in the captain's chair

Lately it seemed to Jim as if all he was destined to do was to endure painful falls from very high places.

Vision and consciousness returned simultaneously, though not efficiently, as he struggled to free himself from the encumbering safety harness. He had not gone quietly. At least he had departed the Enterprise secure in the knowledge that sedation had been administered by someone other than Bones McCoy. The good doctor might have disagreed with him on strategy and chosen to side with that pointy-eared usurper, but he had also opposed the need to ban Jim from the ship.

"I can keep him quiet and out of trouble while he's on board," McCoy had insisted.

"With all due respect for your medical expertise, Doctor," acting Captain Spock had responded, "from what I have seen and know of Lieutenant James Jim, short of placing him in permanent stasis it is not possible to do either. And even then I would have my doubts."

( Groaning, Jim pushed himself forward... )

[NFB but open! Jim's managed to jigger the computer into being a communciator through ~ science ~. If you wanna get a call from him, you'll pick up your phone to an unknown number and Jim cursing before he realizes who it was. Taken from the ST novelization.]

It was Jim's birthday.

"And on January 4th, my mother birthed the beautiful, gifted, charming, amazing man you see before you!" Jim shouted while standing on the counter of some bar he'd found. In his hand, he held a drink high, looking out over the patrons of the bar. He knew none of them but he didn't care. "So, on this illustrious day, I say we drink. To me!"

Any excuse to drink seemed to satisfy the denizens of the bar so Jim knocked his shot back and everyone else did too. He raised his fist up in victory before jumping down and getting another drink. He grinned and leaned against the bar, chatting up the nearest pretty girl.

"I think you should sing to me," he told her breezily. "The birthday song. You know it?"

She did and so she sang it. A few people around her joined in, some in drunken, slurring voices and some a little clearer. Jim loved it either way!

"Best birthday ever!"

Spent around strangers. Yeah, he was faking it but he was still having fun.

[NFB but open for all the usual things. Slowing time down a bit in Jim's world to get this post in since I missed it on the exact date. Yay canonical birthdays.]

Jim had pretty much repressed most everything that had happened to him over the past few weeks. No one had really asked him about it so that just made it easier to push it down and forget. He had other things to deal with anyway. Namely, graduation was less than a month off and he was going to have to make a decision on what he was going to do. The options weren't that vast: stay here and hang out on the island like a bum, go somewhere else and be a bum, or go home and deal with...home.

The thought of bumming around was attractive but he the intelligent side of him knew he had to get himself together because he wasn't rich and he wasn't going to be able to do that for long. He also figured he'd get bored pretty quickly which, yeah. That was never a fun thing to be.

Of course, this was when Pike's words came floating back into his head, annoying him (thought not as much as usual). It was more annoying that he hadn't been able to forget the words and the guy then it was that he was thinking about it now. Something about it had stuck which pissed Jim off.

He grabbed for the first book he could find on his desk and sat down, willing his brain to stop thinking about Pike and start thinking about beaches and beautiful men and women.

Didn't work too well. Dammit.

[Door & post are open]

So, Jim had gotten drunk last night. That wasn't surprising. He'd gotten drunk, gone out to the mainland, gotten a little drunker and then come home where he'd passed out. Getting up the following morning for class had been...interesting but he'd managed it and now he was back in his room, back in bed and recovering from that little bender.

Jim really couldn't even explain it. At first, he'd started drinking just to get Frank's voice out of his head and then it just turned into wanting to have fun which meant he got to deal with the headache and the general gross feeling the next day. But, he was an expert at this.

Yes, at sixteen, he already knew how to deal. He'd had some water, taken some pills (he preferred futuristic shots, thank you) and propped himself up in his comfortable bed with blankets, pillows and pajamas. And by that, he'd wriggled into a pair of pants and that was it.

He really wished for a television or something in the room. How could Jackson not have that? It was a mystery. Maybe he'd try and convince his roommate to get something like that.

Blackmail was always an option.

[Door cracked/post open.]