Title: For the Sake of Nothing, Part 27 (27/28)
Author: klmeri
Fandom: Star Trek AOS
Pairing: pre-Kirk/Spock/McCoy
Summary: A secret (identity) is revealed.
Previous Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26

Kirk’s mind was so tangled he didn’t know where to begin to unravel it.

For Jim, helping Bones had been a priority since the beginning. He couldn’t stand to see someone who was essentially decent at heart live as a shadow of himself. It just seemed wrong. Jim had, since one of the first days of knowing Leonard, made plans for interference, albeit in a uniquely Jim Kirk sort of way. It meant being involved with the man, if only as a friend; when that happened, though, it didn’t come about as he had anticipated. Fate (with a little insistence from Jim) had brought Leonard into Jim’s life on a nearly daily basis; in this sense Jim was as close as he might ever get to the man. Yet, inexplicably, the means to achieve his goal grew more elusive, until one day the goal itself became unnecessary.

Mostly, Jim mused, that was not his fault. It was Spock’s.

With a disturbingly natural ease, Spock took on the role Jim had imagined for himself. It was Spock who connected with McCoy, who became the confidante, and who helped to free Bones from personal torment. Jim wished rather selfishly he had been at the heart of those events. Certainly he had been their instigator… hadn’t he?

It was amazing how, even in this small way, Jim managed to alienate himself. He liked to blame others for not returning his overtures at companionship, but in truth Jim began to wonder if, given that he was the common factor in every failure and deep disappointment since childhood, he was also his own saboteur.

Other if‘s bombarded him then: if he hadn’t noticed the latent chemistry between Leonard and Spock; if he hadn’t made the decision to back off; if he had been more willing to share himself rather than doggedly focused on anything but.

“If if if,” Jim muttered under his breath as he shoved a last t-shirt into a backpack and zipped it shut. He sat back on his haunches, inspected the now-empty closet and said, “If Spock hadn’t promised. Shit.” He rubbed his forehead. “What am I doing?”

But Jim knew.

A promise from Spock was like a promise from a holy saint. Maybe Spock skirted around the truth sometimes, but he didn’t outright lie. He wouldn’t lie to Jim. Jim believed that, had to believe it with unshakable certainty.

Was it such a big deal that Jim turned out to be so desperate? Would, someday, Spock resent Jim because he had a difficulty accepting affection yet craved it more than anything in the world?

I think I’m broken, he thought not for the first time in his life, only to realize: I’m going to do this anyway.

Maybe his luck would hold out, and his choice would lead him to a happy beginning rather than a miserable end. Maybe.

Jim slipped the backpack onto his shoulder. The backpack contained the majority of his possessions, those which were secondary in need to what he always carried inside his duffle bag. He hoisted the duffle bag by its handle over his opposite shoulder, stood, and left his apartment.

He didn’t get farther than two blocks from his building before the hairs at the back of his neck rose with the sensation of being watched. He slowed, turned casually as if to check a street sign, and spotted a black SUV creeping down the street. Jim resumed walking. The vehicle was still tailing him by the next block.

Jim’s eyes cut to a side alley up ahead; he recalled a mental map of the area and, in a span of seconds, had plotted an escape route. He counted his steps, spying a group of teenage kids coming his way, and made his break for the alley in the same moment they passed by. The gunning of an engine reverberated through the narrow passageway, as if following him.

Jim broke into a cold sweat, swung his duffle bag over a half-rotten fence at the end of the alley before jumping it himself. He landed on his feet, snagged the bag, and kept going. A series of short alleyways and abandoned lots later he was in an old residential area about half of a mile south from where he had been. As he eased onto the deserted street, it took only a handful of seconds for Jim to realize he made a serious mistake by assuming no one was tracking his movements. A black SUV of the same model and make as before turned onto the end of the street.

Jim dashed around the corner of an empty warehouse, prepared for a full-out chase. Another SUV, gleaming silver, braked to a screeching stop at the street curb just ahead of him. The passenger window was down and the driver shouted at Jim, “Get in!”

How weird, Jim would muse later, that when he heard the commanding tone, it was like his brain was hard-wired to obey. At present, Jim would tell himself he had no better choice than to trust Pike not to get him killed. He scrambled into Pike’s car with a breathless “What the fuck is going on!”

“Seatbelt,” Pike snapped and threw his car into reverse.

Jim’s fingers fumbled at the seatbelt clasp. “What the fuck is going on?” he demanded again. Civilians didn’t regularly get chased down through town, or so he thought. Pike did not reply and broke every speeding limit, which kind of awed a wide-eyed Jim, until they took a ninety-degree turn nearly on two wheels. Then Jim was just plain terrified. “Fuck, Chris! I don’t want to die in a car crash!”

Pike, the insane man, still used his turn signal as he swerved in front of someone at seventy miles an hour. “I’m taking you to the bus terminal.” For some reason, Pike refused to look at him.

Something unexplainable lodged in Jim’s throat. His duffle bag suddenly felt heavy in his lap. “I’m… leaving?”

“Unless you want to die,” Pike snapped at him. “He’s found you.”

Jim dug his fingers into the rough, stained fabric of the bag. “How?”

Pike hesitated, said, “There was a leak in the department.”

Jim dropped his head back against the seat and cursed. “I can’t leave!”

“Your bags are packed,” Pike observed, gaze finally sliding over to take in Kirk.

“That’s not what—” Jim loosed his grip on the duffle bag. “I planned to go to Spock’s.”

“Plans change, son.”

A protest formed but he kept silent, logic warring with emotion. Pike turned onto a highway, driving more slowly now.

This couldn’t be happening. Not now. Who would tell Bones and Spock?

“I can pass a message on,” Pike said, like he had plucked Jim’s question out of the air. “If,” the older man added, “I can get it to them.”

Jim’s stomach dropped with a brand new kind of terror as he deciphered what Pike said. “Go back!”

Pike didn’t turn the car around.

“I said go back!” Jim tore off his seatbelt, panic whipping through his veins, and tried for the door handle. The door didn’t budge. He popped the lock. A hard grip caught Jim’s arm before he could literally throw himself into the wind.

“What the hell—” Pike half-shouted, half-gasped. “You fool, what are you doing!”

“Let go of me,” Jim said, low and deadly, and tried to break free of Pike’s hold.

Pike swerved to the side of the road in a spray of gravel, the open door swinging wildly back and forth with the momentum. They both automatically jerked forward in their seats at the abrupt halt of the car.

Pike turned on him, looking livid. “You don’t fucking jump out of a fucking moving car, Jim!”

“I told you to go back!”

“I’m not taking you back.”

“He knows about the shop,” Jim said over the harsh pounding in his ears. “That’s what you meant: if you can get it to them.“

“So what?” Pike’s eyes bored into him, daring him in some way. “You go back, you die. Is your life that worthless to you?”

“No one dies for me, and no one,” Jim concluded fiercely, “touches them. Ever.”

Pike’s grip eased on his arm. “So you’re a hero now?” Strangely, the question was too mild to be condescending.

“No, but I’m not a coward.” Jim’s patience had been limited to begin with; now it was at its end. “Are we going back, or do I have to walk?”

Pike faced the steering wheel and laid his hands on it. He made no move, however, to pull onto the highway again. “Hm,” he said.

Screw Pike; the asshole could do the walking. Jim was devising a plan to steal the vehicle when Pike reached down and removed the key from the ignition. Jim slammed the heel of his hand into the dashboard, spit out some uncomplimentary things about Pike and his ancestors, and kicked at the half-open passenger door.

“I lied. He’s in jail,” Pike said when Jim had a leg out of the car. “A partner turned state’s evidence against him and he was convicted to a ten-year sentence a year and a half ago.”

The world slowed down. Jim’s adrenaline rush abandoned him all of a sudden. He floundered under the news. “What?” Pike was watching him when he turned around, fighting to respond properly. “But the car…?”

“Buddy of mine.” Pike’s mouth quirked at one end. “Surprise.”

Jim vacillated between shocked and angry and finally settled on angry.

“Don’t bother trying to hit me,” Pike warned him. “There’s a can of mace in my pocket.” He exposed the top of the canister for Jim to see. “Now, do you want to hear the rest?”

“What?” Jim snarled. “That you’re a fuckin’ lunatic? Is this some kind of sick mind-game?”

“Cut the histrionics.” Pike tilted his head to the side and observed Jim. “You know, when I let you go almost three years ago, I thought this city couldn’t possibly hold you.” Pike snorted. “Yet I come to find out you stayed. In fact, you holed up in some dinky, hipster coffee shop for two years.”

“How shocking it must have been,” Jim mocked, “to find out you can be wrong.”

Pike countered with a jab of his own. “Settling down—that’s an unusual thing for you, isn’t it, Kirk?”

“Get to the point.”

“The point is I wanted to know what changed you. Now I think I do.”

Pike put the key back in the ignition and started the car. Jim hesitated for a second before shutting the passenger door and buckling himself in again. Pike was, like always, confusing him rather badly. The SUV eased onto the road, made U-turn, and Pike drove them back toward the city.

“I have some advice for you, son.”

It took effort but Jim managed to bite his tongue.

Pike snorted softly at his silence. “Only a little while ago you were making a lot of mistakes, Jim, and as somebody who’s made as many—if not more—mistakes, I think it’s time you got your head on straight.”

“You’re not my father,” Jim said, feeling childish, and wow this conversation was very déjà-vu like.

“You don’t have a father,” Pike said bluntly. “You won’t ever have a father so take what you can get when it’s offered.”

Jim deadpanned, “From a bitter old man. That sounds great.”

“My point exactly. Don’t be like me. Make smart choices. You’re already halfway there, Jim. My number one priority has always been myself. I’ve got a wall of commendations, a fat bank account, and a mayor at my beck-and-call… but nothing else. Nothing that matters and I can’t trust what I do have.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I want you to do better.”

Jim looked at him. “That doesn’t explain anything.” He only prodded for more answers because he was marginally curious now. Pike didn’t seem like a man who shared his feelings often.

Pike caught his eyes and held them for a second before watching the road again. “I’m telling you that this reprieve, this good thing you’ve found for yourself…? It’s not going to last. Someday all the shit you’re used to is going to come back. Somebody’s going to let that motherfucker out of prison. We don’t have time on our side. We never did. So don’t waste it.”

Jim swallowed down a surge of emotion and replied as evenly as he could, “I won’t. I’m going to Spock’s.”

“That’s a smart choice.” Pike released a long breath which ended in a sigh. “Make it worth it.”

Arms folded, Jim silently let the minutes pass while he watched scenery go by. He would have kept silent until the ride was over but a thought nagged at him constantly. He must have imagined the strain in his voice when he asked, “Are you giving up on me?”

Pike responded slowly, as though he was reluctant to admit the truth. “Not giving up. I’m letting you go. For now.”

Jim studied the profile of a man who he thought he would never trust and suddenly understood what Pike wasn’t saying. “You think I’ll work for you.”

Pike nodded. “Yes, I do.”

Jim finished for him, “When my past comes back to fuck with my life.”

“When you realize I’m your ally, not your enemy,” Pike clarified.

Jim sunk into his seat and closed his eyes. “It’s your fault if you end up waiting forever, Sir.”

Jim could hear the smile in Pike’s reply. “Maybe.”

At Kirk’s insistence, Pike went no farther than the outskirts of Spock’s neighborhood. By then the boy was back to his usual self, though he seemed exhausted. (Chris, being the cold-hearted bastard he was, felt no guilt over that.) Since Pike knew a play at concern wasn’t welcome and they weren’t on good terms, he left Kirk to make his own way to his destination. This wouldn’t be the last time they saw each other, he knew.

After checking his watch with smidgen of smugness that he had timed everything so seamlessly, Pike drove through the center of town and to the west, finally pulling his SUV into a small parking lot adjacent to a clean-kept park. He stalled there and sat watching the families come and go, dogs running after balls, kids running after the dogs. Across the grassy lawn, the person he was waiting for approached the SUV. He unlocked the doors. The young woman slid into the passenger seat, dropping her purse on the floorboard as she leaned across the gear shift to hug him.

“Uncle Chris!” Her cheeks dimpled. “The sun finally came out. Isn’t it lovely?”

“Hey there, doll,” he said fondly, tweaking a strand of her hair. “Still can’t say I like your haircut.”

His niece sniffed in mock affront and fluffed her hair. “It’s chic. You just don’t like change.”

“I’ll admit I’m set in my ways, but I am fairly certain you didn’t have to cut it to impress that boyfriend of yours.” Pike narrowed his eyes and skimmed the park. “Where is he?”

“He had a school project to work on.”

Pike’s mouth twitched. “You mean he’s still afraid of me.”

“He’ll come to lunch next time,” she promised.

Wisely Pike said nothing because it was a miracle in itself he had met the guy, given that she hadn’t let him meet any of her other boyfriends in the past. Then again, she planned to marry this one. The girl must have realized she couldn’t prevent the meeting of uncle and husband forever. He turned the key in the ignition. “Where to?” He didn’t have to look at his niece to know her eyes were suddenly twinkling. It was a trait she’d inherited from his sister, that mischievous streak.

“I’m not terribly hungry. How about a cup of coffee?”

“Jocelyn…” Christopher warned in the no-nonsense tone he used on prank-playing rookies. Sadly, it seemed to have no effect on her. He shouldn’t have been surprised.

She laughed. “You know you want to!”

“I really don’t,” he responded dryly.

Jocelyn was much too observant for her own good (this was a trait he proudly accredited to himself). She gasped and smacked her hand on the dashboard, exclaiming, “Uncle Chris! You went to the cafe, didn’t you!”

“Are you going to tell me you haven’t?”

“I have every right to do as I please. Besides, my friend works there.”

He simply looked at her until she put on her seatbelt with a roll of her eyes. Then he edged into traffic and headed to a restaurant he knew she liked. Pike let a minute or so of silence stretch between them before he spoke again. “I don’t think Kirk’s going anywhere.”

“He’d better not,” Jocelyn said promptly. “I will hunt his ass down and drag him back by the ears.” She slyly cut her eyes at her uncle. “I have the resources to do that, don’t I?”

“That would be an abuse of my power, doll.”

“So yes?”

He barked out a laugh and reached over to ruffle her hair. Jocelyn slapped at the air with a squeal, narrowly missing his hand, and spent the next minute fixing her hair in the mirror and cursing a blue streak at him. “Don’t do that,” she fussed. “I’m not a boy!”

“You certainly don’t look like one,” he agreed amiably.

She sat back and took several sidelong glances at him while he drove. “Have you talked to Mom?”

“Not for a while.” When he was younger, he would have been defensive about that, and angry. Years and distance from his sister and her family, with the exception of Jocelyn in the last couple of years, had served to harden his feelings over their estrangement. He no longer harbored the illusion he would be welcomed into his sister’s life again. It was only through Jocelyn’s stubbornness that he had any connection to that part of his past at all.

He couldn’t say he regretted it, or her.

Jocelyn gave a quiet, understanding “Oh” and they spoke no more of the painful subject.

He slowed the car to a full stop at a red light. Figuring he had to sacrifice a little dignity for the sake of improving his niece’s mood, he remarked, “If it wasn’t for sheer dumb luck—” And by that, he meant McCoy’s dumb luck to give Jocelyn’s name as his emergency contact on his paperwork. “—I would have never known McCoy knew you.” How that had raised all kinds of alarms when he had seen her name. That, more than Jim’s accompanying scrawl on the arrest form, had been the reason he removed the two idiots from Holding and let them go.

Jocelyn stopped biting down on her bottom lip and perked up. “Did you run a background check on him?”

His mouth curved. “Yes.” And raided McCoy’s apartment, but she didn’t need those details. The least Jocelyn knew about her uncle’s methods of investigation (and his cold-blooded desire to eliminate any potential threats to his beloved niece), the better—for all of them. “Let’s just say it’s a good thing you never introduced us when you moved up here.”

Her confused expression was cute. Nevertheless, Pike did not intend to enlighten her to his real meaning. He gave his full attention to parallel parking along the street and unclipped his seatbelt once they were safely parked. He pointed out, “You know we’ll have to tell them sometime.”

“I know,” Jocelyn said. Her face was the happiest he had seen it. She bounced slightly with excitement, as she used to do when he let her sit on his shoulders to reach the lowest hanging apples from the apple tree in her family’s backyard. Pike cherished what few memories he had of those times. How she’d grown since then; how much he had missed.

“Uncle Chris, I have a brilliant plan!”

Pike loosed a long-suffering sigh. If Jocelyn hadn’t succeeded in wrapping him around her little finger when she was an adorable baby, he would have dumped her out of the car and sped away to preserve his sanity. “Does this brilliant plan require me to arrest anyone?”

She lifted her chin and stated quite primly, “It would be rude to arrest invited guests to Thanksgiving dinner.”

So he couldn’t arrest Clay. That was very disappointing. Well, the Treadway boy would likely have a heart attack at the sight of handcuffs anyway.

Jocelyn was still talking. “There’s no way to break it gently, really, so we might as well minimize the shock as best we can.”

Shock was a mild term for what would happen to Kirk, Spock, and McCoy when they saw him in a button-down cardigan serving turkey. The image made him chuckle.

His niece paused thoughtfully. “I suppose I could warn Len he will finally get to meet my mysterious uncle. He always did complain about that around the holidays. He told me once the black sheep of the family are supposed to be the most interesting.”

You reap what you sow, McCoy, Pike thought. He pocketed his keys and smiled. Jocelyn smiled back. “Isn’t having me here the best thing in the world?” she asked, impish as ever as she shouldered her purse.

“It is,” he said, meaning it. “And those who dare disagree,” his smile widened, “deserve their ill fortune.”
He would see to that personally.

Jocelyn grinned. “Leonard thinks I get my temper from my mother.”

That was the funniest thing he’d heard all day. They laughed, went into the restaurant, and laughed again.

Next Part

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