Story [Star Trek: TNG] The Moment (Will/Deanna, AU, Based in film timeline)

Title: The Moment
Summary: Deanna Troi is offered a teaching position at the University of Betazed and she seriously considers
leaving Starfleet forever after a conversation with her mother. It's another conversation that just might make her
change her mind.
Notes: Set one-year post Insurrection. Will likely be completed in 3 posts. Covers briefly during and after Season
7.
Category: Based in the years between Insurrection and Nemesis.
Pairing: Will Riker and Deanna Troi.
Disclaimer: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and all content in this story is owned by Paramount Pictures and every one else who owns Star Trek which isn't me. I'm just a humble fan and a big fan of The Next Generation series.


***

"I still can't believe you're on this Ship, little one."
Deanna Troi scowled darkly while falling into step with her mother in the corridor outside of her personal quarters
on the Enterprise and just as quickly plastered a fake smile to cover her frustration with her mother. Lwaxana Troi shot her daughter an equally forced patient smile. This was a game that had been on going with them after all
for over twenty years of Deanna's adult life. The entire span of time she had known the man named Will Riker
was a better description.

"Your brother hasn't this sort of problem, you know." Lwaxana went on. "Why I've had six different offers of an arranged marriage for Olan already. He's excited about at least two offers. He plans to be married by the time
he's twenty and career ready."

"Olan is only a boy, mother. He has plenty more years yet to change his mind like I did about such nonsense."
Deanna countered dryly. "People should have the right to make their own choices about who they're going to
marry."

"And where exactly has that human way of thinking gotten you, my dear? You're forty-years-old, without
children, and without a husband. What will you have when all this ends?" Lwaxana demanded while looking about
the corridor with cool black eyes.

Lwaxana soften instantly after seeing what her words were doing to her
daughter. Deanna was staring at her with wide angry eyes and tears threatened to spill. Lwaxana had honestly not
wished to hurt her daughter, she just wanted her daughter to have a family of her own so she wouldn't ever be
alone.

"I'm sorry, little one, I know I get carried away sometimes. I went too far. I just love you so much, I can't
bare the thought of you being alone when I'm gone."

Deanna smiled when her mother hugged her tightly. Her mother was strong willed and forgot often that her
youngest daughter was no longer her baby girl that needed constant care. Her mother was raised in an old time
on Betazed and dreamt for years of marrying her daughter off to one of the rich families on their home world.

Now Lwaxana would settle for just about any man for her daughter who'd give her a grandchild.
"I know, mother, I know. I won't be alone, though."

Lwaxana's dark eyes lit up as brightly as the blue silk dress she was wearing at mention of this fact.

"Oh, you're not telling me something, little one."

Deanna rolled her own black eyes and laughed softly from her belly. Her uniform no longer felt tight.

"Will and I have been seeing each other again. We've gotten quite close again this past year. I think we're finally
getting ready for the next step."

"Has he asked you to marry him, yet?"

The question gave her a sickening feeling in her stomach upon admitting the answer to herself before aloud. Will
hadn't asked her to marry him yet. He in fact still hadn't asked her anything about their new relationship. But she
knew how he felt about her. He loved her more deeply than he first did over twenty years ago when they first
met. It felt good to have that again in her life. There had been other men, but none like Will Riker. They were a
distant vague memory, like waking up from a dream you didn't quite remember. Will was something else entirely.

Deanna could remember e

 

It had been a full week since Lwaxana Troi had come to the Enterprise to visit Deanna and she still hadn't announced
when she'd be leaving them yet.

Deanna was unusually quiet and withdrawn from him. Deanna even refused any time alone together the last seven days, swearing it was due to an unusual amount of patients she was seeing, and her
mother wanted to see her every minute.

Will Riker had no problem sharing his girlfriend with her career and her mother. He knew how importantly and how seriously Deanna took her duties. Will also realized from the years of knowing Deanna Troi just how deeply the woman loved and cared for and respected her mother. No matter how crazy her mother managed to make her life.

But there was just one problem.

This week he had only seen Deanna either in the company of her mother or when he had Bridge duty when he relieved
her some mornings from night shift.

Deanna hadn't been to her Office this week at all.

The Ship's computer told him that.

Was there someone else?

Will knew that he hadn't seen her in the company of any man besides either the Captain, Geordi, or Data, and he knew
that Deanna thought of them as her extended family as he himself did.

What if there was someone on Betazed?

They had been steadily back together for over a year. They took turns staying over night in each other's quarters, they
spoke words of their devotion constantly to each other in private moments, and they made love as often as possible.

There had been no one else for him this last year, fully believing Deanna was ready to trust him again, and he didn't
want anything to hurt that trust. He wanted to protect it and cherish it for the rest of his life.

Finally, while sitting over a drink in Ten Forward, Will decided he was insane to think Deanna wouldn't have felt the
same about him this past year, and had been seeing someone else back home while letting him believe they had
something that was finally going to last.

Riker smiled as he continued to think of where he wanted what was happening to them to last forever and where
exactly he wanted them to go from here. He decided once her mother left he was going to ask Deanna to share rooms
with him. Then, maybe, just maybe, they would finally go to the next step.

Deanna Riker had a nice sound to it.



***

"Computer, where is Counselor Troi?"

"No such name found on board in crew registry."

Riker stopped walking and looked towards the ceiling as if to scowl at the Ship itself. What the hell was going on? No
name found on the crew registry?

"Computer, locate Counselor Deanna Troi!" Will snapped.

"No such name found on board in crew registry."

"Are you kidding me?" Will was furious now. "Computer, find Commander Deanna Troi!" Said the First Officer,
hoping the rank would wake the computer up from the glitch it obviously was in this morning.

"Commander Troi, Deanna, has retired from Starfleet active duty, at 13:00 hours yesterday afternoon. Authorization,
Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Deanna Troi is scheduled to leave the Ship at 15:00 hours this afternoon at Deep Space
Nine."

His legs were moving before he could even fully register everything the computer had said. She couldn't be leaving the
Ship, she couldn't be leaving Starfleet...and she couldn't be leaving him.

Not without a fight, she wasn't.

 

The position at Betazed University had been an unexpected and unwelcome suprise at first. Her life was here on this Ship. Will
was here on this Ship. They were finally back together and they loved each other. Content was only a word that could begin to
describe Deanna's joy on that fact.

But they still weren't married yet.

It was something she told herself repeatedly that it wasn't something that was a concern in their relationship. Many couples
never took that step. It never bothered Deanna until her mother decided to point the fact out to her like a sore thumb.

Why hadn't Will asked her to be his wife yet?

He had once before, over twenty years ago. He had meant it then when he asked her those words. Deanna knew he cared
about the idea of marriage. His own parents marriage hadn't frightened him off the idea of it for himself.

Did time change things though?

Will was nearly forty-five years of age and still wasn't a Captain yet. The young Will Riker she first fell in love with had sworn
to be a Starfleet Captain by the age of twenty-five.

Was his career first in his life even now?

The only answer Deanna could arrive at was yes and that's why she accepted the position at the University at her mother's
suggestion.

If Will was putting his career before their future together then what was stopping her from doing the same?

Captain Picard had been shocked at her resignation and asked her softly if she was all right. Stony black eyes said it all and he
did not press her. He gave her a hug good-bye like a father saying farewell to his beloved daughter. The good-bye with
Beverly had been even worse to bare. Her dear friend told her not to go, that things might work out yet. Deanna couldn't live
her life still only on the possibility of Will Riker.

Deanna was about to pack away a last picture when she finally broke down. It was a very small framed photo of Ian. Not her
father. Her son.

Had he had lived a normal developmental life as a human he'd be fourteen years old this year. Her son had been anything but
normal however. He had aged four years in his first day and then was gone forever the second.

Deanna realized her son actually had been just an alien life form studying human life, but to her he would always be the baby
she had given life too. Also Ian was so far the only chance she'd ever experience at motherhood. At forty years of age, she had
no other children. Deanna tore her eyes from her son's little face and looked to the man holding him in the picture.

Will.

Oh, how could she leave him?



***



"I remember that photo. It was taken about fifteen minutes after Ian was born. You got Data to take it for us."

His voice suprised her and Deanna gasped in suprise. She turned to look at him while clutching the photo on her hands. "You
remember that? It was so long ago..." She trailed off nervously. She was shaking now. Did he know she was leaving? Was he
hurt she hadn't told him?

"How could I ever forget your son, Deanna?" Will whispered softly. He was moving slowly towards her. "I remember
everything when it comes to you." Riker reached out to touch her hair and that was her undoing. She began to cry and he took
her easily into his large embrace. She was so small in his arms. "What is it, Imzadi? Why are you leaving me?" He urged her
gently against the thick dark curls of her hair. "Please don't go anywhere without me." He pleaded. His voice was barely a
whisper.

Deanna hugged his uniform shirt so tight as if it were to rip in her hands while trying to remember his scent in her mind forever.

It was so easily earlier that day. It was so easy to even walk out on the disappointed look on Captain Picard's face when she
told him of her abrupt decision to leave the Enterprise and to move home to Betazed with her mother.

He hadn't asked her to marry him yet and that was her true reason for going. It seemed so right before but she felt as if she betrayed every one she ever loved right at this moment. And it killed her to even

 

Oh major major Squeeeee!!!!!! Oh I've melted and I'm so glad!!! They're my fave TNG pairing and oh my, that was delicious!!!





!!!!