Fic: The Odyssey, xxix. daedalus
--
“I’m no good with words
and neither is Keenser;
back on Earth, after Vengeance,
Nyota took me to see a painting.
She said it was important, so we went.
I know my limits--
Keenser’s seen them long ago--
that’s why I resigned my commission;
that’s why I let go.
When I can’t do something, I can’t do it;
not a matter of willpower or physics.
Keenser won’t do, won’t follow
into what he can’t fix;
we agreed to that early on.
Push each other farther along in what we know we can do,
that’s easy.
I can break a few transwarp equations,
he can break what’s possible in a warp core:
we won’t break each other.
That moment, turning in my PADD,
Jim was willing.
It was in his eyes.
It didn’t occur to me, as much as he was willing to break ship and crew,
he was willing to break himself.
Do you know that myth about Daedalus?
Nyota took me to see the painting,
and that about sums it up.
Ikaros falling-fallen, head in the water, legs kicking,
shepherd and plowman looking the other way,
like they’re distracted by the clouds.
That’s what falling is.
It doesn’t matter if it’s feathers, wax, and the sun
or a starship with radioactive engine.
This is the thing--
the myth of Ikaros:
I was going to tell Jim
before he knocked me out.
Keenser was on his way, with a portable transporter;
just relay the coordinates
and he could get directly into the core,
without the climb,
realign the bloody thing and stabilize us before we burned up.
And what’s more:
he’s immune to the radiation.
Jim wouldn’t have needed to die.
That’s what I witnessed.
Pointlessly, needlessly
slow, agonizing death, and Spock’s grief,
because they got pulled into the sun.
When Nyota took us to see that painting
Keenser was the one who cried,
thinking of the things he could have fixed,
or at least prevented
if he’d had a little more time on the ship.
That’s Daedalus.”
--
“I’m no good with words
and neither is Keenser;
back on Earth, after Vengeance,
Nyota took me to see a painting.
She said it was important, so we went.
I know my limits--
Keenser’s seen them long ago--
that’s why I resigned my commission;
that’s why I let go.
When I can’t do something, I can’t do it;
not a matter of willpower or physics.
Keenser won’t do, won’t follow
into what he can’t fix;
we agreed to that early on.
Push each other farther along in what we know we can do,
that’s easy.
I can break a few transwarp equations,
he can break what’s possible in a warp core:
we won’t break each other.
That moment, turning in my PADD,
Jim was willing.
It was in his eyes.
It didn’t occur to me, as much as he was willing to break ship and crew,
he was willing to break himself.
Do you know that myth about Daedalus?
Nyota took me to see the painting,
and that about sums it up.
Ikaros falling-fallen, head in the water, legs kicking,
shepherd and plowman looking the other way,
like they’re distracted by the clouds.
That’s what falling is.
It doesn’t matter if it’s feathers, wax, and the sun
or a starship with radioactive engine.
This is the thing--
the myth of Ikaros:
I was going to tell Jim
before he knocked me out.
Keenser was on his way, with a portable transporter;
just relay the coordinates
and he could get directly into the core,
without the climb,
realign the bloody thing and stabilize us before we burned up.
And what’s more:
he’s immune to the radiation.
Jim wouldn’t have needed to die.
That’s what I witnessed.
Pointlessly, needlessly
slow, agonizing death, and Spock’s grief,
because they got pulled into the sun.
When Nyota took us to see that painting
Keenser was the one who cried,
thinking of the things he could have fixed,
or at least prevented
if he’d had a little more time on the ship.
That’s Daedalus.”
--