IMPORTANT NOTE: This chapter has been edited for content in order to comply with this site's TOS. The uncut version, which is about 2.5k longer, has been posted to Archive of Our Own.

Equally as important note: Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed this story, or sent me PMs, or otherwise encouraged me to continue working on this ridiculous epic. It's hard to reply to individuals on this site, and impossible to reply to individual anons, but I promise I read (and reread!) every single review and cherish them. I'm not going to lie, my notes for Part Three are a great big mess and I don't know when I'll be able to update again. But I hope you will all enjoy this chapter, and the conclusion of Part Two.

x

The launch of any Starfleet flagship on a five-year mission will undoubtedly draw large crowds, but the Enterprise and her crew have attracted a particularly immense and diverse collection of onlookers and media. Sevin suggests that all of San Francisco has come to the space docks to see them off. Spock knows this is an exaggeration, but he understands the sentiment.

"Just remember to stay close to me," he says, and adjusts his hold on his son's wrist. They're still on the edge of the crowd, but already people are moving in close around them: curious observers, not sure where to go; family searching out specific members of the crew; reporters who want to be everywhere at once.

"I will," Sevin promises. "Don't worry, Father. You won't lose me."

"I am not worried," he replies, which is mostly the truth. There just happens to be a lot on his mind, that is all. He cranes his neck and scans the crowd, trying to find the fastest, most efficient route through it.

He catches sight of Nyota first, stuck in the middle of a small throng of her own. Her extended family flew in to California last week, Spock knows, to see her off. Ensign Chekov also has several people with him, probably his parents and grandparents, some younger people who may be siblings or cousins. They are speaking very quickly, and on top of each other. Lieutenant Sulu is having a more sedate conversation with his own parents, not far off.

Spock notices other members of the crew as well, all in their dress uniforms for the occasion, surrounded by family and friends. He sees emotional conversations, teary goodbyes, hugging and kissing and other dramatic displays. Had he encountered this scene six years ago, he would have been overwhelmed by it. But his time on Earth and among Earth people has made him more accepting of their otherwise alien habits.

His own father isn't here. Sarek had planned to come and see them off, but unexpected complications regarding the new colony kept him in Washington. In a way, this is a relief. What could they say to each other in this moment? What could they do? Goodbyes among Vulcans—the set phrases, the moments of silence, the final pause before parting when truth may finally be said—are different from goodbyes among humans and would be an oddity in this foreign place.

That's what he tells himself. Before he left for Starfleet, his father took him by the shoulders and said, "I cannot tell you I know this is the right choice, but I am proud of you," and that is what he remembers now. It is almost the only thing he remembers of his last day on his home planet, before he came to California for the first time.

Spock takes another look across the dock and this time he finds the Captain, calmly and confidently answering questions from an overeager reporter. He's smiling, relaxed, obviously showing off his charm. A handsome young Captain, creating the sort of positive, upbeat headlines everyone wishes to read. He moves his hat under his arm, gestures widely, laughs brightly and the reporter laughs too, and Spock forces himself at last to look away.

He notes, without surprise, that despite her promises, Winona Kirk is nowhere to be seen. He reads no malice into her absence, though he's not sure her son will do the same. More incapable of understanding and controlling her feelings than a Vulcan child, she hides from them in the safety of work and its formalities. The emotion of this moment would unnerve her. Of course she stays away.

Off to the side, making up the edge of the crowd, is a group of Vulcans, awkward in their Terran clothes, uncertain of their own presence. The media must have learned quickly not to bother them—there is no uplifting story here—and so they wait and watch, undisturbed. To the humans, they must look somber. But Spock feels the curiosity that comes from them in gentle waves, and underneath that something that might be hope.

He's about to turn away from them again, and finally find a path toward the ship, when one suddenly raises his hand to get Spock's attention, and Sevin calls out, "It's Soval!"

So it is.

Spock raises his hand in return, then forces a path through the disorganized mass of people to get to him. The crew who recognize him step aside. The spectators who see his uniform try to ask questions, get his attention, but he only waves them off. He has no time for tourists and onlookers, not today, and this many strangers this close to his son raises certain primal instincts. Eventually, he clears a small space, not far from the group of Vulcans, where Soval can meet them. Spock sees now that Senar is with him, and that he has their daughter in a sling against his chest. Spock's own son comes to stand in front of him, looking quietly, curiously, up, and Spock keeps him close with two hands on his chest: a protective Earth gesture he learned from his mother. Senar notices, tilts his head, but says nothing.

"Spock," Soval greets him. "We did not truly expect we would get a chance to speak to you." His tone says the rest, what he need not say in words: But we are glad to have found you.

"When we arrived and saw the number of people," Senar continues, "I calculated that it would be irrational even to attempt to locate you. Does the launch of one of your ships always attract such attention?"

"One of our ships," Spock corrects. A Federation ship, and we are still Federation. "No. This is... unusual, even for a Constitution class vessel. I am pleasantly surprised—"

"Is that your baby?"

"Sevin!" Spock's voice takes on a slight sharpness and he looks to the others with apology. "Do not be rude."

"I'm sorry, Father," he answers, and sounds it, but he doesn't stop staring up at Senar. Spock catches the two exchanging a glance.

"Yes," Senar answers, then, after the slightest of uncertain pauses, "This is our daughter, T'Prina."

Sevin cranes his neck, up on his toes now trying to see her face. Spock's subtle attempts to keep him down do nothing, but Soval, at least, seems amused and Senar is trying to pretend he does not notice. "Father told me she was born," Sevin is saying. "She doesn't mind all the noise and the people?"

Spock notices Senar look to his husband again, just for a moment, before he answers, "Not yet." In those two words, Spock reads how wary he is, how uncertain of his own decision to bring his child here, surrounded by the Earth people who make him so nervous, and Spock wonders for a moment if Soval had to convince him to come, if they fought. But no. Senar is too curious. He doesn't entirely trust the people crowding around them. But he isn't eager to leave, either. And he seems confident at least in this: that if he keeps his daughter close, no one can harm her, and if he keeps his own mind calm, she will feel it through his skin and be calm too.

"Spock," Senar addresses him suddenly, and he startles, wondering if he's been caught staring too. But it's been only a moment, only the slightest pause. "May I speak to Sevin for a moment?"

What he means is, may Soval speak to you for a moment?, but Spock appreciates the phrase. He lets Sevin go. "Do not wander too far," he warns. "Stay with Senar."

"I will, Father," Sevin promises, with admirable politeness, given how many times he's heard a variant on this 'be safe' message today. They take a few steps away but stay within Spock's line of sight. He can only hope the crush of well-wishers won't utterly swallow them up.

"Thank you," Soval says, then, his voice a bit lower and quieter now. "I only want a few words, especially as I do not know when I will see you again."

Spock opens his mouth to say that they certainly will meet again: when the colony is ready for habitation, when the Enterprise is called upon to visit it, as she most certainly will—but that is not what Soval means. Or rather, it is exactly what he means. The day when he and his family are finally able to call another planet named Vulcan home seems impossibly far away. Nothing Spock can say will bring it closer, or take it from the distant daydream plane on which it exists into the real and the certain. So he falls back on an old phrase, instead, a formula because that is all he knows for moments like these. "I appreciate the chance to say goodbye."

Soval inclines his head. He has never looked more Vulcan, nor, because of the setting, more foreign. "Spock," he says, voice quiet but still audible despite the noise around them, "I have a favor to ask you."

Spock glances to his left, where Senar and Sevin are talking. A couple of rowdy ensigns jostle closer, and Senar frowns at them, disapproving. He takes Sevin's wrist to pull him a step closer, then doesn't let go, just in case.

"Of course," he answers. He wonders if Soval can hear, over the sound of shouted greetings mingling with lengthy goodbyes, what is underneath the simple words. He seems to. Spock thinks that he does, in the way he steps forward slightly, the secret-low pitch of his voice, how he does not seem embarrassed by his own hesitance.

"I know you are aware of how difficult living in San Francisco is for us," he says. "Not just because it is so different from home—" Soval hesitates, faltering over the last word, and Spock feels an ugly second-hand embarrassment welling up in him again. He wants to look away. "We are too isolated. We have found other survivors in the city and the Federation gives us what resources it can but...even after a year, it is triage. Sharing information seems to be the last priority of the aid workers, the volunteers...or perhaps they have nothing to tell us. The Council is on the other side of the country. Your news programs speak of our people in only the vaguest of terms—Spock."

He reaches out one hand, drops it quickly before he can grab on to Spock's sleeve. He swallows down the desperation Spock was starting to hear in his voice. If he thinks that Spock is judging him, if he thinks that Spock has looked away out of disdain or disgust, he is wrong; it was only the word your that tripped him, how Soval sees Earth as Spock's planet, its people as his people. As simple a word in Vulcan as in Standard, it must have slipped right off his tongue; he did not notice. But Spock noticed. And from that point fans out everything else Soval has told him, a vast wasteland of nothingness, no information and no future and no anchor for himself or his husband or their child. He wants to reach out, too. He wants to send his thoughts from his mind right to his friend's, or at least touch skin to skin and let him feel whatever reassurance he can find in himself to give. But he holds back.

"I know there is little you can do," Soval concedes. "But you have many more connections than either Senar or I do. If you hear anything from your father, or from Starfleet..."

What he is asking is so little. Yet he cannot seem to hide his guilt, or, beneath it, mixed in with it, his worry and his fear. Spock glances to the side again, to their families, and sees that Senar has crouched down now to introduce his little girl to Sevin, and the scene looks so much of a piece with the rest of the interactions around it, family reunions preceding long goodbyes, that Spock could almost forget just how out of place his people are.

"Soval," he answers, "I will not forget your family. I cannot. Whatever information I receive that I may share, I promise I will."

There is nothing in Vulcan, no words and no gesture, to convey the depth of his sincerity; he has only the tone of his voice, the subtle notes he knows no human ear could catch. Soval hears them. He inclines his head and murmurs, "Thank you," and Spock knows there is more he wishes to say, but cannot. The space docks are loud with conversation, people who speak because they cannot stand the silence, because they want to put off the final moment of goodbye, and in this moment Spock understands them. He cannot stand this silence either.

"You will find a home on New Vulcan," he says. It is more platitude than promise, but all he can offer. "Our people have survived worse than this."

"Have we?" Soval answers, and looks up. Not even during their engagement did Spock see an expression so open or emotions so clear on his face. He has taken down his barriers. Even without skin to skin contact, in a space as crowded as this, surrounded by so many humans with no sense of themselves, bursting with the feelings they share so indiscriminately, he must feel everything. He must feel, in a sense, connected to everyone. But when Spock looks at him, he sees a man apart.

He opens his mouth to answer but before he can, a loud shout reaches him: "Spock! Come here for a moment! They want to take a picture of the whole bridge crew!"

Kirk's voice. A part of him is annoyed at the interruption, another part, simply relieved.

He hesitates only to glance at Sevin, but Soval notices and says quickly, "We will keep him safe. In a few minutes, I assume you will be ready to leave." The last sentence veers toward a question, and Spock nods.

"Yes," he answers. "I will be in touch." The sentiment is an echo of their last goodbye, on Vulcan, but this time he will not let the promise lapse.

With some reluctance, he steps back and joins the crew where they are gathered a few yards away, getting into position for their photo. Kirk is standing in the second row, in the center, McCoy and Nyota on either side of him, Scott and Chekov and Sulu huddled in front. He waves Spock forward and then makes a space for him to his right, next to Nyota. When Spock is in place, Kirk puts one arm around his shoulder loosely.

Spock's spine turns rigid, and his muscles tense. He looks straight ahead. He tries to disconnect. But the photographer urges them closer together, and the press of his side against Kirk's, the movement of Kirk's arm down to rest just above his hips, all bring him right back to himself—right here to this humid San Francisco summer, to these crowded space docks—fully aware, hyper-aware, of every point of contact between them.

"You okay?" Kirk murmurs to him.

The photographer takes his first picture: a brief flash, underscored by an unintelligible, encouraging yell.

"Affirmative," he answers, no more than an outtake of breath.

These pictures will be in the history books. Even if they fail, they will fail spectacularly; they will fail because their ambition was too great. Even if they fail, they will be remembered.

Then Jim asks him, "You think we're ready for this, Spock?" and he wants to ask ready for what? because the question could mean so many things.

Another picture flash.

Ready to take off? Ready to explore? Ready for an adventure? Ready for—?

"Yes, Captain," he answers, as the photographer shoots them a thumbs up, as their crew stand around them, smiling and laughing. His own spine is perfectly straight but he's looped his arm tentatively behind Jim's back in return. "I believe we are."

x

Two days earlier

In the morning, the Enterprise is alive with activity: hundreds of crewmembers moving into their quarters, dragging boxes through corridors, hauling in the occasional piece of furniture, stopping at the most inconvenient of times to talk with old friends or future shipmates—making, in all ways, the greatest amount of noise and commotion they can as they transform this still-impersonal space vessel into home. Spock has not seen such confusion since the day he moved into the Academy dorms, an experience he now realizes was remarkably similar to this one. Even seasoned officers will act like excited teenagers in the face of an adventure as momentous, as potentially life-changing, as this one. Even experienced members of the Fleet will transform their combination of nerves and elation into energetic chatter and meandering curiosity.

When he moved into the dorms, he tried to attract as little attention as possible, and was quite unsuccessful in the attempt. The only Vulcan in his year and the only cadet with a child, he'd immediately inspired an uncomfortable degree of notice. This time, he does not bother with discretion. As the First Officer and only Vulcan, he knows he will incite some curiosity, and that is more acceptable to him now. He does not even mind when Sulu and Chekov poke their heads into his quarters as he is hanging up his curtains and ask about the statue still sitting, out of place, in the corner of the room. Chekov in particular seems fascinated by it, and the glowing crystal it holds in its hands. "Is this from—have you had this a long time, Mr. Spock?" he asks, twisting around to try to view it from the side.

"Yes, it is from Vulcan," he answers. "I have had it for many years."

"You've really transformed this place," Sulu tells him. He's glancing around at the half-unpacked boxes, taking the room in. Spock would disagree; there is still much to be done. His quarters are a mess more than anything, and that is a characterization he assumes would apply equally well to many of the rooms on the ship. But he understands the point. Before he can reply, Sulu notices the antique weapons Spock has laid out on his desk, and he instinctively reaches out for one, drawing his hand back only at the last moment. "Hey, is this—is this a sword?"

"Yes." Spock finishes with the curtain and steps back down from his stepstool to the floor. "It used to belong to my father. I brought it to Earth from Vulcan three years ago, but in truth I have never let myself display it before. I think it is time now. Are you familiar with Vulcan weaponry at all?"

"Not much," Sulu admits. "Old Earth weaponry is more of my specialty—and the modern stuff, for work," he adds, almost an afterthought. "I'd love to know more, though—do you actually know how to use this?"

"Yes," Spock admits, with some reluctance. "My training is mostly theoretical, however—"

"Oh, that's cool. Mine is too, for a lot of the older stuff. I'm not actually taking my pistol and having shoot outs." He grins, and when Spock only raises his eyebrows, tilts his head, and pulls up one corner of his mouth, he seems to understand that this is a sign of amusement, and laughs.

Before Spock can reply, Nyota pokes her head around the corner to ask if he still wants help getting Sevin's room in order, and Sulu's laugh falters and turns into something forced and awkwardly long. Spock keeps his eyebrow down only with difficulty. Nyota pretends not to notice, and Chekov quickly comes up with an excuse for them to leave. "I'm serious, though!" Sulu calls from the doorway before he steps out. "You gotta tell me about all this stuff!"

"What was that all about?" Nyota asks after they leave. She sounds just the slightest bit amused, and a little fond.

He picks up one of the boxes he has stacked near the doorway and replies, "I believe we are discovering common interests."

"Mmm," she smiles. "Bonding already."

Privately, Spock thinks a good deal of intra-crew bonding has already occurred, on the Narada mission and perhaps in San Francisco as well, but he doesn't say so. He also does not ask why this idea that they are 'bonding'—and what a strange term for it, too, a slippery Standard term, a part of the language with which he still does not feel comfortable—should either interest or amuse her, as it seems to. In a few moments, they are distracted anyway. The project takes longer than Spock had anticipated, and they have barely gotten the room in acceptable order when they decide to break for lunch.

On their way, they run into Mr. Scott, who is making his way awkwardly with a large toolbox under one arm and several very loud shirts slung over the other. He tries to wave, and almost drops the shirts. In the cafeteria, they again run into Chekov and Sulu, sitting with a large group of younger members of the crew. Sulu waves, though Chekov is too distracted by his conversation with a blond Yeoman to notice them. After lunch, they make their way to Nyota's quarters, so Spock can assist her in return, and pass by medbay, where Dr. McCoy and several harried members of the medical team are stumbling through an inventory of the ship's supplies.

As the afternoon wears on, the sound of excited conversation in the hall dies down, and fewer visitors poke their heads through the doorway of Nyota's quarters to say hello. Slowly, the ship becomes quiet again. Those still working are more tired and more subdued; many have finished their work for the day and gone home. Even Spock's energy has started to flag by the time Nyota suggests they stop and get some dinner. He looks around in something like a daze and then nods. A break does seem like a wise idea.

They meet only one person on their way off the ship: Dr. McCoy, looking worn down and also, Spock thinks, more annoyed than usual, and whose eyes widen slightly when he sees them. "And here I thought I was the second-to-last person to call it a day," he says.

"Second-to-last?" Nyota asks.

McCoy nods back up the gangway behind them. "Jim's still making his rounds, trying to be everywhere at once."

They separate briefly, taking different routes around a large pile of boxes marked for Engineering, and as they meet again, Spock answers, "Curious. We have been on the Enterprise all day and have not seen the Captain once."

"Guess he hasn't actually mastered splitting himself in two yet," McCoy quips, before suggesting they get something to eat at a little hole-in-the-wall restaurant nearby.

Spock checks his communicator intermittently through dinner. He tries to be discreet, but still Nyota notices, tipped off either by his movements or perhaps by the expression on his face. "You still want me to pick up Sevin tonight?" she asks.

"Mmmm," he answers, nodding, then flips the device closed and looks up properly again. "Yes. If it will not be a burden to you. I have quite a bit more work to do on the Enterprise this evening, and I do not know when I will be home."

"More work tonight?" McCoy asks, incredulous, and shakes his head. "You're as bad as Jim."

For once, Spock finds himself agreeing with McCoy, but he would never give him the satisfaction of saying so aloud. In truth, it's not a message about Sevin he's waiting for, but one from Kirk himself, a message that does not come until after he has said goodbye to Nyota and McCoy, made his way back to the space docks, and is standing, enjoying the quiet and stillness of the moment, staring up at the ship that will take him into the far reaches of the unknown. It towers over him. The start of early-summer-twilight is washing up behind it, a cautious bleaching out of the sky, and he cannot help but think it looks both majestic and softly familiar. He realizes that he has been waiting for this moment for a long time: not to take off, not to leave, but to feel like he is coming home at last.

The beep of his communicator startles him out of his thoughts abruptly. "Kirk to Spock. We still on?"

"Affirmative, Captain," he replies, and walks up to the ship once more.

They meet on C deck, just down the hall from the First Officer's quarters. Kirk looks exhausted, but happy, and there is a relieved satisfaction about him that Spock finds immediately curious and attractive both. He flicks his gaze away before he asks, "What is your assessment of the crew so far, Captain?"

Kirk sighs, but the exhale of breath turns into a slow echo of laughter at the end, and the look on his face is undeniably fond. "Well, they're not the most efficient bunch of people, or they weren't today. But they'll shape up."

"You sound quite certain of that," Spock says, turning to fall into step next to Kirk as they start walking toward the turbolift.

"Of course I am. Today was basically a celebration." The lift doors open and they step inside, both facing the door and yet Spock is aware, aware but almost subconsciously so, of exactly the amount of space between his shoulder and the Captain's, next to him. "But the real voyage—that's a shape up or else situation."

"And facing your disapproval is the 'or else' in this equation?"

Spock catches a flash of a grin out of the corner of his eye.

"Essentially."

They take a tour through Engineering, Communications, medbay, the transporter room, the cafeteria and rec rooms, the weapons room, and, of course, the bridge, making notes as they go, planning last minute adjustments. As they cross the observation deck, Spock sees that the sun has set fully by now, and that the sky outside is dark and clear. It feels later than it truly is, and the ship, built to house over four hundred and now empty but for two, has an air almost of abandonment about her, but without any accompanying melancholy, as such a word would generally imply. It is peaceful. Pleasant. And he feels so at ease and so relaxed that when Kirk leads them up one level, instead of down, instead of toward the exit and San Francisco and their separate apartments, he does not say a word. He is hardly surprised to find himself, at last, standing outside the door to the Captain's quarters.

"Look at that," Kirk says, and taps the sign next to the door. "Captain Kirk. Almost looks like a mistake, doesn't it?" He's smiling, but the smile seems out of place, uncertain, like an expression he's forgotten to wipe away. His eyes seem to be looking at something much farther away than the small strip of black plastic affixed next to the door, or the neat white embossed letters of his name.

"Not at all, Captain," Spock replies, and the words seem to snap Kirk back again. "The title was well-earned."

"Thanks." His tone is difficult to place, something like tired amusement, perhaps tinged with disbelief, and undercut by laughter not quite expressed: one of those human tones that Spock is not sure he'll ever be able to read. "Hey, you don't have to stay," Kirk adds, as he commands open the door and steps inside. "I've been all over the ship today, barely had any time to get my own place in order…."

The lights snap on to full brightness and illuminate a room cluttered with boxes, many half-unpacked; there are clothes on top of the dresser in a half-folded pile and books stacked on the desk next to the computer screen, a statue sitting on the desk chair and a plant taking up an inconvenient space in the middle of the room. Spock pictures Kirk beginning to unpack a box, being called away, and returning to start on a different project before being distracted yet again. Now the Captain surveys the room, throws up his hands and lets them fall again with a sigh, and shoots an apologetic look back at Spock. "Disgraceful, isn't it? Looks like a teenager is in command." He opens his mouth to continue when his own last sentence strikes him, and he falters, and Spock knows he is thinking exactly what Spock is thinking himself: that his quarters have the same air of disorder as his old Riverside apartment, that the night of their first meeting feels, perhaps for this reason, perhaps for some other, closer than it truly is.

"Anyway," Kirk continues. "I just thought I'd try to get some more unpacking done. I don't want to keep you. Though," he adds, "I would enjoy your company."

Spock wanders over to an open box of books sitting next to the bookshelf and asks, "Do the rest of these go here?"

It's a simple question, but for some reason it makes Kirk grin. "Hey, I said company, not assistance. Aren't you burned out for the day?" He's already on his way through the doorway to the sleeping area of his quarters, but he turns around once more, sticks his head around the edge of the dividing screen, and adds, "But yes. That is where they go."

Spock perches on the edge of the Captain's desk and starts shifting books from their place in the box to their place on the shelf. It's a mindless task, and it allows him a bit too much opportunity to glance through the mesh of the screen into the next room and watch Kirk, who is slowly unpacking a suitcase of clothes, refolding them, and putting them in his dresser. This, watching him, floating in these quiet, everyday moments, is not a good habit to encourage in himself. He turns his attention back to the books.

The next volume he takes out is different from the others, more ornate: the title is embossed in large, curling letters on the front cover; the pages are gilt around the edges. Yet it looks worn, too, in a well-used, well-read way that has nothing to do with its age. He pictures the human boy reading it, lying out in the middle of a field of infinite green Earth grass, under an Iowa summer sun, and then, before the image has even faded away, he wishes he had never conjured it at all. Without thinking, he runs his fingertips over the raised letters on the front cover and murmurs the title aloud: "A Tale of Two Cities."

He startles when Kirk's voice from the next room answers him: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness…" His voice follows a steady melody as well-worn as the pages of the book themselves. Spock has never heard these words out loud before, but immediately he feels himself slip into the familiar cadences, and he does not want to look up, though he hears footsteps and knows Kirk is walking toward him, because it would be too much like opening his eyes. "It was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair…"

The voice trails off, and Spock forces his gaze up. Kirk is leaning against the partition screen, arms crossed against his chest, smiling at him. "One of my favorites," he says. "I must have been about fourteen when I read it the first time—right before I started high school. Couldn't put it down. Have you ever—?"

"It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done," he answers, solemnly, the closed book still held in his hands. "It is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known." His voice doesn't sound like Kirk's did, no comparable emotion in it, but still his recitation makes the Captain's smile widen and an odd warmth, in turn, spread through Spock's center. He starts talking again without quite knowing what to say, just to distract himself from the realization of it. "Yes, I—when I was on bed rest, before Sevin was born, I read a great deal, including this book. It depicts a particularly strange and alien part of your world's history."

"Yeah, from my perspective too," Kirk answers, but his tone has the far-off quality of one whose attention has already wandered. Something else that Spock said has caught his focus. Spock just tilts his head, and waits the few seconds it takes before Kirk adds, sharper now, and present, "Spock, can I ask you a question? About Sevin?"

"Of course." He considers setting the book down on the shelf, but then decides, irrationally, that this simple gesture will too easily betray the nervous feeling the question incites in him.

At least Kirk is nervous too, Spock thinks, or seems to be. He tilts his head to the side and half-smiles, in that incongruous, hard-to-read way that humans have, as he asks, "What was that—what was he doing, on his birthday, when he touched my wrist? I mean I—sort of understand—" He cuts himself off. His fingers are rubbing at his pulse point and there is something faraway in his expression; Spock knows he is remembering what must have been, for him, the most alien of sensations.

"Sevin is a touch telepath," Spock answers, and hopes he sounds calm and detached. He does not feel detached. "Just as I and all Vulcans are."

"I know. I mean, I knew that about Vulcans. And I guess I knew, intellectually, that Sevin—"

"But you never gave the matter much thought?"

The question isn't a criticism. Spock would not have expected Kirk to contemplate the intricacies of telepathy in his spare time; he would hardly even expect Kirk to understand them. Part of Spock's harshness with Sevin on his birthday had stemmed from exactly this, that he should impose his ability on an alien, even when that alien was his parent, so unthinkingly. Kirk seems to understand his tone, and simply nods.

Spock looks down at the book, because it is easier, and says, "We all possess an innate ability to connect with each other, and, we have discovered, with non-telepaths, through touch. The connection is not as deep or as intimate as that created in a mind meld. I cannot read another's thoughts, not in words…" He frowns slightly; it is so difficult to explain. "It is more… a method of reading emotions."

"Emotions?" Kirk repeats. He sounds, perhaps, just the slightest bit amused.

Spock is just the tiniest bit defensive in turn. "Yes. Our touch telepathy is simply another reason we must learn to keep those emotions in check."

Kirk inclines his head in apology, the small smile slips from his face, and Spock takes a slow, deep breath, and tries again.

"The telepathic bridge is two-way. I can receive the emotions of the person I touch, and I can share my own. Uncontrolled, the exchange is automatic at any skin to skin contact. But if I wish, and I am careful, I can simply send a feeling to another, destroying the two-way aspect of the connection. At its best, it is like speaking without words. At its worst, it is manipulative, a way of altering the mental state of another surreptitiously."

"And that's what Sevin was doing to me?" Kirk asks. "I mean, sending emotion, not manipulating—"

"He was manipulating you," Spock corrects. "Not maliciously, or to a negative end, but he was. That is why I was so harsh when I told him to stop."

He's watching Kirk carefully now, trying to gauge his reaction. It is quite clear that, though he has spent some time considering that moment, trying to recapture, perhaps, that strange and unprecedented sensation of purposefully shared thought, he has yet to see this particular aspect of the event. He leans back against the screen, hands resting behind him on the bookshelf and fingers curling around its edge, and looks down at the toe of his boots. Spock knows more questions will come. But for now, he lets him consider and assimilate this new perspective.

After a long moment, Kirk asks, "Has he ever done that before?"

"Not since he first learned to control the ability," Spock replies. "On Vulcan, where everyone—" he falters, despite himself, looks away and then lies to himself, tells himself Kirk did not notice the second's pause, "—where everyone was a touch telepath, it was essential that we all learned to control the ability. We all know how to form mental barriers to ensure that we share none of our emotions, and allow no one else access in return. Even though we touch casually less often than humans do, it is still a necessary precaution, to avoid chaos. But living on Earth has convinced me that the skill is even more essential here. When I meet another Vulcan, we can protect each other. When I meet a human, we must both rely on my control. It would be unethical for me to take on the emotions of another without his consent, and almost as immoral to send emotion outward to someone who does not understand the ability, who cannot answer, and who cannot control his response to it."

Kirk nods slowly, not because he understands yet, Spock thinks, but to show he is listening, taking everything in. "I don't think Sevin was trying to hurt me," he says, at last. "He was sending me positive feelings—I can't really describe it, but I felt calm, peaceful."

"I know that he was trying to help," Spock answers. "He knew that he had asked you to bring up a difficult memory and he wanted to take away any sadness he had inspired in you. It was an understandable, perhaps even laudable, instinct. But, I hope you understand, not one that either of us can encourage in him."

"Oh, no, I'm not going to contradict you on any of this stuff," Kirk promises quickly. "I didn't mean it that way. I'm just—still trying to wrap my mind around this. How can you control this all the time? Isn't that exhausting? Especially for a kid?"

Spock has never considered creating and maintain mental barriers to be 'exhausting.' He cannot remember a time when he did not have them; they are a part of him, like his lungs, and he can strengthen them or take them down or manipulate them in the same way he can force himself to take deep or shallow breaths. But he does not know how to explain this, not when Kirk is watching him with such an open, curious expression on his face; not when he seems, for a moment, almost on the verge of stepping forward and closing the space still between them. Every sentence that forms seems to die on the tip of Spock's tongue.

At last, all he knows to say is, "This is part of who we are. For most of us, the methods of controlling the ability feel as innate as the ability itself. Even Sevin, a child raised on Earth, knows both how to manipulate his telepathic abilities and that using them as he did with you is wrong."

A long pause follows, during which Kirk simply stares at him, during which Spock finds himself unable to do anything but return the stare himself.

"I still think it was pretty impressive," Kirk says finally, the start of a smile curling up at the corners of his mouth. "From my human perspective at least."

Spock nods briefly. "It did appear to be a deft use of the ability," he concedes, and Kirk's smile turns into a grin.

"But you still have the ability. I mean, as a race. Do you really just spend your whole life pretending it doesn't exist?" he asks. His voice is brighter now, whatever was tentative in his manner gone as if a tension has broken, as if something unsaid has finally been uttered, or some permission granted. Spock feels himself more at ease, too, in turn.

"No. Telepathy does have a variety of acceptable uses," he answers. "Some telepathic bonds form on their own, like those between a parent and a child. Others are created, like those between spouses in a bonding ceremony. To share through a bond is as much a part of our culture as is the use of mental barriers."

"Wait—" Kirk's voice is infused with a sharp confusion, and Spock realizes too late that the concept of a telepathic bond might be too strange to introduce so abruptly. "Do you have a bond like that with Sevin? What does that—what does that even mean?"

"I do. It was strongest when he was a newborn, when he needed me the most. By now it is," he pauses, the slightest furrow forming between his eyebrows as he tries to put the feeling of the link as it now exists into words. "By now it is weak. I do not feel his presence through it, rather—it allows an ease of telepathic communication between us, through touch, if we wished it. Already it is little more than that." The thought is a sobering one, a sad one—his son has already grown so much since the day, barely more than eight years ago, when Spock first held him in his arms—and he hopes Kirk cannot see this emotion in his face. Something in his own expression tells Spock that he does.

"It's…more than I have," he says, at last, and leans back again so that Spock notices for the first time that he was, a moment ago, just on the verge of stepping forward instead. Then he shrugs. "I mean, as far as I know I've never…felt that connection with him."

This thought does not come as a surprise, exactly, but still something in it brings Spock up short. Why should Kirk miss this connection, he asks himself, that is of a sort he has never known and hardly even contemplated? And yet, how can he not miss it, such an integral part of parenthood, a bond that started to form, for Spock, before their child was even born? He does not know what to say.

"Do you think it's because I'm human?" Kirk asks. "Is it just not possible for me to feel that? Or is it because I wasn't there when he was born?"

"I—do not know," Spock admits. "Our situation is, after all, unprecedented in its particulars." He runs his thumb across the corner of the book he still holds in his hands, looking down at it, because he knows if he looks up, he'll find Kirk watching him and he does not want to meet that gaze. "It is possible," he continues, slowly, "for humans to learn something of our telepathic techniques. To wall off their thoughts from telepathic intrusion. To accept telepathic thought. To form marriage bonds with Vulcans." He does not have to explain, of course, how he knows this to be true. "Yet it requires considerable practice, dedication, discipline. Even a biological bond might not form automatically with one who is not versed in our traditions."

"I guess that makes sense," Kirk concedes, though his voice is quiet and distant, and speaks to his own drifting thoughts. "It's certainly," he adds, louder, after a moment, "it's certainly hard to wrap my head around, from my Earth perspective."

"What is the most puzzling aspect of it?" Spock asks. He is not exactly changing the subject, but he is drawing it away from these dangerous, personal, places that it is threatening to invade. Or at least, he is trying to.

But then Kirk answers, "How intimate it is," and he knows he has not stepped away from the whirlpool, but fallen into it, and that it might be more than he can stand to pull himself free. He looks up. Kirk is staring at him, just as Spock knew he would be, and his eyes shine such a clear blue that Spock can almost forgive him for the indecent, unprofessional, much too intimate thoughts he inspires, despite all of Spock's best efforts to keep his mind calm.

"We don't have anything like that on Earth," Kirk is saying. "I know you said it's not like a mind meld, which was—" He touches his temple, seems not even to notice his own gesture, and his eyes go wide just for a moment. Spock tilts his head, curious. "Which was actually a bit terrifying and completely beyond anything I could even describe but—even just to be able to touch someone and know something about him that can't be put into words…" He trails off, shaking his head. "I think there's something beautiful about that, but also frightening. I guess," his tone shifts, and his posture too, as a new thought comes to him. "I guess the closest humans have to that level of intimacy is sex."

Spock narrows his eyes and pretends the comment meant nothing to him, pretends it does not affect him at all to be talking about sex, or intimacy, or closeness, with Jim Kirk. "I am not sure the comparison is apt."

He expects some degree of argument, but Kirk only concedes, "Maybe not." Still, he won't look away and Spock can't read the expression on his face anymore. "Sex just gives the illusion of intimacy, a lot of the time. A way of pretending you know someone better than you do."

"The same can be said of touch telepathy," Spock replies. "I would not overestimate the importance of the ability, Captain."

"Jim."

Spock is used to the correction, but it does not usually sound like this: quiet and serious, gentle, a careful request.

"Jim," he repeats.

In the thoughtful silence that follows, he finds himself noticing for the first time the quiet of the ship, a unique quiet that comes from empty spaces and slowly deepening night. They are the only two on board, and though they're still docked in the city, they could be, for how far away San Francisco seems, lightyears away and out among the stars. And in this quiet, he finds himself thinking thoughts he has no right to think. Memories best left alone rise up to the forefront of his mind. Desires he thought he had buried threaten to flare again.

On the night they first met, he told himself that he would keep his control. He believed, because he had never known anything else, that he could. He had kissed the human boy, touched him, hands to skin and skin to bare skin, and throughout he'd held on to his barriers and defenses like a lifeline for the drowning, because he could not either risk knowing or being known. He had tried. He had believed himself in control because to do otherwise, to admit that he was lost on a foreign planet, with a stranger in a stranger's bed, was a risk not just to his safety but to everything he knew, to his own understanding and knowledge of himself. But with the human boy inside him, he'd reached for a different anchor, one more primal and ancient—the instinctive sense that closeness needed closeness, that his uncertainty warranted reassurance—and he'd opened those gates, felt the boy's desire and something else, something he remembers now as affection, something that he thinks now might have been beyond them both, beyond their time and their existence, flowing through them both: a need for each other, connecting them.

He had lied to himself. He'd told himself he was still in control. But he sees now that he wasn't. Emotions—his, another's, feelings Jim perhaps doesn't remember, perhaps couldn't even understand—had carried him away.

"It's just, I can see it," Jim's voice says, and for a moment, Spock is so startled, brought back from so far away, that he does not understand. See? See what Spock was seeing? Impossible. He jerks his head up, knows there's shock on his face, but Jim isn't looking at him; his own expression is distant and his own thoughts have wandered, too, Spock cannot know how far. "I can see the appeal," he's saying. "That's what I'm trying to say. In being able to get across something, like a feeling, that you can't explain or define with words."

"Yet touch telepathy is as imperfect as any form of communication," Spock answers, slowly. Forming words feels like finding his voice again, returning to himself carefully. He takes a step closer, and returns the book to the shelf, letting his touch linger for a moment against the spine as he ensures that it won't fall. He and Jim are standing so much closer, now, than they were. "We are always limited by our flawed ability to articulate what we wish to say and by the boundaries of our trust in one another."

Jim huffs out a sound that Spock takes for grudging, perhaps slightly amused, agreement. The corner of his mouth twitches up; he tilts his head and looks at Spock with something, some expression Spock cannot quite read, about his eyes. Thoughtfulness, maybe. Or fondness. "Do you ever think," he asks, "what that means for us?"

"Us?"

"Yeah, you and me. I mean, what I'm asking—"

Spock feels a touch to his sleeve, just above his wrist, what he takes at first for a random, impulsive gesture meant only to get his attention. But Jim is looking at him carefully, and he does not pull his hand away even when Spock returns his gaze.

"I'm asking if you trust me."

It is only a coincidence, Spock tells himself, that he was so recently remembering their night together in Iowa, that the echo of the human boy's question (Do you trust me still?) is so precisely primed to rise up in his thoughts. For Jim, the words are eight years in the past, impossibly distant, perhaps entirely forgotten. But for Spock they trigger flashes of memory that make the tips of his ears burn. He has to clear his throat before he answers, "Of course I do. I could not serve on your ship otherwise. It would be more appropriate for me to ask this question of you."

Jim lets his hand drop from Spock's sleeve, shifts his weight from one foot to the other, but Spock is glad for the pause, would not believe any answer given too quickly. "Yeah, I do," Jim says finally. "Not trusting you is like—fighting an instinct. It just feels wrong. So if we do trust each other, can we be honest with each other?"

Spock opens his mouth to answer, closes it again, then forms a few careful, perfect words: "I do not understand your meaning."

This is not precisely true. He might understand, he might hope he understands, he might be afraid he understands. His whole body is set, primed, coiled, like an animal on the defense, thinking it might still jump.

"I'm not accusing you of anything," Jim assures him quickly. "I'm just—there's a lot unsaid here," he gestures, short, between them, "don't you think?" Then he pushes up the sleeve of his shirt and holds out his arm, an awkward, uncertain movement that, for just a moment, Spock does not understand at all how to read. "There's a lot that I want to say that I don't have the words for. I know I don't really know what I'm doing or how this works at all—and maybe this is some humongous Vulcan faux-pas, I don't know. I'm just… asking you to let me try."

It is not Spock's habit to ask questions with obvious answers, but still he finds himself staring at the inside of Jim's wrist, a slash of blue vein there, a hint of tendon beneath the skin, and simply to buy time, he asks, "You would like to communicate telepathically with me?"

"Yes." He sounds certain for that one word, then his confidence abruptly breaks. "If—like I said, if that's something we can do."

"You are not concerned with what you may learn of me, or I of you?"

Jim sticks his arm out further. "Just show me what to do."

It would be a risk, Spock knows. Even at their best, emotions are complicated, messy. They muddy coherent thought; they cause confusion where logic would allow clarity and simplicity. That is why they are best controlled, walled away if necessary. Yet he has never been adept at walling away his feelings when it comes to Jim Kirk. They threaten always to overrun his ordered mind, are constantly on the verge of slipping free of his control, of endangering, he fears, everything he's worked so long and so carefully to build. If he were to take down his mental barriers and they were to touch, Jim could learn all of this.

Worse, he could learn that Spock almost does not care. He is learning, slowly but he is, and steadily so, to accept and even to embrace that which cannot be named and cannot be controlled. And that is why he rolls up his sleeve and reaches out to Jim in turn. Perhaps, when they touch, Jim will feel the pleasant warmth and strange sense of calm that Spock feels at every quiet moment spent together, every gaze that lingers too long, every accidental brush of arm against arm. And perhaps there is nothing wrong in this.

He has not put a name to this feeling. But he has known, for some time now, what it is.

"Any thought on the forefront of your mind will pass between us," he warns. "Not in words or images, but in—impressions, sensations."

"I understand." Jim nods, and takes a deep breath, and as Spock's skin touches his skin, fingers against the inside of his arm and Jim's fingers pressing tentatively below his pulse in turn, he sees Jim's eyes close, and he closes his too.

What he feels first is a strong surge of affection and respect, pleasant and serene, a sure-footed feeling that gives him confidence. But as it flows through him, the emotion deepens, and he feels reliance there too, and then, seeping through him like water through parched soil, a deep sense of need. This need might be that of a Captain for his First—might be—but is emphatically not such a need. It is suffused with desire and want, a yearning for closeness of every possible sort. Brief flashes of long-forgotten feeling illuminate every nerve, the instincts that first brought them together, the spark of a new curiosity that Jim, a stranger and an alien, a fascinating new being, once ignited in him, all brought to the surface and given depth and power from something else, some feeling that is unnamable because it is unbelievable, because it comes from beyond them both, from a time and a place that neither will ever know. They are still touching. They are standing even closer than before, and though Spock barely knows his body, he knows that there is a hand just above his hip and underneath his own fingers the curve of the back of Jim's neck, and that his forehead is touching Jim's forehead, and that his lungs are struggling to breathe. But every second takes him farther from his body as he's always known it and closer to a different sort of physicality, based on touch, on connection, and he's clinging to the very core of the emotions Jim is sending to him, or discovering in him, or both, feelings beyond all language, a sense that he's found a part of himself that has been missing. He feels safe. And so fiercely protective of that feeling that he grabs onto Jim's arm and the back of his neck and can't let go, cannot, until he is, until all points of contact become fainter and the emotions wash back like a wave away from the shore, and only their foreheads touch, and then not at all.

But they're still standing very close.

Jim is taking deep breaths. Spock doesn't remember opening his eyes, but he's watching a spot just below Jim's shoulder, as it moves inward and outward again with each intake and outtake of breath.

"Is that—is this—normal?" Jim's ragged, quiet voice asks. He sounds almost scared. And Spock cannot blame him, because the only emotion left to his own ravaged self is fear. "Is this a…standard psychic overload backlash or….or something?"

Spock shakes his head. The movement is slow, but makes him dizzy nonetheless, and he closes his eyes for just a moment to find his balance again. "No. I am—I apologize—Jim, I should not have even allowed—"

"Don't. Spock. I asked, didn't I?"

When he looks up, he sees that Jim is already staring at him. Staring, but not impatient: there's nothing expectant in his gaze, just thoughtful appreciation, as if he could look at Spock like this all day, and maybe, if Spock asked, he'd say he could. At the edge of his gaze, Spock sees Jim's hands jerk forward, as if he wanted to take Spock's hands, as if he feared to do so.

Gently, Spock rolls the sleeve of his uniform shirt down again, then does the same to Jim's. "I am," he promises, wrapping his fingers around Jim's wrists, watching as Jim's fingers wrap around his wrists in turn, "in control again, I assure you."

"But you're still not going for skin to skin contact," Jim points out, the statement almost a question, and he's not pulling back—the toes of his boots touch the toes of Spock's boots.

"I do not want to assume you are ready. However…difficult for me, that experience could only have been more overwhelming for you, given your inexperience with telepathic communication." He answers with a calm that surprises even himself, but all he wants is to hold Jim's face between his hands, feel the outtakes of Jim's breath against his lips. His grasp on his own self-control has never felt more tenuous, nor more necessary.

Jim lets out an uneven breath that might be a laugh, a one-note bit of self-deprecating, self-protecting laughter, which is nevertheless confusing, and makes Spock's eyebrows furrow low between his eyes. "Spock," he says, in his bright human voice, the word lifting up like the corner of his mouth in its half-smile, "Spock I have no idea what I'm ready for. Especially not after…whatever that was. But I do know that I really, really, want to kiss you right now. You're going to have to teach me some of this mental-barrier stuff so I learn not to say things like this in the future but it's—it's the only thing going through my head right now—"

Spock drops Jim's wrists, closes the last centimeters of space between them, pulls him forward with his hands fisted in the fabric of Jim's uniform shirt, and kisses him.

At first, the kiss is an uncoordinated, confused, jumbled mess: a huff of surprise exhaled into his mouth, hands that grab at his hips, hips that bump against his hips, the harsh scrape of fabric against his still-sensitive fingertips. Undifferentiated panic blaring through his mind. Then a brief and total loss of contact, Jim pulling back, filling his lungs with a deep and audible breath, and before Spock can even open his eyes again, a gentler press of lips against his lips.

The second kiss still feels urgent, and the deep, pressing need for closeness makes him run his hands down Jim's chest, then wrap his arms around him, hands splayed against his back, but a sense of calm has flowed through him, too: he's on fire, but the flame is steady, in no danger of consuming everything around it and then, lacking oxygen, lacking fuel, burning itself out. He opens his mouth to an experimental, questioning press of tongue, feels a dart of tongue against his lips and teeth.

Except for these explorations—a twist of tongue, a slight adjustment of angle, a shifting of weight from foot to foot or press of fingertips against hip—they are still. Only the kiss matters, only the kiss and the warm, pleasant buzz of closeness and connection it creates, a calm sense of intimacy Spock would ill be able to put into words.

When Jim pulls away, it is only to press his forehead against Spock's and breathe. Spock can hear each breath, can feel each breath as if it were his own. One of Jim's hands is at the back of his neck, and the only movement between them, except for the expansion and contraction of their lungs and the beating of their hearts, is the flexing of Jim's fingers as he slides them through Spock's hair.

"I believe I would be a poor choice of teacher," Spock murmurs, "for someone who wants to learn control."

Jim laughs, a quiet, soft laugh that sends a pleasant warmth right through Spock, from the core of him and out. Then he kisses him again, a short and light but still decisive kiss. An affectionate kiss.

"I don't know about that," he answers. "It's taken us this long to get here, hasn't it? That has to be a sign of something."

"Caution? Prudence? A sense of responsibility to our profession and family?"

Jim presses his nose against Spock's nose and smiles—Spock can tell by the sound of his voice that he's smiling. "Spock, the entire Klingon armada couldn't pull me away from you right now and that's exactly the way I want it to be. I know that's not responsible, but I just… I don't care right now, you know?"

"I do know, Jim. Very well." Too well. He's brought up the strongest, the simplest of his mental barriers; he knows no more emotion will slip from skin to skin; but it hardly matters. He does not need touch telepathy, nor human intuition, to recognize the feelings broadcast in every slight movement, every low-spoken word. And he can no more hide from or deny those feelings as they echo within him than he can separate himself from this embrace. He does not think. He leans into another kiss, this one sweet and simple and soft. And a second, which lingers too long. And a third.

Jim slides his hands to Spock's chest and for a moment, a half-second, Spock thinks that this gesture will become a shove, that he is being pushed away. But instead Jim's fingers curl in the fabric of his shirt and he pulls him, blindly, step by staggered step as they kiss, backward through the doorway and to the bed.

x

Afterward, he fixes himself up as well as he can. From next to him, he hears the echo of another zipper, and when he looks to his left, he sees Jim lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling. He seems to sense Spock's gaze, because he looks over at him and smiles in a self-deprecating, reassuring way. Spock is expecting a joke—what humans do, he's learned, to dispel an uncomfortable moment. But the first thing Jim says to him is: "You all right?"

He nods simply. He is not sure if this is the truth. Yet he feels, perhaps merely a corollary to orgasm or an aftershock of pleasure, only an irrational calm. After his first sexual encounter, he felt a painful emptiness, an anticlimactic realization of finality that left him hollow, and which he forced aside through a focus on what practical details were left to him: taking a shower, getting dressed, returning to his hotel. But to read finality into this moment would be foolish indeed. He's not sure what they have destroyed and what they have built, but he knows that this is not an end.

"Are you?" he asks.

For some reason, this question makes Jim grin, wide and bright like laughter isn't far off, and he nods, and answers, "Think so. Might need to throw my uniform in the wash when I get home, though." He stretches, then sighs with a satisfaction that is almost obscene. Spock finds that he cannot stop watching him. Every small movement, every detail of expression, is both fascinating and quite pleasing to him, he might say beautiful, and there is a comfortable lack of urgency in the moment that makes observation that much more pleasant. He is in no hurry to speak. Jim, too, seems to accept the silence as it is.

What has happened, the suddenness of it, the intensity but also the crudity, the surrender to a passion he so rarely allows himself, seems already to be receding into the distance of the unreal, as if it were a particularly vivid dream or fantasy. And yet Jim is still next to him. Their legs and arms touch in the narrow space. Small reminders of reality, like the uncomfortable position of his arm, or the sound of Jim's breath, too close and too loud in the small room, do more than reason or meditation could to bring him back to himself. And slowly, into the quiet, logic reasserts itself. He reminds himself that he has been undisciplined, careless, reckless; that breakdowns of control are forbidden to him, and for good reason; that by any objective measure this encounter was a mistake.

Yet only subjective measures—the warm bloom of agreeable feeling spreading through his chest, not happiness, but an odd and unexpected contentment—seem to matter.

"You know what, Spock?" The words float up slowly next to him. He glances over and watches as Jim leans up on one elbow, looks down at him with casual curiosity. "That's really not how I was expecting it to happen. Us."

Spock nods slowly, thoughtfully, in turn. "Nor did I anticipate quite such a…hurried encounter." He glances down at his wrinkled shirt, the button on his trousers still obscenely undone. As he watches, Jim's hand slides across his stomach, low, just over his hips, until his arm is slung possessively across him, and the gesture makes the pleasurable warm feeling in Spock's chest that much stronger. "I did not predict that we would be, quite literally, in uniform."

"So you have…thought about it?" The words are light, inquisitive rather than teasing, and Jim punctuates the question by leaning and pressing a kiss to Spock's neck, just below his ear. "You said anticipated. You thought something would happen between us?"

"I considered the possibility in the abstract sense," Spock corrects. "I did not think it at all likely, however—"

"You fantasized."

It is illogical, given their current position and recent activities, but for some reason it is this word that makes the tips of his ears burn green. He flicks his gaze over to Jim. He sees the smile on his face, small, just there at the corners of his mouth like he's trying to be serious and failing, a smile not at Spock's expense at all but born from pure and reckless happiness. And he feels safe enough answering, "If you insist on phrasing it that way."

"Mmmm." He's starting to kiss along the line of Spock's shoulder now, which should perhaps be irritating, but isn't, and Spock dares to rest his hand along Jim's arm. "I considered a few scenarios, too. Not in that much detail, but they definitely involved actually undressing."

"That is surprising."

"That I want to see you naked?" Jim looks up, exaggerated confusion on his face, and Spock looks away again, up to the far corner of the room, pretending to be irritated.

"That your scenarios were not detailed."

"Oh. Well, I... I didn't want to encourage myself too much. I didn't want to let myself think we could have something that's so..." He trails off, but the taste of the word forbidden is already there on the back of Spock's tongue; he knows what Jim doesn't want to say. Jim's gaze, a moment before wandering with unexpected, unfair tenderness across Spock's features, trails away just as his words did, to some spot on the wall behind Spock's head. "I do this all the time. I know all the rational reasons I shouldn't do something but then I just think... but it feels so right."

"That is why you are Captain of this ship," Spock reminds him. "You have an instinct that cannot be taught."

Jim just shakes his head. "It gets me in trouble. It gets other people in trouble. I know, I'm starting to figure out, how I feel about you—" He hesitates over the words, an ill-fitting awkwardness to them, then forces himself to go on. "But I've been caught up in that before. And if something happens and it hurts you or our son—"

"Something has already happened, Jim."

The interruption seems to catch him off guard, and he tilts his head to catch Spock's gaze again. A beat, a pause, and he is suddenly smiling. The expression is almost self-deprecating and dangerously disarming. "Yeah, I guess it has," he agrees.

Then he pulls himself a little closer and hesitantly rests the palm of his hand against Spock's cheek. The grin fades from his face, and he only looks fond. Spock wraps an arm around him, pulls him down until their noses bump, until they have met in another slow and languid kiss.

When Jim pulls away, it is only to murmur low against Spock's lips: "What are we supposed to do now?"

"I do not know." And he truly does not. He understands the unspoken. He understands self-denial. He understands fulfilling duty over succumbing to desire, understands following set paths, and maintaining order throughout every facet of his life. These were his earliest lessons, now the pillars of his adult life, but they have ill prepared him for this. He does not know what to do when emotion, messy and dangerous and unaccountable, a looming weakness, asserts itself with such force that it can be neither mastered nor ignored. He does not know what to do when feeling so upsets his balance that it leaves him upended, uncertain of everything, even himself. All he can do is tell himself, with a calm he does not know will survive the night, that perhaps there is a new sort of balance to be found, now.

Jim collapses down, the solid weight of him a comfort against Spock's chest and side, his nose tucked in against Spock's neck. "I guess I'll accept that answer," he concedes. "Not on the mission, though. I'll need real answers from my top adviser, First Officer."

"Captain," Spock answers, both ignoring, and hyper-aware of, the slight, random kiss he feels pressed against his neck, "I will always endeavor to provide you with the wisest counsel I can, given the information available to me."

"I know. That's why you're my right hand." The words are tinged with a smile, lazy and content; Spock sees it as Jim leans up on his elbow again, looks down at him with something like awe, and Spock finds himself thinking that yes, they will wait, they will let themselves simply not know for now. It is not prudent and it is not safe. Yet the risk is a fair price for this moment.

He already knows that a moment can reverberate for years, that a single, simple moment, just like this, can go on to change a whole life.

end part two