In Her Own Image
by lamardeuse

Star Trek: Voyager

Janeway/Michael Sullivan

R

Please note:  If you have no sense of humour vis a vis a) Irish politics or b) organized religion, don't read any further.  These are fictional characters (hopefully in the proper historical context) that do not necessarily speak for the author, and I warned ya, so there. Nasty PC mail will get the big raspberry.

On Irish geography: I did a good bit of research for this story, and the geography mentioned in the Vger episodes is NOT consistent. I won't get into details, but suffice it to say I put the bloody town where I wanted to, using some of the Vger references and not others, because to use them all would have put me nowhere in Ireland.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Why must we love where the lightning strikes, and not where we choose?
                                                                         -Theodore Sturgeon

A darkened pub was a wonderful place to think.

Michael Sullivan knew this from experience, for he had been doing a great deal of thinking lately.  Most of his late night thoughts--and damn it all, most of his daylight thoughts--had been of Katie.  He could not resolve himself to call her Kathryn.  Kathryn would never run through the fields with her hair all tumbled, or laugh that deep, free laugh he came to expect from Katie.  But when he had visited her that time on her ship, she seemed the same to him, even though outwardly she appeared to be a completely different person.  True, the uniforms they all wore were stark and functional, and he was unused to seeing a woman in breeches. Nevertheless, he felt it suited her somehow, her with her purposeful, endearing stride and slender legs.  There was no disguising her more physical feminine attributes, or her spirit's strange combination of vulnerability and strength, even under all of that authority and mannish clothing.

That usually set him thinking of Chakotay, the hatchet-faced man with the tattoo who called her "Captain" yet gave off an air of possessiveness, as if he felt Katie needed protection from Michael. That man seemed to belong at Katie's side, in a way he never would.  Was it simply because the other man was from her time, or was it something deeper?  Michael had expressed his doubts to her as they toured her marvelous vessel, and she had smiled her sweet smile and told him it didn't matter, but he was still uncertain. 

What did she want with him?  He would never be a dashing explorer; it was his brothers who had spent time in America, birds of passage seeking cash to send home.  Eventually they had broken away, spinning from their orbits to careen over the world, one as a merchant seaman on the new ironclad ships and another losing touch with the family as he travelled farther and farther West, in search of a place to lay his bones.  The wanderlust would not infect him, not at this point in his life.  He had been born here, grew up here, and now he enjoyed his position as unofficial mayor, arbiter of minor disputes and  trusted friend of all.  He presided over the pub his father had left to him, played the uncle with his sister's children in the next town on Sunday afternoons, and was as happy as he had a right to be.  

At least he had thought so until Katie had breezed into his pub.

Had it only been four months ago?  Time lost all meaning when he was with her, and not only because she was from some far distant era almost too fantastic to imagine.  When he sat with her on the hills overlooking the town, watching the peace settle over her face and the weight lift from her shoulders, he could forget the passage of time, forget that he was forty-two and had nothing left to offer her.   He could forget the old man's ache in his ankle, the result of a mishap with a coal cart three winters ago.  He could forget the years spent walling off his heart against any and all potential invaders, until it seemed the most natural thing in the world to reach out and pull her to him, feeling her soft, warm skin under his fingers and her breath against his mouth.

Michael uttered a soft curse and shook his head to clear it.  He turned the book she had given him over in his hands, its dark, dull surface absorbing the flickering light.  She had spoken of Twain's novel as a love story, but it was the most chilling, violent tale he could remember reading.  Was it her century's idea of a happy ending, or did women of any time still look for romance whenever they could? 

Smiling, he set the book on the table and stood, putting an end to his woolgathering, at least for now.  After all, the glasses and mugs would not wash themselves.  He turned away from the soft glow of the peat fire and--

She stood in the doorway, one shoulder propped against the wooden frame.  He was surprised to see her wearing her uniform; except for that one other time, she had always dressed as one of them when she came to visit.  Finding himself shamelessly studying her form in the daring costume, he forced his mouth to form words.

"For a second there, I felt sure I'd conjured you."

She lifted an eyebrow.  "Black magic, or white?"

He grinned, a little foolishly, he thought.  "I don't think I'd better answer that one."  Sobering, he nodded toward the bar.  "You're just in time for washing up."

"Lucky me," she deadpanned, but there was a gleam in her eye as she moved to join him.  Plucking the huge pot of near-boiling water off the cast iron stove in the back room, he dumped its contents into the stone sink.  "This is a bit of an antique," she observed, her fingers caressing the smooth, worn kirkstone.

Tearing his gaze from her hands, he told her, "It was put there by my grandfather when he built this place.  When it cracks, I'll buy one of those new copper jobs."

"Maybe even enamelled steel," she teased.

He held his hand to his heart in feigned shock.  "D'ye think I'm made of money?" he cried, and was rewarded with her deep laugh, and a slightly undignified snort.  It was obvious she had had a hellish day, but there was no need to speak of it, only the need to ease if from her.

Eyeing her critically, he asked, "Do those sleeves roll up?"

"Not particularly well."

Michael grunted at that.  "I suppose you'll be drying, then." Handing her a towel, he dug out the Lever soap and set to work.

   

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

Afterwards, she seemed disinclined to leave, and he certainly had no wish for her to go, so he put out the peat fire and led her into the back room, which served as his parlour and his refuge.  It was not at all fancy, occupied only by the stove, one massive, slightly worn, overstuffed armchair, a low table, and a sideboard covered with the valued heirlooms of three generations of Sullivan women.  No one but himself had been in this room since his father had died. He was not sure why he had finally brought her in here tonight, unless it was the fact that he needed to know if she belonged in the room.

She was hesitant at first, realizing that this was a private place and unwilling to intrude, but slowly her explorer's heart won out over her reticence.  Soon he was telling her of this piece of linen and that piece of glassware, recounting bits of family history he would have sworn he'd forgotten.  Then her eyes lighted on the small portrait sitting in a silver frame on the sideboard.  "Your sister?"

"That's Siobhan.  We were to be married."

"What happened?" Her voice was nearly a whisper.

"She was over in America three years to earn money for her family--a service job.  After two years, the letters stopped coming."  He picked up the frame.  "They told us she died of the influenza.  It was common enough in those bloody slums."  His eyes assumed a faraway look.  "Half a lifetime ago it happened, and I still remember her da coming to tell me.  I knew what he was going to say from the way he walked toward me."

"I'm so sorry.  I know how you feel, a little."  When he turned toward her, startled, she shook her head.  "He's not dead.  We were just--separated, and things ended."  Sighing, she laid the porcelain bowl on the sideboard and faced the window, looking out as if she expected an answer in the blackness.  "My ship has been lost for a long time now.  We're very far from home, and some days even I wonder if we'll ever get back.  And if I start to have doubts, that could mean we never will."

Michael forced his hands to stay at his sides.  "How is it you can be lost and still find your way to us time and again?"

He thought he saw her shoulders tighten.  "Our technology can accomplish some things more easily than others," she admitted enigmatically after a moment.  Turning to him, she searched his face.  "I know it's terribly late, and you must be tired.  Do you mind if I sit with you by the stove for just a few minutes more?"

He gazed down at her upturned face; she was such a tiny thing, really.  "Stay as long as you like, Katie-girl.  I'll just get another chair--"

"That one looks big enough for two," she blurted, and Michael froze where he stood.  Her small hand closed around one of his, and he allowed himself to be led to sit, as if under one of her faerie spells.

She stood above him, an unfathomable expression on her face.  "How're your knees?" she finally drawled.

Finding his voice at her cheeky comment, he growled, "They're old, but they're not so bloody old that they can't take a wisp of a woman.  Come on, then," he invited, trying to cover his astonishment.  For weeks now, since their brief, idyllic affair, she had been physically, if not entirely emotionally distant, as if she were fighting with herself for some reason.  Before he could reflect on this turn of events, she was settled in his lap, and reflection became impossible.  His arms closed around her instinctively, and she curled up into a ball, her hands twisted in his shirt and her face buried in his neck.  The intense contact after weeks of yearning only to touch her hand, her cheek, was overpowering.

"I needed so much to be here tonight.  Thank you," she whispered, her lips brushing against the underside of his jaw.

"I could tell when you walked in," he managed, amazed he was capable of coherent speech.  "And if I didn't then, I surely do now."

He could feel her smile against his stubbled skin, and his pulse rocketed.  "I suppose this would be a terribly immodest position to anyone in 1895."

"I don't imagine you're doing it too often on the bridge of your grand ship in 2372, either," he countered.

Her voice was small.  "No, I don't imagine I am."  He felt her withdraw a little, and begin to gather herself as he had seen her do so many times when she was preparing to return to her world. This time, though, instead of letting her leave with a smile and a wave, he only held her tighter.

"Hush," he told her gently.  "Just--let it go.  Let it all go, for as long as you can."

"Time is not on our side," she sighed, though she did relax slightly.

"Just like Sandy and the Boss," he observed.  "Were you trying to tell me something?"

"I don't want you to be hurt," she admitted, leaning back to look in his eyes.  "I can't offer you most of the things you might be expecting--things you would normally have a right to expect."

"What am I expecting, Katie?  I'm expecting to run my pub, live out my life, and be buried in the church yard on the hill.  Anything above that is more than I ever had a hope of getting."  He shook his head and pushed a lock of chestnut hair out of her eyes.  "You've enough people to worry about.  I'm not a member of your crew."   Cupping her chin to draw her closer, he murmured, "If I were, you'd be after court-martialing me for this."  And with that, his mouth descended on hers.

Offering up a silent prayer that she would not withdraw from him now, Michael slid his hand around to the back of her head to bury it in her hair.  He could feel her palms flattening against his chest but they did not push him away, and when he pulled back slightly to graze her lower lip with his teeth, he was encouraged by a low moan.  Already feeling fairly pleased with himself, he nearly crowed with triumph when he felt her run the tip of her tongue over his upper teeth and sensuously demand entry.  He could recall the Father thirty years ago telling the boys of the parish to beware of women who knew that trick, for only whores and Frenchwomen knew to kiss a man like that.   If that were true, it made him bloody sorry he hadn't been born a Frenchman.

Eventually his rational mind surfaced, gasping for air and clutching at the last shreds of his chivalry.  Breaking the contact, he took her face between his hands and looked deeply into her eyes.  "Katie," he breathed, "I know it's my fault for startin' this, but if we keep this up, I may not be able to stop it."  He leaned his forehead against hers. "You're turning this broken down old wreck of a man
into a randy lad who's still wet behind the ears."

"From where I've been sitting, that fact was already charmingly apparent," she observed huskily.

He felt his face flush to what was no doubt a lovely shade of crimson.  "Woman," he chuckled, "you'd test the virtue of a saint. And I'm no saint.  I've been dying to touch you like this for weeks now, but I could tell you weren't sure of me, that you needed time."

She shook her head sadly.  "Not of you, Michael.  I wasn't sure of me."

"Now that is a surprise, coming from you."  Regarding her tenderly, he traced the strong line of her jaw with his thumb.  "I remember the first time you walked into my pub. You were like no woman I'd ever seen, carrying your head so high and standing like a warrior queen, all fire and steel.  I wondered how I could capture this fianna creature before she disappeared back into the book of tales she'd come from, capture her and bind her to my world, if only for a little while.   And in the next minute I wondered what had come over me, for I've never been a man to want fire in his life.  I was content with the earth under my feet, and now I'm not sure if I'm still on solid ground.  It's you who've captured me, in the end."  He fixed her with an intense gaze.  "I know now you might never be able to love a plain and simple publican.  You're after grander things, things I can't even begin to imagine.  But if it's my lot in life to love a woman I can't tame, I'll take it--as long as that woman is you."

"Oh God," she whispered, almost to herself.  "Oh God.  This wasn't supposed to happen." Shakingly she raised her hands to his face, and her fingers caressed his lips.  "When did it become so real?"  And then her mouth joined with his, and there were no more words.
 
  

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

Afterward he would remember the night as one constant, fluid movement, from the moment they climbed the stairs, racing like foolish children, to the moment they collapsed together, her limbs melting into his.  The sounds returned to him too, combining with sense memory to produce intense, brief flashes:

His big hands skimming her back, her arms, her stomach, alighting nowhere, undecided, until she begged him to choose.

Her soft-hard little mouth following the revelation of bare skin from navel to neck as she slowly peeled his undershirt from him. Not bad for an old man, she observed, and he grabbed her round the waist and tumbled her under him until they were both laughing like inmates of Bedlam.

The quiet that descended as he pushed her uniform off her shoulders, her back arching in slow motion as he lowered his head to her breasts.

Her fingernails deliberately, playfully grazing his lower abdomen before reaching for the buttons of his trousers.

Whispering her name over and over until it became a litany.

The indescribable sensation of her body surrounding his, and the low, sweet sound she made when they finally began to move.

You're changing the elements that make me up. The thought coming unbidden as he felt her wrapped around him, as though her skin touching his could perform some strange alchemy.  Her small hands flying up to stop his mouth, making him realize he'd spoken aloud.

Hearing his name stretched on a keening wail that carried him along with her into oblivion.

                  

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

Later, much later, stroking her hair, too keyed up to sleep, he cursed himself when she stirred.  "I didn't mean to wake you," he whispered.

"It's okay.  I was just dozing."  She stretched, cat-like, her legs tangling with his.   "You're so warm," she observed, and Michael asked her why she sounded surprised at that.

Her response was to rise from the bed and walk to the window. He had never seen or even imagined a woman so unconcerned about her nakedness before a man.  The moon had risen, the soft glow through the sheer curtains silhouetting her beautiful, rounded curves.  "What do you expect to see out there?" he queried, curious at the hint of fear in his question, as though some part of him believed she was preparing to disappear in a moonbeam.

He could tell she was thinking over her answer, but whether it was to make it more honest or more evasive, he wasn't sure.  Finally she murmured, "I'm looking for a sign to tell me what to do with Michael Sullivan."  Her voice was strangely sad, and his fear intensified.

Attempting a smile nonetheless, he chuckled,  "If you'd told me that earlier, I'd have made up a big bloody sign and nailed it to the window hours ago."

She returned the smile, and began to walk back to the bed.  "And what would it have said?"

When she was close enough to touch he took her hand in his and drew it to his lips.

"'Love him,'" he told her simply.

Michael heard her breath hitch in her throat, saw a dozen emotions flit across her face, too quickly to be recognized fully.  After a moment, she joined him again under the covers and proceeded to make love to him in ways he hadn't even known existed.

As sleep finally claimed him he managed a last, barely coherent thought:

That wasn't exactly what I meant.
 
  

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

"That bastard will be getting his comeuppance.  Mark my words."

Michael stood in his pub on Monday afternoon trying to look interested in the conversations going on around him.  He nodded sagely at Milo's comment, and when the other man turned away to rail at another patron, he leaned in close to speak quietly to Seamus Driscol.  "What is he on about now, then?"

Seamus stage-whispered back.  "He's off to the Land Court tomorrow.  Old man Kilkenny tried to raise his rent last month."

"He pays the lowest rent of anyone in the eastern part of this county."

"Aye, and he says it's because he's after takin' the landlord to the Court every year."

Michael shook his head.   On a normal day, he usually enjoyed hearing about the little intrigues and quibbles of the residents of Fair Haven, no matter how foolish.  But today was not a normal day, not for him.   She had come back to him last night, and if that was possible, it followed that nothing was impossible.  It was as though his tiny, cramped universe had tilted over on its side and cracked wide open, spilling its contents everywhere.   His life was no longer a foregone conclusion, his path no longer stretched our before him in a straight, narrow line.  If he had any sense left, he reflected, he'd be scared as hell.

Looking down at his hands, he realized sheepishly that he had been polishing the same glass for the last ten minutes or so, and wisely decided to set it on the counter before he wore it down to a paperweight.  He hadn't really expected her to be there when he awoke; he had no experience of the military, but he knew it was probably inimical to discipline for the captain to be seen sneaking down the back stairs in the wee hours.  Still, he wished he could have kissed her awake, made her breakfast, and spent the rest of the morning learning every inch of her beautiful body in the light of day.

Just as Michael was about to descend into another protracted daydream, Tom Paris and a huge fellow about Michael's age with an overgrown red beard walked into the pub, both of them looking somewhat bleary-eyed.  Milo intercepted them before they could find a table, and with much gesturing engaged Paris in what Michael imagined to be a fairly one-sided conversation.  Soon, though, the younger man made good his escape, and the Voyager crewmen sank gratefully into the first available chairs.

"Rough night, gentlemen?" enquired Michael as he strolled over to them.

"Rough week, more like it," the helmsman replied.  "We visited a planet that didn't like us very much."

"Hush, now," the other man hissed at Paris.  Michael's ears pricked up at the sound of his voice.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Paris smiled.  "Michael Sullivan, meet Sian O'Riordan, Voyager's exobiologist.  He studies the alien life we encounter."  Turning to a surprised O'Riordan, he told him, "It's okay.  The people of Fair Haven know where we're from.  They understand we're just visiting from our ship, from the future."

The tall man nodded at this slowly, taking it in.  "Oh.  Well, that would seem to be against the Prime Directive, but all right, then." Smiling, he stood to shake Michael's hand.  "Pleased to meet you, Mister Sullivan."

"And you.  You're from Ulster, if I'm not mistaken."

"You're right there.  County Armagh, to be precise."

"Are they still having the riots and such up there in your time, then?"

O'Riordan traded what Michael thought to be a rather odd look with Paris.  "Well, not for a while now.   We've sorted things out since the twentieth century."

"Ah.  So times get worse before they get better, eh?"

"A bit." 

He still looked uncomfortable with the situation for some reason, and the publican in him resolved to put him at ease.  "As long as you won't be telling me they've done away with good Irish stout in the twenty-fourth century."

The big Ulsterman warmed to that topic.  "No, they most certainly have not."

"Then you won't be saying no to the taste of my brew," Michael replied, and at the answering grin from O'Riordan, headed for the bar to pour him a draught.  Mission accomplished, as the space men would say.

      

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

An hour before last call, Michael watched while O'Riordan led the regulars in a hearty rendition of "Wild Colonial Boy".  Not bad for a fellow who had been a skittish knot of nerves when he first walked in.  Paris had long since returned home to his woman, and Harry Kim had come and gone earlier with Maggie in tow.

Absently, he wondered if anything would come of that pairing; Kim was a nice enough lad, but Maggie was the home-and-hearth type of girl, as most every girl in Fair Haven was.  In the end, she'd choose a man who would settle down here on Earth, and sooner or later that would leave Harry alone and back on his ship.

Thinking of Voyager turned Michael's musings to what Katie might be doing tonight.  He was faring better as the evening wore on; it had to have been a full twenty minutes now since he'd thought of her last.  Although he hadn't lied to her last night about all of this being more than he hoped possible, he couldn't help wishing she was free to come home to him every night.  He was never one to think much about the issue of working women; Irish women took paid jobs when and where they had to, and there was not much fuss about it one way or the other.  Once married, of course, those men who could afford it preferred their wives to tend the house, and their husbands.  If he were to consider it now, though, he had to admit that she seemed as suited to what she did as he was to
the job of publican.  He would not want her to give up such a vital part of herself, even though she risked death every other day, perhaps even on this planet Paris had mentioned.  It suddenly occurred to him that if something had happened a bit differently last week, she might never have made it back to him at all.

The full force of that thought took a few seconds to reach him, and when it did he swiftly pushed it away.  Life experience had taught him the hard way that there were no guarantees of happiness. When it came, he resolved to be thankful.  There was no use dwelling on the misery, particularly misery that hadn't yet darkened his door.

"Michael m'lad!  Join us in a toast!"  Pouring himself a shot of Bushmill's, he complied with O'Riordan's booming request.  The red-haired man raised his mug.  "To Eire: may she live on until the stars turn cold."  When he brought it to his lips, however, he was the only one, for the rest of the room sat in stunned silence.  The Ulsterman stopped in mid-swallow.  "What'd I say?" he asked quietly.

Michael knew that it was not what he had said, but how he had said it.  The space man from the future had spoken in Gaelic.

"You know the Irish."  Milo's voice actually quavered.  It was the first time Michael could recall the hard-edged old Fenian betraying a trace of sentimentality.

"Aye," O'Riordan nodded.  "I'm a bit out of practice, of course, bein' the only one on the ship--" He trailed off, hushed by the pervasive silence.
 

Then Colm McHugh stepped forward.  A young man who was making his way as a railroad clerk, Michael recalled he had begun taking the Irish language classes offered by the Gaelic League. Like many of the young people hereabouts, he grew up speaking only English, his parents probably ashamed to speak anything else. For as long as Michael could remember, Irish was regarded as the language of poverty, the language of the Famine, best forgotten. The idea that it was something to take pride in, something to be celebrated, was still new and strange to most. "Do many in your time speak it, then?" the lad asked cautiously.

O'Riordan thought the question over.  "A little over half of us who were raised in Ireland, I'd say."

"Sweet Jesus," Milo swore softly, shaking his head.  "Not one in twenty of us in this part of the County.  Not one in twenty."

"The next time you visit," Colm ventured, "could you bring books?  And perhaps teach us how to pronounce some of the--"

"Now, Colm, settle down.  Mister O'Riordan didn't come here to be a schoolmarm."

"No, it's all right," the Ulsterman smiled, nodding at Michael.  "Thanks, but I wouldn't mind.  It'll keep me in practice."  He chuckled.  "Though I'll have you all talking like Northerners."

"As long as you're not after turnin' us all into Protestants!" shouted Seamus, and the pub erupted in laughter.
 
  

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

He stood there with his bare toes curling in the sand and wondered if love was just another form of insanity.

"Come on!  The water's fine!"

"The Irish Sea in the middle of May is not fine," contradicted Michael primly.  The full moon illuminated the strand and the gentle waves, and allowed him to watch her from a safe distance.  The madwoman had already tried to splash him once.  Now she waded contentedly in the surf, her dress hiked up to her knees.

"It's positively tepid!" she called, an alluring grin on her face.  He marvelled at the combination of intrepid space ship captain and mischievous twelve-year-old that seemed to inhabit her without apparent conflict.

"Ah, so is that why me toes are falling off the end of me foot?"

"I had no idea you were so unadventurous," she scoffed.  "To think a man who was willing to brave the land of the spirit folk is afraid of a little water..."

"As it happens, I used to take a dip here from time to time--and in the dead of winter, too.   But I was only a lad--"

"And now you're too old and decrepit.  I understand."

Michael sighed.  He knew exactly what she was doing, but there was no way out of it after that.  He started back down the beach toward her, his hands moving to the buttons on his shirt.  "Unless you can conjure yourself up some dry clothes, woman, you'd better start undressing.  But you don't have to worry about the purity of me intentions, because once I hit this blasted water you won't be getting any courting tonight."

     

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

"Dry clothes and a fire.  I love your technology."   A roaring bonfire was unusual for the beaches around Fair Haven, as any wood that washed ashore was removed in short order by the local residents.   But Katie had summoned one quickly enough after emerging screaming from the surf.   He nuzzled her hair  affectionately as he sat behind her on a blanket, his arms wrapped around her, his legs splayed on either side of hers, but she was not terribly responsive. She was still slightly irritated that he had been able to outlast her.

"Shut up and hold me tighter."  Perhaps more than slightly, amended Michael.

"If I held you any tighter you'd be inside me."

"Then just shut up."

"You space women are wicked touchy."  Pinching her upper arms playfully, he observed, "There isn't any fat on you, that's your problem.  You need to bulk up a little before taking on the Irish Sea again."

"I need to wait for August before taking on the Irish Sea again." She shook with laughter rather than with cold.  "I haven't attempted anything that stupid since I was a teenager.  You make me do the most foolish things."

"I make you--!  That's a bit out of kilter, isn't it?"

"Not really."  She paused for a moment as if gathering her thoughts.  "I was getting to the point, before I met you, where I felt like I was losing pieces of myself.  I used to have the opportunity to relax every once in a while, to just let go, usually with Mark, sometimes with my sister when I got home, because they were never part of Starfleet, part of that whole hierarchy.  I haven't had a chance to escape it for over six years, and I was starting to wonder if I had ever had anything else inside me but the qualities needed to be a starship captain."

"The ability to play silly buggers not being one of them, I suppose," observed Michael in a sympathetic tone.  "What were you like as a girl?"

She chuckled.  "Skinny.  Precocious.  A little odd.  Usually you could find me either attempting something that would get me injured or sitting with my nose in a book of physical science.  Or poetry."

"I wish I had known you then.  But then, I couldn't have, could I?" He felt her shiver against him slightly.  "I mean, seeing as how we're from different centuries and all."  He stared up at the sky. "You must see such wonders.  Here I just read they found canals on Mars and now you tell me there are people living up there.  It's a pity I'll not live to witness any of it."

She half-turned in his arms.  "Would you want to?"  The question held a hint of surprise, he thought.

"Think I'd be scared to death by all the marvels of the modern world?" he replied, smiling.  "Do you suppose my poor old heart would just give up?"  After a moment, he added seriously, "I used to believe I was pretty set in my ways, but I'm not so sure any more.  Your ship--it's like nothing I could have dreamed.  But I want to know more about it, yes.  I want to know what we have to look forward to."

At this, she turned completely around to face him, her expression hard to read in the flickering light.  "What would you do if you found yourself in the twenty-fourth century?"

He smiled, confused by her sudden earnestness.  "Well, now, I'm not without certain talents.  I could become a wandering rent boy, offering my services to the lonely lovelies of the Navy."  A raised eyebrow was the only response he received to this.  "I don't understand you, Katie.  Are you asking me what I would do if it were possible for me to live in your time?"

She hesitated, then looked away. "No," she murmured.  "There's no point in asking, is there?  It's impossible."  Her descent into melancholy was even more confusing for being totally against her character, but he chalked it up to the late hour and the exhaustion caused by the swim.

Michael reached up to caress her cheek, and her gaze rose to meet his again.  "It's no use, lass.  You won't be convincing me anything is impossible when you're here with me."  Slowly, giving her the chance to pull away if she wished, he lowered his mouth to hers.  Her kiss was gentle, tasting of salt and of a feeling he didn't dare hope to name.

When they finally broke apart, the expression on her face made his pulse jump crazily.  "Stand up and close your eyes," she whispered.  He did so and felt her take his hand.  "Computer," she called out to the air, "maintaining current character, initiate Cydonia program three."

As soon as she had spoken her gibberish, Michael sensed the world somehow shift around him.  "What did you do?"

"Is your poor old heart up for a little travel?"

"Out with it, woman," he growled, only slightly afraid to open his eyes.

"They never actually found canals on Mars.  But they did find these," she said, squeezing his hand.

Michael opened his eyes.

And found himself standing at the base of an ancient, crumbling pyramid that reached higher than any mountain in Ireland.

After a moment of stunned immobility he stumbled forward, dragging her laughing behind him.  Reaching out with his free hand, he touched the rough, solid red stone.  Turning to her, he saw the mischievous spirit of the wild little girl blended with the woman's emotion he'd seen earlier in her eyes.  And he realized that any wonders she might ever show him would pale before what he saw in her face at that moment.

Michael cocked his head and smiled.  "Not bad," he drawled teasingly, "but would you be having anything newer?"

She narrowed her eyes in mock-challenge.  "Close your eyes," she ordered.  He watched her for a few seconds more before complying this time.
  

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

"Sian!"

"What now?" O'Riordan griped cheerfully, casting a look at Michael as he dragged his bulk out of the pub chair he had been occupying.  Ambling to the door, he yelled out into the street.

"Liam!  Was it you calling, lad?"

Michael could discern only a mumble, then the words "hurling match" in the voice of the youth outside.

"I will in me arse!  Bloody sons of bollocks!  You nearly beat the shite out of me last week with your dozy sticks and now you want to do it again!" roared the Ulsterman.  Then a shrill, indistinct cry, and, "Sorry, Mrs. O'Donlan.  Yes, I know it's the Lord's Day. Yes, I am a heathen.  Thank you, ma'am."  Another pause.  "Yes, all right, Liam, I'll be along directly."  Shaking his head, he ducked back inside.

"Those lads'll be the death of you yet," laughed Michael.

"No doubt.  Hurling's gone out of fashion in my time, so I never got a chance to play it much."

"D'ye think it's wise to start it at our advanced age?" he asked drily, returning his attention to the history book O'Riordan had brought him.

"Speak for yourself, now.  I've just been married and I feel more in my prime than when I was a spotty little sod of twenty. Besides, I've heard you've no cause for complaint yourself," he added, eyeing the publican meaningfully.

Michael's head snapped up.  He had never spoken to a soul of his relationship with Katie, assuming she would not want anyone in her crew to find out about it.  As casually as possible, he murmured, "I don't know what you mean."

"Ah, it's all right, man, you've no need to worry about protectin' the lasses' virtue any more, they look to it themselves.  We're on a bloody small ship, and on a bloody long voyage.  Those of us that know, we're happy for the Captain.  She's the best commander you could ask for, but if I'd been in her place I'd have gone mad with the loneliness years ago.  You're good for her, and that's the truth."

Michael sat, flabbergasted for a moment, then nodded.  "That's good to know," was all he could think to say.

"Listen, I'm off to me own wake," O'Riordan sighed, grimacing painfully.  Gesturing at the pile of books and the contraption Michael now knew as a dataPADD scattered over the table, he asked, "Would you mind this lot for me while I'm out?"

"No trouble."

After the door closed behind the Ulsterman, Michael sat for several minutes processing this bit of news.  Did Katie know their secret was out?  Was that why she had been so standoffish?  If so, what had changed?  Were people truly as broad-minded in the future as O'Riordan seemed to be?  Michael finally shook his head and ordered his brain to concentrate on his book, not on questions he couldn't answer.   Perhaps he would ask Katie the next time he saw her...no, he decided almost immediately.   There was no need for that; he could think of better things to do when they were together.  Realizing he was wearing an evil grin as he remembered the swim of the other night, he had to admit the other man was right.  He didn't feel so bloody old as he had before he met her.

Certainly, the one-man education program that O'Riordan had set up in the village was also contributing to that youthful feeling.  In the past three weeks, Michael had soaked up books written in Irish, histories of the island since 1895, and listened to the language "tapes" spoken by the odd little PADD, which was not much bigger than a small book and no thicker than a pane of glass. The thing had been a sensation in the village from the time it first appeared, and the pub was now packed on Sunday evenings for the Irish lessons provided by O'Riordan and his talking machine. The pleasing female voice it emitted could translate faster than the Ulsterman and answer questions like a live human being.  The space men had tried to explain how it worked to Michael, and he was fascinated by the idea that something man-made could seem to possess intelligence.  Some of the older folk called it blasphemy, but he was willing to learn as much as he could.  After all, the twentieth century was not so far away.

The twentieth century was the subject of the book he was currently reading, and despite the riveting content, he was having a hard time getting through it.  There was a great deal of strife ahead, some of the worst of it in the next twenty years or so...and to think the century would end with the killing of women and children.  Parnell would be spinning in his grave to know that his dream of Home Rule would one day turn to bombs and bloodshed.  Surely, the history of Ireland had hardly been peaceful til now, but things had been looking up, what with the landowners losing their power, education and economic standards rising, and the hope of some measure of independence still alive.  Michael had asked O'Riordan if there was something that could be done to change the march of time, but the fellow had told him that wasn'tpossible, and if it was, it could end up making a worse mess of the world than anyone could predict.  The important point to remember was that Eire survived, and Irish men and women would one day explore the stars with the rest of humanity.

It was hard to think on such a grand scale for long, however, and Michael's thoughts soon turned to Fair Haven itself.  What would happen to the village and its people in the coming centuries?  He had read several books of general and Irish history, but none of them had mentioned his home, which he supposed was not surprising.  It was barely a dot on the map today, and it was unlikely to become a boom town anytime soon.