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just-another-ficwriter · 4 years ago

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Holidate - Part One

Pairing: Sweet Pea x Reader

Words: 3000ish

Warnings: Overbearing parents, alcohol

Summary: Tired of being alone on holidays, Sweet Pea and Y/N decide to be each other’s plationic plus-ones all year round. What could go wrong?

Notes: I’m super late posting this and I feel awful about it!! I just couldn’t decide how I wanted it to go and ended up rewriting it three times🤦��‍♀️

“No Mom.” Y/N pinches the bridge of her nose, irritation seeping into her words. There’s already a dull ache drumming behind her temples and she hasn’t even made it home yet. “I’m not using this as an excuse because I’m running late.”

“Well I simply can’t just drop everything and come get you, I’ve got to stuff the Turkey and cut the vegetables and-“ She lets her Mother’s voice drowned out into background noise with a frustrated sigh on her end.

She hates Christmas, she thinks. Hates the decorations, the songs, the cheer. Every last bit. Nothing’s been the same since the truth came out about Hal and-

“Is Jug there?” She cuts her own thoughts short, desperate not to think of her Dad and all the things he’s done right now.

“Of course Forsyth is here!” Y/N can almost see Jug flinch at the correction and bites back a laugh. “But him and Betty have already opened a bottle of wine.”

“Can you just ask him for the number of his Dad’s garage please?” Another five minutes of Alice rambling on passes before Jughead’s voice appears on the other end with a joyful ‘Merry Christmas’ and a direct contact to someone who might be able to help.

She thanks him quickly, hanging up before she can even finish saying goodbye, so he doesn’t have a chance to hand the phone back. And as she leans against the car behind her, the same car that had given up on her just as she passed the town sign, she dials the number and hopes she’ll make it home in time for dinner.

Otherwise, she might never hear the end of it.

“Again, in English?” Y/N cocks an eyebrow at him, the string of words he’d just said sounding almost foreign in her head.

She doesn’t mean for it to sound as rude as it does, but she can’t help it. She’s tired, exhausted even, not to mention cold. The snow fall had picked up five minutes after she’d called the number Jug had given her and it had taken him, or Sweet Pea as he’d introduced himself, almost 40 minutes to reach her.

But he just laughs it off, smirks before firing it straight back at her. “You aren’t getting anywhere in this car, anytime soon princess.”

“Great!” It’s official. Her mom’s going to kill her and she’ll be blamed for ruining Christmas. She throws her hands up in defeat, kicking a tyre in the process. “Just great!”

“If it makes you feel better, this isn’t how I planned on spending my Christmas Eve either.” He watches her amused, another laugh passing his lips before the sarcastic remark follows, his arms now crossed over his chest and she almost feels guilty.

“I’m sorry for being such an inconvenience.” She throws a false apology at him along with a fake grin that falls into a frown almost immediately.

“Apology accepted.” She’s scowling at him now, eyes rolling back but he simply ignores it, happy to keep winding her up. “Want me to give you a ride somewhere while I tow this back?”

“Only on one condition.” She points a finger over her shoulder towards his trunk, the radio still on loud. “We find a station that isn’t playing Christmas music.”

“Hey, it’s either Mariah Carey, or you walk Sweetheart.” He shrugs, walking backwards, watching her make the choice.

He can’t help but laugh again when she sighs and runs to the passenger seat, desperate to seek shelter from the snow.

10 minutes after Sweet Pea kindly drops her off at her childhood home, Y/N finds herself still on the porch out front, mentally preparing herself for what’s about to come.

She sucks in a breath. Two, three. And with a fake smile so sickly sweet it makes her stomach hurt; she lets herself in.

Polly’s the first to spot her, catches her the minute she walks through the door and pulls her into a hug before she can even drop her bags. She can’t help but sink into the embrace, it’s always nice to see her older sister alone like this, but Y/N doesn’t even get the chance to ask her how she is before the twins descend down the stairs and push past them in a blur.

“Juniper put the presents down- Dagwood no!” She feels Polly gently squeeze her hand in a silent way of saying they’ll catch up later before she’s chasing after them, joining an exhausted looking Jason who pauses long enough to wave a quick hello before he resumes pursuit.

She moves further into the house, away from the chaos of the living room and towards the interesting smells wafting from the kitchen. It’s impossible not to hear her Mother barking orders from where she stands over the stove, while Jug and Betty listen to every word, working on the dining table and it’s fixtures like a well-oiled machine.

“Y/N/N you’re here!” Betty looks up with a soft smile but doesn’t dare move from her task and face the wrath of Alice Cooper.

“Finally!” It’s Alice’s turn to look at her now, a perfectly shaped eyebrow arching in distaste as her eyes roam over her middle daughter. “Please tell me you aren’t wearing that to dinner?”

Y/N lets out a breath she didn’t realise she was holding and prepares to fire back when a gentle arm lands around her shoulder with a calming chuckle.

“Oh come on Mom, Y/N looks fine.” Charles plants a quick kiss to her forehead before ruffling her hair and they both laugh. Her brother had always been her saving grace in situations like this, the only one brave enough to stand up for himself and the others, ever the mediator. But not even he was enough to put Alice off her persistent questioning, she was already sick of her Mother’s judgement and they hadn’t even touched on her job or her relationship status yet.

“You’ve definitely told them we aren’t officially together, right?” Sweet Pea takes one last, slow drag of his cigarette before stomping it out under his boot. Josie nods at him reassuringly but one look up at the exterior of her parents house has his stomach in knots. “They know we’re just casual?”

“Sweet Pea would you stop?” She playfully pokes at his ribs, but he just sighs and rubs a nervous hand down his face.

He couldn’t help it, that sick feeling rising from the pit of stomach by the second. The idea of spending Christmas with Josie’s family, a girl he’d only been dating for a month, was absolutely terrifying on all levels. But Fangs had ditched him to spend the holidays with his boyfriend in New York, not that he could really blame him, and he had no other family in town so when she originally offered, he’d jumped at the chance of not spending the day alone.

Part of him had regretted it since.

If Sweet Pea thought the outside of house was impressive, with it’s perfectly placed lights and overly decorated windows, it was nothing compared to what was waiting for him on the inside.

Myles and Sierra McCoy welcome them at the front door with bright smiles and open arms that engulf Sweet Pea before he even has the chance to say hello.

Josie joins in, the four of them becoming one big, massive group hug like he’s been part of their family his whole life and not just a stranger potentially only passing through. All three of them squeal in excitement before someone yanks him in doors.

If he had doubts before, he thinks, he’s almost certain he’s in over his head now.

Betty gets engaged on Christmas Morning.

Right in front of the Christmas tree, just after the last presents are opened and the twins are happily distracted by a mountain of toys; Jughead drops to one knee and pops the question under twinkling lights.

The minute Betty gasps the word ‘yes’ the family erupts in cheers, fawning over the couple. Of course Alice is already crying, Polly demands to see the ring, while Charles and Jason pat Jug on the back.

Y/N however stays put, her eyes falling down into her mug of spiked coffee that her mom had scolded her over, eyebrows raised over the rim as she knocks it back.

“Aren’t you going to congratulate your sister?” Alice sends her a pointed look, catching her before she can slope off into the peaceful confines of the kitchen.

“Congrats Betts.” She pulls her into a hug and paints on the biggest smile she can muster as she mumbles into her hair. “I’m so happy for you.”

And she is. Her sisters getting everything she’s dreamed of with Jug, of course she’s happy, but it’s hard to ignore the fact that her younger sister will be married before her.

Even Charles has betrayed her this year and invited a date to Christmas dinner leaving her the last single Cooper. And her mom wasn’t prepared to let her forget it anytime soon.

Sweet Pea successfully manages to make it through family movie night, forcefully sat between Josie and her mother, hot cocoa in hand and surrounded from all sides. He even grins and bares the series of photo albums that follow, another embarrassing photo of Josie lurking behind every page turn, but he draws the line when the marriage talk starts, declaring he’s suddenly tired and turns to run up the stairs so fast he’s surprised he doesn’t pull something on the way.

Sienna wakes them up on Christmas morning with a soft knock at 8am sharp, wearing a bright red Christmas jumper and holding two more for the both them.

The mere idea of it makes Sweet Pea’s skin itch as much as the material does once he begrudgingly pulls it over his head.

The rest of the morning is spent sipping coffee, watching the three McCoy’s exchanging gifts. He’s too distracted, wondering if it’s still too late to find a way out of the whole thing to even notice Josie standing in front of him until she’s shoved the present right under his nose.

“Merry Christmas my love.” She places it down on his lap and Sweet Pea finds himself wanting the ground to open up and swallow him whole.

“Jose I… I thought we said we weren’t doing gifts?” All three pairs of eyes are now on him, burning their way into his skin and he’s sure he’s never felt embarrassment like it.

“But that was just a joke, right?” He smiles awkwardly when she laughs, but the sound is humourless, and he can already see the anger bubbling behind her eyes. She doesn’t even give him the chance to reply. “What, so I’m good enough to sleep with but you can’t buy me a gift?”

He chokes, shocked by her transparency around her parents while his cheeks redden by the second.

Ten minutes later he’s out on the drive, bags thrown in the back of his truck, scrambling to get away as fast as he can.

Christmas Day ends the way it started.

Miserably sat at the kitchen table, sipping on something alcoholic held in her hand.

Polly and Jason had slipped off not long after dinner, taking two sugar high kids and all their loud noises with them. Betty and Jug now sit on one couch, his arms wrapped around her shoulders, her head resting on her chest, content in their own bubble of love while Alice sits on the other, quizzing Kevin Keller, Charles’ surprise date. She’d feel bad for him if she wasn’t already feeling relieved that her Mother’s attention had turned to someone else for five minutes. Her brother sits besides her, topping up a glass of red.

“He seems nice.” Charles hums in response, biting back a laugh. Was she missing a joke? “What?”

“If I tell you something, you can’t tell the others.” A quick eager nod and she’s shuffling closer so he can whisper his secret. “Kev’s just my Holidate.”

She blinks back in shock. “Holidate?”

“Just a date for the holiday, someone to keep Mom off my back.” He shrugs like it’s nothing, like it’s the simplest solution to the problem. He sips his wine while he waits for her to process it. “There’s no strings attached and I don’t have to spend events alone. I’m even heading down to his parents after New Years to return the favour.”

“Thats...” Y/N breathes out, she’s a little envious she hadn’t thought of it herself. “What an idea.”

Y/N sinks into a booth at Pop’s Chocklit Shoppe two days later with a sigh of relief, happy to welcome the peace that comes with being away from her family.

She loves them, her siblings, her mother, the twins, of course but it’s exhausting. The intruding questions, the never ending merry go round of pity and interfering. She knows deep down it’s only because they care, but sometimes she wished they’d just leave her alone.

Pops promptly brings her order of curly fries over, with a soft smile and an extra chocolate shake on the side she didn’t order. It’s been two years since she last stepped into the place, yet he still remembers her favourite like it was yesterday.

“It’s good to see you Y/N.” There’s something in his tone that just feels like home and she finds herself welcoming it, it’s been a long time since anything in Riverdale has felt anything close to that, not since the truth about her dad.

Pops doesn’t stick around, a light pat to her shoulder before he’s a retreating form, leaving her to her thoughts. She barely makes it through a fry before someone’s sliding in opposite her.

Sweet Pea pushes the key across the table, grinning cheekily as he helps himself to the basket in front of him. She barely knows him and he’s already stealing her food. “One fully functional car.”

“Finally!” She snatched them up, hiding them

in her bag and he can see the tension practically melting from her shoulders. “Now I can get out of the hell hole.”

“Christmas went that well? He asks, curiosity peaked.

“You could say that.” She presses herself further into her seat, huffing as she rubs the palm of her hands against her jeans. The anxious look in her eyes tells him that what ever she might say next won’t necessarily make sense and she’s a little embarrassed by it. “My sister got engaged.”

“To FPS son right?” He vaguely recalls his boss proudly telling anyone who would listen that morning. “And that’s a bad thing?”

“She’s my younger sister, and now, as I’m about to be the only official unmarried Cooper daughter my mom has even more of an excuse to interfere in my love life.” The words just slip out and she finds part of her gladly confessing her thoughts to a virtual stranger instead of keeping them in. He smiles in a way that tells her he gets it.

“Yeah well, bet you a chocolate shake mine was worse.” He ignores the glare she sends him when he innocently brings her existing milkshake to his lips and continues when she says nothing. “I spent it with someone I’ve been dating for four weeks and her parents.”

She almost chokes on a curly fry. “You got serious that quick?”

“Of course not, and we both knew it.” She stares at him like he has two heads, he knows she can’t quite fit ‘causal relationship’ and ‘family Christmas’ together so he does it for her. “Didn’t want to spend the day alone so I took her up on the offer. Cue overbearing parents, the cringest matching jumpers and the ultimate gift exchange where I got her nothing because we agreed no presents.”

“Aren’t you old enough to know by now that no gifts definitely means get her a gift?” She laughs when he rolls his eyes.

“Ended with her kicking me out before dinner.” She shakes her head, laughs again as she calls him tragic and a tiny part of him agrees. “And now I’m officially dateless for New Year’s Eve.”

“Thanks for reminding me I have to come back in a few days to attend Riverdale’s Annual Blossom New Years Eve Party alone for the second year running.” She wrinkles her nose in disgusted, unprepared to have her friends on her back as well as her family, and ends up missing the way his eyebrows raise in surprise.

“You know Toni and Cheryl?”

“T’s been my best friend longer than I can remember and Cheryl’s brother is married to my sister, guess you could say I know them pretty well.” She tilts her head to the side, eying him slowly, like she suddenly sees him in a different way. “How’d you know them?”

“Guess you could say I spend more time than I should at the Wyrm.” The mention of Toni’s bar lights up her face. “Plus Toni’s been a really good friend to me since I got here, I was actually meant to be taking Josie to their party.”

“I think I know a way to solve our little problem.” A plan suddenly forms in her head, he doesn’t know whether to be worried or not as he watches the smile on her face widen. “Sweet Pea how would you like to be my Holidate this Friday?”

“Your holi-what?”

Forever Taglist: @p-marie-sp

Sweet Pea Taglist: @80sand90simagine @wildberryyyy @hopelesslylosttheway @be-gay-do-crime-cutie

Holidate Taglist: @popcrone818

#riverdale #riverdale imagine #riverdale sweet pea #riverdale fanficton #riverdale series #riverdale au #riverdale edit #riverdale one shot #sweet pea #sweet pea x reader #sweet pea riverdale #sweet pea au #sweet pea fanfiction #sweet pea imagine #sweet pea one shot #sweet pea edit #sweet pea series #holidate #Holidate au

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per-ineptia-ad-astra · 4 years ago

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Star Trek Episode 1.24: This Side of Paradise

AKA Yet Another Creepy Utopia Planet

Our episode begins with the Enterprise heading in to orbit around an Earthy-looking planet named Omicron Ceti 3. Omicon Ceti is a real star, by the way—also known as Mira or Mira A, it’s a red giant and part of a binary star system with its sister Mira B. It’s not a real likely place to go looking for such a nice homey sort of planet, though, because Mira is a pulsating variable star, which means its size and brightness is constantly fluctuating, and it’s hard to evolve life when your sun keeps flickering like a neon sign in a noir movie all the time.

Uhura reports to Kirk that she’s been transmitting a contact signal every five minutes just as he ordered, but she’s only getting dead air in response. Kirk tells her to keep it up until they get into orbit, then moves on to talk to Spock. “There were one hundred fifty men, women and children in that colony,” he says. “What are the chances of survivors?”

Looks like the chances are, uh...not great. And by ‘not great’ I mean ‘nonexistent’. Spock explains that ‘Bertold rays’ are a recent enough discovery that there’s still a lot not known about them, but one thing that is for sure known is that exposure to these rays causes living animal tissue to disintegrate. Nasty. Evidently this planet is heavily exposed to these rays, because a group of colonists-- “Sandoval’s group”-- came here only three years ago and Spock says there’s no possibility they could have survived. Well why the heck would anyone build a colony in such a place? All Spock can say is “They knew there was a risk.”

Kirk questions whether they can risk sending a landing party down under such conditions, but Spock says the disintegration doesn’t start immediately, so they’ll be alright if they don’t stick around too long. The helmsman reports that they’ve successfully established orbit, and he’s found a settlement—or at least, something that was a settlement at one point. Kirk tells Spock to equip a landing party of five to accompany him down there, including a biologist and McCoy. That’s gonna be a fun mission briefing. “Yes, we're beaming down to a planet bombarded with deadly radiation, but no need to worry, crew, your tissues will probably only disintegrate a little bit."

Sometime later, the landing party—Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Sulu, a blueshirt and a goldshirt—materialize into a meadow near a dirt path and a picket fence. They’ve thoughtfully arranged themselves into a nice alternating pattern.

[ID: A shot of a sunny meadow with a dirt road, a few trees and a white picket fence in the background. Newly beamed down are six Enterprise crewmembers standing in two rows: in the front are Kirk and Spock, in the back are McCoy, a goldshirt, a blueshirt, and Sulu.]

The goldshirt, incidentally, is DeSalle, who we last saw back in The Squire of Gothos. The character was originally written for this story as Lt. Timothy Fletcher, but was changed to DeSalle after the production crew realized they’d cast an actor who had already appeared in the series. Yes, really. AGAIN. The blueshirt is Kelowitz, who showed up briefly in The Galileo Seven and Arena, and likewise started out as another character but was renamed after being cast. I don’t know how this situation managed to happen so often on TOS, but apparently it did. At least they both seem to have managed to hold onto more or less the same positions that they had the last time we saw them, a rare feat for any minor TOS crewmember.

The group walks forward towards some nearby farm buildings arranged around a dirt yard, with a horse-drawn cart sitting out in front of one of them. But there’s no horse to be seen, and no people either. They wander through the yard and over toward what looks like a paddock, but without any animals in it. Everything seems quite thoroughly deserted.

Kirk leans on the paddock fence and glumly muses, “Another dream that failed. There’s nothing sadder. It took these people a year to make the trip from Earth. They came all that way...and died.” Hold on, it took them a year? What, do they not give colony ships warp drives? Did they have to hitchhike here?

“Hardly that, sir,” someone says, and suddenly we see three men in green jumpsuits standing at the edge of the yard, looking very relaxed and also very not dead.

As the landing party all turn around to stare in shock the man in front strides forward and says, “Welcome to Omicron Ceti 3. I’m Elias Sandoval.” McCoy looks like he’s getting ready to spray the dude with holy water.

After the titles, we get a brief captain’s log to sum things up, just in case everyone forgot what happened during the commercial break:

“Captain’s Log, Stardate 3417.3. We thought our mission to Omicron Ceti 3 would be an unhappy one. We had expected to find no survivors of the agricultural colony there. Apparently, our information was incorrect.”

The colonists start happily shaking hands with the landing party—but happily as in “oh, it’s so nice to meet you” not “oh thank god you came to rescue us we’re all on the brink of death”. Sandoval says they haven’t seen anyone outside the colony since they left Earth four years ago, although they’ve been expecting someone to come by for a while. Apparently their subspace radio didn’t work right and they don’t have anyone who could “master its intricacies”. Now, I’m no expert on establishing colonies on alien planets, but ‘person who can work our only communication device’ does rather seem like a position you would want to make sure was filled before you left.

Kirk has to explain that they haven’t come to visit because of the dead radio. He does not explain why they did decide to come when they did. Spock’s comment about the colonists knowing there was a risk indicates that whether or not Bertold rays specifically were known about before the colonists left, they at least had reason to believe there was something dangerous about the planet. So why’d the Federation let them go and then wait another three years before sending anyone to check up on them? Eh, probably just another failing of twenty-third century space bureaucracy.

Sandoval’s not bothered about it, though. He tells Kirk that it doesn’t make much difference—the important thing is the party is here now and the colonists are happy to see them. Then he invites them on a tour of the settlement and casually strolls off, leaving the landing party to stand there and try to process what the hell they just witnessed.

“Pure speculation, just an educated guess...I’d say that man is alive,” McCoy says. Thanks Bones.

Spock says that his scans show that the planet is getting ray’d just as their reports indicated, so that’s not the issue. Under this intensity, the landing party could safely hang out here for a week if necessary, as per the usual Star Trek rule that you can be exposed to a deadly thing and be just fine up until the exact moment it kills you, but there’s a mighty big difference between a week and three years. Or as Kirk succinctly puts it, “These people shouldn’t be alive.”

“Is it possible they’re not?” Sulu asks. Great out of the box thinking there Sulu, love it.

Kirk takes a moment to consider that, which is fair—compared to the kind of weird shit they’ve encountered so far, the walking dead wouldn’t even stand out that much. But McCoy points out that when they shook hands with Sandoval, “His flesh was warm. He’s alive. There’s no doubt about that.” Spock fires back with a reminder that, “There’s no miracle connected with [Bertold rays], doctor, you know that. No cures, no serums, no antidotes. If a man is exposed long enough, he dies.” Okay dude, calm down, all McCoy said was “he’s alive” not “my god! Bertold rays have been fake all along! wake up sheeple!"

As Kirk points out, this whole debate is pretty pointless anyway for the moment—they’re arguing in a vacuum, and they’ll need more answers if they want to get anywhere. So they go to follow Sandoval, who leads them towards a nearby farm house, while a few colonists do various farm chores nearby. Sandoval explains that the colonists split into three groups, with forty-five people at this settlement and two more settlements elsewhere on the planet. Apparently they thought that arrangement would give each group a better chance for growth, since if some disaster struck one group the other two would probably still be alright.

“Omicron is an ideal agricultural planet,” he says. “We determined not to suffer the fate of the expeditions that went before us.” It’s rather vague what expeditions he’s referring to here, since at no other point in the episode are any previous attempts at settling Omicron Ceti 3 mentioned. But given that Sandoval specifically mentions the possibility of disease afflicting one group as a reason to split up, and Spock earlier said that Bertold rays were a recent discovery—and that the colonists knew coming to Omicron Ceti 3 was risky-- it seems possible that previous groups tried to settle the planet and, without knowing about the Bertold rays, mistook their effects for some kind of disease native to the planet. Of course that doesn’t explain why this group of colonists decided it would be a good idea to try to settle here again anyway, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned over the past few months, it’s that not everyone sees the possibility of dying to a terrible disease as a compelling reason to change their plans in any way.

As they stand in the farmhouse talking about this, a woman steps forward from another room in the house. She’s in soft focus, just in case we might forget she’s a woman, and instead of the green jumpsuit all the male colonists are wearing, she’s wearing green overalls over a lavender shirt, a combination that somehow manages to be an even worse fashion disaster than the jumpsuits themselves. She starts to say something to Sandoval, then stops in surprise as she sees the landing party. But for once the romance-o-vision isn’t for Kirk—it’s Spock that the camera zooms in on as the woman stares at him.

“Layla, come meet our guests,” Sandoval says cheerfully, oblivious to the wistfully romantic background music. He introduces her as Layla Colomi, their botanist. Layla says that she and Spock have met before, but “It’s been a long time.” Kirk gives Spock a bit of a side-eye for that, but Spock offers no details.

Well, all romantic tension aside, they do still have a mission to attend to here, as Kirk reminds Sandoval. Sandoval tells them to go ahead with any examinations or tests they want. “I think you’ll find our settlement an interesting one. Our philosophy is a simple one: that men should return to a less complicated life. We have few mechanical things here, no vehicles, no weapons. We have harmony here. Complete peace.” Oh yeah, that bodes well. Remember the last place we saw complete harmony and peace? At least that explains why everyone on this farm is using equipment straight out of Stardew Valley, which is presumably not the most advanced agricultural technology available by the twenty-third century. I’m not sure why Sandoval’s idea of a simpler lifestyle excludes vehicles, though. They’re not exactly the most recent thing on the timeline of human technological advancements.

Sandoval tells the landing party to make themselves at home, and they all head off. All except for Spock, who lingers just a few seconds more to give Layla a completely neutral look before walking away as well.

Everyone goes off to conduct their respective investigations. Sulu and Kelowitz wander through a yard over towards another farm building. Kelowitz isn’t sure what exactly they should be looking for, though. “Whatever doesn’t look right—whatever that is,” Sulu replies, climbing up to sit on a railing on the building’s porch. “When it comes to farms, I wouldn’t know what looked right or wrong if it were two feet from me.” I hope you enjoyed that line, because ��didn’t grow up on a farm” is about all the backstory TOS is going to give us for Sulu until the movies.

[ID: Three screenshots showing Sulu pulling himself up to sit on the railing of an old-fashioned farmhouse as he says, "When it comes to farms, I wouldn't know what looked right or wrong if it were two feet from me." Growing up from the ground nearby are two large plants with thick brownish-purple stems and large pink flowers on top.]

Hey Sulu, what's that about two feet from you? Oh well, I'm sure it's not important.

Kelowitz opens up a nearby barn and notes that there’s no cows there—in fact, the barn isn’t even built for cows, just for storage, and indeed it only looks big enough to be useful for holding cow, singular. Having a storage barn isn’t itself that weird, although the fact that there is nothing currently stored in the storage barn is a bit strange. But also, as Sulu points out, come to think of it, they haven’t seen any animals here, native or imported. No cows, no horses, no pigs, not even a dog. Which is a bit odd for an agricultural colony. They must have had or expected to have animals at some point—otherwise what was pulling that cart?

Back in the house, Sandoval is asking Layla about Spock (once again referred to as a ‘Vulcanian’). She says that she knew Spock on Earth, six years ago. Sandoval, apparently having noticed the dreamy background music by now, asks if Layla loved Spock. She says that if she did, “it was important only to myself...Mr. Spock’s feelings were never expressed to me. It is said he has none to give.”

“Would you like him to stay with us now? To be one of us?” Sandoval asks. Layla smiles at him. “There is no choice, Elias,” she says. “He will stay.”

Elsewhere in the house, McCoy is scanning a colonist. He doesn’t look exactly happy with the tricorder result he gets, but all he says is, “That’ll be all, thank you very much,” and the colonist leaves, passing Kirk coming in. Incidentally, I can’t help but note that this room contains two paintings on the wall and what appears to be a cabinet full of china. I suppose the paintings could have been done by a colonist, but the china could surely only have been brought there. Who decided to pack fancy china on a year-long space voyage to an agricultural colony?

[ID: A shot of the interior of a farmhouse with blue walls, with a large wooden table in the middle of the room, a cabinet with china and glassware in the corner, a wooden desk with a copper tea kettle and some other kitchen items on it against the back wall, and a painting hanging on the wall showing some blurry trees. Sandoval, a middle-aged white man with short brown hair wearing a green jumpsuit, walks past the camera as he says, "Oh, captain, I've been looking for you."]

Kirk asks if McCoy’s found anything yet. McCoy replies that he’s surveyed nine men so far, ranging in age from twenty-three to fifty-nine. And they’re all in perfect condition. Not just healthy—perfect. Textbook responses across the board, from all of them. “If there are many more of them,” McCoy muses, “I can throw away my shingle.”

At that point Kirk’s communicator goes off. It’s Spock, calling in from one of the crop fields. He’s made the same observation as Sulu—there’s no life on the planet aside from the colonists and the plants. No animals, no insects. Spock doesn’t have any explanation yet, so Kirk tells him to carry on with his investigation and hangs up.

McCoy notes the absence of animals as peculiar, and Kirk says it’s especially so because the expedition records show that they did bring animals with them to raise for food. And pull their carts, presumably. But it seems none of them are still around. McCoy says he’d like to see the expedition’s medical records, a request Kirk has apparently anticipated because he’s got the floppy disc on hand with him.

Sandoval comes in and says that he’d like to take the two of them on a tour of the fields, to show off what the colony’s accomplished. McCoy says he’ll have to bow out, since he’s still working on the medical examinations. “However, if I find everyone else’s health to be as perfect as yours...”

“You’ll find no weaklings here,” Sandoval says, which uh, sure is a hell of a way to phrase that. “No weaklings! None of those miserable, pathetic sods with imperfect health! Only the strong survive! THE SLIGHTEST BLEMISH SHALL BE CAUSE FOR EXILE!”

Leaving McCoy behind, Kirk and Sandoval head out to the fields, where Sandoval gushes to Kirk about how great this place is: they’ve got moderate climate, moderate rains all year round, and the soil will grow anything they stick in it. Which is pretty miraculous, considering there’s no such thing as growing conditions that are perfect for every plant. But as we’re about to see, that’s not the only weird thing going on with their farming practices.

The conversation is interrupted by DeSalle arriving to give Kirk the biology report. Sandoval excuses himself to attend to work elsewhere, leaving Kirk and DeSalle alone to discuss the report. At first, it seems to be just as Sandoval said: they’ve got a variety of crops growing here successfully. The weird thing is that they don’t actually have very many of those crops. There’s enough to keep the colony going at the size it currently is, but barely more than that. Which tracks with what we’ve seen of the place so far: a couple of tiny fields that look more about the size for someone’s backyard garden than for a prosperous farm, tended by the occasional person idly scratching at the ground with a hoe. For a supposedly bounteous agricultural colony, that’s pretty weird. What have they been doing all this time?

“It’s like a jigsaw puzzle all one color,” Kirk muses, taking a moment to stroll a few steps away so he can say this dramatically in the distance instead of actually talking to DeSalle. “No key to where the pieces fit in. Why?”

Kirk’s communicator goes off. It’s McCoy, saying Kirk had better get back over there. “Trouble?” “No, but I’d like you to see this for yourself.” Of course. No one can ever just explain something over the phone, can they.

So Kirk heads back to the house, where the thing that Kirk just absolutely has to see for himself turns out to be McCoy just telling him what he’s found out, but he definitely couldn't do that over the communicator for, uh, reasons. What he’s found out is pretty interesting, though: McCoy checked up on Sandoval’s medical records from right before the colonists had left, which said that Sandoval had had an appendectomy, and had scar tissue on his lungs from childhood pneumonia (the weakling!). Yet when McCoy scanned Sandoval himself today, the results came back just as perfect as all the other colonists’. Kirk’s first thought is instrument failure, but McCoy says no, he thought of that and tested it by scanning himself, and it recorded him just fine, down to “those two broken ribs I had once.” Which sounds like an interesting story. But Sandoval’s scan? No scar tissue, and one healthy appendix. That’s right, Sandoval’s apparently managed to regrow an entire organ. Do you think you would notice that happening? Like, would it itch?

While Kirk and McCoy try to figure that out, Spock is hanging out in a field scanning with his own tricorder, while Layla stands nearby smiling ominously at him. Spock muses that there’s “Nothing. Not even insects. Yet your plants grow, and you’ve survived exposure to Bertold rays.” Yeah, how are those plants growing without insects? Presumably the native plants have evolved some way around that, but the ones the colonists have brought from Earth would need some help. Are the colonists just manually pollinating everything? Maybe that’s why they haven’t grown very much.

Layla says this can be explained, but when asked to do so, she just says, “Later.” Spock looks annoyed and remarks, “I have never understood the female capacity to avoid a direct answer to any question.” Hey! Cut that bullshit out. No one on this colony has directly answered a question since you got here, there’s no call to go ragging on a whole gender for it. Besides, just saying “Later,” is hardly a stunningly deft diversion, it’s not like she threw a smoke bomb down and disappeared.

“And I never understood you,” Layla says, walking over and placing a hand on his chest. “Until now. There was always a place in here where no one could come. There was only the face you allow people to see. Only one side you’d allow them to know.”

[ID: Three screenshots of Spock and Layla, a white woman with a lot of long blonde hair wearing a lilac shirt and green overalls, standing outside in a field with a large tree in the background. Layla, seen from behind, is pressing her hand to Spock's upper chest and saying, "There was always a place in here where no one could come." Spock replies "you know that's not where my heart is right".]

If Layla was hoping this little speech would prompt Spock to cry out that yes, she’s figured him out, he does love her but has never been able to show it! she’s disappointed, because he just looks uncomfortable and steps away. He tries to steer the conversation back onto the mystery of the colonists. “If I tell you how we survive,” she asks, “will you try to understand how we feel about our life here? About each other?”

That’s a pretty vague thing to make a promise about, so Spock deflects by saying that emotions are alien to him; he’s a SCIENTIST. “Someone else might believe that—your shipmates, your captain—but not me,” Layla says. Oh sure! Obviously none of the people who have lived, worked, and risked death alongside Spock can be expected to know anything about Spock. Only you are the Spock Expert, gifted with incredible insight by virtue of having a crush on him.

“Come,” she says, sauntering off through the field with her hand outstretched to him. Spock rather pointedly folds his hands behind his back instead and follows her.

Back in the house, Kirk and McCoy are struggling to have a conversation with Sandoval. Kirk tells Sandoval that he’s received orders from Starfleet Command to evacuate everyone on the colony, since, y’know, deadly rays and all that. He expects Sandoval to start making preparations. But Sandoval, calmly, casually, says, “No.” It’s not necessary, he insists—they’re in no danger.

But...but the Bertold rays. Sandoval is unmoved, pointing out that as McCoy’s own instruments show, the colonists are in perfect health and there have been no deaths. Okay, what about all those animals? What happened to them? “We’re vegetarians,” Sandoval says blithely. Which, as Kirk points out, does absolutely nothing to answer the question. Actually it raises further questions.

Sandoval remains thoroughly unbothered and thoroughly unhelpful. “Captain, you stress very unimportant matters. We will not leave,” he says, and goes back to gazing out the window, evidently considering the conversation over.

Elsewhere, Spock and Layla are still walking, and Spock is getting annoyed that Layla still hasn’t explained just what it is they’re going to see. “Its basic properties and elements are not important,” Layla says helpfully. “What is important is that it gives life, peace, love.” Oh boy.

Spock is dubious, but Layla pulls him forward, over towards another one of those large pink flowers. “I was one of the first to find them,” Layla says. “The spores.”

[ID: A gif of Spock approaching a large pinkish-purple flower and saying, "Spores?" The flower then sprays a cloud of white spores all over his face and torso while Spock recoils.]

For a moment Spock just looks startled, but then he starts clutching his head and falling onto his knees in the grass, dropping his tricorder and gasping, “No--” For the first time all episode, Layla’s absolute serenity starts to fracture slightly. Over Spock’s agonized protests, she insists that it shouldn’t hurt—it didn’t hurt any of them. But, as Spock gasps out, he’s not like them. Whoops, did the biologist forget to account for biological differences before handing out a facefull of spores? I bet you didn’t even check if he had any allergies first, did you?

Just as it’s looking like this might put actually put a crack in Layla’s blissed-out impassivity, Spock stops thrashing about and starts seeming less anguished and more confused. Layla’s concern vanishes once again, and she goes back to smiling happily while stroking his face. “Now...now you belong to all of us...and we to you. There’s no need to hide your inner face any longer. We understand.”

Spock still seems unsure, but then he takes Layla’s hand in his and smiles. Not the slight hint of a smile or sardonic quirk of the lips you’d expect to see from Spock, but a huge, broad grin from ear to ear. “I love you...I can love you,” he says, and then he kisses her.

Hoo boy.

After the break, we get a quick Captain’s Log to recap:

“Captain’s Log, supplemental. We have been ordered by Starfleet Command to evacuate the colony on Omicron 3. However, the colony leader, Elias Sandoval, has refused all cooperation and will not listen to any arguments.”

Sure enough, we see Sandoval exiting the farmhouse, followed by McCoy and an extremely frustrated Kirk. “Captain, your arguments are very valid, but do they not apply to us,” Sandoval says, as calm as ever. He tries to walk off, but Kirk grabs his arm and pulls him back.

“My orders are to remove all the colonists,” he says, “and that’s exactly what I intend to do with or without your help.”

“Without, I should think,” Sandoval says, and strolls off, leaving Kirk standing there fuming.

Sulu and Kelowitz come walking up to report that they’ve checked out everything and it all seems normal, except for the missing animals. Of course, they also both said they had no idea what to look for in the first place, so maybe take that with a grain of salt. Kirk tells them about the evacuation orders, and says he wants landing parties to start gathering the colonists and preparing them to leave. And by the way, where did Spock and DeSalle go? Sulu says they haven’t seen either one in some time, but McCoy says DeSalle was going to examine some native plants he found. Native plants, huh? I think we can guess what happened to DeSalle.

Since Spock still hasn’t reported in, Kirk gives him a call. Or tries to, at least—Spock doesn’t pick up. On the other end of the line, we see why that is: Spock's communicator is laying abandoned on the ground, while Spock himself, now dressed in the same horrible green jumpsuit as the colonists, is stretched out on the grass with Layla, watching clouds. The communicator beeps away while Spock happily describes how one of the clouds looks like a dragon. "I've never seen a dragon," Layla says. BEEP BEEP. "I have." BEEP BEEP. "On Barengarius 7." BEEP BEEP. "But I've never stopped to look at clouds before." BEEP BEEP. "Or rainbows." BEEP BEEP. "You know, I can tell you exactly why one appears in the sky, but considering its beauty has always been out of the question." BEEP BEEP.

"Not here," Layla says (beep beep), and they smile dreamily at each other before going into another makeout session. Meanwhile, Kirk is still on the line, and not getting any happier about it. Layla finally picks up the communicator and holds it up for Spock, who takes a break from kissin' to say, "Yes, what did you want?"

Naturally, this throws both Kirk and McCoy for a loop. While McCoy stands there with a "what the fuck" look on his face, Kirk takes a moment to recover and then demands, "Spock, is that you?"

"Yes, captain, what did you want?"

"Where are you?"

"...I don't believe I want to tell you."

[ID: Three shots of Kirk and McCoy standing in front of the farmhouse, Kirk holding his communicator while McCoy looks on. Kirk has a stunned expression on his face and looks around with his mouth open, trying to figure out what to say.]

Kirk plows on ahead, telling Spock that, whatever the hell he thinks he's doing, he's got orders: they're getting the colonists out, and Spock is to meet back at the settlement in ten minutes.

"No, I don't think so," Spock says casually. "You don't think so, what?" "I don't think so, sir."

Kirk has to take a moment after that one. It's rather amazing that McCoy's made it this far into the conversation without saying anything himself. Presumably he's just in shock. Eventually Kirk tells Spock to report in immediately, but by now Spock and Layla have gone back to kissing, leaving the communicator open but abandoned in the grass once more.

"That didn't sound at all like Spock, Jim," McCoy says, putting in his bid for the Enterprise’s bi-weekly Massive Understatement contest.

"No, it--I thought you said you might like him if he mellowed a little."

"I didn't say that!"

"You said that."

"Not exactly,” McCoy protests, and then somewhat grudgingly adds, “He might be in trouble.”

I'm sure McCoy did say that, or something like it, but "I hope Spock has his brain taken over by alien spores" was presumably not where he was going with it. He obviously sees this sudden change of behavior as something to be concerned about--even moreso than Kirk, who seems more irritated than anything. But then, it's only been a couple episodes since McCoy had his own run-in with an alien influence making people act a lot more mellow than usual, and he didn't enjoy that experience at all, so it's not surprising that "trouble" is his first thought here.

Kirk tells McCoy to take over the landing party detail and start getting the colonists up to the ship, and to make sure the party works in teams of two, with nobody being left alone. Meanwhile, Kirk himself takes Sulu and Kelowitz and heads off to find Spock, using the open frequency from Spock's communicator as a homing signal. They follow a dirt path out of the main settlement and soon find said communicator, laying open and abandoned in the grass just off the path. As Kirk picks it up, they hear laughter nearby, and Sulu points in astonishment further down the path, where Layla is watching Spock dangle upside-down from a tree branch like a kid on a jungle gym.

[ID: A shot of Spock and Layla among some trees at the end of a dirt path. Layla is standing on the ground and holding hands with Spock, who is hanging upside-down by his knees from a large tree branch, laughing.]

For a moment all Kirk can do is stare weakly at this weird spectacle. Then he collects himself with a stern AHEM and marches over like a principal about to deliver some very serious detention.

Meanwhile, back at the main hub of the colony, the landing party seems to have gotten well underway with preparations for departure, with several colonists and crewmen piling up luggage and equipment in the middle of a field while McCoy stands nearby overseeing everything, a job I’m sure he’s enjoying since we all know administrative work is McCoy’s favorite thing. Then DeSalle arrives, carrying a couple of the spore flowers and tells McCoy to take “a good, close look” at them, because they’re very interesting. McCoy steps forward to check them out right before the scene cuts away again, leaving us with little doubt as to what’s about to happen next.

During that little interim, Kirk and his crew have made it over to where Spock and Layla are cavorting. Spock just grins happily at Kirk, clearly not bothered one bit, even as Kirk asks if Spock’s out of his mind. He didn’t report to Kirk, he says, because...he didn’t want to.

Kirk glances back and forth between Spock and Layla, who’s standing there smiling rather smugly, and tells Layla that she’ll need to come get ready to evacuate with the rest of the colonists. Spock cheerfully says that there’s not going to be any evacuation. “But perhaps,” he adds, “we should go and get you straightened out.”

That really doesn’t bode well, but rather than ask just what Spock means by that, Kirk tells Sulu that Spock is under arrest in Sulu’s custody until they get back to the ship. Which will certainly work out well because it’s not like Spock is strong enough to chuck Sulu all the way across the field barehanded or anything. Not that Spock seems especially perturbed about being under arrest; instead he just shrugs, drops down from the tree, and says, “Very well. Come with me,” before heading off across the field, leaving else to follow in confusion. That’s how you arrest someone, right?

Of course, Spock leads them right to another group of spore flowers, which the group stops and stares at obligingly for a moment. Then the flowers explode a bunch of spores at them. Somehow, even though he’s standing right next to Sulu and Kelowitz, Kirk manages to totally avoid getting any spores up his sinuses, while the other two are immediately affected. “Yes...I see now,” Sulu says blissfully, with that trademark Very High grin that George Takei does so well. “Of course we can’t remove the colony. It’d be wrong.”

Kirk grabs him by the shoulders—Kirk’s go-to method for snapping people out of it--but when this somehow fails to bring Sulu back to his right mind, all Kirk can do is say that he doesn’t know what these plants are or how they work, but “you’re all going back to the settlement with me, and those colonists are going aboard the ship.” This stern proclamation has absolutely no effect on anyone. The whole group just stands there happily watching Kirk stomp back toward the colony. “I can see the captain is going to be difficult,” Spock remarks.

Kirk’s day isn’t about to get any better, because upon making it back to the colony he’s greeted by McCoy, who we can immediately tell is under the influence as well because his accent is absolutely out of control. It’s so thick even the subtitles pick up on it.

[ID: A screenshot of McCoy walking through a meadow with his communicator out, saying, "Sho’nuf."]

“Hiya, Jimmy boy!” McCoy very happily says to a very unhappy Kirk. “Hey, I’ve taken care of everything. Now all y’all gotta do is just relax. Doctor’s orders!” With a very resigned look, Kirk asks how many plants McCoy’s beamed up to the ship, and McCoy says it must be going on a hundred by now.

So Kirk beams up to the ship and heads right to the bridge, where he tells Uhura to put him through to Admiral Komak at Starfleet, though what he expects Komak to do about all this I don't know. But it’s too late. Uhura turns around to show that she’s smiling as happily as everyone else, and says, “Oh, I’m sorry Dave, I mean, captain. I can’t do that.” She’s short-circuited all the ship’s communications, except for ship-to-surface, since they’ll need that for a little while yet. Then she leaves, pausing in the door of the lift to tell Kirk that it’s really all for the best.

Kirk stands there seething for a moment, then stomps over to grab a plant that’s been left in Spock’s chair. He throws it across the bridge, and the camera lingers ominously on it as Kirk heads back into the lift.

Things aren’t any better on the rest of the ship. Kirk soon finds a long line of crewmembers of all different shirt colors, patiently waiting to transport down to join the colony. Out of what I can only assume is some desperate futile hope that someone will follow his orders if he just keeps trying, Kirk orders them all to go back to their stations at once. Unsurprisingly, they all ignore him. Kirk points out to one of the redshirts that this is MUTINY! but it doesn't get him very far.

[ID: A gif showing a young white man with brown hair wearing a redshirt as he says, "Yes, sir, it is." The camera then zooms in very dramatically on Kirk's stunned face.]

So...they’re all going down to join the colony? All four hundred thirty of them? Or four hundred twenty-nine, I guess, if Kirk refuses to join the fun. That’s almost ten times the amount of people the colony currently has in it. That seems like it could present a bit of a problem, because if you’ll recall DeSalle told Kirk earlier that right now the colony’s growing enough food to feed their current population, with little left over. How are they going to handle such a large and sudden influx into their population? Do they have housing for all these people? Or are they just all going to eat dirt and sleep on the ground because they’re all too high to notice anyway?

After we’ve had a commercial break to contemplate this shocking turn of events, Kirk takes some time out to give vent to his feelings in a captain’s log:

"Captain's Log, Stardate 3417.5. The pod plants have spread spores throughout the ship, carried by the ventilation system. Under their influence, my crew is deserting to join the Omicron colony, and I can't stop them. I don't know why I have not been infected, nor can I get Doctor McCoy to explain the physical, psychological aspects of the infection."

And indeed, just in case we had any doubt, we then see McCoy strolling through the field and happily telling Kirk, “I’m not interested in any physical, psychological aspects, Jim-boy. We all perfectly healthy down here.” Kirk grumbles about how much he’s been hearing about things being perfect lately. “I bet you’ve even grown your tonsils back.” “Sho’nuf!”

Kirk tries desperately to get McCoy to do something to figure these spores out—run a blood test, take a scan, type the symptoms into WebMD, something, anything—but McCoy is more interested in rambling on about mint juleps. Meanwhile, back in the farmhouse, Sandoval’s having tea with Spock while they talk about how nearly everyone’s beamed down from the ship and things are “proceeding quite well.” Kirk storms in and demands to know where McCoy’s gotten to, and Spock says he went off to make that mint julep. Which could prove quite difficult unless this tiny half-assed farm colony has somehow managed to set up a working distillery around here somewhere, but Kirk’s got bigger concerns right now than where McCoy’s going to get his bourbon.

Sandoval wants to know why Kirk won’t join them in their private, spore-sponsored paradise. Kirk asks where these spores came from, anyway, and Spock exposits that there’s no way to know—they just drifted through space until they arrived at this planet, which is perfect for them because it turns out they actually thrive on Bertold rays. The plants act as a repository for the spores until they can find a human—or half-Vulcan—body to inhabit. No explanation is forthcoming as to how Spock knows any of this.

Spock and Sandoval insist that the planet is “a true Eden” with belonging and love and no needs or wants for anyone, but Kirk is skeptical. “No wants, no needs. We weren’t meant for that. None of us. Man stagnates if he has no ambition, no desire to be more than he is.” Of all the things wrong with this situation I’m not sure “BEING TOO HAPPY IS BAD FOR YOU” is the take I would go with, but okay. Spock says that Kirk doesn’t understand, but he’ll come around...sooner or later.

Kirk, disgusted with this whole conversation, goes back to the ship. The bridge is dark, silent, and utterly empty. We get a slow pan of the blinking lights and displays of the consoles, with no one left to man them. Kirk walks over to his chair, hits the intercom, and starts calling one part of the ship after another, with no response from any of them. With nothing else left to do, he sits down in his chair and starts glumly recording a captain’s log so angsty it could be a LiveJournal entry:

"Captain's Log, Stardate 3417.7. Except for myself, all crew personnel have transported to the surface of the planet. Mutinied. Lieutenant Uhura has effectively sabotaged the communications station. I can only contact the surface of the planet. The ship...can be maintained in orbit for several months, but even with automatic controls, I cannot pilot her alone. In effect, I am marooned here. I'm beginning to realize...just how big this ship really is, how quiet. I don't know how to get my crew back, how to counteract the effect of the spores. I don't know what I can offer against...paradise."

Hold on hold on HOLD ON what do you MEAN the ship can be maintained in orbit for several months? Every time someone takes their hands off the controls for five seconds we get told that the orbit is decaying and they’re gonna plummet into some hapless planet within a few hours at most but now all of a sudden it’s fine to hang out up there for several months? MAKE UP YOUR MIND.

Kirk gets up to go sit at the helm, just to get a change of scenery mid-mope, and as he finishes his log/rant the camera slowly pans down to reveal the spore flower that he chucked across the bridge earlier. Which is weird because we just got a wide shot of the bridge and that flower definitely wasn’t there then.

[ID: Two shots. The first is a wide shot showing Kirk alone on the empty, darkened bridge, preparing to sit down at the helm. There is nothing in on the floor in front of the helm. The second shot is a closer shot of Kirk sitting at the helm with his chin in one hand, now with a large spore flower poking up in the front of shot.]

The flower promptly shoots Kirk in the face, and for a moment he just continues to sit there with spores in his hair and a “yeah, this might as well happen” expression. But then he slowly starts to smile, suddenly as happy as everyone else. Exactly why Kirk’s been unaffected by the spores up until now, even after hanging out for quite a while on a ship that’s supposedly been thoroughly contaminated by them, is never really explained. Maybe he's just on a lot of Zyrtec. But it seems even Kirk’s determination to not be happy can’t hold out against a point-blank spray in the face. He calls Spock to say that he finally understands now, which Spock is happy to hear. Kirk says he’ll be down just as soon as he packs up a few things, so Spock says he and Layla will wait for him at the beamdown point.

So Kirk goes off to his quarters to pack up a suitcase, the contents of which seem to mostly consist of uniform shirts. Apparently paradise for Kirk does not include one of those green jumpsuits, which, really, who can blame him. He opens a small vault by his bed and pulls out a couple of black cases, one of which he opens to reveal a medal. This seems to stir some sense of conflict because he sits down and stares at it for a long moment, but then puts it aside and heads to the transporter room, where he puts the suitcase on the platform and then prepares to set the controls.

But then Kirk hesitates, and stands there for a moment looking conflicted. Possibly he’s still having feelings about those medals, or maybe he’s having second thoughts about whether he packed enough shirts. In any case, he eventually exclaims, “No...No! I...can’t...LEAVE!” Then he punches the console for good measure.

Apparently this little emotional outburst is all it takes to cure the spores, because Kirk gasps a little, looks momentarily confused, and then seems to be back to his old self. “Emotions...violent emotions. Needs...anger,” he tells the empty room. “Captain’s log, supplemental. I think I’ve discovered the answer...but to carry out my plan entails considerable risk. Mr. Spock is much stronger than the ordinary human being.” Then he treats us to this remarkable line:

[ID: A shot of Kirk in profile at the transporter controls as he says, "Aroused, his great physical strength could kill."]

Down on the planet, Spock and Layla are still waiting at the beamdown point when Kirk calls Spock up and says he’s realized there’s some equipment on the ship that they’ll need for the colony, and he needs Spock’s help to get it all beamed down. Really, you’d think there’d be quite a lot of equipment on the Enterprise that a farming colony could make good use of, but I guess they’re really determined to stick to the whole no-technology approach. Despite this, Spock cheerfully accepts the explanation, gives Layla a quick smooch, and beams up.

But upon materializing, Spock is greeted not with a smiling Kirk ready to go move some equipment with his bro, but Kirk standing there holding some nonspecific heavy metal rod thing that he’s smacking threatening against his hand. “All right, you mutinous, disloyal, computerized half-breed,” he says, “we’ll see about you deserting my ship.”

Spock reacts to this bar-brawl-starter with nothing more than a nonplussed expression and polite correcting Kirk on his syntax. Kirk, determination unshaken, continues laying into him with a stream of insults that would have made that fucker from Balance of Terror go, “Whoa, hold on there a minute.” Undeterred by not being able to use any actual expletives, he compares Spock both to a machine and to various fairy-tale creatures, makes fun of his ears, and rounds it all off by having a go at the entire Vulcan race. He even insults Spock’s parents.

[ID: 1. A shot of Spock standing in the transporter room looking perplexed as Kirk, off-camera, says, "Whose father was a computer and his mother an encyclopedia?" 2. A gif from Monty Python and the Holy Grail of John Cleese as the French knight on the battlements yelling, "Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!"]

Spock stands there taking it all stoically for quite a while, even as the background music gets increasingly tense. He finally starts to crack when Kirk goes after Spock’s relationship with Layla, and when Kirk keeps going despite Spock angrily telling him, “That’s enough,” Spock finally flips out big time. You know what that means, it’s time for a STAR TREK FIGHT SCENE! This one’s got it all: close-up shots of the actors intercut with long shots of very obvious stunt doubles; cardboard props getting punched; even people picking up random unidentifiable bits of starship equipment that may or may not have ever been there before to use as weapons. The only thing we’re missing is Kirk doing some kind of weird wrestling move.

[ID: Three gifs showing a fight scene between Kirk and Spock. First we see a long shot where Kirk and Spock are clearly being played by stunt doubles, as Spock punches a metal rod Kirk is holding, bending it in half. He then punches Kirk in the jaw, sending him careening into the wall. Then a close-up of Nimoy and Shatner as Spock advances on Kirk and throws a punch but misses, denting the control panel in the wall behind Kirk. Kirk dodges out of the way towards the console, and Spock throws another punch that hits the side of the console. Then back to a long view with the stunt doubles as Spock throws Kirk into the opposite wall, which Kirk careens off of, falling on his back on the floor, while Spock picks up something resembling a square metal stool or stepladder and raises it over his head. Finally, we see Nimoy and Shatner again as Kirk lays on the floor looking up at Spock, raising the thing he's carrying over his head.]

We dramatically cut to black as Spock stands poised above Kirk, raising whatever-the-hell-that-thing-is over his head threateningly. Apparently the ad break gives him enough time to cool down, though, because instead of bringing the thing down on Kirk’s skull, he hesitates.

“Had enough?” Kirk asks. “I didn’t realize what it took to get under that thick hide of yours.”

Spock slowly lowers the thing, looking a bit regretful about having to do so. Kirk says he doesn’t know what Spock’s so mad about, anyway. “It isn’t every first officer who gets to belt his captain...several times.” Dude, you just stood there and unleashed a screed of personal and racial insults at your best friend here. A “sorry” probably wouldn’t go amiss here.

“You did that to me deliberately,” Spock realizes, and then realizes that the spores are gone. “I don’t belong anymore.” Kirk explains that since the spores are “benevolent and peaceful,” violent emotions overwhelm and destroy them—that’s the answer. Which...definitely makes sense, chemically speaking. Sure.

Spock, still looking pretty glum about all this, points out that Kirk’s method might have worked out alright for curing one person, but they’ve got over five hundred infected people down there, and trying to pick a fight with all of them probably isn’t going to go so well. But no worries, Kirk’s got another plan. He wants Spock to rig up a subsonic transmitter that they can hook up to the ship’s communications system and then broadcast to all the communicators. Spock says he can do that, but hesitates as Kirk turns to leave. “Captain. Striking a fellow officer is a court martial offense,” he points out.

Kirk mulls over that one for a moment. “We-ll...if we’re both in the brig, who’s gonna build the subsonic transmitter?” he says, and Spock concedes the point. Besides, it’s a bit late to be worrying about striking fellow officers now.

[ID: A gif from The Naked Time of Kirk and Spock standing in an Enterprise conference room. Kirk slaps Spock across the face, and Spock retaliates by backhanding Kirk so hard he is thrown across the table in the center of the room and falls onto the floor on the other side.]

But what with the insults and the punching and de-sporing and everything, it seems that something has clean slipped Spock’s mind: Layla’s still down there waiting for him to come back. As she stands around the field, McCoy wanders over and asks what’s up. When she tells him that she’s been out here for some time now waiting for Spock and Kirk to come back, he gentlemanly offers to fix that for her and calls the ship. Spock picks up, and Layla asks if everything’s okay up there.

With obvious discomfort, Spock tells her that yes, he’s...quite well. Layla, oblivious to anything being wrong, asks if she can come up there, because she wants to talk to him, and besides, “I’ve never seen a starship before.” Wait a minute, never seen a starship before? You’re on a planetary colony! What, did you drive here?

Spock asks if she’s still at the beamdown point, and if McCoy’s there. Layla says yes to both, so Spock tells her to give the communicator back to McCoy, since she won’t need it to transport, and he’ll have her beamed up in a few minutes. One might think that at this point they might take this easy opportunity to also beam up McCoy and get him cured (it shouldn’t be hard, McCoy is already 85% comprised of negative emotions to begin with), so he can start investigating these spores, just in case Operation Go For the Eardrums doesn’t work. But they don’t. Kirk awkwardly asks Spock if he’s sure about talking to Layla while she’s still spore’d, but Spock just nods and heads to the transporter room.

He beams Layla up, and she happily runs over to give him a hug—they’ve been parted ever so long, after all—but when he just stands there stiffly, not reacting at all, she slowly pulls back and says, “You’re no longer with us, are you?”

Spock says it was necessary. Layla begs him to come back to the planet and belong again, but he says he can’t. She starts crying and saying she loves him. "I said that six years ago, and I can't seem to stop repeating myself. On Earth, you couldn't give anything of yourself. You couldn't even put your arms around me. We couldn't have anything together there. We couldn't have anything together anyplace else. But we're happy here. I can't lose you now, Mr. Spock, I can't." Look, if the only time the relationship you want can possibly work out is when the other person is being mind-controlled by alien spores, I think it may be time to consider whether this is really a relationship you should be pursuing in the first place.

“I have a responsibility to this ship...to that man on the bridge,” Spock gently tells her. “I am what I am, Layla. And if there are self-made purgatories, then we all have to live in them. Mine can be no worse than someone else’s.”

Layla soon realizes that all this anguish has resulted in her getting de-spore’d as well, and she’s not happy about it. “And this is for my own good?” she demands angrily. Well...yes, I mean, it is, but Spock doesn’t say that. Nor does he respond when she asks, “Do you mind if I say I still love you?” but she hugs him again anyway.

[ID: Layla tearfully embraces Spock and says, "You never told me if you had another name, Mr. Spock." Spock replies, "You couldn't pronounce it."]

ROMANCE

We’re obviously supposed to read this little story arc as the tragic tale of true love destined never to be, because Spock is only able to express his feelings for Layla under the influence of the spores. He has experienced paradise, but alas, he cannot linger there, and so on. It’s never set all that well with me, though. The problem is we never really get Spock’s side of the story and so it leaves open the question of how much he actually did want this relationship in the first place. Layla said earlier that “Mr. Spock’s feelings were never expressed to me” so evidently he never outright said “I love you but I can’t be with you” or anything of that sort to her. When they’re alone in the field before Spock gets spore’d he seems stiff, standoffish, awkward, and deflects all of her overtures with what appears to be discomfort, even annoyance. He clearly has no interest in talking about whatever history they had together, even when they’re all alone. For all that Layla goes on about how she can see a side of Spock that his crewmates don’t, we see interactions with those crewmates multiple times throughout the show that prove that Spock is perfectly capable of showing people that he cares about them, even if the ways he does it are usually a bit atypical. We don’t see any of that in his initial interactions with Layla.

If we accept the premise that the spores only make people act as they would if they had no inhibitions or fears holding them back, then yes, Spock saying he loves Layla after he’s been spore’d would indicate that he did secretly love her all along. The problem is that we know the spores make people do things that they would not ordinarily want to do. You think all of those four hundred thirty people on the Enterprise secretly longed for a quiet life among the soil but all chose to instead join the space navy for some reason? Should we believe Scotty is actually deep down perfectly okay with abandoning his beloved ship to a slowly decaying orbit? I doubt that Kirk has always harbored a subconscious desire to give up exploring the final frontier to pursue a peaceful agrarian lifestyle, but he very nearly does do just that. So the question of how much a relationship with Layla is what Spock “really” wanted seems to be a bit hazy.

Mind, I’m not saying this makes Layla an evil person who deliberately drugged Spock so she could have a relationship with him or anything like that. It’s clear throughout the episode that the spores induce those who are infected by them to spread them around to anyone nearby who’s not in the spore fandom yet, so there’s no reason to believe Layla would act as she did if she wasn’t under the influence herself. I just personally find it hard to buy into the tragic romance of a star-crossed relationship when the thing crossing the stars is that one of the participants is only enthusiastic about the whole thing when they’re not fully sober. It makes me question how much of their previous relationship really was Spock having feelings for Layla but being unable to express them, versus Layla projecting a lot of feelings onto him and writing off his disinterest or discomfort as denial.

Kirk and Spock go back to working on the signal, while Layla deals with her heartbreak by disappearing into thin air for the rest of the episode. Spock says that the sound they’re going to send out is on a frequency that won’t be heard so much as felt, but apparently it will be felt quite emphatically. Kirk compares it to putting itching powder on someone. Which may seem like another silly technobabble deus ex machina, but speaking from personal experience, driving someone into a frantic frustrated fit by playing an obnoxious noise just on the edge of hearing sounds totally legit. All they need to complete the sensory overload meltdown experience is find a way to simulate some flickering florescent lights and put tags on the backs of the uniform shirts.

And indeed, as the device starts to work, we see Sulu and DeSalle working in one of the fields—for a certain value of ‘working,’ anyway, they’re kind of just digging around aimlessly—when Sulu accidentally elbows DeSalle in the back. He apologizes, but DeSalle shoves him back, and before long they’re having a full-on brawl right there in the field, which can't be good for the crops. As the device on the ship hums away, two more crewmembers start their own fight over by the farmhouse, and when a third tries to break them up he promptly gets dragged into it as well.

The effects haven’t quite reached everyone just yet, though, as we see McCoy chillaxing under a tree with some unspecified concoction. Sandoval strolls up and says that he’s been thinking about what sort of work he could assign McCoy to. When McCoy protests that he does one kind of work and that’s doctorin’, Sandoval says that he’s not a doctor anymore—they don’t need any doctors here.

This does not go over well.

[ID: A gif showing McCoy reclining against a tree in a grassy meadow, a stalk of grass in one hand and a grass of something brown with several leafy stalks in it. Sandoval is standing over him. McCoy says, "Oh, no?" and then slowly stands up, tosses his grass stalk aside, looks Sandoval in the eye and says, "Would you like to see just how fast I can put you in a hospital?"]

Undeterred, Sandoval says that he’s the leader and he’ll be assigning McCoy whatever work he wants to, but when he tries to walk away McCoy pulls him back and snarls, “You’d better make me a mechanic. Then I can treat little tin gods like you.” Sandoval throws a punch at him, but McCoy dodges and whacks Sandoval in the stomach, putting him out flat on the ground. See, I told you it wouldn’t be hard to cure McCoy. Everyone else on the Enterprise was perfectly happy to give up their careers to go do a bit of light farming, but tell McCoy he can’t be a doctor anymore and no amount of spores are going to save you.

While Sandoval is busy rolling around on the ground, McCoy stands there looking confused for a moment, then—presumably having only just now noticed that instead of a mint julep he’s actually been drinking a coke with a bunch of cilantro in it—throws his drink aside and admits that he’s not sure why he just clobbered Sandoval. But Sandoval has other concerns for the moment. With a look of dawning horror familiar to all us chronic procrastinators, he abruptly realizes that they haven’t actually been doing anything all this time. “No accomplishments, no progress. Three years wasted. We wanted to make this planet a garden...”

McCoy points out that the colonists really will have to leave—they can’t survive here without the spores handling all that radiation for them. But the dream’s not over; the colonists could be relocated to start again somewhere a bit less deadly, if that’s what they want.

“I think I’d...I think we’d like to get some work done,” Sandoval muses. “The work we set out to do.”

McCoy calls Spock and says that Sandoval wants to talk to Kirk. Spock notes to Kirk that the crew are all starting to rather sheepishly call in by now. Sandoval tells Kirk that the colonists will fully cooperate with the evacuation now, and Kirk tells him to start making the preparations. Real ones, this time.

Sometime later, everyone’s back on the bridge getting ready to head out. McCoy reports that he’s examined all the colonists and they all remain in perfect health. “A fringe benefit left over by the spores.”

One would think that this would have been quite the eventful afternoon for the medical sciences, given that they just discovered spores with such incredible healing powers that they can make people regrow organs, and McCoy just confirmed that anything healed by the spores stays healed after the spores are gone. Sure, they’ve got some side effects, but Kirk’s already discovered a simple way to get rid of the things once they’re no longer needed. Strap someone to a bed, give em a facemask full of spores, let them lay there for a while having a nice buzz while they heal their cancer or whatever, then play an irritating noise at them until they sneeze the spores back out again. Boom. Done. You’ve solved medicine. Or, y’know, we could vacate the planet and never speak of it ever again, that works too.

Notably unmentioned by anybody during this little denouement is the fate of the other two settlements on the planet that Sandoval mentioned back near the beginning of the episode. The length of the timeskip isn’t specified, so it’s possible that the crew went and collected them as well in the interim, but we never get any details as to how that little adventure went, assuming that it did happen and that the Enterprise isn’t about to get halfway to the next starbase before Kirk realizes he forgot something.

As they watch the planet diminish behind them on the viewscreen, McCoy muses that this was “the second time man’s been thrown out of paradise.” Kirk disagrees. "No, no, Bones, this time we walked out on our own. Maybe we weren't meant for paradise. Maybe we were meant to fight our way through--struggle, claw our way up, scratch for every inch of the way. Maybe we can't stroll to the music of the lute. We must march to the sound of drums."

Spock remains unimpressed by this bit of philosophizing. “Poetry, Captain. Nonregulation.” Kirk notes that they haven’t heard anything from Spock about this whole ordeal, since, y’know, that definitely seems like something Spock would want to talk about. He says he’s got little to say about Omicron Ceti 3.

[ID: A close-up of Spock on the bridge as he says, "Except that for the first time in my life...I was happy."]

oh my god someone needs therapy

On that INCREDIBLY CHEERFUL note, the Enterprise flies away and the episode ends.

It’s somewhat baffling to me that of all the quite reasonable objections available to the whole situation with the spores, the main problem that Kirk—and by extension, the episode—seems to have is that “the spores make things too EASY and mankind was meant to STRUGGLE!!!” I mean, effectively what we had going on here was people being drugged without their consent into a state that overwrote their own desires, ambitions, emotions and much of their individual personalities and replaced them with bland, happy conformity to a goal and lifestyle none of them actually chose. That seems a bit worse to me than “people weren’t working hard enough.” Kirk goes on and on about how the spores made things too easy, but what they really did was make people apathetic to whether they succeeded at anything or not. Sandoval’s horrified when he’s cured of the spores because the colonists had much different plans for their colony; far from making those plans easier, the spores made them impossible. The dreams and desires of the Enterprise crew for a life of exploration among the stars would have been forever unmet if they had permanently joined the colony, they just wouldn’t have been able to care. Kirk seems to believe that the ultimate evil of the spores is that they deprive people of ambition; to me it seems that the worse evil is that they deprive people of their individuality and their autonomy.

Then there’s the fact that while the spores make people happy and friendly, they also make them remarkably blasé about the well-being of anyone who isn’t part of their collective. They have to be—caring about whether someone else is upset or hurt would make them unhappy, after all. Spock and McCoy are completely unconcerned with the mounting distress of their best friend, and beyond peer pressuring him to get with the program and take the spores like everyone else, they don’t seem to much care if he remains the only unhappy person on the planet. The colonists seem completely unbothered by the fact that all the animals they brought with them died a rather grueling death by radiation poisoning. Everyone on the Enterprise is happy to abandon the ship and join the colony with no message left behind for Starfleet, with apparently not a thought to spare for any friends and family back home, who would only ever know that their loved ones disappeared into space never to be seen again.

Or at least, they would if things actually went according to plan, which they probably wouldn’t, because the spores also made everyone cheerfully oblivious to the idea that anything could potentially cause a problem or pose a threat to them. After all, if Kirk hadn’t had a recovery at the last minute, the Enterprise would have been left unmanned in orbit around the planet, with no way for anyone in the colony to get back onboard. Uhura also goes out of her way to make sure that they no longer have any off-planet communication. So it’s probably not going to be long before Starfleet notices that one of their prize starships has abruptly gone incommunicado, and I’m willing to bet they’d be a bit quicker on that investigation than they were about checking on a tiny backwater colony (although it is Starfleet, so who knows, really). And since they know exactly where the ship was headed on its last recorded mission, it probably won’t take them long to find it. If Starfleet sends another ship along to investigate quickly enough, they’ll find the abandoned Enterprise hanging out in orbit around the planet, and Kirk’s log clearly lays out what happened, so all the other ship has to do is figure out how to neutralize the spores and everyone’s going to get rescued from Omicron Ceti 3 pretty quickly whether they want to be or not.

If Starfleet doesn’t show up in time...Kirk says the ship can be “maintained in orbit” for several months, but then what? It can’t stay up there forever. Sooner or later, the orbit will decay and the ship’s going to crash into the planet, and if it crashes anywhere near one of the colonies, their magic healing powers are going to be put to the test. Also their magic agriculture powers--rich soil and mild weather is all well and good, but is that going to be enough to carry all those crops through the ensuing environmental effects of an impact that big? Especially since, as already mentioned, the colony has enough to feed them and that’s about it—so they really can’t afford to lose any crops for very long.

Sure, maybe the Enterprise wouldn’t crash close enough to any of the colonies to ruin them, but why take the risk? All they had to do was have a helmsman set it on a course out of orbit, then take a shuttlecraft back to the planet. Doesn’t occur to anyone, evidently. Nor do we see anyone bothering to bring any supplies or equipment from the ship to the colony, even though there’s gotta be lots of stuff up there that would be useful. All in all, it seems quite likely that Paradise would have eventually collapsed in on itself simply because the spores make people unable to pay attention to any potential threats or obstacles long enough to do anything about them.

So what’s the moral here? ‘Society can’t survive if everyone is stoned all of the time’? I mean, okay? Sure? Cool? Glad we sorted all that out.

That said, despite having ranted for the past nine hundred words about the weird moral, I’m not saying this episode is bad. As a serious point about human nature I don’t find it especially compelling—YMMV, but I just personally tend to side-eye stories that center around the idea of “wouldn’t it be awful if we all had it too easy??”--but as fifty minutes of extremely Star Trek-y silliness it’s glorious. We’ve got Spock hanging from a tree and talking about dragons while making out in the grass, McCoy going full Georgia and wandering about with something he thinks is a mint julep, Kirk stomping around in increasing agitation as he tries to get some sense out of somebody and then making emo log entries while he sits on the bridge alone...it’s great.

The original draft of this episode apparently had the romantic subplot be for Sulu, who would have been motivated to stay with Layla after having been diagnosed with a serious medical condition that was cured by the spores, kind of like the eventual plot with McCoy in For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky. D.C. Fontana rewrote the story to focus on Spock, since if you have an episode about something that causes a strong emotional reaction, throwing Spock and his ever-present internal conflict into the mix is kind of the most immediately obvious way to generate some pathos and drama. The spores originally granted those affected with them telepathic abilities, enabling them to link with everyone else who’d been spore’d and form a hivemind. There are some traces of this in the final episode with spore’d people talking about “joining us” and “being one of us” and so on, but without the telepathy part it just kind of makes it sound like they’re in a cult. Also, the cure for the spores would have been consuming alcohol, so presumably in that draft McCoy never got infected.

For the purposes of the Trek Tally I’m going to count the spores as a Space Disease, which might be broadening the umbrella of that term a bit but hey, close enough. Next time we’ll be looking for life, Jim, but not as we know it, in The Devil in the Dark.

#star trek #star trek TOS #star trek TOS season one #recap tag #star trek TOS recaps #1.24 This Side of Paradise #1.24 This Side of Paradise recap

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aion-rsa · 4 years ago

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X-Men: The Animated Series – The Worst of Charles Xavier

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Decades ago, in Uncanny X-Men #168, Kitty Pryde dared to say something bold yet true, “Charles Xavier is a jerk!” She was right, and the world has been better for it.

Professor Charles Xavier’s jerkdom transcends all media he has made an appearance in; it’s that powerful. He is an omega level clown, which is probably why he treats his X-Men like circus acts. You have to wow those humans in hopes of getting them to treat you like your mutant life matters, at least according to Xavier’s teachings. Now that X-Men: The Animated Series is available to stream on Disney+, here is a list of episodes filled with all of the Professor’s best-worst moments and how he is more of a danger to the X-Men than anyone else.

Enter Magneto and Deadly Reunions

The first season of X-Men is overflowing with moments that make you want to pop Charles upside his bald held. I consider “Enter Magneto” and “Deadly Reunions” as a two-part story since Magneto plays the second most significant part in both of them. He comes second only to Charles’s choice to not say a word about Magneto to any of the X-Men in all the years they’ve been on this team he put together. He didn’t utter a single word to his young team about an old frenemy who could cause them big trouble if he ever came back into the picture.

Spoiler alert: things go wrong when Magneto shows up.

Well, that’s not wholly true. The first time he appears, he successfully breaks into the Mutant Holding Facility to break out Hank Mccoy, who is in jail thanks to Charles. However, Magneto is unsuccessful because Beast wants to wait for his day in court. I know he says it himself, but I’m blaming Charles for this as well.

The rest of the episode is all about the severe danger Charles carelessly inflicts on his precious X-Men. Why wouldn’t you at least tell the guy on your team with an adamantium skeleton that you used to know a guy who has powers of magnetism? The X-Men are so ill-prepared to take on an extremely angry Magneto when he comes back ready to bring the pain to the human race. Things escalate quickly, nuclear warheads get involved, all because Xavier didn’t finish the job the first time around with Magneto. If it weren’t for Storm, a few cities would no longer exist.

Charles’s hypocrisy is also on full display in the subplot of these two episodes, which involves Sabertooth and Wolverine. Charles puts Sabertooth under his care for mind probing despite Wolverine wanting him nothing short of dead. Xavier goes as far as to pull rank on Wolverine, demanding Sabertooth stay untouched, but then orders Wolverine, Storm, and Cyclops to take care of Magneto at any cost. As Logan says to his face, “So we have to go easy on my enemy, but it’s okay to go trash yours.”

X-Men: The Animated Series – The Essential Episodes

By Michael Mammano

Justice League Unlimited: The Essential Episodes

By Jim Dandy and 3 others

In true Charles fashion, he doesn’t realize the error of his ways until after everyone has had their lives threatened by both Magneto and Sabertooth. I forgot to mention this earlier, but at one point in “Deadly Reunions,” he leaves newbie X-Men, Jubilee, in charge of Sabertooth.

Honestly, it’s genuinely no wonder Morph didn’t make it past the pilot episode.

The Unstoppable Juggernaut

The Professor isn’t in this episode, but he doesn’t need to be in order to succeed in making sure yet another enemy of his past blindsides the X-Men. Only six episodes after “Deadly Reunions,” Xavier’s vengeful step brother shows up, and once again, he is another person they knew nothing about.

The mansion is in shambles, and Xavier is nowhere around. He didn’t even have the decency to leave the insurance policy number around so one of them could file a claim. So, not only do the X-Men have to deal with Juggernaut, but they also have to become construction workers.

When the X-Men finally encounter the Juggernaut, it takes all of them plus Colossus to subdue him. Jean, Storm, and Rogue all managed to pass out at some point in the process. Again, I’m blaming Charles because it’s clear they were tired from all of the construction work they had to do earlier in the day. All that devotion and free labor in exchange for near-death experiences, a room, and costumes they probably sewed together themselves.

Cold Comfort

In “Cold Comfort,” an old member of the X-Men who had enough sense to leave returns. It turns into an episode of Dr. Phil because Xavier treats his mentees/employees like his children sometimes.

To make matters worse, Xavier isn’t exactly a great “dad.” He plays favorites.

So when Bobby “Iceman” Drake comes back into the fold briefly and reluctantly, it triggers some feelings Cyclops hasn’t let go of yet. The entire episode is full of Xavier undermining and gaslighting Scott about how differently he treated Bobby compared to him. Scott isn’t wrong this time.

In this episode, we also see how important Charles considers his self-appointed role of the go-to mutant to solely work with the government because he is incredulous when he discovers the government has been working with Forge and his X-Factor team. There’s no doubt he probably made a call to the White House to complain about this the moment he returned to the mansion.

One Man’s Worth Part 1 & 2

Finding love can already be quite complicated at the best of times. Now imagine finding love in a post-apocalyptic world and having to give that love up because one man’s life was supposedly worth more than your happiness. It’s a raw deal, and that’s what you get when Charles Xavier is in your universe. In the two-part story, “One Man’s Worth,” Bishop and Shard travel to a future to recruit Wolverine and Storm to prevent Master Mold from assassinating a young Charles Xavier. They even have to find a way to convince him that his dream of humans and mutants, living amongst one another in peace, is his destiny.

Honestly, the post-apocalyptic world was way less of a challenge and headache. If you can believe it, older Charles is terrible, younger Charles is even worse, and ten times more infuriating. He doesn’t want to listen. He’s so stubborn he manages to get himself killed, forcing everyone to try again.

Ultimately Bishop, Shard, Storm, and Wolverine get the job done, but it also means Wolverine and Storm’s relationships are no more. They don’t even get a full day to spend together before those versions of themselves cease to exist. All for Charles Xavier, who does nothing but keep secrets away from them and interrupts their days off with stories no one asked him to tell.

Proteus Part 1 & 2

Last but not certainly not least on this list is the “Proteus” two-part story from season four. I saved the best for last. Part one contains one of the best Charles Xavier origin stories. It’s tragic but full of delicious drama. The montage of heartache shows Charles certainly has a thing for redheads.

Kevin, also known as Proteus, is the son of Moira MacTaggert and ex-husband, Joseph MacTaggert. His powers are out of control, and he is on a quest to meet a father that has wanted nothing to do with him. Charles swoops in to “help” Moira and her son, but it’s quite obvious it’s because he wishes Moira had married and had a family with him.

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Charles (of course) ropes some of the X-Men into his quest. He is hellbent on showing Moira that he was always the best man for her and her son. And because he is sometimes the Caillou of the Marvel universe, he takes his frustrations out on Wolverine, Beast, and Rogue throughout both episodes. And even after Charles does everything to “help,” Kevin and his dad end up reconciling, leaving Charles as the odd man out in Moria’s life yet again. You kind of want to sympathize with Charles until you realize how disappointed he is about Kevin and his dad working things out.

The post X-Men: The Animated Series – The Worst of Charles Xavier appeared first on Den of Geek.

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kinetic-elaboration · 4 years ago

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August 15: 2x03 The Paradise Syndrome

I have seen this episode once before and I remember it being pretty awful... but tbh, I didn’t think it was so bad this time around. Maybe that’s just because my expectations were, like, Spock’s-Brain low. It definitely had issues but there was stuff I liked too!

Hmmm, that’s not the bridge. It appears to be... California?

Wondering what people might be so “blessed by this environment”--what a manly he-man action/adventure guy thing to say, amirite?

How does Spock know the significant markers of all the Native American tribes at a distance, off the top of his head?

(Answer: he doesn’t; all of this information is wrong and also one of those tribes is completely made up lmao.)

Honestly, who’s to say these people aren’t advanced? How do YOU know?

“Just so peaceful... no command decisions.” Oh no, Jim’s feeling Romantic again.

Honestly, imagine this characterization in AOS: overworked starship captain think he wants a break (but is wrong). Beyond made a vague attempt but missed what it is that Kirk finds stressful about command--it’s not that it’s boring, it’s the weight of the responsibility and the inability to find love.

Although funnily enough, even on his Native American Vacation, he still finds himself in a command position. He just can’t be stopped. Anyway, I’m getting ahead of myself.

Oh no, the obelisk ate him.

Maybe these people specifically built the obelisk so that they could return to this idyllic ““primitive”“ state, hmm? Maybe they like their lives this way. Maybe they experienced "progress" and then decided that whatever era of their development looked like indigenous American peoples had it right. (This is not correct but it roughly is the plot of Errand of Mercy so I’m not without precedent.)

Spock’s using simple tools to explain his point to Bones lol. “Here, let me dumb it down for you, lesser man of science.”

“Who am I? What are these?” Cpine morning voice: “This must be a dream!”

Kirk looks so confused. The god from the obelisk.

“The engines are showing signs of stress.” Seems to me like SCOTTY’S showing signs of stress.

And yet the music is so whimsical.

Honestly Kirk’s expression here = Denny Crane’s when in a meeting

White man brings CPR, is hailed as god. (I wish I were making this up.)

Damn, Salish has been demoted. How embarrassing for him.

This is a VERY interesting Spock. He does all his calculations, but the he takes all the risks. He’s very certain and single-minded, almost obsessed, not afraid of anything. I think it’s IC but I also think you can see some Kirk influence, perhaps... You can see how Spock has grown in his command abilities since The Galileo Seven.

The wise ones = the aliens.

“He died before he could tell Salish the secret” to opening the Obelisk and stopping the asteroid. That IS unfortunate.

“How does this shirt open?” Lol.

“Your name is Kirok?” “Yeah, sure, whatever.”

“I’ve never been this happy and peaceful.” Funny how he looks neither happy nor peaceful. Maybe it’s something like “I’ve never been this happy and peaceful...and I don’t like it.” Or “I’ve never been this happy and peaceful... there must be something wrong.”

“Here there is much time. For everything.” No there isn’t, there’s an asteroid coming.

Kirk’s cottage core fantasy.

Poor Scotty, so stressed out. Maybe he needs some time with the indigenous aliens.

The Joining Day? Lol okay.

Kirk has no chill, at all. “Oh, you want to get married? Tomorrow? Okay!!” Is this how Gary was able to successfully distract with him the blonde lab technician?

The “stardrive.”

“Estimated repair time?” “FOREVER.”

“And you lost Jim.” Cool it Bones, there’s no need to be cruel. Spock’s already in his thinking pose so you know he’s taking this seriously.

Love Spock’s chair. That’s not Starfleet regulation.

“I have found paradise.” Is he high??

Requisite highly choreographed fight scene.

“You’ve barely eaten or slept for weeks.” That’s because he’s worried about Jim. And the giant asteroid. This is a great Spock and McCoy scene though.

I can’t believe this. Spock lies down (barely!) and McCoy just leaves like he actually thinks he’s won, and then Spock immediately gets up again to go back to work.This guy is even easier to fool than Sarek.

You know Spock spent his whole adolescence going "Sure, I'll do the thing" and then just not doing it.

“A strange lodge that moves through the sky...” Well okay.

Okay I’m sorry, is he sensing the enterprise or is he sensing SPOCK? Because most of this dialogue might just imply he’s generically remembering his old life... but he also specifically says that the “flying lodge” was farther away and now it’s closer again, and how he could he know that otherwise?

She’s pregnant? That’s not good lol. AWKWARD.

Also the closest that TOS will ever come to acknowledging people have sex.

Omg he made a lamp. He made a lamp on his first day there. Does this imply that Captain Kirk had an arts and crafts phase?? Like CPR I understand him knowing--I’m sure everyone in Starfleet does. But hand-carving a lamp? That’s a whole other skill.

Various cultures including “certain Vulcan offshoots” use music notes as words omgggggg I love this information PLEASE tell me more.

“The Preservers” is a good concept imo. Nifty sci fi innovation: taking aliens from endangered places and giving them a new place, then setting it up nicely for them.

Stop throwing things guys! It’s not helping!

“I need Nurse Chapel.” Damn right you do.

Spock really doesn’t like that “wife.” He sounds like “Wife?? How dare??”

Then he suggests it’s a hallucination even though there’s a woman right there.

"Naturally, since he did not come from there. He's my man, get your paws off him."

Vulcan mind fusion? What the heck is that? How is it season 3 and they still don’t know what to call it?

“He is an extremely dynamic individual.” Spock was really taken for a ride in that brain.

“The landing party is expendable.” There’s the Captain.

“I have an excellent eye for musical notes.” Brag.

“Just press the right button.”

Looks like Spock was the god they wanted all along.

Okay, that was an uncool ending though. I know they basically had to kill Miramanee as soon as she was pregnant but like, there was also no reason for her to be pregnant??? I would have preferred if (1) Miramanee hadn't been pregnant, (2) Jim got over her as soon as he regained his memory and (3) she lived and they just parted awkwardly.

Also I think it would have been nice if they had ended with the Enterprise explaining to Salish how the obelisk works, and then maybe even a hint that he and Miramanee will get back together. Like, maybe not that, since I’m not a fan of women just being used to, like, make men feel better--though I’m also not a fan of them being fridged because of Inconvenient Baby--but he should have at least gotten his position back and, more importantly, the knowledge he was always entitled to. Also, the very existence of an asteroid deflector, along with the people’s extensive knowledge of what weather signifies Oncoming Asteroid, implies this happens to them with some frequency. So in other words, the threat will return.

Plus Salish never got enough credit for being right, which he was! The whole time!

Oh and also I would have liked some acknowledgement that Jim does like being Captain. If you watch the whole show, you know that he occasionally bemoans the stress and his inability to maintain a romantic relationship, despite his love of long walks on the beach, but that he’s also ambitious, he loves exploration and adventure, he gets bored if left in one place too long, and he believes in the necessity of progress and discovery to keep not just individuals but societies from stagnation. But if you just watched this episode, you’d think he’d never been happy in his entire life, and that returning to command makes him miserable.

Aside from the Native American stuff--which was awkward and rather unnecessary and has aged, as you might imagine, very very poorly--I actually didn’t hate the episode. It had some VERY interesting Spock stuff, which I think is within a reasonable Spock characterization, and some great Spock and Bones moments. Kirk’s story line was surprisingly engaging for him being completely separate from the crew, and the general theme that he sometimes needs, or thinks he desires, a break from command, is definitely in keeping with other episodes. I liked the asteroid as the Big Danger, which was surprisingly dynamic--by which I mean, it did a good job of connecting the very disparate story lines on the Enterprise and on the planet. I also liked the Sci Fi Concept of the week in the Protectors. And it was interesting to see an ep take place over a longer period of time.

None of this is to downplay how awkward the Native American elements are--incredibly fetishistic, and also lazy--like, “I want to show something Simple and Idyllic...I know! Indians!” There was no reason they should look like American Indians. In fact, it makes no sense that they do: the Protectors take peoples from planets that are about to be destroyed and (somehow) discreetly move them somewhere else, but Native American peoples still.... very much exist? And so does Earth as a whole. So obviously these aliens weren’t transplanted from Earth. So why should their culture resemble some awkward mishmash of Native American cultures?

So overall I’d say, the ideas of the episode, the structure, the characterizations (mostly), and the overall ideas were good, but it was just very awkward and unfortunate that it chose the... aesthetic that it did--especially because it was very much an aesthetic choice and not a well-thought-out, culturally sensitive one. Gonna be honest and just chalk that up to it being 1968 though.

Next is And the Children Shall Lead, which I actually think was one of the first TOS eps I ever saw... But I don’t remember it at all. So we’ll see!

#the year 2021 #2021: star trek #star trek tos #2021: fandom thoughts

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calliecat93 · 4 years ago

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Top 15 Star Trek TOS Episodes (Part Two)

(Part One)

Continuing from the last post, here are the remaining seven episodes~! Also picking Number One was SUPER hard. I was stuck between it and two for a long while. But I finally picked, so here we go!

#7. The Trouble With Tribbles

Up to this point, I hadn’t been crazy over some of the goofier episodes of Star Trek. Shore Leave was a mindscrew that left me uncertain about what was even happening by the end, though my opinion has lightened up upon looking back. The Squire of Gothos had a villain that I found far more annoying than entertaining and it remains one of my least favorite episodes. The only more silly one I did like was I, Mudd which remains an utter laugh riot once everyone acts as illogical as possible, including Spock. But then this episode came along, and Dear Lord it is hilarious. Our heroes stop at a space station, but it’s also occupied by Klingons. But wait, it gets better! A sleezy guy convinces Uhura to buy a Tribble, these little puff ball things that are kind of cute... until they begin to reproduce so rapidly that they infest the ship and base. To put it simply, it’s not a good time for Kirk. Honestly Kirk is the best part just because of how much he LOATHES every single thing about this episode. The scene where a whole bunch of Tribbles just topple over him and he just resigns himself to his fate and later his epic death glare at Bones when he orders him to figure out what killed the things. And then there’s what makes him come aorund to them, their shared hatred of Klingons. Seriosuly, Kirk is just So Done in this episode and it is amazing~

But seriously, it’s a very entertianing episode. Far more than I thought it was going to be when I read the description. It’s not an episode taken seriosuly, but not in the ‘they just gave up’ kind of way like in certain S3 episodes. The cast seem to be legit having a fun time with this one. The brawl between Scotty, Chekov, and a few other guys against the Klingons was super fun as was Kirk sulking when Scotty revelas that he got provoked over the Enteprise being insulted and not the captain. Poor Jim XD Cyrano Jones was also just a fun delight with how scummy yet amusing he is. The scene with him and the drinks during the brawl had me laughing so much XD Seriosuly there’s just so many good moments. Spock not being immune to the Tribble’s comforting effect and being embarassed at this revelaiton, Spock and McCoy’s snark, the Klingons utter horror at the tiny little furballs, it’s just an entertaining ride from beginning to end.

Not anything to really note flaws wise to justify the ranking. It doesn’t have that emotional or philosophical umph that I normally seek out in shows like this, so it’s here at seven. But that ain’t a bad thing at all. Not every episode has to have deep meanings or complex stories. Sometimes it can just be something fun and amusing, and the effort was still there to make it entertaining. It’s one of those episodes that I would watch above the others on a bad day just so I can laugh. Probably the most fun episode I have on this list, and that’s nothing to snuff at~!

#6. The Doomsday Machine

Our heroes find a Starship where the only survivor is Commadore Decker, his crew having all been killed when he beamed them to a planet that a planet destroyer... well, destroyed shortly after. The destroyer is still active and now the Enterprise is in danger. As Kirk remains on that ship, Decker is determined to destroyt he doomsday machine once and for all, including taking command of the Enteprrise and risking their lives to do so. Yeah, this is a pretty intense one. Decker, while his sucicdal actions were wrong, is VERY sympathetic. His crew was killed through no fault of his own, the machine that did it is still loose, and the losses have left him utterly broken. He’s very much traumatized but as he is the highest ranking officer and they can’t officially prove that he’s too mentlaly unfit to be relieved (which imo is idiotic cause even someone who isn’t a psycologist can tell he’s mentally unfit, but whatever), they can’t do much to stop him. Spock DOES finally manage to do so, and it leads to Decker’s ultimate choice that leads to his tragic end.

This one really gripped me. There’s this tension throughout. We have an unstable, suicidal man taking control of the Enterprise and willing to get them all killed to stop the doomsday machine. It’s scary to see how broken the man is. Again, he’s wrong to be willing to sacrifice everyone on The Enterprise to destroy the thing even though none of them want to die, but you understand why. I mean imagine if that happened to Kirk, he’d probably snap too if his actions in Obsession is any indication of how he handles major losses like that. Then we have Decker’s final act. Once relieved of command, he steals a shuttle and goes at the machine himself. He knows that he’s going to die and accepts that fact if it means some chance, any chance of destroying the machine once and for all. While he fails to destory it, he DOES give Kirk the opprotunity needed to do so with the ruined ship. A move that almost gets Kirk killed, but still Decker’s act was not in vain. It’s a very interesting character study with themes of guilt, trauma, and desperation. Kind of like in Obsession in a way, only Kirk manages to survive and pull himself together before it was too late. Decker’s only goal was to take down the machine that took his crew’s lives, even if that meant losing his own.

As I said, these are the kinds of episodes I live for. I guess self-sacrifice is also genetic consideirng what happened with his son in The Motion Picture, haha. Flaws... ugh... I guess McCoy disappeairng after the first half sucked? But that’s a me thing that doesn’t affect anything. I just remember watching it wide-eyed despite fully well knowing that everyone I cared about were going to be perfectly fine. It really gripped me! A great episode with great character exploration and themes which for a one off character, is pretty dang impressive!

#5. Journey to Babel

Meet the parents epidsode! Yay! The Enteprise is transporting various ambassadors of various planets to the Babel Conference. This includes the Vulcan Ambassador Sarek and his human wife Amanda, aka Spock’s parents. Yep, it’s time for some good ol’ fashioned family issues! Sarek wasn’t exactly happy with Spock choosing Starfleet and their relationship has been strained ever since. But when Sarek has severe heart problems, the only way to save him is via blood transfusion with Spock the only one compatible. But to make it worse, Kirk gets stabbed and put out of comission, forcing Spock to take command... at the same time that his father needs the surgery. Yeah... it sucks to be Spock in this episode. I know that Sarek is a bit divisive, but I like Spock’s parents. Sarek comes off as good at his job, but not great as a parent. He’s far fromt he worst and we do see that he does seem to still care about his son, he’s just God awful at admitting it and his previous mistakes. Like father, like son I guess. Amanda was a delight, especially when she tells McCoy about the sehlat aka giant teddy bear. Anyone who can make Bones smile that big deserves our thanks. Spock trying to make it less embarassing only made it funnier XD But back on topic, they come off as interesitng characters. They ain’t ideal, but they seem to genuinely be in love, which is nice.

Spock was just great here as we see him in one of the roughest spots he’s been in. He’s naturally not happy about being around the father that cast him aside again, though after his heart issues it’s clear that he IS concerned. Leonard Nimoy once again does such a fantastic job at having Spock express so much but without breaking character. It’s all in the eyes and the strained tone of voice. Then when Spock is more than willing to go through with the tranfusion, Kirk is injured. He has no choice but to take command, knowing that in doing so his father will die. While he COULD give command to Scotty, with the VERY intense circumstances of an assaliant on board and a ship ready to attack wit a number of ambassadors on board, he’s the best bet in handling it. Amanda is of course upset and even smacks him which IS overly harsh, but she’s about to lose her husband and her son, despite clealry hating the fact, has to place his duty above all else. Sarek dying is the least worst outcome to everyone else being killed. It’s the most logical route. Fortunately Kirk is able to pull himself together long enough to take over and the transfusion goes through perfectly despite the fight making it more difficult. Which again, McCoy is the true MVP here for managing to pull that off successfully under those conditions and Thank God that the episode rewarded him by letting him finally get the last word. He earned that one!

It’s such a great episode for me. Family drama, Spock conflict, political tensions, and just some relaly fun bits. Seriosuly, the teddy bear bit will NEVER stop being funny. Hoenstly these last five were all pretty tight and this ende dup here cause the other four had just a little bit mroe to keep me invested for reasons. Spock and Sarek don’t really reach a resolution but we do see that it has the chance to improve, and the movies do show that Sarek DOES truly care about his son and even admits that he had been wrong. It takes a lot for a man, even a Vulcan man, to do that. Although I DID double take when I realized that Sarek is played by the same guy who did the Romulan Captain in Balance of Terror. Guess he was that good XD. But yeah, a really great episode and very much my favorite Spock-centric episode.

#4. The Empath

TRIUMVIRATE FEELS BABY~! Our heroes end up trapped by a duo of aliens and encounter a mute empath woman that McCoy names Gem. They try to figure out how to escape as the aliens known as Vians plan to use them for an experiment as they have others. Shenanigains happen while elad to Kirk getting totured p, and then given the ultimate sadistic choice in having to decide if either Spock or McCoy get tortured to the point of either death (McCoy) or permenant brain damage (Spock). Now the episode has it’s issues, like why the Vians needed to do this to decide that Gem’s people were worth saivng is..l really baffling. But I’m also not a Vian so what do I know anout their mindset? But due to those kinds of plot holes, it landed here at four. It also kind of reads like a hurt/comfort fanfic, which isn’t a surprise when you find out that this was written and submitted by a fan. Which is freakin’ awesome and I can’t complain tbh cause it’s a good hurt/comfort fic. What it fails in some plot tightning it succeeds at in emphasizing the relationship between the main trio and it’s themes of emotion and self-sacrifice. Because OF COURSE that would be relevant for these three numbskulls at some point!

The second half is really what sells it. Kirk of course can’t make a choice like that, so Bones hypos him so that he’ll be spared of it. But that means that Spock is in command and he fully intends to hand himself over to the Vians to spare the two. Just the scene where he looks at Kirk, knowing that it’ll likely be the last time he sees him and Gem touching him to feel his emotions. Her smile sums it sll up. Which sidenote, the actress for Gem was freakin’ fantastic in how she displayed so much emotion and character without saying one word. Excellent acting. Anyways, Spock’s plan seems full-proof... except that he forgot that he’s dealing with McCoy, who promptly hypos him as well and sacrifices himself to the Vians. That was when McCoy became my favorite character, the moment he chose to be tortured to near death to save his two best friends and an innocent woman and even took the time to try and comfort her before being taken away. When we see the ifnal result and are greeted to DeForest Kelley looking at the camera with the most dead expression that he can muster... yeah the image STILL haunts me. Then Bones is dying with the two unable to do anything but try to give him some comfort and Gem is just so distraught and... heah this episode mad eit this high simply because it hit the emotional beats perfectly. That’s not even going into Gem trying to heal him to drive home the themes of the episode, also done VERY well.

This episode really shows how much the three care for one another. They’re all willing to be tortured and die to spare the other two. Ultimately McCoy gets the ‘honor’, but Kirk and Spock were absolutely ready to throw themselves to the fire. The characterization, interactions, and dynamic are just done so well that it’s why I can forgive the plot issues. I’m a sucker for feelings okay?! So yeah it’s not perfect but what it got right it got right. As such, it managed to land here at Number Four with only those plot holes keeping it from Number One. And trust me, I was tempted.

#3. The Tholian Web

Season 3 hadn’t been doing it for me with only one or two episodes really getitng my attention up to that point. This one though? This was the best episode in the seaosn bar none. Our heroes end up in a subspace where they find a starship and it’s crew all dead. Whien they teleport back to The Enterprise, it disappears... and takes Kirk with it. Okay, doesn’t sound liek anythignt hat new right? Kirk goes missing, the crew have to deal without him and find him as quickly as posisble. But this one has a bit of a twist... they cut Kirk out completely. Yeah, from the moment he vanishes in the first act to the very end he is out of the episode. Not only does the crew not know what happened to him, but neither does the audience, this ramps up the fear and emotional weight big time as the longer the crew is int hat space, the influence of it drives them to insanity. Bones wants to get out because of this, while Spock is unwilling to leave Kirk if he is alive. Needles to say, things go off the rails quickly.

With Kirk out of the equation, we keep our focus on Spock and McCoy. Their arguing is probably at the most personal it’s ever been with Kirk seming dead, the crew losing their minds, and it looking more and more uncertain that they can both treat the crew and ge tout alive. While one can say that McCoy may be too harsh here, I think along with the space affecting him in a less intense way, he’s also stressed from all the patients as well as his grief about Jim. Spock is the only one that he can take it out on, especially since his chocie to not leave is why they’re now int he mess that they’re in. Spock is trying to perform his duties despite the hostilities and his own grief that he’s trying to keep a grip on with all the responsibility of the crew and whatever happens due to his choice firmly sititng on his shoulders. What finally starts to get them to resolve this? A tape that Kirk made for them in the event of his death. He gives them his confidence that they can perform their duties withiut him, but that they need to lsiten to and support each other. They CAN go on without him. It’ll hurt but they’re now all that they each have and they need to work together now more than ever. It’s a sobering moment for both with McCoy realizng how ovelry harsh he had been and Spock expressing genuine grief. They do still bicke rone more time, but McCoy catches himself before it goes too far, apologizes, and Spock simply says what Jim would: “Forget it, Bones”. Cue Bones fainting like the Southern Bell that he is, haha!

Now of course Kirk is alive and they manage to save him and get out of the situation fine. But I just loved this because of the focus on Spock and McCoy without Kirk. Why? Because Kirk is the one thing that can unite them. It’s not the only thing, but if anything can make them get over their disagreements quickly, it’s Kirk. So what happens when it looks like he’s gone and never coming back? How will the two deal with it now that that balance is gone? They don’t deal with it well, being at each other’s throats until they see that tape. But it DOES show that if they did lose Kirk, they CAN work together and go on. Like I said, I adore these two’s relationship and while not as slashy as All Our Yesterdays, this is such an excellent one for that relationship as we see that yes, they will bicker but they will also be there for each other when it all comes down to it. It’s such a great episode for that reason and the plot was just well done. Like I said, casitng out Jim and leaving us unsure of what happened to him was an excellent move for this one and I enjoyed the exploration that it allowed.

#2. The Immunity Syndrome

Out heroes are scent to investigate what caused a whole solar system to disappear just as they also receive a message from a Vulcan science vessel. Unfortunately, Spock senses he vessel’s destruction and the Enterprise finds itself against a giant space amoeba that will devour everything unless stopped. That may not sound like much, but it leads into what I think was the most intense situation that the Enterprise has been in. Everything, and I mean everything, is pushed to their limits here. This amoeba can outright destroy galaxies and utterly mindless, so there’s no reasoning with it. But it gets especially tense when, in order to understand exactly what’s going on, Kirk has to send someone in the space shuttle to observe, but in doing so, he’s sending someone to most likely die. And his choices? Either Spock or Bones... yeah.

This is what makes this episode great. Spock and Bones are already on rockier than usual terms due to McCoy treating the Vulcan deaths more like a statistic while Spock sensed all of it outright. That itself is an interesting observation on how we treat these kinds of things, not really understanding how horrific it is unless we’re involved in it outright, otherwise it’s sad and unfortunate but just another number. But then we have the suicide mission. Bones originally volunteers himself, after all he’s a doctor and would have the knowledge to make the necessary observaitons and likely the most fit for it. But Spock is not only also perfectly capable even if not specialized in medical science, but he’s also more fit physically and emotionally to undergo the risk and come out alive. In the end, Kirk picks Spock and McCoy ain’t happy about it. The scene with Spock about ready to go with McCoy still unhappy even when Spock asks him to wish him luck. He does... once the doors have shut and Spock can’t hear him anymore. It’s a very strong scene and it only gets more painful when it looks like Spock is truly going to die and his final words are that McCoy should have wished him luck. Bones’ face says everything.

The episode is just excellent. Great character moments. Great emotional weight. Great stakes that keep going up and up and it truly feels like the darkest hour for the crew. Kirk and Spock outright begin to record their respective final words. Even they’re convinced that this is most likely the end, which is just... dang man. I couldn’t look away during this one. They hit everything perfectly with pretty much everything. If I have any issues, none of them come to mind. It’s just an excellent episode and the best of Season 2. I had a REALLY hard time picking between this and my Number One for the top slot. The top one just had a little bit more emotional impact to get it, but it just barely topped this one. Regardless, it is still an excellent episode and one of the best by far. But what is Number One? Well...

#1. The City on the Edge of Forever

Yeah, yeah, obvious pick I know. I normally don’t go wth popular opinion... but sometimes it’s that way for a reason, and this one I can’t argue about. When McCoy gets badly drugged on accident, he goes into a derranged state and beams onto a planet. The crew is unable to stop him from entering a portal known as the Guardian of Forever that sends him into the distant past where he does something to change histry. In order to figure out what changed and to stop McCoy, Kirk and Spock travel into the 1930’s a few days earlier to cut him off and must now navigate their way though the time period where they end up at a soup kitchen run by a woman named Edith Keller. Which Edith is an excellent character. She’s kind, optimistic, charming, hard-working, ad caring towards those who need it. Kirk ends up falling for her, and... it’s legit really cute. Kirk isn’t being forced to make out with a woman or doing so for information. We see how Kirk is when he genunely likes someone, having been drawn to Edith’s optimism and hopes for a better future. A future that he is from and knows will be reality. He’s really sweet and it’s just cute... which makes what happens at the end all the more tragic.

The 1930’s were fun with Kirk trying to come up with an excuse for Spock’s ears having me dying from laughter. The acting was excellent with DeForest Kelley as drugged!Bones especially being both crazy and scary. I quit doubting that he played villains in Westerns after this episode, haha. But of course Spock soon discovers that the change that McCoy is to make is saving Edith form death, and in doing so she leads a pacifist campaign that delays America’s entry into World War II and... well, things go badly. They are in a time where sadly optimism and peace are simply not options, which is even crueler. In order for time to be restored, they have to let Edith die. Kirk is horrified by this and when the time comes (sidenote, the Triumvirate reunion is utterly adorable), he just grabs Bones, keeps his back turned, and can only listen as Edith screams and is killed via car colission. Whatever grievances I have about William Shatner, he absoluteley nailed Kirk’s utter heartbreak and pain as Kirk just looks utterly boken. His final wordds after they return to the 23rd Century simply being a bitter “Let’s get the Hell out of here” sums it all up perfectly. Bones’ horror at it, especially since he DID have to watch it and him being upset at Kirk is also heartbreaking as he asks him if he knows what he just did. Spock can only somberly inform him that yes, he does.

It’s one of those cases where I wish serialization was more of a thign cause DAMN this is some major emotional baggage for everyone but as per usual. It happens and they go on from there with no lingering development. I guess if I had to complain, that would be it but that’s jut the nature of these shows at the time. Kind of feel like Bones getting as bady overdosed as he did pretty much got forgotten after they enter the 1930’s, but I also know nothing about 23rd Century drugs so... ah well. But the rest of the episode is so good that I can forgive those issues and they clealry did nothing to impact the placing. It had a storgn story, great emotion, great acting, great pacing, and a heartbreaking but fitting ending. The episode has a LOT of history behind it’s making that could be a post all it’s own, but no mater how this episode came to be, it is very much the best of Star Trek TOS. It was fun yet sad and had me gripped form beginning to ed and just htinkign about it now still makes me sad. Thus, it earns it’s place as my favorite episode of Star Trek TOS.

And we are done! There were a lot of really good episodes and some i REALLY did consider. A Piece of the Action, The Enemy Within (that was skipped for... certian reasons), Is There in Truth No Beauty?, This Side of Paradise, and plenty of others that I enjoyed. There were others I.. well, didn’t, but I can’t recall outright hating anything. Regardless I came in apathetic at best, and I left a fan for it’s characters, interesting ideas, and I just had a lot of fun. It’s outdated in many ways, but still relevant in others. Overall, I’m glad to have finally watched it, and I hope that I enjoy TNG just as much. But if not, I’ll always have this~!

(Image Source: TrekCore TOS Gallery)

#star trek tos #callie reviews

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grandtheftstarship · 6 years ago

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Adorkable (Pavel Chekov x Young!Fem!Reader)

Summary: [y/n] boards the Enterprise as a new recruit and meets a flustered Pavel Chekov.

Word Count: 2000+ Warnings: reader is like, 15, though it’s probably not possible but that doesn’t really matter; fluffy af :) also cursing but that’s a given Posted: Tumblr, Wattpad Requested: No

A/n: Sorry if the Russian is incorrect, I used Google translate. I also left some un-translated because some of my favorite Chekov fics made me look it up myself and it made me smile. It’s also more fun that way :)

Today was the day. Today was the day you were finally going to be boarding the Enterprise and working as a full-time ensign, as well as training to be a backup engineer. You were so excited you could barely sleep, and once you woke up the next morning you already had so much energy you had no idea what to do with yourself.

After stress-eating several bowls of [your favorite cereal] and pacing so long you could've worn holes in your floor, it was time to leave your home in San Francisco. You smoothed out your new gold uniform, making sure it wasn't riding up and tugged on your boots. Deeming yourself acceptable, you grabbed your things and left.

After reveling in the beauty of the massive starship, you boarded successfully and started looking for your quarters. You had to admit you were a little self-conscious. The Enterprise had already been flying for five months and everybody seemed to know each other already. You clutched your backpack straps, keeping your head down as you navigated through the crowd of officers.

Chekov stood awkwardly by Sulu who was talking with someone he had never met. He scanned the crowd, seeing the same usual faces... Except for one. Her [hair length] [hair color] hair shielded her face for a moment until she suddenly looked up and scanned the room. Butterflies exploded in his chest, sending his heart pumping at a furious pace as he caught a glimpse of her features. He was unable to move, unable to breathe, as the same four words echoed in his mind.

You're in love.

She suddenly made eye contact and her face burst into pink and she hastily looked away, causing his own face to redden as he averted his eyes. Unfortunately, Sulu noticed.

"Hey, it was nice talking to you, but I gotta go," he waved goodbye to the person he was talking with and dragged Chekov to the side.

"Who are you looking at?" he smirked.

"N-no one," Chekov tried desperately to get his heartbeat to calm down. "It's nothing."

"Okay, I know that you know that I'm 'batting for the other team'," Sulu made quotes with his fingers. "But I really want to know who you're looking at. Is it someone I know?"

Chekov shook his head. "I've never seen her before." Sulu sighed.

"What color uniform does she have?" he asked.

"Gold," Chekov gulped. "Like us."

"Excellent," Sulu snickered. "Easier to find."

" о боже, помоги мне, " Chekov muttered. (Oh god, help me)

You scurried down a random hall, gripping your PADD with a map of the Enterprise in one hand and the other randomly twirling the hem of your dress.

What just happened?

That boy was outrageously attractive and he was staring at you. You tried your best to brush it off and continue to find your quarters. The captain had requested that you meet him on the bridge so he could let you know what you were supposed to do and you really did not want to show up with your face a blushing mess and your backpack.

When you finally found it, you tossed your backpack down, splashed water on your face, and you were back out the door. Your heart raced and your palms were sweaty as you entered the turbolift.

"Bridge, please," you said, trying to sound confident. The lift went faster than you expected and before you knew it the doors hissed open to reveal the busy space.

Quickly remembering protocol, you called; "Permission to enter the bridge, sir?"

The captain turned around, immediately grinning.

"Ah, Ensign [y/l/n]! So glad you made it aboard," ha pat you on the shoulder. "Let me introduce you to some people."

Does he do this with all the crew?

"Bones, this is Ensign [y/l/n], the fifteen-year-old Ensign I told you about!" Kirk led you over to a tired looking man arguing with a Vulcan. They both looked up when you approached.

"Dammit Jim, since when are we letting fifteen-year-olds join the crew?" Bones grumbled. "Chekov's seventeen and I'm already fed up."

"This is our Cheif Medical Officer, Bones McCoy," Jim introduced.

"The name's Leonard," he muttered, sticking his hand out to shake. You gladly shook it.

"And this here is the First Officer, Commander Spock."

"Pleased to meet you, Ensign," he greeted. "I understand that you have taken the record of youngest Starfleet officer, am I correct?"

"I understand that you have taken the record of youngest Starfleet officer, am I correct?"

Chekov tensed.

That was my record.

He stood up suddenly to approach the person who had taken his prized possession but stopped in his tracks.

дерьмо. (Shit)

It was her. It was the girl from before. Before he could go back to his seat unnoticed, the captain called him over.

"Keep cool," Chekov muttered, getting desperate to calm his reddening face. He tried not to look her way, in fear he would freeze up like the last time he beheld her.

"Ensign [your full name], this is Ensign Pavel Chekov," Kirk introduced.

He finally allowed himself to look at her, which was an immediate mistake. Her smile launched butterflies in his stomach and, if it was possible, his eyes reflected hearts.

"Hi! It's nice to meet you Pavel!" she beamed at him, and held out her hand. Chekov shook his head slightly and reached out to shake her hand.

" Это хорошо для - I mean, Its good to meet you," He stuttered awkwardly, muttering, "Я испортил это." (I messed it up)

"You too!"

"Chekov, sorry to tell you this but this Ensign has beaten your record for 'youngest crew member'," Kirk said with a grin. "I'm lucky to have the two youngest members of Starfleet aboard my ship!"

"Wait, how old are you, if you don't mind me asking?" she cocked her head a bit as she looked up at him.

О боже, почему она такая красивая.

"I-umm," he struggled.

"He's seventeen," Kirk winked at him.

"Wow! Seventeen! That's amazing!"

Oh god, that smile.

"Ты великолепен (you’re wonderful)- I mean, you're amazing," they both turned red. "I- I mean that you're amazing for getting in at fifteen."

"Thank you," she smiled sheepishly.

"Chekov why don't you escort Ensign [last name] to her quarters," Kirk instructed slyly.

Sulu didn't tell him, did he?

дерьмо.(Shit)

"O-of course Keptin," Chekov stuttered. He was gonna kill Sulu.

"Thank you," Kirk clapped her on the back and started walking away. "Have fun you two, but not too much fun."

They both stood there awkwardly.

"Um- ladies first," Chekov said when the turbolift opened.

"Thanks," she said softly. The lift was silent before you started speaking.

"So, you're the navigator?" She asked him.

"да- I mean, yes," Chekov cursed himself. "I am also shadowing the Cheif Engineer."

"Hey me too!" she said, smiling. "I actually have to go down there next... Do you wanna come with?"

"S-Sure," Chekov gave a small smile. "I would love too."

"Great!"

There were a couple moments of silence.

"Are you-" she started.

"How did-" Chekov interrupted.

"Sorry!" they both said at the same time.

"You first," she giggled as the turbolift opened.

"No, ladies first," he insisted, smiling as he let you out of the turbolift first.

"Okay fine then," she sighed. "Are you from Russia? I mean of course you are- I mean-"

"It's okay," Chekov chuckled. "I am from Russia. I was born there in 2241."

"I see," she nodded. "I was born in [birthplace], 2244."

"You're fifteen, yes?" Chekov asked.

"Yeah, but I'm turning sixteen in a few weeks," she replied. "Anyway, your turn. What were you going to say?"

"Oh, uh," Chekov rubbed the back of his neck. "I was going to ask how your parents let you join Starfleet so young. Mine barely let me go to America."

"Well it took a lot of convincing by me and my teachers, but once I skipped to the ninth grade when I was ten, my parents agreed to enroll me," she explained.

"That is amazing," Chekov blushed at his words. "Well, we are in engineering. This is where I leave you."

"I'll see you later?" she cocked her head to the side again, making Chekov's insides turn to mush.

"да- I mean, yes," he stuttered. "I can meet you for dinner?"

"Its a date then!" and she disappeared into engineering.

Your face was so hot you were sure it would explode. Grateful for the door that now separated you from Chekov, you started towards the Cheif Engineer's office.

Once you got there, he shook your hand and started explaining a whole bunch of things that he was going to teach you later and started showing you around the basic parts of engineering. You couldn't focus. All you could think of was Pavel and how flustered he looked when you looked him in the eye. Four words bounced around your mind for the duration of Scotty's tour.

You're in love.

"Well, that seems to be it. Your first day down here will be in a few days. You'll know the exact date later," he concluded, handing you your PADD back. "Can't wait to work with you, [l/n]."

"You too Mr. Scott," you smiled at him before moving away. Your thoughts went back to your dinner "date" with Pavel, and your cheeks flushed. Unsure when dinner was, you looked on the map on your PADD.

~спустя два дня~

(two days later)

You waited patiently for your new best friend on the ship by the turbolift. You were both going to shadow Scotty for the day, and you were anxious and excited to work next to him.

"[Y/n]!" He called as he jogged up to you.

"Hey Pavel!" you greeted cheerfully, getting into the turbolift. "Ready to be a shadow?"

"You bet!" he replied stepping in after you.

The ride was short but sweet, and before you knew it you were standing in front of Scotty.

"Okay, here are the rules," he said. "No running near the warp core, don't mess with the tools, and don't be making out while I'm not looking."

Both your faces erupted into blushing messes.

"Alright, off we go," Scotty waved over his shoulder as he walked away. You hurried after him.

Forty minutes in, you were bored to death. You could tell Pavel was too, judging by his slouching shoulders and sagging eyelids. Scotty barely did anything; signing reports, checking in on his underlings, etcetera, etcetera.

"Hey," he whispered. "I have an idea."

"I'm down for anything. Just end my suffering," you whispered back. He nodded.

"Mister Scott?" Chekov called.

"What is it, lad?" Scotty replied, looking slightly irritated.

"Can [y/n] and I take a break?" he asked, flashing his puppy eyes.

"Oh- alright. Just don't tell the captain," he warned though laughter twinkled in his eyes.

"Yay!" you and Pavel cheered. He grabbed your hand and started running in the other direction.

"Thanks, Mister Scott!" he called over his shoulder.

"No prob- Hey! No running...." he trailed off at the sounds of your laughter before chuckling to himself. "Kids these days."

"So, what are we doing?" you giggled, trying not to think of how perfectly Pavel's hand fit into yours.

"Jefferies Tube C," he huffed, still running. "The gravity control doesn't work there."

"So in other words," you smiled. "It's fun."

"Precisely," Chekov slowed to a stop, still gripping your hand. "Here's the entrance."

You climbed up the ladder first, praying you remembered to wear booty shorts under your uniform. You barely got the latch open before you felt your feet lift off the ladder rung.

"Whoa!" You yelped, gripping the latch as your feet rose higher, tipping you upside down.

"It's okay," Pavel chuckled, pushing himself lightly into the tube. "Here, grab my hand."

You blushed as you gripped his hand with one of yours and let go of the handle.

"You can do it," he encouraged. You nodded, slowly letting go of his hand. Before you knew it, you were flipping around and laughing your head off.

"Now you've got it!" He laughed.

You smiled at him, head full of bliss and heart fluttering.

"Thank you."

"You're always welcome."

~две недели спустя~

(two weeks later)

"I can't believe I'm doing this," Chekov grumbled as Sulu thrust a pink rose in his hand.

"You'll do great!" Sulu enthused, leading his friend into the dining hall. "There she is!"

Spending two weeks with his best-friend/ love of his life had been amazing and fun. But he couldn't wait anymore. He had to know.

Pavel's heart raced in his chest as he looked at her standing there. The mess hall was not the place he wanted to do this. He pushed the thornless stem of the rose into his waistband and quickly walked over to her.

"Hey, Pavel-"

"Follow me," he said, putting his hand on the small of her back as he led her out of the busy room.

"Pavel- where are we going?" she asked, struggling to keep up with him.

"It's a surprise," he said, tilting his head down at her small form and grinning. His cheeks turned pink at the sight of hers doing the same.

Once he found the room he was looking for, anxiety spiked through him.

I am really going to do this.

"Wow! Is this the astronomy room?" you gasped, looking around in wonder at the galaxy in front of you.

"Y-yes it is," Pavel stuttered. "[Y/n] I... Uh."

"What is it Pav?" you asked, cocking your head. His grip of the rose stem tightened.

"I-I just-" without thinking, he thrust the rose out in front of him and squeezed his eyes shut.

She's going to reject me. He thought desperately.

Oh God, she's going to reject me.

Instead of being slapped or hearing footsteps run from the room as he expected, he felt a hand cover his on the rose and soft lips touch his. His eyes fluttered open, but seeing hers tightly shut he closed them again. She pulled away.

"S-sorry-"

"No!" he interrupted, giving a soft laugh. "That's what I hoped would happen."

She beamed.

"Will you go on a date with me?" he asked sheepishly.

"Of course," she nodded. "Pasha."

With that, Pavel attacked her lips once again.

#CUTEEEEE #Star trek #star trek reader inserts #star trek x reader #star trek aos reader inserts #pavel chekov #pavel chekov x reader #pavel chekov aos #pavel chekov reader insert #pavel chekov x femreader #star trek imagines #pavel chekov imagines #why is he so cutteeee

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v-thinks-on · 6 years ago

Text

The Adventure Continues

Part 7 of A Crazy Little Thing Called Love

First | Previous | Bonus

“May I say that I have not thoroughly enjoyed serving with humans. I find their illogic and foolish emotions a constant irritant.”

Spock stepped into the captain’s quarters.

He found Captain Kirk sitting at his desk, wrapping up a log entry: “With the energy-being gone, hostilities have ended and the ship is back under our control. We are now bringing the Klingons back to Starbase 5, and from there they can return to their Empire. In the meantime they remain on the Enterprise as our guests.” He turned off the recorder, waved Spock inside with a grin, and stood to meet him.

“Jim,” Spock said, his voice low, “I must apologize for lashing out earlier. I should have been able to resist the creature’s influence, but it was able to find and exploit my weakness.”

Jim put a hand on Spock’s shoulder and looked Spock firmly in the eye. “It exploited all of us.”

“All but one,” Spock replied, his eyes wide in admiration. “You were apparently immune.”

Jim shook his head. “I was able to resist it thanks to you, I think, but for a moment there I wanted to kill you so badly it terrified me.” There was silence as his words sunk in.

Very slowly, Spock rose one hand and placed it on Jim’s shoulder. “And for that, I am sorry. None of what I said under its influence is true. I am fascinated, not irritated by your illogic and emotions, foolish though they may sometimes be.” He hesitated. “And I have enjoyed serving on the Enterprise.”

“Good,” Jim said with a wide smile. “I’m glad we don’t irritate you too badly.”

“Hardly,” Spock replied. “I find I much prefer serving among humans to living among Vulcans.”

“We must accept the fact that Captain Kirk is no longer alive... I shall not attempt to voice the quality of respect and admiration which Captain Kirk commanded. Each of you must evaluate the loss in the privacy of your own thoughts.”

“Spock to transporter, has the captain successfully been beamed aboard? Spock to transporter, I repeat-”

Dr. McCoy hit the button to turn on the intercom with the side of his fist. “We’ve got him, and just in time too! It looks like he’s gonna be alright.”

“Good,” Spock replied. “Keep me updated on his condition-”

“Spock!” Captain Kirk exclaimed into the intercom, leaning heavily on Dr. McCoy, while Nurse Chapel hovered at his other shoulder. “Don’t worry, I’m okay.”

Spock quirked an eyebrow even though none of them could see. “I was doing nothing of the sort,” he said, though a suggestion of a smile threatened to ruin the effect.

Kirk grinned back at him. “Bones is just going to run some tests to make sure I haven’t sustained any damage.”

“And maybe you’ll appreciate the drink I mixed up more than your first officer did,” Dr. McCoy cut in.

Spock ignored Dr. McCoy. “Understood. Spock out.”

Captain Kirk waved Mr. Spock into his quarters after their shift. He half-sat, half-leaned against his desk, his arms crossed over his chest. He and Spock watched each other, each evaluating the other’s condition and waiting for him to make the first move.

Finally, Jim spoke gently, “What happened while I was gone?”

“You heard my official account in the log,” Spock said.

“I understand Bones pretending nothing happened, but why you?” Jim asked, perplexed. He searched Spock’s eyes for an answer.

“I believe humans would consider it an expression of goodwill,” Spock explained.

Jim nodded in understanding, but did not relent. “So what happened?”

Spock hesitated. “I am honored by your professed faith in me, however I am afraid it is not deserved.”

“Spock,” Jim exclaimed in protest, a hand on Spock's shoulder.

Spock did not meet his captain's eyes. When he spoke, his voice was so low it was barely audible, “I was emotionally compromised.” He looked up and continued a little louder, “I stayed in the fragmented space even though I knew it was killing the crew because I hoped I would I be able to find you alive. When the Tholian ship attacked, I fired without thinking of the consequences. Dr. McCoy was correct to question my judgement.” His eyebrows rose to emphasize his words.

Jim frowned. “Bones is a good friend, but I know he goes too far with you sometimes. As I said in the orders you didn’t watch” - he gave Spock a wry smile - “He can give good advice, but at the end of the day you’re in command. Staying in the fragmented space was a risky decision, but I probably would have done the same thing if our roles were reversed, and it turned out alright. I hear Chekov had a bad time of it, but at the end of the day everyone was okay, and I, for one, am glad you rescued me.”

Then he hesitated. “I don’t think I’ve ever been anywhere so lonely before. If I was drifting out in space at least there would have been the stars, but there was nothing, just darkness. I think I would have gone mad if I didn’t suffocate first.”

“Jim,” Spock said softly, his eyes wide. He reached out a hand to comfort the captain, but didn’t know what to do with it.

Jim met Spock’s gaze and carefully took Spock’s outstretched hand in his own. “I know, I’m not alone any more, thanks to you.”

Spock felt the rush of Jim’s emotions; his relief and affection and vibrant joy that were all reflected in his bright hazel eyes. “Jim,” was all he could think to say - there was so much Spock still didn’t have the words for.

Spock felt a spark of mischief before Jim grinned and spoke, “Why don’t you stay the night? I wouldn’t mind the company.”

Spock quirked an eyebrow at him. “If you are suggesting-” he began.

Jim interrupted with a shake of his head. “Just that you keep me company - for emotional security.”

Spock searched Jim’s expression as though appraising it. He did not reach deeper into Jim’s mind, even though he wondered what the captain was thinking. “Very well,” he said at last with a nod.

Spock left to gather his belongings, and soon returned to find the captain already in bed, shirtless, of course, reading the latest in the endless stream of reports that required his attention and approval. He glanced up as soon as the door slid open and smiled up at Spock, whose eyebrows rose at the sight of the captain still working.

“Just keeping occupied while I waited.” Jim put the reports aside. “I know, I need rest, doctor’s orders.”

“Dr. McCoy is quite right on that account,” Spock replied, not without some skepticism.

“I’m not the only one who’s had a stressful day,” Jim pointed out.

Spock nodded in acknowledgement and went to the bathroom to change. The ship was not so warm that even a young Vulcan could comfortably sleep in minimal clothing as humans did. It was probably for the best; brief contact was one thing, but spending the entire night with their minds touching would be another entirely - and humans dreamed.

Spock emerged from the bathroom and Jim watched him intently with an open smile as he made his way over to the bed. Jim shifted over a couple of inches to make room for Spock. He waited patiently as Spock hesitated before finally joining him under the covers. Spock lay flat on his back and Jim molded himself around him.

“Thank you,” Jim whispered as the lights faded to one percent. Spock could feel the human’s warm breath against his cheek.

“I might have seriously injured you, Captain, even killed you. They have evoked such great hatred in me, I cannot allow it to go further. I must master it. I must control…” Spock gripped a ceramic goblet so tightly it crumbled into rubble.

Captain Kirk arrived on the bridge with Alexander - the man they had rescued from the Platonians - concluding their tour of the ship.

“Alexander,” the captain said, once his guest had a chance to look around, marveling at their very alien technology, “I have some business to attend to” - he glanced up at Mr. Spock, dutifully bent over his viewscreen at his station - “But you’ll be left in Scotty’s very capable hands.”

Mr. Scott stepped over to them. “Aye, sir.”

“Alexander is to be treated as an honored guest. Without him, we might very well still be at the mercy of the Platonians.” The captain turned to Spock. “Mr. Spock, a word?”

Spock stood up straight and gave the captain a sharp nod. Kirk waved him off the bridge and onto the turbo lift.

“Detect anything interesting?” Kirk asked as they tread the familiar path back to the captain’s quarters.

“No,” Spock replied, “Just routine observations.”

Kirk grinned at him.

They said little more until they were behind closed doors. They stopped in the middle of Jim’s room, standing hardly a foot apart. Before either could speak, Jim extended a hand to Spock, his first two fingers out. Spock mirrored the gestured and brushed Jim’s fingers with his own, letting the captain’s emotions wash over him.

“You are unharmed?” Spock asked, his voice low.

Jim nodded. “What about you? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so angry.”

Spock inclined his head in acknowledgement. His eyes lingered on the floor and he seemed to war within himself. At last, he looked up and met Jim’s eyes. With some difficulty, he said, “I could have killed you.”

“They could have killed either of us,” Jim insisted. He put a hand on Spock’s shoulder.

Spock hesitated. “I know I was not acting under my own power, but I still feel the associated guilt - and anger.”

Jim nodded in understanding, unable to keep himself from smiling a little. “I’m sorry. I know it’s not very logical, but it is human.”

Spock inclined his head again. “It appears I am becoming increasingly human, for better or for ill.”

Jim’s smile spread across his face and shone in his eyes. “You’ve always been human, and it doesn’t make you any less vulcan.”

Spock’s eyebrows rose in disbelief. “The population of Vulcan would be inclined to disagree.”

“They don’t know what they’re missing.” Jim put both his hands on Spock’s upper arms. “Not that I’m too disappointed - their loss is my gain, after all. If you hadn’t left Vulcan, I wouldn’t have the best man in the fleet.” Jim thought he saw Spock’s cheeks turn a little greener than usual.

“At times I find that you are prone to exaggeration, Captain,” Spock attempted to protest, but the feeling resonating in his voice gave him away.

“Am I?” Jim challenged. He scrunched his forehead and shifted his eyebrows in a poor imitation his first officer.

Spock quirked an eyebrow at him in response.

“Why don’t you see for yourself.” One of Jim’s hands wandered down Spock’s arm, to stop at his wrist, just before his sleeve gave way to skin.

Jim gave Spock a questioning glance, and Spock’s eyes widened a little, inviting him to go ahead. So, Jim took Spock’s hand in his and raised it toward his face, his intention clear. Spock closed the distance, resting his warm fingers on Jim’s psy points. Their minds came together without any need for the traditional litany and they were each bathed in the other’s presence.

“A very old and lonely man. And a young and lonely man. We put on a pretty poor show, didn't we?”

Spock pressed his fingers to the captain’s temple and splayed them out along the side of his face. “Forget,” he murmured.

Their minds crashed together without another thought and Spock was overcome by a wave of guilt and grief: I’m sorry, I should have known better. I killed her. It’s my fault. I ignored your warning. I was so angry, so jealous, so desperate. I was everything he said I was; selfish, brutal, savage, cruel. I was no better than he was. All I wanted was for her to be free. I didn’t know. I pushed too hard. It’s my fault. I tried to make her love me and it killed her. I killed her. She’s dead. I killed her. She’s dead because I loved her.

The thoughts of love and death cycled on and on in an endless vortex, dragging Spock deeper and deeper with them.

His mind cried out and answered with anguish of his own. He could not bear to see his captain, to see Jim in such agony, and his own helplessness threatened to consume him, as though Jim was dying on a distant planet and he was stuck on the Enterprise, light years away. He knew the misery of love though Dr. McCoy had so easily dismissed the possibility.

“Jim,” he heard himself croak.

Like a strike of lightning, the sound seemed to illuminate Jim’s mind for an instant. Spock grabbed onto the sudden clarity with all his might. He knew what he needed to do. He quieted his emotions as he had done all his life and answered the onslaught of Jim’s anguish with logic.

What’s done is done. It cannot be helped. It is not logical to linger-

Jim’s mind revolted against Spock’s cold logic with powerful emotion that threatened to throw Spock out of the meld by sheer force of will. Jim’s very identity seemed to war against Spock’s mind and he recoiled at the rejection, but he did not give up.

He merely needed to try something different. If not logic, then emotion, as ill versed as he was in its ways.

Confident reassurance came easiest, to quiet Jim’s raging mind. The ship was at peace. Their crew was safe. They were free to explore the galaxy.

The torrent of emotion subsided, but the undercurrent of guilt and self-loathing remained, threatening to pull Spock into the heart of the storm all the same.

So, he answered with admiration, with every impossible victory and human virtue the captain had. Rayna’s death was not your fault. You could not have known. It was easy for someone like Jim, to whom human emotion came so naturally, to forget that it would be difficult for an android unaccustomed to such emotion to handle the powerful force of love.

Love. Spock slowly lowered his mental shields to allow just a portion of all the overwhelming emotion he felt for the captain. Everything illogical and irrational he did and felt, but could not bring himself to regret.

You are not alone.

Spock slowly pulled out of the meld and drew his hand away from Jim’s face.

Jim’s bright hazel eyes met his, and Jim threw his arms around Spock’s torso. Jim buried his face in Spock shoulder and squeezed Spock against him.

Spock remained still as though frozen, uncertain how to respond, but unwilling to pull away. He felt Jim’s heart beating fast in his chest and could hear his unsteady breath.

“Thank you, Spock,” Jim said at last. He leaned away just enough to look Spock firmly in the eye. “You’re right, I’m not alone, and nor are you.”

#v writes #Star Trek: The Original Series #Spirk #A Crazy Little Thing Called Love #episode response #Day of the Dove #The Tholian Web #Plato's Stepchildren #Requiem for Methuselah

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gatewaygeek · 6 years ago

Text

October Prompts - Day 8 - It will kill you if you don’t say please.

Jim walked into the ER with Bones. Jim was immediately sat in a wheel chair and wheeled to a private room.

“Bones,” He murmured. “I really don’t need this.”

“I’m not risking my license for you.”

“Spock wouldn’t actually-”

“He would, actually. And either way, you ain’t taking up space in the clinic.”

“Bones, I can’t afford private care.”

“I’ll cover it.”

“I can’t-”

“I don’t want to hear it, Jim.” Jim fell quiet, his face beginning to throb. The tears were in his eyes again when they made it to the private care room, and he promptly burst into tears when the door closed. “Shit, Jim, I didn’t think I was that mean-” Jim shook his head sharply, and Bones crouched before him, taking Jim’s hands. “What’s wrong, Kid?”

“His n-name is Nigel,” Jim hiccuped. “He was on... He was on T-Tarsus IV. H-He was one of m-my kids-” He squeezed his eyes shut. “I th-thought he died- He didn’t- they found him- they- they took him and hurt him and now he wants to hurt the rest of the group, even Val-” Jim was crying harder, now. “All I w-want is for them to be safe and N-Nigel to be okay and Spock- I want Spock, Bones-” McCoy pulled Jim into a soft hug, letting him cry into his shoulder.

“He’s on his way, Jim,” He said softly. “He’ll be here by tomorrow mornin’. I won’t leave your side ‘till he gets here. You’re gonn’ be alright. Nigel’s gonn’ be alright, and so’s Val and all the rest’a your kids. But right now, let’s gets those cuts fixed up, yeah?” Jim pulled back with a soft nod, and McCoy wiped Jim’s tears before beginning to patch Jim up.

Spock had used his father’s personal transit to get on the fastest shuttle to Earth early that morning, arriving at around 6 AM, and directly into a taxi to get to the house (Bones had messaged him saying that since Jim wasn’t delirious, he could go home, and that Bones would stay with them that night to make sure Jim didn’t show any signs of a concussion). He took the lift up, bag in tow before speeding to the door, pressing his hand to the lock, and walking in when it recognized his DNA.

“James?” He called, and James came out of their bedroom, wearing one of Spock’s uniform longsleeves and sweatpants. The two sped toward each other, meeting in a hug. Jim hid his face in Spock’s nape, arms wrapped around his neck tightly. Spock’s arms came to wrap around Jim’s waist, burying his face into his golden curls. Jim was shaking.

“Why can’t I feel the bond?” He asked into Spock’s neck, and Spock moved his hands to Jim’s psi points. He entered Jim’s mind with little resistance. The unexpected fight had put Jim on alert, and combined with some emotional trauma, Jim had successfully blocked off his side of the bond. That is probably why Spock couldn’t reach him. He could feel the turmoil in Jim’s mind, which broke like a dam when the shields were breached. Spock soothed it with waves of love. With Jim’s permission, he looked through Jim’s memories of the fight. Spock’s heart dropped when he felt that Jim did indeed blamed himself for what happened to Nigel.

Ashaya, it is not your fault.

Then whose fault is it?

It is Kodos’ fault. It is the fault of those who believed hurting a child was the solution. You saved as many as you could. You did your best, Jim, under stress, and as a child, and what happened was most certainly not your fault. Oh, James... you are still so incredibly loved, by so many, by me especially. You are alright now, adun.

Jim looked up at Spock and kissed him softly.

“I love you so much,” He whispered.

“And I, you... Where is the Doctor?”

“Asleep on the couch. I wasn’t able to sleep. C’mon.” Jim took Spock’s hand and led him back to their bedroom, and Spock shed his shoes before getting into bed with Jim, whose shaking was starting to diminish. Spock wrapped his arms around Jim.

“I’m sorry I didn’t come home sooner, Jim...” He whispered. Jim shook his head a little.

“You couldn’t have known...” He looked up at Spock. “Spock...”

“Yes, k’diwa?”

“...please meld with me.” Jim needed to feel Spock’s warmth, not only physically. Spock’s fingers found Jim’s psi points once again, and Jim wasn’t falling for long before Spock caught him and pulled him in tight.

Spock?

Yes, Ashausu?

How did you know I was in danger?

Phantom pain. It was as if I felt what you were feeling. And then you blocked the bond, and I knew something was wrong.

And you came back.

Indeed.

What about the ceremony?

No ceremony is more important than you.

Was Sarek mad?

No. In fact, he was rather concerned.

Somehow I struggle to see that.

Sarek does like you, Jim.

That’s a big maybe.

He is not of concern right now, ashayam.

Spock... I love you so much. You know that, right?

Of course I do, k’diwa. Why?

Because sometimes, shit like this happens. Serious shit. Shit that brings everyone together for the worst, and I just... I shut down. I go through the motions and I internalize everything, and I may be moody, and I may do things I don’t mean to, but I don’t want you to think that because I’m not as emotionally upfront that I don’t love you anymore. Because I have never loved anyone as much as I love you. And I’m still entirely happy with the fact that we get to be together for the rest of our lives, and you’re still it for me, and I still want to do everything we have planned, because I love you so much, Spock. Please, never forget that.

I will not... Do whatever you must to heal, James, and I will be by you side, as I always have been, and always will be. Grief... it will kill you if you do not say please.

Jim smiled a little, tears sliding down his cheeks, eyes still closed. It would take time to get over Nigel.

But at least he knew he wouldn’t lose Spock.

#October prompts #spirk

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captainexplody · 2 years ago

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International Spies

Kitty Katzenberg is an international spy, one of the best international spies for the company she works for, International Spies Inc. Society (or ISIS for short). Everybody else at the firm loves her, they’re in awe of her. Once she’s finished an incredible spy mission she wanders back into the headquarters, filling out her spy papers with a purple pen. Nobody else in the company can use anything other than a standard black pen for filling out their official spy papers, except for Kitty Katzenberg. She gets special treatment because she’s the best spy, special treatment like being able to file out her official spy papers using a purple pen. Y’know, important stuff. You’re probably asking yourself, ‘why don’t they all just use emails and online stuff instead of pen and paper gubbins?’ and I must applaud you on your use of the word ‘gubbins’ but the rest of your question is pure gubbins. People like using pen and paper sometimes, not everything is online you fucking prick! Get off Twitter sometime!

Anyway so Kitty Katzenberg is the best spy on the force, the spy force. So here’s one of her missions or whatever, ok? Alright ok, ok so she’s out on a secret spy mission, yeah? Off into the far away land, like Spain or somewhere. So she’s romancing this guy, alright? Because that’s what spies do, see. I’ve seen loads of James Bond films and I know that one thing spies do a lot is have sex with people they want to get information out of. So Kitty Katzenberg goes back to this guys mansion, he’s the bad guy so obviously he has a mansion. Imagine you went back to the Kingpin’s residence and it’s just some tiny little flat in the middle of Manhattan and he’s all like ‘urh sorry it’s all I can afford’, you’d be like ‘dude you’re the Kingpin, you can’t afford a better place than this? There’s a big hole in the wall here!’ It’d be weird, is what I’m saying to you.

Anyway so Kitty Katzenberg goes back to this guys mansion, and he’s snorting hookers off a big pile of coke, know what I mean? He’s a bigshot, a real big gun in the game of ‘Big Guns (tm)’, he’s clearly got secrets. Secrets like ‘where’d you get all this money from?’ and ‘why’d you kill that guy right there? Is it some sort of drug thing? Because if it is I’m just not interested, frankly. I’ll walk away right now. Unless if by me walking away that causes you to come and try to kill me, in which case I will pick the option which results in my life and not my death. Did this make sense? Was this too confusing? I can write it down for you if you want.’

Anyway he’s a real bad guy is what I’m saying here. So you can see what Kitty Katzenberg is up against. She successfully seduces the bad guy, who we can call Chip McCoy. Sure! We can call him that! Whatever you want! Weird name for you to pick, but whatever, we’ll roll with it. So Chip McCoy is snorting some sort of material up his nosular capacitors (nose) and Kitty is secretly taking pictures with her spy camera, because thats what spies do, yeah? They have this tiny camera that they use to take secret pictures in secret. So she’s taking pictures and eventually Chip McCoy calls Kitty Katzenberg over, and he tells her that he wants to show her his bedroom. Katzenberg (Kitty) agrees to have a look at the architecture, because her undercover character is a fan of building design. It’s the best cover job to pick! Nobody would suspect someone who was a fan of building design would be a spy for the whatever I said the company was called earlier (ISIS)?

Kitty Katzenberg walks into Chip McCoy’s bedroom, and her eyes widen. She’s in awe of what she sees. Because here’s the thing that I didn’t mention like 5 paragraphs earlier, but Kitty Katzenberg loves ceramic horses. She looks around the entire bedroom, and there are shelves and shelves of ceramic horses, all lined up. She instantly beelines towards a shelf, and then another, checking the figures to see how rare and valuable they were. She knows the value of a ceramic horse, let me tell you, and she’s astounded by the rare figures she can see.

‘Pretty sweet, yeah?’ says Chip McCoy as he sits on the edge of his big bed and pulls his manky shoes off. ‘I fucking love ceramic horses, dude. Got the biggest collection of ceramic horses in the world, I daresay. I keep the crappy ones in here, the real priceless ones are hidden in a bunker that I NEVER give a way to people I’ve met on a one-night-stand’. Kitty Katzeberg is mesmerised. THESE are the crappy ones? What the hell does he have hidden away?! She thinks that, she doesn’t say that out loud. Kitty Katzenberg turns slowly towards Chip McCoy. Would she? Could she? Would she throw her entire spy career away in order to get her hands on these beautiful ceramic horses? Would she throw away the security of her job and the love of her country for some little horse figurines? I mean they are REALLY pretty, man. You should see them. You have to imagine what they looked like, but Kitty Katzenberg can see for herself, with her own eyes that are totally real within the realms of this story.

What if I ended this right here? With an unsatisfying conclusion that you have to come to yourself, placing all of the imagination on the reader and none of it on the writer? What if I was that arrogant, that assured of my own ability to captivate an audience that they figure out the end of the story by themselves and are completely and utterly satisfied by that? I’m not that good of a writer. Anyway so Kitty Katzenberg shot Chip McCoy in the head and stole the horse figures, alright? See I told you I wasn’t a good writer.

#short story #flash fiction #horse figure #spy #52StoriesThisYear #scribbles

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nepallomo · 2 years ago

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Oriental beat hanoi rocks lyrics

#Oriental beat hanoi rocks lyrics series

The album features backing vocals by Katrina Leskanich, the lead singer of Katrina and the Waves. Many of the lyrics deal with typical rock n' roll topics like breaking the law ("No Law or Order) and teenage rebellion ("Teenangels Outsiders"). This album also marked the first time McCoy was not the sole songwriter, with Monroe being the second songwriter on the songs "Motorvatin'" and "Teenangels Outsiders". The album was produced, recorded and mixed by Peter Wooliscroft who had worked with Frank Zappa for example.

#Oriental beat hanoi rocks lyrics series

But Monroe and McCoy announced what would appear to be the final breakup of Hanoi Rocks in 2008, and the group subsequently played a series of farewell shows at Helsinki's Tavastia Club.nn In 2017, Finnish label Ainoa Productions released Rebels on the Run, a compilation of rare B-sides and EP-only tracks from the early '80s, remastered by Mika Jussila (Nightwish, Reckless Love).Recordings for Oriental Beat (then with the working-title, Second Attempt for Suicide) started in late 1981, at the Advision-studio in London. That year and the next, Hanoi Rocks toured Europe and Asia, and in 2007 the group released a new full-length, Street Poetry, on Demolition Records. The new lineup of the band issued Another Hostile Takeover, also on Major Leiden, in 2005. Monroe, Suicide, and Yaffa reunited in 1994 as Demolition 23.nn However, Monroe and McCoy re-formed Hanoi Rocks in 2002, releasing Twelve Shots on the Rocks on the Major Leiden label, and started touring once again. Chimes, McCoy, and Suicide formed the short-lived Cherry Bombz, Yaffa joined Jetboy, and Monroe recorded a solo album, Not Fakin' It, that briefly made the U.S. He gave the band notice early in 1985, and the group broke up in May after a farewell concert. (Neil was convicted of vehicular manslaughter.) Razzle was replaced by ex-Clash drummer Terry Chimes, but things were not quite the same for Monroe. The band ended the year with a tour of the U.S., but Razzle was killed in a tragic automobile accident while a passenger in Mötley Crüe lead singer Vince Neil's car. chart single the next year, from the album Two Steps from the Move. After it was completed, Casino was fired and replaced by ex-Demon Preacher and Dark drummer Nicholas "Razzle" Dingley.nn Hanoi Rocks signed to CBS in 1983 and began to spread their name in Britain their remake of Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Up Around the Bend" became their only U.K. Their Scandinavian-only (at first) debut album, Bangkok Shocks, Saigon Shakes, Hanoi Rocks, was released in 1981, and the bandmembers soon went to London to promote themselves and record Oriental Beat. All members except Monroe had previously played with one or both of the Finnish punk bands Briard and Pelle Miljoona Oy. Hanoi Rocks were founded in 1980 by singer Michael Monroe (born Matti Fagerholm) and guitarist Andy McCoy (born Antti Hulkko) after some lineup changes, the rest of the group consisted of guitarist Nasty Suicide (born Jan Stenfors), bassist Sam Yaffa (born Saki Takamäki), and drummer Gyp Casino (born Jesper Sporre). Finland's major export to the world of heavy metal, Hanoi Rocks, drew much of their sound and inspiration from '70s glam rock and were thought by some to have fused the two styles more successfully than similar acts such as Mötley Crüe.

#Oriental beat hanoi rocks lyrics

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bluesakura007 · 4 years ago

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Undeniable - Chapter 6: The Final Verdict - Khan Noonien Singh x OC

Summary: It all comes down to this moment as the time has come for the revelation of whether or not Zin’s plan to run away with Khan has been accepted by the Federation court...

The day cycled on from there until there was none of it left, stretching on into the late morning of the next one; prior to which Zinalya hadn't gone as far this time but she once again took another walk for clearing out the background noise and concerns in her mind, like she had done yesterday. Today was the day. As in the day. The time for the outcome of her plan to be revealed - whether or not Khan's sentence was going to be exile or stasis. Whether or not she would be allowed to run away with him or he would be condemned to a perpetual sleep.

There was only four hours to go until this moment of revelation would come. Now, I know four hours is a long time and as a result I wouldn't blame you at all if you ignored a request to sit in your bedroom and do nothing but count to four hours. However, four hours can sometimes seem like a short time to people, because it's an indication of the clock ticking and their time running out, especially when what was to happen at the end of those hours was an event that would decide the future of a person, or sometimes more than one person, and the rest of their life (or lives) as a whole.

Zinalya was at the end of this second amble of hers and was currently walking down the street on which her apartment building sat, surrounded by crowds of other pavement walkers. After she gave the best explanation that she could about her love for Khan to her parents the previous afternoon, she had managed to reverse the way her and her father had interacted during the conversation until then: before this opening-up of hers, he'd been very angry and heavily concerned that his daughter was putting herself in danger by wanting to be with Khan for God knows how long, but after she blew up at him and gave this full explanation for the points that she was able to put into words, he had become more understanding of her plight and the two successfully reconciled after some more discussion.

In the present moment, she had almost reached the apartment building when she noticed a familiar face coming towards her further down the street ahead. Scotty. And then as he drew nearer, what she also noticed was that there was someone else accompanying him, who she soon saw to be Chekov.

"Hey you two." She greeted them when they came close enough to her.

"Hello." Pavel responded amicably.

"Morning Zinalya." Added Scotty in the same manner, during which the three all stepped off to the side, right next to another building, so that their conversation wouldn't take up the pavement. "What're you doing out here?"

"I thought I'd take in the air while I had time to kill." Replied Zinalya, looking out in front of her with a faraway gaze.

The pair picked up on this look in her eyes straight away, to which the engineer who'd previously spoken asked, "Have you been thinking about all this? About Khan?"

"Yeah." She nodded. "It's not as big as the worries I had before this all happened, before I announced my feelings yesterday, I mean, but there's still that little nagging voice in the back of my head telling me that what I'm doing is wrong. I know it's not true, especially since my parents are willing to be supportive of this, but I kinda feel like it's damaged things between me and the others."

It was a fairly weird feeling: she was both guilty about the moment when she slapped Bones the previous day and simultaneously glad that she did, as at the time it seemed like it was the only way she was going to be able to get her point across to him. As a result of this discussion which had caused it, neither she nor Bones had spoken to each other since, and she also wasn’t speaking to Spock either.

"You’re right, it’s not true! There’s been no damage done." Chekov shook his head in reassurance. "In fact I heard yesterday that Lieutenant Uhura was telling the captain and Mr. Spock about how stopping you from doing this would be a bad idea. She might be staying neutral on the matter but that still means she doesn’t wish anything bad on you."

"Exactly." Agreed Scotty. "The laddie’s right, and as for Dr. McCoy, he just got a bit wound up - he’ll come around soon, just wait and see! And you know what Spock’s like, he’s bound to do the same."

"So you don’t think I am on my own in this? I know you pair are on my side but right after I revealed it yesterday I was worried that I was gonna end up alone in the situation, and I suppose that thought’s coming back to haunt me a little." Said Zin.

"No, of course not! Even if things end up never being the same between you and Spock and the doctor, which is very unlikely, by the way, you’ve still got us."

"And you also said just now that you have your parents supporting you." Pavel additionally contributed. "So there will be always be someone on your side, Zinalya. Including us."

To hear these words spoken out loud was at least a partial relief to her. "Thanks you guys, that’s kind of you to say. I appreciate it."

"The three of us are friends, lassie - it’s our job." Scotty and Chekov both mirrored her grateful expression with their own smiles.

Zinalya and this pair were already seated in the stands at the back of the courtroom when the others, as 2 PM rolled round at last, started filing in with various other audience members. First came Nyota with Spock, who Zin only gave a fleeting glance towards, and then there was Hikaru and Jim, with Carol following close behind.

Then finally there was Bones, who looked at the security chief with a somewhat stony demeanor in his eyes; she gave him a quick but frosty stare in return. These six who came in all walked either past the trio who were already there, onto the row behind them or next to them on the side nearest to the aisle they entered on.

In addition, Khan was present at the front once again, and, also once again as you might have guessed, there were metallic forearm handcuffs and guards involved. This time when he came into the room, though, the looks that he and Zinalya exchanged with each other weren't ones of looking into one another in the hopes of decoding the complexities of their feelings - they were now instead ones of a newfound level of warm understanding between the two of them.

"This court has been called to order to draw a conclusion to the trial of Khan Noonien Singh." The judge spoke out. "Miss Zinalya Chloe Hamilton, step forward please."

She complied with this request, getting up out of her seat and making her way towards the front, everyone's eyes on her. While people were still filing in about a minute ago, she could hear a large majority of them whispering to each other after giving what she noticed to be quick glimpses. Spock, also watching the back of her head, thought on Uhura's words from yesterday afternoon as he had also done shortly after this instance itself. "Do you understand that by consenting yourself to accompany Mr. Singh in your recommended exile sentence, you will also be subject to an exile of your own and therefore not be a citizen of the United Federation of Planets during that time?"

She nodded, keeping her head and shoulders held up confidently, even though it was an understatement to say that she had butterflies in her belly. She felt like she practically had an entire conservatory full of them in there. "I understand."

"Very well then." He afterwards addressed the rest of the crowd behind her. "The court has decided to conduct the determination of our final verdict by putting the decision to a consensus: those of you present here today shall participate in a vote for whether or not the defendant and Miss Hunter should be given this sentence of exile." There was a pause for a beat. "All those in favour?"

Now was the moment of truth. Zinalya's breath hitched in her throat in anticipation as she looked up behind her at what the result of this query was going to be, with Khan additionally turning his head for a glance of his own. And then came the hands that were raised.

Scotty and Pavel were two of the first to raise their hands, and she saw that very soon afterwards, so did Sulu, Uhura, Carol and Kirk and then, to her surprise, Spock did the same. He didn't speak it out loud right now, but this half Vulcan-half human had spent the last few seconds realising the truth in what Nyota had said the previous day - it was indeed the conflict orchestrated by the Montagues and the Capulets regarding Romeo and Juliet's love which caused their untimely deaths and the tragic end to the story, and their eagerness for marriage and progression in their relationship was much, much less responsible for it. And then there came an even bigger surprise. McCoy raised his hand as well.

At the sight of this latter devlopment, Zinalya involuntarily experienced a feeling of relief throughout her mind.

But now it was time for her to see how many of the other audience members there in that courtroom had also raised their hands in favour...

#khan #khan noonien singh #khan x oc #star trek #star trek aos #into darkness #aos #khan noonien singh x oc #star trek into darkness #benedict cumberbatch #into darkness khan #khanbatch #khan singh #stid

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mybullshitsensesaretingling · 8 years ago

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No Skin Off My Back

Request: Hey I was wondering if I could request a Leonard McCoy imagine? Where the reader is a bamf and saves crew and/or him on an expedition but gets badly hurt and fluff..?

A/N: I seem to have accidentally deleted the message this is from, so I don’t know who it was from. I’m really sorry

With the back of your head nestled in the palms of your clasped hands, you closed your eyes, letting yourself enjoy the sunshine. It had been months since you had been in real, nonsynthetic sunlight and you planned on soaking up every second of it.

“Ever get the feeling we’re not really needed on these missions?” Bones asked as he watched the scientist analyze the local flora and fauna.

You opened your eyes just enough to see him leaning back against the rock you were laying on.

“We’re just an extra precaution, like locking the doors when you’re asleep.” You paused, thinking. “Or something people actually do.”

“Wait, do you not do that?”

“Noooo?,” the word took its time getting all the way out and went up at the end.

“So anybody can just waltz in?” You had never heard the word waltz used with such disappointment.

“Anybody who comes into my house uninvited gets a skillet to the face,” you told him confidently.

He looked at you for a second longer before turning back around again with a huff.

You nudged him with the tip of your boot. “Stop being such a grumpy Gus and enjoy this wonderful, warm sun.”

You felt his arm brush against your side as he leaned further back.

“I guess it is pretty nice.”

Peeking an eye open at him, you smirked, “I don’t think I have ever heard you call something nice.”

“I’ve called things nice before,” Bones defended.

“Yeah, but sincerely?”

“Oh.” His brow furrowed as he thought back. “I’m sure I have. You just weren’t there.”

“Guess I’ll have to take your word for it.” You closed your eyes again.

“What the hell is that?” the end of his question was muffled by a scream.

You propped yourself up on your elbows to see what all the yelling was about. Your eyebrows sprang up and your mouth fell open. It took you a couple seconds of staring at the giant monster raging a few feet away for your body to catch up with your mind. You lunged off the rock and snatched the collar of one of the scientists, who was walking forward, and yanked him back.

“Don’t go towards it, dumbass!” Your shouting caught the beast’s attention. You spun the scientist around and forced him back the other way and ordered, “Go back to the shuttle.”

You didn’t have to tell him twice. You barely had to tell the rest of the crew once. They all went dashing past Bones, who stood in place, staring at you incredulously.

“Go,” you repeated more forcefully.

“I’m not leaving you here. You’ve got that look Jim gets before he does something stupid and heroic.”

“Yeah, well.” You crouched down, picking up a few rocks.

“(Y/N),” he warned.

“Don’t worry,” you tried to smiled reassuringly at him.

“You know when you say that, it only makes me worry more, right?”

“Yep.” Your tone regained its urgency as the monster grew far too close for comfort, “You really should run now.”

“Not without-”

“Leonard,” you cut him off. “There’s no way we’re all going to make it, if someone doesn’t distract this thing. Besides,” you smiled, chucking a rock up at it and successfully pulling its attention away from the running science officers, “I’m gonna need someone to patch me up when I’m done.”

He gave you one last apprehensive look, that you were too preoccupied to see, before jogging to catch up to the others. You wasted no time leading the beast in the opposite direction, throwing rocks and yelling things you were sure it would find offensive if it could understand you. Every few steps, it would extend one of its great feet in an attempt to puncture your skin with its claws. Attempts you managed to fully dodge about half the time.

Just as you saw a way to put an end to this ridiculous chase, you felt the claws dig into your back, dragging you to the ground. Its heel slammed into the back of your leg. A scream rose from your throat as it snapped under the pressure.

You pulled your phaser from your belt and twisted your body as much as you could under its foot so you could take aim. The plasma did about as much good as the rocks did, but the attack shocked it enough for it to remove its foot from your back. You quickly crawled away from the monster and towards a large hole in the rock wall ahead of you. Once you were through you flipped over and scooted back a few more inches so you could see if it would try to follow you.

Just as you had hoped, its oversized torso got caught, trapping it. But you weren’t given much time to appreciate your victory, before it started to wiggle through. Without stopping to fully think it through, you raised your phaser above your head and shot at a ledge. It came tumbling down in a cloud of dust, bringing the beast’s head along with it.

“Why do I always feel like I’ve been transported into a weird, violent cartoon whenever I go on a mission with you?” As the dust settled, you could see Bones standing at the tail end of the monster with his arms crossed.

“Is that your way of saying that would have looked cooler with an anvil? Because I totally agree.” You winced as you got to your feet and started to climb over the body of the beast. “I thought you went back to the shuttle.”

Your vision started blotting out and your legs gave way, sending you to the ground, but before you reached it a pair of arms found their way around you.

“I came back,” he smiled softly, setting you against a rock. “Aren’t you lucky I did. You can’t walk on that leg.”

“Sure I can. I just have to go slow and believe in myself.”

Bones did a perfect recreation of the look your mother gave you whenever you told her you were having cookie dough for dinner.

“Fine,” you sighed, “I won’t walk.

He turned around and knelt down. “Come on, get on.”

“What?” Your eyes grew wide as you stared down at him. “Really? You’re going to give me a piggyback ride?”

“We’re you planning on disappearing into a cloud of smoke?” he quipped.

“Maybe. You don’t know all my skills.”

“Just get on.”

With a shrug and grin you couldn’t help, you wrapped your arms loosely around his neck and your legs around his waist. Placing his hands under your thighs, he got back up.

“Do you give your patients piggyback rides often?” you asked as he started walking.

“Very rarely.”

You hummed in response and let your head droop down to rest against his back. “When we get back to the ship, you should carry me right to my bed.”

“How ‘bout I carry you right to a biobed?”

“Sure. I can nap in sickbay instead.”

“Great.” He hoisted you up higher as you started to slip. “How many times did that thing scratch you?”

“About five,” you guess. “Asshole was fast and mean as hell.”

“Can you blame it? You said some nasty things about its mother.”

“Well, he was coming after my boy.” You patted a weak hand on his chest.

“Don’t blame this craziness on me,” he grumbled.

“It’s too late. It’s on you. The blame is on you and you can’t take it off and it’s all because I love you.”

He sighed. “I guess I can live with that.”

“You’re going to have to.”

The light shining down on your closed eyelids got considerably less harsh. You opened them to see that you were now inside the shuttle. Bones set you down on one of the chairs.

“I’m going to go check the emergency medical supplies in the back.” He clapped a hand on the knee of your leg that wasn’t broken as he stood back up straight.

Pivoting in the chair, you threw your arm over the back of it. Your head lulled to the side, causing your ear to press against your shoulder, as you watched him.

“Lift up your shirt,” he ordered, coming back into the main part of the ship.

“Are you coming onto me?”

“Absolutely. Nothing gets me going like someone getting mauled.”

“Hey,” you lifted a hand up, “no, judgment.”

“I’m glad you’re such a tolerant individual. Could you please be a tolerant individual with less fabric on your back so I can put some bandages on?”

You pulled your uniform up to your shoulders. Bones helped you pull your arm from the torn sleeve, leaving the fabric to hang loosely around your neck. He carefully started winding the bandages around your torso.

“How does it look?” You always asked but you were never sure you wanted to know.

“You’re expecting me to lie, aren’t you?”

“Only if you can do it convincingly.” Your head dropped back down to your shoulder as you lost the strength to hold it up right. Tears sprung into your eyes as it landed on a deep scratch, but you ignored it.

“It doesn’t look too bad.”

“How dare you lie to me.”

“Ok, fine.” If it was possible to hear someone roll their eyes in their tone of voice, you could now. “It looks like you just got in a fight with the devil.”

A small whine escaped you when his fingers grazed a particularly deep cut. You clamped your jaw shut and squeezed your eyes closed.

“I’m going to have you good as new in no time,” he promised, softly.

“I know,” it came out quieter than you had expected.

You felt a hand on your cheek. You opened your eyes to see Bones smiling faintly down at you. He gently lifted your head up so he had a clear path to the wounds on your upper arm. When he had finished with the bandages, he slowly tucked your arm back into its sleeve and tugged your shirt back down. It made you feel like a toddler, but at that moment you were too tired and in too much pain to care.

“Where are the nerds?” you asked, as he cleaned your face of the blood that had smeared there from the cut on your shoulder.

“You realize being a starship engineer qualifies you as nerd, right?”

“Where are the scientists?” you amended, letting your forehead fall forward to rest on his stomach.

“I think they went to finish collecting samples or something.”

“If they get themselves killed, I’m not rescuing them,” you grumbled into his shirt.

“Damn right you’re not.” He stroked the back of your neck.

“One rescue is no skin off my back, but two rescues in one one mission,” you gave your head a minute shake, “you gotta be Diana Prince to make that work.”

“Did you just admit you’re not a god among men?” Bones smirked.

“I admit nothing,” your voice barely retained its sarcastic tone as your eyes slipped shut.

#Bones #bones imagine #bones x reader #Leonard McCoy #leonard mccoy imagine #leonard mccoy x reader

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star-trekkin-across-theuniverse · 8 years ago

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TrekFest 2017

Word Count: 2984 Prompt: "I say what I mean and I mean what I say." @travelwithwords Tags: @southernbellestatues @engineeringtrashcan @rayleyanns @sistasarah-sallysaidso @outside-the-government @samaxraph99, @flirtswithdanger @feelmyroarrrr @kirkaholic123 Author’s note: I feel like Uhura is the ultimate friend, who would boost you up without reservation, and then some. I could be way off, but she’s who I’d want reassuring me.

You sighed and stared at the scale, knowing the result meant that Doctor McCoy would be giving you that kind and gentle, hand-on-the-knee talk about maintaining safe and healthy weight while in the artificial atmosphere of the ship blah blah. And you knew he was right. Not because you felt you should be slim and sylph-like as models were, but because your arthritic knees, which you’d been living with successfully since you were a teenager, only bothered you when you hit a certain weight, and they’d been aching so much that even getting out of bed was making you groan. And if you were completely honest with yourself, there was a level of vanity involved. You liked your uniform dress. You’d been stuck in your tunic and slacks for weeks now, hiding your long legs because your dress pinched just a little too much through the hips.

You reported to MedBay for your physical and walked to the biobed like a convict headed to the hangman’s noose. You couldn’t even meet Doctor McCoy’s eyes when he ambled over, PADD in hand, comparing your historical results with those on the monitor above you.

“Hmm,” he said. That was all he needed to say.

“I know. Fifteen pounds or I’m grounded, right?” You asked. His eyebrow shot up in surprise and he met your eyes with some concern reflected within his own.

“Not at all. I was just about to comment about how everything looks just fine. You’re still within the weight specs for your field, and your physical activity log is showing good consistency, your run time is improving. I’m not worried at this point,” he explained, showing you each item on his PADD.

“My knees hurt, Doc. All the time,” you admitted.

“I see an arthritis diagnosis on here. Why haven’t we run a course of JointGen?” He asked.

“Because when I’m at my old weight they don’t bug me at all,” you admitted. “If nothing else, it’s always kept me honest.”

“Well, I’ll order the JointGen. It’s two tablets daily for a week. That should resolve any issues you have,” he shrugged. “Don’t beat yourself up about your weight. We all gain a little our first mission.”

“My uniform doesn’t fit properly,” you complained.

“So req a new one, and stop killing yourself over it,” he shook his head. “Don’t allow your value to be dictated by the size of your ass, Lieutenant.”

“Ah, but you did notice it was my ass that was bigger,” you teased him. He rolled his eyes, and swatted you on the knee with the PADD.

“Get out of my MedBay, and go req a uniform that fits you, or I’ll order you dietary salads, and then you’ll be sorry,” he laughed.

You smoothed down the front of your new, larger uniform dress self-consciously and sighed, looking in the mirror. You could see every bulge that hadn’t been there before, the way your hips were broader, and your ass was plumper. It wasn’t that your shape was bad, just different, and you had a hard time recognizing it as being you. With another heavy sigh, you collected your PADD and headed to the communications lab.

You felt like everyone was staring at you as you made your way to your station, brushing the back of your skirt under you as you sat. You hoped they hadn’t noticed the extra jiggle in your ass, or the way your hips brushed against things as you maneuvered through the close quarters of the small space allotted to your division, but you could feel a dozen eyes on you as you logged on to your computer to check the subspace chatter. You forced yourself to push all your self-conscious thoughts aside as you focussed on your work, and soon your worries faded away.

You’d almost stopped paying attention to the frequency when you heard the message come through. Your eyebrows snapped together and you replayed the message a second time, trying to decipher the garbled portions. Again you listened to the message, your brows knit tightly together. You clipped the message and sent it to your PADD, excusing yourself to check in with Lt. Uhura on the bridge.

“Nyota, listen to this.” You passed your PADD to her once Captain Kirk had given you permission to come on the bridge. “It’s Klingon.”

“It sounds like they’re reporting a failure and subsequent of their main warp drive,” Uhura nodded. “Why is this concerning?”

“Well, listen to the way they say warp drive. That’s not a native Klingon speaker. And the way the inflection is on the wrong syllable, it changes the meaning of the entire sentence, from a repair report on the warp drive to a -”

“To a confirmation that they’ve succeeded in a mission,” Uhura finished for you. “This close to the neutral zone can only mean one thing.”

“That’s why I brought this to you to confirm,” you nodded. Uhura had been the head of communications for as long as you’d been on the ship. Despite the equivalent rank, you answered to her, and reported to her. And you respected her incredible talent with language, far superior to anyone you’d ever met.

“This was an excellent catch, Y/N,” she praised. “Captain, Lieutenant Y/L/N has intercepted a Klingon transmission.” She brought the PADD over to the Captain and explained what he was hearing. The ease and confidence with which she interacted with the captain was something you were envious of. Nyota knew she was intelligent, she had confidence in her abilities and she carried herself with that ease of someone who saw herself as the equal of everyone she encountered, regardless of rank. There was a lot you could learn from her, you realized, as you watched her interact with the captain.

“Y/N, you’re exceptionally good at picking up the subtle nuances of speech. If I forward you another message, do you think you could tell me if it’s the same speaker? This one is not in Klingon,” Uhura asked. You pursed your lips for a moment and nodded.

“Yeah, I probably could,” you agreed. She smiled and handed your PADD back to you.

“Excellent. I’ll forward it to your console,” she smiled. “It’s nice to see you in your dress, by the way. You look beautiful, as always.”

“Uh, thanks?” You furrowed your brow in disbelief as you excused yourself back to the communications lab. Nyota always knew how to make you question whether it was you or her that was blind. She was so beautiful that you figured she should be a good judge of beauty. So you wanted to believe what she said. But you’d also been nursing a pretty heavy crush on her since you’d started working together, and tended to think that clouded your judgement. You seated yourself at your console and began to work on comparing the two messages to one another, losing yourself in concentration. The sounds blended together and eventually you were able to pick out specifics of each message that confirmed that the speaker was the same person. You sent a message back to Uhura stating as much.

She sent a response requesting your presence on the bridge immediately.

“So what we have is a theory of what has happened, based on your analysis, Y/N,” Uhura explained. “We think that the Federation ambassador to the planets at the edge of the neutral zone has gone to the Klingons with information about Starfleet. The timeline works out. He was reported missing after leaving Ajilon Prime about six hours after the message you compared to the Klingon one.”

“So why do you need me? Is there more to be deciphered? Other comparisons to make?” You asked.

“We need you for the intercept mission,” Captain Kirk interjected. “We need to lure him back onto this side of the neutral zone, and then get on his ship. We think we can do that by broadcasting our intention to take shore leave at Starbase 234, which would leave the ship available to pull more classified information from.”

“I don’t see where I come in?” You weren’t going to hide your confusion.

“We need you to, ah,” Captain Kirk trailed off, rubbing the back of his neck. Uhura rolled her eyes.

“Flirt with him at the starbase bar, Y/N,” Uhura sighed. You made a face and shook your head.

“Uh, why me?” You asked. “There’s got to be at least fifty other women on this ship better looking, and better equipped to flirt with him, Nyota. You included.”

“You’re more his type,” she countered. You raised one eyebrow and felt yourself flushing. So much for Nyota thinking you were pretty. Now the truth came out.

“More his type?” You repeated. “What do you mean? Fat? He’s a chubby chaser? No. I won’t do it.” You turned on your heel and walked out, ignoring Captain Kirk’s orders to return on the penalty of relief of duty. Rather than return to your station in the comm bay, you headed to your quarters and flopped across your bed, discouraged and sad.

A tentative knock at the door alerted you to someone’s presence, and you pushed yourself from your bed with a sigh. Better to face the captain than a court martial. You pressed the button for the door, and were surprised to see Nyota on the other side. She stepped in, hesitantly, and waited until the door slid closed again before she spoke.

“What’s going on?�� She asked.

“What do you mean? I think I have a right to turn down an assignment that singles me out because of my weight gain,” you countered, unable to stop the bitter tone that tainted your words.

“That’s not why I recommended you,” she replied. She gave you a long assessing look. “I hadn’t even noticed you’d put on weight until you said so. I guess I see it. Sort of.”

“Oh please. So I wasn’t chosen because of the way I look?” You challenged. Nyota smiled.

“Oh, you very definitely were chosen because of your appearance, Y/N. The ambassador is famous for his weakness for busty women,” Nyota explained, her tone straight innuendo.

“So I was chosen because I have big boobs?” You asked, your nose wrinkling in disgust. “Gross.”

Nyota took your hand and led you to the couch, gesturing for you to sit down. “Look at me,” she demanded. Your eyes met hers and you could tell by the set of her jaw you were going to get a lecture. “You are beautiful. You are desireable. You are so intelligent, and intuitive that I trust your working judgement completely. But I don’t trust your self-image at all. Tell me why you think you’re so hideous, when all I can see when I look at you is the stars.”

“Look at me, Ny,” you gestured down your body. “I had to requisition new dresses because of my weight gain. I’m up two sizes.”

“You just had your physical, what did Doctor McCoy say?” She pressed.

“That I was within the weight parameters for my job,” you admitted.

“So your doctor didn’t try to shame you into a diet. Your friend is telling you that you’re beautiful. You’ve been specifically chosen for a mission that panders to man’s lowest common denominator because of how deliciously curvaceous you are. Why can’t you accept that you are beautiful?” She asked, rubbing her hand on your thigh. It wasn’t helping your crush at all to have her saying those things and touching you so familiarly.

“Maybe you’re only saying it to make me feel better?” You knew as you said it that it was ridiculous, and tried to avoid meeting her gaze. You felt it burning into the top of your head and looked up to your friend’s most frightening cold face.

“I say what I mean. And I mean what I say. I wouldn’t offer a compliment that was unwarranted. You are gorgeous, and you have immense value to me.” Her tone was icy. “If you aren’t comfortable using your body to manipulate this man for this mission, we can find someone else.” Her tone softened, and she took your hands in hers again, squeezing slightly.

“I don’t know if I can, Ny,” you admitted.

“I have an idea. Do you think you can trust me?” She asked. You looked down at her hands in yours and took a deep breath.

“I’ll try,” you promised.

Against your better judgement, you were sitting on a bar stool in the lounge on Starbase 234, nursing a drink. Your dress was revealing more than you’d ever shown, the neckline low cut, the hem high, and nothing left to the imagination in between. You felt very on display. Nyota had promised to stay with you until the ambassador took notice of you, and then said she would drift away to another table. The idea was to lure him onto the Enterprise, where he would undoubtedly want to snoop around.

You hadn’t counted on the ambassador noticing you the instant he came into the bar. You’d expected him to survey his surroundings more thoroughly. If you were truthful with yourself, despite Uhura’s assurances that you looked amazing, you still doubted your ability to attract any attention. But there he was, beside you, within minutes of walking in.

“I’d ask what a nice girl like you is doing in a dive like this, but I heard the Enterprise is on leave for the next couple of nights,” he opened. You had to stop yourself from rolling your eyes, and instead gave him a slightly amused smile. “It was a bad line, wasn’t it?”

“It was pretty terrible. Did you want to try again, maybe?” You laughed. He waved at the bartender to bring him a drink.

“I think my entire repertoire is bad lines,” he admitted. “Maybe I’ll buy you a drink instead?” The ambassador was cheesy in his advances and had you laughing more than you probably wanted to admit. His sense of humour bordered on the silly, and you were finding it hard to believe that he could possibly be the mastermind behind the espionage being credited to him, until you said it was time to head back to the ship and turn in for the night. There was a gleam in his eyes, and had you blinked, you would have missed it.

“I should walk you back. Never know what kind of miscreants are waiting in the halls of a starbase,” he insisted, looping his arm in yours. You made eye contact with Nyota as you walked out of the bar, and noticed her whispering into her communicator, warning the rest of the team that you were on your way.

“If you’re walking me back, I should reward you with a tour,” you giggled, feeling like an idiot. “Have you ever been on the flagship?”

“I haven’t. I’d love to see the bridge,” he admitted, that gleam lighting his face up again. This time he didn’t try to hide it, and you had to wonder if he honestly thought you’d had too much to drink to notice. You led him to the ship, and through the corridors until you got to the turbolift that would take you to the bridge. He leaned in to nuzzle your neck and you pulled away, flushing in embarrassment. You absolutely were not going to allow the man to kiss you in order to make the plan successful. Fortunately, he thought your reticence was cute. “Hard to get? I like it.”

You stepped off the turbolift, and he followed, giving your ass a smack. You jumped, and swallowed a startled squeak. He stepped over to Captain Kirk’s chair and sat down, gesturing to his lap for you to join him. You shook your head. “No, I draw the line at defiling the captain’s chair,” you laughed. “Give me a minute? I’ve got to powder my nose.”

“I’ll be right here waiting, beautiful,” he smiled. You let yourself into the Captain’s ready room and dropped into a chair, your work finally done. Once left alone on the bridge, Captain Kirk expected him to try to log in to the computer and steal whatever sensitive data he could find. You just needed to give him the time to do so. Nyota slipped into the room and sat down across from you, offering you a high five.

“He’s already trying to crack the computer,” she whispered. “You did so well tonight, Y/N.”

“I felt like an idiot,” you admitted, keeping your voice low. “But you certainly weren’t wrong about him being a boob man. I don’t know if he could tell you the colour of my eyes.”

“To be honest, Y/N, I’d have a hard time telling you right now too, if I didn’t already know,” she teased. “You’re beyond gorgeous tonight, honey.”

“Stop,” you blushed. She leaned over and took your hands in hers again.

“What did I tell you? I’m not going to lie to you. Ever. You’re stunning in every sense of the word,” she said. “You make me want to break my rule about intradepartmental dating.”

“What?” You gaped, unsure of what you’d heard. Had she just -

“I’d like to take you on a date, Y/N. Tomorrow maybe, if we’re still dealing with the ambassador because we’ll technically be on leave,” she said, looking earnestly into your eyes. “I mean, if you’re okay with going on a date with the woman you report to.”

“Well, we’re the same rank, so I guess there’s not really a conflict of interest,” you hedged. “But really?”

“Honey, it’s been all I could do not to pull that sleeze off you tonight and claim you as my own,” she smiled.

“Then tomorrow night, I’m all yours,” you smiled, feeling your cheeks heat up again.

#trek fest 2017 #star trek imagine #imagine star trek #nyota uhura #uhura #uhura x reader

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