Title: “Enemy Within” (personal logs #4)
Pairing: pre K/S
Rating: G
Author: Starshadow
Feedback: Ya sure ya betcha, starshadow AT starshadow DOT net
Disclaimer: It's ParaBorg's toybox, and all profit defers to them. I just play with my boys for love, not money, letting 'em have a bit of fun in the process. No actual horny dog-critters harmed in the making of this fic. Promise. However, I did actually break my toe two days before writing this. They say creating is painful. They're wrong. Breaking toes is painful. Creating is fun. Vulcan words courtesy of Vulcan Language Institute, http://home.teleport.com/~vli/vlif.htm Don't be lazy, look them up.
Summary: More musings. When will they break down and grab each other? Four in a series
Archive: ASC, ASCEML and the like.
Betas: Frank, Fiona, Pat, Tony and Greyhawk.
All mistakes mine, yada yada
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Personal Log of Captain James T Kirk, Stardate 1673.5
I've just seen a side of myself no man should ever have to. Worse, I had to confront the fact it's that side of myself that makes my command possible. Without that part of me, I'm weak and indecisive. It's disturbing to have to accept this. I had to take the one we've been calling “the impostor”, as though he wasn't me, back inside. Now I must deal with the memories “the imposter” created: of trying to rape Rand, my own yeoman, and the other assaults committed on my own crew.
Spock was right. Trust him to see clearly it was that part of me that makes me the commanding officer I am. But my rational side makes the two parts work together. If this is what Spock goes through all the time, then I can see why he fights so hard to stay in control.
I'll have to speak to Bones later. I don't think he understood Spock was offering me compassion, in the only way a Vulcan could. Bones is a brilliant surgeon, but some days he can't seem to accept that Spock isn't human, nor forgive him for it. Spock has the good doctor convinced Vulcans have no feelings, but I'm beginning to see the truth—their feelings run so deep and can be so overwhelming that the only way they can manage them is to pretend to the world they don't exist.
Without Spock, I doubt I could have found the strength within me to do what was necessary. Normally simple decisions were increasingly difficult. I would have kept weighing alternatives until my men were dead. When I looked into Spock's dark eyes and saw the concern mirrored there, somehow, it gave me the strength to decide correctly. It was not concern for the ship alone – if I'd relinquished command he'd have made the decisions necessary – but concern for me. If he'd had to do it, it might have killed both my halves.
In the end my rational side couldn't let those dark eyes down. I could not disappoint him. In so many ways, Spock and I have come to complete each other. I believe he’s better for what he's learned from me, and I know that I'm better for what I've received from him. I can't deny that I'd like more. When he touches my arm and I feel his compassion, like a river underlying the rock he presents to the world, welling up and bathing me in its warmth, I wonder how it would feel to have that to rely on all my life.
But that's all wishful thinking. He's Vulcan. He can't give more than he’s equipped for, and I won't ask him for more than he can give. I'll be grateful for what I've got and make it enough.
Rand tried to talk to me on the bridge, but I admit I blew her off. How could I explain to her that when the Impostor tried to rape her, she was just a convenient target? That he—I—did not dare go after the real object of my desire, my logical and elegant First Officer and friend.
I remember fear of the possible consequences of arousing Spock's anger—but also fear of rejection, and a wish to spare Spock's feelings. Everyone thinks I'm the great seducer of women. I don't seduce my junior officers. I certainly wouldn't go after my own yeoman, especially knowing she's attracted to me. She's dropped a few hints from time to time, but even if I were interested, I wouldn't try anything. Nothing must jeopardize the smooth running of this ship. I haven't the luxury of making personal decisions based on desire.
Except a part of me did act on some kind of desire. A part of me attempted to rape her. I only hope she can put it behind her—if she doesn't, I’ll lose another yeoman.
But Spock believed in me when even I doubted myself. He told me it had to be an impostor, even with Rand's insistence that it was I who attacked her. What price can a person put on such loyalty?
The lightweight Sigmund test says I'm fully integrated again, fully in charge of my darker side. Most of the time, we humans have an amazing capacity for self-deception, for hiding our barbarism and our savagery. Once in a while something like this hits us in the face and they can't be denied any longer. They are there. We may keep it in check most of the time, but it's part of us. It's part of who we are. Who I am.
But I can say that today, I won't be that savage. I won't be the rapist. I won't be the drunkard. I will harness that energy and I will use it for good, in the best way I know how to do. I guess in the end that's all I can do.
I'm meeting Spock in ten minutes for chess. I just want to get us back to normal, whatever that is. Am I hoping for some sort of benediction from my friend, some sort of validation that I am back in command of both sides of me?
End of log, James T. Kirk out. Encrypt for eyes only, command alpha-beta-alpha.
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Personal Log, First Officer and Science Officer Spock, Stardate 1673.5
Humans are fascinating beings. I don't understand why they still surprise me. Having spent all my life around one in particular, my mother, then leaving home to spend the next several years around them, one would logically think there would be few such surprises, yet the one called Kirk, the one I call my friend does manage somehow to astonish on occasion.
During the transporter malfunction as we orbited Alpha 177, Kirk was split into two people. His rational side, his compassion, gentility and nobility are all qualities with which I have been well acquainted. Yet I was quite intrigued to discover it was the side which held his baser instincts, his animal passions, if you will--gluttony, lasciviousness, ruthlessness and all the rest of the emotions humans call negative—which make his command of this ship and its crew possible. Surak, of course, proscribes all emotion, not just these particular ones. Yet without both sides of himself James Kirk was rapidly losing the power to command and make decisions.
At first it seemed an intruder had found his way on board the Enterprise. When Yeoman Rand was attacked and nearly raped by a man she identified as Captain Kirk and Technician Fisher concurred, the only logical answer was that we had an intruder. The man I know is not capable of such acts. When we saw the quadruped native to the planet also split, it confirmed my suspicion that the intruder had Kirk's memories and knowledge because he was a part of Kirk.
All I could do to protect the man I'd sworn an oath to--the man who was my friend, was be by his side, to remind him when he acted in a manner which might jeopardize the ship. Yet I could see he knew the correct course; but it was the darker part of him which made his will to command as strong as it was, and now is again.
It is well for the ship that it was not I who had been so split. I can but speculate whether I would have been divided into human and Vulcan or left hybrid but split as Kirk was. Either split would be a danger to others, given that I know how to kill, logically and efficiently, should the need arise. It is my training in Surak's tenets which keep me from doing so indiscriminately, or without direct orders from my superiors.
I could not suppress my curiosity about Kirk's dichotomy. This seemed to repel Dr. McCoy; he has little understanding of Vulcans or of Vulcan culture. He resisted my suggestion to the captain that his intellect would keep him alive during reintegration. He appears to think I should behave as a human, with all the attendant emotive expressions. He does not understand it is my duty as First Officer and as Science Officer to let no sentiment, even should I feel it, stand in the way of presenting data to the captain as he needs it.
One of us had to remain rational and able to present him with all the facts; McCoy was unable to do so.
In the end Kirk made the correct decision, as I was certain he would.
Finally, I did note when he had to confront his darker half in front of the bridge crew, and they saw who the intruder was, it was the darker half that could not, after all, make the difficult decision. I saw a frightened being, terrified of dying. Perhaps a reflection of some demon from my friend's past?
Rand now believes Kirk is attracted to her. Perhaps on some level he is; the impostor went to her cabin, not mine nor anyone else's. I wonder if she is attracted to the danger of his darker half or to the whole human who is my friend. I do not know. I find myself disliking the prospect of seeing any attraction played out within my sight and hearing, yet unable to turn away, as well. I should not have spoken to her as I did on the bridge; I may have revealed more of myself than I meant.
Ah, well. It is little enough to base hope on, that when she tried to speak to him on the bridge, he set her abruptly aside. I have, as I have mentioned, little understanding of the subtleties of human emotional interaction. Yet it seemed to me that once in control of himself he dismissed her utterly. It is still true, however, that his baser side went to her, not to me. Would I have turned him away?
That is one question I cannot answer.
End personal log, Spock, double encryption, eyes only, visatilau-viskulan Spock ch'Sarek ch'Skon, kelek t'Surak, maat t'Surak.
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From where Uhura and Rand sat, playing cards in the rec room, they surreptitiously peeked at Spock and Kirk playing what looked like a cutthroat game of 3-D chess.
“Did you hear what Spock said to me, Nyota?” Janice complained.
Uhura chuckled, her contralto somehow soothing rather than stinging. “We all did, honey. Don't pay him any mind – anyone can see he's jealous.”
“Jealous? Of what?” Janice turned round blue eyes on her friend. “You don't mean...”
“Child, a blind man could see it, except for those two. So bright, the pair of them, except for that one thing...” Uhura relented a bit when she saw Janice's stricken face. “You can't tell me you haven't seen the way they look at each other sometimes? That look like no one else is there.”
“But, Nyo, this is James Tomcat Kirk you're talking about.”
“So?”
“And a Vulcan!”
“Don't tell me you've bought that line that Vulcans are emotionless. Even after what he just said to you?”
Janice leaned forward, her cards momentarily forgotten. “You think they..”
Uhura patted her arm. “Not yet, hon. Not yet. In fact, there's still time to get in on the pool,” she leaned back and fanned her cards again, “I'm holding the stakes. There's a bottle of hundred year old scotch and some hefty credit chips so far. Just pick a date. Of course if you think you can deflect the captain's interest...”
Janice got a determined look on her face. “The day I let Spock win is the day I ask for a transfer off the Enterprise. Deal, will you?” She was already planning on methods to get Jim Kirk's attention.
Uhura shook her head. She'd sure miss Janice, but her money was on Mr. Spock.
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