Disclaimer: I don't own Star Trek 2009.
A/N: Here it is, fresh off the press.
Sequel to: Come In, To My Parlor, Said the Spider, and To.
*
Spock folded his hands behind his back in his customary pose and looked out of the view screen to the testing area below. He was almost smiling by the time he noticed the shock of blonde hair that stood by the "captain's chair." That made the smile turn into a smirk.
So this was the boy who had could hack his system, eh? Well, this was going to be…fun.
He stepped back to the monitoring screen and watched quietly as the simulation commenced. He followed the data track with his eyes and quickly froze the screens of the hack in progress, saving them to his personal files.
He wanted to applaud the brilliantly subtle changes in the frames that, had he not been looking at it, no one would ever see.
He had designed the Kobayashi Maru to be the perfect test for up and coming command officers. The frontal purpose was to experience fear; fear in the face of certain death, the captain would maintain control of himself and his crew.
But he had also planned it out to be taken more than once, something few recognized.
The moment The Board had come to him, just fresh out of the Star Fleet Academy with his focus being bimolecular mutations, and asked him if he could design a test for the slim students that where in the challenging Command Path, he had jumped on it with no hesitation.
Throughout school he had been known for his technological prowess, and who would expect any different? He had been in the Vulcan Science Academy for his teenaged years. So, it wasn't a shock for The Board to use him as they did. He had gotten to work immediately between his teaching of the xenolinguistics class and hand to had combat teaching.
Within a year, he had the Kobayashi Maru.
He even rated the people in his head as he went over the footage of cadets taking the test, as per The Boards request. They only wanted the best of the best brought before them, and Spock could understand that.
His ratings were simple.
Take it once and walk away defeated, you weren't fit for command.
Take it once and walk away contemplating, you had potential to be good in command.
Take it twice and walk away contemplating it even more, you had GREAT potential to be good in command.
The few in the second category and all in the third where given to The Board for their look over.
No one had yet come back to take it three times.
Except Cadet Kirk.
That was something that had shocked, and inordinately pleased him. Human or not, people were so afraid of failing that they didn't try anymore, it seemed.
Spock might have known the feeling had he not put up with ruining countless strands of DNA, circuit boards blowing up in his face, and having to laugh at himself and his fellow Vulcan students in the Vulcan Academy when everyone needed to lighten up.
(The people in Star Fleet would surely be shocked to find that to Vulcans, Spock was often the class clown.)
Spock had yet to look up the cadet's file, wanting to be surprised with each encounter but since he had discovered Kirk's digital fingerprints all over the SIM, Spock had known.
Cadet Kirk was either going to kill his crew in a ball of fiery death…
Or he was going to be one of the best to ever serve in Star Fleet.
Spock dearly hoped it was the second one.
Watching as the hack hit climax, Spock was unsurprised to have the lights go out as the program rerouted. They came back on after a spare second.
The other technicians were running like chicken's with their heads cut off as Spock stood straighter and walked back to the viewing window, an almost unnoticeable skip in his step.
Looking down on the blonde with a grin, he unfolded his hands and tucked them into his pockets.
He couldn't wait to meet Kirk.
It was bound to be…interesting.