The Farther They Fall

 PART ONE – Held Captive

 
Zeta-Kesar: Class M planet on the edge of the Neutral Zone near the new border of the Romulan and Klingon Empires, now strategically-located since the most recent incursion of Romulan forces into what had been Klingon territory.

Kirk felt his breath quicken at the implication.  Surely they wouldn’t…couldn’t.  But Sarek couldn’t fight them; he had passed out sometime before Kirk was allowed in, and even if he could, he was far outnumbered, exhausted, chilled far beyond what a Vulcan could likely handle, and now, seriously injured.  Also, there were the plentiful weapons jangling on every belt of the rebels – every weapon of torture imaginable and likely happily used, given the opportunity.

But he had likely heard correctly, “…too pretty to waste this way, leave him for better things.”  The guards had laughed and asked if they might have a turn.  The officer had replied that the ambassador should be served to the officers first, but with enough oil, who knows how long he could last.”

He and Ambassador Sarek had dressed in simple clothes when they had realized there was the danger of discovery by rebel forces, hoping that they might not be recognized.  But Sarek’s face, regal bearing, and voice could not be concealed by the plebian attire of a Vulcan trader.  They had recognized him immediately, Kirk believed, as all eyes shifted toward Sarek as he turned toward them.  They smiled and asked his name rather pointedly.  Upon giving a pseudonym, a guard backhanded Sarek with such force that he fell back and Kirk barely caught him.

Kirk’s anger had boiled over at the obvious misinformation they'd been fed.  They had been set up from the beginning.  Everything had appeared as it should when they'd arrived, so the Enterprise had been sent out after a high priority distress call that had also probably been faked.  They had been receiving reports for close to a year that the violent rebels were being contained and that the capital city was a safe place to start negotiations between the dictatorship and those same rebels.

But the dictatorship had never had the control that their faked reports and holo scenes depicted.  They only had the technology to create the images to lure the diplomatic party in.  The elite’s dictatorship had been dismantled and their leaders were held captive.  The Federation diplomat had been brought in as a scapegoat to mollify the furious rebels that had actually taken most of the planet.

From the adjoining cell, Kirk had been forced to listen to Sarek’s jacket being ripped off, the crash as he was thrown across the cell into the wall, the rustle of chains and clank of cuffs being secured about his wrists, then the ripping of the back of his shirt, and finally the crack of the heavy whip again and again.  Kirk found himself cringing inwardly in empathy for the compassionate, dignified man who sought only to bring people together, and seemed to suffer endlessly for it, from what Kirk had seen.

The Patron stood just outside, between the cells, watching as Kirk tried not to react, and too often did, being laughed at heartily each time.  He kept Kirk up to date on Sarek’s ability to stand, his swaying, minute signs of discomfort, and on the amount of skin left on his back. When Sarek had finally sagged and hung from the metal wrist cuffs, they stopped.  It had been much longer than Kirk would’ve thought possible, and he cursed the Vulcan control and pride that kept Sarek standing so long, thereby increasing his injuries and lengthening his suffering.

Two guards dragged Sarek’s unconscious body unceremoniously across the hay-strewn floor and tossed him in a heap.  The remains of his tunic were shredded and mixed with blood and raw flesh, and now littered with dirt and scattered bits of hay.  Kirk was finally allowed to go to him.  He approached and rolled Sarek onto his side to keep the pressure and dirt from the open wounds and his face off the damp floor.

He felt Sarek shiver; heard an almost imperceptible moan escape his lips as Kirk tried to reposition him.  “Let me clean and bandage his wounds, at least,” Kirk said roughly.  “And if you want him to last much longer, he’ll need some warmth.”  Guilt tugged at him – he, the military man, had not a scratch on him, while the ambassador, a civilian trying to help these people, lay bloodied, in immense pain, and cold to the bone.

The Patron grinned.  “Watching you cleanse him might entertain the guards, but I’d rather see you lie together under a single blanket," he leered and Kirk had to wonder if he was implying something sexual, but not for long.  “He will be nice to lay with, don’t you think?”  He snickered and winked.

Kirk glared at the Patron, but softened his expression as he realized that any more punishment would be dealt to the ambassador, not himself. The rebels had decided that Sarek, being Vulcan, certainly would not tell them what was sought, and so decided to use him to get to the captain to provide them their bounty of information for use in their insurrection.

Water, rags and bandages were brought, and a single small blanket.  More guards than necessary sat about the outside the cell, vying for the best seat.  Kirk positioned himself as best he could to block their view of Sarek and began to gently wipe away the blood and debris from amongst the wounds.  Sarek jerked slightly with each wipe.  He worked quickly, taking advantage of Sarek’s unconsciousness to spare him even more pain upon his wakening.  Too little was left of the tunic, so Kirk ripped the remains from him.  The guards chuckled and offered, “I think the pants should go to.  They will soon enough, anyway.”  The guards laughed heartily.

Kirk swallowed at the thought of what might come next for this man he so admired and respected and was coming to think of as a friend.  Their shared experiences in sickbay while both recovered during the journey to Babel had only been the beginning, but it had sparked Kirk's interest in getting to know the man behind the often intimidating demeanor.

The ambassador had the adoration of a beautiful, generous, loving, and indubitable woman that Kirk felt drawn to immediately, and a complex relationship with his son, Kirk’s closest friend, that involved incredible respect, a hair-trigger volatility and a deep devotion each seemed not to see in the other because of constant misunderstandings.  He had wondered if he would ever have the chance to get to know the man himself with family drama, battles, and treachery always taking the forefront in his presence.  But little by little, he had.

He had made so many assumptions about Vulcans based on Spock, and his father seemed to dispel almost every one of them after his heart operation, during their trip to and from the Babel conference.  There was his obvious devotion to his wife to the point of distraction, and his odd almost quixotic tendencies toward both women and men that Kirk had attributed to the demands of his position.  Sarek could persuade and enamor with charm, magnetism and a devilish sense of humor that was both infectious and erotic.

And just like his wife, he showed a generous nature, whether it be to help a cadet confused by astrophysics she was studying as he did on the way to the Babel conference, the need for a musician to accompany Uhura in her singing.  Even an emotional pain to be eased by a brief mind touch.

Kirk had not thought Sarek would have had the sensitivity to glean his pain from the loss of Miramanee that welled up as he watched Amanda tend to Sarek and his attentiveness back.  But he had called Kirk over and subtly talked of the Vulcans use of a mind touch to lessen the pain of grief after there is little left of value to gain from it, and offered his touch.  Kirk was a surprised by the admission of grief by a Vulcan as he was by the offer of what felt a very intimate act as he accepted and experienced it.  He felt the pain ease as it seemed to sift from his mind, saw Sarek’s body stiffen subtly, heard his sharp intake of breath, then his eyes closed then opened, glistening, and a flash of sadness crossed his features, then he looked again as he always did – confident and regal, in full control.

Sarek and Amanda ingratiated themselves together and separately all over the Enterprise.  Not knowing Sarek before except through the media, Kirk had considered that it might have been his gratitude and relief at having a second chance at life, but Amanda never seemed surprised by what she saw him do, or heard he had done, in this vein.

Then there was his completely illogical and provocative contrariness when cooperation would win him what he wanted, his need to poke the hive to watch the bees swarm angrily.  He seemed a man of depth and contradiction whichever way Kirk saw him.  Kirk had seen him at his worst – emotionally ravaged and defeated when the timeline sabotage had taken his wife, and with it the incredible courage it took to try to gain her back, and emotionally vulnerable in pon farr when Lieutenant Teanae had taken advantage of his weakness and assaulted him.

Kirk had realized that Sarek’s austere and indifferent mask was merely him trying to be the Vulcan most expected or needed to see in his position of authority.  Sarek was, however, more secure and comfortable with himself; he was not so rigid as his son in his need to appear in control.  Kirk was afraid how this experience might affect Sarek, because though he had been vulnerable and even defeated before, he had likely never been so brutalized or humiliated, if what he’d heard was going to happen.  He could not imagine a man of Sarek’s stature, background, and dignity sodomized and raped.  The unfortunate irony was that these were exactly those things that made him these men’s target.

He lifted him gently into a sitting position, laying Sarek’s head on his shoulder to wrap the bandages around his chest.  Sarek let out a soft moan that just reached the guards.  “Hmmm, he is already getting hot from your embrace, Captain.  Just wait ‘til we have him in ours.  He'll really like what we're gonna give him.”  A chorus of laughs followed. 

Captain Kirk gritted his teeth and tried to imagine how Sarek would have wanted him to respond.  He gave them no reaction – imagined they weren’t there.  Sarek rolled his head and croaked a word that might have been “James”.  Kirk shushed him gently.  “Rest.  I’ve just bandaged your wounds.”

As he turned Sarek and started to lay him back on his side, he saw a gash on his forehead he hadn’t noticed before, and swallowed.  The now-dried blood had oozed down the side of his face in rivulets.  Head wounds were very serious for Vulcans.  He cupped and lifted Sarek’s face so he was eye-to-eye with him.  Sarek’s eyes were partially open, but looked cloudy with confusion – a bad sign.  “Sir,” Kirk whispered as he tried to catch some recognition in those eyes.  “Sir!” he said loud enough now for the guards to hear.  Titters followed, and they echoed him, “Sir!” in the same anxious tone.

 The eyes seemed to focus a bit, but the cloudiness remained.

 “James?”  Sarek asked in a slightly stronger tone.

 Kirk smiled.

 “Where is my wife?”

Kirk frowned.  Could it already be too late?  He couldn’t give up.  Sarek was traumatized and confused, but with some rest, perhaps he would be himself again.  He had to believe that.  The Enterprise would come for them.  Soon they would discover the deception, and realize the likely explanation.

He could not help but think of Amanda on board.  He remembered her discomfort at leaving her husband behind.  Sarek explained how it was simply the preliminary meeting and it would be short and organizational, essentially of little substance, and that the capital was secured long ago.  But since it qualified as an area of unrest, Sarek wasn't comfortable about bringing her as he usually did.  Kirk had heard that Amanda had a bad feeling, perhaps that had also influenced Sarek to leave her somewhere where he knew she would be safe.

Kirk wondered if she had now heard that the distress call was probably faked and felt compassion for what she must be fearing for her husband, but he realized it was infinitely better than having her here to see this, or worse, to be assaulted herself.  The Enterprise would come back soon.  Hopefully, soon enough.

Sarek’s eyes slipped closed and Kirk felt panic as he felt for a pulse on his neck.  It thrummed softly, perhaps too softly, but he was still alive at least.  He had to hope that the head injury would not kill him, and that his body would mend enough to survive until the Enterprise arrived.  It had been only a couple years since they’d almost lost him on the way to Babel.  He could not face Amanda and Spock with the news of Sarek's death, just as he could not imagine witnessing it himself.  Just as the rest of the crew had grown fond of him since the journey to Babel, so had he.  He had been as relaxed, warm and teasing on this mission as after his heart operation.

His reconciliation with his son had allowed him to be more himself and he had seemed sincerely motivated to get to know his son’s friends, and continually drew out and comforted others by his mere personality and sense of humor alone.  Kirk quickly saw the charisma, magnetism and charm he had always heard of in the man and understood now why he was the ambassador extraordinaire.  His serious heart condition and rift with his son had seemed to suck the life out of him when Kirk had first met him.

When Sarek had first arrived on the Enterprise, he had seemed so severe and cold, but with the back story filled in, it all seemed so understandable why he was not the same man they saw later.  They had all rushed to judgment, Kirk thought sadly, and taken Spock’s side with poor Amanda caught in the middle trying to explain how such divergent views could coexist.  Yet what son sees his father clearly?  How many fathers act the tyrant out of desperation thinking that that might help protect the son?  Wasn’t it usually the middle ground that held the grains of truth?

Sarek had been filled with hurt and disappointment in losing his son so early, young even by human terms when he left Vulcan for Starfleet.  Spock had been so resentful, independent, and angry at his father he felt did not care for or respect him (and wrong on both counts, Kirk had found out rather quickly).  That hurt only grew over the eighteen years, brick by brick, the lack of communication fortifying the anger and betrayal Sarek must have felt.

Then to come aboard the Enterprise full of his son’s comrades and friends fiercely loyal to him, already ill with a dangerous heart condition; his wife realizing something was wrong and feeling Sarek was pulling away from her; fearing for her marriage as she had admitted to Kirk when Sarek had moved to a guest room in their house.  Likely it was easier than sleeping with a wife he couldn’t be physical with, especially when he couldn’t even explain why.  He had wanted to protect her, Kirk had figured, but had done more damage in the end.

All that stress plus the over one hundred representatives, half of whom attempted to corner him to argue about the vote, the volatile conference they headed to, the Tellarite ambassador regularly in his face, the murder, and the accusation of murder.  They had not given Sarek any leeway for the considerable stresses, and no chance to explain his side.  He and the crew had been so unfair to Sarek that he had to make the first move by involving his son in the teasing of his wife when some of the stresses had been relieved and he realized he would live.  Sarek never begrudged any of them that judgment and treatment.

He gently lay Sarek down on his side and saw him shiver again more forcefully.  He had to keep him warm.  Kirk pulled off his jacket and wrapped Sarek in it, then tucked the blanket about him.  He paused, not wanting to give the audience even more of a reason to mock them, but realized that Sarek needed all of the warmth Kirk could offer.  He slipped under the last of the blanket and lay down along Sarek’s back spooning him as closely as he could without aggravating his injuries.

 “What ya doin’ under there, Captain?” one guard asked.

 Another chimed in, “Stuff somethin’ between his knees, Captain, and you can get at his package!”

 “That’ll make him feel better!” another added.

 They all laughed at that.

 “Captain don’t know how to take advantage of a pretty ass and face ready for the taking!”

 “He ain’t got fight to stop you, Captain.  At least have a taste, if not a meal.”

Kirk tried to focus elsewhere.  Nothing he could say or do would improve their situation, and too many things could worsen it.  He only hoped the guards kept to their orders to let Sarek recuperate until their intended sport the next day, at least.  But he could feel those eyes on their backs; feel the lust and rage directed toward them, and especially toward Sarek who he believed they resented for his comportment and station.

Kirk had the sense to question Sarek about the choice for this assignment.  Sarek had also felt trepidation about his ability to be heard by the rebel side that seemed to want to hate him before he said a word.  He was aristocracy incarnate to a world of the downtrodden and resentful, presumably held captive by the regal, spoiled, and callous minority.  He had all of the opportunity, wealth, and circumstance they could never have.  Except for his integrity, fairness, generosity, and compassion that they could not envision in him, he was the epitome of their mortal enemy.

The Federation Council argued that it was merely the beginning of long talks between the dictatorship and the rebel factions.  Sarek would certainly make a great impression on the elitist leaders and he could get the “ball rolling” as those leaders seemed to be seeking this resolution of hostilities out of the goodness of their hearts.  Sarek protested such an optimistic assumption, but they had at least thought that they would enter the safe capital city and organize and educate the leaders to mend their fences and possibly start their planet on the road to a possible Federation alliance, if not full admission.

Little contact had been made with the planet, as it had been hands-off for many decades due to unresolved hostilities that were too threatening to visitors.  The majority of the world had an almost paranoid vision of visitors taking over their world due to skirmishes with both the Klingons and Romulans in the past.  Only the more street-wise and sophisticated traders had penetrated the established zones, and in the last decade, few traders slipped in and then escaped.  For almost a decade, only holovids had made it out and reports from the constantly changing leaders.

Kirk and Sarek had argued that there were too many discrepancies, and that the view of the planet suddenly sounded too serene and close to cooperation to be believed.  Strategically, it was a brilliant holding should the Federation acquire it, allowing a window into both the Klingon and Romulan Empires.  For all their resource-draining wars, it still was a fairly rich planet, not needing support but able to pay their fair share of Federation taxes if they received membership.  It was also mineral rich, which translated into dilithium.  So, the positive reports offered up a rationale, at least, to send in diplomat.

Ambassador Sarek was the best, and so the Federation ignored both Kirk’s and Sarek’s objections, and with trepidation, Sarek agreed and resigned himself to a steep battle of persuasion.  Who could have known that he would be so silenced before he could even marshal his first argument?

Sarek might have had a chance to begin to state his case if he was allowed a few more hours to recover from his injuries, for he appeared to be in a healing trance.   But the rage beyond the bars had been burgeoning throughout the evening, and late in the night, as many of the guards fell asleep, one stood, and with a fierce determination, wanted to take the one who seemed so like those he hated.  He grabbed the key opposite the door, slid it into the lock and stepped in so quietly that no one noticed.

He stood and stared at the two soft faces in sleep, then stooped near the ambassador and traced the streak of dried blood on the side of his face and touched it to his own lips.  He imagined what the ambassador’s mouth might taste like, perhaps a light reflection of this coppery blood his tongue savored.  He imagined tasting his lips, his tongue, biting down and cutting deeply as the ambassador fought him but could not pull free.  But there were even greater pleasures he might find with this soft-voiced prince.

He lifted the blanket and surveyed the wrapped chest, tight and full with well-developed muscles, and the expanse of soft skin above and below the gauze.  He traced the furls of hair just above the bandage and imagined the drifts that would lead to his nipples that were now, unfortunately, hidden under the dressing.  His finger traced the trail of dark hair that led into his pants.  His finger caught in the fastener, pushing it down to survey the upper groin.

He would have this prince before the officers.  He pulled out his dagger, newly sharpened and slipped it into the waistband.  With a quick slice, the crotch opened to the sight of a soft, stretchy undergarment, almost transparent over a mound of hidden flesh revealing a good-sized organ.  He felt his heart quicken as he reached underneath the soft material to feel the warm flesh and fondled the flaccid yet hefty penis.

Sarek groaned as his breathing accelerated.

The guard grabbed Sarek’s hair and thrust his mouth over his to silence him as he masturbated his prize.

 “Leave him be,” Kirk growled with a ferocity that surprised even him.  The shock of what he saw, and worse, what might come of it, in front of him, filled him with rage.

“Wake the others and he’ll die,” the guard said, and the dagger whipped to Sarek’s throat with breathtaking speed.  Kirk could see it poised over Sarek’s carotid artery.  One flick and there would be no way Kirk could save him.  He also saw that the guard intended to continue his violation as he saw the hand underneath the sheer fabric still stroking Sarek’s penis.  Kirk tried not to notice whether Sarek was responding, other than his breaths quickening.

Just how far would the guard go, and what chance would there be that this man might risk all – a loose canon that would give his life for this last act of defilement, out of lust, rage, and resentment?

 “What do you want?”  Kirk asked, thinking that there might be some way to barter for later “gifts” from Sarek or himself.  More importantly, Kirk wanted to delay what might be inevitable.  He only had to get the man talking, and keep him talking to begin to develop a bond.  If he saw them as worthy beings in their own right, that might ameliorate the damage to come – something he had learned from Ambassador Sarek, himself.

The masturbation ceased.  Kirk swallowed and felt his fear-induced nausea decrease.

 “You will strip him, and I will have all of him.”  The guard looked around and frowned.  “There is no surface to lay him over…”

Kirk felt shock roil through him.  Surface to lay him over!  Kirk had to force the sickening image of the guard's preparation of Sarek – the naked form draped forward, legs spread – from his head.  The man seemed to be organizing his entire night’s horrific entertainment in front of Kirk, as if he would gladly stand by and help with the tools and props.

The man was not set to bargain; he had simply thought Kirk was willing to allow him anything of Sarek in his fear for Sarek’s life.  Then the nausea came back with a vengeance as he imagined what this man could do to Sarek and that at some point, Sarek might awaken to see Kirk as his audience.  His heart pounded at his impotence.  Sarek was so vulnerable now, and this man was a strong specimen of a strong species, loaded down with weaponry, bent on taking Sarek in every way he could think of.

They stared at each other for several moments, when the guard smiled.  “Is it really so much to ask, for the life of your succulent prince?”

The man looked down at his quarry and traced the bandages.  “It is too bad they damaged him so soon.  I would have liked to feel the length of his body against mine.”  His eyes became hooded with lust as he caressed Sarek’s face and licked his lips as if ready for an enticing meal.  “Pull off his pants,” the guard ordered.  He looked distracted by his heady lust and glanced around the cell.  “We can bind him to the bars above the door."  He pulled off a leather strip from his belt that must have been a sort of garrote.  With a sick irony, he remembered losing consciousness, almost dying, by a very similar weapon at the hands of Sarek’s own son.

The guard caught Kirk’s anxious stare at it.

“I don’t need to asphyxiate him while I take him.”  The guard actually laughed good-naturedly.  “That’s a fondness and privilege of the officers, which he will soon experience, no doubt.  I will bind his wrists with this, and leave some length to turn him so that I can taste his seed before I leave mine within him.”

Everything seemed to be accelerating out of Kirk’s control.  He had thought by now the other guards might have awakened.  He was beginning to believe this man’s revolting fantasy might actually take place, with Kirk powerless to stop him and being forced to watch as Sarek awakened.  It was a nightmare.  Why hadn’t the guards awakened?  He stared at them as they lay still, mouths hung open, snoring.

The guard caught his appraisal of the guards. “Don’t worry about them.  I added a little herb to their drink.  We’ll have the whole night to enjoy him.”

Kirk felt himself pale; the man thought he might join in?  There was little he could do but play along.  If he thought he was in on it, perhaps he might be afforded a chance to save Sarek from this.

The guard smiled at him.  “You realize your friend will never survive the officers, each man will be allowed to asphyxiate him a little longer as they take him, until the last officer gets to watch him die.  They like to see the light flicker out as the victim stares at he who takes him.  You feel them rock with your thrusts, see that last bit of terror, as their life force ebbs.”  He seemed to shake himself out of his reverie, a bright smile on his face.  “I can’t wait to be an officer; someday maybe I will watch that life force ebb as I ram him harder and harder.”  He stared at Sarek’s still form hungrily.  “I am almost tempted…”

 Kirk shivered at the thought.

“Let me get some drink for the occasion!”  He stepped out, leaving the door open slightly, then thought again about that, smiled, and locked it.

Kirk felt his mind racing.  Sarek was to die the next day, after this guard spent the night…  He stepped quickly toward Sarek.  If perhaps he could wake him.  Together they might be able to surprise or distract the guard.  He pulled Sarek up to a sitting position, careful of his wounds, but his head lolled; he was still unconscious in his healing trance.  Perhaps, if he knew of the danger, he could awaken for a short time.  He shook him lightly.  “Sarek…Sarek!  Wake up!”

But the footsteps approached again.

Kirk laid Sarek back down, as the guard walked back in.

 “I thought you would have stripped him by now," he said, already chugging a bottle of liquor.  “No matter, I'll enjoy ripping the last of his clothes off before I have him.”

Kirk suppressed a shudder at that and then noticed that some of the spiked bottles of liquor were not yet empty, and looked the same as the guard’s.

The guard stepped over to Sarek and lifted him onto his shoulder with ease.  He carried him to the bars where a crossbar hung about seven feet up.  The guard looked Sarek up and down.  "He's about six feet tall, I’d say."

Kirk nodded numbly, glancing at the bottle in the guard’s hand, then at the bottle just outside the cell door.  He’d have to wait until the guard was distracted, unfortunately, and Kirk didn’t want to have to think about what that distraction might be, exactly.  He couldn’t think about that now, because what awaited the ambassador tomorrow would be far worse.  He had to focus on limiting the damage, and keeping Sarek alive, but if Sarek died, Kirk would ensure the reports would be vague.

The guard lifted Sarek up against the bars.  “Hold him will you.”

Kirk held Sarek against the bars feeling oddly guilty in his acquiescence as he felt Sarek’s dead weight lean against him, but he had to play along.  Then, as the guard retrieved his leather strap and tied Sarek’s wrists together, Kirk had an idea – to lessen the damage should it come to that and which might provide a chance of escape.

 “Lubricant,” he said, blushing at the thought that this could also be seen as another  acquiescence, worse a very intimate one.

The guard looked up.  “Oil, yes, I can’t leave any damage they might notice.”

Kirk felt disgust for the man’s total obliviousness to Sarek’s needs, as if he was a nice steak the guard wanted for dinner – add a little seasoning, toss it on the grill…

The man locked the door again, and ran off down the hall.

Kirk lowered Sarek and propped him gently but quickly.  He slipped his arm through the bars and reached, but came up several inches short of the first spiked bottle, no matter how hard he strained.  He started to run for another he might reach when the guard came back down the hall.  He ran back to Sarek and lifted him back in place.  He thought about trying to wake him again in these last seconds, but realized his unconsciousness was probably for the best, psychologically and physically.

The guard stepped in with the oil and frowned at Sarek.  “I had thought he’d be awake by now.”  He looked disappointed and pensive.  “I wanted to see his face when I ripped his clothes off.  I was hoping he’d fight a little before I took him.  That makes it so much more enjoyable.”

The nausea crept back up Kirk’s throat as he couldn’t help but imagine it.  What would a rape be without a violent subduing?  Kirk shuddered before he could help himself.  Luckily, the guard hadn’t noticed.

The guard stepped up and pulled Sarek’s tied wrists up to the crossbar and tied the leather to it.  Sarek’s feet barely touched the ground.  His arm muscles strained holding his weight, showing how clearly defined they were.  The guard stroked down one. “Nice," he said almost breathless.  His hand traveled over Sarek’s chest, scrabbling at the bandages, twirled through the hair at the slice of belly exposed, to his lower groin.  He stuffed his hand into Sarek’s pants, grabbed his penis and rubbed it roughly with a sigh.  “He has a beautiful body.”  The guard put his hand up to raise Sarek’s face, “and such a pretty face.  Too bad he will be dead by tomorrow.”

Kirk had to look away at the man’s treatment of Sarek to hide his fury, lest he give away his true agenda.

“Perhaps some rilea would wake him.”

This didn’t sound good to Kirk at this point.

“An herb with a very potent scent.”  He considered this.  “But then we will need a gag so he won’t cry out.”

Kirk was not sure if he meant out of the attempt to summon help or pain.  He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

“What about a blindfold?”  Kirk couldn’t help himself.  The thought of what might happen to Sarek, and having him see Kirk there…  His request was purely selfish on his part, and he felt guilty for that, but if what was likely to happen actually did, he wouldn't think he could look in Sarek’s eyes if he saw Kirk watching.  And what would he think?  It might be easier for Sarek to not see Kirk.

The guard stared at Kirk.  “Why?  You are taking part and you don’t want to watch his eyes?”  The guard looked shocked.  “That’s the best part!  The fear, the humiliation, the resignation, the pain…” 

Kirk noticed the bulge visibly grow in the guard’s pants, and had to look elsewhere and focus back on the bottles.

He must have looked stricken, because the guard patted him on the shoulder.  “I will apply the blindfold while you are with me.  Then, I can put you in the next cell when I pull it off.  Would you like to be here at the beginning or the end?”

“The beginning,” Kirk answered too quickly and hoped that the guard didn’t notice.  He couldn’t imagine leaving Sarek in here for hours alone with that monster.  At least he could provide some minimal protection.

“Okay, the rilea to wake him up, a gag, and…” he laughed and shook his head, “a blindfold.”   He started for the door but paused, “I will get you to look in his eyes as you take him.”

Kirk’s knees felt weak at the thought that he might have to do just that in order to save Sarek’s life.  But could he actually do it?

The guard looked as if he were about to throw a party.  “I always like to use a mirror in their face.  You grab their hair and pull their face up as you thrust into them.  If I was an officer I would so enjoy the leather around this ambassador’s neck while I thrust hard enough to split him in two.  I would pull harder and harder and watch the fear in his eyes.”

Kirk saw the bulge in the guard’s pants swell even more.

With a big smile, the guard locked the door and trotted off for the last of his tools.

Kirk launched for the bottle at the furthest end.  His fingers just missed the top.  He tried and tried, but it was also inches too far.  He stared at Sarek sadly.  He couldn’t be this close to a chance to save him, and not.  Then he froze and looked at Sarek’s chest.  The remains of his tunic!  He heard the footsteps coming back.  He launched himself for the tattered shirt.  Ran back toward the far bottle, held two ends of the tunic and threw it over.

The footsteps grew louder.  He pulled the bottom of the bottle toward him until it was close enough and lunged for it.  He ran to the other bottle and switched them.  He only hoped that the guard couldn’t taste the drug in it, but the others hadn’t, so maybe this would work out.  How long would it take?  He took a swig of the undrugged bottle and grimaced, then slipped it out near where the other had been.

The guard came back in.  “I assume you want the blindfold before the rilea?” he asked, then laughed.

 “That liquor tastes like hell,” Kirk said offhandedly, hoping to remind the guard to drink more, and at the same time sparing himself from having to risk drinking the drugged bottle, if offered.

The guard smiled.  “So now you are starting to enjoy yourself?”

He had stepped up and was about to blindfold Sarek, but held it up for Kirk.  “You’re sure?”

Kirk nodded yes, fearful for the moment the guard would refuse.  Then he covered Sarek’s eyes.

 “Oh, I’ve been daydreaming of this all day.”

Kirk stared at the bottle, but couldn’t risk giving himself away by bringing it up twice in so short a time.

The guard grabbed the gag.  "I would’ve liked to kiss him while he was awake.  He has a beautiful mouth – very sensual.”  The guard brushed his fingers along Sarek’s lips almost tenderly.  “Maybe later, when the blindfold is off I can sneak off the gag.  Just one long kiss and a solid bite to his tongue while he struggles against me the last time I take him.”  The guard moved his hand to Sarek’s throat as he said this and squeezed, leaning his weight into it.

Kirk shifted uncomfortably.

The guard added his other hand to Sarek’s throat and his eyes gleamed with his smile.

Kirk began to wonder if all of this was a ruse, and he would simply strangle Sarek as he hung from the bar, but just as he was about to protest, the guard smiled at him.  “Oh, don’t worry.  I won’t spoil our fun.  I wouldn’t want to waste him with so much planned.”

The guard applied the gag, and uncorked the rilea.  He waved it under Sarek’s nose and quickly he started to come around with a cough or two, but he still looked groggy and was likely very confused as to what was going on.

“The prince awakens,” the guard announced.  Sarek’s head came up at the voice.  “My lord, you are likely very lost.”  The guard laughed in a friendly manner.  “I would like to know if you are aware of your surroundings enough to…interact with me.  Give me a nod for yes or a shake for no.”  The guard said this very officially, but a cold smile alighted on his lips.

Sarek gave no response.

The guard’s hand flew out and slapped Sarek hard across the face.

Kirk clasped his hands behind his back tightly to keep from interceding.  He glanced again at the bottle of liquor.

"I have your friend here,” the guard said.

Kirk jerked his head up toward the guard.  He had said he didn’t want to be seen, but would the guard let Sarek know he stood here by interacting with him in a friendly way?  He noticed Sarek didn’t react at all – here diplomatic and Starfleet training were the same – no reaction is the safest for all parties if there is doubt as to your awareness.  Kirk noticed a bit more tension in Sarek’s face, which translated into a show of great concern from a Vulcan trying not to react.  Kirk felt warmth toward Sarek flood through him for that.

“You have no servants here, my lord.”  The guard smiled brightly.  “In fact, I think you will have to service me.”  He grabbed Sarek’s crotch. 

Sarek jerked, obviously startled.  His body tensed in what Kirk decided must be revulsion, but then his body relaxed and Kirk was willing to bet he would be reacting little to anything else done to him.  The clues for what was to come were not subtle.

“Now answer me with a nod meaning yes or a shake meaning no, or I will hurt your friend.”

Kirk tightened his grip and looked down to not show his anger.

“Are you completely aware of your surroundings?” the guard asked.

Sarek shook his head no.

The guard flushed with anger, “You think you’re so clever.”  He swung again; a closed fist caught Sarek in the jaw.  The crunch shook Kirk – that sound would be teeth breaking and grinding flesh along the way.  A droplet of blood appeared at the edge of the gag.

“Other than the limitations of the blindfold and the gag, are you completely aware of your surroundings?” the guard asked.  “I will hit your friend next if you continue to play with me.”

Sarek nodded yes.

 “Good.”

 He reached up and tore Sarek’s remaining clothes off with one sweep of his hand and stepped forward.  He pressed up against Sarek, his hands caressed then squeezed his buttocks.  “You have a beautiful body, Ambassador Sarek of Vulcan.”

Kirk forced himself not to look away.  He had to steel himself for much worse he imagined.  He noticed a little shiver course through Sarek when the guard licked and bit his neck as he slipped his hand down to grab Sarek’s penis and stroke it.  The guard had to pry Sarek’s legs apart to reach between them. 

“Don’t deny me access, Ambassador, or I will turn to your friend for my need.”

Sarek relaxed his legs, allowing complete access as the guard parted them.  Kirk felt a burning hatred at the guard using him to coerce Sarek.

Sarek’s breathing grew imperceptibly more rapid yet the tension in his face softened.  He was fighting to control his reactions, Kirk surmised.  Likely his injuries were still strongly affecting him.

The guard gripped Sarek’s penis and rubbed it between his hands.  “You are absolutely beautiful.”  He lowered himself to his knees and teased the organ with his tongue, flicking and tasting it.  Sarek’s breathing grew more rapid then, suddenly, decreased to normal.  He tested the leather tie about his wrists.

 “You will be under my…administration…for several hours.  You might as well relax and enjoy the attention.”  He laughed, then took the rather large penis into his mouth as he fondled Sarek’s testicles.  The guard’s other hand snuck around behind and Kirk had to look away as Sarek jerked in obvious response to being entered.  His breathing quickened then slowed again almost as quickly.

“Ah, Mr. Ambassador, you are nice and tight.  It will be an honor to be the first male who takes you.  You can think of it as your preparation for the many who will have you tomorrow.  That will be far more painful.”

The guard suddenly stopped and stood.  “This will not do!  You are playing with me again, Mr. Ambassador.  You responded easily when you were unconscious.  This leads me to believe that you are somehow keeping yourself from becoming aroused.  Do I have to try this on your friend now?”

Sarek shook his head and lay his head back against the bars. 

The guard gave Kirk a knowing smile and wink.  “Now I will taste you before the meal.”

He grabbed at Sarek’s penis roughly and pulled Sarek from the bars with it.  He stuffed as much as he could into his mouth and grabbed at Sarek’s testicles and squeezing and manipulating them roughly.

Sarek tensed from the pain as the guard thrust his fingers roughly into him again.  His breathing quickened.  “You’re going to have to relax, Mr. Ambassador, or I am going to injure you when I shove something much larger in.

Kirk had to look away as he saw the guard greedily sucking the now large, aroused penis.  He focused instead on Sarek's chest as it heaved and the unbandaged parts of his skin flushed as he allowed himself to get excited, thereby supposedly protecting Kirk from the same treatment.  Kirk felt white hot anger at what the man was doing to Sarek; felt himself disconnected, as if he were anywhere but watching this eminent man being forcibly sodomized.

Sarek’s breathing became ragged and then he shuddered, and a little breath of a moan escaped him as he climaxed into the guard’s mouth.  Kirk could not watch, yet what he heard and felt, being this close, made little difference.

“Well done, Ambassador, now…” he flipped Sarek roughly and pressed him against the bars, then yanked out his hips and kicked his legs apart.  He looked around for a moment, "this will be a tight fit.  Where's the oil?"

Kirk stared at the oil sitting next to the bottle of liquor, and could only hope.

The guard grabbed the oil, then glanced at the bottle of liquor and picked it up.  He set down the liquor and poured oil in his hand and started to massage Sarek’s buttocks.  “Hmmm, beautiful.”  He thrust his finger into Sarek a few times.  “Well, after tomorrow you certainly won’t be tight!”  He laughed and looked over at Kirk, just missing his adam's apple bob. 

Kirk started to worry whether Sarek would receive any mercy at all, and whether it might be kinder for him to die here before being delivered to the officers.  His throat burned and his eyes misted at the thought.   He stared at the liquor that the guard had set down.

The guard pulled a long knife from his belt and Kirk cringed as he brought it down near Sarek’s testicles and tapped them with the blade.  Sarek visibly tensed.  Then the guard brought the knife to the bandages and sliced them off in one savage stroke.  The back was layered with deep verdant stripes and severely damaged skin.  The guard dropped his pants.  A very large, erect penis leapt out.  He oiled it up and bounced it about between Sarek’s thighs and kicked his legs even further apart.  He grabbed Sarek’s hair with one hand and his huge oiled cock with the other as he started to place it behind Sarek and tease his buttocks with it.

“If there was ever a time to relax, Mr. Ambassador, this would be it.”  He laughed merrily, then paused and looked back around and stepped back.  Kirk’s heart leapt as he picked up the liquor and took a long swig and then a second, but then he rummaged around for something else he brought.  He picked up another of the leather ties that bound Sarek’s wrists and twirled it as he smiled at Kirk.

Kirk swallowed hard.  Was it coming down to this?  Was he always intending to strangle Sarek as the officers would have?  Kirk stepped toward the guard.

The guard slipped the leather around Sarek’s neck.  Sarek’s head snapped up and tension filled every part of his body.  Did he believe at this moment he was about to die?  Kirk wished he could reassure and comfort Sarek, but he was worried himself.  What if the guard decided to throw caution to the wind for one last big thrill by taking what was meant for the officers.

Kirk saw that Sarek was still tense.  He watched as the Vulcan pulled again at the leather binding his wrists, testing it for any weakness, but the leather was too thick and supple, the knot too tight and multi-layered.  It had been a last futile attempt, but Sarek had little choice left but to try.  All of his muscles tightened.

 “Now, Mr. Ambassador, this really is going to hurt a lot if you don’t relax.”  The guard sounded odd, almost giddy.  Kirk realized he was hoping to hurt him as much as possible.  The warnings were simply his way of reminding Sarek of what was about to happen.  He didn’t look back at Kirk to reassure him though he had to have noticed Kirk getting closer.

 The guard tightened the leather around Sarek's neck.  “Now you can still breathe, right?” 

Sarek nodded but he didn’t look confidant to Kirk that it wouldn’t get much tighter.  His breathing had accelerated; it was as if he could not calm his fear of dying while being violated.  Was he likely even now thinking of Amanda and what she might learn through the bond?  Knowing Sarek, he was blocking all of this from her.

But she would know through the bond if he died.  If Kirk couldn’t stop what he feared most at this moment, there was no way that Kirk would let Amanda hear of the details of Sarek's death.

The guard set his huge, engorged penis behind Sarek and adjusted it slightly, poised for entrance.  Sarek stood tense, utterly at the mercy of the guard.  The guard twisted the leather.  Sarek sucked a breath in with difficulty.  Kirk tensed, trying to figure what to do if the guard continued tightening it.  He scanned the cell, but there was nothing left there. He stared at the ridiculous variety of weapons that were too securely attached to the guard’s belt to do him any good.

In one forceful lunge, the guard rammed his huge penis into Sarek as he yanked and twisted the leather.  Sarek jerked from the onslaught and sucked in a last gasp of breath.  Kirk jumped, his heart pounding, the blood running in his ears as the guard held fast to the leather as he thrust himself again and again savagely into Sarek, pulling on the leather as if reins to a horse.  Sarek bucked against the assault, but with his hands tied, he was helpless.  The guard reached for the blindfold and ripped it off.  Grabbed Sarek’s face and twisted it viciously toward him.  “Look at me as I take you," the guard screamed. “Keep looking at me.  Or I will kill your friend, too!”

"Nooo!" Kirk screamed and ran at the guard.

The guard swept his arm and Kirk flew across the cell.

He thrust harder into Sarek, his face twisted back to look into the guard’s face.  Sarek groaned as he struggled pitifully, all of him taken by this man as he writhed his last.

Kirk could only watch as Sarek’s eyes, fastened on the guard, lost their luster, and sadness infused them as his eyelids started to droop, his body rocking with the violation that became more extreme with each pounding.

Sarek’s eyes closed, and his head fell.

“Die, Ambassador, die!” the guard screamed, then laughed.  He held tight to the leather, twisting it yet again as he rammed himself into Sarek once, twice, three times and screamed with his climax, thrusting so hard Sarek’s limp form flew into the bars again and again.  The guard gave the leather one last twist as he withdrew himself from Sarek.  The guard's knees collapsed.  He screamed like a madman until his body crumpled to the ground.  Sarek hung unmoving, the leather still tight around his neck.

Kirk ran to Sarek and ripped off the leather strap.  He wasn’t breathing.  Kirk lunged at the guard and detached the knife, ran back and sawed the leather from Sarek’s wrists.  Sarek collapsed into Kirk’s arms and he laid him on his back and yanked down the gag and checked for a heartbeat, finding none.  Kirk tilted Sarek’s head back, pulled open his mouth and blew as much air in as he could three times, then pressed hard over his heart five times.  He started again when strong hands pulled him away as he screamed again. “Nooooo!”

A hypospray hissed on his arm and the cell around him faded.

PART 2 – Coming to Terms

Kirk awakened in the Enterprise sickbay on a diagnostic bed.  In the next bed over lay Sarek, sleeping or unconscious, but obviously alive from the readings above his head.  Movement caught his eye.  He heard footsteps, and turned to discover Doctor McCoy, whose slight smile betrayed his concern. 

Kirk looked back over at Sarek. “Is he asleep?”

“More like half-conscious,” McCoy said, his eyes glistening.

“How is he?  Kirk asked.

“Lucky to be alive,” McCoy said.  "He's on heavy pain meds and sedated.  His head injury will keep him, at the very least, dizzy, groggy, and uncoordinated for awhile.”

Kirk stared at him, obviously wanting more.

“A few seconds more without oxygen and his brain would have shut down irretrievably,” McCoy said.  “It’s a moderate head injury, but then Vulcans don’t survive anything more serious." McCoy did not meet Kirk’s gaze. “He has some serious internal injuries as well.”

“Have you talked with him yet?” Kirk asked, hedging, hoping for some clue as to what McCoy knew without volunteering anything before he had a chance to talk to Sarek.

McCoy stared at Kirk for several seconds, then stared at Sarek and cocked an eyebrow.  “I know about the rape,” he said quietly.  McCoy’s eyes warmed as he watched him.  Kirk realized the physical evidence for that would have been clear, especially with that level of violence. 

McCoy continued, “He hasn’t been conscious enough to be coherent.  Anyway, I didn’t feel it would be beneficial to his overall health to try questioning him about what I could discover on my own, and…”  He looked as if he regretted that last word, and looked away.

Kirk felt his insides twisting.  “And?”  He knew whatever McCoy held back wouldn’t be good.

“I witnessed the assault,” he said.  Then corrected, “We witnessed it.”

Kirk paled at what they must have seen.

“We had the two locked gates to get through.  We couldn’t blast them without attracting guards from the other sections, so we had to use a code-key generator.  It took about a minute or two.”

Kirk thought back.  That had to be the entire time Sarek was being strangled and he shuddered.

Both McCoy and Kirk looked back to check on Sarek – still unconscious.

McCoy continued.  “I didn’t think we’d make it in time, and to watch that monster do what he did while we stood helpless…”  He closed his eyes.  “If that guard had not passed out, Sarek would be cooling in the morgue instead.”

“I drugged him,” Kirk said, now fitting in what must have happened, “but it took longer to act than I’d hoped.”  So he wasn’t impotent after all.  He did all he could do.  He just hoped it was enough.

“Quick enough to save his life,” McCoy added to emphasize its importance.  “We just have to keep an eye on him to make sure his larynx doesn’t swell closed.”

“Who else saw?”  Kirk asked.  Then he swallowed, feeling his heart begin to pound.  “Not Spock! 

“No!  Thank God!”  McCoy said and looked as is he felt ill at the thought.  “Uhura was there.”

Kirk swallowed hard.  Uhura had become close to both Sarek and Amanda.

“And Sulu, and a security detail.  They’re all pretty shook up.”

Kirk swallowed.  “Does Amanda know yet?”

“I didn't have the heart.”  McCoy looked up and his eyes looked pained.  “She’d seen the head injury, and the gouge and bruises from the attempted strangulation and her knees gave out.  I sedated her.”

Kirk couldn’t help but wonder how they would tell her.

---ooOoo---

Spock stepped in not long after to update the captain before he was released.  Kirk noticed Spock’s brief glance at his father, and had had years to learn to recognize the concern in his eyes.  He knew McCoy had given him the general information, but had left the worst to Jim.

Kirk was released and brought Spock to his cabin to talk.  He first poured himself a stiff scotch.

Spock refused the offer.  “I would rather just hear what you wanted to tell me privately.”

Kirk paused, his mind frozen at how best to begin.  “There is no easy way to tell you this,” he stalled, realizing he sounded like a bad movie, but at least he had begun.

“Please, Jim,” Spock prompted almost impatiently, then looked away.  “If my father is dying…”

“No, God no,” Kirk said.  “At least I don’t think so.  I doubt it.  I hope not.  No.” 

Spock seemed to stare deep into his eyes as if he might net the answer from their depths.  “Rest assured, my father will always be taken care of, no matter what his mental state is,” Spock said quietly.

Kirk realized Spock thought his father’s head injury might be too devastating to recover from.  To be brain damaged, for a Vulcan, would be worse than death.

He realized that Spock had likely suffered more imagining the worst, so he just said it.  “Your father was sexually assaulted.  Violently.”  Kirk watched Spock for a reaction, but only got a firmer posture and a cooler expression.

“That would be the serious internal injuries the doctor referred to,” Spock said, his head bowed as if considering.  “I had wondered how they had come about and why he did not specify.”

“I’m sorry, Spock.”

Spock looked up.  “As a diplomat, traveling throughout the galaxy to settle disputes, he has always been in a vulnerable position, if not a target.  It was always a possibility that I am sure he came to terms with long ago.  My father has gone through much in his many years in the Diplomatic Corps.  He is strong and resilient; he will overcome this unfortunate occurrence without undue emotionalism or indulgence, as he has others in the past.”

Kirk felt immediate rage, but contained it.  He had attacked his First Officer before for precisely this cold analysis only to find it a front when dealing with what bothered him most.  He could not believe Spock could be so unaffected by his father’s sexual assault.  Could Spock truly think his father was so impenetrable?  He wondered how clearly Spock saw his father, instead of the paradoxical hero and tyrant he had envisioned as a child.  Kirk decided to handle it in a calmer fashion that might instill seeds of doubt so that Spock might consider offering support to his father and continue to deepen their understanding and support of one another. 

“I wonder,” Kirk said, “if you don’t have higher expectations of your father than he would ever consider expecting of you, Spock?”

Spock looked at him quizzically.

“He has feelings, and monumental pride, even though they are supposedly suppressed.  He takes comfort in your mother and worries about her constantly.  He also fears for your acceptance and contentment and is hurt by your distance.  I can’t see how you can miss all of these things.  Did you ever stop to think that he might need you, even more than you need him?”  He stared hard at Spock.

Spock looked vaguely hurt and almost dumbfounded, then shifted and turned as if to reply, but Kirk cut him off.

“I don’t want to hear any argument until you think hard about what I said.  And think about who you would actually be defending, if you were to argue this – your father, or yourself for your imagined archetype of a father.”

---ooOoo---

As Kirk returned to sickbay hours later, Amanda stepped in looking sluggish and tearful.  She had obviously not waited to sleep off all of the sedative.  Kirk stepped over to her side.

“I want to see my husband again,” she said quietly.

Kirk took her to him and since he had not had a good look himself since his arrival aboard, he stared at the ambassador.  The gouge about his neck was ugly and deep, bruises mottled much of the skin around it.  Kirk swallowed at the thought of how close Sarek had come; how he had lost consciousness likely assuming he would die while violated.

Amanda held her hands to her husband’s face and kissed his lips lightly, then his forehead, then each cheek.  She traced the scar of dermal regeneration down his left temple where it met with abrasions and bruises and then more bruising around his jaw to his lips, swollen on the left side where the lip was split from being hit.  She slipped her fingers slightly under the cover that ended just under his shoulders and paused, her fingers shaking.

Kirk snared them, and secured them between his hands.  He was thankful she could not see her husband’s back as yet, or the significant damage from the violent rape.  A sheet of permaskin was generating new skin cells on his back in a thin layer between him and the bed.  Though Amanda hadn’t noticed, her husband was actually suspended one quarter inch above the bed while the process was active, to relieve the pressure on the wounds and, therefore, also alleviate any pain from that pressure.

Her eyes were wet as she looked up into his.  She looked so frail and afraid, seeming a completely different person than when she stood smiling with Sarek by her side, gently teasing him, and always ready to rein him in.  “I want to see what else they’ve done to him.”  Her voice cracked, and a tear slipped down her cheek.

“He’s alive, and will be well again,” Kirk promised, though not quite sure of that himself.  He reached to hug her, but she wouldn’t allow it.

“You and the doctor need to get your stories straight.”  She sounded angry.

Kirk was concerned now, but tried to hide it.  “What did he say?”  He felt his stomach tighten, wondering if McCoy had been protecting him from the whole truth.

Amanda looked at him, confused.  “He said there are a lot of ifs with head wounds and asphyxia, especially with Vulcans, but that things don’t look nearly as bad as they could be.”

Not terribly reassuring, Kirk thought.

“I am going to ask him to quit the Diplomatic Corps.  No, I am going to make him quit.  He’s a brilliant and gifted man; he could do almost anything else.”  Her voice caught.  “I never thought I would do that to him…but…”

Kirk swallowed.  There seemed to be no end to Sarek’s miseries from this.  “You need to give yourselves some time before making any decisions. 

“Oh, Jim, you don’t know how many close calls he’s had.  How many times I’d thought he was dead.  How many times he was held captive and, God knows what was done to him.” 

Kirk swallowed at this, realizing he was complicit even now in withholding the truth from her.

She took a shuddering breath and continued.  “Every time I hear a loud noise, I think that it's an explosive device and I have to think of where he is and if he’s still alive!”  She sucked in a deep breath to stop her shuddering, “Twice I heard on the news that my husband was assassinated.  Can you imagine how that feels?”

Kirk reached for her and she let him hold her now.  She felt even smaller in his arms as she continued, “They showed his limo exploding only a year after we were married.  I was visiting my parents; he was on his way there.  My father almost had a heart attack seeing that.  But the bomb had mis-signaled.  The driver was killed instantly.  Sarek had just stepped out less than five minutes before.”

They heard a faint noise from Sarek and both turned and stepped toward him.  His eyes looked foggy still, but they seemed to focus on Amanda, and concern was clear in them.

Amanda picked up his hand and held it tight as she leaned close.  Kirk stood just behind her, watching Sarek closely.

He seemed to be fighting to keep his eyes open.  He struggled to speak, whispering something so softly, neither could hear.  Amanda leaned close.  Kirk leaned in behind her.  “Are you well, beloved?” he whispered so very quietly, straining even to get that out.

“Yes, my love,” Amanda said.  “How are you, sweetheart?”

To this Sarek allowed a slight smile, and whispered, “Tired…” and his eyes slipped closed again.  Amanda kissed him softly on the lips again, then turned to Kirk and kissed him on the cheek.  “I think he’s going to be all right, with time…”

Kirk left them, closing the door to the private room and went to visit with McCoy.  He had only been there ten minutes when Amanda burst into the office, surprising them both so that McCoy slopped coffee over his most recent report.

“It appears you’ve left out some details regarding my husband,” Amanda said, her voice darker than they’d ever heard it.  It was immediately clear why Sarek seemed to avoid her wrath.

McCoy and Kirk traded concerned glances.

“He’d been having trouble sleeping…”  Amanda started, still glaring.

McCoy interrupted, “That’s to be expected, with a head injury and the drugs.”

“Being his wife, I took the prerogative of trying to help him relax."  Her eyebrows rose as her eyes darkened further.

McCoy got the gist immediately and stared at his coffee.  He'd had Sarek in sickbay for more than a week after his heart operation and he knew exactly what she meant.  She had asked then if it would be safe to help her husband relax through “gentle manipulation” – a hand job or fellatio he had gathered when she had winked and smiled. 

When he had assured her it would be safe, she frequently visited to relax her husband.  After her visits, Sarek had slept like a baby.  It was certainly safer and healthier than the additional drugs it would have taken, and had provided a further workout, besides the regimen he had prescribed, to strengthen his repaired heart.  It had also seemed to keep them very close and their spirits up as he recovered.

Kirk stared at her, confused.

“We were going to tell you soon,” McCoy said softly.

“Not soon enough!  When I reached between his legs, he nearly jumped off the bed, and he can barely move on his own."  Her pain reached her voice and mixed with her anger.  “In over forty years of marriage, my husband has never once refused me intimate relations.  Until now.”

Kirk understood finally and felt saddened that Amanda had to find out that way.

McCoy cleared his throat and set his coffee down.  “There was a sexual assault.”

“Obviously!”  Her anger rocketed back with a vengeance.  “Perhaps if I’d known, I wouldn’t have added to his trauma just now!”

“I’m sorry,” McCoy said, “but we were concerned for you, too.  We thought it best not to burden you with too much at once.”

Amanda’s eyes lit up.  “I don’t even allow THAT from my husband, as you well know!  How dare you!  He was attacked and I need every detail so that I can piece him back together.”

“Yes, ma’am,” McCoy said.

Amanda glared at Kirk, who couldn’t meet her eyes.  “You knew, too, didn’t you!”

Kirk swallowed as he caught her glare.  “Yes, ma’am.”  He had heard that Sarek and Amanda had had some firestorms of fights.  Now he believed it.  She looked ready to tear him to shreds with her bare hands.

“I want every detail of what happened, in case my husband decides to block any memories from me and become 'creative' with the truth again.”  Her sarcasm was scathing.

McCoy nodded.

“I also want to view all evidentiary and documentation holos taken, both public and confidential.”

McCoy’s eyebrows rose into his hairline.  “Now wait just a minute!”

Kirk felt shock at the thought that she would see crystal clear 3-dimensional images of all of her husband’s injuries.  By law, since Sarek had been representing the Federation, holos of any and all injuries received during a mission were taken immediately upon his arrival to sickbay and then again after being cleaned for a clearer view of the damage.  This included the anal/rectal damage, external and internal, that had to be taken.  Kirk couldn’t even bring himself to look at them, though as captain, he was supposed to.

Amanda’s eyes turned icy.  “Federation law cannot pre-empt Vulcan law in matters of privacy, Doctor.  Vulcan required that contingency before their acceptance of admission to the Federation.  Since my husband is Vulcan, this applies to us.  The Vulcan Privacy Code allows a husband no privacy from his wife with regard to medical records due to the dangers and lack of judgment brought on by pon farr, but I believe you know that.”

It was a twisted irony, Kirk realized, that the Vulcan Privacy Code, used as a shield innumerable times by Sarek to protect his privacy, was now being used as a sword against him by his own wife.  It would kill Sarek to find out Amanda had seen those holos.

Just because she could, would she actually view them?  And if she did, would she actually tell Sarek?  She had become ferocious in guarding his health without regard for his privacy, but Kirk didn’t believe she would actually take advantage of or hurt her husband unnecessarily, unless perhaps out of anger should he try to hide something else from her or casually risk his health or life in some way.

Kirk noticed McCoy took a breath to calm himself before responding to her shocking request.  His face had reddened, his eyes steely.  “Propriety would require a wife would request the viewing of confidential images of her husband in the rare circumstances where the viewing is necessary.  That privilege is extended even to young children.”

“Doctor, did you think Sarek could withhold that he'd had heart attacks from me without effect or sanction.  He lost that privilege when he did so.”  Her voice was calm, but the anger behind the words stunned Kirk.  This was a side of Amanda he had never imagined.

She had obviously not forgiven Sarek for not telling her of his previous heart attacks, and would use it as a weapon to afford her better leverage in protecting his health and safety.  Kirk had to wonder then what she had meant when she said she would “make him” quit the Diplomatic Corps.  What else might Sarek have given up to appease his wife for his earlier withholding of information?

Kirk had heard that T’Pring had lost her status as an equal to her new husband Stonn due to invoking the challenge upon one other than her chosen, thereby risking “innocents” to protect her desired intended.  She had in essence become Stonn’s property because of that.  Though Kirk detested the woman, the thought of someone becoming the property of another made him nauseous.

For such a seemingly sophisticated and advanced society as modern Vulcan was, sometimes their completely unorthodox and unexpected wrinkles tied to ancient ways caught Kirk off guard.  He had to wonder if somehow Sarek had lessoned his status as compared to his wife, if somehow she gained a power over him to make choices he would normally never concede.

Vulcan was a matriarchal society, Kirk remembered, and in essence, those in power take that power for themselves more often than not.  He knew that during pon farr, a male could refuse absolutely nothing to his wife.  Yet a wife, by law, could refuse even her body to her husband during his Time and thereby force him to endure a death that, Kirk had heard, was the most painful in, at least, known history.  Kingdoms had changed hands as wives watched husbands writhe in agony, slip into insanity, and die.  Sarek’s most recent pon farr had been quite recent, less than a year after the journey to Babel, and they had ended up on the Enterprise.  Kirk remembered that crisis all too well.  Could Amanda have forced him to give up certain rights then?

There was much Kirk didn’t know about Vulcan society so full of bizarre contrasts and seeming oxymoron’s, like the peaceful people surrounded by deadly weapons ready for use at every ceremony and gathering.  There was really no way to know what Amanda might hold over him, perhaps nothing but his incredible devotion or a significant promise in a vulnerable moment unconnected to pon farr.  Kirk decided that he must try to warn Sarek of what his wife knew, before he had the chance to worsen her trust in him even further and likely force her to view the holos and even to tell him she had viewed them.

Amanda continued, “And I want a full psychological evaluation.  Again, being the wife of a Vulcan, I am allowed full disclosure.”

Kirk grimaced.  He didn't believe that Sarek would be happy about that, either.  McCoy looked sad and shook his head.  Vulcans viewed psychological exams as an indignity if done voluntarily, a disgrace if forced upon them, likened to being locked up in an insane asylum for a human – a questioning of their essence as a Vulcan.

Amanda sat down and looked expectant.  Though they tried to soften the details, they told her everything.  She looked vacant and numb, though she said she was fine.  McCoy called Uhura to come spend time with her, and watch her.  None of them wanted to burden Sarek with her reactions to all she had learned.

While they awaited Uhura, McCoy tried to head off another disaster.  “Amanda, now that you know everything, well, I couldn’t help overhearing about what you’d said to Jim about the Diplomatic Corps.”

Amanda looked up at him.  “Already marshalling your defense of him?”  She didn’t sound angry, but she eyed the doctor and then Kirk with suspicion nonetheless.  “Had my husband the faculties for it since…his injuries… I would think he’d been lobbying all of you, or is it his soft-spoken nature and seeming vulnerability that garners all of this sympathy?”

McCoy looked saddened.  “No, it’s not my business, I admit that.  I just hoped that you would let Sarek recover before laying that on him.”

Amanda almost smiled.  “I love my husband too much to hurt him when he’s down.  I'll wait until he’s formidable again before starting that round.  You see, Doctor, both my husband and I are wolves in sheep’s clothing, and we each would protect the other to the bitter end.  Do you not think he would be this aggressive, if not more so, if he thought my life depended on it?”  She arched an eyebrow at them, so like her husband did that it took some of the sting away.

After the short, truncated blow-out at Sarek on the journey to Babel after his and their son’s teasing of her, Kirk had realized she was no shrinking violet, but he didn’t realize she was such a force to be reckoned with.  Kirk smiled but felt unnerved by the boxing metaphors and the realization that this woman was formidable herself and could be calculating and even ruthless.

It made him respect Sarek even more to fathom that they had made it through forty years together.  To think Kirk had first thought of her as only a trophy wife unveiled a shocking dichotomy.  He wondered how many underestimated her, and how many paid dearly for that mistake.  He was not surprised by the fact that Sarek generally referred to himself and his wife as a diplomatic team.

---ooOoo---

Sarek slipped into a healing trance for several days after arriving in sickbay.  He was asked about constantly, and had frequent visitors though still unconscious.  Amanda would read to him and hold his hand as she watched him.  Uhura would play the lyrette and sing to him.  Most simply walked in and out in hopes that he might have just awakened to the point that McCoy put up a sign on the outer door saying ‘No, he is not awake yet.  Go away!’

When Kirk first heard that Sarek had awakened from the healing trance, he felt anxious.  He wasn’t quite sure how Sarek would react to him or, in fact, how he would react to Sarek.

He realized that more than a few hours had passed since he had meant to visit him and felt even more guilty and uncomfortable about their now delayed first meeting.  He realized it would only get worse, so he forced himself to go, deciding that he would only stay a short time.

To prepare Kirk, McCoy had mentioned that it would still be a long road before Sarek was even close to his old self, but that he seemed anxious to interact and get about, though he was nowhere near alert or mobile yet.  The healing trance had been far less effective than it should have been due to the head injury; however, the signs were good that he might regain all that he had lost with time.  There were, of course, no guarantees.

When Kirk entered sickbay, he was shocked when he saw the doped up, stiff and wobbly Sarek trying to stand for the first time with the help of his wife and McCoy.  It would almost have been amusing, except for the events that precipitated it, though Sarek seemed actually to be enjoying the absurdity of the situation.

He sat on the edge of the bed, looking half asleep still, and exhausted already.  He swayed a little and tried to lay back down but McCoy refused to let him and pulled his arm over his shoulder.

“This does not seem like a good idea,” Sarek whispered.

Kirk froze at the bare whisper Sarek could still only manage.

Amanda spotted him hovering in the door and waved him in.  “Captain, could you help us?  Sarek is concerned that we can’t support him.”

Kirk flushed at being caught at the door, then tried to cover by immediately stepping in to take Sarek’s arm from Amanda.  Sarek still looked reticent as he edged off the bed.

“Just try to balance your weight for as long as you can,” McCoy said in an encouraging tone.

“If I don’t land on my face, I will consider this a success,” Sarek quipped in his whisper-croak.

Kirk couldn’t help but smile as he tried to avoid pressing into Sarek’s back injuries by gripping his other side.  Sarek tensed immediately and Kirk couldn’t be sure if it was from his touch, or readying himself for a possible crash to the floor.  He felt Sarek attempting his balance even sitting up, leaning the wrong way often enough that McCoy and he had to compensate against him back and forth.

One slippered foot landed on the floor, then the second and he attempted to steady himself.  “Is this sufficient? “ Sarek asked.

McCoy shook his head.  “The sooner you can stand, the sooner you can walk and then escape to the observation deck or the shower, your two favorite places to run to from sickbay it seems.”  McCoy grinned at unfurling the tidbit he had learned.

“Actually, there are three favorite places,” Sarek said quietly.  Amanda immediately started laughing and shot a dark look at her husband.

McCoy exchanged raised eyebrows for an uncomfortable smile from Kirk.  “I don’t even want to imagine,” McCoy said.

Sarek seemed to lean back and forth between them and Kirk had to wonder if his lack of balance was due to his head injury, the asphyxiation, or simply his leg muscles needing to rememorize the process of balancing his body.  But after a matter of moments, Sarek’s legs started to shake and he and McCoy lifted him back on the bed and leaned him back on the pillow, where he promptly fell asleep.

Amanda smiled at her husband as she retrieved the blanket and covered him.  She tucked the covers about his neck, gently caressed the edges of his hair, and softly kissed his lips and sat watching him with adoration as she stroked his cheek.  Her actions were such a contrast to her earlier unethical and immoral stripping of her husband’s rights that Kirk and McCoy couldn’t help but stare at the gentle intimacy toward him.  Kirk motioned McCoy to the office for privacy.

Once they had closed the door, Kirk asked, “Is he going to be okay?”

McCoy’s eyebrows rose.  “In what respect?  You saw what I saw.”

“His balance?” Kirk said.

“Give him time to adjust.  Head injuries can cause many different and divergent symptoms in a Vulcan.  And part of that is likely his leg muscles coming back.”

“He’s making jokes,” Kirk said.

“He made jokes before,” McCoy replied.

“But after…?”  Kirk didn’t even want to finish.

“He’s trying to come to terms with what has happened; we all have our different ways of coping.  He’s likely very confused as to how to deal with it, especially a man as reserved and private as Sarek.  Amanda seems to be tuned into exactly what he needs, thankfully.”  McCoy thought about what he had just said, “excepting of course for his privacy and his self-determination.”

Kirk ignored this last bit, trying to focus on Sarek’s physical welfare first.  “She acts like nothing’s happened when she’s around him.”

“She looks him in the face and interacts with him.  She shows him warmth and entertains him.  I’d say that’s exactly what he needs.  He probably feels like a bug under glass the way people have already been tiptoeing around and watching him, and he’s only been truly aware of it for a matter of hours.”

Kirk blinked at the seeming indictment, unsure if it was general or aimed at him.

“Talk to him Jim, like you used to.  You’re probably as close to him as anyone on this ship besides his wife.  Hell, play chess with him or bring him a donut and coffee like that time on the observation deck.  He appreciated that.  To be honest, Jim, with Sarek more than anyone, it seems it’s the thought that counts.”

Kirk pondered what McCoy said.  He felt badly that his own discomfort seemed so obvious to others already.  He wondered if Sarek picked up on it and Kirk felt even worse.

“He’s still having trouble sleeping?” Kirk asked.

“Likely the middle of the night will be the worst of it, with no one around to tire him.  He can’t seem to concentrate long enough to read yet, though that’s improving.  I’ve brought him music discs and set up computer access, but the computer seems to tax his concentration and patience.  From past experience with him, he’ll get restless and stressed without even that and with his claustrophobia eating at him…”  McCoy stared at him; the implication was obvious.

“Thanks!”  Kirk said, then started off to gather some ideas, feeling hopeful and reenergized.

---ooOoo---

 

At about 2:30 am, Kirk stepped back into sickbay with his arms full and piled all of his findings just outside the door, then retrieved two decafs with cream and two chocolate-covered glazed donuts.  He knocked, heard the whispered “come in” and found Sarek playing an archaic computer game that looked like a game of tennis on a screen.  He at least looked amused at Kirk’s reaction.

“This is what I am reduced to for the time being, it appears,” Sarek said.

Kirk smiled, but forced himself not to laugh, since he wasn’t sure if it had been a joke, or just sad for what had been, and hopefully would soon again be, a brilliant and incredibly skilled man.

A little delayed, Sarek noticed what Kirk carried and looked almost pleased.  “You have come to my rescue again with chocolate.”

Kirk smiled, but had trouble meeting his eyes.  He set one coffee and donut on the bed tray and put it where Sarek could reach it with ease.

“I fear the donut may be against the rules,” Sarek said.

“I came prepared.”  Kirk whipped out a knife and diced Sarek’s donut into tiny pieces.  McCoy had mentioned that Sarek’s esophagus would be too sensitive to all but liquids and tiny pieces that weren’t rough or hard.

Sarek’s eyes glistened and he cleared his throat though it did no good.  “You continually surprise me, James.”

Kirk felt his throat tighten at Sarek’s reaction to Kirk’s forethought.  “I’m sorry about earlier.”

Sarek looked Kirk in the eye when Kirk forced himself to meet his gaze.  “I don’t understand.”

“I was uncomfortable around you…”  Kirk looked away and felt himself flush from the admission.

“I sensed as much,” Sarek said.  “I regret that they coerced you into helping me.”

“I don’t,” Kirk said.  “I felt there’s been so little I could do for you, here and…down there.”

“Knowing you, James, you did whatever you could.  And, likely more than most would have thought of.  I hear I owe you my life, again it would seem.”

Kirk felt his eyes tear and turned away.

“Have I offended you?  If so, I did not mean to.”

“No!  I’m sorry.”  Kirk said, angry at not keeping his composure.

“I do not understand this need to act Vulcan when one is not,” Sarek offered.  “Some of my most cherished moments with my wife are those in which she is laughing.”

This did not actually surprise Kirk; Sarek seemed to glow when she laughed.  He was surprised that Sarek had admitted that though.

“I was hoping you had brought me something to distract me from my immobility and sluggish wits.”  Sarek had changed the subject for Kirk’s comfort, he realized, and given him something else to focus on besides their mutual misery.  It seemed that Sarek hadn’t lost his innate skills and sensitivity that took him so far in diplomacy.

Kirk stepped out and retrieved the 3-dimensional chess set, and Sarek did not look pleased.

“That is something I would have expected of my son,” Sarek said.  “It is rather like bringing a trapeze to a man with a broken arm, is it not?”

Kirk smiled.  “I thought so, too.  So I improvised.”  He stepped out and picked up a large armful of boxes that Sarek stared at curiously.  “I think the time is nigh to rebuild those synapses, sir.”

“It is good to hear someone actually talk of my injuries in other than diagnostic terms,” Sarek said with almost a smile.  He looked more relaxed now that Kirk had broached the subject.

“We can talk all you want of them, sir.  Or of your experiences.”  Kirk swallowed, but felt a dam of apprehension burst within him.  He wanted to help this man he had grown to care for.  And, dammit, he’d work past this discomfort that had been wedged between their infancy of a friendship.

Now Sarek looked away.  “I would like that, James, but with time, perhaps.  I do not want to lose the fragile connection we have between us.”

Kirk had never felt so protective of him.  “You won’t, Sarek.  That’s the last thing you need to worry about.”

Sarek suddenly appeared to remember the coffee and donut and started to reach for the coffee.  “This may not be elegant, “he said.

Kirk reached out.  “Let me help.”  Sarek allowed him to add his stable hand to Sarek’s less-coordinated ones.

After finishing their coffee and donuts in more comfort than Kirk had imagined, he pulled some of the boxes open.

“First, we shall begin by rebuilding your eye-hand coordination."  He pulled out several little cups and plastic discs on the small table next to the bed.  “Welcome to the time-honored challenge of Tidily-Winks!”

Sarek raised an eyebrow.

Kirk set out several small plastic disks of various sizes and little cups.  He attempted an example by pressing a larger disk against a smaller and it gained just enough momentum to barely slip the few inches across the table to fall to the floor.

They both stared at the floor momentarily.  Sarek raised the other eyebrow.  “I believe that would not be the example I would glean much from with respect to the goal you had in mind.”

Kirk stared at Sarek, attempting to determine if he were being teased.

“Let me attempt this,” Sarek said.  “I think I surmise your purpose.”  HHHe collected the little disks and cup from Kirk and transferred them to his bed tray.

Kirk stared at Sarek’s precise placing and manipulation of the disks, as if it were some great experiment, then sighed loudly in impatience.

Sarek gave him a long, blank stare, then continued his slight adjustments, when finally he pressed the disk, it snapped and flew into Kirk’s forehead with an audible slap.

Kirk held his hand to his head, but did not appear to be in pain.

Sarek pressed his lips together a moment.  “Forgive me,” he said.  “That was not my intention.”

Kirk laughed finally at how ridiculous they must look.  Sarek looked relieved and pleased at Kirk laughing.

“How about SpongeBall, instead?” Kirk asked.  He waved at the uncooperative game pieces.  “You can practice those on your own time.”

But as he looked back at Sarek, he noticed his eyelids drooping, and Sarek fighting it.

Kirk put the small crate of SpongeBalls within Sarek’s reach as his eyelids slid closed and fastened the hoop near the entrance to the private room – the furthest point away. 

As he started to leave, however, he heard Sarek.  “James?”

“You need your rest,” Kirk said with a smile.

Sarek looked a bit dismayed.  “We have many more games...”

“I have a standing appointment with you at 2:30 a.m. every morning, but will stop by during the day and evening when I can.”

Sarek looked content with this and his eyes slipped closed.

Kirk stepped out pleased with his reconnection with Sarek, but concerned at how the man withdrew from the discussion of what occurred on the planet.

---ooOoo---

Kirk had spent the day on the bridge noticing Spock avoiding his gaze and wondering why.  He had dug into a personal area, but for a very good reason – a son should be there for his father, and his father needed him.  He had waited for Spock to approach him and decided that he would push Spock if his first officer tried to avoid the issue.
 

When the door buzzed and he said “come in”, he was surprised, but pleasantly so, to find Spock standing inside his door.

“Good evening, Spock,” Kirk said.

“And to you, sir.”

Kirk eyed Spock warily.  “So formal.  Are we about to have a fight?”

“An argument, you mean,” Spock corrected.  “On Vulcan, we would call it a discussion or debate and find merit in it.”

“So, growing up, you had many discussions and debates with your father, and found merit in them?”  He smiled at Spock’s discomfort.

“In a discussion or debate there is more to be said by one side than ‘Yes, Father’, repeatedly.”

That surprised Kirk.  He looked at Spock closely, wondering if he realized how much he had just given away.  “Jesus, Spock, it’s been, what, well over twenty years now.  You’re still so angry.”

“It does not require anger to point out a discrepancy in your logic.”

“But if you were still angry, hypothetically,” he grinned in a patronizing way Spock could not have missed, “don’t you think that would cloud your judgment of how you see your father and what he might need?  Especially from you?”

Spock stared at Kirk, then dropped his gaze.  “I have come to tell you that I will consider further what you said, and that perhaps there might be some truth in it.”

Kirk’s eyebrows rose at that.  He had not thought it would be this easy.  Perhaps the sympathy for his father had seeped in to soften his judgments and salve his anger.

“I have spent little time with him since I was seventeen.  We separated on unfortunate terms.  I may need to reevaluate my view of him.”

Kirk smiled.  “That’s all I ask.  It seems he’s got plenty of time for you to get reacquainted.”

Spock looked a little disconcerted at the thought of it.  Change could be good, but it could also be scary after so many years of possible misunderstanding.

“There is another concern I had,” Kirk said.  “Just how well do you really know your mother?”

Spock’s face softened.  “Specify.”

Kirk asked Spock to sit while he poured himself another drink.  “Your mother mentioned that she would – let me quote her here – 'make him quit the Diplomatic Corps.’”

Spock’s eyebrows rose.  “She is an emotional woman.  She will get past this upset to think clearly again.  It seems a cycle with humans.”

 Kirk ignored the seeming insult to the human race.  Since he had included his own mother in the generalization, he likely didn’t imply any criticism.  “There’s much more to it.”

Spock looked bothered by the direction of the conversation, but he looked expectant.

“I got the impression she could do it.”

Spock stared, a haunted look took hold of him then slipped away as suddenly.  “There is little, if anything, my father would refuse my mother.”

“I got the impression that your father would not need to agree.”

Spock’s head snapped up at that.  “My mother is a devoted wife."  But the line felt stilted, as if there were more Spock would rather not consider.

“But could she?” Kirk asked.

“She is not that kind of woman,” Spock said coldly.

“You deliberately misheard me, Spock.  I didn’t ask if she ‘would’, but if she ‘could’."  It appeared to Kirk that Spock was not aware of any wrongdoing of his mother with regard to Sarek’s privacy or self-determination, but it appeared that he feared such, and this seemed to upset Spock’s apple cart.  He had considered that he might not know his father well enough, but his mother he felt much closer to.  She had always been the one he could always believe in and trust.

Kirk decided it was time for the coup de grace.  “She has requested all evidentiary and documentation holos taken, both public and confidential.  She is not asking your father’s permission.”

“Mother would not do that,” Spock said, but his voice was bit unsteady.

“She also requested a full psychological examination of your father, and full disclosure of the results.”

This hit Spock hard; he closed his eyes momentarily.  He looked a little disoriented at the possibility.  “If this is so, then she has changed.  I have to believe she said this out of anger or upset.”

Kirk softened his tone.  “I think she is desperate and terrified of losing your father.  I don’t think she wants to hurt him, or even control him.  I don’t think she ever really recovered from his emergency heart surgery and the gamble he took by attending the Babel conference.”

Spock looked unsettled by the idea.  “I will talk to her.  I cannot believe that she would create a slave of him; she…respects…him too much.”  Kirk wondered if Spock had originally intended to say ‘loves’.

Kirk added his final concern to the mix.  “I would be as concerned with how your father might reciprocate, should she follow through on this.  He cherishes her, but he is also a proud and independent man.”

That brought a haunted look to Spock’s eyes that he could not seem to dispel.

---ooOoo---

The next morning, Kirk stepped into Sarek’s private room among an air of tension. Amanda appraised her husband coolly.  Sarek stared back at her, a bit of his fortitude seeming to have returned, at least a shadow of the usual glint in his eye.  McCoy stood, looking uncomfortable, caught in the middle of something.  They all watched Kirk step into the room – Sarek appeared pleased at his arrival, Amanda irritated; McCoy looked like he wanted to be anywhere else.

“I have the right to know your intentions,” Sarek said, with a bit louder voice than he had had, but not much above a hoarse whisper.  Kirk had to wonder if his voice was returning, or if he was just angry, by his stern face.

“Do you, my husband?  You recanted your rights to me regarding anything effecting your health and safety.  There were no conditions, as we agreed.”

God, Kirk couldn’t help but think, it was true.  But did he volunteer this after his heart operation to appease her, or did she take them at his last pon farr, which caused him to shudder.  By any standard, that was taking advantage of someone in the worst sense.   Either way, he was shocked that Amanda had allowed it.

Sarek looked down at his hands.  An almost meek action it seemed to Kirk.  “I am not disputing that, my wife.  I only want to know what you will do. 

Amanda glared at her husband.  “Are these your soldiers to protect you from your own wife?”

Sarek looked hurt at that.  “Aduna, please, you have not been yourself since…”

“Since you withheld that you were at death’s door?  Since you agreed to attend the Babel Conference, a stressful mission that would likely have killed you?  You gambled your life because you could not live without your precious career, and to be able to continue your sexual relationship with me.”

Sarek flushed a little at that.

“I would have done anything to keep you safe, Sarek, sacrificed anything to keep you by my side.”

“It does appear that way now, my wife.”  His tone was cold.

“How dare you!”  She stepped close and Sarek actually flinched.

Kirk felt acutely uncomfortable at the very personal nature of the argument and the intimacies being disclosed and wanted to leave, but also felt anxious for Sarek.  “Amanda… 

She stung Kirk with a piercing stare, “This is not your business!”  She turned to McCoy, “Nor yours!  You should both leave, now!”

“NO!”  Sarek yelled his best, but only the emotion made it very far.  “Please, stay.”  He looked at McCoy then Kirk.  “I need to air this out.  There is much more here.”  Sarek shook until he calmed himself.

Kirk and McCoy held their ground.

Amanda’s eyebrows rose at her husband’s last comments.  “Okay, my so-private husband, why don’t we air this out.”  Her tone edged into mockery.

“I made a mistake not telling you about the heart attacks,” Sarek admitted.

Amanda snorted at that.  “My ever-forthcoming husband.  Let’s turn our attention to this mission, shall we?”

Sarek frowned.  “That is not the issue, Aduna, and you know it.”

“NOT THE ISSUE?” she screamed.

Kirk realized he stood in the doorway completely transfixed and stepped further in so the door swooshed closed so their voices would not carry into sickbay, and possibly the main corridor.

Sarek’s eyes closed.  “Please, Aduna.”

McCoy interceded, “Perhaps this would be better dealt with when your husband’s more himself.”

Amanda laughed, “The only difference between then and now is that he CAN”T YELL BACK!  That’s just too bad, Sarek.  A little frustrating isn’t it that I can out yell you this time.  Now you will just have to sit and listen.”

“As long as you also listen, my wife,” Sarek said calmly.

Amanda turned to Kirk and McCoy.  “My husband had said that this was simply a preliminary meeting of little substance… that the capital was secured long ago, I think he said.”

Kirk piped up, “We were misinformed.”  He blanched at how those little words had become so much more.

“Am I to believe that, Captain?  Did you hear that straight from the Federation Council, or through my husband?”

Sarek’s head shot up at that.  “Aduna, you cannot believe…”

“Stop using that term of endearment!  I am not feeling very endearing toward you now!  You left me behind!  What do think I gleaned from that, husband?”  She was starting to sound hysterical and both Kirk and McCoy approached her, concerned how far she might go, but their concern came too late.  “And you come back beaten… molested… tortured…sodomized…raped and strangled to within an inch of your life!”  Her voice had risen to a scream by the end.

Both Kirk and McCoy froze at that, and turned toward Sarek.  It had sounded like she blamed him for his own injuries, as if he had gotten what he deserved, though they knew she couldn’t mean that.  Still after the trauma he had been through, much might not yet be clear to him.  He had closed his eyes and seemed to be trying to regain his control, but he was shaking.

Amanda seemed to realize what she had thrown at him.  Nothing had been discussed or dealt with yet in the psychological sense.  The words had not even been spoken, and Amanda had just laid it out for them plainly, even with her seeming blame of him attached to it.  He hadn’t even known she had received the details as yet.  Sarek had had no chance to tell her anything.

She looked shocked at what she had just said, then looked to Sarek, stricken.  “Oh, God!  I didn’t mean that…  Sarek!”

He didn’t open his eyes, and Kirk had to wonder if they held unshed tears.  But his shaking continued.  “Leave me, all of you, please!”

“Sarek!”

“Leave me!” he tried to yell.  “I will submit to anything you like, Amanda.  I will not fight you anymore.”  He turned from her.

“Sarek, please.  I love you.”

“Your actions speak in contrast, my wife,” Sarek said softly.

A tear streaked down Amanda’s cheek.  Kirk and McCoy gently guided her out.

Christine Chapel had heard the beginning of the fight before Kirk had let the door slip closed, and when they had filed out she couldn’t help but notice Amanda crying and McCoy and Kirk looking upset, anxious, and drained.

They gave Amanda a sedative and put her in another room.

Kirk and McCoy sat down to a stiff drink each.

“Well, one good thing came of that,” Kirk said, “it’s all out on the table now.”

McCoy didn’t look so hopeful.  “You mean splattered all over the walls.”

“Well, it wasn’t graceful.”

“That was a hell of a punch Sarek took,” McCoy said.

“Amanda was angry and upset,” Kirk said.  “Surely he’ll realize that, after a time.”

“This family is not the quickest to forgive, in case you haven’t noticed.”

Kirk sobered at that.  “You don’t think Sarek would do anything drastic.”

McCoy gave a long look at Kirk.  “I’d say this would be a trial to any marriage, and right on top of the Babel fiasco.  Sarek has got to be wondering when the 'for better' will return.  Vulcans treasure a peaceful environment.  I doubt he’s had much peace for quite some time.”

Christine Chapel couldn’t keep her concern at bay after hearing the tip of the blow-out, the concerned discussion and then the silence that ensued afterwards from Sarek.  She stepped in to see if she could get him anything.  He was lying with his back to the door, and did not turn when she entered though he had to have heard her.

“Sir, can I get you anything, water, tea, something to eat?” she asked calmly, trying to exude a measure of peace to still the rippling waters from the intensity of the incident.

“Nothing, please.  And could you ask that I not be disturbed, indefinitely?”

Nurse Chapel felt saddened by his resigned tone that seemed drained of any hope.  She also felt concerned for his psychological state for the first time since he came aboard so wounded.  She had tried to think of anything to say that wouldn’t be too personal, but could think of nothing, and slipped out of the room.

She informed McCoy of his request and her concerns.

“Well that’s just great!” he said, irritated.  “How can we help him now?”

Kirk felt saddened.  The ridiculous game of Tidily-Winks seemed so long ago already, but he had an idea, and smiled.  “We can still pipe music in.”

McCoy frowned at him.  “He has music.”

“But not our sweet voice and soothing soul.”

McCoy smiled and raised an eyebrow.  “Our secret weapon!”  He smiled at the possibility.

---ooOoo---
 
 

The lights were dimmed for the gamma shift and the Enterprise had quieted.  All had been prepared as Uhura crept into sickbay with the lyrette in a long, flowing traditional Swahili dress of vibrant colors.  She opened the channel to the private room Sarek rested in and started to play a soft, lyrical song of love and understanding.

He had been alone in the room for almost eight hours and McCoy and Kirk hoped that perhaps he'd had time to get some distance from the painful episode and might be amenable to a calmer and less-biased approach to solving his troubles.

Several songs into her attempt to coax Sarek out of his self-imposed isolation, the intercom chimed and then Sarek’s scant voice reached her, “Nyota?”

Lieutenant Uhura smiled.  “Yes, Sarek, it’s me.”

“Are you alone?” he asked.

“Yes, Sarek.”  She kept her voice soft and soothing.

There was a long pause.  Uhura could imagine his stubbornness, hurt, and loneliness wrestling control from each other.  She had heard about the entire blowout in detail as she was prepared by the others to make clear what she was up against in her attempt to calm and console him.  To her horror, she had seen much of the brutal attack on this so-reserved yet compassionate man.  She had to struggle to keep her sympathy contained; she wanted so to hug him tight and help him past all of this misery, but she couldn’t risk alienating him.  She was about the only one left to reach him now.

“Would you like some company?” Sarek asked.

“Very much, sir,” she said.  "Would you like me to come in?”

“It would be easier than my attempt to come to you, I believe.”  His tone had a slight undertone of teasing and she felt relief that he was comfortable enough with her that he had allowed that.

She slipped in and controlled her reaction to his injuries.  She had seen them briefly as they rushed him away from the jails, and again very briefly after he had been stabilized, but the bruising had not been so clear then, and somehow she had thought them less dramatic before.  Perhaps it had been her denial.

He looked away from her gaze

“I’m sorry, sir.”

“Please, let us drop the formalities; it seems to make everything seem…”  He stopped, as if he could not think of an appropriate word.

Uhura felt shaken; she had never known him to experience such a difficulty.  “Sarek, I am sorry I stared,”

“It is understandable.  I forget what I must look like.”

Uhura smiled.  “Still handsome.  It is more what is under the physical damage that causes my concern.”

He looked uncomfortable at this.  With her recently-discovered psi abilities, she felt his shields attempt to strengthen, but they were still too fragile from his injuries.  She attempted to keep her mind on things other than on her curiosity at what he was truly feeling and experiencing.  He was the one, in fact, that had discovered her high psi potential back after his heart operation, when they spent much time together playing and discussing music.

“I’m sorry, again.  Perhaps I should just keep to my music.”

“No, I would not silence what you feel the need to say.”  He looked as if he wanted to say more, but looked away instead.

“Words are not so easy sometimes,” she said.  “Sometimes the impulse is to touch and hold someone to ease their pain.”

“Yes, my wife…” and here Sarek closed his eyes a moment and looked pained.  She felt the wave of telepathic pain he tried to hide reach out and nip at her, though she had turned it elsewhere.

Uhura reached for him, but he jerked from her.

“Forgive me, Nyota.  It is not you.”

“Can I sit closer, Sarek?”

“With my voice as it is, that might be less problematic.”

She pulled the chair against the side of the bed, but turned sideways so that he would not feel she was staring him in the face.

“Your wife loves you very much,” she said, trying to sound casual and unplanned.  She felt another ripple of hurt tease her mind.  She would never forget what she'd been told Sarek had said, that Amanda’s actions spoke in contrast.  It tore at her that he would feel that way.  It must make him feel so alone after more than forty years of marriage.

He blinked and his lips tightened, and then his eyes closed.  When he opened them, they seemed to glisten ever so slightly.  “This is difficult for me.”  His voice was rougher now.  He cleared his throat, but Nyota realized it had been emotion.  He had probably never come so close to losing his faith in his wife and his marriage.

Nyota slipped her hand to his arm and touched it tentatively.  When he didn’t pull away, she let it rest upon him, and he closed his eyes again.  “My controls are not very secure, Nyota, as you have likely already sensed.”

Nyota had visited Sarek several times to play music with him while he recovered from his heart operation, and her immense acceptance and understanding of him had struck a cord.  She had felt like the mother he had lost too soon, the sister he had never developed the closeness to due to his need as eldest to take over the parental responsibilities.

She was a font of understanding and compassion that reached out to him without her even knowing it, to soothe his hurt and upset.  He had never felt such warmth before, except from his own wife.  It acted to lure his pain out for her to soothe.  And he had never felt so vulnerable, with his wife feeling almost like the enemy.

He had fought with his wife many times, but had always before felt that she had his best interests at heart and that they could find some common ground in the end.  This was the first time he had wondered at both.  He had never hurt so much since his own son had left him almost two decades back.

“No one need know if you slip with me, Sarek.”  Now she could see that his eyes were glistening.

“Nothing has ever been as important to me as my wife,” he said quietly.

“I know.”

“But she does not seem to want what I…am…anymore,” Sarek said his voice unsteady.

Uhura squeezed his arm.  “She loves what you are.  She just sees how that may be a fatal combination, that she may lose you someday.”

“I do not want to hurt her.”

“And she would strive in every way to protect you,” Uhura said.  “Her focus made her lose sight of what she loves in you.”

Sarek seemed to stare into the covers considering.

“If you could go back, Sarek, would you have told her of your heart attacks?”

Sarek stared at her and realized her point.  He blinked at this and did not look comfortable even with his own thoughts of it.  “I do not know,” he admitted though it pained him.  He had hurt her very much by withholding that information, and yet he did not even know if he would do anything differently if he had the chance again.  She did not need to suffer with her knowledge of the earlier attacks, and it had turned out for the better without her protecting him.  Perhaps what he had done was not so different from what Amanda was doing.

Uhura watched him considering what she had said.  He looked disturbed at his realization.  “Sarek, will you let me do one more thing, before I play for you.”

He looked concerned, but trusting of her.  “If you would like.”

Uhura smiled.  “I would very much like.”

Sarek looked curious at this.

“Lay your head back and close your eyes.  Don’t react and don’t argue.  I know that will not be in your nature, but do it anyway.”

Sarek looked amused but did as he was told.

Uhura softly touched the edges of his hair as she began to sing a lullaby.  His face started to relax.  She sang as she stroked his hair softly and watched as his exhaustion took hold and he finally slept.  She kissed his forehead, then softly her lips touched his as she caressed his cheek.  She left the lyrette in the chair so she would have to come back to visit him soon to pick it up and possibly play for him again, then slipped out.

---ooOoo---

Spock stood apprehensively at the VIP suite, marshalling his resolve and control.  He could not lose the mother he knew; there had to be a way to bring her back to herself.

The door opened and Spock stepped in.  Amanda stood waiting for him but didn’t look him in the eye.

“I’ve heard some disturbing news,” Spock began.

Amanda stepped up quickly.  “Not about your father?”

“More about you, in regard to Father,” he said.

She looked momentarily relieved, but nervous and immediately distanced as she turned away.

“You once said that nothing was more important than Father’s life,” he said.

“Yes, I said that,” Amanda said, dully.

“Do you really believe that, now?  That Father would give up whatever was necessary to stay alive?”

She leveled her eyes at her son.  "Sometimes his honor and pride confuse his priorities.”

Spock frowned, “I don’t think you would have ever wanted to marry him, if that were not a part of his essence.”

Amanda’s mouth tightened, but her eyes teared.  “I just don’t want to lose him.”

“And neither would he want to lose you.  But do you think he would really take your privacy rights and choices?”

“I do not endanger myself, as he often does,” she said, anger infusing her tone.

“You knew what he was,” Spock said.  “Has he changed, or have you?”

“I am tired and scared.  I can’t stop worrying.  I imagine the worst, always.”  She started to cry.

She ran to Spock and held him tightly.  He rested his arms about her as she had done so many times when he was young and felt as inconsolable.

Spock began softly, “If you can’t accept him as he is anymore, perhaps you should consider separating.”

“No!”  Amanda began to sob.  “I cannot live without him!”

“I fear, on this present course that will happen.”

Amanda stared at him.  “He wouldn’t leave me…no…”

“When you ask him to leave diplomacy, all he has ever done since you met him, he might wonder what else you will require.  To grant you this control over him, without limit, could sacrifice his pride, self-esteem, even his honor which he holds sacrosanct.  He could become a shadow of the man you married and cherished for most of your life.”

“So, I will lose him either way – lose him physically or lose his soul, is that what you’re saying?”  Her voice was small and fearful.

“I am saying that you need to find what has changed in yourself, and what might be done, if anything.  I am saying that to do what you are doing is not only so wrong I couldn’t imagine it of you, but a guarantee that you will destroy exactly what you seek to protect.”

Spock held his mother and rocked her, as she had done so often for him.  He hoped his parents could find their way back to one another.  For all of his anger at his father, whether deserved or not, he knew they'd had a strong and vibrant marriage and could again.  He knew that they loved one another very much.  He could see it in how they looked at each other and how they suffered each other’s pain.

He would never admit that he saw that love and the vibrancy it created between his parents but realized, after his talks with Jim and much thought and meditation, that he needed that crutch of denial of the obvious between his parents to feel Vulcan; he had yet to see and to understand the varied grays of being Vulcan as his father did, to understand the essence of his Vulcan heritage.  He accepted that he need the blacks and whites of what a Vulcan does and does not do as a crutch – he was who he was and accepted that of himself.  He had many more years to develop his father’s security and assurance; after all, he was still only an adolescent by Vulcan standards, even as he neared forty. 

---ooOoo---

It was very late when Uhura crept back into sickbay.  She had thought so much on what had happened, and found herself more and more angry with Amanda for leveling such a psychological assault on her own husband after what he had been through.  But that had pushed her to do what she needed to do.

She had always wondered why everyone assumed that Amanda was the more sensitive and compassionate of the two, but realized it was hard to see the real Sarek for the tremendous walls he erected for being Vulcan, from such an important family, so male, and so proud.  She had to wonder with his position in his family, his government, and the Federation if he had ever been allowed to let his guard down and be the one to be taken care of, to need, even to show that he suffered, except of course when his Vulcan biology demanded it, and then it was against his will and he likely had little if any memory of it due to the psychological trauma of it.

Uhura stepped into his room and picked up the lytherette and started to play. 

Sarek came around to the soft music.  His eyes opened and a soft smile graced his lips.

“I am sorry if I am being presumptuous,” she said.  “I can leave if you’d like.”

“Please stay,” he said.  “With you I feel almost…normal…again.”

“Soon enough this will all be a bad memory,” she said.

Sarek looked her in the eye, raised an eyebrow, and allowed a soft smile, “Not all of it, Nyota.”

She smiled back.  “Nor for me, Sarek.”

He looked perplexed.  “It is unfathomable to me how the wealth of men you must meet have left you unmarried?”

Uhura blushed at the tremendous compliment from a man renowned for his scarce and meager praise.  She did not look him in the eye.  “Sometimes the one we would choose is already married.”

“Why do you turn from me, Nyota?”

She smiled.  “Admissions can be embarrassing.”

“Wanting one that is already taken is a common enough occurrence,” he said.

She smiled and met his eye, then laughed.  “You really don’t know do you?”

He looked confused by this.  “Know what?”

“How many women would trade places with Amanda,” her smile disappeared, “and, perhaps, treat you with more understanding.”

Sarek’s eyes darkened.  “You do not know enough to judge her thus.”

“Where is she now?”

“I made it clear I wanted no visitors.”

“And yet I am here.”

“My wife and I have issues that must be dealt with.”

“Perhaps we are not without issues, Sarek?”

Sarek looked up concerned.

“I sense your acceptance of me,” she said.

“Your perception is clear,” he said, still watching her, keeping his eyes only on her face, yet only now realizing that he was doing so, with surprise.

“I know you find me attractive,” she said.

“I appreciate your aesthetics.”  He relaxed, unsure why he had felt tense before.

“I am not talking of the purely appreciative,” she said, staring at him now to glean any reaction.  He looked a little wary of her now.

“I do not know what you mean.”  He sounded a bit affronted.

"Then you will relax and let me show you."

He eyed her.  “If that is what it will take to smooth this…difficulty, proceed.  I value your company and…support… very much, Nyota.”

She leaned over him.  “Close your eyes and cooperate, then.”

He looked a little concerned.

She stared at him.  “Do this one thing for me.”

His concern didn’t waver but he closed his eyes.

She leaned close and tentatively pressed her lips to his.  She felt his alarm and confusion, but also his reticence to force her away after he had agreed, and allowed her.  She wove her fingers through his thick, wavy hair, imagining him naked above her, entering her.  She could feel him caught up in her fantasy due to his fragile shields, and her touch.  He attempted to pull his mind inward, to fight the erotic feelings it instilled, but succumbing until they were both lost to it.

After a brief moment she deepened the kiss and forced her tongue into his mouth.  He moaned and reciprocated even as he reached to push her away.  She sensed his panic and concern, for her, for him, for his wife.  She finished the kiss as she felt his breathing quickening, but kept her hands cupping his face.  She could see him fighting for control.

His eyes opened and he stared at her.  “You have then realized my attraction is more than platonic," he said, sounding sad.

“Ambassador, it has always been clear to me.  I feel the same way.”

“But I am married,” he said, seeming confused.  “You do not think I would leave her for another, like this?  No matter what is to become of my marriage?”

Nyota smiled, but she did not seem altogether happy, nor sad.  “No.”

Sarek frowned.

“But I think now you realize this problem is with your wife, not yourself.  I know that is difficult for you to face, that she could be less than she was and may need help getting back.  If you have the strength…”

At this Nyota was shocked to see Sarek’s eyes glimmering with unshed tears, “Forgive me,” he said unsteadily, not meeting her eyes.  “I don’t know how you see through so much.  You have made my course clearer.”

Nyota hugged him and held him tight.  She felt him shake, and then breathed deeply, giving him a chance to regain his control and composure before she looked into his face again.

“I will always be in your debt, Nyota, for this insight.”

“Sarek, this is nothing compared to what you have done for so many others.”

Sarek’s eyes glittered with humor.  “Is this the karma humans talk of?”

Nyota smiled and kissed him on the cheek.  “You are starting to catch on fast, Ambassador.  Before long you’ll be back to tossing Tellarites.”

Sarek blushed at that.  “That was him receiving his karma.”

Nyota laughed as she stood to leave.  “You have another visitor.”

Sarek looked suspicious at the timing of the arrival of this new visitor and got the distinct impression that he had been set up.

“And what would have happened if I had reciprocated further than I had, as I assume my wife is standing outside.”  His eyes showed his amusement clearly.

 “I know you too well, Sarek.”  Nyota laughed as she stepped out.

---ooOoo---

Amanda slipped through the door and stood tentatively in the doorway.  “My husband, may I come in?

“It would seem I am in no position to refuse you, Amanda.” Feeling his anger flare again. “By my mobility or my rights.”

There was no emotion in his tone, and Sarek had not referred to her as ‘his wife’, which was not promising; he only called her by name when he was unhappy with her.  She had to consider the fact that he had already considered ending their marriage.  Her eyes stung at the possibility, and she had to catch her breath as her chest heaved.  She had to believe he was still very angry and upset, and that he might, someday, come around to call back for her, instead of rushing into divorce.

“Do you wish me to leave?” she asked, her voice catching.  “I will go if that will make you more comfortable.”

He noticed the tightness in her voice – she was afraid – for herself or for him he could not decide.  Interesting, he had never questioned her motives before.

“Come in then,” he said blandly.  "We should clarify these last things.”

‘Last things.’  Amanda all but cringed at his resigned tone and this sense of finality.  She bit back tears and realized that might be what he really wanted, that he might be happier or at least more content that way, after what she had put him through.

She would want to die if he chose to continue without her, but likely she would get over that in the years to come to only miss him greatly the rest of her life.  She would never force him to stay married to her, though she could, and he might even stay married to her out of his strong sense of duty.  She would not be able to live like that, a burden upon him, so perhaps she should dispel his worries, give him the choice without concern for her.

She stepped over to the chair, uncomfortably close to her husband that she felt so distanced from suddenly.  She turned her head from him so that he would not see if she cried.  “I can have my things removed from the houses and embassies before your return, if that would be your wish.”

She saw, out of the corner of her eye, his head jerk up at that.

“Then our marriage is done,” he said. 

She could not read the tone, did not quite understand it as a question or a statement.  “I want you to be happy,” she said, her voice a little thready for a moment.  “I do not wish to be your jailer…”  Spock had said to show that Sarek had his choices back so that he knew she would no longer hold the recanting of his rights over him.

He nodded.  So she had given up on him finally, he decided, and felt his eyes sting at the loss of her.  The thought of her no longer wanting to be his wife tugged at his chest so that he felt it might burst.  His throat burned as it never had before.  He hurt so that he wished he was unconscious to be unaware of such pain.  The universe at once felt vast and empty to be navigated alone.  On Vulcan he would only think of her.  On Earth he would only think of her.  All of those places that they visited, he would only think of her.  He wondered how long it would take to feel more than bereft.

He did not want her to suffer more than she had.  Nor did he want her to ever worry again.  “I will take care of everything.   You can have whichever houses, or I will purchase one or more wherever you like.  I will support you very comfortably the rest of your life; it will be in my will should I predecease you.”  His mind was flooded with grief as he tried to navigate these details of separation and divorce through his loss and confusion.

He had thought she would come back to him.  He had not thought it would come to this, and so suddenly.  He felt himself spinning, trying to steady himself but failing.  She was leaving him.  She would be gone from him soon.  The feel of her cool skin, her scent, her laughter that reminded him of wind chimes.  Her laughing blue eyes, even when she didn’t laugh.  She had loved him so.  Had said her love was strong.  Then where had it gone?

He heard her suck in her breath.  He frowned, she was crying.  He reached for her chin and pulled her face to his.  “I have hurt you so much, my wife.  I only want you to be happy.”

She finally looked at his face that she had been avoiding so he wouldn’t see her tears.  But the warmth in his tone, his calling her his wife again, and then she saw his eyes glistening and filling at the sight of her pain, caused her to question her assumptions altogether.

“I will give you whatever you need, whatever you want," he said.  “I had come to that conclusion already, whether we stayed married, or not.”  His voice was rough at that last and he closed his eyes and swallowed.  She felt a sudden revelation as she pieced together what had been said and the misery she saw her husband trying to hide from her.

“Sarek?”

"Yes, my wife,” he said softly, as if he shouldn’t be allowed now.

“Do you want a divorce?”

Sarek blinked rapidly.  A sign she knew as distress.  “I want you to stop hurting.  I want you to be…happy,” he said.  Such an alien word for him.  He had never used it before now. 

Amanda stared at him.  Would he try to keep his pain from her as she had from him?  Would he try to allow her to decide whether she still wanted this marriage without his influence, just as she had?  Were they each trying to help the other by sacrificing themselves?

“Can I kiss my husband?” she asked.

He looked confused and vaguely concerned.

She knew he could not keep his true desires from her, but she also could not keep hers from him if they touched minds freely, but he might shield those thoughts from her, as well as his reaction to her kiss.  But a wife knows when her husband loves her by his kiss, and she was at a standstill as Sarek would not give her an answer.  Perhaps to not influence her?  Or to not hurt her?  It would be too sad to end a forty-year marriage because each thought the other wanted it and so helped the other toward it.  She had seen it too often – a divorce based on assumptions and too often, pride.

“You are still my wife, and I would refuse you nothing anymore.”

If he didn’t love her any longer and she was forcing this intimate act upon him unwelcome, then so be it.  There was too much at stake.  She leaned forward and caught those beautiful lips in a kiss that could be her last with him and focused on his reactions.  He did not respond at first, perhaps hoping she’d break it off before he gave himself away.  She hoped that those were his motives that she might unravel.

But then she deepened the kiss and felt him respond at the same time he tried not to.  She felt it in the bond as he tried to collect up his reactions and fears regarding her and shuffle them away in his distraction by what he thought might be the last kiss of his beloved.  She sensed his fear that she would discern his true feelings, and that was all she needed.

She allowed her shields to lower to shed light on what was too much confusion and hurt mucking up their communication.  He moaned and released his shields as he thrust his tongue into her mouth and pulled her onto him.

*You still love me!* she thought.

*My feelings have never changed.*

An explosion of relief and joy suffused their minds.  She had her husband back.  He had his wife back.  Together they would find their way again and do whatever needed to be done to repair their bond and relationship.  He loved her and she him, and that was all that was needed.  They could find their way now.

She pulled from the kiss as she felt him getting aroused.  She didn’t want to press him so early.  She loved him too much to hurt him that way.

“I wish I could make love to my wife,” he said a bit sadly, “to show her how I feel.”

“With time,” she said.  “For the moment, I am happy to know we will stay together, and that wasn’t our last kiss.”

“Nor is this,” he said as he kissed he deeply again.  *Let me feel your hands.*

Amanda put her hands to his face, conservatively, knowing how sensitive to touch he had become since the attack.

He took her hands from his face and placed them on his chest as he pulled the fabric closures apart and felt her hands slip in to comb through his chest hair.  *How I have missed those hands, Aduna.*

He moaned as they extended the kiss, slipping his hands into her hair .  *Never leave me.*

*Never by choice, Adun.*

They heard the door slip open and a footstep before they could pull their senses back from the meld deepened by the kiss.

“Excuse me,” they heard as they started to break the kiss, and realized the captain had walked in on them.

They slipped from their deepened bond and became aware of the world again.

“Captain,” she called to him sweetly, and he popped his head back in, noticing her refastening her husband’s med tunic and Sarek watching his wife with the usual intensity that appeared almost lustful now that he looked more closely.  Funny, he had never thought of that before, likely because he was Vulcan.  He looked down at his shoes momentarily to give them some space.

With one last soft kiss, she left her husband.  “We have a date tomorrow, Captain.  I don’t want to be greedy with my time with him.”

Kirk smiled brightly at their obvious reconnection.  “No one would blame you," he said.

As she disappeared, he noticed the wistful expression on Sarek’s face as he stared at her when she slipped out past Kirk.

Kirk smiled at Sarek’s obvious distraction.

Then Sarek turned toward Kirk, an eyebrow rose.  “No donuts?”

Kirk smiled, stepped out and returned with their usual fare and began cutting up Sarek’s into tiny pieces.  “You’re looking improved.”

“Much improved,” Sarek said.  “Though the physical recovery is still far from complete.”

Kirk smiled at Sarek’s vague admission that his physical recovery was the lesser of his worries, leaving only the psychological.

“Do you want to talk?”  Kirk’s tone darkened.  The implication was obvious that Kirk didn’t need to say ‘about down there’.

“I had assumed we were to get to those other games.”

Kirk watched Sarek; he hadn’t reacted so strongly as before, and still seemed to look him in the eye. “We can talk, too, as we play.”

“We can,” Sarek agreed.

Kirk wasn’t sure if Sarek had agreed or was merely admitting the physical possibility of speech.  And Kirk hadn’t been specific about what they might talk about.  He was sure Sarek knew, but that didn’t guarantee he would cooperate.

Kirk pulled out a checkerboard and checkers.

“Not as fanciful or creative as your usual,” Sarek said.

"It is a precursor to build up to your playing chess with your son."

Sarek’s eyebrows rose at that.  His eyes looked brighter.  “My son will be visiting?”

“He believes you two need to get reacquainted,” Kirk said casually as he set out the pieces, as if he had nothing to do with Spock’s interest or realization.

Sarek almost smiled at that.  “Not something I believe that Spock would perceive on his own.”  He continued to look Kirk in the eye.

“In some things, he can be a little thick.”

Sarek nodded.  “I should take issue with that as he is my son, but it is true.  In matters of personal relationships he is rather…underdeveloped.  I am glad he has his friends here.  I feared his worsening isolation out in space.”

Kirk looked up to see Sarek still watching him.

“Thank you again, Captain.  If my son and I could reconnect at a deeper level…‘all would be right.’  I think that is your saying.”

Kirk took his first move on the checkerboard.  “Would it?”  He pinned Sarek’s eyes with his and didn’t blink.

Sarek held his gaze for several long moments.  “It was a painful and debilitating experience.  The rebels have many reasons to hate.  I did not take it personally.”

Kirk took a deep breath, hoping that Sarek would continue to be so open.  “It was a very personal attack.”

“Yes,” Sarek admitted.  “Were it not so, it would have been easier.  But it helped, not being alone.”

Kirk felt surprise.  “You knew I was there, from the beginning?”

“I sensed your concern and your fear for me,” he said.  “I also sensed your guilt and your embarrassment for me.”

Kirk blushed at that.

“The guilt and embarrassment were unnecessary.  From what I understand, you did all that you could.  It was only your recognized ingenuity that saved me, I believe.  Vulcans are perhaps less modest about the body; it is simply a vessel for so much more.  The mind is another matter altogether.”

Sarek continued, not meeting Kirk’s eyes now.  “I feared I would die in a way that would crush my wife.”  He looked up at Kirk and Kirk swore his eyes misted before he looked away again.  “Fearing death for me is less than fearing leaving my wife.  I have significant difficulty imagining separating from her before we have both had time to come to terms with the possibility.  Perhaps I have been too casual about accepting missions.  I had some discomfort accepting this one, as did my wife, and I discounted both ‘intuitions’ as she would call them.”

“But hindsight…”  Kirk started.

Sarek was nodding his head.  “I, and my wife, have dealt with too many missions not to realize when something is not right.  I should have listened to her.  I should have listened to my own discomforts.  I should have been less…arrogant.”

Kirk smiled at that.  “You continually surprise me also, Sarek.”

Sarek looked at him as if searching for something.  “I wish there were some way that I could…‘put your mind at ease’…with regard to me.  I have surely realized my mortality, and also what is important.  I will endeavor to rectify what has ailed my marriage, and continue to seek out my son and…’repair those fences’ even with my son’s stubborn nature equal to mine and his unusual social development.”

Kirk smiled at Sarek’s admission of being quite stubborn, as well as the diplomatic way of referring to his son’s sometimes abysmal social and interpersonal skills.

They continued to talk for hours, all but forgetting the checkerboard.  They mostly talked about Spock and his difficulties and accomplishments.

Spock arrived with the 3-dimensional chess set.  Kirk laughed at Sarek’s earlier prediction.

Spock looked affronted.  “It is only fair that I reintroduce this pastime to my father as he was the one who first taught it to me.”

“Logical in one aspect at least,” Sarek said.

Kirk snorted at that.

Spock frowned and stared at his father.

“This will be more complex,” Sarek said, “but I have had some preparation.”

Kirk realized Sarek was likely talking about reconnecting with Spock, since they had made so few moves on the checkerboard to qualify as preparation for three-dimensional chess.

“We might, however, start with two dimensions,” Sarek offered.

Kirk left them to themselves, and sighed at the work cut out for them both.  He marveled at how such an awful experience could bring so many positive results.  Sarek was on the way to rectifying his difficulties with his wife, and was finally very motivated to turn to cementing his parental bond with his son.

Kirk had feared for the family that seemed to be exploding under its own stubbornness, pride, and disappointment, but which seemed to be coalescing more strongly due to the upheaval that made them all question themselves.  He earnestly believed that tomorrow would bring good fortune for all, where it really counted.