Isolation was protection though. It was his actions, his decisions that caused everything, and if anyone had to go down on this ship it would be himself. His crew came before everything, be it in real, life-and-death danger or against the powers of Starfleet's martial courts. These people, all of them, were his family in a way he had never experienced, and losing even one of them would just... destroy him, as Pike's loss nearly had.

He reached out, finding Spock's fingers and gripping them tightly, trembling despite himself. "Yeah, but... do you forgive me? Did any of them forgive me?" he asked quietly, looking to Spock, pleading in his eyes. Even now, he fully expected to be cast out when he returned home, for his crew to blame him rightly so for the poor decisions that had nearly lead them all to their deaths.

He squeezed tighter, knuckles white, suddenly afraid that to let go would mean that Spock would vanish, leave him behind. And the loss of Spock was not something he could imagine, nor survive.

"Why is it you stay by me?"