FIRST STIRRINGS by Ster J

DISCLAIMER: Don’t own Trek. Wish I did. It may own ME, however…

Characters: Spock, Amanda, Sarek, Dr. Corrigan, Healer Sorel

(Thank you, Jean Lorrah, for Dr. Daniel Corrigan and Healer Sorel.)

Rating: PG

Genre: Angst

Setting: Spock hits puberty—or is it something else?

Tossing. Turning. Burning. Something was wrong. Spock put a hand to his throat and tried to swallow past the pain. He rolled from his bed, checking the time. It was late. He didn't think his parents were still awake, so he tried their bedroom first.

Amanda was lying quietly in her bed, alone. Reflected light from Vulcan's sister planet streamed softly through the window and spilled across her face. Spock was startled by his mother's radiant beauty. He drew nearer, just gazing upon her face. He had never noticed how very lovely his mother was.

Two hands grabbed at his shoulders and pulled him away roughly. He staggered to the floor. The dark figure of his father loomed over him.

"Out!" Sarek ordered.

Amanda awakened, startled by the sudden noise. "What's going on?" she asked sleepily. "Sarek? Spock? What's happening?"

Sarek picked Spock off the floor by one elbow and shoved him out the door. "Out!" he ordered again.

Spock found it hard to keep his footing as Sarek kept pushing him. He tried to understand his father's bizarre behavior. It was not yet time for the blood fever, so Sarek was not in pon farr. What had Spock done to deserve this kind of treatment?

Sarek had taken his son out of the room, down the hallway, out the door into the courtyard and across the eastern expanse of the mountain estate.

"Father!" he called. "Listen to me!"

"Out! I will not have you attack my wife in her own bed."

"Attack? I was trying to tell her I was sick!"

Sarek took his son by the elbow and dragged him further along. "You are not sick. It is first stirrings, and you are much too young to be married. I must protect my wife."

Spock was puzzled. First stirrings came upon young Vulcan men as they reached sexual maturity. Spock was only in his mid-teens. "No! No, I only have a fever."

Sarek refused to stop.

"Where are you taking me?"

Sarek dragged his son closer to a formation of rocks.

"Why are you doing this? I would never hurt Mother." Spock's bare feet slipped on the rocks surrounding a hole in the ground. Fear flashed in him as he realized that Sarek intended to throw him down that hole. "No, Father!"

Sarek pushed, and Spock tumbled down the smooth sides of a well. Sarek heard a splash and knew that Spock had hit the water. He crouched down at the well's side and tried to see to the bottom. "I shall return for you in three days," he called to his son. "There is sufficient water for you, and the rock will protect you from the heat of day."

"But why? I'm sick."

"You are not sick, my son. You will survive first stirrings." Sarek rose to his feet and turned away.

Spock's cries followed him back across the desert. "Father, no! Don't leave me here! Get me out! Father! Papa!"

Sarek intercepted Amanda on her mad dash to find her son.

"Sarek! Where is he? Why is he screaming like that?" Sarek held his wife firmly in place. "Let me go! You just can't leave him out here!"

"I can. It's first stirrings, my wife. The well is the only place for him."

Amanda threw her gaze back to her husband, incredulous. "You tossed him down a well?" She intensified her struggle. "You can't do that!"

"I can, and I have. Amanda, many generations of my family have spent time down that well, including me. I came out of the experience stronger for it."

Amanda sagged against her husband. "Explain."

Sarek sat his wife on a nearby rock. "Amanda, first stirrings refer to the onset of the cycle of pon farr. If our son were older, we would be calling on T'Pring's family and arranging a marriage right now."

"But he is too young to get married."

Sarek nodded. "Exactly. And because he is so young, he will be able to survive first stirrings without risk of madness." Sarek smoothed her hair. "He will be fine. Trust me."

Amanda looked into her husband's face, trying to accept what he had told her. The echo of Spock's voice wafted across the desert. "How can you stand to listen to that? To our boy crying out that way?"

Sarek lowered his head a moment. "It's not easy. Come, it's late." Sarek turned her back towards the villa.

"Oh, how can I sleep with our boy out there?"

Amanda spent the better part of each day pacing across the east windows. Prudence kept her from dashing across the desert in the heat of day. Sarek had canceled all of his appointments for the three days Spock would be down the well. Amanda didn't know if Sarek did that to keep his eye on her, or if he was genuinely worried about Spock. Amanda knew that she had married into an alien culture, but never before had it seemed more, well, alien.

Sarek kept vigil at the window at night. Fortunately, the predatory creatures were giving the well a wide berth. If I-Chaya were still alive, Sarek would have posted the sehlat at the mouth of the well. Instead, Spock had to face this ordeal totally alone.

Early on the evening of the third day, Sarek loaded up the flitter with harnesses and ropes. Amanda packed food and water and clothes. Together they flew the short distance to the well. As Sarek busied himself with attaching the ropes to the car's side, Amanda flung herself down at the mouth of the well and shone a light down to the bottom. Spock was curled at the edge of the water, asleep, she presumed.

"Spock!" she called out. "Wake up, son. It's time to get you out." Spock didn't stir. Amanda shone the light directly onto his face. "Wake up!" Still nothing. Amanda started to panic. She directed the light onto his abdomen to see if he was breathing.

Sarek came over to her. "What's wrong?"

"I can't wake him up. Get him out of there! Get him out now!"

Sarek flung himself over the side and lowered himself down the smooth shaft. Sarek shook the boy's shoulder. No response. Sarek scooped his son into his arms and started back up the well. "Amanda!" he called out. "Call the medical center! We are bringing him right in!"

Amanda radioed the center as she fired up the flitter's engines. As soon as Sarek was on board with Spock, she took off and headed for the city, too frightened for her son to be angry at her husband and this planet's bizarre customs.

Sarek and Amanda stood vigil at the examination room window. It was only then that they could see Spock's other wounds--his scraped knees and elbows, his torn feet and hands. Obviously, he had tried to climb up the shaft to get out. Dr. Daniel Corrigan was treating Spock's physical wounds as Healer Sorel was employing a healing mind touch. Once Spock was stable, Dr. Corrigan stormed out of the room and over to the boy's parents.

"How is he?" Sarek demanded.

"He'll live, no thanks to you. Didn't he tell you he was sick?"

Sarek was taken aback. "Was that not the symptoms of first stirrings?"

Corrigan threw his hands into the air. "What gave you the idea that he was in first stirrings?"

"I found him watching my wife sleep, clad only in his briefs."

"Maybe he sleeps in them?"

Sarek shrugged. "What does this have to do..."

"He has a raging throat infection," Corrigan interrupted, "made worse by exposure. He is severely dehydrated, even though he was in a well, because he could hardly swallow. Sorel is doing a healing mind touch with him because he is so angry with you. And I don't blame him." Corrigan turned back towards the exam room.

"So it wasn't first stirrings?" Sarek called to him.

"First stirrings! Sarek, your son is a boy! What were you thinking?"

Sarek looked at his wife and saw the muscles in her jaw working. Spock wasn't the only one angry, it seemed. She broke away from him and rushed to her son's side as Sorel came out to Sarek.

"Sarek, your son will require a day or two here in the hospital."

Sarek was quiet a while as he struggled to make sense of this. He sighed. "Then I was wrong? It was not first stirrings?"

Sorel followed Sarek's gaze to Spock being comforted by his mother. "It may have been. Daniel does not concur, however. The symptoms of this illness could have masked the symptoms of onset. On examination of him, I see that Spock has fully developed. While this is unusual for a full-blooded Vulcan child of similar age, we know that Spock is aging at a slightly accelerated rate." The healer placed a hand briefly on Sarek's arm. "Be at peace. You did what you thought was right."

Sarek moved past the healer to his son's side.

Corrigan returned with a padd and stylus and handed them to Spock. "Use these to communicate. I don't want you speaking for a couple of days," he ordered tersely before leaving the room.

Sarek looked at his little family, wondering if either of them would ever speak to him again. He noticed Amanda's white knuckles, and the thin line of Spock's lips. "How are you feeling, my son?"

Spock turned away his head, then picked up the padd, scribbled on it, and thrust it at his father. I TOLD YOU I WAS SICK.

"Healer Sorel believes that it may indeed have been first stirrings."

Amanda snapped her head towards her husband. "Daniel doesn't think so."

"Daniel was more concerned about the infection. Sorel has touched Spock's mind and knows the truth." Sarek lowered his head. "Had I known about the infection--"

"You mean, if you had listened to your son,” Amanda interrupted.

"Had I listened, I would have sought a different solution."

Spock stole furtive glances at his father. He wrote another message. IS THAT AN APOLOGY?

"If you wish it to be," Sarek answered.

Spock drew his knees to his chest and rested his head. Amanda patted his arm. "Do you want us to leave, son?" she asked. Spock shook his head. "Do you need Daniel to come back?" Another shake. "Sorel?" Another shake. "How can we help you? Talk to us."

I CAN’T.

"Maybe we should leave and let you get some rest."

Spock grabbed at her arm and shook his head. He grabbed at padd and stylus and scrawled another message. NO…WAIT…MAYBE THERE IS SOMETHING…He wrote again on the padd and held it out to Sarek. EXPLAIN?

Sarek didn't hesitate. He sat himself beside his son and took Spock's hand between his own. "My son, my first responsibility to your mother is to see to her safety. When someone is in the blood fever, he does not know what he is doing. He must be dealt with severely. That is why I had to get you away from her, so I put you in the well. Many of us over the centuries have spent time down that well, including me. If I had listened to you and known that you were sick, I would have found a different solution.

"Remember how you were doing things long before other boys your same age?"

Spock nodded.

"That was because your human genes were causing you to age and develop faster. This early onset is only another manifestation of the effects of your hybrid physiology."

Spock thought a moment, then nodded again.

Sarek traced two fingers gently across his son's cheek. "Rest now, my son."

Spock gave his father's hand a squeeze, them stretched his body out on the bed. Amanda pulled the cover up under his chin and caressed his head. "Sleep well, Spock. We'll see you in the morning."

Sarek steered his wife out of the room and down the corridor. "Are you speaking to me yet?" he asked.

Amanda didn't answer immediately. Perhaps she wasn't. "Do you have any other barbaric customs I don't know about?"

"'Barbaric'?"

"Yes, barbaric, as in, it was barbaric for you to throw a sick boy down a well for three days and endanger his life to protect my virtue."

Sarek thought a while. "None come to mind."

"I didn't think they would."

FIN