#tarsus IV

[a-trek-trough-the-stars]

Barry Trivers and Gerd Oswald dropping “The Conscience of the King” on December 8th of 1966, only to never elaborate on Tarsus IV and Kirk’s past there

[rhinexstone]

Thinking about Tarsus IV and how much that must have sculpted Jim into the person who knew every crew member by name, loved his crew like they were a kin of 500, never dared to put them through pain or stress even when it seemed impossible, and treated his power of command as a minute if not false aspect of his title. Because to command someone to do something is what his childhood was ripe of, but to lead and educate and strengthen a person was his wildest dream

[ilovefredjones]

i have not stopped thinking about tarsus iv ever

[naturegirly55]

I'm currently reading The Autobiography of James T. Kirk and it has pictures!

This looks like a family photo tbh.

This is so cute. I love Edith.

A letter to David that Kirk never sent. He mentions that kid in A Piece of The Action. Sorry it's kind of blurry.

Kirk's travel pass for his trip to Tarsus IV.

A picture of Carol Marcus and David when he was two and the camping trip in The Final Frontier.

[major-comet]

bones and spock both strike me as people who are likely to skip breakfast in the morning. they both know better, of course, but some habits are hard to kick. maybe it’s morning nausea, maybe they’re trying to squeeze just a bit more work into their day - who knows

they both notice, however, that jim seems to be a bit twitchier on the days where spock skips breakfast to go to the labs for a bit before reporting to the bridge. or mornings where bones shows up just to have some coffee and nothing else. it’s not super noticeable, they probably only notice because they pay a Lot of attention to him, but he’s just a bit jumpier, a bit more distracted

maybe they discuss it with each other, maybe they both notice it independently. maybe it’s something they noticed about him even before the 5 year mission, but just really fell into place after they semi-established their breakfast routine. he’s usually fine after lunch anyways, and he doesn’t generally get like that if they just skip lunch or dinner. spock tested this, of course. logically.

so it’s probably not worth worrying about; just a weird little quirk of their captain’s. but they start trying to be a bit better about making themselves eat at least an apple or something with jim before work every morning. it seems to get better, and the new habit is mostly sticking, so they kinda stop thinking about it

that doesn’t last, of course. ‘conscience of the king’ happens. they learn about jim and kodos and tarsus, and now all of a sudden the prospect of jim being in a weird mood whenever the two of them skip breakfast seems to be a much higher priority.

because if they skip breakfast, jim has no way of knowing for certain if they’ve eaten anything until at least lunch - if not dinner, if they’re too busy to have a proper lunch break together. jim, who probably regularly went without food to make absolutely sure that kevin riley and the others had something to eat, because making sure everyone else is okay is far more important to him.

i don’t think they really talk about it, after. at least not for another few years. but they stop skipping breakfast.

[ironicandpunny]

Recently been obsessed with the idea of Jim being just a little chubby. Jim, always finishing his food, always saying yes to dessert, always agreeing to cafe and meal arrangements, and gaining a little weight cause of those habits, and he loves it. Loves his body, loves the way his thighs touch and his arms jiggle, all because of Tarsus IV. All because he can remember a time where he could easily count all of his ribs, where even just staying awake was a struggle, cause he had no energy, cause he hadn’t eaten in days.

That’s just me though

[kaffkanya]

must write something about spock just *observing* jim, noticing his habits bad and good. like the way he kind of waits for everyone to finish eating first to finish his own food (as if hes waiting for someone to say "im still hungry" and then share what he has. spocks sure jim doesnt even notice hes doing it). like how he always faces death as if it was something he already knew intimately (he does, spock learns later). how he likes to sleep with a leg dangling on the side of the bed and is a *very light sleeper* (this is just something spock cataloged, doesnt mean anything. its just. a thing. a jim kirk thing), and so on and so forth. but slowly, spock realizes, hes finds himself falling in love with jim. no, not falling. but getting to the logical conclusion that, yeah, it makes sense hed be in love with jim. He Is The Man. spock shall be his Companion.

[xiaq]

New Fic Alert!

It was a last ditch effort.

Then again, everything Jim tried at that point was a last ditch effort.

[firstofficerkittycat]

in stressful situations jim will say shit under his breath like we're never getting off this fucking planet and spock will touch his arm and whisper in his ear what year it is and he'll be like oh

[smilingscully]

Star Trek after dropping the most important part of Kirk’s backstory in one episode and never bringing it up again 😹

[orangexmachina]

"So signed Kodos, Governer of Tarsus iv."

Episode: The Conscience of the King Song: August Underground by Ethel Cain

[2063april5]

Every time snw producers say they're gonna do something completely new that has never been done in trek before I think "like address the Tarsus thing?" and I remain hopeful to this day

[wizard-amulang]

highschool au Jim Kirk 💛

Here I decided to draw different highschool!Jims. In fact, they are all perfect, nerds, traumatized by tarsus. It's just different for everyone

Let me know if you want something similar with Spock

[a-most-beloved-fool]

One potential Tarsus IV side effect that I don't think I've seen much of is Kirk not really having hunger cues.

This would mean that Kirk might forget meals regularly, especially when particularly busy or dealing with crises. A high-tension week may pass, and Kirk will look back on it and realize that he ate about ten meals during that six or seven day stretch, and oops, he's really rather lightheaded now, but if he tries to eat a full meal he'll definitely make himself sick. so he has to start with, like. One Cracker and a glass of water, and slowly build up to real food again.

Spock and Bones, upon learning this about him, would be mother hens. They would take it upon themselves to make sure he eats, both by coercing Kirk to take meal breaks, and by carrying around ration bars and fruit.

Spock would be able to Tell whenever Kirk forgot to eat breakfast and would silently hand him some kind of snack, which Kirk would then sheepishly accept. If he decided they'd all been on the bridge for too long, he'd send a yeoman to pick up sandwiches for everyone, and he'd forgive Chekov for smearing mayo on his controls, because if everyone else was eating, Kirk would remember, too. He'd bring out grazing-food, like a cheese board or nuts, during their chess matches that Kirk could snack on. (and then he'd do his very best not to blush when Kirk licked his fingers clean.)

Bones would help Kirk set up and maintain meal schedules and plans, and make sure that he got all the nutrition he needs even during bad eating weeks (by hypo-ing at abandon, if need be, though he'd prioritize Actual Food). He'd mandate meal-breaks, and physically drag Kirk down to the mess, if necessary.

Both of them would make a point to eat meals with Kirk whenever possible, because it's harder to forget when you've got company. Whenever either Spock or Bones was busy or otherwise out-of-commission, the other would become doubly diligent about taking meals with Kirk. (If Kirk was sitting at Spock's side in sickbay, McCoy would bring meals to the bedside and would eat with him, ignoring his "don't bring food to sickbay" rule.)

(Personally, I like the idea of Spock later becoming known around Starfleet Academy for always having food available for hungry cadets. His desk would constantly be stocked with fourteen different types of ration bars just to make certain he had something available for everyone with specific dietary needs, and any time a cadet forgot breakfast or lunch, they'd know they could go to him. McCoy would offer the same to his patients.)

(Sorry, I'm going to talk about the side effects of starvation for a minute underneath here, don't read if that's rough on you. It's not graphic. I wrote all that out before realizing that it wasn't really necessary for my little fandom post, but didn't want to just. delete it.)

(also, please note that I'm not a food scientist or expert. this is all generally correct, to the best of my knowledge, but I'm not going to promise that I've got the correct terminology, nor am I going to claim that I know better than anyone else)

If you skip a meal or two, or you just don't get enough to eat, you get hungry. Your stomach growls and aches, and it generally kinda sucks. It's a constant discomfort, because you body is telling you, "Hey, I need food. Now, ideally."

If you continue not eating, or not getting enough to eat, though - your body adapts. It knows that saying, "I'm hungry!" isn't doing much. It assumes that there isn't food for you to eat, because if there was, surely you'd be eating it. And, well, it's a little pointless to have an alarm going "Eat now, eat now!" when you can't.

So it stops sending hunger cues.

You don't feel 'hungry' anymore, in the classic sense, at least. You still need food, but your stomach doesn't hurt. Maybe you feel a bit lightheaded, or a bit hollow, but you're not constantly aching. This is part of starvation mode.

For as long as you continue not getting enough food, this stays true. When you are once again consistently eating the amount your body needs, eventually, you will come out of starvation mode. Your body will resume hunger cues.

Except, sometimes it doesn't.

Sometimes, even when you're able to eat as much as you need once again, your hunger cues just. Don't come back. You forget to eat a meal? You might not even notice, because you didn't get hungry about it. It becomes hard to tell when you need food because you don't get hungry.

This means that you have to be careful about keeping on top of things. It becomes really easy to slip back into poor eating habits - even if your original bad eating habits were manufactured by poor circumstance. You might need eating schedules, or food that's less draining to prepare, or to start going to restaurants, but you have to find some way to manage it to stay healthy.

[emptyjunior]

Undergoing the 6 month cycle where I can't stop thinking about Tarsus IV and baby Jim

Oh James, his father's fancy ship and fancy medals couldn't save him

[major-comet]

thinking about tarsus and the mirror universe, and wondering in what ways the events may or may not have differed between the two. how can an already nightmarish situation have been twisted even worse - and what kind of effect would that have on young james?

our jim likely came out of tarsus with an even deeper sense of compassion for his fellow man - kindness forged in fire. he’s been through such hardship and pain that all he wants to do is alleviate that in others - his idea of “let me help” perhaps being even more romantic than “i love you” being cultivated there

and what the mirror image of that must be. any sense of trust or heart mirror!kirk may have possessed as a child completely shattered - kindness quite literally starved away. he’s been through such hardship and pain, so why should everyone else get off easy?