I'll Save You - Spirk

Chapter Fourteen

*Jim's POV*

We were among the last of the cadets to leave the small ship and set down on the planet, which appeared to be nothing more then a barren wasteland.

We were given parachutes and jumped from the slow moving ship at 4,000 feet.

I landed just after Spock, who was patiently untangling himself from his parachute, the differences in our personalities clear as I ripped mine off.

Spock arched an eyebrow at me. "Do not rip the fabric, we can use them as blankets when it gets cold," he instructed, carefully folding his into a neat bundle after using a sharp rock to cut away the ropes.

I copied him the best I could. "How do you know it will get cold?" I asked as we surveyed the terrain.

To the east there was a massive lake with a river curving around to the south, disappearing into some mountains in the west. There was little vegetation and I couldn't see any form of life. It really was a wasteland.

"Due to the current temperature, the lack of clouds to keep the suns warmth in the atmosphere and the desert like terrain, it's logical that the days will be warm and the nights cold" he answered, his brown eyes shifting around, taking in everything.

His expression was serious, as always, his eyebrows drawn together in a frown of concentration.

I pointed to the mountains "I reckon we should head that way, the river runs there so there will be fresh, clean water and hopefully more plants" I picked my folded parachute up and he nodded in agreement, doing the same to his.

............

*Spock's POV*

We walked over the hard, red earth for hours, not saying anything, just walking towards the mountains.

I sneaked a sidelong look at Jim, who was walking with his head down, frowning at the ground.

My eyes lingered on his face, his open blue eyes, his kind mouth that was always quick to smile, the faint red colouring in his cheeks, his tousled blonde hair.

James Kirk was an attractive man, no doubt about it. If that wasn't obvious enough from the unusually high number of human females who were always looking at him, flicking their hair and going out of their way to show off their breasts and butts, desperately trying to get his attention.

However, despite their efforts I have never seen him take interest in any of them, except for Uhura but I am 86.4% certain he only flirts with her to annoy Hendorff.

Attraction. Was that the foreign emotion I was feeling for my T'hy'la? Was that the reason that, despite my sensitive Vulcan skin, I wanted to feel his skin against mine?

As if he felt my gaze he looked up at me, a quirky smile appearing on his face. I looked away, towards the mountains again. "We are almost there" I commented, hoping to distract him from the blush creeping across my face.

It succeeded and he looked over to them, then up at the sky. "Good, hopefully we will be able to find a place to rest before it gets dark" he quickened his pace, and I hurriedly matched it.

We reached the base of the mountains and immediately split up to search for a place to rest.

After just a few minutes Jim waved me over, pointing into a smallish cave "how about here?" he suggested.

I examined it for a moment, it didn't have any tunnels leading out the back where something could sneak up on us, and looked like it would shelter us for the worst of the weather.

"This will be adequate" I told him, and we entered the small cave. We moved to the back corner and placed the fabric from the parachutes down, him just dumping his and me arranging mine carefully.

Jim looked thoughtfully at the cave entrance "we will need some wood to make a fire, and something to eat, but I don't really know what" he said apologetically, looking to me for ideas.

"I will find us some food, you see to the fire" I told him, careful to keep a respectable distance between us as I left the cave.

I decided to go near the bubbling stream in search of some form of nourishment. As I was searching I had plenty of time to ponder my newly discovered attraction for Jim.

It really is logical when you think about it, he was the first person outside of my family to show me kindness in a long time, he stood up for me when no one else would and seemed to expect nothing in return. It made sense that I should be attracted to him.

Despite my reasoning I had a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that my reasons were pointless, that I would probably be attracted to the blue eyed human even he he didn't know or care that I existed.

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a patch of mushrooms and bent to pick them, making sure to only take what we needed.

I walked a little further and found some sort of herb that smelt faintly of something mother cooks with and, calculating that it was more likely not to be poisonous then to be poisonous, collected some.

I glanced in the direction of the rapidly setting sun that was casting dark shadows and took note of how quickly the temperature was dropping.

Deciding that it was getting too dark to continue searching I headed back to the cave, where Jim was standing in the entrance looking around for me.

A relieved look crossed his face when he saw me, I felt my heart stutter a bit at the thought of him being concerned for me.

We walked into the shelter of the cave where he had gotten a merry fire crackling, its cheerful glow lighting up the entire cave as the flames danced around each other.

I showed him the small pile of mushrooms and herbs, feeling a touch of pride when he beamed and put them into something vaguely metallic and rounded which was filled with water, the put the whole thing into the flames.

"I found it under a shrub" he answered my unasked question as we waited for our first meal on this planet to cook. I nodded in understanding and tried to keep my gaze from wondering to him too much, illogically not even wondering how strange bucket/dish thing got there .

"Are you alright Spock? You seem a little edgy" he asked as he poked the fire, his eyes switching between it and me. I looked over to him, "I am fine, it is always better to be a little 'on edge' then to be caught unaware" I replied, watching as he removed the strange dish from the fire, careful not to burn himself.

"Bon appétit" he said waving to it and smiling to me.