Spectral Mornings

"why do you tag like that" it's been the best solution for songfic credit according to my OCD-addled brain. also this

They can see an asteroid shooting down the plane of Spock's nose like a bullet, like a skier about to jump, like a wave about to crash and a heart about to burst and every other metaphor, colorful or otherwise (massacred devolution in grayscale, relief, relief, relief), that words can only dare try to capture when the true enclosure, unfiltered, so very achingly raw, is the body, the soul, the mind.

Naturally, Jim wants to kiss him. Kissing is...well, to James T. Kirk, it's like talking with your mouth shut, pressed against the equivalent oral interface of another person to give all the meaning you can muster (or only part, sometimes, but even if he knows that technique, he never really uses it).

That's why it makes perfect sense to him that Vulcans' touch telepathy through digital interfaces corresponds with a kiss, when taken in that way. Why their ebullient, oh-so-human tendency to grasp at the side of an arm or the satisfying trapezius bit of a shoulder does all they mean it to, every time.

Only, not quite enough.

On the viewscreen, when they'd entered the bridge, the solar system before the Enterprise had been afire with stars so brilliant Jim swears they could have heard them. He's certain Spock could have, with those brilliant, brilliant ears of theirs.

They'd been early, for once, but they hadn't come together. Maybe if they had, they would have been late. Jim's not sure - but what he is sure of is that they might very well spend the rest of the shift out here, on the observation deck because where else, good god, where else, you've got to look, look, LOOK at what's out there, my GOD, isn't it gorgeous, Spock, Spock, Spock--

Spock lets him squeeze their hand. After a beat, Jim feels them squeezing back. Hard.

They've seen sunrises before. They've seen moonrises, they've seen nebulas, they've seen supernovas.

(Who's to say they don't see them every night, in the body and the mind and the soul of the officer above, below, across from them?)

So there isn't any reason, no special logic, to why today's is different, and that's a fact Jim revels in, because he's beyond grateful, down to his elbows and knees and knuckles is he grateful, that his wonder hasn't diminished, that his glory has only increased, only it isn't his, it's theirs, it's the property of all the Enterprise, all of creation, to gaze upon itself.

He can't imagine living in any other time. Knowing space was up there, but not being able to see it? Terrible. Horrible thing to consider. Not right at all, for James T. Kirk. Since creation, man had looked up to the stars.

The same proposition was, could be, perhaps right for S'chn T'gai Spock, but perhaps again not. Spock...they'd professed themselves to not being suited to philosophy or ambassadorship. Maybe later. But not now. Not when there were spectrums and event horizons and energy ribbons to discover.

Later. Tomorrow morning, even. What a righteous promise, one that flickers and spits in your hand as it dies and comes back again to life.

And what if they had been the property of the future, a being that had seen all these epiphanies a dozen times over and was now experiencing phenomena the crew of the Enterprise couldn't even conceive of?

Maybe. Just maybe.

So.

Back to the asteroid.

What Jim wants to do, actually, is keep his mouth shut, stew on it, just gaze and gaze and gaze. Spock's been getting to them like that. They need to meditate, of all things - isn't that what this is?

The rip of the central star over the crest of the planet they've been approaching to orbit wrests all of his usual yen for emotional security via "talking it out" like it's the god's own hand that's painted it there, into the sky.

It isn't even the sky. It's a carpet. It's a background. There's no saying it's up.

Who's to say what's up?

Just like that, Jim's stomach flips, dismissing gravity.

He knows that if Spock were concerned as to the reason for their continued respite here, away from their administrative duties, he would have spoken up by now. It's only in the evening hours when the reins of discipline are stayed, just a bit, to allow for the uninhibited observation of all that Jim is.

Spock is not concerned. Spock, too, is watching.

Their eyes, dark and deep, are trained on Jim's head like a halo, a corona, surrounds him.

Stupidly, Jim decides that if he thinks hard enough, Spock will take up the mantle of commenting on the beauty of the sight for them. Even reticent as he is, the science officer is not immune to...well, fascination. And there is so, so much fodder for fascination.

Jim feels their hand tremble.

"Jim..."

He's excited. Good god, is he excited. He feels like they're floating, and that's because they are, they are, they are!

They're really out here.

"Isn't it majestic, Spock? Think of all the peoples, the civilizations, the cultures, the societies we haven't met yet. All the peace we haven't made, all the first contacts..."

And then Spock's lips are on his, their joined hands at his left cheek and Spock's two - maybe three? - fingers at his right.

A second longer and he'd likely have buried his nose in the security of the planar place under Spock's jaw, but this is far better. Far more exploratory, symbolic, adventurous...

They could practically fall through the glass, fingertips whizzing through the abscessive blank. He gets the sense that Spock wants to, even, but that this divine union is a satisfactory compromise.

Only satisfactory, Mr. Spock?

Their fingertips caress the rounded tips of his ears. Matter is coaxed together, not into order but into a pattern whose arrangement hasn't yet been seen the use of.

It defies description, Captain. I'm afraid I will simply have to say...yes.