Title: After the Rescue

Part: NEW 60/73

Author: Karmen Ghia, karmen_ghia@yahoo.com

Series: TOS

Romance Code: S/Mc and then some.

Rating: NC-17

Appendices: http://members.tripod.com/karmen_ghia/atrappendices.html

See part one for disclaimers, etc.

"I didn't realize I was on your turf, Nolo." Maja said to Hobie later that afternoon with more bravado than he felt. 'However could you have left him?' he wondered just below the surface.

"It's all right, Maja. He never loved me." Hobie watched Maja slump in shame for having succeeded where his eldest brother had failed. "I might've had some fun and a few nice things but, as you can see, there really wasn't enough to hold me. Besides, you and getting away from Vulcan were more important to me than Sarek at just that moment." Hobie told him firmly. "Never mind. It's a long story, Noli." He had no time today for Maja-tude or misplaced sentiment. "I need you ..."

"... to tell Polmira that Tossar was not his father and therefore Lyra and Bot are not his brothers," Maja finished, resignedly. "That actually Sarek is his father and Spock, o' horror, is his brother. What a delightful chore, Nolo, why me?"

"You're good at delivering bad news."

"Oh, thanks."

"It's part of your life in religion to talk to beings in difficulty."

"I talk to Klingons with guilty consciences."

"You know what I mean. Also, you love Sarek, so you'll present him in a more positive light than Jir would."

"Well, that's true. What about Ling?"

"Maja, let's just let Ling and Stez have their first baby in peace, okay? The way things are going, that child is going to have a womb received phobia of currency markets." Hobie smiled sadly.

"Oh, Hobie," Maja melted. "I'll tell Polmira so he'll understand. He might be relieved, he was wondering the other day why he was so happy here. Now I can tell him he's not happy, just logical. Don't worry. Everything's going to be ... be aligned with god's will. I feel it."

"I feel it, too, Noli. It's just that getting there might be a bumpy ride."

* * *

'Defending my son?'

Waiting to testify in Hobie Talljet's piracy trial, Sarek had the leisure to review the events that brought him to the witness waiting room of Shirkar Federation Court #3.

* * *

"This Maja Talljet was suspended from school for defending my son and now neither he nor his brothers will return to school," Sarek had restated to SiVrisa, an administrator from the Preparatory Institute, seated across from him in his modest office at the Vulcan Interplanetary Ministry.

"Yes, and the Sas are not exhibiting any interest in or intention of returning them to school," SiVrisa said. "I know that you studied Klingonese with SerNera for a time and I hope you might have some influence with them."

"If you are concerned about the children's welfare, perhaps this is more a matter for the Federation child protection authorities than for me," Sarek said.

"I wish to avoid their involvement, Lord Sarek. My cousin, SiJidi, tells me SaGolia and T'Prol took some trouble to place these children where they are. It would be a shame for the Federation social services to take them away. Perhaps worse than a shame considering the exceptional telepathic and empathic gifts they possess." SiVrisa explained to Sarek that the Talljets were in the Sa mansion so SaBrzia and his linguist students, SiJidi, SaCriz, Sriri, SoLri, SerNera, Spaga, Smvit, SiRond, and in those days, SaBrzia's fellow linguists: SaTinn, Sonza, and SaXri before they died, could decode the Magidrian Patois. SiVrisa omitted that SiJidi had told him the Talljets had studied Vulcan en route to Vulcan and that they did not speak anything comprehensible when they did use a language other than Vulcan or Klingonese; that when they did speak in Patois, it was a pure telepathic form and all the listener heard was an inflected but indecipherable keening. Nevertheless, SiJidi and SiRond were concerned that the Talljets should return to school and blend into Vulcan life as much as possible. They were challenging but good children overall. An institution or separation from each other would be a disaster for such sensitive beings. Only Hobie and Jir seemed to realize that the Sas were their last chance before the void of the unknown and they were doing their best to keep Maja and Ling in line. SiJidi suggested Sarek use his influence with SerNera, who would influence the rest of the Sas. Hence SiVrisa's errand to the Vulcan Interplanetary Ministry. "I was also very impressed with the intelligence Hobie and Jir displayed in their classes at Preparatory Institute. I would be sorry to lose such talented students over a misunderstanding involving your son, Lord Sarek," SiVrisa concluded.

Sarek rang for a messenger and reached for a sheet of opaque flimsy and a stylo, thinking that he was about to involve himself in a matter provoked by his son that his son had not even bothered to tell him about. He penned a careful note in Klingonese to SerNera requesting admittance to the Sa mansion after dinner that evening. He handed it to the messenger, who knew exactly where the Sa mansion was, and told him to wait on a reply, if possible. In those days, the Sa mansion had no comm units, so the only way to contact them was in writing, by messenger. It was considered quaint and a certain chic was associated with needing to send a note to the Sa mansion. There was a legend that Sarek's great great great great grandfather had kept a messenger service in business with notes and gifts to SaKoza over the years of their association.

Sarek promised SiVrisa he would do what he could to have the Talljets returned peacefully to school and saw him out. He noted that SiVrisa had not really changed much since Sarek was at W. Vul. Prep. many years ago. He turned back to his work after a brief and efficient moment contemplating what a lot of trouble his half breed son was turning out to be and relief that the sand eating incident had not reached his wife. SiVrisa told him that SaGolia herself had had strong words with Smitok's mother and clan matriarch in defense of Spock. Sarek found that distasteful - he would prefer to defend Spock himself, or have T'Pau do it, if he felt Spock needed defending. He did not feel this incident warranted such measures and hoped to convey this to the Sas that evening.

A short while later his note was returned with corrections and suggestions to improve the grammar and an assurance scribbled in the margin that he would be most welcome after sunset and where had he been all this time?

Sarek found himself in mildly pleasant anticipation the rest of the afternoon. He had always enjoyed the eccentric Sas. When he thought back on it, later, after, he realized that perhaps it was more than pleasant anticipation of seeing an old tutor. Perhaps it was the foreknowledge that something so incredible was about to happen that it would etch its own design on his soul.

* * *

"Who are the Sas?" Amanda had asked over dinner that night.

"An ancient and eccentric clan," Sarek had answered. "You have met SaGolia; she will be their next matriarch if T'Prol ever dies."

"Oh." Amanda had found SaGolia a refreshing change of pace after all the staid Vulcan matrons she'd been exposed to in her first years on Vulcan. A celebrated linguistic anthropologist at the Vulcan Institute, she was dashing and fascinating and seemed to be very interested in everything Amanda had to say. It was later that T'Pau had explained to Amanda that SaGolia was a lesbian and probably was very interested in everything Amanda had to say and more. T'Pau had discouraged Amanda from associating with SaGolia because SaGolia didn't bother having female friends, only lovers. These were the early days of Amanda's residence on Vulcan and her reputation was too fragile to withstand gossip about her and SaGolia. T'Pau was right, as usual, several years later there was quite a scandal about SaGolia's seduction of and liaison with Princess T'Pria. T'Pria's bondmate's family had broken off the bond over it and T'Pria had moved in with SaGolia for a few years. Eventually T'Pria left Vulcan and was not heard of again outside her family, which chose not to discuss her very much or very often. "Will SaGolia be there tonight?" Amanda asked.

"I doubt it, wife, SaGolia avoids SaBrzia."

"Why?"

"Professional rivalry." Due to Spock's presence, Sarek omitted that SaBrzia had called SaGolia a wanton madcap talentless dilettante who would be nothing without his training and would not have her postition at the Vulcan Institute had he, SaBrzia, not chosen to remain blind. Possibly this was true, SaBrzia had been the head of Linguistics there until he went blind but it entirely overlooked the fact that SaGolia was one of the most brilliant scholars of her generation. Eccentric like all her clan, but brilliant nonetheless.

She was not alone in her eccentricity. SaBrzia's decision not to correct his deteriorating vision was considered an incomprehensible tragedy among the new families. SaBrzia's only explanation in his resignation was that he had seen as much of this life as he wanted and preferred to listen to it for what was left of the rest of his existence. More than fifty years ago he retired into the old Sa mansion with a group of his fellow linguists and students, among them SiJidi who was rumored to be his lover, and was not seen again. For a time, various members of the household taught in certain schools: Sonza and SaXri had retained their xenolinguistic posts at the Vulcan Institute. SaCriz and SoLri taught Standard at W. Vul. Prep. Spaga and Smvit had taught Vulcan grammar and composition at Shirkar Middle School #7. SerNera and Smvit were Klingonese tutors for the diplomatic section of the Vulcan Institute. SaTinn, SiRond and SiJidi had withdrawn completely from society into the hermitic but scholarly structure of the SaBrzia dominated Sa mansion where they explored the more esoteric aspects of communication and made a little money with translations and the occasional review or monograph. Eventually the other denizens of the Sa mansion followed their example and withdrew from the Shirkar educational milieu. It was a tremendous loss for those institutions and their students. Sarek was one of the last of a generation that studied Vulcan grammar with Spaga and wrote that language with an elegance that is now nearly impossible to attain. (The Talljets, especially Ling, wrote beautifully in Vulcan but they, in addition to being quick studies, had the benefit of instruction from the Sas. Their little essays were read aloud to SaBrzia for his critique as well. Maja was always the weakest student but he could have cared less as long as he could draw and paint and waste time with Spock.) Sarek had been one of the students in SaCriz's final Standard class at W. Vul. Prep. His Standard was as much admired for its beautiful cadences as for its flawless structure. This was more due to SaCriz's instruction than Sarek's years on Terra and his Terran wife. He had also benefited immeasurably from SerNera's tutelage in Klingonese and because SerNera liked him, the tutor had continued to teach him privately until Sarek was assigned to the Vulcan Mission on Terra. Sarek's one letter had been answered with a terse note from SerNera stating that he never corresponded, ever, and hoped all was well with him. That was the last contact they had had until today.

So Sarek felt something very like excitement as he pushed open the garden gate and made his way to the kitchen door that evening. He knocked gently to get the attention of the elderly Vulcan, Sonza, washing up at the sink.

"Ah, there you are, Sarek." Sonza said, drying his hands. "SerNera said you were coming to visit tonight. Welcome." The old man, he had been one of SaBrzia's teachers so he was truly old, waved Sarek into the big room where SerNera and a younger crowd awaited him.

"What do you want, Sarek?" SerNera greeted him in Klingonese with the closest that language had to an expression of welcome. "How old you look now. I understand your life has changed, that you have a new wife and baby."

"Is that so, child?" Spaga asked from his seat by the fire.

"Indeed," Sarek answered, not taking a seat because he was not offered one. "But I have had them for over ten years now so they are not very new anymore."

"Ah," SerNera said, losing interest in the subject. "Before you sit down, why don't you go pick something from the cellar for us to sip on while we talk."

"It would be a great pleasure, SerNera," Sarek assured him. He was sincere: the Sas' wine cellar was of legendary proportion and quality and much of it provided by his great great great great grandfather for SaKoza's refined consumption. In the old days, it was considered rude to give less than a case of anything to your 'protege' and Sarek's great great great great grandfather had a generous nature anyway. So the wine cellar was full of good things and it had always been SerNera's practice to send Sarek down there for a bottle of something good for them to sip on during his lesson. It was one of the things Sarek had enjoyed about those lessons. "What shall we ha..." Sarek trailed off, catching sight of Jir, in nothing but a loin cloth, descending the staircase. "...ve?"

"A brandy. There's quite a bit of good brandy down there somewheres, try to find it." SerNera glanced up at Jir. "Aren't you cold, Jir?" he asked him.

"No," Jir answered.

"Then go help Sarek find some brandy."

Sarek tried not to stare when Jir turned his attention to him but it was impossible: Jir was the most beautiful male he'd ever seen in his life. Luminous brown eyes set in an angular pure white face with high Magidrian cheekbones and full lips. He seemed to have been designed to catch light and move though space with the fluid and elegant economy of a bird of prey. There was, however, something cold and distant about the youth, as if one would want to wear a warm coat to embrace him. Sarek was surprised by his own train of thought and removed his contemplation to the impending selection of wine.

Jir met his gaze for a few moments, assessing him, attempting to read him. "This way." He turned and started for the door under the stairs.

"JIR!" SaBrzia bellowed from his office upstairs.

Jir glanced heavenward and then at SerNera.

"You'd better go," SerNera told him. "Send Hobie down."

"Sorry," Jir murmured as he departed.

"SerNera, I am certain I will not need assistance," Sarek protested.

"Oh, but you do," SerNera replied. "I can't even remember where I saw the brandy last time I was down there, well before you started studying with me. I think over there somewhere." He gestured vaguely at the far end of the room. The wine cellar ran the width of the house.

Sarek heard a step behind him and turned to find the impossible descending the stair: a youth even more beautiful than Jir. Or perhaps simply more to Sarek's taste than Jir. Hobie possessed brown eyes as large and luminous as Jir's, however, his eyes were warmer and radiated light, whereas Jir's eyes reflected it. His face was rounder than Jir's, the same Magidrian high cheekbones but less full lips. He had a stronger jaw which gave the impression of a more masculine temperament. His ivory skin glowed in the low light as if he were lit from within. He was wearing black leggings and a tunic so his hands and face were nicely set off by his dark clothes and ebony curls, which he wore loosely tied back with a black ribbon. He held Sarek's eye as he descended the stair with a grace that bordered on poetry. Or was poetry; Hobie moved as if every action were the realization of a heartfelt desire.

Sarek found himself comparing Hobie to representations of pre-reform beauties he'd seen in museums. Hobie possessed the same serenity, poise and graceful mien of those men and women of olden times. As a child, before such interests were crushed in him by the matriarchy and the House of Surak, Sarek had been fascinated by pre-reform life, the drama, the chivalry, the romance of it, and now he found before him what appeared to be its incarnation. 'Impossible.' He scolded himself. 'This youth is not even a Vulcan.'

The youth kept his classical features bland but for a wary flicker of interest in Sarek. He turned to SerNera: "You sent for me." It was a statement; very simple, very direct. Sarek found the timbre of his voice like the amber glow in a snifter of fine cognac: dark, velvety and warm.

"Yes, yes. Help Sarek find some good brandy downstairs, will you, Hobie?"

Hobie nodded and caught Sarek's eye before turning to the door under the stair.

Hobie switched on a lantern and they descended into the cellar's blackness.

"SerNera says you talk Klingon," Hobie stated in that language as he led Sarek down the stairs.

"A little," Sarek told him.

"Where did you learn?"

"At school."

"Here? In Shirkar?"

"Yes. Where did you learn it?"

"In the streets." Hobie was looking at labels on bottles.

Sarek was looking at him. "What else did you learn there?" The Vulcan could hardly believe he'd said it.

Hobie turned and looked at him quite seriously. Then he laughed in Sarek's face.

Sarek decided to brazen it out. "I meant what other languages did you learn there? On Magidrian?"

"I know what you meant, Sarekanas." Hobie added the Klingon honorific with a snarl.

"Then tell me."

"I learned how to keep the Klingons off me and my brothers." Hobie turned his attention back to the rows of bottles. "I'm still trying to figure out you non-Roms."

"Non-Roms?"

"You people look like Roms but call yourselves Vulcans." Hobie held a bottle up to the light. "So far, I haven't seen much difference except the name."

"Are you mad, child?" Sarek asked. "The differences between the two species are vast and striking."

Hobie had a moment of uncertainty. He was not finding his experience of the Sa mansion very different from the Talljet monastery, both were full of eccentric and kindly old men, but he was unsure how to explain this to Sarek in any language. "You would not understand," he sighed and looked away.

"I would like to try to understand you, Hobie," Sarek said and was surprised to hear the caress in his own voice. In the low lantern light, Hobie looked to Sarek even more as if he were lit from within.

Hobie looked up him, unsmiling, wary, but not his usual closed and forbidding demeanor.

Perhaps it was a trick of the light but Sarek thought he saw something soften, beckon, in Hobie's eyes and it drew him closer to the silent, still youth.

"Shiiiow, Nolo," Maja breathed from the cellar stairs. The sound had no meaning, it was merely to get his brother's attention.

Sarek started, he had not noticed Maja's approach. He wondered if this was the odd keening SiVrisa had mentioned.

"Shhhhhhhiiiiii, Noli, shiii." Hobie answered, again a meaningless sound, merely an acknowledgment.

"Sarekanasa ChequSpocka. (Spock's father, lit. the Sarek half of Spock)." Maja jerked his chin at Sarek.

"VulChequ SpockDeVulCheq. (The Vulcan half of Spock the half Vulcan.)" Hobie turned to Sarek with new interest. "You should teach your ..." Hobie didn't have the word for son in his Klingon vocabulary. "... your boy to fight, old man."

"Shiiiiowca sait, NoliHobie, sait siiiiiiow. (Not so old, NoliHobie, not so old.)" Maja keened.

Sarek felt a chill run up his spine, the weird keening, the darkness, the strangeness of these children were getting on his nerves but he refused to succumb to it. "And do you speak street Klingonese as well?"

"Oh, no sir!" Maja assured him in his rough Klingonese. "I speak the barracks version of it." This was true, Khatanya was responsible for the more colorful aspects of Maja's Klingon. Kzost had tried valiantly to correct it, alas, in vain. Maja could swear like an Imperial Trooper from dawn till dusk.

"Excuse me," SiRond asked in Vulcan from the top of the stairs. "But are you finding the wine all right? You've been down here quite some time. Bring two bottles while you're about it."

"The same or different?" Sarek asked, reassured to be in his own language again.

"Different." SiRond withdrew.

Hobie and Maja prowled around and eventually turned up four dusty bottles from which Sarek selected two.

"Hemzjit, Nolo, Hemzjit, ChequSpocka. (Let's go, elder brother, let's go Spock's father.)" Maja led them out of the cellar and back up to the main room.

Jir and Ling sat studying with SiRond and Spaga on one of the couches. SerNera had set out brandy snifters and bottles of mineral water. He heartily approved of Sarek's choice of wine. "Worth the wait, eh?"

"Indeed," Sarek murmured neutrally as he surveyed the domestic scene before him.

Hobie and Maja joined their brothers. The resemblance between Maja and Ling was quite pronounced when they were younger but they all resembled one another with their long ebony Mage curls, high cheekbones and long jawlines. Spaga was drilling them in Vulcan grammar and Sarek noted that they were doing quite well.

"So," SerNera asked when they had settled with their glasses. "Why have you come to see me, Sarek?"

"Now that I live in Shirkar again, I would like to work on my Klingonese with you," Sarek said, realizing it was true.

"What good timing," SerNera told him. "Now that we have such fine Klingon speakers here with us. Almost native speakers, you know." He looked up at the Talljets. "Isn't that so, boys?"

"Most assuredly," Ling piped up.

"You flatter us," Jir murmured demurely.

"I do hope we won't embarrass your confidence in us, SerNera-anas," Hobie offered with modestly lowered eyes.

"It will be a great pleasure to converse with Spock's father-anas as often as he will allow us," Maja avowed.

And it was all in the fine and courtly Klingonese they'd absorbed from Kzost's valet in the time they spent in the governor's mansion on Magidrian.

"How fortunate I am," Sarek said deadpan, but he managed to enjoy the amused glance Hobie shot at him from under his lowered jet lashes.

"'Spock's father-anas'?" SiRond asked. "Wasn't Spock the name of the boy you got in trouble over, Talljets?"

"Yes," Hobie answered.

Jir and Ling looked at Sarek with new interest.

"How d'you know this is Spock's father, Maja?" Spaga asked.

"SaGolia told me the other day. She said Sarek's grabbed himself a world of trouble with his Terran wife and half breed son," Maja said simply. "He's got the same name," Maja tilted his chin at Sarek. "And he looks like Spock."

"Rather, Spock looks like him," SerNera corrected.

"Raaaather, how I said," Maja told him. "I saw Spock first."

"Logical," SiRond said sourly.

A moment of silence ensured while the Sas waited to see if Sarek would rise up and defend logic. He did not.

"Why didn't ya bring him?" Maja asked, slipping back into his rough Klingon.

"Maja! Please!" SerNera chided.

"Bring whom, Maja?" Sarek asked.

"Sorry," Maja said to SerNera and turned to Sarek: "Why did you not bring your son, Spock?"

"I thought perhaps you would see him at school." Sarek said smoothly. "I understand you are in the same class there."

"Due to certain cultural misunderstandings, we have decided to educate the Talljets at home," Spaga informed him.

"Oh. I am certain it is the right thing for them. It must be very difficult for them to blend in with the other children," Sarek said blandly. "Was the course work too difficult for them?"

"Certainly not," Spaga said shortly. "There was an incident involving your son and ..."

"Yes, I know," Sarek cut in before Spaga could get worked up. "I understood Maja was suspended for one day, not expelled with his brothers."

"Maja was discriminated against and his brothers joined him in protest," Spaga said.

"Maja is an offworlder and perhaps not aware of the Vulcan code of non-violence." Sarek said. "Had the incident happened to one of the Talljets, would you not have wanted the offender punished?"

"Of course," Spaga said.

"And now that the incident is over and done with, would the children not like to return to school?" Sarek asked, wondering if they would not, in fact, receive a superior education in the Sa mansion along with a highly skewed view of Vulcan life.

"Well?" Spaga asked the Talljets.

"It was rather interesting there," Jir ventured mildly.

"Yes, new place, new faces, people our age," Hobie said in support.

"There are a few good teachers left at the Middle School, Spaga," SiRond said. "Did you like your class there, Ling?"

"Yes, very much," Ling nodded.

Spaga looked hard at Maja, looking innocently at him. "Can you stay away from trouble there, Maja?"

"If trouble stays away from me."

The wave of disappointment that went through the other Talljets was almost palpable. "Yes," Maja caved in. "Yes, of course."

Sarek sipped his brandy and spent the ensuing hour in Klingon conversation with SerNera, the Talljets and even Smvit came down to join them. At the end of the evening, SerNera and Sarek settled on a fee and arranged for Sarek to return a week hence. Maja walked Sarek to his car.

end of part 60

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Appendices: http://members.tripod.com/karmen_ghia/atrappendices.html