Shortly after his meeting with Counselor Jinean, Yajat, who was now back in his quarters, set up his mini-telescope, sat down on a chair, put the mini-telescope on a glass table and did some stargazing.

As he watched the stars, he pulled out the first notebook that the Counselor saw early in the day and a fountain pen, its black and gold features exuding elegance and class, before noting down what he could see. It was a particularly long session, 3 hours to be exact, as he wanted to forget as much of the day’s events as possible. He had managed to see, with his keen eyes and his mini-telescope’s high refractive index, the typical stuff you’d see during a stargazing session (the planets in the Solar System, the Kuiper Belt, asteroids and moons) but also an exotic object: a binary star system.

“α Persei. Haven’t spotted you in a stargazing session in 3 years.”, Yajat said. He noted this down, the fountain pen’s blue ink gently drying onto the old notebook as his hand went across the page. Once done, he noted the time and ended the stargazing session, packing everything up for the night.

Once done, he prepared himself for bed before settling in. As he did, his thoughts inevitably drifted back to the counseling session he had earlier in the day. He began analysing every word that the Counselor said, given his calculating nature. As he went over it, a sentence that the Counselor said started ringing in his head:

“I will recommend your removal from Starfleet Academy unless you are willing to work on whatever it is that causes your desire to be numb and emotionless.”

Yajat’s eyes froze and his brain went into overdrive, calculating possibilities.

Would… they actually do that? Just because I am a near-sociopath?

As he kept tossing and turning around in bed, nightmares started appearing: him getting removed from Starfleet Academy, his family disowning him completely, more bullying and torture by more ruthless gangs, Eric and his ‘power teens’ back out for revenge and so much more. Yajat kept moving around in bed in an erratic manner, screaming and yelling every couple of nightmares, his breathing very ragged and his quantum cybernetic heart now delivering irregular nano-clicking from the chips and irregular quantum pulses, sweat pouring down his pyjamas by the metaphorical bucketload, face turning into all different shades of colours. Yajat started to regulate his breathing, taking deep breaths in and out to keep his heart, face and respiratory system in check. Coupling that with water from a glass nearby to combat the profuse sweating, it calmed him down and he’d go back to bed, only for the cycle to start again. And each new set of nightmares was worse than the previous set.

As this cycle continues, a spare bed is seen above his quarters. Although he hated it, could the solution to ending this for Yajat, as well as understanding him outright, be a roommate – someone who shares some characteristics but also has different traits that Yajat admires?…