Chapter 7 - A Diamond in the Rough

Admiral Diamond sat quietly in the corner of the conference room during the all department staff meeting. They were halfway through acting as a ferry boat, and Kirk wanted his senior officers to start thinking ahead to being a starship again.

Diamond didn't speak at all. He didn't criticize anyone. He didn't recount some detailed personal observations from his morning tour. He didn't have any suggestions. Kirk had been enjoying the last few days, but this was getting alarming.

As the meeting broke up, Diamond stood with the kind of forcefulness an athlete would use. It wasn't his normal business-like posture.

"I need to speak with you, Kirk."

Everyone else hurried on, but Spock stopped. Without looking at his First, Kirk tossed his head that he should go and Spock did, with one piercing Spock-glance back at the admiral.

Diamond stared at the doors after they closed. Kirk waited.

"Well, Kirk, I was wrong about a lot of things."

Kirk raised his head in shock, thinking that he really needed to relearn how to expect the best out of people.

Kirk began, "I should also ap-"

"Don't interrupt me, Kirk."

Kirk closed his mouth and shifted to stand at parade rest.

Diamond put his hands down and leaned over the conference table, taking on the aspect of one who commanded a giant desk.

"I'm not like most of my rank at Starfleet. I like to think I have a clearer perspective on things because I don't have my own weaknesses from being in the line of duty out in space to cover for with regards to my pride."

Diamond paused and studied Kirk's face. Kirk wondered what that meant exactly, but he remained in stillness.

"I suspect many other brass would let this slide, but I can't. Some things just aren't acceptable."

Kirk felt his heart speeding up. It irked him greatly. Pretend you are facing a deadly cobra, and don't move so it doesn't strike. Who had said, that? Someone at the academy when Kirk was a suffering plebe.

Diamond jammed a finger at the table. "Especially if they can threaten a ship."

Kirk had a wild idea this had something to do with the phaser crews, but even he couldn't believe the admiral would be this melodramatic. His crews were excellent, even if they didn't want to show off for this man.

"You know, I guess I should have expected something like this once I saw you in action. I thought you were a rule-follower. Your record, nearly every note in it, says you are, at the core, a lover of rules, of how they make the world work well. I thought we'd get along on that point. I was made to understand that you just like to get creative when things get tough, and you like to question command's goals based on the facts once in orbit. That was what I read before arriving that's what I assumed, but I was wrong."

Kirk slowly pushed his shoulders back so the motion wouldn't be apparent. He can remove you from command, Spock's voice reminded him. It wasn't a good reminder. His gut was feeling unsettled. He couldn't stand here helplessly much longer, but he also couldn't speak against orders until he knew the damn topic.

"But this." Diamond glanced at the conference room door as if he worried it would open. "I would have brought the hammer down on you sooner, but I didn't know what to think. I had to do a few more interviews and think it over."

Kirk broke. "May I ask what the topic is?"

"The topic, Kirk, as if you didn't know, is your fraternizing with your crew."

Kirk lost his parade rest posture, dropped like a marionette. "What?" He struggled a moment too long and when he opened his mouth again he got cut short.

"Let me finish," Diamond said. "Do try to remember that I am in charge."

Kirk glanced around the room, trying to figure out how they'd gotten to this juncture.

Diamond's voice pulled him back to the present.

"I won't insult you by enumerating the risks involved to your command. Or how disappointing it is to find our star captain isn't. But I am personally condemning your actions. And I don't know my next step yet. You have too many of my colleagues enamored of you back at command."

A long pause ensued. Kirk took it as an opening.

"Do you have evidence of this?"

"Do you really think I'd be standing here talking to you if I didn't?" Diamond pushed off with his hands and stood with his arms at his sides. The table seemed to yawn between them like a chasm. "Anything to say for yourself?"

"I deny your accusations," Kirk blurted. He couldn't seem to get control of himself fast enough. That was always true with this man for some reason. McCoy would probably have a crackpot theory as to why.

"Noted," Diamond said. He paced around the table to the door.

"That's it?" Kirk demanded.

Diamond stopped just short of the door sensor. "What else is there to say, Kirk. You want me to repeat how disappointed I am?"

Kirk felt that slice through armor, muscle and bone and hit some tender spot he would have utterly denied was there.

Kirk said, "I demand a chance to defend myself. There is absolutely nothing to this. I have never slept with my crew. I have never even hinted at it in jest. My crew are my family out here."

Diamond stared at him. "You put on the innocent routine quite well. Makes me wonder what your sociopathy profile looks like. I didn't see it in your record. Maybe it was sealed for some 'official' reason." He stepped into the door trigger. "Captain." It sounded like a threat.

Alone, Kirk stretched each of his shoulders, one at a time, rolled his head to stretch his neck. He needed full control of the one thing he could control: himself.

Kirk went to the bridge and finished his shift in a state of perfect normalcy. Extra perfect normalcy. Diamond watched him carry out this charade without comment, although he had his arms crossed even more than usual.

Kirk intentionally stood near the admiral, chatting with Uhura about ship reporting procedures. It was a subject he'd had in the back of his mind for a while and there was no time like the present to get lost in minutia. And Scotty was on the bridge for once. Kirk got an update from him that he stretched long by asking for more design details on top of engineering details on top of specifications.

When Kirk got around the other side of the bridge, Spock turned in his chair to look at him, eyes alert and questioning. He wasn't falling for the charade.

"Did you find the second sensor anomaly you were tracking down?" Kirk asked. There was no first sensor anomaly, let alone two of them.

"Not, yet, Captain. I have brought on line and programmed a backup array to compensate."

He pressed several switches and turned the monitor so Kirk could look into it. Kirk bent to do so. It showed the ordinary scans.

In a low voice, Spock said, "Is everything all right, Captain?"

Kirk adjusted the monitor settings and put a hand on Spock's shoulder while he peered into it again. With his thermal shirt, Spock felt cooler to the touch than a human would.

"Surviving at the moment. No risk of violence. Ask me later," Kirk replied.

"I shall do so, Captain," Spock said in a normal voice.

Shift ended with a shuffling of replacements coming onto the bridge. Spock followed Kirk to his quarters, nearly stepping on his heels he kept so close.

Once Kirk's door swished closed, Spock said, "Although you are covering it well, you seem extraordinarily agitated, Captain."

Kirk paced to the partition and rubbed his head. He really should get out and tour his ship. Make sure his crew's morale was holding up. The enlisted that hadn't been to the receptions might be feeling left out. But he refused to appear artificial and feared he would right now. His crew didn't deserve that.

Kirk paced to the door, annoyed when it slid open. He stepped back again to make it close.

"Captain, is there anyway I can assist?"

Kirk stared off through the bulkhead. This really wasn't something to burden Spock with, of all people. McCoy maybe.

"It goes without saying, I'm still having issues with the admiral."

"That was the highest percentage assumption."

Kirk paced again. He paced the longest path he could, from the sleeping alcove to behind his desk.

Kirk said, "I really don't want to bother you with this. It's my problem and you need to be there to keep this ship together."

"That is an easy job right now, Captain." He watched Kirk go back and forth. "Perhaps you should speak to Doctor McCoy if not me."

Kirk snorted. He stopped and snorted again. "I know what he'd say." He looked at his hands. They didn't appear to be shaking but they did not feel steady. "He has no evidence." He dropped his hands. "Maybe I do have daddy issues."

Kirk moved again. He turned at the corner by the wall shelf and came back again. Spock stepped into his path, blocking the narrow opening between the desk and the partition.

"Jim." This was almost shouted.

Kirk halted and looked up at him.

Spock said, "Your behavior is concerning."

Kirk had an additional, not useful, realization that Spock also could remove him from command. Kirk's shoulders dropped.

"Admiral Diamond accused me of fraternizing with my crew."

Spock's left brow rose and stayed at his bangs. "I am- Based on what evidence?"

Kirk tossed his hands in the air. "I don't know. He thinks he has some." He shook his head. "I've been out flanked. I didn't see it coming."

"An odd analogy to chose in this circumstance."

"I don't know why he has it in for me," Kirk said. "I didn't get that sense when he first came on board. I got the sense he meant well, in his own addicted-to-manuals and having-everything-just-so way. But now I don't know." Kirk swung his arms, pressed his fist into the palm of his other hand. "Now I feel like he's out to break me. He's doing a fine job of it."

Kirk stared at his medals on the long shelf behind the desk. He kept his voice low, said with a half laugh, "I don't even know who he thinks I'm fraternizing with."

Spock started to speak, stopped, then said, "I think I can help in this area, Captain."

Kirk looked over his shoulder at him. "Help with what?"

"With identifying the person in question."

"And you didn't inform me?"

"I did not understand the significance at the time. I overheard the admiral speaking to his assistant during the first reception. Most are aware of how keen Vulcan hearing is at a distance but do not realize we can also discern a single voice out of a loud room with many voices."

Kirk's felt lifted up for the first time that day. "What did he say?"

"He stated that he was amazed that you were standing so brazenly close to this person. That you and this other person were not making any effort at all to hide your affections. And he wondered how you had gotten away with it so long. Like I said, I was not certain what or whom he was referring to at the time, but given these additional facts, I give it an ninety-seven point two percent chance it is you he was discussing."

Kirk thought back to the reception, filling his mind with a blur of colors, Starfleet and that of the delegates.

"I talked to Rand several times. Of course I did, she was coordinating things. Of course I was standing close to her; I was trying to be heard. And Uhura. We talked several times. Damn it, we've been serving together a long time, can't I relax around her long enough to finish a drink? And that little ensign, Holsted. I had to bend down to talk to her. She's not very tall, but she is well put together. Should probably wear a uniform top one size larger. Not that I can recommend that to her."

Kirk shook his head to clear it. "You didn't happen to note whom I was standing next to when the admiral said that?"

"Yes, sir."

Kirk put his hands on his hips, feeling ready for battle, finally.

Spock continued, "Myself, Captain."

Kirk felt his head falling forward and caught himself. He stared at Spock. A long time.

He snapped his fingers.

"That explains the glances at the door. He was worried you were coming back." Kirk thought back over the meeting in the conference room in a new light. He smiled faintly. "I think he's scared of you."

Kirk paced away from Spock and straightened the medals case of dark velvet encased in transparent aluminum.

"I feel better knowing it's you he suspects."

"I do not understand."

Kirk pushed his shoulders back. "I feel better in that at least Diamond doesn't believe I'm capable of exploiting my crew in such a horrible way. You I couldn't possibly have coerced."

"I still don't follow, Captain."

Kirk drew in a deep breath. "If Admiral Diamond thought I was capable of abusing my position to get one of my crew into bed, he should pull my command. Turns out, at least, he doesn't think that badly of me." As Spock continued to appear puzzled, Kirk said, "Spock, if I ordered you to sleep with me under treat of . . . demotion, or something. What would happen? Nothing. Or maybe you'd neck pinch me, I don't know. All I know is we wouldn't end up in bed together."

"The power structure is still there, Captain. You are still in command."

Kirk studied Spock's features. He looked more alien today. "I'm surprised you don't see the distinction. There is a big difference in the kind of power I hold over you, or Bones, or Scotty compared to the rest of the crew. Remember the Plalaga Mission when you didn't believe I could fool the planetary command. Remember how long you argued?"

"Yes, but in the end I obeyed your orders. I had no choice. I would expect to face a court's martial had I not."

"For the record, Spock, in a case like that, I would not have court martialed you. If you had refused to back down, I would have replaced you for the duration of the mission. Your arguments were completely logical."

"But incorrect."

"You got unlucky. I just had a strong hunch on my side."

"I would have been disloyal."

"The difference is had your decision come up for review by command, you would have fared well. Same thing if I crossed the line in our personal relations. Command would back you up and you know that. You know how the system works and how it gives you power too. No one on this ship reaches the rank of senior officer without understanding that. Most of the regular crew and even many of the ensigns, they're enamored with this ship and me. It would be heinous to take any kind of advantage of that. Well, I take advantage of it every time I put their lives at risk. But that's what they signed up for. They didn't sign up to be used."

"Interesting, Captain."

"So, yes. I'm a bit relieved. Although, surprised." He rubbed his chin and looked Spock up and down. "You aren't exactly my type."

"Indeed." Spock adjusted his stance, put his hands behind his back.

Spock said, "I am curious what you intend to do."

"Think it over before deciding anything."

Kirk gestured at the door. "I can't count how many times Farragut has seen you leaving my quarters late."

"That is not evidence of anything."

"It's evidence that you are in my quarters at odd hours. Circumstantial. But if one were already predisposed to assuming . . ."

Kirk sat down. He tapped his fingers on the desk. He was feeling considerably better the more he understood his position. But then he looked up.

"I wonder if you should talk to your father. I'd hate for him to get wind of this without an explanation.

Spock appeared appalled for just an instant before staring over Kirk's head.

"I do not think you appreciate how inappropriate this topic is to a Vulcan, Jim."

"These are special circumstances. And it's not like anything is actually going on."

"Nevertheless. The topic itself is extremely unsettling simply to bring up."

"That's not logical, Spock. It's part of life."

Spock looked to the side. "It is our way." He fell thoughtful and lightly shook his head. "Do you imagine Admiral Diamond will speak to my father about this?"

Kirk pushed his shoulders back. "Well, they have been talking a lot, by design I suspect." He waited for Spock to acknowledge this with a nod.

It was hard to imagine the admiral broaching this topic out of the blue with Sarek of all people. Especially given Diamond's uneasiness with Spock. It would violate the manual, for another thing.

Kirk said, "I suppose I rate it fairly low."

"Then I do not have a logical reason to initiate such an uncomfortable discussion. This topic is simply not brought up among Vulcans unless it is life or death."

"If it would be easier on you, I'm willing to speak with him."

Spock breathed in and out. "I appreciate your willingness to do so, but since we have already discussed having said discussion and you have been informed of the inherent displeasing effect the topic will have, you will also be violating significant social conventions."

Kirk shook his head. "Since your father travels widely and sees all kinds of beings. I don't quite agree with you. But I will defer to your opinion where Sarek is concerned."

"It is not an opinion, Captain. It is a statement of fact."

Kirk suppressed a smile. "Fine. Spock. I hope you don't regret it."

"If he does hear of it and deems the topic important enough to discuss it, then I will of course, also discuss it. I expect if he does hear of it, I will be the first one he discusses it with. Logically."

A smile forced its way onto Kirk's lips. "I'll leave it to you, then."

"And as to your plans, Captain . . ."

"I don't have any yet. I'm working on them."

"Simply speaking to the admiral again is not the logical next step? If you wish to set up an interview with him and me . . . he must know I am incapable of lying.

Kirk grinned. "Spock, you just lied about a sensor anomaly."

Spock raised a brow.

"No." Kirk rocked back in his desk chair and put his feet up. "No. I like that he's this far off the mark. And he's been avoiding me the last two days, otherwise. It's been glorious. I thought he was just busy with the delegates, but maybe he's decided I'm a lost cause. Which is fine with me."