Summary: Don’t really want to spoil anything? Who gets shot? Do the reader and Jim reunite? Who knows?
-Enjoy!-
You'd thought for a second that you'd been shot.
And it was only when you saw Jim stagger backwards a few steps, his hand flying to his chest, that you knew you were wrong.
A flash of red beneath his fingers.
He sunk to his knees.
No.
"Jim!" You screamed and were surprised to find yourself free to run forward to him, you would have thought Eve would have restrained you.
"No, no, no, no,no ." You cried, quickly kneeling next to Jim, taking his head in your hands.
"I..." He struggled and you helped lower him to the floor when he swayed towards you.
"Jay, no." You slid your hands onto his chest, moving his hands to press on the red stain that was ever-spreading.
The wound was just right of his sternum, and every ragged breath that Jim took made more blood spill out. Tears streamed down your cheeks now and you looked to Jim's face, his skin growing ever grey, his eyebrows furrowed in pain, and his mouth opening and closing as he tried to get a good breath.
"I can't... Y/N... I can't breathe." Jim rasped and you leaned closer to his face, his eyes meeting yours, the colour now dull compared to the crystal colour which they usually were.
"I know, Jay, I know." You cried, leaning in and pressing your cheek to his. "I know, just try for me. You have to live. For me."
"Alright, that's enough." A different voice made your head snap up.
Eve. You had forgotten she was even there.
Suddenly you were being dragged to your feet again, away from Jim, two sets of large hands encircling your biceps easily. You kicked out, screaming Jim's name as you were pulled away, your veins full of heat and anger and anguish as you stared down at Jim's prone form, the blood stain now spreading onto the floor.
"JIM! NO! JIM!" You screamed over and over, but the hands on your arms never faltered.
"Now you know." You barely registered Eve's form appearing in front of you.
You gasped for breath as you continued to kick and cry out for Jim.
"Now you know what it is like to have your heart be ripped out in front of you." Eve's voice was calm in the raging storm of your emotions, and it only made you more angry.
"LET ME GO! I NEED TO SAVE HIM! LET ME GO!" You wailed.
"I've had enough. Drug her so we can throw her in the shuttle." Eve said, her dark ponytail swishing as she turned and walked to the elevators.
You barely had time to let Jim's name leave your lips one more time before the world went black.
You woke up in a world of pain. Spots shimmered before your eyes as you peeled your head off of the back of the seat you were in. You swallowed thickly, your tongue feeling impossibly large in your mouth. Your head slumped forward onto your chest and it took all of your power to lift it again.
You focused all of your energy on making your vision stop being blurry and you finally saw what was in front of you.
Space.
Endless amounts of black, peppered with white speckled stars.
Looking around, you realized that you were in a shuttle, a pod of some sort, and you were buckled into the seat. The interior was small, the glass window in front of you inches from your face, and you were hurtling through space, the control panel below the window blinking away, showing your trajectory and speed.
Your head flopped forward again and your hands came into your view. They were red. Stained red up to your wrists, but with what?
That's when the memories of what had just happened hit you. The red was blood. Jim's blood. Jim lying on the floor of the office, bleeding to death. You being hauled away. Eve's cool, indifferent glare on yours.
Jim.
The memory of his graying skin, the light leaving his eyes made your heart rate jump suddenly and you found yourself heaving for breath.
Memory after memory flowed over you, new ones that you hadn't seen before when you were back in the office. You cried out as they split your brain apart, as everything you had lost came back to you. The amount of love you felt for Jim bored holes in your heart and tore at your insides because you had forgotten. You had forgotten him. The man that had your heart. You had forgotten.
Suddenly the inside of the ship was too small. The window in front of you was too close to your face. The walls narrowing in on you.
Panic sank into your veins and you lashed out, beating at the walls and window with your fists, bloodying them, now with your own blood. Screaming for someone to get you out of here. Screaming for Jim. Screaming for all you lost.
Your throat was sore and raw when exhaustion finally hit you and you slumped back into your chair, utterly empty. Your limbs were heavy and hollow, and you couldn't find the energy to even wipe the blood off your hands.
The memories still grated against your mind. Scraped against the back of your eyes, revealing themselves one after another. They were raw and ragged as they tried to fit themselves into the timeline of the last few years.
The problem wasn't that the memories didn't make sense or that they overwhelmed you, no.
It was that you remembered not remembering. You remember the emptiness that was your mind over the last three years. How you knew nothing of Jim. Didn't try to escape or find him. You had lost days, months, and years with him.
Hot tears dripped down your face for these lost moments. You gulped back sob after sob as grief wracked your body.
At some point you must have fallen asleep, because you had to heave your sticky eyelids open when you heard the fuzz of a com connection.
"Hello?" A voice suddenly sounded, the connection unsecured and spotty, but it was a connection none-the-less.
You couldn't get your mouth to move to form words at the sudden surge of hope that exploded within you.
"Anyone there?" The voice on the other end had a distinct accent to it, and sounded vaguely familiar.
"Y-yes, I'm here." You suddenly heard your own voice, hoarse and ragged from your screaming fit.
"Ah! There is a connection, I was worried for a moment that we didn't get it." The accent was now easily identifiable as Scottish, and you were suddenly able to place the voice.
"Scotty?" You breathed, fresh tears perking on your eyelids.
"Lass, we've got you, now just give me a few minutes and we can beam you up- aGH!" Scotty was cut off at the end, and you found a smile on your mouth at the prospect of being rescued.
"Y/N?" A new voice sounded. Leonard.
"Len?" You called, tears slipping down your face now at the familiar friend.
"I... you remember? Oh thank god! I was beginning to think your amnesia wasn't going to pass." Leonard sounded relieved from the other side of the com.
A sudden strike of panic laced through you again as you remembered your reason for being on this shuttle, "Jim? Len, where's Jim?"
"He's..." Leonard started but sounded like he was shoved out of the way.
"Lassie, we are locked onto your signal. Ready to come home?" Scotty's cheery voice now took over the com.
You let out a shaky breath, "Yeah, Scotty. Beam me up."
After a familiar tug at your belly you were suddenly standing on the hard surface of the transporter room. You looked around nervously, your knees weak after being seated in that cramped shuttle for so long, but somehow you stayed standing. You were back. You were home.
Relief flooded over you and you gasped in jagged and labourous breaths.
"Glad to have you back with us, Lassie." You heard a scottish accent drawl, recognizing the voice instantly as Scotty's and you looked up to see his smiling face appear over the transporter console.
"Where's...?" you began to ask when a strikingly familiar voice sounded .
"Y/N?" The voice belonged to a blue-eyed, blond form that appeared at the foot of the transporter pad.
"Jay?" You breathed and looked into his eyes, tears now streaming down your face as overwhelming emotion overtook you.
You barely had time to breathe before you were wrapped into his strong arms, Jim squeezing you into a desperate and shaky hug. You wrapped your arms back around him and crushed your face into his chest, soaking his jacket in your tears.
He was saying your name over and over, one of his hands gripping your waist, the other pressed into the back of your head. His face was pressed against your temple and you felt your knees give out beneath you, and you sunk to the floor, still wrapped in Jim's embrace.
You sobbed into him and you could hear him crying too, out of relief and sadness and finally being safe.
Only when you began trembling violently and leaning into Jim more did you feel him falter beneath you. You brought your head up to look at him but were caught with a stabbing dizziness, probably from all the blows to your head. Jim tried to support you but you heard him hiss in pain.
Suddenly another set of hands pulled you from behind,
"Jim, I can take her from here, she needs to go to the medbay." You recognized the voice as Leonard's and you let him pull you away from Jim, your vision spinning wildly as he lifted you up into his arms, "Jim, you should come too, your wound has started to bleed again."
This caused you to open your eyes and through the black spots and stars you saw a red stain spreading over Jim's shirt. He had been shot. How had you forgotten?
"Jay..." You croaked and reached for him but Leonard held you back.
"He's alright, darlin', I patched him up myself, but he should be resting in bed." Leonard's voice rumbled against your ear as your head flopped against his chest.
You felt the sway of his steps beneath you as he began walking back to the medbay, the sound of Jim's footfalls close behind, but you couldn't see him.
"How long was I in that shuttle?" You asked, assuming it was longer than you thought if Leonard had time to save Jim's life and Jim be well enough to get out of bed.
"About three days." Leonard breathed, his voice laced with concern, "You probably haven't had any food or water since then either, but don't worry, I'll get you all healed up."
Three days? Another three days you couldn't remember. You felt yourself stiffen in panic and Leonard's grip on you got tighter.
"Just relax for me, darlin'." He chided, and you let a few tears out before sinking back into his arms.
"Thank you, Leonard." You whispered into his chest, and he only hummed in response as you had reached the medbay, your vision going spotty all of a sudden before you felt the world spin and you dove into a vat of darkness.
When you woke up, you had the biggest headache you could ever imagine. You squinted your eyes against the bright lights of the patient room and lifted your head, which elicited another sharp stab of pain.
A feeling of disappointment settled over you when you didn't see Jim by your bedside.
"I told him to go home and rest." A deep voice sounded from above you and to the left.
It was Leonard.
"He was by your bedside for 72 hours straight. So I told him to go back to his quarters and rest, I can send for him if you want." His hazel eyes were calm as you met them and you let out a breath that you didn't realize you'd been holding.
You shook your head lightly in response, "No, I think I want to see him when I feel better. When I am able to process this all better."
Leonard smiled down at you knowingly, "Alright. You feeling okay? How's your head feeling?"
"Like I've been hit in the head repeatedly with a gun and been deprived of food and water for three days." You responded with a smile.
Leonard chuckled softly, "It's good to have you back, Y/N."
You nodded, unable to form words around the lump in your throat. But this time you didn't cry. You were left on the biobed as Leonard left, feeling the safest you had ever felt in the past few days, and you couldn't bring yourself to feel happy.
Everything was different now. Everything had changed. How were you going to fit back in your old life when it had gone on without you for three years? Were you supposed to just jump back in with both feet? It sure seemed that way. And that scared the crap out of you.
A few minutes later, Leonard came back in, a gentle look on his face, "Jim's here, do you want to see him?"
A rush of emotions hit you. Panic, anxiety, desperation, sadness, excitement, and longing all swept over you at once at the thought of seeing Jim and you couldn't handle it. You heard your heart rate spike on the monitor and Leonard walked over, his gaze concerned as he looked at the screen and then back at you, his question still hanging in the air.
Your voice was hoarse and ragged as you forced yourself to form words,"No, Len, I... I think I just need a little more time."
Leonard just nodded, looked at the screen one more time, turned and left, closing the door behind him.
And you were alone again.
You knew you were going to have to face Jim eventually, but didn't want to be lying on a bed, your vital signs displayed for all to see, showing your inner emotions.
So you sat alone, only you and your memories, trying to figure out how things were going to go back to normal. Or what normal really was.
You tried to capture the years that had gone missing, tried to fathom all time you had spent apart from Jim. All the moments you weren't going to get back.
