K'hat'n'dlawa

Coping

Sarek stared at the 3D-chess board before him. Chess enabled him to think clearly. Logically. Unemotionally.

It was a complex game- and it required his full attention. It was a test of strategy, of wit. It distracted him. While he played chess, he could not think about Amanda, and the way her voice had sounded as she told him to leave...he could not think of what he had felt from her and seen in her mind when he was with her. This was what he required right now.

He saw movement out of the corner of his eye, but did not even look up as he reached out to move a knight.

"T'Shan," he acknowledged. The Vulcan woman stepped forward from the doorway, into the dim lighting. "How is she faring?" he asked.

"She is sleeping again. The contusions are fading, and she is asking for pain-suppressants less often," T'Shan replied. "Osu...it has been three days. It is not my place to ask this, but why do you not visit her?"

"She told me to go," Sarek said flatly. "Will you join me in a match?"

She hesitated, and then sat across the table from him. He reset the board, and made his first move.

"When I enter the room," T'Shan said slowly. "I can only describe the expression she gives as 'disappointed'. I am unfamiliar with facial cues, but I am certain that is what it is. She is disappointed because she expects me to be you."

"You are assuming. How illogical," Sarek said bitterly as she moved a piece.

"I am not assuming. I am observing," T'Shan retorted. "She does not ask for you, but I believe she wishes to. There are times when she begins to say something, and stops."

"She could be attempting to say anything," Sarek countered as he debated his next move. "Why are you concerning yourself with this?"

"I am not 'concerning' myself with anything," T'Shan said, stiffening in her chair at the implication. "I am merely informing you of how she is faring, which is what you asked of me."

"You seem to have grown fond of her. I have never heard you become so defensive," Sarek said, eyes still on the board.

"Perhaps that is what she requires at this time, and you are not willing to give it because you are illogically dwelling on what has happened," T'Shan said, her voice as even as ever, but infused with disapproval. "You are failing in your duties as bond mate. You are charged with the responsibility of caring for her and seeing her through such times. You have not done so, and your reasoning is that she 'told you to go'. You have not even tried to see her again."

"I do not see how this warrants your interference, T'Shan," Sarek said coldly.

"You are speaking to the woman who has known you since infancy and assisted in raising you, Sarek," T'Shan replied, her voice icy. "I know very well how your mind works. You will allow guilt to consume you."

Sarek noted that she had called him by his name, without the appropriate title- which she only did in private and when particularly displeased with him. There had been very few occasions when she was this forceful, speaking above her rank. Each time, it had been necessary.

He had known her all his life. She had been more of a mother to him than his own mother- as illogical as such a thought was, and even though she was only sixteen years his senior. He trusted her more than all the rest of his servants, combined. That was why she was head of staff. The fact that she was considered beneath him and must therefore follow his orders did not matter- he respected her, and sometimes she did see fit to intervene in his affairs. Yet unlike with T'Pau, it was always in his best interest to listen to her.