Nothing Left to Translate (Explicit Content)
Posted on Tue Jul 28th, 2026 @ 4:59pm by Lieutenant Evelyn Stewart & Lieutenant JG Koaruh Avestro
4,707 words; about a 24 minute read
Mission:
Year Two: The Last Honest Port
Location: USS Moore - Various Locations
Timeline: MD: 007 - 2030hrs
The holodeck had given her two hours.
Two hours with the music loud enough to crowd out everything running alongside it, her body doing the work that nothing else had been able to do reliably — burning the bond pain down from sharp to something she could roll through, leaving her with nothing but the floor and the next movement and the one after that.
She hadn't thought about the fact she was relieved of duty, or about the bag sitting unpacked on her bed. She hadn't thought about the transport at Red Thread Station. She hadn't thought, with any real sustained attention, about the fact that in less than twenty-four hours she would be leaving this ship for Vulcan, of all places — Vulcan, for treatment, like she was something that needed to be sent away and fixed.
The corridor outside the holodeck was quiet, and she moved through it without hurrying, still warm from the exertion, her breathing not quite settled. Her ponytail had been losing ground since somewhere in the second hour, the elastic slipping each time she'd turned, and she gathered the loose strands back as she walked, twisting the elastic free from her wrist.
A week since the Gallant.
A week since she'd taken the Moore broad and slow into the gap between two ships and felt exactly what she was supposed to feel doing it. Not relief. Not fear. Just the absolute certainty of where she was and what she was for.
And now she was going back to pack.
Her teeth found her lower lip for just a moment.
Not the treatment. She wasn't fool enough to pretend nothing needed addressing. But the timing of it. The Moore was in the middle of something and her place was at that helm. Not in transit. Not on Vulcan. Not being managed.
The turbolift doors opened before she reached them and she stepped inside. "Deck four."
The turbolift slowed. Two decks too soon.
Her arms were raised, hands still working the elastic through her hair, when the doors opened.
Koaruh stood on the other side of the doors with a PADD in one hand.
The last week showed around his eyes more than anywhere else. The Gallant had left no shortage of work behind it. Crew who had slept badly. Crew who had slept too well and felt guilty for it. People still trying to decide whether what the Moore had done made them proud, frightened, or both.
Then the doors opened, and there was Evelyn.
He felt the reaction before her jaw had finished setting. Anger, tight and immediate, with too much else pressed beneath it to separate cleanly.
Koaruh left all of it alone.
“Evening, Evie.”
Pleasant. Easy. Not falsely cheerful.
He stepped into the turbolift as the doors closed behind him. His gaze touched briefly on the loose strands of hair, the warmth still high in her face, the training clothes darkened slightly from exertion.
“Your ponytail appears to have lost.”
There was the faintest curve at one corner of his mouth as he turned towards the control panel.
“Deck four.”
She found him, and her jaw set.
Her eyes went briefly to the ceiling.
She finished the ponytail without comment — smoothing it once, the elastic properly secure this time — and took a half step to the right, putting the width of the turbolift between them. She faced forward. The doors had already closed. He had already called her deck.
There was nothing left to do but stand in it.
“Counselor.”
Flat. Even.
Her hand dropped to the railing at her side and gripped it. Her other hand settled on her hip. She looked at the wall directly ahead of her, weight shifting once onto her left foot, her thumb moving along the side of her index finger in short passes.
The turbolift hummed.
She kept her eyes on the wall.
The grip on the railing tightened. Her jaw worked very slightly, just enough to be visible, like something was pressing against the back of her teeth looking for a way out.
Koaruh’s eyebrows lifted a fraction.
“Counsellor,” he repeated, mildly. “That’s bleak.”
He stayed where he was, leaving the space she’d put between them untouched. There was no missing what was coming off her. Anger, sharp and close to the surface, with enough strain beneath it to make the hand on the rail look like part of the architecture.
He didn’t look at it for long.
“For the record, Evie, I wasn’t planning to ambush you in a turbolift.”
His tone stayed easy, almost conversational.
“We’ve got three decks. I can survive the silence.”
Koaruh faced forward again, PADD resting loosely at his side, and let the lift hum around them.
“I didn’t say you were.”
Cool. Flat. Eyes back on the wall.
The turbolift hummed.
She wasn’t going to do this. He’d said his bit, she’d said nothing, and that was how this was going to go — she was going to stand here, give him nothing, let the doors open and walk away. She was tired. It wasn’t worth it.
Her thumb stopped moving along her finger.
“Computer, halt turbolift.”
The hum died.
She turned on him.
“And for the record—” the phrase landed sharp and deliberate, “—I didn’t ask for this. The trip. You on it.” Her eyes were on him hard now. “And just because we happen to be booked into one cabin with two bunks, don’t read into it.”
A moment. Something almost pleasant in her expression, the way a blade looks before it moves.
“You were very clear about lines. About knowing exactly where yours are.” The corner of her mouth didn’t quite smile. “I’d hate for the arrangement to confuse you.”
She turned back to face the doors.
“Computer, resume turbolift.”
Koaruh let the lift move for a second before answering.
“Evie.”
Just her name. Warm, familiar, without any of the distance she was trying to put between them.
“If it wasn’t me, it would be Greco. Or some Security officer shaped like a bulkhead, carrying six forms and a phaser.” The corner of his mouth lifted. “You got the better deal.”
He leaned one shoulder against the wall, easy in the space she had left between them.
“And two bunks aren’t going to confuse me.” His eyes found her profile. “I know what it looks like when you want me in yours.”
There was no smugness in it. Just that quiet, shameless warmth he had always used with her.
“I know you didn’t ask for this. I know you don’t want Vulcan, and you definitely don’t want anyone watching while you go through it.” His voice softened. “But I could have objected to going. I didn’t.”
A small pause.
“Not because I think you need a minder. Because if you’re walking into the last place in the quadrant you want to be, I’d rather be beside you than back here wondering how badly you’re pretending to be fine.”
He let that sit for only a moment before the smile returned.
“So take whichever bunk you like. Claim the whole cabin if it makes you feel powerful.” His gaze lingered on her. “Call me ‘Counsellor’ all the way to Vulcan.”
A beat.
“I’ll wait until you remember you like saying my name.”
“You felt it—” she started quietly, “You felt it for two months!” Full volume, no build, just there. She turned to him. Eyes locked on his and not moving.
“You said that. You sat there and you felt all of it and you still made me sit alone with it—”
Her hand came up hard between them.
“I didn’t want the counselor! I didn’t ask for a speech about what I previously said— I just needed you to be there! That is it! That is all I needed from you and you just stood there and you—”
She stepped in, everything forward and furious, eyes never leaving his—
Stopped herself.
Stepped back.
“Goddammit, Koaruh—”
And then stepped right back in, chin up, jaw tight, still shaking slightly, still looking right at him.
“I told you I needed you and you corrected me.”
Still at full volume. Still ringing off the walls of the small space.
Her hands dropped to her sides. Nowhere else for them to go.
The doors opened on deck four.
One breath. Still looking at him. Cold now. Controlled.
“You were never just my partner. Not once. Not even then.”
She was gone before he could say anything.
Koaruh stood in the open lift for half a second, her words still ringing around the space.
Then he stepped out after her.
“Evie.”
There was no lightness in it now. No careful professional distance. Just him.
He didn’t try to catch her or close the space between them.
“You’re right.”
The words came plainly.
“You told me you needed me, and I started explaining myself. I was so worried about getting the lines wrong that I got the important part wrong instead.”
His grip tightened once around the PADD at his side.
“You needed me beside you. Not analysing it. Not correcting you. Just there.” A breath. “And I left you alone with it.”
He swallowed, gaze fixed on her retreating back.
“I’m sorry.”
No defence followed it. No qualification.
“I wasn’t trying to manage you, Evie. But I can see how it felt that way, and I’m not going to argue you out of it.”
His voice softened.
“You’re right about something else too. I was never just your partner.”
A small pause.
“I’m the man who loves you. I should have remembered that first.”
Evelyn stopped and turned toward him as what he said registered.
“You love me?”
Barely above a breath. Almost to herself. Like she was just trying to make it real.
It landed.
She stood with it. The corridor was quiet. Her eyes stayed on his and something moved through her face that wasn’t readable as any one thing — not surprise, not relief, not fear, though it carried traces of all three. Her jaw worked very slightly. Her hands, still at her sides from the turbolift, didn’t move.
A long moment passed.
Something crossed her face — a decision, quick and certain, the moment before a jump — and she crossed the distance between them fast and deliberate, hands going straight to the back of his neck, and kissed him — hard, not gentle, not careful, pulling him into it like she’d made a decision and wasn’t second-guessing it — and then she stopped herself, pulled back just enough.
Still close. Her upper lip sucked in, held there, the effort of trying to stop herself written plainly across her face. Her hands stayed at the back of his neck, not letting go, not pulling him back in — just holding on. She was shaking slightly, the kind of trembling that had nothing to do with cold, everything pressing up against the inside of her looking for somewhere to go.
Her eyes found his and stayed. Searching. Needing him to understand without her having to find bigger words for it.
“You really hurt me.” Barely a whisper. Her lips brushed his as she said it, her jaw against his as she turned her face slightly, impossibly close. “And I don’t want to hurt anymore.”
“I’ve had enough troubles in my life.”
She kissed him again — passionate, certain, all of it — and stopped herself a second time, pulling back with what it visibly cost her, chest heaving slightly, still trembling, still right there.
“Not here.” She whispered against his lips, taking his hand with a fierce certainty.
For half a second, Koaruh forgot how to breathe.
Then his hands found her waist, steadying her without trying to slow her down. He kissed her back with everything she gave him, but let her set the pace, let her pull away when she needed to.
“I do,” he said, close enough that the words barely had anywhere to go. “I love you, Evie.”
When she told him he had hurt her, something in his face tightened.
“I know.” His forehead rested briefly against hers. “I’m sorry. I should’ve been there.”
No defence. Nothing dressed up to make it easier on him.
His thumb moved once against her side as she kissed him again, and he followed her into it without hesitation. When she pulled back, he stayed close, breathing with her, not trying to take the moment away from her.
Then her hand closed around his.
“Not here.”
The corner of his mouth lifted.
“Probably sensible,” he murmured. “Although there is a very conveniently placed supply closet about ten metres that way.”
A beat, the warmth returning fully to his eyes.
“Lead on.”
At the supply closet door she turned to him and kissed him again — and then kept going, walking backwards through it, pulling him with her, not looking where she was going, the dark and the tight space barely registering.
Her heel caught the base of something — she stumbled hard, momentum carrying her back into a shelving rack that rattled sharply in the small space — she grabbed his jacket to catch herself and didn’t stop kissing him.
Her hands found the front of his uniform jacket and worked at it with something close to urgency, pulling it off his shoulders and letting it fall somewhere in the dark without looking, without caring.
“…Ashayam?…” The word came out the way she said his name — like it was his name, soft and Vulcan and completely unguarded, falling out of her without thought between one kiss and the next. “Read my mind.”
She didn’t wait. Couldn’t.
Her hands dropped from his shoulders to the hem of her own tank and she yanked it over her head in one sharp movement, already reaching for him again before it had finished falling.
The significance of it stopped him for half a heartbeat.
Not the heat. Not the urgency. The invitation.
Koaruh caught her at the waist before the shelving could do any more damage, one hand braced beside her as the rack shuddered itself quiet.
Then he opened the door she had given him.
What came through was immediate and fierce.
She wanted him. Not vaguely. Not because he happened to be there. Him. His hands, his mouth, the sound of his voice when he stopped being careful. She wanted to feel chosen, wanted, held without being managed. Beneath it ran everything she had been trying to outrun for weeks: the pain, the fear of Vulcan, the anger at being sent away, the awful thought that he might stand beside her and still somehow remain out of reach.
And under all of that, bright enough to hurt, was love.
Koaruh drew in a sharp breath against her mouth.
“Evie…”
It came out rougher than he intended.
His hand moved from her waist to the back of her neck, holding her there as he kissed her again, slower for only a second before the restraint went out of it.
“I hear you,” he murmured against her lips. “All of it.”
He didn’t explain. Didn’t turn it into a question or ask her to name anything she had already shown him.
He just pulled her closer, forehead brushing hers for the smallest moment.
“And I want you too.”
Then he kissed her again, giving her exactly what she had asked for: no distance, no analysis, no careful line drawn between them.
The moment he opened what she’d given him she gasped — small, sharp, involuntary — and then just — exhaled. Long and slow and unsteady, like something that had been pressed against her sternum for months had finally been put down. Her eyes closed. Her grip at the back of his neck loosened, fingers going soft without her deciding to let them.
A small sound escaped her. Not quite a whimper. Something beneath that. Something that had no category except surrender.
Her jaw flickered — something crossing her face for just a moment, the part of her that had been running and managing and controlling everything for as long as she could remember putting up one last resistance — and then it passed. Her hands stilled completely. Her shoulders dropped by degrees.
Her upper lip sucked in. Held.
She was shaking slightly but differently now — not the trembling of everything pressing outward looking for somewhere to go. Something quieter than that. The shaking of something finally being set down.
Her hand found the back of his neck the way his had found hers. Her forehead pressed to his.
She made herself stay there. Made herself be still. Made herself be present with him instead of moving through it and past it the way she moved through everything.
It cost her visibly.
She stayed anyway.
Then she kissed him.
Not urgent. Not driving. Just — certain. Slow and present and completely there in a way the first kisses hadn’t been. Her hands found the hem of his shirt between kisses, working at it steadily, unhurried — but even as she undressed him she was following rather than leading, her hands moving in response to him, to where he put her, to what he did next. Giving him the pace. Letting him have it.
The shirt came off and her hands moved lower and she made a sound against his mouth that said very clearly she had no objection to how this was going.
“Koaruh—“ barely a breath between kisses.
Her hands still moving. Still his to direct.
“Taluhk—”
Another kiss. Her body language saying the same thing the Vulcan was saying — I’m here, I’m not going anywhere, you have me.
“I’m sorry—”
Not sentences. Not declarations. Just fragments surfacing between kisses, the deepest language finding the only exit left while the rest of her — for the first time in longer than she could remember — stopped trying to be in charge of anything at all.
“Please..” the plea softly, but no less raw, escaping her lips before her brain could catch up.
The plea went through him.
Koaruh’s hand tightened at the back of her neck, his other closing around both of hers before they could move any further.
“Look at me.”
His voice had dropped, the warmth still there but sharpened into something firmer.
The connection between them remained open. He could feel the want pouring through it, stripped of every defence she usually put around herself. She wanted him to stop being careful. Wanted the weight of him, the certainty of his hands, the relief of not having to choose what happened next.
There was no mistaking her.
“Good,” he murmured when her eyes found his.
He turned them, putting her back against the bulkhead with enough force to make the shelving tremble beside them. Something shifted overhead with a metallic scrape, but his attention never left her.
One hand held her wrists above her head. The other settled firmly at her waist, drawing her against him.
“You asked me to read you.”
His mouth brushed hers, close enough that each word warmed her lips.
“I did.”
Then he kissed her.
Not gently. Not cautiously.
He kissed her with all the restraint she had spent weeks accusing him of hiding behind finally gone, holding her in place as he took the pace she had offered him. Her breath caught against his mouth, her body pressing instinctively into the hand at her waist.
Koaruh broke the kiss only long enough to look at her.
“No more apologising.”
His fingers tightened fractionally around her wrists.
“And no more trying to carry everything while I’m standing right here.”
His mouth moved along her jaw, then down the side of her neck. He knew the places that made her breathing change. Knew them as her lover, not her counsellor, and there was something almost possessive in the care he took finding each one.
The link between them flared with every touch.
He felt the heat of her wanting him. The relief beneath it. The need to be held firmly enough that she could finally stop holding herself.
Koaruh’s hand slid slowly from her waist along her side, the pace deliberate now, making her wait for every inch of contact.
“That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?”
He didn’t need an answer. He already had it.
His mouth returned to hers, swallowing the small sound that escaped her. He pressed closer, pinning her between his body and the wall, leaving no room for distance or doubt.
When her hands shifted in his grip, he held them more firmly.
“Stay.”
One word. Quiet and absolute.
His free hand moved into her hair, drawing her head back just enough to give him her throat. He kissed the line of it slowly, then bit down lightly before soothing the same place with his mouth.
The shelving rattled again as his hip drove into hers.
Koaruh lifted his head, breathing harder now, his forehead nearly touching hers.
“You told me you needed me.”
His thumb traced her lower lip.
“I’m here.”
He kissed her again, deeper, and released her wrists only to guide her hands where he wanted them. Then his own hands returned to her waist, gripping firmly as he lifted her against him.
The cramped closet filled with heat, uneven breath and the faint metallic complaint of shelving never designed for this particular use.
He carried her weight without effort, holding her exactly where he wanted her while his mouth found hers again.
No analysis. No distance. No careful correction.
Only Koaruh, strong and certain, giving her what she had finally allowed herself to ask for.
“I’ve got you.”
His eyes held hers, the connection between them still wide open.
Then his mouth curved, the smallest flash of that familiar Koaruh returning through the heat.
“And I’m not letting you go.”
When his mouth brushed hers with the words, she held very still — breath shallow, jaw tight, her body already knowing what was coming before her mind caught up.
His mouth had moved along her jaw and she bit her lip — hard — her head tilting back slightly despite herself, giving him what he was looking for before she'd chosen to. The places that changed her breathing he found without difficulty. She couldn't stop the small noise that escaped. Tried to. Failed. His hand slid along her side and she inhaled sharp through her teeth, her fingers flexing in his grip, her body turning into the contact before she'd decided to allow it.
She said nothing when he asked if that was what she wanted. Didn't need to. Her cheek turned into his jaw instead — nuzzling into him, soft and unguarded, the answer given with her body because her mouth had nothing left.
Then his grip on her wrists tightened and she stilled immediately. She'd always sensed it was in him — the certainty, the possessiveness — felt it underneath the warmth and the careful management the way you feel the current beneath still water. The way he held his ground. The way he moved despite his warm smile. The heat of his gaze regardless of his playful tone. She didn't meet his firmness with fear but recognition and ease.
His mouth found her throat after drawing her head back and she hissed — nails digging into the back of his hand — then exhaled slowly as he soothed the same place. Her eyes closed.
When his hip drove into hers she couldn't stop the sound that escaped. Didn't try.
When he had told her no more apologizing, she nodded. Small. Against his cheek.
No more carrying everything alone. Her eyes closed again. Something in her chest loosened at the words. She nodded again — quieter this time, her forehead dropping briefly against his.
His thumb traced her lower lip and her breath caught, lips parting slightly, eyes finding his.
He released her wrists then, guiding her hands where he wanted them. She went without resistance, fingers curling where he put them. Something in her shoulders eased. The last thing she'd been holding finally let go.
He told her he had her. That he wasn't letting her go. She looked at him. His mouth curved — that smallest flash of warmth, the familiar smile breaking through everything else — and something in her chest simply gave.
When he lifted her her legs went around his waist the way they had a hundred times before — immediate, instinctive, like her body already knew him by heart.
Then she felt him. Mind and body.
She inhaled sharp.
The universe went still. Suddenly everything made sense.
She looked at him. The black of his eyes in the dark. Everything open between them, nothing held back on either side. There was nothing but the dark pools that bore into her own brown eyes and in them — everything clicking into place. Not a moment. A truth. The kind that had no before or after, that simply was and had always been waiting for her to be still enough to find it. She didn't need his gifts to know what he felt, his eyes told her everything.
Then she moved with him.
Following his rhythm, her body finding it without thought, without effort. A catch of breath, her grip tightening where he had placed her hands, her legs pulling him closer. The heat between them built steadily, deliberately, his pace setting the terms and her body answering every one of them. When he moved she moved. No distance between them. No management. Just the two of them in the dark, finding the same rhythm, her responses honest and unguarded and entirely his to draw out.
Her hand found the rack beside her, gripping it for added leverage and to help support her weight. Her other moved slowly into his hair, fingers curling into the thickness of it. A sound escaped her against his mouth and she kissed him to quiet it — then let the next one go without trying.
A small sound escaped her first — barely a whimper, soft and unguarded — and then something deeper, fuller, as her body finally settled into it. Into him. Into giving him this completely. Her head tipped back against the bulkhead, face turned upward, throat exposed, lost in the sensation as the last of the resistance left her.
Her hand shifted in his hair gently, drawing his head down toward her chest.
Not in command, but invitation.
Koaruh followed the invitation of her hand without hesitation.
His mouth moved lower, the arm beneath her tightening as he shifted her weight more securely against him. The rack pressed cold against his knuckles and gave a faint metallic tremor, but he barely registered it.
The link between them was still wide open.
Until now, he had been the one listening. Feeling everything she gave him while keeping his own emotions softened at the edges, careful not to crowd her with them.
He stopped.
Betazoid intimacy was never meant to run one way. The invitation mattered, but so did the answer.
Koaruh let her feel him.
All the warmth he usually tucked behind humour. The want he had spent weeks keeping gentle. The fierce pull of her against him. The hurt, the relief, the maddening tenderness of knowing exactly how difficult she could be and wanting her anyway.
Nothing arranged. Nothing made easier for her.
Just him.
His hand tightened in her hair, holding her where she had drawn him, and he lifted his head only far enough for his mouth to brush her skin.
“Then feel me too.”
He didn’t wait for words.
His mouth returned to her, and the link carried everything speech would only have made smaller.
The shelving shifted again in the dark.
Beyond the sealed door, the Moore continued towards Red Thread Station, its engines humming steadily beneath the deck.
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