Fic: Love, Actually
Title: Love, Actually, Part One
Author: Saffy
Beta: Um...All mistakes mine
Series: STXI
Rating: NC 17 eventually
Length: 3,500 words for this part
Warnings: Can't think of any currently...flangst, maybe?
Summary: Everyone knows Spock loves Kirk, apart from Spock himself. With seven days till Valentine's, will a cranky doctor, a couple of Andorians, Spock's own older self from an alternate universe and his long-lost brother be able to convince him that Kirk's his one twue love?
This has nothing in common with the movie Love, Actually, except for the countdown format and some good looking guys in the lead roles. No Colin Firth, I'm afraid. And no Hugh Grant doing his little dance...sigh.
For this prompt: The leader of a telepathic/empathic race the Enterprise comes across, senses unrequited love in both Kirk and Spock.
SEVEN DAYS 'TIL VALENTINE'S
James Kirk rolled out of bed reluctantly, ran both hands through his (thankfully short, so not too sleep-mussed) hair, and padded over to the comm unit. He pulled on a black Starfleet-issue undershirt dredged up from one pile or another and attempted to look both professional and awake. Right. After yet another fitful night.
Jim silenced the beeping of the unit. "Yes?" he asked of the cheerful face that appeared onscreen. If his tone was a little tetchy, Kirk thought he couldn't be held responsible. Fifteen more minutes and his alarm would have gone off anyway, but perhaps by then the dream he'd been having - which had involved his first officer Spock looking up at him wantonly from a position on his knees, hands grasped around Kirk's hips - would've come to a more satisfactory conclusion. Which was the only way any of his recent fantasies about Spock could come to a satisfactory conclusion, Jim thought with a touch of self-pity. The way dream-Spock's eyes had looked up at him so intensely, his lips stretched full around Jim's cock...gah. Kirk shook his head.
"Sir, we've just received new orders," said the overeager Ensign on the bridge. "I'm relaying them to you now."
Kirk's glance dropped to the bottom of the screen, where Command clearly told him to reroute to Andoria and then carry on to New Vulcan with some additional passengers aboard. Possibly this information could have waited fifteen more minutes, but he gave the enthusiastic Ensign a bleary smile anyway. The kid looked like she was desperately trying to please the captain by following protocol to the letter. It wasn't her fault ... Singh, was it?... that she didn't know the Captain well enough yet to know he wasn't exactly a schedule stickler. And the poor girl was stuck on the most unenviable shift on the ship.
"Alright, Singh," he said, and she lit up at the mention of her name - Kirk was just happy to have remembered it at this time of the morning - "Divert course to the Andor system. Warp factor 5, please," he said, calculating time of arrival quickly. Enough time to have breakfast and make himself presentable to welcome the slew of Vulcan passengers that they were apparently now transporting.
More Vulcans. He looked over the roster of names but didn't recognize anybody in particular. At this point, a year and a half after the destruction of Vulcan, they were reduced to picking up any stragglers who had been serving on non-Vulcan ships, or who'd made lives for themselves elsewhere in the galaxy. Some of them had been posted long-term to deep space stations or observation platforms. A few were crewing civilian transports or mercantile ships, or had been part of Federation colonies on remote planets. Whatever their reasons, these Vulcans hadn't been anywhere near their planet when it was destroyed, but now wanted to reunite with their decimated people on the new Vulcan homeworld.
Jim could understand this impulse. It was logical - and, undeniably, emotional - and so he hadn't resented it when Enterprise had been assigned to play ferry in this way for quite a while. In fact, Jim had gotten an unprecedented chance to meet Vulcans of all shapes and sizes (so to speak: there was more physiological uniformity amongst Vulcans than most species, Jim had found). It was an incredible experience. Perhaps no human besides Amanda Grayson had spent so much time with individual Vulcans, and Jim had treasured the hours he'd spent learning to play logic games with the (mostly orphaned and wholly adorable) Vulcan kids, cooking odd vegetarian meals in the officer's galley with renowned chef Srepak, or being schooled in 3D chess by ... any one of the Vulcans on board. Kirk learned about Vulcan cultural history from T'sel, took much-needed language lessons from Sirik, and generally stayed out of T'Pau's way: the powerful clan leader kind of scared him.
None of them compared, however, in Jim's estimation, with one half-Vulcan that he had no plans to surrender to the fledgling Vulcan colony any time soon.
He'd served with Spock for eighteen months now, and it had been a pleasant surprise to find out just how well they could work together. Not at first, of course. Their early arguments were legendary, as their approaches to every aspect of life - ship's business, leisure, relationships, traditions, new experiences - were so different. A month into the mission they'd had an hour-long argument about the correct way to hold a phaser, for pity's sake! (Kirk still maintained that his grip was the right one).
In addition to their rocky start, Jim was learning the ropes of captainhood and the day-to-day operations of a Constitution-class starship, and Spock was healing from the loss of his home planet and his beloved parent...it was a lot to deal with. Things were never bound to go completely smoothly between them at first.
But enough time spent in each other's company cured that. They were constantly thrown together on command issues: leading meetings and away missions; keeping the crew in line; debriefing the department heads; drawing up duty rosters and project assignments and repair schedules.
There were some things they could only discuss with each other, and that often led to shared meals in the officers' mess or in one of their quarters. They began to spend a fair portion of their off-duty time together, challenging each other in the practice ring, walking the length of the ship steeped in some debate, or staring intently at a chess board, neither willing to give in.
When it came down to it, they were both extremely intelligent men who relished a challenge. The challenge of each other was perhaps the biggest, or at least the most interesting, either had ever faced.
For Kirk, the problem began when he realized just how well-matched they were. He'd been unable to think of Spock completely platonically since he and Uhura had parted ways four months into the Enterprise's mission, and a year later had made the massive mistake of letting his feelings for Spock get the better of him one night.
He winced as the memory came back: a night of consulting over unfinished PADDwork in Kirk's quarters had turned into a bit of a social call; they were chatting freely and Kirk had consumed a glass or two of a garnet-coloured Rigellian wine. He was feeling generally happy and carefree. Spock had long since relaxed his work stance and was almost sprawling next to Kirk in his chair. Well, sprawling for a Vulcan, anyway. Suddenly, there seemed to be no reason in the galaxy to withhold certain information from Spock. Stuff like how attractive he thought Spock was, every part of his lean, gorgeous body, from his beautiful jawline to his lovely pointed ears to his intense chocolate eyes. Stuff like how Kirk thought he might want to give that hand-kissing thing a try (he'd seen Spock and Uhura do it one day in the officer's mess and found his eyes helplessly drawn to it ever since), or spend some time perfecting the good old human method of kissing with Spock.
Or how Kirk found his thoughts turned, more and more frequently, to his first officer. Whereas Jim had been happily venturing through life just fine on his own before, now he seemed to need Spock's opinion on everything, from the inane to the essential. Spock's say was critical on matters as varied as Jim's new dress uniform (did it showcase his ass properly?); to the latest gossip in FleetNews Monthly (was the El-Aurian Commodore RejTan really having an affair with her half-Cardassian assistant? And if so, how did that work?); to the probable location of the next neutral zone border skirmish.
Kirk kind of needed Spock now, needed him in every part of his life.
True, Kirk had fumbled through expressing all this, but his feelings had been sincerely stated, and his heart was full of Spock and what the two of them could be to one another. Jim had never said such things to anyone else before - had never felt these sort of things before in order to say them. He hadn't arranged his sentences well, frankly, but he was surprised at the ease with which the words appeared. He really meant them.
But they had barely tripped out of his mouth when Spock had given him such a cold, withering look that Kirk had almost fallen out of his chair. Spock had peeled Jim's fingers off of his forearm, which they'd somehow latched onto, and made it quite clear, quite quickly, that Jim's declarations were not reciprocated.
"Captain," he'd started, and Jim knew he was in trouble when ranks were slammed back into place, "I must inform you that I do not share your attraction, nor do I hold such expectations for our future together. Whilst I admire you as an individual, and appreciate the friendship we have forged, I do not view you as a potential romantic partner. I hope our working relationship is not adversely affected by these revelations. I hold it in high regard."
Kirk had been absolutely mortified. He'd never sobered up so fast in his life.
"No, Spock, of course...that is to say... I mean...No. I won't bring this up again. I'm sorry, man. It won't affect our command."
Kirk had tried to prevent the heartbreak from showing on his face and somehow retain a little dignity. Plucking up the last reserves of his courage, he said, "I hope I haven't offended you Spock," and flexed and unflexed his fingers, bringing his betraying hand to rest on the back of his own neck. Jim realized that all his human feelings - all his love and lust and affection and admiration - had leeched through that hand on Spock's arm, and had obviously been deeply unpleasant for the Vulcan. If he didn't share Jim's feelings, it must have been distasteful.
"No, Captain. You have not offended me, and I would not object to starting anew tomorrow morning," Spock had said. 'Starting anew,' Jim would come to realize, meant 'let's pretend this little episode never happened'.
Spock bid him goodnight, gathered his working PADDs together and promptly left.
Kirk had crumpled backwards against his own door, feeling more rejected than he ever had in his life. And that was saying something.
Lord, had he really said 'intense chocolate eyes'? It may have been how he felt, but he really needed to learn to keep his mouth shut. And keep his flowery descriptions of Spock's person to himself. All in all, a spectacularly unsuccessful attempt to move things in a different direction.
Two months had passed since that debacle, and though Kirk found himself hoping that time might heal all wounds, it was pretty clear that Spock wasn't interested, and Jim's wounds were sort of festering. He was miserable. It wasn't that Spock was difficult to work with now - of course he was the consummate professional - and Jim was pasting on his bravest face every day and plumbing his deepest reserves of professional detachment. Their working relationship was just fine; socially, however, to say things were stilted would be an understatement.
These maudlin musings were interrupted by Kirk's alarm actually going off. Oh-six-hundred, then, and time to get a move on.
He pulled his shirt off once more and prepared for his morning shower, but wasn't able to actually begin, as two things happened simultaneously: his comm unit beeped again and his door chime let him know someone was outside. He stood in the centre of the room, sleepily trying to figure out which one to address first, when the door to his quarters simply slid open and in walked Spock, perfectly awake and beautifully groomed. Of course. Kirk rolled his eyes internally.
"Good morning, Commander. Hang on a sec...," and Kirk reached for the toggle to activate the comm unit again. Staring at him from the viewscreen was Spock. Well, the other Spock. Spock the First? He had no idea what to call the man, so he settled on, "Ambassador. Good morning."
Jim turned back to his own Spock. It hadn't occurred to him that he was half-naked until he saw his first officer contemplating him with a look he read as "Get your shirt back on, you caveman." Not that either Spock would ever say such a thing, of course.
"Excuse my state of undress," Jim said, mainly to the Ambassador, "I was just about to head to the sonics. What can I do for you?" he thought it best to ignore Spock the Younger for the moment, and began looking around for something to cover up with. Wow, his rooms were really messy. No doubt that was impressing Spock too. Sigh.
"Do not concern yourself about it, Jim. It is good to ... see you," said the Ambassador, with a pause and a little quirk of his lips. That pulled Jim's attention fully to the vidscreen, where Ambassador Spock stared for some seconds at Jim's naked chest and then winked. Actually winked. Oh my god. Was the Ambassador flirting with him? Could a Vulcan even do that?
"My Jim was partial to wandering around wearing too few garments as well, Captain," continued the Ambassador. Kirk noted the possessive in front of his name. "In fact, he and I began to make bets at the beginning of an away mission as to whether he would return to the ship with his uniform top in tact. Most often he did not manage it."
Jim chuckled. Clearly some things were universal constants. "So who won?"
"As I most frequently bet against the shirt remaining whole, I was usually the winner, Jim. I think my Captain kept hoping to prove me wrong, however." Spock said this with an almost wistful look at his Captain's pig-headedness, and Jim offered a little smile. "It hardly mattered, though, as his shirts were normally in ruins by the time we got through with them anyway, one way or another. My Jim was quite vigorous." Another slight Spock-smirk, and a suggestive eyebrow-raise. "I suppose I was as well. He did have a substantial supply of extras in our quarters, though - I made certain of that."
Jim was taken aback. What on earth was going on here? By the time we got through with them? Vigorous? Our quarters? Had he and Spock been romantically involved in the other timeline? This was a lot of information to process this early in the morning.
He was just about to ask if they had been lovers, fairly bluntly, when the Commander stepped closer to the comm unit. Jim glanced upwards, noted the thunderous expression on Spock's face, and decided to keep his question to himself.
"Ambassador, please state your reasons for contacting the Captain at this early hour," Spock demanded.
There was a weird pause, where the Ambassador and the Commander locked eyes. Jim glanced between the two of them, bewildered. The way Spock had said 'contacting' made it sound more like 'harrassing', and Jim wanted to assure that this was not the case. But then the Ambassador nodded, as if to himself, and said, "Jim, I shall be waiting on Andoria with the others for transport to Vulcan. I was unsure as to whether you had been informed, as a I am a last-minute addition to the party. This is, of course, to make certain that Sybok has really returned for the reasons he says he has - in my timeline he was quite a disruptive influence. Much later in his lifetime, it is true, but he is powerful at this age, make no mistake."
The Ambassador was looking at Jim as if he expected him to nod solemnly, but as Jim had absolutely no fucking idea what was going on here, he turned to his usual source of information: his own Spock. "Sybok?," he whispered out of a corner of his mouth.
Clearly he hadn't whispered quietly enough, as the Ambassador piped up from his screen, "Have you not yet told Jim about Sybok? I'm not sure that is wise, and you are far enough into the relationship that perhaps he should know..."
"Wait, um, relationship?" JIm said.
"Yes, Jim. You should know about my - our - family," continued the Ambassador, blithely. "My father was bonded, early in life, to a Vulcan woman of noble descent. They had a child together, a son, who was brilliantly intelligent and a gifted telepath. He was raised in the teachings of Surak, as most of my people are, but for his own reasons, rejected them to follow another path. This was the v'tosh ka'tur, the ancient practice of combining logic and emotion. It was thought by the adherents of v'tosh ka'tur that a balance of both could be achieved in the individual through decades of careful meditation. Sybok was sure he had the key, and was beginning to convince others of his findings, when he was exiled from the planet. Sarek was involved. He couldn't stand to see his child, so full of promise, turning against logic. Sybok had the potential to be a powerful force for dissent on Vulcan. Instead, he left to seek out other adherents of the v'tosh ka'tur, whom he believed had been scattered across the galaxy. I was just five years old. But Sybok came to me before he left to explain and bid me goodbye. It was more than many of my family have done for me. I always felt his brotherly regard, and I wish to see if I can help him now, particularly if he wants to reintegrate into Vulcan society. Do you have anything to add, Spock?"
Jim gaped for a bit. Spock had a half-brother? An emotion-loving half-brother? A rebellious emotion-loving half-brother? What the hell was up with this morning?
"No, Ambassador, indeed I think you have explained the situation quite fully," said Spock, the thunderous look back on his face.
"Well, then, I shall get back to my preparations. Jim, I very much look forward to seeing more of you soon, and introducing you to our brother. Live long and prosper, old friend." A tiny smile crinkled the corner of his eyes.
Jim held up his hand too, feeling faintly ridiculous doing the Vulcan salute half-naked. "Peace and long life, Ambassador." They signed off.
Jim whipped his head around to Spock, desperate for some answers. "What on earth was all that about? Did you know that your counterpart was going to be at Andoria too? Did you know about Sybok coming? And why didn't you tell me about him?"
Spock fixed him with a blank look, the kind of look he adopted when he didn't want to reveal too much. Great. This was going to be one of those really helpful Spock moments, thought Kirk with an internal groan. "To answer your questions, Captain, this has nothing to do with Earth; I was unaware that the Ambassador was going to be joining us; I knew of Sybok's return, but regardless of what the Ambassador seems to think, I didn't believe it was necessary to inform you of the existence of our brother. It is a personal matter, not a professional one."
Ouch. "So you weren't really planning on telling me anything about him."
"No, Captain."
"And when he came on board you would have just introduced him as you would any other Vulcan."
"I wasn't particularly planning on introducing him to you, Captain."
Double ouch. "So why are you even here?," asked Kirk. Ha, got you there.
"I was merely ascertaining that you were in a ready state to receive our visitors, Captain. I see that is not currently the case," and here Spock's eyes swept imperiously over Jim's semi-nude person, "and so I shall leave you to make your ablutions."
After he made good on this promise, Kirk looked at the closed door and heaved a sigh of frustration. It was like they were suddenly going in reverse. Spock was now more uptight and reticent than he'd been before they had become friends. How was that even possible? Oh well. At least he'd soon be seeing the older Spock, a Vulcan whom Jim was sure appreciated his company. And he'd be meeting Spock's brother, he'd make sure of that. That would certainly be interesting...
Part two here
Author: Saffy
Beta: Um...All mistakes mine
Series: STXI
Rating: NC 17 eventually
Length: 3,500 words for this part
Warnings: Can't think of any currently...flangst, maybe?
Summary: Everyone knows Spock loves Kirk, apart from Spock himself. With seven days till Valentine's, will a cranky doctor, a couple of Andorians, Spock's own older self from an alternate universe and his long-lost brother be able to convince him that Kirk's his one twue love?
This has nothing in common with the movie Love, Actually, except for the countdown format and some good looking guys in the lead roles. No Colin Firth, I'm afraid. And no Hugh Grant doing his little dance...sigh.
For this prompt: The leader of a telepathic/empathic race the Enterprise comes across, senses unrequited love in both Kirk and Spock.
SEVEN DAYS 'TIL VALENTINE'S
James Kirk rolled out of bed reluctantly, ran both hands through his (thankfully short, so not too sleep-mussed) hair, and padded over to the comm unit. He pulled on a black Starfleet-issue undershirt dredged up from one pile or another and attempted to look both professional and awake. Right. After yet another fitful night.
Jim silenced the beeping of the unit. "Yes?" he asked of the cheerful face that appeared onscreen. If his tone was a little tetchy, Kirk thought he couldn't be held responsible. Fifteen more minutes and his alarm would have gone off anyway, but perhaps by then the dream he'd been having - which had involved his first officer Spock looking up at him wantonly from a position on his knees, hands grasped around Kirk's hips - would've come to a more satisfactory conclusion. Which was the only way any of his recent fantasies about Spock could come to a satisfactory conclusion, Jim thought with a touch of self-pity. The way dream-Spock's eyes had looked up at him so intensely, his lips stretched full around Jim's cock...gah. Kirk shook his head.
"Sir, we've just received new orders," said the overeager Ensign on the bridge. "I'm relaying them to you now."
Kirk's glance dropped to the bottom of the screen, where Command clearly told him to reroute to Andoria and then carry on to New Vulcan with some additional passengers aboard. Possibly this information could have waited fifteen more minutes, but he gave the enthusiastic Ensign a bleary smile anyway. The kid looked like she was desperately trying to please the captain by following protocol to the letter. It wasn't her fault ... Singh, was it?... that she didn't know the Captain well enough yet to know he wasn't exactly a schedule stickler. And the poor girl was stuck on the most unenviable shift on the ship.
"Alright, Singh," he said, and she lit up at the mention of her name - Kirk was just happy to have remembered it at this time of the morning - "Divert course to the Andor system. Warp factor 5, please," he said, calculating time of arrival quickly. Enough time to have breakfast and make himself presentable to welcome the slew of Vulcan passengers that they were apparently now transporting.
More Vulcans. He looked over the roster of names but didn't recognize anybody in particular. At this point, a year and a half after the destruction of Vulcan, they were reduced to picking up any stragglers who had been serving on non-Vulcan ships, or who'd made lives for themselves elsewhere in the galaxy. Some of them had been posted long-term to deep space stations or observation platforms. A few were crewing civilian transports or mercantile ships, or had been part of Federation colonies on remote planets. Whatever their reasons, these Vulcans hadn't been anywhere near their planet when it was destroyed, but now wanted to reunite with their decimated people on the new Vulcan homeworld.
Jim could understand this impulse. It was logical - and, undeniably, emotional - and so he hadn't resented it when Enterprise had been assigned to play ferry in this way for quite a while. In fact, Jim had gotten an unprecedented chance to meet Vulcans of all shapes and sizes (so to speak: there was more physiological uniformity amongst Vulcans than most species, Jim had found). It was an incredible experience. Perhaps no human besides Amanda Grayson had spent so much time with individual Vulcans, and Jim had treasured the hours he'd spent learning to play logic games with the (mostly orphaned and wholly adorable) Vulcan kids, cooking odd vegetarian meals in the officer's galley with renowned chef Srepak, or being schooled in 3D chess by ... any one of the Vulcans on board. Kirk learned about Vulcan cultural history from T'sel, took much-needed language lessons from Sirik, and generally stayed out of T'Pau's way: the powerful clan leader kind of scared him.
None of them compared, however, in Jim's estimation, with one half-Vulcan that he had no plans to surrender to the fledgling Vulcan colony any time soon.
He'd served with Spock for eighteen months now, and it had been a pleasant surprise to find out just how well they could work together. Not at first, of course. Their early arguments were legendary, as their approaches to every aspect of life - ship's business, leisure, relationships, traditions, new experiences - were so different. A month into the mission they'd had an hour-long argument about the correct way to hold a phaser, for pity's sake! (Kirk still maintained that his grip was the right one).
In addition to their rocky start, Jim was learning the ropes of captainhood and the day-to-day operations of a Constitution-class starship, and Spock was healing from the loss of his home planet and his beloved parent...it was a lot to deal with. Things were never bound to go completely smoothly between them at first.
But enough time spent in each other's company cured that. They were constantly thrown together on command issues: leading meetings and away missions; keeping the crew in line; debriefing the department heads; drawing up duty rosters and project assignments and repair schedules.
There were some things they could only discuss with each other, and that often led to shared meals in the officers' mess or in one of their quarters. They began to spend a fair portion of their off-duty time together, challenging each other in the practice ring, walking the length of the ship steeped in some debate, or staring intently at a chess board, neither willing to give in.
When it came down to it, they were both extremely intelligent men who relished a challenge. The challenge of each other was perhaps the biggest, or at least the most interesting, either had ever faced.
For Kirk, the problem began when he realized just how well-matched they were. He'd been unable to think of Spock completely platonically since he and Uhura had parted ways four months into the Enterprise's mission, and a year later had made the massive mistake of letting his feelings for Spock get the better of him one night.
He winced as the memory came back: a night of consulting over unfinished PADDwork in Kirk's quarters had turned into a bit of a social call; they were chatting freely and Kirk had consumed a glass or two of a garnet-coloured Rigellian wine. He was feeling generally happy and carefree. Spock had long since relaxed his work stance and was almost sprawling next to Kirk in his chair. Well, sprawling for a Vulcan, anyway. Suddenly, there seemed to be no reason in the galaxy to withhold certain information from Spock. Stuff like how attractive he thought Spock was, every part of his lean, gorgeous body, from his beautiful jawline to his lovely pointed ears to his intense chocolate eyes. Stuff like how Kirk thought he might want to give that hand-kissing thing a try (he'd seen Spock and Uhura do it one day in the officer's mess and found his eyes helplessly drawn to it ever since), or spend some time perfecting the good old human method of kissing with Spock.
Or how Kirk found his thoughts turned, more and more frequently, to his first officer. Whereas Jim had been happily venturing through life just fine on his own before, now he seemed to need Spock's opinion on everything, from the inane to the essential. Spock's say was critical on matters as varied as Jim's new dress uniform (did it showcase his ass properly?); to the latest gossip in FleetNews Monthly (was the El-Aurian Commodore RejTan really having an affair with her half-Cardassian assistant? And if so, how did that work?); to the probable location of the next neutral zone border skirmish.
Kirk kind of needed Spock now, needed him in every part of his life.
True, Kirk had fumbled through expressing all this, but his feelings had been sincerely stated, and his heart was full of Spock and what the two of them could be to one another. Jim had never said such things to anyone else before - had never felt these sort of things before in order to say them. He hadn't arranged his sentences well, frankly, but he was surprised at the ease with which the words appeared. He really meant them.
But they had barely tripped out of his mouth when Spock had given him such a cold, withering look that Kirk had almost fallen out of his chair. Spock had peeled Jim's fingers off of his forearm, which they'd somehow latched onto, and made it quite clear, quite quickly, that Jim's declarations were not reciprocated.
"Captain," he'd started, and Jim knew he was in trouble when ranks were slammed back into place, "I must inform you that I do not share your attraction, nor do I hold such expectations for our future together. Whilst I admire you as an individual, and appreciate the friendship we have forged, I do not view you as a potential romantic partner. I hope our working relationship is not adversely affected by these revelations. I hold it in high regard."
Kirk had been absolutely mortified. He'd never sobered up so fast in his life.
"No, Spock, of course...that is to say... I mean...No. I won't bring this up again. I'm sorry, man. It won't affect our command."
Kirk had tried to prevent the heartbreak from showing on his face and somehow retain a little dignity. Plucking up the last reserves of his courage, he said, "I hope I haven't offended you Spock," and flexed and unflexed his fingers, bringing his betraying hand to rest on the back of his own neck. Jim realized that all his human feelings - all his love and lust and affection and admiration - had leeched through that hand on Spock's arm, and had obviously been deeply unpleasant for the Vulcan. If he didn't share Jim's feelings, it must have been distasteful.
"No, Captain. You have not offended me, and I would not object to starting anew tomorrow morning," Spock had said. 'Starting anew,' Jim would come to realize, meant 'let's pretend this little episode never happened'.
Spock bid him goodnight, gathered his working PADDs together and promptly left.
Kirk had crumpled backwards against his own door, feeling more rejected than he ever had in his life. And that was saying something.
Lord, had he really said 'intense chocolate eyes'? It may have been how he felt, but he really needed to learn to keep his mouth shut. And keep his flowery descriptions of Spock's person to himself. All in all, a spectacularly unsuccessful attempt to move things in a different direction.
Two months had passed since that debacle, and though Kirk found himself hoping that time might heal all wounds, it was pretty clear that Spock wasn't interested, and Jim's wounds were sort of festering. He was miserable. It wasn't that Spock was difficult to work with now - of course he was the consummate professional - and Jim was pasting on his bravest face every day and plumbing his deepest reserves of professional detachment. Their working relationship was just fine; socially, however, to say things were stilted would be an understatement.
These maudlin musings were interrupted by Kirk's alarm actually going off. Oh-six-hundred, then, and time to get a move on.
He pulled his shirt off once more and prepared for his morning shower, but wasn't able to actually begin, as two things happened simultaneously: his comm unit beeped again and his door chime let him know someone was outside. He stood in the centre of the room, sleepily trying to figure out which one to address first, when the door to his quarters simply slid open and in walked Spock, perfectly awake and beautifully groomed. Of course. Kirk rolled his eyes internally.
"Good morning, Commander. Hang on a sec...," and Kirk reached for the toggle to activate the comm unit again. Staring at him from the viewscreen was Spock. Well, the other Spock. Spock the First? He had no idea what to call the man, so he settled on, "Ambassador. Good morning."
Jim turned back to his own Spock. It hadn't occurred to him that he was half-naked until he saw his first officer contemplating him with a look he read as "Get your shirt back on, you caveman." Not that either Spock would ever say such a thing, of course.
"Excuse my state of undress," Jim said, mainly to the Ambassador, "I was just about to head to the sonics. What can I do for you?" he thought it best to ignore Spock the Younger for the moment, and began looking around for something to cover up with. Wow, his rooms were really messy. No doubt that was impressing Spock too. Sigh.
"Do not concern yourself about it, Jim. It is good to ... see you," said the Ambassador, with a pause and a little quirk of his lips. That pulled Jim's attention fully to the vidscreen, where Ambassador Spock stared for some seconds at Jim's naked chest and then winked. Actually winked. Oh my god. Was the Ambassador flirting with him? Could a Vulcan even do that?
"My Jim was partial to wandering around wearing too few garments as well, Captain," continued the Ambassador. Kirk noted the possessive in front of his name. "In fact, he and I began to make bets at the beginning of an away mission as to whether he would return to the ship with his uniform top in tact. Most often he did not manage it."
Jim chuckled. Clearly some things were universal constants. "So who won?"
"As I most frequently bet against the shirt remaining whole, I was usually the winner, Jim. I think my Captain kept hoping to prove me wrong, however." Spock said this with an almost wistful look at his Captain's pig-headedness, and Jim offered a little smile. "It hardly mattered, though, as his shirts were normally in ruins by the time we got through with them anyway, one way or another. My Jim was quite vigorous." Another slight Spock-smirk, and a suggestive eyebrow-raise. "I suppose I was as well. He did have a substantial supply of extras in our quarters, though - I made certain of that."
Jim was taken aback. What on earth was going on here? By the time we got through with them? Vigorous? Our quarters? Had he and Spock been romantically involved in the other timeline? This was a lot of information to process this early in the morning.
He was just about to ask if they had been lovers, fairly bluntly, when the Commander stepped closer to the comm unit. Jim glanced upwards, noted the thunderous expression on Spock's face, and decided to keep his question to himself.
"Ambassador, please state your reasons for contacting the Captain at this early hour," Spock demanded.
There was a weird pause, where the Ambassador and the Commander locked eyes. Jim glanced between the two of them, bewildered. The way Spock had said 'contacting' made it sound more like 'harrassing', and Jim wanted to assure that this was not the case. But then the Ambassador nodded, as if to himself, and said, "Jim, I shall be waiting on Andoria with the others for transport to Vulcan. I was unsure as to whether you had been informed, as a I am a last-minute addition to the party. This is, of course, to make certain that Sybok has really returned for the reasons he says he has - in my timeline he was quite a disruptive influence. Much later in his lifetime, it is true, but he is powerful at this age, make no mistake."
The Ambassador was looking at Jim as if he expected him to nod solemnly, but as Jim had absolutely no fucking idea what was going on here, he turned to his usual source of information: his own Spock. "Sybok?," he whispered out of a corner of his mouth.
Clearly he hadn't whispered quietly enough, as the Ambassador piped up from his screen, "Have you not yet told Jim about Sybok? I'm not sure that is wise, and you are far enough into the relationship that perhaps he should know..."
"Wait, um, relationship?" JIm said.
"Yes, Jim. You should know about my - our - family," continued the Ambassador, blithely. "My father was bonded, early in life, to a Vulcan woman of noble descent. They had a child together, a son, who was brilliantly intelligent and a gifted telepath. He was raised in the teachings of Surak, as most of my people are, but for his own reasons, rejected them to follow another path. This was the v'tosh ka'tur, the ancient practice of combining logic and emotion. It was thought by the adherents of v'tosh ka'tur that a balance of both could be achieved in the individual through decades of careful meditation. Sybok was sure he had the key, and was beginning to convince others of his findings, when he was exiled from the planet. Sarek was involved. He couldn't stand to see his child, so full of promise, turning against logic. Sybok had the potential to be a powerful force for dissent on Vulcan. Instead, he left to seek out other adherents of the v'tosh ka'tur, whom he believed had been scattered across the galaxy. I was just five years old. But Sybok came to me before he left to explain and bid me goodbye. It was more than many of my family have done for me. I always felt his brotherly regard, and I wish to see if I can help him now, particularly if he wants to reintegrate into Vulcan society. Do you have anything to add, Spock?"
Jim gaped for a bit. Spock had a half-brother? An emotion-loving half-brother? A rebellious emotion-loving half-brother? What the hell was up with this morning?
"No, Ambassador, indeed I think you have explained the situation quite fully," said Spock, the thunderous look back on his face.
"Well, then, I shall get back to my preparations. Jim, I very much look forward to seeing more of you soon, and introducing you to our brother. Live long and prosper, old friend." A tiny smile crinkled the corner of his eyes.
Jim held up his hand too, feeling faintly ridiculous doing the Vulcan salute half-naked. "Peace and long life, Ambassador." They signed off.
Jim whipped his head around to Spock, desperate for some answers. "What on earth was all that about? Did you know that your counterpart was going to be at Andoria too? Did you know about Sybok coming? And why didn't you tell me about him?"
Spock fixed him with a blank look, the kind of look he adopted when he didn't want to reveal too much. Great. This was going to be one of those really helpful Spock moments, thought Kirk with an internal groan. "To answer your questions, Captain, this has nothing to do with Earth; I was unaware that the Ambassador was going to be joining us; I knew of Sybok's return, but regardless of what the Ambassador seems to think, I didn't believe it was necessary to inform you of the existence of our brother. It is a personal matter, not a professional one."
Ouch. "So you weren't really planning on telling me anything about him."
"No, Captain."
"And when he came on board you would have just introduced him as you would any other Vulcan."
"I wasn't particularly planning on introducing him to you, Captain."
Double ouch. "So why are you even here?," asked Kirk. Ha, got you there.
"I was merely ascertaining that you were in a ready state to receive our visitors, Captain. I see that is not currently the case," and here Spock's eyes swept imperiously over Jim's semi-nude person, "and so I shall leave you to make your ablutions."
After he made good on this promise, Kirk looked at the closed door and heaved a sigh of frustration. It was like they were suddenly going in reverse. Spock was now more uptight and reticent than he'd been before they had become friends. How was that even possible? Oh well. At least he'd soon be seeing the older Spock, a Vulcan whom Jim was sure appreciated his company. And he'd be meeting Spock's brother, he'd make sure of that. That would certainly be interesting...
Part two here