Chapter 18: Indispensable
"I married her because I loved her."
A revision, rather than a revelation.
At some level, Spock realizes that he has always known that his parents loved each other. What requires revision is his understanding that love, an emotion, was his father's motivation for marriage—the because that tipped the equation.
No, not tipped it.
Was the equation—a new one, setting aside Vulcan tradition and propriety to become half of a whole with a human woman.
Not until much later does Spock also realize that his father's words in the transporter room are not a confession, not an admission, but a tacit kind of permission offered to his son.
Or more than permission. Advice.
Marry for love.
Spock sets aside this idea for later consideration.
For a year after the destruction of Vulcan, he stumbles forward like someone who trips over one rock after another. Until the anniversary of his mother's death he dodges most conversations about her, about any of the losses. The first ceremony at the Academy, for instance, barely a month into that year of grief—he misses that one completely, though he knows that Nyota will be there standing in formation with the rest of the remaining cadets.
He almost misses the bon odori festival in August, when Lieutenant Sulu rigs the hologram projectors in the botanical gardens of the Enterprise to simulate a lazy river so the crew—still finding their "sea legs"—can light and set adrift mourning lanterns. Spock makes a brief appearance but finds it too evocative to stay long.
He spends Rosh Hashanah in quiet, intense meditation, his guilt almost too much to bear.
At Mr. Scott's holiday ceilidh in December, Spock consents to play his ka'athyra while the crew dances and drinks before they turn maudlin with a toast and a throaty rendition of Robbie Burns' "Auld Lang Syne."
And finally February 11 rolls around again—the anniversary itself—and Spock spends it in voluntary duty onboard the ship in orbit around Earth while most of the crew beam down for the obligatory speeches and gatherings. Then a private moment with Nyota in the botanical gardens where he touches her mind and shows her an imagined visit to a home that is no more, with a woman who is lost in the abyss.
The year is full of other things, too—a brief adventure where he escorts a Vulcan teacher and her students to the colony world still being built—hearing himself called an abomination, a disgrace to Vulcan for doing as his father had done before him, for choosing a human partner.
Bonding with Nyota in a ceremony so simple, so silent, that Leonard McCoy lets out a puff of air between his lips and says, "Well! If I'd blinked, I woulda missed it!"
Through it all, he hardly speaks of his mother, skirting the edges of his own memories.
Through their nascent bond, he feels Nyota's concern.
Soon, he tells her, and he knows that she understands that he is waiting for the right moment.
And then he sees Professor Artura, not in the Academy halls or even on the streets of San Francisco, but coming toward him on a sidewalk of New Vulcan, the Andorian walking with his head tucked down and his antennae curled against the late afternoon wind.
For a moment Spock lets his footsteps falter and considers turning aside, careful to avoid contact. But he waits a beat too long and Professor Artura looks up just as Spock retreats a step toward a teashop off the thoroughfare.
"Commander!"
Too late to avoid conversation now. Spock stifles a sigh, clasps his hands behind his back, and turning toward Professor Artura, nods.
"Professor. I admit to being surprised at seeing you here."
"And I you," Professor Artura says. "I thought you would be on the Enterprise."
"We are in orbit," Spock says. "A supply run. Many of the crew are planetside on leave."
"Then perhaps you have time?"
Professor Artura motions with his hand toward the teashop and Spock stifles another sigh and weighs his options. He has no interest in spending time conversing with the professor right now. Professor Artura is not unpleasant and Spock is not in a particular hurry to get anywhere, but still—
Spock hasn't seen him since the genocide, and if Professor Artura is like most people he knows, he will feel compelled to comment on it—and worse, to offer his condolences.
Not that Spock doesn't understand the impulse to do so. More than once Nyota has taken him aside after colleagues from the past have made a point of seeking him out—crossing a conference room, hailing him on the street, sending him old-fashioned paper letters—to tell him how sorry they are, how distressed on his behalf, how inadequate they know their words to be.
Exactly so. He wishes they would cease trying. Their words fall short of any comfort—and always will.
"They have to say something," Nyota says, and while he doesn't contradict her, he does not agree.
Professor Artura stands motionless in front of him, willing, it seems, to wait forever for an answer. With a quick nod, Spock leads the way to the door of the teashop.
They are greeted by a cheerful Denobulan offering them a menu padd as he ushers them to a table in the corner of the small room. Glancing at the padd, Spock notes an unusually large number of Terran teas—not a surprise, really, considering how many human Federation personnel are stationed on the colony or who make regular trade runs from Earth. With a tap of his finger, he orders tea for himself and a dark coffee for Professor Artura.
"Cadet Uhura?" Professor Artura says when Spock sets the padd on the table. "She is here on New Vulcan?"
"Lieutenant Uhura," Spock says, and Professor Artura unfurls his antennae and gives a toothy grin.
"Of course," he says, bobbing his head. "The last time I heard from her, she said she was still in Starfleet."
That Nyota has been in contact with Professor Artura is unexpected, though it shouldn't be, Spock thinks. Her social contacts are far more extensive than his own, and better tended to.
"Serving on the Enterprise," Professor Artura says, looking up at Spock, "with you."
As he always does when he is with Professor Artura, Spock has the sense that a great deal of subtext goes unsaid, that the professor layers his sentences with multiple meanings. Is he doing so now? Spock isn't certain.
"As for me," Professor Artura says, lifting his hands to take the cup of coffee the approaching server holds out to him, "I am no longer employed by Starfleet."
"Indeed," Spock says, sipping his tea. The Academy is in flux, many of the professors and instructors returning to their home worlds until the student corps is rebuilt. Apparently Professor Artura is one of those who has chosen to leave.
"In fact," the Andorian says, "I have been on New Vulcan since the beginning. It's the only place where I feel….sane."
He looks up as he says the last word and Spock takes an involuntary swallow of tea.
"Are you okay, Commander?"
Spock sets down his cup and suppresses a cough.
"I didn't mean to startle you," Professor Artura says. "I know your reticence in talking about…certain things."
Again Spock has the feeling that Professor Artura is alluding to something just out of reach—a conversation with Nyota about the difficulties of the past year, perhaps, or a shadow reference to Spock's disciplinary hearing while he was still teaching at the Academy—when the professor proved himself a friend after all, refusing to testify that he had seen anything inappropriate in the relationship between Spock and his teaching assistant.
They sit in silence for a few moments before Professor Artura says, "I'm not sure how often you get here, but the colony is doing remarkably well. Vulcan resilience, I think. Not like Andorians. If Andoria had been…attacked, my people would have wasted all their energy on retribution, not rebuilding. But here! By the end of this first growing season, the farmers will already have half the necessary grain for a year. In three more years, New Vulcan will be self-sufficient, at least for food. Do you know how remarkable that is?"
From the tone of the professor's voice, Spock infers that the question is a rhetorical one, not requiring an answer. He lifts one eyebrow and waits for him to continue.
"Already most of the government buildings are completed, at least here in Shi'Kahr'a."
"Are you working for the Vulcan government?" Spock asks, and Professor Artura looks down suddenly at his cup and shakes his head.
"No," he says, "I'm not working here. I'm in recovery myself—with a healer."
Spock is so astonished that he says nothing. Professor Artura looks back up and says, "When…"
He blinks twice and starts again.
"When Vulcan was…destroyed," he says, "I lost someone dear to me, someone who had helped me, in an earlier time."
"After your wife and child were murdered."
Spock's tone is more matter-of-fact than he intends and he gives a slight frown to soften his words. Professor Artura nods.
"The lieutenant told you?"
"She mentioned your situation briefly. I do not know the details."
"A blood feud," the professor says, running the fingers of one hand along the rim of his cup. "Taria and Lullia—"
Pausing, the professor takes a breath.
"Your wife and child," Spock supplies, and Professor Artura says, "Yes. My family. My wife's brother killed a member of a rival clan and they retaliated. It's traditional justice on my world, Commander. For a time, I thought I would lose my mind. I lived with some Aenar cousins until I went to Vulcan to work with a healer. T'Van. She helped me find a measure of peace."
And suddenly Spock knows.
"You were more than healer and patient," he says simply, and Professor Artura says, "When I left here, I took a part of her in my mind. Later—well, the emptiness has been hard to bear—"
The professor's eyes meet Spock's own.
"Yes," Spock says. "I know."
From the corner of his eye he sees the waiter approaching and he sits back and watches as the teapot is refreshed, as Professor Artura is offered another cup of coffee.
"The healer I have now is helping," the Andorian says when the waiter moves away again. "I need to be here. I need to—talk—about what happened with someone who understands. Talking helps. That must be your experience as well, Commander."
Canting his head to the side, Spock considers what to say. That he has not had access to a Vulcan healer, that he almost never talks about the genocide, that when his mother died, he abruptly stopped being able to tell any stories about her? All true, of course, though for some reason Spock is reluctant to share this with anyone.
Professor Artura, on the other hand, isn't just anyone—
"It is not," he says quietly. "Though I suspect that my mother would not be pleased with my silence."
And with that, he begins.
X X X X
"Doesn't he talk?"
"You always say that," Amanda told her mother, trying not to sound as annoyed as she felt. Doesn't he talk wasn't a real question at all but some sort of accusation, an unspoken commentary about Amanda's parenting skills.
It was one thing that her mother was disappointed in her and quite another to have to listen to her criticism of Spock.
"He talks," Amanda added, a defensive tone creeping into her voice and raising her mother's brow. "He's just shy."
"It's more than that," her mother said, glancing down to the floor where Spock sat quietly examining pictures of Terran insects on a small padd. "He refuses to speak."
It was true that Spock was quieter than most human four-year-olds, but Amanda wasn't about to concede any ground to her mother. Instead she said, "Give him time. He doesn't know you that well."
As soon as she said it, Amanda heard her mother huff.
"It's not my fault that he doesn't."
And there it was, the gauntlet Irene Grayson repeatedly threw down, her invitation to argue about Amanda's choice to marry Sarek and settle on Vulcan.
Choices Amanda had more difficulty defending these days, even to herself.
Two months ago she had done what she never imagined she would do—shown up at her mother's door, blinking back tears, holding Spock's hot little hand in hers.
"Can we stay here for awhile?" she asked, bracing herself for her mother's I told you so, relieved when it did not come. "Until I decide what to do?"
To be fair, her mother hadn't pressed her on the reasons she had left Sarek and Vulcan, had been, in fact, patient with her prodigal daughter.
Still—there was the gauntlet lying between them, demanding a response.
"Do we have to go through this again?" Amanda said, standing up and walking toward the kitchen. Behind her she heard her mother rise and follow.
"You don't have to do anything you don't want to do—apparently," her mother said. Amanda flinched.
"Mother, I—"
"You have to have a plan," her mother said. "You have to move forward. You can't just drift here forever."
And that was that, her mother making a pronouncement and Amanda having no other choice than to agree, as if she were still a child living at home.
On one hand her mother was right. She couldn't just drift. It wasn't good for anyone, this aimlessness, this waiting, if that was what she was doing.
When she packed a small travel case for herself and another for Spock two months ago, she was sure Sarek would show up any day to take them back home, but a week went by before they talked over the subspace—a short, clipped conversation dry and inconsequential, the bond between them oddly tamped down from his end.
He was hurt that she had left. Or angry. Either way, she wasn't going to do as she always had in the past, rushing in to sift through his emotions, articulating them for him, with him.
Was she leaving him? Really and truly? She wasn't sure.
Spock was grieving, she could see that. His unnatural quietude, for instance. No matter what she told her mother, Amanda was also concerned at how inward he had turned, how focused he was on some internal calculus that he kept hidden from her.
Only when Amanda's sister Cecilia brought her three children over on the weekends did Spock perk up, though he was content to watch his rambunctious cousins from the safety of his mother's side or his grandmother's sofa.
"Go," Amanda said, nudging him, but he held back, like a tentative swimmer at the edge of a pool.
You have to have a plan.
Was it wrong to be relieved when the local school authorities told her that they weren't hiring right now? Accepting employment would be a statement of purpose, of permanence, proof that her marriage was over, that she was—as her mother said—moving forward. As difficult as it was to drift without a plan, she wasn't ready to do more just yet.
And then one night as she was setting out the dinner plates, her mother said, "I've asked Richard Jenkins to come by. I hope you don't mind."
"What are you up to, Mother?" Amanda said, trying not to sound as flustered as she felt.
Her mother made some noncommittal sound and Amanda knew better than to push her. Besides, she already knew what her mother was up to.
Amanda and Richard had never been engaged, but as far as Amanda's mother was concerned, they should have been. They dated when Amanda was a senior at Berkeley and Richard began his law degree at Hastings, across the bay in San Francisco.
She wasn't sure why they stopped dating—or whose idea it was, if it was anyone's at all. Like so many things in her life, Amanda wasn't aware that she had started down a certain path until she turned some bend in the road and realized, with a start, that she was navigating by new landmarks. When Richard passed out of her view, she hardly noticed.
That her mother had invited him to stop by was disconcerting, to say the least. She felt a wave of anger and saw Spock look up across the room to her, his brows furrowed.
"It's okay," she said, as much to convince herself as to reassure him. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
When the bell rang an hour later, Amanda heard her mother open the front door and murmur a greeting. Keeping her eyes trained on Spock, who was arranging a set of multicolored tessellated tiles on the floor, she listened as her mother entered the room, Richard in tow.
"I'll leave you young people to get reacquainted," her mother said without preamble, exiting the way she had come. Amanda blushed furiously and looked up.
I'm sorry, she tried to say with her expression, but she wasn't at all sure that Richard understood her.
He was as she remembered, dark-haired, unusually tall and thin, with the body of a biker or a runner. Not handsome in a classic sense, but not unattractive, either. His most distinguishing feature was his eyes, such a piercing shade of blue that she was always reminded of cornflowers or cloudless summer skies.
"It's wonderful to see you," Richard said, holding out his hand as Amanda stood up. As soon as her fingers touched his, he leaned in and brushed her cheek with his own—not quite a kiss, but something more intimate than she was expecting. She felt herself blush again.
Below her, Spock looked up.
"And this is your son?"
Without meaning to, Amanda braced herself for the kind of reaction that had become all too common—a raised eyebrow, a frown, some expression betraying astonishment or a reevaluation. This is your son?
But Richard gave none of these. Instead, he returned Spock's gaze with an almost gentle earnestness.
"This is Spock," Amanda said. When Spock turned his dark eyes on her, she motioned toward Richard and said, "This is my friend."
"Richard," Richard said, darting a glance at her. She laughed at her omission.
"Yes, Richard," she said. She watched as Richard picked up a loose tile and made a show as if contemplating where to place it.
"Perhaps here?" he said to Spock, leaning over and setting it on one end of the connected tiles. Spock said nothing.
"Or maybe here?" Richard moved the piece to the other side and set it down. Spock picked it up and moved it to a new spot.
"Oh, yes, I see," Richard said. "That's a more logical choice."
"The colors are complementary," Spock said softly.
"Ah," Richard said, picking up another tile. "So this one—"
"Will go here," Spock said, pointing.
"Fascinating," Richard said, putting down the tile and hazarding a glance up at Amanda. To her dismay, her cheeks grew hot with some unnamed emotion.
Gratitude, and relief, and even pleasure—that this man was being kind to her child. Nothing more, surely.
Suddenly her mother's voice called out from the kitchen.
"Spock, come here."
His unwillingness to leave her side—Amanda felt that through their bond.
"I'll be right here," she said, and Spock stood up and walked away with undisguised reluctance.
"Please excuse my mother—" Amanda said as soon as Spock disappeared through the doorway. Richard sat down on the other end of the sofa and smiled.
"She's just worried about you," he said. "Don't apologize for that."
"I'm not even sure what she's told you."
"Nothing much," Richard said, "except that you are here for now. That you've left your husband."
"Oh!" Amanda said. Hearing it said baldly that way—out loud—caught her off guard. "I don't know if I've left my husband. I'm, well, I just needed some time to sort things out."
Again she felt herself bracing herself, this time for Richard to ask her to explain. When he didn't, she looked up and saw him watching her intently, his blue eyes eerie in the reflected light of the table lamp.
"I mean," she said, stumbling slightly over her words, "I have left, but I don't know if I've really left. Does that make sense?"
Richard nodded slowly.
"I think so."
"I don't want to bore you," Amanda said, and Richard said, "You could never do that."
She tried to dissipate the awkwardness of the moment with a little laugh—but to her dismay, Richard continued to look at her with the same gentle earnestness he had shown Spock.
"Tell me about you," she said abruptly, and Richard sat up a fraction and shrugged.
"Not much to tell," he said. "I dropped out of law school and went to work in business—"
"You did!"
"Shortly after you broke my heart," he said, smiling, and Amanda let herself laugh.
"I didn't break your heart," she said, her voice playful.
"Sure you did," Richard said, and though he was still smiling, still looking at her with those blue, blue eyes, she had the sense that he was hiding something, too. "But that was a long time ago. I'm more interested in what you are going to do now."
A simple comment, but Amanda felt herself squirm. What exactly was Richard asking? Had her mother made some suggestion to him, hinted about the possibility of resuming a relationship with Amanda? It would be like her mother to do so. How unfair to Richard if she had.
"I hope you don't have the wrong idea," Amanda blurted out. "I still love my husband. It's just—"
Sitting back against the sofa cushion, Richard said, "I don't mean to pry."
"No, I know," Amanda said, looking down. "The truth is, there's not one reason I can point to and say this is why I left. It was a lot of things. And I could tell they weren't going to go away or get better, and I got…tired."
She glanced up. From the end of the sofa, Richard said, "I see."
With a sigh, Amanda said, "You might find this hard to believe, but Vulcans aren't as open-minded as they think they are. IDIC, their commitment to diversity? When it comes down to it, they are as tribal as humans, and as prejudiced."
"That is surprising," Richard said mildly, and Amanda wondered if he was truly surprised or merely humoring her. Deciding she didn't care, she went on.
"At first when I moved to Vulcan I thought it was just me, that I was imagining things. Or that Vulcans were just hard to get to know—that it was part of their culture or their nature. But it's more than that. Oh, they won't say anything to me or Sarek directly, but they don't approve of us. I've lived there almost nine years now and I can count only two friends. Two."
Richard frowned and Amanda said, "People are nice enough at the university where I work with student teachers, but they aren't friends. And Sarek—well, I don't even want to think about how his work has been affected, how he's been passed over for promotions he deserves. He keeps that from me, I'm sure."
"He must find any disadvantage worth it," Richard said.
Like Richard's earlier comments, this also felt weighted with some unspoken context, making Amanda uncomfortable. She shook her head.
"When it was only directed at me or Sarek, I could bear it," she said. "But now with Spock—"
She paused. In the distance she heard her mother, probably giving Spock some unwanted direction. Looking up, she made eye contact with Richard.
"When I'm out with him," she said, "in some public place like the market or a teashop, I overhear what people say. Most of them don't mean to be unkind, but it's tiring to always be an object of interest. To hear my son called…."
She stopped, unable to go on.
"Don't say anything else if you don't want to," Richard said, and Amanda felt such a wave of gratitude that for one horrifying moment her eyes welled up.
Swallowing, she said, "How about something to drink? Tea?"
Richard left shortly afterward but made a point to phone the next day to—as he called it—check to make sure he hadn't upset her.
"Don't be silly," she said. "It was nice to talk to a friend."
"Maybe we can talk again sometime," he said. When she hung up, she felt lonelier than she had since she left Vulcan.
That night Sarek called.
"Are you well?" he said, and Amanda tried to listen past his words to his meaning. Did he miss her? Was his question an indirect way of asking her to return?
She asked him.
"I am inquiring about your health," he said, and Amanda huffed.
"Are you sure you aren't asking when I'm coming home?"
"Are you coming home?"
"I don't know."
She closed her eyes and tried to get some sense of him through their bond. There he was, as remote as someone standing on the other side of a canyon. Here or on Vulcan, it was no different. She couldn't reach him.
Twice in the next couple of weeks Richard took her and Spock out—once to lunch at an outdoor café near Puget Sound and another time hiking in the nearby hills. If nothing else, it was a relief to be away from her mother for a few hours—and to have someone else interact with Spock for a change.
Both times Sarek called later in the day—as if he was aware of how unsettled those outings left her, which, she thought, looking at Spock, he might be.
But nothing came of their conversations, nothing she could count as moving forward.
"I feel like I'm in limbo," she told Richard the next time he called, and he said, "You don't have to be, Amanda." She felt a jolt as she realized what he was offering.
"Richard, I'm not ready—"
"Don't say anything right now," he interrupted. "I won't push you into anything."
She took a breath but before she could answer he added, "But life is short, Amanda. Don't wait too long to decide what you want to do."
As she expected, Sarek called that night.
"I'm thinking about staying here permanently," she told him. "On Earth."
When he said nothing, she felt a flash of irritation.
"What do you think of that?" she said, hating herself for being so deliberately provocative, for baiting him this way.
"And Spock?" Sarek said at last. "You intend to keep him with you?"
At once she was both angry and scared. Closing her eyes, she was flooded with something dark and furious—and with a start, she realized that after months of internal muffling she was once again feeling what Sarek was feeling, seeing what he saw. Her heart raced and she felt behind her for a chair and sat down heavily.
"What are we doing?" she said breathlessly.
"I must go," Sarek said, and the subspace connection snapped closed.
But not the mental bond. All night she felt his internal storm and her own. By morning she was exhausted, and she was slipping into sleep at last when she heard the doorbell chime. One eyelid cracked, she noted the time. 5:30—the sun barely up. No human would visit this early. She threw off the duvet and grabbed her robe, meeting her mother in the hallway.
"I'll get it!" she said, barely registering her mother's quizzical expression. Unlatching the front door, she tugged it open, fully expecting to see Sarek standing there, not sure if she wanted to or not.
"Lady T'Pau!"
In the foggy morning light stood the clan matriarch of the S'chn T'gai clan, her dark gray robes sweeping the ground. Behind her Amanda noted a thickset Vulcan male in a simple cloak. Part bodyguard, part honor attendant, the man stood silent, imposing.
"I will speak with you now," T'Pau said as she took a step forward. Amanda fell back wordlessly, stammering, "Of course," as T'Pau headed down the hallway.
"What's going on?"
Amanda's mother, one hand clutching the front of her bathrobe.
"It's alright, Mother," Amanda said, not daring to catch her eye. "Would you take Spock back to his room?"
As she pressed past her mother and led T'Pau into the living room, she saw that her Mother was unaware that Spock had been making his way slowly down the stairs. With a meaningful glance at her daughter, she turned and shepherded him back up.
"In here," Amanda said, and T'Pau arranged her robes around her as she settled on the sofa.
"Is it customary," T'Pau said without preamble, "for human children to live apart from one parent?"
Momentarily flabbergasted by the question, Amanda blinked.
"Well, many do," she said. "When their parents divorce or—"
"And is it your intention to divorce Sarek?"
There was no claiming that her private business was her own, that T'Pau was out of line in asking. As clan matriarch, she officiated over every ceremony and legislated family disputes. Before he had asked Amanda to marry him, Sarek had spoken to T'Pau first, not, as Amanda liked to tease him, for permission, but to make sure that he had her support.
Wizened, petite, her dark hair streaked liberally with gray, T'Pau leaned both hands on her carved walking stick and watched Amanda with black, impenetrable eyes.
"I don't know."
"He's harmed you in some way."
"No!"
"Or been negligent in his duties as spouse."
"No, it's just—"
"Or reneged in his duties to Spock."
"He's a good father—"
"Then why," T'Pau said, her expression unreadable, "are you here?"
"Lady T'Pau, it's hard to explain."
"But not impossible. Proceed."
Letting out an exasperated sigh, Amanda shifted on her chair.
"I'm here because…because Sarek didn't ask me to stay."
"I do not understand."
Amanda shifted again.
"I'm tired," she said simply. "I'm tired of being an alien on an unfriendly world."
At that Amanda saw a tiny flicker of something in T'Pau's expression. Surprise? Anger?
"You find Vulcan unfriendly?"
"Very," Amanda said with some heat. "And prejudiced. And arrogant, annoying, dishonest—"
She stopped long enough to gauge T'Pau's response before continuing.
"But I value Vulcan, too," Amanda said hurriedly. "The commitment to rational thought and logic, to order, to seeking solutions peacefully. The lack of materialism. The belief in the rule of law. The history and traditions, the wisdom of Surak. The strength families draw from each other—"
Her voice wavered and she fell silent. Overhead she heard the hum of a passing commuter shuttle.
"Lady T'Pau," she said when she could speak again, "I'm not blind. I see the looks people give me, hear what they don't think I can hear."
"People are curious," T'Pau said with a dismissive motion of one hand. "It is unusual to see such a pair bond."
"Curiosity I understand," Amanda said, feeling her frustration rise. "This is something else. Something more. Something…unkind. And if it only concerned me, I could endure it. But Sarek's work—"
"Sarek has said repeatedly that you are indispensable to his work."
This said without fanfare, as a matter of course. Amanda let her astonishment show.
"Then why hasn't he—"
"I fail to see why this is sufficient reason to leave him and your home."
Folding her hands in front of her, Amanda said, "Spock."
"Spock?"
"The day before we left," Amanda said, "Spock asked me what a half breed is. A mother in the market told her daughter not to come close to him because he is a half breed."
"He is," T'Pau said, her eyes flinty and hard. "And there will always be people who find exception to anything. That is hardly reason to separate your child from his father."
"That's just one incident," Amanda said, lifting her chin. "I could tell you dozens more as hurtful, as thoughtless. Sarek knows. He tells me to ignore them. But I don't want my son to grow up believing he is less, that he isn't as smart and beautiful and cherished as anyone else's child—"
She gulped a mouthful of air and felt her heartbeat thrumming wildly in her neck.
"You put Sarek at risk by staying away," T'Pau said at last, and Amanda blushed at the allusion to pon farr.
"Not if we divorce," she said slowly, looking down, "and he finds someone else."
"And if he does not wish to find someone else?"
"If he had wanted me to stay," Amanda said, raising her eyes, "he would have asked me not to go."
T'Pau was on her feet before Amanda realized that she was leaving. At the front door the elderly Vulcan turned and said, "This is your answer to him, then?"
The morning light was noticeably brighter than it had been earlier, the fog beginning to burn off. T'Pau's Vulcan bodyguard stood at attention when the door swung open.
"Lady T'Pau," Amanda said, her voice quavering, "I love Sarek. But human life is short. I can't keep waiting for things to improve, because you and I both know they aren't going to. I can't do that to Spock."
Because she was looking so closely at T'Pau's face, Amanda registered the slight change in her expression—a softening of her brow, almost a sympathetic glimmer in her eye.
"Then this may be the last time I speak with thee," T'Pau said, reverting to formal Vulcan, raising her hand in farewell. "Live long and prosper, Amanda Grayson."
The rest of the day was a blur—meals cadged together with indifference, a persistent headache that fuzzed her vision and made her snap at Spock, confusing him. By evening the headache had finally started to ease when Spock said suddenly, "Father is here," and Amanda knew it was true.
She led Sarek to the same room where earlier she had talked to T'Pau. They sat in awkward silence at either end of the sofa. Spock, she knew, was upstairs in the room where he slept, her mother with him supposedly helping him get ready for bed. If she quieted herself, she could feel his anxiety—and something more, Sarek's presence hovering in the background.
She turned her head and swept her gaze over him.
Come here.
She wasn't sure who said it first but it didn't matter. The warmth she associated with his mind flooded through her and she shivered.
Slipping his long outer cloak off his shoulders, Sarek stood up and stepped toward her, draping his cloak around her before sitting back down. As he did, she reached up and let her fingers brush his hand.
"T'Pau says—"
"Sarek, are you—"
They both began and fell silent together. Then taking a breath, Amanda said, "T'Pau contacted you."
"Indeed," Sarek said, peering into her face. "She said I should begin negotiations as soon as possible."
Amanda felt her stomach contract and her face flush.
"To settle the divorce," she said, blinking hard.
"To repair the marriage."
"I don't—"
"Amanda," Sarek said, leaning forward so close to her ear that she could feel the heat from his face, "there is something I haven't shown you, something T'Pau says you must see."
Tipping her head back to look at him better, she noticed a sheen of perspiration across the bridge of his nose, saw a crease between his brows.
He was uncharacteristically nervous.
Of being shamed by what he wanted her to see? Of being rejected once she had?
Yes, he thought, and she closed her eyes and searched.
There they were as they had been when they were first married, Amanda's face still unlined, her hair pinned back the way she had worn it then. Sarek's memory of them walking somewhere—in the city?
Yes, he thought, and she returned her attention to the scene.
What am I looking for?
The sun was warm on her face, the scent of il'drith flowers heavy in the air. And then, dreamlike, a Vulcan acquaintance was at their side, his words muted and distant in the memory. And like a dream, she turned aside and yet could see what was behind her—Sarek grasping the other Vulcan by the wrist and twisting so hard, so fast that the man's knees buckled and he fell, gasping, to the ground.
Before she could react, the landscape dissolved and was replaced by a street in the vegetable market, Sarek again at her side. This time when she took a step she felt herself sway with the heavy-hipped walk of the very pregnant, and looking down, she laughed at the image of her belly. As she reached out to pick up a melon from an outdoor display, she heard someone's voice and saw Sarek lean over like a battering ram. With a furious motion he darted forward and slammed into a small gathering of shoppers, knocking some down and scattering others.
And then Spock was in her arms, not quite newborn but almost, the tips of his ears barely unfurled. Their home—and neighbors sitting with her in the front room having tea. One elderly Vulcan woman turned to another and made a comment—and there was Sarek, upending the teapot over her head.
Opening her eyes, Amanda said, "I don't understand. These never happened."
"No," Sarek said, "but they almost did."
And suddenly his struggle was illuminated—the slights and insults and barely concealed looks hadn't escaped his notice after all—had infuriated him and tested his control almost to the breaking point.
She felt her eyes watering.
"I thought you didn't care," she said. "When you told me to ignore it—"
"I was wrong to tell you to," Sarek said, his breathing labored. "It was myself who needed to hear it."
"I felt so alone," Amanda said, and this time a tear did slide down her cheek.
With his thumb, Sarek rubbed it away.
"I want you to come home," he said.
He lowered his hand from her cheek and she sniffed once, twice, and then said, "But nothing will be different if I do. Nothing's going to change."
"You will not be alone."
She felt him approach her through the bond—tentatively, as if she were a piece of fine china.
"I don't know," she murmured. "I'm worried about Spock—"
"You told T'Pau," Sarek said, "that life is short. Surely it is logical to spend it with someone who shares your worries."
At that Amanda gave a soft laugh.
"Well, that's not the most romantic thing I've ever heard," she said, "but you do make a compelling case."
"Not surprising," Sarek said, curling his fingers around her own. "I am a skilled diplomat."
"Is that right?" Amanda said, pressing her other hand into his. "Then please explain why T'Pau said that I was the real ambassador in this family."
"She said that?"
"She said you told her I was indispensable to your work."
"Indeed."
"Don't pretend you didn't. T'Pau doesn't make those kinds of mistakes."
"This may be her first."
"Just admit it," Amanda said, hearing the patter of footsteps coming down the steps. Spock, of course, his relief almost palpable. "You need me."
"It would be illogical to deny it."
X X X X
"So your father convinced your mother to return to Vulcan."
Professor Artura is hunched over his empty coffee cup, his antennae straight up in the Andorian signal of intense attention. Spock nods.
"He did," he says. "My parents never spoke to me directly about the details, though I was more aware than they realized."
"Like most children," Professor Artura says, and Spock starts to ask him something about his own daughter but hesitates.
If Nyota were here she would know whether or not to mention the professor's daughter. Some people seem to welcome remembrances of dead family members. Others do not. Knowing who prefers what is beyond him.
They part soon and Spock doesn't think again about Professor Artura until after he and Nyota enter the Enterprise's recreation lounge that evening. Jim Kirk and the doctor are already there at a small table, glasses of some amber liquid in front of them. Alcohol, from the appearance of it. And also from the appearances of things, not the first drink of the evening.
When he drinks, Jim Kirk has the tendency to run his fingers through his hair until it is oddly disheveled. Dr. McCoy, on the other hand, gives himself away by lengthening the syllables of his words into a heavy Southern burr.
"Looky who's here," the doctor says, waving them over. "We were jus' talkin' about you."
At once Spock feels some alarm. Nyota merely laughs.
"Sure you were," she says in a tone Spock recognizes as her teasing mode. "You smooth talker."
"No, really," Kirk says, "we were. Bones here was saying that his mother made the best pie in the universe and I said he was crazy."
"And I said," McCoy says, lifting his glass with his right hand, "that everyone thinks their mother makes the best pie but everyone is wrong. You haven't tasted real peach cobbler until you've tasted my mother's."
"Aw, cobbler isn't real pie," Kirk says. "Real pie requires finesse."
Resting one elbow on the table, McCoy says, "What about you, Lieutenant? You eat pie in your neck of the woods?"
"Are you kidding?" Nyota says, grinning. "My mother makes a yam pie that would knock your socks off."
"I won't even ask you," McCoy says, tipping his glass toward Spock.
"Strawberry," Spock says.
"Huh?"
"Blueberry, gooseberry, raspberry, currant, pear, and apple. My mother often baked them when we visited family in Seattle. While I cannot claim that they were the best in the universe, they were enjoyable…if you like the taste of refined sugar."
"Imagine that!" McCoy says a little too loudly, sounding genuinely dazed.
"But not peach," Spock adds. "So perhaps your claim about your mother's cobbler does have some merit."
They don't stay long in the rec room—but it is longer than they usually do, and Nyota remarks on it later as she prepares for bed.
"You seem happier today," she says as she unzips her boots. "More content. Did something happen while you were on the surface?"
"I had tea with Professor Artura," he says. "He's working with a healer on New Vulcan."
"He's here? I knew he worked with a healer on Vulcan before," Nyota says. From the corner of his eye, Spock sees her darting a glance at him and he realizes that she does this when she talks about the time before the genocide. "How's he doing?"
"Uncertain," Spock says. "He appears to be functioning well, but appearances can be deceiving."
"Yes, they can."
"You are speaking about me."
"Yes, I am."
She gets up from the bed and crosses on bare feet to where he stands near the dresser. Putting her arms around her neck and leaning into him, she says, "Professor Artura must have said something to cheer you up."
He circles her waist and pulls her closer.
"It was not what he said," Spock says into her ear, "it was what he let me say."
"What do you mean?"
"It was…the first time I have wanted to talk about my mother since—"
Nyota moves her hands up until her fingers rest on either side of his face. Tugging his head down until their foreheads touch, she says, "I've missed your stories about her."
"I was not ready to tell any until now."
"I know."
"My mother liked to say that life is too short to remain silent," he says, shifting his face and resting his chin on the top of Nyota's head.
He feels her heartbeat against his chest, slow and steady, like some answer to a question he didn't even know he was asking.
Feels her waiting for him to continue—without interruption, if he needs to, until he says what he doesn't yet know needs to be said, the way a diplomat serves by listening, indispensable.
A/N: The end! Let me know what you thought of this ride! I certainly hope you had as much fun reading it as I had writing it.
If you've read my other fics, you may recognize Professor Artura. His backstory is explored in the most detail in chapter 6 of "People Will Say." And Spock refers to his parents separating in "What We Think We Know."
The year of ceremonies is detailed in my oneshot "Ceremony."
That first trip to New Vulcan and Spock's and Nyota's bonding are in "Once and Future."
My plan is to write an early Sarek/Amanda fic next, one that explores their relationship with Sybok. Interested? Let me know! That will help me get started.
Thanks for sticking with this to the end!