As you can probably guess, I don't own anything, just play with it.

Spock looked down glumly, though he would deny the emotion it was hard to suppress the resentment and anger, both with Stelev and with himself.

He shouldn't have reacted. Thirty-four times he'd held back but all his father would know about is the time he failed, the time they mentioned his mother. Now he had reacted they would know what hurt. He couldn't keep it from hurting but he could press it town beneath the logic if it was just about him, but his mother, she was like a warmth in the freezing desert night. Despite their higher body temperatures and the boiling sun beating upon the planet Vulcans were cold. The only way to deal with it was to let the logic freeze him, deep, so he couldn't even feel it anymore, but somehow the fiery anger just came back. His father was going to be so disappointed in him.

There was blood on his knuckles, the rich green stark against his skin. He was staring at it when quiet footsteps drew his attention to an approaching girl. He didn't recognise her, they were taught separately. She stood staring at him solemnly in thought, her eyes as green as the blood. It was unusual and striking.

"Deliberately hurting someone who has done nothing to you is illogical." Her words were steady with a note of decision, as if the statement were the conclusion to whatever she had been thinking. He didn't know how to respond so he said nothing, the silence stretching between them. She was the first to look away, he wasn't sure if that meant something but her eyes went to his hands. She tilted her head and he felt uncomfortable, he should have cleaned them somehow. Spock tried to move them to hide them, but she reached out before he could, fingertips grazing across his skin. He tucked his hands into his sleeves.

"It was wrong of me to fight with Stelev." Was that why she was here? Was she connected to him in some way that she had come here to gain an apology? Perhaps she was his betrothed. There was a slight ache in his chest, he was not sure if even the weight of his father's position and the respect for his family would be enough for someone to join their child with a half-breed.

"I meant him. It is illogical to enjoy hurting people, to spend time coming up with insults. He should really have spent it studying, he needs to be better if he wants to go to the Science Academy." Spock frowned slightly at her words, they were unexpected. "You hurt the person who was hurting you, perhaps you thought it would make him stop but it will not. It was wrong but not unprovoked. If you want to hurt him a better way would be to get into the Academy when he does not." Spock nodded. That seemed logical, and productive. Though he should not wish pain on another. He wondered why should would tell him such, why she would want Stelev to feel pain.

While he was still trying to figure out how to respond she turned abruptly and walked away. Curiosity was a much easier emotion to deal with while he waited for his father to finish with the school's headteacher. He still didn't know who she was.