Fic: It's the Same Old Song
Fandom: Star Trek: Reboot
Rating: PG
Pairings: Kirk/Spock, Kirk Prime/Spock Prime
Disclaimer: as always I don't own anything in this awesome franchise.
Summary: A freaky space anomaly dumps Kirk Prime on the Enterprise bridge. Spock Prime's emotional response to his return has consequences for Kirk and Spock.
The very first Star Trek story I ever wrote. And it was a kink meme fill, is anyone surprised?
It’s the Same Old Song
They are preparing to take Grandpa Spock, as Jim likes to call him, to a diplomatic conference. Jim really can’t understand why the guy wants to keep working at his age. You would think after saving countless civilizations and seeing every star in the galaxy at least twice that he might like to retire and, you know, relax, but apparently he doesn’t so here they are. He doesn’t mind it really it was just that with two other dignitaries on board as well they had to wear their finest clothes, and his dress shirt itched something fierce. Also the route was pre-planned by Starfleet to avoid danger and so it was also tremendously boring. He and Spock had taken up playing chess in an attempt to pass the time and he thought he was getting rather good if he did say so himself. Jim did have to admit Grandpa Spock was right about their friendship. It was wonderful to have someone there to lean on in all kinds of circumstances. He still had Bones of course, but Spock was just different somehow. Although now that he thought about it Spock might be beginning to take it a little too seriously. He had thrown himself in front of that plant that shot poisonous thorns just a week ago to protect him, when it would have been just as quick to shout at him to get out of the way. Well he could think about that later. Then he slouched down in his seat slightly and decided maybe he should think about now as there wasn’t anything else to do.
Some time later Jim would kick himself for jinxing the mission.
The ribbon of energy seemed to come out of nowhere. For almost half an hour the ship was shaken up and put on red alert. Eventually torpedoes got fired and the energy ribbon finally took the hint and buggered off. Spock continued to scan the area to make sure it was clear and Bones came up to treat one on the crew members who had received a mild burn. As everyone else picked themselves up and straightened out their uniforms they turned to the area of the floor just in front of the viewscreen to find that they had taken on an extra passenger.
The first thing James T. Kirk noticed as he picked himself up off the floor was good old McCoy. Well okay he didn’t look exactly like Bones, but he had that grumpy old country doctor aura about him that Bones always had. He looked over to Spock’s station and he was there with his eyebrow arched up practically to the ceiling. He knows instantly that somehow this is not his Spock. He is too young for one thing, in fact as he continued to look around he noted that everyone on the bridge was too young to be his crew and who was the whipper-snapper sitting in his chair?
Jim opened his mouth to ask just what the hell was going on when the turbolift doors opened and an old man dressed in black stepped out.
“Spock?”
The man stopped dead when he caught sight of him. Jim started to walk towards him instead, he knew that this one was his Spock, and he didn’t care that Spock looked so much older than he remembered. He stopped though when he noticed that the other man was looking at him blank-eyed and stone-faced.
“What happened?” he asked taking a quick glance to the other Spock again, perhaps he was mistaken and that one was his after all? Was he in a parallel universe again?
“Time continued on and doubled back on itself in a manner of speaking.” Was the stiff answer Jim received.
Spock dared to take a few steps towards the figure. He had seen so many things in his years. Jim split into two people. Jim’s body inhabited by another’s mind. Jim replaced by an android. There were many possibilities. So he snuffed out the little flame of hope in his chest with swift efficiency. He can’t afford to think like that. It’s not his Jim he told himself. Just like the boy who sits in the captain’s chair is not his Jim.
“Time travel?”
“With grave consequences. An alternate reality has been created and I can never go home.”
He has had dreams like this, more of them than he cares to remember. Of seeing him, hearing his voice, reaching out to touch him, only to wake up before he could, and reach out in reality to touch only a cold empty pillow where he should have been.
“Where did you come from?” Spock asked.
“From a place where time and space have no meaning, how long has it been?”
“Eighty years.”
He was in front of the man who looked like Jim now. He reached out slowly and then tried to curl his fingers away from him. No he can’t do it, because it was not real, it was some alien induced, or spore induced, or insanity induced fantasy this isn’t his-
He never completes that thought because the other man catches his hand with his own and interlaces their fingers. The contact made him shiver and flooded his mind with memories.
“It gives me emotional security.”
“And I do want to go back to the ship, captain.”
A hand that would have pressed against his own if there wasn’t glass in the way.
“Jim…your name is Jim.”
Strong arms that pulled both of them into cold water.
“Please, captain, not in front of the Klingons.”
A voice that promised to be back soon.
Spock let go of his hand and the images faded.
Jim saw that finally there was true recognition of who he is on the other man’s face. He smiled slightly and prepared to be grabbed by the shoulders and for him to yell out ‘Jim!’ in a fit of joyous emotion, and for Bones to then make some comment about emotional performances that bring houses down as he had so many years ago. He was not prepared to have Spock start blinking rapidly, pull him into the strongest hug they had ever shared, and bury his face in his shoulder. He stiffened for a moment in surprise before wrapping his arms around his T’hl’ya’s shaking shoulders.
“It’s okay, Spock, it’s okay.”
Spock, his eyes still wet, moved his head so his forehead was resting against Jim’s. He looked in those eyes and they’re the right eyes. He let himself smile and kissed Jim gently.
“Yes, Jim, it is.”
Out of the corner of his eye Spock saw his counter-part get up suddenly and dash off the bridge. He cringed a bit at the thought that, although he was truly happy for the first time in many years, he may have just done something stupid.
***
Spock watched the intruder get up off the floor. The man didn’t appear to have hostile intentions, no weapons were visible. In fact he looked more confused than anything. His eyes passed over each of them in turn. Spock turned his head slightly as his counter-part came on the bridge. He stopped as the intruder called out his name. He recognized him, so he was from that other universe then, fascinating.
As his counter-part slowly approached the other man while discussing the events that had brought him here he noted that even though the behaviour was stiff there was a deep closeness lying just beneath the surface. As if they would finish each other’s sentences if they could, a true friendship it would seem. If it was that meant this was the other captain James T. Kirk. His eyes flickered over to his captain yes, yes he could see the resemblance now.
Spock looked back to the front of the bridge as the other Kirk caught his other self’s hand and locked their fingers together. In that instant his other self’s whole demeanour changed. Spock could only sit there in shock. He realized that this was not just his captain to the other Spock this was his bondmate, there could be no other explanation for such a reaction, and to have that kind of bond, after eighty years of absence flare up at the merest touch, and with a human no less, was incredible. It was also confusing.
He had begun to have feelings for Ji-his captain that he should not. And now to have proof that those feelings had legitimacy that Jim might one day return them…it is overwhelming, and yet his other self was so accepting of it. Oh, how could he ever be him? He watched him as he hugged him, cried, and kissed him and finally smiled all in a public setting. Spock couldn’t stand it.
Jim sat in his chair and watched the exchange of Grandpa Spock and the stranger. It was weird seeing the elder Vulcan smile. Apparently though the weirdness was just beginning, as Jim suddenly saw a blue streak, that turned out to be his first officer, cut across his vision as Spock ran across the bridge and into the turbolift. Not wasting a moment he ran after him and shoved himself between the doors before they closed.
Not expecting anyone, least of all Jim, to follow him Spock turned around in shock and pressed himself against the back wall of the lift.
“Spock, what is this all about? You’re the last person I would expect to run off the bridge like that.”
“I apologize for my actions, Captain, but I could not be around that display.”
“Why? I mean I know it’s not everyday some old dude gets on the ship that older you really likes, but-”
“He’s you.”
“Excuse me?”
“That man we have onboard is the future you.”
Jim glanced at the doors and put one hand on his stomach.
“I’m letting Bones do whatever he wants to my diet card.”
Spock sat down on the floor on the lift and Jim sat down beside him.
“Seriously though I don’t get it, I mean you heard other you he can’t go home. It has got to be lonely to be in a universe that isn’t yours. He seems happy now.”
“He’s emotional and he’s comfortable with that. With himself it’s-”
He was cut off as the two men under discussion suddenly entered the lift.
“Nice to know all the override codes still work here.”
The sat down on the floor, their hands clasped firmly together.
“Spock, I still don’t see what the big deal is, they aren’t the first people on this ship to hold hands.”
Everyone stared at him.
“What, what did I say?”
“Vulcan traditions were covered in your xenolinguistics introductory course were they not?”
“I think so. It was an early class I slept through most of it.”
“You actually slept through a class?” Jim asked his younger self.
“You didn’t?”
“I was a stack of books with legs at the academy.”
“Seriously?”
“Gentlemen, you are getting off topic,” the elder Spock admonished.
“Indeed. Jim, holding hands like that is the human equivalent to kissing.”
“Oh, oh so the future you and I are…whoa.”
The elder Spock looked at the two young men seriously.
“I apologize for what has happened. I did not wish to inform you of this development in your lives because I did not wish to push its development prematurely, if it was to happen at all; my actions on the bridge were rash and from a deeply emotional place.”
“But you have accepted what you feel,” Spock said.
“Very much so. This simple feeling brings me great fulfillment.”
“I wish I could say the same.”
Jim looked at his first officer.
“Spock?”
“I feel deep affection for you, Jim, and I am ashamed of it.”
“Because I’m human and not worthy of your race, or because you feel it at all?”
“I do not know. It would seem unacceptable to be with you. My peers berated me for my heritage and yet, and yet, my father loved her. I am conflicted. I have no experience with which to properly process this,” he looked at his elder, “and to see you so sure of it is…disheartening.”
“Spock, I have had 129 years more experience than you of course I’m more comfortable, and also her hand was there to guide me longer.”
“Forgive me for being at such a disadvantage,” Spock said, his tone hard.
“Ah, you feel inferior to me. You have deduced that because you see this behaviour regularly in me now that I have always been so open and well-balanced about my heritage and my feelings. That is not the case.”
“You were not accepting to his advances?”
“On the contrary I, as humans put it, ‘freaked out’ left him and attempted Kolinahr.”
“Really?”
“I would advise against that course of action. Staying with him will likely prevent him from piloting a desk at Starfleet command. Which is better in the long run for both of you.”
“Wait, a desk? Like being kicked upstairs? They’re actually going to want to promote me one day, like legitimately and not just because they kind of had to?”
Jim Kirk put his hand on the shoulder of his younger self. “Don’t take it, Kid. Just don’t and save yourself a lot of grief.”
“Okay then.”
The four of them fell silent and Spock turned the whole situation over in his mind. He looked at them again. They were a couple and very happy to be so. They both acted like the relationship was an inevitable outcome, destiny if you will, but-and then realization slammed into him in an instant. Once he had confessed his feelings to Jim, Jim had not turned him down. He had never denied that it was indeed a possibility. He grabbed Jim by the shoulders and forced him to face him.
“You didn’t contest me about my…desire for you.”
Jim cocked his head to the side. “Was I supposed to?”
“You reciprocate?” Spock asked, not managing to hide his astonishment.
“Yeah, I do.”
“When, when did you know?”
“About ten minutes before the situation went to hell today.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Before that energy ribbon and he showed up the mission was giving me a lot of time to think. About us and what kind of a relationship we’ve been building lately. I enjoy being with you even when we don’t do anything. You make me feel good and not in the same way it is with Bones. It’s different with you, Spock, and I like it.”
“You shouldn’t.”
“Why not? You and Uhura were-”
“That was an attempt at human courtship in a time of great emotional and physical stress. If I pursue a partner again it will be the Vulcan way, with my planet gone it is more important now then ever that I embrace the culture and traditions of my father.”
“And I can’t be a part of those traditions because?”
“Vulcan relationships are strictly monogamous and permanent baring the death of one’s spouse and I can’t ask you to enter such a union.”
“Again I ask, why not?”
Spock bowed his head in slight embarrassment. “Your reputation at the Academy made its way around the faculty lounge more than once.”
“And did you check the facts? Did you confirm my reputation?”
Spock looked up staring into Jim’s eyes. “Are you saying you take no pleasure in…frivolous relationships?”
“Frivolous relationships lead to frivolous divorces, angry parents, and unhappy childhoods,” he answered tersely. “Yes I flirt, it’s fun, but that doesn’t mean that a revolving door of partners is what I really want. I want something that is strong, something that will last. Someone who says they won’t leave and really means it.” He sighed. “I just don’t know how to get it.”
Jim leaned over and put his hand on his counter-part’s shoulder. “Go slow, be gentle, let it grow as you both grow.”
“Wait! On the bridge you noted he had been gone for eighty years that implies one of us will leave at some point. Is that not something we should be concerned with?”
“Coming to the relationship much earlier then we did will no doubt alter the events that lead to his disappearance in the first place.”
Spock nodded and turned his head back to Jim.
“Then you would be willing to learn for me, to try with me?”
“Scout’s honour,” he said, holding up his hand.
“Scouts salute with their right hand,” the older Kirk informed him.
Jim shrugged and grinned. “Well they did kick me out of that.”
Spock felt his lips twitch slightly upwards and he took Jim’s hand and positioned it properly to his own slowly letting their fingers slide along each other’s.
“It’s so weird,” Jim said, and smiled. “In a good way I mean.”
Spock was half ready to attempt to kiss him the human way when the doors opened and they all looked up to see an irate McCoy standing over them.
“What in the name of Kentucky gumbo are you doing in here?”
Everyone remained silent until Jim just shrugged his shoulders and answered, “bonding.”
“Well that’s just dandy now would the four of you mind getting out of the damn elevator!”
***
Spock lay in bed staring at the wall, his mind’s eye playing the images over and over again in his head. He could touch Jim, really touch him, when he returned this time. He could talk to him at length. He was never able to do that in his dreams before.
“Spock?”
Spock stiffened at the other voice, and that was when he noticed a hand wrapped around his own. The feeling of heat from another person next to him, in a bed he had never shared. Not a dream, reality. Jim was alive.
“Spock, are you all right? You were mumbling in your sleep a lot.”
Spock turned over and sat up. Jim sat up as well squeezing Spock’s shoulder in reassurance. As he commanded the lights on Spock looked into Jim’s eyes; that had always been so bright and were now filled with concern for him. It took almost all of his Vulcan control to stop himself from weeping with joy again.
“I was without you for so long, Jim, and now to finally have you again so abruptly is,” his gazed dropped to the bed, and he began twisting the bed sheets between his fingers. “I am having difficulty dealing with it emotionally.”
“I’ve noticed that.”
Spock looked up as Jim slid his hand down Spock’s arm to take his hand again.
“If that repulses you, Jim, if you no longer desire what I have become-”
“No, no! Spock, never!” he answered, gripping his hand tighter. “I didn’t hassle you all those years to accept your human side just to turn on you when you’ve truly embraced everything that you are so openly, everything that I love about you. I’m just so sorry I’ve caused you so much pain.”
“You did not do so intentionally.”
“It doesn’t matter that it wasn’t intentional I still hurt you.”
It was true it had hurt. It did hurt, and Spock hated himself for feeling even a modicum of resentment towards Jim when every moment with his t’hy’la should be being cherished.
“The minute you weren’t there I should have known something was wrong, but I was so caught up in being somewhere that wasn’t Starfleet, where people didn’t treat me like a figure head celebrity with his glory days behind him. Oh, god, I didn’t even try! What kind of a t’hy’la am I?”
“A human one, capable of making mistakes, but also able to recognize them and work to correct them,” Spock answered simply.
Jim turned away from Spock now disgusted with himself.
“I was without you for a flicker of time in comparison, why do you even want me to correct it?”
“Because I love you, Jim, and I want you to hear that, to know that.”
Jim nodded he knew Spock was nothing if not loyal, and he was so grateful for it, but, “eight decades…a lifetime. I’ve been gone for most of your lifetime, how, how can I ever make that up to you?”
“Care for me, Jim, cherish me, love me, love me as you always have and always will.”
“Love. That emotion has sent us down so many harrowing paths in our lives already, perhaps we were better off without it.”
“No.”
It was a stupid thought and Jim knew it, and to begin to apologize properly for his stupidity Jim pulled his Vulcan friend close to his body, and Spock started kissing a hairline that had receded every so slightly with time. Letting his hands roam over flesh that had grown soft and rounded with age, looking into eyes that he knew they would have to track down glasses for again. Jim in turn ran a hand through hair that was now grey instead of the sea of ebony it had remained for so long, kissing drier lips, touching skin that had folded and creased in the years he had been gone. Yet Jim could feel the muscles under the skin still as strong as they ever were, and he knew Spock, as he put his hands against his face in a familiar fashion, could tell that his mind was as sharp as ever.
Their connection was broken abruptly by a loud thud as something or someone hit the wall that separated their room from the younger captain’s. Their counter-parts had obviously wasted no time in getting to know each other intimately as well.
Jim smiled wistfully at the thought that that had been them not so very long ago.
“We are not young.”
“No, but that has its own advantages. We will not be expected to be on the bridge at 0800 hours bright and alert as they shall be. We have the luxury to fully explore that which his been given back to us again.”
Jim laughed and put on his best flirtatious smile. “Then commence exploratory mission, Mr. Spock.”
“Affirmative, Captain.”
The End
Rating: PG
Pairings: Kirk/Spock, Kirk Prime/Spock Prime
Disclaimer: as always I don't own anything in this awesome franchise.
Summary: A freaky space anomaly dumps Kirk Prime on the Enterprise bridge. Spock Prime's emotional response to his return has consequences for Kirk and Spock.
The very first Star Trek story I ever wrote. And it was a kink meme fill, is anyone surprised?
It’s the Same Old Song
They are preparing to take Grandpa Spock, as Jim likes to call him, to a diplomatic conference. Jim really can’t understand why the guy wants to keep working at his age. You would think after saving countless civilizations and seeing every star in the galaxy at least twice that he might like to retire and, you know, relax, but apparently he doesn’t so here they are. He doesn’t mind it really it was just that with two other dignitaries on board as well they had to wear their finest clothes, and his dress shirt itched something fierce. Also the route was pre-planned by Starfleet to avoid danger and so it was also tremendously boring. He and Spock had taken up playing chess in an attempt to pass the time and he thought he was getting rather good if he did say so himself. Jim did have to admit Grandpa Spock was right about their friendship. It was wonderful to have someone there to lean on in all kinds of circumstances. He still had Bones of course, but Spock was just different somehow. Although now that he thought about it Spock might be beginning to take it a little too seriously. He had thrown himself in front of that plant that shot poisonous thorns just a week ago to protect him, when it would have been just as quick to shout at him to get out of the way. Well he could think about that later. Then he slouched down in his seat slightly and decided maybe he should think about now as there wasn’t anything else to do.
Some time later Jim would kick himself for jinxing the mission.
The ribbon of energy seemed to come out of nowhere. For almost half an hour the ship was shaken up and put on red alert. Eventually torpedoes got fired and the energy ribbon finally took the hint and buggered off. Spock continued to scan the area to make sure it was clear and Bones came up to treat one on the crew members who had received a mild burn. As everyone else picked themselves up and straightened out their uniforms they turned to the area of the floor just in front of the viewscreen to find that they had taken on an extra passenger.
The first thing James T. Kirk noticed as he picked himself up off the floor was good old McCoy. Well okay he didn’t look exactly like Bones, but he had that grumpy old country doctor aura about him that Bones always had. He looked over to Spock’s station and he was there with his eyebrow arched up practically to the ceiling. He knows instantly that somehow this is not his Spock. He is too young for one thing, in fact as he continued to look around he noted that everyone on the bridge was too young to be his crew and who was the whipper-snapper sitting in his chair?
Jim opened his mouth to ask just what the hell was going on when the turbolift doors opened and an old man dressed in black stepped out.
“Spock?”
The man stopped dead when he caught sight of him. Jim started to walk towards him instead, he knew that this one was his Spock, and he didn’t care that Spock looked so much older than he remembered. He stopped though when he noticed that the other man was looking at him blank-eyed and stone-faced.
“What happened?” he asked taking a quick glance to the other Spock again, perhaps he was mistaken and that one was his after all? Was he in a parallel universe again?
“Time continued on and doubled back on itself in a manner of speaking.” Was the stiff answer Jim received.
Spock dared to take a few steps towards the figure. He had seen so many things in his years. Jim split into two people. Jim’s body inhabited by another’s mind. Jim replaced by an android. There were many possibilities. So he snuffed out the little flame of hope in his chest with swift efficiency. He can’t afford to think like that. It’s not his Jim he told himself. Just like the boy who sits in the captain’s chair is not his Jim.
“Time travel?”
“With grave consequences. An alternate reality has been created and I can never go home.”
He has had dreams like this, more of them than he cares to remember. Of seeing him, hearing his voice, reaching out to touch him, only to wake up before he could, and reach out in reality to touch only a cold empty pillow where he should have been.
“Where did you come from?” Spock asked.
“From a place where time and space have no meaning, how long has it been?”
“Eighty years.”
He was in front of the man who looked like Jim now. He reached out slowly and then tried to curl his fingers away from him. No he can’t do it, because it was not real, it was some alien induced, or spore induced, or insanity induced fantasy this isn’t his-
He never completes that thought because the other man catches his hand with his own and interlaces their fingers. The contact made him shiver and flooded his mind with memories.
“It gives me emotional security.”
“And I do want to go back to the ship, captain.”
A hand that would have pressed against his own if there wasn’t glass in the way.
“Jim…your name is Jim.”
Strong arms that pulled both of them into cold water.
“Please, captain, not in front of the Klingons.”
A voice that promised to be back soon.
Spock let go of his hand and the images faded.
Jim saw that finally there was true recognition of who he is on the other man’s face. He smiled slightly and prepared to be grabbed by the shoulders and for him to yell out ‘Jim!’ in a fit of joyous emotion, and for Bones to then make some comment about emotional performances that bring houses down as he had so many years ago. He was not prepared to have Spock start blinking rapidly, pull him into the strongest hug they had ever shared, and bury his face in his shoulder. He stiffened for a moment in surprise before wrapping his arms around his T’hl’ya’s shaking shoulders.
“It’s okay, Spock, it’s okay.”
Spock, his eyes still wet, moved his head so his forehead was resting against Jim’s. He looked in those eyes and they’re the right eyes. He let himself smile and kissed Jim gently.
“Yes, Jim, it is.”
Out of the corner of his eye Spock saw his counter-part get up suddenly and dash off the bridge. He cringed a bit at the thought that, although he was truly happy for the first time in many years, he may have just done something stupid.
***
Spock watched the intruder get up off the floor. The man didn’t appear to have hostile intentions, no weapons were visible. In fact he looked more confused than anything. His eyes passed over each of them in turn. Spock turned his head slightly as his counter-part came on the bridge. He stopped as the intruder called out his name. He recognized him, so he was from that other universe then, fascinating.
As his counter-part slowly approached the other man while discussing the events that had brought him here he noted that even though the behaviour was stiff there was a deep closeness lying just beneath the surface. As if they would finish each other’s sentences if they could, a true friendship it would seem. If it was that meant this was the other captain James T. Kirk. His eyes flickered over to his captain yes, yes he could see the resemblance now.
Spock looked back to the front of the bridge as the other Kirk caught his other self’s hand and locked their fingers together. In that instant his other self’s whole demeanour changed. Spock could only sit there in shock. He realized that this was not just his captain to the other Spock this was his bondmate, there could be no other explanation for such a reaction, and to have that kind of bond, after eighty years of absence flare up at the merest touch, and with a human no less, was incredible. It was also confusing.
He had begun to have feelings for Ji-his captain that he should not. And now to have proof that those feelings had legitimacy that Jim might one day return them…it is overwhelming, and yet his other self was so accepting of it. Oh, how could he ever be him? He watched him as he hugged him, cried, and kissed him and finally smiled all in a public setting. Spock couldn’t stand it.
Jim sat in his chair and watched the exchange of Grandpa Spock and the stranger. It was weird seeing the elder Vulcan smile. Apparently though the weirdness was just beginning, as Jim suddenly saw a blue streak, that turned out to be his first officer, cut across his vision as Spock ran across the bridge and into the turbolift. Not wasting a moment he ran after him and shoved himself between the doors before they closed.
Not expecting anyone, least of all Jim, to follow him Spock turned around in shock and pressed himself against the back wall of the lift.
“Spock, what is this all about? You’re the last person I would expect to run off the bridge like that.”
“I apologize for my actions, Captain, but I could not be around that display.”
“Why? I mean I know it’s not everyday some old dude gets on the ship that older you really likes, but-”
“He’s you.”
“Excuse me?”
“That man we have onboard is the future you.”
Jim glanced at the doors and put one hand on his stomach.
“I’m letting Bones do whatever he wants to my diet card.”
Spock sat down on the floor on the lift and Jim sat down beside him.
“Seriously though I don’t get it, I mean you heard other you he can’t go home. It has got to be lonely to be in a universe that isn’t yours. He seems happy now.”
“He’s emotional and he’s comfortable with that. With himself it’s-”
He was cut off as the two men under discussion suddenly entered the lift.
“Nice to know all the override codes still work here.”
The sat down on the floor, their hands clasped firmly together.
“Spock, I still don’t see what the big deal is, they aren’t the first people on this ship to hold hands.”
Everyone stared at him.
“What, what did I say?”
“Vulcan traditions were covered in your xenolinguistics introductory course were they not?”
“I think so. It was an early class I slept through most of it.”
“You actually slept through a class?” Jim asked his younger self.
“You didn’t?”
“I was a stack of books with legs at the academy.”
“Seriously?”
“Gentlemen, you are getting off topic,” the elder Spock admonished.
“Indeed. Jim, holding hands like that is the human equivalent to kissing.”
“Oh, oh so the future you and I are…whoa.”
The elder Spock looked at the two young men seriously.
“I apologize for what has happened. I did not wish to inform you of this development in your lives because I did not wish to push its development prematurely, if it was to happen at all; my actions on the bridge were rash and from a deeply emotional place.”
“But you have accepted what you feel,” Spock said.
“Very much so. This simple feeling brings me great fulfillment.”
“I wish I could say the same.”
Jim looked at his first officer.
“Spock?”
“I feel deep affection for you, Jim, and I am ashamed of it.”
“Because I’m human and not worthy of your race, or because you feel it at all?”
“I do not know. It would seem unacceptable to be with you. My peers berated me for my heritage and yet, and yet, my father loved her. I am conflicted. I have no experience with which to properly process this,” he looked at his elder, “and to see you so sure of it is…disheartening.”
“Spock, I have had 129 years more experience than you of course I’m more comfortable, and also her hand was there to guide me longer.”
“Forgive me for being at such a disadvantage,” Spock said, his tone hard.
“Ah, you feel inferior to me. You have deduced that because you see this behaviour regularly in me now that I have always been so open and well-balanced about my heritage and my feelings. That is not the case.”
“You were not accepting to his advances?”
“On the contrary I, as humans put it, ‘freaked out’ left him and attempted Kolinahr.”
“Really?”
“I would advise against that course of action. Staying with him will likely prevent him from piloting a desk at Starfleet command. Which is better in the long run for both of you.”
“Wait, a desk? Like being kicked upstairs? They’re actually going to want to promote me one day, like legitimately and not just because they kind of had to?”
Jim Kirk put his hand on the shoulder of his younger self. “Don’t take it, Kid. Just don’t and save yourself a lot of grief.”
“Okay then.”
The four of them fell silent and Spock turned the whole situation over in his mind. He looked at them again. They were a couple and very happy to be so. They both acted like the relationship was an inevitable outcome, destiny if you will, but-and then realization slammed into him in an instant. Once he had confessed his feelings to Jim, Jim had not turned him down. He had never denied that it was indeed a possibility. He grabbed Jim by the shoulders and forced him to face him.
“You didn’t contest me about my…desire for you.”
Jim cocked his head to the side. “Was I supposed to?”
“You reciprocate?” Spock asked, not managing to hide his astonishment.
“Yeah, I do.”
“When, when did you know?”
“About ten minutes before the situation went to hell today.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Before that energy ribbon and he showed up the mission was giving me a lot of time to think. About us and what kind of a relationship we’ve been building lately. I enjoy being with you even when we don’t do anything. You make me feel good and not in the same way it is with Bones. It’s different with you, Spock, and I like it.”
“You shouldn’t.”
“Why not? You and Uhura were-”
“That was an attempt at human courtship in a time of great emotional and physical stress. If I pursue a partner again it will be the Vulcan way, with my planet gone it is more important now then ever that I embrace the culture and traditions of my father.”
“And I can’t be a part of those traditions because?”
“Vulcan relationships are strictly monogamous and permanent baring the death of one’s spouse and I can’t ask you to enter such a union.”
“Again I ask, why not?”
Spock bowed his head in slight embarrassment. “Your reputation at the Academy made its way around the faculty lounge more than once.”
“And did you check the facts? Did you confirm my reputation?”
Spock looked up staring into Jim’s eyes. “Are you saying you take no pleasure in…frivolous relationships?”
“Frivolous relationships lead to frivolous divorces, angry parents, and unhappy childhoods,” he answered tersely. “Yes I flirt, it’s fun, but that doesn’t mean that a revolving door of partners is what I really want. I want something that is strong, something that will last. Someone who says they won’t leave and really means it.” He sighed. “I just don’t know how to get it.”
Jim leaned over and put his hand on his counter-part’s shoulder. “Go slow, be gentle, let it grow as you both grow.”
“Wait! On the bridge you noted he had been gone for eighty years that implies one of us will leave at some point. Is that not something we should be concerned with?”
“Coming to the relationship much earlier then we did will no doubt alter the events that lead to his disappearance in the first place.”
Spock nodded and turned his head back to Jim.
“Then you would be willing to learn for me, to try with me?”
“Scout’s honour,” he said, holding up his hand.
“Scouts salute with their right hand,” the older Kirk informed him.
Jim shrugged and grinned. “Well they did kick me out of that.”
Spock felt his lips twitch slightly upwards and he took Jim’s hand and positioned it properly to his own slowly letting their fingers slide along each other’s.
“It’s so weird,” Jim said, and smiled. “In a good way I mean.”
Spock was half ready to attempt to kiss him the human way when the doors opened and they all looked up to see an irate McCoy standing over them.
“What in the name of Kentucky gumbo are you doing in here?”
Everyone remained silent until Jim just shrugged his shoulders and answered, “bonding.”
“Well that’s just dandy now would the four of you mind getting out of the damn elevator!”
***
Spock lay in bed staring at the wall, his mind’s eye playing the images over and over again in his head. He could touch Jim, really touch him, when he returned this time. He could talk to him at length. He was never able to do that in his dreams before.
“Spock?”
Spock stiffened at the other voice, and that was when he noticed a hand wrapped around his own. The feeling of heat from another person next to him, in a bed he had never shared. Not a dream, reality. Jim was alive.
“Spock, are you all right? You were mumbling in your sleep a lot.”
Spock turned over and sat up. Jim sat up as well squeezing Spock’s shoulder in reassurance. As he commanded the lights on Spock looked into Jim’s eyes; that had always been so bright and were now filled with concern for him. It took almost all of his Vulcan control to stop himself from weeping with joy again.
“I was without you for so long, Jim, and now to finally have you again so abruptly is,” his gazed dropped to the bed, and he began twisting the bed sheets between his fingers. “I am having difficulty dealing with it emotionally.”
“I’ve noticed that.”
Spock looked up as Jim slid his hand down Spock’s arm to take his hand again.
“If that repulses you, Jim, if you no longer desire what I have become-”
“No, no! Spock, never!” he answered, gripping his hand tighter. “I didn’t hassle you all those years to accept your human side just to turn on you when you’ve truly embraced everything that you are so openly, everything that I love about you. I’m just so sorry I’ve caused you so much pain.”
“You did not do so intentionally.”
“It doesn’t matter that it wasn’t intentional I still hurt you.”
It was true it had hurt. It did hurt, and Spock hated himself for feeling even a modicum of resentment towards Jim when every moment with his t’hy’la should be being cherished.
“The minute you weren’t there I should have known something was wrong, but I was so caught up in being somewhere that wasn’t Starfleet, where people didn’t treat me like a figure head celebrity with his glory days behind him. Oh, god, I didn’t even try! What kind of a t’hy’la am I?”
“A human one, capable of making mistakes, but also able to recognize them and work to correct them,” Spock answered simply.
Jim turned away from Spock now disgusted with himself.
“I was without you for a flicker of time in comparison, why do you even want me to correct it?”
“Because I love you, Jim, and I want you to hear that, to know that.”
Jim nodded he knew Spock was nothing if not loyal, and he was so grateful for it, but, “eight decades…a lifetime. I’ve been gone for most of your lifetime, how, how can I ever make that up to you?”
“Care for me, Jim, cherish me, love me, love me as you always have and always will.”
“Love. That emotion has sent us down so many harrowing paths in our lives already, perhaps we were better off without it.”
“No.”
It was a stupid thought and Jim knew it, and to begin to apologize properly for his stupidity Jim pulled his Vulcan friend close to his body, and Spock started kissing a hairline that had receded every so slightly with time. Letting his hands roam over flesh that had grown soft and rounded with age, looking into eyes that he knew they would have to track down glasses for again. Jim in turn ran a hand through hair that was now grey instead of the sea of ebony it had remained for so long, kissing drier lips, touching skin that had folded and creased in the years he had been gone. Yet Jim could feel the muscles under the skin still as strong as they ever were, and he knew Spock, as he put his hands against his face in a familiar fashion, could tell that his mind was as sharp as ever.
Their connection was broken abruptly by a loud thud as something or someone hit the wall that separated their room from the younger captain’s. Their counter-parts had obviously wasted no time in getting to know each other intimately as well.
Jim smiled wistfully at the thought that that had been them not so very long ago.
“We are not young.”
“No, but that has its own advantages. We will not be expected to be on the bridge at 0800 hours bright and alert as they shall be. We have the luxury to fully explore that which his been given back to us again.”
Jim laughed and put on his best flirtatious smile. “Then commence exploratory mission, Mr. Spock.”
“Affirmative, Captain.”
The End