Work Text:
Photinus pyralis. Spock observed the kindling once again against the dark. Communicating desire through light. Instinctual. Irrepressible.
Each flash, a proposition; each pause, restraint. A sound mechanism, logical and elegant: chemistry answering chemistry. No space for deception in yellow-green code. And yet the recipient must judge each signal alone in darkness, some deep biological calculator running the determination of whether to answer.
Vulcans, too, possessed a language for wanting buried deep. But they have no light to brighten the darkness, only the burrowing until the years will defer their pay no more.
The small flame flared, vanished, flared again.