Work Text:
I had been reborn. My Katra placed back into my body that had been regenerated by what they told me was the Genesis Effect. I understood the science. Numbers and logic came easy to me. My mother hovered over me as I let the information flash across the multiple computer screens as I tested my ability to be the man I once was.
She was concerned about my emotional state, which was something that the priests of the temple were not. No Vulcan came to me to see if I was all right. They simply wanted to ensure that I was sane and could become a productive member of society once more. Feelings were dismissed—as was any thought that I was half-human or that a human had carried my Katra.
But she knew. My mother knew that I was feeling things that I was not ready to understand, and I was comforted by the touch of her hand on my shoulder. “I feel like a child, mother. There are emotions that I do not understand that are part of me, and there are memories that are not mine. They are his.”
“You should talk to him, Spock.” She reached up to brush my bangs in place. Her blue eyes were clear as the sky of her home world, and I could feel how much she loved me. She was older than my memories made her, but then so was I. It was confusing, but I would adapt.
“I do not know how to approach him, mother.” I let her lead me to a stone bench where she kept her hands wrapped around mine as we sat. It was good to feel my mother’s presence. “Speaking to Jim is easy. He is like the sun, and I cannot ignore him. But Leonard, he smiles and darts away. I believe he is embarrassed by the connection that we now share. I do not wish to be an embarrassment to him.”
“Oh Spock.” Her hands moved from my hands to cup my face. “You are not an embarrassment to Dr. MoCoy or any of your friends or to me and your father. We love you.”
***
I found him lurking in the shadows of the temple. He was leaning on a boulder, drinking from a heavy mug. The smell was of coffee, and I had no doubt that my mother was sharing her hoarded coffee with the crew. Coffee was not something we drank on Vulcan. We preferred tea, but I found myself wishing that I had a cup of my own when the smell reached my nose. It made me wonder if that was my memories or his that made me want it.
“I believe you are avoiding me,” I told him as I came closer, finding a spot at the edge of shade and sunlight, letting it warm my shoulders beneath the white robe that I’d taken to wearing.
“Me, no,” he said, looking up at me, squinting against the light, but I could see the guilt there that I’d figured him out. “Just havin’ some coffee.”
“I see.” I moved forward into the shadows of the hillside to spare his eyes. Vulcan was too warm for me to worry about being chilled. There was sweat on Leonard’s brow. We had been here for seven weeks, but I knew from my mother’s experience that it would take them some time to adjust to the temperature and thin air.
“I don’t know what to do around here.”
“That I understand well.” Leaning against the rough stone, I touched the sleeve of his tan jacket. “This is too warm. You should find something cooler to wear—something blue. It feels strange to me to not see you wearing blue or for me not to be wearing it.”
He smiled, crows feet deepening at the corners of his bright blue eyes. The smile replaced the warmth that I lost when I stepped into the shade. “You and me both. You remember the old days. I was afraid you’d lose somethin’. Weren’t you afraid that I wouldn’t have enough space in here to hold you?”
“If I remember correctly, I did not have time to worry about that. I trusted you then, Doctor, as I always will. I knew that you would take care of me.” The memories that flickered through my mind were from both perspectives—his and mine—him hovering over my sickbed and me doing the same for him. Covered in ice. Covered in bruises. Green blood on my chest. Red blood on his. “We have been through life and death and life again on many occasions, including this one.”
“That’d mean more if you knew you were coming back,” he pointed out, taking a drink of his coffee, and while he did that he put his free hand over mine, giving it a squeeze.
“I had not planned on it. It was quite a surprise.”
“To you and me both. But we’re both where we’re supposed to be now. You’re feelin’ alright?”
“I am feeling quite a bit.” I put my hand over his. He was older than the images in my memory, but I think that was because we were both trying to remember the distant past not the recent and that was all right as well. “I am uncertain whether I should thank you or be angry about that.”
“You angry and admitting it?” The smile grew, and I could feel how smug that made him feel. “My work here is done, then. I helped the Vulcan to feel. Nice to know that being in my brain helped you out with that emotional constipation of yours.”
My eyebrow arched, and I found myself holding back a smile of my own. “Really, Doctor, must you turn a deeply emotional moment into a chance to tease me?”
“Are you really askin’ me that, Spock?” His fingers tightened in mine, then he got up and pulled me along with him and out into the sunlight. “Now show me around this place. I’ve got words in my head that are yours, and I don’t know what they go with.”