In fact, she was in one of the sparse, hard-to-find useless rooms on the Enterprise, the ones the building crew kept forgetting to remove because the rooms, smaller than closets, were hidden by such confounding twists and turns you could almost swear they couldn't be found on such a straightforward-ly built ship, face to face with something that looked suspiciously like a mop and a couple of old coats. She couldn't tell, however; her vision swam before her, lit and made prismatic by tears. The sobs were almost disturbing Saavik; it was like she wasn't even part of her own body, like this was someone else. Or maybe you're just afraid to face the self like this; maybe this is what you're really like, Saavik. She blinked, glared furiously at the wall and tried not to think, all the while unable to stop the flood of heat and water, finally settling into an exhausted dead-black sleep.
A sharp sound woke her; she quite forgot her training in all matters and shot upwards in surprise, hitting her head with a sound like a gunshot. Saavik winced; the wince pulled at the strange stiffness of dried tears on her face. Oh. She was mortified, almost blushed a deep green, tried to hide behind the ratty old Earth coats in the tiny room.
"What the hell?" someone swore. By the accent, McCoy. Great, she thought. "…is with this room?" McCoy continued, glaring and rubbing his head. He thought he could make out in the darkness, though that Romulan ale—something shifted. No, someone, someone breathing at a familiar rate that definitely was not human.
"Saavik, what the hell are you doing in he—" he began, then saw her tearstained face and was astounded. Oh god.
"I hit my head on the ceiling," she intoned, "and that is why." The intelligence of her face, even after crying, pushed the questionable intelligence of her argument out of his mind. Never mind that she looked miserable and could barely think. She sprung out of the room, ducking past McCoy, and rushed away.
Saavik removed herself to her quarters a while. All was darkness, in space she stared out to; all was darkness between the points of light.
—
"You used unstable particles to form Genesis?" Saavik couldn't help the feeling of betrayal that coursed through her. It was completely irrational, but she thought this planet and its wonders could last forever, and David had ruined that completely.
David walked past her to the campsite, then turned. His eyes were alight. "I'm sorry," he said, and put two fingers to her lips. Saavik almost laughed; he couldn't know what that meant. Even if he had, she realized, he wouldn't have taken it back. She felt rejection of him snap through her eyes, tried to look away so he wouldn't see it or the uncontrolled blush of green that swept across her cheeks. She hunkered down to the planet floor, pulling the blanket tightly about the snow-sodden shoulders of her uniform; Genesis was cold, even for a half-Vulcan body.
The firelight flickered. She could sense him from her peripheral vision but couldn't stop him, his lips descending on hers warmly. Saavik blinked. She was a mature woman, but she couldn't have guessed, well, this.
"David, I'm not trying to pursue a human relationship," she said, but so quietly he couldn't be sure if he heard. He couldn't even guess at the weight of those words, their significance, or what ran through her mind as she turned away. Saavik was silent, watching the shadows the light made on the walls of the cave, thinking of the stars, darkness and light, life and death.
The Past
Saavik looked down at the sprawled form of young Spock, half shadowed by the cave walls, trying to ignore her aching body and the shuddering spasms that tore through her. Was the air getting warmer? It swept, unbearably hot, against her skin, a great pressure becoming heat waves that rolled across her body. Her forehead, breasts and belly were beaded with sweat, and her face was tinged an unhealthy gray-green from exhaustion. Focus, she thought. Your bruises don't matter, your pain and love don't matter. Not even Genesis, not anymore. Only him. He must live.
She moved closer to him, unaware of further scrapes across her legs as her knees brushed stone. He lay with outflung arms and legs, as if he could not move; as she neared him, Saavik marveled at the resemblance in his younger features to the older, comfortable Spock she knew, his eyebrows strong and slanted exactly the same, his cheekbones mirror images to the ones she remembered, his eyes a little larger and his lips the same but, this time, known—unbidden, a flush crept furiously across her cheeks—and parted without the restraint normally seen in Vulcans. Of course, Spock was not himself; his soul resided elsewhere for safekeeping, in someone's mind somewhere along the stars, for all had thought him dead.
As she neared even more, she snapped back to awareness, saw that he could not move because of the pain he was in; he was bound by it. She pressed two fingers against his forehead; the coolness of it shocked her; this was not right—but then he flared burning hot and hazily focused on her face. His mouth slid open a little more; he breathed out as if to speak, then frowned; he didn't know words. But this feverish youth did not need words; pain like fire beat at him, though he now controlled his screams inwardly—before, Saavik had tightly shut her eyes at his cries of anguish, for she had been unable to help—he was too young—only to try and wildly hope that he could hold on to her presence as the slightest comfort in his turbulent awakening to the accelerated hell that was pon farr—what was supposed to happen only every seven years to Vulcans, and with preparation and meditation to ease it, then a companion to ease the edge, and most of all, with thought and consciousness, she thought fiercely, but what now gripped Spock in the space of a day. His eyes pleaded, burned in her vision with unfocused agony. She had no time to think of the urge to comfort, the basic instinct to take him in her arms and simply hold him, and expected the weakness of a child as she saw his arm lift upward to her face, but his hand was hard as bone, tore with fervor past her hair after slipping along her cheekbone, trailing desire, as he brought two fingers to lay against her own in perfect symmetry.
She would forever remember the fire, the breathlessness of him. She was unprepared for the fear that tore into her consciousness as his mind linked with hers—
Alone, in a galaxy of unknown things, unnamable, happiness, pain, change, light-dark-green-day-sun-life-plants-stone-snow-age-found-wordless-stars-sadness-longing… Alone!
She gasped, hot tears spilling from her eyes, and gripped his hand tighter. Saavik wasn't sure if he could even sense her presence beyond the knowledge of the raw need that engulfed him rapidly until he was almost further senseless, blind as an animal, helpless as an infant, rough as an untrained man—but the bond of skin upon skin, the memories she tried to remind him of…
We are connected. You are safe. Her hand against his, she stressed in her mind. Always, if you…if you want me. His face contorted, and she thought he would weep, but the solid bulk of his body pressed against her own as he gripped her hand more tightly, unsure of what could ease this small death and rebirth that heralded the start of another accelerated seven years. His eyes flashed like sudden sparks before her face, so briefly she was startled by their liquid depths, the expressiveness he had even without words, without thoughts or memory—the anguish, the recognition—before his hot mouth latched onto hers, breathlessly, eagerly, frustratedly tearing at her lip as his hands moved around and didn't know where to move. She pulled away from him for a moment, dizzily took in his eyes, and, looking down while he moved forward and forward again, clearly not understanding why she had separated her mouth from his—she ran a finger along his finger, but he cried out roughly, in pain still—Saavik ripped her jacket and soft shirt away and fumbled with her pants. Still with her fingers to his fingers, her eyes seeing his eyes, she brought her mouth to his mouth again, kissed him with such sadness that she wondered if he would ever remember his past and this combined, brought her arms around his thin chest. As he ducked his head downward, nipped at her collarbone, her side, all of her, inflamed…His legs wrapped tightly around hers, his mouth once again grasped at hers. His arms were hard as bars, bruising her back as he crushed into her chest—small flames against the larger fire as her breasts protested at this proximity—and latched his hips against her own, penetrating her in one swift movement. The sweat shone across his brow, the rictus of pain and desire in his face imprinted in her mind. And still, she felt tears in her eyes; his hand was still in hers even as he kissed her again and again, even as he tore into her and she screamed and wept. The fire was unbearable, white-hot. She flung her loose arm out senselessly, escaping the burning, felt a sharp, shattering impact, bone-deep, then shuddered into the warmth and proximity she felt. But the fire pulsed through her, tore and ripped and drank at her savagely. His pain, his confusion, his final satisfaction rolled through her with such intensity that she forgot she was Saavik, forgot all.
Not alone.
Saavik was only distantly aware of no longer shivering, hazily confused at the cold air that somehow didn't bother her. She awoke to the change of temperature. The weak sun's sudden arc across the sky formed a line of fire in the sky so that the cave was alit with red. Sunrise slanted over sharp cheekbones—Spock. Saavik sat up, wondered at the sensitivity of her skin—saw the pale luminescence of her nakedness against the darkness of the cave just as she saw the face of the young Vulcan who lay asleep and vulnerable, whose hand in hers filled her with the unbearable, confusing aftershock of passion and fierce protectiveness. She frowned then winced; her body ached, bone-deep, to where the pain surfaced in unbearable red-hot points where she saw the beginnings of bruises form.
Naked, looking like she'd been through a hell of a fight or a sickness or something, staring down at herself with shock, unable to tear her hand away from Spock's as if he were a sick child—no, a lover—this is what David Marcus walked in upon.
Saavik heard a softly muffled exclamation from the mouth of the cave and immediately wished she could move from where she lay painfully. David's hair and face were lit on one side spreading to the other by the unnaturally fast sunrise.
"What the hell happened here? Saavik, what the f—"
"I suppose I should have told you at a more opportune time, Sa—" David broke off, swallowed. His eyes filled, his large fists clenched. He could not duck his head, only stare at what he always hoped he would see but not like this and not with him, found he could not even say her name and that frustrated tears pricked at his eyes from an overwhelming anger. Anger that overwhelmed desire and anguish. "Genesis is destroying itself." He was faced with an incalculatable gaze; even—as she was—her eyes were so composed, so alien in their composure, so beautiful, a tiny part of himself whispered.
That's it. Don't look at her body, her—just at her face.
He swallowed and inadvertently stepped back, eyes wide. Saavik was crying. He would have missed it if he saw her thin, compact body right then. "God, David, would you help me up?" He flushed and gripped her arm until she stood, struggling to compose her face, crossing her arms over her breasts and swaying a little wearily. Saavik shifted her weight to one foot, then another, found she could stand. The darkness and lightening air revealed a slight curve, a flash of her side, as she bent down and pressed her lips to the Vulcan's forehead. His eyes were shut tight as a newborn's, and his face still looked pained, though not alone was the last feeling she had sensed from him, their connection wide as an open wound, a new world. Reluctantly she slid her fingers away from his.
"He dreamed of dawn," she realized she was saying to David. "I don't know if he understands, but he caught a glimpse of my—mind, the outside world—" She looked down. When she looked up, she saw that David was almost glaring and crying at once.
"Good. Whatever. It's not as if—" He just turned from her, the body language saying even more than the words. Saavik felt as if an emptiness had been punched through her—Spock wouldn't remember, wasn't himself, and David—
"Fine," she said, feeling her control slip. As she hadn't since she was a child on a strange new world, Vulcan, she ran, bitter tears flying behind her.
Not since Hellguard had she felt this way, so very young and so very old at once, with so many experiences left behind and such a terrifying new world ahead of her. Spock probably wouldn't remember any of it, and David…She clenched her fingers around one of the tall, green fronds around her that smelled like a world made anew by rain.
"How could you have done this to him?" she said, quietly, picturing David in her mind, the pale fire of his hair, the brighter fire of his smile, and the slow studiousness of him that overtook his face, body and movements whenever he was lost in thought, the intelligence of him curiously reminiscent of a Vulcan, not a human, but colored by incomprehensible passion and emotion. The darkness in her mental landscape made David stand out like, yes, fire: fire that burned away Spock, tore into the newborn man, threatened to destroy the life he had begun anew here.
"He would be dead, if otherwise, if I hadn't," she whispered even more quietly, voice pensive. As she had been in the realm of feeling before, now the realm of thought overtook her; she parted her fingers then looked up to the stars that stung wildly from the lightening dawn of the sky of Genesis.
She had to go back. Darkness had fallen once again, merging all forms into obscurity she picked silently through, yet she knew when she had reached the cave; the firelight flickered in shadows and light, but even before she reached that threshold, she heard a voice raw with pain. Then, sudden in her vision, she came upon David, who crouched by the fire as in great pain with his hands tense. Spock lay, older, still in the cave, but the veins stood out on the soft green-grey of his skin; he rocked with tension, and his eyes were bright with agony and fever. He hurled a hand out to grip hers like a lifeline, and with such intensity she was overtaken by the tumult of his mind:
No words. He knew no words. Before, there had been pain, but it left. Why did it not leave now? Fire, darkness, days…Alone! Together and still alone.
Gasping, reeling, she knelt, winced at the scrape of stone, unseeingly removed the blanket from around her shoulders, and brought a hand up to Spock's face; her touch shocked against burning skin.
Her hand on his hand was her only connection to sanity, to consciousness. She was only aware of the burning as she forgot all surroundings, but before this, she bent her head to his and desperately kissed him. Before all was heat and confusion, she felt the bitter tears fall and the absence of the mind like an open wound, the thoughts and memories she knew and loved, the mind somewhere among the stars though the body was here and aflame—the man she gave all for to save.
There were no words, not exactly, in his mind, but it lacked the singular pain and wisdom that structured, made terrible and awe-inspiring the Spock she knew. This younger, empty Spock had felt a strange sadness when she parted from him before, but he could not possibly know her heartbreak and her own agony so removed from the physical kind. Saavik felt the ache in her bones, the bruises, the nausea and yes, the desire, and thought bleakly that this was not all. She would sacrifice all to save him, if she could—even this strange, newborn side of him, this twin-like reappearance, this empty, younger man she already felt a wild connection, almost maternal and deeply sad, to, would save too if she could. Yet, though like a child, even he could hurt her, beyond any physical way.
He would never remember this, when he became himself again. All of it would be wiped clean, a distant part of herself realized. And all the meaning, he could never even guess. She would be torn in two, unable to speak a word of it. Dimly, she thought, even in joy, this brief different joy the young, practically newborn Vulcan could never understand the implications of, of a great sadness, a great emptiness. The death of Spock and the new life he would remember nothing of.
The young one dreamed of darkness, a great wondering darkness, greater than understanding, and almost felt recognition, a brief bond, before feeling anguish he could not understand, a pain not his own. He woke and looked up at the other one, could not understand the thoughts in her eyes. He brought a hand up to her face, hesitantly, but the expression remained. Confused, hurt by her hurt, he wrapped thin arms around thin legs tightly and buried his face in his kneecaps, then stared out to the vast open covering of the world, at the light in the darkness, seeing David but not knowing.
The eyes of David Marcus reflected bright from the fire. He had wandered off, that night, unable to leave entirely for he feared what could happen if there were other life forms on the planet, ones not entirely friendly, and if they encountered Saavik and—and him—in the state they were in, could not break out of. He had gone there first to respect their privacy, though this was futile, for thoughts fought angrily in his mind, battered their wings against his consciousness, and he could not forget. Greater, raw fire flowered in the near distance as darkness lightened unnaturally towards day, sunrise heralded by great angry colors almost greater than the size of the sky. As he stared out to the turbulent, born-and-at-once-dying landscape, the fiery wounds of Genesis not creating but destroying it, he felt suddenly young, insignificant, as if the plans he had made, the ideas postulated, were the smallest of particles and ridiculous.
He had seen the angry, new yet healing strangely fast bruises along Saavik's legs, hadn't tried to but the contrast of her skin against the darkness had caught at his eyes for an instant. Had seen as she bent down to kiss this seemingly same but different—so different, like a child but in pain and so much harder to understand—Spock, had almost seen her eyes, the complexity of the feelings she could only reveal there. Had looked away as she un-self-consciously flung away the red-and-black-checked blanket from her body. And he still could not understand, though memories had flashed through his mind unbearably: that day on the Enterprise, before they left for Genesis—Saavik's angular, strangely beautiful face as she turned away from David's uncontainable embrace, and her distant eyes as she turned. He remembered the barest V of her skin and her soaked uniform peeking above the bright folds of the blanket he'd reached for when he saw her shivering—reached for almost automatically then later wondered at; my father had this, camping, David had remembered for some reason, just as his mind suddenly clicked and he could read what lay in her eyes as she gazed out the turbolift to where the body of another Vulcan had recently been: that was when David realized—and it hit him forcefully—that Saavik did not love him.
There was so much he could never understand, he realized, seeing Saavik's fingers against Spock's, their unreadable, uncontrollable emotions in their eyes as their hands met. Like he had realized, though not completely, what seemed like years before.
Saavik would never love him. She was acting to save Spock's new life, but he knew, as he saw then turned away, walked to witness Genesis, that that was not all to it, could not be. She would die to save Spock, if she needed to—all this David saw, knew, without words—for the depth of what David could not understand was rooted beyond even her own life. Magma spurted upward as the planet heaved. David's eyes were suddenly fixed to the stars, their tragic clarity, the balance of beauty and sadness. In that instant, he knew, the knowledge strong and vivid through his heartbeat, he would die to save Saavik.
Love was not something that could ever entirely be understood.
"Saavik!" he thought wildly, but he couldn't warn her. Klingons had found them—the last thing David had expected. Saavik was outside the cave, her clothing painstakingly put on again, with Spock, and David could do nothing, only watch as they were captured.
And as the knife pointed to Saavik—the Klingon didn't care which one he killed, but fate—David felt not his life, but hers, flash in front of his eyes. He leaped and tackled the Klingon man, couldn't even see Saavik's eyes one last time before strong arms met strong arms and he fought, desperately, bitterly for his own life and theirs. His heartbeat seemed to span an eternity, encompass a world, and then the knife point like bitter irony went home. He died under hidden stars, with his hands open to the sky.
"How can you explain the death of my son?"
The only thing Kirk had heard was that David was dead, not why. Not how.
"He died saving us." Saavik's eyes were wide. So much under the surface, so much more she could say. Her eyes went to Spock, who lay again in the grip of the shattering pain that was the blood fever and his accelerated growth all at once. A shadow of pain gripped her heart.
Saving me.
She studied her open hand, still in shock, though under the surface of her thoughts were galaxies and still water—and yet, if things had gone differently…
In her mind's eye was David Marcus. Her whole life gravitated toward Spock, but David…his eyes, his hair, his smile in the firelight, his openness, his humanness…he was a good man. How could he be dead? As easily as Spock had died, though David wouldn't come back.
The sun rose silver over Genesis.
She had gone to David, brushed a finger over his hand, hesitantly, though he could not breathe, move to stop her, or know.
David, who had helped her through fever—at the very beginning, when she could hardly move, had no idea what was happening—David, who was always there. Except now he was not. David, who she might have loved, if the worlds orbited differently, if the universe was not entirely the same.
And Genesis was destroying, dying.
Spock groaned, almost screamed, grabbed his head with tight knuckles, but a strange feeling shuddered through Saavik, breaking her usual calm, and her own knuckles clenched. "Excuse me, Captain," she managed before a wave of nausea made her walk quickly to the bushes and heave. She closed her eyes, brought her fingers to her temples, tried to steady herself. Strangely enough, Spock looked up at that moment, just as she did; the now-afternoon sun reflected off his eyes.
Saavik was sleeping more than usual, her sleep deeper than she remembered it usually was. The darkness seemed to almost expand, behind her closed eyelids, though she knew this was impossible—and yet, it was a curious thing; she was neither falling nor experiencing normal dreams, though when she dreamed, it was rarely. But this was different. It was as if another consciousness was reaching out to her, one that divided and changed her persective...dizzy, she lurched over to be beamed back to the ship, and quite suddenly the feeling had subsided, but still lay at the back of her memory. Even as she functioned normally, pointing her phaser-armed arm at the one remaining Klingon in the warbird the captain had captured, her mind surged in grave calculation, so much so that even the sudden tearing absence of Spock as he was taken to sickbay barely even registered in her mind.
On Vulcan again, it felt like she was a time bomb. The red-scorched heat of the place—she was used to it, but it was unsettling, after so much time in space and then on Genesis, like she was suddenly a child again—hit her with a force as she strode out of the ship she had come there on. She felt like her head was slip into two different people, one much less formed. Her eyes widened as a sudden sharp pain jerked her abdomen.
No. This couldn't be happening…
And yet, at the fal tor pan, with the sun rising over Vulcan, as the newly made Spock joined with his katra and then looked at the people there, looked almost past her, that same sudden pain had momentarily stunned her, and she could barely look into his face.
Amanda understood immediately. Saavik had no idea how she knew, but somehow Spock's mother guessed everything, as Saavik came to the house without the usual Vulcan calm and with a shockingly vivid pain instead on her face.
"My god, Saavik," Amanda was saying. "And he doesn't know?" Saavik shook her head. "It shouldn't have gotten in the way of my normal duties, but on the ship, I felt…odd, like something was off with the entire world—even with Spock back, his mind felt different, and I had grown accustomed to the mind of his on Genesis, all the while a small part of me"—she glanced swiftly downward—"felt fine."
In my mind, my memories, she thinks, I'm still on Genesis...
It's rained and the boy Spock looks up with wonder, uncaring that the rain is cold and he's getting steadily wetter. The rain drips in liquid ropes from the glistening leaves. Something clicks within her as she notices the world's beauty coming forth from the senseless, heartbreaking day. "Sov-masu," she tell hims, rain, though he won't remember it. David walks over; she can hear his footfalls. Spock is swaddled tightly, on her lap, and reaches a questing finger up to the side of her face—as it snags on a hair, Spock pouts, then twists the hair in his fist. Saavik restrains herself from wincing. But she can hear her own heartbeat: loud, strangely open, as is her gaze as David sits down. He sees her wide eyes, the thoughts she doesn't stay. If anything, their gazes are enough of a bond—she smiles absently—parting and never parted, never and always touching and touched. It is enough so that though he wants to kiss her, feel the heat and breath of her, he simply sees her instead. Saavik closes her eyes; against the imprint of a fire—a sudden thought, a distant possibility—in the brief darkness of Genesis, finger meets with finger, hand to hand, woman to man, to merge as the sparks flare mightily upwards, flame surging into the wind. And Spock is nowhere to be seen. She wakes with eyes shocked wide. Something moves her, so that her usual calm is somewhat hurried, though it carries traces of unconscious grace. As the wave of violent heat and nausea passes and her body heaves, thoughts slam into her instinctual emotion and adrenaline; she truly wakes. David is dead. Spock is alive, but he is dead to me, though it is far worse than that in reality; he lives but does not remember. Where is the child, the man I loved? Where do the two halves meet? She stares upward, seeing in her mind's eye not the hallway of the ship but stars that seem less distant. What am I, without them? An illogical question, she would say, but shaken, she only knows she must return to Vulcan.