Chapter Text
Pike harbors something of a fondness for Riverside. Iowa is a calm place, and the people of Riverside are perfectly situated to be simple without being too disconnected. That’s not say that the town doesn’t harbor it’s fair share of idiots, or that Starfleet couldn’t do without recruiting a few less of them, but more good comes out of Riverside than one might expect. Something that Pike knows better than most.
And because he strives to be humble, honest, and self-aware, Pike admits to himself that it is this memory of Riverside that draws him to this rowdy bar when he has no interest in drinking. It’s the kind of place where fights break out often enough that people feel entitled to be stupid, but the company is also just as likely to be enjoyable.
Take the young cadet sitting at the bar, for example. Pike doesn’t yet know her name, but based on what he overhears of her conversation, he would do well to learn it, and keep an eye on her career.
There are many other cadets and personnel in the crowd tonight: a group of red-shirts who look like they wouldn’t mind finding a bit of trouble, a couple of science officers talking excitedly about something that is apparently very important, as most things are to the scientists, in Pike’s experience. There is also, of course, the local wildlife: mostly tired and dirty old men nursing their drinks alone, but also a few youngsters, making noise, playing pool, and trying to flirt with the cadets. But no matter how long Pike lingers in the background, no matter how many people he watches, he doesn’t find what he’s looking for.
It was a long shot, he knew that in the beginning. He feels old and stupid and overly sentimental to have have hoped that he would find the son where he first met the father. But Pike has grown frustrated over the years, and he feels that Starfleet sorely needs the leadership of someone like Kirk. Still, perhaps it was unfair to expect so much of a boy he’s never met. Who even knew if James, where-ever he was and whatever he was doing, even had anything of what had made his father so great?
Pike supposes he’ll have to accept that he will never know.
Leonard is no longer sure who he thinks is more stupid: the dumbasses he’s treating, or himself. On the one hand, getting a concussion by walking into a set of glass doors is forgivable the first time, but you have to be dumber than a dog to do it three times in one week. (Or drunker than a skunk, but what’s the difference.) On the other hand, at least these kids are young enough that they can afford to make a few mistakes. Leonard is already old and fucked up and he doesn’t even want to be here. His future looks just as miserable as his past.
God, he needs a drink.
What he gets instead, is a loud knock on the door.
“What.” Maybe not the most civil response, but at least it’s better than ‘Go away.’
The door slides open and Leonard is assaulted with the smell of blood. There’s still enough doctor in him that he’s on his feet and whipping out his tricorder. It’s two cadets -- no surprise there -- a garden variety red-shirt with some idiot in gold draped halfway over his shoulder, moaning like a cat and clutching his arm.
“Training accident,” says the red-shirt. “Dislocated his shoulder, sprained his ankle.” Which Leonard already knows from a visual scan and a quick confirmation from his tricorder. Still, at least the kid was succinct.
“Put him over there” Leonard directs with a wave, and the red-shirt obeys while his friend snivels. Leonard starts cutting the moron out of his shirt before he remembers the smell of blood that caught his attention in the first place. Except the whining brat doesn’t have so much as a scratch on him, let alone a prolific nose bleed. Which means it must be the other guy.
But when Leonard cranes his neck around, tricorder high, all he catches is a streak of blonde hair beyond the gap of the sliding med bay doors.
What kind of idiot walks out of med bay while he’s still bleeding? Leonard smacks his shoulder as he squeezes through the doors that don’t open fast enough.
“Hey, you!” No way is he letting some bonehead who waltzed into his medbay bleed out on campus and inconvenience everybody. He pushes his way through the crowd, (okay, it’s like, four people) still yelling, but he’s already lost sight of the kid. “Cadet!” he barks in his most authoritative I’m a doctor and therefore know the best ways to make you miserable if you don’t do what I say voice.
Turns out, when you yell ‘cadet’ at the top of your lungs in the middle of the Academy campus (or close enough) everybody within spittin' distance turns around and stares at you. Or maybe that’s just what happens when you start yelling like a lunatic in public.
The red-shirt he’s looking for is gone. As for himself, Leonard is pretty sure his reputation got upgraded from ‘that scary mean doctor’ to ‘scary, mean and mentally unstable.’ Not that he gives a damn at this point. He throws a healthy glare at the onlookers before stalking back into his office, where he remarkably still has a patient.
The kid with the busted shoulder is staring at Leonard like he’s crazy, and scoots back not so subtly as Leonard marches up to him.
“Name,” he demands.
“Wha’?” asks the kid.
“Name. Of the moron who brought you in. And then bled his way out of my office.”
“I dunno. Just some kid from my Gen Tact. class.” Which hundreds of students were taking. Fuck. Leonard would never find him now.
Whatever. Not his problem. He was probably just a spineless idiot who preferred being treated by a pretty nurse. Or skipping class. And it was probably a nosebleed or something stupid and trivial.
“So …” the cadet on the bed interrupted, “Are you gonna fix me or what?”
Fucking dumbasses the lot of them. At least Leonard got to hypo this one.
A few weeks later, Leonard has forgotten all about the red-shirt, though that might have something to do with the fact that he’s drunk off his ass.
Jocelyn called this afternoon. He was smart enough not to answer but dumb enough to listen to the message. And now here he is, sitting in the filth of the shadows outside the dorm, unable to stand the crushing emptiness of his tiny room, more alcohol than man at this point.
If he’d thought coming outside would change anything -- change him -- he was wrong. He’s ended up right where he began: low as the dirt, and ten times sicker.
He pukes over some stranger’s boots.
“Nice aim,” says the kid. God, he sounds young. What is he doing gawking at the local drunk in the middle of the night?
Leonard opens his mouth to ask just that, but all that comes out is, “Tall.” Because, seriously, the kid was one long streak of black topped by some red and then a blurry blonde mop. The mop moves, slow enough that Len’s stomach stays mostly in one place. The kid kneels down next to him, mindful of the puddle on his boots. Woah. Talk about blue eyes.
“You look terrible, Doctor.” Fucking cheeky kid.
“Mah. Fuck off, smart ass,” It comes out sounding less like a growl than Leonard wanted.
“Nope,” says the kid blithely. “Can I comm your roommate?”
“Don’t got one.”
“Single room? Oh. Right. Doctor.”
Leonard grunts.
“Well, then, how about a friend?”
More grunting. He’d roll his eyes, too, but … yeah. No.
“Classmate? Coworker?”
“Sure,” says Leonard. “Plenty who’d enjoy the chance to see me like this”
“Well,” says the kid, as evenly as before. “Guess I’ll settle for a room number at this point.”
“Ha. Like I’m climbing back up the stairs to the fourth floor. No thanks, kid.”
He’s not sure what the kid says next -- something about inventions and turbolifts. (An engineering cadet, then. Funny, Leonard had guessed security) The words ought to imply snark, but the kid actually sounds genuine. Leonard thinks that might be even more annoying, but he’s distracted as a sudden change in elevation diverts necessary blood away from his head. It appears he’s been hoisted to his feet. Also, he might have puked all over the kid again, he’s not sure.
They limp their way back into the building. (Well, Leonard stumbles, the kid walks.) Leonard keeps his head firmly down, in case there are any onlookers that he doesn’t want to know about. Also because it’s easier that way.
The kid shuts up besides the occasional ‘careful,’ bless him. Once they reach the fourth floor, Leonard is prompted for a room number. He points, grudgingly.
The room is dark and quiet, and just as suffocating as when Leonard fled from it. The kid doesn’t dump him in the doorway like Leonard half expects. Instead, he sets Leonard down on the crappy couch, and props him up with a pillow.
“Take off your shoes,” he commands, and next thing Leonard knows he’s alone.
He considers taking his boots off, he really does, but they’re all the way down there , and he’s not sure he could remember how to, anyways. And he’s comfortable. Ish. His couch is really crap.
Woah, hey, look, Mr. Puked Upon is back, with a glass of water and a blanket.
“Let me guess,” says Leonard, “kids?” And he’s not really sure what he means by that, but the cadet just shrugs.
“Something like that. Drink.”
Leonard drinks, and acquiesces to being tucked in, (okay, not really, but he lost the struggle pretty easily) and pretty soon he’s out like a light.
There’s another tall glass of water on the coffee table when he wakes up.
Leonard doesn’t like owing people. It makes him grumpy. So even though he doesn’t really have any idea what he’s going to do when he finds the red-shirt who probably saved him from getting hauled in and having his commission revoked, he’s determined to track the bastard down. He puts in a good deal of effort, too, which makes it even more humiliating to find out that they’ve been sitting in the same lecture hall for a two months.
It’s actually the kid who finds him, again . Though this time, neither of them are bleeding, both of them are sober, and there’s not even any vomit involved. Not that he takes credit for that part.
It doesn’t start out looking like the chances are good for him holding his stomach; he gets nauseous the moment he straps in. He doesn’t notice the kid at the time because they’re a few seats apart, he’s trying not to hyperventilate, and he has very actively avoided looking at his classmates in these scenarios since his aviophobia became common knowledge. (They always giggle .)
The instructor lounging at the front of the shuttle has the gall to sound bored as she drones on about the safety procedures they’re here to observe --
“Holy Mother Mary of Fuck.” The shuttle lurched and heaved, and Leonard's lunch heaved in return.
“Seriously?” snaps his partner. Judging from the dirty looks Leonard had gotten earlier, the science cadet know better than to expect any assistance on their assignment, and isn’t too thrilled about it. Insensitive asswipe.
“Do you have any idea,” Leonard gasps, “how dangerous this is?” He grasps at this stomach. “I know , okay, I’ve seen what these things can do to people. Space is -- is disease, and danger, wrapped in darkness and silence.”
“Oh please,” scoffs the jerkwad.
“He’s right,” says a third voice. Leonard leans forward to cradle his stomach and sees that it’s the red-shirt cadet. The red-shit. It’s the first time he’s able to get a proper look at the kid: shock of blond hair, electric baby blues, and a stony face so solemn Leonard suspects mockery.
“Dude,” says Leonard's partner.
“Of course,” says the cadet, “if we are going to die during this class, it’s probably going to happen before we ever get to space.”
“Reaaally.”
“Yup. The most like scenario is that the joining in the primary thrusts will collapse during the mid-stages of take-off, and we’ll plummet thousands of feet back down to Earth before we manage to break atmo.”
Nobody else is talking anymore; even the Professor has stopped to consider the kid.
“It a weak link in these older model short range shuttles,” explains the cadet, completely matter of fact. “It’s usually not an issue, perfectly manageable with regular maintenance and monitoring, but this lady hasn’t been looked after properly for a while. You can hear it: no-one’s even bothered to check for build-up.”
The lurch and rumble of of take-off, which Leonard had managed for the first time in his life to tune out, is suddenly incredibly loud.
“Cadet,” calls the Professor, and Leonard guesses she doesn't know this particular student’s name anymore than the rest of them, “The intention of this exercise is not to discuss mechanical failure scenarios, but since you have raised the issue ahead of schedule, tell me: what would you do, if your prediction came true?”
The cadet shrugged. “Well, assuming that the mechanical fail safes also malfunctioned, and the pressure variation actually was enough to interfere with primary engine propulsion” -- Leonard really wishes the kid had thought to mention those ‘ifs’ the first time around -- “I’d kick him,” the cadet points to the pilot, “out of the chair and ask … her” pointing now at one of their gold-shirted classmates, who looks surprised at being pointed out, “to take over.”
“You would, in the middle of a crisis, substitute a graduated and seasoned pilot with a cadet who has no authority, and hasn’t even completed her flight training?”
“Well, yeah. I mean, no offense to Pilot Dekvir, but as you said, he’s obviously been out of the academy for some time, and yet he’s still shuttling around a bunch of trainees.” The man in questions coughs loudly and throws a glare around his shoulder. “Could just be a matter of politics rather than skill, but still, it’s likely he’s had exactly no experience with in-flight emergencies. Cadet Yelsen, on the other hand, has demonstrated an ability to think quickly under pressure, is currently at the top of most of her flight classes, and has at the very least spent much more time recently in the sims drilling crash procedures. If nothing else, she has a fresher grasp of the materials.”
“Um,” pipes up the gold-shirt who’s supposed to save them, “I’m pretty sure that all I know how to do would be maneuver us to create more drag and maybe crash us into the water so we don’t smash anybody beneath us.” The pilot lets off a strangled noise in response, but doesn’t rush to contradict the cadet.
The red-shirt shrugs again. “Seems to me that reducing casualties is a pretty important part of crash landing.”
The professor has slipped out of her mask of neutrality to frown at the cadet. She proceeds to instruct the class on the ‘proper way’ to react to a crash landing scenario, which mainly seems to involve trusting your pilot -- though unlike in previous lectures, she avoids saying that directly -- and assuming crash positions and knowing where emergency supplies and exits are.
The red-shirt doesn’t contribute again during the lecture, though his classmates continue to not so subtly eye at him. Leonard included, apparently. The gold-shirt Yelsen, on the other hand, makes some very astute observations, which is not lost on the class.
Once they’ve settled into orbit and start unbuckling to begin their assignments -- complete busy work, in Leonard’s opinion -- the distraction is sufficient enough that Leonard loses track of the kid. He grunts as needed and lets his partner do his thing.
At last, the cursed hour is finally up, and the cadets make their way back to their seats. Leonard rides an impulse and snags one next to the red-shirt kid. He buckles his harness somewhat ferociously, thinking of the bone rattling decent ahead of them. God, what space travel must have been like before stabilizers.
“Four percent,” says the kid, not even looking at Leonard.
“Huh?”
“That’s the probability that re-entry will manifest an issue not exposed during take off and orbiting. And then it’s between an six and eleven percent chance that the resultant error will compromise the integrity of the shuttle.”
“Kid,” scoffs Leonard, “is that supposed to reassure me or something? ‘Cause it’s not working.”
“The odds would be lower if people could be bothered to look after their ships properly.”
It’s the first time Leonard has heard the kid say something that actually makes him sound like he’s a regular engineering-nut. (The apocalyptic-prophesying techno mumble earlier didn’t count.)
Quietly, placidly, the kid begins to point out the various aspects of the shuttle that require ‘a proper looking to’: The vents, some of the harness straps, the door hinges, some of the interior panels that creak. Leonard begin ticking off on his fingers the number of things wrong with the hunk of metal that their lives currently depend on, starting with the pilot. When the kid begins describing the rusting on the emergency exit control panel that he noticed when they first got on board, Leonard interrupts him.
“You know, most people try and convince me that I shouldn’t be afraid of space and ships. You are the first person I’ve met to actively encourage my complex.”
He gets caught in a blue vice as the kid considers him. “Know what causes more than seventy percent of casualties in all of Fleet history?” he asks.
“Idiocy,” Leonard guesses. It’s what he blames for most things.
“Combat.”
Leonard doesn’t get it.
“Fleet isn’t an army. They’re supposed to be a bunch of scientists. And yet the vast majority of times when things go wrong, it’s directly due to intentional hostility.”
Well, yeah, that’s pretty freaky, but Leonard still doesn’t get what the kid is trying to say.
“Space is dangerous,” the kid tells him. “But it’s people you really have to look out for.”
Wow. And people called Leonard cynical.
The kid starts unclipping his harness. Because they’ve landed. And Leonard … didn’t notice . Because he actually didn’t spend that much time thinking about the fact that he was in a spaceship in space . Even though he was in space . He’s only bothering to hyperventilate now that they’ve landed.
There’s a flask in front of his face. He grasps at it desperately, gulps it like a drowning man. Except, it actually is water, not whiskey or something that would have actually been helpful. And it’s so ridiculous that someone would actually carry around a flask full of regular water that Leonard starts laughing, because he’s a tad hysterical and, seriously, who does that?
He manages to wrangle up enough self-control to regulate his breathing. He takes another sip, strangely parched.
“Um,” says the kid, “I hope I didn’t break you.”
“Don’t worry about it, kid, happened long before you got here.” He gestures vaguely. “Ex-wife, grueling divorce, estranged kid, and a career in ruins … all I’ve got left to break are my bones.”
“Definitely not a good thing you’re so skinny, then,” says the kid, utterly solemn.
Leonard grins.
He’s not sure who exactly takes whom out to lunch after that, but with a meal in his stomach, and his first official non-puked-upon space flight under his belt, the next three years are looking marginally less terrible.