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“I do not eat meat.”
She looked up at her neighbor, a rather striking man with black hair poking out from a beanie and eyebrows that were just...out of this world, she realized. But he looked almost embarrassed to be asking, and then his cheeks were tinged...green?
Vulcan. Must be.
Fortunately, she had heard there was a Vulcan in the neighborhood and planned accordingly.
She smiled and motioned for him to move away from the grill and towards the cooked foods. “We have vegetable kebabs and a lot of other vegetarian fare. We’d heard there was a Vulcan in the area.” She stuck her hand over the food to show the different dishes. She knew he might interpret it as a sign she wanted to shake hands until she moved it from side to side, and as his face relaxed she saw just that. “My father is a linguistics professor at the Academy. Are you a student?”
He nodded. “Yes. I am one of the few Vulcans on campus.”
“Only because they have one of the best universities in the universe on their planet, but we’re really glad to have you here. I’ve always wanted to learn Vulcan.” She smiled at him. “I’m Nyota. Nyota Uhura.”
“Schinn T’Gai, though you may call me Spock.” He nodded to the food. “Is there anything you would recommend for someone with a low spice tolerance.”
She nodded and showed him some of the food, most of the stuff that was made with tofu and a nice salad without the spicy dressing a lot of the other students had preferred. She didn’t spend much time in San Francisco; she went to a special school for students gifted in languages in New York. It came with having parents who were experts in the field of xenolinguistics, and they expected much from her. And thankfully she aimed to please and was quite adept at learning many languages, and if she couldn’t speak then she could at least understand them.
Vulcan, though...that would be a challenge. Very few humans could speak it with any real degree of fluency, but she was determined to try...especially if such a handsome student would help her this summer before she went back to her own Academy.
He lingered for a moment after selecting his food items, and she decided it was no or never. “Could you, perhaps, teach me the basics of Vulcan while I’m on break? I would appreciate learning it from a native speaker more than data pads and audio recordings.”
He nodded slowly, as a small smile formed on his face. She wondered how many students looked at him in something other than awe or delight. That was what she felt when she looked at him, at least. But the smile looked nice on his face. “Kuv du nah-tor i kupi saven-tor du muhl, i dungi ar'kadan. Nash tor ish-veh wuh'rak tupa,” he said before walking away. It had sounded like music to her ears, and thankfully she could remember it all. She went to her translator and repeated the sentence, reading the readout in delight. “If you think I could teach you well, I will try. This is your first lesson.”
She found him in the crowd and gave him a wide smile, one she got almost fully in return before another neighbor asked for her attention. This was going to be a fun summer after all...