As Spock and I walked away, I noticed the furtive glances his former bridge crew exchanged behind his back. Including how instead of going into his own room, Bones followed like a puppy behind Uhura with Scotty not too far behind, his eyes tracking both of their forms with barely disguised hunger. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from breaking out in hysterical laughter. So it was definitely obvious that Uhura and Spock weren't together anymore. I'd have to take that as a positive sign for our relationship. Not that there was one currently, but if what I'd felt at the club was any indication… Well… That could very well be changing here shortly.

Once we were in my quarters, the hushed hum of the ship brought the silence between them to the fore. I looked up at Spock from where I'd collapsed in the chair that was sitting at my desk. My quarters were by far the largest. As often as we all ended up piling into my bed however, it didn't really matter. However… It was about to change. I was about to (Hopefully at least) gain the one person in the universe, no, make that the multiverse, who I'd ever truly wanted beyond life and death.

"Have you ever listened to an old Terran artist Pink?"

Spock tilted his head, the only sign of confusion he showed. "No..?" His former first officer offered tentatively. Laughing, I leaned forward in my seat, ordering the computer to play one of her albums as I did do, "Computer, play Pink, album Truth About Love, song Beam Me Up, followed by the rest of the album."

As soon as I'd finished the order, Pink was playing softly in my quarters, her voice throatily crooning about how things would be different in another universe, just asking for one more minute, even if only to say good-bye. I motioned for Spock to take a seat. After all, if we were going to chat, we'd do in comfort and I damned well knew that my furniture was comfortable.

"So... Now that you've found me, whatcha gonna do 'bout it?"

Spock just looked at me. It wasn't a wholly pleasant look either. It was as if he knew every little thing I'd done in the recent months... Which shouldn't have surprised me, apparently I hadn't blocked the bond fully. He must have gotten bleed over from when I'd fooled around with my kids. Which sounded wrong, but damn it... There wasn't really another way to say it, we weren't just friends, we were a family, but... I'd helped raise most of them... Gah! This was just awkward!

Leaning forward, I just sighed and looked back at him. "Meld with me, let me show you..." It came out as a whisper, the only way for me to explain to him, was to show him. There was nothing else to be done, words in this instance were inadequate.

With no other words exchanged, Spock leaned forward, murmuring the ritual words under his breath, even as they weren't needed. As he finished, they were sucked into his mind. Brilliant and blinding, with spots as dark as the deepest space they'd traversed together.

With mental hands, Jim pulled Spock to a corner of his mind, where all he had hidden, all the pain and sorrow he had felt was piled into one big heap of darkness. Slowly, he sifted the memories into a semi-coherent line of thought, letting Spock see each one, moving on only when Spock indicated he was ready.

In flashes, Spock watched Winona Kirk in her absence, Frank wailing on a young Jim, felt his tears as his older brother Sam walked away and never came back. Being sent to Tarsus and meeting Kodos, the horrors that had been wrought by the man who professed to care for the boy-who-was-Jim. The only adult aside from his Aunt and Uncle, who Kodos had killed. His cousin decaying in front of his eyes, even as he rescued those he could. Starving himself to feed them, letting Kodos have his way, even as he turned a blind eye to what Jim was doing.

Shuddering, he pulled himself from the memories, but not from Jim's mind. He wasn't ready to let go just yet. There were still memories to go through. He would understand his t'hy'la and his mates reasoning for leaving, not just him but the Enterprise and her crew. A crew who had relied on their Captain...

Pushing through the exhaustion suddenly coursing through his body, Spock reached for the memories once more, letting himself be engulfed. He saw felt Jim meeting McCoy for the first time, saw how often the doctor had saved him, realized just how much they were willing to give up for the other, including risking a court martial, just to get Jim on-board the Enterprise during the Narada Crisis. He was thankful that the doctor had done that, he hadn't known just how they'd done it, just that they had and that Jim had suffered an allergic reaction.

He projected the feeling to Jim, feeling his reaction as if it was his own. He huffed a laugh and sent that as well, feeling an inescapable feeling of pleasure when it was returned. Next he saw himself with Uhura, realization starting to dawn even as he watched in an almost fast-forward blur of moments between the two, the feeling of wrongwrongwrong echoing between them. It should have been Jimjimjimjim, not Nyota in his arms, sharing breath and touch.

Interrupting the stream of images, he starting to project his own, showing Jim in his own way he had known, had felt, was already terminating the relationship even as he was leaving. He could feel Jim's surprise, letting himself go and sink further into Spocks own mind. Letting their compatability show by how their minds blended and they could no longer tell whose mind was whose, memories blurring and blending, emotions...

They pulled away almost simultaneously. Both panting even as they leaned into the other, across the small space where a coffee table sat, lips brushing in gentle motions. Love bloomed between them, the truth of what had happened no longer an issue.

"You will no longer shar your body with them. You are mine."

Jim leaned back against his seat and laughed, he laughed until tears were running down his cheeks, "No... I have no need of doing so. Not if I have you to share my bed with, after all... We're t'hy'la, imzadi. There is no one else for me, nor will there be. Imzadi... I love you. You are my first beloved. I have never allowed anyone into my mind like that, as you well know. Not many people know I'm part Betazoid either. I'm lucky I managed full maturity with everything that went wrong in my life... Sam.. Well, far as I'm aware, Sam ended up on Betazed and was in the process of being treated for a suicide attempt due to his not being trained. Don't ask me how with all the fucked up things that happened, I managed to stay sane!"

"Ashayam..." Spock looked at his t'hy'la and wondered how to explain his thoughts before just plunging ahead, "Perhaps it is because we were always destined to meet... Our minds have been linked since the first breath you took, we just never realized it until we met. After all... It makes sense does it not?"

With a sigh, Kirk nodded. It did. In a weird twisted, freakish way. After all, it was the two of them. Neither of them was normal by any definition of the word. He'd let the explanation fly and if something else came up to contradict it? He'd deal with it then.

"Now, are you coming back to the Enterprise or will we have to drag you back, kicking and screaming as the vernacular goes?" Spock queried softly, eying the blond across from him hungrily. It had been too long since he'd since him, the soft lights of the mans personal quarters highlighted his blonde hair, blue eyes even bluer than the last time he had seen him if it was possible. He was definitely darker than he had been, his freedom allowing him to touchdown on planets more often, allowing for a tan.

Smirking, Kirk waved a hand flippantly, "Yeah, yeah, I'll come back. After all, can't have my beautiful lady left alone too long, no knowing what Scotty's done to the poor girl recently!"

Quirking a brow, Spock responded with, "He hasn't modified anything recently aside from the replicators. Which he did as soon as you left."

"The replicators? Why would he do that?"

"To punish the rest of us for not noticing what you were planning when he plainly did."

"Oh."

"Yes."

With that, I stood and motioned for Spock to follow me. It was time for bed, as much as I'm sure both of us would like more, there was a time and a place for that. Neither of which was here. This was the bed I had taken my kids and they had taken me, it was a beginning and and end. The true beginning for us lay on the Enterprise. From there, we would go as ordered, living life by the seat of our pants even as our love carried us through. No more going where whim would have me, but back to the grind and monotony of Starfleet, but it was a homecoming, not a thing of sorrow.

My other family... They needed me and my kids were alright. They'd survived without me and me without them, it was time for them to get back to their real lives, a life without having to take care of me and make sure I wouldn't fall to pieces at a moments notice, it was with these thoughts that I drifted into sleep with Spock a warm presence at my back, his arms cradling me even as our breathes evened out into slumber. Just before I let sleep take me, I called out just loud enough for the computer to shut off the lights and turn off the music, in the middle of Pink singing about the truth about love, the lyrics echoing for a second before she fully cut out and sleep took me away.