Lost and Found
Title:
Lost and Found
Author: T'Riva
(rstrimble@sbcglobal.net)
Series: TOS
Pairing: Sa, K, Am.
Warnings: [R];
violence, sex implied.
Acknowledgements: I
would like to thank Selek for the beta read and thanks to Saidicam for
inspiring this story by her writing the story “Time Portal” from which I also
borrowed a few tasty bits.
Archive: Sarek and
Amanda group; ASCEM; all others please ask.
Disclaimer: Paramount
owns these guys, I just take them out to play
and don't get paid.
Summary: Klingons have
tried to assassinate Sarek, but nothing turns out as expected.
Two years before the
Journey to Babel – Shi-Kahr, Vulcan
Kirk stepped toward the
darkened, quiet, house that bordered the desert, feeling apprehensive at what
he might find. He was not invited,
likely unwelcome, and had not met this man as yet in this time. He would, much later, respect and admire him
greatly, and grow to care for him through his son and…wife. He swallowed.
But as it was, in this time,
Kirk would be a stranger intruding on a man who had just lost that wife a week
back and only a few years before he was to meet him onboard the Enterprise, on
the journey to Babel. Somehow, if he
did not intercede, Sarek would follow Amanda in death soon after, though no
details were ever released as to why due to the Vulcan Privacy Code.
Their first attempt to save
Ambassador Sarek from assassination, at the first embassy function he had
brought Amanda to, had been successful, but they found later that Sarek and
Amanda had parted immediately after, so they never married and Spock was not
born. They had been successful then in
reconnecting the couple, leaving them to their passionate lovemaking in the
beach house.
Kirk grinned at that, but as
quickly sobered. The Klingons had sent
another party in before the ones they had caught, as insurance, to eliminate
Sarek’s influence at the Babel conference, as his vote had carried enough
weight to bring about the admission of the Coridan system into the Federation. This time, the Klingons had been successful
enough it seemed, and Kirk grimaced at what they had seen played out on the
Guardian…
Sarek and Amanda had been
walking through Golden Gate Park on a lovely spring day, Amanda smiling
gloriously, and Sarek looking as pleased as when he had, would have, Kirk corrected, teased his wife in sickbay of the
Enterprise. They strode along the path,
oblivious of the stares, smiles and pointing of passers-by.
A large man had come down
the path from the opposite direction and Kirk, as well as Sarek, had eyed him
suspiciously. He was hooded, with a
lumbering walk of the injured or perhaps elderly. Kirk saw Sarek warm to his plight and give him the benefit of the
doubt, continuing with his wife with only a brief, concerned glance toward the
man as he came close. As the man
neared, he paused and collapsed and Kirk felt dread. Immediately, Sarek and Amanda stepped toward him to render aid,
but almost immediately after, Amanda looked troubled at their vulnerability,
and had started to try to pull Sarek away.
The ambassador, now stooped
beside the man, turned at his wife’s reticence, looking confused. She saw the man reach into his coat and she
tackled Sarek as several shots rang out.
The authorities were there almost immediately, but too late as the
mystery man had disappeared by transporter beam. Both the ambassador and his wife lay bloodied beside an
old-fashioned pistol that would have been untraceable by the old-style tracing
system. The serial number was filed
down and it was likely stolen from another time, anyway.
Sarek had been hit in the
cheek, shoulder, and thigh, but Amanda had taken the one true bullet through
the heart and died in his arms as he held her, caressing her and calling for
medical help. The memory of the expression
of terror and grief in Sarek’s eyes that only the Guardian could catch still
haunted Kirk.
He felt he betrayed Sarek
now. He had first thought that they’d
be allowed to go back to save both Sarek and Amanda, but Starfleet had argued
that, since Sarek had died later possibly from something other than his wounds,
saving Amanda may not save Sarek anyway.
They felt they needed to act more directly to protect their interests in
a strengthened Federation by possibly sacrificing Sarek’s wife to the assassin.
He was aware that in order
for the plan to work, he might have to make Sarek believe that they would also
save Amanda. He couldn’t imagine so
great a lie to a man who loved his wife so dearly, and how Sarek might look at
him afterwards, but he couldn’t help but think there might be another way
altogether.
He was known for playing the
big bets and winning, and he couldn’t help but wonder if Sarek might die on the
journey to Babel if Amanda was not there to intervene and bring father and son
back together. Then there was the look
on Spock’s face when he heard that they meant to sacrifice his mother, his
father’s wife of forty years, to better their chances at limiting the Klingon’s
damage to the Federation.
---ooOoo---
One week had passed since
the shooting when Kirk approached through the garden and felt shock at Sarek’s
appearance -- he looked drained of life, disheveled, the right side of his face
still swollen and blotched around the bandages, his left arm in a sling, and
the shoulder above heavily bandaged and obviously stiff. He moved with a heavy limp from the bullet
that had entered his right thigh, though, ironically, his hair was still jet
black, with no trace of gray whatsoever.
Kirk wondered if the stress of Sarek’s heart problem had started to turn
it prematurely gray.
Sarek looked at him with a
vacant yet somewhat irritated expression.
He looked not the least bit concerned that a strange man approached him
at close to 3 am in what was supposed to be a secured area of the gardens. He looked as Kirk had never seen him –
defeated.
“Are you from the academy?”
Sarek asked tepidly.
“No,” Kirk answered. He stood back to lesson the threat he likely
presented, but it didn’t seem that Sarek even cared.
“The embassy?”
“No,” Kirk answered again, and
sat down on one of the many benches. He
realized that Sarek might think that Kirk could, in all likelihood, be sent to
finish the failed assassination and he wanted to at least put him at ease.
Instead, Sarek looked
marginally pleased. “At least someone
seems to have taken notice of my wishes then," he said, but weariness so
infused his tone that any humor was drained.
Sarek looked him in the eye, still with no concern apparent. “You must be cold out here. My wife prefers…” and here his eyes looked
immeasurably pained, “My wife preferred to be inside in…this season.”
“If you like,” Kirk
said. He was confused by Sarek not
asking directly who he was, especially after the attempted assassination. He followed him inside. It was cooler, and the soft lighting showed
the house to be beautifully grand and decorated, though bereft of anything
personal, as if Sarek had just arrived home.
Kirk noticed two pill bottles on the counter – both still sealed, though
he had been discharged from the hospital several days earlier.
Kirk needed to push past
Sarek’s fog that must have been caused by his grief. “Are you not concerned that I eluded your security?” Kirk asked.
Sarek almost looked
amused. “I turned off the security
system days ago.”
Kirk’s eyebrows rose at
that, and also at the fact that Sarek had not been exact in his determination
as to how long it had been. “Yet you’re
not answering the com or your door.”
Kirk had rung each numerous times, hoping to approach Sarek in a less
threatening way after all he’d gone through.
“Vulcans do not enter unless
invited.”
Kirk decided to press. “Are you not concerned about…” assassins, he thought, “…intruders?”
“No,” Sarek said
calmly. “Would you like some tea?”
Perhaps Sarek had recognized
him, or at least thought he should, and was playing the polite host as he did
most of his life – old habits. “You do
not know me?” Kirk asked to be sure
Sarek had not run a check on his son and seen that Kirk was his captain.
Sarek turned and looked
closely at him. “I do not know
you.” There was no doubt as to the
certainty in his tone. He placed two
mugs down. “Do you prefer honey?”
Kirk shook his head then
watched for a reaction. “I could be an
intruder.”
“By definition, you most
definitely are,” Sarek said.
"Since you weren’t aware that the security system was off, you must
have used some avenue to attempt to elude it.”
Kirk stared at Sarek
bewildered. He would have to be blunt
to counter Sarek’s obtuseness or, perhaps, purposeful ambiguity. “I could be an assassin.”
Sarek stopped at that and
seemed to consider it, then eased open a drawer full of kitchen
implements. Kirk grew concerned that
Sarek would now arm himself and order him out of the house before Kirk had a
chance to talk to him. He almost jumped
back when Sarek pulled out a butcher knife and set it between them. He swiveled the handle toward Kirk. “Will this do?”
Sarek
picked up his tea as he watched Kirk’s play of emotions, then stepped over to
look out at the gardens, seeming to purposefully turn his back on Kirk, as if
waiting to be stabbed.
Kirk picked up the knife and
approached Sarek, but he still did not react, though with his Vulcan hearing he
would know he had picked up the knife and was approaching him. He stepped up next to him and held the
handle out to him.
Sarek turned and looked
nonplussed as he took the knife back.
“You are not a terribly efficient assassin then, at least less so than
last week’s.” Sarek’s voice had so
quieted and tightened at that last that Kirk had to strain to hear. He thought he saw Sarek’s eyes glisten as he
quickly turned away and slipped the knife back in the drawer. He slammed the drawer, causing Kirk to jump.
Sarek seemed to come out of
his fog a bit, “Forgive me. I am not
myself.” He stood at the counter,
looking at the bare surface, holding the tea he seemed to have forgotten about.
Kirk stepped up to the
counter. He noticed now that the pill
bottles contained a strong pain killer and a strong sedative and that Sarek had
not touched them, though he seemed to be in considerable pain physically and
emotionally. He noticed how gaunt Sarek
had become in only the week since the attempted assassination. From his appearance Kirk doubted he had
slept at all.
Sarek put his tea down still
full. He looked up at Kirk. “If you are
not here to kill me, then why are you here?”
He sounded frustrated and didn’t care to hide it. Kirk realized that perhaps he had dashed
Sarek’s last hopes of joining his wife and ending his pain. Now he was just irritated with what he
likely perceived as another meddler.
“Ambassador…”
“I do not hold that title at
this time,” he said stiffly. At Kirk’s
look of confusion, Sarek added, “I am on a forced leave of absence. They do not trust my judgment presently and…need
to be assured that I will survive.”
Kirk understood, merely from
Sarek’s appearance and behavior, that first part. “Survive, sir?” Perhaps
he would unearth the mystery cause of death Kirk was trying to prevent.
“Most bondmates do not
survive the other’s death,” Sarek said.
Kirk had learned that two
Vulcans bonded often died within hours of each other due to their telepathic
connection. Obviously Sarek had
survived the telepathic severance, but still was starting to look deathly ill. He had to wonder.
“Sir, have you eaten since…”
He saw Sarek’s pain again as he likely finished the sentence in his head.
Sarek looked angry now. “That is none of your concern,” he said
coldly.
Kirk felt relieved to get
past his foggy apathy and decided to push further to find the man he
remembered. “You have not touched your
medication either.”
“You are treading on
dangerous ground.” Sarek’s voice was
low and threatening.
Kirk swallowed and felt his body tighten with
anxiety, but he had to proceed. “I bet
that full bottle of sedatives would do the trick less painfully." He had barely finished the sentence when
Kirk felt himself thrust up against the wall with such force it took his breath
away. He felt his leg dangling.
Sarek eyes were steely with
fury as his grip on Kirk’s tunic tightened.
Nose to nose, Kirk felt his hot breath and felt the man shaking with
rage. “You would do well not to call me
a coward," he hissed in Kirk’s face.
Kirk’s heart pounded. He had never seen Sarek this angry. Even when he had bounced the Tellarite off the bulkhead, he had
only looked vaguely pleased with himself.
Sarek seemed to regain his
control as the shaking lessoned. Kirk
felt himself lowered, but as he reached the ground, he felt Sarek start to
collapse as the flow of adrenaline decreased and the strain on his shoulder and
thigh injuries likely started to rip though his senses. As Kirk found his footing, he tried to help
Sarek down, but Sarek fought him and dropped in a pained heap. “Leave me alone,” he rasped.
To Kirk’s surprise, Sarek
stayed on the ground. Kirk saw green
spotting through the bandages and tunic on his shoulder. Sarek looked even paler and made no move to
get up or even to straighten his body on the floor. “You’ve re-injured yourself, sir.”
“Why won’t you leave me
alone? Why do you keep coming?” Sarek sounded strained and confused. Kirk realized that there were likely many concerned
friends and relatives that had been hounding him to keep him alive. Kirk had been the end of a long train, and
Sarek was weary of fighting. He had to
wonder if the most important person had come.
That would be his next inroad through Sarek’s stubbornness. If Sarek got through this, there might be a
way to return both his son and his wife to him. Kirk’s mind had already started creating a plan. The odds were long, but he’d beaten long
odds before.
Sarek passed out and Kirk
ran for the medikit. He pulled Sarek
flat on the floor and stripped off his tunic.
He cut away the bandages, applied the pressure swabs to stop the
bleeding, and checked his vital signs, which were shockingly low for a
Vulcan. After the bleeding was
controlled, he carried him up to what appeared to be the master bedroom and
noticed several holos of Amanda obviously watching her husband, the
holographer, with adoration.
There was even a few holos
of them together in the snow. They
looked secretly taken by another -- holding each other, garbed in very Terran
jeans and sweaters and looking very happy.
He was surprised Sarek allowed these holos to be displayed and guessed
that few visited the master bedroom, or they were placed more privately when
they had visitors. Kirk paused at
whether to leave them or hide them, but likely noticing them gone would be just
as upsetting.
Kirk tied Sarek’s arm with
the bad shoulder loosely to his waist so he couldn’t re-injure it again and to
keep Sarek more manageable, he grinned.
Then he went back to the kitchen for the pills, read the amount
prescribed, crushed the recommended dosage of the pain killer and sedative and
mixed it in with a heated vegetable broth from the replicator – about the only
thing Sarek could probably handle after likely not eating for so many days.
He found Sarek awakening and
staring at his wrist tied to his waist.
He didn’t look angry about it, just confused and possibly a little
embarrassed. Kirk pulled up a chair and
sat down with the mug of broth next to Sarek.
Kirk decided simply to ask
first. “Would you drink this, please?”
“What does it contain?” Sarek ask noncommittally, seeming more
himself for the first time since Kirk had arrived
“Just vegetable broth,” he
said.
Sarek looked him in the
eye. “You’re not a very good liar,” he
said, but he held his hand out and Kirk handed him the mug. “But I doubt you would put a bottle of pills
in it if you thought I was trying to commit suicide anyway.”
“Somehow I didn’t think you
would mind if I did.”
“I was not trying to kill
myself,” Sarek said, resignedly.
He waited for Sarek to
finish the broth, then said bluntly, “But you will have succeeded…”
Sarek frowned and looked
astonished. “You did poison me?”
Kirk realized how what he’d
said sounded, “No, sir, I could never do that.
But you would have ended your life, had I not intervened, whether you
call it killing yourself or not allowing yourself to survive.”
“Would have, could have,
should have.” Sarek sounded
regretful. “Unfortunately, they are not
fact – for you or for myself. I could
have kept my bodyguards nearer. I
should have. But I did not, and now my
wife is dead. But I will never really
know, will I? Would I have killed
myself had you not stopped by? Again,
we shall never know.”
“Sir, your vital signs are
significantly low. They would not have
released you from the hospital like that.
I can only surmise you have not eaten or slept, or even rested. You have been straining an injured and
exhausted system unrelentingly.”
Sarek stared at him. “Who sent you?”
“You’re changing the
subject.”
“You have no authority over
me,” Sarek said pointedly.
Kirk smiled. “Would you listen if I did?” He did not try to hide his sarcasm.
“What difference does it
really make to you if I live?” Sarek
sounded annoyed, but also curious.
“It is important to
many. It will affect more than you
know.”
Sarek only stared at
him. “You want something of me, yet you
are not candid. Why should I
listen? The only person who would have
suffered at my death has preceded me.”
Kirk felt stunned at
that. He knew many who cared for Sarek,
a son who had loved him even in their estrangement. That he could excise their feelings… Then he realized it was his grief talking. Sarek could not see beyond it.
“But it is irrelevant, since
I would not have killed myself.” Sarek
looked Kirk in the eye. “You can no
more argue that than I can argue your assertion that I would have. We have a draw, I believe. You can leave my house now.”
Kirk knew that if he left
now, Sarek would be at least as motivated to continue as he had. He may even feel vindicated, if not
motivated, to accelerate the process.
“Was I not clear?” Sarek’s voice grew intolerant.
“Sir, I have not been candid
because it would be too dangerous for everyone.”
“Now you speak in
riddles. Leave my house before I remove
you.” His voice was low and
threatening. Kirk knew Sarek could
remove him easily enough. And that Kirk
could simply come back. But Sarek would
likely re-injure himself and his body was likely significantly weaker having to
repair itself again. He needed Sarek on
his side.
Sarek started to get up.
“Wait, I can be more
candid.”
“Then do so, before you find
yourself tumbling into the desert.”
Sarek raised his eyebrows in expectation.
“You will die, not would
have…” Kirk stared at Sarek, knowing he
would ascertain the difference immediately.
Sarek looked shocked at the
seeming prophecy, then eyed him warily, “You are telling me my future? Don’t you need some sort of prop to be an
official psychic?” The sarcasm was
laced with anger. So, he imagined Kirk
a charlatan now.
“It is not a matter of
reading, but of seeing first-hand.”
Sarek stared at him blankly,
then he looked uncomfortable. “A time
traveler then. Well, at least your
creativity is refreshing.”
“Where is your son,
Sarek?” Kirk asked quietly.
Sarek did not meet his
eyes. “Somewhere out in space, most
likely.” His voice sounded cool, but it
was not steady.
“He did not come to console
you?” Kirk hurt for Sarek, but he had
to get through to him.
“Are you here to torture
me?” His voice sounded small. “Have I not endured enough for your taste?”
“Far too much, Sarek. I want to bring you back your son. And your wife.”
Sarek turned toward him with
hurt, anger and even a bit of hope.
“There is no better pawn than one who dearly wants to believe.”
“In two years time, you will
be on the Enterprise where your son is the first officer and science
officer. You will vote on the admission
of the Coridan system to the Federation, a controversial issue. Your vote carried others. In my time, your wife came with you and you
suffered a heart attack…”
Sarek’s eyebrow rose at
this.
Kirk continued, “…due to a
genetic defect in a valve. You can
check it out, if you’d like – the defect at least. I would rather you forget what I said and let the stream of happenings
fall back into place. There are…important
benefits you will not realize if you don’t.”
Sarek’s eyebrow rose at
that. “Interesting.”
“You have an operation with
a blood transfusion from your son. In
order to generate enough blood, a process being tested on Rigillians…”
Sarek’s head jerked up. “That’s highly classified. The studies won’t be complete for…”
Kirk smiled.
The light seemed to click on
in Sarek’s dark eyes. “Someone went
back in time to kill me, to affect the Coridan admission,” Sarek surmised,
"and killed Amanda instead.”
Kirk nodded.
Sarek looked
uncomfortable. “They didn’t allow you
to go back to keep the assassination attempt from happening…”
Kirk blinked at that. He had not thought that Sarek would realize
that queer inconsistency so quickly. He
struggled to come up with an alternate explanation.
“If they believe that
Amanda’s death did not cause mine, because this time I survived…they would
focus on another cause of my death.”
Sarek caught Kirk’s eye.
Kirk did not meet his. “I’m not sure.” He had started to realize he had likely said too much.
“Yes, you are,” Sarek
said. “They will not attempt to save my
wife if they can save me, will they?”
Sarek looked saddened, querulous and angry.
Kirk had been running the
scenarios through his head and didn’t like the possibilities. If Sarek survived, then the direct
connection between Amanda's death and his will be disputed. There had to be another way.
“But if they have sound
evidence to prove a direct connection, they will have to save her, too,” Sarek
said.
“We can find a way to show
that you would have died,” Kirk said.
He realized that he had used the ‘would have’ that Sarek had so recently
lectured him on. Just because they say
“would have”, doesn’t mean it would be at all convincing, as convincing as his
death at least. But there had to be a
way, he just need time to think it through.
Together they could figure a way.
Kirk saw the mug Sarek had
been balancing starting to tip and caught it, then saw Sarek’s eyes slip
closed. He had momentarily forgotten
that he had laced the broth and smiled.
His face look relaxed and he breathed deeply in sleep.
He picked up and draped a
blanket over him and pulled it up close to his face and imagined that his wife
must have done this many times. He
could not help but glance back at her smiling face in the holo and decided that
he would do whatever it took to save Amanda for Sarek, and for her son. He could not leave Sarek to this bare
existence.
---ooOoo---
Kirk awakened on the couch
in the living room not even remembering laying down there. He sat up with a sense of dread he could not
dispel. It was entirely too quiet this
late in the morning, and he’d not heard Sarek at all and doubted the sedative
and pain killer would have kept him asleep this long.
He pulled himself up and
immediately noticed a note on the table beside him. His heart started to pound.
He had told Sarek much more than he had wanted, or perhaps should have. What if Sarek had not actually believed
him? Or had decided on his own assurances? Kirk jumped from the couch with a sick knot
in his stomach and ran into the kitchen and saw the two pill bottles, empty.
“Nooo!” he yelled. “Sarek!” he screamed as he bounded for the
master bedroom. He stopped short as he
saw Sarek’s arm, that had been tied, freed and draped off the bed. Kirk ran to him.
He pulled Sarek up but his
head lolled and his face was paler than it could have been alive. He felt no pulse on his too-cool skin. He thrust his ear to Sarek’s side, but there
was no heartbeat any longer. Kirk felt
as if his insides had been clawed out of him and sucked a deep, ragged breath
as his eyes burned.
Why had he given Sarek so
much information? He had known he loved
his wife. Why hadn’t Kirk considered
that Sarek might throw away his own life in the hope of his wife living
again? He remembered something that
Amanda had said just before Sarek’s heart operation, that Sarek had said that
he thought Amanda could live with his death, but that he would not, could not,
survive her’s. She had worried that he
was entirely too dependant on her love.
She was proved correct.
Kirk had thought that
sentimental and foolish of Sarek to say because it sounded as if he thought it
romantic. Now, Kirk realized that Sarek
had meant it, that he would be adrift without Amanda, and lost without some
lifeline to pull him back. His son had
been absent, leaving him nothing to hold on to.
He realized he held the
crumpled note in his hand, and finally blinked the blur from his eyes to read
it:
James,
I am sorry to waste your
efforts at saving me, but I must join my wife.
I cannot live without her. You
must realize this was the logical thing to do.
Live long and prosper,
Sarek
Ironically, Kirk realized
that Sarek had accepted Kirk’s words as fact, indeed, and had thought ahead
more clearly and objectively than he had.
Kirk could never have let Sarek commit suicide, but by committing what
he saw as such an offense, Sarek had possibly saved himself, his wife, and his
relationship with his son by forcing the Federation’s hand into letting Kirk
save both Sarek and Amanda and setting history’s course back as it had been.
Only Kirk would know what
Sarek had done in this timeline that would never come to pass, if he can save
both Sarek and his wife from the assassin.
Sarek would not have actually committed the act of suicide, as he was
actually saving his life and his wife’s, and, likely, the relationship with his
son. It, therefore, was the logical
thing to do. He smiled though his eyes
still held unshed tears.
He could not help feel the
crushing weight of what this man had endured, and the courage Sarek had to take
that risk to save all that he knew. Who
knows if he would ever experience what his counterpart would, or if they are
truly one and the same? He would never
know, but Kirk would, and he felt blessed and damned by that knowledge. He laid his hand on Sarek’s shoulder, which
already felt cooler than it should, then brushed the side of his face, cool now
in death. Hopefully, Sarek would be
transmuted to another life in another time he would have helped to create.
---ooOoo---
Sarek and Amanda walked
through Golden Gate Park on a lovely spring day. Amanda smiled gloriously; Sarek looked as pleased, oblivious of
the stares, smiles and pointing of passers-by.
The breezes were light and warm.
Sarek had set aside the full day to spend with his wife as they were
headed back to Vulcan the next day.
They would do whatever his wife decided after their walk through the
park, but he had an idea of what that might be and repressed the urge to smile
at spending the afternoon in bed together before they set out to their favorite
restaurant for dinner.
A large man had come down
the path from the opposite direction and Sarek eyed him suspiciously, though he
realized this “nagging intuition” had no logical basis. The man was hooded, with a lumbering walk of
the injured or perhaps elderly. Sarek
sympathized and decided that he was just a more unusual sight than most, The
same could be said of himself. He
stopped watching the man, as he hoped others would do to him, then continued
with his wife.
A colorful turbo-line skater
edged over the hill in graceful, sweeping movements that Sarek had thought
should be less so with her buxomness – a beautiful, black woman who barely
seemed to notice her approach toward the large, lumbering man. A jogger came striding up from behind
them. As they stepped to the right, he
smiled and nodded thanks and Sarek stared after the sandy-haired man as if he’d
seen him somewhere. It was strange
that, though the park had seemed rather empty, the five of them appeared to
intersect at precisely the right time. A statistical anomaly, but not illogical
on its own.
As the lumbering man neared,
he paused and collapsed, but the turbo-line skater seemed almost to predict the
fall and swept in with graceful movements and caught him. The jogger ran to him and seemed to hold him
tight – “Uncle Jesse” he yelled at the man, "what are you doing
here?” Sarek and Amanda had stepped toward
him to render aid, but the jogger with warm hazel eyes cut Sarek off and waved
him away, “We’ve got him,” he said. “My
cousin and I always find him here, no worries.”
Sarek stared at him, seeing
something in his eyes that seemed so familiar.
“Do I know you, sir?” A flash of
this man’s face over him, a feeling of warmth shared between them, fingers
touching his face as he, himself, lay dead?
Surely not. Sarek shook his
head. That was completely illogical.
Kirk swallowed at Sarek’s
look of confusion and struggling rush of slight expressions. He needed to get rid of Sarek and Amanda
before the sedative Uhura injected into the Klingon wore off. But he had seen it in Sarek’s eyes, he was
feeling “the remnants,” the bleed over from the other timeline – Kirk would
look familiar, the sense of deja vu of things left unsaid and undone in the
other timeline, flashes of memory creeping back.
Any other time, Kirk would
have helped Sarek adjust, even explained what had happened, enough, at least,
not to cause him too much shock and trauma often associated with experiencing
multiple timelines. Even now, Kirk
heard a grunt from the Klingon that had been ready to assassinate Sarek and
might still accidentally kill his wife.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw him shift and Uhura trying to hold
him. All could be lost.
“It’s a family matter,
please.” Kirk had been very careful
with his words to get through to this particular man. Because of the importance of family privacy on Vulcan, Sarek bowed
and wished them well.
Amanda came up looking a bit
concerned. “My husband, you promised me
the whole day to do as I choose with you.”
“And you shall have it,” he
said, now all but wrapped up in her eyes as he turned briefly to nod at Kirk,
already seeming to forget the previous confusing flashes with his wife seducing
him into a day of her delights.
Kirk waved and chuckled as
he turned his attentions to the Klingon, who Uhura held in what appeared to be
a hug but Kirk realized was a headlock.
The Klingon tried to grab her but couldn’t reach because of the odd
angle.
“Let’s go home,” he said to
Uhura’s beaming smile as they both turned to see Sarek and Amanda disappearing
over the gentle hill.
---ooOoo---
One Year After the
Journey to Babel
Kirk had thought all was
lost only weeks after their successful timeline repair when Sarek was wheeled
in with bizarrely-similar injuries to the previous timeline, as if fate had
owed Sarek and repeated the injuries.
He suffered from some sort of plasma bullet wound to the left shoulder,
the right cheek, and his right thigh.
Luckily, however, Amanda’s injury was not repeated as she ran alongside
him looking worried.
The circumstances reminded
Kirk too glaringly of that ending. It
also seemed to jog afresh Sarek’s strange feelings of déjà vu and memory
flashes. Sarek lay in the sickbay, and
Kirk noticed the twinges of confusion whenever Sarek looked at him, but his
wife so often hovered around him that the two of them were never left alone
when Kirk stopped by.
One quiet night, when Amanda
had gone to bed after Sarek had fallen asleep in sickbay, Kirk stopped in,
walked over, and stood looking at the face close up that he so clearly
remembered dying.
It all seemed so strange –
to remember him dying, and to grieve his death that he felt somewhat
responsible for. He couldn’t even think
of what other choice he would have had at the time, of what Sarek might have
done other than commit suicide, in hindsight.
Perhaps that was why Kirk had not seen the answer in front of him –
denial that Sarek might have to die for them to win in the end. He would never forget touching Sarek’s face
gently and it feeling cold. He had to
keep reminding himself that that never happened now – that the timeline had
been repaired.
He could not help himself as
he sat in precisely the same position as he had, and stared down at the same
man, but with hair going gray now among the waves of jet-black. He reached his fingers to that face and drew
them down from temple to cheek as he had before, and smiled at the warmth.
Sarek’s eyes opened and he
stared at the young captain, a look of confusion now clear on his face. "You did that before,” Sarek said
quietly.
Kirk looked shocked that he
could remember what happened when he’d been dead, and answered truthfully,
"Yes and no.”
“When was that? Where was that?” Sarek looked lost as he seemed to grasp at the wisps of memories
that made no sense.
“Another time,” he
said. “I had to fix some sabotage to a
timeline.”
Sarek stared at the captain,
“I remember Amanda’s garden, some bottles…of pills. I hurt you.” He stared as
if he knew much more, and needed confirmation.
Kirk look pained at
that. He had hoped the ambassador would
be spared the worst of the memories, but it seemed that those with the most
impact were the clearest. Kirk felt his
eyes glisten at the memory that was so clear for him.
Sarek lifted his hand toward
Kirk’s face silently asking for a meld.
He wanted to eliminate that pain for Kirk, but in so doing, those same
memories would be fresh for Sarek, and Kirk knew he would suffer much more.
“No, please, sir. Let it be.”
Kirk saw by Sarek’s sadness at leaving Kirk to suffer but Kirk could not
let Sarek live through that misery again, if only second hand.
“Did I not hurt you, then?”
Sarek asked, trepidation skittered through his voice.
Kirk smiled ruefully. “It was nothing compared to your own
pain.” He felt his throat constrict as
the vision of Sarek dying came unbidden to his mind. He could never tell Sarek what seeing him die felt like. It would live with him always, but it had
been necessary. It had been
logical.
He could only hope that this
man and the one who had sacrificed himself to save him were one and the
same. That he had found his deliverance
in himself, and he had saved his wife as he’d hoped. That it was karma in its truest sense.
The End