ACADEMY DAYS

SECOND YEAR

By Jackie Stone

(Reprinted with permission of the author)

 

"...and unless exempted by provisos (a), (b)(i) and (3) or 5(a) of section 2 para 15, these officers shall at all times observe the order of precedence specified in General Order No. 24. Notwithstanding an exemption under (b)(3), the said precedence will nevertheless apply in the event of a General Alert Type D (viz Section 12 para 18..."

There seemed to be a slight fault in the air-conditioning. The evenness of the subdued hum blurred now and then, and then made a hiccupping sound before settling back into its regular rhythm.

It might not, of course, be a fault at all. There was no apparent impediment to the air flow, so perhaps it was some kind of thermostatic control built into the design.

But the hiccups did not hiccup at regular intervals. They varied between 18.825 seconds and...

That was 27.42 seconds after the last one.

It must be a fault.

"...it will, I am sure at this stage appear to you that there exists a contra- diction between para 32 sub para 3 and para 35 sub paras 1 and 2. The interesting aspect of this apparent contradiction is that the interpretation found in Nelligan's 'Modern History of Law Relating to Military..."

It seemed a strange error in organisation to arrange a lecture on the first day of the Year. The room was dotted with a fraction of those due to attend - obvious gaping spaces between the few Second Years who had made it back in time. He had passed four new arrivals on his way to the lecture hall itself, all staggering under the awkward weights of their prized possessions without which they could not spend one year, such as lampshades, cushions, mirrors and other similar encumbrances.

If they had arranged the lecture for the following day, there would have been maximum attendance.

But perhaps if they had arranged the lecture for the following day, they would all have arrived back at the Academy a day later than that.

"...All officers between ranks of Ensign and Lieutenant Commander shall be required whilst on shore leave on non-classified bases to wear standard belts and equipment supports..."

Another sound had joined the droning of the air-conditioning and the droning of Professor Wilde, indicating that whoever it was sitting just behind him had fallen asleep, and had a tendency to snore, albeit fairly gently. He couldn't remember who had sat down behind him.

He felt that whoever it was had hit a sensible method of passing this interminable lecture.

Which, it seemed, had ended. The professorial droning had stopped, and the cadets were gradually emerging to the surface, like so many cold-sleep star travellers. Chairs were scraping back. Professor Wilde had left the room. The droning behind him continued apace.

Spock turned round and looked at the kneecap which presented itself to his gaze at eyelevel. He followed the body up to the next tier, fitted a name to the face, and thought hard for a moment.

"Mr Andrzejewski," he said.

The sleeper slumbered on.

Spock tapped the kneecap tentatively with his finger-tips. "Jan:" he said again.

"Whuu? Ah? Oh God!" said Jan, in a sleep-deadened tone.

"The lecture has finished," offered Spock, by way of explanation.

"Oh wow, thanks!" Jan stretched a little, and then looked anxiously at the Vulcan. "Did he notice, do you think?"

Spock paused fractionally. "I doubt that he would have noticed had we all followed your excellent example."

Jan stared in surprise, and then gave an abrupt guffaw which made Spock start slightly, since he had been away from Humans for so long that he had not remembered to expect such things. "Oh well, that's okay then; Hey, I need some air. Let's get out of here." He clambered to his feet and beckoned to Spock to follow, and the two stomped down the steep levels between the banks of seats and walked out after the others.

"Enjoy your vacation?" asked Jan as they strolled together along the corridor towards the elevator. They were parted briefly as a cluster of cadets surged towards and between them on their way along the corridor, and Spock was thereby afforded the opportunity to consider whether a non-committal "Mmm" would suffice in reply.

He tried it, and it did.

"Oh good. Where d'you go? That's quite a sun tan you've got!"

"I went home for the whole vacation."

"Yeah? Is it sunny on Vulcan, then?"

An eyebrow twitched slightly.

"Yes, it is very...hot," he said, faintly.

"I'll have to try it some day. I think there's a ball game set up before the meal. I'm gonna try and catch it. Coming?"

"No, thank you, I...have some unpacking to do. Perhaps I'll see you at the meal."

They paused, and stood together outside the door in the wintry late-afternoon sunlight which flickered down into the courtyard between the high buildings. Jan looked up at the sun, and then turned back to Spock with a blink and a smile.

"Sure?"

Spock nodded.

"Okay, I'll see you then. I'd better run." He waved and hurried off, leaving Spock to turn away and walk slowly in the direction of C Block, where was situated his home-from home for the coming year.

He felt relieved that he had the chance to be on his own for a while before the crush and hustle of the dining hall. Even though not all the cadets had bothered to return for the first day, those who were there, when gathered together, would constitute a small multitude in comparison with the company he had had during the long vacation:-

Mainly himself, sometimes his mother and, less often, his father as well.

The vacation had been peaceful enough. He had enjoyed his walks on the Forge, and had relaxed in the familiarity of the scenery and atmosphere. But the company of his family had been - difficult. He had felt no compunction at returning to the Academy a day earlier than necessary, and they had probably not been sorry to see him go, for their own respective reasons. And now he was back, and the Academy too had its own familiar scenery and atmosphere, its sounds and smells correlating with his memories, and the furniture as uncomfortable as ever.

But the contrast between his two worlds was vast, and the confusion brought about by the abrupt transition was at present manifesting itself in a sense of detachment just sufficiently discernible to be unpleasant. He wanted to grasp the present, but could not, and was glad to be alone so that he could strive to adjust and to achieve full realisation of the fact that he was no longer THERE, but HERE.

He opened the door of C Block's room 7ll3, went in and allowed the door to swing shut behind him.

It was very quiet.

Perhaps that accounted in part for his present difficulty, because he now realised that, umbilically connected in his mind with the Academy, was the impression of noise and ceaseless boisterousness and activity. But the Year was still awakening, cadets were still arriving and settling, and, right now, there was silence while he stood in the centre of his new room.

Which bore an unnervingly close resemblance to his old one. The only major differences which he had as yet detected were that the chair was brown and not black, and rather more comfortable, and the bed was on the opposite side. He hoped, as - he now plonked himself down on it and leaned back against the wall, that he would not forget after working late in an evening and attempt to throw himself down to slumber on his chest of drawers and odds-and-ends box.

He must find places for the odds and ends.

His mind was wandering again.

He sat up, and then sighed.

He heard footsteps; they were even at first as they became louder, and then jerked into a tapping dance and then back again, as though their perpetrator had begun to skip.

Then the footsteps stopped outside his door and before he had the chance to ready himself the door burst open.

"Huh?" said the newcomer, enigmatically.

"Henri?" said Spock, somewhat affronted at the abrupt intrusion. The man hadn't even knocked.

"What...? Oh no! Have I got the wrong room? Is this your room? What...?" Henri LeServe could get no further in his questioning. His belated grasp of the situation, combined with the expression of dignified annoyance on Spock's face, proved too much, and he leaned against the door and shook with laughter. "Oh..." he wheezed. "I'm sorry!"

He didn't appear to be very sorry.

Spock waited until he had recovered. He couldn't think of anything to say, and he had no inclination to join in the joke, unaware that he constituted an intrinsic element of it, so he sat on the edge of his bed watching Henri until the latter had got over the worst and managed to say, "What floor are we on?"

"The seventh."

Spock's tone of voice drove the last of the giggles from LeServe's System.

"Oh. I meant to stop on the sixth. Ah...it looks like I'm just underneath you for the Year. Ah..." He felt another giggle begin to push itself to the surface, and ruthlessly squashed it. "Hey, this place is so confusing. Don't you ever get lost?"

"No."

There was a brief, difficult silence.

"Well, I'd better get back to the elevator and go down one. Sorry to bust in on you like that. Ah...did you have a good vacation? That's some tan you got, wherever you went."

"Yes, I did, thank you," Spock replied, aware that Le Serve's apology this time warranted some acknowledgement. "Did you?"

"Oh yeah! Everything a vacation should be, y'know?" He glanced up at Spock's face again, and rapidly decided to cut short that line of conversation. "Well, I won't bother you any longer. Sorry again. See you later - 'bye!"

He went.

Spock remained as he was, perched on the edge of the bed. The brief interlude had done nothing to restore, or induce, any greater sense of nowness - rather it had served to thrust him still further into the mental limbo so alien to his usual alertness, and he felt as though the scene with Le Serve had happened to somebody else while he had disinterestedly looked on.

He leaned back against the wall again, and set himself to reflect. His mind returned to his recent weeks at home, and then skimmed faster and faster over them, until he saw himself preparing for the return; the memories disturbed him and he had no wish to dwell on them. So he had left home and returned - to this.

To the Academy and to people like Henri LeServe.

That was both unreasonable and unfair - they were not all like Henri LeServe.

Although they might as well be, the difference it made to him.

Spock had hit upon the reason for his sense of vagueness and detachment, although he did not know it. The reason was that because his two different, uncomplementary worlds each presented him with unanswerable questions which disturbed him to the core. He did not wish to be confined in either of them, and he did not know that that was the reason because he did not want to know it.

In fact, it was all rather too much for one day, so he decided to finish unpacking. He wandered about the room in a desultory fashion, finding places for the few possessions he had selected to bring with him, until it was time to go to the dining hall, which he did through a sense of duty rather than one of hunger, and pushed through the large swing doors of the hall into the full clamour of the First Day Back.

The knot in his stomach tightened, and he eyed the selection of food and the queue of cadets collecting it with equal disfavour. He had just made up his mind that his duty was now done and he may as well return to his modest sanctuary when his left arm was seized and squeezed briefly but tightly. "Hello Spock, how are you?" said the glowing, smiling girl who, to her credit, released his arm immediately.

"Look at the sun tan," declared the feminine voice to his right, emanating from another, equally glowing female. They both stood and beamed at him delightedly, throwing him into such confusion that he could do no more than bow his head slightly in greeting and then nod at them.

"It's good to see you again," said the first girl. "Let's go and get some food." They steered him towards the end of the queue. His escape route was cut off as two more cadets, male, joined the line behind him, and to his growing bewilderment, greeted him as lavishly as had the two young ladies, who were now engrossed in conversation with a third and were ignoring him completely.

Spock made a show of selecting his supper with inordinate care, hoping that nobody would remember that he always made the same selection in view of the limited types of fare which he could actually eat. However, the ploy did work, for he was left to himself again, and thereby given the opportunity to observe the other people whom he knew in the huge dining hall whilst he moved slowly down the line with his tray.

They were all in raptures, it appeared; all overwhelmed with joy at seeing one another again. He knew that many had scarcely spoken to each other throughout the previous Year, some had parted on definitely bad terms and some had apparently been friends. But now all differences seemed to be forgotten, amidst the hugging and shoulder-thumping going on noisily around the hall.

He wondered why.

"Hi, Spock!" yelled a cheery voice, but the owner of the voice had gone by the time he turned around, so he did not know who it had been. He turned his attention to the man collecting the food tickets, and waited for the joyous greeting from this person who had known him only as a face in the food queue during the First Year.

It came.

Spock hefted his tray to a seat at one of the long tables, more puzzled, and intrigued, by the minute. He could not know that the enthusiasm which he saw around him was an exaggerated expression of recognition and nothing more; that after the first meeting following the End of Year break the cadets would settle back into the indifferent or antagonistic relationships enjoyed prior to their parting, and that he was included in the delirium not because he had been missed, but just because he was known. He was in their Year, one of the select.

It was not a phenomenon which he could unravel by himself without further and more detailed experience of Humans, and it was unlikely that any of the others could have enlightened him since, by its nature, it was not an activity which involved much thought or reflection. So he remained baffled, kept his head down and tucked into his soup.

The table shook slightly, and someone kicked his shin.

"Oops! Sorry!"

He looked up at Amanda Pears-Houghton and blandly excused her, returning quickly to the soup in order to discourage any further dialogue. Her voice was as shrill as a desert kryshak and tended to grate on his nerves after a few nanoseconds. This time he was lucky, as she was more concerned with mopping up the soup spilt on her tray than in talking to him. But her companions were not so taciturn.

"Oh, it's Spock," said Katerina DelGardo, the lightning reaction and ready wit of this conversational gambit drawing forth Spock's unwilling admiration.

"Yes," he said, equally scintillatingly.

His soup was getting cold.

"What a lovely sun tan! Where did you go for your holiday?" enquired a third, whose name escaped him.

//Next time I go home//he vowed silently as he reached for another hunk of bread for his soup,//I shall spend my entire vacation in the cellar.//

"I went home," he said aloud. "To Vulcan," he added, in case she had not properly understood.

"Ah" she replied enthusiastically.

He remembered her name. It was Tracy.

"Next time can I go with you? Would I like it there?" Her sweeping gaze and shrill giggle embraced both the distressed Vulcan and the growing number of cadets who were joining them at the long table.

"Come with me?" asked Spock, blankly.

"Yes!! Oh yes! I'LL spend my next vacation with you there in the sun!"

As the giggle erupted again and mingled with the subdued snorts and chuckles from the others, Spock became transfixed by the mental vision of Tracy and Amanda playing Frisbee on the Forge, while Katerina sunbathed in his mother's flower garden.

//Hi, dad. This is Tracy. She's come to stay.//

The vision moved to his father's expression, and he choked abruptly on a crumb.

By the time he had recovered his breath and his aplomb, the subject of conversation had already moved along, and whilst he finished his soup and reached for his second course he listened with half an ear to the tales of the highlights of the vacation and the plans for the coming year. The cadets spoke loudly and excitedly and all at once, breaking in on each other, interrupting and being interrupted. Spock, unnoticed, left them after his vegetable cutlets, and fled back to his room. In the corridor leading to his room he was accosted by a nine foot high seewa plant which paused in its march towards him and cried, "Hi, Spock!" in the tone of voice which he had come to expect from everyone  today except a seewa plant. He peered behind it.

"Hello, Kevin. Did you enjoy your vacation?" he recited.

"Mmmm," came the leafy, muffled reply. "Can you tell me where I can find a stand for this? There was one in my old room but it's walked."

"Walked?" queried the Vulcan.

"Yeah. I should have expected it. But can you think of anything I could use?  Jesus, this is heavy!" He let go of the seewa plant which thudded on to the polished floor and shed two large blue leaves and some soil. Kevin wiped his brow. Spock wondered if he and Kevin were talking about the same thing, and elected to assume that they were. "Have you tried the botanical section in G Block?" he suggested tentatively.

Kevin beamed.

"Good idea. I'll go there when I've dumped this. Thanks! I'll see you in the Psyc session on Friday?"

Spock nodded.

"Right - seeya then." The plant heaved itself upright and continued on its dignified way along the corridor, and Spock finally crossed the threshold of his room and shut the door, feeling exhausted.

He was no more to grips with the situation now than he had been all day. He decided to stop trying, and, carefully lifting his lytherette from the table, he  sat with it in his chair, closed his eyes and ran his fingers across the strings.

The knots in his mind began to loose, and the tension in his muscles gradually dissipated.

He had not brought the instrument to the Academy last Year, and had in fact missed it terribly.

This Year, it was going to be a great boon.

***

The timetable displayed on request on his viewscreen told him that nothing was required of him until Wednesday at 1530 hours. It was now Tuesday, 0730 hours, he had just climbed out of bed, breakfast was scheduled for 0800 hours, he was not hungry, and so he got back into bed, from which vantage point he surveyed his room and ruminated lazily over the day ahead. There was nothing he had to do, since he had finished all his set preparation during his vacation, mostly during, or to offset, moments of domestic difficulty, and so his day was entirely his own. Home was parsecs away, and Gen Com wasn't until tomorrow afternoon.

Complete freedom.

The sensation was so novel and so refreshing that he almost smiled.

Had it occurred to him, which it did not, that every other 2nd Year cadet who was awake at that hour was probably bemoaning the sudden loss of freedom, he might either have laughed out loud or hidden under the bedcover. In ignorance of the irony, however, he merely stretched, stared at the ceiling for a few seconds, and then got up and ready in a leisurely fashion.

He spent the first hour of his day with his lytherette and a pot of tea, and then spent the rest of the morning walking fairly aimlessly around the Academy buildings, wrapped up against the clear sunny chill in the standard Academy overcoat and non-regulation boots.

He had no objection to the bland and unobtrusive buff coloured cadet`s uniform, which, although somewhat lacking in the graceful design of Vulcan apparel, was comfortable enough, and therefore satisfied one such as he who was not prone to studying his appearance in every available mirror or reflective plate surface. The boots, however, he detested. He had never in his life been required to cram his feet into anything so ill-designed and inappropriate for humanoids as these high-heeled, narrow, stiff, cumbersome, restrictive instruments of torture which Starfleet Academy in its infinite ignorance had specially chosen to inflict on its candidates.

One day early on in his First Year, when, not for the first time or the last, he had mentally berated himself for not listening to Sarek's diatribes on the multifarious evils of Starfleet and Starfleet Academy, (which had not, in truth, included the hazards of sore feet but might well have done eventually, given time) he had limped up to Savel, one of the two other Vulcans in his Year, when the latter was sitting on his own in a common room, and asked him for his opinion of the regulation boots.

He had received in reply a gaze replete with mournful resignation bordering on despair, a desultory wave of a booted foot, and a deep sigh.

Savel had failed his end-of-Year exams and left. Spock often wondered why.

He had paid a visit to the quartermaster some days later and had informed the officer in charge of his difficulty. He was issued with a larger pair, but, to his chagrin, not only did the backs rub up and down on his heels with inevitably agonising consequences, but he also found it difficult to keep his feet under control, since the toes of the boots seemed generally to differ in opinion with himself as to which direction he and his feet should take. Swallowing his pride, he returned to the quartermaster and reclaimed his old boots, retreating from the room with dignity and ignoring the sneer which followed him out.

Thereafter he compromised, and wore his own Vulcan footwear whenever he considered that such a lapse in protocol would go unnoticed by his superiors. Despite occasional errors of judgement with their ensuring disciplinary measures, he continued to pursue this policy with the long term intention of adapting himself to the boots by degrees.

By the second day of his Second Year, he had achieved only limited success in this aim, and so trudged around the Blocks in a new pair of Vulcan soft boots which looked as similar as he had been able to find to the regulation uniform variety, minus the heels. Shunning the dining hall, he visited one of the campus shops, and bought cheese sandwiches for lunch. He made no excuses to himself for this act of rank cowardice. It was his day off.

And he liked cheese sandwiches.

He drifted through the rest of the day alone and isolated, still cocooned within the invisible bubble of unreality which confined him in a limbo between ShiKahr and Starfleet Academy. Random attempts to break out, instigated either by himself or by other Second Years greeting him as they passed by, were not successful - when he did speak to others the only effect was for the wall of unreality to thicken, and he would give up for a while until prompted by duty, politeness or necessity to try again. Tomorrow would be easier, he determined as he buried himself under the bed cover that night. Gen Com tomorrow.

Gen Com came and went, and the Second Year moved laboriously into impulse and set off. Spock of Vulcan wandered through the opening days of the Year and watched Academy life on its parade past and round him. The pattern of his life which had established itself in his First Year seemed to fit into place again unbidden.

He watched the Humans and they, when they had nothing else to do, watched him.

He remained, as per his First Year, the focus of attention during any formal educational session in which some response was required from the cadets. There was a difference, however, in that during his First Year he had been unaware of his classroom charisma, and now, in his Second Year, he was. It had begun to dawn on him with his private assessment of the end-of-Year exam results, the significance of which could not escape him, and his lurking suspicion of yet another difference between him and them was confirmed on a rather overdue entry to S Block's room L20 for the First App Stats seminar of the Year.

"Here he is! The man himself!"

Spock looked back over his shoulder, saw no one, and turned to face the group.

"I told you he was back."

"Thank God!"

"Spock, you had us worried. Come and sit down."

"If you've all finished, gentlemen, I'd greatly appreciate it if you would shut up and get down to some work."

So saying, Professor Hammel extended a gracious and genuinely welcoming smile to the Vulcan and gestured him gallantly towards an empty seat amongst the (temporarily) subdued cadets. He sat down next to Paul Tachyer, who treated him to a grin and what was in fact a friendly wink but which, to an extremely perturbed and puzzled Vulcan, could have been anything from an involuntary muscular spasm to a declaration of challenge. He felt, to his added horror, the hot flush of embarrassment crawling up his face and creeping up his ears. He was too confused to summon the required concentration to assess the atmosphere, and it was only later on in the session that he was able to ascertain retrospectively that it had been wholly friendly and devoid of barbs of any kind other than those born of ignorance.

Meanwhile he lowered his gaze to his lap, and settled into misery, while the seminar plodded through its allocated time, without Vulcan assistance. Only towards the end of the session did he relax sufficiently to listen, and then, almost at the end, to contribute. As he spoke he received unfamiliar impressions from the cadets, of warmth, amusement and what was almost comradeship.

For an instant, Spock felt as though he belonged.

The moment passed as Hammel wound up and set preparation for the next session, but Spock was left feeling shaken and vulnerable. He had been given a glimpse of a state about which he had known little, and it felt dangerous, and distasteful, and delightful.

"Eleven fifteen. Time for coffee."

"I think you've got a tape I wanted to look at. Levenstein's 'Suppositional  Apperception'."

"Yeah. Brilliant. Can't put it down."

"Yeah I know, but I need to look up a chapter. I think it would help with the Psyc project. Will you be using it tonight?"

"You're joking! Keep it 'til I need it. It's in my room."

"Thanks. Spock! Where'ya going? Coffee's this way - common room 2."

Spock halted in his tracks and turned to face the group, who had walked halfway down the corridor before realising that their silent companion had not joined them. He had not joined them because it had not occurred to him to do so. He never included himself in general invitations. They were indiscriminate, shallow. But...

He shifted his grip on his clip-board, and walked slowly towards them. They waited until he reached them and then all moved off, together, towards the common room door.

"Hey, I've just realised why we didn't know you weren't with us," said Alex Meadows, in his usual stentorian voice. "You've got different boots..."

"Ssshhh!"

Spock's own reaction to his sudden and total lapse in dignity went unnoticed under the howls of surprised mirth from the others. One of them clapped him on the back and pushed him through the common room doorway, and another told him to pull over one of the easy chairs to the table before it was taken. Feeling like a leaf floating on a torrent of flood water, Spock sat down. When Meadows arrived at the table and set down the large tray of coffee beakers, Spock reached forward to take one (after checking to see what the others were doing) and leaned back in his chair.

As far as he could.

He didn't stay long, and whilst he was there he said nothing. He had had a lifetime to practise the art of maintaining a relaxed posture and of restraining the desire to bolt, and although his instincts forcibly insisted that his inclusion in this sunny, garrulous coffee break was apt as his great-aunt T'Rei taking part in an American mid-western barn dance, experience told him (quite correctly) that he presented to the watching world an imposing picture of dignity and self-assurance, his silence amidst the chatter dictated solely by his wish to relax and to listen rather than to participate.

He could not have participated to save his life, but that fact remained locked in secret inside him, and was eventually released in the guise of a long sigh of relief outside the common room following his eventual escape. His head whirling, he wandered back to his room, collecting his scattered senses sufficiently on the way to avoid the route that led him past the Physics Faculty tutor's room, because of his boots.

Years before, (five point five three years before) his father had returned home to ShiKahr having headed an inordinately tricky diplomatic game of intergalactic musical chairs involving delegations of Genusans (whose diminutive physical proportions resulted in a proportionately high degree of belligerence - being only eight centimetres in length they considered, presumably, that they could not afford to offer any concessions to anybody); of Walleens (whose presence off-world necessitated their transportation in ll metre by 7 metre by 3 metre tanks containing strictly regulated volumes of Kelane gas, their natural element); and of Tellarites (who liked nobody but Tellarites, and who therefore constituted a difficulty in themselves). The conference had been a success, it had achieved everything which Vulcan had hoped for and a little more besides (owing, according to subsequent speculation, to minor but significant communication problems during a brief power failure on the first day) and the success had been largely, and correctly, attributed to Sarek's handling of it. He had walked into the morning room of his home to greet his wife and son, and his air of complacent triumph had emanated so tangibly, despite the usual passivity of his features, that Spock had found himself staring in a very unintelligent manner (which went unreprimanded), while Amanda had been moved to suggest a small celebration drink before she had been told a word about the conference.

Five point five three years later, Spock sauntered into his room in C Block, knowing exactly how his father had felt.

Had he been a cat, he would most certainly have been purring very loudly.

***

He preferred his new room in C Block to his old First Year room. Or, to put it more accurately, his spell in 7ll3 was, so far, more pleasant and comfortable than that spent in the old room. The differences in accommodation were negligible, but the view from the window of 7ll3 over the small recreation park and, further away, one of the electrolly stops provided greater scope for contemplation and interest than had his First Year vista of walks, windows and elevators, and, inside the room, he had come to regard his territory as a residence rather than merely as a sanctuary. It wasn't only that he had brought with him for company and solace his lytherette, his firepot and his pltzol tea. The main factor which contributed to his comparative sense of ease and relaxation inside 7ll3 was that he did not have to be there.

This Year, he had faced the other cadets. He had talked to them, he had, perhaps, begun to acknowledge the validity of their existence.

He had drunk coffee with them in the common room!

He had allowed an infinitesimal part of the Academy past the threshold of his own room, and thereby, by unconsciously breaking through some of the barriers of contrast between himself and the rest of the world, had let into the room some new air. He was no longer imprisoned and suffocated inside his four walls. As the apprehension began to recede from the space in the corridor outside his door, he found himself more able to breathe.

His brief sallies into the social world were, of necessity, of an experimental nature only. The sense of detachment that had coloured his first few days of the Year had dimmed from the disturbing to the barely perceptible, but it had not left him. Whether he sat alone in his room, or in a seminar or lecture room, or simply walked the length of a corridor with another cadet, the vague but ever present disorientation always prevented him from embracing the moment. So he continued to view himself from a vantage point somewhere in his head, and together the two of him began to sample the hitherto unknown tastes and sounds of COMPANY.

The all-inclusive "Come on!" at the end of a seminar or tutorial was assumed to include him, and after some weeks he even had his own place in the dining hall or the common room. Even when he was alone, he would through habit gravitate to the end of the third table with his meals, and the other cadets would join him there. He seldom joined in with conversation (although he found to his private satisfaction that he now understood a good 72.38% of what they were saying to each other), but he spoke when addressed, without his previous painful pauses, and occasionally chipped in with a point of information when it seemed appropriate.

(He gradually became aware that they did not always seem to value his willingness to contribute verbal corrections if a factual error had been perpetrated in conversation. He did not understand why this should be and, after searching in vain for a logical solution to the question, he decided that the best course of action was to continue until advised to the contrary. He was never advised.)

The cadets became used to his company as well, although in their case the process did not take as long, and, in a strange way, they enjoyed his presence during the break times. Alex, of the loud voice and penchant for tactlessness on the subject of boots and other matters, regarded Spock as one might an exceptionally talented child. He would take delight in asking Spock questions on any number of issues, simply to listen to the kind of reply he received, and he would tease him subtly in the mistaken belief that the Vulcan did not understand that he was being teased. It was a measure of the growth of Spock's confidence that he was sufficiently calm to test the atmosphere as a hound sniffs the air, and he concluded that, whatever malice may have lurked within Alex, it was not directed at him. Alex liked to play, and Spock was his new six feet tall novelty.

Henri was another in the Group who actively derived positive amusement from the Vulcan's company, but in his case this was his attitude to everyone around him.  Life, he had decided some years before, was for laughs, and this trait had rendered him one of those unusual souls who exercised the minimum selection or discretion in his choice of social companion. Spock had, in fact, formed an opinion of Henri during the course of their brief encounters in the First Year, which opinion had been reinforced on the occasion of Henri's abrupt entry into Spock's room at the beginning of the Year, and which he had found no grounds to change since. While Alex studied Spock, Spock studied Henri, and, had his growing mental list of typical Human characteristics ever been committed to print, then Henri LeServe would have deserved an acknowledgement.

The fact that he was almost always accompanied by a female added valuable additional footnotes to Spock's unwritten observations. The fact that it was never the same female for more than a week at a time may possibly have distorted the Vulcan's viewpoint and, although the other cadets in the Group passed frequent comment on Henri's varied appetite, the comments were generally phrased in the 27.62% of the Humans' English which Spock hadn't yet mastered. It could therefore be fairly said that if Spock's considered conclusions on the Habits of the Human veered rather towards the Habits of the Rabbit, then the fault lay at Henri's door.

The females, incidentally, were usually unknown to Spock. The girls in their General Group, viz those who knew Henri, tended not to bother with any involvement deeper than a chat over a coffee cup or a plate of beefburgers à l'Academy. The adoring appendages were therefore generally trawled from outside the Group and, frequently, outside the Year. Spock often found himself dining opposite an awestricken but proud First Year cadet who would gawp at the exalted Second Years around her and literally lean to Henri for reassurance.

The other members of the General Group tended to come and go as far as the between-class social sessions were concerned, and they treated Spock with much the same kind of distant politeness that he had experienced in his First Year. The fact that others in their number had actively begun to include him tended to bridge the gap somewhat, but, otherwise, the only other regular companion was Paul.

Paul had been born for Starfleet, and the plans which his parents had formulated for him since before his birth had not been thwarted. His planet-trotting childhood with his medic father and biologist mother had long since accustomed him to inevitable contact with off-worlders (he had spent many of his formative years as an off-worlder) and, in utter contrast to Spock, his decision to apply for entrance to the Academy had been nothing more than a natural step on his way to the stars.

He had expected to find aliens at the Academy and, unlike the others who either ignored Spock or made a fuss of him, Paul took the Vulcan more or less in his stride.

Far more successfully, in fact, than Spock took Paul in his.

Paul constituted Spock's first encounter with the phenomenon of Human Charm and he didn't know what to do with it. Ninety per cent of the Humans he had met at the Academy had been nice to him, but that niceness had never battered at his shields of dignity and distance as did Paul Tachyer's good-humoured warmth.

When he was with Paul, Spock frequently experienced the urge to grin.

It would have been a comparatively simple task to retreat inside the full Vulcan barricade, but he knew that that would constitute inexcusable bad manners in respect to this particular cadet. He was aware that he had probably been inexcusably bad-mannered to a fair number of people, but this person was an exception although he didn't know why, and he was thereby deprived of his only defence against a desertion of everything that he was.

That, for Spock, was terrifying.

Paul, for his part, had thought hard and hesitated long before steeling himself to approach the Vulcan at the end of the First Year, and Spock's immediate agreement to help him with his work had not helped to ease a very bad case of nerves. He knew full well that he needed help with some aspects of the course if he was to do as well as he wished, otherwise photon torpedoes wouldn't have driven him to ask for extra tuition from another cadet. (A tutor, perhaps.) But he had gained the strong impression that Spock was more capable of helping him than any of the busy tutors, and necessity drove him to remind Spock of his pledge after one particularly unedifying lecture soon after the start of the Second Year.

So the two of them had disappeared together into one of the study rooms, both strenuously polite and formal, and both scared half to death.

They need not have worried. Spock found to his secret glee that he had the ability to explain and reduce and clarify in terms a baby could understand, and Paul was not a baby. Paul succeeded after a few minutes in forgetting his undignified position, and eventually realised that it wasn't undignified anyway.

They worked together quite frequently after that, Paul learning about Applied Statistics and Spock learning about Humans, and about Paul in particular. Paul would ramble at considerable length and in great detail about his background, his family, his views, his hopes for his future, and Spock would listen and say little, knowing that he was not expected to reciprocate with confidence of his own. Paul knew a little about Vulcans, and of their respect for personal privacy, and Spock was a Vulcan.

Paul was used to aliens after all, and that was what Spock was. Paul, intent on doing the right thing in the right way, never moved any closer.

***

Spock was surprised by the apparent speed with which the First Half passed by, compared with the interminable trudge of his First Year. He looked forward to Half Year break with anticipation. He would again spend it alone, but not at the Academy. Henri had given him the idea, when the latter had announced that he and Hailey (his latest, who, to the surprise of those who bothered to take an interest, had survived two weeks with Henri and was well into her third) planned to hire a car for a few days and wanted companions to cut the cost. After several days, by which time, Spock judged, Henri would have found his volunteers and wouldn't misinterpret any further enquiries, the Vulcan asked a few questions about the hire of a car, and found out that it was a very popular method of temporary escape for many of the cadets. The high cost of the hire rendered it essential that a party of at least eight take the trip, and if those electing to go still found themselves short of a credit or two they would post up a notice inviting more to join in.

Spock then wandered along to the car port to check on the prices and conditions of hire, bouncing back to his room a half hour later with his head full of his holiday plans. The officer at the port had appeared surprised when Spock booked a car for seven weeks but had asked no questions. He would have been still more surprised had he known that the Vulcan would be taking the car out alone. It was not that the controls were too complex for one to handle alone; it was just that the total charge amounted to more than most cadets saw during an entire Academy Year.

There had to be some advantages to a background such as his, and Spock had just made full use of one of them.

He had kept his plans for The Mountain in their proper place, however, as the First Half had three point eight more weeks to run; three point eight more weeks of solitary study and lengthy lectures, of talking to Paul and listening to the others, of devising new methods of avoiding Physical Instruction, of practising his boots, of watching cadets racing round the playing fields in the sunshine whilst he strolled sedately on the sidelines, of polite talks to tutors about suggested avenues for specialist training, of playing his lytherette and of watching the view from his window. It was quite a full life now, and he had access to even more. But he still found ample time to wonder why he still felt that he had no part in it. Even when sociability of a kind was forced upon him during the next Science Spec seminar, with Professor Harris' announcement of the project he wanted completed by eighth week of Second Half. (The week, incidentally, before the examinations began; a pointer towards the relative importance of the project.) It was to be completed by groups of two, groups which Harris selected himself. So he read out the names from his list, ignoring the muted mutters of agreement or otherwise from the cadets, leaving Spock wondering who in the Galaxy was Rhoda Mulvahill, and Rhoda Mulvahill wondering what she had done to deserve this.

Not that she had anything against the Vulcan - she'd just never once spoken to him. She'd never had anything to say.

She still had nothing to say.

Oh dear.

The Professor called an early end to the session, so that the cadets could make an immediate start on their project and work on their ideas for a theme, and also so that he could join McAlistair and Stewart (History and Engineering respectively) in a wee, er, brief, birthday celebration. It was McAlistair's sister's birthday. Tomorrow. But Harris and Stewart had a full timetable tomorrow. So he hurried off, and the buzz of conversation grew abruptly louder and then gradually quieter as the cadets drifted out of the room in groups of multiples of two.

Two of the cadets made their way slowly down the corridor. Slowly, because they didn't know where they were going. It was a difficult situation, so they kept on walking. She had made her way over to him when she realised that he had no idea who she was, and had smiled nicely. That was about all that had happened, and now they were walking.

"Wonder why he chose me to work with you," she tried eventually, wondering whether her voice wasn't a little too shrill. "Great minds thinking alike, d'you think, or p'raps I need a helping hand!"

Spock's mind whirled dizzily in its attempt to decode her query, but to no avail. "I beg your pardon, but I don't quite understand," he replied.

//Oh God//.

"Never mind. Where are we going?"

"There may well be a vacant study room on fourth level.

"Oh, no. Er...I've never been able to work very well in study rooms." She paused, wondering whether she should attempt an explanation of something she had never bothered to analyse, and decided against losing even more credibility with her daunting companion. "Would you mind very much if we used one of our rooms? I just don't like the atmosphere in study rooms."

"I have no objection to either location, Ms Mulvahill, so..."

"Oh, do me a favour!"

"Certainly."

"No! I mean - don't call me Ms Mulvahill! Please," she added, contritely, realising that she had snapped. "People call me all kinds of things, but never that.

"I am sorry."

"That's okay. Er...people don't usually call me Rhoda either, actually."

Spock wondered, not for the first time, why Humans bothered to invest their children with names which were never to be used. It struck him as a waste of time.

"Generally," she continued breathlessly, (they were still walking), "it's Roddy, or Rod, or Dipstick, or..."

Spock rebelled. He turned to her and said firmly, "I prefer Rhoda. I will, if you do not object, address you by that name." He then shut up, and fastened his gaze ahead. They walked on in silence.

"Spock," she tried again tentatively.

"Yes?"

"Where are we going?" She paused. "Your place or mine, honey?"

//Oh God. Why did I say that?//

"I... er... What do you suggest?"

//This is ridiculous. The project's got to be finished by eighth week and we can't even pass the time of day.//

A second thought wriggled insidiously into the midst of her rising panic. //He could do the whole thing on his own anyhow.//

She quashed the thought, swallowed, took a deep breath and quashed the panic as well.

"Can you make coffee in your room? Or tea?" Her voice, to her satisfaction, was calm and even. Not a trace of a squeak.

"Yes," he said, with some surprise. "Why?"

"We'll go to your room then - it's probably tidier than mine. You're C, aren't you. But..." she left no room for acknowledgement, but surged on determinedly, and calmly, "...we'll go via my room."

"Why?" he said again. Her panic, having been expelled, had hopped the necessary couple of feet to the nearest host to wreak what havoc it could there.

It was doing quite well.

"We'll pick up some of my mother's best Walnut Honey Surprises. She always gives me a shipload to bring away with me. I'd go into withdrawal if she didn't. Come on. I'm in F. It's on the way."

She punched for the elevator, stepped in, waited for him and off they went. Fifteen minutes later they were standing outside 7ll3 in C Block and Spock was nervously opening his door. "Please come in," he said.

These were the first words that had been uttered between them for fifteen minutes.

"I was right," she said, surveying the room. "Yours is tidier! First things first then. Let's have some coffee."

Spock busied himself with water and mugs, and watched as she dropped her clip- board notes and stylus on the bed, put the Walnut Honey Surprises on the easy chair, and sat down on the floor. "You've got a nice view haven't you. You're lucky. I've got a wall. What's that?"

"It's tea. You don't mind if I have tea, I hope."

"No, no. It just looks funny."

Spock stared at the container in his hand, and tried to ascertain what it was about it that the girl found amusing. Then he remembered the illogical Human usage of the word, and realised that he was going to be very thankful for all those mealtimes and coffee breaks with Alex and Co. He wouldn't have stood a chance of understanding one word in twenty a year ago.

"It is called pltzol tea. My mother gives me shiploads to bring away with me." He dived into a cupboard to search for spoons and thereby missed the expression of dawning astonishment on Rhoda's face.

//Surely not...// she thought. And then he was bringing her coffee to her, his face as impassive as always, and she decided 'not' after all. "I hope you like these," she said, proffering a Walnut Honey Surprise.

"What is this?" he asked as he sat down on the remaining vacant chair.

"It's a cherry! Haven't you seen one before?"

"Ah, no, but... I have heard about them."

Spock was still examining the cake as Rhoda bit a large chunk from hers and said, indistinctly, "Hmmm. I can never work on an empty stomach, you know." She swallowed, and then went on, somewhat forlornly, "I have to lose pounds after exams. I suppose we'd better get on.” There was a brief silence. “Spock?"

The Vulcan was sitting, his eyes half shut, an expression vaguely resembling rapture on his face, and half a cake held delicately between his finger tips. The cherry had gone. He was chewing slowly.

Rhoda tried to hide her grin, and failed, and watched, fascinated, as the other half of the cake disappeared. Then his eyes swivelled compulsively towards the plate on the other chair. She held it out towards him. "Would you like another one?"

Whilst he reached for it, and then took a sip of his tea, she suggested once more, "Do you think we'd better get some ideas together for this project?"

But she had to wait some twenty-three seconds before she received a reply, and then it was only a nod.

She moved the plate to the other side of the room, out of sight, and then they sat down together at the desk in replete companionship and began their work.

Rhoda had frequent cause during the following few weeks to bless her guardian angel, her mother and anyone else it occurred to her to bless, for providing the inspiration to use her Walnut Honey Surprises as an ice-breaker, because such as they were, and the project sessions ever after flew by without a hitch. When she arrived at Spock's room for their second session the water was already boiled, and she tried some of his tea that time and found she liked it. So he promised to bring her some from home, and she promised to bring an extra quantity of cakes.  "It's no use giving you the recipe. No one but no one makes them like my mother makes them, and, believe me, plenty have tried."

Spock believed her. Fervently.

The fourth project session was rather difficult, as Rhoda had to confess that these six Surprises were the last of her supply. She was moved inwardly to admire the superb Vulcan control, as the sole detectable reaction was a slight twitch of the jaw muscle and a brief tightening of the mouth. It was a poignant occasion; she divided them carefully, three each, and they sat silently, disposing of them with due respect.

The session marked a turning point in their relationship. She arrived for the fifth session with a plate of freshly baked Almond Puffs with a coconut topping, but, to her great surprise, was offered a sample of something which Spock did name, but she didn't catch it (it sounded off-putting anyway), and which tasted a bit like oranges and a bit like wheat and a bit like vanilla and was, despite its unappetising name, delicious.

"Where did you get these?"

"I made them. Today. Would you like another?"

"Oo, yes! You can have an Almond Puff if you like, but your thingummyjigs will put them to shame."

"I am sure that they will not."

Thereafter they found it convenient to hold their project sessions less frequently, in order to make more time for cooking. The Second Years on the landing became quite used to Spock's company in the communal kitchen, and occasionally they swapped recipes with him whilst waiting for the computer timer to sound. There was only one disaster, when the xlantyls failed dismally and had to be scraped out of the cooker with a file, and Spock had to contact Rhoda and confess that, unless she could make do with cheese sandwiches, the session would have to be postponed. But, although it wasn't her turn, she had in fact made a supply of apfelstrudel as a standby, and the day was saved.

On reviewing their progress on the project during the last session before Half Year break, Rhoda found that they had achieved more than she had expected at the outset. Thinking about it on her way back to her room, she realised with some astonishment that she and Spock were able to work well together. She had never encountered a mind like his and he, judging by some of his reactions to her suggestions, had never had much to do with someone like her. He had, however, acceded to her ideas more frequently as the weeks had passed, and this gave her great satisfaction, because she knew that, although he often couldn't understand her thinking processes (such as they were), he was forced to concede that they worked. He called her illogical and she called him pedantic but, between polite insults and helpings of food, they had each contributed their respective methods and viewpoints to the pool and had managed to produce a piece of work which was atypical of either of them and more subtle than either could have concocted alone.

And she wasn't a bit scared of him any more. This was quite a prestigious position to be in, as the others in her circle still imagined that she was entering the lions' den at every session. She did not disillusion them. When they asked how she managed to work with someone who never smiled and only spoke in logarithms, she simply replied airily that she found their partnership to constitute a perfectly satisfactory working relationship, and they were all suitably impressed.

She didn't tell them about the Walnut Honey Surprises or the exploding xlantyls, or about his expression when she tried to tell him through a mouthful of honey cake that she preferred his plztol tea to coffee, and spat crumbs onto his clipboard. She'd begun to tell them, but found that for some odd reason she preferred to keep that side of him to herself. Thus she betook herself off home for her Half Year break with her new memories and empty cake tins, and Spock made the necessary preparations for his sojourn in The Mountain.

The site of Starfleet Academy had been selected not for its equability of climate nor for its scenic glories, but for its central and safe position in Federation territory. One could reach it without too much difficulty or too many changes from most of the prominent worlds which relied for peace and prosperity on the Federation's finest, but, once there, the generally grey bland climate and generally grey bland landscape elsewhere on the planetoid turned one's attention perforce back in to whatever entertainment and distraction the Academy could provide. Not that the Academy failed in this respect, but some, such as Spock, welcomed the occasional escape route, and the hire of the car brought within his scope the only area of any scenic interest, viz The Mountain. (Its unassailable claim to being the sole such geological feature of the planetoid negated the necessity of finding any particular name for it.)

At this time of year for a period of about three months the greyness dissipated to reveal the strong bright sunshine hiding behind it (it was no doubt a deliberate ploy on the part of the Academy's answer to the Founding Fathers to arrange Half Year break to coincide with the only presentable weather of the year; nobody was expected to be there to enjoy it), and Spock was able to pack clothes and equipment in the more or less sure knowledge that he would not be rained out or depressingly frozen. On the due date he hefted his characteristically scanty bundle of luggage on to his back, took the trolley over to the car hire office, transferred the necessary credit and lifted off for seven weeks of solitude, exercise and open air.

It was not the Forge, to be sure, and considerably colder, but he did not mind. He remembered his mother saying something about alteration providing adequate recompense for relaxation. He had not fully understood what she had meant by this, and still didn't, but he had an idea that it was an appropriate adage for the occasion of his holiday. He walked, and climbed, and found fruit and foliage to eat to supplement his own food supplies. He slept and ate outdoors, except on one day when the heavens dropped a deluge on him, and he stayed in the car and played his lytherette. He flew from site to site, and sometimes took the car up for aerial sight-seeing tours, which did not take long as there were very few sights to see. However, the alteration proved beneficial in the extreme. As had happened during his break last year, he was able to relax and restore.

The opportunity was as essential to his well-being this year as last. His First Year holiday had been a break from the bewilderment and distress caused by the strangeness of his new environment. This year he needed to regain (and re-evaluate) his inner composure after thirteen weeks of almost constant contact with Humans. Sitting by his fire one evening, about three weeks into his holiday, he found himself wondering why he had ever worried about undergoing his Kahs-wan.

He was exhausted.

And dissatisfied.

During his First Year he had been isolated because he had isolated himself. Now, reviewing what had passed of his Second Year, it had dawned on him that he had been thrust back into the all too familiar scenario of his home life on Vulcan; people talked to him and included him in their activities, but he was nevertheless the Outsider. He had sought isolation during his First Year. He had sought companionship during his Second Year, but he was still isolated. He had attributed it to his disorientation following his return from Vulcan, but time had belied that explanation and he was now left with the hard fact, if not the reason behind it.

He was, perhaps fortunately, too used to it to allow it to hurt too much, and he did not in all honesty know whether or not he had really expected to find among Humans that which he had unsuccessfully sought amongst Vulcans. But he did wonder now whether, after their apparent willingness to welcome him in this Year, they could realise that in fact they had not.

Only one of them did he regard as having accepted him as he was. Paul had always been careful to observe Vulcan propriety to the letter and had happily ignored the actual person behind the appearance. Alex, Henri and friends had adopted him as their pet. Only Rhoda had been forced to take account of him as she found him. He had observed her attempts to calculate the direction his thoughts would take so as to anticipate him, deflect or dissuade him, or merely understand him, and he had realised over the weeks that she was learning about him. She was getting it right more and more. She had not, he knew, wished to work with him any more than he had with her but, having been forced together, it was she who had made it work. She had established their points of contact, namely, work and refreshment, and it proved surprisingly simple to work with just two aspects rather than to dissipate one's energies on life histories, social complications and who was going to win on number eleven on Wednesday.

Rhoda, Spock reflected, was a sensible young lady. He had no qualms about the prospect of renewing their partnership for Second Half, provided that he could find some more recipes.

As for the rest of them, he found himself recalling yet another of his mother's useless phrases which now seemed so strangely apt. This one being 'Business as usual'.

The fire had sunk down to a few glowing embers, and he kicked it out, rolled up in his blanket and went to sleep.

***

It was lunchtime on the third day of Second Half, the sun had not yet lost its battle against the encroaching greyness, and spirits were generally high. An Andorian Second Year, Tevar, had joined the group for the meal so that he could settle up with Alex who had lent him money for his holiday, and now they were watching and listening whilst Tevar attempted to demonstrate Theidak, his local sport, with the help of two bread rolls, an apple, three forks and a water jug. Just as the other cadets felt that they were beginning to grasp the basic rules, which seemed to depend (unless they had got it all wrong) on the month and on the ages of the seven umpires, Tevar's cunning underpass from the sidelines catapulted a bread roll into Kelly Marker's onion soup. The resulting splashing of the soup on to Paul's trousers prompted the latter to thrust a quantity of tomato salad down the back of Kelly's neck. Understandably, in the circumstances, Kelly struggled to avoid such a damp and sticky intrusion, and this involved a certain amount of kicking which, while it did not completely upturn the table, did cause Spock's milk pudding to slide against his vegetable goulash, at which both dishes rapidly left the table and landed on Alex's feet.

Vulcan reflexes being what they are, Spock escaped without so much as a glancing blow from a carrot. The others bore him no resentment for this, however, and Kelly would not hear Spock's objections to his gallant suggestion that Paul replace the lost meal. Paul gave in, got up and squelched up to the food counter with Tevar, who had been told that he had started it all and who was laughing too much to attempt to deny it. Moments later, peace reigned once more, except that Alex kept objecting to the sensation of the semolina in his sock. Desultory vacation reminiscences were resumed. Spock desirous of avoiding any mention of his own holiday and the remarks about the expense which would inevitably ensue, changed the subject by asking where Henri was.

(One noticed when Henri was not here, even if one were a Vulcan who admitted no particular interest in such matters.)

"Ah hah" said Alex, meaningfully. Noting that he had clearly afforded Spock not one whit of enlightenment with this remark, he continued, equally meaningfully, with, "With Hailey." He sat back and waited for the response which, considering the nature of his audience, did not disappoint him.

"Extraordinary," said Spock, after a moment. And he meant it, because during that moment's pause he had calculated that Hailey had lasted nineteen weeks at the side of the indomitable Henri LeSevre.

"I think it's a record," put in Paul.

"Do you remember Mari? You know - the one with..."

Spock had indeed succeeded in changing the subject of conversation, to one in which the others were considerably more interested than he. He gulped the rest of his replacement meal and left, leaving the others debating the various charms necessarily possessed by Hailey to hold the attentions of the Cassanova Cadet for so long. Their suggestions were of entertainment value only however, for they all knew (all but Spock, that is) that Henri was in love.

Blissfully.

Endlessly.

Devotedly.

Etc, etc, etc.

When he and she appeared together in public, (for meals, that is - they had ceased to appear at all on other social occasions) he exuded serenity, contentment and bonhomie to a degree that would have been ridiculous if it had not been touching.

("Touched, more like it," Alex was heard to mumble disparagingly one dinner time.)

Henri was a changed man. Even Rhoda, who hardly knew him, remarked on it during one of the project sessions in Spock's room, whilst spreading margarine on a slice of pumpernickel.

Spock made no reply. He found the whole affair unintelligible and tedious. Rhoda considered it 'sweet'. Spock made a few mental alterations to his list of Typical Human Characteristics and then ignored the Happy Henri to the best of his ability. He had other matters on his mind, anyway, such as his sprained foot. The injury at least provided him with the excuse he had been searching for to get him out of Physical Instruction for the time being (it was not that he objected to exercise as such; it was just that throwing hot and heavy cadets around a room and avoiding being thrown around by them offended his aesthetic sensibilities), but the occasional twang of pain which darted up his leg during unguarded moments inevitably served to remind him of the humiliation suffered when McClosky, the instructor, turned off the anti-grav without warning during the zero-G practice session. The admonition that Spock should always be on guard for such eventualities had done little to improve the Vulcan's alarmingly rising temper, and the degradation of seeing the inside of Sickbay for the first time(and, he hoped, the last) in his Academy career, had eroded most of the benefits gained during his solitary relaxation in The Mountain. His mental discomfiture had subsided after much-needed meditation and isolation, but he wished to forget the incident, and the pain in his foot and Rhoda's hen-like ministrations prevented this. He could devise no tactful method of asking her to desist. His initial politeness had obviously been mistaken for genuine gratitude, and his insistence that he could manage by himself went unheeded. When he retreated behind his full Vulcan armour of dignified distance, she assured him that he needn't feel he was putting her out, as she didn't mind popping round to see him at all. Any other tactics were quite out of the question, as they had the project to complete.

And she still had plenty of the Second Half supply of Walnut Honey Surprises.

So he gave up and concentrated on the repair of his foot muscles. On weighing up the choice between McClosky in the gym and Rhoda in his room, he opted for McClosky and went back with a small sigh to Advanced Body Tackles.

It did at least ensure that it was only during project sessions that Rhoda visited him, and no one else ever did anyway. Since the Half Year break he had felt an increasing desire for isolation and he tended to miss his meals more frequently so as to avoid the company of the others in the Group. This was due in part to his decision to get down to some solid study; he was shocked at the degree to which his work pattern had been interrupted during the First Half. He knew that the tutors had not noticed, but he had, and was grimly determined to rectify the lapse. Thus he permitted himself only two hours per day for exercise and amusement (his lytherette) and devoted the rest to reading round his course work. Thus was his partial withdrawal from Company justified, but another reason was also that, for the time being at least, he had decided to give up.

He had felt apart from the world around himself since the beginning of the Year, but the surprise, novelty and excitement of his new-found social life had pushed the sense of detachment to the background. He had realised only during his holiday that the only real aspect of his Year had been the detachment, and all the rest was illusion. He was now ashamed, but knew that it was by no means too late to regain his integrity as a Vulcan. Unlike this time last year, he had no fear of, nor aversion to, the company of Humans, but he knew it now for what it was and could relegate it to its proper place in his life.

The disappointment and regret and sadness and loneliness and sense of failure were, one and all, stifled and denied. It is illogical to regret the passing of an illusion.

Therefore, he was unaware of the small stirring of alarm among the others when Henri ceased to appear at all, even for meals. When the news broke that the unthinkable had happened and Hailey had actually left him, Spock was elsewhere and missed the disclosure. He remained utterly unaware of the turmoil and alarums sounding off all over the Block, a fact which would have proved incomprehensible to Henri had he known of it, because surely the whole universe must know. The whole universe was different. But indifferent. The stars continued to move in the sky, the sun continued to rise and set, the tutors continued to set revision and Joe Pawalski continued to sing piercingly loud Polish laments (or were they folk songs?) in the room next door, but it was all to no purpose. There was no purpose any more. He'd found a reason for living, and now that reason was gone. (To a smart-ass Fourth Year, and that hurt even more.)

Oh, people were kind to him. Recognising his terminal disability, but despite it, they invited him round to their rooms, and to games and concerts, but... They didn't understand. They didn't know what it was like to live in a world of pain and loneliness, from which happiness and contentment and... love... had flown, leaving only the cold harshness of desolation and hopelessness. He couldn't bear to see all those people just now - living. He wasn't living. He was just waiting for merciful death to soothe his tortured brow, or whatever, So he sat in his room alone, and tried to compose his thoughts, and to get to grips with the Almighty.

This, however, was worse. The silence hummed round him in the darkened room, whispering 'Alone, Alone' to the pulsing in his ears, and the ache in his heart was making him cry. He wanted to run to someone for help, but none of them could help. They'd tried.

"Spock!"

The thought took him by surprise, and he found that had spoken aloud.

But Spock wasn't like them, and it wouldn't be like being alone. Spock would be different - he wouldn't remind him of...

Choking back a snivel, he pushed himself to his feet and set off for Spock's room before he could change his mind. He knocked purposefully on the Vulcan's door, and, after a slight pause, heard the dark, even voice of the occupant saying, "Come in."

He opened the door, and took in the impression of subdued lighting and alien atmosphere before noticing his host, who was sitting on the floor with a musical instrument of some kind in his arms and a tea-pot and cup on the floor beside him. There was a flickering in the shadows as though there were an open fire in the room, which of course there couldn't be. //Oh, wow// he thought. //What am I doing here?//

"Henri?"

He was still standing in the open doorway.

"I... er... wondered... er... if I could...er... come in for a few minutes. Thatisifyournotbusyorsomething."

"I am not busy. Do come in." The Vulcan unfolded his length from the carpet, and gestured towards the chair. "Please come in. There's a draught."

"Oh! Sorry." He was in, and sitting, and feeling terrible.

What in the Galaxy could he say to explain this?

"I'm sorry to bust in on you like this," he tried.

"Not at all," said Spock, and an eyebrow raised itself slightly. "It was a vast improvement on your previous entrance."

Henri thought fiercely for a moment, and then remembered, and laughed - a weak and sorry shadow of his usual guffaw. "Uh - yeah. Well... uh..." he trailed off, and Spock sat and wondered.

"Would you like a cup of tea? Or coffee?"

"Oh... ah, thanks. Ah... coffee, if that's okay."

Was this Henri, wondered Spock, as he set about making the coffee, or Henri's cousin who had come to visit the Academy and was playing some kind of practical joke?

He mentally kicked himself for entertaining foolish notions, but still wondered.

He cast about for an opening gambit for conversation with the wan stranger in his chair, and came up with a gem.

"Where is Hailey this evening?" he enquired confidently, turning towards Henri, and the look on the other's face told even Spock of Vulcan what had happened.

//Oh no!// (This emerged, interestingly enough, in Old Vulcan, but, since it was not spoken aloud, no harm was done.)

"I am very sorry," he said at length, for want of anything else. He was completely out of his depth and knew it and wondered almost frantically, as he calmly presented the coffee cup to his guest, why this had been visited on him.

Perhaps the others had drawn up a rota and it was his turn.

Surely not.

He sat down in the other chair, and nodded solemnly to Henri because he didn't know what else to do or say. If he only had some idea of how Henri felt he would be better equipped to cope with whatever was expected of him, but he did not, so he leaned back in his chair and pondered on what to say next.

Henri was always such a nuisance.

"How long ago was this?" he tried eventually.

The gods were obviously smiling down on him. Approximately seventeen minutes later he was able to conclude that Henri had wanted nothing more than someone or something to talk at, and that that innocuous question had provided the trigger that was needed to start him off. All that Spock needed to do was to sit back silently and appear to listen. He nodded sagely once or twice, although he could not in fact have been able to recall one word of Henri's monologue two minutes after its utterance, but he spoke not a word himself. At one point he noticed that Henri's cup was empty, and he silently and soothingly refilled it (during a section about the way her hair used to curl into her eyes.) He made himself some more tea, and planned the work he would tackle tomorrow. He mentally checked on the time.

Henri droned on, no longer hiccuppy and hesitant, but fluently and monotonously boring. Thirty eight minutes it lasted in all, and then, with a sigh, he too lapsed into silence.

"You see?" he asked, after a moment.

Spock nodded again.

"Yeah," said Henri lugubriously. Silence reigned again, but for the soft slurp as Henri applied himself to his cup of rather cool coffee. He felt a little better, he thought. No one else had actually listened to him. They had all broken in with remarks like, "Well, never mind," and "I know it's hard to believe now, but you will get over it," and "Yeah, I know," which they didn't. Spock had let him talk and had listened without minding or saying that he had to go to a class or meet someone or advising him to have another drink. He was still sitting there - the light was behind him and so his eyes were in shadow, but Henri knew that they were looking at him with - kindness. And understanding.

Spock was so understanding.

"Hey, Spock?"

"Yes?"

"You were playing that thing" (gesturing towards the lytherette) "before I came in. Can you show me what it sounds like, before I go? I guess it's a bit late, and I don't want to keep you long. I'll just finish my coffee.

Spock was so relieved at the promise of imminent reprieve that he allowed the improbable concept of 'showing a sound' to pass without comment. He reached for the lytherette, balanced it on his knee and sat quietly for a moment, whilst reflecting on what piece to play. There were a great many to choose from (it had been said that if the Greeks had a word for it, the Vulcans had a ballad about it), and Spock's solid grounding in The Arts left him spoiled for choice. Eventually, he ran his fingers softly over the strings, paused, and then began 'Sorab and T'Vienne', a Pre-Reform ballad in whose weaving, lilting and haunting chords was unfolded the tragic tale of these two Clan leaders, pledged by centuries of tradition to bitter mutual hatred and yet drawn towards each other by an unwilling respect and attraction which evolved into the desperate and passionate devotion with which their names have ever been synonymous throughout the long ages. The flowing harmonies shifted in almost imperceptible steps towards the harsher cadences of the climax, which described the agony of their acceptance of tradition, their mutual rejection of their own peoples' sake and their grimly inevitable and violent deaths at each other's hands at the final bloody battle of Vrxlztzrbmgwcyuk. But then, like the rising of the lark from the hush of dawn after the storm, the harpstrings drew their two souls up and they rose with the music from the ashes and blood of death into the everlasting peace and joy of The One, joined forever in serene hope and love, for the perpetual inspiration of all those after who would reach towards the essence and purity of true Union.

Spock had never liked it very much.

After a suitably respectful pause, he rested the lytherette on the floor and looked up at Henri.

Who was blinking limpidly at him through tears. He looked like a sy'di that had had sand kicked in its face, Spock reflected involuntarily, and then he felt ashamed. Perhaps he should have chosen a different ballad - one with some verve and gaiety... and a bit more of a tune...

"Glub, gulp."

"I beg your pardon?" enquired Spock.

In reply, Henri got to his feet, surged across the room and, before the Vulcan had time even to flinch, Henri grasped him by the hand. "I've never heard anything like it," he croaked tightly. "It was..."

Henri was overcome. With a final heartfelt thump on Spock's shoulder, he turned and stumbled towards the door, where he paused, and said, "Thank you. For everything. It was..."

He left the room on a last gulp.

***

It was two days before Spock emerged from his room again, and therefore it was two days before he learned that he had, inadvertently, become the Most Popular Boy in the Second Year. For two days he had lurked within the sanctum of 7ll3, not daring to venture out lest he meet Henri and endure either more of the same or, as he fully expected and felt that he deserved, a deluge of justifiable criticism for his callousness in letting Henri down in his hour of need. Spock was not hypocrite enough to pretend that he cared one iota for Henri's sensibilities, but he was a good Vulcan who had been brought up with a strong sense of duty and Responsibility to Others. He had, he thought, reneged on that responsibility. But no. Far from it.

From the way in which the enthusiastic Henri LeServe had described the evening to the other cadets, they could have believed Spock to be endowed with any mystical power one cared to mention. It was apparent to all, however, if one cut through the peculiar bits about flickering altar lights and music from Heaven, that Spock had exercised more compassion and understanding than any of Henri's Human friends, and had succeeded where all others had failed in breaking the edge of Henri's near-suicidal misery and setting him on the road to recovery.

Despite Henri's tendency to hysteria on the subject, the message was clear.

Spock was a really good guy. One of the best. All heart.

He cared!

And the barrage of shoulder thumps, warm smiles and gushing greeting that swamped Spock from all sides on his emergence from his hiding place was almost enough to drive him straight back again.

He never did find out what it was that had boosted him to the near summit of the popularity charts. Neither was he ever quite able to work out whether it was any advantage to him to be there.

But there he was and, since the other cadets saw so little of him, there he remained, providing no opportunity to anyone to dislodge him. He did nothing, and could, therefore, do no wrong.

"I've heard he's a really good guy, in fact," said one of Rhoda Mulvahill's friends to her, watching as she packed food and notes for her next project meeting.

"Yes, isn't it odd," said another, waving her fingers in the air to dry her nails. "Pauline said that John had said that he - you know - really - you know - ah - cares about people and really takes time to help them and - oh damn." One of her nails had smudged.

Rhoda smiled mysteriously and left them to it.

The smile disappeared outside the room. She didn't consider that there was anything at all to smile about. It was all very well, all of them saying that he was a nice guy. She thought he was a nice guy. She'd thought that he was a nice guy before any of them had thought that he was a nice guy.

But not the same sort of nice guy.

If he was that sort of nice guy, why hadn't he... well...

Perhaps, she thought as she plodded down the steps and trudged across the courtyard towards C Block... perhaps she'd never been upset.

Well, she hadn't been upset.

Perhaps if she'd got upset about something he'd have been that sort of nice guy, and not just the sort that she had thought he was, which wasn't what you'd call nice, anyway. It was more, sort of...

Oh dear.

She reached his room in an ominous state of mental upheaval, and, to his surprise and her embarrassment, actually found herself searching his face for evidence of niceness beyond the call of duty.

"Good afternoon, Rhoda," he said, and backed away towards the heated teapot.

A little cloud of sick misery settled over her in a small soggy blanket, and she did not even know why it was there. She swallowed hard and wished that her heart would stop hurting.

She suddenly felt unaccountably but unbearably lonely, and sat down at his desk and stared fixedly with wide eyes out of the window.

A cup of tea was deposited on the desk top in front of her, and she heard the sounds of rummaging in the cake tin. A tiny shaft of light pierced through the cloud and made her smile. The shock of the sudden contrast between the two emotions proved nearly disastrous, and she found it necessary to leave her seat and go right up to the window to stare out at the unchanging scene down below.

//Pull yourself together// she entreated herself desperately, and she did. She returned to the desk with her best attempt at an airy smile and, in case any explanations were called for, said, "I must say, I've been a bit worried about the exams lately."

This was, at least, a true statement.

"Shall we get on now?" she surged on brightly, fixing the wide unblinking stare on him.

Both his eyebrows shot upwards for an unguarded instant, before he hastily swallowed the last crumbs of his chocolate slice, licked his fingers surruptitiously and picked up his stylus.

"Certainly," he said, coolly.

The dark head and the red head bent towards the notes scattered on the desk, and they worked hard for the rest of that session, and for the next, which was the last, bar a tidying-up meeting suggested by Spock. Out of deference to Rhoda, she decided, as he could have done it by himself before early breakfast. It was an important session however, and longer than all the others in the event as, although they had throughout made notes to indicate the author of this idea or of that method, the written project had to be assembled and presented in such a way that the reader was left in little doubt as to the part each had played in the work's formulation. The examiner would only interview in doubtful cases, and Spock and Rhoda had early on reached an unspoken agreement that they did not wish to be interviewed on the details of their working relationship.

So she visited his room early one afternoon, and the hours went by in clouds of papers - papers all over the floor, piled on the chairs and strewn on the bed - Spock on the floor in the middle of it collating pages, and occasionally asking for an interpretation of one or other of Rhoda's frenetically scrawled notes in the margin - Rhoda standing by the desk assembling the papers in a neat orderly pile, fighting down irritation and panic, with her hair on end and stylus marks on her face from where she had rammed her hair back from her face without putting the stylus down first.

It seemed to take days. It would never be finished. It was useless anyway! She needed the grades from this if she was going to push up her overall mark; astrogation was a wash-out now after that fiasco when they put her on the wrong module at the start of the Year - that wasn't her fault but Keller had said they'd changed her back soon enough for it not to affect her grades, but he wasn't doing the bloody exam, and now this project - they'd laugh it out of the Academy, her bit anyway. They probably wouldn't look at his, they'd just...

"Rhoda!"

She jumped, and looked across at him guiltily. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor, chin propped on his hands, elbows on his knees and not one paper to be seen. "I said, we have finished," he repeated.

"Oh," she said, limply, and fell into a chair.

She went to dinner with him in C Block's dining hall as it was too late for her to get back to her Block for her usual sitting, and then they went for a stroll round the Rec fields and chatted quietly and tiredly about their project. The late sunlight died and they turned back towards C Block in the harsh starlight, and Rhoda found herself recounting her fears about the forthcoming examinations in every gory and humiliating detail, wishing that she could stop and retain just a little dignity to call her own but prevented by sheer weariness from summoning the willpower necessary to call a halt to the diatribe.

Only when she found herself walking with Spock down the corridor to her own room did surprise suffice where willpower had not.

He had walked her home.

Oh dear.

"Spock, I am sorry. I've been going on. I'm sorry." She pushed her hair back from her face yet again.

"I suggest that you go to bed early and get as much sleep as possible." He paused awkwardly, and then went on, "That will help you, I am sure."

She nodded, and stooped to open the door of her room. He turned to leave, but paused again, and said, "On the evidence of the work which you have done with me, I consider it most unlikely that you will not achieve all that you need in the exams.

She was just staring at him.

"Really," he said, almost urgently. "I should not worry so much if I were you. There is no need in your case."

She was still staring, and he could bear it no longer. "Good night," he said, and then remembered something else that Humans said to each other, and added, "Sleep well." Then he dashed away down the corridor and into the shadows.

She continued the movement of opening the door from where she had frozen at his first words and went in. Then she laughed out loud, and suddenly burst into tears.

***

It was approximately two and a half weeks later, eight o'clock in the morning, and Rhoda was buried under her bedclothes feeling wretched. The results went up that morning but she did not want to know. She had spent a sick and sleepless night, and now wished only that she and the rest of the world could forget about each other. At the sound of the thud on her door she burrowed even deeper under her covers and resolved to ignore it.

Two of her friends, Maya and Ivy, burst into the room, almost taking the door off its hinges in the process.

"Rod!" Maya shrieked.

"Gooway," said the pile of bedclothes.

"Rod" The two girls shook and prodded, and finally and mercilessly wrenched the covers away. "Rhod, go and look at your results! You've passed! You've got an overall merit!"

"You're lying," said Rhoda faintly, grasping feebly at the disappearing bed- covers. “You're lying," she said again more forcefully.

"Would we lie about this, you great moron?" Ivy yelled kindly. "Go and look'. Your science project thing came top in your group."

"We passed as well," said Maya, and then let out another shriek, to be joined by Ivy, and the two hugged each other and danced round the room, while their words slowly sank into the brain of their hostess.

She was off the bed, dressed and out of the door in twenty seconds.

"Rod!" shouted Ivy after her. "You've forgotten your bra!"

"Stuff it!" came the reply from the end of the corridor.

"You're supposed to do that," Ivy yelled back, but Rhoda was gone, leaving Maya and Ivy dancing a Charleston on Rhoda's bed with the blankets draped around them like togas.

She clawed her way to the notice board and stood, entranced, while tears of relief pricked at the back of her eyes. Someone's arm encircled her shoulders and gave a quick congratulatory hug and she nodded thanks blindly.

"Hey," said a voice near her. "Why didn't Spock come top in Engineering One?"

"He didn't take it," said another voice in reply.

"That's no bloody excuse;" roared the first voice, and the crowd erupted with laughter.

Spock.

She clawed her way back out of the crowd and ran, out of the building and across the courtyard towards C Block. Outside his door she heard the sound of his music, and she lurched in without waiting for an invitation and stood, gasping for breath and grinning from ear to ear.

He looked up at the spectacle from his perch at the end of his bed, and a very small smile crept slowly from his eyes to touch the corners of his mouth.

"Rhoda," he said as he put the lytherette down and got to his feet. "You are a mess."

She gave a gurgling laugh, and then flung her arms round his neck and hugged him. Then she remembered herself and let him go and, as he recovered his balance said, "You've seen the results?"

She was shouting, but he tried not to mind, and nodded.

"Oh Spock!" She flung herself into his chair and beamed at him. "Thank you!"

"Me? Why?" Force of habit drew him over to the teapot, and he set about preparing the beverage.

"I couldn't have done it without you."

"That is nonsense." He turned and pointed at her with a spoon. "You sat your exams, not I."

She opened her mouth, and then shut it again. Argument was pointless, and she felt too happy to attempt it. She sat for a while in contented silence and then, as he came over and joined her with the drinks, said, "Well, anyway, whether or not I owe you anything, I thought I'd like to invite you to a meal. I'll cook us something, as long as you tell me what things you can't eat, and we'll eat it in my room. As a celebration."

There was another brief silence, during which time Spock thought about the offer and tried to find a catch.

He couldn't find one.

"Hmmm?" she enquired.

"Yes," he said, slowly, "Thank you."

She beamed again. "Would anything that's not meat be all right?"

He nodded.

"Good. How about... Thursday? That'll give me time to work out what to cook and tidy the room. Thursday at... oh... eight o'clock?"

"That will be quite satisfactory. Thank you."

Life, she decided, had taken a sudden and dramatic turn for the better. She scoured the library for ideas for a menu, scoured her wardrobe (and those of Maya and Ute who were her size) for something to wear, scoured the room from top to bottom to a standard almost approaching his and was ready and waiting by half past seven, the meal warming, some wine chilling, and her nerves jumping.

She served the food almost immediately after his arrival. This was a successful ploy; the familiarity of the situation, viz the two of them at a table pushing food down their throats, helped ease the tension which he too felt, and, by halfway through the second course, the atmosphere was as clear as a summer day. They did not talk much, but just ate, and Spock accepted a little wine, and then a little more when that was finished. She then proposed a toast to their respective glowing careers in Starfleet, and their conversation turned to the future, and Rhoda topped up Spock's glass and they talked contentedly about their hopes and ambitions, wrapped around in the rosy glow of recent success, good food and sparkling wine.

"Command training really sets in next year," she said, leaning back from the table and stretching luxuriously. "You can start working for your captaincy."

Her voice and eyes were teasing, but a brief memory of a long ago conversation pierced his consciousness like a splinter and jarred him slightly before it was pushed away again. He said, "Hmmm," in a non-committal manner, and changed the subject to, "Have you yet made plans for the vacation?"

"Nooo," she said, casually and carefully. "I... ah... thought I might stay here this vac. Get in some prep, for next Year. I don't know. No plans really." She looked expectantly at him, but he didn't seem to be very interested in what she was saying. He was absorbed in pushing a couple of crumbs around on the table top. She watched him, and a silence fell.

"What about you?" she said eventually.

"Hmmm?" Spock looked up from the crumbs.

"The vacation."

"Oh. I don't know either." He paused, and stared at a patch on the wall in an effort to focus his thoughts. But that failed, so he merely said again, "I don't know," and leaned back in his chair, abandoning the crumbs to their own devices.

He really did feel most strange.

But it was not unpleasant.

Not at all.

He took another sip from his glass, and Rhoda reached for the bottle to pour him a little more.

"No, thank you," he said, in as formal a manner as he could muster. "I have had quite suffit...quite enough, and, indeed, I must return to my room." He drained the glass, put it down on the table top with a slight thump and looked at her with his head on one side and a half smile on his face that made her insides melt. "Thank you for an excellent meal."

"You don't have to go," she said in a feather-light voice.

"No, I must return," he said, misunderstanding her. "I must rest as I have agreed to meet Professor Marten tomorrow to discuss..."

"I meant," she broke in, still succeeding in keeping the edge from her voice, "that you don't have to go back to your room. You could stay here if you liked." She avoided the crushing temptation to find table-top crumbs of her own, and instead rested her chin on her clasped hands, and looked steadily up at him.

He looked at her, frowning slightly in puzzlement, and then he felt as though someone had turned up the heating in the room. His mouth had suddenly turned very dry, and he licked his lips. He took a quick and involuntary glance at the door.

None of this was lost on Rhoda, who gave a very small sigh. She smiled at him, perhaps a little wryly, and quietly asked, "No?"

He ventured to meet her eyes, but did not know what to do with what he found there. He was rooted to his chair and utterly distracted.

But she was still smiling. And it was still a smile that he could recognise. He managed to think back to her last utterance, and at last stumbled upon the question mark with which she had provided him. An absurd relief flooded him. She was offering an invitation - not issuing an edict.

He took a very deep breath, and got slowly, and almost apologetically, to his feet. He looked back into her eyes, which were still glowing amber in the soft light, and shook his head sharply. "No," he replied, perhaps a little hoarsely.

Then he crossed quickly to the door, opened it, and gave a quick look back. But he found that he didn't know what else to say and he shut the door sharply - and then ran.

Rhoda sat for a moment, still staring at the door, and then her gaze dropped to her wine glass. She let herself drift into a reflective dozy dream, and a small smile crept back to her face.

"Not this time, perhaps," she said, to the empty room.

Spock, meanwhile, had not stopped running. He ran from her Block towards the direction of his own, and then found his footsteps turning instead to the park which lay beyond the Science Blocks. He ran into the middle of the lower field, and flung himself down onto the grass. There he sat, panting slightly, his arms locked around his knees, and he stared up at the sky. The vastness of the night vista pressed him down and down, and he lay stretched out on his back, watching the brilliant stars as they weaved an erratic minuet to the beat of his heart. Spock had never before seen the stars dance, and he thought it beautiful. He stretched both hands up towards them, and watched their patterns change between his fingers.

"The starrrrs," he whispered, and chuckled at the strange sound, and then he rolled over like a cat and rested his chin on his folded arms and squinted at the blades of grass which pricked up centimetres from his nose.

"The stars," he whispered again.  He could see his way through to the stars now. His future was uncluttered with mystery or inconvenience. Everything was under control now.

"Hic!"

He blinked in surprise, and then returned to his musings on his glowing prospects. Fly through the rest of the Academy; no more worries about Humans - they were easy to handle once you knew them, just like falling off a log...

And from where had he got that? Someone must have said it. It was stupid anyway.

"Stuupid, stuupid, stuupid - hic!"

He sat up again, and suddenly felt dizzy. Must have moved too quickly.

Better go home anyway. Must get some sleep.

The glow of Rhoda's eyes looked back at him from the lighted windows of the distant Science Block, and he turned hot again.

His acute embarrassment stemmed from a multitude of factors, not the least of which was that he had been taken completely by surprise by the turn of events, and was therefore (for the present befuddled moment, at least) unable to determine what exactly had prompted that particular suggestion at that particular time.

He found himself recalling one of those meal-time conversations to which he had been an unwilling eavesdropper, when Alex, on recounting the tale of one of his amorous disappointments, had declared that the female in question had 'led him on'. He remembered the phrase quite clearly, because he had spent some moments in attempting to visualise the scene.

And so now, this evening - who had led who on?

He tried to work back through the events of the evening, and then back through the weeks, but his head seemed to be spinning round (illogical, but an apt description), and he couldn't remember anything in order.

Either way, the answer to the question was unacceptable, and he was getting hotter with every ounce of concentration devoted to it. He kept on seeing her eyes, swirling round with everything else, and, to make matters very much worse, the eyes of his father would interpose themselves between her and him and glower at him balefully.

His father.

"0h, I just went to her room and had a few drinks and then she asked me to..."

"Hic."

Tomorrow!

Tomorrow, he would return to what he was; resume his true self and never again deviate. Shed from himself all the Human contamination which had (somehow) sneaked into his consciousness whilst he was looking the other way.

(And he had better go home for the holiday, as well.

For several reasons).

And then, eventually - soon! - all of Vulcan would admire him, and point to his achievements, and Sarek would take him to High Council on Shak'dar day and say to them all, "Behold, my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased!"

Spock smiled up at the stars and paused in happy thought.

"Hic!"

But not yet. Tomorrow. He would start tomorrow.

Meanwhile, he clambered to his feet and stood, swaying slightly, before beating an unsteady path towards C Block, and sleep.

Final Year

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