Vivian was beginning to get restless, standing on the surface of the admittedly beautiful planet with Spock and the Captain. The longer she stayed in Starfleet, the more uneasy she felt on planets where the Prime Directive was in effect.
"Doctor McCoy," Vivian said into her communicator.
"Yes, Jamie," he said, and Vivian raised an amused eyebrow at the Captain, who smiled patiently.
The Captain took the communicator and said, "How much longer, McCoy?"
"Oh, about another thirty minutes. I've come across some most interesting organic compounds. Hey, Starfleet was right. These roots and soil cultures can be a medical treasure house. Any problems there?"
"Clear for now," Vivian said, taking her communicator back, watching Spock bend over something on the ground. "We'll keep an eye out. Buckingham out."
She put her communicator away and Spock straightened up, letting her see the prints he'd found.
"Large prints," he said. "The ape-like creature in the reports?"
"Yes, the mugato," the Captain said, looking at the prints more closely. "No problem, though. Those prints are several days old. They seldom stay in one place."
"Aside from that, you say it's a Garden of Eden?"
The Captain smiled. She said, "Or so it seemed to the brash young Lieutenant Kirk on her first planet survey."
"Certainly M-class," Vivian said, checking Spock's readings. "Could be Earth, actually."
"Except these people stayed in their Garden of Eden," the Captain said eagerly. "Bows and arrows for hunting, but absolutely no fighting among themselves. Remarkably peaceful and tranquil."
A voice called out, "Ho! Take cover there!"
Then looked at each other briefly before all three dashing away toward the voice, investigating the disturbance. Vivian saw three dark-haired local peoples laying an ambush for something or someone, and she was startled to see the weapons they were carrying.
"Bows and arrows, Captain?" Spock prompted.
The Captain seemed disturbed by the sight and said, bewildered, "Villagers with flintlocks? That's impossible. They hadn't progressed nearly that far."
Before Vivian could argue that it wasn't really impossible, Spock said, "Captain, look."
The two women followed his gaze to a group of blond hunters approaching with bows and arrows, the object of the ambush.
"One of those men walking into ambush is Tyree," the Captain said, horrified. "The friend I lived with here."
She was beginning to draw her phaser when Vivian shook her head and said, "Captain, orders said no phasers."
At the reminder the Captain let go of her phaser and picked up a rock. She threw it well, startling one of the villagers into firing his weapon without orders, hitting no one.
"Villagers!" the man who seemed to be the leader cried.
The Captain, Spock, and Vivian led the way, the villagers following behind, the hungers chasing after all of them. Vivian shivered as she heard a shot fired, but she didn't look back to see what it might have hit. They were just approaching Bones when another shot fired, and Spock stumbled slightly as it hit him in the back. He kept running.
"Spock?" the Captain said, horrified. "Your phaser."
Vivian realized that Spock's phaser was missing, that it must have been dropped somewhere along the line. If there wasn't immediate danger, she would have gone back for it, but it would do no good to die for it. Vivian and the Captain both drew their phasers with the intention of making a stand, protecting Spock, but he shook his head.
"No, Captain," he said. "I can travel."
They helped him move quickly to where Bones was, and the Captain said, "Beam us up, quickly."
"Now, Scotty," Bones said into his communicator. "Have medics stand by."
/-/
Spock gritted his teeth together as they landed in the transporter room, Vivian holding on to him, helping him collapse safely to the floor. He held onto her hand, not thinking of how tightly he was gripping at her hand, her wrist. Perhaps he was hurting her, but she made no sign.
"What happened, Captain?" he heard Mr. Scott say, his tone distressed.
"Some kind of primitive firearm," Vivian said, her soft brown eyes shining with unshed tears. She was panicked, afraid, and he could hear it. "Metal projectile."
"Vitalizer B," the voice of a relatively new crewmember said, a Doctor M'Benga. Doctor McCoy was scanning him, he knew, and his eyes shut, his regular consciousness going, but he could still hear them, could still feel Vivian grasping his hand.
"Pressure packet," he heard Doctor McCoy say. "Lucky his heart's where his liver should be, or he'd be dead now."
"Not good, sir," Doctor M'Benga said. Vivian squeezed tighter.
"Coranalin," Doctor McCoy said.
"Bones," Vivian's voice said urgently, "will he live?"
The voice of Lieutenant Palmer over the intercom: "All decks, Red alert! Battle stations! Go to Red Alert!"
Spock wanted to wake, but he was not able, and Vivian hesitated, still holding his hand.
"Kirk here," the Captain said.
"Palmer, sir. We have a Klingon vessel on our screen."
"On my way. Scotty. Vivian." Vivian's hand reluctantly slipped from Spock's. "Bones?"
"I don't know yet, Jamie," Doctor McCoy said, and Spock knew that Vivian had left the room a moment later.
/-/
Vivian's hands were trembling, but she ignored them. She kept telling herself there was nothing she could do for Spock, and she was needed on the Bridge. Nothing she could do – needed on the Bridge, over and over in a kind of mantra.
"Captain," Chekov said, reporting as Vivian, Scotty, and the Captain arrived, "we're holding the planet between us and the Klingons. I don't think they've spotted us."
"Make that definite, sir," Lieutenant Palmer said, not looking up from her work. "They're sending a routine message to their home base with no mention of us."
"Yellow alert, then," Vivian said, crossing to Spock's station to take readings.
"Yellow Alert," Palmer announced over the intercom. "All stations go to Yellow Alert."
"Do you think you can keep it up, Chekov?" Vivian asked, examining the composition of a nearby moon.
"I can try, Counselor."
"Message for Starbase, sir?" Palmer asked.
"No point in giving ourselves away, Lieutenant," the Captain said. "Not until we find out what's going on."
There was a frown in her voice, and Vivian knew that the Captain was distracted by worries about Spock as well.
"We can hide for a while, sir," Scotty said, "but we may have to go out of orbit to keep it up for long."
Vivian crossed quickly to the Captain's chair and pressed the intercom button, no longer able to control herself.
"Bridge to Sickbay."
Bones, sounding irritated and frayed, said, "McCoy here. I'll call you as soon as I know anything. Sickbay out."
Vivian closed her eyes for a moment, breathing in deeply through flared nostrils. Spock would be calm if it were her who had been shot.
Of course, if she'd been shot like that, she'd be dead, so perhaps calm wasn't quite the right word.
"So, they've broken the treaty," the Captain said, pulling Vivian back to the present. She was needed. Nothing she could do for Spock.
"Not necessarily, Captain," Scotty said. "They have as much right to scientific missions here as we have."
"Research is not the Klingon way," the Captain said, almost derisively.
Vivian's memory prickled, something about a Klingon scientist…genetic engineering….
"It's not entirely unheard of," Vivian said slowly, opening her eyes again, "although it is unlikely. But how do you expect us to prove it?"
The Captain raised a finger sternly to punctuate her point, jutting it forward every few words, saying, "When I left there thirteen years ago, those villagers had barely learned to forge iron. Spock was shot with a flintlock. How many centuries between those two developments?"
"On Earth, about twelve, sir," Lieutenant Palmer said.
"On the other hand," Scotty said with raised eyebrows, "a flintlock would be the first firearm the inhabitants would normally develop."
"Yes, I'm aware of that, Mr. Scott," the Captain said dismissively.
Vivian, well aware that she was looking for excuses not to leave the ship, said, "It's a known anthropological fact that some species progress differently. Look at early warp engine development on Earth, only one century to warp five where other Federation worlds took three."
"We've seen all kinds of different development at different rates on different planets," Palmer said.
"And were the Klingons behind it," Scotty said with the tone of a devil's advocate, "why didn't they give them breechloaders?"
"Or machine guns?" Chekov chimed in.
"Or old-style hand lasers?" Palmer said.
The Captain was not really considering their information, Vivian could see. She was set in her belief on the Klingons, and Vivian was too focused on Spock to try to bring her around.
"This isn't helpful," she said, taking advantage of a lull in the argument. "Scotty, the Captain and I will be in Sickbay. We won't accomplish anything until we have news on Spock."
/-/
Vivian watched the unconscious Spock as M'Benga gave his report to Bones.
"We've got no replacements for the damaged organs, sir. If he's going to live, his Vulcan physiology will have to do it for him."
"Agreed," Bones said, almost reluctantly. "Sterilite off."
"Yes, sir," Christine said, complying with the order.
Bones turned and approached them, looking exhausted.
"He'll live or die now, Jamie," he said. "I don't know which. Doctor M'Benga interned on a Vulcan ward. He couldn't be in better hands."
"Then the three of us are transporting down," the Captain said.
Bones looked startled by this news, and Vivian swallowed back the bile in her throat.
"I can't leave Spock at this time," Bones argued.
Vivian forced herself to exhale and said, "You have a capable doctor to leave him with, and it's all on his physiology. Klingons are here, Bones, and we need someone to figure out if they have a genuine scientific interest here. Without Spock, only you can determine that."
Bones went slightly pale and said, "And if that's not it?"
"Then we'll need help," the Captain said. "Advice we can trust as much as Spock's."
"I appreciate the compliment, Jamie, but—"
"Bones, I'm as worried about Spock as you are, but if the Klingons are breaking the treaty, it could be interstellar war." She pressed the intercom button. "Kirk to Bridge."
"Bridge. Scott here."
Vivian said, "Bones and the Captain and I are going to the surface. Tell ship's stores we need three native costumes."
Scotty replied, "Counselor, we may have to break out of orbit any minute to keep out of their sight. We'd be out of communicator range with you."
Her stomach turned slightly, and she glanced at Spock again. If she left him and couldn't reach him, if something went wrong and they couldn't bring her back to the ship…. How would she live with herself?
But it wasn't her choice, and the Captain said, "I understand. We'll arrange a rendezvous schedule. Kirk out."
Captain's Log, stardate 4211.4. Keeping our presence here secret is an enormous tactical advantage, therefore I cannot risk contact with Starfleet Command. I must take action on my own judgment. I've elected to violate orders and make contact with planet inhabitants.
On the surface, Vivian, Bones, and the Captain stood in the leathers of the local hill people, the ones who had been chased off by the villagers lying in ambush before. They weren't very comfortable, but they were warm enough. Vivian tried to read Spock's tricorder, but she did not have his experience.
"I believe it's a quarter mine…that way, Captain," she said, pointing when she finally determined the direction to the camp.
"What to think about it again, Jamie?" Bones prompted. "Starfleet's orders about this planet state no interference with—"
"No interference with normal social development," the Captain finished, her dark eyes
narrowing. "I'm not only aware of it, it was my survey thirteen years ago that recommended it."
Bones nodded, unperturbed, and he said, "I read it. Inhabitants superior in many ways to humans. Left alone, they undoubtedly someday will develop a remarkably advanced and peaceful culture."
"Indeed. And I intend to see that they have that chance. You coming with me?"
The Captain took a step, and Vivian saw that Bones was scowling. She raised her eyebrows at him and said, lightly, "That wasn't giving you an option."
Bones turned his scowl to Vivian, but he followed the two women down the slope, several paces behind them.
Vivian didn't see it coming. When a large white ape pounced at them, horns on its head and hideous spines down its back, she felt a freezing fear in the center of her chest. It went for the Captain first, and when Bones threw himself at it as it bit the Captain, it tossed him aside with alarming ease. Before Vivian could draw her phaser to intervene, it turned and bit her, at the meatiest part of her upper arm. Vivian let out a gasping cry as the hot pain of the venom mixing with her blood caused her arm to throb and ache.
A rock bounced off the beast as he looked down at Vivian, and it turned to look at Bones, who vaporized it with his phaser. She groaned, trying to sit up, her whole body trembling. She collapsed again, and saw that the Captain, too, was shaking.
The Captain choked out, "Contact ship. Took full poison. Fangs. Both."
Vivian was trying to make sense of these words as Bones pulled out his communicator, opening the channel and saying, "Enterprise, McCoy. Emergency. Come in." No answer. "Enterprise, come in. McCoy! Emergency!"
"They left," the Captain said through gritted teeth. "Out of orbit."
Bones put away the communicator and gave them injects, starting with Vivian, who supposed she must have gotten more of the poison than the Captain.
"Jamie, there's no antitoxin for this poison," he told the Captain as he finished the injection. "I can only keep you alive for a few hours with this."
Vivian's whole body shivered uncontrollably and she managed to say, "Hill people. Cure. Tyree."
She nodded at three men standing nearby, although the motion was exceedingly painful.
"Are you hill people?" Bones asked them. They did not answer. Vivian whimpered at a horrible throb of her shoulder. "Do you know a hunter named Tyree? A mugato attacked them." He gestured to the Captain. "She's Jamara Kirk. She's a friend of Tyree's." Still, they did not answer, and the world began to spin. "Blast it! Do something! They're dying!"
Vivian's world went black just before she felt her eyelids close, and then she felt nothing.
Medical Log, stardate 4211.8. Kirk is right about the people here. Despite their fear and our strangeness, they're compassionate and gentle. I've learned the hunter Tyree is now their leader. He is expected to return shortly with his wife, who they say knows how to cure this poison. My problem is the Captain and Counselor are in deep shock. I must keep them warm and alive until then.
Spock was in darkness, only vaguely aware. He was aware enough to know that Vivian was not herself, and he was aware enough to know that someone was holding his hand. It was small, feminine, but it was not Vivian's.
The hand let go abruptly and the voice of Doctor M'Benga said, "Don't let these low panel readings bother you. I've seen this before in Vulcans. It's their way of concentrating all their strength, blood, and antibodies onto the injured organs. A form of self-induced hypnosis."
"You mean he's conscious?" the voice of Nurse Chapel said.
Spock was aware that she must have been the one holding his hand, but he did not think about it. It was an instinctual awareness, because he could not afford more, even to think on what was wrong with Vivian.
"Well, in a sense," M'Benga said. "He knows we're here and what we're saying, but he can't afford to take his mind from the tissue he's fighting to heal. I suppose he even knows you were holding his hand."
Something in the room shifted, but Spock was not aware what, and then Nurse Chapel said, "A good nurse always treats her patients that way. It proves she's interested."
/-/
When Vivian's eyes opened, dry and stinging, she saw the Captain drowsy, and she saw that she was in a cave. She was freezing.
"Bones, I had the strangest dream," the Captain muttered, and her eyes closed. Vivian felt envious. She wished she'd had a dream.
"How do you feel, Vivian?" Bones asked, brushing sticky, sweaty hair off her face.
"I'm…tired. Good…. Thank you." She felt a dull ache in her head and extreme exhaustion. "I'm going back to sleep."
Before he could say anything else, her eyes had closed again, and darkness reclaimed her.
/-/
Vivian's eyes were still closed, but she became aware of someone near her.
"Jamie," she heard Bones say.
"Bones," the Captain responded, tiredness evident in her voice. "What are you doing here?"
Vivian opens her eyes, and a man with them in the cave also woke up. The Captain smiled at him and said, "Tyree. My old friend."
"Yes, Jamara!" Tyree said, smiling at her. "Jamara, it's good to see you."
"What am I doing here?" the Captain asked, looking around the cave they were in, and Vivian sat up slightly, puzzled. "A mugato bite!" she said suddenly, the memory coming back to her. "I remember. Vivian said to take us to Tyree's camp. You found a kahn-ut-tu to cure us." She turned to Vivian and explained, "The kahn-ut-tu is the local witch people here. They've studied" – a woman with dark hair stood from where she had been lying near the Captain's head, and the Captain's voice faltered for a moment. "They've studied the roots and the herbs."
The woman, in a very confident voice, said, "I am a kahn-ut-tu, Captain. I cured you."
Tyree nodded to her and said, "My wife, Nona."
The Captain's face brightened and she said, "Yes, of course. I should've guessed. Congratulations." Then her eyes darkened again and she said, "Tyree, we must talk now. The villagers, their new weapons. I want to hear all about that. We must make plans."
"Good," Nona said eagerly. "It's past time to plan."
Tyree helped Vivian to her feet and said, "Much has happened since you left, Jamara. Come, we'll speak of it."
"And of things to be done," Nona added.
"Come," Tyree said, and the men went to leave, followed by Vivian and Kirk on weak legs. Vivian saw Tyree stop Nona from following and he gave his wife a stern look. "We will speak of it."
/-/
In the back of the darkness, Spock could hear Nurse Chapel say, "The readings are beginning to fluctuate."
"Just as they should," Doctor M'Benga replied. Then the voice came closer. "This is Doctor M'Benga. There will be someone with you constantly now. When the time comes, I'll be called." Then the voice was further away. "As soon as he shows any signs of consciousness, call me immediately."
"Yes, Doctor."
"After you've called me, if he speaks, do whatever he says."
"Do whatever he says?"
"Yes. That's clear enough, isn't it?"
Spock could sense that Vivian was more herself, somewhere on the edge of his consciousness.
/-/
In a different cave, Vivian sat with the Captain and Tyree, who was explaining how the weapons had come to the villagers.
"The firesticks first appeared nearly a year ago," he said. "Since that time, many of my people have died."
"How is it you know that the villagers build them?" Vivian asked.
"I've looked into their village. I have seen it being done."
Vivian nodded and Bones asked, "Have you seen any strangers among the villagers?"
Tyree frowned.
"Strangers? No."
"Can you take us to their village while it's still dark?" the Captain asked.
"Yes, but the mugatos travel at night also. You killed one. Its mate will not be far."
The Captain pulled out her phaser and said with a smile, "You've seen how these work."
Nona, who slipped in while they were talking, said eagerly, "I've seen them also, and I know you have many ways to make your friend Tyree a man of great importance."
Vivian frowned at this obviously greedy ambition, and Bones said, "Many ways? What else does she know about us?"
"Tyree has told me much of you," Nona said, grinning like a Cheshire cat. "Do not blame him. It was the price for saving your lives."
Hoping to salvage the situation, Vivian said, "We are just strangers—"
"From one of the lights in the sky," Nona said slyly, "and you have ways as far above the firesticks as the sky above our world."
Vivian felt slightly sick and Tyree turned to his wife sternly and said, "You will not speak of this to others."
But Tyree did not have the power over his wife, and as obvious as this was to Vivian, it became infinitely clear when Nona said, "I will not if I am made to understand. Teach me. There's an old custom among my people. When a woman saves a life, that one is grateful."
"We are grateful," the Captain insisted.
"A splendid custom," Bones said softly, "if not carried to extremes."
The Captain took a deep breath and tried to explain in a way Nona could understand why they could not give her what she wanted. She said, "We once were as you are. Spears, arrows. There came a time when our weapons grew faster than our wisdom, and we almost destroyed ourselves. We learned from this to make a rule during all our travels: never to cause the same to happen to other worlds. Just as a man must grow in his own way and in his own time."
"Some men never grow," Nona said bitterly.
"Perhaps not as fast or in the way another think he should," the Captain said, both anxious and amused. "But we're wise enough to know not to interfere with the way of another man, or another world."
Nona was not satisfied, and she insisted, "You must let the villagers destroy us? You will not help your friend and brother kill them instead?"
"No!" Tyree cried, hearing quite enough. "I said I would not kill!"
"We must fight or die! Is dying better? You will let him die when you have weapons to make him powerful and safe?" Nona said, turning on the Captain again. "Then he has the wrong friends. And I have the wrong husband."
She left in a huff and the cave was left in silence at her departure for several long moments.
"You will help in ways she does not understand," Tyree finally said with a hopeful smile. "I have faith in our friendship, Jamara. Come, before we lose the darkness."
Tyree led the way out, but the three Starfleet officers lingered for a moment in the cave.
"What is it, Jamie?" Vivian asked. "If we can catch the Klingons arming villagers, we can do something."
"That's what's bothering me," the Captain muttered, her eyes dark. "The something we may have to do."
/-/
The village had smooth, walled buildings with tiled roofs, shrubbery in terracotta jars, and wooden doors. Vivian frowned at the sight of an armed guard patrolling in front of a building with a verandah, which must have been a place where someone important was.
"The guard," Tyree said, gesturing. "We must wait."
Vivian licked her lips.
The Captain said softly, "Tyree, supposing you had to fight? What then?"
Bones, horrified, said, "Jamie, this man believes in the same thing we believe in. That killing is stupid and useless."
Vivian wouldn't have been as quick to say she believed that, and she glanced at the Captain, who ignored Bones.
"Tyree?" the Captain prompted.
He had certainly heard her, but he did not answer. Instead he said, "No. Come."
Vivian went in first, using her training to sneak in behind the guard, putting him in a sleep hold before he realized what had hit him. She took his weapon and ammunition and held them up as they others hurried forward.
"Gun," she said passing it to Tyree. "Ammunition. Doctor, Captain."
Tyree held the weapon and ammunition awkwardly as the other three hurried away.
"Jamie," Bones said, gesturing to what appeared to be a factory of some kind. "Coal for forge, sulphur for gunpowder."
"Let's take a look inside," the Captain said, nodding toward the entrance to the building. Vivian led the way in, scanning the bellows they found inside. It ran straight into the base of the fire, and the Captain sighed a she looked at it. "Well, here's your forge," she said, looking at it more closely. "People's exhibit number one. A chrome steel drill point."
Bones, who was also scanning, said, "This pig iron is almost carbon-free. That village furnace certainly didn't produce it. People's exhibit number two." He picked up a gun and turned it over. "Cold-rolled gun barrel rod fashioned to look homemade. You were right about the Klingons, Jamie."
"Make recorder and scanner tapes of everything," the Captain said, gesturing.
Vivian rubbed the back of her neck and said, "If only we could get an image record of a Klingon here. That would—"
She broke off at the sound of approaching voices, and her heart leapt into her throat as the three of them hid behind the bellows.
The voice of a villager said, "Is it quite difficult to cut grooves into the barrels?"
The rich voice of a Klingon answered, "It's quite simple. I'll show you."
The pair entered the forge and Vivian held her breath as the villager said, "I thought my people would grow tired of killing. But you were right. They see that it is easier than trading and has its pleasures. I feel it myself. Like the hunt, but with richer rewards."
"You will be rich one day, Apella, beyond your dreams. The leader of a whole world. A governor in the Klingon Empire."
Suddenly, Bones's scanner began to whistle, and Vivian felt her heart in her eardrums. On instinct, Vivian and the Captain jumped the Klingon while Bones hit the villager Apella across the head with the steel rod.
"Bones!" the Captain cried, irritated.
The trio moved to the doors, but there were two more armed villagers. Vivian and the Captain knocked them out with well-aimed blows and all three ran as fast as they could.
"Guards!" Vivian heard the Klingon cry. "Intruders!"
As they came toward the gates out of the village the Captain called out to Tyree, "Move! Fast!"
Shots were fired at the four of them as they ran as fast as possible away from the village, and they were lucky to have the darkness on their side, getting away without a scratch.
/-/
Near consciousness. Someone else's fear. Vivian's fear.
Spock gasped for air, recalling Doctor M'Benga's words to his barely-conscious mind.
"Nurse," he said.
"Yes?" Nurse Chapel responded, startled by his voice.
"Hit me. The pain will help me to consciousness. Hit me."
Vivian's fear. He could feel it, but it was not enough on its own to pull him back to himself.
"Hit you?" Nurse Chapel said, horrified. "No! I can't—"
"Blast you, strike me!" he gasped. "If I don't regain consciousness soon, it may be too late."
Spock felt a strike across his face, weak and tentative. Anxiety, not his own. Vivian's.
"Harder!"
The strike was harder, and he could feel his heartbeat, and Vivian's heartbeat, nearly the same rate.
"Again. Continue. The pain will help me to consciousness."
The striking continued for several strokes as he slowly came to, but he heard the voice of Mr. Scott cry, "What are you doing, woman?"
The striking stopped and Nurse Chapel said, "Let me alone!"
"Have you gone daft?"
"Mr. Spock needs me! Let me go!"
Spock was beginning to slip, unable to cling fully to the sensations of his own mind and Vivian's without the stimulus of the striking.
Suddenly someone pulled him into a sitting position, striking him hard across the face. After several sufficient blows, Spock grabbed what he became aware of as the arm of Doctor M'Benga and said, "That will be quite enough. Thank you, Doctor."
M'Benga nodded and pulled out of Spock's hold, turning to a stunned Mr. Scott.
"Please, release her."
"What's all this about?" Mr. Scott asked, letting go of the nurse, horrified.
"She was doing as I requested, Mr. Scott," Spock said. "A Vulcan form of self-healing."
"As you saw," Doctor M'Benga explained, "they must wait until the last possible moment, then fight their way back to consciousness."
Spock, feeling another stab of urgency that was clearly from Vivian, made to stand.
"Here, let me help you, Mr. Spock."
"Thank you, Nurse," Spock said, brushing her off, his mind focused on Vivian's sporadic and confused emotions. "I'm quite fully recovered."
"Yes, I see you are," she remarked, bemused, but Spock barely noticed her.
He needed to learn what had happened while he had been healing. He needed to know what sort of danger Vivian was in.
/-/
A bit away from the tents at Tyree's camp, Vivian was helping the Captain oversee the training of the hill people in the use of the flintlock.
"Pan is here," she was explaining to them, holding up one of the horrible things that might have actually killed her husband. "Hammer is here. When the hammer strikes the pan we have a spark, like your flint. This ignites the powder, and the ignition fires the projectile. Remember your aim. Hold your breath, and gentle squeeze the trigger."
Tyree did as she asked, his eyes narrowing as he aimed, and his shot hit a clay pot they'd decided to set up as one of the targets.
"Yes, perfect," she said, smiling.
"Vivian, Jamie," Bones said, coming over and frowning, "I want to talk to you."
Vivian's lips twitched and she nodded.
"Alright," she said, forcing a smile, looking around. "The cave. Yutan, you give it a try now."
She led the way across to the cave, feeling her hands tremble slightly. She hated herself, and she knew what he was about to say was only going to remind her why everything she was doing was terrible. But she had to, and she knew it.
"Do I have to say it?" he said when the three of them were alone. "It's not bad enough there's one serpent in Eden teaching one side about gunpowder. You want to make sure they all know about it!"
"Equal knowledge is the only way to give them a chance to survive!" Vivian said, feeling horribly ill at the thought.
"Have you gone out of your mind?" he demanded. Then his face softened and he shook his head and said, "Yes, maybe you have. Tyree's wife, she said there was something in that root. She said now you can refuse her nothing."
"Superstition," the Captain said dismissively.
Bones argued, "Is it a coincidence this is exactly what she wants?"
Vivian, awash with frustration and helplessness, said, "But it's not! She wants superiority, the power to utterly destroy, and we cannot do that, Bones. Neither side can have that kind of power, but that is what the Klingons were doing. We just need to restore the balance."
She could see in his eyes that he didn't agree with her, and she wasn't completely sure she agreed with herself. She tried to think of what Spock would say, but she just wasn't sure, and thinking of him reminded her that he could be dead and she couldn't even contact the ship to find out.
"Vivian, that means you're condemning this whole planet to a war that may never end. It could go on for year after year, massacre after massacre."
"Alright, Doctor!" the Captain said, irritated. "Alright. Say we're wrong. Say we're drugged. Say the woman drugged us. What is your sober, sensible solution to all this?"
"I don't have a solution," he said, which felt disappointing to Vivian, although she knew he would say it. "But furnishing them firearms is certainly not the answer."
Vivian scratched her head at the hairline, pacing the cave once, twice, trying to think of how she would make the case to Spock, were he here.
"Do you remember your 20th Century history, Bones?" she asked softly. "The Asian wars played out as proxies of two giant governments pushing pawns around the continent? Both sides thought leaving could signal unrecoverable disaster."
"Yes, I remember," he said. "It went on bloody year after bloody year."
"What would you have suggested," the Captain said, "that one side arm its friends with an overpowering weapon? Mankind would never have lived to travel to space if they had. No. The only solution is what happened back then. Balance of power."
"And if the Klingons give their side even more?"
"Then we arm our side with exactly that much more. A balance of power. The trickiest, most difficult, dirtiest game of them all, but the only way that preserves both sides."
"The trickiest part is helping our friends understand," Vivian said, sitting down and rubbing her temples. "They may never."
The Captain nodded and said, "No. Probably not. But I'm going to have to try and make Tyree understand. I never had a more difficult task."
Vivian's stomach lurched at the thought, not envying her friend that task, to be certain.
"Well, Jamie, here's another moral agony for you," Bones said sadly. "Since Tyree won't fight, he will be one of the first to die."
"Well, war isn't a good life," the Captain said, slightly dodging the question, "but it's life. His wife is the only way to reach him. If I tell her we're going to supply guns, maybe she'll convince him."
It all felt terribly wrong, but Vivian couldn't see a better way, either.
/-/
Spock settled into the Captain's chair, feeling a sense of confliction from Vivian's space in the back of his mind.
"Position, Mr. Scott," he said.
"Entering distant orbit, sir," Mr. Scott replied. "Approaching rendezvous time."
"The Klingons?"
"They haven't spotted us yet, sir," Mr. Chekov said. "Looks like they're beaming someone aboard."
Spock nodded and said, "Stand by to signal the Captain."
"Aye, sir."
She was distressed, although not the worst she'd been since they became connected. Still, it left a much stronger impression than usual on Spock so soon after healing, and he wanted to fix it and fix it quickly.
/-/
Tyree came back to the camp in a huff, and Vivian felt a strong sense of foreboding.
"Tyree, have you seen the Captain?" she asked. Then she saw what was truly wrong with the picture. "Wait, where's the firestick?"
Bones's head turned at this, horrified.
"There!" Tyree said, pointing behind himself. "I left it there."
She inhaled, frustrated and a bit afraid, and she said, "It's not the sort of thing to just be left somewhere. Let's go."
She, Tyree, and Bones led the way, and Yutan came along with them, perhaps from curiosity, perhaps for extra protection should something go awry.
And everything was most certainly awry. When they came to the waterside, the Captain was unconscious, and the rifle was on the ground. Yutan picked up the rifle and offered it to his leader, but Tyree pushed it away.
"I do not want it," he said stubbornly.
"Jamie?" Bones said, reviving the Captain. "Jamie. Who hit you?"
"Nona," the Captain groaned, trying to sit up. She took the pills Bones gave her, and when he was about to give her an injection as well, she held up her hands in protest. "No, no. I'm alright."
She felt around, reorganizing her memories of what had happened, Vivian knew. Suddenly, the Captain's eyes widened in horror.
"My phaser. She took it."
And Vivian felt her heart in the base of her stomach.
/-/
Following the trail Nona left in her haste, Vivian, Captain Kirk, Bones, and Tyree rushed to the hillside, not far from where Spock had been shot during the ambush. Vivian was horrified as they grew close enough to see four villagers trying to rape an irate Nona.
"Nona!" Tyree called out to his wife.
"Hill people!" one of the villagers cried.
"It's a trap," one of his companions said. "The woman's tricked us."
Hardened to killing, not hesitating to second-guess his conclusion, this villager stabbed Nona as his companions shot at the approaching runners. Vivian felt a sudden shock of heat in her arm that melted into an aching pain. Yutan, who had followed them to the hillside, shot back at the villagers, and instead of reloading, the two parties began a hand-to-hand battle. Vivian was grasping at her bleeding arm as Tyree bashed the head of a villager – the one who had stabbed his wife – repeatedly with a very large rock.
The Captain stopped him with a gentle hand to his shoulder, and Tyree tossed the rock aside, remembering himself. Vivian watched him scramble to his wife, and she felt a stab of urgency to go to Spock.
"She's dead," Bones announced solemnly, and Tyree picked up the firearm with new conviction.
"I want more of these, Kirk," he said firmly. "Many more! Yutan, two of those who killed my wife have escaped. Track them down. I will kill them."
Vivian, aware that she was avoiding the consequences of their actions, knelt down and picked up the phaser from the dirt, not far from the scuffle.
"I found it," she said softly.
The Captain frowned as she looked at Vivian, holding her wound with one hand, the phaser in the other.
"Tomorrow in the palm of your hands," the Captain said.
"Well, you got what you wanted," Bones said bitterly.
"Not what I wanted, Bones. What had to be."
He frowned, not agreeing, still, and he took out a communicator from his bag, handing it to the Captain.
"Kirk here," the Captain said as Bones began to scan Vivian's arm.
"Spock, Captain. I trust all has gone well."
Vivian closed her eyes to keep from crying and said, "Spock, is that you?"
Surely he could hear the emotion she couldn't keep from her voice, but he simply answered, "An illogical question, Counselor, since obviously you are hearing my voice."
She laughed, and Bones said, amused, "Well, I don't know why I was worried. You can't kill a computer."
"Spock," the Captain said gravely, "ask Scotty how long it would take him to reproduce a hundred flintlocks."
Scotty, incredulous, said, "I didn't get that exactly, Captain. A hundred what?"
"A hundred serpents for Eden," Vivian said, shrugging Bones off after he tied the wound to stop the bleeding. "Spock, we're tried and I think my arm's broken. Have somebody beam us up."
/-/
When Spock finished his report to the Captain, he learned from Doctor M'Benga that Vivian had already been healed, cleared, and released. He went directly to her quarters, knowing she would be there, on orders, recovering.
"Come in," she said when he pressed the doorbell, and Spock entered to find her sitting on the edge of her bed.
Her features swam with relief as she caught sight of him, standing until he came over and pressed her down, sitting beside her, pressing his forehead to hers.
"While I was recovering," he said gently, "I was aware of your distress. You were struggling on the surface? The Captain said the Klingons were supplying weapons."
Vivian nodded and whispered, "I was bit by a poisonous beast, revived, and then we found the weapons and the Klingons. And I had to teach shooting to the hunters, and then the witch doctor stole a phaser and got herself killed in the fight with the villagers, and her husband demanded weapons."
"Indeed," he said. The Captain had told him this, but he could tell she was exhausted. "You were shot as well?"
"Not like you," she sighed as his hands moved for her hem to tug it away. Vivian removed her dress to show him her arm, where there was a puckered scar from the bullet on her forearm. "Doctor M'Benga says he can lower the scar tomorrow, but not get rid of it altogether."
Spock nodded, lifting her arm to look at it more closely as she laid down on the bed, resting her head on her pillow.
Without thinking over his actions, he pressed a kiss to her scar, then her elbow, then traced his lips down to her inner wrist, where her pulse jumped slightly at the contact. He placed several kisses on her surprisingly steady fingertips, feeling his own heartrate shift inexplicably.
Spock looked at his wife's face and felt slight amusement that she had very clearly fallen asleep while he was paying such careful attention to her arm. He sighed, kissing her forehead gently, laying down beside her, pulling her body to his and a blanket over them to keep her warm.
A/N: Well, that took forever, but c'est finis! I'm in the latter half of my student teaching, so it may be slow going on updates, but I will certainly do my best. I'm also doing some cataloguing that will help speed the story going forward, so hopefully when that's done, you'll get more regular updates! Meantime, I'm outlining the last scenes of "Spock's Brain," so if that's your favorite, you'll be pleased to know it's on its way eventually!
Review Prompt: Were Vivian and Kirk right? Was supplying with firearms the only way? Or was Bones right, that supporting violence and war is never the answer, even if it means the hunters being wiped out?
-C