Catching Up [For Carol Marcus]

[smartass_captain]

The good thing about being in a weird multiverse meeting point is that there's no shortages of doors to other worlds and places. There's a particular cafe Jim has frequented more than a few times since he's ended up in this place.

Good of place to go as any. At the very least, it's off the beaten path and there's coffee and real tea. The ship might have been a more appropriate place to take her, but replicated is not decent, as far as Jim is concerned.

Once they've got some drinks (black coffee for Jim) they can pick a quiet spot in a corner somewhere to catch up.

"Hopefully the tea here is decent. I haven't had it myself, but. Better than what we've got on the Enterprise, that's for sure."

Comments

[drcmarcus]

The tea isn't replicated and that's something she hadn't expected. The scientific part of her mind is taking everything in, all the changes, even the possibilities around her. She's afraid she won't be able to shut that part of her brain up long enough to have any sort of decent conversation. That fear is slightly assuaged once she's actually seated with Jim and sipping on the most glorious thing she's had in months.

"It's wonderful. There's an actual flavor other than watered down." She smiles at him before setting her cup down. There are serious matters to discuss.

"Have you been here long?"

[smartass_captain]

She'll know she's thought too hard about alternate realities and possibilities when she starts tasting purple. If that is not the case, she's probably fine. Jim smiles when she takes a sip of the tea, it's a face he recognizes.

"I love my job, and I wouldn't trade it for the world but sometimes a break from replicated nutritionally calculated meals and drink is nice." He sips at his coffee until Carol gets her 'opening missles' face and he sets his mug down too.

"About four months now." At least, according to the time back on the ship. Multiverse time is really strange that way. "I was stranded for the first month of that time, before finding the connection between the multiverse and my world. Now I pop in and out whenever we're between missions. Managed to keep it a secret, too. No one's government needs to know there's such a convenient way between worlds hidden on the Enterprise, of all places."

[drcmarcus]

No purple, not yet at least.

"I'm half tempted to eat something entirely devoid of any nutritional value whatsoever just for the sake of doing it." The thought of indulging in nothing but chocolate for days on end is appealing. Attempting to fit into her uniform after is less so.

"Four months? And you didn't say a word?" Carol is both impressed and slightly peeved. The amount of research that could have been done...

Still. She can understand his reasoning. There are those that have no business knowing about easy access to other worlds. Even those you think you can trust. She'd learned that lesson the hard way.

[smartass_captain]

"Oh man, now that you mention it I could so go for a burger." Jim laughs and it really is a tempting idea. But he's met his future self in the Nexus, and it's enough of a reminder to immediately put the lid on that idea. As well as book himself some gym time when they're done here.

"Not entirely true. Bones knows. Spock knows. Scotty knows." Jim picks up the mug again, but doesn't drink just yet. "It was Spock's idea to keep the door under wraps. I've humored him a few times and brought experiments over for him, taken a LOT of research notes to keep him and Bones appeased. Brought Scotty a bottle of scotch for his birthday."

"I swear I do more work over here than on the ship. But yeah, as for telling the crew? No. We haven't. They don't even want to use the door in case it affects the..temporal..biosignature...something. Spock said it was dangerous to mess with, so we've been pretty careful."

[drcmarcus]

"Then why don't you?" She's enabling for entirely selfish reasons that are neither here nor there. Seriously though, if he indulges then she won't have any guilt in doing the same. And the calories would be cut in half.

Hearing about the amount of people that know the truth earns him a raised brow. Of course he would have told his senior officers. His doctor. His First Officer. Chief Engineer. It makes sense but she still wishes she'd been in on it all earlier. What need for a weapons expert though? So far things seemed peaceful.

"I believe it. Though I'm sure Doctor McCoy is more than willing to avoid going through it himself. He doesn't even trust the transporter, let alone a door to multiple universes."

[smartass_captain]

"Bones'd kill me." It's an easy excuse to make. He's not as bad as everyone thinks he is and at the same time so much worse than everyone thinks he is. Jim finds this incredibly convenient when he's not quite being honest.

"Scotty was the first to know because the door....isn't in a good place." The captain looks incredibly serious for all of a second, before you can see him push the thought from his head and move on. "Had to do a lot of tests to make sure it was safe at all. I told Bones in case I caught something while I was out, and also because he chases me around the whole damn ship, you better believe he knows when I'm not on it. And I didn't tell Spock so much as he inferred it on his own and then we got together to talk about it seriously. No one else wanted to risk using the thing, so..."Jim shrugs.

He has become delegated ambassador to the Multiverse. He doesn't seem to mind. Her observation about McCoy would be correct in enough ways that Jim gives her a huge grin.

"I run into a few familiar faces now and again though. None from my version of reality so far, but some pretty similar ones. And no one I know is a regular in the place I ended up at, so..." He shrugs.

[drcmarcus]

Carol is very well aware of how the good doctor can be, especially where Jim Kirk is involved. She's seen him in action on more than one occasion. And after the Khan incident... "Somehow I doubt that."

Not after he went to all the trouble of bringing the man back to life in the first place. That she leaves unsaid.

Carol nods in silent understanding, listening as he explains the situation until a thought strikes her. "Does that mean... are we different then? From different realities? Clearly I know you, and you know me, but if there are similar realities that run on a line parallel to those of ours without actually being ours, how can we be certain that we share the same original timeline?"

[smartass_captain]

"That's actually the big reason I didn't bring you back to the ship. Easiest way would be to take you back and see if you're already there. But understandably, that would kind of be a huge deal if you were, so..." He gestures around them.

"This seems safer. I've had a lot of time to think about alternate realities and consequences in the last few months.." Coffee sip.


[Since there hasn't been another AoS character in the game Jim's at, I've been playing the crew as npcs back on the ship. If Carol would like to be from Jim's timeline I'm cool with it, I figured it was easier to assume everyone was from different realities until I talked to players about it.]

[drcmarcus]

"The sad part is that I can't even say with certainty how I would react to that." Having another version of herself walk in would make her head spin for sure, but there would be certain advantages.

Her hands rest on her forgotten mug as she considers the possibilities. And the consequences.

"How have you managed?"

[That works for me if it's easier.]

[smartass_captain]

"I'm pretty sure by now I'd just crack jokes at myself before explaining everything. Then again, I'm lucky because I met an alternate Spock a while ago during the Narada incident." He knows she's read the report. Carol's thorough that way. "So I'm a bit more prepared for crazy."

He's also pretty sure it would boil down to them either fighting or flirting with each other for kicks. Which, while amusing, would confuse and annoy the hell out of everyone else, Jim is certain.

"By keeping the Nexus more or less a secret, it's kept the complications to a minimum." Jim shrugs slightly. "The location of the door is another thing going for it. Keeps me from taking trips on a whim."

[drcmarcus]

"I'd likely put myself to work. Two heads are better than one, though I'm not entirely sure that would still be true if it's the same head twice." He's right in that she'd read the report. As a matter of fact, it had been her job before her father had shut her out and decided there were things she had no business knowing. It was why she'd taken it upon herself to get stationed aboard the ship in the first place. There was more she'd needed to know.

Carol lays a gentle hand on his, dreading the question she's about to ask but knowing it needs asking all the same. "The door. It's in engineering?"

[smartass_captain]

"That sounds like you." Jim agrees. Carols was always quick to pick up on things. And sharp enough to usually be right about them, too.

Jim lets her touch him for a moment, but pulls away gently before he answers. He appreciates the sentiment, but he can't handle being pitied. It's not personal Carol, he didn't tell anyone at first because of the same thing.

"Yeah. It operates normally unless I touch it where I...so I mean, it's still functional for it's purpose. But. Yeah. Where I died."

[drcmarcus]

"Maybe I'm too predictable for my own good." Of course she's not entirely serious. She'll never settled for being too predictable.

When Jim pulls his hand away she doesn't take it personally. She can understand. What they're discussing is highly intimate. There's nothing closer to the vest than the subject of one's own death.

"I can't even begin to imagine." Whatever thoughts she'd had about Jim Kirk before actually meeting him, getting to know him, had long since been erased. The respect she had for him was endless and he never failed to surprise.

[smartass_captain]

"Not predictable. Predictable doesn't hack her way onto a starship under the nose of my first officer." Jim raises his mug in a slight 'well played' gesture toward her and even now he's trying to diffuse the situation, play it off as though he wasn't having to relive hell every time he wanted to take a trip off the ship.

"Obviously Scotty wanted to make sure the door was still functional. In its original purpose. Bones wanted to make sure I wasn't d...doing something stupid. And Spock just wondered if it would work every time after the other two stopped freaking out about it." And there's a shrug. See Carol it's no big deal after all!

Jim just isn't going to sleep for the next seventy two hours so he doesn't have to have debilitating panic attack inducing nightmares! Hooray!

"But like I said, everyone's trip is different. Lots of people just wake up somewhere else. Or walk through trying to go to the bathroom or something equally mundane."

[drcmarcus]

Her grin fairly borders on a smirk though she knows good and damn well that there's no way the circumstances of this situation don't bother him. She's no expert, her credentials are for weapons rather than people, but she knows how certain things set her off. How they bring her back to her father and watching what happened. Khan standing over her, the sound of her own bone snapping under his boot, the pain of it paling in comparison to the agony she felt watching her father's skull crushed like nothing more than overripe fruit...

No, it doesn't take much to go down roads that are better left avoided and suffer the consequences traveling them brings on. To willingly subject oneself to such torment over and over again, she can accurately gauge the toll it must take.

"I'm still not entirely sure how I got here. I don't really remember much. I feel like that should bother me more than it does, yet somehow I don't seem to mind. I don't think it was anything traumatic. I remember getting ready for my day, stepping into my closet and then... I was here. Well, where you found me."

[smartass_captain]

"No harm in that, so long as you make sure you're decent when you traipse into your closet from now on. Just in case." Jim throws her a cheeky wink and a smile that's half hidden by his mug of coffee.

He really tries quite hard to make other people think about literally anything else besides worrying about him. Even if it makes them mad at him for being crude.

"I don't think the whole of the Multiverse is going to listen to you telling them to turn around."

[drcmarcus]

"A wardrobe on hand in order to enter my wardrobe. This already sounds like a headache." The smile is nothing less than she expects. Charm and bravado seem to get Jim out of most of the situations he finds himself in from what she's witnessed, and pure dumb luck seems to account for the rest.

"I can be quite intimidating. I got you to listen, didn't I?" A point of pride she might mention. Even if it did take repeating herself for it to work. Jim had been focused on his goal at the time and she didn't honestly believe that he'd looked just for the sake of looking. That she might be undressed hadn't seemed to come into his mind at all. She was more than willing to let it slide.

[smartass_captain]

The only genius level repeat offender in the Midwest, Carol. There's some genuine talent and skill involved. Bullshitting and luck do make up far more than they should percentage wise though.


"Eventually, yeah. Man, that feels like forever ago." Then again, most things before the ship going down do. Jim takes a deep breath suddenly and sets the coffee cup aside. "Anyway. We seem to be from the same world, or at least very very similar ones. I hope everything's been going alright after...after I went under."

[drcmarcus]

She'd read the pertinent information when it came to him as soon as she'd figured out the missiles were going to be put on the Enterprise. She was nothing if not thorough. His intellect was never really in question.

Usually.

"We've just recently started the five year mission. Our first. You've been handling things well, better than anyone could have expected if we're being honest." There was a part of her that felt like she should keep a few things close to the vest just in case he wasn't the Jim she knew. What if she altered some timeline? Or said something she shouldn't and it made things awkward because he was the Jim Kirk she knew. Discretion seemed to be the better part of valor.

[smartass_captain]

"Same here." Jim nods along, because everything was matching up. At least that made chatting less awkward. She knew everything he was talking about, and it's really a comfort he didn't know he'd been missing around here.

Being able to talk to someone else who had been there. Another part of the crew who knew him. Well. Knew Captain Kirk. Very few ever got to know Jim. He likes it better that way, the keeping up walls between himself and others. It's a safety mechanism, perhaps no longer needed, but now unable to go without.

It's been so long Jim doesn't know how to stop doing it. So he doesn't.

"I can only come here when we're en route to our next mission. Or on down time. It'll be nice whenever we have our first shore leave eventually, because I won't constantly be worried about whether there's an emergency happening back there while I"m over here."

[drcmarcus]

A safe distance was something Carol knew a little something about. She tended to bury herself in her work to the point that interpersonal relationships often suffered or withered before becoming anything at all. It was something she was working on and that had started to come a little easier to her with the crew. Life aboard the Enterprise really had changed everything for her.

"It makes sense. This could easily prove to be a distraction." In more ways than one. The fact that it could be incredibly compromising to his mental and emotional health meant that it was also something that could compromise his command decisions. Then again, she was sure both Spock and Doctor McCoy had already voiced those concerns and taken steps to keep an eye on things. To say they were thorough was an understatement.

"Being from the same universe would certainly make things easier in that regard at least. You'd have less to worry about if you could easily be reached." Provided communicators worked here. That was something she'd need to test.

[smartass_captain]

It had changed everything for all of them. Whether they wanted to admit it or not. It was good to consider the crew a second family. Especially since in some cases many of them lacked a blood family to relate to.

Of all things, Jim's actually getting help out here for his mental health. Sometimes, it's easier to admit flaws to strangers. He hasn't been sleeping well, but a quick check with Bones would prove he's been that way since before the Academy. Jim Kirk is a man too busy for sleep and food.

"I've got a dump phone from one of the commercial districts round where I spend most of my time in, but it only works in this place, not on the ship." Which, considering they're going to the farthest corners of their galaxy, makes a fair bit of sense. The weird thing is how a door to another dimension is on their ship in the first place. multiple doors even, since Carol's is in her quarters.

[drcmarcus]

"Maybe I should invest. As a precautionary measure, of course." She finally seems to remember her tea and takes a sip to find it significantly cooled. It's not the first time something like that has happened.

"Aside from this place, what else is there on offer? Can you go into other realities through other doors? More importantly, how do you find your way back to your own door?" Carol was full of questions and burning with curiosity.

"Have you been to another reality?" If it was possible then what might they run into? What qualified someone to travel the multiverse as it were? Or was it an entirely random selection? So many questions only barely kept in check.

[smartass_captain]

[nexus_sages is where Jim is talking about, fyi. I dunno how to invite but you should check it out :D]

"Yeah, they're easy enough to come by over where I frequent and they seem to accept pretty much everyone's currency. And bartering." Which is useful because actual paper money hasn't been a thing for a long time.

"I've been to a version of 2013 Brooklyn, New York." Jim smiles fondly. "My friends live in that universe, so I spend most of my time there if I'm not in the multiverse forum proper." Jim really likes it there, but explaining Marvel 616 universe would probably just make Carol worry more.

"The doors can be fickle. Like I said, I was stranded for well over a month before I was able to get back to the ship. That was when I crashed with a friend in his world. And as much as it hurts to say this, the best answer I can give you for how the doors are stabilized is 'magic'." Jim honestly shrugs. "There's a guy that specializes in fixing portals to people's homes, but damn if I know what he does."

[drcmarcus]

[Ooh, definitely! :D Though I'm totally giggling at the Marvel 616 thing. There's a Loki in my head smirking outright.]

"A plus to be sure." If people from different worlds, different times, different universes were able to meet in one place, there would need to be some sort of system in place to keep things from devolving into chaos.

"2013? Fascinating. From our universe or an alternate?" Because now it was really hitting her that there were worlds with entirely different histories. She'd known after the Narada incident-- most of the higher level officers in Starfleet did, it was just different to have it, and the ability to traverse those realities, right there.

And that's the first thing to really dampen her enthusiasm. The potential to get stuck. As much as she'd love to discover what these other universes have to offer she's pretty attached to her own.

"With some of the things we've seen it doesn't really seem that far fetched."

[smartass_captain]

[There's a halloween ball going on starting tomorrow. No form to fill to join the comm. You'd be more than welcome :3]

"Definitely alternate." Jim chuckles. "Trust me on that one. I met my like...super great great grandpa though. A version of him at least." Yeah that was ten kinds of weird, but DNA doesn't lie.

"Do you....want to see it? The place I hang out in?" Jim raises and eyebrow. "So long as you're willing to keep this off the record...I'm okay taking you."

[drcmarcus]

[Ooh! I have a few muses that could do with some air. I might just have to join up.]

That's enough to make her pause. She wonders if... maybe in another reality her father hadn't strayed so far from the path he'd started on. But would she be able to forgive him? Even if it wasn't him, even if she ran into a man that hadn't committed the same atrocities the father she'd watched die had, would she be able to look him in the eyes and forgive what he'd done?

"How did that turn out?" She tries to smile for Jim and mean it. For him that experience must have been wonderful. Or so she hopes.

"I'm the same woman who lied to your face and forged records to covertly study missiles I wasn't meant to know existed. I can keep this off the record." In fact, she was looking forward to exploring.

[smartass_captain]

[Post a question I'll reply even from work! You can even say Jim brought you back there :D :D :D]

"We look like we could be brothers." Jim snorts. "It's...weird." And the smile fades. Carol isn't the only one with problems when it comes to the idea of family. In truth, finding out they were related made Jim certain...he'd be thrown away again. He's just waiting for it to happen.

Oh no, that's too serious. Think. Think like the wind before she asks questions, Jim.

"At least I found out before I invited him to bed." God dammit Jim. Too late. Abort! Abort!

[drcmarcus]

[I'm actually excited. Is that ridiculous??]

Carol snorts out a laugh and then covers it with a hand but there's still an almost gleeful smirk on her face.

"That would have been a level of awkward few have seldom seen. Possibly narcissistic as well." She doesn't bother hiding the smile when she ribs him.

"How did you eventually figure it out? Was it the resemblance or something else?"

you saw nothing

[smartass_captain]

[ You should be excited! Also, realtalk: the ball got posted early. You should totes join and post a welcome to the nexus question, and then Jim can take carol as his plus one to the ball. How's that sound?]

"Got him patched up on the ship, after a nasty fight. Bones had to draw blood. And, well..." Shrug. "DNA doesn't lie."

Of course not ;)

[drcmarcus]

[I have stage fright. It has been years since I've been in a game. OMG. Why am I being such a wuss?]

"It certainly doesn't. Although sometimes it would be lovely if it did." Because there were times when it would be fabulous to deny certain genetic relations.

"Have you met any other relatives? Or versions of yourself? I admit I'm most curious about that. To pick my own brain would be fascinating." It takes her a minute to think about what she's just said. "I mean that in the least self centered way possible, I swear."