[ Trek Crew Catch-All ] And you may ask yourself

[finalfrontiersman]

Who: Jim Kirk, Spock, Tendi, Bones & friends.
Where: The Trek house!
What: Catch-all for the month's nonsense.
Content Warnings: Profanity. Potential for discussions of survivor's guilt and Gnosia-related trauma. Old man yaoi.




See below for closed starters! This post will serve as a catch-all for the Trek cast~

Contact for plotting:

James "Jim" Tiberius Kirk | trickster88, PM, Discord by Request/Game Discord

S'chn T'gai Spock | askefise, Game Discord

D'Vana Tendi | posolutely, Game Discord

Leonard "Bones" McCoy | PM, Game Discord, Discord: chatnoir

Comments

[arachnerina]

["He's the same, in the way that matters." Maybe some things were the same. Peter was always there for her when she needed someone. He made her laugh and smile when she had bad days. But he also chose to follow his anger and insecurities and became a monster because of it.]

I didn't... tell you the whole story. Peter didn't just die. He was tired of being bullied and feeling weak. He took this formula one of our teachers made and turned into a giant Lizard creature. He attacked our school, and tried to kill his bully. He said he just wanted to be special, like me. His last actions were out of jealousy and anger. [She couldn't be sure if it was the formula that made him the monster, because, clearly...other Peters could gain power that didn't corrupt them and turn them into monsters. She couldn't see her boyfriend falling like that. Even messing up the way he did now, it was because he didn't want to hurt her feelings. He was thinking about her, albeit a bit irrationally. His heart felt more pure and kind, even having lost Ben. Maybe it was because they didn't want power, but got it anyway? Maybe just the fact that he sought it out was the problem? She wasn't sure, but sometimes it hurt to think about how many Peters became this amazing hero, but hers....failed, in the worst way possible.]

It sounds awesome. [She wants to ask more, but will he tell her more?] The Jetsons was the old TV show, something my dad watched when he was a kid. It was about a family in the future, only it was like...maybe thirty years in the future now? So not nearly as far as you and Spock. But it had flying cars, smart homes, zoom calls-- a bunch of stuff we have now, but also the whole printed food thing. Oh, and instead of elevators they had these tubes that shot you from place to place.

[finalfrontiersman]

[ Sometimes people made bad decisions. Decisions they couldn't always take back. It hurt, especially when it was someone you loved.

Jim takes the new information in stride - that is, with only a minute furrow appearing in his brow. Reconciling Gwen's words with the picture of Peter that he has - the only one he can have, this bubbly, other-universe version of him - is no easy task. Still, as he said, people are complicated. They can make the wrong decision for the right reason just as easily as anything else. ]

People aren't defined by any one moment. Or...they shouldn't be. [ At last, Jim says something, slowly, choosing his words carefully after the beat of silence that follows Gwen's admission. Blue eyes turn to her, vibrant and full of empathy. He's not judging her Peter, even knowing this, and maybe that's part of what's eating her inside - the idea that other people will think poorly of his memory. ] And it doesn't make one better or worse than the other. We're all just...people. Everyone does the best with what they've got.

[ Jim moves to rinse his hands, dipping into thought for a moment. How easily it parallels his journey versus his counterpart in another life - Jim doesn't have to like the dots he's connecting. He turns, reaching out to squeeze Gwen's shoulder gently as he levels with her. ] I'm sorry that your Peter didn't get to find out what his best truly was.

Not bad. And always getting better. [ Aw hell, why not? Shit. How much more could they break the universe anyway? And no, that's not a challenge. ] Optimistic, putting that only thirty years ahead of the present. What's a smart home supposed to be?

No tubes. Well, turbolifts - which are essentially elevators, on a starship, but they operate both vertically and horizontally because of the gravity shift - I'm getting off track. We have Jeffries tubes, but they're not pressurized. And transporter pads, which I think I've mentioned, right?

[arachnerina]

And yet, here we are. [Wasn't that what this place was doing to them? Defining them by one moment. One moment where maybe they didn't something good, and now they're doomed to be punished for it. It wasn't right. It wasn't fair, just like it wasn't fair Peter didn't get a chance to make a better choice.]

It's just-- every other Peter I've met, they've been this amazing person. A hero. Not perfect, but so good. And in my world... he messed up, and never got a second chance.

[That's life, for you. Not fair. It rarely seems to be, especially for spiders like her and Peter.]

Oh, so it's like-- a digital assistant that controls the house? They're connected to the phones and computers and what-not, and all you have to do is be like "Hey Siri" or "Hey Alexa", and it'd turn on your lights, or adjust the thermostat, or play music. Whatever you wanted, as long as it was connected to that system. My house isn't that fancy, but it's a pretty standard thing on everyone's cellphone these days.

[As Jim rambles about his turbo lifts and Jeffries tubes, Gwen can't help but laugh.]

No, that's sounds exactly like what I was saying. Just more elevator like. What are transporter pads, though?

[finalfrontiersman]

Just because this is the way things are doesn't make it right. [ Jim says it simply, a fact of existence. Well, from his perspective, it is. ] The 21st century couldn't imagine a world without capitalism, and yet, the 23rd begs to differ.

Sometimes our mistakes have consequences that we can't recover from. It's not his fault, Gwen it's - just his circumstances. [ No, it's not fair. Spock Prime's mistake cost Jim's entire timeline so much but - there was nothing anybody could do about it. ] And ours. Yours. You wouldn't be you without him, too.

Oh, like the computer? [ Yeah, he's got no concept of Siri or Alexa. Antiquated to the point of a head tilt and quizzical gaze. Which is evident by his next question: ] Or are they androids?

[ Yeah, they've got androids. But the computer is what controls the ship's climate controls and things of that nature. ] We have that. Aboard ship, everything is run by the computer. Androids have a more advanced intelligence.

It's a dematerialization system. We use it to transport matter - people, cargo - from one point to another by converting them into an energy pattern and reassembling them.

[arachnerina]

[No, it wasn't his fault, was it? Being bullied mercilessly? Being alone, while Gwen disappeared day after day to be Spider-Woman. Feeling isolated and angry, while his best friend was "special"? Gwen could never blame him, not fully, even if she could never come to terms with what he did and the choices he made.

She just wished it could have happened differently, and didn't have to lose her best friend.]

Yeah, I guess. [He's not wrong, at least, that his influence is what made her want to be a better Spider-Woman. That losing him had pushed her to do even more good in her community. But still.]

Um. Yeah. A computer. More like an AI on a computer, I guess? Not like a take-over-the-world kind of AI. It's only capable of simple things, but they're pretty cool. [She can only imagine what the scope of it on his ship would be, though. Especially that far into the future. It probably made Siri look like a child's play thing. ]

Wait, wait-- dematerialization? Isn't that-- but that's basically just killing you, and recreating you in another point in space, right?? [It's a scientific theory, but... just a theory, in her time. And even if it was possible, is it ethical?? Jim seems comfortable with it, though, and she tends to trust his judgement, but...still.]

[finalfrontiersman]

[ Jim knows as well as anyone that it doesn't make it better. It's a piss-poor consolation prize to an absolutely shit time - that tends to be how the universe works, in Jim's experience. Jim wants to reach out, offer Gwen more tangible comfort but...he doesn't know how welcome it would be, given everything. Instead, he bumps his elbow against hers companionably, a safe compromise. A silent way of saying I know, and hopefully offering some solidarity. ]

Gotcha. We have something similar running the main systems on the Enterprise. [ That is, essentially, what the computer system is for. It doesn't have full control over everything, isn't encouraged to a certain level of cognition - since the debate over classified lifeforms still rages on. He'd akin it to the debates on bodily autonomy in Gwen's time - when does life begin, and what, precisely, constitutes it?

He chuckles and dries his hands on the towel, shrugging slightly. ] Some people believe so. The thing is, it's the same atoms? The transporter converts you into an energy pattern, transits you through the system to your target location, and reassembles you - but it's still you. It's not taking your consciousness and destroying your body so you have nowhere to go. Even if something happened in transit, you can be emergency-beamed to a secondary location, and the effect would be the same.

We actually just recently discovered the equation to beam aboard a ship while it's at warp - that's a step above light speed. [ Jim tacks on the end, realizing belatedly he might not have mentioned that before. ]