Coy Sessions - The Line Crossed

Posted on Fri Feb 20th, 2026 @ 5:46pm by Commander Rosa Coy

1,052 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Character Development
Location: USS Sunfire

The room held a comfortable warmth, but Rosa occupied it like a pilot anticipating turbulence, shoulders drawn inward, arms folded across her ribs as though bracing for a pressure wave that had not yet struck. Remal observed without intrusion, his attention precise and unhurried, the kind of awareness that neither pursued nor retreated. “You’re sitting like someone is trying to pressure you,” he said gently, naming what already existed between them.

Rosa’s jaw tightened with practiced control. “I’m tired.” The words carried authority, but not persuasion, and she knew he heard the difference.

Remal acknowledged the statement with a quiet, thoughtful hum, neither acceptance nor contradiction, only recognition that deflection had a structure and she was still inside it. Rosa unfolded one arm with visible reluctance, as if the motion required negotiation with herself, while the other remained anchored against her side, a shield not yet ready for decommission.

A subtle movement passed through her awareness, a faint internal shift that felt less like intrusion than a presence adjusting its posture. You are not required to endure alone. Coy did not press, did not argue, offered only a measured nearness, a consciousness careful not to claim more space than she allowed.

Rosa steadied her breathing and set her jaw as though aligning a vessel against drift.

Remal leaned forward by a degree so small it communicated intent without imposition. “You’re holding something heavy,” he said, voice even and grounded.

Her gaze settled on a fixed point in the carpet, choosing stillness over evasion. “I made a mistake.”

He did not react to the word. He created room for it. “While you were on Trill?”

A single nod acknowledged the location without surrendering the memory. Structured silence held, like the pause between sensor readings. Rosa selected her next words with the caution of a pilot approaching an unfamiliar corridor of debris.

“I crossed a line I believed was structural,” she said. “And I cannot account for the moment I crossed it.” Her thumb pressed into her palm until sensation sharpened into focus, anchoring her to the present.

Coy’s presence shifted again, not in opposition but in response, a quiet undercurrent of recognition. You were not the only influence present.

Rosa drew a breath that resisted becoming speech. “I don’t want to discuss the details,” she continued, voice controlled, instructional even. “Not the event. Not the individual. Only the part of me that permitted it.”

Remal inclined his head slightly, receiving the boundary without negotiation. “So the distress is not about the action,” he said. “It is about authorship.”

Her breath faltered despite her effort to maintain composure.

“The fear,” he continued with careful precision, “is that you were not at the helm.” Her eyes lifted before she intended them to. “That another will was operating within the same vessel.”

The truth registered not as surprise but as recognition finally named. Rosa allowed her head to rest against the back of the chair, posture releasing by increments. “Yes.”

Coy remained present without movement, attentive without pressure.

Remal folded his hands, voice steady as a constant frequency. “This fear extends beyond a single event. It anticipates the next threshold.” He allowed the implication to form naturally between them before giving it shape. “The Zhian’tara.”

The word altered the atmosphere without raising volume. Rosa’s breath thinned as if passing through narrower space.

“That ritual,” Remal continued, “is both literal and symbolic invitation. You permit each host to inhabit your body again. You grant access even where trust has not yet formed.”

“Handzon,” Rosa said quietly, the name landing with density rather than force.

“You are not only wary of him,” Remal said. “You are wary of scale, of the weight of accumulated presence.”

Her composure held, but tension moved through it like current through a conductor. “I have spent my life maintaining structural integrity,” she said, voice carrying the clarity of instruction. “That ritual requires permeability.”

“Participation,” Remal corrected gently.

She pressed her palm against her abdomen, feeling the steady hum beneath her awareness. “What if participation results in displacement? What if their patterns override my own?”

Coy answered not with argument but with quiet assurance that carried the weight of continuity. I do not seek dominion. I seek coexistence.

Rosa’s breath wavered, but she did not withdraw from the sensation.

“You have not yet established governance,” Remal observed, his tone neither cautionary nor corrective. “You have not defined operational boundaries.”

“That absence is precisely the instability,” she replied, voice low but firm. “I do not know where those boundaries reside.”

“The Zhian’tara,” Remal said, “asks you to enter that uncertainty deliberately. It is not a surrender of personal identity. It is exposure to influence, in this particular case, past lives.”

Her shoulders trembled once, a controlled release rather than a collapse.

“You are not afraid of the ritual itself,” he continued after a measured pause. “You are afraid that within it, you may lose singular authorship.”

Her throat tightened around the admission she no longer needed to voice.

Coy’s presence softened further, restrained yet unmistakably sincere. I do not wish for your absence. I wish to share existence, not replace it.

Rosa allowed the words to settle without resistance, absorbing rather than deflecting.

“Integration,” Remal said, “is negotiated unity. And negotiation requires language, structure, and consent. Those skills can be learned.” The statement carried no urgency, only direction.

Rosa exhaled slowly, the breath unsteady but intentional, and within that exhale Coy’s presence aligned with hers, neither dominant nor diminished, simply concurrent.

When she opened her eyes again, her gaze held focus rather than strain. “I want to learn how to do that,” she said, voice quiet but grounded, the tone of a pilot accepting a new flight condition rather than resisting it.

Remal inclined his head with calm approval that did not presume completion. “Then you have already begun the process.”

The session concluded with a new orientation, like a vessel establishing a stable heading after prolonged drift. Rosa did not leave with certainty, but with structure, and for the first time since Trill, the presence within her felt less like occupation and more like accompaniment, a shared awareness moving forward under deliberate command.

TBC

 

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