Under Orders by Ann Harrington (1/1)
Aug. 28th, 2009 11:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
califmoleUNDER ORDERS by Ann Harrington
Rating: Gen
Fandom: Star Trek XI
Disclaimer: Not mine, merely playing in the sandbox.
Summary: Knowing is only half the battle.
"I don't see how I could have done anything else," Professor Moreno grumbled.
Christopher Pike looked up from his datapad, resisting the urge to straighten in his seat. He was a Starfleet captain, not a green cadet, but Moreno, who'd been teaching at the academy since before Pike was born, still struck fear into the hearts of students and ex-students alike.
Moreno walked past to the empty table behind him, taking a seat so his back was toward Pike, while his companion Professor Kwame sat facing him.
"He doesn't look like a colonist," Moreno added. "Never acted like one."
Pike winced. Even here in the faculty lounge, where instructors expressed their views with a candidness that would shock their students, such a statement was likely to result in an enforced meeting with the academy administrator, and a blunt reminder of how much Starfleet valued inclusiveness.
But Kwame, who would have spoken sharply to anyone else, instead merely frowned at his lunch. He took a bite, paused, then swallowed. Picking up a bottle of hot sauce he poured it liberally over his plate. "What did he do?"
"Made an ass of himself in this morning's Leadership Ethics class, when I called on him to explain the governor's rationale," Moreno said. "He refused and asked to see me after class. Of course I told him that refusing to answer would earn him a failing mark. Then he quoted General Order Twenty-One and walked out."
Pike winced. General Order Twenty-One dealt with unlawful orders. While it might have been applicable to the topic at hand, walking out was not. The hapless student would be lucky if a failing grade was the only consequence of his behavior--Moreno might well decide to bring him up on disciplinary charges for lack of respect.
At least it wasn't James Kirk drawing Moreno's ire. Pike had wondered how Kirk would fare, knowing that the Kelvin's final engagement was certain to be discussed. But his concerns had proven groundless. Just two weeks ago Moreno had lowered himself to speak directly to Pike, informing him that his protégé had produced a paper so dispassionate that it would have done credit to a Vulcan--and one that disagreed with the major points of Pike's graduate thesis.
It was hard to say which had surprised him more. He'd pulled Kirk's paper off the server, intrigued to find that Kirk had argued that Captain Robau had made a mistake by leaving his ship. Kirk had pointed out that per protocol the Kelvin's first officer should have been sent to negotiate terms of the ceasefire, while the captain remained behind to lead an immediate evacuation.
"There were only a few thousand survivors, as I recall," Kwame said.
"Four thousand and three were alive when the first rescue ship arrived. Two hundred and seventeen died from starvation and other complications of their ordeal." Moreno's tone was as bland as if he was discussing the weather. "It is believed a significant number have since committed suicide or died under suspicious circumstances, but there is no official tally."
Tarsus IV. It had to be. The edges of the datapad cut into his palm, until Pike forced his hand to unclench.
He still remembered how disbelief had turned to horror as news of the events reached the federation. At the time he'd been assigned to the USS Fortitude, on a supply run to Space Station Four. Eight months away from Tarsus IV, at their maximum speed of warp three, yet he and the rest of the crew had felt obscurely guilty, as if there had been something they could have done to avert tragedy.
On Earth there'd been an immediate backlash against the independent colonies. Those willing to choose such isolation had been painted as radicals who'd rejected the values of civilization. Governor Kodos was seen as the logical consequence of unfettered societies, rather than an aberration. Earth had no longer trusted the colonies, while the colonists had resented being demonized.
Apparently the ill-feelings still lingered, or perhaps the student had felt insulted, assuming that Moreno believed all colonists shared Kodos's values. In either case, he was beginning to understand Moreno's anger. Storming out had been an overreaction, and if the student could not cope with one pedantic instructor, how would he fare when faced with a real challenge?
"You can imagine my surprise when I returned to my office and found not an apologetic student, but rather Starfleet Intelligence. Refused to explain, just stated that the cadet was under orders not to discuss his experiences."
Pike swallowed hard. Not just a colonist... a survivor.
"Who was it?" Kwame asked.
Pike held his breath.
"You know I can't tell you--"
Pike's datapad beeped, reminding him that he had class in fifteen minutes. As he walked past Moreno, the professor shot him a venomous look, perhaps only now realizing that his complaints to Kwame had been overheard.
#
Thoughts of Tarsus IV and the mysterious survivor lingered in the back of his mind, even as Pike lectured on the botched first contact with the Kreetassans. For all he knew, one of those laughing at the antics Captain Archer's dog could well be another survivor of Tarsus IV or some other horror. And even if they were innocents today, those who entered shipboard service would eventually witness similar tragedies first hand. Which was why veterans like himself were called back to the academy, to prepare the students as best they could for whatever they might face.
After class he attended a vid-meeting with Starfleet yard and the senior engineering project managers assigned to the 1701 build. The third generation warp cores had still been in development when plans for the new Enterprise had been drawn up, but they'd just passed their final tests. Ripping out the Mark II's and enlarging engineering to accommodate the new model would add three months to the construction timeline, but the performance improvement was too good to pass up, and after weeks of arguing he'd finally swung the project managers around to his point of view.
Assuming no other delays, this meant the launch of the Enterprise was officially eleven months away, ten months if the yard dogs were feeling inspired. In eight months they'd start assigning command crew. Pike's own shortlist, which had been based on an earlier launch, would have to be revised. For starters he'd lose Phillip Boyce as CMO--the delay put Boyce too close to his retirement, and the doctor had shown no signs that he was willing to sign up for another hitch.
And there was no way to hold on to Commander Anita Yang as head science officer--her current assignment ended in four months, and she'd be scooped up long before he could officially request her. Lieutenant Commander Spock, who he'd been considering for her second, was slated for promotion, but whether the admiralty would allow a newly promoted commander as head of science was yet to be seen.
On the plus side, in seven months the Farragut was due back for a refit, which meant the opportunity to poach Commander Robbins for his first officer. Unless, of course, she was offered her own command.
Accessing the personnel system, he updated his standing search request to include the new launch date. The computer would automatically notify him of any candidates that met his criteria, or any changes in availability of the names he'd already flagged.
Lunch a distant memory, his stomach growled with hunger, but rather than logging off, he signed on to the central academy server and pulled up the roster for Moreno's class. Out of forty students, the fourteen females and seven non-human males could immediately be excluded. Three of the remaining were attending on colonial sponsorships which Moreno would have known about, which left sixteen files to go through.
As he paged through their records, he wondered why he couldn't leave this alone. It had been a dozen years since the events of Tarsus IV, what difference would it make if he could put a name and a face to the story? And yet still he searched on.
One student had been raised on Mars, another had split his time between his mother's freighter and the Alpha Centauri commerce station. The others were from Earth, having never left the solar system before joining the academy. Then again, what had he expected? Starfleet intelligence had likely scrubbed the file, though why they had done so was a mystery.
He'd saved James Kirk's file for last. Officially Kirk's advisor of record was Professor Kelly, while Pike had merely sponsored his application to the academy. Unofficially, Pike had kept an eye on the brash cadet, who was not only on track to fulfill his boast of graduating in three years, but would graduate at the top of his class. His file had recently been accessed, but contained no new disciplinary infractions, a pleasant contrast to his early days at the academy.
His late entrance meant that Kirk was older than the rest of the cadets, closer in age to Pike's graduate students. He wondered what it would be like to have Kirk in one of his classes, then smiled and shook his head. He had enough on his plate already.
#
"Whatever you said to him worked. Head down and not a word out of him, not to anyone. The rest of the class seems to think he's on probation."
Pike looked up from the latest budget estimate file, to where Professor Moreno stood in the doorway of his office.
"Excuse me?"
Moreno stepped inside, closing the door behind him. Pike waved his hand to the empty chair, but Moreno refused, preferring to loom over him.
"Your pet cadet, James Kirk," Moreno said.
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
Moreno gave a grim chuckle. "Reduced to repeating whatever Intelligence told you to say? I thought ship captains had more spine than that."
The back of his neck prickled as he remembered the conversation he'd overheard the day before.
"If Cadet Kirk is behaving himself in class, I fail to see a problem," he said, stalling for time as he tried to gather his racing thoughts.
"The problem is that neither of you thought to warn me off, before it became a public spectacle," Moreno said. "Students are idiots, but as a fellow instructor, even if only a temporary one, you had a duty to inform me."
"Inform you of what?"
A terrible suspicion was growing, even as his rational mind tried to insist that it wasn't possible. It couldn't be.
After a sharp look, Moreno pulled out a chair and dropped into it. "Tarsus IV? James Kirk knows or does something that earns him an intelligence interdiction?"
Pike shook his head in instinctive denial. "There's nothing in his records."
"Did you think there would be?"
No, he'd realized that the records had been scrubbed. But Kirk's life in Iowa was well-documented. Too well documented in his later teenage years as typical adolescent rebellion gave way to a host of petty offenses and time spent in rehabilitation facilities. How had the son of one of Starfleet's heroes gone from rural Iowa to a remote colony? And how the hell had they kept his presence quiet, after news of the tragedy had broken?
"He owes me an apology for not telling me beforehand," Moreno said.
"What could he have said? If he'd told you he couldn't discuss the topic and couldn't explain why, would you have believed him?" Pike rose to Kirk's defense.
To his credit, Moreno thought about it for a moment, before replying, "I imagine not."
Pike might have been able to convince Moreno to lay off, but Kirk would had to have trusted him enough to ask.
"Not many people know that Kodos was an alias. They found a burned body that they claimed was his, but quietly Starfleet has left the case open," Moreno said. "Perhaps Kirk knew him on Earth and could identify him?"
No. It wasn’t that simple. Merely knowing Kodos wouldn't have been enough to provoke Kirk into walking out. It had to be more than that, and he had a sinking sense that he knew the missing piece of this puzzle.
Pike tapped his terminal, pulling up Kirk's student record.
"You think I haven't already checked?" Moreno asked.
Pike ignored him, clicking on the family history link, then entered his security code which gave him access privileges beyond a mere instructor. "Did you know that Captain Kirk had two sons? George Samuel Kirk Junior was living with his grandparents on Earth when the Kelvin was destroyed."
It was nearly two years since he'd sat in an Iowa bar, reviewing James Kirk's records. At the time, he'd been struck by the realization that Kirk had already lost two family members, three if you counted Winona who'd been off-planet more than she'd been on.
The screen flashed with the bare details. Just the date, no listing of where or how.
If Pike had been paying just a bit more attention back then, he might have been able to piece together the story. Then again, at the time there'd been nothing to connect a kid in Iowa with a tragedy a decade old and half a quadrant away.
"George died on 2246.121," Pike said, knowing Moreno would recognize the significance of the date. "What do you want to bet that Jim was there?"
A look of sympathy flashed across Moreno's face, then was replaced by his customary disdain. "An idiot, as I said before." Moreno rose to his feet. "But Intelligence is equally responsible, for their nonsensical rules. See that you talk to him, so he'll know what to do next time."
And with that Moreno left. Pike noted that there'd been no repeat of the demand that Cadet Kirk apologize.
A few angry jabs at the keypad served to cancel his afternoon meetings, then he shut down his terminal and headed for the gym. In the mood he was in he needed to break something or someone, and he wasn't feeling particular.
Running took the edge off his anger, and a kickboxing match with Instructor Olivera took care of the rest. He would have spectacular bruises tomorrow to show for his efforts, but declined the medtech's offers of painkillers or a session under the dermal regenerator. Bruises from Olivera were badges of honor, and physical aches far easier to bear than mental ones.
He wondered how many bruises Jim Kirk had collected in these past two days.
Returning to his quarters, he sent a message requesting a meeting with Cadet Kirk for the following afternoon. Standard protocol, something he'd done at least a half-dozen times before, but Jim would know this was no ordinary meeting.
From a locked box in his desk he retrieved a silver data solid with no identification markings, a gift from Commander Robbins. She'd called it a database authorization bypass routine. He called it a lockpick. Against regulations to own or use, but the best toys usually were.
He'd had time to think, and the pieces didn't add up. Other Tarsus survivors had given interviews on their ordeal. Children learned about it in school, how Tarsus's crops had been destroyed, and Governor Kodos, knowing that there was not enough food to last until the next harvest, had implemented a brutal culling. Men, women and even children had been executed, half the colony murdered in a single day. Kodos himself had calculated how far the remaining food supply would stretch, and then drawn up the lists of those he considered unworthy to live.
Except, of course, the story hadn't ended there. The first relief ships had performed heroically, arriving well ahead of the governor's calculations. There'd been no need for the executions after all.
So why had Jim been sworn to silence? What did he know, that the history books did not? Was the secrecy for his own protection? Or was it merely Starfleet not wanting to admit what had happened to the sons of the captain who had given his own life to save so many?
Bypassing the academy server, he signed onto the central personnel files and pulled up Jim Kirk's file. Plugging in the lockpick he activated it. There was still no mention of Tarsus IV, but now a link to an SI file number appeared. He took a deep breath, then opened the link.
#
Pike rinsed out his mouth and spit, swallowing against the bile that threatened to return. Haunted by the images of a hollow-eyed, starved boy recounting one horror after another in a voice devoid of all emotion.
A boy who'd been chosen by Kodos as the best of the best. Forced to witness the executions of his brother and cousins, then adopted by the man who'd ordered their deaths. Jim had dissembled to survive, stealing food from the governor's own table then risking his life to deliver it to the rebels. It had only been a matter of time before it had all gone wrong.
The relief crew had found him locked in a cell where he'd been left to starve to death for refusing to give up the location of the rebel's camp.
Jim could not only identify Kodos, he was one of a handful of survivors who had witnessed Kodos overseeing the executions.
It was no wonder that being asked to explain Kodos's logic had set him off. But Jim was smart enough to have see this coming. Had he planned to miss the Tarsus lecture by feigning illness only to have been caught out when Moreno changed the schedule? Or had he thought that he could somehow bluff his way through this, summoning the same detachment he'd used to analyze the Kelvin's destruction?
Whatever his plans, something must have gone wrong. Unable to explain his rage, Jim had mouthed off, preferring to be seen as an arrogant jerk rather than as a victim.
At least he'd had the sense to contact S.I. afterward. Though it hurt that he'd turned to a faceless intelligence drone, rather than to Pike.
Had Jim ever been able to talk about this with anyone? The intelligence interdict meant that officially no one had known that he needed help. Even his medical records had been sealed. If Jim had been a member of Starfleet, he'd have been given mandatory counseling to go along with the commendation that he'd surely earned. But instead he'd had all of the responsibility with none of the protection that was supposed to come with it. His silence jointly mandated by S.I. and the UFP prosecutor's office, ostensibly for Jim's safety, though Pike was certain their motives were far more self-serving.
And where was Jim's mother in all of this? Why hadn't she fought harder for her son, or was she the one who'd asked for the records to be sealed in the first place? What story had the family spun for the neighbors to explain how they'd sent two sons away but only one had returned?
Jim had been troubled before his ordeal. Tarsus IV was supposed to have been a fresh start for him and his brother, a chance to get away from a stepfather who'd been repeatedly investigated for abuse, though never charged. But instead of a new beginning Jim had found tragedy, returning to Earth burdened by anger and survivor's guilt.
It was easy to see the effects of Tarsus IV in his record, if you knew what you were looking for. There were no school attendance records after 2145, merely notations when Jim completed his independent course work, until he'd finished his mandatory schooling. Stellar exam scores had earned him invitations to Starfleet Academy and a host of other universities, but he'd declined all offers, drifting from one job to another in between stints spent in the county lockup.
Distrust of authority. Mood swings and sudden aggression. Paranoia, one interviewer had noted, while another had chronicled depression and inability to form personal connections. The kid's behavior had practically screamed PTSD but no one was listening. He'd been headed for a dead-end or an early grave, until that night in an Iowa bar when he'd tangled with Pike's cadets.
Pike had looked at Jim and seen both the damage and the potential, though it turns out he'd underestimated both. He'd challenged the kid to do better, but he knew it wasn't merely his own eloquence that had swayed the kid. Maybe all it had taken was someone willing to believe that Jim could be more.
Maybe he was simply the right person, at the right time. Maybe anyone could have done it. But it wasn't just anyone, it was him.
He couldn't turn back the clock, couldn't undo what had been done. But that didn't mean he was powerless. He was a Starfleet captain with over twenty years of distinguished service in the black, an extensive list of favors he could call in, and an equally long list of arms that could be twisted.
A few calls followed by a less than casual visit to Commodore Watanabe's office was enough to convince S.I. to update Jim Kirk's records so the security flag was visible to all. Only those who had the proper clearance could see the details, but now everyone could see that there was something to look for.
More importantly, the S.I. interdict was amended to allow James T. Kirk, at his discretion, to reveal his status as a Tarsus IV survivor to anyone with a Starfleet general security clearance. Which would include commanding officers, medical personnel and academy instructors.
Would that have been enough to avoid this week's fiasco? Hard to say-- Jim might have chosen silence rather than inviting Moreno's pity. But at least he would have had a choice, something no one had thought to give him before.
It wasn't enough. But it was a start.
#
The next day, Jim Kirk arrived at his office at precisely three o'clock. Pike felt the tension in his shoulders ease, and he realized that he'd half-expected Jim wouldn't come.
"Jim," he said. "We need to talk."
Rating: Gen
Fandom: Star Trek XI
Disclaimer: Not mine, merely playing in the sandbox.
Summary: Knowing is only half the battle.
"I don't see how I could have done anything else," Professor Moreno grumbled.
Christopher Pike looked up from his datapad, resisting the urge to straighten in his seat. He was a Starfleet captain, not a green cadet, but Moreno, who'd been teaching at the academy since before Pike was born, still struck fear into the hearts of students and ex-students alike.
Moreno walked past to the empty table behind him, taking a seat so his back was toward Pike, while his companion Professor Kwame sat facing him.
"He doesn't look like a colonist," Moreno added. "Never acted like one."
Pike winced. Even here in the faculty lounge, where instructors expressed their views with a candidness that would shock their students, such a statement was likely to result in an enforced meeting with the academy administrator, and a blunt reminder of how much Starfleet valued inclusiveness.
But Kwame, who would have spoken sharply to anyone else, instead merely frowned at his lunch. He took a bite, paused, then swallowed. Picking up a bottle of hot sauce he poured it liberally over his plate. "What did he do?"
"Made an ass of himself in this morning's Leadership Ethics class, when I called on him to explain the governor's rationale," Moreno said. "He refused and asked to see me after class. Of course I told him that refusing to answer would earn him a failing mark. Then he quoted General Order Twenty-One and walked out."
Pike winced. General Order Twenty-One dealt with unlawful orders. While it might have been applicable to the topic at hand, walking out was not. The hapless student would be lucky if a failing grade was the only consequence of his behavior--Moreno might well decide to bring him up on disciplinary charges for lack of respect.
At least it wasn't James Kirk drawing Moreno's ire. Pike had wondered how Kirk would fare, knowing that the Kelvin's final engagement was certain to be discussed. But his concerns had proven groundless. Just two weeks ago Moreno had lowered himself to speak directly to Pike, informing him that his protégé had produced a paper so dispassionate that it would have done credit to a Vulcan--and one that disagreed with the major points of Pike's graduate thesis.
It was hard to say which had surprised him more. He'd pulled Kirk's paper off the server, intrigued to find that Kirk had argued that Captain Robau had made a mistake by leaving his ship. Kirk had pointed out that per protocol the Kelvin's first officer should have been sent to negotiate terms of the ceasefire, while the captain remained behind to lead an immediate evacuation.
"There were only a few thousand survivors, as I recall," Kwame said.
"Four thousand and three were alive when the first rescue ship arrived. Two hundred and seventeen died from starvation and other complications of their ordeal." Moreno's tone was as bland as if he was discussing the weather. "It is believed a significant number have since committed suicide or died under suspicious circumstances, but there is no official tally."
Tarsus IV. It had to be. The edges of the datapad cut into his palm, until Pike forced his hand to unclench.
He still remembered how disbelief had turned to horror as news of the events reached the federation. At the time he'd been assigned to the USS Fortitude, on a supply run to Space Station Four. Eight months away from Tarsus IV, at their maximum speed of warp three, yet he and the rest of the crew had felt obscurely guilty, as if there had been something they could have done to avert tragedy.
On Earth there'd been an immediate backlash against the independent colonies. Those willing to choose such isolation had been painted as radicals who'd rejected the values of civilization. Governor Kodos was seen as the logical consequence of unfettered societies, rather than an aberration. Earth had no longer trusted the colonies, while the colonists had resented being demonized.
Apparently the ill-feelings still lingered, or perhaps the student had felt insulted, assuming that Moreno believed all colonists shared Kodos's values. In either case, he was beginning to understand Moreno's anger. Storming out had been an overreaction, and if the student could not cope with one pedantic instructor, how would he fare when faced with a real challenge?
"You can imagine my surprise when I returned to my office and found not an apologetic student, but rather Starfleet Intelligence. Refused to explain, just stated that the cadet was under orders not to discuss his experiences."
Pike swallowed hard. Not just a colonist... a survivor.
"Who was it?" Kwame asked.
Pike held his breath.
"You know I can't tell you--"
Pike's datapad beeped, reminding him that he had class in fifteen minutes. As he walked past Moreno, the professor shot him a venomous look, perhaps only now realizing that his complaints to Kwame had been overheard.
#
Thoughts of Tarsus IV and the mysterious survivor lingered in the back of his mind, even as Pike lectured on the botched first contact with the Kreetassans. For all he knew, one of those laughing at the antics Captain Archer's dog could well be another survivor of Tarsus IV or some other horror. And even if they were innocents today, those who entered shipboard service would eventually witness similar tragedies first hand. Which was why veterans like himself were called back to the academy, to prepare the students as best they could for whatever they might face.
After class he attended a vid-meeting with Starfleet yard and the senior engineering project managers assigned to the 1701 build. The third generation warp cores had still been in development when plans for the new Enterprise had been drawn up, but they'd just passed their final tests. Ripping out the Mark II's and enlarging engineering to accommodate the new model would add three months to the construction timeline, but the performance improvement was too good to pass up, and after weeks of arguing he'd finally swung the project managers around to his point of view.
Assuming no other delays, this meant the launch of the Enterprise was officially eleven months away, ten months if the yard dogs were feeling inspired. In eight months they'd start assigning command crew. Pike's own shortlist, which had been based on an earlier launch, would have to be revised. For starters he'd lose Phillip Boyce as CMO--the delay put Boyce too close to his retirement, and the doctor had shown no signs that he was willing to sign up for another hitch.
And there was no way to hold on to Commander Anita Yang as head science officer--her current assignment ended in four months, and she'd be scooped up long before he could officially request her. Lieutenant Commander Spock, who he'd been considering for her second, was slated for promotion, but whether the admiralty would allow a newly promoted commander as head of science was yet to be seen.
On the plus side, in seven months the Farragut was due back for a refit, which meant the opportunity to poach Commander Robbins for his first officer. Unless, of course, she was offered her own command.
Accessing the personnel system, he updated his standing search request to include the new launch date. The computer would automatically notify him of any candidates that met his criteria, or any changes in availability of the names he'd already flagged.
Lunch a distant memory, his stomach growled with hunger, but rather than logging off, he signed on to the central academy server and pulled up the roster for Moreno's class. Out of forty students, the fourteen females and seven non-human males could immediately be excluded. Three of the remaining were attending on colonial sponsorships which Moreno would have known about, which left sixteen files to go through.
As he paged through their records, he wondered why he couldn't leave this alone. It had been a dozen years since the events of Tarsus IV, what difference would it make if he could put a name and a face to the story? And yet still he searched on.
One student had been raised on Mars, another had split his time between his mother's freighter and the Alpha Centauri commerce station. The others were from Earth, having never left the solar system before joining the academy. Then again, what had he expected? Starfleet intelligence had likely scrubbed the file, though why they had done so was a mystery.
He'd saved James Kirk's file for last. Officially Kirk's advisor of record was Professor Kelly, while Pike had merely sponsored his application to the academy. Unofficially, Pike had kept an eye on the brash cadet, who was not only on track to fulfill his boast of graduating in three years, but would graduate at the top of his class. His file had recently been accessed, but contained no new disciplinary infractions, a pleasant contrast to his early days at the academy.
His late entrance meant that Kirk was older than the rest of the cadets, closer in age to Pike's graduate students. He wondered what it would be like to have Kirk in one of his classes, then smiled and shook his head. He had enough on his plate already.
#
"Whatever you said to him worked. Head down and not a word out of him, not to anyone. The rest of the class seems to think he's on probation."
Pike looked up from the latest budget estimate file, to where Professor Moreno stood in the doorway of his office.
"Excuse me?"
Moreno stepped inside, closing the door behind him. Pike waved his hand to the empty chair, but Moreno refused, preferring to loom over him.
"Your pet cadet, James Kirk," Moreno said.
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
Moreno gave a grim chuckle. "Reduced to repeating whatever Intelligence told you to say? I thought ship captains had more spine than that."
The back of his neck prickled as he remembered the conversation he'd overheard the day before.
"If Cadet Kirk is behaving himself in class, I fail to see a problem," he said, stalling for time as he tried to gather his racing thoughts.
"The problem is that neither of you thought to warn me off, before it became a public spectacle," Moreno said. "Students are idiots, but as a fellow instructor, even if only a temporary one, you had a duty to inform me."
"Inform you of what?"
A terrible suspicion was growing, even as his rational mind tried to insist that it wasn't possible. It couldn't be.
After a sharp look, Moreno pulled out a chair and dropped into it. "Tarsus IV? James Kirk knows or does something that earns him an intelligence interdiction?"
Pike shook his head in instinctive denial. "There's nothing in his records."
"Did you think there would be?"
No, he'd realized that the records had been scrubbed. But Kirk's life in Iowa was well-documented. Too well documented in his later teenage years as typical adolescent rebellion gave way to a host of petty offenses and time spent in rehabilitation facilities. How had the son of one of Starfleet's heroes gone from rural Iowa to a remote colony? And how the hell had they kept his presence quiet, after news of the tragedy had broken?
"He owes me an apology for not telling me beforehand," Moreno said.
"What could he have said? If he'd told you he couldn't discuss the topic and couldn't explain why, would you have believed him?" Pike rose to Kirk's defense.
To his credit, Moreno thought about it for a moment, before replying, "I imagine not."
Pike might have been able to convince Moreno to lay off, but Kirk would had to have trusted him enough to ask.
"Not many people know that Kodos was an alias. They found a burned body that they claimed was his, but quietly Starfleet has left the case open," Moreno said. "Perhaps Kirk knew him on Earth and could identify him?"
No. It wasn’t that simple. Merely knowing Kodos wouldn't have been enough to provoke Kirk into walking out. It had to be more than that, and he had a sinking sense that he knew the missing piece of this puzzle.
Pike tapped his terminal, pulling up Kirk's student record.
"You think I haven't already checked?" Moreno asked.
Pike ignored him, clicking on the family history link, then entered his security code which gave him access privileges beyond a mere instructor. "Did you know that Captain Kirk had two sons? George Samuel Kirk Junior was living with his grandparents on Earth when the Kelvin was destroyed."
It was nearly two years since he'd sat in an Iowa bar, reviewing James Kirk's records. At the time, he'd been struck by the realization that Kirk had already lost two family members, three if you counted Winona who'd been off-planet more than she'd been on.
The screen flashed with the bare details. Just the date, no listing of where or how.
If Pike had been paying just a bit more attention back then, he might have been able to piece together the story. Then again, at the time there'd been nothing to connect a kid in Iowa with a tragedy a decade old and half a quadrant away.
"George died on 2246.121," Pike said, knowing Moreno would recognize the significance of the date. "What do you want to bet that Jim was there?"
A look of sympathy flashed across Moreno's face, then was replaced by his customary disdain. "An idiot, as I said before." Moreno rose to his feet. "But Intelligence is equally responsible, for their nonsensical rules. See that you talk to him, so he'll know what to do next time."
And with that Moreno left. Pike noted that there'd been no repeat of the demand that Cadet Kirk apologize.
A few angry jabs at the keypad served to cancel his afternoon meetings, then he shut down his terminal and headed for the gym. In the mood he was in he needed to break something or someone, and he wasn't feeling particular.
Running took the edge off his anger, and a kickboxing match with Instructor Olivera took care of the rest. He would have spectacular bruises tomorrow to show for his efforts, but declined the medtech's offers of painkillers or a session under the dermal regenerator. Bruises from Olivera were badges of honor, and physical aches far easier to bear than mental ones.
He wondered how many bruises Jim Kirk had collected in these past two days.
Returning to his quarters, he sent a message requesting a meeting with Cadet Kirk for the following afternoon. Standard protocol, something he'd done at least a half-dozen times before, but Jim would know this was no ordinary meeting.
From a locked box in his desk he retrieved a silver data solid with no identification markings, a gift from Commander Robbins. She'd called it a database authorization bypass routine. He called it a lockpick. Against regulations to own or use, but the best toys usually were.
He'd had time to think, and the pieces didn't add up. Other Tarsus survivors had given interviews on their ordeal. Children learned about it in school, how Tarsus's crops had been destroyed, and Governor Kodos, knowing that there was not enough food to last until the next harvest, had implemented a brutal culling. Men, women and even children had been executed, half the colony murdered in a single day. Kodos himself had calculated how far the remaining food supply would stretch, and then drawn up the lists of those he considered unworthy to live.
Except, of course, the story hadn't ended there. The first relief ships had performed heroically, arriving well ahead of the governor's calculations. There'd been no need for the executions after all.
So why had Jim been sworn to silence? What did he know, that the history books did not? Was the secrecy for his own protection? Or was it merely Starfleet not wanting to admit what had happened to the sons of the captain who had given his own life to save so many?
Bypassing the academy server, he signed onto the central personnel files and pulled up Jim Kirk's file. Plugging in the lockpick he activated it. There was still no mention of Tarsus IV, but now a link to an SI file number appeared. He took a deep breath, then opened the link.
#
Pike rinsed out his mouth and spit, swallowing against the bile that threatened to return. Haunted by the images of a hollow-eyed, starved boy recounting one horror after another in a voice devoid of all emotion.
A boy who'd been chosen by Kodos as the best of the best. Forced to witness the executions of his brother and cousins, then adopted by the man who'd ordered their deaths. Jim had dissembled to survive, stealing food from the governor's own table then risking his life to deliver it to the rebels. It had only been a matter of time before it had all gone wrong.
The relief crew had found him locked in a cell where he'd been left to starve to death for refusing to give up the location of the rebel's camp.
Jim could not only identify Kodos, he was one of a handful of survivors who had witnessed Kodos overseeing the executions.
It was no wonder that being asked to explain Kodos's logic had set him off. But Jim was smart enough to have see this coming. Had he planned to miss the Tarsus lecture by feigning illness only to have been caught out when Moreno changed the schedule? Or had he thought that he could somehow bluff his way through this, summoning the same detachment he'd used to analyze the Kelvin's destruction?
Whatever his plans, something must have gone wrong. Unable to explain his rage, Jim had mouthed off, preferring to be seen as an arrogant jerk rather than as a victim.
At least he'd had the sense to contact S.I. afterward. Though it hurt that he'd turned to a faceless intelligence drone, rather than to Pike.
Had Jim ever been able to talk about this with anyone? The intelligence interdict meant that officially no one had known that he needed help. Even his medical records had been sealed. If Jim had been a member of Starfleet, he'd have been given mandatory counseling to go along with the commendation that he'd surely earned. But instead he'd had all of the responsibility with none of the protection that was supposed to come with it. His silence jointly mandated by S.I. and the UFP prosecutor's office, ostensibly for Jim's safety, though Pike was certain their motives were far more self-serving.
And where was Jim's mother in all of this? Why hadn't she fought harder for her son, or was she the one who'd asked for the records to be sealed in the first place? What story had the family spun for the neighbors to explain how they'd sent two sons away but only one had returned?
Jim had been troubled before his ordeal. Tarsus IV was supposed to have been a fresh start for him and his brother, a chance to get away from a stepfather who'd been repeatedly investigated for abuse, though never charged. But instead of a new beginning Jim had found tragedy, returning to Earth burdened by anger and survivor's guilt.
It was easy to see the effects of Tarsus IV in his record, if you knew what you were looking for. There were no school attendance records after 2145, merely notations when Jim completed his independent course work, until he'd finished his mandatory schooling. Stellar exam scores had earned him invitations to Starfleet Academy and a host of other universities, but he'd declined all offers, drifting from one job to another in between stints spent in the county lockup.
Distrust of authority. Mood swings and sudden aggression. Paranoia, one interviewer had noted, while another had chronicled depression and inability to form personal connections. The kid's behavior had practically screamed PTSD but no one was listening. He'd been headed for a dead-end or an early grave, until that night in an Iowa bar when he'd tangled with Pike's cadets.
Pike had looked at Jim and seen both the damage and the potential, though it turns out he'd underestimated both. He'd challenged the kid to do better, but he knew it wasn't merely his own eloquence that had swayed the kid. Maybe all it had taken was someone willing to believe that Jim could be more.
Maybe he was simply the right person, at the right time. Maybe anyone could have done it. But it wasn't just anyone, it was him.
He couldn't turn back the clock, couldn't undo what had been done. But that didn't mean he was powerless. He was a Starfleet captain with over twenty years of distinguished service in the black, an extensive list of favors he could call in, and an equally long list of arms that could be twisted.
A few calls followed by a less than casual visit to Commodore Watanabe's office was enough to convince S.I. to update Jim Kirk's records so the security flag was visible to all. Only those who had the proper clearance could see the details, but now everyone could see that there was something to look for.
More importantly, the S.I. interdict was amended to allow James T. Kirk, at his discretion, to reveal his status as a Tarsus IV survivor to anyone with a Starfleet general security clearance. Which would include commanding officers, medical personnel and academy instructors.
Would that have been enough to avoid this week's fiasco? Hard to say-- Jim might have chosen silence rather than inviting Moreno's pity. But at least he would have had a choice, something no one had thought to give him before.
It wasn't enough. But it was a start.
#
The next day, Jim Kirk arrived at his office at precisely three o'clock. Pike felt the tension in his shoulders ease, and he realized that he'd half-expected Jim wouldn't come.
"Jim," he said. "We need to talk."
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(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-29 05:25 am (UTC)This is excellent. Poor Jim to be so ill-served by Starfleet. It puts his initial incredulity when Pike told him to enlist in a whole different light. I hope Pike can help him/get him help.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-29 01:31 pm (UTC)