Chapter Text
Spock chose to sit in a quiet corner of the Academy refectory, eating a light lunch. The food was freshly prepared – for which he was grateful after nine months of eating synthesized meals on board the USS Reliant – and he took a moment to savor each mouthful, enjoying every crisp and flavorful morsel.
Beside him on the table lay his PADD which held one of two new sub-routines for the Kobayashi Maru – a project he has been responsible for improving and enhancing over the past three years – which he worked on in his spare time on this last tour. The current upgrade was almost complete – there were a number of inelegant lines of code he wished to clean up before inserting it into the main body of the program. While he was perfectly capable of working on the data while eating – as he regularly saw students do, generally as a last minute rush to complete an assignment before class – that was not the Vulcan way. Meals were traditionally a social event, a time when Vulcans gathered to partake of a proportion of their daily nutritional needs and to discuss topics of interest. The fact that more often than not Spock dined alone did not deter him from practicing this custom.
Instead he reflected on the morning’s meeting between himself, Captain Pike and Admiral Barnett, acknowledging a degree of satisfaction at the outcome. It was agreed that having completed this recent tour – his third since graduating – where he served as the ship’s Science Officer under Pike’s command, he was to be promoted to full commander with immediate effect. In addition, Pike made a pitch for Spock to be listed as First Officer for the Enterprise when she launches in eleven months, a petition Barnett had agreed to support when Pike submitted it to the admiralty.
The flagship was to be the first to break the mold of short-tours by embarking on a five year mission focusing on science and exploration. It would give a great deal of autonomy to the command team and Spock relished the thought of all the discoveries to be made as they pushed beyond the boundaries of known space.
Spock turned his attention to the increasingly busy hall to observe the puzzling social behaviors of cadets – something he did with frequent occurrence. He had learned shortly after his enrolment at the Academy that he was particularly woefully unprepared for human social interactions, realizing for the first time how much his mother had altered and repressed her own behaviors to conform to Vulcan standards.
With the time just after noon, the refectory was beginning to fill with cadets coming to get lunch before their afternoon courses and lectures. Suddenly his corner was not so quiet when a group of seven cadets sat at the long table adjacent to his.
“Are you seriously going to take the Maru again, Jim?” Spock surreptitiously glanced in their direction to see a dark-haired, earnest-looking cadet addressing a young blond man who was standing with his back to him. He checked a frown before it had formed. Cadets were forbidden to discuss the test, or to tell others how they win, if they win. “Wasn’t it torturous enough the first time?” the young man continued.
“Yeah, Gary, it was,” the cadet identified as Jim said, shaking his head. Spock was about to intervene and point out they were breaking regulation by discussing it when Jim said, “You’ve all done the Maru, right?”
Everyone around the table nodded or verbalized their assent. While Spock knew it was his duty to interrupt and stop the discussion, his curiosity got the better of him, wishing to know what Jim had to say about his test, and since all the cadets had taken it, none of them would be compromised by his sharing.
“Okay, so I can talk about it. I self-destructed the ship, thinking I’d be taking the Klingons with her while the crew escaped in pods, but the instructor pointed out that none of the crew would survive the explosions of the four warp-drive vessels and attending radiation. I just…can’t leave it there – I have to try approaching it differently.”
Two others at the table responded they had done similarly when taking the test, but this didn’t appear to mollify the cadet. His actions – opting to self destruct – was the scenario chosen by twenty three point seven percent of cadets who took the test. There was nothing noteworthy in that; however it was almost unheard of for a cadet to request a re-sit. Spock found himself curious as to Jim’s motives and made a mental note to look up this cadet and his academic record.
Having paused to answer the question, the young man walked around the table and putting down his tray, sat down next to a raven-haired female. “I think you’re insane,” she said as he lowered himself onto the bench. “Why put yourself through it all again?”
As Jim turned to answer her, Spock was able to get a look at him and was immediately taken by his aesthetically pleasing countenance, the easy smile he bestowed on the young woman.
Jim picked up a large hamburger from his plate. “I don’t believe in no-win scenarios,” he said and took a large bite.
For some reason, the cadet took that moment to look up and across his table, meeting Spock’s gaze. He became aware of how vividly blue the cadet’s eyes were – all the more striking to someone coming from a planet where brown eyes were the norm. It was Spock who looked away first, not wishing the others at the table to notice Jim was staring and have their attention turn to him. Directing his attention back to his meal, he lifted a forkful of steamed vegetables and ate.
“Whatever devious bastard programmed it would disagree with you,” a sandy-haired man at the other end of the table said.
The comment reminded Spock of something his mother had once said, that eavesdroppers never heard good of themselves.
“Yeah well, whoever it is, obviously hasn’t met me,” Jim grinned and took another bite.
Spock was unsure what to make of the cadet’s apparent tenacity: the scenario was unwinnable, he’d made certain of that when he’d designed it, and all cadets on the command track who took the test were aware of that fact after they had taken it. So on the face of it, attempting it a second time was illogical. Yet despite that, the scientist in Spock could see there was something admirable in his refusing to give up, even though it was an exercise in futility. How many scientific breakthroughs had been made where someone had refused to accept defeat in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary? The cadet would no doubt learn, once out in the black, when it was appropriate to doggedly pursue something and when to let it go – it was a useful trait to have given all the unknowns that starships on exploration routinely faced.
A giggle made Spock glance across to the other table, where the cadet – Jim – had draped himself around the woman beside him and was whispering to her. Judging by the heightened color in her face, he surmised it was likely something inappropriate.
“Sure, catch you later, Jim,” she said as the cadet stood and picked up the messenger that had been at his feet.
“Adios amigos!” he said with a wave of his hand, garnering a response from the others he had been seated with, and headed towards the exit.
Spock could not help but notice that his uniform pants fitted very snugly around his narrow hips. Before he could ponder on the strange direction his thoughts were going, his attention was drawn back to the table.
“Hey, Salara, you got a date with Jim?” the sandy-haired young man asked the woman the cadet had whispered to.
“Maybe, I have Kyle, maybe I haven’t,” she grinned.
“You mean you haven’t slept with him yet?” one of the other cadets said. “I thought he’d worked his way through pretty much everyone by now.”
“I heard he was dating that doctor, what’s his name? McCoy?” Kyle said.
“No, they’re just friends,” Salara said adamantly. “And you’re a one to talk, Gary,” she added, turning to the cadet seated on the other side of her, “you’ve not exactly been celibate yourself.”
“Yeah well, who can resist a dick like mine when it’s so—”
The cadet, Spock noticed with satisfaction, broke off whatever he was about to say when he chose that moment to stand up, his chair loudly scraping along the floor as he did so, thereby bringing his presence to the attention of all the occupants of the table.
“What’s wrong, Gary,” Salara whispered with a smirk, still loud enough for Vulcan ears, “don’t want the professor to be jealous of the size of your cock?”
Spock picked up his tray and padd and began to make his way towards the exit.
“Way to go, Salara,” Gary hissed. “You do know about sensitive Vulcan hearing, right?”
“Of course I do,” she laughed. “That’s why I said it!”
Whatever his answer was, was drowned out by the general hubbub of several hundred cadets dining and talking, as he increased the distance between them.
Depositing his tray on his way out, Spock walked down to the sunny quad and paused to check his personal messages, and there it was: a request from one Cadet James T. Kirk to make a second attempt at the Kobayashi Maru. As head programmer for the exam, the faculty had automatically forwarded the request to him. The entire Kobayashi Maru program was supposed to be unknown to those who have never taken it, so they couldn’t pre-plan tactics, which meant Cadet Kirk would have an unfair advantage over those taking it for the first time. Nevertheless, Spock thought with a curl of satisfaction, it would make no difference having prior knowledge of the scenario. Kirk would still fail and perhaps, after the second attempt, would actually learn the lesson the test was meant to teach.
He pressed ‘Accept’ and turning, strode towards the computer sciences block for his first lecture since his return.
+
Even though he’d only been back on Earth for two weeks, as his return coincided with the beginning of the new semester, he had been given a full load of classes in both his specialties: science and computer sciences as well as one advanced xenolinguistics class. Between those and time spent on lesson plans and marking coursework, he noted he had less free time than during his tour on the Reliant. Nevertheless he still chose to participate in a number of extra-curricular activities since he had no plans for further research for the time-being, having just been awarded his fourth doctorate for his pioneering work in the new field of biomolecular physiology.
As a Vulcan, Spock would never admit to having a partiality towards something – his interest in xenolinguistics was purely from an academic standpoint, having mastered all the official languages of the founding Federation members, together with a further nineteen languages – three of them Terran and the remainder from other Federation and non-Federation planets (the latter including two dialects of Romulan and Klingon).
Walking into the Gagarin Building, he made his way to the lecture theater where the Xenolinguistics Club was holding its first meeting of the new academic year. Eschewing the tiered seating to the right, everyone was gathered on the large expanse of floorspace, gathered standing and sitting in groups of between two and six people.
Spock was momentarily taken aback by the volume of noise produced by the – his glance took in – forty one occupants. He was here purely as a participant, not as a professor; nevertheless, his entrance had a dampening effect with many of the cadets falling silent. A notable exception were two individuals seated at the other end of the room – one he recognized as James Kirk, the other an attractive young woman whose skin coloration suggested an ancestral origin close to Earth’s equatorial region – who were in the midst of a heated discussion.
Spock was somewhat surprised to see a command major in the Xenolinguistics Club since it was typically attended by those on the Communications and StarFleet Intelligence tracks, or by non-Terrans, such as him – those who were willing to coach others in their club on their native languages.
“Professor Spock will know,” the young woman said to Kirk, folding her arms across her chest, though she wasn’t looking at the cadet but rather at him.
Spock raised an eyebrow, somewhat surprised at her assertion and the fact she knew of him when he was certain he had not met her before.
“Professor, I'm Cadet Uhura - I'm on the Communications track and am going to be in your advanced xenolinguistics class."
"Indeed?" he nodded in acknowledgement.
"I was wondering if you could you help us settle an argument,” she said, directly addressing him. “I have a question.”
Spock made his way over to where they were seated. “If I am able to do so. What is your query?”
Kirk, who had been leaning forward towards her, sat back, sprawling in his chair with a smirk on his face as he, too, looked at Spock.
“Sir, we’re arguing—”
“Debating,” Kirk cut in.
The young woman glared at him. “—debating which came first in Vulcan written language: the more modern version of the logographic calligraphy – vanu-tanaf-kitaun or was it gotavlu-zukitan, what we call Vulcan standard script? I say vanu-tanaf-kitaun came first; Kirk says it was the standard script.”
“Upon what basis did you arrive at such a conclusion, Cadet Uhura?”
“We know from the Kir'Shara that at the time of Surak, the ancient version of the script was used. It’s a logical progression to simplify the script and then to progress to a phoneme-based glyph system.”
“Cadet Kirk.” Spock was inwardly amused to see the cadet startle at the use of his name. The cadet was unlikely to be aware of his connection to the Kobayashi Maru as his involvement in it was not widely-known, and so wouldn’t be aware how he came to know of him. “I ask you the same question.”
“An excavation on Trienta Verconis seven years ago uncovered the remains of a colony, believed to have been settled by Vulcans who had left their homeworld following the Surakian wars. Among the artifacts found were a set of dice covered in symbols that form the syllabic nucleus of the Vulcan language. So the script system was apparently in use as long ago as that.”
“How the hell do you know something as obscure as that?” Uhura said, glaring at Kirk.
A smirk formed on the young man’s face. “I dated someone on the science track, specializing in archeology and paleontology. You’d be amazed at her pillow talk!”
“I do not need to know about one of your many conquests and I’m quite sure Professor Spock isn’t interested either.”
Kirk grinned at her and it was clear it was meant to antagonize. Spock would never admit it, but he found himself intrigued that Kirk would not only be interested but have the ability to retain such information in the aftermath of sex.
“Cadet Kirk is indeed correct. As technology began to flourish, the logographic form became too cumbersome for everyday use and so glyphs were introduced that formed the foundation of the script used today. This preceded a simplifying of the logographics which continued to be used in certain specific arenas, while the old form remains in use for a number of ceremonial and other traditional events.”
The look on Kirk’s face could only be described as smug. “I can’t believe you doubted me, Uhura,” he said with a distinct lack of sincerity.
“TaHqeq,” she muttered under her breath though it was clearly audible to both he and Kirk.
“‘One who has no honor’ – and in Klingon, no less. I’m torn between feeling flattered and cut to the quick,” he declared, the last comment said with his hand held dramatically over his heart.
Spock had to control an amused twitch of his lips at Kirk’s antics and Uhura’s shocked expression, presumably at the fact the young cadet clearly had some knowledge of alien languages.
“Can I have your attention please.” Spock turned to find another Academy instructor at the front of the room. “First order of the day is to elect a chair and treasurer of the club who will remain in those positions until the end of this coming academic year. Do I have any volunteers for chair, first?”
Uhura stood up. “Hi, I’m cadet Uhura and I’d like to put myself forward.”
“Anyone else?” the instructor asked. When no-one opposed her, she was declared the new chair.
“And treasurer?”
Kirk stood. “Cadet Jim Kirk – I’d like to do it.”
A young woman on the other side of the room stood. “Cadet Falayi. I’d also like to put myself forward.”
“Right, we’ll need to vote. All those in favor of Cadet Kirk.”
Three quarters of the room put their hands up – Uhura being one of the notable exceptions. “Carried. Sorry, Cadet Falyi.”
Uhura glared at Kirk. “What, did you bring all the people with you who you’ve slept with?” she hissed. “You only came here to annoy me. You’ve got zero interest in xenolinguistics.”
“You know, it’s not always about you,” Kirk said.
“Oh yeah? So tell me, Kirk, how many languages do you speak?”
Kirk smiled. “Well let’s see. Um…eight Terran languages, and the official languages of Andoria, Centauri, Tellar, Vulcan, Rigel,” he recited, counting each one off on his fingers, “then there’s Romulan, Klingon, Phlaxan…” how many’s that so far? Sixteen? Hmm…I’ve missed a couple…”
Uhura’s mouth was a thin line. “Okay, Kirk, you’ve made your point.”
“So, will the new Chair and Treasurer come to the front? You’ll be working closely together over this coming year…”
Uhura, who had just stood up, stiffened, clearly not relishing the prospect. Kirk, on the other hand, was grinning and winked at her.
“It’ll be fun, you’ll see,” Kirk said quietly to her. “We’ll have a chance to get to each other better. Maybe you’ll even get to be another notch on my bedpost.”
Uhura, who had taken two steps forward, froze, her head whisking around so fast, her long pony-tail caught Kirk’s face. “I hope your dick rots and falls off,” she quietly hissed.
Kirk laughed as he continued to make his way to the front and Spock found himself watching the easy way he walked, the confidence in his step and the manner in which his uniform was form-fitting, emphasizing his lean but muscular body. The last thought brought him up short and he swiftly averted his gaze to input a query into his padd in order to discover the meaning of Kirk’s curious comment about bedposts. On finding it, he began to understand Uhura’s negative reaction.
Kirk, Spock decided, was an interesting conundrum. On the one hand, as he'd discovered when he’d delved into the cadet’s records following his request to take the Kobayashi Maru for a second time, Kirk was one of the Academy’s high-flyers: top of his class in both Survival Strategies and Tactical Analysis, with a grade point average of four across all his coursework, and the fact he was able to achieve this while condensing his course from four to three years was both surprising and admirable. On the other hand, from various comments overheard, Kirk appeared to have a reputation as being something of a Lothario, his behavior towards Cadet Uhura reinforcing the point.
Those with such a reputation were all too common at the Academy – an inevitability, Spock supposed, when you put several thousand young humans together, many of whom were living away from home for the first time in their lives. Generally, those who had garnered such a status seemed to see him, as the only Vulcan on campus, as a challenge. All propositions of a sexual nature were entirely unwanted and were always spurned. So far, Kirk had not appeared to show any such interest in him; nevertheless, Spock was ready to coldly rebuff him, should he suddenly choose to do so.
As the first Xenolinguistics Club meeting got underway, chaired by Uhura with support from Kirk, Spock took a seat, and from the back found himself watching them both.
+
Uhura was indeed in his advanced xenolinguistics class and within weeks had become his top student. Her aural sensitivity was unusual for a human, demonstrating an unparalleled ability to identify sonic anomalies in subspace transmission tests. He was considering providing her with extra work to stretch her, as the regular course work didn't appear to challenge her unduly.
Meanwhile, for the first six weeks of the semester, Spock ran a beginners astronomy class on Wednesday evenings for non-science students. In the main lecture theater in the Einstein block, the screen was hooked up to various telescopes orbiting first Earth and then later, other Federation planets, where he took them through basic star-mapping.
It was only when that module of the course was over and he handed over to a professor specializing in astrophysics, on the seventh week, that Spock was free to attend StarFleet’s chess club. It was a game he had learned when he himself was a first year student, and had quickly mastered it to such a degree, that he spent most of his time having to play against the computer. Each year, he hoped to find a cadet or two who had the required level of skill to challenge him.
When he walked into the hall, it was filled with – he glanced around and took in the numbers instantaneously – forty three cadets and four instructors. Because he had his back to Spock, he didn’t notice Kirk’s presence until he heard his laugh, surprising himself that he recognized it, though having seen Kirk at the Xenolinguistics club over the past several weeks, he believed the familiarity was understandable. They’d conversed little in that time, since Kirk tended to spend much of the meetings flirting with other cadets while demonstrating his extensive knowledge of languages. Apparently, he used the chess club for a similar purpose, since he was standing closer to a red-headed male cadet than was the social norm, touching him frequently as he spoke.
Other than Kirk, he was acquainted with twenty one other cadets – the club always seemed to be favored by those on a science track and five of his students approached him within a minute of his entering. It was clear to him that three of the cadets were more interested in attempting to learn more about him, displaying typical courtship behavior which he pointedly ignored, instead engaging the other two who were interested in his thoughts on the discovery of a singularity in the Milky Way’s beta quadrant. He had, of course, read every report he could find about it, and was more than willing to share his knowledge with those who shared his interest.
By the time the class was ready to begin, a further seventeen people had arrived and one of the instructors asked everyone to form into one of four groups according to ability. It was at this point that Kirk turned around and catching his eye, smiled and sauntered over.
Spock was somewhat alarmed when he didn’t stop, moving in close and whispering in his ear, “Are you stalking me?”
The very thought had Spock reeling – he was all too familiar with the occasional harassment claims made by cadets against the teaching staff and he stepped back, away from Kirk. “I can assure you—” He broke off when he saw the cadet’s face break into an open smile and he realized it was his attempt at humor. “I have been unable to attend previous club meetings due to teaching commitments.” He had no idea why he was explaining himself to this cadet.
“So, you’re in the advanced group too, huh?” Kirk said. “Cool.”
Before Spock could respond, everyone was told to choose a partner. Spock deliberately did not choose Kirk to make a point, and for some reason this seemed to amuse the cadet.
His opponent was an upperclassmen he’d played before in previous years and it quickly became clear that his ability had not improved significantly since their previous match over a year earlier.
“So, I’ve played you four times and I still hardly know you,” Spock heard Kirk say from a table behind him.
“What do you want to know?” a quiet male voice responded.
“Well, what year are you in, what track are you on…do you have a girlfriend…or boyfriend…”
Spock could hear the smile in Kirk’s voice as he said the last few words. He turned his mind back to the game in front of him, but really, the standard of the player was such, he barely needed twenty five percent of his attention. He tried to tune Kirk’s conversation out, finding the questioning to be overly personal.
Unfortunately, after less than fifteen minutes, he had roundly beaten his opponent, and with the rules of the club stating one game per round, he decided to go sit on the other side of the hall and do some class-prep on his PADD.
When it came to the next round, Spock found himself with Kirk’s partner. The young man – Timothy McLeod – was a freshman from one of his computer science classes. A new player to Spock, he was hesitant with every move, which meant that Spock was obliged to listen to Kirk talking to a young woman.
“So, tell me again, what’s a beautiful girl like you doing in a place like this?”
Spock heard her laugh. “You’ve asked me variations on that question every week since we started, Jim! Don’t you know any lines that aren’t so cheesy?”
“Hey, it made you smile and that’s what counts!” Kirk answered. “And you’ve got such a pretty smile, Jeannie.”
Spock repressed the urge to shake his head, glad for the distraction when his opponent finally made a move. Given Timothy’s game with Kirk had ended only minutes after his own game, he wasn’t surprised that they’d finished in thirteen point four minutes. Once again, he chose to move away and continue working on his lesson plan.
Round three, the final one of the evening, Spock found himself confronted by Kirk.
“So, I figure we’re about even, standard-wise, so let’s play together this round.”
“Upon what basis did you make that evaluation?” Spock asked, curious. He was fairly certain Kirk was not watching him play.
“We both finished our last two games within minutes of each other. I’d say that was pretty convincing evidence right there!” he grinned.
As it turned out, Spock somewhat grudgingly admitted, Kirk’s assessment was accurate. They were indeed evenly matched, though their playing styles were radically different, keeping Spock on his toes throughout.
They played their first moves in silence, before Kirk opened up the conversation. “I hear you were First Officer on the Reliant. Is Pike going to give you that position on the Enterprise?”
“If Captain Pike wishes it,” Spock responded, “then he will make the proper request to the admiralty.” He had no intention of revealing the truth of the matter.
“I hear he already has,” Kirk said with a sly smile.
Such requests were not made publicly in case they were rejected, so Kirk’s knowledge of it represented a breach in security. He rose his eyebrow. “Indeed? And you would know…how?”
Kirk tapped his nose twice. “I couldn’t tell you that, Professor – it would be a breach of security.” His smile widened.
The next few moves were played in silence, though there wasn’t any awkwardness between them. Kirk seemed focused on the game, his tongue caught between his teeth as he studied the positions of all the pieces.
“Check. I gather StarFleet have installed the Enterprise with computers that use the new Optical Data Network Relays,” Kirk said after moving his rook into a defensive position, obliging Spock to move his queen. “That’s pretty cutting edge stuff.”
Spock looked up at Kirk, surprised. The cadet was on the command track and was not obliged, therefore, to have such detailed knowledge of computer systems. “Indeed. It is estimated they will decrease the time taken for an input on the bridge console to reach engineering by four point three nanoseconds.”
“Isn’t there a concern that the ODN relays can be accessed remotely from both numbers four and seven Jeffries tubes, making the ship vulnerable to sabotage?”
Clearly the cadet had been studying the schematics, which Spock wasn’t aware was available to non-essential personnel and made a mental note to check if Kirk was hacking the Academy’s computer system.
“There is a remote possibility, though any attempt to access the system can be traced back to the source and the authorization code used.”
“Bit late then, wouldn’t you say?” he asked, smiling and then moved his bishop into check. Again.
Spock focused his attention on the board with a frown. He hadn’t been so thoroughly routed for three point seven years. He was unexpectedly finding both the match and the conversation stimulating.
As Kirk chased his queen around the board and Spock’s game became entirely defensive, the cadet began a discussion on the pros and cons of the mnemonic memory circuits that the ODN relays were replacing. Spock was intrigued at the profound understanding of computers that Kirk was demonstrating and found himself both impressed with the cadet’s degree of knowledge and baffled why he was on the command and not the science track. His innate sense of privacy preventing him from asking the question aloud.
And not once, during the entire match, which lasted over an hour – and which he finally lost – did Kirk make any attempt to elicit personal information from him.
As Kirk left, his arm slung around the shoulders of a petite cadet from another group, he found himself grudgingly fascinated by the young man.