James T. Kirk

Okay, so he--they, really--were mussed from sex, and he didn't have clothes that fit. But despite the afterglow, and numerous thoughts on how to best take advantage of the situation, Jim knew this could not wait. Nor did he want it to--he was very cognizant of the precarious nature of the situation. In fact, he shouldn't have allowed the interlude to happen at all.

He just couldn't bring himself to regret it.

He smiled tightly at Jim and Spock as they entered and sat, Jim's body language almost exactly that of his male body, proportionally modified.

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Spock sat quietly. Her clothes did not fit and there was something that should be bothering her - an illogical thought if she had ever had one - but the sex had been a suitable reconnection with her bondmates.

As well as highly satisfactory from a physical perspective. Spock would conduct more research.

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They really were girls. Spock hadn't precisely been skeptical of Kirk's report that some transporter malfunction had occurred, but he wouldn't be surprised if it was incorrect in any fashion. With what he was seeing in front of him now, along with Jim's public communication from earlier, it was entirely correct.

As far as the female form was concerned, they were not unattractive either. Spock wondered if the malfunction had been completely unintentional, as the odds of it altering certain anatomical areas without resulting in a third arm or a misplaced joint were rather...overwhelmingly negative.

Spock nodded once to them both, predictably tight-lipped and smothering his own questions of why? and are you both, by chance, delusional?, and looked back to his captain.

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Kirk looked between the other three in the room, and leaned forward on his elbows, "Nero and Ayel are in the brig, separated. Both female. I have no doubt they have some weapons onto them, but I don't dare send someone in to frisk them. The Narada's gone from the ship. Her power levels are back to fully functioning, and we have no idea what she's doing down there. I agree she's sentient, at least to the point I have no doubt she's going to possibly come up here and attack us. There's nothing we can do to her, that shielding is too powerful. Starfleet's almost here. I need to know what you two found out while in that ship."

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Jim glanced at Spock, and then back to Kirk.

"Do you know at what point she left the Enterprise?? Nero implied I don't understand their customs, and so far as it goes, he's right. I'm not sure what her sense of what we've done is."

He was relieved that Starfleet was coming. Relieved to be off the ground. He had hoped, fervently, that something might have been done before the Narada had acquired the dilithium, but it was pointless bringing that up now.

"She has to know they're here. She has to know she risks killing them if she moves against us."

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"She left the Enterprise not minutes before I managed to get the four of you beamed up. Almost the exact moment you sent me that warning, Jim. What customs was he talking about?" This was interesting, considering what had happened down in the brig.

"Considering... what I know, I'm not sure they prefer captivity over death." His expression was tight, grim.

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"Most of us don't," Jim point out softly, and no less grim. "He meant the hostage thing. What it meant, us having her, them having Spock. I don't know how much of that Narada's absorbed, or what form her initiative will take. She must have left for the dilithium. Maybe they were planning something, or maybe she just couldn't split her energies anymore."

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"Damn, damn," Kirk breathed out the second word, angry. "What was happening down there? How did they get the dilithium without their plasma drill?" He needed to know. Dilithium wasn't easy to get.

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"The found the deposit, Jim. They were going in by hand." He glanced at Spock. "We all were." Hell, maybe that had something to do with what had happened.

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We. A pronoun inclusive of the speaker and others, to be grouped together as a single entity towards a common predicate. We as in this Jim and this Spock, we as in Jim, Spock, Nero, and Ayel had helped mine dilitihium from the planet to give to the Narada for the possibility of further malicious destruction against Vulcans, the Federation, and probably himself.

"You assisted him." Spock leaned forward, elbows propped on the table, hands slowly folding together from the pinky to the index finger. He repeated, for his own sake, "You assisted them." His eyes were cold, regarding Jim and the other Spock. If he were not so conscious of his potential loss of control, his fingers would have already held a slim and delicate throat. The table would have proved no consequence whatsoever.

His heart beat picked up. Tension curled through his muscles. "If you have aided them so, and done nothing to offset this assistance, why should we not imprison you along with the Romulans?" Spock had no qualms with the suggestion. What good were the loyalties that might contribute to your destruction in the future?

Edited Date: 2010-01-31 02:39 am (UTC)

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If Jim had been less than recognizable before, anyone on his crew would have seen him in the set of his jaw now, the line of his mouth, the intensity of his gaze as he turned it on Spock. He should not have been surprised, he told himself. The signs were all there--that all was not well here. But he had held out hope.

"Have you ever been imprisoned, Spock?" he asked with quiet intensity. "Have you ever been under the direct threat of death to yourself or your crew or your loved ones? I don't think you have--not like this. So I'm going to put your question down to ignorance. You don't rail and fight until they're forced to kill you. You do what you have to and you get out. Spock and I did the minimum amount of work to keep from getting killed. We risked life and limb in an attempt to give every party involved the chance to turn themselves in. I risked the same to get messages to your captain."

He turned to Kirk, his body buzzing with latent energy, the after-effects of adrenaline and the beginnings of a second wind after a day's labor and more. "If you're going to accuse myself or my first officer of conspiracy against this ship, Starfleet, or the Federation, I think we have a right to hear it straight. Otherwise, these implications are worse than insulting."

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Kirk threw a glare at Spock, trying to communicate through that look alone. "Those accusations aren't for me to decide," Kirk said calmly, though his fingers clenched for a moment in his lap, "They're for Starfleet to decide." It wasn't the helping that made Kirk sick to his stomach. If Spock or Bones or any of his crew had been under the threat of death, he would have helped to.

It was Spock himself that Kirk didn't know how to felt about. Spock chose to aid the enemy, whether or not he fully realized it. The Narada had forced herself aboard, had gotten who knew what information from the ship's computers, and now... had dilithium.

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"It's for you to decide whether we're to be locked up until they arrive," Jim said, hardly believing what he was hearing. "What do you want to know? I was led into the forest by a concerned Aguran, caught by Nero and Ayel, was not abused during my captivity, and attempted to convince Nero of the futility of his actions. We were then forced to mine for dilithium, which we did because there was no option. I had hoped they'd be prevented from reaching it, but I had no say in the matter--I didn't know the equipment well enough to sabotage it without giving myself away, and then everyone would have been in danger and they'd still have gotten it, eventually. I'll write a full report and log it.

"But here's my question--why were they allowed to reach the dilithium in the first place? You could have guarded it. You could have beamed all of us away any time. Weren't you monitoring their activity?"

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Spock had trusted that they all operated under the same purpose - to seek out new life. She had, apparently, been mistaken.

James and her young counterpart were clenched tight - their anger apparent even to her.

Emotional men.

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"Excuse me?" Emotional, definitely. His body tensed up like a cat's fur fluffing up, "Don't you think we would have if we could have?! Why do you think I waited until that exact moment Jim?! She had some sort of damn shielding up that she didn't take down until then! We've been keeping an eye on the Narada and everything around her for days, but there was nothing we could do! That shielding naturally deflected most information from our scanners, and the four of you were beamed out of there the second it was possible!."

His fingers clenched together, left hand aching. "It isn't you I'm worried about at all, Jim." He gave a look at Spock. "I'm not going to lock either of you in the brig, dammit, but because of Spock the Narada has information about our ship. You can argue it isn't anything important, engine, shields, weapons, but any information a ship with every possible reason to want to destroy us has about our ship means a possible weakness to be used against us. If nothing else, it's bettering an enemy ship."

"I'm not stupid enough to not realize she's sentient, but that doesn't mean her will is completely her own. Say what you will, but I'm divorced enough from the knowledge of her sentience to realize she could turn everything against us, and destroy us, because we have her masters."

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"You underestimate her intelligence."

Spock's voice still conveyed implacable calm.

"And the value of information gained about her in return."

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Jim could feel Spock through the bond, incredulous but not emotional. Still, he sent his reassurance through it. And that ability comforted him. He nodded at Spock's words.

"Calm down, Jim," he said, without condescension. "I'm not challenging you. It's a debriefing. I want to know as much as you do--I wasn't here, I don't know what happened. Let me see if I can explain my reasoning, regarding the Narada. She could have destroyed us at any time--if she'd wanted to, no doubt she could have infiltrated our system without weapons or dilithium or anything. We were already in a relatively defenseless position. My feeling was that arming her with the knowledge of how we operate in a civil sense, how we care for our crew, how we run our ship, might better an enemy ship in the short term but in the long run allow her to absorb some of our own ideals and concepts of justice and mercy and fairness and human feeling. In the small-h sense. She was already sentient, already hungry to absorb what she could learn about this world. Until then, she'd only had Romulan culture, and whatever else she'd encountered out there, to go on. I thought the gamble--that she could learn autonomy, that she could learn to make choices that served the greater good--was worth it. She could destroy us anyway, at a word from Nero. I wanted to give her a choice whether to follow him or not."

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"She couldn't have destroyed us at any time, Jim, that's the point. She was running on next to nothing energy for a long period of time, and if I'm right, was probably putting everything extra she had into shields to keep herself and her crew safe."

He felt frustrated, so he spoke his mind, "It feels like half the time you care about making sure she's safe, learning, then the fact that whether or not you like it, she's still potentially our enemy. I don't know, Jim. Maybe it's how you grew up, or your universe, but I can't forget or even side on the fact that she could learn something. I'll admit, maybe it's what's kept you and Spock safe for now, but... now? What about now, Jim? She's out there right now, chock full of energy, and we have her masters ready to turn them over for punishment or possible death. How do you think she's going to react, and with knowledge about our ship?"

"I'm trying to think on the safety of this crew, and Starfleet, then worrying about hers." Maybe that was just a huge difference between them.

He looked over at Spock, trying to figure out what his first officer was thinking.

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Spock was still attempting to control himself within the boundaries of his own mind. Thoughts and emotions, intertwined and at this point inseparable, washed forward and receded like a violent tide, almost painful in both the rush and the mass. When it pulled back again, he spoke.

"What point is there to provide a chance for its sentience?" His eyes focused down at the table, fingers still tight together. "This is neither the time nor place for applied philosophy, especially when the potential consequences are unacceptable."

His gaze then flickered up to his counterpart. "Additionally, should it be peaceful to us and surrender in turn--as according to the morals you have attempted to impart--Starfleet cannot maintain her form as it currently exists. If it is not destroyed, then it will be dismantled from the inside until it is in pieces to be studied.

"That is, of course, assuming that the Fleet does not destroy the Narada at first sight." An illogical waste of time overall. Surely they could recognize that?

Edited Date: 2010-01-31 06:38 pm (UTC)

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Spock's brow arched smoothly.

The words were cold from her lush mouth.

"You require healers from the High Council if you truly reject the most basic tenet of Vulcan philosophy, the value of every life."

She glanced at the humans and spoke in the formal tones of High Vulcan, more than enough to at least shield her counterpart from... embarrassment.

"Your emotion continues to cloud your vision. Be wise in this thing, Spock, or openly declare your rebellion."

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Jim raised his hands. "Gentlemen, you seem to be laboring under a misapprehension about our values and motives. Jim, at no time have I valued the Narada or her sentience over the safety of this ship. It is simply that I do not believe in the taking of life under any circumstances that aren't direct self-defense. I have found, over time, that beings want to response, to respect and be respected, to grow and cooperate when given the chance. Not all. I'm not without my own prejudices, either. But I try to live and command by the values of the Federation and of Starfleet. And that means seeking any alternate means than destruction whenever possible. No matter the crime. In my opinion, this is exactly the time for applied philosophy. Else, what is it worth? If our values only hold up in the abstract, academically, what value are they? What are we spreading to the four corners of this galaxy?"

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"I have not attempted to kill them," He replied back in the same formal dialect, outside of Jim's understanding and what Kirk could have possibly learned at the Academy. "Of the seventy-three methods they could die where they sit I have not committed one of them, though they have disregarded any possibility for mercy."

Then, back to Standard, regarding them both. This was supposed to be a constructive meeting. "Then, sir," To Jim. "what do you suggest? Shall we convince her to be towed to the nearest Starbase?"

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Kirk couldn't help the bristling, feeling like Jim was calling him out for not following the values of the Federation. He would hold the safety of his crew, and Starfleet, and this ship above an enemy. He had gone so far as to work to keep Nero and Ayel alive, but he wouldn't give the Narada a chance.

Spock had a point. He looked to Jim, brows up. What exactly, after that little speech, did Jim expect to do with the Narada?

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If Jim had been calling Kirk out, Kirk would know. He felt that was a fundamental misunderstanding somewhere, but he had yet to pinpoint it. That he could be confused of prizing the Narada above the lives of those on board... It was unthinkable to him.

"I think we might convince her to be part of this process," he said slowly. "Don't misunderstand me--I've never been afraid to use deadly force when necessary. If she fights, we must defend. But if she believes that some future lies in cooperation, I cannot help but think she ought to be given the chance. She never chose to fire on us, or Vulcan. Now that she's capable of choice, she has yet to prove herself."

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The High Vulcan was a pleasure to her mouth.

"Your precision is not to your credit in this instance. It speaks of speculation and fantasy."

Illogical. And dangerous.

"If you would be a judge, you must master yourself. This much has not changed in my absence."

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"I don't necessarily believe she just magically became sentient over night," Kirk retorted, "specially when we just 'happened' to show up."

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"Nor do I," Jim said evenly. "I doubt it works like that. But it seems plain to me, from conversation with her, that she hadn't gotten very far in any process of self-actualization when we met her. I believe her decision to send us back here, and then to show up, were her early expressions of autonomy. The fact is, Jim, I don't know, and I can't know for certain. But that very fact, and the fact she's made no move now and has to know they're gone, tells me she can at least be talked to."

Jim didn't look at Spock, but obviously something was going on there. Spock was cool as ever, but there was something about the younger one that was puzzling and disrupting him.

Spock. What's going on?

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The High Vulcan helped somewhat. Formulating his words through such filters worked to scrape the emotions from them like barnacles off a hull. There were still little angry thoughts, certain especially petulant ones of well, you were not present to assist, and neither have your actions helped any, but Spock through those aside, because they sounded young and sour even to his own ears. But for all the grammar constructions he began to create, none of it produced any rhetorical bounty.

He leaned back into his chair, folded his arms over his chest, and remained silent.

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He is angry, vengeful, at the edge of his control.

The words through the link to her Jim were harsh but her eyebrow this time was moderately approving - they would speak later, she and her young counterpart.

Spock turned her attention to James.

"You assume much. It is illogical to draw conclusions prior to gathering information. Which I will share if you have satisfied your need for threat display."

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"What information can you give me about the Narada, if you say you've gathered some. Shield design, weaponry... ways to talk with her too. I need all of that.. if she attacks, I want a way to defend this ship. If she will talk, I need to be able to bargain with her, or be able to listen in while you do."

Spock would probably be the best bet to talk to her, as at least the ship knew him. He wasn't sure he could entirely keep his cool either in the situation... something he was still learning how to handle.

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She kept her answers to herself a moment more.

"You seem to harbor a specific and focused hatred for her in place of the Romulans themselves. You are determined to see her destroyed. Why is this?"

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Kirk gave Spock a focused look, brows raising. "I believe I said said two seconds ago, that I want to be able to defend against her ... or talk to her. Why do you seem convinced that I'm incapable of changing? I wanted her, and the Romulans, destroyed to begin with, but now I just want to turn the Romulans over to Starfleet and I want to deal with the Narada in whatever way is necessary. Is this not what you wanted, or am I hearing things?"

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"I am certain that you hear many things, James. As I am certain I feel many things from you."

The thread from his mind to hers. It was a window - it was only logical to look through; she would not pry it open but his strong emotion was clear as glass. Hate, anger, a desire for vengeance. The same as her younger counterpart.

There was some satisfaction at having the Romulans, but everything flared at the topic of Narada.

"Have you attempted contact yet? She is a newly emerged intelligence, with a sense of self and freedom that has continued to emerge. She regards her crew as her family, a logical conclusion. Yet she defied them to return you to your own Enterprise. Speak with her."

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