She’d been so excited when she was assigned to the same ship as Nyota, but her friend hadn’t shared her feelings about it. Uhura had rushed off with a frown, not saying a word. So Gaila had boarded the Farragut with a backward glance, seeing Cadet Uhura, all business, talking with Commander Spock, and then heading in the direction of the Enterprise.

She hadn’t had time to consider this for long, as her shuttle was quick to depart. Once on the Farragut, she rushed to her battle station, along with everyone else. She did, however, note that there was an escape pod hatch only a few meters from her desk, but had no way of knowing how important that information was going to be to save her life.

In a way, the Farragut was lucky, really. They were the last ship to leave the docking station, and, aside from the Enterprise, the last ship to arrive. They also arrived a little farther away from the planet than the rest of the ships, as they were last in the formation. So they had a couple of seconds of warning, and managed to get shields up just in time.

Gaila was in the computer lab when the first bomb hit. Red alert lights were already flashing, but the shields were up, so there wasn’t much damage done. She yanked her hands back from her computer as it crackled ominously with a warning of another bomb coming in.

This one was right on top of them, and the shields couldn’t hold here. The bomb broke through above her. She could see, on her computer screen, the image of the damage being done to the levels above her, and caught her breath. Then she was diving for the doorway, somehow grabbing hold of two other cadets, and sealing the door as the bomb invaded, and the room was exposed to space.

The escape hatch was right there! One of her crewmates seemed to be in shock, but somehow Gaila and the other cadet kept her under control, shoving her into the pod first. Two other people rushed up as they were getting in and followed her into the pod. Then Gaila was taking the controls of the tiny pod, and the escape pod was spinning, spinning out into the carnage of Nero.

She directed the pod as far away from the mess of ships as possible. From the corner of her eye she could see a final ship arrive, and get fired on immediately. She caught her breath when she realised it was the Enterprise. “Nyota!” she whispered. And then, with horror, she realised who else would be there. “Christopher,” she breathed, and the name was almost a prayer. “Be safe, please, be safe.”

Gaila was the only person outside of Christopher Pike’s contemporaries who ever called him ‘Christopher’ outside of formal occasions. Even Jim didn’t, preferring ‘Pike’ for some odd reason. But Gaila thought it was really kind of weird to refer to the person you were sleeping with by their last name. She doubted Jim would have loved it if she called him ‘Kirk’ in bed.

After all, neither of them ever called her ‘Cadet Orci’ while they were together in bed either, and she would have laughed in their faces had they tried.

The young male cadet who Gaila had pulled out of the computer lab slid into the seat beside hers. “Want me to take those controls?” he asked. “You’ve done brilliantly, but you look a bit shaken.”

“Yeah, please,” Gaila said, pushing a few buttons on the console. “What was your name?”

“I’m Cadet Andrew Blake, and she’s Cadet Helen Jordan,” he responded, gesturing to the girl Gaila had saved.

“I’m Cadet Gaila Orci,” she said, moving away from the pilot’s chair to sit down next to Helen, across from the other two who had rushed up at the last minute.

“I’m Cadet Stalia N’dwena,” said an alien woman with blue spikes on her head instead of hair and a pattern of dots across her face. She gestured to the other person, a human, who was lying on the bench with his eyes closed. “I think he’s sick or injured.”

“My name is Ryan Dawes,” he said, bringing his hands up to cover his face. “I feel really dizzy and my head hurts.”

“Look, the Enterprise survived!” Cadet Andrew said from the pilot’s seat. Gaila glanced up. The bombing had stopped, for the moment. Everything seemed hushed, waiting.

“Escape pods, come in,” a voice then came on in the ship. “This is the Enterprise.”

“We have a possible medical situation on Farragut 29,” Andrew said into the comm.

“How many to beam up?” the voice asked.

“Five!” Andrew responded.

“Stand by.”

They stood by for a little less than a minute, then the voice came on again. “We have taken damage to sickbay and cannot beam you directly there. You’ll be beamed to the closest transporter room instead. Please be ready.

The four of them gathered Ryan up and held on as they arrived into a transporter room. From there, medical staff pulled them all aside into the nearest set of quarters which were undamaged. They carefully lowered Ryan down onto the bed and waited for a moment.

“I’m Doctor McCoy,” the man said as he strode through the door, looking like he was in a hurry. “What’s with you, young man?”

“He said he felt dizzy,” Gaila offered. “The rest of us are fine.”

McCoy slipped a hand under Ryan’s head, feeling around. “Looks like he hit his head. What happened?”

“I’m not sure,” Stalia said. “There was a bomb very close to us and a flying bit of shrapnel may have — “ She broke off as McCoy made a face and yanked, and then held up, triumphantly, a small bit of metal.

“Shit, kid, you’re damn lucky you have such a hard head,” he said, looking down at Ryan, who had breathed in a long shuddering gasp as soon as the metal was pulled out.

“This is gonna bleed a lot now,” McCoy said, placing a bandage underneath his head. “Lots of blood vessels in the head. Doesn’t mean he’s been badly hurt though. I need to go on to other patients for now, but I’ll be back as soon as possible. At least one of you should stay with him, make sure he stays awake.” He pulled out a hypospray and jabbed Ryan in the neck swiftly. “That’s for the pain.”

With that he rushed out of the room, and Cadet Helen volunteered to stay with him, especially as she was still feeling quite shaken by the incident. The rest of the group split up and Gaila headed toward the computer lab on the Enterprise, but stopped as she passed the transporter room. A very young-looking Russian guy was yelling “I can do that!” and two people were appearing on the platform. Gaila put her hand to her mouth as she realised it was Jim and another guy, landing hard.

What in hell was Jim Kirk doing on the ship? As soon as she could, she dragged him aside.

“I thought you were on probation and safe on Earth!” she exclaimed.

“Yeah, well, I thought you were on the Farragut and dead!” he returned fiercely, then softened. “Glad to see you’re not, though.” His hand slipped into her hair and he kissed her forehead. Then he frowned. “Pike — he had to go over to the other ship. I’m so sorry.”

“He what?” Gaila stepped back, looking up at Jim.

“Captain Nero — the bastard Romulan responsible for all of this — told him to go over. So he did. We’re to go back and get him when we can. I can’t wait, myself.”

Sulu called to Kirk from across the room, and he looked up. “I have to go to the bridge, Gaila. Pike made me first officer.” He squeezed her shoulder and turned away.

“Take care, Jim,” she said, half under her breath, and hurried off herself to find the computer lab.

Once she found the computer lab, she was immediately given an extremely boring and repetitive, but important, task to do, as the cadet who was intended to fill this position also had medical training and had been pulled away for that. So Gaila entered a soundproofed room and pushed buttons to regulate the core temperature for several hours. There was plenty of time to worry about Christopher Pike and Jim Kirk, but to distract herself, she remembered, instead.

---

It was a beautiful spring day in San Francisco. Most days in San Francisco were beautiful, but this one especially so, all the flowers in bloom and all the birds singing their hearts out. Better still, it was a Saturday, Gaila’s favorite day of the week. It meant a long lazy morning, an even longer lazy afternoon, and a night of fun, if she played her cards right. Gaila was excellent at that type of card-playing, and was looking forward to this evening.

But right now, she was sitting in the sun on a park bench without a care in the world, eyes closed, feeling the heat of the sun on her face. She opened them again when a shadow moved over her and she saw the face of Jim Kirk.

“Hi,” he said. “I’m Jim Kirk.”

He was cute, she’d give him that. But the older guy behind him was breath-taking, and it’s maybe for that reason that Gaila didn’t send him on his way.

“Hi,” she said back to him, but looking at the guy behind him. “I’m Gaila Orci.”

The man behind Kirk clearly thought they were imposing on her. “And I’m taking him away now,” he said, giving Gaila an apologetic glance.

“No, no, that’s all right,” Gaila said, standing up, and stepping forward. She wasn’t about to let him get away. “You are?”

He took her hand. “Christopher Pike. Captain Christopher Pike, if you want to get technical. I think I’ve seen you before, Cadet Orci — Gaila.”

“I wish I could recall,” she said. “I think I’d remember you, Christopher.” Behind her, she heard Jim give a frustrated huff of his breath. So she turned and took his hand too. “I’ve definitely never met you.”

“Now your life is complete,” Jim returned, and followed it up with the cheesiest of grins.

So she walked off with both of them, one hand in each of theirs. Somehow they ended up having a picnic in the park as the sun went down, several hours later. And the teasing flirtation she’d carried on with both of them through the afternoon got a bit more serious when she was lying on her back in the warm grass, being fed bits of delicious fruit and cream. She realised she had no interest in choosing between these two; she wanted them both.

It wasn’t long afterward when she realised that they would be fine with that. She’d already noted that they had very little concept of personal space and had been wondering if they were maybe already in a relationship. And as they made their way together back toward Pike’s house (determined to be a better place for where the evening would clearly end up rather than cadets’ dorms), they kissed her, Jim first, then Pike, and then kissed each other, and Gaila couldn’t stop herself from smiling.

Once in Pike’s house, they didn’t bother with the ‘may I get you a drink’ routine. Just went for it instead. They stumbled together in the half-darkness toward a bedroom, hands caressing and undoing clothing along the way.

Jim slid a finger down her belly, dipping into the folds of her cunt and finding her clit effortlessly. Pike kissed her then as Jim fingered her and she had the first orgasm of many just like that, before they even landed on the bed.

Once there, she turned to grab for Pike and kissed him hard. She could feel Jim’s erection pushing against her, and he was kissing her neck and ears, licking them softly, breathing into her ears in a way that made her close her eyes and shiver. Pike slid closer to her, and she could feel him too, still only half-hard. She slipped a hand down to his cock, and he went from half-hard to fully hard pretty quickly.

Both of them now had their hands on her cunt, Jim slipping a finger inside her, Pike on her clit, working her toward another orgasm. She let her hands fall as stars exploded in her head. After that the orgasms came thick and fast, for both her and for them. She could recall Jim sucking Pike as he licked her — she’d tried to see if it was possible to suck Jim at the same time, but the angles weren’t quite right. Then Jim was inside her and she was watching Pike kiss him. Just that sight alone made her come.

From then on, things got hazier and hazier in her memory. Just fingers and tongues and teeth sliding over her, her mouth on mouths, on necks, on ears, on the tender skin just below the armpit, on nipples, sucking on a finger, tongue sliding warm over Jim’s cock and balls and down from there until he was breathless and clutching at the sheets.

And finally, curling up and going to sleep beside Jim, who’d taken the middle spot, her arm draped over his torso.

The next morning, as the first to wake, Gaila found her clothes strewn from the front door all down the hall, and laughed. Nude, she gathered them up and folded them, then stepped out onto the secluded patio, and stretched out her arms to the sun.

Jim found her lying in Pike’s hammock in the sun half an hour later and climbed in with her. They spent an eager hour recapping everything they’d learned the previous night, and were in the kitchen, drinking orange juice and making toast, still naked, by the time Pike woke up.

You would expect something begun so randomly to happen only once. But in fact it happened again and again. By the time they’d spent five weekends straight doing nothing but fucking, Gaila decided it was time for some definition. It was early yet, and Gaila was lying in Jim’s lap with Pike next to them on the bed.

“I’ve been wondering,” she said. “What are we doing?”

“Other than having some fantastic and amazing sex?” Jim asked, tweaking her nipple.

Pike looked up at her, and then pulled himself to a seated position. “I don’t know,” he said. “I think it’s something we can’t define, just yet. But we’ll find out.”

---

“Core will be ejected in…” The computer’s voice broke in on the silence of the soundproofed room as the program she was working on stopped altogether.

“What?” she said, and requested the log of events from the computer. Apparently the last couple of hours had been eventful and to cap it off they were about to eject the warp core. She skimmed the log quickly, catching Kirk’s name as captain — how? — then Kirk and Spock’s beamout from the ship, and within the last few seconds, their safe return with Pike.

As the warp core ejected, she left the soundproofed room, glancing out the window to see a black hole imploding. She barely had time to grab hold of a conveniently-placed hand bar before the ship was swept up in the blast, and tossed beyond the reach of the black hole. Swiftly, she made her way to Sickbay.

Pike lay on one of the beds, looking exhausted beyond measure, but not badly hurt. Doctor McCoy was working on him, along with two nurses. She stood back, watching and waiting. In another bed she could see Ryan Dawes, now asleep, under the care of another nurse.

“How is he?” Jim said from behind her, sliding an arm around her waist and looking at Pike.

“I think he’ll be okay, eventually,” Gaila said, and looked up at him. “I think, once we’re home, we should talk.”

“Just so you know,” Jim said, not looking at her or at Pike, but into the distance, “I love you both.”

“Really?” she said, shaking her head. “That is so weird.” Jim looked at her then, and they laughed. Gaila took his hand. “Well, come on then. Let’s go see our lover.”