Author: Jane (jat_sapphire)
Contact:  jat_sapphire@yahoo.com
Part: 1/1
Rating: PG 
Codes: K

Summary:  Kirk is scuba diving near Hawaii.  Set after STVI:TUC sometime. Response to Istannor's "The boys lead lonely lives" challenge.

Archive: Yes

Feedback:  Any - good, bad indifferent. 

Disclaimer:  Kirk would climb Paramount if it was risky enough, but for him it's not:  they own him.  Scuba diving, they don't own, and I don't either.  No money is being made here.

Notes:  T'Aaneli and Islaofhope betaed this and didn't say, "Work on your other story, jat!"  (In fact, they said, "Hmm, that *was* an interesting challenge."  But oh, Istannor, how do you do this?  I was *not* going to write out of my canon for a while.

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Under Water


There's no good reason why I should think of you when I'm diving, while my hair waves around me (longer than usual, I'm on vacation) and my breathing is the loudest noise in my ears, and the waterlight, the most distinctly Earth thing I know, is above me.

I'm sure you've never gone scuba diving.  I can remember seeing you wet all over only -- maybe twice?  Three times?  The last was when we brought the whales home.

So maybe that's what reminded me?  It's the same ocean, just the other side of it.

I wonder where George and Gracie are.

The Pacific's a big place, and I bet they don't really want to see me again anyway.  It must be lonely, being the only couple of whales in the world.  Though by now they're not. 

We brought the whales home, and then there was the Klingon thing, and then you just -- went away.  Went home.

And I went on talking to you in my head. 

If you never did dive (and, JT, gotta remember he had a few moments not under my supervision, a whole goddamn life I was not part of) but if you never did, my desert-born friend, I'm sorry, because you'd love this coral, these fish, this light.

This light.  So wet, green/blue/moving/still.

Oh -- there's a shark.  My heart is beeating faster even though I know he'll just go about his business.  I think he will.  These days, the wonders of Federation science have finally managed to create a wetsuit that doesn't say "seal."  "Free lunch here."

I am, of course, if he disregards the suit design, and to be honest that's one of the reasons I'm here.  Now that I'm not beaming down into god-knows-what, I get my risks in other ways.  Climbing El Capitan again.  Caving.  Diving.

Hitting the bars.  A different risk, disguised as relaxation.  Said that to Bones once, but he can't see it -- he's up there now in the boat, getting ready to tear strips off my hide.  I don't know why he comes along when it obviously terrifies him to watch and he never tries anything dangerous.

But I do know.  He's lonely too.

Another reason I do this.  Oh, my God, look, a whole school, the colors, it's like a live nebula, a something, I don't know - they're all around me, beautiful!  Oh, Spock, you're missing this.

I stretch out a hand, and they divide around it, smoothly, as if they knew in advance where it would go.  Bats do that too, when I've been in caves that had them, and when they're startled, they flow past like water.  My guide could even hear them, a little, but not me.  Getting too old for the high sounds, or maybe - well, psi-null, that's me.  You know.

I do this because I can do it alone, or nearly, and even when I'm with other divers it feels alone.  My breathing.  The coral.  The fish.  The light.

The women at the bars, that's what those fish remind me of.  I reach out and they move away.  I've almost stopped fucking them, but when I try for conversation they seem to have someplace else to be.  And when they do stay, I start feeling restless, looking past their shoulders for somebody else.  Rude as hell.  I don't know whether McCoy's the same, but he and I have closed out a good few bars lately, drinking on and on and hardly talking.  To anybody.  Even in my head.

I'm almost out of air.  Tri-ox shot and all, some air you just have to carry, and when it's gone, it's gone.  Time to go, drifting up, where the fish were, where the shark was, the boat a dark shape above me, blocking the light.

I'll remember the shark.  How close it was, how the black eyes gleamed, how it could have eaten me alive in a minute if it had really noticed me.

I'll remember thinking about you, Spock.


**end**


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