Unfinished Business
Chapter 21 : A Beginning
April, 2273
He sat before his firepot, but he was not meditating. He was simply thinking. He was finding it difficult to meditate, and even more difficult to sleep. His mind was full of the conclusions he had come to during the interaction with V'Ger. He found himself going back over the last three years continuously, examining his own actions, and those of others, and trying to explain them logically. When that did not yield the desired result, he tried to explain them emotionally, a strange undertaking for him.
At length, he rose from his position and pulled on a long-sleeve shirt over the short-sleeved tee that he wore for meditation and sleep. He exited his quarters and headed down the corridors to the observatory, planning to sit and watch the stars go by and think some more. And possibly he would calm himself enough that he could return, and sleep.
But when he entered that room, it was to find that there was someone already there, leaning against the transparent aluminum window, silent and still. He stopped, not sure what to do. She lifted her head, from where it had rested against the cool window, and turned to look at him. She did not speak, only stood looking at him. He advanced slowly, uncertain, until he stood close enough to see the expression on her face.
She looked sad. He knew this feeling now, knew it well. He stood looking at her, wanting to say something, but uncertain what that might be. And she straightened up, and looked back at him, and there was a tear, sparkling in her eye. Her voice, when she spoke, was soft and full of emotion. "I think it hurt you even more than it hurt me." And then she turned and headed out of the room.
He held out one hand, as if to stop her, but he found that he could not. Nor could he speak. He could only stand, and watch her leave, and struggle not to break apart. And when she was no longer in sight, he collapsed upon the bench there before him, and clasped his hands about himself, and rocked his body, seeking comfort. He found none. Unless it was the fact that she had spoken to him, directly to him, for the first time since his entrance onto the bridge. It was a beginning.
Some time later, he rose and returned to his quarters. And there he once more folded himself down onto his flat pillow before his firepot, and lit the incense, and this time he was able to descend into meditation. And when he rose from that, he went to his bed, and lay down, and slept peacefully for two hours. Even the limited contact he had had with her had calmed him. He did not entirely understand it, but he accepted it.
When he was on the bridge later, and she sat at the next station, just on the other side of the turbolift doors, he did not feel tense, or anxious, but rather had a desire to interact with her, to let her see that he wished to atone for what he had done.
And from time to time, he felt her eyes on him, and he was content. It was enough for now. It was a beginning.
When she left the observatory, Nyota went straight to her quarters. She curled up on her couch, clutching the pillow she kept there, wondering if she had done the right thing. Should she have stayed there, and tried to get him to talk? Or was it still too early, as she suspected? It was hard, so hard, to know what was right.
He had looked so tired. But he did not look as gaunt as he had when he had arrived on board. He had started to fill out a little. He needed to fill out more. She worried so about him. It was so obvious that he had suffered, surely as much as she had, if not more. She wanted to go up to him, and comfort him, and at the same time, she wanted to yell and scream at him, and ask him why he had gone away and left her all alone. Although she thought she was beginning to understand that. The things he had said to Kirk and McCoy in the rec room had given her insights that she had not had before. But they still needed to talk, although she was not at all sure that he was capable of doing that yet. And she was certain that she could not do it without crying.
But they had stood there, in the same room, and looked into each other's eyes. And he had listened, when she spoke to him, and watched her carefully. It was a beginning.
The next day, when she sat at her station, she found her eyes drawn to him, from time to time. He was changing, from that hard, harsh, totally contained 'thing' that he had been when he arrived on the ship, growing slowly closer to the man she had known for so long. All she had to do was wait. Wait for the proper timing, the proper situation, to find the proper thing to say. For now, she could only look, and wait, and hope. But it was a beginning.