Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last conversation. You are absolutely fabulous. I appreciate all the feedback and kudos. I genuinely enjoy it and treasure every bit of encouragement.

So, we are at the start of a new batch of chapters. This is the time when I need your encouragement the most. Mainly because I wasn't able to bank as many chapters as I wanted to before I started posting. I had another health episode that limited my writing time again. This means that I am still working on new chapters.

This was also a tough week for us as a fandom since we lost Nichelle Nichols this week. I didn't have the energy to work on new chapters last weekend because of that.

Day 326: Greetings from the New Vulcan International School.

From: Saavik of New Vulcan

To: Peter_K

Time arrived: 1/13/2260 00:00:01

Subject: My New School Is Significantly Less Horrible

Greetings from the New Vulcan International School. I usually video call you; however, my new English teacher believes in the importance of writing written communication. So, I am planning to write to you, Josephine, and my foster brother quite often to satisfy the curriculum needs. I may also write to my brother-in-law's family. I found them all intriguing. I am interested in joining Starfleet at some point and would like to know more. I feel like Winona Kirk will give me a more accurate description of the organization as a whole compared to other individuals.

I am adapting adequately to my new educational experience. Although I am grateful for the time spent with your classmates to help me acclimate to having an actual instructor and positive peer interactions. That has lessened the culture shock I experienced on my first day of classes. I at least had a frame of reference. That was quite beneficial.

Technically, I had an instructor before, but she merely watched over the class and rarely did an adequate job at that. She completely ignored anything that happened to me. Actually, I think she encouraged it. My new instructor Mr. Madison is significantly better in this regard. He had zero tolerance for those that said inappropriate things about my heritage. Although it is less than in the traditional Vulcan school system, I have dealt with some unacceptable comments from classmates due to my Romulan ancestry. Predominantly from classmates who lost family members during the actual battle of Vulcan. This was a factor in my treatment previously because every student in the traditional system lost somebody during the Battle of Vulcan. They felt that justified my harsh treatment even though I lost people too. In contrast, only a small percentage of international school students experienced similar losses. This is a preferable environment for me.

Have classes already resumed for you on Enterprise? Have you turned in your winter history project yet? Are you going to send me a copy? I really would like to review what you learned about the incident. I feel that the official version of events is highly selective and framed in a way to make us look better than what we actually are. Mistakes were made on all sides. Of course, that is obvious, but I am well aware that Vulcan society rarely admits or acknowledges their faults.

Let your friends know I miss all of them. I probably will write at least Ashley three at some point. I have to write a letter every 2 to 3 days, so there probably will be a lot of correspondence with everyone. But I think that would be good. Also, this is a much more practical way to practice writing and interpersonal skills. I much prefer writing actual letters to writing in a journal. Primarily because these are not graded for grammar only for participation. Although he could always have an AI grade us.

I am grateful for this assignment because I miss all of you and wish you could come back and maybe even stay for a couple of months. I know it is something my foster father wants as well. He misses you and Spock terribly. My starting a new school has been a perfect distraction.

I have been informed that we will see each other this summer. The ambassador has agreed to help set up the new Embassy at Yorktown this summer. It will be a three-month detail to the Starbase coinciding with the "summer" break of the international school. I wonder if this is a test run to see how I would do if my foster parent were an active member of the foreign ministry again.

I know he enjoys his work with the Vulcan Science Academy. He is also glad that he can rebuild the organization in a way that makes it a less bigoted institution than it was pre-battle of Vulcan. However, I think he wants something more challenging and misses being out in the greater Galaxy. Or maybe he is still worried I'm not getting everything I need from school, and he needs to consider other options. I may not get everything I need, but the current experience is still better than what happened previously.

Anyway, please write back when you have a chance. I always appreciate our interactions. They are usually the highlight of my month. I look forward to additional correspondence.

Xxxx

From: Peter_K

To: Saavik of New Vulcan

Time sent: 1/13/2260 07:07:01

Subject: Yes, classes have resumed, and I'm not happy about it

Classes were so much more fun on New Vulcan. There is only so much you can do in a classroom on board the starship. It gets really dull, and it's made worse by the fact you know there are more exciting things going on, like the expiration of the new Vulcan solar system. Instead, I am stuck in class writing research papers.

Unfortunately, not all of them can be as interesting as the great battle of Vulcan history project. Yes, we have turned in the assignment, but we are still waiting on our grades. It was a very intense report. You're right; we uncovered many things that did not paint the Vulcan government in the best light. Starfleet made even more mistakes. As a precaution, Uncle Spock made my teacher sign an NDA. My uncle is very pragmatic.

I'll check with Uncle Spock to see if I can send you a copy. Although that's probably gonna have to wait until after he reads the final version. We may have kept some more sensitive things out of the version I let him proofread before submitting. I didn't want him to not let us submit it to Gina. I might not be able to send it to you, but I'm pretty sure I can send it to grandpa because he has the proper security clearance.

I'm so glad you'll write to us more often. I love your video calls, but I also love the letters I get from everyone else. So I'm happy to be getting letters from you.

I wouldn't mind a class assignment where I had to write to people. Especially to people I like since I'm already doing it anyway. I would love to get to email Liz during class hours. She's so wonderful.

Unfortunately, we've yet to receive an assignment like that. Although now I'm going to suggest it to Gina. Normally I wouldn't volunteer to write more, but this seems more practical. Mainly because I doubt it would be that much more than what I do now. I prefer letters to journals as well. Dr. Margarita has me doing that. I'm already on my second therapy journal.

I'm glad you're doing better at the international school. I wish there weren't still hateful idiots, but at least there are fewer. That's progress. I know you feel their anger at you is justified, but it's really not. You were a little kid when Vulcan was destroyed. You had nothing whatsoever to do with that. Just because you are the same species as the person who destroyed Vulcan doesn't mean you should take all that guilt. You did nothing wrong. It wasn't your fault. They need to work through their emotions and not blame them on you.

Did your previous school offer anybody counseling services? What about your new school? I feel like it might be pretty helpful for some of your classmates and maybe you too. Losing your parents is highly traumatic under normal circumstances like I went through. I couldn't imagine how much worse it would be if it happened while my entire planet was destroyed. I am already seeing Dr. Margarita twice a week.

I miss you as well. I'm glad we got to spend so much time together. It was fun. Bonus points for helping you prepare for your new school.

I also realize how much I miss living on a planet. I never thought I would miss the rain, but I do. I wonder how long it will be before I'm on a planet again. I'm not sure the Starbase we're going to in February is an actual planet. It might be a moon. I almost successfully talked Uncle Spock into taking me down to the current world we're exploring, but that's before we discovered that the tunnels were being created by Fraggle-like creatures. Pictures attached. I swear they look exactly like actual Fraggles. It's a little creepy.

Josephine says I shouldn't be surprised that there is a planet of Fraggle-like creatures. There's an entire planet of people that look like kittens but with sharper claws. Actually, there are a few cat-like species. Uncle Jim went to the Academy with a set of Caitian twins. However, they are not the people who live on the planet close to Yorktown. They are the Teenaxi and are not on the best terms with the Federation right now. So I doubt we'll ever go there.

I just realized you probably have no frame of reference when I talk about Fraggles, so I have attached video files. They are puppets from a show from the 20th century revived a few decades later during the great pandemic. That was not a good time for anybody on Earth.

It's a good thing we're going to see each other this summer because obviously, I've neglected your Earth pop culture education. I will have to send you all sorts of things to learn more about. At the same time, you should send me more Vulcan pop culture things. We had our first Vulcan movie night when Uncle Spock returned from mission Fraggle yesterday. (Enterprise is still studying the planet, but no more boots on the ground to avoid prime directive issues.) Vulcan Shakespeare adaptations are fascinating, and I understood half of it without referencing the standard translation. Uncle Jim joked that I did better than him with the play in original Elizabethan English. Apparently, Earth languages have changed a lot in a few hundred years.

I'm sure the grandparents are scheming so that we get to see each other again, but I'm grateful for it. Before living with Uncle Jim and Spock, I wasn't around that many people my age. There were not any other kids on Devon. I was only there because mom had special permission as a single parent. There were plans to allow other families to be part of the colony in about another year. In hindsight, they made the right call.

I spoke to the Elder, and he told me that the incident that took my mom still happened in his time but a little later. I guess I'm just destined to be an orphan. I don't know who I lived with then, although I know it wasn't Uncle Jim. Let's just say he wasn't a stable married man there. Maybe my aunt wasn't dead in that timeline. Perhaps it's better not to know. I'm surprised the Elder told me that much. Maybe he just wanted me to know it was something that couldn't be prevented. I probably shouldn't have typed this, but I trust you, and I'm sure if I wasn't supposed to, Uncle Jim's special software would delete it. So if that part of the letter makes no sense, I apologize.

I'll let Ashley 3 know that you might email her. Although I think Ashley 2 would love to hear from you as well. Actually, all the Ashley's like you. The only one who was mean to you was Chris three, who is long gone. Anyway, I look forward to hearing from you again.

To be continued.

Just to let you know, you probably won't see all of Saavik's emails to the good people of Enterprise. I really want to keep the story from being a billion words. We're already 30% of the way there and have a few more months to cover before the endpoint. This is also why you didn't see all of the cute emails between Jim and Spock, even though I'm sure you would have loved reading them all. Just know that they were adorable. Until they had to switch to work communications due to the Fraggle incident.