======================================================= No Emotional Demands
DISCLAIMER:
I Don't Own Star Trek. And I'm not making any money from
this.
She'd forgiven him. He could not be anything other than what he was. And he had apologized. Desisted immediately when he realized she needed more, had calmly accepted her offer to stay on as his assistant.
They'd had a very interesting conversation on the walk home after the attempted seduction. It had been her first personal conversation with a Vulcan, or half Vulcan. She began to realize that it was the only personal conversation she'd ever had with him either...she had to slap herself for her stupidity. She'd let infatuation and curiosity override her normally sensible approach to such things. And maybe she'd used him just a bit -- the appeal of figuratively getting into an alien mind to a xenolinguist...well, served her right if she literally got into an alien mind and discovered just what a cold place it could be. Who knew that telepathy didn't necessarily engender deep and powerful empathy for all living creatures?
And then she'd begun to feel sorry for him. He really didn't feel, couldn't feel for the most part. He was so cut off from the world of humans -- most of the time she realized their motivations were invisible to him. He was a touch telepath after all, not a Betazed...and he touched no one.
She began to feel that part of her job as his assistant was to translate the emotions, motivations and culture of the humans around him. To try and help him adapt, fit in.
She had been rewarded for it. He had helped her tremendously professionally.
He had acknowledged her in his paper. He even let her present with him. So many assistants in other labs went without receiving any acknowledgement from their superiors -- he let her present. And to be honest, he had more than let her present with him...he had convinced her to present with him. He hadn't let her fear of public speaking interfere with what was best for her career.
He'd been more than interested in reading her paper on proto-Vulcan and proto-Romulan translations of the epic T'Kai Lamana Ita, and being her sounding board as she wrote it.
They had accidentally bumped into each other on a night off. And he had spent his night off listening to her drone on about her paper for over an hour. During her rambling he hadn't even fallen into what they both referred to 'The Pavlovian Vulcan Sleep Effect' -- the tendency to nod off when faced with a Vulcan like data dump. And lets face it, when it came to xenolanguages Nyota knew she was perfectly capable of putting sentient species to sleep. She was just a little too detailed in her analysis.
Then there was the language practice. Discovering she had to retest out of standard language courses every semester to avoid taking prereq classes he started speaking in alien languages around the lab. Just to keep her skills up to par. She strongly suspected that he enjoyed it as an intellectual exercise -- and he said that if she wasn't taking prereq courses she would have more time to help him with his research.
Ever practical. Ever efficient. And except for that first incident...Ever logical. That was Spock.
She wasn't exactly sure when he started to change. After the episode, a little before they'd presented together he started trying to respect human niceties. Saying hello and goodbye -- big things for Spock.
Then on several occasions she began to suspect he tried to make her laugh. At a certain point she realized he was actually getting good at it. The night he'd listened to her ramblings about the T'Kai Lamana Ita when she hadn't been talking about proto-Romulans and Vulcans he'd been cracking her up.
It was probably just some sort of Vulcan intellectual game to him. But it made their association together...well, genuinely fun.
Actually, maybe it was the night of that accidental meeting and the T'Kai Lamana Ita conversation when he started to change? Or maybe she had been the one to change?
She'd been planning to go out dancing that night with friends. Then they bumped into Spock and his ex-roommate Brian at a bar. Brian was going off to fight in the neutral zone and of course Gailia, Nyota's Orion roommate just had to make sure his last night was memorable. Patriotic duty and all that. Of course it left Spock the third wheel.
Nyota really, really, really wanted to just leave Spock to his own devices. She didn't feel like being her professional self that evening. But it seemed so tacky on Gailia's part -- and Brian's. So she stayed to keep Spock company while Gailia decided if Brian truly represented a patriotic calling.
She actually made fun of Spock a little bit, and not entirely in a nice way. She was frustrated to be stuck with her superior on her night out -- her superior who was dressed practically warm enough to go skiing in a roll neck sweater and flannel trousers. He looked good, she always thought he did -- although her experience in his mind had left her more than immune to his charms. That evening his warm clothing made him look distinctly out of place among the t-shirts and tank tops. She teased him for his inappropriate attire. "Isn't that sweater awfully warm on a night like this?" She'd asked.
"Only if you're a cold blooded human," Spock replied looking at her sideways. And then he really began to tease her -- but in a nice way, unlike her comment. Some of the time she was sure he was just being logical...some of the time...
She got to unload her professional issues that night on him. And they had fun. He even was able to repel a drunk who had been much more obnoxious than Jim Kirk. And he did it without lifting a finger. Typically efficient.
After Gailia and Brian had run off he took her to the shuttle stop. She had planned to meet up with her other friends, to actually have her intended night out. The night had turned colder and Spock had practically ordered her to take his sweater. When she pulled it over her head she felt herself melting -- literally and figuratively.
What was he trying to tell her? She imagined it to be something like, 'I can't provide you with emotional sustenance, but I don't enjoy the thought of you freezing to death.' He was still apologizing she imagined. But he didn't need to; she had forgiven him long ago. For some reason she changed her plans and let him walk her home...and had her second most personal conversation with a half Vulcan.
And then this semester, the fall semester of her second year...he had taken up Trill the new language she was studying because as he said raising an eyebrow, "I thought it would be Trilling." The pun was terrible, but with the eyebrow...And he'd been the perfect Trill data dump, had helped her study just by listening to her.
They spent more and more time together -- at his invitation. She began to get more and more attached to him. She knew she shouldn't -- Spock didn't form attachments due to proximity. And he was perfectly capable of having 'intellectually stimulating conversations' without emotional attachment.
She was friendly to other men, and tried dating human men...and of course got a lot more emotional feedback from them. But she couldn't talk to them about the finer points of xenophonology or morphology without them experiencing the Pavlovain Vulcan Sleep Effect. And quite frankly, a lot of them she found just boring. Or condescending -- being a pretty girl is wonderful until you want to prove you have a brain.
She missed Spock's dry humor and wit. And he had never questioned her intelligence; in fact he'd defended it on more than one occasion.
When you have more fun at lunch with a half Vulcan than you do being wined and dined at fine restaurants by ambitious Star Fleet would be captains, doctors and officials you know you're in trouble. It was emotionally unhealthy.
Then the rumors that had been circulating about her relationship with Spock made her attachment to him professionally unhealthy. They spent too much time together around campus. People were noticing and talking.
It wasn't worth it. To maintain anything other than a strictly professional relationship with someone who did not, could not return your affections...even without the rumors...it was a bad idea every way she looked at it.
So she'd tried to return their relationship to what it had been before. Purely professional. She didn't want to lose her assistantship...she had was determined to get to the bottom of the mystery transmission they'd discovered. And she knew he could handle being purely professional, he was a logical creature after all.
But then he'd said, "I find this option...unacceptable."
She'd been angry at him, furious...for an instant. Then it occurred to her he simply didn't understand that it wasn't just illogical gossip that compelled her to return things to the status quo. She was an emotional person, she needed an emotional bond that he couldn't provide. So she tried to explain.
He lifted two fingers to her temple and said, "May I?"
A/N:
This
is sort of a bit of Nyota's perspective. Goes along with
Descartes Error which is almost entirely from Spock's POV. If
you're curious as to how Spock's emotions for Nyota changed you can
read the chapters "Sleep", "Breakdown" and
"Absolution"...and maybe you'll find the whole story worth
reading!
Here's the link for Sleep: /s/5147894/6/Descartes_Error