Who Would Have Thought?

K/S Fanfiction
Title:	Who Would Have Thought?
Author(s):	Kitty Berman
Date(s):	1995
Length:
Genre:	slash
Fandom:	Star Trek: The Original Series
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Who Would Have Thought? is a Kirk/Spock story by Kitty Berman.

It was published in the print zine Within the Mirror #10.

Summary

"After spending a week together as youths, Kirk and Spock remeet on the Enterprise where Kirk finds himself falling in love with the Vulcan."

Reactions and Reviews

One thing that I especially admired about this Mirror story is that so much happened in it. I haven't read all that many Mirror universe stories, so I can don't know if this is typical of the genre, but I continued to turn pages because I was genuinely interested in the characters, and intrigued by what twist the author would provide to well-known plot lines next.

I enjoyed the opening sequence when Kirk and Spock are young and meet on Earth, as this was original and I've got a weak spot for the younger guys. It really is intriguing to wonder what would have happened if they'd met when they were youths.

I appreciated it when First Officer Kirk decided to make his move on Pike earlier than he'd planned because it would help him get the Enterprise to Vulcan for Spock's pon farr, and I thought the execution of Pike by both our guys was excellent. I also really liked it when Kirk tells the science officer "Go kill the bastard," referring to Stonn at Koon-ut-kalifee. Yeah!

Ms. Berman is a competent writer with good ideas who would benefit from a strong editor who's willing to work with her on sentence construction and punctuation. There were bunches of mistakes in both (commas and apostrophes and a few verbs were needed) but I found that once I adjusted to the grammatical and other errors that I was still able to read and enjoy the story.

What would make this story, and presumably the rest of the author's work even better would be more attention paid to rounding out situations, making them more believable and fully realizable, with concurrent improvement on characterization as well. Some of the early part of this story seemed a bit too naive for my taste, and it lacked the biting edge of the Mirror situation and characters. Jamie seemed too soft to grow up to be the mirror captain.

Some of this naivete came through in writing style, such as when the younger Kirk and Spock are exchanging their life histories. A bit too much conversational dwelling on "I don't really want to tell you this but I trust you so I will." And then, virtually several pages of monologue from each, information that I thought could have been conveyed in a less static way if imbedded within a genuine conversation.

But despite what this story might have been, it was an enjoyable reading experience, with characters that made sense overall, and a plot that held my interest.

This may qualify as "child sex" story in the sense that Kirk is 16, 17 at most, but this Kirk is a naive prostitute. He doesn't truly become embittered until he is brutally raped before he enters the Academy. Spock, however, is also young and naive, so this may be simply juvenile sex.

I have a little trouble with stories like this and "A SUNSET TOUCH'" (same zine) in which Kirk "earns" his way into Starfleet by whoring for some prominent person. This, of course, is a legitimate scenario, especially in an alternate universe, but I just can't see Kirk doing it. I also was uncomfortable about the way both Spock and Kirk killed without a second thought, much less emotion. (My impression of this particular issue of the zine was of casual, callous killing throughout, but it may be just the mood I was in when I read it.

I really liked the way the author showed the characters growing and changing, That is hard to do.