The bullet tore through his shoulder, burying itself deep amongst flesh and muscle and bone. A strangled cry was ripped from his lips and he stumbled forward, falling to his knees in the shallow water near the bank. The baby was clinging to him and he saw the figure in the brush change position, aiming again, and he held up his hand. "Wait," he gasped, feeling his flesh tear further when he jostled his shoulder.
His attacker stilled, an expectant silence falling over the brush. "Please," Jim ground out, holding his charge close as she began to cry. "I have a child, she's alone, I need to get her somewhere safe."
The barrel of the rifle disappeared from sight, and a moment later the golden eyes did as well, then the unseen attacker emerged from the forest. He was a boy, a young boy of around eleven years, with dark green skin and ridged cheek bones- a Frooliin, same as the baby. The boy watched Jim with tense suspicion, shifting weight on his large paddle-like feet.
"Do you know Standard?" Jim asked, not yet moving from his position on his knees. He knew what it was like to be eleven years old and on your own, trying to protect yourself, having to hurt people along the way- he knew, so he stayed put, blood staining his shirt and dizziness crashing over him.
The boy nodded shakily, his large, luminous eyes traveling to the wailing infant in Jim's arms. His face tightened in surprise, over what Jim couldn't tell, but he nodded again, more steadily this time. "I am sorry I shot you," the boy's voice was surprisingly deep and sonorous, it reminded Jim of Uhura's voice, and he swallowed down the lump in his throat. "My people do not take kindly to strangers."
"I've noticed," Jim grinned, hoping it didn't look too maniacal when he was sopping wet and bleeding and torn and melting. The baby's cries had tapered off into soft hiccups, and he bounced her gently in his arms as he stood uncertainly. The boy watched him, still wary, but less like a cornered animal. He wore no shirt, and Jim could see every individual rib, as well as the strange rows of pores between them.
The boy bowed in a manner that was short and curt and reminded him of another boy years ago, but the memory fled as the boy straightened again. "My name is Ruhn." He put the gun down and stepped forward, raising his hands in a non-threatening gesture when Jim flinched. The ridges on his cheekbones seemed to ripple as his nostrils flared and his eyes narrowed. "You were injured previously."
Jim stood slowly, narrowly catching himself when his knees buckled underneath him. Sweat trickled down his face and he was dizzy and nauseous, but he couldn't be sure how much of that could be attributed to the gunshot wound and how much to his burns. "My crew and I found one of your villages, completely destroyed," he choked out with some difficulty. "We investigated - that's when I found the kid - and then bombs just… just started falling."
The boy looked concerned and Jim didn't blame him, since he now appeared to have four eyes and that would be worrying for anyone. Unsteadily, the young captain stepped out of the creek and onto the sandy bank, the shifting of it underneath him making his stomach lurch. "I'm gonna collapse here in a second, Ruhn, so you'd better take the kid…"
Already large eyes widened and Ruhn took the baby in his spindly arms. "What can I-"
That was the last Jim heard before he pitched forward.
He awoke screaming, agony turning his back to fire all over again. With what meager strength he could summon he struck out, but his fist didn't connect with anything but solid ground. Jim's eyes snapped open and he found himself laying on his stomach on the forest floor, his shoulders aching like he'd been dragged, and Ruhn several feet away after likely dodging Jim's frenzied attack.
"Your body temperature is elevated far beyond what is normal for a human," Ruhn said carefully, approaching once again in a crouch. "I attempted to remove your shirt to assist in the cooling process, but the material has melded into your skin, and the infection is too advanced for it to be of much help anyway." The alien boy's lips pursed. "Your condition is quickly deteriorating."
"I've had worse," Jim muttered as he slowly pushed himself onto his hands and knees. "Thanks for not leaving me, like, passed out on the ground. That would've sucked."
"Despite your flippant attitude, it is obvious that this scenario would have distressed you deeply," the boy's disapproving golden gaze was more than a little piercing, even as he gathered up the baby to his chest. He scrutinized the strange yellow-haired captain, like he was reading a book. "You say you've had worse and you do not lie, so why deflect in such a manner?"
Jim groaned as he got to his feet unsteadily, swallowing down waves of sickness. Blood had finally stopped oozing from his shoulder, but it had stained the front of his uniform dark red that was already beginning to turn brown. "You ever hear of Vulcans, Ruhn?"
"Yes, of course," the boy replied as he stood as well. "They were very good trade partners before the destruction of their home planet."
"You would've fit right in." Jim muttered. "Alright, kid, what're you gonna do with me now?" It was strange, calling another 'kid', when all Jim had ever been was 'kid'. To Starfleet and to Bones, he was inexperienced and green and a little to exuberant for his own good. It was refreshing, assigning the title to another. And a little bit nostalgic.
"I have injured you without provocation when you had already sustained extensive damage," the young Frooliin said. "In addition, you have carried and protected one of our own though doing so offered no benefit to yourself. As such, I would be more than happy to return you to my village." He tilted his head as the captain swayed. "However, we must hurry. I do not mean to cause you distress, but it appears you are dying."
"Yeah, it's not fun," Jim muttered. "Which way's your village?"
The boy pointed downstream, the same direction Jim had been floating. "Typical," the captain sighed. "Give me the gun. I don't trust you with it."
Ruhn had the good graces to look chagrined as he handed Jim the rifle and shifted the infant in his arms. "It is not far. We will likely reach it before the moss begins to glow."
Jim grunted in reply, not sure how to respond to this tidbit of information. "Glowing moss. Right. Getting' real sick of this planet, Ruhn…"
If the boy soon became annoyed by Jim's constant rambling, he didn't give any indication. If anything, he seemed incredibly aware and respectful of his need to fill the silence. Jim must have commented on that at some point, because Ruhn answered in that infinitely patient way of his, "my people feel their emotions deeply and truly. We see no reason to hide them or to deprive others of them."
"Never mind," Jim had answered, "you wouldn't have fit in on Vulcan."
After a while he stopped talking and his feet started dragging and Ruhn was leaning into him- the poor kid must be tired, his exhausted mind rationalized. His meager psych knowledge told him he was regressing- his mind was in survival mode, slipping into the role like a long-lost glove. Now it was he leaning on someone else, a kid no less. A kid, like who he'd been back then. The irony was not lost on him.
"You have not told me your name," Ruhn said softly, and Jim truly loved that voice, and damn at that moment did he miss Uhura. She would like Ruhn and the baby. She was great with kids, he mused, and a smile tugged at his lips.
"'M name's Jim Kirk," he slurred, his lips unpleasantly numb. "'M Captain of the USS Enterprise," the body supporting him stiffened, but he didn't really notice. "'N I thought I was done wit' this sorta thing. Thought I wouldn't be hungry an'more, thought I was gettin' away, Tom, 'n then it all went'ta hell."
"Captain," Ruhn said in a voice that was gentle and soft and snapped him back to here and now not then and there, never again. "You appear to be hallucinating. Can you hear me? We should arrive at my village in twenty minutes."
"I hear ya," Jim replied, just as the baby began wailing. He was grateful for that little distraction to keep him from slipping away again, and so for the rest of the walk he was silent, just listening to the cries of the infant.
In the last ten minutes of the torturous walk, Jim noticed a strange phenomenon emanating from the forest. The shaggy moss-bark of the trees had begun to ooze light. Underneath the great sheets of the foliage covering what had to be the trunk, ribbons of light could be seen cutting through. As time passed the light got brighter, and for each tree, the light was a different hue.
Glowing moss, Jim's fever-choked mind surmised. That's really fucking weird.
It was also beautiful, he supposed, the light slicing through the monochrome gray of the world, like daggers of color fighting to bring life back to a barren land. Last night, he must had fallen asleep before the glowing took place. Then again, hadn't he felt a peculiar coolness seeping from the trees? Some sort of preliminary to the light? His head hurt.
"I don' like your planet," he told the Frooliin boy apologetically. Ruhn didn't reply, but he could swear there was a small twitch upwards of his lips. At least someone found him amusing.
The trees began to thin out and the ground began to slope upwards, slowly at first, until the boy stopped at a broad rise. Looking up, Jim could see a village resting at the crest of the hill. From where they stood, it looked remarkably like what Jim had imagined the other village to look like, before its destruction.
"This is the last leg of the journey," Ruhn said, by now holding quite a bit of Jim's weight as they hobbled along through the woods.
"'M I… they're not gonna kill me, 're they?" Jim asked, his wooziness increasing from looking up the modest height. "'Cause that would suck, gotten so far, y'know, m' crew…"
"They will not kill you, Captain," the Frooliin boy said as they walked slowly up the hill. The hill was in fact more of a small plateau, but the village used the softest of the sides as a means to reach their encampment, giving the impression of a rounder shape than it actually possessed. The village was situated high enough that one could easily see the broad creek's course as it wrapped around the base of the plateau and disappeared into the silver woods. Had Jim been a bit more coherent he would have marveled at the beautiful placement of a village for a people who were obviously semi-aquatic.
"You said you don' like strangers," the young captain protested, trying to distract himself from the laborious climb and the aching of his shoulder and back.
"No, but we are quite fond of heroes," said the boy softly, and instantly Jim's mind was overrun with confusion. Not a hero not a hero not a hero, voices from long ago, from that time? No, from before then. He lived to prove those voices wrong but they were right this time, he hadn't done anything, hadn't saved anyone, not a hero-
The baby cried out just as the weary band crested the plateau and entered the open circle of the village.
A Frooliin with dark blue skin emerged from one of the houses. He gasped upon seeing the captain and ducked back inside the house, only to emerge a moment later with an orange-skinned female in tow. They approached just as Jim's head spun and the world began to tilt and suddenly he was headed straight to the ground when a pair of strong arms caught him.
"Relax," said a soft voice somewhere in the distance, not from the person holding him, but from the brave boy who supported him. "You say you've had worse and you do not lie, but you are not alone this time. Let us help."
Jim let the world go black.
The strange man went still in her arms, all the strength draining out of his long, wiry body. His skin was hot to the touch, and the sight of his back was enough to make her gasp in sympathy. "Irin," she ordered the blue-skinned man to her left. "Carry him inside. Tell Juuir and Homna to fetch me bandages, hot water, and that human anatomy handbook. Be quick." The man nodded as he hefted the human's body into his arms and carried him as quickly as possible to their house.
She turned to Ruhn, who held a baby in his arms, one of their own kind. Brave, sensitive, reckless Ruhn, her youngest son, the healer-after-her. Quickly she embraced him, pressing her lips to his hairline. "You have done well, Ruhn, and I am proud to call you son," the healer whispered.
Ruhn smiled in that soft way of his. "Your pride fills me with happiness, Frunize."
Frunize pulled, resting one hand on his raven-black hair. "Take the baby to Chenla, then come assist. I will begin healing the stranger immediately." Her son nodded shortly and ducked away with the red-skinned baby in his arms, toward the house across from their own.
Upon entering her own stone house again, Frunize was please to find her mate, Irin, had already set out the soft grass mat and had lain the stranger down on his stomach, the couch drawn away to make room for Frunize's healing. Her pouch was set out in front of the man's prone form, full of her herbs and bandages she'd collected over the years. The back door could be heard and in came Juuir, her oldest son, hefting a bucket of boiled water, and then Homna, her daughter, with the old handbook she'd never had to use.
Without a word Frunize kneeled at the mat in the center of the room, doing nothing, simply observing. The wounds across the man's back were horrific. The burns glistened wetly, deep red and white-lipped, scorched flakes of black skin dangling from thin strips of viable flesh. In some areas his shirt melded into the skin, long fingers of golden fabric slipping into moist wounds, digging down into flesh and musculature.
The infection had made the flesh swell grotesquely, diseased skin around the burns puffy and hot and oozing a pale yellow liquid, leaving very little skin on the back unmarked. She stroked the man's golden hair back, seeing his eyebrows twitch as the movement disturbed him. Sympathy ran deep within her for the young man.
Ruhn dropped to his knees beside her. "The stranger's name is Jim Kirk, Captain of the USS Enterprise." Startled by this information, Frunize looked up, but Ruhn continued. "I was out hunting. I found the stranger in the creek. Startled, I shot him, before he had a chance to speak for himself," her son bowed his head. "He had rescued the baby from a collapsed village before it was bombed. The rest of his crew appears to be gone."
"You should not have attacked a man who was alone and scared," Frunize admonished gently. "This man tries to hide, but he does not know how we read one another. You should have seen." The boy looked crestfallen, but his mother pressed on. "That being said, you were scared as well. You are but a child, but you acted as an adult when you brought him back to us. My pride has not diminished."
Ruhn nodded, and he was her soft son again, sensitive even for their kind, caring and warm. "He deeply fears this place. It awakens something for him. Something from long ago."
The healer nodded, flipping open the book of human anatomy to see where she should begin in what would be a painstakingly long process. "His burns hide his scars. I believe that is what humans call 'irony'."
Prepare yourself for galactic amounts of Jim whump next chapter. Like, it's gonna be painful.
Also, I know I have this story set as Gen, but how would you guys feel about some implied Spock/Jim/Uhura? I ship it too hard for my own good. But it's up to you.
My reviewers were lilyflower1345, spinalcracker, and Doodle0505. Thank you for your support!
Please please review. It makes me happy. Very, very happy.