AU: This is a collection of short random pieces. They were not written as a story although they do follow a general progression. They are the random ideas that occur to me and do not fit elsewhere. Comments are always welcome.
I was reading through the Vulcan language Dictionary and a word intrigued me. Of course I had to test it out on Spock! How could I resist?
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Commander Spock knew the name Cadet Nyota Uhura. He was vaguely aware she was the slim cadet who wore her hair in a long pony tail. She was one face in a sea of faces during a lecture and he could not clearly recall what she looked like. He knew her by her work. Her assignments were praiseworthy and showed great promise. He had decided to express this to her personally because he believed that a teacher should show appreciation of excellence. At the end of his lecture, after the latest assignment grades had been sent to each student's PADD, he approached her. Cadet Uhura was putting some items in her bag and had her back toward him.
"Cadet Uhura," he said and she turned towards him.
"Yes Sir," she said and looked up.
"You analysis of the text in the last assignment was excellent Cadet. Your work is generally of a high standard and you are showing great aptitude for this subject." His mouth spoke the words clearly and without emotion as he looked into her eyes for the first time.
He experienced a shift within himself, a precise almost mechanical locking into place and a sensation analogous to solving a vital and infinitely complex mathematical equation. It was done. It was irrevocable. This was fact. This altered state rippled through him, suffusing his mind and body and engulfed him. He knew that this state was now as much part of him as the prints left by his fingertips. He also knew that as a student she was forbidden to him.
Vulcans had a word for this, Shan-ha-loch. Humans would translate this as "love at first sight". Love was too insubstantial. It was a human word describing a pattern of physiological and emotional arousal. Love could fade, and those who love could be inconstant. Shan-ha-loch was to love as a statue carved in marble was to a staue carved in ice. Spock first learned the word during his studies of the ancient texts from the time before Surak. Shan-ha-loch was celebrated in the ancient poems from the time when Vulcans still rejoiced in their passions. The word had never fully faded from use, but now it was whispered. Shan-ha-loch was the engulfment. Shan-ha–loch was an absolute; it would not fade and would admit no other. Spock had considered it a phenomenon born of the uncontrolled emotional state of pre-Surak Vulcans and that it therefore no longer existed. Now he knew he had been in error.
His world had changed silently in the time it took for her to smile warmly and say, "Thank you Commander," then turn and walk away.
He was Vulcan, he would behave as befitted a Vulcan and this new reality was his to accept and endure as best he could.
AU: Shan-ha–loch, the engulfment, from the Vulcan Language Dictionary.