Once again, the characters, ship, etc aren't mine. If they were, I wouldn't be sitting right here, but that's another story for another day! I'm not making any money off of this, I do it only becuase I like to, and it's either this or Psychology homework, and I like to procrastinate!

This is a story I wrote in response to the JuPiter Station's Narrative Challenge #55: What if Janeway was pregnant at the end of "Threshold"?

Unexpected Part One

By Angela Higbee

The first sensation that registered when Captain Janeway opened her eyes was the blinding light coming from above her. She groaned, squeezing her eyes shut and rolling to one side to avoid the glaring light. And she nearly rolled right off the biobed.

Fortunately, the doctor was there, blocking her fall and helping her back onto the bed.

"Where am I?" she asked groggily, not recognizing her own voice.

"You’re in Sickbay," the doctor answered, wondering why everyone had to use the same, overworked line when awaking.

Janeway struggled to sit up, opening her eyes again, this time fighting to keep them open. "What happened?" she asked, wondering why she was even there.

"Tell me what you remember," the Doctor directed, scanning his tricorder over her.

She began recounting the events of just a few days before, how Tom Paris was determined to break the Warp Barrier, and his plans for doing so.

"And after the mission," the doctor interrupted, fast-forwarding her memories.

"He came back to the ship," she explained slowly. "Then took me back to the planet."

"And do you remember what happened after you crash-landed on the planet?" he asked.

She thought for a moment. "Everything was so clear then," she murmured. "Not just my memories, but everything about life. I could see the ship, I could see Earth...but I was different. I was--" She trailed off, not knowing what she meant.

"Evolved?" the Doctor supplied.

Janeway nodded. "Yes," she answered, understanding. "It’s fading, but I was...a lizard," she finished with an absurd laugh.

"And while you and Mr. Paris were lizards,” the doctor said, “What happened?”

Janeway struggled to remember, and the images that came to mind made her blush bright crimson. "I...we..." she trailed off, shocked at what her brain was telling her happened. “Did we…?” she asked, wondering if her memories were right.

“It does appear,” the doctor began slowly. “That you did mate with Mr. Paris. Or his lizard form,” he said, answering her unspoken question. Janeway sighed, laying back down on the biobed.

“Why do I get the feeling that you aren’t telling me everything?” she asked, disliking the feeling of foreboding she felt.

“There is a slight…lasting result of your mating,” the doctor said, continuing to scan her.

“Doctor?” Janeway pressed, not wanting to be kept in suspense any longer.

“I must inform you, Captain, that you are pregnant. With Tom Paris’ children.”

Janeway felt her jaw drop and her eyes widen. “How is that possible?” she asked.

“I assure you, they are human,” he said. “As for the biological possibility of this, when I changed your DNA pattern, it affected the fetuses, as well. They will be fully human, though you might have a challenge explaining their conception to them in a few years.”

Janeway furrowed her brow, uncertain of one detail. “Why do you keep saying ‘them’?” she asked, not looking forward to the answer.

“Congratulations, Captain,” the doctor said with a smile. “You’re having triplets.”

And though she would deny it later, Kathryn Janeway fainted.

“Are you alright?’ the doctor asked as Janeway awoke for the second time in Sickbay.

She groaned again, remembering what the doctor told her minutes before. She didn’t answer him.

“Is there anything I can do for you?” the doctor asked, his manner softening somewhat.

Janeway quickly shook her head, but stopped as she thought of something. “Actually, doctor, I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t mention this to anyone,” she said. “I’d like to handle this myself.”

The doctor nodded once. “Of course,” he agreed before turning to head to his office. He turned back around when Janeway called him back.

“You say I’m going to have triplets?” she clarified slowly. He nodded.

“Can you tell what sex they will be yet?” she wondered.

The doctor smiled, once again reaching for his tricorder. “Two boys and a girl,” he announced proudly.

“Thank you,” she said, the sense of awe returning. “But when can I get out of here?”

“Give me another hour to make sure everything’s back to normal,” he said.

Janeway raised an eyebrow. “And how,” she wanted to know, “Is this normal?”

“As normal as can be under the circumstances then,” he amended, then returned to the task of finishing his tests.

Two hours later, changed into a pair of casual black pants and a red sweater, Janeway ran the chime at Tom Paris’s door. She still didn’t know what she was going to tell him. Or Chakotay, or Tuvok, for that matter. But this was something that she had to tell someone, and Tom had a definite right to know. This wasn’t news she could keep from him in any sense of fairness.

“Come in,” he called, faster than she was ready for. But she squared her shoulders, walking through the parted doors.

“Captain,” Tom said in surprise when he saw her.

“What can I do for you?” he recovered quickly.

“We need to talk,” Janeway heard herself say, and wondered why she was using the tired line.

Tom nodded nervously. “I suppose I should apologize,” he began once they were seated on his couch. “I’m sorry. It never should have happened…” he stopped when Janeway interrupted him.

“Tom,” she broke in. “It’s not your fault. We all encouraged you to take this flight, there were unexpected side effects. And what you and I did on the planet…well, we weren’t ourselves, now were we?” she asked with a weak smile.

Tom nodded. “I just feel guilty… Janeway interrupted him again.

“You don’t need to apologize,” she insisted.

He nodded again. “You’re right,” he said. “We should just put this behind us…

Janeway smiled apologetically as she interrupted him again.

“We can’t exactly do that,” she said grimly.

“Why not?” a very confused Tom Paris asked.

She had been debating how to tell him her news all afternoon, and still didn’t know what the best approach would be. She just blurted it out. “Tom, I’m pregnant,” she said quickly.

He just looked at her, not comprehending. Why would this be so difficult for her to tell him, especially if they were going to put what happened on the planet behind them, he wondered. Then a possibility dawned on him. “Am I…” he asked, shock making him unable to finish the question.

Janeway stared at her hands, folded in her lap as she nodded miserably. “The doctor assures me they will be completely human, and will arrive in approximately nine months,” she said quietly.

Tom whistled. Somehow, he didn’t expect the conversation to take this twist. He turned her words over in his mind, one word catching his attention, not quite making sense. “They?” he asked, something near panic in his voice.

Janeway looked up, still miserable, meeting his gaze. “Congratulations, dad,” she said unhappily. “Triplets.”

Tom paced in his quarters, his thoughts chasing themselves recklessly through his mind. Janeway had left an hour before, and Tom was still having a hard time believing what she had said. Oh, he knew there was truth to it, it just wasn’t sinking into his brain.

His captain was pregnant with his triplets after he achieved warp 10 and evolved. He kidnapped her, hit warp 10 again, and crash-landed on a planet, where their evolution was completed. They had mated in their evolved forms, and now she was pregnant. He didn’t envy Janeway her official captain’s logs right then. But he would like to see the face of the admiral that reviewed those logs when they got home. Perhaps his father…

With that thought, Tom once again drifted into thoughts of his father. What would his reaction be to the events of the past few weeks? Tom had broken theoretical impossibilities, had achieved warp 10. Warp 10.

Even Admiral Paris couldn’t frown on that, couldn’t expect him to do better. But on the other hand, he had gotten his captain pregnant. That was not only probably against some Starfleet rule, but Kathryn Janeway was Admiral Paris’ protégé. Tom knew what he would see if he could see the look on the Admiral’s face when he found out. That look of disappointment, and anger. “How could you have messed up this bad?” he would ask. And, if both pieces of information were given to him at the same time, warp 10 would be overlooked. Oh, there might be a “congratulations” before he started in on how stupid he was for the other half of the situation.

Tom shook his head, not wanting to go into those thoughts any deeper. When would he free himself from his father, become his own man, uncaring what the other man thought?

And what was he going to do about Janeway?

And what was Janeway herself going to do? She, too, paced in her quarters, thoughts speeding through her brain with no particular order. Back home, four hundred years earlier, she could expect Tom to show up with a ring and a marriage proposal, assuming the circumstances were at least somewhat normal.

Back home now, it wasn’t a problem to raise a child, or children, on her own. Her mother would help, and be delighted, and society in general wouldn’t care. But in the Delta Quadrant, on a small ship decades from home, there were no guidelines. Sure, the crew would stick by whatever solution she went with. But what was she going to do?

Terminating the pregnancy wasn’t an option. Even if this happened through no apparent fault of her own, she couldn’t harm innocents. Voyager may not have been a place to raise children, but it was fast becoming necessary that they adapt.

Naomi Wildman had been the first born on the ship, but wouldn’t be the last. And Janeway didn’t feel that the birth of her own children would be the end, either. No, they had a long journey ahead of them, and children were bound to become part of their close-knit family.

But that still didn't explain what she was going to do now!