"That would explain it." He says it with a slight shrug, and pulls in a breath, clearing his throat softly before he starts to talk.

It's funny. This---this is the first time he's talked about it to anyone.

"He and his crew came to the aid of a colony on the outer rim. He found me and my friend Thomas, he was hurt pretty bad, and we were both half-dead from starvation." What he's telling him now is in the reports. Anybody can look it up. It's the why and how that they redacted and changed. That they hid.

"I saw the uniforms. I knew they were like my ma's, but ---we'd been out there for so long. I--" He gives a soft, laugh that's just shy of desperate. "I tried to hit him with a pipe I'd found, but I couldn't even lift it."

He drains a bit more of the bottle. "But he was there the whole time, even though his crew looked like they were gonna get sick, and he or---someone else I can't really remember picked me up, and I don't remember a lot after that until I woke up in sickbay."

He looks up at Pike. "The colony was Tarsus IV."