Chapter Text
He could recall that meeting around the conference table like it had just occurred; with Sulu and Uhura, Chekov and Scotty, Dr. McCoy and the Captain all seated around the long table. There had come a lull in the reports when Uhura finished reporting the last of her transmissions back to headquarters and all senior staff were anticipating a dismissal from Jim, who sat in a sprawl at the head of the table, his arms folded across his chest as he seemed to deliberate something very intensely. Spock had turned his PADD off, casting a short glance across the table at Dr. McCoy, the two of them sharing a question.
It was finally the doctor who broke the silence, "Jim, you got more to say or are we done wastin' our time?" They all noticed the odd shake of their Captain's head, as if he was throwing off some sort of reverie and just now returning to the present.
"Oh uh," Jim straightened up, fidgeting a little as he gazed around the table, looking at every officer seated around him. They were his friends, his colleagues, Starfleet's best and brightest. They were all eyeing him with concern by this point, each catching the scent of a difficult topic their Captain was having trouble broaching. "Sorry, not yet, there's one more thing I should mention before we disperse for the night." Jim seemed to steal himself, the lines of his face hardening with determination as he got up out of his chair and braced his hands on the edges of the conference table. He leaned there a moment, long enough to make Spock lightly clear his throat, quietly prompting Jim to continue before he lost his tired officers' patience. "I know it might," he looked up but his gaze didn't settle on a single face, rather staring across the room at empty air, "surprise most of you, and it has come as a rather sudden development, but as circumstances would have it, I've decided to resign from my position in Starfleet."
There was a long silence during which no one moved, varying shades of shock broadcasting across almost every face. Dr. McCoy's eyes widened in shock and he stood suddenly in a fit of emotion, always the first to speak his mind, "What the hell are you talkin' about Jim? Are you out of your goddamn mind?"
Jim straightened up to face his friend and Chief Medical Officer, a wave of exhaustion transforming his face from its resolute expression to one of weariness. He had to have known he would get this reaction; "Bones-"
"Don't 'Bones' me, Jim. I haven't heard a thing about this, not even in passing." Dr. McCoy waved a hand towards Spock with a level of incredulity, "Not even the hobgoblin would have kept that from me, and we're your friends Jim. Whatever it is, we can talk it out. Is this coming from the brass up top, are they forcing your resignation Jim?"
"They couldn't possibly, ve are so short of qualified Keptins in the fleet." Chekov was looking nervously between the doctor and Jim, seated at the other end of the table.
"You can't be serious..." said Uhura, who considered herself the last person on her Captain's friends list, but still respected him as at least her equal since the Narada incident. "We haven't even finished the five year mission."
The Captain was beginning to realize his error in judgement in telling the group this way, his hands lifting in a placating manner as everyone began to speak at once. By the time Jim regained control of the room, Spock was the only one still seated, one hand braced under his jaw, long fingers splayed against his temple, with the other arm tucked under his elbow. Dr. McCoy was glaring daggers at him past Jim's shoulder, having been the most outspoken member of their party. "Did you know about this Spock?"
Taking a long, slow breath, Spock leaned forward to slide his arms over the table top, folding his hands idly and arching a brow up at Jim. "I was not taken into the Captain's confidence regarding this matter; however, I did notice his agitation prior to this meeting. Had I known his intention, perhaps I could have persuaded him otherwise, but if I am not mistaken, the Captain has already submitted his resignation, if informally."
Jim threw him a long-suffering look, wiping a hand down over the back of his neck, "Spock, I-"
"Already resigned?" Sulu's voice caused another clamor amongst the officers, each vying for Jim's confirmation, for their questions to be answered and their concerns to be heard. The noise was loud enough to make Spock rise, pushing in his chair and bracing his hands along the back. It was only Jim's shout over the chaos that brought silence again, a tense quiet that sank into the room like a stone.
"Enough!" Jim roared, his fingers curling into fists at his sides, stubbornness turning the line of his jaw into steel. "I do not have to disclose my reasons if they are private. What is done is done and I will make my formal public resignation when we reach Outpost Ten. I've already arranged transport back to Earth and the Enterprise will continue on her mission."
"What?" It was barely a breath and hardly a word at all, from the shocked lips of Dr. McCoy. "With who to Captain her?"
"With 'whom'..." Spock interjected softly before he could restrain himself, and the murderous look he got from McCoy was well deserved. This was not a good time to be 'winding' the good doctor up, as the man himself would put it so colorfully.
Jim rolled his eyes towards the bulkheads of the conference room, "Not helping Spock."
Spock wasn't trying to be helpful. For once he was genuinely confused and just as concerned as the rest of his shipmates. That concern grew exponentially when Jim turned his gaze on Spock.
"I haven't sent my recommendations to headquarters just yet, but I do have you, Mr. Spock, as my top choice as replacement. Should you accept, as I think you should, you all will barely notice I'm gone."
"Jim." Sounding plaintive now, Dr. McCoy was gripping the Captain's arm and forcing him to meet his eyes. "We all stayed on the Enterprise to serve under you, and you know they'll try to stick some old desk jockey in your position instead. They've been pulling all the Admiralty out into space, giving them all ships to run until a fresh batch of graduates can get their rookie fingers on the steerin' wheel."
"With enrollment down, who knows when that will be...," Sulu muttered from his side of the table.
"How could you abandon us now?" Dr. McCoy's country brown eyes blaze into the Captain's, hoping he's rattled some sense into the younger man, but Jim's expression is closed off; hard.
"They'll manage just fine, and if Mr. Spock won't Captain her, I've made a few other recommendations. She won't fly brass. As Starfleet's flagship, it's too risky putting a top man in her seat. If anything, you'll get another rookie like me." Jim shook the doctor off and picked up his PADD, folding it under his arm and sidestepping to leave. "You are dismissed."
"Jim..." Uhura turned and watched their Captain stride from the conference room, his pace clipped and his back ramrod straight. Her brown eyes turned to survey the rest of her friends, "Why do you think he's resigning?"
Everyone except Spock shook their heads in puzzlement, varying levels of disbelief and anger evident in each of their faces. "Family business maybe?" Chekov supplied with a grimace.
"What family, Winona Kirk has been grounded for five years and we all know his father isn't around." Uhura folded her arms over her chest, very obviously frustrated. Suddenly, they all looked at Spock, "Are you going to accept?" She asked him softly, searching his unreadable face for any clues to what the inscrutable Vulcan might be thinking.
Picking up his PADD from the table, Spock lifted his head and rounded the end of the table, passing the Captain's now empty chair. "I am not certain of my choice yet. I will speak with the Captain and perhaps this issue will be resolved."
He had walked from the conference room that evening, in the middle of the Gamma shift, to his Captain's quarters to do just that. Spock naturally didn't wish to pry into Jim's personal affairs, especially since when he asked, they provoked odd and unsynchronized changes in Jim's expressions. The expressions ranged from annoyance and anger to sad acceptance. Spock could freely admit that it disturbed him, but not enough to probe deeper still. In the end, he left no wiser about Jim's causes for distress than when he had come.
Even the good doctor had tried to wear their Captain down, no doubt over a glass of some of his prized contraband, but every attempt was rebuffed and Jim remained a tightly closed book about the topic. By the time they had reached Outpost Ten, the whole ship knew of the Captain’s resignation. The Captain ran the Enterprise through her docking process one last time. His meager possessions were stuffed into Starfleet duffel bags and his golden tunic was thrown over one of his shoulders on his way to the transporter room. Crew members in the halls had stopped to stare, some offering words of luck or sorrow at his leaving, but most remained silent as their Captain, flanked on each side by his First Officer and CMO, boarded the transporter pad for transfer.
The last memory Spock had of his Captain was of standing behind him on a hastily erected stage in the wide meeting room on Outpost Ten. Kirk delivered his short speech publicly, a few passersby stopping to listen as his words were taken down into a message cube and date stamped. It was sealed into a parcel to be shipped alongside him back to Earth, along with his formal written recommendations for the Enterprise's new captain following his profile's data dumps into the Starfleet databases. By next week, Jim would only be a closed record in Starfleet's memory banks. For the first time after that meeting in the conference room, Jim had turned to Spock and McCoy with true regret shining in his eyes, his voice thick with unspoken emotion as he bid them both a farewell, leaving Spock in charge until further notice as her acting Captain. Both the Vulcan and the old country doctor had watched as their Captain, now gone civilian, carried his things towards a turbolift with defeated shoulders. The Outpost would house him for two more solar days before a rendezvous with another ship would take him back to Earth.
"There he goes..." McCoy had muttered, still sounding as if he was trapped in a state of disbelief.
"Indeed, Doctor." Spock had murmured; a little surprised to hear a sliver of disbelief in his own tone as he spoke.
They had returned to the Enterprise and in the weeks after leaving Outpost Ten, Jim remained the most talked about subject of conversation amongst the Enterprise's crew. Speculations regarding his departure ranged from him changing his mind about Starfleet, to having a secret lover he just couldn't live without. Each guess was more outrageous than the next. Only when headquarters’ decision to make Spock the Enterprise's captain came through did the Vulcan feel the abruptness of this transition truly settle in upon him. Whatever had caused Jim to drop his position so suddenly had to have been serious and it was only a year later that Spock found himself talking about the subject with Dr. McCoy:
"Not a single message you know? No transmissions from Earth from that bastard." McCoy griped. "Not even in my personal mail. It was like we were never friends." He scoffed, but the undertone of hurt was easily heard.
"Perhaps circumstances have kept him from being able to contact you Doctor. We were not given knowledge of his future plans." Spock sat in the center seat on the bridge, Dr. McCoy hovering behind him as he was wont to do now.
"Doesn't that bother you even a little Spock?" McCoy needled, his eyes narrowed at the view screen as they approached an M class planet in the D Sector asteroid belt. "That he could just up and leave without saying a single thing to either of us? What if it was some kind of top secret mission headquarters gave him, Spock? He could be in danger."
Spock arched a long-suffering brow at his medical companion and let his head tip to the side in deliberation, "What concerns me Doctor is that you continue to let your mind dwell on these speculations without supporting evidence with logic ." He would never admit it to the man, but Spock had considered the same possibilities, and then some. He had considered deaths, including that of Jim's brother Samuel, but upon looking up the man's whereabouts, he had found him safe and sound on Deneva with his small family, alive and well. Of course, he hadn't attempted to contact them, for that would be prying. But it was increasingly clear that he was going to have to make a decision soon, McCoy wasn't the only one pressuring him to talk to Jim.
Three days and seventeen hours ago Spock had received a transmission from Admiral Pike. Apparently Jim had not given any details for his resignation to the Starfleet brass either, and questions were brewing just as thickly back on Earth as they were in the ‘fancy tin can’, as McCoy called the Enterprise. Admiral Pike had been probing Spock for any insights he might have or details about the last weeks he had spent in Jim's company that might provide answers but the Vulcan hadn't been able to give him any additional information. At the end of their call, the Admiral had asked him their ETA to Earth. They were due for a short refit on their way back for what Jim used to call a 'milk run'. The Enterprise would be in space-dock to repair some damages for an estimated three months and two days and Spock had already signed off on the rotations for the crew's shore leave.
It was clear to Spock in his conversation with Pike, that he would not be making it back to his small rented apartment in San Francisco. Spock would be making a social call; one Pike hadn't been able to make himself. Now with plans to go to Iowa, Spock had been considering what he might say to Jim upon seeing him for the first time in five-hundred eighty-six days, eleven hours and fourteen minutes. Pike clearly wanted him to try to convince Jim to return to Starfleet, regardless of whatever reason he might have had for leaving. All Spock had by way of starting that conversation was a time of arrival, an address, and too many questions. One of which was... Why me?