Hehe. Hi. I'm really not working on Letters like I'm supposed to be.
Anyways.
This is the chapter you've all been waiting for. Spock and Michael showdown. Let's go.
"Michael, what was your father like?"
Kirk was carrying the boy towards the shuttle. The little boy stared up at him in curiosity at his question.
"I mean, I only saw what he was like when he was doing bad things. What was he like to you and everyone else?"
"I already told you he wasn't a bad man, but...Well, it's kind of hard to say how daddy was. He just made you feel nice and warm inside."
"Nice and warm?"
"It's a cruel world, Mr. Kirk. Like I said before, people didn't have time for us. They didn't like us and they wanted to get rid of us. For keeps. We tried to run away, but they found us. They didn't just want us to go away. They wanted to end us. All of us."
"I guess you never really felt safe, did you?"
"But daddy made me feel safe. He would get angry sometimes, but it was a good angry. He just wanted to keep everyone together and keep us safe. Daddy was never angry at us. He was angry at the scientists and soldiers who wanted to hurt our people."
"He kept telling me that his crew was his family."
"And that was right. Every Augment was family. After the Terrible Day, daddy only had his crew for a family- except for Jade, of course."
"Who was Jade? You said that Carol looked like Jade."
"Jade was daddy's little sister- my aunt. She was named for the color of her eyes."
"I see."
"Jade was really nice. She helped mommy do lots of things."
"Like what?"
"Well, after daddy and mommy led everyone away from the canyon, they had to start everything all over again. They had to build new houses and plant new fields. Mommy was good with farming and she helped people grow food. The Homelanders grew all sorts of veggies and grains. They had lots of orchards, too. The Homelanders were really important. Feeding everyone wasn't easy."
Kirk smiled at Michael. "What did you want to be when you grew up? A fighter or a... What was it- Homelander?"
"You don't understand. We split the work up. The men would trade between farming and fighting."
"Sounds like the draft."
"Huh?"
"Err.. Nothing. What did the women do?"
"They were Homelanders. They would take care of... Everything while the men went off to fight."
"Sounds kind of..."
"Sexist?" Michael looked at Kirk thoughtfully. "Not really. None of the women wanted to go off to war. And some of the men just wanted to raise a family. Daddy was kind of like that."
"Really? He ruled Asia with an iron fist. He was the leader of the Augments; that meant he had to fight." They arrived at the shuttle bay. McCoy wasn't there yet.
"Well, yes- daddy was the leader by blood right, but Uncle John did most of the fighting."
"Uncle John... John Harrison?"
"John became Prime Minister of England, and took over Europe. Daddy ruled the Asian half... But it wasn't fair! Daddy had to work to rule Asia. He could have become Prime Minister. If he wanted to, anyways..."
Kirk chuckled. "Khan Noonien Singh for Prime Minister."
"Who?"
"Khan Noonien Singh." Michael just blinked. "Your dad."
Michael shook his head. "Daddy's name was William. William Gregory FitzSimmons."
"Well- then... Khan wasn't your-"
"Khan was what the scientists called him." Michael looked at Kirk coldly. "They called him Khan because he was the leader by right of the Augments. That's what 'Khan' means. Leader. They didn't care that he already had a name. He used 'Khan' around normal people, but to the Augments, he was still William FitzSimmons. And anyways, Khan sounds much more threatening than William."
"You're pretty smart for a little kid."
Michael shrugged. "The elders tell lots of stories about all sorts of things. And we have good memories." He nestled his head into Kirk's shoulder.
McCoy came into view as he turned the corner.
"Hey! Bones!"
McCoy rushed Kirk and hissed into his ear, "are you out of your mind? What about-"
"The truth is out of the bag, Bones. He knows we aren't his family."
"Oh... Why are you here then?"
Kirk shrugged. "He doesn't like the transporter. He thinks it looks like a vaporizer."
"Well at least someone agrees with me."
"Hehe- yeah. Let's get going."
Later...
"Wow! This is a really, really big room!" Michael's blue eyes glittered with excitement as they traveled from one side of the room to the other.
"You think so?"
Carol elbowed Kirk in the side. "Of course it is!" She gave him a sideways glance. "You can go back to the bridge. I can handle this one."
Kirk shrugged. "Well, it's almost O-hundred hours. I was going to go back to bed. But if you want to handle Mikey by yourself, that's fine by me. But if you need something, holler. OK?"
"Sure thing." She pointed to Michael, who had his face pressed to the glass of the inset aquarium. "But I don't think he'll be much trouble."
Kirk smiled. "Just feel free to ask." He turned and walked away down the hall.
"Michael! Come over here." The boy's attention was fully on the aquarium, most notably its lone inhabitant.
"Carnivore. Semi-aggressive. Venomous. Scorpaenidae. Pterois volitans..." He looked at her. A broad smile grew on his face. "Red lionfish. What's his name?"
"I don't think he has a name."
"A fish without a name?" He turned back to the tank. "How rude." He thought for a moment. "Threshfarer. That's your name. You're going to be called Threshfarer."
Carol smiled. "Well, now that you've named your fish, how about looking at some of the other things you have?"
Michael turned away from the aquarium and walked over to her. "OK."
"Now this is your be-"
She didn't get to finish. Michael sprang up onto the bed and began jumping. His laughter rang throughout the hall.
"This is great!"
Carol smirked. It was hard to stay upset- especially when the boy had the largest grin of the year plastered on his face. "How about I leave you to yourself for a bit? There's nothing in here that you could hurt yourself on- short of falling off of chairs and things."
"Don't worry. I'll be careful."
"You can unpack on your own?"
"Ya." Michael continued jumping.
"Alright. Just don't go wandering off around the ship. People might not like that much."
"OK... By the way, who else is sharing this room?"
"There is no one else sharing this room. You get one all to yourself, since you're a guest."
"My own room? Wow!" Michael jumped even higher.
Carol turned around and strode out of the room smiling as laughter filled the hall once more.
Michael sprawled out on the bed. He gave a blissful sigh. Everything was so big here! And there were no loud noises form explosions above. No cement falling in chunks off of the ceiling. No dust, either. It seemed so peaceful. He looked out the window to his left, seeing thousands of stars. He never saw stars back home. No one back home even went out of the bunker past dusk. Most people tried to spend time below ground as much as possible, for safety if nothing else. And now he was farther from solid ground than he ever would have dreamed to be. Yes; it wasn't home, but the Enterprise was somewhat convenient and quite comfortable. He smiled and ran his hand over the soft bedspread. He could get used to this.
The beeping of the door woke him from his daydreaming. "Come." Carol coming to check on him... but... It shouldn't be Carol. She just left. And Kirk was probably well on his way back to his quarters. He tipped his head to the side as the doors slid open.
Commander... Spock strode into the room. Michael sat up. His legs dangled over the side. What did the commander want? To see if I'm settling nicely? Not likely, his mind told him. His stance is wrong, and he's tense. If he was asking to see if you had gotten well acquainted with your room, his expression wouldn't be quite so taut, and his eyes wouldn't be glittering with... whatever that expression was.
Aloud, Michael said,"Oh, Mr. Spock! What a nice surprise." He motioned to his surroundings. "You have a very nice starship." He smiled brightly.
"You do not belong here."
"Sorry?"
"You. Your kind. You do not belong here."
"My kind? I'm sorry if I seem rather ignorant- what do you mean?"
"You're an Augment," the commander hissed. "You do not belong here on this ship."
Michael's eyes began to glitter with cold fire. "Oh, so that's what you mean by 'my kind'," the boy sneered. "Being an Augment must make you some sort of animal, or something."
"Your race has looked down upon the humans since you were created."
"Oh, it's racial hatred now." Michael walked over to the window and looked at the stars.
"Not racial hatred. The preservation of my ship and crew requires that you are not here on this ship. You are a superior being. You will see others as inferior. That will eventually be detrimental to the crew and our mission." Spock squirmed with unease when Michael fell silent for more than a minute.
"And what about you... Half-breed?" Michael gave a slight smirk when he realized he'd hurt a tender spot. "Your mother was human. Father a... Vulcan, he said. Your people, by what I can guess form the Captain's conversation with McCoy, are rather bigoted, aren't they? I would assume you faced quite a bit of racial hatred. Stereotyping. Bullying." Michael paused.
Spock tipped his head to the side. Michael picked up on it immediately.
"So that's it. Bullying. In the height of youth? My, my, my." He turned around slowly. "Would it please you to know that the Augments faced... Quite a bit of bullying in our time?"
"Bullying is not the correct terminology... And another thing. You were the villains. Not the victims, or what your teachers have put into your mind."
"They were the elders, and they knew what they were talking about," Michael spat. "Do you know what the scientists did to us? To everyone who lived in the canyon..."
"Historical accounts say-"
"Historical accounts?" Michael stared at him in mock wonder. "So that's what they call mass murder these days."
"Mass murder?"
"Genocide." He gave a slight smile when Sopck shifted with unease. "Logic says that you can't make a decision on an idea until you have heard both arguments for and against said idea...Would you like to hear our side of the story?"
Yes. I just gave you our first cliffie.
I figured that Michael's cuteness really doesn't mix with the content of next chapter, thus I made it next chapter. If that makes any sense at all.
I'm sorry that I have sort of disappeared from fanfiction a bit- I've just been so busy with other things that something has to take the back burner, and I've decided that it's fanfiction. Not that I don't love you guys, but I have lots of other things on my plate at the moment. Don't worry, I'll try to give you a warning for disappearances, and if I don't give you a warning, assume that the chapter I'm working on is just taking forever.
Please review.
Please excuse errors.
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