Disclaimer: SSDD

Warnings: Language and Slashy stuff – mentions of Tarsus.

A/N: Okay first – I'm sorry for cliffhangering you guys – I know you are 'readers and not cliffhangers' … dammit… lol. I didn't mean for you to all get so angsty and DIE…. Gahhhh… and all that shit. Lmao.

I would say more but… *spoilers* and all that crap – so you'll just have to trust me and keep reading…

Okay – BIG note.

I did a little more research and found a NON CANON wiki reference to Kevin Riley that lists his age at the time of the Tarsus IV Massacre as 7. It states that he was born in 2240, which would have made him 18 at the time of the Nero incident, and around 20 in this story, not 17 as I had previously calculated. I had based his age on a reference that he had been 4 years of age at the time of the Tarsus Massacre.

I believe I placed his age at 17 in M.O.I.I., but at the time I thought that I was taking liberties with the time line in that, in order to make him .. sort of.. old enough to be in the story.. if he was a kid genius like Chekov.

Since this story is NOT Canon(duh) and I'm still taking creative liberties with the characters… I am going ahead from this point forward with the wiki dates and placing Kevin's age at the point of the story as 20…ish(say this in a ZQ Sason voice) and 7 in all future references to Tarsus….

Thank you for listening to my incessant rambling…. Sorry for the confusion and the age change mid story. (Somebody remind me to edit the previous chapters when I'm not so tired so it will be consistent)

Enjoy….

T

"What do you mean your resignation?"

"I mean my resignation Bones. The one I wrote more than three months ago, the one that I was just about to send to Admiral Pike when a Temporal Agent showed up in my quarters and started talking to me about fate and destiny and the future of The Federation."

"Temporal what the hell now?"

"He has been ranting and raving since just after you left about Temporal Cold wars and Temporal Accords. It has been extremely overwhelming to say the least."

"But he was barely saying anything when I left, and when I left – he was James."

"Be that as it may, that soon changed. It became clear that as his frustrated explanation of the children's teasing and taunting escalated, he was becoming Jim and not James."

"Wait, what? The kids were teasing him?"

"And calling him a freak."

"But why was James talking about Temporal Cold wars?"

"He was not. Jim was."

"But you said it was James, and the kids… "

"It was, then it changed and it was only Jim."

"Oh for cryin' out loud I don't understand a damn word you are saying. Would somebody please tell me what the hell is going on… In plain English, so that I can understand."

"I would if you two assholes would quit talking to each other and shut up long enough to listen." Jim finally interjected.

"I… uh.. dammit Jim."

"Yeah I know Bones. Look, just sit down and I'll tell you what I can." Jim said waiting for them both to sit down and give him their undivided attention. "Okay so it's like this, there's this Temporal Cold war see, but it's in the future and for some damn reason my quitting Starfleet made everything worse and key races didn't join the Federation and then the Klingons and the Romulans united and kicked our asses or something and that wasn't supposed to happen, so the Federation crumbled and then the Xindi…."

"Woah wait up, what? Who the fuck are the Xindi and what the fuck are you talking about Jim. Klingons hate Romulans and the feeling is mutual and the Federation is fine."

"Well apparently it won't be if I move to Idaho and don't stay here with Spock, and you too I guess, but whatever, and I didn't even get to the part where the Borg found out about Earth and the Federation wasn't here to stop them and they assimilated half the fucking galaxy and somehow this is all my fucking fault for being selfish and wanting some peace and quiet.

So they turned me into a kid so I could have a different perspective. Untainted and untarnished by preconceived adult notions, or some damned bullshit. Like my Destiny could be seen clearer or understood better through the eyes of an unassuming child or I could accept it better if I was just seeing it for what it was and not letting all the other stuff sway my decision or something, I dunno. I don't really remember all the garbage they tried to pound into my head at this point."

"Jim, you are not making much sense. Perhaps it would be better if you were to start at the beginning." Spock suggested.

"Yeah, I'm with him for once. None of what you just said made a damn bit of sense to me. What are Borg and what are they assimilating?"

"Borg are Borg Bones. They assimilate us, or will assimilate us, turn us into machines. In the future I mean, not now."

"These Borg are coming to Earth? Don't we need to warn Starfleet? Are they the ones that took you? Where did they hold you? Good god man, they had you for over three weeks, is that what they did to you? Assimilated you or something?"

"God no. Slow down. The Borg aren't coming. Well they are, but not now. Later, like in a hundred years or something, I dunno. Some dude named Picard is gonna stop them, but only if I stay in Starfleet. Jesus. This is harder to explain than I thought, and I wasn't gone for three weeks. It was more like 3 or 4 days."

"I beg to differ Jim. You were missing for 24.36 days by Earth Standard calendar. That is just over three weeks."

"Yeah but I wasn't here. Look if you go back and analyze the logs from my quarters the day I disappeared you'll find that I wasn't beamed off the ship, and the signature you will find will be a temporal anomaly."

"Dammit Jim I'm a Doctor, not a physicist, are you trying to tell us you got sucked into a black hole?"

"I didn't say a singularity, I said a temporal anomaly or a fluctuation really, the signature will be small and you'll miss it if I don't show you what to look for, but it's there."

"What he is saying Leonard, is that some sort of Temporal Agent, charged with preserving the time line by a Temporal Agency based in the future, transported Jim from his quarters to some other point in space time. Jim was not here, meaning, he was not in the same time and space from whence he was transported."

"Exactly, thank you Spock."

"How the hell did you get that from what he just said?"

"I was also privy to his earlier rants Leonard, in which he spoke of Temporal police preserving the time line."

"Cheater." Bones accused.

"See…Now who's the cheater." Jim chided, waggling his eyebrows suggestively at Spock.

"I did not cheat. I used the information at hand to deduce a logical conclusion. You however, cheated on the Kobyashi Maru."

"Original thinking is not cheating. I possess unique abilities to think far outside the confines of your proverbial and logical box. Deal with it."

"Can you two engage in foreplay some other time, like say when I ain't here to watch? Pointy ears may get what's goin' on here but I sure don't."

"Nor do I Leonard, please Jim, start from the beginning."

"Gahhh…fine… okay, it's like this. You remember that run in we had with the Klingons about 8 months ago?"

"Of course we do, we were on board. That was the last incident that brought on your Tarsus dreams. I told Spock about that."

"Yeah and you remember why it brought on the dreams don't you?"

"How many times do I gotta tell you that it ain't your fault we lost that many people Jim? One of their torpedoes tore a hole in D deck. You couldn't have prevented that."

"You're wrong about that…"

"He is not, there is no maneuver that you could have executed that would have prevented the volley from causing damage to the Enterprise. In fact, given the nature of the assault we were under, it is a miracle that we did not suffer more damage than we did before we were able to target and destroy their weapons arrays."

"Look Spock, I'm not going to give you the standard 'I don't believe in no win scenarios' because that's not what this is about. I know we are lucky we didn't suffer more damage than we did. Just as I know that we are lucky we didn't lose more people than we did, but that doesn't help the situation."

"Which is what?" Leonard asked when Jim just stood there for a minute.

"Which is the fact that I'm a fucking jinx, or bad news, or just the worst Captain in the history of the universe and I am responsible, it is my fault, all of it is my fault, and I'm not just talking about that time, or those deaths, I'm talking about all of them."

"Okay, not to sound like an ass or anything Jim, because I know you are trying to explain, but you are doing that thing again. You know the one you used to do at the academy, so I ask you… What the fuck are you talking about? This time go slowly, put all the thoughts that are in your head out in the air where everyone can hear them with your words Jim, remember? Use your words."

"I am not doing 'the thing', why do you always accuse me of doing 'the thing' when I'm not?"

"I don't. I only accuse you of doing 'the thing' when you are actually doing 'the thing', which you are."

"Am not."

"Are too."

"Am not."

"Are too… Spock, tell him he's doing 'the thing', he'll listen to you."

"I would love to oblige you Leonard, but I have no idea to what you are referring, and your verbal sparring is likened to the banter that Jim and I were exchanging earlier when you accused us of engaging in foreplay."

"Hahahaha BURN…"

"He was burning you too asshole. Okay here's the deal. When Jim gets frustrated with something, I mean really frustrated, and tries to explain it, it comes out all jumbled. His mind goes about three or four hundred percent faster than his mouth does and something gets lost in the translation. He THINKS he's telling you everything, because it's all up here," Leonard explained, thumping on the side if Jim's skull with his forefinger, "but what he doesn't realize is that all that stuff up there, isn't actually coming out of his mouth. He's doing that now."

"Taking your explanation into consideration, along with the fact that Jim is making little sense, I would have to conclude that you are correct in your accusation that he is indeed doing 'the thing', and is not aware."

"Thanks, love you too." Jim said wryly.

"Don't be an ass. Concede and use your words. How is that incident, or any other death your fault?"

"Because I am… because I WAS the Captain, Bones. Because I was the Captain, their Captain, I was responsible for their lives and their wellbeing. Therefore, it was also my responsibility to keep them alive and I didn't. I didn't and so the responsibility for their deaths also lies on me, which makes it my fault. I was the one in charge. I should have done something differently, I should have prevented it, I should have, stopped it, I should have made sure they were safe, I should have tried harder, I should have… I should have hidden them better, I should have made sure they stayed together… I should have made sure she ran out the back and not the front…I shouldn't have fallen asleep on watch… I should…"

Bones stopped Jim's pacing and the frantic ranting right there and took ahold of Jim firmly. He hugged the man fiercely to him and shot Spock a pointed look, then let Jim out of his embrace only slightly. He held tight to his shoulders, breaking his grip only long enough to grab the other man's jaw and force Jim to look him in the eye.

"Now you listen to me James Tiberius Kirk, you are the damned finest Captain in the fleet. The damned finest Captain in Starfleeet's history, and I will not have you blaming the deaths of random crew members that couldn't be prevented on yourself, just because you are still blaming yourself for the kids that died on Tarsus. Tarusus wasn't your fault either. Are you understanding me?" Leonard nearly yelled at his friend before turning to the Vulcan. "Call Kevin."

"No. Do not call Kevin. This doesn't concern him and he cannot, I repeat, cannot know that I'm here, or that I've taken over or that I even can take over. Spock I swear to God if you take one step toward that comm I will leave and I might not come back, and James isn't going to explain anything else to you, I won't let him." Jim threatened causing Spock to stop short in his tracks.

"Jim you are confusing Tarsus, with the deaths of the Enterprise crew members. This does involve Kevin, and you can't keep this from him. He's your family, just as much as we are, and he needs to know what's going on here. He can help."

"No he can't. He can't help Bones, and neither can you, and neither can Spock. Nobody can help. I'm a fucking failure. I've always been a fucking failure. My own mother couldn't even love me. I don't deserve to be Captain, not of the Enterprise, not of anything."

"Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor, not a psychologist, but I've been down this road with you more than once and I know one thing for sure, I can't do this alone. I need Kevin here, even if you don't."

It was a lie. At least it was sort of a lie, but Leonard knew that Jim needed Kevin, hell he needed Dr. Borja, his psychiatrist back home on Earth, but that wasn't possible right now, and Kevin was the only other person who was privy to Jim's psychosis, his self-doubt and self-blame. He and Kevin had been to enough joint counseling sessions to know exactly what was going through Jim's head and how to handle it, but Leonard hadn't been there, on Tarsus IV, and Jim would never accept that the loss of life there was not his fault from Leonard. He only accepted that from Kevin, or Tom Leighton, sometimes Eric Molson, but Molson didn't like to get involved. He was older when everything happened and hadn't been with Jim's group like Kevin and Tommy were.

Somehow they got Jim to relent and Spock went to retrieve Kevin personally because Jim insisted that they ensure that no one else know that Kevin was needed. He didn't want anyone else to even hear about it and get concerned about James. If they did they might stop by to check on things and he wasn't about to deal with that. By the time Spock and Kevin got back, Kevin knew what was going on, Spock having discreetly filled him in on their way to his quarters.

"Jim are you nuts?" was the first thing out of Kevin's mouth.

"Hi, nice to see you too."

"Shut up. I'm serious."

"So am I dickweed. I haven't seen you in nearly four months and the first thing you do is insult me."

"You see me every fucking day."

"No James sees you every fucking day."

"Same thing. He told Spock you were one and the same."

"Semantics."

"Can we get back to the subject? Are you nuts? You can't quit! And what's with the fucking blame game again? How many times do we have to go down this road bro?"

"Damn it Kev, you know how I feel about all that shit."

"Yeah and you know how I feel about it so knock it the fuck off."

"What the hell do you know about it? You were a baby."

"I was seven Jim. I was seven and that might be young, but I watched my whole family get murdered in right front of me. I watched my friends die. I watched hundreds of people die Jim, and that was after starving for weeks. A kid tends to grow up real fast when faced with that kind of crap. You hearing what I'm saying Jimmy? If it hadn't been for you, I'd be dead too, and so would Tommy. Eric Molson was down there, he knows what it was like. He was my age when Kodos executed everyone and he spent those weeks running from the soldiers too. He was my age and had a hard time keeping himself alive. You kept us all alive Jimmy, for a really long time.

Gerald and his group, they had a choice Jimmy. I know there were five of them that left with Gerald, but you explained to each and every one of them why they shouldn't go with him and why he was wrong about the food storage facility. You told them Jimmy, you told them that he was wrong and that the place was crawling with Kodos' soldiers and dogs and that they'd never get near it. They went anyway. If they'd stayed with you, they'd have lived and you know it. Them getting slaughtered, that was their fault for not listening to you Jimmy. Just because Gerald was older, didn't make him right.

Sarah, panicked, that wasn't your fault. Eddie wandered off. He didn't stay with the group. You told him not to wander, to pay attention. Alexandra was supposed to be watching from the rear, it was her fault he wandered off Jimmy, not yours.

As for Alexandra, you'd been awake for three days straight Jimmy. You shouldn't have been on watch at all that night. It was her turn. It was her turn. She should have been standing watch, you were too tired and she knew it, but she didn't care Jimmy. She was too wrapped up in her depression to care.

I'm sorry she's dead, but you killed the fucking prick that snuck into camp and tried to rape her. Tried Jimmy, not succeeded. You stopped him, remember? Alexandra had other issues. Lots and lots of other issues, not the least of which was living with the guilt that she watched her own twin sister die in her arms. She killed herself because of those issues Jimmy, not because some guy snuck into camp when you dosed off.

You didn't kill her, and you couldn't have stopped her.

Annalee lived, Nikolai lived, and if they'd been assigned to the Enterprise and not the Farragut, they'd still be alive today. Nero killed them.

Torvald is still out there somewhere. I know we haven't heard from him in a while, but you saved him too Jimmy. You saved him too. You gotta get it through your fuckin' thick skull Jimmy. You are a god damned hero, not a failure. You were never a failure. Your mom can suck it and go to hell. God dammit. Do I need to call Sam?"

"No! Jesus, no. The last thing I need right now is Sam on my case too. You three and the fucking Time Police are plenty thanks."

"Then quit being a dolt. Look Jim, when you sign up for the academy Starfleet explains to you how dangerous working in space is. Even if you are a scientist, there's no such thing as completely peaceful exploration. There are too many variables and unknowns, too many uncontrollable and unforeseeable elements. Cadets sign waivers before they ever step foot in space. We all know the risks. Our jobs are dangerous by nature, people are going to die. It's unavoidable. They die on other ships too, it's a fact and it's no one's fault, and no one is blaming you."

"Oh yeah. No one is blaming me huh? Gimme that data PADD back Bones."

"You mean this one, with your resignation on it? No way. You're never getting this back. Not until Spock can break the encryption code and erase the damn thing."

"Ha, good luck with that. Just gimme it, I'll give it back I swear." Jim said yanking it out of Bones' hands. He quickly scrolled through some other data and then shoved it back at Bones with a 'so there' look on his face.

"What's this?"

"Those are the recruiting quotas, throughout Starfleet, for the six months prior to my writing that resignation. Go ahead you know-it-all assholes. Read it."

Spock, Leonard and Kevin all read the reports, looked back and forth at each other and Jim. Finally they all spoke at once.

"Jim this proves nothing." / "This is bullshit. These numbers have to be wrong." / "This is just a coincidence, so what if the other ships numbers are higher."

"A – it proves everything. B – I checked and rechecked that data and then had Pike recheck it, the numbers are beyond accurate. And C – it's not a coincidence and the other ship's numbers aren't just higher Kevin, they HAVE recruits, we don't. I don't. None. Not one. What I do have are people from Communications and Engineering transferring OFF my ship at an alarming rate. It seems word has gotten around the Federation that the name James T. Kirk is synonymous with red-shirted Ensigns dying all over the damned universe."

"Do not exaggerate Jim."

"I'm not exaggerating Spock," Jim said touching the screen to bring up another report and show him the transfer request data during the same time period.

"Yeah but I'm with Kevin, it's just coincidence Jim."

"Is it Bones? Is it really? Check same data for the last three months then. See what's happened since Spock has been Captain."

"Oh come on Jim, so we've had a couple recruits in the last month or so. So what, a fresh group of cadets just graduated." Kevin declared.

"We had more than a couple. Twenty new recruits and no transfers since Spock took command Kevin. That's twenty more recruits than in the previous six months, and ten more than in the six months prior to that. As for transfers, as I said, there were none. Thirty people put in requests for transfer in the six months prior to Spock taking command, thirty. When your crew compliment hovers around 400, thirty is a lot for one fucking department."

"Technically Communications and Engineering are two different departments."

"Don't start with me Spock. You know damn well what I'm trying to say, and before any of you start in on the red-shirted ensign crap. It's true. Ask around. I did a lot of digging. I created fake online profiles and went into academy chat rooms as a lurker. It's all true. You want the chat transcripts? I'll show 'em to you."

"Oh come on Jim, that's just talk, conjecture."

"You're point being? They're still scared of me Bones. How do you think that makes me feel, conjecture or not, that's what they are saying and that's what is keeping them from wanting to serve on the Enterprise. This is the Federation's Flagship, the finest ship in the fleet. They should be jumping at the chance to serve on this ship, instead they are running the other direction as fast as they can, and it's all because of me."

"Then why is it so important to the preservation of the time line that you remain in the Captaincy Jim? You said yourself that a Temporal Agent prevented you from sending your resignation to Admiral Pike, and then somehow transformed your conscious mind so that you could view things from the perspective of a child, without the predisposed prejudices of adulthood, in order for you to understand how important your role as Captain is and will be, so that you could more readily accept your destiny and return to the Captaincy."

"When the hell did he say that?"

"I said it before, see, HE listens to me."

"I was listening too and I didn't get any of that."

"He made statements to the effect, which I was able to derive my conclusion, during his earlier explanations."

"Did not."

"Yes, he did. Had he not, I would not have been able to summarize his statements nor my conclusions."

"When?"

"Towards the beginning he explained that his resignation was not sent to Admiral Pike due to the arrival of a Temporal Agent in his quarters, who then explained to him that it was his destiny to remain as the Captain of the Enterprise. It was after our discussion that he explained their reasoning for giving him the outlook of a child."

"I remember the resignation stuff, but was the other stuff before or after the Borg stuff?"

"After the initial mentioning of assimilation, but before the comment that 'Borg are Borg' I believe."

"Okay, okay, I think I remember now, it's just all so confusing. I don't know how you keep it strait."

"He has an eidetic memory, a very logical, eidetic memory." Jim explained proudly.

"You do?"

"Not completely eidetic no, but it is very close yes."

"What are Borg?" Kevin asked.

"Don't ask." / "Do not ask."

"Okay, I get that you are blaming yourself for a lot of shit that you shouldn't be blaming yourself for. We'll work on that. You still can't quit. Apparently you said it yourself. You are too important to the future of the Federation Jim. Why don't we start there. Start with the Temporal Agent and tell us what he said and what happened there."

"Fine, we'll start there. Everybody sit down, this is going to take a while."

A/N: Yeah I know. I sort of cliffied you again. The explanation is long and hard. I'm almost done – but I wanted this much up now so you wouldn't have to wait as long. I'll hurry as fast as I can. I promise.