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From: smw@tilt.UUCP (Stewart Wiener)
Newsgroups: net.startrek
Subject: Saavik's background
Message-ID: <15@tilt.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 20-Mar-84 02:15:54 EST
Article-I.D.: tilt.15
Posted: Tue Mar 20 02:15:54 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 21-Mar-84 03:06:01 EST
Organization: Princeton Univ. EECS
Lines: 26

Saavik's ancestry (as several have pointed out) is half-Romulan and
half-Vulcan.  Her Vulcan parent was raped.  She doesn't know who her parents
are, or even which sex the Vulcan one was.  Doesn't want to know, either.
This is all revealed in the book.  NO WAY could she be a daughter of Spock; 
in the book, she nearly punches out David for inadvertently implying that 
Spock was so dishonored.  Satisfied?  (Well, it IS a remote possibility, but 
a really CHEAP one.  I say it couldn't be.)

The book goes on to tell us that she grew up in the streets of a MEAN
Romulan colony called Hellguard.  The colony was declared a failure, the
Romulan government evacuated the colonists... but left the old and the sick
and the half-caste embarrassments.  Spock came along with a Vulcan science
team to rescue them, and spotted the potential in this grimy waif.  And now
she's a fine Starfleet officer.

This might be fabrication on Vonda McIntyre's part -- she's done PLENTY else-
where in the novel -- since it leaves unexplained just where this fits into
Spock's life.  After the original 5-year mission, certainly; probably after
ST:TMP.  Anybody know how many years (in the ST universe) between ST:TMP
and ST2:TWOK?  The bare minimum for Saavik's background to be plausible is
five years, assuming she's an amazingly fast learner (from illiterate to 
Starfleet Academy graduate...)
-- 
	     Stewart Wiener			:-) "Read and weep as did
	  Princeton Univ. EECS			:-)  Alexander when he beheld
 {allegra,ihnp4!mhuxi}!princeton!tilt!smw	:-)  the glories of Egypt."