I do not own Star Trek. I do own an icon of St. Nicholas of Myra. He has some magnificent frown-lines in it but doesn't look much like a Klingon. I don't speak Klingon, but there's a dictionary online and I hate the latinisation system so you can deal with the way I've spelt the handful of Klingon words in this story. I also barely speak Russian, and am pretty unfamiliar with any official latinisation system for that. Anyway, on with the musing that got away from me when I saw a meme.

Gault, 2347

"What happened?"

Yelena Rozhenko cut a motherly figure as she knelt down in front of Worf, bringing herself to his level. He was big for a seven-year-old, in both height and stature, but then, Klingons were big-boned compared to humans, and grew a little faster than them too. It had been five months since her husband Sergei had found him in the rubble of Khitomer, three and a half since Qoɂnosh had confirmed he had no living relatives, and a little over a month since they had come back to Gault.

Kolya, now a teenager, was happy to be back – he hadn't really wanted to go to Khitomer in the first place, much less simply because his father had found a Klingon child and he couldn't be left in Gault while his mother helped take care of it. He'd fit back into his friendship group easily enough, heading off to school on his own. They'd given little Worf a few weeks to settle in to his new home before taking him in to the school for the first time.

That had been two weeks ago, and now here he was, standing in the corner of the room even as five teenagers complained in the next room and the nurse cleaned the blood from their noses.

"They were disrespectful," Worf told her, squaring his jaw.

"They were disrespectful," Yelena repeated.

Worf just bobbed his head very quickly, and wouldn't say anything more.

Worf, although he was just seven years old and still coming to grips with languages that weren't Lhangon Khol, knew that he didn't fit in in this place. They were farmers – he was a warrior! He could still remember going on a hunt with Vav's friend Leɂkor, and fighting the beast! Well, he conceded, fingering the scar that still bothered him sometimes, the beast had been victorious on that particular occasion.

But nevertheless, he was a warrior, not a farmer. He was a Klingon, they were not. He may still be young, but he knew all about honour and respect, and Kolya's friends clearly did not. And he was a Klingon – the Klingons killed their gods! A Klingon warrior had no need for superstition. Lenochka and Serya, these two humans who said they would take care of him like his own parents, went to a temple every week to worship a human god.

He could always feel the eyes on him, the stares, as he stood with Kolya and Serya at the back of the room, looking at the linen-clad backs of these farmers as they lit candles. He was never sure where Lenochka went after they stepped past the forest of candles in the first narrow room and into the bigger room with painted golden human faces wobbling out at them from the dark blue walls. There was chanting, repetitive but nothing like what he'd heard when Klingons chanted, coming from somewhere nearer the front of the room, but he never bothered investigating. Kolya usually handed him a cube of bread at some point, but it was dry, and bread tended to give him a stomach-ache anyway. He hated human food.

This time, though, when he want two days after his altercation with those boys, he had no patience for the stares. He glared at one woman who stared at him – the mother, he thought, of one of the boys whose nose had bled under his first – and then turned away to glare at the wall.

He'd never actually really looked at the walls, not with everything else going on, and now he did. These human faces didn't look quite like human faces – longer, possibly more serene, and dressed more like Vulcans than like humans. They were all wearing space suit helmets for some reason, and there were labels floating above their shoulders. He had been learning to read the language used here, and he sounded them out slowly.

Stiy Vasiliy Blshenniy Moskovskiy – Worf wasn't at all sure what that meant, but they all had "stiy" so he decided to call that one Vasiliy. He was turned to the side, arms out at looking towards the front of the room.

He followed Vasiliy's gaze. A man in white, with white hair, had the label Serafim Sarovskiy. He was playing with some sort of targ, although with fewer spikes and teeth. The creature was looking up at him, and Worf glared all the more as he remembered Vedd, the targ he'd had to leave behind when his parents – his real parents – had decided to move to Khitomer.

He glared once more at the man and his bear before moving on. Here was another human man, with a big black hat and waving at him with his fingers in an odd position – and a very long name. It took Worf quite a long time to sound it all out. Ioanne Archiepiskope Shankhaiski Sanefrantsieskiy.

Stupid human with a stupid long name and a stupid tall hat.

He moved on, even more resentful of the whole situation, and the choir just got louder.

The next wall human, however, made him stop short. Nikolay Chudotvorets, but his equally stupid long human name wasn't what started him, nor was the fact that he had the same name as Worf's new housemate.

This man was Klingon.

He was sure of it. He could see the ridges. He might be holding a book and waving his hand in the same stupid way Ioanne Archi-whatever had been, but he had ridges above his eyes.

Worf stood there staring for a very long time. Maybe, just maybe, he could fit here after all.

"You like Saint Nicholas?"

Worf startled slightly, and then realised that the singing had stopped and most of the people had left, and it was just him and the bearded human man in black robes with a silver amulet hanging on his chest.

"He's like me," he admitted, turning back to look at the man on the wall.

"He's a popular one with children," the black-robed man – Worf cast about in his mind to remember what Lenochka had said his name was, weeks ago. Father Anatoliy, that was it. "He's known for bringing gifts, coins, in December."

Worf had no idea when December was. "I have no interest in gifts."

"Perhaps not," Father Anatoliy agreed. "Well, that's one of the most popular stories about him. The other one is the time he punched a man."

Worf turned to stare at him, mouth opening in surprise. "He punched a man?"

He seemed so calm in his painting, not at all like a warrior! Besides, humans disapproved of punching. And betlechs. Maybe the man was Klingon after all!

Father Anatoliy nodded. "Oh, yes. He got into an argument with a man named Arius. Arius thought that Christ was not God. Nicholas knew that he was, and he got so angry that Arius was disrespecting God that he punched him."

"Just like I did," Worf nodded, still staring at this man on the wall with awe.

"I suppose so," Father Anatoliy agreed. "Of course, you shouldn't go around looking for fights. There are better ways to resolve things."

Worf rolled his eyes. "I know. That's what the teacher said. And Lenochka. And Serya."

"Well, they're all right," Father Anatoliy told him.

"They were being disrespectful," Worf shrugged, squaring his shoulders. "Just like Arius."

"Worf? Worf, are you in here?"

Lenochka was in the doorway, her scarf still tied under her chin as she called out.

"Over here, Yelena," Father Anatoliy told her.

Lenochka came over to join them, placing her hands on Worf's shoulders as she looked up at St. Nicholas.

"We were just talking about Nicholas and Arius," Father Anatoliy explained.

Worf looked up at Lenochka, the ties of her skarf tickling the top of his head. "Nicholas is like me."

Lenochka smoothed his hair back from his ridges, the same way she'd smoothed Kolya's hair when he was small. "I suppose he is indeed."

"You know what," Father Anatoliy said, "I think I might have an icon of St. Nicholas just waiting for someone to go home with. Come with me, Worf."

Worf touched St. Nicholas' hand briefly to bid him goodbye, before following Father Anatoliy to the door at the front-right of the room.

"Now, you can only come through here if you have a good reason," Father Anatoliy told him, "So it's just as well that you do."

He turned around, just as Worf was about to step through the door, and waved his hand in the air before him, before resting it on Worf's head for a moment, muttering something quickly under his breath all the while. Worf was a little baffled by it, but then the black robes swished and Father Anatoliy was moving into the next room, which had a table in the middle of it and lots of gold and candles.

Worf followed him tentatively to a cupboard at the side, where he drew out a small slab of wood, about the size of a padd, and presented it with a flourish.

"This is Saint Nicholas!" Worf exclaimed, surprised. It was the man from the wall, but in miniature, looking back at him with the same serene expression. He touched the man's forehead gently – still the same lines across it, just like his own.

"It's for you, Worf," Father Anatoliy smiled. "You can take it home with you. Put him on your bedside table. And next time you feel the urge to punch someone, think about Saint Nicholas and he will help you stay calm."

"Thank-you, Father Anatoliy!" Worf grinned. "I will put him in a place of honour!"

"I'm sure you will," Father Anatoliy put a hand on his shoulder, and looked over to where Lenochka was still standing by the door, smiling at them both. "Right now I think Yelena wants to go home. Don't you want to break the fast? It's a meat day!"

Worf nodded firmly, and allowed Lenochka to take his hand and lead him back to Serya and Kolya and the new house and the strange human vegetables and the strangely-flavoured meat. He didn't care now, because he had Saint Nicholas there, who looked just like him.

Worf's foster-parents lived in Belarus, so it's not inconceivable that they would have been Orthodox. What made me think it might actually be likely, though, is that line in DS9 where Worf talks about having faith and believing in the power of faith. Klingons, according to legend, killed their gods and had no need of them – and Worf is nothing if not attempting to be the ideal Klingon. Something taught him about faith and miracles and I for one would like to believe it was his Orthodox foster-parents.