Kirk x Spock's T'hy'la Bond in the Kelvin's Timeline (AOS)
Do you guys wonder how the existence of another Spock may have altered Jim and Spock's relationship after all the events of the first film?
"A friendship that would define you both in ways you cannot yeat realise", Elder Spock tells him.
That shifts everything. Because up until then, AOS Spock has been telling himself a story:
His relationship with Jim is adversarial but necessary, they're both starfleet officers who need to act accordingly;
Even though respect is earned and their dynamic shifts after defeating Nero, Spock has to keep his emotional distance, because it's what's appropriate;
And lastly, his relationship with Uhura is the correct, logical path.
So learning that, in another timeline, Jim is his T’hy’la (be it romantic or platonic) reframes everything.
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His first reaction would be, of course, denial disguised as logic because, yes, their circumstances differ. That was a bond shaped by shared history and does not imply inevitability.
But emotionally? He’d be rattled.
Because now every instinctive pull toward Jim has a name.
Then would come the jealousy (and he would HAAAATE that)
Because he wouldn't be jealous of TOS Spock for having Jim.
He'd be jealous that his counterpart managed to have something so wondrously deep and emotional and still remain a fully functional vulcan.
He'd be jealous of his clarity.
Because while TOS Spock knows what his Jim is to him, AOS Spock is still fighting for his sanity, policing every emotion, trying to fit into Vulcan and human expectations.
And Jim? Homeboy is OBLIVIOUS to that.
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Eventually, Spock is forced to confront two things:
The first being that he has Uhura, a somehow solid relationship that does not invalidate his possible bond with Jim since bonds are layered
The second is that, if Jim is T’hy’la in another universe… what is he actually risking by pushing him away here?
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In the begginig of into Darkness, Jim breaks the Prime Directive. On purpose.
And when confronting Spock about ditching on him, Jim simply asks if Spock understood why he did it.
That was not a tactical question.
That was Jim asking: Do you understand how important you are to me?
And Spock doesn’t. Not yet.
Not until they're faced with the innevitable.
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In the end, it's Jim who's dying behind a radiation shield.
Cold glass, tears, rage.
History repeating itself like a curse.
And we have seen Spock going through grief when his mother died along with his whole planet. But people often hand-wave his reaction to Amanda’s death with: “He was in shock”, “He had to stay functional” witch is true, but still not the whole picture.
Because when Jim dies Spock does not suppress anything.
He doesn’t compartmentalize, doesn’t withdraw, doesn’t go still.
So Spock can suppress grief when he believes it is unavoidable.
He cannot suppress it when the loss feels preventable.
Amanda’s death is final. He was powerless. The whole planet is gone.
But Jim’s death feels wrong. Unacceptable. Against the order of things.
In that moment, there is no girlfriend, no Starfleet and no Vulcan logic to stop his brain from going haywire.
There is only Jim.
And Jim is gone.
And this is wrong.
That’s a pure limbic response, if i've ever seen one.
Because, when Jim is gone, so is Spock’s center.
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So in that few days while they wait for Kirk to come back, hoping on a miracle, that's when every doubt he harbored about the bond dissolves.
Romantically coded or not, T'hy'la still refers to "the one being whose absence would unmake you".
Not romantically. Not even sexually. Just this raw undertanding that if Kirk's ever gone, Spock would not remain intact.
By the end, Spock undertands that distancing himself doesn’t make him safer.
It only delays the inevitable.
