A/N: I had far too much fun over Spring Break, so this post is much later than I thought it would be -- my apologies.

Thanks to all of you who are reading/reviewing/favoriting/etc! I really appreciate the feedback -- criticism is always welcome.

Disclaimer: Alas, I have no rights to the Star Trek franchise.

IV. Fight or Flight

In Which Jim Gets Into an Argument With Himself

There was something surreal about sitting in front of an old-fashioned fireplace in a rustic cabin, bare feet propped up on the grate as you split a tureen of lukewarm soup with your inter-dimensional counterpart -- Jim just wasn't sure whether it was the good kind of surreal or the what-the-shit-I-don't-even-know kind of surreal yet. Anyway, the other him seemed pretty relaxed, all circumstances considered, so he tried not to look as terrified as he felt.

Forcing another mouthful of soup down his throat, Jim cast around for something to say. Initially there had been too many questions to ponder, but now the awkwardness was setting in. Technically, he was talking to himself, and if that wasn't fricking weird, he didn't know what was.

"So, uh, Admiral," Jim's eyes dropped down to the half-empty bowl in his hands, "thanks for the soup. It was . . . great."

The admiral lifted one craggy brow in a way that was utterly Spockian. "Sure. And call me Jim; 'Admiral' sounds stuffy."

"But I'm Jim."

"Okay, 'Kirk' then. That work for you?"

"Yeah." Blowing out a nervous breath, Jim shifted, turning his face back to the warmth of the fire. "Is this as weird for you as it is for me?" he blurted out, wondering if the sudden ache in his stomach was the result of that godawful soup. "I mean, I'm you. Isn't that freaking you out a little?"

There was a brief pause, and then a huff as the admiral slipped from his chair to hunker down on the carpet next to Jim. His solid presence was strangely reassuring.

"I wouldn't say that I don't think this is weird," he said thoughtfully. "When you first showed up on my lawn, I wondered if I'd finally gone crazy." That smile -- a shade softer than the smirk Jim employed so well -- flashed at him briefly. "I've been lonely for a long time, so being crazy didn't seem to so bad after all if I meant I could have some company for a change."

"You accepted the whole 'alternate dimension' thing pretty fast."

"I have a little practice with alternate dimensions," the admiral said simply.

"Yeah, but I could've been some shapeshifting imposter or something; we've come across a couple of those already in this universe."

"You weren't sporting a goatee, so I guessed that you didn't mean me any harm."

"What?"

The admiral laughed. "Never mind. Jim, I'm sure you're curious -- go ahead and ask me anything. We've got plenty of time."

"Tell me about this place," Jim said at last. Other questions could wait -- he wanted to know where the hell he was.

"I should have known you'd pick that." The admiral set his bowl and spoon to the side and sighed, folding over until his elbows were propped on his knees. "To the best of my knowledge, this appears to be some sort of . . . alternate reality. Not another dimension," he amended quickly, when Jim opened his mouth to protest. "More like a . . . simulation of life."

"In what way?"

The admiral scuffed one stockinged foot into the carpet. "It's like this planet tries to recreate a person's idea of paradise. When I first came here, I was free to explore -- I could hike and fish and enjoy the peace, and I was given . . . company. I was content."

"You were suckered into it," Jim corrected, studying the older man's face curiously. "Some kind of memory-swiper?"

"Perhaps."

"But you remember now. What changed?"

The admiral chuckled. "I was a starship captain, Jim. Do you really think either of us could be happy staying put in the same place for very long, doing the same things, seeing the same sights day after day? It was driving me crazy, and as soon as I realized it wasn't real, it all disappeared. The people, the cabin, even my horse. It was all illusion."

Jim's eyes narrowed. "But here -- the cabin, all of this -- it's all here now."

"Yes," the admiral agreed. "I don't know what happened after everything disappeared; it came back. It always comes back, but I was alone after that."

"You're aware of what this place really is," Jim protested. "How could you have still retained that, when someone could have wiped your memory again?"

The admiral shrugged.

"For that matter," he continued, "how in the hell am I still myself? Shouldn't my memories be wiped out too?"

"I think it feeds off information, images in our heads -- this forest, it looks exactly like the Black Hills. Exactly, right down to the grass and flowers. And we are the same person, so maybe our memories coincide."

"It takes images from your mind and duplicates them?" Jim processed that for a moment. "Okay, say that's really what's happening. Why? Who's taking the information?"

"I wish I knew."

"And you're the only one -- the two of us are the only people on this planet? There's no one else?"

"As far as I know, yes."

"Then shouldn't my memories have created something different? I mean, I've never been to the . . . what did you call it?"

"The Black Hills," the admiral finished for him. "Didn't our father take you and Sam camping there? We went almost every shore leave in the summer."

Jim's throat closed up, but he managed a succinct shake of the head. Not now . . . there was time for that later. Focus, Jim.

"How did you know I wasn't another illusion?"

The admiral smiled. "As soon as you fell into the river, I knew you weren't. Paradise doesn't usually involve bleeding strangers."

"I don't understand." It was becoming more and more difficult to keep a lid on his frustration. He wanted to get back to his lady, goddammit. Who knew what this thing had done to the Enterprise, if it had the power to suck him into some ass-backwards planetoid? And the crew -- what if his crew been pulled into this with him?

The admiral seemed to sense an impending tantrum; his back straightened, slightly-stooped shoulders thrown back. It was pretty intimidating, and Jim's own posture corrected itself unconsciously in response. "Did you see anything strange before you were drawn in? Any abnormal readings, or flux in the gravitational pull?" His don't-you-shit-around-with-me-boy tone was a dead ringer for Komack on his prickliest days. Did they teach admirals that voice or something? Maybe there was a fucking manual.

"No." Jim felt the most absurd urge to salute, and it pissed him off. "I think we would have noticed if some giant planet popped out in front of us. Everything was fine until I got warped into purgatory.

"Look, Kirk, I have to get back," he insisted, hating himself a little for the note of hysteria in his voice. "I can't stay here, I have a starship to run, for God's sake! If the Enterprise is even still in one piece. I don't even know how long I've been gone!"

"It's impossible to calculate the relationship of time in here and time out there," the admiral lifted his hand away and pinched the bridge of his own nose in a gesture of helpless frustration, "but it's probably been a few days, a few weeks, by now."

"Wonderful." Anything could happen in a few weeks. Spock had probably flipped his shit by now, in that crazy yet logical shit-flipping way he had, and if Jim knew Bones at all, the good doctor was either spending his days pestering Spock about the rescue or getting completely smashed in the privacy of his office.

When it became apparent that Jim wasn't going to say anything more, the admiral hauled himself to his feet with a grunt and bent to collect the dishes. "I'll clean this up. Make yourself at home."

For the first time, Jim thought he understood why Bones claimed he had a warped sense of humor.

"So, uh, tell me more about your time."

The admiral did that eyebrow-thing again as he lowered himself back down next to Jim. "Do you think I should? I don't want to send our timelines spinning onto divergent paths because I said too much."

Jim snorted. "It seems to me like our timelines have already diverged -- I'm in a time paradox, so I don't think the time-stream can get fucked up much more than it is already."

"True," his other self conceded.

"So, am I still in Starfleet in your universe? Tell me I'm not going to spend my twilight years playing bingo."

"I just retired; I was giving my last press conference on the Enterprise-B when this," he swept one arm around the cabin, "happened. I should have known that the trouble wasn't going to stop because I hung up my uniform."

"Enterprise-B? What the hell happened to the Enterprise-A?"

"I might have . . ." He coughed and fidgeted. ". . . blown her up a little."

Jim was aghast. "You blew up our lady?!"

"It was necessary," was the rather defensive explanation. "I won't go into details, but believe me, I had no other choice." His voice softened. "And it was worth it."

Jim was speechless, picturing that shiny hull being ripped apart, wires and nodules and tubes flung into the cold depths of space as his ship bucked in her death throes. Well, now he knew how he would die: Scotty was going to murder him. "I can't believe I'm going to kill my beautiful girl!"

"You probably won't," the admiral mused. "As you said, the timelines are divergent. I doubt that the exact set of circumstances that we faced then will occur here." He smiled, but the gesture wasn't meant for Jim -- it had the air of someone enjoying a private joke. "And old friend of mine could have given us the precise statistical likelihood, but I can tell you that the chances are slim."

Jim laughed. "Your Spock gave estimates down the thousandths too?"

The strangest expression flashed across the older man's face. Wistfulness? Regret? "I take it our respective crews aren't any different from universe to universe."

"Probably not." It was weird enough to think of two Spocks and two Kirks living in the cosmos, but two Sulus? Two Uhuras? Damn, the very thought was making his headache return.

Still, they didn't seem to be mirror images, if the Spocks were anything to go by. The Ambassador was a different person than Jim's Spock -- he was more human, calm without seeming cold, soft-voiced, with kind eyes. And his Spock -- his Spock wasn't like that, not really. His Spock wasn't anything like that charming old bastard.

And fuck, now Jim really wanted to get back to Spock.

"Well, I think I've had a long enough vacation now. What would you suggest for our first move?"

The admiral cut a glance over at him. "You've cooked up some sort of crazy escape plan, right?"

"Actually, I was hoping you did."

"I'm afraid not," the old man sighed. "There isn't anything to work with in this place. Too bad our vision of paradise doesn't include a communicator and a private shuttlecraft."

"So what, we're just supposed to sit here?" Jim demanded. "We need to find some way out of this . . . this clusterfuck. I mean, we got in, didn't we? So there has to be an exit door somewhere."

"If there is, I haven't found it," was the admiral's short reply, something in his tone warning the younger man that he was about five words away from losing his patience.

"Then we'll make one," Jim swore.

"And how do you propose we do that? How can we fight a figment of our imagination?"

"I don't know, but we'll figure it out. We can wing it." The two men glared at each other. "What? Don't tell me you didn't bullshit your way to the captaincy too." "That was a long time ago -- apparently, a very long time ago. You reach a certain age and you can't pull miracles out of your ass anymore, son."

"So you're going to give up?" Jim paced along the fireplace with restless energy, rapping his fingers nervously against his thighs as he moved. "No, there has to be a way to get back to the Enterprise. Come on, you've got to give me something to work with, man."

"I don't know what you expect me to say. We can't just waltz out of this place when we get tired of it. It's impossible. It's all impossible."

"Bullshit! You just don't care anymore," Jim exploded. "Fine, don't care, but at least try to work with me. Don't you give a fuck about what your family and friends . . . "

"What family? What friends?" the admiral snapped. "Listen, Jim, this isn't my universe and it sure as hell isn't my timeline. Everyone I loved is dead. Seventy-eight years, remember?"

For a moment neither man spoke, the sound of the crackling wood unnaturally loud in the still room. Firelight played across their bodies and serious faces, and suddenly Jim realized how old his alternate self looked -- old and very tired . . . .

"I'm sorry." He nearly choked on the apology.

The admiral didn't look at him, flapping one hand in a familiar 'forget-about-it' gesture.

Jim tucked his chin against his updrawn knees. No Bones, no Spock, no Uhura or Sam or Pike . . . and no Enterprise. If he was stuck here forever, they would die too eventually, like everyone in the other universe.

Or maybe not everyone. A spike of excitement made Jim sit up and smile triumphantly, secure in his unbeatable logic.

"You're wrong, Kirk," he said, the words tumbling over themselves in his rush to get them all out, "there still is someone for you to come back for. See, I wasn't all that freaked out by finding another version of myself because you're not the first one from your universe to end up here. Wouldn't you like to get out and see your Spock again?"

"Spock?!"

Jim jumped as leathery but still-strong hands gripped his arms tightly -- the admiral's eyes were wild, his body practically trembling with frantic energy.

"Spock is alive?" he hissed, shaking Jim a little. "Here, in this universe? How? For god's sake, where is he?"

"New Vulcan," Jim said automatically, "and do you think you could let go before you pull off my biceps?"

The admiral dropped his arms with a mumbled apology and started twisting his fingers together instead. "What do you mean 'New' Vulcan?"

Now that it was coming down to the point, Jim really didn't want to have to break the news -- hell, the whole thing had been traumatic for him, and he didn't want to give the poor old guy a heart attack or something. Was it even possible to die here in this mirage-world?

The admiral's voice, brisk and sharp, snapped him out of his thoughts. "Jim, focus. Where's Spock?"

"The new Vulcan colony. I didn't explain well enough the first time, when I was telling you about that fuckwit Romulan." Jim pointed helplessly at the chair. "Um, you might want to sit down for this."

"I'll stand," the admiral said, straightening up in preparation. "Please just get on with it."

"Nero went batshit after Romulus blew up, right? Well, the reason it blew up in the first place is because the Federation didn't get to it on time -- a scientist had created red matter, this substance that would create a gravity flux to suck the sun into a synthesized black hole and stop the explosion and save Romulus, but no one could get there in time. And the scientist who developed it -- um, it was Spock."

"And Nero went after him," the admiral said tonelessly.

"Yeah, but he didn't kill him," Jim was quick to reassure him. "Spock got sucked through the vortex too, along with the Narada, and ended up in this, my, universe. Nero didn't hurt him; he was marooned on this planet called Delta Vega, which is really fucking cold, but he saved me from this snow monster when my Spock decided to be a dick and was completely fucking illogical . . ." Jim stopped and took a deep breath, aware that he was rambling. "To make a long story short, Nero dropped a drill down onto Vulcan and injected red matter into the planet's core, and it sort of . . ." he swallowed thickly, " . . . imploded."

"Oh, God." The admiral's face was ashen. "Vulcan -- the whole planet, gone?"

"His mother too," Jim said softly. "He saved Ambassador Sarek and some of the Council, but the transporter didn't get a firm lock on her."

"Is he . . . has he . . .?" The question wouldn't come, and Jim took pity on him.

"I think he's okay. Or he will be." He paused. Which Spock was he even talking about now? "Spock -- your Spock -- is at the new colony now, helping rebuild. I talked with him a few months ago. He's alright."

But the admiral was shaking his head. "No, no he's not, not even if he looks like it. I know him. He's blaming himself. He'll never voice it, but he'll stew over it until it kills him." His face hardened with an expression that Jim was very familiar with, having seen it in the mirror more times than he count. "If we're going to escape, the first thing we need to do is find a way of communicating with the Enterprise," the admiral said crisply.

Jim didn't even bother hiding his grin. "When do we leave?"

"Right now. We're getting the hell out of here."

The grin widened. Fuck, yes.