Deanna felt the expectations of her crewmates around the corner of her mind, like a pleading, anxious moan. The Enterprise was in danger, and it was Deanna they had turned to--it was Deanna whom they expected to save them. They were depending on her because the problem was emotion. For the past several days, powerful emotional outbursts had possessed random members of the crew--up to a dozen, by now--in which buried, repressed desire bubbled up the surface and overflowed like a cup of boiling water. One crewmember began passionately kissing a woman he had secretly loved for years. Another woman assaulted an ex-lover and left him severely wounded. It wasn't coincidence; something out there was causing it. And because of Deanna's empathic powers, they were all depending on her to find out exactly what. Was it coincidence, also, that Deanna's personal life was acting up at the same time as these strange incidents? At this exact moment, her lover, Worf, was glaring at her with intense, dark eyes, his features furrowed into a frown even more intense than his normal scowl. He was demanding things of her, accusing her...she tried to put the unresolvable dilemma of the Enterprise out of her mind, so she could focus, just for now, on the quarrel that had strangely errupted between them. "You are quite used to having things your way," Worf growled at her. "When you were Riker's lover, you were always in control. But if we are going to make this work, things need to change." Deanna was really quite struck at the palpable aggression her emphathic powers sensed from him; waves of anger beat against her like drops of rain. She brushed back a strand of long hair, and her dark, glittering eyes--as gleaming and mysterious as a pair of black stars--studied Worf intently. Was Worf acting like himself? Or was this all part of the puzzle, the one that somehow, she had been given the responsibility to solve? "I don't understand what you mean, Worf," she said gently, reaching her hand to brush across the slope of his forehead, the texture of his dark skin. "If there's something you want from me, something that I'm not giving, you have only to ask." At this concession, Worf suddenly seized up and let forth a deep snarl. Deanna moved back startled--she suddenly realized he seemed to be fighting with himself. He snapped at her, his voice low and fiery. "Klingons do not mate the same as humans. We are violent...brutual. We enjoy giving and receiving pain as part of the mating ritual." Deanna averted her eyes, feeling a slow sense of shame begin to creep over her and envelop her. She knew this...but she had never broached the subject. Worf continued, "I have been restraining myself in my relations with you. I knew you would not be able to fulfill the role of a Klingon woman, and I have not asked that of you." She raised her eyes to him. "Then what are you asking me now?" He gave out a gutteral sound that seemed to rattle in his throat. "I am asking...for fairness. I want to mate as Klingon, not a Betazoid. I want...." Deanna perceived his mood change, a move from gray, metallic anger to a bright, multi-colored prism that she understood as sexual arousal. In his mind, images and pictures were flashing before him, and they were being translated into need. Almost without thinking, she grabbed his hand. "What do you want, Worf? I am your friend, and your lover. I will give you want you want. But you have to tell me." He flung her hand away from him. "The last thing I want is your Betazoid empathy. I want something real, direct, not your practiced bedside manner." This was a slap in the face. Her gorgeous dark eyes grew wide and uncomprehending: something was definitely wrong here. She opened her mouth to speak. But then a sharp cry pierced the air, followed by a number of slapping sounds. It was the sound of flesh being struck, and it was quickly followed by a woman's muffled sobbing. Whatever was possessing Worf, he seemed to shake its influence. He barked a gruff "Come on" to Deanna, before he was down the corridor in search of the origin of the sounds. His speed belied his bulk; he was not only strong, but could move amazingly fast. Deanna had to hurry to keep up with him. They rounded a corridor, and stopped short at an astounding sight. A young male ensign, with sandy-brown hair and dark blue eyes, was sitting on the floor with his back to the wall. Across his lap was another ensign--a lovely young woman with tumbling red hair--her starfleet uniform in tatters on the floor, her young backside upturned into the air. It was rosy red; the sound had been that of a spanking. The woman was crying softly. So was the young man. His face wore an anguished expression, and he turned to Worf and Deanna pleadingly. "I...I'm sorry," he managed. "I don't--I don't know what came over me. Arissa and I were going off duty, and we were going to have a drink at 10-Forward, when I had this desire to...to..." He suddenly realized that Arissa was still placed across his lap, for he suddenly looked at her and tried to help her to her feet. Deanna turned to look at Worf. "It's that thing again. And it's getting worse." Worf nodded, his eyes dark, intense pinpoints of black light. He tapped his combadge and snapped, "I need a security team to the fourth level, section 7-G." Addressing the ensigns, he said, "You will be escorted to sickbay. You will both be given a full psychiatric and physical examination by Dr. Crusher." The young man nodded, still shaking. "Y-yes sir." The young woman, clutching the remains of her outfit around her, also managed to nod. Deanna and Worf remained until the security team arrived, then they slowly made their way back to Worf's quarters. Deanna's mind was a furious blur of activity. There was something about this particular incident that seemed to make the pieces fit together...she had picked up on the young man's sexual arousal; clearly, he had, on some level, enjoyed administering the spanking. The young woman had also enjoyed it; she, too, had radiated sexual arousal so powerful that Deanna had to block it in order to maintain her concentration. But she sensed that the woman's arousal was largely negated by surprise and shock at the unexpected punishment. Could the entity be experimenting with various forms of deep-seated emotion, and its effect on those who possessed it? Or was there more to this than simply an experiment? Her reverie was interupted by Worf. She hadn't even realized that they were back inside his quarters. Worf turned to her and grabbed her shoulder. "What we witnessed was a human form of giving pain," he snarled at her. "And you are too frail to even withstand that. You are no mate for a Klingon." "Worf!" she returned. "This is no time for discussing our personal problems. We have to--" "Falling back on duty again," Worf interupted. "That is very important to you, Deanna. Perhaps more so than even me." "Worf, you are being absurd." "And you are being willful and stubborn." It only vaguely occurred to Deanna that she was quite possibly in trouble. She had no doubt now that Worf was partially under the control of the entity--he was saying and doing things that he may only have thought on a subconscious level--and there was no reason to believe he would not act on his feelings, just as the other victims had. At that moment, something seemed to alter inside her. Like a kaleidoscope, her desires shifted from one color to another. Instead of the smoothly professional, calm starfleet counselor, Deanna was now something else. She sensed Worf's intentions, and was possessed by a desire to goad him, to encourage him. "Yes, I am willful and stubborn," she told him playfully. "And you, like all Klingons, are nothing but talk." "What?" he demanded, his face turning from rage to surprise. "You heard me. You Klingons growl a good fight, but you're more like a bunch of nattering old Ferengi. No wonder you were forced to sign a peace treaty with the Federation--you found you couldn't just talk your enemies to death." Deanna thought: THIS ISN'T ME TALKING. IT'S THE ENTITY--I'M UNDER IT'S CONTROL. But that realization was no consolation. She began to say something else, but then she looked at Worf, and sucked in her breath. He was furious. Rage seemed to radiate around his brown head like fumes. With a single fluid motion, his hand shot forward and grasped her arm. At almost the same instant, his other hand reached behind her to undo the catch of her uniform, a light-blue turquoise jumpsuit that he proceeded to peel away from her skin. She soon dangled naked in his grasp: her dark-tipped nipples, which had grown unaccountably stiff, and that dark patch of hair between her legs. She stared at him, unabashed in her nudity; after all, they had been naked together many times. She tried to remain calm, but she felt that presence in her head, drawing on a part of her personality she had never dared to express. "I take back everything I said," Deanna returned. "You know how to take off my clothes; that definitely proves your worth as a warrior." With a cry of frustration and rage, Worf lifted her in the air--and then he sat down on the plush couch and flopped her over his lap. For a moment, Deanna was too shocked to speak--he couldn't possibly be thinking of imitating that barbaric human ritual they had witnessed earlier in the corridor. The sudden flush of humiliation resulting from the position--that of dangling over her lover's lap, totally naked, bottom thrust in the air--allowed her to momentarily regain control of her own tongue. She shrieked, "Worf, put me down this instant! This is no time for foolishness!" "That would not be a good idea," Worf snapped. "You are too frail to withstand a Klingon punishment, so let us see how you handle a human one." With that, he brought his heavy hand down hard upon her backside. CRACK! Worf was, of course, quite strong, and it didn't feel like he had checked the momentum of his blow at all. Deanna felt a moment of shock, as the intense pain spread through her bottom, and then she gave a short cry. "I thought as much," Worf scolded. "Very frail." He spanked her again, the blow landing only slightly to the right of the first. Deanna kicked and bucked, instinctively trying to squirm out of his grasp, but she realized that he was holding her fast; she was absolutely unable to escape. A third painful spank landed hard on the very curve of her buttocks. "OWW!!" she cried, unable to keep quiet. "Worf, I'm sorry! I...I don't know what..." "Silence!" he ordered, and began a series of sharp, blistering spanks, that rained down on her left and her right buttocks alike. SMACK! SMACK! SMAACK!! "Ohhhh! Worf, please, can't we--OWW!!! Talk about this--OH!! Stop this at once!!!" It was unbearable; her bottom couldn't take one more spank, and yet they continued harder and faster with each new impact. She squirmed to the side, trying to avoid the blows, but this only provoked Worf to spank her more vigorously, so that her bottom stung with a fierce, lancing pain. She also began to be aware of her sex. It had grown quite wet, almost hungry--and although the primary thought in her mind was how much she hurt, how much she wanted the awful, painful spanking to be over, she was also aware of how much she wanted Worf inside her--maybe more than she ever had. After he had spanked her several dozen times, her threshold was nearly crossed, and she began to cry. This was, perhaps, the final humiliation---the professional counselor of emotions unable to control even her own. At this, Worf stopped the spanking, his hand raised high in the air. "You seem to have learned your lesson," he observed. "I...I have, Worf. Please let me go...please!" "I will," he said softly. "AFTER another six blows." With that, he delievered six final blistering spanks, each one bringing a fresh burst of tears out of Deanna's eyes, and a new plea for leniency. Finally, at the end, she lay sobbing over his lap, unable even to get to her feet. Her bottom was a deep, dark red and scored by dozens of tiny welts; Worf's hard, heavy hand had had abraded her skin to some degree. Finally, Worf helped her to her feet. She finished crying--as much from the humilation as the pain--and she her hand held behind her, as though the gentle pressure of her own fingers could cool the burning pain in her backside. Then they stared at each other. She suddenly noticed how hard Worf was; his erection bulged out his uniform. She took a cautious step towards him, but suddenly they were entangled together; his hands pinching her breasts, his hard cock almost puncturing his unform as it pushed against her leg, their mouths fusing together hotly. But before Worf could remove his uniform, they heard a familiar electronic chirping. It was Deanna's combadge, still on her uniform, which lay in a clump on the floor. Captain Picard's familiar voice, tinged with an edge of urgency, followed: "Counselor, we need you on the bridge immediately." Deanna and Worf allowed themselves a moment to share a look--a promise, of sorts--before she darted to retrieve her uniform. "On my way, Captain," she said huskily. Getting on her uniform was bad enough, but walking to the bridge was definitely difficult, considering the spanking she had gotten. Each step produced a new twinge of pain; did Worf have to be so thorough? Not to mention that she had to fight down her own sexual arousal, which seemed to flare through her--and at a moment when she needed to be professional and detached. Entering the bridge was worse. First she wiped the final tears out of her eyes and sniffled, hoping she didn't look as if she had been crying. Then she left the turbolift. All eyes greeted her arrival; it was as though they could all read her expression. *Your counselor Troi was just taken over her lover's knee and spanked, and they would have had sex if duty hadn't called.* But Picard merely looked at her curiously and said, "It seems a friend has dropped in to pay you a visit." Troi didn't understand what he meant, until she looked at the viewscreen--and realized that the Enterprise wasn't alone. A soft, pulsating mass of light floated in space with them. Troi also realized that there was a telepathic presence filling the bridge, that was communicating to every person there. It was saying her name. She opened her thoughts. The entity opened a channel to receive her thouhts and return its own responses. No one else could hear them; they communicated privately. It fumbled to express the concept. <...being happy yet not happy at the same time. I did not think it would work...until you and your mate have shown me that it *can* be done, in a way which is...satisfying.> Troi grew beet-red, to her own total and abject humilation. The entity abruptly dissipated and vanished from view. Picard swiveled around in his chair to stare at Deanna. Riker spoke up, sounding annoyed: "Do you mind telling us what *that* was all about?" All she wanted was to return to Worf, to satiate the desire threatening to soak through the thick fabric of her uniform. But she forced herself to look calm and composed; she answered Riker measuredly: "You can read my report, Commander. As for now, I'm afraid I have...business to attend to." If it were possible to make a smooth, dignified exit into the turbolift with a sore, stinging backside, Deanna managed to do it...and although she and Worf were back in their right minds, she suspected that the scene they had been compelled to enact might have many repeat performances in the future....