He had not expected his next audience to be any less difficult than his conversation with Jim.

Indeed, it was not.

Apprising Nyota Uhura of his condition and its cure was proving to be considerably more difficult.

"Let me get this straight," she said, placing her hands on her hips, her voice more shrill than was customary. "I wasn't good enough to date, but now you want to make me into a brood mare."

"While conception is not ultimately necessary, the attempt is a biological imperative, Nyo— "

"That's bullshit and you know it!"

"It is not 'bullshit.' During the Pon farr, a Vulcan male must mate," he stated as plainly as he could given the circumstances. "If he does not give in to the compulsion, the need results in plak tow. An adrenaline-like hormone – there's no true human equivalent – builds up in his brain causing a fever that will eventually result in death."

Her hands dropped to her sides. She sighed and looked away, reminding him for one brief moment of his t'hy'la's reaction upon receiving the same information.

When she looked at him again, her eyes were no longer blazing with anger.

"There's no other alternative?" she asked quietly.

"None that are likely to be effective in my case," he told her. "I have already attempted intense meditation, but the symptoms continue to escalate. Once the plak tow sets in, I am likely to become more irrational than I have already become. I may become violent, and the required mating will be of a significantly more… passionate nature. The duration of the drive will also increase exponentially the longer I wait to sate it."

"So, it's mate or die, and the longer you wait, the rougher it's going be when you actually do mate?" Although her voice carried none of the skepticism he was certain she meant it to hold, he was momentarily taken aback coldness implicit in her words.

She apparently intended for him to believe that his life was of little value to her. He decided his supposition was confirmed as she continued, "You're trying to tell me, unless I say yes right now, some other poor sap is going to suffer through inordinately rigorous, possibly violent, sexual intercourse with you?"

"You do not have to agree at this moment, Nyota," he said, resigned to the fact that she would not agree quickly, though by no mean ready to give up trying. "However, yes, the manifestation of my condition will continue become more severe the longer I wait."

"Shit, Spock," she said in an uncharacteristically inarticulate manner. "Why me? Can't you… self-stimulate your way through this? I know the Vulcan brain isn't given to fantasizing, but you're half human!"

"Masturbatory activities have proven unequal to the task."

"Not even with toys?"

He did not bother with a verbal answer.

"What about Jim? He won't help you?"

Spock was far enough into his Time to give in to the urge to sigh.

"Jim is most willing to help, but as this is a mating drive, there is little that he is able to do."

"Have you considered engaging the services of a prostitute?"

He rolled his eyes.

"We have been acquainted for four point seven years, Nyota, and I trust you implicitly," he said slowly, carefully. "I would prefer not to risk exposing one of my people's most carefully guarded secrets by seeking a cure from one I neither know, nor trust."

She arched an eyebrow in what he realized was an unconscious imitation of the only facial expression he generally allowed himself.

"But you're willing to risk my physical, mental and emotional well-being?" she wanted to know. "When we agreed to remain friends, Spock, I didn't think that this would be a service required of me."

"Nor did I," he said in a flat voice. "If I had been bonded as a child as most Vulcans are, and if the one I had been bonded to had survived the destruction of my home planet, I would not have come to you. Indeed, the bond would have compelled me to seek her out at the first sign that my Time was upon me.

"But I was not bonded as a child because the parents of all suitable females my age did not wish to tie their daughters to one of my heritage," he continued, his voice rising. "I do not have a wife or a betrothed waiting for me, or rushing to me in my need. And in the absence of that, the best chance for my survival is to join instead with a woman with whom I have an emotional tie.

"You, who have asserted frequently and stridently for all the crew to hear that you continue to be my friend, are the only female remaining in this universe with whom I have an emotional tie. The only other woman with whom I had such a connection, even were she alive for that connection to remain intact, would have been disqualified by virtue of having given birth to me!"

Spock nearly was breathless by the time he completed his diatribe. He felt both shamed and slightly annoyed. He could tell from the way she looked at him that both emotions were evident.

She should have been angry with him, and perhaps she was, but the emotion most dominant in her expression was fear. Somehow he knew it was fear for him rather fear of him.

*******

Nyota wanted to scream, cry, hit someone (Spock), throw things and hug someone (again, Spock) all at the same time. Mentally, she berated herself for having told him that they could stay friends after he'd ended the romantic aspect of their relationship.

At the time, she'd rationalized that such things happened, and that she couldn't make him love her again or wish to remain with her through sheer force of will. For the good of the ship, she decided, she would stand aside gracefully. Any tears she cried would be in private.

Nobody liked a martyr, and a woman who could smile and laugh with her former lover, as well as with her replacement, had a much better chance of moving on than one who skulked around with sad eyes and drooping shoulders.

Suddenly, the role of the miserable dumpee seemed a lot more appealing than the well-adjusted just-a-friend. The truth was, and she wasn't foolish enough not to admit it to herself, she still loved him and what he'd asked of her really would wreak havoc with her emotional and mental health.

And, if she made him wait long enough, her physical health might be endangered, as well, she reflected.

But she'd seen more physical evidence of his emotional state in this single conversation than she seen throughout the entirety of the two and a half years they'd been in their illicit romance while she was his student.

She couldn't argue with what was right there before her eyes.

Like most Vulcans who followed Surak's teachings, Spock had a disinclination towards prevarication so deeply ingrained in his psyche, she would almost say he couldn't lie.

The loss of control he had described was glaringly apparent (to her, at least), and if one aspect of his condition proved true, then it followed (when dealing with a Vulcan devoted to the path of logic) the rest must be as well.

Pon farr genuinely existed, for all that she'd never read about it in any of her research into Vulcan sociology, anthropology and biology.

The possibility of Spock's imminent death was as real as the shame and annoyance written all over his face.

"Shit, Spock," she muttered again.

*******

disclaimer: I do not own Star Trek and I am not making any money from this fanfic.