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Sarek of Somewhere
“Stupid uniform,” Bones grumbled. “Is choking us supposed to be some kind of--”“Consequence of being in Starfleet,” Spock finished for him. “Before you ask again--” he demonstrated the ta'al.“Worse than the neck on this damn uniform,” Bones grumbled. He pinched his fingers into place and stuck two of them in his pocket so his hand would stay more or less in shape. Spock noticed, raised an eyebrow at Kirk and thought a crude comment at him.Bones quit fussing and got to his real point. “Your dad is okay with coming aboard again? It doesn't look quite the same, at least.”Spock clasped his hands behind his back. “He is a logical man and it will not matter. Thank you for asking, but that is what he will say. “On the other hand...the cause would be sufficient.”Kirk shuddered. That room had been crammed with forty-seven broken-hearted Vulcan elders, definitely not including Spock's lost mother, trying to keep a stiff upper lip during a hellacious voyage, slingshot and all. He was unsure whether Spock ever wanted to see most of them again. Sarek, however, was no longer in doubt. Between the Vengeance incident and the aftermath on New Vulcan, Spock and his father had reached a sort of lonely detente. They and most of the family messaged one another daily, drawing Kirk into their loop in a way that seemed oddly natural.Selik is right, you know. I belong here. The thought nearly as clear as speech happened all the time now, his thoughts to Spock's and Spock's to his. He had a brief vision of the old tin cans and string comm kids used to make; on some days he imagined a cord hanging out of Spock's ear. The old ambassador had mentioned how wildly accelerated the budded timeline seemed, but that he and his Jim had enjoyed the same ability even without the Trellium-D poisoning that had taken place after the Vengeance. “Teenagers with low psychic ability used to call it 'cheat-rock,',” old Spock had explained. “It enhanced their abilities, though it damaged their control if taken in large doses or more than once or twice. I never had to use it. Furthermore, with my Jim, it would have been superfluous.”Of all those who might have been arriving, Kirk wished old-Spock could have been among them even though the trip would have been very hard on him. Sarek's father would have to do, and of those who might have come along, Kirk thought Sarek might need his company most.Normally, ambassadors arrived with an entourage of aides. Due to va'Pak, Sarek would be accompanied only by his father, because everyone else was either too frail to travel or too busy rebuilding and/or trying to reproduce. There was enough rumbling already about the tiny remnant of Vulcan needing to step back from the Federation Council. Showing up with a single aide, even one who had once been an ambassador himself, wasn't going to help, but what else could they do? Even the newly stolen former Romulan warships were unavailable because of their obsessive guarding of New Vulcan and their runs to k'turr colonies to beg help from those rejected years ago. Even the Surak, Sarek's assigned fast diplomatic ship, had been lost as his aides tried to escape. Many other planets had sent their ambassadors along on the Enterprise, but not having their own craft was one more reminder of the Vulcans' precarious situation.Kirk's comm continued to murmur updates in his ear, announcing the shuttle's arrival, the pressurization of Bay Two, the imminent presence of the honor guard. Scotty was positively kempt. “Och, wouldn't do not to be respectful, would it? That Tellarite beast was spewing about small planets not needing a voice. Keenser took it personally and bit his kneecap.”A captain really couldn't guffaw at such things. On the other hand...“Then mooned him?”Spock remained upright and frozen. “Apparently, the frequent need to express themselves so is the reason Keenser's people do not wear pants.” I may reconsider my own uniform. The image that went with the thought caused Kirk to snort in an unbecoming way just as the honor guard marched up. He explained under his breath to Bones, who wiped off the grin that sprang to his face and tried to be serious even as Cupcake brought his people up in a salute.“Ambassador Sarek and Ambassador Emeritus Skon,” the comm announced flatly. The shuttle bay doors parted and Sarek walked through, eerily in the same robes and breastplate he had worn on va'Pak.Bones lifted his pre-ta'aled hand to match the others. Kirk said “Welcome aboard.”It was supposed to be impossible to read a Vulcan's face. To anyone who hadn't been around Sarek on New Vulcan during the attempted wipeout, it still might be, but Kirk saw exhaustion, grief and defeat. Spock was alarmed as well, whether or not his own face moved. The way Sarek's clothes hung suggested weight loss as terrible as the torn-off place in his soul where Amanda and the planet belonged.The man behind and beside him, not as riven, looked around with wide dark eyes as warm and curious as a deer's. Had someone stretched Spock half a foot vertically without adding mass, the result would have been about the same. He wasn't that much older than Sarek, barely had the beginnings of gray and seemed pleased by McCoy's attempted salute, which he returned. He looked around again. “Fascinating. Oh. Live long and prosper, yes.”“Peace and long life, o'samekh'li,” Spock said, and jabbed Kirk in the ribs with an elbow.“Peace and long life, Ambassador Sarek, Ambassador Skon. Welcome aboard the Enterprise.” By protocol, he wasn't supposed to admit knowing either of them. He hadn't met Skon in person even though they had talked several times. Sarek, however...Spock had explained their old warfare, egged on by a Council of Elders all too eager to foster the split between father and son. “Skon and his other son were under the same commands because Uncle Silek chose not to follow his father's career,” he had told Kirk over mugs of hot chocolate one evening. “They were wise enough to follow the letter but not the spirit of the orders. Kaiidth, but that Father and I had caught on in the same way rather than wasting so much time.” He didn't have to add “while Mother was alive and I could have visited her more often.”There had been the brief madness, never spoken of, during which Sarek had tried to hijack a starship and go wipe out Romulus. After that, the Vengeance had left all of them more or less hurt and Kirk more or less dead. There had been the trip to New Vulcan, where peace was supposed to reign and chaos broke out instead. Kirk, still reeling, had joined Spock in the rudimentary hospital taking care of people whose bodily systems he only half understood.Sarek had been in the middle of a paramedic course, a dire necessity when there were no healers left to cover the embassy staff's needs. Half-trained and fully desperate, he had jumped in with Kirk, Spock and the few living medics. Hundreds of dire wounds among two thousand of the precious survivors had strained every nerve any of them had. Help had arrived in time, barely, just as it had in Kirk's past and with almost as many nightmares afterwards.Sarek had not only mental, but also physical, damage to deal with. Between old half-treated injuries, new ones from hand to hand combat with a very large Romulan and a leaking heart valve only his wife had known about, he had been fairly dismantled and reassembled after the battle and had taken scant time off to heal. Given the excellent techniques his doctors had used, two weeks might have been enough had he not been trying to run the attempted rebirth of Vulcan culture from his grandfather's couch. Everything Kirk saw face to face contrasted vividly with the muted optimism of his daily posts. Things were going badly, but how?The official Federation vid drone went by to finish its angles, then disappeared back to the bigger cargo bay, now set up as a lounge. Kirk folded his arms. “O'samekh, you're on my ship and it directly affects my mission. What happened...” he paused to feel for the timing, “last night?”The temptation to lie flicked past in an instant and the weary gold eyes met Kirk's. “We almost lost one of the embassy aides. It was my fault.”“Was not!” Skon argued, as much as Skon was capable of arguing with anyone. “She concealed her illness, and the young woman in question is a high adept with excellent shielding. You could do nothing but take her to the Academy hospital even when you did find out.”“Perhaps I could offer an opinion if you can tell me exactly what happened,” Bones interjected. “Leave out the names and give me the rundown while we head to your quarters.”Young Vulcan survivors were trying to conceive at far earlier ages than would otherwise happen. One, unsatisfied with her lack of progress, had taken far more than her prescribed doses of hormones until she collapsed from a ruptured ovarian cyst. “In humans, a mere painful inconvenience,” Sarek said. “In our people, it can be rapidly fatal.”That made Bones wince. “Surprising that a people who used to fight so much bleed so badly.”“A mechanism to remove toxins from our wounds,” Skon said. “Of use on T'Khasi where some areas' sand is very bad, not useful elsewhere. The Academy emergency room would have been helpless had it not been for subspace comm and our doctor. Fortunately, she had the most common blood type and is recovering, albeit with fifty percent reduction in her future fertility.”“Not what we needed,” Sarek added. “I should have known how to ask her about her illness without giving offense.”“Sarek'kam.” His father ducked his head to be nose to nose with him. “Like most of us, she was brought up when everything gave offense. To suggest illness of that nature was forbidden even for a paramedic or nurse. There is a four percent chance that your wife, with her characteristic bluntness, could have exacted the information, though only at the cost of near-mortal embarrassment on the aide's part. The odds of your not being able to do so approach infinity.”“If I may, Ambassador,” Bones grumbled, “that is completely illogical.”“Exactly!” Skon's enthusiasm was barely restrained. “Many cultural aspects have turned out to be recent constructs caused by the old deliberate misreading of the Kir'Shaara--” he lifted a hand. “Pardon. I have been working on those very repairs. Lieutenant Uhura's presence here is providential in that regard, because I need to discuss a great many items with her.--The reluctance of even the young to discuss injuries with supervisors has caused several serious situations. Just after the Vengeance, during a series of small earthquakes, one of our guards fell down the damaged staircase in the dark, broke his shoulder and tried to fix it himself so as not to admit his self-described clumsiness. We cannot afford such logic-free heroics, but how do we overcome a lifetime of mistraining?”“Not only that,” Sarek added. “The irrational replication of every street and building is nearly complete on New Vulcan, with no one to occupy the vast majority of structures. While the wasted effort defies logic, it is trivial compared to the effect of so many people living alone or nearly so in family compounds. Yet, being in rooms with a familiar shape is the only thing maintaining sanity in a large part of the population.”Skon sighed. “Just so. As small towns are rebuilt, in some cases with only one or two people, the problem of monitoring and serving such far-flung outposts will only increase. Getting help in an emergency will require very good transporters. Even the Fort was built to hold a garrison of five thousand. Last year the parts that were not the museum were home to three hundred full-time residents and another thousand who passed through regularly. Now, depending on travel schedules, our encampment is between seventeen and twenty-five, and that only because we were an exceptionally mobile family and many of us happened to be off-world when it happened.”“The Embassy on Earth is more populated now than it has been for some time. It was a former American military prison and administrative center,” Sarek explained to Cupcake, who had been about to ask. “The entire rescued population could live there, had so many not needed the medical care only available from the k'turr stonn healers at Memorial in Carbon Creek.”“In either city, their culture shock was substantial,” Spock said. “It is believed to have been a factor in most of the deaths after the event.”“Just so.” The look Sarek gave his son said far too much. Too many had simply stopped living when the effort of learning a new world overwhelmed them. Kirk knew both he and Spock had given it too much consideration. “Selik was helpful.”“Indeed. He advised me to spend as much time on Earth as I can in the future.”Kirk was stunned to hear Sarek's soft “I concur.” More might have been said; more needed to be, but they had reached Spock's quarters.“Remodeled,” Spock said, showing them in. “The heat control is here, the lighting here now. The bathroom is in the same place as it was before.”“But significantly less crowded.” Deadpan truth. “All seems in order.”Kirk wasn't sure whether to offer. “Sarek, would you like a tour of the ship, since you got to see very little before and what you did see has been redone?”“I will do along if it would be agreeable to you.” Spock still walked on eggshells. “The plant laboratory is now much larger. Our first crop of pepper pods is ripening.”“Indeed. Perhaps,” Sarek said, though his father looked mildly concerned. “You, o'samekh?”“I would enjoy a tour, if you are not too tired, pi'sa'fu.”Ah, so Sarek also had that in common with his son: nothing energized him like a challenge to his health, especially one delivered with a term of endearment attached. “I am not. Lead on, Captain.”Halfway down the corridor, a middle-aged Andorian with weary purple bags under his eyes stamped up. “I see you're annoying these people, too.”Sarek seemed unfazed. “I am, Shras. Have I annoyed you today?”“By breathing. Ambassador Gav is looking for you.”“Speaking of annoyances. Regarding?”“Trying to curry your favor about the Coridan admission, or throw you out of the Federation, depending on which way you plan to vote. He's even more belligerent than usual. Fair warning, eh?”Kirk stepped in. “Would you like to accompany us, Ambassador? We're touring the ship.”Shras looked startled by the offer, or perhaps the understanding. Spock had explained about his father's perpetual Andorian war, and its degree of sincerity. “Since you ask, I will accept gladly. I do have an eye for a fine starship.”The combatants groused their way around the Enterprise the way Spock and Bones did every day. Meanwhile, Skon took it all in with a kittenish curiosity, asking shy small questions. Shras sent his guards to see to the delegation's quarters. When they were gone, he looked around furtively. “Keep an eye on that older aide in my delegation.” Sarek lifted an eyebrow at him. “The Home Office wished him on me while Jhanar is off with her child. No one seems to know him well. He has very little family and that estranged. He's been around the offices for a half-season, but I don't have a good impression of him and I wish my grandmother were around to give me a read.”“What you mean is...” Sarek prompted. Shras glared in his best imitation of disgust.“Yes, you idiot. If he bumps into you, if he lays hands on you for any reason, you don't have to justify it and I don't have to pretend nothing happened.”“His grandmother,” Skon explained. “An Aenar, a most kind woman who never failed to keep frostberry ice on hand for diplomatic functions, and always graciously melted some for me.”“Ha. I don't know who was the bigger marshmallow, her or you. That reminds me, I brought some of the new crop of ale. Drinkable, I think, not my best work.”Sarek lifted an eyebrow. “I'll have to be the judge of its failings.”“You won't like it. There's no huge load of sugar. Why don't you just chug syrup?”“Syrup has its merits, especially maple. I brought more for you from Earth.”“You could have mentioned it would glue my teeth together when it was properly frozen.”“A refreshingly quiet meeting, was it not? As for the flavor--”“It was delicious and the maple ale is magnificent. Oh, see here!”The plant laboratory served for study of various specimens garnered from new worlds, and at the moment it also hosted precious remainders of Vulcan botany. Sulu was busy looking at delicate pink flowers on fine stalks, but he broke away long enough to describe some of his and Spock's experiments. Shras was enchanted by cuttings from P'Jem. “Oh! Not just thornbush fruit, but the tart cultivar. These were thought to be extinct when--” he paused. “When.”“The monastery garden,” Spock said. “They keep many species not grown even on T'Khasi for many centuries, since the climate on P'Jem resembles Vulcan in Surak's time. Only after the event did the monks offer to let me collect cuttings and seed of anything that might be useful.”Shras sniffed at the young plants. “Amazing! They used to sell only so much of the fruit every year. They kept their overripes for my company. I must negotiate a few seeds to see whether the New Vulcan embassy grounds agree with them. Those are the new crop of pepper pods?”“Divested of their seed and available for consumption.” Spock speared split red pods on a toothpick and handed them to his guests. “Not even the captain is allergic.”Kirk didn't have to say what he thought, so he enjoyed it even more. The pods were delicious, very mild to human taste but doubtless the height of flavor to a Vulcan. They must have been to Sarek. The ice in his face melted for a fraction of a second as he thought, too loudly, Home.He refrained from saying so, of course, or praising Spock in any way, or mentioning that it was good to have seed stock growing and soon available for planting on New Vulcan. Such things were only to be implied according to the ancient rules. Skon was more openly appreciative, favoring his grandson with a gentle smile and snitching the last pod as they walked out.Spock did not try to explain the ship's computers; Sarek walked up to them, raised an eyebrow and ran a hand over the main console exactly the way Kirk had seen him do with a promising vehicle. He made a mental note not to leave Sarek alone with it. The demonstration was necessarily brief because of security. “I'm afraid that's all we can show you.”“That suffices. The possibilities of this much computing power are fascinating. Is the transporter console still the same?”“No, it's in storage.” Not only Amanda had been lost to transporter slip. The old core had been stowed until someone might be able to do more with it at some future date. The ambassador's disappointment wouldn't have shown to outsiders. His father stepped in.“The reception is four hours away. I suggest we return to quarters,” Skon said. “Sa'fu, you need to rest.”“I will meditate.”“Rest,” his father said again, as firmly as he could. “Your mother's orders were quite explicit. I am not to let you go without sleep, food, meditation, recreation or, as she put it, a good stiff drink when you need one, or she will come out here herself despite all difficulties.”“I got the same orders and she isn't even my boss,” Shras muttered. “Go to bed, Spikes. See you later.” He stalked off in the general direction of his quarters with Cupcake and Scotty, discussing the merits of several kinds of booze. Kirk tried to pretend they weren't going to get the Andorian pontiff and brewmeister to suggest improvements to their stills.

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Chris Pike's loss had stopped efforts to make dress greens more fitting and less painful, so Kirk once more donned the stiff, garish costume. Returned Romulans on New Vulcan had put on an elaborate strip show featuring Starfleet dress uniforms. Their simulated joy was supposed to be sexual, but he thought just getting the hard collar off would have been enough. “How do you put up with these things?” he asked Spock as they strolled toward the reception at the slowest speed they could without looking reluctant.“Training.” He moved along serenely, head high and eyes forward, already developing his ambassadorial glide. “Vulcan children are conditioned to accept small annoyances without complaint.”“Figures.” Bones tried to gain a bit of breathing room in the scratchy collar. “Is there any upside to being a Vulcan kid? I mean at all, not just lately?”The quick unguarded glimpse straight at Bones was the mental view Kirk often got becoming physical through those midnight eyes. “Not really.”“If you could choose again--”“I cannot.” End of sentence and story, even for Bones. The subject did shift, ever so slightly. “Consider the consequences of not training children to accept hardship when we lived on T'Khasi.” The emphasis on the last five words was faint. “If warfare was past, for the most part, the desert and its steadily worsening conditions were not. It is...was not unknown to lose a child to the kahs-wan, but even that risk had to be undertaken in order to ensure a child alone on the street in ShiKahr during a sandstorm would know where and how to take shelter. Waiting at a transit stop could be fatal if Seleya began to cast lava bombs toward unwary people. Wildlife would often become frightened by unusual weather and bolt into town, often with predators following.”“There should have been—wait, how could something not have been done about all the terrible weather and the other dangers?”The eyes stayed forward. “Tradition, as things decayed. Of course we could have changed it. Recently, just before the day, a few such measures were taken by younger, less disciplined Council members, who were still terribly rigid. On va'Pak a few survivors preserved archive files, into which only the High Masters of Gol had been permitted inquiry. Grandmother T'Rana has always been given a summary; even T'Pau did not access the files directly, only as a heavily redacted report when specific information was needed. Now they have been opened, of necessity.”Bones got it, even before Kirk himself did. “Ohhhh. How bad is it?”“Father was attempting to recover damaged PADDs on the night of the event--” Kirk had a lash of the way Sarek had looked when he caressed the ship's computer. Of course he would have that duty, and at the time he had needed work. “As he began to retrieve the archives, he began to use language which has always indicated severe displeasure. He threw a PADD at me and barked 'Read!' I complied.” Spock shook his head. “The aims of the Masters of Gol had been so perverted...I once aspired to Kolinahr, with Father's encouragement, the goal he cannot attain. I will no longer consider it, even should the monks of P'Jem try to reestablish the order.”“That bad.” He nodded. “Then your father...His whole life...?” Another nod. “And he doesn't even have your mother to help.”“Just so.” Spock's eyes burned a hole in the far wall of the corridor. “Nor do I.” A commotion in the reception room put him on alert. “Interesting.”“--how the two of you are going to vote!”“Gav, you are beyond annoying,” Shras was sighing.“YOU! Sarek of nowhere. How do you vote, not that you deserve to?”Tellarites argued as a matter of course. They were obnoxious because it was their culture. They were belligerent because not being loud and physically threatening was considered weakness. Kirk had never known that to stop the rest of the Federation from taking offense. Half the room edged away from Gav while the rest watched the incipient fight and the gamblers took bets.Sarek sighed and turned away to refill his drink. “You will hear at the proper time.”“The proper time? Just after we revoke your voting privileges?”“That will not be happening.” His voice was even, his eyes on the table in front of him, proper and flat and Vulcan. “You still demand an answer? I will vote for admission.”“What?” Gav roared.Sarek still didn't turn around. “You oppose admission so Tellar can establish a puppet government on Coridan in order to control the ore trade. The petition is therefore--”Gav lunged over Sarek's shoulder. “A mere ten thousand of you xenophobic weaklings pretend to tell us--” He did not, technically, throw a punch; he was too close, and it came out as more of a shove in the Vulcan's back. Before Kirk could move, Sarek spun around and put all his momentum into a left uppercut that sent Gav over a table. He did not pursue, but stood with his hands up, waiting.The Loyalist Klingon envoy, Captain Kharr, helpful punched Gav back toward the Vulcan but took a mighty shove himself. Skon, hurrying to his son, was nearly crushed as the bulky warrior in his armor crashed into the equally thickset Gav and his bodyguard while Shras' aide lunged into the whole stack. The mass in motion nearly knocked Sarek over as he took a Klingon boot in the ribs. “Oops!” Kharr yelped before Sarek could hit him. It was as close to apology as a Klingon would get, so Sarek punched Gav again instead. After that, the usual incoherent jumble of elbows, fists, claws, talons, teeth and curses prevailed as the ship's security forces descended.“Knock it off!” Kirk had discovered he had a good command bark. Laying hands on Sarek at the moment might have been fatal, and Gav would have been honor-bound to go after Kirk had he been able to get up, but yelling was permitted and, as it turned out, effective. “Gentlemen. This is my ship and I do not permit fighting aboard, is that clear?”Sarek had already gone back to pale statue mode. “Of course, Captain.”“Gurgh.” Gav spat blood and licked a broken tusk. “This is not over, Sarek of Nowhere.”“As you wish, Gav.” Sarek glared in the Tellarite's direction until ship's security hauled him off.Skon did not touch his son, but managed to be in the way. Only when the door finally swished closed did he step aside. “Sa'fu, it might be good not to be here for a while.”“I agree,” said the Klingon, “and Skon, are you quite sure you're not injured?”Skon looked at the shoulder Kharr indicated. “Hm. Perhaps so. Sarek?”“Nothing of concern.” He coughed and blotted green from his lips. “I need to meditate.”“Of course.” Skon felt his shoulder. “Do not concern yourself about this. It is minor.”Bones leapt at the chance to get out of the reception, not least because doing his medical duty also required him to get out of the dress tunic. Skon managed to keep his amusement mostly private as the doctor fussed over his wound. “Hm. You caught the edge of a blade.”“Interesting. Who would have been able to produce one with such stealth?”The lights flickered. Kirk had the urge to punch someone about it, then wondered where that impulse had come from. “Good question. The melee got confusing.”“They usually do. I find it a bit disturbing to know that.” His expression prompted a sour-faced Bones to reach for the painkillers. “Really, it is adequately numb. It is very hard to describe the sensation, but it is distinctly not normal and may not be entirely mine.”The doctor's scanner was already humming, his voice suddenly that soft flannel Kirk knew he put on for patients. “Nothing serious if I understand Vulcan readings. Let me put it this way, I saw worse during the...what happened then, and they didn't die, so you won't either.”“Captain!” Cupcake's voice on the comm was pure panic. “Captain Kirk to Engineering!”“On my way, Herndorff, what's wrong?”“Signal thirty sir.” That sent Kirk into a full-on sprint. Signal thirty was a passenger death.

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Gav's thick neck should not have been at that angle, twisted with enough force to come close to tearing his head off. Spock looked at the body for a moment. “Tal-shaya.”The Romulan Tal Shiar had taken its feared name from the old technique. The ship was Romulan-free, only one of his officers and two of his guests could be expected to know how to do such a thing, and one of the three was in Sickbay being his usual polite self. “Spock, where is he?”“He said he was going to meditate. Quarters would be a reasonable assumption.”“Herndorff, do what you have to here and make sure all the other delegates are accounted for.” Once again Kirk felt the Federation swaying around him like an out of balance scale. The difference was the other chaos he sensed, pain and grief collapsing on itself. Whatever was about to happen, he had to find and control Sarek.To his amazement, when he and Spock reached the first officer's quarters, Sarek came to the door. If he had looked bad after the fight, he was clearly worse now. “Yes, Captain?”“Where were you five minutes ago?”“Here. Did I not say I required meditation?” He swayed on his feet, holding onto the doorframe, and his eyes were not quite focused as the lights dimmed and pulsed. Spock stepped forward.“Ambassador Gav has been murdered.”Kirk had seen guilty and innocent men. Sarek looked neither, only numb. “Really.”Spock tried again. “He was killed by tal-shaya.”Still the blankness, beyond Vulcan control and into the realm of hopelessness. “And?”Kirk reminded him. “Tal-shaya is a Vulcan technique. Spock was with me and your father was with us in sickbay.”“Skon might know how, but he would never.” Sarek tried not to prop his head on the doorframe. “Do you think I would do such a thing?”“If the situation demanded.” Spock met his father's glassy eyes. Sarek began to melt to the floor.“Captain!” Bones was shouting on the conn. “Where is Sarek?”Kirk tried to think of where to grab the slumping man. “In front of me and we need help.”“Damn straight you do. Don't move him without an antigrav unit. We can't risk jarring him.”“What the...” Sarek draped over Kirk's shoulders, dripping such chaotic emotion that Kirk's eyes were going crossed even though his heavy clothing. Spock shoved one of his father's hands back to the doorframe and that load, at least, eased. “Bones, he's out cold.”“Of course he is! Get him down here and don't shake him!”Spock snatched the antigrav lift from the corridor's aid chest and called the turbolift. McCoy's resuscitation team met them at the door while he yelled orders. The biobed's displays told no good stories for several long minutes, then began to stabilize. Bones stepped back, mopped his forehead and turned toward them. Spock and his grandfather performed an admirable casual act. “Doctor?”“He's stable for now, and I mean right this second. Your grandfather felt odd not because he had been stabbed but because there was poison on the blade. When we saw the possible weapon Skon gave me a guess as to the type and told me Sarek needed to be here immediately. Security found this on the floor at the fight.” McCoy produced a clear evidence bag with a slender curved icepick of ivory, seemingly missing its tip.Spock examined it with extreme caution. “Have you scanned Grandfather's wound?”“Yes. The missing piece is not in his arm.”“I believe you will find it in Father.”“So I surmise.” Skon looked a little wobbly, but not nearly as pale and damp as his son, and he remembered to include Kirk in the explanation. “That is a lematya tooth dagger, an ancient assassin's weapon.” He paused, too clearly loath to ask. “Spock, was that in your collection?”“No.” He inspected the curved blade with its broken point. “Mine are quite old and no longer toxic. Check the ship's registry and you will see the difference. This fang has been pulled within days, which means the poison is also fresh.”“Oh, it was,” Skon agreed. “But barely leaking, in my case.”“Compound neurotoxin?” Bones asked. Spock nodded. “How strong?”“My sehlat was killed by a glancing bite like that when I was seven. She weighed approximately four point seven five times what Grandather does. In a deep bite, the fang tip and venom sac break off in the wound. Should the prey survive the initial attack, it collapses minutes later. You will get partial clearance with the standard stock antidote to Orion nerve gas.”“Partial,” Bones repeated, even as he lunged for the supply cabinet. “You're awfully damned calm about that.”“Grandfather's wound is less dangerous. My having hysterics would not alter Father's outcome. Your quick action will.”The doctor shot a syringe into Sarek's intravenous line. “I need to get that fang out of him. I can follow the track of the wound itself--”Skon interrupted “If you do, the poison sac will rupture. That would not be good.”“The design of the fang is such that the sac empties itself if the fang is pulled back. It has not yet happened, or we would already know.” Spock went to his father's side and lifted the sheet over his torso. McCoy had positioned Sarek face down for access to the wound. Kirk did not need to ask what Spock thought of its location, or of the fine pale lacework of other scars. His face remained the perfect Vulcan mask, Kirk knew not how. “Did the same stroke hit you, fa'sa?”“I do not know. Your father shoved me aside just as I felt this. There was such chaos. I know our friend Kharr was beside me, not behind us, and Shras was on the other side of the main table in a separate dispute. They are not to blame, but I cannot venture a guess as to who might be.”“The neurotoxin should neutralize to some degree, then.” Bones folded his arms and looked down at Sarek. “If I read the numbers right, there's also a hemolytic toxin.”“That component causes the prey to hemorrhage as well as become paralyzed.” Skon was awkward in his texting, but had an answer. “Doctor granddaughter says he requires whole blood.”“He and Spock have the same type, but how much is he going to need?”Skon watched for an answer. “A unit or two, to begin with. She says it can take much more, if.”Bones retrieved a bag from the locker. “One good, one slightly out of date, and Spock should be able to donate another.”Skon was too worried not to look it. “The other potential matches are on New Vulcan at the moment. By the time they get here, the need will have abated either way.”“There is that Rigellian drug our medics used during the battle on New Vulcan,” Spock said.Skon winced. “You used that? Father said it was experimental.”“It was, but we believed the need was sufficient.”“Bones, if you think the stuff you use on him makes him sick, that made his bones hurt and even his great-grandpa said--” The comm demanded his attention again. “What?” Kirk bellowed at it.“Captain,” Nyota said, as calmly as if he hadn't just barked at her, “we have an unidentified vessel on visual, tailing us barely beyond scanner rage unless we enhance to the maximum.”“Heh. Why am I not surprised?” He looked around, raising his hands in mute helplessness.“Go, Captain,” Spock said, rolling up a sleeve. “We will take care of him.”

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The unfamiliar ship matched the Enterprise's speed and course, neither approaching nor retreating, neither hailing nor accepting hails. Chekhov showed his captain the data. “Is vaguely like an Andorian civilian wessel with old style phasers. Normally small ships like these trade only near Andor. They do not have the fuel range to be out in this part of space.”Sulu took a break from elaborate zigzags, which the small ship followed. “A ship full of ambassadors is a prime target, but wouldn't anyone planning an overt attack send more than this?”“Chasing us into a trap, distracting us...?”Sulu considered that. “Maybe. We're too short on ships for help out here.” The Enterprise's situation was eerily like Sarek's: they should have traveled with a suitable escort, but they were headed to Babel alone. The public heard some of the damaged craft from the Battle of Vulcan had been repaired. Captains and first officers knew the rest wouldn't be usable or replaced for at least a year. Most of what held the enemies at bay was former Romulan firepower in the hands of Sarek's older sister, Admiral T'Lia.Chris Pike would have known how to handle the delicate tasks at hand. Sarek's sister could be as parental as Chris, but unlike him, she had a limit to both her control and her tolerance of fools. Chris would have handled her for him, no doubt teasing most of the rage out of the admiral before she could assign blame and annihilate a planet or two. It would have been perfectly straightforward for Spock to take the inevitable call, but that wasn't protocol. As his exec frequently reminded him, nearly always while Spock was drinking something sweet and chocolate, “You are the captain. I am merely the first officer now. I would not think of usurping your position.”“I wish you would!” he just as frequently replied, usually while he was holding a large alcoholic drink. “How come your dad got me out of trouble instead of you?”Spock's answer was always the eyebrow, often with the addition of some version of “We have made peace. We have not made that much peace. Also, in an apparently illogical manner for which he will doubtless coin an excuse, he became fond of you.”That was true. After his death he couldn't stay alone. His mother made one of her lightning-fast, sorry-gotta-go-son visits and left again, Chris Pike was gone, the Academy was short on rooms after the damage and the hospital was crammed. When a badly rattled Bones suggested he take the Vulcans up on their offer of a place at the Embassy--“they have plenty of room and at least two paramedics staying there are used to humans” --he went without complaint because he had been numb.He met a host of grieving people who wanted to seem cold and weren't, any more than Spock himself was. He had gone off to New Vulcan with those people because Spock didn't want to leave him. He had been drawn into what happened there, memories of which still swirled around his head at night. In the midst of it all he had been forced into further contact with Sarek.It was a very odd way to get acquainted, but so was starting a fight on the bridge and getting bashed around until the consoles needed repairs, and, as Spock pointed out, that worked. After the battle Kirk realized the Vulcan ambassador had begun sending him to fetch things and telling him to settle down when he got too loud. He should have resented that. Instead, he took it for granted and now found himself upset beyond his expectations. Sulu had been talking, and he had missed the information. He gave his helmsman a sheepish look. “Sorry. Huh?”“It isn't overtly threatening, just sitting there,” Sulu repeated. “So how do we deal?”He and Sulu had been through the same command classes. Neither of them had been given any useful information about what to do with a non-communicating craft right after an assassination attempt. Like it or not, this was a captain task, not a shove the responsibility down the line one. “Doing anything might be an overreaction to a deliberate provocation. So would ignoring them. I suppose we watch. That, and gather up anyone off duty who can brainstorm about how to do really delicate microsurgery as fast as possible without cutting into a patient.”
He was relieved to find Sarek conscious when he visited Sickbay. The ambassador was in a stabilization frame except for his forearms and head, and he was turned mostly toward his back. It could not have been a comfortable position, albeit McCoy had managed to cover him to preserve his usual icy dignity. Bones flicked his eyes to the biobed's display, calling Kirk's attention to the K3 pain levels. He resisted the urge to wince at that and the stress index. Oh.Son looked better, if not well. He was in the recliner with his feet propped up and a padd in his hand, on which he appeared to be reading every article he could find on le-matya toxin. Spock had taken one of the upright bedside chairs, which allowed him to keep his back turned to the numbers he could not change. His attention was also on the padd in front of him. “Not Kharr.”“Better not be. Ahh, this is such an affront to Andorian honor. We do not operate in this way, ever.” Shras, head in hands, had the other chair. “Kharr? No. Why would he? Also, Kharr had no access to a fang. How many of those are left? It should be easy to see which animal is missing one.”Sarek cursed softly. “I do not know who did this, but it was not Kharr. Or you, Shras.”“Don't talk, sir,” Bones said. “I'm not sure where that thing is—”“Immediately behind and above the upper right chamber of my heart, in some scar tissue adjacent to the upper lobe of my liver and just below my right renal artery. It is...quite irritating.”The scan processed into midair above Sarek. The tiny spike was illuminated to show proximity to far too many important structures. “You're right. Gad, I hate admitting that to Vulcans.” The doctor flicked through a series of presentations: major blood vessels, heart, liver. “How. In the hell. Can I manage this?”“I do not know,” Spock said, “but you always do.”Sarek's eyes flickered toward his son. Kirk could hear: As do you.The other thought that had snapped across Kirk's mind like a wet towel made him want to slap himself. He motioned Bones out to the corridor. “Is that restraint field necessary?”“Yeah. I'm afraid to sedate him because that does such weird things to Vulcans' control.”“Then tell him he needs to lie absolutely still, but...” How could he put it? Bluntly? He had to. “Do you see the stress meter? He's having a panic attack.”McCoy's Are you nuts? look was unmistakable. “Oh, come on, he's--”“Trust me on this one: he's having a panic attack. He was a Romulan prisoner of war.”It was interesting to try to make sense of the jumbled mass of swears Bones could spit out in a moment of stress. “...I knew that and didn't make the connection and they didn't say anything. Let me guess, Skon and Spock are helping him keep it together, but not by much.”“Uh-huh. There's a neuropressure thing they can do to short-circuit pain for a while. I'm not a hundred percent sure how to do it. They won't ask, because they're deferring to you as the doctor. I think Spock knows how.” The lights flickered again. “Like I said...he's upset. Prime says his Sarek had a whole starship in a knock-down drag-out brawl when he couldn't hold back.”“Iiiiiiiin that case.” Bones walked back in. “Ambassador, the restraint field won't be necessary if you can lie still, and especially keep from rolling over. Try to keep your voice low. We're going to have to keep you a little chilly to slow absorption. Also, what can I do about the pain? The captain suggested a neuropressure maneuver of some kind and said Spock would know?”Spock did not hesitate, as if he had been waiting. He sunk his thumb and fingers into Sarek's neck on either side of his spine. “Done hard enough, it gives an hour or more of relief.”“Satisfactory,” Sarek breathed as the indicator dropped like a rock. “Most satisfactory.”Chapel brought a tightly rolled blanket and laid it behind Sarek's back. “That should help so you don't have to strain to maintain position. Let me get you some pillows and we'll make it easier.”“This gives me time to figure out a nerve block. The nerve gas antidote will hold most of this slow leak in check for a little while, correct?” Bones looked around for the Vulcans' agreement.“The literature says perhaps eight hours,” Skon said. “The amount in my system is negligible now. His is not. The only suggestion I can find is to place some of the antidote as close as possible to the fang tip. Even with care, there will come a time when the sac disintegrates suddenly.”“If I go through his side and pull in the direction it was pushed in, it might come out intact, but it would more likely slice across here and leak a lot on the way. If it keeps leaking even slightly, blood will be a problem, because the artificial supply we have is not compatible with your type.”“I still am,” Spock grumbled.“Even so, you cannot be a sufficient supply and the other donors I know of are at too great a distance to be here in any useful time,” Skon sighed. “Sarek needs T negative, I am positive.”Bones scratched his head. “You're positive he's negative?”“I'm positive that he is negative and positive that I am positive. His mother is K-negative, his brother T-positive like me. The admiral is T-negative, but both pregnant and too far away.”“I remind you there is the stronger marrow accelerator used by the Rigellians,” Spock offered.Sarek obediently kept his voice to a whisper. “Similar physiology. It worked during the battle.”“You actually used--” McCoy looked up at the door. “Aw, now what?”“My wrist, sir,” Chekhov crept in meekly. “I think I broke it on Captain Kharr's armor.”Bones poked the offending arm into the scanner. “That would have been easier. Breaks I can fix, a sprain that bad will take time to heal.”While he set about doing what repairs he could, the young man took stock of the quiet group of Vulcans. “Ambassadors, sirs, I did not mean to intrude.”“You did not,” Sarek said. “This is an interesting problem. We have all combined our talents and would welcome the addition of yours, which are considerable.”“Ordinarily I like interesting problems, sir, but with my track record about Wulcans, it might be I should keep from trying to help.”“Nonsense, Lieutenant.” Skon's words were full of kindness. “The more minds the better, and yours is an exceptional resource. This is the task at hand...”“I wish to ask you...” Spock's insane idea was not that crazy, Kirk realized. No wonder he had been staring at the padd as if his life depended on it. “I have also asked Mr. Scott for his suggestions.”By the time they finished describing the problem, Chekhov's eyes had gone to saucers. “This is what I work on, yes, but so small! Hikaru is on the bridge. This is like navigation, only tiny. If I could talk to Admiral T'Lia, fluid transport is exactly her specialty. Is that possible, sir?”“I think it could be arranged,” Sarek said dryly. He forgot and started to reach for his padd. “Ah. Not a good idea. Father, perhaps a message from you would be a better option. It might also divert some of her...reaction.”“Also if she knows a doctor.” Chekhov winced. “A Wulcan doctor, sir, not that there's anything wrong with you or Doctor Chapel.”“Oh, there's plenty wrong with me,” Bones said, “but you're right about one who deals with these hobgoblins, and her daughter does.”“There may not be time for a new build,” Spock said. “What can we modify?”“I thought he was a patient. He's a project,” Bones moaned. “Furthermore—Now what?”

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

An alarmed Sulu called that power was building up in the small vessel's forward phaser banks. Civil craft seldom had armament beyond what would fend off asteroids; however, many annoying teenage pilots knew a little reconfiguring would boost the power enough to do minor damage to other small ships. The signature of those modifications was common, and Sulu was right: this wasn't it. “Holy crap, how much power are they putting into those bank capacitors?”“They're blast-charging, then backing the engines off just before they overload. If they do that often enough and don't blow, they can punch us pretty good.” Sulu flicked through his displays. “This is the oddest attack, if that's what it is.”Spock lurched onto the bridge carrying a coffee cup. If his florid green face and spiky aura hadn't signaled his mood, the coffee would have. Unlike his grandfathers, caffeine was his last resort to stay upright. He leaned over and poked a couple of panels himself. “Interesting.”“Not 'fascinating'?” Kirk instantly regretted it, and the thought he got whacked with confirmed the wisdom of changing the subject. “Should you be walking around?”“Dr. McCoy did not forbid it.” I didn't ask. “This charging strategem. I cannot recall why it seems familiar or what that signifies.”“I know. It's...” Sulu shook his head. “We've seen a similar curve, but not exactly, and I can't remember when or where. Every time they power up, I hit the shields harder in case, but they haven't locked in on us. Of course, I could leave our shields up all the time, but with the repairs in Engineering only mostly done, that would leave us slow if we need to be fast.”“Which is not good with the ambassador...oh, you need the update.” He explained the project that wasn't going over the ship's net so they would understand why Chekhov needed such weird input.“That would explain,” Scotty said as he stood at the bridge door. “Captain, I was about to say there have been some unusual readings from the gravitational stabilizers.”“Did they settle about five minutes ago?”“Now that you mention it, yes. Should they have?”“It's a long story, Scotty, but they should be better for at least an hour or so while we get the ambassador some better pain relief. Did you get the memo about the transporter?”“Yes, and I do happen to have a couple of bits and pieces that might be useful. There's supposed to be an ambassadors-only formal dinner on the observation deck. Do I have the staff see to that or shall we confine the lot of them to quarters?”“Ah, Scotty, you always have the best solutions. Okay, not always ones we can use, but the best. I'll go around and notify the delegations about the murder in person. With one dead and one in sickbay, they'll want to know before they have yet another alleged party. It'll also give me the opportunity to talk to each bunch face to face in case they want to confess or admit they saw anything.”“Poor Herndorff is sure it's his fault. Will you be needing an escort, then?”“Scotty, if I'm not safe on my own damn ship, we're really done for, and I don't intend to be done for anytime soon.We need to keep an eye on the delegates because I don't intend to deliver any more of them to Babel in a body bag. If I'm distracting them, it might help.”He dropped down to the VIP floor and trotted off in search of the Rigellian ambassador, already going over the questions he was going to ask that Security might have missed. The sudden pain in his back registered as “I must have pulled a muscle” a fraction of a second before his instincts kicked in and whirled him around to grab the wrist holding the knife.Hands flew and feet kicked and shoulders hit the gut and the floor appeared at odd angles and the walls did the same. He yelled at the intercom while he was trying to smash the other's hands into the floor. The blood on his hands was wrong for the antennae, green not blue, body temperature all wrong, and the assailant didn't scream when the antenna snapped off in Kirk's hand. The other did pass out from the captain's choke hold, and Kirk was momentarily proud of the lessons he and Spock had taught each other in the gym, right up until his own vision went to spots and he slumped over the attacker's body.
Bay 3, he thought when he woke up staring at the ceiling. There was a spot on the ceiling from who knew what that looked like a squashed bug, and he had grown used to staring up at it every time he came to from being knocked out. Sarek was beside him in Trauma Bay 1, which had the stain from that time Bones and Chapel...he never had figured out how that happened, but he bet it was interesting. What was not interesting was his back. It hurt. Badly. Sort of like it still had a knife in it.“I fixed most of it, but it's still gonna be sore,” Bones grumbled. “If you could lie still for a few hours, it would be patched up in no time.”“With crazy people running loose?” He tried to sit up, only to have Skon lean on the better side of his chest in a most apologetic way.“I do beg pardon, Captain, but you shouldn't be one of them. Generally, one needs both lungs to breathe properly, and you need to let that one reinflate.”“Impressive technique on your takedown of the assailant,” Spock said, “but your situational awareness was lacking. I have told the rest of the officers to avoid traveling alone until we are certain the person in the brig has no accomplice aboard.”“The antenna,” Shras said, “was not one of ours.” He displayed it to Kirk and the Vulcans. “It is rigid, bloodless and hollow, none of which can be said of an Andorian appendage.”Sarek either muttered or Kirk heard him mentally. In their present states, either was more than possible. Even his muted laugh hurt. He straightened his face. “So, an impostor?”“Definitely.” Spock turned the antenna over in his hand. “Commander Uhura extracted a small device she believes to be a transmitter. She is evaluating the frequency at the moment.”Through the haze of post-shock and medication, Kirk tried to untangle the threads of important events dangling in front of him. There was a distinct loose end. “Spock. You are far too functional for having taken that Rigellian drug.”“I have not, Captain. I must assume command.” He was almost smirking and Kirk dearly wished to punch him, but couldn't muster the energy. “You are compromised, mostly physically.”Chapel leaned over and cleared her throat, which was enough to send Bones to look at Sarek's biobed and curse softly. “Spock, really, I don't want to take any more of your blood, but he needs it.”“I cannot, Doctor. There is an active murder investigation and a current threat to the ship.”“You can't be serious. Your father--”“Understands.” Sarek's voice was a thin croak. “He must do his duty.”“Uhura to Spock,” the wall comm paged.Of course he was unperturbed. “Spock here.”“We have communication from the ship to our brig.”Sulu cut in. “And we have an even stranger power curve from the ship.”“On my way,” Spock said, and left without further comment.“But I—but--” McCoy spluttered.“So.” Kirk felt his own back. “Am I patched up enough to get up there?”“Hell no! You're still apt to spring a leak if you move around too much. Ideally, you need to be in bed for a couple of days, but I know that's not happening.” He glared at Sarek's biobed readings with unmistakable disgust.Kirk sat up. It wasn't a good idea. Sarek couldn't have sat up had he wanted to. The man looked like a wax figure. Skon's eyes broke Kirk's heart and so did the words he spoke so gently to his son in Vulcan: “Is there anything I can do, little one?”“No, father, kaiidth.” It is what it is; them's the breaks; play the hand you're dealt. None of them sounded right for what Sarek had recently been asked to accept, let alone this.Skon went to the blanket warmer. “You know we need you.” He brought back one of the small throws, laying it gently over Sarek's hands.“I am replaceable.” Sarek was trying not to shiver at the only warmth they could safely give him. “The ship is the main thing. These delegates, the negotiations...”“You idiot,” Shras hissed, “shut up and let us help you.”“Then talk,” Sarek murmured. “Distraction. Anchors.”“Us, talk, when you never shut up?” Shras scoffed. That got him a smile's ghost. “Did he ever tell you about the energy savings we managed? You know the embassies adjoin across an internal wall of the old military prison. It finally dawned on him that the waste heat from our coolers could warm the Vulcan side to its customary broil, and vice versa.”“Kept your beer cold.”“Kept your tea lukewarm,” Shras retorted. “Skon, was he always such a massive pain?”“Oh, no indeed. At one time he was a small one.” Skon looked down at his son. “Spock was not a model student, not of his own fault. As for Sarek, he was never the largest child in his cohort, which inspired taller children to illogical attacks that seldom, if ever, ended well for the aggressors.”Sarek did not lift his head or open his eyes. “Surak, Kir-Shaara 337.5 : 'One must never strike the first blow. One should choose not to strike the last, but there is no compulsion.' Regrettable, but very effective.”That was unmistakable pride in Shras' eyes. “The way it was tonight. So he got in fights, Skon?”“I became well acquainted with the local disciplinary officer. Also, the Masters of Gol, their discipline correction...Rana had great faith in their abilities. After four failures, I did not.”Kirk couldn't fathom that. “You were in that much trouble as a kid?”“No, Sarek. T'Pau kept sending him to the program at Gol and they kept sending him back. His teachers on Earth could never understand why he was a problem child on Vulcan. On Earth he got along with everyone.”“On Earth, Davy,” Sarek murmured. “He knows...”“Of course he does.” Skon looked down at the padd in his hands. “A message from Pittsburgh Emergency Services Unit 143, transmitted in the clear and doubtless confusing to our eavesdroppers. I quote: 'What the hell happened to Leroy?' I am answering Father at the moment.”Shras guffawed, obviously knowing the story. “Perfect identifier, isn't it? I believe the first line of the song is 'Leroy, boy, you got no sense.' It still applies.”Skon favored the Andorian with mild dismay. “He is an ambassador. The matter of dignity...”“Yeah, so am I, and he might die, so I need to get my digs in. About the Earth school thing: you never considered he was in the Embassy Row cooperative, among children from all cultures who are neither uniform nor feigning logic, and your man-mountain brother was his age and right there?”That got a small nod from Skon. “Davy was and is indeed a powerful deterrent.”“If you don't know,” Shras continued, looking to Kirk, “Solkar and his wife always wanted more kids than this one, so they tried a few different clinics and finally someone sent them to Karen Wanders, who managed a three-person baby using her own denucleated egg and mitochondria and a gene editor. Because that was illegal on Earth, the boy was unwelcome on Vulcan and technically a banned Augment, other than on Embassy grounds and Cheyenne Nation land because of some old treaties. If you take someone who is, like, ninety percent Vulcan--”“Eighty-four point five seven,” Sarek said. “Betazoid, twelve point five. The rest, Karen.”“You're so cute when you're spewing figures.--Anyhow. Vulcan kid, raised on Earth among people from all over, instead of a jerk you get a decent being who can deal with anybody. When he said knock it off people did. Handy when you're the class shrimp and he's your uncle.”“His sister,” Skon added, “three years older and not often in the same classroom, also spent the majority of her time with me on Earth once she passed her kahs-wan. Among her, her bondmate, her t'hy'la and Davy, Sarek was safe with the other children when he was physically able to go out. Otherwise, he was with me. Boredom caused him to master astrophysics at an early age because all of the materials were available. Had my father been alive after he was three and a half and before his eventual return, he might well have become a professional musician like Davy instead.”“Davy is also a doctor, isn't he?”“Yes. His undergraduate degrees are in music therapy, then he went through medical school after...what else happened, and became a psychiatrist specializing in post-traumatic stress disorder. After va'Pak, he was the only one we had left who understood the Vulcan mind.”“He understands mine,” Sarek said.Shras looked down at him. “Want to talk to him?”There was a flicker of smile. “Am.” Of course; they didn't need the comm for much.Skon showed him another message. “Your mother is concerned.”“She is furious. Damaged control, her excuse.” His neck was getting tired. Christine eased another pillow under his head, and Sarek sank onto it with what looked like gratitude.The wall comm broke in with Spock's voice. “Developments?”“Your grandmother has conveyed her concern in forceful terms, previously unusual.”“Father, this is so?”“Had it been so in your youth. Had it only been so then. I thought it was the right thing.”“Was what you chose the best solution you could reach, given available data?”“It was, it was.”“Then it was logical, and therefore acceptable.” Spock paused. “It was not what I would do, of course.” Kirk saw the phrase meant something between them, right in some awful way.“Just so.” Sarek barely held still against a jolt of pain that startled his monitors. “Like that night. At times, not even 'one more day.' One more hour. Five more minutes. One more breath.”“Kaiidth, that you can,” Spock said. Someone on the bridge called for him. “Spock out.”Shras leaned back and reached across, draping his wrist over the bed rail. He used a fold of blanket to pick up Sarek's arm and lay it across his own. “If I'm trying to bring down blessings on you, there has to be physical contact.”“Sacrifices,” Sarek said, but did not move his arm away.“You could have pretended you didn't hear that crash that night,” Shras continued. “It would have been the diplomatic thing to do, our business and all.”“I knew. Noise was unnecessary.” Sarek sighed. “She was beyond help. You were not.”Kirk asked the question with his eyes, and Shras nodded. “Widowed, both of us, in part in my case. Silka...” he fumbled for his padd and showed Kirk the picture, a small, delicate Andorian woman with sapphire eyes and a winning smile. “Our secondary. Wasn't she beautiful? Especially that night. A year ago, there was a reception at the Capellan embassy, and the evening was perfect San Francisco and we were walking home. There were small earthquakes. Most of the staff shrugged it off and used the elevator when we reached the embassy, but Silka had been stuck one night and always used the long outside staircase in spite of her high heels. She was almost to the top, another tremor, she fell...I tried to catch her and went over the railing myself. She broke her neck, I only broke a leg.”Sarek had closed his eyes. “And your back, in three places, and...”“All right, the point being I was immobile and she was dying three meters away, and you...took care of it. I'm the head of our religion, and there are certain prayers in the last of life. Had he not managed to get me to her it would have been even worse, and then, after.”“Your staff was understandably in shock. It was a small piece of music, easily learned.”“How did you have a clue about that?”“Your great-grandfather's funeral when we were children. The music was striking.”“Oh! It was. Then the two of us began striking each other.”“You were touching me.” Which Shras was again, and this time Sarek clearly did not mind. “I did not strike you. I shoved you. You threw the first punch.”“That I did, that I did. Honor satisfied,” Shras mused. “In human terms, we were approximately five years old, in both cultures an age when children begin to endure long ceremonies and become bored without resources to remain calm. I thought your mother might become violent. The discovery of the unlocked garden gate was fortunate for us both.”“The adults did not follow, or wish to. I should have learned. Spock should not have been expected to do better than I.”“Partly his choice. Kid has a chip on his shoulder and dares the galaxy to knock it off. I'm not cutting you any slack, either. You were always ready to do just that. Now you have to use that to survive and be Sarek of—of Somewhere.” Shras must have felt something. “Like you said, not even a day at a time, sometimes hours, sometimes minutes.”McCoy looked up at the readouts again and Kirk didn't need to ask. “Give me a few.” The main door swooshed. “Well. That's what I've been waiting for.”

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Scotty carried a bizarre combination of small parts fitted together. “Best Chekhov and I can do with the admiral's and Dr. Saeihr's help over subspace. She and a colleague have used a larger unit several times now. The doctor says it works better than she imagined, but this one needs to be even more precise because of the size of the fang and the surrounding structures that will be affected.”McCoy hefted the knobby compilation, a planet-bound child's idea of a Klingon disruptor made from broken medical equipment and a wire arch that would fit over a bed. He read the pasted-on labels. “This, then this and afterward this?”Scotty pointed. “Exactly. Hold this one down to scan and map. Zoom to what you need, accept or reject, fine-tune with this one. When you get the readout you want, hit the big green fire button.”“I need a target the same size and consistency to...” he rummaged for a few seconds and came up with a plastic pellet and a wad of gauze. “Close as I can get.” He wrapped the gauze around the pellet, positioned it under the arch and pressed the buttons Scotty had pointed out, then pressed the green one. There was a brief flash and the pellet appeared, undamaged, on the counter a foot or so from the gauze. Bones seemed to hold his breath as he unfolded the white cloth. It was marginally scorched, so lightly it showed only in the brightest light. “That might be a good thing for cautery.”Kirk knew what had to have happened, though his eyes didn't believe it. “Microtransporter,” Sarek murmured. “They have been working on that.”“With that kind of precision?” Shras gaped at it. “The implications, the multiple uses...”Skon, worried as he was, managed one of his fleeting micro-smiles. “There has been no war to occupy my outcast daughter's attention sufficiently. Boredom promotes creativity.”“I'd say.” Kirk wanted to admire the machine, but Bones wasn't letting him near it. “Won't that solve the bleeding problem?”“Not perfectly. His blood count and clotting time are so bad even the inevitable small amount of leakage will be a problem. We need another unit in him first and another on standby.” Without thinking, Bones brushed a hand across Sarek's back as he moved the arch into position. The gasp was tiny; it was still more than the Vulcan had meant to reveal. “Let me do something about that.”“No, it...” Sarek tried to stir and fainted.“It's for the best,” Shras said. “We need to get this done.”“No kidding. That pain level...” McCoy shuddered. “We need Spock. Now.”Kirk found that if he didn't bend his torso, he could handle standing up, sort of. “Then stick a patch on me and call it good, and I'll go get him. I'll hand off to Sulu as soon as he's gone. That'll leave Scotty to tend the engines and Uhura to trace where the transmissions are going, as if we didn't know.”Bones' disgust deepened as he looked around. “There oughta be another way, but there isn't.”If he held onto the countertop, he could almost walk. “I kinda need clothes for the bridge.”“Remote unlock your cabin. Scotty, go get him a shirt and pants so we can dress him up and take him somewhere. I'm gonna regret every minute of this.”“Gee, thanks,” he groaned, and didn't have the energy to smack him.

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“Mr. Spock, I believe your presence is required in Sickbay.”Spock's distraction was sufficient to make him flinch at the sound of Kirk's best nonchalance. Ordinarily, that would have been good for a few snarky moments over the next day or two. Instead, Kirk quickly put himself in the chair, leaning forward so he didn't hit his back. Sulu started to ask a question and carefully turned back to his console. Uhura nodded at Spock. “Go. I'll be here.”Indecision almost got him for a second, then he marched into the turbolift and was gone. Sulu turned back with a smile. “Well played. Does he know?”“I'm sure, but it gave him the excuse he needed. Now, speaking of needing, Sulu, you have the--” Before he could get the crucial word out, the ship lurched. “Ow! What the--”“The ship is firing on us, sir. With a surprising amount of power.” Chekhov was a master of doing weird things to the weapons console while giving him reports and ducking Sulu's quick course adjustments. “Incoming!”That one wasn't as painful because of the shield adjustments. Uhura listened to her earpiece and waved for his attention. “Most of the ambassadors are demanding to know what's going on.”He knew what he wanted to say to that, and she unquestionably did too. “Tell them to...uh...” She gave a savage little smile. “Tell them to guess, right. Incoming transmission on the antenna frequency, being received in the brig.”“Bring that guy up here.” He thought that might not be proper phrasing for that order, but it was the best he could squeeze out without swearing. Not whining mentally was beyond him. Getting stabbed had lost its novelty several occurrences ago. No one had told him being a captain involved that much time in sickbay. Maybe Spock would take the chair back for good if he begged hard enough. Maybe Vulcans didn't mind getting stabbed. Wait, Sarek minded. A lot. Even though he wasn't saying so. Skon minded, too, especially with the poison and stuff. Skon was a really nice person and didn't deserve to get stabbed even if Kirk and Sarek were not really nice people and did. Also, the gravity fields weren't holding well. Which hurt. A lot. “Turn everything off on this ship,” he said as the next wave hit. Sulu gave him a strange look. “I mean the running lights and stuff. Turn all that off.”“Ah. Play dead. Yes, sir.”Cupcake appeared half-dragging the other guy from the fight. He wasn't an Andorian. The blood trickling from his cut lip was greenish, not that brownish-green Vulcan shade but bright like Gaila's. The thought took a bit to process. “You're an Orion.”“Such a genius.” The Orion was wobbling. “You figure out why yet?”“Can't say I did.”“If the Coridan system comes in, your ships will ruin our safe harbor. Piracy has its pleasures that...” The Orion began to sway on his feet. “The transmission was my order to activate my self-destruct capsule. It was supposed to have a twenty-minute delay. I seem to have...miscalculated.”Cupcake roared a few swear words, threw the prisoner over his shoulder and ran to the lift. “Damn P'Jem convention rules,” Sulu muttered. “Now they have to try to save him, too.”“But we have a dozen Orions aboard,” Kirk remarked. “And lots of their blood. And lots and lots of human. Just not enough Vulcan.” The other ship jarred them again and he swore with great feeling, or not so great feeling, because it hurt, a lot. “I hope he's okay and Herndorff questions him and is mean about it. And calls him a cupcake.”“Should I do anything about the other ship yet?” Sulu asked.“Not yet. Just be very very quiet.” He thought about the old cartoons Nick Mestral had shown him. “We're hunting piwates.”“Sir...” Sulu looked back in alarm.This was the time to say some captainy thing. “I'm okay. Relatively. Not as bad as I have been and still kept going. It's just a scratch. It's a flesh wound.”“It's a collapsed lung,” Uhura said.“Not any more. It's all full of air now like it should be.”She didn't look as if she believed him, and that hurt his feelings. “Humor me.” She took the tiny emergency oxygen from the compartment on his chair. “Take a few hits, would you?”“Oh, yeah, I bet that would help.” The little oxygen packs were only meant for twenty minutes, enough to run around a bad atmosphere either saving the ship or getting to escape pods. Mestral had suggested them for all new ships. That had been awfully nice of him. He held it to his face rather than strapping it on. Son of a gun, it did feel better. His vision was even clearer. “Now let me look at the situation...Holy crap. Yeah, we need to play dead until they make a move.”“Soon. Phaser banks are charging and--” Sulu hovered his fingers above his controls, as did Chekhov. Without looking at each other they moved as one when the first flash came from the alien ship. “Won't catch it all,” Sulu warned. “Brace, brace, brace.”Scotty grabbed him from behind to steady him. That was good. So was the oxygen. So was the mask that muffled his swearing. “Uh-oh,” Sulu said, which was never ever good. “Brace harder.”The alien exploded in a brilliant display of pieces. Seeing people die was never fun even at a distance; he was glad to have the half-numb feeling of watching a movie. “Well...”“What are you people doing up there?” Bones bellowed on the comm.“Watching Orion pirates blow themselves up.”“Orions!” Shras yelled in the background.“Yeah, they were trying to disrupt the negotiations so they could keep stealing the ore out from under the Coridan government.”“Oh,” Sulu said. “The power curve. The Narada. They didn't intend to go home. Capture us or blow us up, either way, that ship wasn't going back, so of course, the power didn't matter.”“Dare I ask how things are going down there?”“If you would quit shaking the ship to pieces...Just get down here. Scotty, throw him in the lift if you have to. Orders of the ship's physician, you can't get in trouble...”“Aw right, aw right.” Kirk stood up, still clutching his oxygen. “You guys got this now?”“I think what you mean is 'Sulu, you have the con.'”That sounded better. They needed the right words, didn't they? “Sulu, you have the con. I'm going to sickbay and see who's still alive down there.”

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

“Bones, how are--”“Shut up and get in that bed or I will knock you out so fast you won't know what hit you.” Given the doctor's history of doing exactly that, he settled onto the biobed as fast as he could. He sensed Spock, in the foulest imaginable mood and aching like a full-body sore tooth.“Sarek. How is--”“I had no idea he knew all those words,” Bones mused as he scanned Kirk. “Hm. Oxygen was a great call and you didn't actually damage yourself.”“What words?”“We did what we could with the blood. I mapped the fang, pushed the button, it came out pretty as you please, but I had to use the laser probe on it without time to warn him it might--”“Hurt like a son of a bitch,” Skon offered. “To quote him.” He pulled back the curtain. “I believe these two are much less damaged than I had anticipated.”“An imprecise quote,” Sarek said. “There were additional adjectives and a gerund.” He draped a hand over his watering eyes. Shras was still sitting in his chair, but with his head down and an ice pack on the back of his neck. “That one became unconscious.”“It's hot in here and the doctor did not warn us. The sound, the smell...a bit daunting.” Kirk saw a blue handprint on Shras' forearm that would be even prettier once it finished getting its color. “I can't believe that impostor. It was a really good disguise, but we're going to have to see why he was able to get that close. The man whose identity he stole is among the missing from the Battle of Vulcan. He served with my daughter. That makes me dislike him even more. How did I miss that?”“I know what I missed,” Spock said. “Unforgivable. The power curve on that small ship. They did not intend to return home. I should have caught that.”Kirk stretched carefully and let himself smile. “Maybe you were distracted.”“By what?” Even gravely ill, Sarek could look innocent. Spock nodded solemn agreement.“I can only imagine what Mother would have said about this situation.”“An approximation of my own words, perhaps. After all, she taught me most of them.”“She was quite emotional. How Human of her.”“Indeed,” Sarek agreed. “But you know why I married her.”Whatever that meant, it melted Spock. The look father and son exchanged wasn't fond, exactly, but it wasn't a bad step in that direction. “Because you--”“Enough!” Bones barked. They all looked up at him.“But Bones--”“You shut up and go to sleep. Spock. You shut up and go to sleep too. Ambassador, I won't tell you to shut up but I will highly recommend you go to sleep. Ambassador Emeritus, you've had one hell of a day. I think you can be excused for wanting to skip the reception tonight.”“That will not be necessary. My wife is making haste to meet us here in order to relieve our son of some of his duties. She is bringing the Seleya with additional medical supplies.”“That may inflame some of the situations at the conference.” Sarek pried himself halfway up, which was clearly a bad idea. “You should have told her I was--”“Shush!” Bones looked around and beamed. “Whaddya know. I finally got the last word!”
Bones' triumph held out for the night while everyone in Sickbay slept off the aftereffects. Spock and Sarek were safely in healing trances, which they expected to be brief. Shras reminded the staff to let him know when someone needed to slap the life back into Sarek, then he and Skon dragged off to the reception, where there were no more fights once the real story disseminated through the ranks, only a few lukewarm, stunned arguments and a snit or two. Kirk gave up on the drama and slept for twelve hours straight.When he bothered to wake up and dress, Chapel said Bones had absented himself to the autopsy room. He came back out looking more disturbed than usual. “Come on,” he said to Kirk.He didn't really want to go back there, especially after a meal. “You told me to stay in bed.”“Make an exception. We'll move slowly.” Bones laid an antigrav on his back, propelled him down the hall to his office and closed the door. “No, I'm not going to make you look at a dismantled Tellarite. Know where the le-matya fang came from?”“No clue.”“The Palace Sanctuary on Tellar. Officially, they keep their le-matya's upper canines pulled for safety. Unofficially, they were last removed the day before Gav left for this conference. His right tusk that was chipped during the fight? Hollowed. Guess what I found on the left side?”“Another le-matya fang in a hollow tusk.”“You get an A in worst-case scenarios we didn't know could exist. One ambassador intended to assassinate another and gave it the old college try, maybe twice. I was so sure the same one got Sarek and Skon, but the other one...the one with a mostly intact venom sac...Gav tried to take both of them out in order to break Vulcan's hold on its Federation Council seats. There's no other explanation, and believe me, Sulu demanded one from the Tellarite delegation. That IS their side of it.”“Oof.” The corner of Bones' desk was a good place to sit. The antigrav let him do it gently while still holding him upright. “This is going to be one interesting after action report.”“Then there's the other question. Gav is dead by tal-shaya.”“You saw the condition Sarek was in. I would imagine the Orion did it.”“He was still bragging that he did it when I put him in near-stasis for transport. It was an old poison, easy to counteract. He'll live to be questioned properly once he lawyers up. The odd thing...”“Yes?”Bones poured himself a shot of what Kirk would tell himself was synthohol. “He's a decent fighter, but that's all. Not to be insulting,” he added before Kirk could protest. “He jumped you from behind, remember? You did an incredible job when you were already wounded. But as far as being strong enough to break a Tellarite's neck, no.”He kept his face neutral and his eyes unfocused. “Spock was with me, Skon was in sickbay and Sarek has told us he was meditating.”“I guess that'll have to do.” He looked Kirk over. “I would expect you'd be more shocked.”“A lot happened on New Vulcan. You'll get the whole picture eventually. Spock will tell you what you need to know when you need to know it, provided you 'need'-le it out of him. That's the way most of the Vulcans I ran into deal. It's not logical, it's how things are.”Bones sat on the edge of the desk beside him, holding the glass without great interest and staring off at the wall. “I asked if Sarek wanted Shras to leave. Shras stayed.”“Got a nice bruise from what was likely an involuntary grab during your patch job. They would be incredibly offended if anyone called them friends.”“For people who never ever lie, they sure know ways to get around the truth when it hurts.” He thumped Kirk's better shoulder. “Sorry. I know it's not right.”“No, but it will do. I might even feel like looking around Babel if we get them there without any more murders. How is Spock, really? He was so busy he barely grumbled at me when I asked.”“Uhura made me give him a long-acting painkiller. By morning he'll feel a lot better. She stayed with him through the night to make sure he wasn't going to dream, and Skon kept coming down to check on Sarek. Spock should sleep more, but he and Daddy Dearest are both fascinated by that gizmo. Uhura will have to remind him to take his supplements, load up on protein for a few days and not skip the salt. His grandmother's message didn't make a lot of sense, about bringing him and Sarek cookies.”“Trust me. They'll be Terran, they'll be as good as the ones Spock makes, and Sarek will eat an entire plate of them if you shove them in front of him while you're talking. Speaking of, how is Sarek?”“He hadn't had time to heal fully from those extensive repairs beforehand, but if he hadn't had the heart valve fixed we'd have lost him.”“And now?”The doctor's hands made a little gesture he couldn't quite read. “Physically, he'll recover quickly. Otherwise, we can't fix what's really wrong. His wife is still dead. His planet is still gone. Everything he worked for is a big fat lie. He may have had to kill Gav, and he won't take that lightly.”“You wouldn't.”“Yeah.” He looked down at his hands again. “We talked about his studies this afternoon. He explained the genetic sensitivity, the reason both he and Spock are so good with electronics, his need to learn how to handle medical emergencies because he has so many young orphaned aides on both planets. He actually said 'I was not an acceptable father in any sense, and now I find myself charged with several hundred priceless lives. I require any help I can get.' I handed him a couple padds of our medic training. The sum total of offworld knowledge about Vulcan medicine is from the old Enterprise when Dr. Phlox wrote his post-mission report, and even that is a hundred years old and redacted because of privacy laws. Why would that be private?”“The civil war,” Kirk said. “Some of them fought. They don't want to admit that. No other planet would worry about it. The doctors and medics they have left don't think that way.”“I knew he and Spock didn't get along and it was mostly his fault. Now I'm feeling sorry for him and giving him medical information. As for Shras, whatever his religion is, he's real about it and he hung in. I bet they have some great debates. The rest...I don't know what, if anything, to do.”“I know what I'm going to do,” Kirk said. “I'm crawling back into bed in my quarters. Bring me cookies when they get here.”“You--” Bones waved the thought away. “Okay. Bed, but alone, and no duty till I clear you.”On his way out, he stopped to check on Spock and Sarek. They seemed to be busy, their fragile New Vulcan truce holding enough that Spock had pulled the recliner over to his father's bed and they were passing padds back and forth. Within seconds, he was dragged into their hazy but still effective attempts to reprogram the prototype for greater accuracy. Nyota brought the cookies in due season, he passed the plate across, and Spock's hand bumped into his just hard enough to send Thank you. For all of it, thank you.
--The End--