A/N: A day late, hehe, sorry. I have completely lost track of days and nights.

Captain Kirk and Commander Spock were playing Tri-D chess. Kirk and Spock and chess.

Elle couldn't stop staring.

"Elle?" Lt. Howard poked her arm. "You gonna get your food?"

Elle grabbed the lieutenant's arm and tugged, unable to tear her eyes away as Kirk moved a rook. "Lt. They're playing chess."

"Yah. It's Thursday. Cap'n must've finished the quarter evals." Lt. Howard moved away like he wasn't witnessing an iconic moment. "Elle, your food."

Elle grabbed her meal tray from the replicator and made her way to a table with an unobscured view of the chess game. She sat down and absently shoved food in her mouth.

"Hey, Elle," Riley said, passing by her.

"Uh-huh," Elle said, waving a hand to move him out of the way.

Riley grinned. "I'll leave you to it, then." He went away to bother someone else.

Spock moved his queen and steepled his fingers.

Elle finished her food and leaned her chin on her hands to watch them play. She'd only ever seen a 3D chess board on the episodes, she'd never seen one in real life, not even an app or anything. But from microexpressions, body language, and how long it was taking for either of them to move a piece, it looked like Kirk was winning at the moment. "This is so cool," she whispered to herself, biting her lip to keep from fangirling too hard. She didn't want to distract them.

Kirk moved another pawn. "You know," he said, just a tad louder than his conversational tone with Spock, "you can come over here and watch us. We don't bite."

Elle blushed to the roots of her hair. She stood up, jostling her tray. "Sorry," she said, addressing her remarks to the floor. She picked up her tray and turned away from the game.

"Elle."

She froze in place and then slowly turned back to face the captain. "Yes, sir?"

He just smiled. "Come sit with us."

She put her tray in the recycler and came over to their table. She took a seat on the other side, to watch both of them. Now that she could really see the board, it actually looked more confusing. She glanced up at Spock.

His right eyebrow was tensed slightly higher than his left.

Yup, the captain was definitely winning. Fascinating. Elle turned back to the board as Spock made his move.

Slowly, she figured out the game as it progressed to the endgame. They fought to a draw, Kirk's pieces around Spock in an eternal stalemate. "Good game, Spock," Kirk said, smiling at him.

Spock inclined his head, a small smile on his lips. "You as well, Jim. Inspired strategy."

Kirk looked over at Elle. "Play the winner, Elle?"

She shook her head so hard she almost overbalanced. "No way."

Both sets of eyebrows went up. "That's a pretty vehement response for a game," Kirk said mildly. "You're not a sore loser, I've seen you play games with Sulu and Chekov. Why don't you want to play?"

Elle made a lot of incoherent noises and waved her hands. "It's you," she said. "You. And 3D chess. That's like, nuh-uh."

Spock's eyebrow went higher. "That was unclear, even for a human of your age," he said. "Please explain, coherently."

She was blushing again. She really needed to stop with the blushing. "I don't know how to play," she said. "I only know regular chess."

"Well that's easy, we'll teach you," Kirk said.

Elle let out a nervous giggle. "I don't think you understand how legendary your games are," she said, still feeling like her face was on fire. "This is like, your thing. It's totally not my place."

Kirk started to laugh. "Starstruck over a game?" he teased gently.

Elle put her palms over her fire-red cheeks. "No," she protested, even though it was totally true. "I just, I just wanna watch. That's more interesting than playing."

"How so?" Spock asked.

"Because it's you guys," Elle said. "Bones said that chess is a diagnostic tool, and he's totally right. I can see it in your plays."

"When did he say that?" Kirk asked.

Elle thought about it. "Oh. Not yet. That comes later, I think. One of my favorite books. I read it so much, the cover's started coming off."

Kirk tilted his head and studied her. "When you were eating, who did you think was winning?" he asked.

"I knew it was you."

"Why?"

"Because of the way Spock was reacting to the board."

Spock's eyebrow hit his bangs. "Very few people can parse Vulcan body language," he said.

"And becuase of the way you were moving," Elle told the captain.

"Very few people can read the captain, either," Spock said.

Elle shrugged, suddenly awkward with both their full attention on her. "I don't know. I've watched you play chess since I was three, I just knew."

"Hm. Possibly that latent ESP?" Kirk asked.

"Possibly, sir. Or possibly, her naturally sensitive intuition." Spock started to reset the board. "I propose another game, captain. This time, Elle, follow along, and I would like for you to write down your observations and predict the outcomes on a PADD."

"Cool." Elle borrowed a PADD and opened the note-taking app.

This time, they played a timed game. Each player only got thirty seconds. By the sixth move, Elle knew Spock would win. He controlled the board and Kirk was only reacting instead of acting. "You did that on purpose," she accused, watching as Kirk moved a pawn, which was immediately captured.

"How do you know?" Kirk asked.

"I just do," Elle said, frustrated.

"I wonder if you'd do so well with new crewmembers," Kirk said, frowning. "This is fascinating. Are you sure you don't know how to play this game?"

"Nope. Me and my dad used to play regular chess, but that was, well, before." Elle pushed down the wave of homesickness that came with the memory of rainy day chess games, hot cocoa and marshmallows. "I've been too busy to really get into the 3D kind yet."

"Hm. Let's take this to the Rec Deck, shall we?"

The three of them moved down to the Rec Deck and walked over to the first people they spotted playing 3D chess.

"Captain?" Ensign Malo-or asked nervously.

"Can we do something for you?" Cingur asked, his fur bristling with nerves.

"As you were, ensigns," Kirk said, giving them a charming smile. "We're just testing our youngest crewmember on chess tactics. Is it alright if we watched Elle watch the rest of your game?"

The two ensigns shared a nervous glance. "Sure, captain," Malo-or said, cheerfully nervous. "We just started, anyway."

"Good man, thank you." Kirk and Spock took seats at the next table and started to have a conversation about quarterly reviews and petri dishes versus dilithium converters.

Elle seated herself across from them to be able to see the two ensigns and the board. She knew very well that the command duo could hold a conversation and still analyze her every movement. Her hands started to sweat.

Kirk glanced over at her and winked.

Elle relaxed. There was no reason to be nervous, not really. What if she really could read body language super well? Wasn't that a good thing? And this way, she'd learn more about chess. She turned on the PADD and poised the stylus.

Malo-or moved a piece. A rook. Cingur let out a huff and moved a knight.

"That messed up his opening strategy," Elle said.

"You know the strategy he's trying?" Kirk asked.

"No, but Ensign Malo-or messed it up for him, anyway. He had to compensate, there."

"Hm."

They spread out through the board. "Who's winning?" Kirk prompted.

Elle chewed on her lip, watching the two opponents. "Cingur. He's got something up his sleeve."

"How do you know?"

"He's breathless. He's hoping Malo-or hasn't noticed his plan."

"Has he?"

Elle studied the Rigelian ensign. "No," she said. "He's too relaxed. He doesn't have a backup strategy to counteract whatever Cingur is doing."

"Can you see the winning moves?" Spock asked.

Elle studied the board itself. "Can the queen move diagonally vertically through the board?"

"Yes."

"He's gonna use that to do something."

"How do you know?"

"He could've sacrificed it for the other queen, but he held back."

Kirk and Spock shared a glance over her head. "How do you know?" Kirk asked.

"That was the strongest piece. If this strategy fails, Malo-or can take him out with his queen. So he needs the queen for something."

Both men fell silent.

Cingur won four moves later. "Checkmate," he said triumphantly.

Malo-or grinned. "Ooh. That was good. Didn't even see that coming." He shook his head and held out a hand. "Good game."

"Well-played, gentlemen," Kirk said, going over to them. "Very good strategy, Ensign Cingur."

"Thank you, captain."

Kirk ushered Spock and Elle out ahead of him. "You called that whole game based on the body language of a Rigelian and a Caitian that you've never met before," he said.

Elle bounced on her toes. "And?"

He patted her on the shoulder. "Good skill to have, kiddo. Very good skill to have. You're going to make one heck of a tactician or a diplomat, one day."

Elle grinned. "Or a starship captain?" she asked.

He ruffled her hair. "Are you angling after my job, mister?" he asked, mock-outraged.

She gave him an innocent smile. "Nope. That's too much stress. I don't want my hair turning gray so soon."

His jaw dropped. "Gray... what?"

She smirked at him. "Just saying."

"I do not have gray hair," he protested.

"Not yet," she teased.

He slung an arm around her shoulders and tugged at her ponytail lightly. "Brat," he said fondly.

Later that night, Spock sent her a link to a 3D chess computer program. The first level, that of beginner, gave you all the possible moves for each piece. He also sent her a list of everyone onboard, including himself and Captain Kirk, who played the game.

"No pressure," Elle said wryly.