Chapter 3: Spock

S'chn T'gai Spock has identified as Vulcan for his entire life, genetics aside. He is Vulcan. He was born on Vulcan. He attends a Vulcan academy. He follows the Vulcan teachings. His father, too, is Vulcan, as is his brother. No one contests that fact. However, many other Vulcans - his classmates and teachers specifically - are under the impression that having a human mother makes him less than Vulcan.

Spock cannot find the logic in this.

Yes, his mother is human. She was born on Earth to human parents who raised her in ways befitting one of the many human cultures. She attended human schools. Her first language was a human one.

Spock can acknowledge that he is half human, genetically, because that is true, but that does not make him any less Vulcan. He was raised Vulcan.

That his classmates continue their attempts to garner emotional responses, pushing him by stretching truths and implying a lack of worth, after their initial attempt failed is illogical. It is also illogical that his teachers will meet his every success with the amendment that his functioning is somehow impaired by human genetics.

Bullying, his mother calls it. Discrimination. She faces it as well, but being fully human, overt acts of discrimination such that he faces at school are viewed as xenophobic, which is even more illogical.

Spock spends his childhood in an awkward gray area of not-Vulcan-not-human and subsequently spends a great deal of his non-academic time meditating in the mountains behind the estate. His father reprimands him every time he returns home for dinner.

Before Sybok left, he would spend the evenings teaching Spock how to wield his telepathy without needing touch as a medium. After he left, Spock continued to hone the skill by either looking for or warding off wild animals during his trips into the mountains. He only realized how proficient he had become when he accidentally felled a le-matya instead of just running it off.

This is why, when the bullying, as his mother calls it, turns physical and his classmates insult his mother, Spock reacts physically. He has the necessary control to hold onto his baser impulses, to restrain his emotions behind shields, but he is used to reacting telepathically when threatened. He knows that, should he react in the manner he is accustomed, his classmates will be grievously injured. Physically, however, Spock is ten and small, taking after his mother's more delicate bone structure than his father's at this point, and the worst damage he can do in a fight is minor bruises or lacerations.

The choice is logical.

He is suspended, pending expulsion. On the other hand, now that everyone is seemingly aware of his un-Vulcan-like reactions, they are content to leave him alone for the majority of the time. During his suspension, his father brings him along for a diplomatic journey to Earth. They spend two years there, which, while not unpleasant, are cold, damp, and crowded. Spock, used to the mountains and the quiet solitude he found there, would rather be back on Vulcan.

Interestingly, the humans find him far more Vulcan than his classmates ever did.

Despite how illogical it is, Spock finds himself longing for the independence he used to have while also enjoying the freer learning environment that comes with not living on Vulcan. He posits to his father that, since he is well ahead in his schooling, that he would be better served learning about other cultures first hand to aid in his future choice of applying to either the Vulcan Science Academy or Starfleet. His father agrees, stipulating that his mother must also agree, and that they will be returning to Vulcan before Spock sets out on his own.

His mother agrees. Grudgingly.

Spock is thirteen when he sets out for the first planet he plans on visiting. He spends six months there, returns to Vulcan for approximately ten days, and spends another six months at a different location. He spends three months at the next planet before moving on, not finding the environment agreeable, and spends the remaining three months recovering on Vulcan. While on Vulcan, he tests out of several advanced classes, not having fallen behind at all during his travels, and updates the books on his padd. He also takes the time to research how isolating a group from the parent culture can result in a shift. He informs his parents that he will be visiting several smaller colonies of cultures he has previously visited to see how they differ. By the time he's fifteen, he's the furthest he's ever been from home on a planet known only by its star and number: Tarsus IV.

It is a farming community with a small town at the center and an estimated average of ten thousand residents at any given time. The vast majority of people living there are families who plan to settle permanently on the colony world. The next largest population consists of transient and semi-transient scientists and college students. The remaining population is made up of the elderly first settlers and a reform school on the outskirts of the town that uses manual labor in the form of farm work to aid the underage students in resolving their delinquency problems. Approximately one percent of the total population is non-human.

Spock takes up residence in a small apartment within the town and spends most of his time studying the differences between those who live on farms and those who live in town. He notes that both groups look down on the reform school, but the farmers are slightly more lenient. He also takes note that the human population has an illogical habit of discriminating against the non-human population. It is not enough to be overtly antagonistic, but if a store owner is speaking to a human acquaintance, the conversation will often continue far longer when a non-human customer is waiting for assistance than when a human customer is waiting. The more human-passing the non-human is, the shorter the wait is. Spock, for instance, will receive assistance far sooner than the single Andorian family would.

For the first two weeks of his stay, Spock does not interact with the residents of the colony outside of daily basic needs and his studies. Then he comes across a boy who introduces himself as JT when he stops by the local clinic to ensure that the local doctors has information relevant to treating Vulcans. The boy is arguing with an older teen, an apprentice doctor by the look of things, about the necessity of "kicking that dick's ass, because he belongs in juvie, not a reform school," while the apprentice puts sutures in a large gash in the boy's arm.

This is not his last meeting with JT. Subsequent meetings result in JT punching someone much larger and older than both of them for making racist comments about Spock, before grabbing Spock's wrist and dragging the surprised Vulcan halfway across town by way of previously un-utilized back alleyways. After than encounter, they wind up in Spock's apartment more often than not, JT scouring Spock's old lessons and assignments like someone starved for information.

"The school teaches to the lowest common denominator," JT explains once while methodically working his way through astrophysics. "They don't have the resources for anything higher than Algebra, intro to Bio and Chem, and some basic composition classes."

Spock hears of the blight by way of the colony-wide announcement. His only semi-regular contact is JT, who is locked in the school five days of the week and spends the vast majority of his time getting into fights. He receives his ration card the same as everyone else.

Spock is half-human, half-Vulcan. He is the fifteen-year-old son of an ambassador. His records indicate that he has been traveling on his own for the past two years without any misdemeanors to his name. He does not cause trouble within the colony wither. He is healthy, but, as a full-time student, does not do anything to contribute to the community at large. His only known acquaintance attends the reform school. His ration card, when he receives it, is yellow.