AN: TA-DAAAA. This is even scarier than the previous update, isn't it? Because it's so soon and you were all readying yourself for anther Super Long and Awful Wait. The Long Winter Between Chapters.
However! Unlike the last time I said I was doing this for NaNo, I'm actually doing this for NaNo this year. Three chapters left, only two to write, and my goal this weekend is TEN THOUSAND WORDS (to catch up because I'm tired of being stuck at the timeout table at write-ins.)
The next one's has kind of an unusual writing style. Also it's short. And you're gonna hate me. Get ready for that now. It should be here in a few days! (Sunday? Maybe? I'll post it when I'm done with the next one, so probably Sunday. I think.)
...Upon reflection, you might not care too much for the ending of this one either.
Oh well 8)
Enjoy!
West of the Moon
No Rest for the Wicked
When Spock returned from his meeting with Jim, he looked more like the Vulcan Pavel once knew, like the person he had become at the bar, before that chapter of their story transitioned into the next.
Before that transition, Pavel would have felt relief. Spock was a formidable ally, and they had sorely missed his presence during their campaign to support Jim through the Academy. Pavel himself had missed the debates they used to have. He wanted to argue with Jim and Spock again, wanted to bicker about equations and variables and the madness of scientists.
But this was not before the transition, so Pavel did not let himself warm with comfort at the prospect of getting his friend back. Spock had already proven, quite thoroughly, that they could not rely on him. He would have to prove, just as thoroughly, that he was finished being a pigheaded idiot. Then maybe-
There were many things to accomplish between would and maybe. Working with Jim had taught him to start at the beginning with plans for the middle and thoughts about the end, but to start at the beginning nonetheless. "You found what you were looking for," he observed.
Spock inclined his head. "In some measure, yes."
"Are you satisfied at last?"
"No. However," Spock added before Pavel's stomach could finish sinking, "I believe you will be able to assist me toward what we both might consider a satisfactory conclusion."
Pavel frowned, saving his work before turning fully to face his superior officer. "What do you mean?"
"It would not be...prudent to discuss it here."
"I am roomed with Hikaru." He nodded back in the direction of the officer's quarters. "It should be quiet there."
Spock visibly hesitated. "When I last attempted to access that area, Lieutenant Scott-"
Pavel grinned. "Do not worry. You are with me now, and Scott will let us by."
So they went to Pavel and Hikaru's room, passing Scott who had a wave for Pavel and a suspicious frown for Spock. Once there, Spock immediately produced the PADD he'd been carrying behind his back and access a set of files, which he sent to the main display unit in the room. Pavel wandered over to inspect the small stack of files, flicking through each with only a brief skim.
His heart constricted at what he read.
"He plans to abandon us," the teenager breathed, face white with shock.
"That is technically accurate but ultimately incorrect," Spock said, stepping closer to select his own letter of recommendation. He enlarged the page until Jim's words took up the entire screen. "Here, where he highlights my leadership abilities without any mention of my resignation under Starfleet Regulation 619, which should, of course, be included. Yet it is not. He does not mean to abandon his crew; rather, he intends to elevate them to positions that will secure their futures when he is gone." The Vulcan highlighted a paragraph dedicated to Spock's handling of Jim's supposed mutiny. "In the same document, he readies himself for court-martial."
"Why?" Pavel demanded. "He has done nothing to deserve it! Worse, he will be killed outside the protection of Starfleet. That is why we fought so hard to keep him! Why would he now run?"
"Because it is the first opportunity he has had to take such an action without harming you and the others," Spock said calmly. "It is the same path he intended to take before he was forced to reveal himself as an agent of the Federal Bureau of Intelligence. This was always his goal."
"But why?"
"Why is not the important question," Spock pointed out. "We will have time to discover the answer to that later, which I suspect will be a...difficult task. For now, our focus must be: How do we prevent these letters, written with this intent, from reach Starfleet Command?"
"And how do we do that without alerting Jim." Pavel heaved a deep sigh. "You are right. We cannot edit their content before he sends them," he mused. "We also cannot prevent him from sending them, or he will simply suspect our motive and find a way to work around us."
"That being the case, our best solution appears to be to edit them after they are sent."
Pavel thrilled at Spock's use of our. He hadn't included himself in their group since McCoy's "death". Perhaps he was finally returning to them. "There is only one person I know who could do that," Pavel said. "We must hurry though, there is no telling when Jim will send these, and we cannot let them arrive in this condition." The teenager hesitated a moment while Spock backed out of the reading program and wiped the last traces of Jim's letters from the unit. "I am glad," he blurted, feeling his face warm but needing to say the words. "That you spoke with Jim. That you understand better. That you are with us."
Spock studied him for a long moment. Then he straightened slightly, tucking his hand at the small of his back. He looked more at the wall than Pavel when he said, "I learned something I had not expected. Now I must ask-or I feel I must ask..." He shook his head, brows lowering slightly, and met Pavel's curious gaze. "When he was still entertaining us at the bar, did Jim ever attempt to teach you a game?"
"A game?" Pavel cocked his head thoughtfully. "What kind? We did play with math on occasion, or else words, because he is very fond of word manipulation and-"
"No," Spock interrupted. "It was not a game so much as a lesson disguised as one. I only thought it a game at the time because that is how he introduced it. The lesson it taught was not one I understood until I spoke with him today. It is the only lesson I have ever failed."
For a long moment, Pavel watched Spock's expression, trying to read it for a hint of what he really meant. "I did not get lessons like that from Jim," Pavel said at last. "He was not a teacher in that sense. With me, the process was more collaborative. What was it he meant to teach?"
"A secret," Spock replied.
Pavel glanced away. "I am sorry, I do not mean to intrude-"
"No," the Vulcan said. "His lesson is not a secret. Rather, the lesson was meant to expose a secret. I do not know why he did not share it with you instead," he admitted. "Or with Doctor McCoy. You were both his friends long before I ever met him."
"What was the secret?" Pavel asked.
"That nothing is as it seems. That he was not what he seemed."
"How did he teach this lesson?"
"He presented a game with no rules," Spock explained, "that was not a game, that only seemed to be one because he prepared me to expect it. It was a lesson on perception. Later, he used a salt shaker, which had been a token of our game that was not a game, to indicate that the lesson continued. I did not recognize the movement as a hint until he reminded me of it in our recent meeting. The game was only a game because he arranged a situation where it was logical to assume it was a game. Similarly, he was only a member of the mob, or a murderer, or an informant because of the years he spent arranging a place where it was logical to accept he was. He gave me the tools to see through to the truth of it, and I could not." Spock looked away again, back straight, hands locked, jaw tight. "He would have done better to give the lesson to you."
"You do know," Pavel said gently. "You must know, of course. He never treated you as just another one of us. You were always unique, from your first meeting. He told me about it, about the snow and the Vulcan, about the Academy instructor who kept up with his twisted way of speaking. You were always special, Spock. Different even than McCoy. Of course he would give the hint to you. You were the one he was most desperate to keep."
Pavel heard Spock's teeth grind. "And yet," he said flatly.
"There is no point to this," the navigator pointed out. "To looking back and seeing things differently. It is not logical, and we have no time for it. Put it aside. Come, we must save our captain from himself.
"We must speak to Uhura."
.
Nyota didn't know what Pavel wanted from her, but she knew it had to be big.
He was working with Spock again, and their body language indicated true collaboration. Neither of them appeared annoyed or coerced. Would wonders never cease?
"What did Jim do this time?" she asked when they approached her station on the bridge. Sulu scowled over from his position but seemed more inclined to eavesdrop than launch further objections to Spock. "Is he hurt again?"
"No," Pavel said, then paused to consider. "Well," he amended, "he is no worse than he was, which could change depending on how well he follows Doctor McCoy's orders, so actually I don't know. I hope not."
"Captain Kirk is preparing to send a set of recommendation letters to Starfleet that, if left untouched, will ensure the permanent placement of the entire bridge crew as it currently exists," Spock explained, "with the notable exclusion of the captain himself. His intention appears to be for me to assume command while he is court-martialed for mutiny."
"He'll be killed!" Sulu yelped.
Spock barely glanced at him before continuing. "It is the opinion of Ensign Chekov that you can catch these letters after they are sent, edit their content to be more representative of the actual events as they occurred, and then complete their transmission without alerting Captain Kirk."
Nyota spun back around to face her station. She dug through the communication logs throughout the ship, poking around a few layers too deep in order to locate the drafts of Jim's letters. Then she pulled them up, making mental notes about how to correct the language once Jim finalized and sent them off. "Oh," she said as she scanned Spock's letter, "ha, I knew he didn't assign you a team for no reason. Everyone knows you could have easily arranged the Vulcan safehaven on your own. Look," she pointed at her screen, "see how this is phrased? He gave you a team to re-establish your abilities as a leader, which translates into a chance for you to see a major project through to its conclusion. You didn't 619 this one, and that will look wonderful when you're recommended to take command of Enterprise."
"But he'll be killed," Sulu insisted, finally getting up to cross the bridge and read over Nyota's shoulder.
"Yes, which is why I'm not going to let these letters through until they're fixed. He'll probably want to send them off before we rendezvous with the fleet," she said to Spock, "and I'll have an easier time sneaking around his paranoia if he's distracted. So you go be distracting while he sends the letters, and I'll make this right."
Spock blinked at her, an endearing expression of befuddlement she thought she'd never see again. "How do you suggest I-"
"That's your problem." Nyota began working on the algorithm to catch Jim's transmissions, dismissing Spock and the others from the majority of her attention. "Whatever it is, you should do it fast. We have less than an hour before the fleet is here."
"...Jim's in McCoy's room," Sulu said reluctantly. "He's supposed to be on bedrest for a few hours, but we couldn't even get him to do that when he was sick, so. He'll be working. You should go," he added when Spock hesitated.
Once he was gone, Sulu traded a long, quiet look with Pavel. "I guess we're getting the band back together," he said.
Nyota felt Pavel's smile even with her back turned.
.
Of all the interruptions Spock anticipated that might disrupt his mission to find Jim, he had not considered his mother. Yet there she was, stepping onto the turbolift Spock was currently using, her expression surprised but please.
"Spock," she greeted warmly, reaching out to enfold him in the gentlest of hugs. "I've been looking for you since I got on the ship. Are you alright?"
"Yes, Mother," Spock replied automatically, returning her hold as he had not since he was a very small child. "I am...pleased. That you are unharmed."
"I nearly wasn't," she said as she stepped back to smile up at him. "There was a young man who came to help me at the orphanage. I would never have gotten the children out in time were it not for him. He's also the one who suggested I take the ship to low-orbit, which I'm sure you know is the only reason we survived. I hope he survived," she murmured, looking momentarily sad. "You've suffered heavily losses. It's possible he was among them."
Spock reached out to stop the lift, thinking about the strange things that happened in his life, the odd and the fortunate, and the disproportionate degree to which they revolved around Jim. He had taken five shuttles to the surface, but there could be only one responsible for the rescue of orphans and salvation of Amanda. "The man who saved you. Was he blond? With blue eyes? An objective person might call him beautiful."
Amanda look startled. "Yes, but how did you-"
"He handled the children himself, didn't he. He took the Vulcan orphans and delivered them into the ship with his own hands."
"Do you know him, Spock?"
The Vulcan inclined his head. "His name is Jim Kirk, and I am also seeking him. You may accompany me and see for yourself that he is well."
"I'm so glad!" Amanda exclaimed. "How do you know him? Is he assigned to your department."
One corner of Spock's mouth tried to tick up in something like a smile as amusement curled under his customary layer of calm. "Rather the opposite, in fact. He is Acting Captain of this ship."
Amanda stared at him in amazement, one hand over her mouth. "Oh my goodness. Well, then! If that's the case, I have one more question, if you'll humor me."
"It isn't humoring you, Mother. Ask me anything."
"It has to do with your description of him." Her dark eyes glittered with mirth. "You're an objective person, my son. Do you call him beautiful?"
Spock fought down a rush of heat that tried to stain his cheeks, started the lift, and didn't answer.
His mother's soft laugh indicated it didn't matter.
Determined to ignore the implications of both her question and its related observation, Spock strode confidently out of the turbolift when it finally opened. Amanda followed him, radiating contentment that her son tried to unobtrusively revel in. Once, not long ago, he thought her lost. Jim had saved her, in every sense of the word.
Of course Spock thought him beautiful.
Scott, still half inside the walls of the Enterprise, let them through without so much as a glance, exactly as Chekov had said. They reached McCoy's room and signaled their presence.
No one answered.
After activating the door chime a few more times, Spock realized Jim might be sleeping, and huffed at himself mentally as he keyed in an override. Jim was indeed inside.
He was not sleeping.
The Acting Captain was collapsed on the floor, back curved and pressed to the wall, arms wrapped tightly around his stomach. His face was pale, his forehead covered in sweat, his eyes closed tight in apparent pain.
Amanda broke out of her surprise first. "Captain Kirk!" she cried, rushing forward. "Spock, quickly!" She dropped to her knees by Jim, calling his name and touching his face gently. "Can you hear me, Captain Kirk? What's wrong?"
Spock sent an emergency alarm to the medbay and stepped quickly to Jim's side, kneeling to help his mother try to shift him out of his curl.
Jim moaned, pressing his face to the floor. His eyes opened in bright blue slits, unfocused before they slid up to Amanda's face. "...Director Ross?" he croaked. "Feels like I got runover by a Cadillac. Did I get made?"
Amanda glanced up at Spock, confused, and frowned at the growing distress on her son's face. "Spock?" she asked.
He shook his head. "A medical team will arrive shortly. The chief medical officer is deeply invested in this man's well-being. Until then, we must attempt to keep him calm."
"What does he mean-"
"Mother," Spock said softly. "There is more to him than a simple Starfleet captain, but it is not a story I can tell. It is barely a story in which I feature at all. Please help me to keep him calm."
Amanda studied his face for a long moment before nodding. "I'm here, Captain-"
"Jim," Spock corrected.
His mother nodded without looking up. "I'm here, Jim," she murmured, taking his hand. Her breath hissed out in concern as she raised his hand to touch the back against her cheek. "You're so hot, poor darling. What happened?"
Jim head rolled restlessly until Spock reached out to carefully gather Jim's overly warm body in a comfortable hold. "Did I get made?" he asked again.
"I don't-" Amanda looked to Spock helplessly. "I don't know what you mean, Jim."
"You're safe, Jim," Spock added, hoping Jim wasn't so delirious he wouldn't know who Spock was. "You have not been discovered. Your secrets are safe."
"Secrets." A small smile cracked Jim's dry lips. "You figured it out after all. Had to be subtle, keep it close. Didn't think you would. But you did. Too smart for me, P'fessor."
"Why are you ill? What has happened?"
Jim's forehead crinkled in deep thought. "Georgia. Bones. Georgia."
"He is on his way, Jim. What do you need?"
"...he's gonna be pissed."
Doctor McCoy chose that moment to burst into his quarters, a handful of medical support behind him. "What the hell, Jim! You had one job!"
Jim lolled against Spock's shoulder, fingers curling in Amanda's skirt.
"He's in distress," Amanda said firmly. "You will help him without adding to that distress or you will step aside so someone else can."
McCoy stared at her. "Lady," he began flatly. Jim interrupted with a weak, pained moan that perfectly redirected his doctor's ire. McCoy hurried to his side, scanning him with a tricorder and cursing at the results. "All you had to do was take a single course of antibiotics with a meal and sleep for two hours. That's it, Jim."
Their captain made another upset sound, at which point McCoy directed his staff in the process of-gently-loading Jim onto their stretcher. Once he was situated, McCoy turned to Spock. "I don't know what you're doing here. Rumor is you've turned over a new leaf. Or, well, turned back to the old one. I don't much care. What I care about is this: If you do to him what you did the last time you had him, and you and I are assigned to the same ship or station at any point, I guarantee you will go to sleep one night and not wake up. Get it?"
Spock inclined his head.
McCoy nodded, once to Spock and then again to his mother. "Ma'am," he said politely.
Then he was gone, and Jim with him.
"If you ever have the right to tell me the story behind this," Amanda said eventually, "I really hope you will. Because I would love to know why a trained medical professional just threatened to kill my son."
"It is...complicated," Spock said.
"Yes," Amanda agreed, "I noticed."
.
Spock visited Jim while he slept in medbay. McCoy knew he should throw the Vulcan out after all the drama he'd caused for so long, but he couldn't quite bring himself to actually do it.
Jim had always been affected by Spock, more than he should, even from the very beginning. But then Jim was a fool.
Maybe McCoy was a fool too, because he let Spock be. After the third visit, though, he felt he had to at least say something. Guilty Vulcans were the absolute worse. "He's doin' fine," he said under the pretense of checking Jim's vitals. "I've got him sedated because the idiot clearly can't be trusted to care about his own life, so that gets left to me. He's on antibiotics to help with various infections, and I'm increasing his fluids because he's dehydrated, and he's unconscious because he needs the sleep." He glanced sideways at Spock. "Which means, of course, that you don't need to be hovering here all the time."
"Yes," Spock said calmly.
"...So why are you here, then?"
Spock turned to face him fully, back straight and shoulders perfectly squared. "I will see him take official captaincy of the Enterprise. Or I will follow him into exile."
"Well then." McCoy made a note in Jim's file about vitamin deficiencies: hard to combat in someone as allergic to the all world and sundry as Jim, but McCoy had his ways. "It's good to see you finally got around to taking your head out of your ass." He motioned to the spot where Spock usually stood during his silent vigil. "Carry on."
"You have no objections?" Spock pressed.
McCoy shrugged. "I already let you know what would happen if you had a relapse into your little land of denial, wounded pride, and idiocy. Long as you don't harm him, we're fine. For now. My personal issues with your more generalized green-blooded hobgoblinry can wait until we're done with Starfleet Command, one way or the other. You know I'll follow him too," McCoy said. "We all will."
"Yes," Spock said again. "In fact, I am counting on it."
"Oh yeah? Why's that?"
"Leverage."
McCoy was still laughing when Jim woke up.
.
Three days after they returned to Earth, Jim stormed Spock's quarters at Starfleet Academy.
"What did you do?" he snapped as soon as the door slid shut behind him.
Spock, who had stood abruptly when his rooms were breached, settled into the appearance of calm with his hands folded at the small of his back. "You must be more specific."
Jim threw a handful of crumpled papers at him. "They're giving me a commendation!"
"You performed admirably in your capacity as captain." Spock collected the wad of papers, smoothing them out methodically. "Ah. They wish to have you maintain your command as well." He met Jim's furious gaze calmly. "Congratulations."
"You know this is wrong," Jim hissed, blue eyes narrowed. "You know this is stupid! You are the only one who always saw how damaging this Starfleet plan of Chekov's was. How could you do this!"
"Do what?" the Vulcan replied blandly.
Jim stared at him in disbelief. "Are you...are you trying to bluff? Do you really think that's going to work? On me, of all people?"
"You of all people," Spock echoed, studying Jim's anger and helpless confusion. "You must elaborate, Jim. Why you, of all people?"
His captain flinched back a step. "I know you," he whispered. "I've known you, and how your mind works, since... I don't even know how long. And in the same way, you know me. You know what I am. It's why you fought so hard, even against a gag order, to protect the others. Because you know what I am."
"I know you are a good captain," Spock replied plainly, ignoring the way Jim shied away, curling in on himself. "I know you are a brave, clever, cunning man. I know you plan better than any being I have ever met. I know you care deeply, fiercely, for those you consider under your protection. You are loyal even to your own detriment. You are," he asserted again, "a good captain. And I will see you in command of the Enterprise, or I will retire from Starfleet to dog your heels, as Doctor McCoy might say. You should know," he added when Jim seemed ready to flee, "that I will not be alone in my pursuit of you. McCoy, Scott, Uhura, Sulu, and Chekov have all vowed to follow you wherever you go, even if where you go is away from Starfleet. You said yourself, Jim: The others are here for good. I consider myself fortunate to once more count myself among them. You cannot be free of us, not now or ever. Accept your command with grace, and come with us to the dark of space, where even the mafia cannot find you."
Jim's whole body shuddered with what looked to Spock like pure rage. His chest heaved, his cheeks flushed red. The blue of his eyes snapped with the force of it. "You son of a bitch," he hissed. "You were supposed to be able to see through it. Out of everyone, you were meant to stop this happening, to stay between the myth built by the others and the truth of what I am.
"You want me to lead? You think I'm good for it? Why? Because I set Nero up with an offer of mercy I knew he had to refuse? No? Then is it because I saved your mother? Or the orphans? Because I didn't kill the witnesses? Do you think that means I never killed anyone? Then you're a bigger fool than I ever thought. Listen to me, you bastard. Because I am only going to tell you this once: You challenged the claim that I'd been a hero on Tarsus IV during the famine. You were both wrong and right. I was on Tarsus IV, but I wasn't a hero. I was a coward. I was a killer. And since you're so eager, get comfy.
"I'll tell you all about it."
