Title: Human Behavior (2/6)
Characters: Spock, Kirk, various including McCoy, Peter Kirk, OCs
Rating: K+
Word Count: (this chapter) 4,313
Warnings: Spoilers for Operation - Annihilate!. Reference to theme of Stockholm Syndrome referring to the neurological parasites. References to deleted scenes and script from OA. Speculation for this and the other parts of the arc. Shameless h/c and character exploration. Lack of plot. The usual, in other words. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Summary: Five human behaviors Spock did not understand, and one that he definitely did understand. Six-shot, revolving around the episode Operation - Annihilate! and all its aftermath.

V. Childhood Resilience

He had silently stood guard over his captain and the child for nearly an hour, after which time they retired from the memorial park to give privacy to another family who desired to utilize the pseudo-cherry tree as their loved one's final resting-place. Spock was, he would not deny, pleased to see that Dr. McCoy had remained well within eyesight of the entrance to the park. He was accompanied by a squad of Security guards in dress scarlets, who immediately closed in before and behind them as they made their egress.

Kirk's eyes widened a fraction as Kevin Riley and Jeffery Garrovick saluted with appropriate solemnity and fell into place before their captain, a barrier between him and anyone who intended to intrude upon the privacy of the Enterprise's commander. Spock favored the two who brought up the rear with a curt nod of approval, again mentally noting a commendation to Montgomery Scott for his foresight in choosing whom to send; he had not thought of need for protection against a human mob, as the idea of such desecratory rudeness would never occur to a Vulcan.

Peter Kirk waved as their CMO approached; the child had, for some reason utterly incomprehensible to Spock, attached himself to the doctor like a Euridian leech-worm during the six days he had spent aboard the Enterprise before their return to Deneva. Whatever his faults, McCoy was still a healer, and a father, and perhaps that was what had attracted the boy to the gentle physician.

Now, McCoy smiled down at the child, after nodding in acknowledgment to their silent captain, and the child smiled back. "How're you doing, young fella?" the physician asked, accent more pronounced due to exhaustion.

"'M okay, Dr. Bones." The words were accompanied by a small shrug, and Spock saw a brief smile glimmer across the captain's face, for the child had picked up on McCoy's nickname at some point and the physician had never had the heart to correct him.

The doctor turned to Kirk, asking something to which the captain smiled sadly and shook his head, responding so quietly Spock could not overhear.

Which event left him free to hear snatches of conversations that were occurring in various pockets around them.

"Mr. Garrovick," he said in a low tone, without taking his eyes off his scanning of the crowd.

"Yes, sir?"

"I trust such measures will not be necessary, but in the event they become so: on my order, you will call for an emergency beam-out of the captain and his nephew to the Enterprise. In the event that I am not present: if this crowd, as you would say, gets ugly, you shall take the initiative and give the order yourself, if necessary without clearing said order with the captain. Am I understood?"

The young man's eyes hardened, and he glared at the closest knot of belligerent colonists. "Clearly, sir. You think there's going to be trouble, Commander?"

"I believe that is what I just said, Ensign," he replied dryly, and could only hope that his precautions would remain just that – only precautions.

"Look out, mister!"

Suddenly, his vision had only just time to register a blur of yellow and pink before an object of pliable semi-solidity struck his torso just above the waist, bouncing off with an airy thud. A child's plaything – some sort of rubber ball, apparently – rolled a few inches away and stopped at the feet of a wide-eyed human child.

It had not been any sort of inconvenience, much less had caused damage; and even if it had, the low laugh he heard from the captain at the sight of his raised eyebrows would have negated any resulting unpleasantness from the encounter.

The little one could not be more than two or possibly three years of age, with a face full of enormous blue eyes and curls the color of Vulcan sand at mid-day. She stood, one finger in a small mouth, staring up wide-eyed…at his ears.

Sighing was a human action, and therefore he did not indulge in it.

An older child, a dark-haired human boy about Peter Kirk's age, flew up to them from the side just in front of a woman in her late twenties, and the family resemblance among the three was obvious.

"Awful sorry, mister, I didn't mean to kick it that hard…holy cow, what're you?"

He raised an eyebrow, amused at the horrified look on the young mother's face; there was no need, for curiosity was one emotion that was both permitted and accepted in all species. But Peter Kirk piped up from behind him before he could offer explanation.

"He's a Vulcan, Tommy! They're like the smartest people in the galaxy!"

"Hardly," he interjected calmly, and saw the young woman relax slowly as he appeared to be unoffended by the child's inquisitiveness (quite the opposite, as many young ones of alien species viewed strangers such as himself with distrust rather than the refreshing curiosity of these). "There exist many life-forms which surpass Vulcans in areas of intelligence and imagination."

"Yeah but you have cooler ears I betcha," Peter informed him, quite seriously, and Spock heard Lieutenant Riley ingest a passing insect, which triggered a vigorous coughing fit in the hapless human.

Jim's lips were twitching suspiciously, and Dr. McCoy was making no such effort to hide his cackling. "James Kirk, ma'am," the captain spoke, smiling at the young woman. "Do you know my nephew?"

Flustered, the woman tucked a stray curl behind her left ear and nodded. "I'm Ariel Brown. You're Aurelan's brother-in-law, aren't you?"

"Yes, I am," he replied softly.

"I work with my husband at the recycling plant four blocks from the labs," Ariel said, eyes soft. "She is…was my day-sitter for Julia and Tommy."

A sudden crease appeared between the captain's sandy brows, bespeaking of pain well-hidden from spectators. "I'm…so sorry," he whispered.

The woman glanced up from where she had checked to make sure the children were still nearby, obviously confused. "Whatever for?" she asked, dark eyes wide with bewilderment.

"For…" Spock saw the man pause, a sudden realization lighting the still, sad eyes for a moment, and he wished to personally thank this woman for her innocent inquiry. There was nothing any of them could have done differently, nothing that would change what had happened, nothing that would make guilt deserved for any of them; and the first step to healing would be for Jim to see that and admit it to himself.

"Captain Kirk," and the woman spared a moment to look down at her toddler, who was still staring at them wide-eyed. "Those…things, were everywhere. I and my husband were both affected…and so were my children. My baby, Captain, one of those things was inside my baby." Her dark eyes sparked with the fury only nature itself understood, the truly terrifying sight of a female protecting her young. "If you had not found a way to kill those horrible creatures they would have murdered my children."

Blinking far too rapidly, finally Jim's gaze dropped to the little one staring up at them, and then flicked back to his nephew, who was crouched on the ground beside the other human child. Peter was currently in the middle of a (highly-exaggerated) account of the workings of the cross-pollination experiments in the Enterprise's Botany Lab Four, complete with diagrams scribbled on the pavement with a piece of chalk.

Hazel eyes moved upward to meet his own, and while Spock was not overly religious he thanked any deity who might be listening that he was still capable of sight; that would have been one more burden that this human did not deserve to bear.

The tiny girl took two toddling steps closer, and yanked firmly on the leg of the captain's uniform trousers. "Up," she commanded severely, reaching up with one small hand.

"Um," was the highly intelligent response, and the captain cast a helpless look at his crew, who were studiously turning their eyes to watch for any signs of trouble (now that the square was nearly deserted). Finally Kirk glanced back to the woman, who was smiling. "May I?"

Ariel laughed. "Of course, Captain. And," she added hesitantly, as the man dropped to one knee to swing the toddler up into his arms, careful to not tangle her curls on the sharp edges of his medals, "if…if you've no plans for the night…Tommy and Peter haven't seen much of each other, it might be good for them to have a bit. We live just 'round the corner from…from your brother's home."

"Ooo," Julia commented succinctly, one tiny finger tracing the Sliver Palm and Cluster (1) which was fastened to the captain's uniform, and the man's features softened as he looked down at the little one.

"Am I the only one that thinks that's ridiculously adorable?" Garrovick whispered covertly to Riley, and the man grinned, knowing better than anyone else just how powerful an influence this man could be over a child. (2)

Spock shot Garrovick a withering look, and the man straightened up on the instant, blushing to the roots of his hair.

"I'm sure you have a hundred other things to do aboard your ship, Captain…but we'd at least like to offer you some coffee, if you can't stay for more," Ariel was finishing slowly, toying with the small handbag she held.

Kirk looked distinctly uncomfortable, hiding his eyes behind the mop of red curls atop the baby's head. "I…appreciate the offer, Mrs. Brown. But –" he broke off suddenly, and Spock followed his gaze over to the two young boys, who were engrossed in a small copy of the Starfleet Academy cadet handbook some crewman on board had laughingly given Peter earlier in the week. "Well," the captain amended, closing his eyes over the child's head for a moment, "it will be good for him…for a while, at least. If it's no trouble, ma'am."

"None," she assured him. Then, as the captain awkwardly looked from side to side at his companions, she continued. "You are all welcome, if you can be spared, Captain."

"Mr. Riley, if you and your men will beam back to the ship," Kirk spoke over the child's head, and though the tone was calm and business-like his eyes were warm. "Do not think for a moment that I don't appreciate what you've done here today, gentlemen."

"Pleasure, sir," the young man nodded, saluting smartly for the benefit of the children watching. "Mr. Scott, four to beam up."

"If you've nothing crucial in your laboratories which will blow up my ship in a few hours, gentlemen, then I'd like the pleasure of your company. Doctor?"

Spock released a small amount of tension, for he was more aware than anyone else aboard just how strained the relationship between the captain and the physician had been, following the full-spectrum light test and its disastrous results. Jim had apologized for blaming his CMO for blinding his First, and yet the rift had not fully healed; mainly due to lack of sleep, grief, and stress keeping them far too busy to truly speak.

A rare smile crossed the doctor's face. "Be glad to, Jim," he replied with obvious sincerity. "Very kind of you too, ma'am," he added, turning toward Ariel. "Are your children fully recovered from the effects of the parasites?"

"Quite, Doctor, thank you; there was a residual fever in both of them while the organism was dying, but they are quite healthy now – isn't that right, baby girl?"

"Na," the little one responded, giggling into the shoulder of the captain's dress uniform.

The look on Jim's face, when she spit up all over him two minutes and fifteen seconds later, was priceless, even to a Vulcan.

The 'coffee' had, in true human form, turned into a meal and then after-dinner conversation; and while such intimacy with humans would not be his first choice for a way to pass the evening, he was after all a diplomat's son and as such gave no indication that he was ill-at-ease.

They had stayed in the Brown home past sundown now, which was early in the evening this time of the planet's cycle, and the house was lit warmly by almost an abundance of lamps and solar-powered lights. Ariel's husband, Paul, had explained that it was a standard precaution in the colony, to keep the parasitic creatures out of their houses at night in an effort to protect the children and few lucky adults who had not been infected. Old habits were hard to break in any species, and he understood the humans' need for an abundance of light, after having endured the darkness of one of those creatures himself. It had taken him nearly three days before he did not feel a twinge of discomfort in meditating in complete darkness, and that was with Vulcan logic - these humans had no such assistance.

What he could not comprehend, however, was how easily the child, Peter Kirk, had thrown off the melancholy and grief he had shown earlier. The boy was currently flying across the room, a small replica of a Klingon Bird of Prey in his hand, shouting at the top of his lungs and making what were most likely supposed to be the sound effects which accompanied a phaser blast. The other child, Tommy Brown, was holding a small model of a Starfleet vessel, his dark head bent over it in rapt attention as the captain of the Enterprise, sprawled on the floor in a woolen sweater borrowed from their host while his jacket was drying out, explained the weak points in the hull and how the nacelles powered the vessel.

"See, it won't work like that," the captain was saying. "You can't just turn it on and off like a light switch, Tommy. The matter-antimatter mix has to be just right, or you'll blow your ship to bits. Unless you have a Vulcan aboard, in which case he might be able to come up with a formula for a cold-core start," he amended, smiling. (3)

"Then you're dead, Tommy!" Peter Kirk shouted, jumping off a floppy, plasticene-pellet-filled chair and sprawling in a heap at the other young one's feet. "Krshhhhhhht! We've shot out your Engineerin' section, so surrender!"

"Well, fine!"

"No, no, no," the captain chuckled, reaching up a hand and taking the model Bird of Prey from his nephew. He tapped it with one instructive finger. "One, Klingons don't take prisoners. And two: as for you, young man – Starfleet officers don't surrender to Klingons, you got that?"

"Whaddo I do, then?" the other child fairly wailed, looking helplessly at Kirk.

"Blow 'em up soon as you see 'em," was Peter Kirk's sagely advice.

"Blo!"

"Here, here, get the civilian out of this briefing," Kirk chuckled, indicating the toddler who had wandered past Spock's legs into the room, a ragged plush bear in one small hand. "Look here, squirt," he added, sending his nephew a mock glare, "you don't ever just shoot at someone without warning, understood? You would hail the vessel and ask to speak to their commander, Tommy."

"Yeah and then I'd shoot your nacelles off!"

"Peter."

"Well I would, if I was a Klingon!"

"What do I do then?" Tommy asked, gazing helplessly down at the Starfleet-model ship in his small hands.

Kirk grinned and leaned forward, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "This is what you do. You get your Chief Engineer up to the Bridge, and you have him create a false sensor reading to broadcast, making it look like your warp engines are about to explode. Because if that happens, you'll destroy everything in the sector, including that Bird of Prey."

Footsteps. "Mr. Spock?"

"Yes, Doctor," he responded, not taking his eyes off the scene in the room before him.

"And you have your Communications Chief send out a fake distress signal to Starfleet, telling them you're about to blow yourself into the next galaxy, and…"

"If you have a minute, I need to speak with you." The words were devoid of any malice or even teasing, and that alone was indication of the gravity of the physician's intent.

He turned and raised an inquiring eyebrow. "Regarding?"

"Regarding the health of a crew member, and don't act like you don't know exactly who I'm talkin' about," McCoy responded tartly. "Leave 'em in there and come out here for a minute."

He slipped silently away from the door, knowing that the captain probably had not even realized he was standing in the shadows, watching. McCoy led the way past the open living area where the Browns were talking quietly in one corner near the holographic fireplace, out to the vestibule.

"Anderson in Engineering sliced his hand and wrist open pretty bad. I'm on my way up to do minor surgery on the ligaments because he's allergic to almost all the anesthetics; have to monitor 'im closely and I don't want Chapel doing it," the physician told him, checking the chronometer on the wall as he withdrew his communicator. "That leaves you to take care of those two in there," he added, jerking one thumb backward toward the small playroom which housed the children and their captain.

He was uncertain what the expected reply to that was, and so settled for nodding.

This only served to irritate the physician, apparently, for blue eyes rolled expressively toward the low ceiling. "That means he's gonna need you at some point, Spock! He's not dealt with any of this the way he should! The kid is going to be fine I think, but –"

"Yes, the child," he mused, gently interrupting what could have escalated into a full-blown altercation which certainly would have been overheard by the occupants of the small apartment. "I am…slightly puzzled, by Peter Kirk's behavior, Doctor. Are you certain he is recovering as he should?"

McCoy sighed, a weary, dismal sound in the stillness. "Mr. Spock, children – human children, at least – are resilient. They accept change, assimilate it, much better than human adults. They recover more quickly from trauma, are able to forgive and forget more readily, and can basically just adapt to anything more quickly than a human adult, if given the time and the help to do it."

Spock nodded, cataloguing this information.

"He's had help from you, from me, from Jim – and he's begun the grieving process already. It's a good thing, that he's in there playin' like he is with someone his own age; it shows he's gonna be okay."

"And you are implying that the captain is not?"

"You bet your pointed ears I am!" McCoy hissed. "He's been so worried about that kid that he hasn't even started takin' care of himself yet! Adults take a lot longer to recover from things like this than children do, Spock."

"That may be; however, I am still uncertain as to your purpose in summoning me out here, Doctor."

"If you could just pretend for a minute that you care more than a – a box of rocks, you might be able to figure it out!"

"Really, Doctor McCoy."

Suddenly the physician's eyes went wide, and then he slumped against the floral-papered wall of the vestibule. "What on God's green earth am I saying?" he murmured.

All human have their methods of coping, and Spock had long ago realized that this particular fiery human was no exception to the rule. Humor, rather than retaliation, he had found in his experimentation was always a better approach, and he applied the technique here.

"Nothing, as we are not on 'God's green earth,' Doctor," he intoned dryly. "And as you are yourself quite exhausted to the point of not realizing just how alarmingly verbose you have become, might I suggest you beam up to the Enterprise, perform your minor surgery on Ensign Anderson, and then retire for the night?"

"Sent to my room for bein' rude, am I?" Spock's right eyebrow crept upward, and the physician chuckled. "All right, Mr. Spock. But before I go, there's this thing I wanted to tell you about when I pulled you out here."

"Please do so."

The physician glanced cautiously back toward the playroom, which was now reverberating with an verbal mimicry of a space battle, together with a dismayed wail from two-year-old baby human lungs. "I've been talkin' to the boy, Peter, all week. I'm a doctor, not a psychiatric counselor, but just the same I've been talkin' to him about the whole mess and so on."

"And?"

"He told me how Sam and Aurelan were infected; how Jim's brother died, Spock."

Spock nodded slowly. "Does the captain know of this?"

"I doubt it; he's not spoken a word about either of them this whole week – another thing that's not healthy, Spock. But anyway," the physician waved a tired hand in dismissal, "Sam and Aurelan were affected pretty early on in the eight months. They didn't fight it, according to Peter, because the parasites threatened to then infect the boy if they kept fighting. But then when they found out the Enterprise was in this sector, Sam Kirk decided the risk was worth it; Starfleet had to know, or more people would die because of those monsters. He tried every chance he could to get a message through to the Enterprise all of that week before we approached Deneva."

"The Enterprise encountered that heavy ionic storm off Delta Phoenicia, which caused a communications blackout for three days and serious malfunctions for another twenty-eight hours," Spock supplied, though the inference was not really necessary; the conclusions were obvious. "We never received the messages."

"No," McCoy sighed. "The parasites finally killed him the day we approached the system; just a couple of hours later Aurelan then tried to answer on the private channel Jim has with them, but…well, you saw how much those things liked that show of defiance."

"And the child?"

"He was stung just before we broke into the house," the doctor answered sadly. "Aurelan apparently was trying to keep the things out, away from Peter, but couldn't quite do it; the kid had just passed out from shock due to the attack when we heard the woman screaming there on the planet. You can figure out the rest."

"I believe I can," he replied quietly. George Samuel Kirk had died trying to get the word out, scant hours before help arrived, and his wife had been killed by the neurological destroyers while trying to protect her child; those two, among so many like them, had deserved a more fitting end than that which Fate had dealt them.

McCoy's communicator chirped. "McCoy here."

"Ye said give ye fifteen, Doctor; Anderson's stable enough, just waitin' for his surgeon to show up. Are ye ready for transport?"

"Yeah, I'm ready, Scotty. Spock," he added, stepping a safe distance away from the Vulcan. "Jim's still a little awkward around me, after all that happened in Sickbay with the parasites and the light test and all that. He's gonna need you, and I need you, to help him."

If he knew how, he would have done so days ago – could the human not see that?

"I know you're not sure how," the physician continued, raising the communicator to his lips, "but we both need you to try. One to beam up, Scotty."

"Aye, sir."

"Do your best, Spock," McCoy said quietly. "Energize."

The physician began to disappear in the shimmering effects of the transporter beam, leaving him alone in the lamp-lit vestibule. Behind him, the sounds of playtime had died down, only a low murmur emanating from the playroom. He could hear the Brown couple still discussing the events by the fireplace in the living area, and caught several familiar names mentioned a few times in their discussion; they were wondering whether Peter would be staying on Deneva or returning to Terra – something that perhaps Jim had not yet considered, or considered asking the boy what he preferred.

"Bah-bye," a voice sniffled from down by his knees as McCoy completed de-materialization, and he looked down to see the human toddler standing there, looking with wide-eyed interest at the transporter pattern-echo as it faded from view.

"Indeed," he hummed softly, mind still on the other occupants of the playroom.

The child blinked. From the touch of the small hand which gripped for steadiness to his trouser leg, he could sense the swirl of baby-emotions that the child felt: security, warmth, home, love, safety...

The sacrifice had been dear, but worth it, to rid the galaxy of such monsters, to ensure no other beings would be forced to undergo such inhumane, indescribable torture. Someday Jim would be able to see that, and would be able to think of it without pain.

For now, however, he must learn enough about the human process of dealing with grief that he could capably guide his captain through said process; and he would not learn such by standing here with a sleepy baby human.

"Come, pi'skilsu," he murmured, and turned back into the house, to the humans it contained. (4)

A small hand wrapped around his fingers, warmth curling against the chill. And if a human child could trust him, as he could sense this young one did, then perhaps he might be successful with a so difficult, and yet so very important, human.

(1) The Starfleet Silver Palm with cluster was one of the many commendations James Kirk received throughout his career; a partial list can be heard in the episode Court Martial and the entire list can be read on Kirk's page of Memory Alpha.

(2) Riley was, according to Conscience of the King, with Kirk on Tarsus IV. He looks far younger than Kirk to me at least, and since Kirk was thirteen then I expect Riley was only a small child.

(3) See the episode The Naked Time, set in Season One before Operation Annihilate.

(4) Pi'skilsu is, in a literal translation from the Vulcan language, little fighter (as in one who overcomes an adversary, is victorious).