A month, a whole stupid month had passed and here she was again sitting with Don. She wanted it to be over, but she was just so damn frustrated. She sat in silence contemplating her coffee.

"Another nightmare?" He asked, beginning their session.

"Nightmare? Who said anything about nightmares?" She looked up abruptly.

He had developed an uncanny ability in recent weeks to know where she needed to go with their sessions. Today was no exception.

He simply raised his eyebrows in patronizing disbelief.

"Hm! Fine so I had a nightmare."

"Why?"

"Why? What do you mean 'why'?"

"Why? Why did you have another nightmare?"

This time she didn't deny them. "I don't know, I just did."

"Why?"

"I don't know!" she threw her hands up in exasperation.

He was infuriatingly calm, "You're still coming to counseling sessions."

"Yes I know. I've been here." She responded sarcastically.

"So why are you having the nightmares? Shouldn't they be going away?"

"I don't know!"

"Yes you do."

"Yes I do? What the hell does that mean?"

"You are in control of your dreams just as you are in control of these sessions."

"I DON'T KNOW!" She screamed leaning at him threateningly as if the force of her voice could make him stop this line of questioning.

He tilted his head to one side.

"Oh Don, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to lose my temper. I'm just as frustrated as you are."

"Am I frustrated?" He asked in his impossibly even tone.

"Don't start that with me."

"Let me ask you a different question then. Why haven't you eaten any meat since your experience?"

This time she was truly taken aback. "What?"

"Why haven't you eaten any-"

"I heard what you said, how did you know?" She was angry. He had invaded her privacy. She had never mentioned her eating habits with him. She hadn't really given it much thought. Well, not *much* thought.

"I didn't until now."

"Then why did you ask?" her eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Are you following me?"

His answer was even, unapologetic. "I am a patron of many of the same establishments you frequent. We have common acquaintances. One of them recommended a favorite dish of yours. It was Vegetarian."

"Mahru." She spat the name as if naming a traitor.

"Yes."

"Hm." She responded, temporarily satisfied. "I don't know."

"Alright then, why are you still coming to these sessions?"

"I need help."

"With what? You excel academically. You are physically healed. What do you need assistance with?"

She threw up her hands now, shouting "I don't know!"

"Perhaps you do and you do not wish to speak of it. I see a connection. Vegetarian food, Baba Yaga, Nightmares. I think you see it too."

"You know you keep telling me I know what's going on, but I don't. That's why I keep coming here. You're the expert, you're supposed to have the answers."

"Who had the answers in the story of Baba Yaga?"

She blinked hard searching her memory angrily, "The doll."

"The doll?'

"Okay the little girl with the doll. The doll was what her mother gave her. her inner voice, her intuition, her experiences, her gut feelings whatever you call it."

"Yes, very good. So what does your doll tell you?"

She narrowed her eyes angrily and responded in terse short syllables, "Nothing! I don't have a doll. I have you. I come to you for my answers."

"Why?" He sat very still, his eyes watching her intently.

She raised her voice again, clenching her fists. "Why? Because you're the goddamned expert! You're the shrink! This isn't a fairy tale, this is real life. There's no black and white here, only endless shades of gray."

"Why isn't this black and white? What are the 'shades of gray'?"

"Because I don't have a stupid doll, I'm not in some godforsaken castle and I'm sure as hell not some helpless little girl about to be eaten by a fat old witch. This is different."

"What is different?" He remained absolutely calm his eyes watching the anger build.

"Jesus H. Christ, aren't you listening? I'm not some innocent child. I'm an adult. A grown woman, a goddamned doctor. I didn't wander into a spooky forest, I knew the risks when I joined Starfleet. I trained for them! I trained to heal and I trained to kill."

The key, he recognized it and latched on, "Did you kill or defend your self?"

She jumped up feeling the need to run away or hit something, she shouted at him in disbelief. "Do you call what I did defending yourself? I split a man open from stem to stern, I sliced through another man's face. My god, I'm trained to heal not brutalize and destroy. I'm a doctor - goddamn it all, not an animal!"

He watched her for a long time. There was only silence.

Silence and the sound of her angry breath, hissing in and out of her chest. Her heart pounded in her throat.

Then the sound changed, her face changed. The angry hissing became a soft strangled gasp for breath. The world swam in watery pools before her eyes.

Tears began to well up and pop soundlessly to the floor.

She gasped again, "I'm not an animal." She felt weak and moved numbly to the couch falling back into its comforting embrace.

The gasping changed to a gentle sob and the tears streamed in a steady stream down her face. The colors of the room seemed to reel and swim into images of that horrific day. The drab metal colors of cheap paint on antique metal galley walls. The paintings on Don's wall seemed to conjure the wild array of pirates in their assorted outlandish costumes.

The memory played and replayed in her mind, each time she felt the smooth steel in her hand, the firm yielding pressure of the sharp blade on flesh. She could hear the sound of metal hitting bone, slicing leather and hair and cloth and not stopping. It was sickening and satisfying like the sound of meat in your mouth.

She was sobbing now, unable to staunch the flow of the horrible emotions that poured out of her.

"I'm not an animal." She kept whispering over and over until she fell into an exhausted sleep.

Don reached for the blanket that sat on the end of the couch for just this purpose. Then he moved to his desk and wrote a short note to Dr. Birdseye indicating that Christine would not be needing his services for very much longer.

Like it or not, she had found what she was hiding from.

Now it was time to heal, time to cope.

She had all the tools she needed. She was well equipped for the journey.

Now came the easy part.

Now it was time to rebuild.