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Two black eyes stared at him across the fire. They were his eyes, but jostling their placid depths was an enticing mischief that Tuvok did not recognize in himself. Tuvok saw his young and troubling face gazing intently at him. His mirror image seemed unconcerned with the master’s reproachful rustling. The image raised his hand and placed it in the fire.

To his amazement Tuvok saw that the hand, his hand, became part of the fire without being burned by it. Intrigued, Tuvok raised his own hand, and reached for the hand of the mirror. He could feel the immediate increase in temperature as his fingers grazed the flame’s edge. Logic dictated that to touch the fire was to be consumed. But the promise of the eyes said that there was something beyond logic, something that he had yearned for but never touched. Here was a place where his emotions could live alongside his reason… in peace.

He wanted the fire. He knew the truth of its promise. He had sought it in quiet contemplation for more than a hundred years of life. And he had never before been so close to it.

Trusting an instinct that was so new as to be indefinable and yet so certain as to be irresistible, Tuvok reached his hand into the darting flames and grasped the hand that waited for him there.

Kol-ut-shan, he said… and almost knew.

The connection was severed in a moment of slicing agony. The fire and the eyes vanished into the oblivion where Tuvok now flailed like a drowning man caught in a tempest. The darkness choked him, assaulting his senses from all sides even as he struggled to return to the warmth and truth of the fire.

Tuvok opened his eyes. The light was blinding, suffocating. Blinking rapidly, he tried to force his senses to adjust. He thought of Naviim and his promise that the transition he was undergoing would be difficult. He longed for the passage, resigning himself to endure whatever was required in the meantime.

The face of the Doctor moved into his field of vision. He was speaking. His lips were moving, but for a few seconds it was impossible for him to process the Doctor’s words.

“… feeling better?” he heard.

“Where…” Tuvok croaked through a parched throat.

“You are perfectly safe, Lieutenant,” the Doctor replied. “You are in sickbay, and I believe I have found a way to reverse the process that was initiated by the parasitic life-form that has invaded your body.”

Tuvok did not know where he found the strength to move, but as if his existence depended upon it, he focused every ounce of will on a single object and grasped the Doctor by the throat.

“You… will… not… continue,” Tuvok demanded, adding the force of his hand to his words as the Doctor’s eyes widened.

Suddenly the Doctor was gone. Tuvok twisted and turned, instinctively searching for the enemy. Seconds later something cold was placed on his neck, followed by the whisper of a hypospray.

The will to fight seeped slowly from his body, replaced by a numb heaviness. He groaned under the effort of keeping his eyelids open as the Doctor said soothingly, “Please don’t be alarmed, Tuvok. I assure you, you’re going to be all right.”

“No,” Tuvok muttered.

“Tuvok, if I don’t proceed, you will die,” the Doctor continued.

With the last remnant of strength and will at his disposal, Tuvok forced his eyes to open and focus on the Doctor, who was once again standing above him.

“It is my wish to die,” he said, and before the Doctor could respond he said, “Computer, deactivate Emergency Medical Hologram, security override authorization Tuvok, pi, six, one, gamma.”

He remained conscious long enough to see the Doctor’s shocked face dematerialize. A few moments later, he found himself once again seated before the fire.

All eyes around the table turned to Harry.

“A body?” Chakotay was the first to ask.

“Yes, Commander,” Harry replied evenly. “The consciousness Seven is describing could theoretically be contained within a holomatrix,” he said. “When we found the Vidiian doctor, Danara Pel, the Doctor was able to transfer her