August 2259
Jamie
"Hello, Captain Kirk!" the group of children greeted her. She couldn't help but smile at all the kids.
"Hello, all you small people," she replied. Jamie was in the school/daycare area to pick up Charlie and Joanna but it appeared that they were in the middle of something. Jamie watched for a while as all the kids finger painted.
"Want to paint with us?" A little girl that Jamie knew to be Lieutenants Wexler and Ramsey's six year old daughter asked her. There was no way she was going to turn down an invitation like that.
"I would love to, Sara. I've never really painted before so you kids gotta show me what to do," Jamie said.
She painted a bunch of pictures with the kids. Some of their parents were surprised to find the ship's XO covered in paint, laughing with the children when they came in. Jamie had so much fun. She didn't know who started it, but at some point, they were painting on each other. The teachers tried to stop the kids from painting on her uniform but she just laughed them off, "It's okay, the sonics get rid of worse messes than this." One of the teachers took a bunch of holos of Jamie covered in paint, it was on her uniform, her arms, legs and even her face but she had a huge smile. Those holos shot through the crew like wildfire, their first officer gained a whole new level of respect, especially from the kids' parents. They loved the fact that she remembered the smallest members of the crew.
Chris
"You three have fun?" Chris asked her, Charlie and Joanna as they entered the shared CO/XO quarters.
"We did Uncle Chris; you should come play with us, too," Joanna said.
He smiled at her, "Only if you promise to keep the paint to yourselves, Jo. Though, I think the orange and green looks good on ya." He saw the holos but looking at them in person, you would think that they got more paint on each other than the paintings. Jamie chuckled as she ushered the two kids towards the bathroom and into the sonic shower. After she got herself and the kids cleaned and settled in Charlie's room, she sat next to Chris on the couch.
"Is that what being a kid is 'posed to feel like?" Jamie asked. Chris thought about it for a second. He knew that even though she got to hang out with other kids her age on Tarsus, she didn't go to school like most of them and related more to the adults. She played chess and poker and never really did things like finger paint.
"I think so. I did stuff like that when I was younger," he told her. He couldn't stop himself from smiling at the look of childlike wonder that crossed her features, giving him him a glimpse of the childhood she should've had. Painting with her brother or playing baseball with their dad. She missed out on so much, sometimes Chris felt like he robbed her of her youth, too. "Do you ever wish that you married someone younger than me or waited until you were older?"
She looked at him, the shock was evident, "I never really thought about it in terms of age. Yes, you're fourteen years older than me but it never really registered. I mean, from that very first day, you were always just Chris. I was never really a kid, sometimes I feel like I'm older then you are. You didn't steal my youth, if that's what you're thinking. Frank and Kodos beat you to it." Jamie kissed his cheek, "It's sweet that you asked though."
Chris chuckled, "So, wanna tell me how you ended up covered in paint?"
A few days later, Lieutenant Wexler approached them in the galley, "May I have a moment, sir, ma'am?" Chris nodded at the lieutenant, who continued, "I just wanted to say thank you, ma'am. You made Sara's day. She hung that painting you gave her."
Jamie smiled, "I'm glad she had fun."
"You'll do it again, right, ma'am? Hang out with the kids?"
Jamie nodded, "I will. I had a blast, and more importantly, so did they."
Jamie
"This is the Apollo; it's registered to the USS Cortez. The plot thickens." Jamie was leading an away team on Darien 224 in search of a missing ship, the team had stumbled on a downed shuttle; it wasn't an answer but it was a clue. "Enterprise, come in. Enterprise, do you copy?" There was some kind of interference and she couldn't get through to the ship.
"There is a significant amount of atmospheric radiation on the planet. It may be the cause of our communications issue." Leave it to Spock to state the obvious.
"Since we're here, let's look around. Bones, gimme a boost," she told her friends. Bones grumbled but helped her climb up to access the hatch on the top side of the over turned shuttle.
"What are you looking for, Jim?" the southerner asked.
"Clues, Bonesy, clues," she answered. He rolled his eyes and moved away from the shuttle. Jamie was searching for any hints as to what happened when she heard a holler and a scuffle, she popped the hatch on the weapons locker and grabbed a phase rifle. She jumped up just in time to shoot the unknown assailant who was charging towards Spock and Bones.
"Nice shot, Jim." The doctor made his way over to Kingcome, the security officer was dead.
"Captain, we are not alone," Spock sounded worried and not just to her. Hendorff, Henderson, Bones and Shinobi all glanced at her, she was looking at Spock.
They were holding their own against the group of attackers that they couldn't see, all of a sudden the enemy assailants got blasted from nowhere.
The leader of this new group spoke in Vulcan, "You must come with me." Bones and the security teams looked at her and Spock.
"Stand down guys," Jamie ordered. They all followed the mysterious man. Why is it that every time they sent an away team somewhere, the shit hit the fan? Jamie did a visual scan of the area, it's a settlement of some kind. "What is this place?" She asked the man.
"The Last-of-all-Cities. I am taking you to our Matriarch," he told her.
Jamie looked at Spock, "Thoughts, Commander."
"This appears to be a pre-Surak settlement. These Vulcan are unlike any we have ever encountered, they have been here since before my people sought logical enlightenment." She nodded, that's what she was afraid of; logical Vulcans are one thing, illogical Vulcans can be dangerous. They were lead into a room where they were introduced to T'Kell, the Matriarch. With her was the Cortez's CO, Captain John Stone.
"Captain Stone, I'm Captain Jamie Kirk, XO of the Enterprise. Can you explain to us what's going on?" she asked the officer. The Enterprise had received orders to look for Stone and his crew after they had been missing for months. Jamie was only on the away team because Chris didn't want to go. T'Kell and Stone told the team about the Vulcans that had crash landed on Darien 224 over two thousand years ago and they've been isolated ever since. While the main colony is ready to rejoin the universe, however, there is a group of warriors that want to stay isolated. They even butchered most of Stone's crew.
"It's the hyper-weapons that's the problem," Stone said. Jamie looked at Spock who explained.
"Weapons of that kind have been outlawed on Vulcan since we chose to embrace logic. Captain, I am concerned that given their lack of emotional control, if these Vulcans joined our colony, it could destabilize New Vulcan," her friend said.
"Are you suggesting that we aren't good enough to rejoin our own kind?" Sutek, the Vulcan who saved them, interrupted, "And what is New Vulcan?" Jamie explained the Narada incident to the Vulcan.
"It was… there are no words. I'm sure you all had a feeling of great loss last year. That was the planet being destroyed. Spock isn't saying that you aren't good enough. You must understand, what's left of the Vulcan people is still in a state of shock. Most of the survivors lost everything and everyone that they have ever known. Many of their bonds were ripped apart. I'm not even Vulcan and I felt it." Jamie hadn't thought about it at the time, but later, she and Amanda had come to the conclusion that it was her closeness to Spock. What happened was so catastrophic that it carried across even the lightest bonds and Selak had confirmed that they did have a bond.
She could see that Sutek was still infuriated by Spock and the state of the Vulcan people, but he chose to let the argument go. Bones came over from where he was speaking with some of the other Vulcans, they had managed to make contact with the ship. "Jim, the Enterprise is under attack."
Chris
"Sir, they're preparing to fire. I've never seen this kind of weapon before," Sulu notified him from the helm. Uhura had managed to contact the away team for only a moment, long enough to confirm that they weren't all dead and to notify them that they were under attack. The Cortez fired and almost instantly, multiple systems went down and the shields failed.
"We have a boarding party on the ship, sir. They appear to be Vulcan," Uhura told him.
"Understood, Lieutenant." Chris didn't like this, they were being attacked by the very Starfleet vessel that they were sent to find. "Mister Chekov, disable the frequency modulator for the Cortez's shields. As soon as they're offline, Mister Sulu, fire photon torpedoes."
His orders were followed perfectly and it worked. Sulu hit the artificial gravity generator when he fired and the Cortez stopped all aggression. Chris ordered repairs to begin, the boarding party issue was being handled by security and the kids were safe, Chris couldn't end the school's lockdown if he wanted to. The way Jamie set it up, it took three senior staff officers, only one of them could be the parent of any of the children; that way Chris, Jamie and McCoy couldn't lift the lockdown themselves.
"Get me status reports."
Leonard
"Sensors indicate that the Enterprise has survived it's engagement with the Cortez," Sutek notified them, Leonard still didn't want to be here.
"Does that mean we can get the hell outta here?" he asked the Vulcan.
Sutek shook his head, "Not with Darien's atmosphere. You will have to wait."
"Well that's just great. I blame you for this, Jim. 'It'll be fun, Bonesy. It's a mystery.' Last time I fall for that." Jim just smiled. He wanted to wipe that look off her face.
"Ya done, doc?" she asked.
He rolled his eyes, "Yea. I'm done."
"Do you allow all of your people to speak with you in that manner?" T'Kell asked her.
Jim shook her head, "No. He's my best friend so he gets a bit more leeway than most people. Besides, I know he's just worried about the children on the ship." Leonard was glad she didn't specify that they were parents, he didn't like these Vulcans. T'Kell and Sutek looked at their team.
"Why would you have children on a warship?" T'Kell asked Jim.
"The Enterprise is an exploration vessel. We have the means to defend ourselves, however, we are not on a mission to wage war," Spock explained. His answer seemed to anger Sutek.
"You mean to tell me that you have all of this advanced technology and you do not use it for battle. What kind of Vulcan are you? You follow this… human child around like you are her slave." Hendorff and Shinobi stood closer to Spock while Leonard and Henderson stood with Jim. Spock was getting angry.
"You will cease your disrespect towards my T'hy'la. You do not wish to experience what happens if you do not," the half-Vulcan growled. Leonard had no clue what that term meant but Sutek must have because he flushed green and apologized to Jim.
"What is a Ty hay lay?" he whispered to Jim, Leonard had to ask. She smiled and whispered to him that it basically meant she was Spock's family. He was sure that there was much more to it, he'll ask later.
Chris
"Five dead, twenty-nine injured, sir." Nurse Chapel was McCoy's favorite nurse, even though they had other doctors on the ship, McCoy left her in charge of sickbay. She was damn good at her job and a pro at wrangling Jamie in sickbay.
"Thank you, Chapel. Mister Scott?" Chris looked at the engineer.
"Ships circuits took one hellava hit by that bloody Vulcan weapon. Shields were spared the worst but we cannae survive another attack like that. We can reroute all power to shields and sensors. Don't wanna be sittin' ducks next time they attack but it'll be close until I can put our lass back together." Chris gave him the okay and ordered that they continue repairs, they had no contact with Jamie's team but he knew that she'd do whatever was necessary to keep her team alive and get back to the ship.
Jamie
"I do not trust them, Jamison," her friend whispered. She couldn't agree with Spock more. They were given rooms to wait in, but they decided to stick together. Jamie had an uneasy feeling about the people in the colony, it's like these Vulcans were just waiting on something.
"I suspect that T'Kell plans to go to New Vulcan with telepathic weapons as conquerors," she said. The other officers looked at them, Shinobi spoke up.
"Ma'am, that would mean…" he trailed off and a look of horror crossed the security officer's features. "Oh God." Yea, telepathic weapons was a way to attack without even getting close, it was going to be bad. Before anyone else could speak up, Sutek showed up to take them to T'Kell.
T'Kell was standing near a large structure, "It is called the Tabernacle of Sharp Conflict. There are many weapons inside of it, most of them bladed and bloody. The weapon of most importance is the Vorl-tak. It's a psionic weapon." Spock was right, telepathic weapons were not good. "Here is what is going to happen, Captain Kirk, you are going to fly your shuttle back to your ship and make arrangements for the relocation of the colony. While en route you will also act as bait for the Cortez, drawing it into our sights. The Vorl-tak will harness the planet's gravitational field as a psionic amplifier and destroy the Vulcans on the ship."
"You could destroy this planet. You would be better served turning the weapon into an impulse engine. There is no need to resort to genocide," Spock told the woman. He was right but Sutek hit him anyway, he continued his assault but Spock didn't strike back.
"Stop," Jamie yelled before she jumped into the fray. If Spock doesn't want to fight back, she was more then happy to. She landed some good hits but the phasers pointed at her team, stopped her cold. "Fine, I'll do as you ask, just leave them alone and keep him away from Spock."
Chris
"Sir, I have Kirk on comm," Uhura called from her station.
"Open the channel, Uhura. Kirk?"
"Man, am I glad to hear your voice, sir. I'm in the Columbus and the Cortez is on my ass," Jamie told him. Sure enough, she was in the shuttle and on her way back but she under attack by the Cortez.
"Helm, move to intercept. Keep me updated on the Cortez's weapon status." After a few minutes and some fancy flying, the bridge was notified that Jamie had docked. She ran onto the Bridge.
"My team?" she asked Uhura.
"Nothing ma'am," the communications officer told her. After Jamie filled him in, Chris made a decision.
"Sulu, take us into the planet's atmosphere. We'll beam them up, Stone too. As soon as they're on-board, Kirk, you get those injuries checked out."
"You're worse than Bones, sometimes," she muttered under her breath.
Spock
He had attempted to sway T'Kell's mind but her passion was too great to be overcome by his logic. At the end, she told him to remember the Vulcans on Darien. Spock had hoped to spare them but they were determined to their course of action and paid for it with their lives, their weapon destroyed the planet.
"Are you okay?" Spock must have lost himself in his thoughts that he did not hear Nyota enter his quarters.
"I am… I am okay, Nyota. It was an interesting experience. They were my people, however, they were not. I am unsure what to do with this feeling of confusion and failure." She slid her hands around his waist and rested her head on his back.
"This isn't your fault, Kirk said they refused to listen to you. You tried, that is all anyone could've asked of you. Sometimes, it doesn't matter what we do, or how hard we try to save someone. They have to want to be saved."