Sarek arrived at his living accommodations just before daybreak on Saturday. Were he not still damp from the night before, he might have remained at the consulate. There were a number of communiqués he still needed to dispatch to Vulcan and still others he needed to read.

This day was different however. Today was Kal Rekk, a day reserved by Vulcans as a time of solitude and reflection. None of his Vulcan staff members would be at the consulate, nor would anyone on Vulcan be there to receive any messages or transmissions he sent. Most followers of Surak's teachings would have risen before dawn to eat a light meal with their families and before retiring to individual rooms before the sun rose over Vulcan. They would spend the day meditating, seeking penance for transgressions committed during the course of the Vulcan year.

He'd been on Earth for forty-seven days and during that time he had neglected to meditate regularly. Meditation was so essential to preserving the vigilant control over his thoughts and emotions, but his mind had been active for so long that he sensed it was beginning to fray at the edges. Just as he could not go indefinitely without food or sleep, neither could he go without meditation.

He entered his bedroom and peeled off his wet overcoat, folding it neatly and placing it in a basket to be laundered. He did likewise with his shirt. He observed his reflection in the mirror next to his wardrobe, noting that his frame had thinned modestly. As he finished undressing, he commenced processing the events of the previous night into a logical summary in his head. He sensed he was overlooking some significant detail.

He had been recording his official log of the day's activities for his monthly transmission to the Vulcan High Council when the power faded briefly. He had exited his office to locate a possible explanation for the problem and from his vantage point noticed the door to the lobby of the Vulcan consulate was open. His staff was usually gone before 2200 and secured the door, knowing he would often depart between midnight and 0100.

He had attempted to call the night watchman in the building from the console on Metana's desk and heard static. He had proceeded to attempt to reach both the courtesy patrol and the control desk for the consulate complex and also was met with failed communication links. Based on his understanding of the building's power systems, circuitry, and communication network, it seemed unlikely to be an operational glitch. In the absence of other logical explanations, sabotage seemed most probable.

He had emerged into the hallway to identify the extent of the problem, and no sooner had he done so than the heavy doors slid shut behind him, most likely due to a failure in the sensor. He had been inept to leave his office without his PADD or access card, and was reduced to searching the building for other occupants. He found none, and it had taken him 20 minutes to locate the only functional exit, which led into the contained central square of the consulate offices. He noted that the entire complex seemed to be suffering from the same rotating power failures when he had spied the lone figure running across the square through the storm.

It had been Amanda Grayson. Miss Grayson…

His thoughts snapped back to the present and he finished dressing into loose, dry robes and contemplated his next actions. He would observe Kal Rekk. He opened the wardrobe and retrieved additional candles and a mat and began assembling the correct dais on the wall opposite the window.

After forty years in the Vulcan Diplomatic Service, he had spent many holidays and observances alone, yet aside from his brother Silek, he was truly alone for the first time in his life: no wife, no children, no parents, and a brother with whom he had not spoken in 9 years. During his studies at the Vulcan Science Academy, he had given serious consideration to attaining kolinahr and purging himself of all vestigial emotion. He had even begun working with a master when he had received his first appointment as attaché under Ambassador Selden. He had reasoned that if he were to live among humans and attempt to understand them, being completely devoid of emotion would be a hindrance to that particular aspiration.

The smell of the dusky pillar candles slowly wafted through the air and he inhaled deeply. He glanced down, noticing that he stood on the approximate site where they had discovered Ambassador Sulak's body.

The woman responsible for administration of diplomatic lodging had asked if he would prefer different quarters based on that fact. He knew the human fear of death had significant roots in the irrational belief in ghosts and evil spirits. It was regrettable that Sulak's katra had extinguished here, but the idea that some ephemeral part of his being would remain to torment visitors to the site of his death was illogical even by human standards.

These quarters had housed the Vulcan ambassador since the Vulcan Consulate moved from the Sausalito compound twenty-four years ago to join the rest of the Federation embassies in the heart of San Francisco. He did not think it necessary to abandon the residence to satisfy human superstition.

He spread the prayer mat across the floor and flicked the knob on the handle of the luminere and began to light the candles, seventeen in all. As his fingers worked, he started calming his mind and breathing deeply. It often took him at least an hour to achieve a perfect meditative state. He hit the switch on the wall to close the opaque shutters over the window and knelt on the mat; he closed his eyes and formed his hands into a steeple.

Through his eyelids he could discern the flicker of the flames dancing and as his mind eased into tranquility, they coalesced into a nameless, shapeless form. His breathing slowed, his heart slowed, and lightness came over his body. It would take half the day to achieve the perfect balance between consciousness and clarity that would enable him to begin atonement in the tradition of Kal Rekk.

After an hour, a familiar sensation of simultaneous numbness and awareness crept into his consciousness, but there was something else also. There was an earthy taste in the back of his mouth, and upon noticing it he rapidly ascended from his meditative state. He opened his eyes and stared at the candles. His stomach growled impatiently, and he was acutely aware of the taste in his mouth. It was like t'hgara tea, familiar, though somewhat different.

Had his mind really become so undisciplined that minor hunger pangs could interrupt his meditative efforts? He swallowed, took three deep breaths, closed his eyes and began again, finding it difficult to escape the unfamiliar but pleasant taste in his mouth.

"So why'd you come beating down my door at this awful hour?" Vera asked, scratching her head and yawning.

"It's ten in the morning," Amanda sneered, holding up her PADD and noting the time on the face.

She was sitting in Vera's apartment helping her fold piles of laundry dumped unceremoniously on the coffee table. Vera peered out her blinds and hissed at the rays streaming into the room. Her hair was the most natural color Amanda had ever seen it: a deep blue so dark that it was essentially black.

"Are you still wanting to go out and do something today? I mean, my plans for tonight fell through," Vera said, shrugging and moving away from the window.

"Glad to know I'm your backup plan," Amanda teased. "But actually, I'm going to the hanging gardens tomorrow."

"Ok, that sounds fine. I'm not getting up before noon though."

"Um, I'm actually already going with someone else. That's what I came to talk to you about."

"Do you have a date?" Vera grinned wolfishly.

"I don't think so, but I'm not really sure."

"You're not sure if you have a date?" Vera asked, moving over to the clothes and sifting through them.

"I think I might have asked the Vulcan ambassador to Earth out on a date, yes."

Vera froze, locking eyes with Amanda and raising her eyebrows as another deep smile spread across her face.

"'I think I might have?' You say it like it was an accident," she laughed. "How'd that happen?"

"I don't know," Amanda wailed, throwing down Vera's shirt into the pile, which she could almost swear doubled in size every time she folded a garment. "We got locked out of the building last night and ended up in my classroom. We were talking about the hanging gardens, and how I was planning on going this weekend and I told him he should visit them too, but words just sort of fell out of my mouth into a stupid jumble. I didn't mean with me, but that's how he took it."

"But you don't want to go with him?" Vera murmured, holding up a sheer bra to her chest and looking in the mirror.

"Well, I guess he's not a bad person or anything, I just don't want to make things weird at work. I'm not sure if there's even a policy on dating at the embassies. I'm not rushing to date anyone right now either, and let's be honest, he's not exactly my type."

"What is your type?"

"Well, I don't know. But he's not it. He's impossible to read and he intimidates the hell out of me."

"Are you sure it is a date then?" Vera asked as she picked up a pair of matching underwear to the bra she was clutching in her other hand. "Maybe he just thought you were being friendly."

"Maybe. But what if he thinks it's a date? Does that mean he wants to date me? Do Vulcans even date? That doesn't seem like something Vulcans would do. I mean, obviously they- well, you know. Never mind. I just wish there were some way out of this."

"If you don't want to go, then don't go. Tell him you're sick. Tell him your grandma died. I've killed mine off half a dozen times to get out of dates."

"I can't lie to him. I already feel like he scrapes the bottom of my psyche every time he looks at me. It's like he knows what I'm thinking."

"Well then go with the truth. Tell him you changed your mind."

"I can't do that. That would be rude. And Vulcans are so formal."

"Is he cute? Do you like him?" Vera blurted, staring fiercely at her.

"I just told you that he's intimidating," Amanda reminded her.

"That's what happens when you're attracted to someone you barely know. They intimidate you. You second-guess yourself. You don't know what to do with your hands. Your voice jumps an octave. Dumb things come out of your mouth, like, 'Hi, my name is Um…' or in your case, 'Mr. Ambassador, date me please!'"

"That is not how it happened. I mean, he's intelligent, and…," Amanda paused, considering Sarek romantically for the first time and feeling color rise in her cheeks.

"You do! You like him," Vera quipped accusingly. "Amanda and- wait, what's his name?"

"Sarek."

"Amanda and Sarek, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-"

"What are you, five years old? Shut up!" Amanda snapped, throwing a pair of folded socks at her and missing by nearly a meter.

"So what, Amanda? I'm the last person to judge anyone for their dating choices."

"By the way, I've met lots of people that I had zero attraction to who also made me nervous," Amanda argued. "You would know that if you had ever been to one of my mother's garden parties. They're nothing but a bunch of stuffy old people who are made of nothing but excess money and judgment."

"Deny it all you want," Vera said, clicking her tongue and reaching into the piles of clothes to locate her PADD.

Amanda reached for another shirt and watched Vera's fingers nimbly trace back and forth across the touch screen of her PADD from the corner of her eye.

"I actually thought you were going to help me fold some of this for a second," Amanda scoffed.

Vera held up a finger and said, "This is important."

"What are you doing?"

"I'm looking him up."

"You can't do that!" Amanda yelped, jumping up from the couch and racing to grab the PADD from Vera's hand.

Vera held it out of her reach and scowled playfully. "Why not?"

"Because- because, you know?" Amanda stammered.

"What, you think he's going to know? Like he's watching us?"

"No…" Amanda said. "It's just- it's weird."

She couldn't understand why she felt so uncomfortable even looking at his biography on the online embassy database. Vera clicked through a few links and then there he was, a stern picture surrounded by Vulcan script.

"That's him?" Vera asked, her eyes scanning the image.

"Yeah."

"He's not ugly," she shrugged. "Can you read any of this?"

"Click there: it will translate," Amanda said, motioning to a small icon on the right hand side of the screen.

Vera complied and a short entry about the Vulcan ambassador appeared. Amanda read over Vera's shoulder as she scrolled.

"He negotiated the Interstellar Comprehensive Trade Act in 2192?" Vera asked incredulously. "So you're into older men."

"Vulcans do have longer lifespans than humans," Amanda replied, realizing it wasn't something she had ever thought about before.

"And by older, I mean even if he was only 12 when he did that, he'd be the same age as my grandpa," Vera cackled.

Amanda sighed and braced herself for a round of ridicule. Her cheeks were hot and she had a strange twisting feeling in her stomach. Vera looked at her suspiciously.

"You do like him," Vera declared.

"I don't," Amanda insisted.

"Sure you do. You know why? Because you're digitally stalking him," Vera answered, holding up her PADD and grinning widely enough to show her back molars. "Only obsessed people do that."

"You're the one who started this," Amanda protested.

"Sure, but who's reading along over my shoulder?" Amanda rolled her eyes and was about to say something petty, but decided against it and flopped back down on the couch, shaking her head.

"Have you ever been on a date someone from Vulcan?" she asked after a moment, hopeful her friend had some insight.

"Ha! No, they're a pretty uptight crowd. And so moral," she said, placing disdainful emphasis on the last word as she clicked her PADD off. "Where do you even go to meet one? I've never seen one in a bar or at a club. Besides, what would a Vulcan pickup line even sound like?"

"Exactly. He'sso... proper, and I don't know much about Vulcan culture. The whole time he was over at my place, I was terrified I would say or do something wrong. It was like being in an interrogation room where no one asks questions; you're just left to squirm until you confess to doing something you've never done."

"Yeah, I can see that," Vera said, moving to the kitchen. "Intercultural relations and all. You fart in front of him and then you have the awkward responsibility of spending the next however many years avoiding him at the embassy. I would be a real interplanetary incident."

Amanda began laughing and couldn't stop. She soon had tears rolling down her cheeks and even Vera started giggling.

"See, this is the problem," Amanda said, hiccupping for air and trying to compose herself. "They don't have emotions. Or if they do they don't show them. They don't smile, frown, or even smirk. It's like they have no muscles in their faces. And I laugh all the time. I imagine that to them it's about as taboo as walking around naked."

"Look, Amanda," Vera said, pausing to consider her choice of words. "You're not dumb. You're beautiful and way more articulate than me. Than I? Me?" she paused, reflecting over her grammar. "Whatever, anyway, be yourself, you know? It's not your responsibility to change who you are just because you think that's what he expects. If this is a date, he accepted because he likes you for you. He's obviously aware that you're human. Even if it isn't a date, he agreed to spend time with you and thinks you're at least capable of getting through the day without doing something outrageous like randomly screaming obscenities or publicly urinating in potted plants."

"Is that what your dates can expect?" Amanda snorted, bursting into another fit of giggles. "Honestly, where do you come up with this stuff?"

"I don't know," Vera mused. "See, I'm always saying weird stuff. It could always be worse, because he could be going out with me. Bottom line is, do you think he's worried about how you might see him right now? I doubt it. Fact is, he's probably old enough to be your great-grandpa and also probably thinks prime numbers are sexy. We're all a little weird. It just depends on your frame of reference. The Denobulan I dated- well, the one before the last one, he had this obsession with licking-"

"Stop," Amanda cried holding up her hand and imagining it would be easier to avoid having a mental image altogether than it would be to get rid of it.

"You get what I'm saying though, right?"

She did. Actually, Vera made a lot of sense. Anxiety went both ways. But did Vulcans even feel anxiety? "I do, and you're right. I think I'm going to read up on Vulcan culture though."

"You're the only person I've ever met who studied for a date," Vera teased, emerging from the kitchen.

"It's not studying, and it's not a date."

"Ok then, you're researching for your rendezvous."

"Are you going to just let me fold all of your laundry or are you going to help?" Amanda asked, changing the subject.

"Hey, you're the one who came over here. I didn't even ask you to fold my clothes; you just started doing it," Vera said, sinking down next to Amanda and turning on her small holo projector.

…no word from the coroner about cause of death.

Amanda looked up from Vera's laundry to the hologram projector. There was a breaking news story in progress. She listened intently to the news anchor announce the death of Starfleet Chief of Staff Admiral Jason Winters. He died in his home the previous evening and had been discovered by his wife and children earlier that morning. Vera looked over at Amanda watching the news intently and started listening to it as well.

"Did you know that guy?" she asked, gesturing to the screen.

"No, but I know his replacement," Amanda answered slowly, watching Admiral Maxwell Bentham come to a podium at a press conference and begin making a statement.

She felt a strange tugging in her stomach, understanding that something was wrong but unsure of how or why. Max Bentham would be heading Starfleet temporarily until a suitable replacement was found. He was certainly qualified, but still… there was something unsettling about him. She recalled his pushy interrogation over breakfast at the conference and the conversation she'd heard through the door of John's hotel room.

She sighed and put it from her mind. It was easy to get carried away with thinking about conspiracy theories. For some reason, news of Admiral Winters' death made her think of her father and the cryptic message she had received the day before. She picked up her PADD from the arm of the sofa and tried reaching him again. There was nothing on the line but static.