Well, it was originally going to be a one-shot at any rate. Now it will be chaptered. How Spock and the others deal with the effects of sudden fame and being classed as heroes by civilian life on Earth. This little prologue is more Spock's thoughts than actual prose. That will come the next chapter, when we get into the actual story.
Heroes
To Spock, people who say heroes are people that do great things that are looked up to and are admired have a false estimate of his own definition.
Heroes are admired, yes, but they are also despised. They are scrutinised, they are unable to have privacy from the hordes of people waiting to pick up their every move, and they are nearly always so traumatised by the events that they became heroes for doing, that it was too hard to recognise it in themselves.
The crew of the Enterprise were now considered heroes. They had saved the planet Earth, and with that, the Federation.
Spock hated it. He had never hated anything so much in his life, had thought himself incapable of such strong dislike, but it was true. He hated it.
Kirk seemed to savour the attention, the affection, the media, even the unwanted touches and advances. So much so, he had taken away a lot of the exposure from Spock himself, so that he could have some time and privacy form the mass of crowds who always wanted his attention now. Kirk revelled in it, seeming untouched by the waves of stubborn hatred by some, the way his every wrong move was bandied about by everyone like it was the highlight of the world's news. The way people only went to him because of his newfound fame.
Spock couldn't understand the role this man had taken on. Why would anyone choose this life? A life so exposed that nothing could be considered personal or secure information. Everything was for sale when it came to Kirk. Or so it seemed to one very confused half Vulcan.
Scott seemed to be getting less attention than the rest of them, when it came to the public. Most of the attention he was receiving came directly from the Admiralty, as they decided what to do with him. Scott did not seem to mind this overly much, as he was at least warm and with copious amounts of foods around, he was willing to put up with anything, so long as he wasn't shipped back off to Delta Vega.
For the most part, he was being left alone.
The others, including himself weren't taking it well at all.
Sulu, who had been saved by Kirk, seemed to be the one handling it almost as well as the Acting Captain was. He seemed to like retelling his adventure on top of the Romulan drill, though there was a tightness to his eyes and mouth that made Spock think that the smile may be false, but he was not as experienced with reading human facial expressions as most people seemed to automatically think he was when they find out he is half human.
If any one of them was to go on interviews with Kirk, it was Sulu. But Sulu was not the one the crowds wanted to hear from.
Nyota was being bothered by the attention, perhaps because she was being posed as the heroine of the battle, the only woman on the main bridge crew who had given major hints and had been able to prove Kirk's theory that they may be running into a trap. If the media had their way, they woud have the entire civilian population believing she was the only female Starfleet cadet to ever have accomplished anything. She was being shown as someone all females should aspire to be. Smart, beautiful, strong. She was being used as Starfleet's poster girl.
She was not at all happy with this. Nyota liked her privacy just as much as he did.
Doctor McCoy, possibly one of the most irritating humans he had ever known, seemed to positively hate it as much as he did, but his reactions always seemed to be slightly out of sync with his actual true emotions. Always angrier, pessimistic, wrong. So he was not sure how McCoy was truly taking being thought of as a hero.
All Spock could really see as the honest truth was that McCoy had been doing his job as best he could and that he was being classed a hero for it was an irritant at best.
He worried for Chekov. The boy was taking the events harder than all but himself. He was being praised for his actions in beaming Kirk, Sulu and Ambassador Sarek off the planet in extreme circumstances, but no one seemed to think or care about the person who he tried to save but couldn't. Whenever Spock was near the boy, he could feel the guilt, the agony of knowing that he had tried his hardest but couldn't save them all. That for once in his life he had failed at something, and it had cost someone their life.
Spock did not blame Chekov for his mother's death. Chekov did not seem to realise that.
He knew it would only be a matter of time before his deeds in saving the Earth with his suicide run would somehow leak. And he endlessly worried about how he would take the added attention that Kirk was trying to keep off of him. That the others were, to the best of their abilities protecting him from.
He knew it was too much to wish for the news to never be found out. He had just wished that he had had a little more time before he was being touched, slapped on the back, hugged and kissed by a mob of hysterical humans.
He had the illogical thought of running away, of trying to hide.
It was a useless thought. They would pursue him wherever he went.
It was not that news that leaked first however, it was the news that he and Nyota were in a relationship.
And with that one bit of information, he lost the love of the crowd and that threatened his very being.