Fizbin (Star Trek: TOS story)

Fanfiction
Title:	Fizbin
Author(s):	Eleanor Locke
Date(s):	2003
Length:
Genre(s):	slash
Fandom(s):	Star Trek: TOS
Relationship(s):	Kirk/Spock
External Links:
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Fizbin is a K/S story by Eleanor Locke.

It was published in the print zine Legends #3.

Summary

"It’s the night before James Kirk is to take command of his new ship, USS Enterprise, and he’s taking the opportunity to relieve some stress. But he’s not the only officer from his soon-to-be ship who’s seeking entertainment this night."

Reactions and Reviews

This is an alternate reality story. Kirk and Spock meet in a bar the night before Kirk takes over as the new captain of the Enterprise. Neither man knows who the other is. The duel story-telling is very well done, and there's hot sex a - plenty if you are up for it! An interesting read.

"Fizbin" opens with Spock at a "men's club" the night before Kirk is to begin his command of the Enterprise. In this story, Spock and Pike slept with each other to relieve Pike's tension between shore leaves. Spock gives his reasons for the relationship with Pike as "curiosity, and a desire to be of service to one whom I perceived to be a mentor". The relationship with Pike had been only sexual, and Spock entirely the submissive one. Pike had not told Spock privately before the official announcement was made that he was to leave the Enterprise, and this has really hurt Spock even though he recognizes he and Pike never had a real relationship. He decides to go to the men's club, because, as he puts it °l was attempting to overlay the tactile memory of the caresses of one whom I had trusted with the casual carnal handling of a stranger. He was the only one with whom I had coupled, and I wished to remove that distinction, that unique gift, that I gave to him." At the club he meets Kirk, of course, although neither knows who the other is. They have a brief but memorable encounter, and then the story ends.

I had a lot of trouble believing in, or understanding, the Spock characterization in this story. In my preferred K/S universe Spock just does not casually sleep around without a very good reason for doing so. In some stories that I've read and enjoyed, Spock has had purely sexual encounters, but the stories have given me a reason for them that I can believe in. The reasons given in this story just don't work for me. First, sleeping with someone because they have been a mentor just seems odd to me. Why would Spock think this was something owed to a mentor? It wasn't really explained further in the story. Then, if Spock decided to serve as a sexual companion for Pike out of curiosity, would he have continued with it for almost 5 years? Yet we never get any further exploration of this reason given for Spock's actions. And wouldn't curiosity compel Spock to sometimes want to be the dominant one, to experience for himself what ft felt like to penetrate someone? Yet it was obvious in the story that Spock had always been submissive, to the point that Pike had never even performed fellatio on him. Why was this? Why was Spock always the submissive one? This is never discussed in the story. I just have too many problems with the idea of Spock and Pike being what is crudely called "fuck buddies". And it seems Spock did have deeper feelings for Pike for him to be so bothered by Pike's actions, but I guess if this were explored more, it wouldn't really be a K/S story (or wouldn't be one I wanted to read). This whole relationship with Pike is so problematic for me, and raises so many unanswered questions, that it marred the whole story for me.

Plus, I guess my personal taste for a K/S story is that there is a relationship between Kirk and Spock, either as friends or lovers, and in this story they are strangers. I just don't care much for this type of story, where Spock and Kirk have an anonymous sexual encounter before they meet on the Enterprise. I do think Eleanor is a talented writer, though. Although I didn't understand what was going on with Spock and Pike in the story, Eleanor's writing made me really feel for this Spock and want to know more about him. I also liked the structure of the story, because it was interesting to read of the encounter first from Spock's POV and then from Kirk's POV. Hopefully Eleanor will someday write a story that is more to my tastes, where I can fully appreciate the quality of her writing.