Chapter Text
Dust kicked up in swirling storms behind the wheels of the car as it careened down the road. Jim felt like screaming, shouting out his relief at being away from all he knew. Now he was truly far away, and he watched the town get smaller and smaller in his rear view mirror. His heart started to race with the adrenaline. He imagined his stepfather as tiny as he seemed now, screaming abuse and waving his arms madly from an inch off the floor. Jim laughed at the thought. How poetic, he thought, the puny man finally brought down to size. His heart involuntarily clenched the more he focused on his step father, so he hit the steering wheel with a closed fist to punctuate his thoughts.
He turned up the radio, and some old song he didn’t know came on. It had a thumping beat and sexy baseline, and he grinned along with it. The road stretched out in front of him, and he could feel the freedom flowing through his veins. Never again would he have to stand there while his stepfather yelled at his mother, or take another of his punches without fighting back. He hadn’t decided what he would do now he was free, but that wasn’t the important part. Just knowing it was over was enough.
After many more songs played and the stations fell in and out of static, he pulled into a motel on the side of the highway. It looked a little seedy, and his stepfather’s fancy ass car stuck out like anything. He’d have to leave it somewhere, so they wouldn’t come after him. His stepfather wouldn’t want Jim, that much was abundantly clear, but the Corvette was his pride and joy. Jim flirted with the idea of crashing it, but that was too risky to be feasible. If he got knocked out they’d find him and bring him back, and that was the last thing he wanted. Maybe he’d sell it to one of the guys at the bar, he thought. He’d not get what it was worth but money was better than no money and it wasn’t like he could sell it in town if he stole it.
He strode into the bar, trying to look tough before he could assess the situation. The dim light didn’t help with that, but he soon picked out the other patrons. Mostly old drunkards like his stepfather. He sat at an empty stool on the far side of the bar, with fewer people around. He ordered a beer, and scanned the room while he waited. It was run down, and the people sitting there were run down too. Looked like some of them spent more time here than anywhere else. Jim shook that thought out of his mind. Reminded him of his stepfather. There were chairs and tables on the side of the room opposite the bar, and to his right was a tack board. The usual small town events just like in Riverside were advertised on it, but one sheet of paper caught his eye. It read ‘JOIN STARFLEET’ in large print, with a picture of a starship shooting at a Romulan warbird underneath. There was text at the bottom but Jim didn’t bother to read it. He was transfixed by the image; it seemed to have a hold on him.
“Your father died on one of those,” came a voice from behind him.
How the hell does he know that? Jim thought.
“Fuck off,” he said. He had no time for this, people who thought they knew everything about you when they didn’t.
“Jim Kirk?” the man asked.
Okay, maybe he does know everything.
“Nope, you’ve got the wrong guy,” Jim replied.
“Don’t play games with me, son. I know who you are and I know what happened to you. I’m not here to mess around, I just have something I need to tell you.”
Jim sat up rod straight as the man spoke, his heart beginning to race. He eyed the door, determining if he could make a run for it.
“Well, get on with it, then,” he said, trying to come across as fed up and not afraid for his life.
“I’m from Starfleet, and I’m here to say that I need you to enlist. I knew your father,” Jim sucked in a breath, louder than he wanted, “and if you’re anything like him, we need you. I can’t say why, I just need you to trust me on this.”
“Is this some new trick to get more fresh meat?” Jim said .
“No, no, ack-” the man looked exasperated. “Look, what proof do you want, or will you just listen?”
“I’ve listened, okay? I’ll think about it. You can leave now,” he said. The man’s expression was pained, and he decided to twist the knife just a little more.
“You look just like him, you know.”
Jim heard something clatter on the floor and realised he had stood up and knocked the barstool over. Before he knew what he was doing, he tore the Starfleet poster off the wall and ran out of the door. The wind stung his face and he realised he was crying. Without thinking, he ran, just ran straight down the dirt road as far as he could before his lungs burned. He ended up in a ditch, sitting hunched over and his breaths coming in short gasps. He unfurled the poster he had crumpled in his hand, smoothing out the wrinkles. The man’s words from the bar spun around in his head. How the fuck had he known all that? And what was Jim going to do now?
A car sped past and dust blew in clouds into the ditch. In that instant, his mind was made up. He stood up and began waving his arms wildly at any passing car. He would go to Starfleet; not because he was told to, but because what did he have to lose?
“Farewell, Mother.”
Spock watched her where she stood next to his father, and noticed tears building in her eyes. A sense of unease grew within him; it was always difficult when she was unable to contain her emotions, though he knew she tried. He turned from her to face his father, and their eyes met. Neither wished to look away first, and Spock steeled himself. Now was not the time to show weakness, not when their relationship was so fraught. Spock felt as if he could light a match and the tension would go up in flames. He raised his hand in the ta’al while staring directly at his father.
Sarek did the same.
“Live long and prosper, my son,” he said.
The distaste he felt for Spock dripped off the words, and Spock’s brows furrowed imperceptibly more as he heard it. He bent down to pick up his bags.
“Live long and prosper, Father.”
The human phrase “Good riddance!” came to Spock’s mind as he strode down the sandy path towards the Vulcan shuttlecraft.
The journey to the Federation space station from where Spock would take a transport to Earth had so far been uneventful. He knew it would be long, so he had taken to meditation to pass the time. An unusual number of thoughts passed through his mind, and he surmised it was due to the turmoil he had created through his recent actions. At first they were easy to ignore; merely passing musings about the design and features of the shuttlecraft. Then, they drifted to his mother: all alone on the little red dot behind him. He cast that one from his mind quickly, but it was replaced by his father next to her, his stony gaze twisting to anger. Spock chastised himself for such an illogical image; his father would never display an emotion so clearly. The image was stubborn, though, and Sarek started to berate him. It was all the most frequent motifs: Spock needed to refrain from reacting to the torments of his peers, he needed to restrain his emotional tendencies, he needed to appear more stoic. When Sarek was particularly lacking control, it was that Spock needed to be less like his mother.
Spock breathed out slightly more sharply in an attempt to clear his head. It was entirely unproductive to dwell on what was already done, he reminded himself. Besides, in all likelihood his father would never speak to him again. It was not the only reason he had decided to join Starfleet, although certainly it was not a disadvantage. He had known he would do so ever since he was a child, when his mother told him stories of the adventures of the great Federation exploring the vast wonders of space. She would only do this when Sarek was not around, and when Spock was upset from being taunted at learning center. Of course, he would not show this, but she knew. It almost made Spock ashamed, though he recalled the comfort he had experienced in those moments and found himself unable to be. She spoke of Vulcans and humans coming together, joining forces, their differences becoming strengths. He knew it was exaggerated for the sake of fiction, but the mere idea that two opposites such as those which existed within Spock could coexist in harmony was intoxicating.
Amanda would take Spock with her to their garden, placing him on her lap and pointing the stars out to him. By that age, he knew their names and classifications from memory, but she was not interested in that. Instead, the tales she told him involved starship captains steering their vessels through asteroid fields, exploring nebulas and black holes, and meeting exotic aliens everywhere they travelled. He would nestle into his mother’s embrace, following her finger to each new star as she smiled down at him. Each one represented a hope for his escape, leaving behind this stifling red and dusty planet to journey along his mother’s gaze. When the VSA had offered him acceptance, it seemed to Spock that the only choice he had ever had was to turn them down and leave for Starfleet.
Several days later, Jim was staring up at the towering scaffolding of the Iowa City shipyard where he could see what looked like a starship being constructed. He recognised the outline of the nacelles and the underside of the disk from his vantage point, and compared it to the picture on the poster in his hand. Staring up was making him dizzy; he squeezed his eyes shut and walked further. Thankfully, the car that picked him up contained a lady that took pity on him, fed him and brought him here.
He stopped briefly at the imposing gates, when something smashed into his back, knocking him forwards.
“Watch it, man!” he said, turning around to find who had hit him.
“You’re the one who stopped. Not my fault you were in my way,” someone behind him said, with a thick Georgia accent smothering his words.
Anger bubbled up in Jim, but he realised there was no point pissing off someone he might have to be around a lot. He turned to face the man, and noticed his height and striking blue eyes. He stuck his hand out and introduced himself, trying to seem polite. God knows he needed someone on his side, for once.
“Leonard McCoy, but you can call me Bones.” He shook Jim’s hand. “So how’d you end up in this godforsaken junkyard?”
“Nothing better to do.”
“Funny, that’s why I’m here, too. Against my better judgement, as well. These starships are flying death traps, ya know. One small hole in the metal and we’d be sucked into space in an instant, our blood would boil and the pressure would explode our lungs.”
Jim resisted the urge to laugh. Starships were very safe, much safer than most of the other things he had done in his life.
“Yeah, well, we’ll see,” Jim said.
They were approached by an officer who handed them a PADD with intake forms to fill out. Jim skimmed the page. At first he thought it was the usual crap he would have to fake; he definitely didn’t want them notifying his mom or stepdad that he’d joined, and they didn’t need to know who his father was either, but he noticed the thumbprint pad that he knew would link to the Federation-wide database of every citizen. Damn , he thought, and begrudgingly answered the questions. Once they had both finished, they handed it back to the man. He made sure they had filled everything out, and when he saw Jim’s last name he looked up sharply.
“You’re George Kirk’s kid?” he asked, eyes wide.
“Nope, must be a coincidence,” Jim said. Despite being a practiced liar, his hands were shaking.
“Huh. Alright, that way to shuttle B for the two of you,” he said, and pointed them to a large shuttlecraft on the opposite side of the yard.
As soon as they were out of earshot, Bones turned to Jim.
“You are George Kirk’s son, aren’t you? I can tell when people are lying,” he said.
Jim took a second to decide if he should deny it. Bones seemed like the kind of man to not take well to being deceived. Low tolerance for bullshitting, Jim figured.
“Fine. Yes, I am,” he told Bones.
“Holy smokes! I can’t believe this. You know, you’d be real famous around here if anyone knew.”
“That’s exactly why I’m not going to tell them.” He knew from experience it was far safer to fly under the radar than to stick out.
“Fair enough, but bloody hell, I didn’t expect to meet a war hero’s son on my first day at Starfleet.”
“Don’t call him that!” Jim hissed.
“Jesus, alright. Is suicidal maniac any better?”
Jim elbowed him. They reached the foot of the shuttlecraft and stood in line to enter. From the corner of his eye, Jim saw a figure leaning against part of the scaffolding. When he turned his face caught the light and Jim recognised him as the man from the bar. What the fuck? This was almost too much to handle, but he got a nudge to the side from Bones that told him they were almost in. The shuttlecraft was bigger than he thought it would be, and not a standard Type 18. It had seats like old fashioned rollercoasters, and had a pointed top rather than being rectangular. Maybe it was designed to scare the new recruits, he thought. It was certainly working on Bones, who looked like he was about to be sick.
“Come on, you’ll be fine,” Jim said, once they were seated and had the protective restraint on.
“You say that, but just look at this thing. I do not trust it not to fall apart while we’re in the air.”
“Would a transporter be better?” Jim asked, having a feeling what the answer would be and provoking him just to see.
“Hell no. No machine is scrambling my molecules up, that’s what I say.”
Jim couldn’t resist laughing at that, and Bones glared at him.
“We’re taking off soon anyway, so you won’t have much of a choice after that.”
Bones sighed and slumped down in the seat. The engines rumbled briefly before the shuttle was lifted fully off the ground. Jim relaxed a little, and smiled at the sight of Bones beside him. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad, he thought. Either way, he’d always wanted to see San Francisco.
Halfway through the journey across the country, Bones had thankfully fallen asleep. Jim had distracted him from his fear of flying by chatting about whatever nonsense he could think of, but it was better for both of them if he wasn’t conscious at all. Jim could see the landscape moving beneath them, mostly farmland with the occasional town or city in between. The only problem was that the silence gave him time to think. He had never liked being alone with his thoughts, as it usually meant he was either in immediate danger or available to think about the last times he was. Right now he was trying to ward off any images of his stepfather or his mother by imagining the distance now between them stretching out behind him. It didn’t work, though, and his heart started to beat faster as his mind sank back into a memory. It wasn’t clear, like normal, but many moments all stuck together into one. Hiding in his room, hearing his stepfather stumble into the house; his mother packing up their things frantically in an attempt to leave; time freezing as his stepfather’s hand careened towards his face.
“Dude, are you good?”
Jim’s eyes shot open and his mind was snapped back into his body. He looked down to see his chest rising and falling with his fast breaths, his hands shaking as they gripped his jeans.
“Yeah, of course,” he said, but his voice shook just enough for Bones to notice. “I just, uh, must have fallen asleep too and had a bad dream.”
Bones’ face scrunched into an expression of clear disbelief, but he knew better than to push harder on something like this.
“Alright, whatever you say,” Bones commented, watching for Jim’s breathing to return to its normal pace.
Once it did, he opened his mouth to make a joke and lighten the mood but the captain’s voice came over the speakers. They were beginning the descent, it said, and therefore they were required to remain in their seats with the harness down. The G force of the descent served to further ground Jim, and by the time they had gotten off the shuttlecraft he was feeling more like his usual self. Not that his usual self was particularly present in his body but he couldn’t seem to shake the disconnect even when he tried.
They walked down the track onto a paved pathway, raising their hands to cover their eyes from the glaring sun. The pathway stretched out before them, with flower beds and fountains on either side. It was far, far nicer than anywhere Jim had been for a long time. The headquarters building rose up in the distance, sleek glass curves and steel beams reflecting the light back at them.
“This place is fancy, huh?” Bones said as they both looked around.
“Sure is,” Jim replied. He felt somewhat uneasy about it. Nothing was this nice without some secret hidden under the surface.
The guide led them through the courtyard, pointing out the different buildings as they passed. The science labs and the library were on one side, and the special simulation rooms for engineering and security were on the other. Where they had come from was the landing zone, and the other end where they were going was the accommodations and the lecture halls. As they walked, Jim could tell that Bones was watching him carefully. Must still be worried after what had happened earlier. Let him worry, Jim thought. Not like he could do anything about it if he wanted to.
Eventually they reached the large glass doors at the entrance of the main building, and through that the auditorium. They filed in a few at a time, and Jim had a good opportunity to look at who he was going to be around for the next few years. There were mostly humans, some Andorians, a few Tellarties, and one Vulcan who was standing stick straight as he waited. That was odd. If Vulcans wanted to go to space, they joined the VSA, so something must be up with this one, then. He had the usual bowl cut, which made his black hair fall just above his eyes. His hands were clasped behind his back, and if Jim didn’t know better he would say the Vulcan looked nervous.
He was shaken out of that thought by Bones poking him and telling him to snap out of it because it was their turn to walk into the auditorium. The room was large and spacious, but designed in old Earth style unlike the rest of the buildings. The ceiling was large and curved, extending all the way to the far side of the room where seats had already begun filling up. Jim and Bones followed the other students over and sat down. In front of them was a panel of high-up Starfleet officials. There were several alien races represented, some Jim knew and others he didn’t, and they were either reading over their notes or watching the young people file into the room. Bones was also looking at them, and he pointed out who was who. He must have known far more than Jim, because he pointed out the head of the Academy, and several of the heads of different departments.
They began the usual dull speeches, welcoming the new students to the Academy, droning on about the values of the Federation and what they would learn here. Jim had never been good at focusing when an authority figure was talking, and this time was no different. It wasn’t anything he didn’t already know, anyway. As his eyes wandered, he found himself staring at the Vulcan he had seen earlier. It really was weird that he would join Starfleet. What had happened that would make him avoid the VSA? Jim made a mental note to talk to him later.
Spock listened to the speech and watched the presenter talk from the first row of the auditorium. Some of what they discussed felt odd to him. Federation morals were substantially different than Vulcan ones. Although, that concept was not new to him, since he had watched his mother struggle to adjust to Vulcan ideals all his life. There was another Vulcan on the stage, and he wasn’t sure if that made him more or less comfortable. It was pleasant to hear the familiar sentence structures and calm tone of voice compared to human’s distinctly emotional voices.
Eventually all the speeches were finished, and Spock stood up to leave. There were too many people walking along the aisle beside him, however, and he was forced to wait until they stopped. He looked to see when that would be, and someone caught his eye. He had brownish blond hair, and bright blue eyes, and he was talking to someone who appeared to be his friend as they followed the trail of future students. Spock purposefully stepped out into the aisle just as they passed.
“Hi!” the boy said, smiling at Spock.
“Greetings,” Spock replied.
“I’m Jim Kirk,” he said, and he looked as if he was about to stick out his hand, but he must have remembered that Vulcans were aversive to physical touch since he put it in his jeans pocket instead.
“I am Spock,” he said. “Are you a relative of George Kirk?”
“Uh, no, it’s just a coincidence.” Spock raised an eyebrow at that, but he recognised it was unwise to pry since he determined Kirk looked uncomfortable.
Kirk opened his mouth to ask a question before he thought better of it. Presumably he was about to inquire as to why Spock had joined Starfleet. It was not unusual for Vulcans to work for the Federation in administrative work, but never for the military branch. He had felt eyes on him because of it for the duration of the time he had been here, and it was beginning to grate on him, so he was glad the man before him had some sense. It also didn’t hurt that he had a rather aesthetically pleasing facial structure.
Once they left the auditorium they were led to a corridor which was lined with Starfleet workers with PADDs who were distributing accommodation assignments. Yet again the worker looked slightly shocked at Spock being there, but quickly recovered and instructed him on where to go. He was to be housed with a roommate named Nyota Uhura. He recognised the given name as being from an Earth language known as Swahili, meaning “star.” Fascinating, he thought. It would be an interesting endeavour to become more familiar with her and her culture. Beside him Kirk and his friend, whose name Spock had learned was Bones, presumably a nickname he did not understand, appeared very pleased to learn they were to room together.
They followed the students down the corridor until each person in front of them had filtered off into their rooms. The setting sun shone through the window at the end, where their accommodations were. His room was just across the hallway from Kirk and Bones’, so Spock said farewell to them and entered his own. He prepared to sleep, and while he did his mind raced with all that had happened thus far. Interacting with humans required far more energy than he had predicted. Perhaps it was the unpredictability of their actions, he thought. Hopefully he would acclimatise the more time he spent with them, and his mind focused on the two men he had just met. He sensed he would get to know them better in the coming weeks, and in his sleep deprived state he could not object to the idea too much.
In the room across from him, Jim and Bones were getting settled.. Jim sat on his bed and began to take his top off, before Bones stopped him by saying:
“Uh, Jim, there’s something I think you should know.” He looked nervous, and Jim was surprised to hear him sound so hesitant.
“Yeah?” he asked.
“I’m, uh, I’m trans. Just so you know,” Bones told him, looking as if he’d rather be anywhere but here.
“Oh, god, right! I thought you were going to say something much worse than that.”
“Okay, good, we don’t have to bring it up ever again.”
“No, it’s totally cool. You had me worried for a second there.”
Bones laughed, and relaxed back.
“And of course you can talk about it if you want,” Jim said.
“Alright, thanks.” Bones smiled at him before they both got ready to sleep, something they very much needed.