Title: While in Solitary

Genre: angst/friendship

Rating: K+

Summary: Spock Prime's thoughts upon recognizing Kirk. Not intended as slash, but read as you will. Same fanon as 'Legacy'.

The cold had become welcome.

Hmm...Jim would be laughing at me for this. Teasing me for my illogical statement. But it is true. I enjoy the dulling effect of the chill wind and snow. Watching Vulcan die while knowing it lived in my own universe was a conflicting experience. It did nothing to quell my grief at the massive loss of life, and so my mind has become thankful for the numbing cold. My world is dead in the sky here. Yet my mother had lived a long life in my own world, the Council I knew had been around being stubbornly Vulcan (bless them for it, too), and many of my years had been filled with duty being interrupted by visits home.

I have to smile at the thought. Many times my friends had come with me. Nyota had wanted to improve her speaking skills and Jim simply tagged along for Fleet knows what.

Jim. It has been many years since I last spoke to Jim.

"It's just a maiden voyage, Spock. What's the worst that could happen?"

"Last time you said that, old friend, we were invaded by Tribbles the next day."

Jim laughed, loudly and long as he was wont to do in those days," True, but I'm not Captain."

Spock felt his lips turn up in an involuntary smile at the long standing joke. He waved his friend off to his shuttle and returned to his studies. He trusted he'd seem Jim soon.

Two days later he receives word that James Tiberius Kirk was killed aboard the newest Enterprise, without even a body to bury. He stayed in his quarters for a month.

That was my hardest experience since the crew I'd known had aged and died. I had never grown quite as close with them as with our captain, so it was not until Jim's death that I really felt grief.

And then for a time there was calm in the greater universe, as if Jim had made it so in his last moments. Many young officers came and went, including several I befriended. Jim's son, Daniel, young Jean-Luc Picard, and Daniel's granddaughter Tiberia, All good Starfleet officers. Jean-Luc and Tiberia actually went on to become captain of the Enterprise in their own days.

There is some pain in that recollection, despite my control. Tiberia most likely believes me dead in the destruction of Romulus, dear girl, and must be feeling terribly alone now. There are other half Vulcans around in her time, but I admit to feeling closer to her. She is a Kirk, after all, and despite having been raised on Vulcan possesses a humor Jim would find delightful. I miss that irreverent wit sometimes, especially here among the ice.

Something crashed in the distance, and I hurry once the sounds of a man's shouts reach my ear. Who would be stupid enough, upon landing here, to go off on their own? It is a wasteland, uninhabitable by all but those accustomed to extreme weather like myself. One would have to be either incredibly dense or foolishly adventurous to wander here.

I must confess to not thinking much as I run to their aid, grabbing the young man and leading him back to my cave. Only when we get there do I truly look at him.

Oh, by the Fleet...this cannot be. But it is. His eyes are different, a blazing teal. But still. The color of his hair, the set of his jaw, they are all those of James Tiberius Kirk. As much as I know this is him before my eyes, I cannot bring myself to speak for a moment. As much as it goes against what I was taught, I missed this man, brother in all but blood. To see him now, cocky and unconscious of the possibility of failure, is refreshing.

"Jim," I say, and suddenly the cold and the quiet is the last thing I care about.