The Autobiography of Mr. Spock by Una McCormack

Author:Una McCormack
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Titan

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After the conclusion of our mission, the balance had tipped in favor of my Starfleet career. I had, by that point, been a serving officer for twenty years. As our crew began to disperse, some with more alacrity than others, I began to wonder if my own future lay in Starfleet, or whether the time had come to consider other options. I had not been home for some time, but having seen my father and mother again on the Enterprise, and perhaps resolved some of what lay between my father and myself, I began to consider whether a return to Vulcan was the next logical step. The years on the Enterprise—the most recent mission, in particular—had been stimulating, exhilarating, and adventurous in a way I had never thought possible. I wished to reflect upon these experiences. I wished to know what they meant in the grander picture of my life. I was curious, too, to see Vulcan again, to discover whether it had altered (I suspected not), or whether I, in all my years away, had altered. I wished to know whether I had drawn closer to my home, or moved further away, and to what extent this distance could ever be resolved.

My mother received me with delight; my father with interest. I found myself glad to be home. I resisted making enquiries about T’Pring and Stonn, although my mother did offer to find out. I was no longer interested. All that I wanted was to be present, once again, on Vulcan. Not long after my arrival, I went again to the quiet waters of the Sirakal canal. The last time that I had been here, I had swum with the o’ktath and melded with them. There was no pod there on that day with which to swim and meld. It was autumn, and the red leaves were falling from the fa’tahr trees. I picked one of these from where it lay on the ground and, placing it on my palm of my hand, studied it closely. Here, the tip or apex, the limit of growth. There, the veins, channeling sustenance throughout. Here, the stem, the point of connection from the whole, now severed. The color would soon fade, I thought.

I pondered again how varied life was, how it presented itself in all manner of ways, some of which we barely comprehended. Placing my hand against the black bark of the tree, I considered all the processes—biological, chemical, evolutionary—that had brought it into existence. It seemed, suddenly, to be the most marvelous thing I had ever seen. How extraordinary, I thought; such elegance and efficiency. I wondered whether it would be possible to meld with something like this, to experience the universe from its perspective, and what that might be. Would I sense some of kind of affinity with something that also originated from this world, some deep connection at a molecular level? Or would this life be alien, more alien, than anything I had encountered, even on

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