The Anthropology of Love

"Q, is this really necessary?" Jean-Luc's voice garbled out from behind a thick purple muffler. His arms jutted inelegantly through the sleeves of a bulky, drooping robe that bundled and bunched around his waist; he felt smothered, enormous and ridiculous under layer after layer of alien undergarments.

"You want to blend in with the locals, don't you? Stop complaining; I'm trying to decide if there's anything that would do your figure more justice." Q cocked his head and snapped his fingers. A scaly, blue-checkered coat and a pair of heavy white pants with a form-fitting underlining replaced the man's robe. Dark brows crinkling, Picard tugged his muffler down to huddle awkwardly under his chin.

"Locals? You didn't say anything about there being locals." Circling the man, hands clasped theatrically behind his back, Q bent at the waist to inspect his backside.

"Much better. Mmm? Don't fret, mon amour… these particular locals bit the big one more than a thousand years ago." Squinting over his shoulder at the immortal entity who had taken to squeezing the seat of his pants experimentally, Jean-Luc frowned.

"All at once? And what's so significant about this particular world at this particular time as to make all of…" Jean-Luc gestured half-heartedly, still frowning. "… this worthwhile?" Picard pulled at the collar of his coat, finding that the extra padding was beginning to make him uncomfortably warm in the moderate climate of his quarters. How had the man let himself be talked into this little holiday of Q's? He felt like a child whose mother had bundled him up so tightly in preparation for a day of playing in the snow that he was hardly likely to be able to stand upright, much less accomplish any serious play.

"Yes, all at once. They're having one of their winter festivals. Très romantique." Q straightened up and snapped again, clothing himself in a sleek, ankle-length moss green overcoat and a pair of pants that were, aside from their purple color, identical to Jean-Luc's.

"I don't know how romantique I'm going to feel under fourteen layers of thermal insulation." Running a hand over his scalp, the man narrowed his eyes as he surveyed his lover's attire. "Speaking of which, you seem to have escaped that particular fate."

"I'm not going to get cold, am I?" The entity shrugged airily. Jean-Luc couldn't resist a faint smile; it had taken some doing, but he had finally convinced Q to accept that he didn't like to be automatically spared the physical hardships of being human. "Besides, it'll be more fun this way; like undressing fourteen different people."

"Are you that bored with me, Q? Do you wish I were fourteen different people?" Q's sensual mouth turned up at the corner as he wormed teasing fingertips under the hem of Picard's coat. The gesture was no less stirring for the man's inability to feel it through layers of clothing.

"Fishing for validation? Mon Capitaine, that's so unlike you." Feeling dopey under the weight and heat of his alien costume, Jean-Luc grinned. His own fingers followed a light path along Q's high cheekbone and into the entity's soft, dark hair.

"Does that mean you're going to refuse me?" Q twined his hands in the bulky material of Picard's coat and drew him in for a soft, wet kiss that was brief but reluctantly so. The man's tongue had just left his mouth to explore more interesting places when Q withdrew and trailed provocative kisses up the length of his jaw.

"You're the only human I can stand. Sometimes you're the only anything I can stand," the entity murmured against the tender flesh of Jean-Luc's ear before he pulled back. "How's that for validation?"

"Schmaltzy, even for you, but touching nonetheless." Q smirked, his dark eyes glittering promises as he raised his hand.

"All set, Johnny?" With an indulgent snort, Jean-Luc nodded.

Snap.


--


The capital city of Malon's industrial state was a teeming, snow-choked metropolis. Squat, rounded buildings huddled in clusters like brightly painted, white-capped beetles among winding, well-trod streets. The Malons themselves were a narrow people and largely humanoid, with thick skin tending toward orange hues and an apparent lack of body hair. Their ears were thin and angular, and it was difficult to tell whether they were larger than those of humans or the absence of head hair made them seem more prominent.

Jean-Luc observed all of this from the busy street corner Q had wished them onto. Their clothing did indeed seem to be appropriate, though it was hardly enough to conceal the glaring differences between their physical composition and that of the native inhabitants. As the man watched, a Malon of indeterminate sex shuffled past on wide feet, staring openly at them and cradling a slim, Malon child in its gangly arms. Unconsciously gravitating closer to Q, Jean-Luc, murmured,

"Q, tell me these people are warp capable."

"Of course, Jean-Luc. I brought you here to enjoy their festival, not to disrupt it by making first contact." The man relaxed, nodding slightly and giving himself greater permission to observe for the pleasure of observing.

The street they were on was a wide thoroughfare, with fifteen or twenty Malons stamping by at any given moment. Most of the inhabitants were bundled up much as Jean-Luc was, in bright, scaly coats and overcoats, and their boots, though wide and flat -- presumably to accommodate their wide, flat feet -- were much like Jean-Luc's.

"Their feet are like snowshoes," the man noted with pleasant amusement. Despite the cold, he was beginning to genuinely look forward to whatever his lover had planned. Very little in the universe gave him more pleasure than experiencing new cultures intimately, and the fact that this particular 'new culture' was long extinct didn't affect his enjoyment at all. Q tugged at the sleeve of his coat, but it took him a moment to notice through his layers and layers of clothing.

"You can write up a report on their feet later. Come on, we're going to be late." Looking around with quiet wonder at the intricate, colorful patterns decorating the buildings on either side of the street, Picard let himself be led by the arm. He wondered dimly what they were going to be late for. Q hurried him across through the crowd toward a building that was significantly larger and grander than the others. Its rounded shell was painted in greens and golds, with a sinewy web of blue splitting the other colors into small, irregular sections. Jean-Luc was craning his neck to see more of the structure as they approached, finding that it reminded him of stained glass, when he collided with a Malon headed in the same direction. It had a large bundle stuffed awkwardly under one of its long arms, and, though its hands and neck were orange, its face was yellow. The man blinked, stepping back and opening his mouth to apologize, when Q interrupted him with a strange gesture. The entity tapped his chest with the tips of his fingers and brushed a long thumb up the corner of his mouth. Jean-Luc tried to look as though he knew what Q was doing, and was relieved when the Malon smiled graciously.

"I acquit you," it said with a nod. Returning the smile and the nod, Picard watched the creature amble away. He was just formulating some sort of thoughtful comment on the event when Q tugged at his arm again and hustled him inside the building.

Broad double doors led into a deep hall crowded with Malons and lit subtly by glowing yellow orbs that dangled from the high ceiling. Over the heads of shuffling natives, Jean-Luc caught tantalizing glimpses of rich blues and elegant purples swirling uninhibited across the high, curved walls. Along the back wall was a delicately carved relief of a large Malon with a headdress extending its arms and cradling something radiant in its cupped hands. Before it knelt ten or fifteen (Picard couldn't see well enough to count) smaller Malons whose faces were rapturous as they gazed up at it. The murmuring of Malon voices was rich and tuneful around him, and Jean-Luc had a soft smile plastered hopelessly across his face when Q took his hand and skirted them gracefully along the outer edge of the crowd to the far side of a low platform at the head of the building.

"That's where the action's going to be," Q murmured, nodding toward the platform and, as if on cue, the lights illuminating other parts of the hall dimmed considerably. Picard spared his lover a suspicious glance, but the entity fluttered his eyelashes innocently. When a large Malon with rich red skin stepped onto the platform wearing an elaborate, leafy headdress, the hall fell silent. Though it first appeared to be especially tall, Jean-Luc soon noticed that wide boots several inches higher than the others he had seen supplemented the being's height considerably. In contrast to the way most in attendance were dressed, the performer wore very little aside from its boots and a wide blue sash around its narrow waist. After raising its arms in acknowledgement of the crowd, the Malon hunched over and hobbled around in a slow, staggering circle.

"Is he ill?" Picard whispered out of the corner of his mouth, feeling as though he were without a program at an opera he'd never seen.

"Extremely," Q whispered back. Soon, two bright yellow faces appeared from behind the platform, and then the orange bodies they were attached to crept nearer. The newcomers wore dull brown sashes and no boots that Jean-Luc could make out, though he had to stand on tiptoes to see everything. They skulked downstage and circled the first performer in wide, opposing orbits before they met again behind it. While the red Malon mimed leaning heavily on something, the others whispered between themselves and wrung their hands fretfully. Finally, one yellow-faced performer drew a long, angled blade from its sash and took slow, almost regretful steps toward the being in the headdress. Its partner raised a narrow, yellow chin and overtook it, snatching the dagger from its grasp, and strode on toward the first performer, who hung its head and feigned obliviousness. Picard's dark brows knitted together as the unarmed yellow Malon followed quickly, grabbing the sickly one from behind.

"What are they doing to him?" As the first performer struggled, it cried out. The noise was haunting, echoing widely through the otherwise silent hall, and Jean-Luc could see the audience shift in his peripheral vision.

"What does it look like?" Q's lips were close to his ear and it made him feel warm despite the apparent lack of central heating in the performance hall. The armed yellow Malon brought its broad forehead down to touch that of the red being, though it had to pull back quickly when the creature whipped its head from side to side as it fought to free itself. Closing its eyes, the yellow-faced performer raised the blade with an air of ceremony and a regret that resembled its companion's.

"It looks like they're murdering him." The blade fell once, and then again, and then a final time, and the second yellow-faced Malon stumbled backward as its victim folded from its grasp.

"That's what they're doing." Dropping its blade, the yellow-faced murderer knelt beside the red Malon and bowed its head reverently. Its companion did the same, though with less grace, as its long-fingered orange hands trembled visibly.

"I should have known a murder festival would be your idea of romance." Q snorted softly as the two performers flattened their arms beneath their victim's body and bore it up slowly, lifting with their knobby knees. "Whom did they murder?" A stirring in the corner of his eye made Picard glance distractedly at the rest of the audience. Throughout the hall, Malons were clutching themselves restlessly, their round, dark eyes trained raptly on the action atop the low platform.

"Prime Minister Tephemus. He lived four hundred years ago. Well, relatively speaking it was about two thousand years ago, but you get the idea, I'm sure." When the man looked back at the stage, the yellow-faced performers were carrying the red Malon toward the edge.

"Was he a tyrant?" The headdress shifted with a discreet push from one orange elbow and tumbled to splay out across the smooth, neutral ground. There was a collective gasp from the audience as the article landed.

"No, they loved him." Jean-Luc frowned, squinting as the murderers draped the body of their victim across the floor at the foot of the platform, seeming to take great care in the way they situated it. They spread its limbs wide, like a star, and rolled its head to the side.

"And now they're celebrating his murder." The yellow-faced Malon who had wielded the blade retrieved the headdress and placed it on the ground above the victim's head. It pulled at the leafy fronds until they fanned out broadly to form a sort of halo.

"Apparently." The Malon's partner produced something from its sash and Picard craned his neck to see what it was. When it knelt below the body's outstretched arm and extended its hand, he thought he could make out a gourd-shaped black vial.

"Are they going to pour poison into his ear?" In his peripheral vision Jean-Luc saw Q look at him for the first time since the performance had begun. Those dark, intelligent eyes caught more dim light than seemed to be their share and he couldn't help shivering under his many layers. On the platform, the kneeling creature emptied the vial of some imaginary substance, taking care to anoint the deceased's entire body.

"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" There was so much lewd insinuation in Q's soft hiss that Picard had to wonder whether it had anything at all to do with his dry question. The man leaned discreetly against his lover as the yellow-faced murderers shuffled offstage, heads bowed, flat feet slapping against the smooth platform.

"I'm sure you'd think he deserved it for his arrogance." The lights dimmed further, shrouding even the platform in darkness. Q's full lips skimmed across the flesh of Jean-Luc's earlobe, making him shiver again.

"I'm sure he did," the entity breathed, withdrawing as the lights brightened again throughout the hall. The platform was empty and the Malons were stamping their wide feet in subdued applause. After a moment, Picard tapped his own toes against the ground, smiling faintly. Gradually the applause died away and the audience began to shuffle around, gathering up their young and talking quietly in small groups. The concentration of Malons near the broad double doors at the back thinned as the less social attendees began to trickle out into the snowy street. "Well?" Jean-Luc turned to find Q posed dramatically with his hands on his hips. The corner of the man's mouth twitched upward slightly.

"Interesting, but the romance continues to elude me."

"Not for long, mon amour. Do you want to meet them?" Gesturing behind him, the entity indicated a small door set discreetly to the left of the platform, along the back wall. It had been propped open and, as Picard looked, a broad-chested Malon carrying the headdress prop gingerly in large hands disappeared through it. Q smiled winningly and Jean-Luc knew he wouldn't have been able to resist even if he had wanted to.

"The performers? Why not?" Q's eyes smoldered and he took Picard's hand once again to lead him on. The man felt himself grow increasingly curious as to how any of what he had seen related at all to romance. All joking aside, he knew that if Q insisted the holiday would be romantic it would be, and his lover had chosen this time and a place specifically, so it must be significant somehow. He was still frowning thoughtfully as they wove their way through a series of hallways in the bowels of the building. The walls were painted brightly, as everything seemed to be, and though some of the color combinations seemed counterintuitive to Picard, he found most of the decoration pleasing to look at. Even those configurations which did not immediately please him made him think, made him wonder whom they might please and whether he couldn't learn to appreciate them given time and greater understanding.

Q stopped at a set of two doors, narrow and together occupying the space Jean-Luc might have allotted for one. They were trimmed in a thick, winding gold pattern, but were otherwise indistinguishable from the other doors they had passed along the way. Surveying the trim carefully and feeling strangely pleased when he noticed the way tiny particles shone amid the seemingly solid strokes, the man took only the vaguest note when Q pressed a flat button on the left side of the doorframe, eliciting a low, airy whistle from inside. As the doors hissed open, though, Jean-Luc wrested his attention from the trim to straighten and step back respectfully. Q, on the other hand, was striding across the threshold almost before the doors had cleared a place and the man was quick to follow, realizing that he couldn't be certain when and how the doors would close again.

"To please my eyes! If it isn't Lorec the Stagemaster, I've died and gone to see Tephemus," Q purred at the orange Malon who stood near the center of the room rubbing absently at patches of red paint across its thick skin with a bunched cloth. The Malon gave a deep, musical chuckle, and Picard found it difficult to decide whether to concentrate on their host or on the rest of the room, which was vibrantly decorated and full of comfortable-looking furniture and sweet-smelling edibles. The chamber itself was not particularly large, but the configuration of articles inside it seemed to maximize the amount of useable space in a way that had the man marveling at both the artistry and efficiency of its decorator.

"You flatter my humble self as always, Q. I was not aware that you would be in attendance. Your presence, too, flatters." Lorec nodded graciously, depositing its cloth on a high, round table and smiling toothily at Jean-Luc. "I see you have brought a companion." Picard nodded politely and allowed himself to give in to the warm smile that itched at his lips. It was all so beautiful and interesting. The more he thought about it, the more he realized that the fact that the Malons were extinct in his own time made it more fascinating to be able to see them living and creating in front of him. How many times, as he had fondled the artifacts in his collection, had he fantasized about seeing them put to their intended use by those who had used them?

"This is my mate, Jean-Luc Picard. It is his first experience of the pleasure of visiting Malon." At the sound of his name, Jean-Luc looked up, realizing that he had let his attention roam wonderingly across the room, nearly forgetting that he wasn't alone in some sort of anthropological holo-book. He smiled again and tried to imitate the gracious nod the Malon had given him.

"It certainly has been a pleasure. The décor is exquisite and your performance was very moving." Lorec's large ears shivered and the creature looked exceedingly pleased as it gestured toward a plush, powder blue divan set against the right wall.

"Your mate is as you are, Q, though I would expect no different. In truth, I am surprised to learn that your kind mates. But, please, do not let my curiosity distract you from taking comfort." The man couldn't help snickering inwardly at the thought that there was a corner of space and time where people considered Q to be courteous and pleasant company. And yet, Q had indeed acted that way thus far. Certainly Jean-Luc enjoyed Q's company, but it was rare that anyone else did, and he found it lovely to be able to be with his lover without having to stifle the urge to apologize for his behavior. Q moved aside so that Picard could seat himself first, giving the man an almost imperceptible wink as he did so. Smiling softly at the entity's discreetly intimate display, Jean-Luc sat on one end of the divan, careful to avoid marring the soft upholstery. Once Q had joined him, sitting closer than the man might have thought appropriate if they had been in a place where he had any idea of the appropriateness of anything, Lorec sat some distance away from them on the other end of the sofa. It smiled and its ears fluttered again as their comfort with the accommodation showed on their faces.

"It is not customary for Q to mate, you're right. Jean-Luc is… special," Q said, leaning back against the piles of powder blue pillows behind them. The man cleared his throat softly and fought back the urge to roll his eyes as a rosy flush tinted his cheeks.

"It was my understanding that all Q were, as you say, 'special'," Lorec rumbled wryly. Picard relaxed instantly at the promise of mirthful intelligence in those round, sparkling eyes. He was couched in luxurious softness, the side of his thigh pressed lightly against that of his lover, and his senses were filled with the strange beauty of their host's room. Beyond that, the orange creature's tone was one he understood and enjoyed and he let go of the worry that he might have a difficult time keeping up with whatever etiquette the conversation would require of him. Still, he couldn't help wondering at the sudden addition of wry insinuation underneath the formal politeness. Had it been there from the start? Could he have missed it?

"How right you are. However, Jean-Luc is not a Q, and he isn't this kind of special." Q grinned faintly and snapped his fingers. Jean-Luc's eyes made an instinctive, lightning-fast circuit of the room to see whether anything had been altered, but it seemed that his lover's gesture had only been a visual aid. Lorec knitted its long fingers loosely and showed its elegantly jutting teeth.

"Is it always so… polite?"

"Not always, no, but he is a diplomat, among other things. I'm sure there's plenty he'd like to say but thinks might offend you." Chuckling softly, Jean-Luc shrugged his concession as Q's dark eyes glittered at him.

"Is this so, Jean-Luc?" The Malon's thick tongue clacked awkwardly around the man's name, but Picard respected the boldness of its attempt. He crossed one leg over the other, relaxing more by the moment, and turned slightly to face Lorec.

"I find that in most cases where I am concerned, if Q says it is so, it is so." Q leaned back further into the pillows so that Jean-Luc's view of the Malon was unrestricted and the corners of his mouth twitched upward.

"Indeed? Then I must assume that you concede being, as it says, 'special', though you gave the appearance of discomfort at its assertion," Lorec murmured, its forehead drawing down. The man studied it for a moment, even as a flush warmed his cheeks again, and tried to determine whether there was a teasing exaggeration in the being's expression or it was only a trick of his wishful imagination.

"If it did not make me uncomfortable I don't think he would have much cause to say it." Tapping at its mouth with the side of a long finger, Lorec smiled faintly, and there was an unmistakably wry glint in its round eyes. Jean-Luc found himself sitting up straighter, found his feet flattening on the floor in anticipation. Challenging banter never failed to excite and amuse him, and there was the promise of it in the Malon's expression.

"Do you say it enjoys making you uncomfortable?" Lorec exchanged a discreet glance with Q, who was sprawled unself-consciously across the blue pillows, smirking and nibbling daintily on the nail of his human little finger. His lover's pose sparked a rich warmth in Jean-Luc's stomach that threatened to migrate lower and the man shifted his gaze quickly back to their host.

"There is no doubt that he does, sometimes."

"Not in this case?" Picard smiled softly, daring another glance at Q. The entity pouted his full lips and Jean-Luc forced himself to look away before his lover did something dangerous like lick them. He tried to focus but it was becoming more difficult not to obsess over the idea of getting Q alone somehow. Suddenly the pressure of Q's thigh against his was almost unbearably hot through his thick pants.

"Not in this case. If he extolled my virtues and I agreed with him, I wouldn't deserve the extolments in the first place. I think he does it to delight in my humility." A wry grin tugged at the corner of Picard's thin, chiseled upper lip. Lorec laughed a rumbling, musical laugh and its ears shivered.

"Ahh, now I can see you are not a Q. I do not believe the Q value humility in themselves. In others, of course, but not in themselves." Q rolled his eyes so dramatically that it seemed almost audible, and neither Jean-Luc nor Lorec failed to notice and grin. Q himself was grinning once he'd tired of crinkling his features into the expected contemptuous scowl.

"I think I'm beginning to like your friend, Q," Picard murmured, exchanging a glittering glance with the orange creature on the other end of the divan. Q smirked and ran a hand up the inside of Jean-Luc's thigh indecently. His eyes widening, the man instinctively tried to scoot away but found that his only escape was off the edge of the divan and onto the floor. Instead, he glared at his lover in what he hoped might be a discreet way.

"I knew you would, and I'm sure you'll be even more fond of each other in the morning after you've gotten to talk a bit more." As the entity leaned forward and braced himself to stand, Picard hazarded a look at Lorec, but the creature seemed far from discomforted by Q's behavior. The Malon smiled knowingly and rose, prompting Jean-Luc to do the same to avoid the awkwardness of being the only member of the party to remain seated.

"As your mate is not a god-thing, perhaps you will appreciate our hospitality tonight." All sarcasm was gone from Lorec's expression, and from Q's as the entity nodded deeply. Picard allowed himself to relax somewhat. Perhaps his lover's gesture would not be considered inappropriate here. The culture did not seem overtly sexual, but it was possible that their attitudes toward propriety differed from those the man was accustomed to.

"If you will deign to offer it." Smiling toothily, the Malon clasped its orange hands together.

"Have I ever failed?" Q wrapped long fingers around Jean-Luc's bicep and the multitude of layers that covered it and gave their host a serene smile.

"No indeed." Its ears shivering with delight, Lorec nodded and went to a panel along the far wall, where its fingertips tapped out a complex pattern, making richly colored lights flash on and off in irregular shapes.

"I have summoned the caretaker. It will find you outside and show you to your accommodations."

--


As soon as the doors of their room hissed closed, Jean-Luc was thrown bodily against the wall as Q kissed him hard. The man had intended to reproach his lover, once they were alone, for not at least mentioning that overt displays of 'affection' would not be considered inappropriate here. Had he been warned, Picard imagined he most probably would have been able to stifle his innate reaction to public intimacy, but under the circumstances he couldn't help thinking that the entity had set him up to look foolish. But a reproach and the probable result -- an argument -- disintegrated from his agenda when Q's hot, wet tongue entered his mouth. His blood surged and the memory of the way his lover had looked splayed across Lorec's blue pillows made him growl and spear Q's tongue with his own. The entity groaned and sucked him in, his eyelids fluttering as he clawed clumsily at Jean-Luc's blue-checkered coat, finally wrenching it open and off of his shoulders to reveal a thick, long sleeved undershirt.

"I hope you were warm enough under here, Johnny," Q snarled as he yanked on the undershirt, ripping it at the shoulder seam but failing to remove it. Tilting his head back and clenching his teeth, his mechanical heart laboring furiously, Jean-Luc struggled with the garment until it was partially over his head and stuck there.

"Get these off… I don't care how you do it, Q, but get these damn things off!" His voice was hoarse and muffled from inside the thick cloth confinement.

"Are you sure?" the entity panted, ceasing to pull at the shirt. It was only Q's hesitation to employ his powers that made Jean-Luc realize his lover had completely forgone their use since they had arrived on Malon. The thought made him warm and desperate and tender at the same time, and the form-fitting underlining of his Malon pants were beginning to feel as tight and maddening as a cockring without being nearly so much fun.

"I've never been so sure of anything in my life!" Picard's arms continued to flail for a moment after the resistance disappeared. In fact, all of his clothes had disappeared, as had Q's, and he felt as though he had lost his balance. He thought he was going to fall, but then Q's weight was pressing down on him and he realized that they were both sprawled across an impossibly soft bed with a thick, dark purple dressing. Brown eyes glittered at him as the entity shifted, brushing their cocks together and making him groan. Jean-Luc was so hard he was dripping and some part of his mind worried vaguely about the mess they were sure to make of a bed that was not their own.

"It's all right, Jean-Luc… we can come all over the sheets, or the furniture, or the walls if we're feeling really adventurous. They won't mind. I promise." The man was never certain when Q was or wasn't reading his mind, and he had even experimented a bit with being allowed to read parts of Q's mind; in this instance, though, it seemed more likely that his lover simply knew him well enough to read his expression.

"Nor will I, I expect," Picard rumbled, tangling his fingers in soft, dark hair and dragging the entity's head down for a hot, enveloping kiss. Their hands were everywhere, caressing heaving chests, pinching tight, straining nipples, clawing at shoulders and enjoying the play of muscles under the soft skin of tight biceps. Jean-Luc lost track of which limbs were whose, of which tongue belonged to him, of whether he was on top and thrusting his cock into the join of his lover's leg or whether he was below and pinned by sturdy weight as his cock sought friction against his lover's stomach. Were his cries raspy and rumbling, or silky and whimpering? He only knew that he strove, and Q strove, and they were so close that not being inside each other was becoming increasingly intolerable. Q's lips were warm and full, swelling fuller as they pressed roughly against his (or were his warm, full lips swelling against Q's?), and soon Jean-Luc was clutching his lover's ass urgently. "I know this is supposed to be a… romantic getaway, Q, but…" he panted distractedly, blinking and trying to hold onto his ability to form complete sentences.

"But you'd like to get on with the fucking?" Q's voice was a silky purr, husky with desire, and it made the man shiver, made the man's cock weep.

"God, yes." His mind reeled with all of the things he wanted to do to Q and wanted Q to do to him. He would take any one of them, or anything else his lover might have in mind, if only he could have it now. With an impish smirk, Q shifted gracefully until he was straddling Jean-Luc's thighs, poised some inches above the man's body. He wrapped long fingers around the base of his lover's erection, eliciting a hoarse moan and an unrestrained thrust of muscular hips.

"Good, because I've been wanting to do this for hours." Q didn't break eye contact, though his lids drooped heavily, as he sank down on Picard's cock, engulfing it inch by inch in slick, tight heat, and ending with a delicate whimper as their hips met. Jean-Luc saw stars and his ears hummed with his own blood as it rushed to his groin, making his cock harder, thicker, making it fill Q completely until it could only be that Q's ass was the mold from which his cock was made. He shuddered and fought to keep his eyes open so that he could watch the entity begin to move. Q arched back, stretching his long body longer, and sweat shone on his pale chest in the dim light. "Ohhhh, Jean-Luc… you're lucky I didn't…" The entity swallowed, closing his eyes and riding out a gentle shudder as his hips rocked. "… throw you down in… the performance hall and… ride your cock right there." Moaning softly, the man met his lover's thrusts with as much restraint as he could summon. Jean-Luc's painful erection told him to surge up and throw Q onto his back, to pound him through the alien bed and on through the floor, to hear his screams as he came and came and came in the way that only Q could, but the rest of him overruled its suggestion; seeing that beautiful face echo every sensation his cock elicited inside that writhing, luscious body was perfect and part of him never wanted either of them to come. He wanted Q to ride him forever. But a little faster couldn't hurt.

"Do I feel good, Q?" Picard didn't have the composure to keep the lust from roughening his voice and he didn't try, though he used every ounce of concentration he had to achieve the steady, sing-song rumble he knew his lover couldn't resist.

"Yesss… oh… ohhhh yes…" Q moaned, his rhythm increasing very slightly as he began to draw himself further off of the man's cock with each upstroke, making the downstrokes heavier, deeper. Desperately resisting the urge to grab the entity's hips and pull them down as he thrust again and again into all of that tight strength, Jean-Luc dug his fingertips into Q's lean thighs and held on. His lover's inner muscles groped at his cock, massaging it, and lying there with relative passivity seemed, at that moment, like the hardest thing he'd ever had to do. Without really knowing how, though, the man knew it was what Q wanted, and so he made himself do it. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew, too, that it would be so much better this way. Q groaned through clenched teeth, tossing his head back and bracing his splayed fingertips against Picard's lower stomach for leverage as he fucked himself on the man's straining cock. "You're so big… I can't believe… you fit, but… you do… like you were made to be inside me… Ohhhh, Jean-Luc…" Jean-Luc clenched harder at his lover's thighs as Q's throaty voice washed over him, bathing him in sex and need and love and relief. He was going to lose it if he didn't hold tightly enough; he was going to empty his aching balls inside those hot, gripping muscles and that was going to be the end of it. But he held on because, more than he wanted to come, he loved being the instrument of Q's pleasure, and watching as Q's body strained and shook with the tension of their maddeningly slow build.

"Q…" Picard growled softly, with one hard thrust for emphasis, as his thighs began to tremble. Q's eyes widened as the man's cock touched him so deeply inside, and he fell forward across his lover's body with a strangled whimper. "You're so beautiful…" Jean-Luc choked, losing his mind with the feel of Q's muscles squeezing him and Q's body touching him everywhere, Q's hands clutching at his shoulders and Q's hard cock rubbing against his stomach. "I've spent half… ohhh, God, Q… half my life exploring… and you're the most… beautiful thing I've ever seen…" When Q moaned loudly in response, his hot breath singeing the fine hairs of Picard's earlobe in a way that was impossibly erotic, the man lost control. Grabbing hold of the entity's ass with both hands, he guided Q's body down to meet his thrusts, each one harder, faster, and deeper than the last. His planted feet were sliding out from under them along the soft bedspread with the force of their rhythm and his fingertips slipped repeatedly from Q's sweaty skin, but it didn't matter. Jean-Luc was arching back into the bed and his cock was doing all of the thinking, plunging itself remorselessly into the tight heat that was Q, and the rest of his body did what it had to do to maintain and heighten the dizzying friction.

"Jean-Luc… Jean-Luc…" Q's moans were strangled and his body was trembling tightly as they slid against each other over and over and over. Bright stars popped in Picard's eyes, vibrant alien colors swirled around him, and the sound of his lover's helpless rapture buoyed him above and outside of himself. He felt light and free and for a few seconds as though he had existed in no other place or time or situation, as though he had been born into Q's body, and onto this strange bed, in this strange room, with no other purpose than to make love to the beautiful creature in his arms. He hovered, seeing the light and resisting it with gentle serenity, waiting. "Oh… Oh, Jean-Luc… Jean-Luc, I'm…" Q arched against him, shuddering deeply and crying out with a husky, choked sob. As the entity's nails dug into his chest with mindless cruelty, as he felt the first hot spurts between their stomachs and the first spasming clench of his lover's muscles around his cock, Jean-Luc came. Q's ecstasy was like food and fuel and the man groaned out his bliss as he emptied himself into his lover's body. Shuddering again when Picard came inside him, Q whimpered, his flushed, swollen mouth open, his dark eyes black and staring. Their bodies were reluctant to part with such perfection, so they clung together, moving tenderly until there was only stillness and warmth.


--


Q rarely slept in any sense, although he sometimes wrapped his vast consciousness in Jean-Luc's slumber and felt the emotionless nothingness of it. At first it had terrified him; nothingness was an almost universal fear among Q, being so contrary to their natures. Jean-Luc's surrender to nothingness, though, seemed both courageous and honest. He longed to match his lover in those qualities, for his lover's benefit and for his own sense of self-worth, and so he let his human body lie helpless and essentially unconscious while he experienced the man's sleep. But sleep was not the only experience Q now relished despite having disdained it before meeting his human starship captain; he allowed the warm, faintly throbbing soreness to remain in the depths of his human body as a delicious reminder of what they had done together. He left them sticky with drying sweat and semen, something he would have found vulgar and disgustingly mortal such a short time before, and he did it because he knew Jean-Luc would regret its absence. More than that, though, he did it because his love for the man made him want, beyond all rationality, to emulate him. When Picard stirred gently beneath him, Q pulled back into himself and his human eyelids fluttered open to reveal the dreamily content face of his lover only inches away. Jean-Luc smiled softly, the expression tugging at Q's heart with the way it seemed to take twenty years off of his age. The entity had not yet had the nerve to broach the subject of what they might do to circumvent the man's impending mortal death, but he would. Soon.

"Good morning, Darling," Q murmured, grinning against the soft skin of Picard's shoulder.

"It can't be morning already; I feel like I closed my eyes five minutes ago." The man's silky baritone was thick and rougher than usual, but his immaculate diction suffered hardly a whit from the recent nap. It made Q shiver, and he decided to exert some effort toward tamping down his superhuman Q-stamina. This was supposed to be a romantic holiday, not a debauched screw-fest.

"In the scheme of things you might as well have… but you're right, it isn't morning." Jean-Luc grinned with knowing indulgence and tangled lazy fingers in his lover's dark hair.

"I know, I know… my entire lifespan is five minutes in the scheme of things. Philosophy aside, how long did I actually sleep?" Pressing into the man's touch, Q brushed full lips against the inside of his lover's wrist and stretched along the length of him, loving the way his human muscles burned and trembled.

"An hour. Your internal clock is such a bother, you know. If you're scheduled to be sleeping you're out in ten seconds and up before the alarm, and if you're scheduled to be awake I can't put you down for more than two hours without a massive dose of sedatives." Jean-Luc's dark brows crinkled as his thin, chiseled lips twitched, and Q could tell he was weighing the pros and cons of an ironic rejoinder. Yawning languidly, the entity smirked, waiting.

"I'm not scheduled to be awake at the moment, but I am. It probably has something to do with what a waste it would be to sleep through having a beautiful, naked immortal stretched out against me in bed." Q's dark eyes glittered and his lips smacked lightly against the man's shoulder.

"You know you can have that whenever you like." The warm, vibrating pleasure of Picard's rumbling chuckle rocked Q and made him unconsciously squirm against the man.

"Did you really drag me off for a romantic holiday on a far-flung planet so that you could downplay every amorous thing I said to you?" Q shifted on top of Jean-Luc, craning his neck just enough so that their mouths met, and kissed him. Their lips parted slowly but without reservation, and the kiss deepened. Though most of the lovers' immediate hunger had been sated, they felt the unguarded candor born of knowing that the most intimate parts of themselves had been coaxed open and shared. There was nothing to tease with, nothing to keep back or hide.

"Mais naturellement, Mon Capitaine," Q murmured, pulling away to regard the man with playful affection. "All the better to glean further endearments, my dear. And besides, that particular comment was less amour and more désir." Snorting fondly, Jean-Luc held his lover more tightly against him.

"You speak more French than I do, mon amour."

"And better. I'm just trying to make you feel at home."

"My home is the USS Enterprise." As he spoke, the man grinned faintly and let his sleepy gaze wander over their alien accommodation. Q could see the way his hazel eyes sparkled with curiosity and appreciation, the way his chin shifted in time with some private speculation, and it pleased the entity intensely.

"Of course it is. That's why I call you 'Captain'." Looking back at his lover, Jean-Luc nodded with an exaggerated air of long-suffering tolerance, but he failed to prevent a warm twinkle from dancing in his eyes.

"While we're on the subject of your bizarre and questionable motivations, my most beloved of nuisances, what exactly are we doing here?" Q couldn't resist the urge to pout until Picard gave in and petted his hair more earnestly, affecting an apologetic frown. It was a ritual to which neither gave more than a passing thought anymore.

"I told you; we're here to enjoy the Malons' winter celebration." Though he tried to sound dismissive, the entity was secretly glad that Jean-Luc had brought the conversation back around to their reason for being on Malon. He mentally rubbed his Q-hands together in anticipation. The man stretched against him, one knee caressing his thigh with lazy pleasure as intelligent eyes glinted idle promises.

"I know what you told me, Q. I won't deny that these people are charming and that their… aesthetics are enjoyable, to say the least, but I still want to know why, of all of the places and times at your disposal, you chose to haul me to the other end of space and time for a murder festival." Q looked mysterious, glancing across the room for effect.

"Don't pretend you don't want to know why they're celebrating the murder of one of their most beloved patriarchs, Jean-Luc." Even without his human peripheral vision, Q could detect a rise in those dark brows, could detect a thoughtful jut in that strong jaw. Taking advantage of Picard's momentary distraction, the entity slithered down his body to plant wet, sensuous kisses over his lover's compact, muscled chest. "You were all but bursting out of those Malon pants from the moment we got here," he purred, swirling an agile tongue around one dimpled areola before taking the nipple gently between his teeth. Jean-Luc gave a soft, helpless moan that was laced with just enough irritation to make Q smirk. The man greatly valued his ability to think and rarely appreciated having it stolen from him without notice, and so of course Q endeavored to do it as often as possible, for his own amusement and their mutual satisfaction. "And it wasn't just my sexy coat, either," he went on against the delicate skin of Picard's collarbone. "It was all these pretty colors, all these foreign things you can't quite wrap your mind around. Exploration makes you hard, Jean-Luc. You've been in some sort of intellectual heat all day." The man's body shook with hearty, rumbling laughter even as it arched against Q's teasing fingertips and warm, hungry mouth.

"I never… mmmm…" Jean-Luc paused to enjoy the way his lover's tongue flicked back and forth along the length of his ear. "I never said you didn't have my number, Q; I'm not sure why you feel the need to dangle it in front of me." Q opened his mouth to breathe something sexy and teasing about other things he might dangle in front of the man instead, when Picard wove the fingers of both hands into his hair and turned his head to kiss him. Closing his eyes, the entity fought back a moan of pleasure and sent his tongue to war with Jean-Luc's, determined to claim the man's mouth in a clear victory. This was his seduction and he wasn't going to give it up without a fight. In the end, his lover accepted him, grinning into the kiss to show that he had only aggressed to provoke the entity into overpowering him. Picard's equivocal submission inflamed Q, challenging him and filling him with the power to meet the challenge. He growled, narrowing his eyes and nipping at the man's lower lip. Jean-Luc tilted his head against the soft, dark bedding and gazed up at the entity with dreamy lust sparkling in his eyes, but when he spoke again his voice was almost infuriatingly steady. "If I've had this intellectual erection for hours and hours, why not take pity on me and do something to relieve it?" Grinning wickedly, Q trailed his fingertips through the gray-black hair dusting the man's chest and along the downy trail that led past his navel and lower.

"Are you sure you don't want me to take care of this first?" the entity murmured as he wrapped a lithe hand around Jean-Luc's rapidly swelling cock. The man grimaced with the pleasure of it and his thighs parted invitingly.

"First? Yes… I'm sure… although you're omniscient and all-powerful… I imagine you could manage both at the same time."

"You want me to tell you the story of the murder of Tephemus while I jerk you off? Holy sexual perversion, Jean-Luc! What a dirty little thing you are! I thought I was being at least partly facetious with that whole 'exploration makes you hard' thing, but it really does, doesn't it?"

"I'm not arguing." Q's dark eyes blackened and his nostrils flared as he squeezed the man's desire gently, feeling the way it pulsed and twitched in his grasp. It was hot and kinetic, a rod of bright, hard light in his Q-vision.

"It really is quite a long story, and your cock is practically jumping in my hand. Are you sure you can last?" Picard shivered, a smirk ghosting across his chiseled lips as he tucked his hands behind his head and got comfortable.

"I'm certainly game… unless you think my cock jumping in your hand might be too much of a distraction." Narrowing his eyes, Q gripped the man's erection more firmly, duly satisfied when Jean-Luc clenched his teeth and thrust against him with something like defiance. The man could control himself now, and it was delicious to watch him approach the task so confidently, but Q didn't plan to let that go on for long. Picard would be writhing and coming all over himself long before the entity finished his story, a suitable punishment for issuing a challenge to an immortal demi-god.

"Of course not," he said as airily he as he could manage with Jean-Luc's cock slithering over his palm. Q lay down beside the man, resting his weight on one elbow as he stroked slowly, keeping the pressure light at first. He was going to win without cheating. "Tephemus was a sort of warrior priest who united the various states on Malon with a combination of tough love and diplomacy." Q kept his eyes locked on Picard's as he spoke. With the obvious exception of his cock, the man's eyes were the most telling gauges of his arousal; his pupils would begin to dilate and his expression would grow hazy. He might tremble just before he came, or he might remain perfectly still, he might cry out or he might remain utterly silent, but there was no doubt that his eyes would widen and stare helplessly at nothing just before he filled Q's fist with his hot, wet defeat.

For now, though, Jean-Luc's expression was irritatingly lucid, and altogether too smug for the entity's liking. Q worked his thumb gently along the underside of the man's erection as he spoke again.

"The governors hated him, of course, but the people loved him. He worked some of the local authorities into political corners and forced them to resign or ally with him, and they went to war against the rest. Remarkably Q-like in his approach, really. Anyway, servants betrayed masters, assistants leaked secrets to the enemy, guards abandoned their posts…" Q trailed off to lick his lips and watch Picard's eyelids flutter as the man shuddered very faintly. His erection had begun to weep and Q gathered the moisture to smooth it along the firm, veiny length of him, earning a pained sigh for his trouble. The entity knew he was pressing his own cock into Jean-Luc's thigh, but he ignored it; the last thing he needed right now was to get caught up in his own desire for the elegant creature stretched out in front of him. He was in control, damn it, and he was going to stay that way. "Are you sure you don't want me to just make you come right now and finish the story later?" the entity purred, his dark eyes dancing with smug menace as he drew his hand smoothly up and down the length of Picard's quivering cock.

"Quite sure." Though the man writhed a bit and his toes curled, his deep voice was steady enough to almost make Q angry.

"Well, as long as you're sure." Q altered his approach, dipping soft fingertips down to fondle the sensitive, tender sac below Jean-Luc's erection. The man whimpered softly, his dark brows crinkling together in a way that made Q want to forget everything and draw those strong thighs over his shoulders. He cleared his throat. "Tephemus understood people… well, he understood Malons, and he understood how to give them what they wanted. He made his citizens feel as though they were free and in charge of their own piteously brief lives and they made him Prime Minister." Teasingly, Q danced his fingertips along Jean-Luc's skin until they encountered the hot, tight entrance to the man's body.

"Q!" Picard snapped, obviously struggling to keep his hips under control. "Are you going to tell me why they… celebrate his murder or are you… ahh… are you going to cheat until I beg you to fuck me?" Q's eyes glittered up at his lover.

"Cheat? Mon Capitaine, I would never. I'm sure you'll be begging me to fuck you at some point, but I promise to have the boring stuff completely out of the way by then." In answer to the incredulous grimace on Jean-Luc's face, the entity trailed his fingers higher and once again wrapped them around the solid, living heat of the man's erection. Picard swallowed thickly and nodded his approval. "Better? Good. Where was I? Oh, yes… He was Prime Minister of Malon for sixty years, which is a long time for a Malon to be anything other than alive. Their life spans were seventy, eighty years if they were lucky, and by then Tephemus was one hundred three." Q stroked Picard gently as he spoke, and although the man's breathing remained relatively steady, his hips had begun to undulate gently. The entity reveled in the way tight muscles stood out and strained against each other to keep Jean-Luc from surrendering to the pleasure his lover's hand brought him, but he had to withdraw himself from his appreciation quickly, before it distracted him. "He started to waste away. Cruelly, I guess, his mental faculties remained largely intact as his body shriveled, and in spite of his infirmity he showed no signs of actually beginning to die. It was like he was being sucked through a vacuum tube that was far too small to take him all at once, and so he went, little by little, with the end seeming very far off." Panting now, Picard turned his head so that one side of his face pressed into the purple bedding. Q stroked him more firmly, almost losing his composure when the man's cock began to leak a steady, slick stream of precum from its tip. Jean-Luc wanted him and Q could almost taste his hunger, whether he went on trying to rein it in or not.

"And…?" Jean-Luc choked softly, his words muffled by his own tight bicep as his lips pressed against it.

"Tephemus was miserable and his people could feel it. It made the whole world sick and sad. His time had arrived and yet somehow refused to come, and they were all wasting away with him. They tried to convince him to take his own life, they told him that he had taught them enough and given them enough history to manage without him, but he refused." Picard arched, moaning softly and clasping his hands above his head as Q dipped a slick hand down to massage his balls gently.

"Why?" he gasped, trembling and digging his heels into the bed.

"Being a mortal, I'm sure he was arrogant enough to think his children couldn't get along without him, but his excuse was that the gods forbade suicide, which was true." Rolling him tenderly in a long-fingered hand, Q smirked fondly down at the pleasure-filled face that tightened as the man struggled to maintain his focus.

"They… they all do… it's bad for… population density…"

"Of course, and the more awkward, primitive beings you have on your favorite little planet, the more awkward, primitive worshippers you have. Well, theoretically." Q went back to stroking Picard's erection, his hand gliding easily over the natural lubrication the man's arousal had provided for him. His gaze blurred and his own body responded achingly as he watched Jean-Luc shudder and widen his eyes. This was it; the man was going to come, finally. He had held out longer than Q had expected, but now he was going to shoot all over himself while the entity drank in every detail of his bliss. Suddenly, though, another hand covered Q's and pulled it away, smashing it against the trembling, sweating skin of Picard's chest.

"No…" the man panted, his hazy eyes blinking up at the ceiling as he took a deep breath. "Just… just finish the story… and then fuck me. Please, Q." Swallowing and allowing his hand to relax where it had been placed, although the man's skin burned him with need, Q groped for a way to maintain control. He pouted.

"You just broke my promise, Jean-Luc." Hard eyes, shimmering with unshed tears of frustration, whipped away from the ceiling to bore into him with an exasperated plea. Nodding, the entity gathered himself together and averted his gaze. If he wasn't careful about where he looked he was going to lose it and just take the man right there, without giving him what he wanted first. In fact, he might not even get inside him at all; he might just shudder and come all over Jean-Luc's hip -- an unacceptable and humiliating possibility. "All right," he murmured, shifting higher on the bed so that he could cradle the man's head against his chest as he spoke. Picard encircled him with strong arms and continued to tremble slightly, full of bright, sparking sexual energy.

"Thank you."

"Of course." Q toyed chastely with Jean-Luc's earlobe and their legs slithered together even as each was careful to keep his erection from coming into more contact than was necessary with the warm, provocative skin of his lover. "Where was I?"

"You did get distracted," the man rumbled mirthfully against Q's chest, squeezing his sensitive hipbone for emphasis. Q rolled his eyes out of habit, knowing that Jean-Luc couldn't see him do it.

"Not as distracted as you got."

"I had a hand around my cock; what's your excuse?"

"I had a cock in my hand." They snickered together, caressing each other's skin without realizing what they were doing and gasping as their erections met by chance. "I'd better hurry," Q breathed, clutching at Picard's shoulder and hoping it would anchor him. "Really, where was I?"

"He refused to throw himself out of the proverbial airlock."

"Yes, right. When everyone who was thought to have any influence over him had come back empty handed, his top attendants got together and tried to decide what to do. The obvious solution was to kill him --"

"The obvious solution?" Jean-Luc snorted and, rolling his eyes again, Q pressed a finger to the man's lips.

"Hush, this is my story. The obvious solution was to kill him and sacrifice their own places in the afterlife for his. He couldn't off himself without suffering the gods' wrath, but that wasn't his concern, really. His main concern was that it would be a betrayal of their belief system, and since he was an ideological hero, his attendants didn't really want him to do that either. They had only tried to convince him to commit suicide because they couldn't stand to see him, and, by extension, their world in misery. You can understand that, can't you Jean-Luc?"

"I suppose so, but…"

"But nothing. Let me finish." Picard grumbled but remained otherwise silent, so Q continued. "They yanked on their little Malon ears and paced on their wide Malon feet trying to come up with an alternative, but there wasn't one. Really, Jean-Luc, it was like a room full of you trying to figure out how to save the universe with a wire and a piece of string." The man snorted against Q's chest, but he ignored it. "Ultimately, they accepted the necessity of killing him, and they went about planning it. They chose their martyrs from among themselves -- "

"How?"

"Oh, I don't know! They drew lots! I thought you wanted to hear the story. Here, let's give you something to keep your mouth occupied." Grinning crookedly, Q pressed the tips of his first two fingers against Picard's lips and when the man laughed he slipped them inside. Sharp teeth threatened to close around them, and he shifted to give his lover a stern look of warning. Jean-Luc rolled his eyes and relaxed, scrunching his brows in a way that communicated his whole-hearted feeling of absurdity. "Right, then. As I was saying, they chose their martyrs from among themselves and said lots of sing-songy Malon prayers while they tried to go about their normal attendant business. If Tephemus got even the tiniest inkling, he'd have to have them all strung up or risk complicity in his own murder, which would have amounted to assisted suicide." Picard mumbled something from around Q's fingers and the entity tapped his tongue impatiently. "Those two you saw murdering him were called Felor and Pim. Felor was Tephemus' personal assistant, I suppose you could say, and Pim was something like a political analyst. They were chosen, or they volunteered, or they drew the short lots, or whatever you like to imagine, and they were given the privilege of going down in Malon history as the two most appalling villains the world would ever know."

"Mmnnlls?" Frowning, Q pulled his fingers out of Jean-Luc's mouth and made a face and as he wiped the man's saliva across a convenient patch of bedspread. "Villains?"

"Oh, yes. The entire world was in on it, in a sense. It had to be a *real* murder or it wouldn't work. Once Felor and Pim were chosen, they planned the event on their own so that none of the other attendants could be faulted for failing to prevent it. The gods would know if they were just going through the motions, you understand, and the whole thing would become a sacrilege. As it was, Felor and Pim were the only ones who would be held accountable in the afterlife." When Picard shifted onto one elbow and furrowed his brow, Q could fairly see the neurons bouncing around inside the man's brain.

"What happened to them afterwards?"

"They were apprehended and executed publicly. Their faces went into history books and their names became epithets." Jean-Luc's frown deepened, and Q had to keep himself from giggling excitedly. Very little made his Q-heart flutter harder than Picard did when he was puzzling over something. His human heart was making a nuisance of itself as well, but he was largely able to ignore it in favor of watching his lover think.

"Let me see if I understand you. The Malons' beloved patriarch and ideological hero became gravely ill, and they hadn't the technology to cure him."

"Mmm."

"When it became clear that he was in terrible pain and that his pain was affecting the world at large, they tried to convince him to take his own life."

"They did." Q smiled sweetly and nodded once.

"And he refused."

"He did."

"On the grounds that to openly defy their gods that way would be an unforgivable betrayal of their belief system."

"Right." Brushing a knuckle under his nose, Jean-Luc opened his mouth, closed it, and then opened it again, seeming to have reconsidered his original thought.

"So his… command staff, as it were, decided to kill him, thus sparing him a harsh judgment in the afterlife and their people a loss of faith in their sort of prophet prince, while still solving the problem of his deterioration and their world's deterioration with him."

"Right again. You're good at this game, Jean-Luc." Picard frowned.

"Well, that much makes sense to me, I suppose, and perhaps even the fact that they had to carry the charade through to the end, to execute the murderers… but I'm not sure I understand why they had to go on demonizing them when it was so obvious that their intentions were honorable and their sacrifices heroic."

"If they'd all thrown up their hands in praise the minute heads rolled, the sacrifices wouldn't have meant much, would they? Particularly not to beings who don't see mortal death as the end of existence."

"Perhaps not, but they were already giving the murder a wink and a nod by initiating it in the first place. That the other attendants didn't know when or how it was going to happen didn't alter the fact that it'd been their idea, and telling their children that Felor and Pim were terrible villains didn't stop them being heroes. How thick did they imagine their gods to be, to be taken in by such a transparent farce?"

"Assume a virtue, if you have it not… For use almost can change the stamp of nature," Q purred, grinning serenely. Jean-Luc slapped his forehead and his eyes rolled back in his head.

"Really, Q!"

"If your beloved Shakespeare says it, you must believe it, mustn't you?" The entity's human eyelashes were batting. He could feel it, but he couldn't stop it. Picard scowled.

"Of course not! And anyway, I hardly think this was the situation he had in mind."

"Not specifically, no, but isn't that what you adore about him? That his themes could be so universal despite their archaic trappings? Besides, Jean-Luc, who are you to judge their gods or their particular method of devotion to them?"

"It is, among other things, and you're right, I'm no one." Exhaling deeply, Jean-Luc laid back into the soft bedding and squinted up at the ceiling. His eyes followed some unseen thought pattern as they wandered, sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly, always seeing nothing but the inside of his own mind. "But I do want to understand," he murmured, still half engrossed in private thoughts.

"I know. It's a contradiction, like everything else that's interesting in the universe. And that's not a coincidence, either; contradiction is what *makes* things interesting," Q breathed, lowering his lips to kiss that beloved chest, smiling as the gray-black hairs tickled his nose. Picard arched languidly against him, sighing.

"So I'm just supposed to accept that it's a contradiction? That there is no answer other than that it worked for them?" Licking a slow path through the recess between the man's pectoral muscles, Q made his way toward Jean-Luc's neck. The man's skin was almost as delicious as his thirst for understanding, and the entity shivered slightly under the dual onslaught.

"What more do you want?" Picard tangled his hands in the Q's soft, dark hair and tilted his head back, exposing his throat to warm, wet kisses.

"I suppose… I want to understand, from their perspective, why it was the only solution." When Q raised himself on his arms to look down at his lover, Jean-Luc made a rumbling, inarticulate noise of disappointment and slid his fingertips down to press imploringly against the small of the entity's back. Q shivered again and licked his lips playfully.

"That doesn't seem to be the only thing you want. Anyway, Jean-Luc, assuming we can manage to tear ourselves away from this bed at any point in the next week, I'd planned to show you around. You might find that it all makes more sense in context." Light flashed in those impossibly shrewd hazel eyes and dark brows shot up for a second before crinkling down again.

"You planned all of this… this place, this… puzzle. For me." Clearing his throat innocently, Q leaned down to press his mouth to Picard's neck again.

"I may have," he breathed against the sensitive, exposed skin, reveling in the way the man squirmed beneath him. The entity was tugged gently but firmly away from his prize, though, by a hand in his hair that drew his gaze up until it met Jean-Luc's. Looking so earnest that Q had to bite his tongue to keep from giggling, the man caressed his cheekbone with a tender thumb.

"It is quite possibly the finest gift anyone's ever given me. Thank you, Q." The entity felt his human face flush and his Q-self tremble and sparkle with energy so warm and intimate it was almost painful. He wanted to tell Jean-Luc that he was able to give such a thoughtful gift because he knew the man so well, and that he knew him so well because he loved him more than he'd ever loved anything. Despite his vast intellect and his nearly infinite vocabulary, though, Q couldn't think of anything to say that didn't sound trite, fall agonizingly short of the mark, or lose its meaning in a swirl of melodramatic hyperbole. Actions, then, would have to suffice.

With the immeasurable grace of familiarity and sincerity, Q eased himself between Picard's loosely parted thighs and kissed his lover in one smooth motion. The man's mouth opened almost instantly, and Q's tongue filled him full of gratitude and pride and adoration and everything else he felt for the strange mortal who had somehow managed, through his own quest for personal improvement, to alter the entity's exceedingly jaded and self-centered view of the Universe. Jean-Luc's legs twined around his waist as easily as he had positioned himself between them and soon the lovers were so lost in each other that it was difficult to tell exactly how Q managed to enter him. Q himself was not aware of making the attempt to do so, only of the fact that, at some point, he found himself surrounded by slick, welcoming heat. Picard was moaning softly into his mouth and pressing him closer, and they moved together dreamily, feeling nothing so specific as love or lust, but simply enjoying their intimacy and the soft, fuzzy pleasure that enveloped them. When Jean-Luc's sleepy eyes flew open, wide and staring, Q was jarred into realizing consciously that they were making love. They were here, on an alien planet, long ago, pressed into alien sheets already once anointed with their passion, and his beloved starship captain was about to lose his mind with bliss. The thought of what was going to happen to the awkward, mortal body he worshipped rolled Q's human eyes back into his human head, wracked his human body with a deep, convulsive shudder, sent his human seed rushing out of him and into the man groaning and coming beneath him. That man, with his curiosity, his need to understand, his integrity and everything else that made him Jean-Luc Picard, was, Q knew, the finest gift anyone had ever given him.