Combating that line of reasoning was the simple fact that T’Prynn could not stop thinking about Anna Sandesjo, the woman. She recalled the way her eyes gazed upon her during their time together in the officers’ club, the way her mouth moved when she talked in her low voice, and how her hands caressed the glass she held. Even her scent, enhanced to the slightest degree by the perfume she had worn, seemed to linger.

T’Prynn wanted more.

She followed Sandesjo into the main room of the woman’s quarters. While anyone living on Vanguard had the option of furnishing their personal living spaces with whatever items they might have brought with them from their homeworld or previous assignment, Anna Sandesjo seemed content with what T’Prynn recognized as standard-issue furnishings available from the station quartermaster for civilian billeting spaces. While some of the shelves contained books, plants, or generic sculptures of the sort one might find in a physician’s waiting room, no photographs of relatives or other loved ones were visible, nor was there anything that might be construed as a personal memento. The only evidence that someone lived here was a few items of clothing strewn about—a jacket on a hook near the door, a blouse draped over the back of a desk chair, a pair of shoes near the sofa. Other, unidentified clothing lay across the bed, which was just visible through an open doorway at the rear of the room, and a slim, silver briefcase sat on the floor next to the desk positioned before the wall to T’Prynn’s right. A cup and saucer sat atop the small dining table in the near corner, and the faint odor of tea drifted to her nostrils.

“Would you like something to drink?” Sandesjo said, making her way to the food slot set into the wall behind the dining table. “I made myself some tea.”

T’Prynn.

The voice, Sten’s, clawed once more from the depths of her mind, interrupting her before she could reply to Sandesjo’s offer. It required sheer force of will for T’Prynn not to show any outward reaction to the abrupt intrusion. “Tea would be agreeable,” she said, feeling the strain with each word as she labored to maintain her normal stoic façade.

Why must you torment me at every turn?Her mind hurled the question at the dark mass she could sense moving to envelop her consciousness.

I will never stop,Sten chided her. Not until you submit. You belong to me.

T’Prynn felt the muscles in her face twitch as she fought to retain emotional control. Sandesjo, facing the food slot, was not privy to her inner turmoil, which threatened to erupt at any moment. I belong to no one, least of all you.

You will never be free of me,Sten said, each word a hammer blow to the inside of her skull. Eventually, you will relent. I have eternity on my side.

Then you will spend eternity in the grips of frustration and defeat,T’Prynn countered, just as you were when I killed you.

The food slot’s door slid upward, revealing a cup sitting atop a saucer and filled with a steaming beverage. Sandesjo retrieved it before turning and setting it on the table near the chair opposite the one before which her own tea sat. Seeing T’Prynn staring at her, she smiled again.

“Join me?” she asked.

Submit,Sten challenged, as he had each day for decades.

Never.

Sandesjo’s smile seemed to have a calming effect, and for a moment T’Prynn thought that Sten might have returned to the darkness from which he had come. Instead, a soothing warmth seemed to be growing from deep within her, radiating outward to suffuse her entire body.

Ignoring the tea, T’Prynn stepped around the table and without another word reached for Sandesjo, drawing her close. Her hand found the back of the other woman’s neck and she brought her forward until their lips crushed together and she forced her tongue into Sandesjo’s mouth. Her free hand slid between the folds of Sandesjo’s robe, pushing past the smooth silk to find the warm, damp skin beneath. She felt hands on her own body, searching for the closures to her uniform, and then there was the touch of fingertips against her own skin. Their kiss remained unbroken and Sandesjo uttered a low moan of desire as T’Prynn’s hands pushed the robe from her shoulders before continuing their frenetic wanderings.

It was not until she sensed herself falling forward that T’Prynn realized she must have lifted Sandesjo off her feet and carried her to the bed in the other room. Sandesjo landed first, on her back, and T’Prynn allowed the weight of her own body to press down upon her. Hands roamed as if possessed of their own will, and T’Prynn sighed with unrepentant lust as Sandesjo freed her from the last remnants of her uniform. T’Prynn pushed herself to a sitting position, straddling Sandesjo’s hips. She looked down at her lover, their eyes locking in mutual fervor before she felt hands on her stomach, moving lower as fingers searched, driven by ardor. T’Prynn moved her hands across Sandesjo’s chest, feeling skin bristle beneath her touch. With the lightest of strokes she traced the curves of the other woman’s neck and the sides of her face. In response to her touch, T’Prynn began to sense hints of images and emotions which were not her own.

T’Prynn?

Hearing Sandesjo’s confused query blending with her own thoughts, T’Prynn did not press her innocuous mental probe any further. For Vulcans, initiating a mind-meld without the consent of the other involved party was considered to be among the most severe breaches of etiquette. Children learning to control their telepathic abilities were taught never to attempt such a noncon-sensual bonding, and that the privacy of one’s own thoughts was inviolable except in the most desperate of circumstances.

The momentary telepathic connection faded, and T’Prynn’s attention returned to the body beneath her. Sandesjo pulled her down onto her, pressing their mouths together, and T’Prynn felt the other woman’s tongue pushing past her lips.

T’Prynn.

She had hoped that any physical activities she pursued with Sandesjo might bring with them some fleeting psionic contact which might offer some insights into the woman’s true identity. Even with that goal in mind, T’Prynn was reluctant to push such mental connection. As the unwilling recipient of a forced mind-meld, she was sensitive to the potential for damage such an act posed for the person on whom the unwanted contact was inflicted. That risk increased when the other party was nontelepathic, as T’Prynn believed Sandesjo to be.

My mind to your mind.

The words rang in T’Prynn’s consciousness, and it took her an extra moment to realize that they had not come from her or Sandesjo.

No!

Without her conscious control, T’Prynn’s hands moved to Sandesjo’s face; to where katrapoints would be on a Vulcan. She felt the pressure of her fingers against Sandesjo’s skin as the other woman’s eyes widened in confusion and fear.

My mind to your mind.

Sten! No!

T’Prynn sensed Sandesjo’s body jerk beneath her just as she felt her own legs wrapping around those of her would-be lover. Her body weight was pinning Sandesjo to the bed, and T’Prynn held her head between her outstretched fingers as Sten’s mocking voice echoed in her mind.

Our minds are merging.

Their naked bodies were intertwined, their faces centimeters apart, and T’Prynn read the anger and betrayal in Sandesjo’s eyes. From the depths of her consciousness, T’Prynn heard Sten’s simple statement of victory.

Our minds are one.

The meld took hold and Sandesjo’s expression went slack, and T’Prynn was gripped by the sensation of falling through darkness. That gloom just as quickly faded and she found herself standing in a small, dimly lit room. A mirror, dirty and scratched, hung on a stone wall before her, and when she looked at it she was greeted by the reflection of a Klingon female, her long dark hair flowing past her shoulders and accentuating the line of prominent ridges extending from the bridge of her nose up and over the back of her head.