Finding Her Center"
By: Teilani Dane, Chief Medical Officer, [PC]

Stardate: 58206.28 2355

==Temporary quarters QT==

Teilani couldn't sleep. The human in her would have taken a sleeping aid, but being a doctor was different. She knew that her spiritual centre was disturbed, misaligned. She had to set it right again, or she would never be able to rest in any meaningful sense.

The idea she had, to find a ride to Mars was bold and dangerous and would probably cost her career if she was caught by security but she had to be sure. She had to find out if there was a way to get her family to safety. Sure she could have tried contacting them over subspace but it was not the same. There were so many things she needed to discuss and that was only possible by meeting them. She didn’t like playing cloak and dagger and how many times had she lingered in front of Patia’s door, wanting to make her part of the crazy idea.

The secret meetings with the merchants at Quarks place were not doin' her mind any good and over the past few days she had been thinking too much for her own good. What if she got caught? What should she say in her defence? Would she be considered a spy? She didn’t want to loose her commission on the ship, she had worked much to hard for that. What if….

***Bajoran Temple***

The moment she stepped through the circular doorway into the temple's shadows, she could feel some of the tension leaving her. She had to come to terms with her raging mind and over the years she had found that the Bajoran belief, even for a non-Bajoran herself, somehow helped her.

Candles made a soothing; flickering light and from somewhere came the distant sound of a voice, softly chanting. Then her heart lifted when she saw a familiar, saffron robed figure approaching from his place at the side of a small reflecting pool.

"Leiris,??" Teilani said happy surprised. "What are you doin'here?"

"Doctor Teilani Dane." he said with a smile as he touched her cheek. He drew her back to the edge of the pool, where they sat down together. "You're disturbed,” he said. "I can feel it in you."

Teilani sighed. "Yes, you can understand, better then anyone."

Teilani started to tell him all, the holodeck adventure, the risk she had taken by contacting merchants to take her to Earth and finally to Mars.

He shook his head serenely. "We've all be scarred Lani, by our own experiences, you are not alone."

She poured out her feelings, like she did when they were both in the academy. She felt lost when he decided to go back to Bajor and become a monk, Leiris always had a good listing ear.

"I've sometimes felt like I'm alone. Here on this station, on the Zion. When you left the academy I gave up meditating. I was out of touch with myself for a long time. But I think I had to be, to go on with the struggle, to make me stronger.” She finished talking.

"And now you are back," Leiris concluded simply. "Perhaps the Prophets have sent me to help you."

Teilani dropped her head into her hands. "I see their faces. When I shut my eyes, they won’t let me rest."

"No Lani. You won't let yourself rest. The dead are at peace with themselves. You imagine their suffering, but you're only feeling your own loss. It is time to leave the past to itself. Time is a series of moments. At each point, it is always now. Lani, you must look into yourself to find the centre of your being. What pulls you into the past? What keeps you from finding your centre, here now?" What happened happend, there will come a time when all is right, when all pain is healed.

"Close your eyes Teilani. Leave the past behind. Bid it farewell." The monk softly spoke

Teilani exhaled; she shut her eyes, and in the inner vision saw the faces of her family again. Their smiling faces in a time when all was right.

"Look away from the pain. Find yourself Lani. Find the center of yourself."

Time seemed to suspend itself or to ease al together. Places faded away. There was only herself. The centre that endured through all times, all events. She separated herself. From mere events, from the world, from its pain. Timeless, eternal.