Next Chapter. Enjoy!
4.
There was a loud thump from the dorm next door. Lacey grunted at the sound, squeezing her already closed eyes together. Oh god, Mary starting it up again. Mary has tried, year after year to master the art of yoga. But she had the worst balance. Ever. It was pretty pathetic.
Lacey sighed and nuzzled into her warm bed. It was a lot comfortable than it normally was. But her head had a dull thump that sounded every once in a while. She let her hand slide over the sheets. They were softer than normal. Usually they were slightly scratchy and soft at the same time- Academy issued sheets and what not but today they were nice. She brought her hand back up to its original position and the mattress trembled.
Lacey opened her eyes quickly and her vision was filled with a tanned, skin tone mass in front of her. It was a chest. It was a man's chest.
"Holy shit," she whisper-yelled and tried to get up but she was pinned to the chest by the man's arm, which had an incredibly strong grasp on her person.
In an instant Lacey went into panic mode. They had won the pool game against dumb ass 1 and 2 and definitely milked their winnings by drinking more than planned. She had a fuzzy recollection of what had happened and she definitely did not remember going home with some stranger from a civilian bar. Oh gosh how did she get back to the Academy in this state? Was this man a civilian? She was positive that even in a somewhat drunken state she was more responsible than this. She had a firm policy against not sleeping with strangers.
God she's only had sex like three times in her twenty some odd years life. Now she could add sex with a complete strangers to her list of not so amazing achievements.
She winced. Moment of truth. Oh dear this is going to be awkward. She looked up slowly and saw Jim's sleeping face on one of her pillows. Lacey let out a deep sigh of relief and closed her eyes resting her throbbing head on his chest. Now that the adrenaline of the morning was over, her hangover was being known. It wasn't bad but her hangovers were never that bad.
Her head lifted off her chest and she nudged him with her forhead, "Jim, Jim, get up."
He groaned and twisted them over. Lacey gasped as her head hit the second pillow and Jim started using Lacey as a pillow. His nose brushed her clavicle and her face burned. He was so freaking close to her cleavage.
"Jim?" Lacey asked breathlessly.
"Last night was amazing," Jim said, his voice thick with sleep, "We definitely have to do that again."
"Yeah, last night was fun," Lacey said "But I don't know if I want to do that again."
"But you had such good flexibility," Jim protested, "You were my best so far."
"What?" Lacey asked. Her eyebrows furrowed then she chuckled. Was this his rehearsed wake up next to a stranger routine? Was this what all those 'lucky' ladies woke up to after his conquests?
"Jim, do you know who this is?" Lacey asked with a smirk.
"Of course," Jim said still half asleep and most likely hung over, "I don't forget my best."
Lacey burst out in fits of laughter. Jim woke up with a start, looking down at Lacey laughing and letting out little snorts here and there.
"You are so stupid," Lacey said in between laughs, "I can't believe THAT is what all of your woman have to look forward to when you wake up."
"Shut up, Lace, my head hearts," Jim groaned going back to using her as a pillow.
"Why the hell aren't you wearing a shirt?" Lacey asked.
"I don't know sometime in the night the Starfleet pin got all pokey and I had to take it off," Jim mumbled.
"You couldn't have just taken off the pin," Lacey said in a flat voice.
Jim rose his head to star at her in disbelief, "I'm barely coherent when I'm sleeping and I was drinking right before. You can't expect me to take off a pin in my strange mind of half consciousness."
"Can't expect you to command a ship either, huh?" Lacey said with a raised eyebrow.
"Low blow," Jim muttered assuming his original position on her chest.
Lacey brought her hand up to pet Jim's head.
"I am not a cat," Jim said but Lacey felt his smile when she started scratching his scalp.
"Oh," Lacey said when she felt him burrow his nose deeper into the hollow of her throat, "I think you like it."
Jim grabbed her wrists and pinned them next to her head. He stared down at her with a shit eating grin. Lacey smirked back up at him. Her heart was beating wildly.
"Hi," Lacey said with a small smile.
"Hello," Jim responded with his own bright grin.
Now she understood why all those girls didn't get all pissed off when they heard Jim's hangover filled morning greeting. James T. Kirk was quite the charmer and quite the looker in the morning. But Lacey shook these blasphemous thoughts out of her head. Friendship she thought. Unpaved terrain. She'd be giving up if she succumbed to whatever non platonic thought she harbored for her friend.
"So," Lacey said with her own shit eating grin, "I was your best huh?"
"Shut up," Jim protested.
"Never forget the name of your best huh?" Lacey teased trying to free her arms.
Jim immediately let go of her wrist to tickle her sides. She squealed and immediately begin to try and fight him off. He was resilient dodging her attempts to free herself. She was saved by the swift knock at her door.
Both froze and Lacey took the opportunity to knock Jim off of her and he fell on the floor in the space between her bed and the wall.
"Stay down Jim," Lacey said pointing at him.
"Why?" Jim asked poking his head and crossing his arms on the top of the mattress.
"Because," Lacey insisted staring at him intently, "I don't want anyone coming to assumptions about this."
Lacey fixed the strap of her bra and dress placing back onto her shoulder while straightening her dress skirt with her other hands.
"Who would do that?" Jim asked.
Lacey stopped fidgeting and stared at him with a disbelieving look, "Really?" Jim continued look at her blankly. "Just get down, Jim."
She turned to answer the door and Anna walked in.
"You look like you had a good time," Anna said looking her roommate up and down.
Lacey blushed and went back to fixing her dress and hair. Jim popped his head up yet again to get back on Lacey's bed. Anna widened her eyes at this and looked at Lacey fixing her wrinkled self. A large smirk started to form on the pretty Betazoid's face.
"My, my, my, did it finally happen?" Anna said slowly with a raised eyebrow, "Did innocent little Lacey finally succumb to her desires?"
"First off, nothing happened," Lacey said raising a finger, counting off her reasons, "Secondly, what? Thirdly, why do you assume that it was me who succumbed to desires? And lastly, where is your door pass?"
"So did you succumb?" Anna asked both girls ignoring Jim's smirk from Lacey's bed.
"Stop saying succumb," Lacey said putting her hands on her ears, "It's now the second worst word ever, ugh."
"Second, what's the first?" Anna asked sidetracked for a second.
"Moist," Jim answered.
Anna turned to him as if just remembering he was there. She stared at him with an appraising look as she raked her eyes down her body.
"Ain't that cute," Anna said, "He knows all about your weird little squeamish tendencies."
Lacey groaned and blushed. Then the day just got five times better when Nyota came rushing into her dorm, through the door Lacey forgot to close.
"Lacey," she rushed, fully dressed-prim and proper as always.
She looked so excited and mischievous then her dark eyes landed on Jim's half naked form stretched across HER bed. Her eyes widened.
Her eyes widened.
"You did not," Nyota said looking between her blonde best friend and the arrogant playboy, "Lace...please tell me you didn't."
Lacey huffed through her awful blush and embarrassment, "Why do you both think I was the one to initiate all this? And why do you think I would agree? Guys, seriously, do you know me at all?"
"Yeah, Lacey's too much of a goody two shoes," Jim said with a nod.
"Can it Jim," Lacey said, "What's up Nyota?"
Nyota fixed her stare on Lacey, "Well, looks like your turn on the Kobayashi Maru is on Monday."
Lacey paled, "Fantastic."
...
"Lacey," Jim said stopping her outside the testing chamber, "I want you to try and pass this damn thing."
"But," Lacey protested, "I don't want to be a commander. I was just going to scratch."
"No, Lace," Jim insisted, "You've got a creative mind maybe you'll be able to figure it out. But at least try and pass it. Show these guys that this test is passable."
"But you could retake it," Lacey said, "You could show them that the test is passable."
"I took this test twice already," Jim said with a sigh, "It isn't even about me passing it anymore, "It's about passing it in general."
Lacey rolled her eyes, "Jim you've been though more of the classes than I have, if you can't pass it, I can't. The only reason I'm doing this is because some fuddy duddy Admiral thought I had 'potential'."
"Still," Jim said, "Try Lacey. I'm rooting for you."
"Thanks," Lacey said with another eye roll.
Lacey sat in a commander's chair staring at her 'crew'. It was made up of people she didn't know. When they asked if she had any special request she said she didn't care. However, unlike others might have done with unlimited amounts of sass, Lacey could not do that to her superiors. She was too respectful.
"Um," Lacey said staring at the blackness and the specks in front of her.
The Klingon warships. Then she saw of on the side was the Kobayashi Maru ship. The freaking ship past the freaking neutral zone line in the area of hostility. What the hell did that ship do to land itself there? She rubbed her forehead brushing past a couple of curls that had escaped her usual braid.
"What are the level of the shields?" Lacey asked.
"We're at 6% and dropping and they're at full percentage," one of her crewmen stated.
Lacey stared at that accursed ship, the Kobayashi Maru. There was no way to win in this scenario. No way at all. If she went to get the ship, she would cross the Klingon Neutral Zone and that would definitely start a war of some kind and both her ship and the Kobayashi Maru would be destroyed. There was no way to win. It was most likely that the Kobayashi ship would go down and so would hers.
She bit her lip. As captain of her ship, her priority was her crewman. Lacey scanned the nameless faces working her ship and felt some kind of camaraderie with these people that she had never met before.
In a real life situation, which was what this test was supposed to simulate, it was her ship over theirs.
"We need to retreat," Lacey whispered standing up from her chair.
"What?" one of the men sitting at the controls said turning towards her with a look of shock, "You want to abandon the Kobayashi Maru?"
"We have to," Lacey said rubbing her forehead, "Warp speed away from the Neutral Territory."
The crew looked confused but followed her orders exactly. Lacey sat back down and sighed as the lights for the simulation turned back on to regular lighting of the Academy classes.
Admiral whats-his-face poked out through the door that had just opened with a swish, "Cadet Archer, can we talk in my office?"
Some of her 'crewmen' gave her sympathetic looks as she left, "Thank you for being my crewmen. It was lovely commanding you! Hope to see y'all again soon."
She bowed before arranging her face in a worried expression as she followed the old, retired admiral's retreating figure to his office. In his office he sat down slowly but she wasn't looking, she was staring intently at her Academy regulated black boots.
"Cadet Archer, I am here to tell you that you failed the Kobayashi Maru simulation," the Admiral informed her.
Lacey looked up and nodded, "No one has ever passed have they."
"No," the admiral said with a wry smile, "But no one and I mean no one has ever retreated and abandoned the ship."
Lacey licked her lips, "I thought it was the only solution."
"Why, dear?" the admiral said, truly puzzled.
"I saw the situation as a no win scenario, someone or both were going to die," Lacey explained using her hands to gesticulate her words further, something she did when she was extremely nervous and the stare of disbelief the old admiral was giving her made her extremely nervous, "So as commander and the holder of responsibility of my crewman and ship. And those crewman and ship are my number one priority."
"What about your fellow cadets, officers and commanders?" the admiral said, "What about them?"
Lacey froze before composed herself quickly, "My father died on the USS Radon, you know."
Her eyes drifted downwards again staring intently at the scuffing on her left toe, "The ship was abandoned in deep space. The crew was going crazy wondering why no other ship was going to their rescue. But their commander, Captain Pleater, told them that just like every other commander the crew meant the most. He told them if places were reversed he would have the lives of his crew held on the highest priority, above everyone else's."
"Yes I remember viewing the footage that was placed in one of the escape pods before the explosion," the admiral said with a sad shake of his head.
"Then you saw the reaction the crewmen had," Lacey said staring at the admiral. The tables were turned now, "They were about to go into mutiny before Captain Pleater went into the most famous motivational speech we study in Intergalactic History of Travel. This made the crew realize the bonds formed between the commander and the crewmen were strong. And those bonds were the same amongst all the star ships in Star Fleet."
"My daddy always said, since what happened on the USS Kelvin, crew comes first and the commander would sacrifice everything for his crew," Lacey said her eyes welling up slightly, "No matter the consequences of death or extreme guilty feelings or whatever. And that's what I thought about during that simulation. Even though I don't know any of those people there, and I went to school
with them for two years, they were my crew and as seemingly selfish as it seemed, those people were my priority."
The admiral stared at her and Lacey held her breath waiting for the verbal slap she would receive.
Your selfish.
Your impossible.
That is the worst solution for this simulation he had ever seen.
Even though she didn't want to be a commander or a captain or an admiral, it was ingrained in her brain that failure was not something to accept lightly. Her mother, ever since her father's death, it had been civilian school, Star Fleet then her way onto a starship. Preferably the new starship they were building. At least that's what she was ordered by her mother through her weekly communications via screen conversations.
"I think you would make a wonderful captain," the old admiral told her with a warm smile, "A secret you are not allowed to share. Even with the young Cadet Kirk."
Lacey stared at him in shock.
"This test has no winning scenario, like you said. It is a test to show how a captain would react in a no-win situation. You showed a creative insight like we have not yet seen at the Academy. Everyone tries to be heroic and save the other ship, they forget about their own crew," the Admiral sighed, "I think it's because not everyone knows their crew as intimately as seasoned captains, or how I knew mine. I told that to the creator of the test but he said it was illogical."
Lacey nodded, "You see that is why I don't think I will make a good captain. I am not selfless, I would not be able to live with myself if I was forced to choose in that situation. I am a follower and I readily admit it. Others are born leaders, I am not."
Never in her life had Lacey taken lead. Her life was guided by her mother's hand and her dead father's memory. At school she followed her more exuberant friends lead in situations and Jim's suggestions unless it is something stupid like streaking in the park.
Even though Lacey hadn't chosen to follow a medical path at Star Fleet, she had grown to be accustomed to the way of a nurse. She liked it, looked forward to being a nurse in a starship even.
"I've made my decision to be a nurse," Lacey said with a smile.
The admiral nodded and she left the office.