A/N: This is based in STID, right as Kirk gets chewed out by Pike. I wondered what it would be like if instead of becoming first officer of the Enterprise, Jim was assigned to another ship? Now I have a plot going in an entirely new direction than the movie (although I absolutely loved STID)!

Thanks for giving this a try, and let's see where it goes.

The prologue is a lot like the Pike/Kirk scene in the film, although slightly different. I can't remember exactly how it goes, and I'm sure all of you aren't interested reading a scene you've already watched. Plus there are a few things I've changed, and I've added onto the scene.

UPDATE: Actually now that I've reread this again, and seen STID again, I realized that I've strayed quite a bit from the actual scene. I'm not sure if I'm going to update this scene to fit it in for the movie, word for word. Or if I'm going to leave it as is, because I don't like rewriting scenes from the movies word for word. I kind of like where I took this, but until I get the DVD, I'm going to leave the Prologue as is for now.

Disclaimer: I do not own Star Trek or any of its characters.

Prologue

"They're sending you back to the academy."

I picked up my gaze the carpet and looked at him in disbelief. School? "So I make one mistake and I'm back to the academy again? Not only that, but learning how to do the same thing that I've been doing for nearly a year?" I lifted my head defiantly, and spit out the next few words. "What if I hadn't gone back for Spock? What if I had let him die? There would have been no one to sell me out, but I would have lost a goddamn good first officer."

"Jim-"

"Were those my options? Let Spock die and stay captain, or save a life and get sent back to school?"

"You shouldn't have put yourself in that position-"

"-In the first place, I know." Pike dropped his eyes from his face I could tell that he was sorry. Sorry that he had to be the one to tell me this. Maybe he was just sorry I was being kicked out in general. I didn't know for sure, and in that moment I didn't really care. After a moment's pause I said, "So that's it then?"

"I'm sorry, Jim. You know it wasn't my call." He looked back at me, his eyes tracing over my face. I don't what he was looking for – forgiveness, maybe? I wasn't even ready to start thinking about that. A part of me knew that I didn't blame Pike, but I ignored that part. He lowered his voice to almost a whisper, his voice losing the authority from before, "I understand why you made that call, but you also blatantly disregarded the prime directive. And Starfleet doesn't take kindly to that; you can't keep relying on luck like this… "

I lowered my head like a whipped dog (yes, I admit it); all the anger that fueled my earlier outburst started to crumble and left a pit in my stomach. "Is the prime directive the only problem?"

"The admiralty thought that it showed a flaw in leadership, and a general lack of respect for the rules."

"Do you?"

He paused for a moment. "There's greatness in you, Jim… but there's not an ounce of humility." Pike took a deep breath and in exasperation continued. "I think you'll make a great Captain, you're just not ready for the chair yet." He looked at me long and hard in the face.

"And Spock?"

"Staying on as my first officer until further notice."

"Permission to leave, sir?" I started to turn around towards the door before I even finished the question.

He sighed. "Permission granted, and Jim?" I paused just before the door and didn't turn around. "You know I believe in you, right?" I didn't answer, just barely twitched my head in a nod. Then, I picked up the pace and hightailed it out of his office. I kept my head down, barely acknowledging the high ranking figures who passed by.

I didn't look for Spock, I didn't want to deal with him right now. I didn't know if he was still in the building and I didn't care. I didn't want to talk to anyone right now and I didn't want to think about what would happen next. I almost marched right out of the building - well marched was kind of a strong word, considering how much of a slouch I'd suddenly gained. Ran was more like it. The only reason I stopped was because of the receptionist.

Before you ask, yes she was attractive, okay? However, the real reason I stopped for her was because I hadn't signed out on her PADD yet. "Sir?" she asked as I brushed past her desk. "You didn't sign out yet!" she called. I turned on my heel and strode back over to her desk.

"Sorry about that," I apologized, and turned my lips up into what could be called my brightest smile. You know, if you were a Vulcan or lived a lonely life in cave somewhere and didn't know what real smiles looked like. She, however, took little notice of the strange thing my mouth had curled into, and smiled at me as she handed me her PADD.

"Just sign right here for me," she said as she pointed on the screen to a space below my picture. My best shit-eating grin looked back at me, happy at his new promotion to Captain. That had been months ago. "Here," I glanced back at her as she handed me a stylus. "So, a lot on your mind?"

"Heh… what makes you say that?" I pressed the stylus to the PADD, and scrawled my name and rank. "There." I said, leaning over the desk and placing it in front of her.

"Thanks…" She grinned brightly at me. I was about to take my leave when a robotic voice rang out.

"INVALID IDENTIFICATION." I leaned back over the desk and the receptionist, Julia said her nametag, crinkled her forehead in confusion. She tapped a few times on her PADD and gave it back to me.

"Sorry, you're going to have to do that again. It probably didn't read your signature right or some… oh!" Her face lit up. "This has happened before; you must've put the wrong rank in. Did the admiral change it?"

"You could say that," I grit out. I glanced at my picture again, but what was underneath was what I was really looking for. It read:

Kirk, James T. Rank: Cadet

A/N: The next chapter is where things are really going to start to change. In case anyone was curious, everything before this scene is exactly as it was in STID.

UPDATE: Sorry! Another update. I added a little to this, not enough to make anyone reread it, I just wanted to fix some sentences etc. Also, back to my interpretation of the Pike scene. I kind of like it, it makes sense for where I'm going to next with the story! Sorry for the slow updates, but the next chapter will be up soon. Also I don't mean to repost this, I just wanted to fix a few things.