AN: I guess I fell into the Pirk trash can.

"This is Pike," Chris said into his communicator.

"Admiral," Spock said, "Mister Scott has found something. He has requested to see us right away."

"Mister Spock, I…" Chris started but he was cut off by his best friend taking the device from his hands.

"He'll be there shortly, Commander. Boyce out." Phil closed the communicator and handed it back to him. "Go."

"Jim…"

"Will be drugged out of her mind for the next few hours. Sitting here and staring isn't gonna help anybody, least of all her. I'm sure McCoy and I can keep her alive while you go see what Scott found." Phil gave Chris' shoulder a squeeze as they both looked at the woman sleeping on the bio-bed.

Chris could admit that he was annoyed when they were summoned to the Daystrom Conference Room at Starfleet Headquarters for an Emergency session. For the first time in months, he got to have a real, face-to-face conversation with Jim. In addition to her demotion, she expressed fear in not knowing who she was without the Enterprise. It was actually a feeling he knew all too well, having experienced it when he was confined to a wheelchair and stuck on desk duty. Once everything was all said and done, he was downright pissed.

Admiral Marcus had called the meeting of all the commanding officers in the area to inform them of a bombing at the Kelvin Memorial Archive in London, killing 42 people. Apparently, the attack was executed by one Starfleet officer, Lieutenant Thomas Harewood, on behalf of another rogue officer, Commander John Harrison. In looking over the images from the scene, Jim started asking questions about why Harrison would choose an archive as a target. She surmised, correctly, that what Harrison was really after was their meeting.

The jumpship that dropped in outside the conference room took everyone -save Jim- by surprise. Abbott from the Bradbury was the first to go down, followed by Admiral Giorgio and after that, Chris lost track. He should've seen the shot coming but he was too busy worrying about everyone else. It wasn't until Jim slammed into him, taking the phaser blast to her back, that he realized just how close he was to losing his life and how close she was to losing hers.

"This is my fault." Chris let out a sigh.

"You shot up Daystrom? Should I have those security officers come in here?" Phil asked.

"Stop being an ass, you know what I mean. She got hurt protecting me."

"Funny, I had this same conversation with her after Nero. 'This is all my fault' she said. 'He got hurt trying to protect us.' Do you wanna know what I told her?"

"No, but I'm sure you're about to tell me."

"You're right, I am. People like you, and her, have seen some of the worst things in the universe and you have both made it your job to ensure that others don't have to suffer. Sometimes, the person you're protecting is nameless and faceless. Other times, it's someone you know, maybe even someone you care about. When the shit hit the fan, Kirk had a choice to make and she decided that your life was more important to her then anything else. Was it reckless and little crazy? Sure. But that's why you recruited her. It's part of the reason you love her."

Chris hadn't told Phil what was going on between him and Jim, but he wasn't surprised that the doctor knew. Phil had a way of seeing things that other people didn't, especially where Chris was concerned. Which meant that, much as it irritated him, Phil was right and Chris couldn't just sit on his hands while Harrison was out there somewhere.

"I hate you sometimes," Chris said with a chuckle.

"I have that way about me." Phil smiled. "Seriously, Chris, she's gonna be fine. She'll probably be more worried about you then herself."

"She does that. You'll let me know when she wakes up?"

"You'll be the second person I comm."

"Second?"

"Her mother's first. That woman scares the crap outta me," Phil said.

"Could be worse; you're not the one in love with her daughter." Chris rose from his seat and pressed a kiss on Jim's brow, then her nose, then her lips. "I'll be back soon, sweetheart."

"How is the captain… Commander Kirk, sir?" Spock asked as they fell into step with each other outside HQ.

"She is sleeping soundly. Boyce has her on pain meds and a sedative while he fixes the damage. It's a little complicated because she has some allergies but you already knew that," Chris said. According to Jim, there wasn't much Spock didn't know since she finds it useless to lie to him. "Can't believe she jumped on me like that."

"I can," Jim's -former- first officer told him. "It is her nature."

"I suppose that's true." Chris smiled. "You know I didn't ask for the Enterprise back, right?"

"I am aware, sir," Spock said before pausing. "May I make a personal query?"

"Sure."

"Do you believe I 'threw her under the bus'?"

"No, Mister Spock. Neither does she, really. Everyone has been waiting for her to screw up since she was a kid. When she made the decision to save Nibiru, she knew it was a risk but she refused to watch as another planet was destroyed. And when she decided to save your life, she was just sticking her neck out for someone she cares about. Lying on the report, while not the worst thing she could've done, opened the door to have all her decisions picked apart. But no, you didn't throw her under the bus or stab her in the back, you did your job."

"That does not alleviate my role in her demotion."

"It doesn't but she's not holding it against you. In fact, she's more upset at herself," Chris said before taking a breath. "Now, you have any idea what Scott found?"

"Only that involves Harrison's jumpship, sir," Spock said. If he didn't know any better, Chris could swear he heard something in Spock's voice.

Since he -literally- had his arms full when the jumpship went down, he didn't find out until later that Spock had been the cause, throwing a phase rifle into one of the turbines. Apparently, the commander got the idea from a stunt Jim pulled on one of the Enterprise's first missions.

Their vastly different reports from Nibiru aside, Jim and Spock were probably the most in sync command team in the fleet. While they didn't agree on everything, they did have this ability to play off each other's strengths and compensate for each other's weaknesses. For most command crews, it could take years to reach that level of understanding and closeness, but they almost seemed destined to serve together. It was another reason why Jim's demotion and Spock's reassignment were such a waste.

"Admiral!" Scott called to him. "I figured out how the bastard got away."

Chris nodded. "Okay, how?"

"This," the engineer held up a piece of gear, "is a portable transwarp beaming device."

"Like your transwarp project?" Chris asked.

"Aye, sir. It's the same formula that I've been working with. Now, according to this thing, he bounced himself to a few places first but his ultimate destination… You're not gonna like it." Scott turned the device so that Chris and Spock could see the panel. Destination: 43 89 26 05

"Is that where I think it is, Mister Spock?" the admiral asked.

"I believe it is, sir," Spock said with a slight nod.

Chris let out a groan. "You're right, Mister Scott. I don't like it."

"You have a moment, sir?" Chris asked as soon as he walked into his mentor's office. There was a meeting going on but Marcus seemed a little more than annoyed with the whole thing. "Harrison's not on Earth anymore. He's on Qo'noS."

"Give us the room," Marcus told the other officers, who scattered in under a minute. "Qo'noS, huh? He defecting?"

"I don't know. According to Spock, he's in the Ketha Province. Used to be farm land, now it's uninhabited, has been for decades. I'm assuming that he knows if we even think about going into Klingon space, we'll have another war on our hands."

"Another war with the Klingons is inevitable. In some ways, it's already begun."

"You still touting that line, Alex?" Chris asked with a smile. Marcus has been prepping for war with the Klingons for as long as Chris has known him. Considering that Alex served under Chris' dad, they've known each other a very long time. They actually came close in 2244 after the scrimmage at Donatu V but it was resolved before either side got too upset.

"Come on, Chris," Marcus said, offering him a seat, "the Klingon Empire has conquered and occupied three planets that we know of and fired on our ships more half a dozen times in the last decade."

"That hardly sounds like a war."

"It's coming. And this whole thing… Your girl was right," Marcus told him. Chris had to stop himself from asking what Marcus meant by that or getting defensive. This isn't the first time someone has referred to her that way, it won't be the last. "What Kirk said about Harrison bombing a library. London was not an archive, it was a top-secret facility for Section Thirty-One."

"Black ops? How the hell did Harrison…? He worked there, didn't he?" Chris asked. It was the obvious answer.

"Yes. The team there was developing advanced defense technology and training select officers to gather intelligence on the Klingons and any other potential enemy who means to do us harm. Harrison was one of our top agents."

"Why did he go rogue?"

"I don't know."

"How much does he know?"

"Enough."

"Is there a plan to catch him?"

"Commander Spock said that the area he's in is uninhabited?" Marcus asked.

"Yes, sir." Chris nodded.

"Okay. As part of our defensive strategy, Thirty-One developed a new photon torpedo." Marcus punched in a command on his console and pulled up a hologram. "Long range and untraceable, it would be invisible to Klingon sensors. I don't want you to get hurt but I do want to take him out. You park on the edge of the Neutral Zone, you lock onto Harrison's position, you fire, you kill him and you haul ass."

"You want me to fire torpedoes at the Klingons?" Chris asked. That didn't even remotely sound right.

"Yes. They can't be traced and the Enterprise is one of the fastest ships in the fleet. Nobody will even know you were there. Go get that son of a bitch, then come home."

"Yes, sir," Chris said. There was nothing else for him to say, really. "Permission to assign Mister Spock as my First Officer while Kirk is in the hospital?"

"Granted," Marcus said. "How she doing?"

"Still unconscious but Phil says everything looks good," Chris said.

"Glad to hear it." The look on Chris' face must've been something because Marcus smiled. "No matter how I may feel about her actions, I don't dislike Kirk."

"Doesn't look that way from where she's sitting."

"She's broke the rules, Chris."

"Anyone can blindly follow rules, not everyone can do the right thing."

"She say that?" Marcus asked.

"No, you did back in forty-six when I almost quit."

When Admiral Straczeskie, one of his father's friends, asked Chris to take the assignment, he never could've imagined almost losing his career in the process. Captain Kamnach, the then-commanding officer of the Aldrin, was a good man and had a reputation as a good commander, however, he started raising some eyebrows at Starfleet Command when it appeared that he was taking the law into his own hands. Chris, a lieutenant commander at the time, was assigned to the Aldrin as the temporary XO for their mission to the Vestian border.

During the mission, Kamnach launched an unprovoked attack on a Vestian vessel, killed over four dozen people and had the official logs altered to provide justification. Seeing no other option, Chris relieved him from duty. However, when they got back to earth, Chris was somehow the one who got charged for mutinying against his captain. Everything was dismissed following a court-martial and Kamnach was forcibly retired but there was a point during the whole thing where Chris considered walking away. Marcus told him that, while he technically broke the rules, he did the right thing.

"She's thinking about leaving Starfleet?" Marcus asked. Chris just nodded. "She's got too much potential to walk away, Chris."

"She's a captain, Alex. Not because the Admiralty gave her the rank, but because that's who she is. That's why I pulled her out of that damn bar. You didn't see the look on her face when I told her that you were taking the Enterprise from her. The way the light in her eyes just disappeared."

"She violated the prime directive and lied on an official report."

"I know. She understands that the way she went about it was wrong but she's not too keen on siting around and being punished for saving lives and I can't say I blame her, especially after what we went through with Vulcan," Chris said, rising from his seat. "I should get a move on. Harrison's not gonna wait around for me."

"Be careful, Chris."

"Yes, sir."