Three's Not A Crowd, Is It?

Posted on Wed Apr 1st, 2026 @ 12:26pm by Lieutenant Cassian Massy & Commander Anastasia Aventnova & Lieutenant Commander Selene Varrin
Edited on on Wed May 20th, 2026 @ 10:10am

4,207 words; about a 21 minute read

Mission: The Hand That Rocks The Babe
Location: Anastasia's Quarters

Ana leaned back in the chair as she closed her eyes for a few minutes. It wasn't to sleep, that was for sure, in fact she wasn't sure what had come over her when she'd asked Cassian if he wanted to come over to her quarters later that evening for... Something. Perhaps it would just be a movie night in, with replicated snacks and drinks; Perhaps she'd snuggle up to him in the next level of affection from when she'd kissed him those days before. From there, who knew where the night would lead? She didn't want to pressure him for anything, that was for sure. Of course, she'd need to change out of what she was wearing now, the shorts and tank top were informal enough as it was, but it could drive him off if she was too forward.

The corridor hummed with the quiet precision of a starship at peace.

Lieutenant Commander Selene Varrin moved with measured steps along Deck 7, the soft glow of the LCARS panels reflecting in the polished black of her boots. Outside the viewport at the corridor’s end, a distant nebula spilled violet light across the hull, beautiful, distant, and indifferent. Selene barely noticed it.

Her attention was fixed inward.

Years ago, she had memorized these corridors in a different way, rushed laughter, late-night debates, stolen glances that lingered just a fraction too long. Back then, she had been a cadet, brilliant and reckless in equal measure. And Anastasia…

Selene exhaled slowly.

Commander Anastasia Aventnova had always been gravity in human form, impossible to ignore, impossible to escape once caught in her orbit.

They had burned fast at the Academy. Too fast. Ambition, pride, and the relentless pressure of expectation had torn them apart before either of them had the wisdom to hold on. Words said. Words unsaid. A door closed that Selene had told herself she would never reopen.

And yet—

Here she was.

Selene slowed as she reached the junction leading to the senior officers’ quarters. Her pulse, so steady through diplomatic crises and combat alerts, betrayed her now with an unfamiliar quickness. She almost laughed at the absurdity of it.

She had faced down hostile fleets with less hesitation.

“Computer,” she said quietly, her voice steadier than she felt, “confirm Commander Aventnova is in her quarters.”

A brief chirp. “Confirmed.”

Of course she is.

Selene resumed walking.

Each step felt heavier than the last, not with doubt, but with the weight of everything that had passed between them. Years of distance. Of wondering. Of imagining how things might have been different if either of them had chosen… differently.

The door to Anastasia’s quarters came into view.

Selene stopped just short of it.

For a moment, the ship seemed to fall away, the hum of the engines, the distant murmur of the crew, the endless stretch of stars beyond the hull. There was only this door. This moment.

This second chance.

Her hand hovered over the chime.

What if nothing had changed?

What if everything had?

Selene Varrin, veteran officer of Starfleet, straightened her uniform with a small, habitual gesture. Whatever waited on the other side, she would meet it as she always had, honestly, directly, without retreat.

But softer, this time.

Her fingers pressed the chime.

A clear tone echoed from within.

Selene drew a breath, her voice quiet but certain as the past and present finally converged.

“Anastasia… it’s me.”

The voice came as a surprise as Anastasia as she stood at the sound of the chime and she froze in mid-motion. Despite it being too early for Cassian to arrive, she'd assumed it was him, but this was completely unexpected. She brushed herself down unconsciously as memories flowed through her mind of the time they'd had at the Academy.

It wasn't that she'd been a prude back then, she hadn't been, but the flame had burned brightly between her and Selene Varrin and she'd spent nearly every minute that they weren't at some class or other event alongside the Betazoid. It hadn't been love, so she thought, but it could have been. It was more than just something physical, though and they had been fun times. The two had shared hobbies and many of their classes had been together, so studying together had been a natural confluence that had turned into... More.

Now her past had once again caught up to her and she took a shaky breath as shetook another two steps towards the door, "Come in." Her voice was even and measured, as it always was.

The door slid open with a soft hiss.

Selene stepped inside, and for a moment, she simply looked at her.

“Anastasia…”

The name came easier than she expected, softer, too. Not rank. Not distance. Just her.

A small breath left her, almost a quiet laugh under it, as if something in her had finally unclenched after far too long.

“You haven’t changed,” she said, though the faint warmth in her eyes suggested she didn’t entirely mean it. “Or maybe you have. I just… still recognize you.” Remembering the times Selene would return home after classes and Ana would already be changed and relaxing.

She took a slow step further into the room, not quite closing the distance between them yet, leaving that space hanging, charged with memory.

“I wasn’t sure what I’d say when I got here,” Selene admitted, her voice lower now, more personal. “I had a dozen well-composed, very Starfleet-appropriate versions of this conversation planned.”

A faint smile curved at her lips.

“I don’t seem to remember any of them.”

Her gaze softened, drifting briefly, taking in the room, the life Anastasia had built, before returning to her again, steadier this time.

“I thought about you,” she said, more quietly now. “More than I ever let myself admit back then… and more than I probably should have, after.”

No defensiveness. No retreat. Just truth.

Another step, subtle but intentional.

“I didn’t come here out of curiosity,” Selene added. “And not just for nostalgia either.”

A pause, gentler now, but far more vulnerable.

“I came because… whatever we had, whatever we almost had, I.....miss it.”

Her voice softened just a fraction more.

“And I wanted to see if it might still be here… with you.”

Selene held her gaze, open and unguarded now, the distance between them no longer quite so safe, but no longer something she seemed willing to keep.

"That was a long time ago." Anastasia demurred, shooting to buy time as her mind thought furiously, one hand reaching across her body to grasp the other arm, now very conscious of the fact that she looked much as she had when relaxing back at the Academy, "A lot of things have changed." She finally tore her eyes away from where they had locked onto Selene's own, "I never expected to see you again, not after those first few years and now... There's someone I've started seeing."

Selene didn’t move at first.

She let the words settle between them, the distance Anastasia was trying to place, careful and deliberate. For a moment, it almost worked.

Almost.

“I figured,” Selene said quietly, her voice gentler now, stripped of the lightness from before. Not hurt, not quite, but aware. “We’re not cadets anymore. Life tends to… complicate things.”

Her gaze didn’t leave Anastasia, even as the other woman looked away.

And then, softer. “You always did prefer to think things through before letting yourself feel them.”

There was no accusation in it, just familiarity. Recognition.

Selene took a slow step closer, closing just a little more of the space Anastasia had tried to create, but not enough to crowd her.

“I’m not here to disrupt your life,” she continued, more quietly now. “Or make anything… difficult for you.”

A small pause. “But I’m also not going to pretend that seeing you again doesn’t matter.”

Her eyes softened, something deeper surfacing now, something that had been carefully held back until this moment.

“You can tell me things have changed,” Selene said, her voice lowering just slightly, “and I’ll believe you. I can even accept it.”

A beat. “But don’t tell me that what we had didn’t mean anything.”

Not sharper, just more real. Selene’s expression eased after that, the intensity giving way to something more vulnerable, more open. “If there’s someone in your life,” she added, quieter now, “then I’ll respect that. Truly.”

Another small step, not closer this time, but not retreating either. Holding her ground.

“I just… needed to see you. To know if what I remembered was real.” Her voice softened, almost a whisper now. “Because it never stopped being real to me.”

It was Selene's presence that did something to Ana, it always had. Her eyes had locked on again and they had this way of just drawing Ana in, both then and now. As the other woman advanced on her, Ana's breath quickened in excitement and dread, the consequences of acting which could doom her or make everything even better. "I never said it didn't mean anything." She said quietly, her voice trembling, "It meant everything to me at the time, but we were both too young back then."

She finally took a half-step back, but then back forward again minus a couple inches as her hands fell to her side again, never blinking, never stopping looking into those deep brown eyes, "It's just complicated, Selene, more than I can say." She took another few inches between them, "I... I..."

Selene went very still as Anastasia spoke.

She didn’t interrupt. Didn’t argue. She let every word land exactly as it was meant to—distance, change, someone else.

For a moment, it showed in her eyes , not shock, not quite hurt.

Understanding.

A slow breath left her as she tilted her head slightly, studying Anastasia, not the officer, not the composed exterior, but the woman beneath it. The one she had known. The one she had never quite forgotten. “A lot has changed,” Selene echoed softly.

Then, just as quietly. “Not everything.”

The space between them felt suddenly smaller. Selene stepped forward, not hesitant now, but certain. One hand lifted, slow enough to give Anastasia time to pull away, to refuse, but steady all the same.

Her fingers brushed lightly beneath Anastasia’s chin, guiding it upward with a familiarity that hadn’t faded with time. A touch remembered, not relearned. “Tell me to stop,” Selene murmured, her voice low, close now, close enough that the words barely needed sound.

She didn’t wait long. Just a heartbeat. Just enough to make it a choice.

And then she leaned in. The kiss wasn’t rushed. It wasn’t desperate.

It was certain. Soft at first, testing, almost, but carrying years of unfinished emotion beneath it. Recognition. Memory. Something that had never quite let go, no matter how far apart they’d drifted. Selene’s hand lingered at her jaw, warm, grounding, as if anchoring them both in the present instead of the past. When she finally pulled back, it was only just, barely enough space to breathe.

Her voice, when it came, was quieter than before. Rougher around the edges. “...That,” she said softly, eyes still on Anastasia’s, “hasn’t changed.”

As Selene’s mouth had removed itself, Ana had almost protested, her lips clinging until the distance had finally become too great as her emotions roiled inside of her unchecked. This was an impossible situation. Her feelings for Selene hadn’t diminished in their time apart, although she’d never expected that they would ever be in this proximity again or that Selene would act hostile if they’d ever found one another. There had been that one example at the Academy after all.

But this reaction had never been anticipated, never planned for in any myriad of scenarios she had played out in her head. And then there was Cassian. In the time she’d been aboard, he had become a friend and then some, more than a friend to the point where she was already actively planning a future that had the possibility of him in it past a year down the line, one where they could possibly even be a family with the next generation coming into play. It was an impossible situation she had just been placed in, one that she could not control now that she found herself in it.

“Nor for me.” She breathed out finally, her lungs screaming for breath as her heart raced once more. The damning thing is that it wasn’t even a lie, not that she could ever lie to Selene in the past, much less the present. All Selene would have to do was look with her empathic sight to tell the truth of the words. Then it was as if two worlds were spinning around a mutual axis point as she closed the distance for another kiss.

Cassian walked through the halls of the ship as he made his was to Ana's quarters, it would be a welcome change from a busy shift and he was looking forward to seeing her. This would be the first time he'd gone to her quarters, as before he'd not want her status on board or reputation blemished by a visit from a junior officer and be seen doing it.

When he walked through the doors he was slow in doing so, not wanting to just stroll in like it was home. What he didn't expect, was to see Ana mid kiss with another woman. "Uh..." His mind fogged, Ana...another woman. It was like time slowed down a little as his brain tried to kick into gear and process the scene before him. Cassian let go the breath he was holding, his face a maze of empty thought of the still yet unprocessed moment.

Ana heard the voice and it was as if it broke her out of her stupor just as suddenly as she broke the kiss with Selene. Her eyes opened as she realized who it was and she took a step back to make a move towards Cassian, "Cassian," Her voice had a slight tremor to it, "I can.." She stopped as Selene's hand reached out and grabbed her by the shoulder.

Cassian acted on instinct. Turned on his heel and left, his face unchanged as the doors closed behind him.

"Give it a moment." Selene spoke. She partially enjoyed watching the moment play out on the man's face, almost delighted in it even.

"But, you don't understand..." Ana said quietly as her eyes flashed between the door and back to Selene, a frozen bit of ice in the pit of her stomach, but she didn't fight it no matter how much she wanted to go chasing after him.

"Just give it a moment." Selene spoke.

Cassian paused outside the doors. What did he just witness? What was going on? Who was she? What were they doing? Even though he couldn't make sense of it without more data, he turned on his heel and entered again. "Ok....." He started. "Who..." Pointing to Selene. "What..." Pointing to both Ana and Selene. "When..."

Ana was finally released and both of her hands came out in front of her and her mouth opened before it shut again, "It's complicated, but I can explain." She began to reach out for his hand to reassure him, but they stopped halfway up, "This is Selene Varrin, she's new on board Dreadnought, but..." The Roman inhaled deeply, "She and I were dating for a long time at the Academy, but that was a decade ago, I didn't think I'd see her again and now... She's here."

Cassian listened, looking from Ana to Selene, then back again. The most bewildering fact was that he was unaware that Ana...liked women. While it never came up in conversation, this was hardly what he expected. "But...."

Selene listened to Ana explain. "Hi, perhaps I can...explain." Selene could read the man clearly enough to know that he was unsure what to think or feel. "Ana and I dated in our Academy days like she said, for a while at least. Then we separated into our own paths when graduation came. I found out she was on board not long ago when I got my posting here and I wanted to see her, my intent was to close a chapter of our lives."

Cassian listened to Selene. There was something about her, maybe he could see why Ana dated her, she had that calculating dominance about her, especially since Ana had a good 4 inches over Selene and yet Ana seemed unlike herself right now around her. "I'm going to guess she didn't tell you about me did she?"

"I did, I tried, I-" Ana gave a helpless look towards Selene. She didn't know what it was about the other woman, but she was just completely speechless at this point.

"Soo....what?" Cassian asked. "What about everything we have done, everything we have shared?" Cassian spoke wondering where the relationship he thought he was building with Ana, was now heading.

"That's why this is complicated." Anastasia spoke quickly, this time reaching out for his hand and capturing it, "Because that is all real, IS, Cassian, present-tense." She really had to come up with the right words and her heart was pounding like a racehorse on a track and an unfamiliar feeling welled up inside her: Panic. "I.. I think I'm falling in love with you if I'm not there already, and I didn't realize that I still felt like I do for Selene anymore." She shut her eyes as she started to stammer, something else that was brand new and finally found the words she needed, "Cor et Anima." She managed to get out.

Selene let Ana explain knowing this was a delicate moment. She bode her time, listened, watching. Selene could see that Cassian was new to this kind of thing, most experienced lovers would have stormed out ranting and raging by now. "I'm not here to destroy what you two have, far from it, I think its sweet." Selene walked to stand beside Ana. "I was hoping, if you're willing, to share her." Selene spoke, tracing a finger a long the jawline of Ana. "What do you think....Kitten?"

Ana glanced over at Selene and then back at Cassian again, terror in her heart as she watched him. If he forced her to make a choice between the two of them, it would be bad, because one way or the other she'd be hurting someone, two people because she herself would be one. But she realized something: What she said felt true. Cor et Anima. Heart and Soul. Cassian had her heart, that was for certain and true, Selene had her soul. "Cassian? Cor meum?"

Cassian was trying to process what he'd heard. Share Ana, he was new to relationships already and now he was thrown this curve ball to contend with. "So let me get this straight." Cassian moved away, giving himself a little space to contemplate. He turned to face the two women again. "You're saying you're in love with me, but Selene here is wanting to rekindle what you had with her. You have told me what you want with me, but what do you want with Selene?"

"I'm in love with you, yes, and I'm in love with Selene. I didn't realize it back then, and I know that sounds strange, but now that I see her now, I know that it's no less true." Ana's mouth was probably going to get her in trouble, "Back on Rome, my Rome, it's not unknown for situations like this to happen, but it's not up to just one person. It's about level of completeness, of 'totum ens', and usually it's two people complementing each other, sometimes three, every so often four." She looked up at the ceiling, "Jupiter, why can't I put it into the right words." Her eyes shot to Selene, "You're the counselor, I don't know if I'm making any sense."

"Every relationship has a dynamic, for some it is cultural, for others its traditional, it can be many things to many people. You know Ana as the Commander, strong, confident, always in control. That is one side of her, a side I don't see. For me, as you see, Ana is the opposite. She comes undone around me." Selene traces a finger down the nook of Ana's neck. "She always has." Selene smiled at that realization. "I'm not wanting to steal her from you, I want to share her with you. The three of us. It might not be normal it straight forward to some but as Ana said, its not unknown."

"The journey of one's life is constantly being written. That's one of the tenets of Janus, and Diana's always been the goddess who says to never give up before finishing the hunt of life." Ana had to fall back on her roots, over a hundred years of her family on Roma Nueva, "I don't want to give up either of you, even if I hadn't realized that about Selene until now."

"So, you want to be with Selene and me." Cassian spoke, as if concreating that fact in his mind. "But what about Selene and Me?" He asked. "This can't just be a thing where the focal point is Ana."
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"This would be a relationship of three. We each get something of Ana the other does not or has not, but that doesn't mean I don't want to share in it. If Ana is willing, I'm happy to share, if that means including you in that, so be it. I don't want to force her to choose between us, I want to share us, with us" Selene answered, implying this would be a relationship trio, sharing Ana, but each other too.

"And I would be happy with that, very happy." Ana agreed, "All relationships require a completeness and openness amongst each other. I'm not going to force anything, because that would be unfair to everyone." She had a worried look on her face, "But what if you and Selene can't work anything out?"

"I'm still wrapping my head around what's going on. I didn't know you liked women..." Cassian spoke.

"Everything takes time, I'm prepared for that, if you make Ana happy then its in my best interest to get along with you. We may not have anything between us, but in time perhaps something will." Selene responded.

"And as for liking women, it's sortof a tradition on Rome, homosexual relations are a good practice for relationships without the um... Risk of unfortunate circumstance." Ana gave a sheepish smile, "As for me, I'm one of those who likes things both ways."

Cassian couldn't help but let himself sink into a chair. It seemed he knew so little about Ana now, Selene knew more about her than he did. His mind whirled with the data given to him, trying to process, consider, review and store what he'd been told.

"It's a lot to take in." Anastasia agreed with what she thought was going through his head, "We've had only a few months to know each other while Selene had a few years of me in close proximity at the Academy, back when I was just getting used to the culture change." She took a few steps over and sat on her haunches in front of him, "If I have to choose between the two of you, it would be you." It was from the heart and she knew it could hurt Selene to hear, but she also knew that she'd understand even as it hurt the two of them deeply. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you about her before, I just thought that part of my life was long in the past, that we had all the time in the galaxy for that to come up."

"I uh....think I need a little time to think...process this." Cassian spoke.

Selene could read between the lines on that comment, but knew better than to intervene. If he was as inexperienced as he seemed, he needed to come to terms with this without the two women being involved to influence him.

"Take as much time as you need." Ana nodded and reached out to squeeze his knee before standing and taking several steps away, not wanting to go over to Selene, it would be a bad look in this delicate moment, but her eyes flitted over to her nonetheless.

"Thanks." Cassian stood, smiled if only faintly at the pair, then departed.

"Give him time, its a lot to take in, a major change has been put before him." Selene spoke softly.

Now that Cassian was gone, Ana stepped back over to Selene, wanting to touch her for comfort, but not sure if it were that good an idea at this moment, "I know... And I meant what I said, Amina, I just... I feel better with him, and with you."

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