Chapter 5
"You do not sound repentant, Stonn. You sound furious."
Spock's voice is inflectionless and Stonn is too far gone to try to deduce any hints from his eyes and hands...
His breath comes in short quick stabs. He digs his fingernails into his palms and shakes with the effort to contain his emotions. "I am. I cannot let it go. I am so... angry."
His voice is low. Is he pleading or accusing? He doesn't know.
"I did not know she would challenge until the procession left the temple, Spock. We had said good-bye the evening before. She was adamant that she would do her duty, that the two of you would bind your houses together for the greater good of Vulcan. She'll never admit to love, she's too Surakisi for that, but she allowed that her… affection for me made it difficult to do that duty. But not impossible. Logic above all else. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one."
He knows his bitterness permeates his voice, and that maybe his own brand of Vulcan arrogance, the Southern ideal that they are capable of balancing emotion and logic side by side, has acted as an alibi to letting go of a little too much control. This is dangerous, but he cannot stop now.
"I did not know, Spock. And then you must have landed on the planet, because T'Pring hadn't shown a single sign of the plak tow herself, but then suddenly she was convulsing. They wouldn't let me touch her. Then she was up again, speaking, walking, but it was as if… she wasn't there." Things had been strange before, but that was when everything started falling apart.
"She's an economist! She's a modern Vulcan woman, but suddenly she was speaking like some lady from the time of the Reformation - all about claiming and riding the fever. She mind-melded with T'Pau, like it was the most natural thing in the world. Even now, she won't tell me what happened in the meld, saying that it's women's lore."
It is only when Spock's controlled anger lessens somewhat in force, that Stonn becomes aware exactly how pervasive it has been around them. T'Pring can be the same. It draws people to them - some are challenged and provoked by it, some are fascinated.
The Surakisi breed heroes or villains - you will not know which until it is too late… It is a derogatory old saying, in his own South Vulcan dialect. It's stereotyping and unworthy, and it fits his mood, right now.
Spock's gaze is less intense now, and it looks like he is about to speak, but Stonn knows that if he doesn't say this now, it will never be said.
He grabs the other's arm.
"Yes, I am furious. I am furious with you. Both of you. I don't have the right, but it doesn't lessen the fact that I am. Where I am from, another name for the plak-tow is 'the time of bitter truths', and the two of you should have known that you couldn't beat the lore with logic. It does not matter what the healers said about your mental compatibility. The plak tow, the pon farr, it's not about mental compatibility."
He tightens his grip. "It's about lust and mating, and for all that the two of you wanted that marriage, you never wanted each other - do you think you would have been able to speak through the plak tow otherwise? And in the end that was all that mattered, all that was left in T'Pring's mind once the fever had burnt through."
"You should have broken the bond years ago, Spock. Either of you." But you never listen to me.
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"Do you believe that I am a suitable mate for T'Pring, Stonn?"
Spock has just come back to Vulcan after more than three years of travel with his parents. The three of them have become more distant, more typically Vulcan, during this time. This is most likely good, Stonn thinks. The most confusing adolescent years are behind Stonn, he tells himself, but he thinks that Spock's control seems to be even more erratic – the hybrid is the image of Vulcan emotionless perfection one moment, but confused and emotional the next. It is clear that his relationship with his father has become acutely tense, lately.
His relationship with everyone seems to be tense, in fact.
Spock has always been wary of the interest he evokes in other Vulcans. The outright xenophobia has lessened as the hybrid's talents has revealed himself - he is a statistical outlier in most fields: a mathematical genius, a celebrated musician. Yet all his successes, and his failures, are interpreted in light of his mixed blood. He is a genius, despite being a hybrid, they say. He is probably such a thought-provoking musician because of his human genes, they say. Exoticism.
It will be years before Stonn truly realizes exactly how deep wounds this constant scrutiny has left in his friend, and how utterly abandoned Spock perceived himself, when not even those closest to him were able to not see his genetics first.
Spock has many associates, a healthy social network, Stonn thinks now, as he guides their flyer down towards the blinking lights of ShiKahr. But lately the hybrid has begun examining it more closely - almost in a paranoid fashion, in Stonn's opinion. How many of them are only interested in him because of the notoriety of his birth? Is it his proofs and his theorems or his exoticness that draws them to him? He seems to be testing his associates, and several have already failed, their attempts at contact suddenly coldly rebuffed. Stonn thought he and T'Pring would be exempt, but this question makes him wonder.
There is only one answer, of course.
"No. You know I do not think you are suitable. Excellent colleagues and associates, but not mates."
"Because I do not desire her."
"Yes." He glances at the other. "Or she you."
"It will come. Or do you think that my blood makes me unable to go into pon farr?"
It is a crude question. Stonn dislikes being tested and answers in the same vein. "T'Pring certainly thinks so. Not that it seems to matter to her. I would not presume to know, but I do know that unlike every other young Vulcan I know, you view pon farr as something despicable and tainted. Something to be dreaded. You think your bondmate doesn't see that that's how you think of it? Of her?"
"Because I am not fully Vulcan." Spock's words are swirling, sharp-cut ter wohn discs.
"Possibly. And maybe your current behavior and attitude is also brought on by some strange alien chemicals in your blood. It would certainly make it easier to excuse."
"And how do you, Stonn, as a full Vulcan, view the issue of your pon farr, specifically when it comes to the matter of my bondmate?"
The discussion goes downhill from there.
Stonn is not surprised when Amanda tells him of the blistering argument between Spock and Sarek, or the fact that Spock leaves Vulcan without his father's permission (required by lore, but not by law) to join Starfleet. Like Sarek, he assumes that the proud, conflicted young man will return to Vulcan within a year or two. He will say nothing, he decides, when that happens. Will simply try to welcome Spock back. Spock's Surakisi clan might demand a tevyah ritual from him to mend fences, but Stonn is a southerner and quite capable of rising above such things. T'Pring maintains that all is well between her and Spock. She takes over management of his property.
If nothing else, Spock will have to come back for his pon farr, Stonn thinks. T'Pring and Spock, scions of their houses, a perfect political and intellectual match. Joined together in the most ancient, of Surakisi rituals. It will all but guarantee T'Pring a seat in the High Command and be the ultimate vindication of Sarek and Amanda's decision to have a hybrid child: no one will question Spock's Vulcanaity after that. T'Pring deserves that, has planned for it for years. Her desire are not relevant, she tells Stonn. It certainly is not relevant that he desires her.
He has said his piece, but she has made her choice, she has planned her future, and in the end he will of course support her, them, in this. Anything else would be dishonorable, one does not have to be Surakisi to know that.
Stonn only wishes ruins on those plans very late at night, when he runs the Forge alone.
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Author's note: Two more chapters to go, after this! Remember that Stonn is at least partly an unreliable narrator, with conflicting emotions, if you find his characterizations of Spock too harsh. What do you think of the chapter?
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