The Mirage (Star Trek: TOS story)

Star Trek TOS Fanfiction
Title:	The Mirage
Author(s):	Michele Arvizu
Date(s):	1978
Length:
Genre:	gen
Fandom:	Star Trek: The Original Series
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The Mirage is a Star Trek: TOS story by by Michele Arvizu.

It was published in the print zine Berengaria #10.

This story was originally published in a standalone zine called The Mirage. That story was a much more intense version of the Kirk-Spock relationship and skated too close to slash, something the editors of "Berengaria" were very much against. The editorial in that zine said the story was "somewhat edited, but still retains the flavor of the original."

The original story had a large amount of art by Leslie Fish. The edited version in "Berengaria" had three illos by M.S. Murdock.

Art from the Story in "Berengaria"

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  art by M.S. Murdock

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  art by M.S. Murdock

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  art by M.S. Murdock

Reactions and Reviews

Spock visits an aging, arthritic Kirk. When he learns that Kirk is dying, he persuades him to have an android body built for himself at an experimental facility. Kirk is excited at the prospect but rejects it at the last minute, demanding to die in his own body. Spock seems very out of character here. Leslie Fish's monumental illustrations add interest to the piece.

Spock, still emotionally dependent, comes face to face with a fatally ill and aged Kirk, and his frantic efforts to save and restore the one person to whom he can exhibit his human qualities, and Kirk's hunger for life, bring them both to a final examination of mortality and acceptance of their own natures. 'The-captain-gets-old-and-dies' theme has been done to death, but Michele Arvizu has taken the trite old plot and given it a truth and depth that raises it to an art, and that's the sign of a good writer.