“I do not need excitement.”
“Then why do you persist in this illogical dream that makes a mockery of everything your mother and I have planned for you?”
“Father—what about my plans?”
“You raise your voice to me?”
“If it is the only way to ensure you hear me, yes.”
Sarek walked around the narrow stone pyramid, his pacing suggesting he found it difficult to keep still. “How can your plans include being surrounded by humans at the Academy for four years? They will ridicule you. Distract you. Erode your logic and your emotional control.”
“But Father, they do not. On board the Enterprise, the midshipmen I worked with did not treat me as a Vulcan, or as an alien. I was accepted for what I could offer the crew and the mission. For what I could do. They accepted me without labels and without preconceptions. I was not Vulcan. I was not human. I was just Spock. And I wish to experience that again.”
“What you are telling me is that you are turning your back not just on me, but on your heritage.”
“My heritage is different from yours.”
“Are you not Vulcan?”
“I want to be Vulcan. I have tried to be Vulcan. But…perhaps it is time that I look to the other half of my heritage.”
“Spock, use your logic. If you are my son, then you are Vulcan. No other option is available.”
“Then, Father, perhaps I am not your son.”
Spock left the garden.
56
The door to the apartment flew open and Kirk rushed in.
“Sam!” he shouted. “Wake up!”
It was noon. He figured his brother had slept long enough. He ran to the bedroom door, pounded on it. “You’re not gonna believe what happened!”
He listened. Nothing. He opened the door. “Hey…”
The bed was empty. The built-in wall drawers were pulled out. Kirk checked them. Sam’s clothes were gone.
He stood in the bedroom doorway, bewildered. Then he saw the aquarium. Its gravel was dry.
“Sam…”
Kirk picked up the cylinder of fish food, could guess what was inside. He saw the block inhaler beside it, picked it up, shook it, heard sloshing. Why had his brother left it there?
“Well, Sam,” Kirk said to the empty apartment. “Wherever you’ve gone, you’re not gonna believe it.”
He went back to the main door where he’d dropped his Starfleet duffel. He bent down and rummaged in it for his personal communicator.
He had to tell someone, so he took a breath to steady himself, flipped open the communicator: “Mom and Dad.”
He waited in silence for the call to go through. He heard the click of a connected circuit. “Mom…Dad…It’s Jim! You’re not gonna be—” He stopped then, to let the recorded message play through to the end. A computer voice politely asked if he wished to leave a message for the Kirks.
He snapped the communicator shut and looked around the apartment once more, registering and dismissing the scorch marks on the wall and the framed poster. Sam’s things were gone, so whatever happened, he told himself, his brother had had time to pack. His brother had had time to get away.
He just didn’t know where.
He looked at the communicator. Why not? he thought.
He flipped it open: “Elissa.”
But her communicator rejected the call. He didn’t even reach a computer voice.
He was seventeen years old and this should have been the best day of his life. But it wasn’t. There was no one he could share his news with.
Jim Kirk was alone, and he didn’t like it.
57
It was morning, the fog was gone, and the Presidio Gate of Starfleet Academy was open.
A cab pulled up to a stand on the sidewalk just outside the gate, and Kirk got out, Starfleet duffel in hand. As the cab flew off, another car landed. Its passenger windows were too dark to see through, but Kirk recognized the diplomatic plates.
Spock got out. The car returned to the airlanes. Kirk went to him.
“How’d it go with your parents?” Kirk asked.
“Satisfactory,” Spock said. “And your family?”
“Really excited.” Kirk smiled brightly. “It’s not a very Vulcan reaction, but it’s good for humans.”
“Yes,” Spock agreed.
Kirk looked up at the stone and metal of the gate. The scene was surreal to him. He still had a picture in his mind of what that gate had looked like two weeks ago, late at night, with the fog rolling through and a Starfleet staff car just sitting in the lot across the street, waiting.
The ironwork had been a barrier then. But now…it signified an entrance. He decided to share this insight with Spock, but when he looked away from the gate, the Vulcan was already gone.
He was walking along the Presidio Road that led to the main buildings.
“Hey, Stretch!” Kirk shouted. “Wait for me!”
The Vulcan turned and dutifully waited as Kirk jogged up to him.
“I just wanted to, you know, wish you luck and everything. I don’t think we’ll be having any classes together, and I’m sure not going out for any sport you’re going out for.”
“Thank you,” Spock agreed. “Good luck to you as well.”
“Luck?” Kirk said. “That’s not very logical, is it?”
“Not really,” Spock said. “But when in Rome…”
Kirk grinned. “Very good. You’ve been practicing.”
Kirk shot out his hand just as Spock raised his and held his second and third fingers apart.
“Ah,” Kirk said. He guessed Spock was giving him some kind of Vulcan salute. So he raised his own hand and attempted to separate his fingers just as Spock reached out to shake.
“We’re never going to get this right,” Kirk said.
“Indeed.”
They resumed walking along the side of the road, and when they came to the main circuit path, they stopped.
Kirk asked where Spock was headed.
“I must report to the science adviser in Burke Hall.”
“I’m heading over to pilot training in the Mayweather Building.”
They stood in silence for a few moments, then Kirk shrugged. “I guess this is it, then.”
“Most likely,” Spock said.
“Remember that night we met?”
“I am unlikely to forget it.”
“I said it was going to be fun. And it was, wasn’t it?”
Spock gave Kirk’s question considerable thought, then surprised him by concluding, “Yes. It was.”
Kirk hefted his bag onto his shoulder. “Well, see you around, Spock.”
“See you around, Jim.”
Then each went off in a different direction, going their separate ways.
For now.
Midshipman Jim Kirk will return in
STAR TREK®
ACADEMY
Trial Run
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Collision Course Page 36
