LESSONS 6 - 10
by kira-nerys
K/S G- NC17

Author: kira-nerys
Title: Lessons
Codes: K/S
Rating: G - NC-17
Summary: A very angsty series of Vignettes dealing with what happened in The Motion Picture. Gol, the Kohlinar, V'Ger and Kirk's and Spock's relationship.
Feedback: kardasi@kardasi.com
Disclaimer: Kirk, Spock, McCoy, the Enterprise, Star Trek et al belong to Paramount. No infringment to their copyright is intended. I'm not making money on this.

LESSONS 6
Soulless Eyes

K/S, G
by kira-nerys

McCoy

Jim is not acting himself. Something is riding him.
Oh, I know what it is. I'm not a fool even if I act one at times.
I feel almost sorry for Decker, but I feel even sorrier for Jim.
I knew it was wrong for him to accept the promotion
That doesn't mean I believe it's right for him to be back on the Enterprise.

There are memories here.
Painful ones.
I don't think he's ready to face them.
I don't know if he'll ever be.

He's jumpy, irritable and I can see the aching in those hazel eyes.
I want to shake him out of his funk, make him realize that he's being foolish.
But I can't.
I'm not a bastard and I care about him.
I don't want to add to his pain if I can avoid it.

I am on the bridge when the message comes.
Someone is asking to come aboard.
I know who it is as soon as I look at Jim.
His entire body tenses like a bowstring.
His knuckles grasp at the edge of his seat.
His face turns a ghostly white.
But his voice betrays nothing.

Spock is here.

I know it as certainly as if I could see him standing there on the bridge with us. Suddenly, without warning, he does.

"Spock..."

Jim's whisper is painful to hear.
It holds all the love, the need and the longing
For the whole bridge to see.

Jim's eyes sparkle like his soul suddenly awoke.
I hadn't realized the spark was missing until now.

Spock is cold.
He doesn't even reply and my heart weeps for them.
Is it too late?
Has the... Kohlinar, or whatever that wretched ritual is called, stolen away all emotion from him? Is Spock now the iceblock I always blamed him to be?

I knew then that it wasn't true.
I knew then that I could rattle him into feeling whenever it was needed.
But now?
His eyes are as cool and as dead as they were when he left.

Worse.

It is as if Spock's soul is gone.
God help us all, what will come of this?

~ END

LESSONS 7
Human Heart

K/S, G
by kira-nerys

Spock

I believed I had prepared myself sufficiently for this meeting.
I found that it was not so.
I was utterly shaken by the stab of pain in my heart.

Spock, he said.
His whisper tore at me, stirred the emotions like a stick in a pond.
Making my soul feel grained, mudded and shaken.

His face lit up with that expression I am so familiar with.
It held emotions I thought he had buried.
Emotions I know he no longer feels.

I found myself incapable of answering him.
I found myself incapable of speaking at all.
They were my friends.
I left them all.
I could do nothing else.
It is an inadequate excuse.
My pain became theirs.
It was not my intention.

Their reactions as I entered were not what I had expected.
I did not expect happiness at my arrival.
I did not expect them to welcome me.
Not after I left them thus.

But the human heart is a curious thing.
I forget that in my chest beats a half-human heart.
Its reactions are not always logical
I cannot prepare for what it has in store for me.

Now I struggle to keep the shields up.
I turn to Decker and he allows me to take the science station.
I wish to leave.
I wish to weep
I wish nothing more than to stay here, in their presence
In his presence.

Is there still hope?
Hope is illogical.
Yet, I cannot help but feel it.

~ END

LESSONS 8
There

K/S, G
by kira-nerys

Kirk

There he was.
I never thought I'd see him again.
"Spock," I whispered.
The need poured out of me in that single word.
It stretched toward him, reached for him on its own volition.

I didn't know he was coming.
But as he stood there it was as if my whole being came alive.
I had no idea I was so close to dying.
Without him, there just wasn't any life left in me.

Had I known he was coming I might have been able to prepare.
Now, it was like I poured my soul out for the world to see.
But I doubt knowing he was coming would have made a difference.

All that I wanted.
All that I needed.
All that I desired.

He was there, before me.
And yet he wasn't there.
It took quite some time before I realized that he was there in body, but not in mind.
The link was still gone and he didn't answer my desperate mindcries.
Maybe he could no longer hear them?

I watched his stony face.
Attractive to me like nothing else in this world could be.
I watched him move, distinctly and economically.
He was all I desired.
Beautiful.

I withdrew, apalled at the way I'd reacted.
I struggled to pull myself together and I lifted my head.
I met McCoy's eyes and saw the compassion there.

He knew.

Good God, Bones. What do I do? How do I go on?
I've lost him and I have no one else to blame.

I don't know how I managed, but I got myself through the rest of that day,
This horrible day, chasing after that *thing*, getting closer to Earth by the minute.

I made mistakes, but who can blame me?
Who the hell can blame me?
My sun just rose, only to see my world fall apart again.

~End

LESSONS 9
Advice

K/S, G
by kira-nerys

McCoy

I never thought I'd say this, but I think it was a bloody good thing that V'ger came into the picture. It gave them both time to think and get used to the idea that the other was there, you know?

They both walked around like stiff mannequins, especially Spock of course. Even my jabs didn't seem to reach him. I'd have expected him to react that way to Jim, but to the rest of us? I sure as hell wasn't responsible for his pain. Oh yeah, there was a lot of pain there, and if I could see it maybe there was hope for him yet.

I'd hoped he'd be less Vulcan around me. But he wasn't. I suppose that Kohlinar experience could have run deeper than I had expected. If it's true, that's a damned shame.

Jim came to me last night to talk. We're nearing Earth again, V'ger's been dealt with. Ilia and Decker are both gone, and good riddance.

"You know, don't you?" he asked. I just nodded. There was no sense in trying to pretend I didn't know what he was talking about. I think my words to Jim last night rattled him. Not that I said anything bad, mind you, but just the fact that I knew so much or had guessed so much.

"I've lost him for good. He doesn't even talk to me unless he has to," Jim said. He was still tense. It seemed to me then that I hadn't seen him relax ever since Spock came back.

"You can't expect him to trust you with his feelings so easily again, Jim," I said. "You hurt him by rejecting him. What did you expect?"

"I don't know. I don't understand how I could ever have rejected him. He's the best part of me. God, I was so scared. I don't even remember what scared me so much anymore!"

"Commitment," I replied dryly.

"Yeah, but I've forgotten why it scared me so much. I want him in my llife for good. Do you think I still have a chance?"

"Talk to him, Jim, that's all I can say. Go talk to him. He's still in sickbay."

"I almost lost him out there. I thought he was dead. For several minutes I thought he was dead and that I'd never get another chance."

"I know, Jim, but he's alive and the only one who can set things straight again is you."

He left me then, and so far I don't know how things really went. I don't even know if he went to Spock.

~ End

LESSONS 10
Unrequited

K/S, G
by kira-nerys

Spock

When I first woke up I felt disoriented.
My mind filled with mechanical cries and determination to find the ultimate knowledge.
Overload.
That is what V'Ger's entrance caused to my mind.
It appears my consciousness has been able to organize it.
I am alive.
I still function.

I have a faint recollection of seeing Jim.
Holding his hand in a desperate grip.
Trying to convey the emotions.
"This siimple feeling, is beyond V'Ger's comprehension," I said.

The look on Jim's face.
Maybe there is hope for us yet?
I tried to convey the emotions I still have for him in that single touch.
Without link, it was difficult.
I noted how it startled the doctor, but it did not disturb me.
I would not permit it.
The moment was too significant to allow such concerns to sway me.
If I succeeded?
I do not know.

Jim left.

I have not seen him since.
I have lain unconscious to him and the world for quite some time.
Perhaps he has tried to contact me.
I do not know.

McCoy is present again.
Sickbay is permeated by his presence.
Although I cannot see him.
I must have slept for a significant period of time.

I can sense McCoy's concern.
Surely not for my health?
I am progressing satisfactorily.
Of that much I am certain.

It is, however, not the doctor's nearness I wish to feel.
As much as I value his friendship.

It is Jim

The longing for him intensifies again.
As if it was never gone.
Perhaps it never was?
No, I will not lie to myself again.
It was always there.

There are questions I am now faced to answer.

Should I leave or should I stay?
Should I stay and take what he is capable of giving?
Should I deny the part of me that is Vulcan?
The part of me that needs...
The part of me that craves the bonding?

It is not what I hoped for.
It is not all that I need.
It is not enough.
But without it I cannot go on.

The futility of the Kohlinar is clear to me now.
If I had achieved it, I would have become less than I am.
I would have become a machine.
I would be like V'Ger.
Devoid of emotion.
Sterile and barren.
My heart would have turned to ice.

I realize suddenly a truth.
The old Earth idiom holds more than a measure of truth.
"It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all."

Even the pain, and the unfullfillment is precious.
The agony of unrequited love is worth more than all the logic in the Universe.
I understand that - now.
The Kohlinar is perhaps the answer for some.
Not for me.
T'Sai was correct.
My answer lies elsewhere.

Denying my emotions would have been denying part of my being.
Denying the part of me that was human.

I need Jim.
I wish to speak to him.
I have to speak with him.

~END

| Lessons 1-5 | Lessons 6-10 | Lessons 11-15 | Lessons 16-20 |