universal_charm | SANCTUM IC CONTACT

"You can't blame one man for the loss of a planet." AT least, you can't blame a man for it and expect him to keep living. "It's not on you. It's on the sonovabitch that decided torch'n Vulcan was a good idea."

It was. It was on Nero for thinking that revenge would make things better. That making innocents suffer for something Spock and the people of the future could not control was right. But it didn't take away his sense of duty, the bit inside of him that said he could have stopped it, saved them all. That if he realized sooner what was waiting on the other side he could have told Pike to hail the other ships, that his friends, his classmates wouldn't have lost their lives for nothing.

"Maybe," he acknowledged, but it wouldn't stick. He licked his lips, looking down at his hands, his next failure bubbling up, running through his very veins.

He shook his head, the old instincts rising up.

"Sorry. This is all heavy enough without me throwing shit out there too," he said, a part of him lashing out at himself, telling him it wasn't fair to expect Whiskey to share in these burdens he carried. Bones did. But Whiskey was not him and it was not fair to ask that of him.

"Kid the first thing any doctor learns is that you can't save everyone. It's impossible. Maybe they need t'find a way to teach Captains that much too." Maybe there was some kind of test they could take, some sort of lesson in futility- because sometimes fights are just that. Futile. you hold the line. You hold it till you die and it won't save you or the guy next to you, but it might save the guy behind you. It might give the people back home another few minutes, few hours before everything roils over.

He snorted, shaking his head.

"They have a test for that, actually. You know what I did to it?" He looked at him, smiling a bit, missing those old days, his red uniform, missing when things had been innocent and the sky just full of stars. "I hacked it and changed the program."

There was no such thing as a no-win scenario. You could find a way to win, to pull everyone through that fire or die trying. Teaching people that sometimes you had to lose - fuck that.

"...kid, that's not how you do those things. You can't hack reality to change it." For all that Bifrons tries to do the same to their heads, every day they can. "It is how it is. You gotta deal with the reality in front of you, not run from it by trying to change things that can't be changed."

He rubbed the back of his neck.

"I know. Believe me, I know that. I hacked it because I didn't agree with the premise of the test. Spock said it was to teach us fear, to teach us that some situations you can't find a way out of way, that they're hopeless. And I don't believe that. I don't believe that's what you should teach people. Teach them to think on their feet, to think outside the box, outside damn regulations and find the way out. Don't teach them to give up!"

He took a breath, his voice maybe haven risen a little, feeling like he was on trial again.

"If I had done that when Marcus turned on us - or, I guess, when I finally figured out he'd backstabbed us, my crew wouldn't have made it through that. We'd all be dead, not just me."

"That's not the point, and if that's what Spock said the point was he's as much a dumbshit as the rest of your Fleet Brass." Exploration and discovery, sure, but everyone needs to know when to hold the line. "It's not to know how to die with dignity. It's not to know ow to work through fear and be'n hopeless. It's about holding the line till the job is done or until you've put more of them in the ground than there are of you."

"And I held my line, Leonard," he said, clenching his hands together, voice rough. "I've always held my line. I'll continue to hold my line. The people in it just have changed over time, that's all." He sighed, rubbing at his eyes and cracked his neck, looking over him. "You know I will, don't you?" he asked him. That he wouldn't leave Whiskey hanging. He'd told him once before, but he'd wondered if Whiskey actually believed him or if he had just nodded his head, placating the kid with the bright blue eyes.

"Can you?" This isn't about his Jim anymore. It's about what this kid has weathered, what he's done, what he's died for- its' about how he looks this Jim in the eye and doesn't see a soldier. And that? That's a benefit. "Can you hold position and kill whoever comes at you to protect who's at you back? Can you put a bullet in someone without blinking? Cuz that's what it'll take. And that's what I never want to see you have to do, kid."

There's a pause, a long one as he considers. His Adam's apple bobs, blinking for a second as he recalled one of the worst weeks of his life.

"To late," he whispered.

He wiped at his mouth, thinking back to the days in that village, to listening to the people scream in the night, walking through the streets lined with their bodies the day after.

"We got got sent to this place call Zompania by the Malnosso - I've told you that before, right? We got told we had to fight the cultists or some new shit enemy that popped up and they wouldn't fight themselves. Somewhere along the way my phaser lost power cause I'd been shooting so much. In the end I took up an iron pipe, and I simply beat their heads in to keep moving, make it to nightfall and pull people along with me or back them up when they were stronger."

And he hated it. He hated the crunch of bone, the stink of blood, adding to the piles of bodies, the slickness of the mud. But he had to - because the people around him had needed it, because he couldn't lay down and give up. He had a job to do, and people to protect and people to get back to. He didn't necessarily feel bad about what he had done then, they weren't exactly human, and they deserved it for what they had done to that village. But it didn't mean he liked it. He had never been proud of himself for that day. He never would be.

"..." This. This is his sympathetic face. Hell if anything he reaches up to cuff the back of Kirk's head, trying to knock some of that ill gotten sense of self pity out. Guilt, remorse? Sure. Self pity due to some kind of assumption that he's lost all his innocnece?

That's bullshit.

"Kid if it was 'too late' you'd be Hob motherfucking Ravani. Or me. Or my Jim. You ai'nt any of us, you're you. You still feel bad about what you had to do. The day that shit stops bother'n you? That's when it's too late."

"Ow," he muttered, rubbing the back of his head, looking at him.

In truth he hadn't been looking for pity. He hated pity, really he did. A part of him had more been scared, admitting it, saying it. Afraid that somehow it would shift whatever foundation they had been building and scatter it. No, he wasn't proud of the things he'd done. He wasn't proud of sending Nero's ship into a void, he wasn't proud of how things had gone down with Marcus and Khan, he wasn't proud of surviving Zompania. He didn't want Whiskey to be proud of him for it either. He just didn't want him thinking him less for them.

"I can get messages without smacks to the head," he grumbled, reaching out and smacking his shoulder.

"The message is so you know it. The smack is so you'll remember it." He mutters, nudging Jim to help him settle. "It is what it is. You did what you did. Now you move forward."

"You going to keeping moving forward with me?" he asked him seriously.

"Kid I move forward whether you're there or not. Ain't nowhere to go but forward."

"Good. Just wanted to make sure," he reached out and patted his knee, pausing to give it a squeeze. That was good. Whiskey was a serious man, and their talk at his house had scared him a little, the other so willing to believe his time was up.

"Awright then." not much else to say on the matter. You go forward or you go down to die. Not much else to do.

Kirk nodded, picking up his sandwich again and biting into it to get the last few bits, still good even though it had gone to cold.

"Thanks for lunch," he balled up the wrapper. "Thanks... for today." He leaned over slightly so their shoulders touched.

"Anytime, kid." He pats him on the shoulder, standing to toss his wrapper in the trashcan.

Kirk follows his lead, pausing once more to look at the wall with all its names, what they meant for Whiskey, for this planet, for the people of the Dome. He tucked his hands into the pockets of his jacket and bumped Whiskey gently to get him moving.

"Come on. I promised your mother I'd finish fixing up some hardware today for her, and I don't want her mad at me."

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