I'd bored to tears with praise for Tom years earlier.

"He's a good pilot," she'd commented. "A good man."

I snorted.

"Good pilots don't kill people. Good men don't go to prison."

Her expression was closed then, but I could sense some of the same disappointment I got from Evie. It rankled me. Why was I the one feeling guilty when Tom was the convict?!

"Even good pilots make mistakes," she'd told me then. "And good men admit to them and face the consequences."

I didn't hear from Tom before he left for DS9 although he did contact Evie. I know she told him to come home when it was all over and I know that his response was "Why bother?". She blamed me for that too.

Ironically, or perhaps appropriately, it was Jacobs again who came out to the house to tell us the Voyager had been lost. She remained lost for several months until Starfleet changed her status. The crew, all of the crew including the Starfleet "observer," were missing and presumed dead.

There is a memorial at Starfleet command for all the ships lost. It is very nicely done. All the ships, with the crew's names, and the circumstances of their loss, are displayed on marble. On a sunny day it is very bright in there. Bright with the reflected light of so many lost souls.

Somehow, I got in the habit of walking up there on my lunch break and sitting there in the brightness, contemplating what was gone. His name, with no rank, was listed at the bottom. No explanation for his presence, no assignment identified. No need to mention that he was on parole for crimes of terrorism and was only there to help capture his former comrades in arms. The marble didn't have to tell me that. I told myself every day.

At Jacobs' retirement party I bumped into his new assistant. She was much prettier than the young ass who'd so coldly suggested Tom spy on the Maquis. Young, enthusiastic, intelligent - yes, Jacobs had a good staff. She was also pregnant, her hands resting now and again on her swollen belly.

"Do you have any children, Admiral?" she'd asked when she caught me noticing her unconcious gesture.

The question so startled me I didn't know how to reply. It had been a long time since anyone spoke of Tom to me.

"I used to have a son," I'd told her, gruffly. Fortunately, she left it at that.

There was a day when I reached out to touch the marble of the memorial, his tombstone, as if its coldness could somehow ease the feelings I had. And they were all angry, these feelings.

"Goddammit Tom! Why did you have to go and get yourself killed?! Don't you know what that did to your mother?! A series of spiralling downward events: pilot error, court martial, terrorism, prison ... *death*. Couldn't you do something RIGHT for a change?!"

I used to have a son that I loved more than my own life. Now the mere mention of his name brings bitterness to my soul.

I was in my office when the news came. Just by coincidence Evie was there as well, trying to coax me to take her to lunch. How could I go to lunch when I had so much work to do? How could I miss my walk up Memorial Hill?

"Admiral!" That same young officer, now a mother, burst into my office. Evie had left the door open. "We've just had a transmission from the Prometheus. Voyager is in the Delta Quadrant."

At first I really didn't know what she meant. Evie did. She turned a ghastly pale and leaned into my desk for support. I walked over to put my arms around her.

"What kind of nonsense is this?" I thundered at the poor lieutenant. She didn't even flinch.

"Sir! We just got a message via an alien communications network. Voyager is in the Delta Quadrant and has been trying to get home for the last four years."

"Tom," Evie was saying. "Tom..."

"That's why I came to see you. Tom Paris is amoung the crew. He's been given a field rank of Lieutenant junior grade."

I used to have a son. Where is he now? He who was lost is now found and yet, and yet, so far from home...

It seemed impossible for me to get my head around the idea that Tom is alive, that he's been alive all this time. The messanger from Voyager, their Emergency Medical Holographic program (extremely unusual way to send a message!) spoke very highly of Tom, saying that he was the senior conn officer and doubled as the ship's medic.

"Tom? Tom Paris? *My* Tom?" I'd asked. Perhaps there was another Tom on board. I knew there wasn't. I'd memorized those names engraved in the stone.

Evie shed tears of joy and sorrow but I was left feeling empty. Our son was alive, but beyond our reach. Barring some miraculous intervention, it was unlikely that we'd live to see him again.

Starfleet Command was sending messages back through the alien network. Evie had no message but this:

"Tell him I love him and I always will, and that when this is all over he should come home."

I sat at my desk a long time thinking about my message. There were many words I'd wanted to say to Tom, over the years. And many words that I wish I'd left unsaid. After a moment or two, I reached into my desk and from underneath some old briefing reports I pulled the photograph.

Same cocky grin and challenging eyes. But this photograph was more than ten years old, I suddenly realized. What had the experiences in the Delta Quadrant done to him? The image the EMH had given was of a responsible, hard working, well-liked, intelligent officer. I don't remember Tom in these terms. I remember a lazy, self-serving, rebellious, irresponsible youth with a smart mouth.

It suddenly hit me then. I have no memories of Tom beyond his teenage years.

What had happened to that sweet, easy going boy? He had turned rebel, in more ways than one, and then disappeared from my life.

Did he turn away from you, Owen, or did you turn him away? Did he disappear or did you no longer seek his company?

Ah, I used to have a son, but then he grew up and became a man.

I find my words coming out stiffly in my message. It has been so long since I communicated with Tom I hardly know what to say to him. Our last encounter was fraught with tension, anger and many words flung like barbed arrows. Hurtful words.

"Tom, it was a shock and a surprise to hear of ... no, no, no, computer delete that."

"Tom, your mother and I miss you very much. She wants you to know she loves you, she will always love you and she wants you to come home when ... this is all over.

Starfleet is working on some method of shortening your journey and I have every confidence that a solution can be found.

I know you think I'm an unforgiving and hard man and I know that you have every reason to feel that way. But if I think of mistakes I've made in this life, well, then the one I most regret is that you and I were at such odds.

I think of you often, son."

After the messages were sent I walked up to the memorial where someone had laid flowers in front of the Voyager stone. Somehow, the rock didn't seem as cold today.

I have a son.

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