Title: LEGACY

Author: R.Schultz (cousindream@MSN.com)

Series : Star Trek The Next Generation

Code: Crusher/Ishara Yar

Rating: NC-17/R for graphic sex

Spoilers: Fourth season immediately after the "Legacy" episode

Disclaimers: Paramount owns all things Trekkie. Not that they deserve such a treasure. I'm just bringing a little innocent wholesome depravity into their sadly sex-starved character's lives. After they've had a few satisfying climaxes, I'll put them back good as new. Better. This STORY, however, is mine under common-law copyright. Written January, 2001, apx. 15,500 words. Beta reading graciously provided by T'Lin.

Note: Alternate universe.

Summary: The StarShip ENTERPRISE has acquired a new passenger, a political exile seeking asylum. Natasha Yar's sister, Ishara. She has a crush on Crusher.

Archiving: Part of the Femme Fuh-Q Fest. May be archived to ASCEM, and elsewhere. Please notify me of where this is being posted.

Feedback: by all means send your comments to cousindream@MSN.com

When Jean-Luc Picard became Captain of the new flagship of StarFleet, along with the ENTERPRISE he inherited a young, tough, strong, and lovely Security and Ops officer, Natasha Yar. She died violently during an Away Mission within a year of being posted to her new ship. A few lovers grieved, as the entire crew mourned her senseless death.

Years later, the ENTERPRISE visited Turkana IV. A blasted world which was once the violent home of Tasha Yar. There Tasha had been a whore, a lesbian, an assassin, and eventually a mercenary soldier. Falkhyn's Legion had been her escape route from her hell-hole home world.

The planet was shortly thereafter blasted to a cinder in a suicidal war. Only a few survived in a series of underground city-fortresses. Tasha had a sister, Ishara, and she presumed the child had died long before the holocaust of the planet's destruction. But Ishara survived, down in the tunnels.

Two shipwrecked merchant starship sailors landed on Turkana, and were swept up by one of the opposing sides in the continuing war. In an attempt to save the sailors, the ENTERPRISE came face to face with a young woman claiming to be Ishara Yar, Tasha's sister.

The claim was proven true by DNA, and Ishara was recruited to facilitate the rescue of the castaways by the ENTERPRISE. What they didn't know was that Ishara meant to use the rescue mission to penetrate her enemies defenses, and destroy their fusion reactor.

In this alternate reality, Ishara changed her mind and her loyalties. She was never caught by Data, or exiled back to the endless tunnels of Turkana. For she willingly embraced the life of a free woman, and the friendship of Data, the android Second Officer.

After the successful rescue, Ishara went to Captain Picard to confess her previous intent. She went to ask for asylum on the ENTERPRISE. Meaning it, this time.

LEGACY

"Captain's Log, Stardate 99225.9; Ishara Yar has shown considerable courage by coming to me after the Away Team's rescue of the stranded merchantmen. She explained the plan to destroy her enemies fusion reactor, as well as her duplicity towards Data.

"Mr. Data, on his part, has shown understanding, and told Ishara she still has his trust. Despite her earlier lies. Ms. Yar, on her part, has shown positive traits which will adapt her to life in the Federation.

"She has also shown interest in following in the footsteps of her older sister, Natasha. If she continues to show determination and intellect, she might go to StarFleet Academy.

"There are programs designed for those of promise who have been lacking in formal schooling. Her sister Natasha was just such a student, and a graduate of the program. My Senior Officers have shown a guarded optimism that Ishara might graduate from the program and the Academy. I resolve to recommend to Starfleet that Ishara be placed in such a catch-up program, and then, when she has proven herself, be tested for admission to the Academy.

At her request, there is no urgency in sending Ishara onward to Earth. She blatantly enjoys the ship, and the people on it. Her wish is to begin adjustment to life in the Federation, here, on this vessel. We are scheduled to visit Star Base 71 in two weeks. It has a regularly scheduled commercial flights out of it towards Earth every three days.

We shall be rid of our newest guest at that time. The interval shall also give us time in which to judge Ishara for StarFleet service. End Captain's Log."

"Captain's Personal Log; Deanna Troi states Ishara Yar truly wants to join StarFleet, as does Data. Were he not an android his reports would be glowing. Her intended duplicity is immaterial, he states, and only her actions should be judged.

"Ishara faces great challenges on Earth. Woefully undereducated, she cannot even be guaranteed a place in the Fleet remedial program. And she has to succeed in the program to enter the Academy.

"The brightest aspect of this is that Lt. Commander Data has pledged his accumulated financial savings to aid her. He has pointed out that even if she succeeds, monies will be necessary. If she cannot go to the Academy, education and training become vital for her future.

"He is quite unmoved by my promises that StarFleet shall support her through her remedial schooling, continuing to do so if she becomes a Fleet cadet.

"An android does not spend much of his Officer's Pay, so it is indeed possible for Ishara to live modestly for some years on Data's financial nest egg. His commitment to Tasha Yar's younger sister is understandable considering the unique ties he had to Tasha.

"Ishara's future is limitless, provided she is bright enough. She is quite as tough as her sister, and as beautiful. A personal opinion. End of Captain's Personal Log."

Ogawa bustled over, not in the least noticing my big smile.

"Is there anything that requires medical attention?" she asked.

All business. Doctor Selar was already eyeing me, her Vulcan gaze quite unperturbed. She glanced at the medical office, and came to me. The nurse turned to Selar, and the Doctor told her to go back to the two merchantmen, sitting on the bio-beds. Probably undergoing routine follow-up examinations.

Selar gave me a going-over with her eyes, folding her arms. I gave her my biggest grin. "Could Doctor Crusher spare me a few moments of her time? Just a few. Then I'll leave. Honest!"

Selar bore little holes in my head with those dark eyes of hers. "I presume your statement was meant to finish with the line 'Until the next time.' Am I correct?"

Gave her my biggest grin. She got me. Until the next time it was.

Selar had turned and was in the medical office before I had noticed it. I wondered if all Vulcans could spin on a grain of dust like that. She had a nice body, I'd noticed this before. Young for a Vulcan. Someone had said she could be between twenty and seventy T-years old, and possibly mother to babes now in their forties.

Still, she moved so ... nice.

I was waved into the office space, to find Doctor Crusher sitting back, looking at me as I looked down at her. There was a little rolling stool there, and I sat down on it. Forcing her to follow me slightly. I reached into my jacket, bringing out the little nosegay of tiny white corpeosis flowers. It fit in my hand, tied off with a bit of thread. I held them out to her, daring her to reject them.

She almost did, I could see that, but she put out a hand to take them. She put them to her nose, smelling their soft perfume.

"Thank you. Ishara. They're very pretty. The biogardens?"

I nodded yes, folding my legs, enjoying the slight pressure in my groin as I rocked my free leg up and down. She stared at me for a minute, thinking.

"Why me?" she began. "I know very well you're paying court to me. I'm not afraid to use words like lesbian, Miss Yar. It's vaguely flattering, I suppose. But I haven't given you any reason to think I feel any attraction to you in return, now have I?" Still sniffing the little white flowers.

"Why me?" she asked again.

"Why anybody, Doctor Crusher? Beverly? Please, when we're alone, may I call you Beverly? I think it's such a pretty name..."

"Doctor Crusher, if you please. We're not close friends, and we sure as hell aren't lovers. Let's leave it at that. I respect and admire you for many things, and Data's approval of you means a great deal in my estimation. But why me? What makes you think I'd care to be romantically involved with another woman, and that woman being you?"

"Nothing, really. Except the first time you laid those lovely hands on me in this sick bay, I knew I wanted to lay my hands on you. If you've never been with a woman before, why then, I guess, I could be your first. Have you ever had a woman? Wouldn't you like to try?"

Privately thinking to myself this one isn't a stranger to a woman's touch. I wouldn't be the first. But if she wanted to play the sapphic virgin, I'm a girl who is willing to play games.

I was supposed to have been completely anaesthetized while you removed the old Police explosive device, Doctor Crusher. But I remember your hands on my breasts. They were such loving hands.

"I can't understand why I'm so completely taken by you. After all, you're only strong, competent, vital, caring, energetic and one of the prettiest women I've ever known, Doctor Crusher," I stated.

Every time I see those cheekbones I want to touch and kiss them. Every time I see that red hair, I want to run my hands through it, and bury my face in it. Every time I see those long legs of yours, I want to lick every inch of them. Every time I see that lovely soft woman's ass of yours I want to spread your cheeks....

Please, please, Beverly Crusher. Smile at me. Let me be close...

"I'm twice your age in Earth years, Miss Yar. More. Not bad for my age. But! Still more than twice your age. And my days of mad and wild romancing ended probably before you were born.

"I'm a widow with a grown son, and my moments of passion are behind me."

I noticed she wasn't saying she was a straight girl and didn't do other women.

"I'm a very busy person, in fact I'm perpetually busy as Hades. The Captain and others trust me implicitly, and I really don't have the time to fend off children with childish crushes. I was glad to remove that explosive implant from your body...."

Children?

"Did you like my body, Doctor Crusher?" Ooops! She gave me the most peeved look at that moment, and I realized I'd gone too far over the line this time. This wasn't the tunnels, dammit. I was going to have to hone my social skills a hell of a lot, I could see that.

"My apologies, Doctor," I gave in a soft voice. "We're a lot more direct down in the tunnels. I've got to adjust to other ways, and I've managed to offend you. Please forgive me?"

Still giving me a nasty look. "We're always busy here in Sickbay, Miss Yar. This is a military vessel, even if we're more than a warship. We always have things that need to be done.

"I would appreciate it if you didn't appear here again unless it is for a valid medical reason. Do we understand each other?"

Such lovely breasts you have, Beverly Crusher. Are they as big as I think, I hope they are? You can't be sure with those double-damned uniform jackets. I do know, though, that they're bigger than mine. Probably with large red nipples. Redheads are known to have that beauty. Do they hurt when you spike? Do you cry out when they're sucked and bit?

I hadn't felt this terminal with another woman for.... Years.

"Again, Doctor, my apologies. I'll leave you in peace in your sickbay." Hesitation ... "Would it be okay if I see you elsewhere on this ship? There's a thousand crew on board, but I think it'd be quite difficult to avoid you altogether."

She allowed as how that were true, and pointedly turned back to her Padd's. Giving me leave to go. Walking away, I hoped she wasn't thinking my backside was too big. I keep fit, but when I grew up, it had just spread. Not my fault.

I think the Doctor's so pretty, so vibrant, so ... She probably wears that blue coat half the time to hide her lovely backside. Throwing a drape cloth over a diamond.

On the way out Selar gave me another patented Vulcan stare. Smiling big, I sidled over to her. "Granted I haven't seen that much of StarFleet, but at least she has to be about the prettiest woman on board the ENTERPRISE? Don't you agree?" Maybe that wasn't the best thing to say to the - maybe - second or third-prettiest woman on this ship.

She was still staring. "Next to yourself, of course."

"Vulcan women place little worth in physical beauty. Miss Yar. It passes so quickly, and means so little in stating a person's actual worth as an individual and as a member of society. You may flatter me, but it shall little affect my judgment of you or myself."

A good day for saying the wrong thing. Selar stopped me when I would have moved on. "Don't you want your answer?"

I HAD to pause to swallow that one.

"You asked me to make a qualitative judgment without proper parameters. Yet I shall attempt to answer you."

Selar looked back at the office. "I think Doctor Crusher would probably be high on a physical and sexual desirability index provided by most of the male and a small number of the female crew on this vessel. Yes, she is pretty.

"She is also a competent authority figure, and we both know that in itself is attractive. It must add to her sexuality quotient considerably.

"Is this so important to you, Miss Yar? How 'pretty' she is?"

"It's a bonus you get sometimes with one of the more marvelous women, Doctor Selar. Just a bonus." On that note I escaped that Vulcan stare.

Sitting there was the helmsman, Ensign Allenby. I remembered her from my visit to the Bridge. She was a beauty, blond and competent in her Command Red uniform. Blue eyes, not green, still....

Those green eyes of Beverly's, above those classic cheekbones kept reappearing in my mind's eye. Oh, I had it BAD!

Allenby smiled back, so I'd slid in next to her. Nice smile. With very little prompting she told me a bit about StarFleet Academy. Not making it sound easy.

Fair enough. Most things in life worth anything didn't come easy. Leaving Turkana was not easy. And betraying everything, and everyone I'd never known ... that was a good deal harder.

Not to dwell on that. What was done was done.

I started getting a little personal in my questions, and she suddenly began giggling. It was at my expense, I knew that. Not done maliciously. She put a very nice hand on my arm. Rubbing it. Reminding me she was a warm and lively female. If it weren't for those green eyes I kept remembering....

"Before you work any harder at seducing me, Miss ... Ishara? You should know I'm taken. My emotions are firmly committed to someone else. He's in Life Sciences. Just so you know."

Another one not saying she was straight and didn't do women. Maybe it was the way everyone spoke here? A societal convention? In which case I might have badly misjudged Doctor Crusher. Hell, maybe I had imagined those fingers on my breasts? It had been such a light touch, and I had indeed been almost out.

"Do you mind being seen with me? I think it's becoming known on this ship that I like other women. If this bothers you...?" Thinking she's a sweet Madchen. Except for those green eyes I keep remembering.

It became fun, talking with her. She told me about living on a planet labeled Norfolk. Managing the big harvesters and biocare programs from when she was a small child. Always looking to the stars at night. Being amazed to discover the stars were different over Earth. She had been three or four T-years old when she realized she wanted to go to space.

She told me what it took to hand grind your own telescope mirror. How proud she had been with her new telescope to find one of the miner ships bringing in a new metallic asteroid for the LaGrange factories.

I met her man during this shift-lunch. He wasn't too happy to see me chatting up his Madchen. My reputation must be spreading, or he was a good judge of character. But he was civil. I'd a few scars to prove lovers weren't all that understanding on Turkana.

Later, Allenby and I had a chance to walk the corridors of the ENTERPRISE. Walking off our meal. She checked me out at one point, I wasn't supposed to notice. Nice to know someone up here liked my body.

The high point was finding their little gymnasium. Machines and aids I'd never known back on Turkana. She showed me what was there, and then helped me find my sizes in a few replicated clothes items. They had clothes just to exercise in. And you could get them for free through the replicators. You just asked. I LIKED that.

Allenby introduced me to memory fabric bra's when she got me my first sports halter.

Oh, the joy!

You put your arms through it, give it a few taps on the bind's, and it GREW around you! A perfect fit every time, it supported like a pair of lover's hands, and NO STRAPS! Granted I wasn't large, but the CALLUSES I'd grown over the years on my shoulders! For the bra's alone I was happier with my choice to leave Turkana.

I felt like I'd been given a new universe of freedom. Beverly must wear bra's like this. Lucky girl. It'd be sssoooooo easy to slip one off her.

Life in the Federation was already looking brighter.

We were in the changing room when I noticed Allenby staring at me.

"Those ... they're scars, aren't they?"

Hell, yes, they were. We'd been at war, down there in the tunnels, for fifteen years. You picked up a few. Then I quickly recalled how some women found them ugly.

Allenby had never seen the number, size or brutal nature of the scars I had, not on a living sentient before. I had to explain slug-thrower's and vibrating sliv's for cutting. An eye-opener to her. She informed me they routinely took scars off, on the ENTERPRISE. All I had to do was ask.

Go down to sickbay and talk to Doctor Crusher. Hello, Doctor Crusher! I'm back! This time with a medical problem.

I made my scars a game with Allenby. Being flip, bragging about how I got some of them. Not mentioning the two knife scars I got from putting my face in someone else's love affair. Impressing the hell out of this thin little helmsman. Leeching all the pity out of her face and enjoying when it become admiration.

On her advice I made my new sports halter triple ply thick. After she left I went back to the replicators. Ordered a single ply. Studied the new me in the mirror. Smiled a big grin. Let everyone look. It was as if all I'd done was paint blue coloring on my skin. Talk about flaunting! Maybe my scars would show less.

She'd left me to try out the machines on my own, one by one. As I did so one tall and thin dark-skinned crewman spotted the almost- naked me in the one-ply bra. He did balance beam and rings, showing off the muscles in his belly and arms. Nice act. Great bi's and ab's on him. He liked the thin halter.

I'd left my most recent lover back on Turkana. He'd been the boss of my undercity. It'd been nice with him, but this was the first time I'd thought of him since making my decision to defect to StarFleet. Now there was no sense of loss. This lack of pain, feeling nothing at our permanent separation, told me better than anything else that it was over between us. We had separated in my mind long before I began confessing our plans to the Captain and Data.

Now all I could think of holding was Beverly Crusher. Her neck was so smooth and long. I wondered if she shivered when someone traced her vertebrae with their tongue? Did water flow downhill?

I'd gone back to my guest quarters after this brief foray into fitness, taking the time to investigate the replicator's more fully. Everything here was FREE!

I discovered that they could replicate things that were put in the disposal door. They'd come back clean, but they'd have every little hole or flaw duplicated as before. Absolutely clean, though. Beats the hell out of hand-washing thick work pants in one of the cistern tubs down on Turkana.

I must have gotten myself a dozen different memory-fabric bra's in my size range, once I discovered what to say to the computer. Tried every single one on. Then I investigated what they had in the way of panties.

Someone had placed a pattern for dainty lacy crotch-less panties in the replicator. I HAD to see myself in the mirror wearing one of those. I felt like such a complete pervert. It wasn't my style, but for just once, I HAD to wear a pair just to see. Oh, if only I could admire Beverly in one of those totally useless confections! Long legs and red hair.

I liked myself in my new blue briefs and halter. But I listened to my better judgment and switched to an outfit that tended to cover a few more of my scars. Common sense also told me to wear a thicker bra than one-ply. Four ply at least completely hid my nipples.

Feeling more positive than I had just a few hours ago, I slipped my leather jacket over my new large blue halter, and padded barefoot back to the gym. Time to get back into my exercise routine. Time to show myself in my small briefs. Let my belly hang out for public admiration.

Maybe I didn't have abdominal muscles like that dark male did, but I looked strong and very, very Crocodile, bossy, Alpha female, when I flexed them. Flaunting time.

It was fun using machines that worked. Somewhere after I had left the climber for the rowing machine, Beverly and the ship's Counselor strolled through the door.

I was in the good burn by then, working slow, letting the sweat drip. Being enthralled by Beverly in a hideous exercise outfit of tulle brown and green cream. They hadn't been expecting to find me here.

Deanna Troi came by to chat me up. Smiling, friendly, properly admiring of the little squares of stomach muscle showing as I worked the machine. Ignoring the two major scars in my lower left rib cage spoiling the overall effect. She called Beverly over to admire my muscles, and wonder of wonders, the Doctor came. I must have sounded like an ass, I can't recall a word I said. I kept thinking of those long legs of hers, and those green eyes. Ohhh, this was a BAD BAD BAD case, Ishara Yar!

Beverly and Counselor Troi eventually left me to my own exercises. For my part it was difficult not to stare at my new and favorite redhead. But I tried.

When they were doing their preliminary limbering disciplines, Beverly caught me staring as she bent over. They had these giant mirrors as the walls. Doctor Crusher immediately turned around, perhaps forgetting I could see her backside flex and move in the mirror now. Not wishing to offend, I concentrated on my own little world of muscle ache and smelly sweat.

After a dozen years in the tunnels I could justifiably claim to be an expert on smells. This night, however, I was going to luxuriate in a disgustingly wasteful hot water shower. I was going to use that lovely big sweet-scented bar of soap on every inch of my body and then stay under that hot water until my skin began falling off my bones. And this was a StarShip, almost a warship, not a pleasure chamber!

I toweled off, and began a splotchy series of cool-down's. Conscious of the presence of Bev and Deanna behind me. Seeing the distortion of her red-haired beauty in the shiny surfaces of a few of the other machines. Knowing she was watching me. Hoping she enjoyed what she saw. Wishing she wanted me. Admitting to myself she might never do so. Other people watched my breasts move, my muscles knot and my legs move. It didn't seem to matter very much. I quickly left for my shower.

A large woman sat beside me. Guinan, black skin, the bartender here, or whatever her title was. She put down a glass of a dark liquid in front of me. I stared at it, then at her. Dressed strange, those big hats of hers. Not threatening, just a style I was unaccustomed to. I really didn't feel like having company tonight.

My body had suddenly decided to set a new schedule for itself. More than a week early, and I was feeling crappy and on edge and especially fat the way I usually did my first day.

I loved those big soft absorbent pads, though. Just put them vaguely where needed and they stayed by themselves. The bartender ignored any rejection in my face, if it showed.

"It's prune juice," Guinan said, meaning the glass of liquid. "The drink of warriors, according to a friend of mine. Try it. You might like it." It was horrible, but I finished it anyway. Down in the tunnels you learnt to turn down nothing.

"Why give it to me?" I asked.

"You're a warrior. You are, aren't you? You're pretty and you're young and you're smart. But most important, you're a warrior, aren't you?" She was smiling nice when she said it, so I smiled back.

"Nothing wrong with being a warrior. Someone has to do it. It's an honorable calling.

"Most everyone on this ship is a warrior, even if they don't think of themselves in that way. They serve on a StarShip that on any given day may be destroyed in an act of war or a natural disaster. You can't get very much more warrior than that. Knowing deep inside, that you might be thrown into a dangerous situation and never live to see the other side."

A bartender who fantasizes being a philosopher.

"Your sister was a warrior as well." Straight out of nowhere, that one rocked me.

"Did you know her?" Suddenly holding her hand. Tasha abandoned me, she'd taught me how to kill, she saved me, she hurt me, she held me close, she protected me, she left me behind. She was my greatest mystery. I hated her, I missed her. This was the ship where she served the last year of her life. She must have spent time right here. In Ten-Forward.

Tightness in my throat. "Did you know her well?" Wanting suddenly to hear about that tall blond woman I'd hated and loved and loathed and envied for most of the past fifteen T-years.

"I never knew her at all. She died shortly before I returned to the ENTERPRISE, and I've always regretted the loss. Most all who knew her loved her. And a few loved her more than that. Would you like to talk to some of her friends? A number have left the ship since she died, but most remain.

"That Klingon, for instance, his name is Worf, he might qualify as one of her best friends. Klingon's value warriors, and warriors ways, and Tasha... Come with me, I'll introduce you, and get you a new prune juice. Worf will ... Worf has a few tales to tell you.

"I think he'd be the one best for you to talk to, about her. Come with me. Did you know he has composed an Opera about Tasha? Her glorious deeds in battle, her valor, her honor? Her death? Klingon's do that, they write songs about glorious deaths in battle. Songs about warriors.

"He even has an act of two scenes about her difficult days in the Academy. He hopes to finish it some day. Here we are..."

"Worf, will you do an honor to an old warrior? Speak to this woman, speak of Natasha Yar. Ishara wishes to know something of her sister."

I felt unsure. I'd never met an alien before that I could recall. There might be tremendous problems in understanding what he would say, he might not want to talk to me. He was an alien. Yet I might be finding truths of what actually happened. He was an alien race, yet he knew my sister well. He was not just a shipmate. He was her friend. I wondered what I would learn of Tasha from his lips.

Suddenly it struck me he might have been more than a friend. How close did you have to be to someone before you began composing Opera's about them?

Our talking began with a few platitudes about his loss at her death. Platitudes which I realized he meant sincerely. Klingon's were beyond my understanding at the time. And to a lesser extent, still are. They are wired different.

First he told me of when he first met her, there, on the bridge of the ENTERPRISE. How he knew she was a warrior, that she had a Klingon heart. He named her yellow-hair when they spoke as warrior to warrior, friend to friend.

He described some of her adventures, and some of her quieter ways.

At times I have hated Tasha for never saving me, never sharing some of her faults and strengths with me. Other times I missed her so. Worf gave me a new Tasha. Worf began painting a woman strong with desperate resolve.

The third night we were together, we sat on the floor in the middle of his cabin. Listening to him as he translated scene after scene in his Opera of Tasha.

One of the most melodramatic was Tasha in the den of the barbarian seeress. Worf said something which has stayed with me all of my days. He had learned from her own lips she would die young. It had been foretold to her many years ago that she would die four times. There, she was told this, in that awful burst of prophecy.

Tasha must have mis-counted, he judged. Her third death had been down on that desolate planet. She'd died twice already before she came to the ENTERPRISE? Suddenly I was seeing Tasha as a warrior. And myself. Her life had been a struggle against the darkness she had known was speeding towards her on the wings of a Roc.

Worf spoke of how she'd spend hours on the holodeck. Practicing her open-hand fighting, teaching others, day after day. Honing the fine edges of her Security staff. Including himself. How she'd learned basic Bath'let fighting from him.

How they each eventually told something of the violence they had seen before the ENTERPRISE.

Warrior's talk, veteran's talk, talk I could understand too well. He proudly called me a warrior, without comparing me to my sister. I accepted that.

He told me of a few of her male warriors, the ones she had loved. Back then, in the Legion. Of a woman she had married there. Tasha had never talked of a death, but Worf judged it must be so.

Worf surprised me by admitting they had been lovers. Klingons were proud of female warriors they had bedded. It was another form of glory for the male.

On the holodeck, after a battle there, they had become one. He boasted of the broken arm she had given him, his blood that she had spilled.

REALLY rough sex.

I needed this, this understanding of Tasha. What I didn't want was finding a Tasha I could understand and find myself liking.

But during that very first night, there in Ten-Forward, Worf asked for a story from me, about me. A warrior's tale. He admitted he was writing a "very bad Opera" about my sister. Tasha. My Tasha. He wanted to incorporate something of me in his musical epic.

I told him of a time when I was the last woman standing in a small vicious ambush. It seemed so banal now, just some more veteran's tales. Thinking of it in an Opera, knowing it was not worthy of such an honor. So useless. Seven people dead and for what? And so much hurt as I healed. Did it alter anything?

Was I growing up? Or just getting tired?

That first night Worf and I shared hours in Ten-Forward, late into the night. Until he had to leave to refresh himself with sleep. A warrior did not allow his body to be less than perfect, responsive, alert, strong.

We met again in Ten-Forward the next day, and we became closer as he told me of Tasha. The day after that we met in his cabin.

He told me he had a son. When I told him how I felt about Doctor Crusher there was something unsaid, something important in his eyes. Worf praised the Doctor highly. He said she had a Warrior's Heart. He also knew something else about her which he did not share with me. I put it aside to investigate later.

We listened to data filches of his Opera. Klingon Opera it might be, it sounded exactly the same as Terran Opera. An Opera about TASHA! I felt envious and bitter. The woman who'd left me behind was admired and loved, even in death.

In that cabin Worf sang of Tasha's life as a mercenary soldier. Her problems at the Academy. How Geordi LaForge had known her there. Worf had a beautiful voice, so strong.

While serving on the ENTERPRISE Tasha fought a reluctant battle, to the finish, with another female. For a planetary ruler she did not want. She saved the woman, with the help of the ENTERPRISE's medical skills. Worf relished the revenge the treacherous ruler received.

Worf told of the virus that made everyone drunk. Of the night she spent with Data. The android had been her lover, and Tasha proudly let the entire crew see them kiss and talk of sex and love. Suddenly I understood about the "special ties" between my sister and Data.

Eventually, during that long third night, I realized that for a few bright times, he too was part of the Opera. His voice lifted in that recording, singing of a Tasha much more than a friend or a sexual partner. He had loved her, in his own way. This was more than an ex-lover being poetic. He meant his praises with every atom of his being. He sang not of a lover or a friend, but of a true hero. Crying, singing of a warm diamond he had once held close.

He told me of her impetuous attempt to resolve a deadly stalemate on the planet's surface. Her lover was trapped in the crashed shuttlecraft, and Tasha died trying to rescue her.

"Two hours. I have other appointments. Will that be acceptable?" Suddenly she stopped, looking me directly in my eyes. Looking a question she never asked and I failed to answer. "My cabin. In two hours. Do you know where it is?"

Two hours to try to rationalize what I wished to know. What questions to ask. What truths to uncover.

In the event, it was simple. I consisted entirely of doubts as I sat in a chair next to her on the couch. I couldn't even tell you much of what the insides of her cabin was like. Other things were on my mind.

I'd meant to ask other things first. Practice the civility that seemed so important in the Federation. Instead the most important one came first off my lips.

"Were you and Tasha lovers?"

She could have gotten mad. Or thrown me out, or denied everything.

Deanna never stopped looking me in my eyes. "I was her last lover, Ishara. She died after a night in my arms."

I'd already figured it out. Tasha always did have an eye for the pretty Madchen. Troi at least fitted that criteria. I was pleased with myself, for I'd discovered a little more about my sister. At the same time I was dismayed to find I had misjudged the Betazoid so completely. And I did not want to know a Tasha I could love.

"Could you tell me about her? When ... Tell me what you feel you can. I still don't love her as a sister, but maybe I'm beginning to know her. A little. Will you help me?"

She served tea, and a few tiny squares of fruit that dissolved in the hot liquid to give me a new thing to enjoy. I was beginning to appreciate how poverty-stricken we had been, down in the tunnels.

She touched me, an idle caress of my arm, a friend's touch, not a lover's. She looked out the windows into the trails of stars, she was gathering her thoughts. Then she turned to look into my eyes.

"I do not think of myself as a great lover, for all my empathy. Others are greater, wiser, more giving. I know I have a pudgy little body and most of my clothes sense is a disaster. I know my faults, and I knew Tasha's as well. We both had a full measure of them. But for three shining weeks we grew closer, your sister and I.

"Once we had shared a short shore leave together. She reached out to me with her heart, and we became lovers. It was a lovely interlude, but I presumed it was just a night's loving and nothing more. I thought we could return to the ENTERPRISE to pick up our lives where we had left off.

"What had begun as a passionate shore-leave evolved into our finding our lives more closely intertwined. It was so ... unplanned.

"She'd had so many women before me, and so many men. Tasha was a lover skilled in pleasing either sex. Yet she was able to bring something new and innocent to my bed, and my life. She still hoped for each love affair to be her last.

"In the end I WAS her last love, and it has saddened me ever since. Dying like that was as if a child had suddenly died. All that potential, all that future lying ahead, all that promise. All gone in an instant.

"Miraculous it might seem now, but we never argued. We didn't have the time. I do not believe her and Beverly ever argued much, either. She had a bad temper, she was willful, she could be selfish and childish and petty and stubborn. She could be so very human. Yet we never argued. There was a great darkness in her, but it was never allowed to scar those she loved. I thought in time I could banish that darkness from her.

"She must have hurt someone very badly, and knew it. Years ago.

"She died with four words still fresh in her ears. I'd kissed her, there in the shuttlecraft bay, and I told her 'I love you, Tasha.'

"They were the last words I ever spoke to her. Her last words to me were how she loved me.

"I've been very fortunate, Ishara. I held her for a few short weeks, I'll remember her all my life, my memories are gilt and sharp and sweet. And our last words to each other spoke of love.

"How blessed I've felt ever since."

I held her as our tea's grew cold, she burrowed into me, shuddering for long minutes, venting grief. My own sense of loss grew sharper, then softer as my tears wet her long dark hair.

Oh Tasha! I wanted you so! DAMN YOU! Why did you leave me?

The Captain, Jean-Luc Picard, had finally answered my questions about tokens left behind by Tasha.

His was a holo of Tasha. And some personal little holo-images he would not throw away, as Tasha had requested. They were mine now. If I wanted them.

The pedestal holo of my sister asked the Captain to give her possessions to other crew members in the case of her death. Was that how she looked when she died? I'd never imagined her so clean and tall, so straight and strong in her duty uniform. She had cut her hair much shorter from what I remembered.

Worf had shown me her three antique pistols, and the pitiful handful of medal's she'd earned in Falkhyn's Legion. I was still debating accepting Worf's offer to return them to me. If I kept them, did that mean I was forgiving Tasha?

The Captain had left me alone in his office to view the holo. In the holo Tasha explained how I had died. A vengeance killing after she had betrayed the Coalition.

Evidently betraying the Coalition was a Yar family trait.

She asked the Captain to investigate my death, if he ever could, if he ever had to go to Turkana. Find my grave if he could.

She was very apologetic about the favor she asked of the Captain. Stating many qualifiers, asking him not to bother if it was too difficult. It was difficult to think of my tough sister being embarrassed to ask a token from a friend. At the time she recorded that holo she'd been feeling sorry she had not done this for herself.

She'd thought me dead. That first year without her, when I'd had to do all I did, I'd spent many nights wishing I was dead, Tasha had thought me murdered.

I thought I'd put that all behind me. It was the past. I didn't have to do things like that any more in order to just survive. Now it all rushed back, and the pain hadn't subsided a millimeter.

Her eighteen personal holo's... Ah!

I'd viewed three of her 3D memories and couldn't take any more. A petite oriental man in military dress was draping a ribboned star over her neck, and a tough polished officer was saluting her.

Another was of her sitting on the hatch of an armored vehicle. A much smaller curly-haired blond was sitting in her lap. Tasha had both hands in the waist band of the woman's military fatigues, enjoying the other's belly. They looked so happy together. The holo was titled "Tiptoe".

Was this the woman she married?

A few words of a song came to me.

"Do you have a holograph? / Made when you were happy?

/ Do you re-memb-er / how you felt when it was done?"

The third was of me and Imke. A flat, black and white, grainy photograph, not a 3D or holo. It had been cold that day, and me and Tasha's Madchen, Imke, we both had buttoned coats on. I looked mad in the photo, I looked like I was ready to hit Tasha's girlfriend, back there on Turkana's surface. I was mad at Imke a lot back then. Tasha must have carried this flat picture as a dot, secreted somewhere on her. Saving it.

I didn't cry, but I had to flee the Captain's ready room.

Now I had to decide whether or not I'd keep the holo's. The Captain had not destroyed them as requested. Now I had to judge whether I wanted to know my sister any better than I did.

Hating her had always kept me strong. Hating her had kept me focused. Hating her had made my life simpler. Blaming her was my only comfort for too many years.

Counselor Troi would say I should let it go. Counselor Troi could remember kisses and love. I remembered putting on shows for Fat Joey and all his friends.

I felt Worf's stride on the deck before I lifted my head. He towered over me and extended his hand. He admired Tasha. Which one of us was right? Were we both right and wrong?

"Worf ... Tell me about her lovers." Maybe there was a truth in the list of her sexual partners. Back on Turkana, she'd always been a boss Crocodile, a controller of other women. Learning she'd discovered a taste for men had been one of my bigger shocks.

Another Yar family trait. We don't seem to have the sense to limit our lovers to one sex. Though I'll admit I prefer the ladies.

Worf didn't want to reveal personal things about my sister. I had to remind him she WAS my sister. I was trying to understand her. I needed help. I told him I knew about her and Counselor Troi. I knew of her and Data. Worf told me Geordi LaForge and her had shared a room back at the Academy. And more.

Wasn't my sister full of surprises.

To myself I recalled the small note in the code of the holo I'd seen in Captain Picard's office. "Tiptoe", it said, and I knew it was the name of the little blond she had held so lovingly. I needed to know more.

Worf didn't want to go further. He had this stretch of nine months in my sister's life and according to him, she led the life of a silent order female monk during this time. He knew her lover, and didn't want to tell me. Good for him, actually. It irritated me, but he was showing more and more admirable traits as time went on. I admired him at the same time I wanted to kill him for not telling me what I wanted to know.

Suddenly it hit me, it all fell together. Deanna had said my sister had never quarreled with her, a condition that wouldn't have lasted much longer considering my remembrances of my sister's temper. She also said my sister and Beverly never seemed to argue much.

Beverly.

I'm sure there were other females named Beverly on that ship, then and now. However, the one Deanna meant was a red-headed Doctor with tapering hands and green eyes.

I gave Worf an apology, a tongue-tickling kiss and a pat on his muscular rear. I had things to do.

I tried not to stare at her body as I looked up at her. She waited for me to speak.

"I have been told you practice removing body scars in that sickbay of yours. You've seen most of my body. Do you think you could begin removing some of them tomorrow? Some of the worst ones? Please?"

She managed to achieve a small smile before giving me a hand. "I'd be glad to. Can we talk about it tomorrow? First thing tomorrow. Unless you'd like to begin now? Doctor Hill has repaired injuries that would have killed even you, and left them bright and clean. Just tell him to proceed, and I'll do the paperwork tomorrow. We can both work at cleaning off those scars."

Her door opened, and she turned to me, a thin little smile on her beautiful face.

"You'd prefer to have me do the repair work, wouldn't you? Very well, I'll see you tomorrow. But I'd still recommend you let Doctor Hill begin the procedures tonight. It's a lot of delicate work with old scars like yours, to make them invisible. You'll suffer a great deal of lingering pain once the local anesthesia wears off. But we can make you beautiful again. You'll be a big hit at the beach."

The beach? Why would I go to the edge of a body of water? What was there?

Beverly went to go inside when I stepped closer.

"Doctor Crusher ... can you tell me about my sister?"

I've seen that sort of look before. It's called pain. Her lips pursed, she looked away, then she swung back to look me in the eye.

"I knew you'd find out about Tasha and me. Eventually."

She waved me inside, walking to a window and staring out at the fleeing stars. "We lived together, here, in this cabin. We were lovers, and I was trying to obtain the nerve to ask her to be my wife. We ... we broke up."

At that moment her son chose to walk in. Alpha duty shift had been over for an hour, but no one in the higher command structure or on the Bridge could call any time their own and no one else's.

Wesley knew immediately this was a private matter. He had no desire to deal with the look on his mother's face. I suggested to Doctor Crusher we take our discussion to Ten-Forward. She was unhappy, but agreed.

Once there she asked for her own bottle. Guinan saw us coming and personally brought the bottle to the furthest corner in the lounge.

Doctor Crusher poured me a small splash in a small glass. I looked at it inquiringly and Beverly chirped a little nervous laugh.

"'It's green.' That's a very old SpaceFleet joke. From the time of Kirk and Spock.

"Scotty, the chief engineer, he was drinking a group of Klingon's under the table, and at one point one of the Klingon's asked what was the liqueur they were drinking. Scotty couldn't read the label anymore, so he said: 'It's Green.'

"Saurian Brandy has been the Fleet drink of preference ever since. Two of the biggest distillers bottle their product under a 'It's Green' label, specifically for the fleet. I think it sells quite well under that label throughout the quadrant."

We downed the liquid, and Beverly refilled. We downed them too. She was stalling, but I had been wanting so badly to be near her. Now, when I was doing so, I could not complain. She began giggling when she noticed I was staring at her breasts.

I blushed, and began concentrating on her hands. The further along the evening got, the more she used her hands to talk.

"You've heard of the occasion when the ship was infected with a fast-mutating virus that made us all drunk?" Nodding a Yes. It was when Data and Tasha became lovers.

That one hand in the air, those lovely fingers bending and flexing. I was fascinated by her circling movements.

"I was infected, bad, oh, really bad. I went up to the bridge and threw myself at the Captain, on the Captain, all over the Captain. I came within a hair of raping him.

"Oh, the things I suggested to him! Have you ever read a book called the Kharma Sutra...? No, you wouldn't have. In any event he resisted enough for both of us, and sent me to bed for my own good.

A cupping movement followed by a reach followed by a ... Her hands had awakened to movement, fascinating me, poetry in air.

"I am not normally... It was as if I was out of control, wanting to... I wasn't just drunk from the virus. I'd snapped."

The way she'd touch her thumb to her little finger when emphasizing something, her hand circling and dipping.

"I was making my drunken way to my cabin when a nearly naked Natasha Yar waylaid me. I was in a high state of ... sexual tension, and made only a few completely un-meant peeps of protest as she dragged me into her cabin. She meant to enjoy my body and I immediately acquiesced in my own mind as soon as I understood what she wanted of me."

An artist's hands. An artist in flesh. Turning and weaving, flowing, molding air with her delicate strong fingers.

"She was a beautiful woman, as you know. Tasha'd awoken something in me from the first time we'd met, two weeks before. Data had not slaked all of your sister's passions. Now she wanted a woman. My own needs were completely unsatisfied, and I threw myself into the eager arms of our equally drunken Ops officer."

The Doctor would raise her other arm, touching it with the tips of her fingers, crossing the arm with her hand.

"It was an encounter of raw unadorned sex."

Like a snake her hand dipped and bobbed at the end of her arm.

"The next night I had to return. It was impossible to resist, she was impossible to resist. All I had been able to think of all day had been Tasha holding me. Loving me. Giving me one climax after the other. And so we began our affair."

Both her hands were moving now, the right circling closer to the table, a dance. Quite unconscious. She kept bringing the fingers of her right hand together. Again and again. She talked of Tasha with emotion finally coloring her voice. The patterns of her right hand were so familiar, somehow... Straighten the fingers together and then curl into a soft fist.

Fist.

All those years with my sister and her girlfriend Imke, in those single rooms and small apartments, I'd hear them. Allah knows I watched them enough times, as she and Imke woke me. Again and again, it was their favorite form of sex. I doubt if she'd changed much by the time she got to the ENTERPRISE.

I knew the patterns well from my own experiences, down on Turkana. Sometimes a girl making that kind of a fist at me was enough to set me off in a hunger.

When we met another girl along the neutral line, it was our signal, one of them. Alliance girl to Coalition girl. She'd make a tapered fist at me, or I her. An invitation for the most dangerous form of sex possible.

Later, with our hearts beating with apprehension and excitement, we'd meet again. Find a hole to lie together in, and make lust. If it wasn't an ambush and death waited instead of a girl. That was the other side of our seeking sex. The possibility of dying for it.

Beverly Crusher was talking of my sister and making one of those kinds of fists. I could immediately feel myself tightening, especially in my groin. My lungs felt ... constricted.

"We continued long after we were sober, and I found myself falling in love as she fell in love with me. I'd never LOVED a woman before then, not real love. We had sex and love. We had one strange love affair."

Not strange at all, Beverly. Passionate. All I could think of for minutes was Beverly shaping her hand like that and loving me with it. I lost quite a good deal of what she said. I couldn't keep my eyes off her hands. Beverly noticed my flush, maybe she thought I was embarrassed. Such strong long hands she had, so ...

"We broke up after eight months, and we never got together again.

"That's all there is to it. Tasha fell in love with the Counselor and then she perished on that incredibly botched rescue mission. Any hopes we could get back together again ended when that bastard entity used it's powers on Tasha."

I didn't know what to say. I was mesmerized by the way her hands moved. Beverly poured for us again, this time proposing a toast. "To Tasha."

My hand was shaking so very badly I had to work to pour that shot straight down. I stared at my hand for some time. Not staring at hers. Deciding this toast didn't mean I had forgiven my sister for her sins against me.

Bev had noticed where my eyes had been, and now left her hands sedately folded on the table. Probably wondering what the hell I had been looking at.

The fumes from the Brandy were making me smell the biogardens, the arboretum, specifically the apple blossoms. We had another round. I liked apple blossoms. Better to think of apple blossoms than Doctor Crusher's wet hand folded into a fist.....

Somehow Guinan had gotten a few tables moved, and we were alone in our own little stretch of the side wall. Reeking of Apple Blossoms. I moved my chair alongside the Doctor's. Leaning over, watching her intently. I could smell the Apple Blossoms on her lips, so I leaned up and began licking her lips, enthralled by the taste.

Beverly let me do so. She closed her eyes when I licked her face. Was she remembering my sister?

She let me kiss her a few times after that. Passion was not a part of them. Yet.

I went seeking other areas to caress with my tongue, finding them. Her neck was so perfect, I loved the deep soft hollow of her throat.

I had another shot, and then she began licking the flavor off my lips. That was the best fun yet. I fought her tongue with mine a few times before we both fell into terminal giggles. I was giggling because I thought of her scenting, wetting her hand with a perfume of apple blossoms. Unfortunately it would probably burn like acid. Too bad. I wasn't too sure what Beverly was giggling about.

Time for another shot and a toast to go with it. We toasted Cochrane, the mad iconoclast who gave humankind entry to the Galaxy. The windows kept drawing our eyes, I couldn't tell you why. It was infinity out there. Eternity. A beam blocked our left and Beverly curved into the space angled there.

We were letting each other touch the other now. We weren't drunk, but this redhead had decided to use a slight glow as an excuse to begin something she must have wanted all along. The WALLS she had built up around herself! The years, the work, the WASTE of building those walls. She surrounded herself with walls ... and maybe did not know how anymore to surmount them. The waste....

Now we were touching, she was letting me touch her. She had found an excuse to allow us to touch. I adore apple blossoms now. So I smiled and let my hand find her butt. We were both giggling uproariously when she found mine. We were friends for life now.

Beverly sang me a little ditty she remembered from her home planet.

"Tommy Loy, the cabin boy / The dirty little nipper

"He filled his ass / With broken Glass

"And circumcised / The Skipper"

She had to explain what circumcision was about.

I told her about what pigs the men were on Turkana, and she told me about the world of prudes where she was raised.

Her hands were active again, in a most wonderful way. She let me call another toast. Her hand was touching my leather sleeve, her breast touching me, her breath strong with the scent of apple blossoms.

"To our women," I proposed. She stared at me for some time, before lifting her glass. "To our women," she whispered. She knocked it straight back and splashed more into our little glasses. She hesitated, debating whether to mention men. I took the initiative.

"To our men." We clinked glasses and drank. Another small splash of "It's Green!". Beverly watched me raise the little glass again.

I think I spilled a little of the marvelous brandy when I brought my face close to that of a mesmerized Beverly. Who cared really?

I whispered the words. "To the sweetest lips in the Galaxy....." We managed to drink the liqueur. "Yours." She let her face tilt as her lips remained slightly open. I bent and we barely touched our lips together. Then her hand went around my head and pulled me to her.

I'll always love the scent of apple blossoms.

I couldn't seem to pull my mouth away from her pale neck, or her cheeks or chin or ears. Oh, for a sweet hollow of the neck like Beverly had! Though her hair tickled when I searched her ear with my tongue tip. Beverly was becoming more forceful now, her hand on my backside was just one aspect of that. When her hand strayed to my belly I debated bringing this encounter from Ten-Forward to someplace more private.

When Bev edged her hand down the front of my pants I changed my mind. This place didn't seem all that bad a site for me to melt down and breach my core. I remembered those beautiful fingers, and felt my eyes going blind as Bev inched their way into my body hairs.

Guinan sat down opposite us, not saying a word. Just resting her chin in her hands and staring at me when I re-opened my eyes.

"I'll leave your bottle in the usual place, Doctor.

"I truly envy the two of you right now, your marvelous exhibition of fireworks has drawn the admiration of a score of customers, as well as my own. I wish you two the most splendid of love affairs, and I shall truly envy you both. As will a number of other people on this ship. You look glorious in Ishara's arms, Beverly, and happy.

"But it's late. One of you still has to do your duty shift tomorrow. I think it's time you two lovebirds took your bodies to bed."

For some days every thinking moment involved either finding out things about my sister or having heartache thinking about that pretty redhead in sickbay.

She had the DEEPEST hollow in the base of her throat. Did you know that? I couldn't kiss it enough, and every time I did Beverly went off into another flurry of giggles.

Men were so damned SERIOUS about sex! Women knew it could be so much fun.

Tasha had kissed that throat, and I wasn't too happy about that. She had tasted her pubes and nipples and her love-sweat. She'd held her, she'd whispered love words into those fragile ears, she'd made love to her with her mouth and kissed her belly button.

Tasha had loved her, but Tasha had lost her. Tasha had tasted this redhead's fire, and then left her. Chewing on that earlobe, feeling those nipples harden right through her bra, fondling the skin of her belly, feeling her shudder when I kissed under the line of chin, whispering for her to pinch my breasts through my bra when my nipples were in her hands, breathing the scent of apple blossoms in her hair. Kissing those hands on wrist, licking the inside of her palm.

Tasha was an ass to let this one get away.

Somewhere in the past few minutes Beverly had discovered how to unbutton my blouse. I kept slapping her hands away and giggling non-stop. She kept unbuttoning me and giggling back. Belts and hooks as well. She'd found her way beyond my waist, and I was more than a little worried.

I had finished my three days yesterday, but I wondered how Beverly might react if I bled on her. I purposefully hadn't contemplated that problem. I'd been too damned anxious to bed the Doctor. I still was. I was also ready to come the next time she palmed my groin or softly scratched my belly.

Quite a few people had seen us in Ten-Forward. More had done so as we bumped and groped our way to a cabin and privacy. The entire ship would know by tomorrow that Doctor Crusher was being remarkably amorous with another woman. Eat your hearts out! The new exile from Turkana had the prettiest woman on the ship!

This was a remarkably public display for a woman as reserved as Beverly Howard Crusher, and I wondered about it. During those moments when I tried to think. Mostly my thinking involved those tapering hands and the next few hours. Oh, that hollow of her throat!

Maybe this was her pattern for a new love. Let everyone know. But maybe it was her over-reaction to having an affair with another woman. Flaunt it in giant letters. Beverly Crusher was going to make love with me. Lust. Both.

I had a hunch she had kept her love affair with my sister a deep dark secret for a long, long time.

Now she was making sure that didn't happen again. I wondered if I'd ever know what caused the break-up between her and Tasha?

We were circling each other in a type of dance, taking small kisses from each other. Me looking forward to when those damned boots were off her so her lips would meet and match mine. We came to a cabin, Beverly's arms on my shoulders, a sweet innocent smile on her lovely face. Oh, the bone structure on that woman!

As the door slid open she leaned against me and whispered in my ear. "My son is a solid sleeper, and you probably couldn't waken him with anything less than a Klingon assault, complete with swords beating on his door. Still, do you think you could make mad passionate incredibly satisfying love with me without making much noise?" She licked my lips again.

"I've been told I myself can be incredibly noisy. Sometimes.

"Perhaps it might be better if we went to your guest quarters? We could continue as we were all the way there." She began giggling again. "Maybe you could figure out how to get my bra off without taking my jacket or jumper shirt off."

"Beverly?"

"hhmmm?"

"This IS my cabin."

I saw this incredible woman pout at me, her green eyes teasing. Maybe she HAD had just a touch too much "It's Green!". I kept feeling her breasts against mine, my belly against hers.

"Do you like to be called Ishara or what?"

I told her. "Well, Ishara, it doesn't matter in one respect. You're not going to get your mouth on this lovely EXQUISITE damned hot body of mine until you figure out a way to get my bra off without taking my jacket off."

Okay, so it was just Beverly in her "I'm In Control Here" mode. I didn't mind her being bossy. Some of the time. It's just that ... now seemed a bad time to have me solve Chinese puzzles.

Oh hell. I always did like the reserved unassuming ones when they acquired a pair of cojones.

I was eventually able to call up a pair of scissors from the replicator. Of course the Doctor had most of my clothes off by the time I managed to decipher the damned machine. She had everything off me, excepting my bra. Cantankerous stubborn machine. We cut both our bra's off.

Her eyes shut with pain as I fitted my thigh against her groin, as I began working my sex against that long leg of hers. I was longer in the body and shorter in the leg, but it worked. I put my fingers in her thick mass of hairs, searching for her hard little pearl and finding it. We began to rock ourselves on the other, my hand between my thigh and her sex. I could not breathe, my belly was so hot and so tight, like a mechanism was wound too tight in it.

Then we kissed. Then Beverly went into a frenzy on my hand and thigh. She made points of pain in my hips and ass as she desperately pulled me tighter and tighter with her hands.

"Beverly ..."

She opened her eyes, such a mask of wrinkles of pain marring her face, her body jerking against my loving busy fingers.

" ... Wait for me. Hold on, hold together, I'm almost there, oh baby, hold off, I'll be there with you ... A minute, oh, hold on, just for me, baby, just for me ..."

Beverly risked one hand, letting it let go of my butt, inserting it between my groin and her long hard soft beautiful leg. Her knuckles rubbed my bead and I ...

"Now!" I whispered into her eyes.

"Now, oh now, my darling, yes, yes, yes, it's so good, so very good..." We didn't kiss, we just stared into each other's eyes.

I felt as if I'd entered a gigantic room. My every breath was a clash of metal in the stillness, my soul was an electric current going forth into forever, her knuckles were so vvveeeerrryy hard against my clit, and I couldn't quite rub myself on her hand fast enough. Until she balled her hand in a fist and I went crazy with how GGOOOODD it was...!

We both woke up, still standing, holding desperately to each other, dizzy, gasping for breath. My chest felt tight and hot, my nipples hurt they were so stiff, and I don't think either one of us had touched them, there, the other's breasts, as we came.

I looked down, seeing Beverly's red nipples. Perfect brown-hot-red cones, her nipples sticking out like additions by a master builder.

I dipped to take each, any, nipple in my mouth and found ...

Oh, they were so HARD! I chewed gently on the breast in my mouth, the nipples and cone of her breast was like a stiff pad glued to the more giving flesh of her soft breasts. The other breast was just as hard, harder, and I lost track of time.

We remained braced against the frame of the doorway. I was bent and lifting each perfect breast in turn, knowing I might never again find a woman or a time when her breasts were blessed with nipples so full and hard and unyielding.

Beverly was busy on her own groin now. Working herself desperately, a madwoman trying to rub her sex, her clit, away. I heard the most unearthly high keening from Beverly as I chewed harder, bit down into the barely giving cones of her nipples.

I switched nipples again and again. Mauling her breasts, rubbing them, biting them hard in turn. Then with her keening high pitched by now, Beverly bent and gave one nipple to herself. I watched as she changed tone and felt her hips convulse in a frenzy against my thigh. When I saw her nipple flatten beneath her teeth, I bit down hard on the one in my own mouth.

Beverly threw us to the carpeted deck, gasps of a sort coming through her nose as we both continued biting her nipples, her soooo red, soooo large, soooo stiff and hurting nipples. I could almost feel her pain as we both worried her with our teeth. Then she had to break.

Beverly was lying prone over my body. I could feel my own stiff nipples poking into her larger breasts. Both of us panting, sweating, still excited.

Beverly was rubbing her groin on my hip, staring vacantly in my eyes.

"Ishara ..." in a squeaky voice, then squirming her hand between us.

I could feel her fingers frantic on herself. I rolled her onto her side (oh my, that bed looked soft and inviting right now!) and reached for her groin with my own hand.

Her body hair was so thick and wonderful, I was going to enjoy tasting it, loving it, running my fingers through it.

We faced each other on our sides, staring into the other's eyes. She brought her hand to my groin, as my fingers probed at her opening. I wet my fingers again and again, her eyes burrowing into mine as she did the same with her fingers. Then she put her fingers in my mouth, and I put mine in hers, until we each opened the other easily. Our fingers glided in without resistance.

She was the first to cock a leg, then to raise it into the air. I followed suit because it felt so good to tighten my groin by stretching my legs open. We stared at each other as we built our rhythms, the speed of our fingers seeking the g-spot fire-points of the other deep within the other's vagina. She found mine and I found hers. We groaned, she leaned to kiss me, I leaned to nurse the soft neck I so needed to kiss.

We were kissing, hardly able to breathe when Beverly crashed into her come. Mine followed. I had to trap her fingers, her hand in me. I worked my come out for long minutes. Half blind, grunting like a pig, working myself on her beautiful fingers in a come that must have stretched for many long minutes.

Beverly was waiting for me with her lips when I could finally stop, finally ceasing rocking motions, impaling myself on her surgeon's fingers so strong in me.

I collapsed against her, feeling my still-stiff nipples poking her own breasts. I breathed her, a lingering scent of apple-blossoms still in our faces and hair. She was the first one to begin caressing again.

"Beverly, darling," I began. "It's been years since I had this much good fun, and a year since I've done it on a floor. But could we go to bed now?" I looked at her blearily. "If you prefer the floor, that's fine, we can manage, right now I could make love to you on the deck of the bridge and smile at Captain Picard besides. Or out in the corridors. But could we get some blankets under us?"

When we literally staggered the rest of the way to my bed, the next problem developed. Beverly put me down, no doubt who was the top at this moment. Okay, that's exciting. Boss me, Doctor Crusher. Be my Crocodile. Tell me what to do and when you'll let me do it. I remembered I might have a problem, though.

"Beverly, darling..." She looked up at me instead of continuing to tongue my belly button. "I think I'd better mention something...."

She cupped my groin, running her fingers in my pubic hair as she leaned back on her elbow, obviously liking caressing me there. "Four days ago I, it was early, listen, I hadn't been expecting it. It's not something I planned. Beverly? I might still spot for you?"

She stared at me for a half-minute.

"Ishara..." What was she going to say?

"Open those godamned lovely legs of yours and stop interrupting me when I'm engaged in a very important task."

I thought that was a very definite yes. When she shoved a pillow under my too-big rear end, I felt more confident. But, ah, it was when her tongue began working it's way inside me through spasming ring-muscles that I felt reasonably sure she didn't mind.

Damn, she had such a long pointy tongue!

It was good, she kept moving from area to area of my groin, doing so many different things. Teasing, sucking, nibbling. Biting gently the insides of my thighs, telling me to raise my legs high so she could lick me in my rear.

I hadn't been expecting her to do that on a first date, and had not been entirely sure she'd ever do it. It was a pleasant surprise, but I was beginning to wonder if I'd bit off more woman than I could handle.

It was a long slope I climbed with Beverly, lovely Beverly. My come grew on me, my groin took fire in slow increments, I could hardly think for wondering where her fingers or mouth might concentrate their attentions on next. Finally she put three fingers in me in a frenzy, then sucked hard on my pearl. Oohhh GOD! It was good. I barely hurt because Beverly had worked me up into it so carefully.

We kissed and hugged, fondled and breathed deeply. I was sweaty, but so was she. If I'd spotted during any of those mini-cramps I had in my come, it hadn't bothered the good Doctor. When she rolled over, pulling me on top of her, I suspected I had indeed acquired more lover than I could ever have imagined having this night.

"My turn, lover. My turn ... please? I want that gorgeous mouth of yours on me, all over me ..."

"No problem. Give me a second to get my breath..."

"Did you get lost or what? What are you doing down there?"

"Realizing how wonderful it is to wake up and enjoy my lover's body in the morning. Sex is optional, but this is the way I'd like to wake up every morning for the rest of my life.

"Tasting and kissing the woman I love, especially right here and right now."

"Ishara, I don't know if, well, if ..."

I'd just used the love word. Immediately I knew I'd passed from wanting Beverly and sexing Beverly to 'love'. I loved her. But she wasn't sure she loved me back. Well, since when is love fair?

"Love is never an equal thing, is it sweetheart? One always loves the other more than she's loved back. Or vice versa. It's the way of things. There's no way in the cosmos we could figure out whether or not you love me to X degree, or I love you to Z degree. Not in the few days we have left.

"I'm still leaving at station 71. I HAVE to go to Earth. I HAVE to find out if the Fleet is for me or if I'm good enough for the fleet.

"It's the way things are." I licked her more vigorously now, enjoying the stronger scent of Beverly that I was picking up with my tongue.

"Therefore, please. Beverly, sweetheart, let's accept our few days and nights and let me leave while I am in love with you and you are in love with me, and together we're the greatest lovers in the Galaxy, the loveliest of women, and the hottest goddamned fucking lesbians in this corner of the universe." I gave her more lickings, sucking her bead hard away from her body.

"Speaking of which, babe, darlin', whatcha doin' tonight? And the next hour and a quarter?"

"Oooh," she breathed. "Can you make it last an hour and a quarter?"

"More, I think. How do you call up some lubricant on that damned cranky replicating machine?" I was thinking of those hands of Beverly's again. Moving, dancing, so graceful, so strong.

Beverly rolled onto her side and pointed to the main cabin where our clothes were scattered all over the floor and furniture. "Inside breast pockets of my blue coat. One tube and one spray. And what do you have in mind?

"Something I think you'll REALLY like." I had her coat in my hands, pulling out both the creme and spray before it hit me.

Beverly noticed me standing in the doorway. Quite still, leaning against the frame. Where we'd started our little two-person orgy. Smiling evilly. Holding Beverly's Doctor's coat with one hand.

Bev looked at me quizzically for a moment, then she shook her head, hiding her face with her hand. "Ohh, shit," she weakly said.

"Do you always walk about the ENTERPRISE with sex lubricants in the pockets of your coat? If I hadn't been waiting for you in front of your cabin last night, what would you have done?"

"Found you and let you chase me until I caught you." Bev had just made a joke.

"How long? How long have you wanted me, if you don't mind this poor little frustrated dyke asking?"

"Ever since I saw you. Years ago. Last week.

"Walking about in those masculine damned fuckme boots you wear. You know, you come across as one beautiful soft and bossy femme. Strong and pliant, Croc and doll, and who knew which part would be there one hour to the next? How could I help but be fascinated by you?"

Beverly looked so woebegone I couldn't fault her teasing. All that reserve, that proper lady air to her, the reserved aloof professional.

Ah well, the harder the chase, the richer tasting the prize.

Back to the business at hand.

I hate it when I make puns.

Beverly looked so flushed and hot in the face as I began squeezing creme on my hand. Then her tongue stuck out as her eyes became half-lidded. By the time I was carefully rubbing it on my hand, she was rubbing herself and giving out that unearthly keening of hers. I leered down at her and told her to get on her elbows and knees. I slapped that great ass of hers a few times, then I knelt behind her. Kissing her rear, inserting the first finger in her. That keening again. Surely she couldn't be coming already, could she? Could she?

As a matter of fact ...

She remembered, later, to ask for a wake-up from the computer, and it was a fortunate thing she did.

Neither one of us could do anything but moan when the alarm sounded. No sleep to speak of. Amongst other problems.

At least neither one of us had a trace of hangover. We'd burned it all out of our systems.

We both went to the Sickbay together. Hand in hand and to hell with anyone else. Her pointy nose was so damned cute.

Her hands were IN me, but it wasn't any fun. "We have to sew your body together again and remove the encysted material at one and the same time. Cut out and sew back at the very same instant," she explained. "The body will be unhappy at the intrusion, the work done, and being forced to realign itself. Think of it as a bad bruise. It will hurt for a few hours even with the knitter hypo in place in your system. Possibly as much as days."

Ogawa spread a clear creme on my site, making little encouraging noises at me. She couldn't stop giggling as she kneaded a dab into the site of the knife cut in my right buttcheek. I was too tired to respond even if she had started kissing my backside. It was nice being fussed over, though.

"You are sure you wish to proceed further at this time? You could come back this afternoon and we could begin on the six sites on your right arm? Very well. Stay as you are. I shall begin on that exceptional site on your left shoulder."

Ogawa traced it. She was fascinated by my body. She couldn't understand how it could be I was still alive. Such a sweet young Madchen. Double damned if she didn't finally bend over and kiss the old wound in my back.

"Dear," she began. "I hope you'll forgive me asking, it must be very personal to you and I know I shouldn't ask. But what was this wound from?"

Selar piped in as well. "I've been a doctor for forty T-years and I also wonder what produced such a traumatic wound. Satisfy my curiosity. Please."

"I got a sword through my shoulder."

Silence. Then Selar spoke in a level voice. "Absolutely fascinating. A sword. From the front? That one in your front chest? Extraordinary. This is similar to treating an old Klingon. Yet you survived. This is improbable. Do you mind if I take a few more DNA samples from you?" I dozed, waiting for her to return.

When I woke up I realized I'd gone to sleep. From the pain in my left shoulder it was obvious Selar had worked on my scar there whilst I was near comatose. Good for her.

What was more surprising was seeing Beverly stretched out on the BioBed next to mine. Selar came in through the opaque privacy screen to gaze down at her fellow Doctor. Bev was on her stomach, and she was drooling a little. A soft shiny BioBed blanket was over her, and her bare shoeless foot stuck out the other end. Selar turned to me. She brushed the hair out of my eyes, and if she hadn't been Vulcan I think she'd have been smiling.

"You are leaving when we arrive at Station 71, are you not?" Not really a question. Selar whispered, but I heard her clearly. "Doctor Crusher is important to me, Miss Yar. To all of us. We all would be unhappy if she were to be hurt."

I had to smile back. "I love her."

Selar looked back to Beverly, then at me again.

"Sufficient." Selar walked to the edge of the privacy screen, not turning her head.

"I've recommended the Doctor be given an emergency medical absence from duty. Recuperation from overwork and stress. For the next three days." She turned back to look at me.

"Please see to it she gets some sleep. Please? She needs her sleep. I will also give you a dozen vitamin shots, enough for the both of you. Each of you should take one shot each morning and each night."

I was thinking I must have acquired quite a reputation aboard this ship by now if it was thought necessary for us to be given vitamin shots. I had to smile inside to think Beverly must be acquiring the same reputation. Fair enough. Beverly was more woman than I'd ever bargained for.

"I will see you here tomorrow and the day after. I wish to get the one in your side and the two in your lower left chest, at the least. After that you should be able to flaunt your body at the beach." She left.

What the hell was it about the edge of a large body of water? I'll ask Beverly tonight.

At the same time I was gearing myself for the year's long task ahead of me. Schooling, then StarFleet. If I ever wanted to see Doctor Beverly Howard Crusher again, I was going to have to succeed in joining StarFleet.

Beverly was never going to leave StarFleet. It was her life. We might share a love, but without StarFleet Beverly would die. I hoped that thought would focus me for the task ahead.

Battles and fire-fights were easy. Being shot and cutting someone's throat was harder. Being a good lover was a joy. Coming back to Beverly might take my entire life.

Fair enough. I kissed her back as she bent over me.

Apple blossoms?

She handed me a not-so-small bottle and I knew it had to cost Beverly too much. She crouched beside me, sitting on her heels, adoring me. Fair enough. I adored her.

She opened the bottle, and I knew she'd already confirmed she'd gotten the scent right. Apple blossoms. She applied some to each side of my neck, then we kissed. I rubbed some on her wrists and it seemed that was a good reason to kiss again.

She had a bag of things. A surprise! Oh, I adored surprises. Happy ones. Beverly pulled me erect and I followed her into the bedroom. She began laying out clothes and other oddities. One of the items on the bed was a simple clinging dildo, and I smiled at Bev. Wondering which one of us was going to wear it first.

More kissing. Woman had a fantastic soft mouth. I took the opportunity to kiss the hollow of her throat again. Pretty woman.

"Ishara, darling, I've a special treat for us. And no, I'm not going to tell you about it. You'll have to find out the hard way."

Being busy, laying out pants and undergarments, half-boots and make-up, my eyes following her with bemused interest now. "Now this is money. Keep it in the pocket, and the green ones are five-gulder notes, an old currency, made out of paper. These are West German Marks ... I'll explain some other time. Just keep hold of them, will you? You're a doll. You're such a sweet dyke to trust me so. Have I said I love you?"

She continued. "Now this is a wrist watch ... ah. Yes. This hand ... Oh, you know about them already? Turkana? Very good. Now at exactly 15:20 hours Zulu I want you to enter holodeck One. Oh, and wear the mustache."

I wore a cloth cap with a bill, and my hair was hidden. We entered the way and it was another world. Small two and three story houses, no vehicles in sight, round stones underfoot as the road surface. Night was coming on, and a chill came with a strong scent of brine and old garbage.

Each house had at least two showcases in their front. Large windows of something transparent, decorated with tiny colored lights. In most of the windows women could be seen. Sitting in chairs, now rising and shedding their robes as the eight of us came down the way.

A pair of twins were to my right. As well as a blond, and a near-child if looks were correct. All were women, and - "we" - were all men. This was a merchant's square, street, and the items for sale were women.

I tore back to the corner building to read two signs there.

The one said "Bibliotique" and the other "Reeperbahn". Didn't mean a thing to me.

My "fellow men" were making nervous comments, gazing in awe at the willing females on display in the show-windows. I looked across the street at Number 44a. I was not surprised, not now. As I walked to the sparkling window, I felt my long dildo move in my rough men's pants. One hand made sure my mustache was still on.

Three of my "friends" joined me there and we watched the tall redhead inside flaunt her body. She also flaunted clothes whose only possible reason for existence was to emphasize areas of the female body. To make her ... desirable. As if she much needed the assistance. I stopped breathing, watching her. What WERE some of those things, clothes, on her?

She cupped herself when the man on my left asked if she was a natural redhead, tugging her red hair to state silently her pubic hair was red also. A plumper man to my right pointed out she had to be in her forties if she was a day. So? I asked myself. I hurried through the door, eager to "buy" the redhead.

Inside, a dark muscular man asked for fifty gulder to rent a room for the night. His eyes bugged when I shoved the entire wad of money at him. I couldn't remember which ones were gulder or whatever. My whore had noticed the exchange and leaned against my shoulder.

She quickly fondled the stiffness hidden in my pants, licking her lips. "This one wants the whole night, don't you lover?" I wholeheartedly agreed.

A large brunette with long hair and a brown leather dress patted me on my ass as she went past us into the show-window. "If the young airman wants a three-some, don't forget about me, love, now will you? He looks like he wants some serious love, dont'cha mate?"

Beverly let her hands quickly fondle the dildo I was wearing. "Is that right, love? Do you want some serious love? Well, I have to tell you, my young man. You've come to the right whore to get it."

END

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