Work Text:
Change is an ever present force in the universe.
Every planet, every solar system, and every galaxy bends at the will of change.
It's beautiful, and tragic, how quickly things can change within an instant. How one choice, or one mistake can make your entire world..explode.
Nero still remembers. Of course he does. How could he ever forget, watching his planet be consumed? Screaming at screens, at his crew, begging for it to not be true. He remembers he had to be dragged away from the console, lest he drive them straight into the blast.
Nero barely twitched as they were swallowed into a black hole. The crew panicked around him, but he couldn't bring himself to even blink. His crew ran in circles, activating every thruster and shield they had. They wanted to live, but all Nero had wanted in that moment was to die.
When they popped out of the other side alive, there was celebration. Nero did not celebrate. How could he?
Nero walks through life in a daze for weeks after, praying for it all to be a dream.
His home. The place where he grew up, where he spent all his life. Just..gone, in an instant. An entire race, a culture, a society. Neighbors, friends, family..
Family..
He has nightmares, almost every single night. The others have stopped mentioning it. They've stopped bringing it up during meals. They've stopped attempting to comfort him, because they know they will be shoved away. He shoves everyone away.
He can't stand to be on this ship. It's a constant reminder that he wasn't there. He was out in space, trying to earn a living, trying to give his wife and child the life they deserved.
His nightmares always follow the same patterns.
His wife burns in every one. She dies terrified and screaming. She died in unimaginable pain. Her hands cradle her stomach in every one, as if she could protect them from the blast. His unborn child was never even given the chance to cry.
Nero doesn't just poke at the wound. He digs his fingers in until they are coated with blood, rips himself open chunk by chunk. He thinks, if he could just dig deep enough and finally rip his heart out, the pain would stopd.
Why wasn't he there?
Why wasn't he there?
Why wasn't he there?
He wakes up screaming, and for hours, he paces the ship. Nero wears holes in every landing, in every room. He walks in circles, lost in his grief.
Days..weeks..months..then years pass this way. Pacing. Grieving.
In all that time, he imagines his wife dying in so many different ways. He drives himself mad imagining what his child would have been like if they had the chance to be born. 'What if's terrorize him every waking moment, and they follow him even when he sleeps.
He wants to be dead. He wishes he was dead.
Nero does not snap.
There is not one moment where he loses his mind, where he finally dives off the deep end.
Insanity is a slow process. It's a path he chooses to walk, as screams haunt his mind. He chooses to listen to the voices. It is a choice he makes every single day. When he wakes up, when he eats, as he paces—he slowly descends further and further into the quicksand that is madness.
It's grief that drives him crazy. Grief never leaves. Grief stays, condensing, a churning ball in his chest akin to his own black hole. It pulls him in, speaks to him, urges him to choose anger.
Grief is inescapable. Grief becomes the most all-consuming red matter. Grief becomes rage.
Why should he not be mad? Spock made a promise. Said with certainty that his planet would survive, that Nero's family would survive.
Spock lied. Lied to every one of them. Lied to Nero, lied to his wife, lied to his child.
Liar liar liar—the word begins to accompany the constant screams, echoing in his mind, each day becoming louder. He begins to wake up with one thought on his mind: Spock lied.
He's the one who made false promises. Spock gave him false hope, just to rip his heart from his chest at the last moment. Spock is the one who arrived too late, who waited too long. It's his fault. All of this pain and suffering, it's his fault.
As Nero stares at the holographic pictures of his wife, he knows what he must do. The voices, once screaming, quiet to a gentle hum in his mind. The soft music of a man who's found peace in his rage.
Spock will suffer, just as he has.
He thinks on it carefully. There are so many ways to bring about a man's end, but that isn't what he wants. No, Spock will live. He will live a long life, with the same pain that he has for the past years.
He rolls different ideas around in his head. Physical torture won't be enough. He doesn't want Spock to be able to heal from his wounds. The torment must be mental. It must leave a wound that will remain open and bleeding for the rest of his life—just as Nero's has.
There is an old saying on Earth. 'An eye for an eye.' If a man kills your son, should you not be able to kill his in turn?
If a man destroys your planet and ends the lives of every member of your family and every friend you've ever had, should you not be able to do the same?
Should Spock not watch his planet burn just as Nero had? Does he not deserve that much for what he has done?
A tiny voice in the back of Nero's head—one drowned out by the symphony of screams and liars and his faults—tells him that he is walking a dangerous road. That, if he chooses this path, there will be no going back, it will bring about his destruction. The voice begs for him to see reason, to stop this before it's too late.
The voice is swiftly drowned out.
In the fork of forgiveness and revenge, Nero knows what he will choose, every single time, and in every universe.