#asharpintake9

Chapter 9

It smelt like swimming pools, packed and empty at the time, the air conditioning the was the only thing keeping things together. Spock stood beside the captains chair, unbeknown to him much like his older self did.

“Are you just….gazing at the stars?” Jim asks his chin resting on his hand as he stared intensely at him, like a fool might stare at a kitten.

“What else would I do?” Spock asked.

“Oh I don’t know” he said, deciding that this was what Spock did most of the time. He always thought he was thinking, doing some math or some science - but maybe not, maybe he really was just staring out the window. Chekov looked over the back of his shoulder and scratched his head, a paranoid itch going down his arm.

“Don’t you have hobbies? Something you can be doing? Reading maybe?” Chekov suggested. 

“I’ve tried to read.” Spock said.

“What do you read, history?” Uhura asked.

“Terran classics, ‘Lord of the rings’, ;Alice in wonderland’ ’50 shades of grey’ ‘Jurassic park’. Although I was somewhat prompted to read jurassic park…”

“I’ve got a few classics you might like” Kirk suggested.

“No thanks. Everytime I open a book and begin reading them I remember I’ve already read them.” Spock said.

“Oh. So what are you going to do with your time then?”

Spock shrugged “I dunno.”

Kirk grinned his cheeks raising to his eyes “well I’m sure we’ll find something for you. It won’t do to have you stand here all the time, though I don’t mind, I think Chekov does.”

“Sir, please” Chekov said turning in his chair “I am just nervous, when Spock is older he will recount Thursday, and he will say chekov, you hit the button to slowly, chekov you tapped your foot too much, Chekov you’ve were navigating us in the wrong direction and corrected without telling anyone in hope no one would notice, chekov your uniform is crinkled when you sit on it.”

“Hmm” Captain Kirk nodded “Sulu are we on the right course?”

“Errrr” Sulu said, his eyes spinning from the Chekov to the Captain, he hits a few buttons on the console “of course, Sir.”

“You two aren’t filling me with confidence today.”

“It is like examiners day, I will loose points because I sweat” Chekov said.

“Hmmm” Kirk said. 

“I could give you some books to read. They wouldn’t be classics, but they would be written in this decade. It’s logical to read them because you can see how modern humans talk and interact with eachother, and compare the changing of the genres.”

“I suppose” Spock nodded.

“Or you could just read them because they’re fun” Chekov said.

“No. I need a purpose to read them.” Spock said firmly

“Oh? And what purpose did you have to read lord of the rings?” Kirk asked.

“History.” Spock said. Sulu glanced back to Spock and then to Chekov.

“That was my favourite time in history” Sulu said.

“Yes I was fond of the orcs” Chekov said.

“I feel like a hobbit myself.” Sulu said.

“It’s a shame they went extinct.” Chekov said and Sulu giggled.

“Mr Spock, perhaps you are related to Legolass.” Chekov suggested.

“Captain. These men are idiots. This is a new level of illogic I have not seen before, and I find myself unsure whether this ship will survive for twenty eight days in space.”

“Spock, don’t be mean, not everyone knows their books as well as me, or you apparently, nerd.” Kirk said light heartedly.

“What?” Spock asked sharply.

“Would you like to educate Sulu and Checkov on why ‘Lord Of The Rings’ is historic?” Kirk suggested.

“Lord Of The Rings is symbolism for the second world war.” Spock said.

“Oh” Sulu rolled his eyes “good guys vs bad guys, I guess I should have seen that coming “isn’t… that every war to someone?”

“I love reading for symbolism.” Chekov joked.

“I do read symbolism in books” Kirk said offended “thats enough talking I’m sure you should be paying more attention to the ship.”

Chekov gave a hearty chuckle “of course Sir.”

Kirk spoke to Spock quietly after that. Quiet whispers about ‘Lord Of The Rings’ and favourite characters. 

“Captain” Officer Finnegan said approaching him from the lift with a paid “is it wise to have Commander Spock? He is a child.”

“He’s not working as the Commander right now” Kirk said with a smile.

“I don’t think the bridge is the safest place for a vulcan.” Finnegan said his eyes glancing over the tiny vulcan.

“Finnegan” Kirk said sitting up “it’s a quiet day, it is perfectly safe for him to be here.”

“I don’t think it is-”

“I will leave then.” Spock said taking a step back from the captain.

“Spock you don’t need to do that.” Kirk said “Finnegan who the fuck even are you? God this writers so lazy summoning up villains just to move the plot on, and make you say oof.”

“It’s fine. I’m well adapted to telling when I’m not wanted, I’m sure I can find something else to do.” Spock said and turned on his foot, walking past Finnegan with a breeze that even with his small height seemed intimidating.

“Spock come back. Come on” Kirk called.

“No” Spock said almost huffed as he entered the lift.

Spock was an adventurer. In the days before he’d go to the mountains, to walk deep into the desert finding what he could to survive with I-Chaya in tow. Today he wandered the halls of a starship. He started where he would always begin, at the bottom of the mountain. So the lift took him to the bottom of the ship.

He snuck out the lift into a hallway of pipes, where his ears stung from loud shouting humans. No one noticed him as he stayed close the side of the walls. The crew in engineering was different from anywhere else on the ship. Hands on and intelligent thinkers, tinkers and inventors, it was officially professional work, but the lack of professionalism they had would not be seen nor put up with else where on the ship.

Knowing that if he were spotted he would be made to leave, Spock ran and crouched, hiding behind pipes and boxes. Some meters from him Spock spotted a group of humans leaning over an upside down box that they were using like a table. They were smoking, and fans drifted the fumes away from themselves. A red shirt leant with cigarette in hand as he looked bright eyed at the other four around him.

“So I said to him, maybe if you had the surgery on your eyes and not you dick, we wouldn’t even be having this problem.”

His sentence ended with hearty laughter from the others, the sense of the joke, the story, a glimpse of documentation escaping the sense of Spock. 

There were boxes piled high in the corner of the room. There were boxes piled high in most places, but the pile in the corner caught Spock’s eyes. The boxes left little more than a meter between themselves and the roof, but on the roof, was a vent. Perfect to climb into. Dangerous to climb into. The perfect challenge. So Spock ducked and rolled to the boxes, and began his climb. He did it slowly and he did it carefully but that wasn’t the hard part. Spock laid flat on the top of the boxes, he had perfect sight over the people. Groups and couples that walked, carrying tools and scanners, tapping at pipes and - Spock squinted. One man was placing duct tape around a leaking water pipe. Spock sighed shaking his head. He should probably mention how bad that is - when he’s older. That can’t be proper procedure. When he was certain no one was looking Spock began to undo the screw’s from the vent by twisting them with his hand. When all the screws were undone he carefully and quietly pulled down the vent grid and put it on top of the boxes. He climbed into the vent.

No matter how quietly Spock tried to crawl he was sure he was making a racket. He was sure every time he moved his arm forwards the metal clinked and banged. He was sure a knee forwards sent a shuddering though the whole of the ship. After spending ten minutes slowly climbing forwards Spock rolled on to his back and rubbed at his head. He was sure when he came out where-ever that be, there would be a group of people waiting to question him. To ask him what he thought he was doing. Why he had opened the vent. What the purpose of doing so was. This was why Spock had stopped. What was his explanation? He had not words he could say to those people. To the Captain, to McCoy. After a while, Spock rolled back around and made his way forth deciding to keep a vow of silence when they found him, because they would. He was certain.

The vent ended at a grid looking in to a dark room. It wasn’t fully dark, there were large windows that looked out in to space, and space lit his way. It took a while for Spock to realise why he couldn’t see anything in the room. There was nothing in the room. Spock slipped his fingers through the holes of the vent to unscrew it. But his fingers, from this side, weren’t long enough. He was stuck. He took a deep breath, and carefully turned himself around. Laying on his back with his feet facing the vent he gave it a few solid kicks. At the fifth kick the vent flew off the wall. Spock escaped. Walking over to the vent Spock picked it up. The screws were still firmly attached to the vent as was a small portion of the wall around the screws. Sighing Spock stood on the middle of the vent attempting to straighten out the mess he had made. The vent actually straightened enough to be passable so he carefully balanced it back on the wall. He took a few steps back examining the vent carefully. No one should notice unless they got close.

The room he had discovered was dark, and empty. It was some sort of unused, perhaps even forgotten observation deck. Could things be forgotten on a spaceship? The door showed the most sign of life, and that door had spider cobwebs across it. How? They must have sneaked on by sitting on someones shoulder. There was also a bench against it and some other planks of wood. The entire place was empty. There were other vents but they didn’t really take Spock’s attention. Spock walked up to the window and sat staring cross legged out across the stars. He wasn’t sure what he would be doing for the next few days, but at least he had found this. He laid down on his side, one elbow beneath his head. It wasn’t quiet, wherever he was, he was too close to the engine room still. But it wasn’t a horrible racket he could hear, it was just a gentle purr.

Spock woke some time later, and he turned over on his other side as he watched the door shake. A crowbar shot through the centre of the door. Spock sat crossed legged silently watching the feat as fingers slipped between the door pulling it opened. There stood the Captain, McCoy, Finnegan and Uhura.

“Spock!” McCoy was the first to push himself through he door “what are you doing here?”

He ran forth, making Spock flinch slightly as he ran a scanner over Spock. Spock looked carefully at McCoy wondering if he should keep his vow of silence as the Captain rushed over.

“Is he okay?” Kirk asked crouching.

“According to this he is perfectly fine.” McCoy said standing up.

“Spock, what are you doing here?” Uhura asked concernedly.

“I didn’t even know this room existed. On my ship as well.” Kirk said looking around the room.

“Was it because of Finnegan?” Uhura whispered.

“Yeah Spock” Finnegan said in a carefree attitude “I’m sorry if like I upset.”

“I’m vulcan. You did not upset me.” Spock said standing up, as he decided he didn’t like the attention he was getting. He literally hadn’t spared a second thought to Finnegan.

“Wait, Spock where do you think you’re going?” Uhura asked “you can’t just go off by yourself.”

“Spock, I thought you had gone back to McCoy, do you realise what the ships been like since we discovered you missing? This past hour has been chaos looking for you.” Kirk said. Spock looked at the people surrounding him. His way was thoroughly blocked. The vent Spock had propped up fell on to the floor with a bang, cascading dust surrounded it as the humans jumped to look at it. They turned back to Spock, looking for an explanation as he finished a yawn.

“Oops?”

[Chapter 1] [Chapter 2]        [Chapter 3] [Chapter 4]        [Chapter 5]

[Chapter 6]     [Chapter 7]       [Chapter 8]   [chapter 9]   [Chapter 10]

[Chapter 12]

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