one
jim knows she’s the survivor who shouldn't have survived. that much has been embedded into her bones. marcus doesn’t tell her anything she doesn’t already know.
the good for nothing daughter of a celebrated hero, the run away with a sealed record a mile long, the ungrateful bitch.
she knows all the things people call her. marcus isn’t any different, the only thing that’s different is that she doesn’t fight back.
fight back, and she’s out. the admiral has enough clout to tear her to shreds. that much doesn’t matter, she’s used to that. it’s nothing worse that what frank could do to her when she was little. what matters is that bones goes down with her. bones, with the sweet daughter she barely gets to see. bones, who somehow decided to keep jim around, bones who takes her to bed like she could possibly love her.
jim fought back once. the first time, when the alcohol sat heavy on her tongue and the whip hurt more than where her head had been slammed into the ground. she never fought back again once marcus told her, in explicit detail, what happens when whores who shouldn’t be in the academy fight back.
bones will always be her weakness and he knows it.
she’s the admiral’s whipping boy.
he found her almost as soon as pike drops her off that first day with a warning to walk straight for a while. he found her, and it’s been a year of broken bones healed in his office, the soundproof walls hiding the screams. a year of whip marks and her back raw because “everyone knows jim kirk’s reputation” hidden under her uniform.
she’s ahead of her class, on track to graduate with bones. there’s a stuck up vulcan who’s always surprised when she manages to fuck with their grading curve.
it would almost be good, if she could ignore the bi-weekly summons, the ping on her pda.
he hides it as advising, making sure the fuck up from nowhere doesn’t disgrace starfleet, making sure she graduates in three years.
he makes sure she knows he got her because pike washed his hands of her, unwilling to waste anymore time on someone like her.
there’s no one to take her side. when it comes down to it, it’s an admiral against the failure with the g.e.d. who thinks she’s better than everyone else. and he’s careful. no marks that aren’t reasonable with her reputation, nothing to keep her out of commission unless she lets it, and she knows what happens then. bones got jump by a gang on her way back from the clinic once. he never said it was him, but he didn’t need to. jim knew the moment bones came home with a split lip and fractured collarbone.
in some ways, he’s just like frank, like kodos, like every other fuckhead in authority she’s run against.
nothing’s really changed.
jim thinks spock might have figured out something’s wrong, and she can’t tell if she wants them to have or not. bones has been pulling shift after shift at the student clinic -- doesn’t want to deal with the fuckup for a lover she never asked for -- and isn’t home until jim has drunk herself to sleep. spock, though, spock sees her four days a week for class, every wednesday night for linguistics club (and wasn’t it fun to see their face when she started joining conversations in vulcan, points to the fuck up from the middle of no where), one sparring appointment when their schedules allowed it --
if jim didn’t know better, she’d say they were friends.
but they’re not, because she doesn’t have friends. she has people she uses, people who use her, and a bones. she doesn’t get to have friends, because friends are dangerous, friends create vulnerability.
marcus notices, of course. she doesn’t know how he knows everything about her life, but he does. sealed records aren’t a problem when you have friends in good places, compared to that, what’s spying on a student? spock is just another thing to add to his list of things to hold over her head when she starts thinking maybe she could walk away.
(she’s never going to be able to walk away.)
she’s decided she doesn’t want spock to know, works even harder to play things off, cover up what she can’t. jim’s just started to feel like she’s getting some respect from them, they don’t need to know that for a year, she’s been an admiral’s
bitch.
marcus likes to change things up sometimes, when he thinks she’s too used to the whip or his boots. he thinks it’s funny to have her on her knees, to watch electric shocks pulse through her, to watch her bleed from his knives and to have her thank him for it. likes to watch her as he talks about everything he could do to bones and spock and the tiny russian kid who doesn’t belong, he’s too young -- she can take what deals out but if he hurt them, she thinks she might actually kill him. he puts his cigarette out on her shoulder and tells her she’s got a filthy mouth and that’s only ever gonna get her so far.
he never touches her, not like that, but she still leaves feeling filthy every time.
she knows it’s her own fault, knows that she’s good for nothing else. wonders if, when she graduates, he’ll just have her posted on his ship or maybe he’ll stay grounded and force her into a cage.
she doesn’t think she can stand being on this planet for much longer, two years seems like an awfully long time.
when spock finally asks, in their own way, “do you require assistance,” over dinner, the first meal she’s eaten in a couple days because she’s been in so much pain the automatic responses built in from years of frank took over, she laughs. she’s no damsel in distress, kirk’s aren’t built that way. she doesn’t need assistance, she needs --
she doesn’t know what she needs. she’s fine, this is what she’s for. she’s done this before and she’ll do it again. if she repeats that long enough, she’ll believe it.
in the end, she doesn’t know how it happens. she doesn’t want to know. all that matters is that it’s over, and she’s not the one to take the fall. the door opens one night, when she’s crawling on the floor because everything hurts too much, and marcus kicks her in the head hard enough that she can’t see clearly. and then he runs. she finds out later, spock is running first.
she wakes up in a hospital bed with bones curled up around her, pale and haggard. all jim can think of saying is “are you okay?” bones nearly cries at that, presses gentle fingers to the brace on jim’s arm as the bone reknits itself. they can’t give her painkillers, but bones stays, reading books out loud until her voice cracks and jim begs her to just leave her. (she doesn’t leave)
later, much later, spock arrives with flowers from uhura and a chess board.
“marcus has escaped,” they say, instead of hello. “he will not, however --”
“don't.” jim is tired of pity, pike has already been in, playing the part of the grieving father as if he has that right anymore. spock doesn't bring it up again. they play chess and bring padds with homework and novels, and treat her like everything is alright (nothing is alright). the first game she wins, but that’s the closest to pity they get.
when jim’s deemed fit to be released into bones’ care, she's under orders to see a psychiatrist. she can't stand the thought of someone else knowing. it wasn’t as bad as everyone else is making it out to be. she’s a kirk, kirks don’t get abused.
lies are easy.
the guilt is obvious on bones, she acts like jim is fragile, doesn’t go further than chaste kisses. jim hates it. wishes she could take everything back, if only so bones never had to find out. it would have been bearable. one night, when bones is cooking dinner, jim takes her hands and presses them to her chest so that they cup her tiny breasts. “he didn’t touch me like this.” she says. “please touch me like you love me.”
it hurts to ask for what she needs, but she can’t go another week without having bones touch her like she’s jim, not some patient they didn’t have room for in the hospital, not some sick puppy bones found on the side of the road.
bones drops her hands and jim claims the couch that night, too tense to sleep but unwilling to lie there.
she waits for the summons. they never come. it’s as if the nightmare was just a dream, and that he won’t come back. of course he’ll come back.
it hangs over her head.
jim’s allowed to classes a few days after she reduces the psychiatrist to tears and doesn’t feel guilty about it because the man -- and who thought that was a good idea, giving the abuse victim a man -- wouldn’t stop prying into things he shouldn’t have the clearance to know about.
no one knows what happened. she slips back into classes and all anyone knows is that she screwed something up so bad she got beaten half to death, probably over a girl or maybe she opened her big mouth and someone did the rest of campus a favor. marcus’ disappearance is being kept hushed up, no one wants to admit that they let him get away. she knows she has pike to thank for her involvement being swept under the rug, has seen the way he looks at her like she’s broken. she’s a kirk, kirks don’t break. spock doesn’t look at her any different and she’s grateful. they corrects her maths and she argues in vulcan and they both play chess.
they follow her out of class now, though, walk her to the next one like they’re friends. jim knows that marcus is hanging over their head almost as much as he hangs over hers. she doesn’t think she’ll ever tell them what the bastard wanted to do to them, the ‘filthy half breed who couldn’t make up their mind,’ if only because no one else deserves to hear that. it’s something she’ll take to the grave.
they eat dinner, play chess, and hide away from the rest of the world in spock’s office (illogical, but jim can’t help it)
things are almost okay.
she’s just waiting for everything to go to hell.
two.
when they catch marcus, jim’s first thought is that at least now she can stop waiting.
spock is walking her to engineering, where she and checkov will cause trouble for a couple hours and hopefully blow something up when one of pike’s kids (they all look the same, shiny faced students who have everything she never did) catches up to them and hands spock a padd.
it’s a trial summons.
she goes to engineering, blows things up, and when she gets out, bones is waiting for her, hands shoved into her pockets. she’s still in scrubs, and jim feels a wave of relief wash over her.
it doesn’t take long for the trial to fuck jim over. someone lets something slip, and suddenly kirk’s the kid who was stupid enough to let the admiral beat her without yelling for help. she deserved it, big mouth, stuck up bitch who thinks she can make it out of the academy in three years.
jim knows everything they call her. none of it is new. she’s been called names since before she was old enough to understand them, if they think they can hurt her, they’ll need to be more creative than bitch.
her professors pity her, and she grows more insubordinate, more stubborn, pushing back against the suddenly forgiven absences.
she’s a kirk. kirks don’t need pity.
the collection of cans of food stacked in a bag under her bed grows. she’s planning for three now, almost. her and bones and --
checkov looks at her with that puppy dog look and uhura takes her out to coffee far enough into the city where she’s not the bitch, she’s not a dead hero’s fuck up, and she --
she knows she should be grateful.
spock keeps their office door propped open, as it is logical to create a breeze, and it’s a tiny broomstick of a closet, but jim sometimes wanders in instead of going to class. it’s not that her classmates can hurt her -- she’s been playing games like this for too long -- but she’s tired of it, even if she’ll never admit it.
the admiralty makes it clear she’s expected to show at the trial. she shows up in dress uniform, hat tucked under her arm, keeping her eyes focussed on the wall instead of those testifying. pike goes first, a long list of captains, officers, and admirals called to testify. jim tunes all of them out, not caring about how marcus is a good man or not, not caring about the warning signs anyone saw too late.
she sits through the first day, restless and bored. none of this matters. bones sits next to her and jim wishes she wasn’t there, that she didn’t have to listen to the things jim lived through.
she’s waiting for bones to give up on her and walk away.
(she’s really waiting for her summons)
(it arrives three days into the trial)
there’s a story to this they want her to tell. she’s a damsel in distress, marcus is a monster, she fought back, she told someone, implications of things that never happened.
she’s not that story.
she’s a kirk, kirks don’t get abused.
spock is called before her. she’s grateful for that, listening to the logical way they lay out everything, the reasons they were there, the response, the medical procedures that took place -- when she’s ordered to the front of the court, she shoves her free hand in her pocket and clutches to her hat. she doesn’t look like she spent three hours crying and vomiting because all she could hear were all the things marcus said he could do. she has her weak spots, they don’t go away because he might go away for a few years. she knows she still has them.
she stands tall, chin up, like she’s not afraid of marcus anymore. she’s not.
there were others before her. she doesn’t know if that makes it any worse, knowing that marcus got his claws into other students and if anyone noticed, they swept them under the rug.
jim focuses on spock in the audience, addresses her answers to them like they’ve heard the details before. she can’t bear to look next to spock where bones should be sitting, doesn’t want to see the disgust on bones’ face when she realizes how screwed up jim is.
yes sir, no ma’am, i couldn’t say ma’am, yes he did sir, i wasn’t
the words are poison in her mouth, she keeps talking anyway. when they release her, she salutes the admirals out of habit not respect, nods at pike who sits at the end of the bench, and returns to her seat next to spock. bones is absent.
it hurts.
she reaches out to hold onto spock’s sleeve, careful not to brush against skin. they look down at her but she looks straight ahead and whispers
“please,” just loud enough for them to hear her. it’s the most vulnerable she’s felt since she found out spock was the one to walk in on marcus tearing her to shreds. they acquiesce, letting her hold onto them, and god, she’s spending too much time with them if she’s using fancy words like that.
bones slips back in half-way through marcus’s testimony, with red-rimmed eyes and shaking hands. jim holds her hand as bones leans against her, surprised she came back.
marcus is proud of what he’s done, keeping the biggest troublemaker in starfleet academy in line. there’s no doubt in his eyes that he did the right thing as he rattles off jim’s history like she’s the one on trial. he stares at jim and she stares back, clutching at spock’s sleeve and bones’ hand.
the guilty verdict feels like it’s sentencing her too.
three.
things scab over and fester and jim is okay.
she only visits spock’s office when she knows they’re in class. is so obnoxious during pike’s office hours that have replaced therapy that he asks her why he lets her stay. laughs too hard, drinks too much, flirts with everyone --
prays to god no one sees through her.
she doesn’t eat, barely sleeps, functions on a truly terrifying amount of caffeine and still makes the best grades in her classes.
she’s fine --
and then she’s not
she’s shaky and twitchy and it’s not the caffeine but she swears it is so the crease between uhura’s eyebrows will go away. everything feels too big and too small and she hasn’t felt this way since no, don’t think about that.
but it’s like marcus hit her once too hard and now everything she’s run from is catching up to her. the lecture hall is too large, has too many people, is too much. she’s not sure how she makes it out, but she can smell the blood and his cologne and clay. she can’t breathe, can’t get out of there fast enough.
uhura finds her sitting under spock’s desk in their office, tapping her fingers against the side of the desk repetitively. she kicks off her boots and sits next to jim, running a hand through jim’s short hair. jim curls up, head in her lap, trying not to cry.
spock joins them when they realize jim and uhura are throwing a fucking party under their desk. they crouch next to uhura, trading looks jim is too worn out from sobbing and shaking and running on empty for so damn long to decode past kirk is an idiot before spock asks, “do you require assistance?”
jim chokes back laughter, aware of how hysterical she must sound. there’s no answer to that question. there has never been an answer to that question.
she goes home, escorted by spock and wrapped in uhura’s sweater (and under strict orders not to get anything on it, or god forbid try to wash it), and bones is there pacing the length of the apartment kitchen. spock stands in the doorway as bones holds tight onto jim, and jim reaches out to grab their sleeve before they disappear down flights of stairs and she starts to think she can pretend none of this happened.
jim cracks and breaks and ends up on the floor curled up around bones as spock asks the questions no one got close enough to ask. she drinks too much whiskey and talks too loud about things she was never supposed to talk about and bones holds onto her, the tempest, the wayward storm, the good for nothing daughter of a man who only got remembered for how he died --
the whiskey only numbs so much of it --
the heat of the desert, the smell of cologne and burning flesh, the taste of carpet and dust and choking on her own blood
she's a kirk, kirks don't show weaknesses, but jim draws a goddamn map of hers before the whiskey runs out, spills her guts on the kitchen floor like it doesn't feel like she's being torn apart, like she can't barely breathe
she’s survived too many things she was never supposed to.