The BLTS Archive - Amends
by Llewlyn (llewcie@gmail.com)

---

Published: 01-06-07 - Updated: 01-14-07

AN: This is not the story i had intended to write. It's almost a
betrayal, because i adore Tom Paris, and i can feel that even as i sit
here helpless in front of my computer, listening to Coldplay and Ben
Harper and pounding out page after page of the story. I've been
watching Voyager in order, and just came across Blood Fever, and was
stunned by the empathy i felt for this poor lost belowdecker Vorik.
So, madness ensued, and i thought, why not let him have his chance? I
don't know-- maybe you'll all get lucky and i won't finish it. But
right now, it has me in a relentless grip-- Coldplay is the ultimate
trancewriting music. Somebody please come switch it off...

Disclaimer: We pick up the crumbs, the lost chances, from Paramount's
high table, and make them into banquets. All characters belong to
TPTB.

---
Courage
---

Dishonored.

Ensign Vorik attempted to find a better word to describe his state of
mind, but he could not. No amount of meditation could get him past the
unalterable fact that he had been defeated by the very woman he had
chosen to be his mate. No, not defeated. Beaten. Conquered. True, this
cast her in an even more desirable light; she was lithe and powerful,
with a nimble mind and an intellect that went beyond his own, at least
in the field of engineering. She had such an amazing ability to leap
from problem to solution... 

He shook his head. These thoughts were not helping him gain peace. The
more he thought about B'Elanna, the less he thought of himself, and
his behavior. Which drove him in turn to make some sort of gesture, to
balance things between them. They would, after all, be working
together for a very long time, in intimate circumstances, dependent on
each other. It was only logical that he attempt to return their
professional relationship to one that was equivalent to what had been
before.

This was how Ensign Vorik found himself, one week later, in the mess
hall, pondering the human concept of courage. Not that Vulcans lacked
a concept for courage — it was called kyi'i. But somehow this was
different. It was possible that traces of the aborted mating bond
still lingered in Vorik's subconscious, although he was loathe to
admit to such a possibility, and that the human or Klingon, or even
both identities of B'Elanna were wrapped up within him, confusing his
own sense of self. Whatever it might be that prevented him from rising
from his chair, he sat helplessly and watched as the woman he most
admired on this lost ship chatted endlessly with the overly cheerful
(even for a human) navigator Tom Paris. The man whom she had chosen
over Vorik. A most irritating man, in Vorik's opinion. He laughed too
much, and was reckless, and graceless, preferring to slouch rather
than to sit with poise. Why would B'Elanna, a mighty warrior, choose a
weak human over a strong Vulcan? Admittedly, as he watched his
thoughts turn a full circle, she had beaten him soundly. But not on
the first hit. Tom Paris wouldn't have lasted past the first body
slam.

Vorik turned that moment over and over in his mind. He had been hazy
with the blood fever, the ritual battle, the kali'fee. But when her
fist had connected, it had shocked him into clarity for a moment, and
sheer astonishment made him stumble. In all his years of training, no
one had ever hit him that hard. The blow rang through his bones like a
bell, turning his knees to water. It was...  bewildering... 
beautiful. In that moment, he had wished that the battle could
continue forever, that he could be locked into combat with his warrior
queen, savage and lovely, until there was nothing left of him to
fight, and that as he lay broken and dying on the ground, his only
wish would be to see her gazing at him as he took his last breath, and
closed his eyes, losing his katra to her keeping.

Suddenly, he found that his kyi'i had not abandoned him at all, but
was just waiting for the proper moment. Tom Paris was being called to
the Bridge. How fortuitous. Vorik waited a moment, and then rose and
sat down beside B'Elanna, a plan not even considered a moment ago now
fully formed. His mind was extremely quick in its own way;
lightning-quick, B'Elanna would have acknowledged, had she not been
still so angry about the entire circumstance of the pon farr. She
attempted an appropriate smile and hoped the Vulcan wouldn't notice
her lack of warmth. But she was to learn that Vulcans were much more
perceptive about emotion than she would ever have thought possible,
from a species that claimed not to have any.

"Lieutenant, I wish to make a proposal."

B'Elanna raised a disbelieving eyebrow at him, a half-smile gracing
her lips, and he looked down at the table, reconsidering what was
clearly a poor choice of words. "What is it, Ensign?" she asked,
sparing them both an awkward rephrasing. She wondered if that was how
he was taught to speak, or if was an affectation. Maybe he was shy, or
felt tongue-tied around humans. Tuvok, the only other Vulcan she knew
well on board Voyager, was completely at ease in human company, even
using humor on occasion. Vorik just seemed...  young. And she realized
that he was. He had just, more or less, reached puberty, even though
she knew he was easily in his fourth decade. That was a disconcerting
thought, and she did her best to stifle it, as he gathered up his
courage, and spoke again.

"I have been burdened with...  regret at my behavior, and I wish to
make amends." He looked at her with what was unmistakably eagerness,
and she blanched inwardly, wondering what these amends were going to
entail. To her dismay, his eagerness was shrouded immediately, and his
dark, solemn eyes flickered down to the table. She flushed, wondering
if her thoughts had been so obvious as to embarrass him. She hadn't
intended to cause him more pain, and yet here she was, rubbing his
nose in it like a bad puppy. That was damnably unkind, and she owed
him better than that

Her voice was gentle with embarrassment when she spoke. "What you did,
Vorik...  I may be the only person who isn't a Vulcan on this ship
that understands what you went through. And let me tell you that if
you were only half as helpless as I was against that tidal wave... 
well, you did just fine."

"Tidal wave?" Curiosity perched on his eyebrows, and she found herself
warming again to the young man sitting in front of her. He was quite
handsome when he forgot to be concerned that someone might be watching
him. Olive-complected and sleek black hair always slightly untidy in a
way she found endearing, although she was certain he took great pains
to make himself look as polished as possible. She nodded, remembering
now.

"That's what it felt like. Like I was being washed away, every
civilized layer, everything that made me who I was." She clutched at
her uniform, as if that would describe what the pon farr had taken
away from her. Two years ago such an icon would have been a symbol of
scorn, but now it was the face that she was proud to present to the
world. "The brutality of it...  the sheer power." She shook her head.
"I fell like a cut flower." Her sudden realization struck her like a
weight in her stomach, and she looked up to meet Vorik's eyes. He
looked slightly horrified, as if she were loudly describing her
lingerie collection in public. She blushed even more. "I'm sorry.
Would you like to go somewhere more private to discuss this?"

He blinked. Twice. His voice, when he finally spoke, was more of a
breath. "Yes." She nodded at him, and wondered, not for the first
time, what she was getting herself into.

---
Watcher
---

They ended up on Holodeck Two, which was the only holodeck not
occupied. B'Elanna had briefly entertained the thought of going to her
quarters, and then rejected it wholesale. The entire incident was just
too close, and she didn't want to be within shouting distance of a bed
in the presence of Vorik, even if she could kick his ass with one hand
tied behind her back. No, holodecks were safer. She programmed a café,
a quiet meadow, and then a crowded bar all in quick succession, and
rejected them all. Finally, Vorik leaned over her shoulder, which was
no problem for him since he was considerably taller, and punched a few
commands into the pad. "I come here often to meditate. It is a neutral
place."

B'Elanna frowned. He had correctly interpreted her unwillingness to be
in an intimate situation with him. That didn't speak well for her
outer façade, or her theory on Vulcan obliviousness to emotion. In
fact, she had no idea why she had formed that theory — based on her
experience watching Tuvok and the captain, the Vulcan tactical officer
had Janeway pegged, often before Janeway had even spoken. Had Vorik
studied her with equal care? B'Elanna didn't know how to think about
that, so she chose not to. Perhaps there was nothing to her thoughts
at all. She simply nodded to Vorik, and he preceded her into the
holodeck.

Vorik's thoughts were in turmoil, and he was relieved that he had been
able to choose the setting. B'Elanna might as well have been stripping
him naked in front of the crewmembers in the Mess Hall. He wasn't
aware that any of them had been able to hear, but the matter of the
pon farr was so profoundly private that he was stunned that she could
speak of it with such freedom. And yet, he wanted to know what she had
to say. No one had ever spoken to him like this. All of these things
were shrouded in mystery, in shame and humiliation, and no one spoke
of them. Ever. Except B'Elanna Torres. The temple vista surrounded and
soothed him, its familiarity gentle and sopophoric on his troubled
mind. He felt her come up behind him, looking around. "What is this
place?"

"It is a temple. The original is in the city where I grew up on
Vulcan." He reached out for a glowing canister of incense, burnished
to a bright gold in the dying suns of the twilight. "I came here often
when I was...  younger." What had he intended to admit to her? Had he
not bared his soul enough to this woman? Sighing softly, he gestured
to a mat on the floor. "Please, sit, and continue your thoughts."

She did sit, after a moment of staring into the middle distance, and
he kneeled stiffly opposite her. B'Elanna's mind flashed, for a
betraying moment, back to his flowing grace during the kali'fee — that
is, until she sent him sprawling. He moved like he belonged in the
battle, just like some people were only graceful while swimming or
dancing. When he walked, his movements were carefully controlled, but
stilted — hardly graceful. She shook her head, not wanting to dwell on
it, and attempted to recapture the broken threads of her thoughts from
the mess hall. Vorik just waited patiently, as the sun fell below the
horizon, and B'Elanna could faintly see the sliver of what looked like
a large moon on the horizon. "Your sister planet is beautiful."

Vorik softened perceptibly. "Most off-worlders think T'Khut is a
moon."

"What does the name mean?" She couldn't help herself. She was being
drawn in to conversation with Vorik, and his gentle manner was
disarming her in exactly the way she had intended to be on guard for.
He gazed at her calmly, and she wondered if he knew again what she was
thinking.

"She is the Watcher."

The silence stretched between them, silence that B'Elanna became
desperate to fill. She struggled to focus on what she had been
thinking, and then how to redirect the conversation. Small talk had
never been her strong suite, and this small talk seemed to be looming
rather larger than its name implied. But after a tense moment, Vorik
unexpectedly came to her rescue. "Please. You were telling me how the
pon farr made you...  feel. You must understand that this subject is
simply not discussed among my people. But I must admit that if you are
willing to share your experiences, then I would be fascinated to hear
them."

She took a deep breath. "I was telling you that I felt...  that I had
been stripped of control, of all that made me who I was." A throaty
chuckle escaped her. "And then I thought how ironic it was that I
would reference this uniform as a symbol of that control, but then I
guess that it's sort of appropriate." She sighed, and stretched out on
the ground, reaching to access all of the experience that she could.
"And I fell. I just...  collapsed under the pressure of the wave. It
took me over, and I couldn't resist it." Her hands slid around her
stomach to clutch at her ribs, the discomfort of the experience still
nearly overwhelming. "I tried, I fought. And I failed. Completely."
She fixed Vorik with a serious look, and he tilted his head slightly
toward her, listening intently. "I wanted to kill you. If I had...  I
would not have been able to live with myself."

Suddenly, overwhelmingly, she wanted to reach out and touch his hand.
Between the thought and the action was a wall that was as solid as
granite, the exact color of her pride. Instead, she tucked her hand
behind her head to cushion it against the hard clay floor. But the
thought stayed with her, intense and unfulfilled. He had been as
helpless as she, following the ancient dance of his people. He had
chosen her, among all the women on the crew, as the one he wanted for
a mate. And she had utterly humiliated him for it.

After a moment, he spoke, but his voice was rough around the edges.
"What you did was the only honorable path you could follow. I gave you
no choice. You rejected me as a mate, and the ritual was played out.
If I had been killed, no one would have faulted you for it." His full
mouth quirked in a tiny smile that B'Elanna was sure she was
hallucinating. "Indeed, at the last, I did not expect you to stop."

B'Elanna was stunned, not certain if she had heard right. "What?" She
sat up, her attention fully on him now, and he acknowledged the shift
in their dynamic with a delicate out-thrusting of his chin.

"The ritual challenge ends, almost always, in death. If you had been
Vulcan, I would likely be dead." He spoke readily, his eyebrows
raised, and she was again reminded of a puppy, but horribly now. Her
brow creased in pain, and she felt queasy, for a culture that would
betray such a bright young man so completely. Would Tuvok had stood by
and watched her murder her junior officer? She couldn't imagine him
doing such a thing, but yet, could he have prevented it? And yet Vorik
had intended to challenge Tom, and Tom would have been cut down in an
instant. Was Vorik tacitly admitting that he had been prepared to kill
Tom to win her? She looked down to see that her hands were shaking. He
saw, and took her hands in his, unthreateningly. Surprised, she
allowed him to. They sat for a moment in a silence that B'Elanna did
not need to fill. His body heat was intense, and it soothed her,
washing through her hands and wrists and up her arms. Finally, a
thought filled her that could not be silenced.

"All these years I thought Klingons were so violent...  I had
absolutely no idea that Vulcans kept such a terrible secret."

"It is often a...  hard discipline. I have much to learn, B'Elanna."
His voice was fragile, and she squeezed his hand, glad that she had
not had to break through her own wall to touch him. "I never intended
to be so far from my studies, and my teachers. I wanted to ask you if
you would help me with a part of them."

She smiled at him then, certain he was joking. "I didn't do so hot
with the first Vulcan ritual, Vorik. I'm not sure what I can do for
you."

He raised his eyes to hers, deep and uncertain. "I was hoping that you
would consent to teach me how to fight."

Unbidden, his graceful sweeping back-kick came flying through her
mind, and a curious slow-motion vision of his lanky and powerful body,
untrained but full of potential, in their blurred and bloody battle on
a now-distant planet. She realized that in all her time spent with
him, those few brief moments were the only moments she had truly felt
blood-lust for him. Dangerous, but intriguing. She eyed him carefully,
and decided that her answer would depend on how he answered her next
question. "Why?"

He contemplated her carefully, seeming to realize how much was riding
on her answer. Suddenly, B'Elanna felt like one of her own Starfleet
instructors, pushing and judging to the limit. She was uncomfortable
with that comparison, but she had to know. Vorik let go of her hands,
slowly, and templed his fingers against his lips. "I lack discipline.
That you were able to prevent my death at your own hands, though you
clearly wanted it, shows me that your discipline is superior to mine.
I wish to learn. Will you be my teacher?" His half-hidden face was a
stoic mask, but she could tell how much his confession had cost him.
Vorik never hid his face when he spoke. If he could observe her, she
could do the same to him.

"How do I know you don't want to learn just so you can beat me in a
fight?" But she was smiling, and they both realized with considerable
surprise that she had agreed. He dropped his hands to his knees with a
near-blank expression that bordered on relief.

"I have told you the truth of my motives. If you choose to teach me
the techniques that will lead to your defeat, then that is up to you."
Perhaps it was just the candlelight, but B'Elanna could have sworn
that his eyes were sparkling. She nodded.

"Alright, Vorik. You've won your point. Meet me back here at oh-five
hundred hours tomorrow. Wear something loose fitting." He nodded, and
then rose, and took her hand again to help her stand. She came up to
his shoulders, and her mind was already racing, adjusting for height
and weight differentials. He was fast, but his aim was off, and he was
going to have to learn that the hard way. She looked around her to
find that the sun had completely set, and the chill desert wind was
cresting from the valley below the temple. She shivered.

"Changeable weather."

"Vulcan is a difficult planet." She turned instinctively to him, a
lost, raw quality in his voice that she had never heard before. "Yet
not a day goes by that I do not wish to be home." Looking up into his
eyes, she connected with the stark loneliness there on a visceral
level. He returned her gaze, and she found herself wondering for a
moment, what it would have been like to have accepted his offer. And
then she knew she had spent way too much time in his company.

"Good night, Ensign. See you tomorrow." She turned and walked out,
feeling unaccountably like she was abandoning him. That was a foolish
thought, and she knew it. But she could feel his dark eyes on her even
as she crossed the threshold of the temple and walked out into the
corridor. She did not dare look back.

---
Restraint
---

B'Elanna walked the entire way down to Holodeck Two wondering why she
had ever agreed to this, and trying to devise a way, legitimately or
not, to back out of it.

ToDSaH, she thought. Wuss. She shook her head. It wasn't the fight
that she was concerned about — it was all of the peripherals. The fact
that Vorik was clearly still attracted to her. His intense loneliness,
and youth and inexperience with life. She wasn't a nursemaid, and
didn't feel like nursing a young man who had a crush on her, even if
he had tried to take matters into his own hands. Actually, now that
she thought about it, the challenge had been quite refreshing. It
appealed to the Klingon in her that she struggled to keep buried deep,
and that was what frightened her most.

Well, B'Elanna wasn't much for backing down from a challenge, as long
as she knew what she was fighting. Feeling a little more confident,
she faced the holodeck door, to find a program already activated. She
smirked. Vorik had better not have tired himself out, because he was
going to have a long day ahead of him. She certainly wasn't going to
give him a break in his duties in engineering even if they had a rough
morning in the holodeck.

When she stepped through the door, though, she found him seated in
meditation, wearing a pair of loose pants fit for a martial arts
workout. His shirt was folded neatly next to him on the floor, and the
room was warm and dark, filled with candlelight. Vulcans and candles,
and yet they pretended not to understand romance. She studied his
well-muscled shoulders and back in the soft, flickering light, reading
the map of his strength. He was definitely fit, but no muscle group
was overly developed beyond his shoulders and triceps. She remembered
that he had done extensive rock climbing, which would account for
that. His head turned slightly at the swish of the door, and his hand
reached for his shirt. "Forgive me, B'Elanna. I came early to
meditate."

"No problem, Vorik. I can see you're top-heavy, with less muscle
strength in your lower back. You'll have to watch for that." She
grinned at him as he turned, pulling his shirt on smoothly, but she
got a glimpse what she expected — broad pectoral muscles and strong
biceps but a smooth abdomen. He had no strong muscle wall over his
stomach, and would be easy prey there. He studied her for a moment
with his head slightly cocked to one side.

"I have always underestimated you, B'Elanna."

"Yes. You have. Now you get to find out how much that will cost on the
dance floor." Without any more warning than that, she swung into a
high kick and immediately dropped into a spin and went for his soft
abdominal muscles with her fists. He allowed the kick to land on his
shoulder, but the blow was heavier than he anticipated, and he barely
deflected her double punch from his stomach. She righted herself and
grinned saucily at him. "You need better protection. You're weak where
it counts most to be strong." Without waiting for his reply, she
barked at the walls. "Computer! Run Torres A. Safeties on. For the
moment." She flicked her eyes back at the young Vulcan, his serious
eyes on her rather than the environment taking shape around them.
Good. He had learned his first lesson.

Torres A was a simulation made from an amalgamation of an old Earth
Marine boot camp, some of her most hated Starfleet simulations, and
Klingon wargames. It was the most intensive workout she had ever put
together, and she ran through it when she needed to blast herself into
oblivion. She didn't expect Vorik to make it even halfway through. The
first barrier was a granite wall, which they climbed with minimal
gear. He was a natural on the sheer wall, finding crevices that
B'Elanna had trouble using, even with her smaller hands. She found out
that his thigh muscles were as well developed as his biceps, as he
made powerful stretches and balanced on holds that she wouldn't have
risked a hook on, much less a life. But Vorik didn't say a word to her
through the entire experience until they got to the top, and then he
turned, nodded to her agreeably, and said, "That was most refreshing.
May I borrow it?"

She nodded, trying not to appear impressed. "Anytime, Vorik," she said
with practiced nonchalance. And then he turned to look beyond them,
and his easy confidence shriveled to nothing. Between them and the
next checkpoint was a vast lake. His mouth fell open, and then he
closed it, and squared his shoulders. B'Elanna creased her forehead,
wondering if it was too much. Desert planet dweller that he was, had
he even been swimming before? Before they reached the bank, he
confirmed her suspicion.

"You will have to teach me to swim, B'Elanna. I do not have this
experience." His voice was quiet, mildly awestruck. She nodded, and
looked up at the ceiling.

"Computer, end Torres A simulation." The lake vanished, leaving them
in the empty deck. She thought for a moment, and then spoke again,
uncomfortably aware that his eyes hadn't left her. "Tomorrow, I'll
begin to teach you to swim. Today, we'll finish with standard
wrestling holds. In 3 G's." He nodded, his eyes darkening, and as she
finished giving the computer instructions, the weight in the room
increased steadily until, to him, it felt like home. He tucked and
rolled, catching his commanding officer off balance and sending her
tumbling. She laughed out loud, knowing that she couldn't make any
excuses for having not been ready. She settled into a low stance, and
they threw themselves together, each determined not to fall. The heavy
gravity dragged B'Elanna down, and she threw herself into the fight
against it, and against Vorik, whose powerful shoulder strength was to
his advantage in this game, and something loosed inside of her, and
she was straining, all of the sudden, with everything she had. A small
part of her mind realized that she had never let herself go like this,
had never just cut the cords of her restraint. And then Vorik grunted
with the strain beside her, a sound of pure, unadulterated joy, and
she felt a new surge of power from untapped sources deep within. She
threw Vorik to the ground, but before she could pin him he was back up
again—she had underestimated his natural quickness in this dense
gravity. And now he was on her without mercy, breaking every hold she
could find on him, using his height and reach to his advantage, and
she was pressed into a game of avoidance, into defense.

That wouldn't do.

Breaking free, she circled him, panting. How long had it been since
she had become winded during a workout? Vorik was sweating lightly,
his concentration steady and his eyes black. She grinned a heady grin,
feeling energy building up inside her, ready to take him out...  ready
to...

A communicator chirped somewhere. "Carey to Torres." She shook her
head, and Vorik straightened, their battle trance broken. She looked
around for her commbadge, and then realized that it was pinned to her
shirt. She tapped it. "Torres here." Her voice was a little unsteady,
and she swallowed.

"Chief, can you come down a little early today? I wanted to get
started on the new sequencing for the warp coils before the captain
comes by for inspection." Carey sounded nervous. The captain had
ordered them to shave off energy usage all over the ship, and she and
Carey had been working on a timing sequence that would take seconds
off the powering of the coils. It was tricky, to say the least.

B'Elanna forced herself fully into the role of Chief Engineer, leaving
the warrior behind. "Sure. I just need to take a shower and change.
Ten minutes. Torres out."

Vorik looked slightly bemused, but bowed, and she returned it. "Thank
you, B'Elanna. That was...  most enlightening. What will I need to... 
swim?"

She imagined what a Vulcan would look like in swim trunks, and shook
her head. Talk about a targ in the water. "Bring standard swim gear,
with gills. I'll teach you the crawl stroke tomorrow." He nodded, and
then turned and walked out, only slightly favoring his left leg. She
stood for a moment, trying to catch the last threads of a dream. What
was it that she had just been ready to do to Vorik, before Carey had
called? She had to be very careful that this little exercise didn't
spiral rapidly out of control. She was in complete control. Complete
control.

---
Burden
---

Carey was waiting eagerly for her in Engineering when she arrived
fifteen minutes later, showered and feeling focused. The morning
workout had done her a world of good, and had even left her a little
sore. She hid a smile as she watched Ensign Vorik lean stiffly over a
console — of the two of them, she had definitely come out with fewer
bruises. And to her pleasure, the three of them managed to shave
almost five seconds off the power-up of the warp coils in the test
sequence. It wasn't much, but small power-savers like this all over
the ship would help them stockpile energy that they desperately
needed. On long stretches between planets and bases, Captain Janeway
always came up with interesting and useful ways to keep them all
occupied, their skills finely honed, and B'Elanna was grateful.

She was also pleased with the teamwork among the members of her crew.
Carey was a fine engineer, if limited in courage. Vorik was limited
only in experience, but his fine mind and lightning-quick ability to
make ideas meet in solutions was something that B'Elanna valued
greatly. She realized that she had missed that for the brief time they
had been alienated, and that she hadn't realized how much she had come
to rely on him as a sounding board. His steady calm and insight,
Carey's bright and active intelligence, and her unique problem-solving
abilities made them a solid team, one that she did not want to lose.
She caught Vorik's favoring his wrist, and smiled ruefully.
Unfortunately, he caught her eye at the exact same moment, and his
gaze softened in embarrassment. She moved over to his station,
ostensibly to check on some readings, and took his wrist in her hand.
Dark brown bruises in the shape of her fingers crossed over the thin
flesh that covered his strong bones. Her eyebrows shot up in surprise.

"I am beginning to feel the effects of the morning, Lieutenant." His
voice was pitched only for her ears, and his breath whispered against
her cheek. She smiled, feeling perversely pleased.

"Feeling like you made a bargain with the Devil, Ensign?"

He considered her for a moment, and his dark eyes dropped to where her
hand was still holding his wrist. She gently let go of his hand, but
didn't let her question drop. A tiny smile quirked the corner of his
mouth, adding a wry depth to his expression that she had never seen
there before.

"Vulcans don't believe in the Devil, Lieutenant."

Her grin only broadened. "Brave words, Vorik." He watched her in
return for a moment, the wryness not leaving his eyes, until a chirp
from the board called his attention back to the process he was
running. B'Elanna turned back to her boards, and Carey came up behind
her, beaming.

"This went well. The captain seemed pleased." She nodded, and felt a
flush of pride at the small triumph. In a passage full of terrible
crisis, every victory, no matter how small, was a worthy one.

At lunch, Tom tracked her down and slid into the seat next to her,
eager to hear about the morning session. "So, did you kick his ass?"

She rolled her eyes, munching on sliced leola root salad and some
gingered rice. "No. Actually, I didn't. We did some rock climbing, and
practiced wrestling holds."

Tom flashed her a disapproving look. "Wrestling holds? That sounds... 
cozy." His voice insinuated the exact feeling of discomfort that
B'Elanna had felt herself, so she naturally denied it with a wave of
her hand, instead leaning toward him.

"In three G's, Tom."

His sandy eyebrows shot up. "Three? As in three times Earth's
gravity?" He settled his elbows on the table and scowled at his rice.
"Heavy."

"Very." She poked at a slice of root. "He is a skillful rock climber.
He might even be better than you, Tom." She watched her friend's light
skin flush with umbrage, and his lips twitched mildly.

"If he needs a rock climbing partner, he's free to ask."

B'Elanna suddenly didn't want to escalate this competition anymore.
"Tom, I'm not romantically interested in Vorik. He asked me to teach
him how to fight. To do that, we have to go through some pretty
intensive training. That's all."

Tom looked at her, his light blue eyes intense. "Who are you trying to
convince, B'Elanna?" She pulled back, a little shocked, and he reached
across and took her hand. "Look, whatever you do is fine. He came to
you to make things better between you, and that's good for everyone in
Engineering, which is good for the rest of us." The impish light came
back into his eyes. "Besides, you've been looking for a sparring
partner. And I'm sure it's satisfying to beat the crap out of him."

B'Elanna laughed out loud at this. "It is! I almost feel guilty. But
he is very...  durable." Tom was grinning, sharing her glee, and
suddenly she felt a lot better about the whole thing. "Thank you. I
was having second thoughts. I'm teaching him how to swim tomorrow, and
he's really nervous." She ate the last of her food quickly and
squeezed Tom on the shoulder. "See you later, Navigator."

Tom stared at his rice for a while after she left, wondering just what
had happened to make the conversation turn against him so completely.
Would he ever stop making things worse just by opening his mouth? And
now she was teaching Vorik the Vulcan, a man from the desert planet,
how to swim. The thought of it made him lose what was left of his
appetite.

The door to the mess hall opened, and who should walk in but the
Vulcan in question. Tom was satisfied at least to see that he was
limping slightly, but the thought that Vorik was carrying the injury
rather than taking it to the Doctor bothered him slightly. It was
something Tom would do with a war wound that he was proud of. Feeling
perverse, he motioned Vorik over to his table, and the tall Vulcan sat
hesitantly down with a tray full of greens. They had not actually
spoken since Vorik had attempted to engage him in the ritual combat of
the plak tow, and Tom was still feeling less than friendly. When Tom
continued to stare at him, Vorik bowed his head over his meal and
began to eat. Finally, Tom spoke, wishing he had never invited the
Vulcan over in the first place.

"So, B'Elanna tells me that she's going to teach you how to swim
tomorrow. That sounds interesting."

Vorik chewed his food slowly, and swallowed. "I have to admit, I am
uncertain about submerging myself in water." His face was a mask, but
Tom could see the nervousness in his eyes. He softened a bit. A small
bit.

"You'll like it, I bet. It's a little like zero grav, but without the
nausea. And if I know B'Elanna, she'll find some place that will take
your mind off the water.

Vorik looked at him curiously. "What do you mean?" He set his hands on
the table, and Tom caught a glimpse of the bruises under the cuff of
his uniform. So the limp wasn't the only injury he had kept. A brief
flare of jealousy flared within him, but he tamped it down. Was he
jealous about not getting the stuffing beat out of him? Certainly not
— Vorik could have all the abuse that he wanted. He tried to focus
back on the question, when he realized that the Vulcan was waiting
patiently for his answer.

"Well, I remember when she introduced me to wind sailing, she picked a
very pretty piece of tranquil coast in the Caribbean. Even when I
crashed, it was into the shallows. She'll take good care of you."

Vorik flicked his eyebrows up at this, and his gaze dropped ruefully
to his wrists. "Indeed." Tom realized suddenly that more was going on
than met the eye. Perhaps Vorik even felt that he deserved these
injuries, for what he had done to B'Elanna. Abruptly, Tom lost the
taste for teasing the young man. He stood, and forced a smile.

"You'll do fine." And then, without knowing what led him, he clasped a
gentle hand on Vorik's shoulder. The Vulcan nodded, and met his eyes,
something unfathomable in his gaze.

"Thank you, Lieutenant."

"Most people around here call me Tom."

"Thank you, Tom." And then the conversation was closed, and Vorik
turned back to his salad, and Tom left the mess hall, his mind full of
troubled thoughts. He wasn't going to betray a confidence that he only
suspected. But he would watch out for the two of them. After all, what
were friends for? But the haunted look in Vorik's dark eyes stayed
with him long after duty shift was over.

---
Safety
---

The next morning B'Elanna woke up nervous, and the feeling didn't
leave her all the way down to the holodeck. The program Torres A was
already running, and the safeties were off. Merciless guilt ransacked
her stomach — that lake was full of deep undercurrents and treacherous
spillways —  no easy path even for an experienced swimmer. If he had
attempted it without her... !

She rushed through the door, calling Vorik's name, but there was no
answer. The climbing wall was a blank face of morning - warmed
granite, and she didn't feel like dealing with it.

"Computer, stairs!" A gently sloping path of rough dirt stairs
appeared in front of the wall and she sprang over them, leaping over
the wall in a tenth of the time it would have taken her to climb it.
It was her program, and it was full of shortcuts. She was a very busy
person. She had never before thought that she might have to rescue
some foolish Vulcan from a man-eating lake.

Crashing through the underbrush, she called out to him again, but only
silence met her sensitive ears. The woods seemed unusually dense, and
briars tore at her cheeks as she forced her way through to the shore.
There, at the edge of the lake, sitting perfectly oblivious in his
Starfleet issue swim gear, mask at his side, was the reason for her
thundering heart. B'Elanna dropped to her knees beside him and took
him by the shoulders, wanting to shake him as hard as she could.
"Vorik, didn't you hear me calling?"

He looked up at her, his eyes curiously blank. His mouth opened and
closed, and he blinked, but said nothing. She shook her head at him,
and realized that his shoulders were damp with dew moisture. "How long
have you been out here?"

His dark eyes broke to the pebbled beach, not quite meeting the
waterline. "Three hours and twenty two minutes."

B'Elanna swallowed, her nervousness back in a trembling rush. "You
weren't planning to swim without me, were you?"

He wouldn't meet her eyes. "Yes."

She forced him to look at her, gazing deep enough to make certain she
made a connection. "Vorik, this lake is incredibly dangerous. It has
undertows, and whirlpools. Never swim here without me. Do you
understand?"

His breathing accelerated, and his heart rate with it, and she had to
force herself not to look away, not to allow him to keep his pride.
This was too important. He was too important, she realized. "Please,"
she added. His gaze softened slightly, and he nodded.

"I am sorry to have upset you, B'Elanna."

"I'm here to teach you how to swim, not to resuscitate you, Ensign."
She allowed a glint of flinty anger to leak out of her expression, now
that she could accept that a crisis had been averted. He lifted a
consummate Vulcan eyebrow at her.

"Yes, sir." He had reverted to the ultimate formality, calling her
sir. It felt like a wall, one without crevices in which to find
purchase.

"Right." She stood briskly. No sense in trying to salvage that
situation. On to the next. "This is not where we are going to swim.
Computer. End Torres A." The lake vanished around them, and Vorik
stood calmly, as if he hadn't been on the brink of death a moment
before. He was made of such extremes, she mused — the intense violence
and the blank passiveness, all bound within moments of each other. It
was disconcerting. She directed her attention to the program instead.
"Computer, begin Torres Ocean B. Depth begin at one meter, angle
outward at fifteen degrees. Flora and fauna." She paused, thinking,
and then added, "No jellyfish."

"Jellyfish?" Vorik queried. B'Elanna just smiled, as the water came
into existence around them. At first, Vorik stood stock still, his
knees locked, and she reached out and took his forearms to help him
balance. They stood close to each other as the water level rose up
above their hips. The brilliant blue of Earth's Caribbean ocean
gleamed out in all directions, and he stared in amazement around them,
his hands clutching at her biceps. "This is on Earth?"

"Yes. The Caribbean."

His brow darkened momentarily. "Where you taught Tom Paris to wind
sail."

B'Elanna raised her own eyebrow at this revelation. "Have you two been
trading stories about me? Because that can stop."

He looked back at her, disconcerted. "No, B'Elanna. He was only trying
to make me feel better about learning to swim. I would not betray your
confidence in such a manner."

She narrowed her eyes at him, but he seemed genuinely sincere. So
rather than prodding him, she reached for his mask and tugged it out
of his fingers. "You won't be needing this right away." She had let
hers drop to the sandy bottom already, luxuriating in the feel of the
warm water seeping through the light water cloth. "You have to learn
to trust the water to hold you up before you can begin to swim. I want
you to lay back in the deeper water over here, and relax. Just keep
your nose above the water, and let everything else go."

Vorik looked at her with clear apprehension in his eyes, although he
struggled to present a calm façade. But he attempted to do as she
asked, first trying to sit down in the water, and then bending down to
lie on his back on the bottom. B'Elanna struggled not to grin — it was
hard not to watch him flail like this and not laugh, but she knew if
she insulted his pride now she would never get him back. "Here, watch
me," she said, after he stood and shook himself off in frustration.
She set her back against his forearm so that he could feel her relax,
and then she just gave herself over to the waves. She felt him trying
to hold her up, but she shook her head at him. "Let me go. Trust the
water." As her ears went under the waves, the sounds of her starship
throbbed into life, and the thunder of her heart, and the gentle
washing of the waves. Bliss. She felt his hand slide down the length
of her back, leaving her to the burden of the wave, and she smiled
gently at him. He was gazing down at her, a bemused expression on his
young face.

After she rose, she let him sink slowly against her arm, which is what
she should have done in the first place, and he was able to use her
arm as a counterpoint to find his balance. She could feel the muscles
in his back knotting and unknotting, and she stroked her hand along
his shoulder blades until the tension eased. Finally, she asked him to
balance on her hand as she spread her fingers on the small of his
back, and to let every other muscle group relax. Slowly, he complied.
He didn't even notice, a moment later, when she took her hand away.

The time passed too quickly. Once Vorik had gotten the hang of
floating, swimming came naturally to him, and soon they were off
exploring the ocean floor. She had always been fascinated by the
variety of plant and animal life at the bottom of the shallow blue
ocean, and as they swam among schools of brightly colored fish and
coral, she felt the tensions of the past month ease and let go
entirely. Vorik was her friend, and she had found a sparring partner,
and had reclaimed the third part of her engineering team. And Tom
Paris could go suck on a spanner if he had a problem with it.

The time for shift beginning loomed ominously near, and B'Elanna
surfaced regretfully, with Vorik right behind her. He turned to look
behind them at the sparkling vista one last time, and feeling
mischievous, she twisted away from him, diving down and around him,
and came up behind him, jumping on his back and shoving him down into
the waves. He tried to capture her hands, but she had the advantage,
and he went completely under, rising a moment later in a sheer wave of
sparkling water, his mouth gasping open and eyes squeezed tight. She
was laughing, and he plunged toward her by sound only, scrubbing salt
water out of his eyes. She narrowly escaped him, spurting out of his
grasp, only to feel his firm grasp on her hip a second later as he
lifted her up in his arms and tossed her screaming a clear meter out
into the blue water. When she surfaced again, he was emerging from
under the ocean, rinsing off his face and hair, and watching her with
a wary sparkle in his dark eyes.

She thought, in that moment, that he had never looked more beautiful.

The nervous butterflies came to life all over again.

---
Custom
---

For the next several weeks, they alternated mornings of swimming and
fighting with mornings of sheer crippling exhaustion from which
neither of them could raise themselves from their bunks. On one
occasion, B'Elanna commed Vorik to tell him that she wasn't going to
make it, and he thanked her with a slight tremble in his voice.

The night before they had spent three hours working out in 3 G's after
the captain had been displeased with a minor setback in the energy
curtailment schedule. It had been nobody's fault, but Carey had
volunteered to fix it, and Vorik and B'Elanna had both headed to the
holodeck for a rare afterhours workout, feeling frustrated and sullen.
They had met, surprised, at the door, from opposite ends of the
corridor, and he had bowed her in and chosen the most punishing
routine they had programmed in.

They had also both taken to carrying their injuries with a certain
amount of pride, as long as they weren't too obvious or didn't
interfere with the job. When B'Elanna dislocated Vorik's jaw again, he
had the Doctor fix it. B'Elanna had come along to explain, but the
Doctor had his own ideas.

"The two of you look like you've been using each other for target
practice. Something I should know about?" Vorik stared stonily ahead
and B'Elanna scowled, rubbing her bruised cheek, where Vorik had
clipped her with a solid fist just before she had kicked him in the
jaw and downed him. The Doctor smiled at them both pleasantly. "No?
Certain this isn't some obscure Vulcan/Klingon mating custom that
escaped us the first time around?"

"Doctor, you do like being repaired, don't you?" B'Elanna had asked
icily. But the question had hung heavily in the air between them long
after they had left sickbay. Finally, she had asked Vorik, as they
suited up in the shallows one morning about a week after.

"Is this helping you the way you had hoped, Vorik?" Her voice was
fraught with other possibilities, other questions that she could have
asked. He turned to her, considering her face for a moment.

"You mean to ask if I still want you as a mate? As the Doctor
suggested?" His voice, in contrast, was full of steady calm. She
nodded, hanging onto his calm like an anchor. His brow creased
slightly. "I do still desire you as a mate, B'Elanna." Her heart
hammered in her chest, and she flushed, turning on her earlier
judgment. How could he talk about this so calmly? "But I was
overconfident when I forced that decision on you." He turned to her
now, and she couldn't look away from him, from the fading bruise under
his ear where her hand had slipped past his guard two days ago; or the
white thread of a narrow scar at the line of his jaw that she didn't
even remember giving him. "I will not bond you without your consent.
And Vulcans cannot mate without the bond."

But despite her asking, he would not tell her more. So eventually, she
ceased to ask, hoping that he would decide to tell her when he was
ready, and uncertain what she was hoping to gain with the knowledge of
it.

One evening, about two weeks after Vorik's jaw had healed, they were
working on a series of throws from a variety of cultures, turning one
style against another in a battle that had become increasingly and
more obviously brutal to everyone but themselves. Spotting injuries on
either of them had become a bit of a sport to the rest of the
engineering crew, and Tuvok had spoken to Vorik privately on the
matter, as Chakotay had to B'Elanna. But both had sincerely denied
that anything but honest sports competition had been taking place.
Vorik spun a nasty slice toward B'Elanna as he slowly related Tuvok's
words.

"He told me that he was most concerned that I would injure you, and
that my superior strength was a most unfair advantage." B'Elanna
dodged him easily and slammed a kick into his thigh, which he rolled
off with a grunt and shook off as if it were nothing. She grinned,
thinking of that vaunted Vulcan pride, and how Tuvok would blush if he
knew the truth.

"What did you tell him?" Vorik eyed her with practiced ease as she
tensed the wrong muscle groups to throw him off, and then launched
himself into her real attack with the force of a phaser cannon,
knocking her backwards into a tucking roll. She caught his abdomen
with her heels on the way back up with the strength of a forward kick,
leaving him winded. He reeled back for a moment, and then steadied
himself, blinking.

"I invited him to come and teach us the ancient Earth discipline of
Gong Fu, which he regards highly."

She paused, straightening. "Oh. Did he accept?" The thought of Tuvok
invading their private sanctum was somewhat...  disquieting. And the
surfacing of that thought bothered her. Did she really consider this
time private, or even sacred? Vorik studied her, and then bowed
slightly, standing down in the way that he did when he observed that
she was no longer engaged in their wargames.

"He told me that he would consider it." Vorik sat comfortably on the
ground, a sandy desert that seemed to stretch for miles, and peered up
at her. "What of Chakotay and his concern for you?"

B'Elanna shrugged, suddenly embarrassed. "He wanted to know if you
looked as bad as I did."

Vorik almost smiled. He did that more and more often in her company
now, nearly exposing emotional states. After everything they had put
each other through, wearing masks seemed an excessive use of energy.
"Did you tell him that I invariably look worse?" She chuckled with
velvet in her voice, but didn't reply. Actually, she had, to ease
Chakotay's worried frown, but she didn't want to expose Vorik like
that, with just the two of them here. It seemed unnecessarily cruel.
He had taken an immense amount of punishment from her, more than any
three people could have been expected to bear, and he was still here.
True, he gave out as good as he got, and she wouldn't stand for
anything less than his finest effort. Their constant wargames had
developed iron where muscle used to lay. B'Elanna had never been so
strong, or so fast. Or so determined.

"Vorik, I have a proposal for you."

He squinted at her in the bright desert sun, his eyebrow quirked in
amusement at her choice of words. "I will endeavor to hear it with
composure, B'Elanna." He was toying with her, using his own
tranquility as a shield as she got flustered at him. But she had
learned a great deal about Vulcan composure, and Vulcan emotion as
well. It was all a matter of subtlety. B'Elanna had never been subtle
before she had met Vorik. It was still not much more than a clumsy
weapon in her hands, while he was the clear master. But she was a
quick study, and he was an excellent teacher.

"I want to learn something from you that I know that you will not
teach me willingly." She kept her voice from betraying the importance
of this request. He lifted both eyebrows at her. Both eyebrows was a
good sign, she knew. One eyebrow was often a sign of contempt, or of
mild interest at best. But both eyebrows meant he was listening. She
focused on him, forcing out thoughts of everything else. This was all
that mattered at the moment. "I will fight you for the honor of
learning the Vulcan nerve pinch."

Both eyebrows shot straight up past his slightly wind-ruffled
hairline. She wanted to smile, delighted that she had managed to shock
him, but this was important. Of all the disciplines they had studied,
this had been overtly missing, and she was willing to do nearly
anything to earn the right to know it. His brows came together in a
frown, and she prepared for the rebuttal.

It came in the form she expected. "Tuvok would not approve."

"Tuvok isn't here." B'Elanna heard the beginnings of a purr in her
throat, and evidently Vorik did as well, because his eyes widened
slightly. So much for subtle, she thought.

He stood in one fluid motion, and reached for her hand, lifting her
up. "Very well." And without any more warning, he attacked. She barely
kept her footing in the shifting sand, and for a long minute, as a
quick shower of brutal blows sent her reeling, didn't think she had
made a very good bargain. But slowly, her determination and focus
reasserted itself, and she began to fight him in earnest. And then she
realized that he had been waiting for her to begin.

This combat was the longest they had ever engaged in. Vorik was
defending the right of his people to keep private a technique that
gave him a tactical advantage in nearly every conflict situation
possible. B'Elanna wanted that advantage for herself, knew that she
could master it if she was given a chance. She was strong enough if
Vorik was. That he had never used it against her was telling — he must
have been certain that she could have worked it out on her own. All of
this flew through her mind and out as the searing heat of their dance
took over ever available synapse, every flicker of reason, every
breath in her body. All they became were shadows of each other, he
reaching for where she had been a heartbeat before, she bowing
gracefully beneath a surging blow and slicing outward to meet the
whisper of heat where his body had vacated the space she had just
entered. For a long moment, neither of them could even land a single
touch on the other.

It felt...  lonely.

And just as B'Elanna was forced to acknowledge such a feeling, Vorik's
reaction time slowed, just slightly. Just enough. And her world
shattered into red pain as her wrist connected with his hip, the
hardest bone she could have possibly hit. Enraged, she screamed and
threw herself against him, and he lost his balance, stumbling in the
shifting sand, and fell flat on his back. Hot with bloodlust, panting
and victorious, B'Elanna locked him down against the ground. He
shifted and stretched against her, his eyes seeking the path of her
hands against his forearms as she stared down at him, but he couldn't
dislodge her. When she spoke, her voice came from far away, like the
roaring of the surf. "Teach me." All she could feel was the tensing
and untensing of his body, still fighting, unwilling to accede.
Stubborn Vulcan pride.

But he would not answer. His eyes on hers, dark and defiant, suddenly
lost focus. And B'Elanna Torres, in the midst of a red battle haze,
realized her only tactical error a second too late. While she had
effectively pinned down his body, she had left his head free, trusting
that her bony head ridges would protect her from attack. Instead, he
came up at an entirely different angle than what she was expecting,
and kissed her hard on the mouth. Her breath caught in her throat as
his body relaxed under hers, as her grip on his tense muscled melted
into a flood of blood-tinged desire.

He flipped her effortlessly, landing her in the sand solidly half a
meter away, and pinning her without hope for escape. It was his one
incontrovertible advantage, and he knew how to use it. She closed her
eyes, wanting to shut out the sight of him, the copper taste of him
still on her lips. Her blood still pounded, but all the fight had left
her. She sighed. "That was ungentlemanly, Vorik."

He was silent for so long that she finally had to open her eyes. To
her surprise, he was staring at her with a complex mixture of shock
and tenderness in his expression, something she had rarely seen even
in a human. He shook his head at last.

"I have no explanation for my behavior, B'Elanna. You have won. I will
teach you, if you will allow me."

He lifted himself off of her, and handed her up. She gave him an odd
look. "You used a tactical advantage, Vorik. I fail to see how that
makes me the winner."

"I took advantage of you, where I promised I would always give you a
choice. I am at fault. Please, allow me to make amends, B'Elanna." He
looked genuinely stricken.

She nodded. "Alright." Retreat in the direction of her original goal
seemed strange, but she had no other place to go if she were to allow
him to save face in his determined manner.

"Come to my quarters tomorrow evening. This is a private matter."

She eyed him with a little of her humor restored, as her breath came
more easily. "If that's the case, come to mine. I have a higher
security clearance."

He nodded, and then his gaze lingered on her mouth for a tiny,
flickering instant before he turned and walked out the holodeck door.

It took a few moments before B'Elanna realized that she hadn't
followed him.

---
Irrevocable
---

It was a curiously subdued Vorik that met B'Elanna in her quarters the
next evening. They had foregone their morning workout and had skirted
each other delicately in Engineering, only speaking in single
syllables, and then only when syllables were actually required. When
B'Elanna's watch-shift began, she was unaccountably relieved to get
away, until she saw Tuvok on the bridge, and then had to deal with odd
feelings of guilt at her clandestine Vulcan-compromising activities.
So she had escaped with relief to her quarters, energy high and
unrelieved, and Vorik's restrained presence only made her edgier.

"Having second thoughts?" The question seemed perfectly legitimate,
but he fixed her with a mildly insulted eyebrow, and instead of
replying, undid the closure on his uniform jacket, and then tugged his
grey undershirt over his head. B'Elanna briefly wished she had lit
some candles, and then shook her head at the treacherous thought. His
finely delineated muscles threw soft patterns across each other in
rippling dunes of shadow. Gone was the smooth abdomen and
uninteresting muscle structure of several months before. She had to
close her mouth twice before she remembered to look up at his eyes.
"Guess not." Her mouth was dry, and she tried to swallow
unobtrusively. He watched her in steady silence.

"You are familiar with the carotid sinus?" His voice was as quiet as
his presence, and her brow creased in concern, but she nodded. "You
must apply pressure to the exact point of the carotid sinus,
effectively shutting off all nerve communication to the brain." She
nodded, focusing on the hollow of his collarbone, willing herself
against distraction. But his body radiated heat, and was it even
warmer in her quarters than she had realized?

His unnerving quiet stretched longer, until she could no longer ignore
it, despite her newfound fascination with his body, which she had
never seen uncovered for longer than a few carefully guarded moments.
"Vorik, what's wrong?"

His dark eyes were expressionless. She recognized this mask. It was
the one he used when he simply was not going to talk about it. He
again did not answer her, instead taking her hand in his and lifting
it up to his shoulder. His skin was feverish to her fingertips, but
she told herself this was normal for Vulcans. Focus on the task at
hand. He was taller, and exerting that sort of pressure at such an
awkward angle would be very difficult. It would be simpler to come
from behind him, so she did so. His head turned slightly to follow
her, but otherwise he didn't move. B'Elanna closed her eyes, and slid
her hands across his shoulders, allowing herself the luxury of this
gentle, intimate contact, just for a moment. How often had she touched
him, and yet what touch had been tender? She couldn't think of a
single one. Under her hands, she felt him flex and tremble slightly,
and a thrill ran through her, her blood stirring at the point of a
remembered kiss. And then her fingers found the contact point, and she
instinctively pressed down. He instantly fought back, flexing his
shoulder muscle taut, until she could have been squeezing tritanium.
But still she pressed, her biceps cording, shaking with the effort.

How long it might have gone on, she didn't know. Their endless battles
had honed them both so hard that they might have stood until the next
morning, shaking and cursing, locked in a silent struggle for control.
But B'Elanna's blood was already up, and Vorik's trembling strain
under her hands was too much for her to ignore. Something primal and
searing came roaring up into her mind, blanking out her peripheral
vision, honing her world down to scent and touch, and the blazing heat
of his skin, and the blood throbbing underneath it, blood that she
suddenly, desperately had to know. Longing pervaded her entire being.
The ancient blood lust of her birthright took over, and she bit hard
into his shoulder, his coppery blood bursting dusky and hot against
her lips. A guttural cry escaped him, and even her hazed mind
registered that it wasn't a cry of pain. His shoulder untensed for an
instant. And then his knees buckled, and he crumpled senseless to the
floor.

For a moment, her sluggish mind couldn't process what had happened, as
the jewel-bright green life-blood of her desire trembled on her
tongue. And then, slowly, it penetrated. She had done it. The nerve
pinch had worked.

"Ghay'cha'! Damn it!" B'Elanna fell to her knees, her trembling hand
over her mouth. Vorik lay in a twisted heap, his eyes closed, his
exposed shoulder bleeding. She cursed again and jogged to the
bathroom, grabbing a towel and a medkit, and sat down next to him,
cleaning and dressing the small wound, her thoughts roiling. Timing
had always been her finest talent, but this was a shuddering disaster
by any standard. She wondered how long he would be unconscious, and
distractedly brushed back his slightly untidy bangs from his
sweat-damp forehead, her hand still shaking. Well, it was no good to
leave him in a heap on the floor.

With a grunt, she lifted him to her shoulder in a graceless soldier's
carry and hefted him over to her bed. He was a damn sight heavier than
he looked, for certain. She fell against his senseless body and just
lay there for a moment, listening to his thrumming heart, deep welling
frustration and confusion blinding her by turns. Realizing he was
still twisted up, she sat up and straightened him into a comfortable
position, tucking a pillow under his head and covering him with a
blanket, since his uniform jacket and shirt were still on the other
side of the room. Then, deciding she had already crossed the major
incident line tonight, she slid her body underneath the blanket and up
against his. He could kick her out when he emerged into consciousness.
Exhaustion took her before she could think too much more about
anything but the flush of velvet heat under her hands as she stroked
across the sensual curve of his abdomen with sleepily reckless
abandon.

Vorik awoke to awash of heat and sensation that he was wholly
unprepared to deal with. B'Elanna lay sprawled against him, her jacket
long abandoned and her bare arms and hands pressed against his skin in
the most intimate possible manner. Her mouth was pursed against his
throat, and he could feel the heat of her breath like a blossom
against the thin skin under his jaw. He was paralyzed, unable to tear
himself away from her, and unable to bear one more moment of such
intense intimacy. His heart thudded in his chest. This he could not
battle — lying in this bed next to her there was nowhere for his
untamable, shameful, painful desire to go. Horrified, he felt the
overflow of his emotion leak out of his eyes in tears, and he
struggled with everything he had to draw himself back in and under
control. Mantras that Tuvok had taught him flew through his mind like
birds, rushed out with the trembling breaths of the woman in his arms.
B'Elanna, whom he prized above all others, whom he would have walked
away from had she simply asked, and who he kept coming back to because
she had simply asked...  he could no longer bear the strain.

His hand trembled as he reached up to stroke her hair, as his need for
control fought with his desire to know what she felt like in a moment
of tenderness. He knew he was only betraying himself, that the memory
would simply heap more pain on top of what already needed to be
forgotten, but he couldn't stop himself. His fingers threaded through
her dark hair, and it was a texture somewhere between silk and wool,
both soft and strong; appropriate to her. He pulled her closer,
heedless now of the damage he was doing to his shattered mantras, and
kissed her forehead, breathing in the heady, familiar scent that he
recognized in his dreams. A brush of her eyelashes against his cheek
made him aware that she was awake, and he closed his eyes, wishing to
delay what had to come.

But she had made her wishes irrevocably clear.

"Vorik... " she breathed.

He gently disengaged himself from her, and rose from the bed, not
trusting himself to speak until he was no longer touching her.
Reaching for his uniform gave him a thread of stability, and he took a
deep, shuddering breath. "This relationship has caused us both too
much pain, B'Elanna. It violates the very precepts of Surak that I
honor. I have done you harm, and you... " He turned to face her, as
the very hurt he spoke of flooded across her face. "Being near you has
rendered me less than proficient." Cold words. He couldn't think
clearly. She rose from the bed, too beautiful for reason, and his
throat closed up.

"What are you saying, Vorik?" Her voice was low, dangerous. He
swallowed, his trembling fingers reaching for his uniform jacket.

"You will not bond with me." It was a statement of fact. And she did
not deny it now, but simply stared at him, confusion and
incomprehension widening her dark, expressive eyes. He pulled on his
jacket, nerveless fingers finding the fastenings by rote, and then he
turned to face her one last time. It took all of his courage. "I love
you, B'Elanna. I can bear this no longer." And without waiting for a
reply, he turned gracefully on his heel and walked out of her life.

---
Belonging
---

Morning dawned black, as it always did. B'Elanna was dreaming of the
sun, and the warmth cresting over the hills of her home colony as the
red light pierced her window. In the dream, she had been lying against
her lover, and had not wanted to get up out of bed. But the harsh
alarm that woke her revealed her bed empty, and the night before came
crashing back. He told her that he loved her, and then he had left.
Usually when men confessed that they loved her, they tended to stay.
She buried her head under the pillow, but the day would not be shut
out. Engineering was waiting.

Vorik, however, was not waiting in Engineering. She found that he had
already worked his shift — the Gamma shift, for which he had requested
a permanent change. Gamma and Alpha shifts would only overlap if they
happened to walk through the door at the same time, going opposite
directions. She absorbed this in silence, oblivious to the flickering
looks in her general direction.

By 08:00 hours, she was furious with him. How dare he arbitrarily
change his shift? She was his commanding officer, and that was her
decision, no matter what sort of personal feelings he might have. If
she could deal with them, then the vaunted dispassionate Vulcan could
certainly deal with them.

At 09:13 hours, she was replaying over and over his last words. I can
bear this no longer. Had she really tormented him so much? They had
fought, and fought well together. She had taught him how to swim, and
he had taught her the value of subtlety. Certainly, she might have
touched him once or twice, but what was that to the thousands of
punishing hours they had clocked hammering into each other? He had
bonded with her, without her permission. Where was that on the scale
of intimacy?

By lunchtime, she was pacing, and no one would come within a meter of
her. Her thoughts were deeply troubled, and she couldn't concentrate.
It was all a matter of intimacy, she was certain. When he had bonded
with her, it had been by accident — he had been acting purely on
instinct. But the last few weeks, they had been pushing each other's
boundaries with full awareness of exactly how much ache it would
cause. B'Elanna's hands tingled with remembered heat, and she wiped
them on her uniform trousers. He had kissed her to win a battle, and
she had curled up against him while he slept, which in retrospect was
absolutely unforgivable...  touch telepath that he was, and helpless
in his unconsciousness, which she had induced. She flushed in shame.
Conduct unbecoming an officer. First, he had asked for her hand, and
she had humiliated him in combat. Then he had asked for her help, and
she had driven him to despair. Her heart thudded in her breast, loud
and uncomfortable. In all this time and pain and war, they had formed
a bond much deeper than anything that she had expected. Somehow, for
the man who had become more than a sparring partner, more than a
companion, so much more than a friend, she had to make amends.

The holodeck was running Tuvok 27A.235 when B'Elanna finally reached
it, after her watch-shift ended and she took a shower and drank a cup
of coffee to steady her nerves. Vorik hadn't been in his quarters, and
this was the only other place she knew were to look. She requested
entry, and the door opened on Vorik and Tuvok, both in loose pants and
tied robes, moving slowly through an ancient dance. Her mission
momentarily washed right out of her mind, she just stood and watched
in fascinated silence.

She was, of course, familiar with the ancient martial art, but had
never seen it performed so slowly. At killing speed, it was
breathtaking, but at this meditative, magical pace, she felt time slow
down around her. Tuvok was using the Snake style against Vorik, who
was using Tiger style. She felt the immense effort of holding the
forms in Vorik's lower back and thighs, as he followed through with a
forward thrust that Tuvok had already anticipated. The deep lake-like
calm and steady balance of the older Vulcan was immediately apparent,
and B'Elanna knew that Vorik was in trouble. She felt her heart clutch
in her throat, but forced herself to stay absolutely still. She had
done enough damage.

With a tap, the match was over. Vorik bowed to his master teacher and
mentor, and Tuvok returned the bow with equal respect. Then the
tactical officer turned to B'Elanna and eyed her with an
uncompromising stare. She returned it, caught up in his eyes, so
familiar and yet not. Tuvok nodded to her once.

"I do not like interfering in the personal matters of the crew.
However, in this case, I have been asked by the captain to make a
request of you both. Work this out, for the benefit of the ship and
its crew, and for your own peace." He paused, his brow creasing
slightly. "By any means necessary, Lieutenant. Ensign." He nodded also
to Vorik, and then without a backward glance, walked out of the
holodeck and left them alone.

Vorik gazed at the floor, his mask firmly in place. B'Elanna gathered
up her courage, and stepped forward. "I was hoping that you could
answer a few questions for me, Vorik."

He met her open gaze carefully, his eyes heavily shielded. The
distance between them made her heart ache, but she focused on what she
had to do. Any means necessary. Slowly he nodded, and motioned her to
a mat on the floor.

They kneeled in one fluid motion, taking familiar places in a new and
frightening place. She swallowed and took a deep breath. "Do Vulcans
only have sex once every seven years?"

For a moment, she could only hear the stressed sound of his breathing
as he struggled for composure. "Is...  is that what you believe of me,
B'Elanna?" His voice was notched considerably higher with the obvious
strain her question had caused him. She felt a nervous laugh bubble
up, and forced it down without mercy.

"That's how often the pon farr happens, isn't it? I guess I just
assumed, since you don't have sex otherwise, that once every seven
years would be all she wrote." She caught a tremor in her voice, but
chose to ignore it. If he could be stressed, then by all that was
holy, so could she.

He took in a shuddering breath. "Why do you think I have been fighting
you?"

"Why do you always answer a question with a question?" she countered.
But a growing realization began to fill her like the warm ocean water
pouring in on her. He blinked, and broke the fragile thread of eye
contact. "Oh. You mean that Vulcans and Klingons aren't so different
when everything is stripped away, after all?"

His voice was subdued, but his words were full of passion. "I believed
that I could control my desire for you with our battle: our wargames,
as you called them, but the more we fought, the stronger my desire for
you grew. It is beyond my comprehension." He reached for her hand and
clutched it, hanging on to her like a lifeline. "I have asked Tuvok to
take the memory of you."

Horror leached through B'Elanna like ice water. "He can do that? You
would do that?"

Vorik looked at her, and the bleakness in his expression consumed her
like an icy deluge. His dark eyes were pools of anguish. "I must. I am
dying every day. Each time that I see you, I die. You invade my
dreams, and I am helpless. I have betrayed everything that I know,
that I am."

B'Elanna broke then, and wept. Tears poured down her cheeks in hot
rivulets, and she bowed over his hands and buried her face against his
thigh. Grief and frustration welled out of her as she breathed in
deeply and tried to find her focus point. He waited quietly, his hands
still clutching hers, now soaked by her tears. Finally, she stilled,
and rose to face him. It was time.

"I have one more question for you." He nodded, looking almost calm.
She nodded back, taking her courage where she could. "I came here
tonight because I was going to offer to bond with you." His eyes
widened in shock, but she forged on. "I have realized that the person
who has been most wronged has been you, Vorik. I have by turns
humiliated and punished you for something you had no control over, and
you have borne up under it with remarkable dignity. And somewhere
along the path, I at first realized a powerful desire for you, and
then fell in love with you." His jaw actually dropped open slightly,
but she wasn't stopping now. "But I wasn't honorable in this, either.
I seduced you, and then slept in the same bed with you, and I have no
idea how much damage that caused. And through all of this, I denied
you the one thing you asked — a promise that I would be faithful." Her
brow crinkled in pain as she continued. "I realized it today, when you
didn't come to Alpha shift, and I fretted and worried and thought over
what had happened...  and I realized that I was scared that I was
going to be committing to a cold relationship with an absent partner."
She raised her eyes to his, and met astonishment there. He shook his
head numbly.

"Whenever you want me, I will be there, B'Elanna. Just because the pon
farr only happens ever seven years...  it has been over now for
months, and I can't...  I... you can't imagine... " He stumbled to
silence, unable to even complete the thought. She reached up and
pressed a finger to his lips.

"One more question. Will you still have me?"

He simply stared at her for a very long moment. And then, from the
depths of despair in his eyes, she watched hope breach like a cresting
wave. "Yes." It was all he could manage to say. They spent a long
moment in this new, fragile hope, breathing in the possibility of a
new existence, one where trust took the place of war. And then Vorik
stood, and helped her to stand, and her hands were trembling in his.

"How?" she asked. "I don't know what to do."

"Nor do I," he admitted. But before any flurry of nervousness could
disrupt their newfound peace, he touched her lips gently, with an
expression akin to wonder. "We will find our way, B'Elanna."

In the end, they decided to stay in the private holodeck, in the
temple where they had first spoken to each other. Candles filled the
low-ceilinged room with warm, glowing light, and a simple tatami mat
on the floor cushioned them from the hard clay. Neither of them would
have noticed if the floor had been covered with shards of dilithium.
B'Elanna sat opposite Vorik in heady anticipation, and drew strength
from the fact that he looked none too calm either. His eyes sparkled
in the dim, golden light, and a thin sheen of perspiration gleamed
over the top of his lip. He swallowed uncertainly.

"When I first bonded you, I did not know what I was doing." She
thought she saw his olive skin flush a shade darker, but it might have
been a trick of the light. "I needed to touch you, but did not
understand. Now I know what my instincts were telling me to do. Please
allow me to explain." He took a moment to gather his thoughts as she
watched the delicate light flicker over his exotic, handsome features.
Gone was the pale youthfulness, the planes of his face lean and strong
now. She liked the change in him. His gentle voice washed over her
thoughts. "The bond is more than just a psychic connection between
lovers. It is...  a bridge that enables us to share experiences and
emotion in a way that is impossible in everyday life. Vulcans,
underneath our millennia of discipline, are a dangerous and violent
people. Mating without the bond would be inviting me to murder any man
that looked at you with even a hint of want in his eyes." He paused,
clearly struggling with sharing something so deeply shaming, and
B'Elanna forced herself not to react. But she knew in her heart that
he was capable of murder — had known from the beginning that he would
snap Tom like a twig if it meant clearing the way to her. Her mouth
was dry with this awareness.

"But the bond gives you security?"

"No." His eyebrows came together in a thoughtful expression. "It is
not security, or assurance that I seek from you, B'Elanna. The bond is
necessary because it allows me to...  feel. To feel the natural flow
of passion, and love. It is not about possession, but about
belonging."

She was confused. "Aren't possession and belonging the same?"

He shook his head, and reached out to stroke her cheek. "It is a
matter of choice. When I bond with you, the depth of the connection
between us will allow me to accept my emotions for you — my love, my
passion, and even less noble emotions like jealousy. Instead of
letting them take possession of my actions, they will be under my
control, as your emotions are under your control. Do you understand?"

She tilted her cheek into his hand. "I'm not certain I completely
understand yet, Vorik, but I accept that in time, I will."

"It is enough." And then he smiled, barely a crinkle of the corners of
his eyes and a curling up of the corners of his mouth, but he looked
completely charming, and her fears and hesitancy melted into the
pooling warmth in her belly. She took his hands in hers and pressed
them against her throat, as she remembered he had done a lifetime ago.
Startled, he did flush this time, and she grinned back, heat rushing
through her in waves now, overwhelming her senses. His eyes closed,
his features framed in peaceful ecstasy, as the bond flowed through
his hands and into her. Nothing she had felt before prepared her for
this. Before, she had fought it...  now she hung on to his forearms
and let her body fall back into his keeping. Light flooded through
her, and with it an extraordinary awareness of him...  as if he were
not just beside her but inside her, as if they shared the same womb
and breathed in the same breath, beat the same blood through the same
heart. And then, she did understand, and knew that words would never
have been able to express this perfect symmetry of being.

When he kissed her, the feeling of completeness faded only slightly,
to where she was able to separate her reactions from his. She had
never wanted anyone more in her life, couldn't imagine wanting anyone
as much as she wanted him. His mouth was a hot brand against her lips,
her cheek, and she surged across the gap between them with
single-minded passion, not able to hold anything back, and broke
against him. They crashed to the ground, half off the mat, and
B'Elanna thought she heard the sound of tearing cloth, but something
was in the way, in between her skin and his, and she tore at it,
consumed by the sharp, satisfying snap of his teeth nipping at her
neck. A snarl in her ear drove her to near-frenzy, and there was
nothing but desire, and wave after wave, and he underneath and then
throwing her over and above his strength more than a match for her
own...  this body she knew so intimately...  he did not shatter.
Worthy...  blood and silk and all consuming fire. He did not shatter.

---
Subtle
---

"Computer, end program."

Vorik eyed her hazily, his eyes bright but unfocused. "Is it time for
shift to begin?" She smiled softly, and reached up to tuck his
raven-black hair behind his tapered ear.

"No. Not for a while. I wanted to share something with you." She
turned her head slightly from where she lay against his heavily
muscled chest and spoke upwards to the now blank ceiling. "Computer,
begin Torres Ocean B. Dusk. Depth begin at zero, angle outward at
fifteen degrees. Flora and fauna." Vorik raised an eyebrow at her, and
then gazed at their nakedness with gentle amusement.

"Remember to delete the jellyfish, B'Elanna."

She grinned and slid a hand across his ribs. "Computer, delete all
jellyfish." The rushing sound of waves filled the room around them,
and the floor beneath them became soft white sand instead of hard
clay. Warm water licked at B'Elanna's feet, and a purr escaped her
throat. "Vorik, it's my absolute pleasure to introduce you to the
ancient Earth custom of skinny dipping."

She got both eyebrows this time, and a curious sparkle in the fading
glow of a magnificent sunset. "Skinny dipping?" He pronounced the
words with care, and she laughed, delighted at his dubious expression,
and then rose in one fluid motion and took his wrist in both hands.

"Come on while the tide is still in!" He came up with her, no less
graceful for a few minor cuts and bites and bruises, not that she was
any better off. Without any ceremony, they plunged into the ocean
water like charging bulls, the cool salt water stinging clean the cuts
and filling them with exhilaration. Vorik had been working on holding
his breath underwater, and although he didn't have the redundant lungs
that B'Elanna did, he was near her match for time. Like everything
else between them now, it was a game without winners, a contest for
pleasure and challenge. And now he crashed into her and threw them
both down under the surface, his mouth over hers, sharing a breath,
twining in the deep cool darkness. Long before her lung capacity gave
out, B'Elanna was breathless, and when they surfaced, all
introductions to ancient Earth customs were momentarily forgotten.
They found an island of washed sand almost by chance, and this time
B'Elanna allowed her human side the luxury to thoroughly explore every
sensual detail of her Vulcan lover that her Klingon passion had rushed
through the first time.

Vorik felt the wash of the surf carve out the sand underneath him, and
the delicate touch of the woman above him as she teased out sighs and
moans from the very depths of his being — places within him that he
didn't even know existed until now, on this foreign shore with her. If
he had thought that his superior strength was the only advantage he
needed to buffer against her passions, he was greatly at a loss. For a
terrifying moment, tears gathered again at the corners of his eyes,
even as his strong hands found the sloping curve of her hips for the
second time in his life and guided them into the joining, a near -
unbelievable sensation of physical resonance. But her lips came softly
down against his cheek and kissed his tears away, and her low, husky
voice murmured something wordless and soft, and he knew he was meant
to recognize that this was love. He was not certain that he fully
understood. But for now, this was enough.

---

Tom Paris ate, but the food was uninteresting. Across from him, Harry
was telling him what was probably a really funny story about Tuvok and
the pool table in the holodeck, but he wasn't really listening. Ensign
Vorik was standing at attention in front of a seated Chakotay, looking
very uncomfortable, and Tom Paris wanted to know why. Rumors had been
rampant since, two days before, Vorik had worked the Gamma shift in
Engineering and B'Elanna had scared the hell out of everyone the
morning after during Alpha shift.

Both of them had missed shift the next morning, and Carey wouldn't
answer any of his questions. B'Elanna had come in for her watch-shift
on the Bridge, though, looking perfectly unconcerned, and the captain
had pulled her into the ready room for a five minute conversation that
Tom would have given his entire weeks replicator rations to be able to
hear.

But the two women had come out with closed faces, and nothing more was
said on the matter. And when Tom had tried to question her about it,
she had just lifted an eyebrow at him. Too much time with that damn
Vulcan, was what it was. She just needed some time with a real man, so
she could remember how to loosen up.

"Ensign, I see you put in a request for a permanent move to the Gamma
shift?" Chakotay's voice didn't exactly carry, but Tom held a finger
at Harry, motioning for quiet just for a moment. Harry shook his head,
not wanting to encourage his best friend to take a turn at the rumor
mill, but obligingly fell silent.

"Yes, sir." Vorik stood with the annoyingly perfect balance of someone
who never had any fun, hands clasped behind his back. Tom saw that he
was sporting a fresh injury of some kind or another just under his
sleeve cuff. It was slightly rounded, and if he hadn't known better,
he would almost have thought it was...  huh.

Chakotay frowned. "I assume you have a good reason?"

Vorik nodded once. "I did, sir. The difficulty has now been resolved."
His voice was curiously calm, not stilted and awkward as Tom
remembered him. His eyes lingered on that damning vivid green bite
mark on Vorik's wrist, and the blood began to heat up his cheeks. No.
It wasn't possible. He was imagining things. B'Elanna and Vorik were
sparring partners. Accidents happened.

Chakotay nodded. "Then I assume you no longer want to transfer?"

"Not unless you believe my abilities would be better utilized on Gamma
shift, sir." But the exec shook his head.

"I think you and Lieutenant Torres make a good team, Ensign. I would
prefer to keep you together, if that is alright with you."

"That is my choice, as well."

Tom flushed at the hint of warmth on Vorik's voice. Chakotay just
smiled, and nodded, dismissing him, and Vorik went to pick up a tray
of food. Tom turned in his seat, seething. Harry just watched him,
feeling helpless but knowing that anything he said would only make the
situation worse. He knew that Tom had a thing for B'Elanna, especially
after the nastiness with the pon farr, but if Vorik and B'Elanna had
worked it out, he was happy for them. For Tom, there was an entire
ship full of women. How many were there for a lonely, brilliant
Vulcan?

With that thought, B'Elanna came through the door and caught Harry's
eye, and smiled. Harry grinned back, but inwardly wondered how her
timing could be worse. She sat down at the table and thumped Tom on
the back.

"Hey, navigator. Hi, Starfleet!"

Tom looked up at her, and smiled lamely, and then looked down at his
plate. Harry watched as she gazed up at Vorik, and he saw her eyes
soften in a way that suddenly filled him with longing for his
girlfriend Libby. He could remember when she looked at him like that,
and he knew exactly what it meant. B'Elanna flicked her eyes at Tom
and then tilted an eyebrow very slightly. Vorik chose another table.
Harry was extremely impressed. B'Elanna was not known for her
subtlety.

"So, Tom. You wanted to know what was going on. I'm here, now."

Harry grinned. Check that. B'Elanna would not soon be widely known for
her subtlety, either. Tom flushed again, and she raised both eyebrows
at him. "You've asked Carey, you've asked the bridge crew...  is there
anyone you haven't asked?" She paused for a moment to let it sink in,
and then she followed up with, "Oh, yeah. That would be me." Crushing.
Harry decided to intercede.

"We're all curious. You missed your shift yesterday, and we were
concerned. Is everything okay, B'Elanna?"

For a moment, her eyes narrowed, and he could tell that she was
debating on whether or not she was going to answer him. But then Tom
surprised them both, and spoke.

"I'm sorry, B'Elanna. I thought there was something between us." His
blue eyes flashed with regret and displeasure. "It hurts to get
rejected. But you've obviously made your choice, and since your
friendship means a great deal more to me than getting killed in a dark
hallway by an angry, jealous Vulcan, I'm going to be gallant and wish
you both all the best." It all came out in a rush, but by the time he
finished, his voice and expression had regained some of his trademark
wry cheer.

Harry's eyebrows had vanished into his hairline, and Tom could feel
Vorik's eyes on him, even though Tom didn't dare look in his
direction. B'Elanna blinked and nodded, and then stood.

"Thanks, Tom. I really do appreciate it. Although next time, you don't
have to tell the entire mess hall, okay?" She shook her head at him,
genuine affection warring with irritation in her expression. But true
to herself, she could never be angry with him for long. He tossed her
a smile, and she grinned back, and their war was over as quickly as it
was begun. She walked over to the table Vorik was sitting at and sat
down opposite him, and they launched into a quiet conversation about
plasma vent spanners, or something equally stimulating to two
high-level engineers.

Harry breathed a sigh of relief, and turned back to his soup. Tom
scowled at the table, and wondered if it was too late to ask the
petite blonde from astrophysics to a holofilm after shift.

And in a quiet, unobtrusive corner, Captain Janeway and Lieutenant
Tuvok met each other's eyes quietly. "Is this going to work, Tuvok?"

He was silent for a moment, his dark eyes fixed on the starfield
moving past them at high warp. "I do not know, Captain. I have no
experience with this sort of bond. Although I know of cases where an
inter-species bond has been successful, Vorik has chosen a highly
volatile companion."

Janeway tossed him a grin. "Also the most brilliant engineer we have
to offer. To get even close, he would have had to bond with Lieutenant
Carey." Tuvok didn't dignify this with a verbal response, but just
raised a single eyebrow at her. Her grin broadened. "You have to admit
that she has been good for him so far."

Tuvok frowned. "I have seen a great deal more evidence that he has
improved her social skills than the opposite, Captain. On the whole,
Vorik has been more emotional and less focused in the past four months
than I have ever seen him."

"Must be love." Janeway's voice was low and soft, and Tuvok caught the
change almost viscerally. He turned to face her more fully, examining
her wistful expression carefully.

"Captain, what humans see as a positive change, Vulcans see only as a
disruption in function. You laud what we seek to eliminate. I will
never understand this compulsion for the destruction of peace in your
lives."

Janeway leaned toward him, her light eyes intent. "Tuvok, if humans
lived solely to reach a state of peace, we never would have left
Earth. And don't tell me that Vulcans do it either. We could have
chosen any number of planets to settle on by now, but we still forge
ahead." She touched the cuff of his uniform gently. "I think you
understand it better than you let on. You just aren't ready to admit
it yet."

Tuvok blinked slowly, studying her eyes, and then he turned to watch
the two lovers chat comfortably over soup and bread. What the captain
said had a certain logic to it. There was much to consider. He simply
nodded, and his captain smiled. For now, it was enough.

Across the room, B'Elanna laughed like a bell. Within Vorik's eyes was
captured the reflection of her joy.

---

The End