Spock watched as Kirk's usual shields broke down and he wept over Pike's lifeless body. A hand curled on one of the Admiral's shoulders, his head buried in the other. Abruptly, Kirk lifted his head and looked with blurry eyes at Spock, who stared back blankly. Kirk blinked, once...twice, and then with slow motions, as if through water, moved toward Spock.

He half expected him to stand and move away, but he didn't. Spock started slightly as Kirk's arms circled loosely around his neck and his face burrowed between his neck and shoulder. "Just give me this..." came the hoarse, barely breathed whisper against the cloth around his neck. "Please, Spock." And so he did. He let Kirk wet his collar with tears, held him and offered what little comfort he could, tried to block out the waves of emotion rolling off Kirk.

Few people looked at the pair, ex-Captain and First Officer on their knees, one crying in the arms of the other, the Vulcan other. He wasn't sure how long they knelled there next to Pike's lifeless body, Kirk letting out pulse after pulse of emotion. What seemed an eternity, but still all too soon for Spock, Kirk started to pull away with a quiet breathed "Thank you, Spock." He finally stood, not meeting Spock's questioning yet concerned gaze. One hand hesitated on his shoulder, before reluctantly trailing off.

Spock's burning gaze followed his ex-captain, though now his captain again, as he disappeared into the thongs of medical and the wounded. Spock's mind was reeling. If one had scratched Spock's calm exterior they may have been surprised at the thunderous turmoil of thought and emotion under that skin.

For in that last trailing touch of Kirk's hand he had gotten more than just giant waves of sadness and thought's of "another lost father." No. There was more. Under that dark stormy sadness there had been one other thought solid in Kirk's mind.

I can have them back.

Five words. So simple, yet so complex; to Spock anyway. For the "them" referred to two things.

The first was the Enterprise. The only shinning lady in Kirk's eyes. His one beloved and the only starship for him.

But the second...the second was a person.

I can have them back...

I can have you back...had been the echo thought behind the first. A thought projected with such intensity and emotion that it drifted through the shields Spock placed around him.

Him. Spock. Kirk wanted him back.

I can have you back.

The impression of the words in his mind, branded there forever. Because behind the first two thoughts there had been a third, faint echo. Barely there.

I want you back.

Just a short drabble. Drop me your thoughts if you can!