Bright Star

K/S Fanfiction
Title:	Bright Star
Author(s):	Roberta Haga
Date(s):	1986
Length:
Genre:	slash
Fandom:	Star Trek: The Original Series
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Bright Star is a Kirk/Spock story by Roberta Haga.

It was published in the print zine First Time #7.

Summary

"The day after she graduates from Starfleet Academy, McCoy tells Kirk and Spockʼs daughter about her parents, their lives and death together."

Excerpt

"T'aiya was quiet for a moment, then she gathered her courage and asked the question she'd held in for years. "You knew my parents, Bones. Why have you never told me of them?" The blue eyes were steady as he answered. "I've waited for you to ask about them. You never seemed interested T'aiya, your father was Spock..."

Reactions and Reviews

Undoubtedly one of the warmest stories I’ve ever had the pleasure to read. I almost skipped it because I knew it was going to make me cry again, but then I just couldn’t because the love just pours off the pages. Their deaths are made more acceptable because they are alive through their daughter. Sad and comforting, it made me feel good inside.

I lovely poignant story of McCoy letting a child of Kirk and Spock know after their deaths that they were, in fact, her biological parents. Kirk being turned into a woman for a year in order to conceive, bear and deliver a baby! An interesting concept to say the least, but one which left me with a very warm feeling.

I recently read FT7, a contest zine, where the authors are not listed. I have submitted this LOC without knowing who wrote the story and have asked Corrine and Elizabeth to insert the name of the author.

I had two favorites of the zine; this was one of them.

T'aiya is a Starfleet lieutenant, raised by McCoy. A charming idea, McCoy raising a Vulcanoid girl-child. At least this McCoy, this girl. The characters in this story are so likeable. It's easy to suspend disbelief about certain aspects of this story because it's so full of heart.

Although it's not said at first, we can of course make some assumptions about T'aiya's parentage. I think it's beautiful; I love the idea of Kirk and Spock having a Vulcanoid-looking daughter. And I like the choice of a daughter rather than a son.

In their home, T'aiya looks at a photo of Kirk and Spock a lot; these old friends of Bones' (T'aiya calls him this) have meant a lot to her all her life. He's always told her stories of them.

I love the old photo of Kirk and Spock on the beach, mostly naked, wet and sandy, Spock behind Kirk with arms around him, and smiling....

Bones tells the story of their becoming lovers. I loved this scene! (It is actually "shown" rather than being in McCoy dialogue. Much more satisfying that way.) On the ship after V'ger incident, Spock is playing the lyre and Kirk is in the group watching. They are making love with their eyes.... McCoy thought, "I'd be a puddle on the floor if someone looked at me like that." I was!

Then there is the story of their deaths. I felt really disappointed they hadn't died saving someone or doing some heroic feat. They had been together 30 years. Very sad.

McCoy finally tells T'aiya that Spock is her father and Kirk is her mother! Kirk had become a woman on a planet where this can be done in order to have a child, I do find it interesting to imagine Kirk as a woman.

I have to argue with McCoy's not telling T'aiya much sooner--why in the worlds not?

Also, it's such an interesting exploration to imagine how it would be when men can bear children.

The scene of the birth was beautiful, Spock melding with Kirk during labor and birth. Made me cry right along with Kirk and Spock and McCoy when T'aiya was born. Spock's words were the ultimate beautiful, and the three-way bonding, Kirk, Spock and the child.... (Wait a minute, haven't I said repeatedly that I am not a mushy baby-lover?)

After Bones died (too sad...) T'aiya is on her new ship and of course the captain falls in love with her. Some charming parallels here, the captain, the CMO. The doctor takes T'aiya under his wing. I wished the doctor had been a woman.

Sigh.... I didn't even notice, didn't miss in other words, that there was no sex until after I was finished with the story!

McCoy tells his adult adopted Vulcan daughter about her real biological parents. Incredibly moving, great OC and great explanation of how Kirk and Spock could have had a child (it's NOT mpreg). You might want to read the Star Trek: New Voyages 2 story The Procrustean Petard first but will understand the story even if you don't.

This story is the winner from the contest zine, FT#7, by a new (then) writer Roberta Haga. It is one of those stories that I can come back to time and time again, it has no sex, no torture, just love.

"T'aiya of Vulcan."

The admiral's voice boomed out over the loud speakers and McCoy beamed with pride as he watched the beautiful young Vulcan step up to receive her diploma stating that she was now officially a Starfleet lieutenant and ready to assume her duties aboard the USS Freedom under the command of Captain Thomas J. Hamilton.

This story concerns the above mentioned T'aiya, and given her name, and the fact that McCoy is her guardian, we can make a pretty good guess that she must be related in some way to one or other of our two heroes.

When the ceremony concluded twenty minutes later, he got up to look for her. "Bones", came a low melodic voice from behind him, "I wasn't sure we would be able to find each other in this crowd."

"Come on, let's get this reception over with, I'm not as young as I used to be."

She watches McCoy carefully and takes him home as soon as he begins to look tired, but he realises that something is bothering her. Left alone while he rests she wonders what she will do when he is gone, and her eyes light on the golden framed picture of a handsome human and his equally striking Vulcan bondmate — Captain James T. Kirk and Commander Spock.

McCoy has told her tales of the two men throughout her life, tales which she freely confesses that she thought were embellished by time and distance until she entered the Academy and realised that they were indeed true.

"You look at that picture so much, I'd think you'd be bored with it by now."

"You are supposed to be resting."

"I'm rested. Now will you please tell me what's going on?"

"My orders arrived last week."

"Was?"

I was to report to the Freedom next Thursday.

"I talked to your doctor, I will not leave you now. I love you and that gives me the right. You would not tell me what was wrong, so I went to someone who could."

Please, Bones, don't send me away now. I need to be with you."

They talk, and McCoy agrees to call in some favours so that she can stay with him for the few months he has left. Once again she asks him for more stories of Kirk and Spock, and this time he brings out a box containing medals and photographs that she has never seen before. She asks for and keeps one that McCoy had taken himself of the two men relaxed and smiling, one he tells her that he considered to be private for no one else's eyes but his.

Realising McCoy is tiring again, T'aiya offers to make some tea, and leaves McCoy to his memories of his two friends, of the time before they realised what he could see so clearly, their great love for each other, and his frustration at their apparent inability to acknowledge the tact "Sanity can be tenuous you know" he tells her describing how he eventually decided to interfere only to find himself talking to two lovers after all. "I'm sorry you never knew them."

They continue to discuss his two friends, their lives, and eventually their deaths—together as they had always agreed.

"There was nothing I could have done...if it hadn't been for you."

Taiya tells him of the people she can remember as a child, before he came to take care of her, and wonders that he did, when he hated the Vulcan climate so much.

"You needed the education that only Vulcan could give you. The tests showed that mind would be incredible. But I sure as hell wasn't going to leave you in that sterile environment I didn't want to come back and find a robot on my hands!"

Taiya was quiet for a while then asked the question she had held in for years. "Bones, why have you never told me of my parents?"

"I've waited for you to ask about them, you never seemed interested."

"It always seemed disloyal to do so. I was also afraid of hurting you."

"You've heard about them all your life. Your father was Spock. Jim was your mother."

He explained that as Jim would be retiring shortly, they had decided that they wished a child of their union. Years before they had encountered a planet of machines and robots that captured ships personnel and changed their sex. ("The Procrustean Bed" from one of the first commercial anthologies of Star Trek stories.)

Jim proposed to revisit this planet and live again as a woman in order to carry Spock's child, before regaining his masculine form. She had been three months old when he returned to active service and they had died two weeks later.

They talk far into the night, and he gives her the tape that Jim and Spock had made for just this eventuality, plus the tape recording her birth, which shows Spock bonding with her seconds after her birth, and naming her Taiya Aisha Chyana - the Vulcan for "Bright Star of Love".

Five months later and two weeks after her beloved Bones' death, Taiya is unpacking in her cabin aboard the USS Freedom. The ship's Captain and his CMO are playing chess when the doctor realises that he is being completely ignored, the Captain has seen his new navigator.

I thoroughly enjoyed this story, even though it sees off our trio, but their ends are not messy, and we are left with that greatest of gifts hope for the future.

Roberta's prize winning story "Bright Star" has an intriguing premise, but its structure seems to me problematic. Although the copy of FT 7 that I was able to obtain was missing the first four pages of this story, I was able to determine the basic plot. Kirk and Spock had a daughter as a result of Kirk changing sex via the Procustean Petard. (See the story of that title by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath in NEW VOYAGES 2). Roberta ki1led Kirk and Spock off before the story began and told the story from the perspective of McCoy. who was the only parent that Kirk and Spock's daughter had ever known. The problem with the way Roberta has decided to structure this story is that we never get to see the process of deciding to have the child first hand, and we never see our heroes making the choices involved in a child's upbringing. Those choices are evaded by their death. Many fans don't think Kirk and Spock would make proper parents. It's a pity that Roberta didn't give them the chance to prove themselves in this area.