Picard settled himself into his chair, sipping gently at the still slightly too hot tea. He placed the cup on his desk to cool a little and picked up the padd reluctantly. All the routine reports of the last 24 hours - engineering reports on fluctuations in warp drive efficiency, security reports on discrepancies in stores which always turned out to be human error, sick bay reports on the health of the crew. The bureaucracy and file-keeping that went with the running of a starship - worse than normal with a new ship not long out of dock. Much as he hated the tedium, Picard could never bring himself to sign off these reports without reading them first.
He caught the flash of white light in his peripheral vision. "Hello, Q." He didn't look away from his reports until Q perched himself on the edge of the desk beside him.
"I must be losing my touch," Q pouted. "You used to react so much more satisfyingly to my presence." He leaned in closer, ostensibly peering at the padd in Picard's hand and taking the opportunity to whisper in his ear. "Some might even say you over-reacted."
Picard felt the familiar twinge of response to that sultry voice and warm breath and quashed it ruthlessly, pushing his chair a little further away from the desk. "I'm trying to work, Q."
Q smiled briefly, presumably happy to have got the desired reaction. Picard resolved not to give him the satisfaction next time.
"Oh, don't be such a stick-in-the-mud, Jean-Luc. I know you're officially off-duty. You can't blame me because you don't know how to stop working."
Experience had taught him that he may as well just admit defeat - he wasn't ever going to get rid of Q until Q wanted to go. And besides, he admitted to himself, Q was as good an excuse as any to delay reading those reports, which he wasn't looking forward to. He put down the padd with a manufactured sigh, unwilling to be seen giving in quite so easily. "What do you want, Q?"
Q looked affronted. "The same thing I always want, of course. Merely the pleasure of your company to brighten my otherwise dull existence." He swung his legs up onto the desk, leaning backwards to rest his weight on one elbow. Picard's cup popped out of existence as he moved, reappearing safely a moment later on a Q-free part of the surface.
Picard suppressed a smile with some difficulty. "I must be going quite mad, Q, because I'm almost starting to believe you."
Q swivelled his head to stare up at the ceiling. "At last!" he proclaimed loudly, throwing his free arm out parallel to the desk. Picard considered that you'd have to be a Q to hold that position without straining something. Q twisted back around to look at him, brown eyes staring into his with humour. "So, Picard, what did I finally do to convince you? It will save me a great deal of trouble in the future if you tell me."
Picard did smile at that. "But I rather enjoy watching you struggle to get on my good side."
Q made a face. "That's harsh of you, Jean-Luc. Whatever happened to the human charitable impulse?" He wriggled a little closer, lowering his voice conspiratorially. "What if I guess? Maybe it was my generosity in making your quarters a little less prison-like?"
"I gave everything back at the first opportunity," Picard pointed out, remembering the surprisingly large, ostentatious statuary that had appeared overnight.
"And since you mention it, that was extremely ungracious of you. I put a great deal of thought into just which antiquities would suit you best. Didn't your mother ever tell you it's rude to refuse a gift?"
"The Pentharan authorities were very relieved to hear they were safe."
"They'd never have known they were missing if you hadn't told them. They really don't appreciate them as much as you do, you know. You'd shudder to see that dusty vault they keep them in." Q leaned forwards as he spoke, narrowed eyes and frown demonstrating his opinion.
"I'm not sure that my quarters set them off to their best advantage either." But despite his disapproval, Picard couldn't shake the joy from the memory - the awe at being the first person to see those sculptures in over half a century. Apart from Q, presumably. And thankfully the Pentharans had accepted his rather thin-sounding explanations in preference to causing a diplomatic outcry.
"A small misjudgement on my part, if any. I could have made you scaled-down replicas, of course, but that wouldn't be the same." Q didn't sound particularly regretful over the incident. "But I won't have you distracting me, Jean-Luc. Where was I?" He stared at the ceiling again, a study of profound thought. Something of an affectation for a creature that knew everything he wanted to know instantaneously, Picard reminded himself. "I've got it!" Q was sitting upright again, legs hanging over the edge of the desk. "It was that hint I dropped about the Ligonian delegation, wasn't it?"
"I discounted that," Picard replied in a distinctly colder voice. "We managed to solve that particular diplomatic mess in our own way."
"I know. I really wasn't offended by it, in case you were worried. I found your solution quite... innovative."
At one time a statement like that would have disconcerted Picard, but he was no longer even surprised that it didn't. He'd wondered over the years just how often Q was watching the ship, whether he went digging in their minds. More recently, though, he just found it convenient that Q didn't show up when he was on duty, when the ship was in crisis or when he simply wasn't in the mood to play mind games. It was becoming increasingly difficult to think ill of this new Q - no puzzles, no tests, just a few mild insults and some casual chit-chat before he flashed out again. So he contented himself with a dry reply. "Oh, high praise indeed from you."
Q shrugged elegantly. "You can't expect to surprise a Q too often, Picard."
"I shall continue to try," Picard said with a small smile.
"Of course you will, Jean-Luc, that's what I like about you. You're not afraid to pit yourself against a superior brain."
Q appeared to stare nonchalantly past him to the windows as he spoke, but Picard caught that wicked sideways glance of his eyes and laughed abruptly. "I thought we had that discussion last month."
"And we could still be arguing now and you wouldn't have conceded. You are a very stubborn human, my friend."
Picard stiffened slightly in his seat. It wasn't the first time Q had referred to him as friend, but it was the first time he'd felt that he actually meant it. He sipped uncertainly at his tea, now slightly cooler than he usually liked it. He considered asking the replicator for another, but recognised that he was only looking for a distraction from his own uncomfortable thoughts.
"Or maybe you finally developed some respect for this uniform."
Picard's mind baulked at the non-sequitur before he realised Q was back to his earlier game. But there was a hesitation underneath the light, flirtatious tone that Picard would have missed just a few months ago. So Q was responding to his own sudden tension. He raised his eyes briefly from the cup and saucer he still nursed in his hands, replying with the expected words to fill the gaping silence. "I respect it when it's earned."
The tangle of unreadable emotion on Q's face disappeared the instant he glimpsed it, Q's lips lengthening out into a non-genuine smile. "If you wanted me to wear something else, you only had to ask."
The flash so close by dazzled him. He blinked as his eyes readjusted, the figure sitting on his desk resolving into Q once more. Q in an eighteenth century French nobleman's outfit, complete with white powdered wig and a truly excessive amount of lace.
"Perhaps you prefer me like this." Q trailed one hand across his chest as he spoke, Picard's eyes following involuntarily where the fingers depressed the material so lightly.
"The cologne is somewhat over-powering," he said, suppressing the urge to cough. He realised just how deftly he'd been distracted from his brooding of a few moments ago, but was human enough to appreciate the return of the less serious mood.
"But I do hate to be anachronistic," Q sighed. "How about this, then?" The ridiculous ensemble was gone in a fingersnap - no flash this time, Picard noted - replaced by a traditional Klingon warrior's leather look.
Picard considered the effect thoughtfully, sitting forwards in his chair to peer at Q from slightly differing angles. "It doesn't really work without a beard," he concluded. "And I'm not sure Mr Worf would approve if he were on board."
"As if I would care what he thought," Q said spitefully, but the clothes changed again anyway. Now he sported western turn-of-the-millennium casual dress - checked shirt open at the neck and faded blue jeans that shaped themselves tightly around his upper thighs. All very simple, yet Picard was finding the result powerfully erotic. Then he saw the smile creep across Q's innocent expression.
"I don't think it's you," he said shortly. "A bit too dull."
"Well if you just want me to look like myself...."
And Picard knew immediately from his voice that he'd walked into yet another of Q's verbal traps. He was already leaning away in his seat when the change occurred. The flash was back this time, presumably for dramatic effect, but the intensity low enough not to white out his retinas. And Q was sitting on the edge of his desk naked.
He shoved his chair roughly backwards and leaped to his feet. "Get that damned uniform back on now, Q!" But self-discipline just didn't extend to not looking and he knew Q would see him look.
Fortunately Q acquiesced after only a couple of seconds, his Starfleet uniform reappearing before he flashed himself out in fits of laughter. Picard sank back into his seat, reflecting sourly that he'd obviously provided Q's entertainment quota for the day.
He reached for the reports again, pausing with his finger over the activate button. He probably had looked rather silly, he had to admit, reacting like that to a naked man. He could only have behaved more like a governess in a nineteenth century novel if he'd fainted, he decided ruefully.
He tapped his link. "Picard to bridge."
"Yes, Captain?"
"Q was just here again."
He heard Riker's sigh over the link. "I'll enter it into the log."
Picard was forced to smile at the mild reaction from his first officer - it seemed familiarity was promoting a casual attitude amongst all the crew.
He picked up the padd and carried on with the reports.
"You have the bridge, Number One." And welcome to it, Picard thought acidly as he headed for the turbolift. It had taken over fourteen hours to expose the latest Cardassian infringement of the peace treaty without starting a war. Inevitably the Cardassian government denied all knowledge of espionage and its captured spies, citing a rogue faction of trouble-makers.
He still hated any dealings with Cardassians. Even when he only had to talk to them via a viewscreen.
"Deck five." He stood erect in the turbolift out of habit. Tension ebbing, riddled with chronic tiredness, there was a real temptation just to slump against the wall and close his eyes.
The whole crew was on edge, short of sleep. There was an overbearing sense of pressure everywhere on board, not even abated in Ten Forward. The constant security checks to guard against Changeling infiltration encouraged paranoia, removing the comfort zone from the dullest of routine missions.
The turbolift door swished open and he strode along the narrow corridor, nodding at the crewmen he passed, carefully giving the impression of focused energy. He seriously needed a shower.
He saw Q as the door to his quarters opened before him, the familiar form sitting in his armchair across the room, watching him. This was unusual enough to spark his brain back into alertness - Q more often arrived when Picard was already there rather than sit around waiting for him.
And he was never around when Picard was in this kind of mood.
Q slouched languidly enough in the chair, saying nothing. The silence was another anomaly. Those eyes raked slowly across his body as they had so many times, but not a trace of mockery in that look.
And Picard knew.
This was it. After all these years of half-jokes and casual insinuations, Q was finally going to say something that couldn't be ignored.
And his immediate thought was simply, *Oh, God, why now?*
He had known this was going to happen, of course. It had been there for years, an undercurrent in all their dealings, becoming more overt as time passed. And sometimes, after Q's more recent visits, he'd reflected in amazement that Q hadn't pushed the issue already.
He realised he was standing frozen outside his own quarters.
"Hello captain." Q was still regarding him with that disconcertingly open gaze.
Picard stepped into his room, hearing the door hiss shut behind him. He maintained his formal captain's voice with the aid of long years of practice. "Q, I don't think -"
Q held up a hand to stop him. "Let's skip the formalities, shall we? You know why I'm here."
Annoyance surged through him, fuelled by his exhaustion and the need to avoid this confrontation. "Stay out of my head, Q!"
Q drew himself up in his chair theatrically. "Oh, please, Jean-Luc, spare me your affronted lectures. You're really not the Ice Captain you like to think you are. Even Data would have spotted that reaction of yours."
Picard felt his tension recede just a little, back on more normal ground with the return of Q's scorn. "Then you'll understand that I really don't want to have this conversation right now."
"Oh, I understand that, Jean-Luc, but unfortunately for you I've decided that it is going to be now. You know that you want me, or are you just going to deny everything? That would be so tedious," Q concluded with a wave of the hand.
"Yes, of course I want you!" The reply was more shouted than spoken. But even through the frustration and impatience, Picard felt that long-seated desire coiling in his guts at the admission. His anger was more a product of the day's fraught negotiations than Q's needling, and he reigned it back with a conscious effort. "But that has absolutely no influence on what I'm going to do, or rather not do," he continued at more normal volume. "Your timing could do with a little polishing, Q."
"What is so obviously wrong with now?" Q leaned forward as he asked the question, resting his elbows on his knees and his chin on his hands. Those dark eyes burned into Picard, studying with apparently genuine interest.
"Everything," Picard stated flatly. "I thought you might have noticed that there's going to be a war."
"Exactly," Q responded with a flourish. "Think of how very helpful I could be."
Picard smiled tightly. "Starfleet don't seem to see you that way. They're highly unlikely to condone any kind of relationship between us."
Q drew back slightly, faking hurt in the familiar manner. "You mean they don't appreciate me? After all I've done for you and your little species?"
"Q, the only facts they have about you don't exactly endear you to them. My explanations of the Continuum's last puzzle were greeted with more than a little scepticism and earned me three months of ongoing psychological testing."
"I can only apologise for any inconvenience my assistance may have caused."
Picard ignored the sarcastic interruption. "I'm not even sure half of the crew believe me. They say they do, but..." He trailed off with a shrug.
Q rose from the chair and propped himself against a wall, one hand on his hip in a flirtatious pose. "My dear Jean-Luc, you still haven't given me a reason that sounds at all convincing."
Picard looked straight into those sparkling eyes, quashing the lust firmly and hoping it didn't show. "Starfleet would take away my command."
Q pushed away from the wall, took a few paces towards him and then stopped abruptly, his face serious. "You're sure about that?"
"There's a war coming, Q, and Starfleet consider you a security risk. They would no more tolerate the captain of their flagship sleeping with you than they would with a Romulan commander!" Picard's voice rose as he spoke, anger and frustration once more leaking past his controls. "Surely you in your much-vaunted omniscience should have known that."
"I don't have time to waste on your petty internal politics," Q defended himself hotly. "And I am not," he concluded with a pout, "a security risk."
"Of course you're a security risk!" Picard lashed back. "You could rip every Starfleet secret out of my head and reveal them to the Dominion just to stir things up for your own amusement. I wouldn't even know you'd done it!"
"Oh, but Jean-Luc." Q's voice had darkened, dangerous, weaving around Picard's senses seductively. "I don't have to sleep with you to do *that*. I could do it right now."
Paradoxically this display of threat defused Picard, knowing it for the fake that it was. "I know you could," he replied more quietly. "And I also know that you wouldn't. But Starfleet don't." He was aware that his defeat and resignation were filtering through into his body language, and he just couldn't bring himself to care right now. "They put up with your little visits here, in rather bad grace I might add, simply because they have no way to stop you. If I were seen to be in any way condoning or encouraging you, they would have grounds for removing me from the Enterprise."
By the end of this speech, Q was looking at him with seemingly genuine sympathy, all the dramatic play-acting gone. That concern was harder on Picard than Q's flirting. Honest emotion from Q was a rarity that only accentuated his unwanted feelings. "Who would make the decision?" Q asked softly.
"There would be an initial board of inquiry consisting of three Admirals," Picard explained, grounding himself once more in the details of Starfleet procedure. "If they decide that the situation requires further action, there would be a full hearing allowing me to state my defence."
"But if those three admirals decided that I wasn't a danger, there would be no further repercussions." Q smiled slightly as he spoke.
"No!" Picard interrupted before Q could continue. "I will not have you interfering in Starfleet procedure! That's precisely why they consider you a problem, you must see that!"
That tight smile remained in place. "Your morals really can be most tiresome, Jean-Luc. I can't say I expected any differently, but I had to try." He turned to look out of the viewport at the streaks of stars.
Picard heard his own defeat echoed in Q's voice. Normally that would mean a rare victory for him in their dealings, but this didn't feel like a success.
"Why now, Q? Why did it have to be now?"
"When would have been the right time, Picard?"
There wasn't one, of course. The last months had been a hellish time throughout Starfleet, with no obvious end coming. "You're avoiding the question, not answering it."
Q turned back to him, suddenly pure menace and glittering eyes as Picard hadn't seen him in years. He was left with the uncomfortable feeling that there was genuine danger here, unlike a few moments ago.
"Just how much of your future do you want to know, Jean-Luc?"
"None!" The reply was automatic, the product of years of Starfleet training.
And then the implications of Q's question hit him shockingly as his earlier statement came back to him. There was going to be a war and he was going to die.
And in the next instant he told himself not to be so ridiculously melodramatic. Q didn't have absolute knowledge of the future, he just made predictions based on a near-complete knowledge of the present. But the war was going to be severe, with the loss of many Starfleet personnel, possibly even defeat. There remained a distinct chance that he himself would be killed, but that had been true throughout his entire career.
Q was leaning casually against the glassless window; no menace now and no flirtation, just a man waiting for him to speak. Q knew everything he had thought, of course, those emotions must have run across him like a play.
He was left with nothing to say but the basic truth. "I can't give up my career, my life, simply because I want you, Q."
Q said nothing, but slowly raised one hand.
Picard stood on sand, a twilight shore, the last vestiges of sunset colouring the horizon. The air hummed gently with the calls of insects from the trees behind the foreshore. They reminded him faintly of crickets. Just offshore the ocean glowed with the luminescence of a million tiny marine creatures. The ghostly light they cast over the scene, combined with starlight, made visibility comfortable, if slightly surreal. The soft breeze that huffed at him from over the waves kept the temperature from being uncomfortably hot.
Q was standing several feet away, looking out across the water. His hair was flattened and parted, then lifted and ruffled by the play of air around him. No other part of him moved, even the breathing motions of his human form undetectable from here.
They stood a while, each other's presence unacknowledged, the silence lengthening until it became slightly uncomfortable. Picard found himself wishing that Q would push, just a little. If Q were to stand close behind him, whispering in his ear, using seduction to influence his decisions - then he could tell himself that Q was selfish and arrogant, and it would be so much easier to say no.
It was hard to say no to this considerate Q who left him to his own thoughts, when what he really wanted was to explore every inch of Q with his hands, his lips, his tongue....
Picard found his wandering thoughts more than a little disquieting.
"Q, where is this place? It's... it's beautiful." He struggled with language that could never catch the quality of the light, the sheer peace of his surroundings. In Picard's experience, the tropical idyll was usually marred by plagues of biting insects, but there was no indication of those here, at least not yet.
Q turned to look at him then, his face closed and unrevealing. "We can come here whenever you like Jean-Luc," he said softly. "Here, or anywhere else. And you can be back on your ship the instant you left. No one need ever know."
In this place, away from the ship and the responsibilities, it would be so easy to walk over and touch Q.... The self-denial was an almost physical feeling in his guts, but this was one thing he was certain of. "I won't have you be my dirty little secret, Q. We both deserve better than that."
Q nodded slowly, as if he'd expected that answer all along. His expression didn't change, still masking whatever he thought from Picard. "You sound very sure that your decision is a good one."
"I am sure."
Q looked back at him, impassive. "You'd better be." And oddly Picard knew it wasn't a threat, just a statement.
Picard was back in his quarters. No Q - at least not a visible Q.
It was a mildly disconcerting thought. Over the past months he'd found himself thinking less often of Q as an entity and more as a man, a friend. His recent behaviour around Picard had been so very human, the illusion was almost complete. Transporter technology meant his sudden comings and goings didn't destroy Picard's complacency. And he recognised it was complacency to forget just what Q was.
He checked the ship's chronometer. Just under eight and a half minutes had passed since he left the bridge.
Only eight minutes.
"Tea, Earl Grey, hot." Distraction, routine, anything.
He took his tea over to the bed, grabbing a book from his shelf on the way. He sat upright against the wall at the end of the bed, flicking through the thick, faintly discoloured pages. For such a warrior civilisation, the Klingons had produced an astonishing detail of decorative artwork. Admittedly, much of their talent was aimed towards the production of ornate ritual blades, but that didn't reduce the beauty of it.
He reached for his tea, but it was still too hot.
Maybe when he next had some leave he should visit the Ter'pach ruins.
He wasn't going to get anything like normal leave for quite some time.
He abandoned the book with a sigh, placing it carefully on a side table away from his tea. The images on the pages had lost their meaning; he was unable to concentrate on the symbolism, the changing styles of the periods reflecting the slow evolution of a culture.
At least his little chat with Q had given him something to think about other than the Cardassians, he acknowledged with some gratitude. Normally after a day like today he could look forward to a broken sleep of violent nightmares, but his mind had been very effectively side-tracked.
What exactly was Q offering him, anyway? Sex, or something more like a genuine relationship? It wouldn't affect his choices, but it would be nice to know just what he was turning down. Would Q be a distraction, preventing him from devoting his full effort to the coming war? Or was Q capable of offering support through the worst of it, someone to be honest with and say the things he couldn't within the chain of command?
He grimaced a little at his thoughts - neither of them were the sort to sit down and discuss what they wanted from each other.
He simply wasn't as confident in his decision as he had maintained, as he should be. His logic was correct; he wasn't capable of diving into a ridiculously uncertain relationship, especially not now.
The uncertainty remained, a shifting itch at the back of his mind.
Just what did Q know about the Dominion? Picard now had the knowledge that this war was going to be bad, but nothing more - and he could never ask, no matter how desperate the situation became. He was too suspicious that Q would tell him if he did.
But more than that, he wondered what would happen if the Enterprise found herself in serious trouble - would Q volunteer information, some small hint? Or more? Q may have already saved him once - if it had been real, if Q hadn't been lying about the dead part. Picard had never spoken of that to Q. Either Q had intervened drastically in his life to aid him, or his own subconscious had created that scenario; both possibilities were deeply disturbing. It was one of the very few occasions in his life when Picard found ignorance more comfortable than the truth.
But now, here, the more he contemplated disaster for ship and crew, the more certain he felt that Q would step in.
And that was more dangerous than anything else, dangerous in so many ways.
The end