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Chapter 10: Cosmic Waves

For the next few days, Amanda avoided Spock at all costs. She spent most of her time with Pavel and, when he was free, Jim. The rest of the crew was very welcoming, but it seemed that they were no where near close to getting used to her presence. There were still stares, whispers, and unusual behaviors wherever she went, even more so now that news that she had empathic abilities had spread around.

Amanda had been lamenting about the lack of exercise she was getting on the ship when Sulu challenged her to a fencing match. She gleefully accepted and planned to meet him in the gymnasium later that day.

Arriving at the gym, Amanda saw no sign of Sulu. The place was pretty much empty, so she grabbed one of the practice swords and started to warm up. She had begun wondering if Sulu was going to show up when Spock waltzed into the gym. She looked at him with dismay.

"Sulu asked me to extend his humble apologies." The Vulcan was telling her, "He has been detained for a meeting with the Captain."

Amanda was only half listening as she took a few more swings and then moved to put the sword away. At least she'd gotten a little physical activity in for the day.

"If you still wish to spar, I may be a suitable partner."

She looked at him for a long moment. Spock knew that look. She was sizing him up.

Amanda shook her head as she wiped her forehead with a towel. "I wouldn't want you to mess up that fancy uniform."

"The uniform should not inhibit my fighting abilities. It is designed to render comfort and maximum range of motion."

She smiled and mumbled to herself, "In that case, maybe I should have one." She knew that Spock had heard her, but he made no effort to respond and instead picked up his own practice sword.

"Shall we?" he asked once he had moved to the center of the mat. The sparring began.

Spock, for all of his uncomfortable, stiff ambience, was a very skilled and fluid fighter and proved to be quite a match for Amanda. She tried every one of her best moves on him, all of which were thwarted. After fourty-five minutes of back and forth combat, Amanda called the match.

She was extremely frustrated by Spock's ability to maintain energy during combat. She was practically dying, skin soaking wet, sucking in air, and Spock had barely broken a sweat.

He watched her with interest as she collapsed down on the mat, arms outstretched on either side of her. She was strangely alluring this way – skin glistening, face flushed, chest heaving, with a wide smile on her face. Physical exertion was so completely human, and while he analyzed her, he tried to imagine a Vulcan in the same situation. The image almost made him laugh out loud.

He replaced their swords and returned to stand above her.

"Excellent match."

"Ugh," She rolled onto her side and then jumped up on her feet, "Damn that felt marvelous." Amanda noticed Spock looking at her very closely and was suddenly more self-conscious. She fixed her ponytail and quickly grabbed her towel to clean up a bit. "It must be nice to have no sweat glands." She laughed nervously as she wiped her arms and chest.

"At times," he agreed with a nod, "But considering that Vulcans expel heat through breathing, we can make the environment uncomfortable for others in close quarters."

"I'm not sure it's the breathing." She mumbled as she turned towards the door.

It was another comment that he chose to ignore. "It has been a while since our last exchange." Spock observed, lengthening his strides a bit to meet her at the door.

"Has it?" Amanda asked as if she hadn't noticed.

"Indeed." He was following her down the hall now. "Do you intend to have dinner this evening?"

"As soon as I shower."

"Perhaps you would like to join me?"

"Well, I do have to shower." She explained, hoping that he would just decide to eat without her.

"I will wait." They had reached her doorway and Spock stood obediently beside it. She looked at him for a long moment. She supposed that he intended to just stand there while she showered.

She wondered if it would be rude to leave him out there for a while, and if he might eventually leave. He looked awkward and attention-grabbing there, however, and she rolled her eyes a bit. "Might as well come inside."

It was the first time that Spock had been inside Amanda's quarters while they were being occupied. She had added a variety of personal touches – not the least of which was her giant dog, who was lying in his giant bed with a giant piece of rawhide. He settled down at her table while Amanda grabbed some clothes and headed in to shower.

It did not strike Spock that this might be considered improper. He just waited, analyzing any changes she had made to the room. She had a photograph of the captain, herself, and their mother on her nightstand. The rest of the room was relatively bare except for some space flowers that she had probably been given by Sulu. It was clean and neat, and she had made her bed in the morning. He approved of her cleanliness.

He was startled by a wet feeling in his hand, and looked down to see that Dante had come to welcome him to his master's abode. Spock had just begun to scratch the dog's ears when Amanda emerged, buffing her hair with a towel.

"I don't see you as a pet person." She concluded from the somewhat awkward display.

Spock was a bit disgruntled by the accusation, "On the contrary. I enjoy the company of animals. I had a pet sehlat when I was a boy."

"A sehlat?" She looked at him with questioning eyes.

"An animal native to Vulcan. I suppose that earth's equivalent would be a bear."

"You had a pet bear?"

"No, a pet sehlat."

She shrugged. "Not quite the same as a dog, I think."

"They can be very affectionate." Spock had risen and begun wandering around the room, inspecting the flowers. He noticed that one had a card – a note from Ensign Chekov. His forehead creased into a frown.

Amanda walked towards the door and Spock slowly followed. He didn't know why, but the idea of Chekov sending Amanda flowers discomfited him.

"You will permit me to make a personal inquiry?" He asked her as they walked down the empty hallway.

"It depends on the question, I guess." When he looked confused, she laughed. "Go ahead."

Spock intended to ask about Ensign Chekov, but they were headed towards a group of people in the hallway and he decided against it. "Nevermind."

Amanda was puzzled by the exchange, but before she could ask about it, there was a group of people calling out to her.

"Hey Amanda!"

"Where have you been!?"

She smiled as they passed, "I've been around. Where have you all been?"

They were wearing Engineering red, and Spock thought that he recognized one or two of them.

"Oh, you know, Scotty keeps us pretty busy."

"I know where you've been," taunted a girl, "out with Ensign Chekov!"

Amanda's only response was to smile and shake her head.

This only bothered Spock more.

Once they had arrived in the cafeteria and gotten their food, Amanda and Spock settled down at a table with Kirk, Sulu, and Uhura.

"Amanda, how are those flowers that I gave you doing?"

"They look very healthy," Amanda told Sulu, "And they have cheered the room up nicely."

"I didn't know the room was lacking in cheer." Kirk seemed upset that she didn't like his decorations.

She smiled at him, "Jim, the room was very cheerful. The plants just make it – more alive."

An awkward silence settled over the table, only to be interrupted minutes later by an announcement over the ship's intercom.

"Captain Kirk, Commander Spock, please report to the bridge. Captain Kirk, Commander Spock, please report to the bridge."

Jim, Spock, Uhura, and Sulu all got up to leave. Amanda followed them without asking.

Once they arrived at the bridge, they found it engulfed in a flurry of activity.

"Captain, sensors are picking up rogue solition waves in the area."

Amanda watched as the officers took their places and relieved their less-experienced replacements.

"Scans show that we are headed straight for the waves, Captain." Spock informed the bridge. Amanda looked over the screens in the science officer's station and tried to remember what she had learned about solition waves at the Academy. She knew that a solition wave was an extremely powerful, nondispersing wavefront of artificially created subspace distortion.

"What created it?" She asked, leaning over Spock's shoulder to analyze the phenomenon. "There seems to be nothing else in the area."

Despite his training to the contrary, Spock felt his mind drift. It had been a while since he had been this close to a woman. Since Uhura. There was something different about the way Amanda was, though. First of all, her smell was completely intoxicating to him, in a way that he had never noticed about another woman before. Her chest was dangerously close to his cheek, and Spock's mind began to go down a path that was completely inappropriate for a Starfleet officer and, more importantly, for a Vulcan. Disgusted with himself, he stood up next to her and moved away quickly.

It was too late, he realized as soon as he got to the area behind the captain's chair. Uhura was looking at him through slitted eyes.

It was commonly believed that Vulcans felt no sexual urges unless they were related to the time in a male's life when he was supposed to find a wife and produce offspring. Vulcans were such a proud people that they never even considered clarifying the circumstances for humans or other species. Sexuality was completely taboo to Vulcans. But contrary to popular belief, that didn't mean they didn't think about it. Perhaps not often, but every now and then someone would come along with some particular quality about them that brought out the more…carnal side of a Vulcan. Uhura had started to see that side of him, but he had always managed to keep it under firm control. He was finding the same control difficult when he was around Amanda, and Uhura could tell.

Just then, several seconds later, he remembered Amanda's question. She was looking at him expectantly.

"It is possible that the wave was created by a subspace quasar."

"I thought that soliton waves were only artificially created."

"The natural wave theory has only recently been postulated."

"It is heading towards us at an increasing speed." Chekov announced.

"And no doubt picking up tons of soliton particles as it comes."

Jim looked at her expectantly, "Since you seem to be the authority on the issue, what can we do about it?"

She shook her head, "The closer it comes, the more particles it attracts, the larger and stronger it becomes. If it's crossed a wide gap already, we could be looking at enough power to obliterate a planet, let alone this starship."

"If it hits the ship," Spock added, "We will not survive."

"Is there a way we can avoid it?"

Amanda shook her head, but thought a moment. "I may be able to disperse it."

"Just let us know what you need."

Amanda nodded and stood at the helm with her hand on Chekov's shoulder observing the distance. The wave was not yet visible, but she knew from the radar that it was getting dangerously close.

"First, we must report the wave on all emergency channels. Just in case. Note position, heading and velocity." Kirk nodded to Lieutenant Uhura to do as his sister instructed. Amanda looked back at Kirk, "The wave can be disrupted by creating a backfire directly in its flightpath. A simple antimatter destination equal to the impact of the wave should be efficient. We need to evacuate any areas at the head of the ship that may be affected by radiation backlash."

Kirk nodded and issued the orders. Spock, impressed by Amanda's knowledge of the wave behavior, gave her an approving nod. She almost smiled in response.

Spock turned back to the screen. "Captain, the wave has just jumped 100 yards closer."

"We need to detonate NOW." Amanda told Jim. He issued the order to fire again, but there was no response from the ship. "It's taking too long! The wave will hit us!"

Just as she spoke, a torpedo was launched from deep within the ship's guts. The crew saw it head off into space and Spock monitored it on the screen.

"Full impact." He declared. The crew seemed to relax a bit, but Amanda was shaking her head.

"It was too close. We're going to get backlash. You guys had better tie yourselves down."

No sooner had she spoken than debris and a thick wave of energy launched towards the ship. The Enterprise shook and the bridge temporarily lost power as officers were being flung around in all directions by the impact.

Moments later, the power came back and the bridge began to come back to life.

"All present and accounted for?" Kirk asked, looking around the captain.

"Captain!"

It was Chekov. He had run to the corner of the room, where he was kneeling over Amanda's completely still body.