Note: I removed the acknowledgments from the beginning; I will post them in the end when I finish the story. I think it'll be an easier way to start reading this way.

Sarek left the home office he shared with his wife, leaving behind the arguing Kirk, McCoy, and his son. Their voices pelted his ears except for Spock's low tones, but as the argument encompassed the forced meld on Valeris, even his son's quiet voice seized Sarek's body until he had no air. He took the first opportunity to excuse himself, wanting to check on Amanda, and felt Spock's gaze follow him out of the room.

What did his son expect? No, if Sarek gave into his internal struggle with blistering, heated words, he'd never be clear of them. The shadow from his and Spock's previous eighteen years of silence made him take great effort to keep his reactions reined in when talking at all with his son, even as his disapproval (his utter disbelief) swam in the undercurrents of the room.

Another good reason to excuse himself.

He found his wife sitting in the rocking chair. How surprising. She hadn't sat there since the days she held a very young Spock in her lap. The chair was actually too big for her so she always preferred to sit elsewhere. She looked off into an unseen distance, the fingertips of one hand laying on her lips.

"Amanda?"

No answer. She appeared so dwarfed by the chair, and he saw written on her features -- old age. Older than his, not chronologically, but in their periods of life. If Spock was lost over this crime, the blow on Amanda would equal their son's death years ago. He faced losing both wife and child.

She faced him, the fingertips sliding to her chin as she continued to lean her elbow on the chair arm. "Sarek, what can we do?"

Quiet words; his were the same. "I do not know." He brought another chair to sit across from her. "In the other room, they argue how to save Kirk."

"Jim?"

"From a charge of being an accomplice."

Her other hand gripped his knee as she turned away to stare at nothing once more.

"Amanda, tell me again what Saavik said to you."

But she didn't repeat it. She asked instead, "Do you think she stands a chance?"

"They were friends at one time. Valeris used to listen to what Saavik said. Perhaps--"

A silent moment passed. "Sarek, what can we offer Valeris?"

"If Saavik fails?"

She sighed. "I noticed you never quoted the odds of her making Valeris develop a conscience. I don't blame you. No one can do that."

He spoke softly. "Then, my wife, how do you suggest we do it when someone who knows her better cannot? Especially as our doing so deprives Valeris her right to justice?"

She pressed white knuckles against her mouth, perhaps holding back a sob. He held her other hand in his large one, but found he was wrong. Bitterness, not sadness, spilled out in her next statement.

"All the time I spent pointing out Valeris' faults, not hiding what I thought of her, it's haunting me now because it means that I can't go to her and beg her for anything. Maybe if I had kept my opinion to myself, given her my approval when she wanted it--" Her eyes flashed blue lightening. "But look at how what I said came true. She hurts Spock and Spock--" She couldn't say again what Spock did.

"My wife, what would you have us do?"

"She must need something that we can give her. With all our influence--"

"Amanda... do you understand what you are suggesting? I have never abused my position! I will not begin now!"

"Not even for your son?"

"Do you believe a guilty man should go free because his family bribed his victim?"

"Yes! ...no. Sarek..." She swallowed. "If it was someone else telling me about their son, I'd be appalled that they flaunted their power to get him free. But Spock is our son, and I know it makes no sense, but I can't help but see the difference."

Abuse his position to save his son who admitted his guilt to a heinous crime? Amanda sounded like she believed Kirk – that as wrong as Spock's actions were, some validation played a part. "It does not make him innocent."

"I know!"

"And yet, you still suggest doing this?"

She looked up at him with deadened eyes. "I don't know what else to do. If you can think of anything, please tell me. I'm so lost, Sarek."

If he didn't use his position to save his son, he added Amanda to the loss. He saw the pressure already taking a toll on her. So did he choose to do what was right or what would save his family? That was if he could do anything to influence a Vulcan tribunal or to make Valeris listen to him.

The sound of a footfall was the only indication Spock had entered the room. "Mother?"

Amanda didn't turn to the sound of that entreaty. Sarek stood, keeping the delicate hand in his, and saw the desolation in Spock's expression.

"Mother, I want to give you an explanation, but I cannot, not when I do not have one for myself. I immediately regretted what I did to her, but regrets do not take the action away. I never mentioned it before now because I believed it partly justified."

Amanda spoke with her face still averted. "You mean, after Jim justified it for you."

Kirk walked in just then, recoiling, but he knew to stay out of it.

"Mother, I believed I acted out of protection for what was right."

"Isn't that what Valeris said?"

But Spock only nodded. "And it is what you plan now."

She made a noise between a gasp and a cry.

"Do you not? Wish to use your and Father's position to prevent my paying the penalty for what I did?"

Sarek started to speak and stopped. Spock noted it.

"You nor I cannot erase my guilt, Mother, or undo the damage to Valeris."

Amanda covered her face with her hand, and Sarek shared a troubled look with Spock. She suddenly spoke. "What do you want me to say?"

But Spock floundered with his answer and Sarek shared the ache with him. It telegraphed through the bond to Amanda. She suddenly dropped the hand covering her eyes and smiled slightly at Spock, weary and sad.

"I don't hate you. You're still my son. Is that what you needed to hear?"

His back straightened, tension draining visibly out of him. He rose an eyebrow calmly. "Yes, Mother. That is more than sufficient."

A faded version of her old sparkle flickered for a second, then disappeared. But she could look at him. "Spock..."

"I know, Mother."

McCoy was hanging back with Kirk, his head going from Spock to his parents and back. He and Kirk exchanged a glance before he spoke. "What do we do now?"

Amanda dropped Sarek's hand and held it out to Spock. He crossed the room, taking it and returning her squeeze; a rare public gesture from him, but he clearly didn't care about appearance in front of those present. He then stood and addressed Kirk.

"We must agree on this.."

Kirk's hands clenched with his frustration even as Amanda pressed her knuckles again to her mouth. "Listen, I was reluctant to give the order, I knew what it meant, but I gave it."

"Your argument has discrepancies. For example, you did not actually make it an order."

Sarek's head snapped up at this new information.

Kirk disagreed vehemently. "You knew it was! Everyone knew it was!"

"That is not what we must discuss."

"Spock, I don't like what happened anymore than you. But if we had let them destroy Khitomer, the Federation and the Klingons would have fallen with it!"

"That is the decision made. Khitomer was saved and the possibility of peace with it. Now, I must take the responsibility for what I did. Right or wrong, it was done."

Sarek closed his eyes and kept silent. Nothing he wanted to say helped Spock or Amanda. He laid a hand on her shoulder. When her eyes stared up into his, he felt the weight of what she wanted, and then saw doubt creep into her gaze. A heavy burden: justice must be done, even when the guilty one was… his child, his only remaining child.

"Spock--" Kirk began.

"It is time, Captain, to give equal right to Vulcan and Valeris in judging my action as Starfleet was given. It may be that they will come to the same conclusion. They may not. It is irrelavent."

"What the hell are you trying to do? Get yourself killed?"

Sarek saw Amanda choke at the words, and he almost snapped at the former captain to either be silent or get out of the house. Only Spock shaking his head tiredly stopped the command from crossing his lips.

"No," his son said. "I will face my consequences, and I will not make this worse." Kirk started to protest, and stopped dead when Spock called him by name. "Jim! I am no better than the conspirators if I take any other action than this."

An uneasy silence stretched over everyone, a blanket of white noise that snuffed their strength. McCoy broke into it. "Then tell us how we can help."

Spock raised an eyebrow. "A logical reply, Doctor. You surprise me."

"Goddammit, Spock, don't try to make me laugh now! I can't take it."

Spock suddenly darted a glance in his father's direction, the lightness he exhibited with McCoy laying only on the surface, already dispelled. Sarek couldn't turn away as he tried to gauge what the glance meant. Entreaty? Spock never asked him for help before. Did he now when his father had no idea how to give it? Or did he want -- understanding? Sarek did much in his life that he wasn't proud of, both personally and professionally, but this...

... it was unthinkable. Where did that come from in his gentle son?

And all anyone told him was how he did not understand because he had not been there for that moment. Did not know how Valeris...

Sarek's shoulders drew straight. How wrong I have been to not see this before. "We illogically waste time with this discussion. We have gained no new facts, and only wait for someone else's actions. It advances us no further under these circumstances."

He picked up the faint sound of a groundcar pulling up in haste to the estate.

Kirk's ears couldn't detect it. "I'm all for the direct approach, but what are you planning to do?"

The door in the main entryway whisked open and close, and Sarek thought he heard slight clicks and scratches on the tile. He started for the foyer; a guest must always be greeted, and he had sent all his aides away. Although, whoever it was, they had come through the door on their own. That fact spoke of familiarity.

"I plan to first discover what exactly is the situation. We are reacting to what we expect will happen, not to what we know. An unsuitable use of our time."

Kirk stepped rapidly after him. "I'm coming with you. Bones!" he called over his shoulder.

"I'm a doctor, not a lawyer, Jim. What the hell am I going to do?"

"You can--"

Rrelthiz burst through the archway into the room, the speed of her flight causing her unique cape to swirl around her legs, the sounds of her taloned feet now muffled because of the carpet. She stopped short before running into Sarek. "Excuse me, Ambassador. I was hurrying."

"Rrelthiz!" McCoy yelled in great relief for some reason Sarek didn't know. "Is Saavik with you? Where is she? Is she okay?"

Amanda was on her feet, holding on to Spock's arm. His brow was knitted in confusion, but her frown revealed the deep anxiety she barely kept hidden all night.

The Carreon healer answered each question instead of giving one overall answer. "Yes, she is. In the car outside. Yes, as you might expect for her stage, Dr. McCoy, but I am returning her to the hospital. We already would be there, but she insisted we must stop here so first I can give this..." Her head swiveled, finding Spock. "…to you."

Sarek very much wanted to see that padd Rrelthiz held out, but she held true to Saavik's instructions and rushed to his son. Amanda leaned closer so she could read with him, and when Sarek was one step away, her features melted in relief and she pressed her forehead against Spock's shoulder. He knew they were saved.

Spock's expression switched from confusion to a blow from what he read, and Sarek now no longer wanted but needed to see the padd for himself.

'The signer of this document agrees to waive away--' and at the bottom was Valeris' signature, witnessed by Saavik's.

She did it, Sarek thought. One of the children he had argued against ever being Vulcan, the woman who once lived in his home but he knew mostly through his wife… and now, she saved Spock's life again, he thought, and through it, most likely Amanda's and mine as well. The boulder on his chest that had made it hard to breathe rolled away.

Spock said, hushed, "She did this?"

Rrelthiz seemed to hear some guilt attached to the statement. "Captain Spock, accept it as the reparation owed to you from this Valeris. Your amends to her," she lectured sternly, earning Sarek's respect, "is in the next file. You need to sign it."

Spock asked, "My amends?" even as he read on. Sarek couldn't see, neither could McCoy now at Spock's other side, so he only saw his son's eyebrows vault under his bangs and Amanda scowl darkly.

He got his opportunity to see for himself when Spock looked up to Rrelthiz. "There's a third file."

"Friend Saavik's promises. That is already signed. No one is concerned with that one except her, she said. You only see it as all three agreements are being filed together. But your agreement… indeed you must sign it, Captain Spock. Saavik went through too much to gain this. Do not--"

"I fully intend to sign, Doctor." But his voice was far away.

Sarek read the second contract: the same as Valeris' until it listed the charges Spock was agreeing not to make against her. '…abuse of a meld -- including theft of information – occurring on…'

He stared up at Spock who nodded vaguely. "That must be how she knew what to put in my letter. She might also have learned of my talks with the Klingons."

Valeris abused a meld years ago, and other charges were listed including the computer espionage. By signing the waivers, she and Spock agreed their wrongs would cancel each other and they would never bring charges against one another. Quickly flipping to Saavik's file, Sarek saw she also promised not to bring charges for the injustices done to her as well as agreeing to speak on Valeris' behalf at her trial.

No bribes, no abuse of position necessary. Saavik had sensed more was behind Valeris' personal betrayal and had used that to trade Spock's freedom.

His son's voice suddenly gained strength. "Dr. Rrelthiz, did you say Saavik was outside?"

"In the car, waiting for me, yes. If you will sign that--"

But Spock was leaving, his sudden departure getting him a few steps before Sarek managed to get in his path and Amanda's grip on his arm held him back.

McCoy had rushed with them, and Sarek asked in a lowered voice, "Rrelthiz said a stage?" The doctor nodded, and held up two fingers.

Kirk was the only one not to come over to see the padd, and he didn't hear what was going on now. He was pulling the Carreon aside, trying to get her attention. "Rrelthiz, why did Saavik take you with her? Why not McCoy if she needed a doctor?"

Sarek tuned out that conversation almost completely, speaking in the same volume as before. "Spock, you cannot go out there to Saavik."

Amanda looked like she'd rather say exactly the opposite, but she knew better. "You heard Leonard. She's in Phase II."

"I am already aware of this, Mother. However, Saavik must not be deeply in the phase if she was allowed outside the hospital."

McCoy darted a glance at Rrelthiz next to Kirk, and lowered his voice. "Believe me, we weren't thrilled when she found out she had left. But Rrlethiz signed her out and left a note. I saw it just before I came here. She said she almost didn't let Saavik out herself. In fact, Saavik explained to her she would not normally do this, but she had to in this case. Guess what she quoted? 'The cause is sufficient.'"

Surak, Sarek identified.

"Now that I know where they went, I got to agree with her. Should've guessed that's where she had headed. And they knew the limitations for how long Saavik could be out. It's why Rrelthiz is anxious about returning her to the hospital. She is going deep in the phase."

Amanda added, "And she's not chosen a consort. Any male will only aggravate the condition. That includes you." Spock's head swung sharply to stare at her.

Sarek spoke again. "Respect Saavik's decision, my son."

Some of Spock's intensity left him, but he still nodded tightly, thwarted. "Of course. I was not arguing against it." He took back the padd, preparing to sign it.

The other conversation now filtered into Sarek's hearing again. Rrelthiz was in the middle of explaining. "…it was an excellent plan. Let this Valeris think Saavik weak and she is in control. Then I push on a different problem so Valeris does not see she is confessing. Friend Saavik then shows she is not weak, and we get the agreement."

"But why you?" Kirk insisted. "No offense, Rrelthiz, I just don't understand. Why not McCoy or me or Spock? You said it needed to be you."

Her tail swung powerfully as she responded strongly, "No offense to you, Captain, but you name humans and Vulcans. I am Carreon. I understood the situation as you can not."

Kirk was angry, and it showed in the way he snapped. "Meaning reparations? And revenge?"

"Indeed."

He bolted for the door, his face tight with rage. Sarek opened his mouth to speak when Rrelthiz called out first. "Captain, where are you going?"

He had made enough distance that he was already out of sight. His voice came back. "I'll take Saavik back to the hospital! I have something to ask her!"

Sarek rushed after him, hearing McCoy's yell, "Jim, get back here!" The slim Rrelthiz slipped past, scrambling for purchase on the tiles for a second, and then finding her footing and flinging herself down the hall. Spock and McCoy were with Sarek, but they reached outside only in time to see the groundcar's lights already up the street.

Sarek immediately spun back inside his home. "We must contact the car and tell him to come back. At once."

He heard McCoy whisper to Spock, "It'll take a diplomat to come up with a polite way to tell Jim what he just got himself into. What are you glaring at me for?"