---

He settled into the couch in Downs’s office, facing the doctor’s desk as he walked back from the door to his desk chair. This was his fifth session since they’d gotten back from space nine days ago, and while he didn’t mind the extra time since it got him away from the others during house arrest, he wasn’t going to change his mind. The team didn’t deserve the punishments Mick had forced on them, and if the others were too afraid of losing their spot at the Academy by standing up to him, then he would do it. Zee had caved quickly to avoid conflict. Even Allison was starting to waver. He knew Felix and Barbe said they’d be fine with the streets, and he had absoutely no idea what it was like to live there. That wasn’t where he’d be headed though if Mick kicked him out. He really didn’t want to leave, and he didn’t think Barbe was right that was where this was headed, but if it was, so be it. Someone had to stand up to the arbitrary nature of the punishment.

He took several deep breaths. Just thinking about it was enraging and he felt caught. The leadership training had started not long before the adventures and space, but it had become hard to focus between the need to protect his . . . team and the friends on it and some very pointed comments from Barbe about his . . .

“Do you have an answer for me Lukas,” the Scottish burr of Downs accent finally burrowed through his musings.

Flushing, Lukas tried to catch up to what he had missed, “I’m sorry, Doctor, I was, distracted.”

“I understand. It has been a trying few weeks to adapt too. I will repeat myself but do try to focus on our current topic.” Downs paused, looking at his notes, “I asked if you had experienced a recurrence of the nightmares about the abuction.”

“No, sir, not in the last week or so.”

“Very good, sometimes the light hypnosis we tried during your last session can dredge up memories, some old, some recent, and we should explore any that had presented itself in your dreams.” He paused again, but Lukas just nodded in understanding. “Then, let’s delve into some of the, shall we say, tenseness you share with certain teammates.”

Lukas shoulders slumped for just a moment, before he caught himself, and said, “I thought we had already discussed Felix at length, just because I don’t like him doesn’t mean I was going to let him die on some alien planet.”

Downs wrote something in his journal, before looking at him with his piercing blue eyes, “We have discussed Felix quite a bit, and while there is certainly some additional layers to explore, I thought we would chat about Allison.”

“I . . .” he could feel his face flush, and it annoyed him, making the calm he’d achieved earlier dissipate, “what exactly do you mean, Doc? I like Allison. A lot.”

Lukas gazed at the doctor looking at him, and squirmed slightly. Dammit, he didn’t want to talk about this, not in the . . . he sighed.

“It’s just . . . I don’t know that its tenseness. I just don’t know, I guess, I just, I mean . . .” he looked at the wall behind Down’s head, which seemed to help a bit, “I just think, sometimes anyway, that she’s giving me mixed signals.” Phew, there, he said it.

“Mixed signals.” A scratch of the pen on paper. “What exactly do you mean?”

“I just . . . I’m not used to having to figure out if someone is interested, I guess, I mean, I am, but . . . shit. Crap, sorry Doctor Downs.” He paused, “What I mean is, at home, lots of . . . back home everybody wanted something from me and . . . what I mean is that here, most of that doesn’t apply, because nobody here really knows who I am, or I guess I should say, thinks that being with me gets them some sort of status or whatever.”

“Nobody knows who you are . . . hmm.” Some notes. “Have you told them? Specifically, have you told Allison?”

“I . . . no, not really, I mean a little, but hardly anybody has shared much about their family. Felix I guess, about his step dad, but he kind of just throws it in your face and then leaves before anybody can talk about it.”

“That’s not what I asked Lukas. I asked if you had told people who you are . . . not about your family.”

Lukas felt a bead of sweat run down his back, under the T-shirt he had worn to the appointment. He felt frozen, like a deer caught in the headlights of a car back home.

“I didn’t mean about who you are attracted to Lukas,” and he slumped slightly in relief as Downs continued, “our identities are about much more than those whom to which we are attracted in a physical sense.” He paused again, writing some notes, before looking up, “Am I right about what you were assuming my question regarded?”

“Yes, I mean I know you know, since we’ve talked about Jeremiah and Alaine, I just . . . I don’t know.”

Some more writing in the never ending notebook. “Well, since you brought it up with your assumption, let’s start there. Have you told any one on the team about your bi-sexuality?”

Lukas leaned forward, propping his elbows on his knees and putting his head into hands, before uttering a muffled “No.”

“Why not?” He waited for a slow count to thirty, “Lukas, do you want to change the topic?”

“No,” and the big teen sat up again, “Yes. . . No, I guess not.”

“We can certainly move in a different direction if you want to . . . “

A frustrated sigh, “What good would that do?”

The Scottish doctor smiled, “Therapy is a process Lukas, we can’t solve everything in one session, as I know you are aware.”

“I know, but we can start that process today, Doctor,” his voice steadying some on the formality of the title.

“Good. Have you told anyone about your bi-sexuality?”

“Have I told anyone? You, Mick knows obviously. My sister. Her fiance. Her sister. Obviously my Dad knows now. Jeremiah, Alaine.”

“Good, good. Now, have you told anyone on the team?”

He sighed, “I started to . . kind of.”

“Who did you kind of start to tell?”

“Allison.” A deep breath, “The day . . . a few weeks ago, the day that Barbe and Allison were late to class. I mean, you could hear them on the elevator, and of course Barbe made a production of it after they got to class. Allison appeared . . . extremely embarrassed. After class we discussed a few things and well, we were supposed to meet later that night to talk more.” He paused in thought, looking at the floor between his knews for a few moments before continuing more softly, “I had told her I understood . . . she thanked me for being a good friend. But that night she seemed to have decided against discussing it further, like she’d made a decision so we never talked about it again.”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t want to push her into a discussion she didn’t want to have.”

“Did you want to talk to her about yourself?”

“I thought it might have been a good way to tell her, so, at the time, yea.”

“Instead, though, you have buried that part of you away from your team, away from someone you are potentially romantically interested in?”

A slow nod.

“Why?”

A whisper, “In my experience, it . . .” a pause, as he searched for the right word, “disturbs a lot of people, especially if its a . . . man. I don’t want to blow it with her before anything really starts.”

“So you would rather hide that part of yourself?”

Miserably, he just looked at the doctor.

Kindly, Downs asked, “Do you think that might qualify as tension?”

A nod, a clearing of the throat. “Yes.”

“Very good Lukas. Now, how about . . . “