༄ chapter seventeen
-ˋˏ WHERE PROMISES LIE ˎˊ-
"VERA," Kirk began solemnly, his tone serious as his hands stayed wrapped around hers. When she looked up expectantly, he spoke again, "I know you and Pike's son are planning on abandoning again."
The engineer's eyes widened, and she found herself jumping from her seat, skittish. Her stance was defensive as Kirk also jumped up, looking to the eyes of those that had noticed the sudden motion and turning their gaze elsewhere in value of their privacy.
Vera, over time, had become no one to mess with, especially when it concerned her own wellbeing and the wellbeing of her best friend. She stood on her tip toes, getting as close to Kirk's face as she could, before grabbing him by his collar, lowering the new acting Captain to her height, her eyes full of fire and a flickering worry that, should Kirk reveal this, she and Kit would be given a much worse punishment than they had been given before, which was simply a slap on the wrist, and even came with a free promotion.
"How exactly do you know that, James Kirk?" She asked fiercely, her voice barely above silent, and yet filled with so much menace that it sent a shiver down Kirk's spine. She may have been relatively small and seemed harmless, but it was evident that Vera Crynn wasn't someone the Captain wanted to cross paths with under the wrong circumstances.
Kirk struggled for an appropriate answer, stammering over his words. He wasn't exactly certain of the reason why, as he had learned it from a supposed 'old friend' on Delta Vega, but his fear of the small Chief Engineer was enough to make his tongue trip in his mouth and his blood run cold. "I...I...look, Vera, I can't tell you, all I can tell you is that there's someone in this galaxy that knows everything that's going to happen to you, and they told me so that I could know ahead of time."
"Who, Kirk? Who?" Vera questioned, her tone almost demonic in nature as she tried to shake the answer from the nervous young man, not liking that there was someone out there that supposedly knew her, but she didn't have a clue of.
Shaking his head, "I can't tell you, Vera, but I can say this: I'm not going to force you to stay."
With his words, Vera furrowed her brows, stumbling back as she let go of a very frightened Kirk. He had said the exact opposite of what she was expecting, but then again, this was James Kirk - the man who cheated the Kobayashi Maru. Though Vera had, in her short time of knowing him, figured Kirk to be different than many of Starfleet's members, she had never imagined he would go so far as to support what was, essentially, mutiny. "You're not?" She repeated, puzzlement laced in her voice, her previous anger gone.
"No, Vera," Kirk began, almost sympathetically, going closer to the mechanic and pushing her into a more remote area of the bridge, "I'm not going to force you to stay. I know what could happen when a person is placed in a position they're not willing to take, and I'll support the both of you, even if you do get caught - I'll vouch for you the best I can. But, before you go, I do have one request."
The anger Vera had once felt was replaced by amazement and, dare she say it, giddiness. The Cadet whom she had known for so little time had turned from acquaintance to friend in the blink of an eye, and she found herself grateful to have met the rebellious young man. With his granting of freedom came a request, and she was willing to do anything to appease Kirk, "A request? What is it? I'll do anything you want."
He sighed slightly, taking a moment to brush his hair out of his face and allow his hand to travel down to the back of his neck, which he scratched nervously, "Um...well, I would like for you to go find Spock and talk to him about our fight."
Immediately, Vera's happiness was once again dropped, but instead replaced with confusion, her brows furrowed and her gaze curious, "Why me?" There was absolutely no reason for her to talk to the Vulcan - she had despised the very idea of acquainting with a Vulcan since the moment her father left, and now she was being asked to talk to him on behalf of the USS Enterprise's acting Captain, both of whom she barely knew.
Kirk replied, "Because last time you talked to him seemed to turn out pretty good. Plus, I'm fairly sure that if I tried to talk to him he would only try to kill me again."
At his comment, which was given with a slight smile and soft airiness, Vera chuckled lightly, before returning to her state of confusion, "No, Kirk, last time I talked to him, I'm pretty sure I just made him feel worse for his mammie dying. In case you couldn't tell, I'm not exactly the best at emotion confrontation. Besides, I barely know him! I really don't think moments before my second abandonment is a proper time to try to comfort an emotionless Vulcan."
"Trust me, Vera, it is. Just go talk to him, then you can leave, I promise."
Vera sighed, then nodded, "Make Scotty Chief for me, would you?"
"I just don't see what the point is," Vera muttered to herself as she took the turbolift down to where she hoped she would find the Vulcan, "I mean, I couldn't even comfort him about his damn mammie dying, what makes me think I can make him feel better about loosing his position to his emotions? I can't control my own emotions, so what makes me think I can help someone who's not even in touch with theirs?"
In the midst of her own rambling, Vera was barely able to tell she had reached her designated floor, and even less privy to the fact that Spock was standing right outside the turbolift, waiting for his time to get in. Once Vera did realize this, however, she was quick to leap from the lift before its doors closed, grabbing onto the Vulcan's arm without warning and dragging him behind her, no explanation to be seen.
It took only a few moments for Vera to reach her destination of an empty storage room and, wanting to get her demanded talk over with as soon as possible, practically chucked Spock into the room and barreled in herself, shutting the door behind her. The Vulcan, rather surprised with Vera's erratic behavior, allowed a single of his pointed eyebrows to be lifted in confusion, his voice laced with just as much puzzlement as Vera's had been before, "Miss Crynn? What are you doing?"
Vera shook her head tiredly, holding up a hand to allow her, and her alone, to speak, "Look, Spock, I'm going to be leaving soon, and Kirk asked me to do one last favor for him before I do so, so I'm just here to be the human version of a telephone and ask if everything is okay."
"Leaving?" Spock repeated, puzzled, "What do you mean 'leaving'? If you and Mister Pike plan on abandoning soon, I can guarantee that Starfleet with have severe consequences in store-"
"I don't care what the consequences are, I just want to get away from all this; I want to get away from the missions, the people I don't like, the putting my life at risk for the very same people I hate, the not being in control of my own actions..." Vera began, trailing off as she realized that her own excuse for leaving was rather pathetic.
As a child, being raised by both Verenia and Chris, she was taught that loyalty, above all, was something that a member of Starfleet should value. And yet, here she was, ready to leave for the second time for the mere purpose of being dissatisfied with the way the last seventy-two hours aboard the USS Enterprise had been. She wasn't noble, nor daring, nor done with the way her life was. No, Vera Crynn was selfish, and she knew it just as well as anyone else.
"You do not appreciate me?" The Vulcan asked, his tone the same monotone it had been before, though his words suggested that Vera had been aiming her displeasures with Starfleet at him alone.
She sighed, shaking her head, "No, Spock, I like you, but it's just Starfleet in general. Sure, I'm loyal to my friends and those I love, but I can't remain loyal to a Federation that believes it can place my worth on skill or willingness to obey orders when I'm so much more than that."
"If you are loyal to your 'friends', and those friends are part of Starfleet, then what is the logic in leaving?" The Vulcan pointed out.
Vera thought of his words, considering for a moment that, if we she leave again, she would have Kit, but would lose so many more, like McCoy, Uhura, Darcy, Chris, Scotty, her mammie and siblings, and now Kirk, and possibly even an acquaintance in Spock. But, still, she pushed it to the back of her mind, knowing she would do anything to keep Kit, of all people, happy, even if that meant leaving the others behind.
She shook her head, responding, "I can't. I just..." Vera sighed, finally finishing her words with her head hung in shame, her head racing with the possibility of losing everyone again, "I can't, Spock."
It was a moment of true emotional vulnerability for Vera, as she hadn't yet thought of what would happen if she left again, only to have Kit by her side. She would never be able to hug her mother, never rant with McCoy, never see McCoy and Darcy's daughter grow up, never play noughts and crosses and lose every time with Uhura, never experience the rush of being in the same room with someone as energetic as Kirk, never get that small, approving chuckle from Chris after she tells a joke, only for it to be covered back up with a sigh of false disappointment again, never take a burning insult from Cas... and she was revealing all of that to a Vulcan, the one person on the Enterprise that would never be able to understand people's thoughts, expect the other Vulcan's from their planet.
Remembering the reason she had come down to talk to the former-acting Captain in the first place, Vera shook her head, as if coming out of a trace, her cheeks tinged with pink, embarrassed at having shown such a moment of weakness to someone she barely knew, "Anyway, that's not the point. The point is that Kirk sent me down to see if you were okay after your little...breakdown."
"Yes, you can tell the Captain that I will no longer be of hinderance to the crew or it's mission to rescue Captain Pike," Spock responded, nodding curtly and returning to his monotone voice, as his previous one had been just a bit too emotional compared to his usual speaking pattern.
Vera shook her head, chuckling slightly at the ridiculousness of the Vulcan's formality, "You tell him yourself, I'm leaving." With that, the former Lieutenant Commander stepped back into the hall, allowing Spock his own time to think in the privacy of the vacant room. Her heels clicked against the shining white floors as she wandered down the hallway, her brain consumed by nothing but flashes of her friends, both new and old, and of her family. For a split second, two half-Vulcans made their way into the collage of her sorrow, but she quickly shook both out, allowing her mind to be overwhelmed by the rhythmic clicking of her boots.
She had made it to the end of the hall, her hand clasped on the handle to the stairwell that would lead down to the bottom level of the Enterprise, when Vera was stopped by a lone voice echoing over the glass walls, "Vera, wait!" Vera turned around, expecting to see Spock with a possible possession she had accidentally dropped in her melancholy saunter. Instead, the Vulcan was jogging towards her, a slight relief on his face when she let go of the handle and started walking to meet him in the middle, willing to hear whatever he had to say just before leaving.
When the two met halfway, Vera looked up expectantly, an eyebrows raised as she waited for the Vulcan to speak. When he did, it came out in a tone unreadable; it wasn't his usual dryness, but it wasn't quite concern either: "Miss Crynn, I..." He seemed unable to quite get out what he was saying, hesitation evident in his voice.
"You what?" Vera asked, batting her eyelashes, trying to goad him into spitting it out in a timely manner.
Straightening himself up, the emotion from his voice gone as he tried to look more professional, Spock rephrased himself, "I believe it would be unwise for you to abandon Starfleet a second time."
Vera's eyes widened, not having expected him to say such a thing. She knew that he was likely just saying it out his loyalty to the federation, not any concern for her own wellbeing. "Oh? And why is that?" She questioned, genuinely curious as she leaned closer, not wanting to miss his likely mundane and very formal answer.
Spock, though, seemed unprepared to answer, rather speaking as if he were coming up with his reasoning on the spot, something Vera would have never expected from a Vulcan. He stumbled over his words and seemed almost nervous, his ears tinging green as he spoke, though Vera knew it was likely just from his running, "Well, there are people here who would find themselves..." he trailed off, trying to think of a proper word, "...emotional, should you leave so soon."
"What do you mean?"
The Vulcan shrugged, continuing to trip over his explanation, "Well, Kirk seems to have taken quite a shine to you, and it's obvious that Doctor McCoy enjoys your presence, and Lieutenant Uhura is certainly glad to see you again, and so is Miss Simmons, as it's obvious you all share a history..."
Vera narrowed her eyebrows, her lids turning to slits as she turned her head on an angle. She chuckled slightly, having figured out what the overly-professional Vulcan may have been saying, "Are you saying this because you want me to stay, or is it purely out for the wellbeing of your crew?" She knew it was likely the second option, but Vera still couldn't help but feel a strange satisfaction at the obvious discomfort the Vulcan felt as her first option.
Surprisingly, though, his answer was akin to that of the former, something even he seemed astonished with, his words fast and to the point, as if he felt he had to say them quickly, or he would never otherwise be able to, "Actually, I want you to stay."
Of course, Vera was both suspicious and surprised, having not expected such an answer from him, her eyes once against narrowed as she attempted to process his words. Eventually, though, she responded with the only thing she could, hoping it was just some strange Vulcan way of joking, "Are you serious? Like, you're not joking? You actually want me to stay?"
Uncertainly, Spock nodded, "Yes."
Vera, though, was still not quite convinced, "You promise you're not lying?"
"Vulcans do not lie," Spock replied in a monotone voice.
Still a bit wary, Vera narrowed her eyes, but accepted it, making a split decision to not follow through with what she had promised, electing to stay aboard the USS Enterprise, despite the risk. She stuck out her pinky for a rather childish pinky promise, but had always considered it to be the highest form of a promising bond, a small smile painted across her cheeks, "Very well, then, the USS Enterprise it is for me."
Spock, however, did not take her pinky, instead awkwardly looking at it, his ears tinged with green. After a few moments, Vera realized what she had done, her cheeks glowing a bright red as she retracted her pinky, laughing awkwardly, "Oops, my mistake." Without a word, Vera elected to take another approach of shaking hands in some form, taking her elbow and bumping it against the Vulcan's before wordlessly heading back to the turbolift, Spock not far behind, as the two ascended back to the bridge.