K'oh-nar

by AlexPrime

Somewhere, hidden on this desolate planet of ice and snow, a lost civilization reaches out to the only one capable of reaching back, and Spock discovers that first contact can have lasting, devastating consequences. He never should have come here.

10. Meskarau

— Chapter Ten—
— Meskarau —

For a long moment, all Spock could do was stare.

Jim.

He couldn't think, he couldn't move, he couldn't breathe. His lungs felt frozen, his limbs stiff, his eyes unblinking. Everything was heavy; sluggish and hazy, as if it had been hopelessly muddled before it ever reached him. He could hear his pulse thrumming loud in his ear, could hear the low moaning of distant wind, and all of it felt real, but by now he knew better than to trust his senses. They had already betrayed him in ways he'd not imagined possible, and it was more likely than not that they were betraying him again now. His consciousness had been hijacked; taken from him and twisted to feel and experience what was not real. There was a high probability that this was not real either.

But Jim was still there.

The captain was watching him with open concern as he hovered above him, eyes bright even in the dim light of the room. He looked real. He sounded real. But then, everything else had too; it had all felt real, over and over again, until that forced reality was the only one remaining. This was… just another memory. Just another memory that he had been made to observe and participate in. Not real, not true.

James Kirk was not here, now, in front of him. His captain had not come, and Spock had been left alone; left behind, left to die on an already dead planet. This vision of his friend would disappear, just as certainly as the rest of them had. Inevitably, he would see Jim die by his hands on Vulcan, and he would mourn and break all over again. And again, and again…

But Jim did not die. Jim was still there.

There was a crushing, suffocating pressure in his chest as some fragile sliver of doubt crept in. His vision swam, blurring as his eyes stung. Spock could not stop staring, afraid to so much as blink for fear of Jim disappearing, as he surely would. Because this wasn't real, and his captain was not there. Any movement, any action, any thought could trigger another memory, and then he'd be somewhere else, feeling something new, without any choice otherwise. Worse, it could trigger Jim hanging lifelessly from his hands, and Spock did not think he could take that again, not after so many times already. Please, not again. Please stop this. It was useless to beg; they were not going to listen to him. They did not understand words, or begging, or the emotions that drove him to do it, but there was nothing left he could do. They had taken everything else from him already.

The only thing he had, if it could even be called his at all, was this vision of Jim. Breathing, smiling, and vibrantly alive. They would certainly take this from him too, and Spock hesitated to move in case doing so might spur them on faster.

But… Jim was still there.

"… Captain?" His voice was barely audible, little more than a croak of sound from cracked, bleeding lips. He waited, exhausted and so, so tired, for Jim to die again, as he had so many times before. It did not come; the scene didn't change. There was no sandy arena, there was no limp weight dangling from his grip, there was no creeping shock of grief. There was only his captain, worried and smiling that wide, warm smile at him.

"I'm still here," Jim reassured him softly. "I'm not going anywhere, I promise. I'm right here, but I need you to breathe, Spock. It's alright, I'm not leaving, just breathe…"

This… was not a memory; this hadn't happened before, because he did not recognize it. Not a memory, not a vision, not in his head, and not something that could be taken away.

Real.

The captain was real. He was here; he'd come for him.

All at once, his burning lungs began to work. A shuddering wheeze rasped from him, and Spock realized he'd been holding his breath, only just now recognizing the intense ache as deprivation. The betrayal of his own body behaving in ways that he normally could—and should—control would have been humiliating, but the first choke of air was relieving enough to soften the shame. It hurt to inhale; his chest throbbed and spasmed with every cough. Deep, ragged gasps were dragged into his throat, his lungs, his chest, and exhaled heavily, shakily. It burned. It felt as if he were being constricted. And yet, Jim had told him to keep breathing and so he did. There was nothing—nothing—Jim could ask of him in this moment that he would not comply with, because his captain had come for him after all.

That crushing in his chest eased some as he took a ragged breath, and then another, but the stinging in his eyes did not. It only got worse, until he had to blink rapidly to prevent the moisture gathering there from falling.

"Jim." It was a word, a name, a supplication. Even forming the name, with vocal cords that belonged to him, felt dizzyingly good. Spock would have said it again, just to hear the sound aloud with ears that were his own, and even again after that, but his throat felt too choked to do anything else but rasp in the next breath. He had to breathe; his captain had ordered it.

Relief struck him like a physical blow, stuttering his next exhale into something heavier. Staggering, overwhelming relief that made some weighted, heavy kind of noise wrench from his chest. He wasn't alone; Jim had come for him. This wasn't something the Seskille could take from him, because it was not in his head. It was real. Jim had found him.

"Easy. Take it slow, that's it, that's good. Keep breathing. Now this is important, Spock. I need you to do something for me, alright?" Absurd. The captain needn't have asked for his approval; Spock thought that he would do anything for Jim right now, anything at all. "I need you to stay awake. Eyes open, breath slow and steady, like you are right now. I know you're tired, Spock, but I can't let you sleep yet. Not until Bones gives the okay. He'll be here in a minute; he was right behind me, but he got slowed by the snow. Right now, I want you to just focus on me."

The instruction was entirely unnecessary, almost ridiculously so, because Spock could do nothing but focus on Jim. In fact, he did not think he could have shifted his attention away even if he wanted to.

As it was, he did not want to. No, he wanted to soak in the sight of his captain and to never stop looking at him. His very alive captain, who stared back at him with that familiar expression of steely resolve and barely concealed distress. His hazel eyes were bright with it, for all that he overlaid the majority of his unease with practiced smiles and confidence. Fear had only ever served to sharpen the captain's determination into something dangerous, rather than dull or weaken him. Jim was clearly worried, and so he disguised it with sheer, unfaltering persistence. As if the act of merely deciding that something was no longer a problem would somehow cease it to be one.

Someone was saying his name…

When he blinked, the captain was considerably closer, and Spock had no memory of him moving. The captain was right: he was tired. So tired; more exhausted than he could ever recall weighed him down into the stone, pulling at every muscle. His eyes threatened to close again, but he'd been given a very specific order and he would be a poor first officer to disobey such a simple command. So, Spock did just as he'd been instructed: he kept his eyes open, he kept his breath even, and he kept his focus on Jim.

"... Safe?" he asked, doing his best to examine Jim from his position. The sensation of the word was grating in his throat, which he found to be sore and raw. Spock had vague, hazy recollections of screaming, but he did not know for how long. Or, for that matter, how long he had been unconscious. It could have been minutes; it could have been hours. The Seskille did not know such concepts as time, and they afforded him no such considerations either.

"That's right, you're safe now," the captain tried to assure him, but that was not what Spock had been asking. Quite the opposite. He shook his head; a sluggish side-to-side flop that pounded at his skull, but it had the desire effect of making Jim pause. His eyebrows shot up as he realized. "Am I—Spock, I'm not the one you should be concerned about! You, on the other hand..." Jim trailed off, and Spock didn't need to see what his own injuries looked like to guess at them. The captain's expression, grave and nauseous, informed him well enough on it. Jim's eyes had tightened, that distress a little less hidden when he took in extent of the damage. "…I'm alright, Spock. I'm safe too. I don't want you to worry about me."

An unreasonable, illogical request. That was all Spock ever did.

Jim didn't look injured, from what little of the captain that he could see from his vantage point on the ground. His face was a little too pale and his lips a little too blue—from the temperature no doubt—but he didn't appear to be bleeding or hurt. There were no obvious abrasions or bruising, no signs of red on the… blue coat?

Spock's awareness of the rest of the world came trickling in now that he'd been assured of the captain's health. For the first time, Spock noticed exactly what his captain was wearing. A black hat covered most of his head, which made sense, and the rest of him huddled into a heavy science-blue winter coat, which did not. It seemed too big for him; it sat on his shoulders awkwardly and looked more than a little out of place, both in fit and in color. Blue. Was he not supposed to be wearing gold?

The overwhelming blur of his surroundings made thinking difficult, and everything else seemed too loud; too dizzying. He was aware of Jim, the clothing he wore, the dim lighting of the small room, the faint pressure of gloved hands on his arm. Spock saw that he was lying on his back, hunched and curled into the tightest corner he'd been able to find. No doubt a desperate attempt to protect his body from further harm, even if his mind had been a lost cause. It did not seem to have done much; his head pounded, his body ached, his side throbbed. Every centimeter of his skin felt bruised and swollen. He felt sick; undignified.

Vulnerable.

Spock shifted what little he could, heedless of the captain's gentle protests, and tried to lift himself up to at least his elbows so that he might be able to lean against the wall in a manner more presentable. Some grasp at preserving any lingering shred of dignity that might still remain. He didn't manage to lift even his head and knew instantly that it had been a mistake to try. The movement spotted his vision with black; the room tunneled from him. Spock's attention wavered, not shifting from Jim so much as starting to fall away from everything entirely.

A terrifyingly familiar pressure battered his mind, one he could not hope to fight off this time. He could feel his eyes rolling backward. No. No, he needed to stay conscious. He needed to—

"—do this again sometime," Mattias said with an easy smile. He shifted closer; close enough that Spock could feel the radiating heat of his higher body temperature. The other cadet's arm pressed to his own, separated only by his thin jacket and Spock's much thicker one. Admittedly, the warmth against him was pleasant on its own; the San Francisco air was far colder than he was used to on Vulcan, and he'd felt chilled for hours now. However, it was only present as a result of close physical contact, and that lessened his enjoyment of it considerably.

"Indeed," Spock replied, taking a small and polite step to the side to create some space between them. "The meal was satisfactory and expertly prepared. Your choice of locations was well thought, Mattias."

Mattias closed that newly formed distance as if he'd been challenged to do so, pressing to his side once more. Spock raised a brow, puzzled and more than slightly uncomfortable. His peer had been making increased amounts of physical contact during the walk home, and he was not certain how to verbally express his aversion for such a close proximity. Humans, he now knew, often struggled to take such comments objectively and without defensive emotions surfacing. It had not been an objectionable evening thus far; Spock did not want to be the cause of its deterioration by saying something that might trigger a confrontation. However, he also did not know what phrasing might explain his discomfort in a clear, concise, sensitive manner.

"Matty. My friends call me Matty." The cadet leaned up, so near now that his breath misted over Spock's cheek. "Although, I was sort of hoping we could be something other than friends, you know?"

He did not know. In fact, could not even begin to guess at the presumed answer. Spock stiffened, fingers clenching and unclenching into loose fists. He felt unsettled, he felt nervous, he felt lost. There was an implication there that he was missing; an allusion or inference present in the other cadet's tone of voice. Some kind of context in the starkly emphasized word that a human would likely have understood, but that Spock had not. He wished, desperately, that humans would say what it was they actually meant, rather than speak in half-truths and abstract subtleties that made little verbal or logical sense.

"Something such as… classmates?" Spock tried resignedly, knowing that he had undoubtedly gotten it wrong. Such was proven when Mattias—when Matty started to laugh.

"Yeah," he said, physically shaking his head in a way that did not correspond with his verbal words of agreement. Such an action was typically meant to be taken as a gesture indicative of a negative response, and yet Mattias was not disagreeing vocally. Spock felt, all at once, exhausted with the conversation and with trying to follow it. "Yeah, sure, we can be classmates."

Spock did not understand, not at first. Not until the cadet was there, rapidly closing the remaining distance between them and leaning up. There was a brush of lips against his own and Spock flinched away as if he'd been struck. He was immediately dismayed; appalled at how truly misconstrued this evening had apparently been. Spock must have missed some inference, either during dinner or afterwards, to have mistakenly indicated a willingness to engage in human intimacy. That was not the case, and he wanted no part in it.

He opened his mouth to inform Mattias of exactly that, gently and firmly, when hands cupped his jaw. The touch felt so invasive that the words—

—caught in his throat. Couldn't breathe. Everything went so quiet, fingers numbing and slipping as he lowered the body—not Jim, not Jim—to the—

—room was frequently empty, as Spock knew from his careful monitoring of it. The crew often preferred the more populated recreational areas to socialize in, and this was not an ideal spot for such engagement. Not located in a traversed-enough hallway so as to encourage frequent visitors, the odds were high for the room to be vacant.

It was for that very reason, that being the solitude, that this particular observation deck made an appealing destination for an upset starship captain to brood in. Time away from his crew to privately reflect on any number of issues, and to stew on them without an audience. A mission gone poorly, unfavorable information, a loss of life, emotional turmoil; all could be felt and vented with only the passing stars as a witness. It had only taken losing track of a distressed Jim in the ship a few times before Spock had quickly learned to include the checking of this observation deck in each and every post-mission route. He'd been proven right, more times than not, to do so.

The captain wanted to be alone with his emotions, a desire that he might have normally respected. However, Spock also knew that what Jim wanted and what Jim needed were very different things. He wanted to be left alone, so that he could privately spiral through his worries and presumed failures. He needed company, so that he did not drown and become trapped in them entirely. Spock could not take the pain of Jim's distress away, as much as he would have been glad to do so, but he could ensure the captain wasn't suffering or struggling by himself.

The captain was there, as Spock had suspected he might be.

But he was not alone.

Spock halted immediately, the captain's name dying on his lips before he could even fully form the word. Some nameless kind of hurt rose up like bile; an ache that echoed in his chest. He felt hollow. He felt unsettled. He did not understand either emotion, because seeing Jim's semi-frequent displays of human romantic intimacy had never caused this sensation in him before. Perhaps an occasional momentary discomfort or small twinge, but those had been fleeting and easily ignored. It had not hurt like this.

And the sight of his captain, of his body pressed against the female Thunoi councilor, and his lips even more firmly pressed to her own, undeniably hurt.

Turning on a heel, Spock wordlessly exited the observation deck. He'd leave Jim to his—

—pleasure. The one named Spock. The burning one. The passionate one. Adoration. Not like the others had been. So willing to share and be shared with, so accepting of learning and being learned from! Such emotion, passion, fire, burning, Jim. The others had not felt like this. Shared things called numbers, things called buildings, things called coordinates, things called metal. None had shared knowledge of those things. Asked them to show more, but was given no meaning, no understanding, no knowledge. Not like the one named Spock, who gave and was given to. Metal, buildings, numbers, locations, all of it was unknown. No meaning, no emotion, those others did not feel like this felt. It was a happiness to share with the one named Spock! Joy for the collective. Fascination and wonder and—

—

and his face looked beaten in. Bones broken; skin bruised, but unmistakably Jim Kirk. Jim, who was his closest friend. Jim, who meant more to him than any person ever had or ever would. Jim, who had risked his captaincy and his career to save his friend's life. Jim who had been killed—murdered—by that very same friend he'd given up everything for.

"Shh, okay, I've—God, you're okay, you're fine, it's okay…" Jim's voice, sounding frantic, but Jim was dead. Jim was dead and it was his fault. He'd killed him. "Breathe, Spock. Open your eyes, come on. That's an order, Commander."

An order… Spock opened his eyes, unfocused and disoriented. His head already hurt, and only worsened at being shifted around in a blur of dizzying movement that left him choking. He groaned; something painful and small sounding; something that would have mortified him if he'd been able to feel anything other than pain. Spiking, radiating pain. The rocking sensation of motion almost made him vomit, but he didn't think his stomach had enough energy to contract anymore, nor enough contents left to do so. It was only once the shifting stopped that he was able to comply with instructions and breathe once more.

Something had changed; Spock could tell that his head was tilted at a different angle, and Jim was now directly above him in a way he'd not been before. A faint warmth, burning against the cold skin of his neck, started to seep through him from where he lay. His head felt worse than it had before; it had previously been an insistent pulsing, but now was a thunderous hammering in his skull. He did not remember what had happened to have changed his condition, and trying to decipher the confusing fragments of memories was more than he could manage. He could hardly concentrate as it was.

An object entered his close vision, brushing against the skin of his face, and Spock was confused by it until it pulled away. A black glove, smudged with green.

"I'm sorry, Spock, I didn't want it to get in your eyes," Jim reassured him, which did very little to clear the confusion up. He did not understand, Jim didn't want what to get into his eyes? "I know this is invasive, and probably very uncomfortable for you, but I can't let that happen again. Your head is—just… try not to move anymore. I wasn't even supposed to touch—"

"Touch what?" A voice called out, rough and skeptical and immediately familiar. The moment Spock heard it, he felt a tenseness in him slacken and go limp; one he had not noticed it until it was gone. The fear, still so present, lessened at the distinct voice; that voice was comforting. It meant safety. His body seemed to recognize that help had arrived, at least, because it relaxed automatically. "You weren't supposed to touch what? Jim?"

"We're here, Bones."

Doctor McCoy stormed into the room with the same inherent authority he displayed on the ship, as if the frozen ruins were just another part of his sickbay for him to command. Uncharacteristically, he didn't appear to look worried or angry; he instead looked blank, cautious. Clinical. Spock thought it looked out of place. For all he frequently expressed a desire for the doctor to display a more professional demeanor, he found it didn't suit him at all.

But then, after raking his eyes once over the scene that greeted him with eyes widening in alarm, the much more natural expression of disgust, incredulity, and anger surfaced and took over. Not only did it remain, it increased; that already foreboding expression darkening further into a furious, enraged scowl.

"Goddammit Jim," McCoy snarled, bending down to Spock's other side with fluid, practiced movements. The doctor, as he often did, took control of the crisis situation with perfect ease. He spoke as he dug into his tricorder and within a second, the medical scanner was whirring. "The hell is the matter with you?! I told you not to move him 'til I got here! Just a few minutes! You only needed to keep your damn hands to yourself for a few whole minutes! And you—" Spock eyed him, dazed. Despite the aggressive tone he'd aimed towards the captain, Doctor McCoy spoke far more gently to him. It was unnerving. "—know better than to just let him manhandle you around like that, so use that famed logic of yours next time and make him stop. Hopefully he'll actually listen—"

"Bones, his head was hitting the wall—"

"—to you, because he sure doesn't ever hear a single word I say. Too late now, but alright. Let's get you stabilized before we load you up. Might as well kick back, relax, and hope he didn't paralyze you."

The doctor ignored the captain's half-hearted protests with a swift wave of his hand, relegating him to mere support at best and an annoying hinderance at worst. They'd been speaking quickly enough to make it difficult for Spock to understand, and he had to concentrate hard to follow them at all. The rapid movement above and around him was nauseating, as if everything was sped up but himself. He watched, eyes half-lidded, as Jim leaned to peak at the tricorder. Whatever it displayed, he apparently did not like the results. Neither, it seemed, did Doctor McCoy. His expression remained fierce but his voice, if anything, evened out to something more neutral. It set Spock on edge.

"Looks like you've certainly had an eventful day playing out in the snow, Spock. Why, I'd imagine you're probably smarting a little."

Spock tiredly raised a brow. A little. The understatement was ludicrous to the point of being laughable, if he were inclined towards that action. He was not. Not before this mission and not now. He could tell that the doctor was goading him into some kind of reaction or argument, and it was thankfully working. Fighting with McCoy was familiar, routine, comforting, and he latched onto the conflict gratefully. It was a stability he could rely on.

"Is… that your professional diagnosis?" Spock asked slowly, enunciating as best he could. He could see Jim wince at the sound of his voice. It was raspier now than it had been, and his mouth struggled to form the words correctly. They were noticeably slurred. He felt a stirring of shame at his condition, because he was a Vulcan, and acting this way was beneath him. Rather, it should have been beneath him. Spock wasn't certain there was much distance left to go; not with how low he'd sunk already. "Starfleet's passing standards for a… medical practitioner are… somewhat dubious, in that case."

Doctor McCoy huffed and pressed a hypospray into his arm, with a second one immediately following it. Spock didn't feel either of them. "Yeah, well, it's either me or the handsy octopus over there, so your choices are limited. Here, Jim, make yourself useful and put pressure on this." Spock closed his eyes as his head was jostled, resisting the instinctive flinch. The gloved hand returned and pressed a thick gauze against his forehead, which he could not really feel save for a bit of pressure. "Keep your breathing steady, Spock; match mine if you need to. Whatever you do, just hold still; I need to get you fit enough to survive the shuttle ride from hell. Are you gonna tell me what happened to you, or am I guessing?"

Spock did not know where to begin, or where he even could begin; his recollections were not linear. He did remember it, even if it made no logical or cohesive sense. None of the memories were in order, as scattered and time skipped as they had been, and so forming any kind of synopsis was proving difficult. He remembered falling from the cliffside, careless of his own step, and of Jim frantically trying to grab at him. He remembered Jim dying, being on the bridge of the Enterprise, being hugged by Leila. He remembered visiting San Francisco for the first time with his mother, of crying in I-Chaya's fur, of feeling the first stirrings of fire in his veins.

He remembered, more than anything, losing control of his mind, his defenses, and himself. He remembered punching Jim hard enough to break his jaw. He remembered hitting Jim hard enough to crash him over the table and split his lip open. He remembered shoving Jim hard enough to send him slamming into bare rock.

He remembered killing Jim, over and over again.

Emotion gripped him, revulsion and disgust, intensely enough that his breath hitched audibly. He immediately tried to disguise it as a clearing of his throat, refusing to debase himself further. Gathering whatever fragments of his dignity remained, Spock stayed silent. It only made the doctor snort derisively.

"Uh-huh, I figured as much. Okay. That's fine, Spock, I'll go ahead and play that game with you; I'm pretty good at it by now." Doctor McCoy didn't seem phased at Spock's continued silence and also didn't appear as if he'd expected anything different. "Well, I can say right off the bat that you're lucky to be alive. Stage two hypothermia, hypovolemic shock, frostbite, and a nasty concussion to kick it off. If that weren't enough, five of your ribs are broken, your ankle is practically in shards, your thick Vulcan head is cracked open like a damn melon, and—if we're really going split hairs about Starfleet's dubious passing standards, Mr. Spock, then let me be the first to inform you that shoving half of a tricorder into your guts 'ain't gonna scan the body any better than scanning outside of it will."

Hearing it laid out in that manner, laced with faux-irritation and exaggerated disapproval, helped somehow soften the information. That had likely been the intention: preventing overt panic. Not a concern he was often—or ever—plagued by. Spock would normally have preferred that the assessment be delivered factually and logically, but the doctor always tended towards embellishment when he was upset, and it was a familiar enough routine by now to be bearable. The injuries were… worse than he'd expected, but not by much. Spock had known, of course, that his condition was far from ideal, but he had not allowed himself to consider just how serious it was. Doing so was a distraction and would have allowed his defenses to fall that much sooner.

Not that, he thought with no small bit of bitterness, it would have ended up making much of a difference. His barriers had fallen shortly after, and he'd let them in anyways.

"He'll recover, though. Right?" It wasn't necessarily a question, for all that it was phrased like one. There was an edge to the captain's voice; a determination that, if he only stated it firmly enough, what he said would prove to be true regardless of reality or fact. While the injuries had been more or less what Spock had thought, it seemed they had not gone over nearly as well with the captain. Jim's hand, the one not holding pressure to his forehead, clenched lightly against his shoulder. Spock could hardly feel it, but for a soft bit of weight on his body.

Something beneath him shifted, jarring him in a rocking motion that made him recoil away. The doctor let out a sharp hiss, pulling his hands back so that they didn't slip and jar something.

"I said don't move, Spock. And Captain, if you're gonna insist on going against medical instructions to play pillow, at least do the job right and be a good one," Doctor McCoy said, distracted as he returned his attention to a spot somewhere behind Spock's left ear. The gloves he wore were stained green; Spock watched them drip. "And… mhmm, sure he will. God knows he's too stubborn for anything else." He was doing something with his potions and toxins, something that stung at his head, but Spock was no longer paying attention to that.

No, he was also distracted.

The captain's mention of discomfort and invasive actions, a disjointed comment that he had not understood at the time, now made sense. Spock realized, with the awful swooping sensation of his stomach plummeting, that his head had been moved at some point. It was no longer laying against the stone ground but was instead cradled securely in Jim's lap. One of his ears was held against the captain's stomach and the rest of his head and neck laid across his thighs. The warmth he'd felt, which he had not been able to determine the source of, had been human body heat seeping through clothing and against the skin of his neck.

That was… he—Spock felt mortified at the position; feeling exposed in a way that even being injured couldn't hope to match. He felt laid bare, utterly and completely, and the way that Jim was looking down at him didn't help. The captain handled him as if he were something fragile, physically pressed so close that Spock couldn't help but shiver at the contact. It wasn't skin-to-skin—there were multiple layers of clothing and coat between them—but it was near enough to be concerning.

The captain had been right: it was invasive. Not only that, it felt… intimate, although rationally, Spock knew that wasn't the case at all and he was applying a significance to the action that did not exist. If he examined it objectively, it made logical sense to secure his already injured head away from stone surfaces as a preventative measure from further harm, especially if he had been thrashing. It was logical, yes, but it also felt intensely personal. Spock could feel his pulse skyrocket, accompanied by a twisting feeling in his stomach that he could not reasonably blame on the tricorder shards. His skin might have been too cold to flush from the sudden surge of nervousness, but the feeling churned in him. He avoided eye contact.

"I… am fine, Captain," Spock slurred out, and he wished his voice was not so weak. "Thank you, but... I can sit up now."

There was silence for what he approximated to be around five seconds—he could not calculate the exact length of time to his former optimal standards—as Jim and Doctor McCoy stared at him.

"See? He'll be fine. Look at him, he's already cracking jokes. A few days in bed, which I'm sure he's just going to love, and he'll be back on duty before you know it; pointed ears, calculations, and all." The doctor's tone softened then, knowingly; consolingly. "I'll make sure of it, Jim."

Jim nodded; a sharp, tense movement that betrayed just how upset he actually was. Spock eyed the captain's agitation, the guilt rooting in deeper, knowing that it was because of him.

"Jim," Spock said, his voice stronger now but no less hoarse than before. The captain's attention wheeled to him instantly, softening as it always seemed to do. It was undeserved. "I… must apologize for—"

"No, Spock." The captain shook his head tightly. "No, this isn't on you. If anyone owes apologies, I do. We should have beamed back the moment it started snowing; we weren't prepared for this. I'm sorry it took me so long to get to you. I tried to get to you, but there were some obstructions—"

"Thin ice, Jim. You're lucky that I'm allowing you to be here at all," Doctor McCoy said, focused on what he was doing to Spock's ankle. It was jostling him slightly, causing a horrible throbbing in his head. The pain was thankfully starting to dull to only an insistent ache; clearly one of the doctor's many toxins had been a pain reliever. "Don't think for a second that I've forgotten about you, just 'cause Spock's condition is critical. The moment we're on board, you're getting a bed right next to him."

That caught his attention. Jim hadn't looked hurt, but then, Spock hadn't been able to see much of him at all. His vision was blurred and hazy at best, and most of Jim was covered by his outerwear. What little of his skin was visible looked pale and cold, but not otherwise damaged. No blood, no bruising—not to his face, at least. McCoy didn't make idle threats, however, and so Spock looked over the captain with a more discerning gaze in case he had overlooked something.

He ended up not needing to ask for elaboration; Doctor McCoy seemed delighted to do so himself.

"Our clever, Starfleet-renowned tactician of a captain decided to embark on a one-man rescue mission for you in the middle of a blizzard," the doctor continued, and there was some level of exasperation in his voice, underlaid by giddiness at calling Jim out for what he apparently thought to be reckless behavior. Spock agreed with the assessment. "Kemen-Varley had to practically haul him off the mountain; by the time he got there, our genius commander was practically frozen through. Hypothermia, frost bite, and bruising all over from who the hell knows what. They had to damn near drag him back to the ship kicking and screaming."

"I wasn't that bad," the captain tried to defend himself, looking a bit abashed. But then he glanced hurriedly at Spock, and there was a tone in his voice that was difficult to place. It set Spock on edge immediately, because it was uncharacteristic. "It's not that bad. I'm fine, Spock. I got warmed up already; Bones is just being illogical about it."

"Illogical, my—you even hearing the nonsense coming outta your mouth?"

But Spock wasn't listening to their faux argument anymore.

Bruising. Bruising all over. Spock couldn't see any sign of it, but of course he wouldn't, not with the heavy coat the captain was wearing. It would be completely concealed beneath layers of fabric. He had the worst feeling clenching up in him, weighing and aching. Bruising all over. Spock suspected that he knew just where it had come from, too. The tone the captain had used—he now identified it as nervousness. An uncommon response to something that had been accidental or sustained by a fall of some kind, and so the suspicion of the origin of the injuries persisted. Jim would have made a joke were it merely a result of a clumsy moment or a slip, perhaps even been embarrassed, but he instead tried to distract him with a faked argument. While it was possible that the injuries came from another source, Spock's intuition told him otherwise. His intuition told him that this was his doing.

He had pushed Jim on that cliffside. No, not merely pushed; he had shoved Jim, sending him slamming into unforgiving rock. The landing had looked hard, he remembered, and the human body was fragile compared to his own build. Jim was not a Vulcan; he could not fall from cliffs and still walk away from it in the same manner that Spock could. Something as simple as a bad stumble could cause injury, even to the strongest of humans, should they land in just the wrong position. He had not been in his right mind at the time to regulate his strength, but Spock thought it likely that considerable force was used. It always had been before. This was not the first time he'd severely hurt the captain with a shove or a punch. He'd done this before, and now it happened again. He'd lost control of himself.

And Spock knew what happened when he lost control.

He did this. His weapons, his hands, his fault. That horrible burning, no longer immolating him from within, took root behind his eyes and in his throat. He felt choked, sickened, gutted, because this was his fault. His captain. His Jim. His fault…

"Get your hands off of him—"

"—Spock!"

He looked up at the doctor's rough, barking voice. An apology was already forming on his lips, his eyes stinging, and his throat clenched so tight that he felt choked, when he realized that Jim was also looking down at him too. Jim, who was alive. His captain. His captain, who he'd hurt, because he'd lost control again. He'd lost control and hurt the man he'd vowed to protect at any cost. Again. Because of course there was another again. There shouldn't have even been a first time, let alone multiple of them. Unforgivable. But… not surprising. No, this was exactly what he'd come to expect of himself when it came to damaging those he cared about. The closer he got, the more pain he inflicted. Over, and over, and over again.

His surroundings swam away, and he could not hold onto them.

Jim died in front of him again.

With the strangling hold of the ahn-woon wrapped tight around his neck and keeping him partially suspended, the captain hung bonelessly, slack limbs sprawled out against the sand.

Happiness. The one named Spock, the one named Jim. Wanted more. No creation without inspiration, without source. Lost all memory of times before, but it was not an end! Embraced what is new, what is feeling, what is emotion. Joy, positivity, delight, happiness! Repeat until known, know until understood, understood until felt! Such passion…

"—n't from the concussion, Captain. I don't know what this is."

"Spock?" Jim. Jim was talking to him. "Can you hear me?"

The question came suddenly, and Spock looked up from his microscope, startled. Yes. Yes, he did hear him now, although it was worrying that the captain had apparently been calling his name for some time without him acknowledging it. He was normally so very attuned to that particular voice but focusing had been difficult.

Jim was smiling down at him; an easy, relaxed kind of grin that Spock examined closely. He searched it, but it didn't so much as hint at distrust or caution. Illogical, because the captain should have been expressing both, and in spades at that. In fact, he should not have been here at all; alone in Spock's private lab with him. There would be no witnesses, no one to interfere, no one to come up with another deception, no one to get Jim to safety. Even being in this room was a great risk—but then, Spock was aware of the captain's proclivity towards risky behavior, and so he supposed it wasn't much of a surprise that it would manifest in this way too.

"My apologies, sir, I was… distracted. Is there something I can do for you, Captain?" Spock asked, his voice carefully monotone and stoic. Polite. Distant. He did not meet Jim's eyes.

It had been five-point-three-six-two days since the events of Vulcan.

"Don't apologize. I'm sorry I broke your concentration," Jim replied, and there it finally was. That small bit of hesitation to his tone. Hardly noticed except that Spock had familiarized himself with every single minute kind of vocal range this human could express and what each of them meant. "And no, not exactly; nothing official. Only, well, it's Thursday."

"I do not understand, sir."

"Thursday," Jim repeated, his smile definitely wavering now and starting to strain towards forced. "Chess, Mr. Spock, or have you forgotten? Don't tell me you're double-booking on me with science, my ego couldn't bear the heartbreak. Tell me there's at least something that interesting under there?"

Thursday. They played chess every Thursday at exactly 1900 hours, switching between Jim's quarters or his own depending on the week. While it was common that they played other times during the week as well, this was a standing block of time that they had both set aside in their schedule for that one specific purpose. Regular. Predictable. Punctual. And, according to Spock's internal chronometer, he was already forty-six-point-two-three-seven minutes past the appointed meeting time. He should have felt alarmed by this, but he only felt puzzled.

Spock had not forgotten what day it was, but he hadn't thought that their routine would continue as normal. Not after what had happened; not after what he'd done. Jim had every reason to avoid him, and more specifically, to avoid being alone with him. He'd not verified the change of plans, but it would have been a logical protective measure, so much so that he had safely estimated it to be factual. That Spock was still considered a first officer at all was surprising; especially as, by all accounts, he should have been turned over to the authorities the moment they reached the next starbase. But he wasn't in the brig, where he belonged. He was standing free in his empty lab, and Jim had purposely looked for him to play chess with.

It was… perplexing. It did not make sense. Jim hadn't told him specifically that the standing appointment had been canceled, and Spock had not asked about it. He had not wanted to impose himself on the captain any further, so as to avoid making the man feel uncomfortable or put into a difficult position. He'd been determined to wholly accept the repercussions of his actions, no matter how painful they were. Jim could not reasonably avoid professional interactions with him due to the nature of their career and respective ranks, but Spock had avoided any and all personal ones. It was easier to cut their friendship out of his life himself, rather than force the captain to verbalize the new circumstances aloud.

"I… suppose I assumed—"

"Assumed what?"

Spock blinked, and Jim was still there. Not as he had been, though. A black hat covered most of his head, and the rest of him was enveloped in an oversized science-blue coat. Why was the captain dressed for cold weather? If anything, he should have been overheating; Spock's private lab was considerably warmer than the standard human ambient preference. But… they were not in his private lab any longer, and he was cold.

"Sir?" His voice was a dull rasp instead of the even one he'd been using only seconds prior.

"You assumed what?" Jim asked again, brow furrowed. "You keep talking like—Spock, what the devil is going on?"

Spock wished he knew. He didn't remember what he'd said, or what had happened. He had been in the lab, and now he was in a freezing stone room. Jim had been dead, Jim had been leaning against his worktable, and Jim was wiping away blood from beneath his nose with a gloved hand.

He had also, Spock discovered, been moved around. No longer was he resting in Jim's lap but instead laid on an anti-gravity stretcher, strapped firmly into place to prevent him from rolling off. He had no recollection of how he'd gotten there, nor who had lifted him or when. The series of events were incoherent and lacking rational continuity. He could not be on the ship, on Vulcan, and also on Seskilles VII at the same time, but they had all felt real. How could he possibly distinguish what was true and what was a vision, when both his reality and his memories felt the same?

Vulcan was false. It had happened, but it was not happening now. The captain was not dead, because he was right here at his side. Jim was alive. Jim was injured, Spock reminded himself with a stab of such disgust of his own behavior that it stole away his breath. Injured, yes, but he was undeniably alive. Not dead. That was a memory. It wasn't real.

He could not take anymore. Memories and truth intertwined in such a tangled knot, that Spock felt exhausted trying to unravel it. Was what he saw now even true? He did not know how to determine that, and the thought was frightening. He could no longer trust his own mind, his own senses, his own perception. He could no longer identify reality whatsoever. Fatigue hit him like a physical strike, so much so that he felt his eyes roll backwards and his awareness begin to fade out—

"Spock." McCoy was at his side too. The stretcher was moving, and while the vertigo it caused made him feel nauseous, it also helped ground him. "Jim asked you a question. Answer him."

Right. A question. He'd never been able to refuse Jim anything.

"The Seskille." Spock said tiredly, and even the feeling of their name in his mouth made him ill. He did not want to speak of them. He did not want to think of them. Each reminder felt like a new wound opening up in his mind, ripping and bleeding and mangling him that little bit more. "In my head."

"Your head?"

Spock couldn't find the energy to nod, although he wouldn't have been able to do so anyways. His head was strapped down too; immobilized against the stretcher to prevent it from moving. "No bodies…" His voice was little more than a slur of sounds now. "No form, they're… mental energy. Telepathic."

"And they're… talking to you?" Jim asked for clarification, brows furrowed, but then waved his hand rapidly. "No, questions can wait until we're warm; let's get out of here."

He made an affirming sound, which was about all he had the energy to manage. His present ineloquence was grating, but he was also too tired to change it; not when he could barely keep his eyes open. They refused to focus; the world reduced to a dizzying blur of movement. The sunlight was gone, Spock noticed hazily, as the stretcher glided into the first room of the stone building. The sun had set at some point, and it was apparently far colder than it had been before by the way that Doctor McCoy and Jim were both huddling in their blue coats.

The blue coat that… Jim was taking off?

"Turns out that it's not really my color," Jim said, smiling wryly at him as he slid the oversized jacket off his shoulders. "As it happens, yellow doesn't suit you either. I guess we should both stick to our respective divisions and trade back. Yours should be good to go."

The captain spread it open like a blanket, carefully wrapping the fabric around Spock's torso so that it covered his chest and shoulders, mindful of his injuries. Jim's odd attire made sense now. Humans typically ran at much higher internal temperatures than Vulcans did; the captain had been warming his coat up for him. Wearing it around so that it would already be comfortable for Spock when he gave it back. He couldn't register the warmth itself, as most of his body had long-since gone numb from either the cold or Doctor McCoy's hyposprays, but the gesture itself lit a small heat in him. The consideration and care in that one small action, and the resulting surge of emotion it raised, left him rattled. His eyes stung.

A similar gold coat—which, having neither felt nor seen it, Spock only now noticed was there at all—was lifted from where it had been covering his legs. The inside of it must have been freezing; it'd been blanketing against Spock's own hypothermic temperatures, and they certainly were below comfort levels for humans, but the captain slid it on without complaint. He looked far more like himself in his yellow command colors.

The swirl of snow was nauseating as they exited the building; still a whiteout, but the doctor was thankfully able to navigate by following his tricorder charts. Without cliffsides, it would be considerably safer than his own attempts had been. They moved slowly. The stretcher glided along smoothly, but he could see that his companions were struggling to wade through the heavy snow that had accumulated. The pathway they had carved to get here only helped a bit.

"Shuttle's as close as it's gonna get," Doctor McCoy said, glancing over Spock with an unreadable expression, eyes squinted to see through the flurry. There was something bothering the doctor, but whatever it was, he did not verbalize it. "I asked Tommason to try to dig us out a path, but plan on a good long trudge. It's practically hip deep now, and not all of us have the energy—or the ability—to plow through it in a dead sprint like you did, Jim. If you leave me behind again…"

"I don't want to stay here any longer than you do. The next shore leave will be somewhere hot, I promise. It can't come soon enough, either; I can't even feel my—oh. Spock, I'm sorry, I meant to give you—here…" The captain slid his own gloves off and reached for him.

No.

Pure alarm raced through him, sparking and bright in clarity, when he realized what was about to happen. No! Spock could barely hang on to his surroundings at all, and his mouth felt too heavy to do more than slur out a half-formed noise of objection. The sound, if it was even heard at all, had apparently been taken as one of agreement. Jim didn't seem to notice his flinch as he carefully lifted one of Spock's hands into his own. The bare skin of the captain's palm touched the equally exposed skin of Spock's fingers. They—

—were ice! God, but it was lucky they hadn't fallen off entirely with how stiff they were. And his ears, as well, were darkened from the cold, the points of them almost purple. They were supposed to be particularly sensitive, right? He'd read that once but had never thought to ask. Rather, he'd felt it was invasive to ask; he'd definitely thought about doing so multiple times. He wished he could give him his hat, but with Spock's head the way it was…

He grimaced, trying to avoid looking at it for too long. The stark white of exposed bone had been visible beneath an alarming amount of green when he'd first saw him, and although it was covered with gauze now, he hadn't forgotten the sight of it.

In fact, he didn't think he'd ever forget that sight; of Spock curled up in that small, dark room, his ankle unnaturally positioned and his vibrant blood pooling on the stone beneath him. So much blood. It'd soaked through his uniform top entirely, covered his face, had frozen into his hair and against his skin like ice. He'd been forced to chip away at it, like cleaning the windshield of one of his speed bikes after a bad frost in Riverside. Spock had looked so small there, huddled up as he had been. Breakable. It'd been unsettling. He was so used to viewing Spock as a constant pillar of strength that the reminder of just how easily and quickly his friend could be taken from him had shaken him to the core.

He focused on lifting one foot in front of the other, wading through the dense snowpack. It felt akin to wading through mud, but he had no leave to complain. He reminded himself sternly that Spock had traveled through it too, and with a shattered bone, a fractured skull, broken ribs, and half of a tricorder sticking out of his intestines at that. While his own body was a mass of aching, like one giant bruise, it was nothing compared to what Spock was suffering.

He took up Spock's hand, watching him carefully for any sign of pain at the movement. Those hands, he knew, were incredibly sensitive to touch and so he kept his own movements as gentle and delicate as possible. Spock's eyes had closed, but he wasn't certain whether he was fighting off nausea or whether he had dozed off again. He'd been fading in and out; waking in small bursts and then nodding off after a few moments.

The haphazard pathway they'd formed to the ruins widened, having been dug out just enough to be—

—shared with the collective! A new one, being shared, being invited, being joined. Happiness. Recognition! This one was known already! Not through experience but through the one named Spock. The passionate one, the burning one. Introductions! This one was named—names!—Jim. Familiar, warming. Such emotion there. Such transference between the one named Spock and the one named Jim! A deep, passionate sharing. So many emotions without names, without context, without understanding. Share and be shared with, Captain James T. Kirk, of the USS Enterprise. Learn and be learned from! All was new! Different than the one named Spock, but no less curious! The one named Jim must join with. To share, to learn, to create, and experience.

It is our happiness.

No.

No.

Spock didn't hesitate; he surrendered himself to the pressure of the Seskille, completely and utterly. He invited them—encouraged them, even—to take from him whatever they wished; to rip and pull and shred at his mind in whatever way they desired. To take his memories, his thoughts, his emotions. They could have it, all of it, just as long as they ignored that blinding spark of consciousness lingering on the edge of his own. No. Take everything else—anything else!—but not him. Please, not him.

The human mind could not handle that kind of pressure; it could not bear it. If his body happened to survive the experience, there would be no spark of Jim remaining. That kind of devastation would leave only a shell behind. Everything that made up his captain would be crushed beneath their collective weight, wholly consumed to obliteration. They had invaded Spock, they had ruined him, but they would not do the same to Jim; he wouldn't allow it.

He shoved his own mental presence between Jim and the Seskille as best he could, and allowed them in. No defenses, no barriers, no walls, only what little scrap of himself he could shield Jim with. They could have everything else, and he would not fight them off, but they would not touch his captain. They delighted at the invitation, their warm, joyful, radiating emotions washing over him like a flood. The Seskille rushed in, just as he knew they would, and it was his happiness—

Spock ripped his hand away from the captain's, breath tearing out of him in a harsh wheeze. He'd have fallen from the stretcher had he not been strapped down, as sudden and violent as the movement was. The glove fell uselessly between them.

"What—" Jim broke off with a flinch back, clearly disoriented. He staggered; one hand clenched onto the stretcher to catch himself from falling and the other rubbing against his temple. Spock pulled his own hands further away. "What was that?"

"Jim?" The doctor was at the captain's side immediately, gripping his shoulder to steady him.

Spock tried, hardly able to gasp air into lungs that now seemed too tight to function, to raise whatever shattered remains of a defense he had left; to get himself under control. No. No. He had… he'd been made to… Jim had touched his hand, his fingers, and he had been there in head. With no barriers to block Jim's stream of thoughts out, he'd gone inside of them like they were his own and the Seskille had eagerly followed. He'd let them find his captain. He'd tried to shield Jim from the worst, but he had failed that too. He'd lost control and Jim paid the price.

Again.

Jim died in front of him again.

"I… don't know, Bones. I don't know what happened. It felt like my brain was full of… something. Something huge, and…" The captain shook his head. "I don't know how else to describe it. I'm fine, it was just a strange feeling in my head. It's gone now, though."

"Your head or your mind? There's a difference."

"My mind, I think? It was like a pressure, one that felt so… happy. Positive, peaceful, and curious. Whatever it was, it was nice. Overwhelming and bizarre, but nice. Comforting, warm, and happy; almost like a… group hug, I suppose. I'm not sure how else to explain it."

"Eyes on me; follow my finger. Any pain? Headache? Nausea? Vertigo? Does it strain or hurt to think?" Pointed questions, and highly specific ones. He was right to ask them, too; this was not an injury he was unfamiliar with. The doctor avoided looking at Spock as he said them, his expression tight.

"None of that, no. The feeling was gone when—" The captain's paused, glancing at Spock in dawning comprehension. "Was… that was the Seskille? Spock?"

Spock didn't answer; couldn't answer. He felt the room tunneling away, and desperate attempts to stay present were failing him. His surroundings were pulling further and further from his sight. His body felt limp and boneless; he felt sick. Had he the energy or the stomach contents for it, he thought he might have vomited. He was so dizzy, and everything spun around him in a blur of color. Blue, yellow, green, black, white. He could not make sense of them, and Spock gave up trying. He gave up on trying to stay at all.

It came in bursts and flashes. Motion. Snow. Wind. Voices. He'd opened himself to the Seskille to keep them away from Jim, and he could not raise any defense now. Spock didn't even try to. He'd allowed this to happen; had told them he wouldn't fight them off anymore and he meant it. He was tired of fighting, of resisting, of blocking it. It was easier to let it happen. He gave them permission, and they could have whatever they wanted.

Surrender felt good, and he hated himself for it.

Jim died in front of him again.

"Spock?"

The silence of his quarters felt swallowing as the door slid shut behind him. They were a pathetic sight; curtains partially ripped off the walls, blankets and pillows scattered, console monitor smashed inward, chess pieces thrown. He'd lacked the focus to straighten the room up before leaving, intending instead to do so once he returned in a clearer mindset. After the events planetside, Spock had assumed he would not be given the chance to do so. In fact, he did not expect to see his quarters again at all, but rather the confined emptiness of the brig. That's where he'd been intending to go, had Doctor McCoy not requested him immediately in sickbay.

And once there, he had found the captain.

The captain was alive.

Jim was alive.

Spock felt empty as he stared at the ruins of his cabin; hollow and drained. The fire in him had gone, the burning vanishing as if it had never been there at all, and it left him cold and dark. Chilled to the very core of himself. His mind felt very distant; lifted and floating from his own body. Spock did not feel present. He did not feel anything. Vacant and listless. He didn't know what to feel. He didn't know what he should feel. He didn't know if he wanted to feel at all.

His body was trembling, Spock realized. His legs were unsteady and weakening, and so he sat down with his back against the door. He did not know what to do. He did not know if he should do anything, or whether there was anything that even needed doing. He could only stare blankly at his shaking hands. Sand was packed beneath his fingernails. There were smudges of browning red on his sleeve. His palms were scuffed and bruised. All visible proof of what he'd done; of killing Jim.

The sight should have been horrifying, but it was not. It was important that he look at them, because it was a reminder that it had happened at all. A reminder that his discipline had frayed so severely and impossibly that he had done the unthinkable and murdered his captain. Jim. It was a reminder of what happened when he lost control; a much needed one too, because his friends were pretending it had not happened at all.

So much of Vulcan felt like a dream—still did, even now. He did not feel real, and neither did the events that had taken place there. Doctor McCoy and Jim had laughed, smiled, joked, and fell into their easy banter as if what happened had somehow just not. Spock could not rationalize it; did not understand. Jim had touched him on the shoulder, grinning, and it was like nothing was wrong. Just… another mission. His hazel eyes held no spark of fear, or loathing, or disgust. And although Doctor McCoy grumbled and teased him, there had been no sign of those emotions in his expression either. No hatred. No horror. No revulsion.

That was fine; he felt those enough for all of them, or he would. Eventually. He was certain those feelings would be there when he could feel again. Shock: he was in shock. A response to grief, because the captain had died, and he seemed to be the only one who remembered it. No one else was mourning, because for them it had not happened at all. The two who had gone with him only saw it as a clever ploy that could be laughed about later on. Spock was not laughing.

For now, Spock had to familiarize himself with his new reality. It was difficult; he'd already become firmly acquainted with the previous new one; the one where he had murdered Jim. In that reality, he'd decided on very specific plans for himself; a guideline to steer by. Not a direction that led to an ideal outcome, but a direction nonetheless, and he'd made peace with it. No, in this new one, where he had killed Jim and yet Jim had somehow not died, he had no such heading. No plans. No guide. Nothing. All of it was… blank. Formless. He felt so very lost, left adrift without a tether. Spock had known what todo and now he did not.

Did he pretend it had not happened, as Jim and Doctor McCoy were doing? Did he transfer from the ship? Did he put those hastily discarded plans into action anyways? Did he just… sit here and do nothing at all? So many possibilities, each weighed with both positives and negatives.

His hands were wet. He did not know why. Another drop hit his fingers.

His face was wet too.

"Steady, ensign, take us up nice and easy—as best you can in this wind. Bones?"

"He's alright, I think."

"You think?"

"Telepathic mumbo-jumbo isn't exactly something I'm qualified to assess, Jim. I couldn't even begin to guess what's going on in that head of his. I don't know if it's hurting him, or if it's gonna be a problem, or even what it's doing. He's not asleep, I can tell you that much. Vitals are holding stable, so physically he's about as good as he can be with those injuries. I'm sorry, Captain, I just don't know what else I can tell you."

"Can he hear us? Spock? Are you—"

"—sure there's nothing you wish to talk about? No worries about the new command?" "No, sir," Spock said. He met Captain Pike's gaze just as steadily as before, concealing how truly shaken he was by the news. "Your concern is… noted, but not applicable in this instance. Vulcans do not experience the emotion of worry. I am certain that James T. Kirk will be a perfectly capable captain, just as you have been. Thank you for informing me."

"—ank you, Mr. Scott. Kirk out."

Jim died in front of him again.

"Not sure which I hate more, transporting or whatever the hell kinda ride this is."

"It's not so—god!—not so bad."

"You don't need to throw yourself on him, Jim; he's not gonna roll off no matter how much this damn ship shakes. In fact, I'd prefer you strap in and don't touch him at all."

"I'm not—"

—not as bright. Not as near. The one named Spock was fading. No understanding. The passionate one was becoming distant. There was more to share, more to learn! It was their happiness to join with the one named Spock and the one named Jim! It was new! Curiosity and wonder and such new experiences! Emotions without name, without context! Words spoken with things called voices, made by things called bodies, used to communicate with things called sound! A thing called a mind, open and vast and willing to share! Endless possibilities, new imaginings! It was a delight and a joy to explore this, to learn and be learned from!

Do not leave! There is no need to go, but to join! It is our happiness to experience from! No sense of loss in what is abandoned, but a new creation instead! The passionate one, the burning one named Spock can bring the one named Jim. All are welcome! There is no need to leave! No need to—

The Seskille vanished.

It was as if they had never been there at all; there remained no trace of their consuming, swallowing presence. No trace of them but for the damage they left in their absence; shattered barriers and blank, demolished space. Shards. Fragments. His mind felt empty and vacant, completely alone once more.

The shock from the abrupt silence made the rushing oblivion of unconsciousness feel like a relief, and he fell into it gratefully.

---

Thank you everyone! I'm so excited for what is to come! I am doing my best to post at least every other week, so thank you all for your patience! We've finally reached Chapter Ten! Although I gave a total count of thirty chapters, that was a very rough estimate. I have a feeling I will be exceeding that; my outline is a lengthy beast.

Writing this chapter gave me some inspiration for a potential prequel of the immediate aftermath of Amok Time. I always found it interesting how Spock would likely have been the only one traumatized by the situation. McCoy had enacted it, Kirk was unconscious for it, and no one else on the ship knew anything happened. Spock had to live, for however brief of time, with the honest belief that he had killed Jim. That kind of devastation would have an impact, especially for a Vulcan; they feel far more intensely than humans do, after all. It may be something I write in the far future!

Vulcan:
K'oh-nar — The fear of emotional vulnerability and emotional exposure.
Meskarau — Hold; to have and keep in one's grasp; to keep from departing or getting away.