Taste What You Feel

[harbors_madness]

She was never silent. Her voice was one of metal and digital information, passing in constant measures across the length of her body. The tiny creaks of her elegant form as she hovered in planetary orbit, silent from the outside, loud from the inside. With a desire to hurry, the Klingon ship that had been her last real meal was being incorporated

Comments

[sehlatbear]

Spock approached his own meal more calmly. He had eaten adequate nutrition with Jim but... much had happened in the intervening time.

Amusement and a certain sober quality of observation warred within him to watch Ayel attack his meal. The mind work would account for a great deal of hunger; however, Spock suspected, there was more to his hunger than the exhaustion that could come with telepathic effort.

Growth needed fuel.

"The Narada. Is she also hungry?"

[loyalty_ever]

That made him pause, the fork frozen in place a moment before he set it down.

Well, we were going to feed her your ship... That train of thought would help no one.

"Almost always. More, recently. She's nearly done with this klivam scow." He looked down at the leaves like he expected to get answers from them. "She needs Rihan parts. She'll become a Klingon ship if we keep feeding her this junk."

[sehlatbear]

It was an obvious train. Spock looked away for a moment, considering.

"I am not sure what else will be granted. But I will ask my Jim what might be done."

He took another thoughtful bite. He would speak with Jim before sleeping. Perhaps something could be arranged.

"Does she do that? Take on the characteristics of that which she eats?"

[harbors_madness]

She had never stopped listening, but had let the lesson complete itself without her intrusion. It was more difficult to be in two places at once, as most of her concentration was linked to watching Ael and alha's life signs while concentrating on streams of incoming data from her this-self on the Enterprise.

She had recorded everything that she could gather from Ael and Spock as they worked, and would review it carefully later. The sound of her ident drew her attention, and so she listened more closely. She knew Ael's words to be true, that she would become more and more what she had eaten. She did not want to be klivam. She wanted to be proud, strong, Rihan.

Carefully, from what she had learned on the Enterprise, she began to change the replicator they sat closest to.

[loyalty_ever]

He stabbed at a bit of stray salad, thinking. Spock would ask. No miracles. Just a request. Ayel did him a favor in return, and didn't hope. Spock was already hoping for the both of them--though he would have called that illogical. But by that same logic, if Spock thought there was no hope of it, he wouldn't have said anything.

Narada would need material again. Soon. And Ayel would never hurt her to spare his pride. But if this worked, he'd be deeply beholden to these people. He already was--to Spock, the Spock he was beginning to think of as his.

Friend. There it was again. He wasn't sure what to do with it. Put it aside, for now.

"Yes," he said, finally. "She learns from everything she absorbs, and keeps the mannerisms with the knowledge. This is why she needs the right parts."

He didn't say I'm not sure 'Fleet parts are the right parts. They couldn't get Rihan material, not here and now, and Federation technology was certainly better than Klingon. But it made him wonder

[sehlatbear]

He silently pushed his plate toward the center of the table. Spock returned to the replicator and set to work again.

"The right parts might be difficult to acquire - there is no peace between the Federation and the Empire in this universe, at this time."

His fingers pulled back.

"She is changing the sub-routines herself. I think she has learned quite a bit from the Enterprise already."

He was less worried as he ordered two beverages and two more plates.

Spiced tea for himself - it looked and smelled right. Jim's favorite, black coffee - it seemed to be something the Romulan would enjoy. And ameelah. Dessert. His fondness for it could, undoubtedly, be traced to Jim's fondness for ending his meals with sweetness.

He carried it all back to the table.

[loyalty_ever]

Ayel followed suit, stacked the plates and moved them to the counter, thinking This is bizarre even as he answered Spock.

"We had--an understanding, in my time." What would talk of the Dominion War do to history? Even without mentioning the regime change afterward--or that Nero himself slew the Senate for their cowardice, and that Ayel had been glad. Better not to say. "I doubt it lasted."

No way of knowing what had happened in his universe, once they left. Couldn't retrieve reports that hadn't been written yet. It made the hairs on his arms stand up.

He rubbed them down again, raised an eyebrow.

"Dyynl." He would let her know, soon, how very proud he was. "She's always been quick."

Oh. That smelled wonderful. It was unfamiliar, but he knew the scent of starches cooking, the promise of warm sugar.

He wouldn't inhale this. It deserved more consideration. And now that they had the pattern, he could call up a third order. Not that Ayel expected his captain to actually sit in the chair they had set--with any Spock, anywhere, ever--

[sehlatbear]

Spock's ear tips tinted the slightest bit jade.

"The tea is not appreciated by many but the other is a popular choice. My Jim prefers it plain though others add sweetener."

There was no logic on which to fall back - Spock had simply thought Ayel might enjoy it. There seemed to be little enough comfort offered him.

"Narada, I must conclude, found the other in the Enterprise's menus. That Spock has programmed in a number of excellent Vulcan dishes."

And appeared to have something of a sweet-tooth from the sampling Spock had done.

[loyalty_ever]

Was Spock flustered? Hard to tell. Nearly all his inflection was in his voice, and that was still calm.

There was a name for this, in Standard--a kind of coda after lastmeal, more than just drinks, but it escaped him. He'd never taken up the fad. But that smelled good. And Narada would have locked user permissions if Spock tried anything. Which he'd have done with the salad, if he were going to bother.

Spock was--just being nice? No wonder his ears were a little green.

Something his captain drank. Wasn't raktajino, then: the Feds and the Klingons were still at war. But it was hot and looked good.

Oh. It was. Bracing and almost bitter enough

[sehlatbear]

He had been so reluctant before, to speak of Vulcan matters. In this universe where Vulcan was mostly a memory in the minds of its remaining people, it seemed more important to share knowledge. And his bonding influenced him as well. The joy of it spilled out in ways he had not predicted, a new openness. Spock would fall back on the logical reason, though - Ayel required the information for the sake of his own mind and for that of Nero

[loyalty_ever]

Where had that question even come from?

He blinked. The food, maybe. Or else it was this human raktajino. Softened his resolve, made him curious.

Damn his curiosity. This was worse than getting caught persuading a live stingtail to roost in Proctor Vriial's desk.

Worse, because he'd felt nothing but triumph, then. Because he cared what Spock thought. And that should have rankled, and it didn't.

He really was going mad. Might as well go all the way.

"Vaedn'ihlan, arhem dochair ehl'ein," he mumbled into his plate. Stronger apology might compound the offense. He didn't know enough Vulcan. And the Standard was...too effusive.

But Spock answered him, eyebrow nearly vertical in that expression they shared--startled, a touch of wry reproach. No more than he'd earned. A lot less, really.

And it was possible, if rare. He held on to that

[sehlatbear]

It had changed him, Spock knew. It had loosened the tight places inside of him that had made him stand stiffly within the embrace of his mother's arms when she greeted him. The places that had kept him from explaining his logic to Sarek, instead allowing his own father to believe that Spock had rejected something, some unidentifiable thing that Sarek had symbolized

[mirror_brightly]

They were speaking.

He drifted, floated across every half word and dipped beneath the veil of memory. Apologies and the scents of solid food and decadent replication pulled him like the tide, churned his stomach and his thoughts as he straddled the lines of slumber. He couldn't pick them apart anymore, Spock and Ayel, both sounded blue. Their voices carried, the space did not, would not swallow them, and bile rose in the back of Nero's throat.

The smell of soap was burned away, had faded back into his skin, behind his eyes. They parted heavily, caught on sleep and the thread of breath that snaked through him. He was tired, bone tired, but it wasn't safe here...too blue. He pushed up from the table and the metal creaked beneath his grip. Didn't look, couldn't risk it, not and keep his stomach

[loyalty_ever]

The chair's flimsy backing snapped in his grip.

It's too soon; I don't know enough. Couldn't reach his captain that way. Not yet.

"Iyyhae." He tried to still his face, settled for looking firmly at Spock's uniform insignia instead of meeting his eyes. "Come with me."

They had no brig. It was...gone, dissolved off into a wall somewhere as she ate, ravenous, straining to become whole.

She took organic matter, too, out of necessity.

Ayel was not about to mention that.

[sehlatbear]

Spock was unperturbed. He took the moment required to gather their plates, empty mugs, and return them to the replicator unit.

"Bonding does require a mind meld." Spock need not react to Nero's upset - he would not disgrace the man's pain by ignoring it but it was the pain of madness and did not require immediate response. He followed Ayel, as though continuing their earlier conversation. "If he is the one with whom you wish to bond, there are things you must learn before any attempt is made. You risk your own mind, given the state of his."

But it could heal, too.

Spock spared another thought for his Jim and his Leonard. In the morning, he would speak with them, mind to mind, if he survived the night. The odds spoke in favor of it.

[mirror_brightly]

The door parted and his feet carried him into the hall, slowly, steadily, like the processions of midnight miners in the Klivam tunnels. They passed by him, shades or real, he wasn't sure. They moved away and distance soon eclipsed their voices, though he heard the trickling color of them for far too long. His hand kept the wall, held it as he walked.