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“Your move, Mr. Spock,” Kirk said, surveying his First Officer over the chessboard. They were, for once, in Spock’s quarters, Kirk’s being repaired in preparation for their return to Earth. The return Kirk was dreading, in a totally different way than he’d dreaded the last time.
Last time, their return to Earth had followed a mission of such strain that no one could even say they were relieved it was over. Kirk had had his own reasons to dread the return; the unwanted promotion weighing him down, the loss of the Enterprise, the prospect of remaining on Earth watching others explore the stars, the breakup of what had become a family. He had felt like his life was over at the age of thirty-seven, the only thing left endless paperwork and Starfleet functions. The dread might have become an eternal numbness if not for everything else.
There had first been the unexpected fight with McCoy, which had turned vicious and insulting in a way Kirk still couldn’t look back on without shame, because the doctor had been completely right and Kirk had lashed out at the easiest target, his emotions all over the place. McCoy had, understandably, resigned without a word, and Kirk couldn’t fault him for it. He would probably have gone after him if not for the even more unexpected disappearance of Spock, which had taken his already fragile emotional state and shattered it almost beyond repair.
Never, in his worst nightmares, had he pictured having to do anything without Spock at least a communique away. Spock’s complete absence, no goodbye, not even a note, was a thousand times worse than the bitter, angry break with McCoy, because Kirk couldn’t even pretend he didn’t understand exactly why his Chief Medical Officer had done it that way. Spock…well, he had an idea. But what little understanding he had only made it worse.
But at least with McCoy, there was the chance of forgiveness. Spock, Kirk knew, once he realized his old friend’s intention, would come back to him almost a robot, utterly emotionless, if he came back at all.
Command was lonely, people said. But it wasn’t nearly as lonely as the three years he’d been without the two people who had become his closest support, so intertwined he had long ago stopped being able to picture himself without them. He would have agreed they were emotionally compromised, if they were not so much stronger together.
Kirk had always dreaded being alone, even as he was called to a life that had loneliness at its core. But he’d never truly been alone before, until those three years.
They had been the worst three years of his life, those few months on Tarsus IV the only exception.
The dread, this time, was for the opposite reason. This mission, while not without the loss and pain of any five-year mission, had been the happiest time of Kirk’s life. The only dread now was that it had to end, with all the uncertainty of what came next.
“Admiral?” Spock’s deep voice cut through his thoughts. “You did not notice my move.”
Kirk hastily searched the board and saw that Spock had set up an attack that would corner his king if he wasn’t careful. He could get out of it, but it would take five extra moves and only if Spock didn’t see it coming. “Sorry, Spock. I’m a little distracted,” Kirk said, beginning his defense.
“By our return to Earth?” Spock asked.
“How’d you guess?” Kirk asked, unsurprised that Spock had perceived his state of mind. Those three years apart not only felt like they had never happened, Spock’s newfound emotional balance meant they were more at ease with each other than before. Still, Spock’s question brought back all the pain and fear from last time.
They might be sure, this time, that they would not be totally separated again, but the end of a mission still meant new assignments, new postings, and they still had no idea whether those postings would be together or not. Kirk had recommended Spock for promotion, because he couldn’t do anything else. His brilliant First Officer deserved a captaincy, but a captaincy still meant he would be out there while Kirk sat at a desk in San Francisco, waiting for communiques and video calls. The thought sent tendrils of fear around his heart, and he forced them away through sheer will. He would not begrudge Spock what he deserved.
“I have found myself distracted as well,” Spock said.
“Well,” Kirk said, trying not to sound worried at all. “The captaincy’s all but assured. You must have multiple offers.”
Spock raised an eyebrow. “I do,” he said. “I have been offered the captaincy of the Exeter, and of the Galileo.”
Kirk considered. “A science ship and a starship. You have your pick.” He smiled and was relieved when the expression came naturally. Whatever else, he believed that Spock deserved to be captain, with everything he had. “Either one would be lucky to have you.”
Spock’s silence would not have meant much to anyone else…but to Kirk it spoke volumes. “What is it?” he asked.
“I find it odd that you are so eager for me to accept a captaincy when you know I have never wished to command,” Spock said.
“I know you haven’t,” Kirk said. “But you deserve it. And you’ll be great at it, Spock, they couldn’t get a better captain, either of those ships.” He swallowed. “I don’t want to…hold you back. You spent two tours as my First Officer, that’s longer than anyone else has been First, and you’re the best in the Fleet.”
“Admiral, I have never thought you were ‘holding me back,’” Spock said. “It was my choice to serve on your second five-year mission as First Officer. It was the only reason that I returned to Starfleet.”
“I know,” Kirk said. “I’m grateful, Spock, you know I couldn’t have done it without you. But now…everything’s changing. McCoy’s going to teach at Starfleet Medical School, I’m back to being Head of Operations, Chekov’s going to be First on the Reliant. Even the Enterprise is being semi-retired, used to train cadets.” He looked wistfully around the room. “Not the ending I would have chosen for her.” He cleared his throat. “But my point is that it’s time to move on, obviously. They won’t give me another ship, and I wouldn’t want it.”
“If it was not the Enterprise,” Spock finished.
Kirk swallowed. He at times felt as if he was connected to the ship itself, and the thought of taking on a different ship felt almost like a betrayal. “No,” he agreed. “But not without my crew either. I have the best crew in the Fleet. I couldn’t do it over with another one, and it wouldn’t be fair to ask it of them. They’ve put their careers on hold long enough.” He sounded false even to himself, like he was trying to convince himself. Which he was. The thought of never returning to space, never commanding his crew again, threatened to pull him down into the dark place he’d been last time. He refused to let it. This time would be different.
“But you do not wish to remain on Earth,” Spock said.
Kirk smiled wanly. Spock knew him too well. “It’ll be different, this time. McCoy will be there, Scotty, Sulu, at least when the Enterprise isn’t out on training missions. You know they agreed to stay, didn’t you? And you and I…” he looked up at Spock. “Whatever you decide, Spock, we’ll be alright.”
“I am as certain of that as you are, Admiral,” Spock said. “I am less certain you are correct in your assessment that you do not wish to command again, or that Starfleet would not grant you your ship and your crew. But as you are determined, I have made my decision. I have just been offered the captaincy of the Enterprise, in her training capacity.”
Kirk understood, in that moment, why hope was often described as having wings, because the feeling was as if something inside of him was taking flight. His ship with Spock as captain was almost too much to hope for. He had been ignoring the jealousy trying to get out over anyone else taking command of what he would always think of as his ship. That was dangerous, that was what had led him to push Decker out of the captain’s chair and into V’Ger, and that could not be allowed to happen again.
But Spock was different. If the Enterprise had to go to someone, then Spock was his first, and his only, choice.
And he would be on Earth at least half the time. Kirk could see it now, he, Spock and McCoy, having dinners at any of San Francisco’s restaurants instead of eating in the mess, playing chess with the bay outside the window, taking walks in Golden Gate Park, visiting Yosemite, Death Valley, Cascadia…even attending those horribly dull Starfleet functions would be alright if they did it together. For the first time, Kirk felt something other than dread about his return to Earth. It wasn’t quite hope, but it was a sort of contended relief. Something he knew he could live with.
Then he snapped back to reality, because it couldn’t just be about him, and while he was sure that McCoy’s decision to remain on Earth was the right one for him, he couldn’t let Spock make a decision that was about Kirk’s happiness more than his own.
“Spock, I won’t lie, you’re the only one I can really live with taking over command of the Enterprise. You’ll be a great training captain, you always were a good mentor, to Chekov, to everyone else in the science departments,” Kirk said. “But it’s a teaching position, it’s…dead end, and you’ll be on Earth, away from your home planet. You remember how much it rains in San Francisco!”
“Admiral, while I appreciate your concern, I must remind you that I have never desired command,” Spock said. “If the rank is my due, I logically must accept it, but the same is not true for the assignment that traditionally comes with it. I shall…chart my own path.” Kirk couldn’t argue with this; it was what Spock had always done. His friend continued, “As for remaining on Earth, away from my home planet, I am of Earth as well as Vulcan. Perhaps it is time to treat it as such.”
That admission had taken him most of his life to come to, and Kirk didn’t refute it. “Logical, as always, Mr. Spock,” he said.
“Naturally,” Spock said. “But I wonder, Admiral, is it so illogical, if you and Doctor McCoy are remaining on Earth, that I would choose to stay as well?”
“Put that way, no,” Kirk said. That admission had also taken most of Spock’s life to come to, and so Kirk accepted it as it was meant. “But it’s different for us. McCoy never wants to serve onboard ship again. The only reason he did this time was because I asked him. And I, as you pointed out, am being given a more appropriate position for my rank, whether I want it or not. But you’ve got your whole career still ahead of you. If it’s what you want, yes, but make sure that it is. Don’t do it on my account, Spock. You don’t-”
“Jim,” Spock said. “I choose to follow you. If you will have me.”
Well. There was nothing else to say to that, and once again Kirk was just amazed that he, somehow, merited that kind of loyalty from anyone, let alone Spock. “At my side, as if you’d always been there and always would be,” he said, quoting Edith Keeler. “You remember, Spock?”
“Miss Keeler was perceptive, and quite correct,” Spock said. “I have, as you humans say, found my place.”