by Charlene Vickers

"You BASTARD!"

Tom ducked fast as the vase whistled past him and smashed into the wall only an inch above his head. "What is WITH you?" he asked, squinting through a cloud of pottery dust.

"You know what you did!" Harry growled. "You KNOW what you said!"

"Do you think I'd ask if I knew?" He held out his hands in a placating gesture as his heart pounded in fear. "Harry! Friend! Calm down! Put down the statue and tell me what I did wrong and I'll apologize, okay?"

"What the HELL were you thinking?"

"I don't know. But maybe you can sit down and tell me what I did so we can get the apologies over and go on from there." His hand hovered over his comm badge; although he didn't want to have to bring in Security, he didn't consider it a good day to die either.

Harry suddenly fired the statue at him; Tom dove behind the sofa as the bronze figurine slammed into the wall, bounced off, and harmlessly came to rest at his feet. "You KNOW what you did!" Harry screamed. "What I want to know is why! Why did you have to go to the only woman on the ship I have any chance with and tell her that I'm-- that I'm--"

"What, that you're an ensign? That you're afraid of spiders?" He threw his hands into the air as he peered at his friend over the back of the sofa. "What, Harry; what horrible deep dark secret did I divulge?"

Harry swallowed. "That I'm -- sensitive."

"Sensitive?" Tom repeated, thinking There's a news bulletin. "I might have mentioned it in passing, but what's the big deal? What, she's afraid she's going to break you now?"

"You have no idea what goes on in that Borg mind of hers, do you?" Harry asked angrily. "She knows what you meant by 'sensitive', Tom. I was this close--" and he squeezed his thumb and index finger within an centimetre of each other, "--this close to getting her into bed, and you go off and tell her I'm 'sensitive' and now she's asking me for advice about ANOTHER MAN! Well, thank you VERY much, Mr. Helpful!"

Tom stood, incredulous. "Harry, you're still not making sense. When I told her you were sensitive, I meant that you were a bit touchy about things.You know, like now. . ."

"Touchy? TOUCHY? I just lost Seven of Nine, the sexiest, most beautiful woman I've ever met -- hell, the most beautiful woman I'll probably ever meet in my life -- to a VULCAN, and YOU THINK I'M TOUCHY?" He rushed Tom, pinning him against the wall. "You RUIN MY LIFE and I'm TOUCHY? Fuck!" He pushed himself away and threw himself onto the sofa face down. "Get out of here now," he groaned, "before I lose it and end up in the brig."

"Ignoring for the moment that these are my quarters you've been trashing for the last few minutes," Tom said as he perched on the arm of the sofa and crossed his arms, "perhaps you could enlighten me as to how the word 'sensitive' could send Seven running into Vorik's arms and out of yours." He bit his lip to stop from laughing at the mental image the idea suddenly conjured up.

Harry didn't look up. "She knows what you meant."

"Well obviously she didn't. I was trying to tell her to slow down and take her time getting to know you before she jumped into anything serious. I didn't mean to make her think you were so fragile that--"

"She thinks I'm homosexual," Harry cut in.

"Homo--" Tom's mouth hung open and his eyes became as wide as saucers. "Wha--where did she get the idea that 'sensitive' meant homosexual? God, nobody's ever called me sensitive and --"

"I don't know; I thought she got the idea from you," Harry said somewhat sheepishly as he pulled himself into a sitting position. "Which is a pretty dumb idea, considering." He looked around the room, surveying the damage. "Oops."

"That has got to be -- oh SHIT SHIT SHIT." Tom banged his forehead with a fist. "Maybe not so oops, Har. I think I know where she got the idea. Remember those old twenty-first century vids we were watching?"

Their eyes met. "Where all the homosexual men were tailors and doctors and Native American mystics? All 'sensitive' types?" Harry asked.

"Yep."

"Fuck."

Tom took in a deep breath. "Yep. And who showed them to her?"

"You did."

"Yep."

"Fuck." Harry snorted a laugh. "So what do I do now? Go up to her and say, 'Seven of Nine. I have been informed that you believe me to be homosexual. Permit me to disabuse you of that fallacy.' Then bend her over the Astrometrics console and--"

"You'd get two words out -- three, max -- before the neck pinch."

"Or the beam-out into space."

"Maximum dispersion." They both laughed.

Harry suddenly sighed and dropped his head into his hands. "So what the hell do I do?"

Tom thought for a moment. "Have you ever shown her pictures of you and Libby? Maybe she wouldn't notice. . ."

"No, I think she probably would."

"Oh come on. Libby looks more feminine in a dress than half the women on this ship. I'll bet you any money that she'd take one look at you and hir and realize she was wrong."

"I don't want to take the chance." Harry reached over to the end table and pulled out an old, worn photo album from the shelf below. "Look at this," he said, motioning for Tom to sit beside him. "You might think Libby looks like a woman in this shot, but I can guarantee you that Seven would pick up on the musculature, the jawline, the brow ridge. . ."

"How about that one there?" Tom suggested, pointing at a holopic on the right-hand page.

Harry shook his head. "Sie isn't even wearing hir prosthetics. Look, you can see the pectoral muscles right through the blouse." He shut the album decisively. "No, it's not a good idea. It'll just confirm what Seven thinks she already knows."

Tom suddenly laughed. "Are you sure she's so wrong?"

"What????"

"Har, you're a nice guy, but sometimes. . . didn't it ever occur to you that the average heterosexual man doesn't usually find himself engaged to a transvestite?"

"Libby was a very nice -- person. And those legs. . ." He closed his eyes, remembering. "And there were things -- oh God Tom you would not believe what sie could do to me."

"Mmmmm, this sounds interesting. Tell me more."

"I swear, hir lips could--" and then he suddenly turned beet red. "But that doesn't mean I'm. . . does it? I mean, I never touched hir -- sie was always dressed in women's -- sie had that long, dark hair that just drove me wild -- I always thought it was in spite of her being, you know. . ."

"A man? Wouldn't know, Har," Tom purred as he moved a tiny bit closer to his friend. "Are you sure you weren't attracted to Libby because sie was a man, and not in spite of it?"

"I--I just assumed. . ." Harry stammered as Tom's warm hand began to caress his thigh. "It never occurred to me that --"

"Of course it didn't," Tom murmured into his ear, his voice suddenly liquid with desire. "I can understand that. You were young, and you'd been brought up in a pretty strict home. I can imagine you never even thought of what it would be like." He barely touched Harry's earlobe with his tongue, allowing just a shiver of contact between his lips and the nervous ensign's warm, rich skin. "It happens sometimes," he moaned, "mainly to women because they don't hit their sexual peak until they're a lot older. But it can happen to men too." He pulled away. "You see, Harry. . . if you were completely heterosexual, you wouldn't be enjoying this at all. But, as far as I can tell. . ." and he shifted his gaze down at the bulge forming in Harry's trousers.

Harry struggled to keep his breath under control. "Please. . . I don't know if I want to--"

"I would never force you, never." Tom licked his lips, his eyes still on the bulge threatening to tear through the other man's uniform, then quickly looked back up into Harry's dark, dark eyes. "But I bet you taste so good. Mmmmm. . . like chocolate, or hot caramel. . . and so hot, and so hard, and so good. . ." He ran a finger up Harry's inner thigh, stopping just short of his throbbing hardness. "Please, can't I taste you, hold you in my mouth, make you feel so good. . ."

"Oh God," Harry panted, as Tom's finger finally reached its target, caressing him with the lightest of touches. "Oh Tom I'm so confused. . ."

Tom growled, the deep sound barely audible despite the silence of his quarters. "I know. Let me help you, let me take you. . ." He reached for the closures on Harry's uniform. "Tell me if you want me to stop, I'll stop." Snap by snap, closure by closure, he peeled Harry's uniform off, revealing the ensign's strongly muscled shoulders, broad chest and tight, hard abdomen. "Just tell me to stop and I will," he repeated as he kissed and nibbled his way down from Harry's neck to the waistband of his briefs, then eased the tight, constricting shorts over Harry's round buttocks and freed his hard, aching, gorgeous cock.

"Small," Harry panted, barely able to speak.

"Perfect," Tom replied, as his eyes drank in the luscious sight. "Exactly right." And it was, for him. So dark, so hard; trembling in anticipation; just right. He leaned down and touched his lips to the tip. Oh, yes; how many years I've waited for this moment. He slid his lips over Harry's glans and drew the head into his mouth, using every bit of his experience to bring the other man to climax. He licked, he rubbed, he sucked hard; worked every sensitive point from the tip to the base of the shaft and beyond. Sliding his hands under Harry's buttocks to tease the sensitive opening, Tom took Harry deep into his mouth, using the back of his throat to suck as hard as he could. He then withdrew, growling, "Come for me, Harry, just for me," before once again devouring Harry's throbbing member.

Harry suddenly arched his back and cried out Tom's name; a second later, Tom's mouth filled with Harry's hot, thick essence. He swallowed the hot juices greedily, then licked his gasping, shuddering lover clean. "Mmmm. . . I was right, you do taste absolutely wonderful," he purred, sitting back up and drawing a shaking Harry into his arms. "You like?"

"Oh God, Tom, it--" Harry began, before giving up all pretense of being able to speak. He covered his face with his hands as his breathing returned to normal. "Is it -- is it usually like that?"

"You really like!"

Harry nodded. "I haven't come that hard in -- well, not since Libby, if you want to know."

Tom raised an eyebrow. "Harry, have you ever been to bed with a standard issue woman? Not a transvestite, not a transsexual, not a hermaphrodite, not a Borg. . ."

"I -- well, I, um. . ."

"I thought so. Didn't it ever occur to you that maybe, just maybe, you weren't as arrow-straight as you'd assumed?"

"Not for a minute," Harry admitted. "Not until now." He then shifted his gaze to the other man's lap. "But you haven't--"

"I think you've had enough new experiences for now," Tom grinned. "Let's save that for another day. I'll just go take a cold shower. But, Harry, next time?"

"Next time--"

"Don't try to kill me first."

---

End