Noon Tomorrow
| Fanfiction | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Noon Tomorrow |
| Author(s): | Addison Reed |
| Date(s): | 1987 |
| Length: | |
| Genre(s): | slash |
| Fandom(s): | Star Trek: TOS |
| Relationship(s): | Kirk/Spock |
| External Links: | |
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Noon Tomorrow is a K/S story by Addison Reed.
It was published in the print zine First Time #18.
Summary
"AU: Kirk becomes a patient in an alien asylum after Spock dies on the crash on their way to their bonding."
Reactions and Reviews
1987
I have to inform you (notice I didn't say WARN?) there is a story -- NOON TOMORROW, that is a death story. Don't panic! I told you ahead of tome AND, believe me, you'll hate yourself when all your friends are talking about how wonderful it was and you don't have the faintest idea what they're talking about. Yes, it is a death story and yes, in my opinion, it is a happy ending, (but keep the tissues handy!) in fact, there couldn't be any other way to end it and I'm sure you'll all agree. Okay, don't read it, see if I care! [1]
1997
The story opens in a sort-of homeless shelter on an anonymous planet where someone who we recognize as Kirk is staying and is being cared for.The departing caretaker or supervisor tells the new guy that they call the mysterious patient "Noon Tomorrow" because that's just about all he ever says.
The new supervisor is curious about this unknown patient and tries to find the records, but gets interrupted by a sleepwalking Kirk. The man ends up holding Kirk in his arms all night while Kirk dreams of how he ended up there.
Flash back to the Enterprise and a great scene where Kirk and Spock are emotionally dancing around each other and finally when Spock is showing Kirk something on a viewscreen, they embrace. A crewman comes in at that moment and interrupts them.
The next event is the mission of the episode "Miri" and included in the scene is one of my favorite K/S moments where Spock tells Kirk: "And I do want to go back to the ship...Captain." I just love that.
After that's over, they're in the turbolift together and Kirk confronts Spock with what happened between them. He asks if Spock feels the same way about him and Spock answers "I am afraid". Nice.
They spend time together, lovely moments, until they are on a planet at night, on a hill top over-looking a city. They get all turned on and Spock has to stop. Kirk doesn't want to. Stop, that is. But Spock wants more—he wants to be bondmates and they profess their love.
They decide to bond in a ceremony that will take place at noon.... It's Vulcan tradition—"...a pinnacle, the height of both mental and physical joining". I loved Kirk's idea "that midday was chosen that no shadow be cast on the bonded pair".
They go in a shuttlecraft to Vulcan. They crash. Kirk is injured and is found and taken away to the facility. He keeps repeating "Noon tomorrow" which leads to his name.
Back to the present time and a storm knocks the electricity out which allows Kirk to escape. The supervisor goes out to look for Kirk at the barren knoll where the shuttlecraft had crashed.
DEATH STORY ALERT! Good gravy! Believe me, if someone I know who had told me to read this story, Jenna, had warned me that it was indeed a death story, Jenna, then I would have been prepared. But I didn't know and I found out that it ends where Kirk dies so that he can join Spock in death.
I felt so happy after reading this.
So if you don't mind death stories (or at least where both die so that they can be together in heaven [groan]), then read this excellent story. [2]
1998
I hate death stories. I loathe them. I adamantly refuse to read any. Why did I read this one? Because it's an Addison Reed story and to me that's reason enough. Don't they tell children not to touch fire because it'll burn them? Well, I'm like a child and I got burned. I felt torn apart. [3]
2005
Heartbreaking. I don't think i will ever be able to reread this. [4]
2010
If you like uplifting stories with happy endings, then this one is definitely not for you. There is no light at the end of the tunnel, no rescue or redemption to be found here, for this is a dismal tale of a man caught in such crushing despair it has left him lethargic and wasted and virtually mute. Found years before beside a demolished shuttlecraft, cradling the broken corpse of his companion in his arms, the only words he would say, would ever say from that day forward, were, 'Noon tomorrow.'And so, for lack of any other, this was the name given to him by the hospital staff in charge of his care.
A rather seedy hospital at that: the out-of-the-way, under-budgeted home for the indigent and undesirable on a tiny planetoid lost in the vastness of space.
On this planetoid, we first meet Hersch, the Attendant Class Three, a man who is about to retire, preparing to transfer care of his charges to one Luer Wylan. Cynical and disinterested at first, a bored Wylan shrugs off his predecessor's comments about the compelling nature of this particular inmate, noting that 'he had done nothing so far to divert him from his monotonous daily routine; had only spent the endless hours shuffling from one end of the dreary wing to the other, a lost, vacant look his only companion. He even took his sparse meals with mindless reflex, neither savoring nor rejecting the meager fare, simply rearranging it on his plate with symmetrical precision.'
To see James Kirk, our noble and dynamic and driven James Kirk, reduced to this is painful beyond words.
And, believe me, it gets worse.
For we learn the reason for his profound sorrow, why he'd fixated on those words: words that summed up a love that had blossomed between him and Spock once they'd realized the true nature of their feelings toward one another. Spock, showing hesitation at first, fearful that Kirk was making a commitment without really understanding all that it entailed; then, reassured, stating that, 'There is an infinite completeness of the bonding – an inseparable blending of katra – which can only be achieved if the bond is formed during the initial... intimacy. And there is a brief ceremony to be performed...' A ceremony that is traditionally held at high noon, signifying neither the beginning nor the end of a relationship, but rather its pinnacle. A time when the sun stands directly overhead and no shadow is cast on the joined pair.
So they took it slow, 'learned to relish the sensitive touching of hands along darkened corridors, across candle-lit tables in small cafes, over unfinished chess games in their quarters. They walked hand in hand, arm in arm, under the moonlight of a half-dozen worlds...' A love that grew and grew, both men aching for its completion. Kirk described himself as happier than he'd ever been in his life.
And then their leave was approved and they set off for Vulcan.
They did not, however, make it. Hit by a sudden magnetic storm, the shuttle is thrown off course and crashes, leaving Spock dead and Kirk locked in the grip of an inescapable and all-consuming depression.
I first read this story several years ago, and have many times since, but its emotional impact has not lessened with time. To see Wylan rushing into Kirk's room and nearly falling as he stumbles over the form 'stretched prone on the cold floor, arms outstretched, cheek pressed to the dirty tile'; relating that he had wandered off the grounds once before, to be found in much the same position, lying atop the unmarked grave of his friend, although no one could understand how he'd been able to find it. To follow Wylan as he discovers, after a power outage, that Kirk is missing again and goes unerringly to the same place, this time to find him dead, draped over the frozen ground, looking, finally, as if he'd found some peace.
He is interred the next day, beside Spock, Wylan realizing with a start that, due to a shift change and the number of people who wished to attend, the ceremony would take place, fittingly, at exactly noon.
Heavy going, indeed: a haunting, tragic story that will stay with me for a long time. [5]