Mindshadow by J.M. Dillard

Author:J.M. Dillard
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pocket Books/Star Trek

Chapter Seven

SPOCK WAS UNABLE to identify what was happening to him.

His lessons with the white-haired Tela’at Stalik were at best unenlightening exercises in futility. While Stalik was accomplished in the practice of Kohlinahr, and in addition had reached the revered age of 265 Terran standard years, he nevertheless seemed to lack patience for Spock’s slowness at relearning the mind disciplines, and did not hesitate to make his displeasure known. For Spock, the lessons were frustrating, and eventually he became convinced that Stalik was deliberately trying to be enigmatic, unclear, and to rush the lessons. Many times Spock came close to saying so, but courtesy and the esteemed position a tela’at held in Vulcan society forbade it.

His powers of concentration seemed to be worsening rather than improving, his memory becoming more clouded instead of clearing. His lack of progress keenly embarrassed him, and he became increasingly seclusive, eventually avoiding contact with his family as much as possible. He spent his days in lessons with Stalik, scouring the bookshelves, and sitting alone in the garden, unable to meditate.

Spock found himself losing patience with everyone: with Stalik, with Amanda, with the overeager T’Pala. He told himself that no one noticed his increasing irritability—until one day Amanda increased his medication to two capsules a day. She had noticed his worsening condition and, without telling him, had consulted McCoy. Inexplicably furious, Spock had turned on his heel and sought the serenity of the garden to gather himself.

He stepped outside into the soothing arid heat and went to his favorite spot—a stone bench half-hidden beneath a hanging arbor of thick foliage, its blooms rustling in the hot afternoon breeze.

He stopped abruptly. T’Pala sat hidden in the shadows, eyes closed, face in the perfectly bland expression of Vulcan meditation, an expression of which Spock lately had been incapable.

He backed away quietly, not wishing to disturb her, more for his own sake than for hers. But it was too late; before he could retreat to the safety of the house, she called out to him.

He faced her reluctantly.

She spoke uncertainly, her face still hidden in the shadows. “There’s something I would like to discuss with you. It’s something that I would not feel at ease discussing with anyone else.”

She motioned for him to sit next to her, but he remained standing. She shifted nervously.

“What do you know of my background?” T’Pala asked.

Spock’s manner was brusque; he wanted only to return to the serenity of the guest room and Amanda’s books. “I know that you are half-human, and that you grew up on Terra. Nothing more.”

She nodded to indicate that his information was correct. “As I say, this is a subject too sensitive to discuss with anyone else. I … I wanted to tell you that I admire your emotional control. I wanted to ask you how you accomplished it.”

If she had not seemed so ingenuously earnest, he would have thought she had chosen this particularly inopportune moment to make fun of him. He decided that she was sincere. “I was raised on Vulcan.

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