Disclaimer: Star Trek belongs to Paramount, and Abrams, and about a million other people over the years, but never me. I know, I know, I'm sad too.

Author's Note: I know you're reading, even if you're not reviewing. Y'all can't fool me! Those of you that do review, you're awesome, thank you! (I probably PM'ed you in response, if not, I will soon) Special thanks to Jedi Buttercup and SBDGirl88 for responding to my rant last time, and thus sparking the idea for this chapter in Jim's life. We're backtracking this time (I said they'd be out of order, bah).

Brothers

He knows he's staring. His eyes are wide and he can feel his mouth hanging open. He looks ridiculous, like he just got electrocuted. Although in all fairness he did receive the shock of his life. His mother had just informed him that he had a brother. A BROTHER?

"I have a brother?" His voice cracks midway through the last word and he winces. Puberty sucks.

His mom's eyes go sad, the way they always do when she talks about his father. She might be remarried now (to a drunk, abusive, abrasive jerk), but he knows that she still loves his father as much as ever. Fourteen years hasn't dulled the pain for her; she's simply learned how to push it away.

"You did. He was with us on the Kelvin when it..." He watches her struggle. Fourteen years and she still has trouble talking about that day. Nowadays she only tells him the story on his birthday. It annoys him, but he's suddenly beginning to get a new understanding of her pain. ".. when it was destroyed."

"But I thought the colonists got off the ship? Dad saved 800 lives! He was a hero!" He knows this story backwards and forwards. His mom told him the story every time he asked, and when he was younger he asked almost everyday. Then his mom met Frank, got remarried, and he hadn't needed to hear the story about his Dad as often. When his mom rejoined Starfleet she hadn't been around for him to ask, so he'd looked it up on the network. His dad was a hero to Starfleet; there were dozens of papers, accounts and reports about the U.S.S. Kelvin. He'd read them all, devoured the information about the Kelvin's (his dad's), last moments. Not everyone had survived, (there'd been 953 colonists on the ship after all, along with the 200 crew members), but the vast majority had.

His mom nods. "Your brother was supposed to be on Deck 6, along with all the other colony children. I was in labor after all, prematurely I might add." Through the sadness in her eyes he can see a hint of teasing, and he rolls his eyes at the familiar jab. His mom likes to say that his tendency to leap before he looked, rushing into anything and everything, had started in the womb. He had been a month premature, too eager to join the galaxy to wait.

"After the shuttles were rescued, I looked for your brother. I asked everyone I could find. No one could tell me anything. Finally, I found one of the care-givers who'd been watching the children." There's no more teasing in his mom's eyes, just the dark light of endless pain. He wants to tell her to stop, to take away the pain in her eyes, but he holds his tongue. He wants to hear this new part of the story. "Your brother... he was a lot like you. Always rushing off to get into trouble. He knew that his little brother was arriving. He didn't understand how of course. But he knew I was in the Medical Bay, and what it meant. That the little brother he'd been pestering us for was coming.." His mom's voice breaks and she brushes away tears. "He disappeared from the playroom. The caregivers noticed almost right away and sent one of the younger volunteers after him. They assumed he was coming to find me. They hadn't been gone long, maybe 10 minutes, when the Kelvin was attacked. No one ever saw your brother or Carol again. They never showed up at a shuttle."

He feels cold inside, like some part of him has died and isn't coming back. His mom is crying now, but he can't move. "What was his name?" His voice sounds dead even to his own ears.

"George... George Samuel Kirk, Jr." His mom clears her throat, trying to get a hold of herself. She reaches out to him and he pulls away. She flinches.

"Why didn't you tell me? Why tell me now?" His questions are fast and furious. He feels the coldness spreading through his chest, his muscles tightening and he clenches his fists. He realizes dimly that he's angry. Angry in a way he's never been. He's felt anger before; at Frank for being an abusive ass, at Johnny for running off permanently last year and leaving him behind, at his mom for being on deployment for half the year. But he's never felt such a cold, encompassing rage. She'd lied to him.

"At first you were too young to understand. Then when you got older, you looked just like him and it was so hard." Her voice is broken, sad, and he's never heard his mom sound so small before. "When I told you about your dad... how could I tell you about your brother too? You were only five, I couldn't bear to tell you about both." He's not even looking at her anymore, eyes narrowed at the wall. He feels her eyes on his face, but ignores them. "I was going to tell you later, but the time never seemed right. Then I married Frank and you had Johnny. It was hard to watch the two of you; to imagine that it was actually you and George together. But good too. You were so happy to have a big brother, I couldn't ruin it with stories of the big brother you lost." She sighs, exhausted by her emotions. "But now... today. Today should be his eighteenth birthday. He'd be all grown up..." She's crying again.

He's motionless. He knows he should be doing something, hugging her, sharing in her tears for the brother he never got to know, but he can't move. The rage boils in his veins and he thinks that if he moves, he might hit her. For keeping this secret from him; for lying to him for fourteen years. Rage is keeping the pain away, and he embraces it. He turns away from his mom, no, from Winona. "You should have told me."

Oi. Poor Kirk. Review please?

oh, AN2: Still on the hunt for a beta, if anyone's interested.