Traps
Kirk and Chekov fled down the halls, firing their weapons back at the approaching enemies as best they could as they went. They slid down a few walls along the way, getting to areas where the ship wasn't level, just trying to keep ahead of the enemies and out of range from their own blasts.
Kirk didn't even realize he'd led them to the engine room until they burst through the doors into it and fell to the side for some cover. He panted, looking over at Chekov a moment, asking, "You alright?" before his attention was pulled to the room itself.
A pit formed in his stomach as he looked around at the rest of the space. It was just…ruined, and there was so much destruction he didn't think he'd be able to find Victoria if she even was there, not from a glance, not without digging through the rubble. He didn't know what he'd been expecting though, given the state the ship was in from just the outside.
"Aye, Captain," Chekov spoke, "But we are trapped!"
Kirk shook his head, trying to focus, trying to keep his hopes alive that Victoria had escaped before the attack and, as terrible as it was to hope, that she had been captured with the rest of the crew. He didn't want any of the crew held hostage, but it would mean they were at least alive.
Now he just had to make sure he and Chekov stayed alive, too.
He moved to the door, leaning over to peek around the edge of it, only to jerk back when the enemy, at the end of the hall, fired at him. He looked around the room frantically for anything that could help, his mind racing with every detail or complaint Victoria had ever made bout the engine room, "Can you get this thing started?"
Chekov glanced at him, his eyes wide as he tried to work out Kirk's plan based on the lessons Scotty and Victoria had been giving him over the years as they worked to make members of the crew more familiar with other areas of the ship, "Are you intimating that we should engage the thrusters?"
"I am open to other suggestions!"
Chekov flinched when another enemy blast flew through the door, "Ok," he muttered, turning to scramble up, to one of the control panels nearby and tapping on it frantically, Kirk guarding his back and the door as he worked, "There is a problem."
"What?" Kirk called back to him, not about to take his eye off the doorway yet.
"The fuel is primed but I cannot get it to combust…" Chekov began, but Kirk suddenly spun and aimed his phaser down at the fuel cell, "Oy, Captain!" Chekov grabbed his arm, "We are basically standing on a very large bomb. If you miss the combustion compressor..."
"I'm not gonna miss," Kirk insisted, trying to fire again, not having time to waste arguing, but Chekov wouldn't let go, "Come on."
"Do you even know what the combustion compressor looks like?" Chekov gave him a look.
"It's square, right?" he asked, and fired down at the general area.
"No, sir…" Chekov tried to tell him, but was too late, "It's round."
Kirk would have smirked and laughed at how easily riled up Chekov was. Of course he knew the combustion compressor was round. His girlfriend was the top Engineer of the ship. He couldn't begin to count the number of nights they were both up late, talking in bed, her with papers and reports and updates about the various parts of the ship she examined every week. He said what he had just to get to Chekov.
"That's what I said," Kirk murmured, watching as the blast hit the compressor and sparked it. His eyes widened when a massive fireball began to flare up and head right for them, "Run!" he grabbed Chekov by the arm and dragged him away, out the door and turning down a hall, ducking under the blasts that shot at them, trying to get away from the inferno behind them.
They flinched back when they reached a crack in the floor, more of their enemies below, firing up at them, Kalara appearing behind them and attacking them from the back.
"Go!" Kirk shouted, shoving Chekov on, pushing him to jump across the crack in the floor, risking their enemies, to get away. He turned, firing at Kalara to distract her long enough for himself to follow, but the woman wouldn't be deterred, following after them.
He nearly stumbled when the ship finally began to move, the thrusters hefting the ship up more and more, causing them the halls to slant as they ran.
They managed to make it back to the Bridge, Kirk heading right for the window, "Chekov!" he called to the man as he tried to guard his back, knowing Kalara was right behind them. He kept blasting the enforced glass, Chekov rushing to help him until they could crack it enough to smash it. They hurried for it, jumping through, and immediately began to slide down the edge of the ship. The thrusters kept on, lifting the ship in just the right direction to keep their momentum going on their way down.
But they weren't alone, Kalara and her minions had caught up to them and were racing down after them.
Kirk grit his teeth and rolled onto his stomach, doing his best to fire at them as they went, until they were near enough to the ground to jump down to it, the ship now vertical and it was clear to them both what direction the thrusters would have it topple over to. He grabbed Chekov's arm and yanked him to the side, urging, "Chekov, move!" as the two of them ran along the side of the ship, just narrowly managing to get to the edge of it and jump moments before it flipped over completely and fell right on top of Kalara and the others, crushing them.
They were thrown even farther to the side by parts of the ship exploding, the force of it sending them flying among the rocks and the dirt, but at least they were alive.
Kirk let out a long breath and let his head fall back to the ground, just taking a moment to get his breath.
For the moment, he was almost relieved Victoria wasn't there, she'd probably have killed him for that.
~8~
"Lassie?" Scotty called as he moved through Jaylah's ship, trying to find his wayward crew member. Jaylah had been fixing something on the Bridge and Victoria had asked for permission to go check the woman's engines, just to see if the ship could even fly as Jaylah wished it to.
It had been a while now.
He'd been trying to give her some space since she'd seemed a little quieter and pale and he thought maybe she just needed a moment alone…but he was growing a little worried when she failed to return.
"Over here, Scotty!" she called from somewhere around a large piece of equipment.
He stepped around it and nearly had a heart attack, seeing her working on part of the engine on her own. Now, that wasn't uncommon, there were things that could be done in the engine room by oneself, but given how complex the engines could be and how old this ship was, he would have felt better if she had asked for his help.
"Lassie, what…" he hurried over, just as she finished repairing a few wires and put a panel back on.
"It's fine," she waved off his concern and moved to another section of the engine room.
"Lass," he sighed, "You shoulda told me you were planning to work on the engine, I'd've helped."
"It's fine," she repeated, "I'm fine. I was just…" she took a breath and let it out long, "Fixing things."
Scotty eyed her a moment as she just began working on the next task, absently observing her methods, the tools she reached for, a small quirk at the corner of his lips, "You know, I could never do what you do."
She glanced at him, giving him a look, "I've seen you fix things and jerry rig up things more complicated than this," she reminded him.
"No, no, I mean…" he gave her a smile, "You're Liaison to the Bridge, because of everything you know and everything you know how to do and explain. Now, I'm a fair hand at the engines and fixing things here and there, but you?" he shook his head, "You knew every square inch of that ship, how it was built, everything that went into it, construction, blue prints, integrity, on top of everything else about the engines and engineering to boot. Lass," he gave a gentle scoff, "You're amazing."
"There are other Liaisons out there," Victoria said simply, "They can do what I do just as well."
Scotty eyed the way her hands moved as she used the tools, noting how she swapped a few for something a bit easier to maneuver, or used another tool when one was missing that she should have used, "How long HAVE you been in Engineering?" he wondered, something he had, oddly, never asked her before.
"Same as everyone else," she shrugged, "I went to the Academy for it, majored in it."
"No," he shook his head, nodding at what she was doing when she looked at him, "You don't handle repairs and tools like that if you've only learned it at school."
It was something he hadn't really paid much mind to before now, now that he thought about it. She was mostly on the Bridge, in the Engine room to help assist him or to conduct reviews of everything for quality assurances and so on. The Enterprise is…er, was…in quite good condition, being relatively new to the Fleet, there wasn't much broken that needed extensive repairs, and if something did need it, he could usually handle it well enough. He'd file a report about it, fix it, and…well, Victoria would be the one to assess it and ensure it was in working order.
He knew she knew how to fix things, she wouldn't have worked her way through engineering to her position without knowing how to make repairs, but seeing her do it was something new.
Victoria shrugged again, "A while."
"Since you were a kid?" he guessed with a laugh, "Aye, me too. I liked making new things, improvements, adaptions."
"I just wanted to know how they worked," Victoria remarked, still focused on the repairs, "If you know how something works, you can fix it when it stops working."
His smile slowly faded, hearing more of a melancholy tone to her voice and he knew, without her needing to say it, that it was about her parents. Once he found out she was the daughter of Captain Pike, a very well-known man in the Fleet, it wasn't hard to work out more about her. He knew Captain Pike and his wife had divorced a very long time ago, that the man raised his daughter, and he had a long legacy with the Fleet.
He could imagine a child where her parents divorced, wondering what she could do to fix it, wanting to know how things work so she can fix it.
"Doesn't always work though," Victoria sighed, even as the item she was fixing began to light up, working functionally again.
"No, I don't suppose it does," Scotty remarked, looking at her again, "If only everything was as simple as a warp drive."
He beamed when that earned a small laugh from her.
"Are you ok, Lassie?" he asked, and he knew she would understand that he wasn't asking about the crash or the attack or all that had happened in the last few hours, but something more. They had worked side by side for years now, he liked to think they were friends at this point.
She let out a long breath, reaching up to push a strand of hair behind her ear from where it fell out of the messy bun she'd pulled it into, feeling a little overwhelmed. It was one thing to talk to Kirk about this but…if there was one thing she'd learned over the years with the Fleet, it was to understand all points and just talking to him about her concerns, when he felt mostly the same as her, might not help her get perspective. Because what she and Kirk had been talking about before in Yorktown was bigger than both of them, it would impact the entire crew.
"I just…" she began, trying to make sense of what was going on in her head, "I was always supposed to be in the Fleet, on a crew, you know? From before I was born even. And now I am and I just…"
"Want to pick your own future?" Scotty guessed when she hesitated.
"I guess," she shrugged, "I just want the chance to decide for myself if I want to be in the Fleet or do something else."
Scotty tilted his head, his brow furrowed slightly, "No, that's not it."
Victoria looked over at him, "What?"
"Well," he shrugged easily, "It's just, you HAVE chosen the Fleet, the crew, a career in engineering, a few times now. You could have left but, you're still here."
"I couldn't do that to my dad after everything," she defended.
"It's a 5 year mission, Lassie," he reminded her gently, "Forgive me saying but…I cannae think of anyone who would stick out five years in deep space in something they were already unhappy in," he hesitated a moment, "I mean, you could have left after we stopped Khan, no one would blame you if you wanted to retire from the Fleet. But you stayed. And there have been other times you coulda backed out, but you didn't. Might you be using it as an excuse?" he eyed her closely, "What's really bothering you?"
Victoria let out a breath at that as his words hit her because…he wasn't wrong.
Of ALL the possible areas she could have looked into with the Fleet, she CHOSE engineering, she chose that field, that was HER option, not her father's. She could have aimed to be a captain, like he was, but she chose engineering for a reason, because she DID love it. When she had been a kid, she did love puzzles and construction and fixing things and knowing how they worked. Her mother might have inspired that love and...perhaps there had been a bitter connotation to it for years after, but it didn't mean SHE hadn't loved it, didn't still love it.
She CHOSE to be a crew member, an active one. Her family would have been fine with her being just IN the Fleet, in any role. She could have been a teacher at the academy for all they would care, she could have been a worker in one of the ship construction facilities even. But she chose to be on a crew.
She could have been any sort of worker once she joined a ship, she could have been someone doing grunt work, or laundry, or kitchens, or anything. She could have just worked in the engine room, but she CHOSE to be a Liaison, that was the station she wanted to be. Because she did like knowing how tings worked, everything, all areas of a ship and that was the position that would allow her that.
Even if her family wanted her to be part of the Fleet, there were so many options within it she could have gone with. But she HAD had a choice as to where and what she did.
And Scotty was right in another regard…she could have left, after they dealt with Khan, no one really would have faulted her with doing so after what happened to her father, not her family, not his memory. Even Kirk would have understood, if he stayed as Captain and she left. Sulu had proven you could have a family outside the Fleet or crew and make it work, they could have too.
But she stayed.
She CHOSE to stay.
Her argument never made sense after what happened with Nero and Vulcan, because she couldn't argue she'd had no choice, when she'd made one.
...it was just...it was easier to use that as a reason instead of having to really dig into the real one.
"Lassie?" Scotty called after a long period of silence, "I don't mean to pry..."
"No," Victoria shook her head, "No, it's just..." she let out a small laugh, "No one's ever really called me on that before," she cleared her throat, before sighing, "My mom left my dad, because of the Fleet. I lost her, because of the Fleet. And then he threw himself into his work, into his position, and it felt like I lost him to the Fleet. Then I...I really lost him because of the Fleet. And I'm just...I am so scared, Scotty, of what else I have to lose," she swallowed hard and had to look away, not wanting to just break down and cry about it, but it was hard not to when she'd been holding this in for 3 years, "I lost my parents, I...I almost lost my crew, my ship, hell my own life for the Fleet. And it was my fault, because I broke the rules and I helped James break the rules and I thought...if I was just GOOD, if I didn't give the Fleet a reason to, they couldn't take anything else from me."
"Oh Lass," Scotty reached out to put a hand on her shoulder.
"But even then, it did," she continued, "It took...me. It took James. It took the parts of us that were...US," she looked at him, as though asking if he saw it, if he understood. His grim expression told her he did, that he'd noticed that fact too, "I didn't want to lose myself, or James. I did everything right, everything I was supposed to do...and I still lost the ship."
That was what kept piling up in the back of her mind, everything she lost and that terrible feeling that it was only a matter of time before she lost something else, because it kept building. Her mother, fine she was better off without her. Then her position on the ship, hard to deal with. Then her father, devastating. Then her own life, personal. What next? Kirk? She felt like she had to stop, she had to get out, find a way to convince him to go with her, to avoid that. If she could get out, then they'd both be safe and she wouldn't just keep losing things. She wanted to support him as Captain, he'd been so excited for the 5-year mission, and she'd done all she could to do what he needed, be what he needed her to be, professional and on top of the rules.
But it had slowly been killing the both of them to be like that, and she'd been so scared that, even with their best efforts, she would still lose him if he lost himself, if she lost herself as well.
"It isn't all on you, Tory," Scotty reminded her, "Nor on the Captain. You're part of a CREW for a reason. We're a family, we share everything. What happened...what's been happening, you shoulda come to us, shared it with us. We woulda done more."
"You've all done enough," Victoria told him, "You really have. And it's not within Fleet Policy to bring your personal issues into the workplace."
"To hell with the policy," Scotty scoffed, "I'd rather have Victoria my friend, than Victoria my Liaison. You care about us Tory, let us care about you. You don't have to go it alone, you or the Captain, all of us are here for you."
"I know."
"No, I don't think you do," he cut in, firm, "Or you two wouldn't've spent the last 3 years making yourselves miserable. The Fleet can only take what you let it take. And, I dunno about you, Lassie, but after three years with you lot, I'm not about to let anyone take you all from me. Not the Fleet, not that Krall dobber. I'll fight anyone I need to for my crew, and I know they'd do the same. Don't sell us short, Lass."
Victoria smiled at that reminder, feeling like...a rock had been lifted off her chest, a weight off her shoulders.
How foolish had she been? She had been so focused on what she had done wrong, the hand SHE had played on Nibiru, she hadn't even thought...it wasn't just her or Kirk, not really. The crew could have refused, reported them, mutinied if they wanted to. But all of them had gone along with the plan, all of them had helped see it through, even Spock, for all his report-after-the-fact, HE had been willing to do it. It had never been just her or Kirk, and it couldn't be just them now.
She'd gotten so stuck on her own losses and their connection to the Fleet that she hadn't been able to see that there was choice involved in all of it. Her mother chose to leave instead of making it work. Her father chose to step back in as captain of the Enterprise when he could have refused or passed it to someone else. She and Kirk could have chosen to be themselves but still be professional...or at least tone it down if the crew were uncomfortable. They could have bent the rules without breaking them. SO much of her time at the Academy with Kirk had been about that, bending them, finding other rules that contradicted some, finding loopholes to get away with things.
How could she have lost sight of all that?
The Fleet might have presented opportunities where she lost important things and people, ones that never would have happened if not for the Fleet, but it wasn't the Fleet itself that took them away. And the Fleet had given her so much in return.
Friends, love, adventure, opportunity, happiness...and a crew that would fight to the death for her just like she would them.
She had never had to give up that piece of herself to keep them, because they would have fought to keep her, and just as she was.
"I'm not telling you what to do, Lassie," Scotty continued after another lapse into silence, "But…I will miss you if you leave. No one else gets my love of engineering."
She set down her tools, snapping on the last piece of the device, smiling a bit when she saw it was working just right, and turned to Scotty, "Thank you, Mr. Scott."
"Any time, Liaison Pike," he added, laughing when she rolled her eyes at his formalities, pleased to see that spark of the old her back in them, "Now, come on, I think Jaylah's getting worried you got lost."
Victoria snorted, but set down her work to follow him out, "Sure, JAYLAH was the worried one."
Scotty turned his nose up slightly, "That she was."
~8~
Kirk sighed as he jumped down a set of rocks, leading Chekov through the forest, trying to find a way to the location of the call Kalara had made. He didn't think the Enterprise would be able to lead them to the comms. of the others, given how they were captured, he wouldn't put it past their enemies to destroy all of them. But a backup was to see if he could lure Kalara into reporting about the artifact the others had been after before the ship crashed. If they could track that one, it would, hopefully, lead them to the others.
"How far are we from the coordinates of that call?" Kirk called out to Chekov as the man moved past him to take the lead once they were on somewhat more stable ground.
"Still a ways, sir," Chekov answered, before hesitating to ask, "Captain?"
"Yeah?"
"When did you begin to suspect her?" Chekov wondered, Kirk had already seemed to know it was Kalara when they found each other in the woods, but he also felt like the Captain must have been thinking about it for a while.
Kirk let out a long breath, "Not soon enough."
"How did you know?"
"Well..." Kirk inhaled, trying to think of a way to phrase it, how it just…didn't sit right with him, even hearing Kalara speak. There was something wrong with all of it but…he was still Captain and he was still in charge of a Fleet ship and when the Fleet tasked you with a mission, you did it or risk the consequences. He nearly scoffed at that thought, he was facing a pretty big consequence right now and that was after he'd done everything right and by the book, "I guess you could say I've got a good nose for danger," was what he settled for instead.
Chekov opened his mouth to ask him more, when there was a small crunching noise as Kirk stepped on something in the ground and smoke instantly began to fill the air around them.
"Run!" Kirk turned, pushing Chekov on, trying to get far away from the smoke when something exploded behind them…
~8~
"Oh, I like this," Victoria joked as she and Scotty entered the Bridge of the Franklin to the sound of some very loud rock music blaring out of a box near where Jaylah was working on something.
"Is that music?" Scotty tried to call out to the alien over the noise, "Where on earth is that coming from?"
"There," Jaylah pointed one of her tools to a very old player, "I plugged the little box in the power cell and the little mouths make it sing."
Victoria stepped over to it and looked around at the way she'd rigged it up to the power, "Clever."
Scotty's face scrunched as a singer came on…or at least he thought it might be a singer, it sounded more like screaming to him right now, "Music's a bit old-fashioned for my taste, not to mention very loud and distracting but, aye, well played."
"I like the beats and shouting," Jaylah told him.
"Oh, you do?"
"What is that?" Victoria asked, having been bobbing her head along with the music but hearing something odd mixed in with it.
Jaylah stiffened and straightened, seeming to hear something off as well, "Switch it off."
Victoria quickly moved to do so, being the one closest to the box, even as Scotty tried to say it was fine…and then they could hear it, a small alarm going off.
Jaylah was on her feet in an instant, heading for the door and grabbing her weapons as she went, "Someone set off one of my traps!"
~8~
Victoria and Scotty tried to be as quiet and quick as they could, following Jaylah through the woods, the woman clearly knowing which trap had gone off and where it was. Victoria had her phaser in hand because there were only three ways this could go. Either it was a random animal that had set if off, or it was one of their enemies trying to find them after they took out three of their minions, or it was one of the Crew that managed to escape the attack. She was hoping for the last one, but wasn't naïve enough to not prepare for the first two. Jaylah had her weapon out and so she thought it best to be prepared, too.
She shot Scotty a look when he stepped on a twig and cracked it.
"Shh!" Jaylah hissed at him in warning, before powering up her staff, keeping the weapon tight in hand as she prepared to step down from where she was and see about her trap.
Scotty glanced at Victoria, before pulling the spare phaser she'd given him off his belt, ready.
The three of them shared a look, preparing, and moved down and around a boulder to see…
"Captain?" Scotty blinked, and there, only feet away, was Kirk and Chekov, appearing to be suspended mid-jump by a wall of what looked like mud.
"Jim!" Victoria breathed, her eyes wide as she saw him alive.
"Tory!" he laughed, beaming when he spotted her, wiggling a little as though trying to break free to get to her.
Jaylah frowned, looking between them and the men in the trap, "You know these men?"
"Aye, Lassie," Scotty chuckled, reaching out to put a comforting hand on Victoria's back, knowing the woman was terrified of what happened to Kirk even if she hadn't said anything, "That wee man there is Pavel Chekov."
"Hello," Chekov seemed to try and wave at them.
"And that absolute idiot is James," Victoria laughed, beaming at Kirk, "They're our crew."
"It's good to see you, sir," Scotty offered them.
"How do we get them out?" Victoria turned to Jaylah, who only raised her weapon and aimed it at them, powering it up.
"What is she doing?" Kirk called, his voice tense, clearly, and understandably, not at ease with a weapon pointed right at them.
"I'm guessing getting you out," Victoria said simply, crossing her arms, though even she was tense, not sure how Jaylah meant to do so.
Jaylah moved closer to the mud wall, reaching out with her staff to poke the hardened substance, causing it to shatter, dropping both Kirk and Chekov to the ground.
"James!" Victoria hurried over to him as he coughed from the dust that flew up at the breaking, Scotty moving to do the same for Chekov, both helping them to their feet as they coughed.
"You're free, James," Jaylah stated, eyeing Kirk and Chekov.
Kirk let out a small, huffing laugh, before turning and pulling Victoria into his arms, hugging her tightly. He closed his eyes for a moment, taking a breath of relief to have her back with him, to know she not only survived but had escaped the capture of the others. He pulled back slightly when he felt a tremble run through her, to cup her cheeks, taking her face in his hands, looking at the sparkle of tears just barely glimmering in the corner of her eyes. He pulled her face closer, and kissed her deeply, pouring his fear and relief and anger and sorrow into the move, knowing she would understand, she always did.
"Awww," Scotty spoke, wincing when the two pulled away from their reunion, Kirk to shoot him a glare for ruining it, and Victoria blushing heavily at getting so caught up before the crew even if it was just two of them.
But just as Victoria tried to pull back, to resume some space and professionalism, unsure how Kirk would take it given SHE had had a revelation of sorts but he might be of the old mindset still, something they'd need to talk about, Kirk tightened his grip on the arm he had wound around her waist to keep her close at his side. A glance at him told her he didn't even seem to realize he'd done it, his gaze turning to Jaylah.
She wouldn't lie and say she hadn't missed this, this casual touch, this reassuring pressure around her in front of the crew. They were always so careful but now? Well, for Kirk to break their unspoken rule meant one of two things. The first, that he was so overwhelmed he just couldn't handle not having that comfort right now, that reminder she was alright. Because she needed it, too. Just because she hadn't said anything to Scotty about her fear for the crew and Kirk didn't mean she hadn't felt it. He'd found her doing what she always did when she was truly scared, trying to fix things. She got the impression Scotty had worked it out anyway. Knowing Kirk was alive, having him back with her, it felt like she could breathe again.
The second thing...was that he was doing it because he felt like he could. She knew how he got, where his mind could go. Without a ship, without the crew with him, in such dire straits, he might view himself as not being captain any longer, that he wasn't truly in charge any longer or held to any standards or rules a captain would be. He would see himself as lost, as relieved of duty since there was no ship or crew to captain and, therefore, he could be freer in his affections.
She hoped it was the first, because if it was the second they would he having some words about that. He was captain, whether he had a crew or a ship to his name. And even without a ship, the crew was out there somewhere.
"Who's your new friend here?" Kirk asked, eyeing the alien, "She sure knows how to throw out a welcome mat."
"Her name is Jaylah," Victoria introduced, "She helped us deal with a few of Krall's men."
The way Kirk's jaw clenched at the mention of 'Krall' told her he knew about the man and who he was, how he was the leader of the attack against them.
"I do not know what is a welcome mat," Jaylah frowned, unsure if a 'welcome mat' was something important.
Kirk shook his head, glancing from Victoria to Scotty, "You find anybody else?"
"No, sir," Scotty answered when Victoria could only shake her head, "The Lovely Lass and I came down in the same place but…I'm sorry, you're the only ones we've found. What the hell happened up there, Jim? Why were we attacked?"
"They were after the artifact we brought back from Teenax," Kirk told them.
"Why?" Victoria shook her head, "It's a broken, defunct piece of garbage."
"You're guess is as good as mine," he sighed.
"Did they get it?" Scotty frowned.
"No."
"Have YOU got it?"
"No."
"Then where is it?" Victoria asked.
"I had to get it off the Enterprise, put it on a shuttle."
"You hid it in a shuttle?" Scotty gave him an odd look, shifting with nerves, because if he put it in a shuttle, it was stationary, and it could be tracked far easier. There would be no one there to defend it or protect it.
"Yes, and no."
Victoria shook her head, "This isn't the place to talk about that," she looked over at Jaylah, "Can we discuss this at your house?"
Jaylah nodded "This way," and turned to lead them back.
Kirk gestured Scotty and Chekov to go ahead, he and Victoria bringing up the rear.
"Kalara?" Victoria asked.
Kirk let out a long breath, not sure if she was guessing at something or asking about the woman, if he knew where she was or what became of her, but it didn't really matter, "Part of it all," he said, "Tricked her into a trap. She's taken care of."
Victoria nodded, silent for a moment as they followed the others, "Tell me you at least punched her once for me."
Kirk chuckled, shaking his head, letting out an almost wet laugh, there was so much he wanted to say, wanted to do, to express how truly relieved and happy he was to find her, but she was right. They were too exposed out here, there was too much at risk just because he wanted to pull her to him and never let go. He wouldn't lie and say he wasn't overwhelmed by everything, and he just...he needed to vent, to get it all out, to have an ear to listen to. It couldn't be Chekov, because he was the crew, in the sense that Victoria wasn't just the crew. She was more than that to him, she was the only one he trusted to let himself be vulnerable and honest and break around. He had to be in charge, to seem sure, to look like he knew what to do and that they would succeed around everyone else. He could express his doubt and sorrow and concerns and anger around Victoria like he couldn't with others, not even Bones.
He just had to make it to Jaylah's house and they'd have enough cover to do it.
A/N: Aww, they're making progress :')
I was debating having Victoria have that sort of 'calling out' and 'revelation' with Kirk, but I felt like the way she processes things and he does are different. Kirk feels like the only person he can talk to and break around without causing fear or lack of faith or loss of hope is Victoria, because he has to be The Captain around the crew and he can't vent that way to them. But with Victoria, part of her felt like she couldn't bring up her own issues to Kirk because he had so much on his plate already, and she also didn't want to feel like she was guilting him or making him feel responsible for it. She would, eventually, talk to him, but some of it would still be held in, till he wasn't the Captain and her words couldn't influence him. She didn't tell him about applying for that one position in Yorktown and waited till he expressed his own discontent to voice hers.
With Scotty though, I think Victoria feels like she can say it because it's one person, there's no one else there, she's really at a breaking point and realizing her literal worst fears about the Fleet and it's just a bit too much :( She's lived with that lingering 'what is the Fleet going to take from me NOW?' fear for many many years, and then to have literally everything taken from her was a blow she needed an outlet and to vent about :( Scotty calling her out felt like the right move, because he's blunt and honest and he cares so much about the ship and the crew, I feel like he'd notice that little flaw in Victoria's excuse because, of the crew, HE is the one who works with her the most, he's the contact to the Bridge, to her, and he'd have seen little things about how she is in Engineering that would probably hint, to him, that there's more going on. She just needed to be called out on that 'back and forth' excuse, wanting to be on a Crew, then not having had a choice about it, depending on the situation, to get to the root of her problems.
But now that Victoria has gotten there...we just have to see how it goes with Kirk ;)
No real notes on reviews ;)