Q

They're all dead. Except for whoever was in that extra ship, whatever they call it, and the remains of the sentient computer program.

I really didn't need to watch that. Unfortunately taking off for another universe has limited efficacy when you're virtually omniscient.

The other universe was supposed to be fun, but it's not. Too much like work. I really have made quite an awful mess. One can only hope that they manage to muddle through. And not blow themselves up, unlike dear Kathy.

You know, the trouble with being a Q is that you really can't get drunk, even if you try.

Maybe I'll go drop in on this universe's Jean-Luc. Who is, as of the moment, neither dead of stupidity nor entangled in a mess I sorta kinda got him into.

I've spent more time than I probably should in a particular alternate universe, and now that I've come home and gotten some distance from the whole thing, I'm beginning to realize that I'm just as affected by the properties of a universe that makes people behave in ludicrous ways as anyone else. The difference being, I don't live there, so *I* have the opportunity to come home and realize I've made a fool of myself.

I am really absolutely mortified. I did something I've sworn up and down I had no interest in doing, and I might well have stuck the Continuum with the results for the rest of eternity. Which was bad enough when I offered Riker a chance to join us, but I thought I'd learned better since then.

I think I'm going to stay here for the time being. Besides, my son from the future is there. (If there's ever any more evidence I needed that that universe warps the judgment of even the Q, it's the fact that I will, at some point, allow my son to go back in time where he can actually interact with the me from his past. This is considered very bad form in the Continuum. The temptation to do something, anything, to prevent him from turning out the way he's apparently going to turn out is nearly overwhelming. Did I mention he's apparently going to be a gendered heterosexual? Great, my child is destined to be a pervert.)

Guinan, by the way, is a twit no matter what universe she's in.

Have just spent approximately... oh... how tedious it is to have to count time in units mortals comprehend... about one hundred thirty years of Continuum time, much of it spent in alternate universes.

q has figured out how to negate the gravitational constant. I don't know whether to be proud of him or annoyed that sticking him in a black hole is no longer an option.

I have done something terribly bad, tasteless and wrong for which I would have been sorely chastised by the Continuum if I hadn't WON THE WAR. But I did. So no one is complaining. Nyaah. Don't worry, my little pals, it was in a parallel universe and has no impact on your timeline. I think. So far, anyway.

(Actually, this is not entirely true. That no one is complaining, I mean. Many people are complaining but no one actually has the authority to do anything about it. Besides, it was an important experiment and we needed to know the results. Besides that entire parallel timeline warps the intellect. I wasn't in my right mind. It was totally irrational and spur of the moment and I shouldn't have done it, but my, it's going to be fun to see how it plays out. Not to mention how many of the Q I have managed to annoy by doing it. Including amanda_the_q and my ex. Life is good sometimes.)

I *really* don't want to encourage a creature who thinks it's a good idea to mind control its playmates.

But...

The rabbit ears? And tail? I have to admit that's downright hilarious. Not something I'd *do*, mind-- I like to think I have a more mature sense of humor than that. But I'd be lying if I didn't say it's a terrible effort for me not to fall down laughing hysterically.

Don't get me wrong. I still enjoy being mysterious and secretive most of the time. But it turns out it's not nearly so pleasant when there's actually something real at stake.

Recently it came to my attention that a certain individual, to whom I feel I owe a debt, might be having some difficulties. Said individual was involved in an unconventional relationship with a completely different form of life, who manifested differently to said individual than to others in the same location, and who obviously enjoyed amusement and fun. I am not really one to talk about people being involved in such relationships, for obvious reasons. *grin*

Buuut, as a Q I have always considered it my ethical duty to make sure any mortal friends I have (and I haven't really had all that many) don't get overwhelmed by me. (I seem to have gone a tad too far in the opposite direction, in fact.) This entity did not seem to be applying such ethical restraints in its relationship with the above-mentioned individual, who seemed to be becoming dangerously dependent on the entity's friendship. I ran a small test to see how this individual would handle being separated from the entity and forced to socialize with those who had always been good friends rather than with the entity. The individual failed my test, spectacularly, in front of numerous witnesses.

So here I've been, dropping hints, twiddling my thumbs, waiting for other people to figure out what's going on and do something about it, and I swear it's like one of those plays where the plot can only be driven forward by everyone being an idiot and you just want to scream "PAY ATTENTION AND USE YOUR BRAINS! YOU HAVE THEM, DON'T YOU?"

There's a fine line to walk when a Q is involved in the affairs of mortals. Involve yourself too much, answer too many questions, volunteer too much assistance and you make them into toys. Keep yourself too aloof, and you end up watching someone who once saved your life disintegrating in front of your eyes, and while you *have* the power to save them, you can't use it. It's a very, very difficult thing, but mortals can die-- that's the point to being mortal, and if you interfere to save their life or their mind, when does it stop? And how do they handle having godlike interference in their lives? (Most mortals handle this very badly.) And how do you prevent from destroying the very qualities of independence and courage and eagerness to grow that you were interested in them for in the first place?

It's so much easier not to be emotionally involved. Or to be able to step in to do whatever the hell you want and as long as you do it in a way that maintains plausible deniability, they either aren't sure you did it or they don't trust your motives. The trouble with trying to become friends with beings who are so much less powerful than you, and, frankly, so much dumber, is that if you intervene they know it was you and why, but if you don't intervene, you don't end up feeling like much of a friend.

How come I only get ten? I'm a god. I should be able to have as many icons as I want.

And it's hardly fair, anyway. I lost half my icons to assorted jerks hijacking my journal. Why should I waste precious icon space on pictures of Q, Q, Q and q when I could devote them to pictures of moi?

Must see if the repercussions of altering the LJ system so I can have more icons would be more significant than I want to put up with.

And attempting to break the locks my fellow Q have put on the icons they hogged my journal with.

Is it actually true that male humans prefer objects of sexual desire to look younger than they do, and female humans prefer them to be older?

Also, if it is true: how *much* younger/older?

Not that I have any actual need for the information, or anything. Just... idle curiosity.

You know, there is something fundamentally stupid about the nature of sentient beings who endlessly complain about something, get it solved, and then don't like the solution and want what they were complaining about back.

Yes, yes, you all resemble that remark, but actually I'm talking about me this time. Running around the universe causing general havoc... isn't nearly as interesting as it used to be. Oh, the nostalgia value was great for a short while, but honestly? It palls, eventually.

I have actually spent a considerable amount of time MISSING my SON. Who, for 500 years, I have been trying to dump on a babysitter. There's something ironic in that.

Anyway, I've got him back, and he's an even bigger know-it-all than he was before. Apparently he thinks his mother knows more than I do. Which, given that we are both Q and therefore have equal access to nigh-omniscience, is absurd. He didn't even miss me, the little ingrate. Well, except for the parts where his mother squished him up and put him in a Hawking black hole for a time-out. I think that's cruel and unusual. Do you know how hard it is to fit a whole Q into a Hawking black hole? It doesn't seem to have permanently traumatized him, but I think she went over the top. He *is* just a kid, after all. If you're going to put him in a black hole, put him in a decent-sized one at least. Poor little guy.

Of course the first thing he did when he got home was sneak behind my back to grab some Kazon ships Amanda wasn't paying close attention to and start playing war with them. You know, here I am, actually missing the brat, looking forward to all this father-son bonding stuff and then the first thing he does is disobey me. How do you mortal parents stand this? Some of you have more than one!

He also got into a fight with an adult who thought some negative things about his mother rather too loudly. The stupidity appalls me. Fighting with a full-grown adult Q is not smart for other full-grown adult Q to do; for a child, it's nothing less than supremely idiotic. On the other hand, I don't care if he's trying to bite you, do *not* throw my son into a gas giant. "It's soft" is *not* sufficient excuse for attacking a *child* as if he were an adult Q! You go to me about it.

Sigh. Kids. Already I can tell that I won't be bored for a while. Stressed out of my mind, most likely, but not bored.

Still no kid. I'm keeping an eye on them to make sure my ex doesn't, you know, abuse him or something, but aside from that? I am a free Q.

So I've been gallivanting all over the universe again. Just like the old days. Except more fun than it was in the old days because then I had nothing to compare it to.

Turned out botanist_keiko really wasn't a very interesting... conversationalist. So I think the dinner and trip to the Cretaceous will not be repeated. On the other hand I'm still looking for a timeline where Voyager had a night shift counselor to win my bet with ohthedarkness (and, though the_prophets are wankers, I must at least thank them for making him STOP WHINING). But not looking all that hard. Even in the light he's not that cute. It's just that a bet's a bet.

Mostly, though... I've been too busy having fun to bother with any of you. I'd drop by if invited (well, if invited by someone who doesn't bore me, which lets you out, Kei-chan, suman' ga omae wa hontoo ni omoshironakisugiru zo kara) but I'm not going to be constantly blathering on in this thing. Well, not until I have to take the kid back, anyway.

There are times when the state of my people seems quite depressing. kathrynjaneway pointed out a few days ago that things would go much more smoothly in trying to raise my kid if Q and I could actually achieve a compromise. Which sounds very nice and is completely impossible for two members of the Continuum. Or I observe how much easier it is for mortals to find people to talk to, or how much easier it is for them to handle things like getting shot at or feeling bored, and I almost feel a tiny twinge of envy.

Then I find out that some mortal female is pregnant (in this case, ezridax), and I once again remember why it's so great to be a Q. No inherent gender, no *pregnancy*, no suffering from physical discomfort and excruciating pain in order to reproduce, no monogamy, no angst over lack of monogamy... It's downright wonderful. (Some may say that since my form-for-humans is male and Q's is female I wasn't the one who'd have had to worry about it anyway. To this I must say, you don't know Q very well, do you. If either of us had had to worry about a disgusting parasite growing inside a physical body and distorting it, there would have been no child. Or, why do you think I didn't hit on Picard after Kathy turned me down? Well, aside from having to choose a different form-for-humans and the fact that the enemy was waiting to ambush me outside the Enterprise, but those are details. The main reason: human pregnancy is repulsive. I suppose a joined Trill is used to having a creature living inside her, but how do the human women do it?)

So, in addition to being superintelligent, omnipotent, ageless, effectively immortal unless one of my own kind shoots me, and free of all worries about maintaining my biological existence, I need to add: Never have to suffer pregnancy, or suffer putting up with a mate who's suffering from pregnancy. (Suffering from being stupid or a coward, yes. Suffering from pregnancy, no.)

*sigh* It's great to be me.