Later Days {Star Trek Enterprise Fan Fiction}

About Nine Months (Chapter 1 - The News)

"We were so arrogant."

"What?" asked Lili O'Day Beckett. She glanced at a wall chronometer. It was maybe a minute before 0300 hours.

"Nothing. Go back to sleep," Doug replied softly, wearily.

"You said something."

"It was nothing. Go back to sleep, or you'll wake up Empy and Dec."

Lili turned over and tried to rest. She stared a little at the chronometer, which showed the date – October 28th of 2176. "It'll be our anniversary soon."

"Huh? That's not until February."

"Not our wedding, but of when we met. Nineteen years ago, tomorrow," she said. "Remember?"

"Yeah, that's true."

"You don't sound so happy, Doug."

He rolled over and pressed against her back, engulfing her in his arms. "I am always happy with you."

"You know what I mean. It's not that you aren't, I suppose, content. It's that something is troubling you. Something or other, whatever it is, you and I have been together long enough, Douglas Jay Hayes Beckett. Can't you tell me whatever it is that's bothering you so much?"

"I, uh," his voice trailed off and he leaned in closer, holding her close.

She turned around in his embrace. Even in the dim lighting of their bedroom, as dawn was approaching on Lafa II, a dawn that would include four suns of various colors and dimensions, she could still see him bite his lower lip. "Whatever it is, I can help."

"No, you can't. Nobody can, not even Miva."

She tensed. "My OB-GYN. Melissa's, too. Something's wrong with Melissa," Lili concluded, referring to Doug's paramour in their open marriage.

"No, uh, Melissa is fine. She's, she's pregnant again."

"Oh, my. Well, it's been a few years, eh? Neil's close to fifteen. That's a helluva long time between kids. You'll have to do the diaper dance all over again. I guess we all will, and you in your seventies already."

"That's, uh, that's not it. Please, don't ask anymore. I'll tell her, though, that we need to start, well," he sighed, "we need to start telling all of you."

"Telling us what?"

"Just, just, let me do this my way," he snapped a little.

"Sorry." She rolled over. The complexities of an open marriage with lovers and children with three sets of parentages were a little much for the nonce.

Neither of them got any more sleep that night.

In the morning, Doug was already on a communicator call when Lili got up. "Yeah, and bring everyone here. We'll see about getting Reed on the line, too, and Joss at Cornell. Everybody needs to hear this at the same time. Right, yeah, see you soon. You know I love you." He'd apparently hung up, so he turned to her. "They'll all be here, kind of a late breakfast. Hope that's okay. You don't have to do anything."

"Of course I do. But Doug, this is a work day."

"No, it's not," Doug told her. "I already called Treve. I'm sorry; I know I went over your head and I'm completely outta bounds doing that. But Melissa, she, uh, you're right, and we need to start talking. Getting this meeting together is the only way to do that. I'll put on the coffee. But otherwise don't go nuts. No pancakes, no elaborate brioches or omelets or whatever. Really, it's okay."

"Very well," Lili allowed. "There are muffins and bagels and the fixings for them. How many people are we expecting?"

"Just Melissa and Norri, with Neil and Tommy. I'll set the table while you shower." Lili just nodded and left. Doug flipped the communicator open again. "Yeah, I wanna talk to Malcolm Reed on the USS Zefram Cochrane. It's a family matter."