They walked in silence for the next hour, Kirk concentrating only on putting one foot in front of the other. He had set himself a challenge; keep up with Spock, step for step, for as long as he possibly could. Breaking the journey into individual steps and turning it into a competition, however one-sided, kept him from thinking about the larger situation. He didn't have any answers at the moment; the only thing they could do was try to survive as long as possible. Second by second if they had to. But he couldn't ignore that it was getting harder and harder to keep up with the challenge.

Every five miles they stopped and called the Enterprise. Each time they received no response. But it served as a helpful way to mark both the time passed and their pace. They passed the first two five mile markers quicker than Kirk had thought, but the third seemed to be taking forever.

"Don't slow down, Spock. We have to cover as much ground as we can today while we still have enough water," Kirk said. Spock had estimated they could ration their water supply to last for three days, but Kirk didn't want to leave too much of the journey for then. Better to push themselves now, while they still could.

"Yes, Captain," Spock answered. "You should have your next water ration now, while I attempt to contact the Enterprise."

"All right," Kirk said. "Two mouthfuls each time, at most, right?" That was what they'd figured out would keep them functioning well enough to reach the mountains in three days.

"No more than that," Spock confirmed, calling the Enterprise. Kirk nodded and took his two mouthfuls; he knew there was no use in trying to prove his strength by taking less. He'd only end up weakening more quickly. He eyed Spock knowingly, ignoring the fact that they'd failed to raise the ship for a third time.

"You're not taking any of yours."

"I require less water than humans do," Spock answered logically, starting to walk again, at the quicker pace Kirk had requested. "It would be illogical to waste our water supplies when I do not require it."

"Always logical," Kirk said under his breath, going back to concentrating on matching Spock's steps. He wanted Spock to keep talking; it kept his mind occupied.

Spock rose to the bait, as Kirk knew he would. "All Vulcan children are taught to survive in the desert through the use of logic and skills handed down from our ancestors. It is-"

"Logical," Kirk finished, beginning to smile. "I suppose it is. Your planet is definitely a desert, although not as bad as this one."

Spock paused for a minute. "It was surprising to me at the Academy that most of the cadets had so little prior physical and survival training."

"Well, Earth is almost a paradise, now, you could say," Kirk said. "There's not much call for that sort of thing anymore. Unless, of course, you enjoy it. Plenty of people go out camping for fun." Memories of his father's leaves from Starfleet, spent in the woods near their farm, entered his mind.

"Is it logical to depend so heavily upon technology?" Spock asked. "To lose the knowledge your ancestors once held?"

"Probably not," Kirk admitted. "But not everything is lost. Take me, I grew up on a farm, one of the few left. My mother farmed because she believed in it, in food that came straight from the ground to your plate. I did more physical labor than any of my friends, and she made sure my brother and I knew how to feed ourselves. Now, my father, he made sure we knew how to survive. Camping trips whenever he was home. So even if some people forgot, others didn't."

"Is it wise, though, Captain, that such knowledge should remain the province of a few enthusiasts, instead of being taught more widely?" Spock asked.

Kirk shook his head with a brief grin, "Again, probably not. But you can't force people to learn what they don't want to, or have to."

They lapsed into silence, until all Kirk could hear was the soft sound of their footfalls on the sand. Kirk cleared his throat and asked, "All Vulcan children have to go through some sort of test, don't they? To prove they know how to survive?" He remembered seeing scraps of memories relating to this the few times he and Spock had mind-melded. Maybe something Spock had learned would be useful here. They could use all the help they could get.

"The kahs-wan," Spock said. "A test for young children, in which they have to survive for ten days, alone, in a canyon known as Vulcan's forge, without water, food or weapons."

"Ten days?" Kirk asked. Even knowing the uncompromising nature of Vulcan culture as he did, he felt that was a little harsh. "How old were you?"

"I was approximately seven Earth years of age," Spock answered. "It is not as vigorous as it sounds. All the participants have prepared for years, and trained professionals stand by in case they are needed. To fail is not considered a disgrace."

"Aren't there predators on Vulcan?"

"There are," Spock answered. "I myself was nearly killed by a lematya during my kahs-wan."

"Really?" Kirk asked. "I can imagine your mother wasn't too happy about that." Even with his parents' focus on outdoor knowledge, Kirk knew he couldn't have survived more than one night alone in the wilderness at that age.

"She was…unhappy with my father for many days afterward," Spock said, sounding almost amused. "However, she seemed to enjoy telling the story of how I fought off a lematya with no weapons for months afterward."

Kirk smiled. He could guess what had been hanging on Spock passing that test; his family's reputation, the viability of Vulcan-human hybrids, the validity of his mother's choice to raise a Vulcan family, Spock's status as a Vulcan. Too much to depend on one seven-year-old's survival abilities.

Kirk became so engrossed in his thoughts that he walked straight into Spock fifteen minutes later.

"Is it five more miles?" he asked. That seemed to have gone more quickly. His throat felt drier than before though, no doubt because they had kept up their conversation. Kirk grimaced; it probably wasn't the smartest thing they could do, but it did make the time go faster.

Spock tried and failed once again to contact the Enterprise, and Kirk looked up at the sky. The suns were much lower in the sky than before, meaning it was close to this planet's sunset. "We should probably try to get some rest. It's going to get dark soon." Deserts on Earth often plunged in temperature at night, but Kirk had no idea if the same would hold true for a desert planet like this.

"We have covered twenty miles," Spock said. "A good pace." This time, he didn't refuse the water, although after they were done they realized they had gone through more than they should have, even though Spock had refused his share throughout the day. At this rate, they would run out of water before the three day mark.

"Sorry," Kirk said.

Spock gave him a look that on anyone else would be called withering, "Captain, the amount of water your body requires is not under your control."

"Or anything else," Kirk said as his stomach growled. Spock might be able to survive easily for three days on no food; Kirk knew he couldn't. Spock's expression grew more concerned; the captain would start to weaken much more quickly than he would. They needed to make it out of this disturbance, and they had no guarantee that the mountains would prove to be any less dangerous than the desert they were traversing.

*Everything about the kahs-wan comes from the episode of Star Trek: The Animated Series entitled "Yesteryear".