A/N: I do not own Star Trek. Profiting from this is neither legal, intended or expected.

This chapter was a good deal of fun to write - and it completely got away with me. (It's approximately four times longer than the shortest chapter so far. Darn. I didn't mean to be unfair.) It contains vague allusions to TOS K/S - though nothing that couldn't be inferred from canon. Also - one chapter to go (yay Kirk!). It might be a while, since I'll be busy for the next two weeks or so, but it should be finished soon. Thanks to anyone who has stuck with the story so far :)

Belonging

On the far edge of the Leda nebula, circling a small sun, was a planet. At first glance, it appeared to be covered in rust, since most of the surface was comprised of sprawling orange-red deserts. An extensive mountain range halved the largest of the deserts, the worn peaks protruding from the sand in a bizarre imitation of a spine. The poles of the planet were irregular splotches of green, the only areas to have seasons, as the rest were trapped in an infinite, sweltering summer. There was little water on the surface, though the porous nature of the crust had allowed copious amounts to collect in underground caverns, creating astonishing subterranean seas. When the planet had first been considered for colonization, the caves had been a concern - would the surface of the planet stand for development? Was it stable? Could one walk across the desert calmly, or was there a constant risk of plunging through a sudden hole and finding oneself, much like Alice, in the underworld?

Geological equipment was imported, as well as the scientists to man it. Samples were taken, tests were run, and data compiled. The crust was safe near the poles and along the spine. The deserts were less reliable, though a map was under compilation, and the prospective population of the planet wouldn't be needing to occupy that much territory to begin with. Colonization could begin.

First the buildings - adobe, much of it. Quick, natural and functional. They began carving the stone into libraries, hospitals, and schools. The city wouldn't stand finished for another hundred years, but it hardly seemed to matter. The important thing was that there was still anyone left to carve. There were still some who remembered. The old planet. The one that was lost.

There were good days. The irrigation scheme took. The first harvest was celebrated. A child - the first one wholly of the planet - was born.

There were bad days. A sandstorm took them by surprise, demolishing a full quarter of the adobe houses. One of the elders lost her grip on reality, sucked in by the gaping hole in her mind that thousands of voices and thoughts once had filled. An exploratory team was killed when their equipment malfunctioned and they fell through the desert floor.

The underground ocean they had discovered was named the Masutra t'Bezhun-Masu. Its propinquity to the city and the subsequent discovery of an efficient way to filter the salt from water soon made it integral to the survival of the colony, and the name was shortened to, simply, 'Masu'. Water, liquid.

There was a plateau in the mountains surrounding the city from which one could see the small wells in the distance, bringing up the water, and watch it flow into the fields and pastures. Closer to the mountains, where the foothills provided some shadow, the less hardy of the crops grew alongside houses and roads. If you wanted to get to the plateau, it was a simple matter of following the roads upward until they merged and tapered into a narrow footpath leading towards a pass between two of the mountain peaks. As the path wound ever higher, it grew more difficult to traverse - it was full of rocks almost as large as a human fist, and obviously seldom used.

The plateau itself was half an hour's trek away from the trail, in a bay in the cliffside sheltered from the wind whistling along the mountainsides. It's discovery was a good deal less conspicuous than that of the Masu sea, and its existence was therefore only known to one being in the entire universe. He was of the generous sort, however, and on the fourth day of his first shore leave on the colony of New Vulcan, Commander Spock of the U.S.S. Enterprise found himself setting out on the foot along the footpath with instructions on how to reach the plateau.

"It is a remarkably peaceful place," Ambassador Spock had told his younger self. "I trust you will find it a more than acceptable location to meditate and replenish your mental barriers, should you wish to do so."

As Spock set out on the journey, he had looked upon the meditation as a necessary task, to be undertaken for his own safety, as well as that of those around him. But after five hours beneath the ever-rising sun, laboring upwards across the uneven terrain, he found he was looking forward to it. The thought of water and shade were agreeable, and he had been neglecting his meditation sadly as of late. It was hard to achieve the necessary degree of quiet and internal peace aboard the Enterprise, where the faint stirrings of human life rippled like waves throughout the ship, and every moment an alarm might blare into full-out cacophony.

When the path curved left to circumvent a particularly large boulder, Spock took a sharp right along the edge of a cliff. Progress was considerably slower away from the trail. He had to watch where he placed his feet very carefully, and he kept well away from where the ledge he was currently walking on plunged into an almost vertical drop. He wondered what on earth had possessed his older counterpart to explore this part of the mountains in the first place. According to the Ambassador, he had kept himself busy during the colonization, and Spock could hardly see how wandering aimlessly through remote parts of the mountains would be helpful towards the survival of their race. He hadn't thought to ask when the Ambassador told him of the ledge, and he supposed the question would keep until he got back.

The air was thin at his current altitude, and Spock paused for a moment to catch his breath and adjust the light rucksack on his back. The sun was almost at its zenith. Spock mentally calculated in which direction north lay, and altered his course slightly to match. It was a nice feeling to be out in fresh air, feeling the sun on his skin and the earth beneath his feet. He found his job with Starfleet to be most satisfactory, but some days he couldn't quite repress a fierce longing for real sunlight. He estimated this to be an inheritance from both his mother's and his father's side of the family - a combination of desert-dweller genes and an illogical human attachment to the intangible air of summer.

His body was quickly adapting to the terrain, and he discovered that rather than hindering any mental relaxation, his physical exertions actually made it easier to focus on the initial stages of meditation. Gradually, he shed his responsibilities and worries. He eliminated any disturbances from his mind as he had been taught, letting the here and now wash over him and suck him in with its multitude of sensations. His muscles shifting, straining in a simple rhythm. Warm air in his lungs. The faint smell of the sash-savas trees and salt, drifting up from the flatlands below. Dust in his nose. His even heartbeat.

When he finally reached the plateau, he was more at ease than he had been in months. Leaving his pack by the mouth of the path, he walked to the very edge of the cliff and settled in a cross-legged pose. The colony stretched out below him in a irregular patchwork of orange and green. It was an odd feeling, looking out over the collective remains of your race. Several thousand vulcans were many to walk amongst and speak to individually, but seen from up high, they seemed incredibly few and vulnerable. The capital city of Shi'Kahr on Vulcan had housed at least ten times this many, and it was one of over a dozen great cities. This was the only vulcan settlement, on any planet. It was a humbling thought.

Perhaps this insight had been the Ambassador's purpose in sending him here to meditate. An acknowledgment of what was, and what had passed. A sharing of the guilt. Even if he hadn't been intimately familiar with his own mind, Spock was sure he could have sensed the weight on the Ambassador's shoulders. The Ambassador's part in the events that brought about the destruction of Vulcan was dragging him down like a sack of stones.

The younger Spock felt it too, though not as keenly. An ancient culture had been almost completely annihilated in mere minutes, and every survivor of the genocide would carry the scars of that until their dying day. Some of their collective knowledge had been saved, but most of what had been Vulcan, in all senses of the word, had been irreplaceably lost. The shame he felt was by now almost familiar - what was he doing, exploring the universe? He belonged here. His people needed him.

Spock had seen his human shipmates stunned and terrified in the aftermath of Vulcan's destruction, but he had also seen them laughing - genuinely happy - only a few days afterwards, still reveling in their victory over Nero. At that moment, he had felt the full weight of what it meant to be a vulcan among humans. Humanity was resilient. How could Vulcan heal, when so many bonds had been brutally severed?

He wasn't surprised that Uhura had understood the significance of the severed bonds. He had explained some of the concept to her himself, after all, and she was remarkably clever and intuitive. She had been patient with him, and he, in turn, had tried his best to impart to her what he felt. A black hole beneath his shields. A void, calling out to be filled. Living, glowing bonds, cut and withered. A terrible, endless silence.

No, he had done his best, and Uhura had... understood.

Spock still wasn't completely sure that he did. Somehow their conversations had propelled them into an odd no-man's land of mutual respect, understanding and friendship, and Uhura had promptly moved out of his quarters. When she had tried to explain it to him, her initial arguments were based on emotion. It had been a profoundly odd monologue, fraught with helpless hand gestures and pregnant pauses. At some point, she had realized she wasn't getting through, and her brow had furrowed like it did when she was translating something particularly difficult.

"You studied biology on Vulcan," she'd said. "Sometimes, when a bone is broken, it grows together crooked. The only thing you can do to fix it is to re-break it and set it right."

"Perhaps your simile would be better suited to Doctor McCoy, Nyota," he offered. "I am afraid I cannot see the purpose of-"

She cut him off by brushing a quick kiss to his cheek. "Try, Spock. It's not that hard."

It depended on what she was referring to, he decided. Grasping her meaning was easy, as it usually was with Uhura, but sorting out the odd and conflicting emotions surrounding her? That had never been simple, and he found he didn't want to explore how the new development would affect his human side. Since Narada, he kept his shields as strong as he could possibly maintain them, fighting to keep the black hole at bay. Bits and pieces would trickle through while he slept, but for the most part, he went through the days without allowing anything to pass. The strain was incredible. His mental barriers eroded steadily, becoming paper thin from the constant onslaught.

On his ledge, Spock took a steadying breath. He couldn't maintain control indefinitely. He would have to tend to his wounds, lessen the pressure on his mental barriers. Sending a grateful thought in his older self's direction for the peaceful location, he took a last look at the fields below, and then directed his gaze inwards.

The upper layers of his mind were as he'd last seen them aboard the Enterprise. Calm and ordered as a rock garden. Unbroken lines of thought in fractal patterns. Usually, he would conduct his meditation at this level, where he retained complete control. He forces his fists to unclench and his muscles to relax as he slowly wound his way through the mindscape. As he ventured deeper, the serenity gradually vanished, and his rock garden became overgrown with wild vines. His human side, shooting up through the gravel as quick as he could repress it, threatening to make a forest of a desert. A stone chessboard was sheltered in the bough of a tree, and Spock wondered where it had sprung from. Engraved in the ground in constantly shifting letters were snatches of dialogue, and he recognized one of the fallen statues from the Katric Ark wound between two particularly thick vines.

He was no longer walking - walking required muscles, joints, substance. His mental shields were glowing before him, and he tentatively brushed against the shell separating himself from his emotions. With the mental equivalent of a deep breath, he lowered them slightly. What had been a faint electric hum through the shields became an ear-splitting roar, an all-powerful tidal wave that tore through his orderly mind, leaving destruction in its path. Spock was enveloped completely, sucked through his barriers on the backwash. It was bitterly cold, and for a moment he blacked out from the pressure.

When he came to, he immediately recognized the location. He'd been there before, many times - the core of himself, the axis from where everything sprung. The ashen remains of his bonds hung silently in the air, quivering and gray. Around him stretched the deep blue expanse of his Katra. Instinctively, he condensed his presence into a tiny ball, waiting for the inevitable blow as the loss of his people truly hit home. The black hole was still there, lurking behind every dead bond. The cold went straight through him, and as if from a great distance, he could sense his physical body shivering violently.

But the blow never came. After a great while, he gathered the courage to stretch out, to examine his surroundings further.

It was a forbidding place, a grave monument. Above him was nothing but endless space, the view from the observational deck of the Enterprise. Below and around him, his Katra was interwoven with his remaining bonds - the familiar steely silver of his father, the dark red link to Uhura, the fine connections of the elders. To his surprise, he noted a new bond - his own marine blue, interspersed with odd streaks of fiery golden. Ambassador Spock. He wondered what would have happened in his future to taint his Katra so. Perhaps the Kohlinar... He paused a moment by the bond to his mother, mourning the vibrant green that had been. No, he couldn't have undergone the Kohlinar. The Ambassador had mentioned that Amanda had lived to a ripe old age in his universe, and he was certain that he would never have been able to purge all emotions if she existed to be hurt by it.

Besides, his older self was as emotional a vulcan as he had ever met.

Bypassing other, fainter links, he came at last to a cluster of slender bonds to his fellow officers aboard the Enterprise. They were shallow, and hadn't yet assumed a particular color - still, they exuded a sense of stability and well-being. As if reacting to his presence, they glowed brighter, calling out to him. On an impulse, Spock reached out for the most eager one, touching it briefly with his thoughts. It wrapped itself around him, broadcasting acceptance, friendship and joy, joy, joy directly into his mind.

Spock instantly slammed up every shield he could muster.

He was flung back through his mental walls, and landed in what had been the wild garden, now a clean-swept grassy meadow. The barriers were back, but he could sense enough through them to know that the pain and despair had receded somewhat. His mother's bond, and the black hole calling out for a true mindlink, a bondmate, were still hovering in there, waiting, but he could control those. No, what terrified him were the clingy, overly emotional bonds of human friendship. He could easily block terror, pain and loneliness - he'd had decades of practice, after all. But how could he be expected to block something as genuinely warm as affection?

Spock pensively settled in the grass, watching the chains of thought rebuild themselves in the sky above. He was still shaking from the aftershock of the wave, and he didn't quite feel ready to return to reality yet. New Vulcan would be exactly the same as when he closed his eyes, a faint echo of what used to be his home. An unfamiliar planet. Perhaps he could grow to like it, though, if he gave it time... The sight of his ravaged katra had given him new fuel for thought. How much good could he do if he stayed on the planet? He knew that the Ambassador had been invaluable the the rebuilding. He was fully aware that most of this had been due to decades of experience, but surely his talents must have had some merits as well...

The only warning Spock got was a faint whoosh, then something glowing and fierce lunged at him from the other side of his shields. He spun, rolling himself upright. Mentally, he tensed, prepared for a second onslaught.

It came only seconds later, as an unfamiliar mental presence lashed out against him. Again, his shield held, but a shower of golden sparks trailed from the impact point. Spock didn't recognize the mind link.

That couldn't be good.

He'd never before heard of a bond acting in such a determined and sentient manner, and he felt an uncharacteristic stab of panic. Reaching out to his body, he determined that there was no-one within at least three hundred metes of his physical presence. For something to have enough raw psychic energy to bridge that gap by willpower alone, it would exude too much power for it to hide from the Vulcan explorers that determined whether the planet was safe for colonization. Something like that shouldn't exist on New Vulcan. It was logically impossible.

As in defiance of this thought, the presence slammed against the barriers again and again, colliding with ferocious determination.

It couldn't be an outside influence. That left only Spock's genes. There had been a lot of consternation when his psychic powers began to manifest. Surely, a half-human brain couldn't withstand the taxation of vulcan telepathy? It was true that he'd had to work much harder to achieve the same results as his classmates in meditation, but, as it turned out, Spock was fully capable of handling telepathy. Indeed, his hard work had given him an edge - he was familiar with the short cuts of the brain, the processes whereby you could achieve your goals with less raw power and more finesse. He'd been sure he was up to anything his mind could throw at him.

Apparently, his human genes had been biding their time, waiting for the perfect moment to trip his concentration and plunge him into madness.

He was finding it increasingly hard to focus on shutting out emotion, shut it out, shut it out! because the link was not aggressive, violent or angry. It was emanating affection, comfort and warmth. It... wished to impart something to him. Spock wasn't sure how that thought filtered through the shield, but somehow, it was as clear as if it had been spoken.

The attacks were growing further apart, each impact with his shields weaker than the one that came before. Finally, the link gave in, hovering tiredly behind the opaque surface separating them. Its glow was dimmed. It reminded Spock of a wounded animal, too weak to go on fighting, and too stubborn to give up. Against all logic, he felt pity. Gently, he reached out, trying to assess if any permanent damage to his assailant had been done.

The instant he came into contact the the barrier, he realized he'd made a mistake. Quick as a thought, the bond smashed through the pity-weakened shield, latching on to his wrist. Spock's eyes widened. The bastard was smug. He could hear it rejoicing its victory, glowing in a throughly self-satisfied manner.

Spock pried at the bond, but to no avail. He'd already called up and lost his shields. It was any vulcan's worst nightmare. Trapped in his own head, completely at the mercy of some unknown presence. Realizing just how thoroughly he'd been beaten prompted a last, ditch effort at escape. Reaching forward into the recesses of his head, Spock threw himself at his bond with the Ambassador.

Help me! Something has broached my mental shields - even as he broadcast, he knew the call wasn't reaching it's destination. Vulcan telepathy, excepting that between bondmates, required skin contact to work.

The bond around his wrist tightened slightly, and Spock knew that his body was hyperventilating.

Ok, it's ok, sorry, won't hurt you, don't worry, the bond projected. Spock stared at it in shock.

This was a human bond.

To be precise, it was one of his. The eager one the had mauled him before. But that couldn't be - humans were psi-null, and he was pretty sure he would have noticed if he'd married one of them. Even Uhura, with whom he had a strong empathic connection, was a two-dimensional presence in his head. Without a bondmate's link, she could not feel him at all. Spock tentatively examined the presence wrapped around his arm, exhaling in relief.

It was an imprint. An idea of a personality, given sentience by the vibrant life force of the human it belonged to, as were all his human bonds. He'd never before heard of a bond with quite so much sentience, however. This bond was devious, determined, insufferable, and projecting warm feelings straight into his brain in a highly effective attempt to take out his shields.

Spock groaned. Kirk.

He had no words. How on earth did he manage to obtain the one captain in Starfleet whose mere memory could do serious mental damage?

Motherfucker, the Kirk-bond supplied helpfully.

Why me? Spock projected. Get out of my head. Stop interfering. What do you want from me? Get. Out!

The bond responded, not by releasing him, but with a series of images - a recent memory. Spock struggled to stem the tide, but the bond simply overrode his complaints.

Spock was forced to watch as Kirk sat on the edge of one the cots in sickbay, bickering with McCoy over Kirk's reluctance to return to Iowa and visit his mother. Spock saw himself, hands behind his back, eyebrow raised at the thoroughly illogical argument - McCoy had been, to use a human idiom, throwing rocks from a glass house. However, when McCoy had administered the required hyposprays to them both and retired, Spock had promptly overtaken McCoy's side of the argument.

"Going to Iowa would be pointless. My mom's busy anyway," Kirk had said, "and Sam's off planet doing the colonizing tango. Are you bored? Because if you have time, we could play a game of chess. I've been thinking about that trick you pulled last week..."

"Your mother would be there." Spock had pointed out.

Kirk had winced. "Sorry. Look, I know this is a touchy issue-"

"-and I am moved by your sympathies. However, I would prefer if you learned by my example instead of professing your pain on my behalf."

The Captain had slouched in his seat. "Of course. It's just - well, Riverside hasn't felt like home in a long time. Not since Sam left." He had given Spock a bleak look. "Now you're going to say I'm illogical, aren't you? I grew up there, and it's the last place I had a room that wasn't rented from Starfleet or courtesy of the Iowa state penitentiary. It's home, whether Sam's there or not."

Kirk's air of dejection was obvious, and when Spock spoke, his voice was a good deal gentler than he had anticipated. "On the contrary. Vulcans determine 'home' simply as the place that holds the most attraction to them. The place towards where their bonds call them."

"New Vulcan."

He had nodded. "For most, yes. That is where their families and bondmates are located. For those with bondmates or family stationed elsewhere, their bonds will call them to wherever that location might be. In your case, home might be where your brother is currently located."

"Well, that is quite a romantic notion." A genuine smile from the Captain, and Spock had raised an eyebrow in return. "That is - it's a very emotional definition of the word," Kirk amended. "Perhaps we humans have been a bad influence on you."

"It is the most logical definition of the word. Home implies comfort and rest. Vulcans experience both when our needs for telepathic contact are met."

He had looked at Spock with a shrewd glance that was somehow deeply unsettling. "Is New Vulcan home to you?"

"I cannot yet be certain, as I have never set foot on the planet."

"That's irrelevant, according to your explanation. Tell me, Spock, at this moment, in which direction are you being pulled?"

Spock had considered remaining silent, but it had, after all, been him who had broached the topic. The question was not unreasonable.

"New Vulcan," he had admitted. He'd grown considerably closer to his father over the last few weeks, as well as discovering an extraordinary - though hardly unexpected - affinity with the Ambassador. Those two bonds, added to the automatic strengthening of the ties between the remaining vulcans, had tipped the scales in favor of the unfamiliar planet. He'd neglected to mention the fact that his nascent ties to the Enterprise crew, his deepening connection to Uhura - even his respect for the Captain himself - put the statistical probability that the Enterprise could eventually become his Katric focus at well over 90%.

Kirk had given him a rueful grin. "Thanks, Spock. I know it can't be easy for you. It's just - you're a terrific First Officer. Thanks for staying. I'll see what I can do about getting you some shore leave on New Vulcan soon, shall I?" Kirk had cuffed Spock's shoulder good-naturedly, and set off for the bridge. Spock had stayed in his chair for a while, frozen. Kirk was being considerate. How perfectly curious.

Back in his mind, Spock felt the bond give his wrist a comforting squeeze, then release its hold. Come home, Spock, it said. This was never your planet. Don't you want to see what's on the other side of the known universe? I'll keep my distance, I promise. But don't stay here. That would be a terrible waste. There is so much to learn out there, so much to explore. You belong out there, amongst the stars. You told me you felt like you didn't fit in as a child - well, you fit in with us.

There was a terrible, tense moment, where Spock considered his options. Then he reached for the bond one last time. I will go, he thought, and it had the ring of finality to it.

Turning, he left the inner reaches of his mind behind, and stretched for his physical body, the sunlight and the cliff.

As he left, the Kirk-link called out after him. How long exactly do I have to keep my distance, then?

Spock?