[Background] - Conscription
[Warning: Dark themes and non-consensual sex. This is the mirrorverse, kids.]
The evening started out like any other. Scope out the prospects, a little hustle-whatever direction that took-and hopefully score enough to get out of town on tomorrow’s shuttle. Fucking Iowa. Fucking Riverside. It’d been awhile since he’d been back, but Frank had insisted he come for Winona’s funeral. Sam was nowhere to be found and Frank was too busy to make the arrangements. Too falling-down drunk was more like it. He wondered why the man even bothered with the excuses anymore.
He’d been surprised to realize how small his uncle was. Last time he’d seen him, Frank had still been big enough, strong enough, to hold Kirk’s head as he fucked his mouth, and now he was a broken old man who eyed Kirk with bloodshot eyes as if suspicious of the retribution to come. Kirk suspected Frank hadn’t changed at all, but he’d grown up, and now he couldn’t understand ever being afraid of the asshole. Ever thinking he could do anything to him.
Winona hadn’t left shit, of course, which was the other reason Frank had left everything to him. Kirk had a little money, and he’d surprised himself by parting with it without much regret to cover expenses. He didn’t really hold it against Winona. Not anymore. Life had fucked her over as completely as anyone else, and she’d tried. Once in awhile. Now she was dead, and there wasn’t much of anyone to care, and Kirk could spare it. Easy come, easy go. He could get more.
Which was why he was here tonight, in this dive, crawling with ‘fleet cadets with the smug superiority of those who thought they’d dodged the draft by signing on as officers. Kirk smirked into his beer. They mustn’t have read the statistics. The higher you got, the closer the survival rate resembled the lowest canon fodder. It didn’t pay to be on top.
But fuck him if there wasn’t a smart little cadet suddenly next to him he wouldn’t mind taking that position temporarily. Hell, he’d do this one for free.
“That’s a lot of drinks for one woman,” he said, his best smile in place. Whoever her friends were, they were probably sorority girls or cadet assholes who didn’t know their dicks from their training phasers. Let alone their tongues.
The look she shot him was steel, almost a language unto itself. He tried again.
“Don’t you at least want to know my name before you completely reject me?”
“Fuck off.” At least she was speaking to him now.
“This gigolo bothering you?” some hulking bastard said behind him, and with the flicker of an eyelid the girl was someone else, the curve of her lips mirroring the sweep of her eyelashes as she nodded.
“I fucking resent that,” Kirk protested. Gigolo implied specialization. He was a jack of all trades, and was mastering them pretty quickly, too.
The brute got all up in his face, spoiling for a fight now, and Kirk figured his luck had run out as far as getting out tonight went. Oh well. Might as well have some fun while he could.
“Yeah? Well I fucking resent... you.”
“Aw, Cupcake, you really shouldn't,” Kirk smiled. “There's enough of me to go around. Though I guess that's even more true of you, huh?” He ducked as the first punch came, delivering a firm blow to the larger man's diaphragm, and winked at the hot cadet who was going to stand back and let this play out. There wasn't much of a contest-even when two of his friends joined, Kirk was faster, with more actual experience, and despite a few blows in the end it was the girl who was scraping her pack up off the floor and herding them out.
Not after kneeing him in the balls, of course. But that was his fault for not seeing it coming.
He was nursing his nuts and contemplating a shot of whiskey when someone sat at his table. The bar had mostly cleared out, and he looked up to see an older man staring at him with a gaze so ice blue it almost froze. He had the hard look of Starfleet, the sort who had bucked the trend and survived. So far.
“What a waste,” he said when he had Kirk's attention.
“Who the fuck're you?” Kirk asked. He picked up his shot. “You know, I'm running a special for Starfleet officers tonight. Two for one, if you wanna scare up that little cadet with the ponytail. Or Cupcake, I don't care, long as he's cleaned up.”
He didn't even see the man move, but the glass was knocked out of his hand before it touched his lips and the officer was leaning over the table, his eyes holding Kirk like a vice. “Your father,” he said, “would be proud of what I just saw. And disgusted it wasn't being put to any better use.”
“My father was an asshole who got himself killed on my birthday for no good reason I can see.”
“Think you can do better?”
Kirk stared at the man. Who was he, to come in here and throw that in his face? Kirk was doing fine, and this asshole didn't get to judge.
“I am doing better. What do you care?”
The hint of a smile played around the man's cruel lips. “I'm Captain Pike. I knew your father.”
“Well good for you. That makes fucking one of us.” He turned to hold up his hand for another drink and was treated to a sharp blow on the back of his head that made him dizzy for a moment. He shook it out and turned back to Pike, hands on the table and ready to spring.
“You make one move towards me and you won't make it to George Kirk's age.” Pike's voice was low, a sinister rumble that needed no volume to prove the sincerity of his words. Kirk blinked at him as his head cleared. “Why aren't you enrolled at the Academy? You're what-nineteen?”
Kirk shrugged, a defiant sneer on his lips. “Yeah, my dad was such a great example. No thanks.”
“Is that what you told the Draft Board?” Kirk looked at him sharply at that. “Get up.” Pike rose, but Kirk stayed put. At least until Pike came over and kicked the chair out from under him. “Get up. If we can't have a civilized conversation, we're going to have to have the other kind.” He shoved Kirk in front of him, who stumbled but continued on. Fuck. The back door. There was an alley back there, dark and rank, and the smell of it hit him like a wave of nausea.
Pike must have caught his expression, because he slammed him up against the grimy brick wall and said, “Get used to this, Kirk, if you don't mend your attitude problem. I don't suppose it'll make much difference to me whether you spend your life sucking dick here or in a penal colony, but frankly, if you're half the man your father was it's a waste of your talents.” Kirk could just feel the edge of a knife at his throat now, and wondered how he'd gotten here. The intervening steps seemed veiled to him, unclear. He'd dodged for years now, ever since Tarsus, but to be found, like this, to be forced into it or die in this fucking shithole, was not what he'd been running toward.
What had he been running toward? Or was it just away?
“Speaking of which, the first thing you need to learn,” Pike was saying, his voice as cold as ever and his strength, Kirk could tell, more than a match for his own, “is proper respect for your commanding officers. You don't have that, and the agony booth is the least of your worries.” There was a rustling behind him and then he was being turned, shoved down to his knees, Pike's cock springing against his face as he slipped on whatever fluid coated the pavement. He looked up, disbelieving and angry, though Pike's cold grim expression hadn't changed. “I hear you're good at this. Now is hardly the time to disappoint me.”
There was something trickling down his collar, the sting in his neck as he opened his mouth and Pike shoved his prick in implying the knife had seen some action. He could feel the hilt of it against his scalp, as Pike grasped his hair in the same fist and Kirk tried to work up the saliva to glide over the huge hard cock in his mouth. At least he wasn't a fucking face-fucker like Frank; Pike let Kirk do the work, and it was work he knew, even in his own terror, even as his mind raced to think of a way out of it. He couldn't kill Pike, someone would come after him. He couldn't wound him, or Pike would. All he could do, in this moment, was apply his skill and try to appease the man that way. Fuck. He wasn't going to jail, and he wasn't becoming some Imperial asshole like his father. There was some way out of this. Pike's cock hit the back of his throat and he opened it up, swallowing him down, so far back he couldn't taste the pre-come. Pike was still talking, calm and low as ever, patient and what Kirk imagined he imagined was fatherly.
“That's it,” he was saying. “You're an eager little cocksucker, aren't you? I bet you enjoy it. Self-preservation, I think. But you won't be the pretty boy forever. Shorter than you think, living this way. It'll only get you so far. That's right-the better you are, boy, the less it'll hurt before I'm done. Though I'm starting to think pain's the only way to get through to you.”
Suddenly he was pulled up and off, shoved against some crates lining the alley and gasping through swollen lips. The edge of one crate knocked the wind out of him, and by the time he began struggling his pants were already around his ankles, impeding his movement, and Pike was poised at his ass, his hand heavy on Kirk's bloodied neck.
“You see,” Pike was saying as he shoved in and Kirk's lip split between his teeth, flooding his mouth with the coppery tang of his own blood, “real survival lies in power. In calling the shots.” His own saliva wasn't nearly enough to ease the passage unprepared, no matter how active Kirk was, but he knew well enough to relax, to let this happen as quickly as possible. “In relying on something other than pretty blue eyes and a sweet little ass. In planning for something beyond your next trick, your next score.”
Kirk was gasping now, trying not to cry out, trying to will Pike into coming even though he could tell the man's control was well established. He even angled himself, every few thrusts, to hit Kirk's prostate, sending a jolt of pleasure shooting through the pain that Kirk resented more than anything else.
“You have two choices,” Pike continued, not even out of breath. “The draft, or a penal colony. It's up to you. And then there's the third.” He drew out, and Kirk did cry out at that, as something hot spattered Kirk's buttocks and something else ran warm between his thighs. The hand was still on his neck, even as the other seemed to be doing up Pike's trousers. “The Academy, and a future.” By the time the weight was removed and Kirk could draw up his pants, Pike was out of reach. And Kirk was in no condition to go after him. The man merely watched him, taking in his elevated breathing, the unbowed anger in his eyes, the cunning that kept him from a pointless attack. And nodded. “Tarsus will be sealed. You'll get prime assignments-provided, of course, you don't fuck things up for yourself. I want to keep my eye on you-if you're another George after all, someone has to.”
Pike tossed him a credit chit, which Kirk caught automatically. “I guess you get paid after all,” he said, the first smile Kirk had seen on his face a superior smirk. “It's only good for the shuttle out of here. 0600 hours. Be on it.”
As Kirk hobbled back to the room he'd been staying in, he wasn't thinking about his options. For the first time, he had plans beyond his next meal, his next score. For the first time, he knew what he wanted. And every time Pike demonstrated his control, over the years, Kirk flashed back to that alley, and to the vow he'd made to himself, and smiled.
The evening started out like any other. Scope out the prospects, a little hustle-whatever direction that took-and hopefully score enough to get out of town on tomorrow’s shuttle. Fucking Iowa. Fucking Riverside. It’d been awhile since he’d been back, but Frank had insisted he come for Winona’s funeral. Sam was nowhere to be found and Frank was too busy to make the arrangements. Too falling-down drunk was more like it. He wondered why the man even bothered with the excuses anymore.
He’d been surprised to realize how small his uncle was. Last time he’d seen him, Frank had still been big enough, strong enough, to hold Kirk’s head as he fucked his mouth, and now he was a broken old man who eyed Kirk with bloodshot eyes as if suspicious of the retribution to come. Kirk suspected Frank hadn’t changed at all, but he’d grown up, and now he couldn’t understand ever being afraid of the asshole. Ever thinking he could do anything to him.
Winona hadn’t left shit, of course, which was the other reason Frank had left everything to him. Kirk had a little money, and he’d surprised himself by parting with it without much regret to cover expenses. He didn’t really hold it against Winona. Not anymore. Life had fucked her over as completely as anyone else, and she’d tried. Once in awhile. Now she was dead, and there wasn’t much of anyone to care, and Kirk could spare it. Easy come, easy go. He could get more.
Which was why he was here tonight, in this dive, crawling with ‘fleet cadets with the smug superiority of those who thought they’d dodged the draft by signing on as officers. Kirk smirked into his beer. They mustn’t have read the statistics. The higher you got, the closer the survival rate resembled the lowest canon fodder. It didn’t pay to be on top.
But fuck him if there wasn’t a smart little cadet suddenly next to him he wouldn’t mind taking that position temporarily. Hell, he’d do this one for free.
“That’s a lot of drinks for one woman,” he said, his best smile in place. Whoever her friends were, they were probably sorority girls or cadet assholes who didn’t know their dicks from their training phasers. Let alone their tongues.
The look she shot him was steel, almost a language unto itself. He tried again.
“Don’t you at least want to know my name before you completely reject me?”
“Fuck off.” At least she was speaking to him now.
“This gigolo bothering you?” some hulking bastard said behind him, and with the flicker of an eyelid the girl was someone else, the curve of her lips mirroring the sweep of her eyelashes as she nodded.
“I fucking resent that,” Kirk protested. Gigolo implied specialization. He was a jack of all trades, and was mastering them pretty quickly, too.
The brute got all up in his face, spoiling for a fight now, and Kirk figured his luck had run out as far as getting out tonight went. Oh well. Might as well have some fun while he could.
“Yeah? Well I fucking resent... you.”
“Aw, Cupcake, you really shouldn't,” Kirk smiled. “There's enough of me to go around. Though I guess that's even more true of you, huh?” He ducked as the first punch came, delivering a firm blow to the larger man's diaphragm, and winked at the hot cadet who was going to stand back and let this play out. There wasn't much of a contest-even when two of his friends joined, Kirk was faster, with more actual experience, and despite a few blows in the end it was the girl who was scraping her pack up off the floor and herding them out.
Not after kneeing him in the balls, of course. But that was his fault for not seeing it coming.
He was nursing his nuts and contemplating a shot of whiskey when someone sat at his table. The bar had mostly cleared out, and he looked up to see an older man staring at him with a gaze so ice blue it almost froze. He had the hard look of Starfleet, the sort who had bucked the trend and survived. So far.
“What a waste,” he said when he had Kirk's attention.
“Who the fuck're you?” Kirk asked. He picked up his shot. “You know, I'm running a special for Starfleet officers tonight. Two for one, if you wanna scare up that little cadet with the ponytail. Or Cupcake, I don't care, long as he's cleaned up.”
He didn't even see the man move, but the glass was knocked out of his hand before it touched his lips and the officer was leaning over the table, his eyes holding Kirk like a vice. “Your father,” he said, “would be proud of what I just saw. And disgusted it wasn't being put to any better use.”
“My father was an asshole who got himself killed on my birthday for no good reason I can see.”
“Think you can do better?”
Kirk stared at the man. Who was he, to come in here and throw that in his face? Kirk was doing fine, and this asshole didn't get to judge.
“I am doing better. What do you care?”
The hint of a smile played around the man's cruel lips. “I'm Captain Pike. I knew your father.”
“Well good for you. That makes fucking one of us.” He turned to hold up his hand for another drink and was treated to a sharp blow on the back of his head that made him dizzy for a moment. He shook it out and turned back to Pike, hands on the table and ready to spring.
“You make one move towards me and you won't make it to George Kirk's age.” Pike's voice was low, a sinister rumble that needed no volume to prove the sincerity of his words. Kirk blinked at him as his head cleared. “Why aren't you enrolled at the Academy? You're what-nineteen?”
Kirk shrugged, a defiant sneer on his lips. “Yeah, my dad was such a great example. No thanks.”
“Is that what you told the Draft Board?” Kirk looked at him sharply at that. “Get up.” Pike rose, but Kirk stayed put. At least until Pike came over and kicked the chair out from under him. “Get up. If we can't have a civilized conversation, we're going to have to have the other kind.” He shoved Kirk in front of him, who stumbled but continued on. Fuck. The back door. There was an alley back there, dark and rank, and the smell of it hit him like a wave of nausea.
Pike must have caught his expression, because he slammed him up against the grimy brick wall and said, “Get used to this, Kirk, if you don't mend your attitude problem. I don't suppose it'll make much difference to me whether you spend your life sucking dick here or in a penal colony, but frankly, if you're half the man your father was it's a waste of your talents.” Kirk could just feel the edge of a knife at his throat now, and wondered how he'd gotten here. The intervening steps seemed veiled to him, unclear. He'd dodged for years now, ever since Tarsus, but to be found, like this, to be forced into it or die in this fucking shithole, was not what he'd been running toward.
What had he been running toward? Or was it just away?
“Speaking of which, the first thing you need to learn,” Pike was saying, his voice as cold as ever and his strength, Kirk could tell, more than a match for his own, “is proper respect for your commanding officers. You don't have that, and the agony booth is the least of your worries.” There was a rustling behind him and then he was being turned, shoved down to his knees, Pike's cock springing against his face as he slipped on whatever fluid coated the pavement. He looked up, disbelieving and angry, though Pike's cold grim expression hadn't changed. “I hear you're good at this. Now is hardly the time to disappoint me.”
There was something trickling down his collar, the sting in his neck as he opened his mouth and Pike shoved his prick in implying the knife had seen some action. He could feel the hilt of it against his scalp, as Pike grasped his hair in the same fist and Kirk tried to work up the saliva to glide over the huge hard cock in his mouth. At least he wasn't a fucking face-fucker like Frank; Pike let Kirk do the work, and it was work he knew, even in his own terror, even as his mind raced to think of a way out of it. He couldn't kill Pike, someone would come after him. He couldn't wound him, or Pike would. All he could do, in this moment, was apply his skill and try to appease the man that way. Fuck. He wasn't going to jail, and he wasn't becoming some Imperial asshole like his father. There was some way out of this. Pike's cock hit the back of his throat and he opened it up, swallowing him down, so far back he couldn't taste the pre-come. Pike was still talking, calm and low as ever, patient and what Kirk imagined he imagined was fatherly.
“That's it,” he was saying. “You're an eager little cocksucker, aren't you? I bet you enjoy it. Self-preservation, I think. But you won't be the pretty boy forever. Shorter than you think, living this way. It'll only get you so far. That's right-the better you are, boy, the less it'll hurt before I'm done. Though I'm starting to think pain's the only way to get through to you.”
Suddenly he was pulled up and off, shoved against some crates lining the alley and gasping through swollen lips. The edge of one crate knocked the wind out of him, and by the time he began struggling his pants were already around his ankles, impeding his movement, and Pike was poised at his ass, his hand heavy on Kirk's bloodied neck.
“You see,” Pike was saying as he shoved in and Kirk's lip split between his teeth, flooding his mouth with the coppery tang of his own blood, “real survival lies in power. In calling the shots.” His own saliva wasn't nearly enough to ease the passage unprepared, no matter how active Kirk was, but he knew well enough to relax, to let this happen as quickly as possible. “In relying on something other than pretty blue eyes and a sweet little ass. In planning for something beyond your next trick, your next score.”
Kirk was gasping now, trying not to cry out, trying to will Pike into coming even though he could tell the man's control was well established. He even angled himself, every few thrusts, to hit Kirk's prostate, sending a jolt of pleasure shooting through the pain that Kirk resented more than anything else.
“You have two choices,” Pike continued, not even out of breath. “The draft, or a penal colony. It's up to you. And then there's the third.” He drew out, and Kirk did cry out at that, as something hot spattered Kirk's buttocks and something else ran warm between his thighs. The hand was still on his neck, even as the other seemed to be doing up Pike's trousers. “The Academy, and a future.” By the time the weight was removed and Kirk could draw up his pants, Pike was out of reach. And Kirk was in no condition to go after him. The man merely watched him, taking in his elevated breathing, the unbowed anger in his eyes, the cunning that kept him from a pointless attack. And nodded. “Tarsus will be sealed. You'll get prime assignments-provided, of course, you don't fuck things up for yourself. I want to keep my eye on you-if you're another George after all, someone has to.”
Pike tossed him a credit chit, which Kirk caught automatically. “I guess you get paid after all,” he said, the first smile Kirk had seen on his face a superior smirk. “It's only good for the shuttle out of here. 0600 hours. Be on it.”
As Kirk hobbled back to the room he'd been staying in, he wasn't thinking about his options. For the first time, he had plans beyond his next meal, his next score. For the first time, he knew what he wanted. And every time Pike demonstrated his control, over the years, Kirk flashed back to that alley, and to the vow he'd made to himself, and smiled.