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Jim couldn’t locate his First Officer. It was the middle of ship’s night, and Spock ought to be asleep in his quarters. He wasn’t.
Despite Jim’s intention to wake Spock to discuss ship’s business, he was actually rather piqued that the Vulcan wasn’t resting after such a stressful series of missions. Currently, they were ferrying supplies to the Vulcan colony, which was a welcome milk run after the diplomatic mess with the sharp-tongued Nulibians, the kidnapping of half of Jim’s away team on Yrrri, and the anomaly in sector 88 that caused their ship to spin in circles for three days until Chekov and Scotty had worked out a counter impulse maneuver. The ship’s First Officer should be getting shuteye while he could.
Jim looked in some of the obvious places first where Spock was known to while away the hours – the science labs, engineering, and the officers’ mess. There was no sign of him.
The ship’s business wasn’t pressing, and it could wait till morning. But now Jim was caught up in the mystery of his missing First Officer. Where could Spock be?
Jim searched the observation deck, where Spock sometimes migrated to when working out a complex problem. Jim also scoured the ship’s kitchen, where Spock would sometimes could be found checking the stores of herbs that he asked the kitchen staff to pick him up from the various Starbases they stopped at. Jim even checked the gym, wondering if Spock was letting out some tension. But none of the officers jogging or sparring had pointed ears.
Extremely curious now, Jim wracked his brain to guess where Spock had wandered off to. Vulcans, Vulcans, Vulcans – of course! Spock was probably examining the supplies headed for the colony. Most were stacked in the open shuttle bay, but some of the foodstuffs and livestock were in separate compartments nearby.
Jim started peeking into the individual storage rooms one by one.
The first one he opened held barrels of quadrotriticale grain and other dry goods.
The second one had crates of electrical equipment for the fledgling community power generator.
The third door he came to had lifesign readings. Jim opened the door and turned on the low light. He startled in surprise at what he saw.
On the far side of the small room was an inviting pile of large, soft, sleeping animals. They were bigger than Earth cats and dogs, but they were certainly domesticated. But even more adorable than the animals – sehlats, if Jim recalled correctly – was the creature sleeping in the middle of the living mound of fluff: Spock.
Jim’s implacable, stone-faced First Officer was fast asleep in a breathing mountain of cuddly pets.
Jim was reminded of when Bones had gotten a kick out of discovering Spock had a teddy bear growing up, shrugging off Spock’s protests that the teddy bears were alive, huge as real bears, and had fangs. These brown, furry animals must be the saber-toothed sehlats Spock had been talking about. Despite the long fangs hanging from their mouths, they didn’t look very predatory now, snoozing together in a puppy pile. Then again, looks were deceiving, because Spock didn’t look very intimidating right now either, although Jim knew from personal experience that Spock could be very intimidating indeed.
Jim’s entrance had woken some of the sehlats. Three of them started nuzzling his legs. They really were large, as tall as his knees. Another one joined in, and Jim found himself muffling his laughter as he was toppled over by an eager gang of truly terrifying teddy bears. Hah.
He leaned against the wall and stretched out his feet, letting the sehlats sniff him. Apparently, he was deemed suitable company, because two of them curled up against him. Jim reached out and stroked their fur. Beady yellow eyes studied him, and sharp-looking claws rested on his leg, but the sehlats rumbled happily under the attention.
Jim glanced over to Spock and saw that the Vulcan was using one of the sehlats as a living pillow, his cheek pressed against the creature’s chest. Jim put his ear to the same place on one of the sehlats in his lap and heard the thumping of a steady heartbeat. His own heart lurched, thinking about how Spock would never hear his mother’s heartbeat again. He wondered if Spock had slept with his own pet sehlat when he was a child. He also wondered what its name had been. Scrappy? T’Cute? Mr. Fluffy? Or maybe Vulcan pets had more dignified names, like Seleya the Second. Jim would have to ask Spock about it one day.
Seeing his First Officer so completely relaxed made Jim happy that they were sending these domesticated animals to the colony. Whoever in Starfleet had the idea to include pets among the supplies for restarting a culturally rich people was brilliant. Jim suspected it wouldn’t only be the Vulcan children who would appreciate having these native Vulcan pets around, though probably only the children would admit it. The Enterprise’s resident Vulcan would probably be embarrassed to be caught snuggling.
On that note, Jim decided to leave and give Spock the quiet time he deserved. Maybe tomorrow he could convince Spock to keep one of the creatures aboard the ship.
Jim excavated himself from his slobbering blankets and went to the door. He put his hand on the light switch, and snuck another look at the peaceful face of his First Officer. Even in sleep, the arch of the brows made him look like he was upset or concentrating on something intently. Jim hoped his dreams, if Vulcans had dreams, were not nightmares. Spock had lost so much. Jim respected his privacy, and Spock always seemed to appreciate that. But something about seeing him here like this made Jim determined to remind Spock that he was there for him – as a Captain and as a friend.
Heck, Jim would cuddle him too, if he wanted. Commanding a starship sometimes meant being lonely despite being surrounded by his (amazing) crew. Maybe Vulcan, like humans, weren’t meant to exist in solitude. Maybe Vulcans needed the warmth and comfort of fellow living creatures, too.
Jim vowed to himself that he’d be there for Spock. He really hoped Spock would take him up on it someday. They were already becoming an excellent command team. Somehow, Jim knew that whatever the form their partnership took, the two of them could be nothing but great together.