1C13:11, Chapter 2, Prv22:6
Title: 1C13:11 - Prv22:6
Characters: Spock, Amanda, Uhura, multiple OCs
A/N: This chapter hints at revelations made in chapters 21 - 23 of Once and Future; however, this story is unrelated to that one.
Warning: Starts off very K, but eventually flirts with M.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Star Trek, any Star Trek characters or any Star Trek concepts. I also don’t get paid for writing about any of those.
( Read Ru2:13 )
Thanks to NubianAmazon and SpockLikesCats for naming the Betazoid teacher, and helping Spock make things right with Nyota
Her little face scrunched up in concentration, Nyota traced lazy figures where sunlight touched the smooth dark wood of Mama’s kitchen table. She couldn’t stop a huge yawn from stretching her mouth into a wide O. Then she was pulled back into a soft embrace, her legs spun to the side while a sweet voice murmured sweeter words into her ear. Things like “pretty baby” and “darling.”
“I’m not a baby anymore, Ceegee. And I’m not pretty, either. I’m four and regular-looking.”
Mama and Cousin Getta laughed at that.
“That is because you look in the mirror using only your eyes, Ennie,” Ceegee said as she twined one of the braids sprouting from Nyota’s large head around her finger. “You must learn to look inside using all of you.”
She and Mama got that look that grown-ups get when they think a kid is too young to understand, then went back to talking in Betazoid.
Lifting her sleepy head from her cousin’s chest, Nyota twisted back around in the Betazoid woman’s lap. Ceegee always wore the softest clothes and her squishy parts were perfect for napping. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried not to let Cousin Getta’s voice - even softer than her dress! - or that thing she was doing with her mind that felt like “sleep, Nyota,“ win.
Nyota wasn’t ready to sleep. If she concentrated hard enough, she could understand some of the words. And what she heard meant she couldn’t sleep. Not while Mama and Cousin Getta were talking about her.
Getta Haresta gave the little girl in her arms a gentle squeeze.
“I do not believe we can afford to wait, Cousin,” she said aloud. “If Nyota were one of ours she would already be in treatment.” She shrugged, accepting what she could not change, and focused on moving forward. “We should start by teaching her to speak the language, since that seems to be where her strengths will lie.”
Nyota stiffened, her finger frozen mid-pattern. She set her jaw and begged the Betazoid words to come. They didn’t listen.
“But I am learning Vulcan!” she protested in that language, instead. “For when I marry Spock.”
Mama’s face looked a little surprised, but not upset like it did when Muta played Baba’s djembe before the sun came up, or the time Upenda had hidden an orphaned cheetah cub with a broken leg in her garden. But, I already told Mama I’m marrying Spocky.
“You understand, binti?” she wanted to know. She must have thought the answer was “yes” because she was still speaking Ceegee’s language.
“A little,” was all Nyota could manage in Betazoid. Switching to Kiswahili, she continued, “but I can’t make the words come. Not like with Standard and Vulcan and French an-” She broke off when she felt a sob forming in the back of her throat. Ceegee wouldn’t believe she was a big girl if she started crying over words.
But Ceegee did that thing with her mind again, and this time it felt like being wrapped in a hug from Mama and Baba and ‘Penda and Mu (not that they liked hugging her all that much) and Spocky and Ko-mekh and Ceegee all at the same time.
“Do you see, Cousin?” she asked Mama once Nyota was smiling and snuggled up against her squishy parts again. “I’ll do what I can for her now, but then you must bring her to us as soon as it can be arranged.”
Physically, M’Umbha’s youngest child was small for her age - unusual among Wakufunzis, but understandable considering her father was an Uhura - but mentally and intellectually she was far ahead of the average human. Emotionally, Getta noted as Nyota fought sleep, she was probably right on target. I hope that will not prove problematic, she thought.
_________________
It hadn’t taken long to coax Ennie to use the lavatory before settling her to sleep after Getta projected enough love and affection to bring a Vulcan to his knees. One young Vulcan in particular came to mind, and M’Umbha smiled to herself as she smoothed the light blanket and patted her daughter’s knobby knees one last time.
She rose from her knees, crossed the small room and opened the verandah curtains, allowing in a sliver of light while keeping out the heat. Nyota would never admit it now that she was a “big girl,” but the child was not fond of any darkness other than the night sky. She smiled again before heading back down the stairs.
Fears and doubts were already chipping away at her good humor by the time she reached the kitchen. One look at Getta told her the Betazoid wasn’t in much better shape.
“Who.. ?” Nyota’s mother let the question trail off, knowing her companion would understand even without using her telepathy.
“I don’t know.” Getta’s own disappointment and concern were mirrored on the human woman’s face. “Miran Helso would have been ideal; she has experience with such cases, but…”
Like her distant relative, Getta did not need to complete the thought. Her human ancestor might have been nearly as far removed as M’Umbha’s Betazoid ancestress - the connection ancient enough to be considered irrelevant - but both women were bint Wakufunzi, and some matters should not be discussed in the presence of the uninitiated.
“But she is destined for other things,” her cousin finished for her.
“Yes. As is our Little Star.”
“Mother.”
Amanda looked over from her wall-facing desk to see her son standing in the doorway to her study. In just the equivalent of five Terran months, he’d become so much better at hiding what he was feeling. But she was his mother and knew that his carefully composed face hid a pensiveness he would be embarrassed to know she sensed. She smiled broadly as if nothing was wrong.
“Come in, Spock.” She waved a hand towards the chair next to the desk and waited, still smiling, while he sat. “What do you need?”
His ears greened a bit, but he gave no other hint of his discomfort. “We are to visit your family in seven Terran months,” he stated and she waited for him to say more. Stating the obvious wasn’t the Vulcan way. After a long pause, during which the muscles of her face started to stiffen, her young son spoke again. “Did you plan to visit the Uhuras again at that time?”
Amanda felt her smile grow even as Spock’s ears turned a brighter green. “Well, no, I haven’t made any definite plans; although M’Umbha and Benjamin assured me that we are always welcome… Would you like for us to go there? They truly enjoyed our last visit.”
“Dr. Uhura informed me that he has several interesting new editions to his garden; I would like to study those. And last year Dr. M’Umbha - Dr. Wakufunzi published a paper on Rigelian phonemes. I have not been able to adequately discuss it with her during our bi-monthly communications.”
A heaviness settled into the pit of Spock’s stomach when his mother’s smile broadened even further at the mention of “Dr. M’Umbha.” Although she did not say so, he knew Amanda still believed that his continued use of the nickname was a sign that he had a “crush” on the human woman. He did not. I must always refer to her by her official title when speak to Mother, he admonished himself.
“Nyota will be happy to see you, as well,” his mother said in what he knew would be considered a sly voice among humans.
“Yes,” he said, refusing to grimace at the mention of the girl who had become so attached to him, “she has indicated as much.”
The learning came easily, and was often fun - even ‘Penda and Mu didn’t exclude her during lessons - but today, Nyota was eager to leave the sunny third-floor classroom where the three young Uhuras took their lessons in Betazoid.
She didn’t mean to fidget, but knowing Axin Loures would sense that her mind was elsewhere anyway, Nyota didn’t bother trying to keep her left foot from tapping out an eager tattoo upon the cool floor tiles.
Upenda glanced at her baby sister and smiled. “Ennie’s boyfriend arrives today,” she told their instructor, using the Betazoid word for future genetic mate. “She probably wants to go put on her best dress.”
“Spock is not my boyfriend,” Nyota corrected in Standard. She glared at ‘Penda.
“Not yet,” Muta chimed in without looking up from the PADD displaying the score of the third movement of a 21st Century symphony, instead of the Betazoid verbs he was supposed to be studying.
“He’s my best friend,” his sibling continued as if he hadn’t spoken. She looked up at Axin with shining eyes. “I haven’t seen him in two whole years!”
“But I don’t need to wear a dress,” she added, flushing. “Spocky says it is illogical to change one’s garments purely for ceremonial reasons which have little to no meaning to the person for whom one is performing the ceremony.”
The young Betazoid smiled at his charges as the older Uhuras looked at each and rolled their eyes. To better assess their progress and readiness to learn, he kept his shields down whenever he was with them. Teaching the Uhura children was always either torture or a treat; there was no middle ground. Right now, they were delightful. Their affection for one another, in spite of the teasing, suffused the classroom. All three happily anticipated the arrival of their guests; they were even more eager for the reunion between the little one and her Vulcan.
“All right,” he told them, “I suppose for such an occasion-” Nyota was up out of her chair and standing at attention before he even finished speaking “we can conclude today’s lesson a little early. Dismissed.”
He stood, alone in the classroom and still smiling, long after the pounding of three sets of small feet had faded.
Spock emerged from the hover vehicle and onto the Uhuras’ pink forecourt less than a second behind his mother. He glanced up at the dark brown doors leading into the ochre-colored house to see a small girl hurtling towards him with an awkward, ungainly gait while clutching a small data oblong, oblivious of her own mother’s call for caution.
“Spocky!” Nyota shouted happily. “Spock!”
In her excitement, the little girl’s feet hit the stones without any discernable rhythm. Too late, he held up a hand to urge her to slow down. As he watched, his young friend stepped on her own foot and her body lurched forward, nearly parallel to the ground.
She landed with an audible thud.
Dr. M’Umbha’s hands flew to her face.
Amanda winced.
Spock stilled.
Three seconds passed before anyone moved.
“Binti,” Dr. M’Umbha rushed forward, with considerably more grace than her daughter had done.
The visitors waited for the inevitable tears and sobbing.
All three were relieved to see the child pushed herself to her knees and looked around, blinking. Spock could see unshed tears glistening in her eyes, but she bit her lip, breathed deeply and seemed to will herself to be calm.
Her mother reached and, without speaking, reached out. For a moment, Nyota simply stared at Dr. M’Umbha’s hand. Then, grasping it, she allowed herself to be assisted to her feet.
Amanda smiled.
Spock resumed walking towards mother and child.
Nyota offered him a tremulous smile.
_________________
Spock was sitting at his desk, absorbed in Dr. M’Umbha’s paper when a soft knock against his open door told him he had company. Nyota, he thought.
“You were not severely injured?” he asked as he spun around in his chair.
Nyota nodded as she gingerly walked across the room. She silently handed over the data oblong that was still clutched in her little hand.
“I was excited,” she explained earnestly as he slipped the oblong into the computer. “I wanted to talk to you in Vulcan and Betazoid and show you my marks.”
Spock looked up from the school report he’d already memorized and studied her intently.
“I wanted you to be proud of me,” she added in an even softer voice.
“It is true that we value intellectual acumen,” he said in Standard, “but you must not live so far inside your mind that you are unaware of what is around you, and of your relationship to those surroundings. Do you understand, Nyota?”
She nodded again, her eyes once more filled with tears.
“Grace,” she said. “I don’t have any.”
Unconsciously, he tilted his head to side as he considered her declaration. “I was going to say ‘adequate coordination,’ but ‘grace’ is a sufficient substitution.”
She turned and, her strides almost fluid, left his room.
Spock turned back to the computer, closed Nyota’s academic report, and returned to reading Dr. M’Umbha’s paper on Rigelian phonemes.
_________________
He hadn’t meant to listen. He hadn’t even intended to be on the second floor verandah at that time. But he needed his notes if he wanted to have as detailed a conversation with Dr. M’Umbha - Dr. Wakufunzi - as he’d intended. And taking the outside path was the quickest route to his destination.
Nyota’s “bedtime” had been announced two hours and forty-seven minutes earlier - more than an hour before Upenda and Muta were also ordered to retire - he had expected her to be sleeping.
Few humans would have heard Nyota’s soft voice. Few human ears would have been able to intrude on the little girl’s privacy.
The murmured words had drawn his gaze towards the open door. She lay back against the pillows on her bed. Her room was dark, but the holograph she held emitted a soft glow.
“…just like you, Uncle ‘Bansi,” she’d been sobbing. “Just like you and Auntie Stella. And when I’m up there, I’ll run and walk and…” another nearly inaudible sob interrupted her words. “When I’m up there with the stars, I won’t ever fall down!”
Spock had continued towards his own room, but Nyota’s words - and the tears that had clogged her normally clear voice - echoed in his mind long after he had rejoined the adults.
_________________
Amanda was already in bed, but not yet sleeping when she heard the light tapping on her verandah door. Only person would visit her at this time of night.
“Come in,” she told her son.
Spock pushed though the curtains, then stood facing her bed, his hands behind his back.
“Mother, I would like to pose a query.
“On my way to retrieve the notes on Dr. Wakufunzi’s paper, I passed by Nyota’s sleeping chamber. She was crying and speaking to a holograph of her Uncle Tabansi. Explain this, please.”
Amanda put down the PADD she’d been reading and regarded her son seriously. “Oh, Spock,” she said. “What did you do this time?”
_________________
His mother’s words came back to him as he waited outside the Uhuras’ third-floor classroom the next afternoon.
“You hurt her feelings, Spock. What you said was equivalent to saying that she is clumsy and awkward.”
She’d interrupted his protest before he’d been able to say more than, “But, Mother, she is-”
“It doesn’t matter how uncoordinated she is,” Amanda had said in that gentle tone she adopted whenever she needed to explain a particularly complex human tendency or proclivity, “you didn’t have to remind her of it. You could have offered her sympathy, instead.”
“I merely wished to help her avoid future injury,” he’d said - almost sulkily, he was ashamed to recall.
“There are better ways,” Mother had said and he’d caught the disappointment in her tone. “It’s too late to change what you’ve done, but you can still make amends.”
“How so?”
His mother had looked grave, but she hadn’t been entirely successful in suppressing the same sly look she’d last used when informing that Nyota would be pleased to see him.
“You’ll have to do something extraordinary, my son.” Her lips had twitched then. “Don’t worry; what a 5-year-old human girl considers ‘extraordinary’ shouldn’t be beyond your abilities.”
“As you have occasionally informed me, Nyota is not an ordinary 5-year-old human.”
“Fortunately for you, one of her extraordinary qualities is a remarkable capacity for forgiving.”
He wasn’t certain that his mother had been correct.
Upenda and Muta had been lively breakfast companions; Nyota had barely looked up from her oatmeal and fruit.
The classroom door opened and he straightened his back as the Uhura children walked out.
He nodded at Upenda and Muta (and missed their suspicious looks - he’d made their little sister cry, again! - they shot at his back) before stepping into their younger sibling’s path.
“Nyota,” he addressed her in Vulcan, dropping his head to meet the little girl’s gaze, “it occurs to me that I did not fully convey to you the process you will need to understand in order to move more steadily.
“I said that you must be aware of the relationship between your body and your environment, but I neglected to mention that it is possible to be too aware. As with all things, there is a balance to be found. Will you allow me to demonstrate?”
The change in her demeanor was instantaneous. Her eyes widened. Her lips spread and curved up.
Suddenly, she reached around and grabbed one of the hands he’d clasped behind his back. Her eyes shone with something other than tears as she stared up at him.
“Yes, please, savensu,” she replied. “I would like to learn.”
Go to Chapter 3
Characters: Spock, Amanda, Uhura, multiple OCs
A/N: This chapter hints at revelations made in chapters 21 - 23 of Once and Future; however, this story is unrelated to that one.
Warning: Starts off very K, but eventually flirts with M.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Star Trek, any Star Trek characters or any Star Trek concepts. I also don’t get paid for writing about any of those.
( Read Ru2:13 )
Thanks to NubianAmazon and SpockLikesCats for naming the Betazoid teacher, and helping Spock make things right with Nyota
Her little face scrunched up in concentration, Nyota traced lazy figures where sunlight touched the smooth dark wood of Mama’s kitchen table. She couldn’t stop a huge yawn from stretching her mouth into a wide O. Then she was pulled back into a soft embrace, her legs spun to the side while a sweet voice murmured sweeter words into her ear. Things like “pretty baby” and “darling.”
“I’m not a baby anymore, Ceegee. And I’m not pretty, either. I’m four and regular-looking.”
Mama and Cousin Getta laughed at that.
“That is because you look in the mirror using only your eyes, Ennie,” Ceegee said as she twined one of the braids sprouting from Nyota’s large head around her finger. “You must learn to look inside using all of you.”
She and Mama got that look that grown-ups get when they think a kid is too young to understand, then went back to talking in Betazoid.
Lifting her sleepy head from her cousin’s chest, Nyota twisted back around in the Betazoid woman’s lap. Ceegee always wore the softest clothes and her squishy parts were perfect for napping. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried not to let Cousin Getta’s voice - even softer than her dress! - or that thing she was doing with her mind that felt like “sleep, Nyota,“ win.
Nyota wasn’t ready to sleep. If she concentrated hard enough, she could understand some of the words. And what she heard meant she couldn’t sleep. Not while Mama and Cousin Getta were talking about her.
Getta Haresta gave the little girl in her arms a gentle squeeze.
“I do not believe we can afford to wait, Cousin,” she said aloud. “If Nyota were one of ours she would already be in treatment.” She shrugged, accepting what she could not change, and focused on moving forward. “We should start by teaching her to speak the language, since that seems to be where her strengths will lie.”
Nyota stiffened, her finger frozen mid-pattern. She set her jaw and begged the Betazoid words to come. They didn’t listen.
“But I am learning Vulcan!” she protested in that language, instead. “For when I marry Spock.”
Mama’s face looked a little surprised, but not upset like it did when Muta played Baba’s djembe before the sun came up, or the time Upenda had hidden an orphaned cheetah cub with a broken leg in her garden. But, I already told Mama I’m marrying Spocky.
“You understand, binti?” she wanted to know. She must have thought the answer was “yes” because she was still speaking Ceegee’s language.
“A little,” was all Nyota could manage in Betazoid. Switching to Kiswahili, she continued, “but I can’t make the words come. Not like with Standard and Vulcan and French an-” She broke off when she felt a sob forming in the back of her throat. Ceegee wouldn’t believe she was a big girl if she started crying over words.
But Ceegee did that thing with her mind again, and this time it felt like being wrapped in a hug from Mama and Baba and ‘Penda and Mu (not that they liked hugging her all that much) and Spocky and Ko-mekh and Ceegee all at the same time.
“Do you see, Cousin?” she asked Mama once Nyota was smiling and snuggled up against her squishy parts again. “I’ll do what I can for her now, but then you must bring her to us as soon as it can be arranged.”
Physically, M’Umbha’s youngest child was small for her age - unusual among Wakufunzis, but understandable considering her father was an Uhura - but mentally and intellectually she was far ahead of the average human. Emotionally, Getta noted as Nyota fought sleep, she was probably right on target. I hope that will not prove problematic, she thought.
_________________
It hadn’t taken long to coax Ennie to use the lavatory before settling her to sleep after Getta projected enough love and affection to bring a Vulcan to his knees. One young Vulcan in particular came to mind, and M’Umbha smiled to herself as she smoothed the light blanket and patted her daughter’s knobby knees one last time.
She rose from her knees, crossed the small room and opened the verandah curtains, allowing in a sliver of light while keeping out the heat. Nyota would never admit it now that she was a “big girl,” but the child was not fond of any darkness other than the night sky. She smiled again before heading back down the stairs.
Fears and doubts were already chipping away at her good humor by the time she reached the kitchen. One look at Getta told her the Betazoid wasn’t in much better shape.
“Who.. ?” Nyota’s mother let the question trail off, knowing her companion would understand even without using her telepathy.
“I don’t know.” Getta’s own disappointment and concern were mirrored on the human woman’s face. “Miran Helso would have been ideal; she has experience with such cases, but…”
Like her distant relative, Getta did not need to complete the thought. Her human ancestor might have been nearly as far removed as M’Umbha’s Betazoid ancestress - the connection ancient enough to be considered irrelevant - but both women were bint Wakufunzi, and some matters should not be discussed in the presence of the uninitiated.
“But she is destined for other things,” her cousin finished for her.
“Yes. As is our Little Star.”
“Mother.”
Amanda looked over from her wall-facing desk to see her son standing in the doorway to her study. In just the equivalent of five Terran months, he’d become so much better at hiding what he was feeling. But she was his mother and knew that his carefully composed face hid a pensiveness he would be embarrassed to know she sensed. She smiled broadly as if nothing was wrong.
“Come in, Spock.” She waved a hand towards the chair next to the desk and waited, still smiling, while he sat. “What do you need?”
His ears greened a bit, but he gave no other hint of his discomfort. “We are to visit your family in seven Terran months,” he stated and she waited for him to say more. Stating the obvious wasn’t the Vulcan way. After a long pause, during which the muscles of her face started to stiffen, her young son spoke again. “Did you plan to visit the Uhuras again at that time?”
Amanda felt her smile grow even as Spock’s ears turned a brighter green. “Well, no, I haven’t made any definite plans; although M’Umbha and Benjamin assured me that we are always welcome… Would you like for us to go there? They truly enjoyed our last visit.”
“Dr. Uhura informed me that he has several interesting new editions to his garden; I would like to study those. And last year Dr. M’Umbha - Dr. Wakufunzi published a paper on Rigelian phonemes. I have not been able to adequately discuss it with her during our bi-monthly communications.”
A heaviness settled into the pit of Spock’s stomach when his mother’s smile broadened even further at the mention of “Dr. M’Umbha.” Although she did not say so, he knew Amanda still believed that his continued use of the nickname was a sign that he had a “crush” on the human woman. He did not. I must always refer to her by her official title when speak to Mother, he admonished himself.
“Nyota will be happy to see you, as well,” his mother said in what he knew would be considered a sly voice among humans.
“Yes,” he said, refusing to grimace at the mention of the girl who had become so attached to him, “she has indicated as much.”
The learning came easily, and was often fun - even ‘Penda and Mu didn’t exclude her during lessons - but today, Nyota was eager to leave the sunny third-floor classroom where the three young Uhuras took their lessons in Betazoid.
She didn’t mean to fidget, but knowing Axin Loures would sense that her mind was elsewhere anyway, Nyota didn’t bother trying to keep her left foot from tapping out an eager tattoo upon the cool floor tiles.
Upenda glanced at her baby sister and smiled. “Ennie’s boyfriend arrives today,” she told their instructor, using the Betazoid word for future genetic mate. “She probably wants to go put on her best dress.”
“Spock is not my boyfriend,” Nyota corrected in Standard. She glared at ‘Penda.
“Not yet,” Muta chimed in without looking up from the PADD displaying the score of the third movement of a 21st Century symphony, instead of the Betazoid verbs he was supposed to be studying.
“He’s my best friend,” his sibling continued as if he hadn’t spoken. She looked up at Axin with shining eyes. “I haven’t seen him in two whole years!”
“But I don’t need to wear a dress,” she added, flushing. “Spocky says it is illogical to change one’s garments purely for ceremonial reasons which have little to no meaning to the person for whom one is performing the ceremony.”
The young Betazoid smiled at his charges as the older Uhuras looked at each and rolled their eyes. To better assess their progress and readiness to learn, he kept his shields down whenever he was with them. Teaching the Uhura children was always either torture or a treat; there was no middle ground. Right now, they were delightful. Their affection for one another, in spite of the teasing, suffused the classroom. All three happily anticipated the arrival of their guests; they were even more eager for the reunion between the little one and her Vulcan.
“All right,” he told them, “I suppose for such an occasion-” Nyota was up out of her chair and standing at attention before he even finished speaking “we can conclude today’s lesson a little early. Dismissed.”
He stood, alone in the classroom and still smiling, long after the pounding of three sets of small feet had faded.
Spock emerged from the hover vehicle and onto the Uhuras’ pink forecourt less than a second behind his mother. He glanced up at the dark brown doors leading into the ochre-colored house to see a small girl hurtling towards him with an awkward, ungainly gait while clutching a small data oblong, oblivious of her own mother’s call for caution.
“Spocky!” Nyota shouted happily. “Spock!”
In her excitement, the little girl’s feet hit the stones without any discernable rhythm. Too late, he held up a hand to urge her to slow down. As he watched, his young friend stepped on her own foot and her body lurched forward, nearly parallel to the ground.
She landed with an audible thud.
Dr. M’Umbha’s hands flew to her face.
Amanda winced.
Spock stilled.
Three seconds passed before anyone moved.
“Binti,” Dr. M’Umbha rushed forward, with considerably more grace than her daughter had done.
The visitors waited for the inevitable tears and sobbing.
All three were relieved to see the child pushed herself to her knees and looked around, blinking. Spock could see unshed tears glistening in her eyes, but she bit her lip, breathed deeply and seemed to will herself to be calm.
Her mother reached and, without speaking, reached out. For a moment, Nyota simply stared at Dr. M’Umbha’s hand. Then, grasping it, she allowed herself to be assisted to her feet.
Amanda smiled.
Spock resumed walking towards mother and child.
Nyota offered him a tremulous smile.
_________________
Spock was sitting at his desk, absorbed in Dr. M’Umbha’s paper when a soft knock against his open door told him he had company. Nyota, he thought.
“You were not severely injured?” he asked as he spun around in his chair.
Nyota nodded as she gingerly walked across the room. She silently handed over the data oblong that was still clutched in her little hand.
“I was excited,” she explained earnestly as he slipped the oblong into the computer. “I wanted to talk to you in Vulcan and Betazoid and show you my marks.”
Spock looked up from the school report he’d already memorized and studied her intently.
“I wanted you to be proud of me,” she added in an even softer voice.
“It is true that we value intellectual acumen,” he said in Standard, “but you must not live so far inside your mind that you are unaware of what is around you, and of your relationship to those surroundings. Do you understand, Nyota?”
She nodded again, her eyes once more filled with tears.
“Grace,” she said. “I don’t have any.”
Unconsciously, he tilted his head to side as he considered her declaration. “I was going to say ‘adequate coordination,’ but ‘grace’ is a sufficient substitution.”
She turned and, her strides almost fluid, left his room.
Spock turned back to the computer, closed Nyota’s academic report, and returned to reading Dr. M’Umbha’s paper on Rigelian phonemes.
_________________
He hadn’t meant to listen. He hadn’t even intended to be on the second floor verandah at that time. But he needed his notes if he wanted to have as detailed a conversation with Dr. M’Umbha - Dr. Wakufunzi - as he’d intended. And taking the outside path was the quickest route to his destination.
Nyota’s “bedtime” had been announced two hours and forty-seven minutes earlier - more than an hour before Upenda and Muta were also ordered to retire - he had expected her to be sleeping.
Few humans would have heard Nyota’s soft voice. Few human ears would have been able to intrude on the little girl’s privacy.
The murmured words had drawn his gaze towards the open door. She lay back against the pillows on her bed. Her room was dark, but the holograph she held emitted a soft glow.
“…just like you, Uncle ‘Bansi,” she’d been sobbing. “Just like you and Auntie Stella. And when I’m up there, I’ll run and walk and…” another nearly inaudible sob interrupted her words. “When I’m up there with the stars, I won’t ever fall down!”
Spock had continued towards his own room, but Nyota’s words - and the tears that had clogged her normally clear voice - echoed in his mind long after he had rejoined the adults.
_________________
Amanda was already in bed, but not yet sleeping when she heard the light tapping on her verandah door. Only person would visit her at this time of night.
“Come in,” she told her son.
Spock pushed though the curtains, then stood facing her bed, his hands behind his back.
“Mother, I would like to pose a query.
“On my way to retrieve the notes on Dr. Wakufunzi’s paper, I passed by Nyota’s sleeping chamber. She was crying and speaking to a holograph of her Uncle Tabansi. Explain this, please.”
Amanda put down the PADD she’d been reading and regarded her son seriously. “Oh, Spock,” she said. “What did you do this time?”
_________________
His mother’s words came back to him as he waited outside the Uhuras’ third-floor classroom the next afternoon.
“You hurt her feelings, Spock. What you said was equivalent to saying that she is clumsy and awkward.”
She’d interrupted his protest before he’d been able to say more than, “But, Mother, she is-”
“It doesn’t matter how uncoordinated she is,” Amanda had said in that gentle tone she adopted whenever she needed to explain a particularly complex human tendency or proclivity, “you didn’t have to remind her of it. You could have offered her sympathy, instead.”
“I merely wished to help her avoid future injury,” he’d said - almost sulkily, he was ashamed to recall.
“There are better ways,” Mother had said and he’d caught the disappointment in her tone. “It’s too late to change what you’ve done, but you can still make amends.”
“How so?”
His mother had looked grave, but she hadn’t been entirely successful in suppressing the same sly look she’d last used when informing that Nyota would be pleased to see him.
“You’ll have to do something extraordinary, my son.” Her lips had twitched then. “Don’t worry; what a 5-year-old human girl considers ‘extraordinary’ shouldn’t be beyond your abilities.”
“As you have occasionally informed me, Nyota is not an ordinary 5-year-old human.”
“Fortunately for you, one of her extraordinary qualities is a remarkable capacity for forgiving.”
He wasn’t certain that his mother had been correct.
Upenda and Muta had been lively breakfast companions; Nyota had barely looked up from her oatmeal and fruit.
The classroom door opened and he straightened his back as the Uhura children walked out.
He nodded at Upenda and Muta (and missed their suspicious looks - he’d made their little sister cry, again! - they shot at his back) before stepping into their younger sibling’s path.
“Nyota,” he addressed her in Vulcan, dropping his head to meet the little girl’s gaze, “it occurs to me that I did not fully convey to you the process you will need to understand in order to move more steadily.
“I said that you must be aware of the relationship between your body and your environment, but I neglected to mention that it is possible to be too aware. As with all things, there is a balance to be found. Will you allow me to demonstrate?”
The change in her demeanor was instantaneous. Her eyes widened. Her lips spread and curved up.
Suddenly, she reached around and grabbed one of the hands he’d clasped behind his back. Her eyes shone with something other than tears as she stared up at him.
“Yes, please, savensu,” she replied. “I would like to learn.”
Go to Chapter 3