by Laura Jacquez Valentine

Disclaimer: Paramount owns The Star Trek Universe. I own this story (which contains m/m sex), and I certainly do not intend to infringe on Paramount's copyright. Furthermore, ifyou are disturbed by m/m sex, or if you are not of legal age to read such things, please leave this unread.

Chekov caught me unawares. I had failed to notice that he was attracted to me -- I, who planned every touch so well. He was solving a problem I had set him in warp vectors through a time continuum (there are some very strange mathematics involved, and he needed a challenge. A year later, we published a paper on the topic which became the standard text on the subject), and he was chewing on his fingernail while doing so.

I reached out and took his hand, and I... forgot to let go. His body, his face -- they called up things in me that are rarely felt. I use my body and my mental powers more casually than some Vulcans, but not out of the common way. What is uncommon is that I am so detached from those I bed. That I keep my emotional involvement lighter than is normal. That I am afraid to truly touch and be touched.

(I know why this is. I know who I love, and why, and I have never yet felt him against me, felt him shudder and cry out in the night, felt his mouth on my sex or run my tongue over his flesh. I keep myself detached because if I should find myself loving another, I could not bear the loss. It is not logical, but it is true.)

I could feel my erection hot against my thigh as Ensign Chekov moved closer, and I smelled fresh wintergreen -- his soap, I think. I was still holding his hand, and I could not bring myself to let go. I dropped my shields, sensed desire and trust welling out of him. I thought -- oh Pavel, I doubted for a second that you wanted this, forgive me -- I thought that I should push him away. He was so young, a child really. But I remembered how he had confessed his love for Sulu to me, how he had looked at me with a man's eyes, not a boy's, and I gave in to the heat within me, that burned in my stomach and my loins.

He kissed me, cool human mouth against mine. His hand tangled in my hair, his lips parted, and I found myself pressing him to me, my hand in the small of his back. Except for Captain Pike, I had always taken my lovers with an eye to the little-bonding. Pike I loved, my first love, light of my life until he left me. The one who first set me on fire. Jim I love, though he may never know. Pavel -- ah, Pavel. Young and strong and still unscarred, and we did not love each other. And we never will. But I knew that I could not make the little-bonding that night. My own desire was too strong. The flame he ignited flooded me, filled my blood like the pon farr. There was a faint haze of green across my vision when we broke the kiss. "I shall lose consciousness if he kisses me again," I thought, a whisper in the back of my mind.

I heard my voice speak through the gathering dark. "My quarters, Ensign?"

"Yes, Spock."

There was something masterful in that voice -- something that chilled me and warmed me at once. We walked side by side, and I stilled my hands' shaking.

We walked, stiffly formal, to my quarters. The door slid open before us, like a red human mouth, and the gentle friction of my clothes against me was almost too much. We stepped inside and I activated the privacy lock with a quick flick of my hand. I was afraid my voice would shake. I noticed that my fingers were flushed, that my pulse was vibrating in my wrist, almost too fast to see.

Pavel closed his hand on my wrist, his grip sure and strong. The flame inside me leapt. "Spock."

"Yes?" So my voice did not shake, after all.

"You...like men?"

"I am sexually attracted to men, yes."

He widened his eyes, a challenge. "I thought you were married."

"Divorced. I am sexually attracted to women as well. Most Vulcans are what humans call 'bisexual.'"

He frowned, then smiled. I leaned forward and kissed him again, inhaling wintergreen, feeling the scent of him flood me. I had the the sense that I had lost control of the situation, and I wanted to regain it.

It was too late. He took it back from me, moving his body against mine, pressing his hand against my erection, sliding it in between my uniform and my skin. As he touched me, human-cool, I thought of the snows of Russia. As his scent filled my lungs, I remembered the sharp sweet cold crunch of wintergreen between my teeth when I was ten, and I slid down along him, pressed my mouth to his loins, breathing hot against the fabric.

He knotted his fingers in my hair, forcing me closer. I hooked my fingers in his waistband and tugged the pants down over his hips, down to his knees, his ankles. He permitted me -- permitted, yes -- and then tilted my head back, his strong fingers still tangled in my hair.

I let myself be seduced. I let myself be forced. Humans are so rarely the aggressors, so rarely do they pressure me, demand of me, ask of me. Part of that is who I am, part of that is what I am, and when someone overcomes that --

"Now, Spock."

I flicked my tongue rapidly over his erection, held him deep in my mouth, moved back and forth, felt him react to my inhuman heat. I locked my arms around his waist and supported him, drawing him into me, feeling the quicksilver shudders in him as he approached orgasm.

I opened my mind, felt what he felt -- burning, lust, pain, pleasure, power, respect -- spilling into me even as he came, as he spilled into me another way.

Pavel's voice was husky afterwards, but he was in control again. How remarkable. He told me to strip -- first him, then myself. I complied in silence.

I stood there as he inspected me, running inquisitive fingers over my body. He bit the back of my neck, and I cried out. His mouth was human, cool and aphrodisiac. (A perversion of mine, some might say, my deep need for humans.)

He kept biting, leaving a trail down my back. I felt the skin part more than once, faintly sensed his shock at the taste of it. He hadn't expected it to taste so similar to human blood. My own words drifted through my mind: "My ancestors spawned in different seas than yours..." but potassium chloride does not taste so very different...

His hands found the cleft of my buttocks, caressed them. I remembered that I could use my voice. "Pavel." He jumped a little, the subharmonics pulling him out of his control, his desire for domination -- but not for long enough. This ran deep in him. I opened my mind, let him flow into me, and realized -- how startling -- that I was the only person he wanted this with. That somehow he knew that I might forbid him or stop him, but I would neither hurt him nor think the less of him.

And so I let him. I spoke again, submissive, helpless. He felt it in my voice, rejoiced in it. I felt the power flow through him, felt him grow hard again. He meant to hurt me, but yet...he did not mean to.

Conflict shuddered through him and I soothed it with a thought: ...Next time, you will be mine, Pavel-kam...

I knew he would not be gentle. I knew part of this was frustration with Sulu. But through it -- my Pavel! -- he knew I was Vulcan, that I was strong enough, that I held him in high regard, that for now, we were meant to be.

He entered me quickly. There was no finesse to it and yet it was what we both wanted. It was like being stabbed and coming at the same time. I absorbed the pain and doubled the pleasure back on him, channeling it between us. I lit the nerve-fires carefully, as I did not want to burn out his desire for me. Not now. Not yet.

Oh, Pavel-kam--

"Spock!"

He shuddered and dug his fingers into my shoulders. I was still bleeding from the bites on my back, and blood mixed with sweat smeared us both. He pulled back slightly and exhaled, his breath cool on my back, cool as wintergreen and the pain and pleasure of him as sharp and sweet.

I fell asleep and dreamed of Russia, of wintergreen, and of Pavel under my hands.