Title: Taking A Chance

Author: Ami

Fandom: Star Trek: Voyager

Category: First Times, Challenge, Romance

Pairing: Tom/B'Elanna

Rating: PG

Archive: Yes, please, WWOMB, and whoever else wants it.

Summary: Sometimes it takes a disaster to tell you where your heart lies

Author's Notes: This is an answer to Peja first line challenge - There was something in his eyes that said he was broken. Not betad, just spell checked.

Disclaimer - Paramount owns them, not me, please don't sue.

Well, here's my entry - I'm a new writer, and I've got a few fics in zines coming out, but this is my first net-fic. Hope I don't get flamed.

Taking A Chance
by Ami

There was something in his eyes that said he was broken and that he knew I could put him together again. That’s what I remember from our first meeting ....our second first meeting, one Voyager. How he could fall for me when I kept rebuffing his advances was beyond me. I thought he would have given up long ago. But after the whole ‘blood fever’ thing, I knew there was more to him than met the eye. I just didn’t know if there was enough there to make it work and I’ve been burned one too many times to just jump in without checking the water first.

But I almost lost him... lost him to the Borg. We ran into the dregs of a Cube today, and we were overwhelmed. We made it out in one piece, with not fatalities, but it was touch and go there for Tom .... he’d pushed Sam Wildman and her daughter Naomi out of the way of one of the Borg’s laser rifles, and took the shot himself. It hit him in the chest, severing one of the ventricles of his heart. The Doctor was able to save him and repair the damage, but we didn’t know if the oxygen depravation would have taken away that quicksilver mind of his.

I spent all my off-duty hours sitting with him, talking to him, about things I never told anyone, not even Chakotay. I knew he would understand, if he heard me. Now it’s two days after he’d woken up, and I’m standing outside his
quarters, trying to get up the nerve to ring the comm. I’m here to tell him how I feel, but I’m not sure if I have the courage. I steel myself and press the panel, and hear Tom yell, "It’s open!"

I come inside, and Tom looks surprised to see me. "B’Elanna?" he asks.

"Hey, Tom," I say.

"What’re you doing here?" he asks curiously.

I take a deep breath; no backing out now. "I realized when you got hit that I was only staying away because I was afraid... but I realized that I would regret never having told you how I felt even more than I would regret telling you,
and having the relationship go bad. I love you, Tom, and I’m sorry it took me this long to realize it."

His mouth is hanging open, like he wasn’t expecting that.

I can only hope I haven’t just made a fool of myself. He gets up and walks over to me, and just stares at me for a moment.

"I love you, too, B’Elanna," he says, and kisses me. And I realize that he wasn’t the only one who was broken .... and now I’m not the only one who is compete.

THE END