Star Trek fic: a fucking space opera (or Six Characters Who Didn't Board the USS Enterprise)
Title: a fucking space opera (or Six Characters Who Didn't Board the USS Enterprise)
Fandoms: Star Trek: reboot, plus guests from Merlin, Stargate Atlantis, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Supernatural, and Harry Potter
Characters: James T. Kirk, ensemble, Arthur Pendragon, Rodney McKay, Cameron Phillips, Sam and Dean Winchester, and Vanessa.
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 3,169 words
Beta: Thanks to the wonderful littledrop for encouraging and being my Trek expert.
Notes: For such_heights and undeny, even though I abused their prompts horribly.
i.
Jim's been taking fencing lessons from Sulu for over a month when Arthur Pendragon comes on board.
Jim's not a believer in false modesty. He's brilliant at fencing, easily as good as Sulu already, even though Sulu tries to insist it's supposed to be about finesse, not brute force and luck. Whatever, Jim's still won their last twelve matches.
Pendragon challenges him to a fight his second week. He's drunk at the time, and Jim's on his way to being drunk, so the impropriety of challenging the captain to a fight is easily overlooked. Pendragon's a cocky young brat; Jim likes that.
Bones complains, of course.
"For heavens sake, Jim, you're not a cadet any more. You can't sword-fight every swaggering ensign who comes on board."
Which of course cements Jim's determination to hold the match.
"Why not?" he asks, just to rile Bones further. It's not really befitting a captain, but he's off duty and it's Bones' fault he's close to inebriated. Bones is the one who confiscated the Alvanian brandy and decided to hold an impromptu party.
Bones shakes his head like he's giving up. "Just don't think I'll be around to patch up the two of you when you slash each other to pieces."
They don't slash each other to pieces. It goes quite differently.
"I hope you're prepared to be humiliated," Pendragon says as they circle in the nearly empty gymnasium. They have an audience of two; Sulu to adjudicate, and Bones who's probably there to heckle.
"Last time someone said that to me was right before I shot him. With his own gun." Which isn't strictly true, but it's close enough and it sounds good.
"I could beat you with one hand tied behind my back," Pendragon taunts, feinting a jab to the left which Jim parries without even having to move. Feeble.
"You must be more drunk than I thought," Jim says. "If you can't handle your sword, I'll let you off."
"Are you conceding?" Pendragon has the temerity to suggest. There's a stifled snigger from the sidelines.
Jim narrows his eyes. "Bring it on, sugar lips," he says. He bounces on his toes and grips his sword comfortably. There's something about sword-fighting that feels right: it's more personal than a phaser, and more elegant than a fist fight. Jim's born to be a sword fighter.
Pendragon, apparently, was born sword-fighting. Which, Jim discovers, is different.
They don't slash each other to pieces. Pendragon does all the slashing, and has the temerity to smirk down at him when he's got Jim on his back and the tip of the sword at his throat. Cocky brat.
The applause from the peanut gallery doesn't improve Jim's mood.
Despite the threat, Bones does stitch him up, though he grumbles all the time, gives Jim barely half a shot of anesthetic, and insists on putting in a row of old-fashioned stitches in Jim's arm when Jim knows he could have used a dermal regenerator.
Jim promotes Pendragon to Lieutenant junior grade. Cocky young brats have to stick together.
ii.
Rodney McKay's a late addition to the ship. Jim's heard the name before, always paired with mixed adjectives like brilliant and pain in the ass, and genius and arrogant bastard, so he's predisposed to like the man.
Most of his records are classified to a higher clearance than Jim's, though Jim is able to determine that McKay gets exiled at regular intervals, first to Siberia, then to Sybaron (which must have made Siberia seem like a pleasure ground), and most recently to the Klach D'Kel Brakt. He's clearly skilled at pissing off important people.
Jim's looking forward to meeting him.
Scotty isn't.
"It's because of the bloody beagle, isn't it? I'm being punished for the beagle."
"I don't think that's-"
"Oh, yes, it is. It's an insult, that's what it is. Suggesting I'm not competent, that I need some bloody arrogant moron to double-check my work.
"I'm sure that's not-"
"All because of one unforgiving, obstinate old mule of an admiral who was far too attached to his dog to be healthy. There are names for that kind of thing, you know."
That's before McKay arrives.
After he arrives, it gets more interesting.
"What sort of idiot thinks that you can just replace an anyon emitter's crystal array without-"
"Who the hell do you think-"
"A genius who graduated with the highest ever score at the Academy, that's who I think-"
Jim doesn't pay attention to more than one in ten of their sentences. He tunes out whenever they mention things like interphase generators and gamma pulse generators and broadband sensor matrices. He had enough of those at the Academy in the compulsory engineering modules. He'll notice if they start throwing things at each other, right?
"Well, go on then 'genius', what would you do?"
"I'd reverse transmission on our accelerometer relay and use it to reroute data from the other ship's primary sensor array to the lateral sensor array, thus causing it to invert all its external readings and become-"
"Huh. That might actually work."
"Of course it'll work. Certified genius here."
"Bloody arrogant bastard, more like," Scotty says, but his tone's admiring, and Jim thinks it's safe to leave them alone.
Two months into the voyage and McKay's saved the ship four times, to Jim's three and Scotty's two. Jim figures McKay's earned the right to be an arrogant bastard.
iii.
They come across The Impala on the very edge of the alpha quadrant, dangerously close to a region known for false vacuum fluctuations. She's limping along, heavy damage on her port side and half her systems down. She looks as though she's been in a lot of fights, and been patched up more than once, but her latest fight might well have been her last.
"There are two life signs on board, Captain."
"She's venting oxygen. The ship isn't going to support life much longer."
"Beam them aboard, Scotty."
"Ay, Captain."
*
It's not as though Jim expects profuse thank yous and gratitude from everyone he rescues. He doesn't. Sometimes he rescues half-Vulcans.
But. "What the fuck do you think you're doing, beaming us on board without even asking?" That's a bit rich from someone who'd have been dead in a few hours if the Enterprise hadn't come along.
Jim's aware that fuck you too isn't the appropriate response in the circumstances, even if it's on the tip of his tongue.
"If you prefer, we can beam you back to your death trap," he offers pleasantly.
The shorter guy glares. "I'll have you know-" he starts, then fury seems to deprive him of basic vocal skills. He goes all red and puffy in the face like he's just eaten Aldebaran blowfish.
"My brother's fond of our ship," the other guy says, which is obviously the understatement of the year. "I'm Sam Winchester," he says, offering his hand. "This is my brother Dean. And that's been our home for the last ten years."
He looks sadly out the viewscreen at their ship, and Jim must be losing it, because instead of either sending the ungrateful bastards back, or dumping them on the nearest planet, he says:
"I'm sure we can help repair it."
Apparently that was the right thing to say, because Dean lifts up his head, a single tear trickling down his cheek, and for a moment Jim thinks he's going to get kissed on the mouth by a complete stranger. Well, it wouldn't be too unusual - he's a handsome guy, he can't help it if some people just can't resist him.
*
Sam's in sick bay, being transfused by Bones. The guy's got some rare blood condition that has Bones intrigued. Jim left when he started talking about leeches, even though he's pretty sure Bones did so deliberately just to get rid of him. Sometimes the man's sneakier than Spock.
So now Jim's in engineering introducing the other Winchester to Scotty. Dean's pacing around impatiently while the outer hull of his ship is being patched up enough to run life support again. He's made it clear that he's not happy waiting and watching - "You want your ship fixed?" "Yes, but-" You got a working space suit on you?" "No, but-" "Then shut up and let my men do their job." - but he's finally settled down to a mulish silence.
"She's a Sacramento class runabout, isn't she? Haven't seen one of those in years," Scotty says, rubbing his hands with glee. Keenser jumps off an overhead conduit and bounces up and down beside him in matching excitement.
"Aren't they obsolete?" Jim asks, and gets matching glares from his chief engineer and newest passenger. He shrugs an apology, understanding. Even if the USS Enterprise weren't the flagship of the fleet, Jim'd defend her honor against any criticism.
"The Sacramento class were classics. Limited production run, sadly. They don't design them like that any more," Scotty says, and that apparently is enough to gain him the approval of its Captain and get him talking.
"She's a real beaut. Got her from my dad. Had to patch her up a few times, practically rebuilt her from scratch after a collision with a Romulan garbage scow - fucker broadsided us and pretended it was an accident - but she's gotten us through some rough shit. Fought off a YED last week, real son of a bitch. Just haven't managed to fix up all the damage from that yet."
"What does she do? Warp 4? Warp 5?"
Winchester grins, and Jim's suddenly taken back years, racing his borrowed car off the edge of a cliff, the sheer joy of speed like he'd never felt before. It's all on Winchester's face. For all his posturing and scars, he looks like a kid. "Nah, warp 6," he says proudly. "I installed a tetryon plasma drive system last year."
"Really? That I have to see."
Keenser elbows Winchester in the thigh. "Me too, me too."
Jim leaves them to their geekgasms. And if he strokes the walls of the Enterprise as he heads back to the bridge, well, there's no one around to see him.
iv.
She appears in a flash of light, crouching in a circle of fire. Chekov grabs an extinguisher and puts out the lingering flames, and somehow manages to spray the girl with foam in his enthusiasm. It's a shame, because not only is she stunning, she's also naked. Very naked. Completely naked.
On Jim's bridge.
And he's got a ringside seat.
Some days, being Captain rocks.
Jim proudly notes that he finds words first. Not that everything is a competition between him and Spock. That would be childish.
"Hi," he says, and okay, as greetings to newly materialized naked women go, it's hardly momentous. But still, naked girl. And that wasn't any ordinary materialization. He turns to Chekov, who shrugs his shoulders.
"I did nutin'," he insists. "And there is nutin' wisible on the long range scanners."
The girl stands up. Still naked. Very naked. "What date is it?" she asks calmly, ignoring the foam on her arm and the blob trickling down her face. She's impressive, and not only because she's naked.
Sulu gulps out, "Stardate 2259.12."
She tilts her head enquiringly. "Ah. That is unfortunate. And we are not on Earth?"
Spock matches her head tilt perfectly. Jim wonders if she's part Vulcan, though her ears look perfectly normal. "No, we are not," Spock informs her. "This is a Federation vessel, the USS Enterprise, on a mission of exploration. And you are?"
That's the question Jim should have asked.
"My name is Cameron."
Cameron stares around her, seemingly unconcerned by her lack of clothing. Uhura hands her a blanket; she holds it up and examines it.
"I'm not cold," she states, and drops the blanket on Uhura's feet.
Jim bites back a laugh. He likes Cameron. More girls should be like her.
Which of course is the kind of thought that comes back to bite him in the ass. It's only minutes after he's had her wrapped in the blanket and escorted to sick bay for a check up that he gets an urgent call from McCoy.
"Captain."
"Yes."
"I think you're going to want to get down here."
Jim recognizes the tone. It takes a lot to ruffle McCoy, but he's definitely ruffled now.
*
Cameron's lying on a biobed when Jim walks in, security officers on either side of her. She's staring up at the ceiling as though it's fascinating. There's something odd about her, something Jim can't quite pinpoint, that goes beyond her appearing on his bridge out of nowhere. Naked.
He can't seem to forget the whole naked thing. With the perky breasts. Really amazingly perky breasts. She's wearing pajamas now. Jim doesn't approve of pajamas.
"Jim!" Bones looks annoyed, and Jim has the feeling that might not have been the first time he'd called Jim's name.
"What's the problem?" Jim asks. He can be professional, even when he's standing over a beautiful, recently naked woman.
"Perhaps you'd better ask her."
"Is it too much to expect a straight answer around here?"
Bones shrugs. "She's-well, she's not exactly what she appears."
Jim looks between the two of them. There's no expression on Cameron's face. Bones, on the other hand, looks thoroughly spooked, which isn't a good sign.
"Not exactly-? What?"
Cameron sits up. "I believe the doctor is trying unsucessfully to inform you that I am a terminator."
"A terminator?"
"Yes."
Jim missed a few classes at the Academy, sure. No point turning up if he was too hung-over to hold his PADD the right way up. But he's sure he didn't miss anything that sounded as critical as a terminator. "What exactly is a terminator?"
"An autonomous humanoid robot from the twenty-first century, designed with the specific purpose of terminating human life forms." Cameron provides the details as though she's reciting them from an encyclopedia.
Bones gives him a pointed look, like it's his fault they have what is apparently a time-traveling robot assassin in the form of a beautiful woman on board.
"But I have been reprogrammed," Cameron adds. "Although my basic circuitry still contains an underlying desire to kill you, I have been overwritten with the command to preserve humanity, so I am unlikely to kill anyone. Intentionally. Unless I malfunction."
Kirk can't help it. It's been that kind of day. He bursts out laughing. "That's a relief," he says.
v.
Sometimes, Jim really, really doesn't want to ask.
But he's the captain now. He has to.
"Why are my quarters completely filled with water?"
It comes out more plaintive than authoritative, but he's tired, damn it. He's off shift, and he shouldn't have to be back on the bridge trying to find out why there's a force field across his door and water on the other side, all the way up to the ceiling.
Scotty beams. "It's amazing, isn't it?"
Jim takes a deep breath. He needs his chief engineer, and unfortunately there are rules about assaulting fellow officers, however annoying they might be. That's why he and Spock only come to blows roughly once a week instead of daily.
"What's amazing?" he asks with considerable restraint, especially since he still hasn't had an answer to his first question.
"She is," Scotty says, as though the answer's obvious.
"You didn't read the report, Captain?" Spock is smirking, though as ever it's sufficiently subtle that Jim can do little more than narrow his eyes in response.
"And which report would that be?" he replies with his last remnants of patience. He has an inbox full of reports, all tagged somewhere between urgent (the least important) to life-and-death (try to read today if at all possible), and so far he's only managed to wade through the life-and-death pile. Honestly, he'd rather be experiencing life or death, hanging off a Romulan drilling platform by one hand with a Romulan boot about to crush his fingers, than reading reports all day.
Spock likes sending him reports.
"The report I sent you regarding our guest."
"I do believe I must have overlooked that one," Jim says with all the dignity he can muster.
"Ah," Spock says, and returns to his console.
"Is anyone going to tell me?"
"Ay, sorry, Captain. She's a giant squid."
"There's a giant squid in my quarters?" His life's a fucking space opera. And not even the erotic type that airs on New HBO. No, it's the animated comic type where the captain goes splat against the wall every episode and the pointy-eared bastard quirks his pointy eyebrow and steps on the captain's flattened remains.
"There wasn't room for her anywhere else - your quarters are the largest, obviously." Uhura looks far too happy - she's not actually smiling, but there's a glint in her eye that tells Jim she's smiling inside.
Jim sighs. "Couldn't you have put it in the hold?"
The entire bridge looks at him in horror. Sulu's the first to speak. "She's- she's not cargo. You can't put her in the hold. Sir," he adds as an afterthought.
Scotty looks downright hurt. "We went to school together. She has a great personality," he says, as though he's setting Jim up or something, which is downright crazy, because Jim has never in his entire life needed to be set up, and even if things are a bit lacking on that front at the moment, he's a captain and it's a price he has to pay and he can still get his own goddamn dates.
Okay, so maybe he's a little more tired than he realized.
"Her name's Wanessa," Chekov says.
Great. Normally Jim would be more than happy to have a Vanessa in his quarters in his off time. And it's not that he's sizist or xenophobic, he'd just prefer a Vanessa without tentacles. And smaller. And an air breather. Ideally hour-glass shaped, but he's been playing solo in his rare off-time since his promotion, so he's not really that picky. Except about the tentacles. Tentacles are out.
Unless they vibrated. Vibrating tentacles might be interesting.
Thankfully Spock interrupts his thoughts before Jim can do something ridiculous like pop a boner on the bridge while thinking about vibrating tentacles. "You may use my quarters if you require sleep, Captain."
"And where will you-" Jim shakes his head. Uhura is standing right behind Spock, arm brushing his. "Scratch that," he says wearily. It just gets better. Spock gets to cuddle up with Uhura, while Jim gets Spock's quarters, which are probably minimalism taken to the extreme. Knowing Jim's luck he'll find that Spock sleeps on a bare sleep platform in some sort of Vulcan masochistic desire to eschew comfort along with emotions, and he can only imagine what his replicator is programmed to serve.
Jim sighs a put-upon sigh. If he has to have Plomeek broth for breakfast, Vanessa's going in the hold, friend of Scotty's or not.
//
Prompts were 'tentacles' and 'Spock and McCoy and Uhura making fun of Kirk'. They were supposed to be in the context of Kirk/McCoy - I'll try better next time!
The Impala was borrowed from kellifer-fic's Two Men Walk Into An Intergalactic Substation.
I had fun writing that! I wish I had more holiday Mondays.
Fandoms: Star Trek: reboot, plus guests from Merlin, Stargate Atlantis, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Supernatural, and Harry Potter
Characters: James T. Kirk, ensemble, Arthur Pendragon, Rodney McKay, Cameron Phillips, Sam and Dean Winchester, and Vanessa.
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 3,169 words
Beta: Thanks to the wonderful littledrop for encouraging and being my Trek expert.
Notes: For such_heights and undeny, even though I abused their prompts horribly.
i.
Jim's been taking fencing lessons from Sulu for over a month when Arthur Pendragon comes on board.
Jim's not a believer in false modesty. He's brilliant at fencing, easily as good as Sulu already, even though Sulu tries to insist it's supposed to be about finesse, not brute force and luck. Whatever, Jim's still won their last twelve matches.
Pendragon challenges him to a fight his second week. He's drunk at the time, and Jim's on his way to being drunk, so the impropriety of challenging the captain to a fight is easily overlooked. Pendragon's a cocky young brat; Jim likes that.
Bones complains, of course.
"For heavens sake, Jim, you're not a cadet any more. You can't sword-fight every swaggering ensign who comes on board."
Which of course cements Jim's determination to hold the match.
"Why not?" he asks, just to rile Bones further. It's not really befitting a captain, but he's off duty and it's Bones' fault he's close to inebriated. Bones is the one who confiscated the Alvanian brandy and decided to hold an impromptu party.
Bones shakes his head like he's giving up. "Just don't think I'll be around to patch up the two of you when you slash each other to pieces."
They don't slash each other to pieces. It goes quite differently.
"I hope you're prepared to be humiliated," Pendragon says as they circle in the nearly empty gymnasium. They have an audience of two; Sulu to adjudicate, and Bones who's probably there to heckle.
"Last time someone said that to me was right before I shot him. With his own gun." Which isn't strictly true, but it's close enough and it sounds good.
"I could beat you with one hand tied behind my back," Pendragon taunts, feinting a jab to the left which Jim parries without even having to move. Feeble.
"You must be more drunk than I thought," Jim says. "If you can't handle your sword, I'll let you off."
"Are you conceding?" Pendragon has the temerity to suggest. There's a stifled snigger from the sidelines.
Jim narrows his eyes. "Bring it on, sugar lips," he says. He bounces on his toes and grips his sword comfortably. There's something about sword-fighting that feels right: it's more personal than a phaser, and more elegant than a fist fight. Jim's born to be a sword fighter.
Pendragon, apparently, was born sword-fighting. Which, Jim discovers, is different.
They don't slash each other to pieces. Pendragon does all the slashing, and has the temerity to smirk down at him when he's got Jim on his back and the tip of the sword at his throat. Cocky brat.
The applause from the peanut gallery doesn't improve Jim's mood.
Despite the threat, Bones does stitch him up, though he grumbles all the time, gives Jim barely half a shot of anesthetic, and insists on putting in a row of old-fashioned stitches in Jim's arm when Jim knows he could have used a dermal regenerator.
Jim promotes Pendragon to Lieutenant junior grade. Cocky young brats have to stick together.
ii.
Rodney McKay's a late addition to the ship. Jim's heard the name before, always paired with mixed adjectives like brilliant and pain in the ass, and genius and arrogant bastard, so he's predisposed to like the man.
Most of his records are classified to a higher clearance than Jim's, though Jim is able to determine that McKay gets exiled at regular intervals, first to Siberia, then to Sybaron (which must have made Siberia seem like a pleasure ground), and most recently to the Klach D'Kel Brakt. He's clearly skilled at pissing off important people.
Jim's looking forward to meeting him.
Scotty isn't.
"It's because of the bloody beagle, isn't it? I'm being punished for the beagle."
"I don't think that's-"
"Oh, yes, it is. It's an insult, that's what it is. Suggesting I'm not competent, that I need some bloody arrogant moron to double-check my work.
"I'm sure that's not-"
"All because of one unforgiving, obstinate old mule of an admiral who was far too attached to his dog to be healthy. There are names for that kind of thing, you know."
That's before McKay arrives.
After he arrives, it gets more interesting.
"What sort of idiot thinks that you can just replace an anyon emitter's crystal array without-"
"Who the hell do you think-"
"A genius who graduated with the highest ever score at the Academy, that's who I think-"
Jim doesn't pay attention to more than one in ten of their sentences. He tunes out whenever they mention things like interphase generators and gamma pulse generators and broadband sensor matrices. He had enough of those at the Academy in the compulsory engineering modules. He'll notice if they start throwing things at each other, right?
"Well, go on then 'genius', what would you do?"
"I'd reverse transmission on our accelerometer relay and use it to reroute data from the other ship's primary sensor array to the lateral sensor array, thus causing it to invert all its external readings and become-"
"Huh. That might actually work."
"Of course it'll work. Certified genius here."
"Bloody arrogant bastard, more like," Scotty says, but his tone's admiring, and Jim thinks it's safe to leave them alone.
Two months into the voyage and McKay's saved the ship four times, to Jim's three and Scotty's two. Jim figures McKay's earned the right to be an arrogant bastard.
iii.
They come across The Impala on the very edge of the alpha quadrant, dangerously close to a region known for false vacuum fluctuations. She's limping along, heavy damage on her port side and half her systems down. She looks as though she's been in a lot of fights, and been patched up more than once, but her latest fight might well have been her last.
"There are two life signs on board, Captain."
"She's venting oxygen. The ship isn't going to support life much longer."
"Beam them aboard, Scotty."
"Ay, Captain."
*
It's not as though Jim expects profuse thank yous and gratitude from everyone he rescues. He doesn't. Sometimes he rescues half-Vulcans.
But. "What the fuck do you think you're doing, beaming us on board without even asking?" That's a bit rich from someone who'd have been dead in a few hours if the Enterprise hadn't come along.
Jim's aware that fuck you too isn't the appropriate response in the circumstances, even if it's on the tip of his tongue.
"If you prefer, we can beam you back to your death trap," he offers pleasantly.
The shorter guy glares. "I'll have you know-" he starts, then fury seems to deprive him of basic vocal skills. He goes all red and puffy in the face like he's just eaten Aldebaran blowfish.
"My brother's fond of our ship," the other guy says, which is obviously the understatement of the year. "I'm Sam Winchester," he says, offering his hand. "This is my brother Dean. And that's been our home for the last ten years."
He looks sadly out the viewscreen at their ship, and Jim must be losing it, because instead of either sending the ungrateful bastards back, or dumping them on the nearest planet, he says:
"I'm sure we can help repair it."
Apparently that was the right thing to say, because Dean lifts up his head, a single tear trickling down his cheek, and for a moment Jim thinks he's going to get kissed on the mouth by a complete stranger. Well, it wouldn't be too unusual - he's a handsome guy, he can't help it if some people just can't resist him.
*
Sam's in sick bay, being transfused by Bones. The guy's got some rare blood condition that has Bones intrigued. Jim left when he started talking about leeches, even though he's pretty sure Bones did so deliberately just to get rid of him. Sometimes the man's sneakier than Spock.
So now Jim's in engineering introducing the other Winchester to Scotty. Dean's pacing around impatiently while the outer hull of his ship is being patched up enough to run life support again. He's made it clear that he's not happy waiting and watching - "You want your ship fixed?" "Yes, but-" You got a working space suit on you?" "No, but-" "Then shut up and let my men do their job." - but he's finally settled down to a mulish silence.
"She's a Sacramento class runabout, isn't she? Haven't seen one of those in years," Scotty says, rubbing his hands with glee. Keenser jumps off an overhead conduit and bounces up and down beside him in matching excitement.
"Aren't they obsolete?" Jim asks, and gets matching glares from his chief engineer and newest passenger. He shrugs an apology, understanding. Even if the USS Enterprise weren't the flagship of the fleet, Jim'd defend her honor against any criticism.
"The Sacramento class were classics. Limited production run, sadly. They don't design them like that any more," Scotty says, and that apparently is enough to gain him the approval of its Captain and get him talking.
"She's a real beaut. Got her from my dad. Had to patch her up a few times, practically rebuilt her from scratch after a collision with a Romulan garbage scow - fucker broadsided us and pretended it was an accident - but she's gotten us through some rough shit. Fought off a YED last week, real son of a bitch. Just haven't managed to fix up all the damage from that yet."
"What does she do? Warp 4? Warp 5?"
Winchester grins, and Jim's suddenly taken back years, racing his borrowed car off the edge of a cliff, the sheer joy of speed like he'd never felt before. It's all on Winchester's face. For all his posturing and scars, he looks like a kid. "Nah, warp 6," he says proudly. "I installed a tetryon plasma drive system last year."
"Really? That I have to see."
Keenser elbows Winchester in the thigh. "Me too, me too."
Jim leaves them to their geekgasms. And if he strokes the walls of the Enterprise as he heads back to the bridge, well, there's no one around to see him.
iv.
She appears in a flash of light, crouching in a circle of fire. Chekov grabs an extinguisher and puts out the lingering flames, and somehow manages to spray the girl with foam in his enthusiasm. It's a shame, because not only is she stunning, she's also naked. Very naked. Completely naked.
On Jim's bridge.
And he's got a ringside seat.
Some days, being Captain rocks.
Jim proudly notes that he finds words first. Not that everything is a competition between him and Spock. That would be childish.
"Hi," he says, and okay, as greetings to newly materialized naked women go, it's hardly momentous. But still, naked girl. And that wasn't any ordinary materialization. He turns to Chekov, who shrugs his shoulders.
"I did nutin'," he insists. "And there is nutin' wisible on the long range scanners."
The girl stands up. Still naked. Very naked. "What date is it?" she asks calmly, ignoring the foam on her arm and the blob trickling down her face. She's impressive, and not only because she's naked.
Sulu gulps out, "Stardate 2259.12."
She tilts her head enquiringly. "Ah. That is unfortunate. And we are not on Earth?"
Spock matches her head tilt perfectly. Jim wonders if she's part Vulcan, though her ears look perfectly normal. "No, we are not," Spock informs her. "This is a Federation vessel, the USS Enterprise, on a mission of exploration. And you are?"
That's the question Jim should have asked.
"My name is Cameron."
Cameron stares around her, seemingly unconcerned by her lack of clothing. Uhura hands her a blanket; she holds it up and examines it.
"I'm not cold," she states, and drops the blanket on Uhura's feet.
Jim bites back a laugh. He likes Cameron. More girls should be like her.
Which of course is the kind of thought that comes back to bite him in the ass. It's only minutes after he's had her wrapped in the blanket and escorted to sick bay for a check up that he gets an urgent call from McCoy.
"Captain."
"Yes."
"I think you're going to want to get down here."
Jim recognizes the tone. It takes a lot to ruffle McCoy, but he's definitely ruffled now.
*
Cameron's lying on a biobed when Jim walks in, security officers on either side of her. She's staring up at the ceiling as though it's fascinating. There's something odd about her, something Jim can't quite pinpoint, that goes beyond her appearing on his bridge out of nowhere. Naked.
He can't seem to forget the whole naked thing. With the perky breasts. Really amazingly perky breasts. She's wearing pajamas now. Jim doesn't approve of pajamas.
"Jim!" Bones looks annoyed, and Jim has the feeling that might not have been the first time he'd called Jim's name.
"What's the problem?" Jim asks. He can be professional, even when he's standing over a beautiful, recently naked woman.
"Perhaps you'd better ask her."
"Is it too much to expect a straight answer around here?"
Bones shrugs. "She's-well, she's not exactly what she appears."
Jim looks between the two of them. There's no expression on Cameron's face. Bones, on the other hand, looks thoroughly spooked, which isn't a good sign.
"Not exactly-? What?"
Cameron sits up. "I believe the doctor is trying unsucessfully to inform you that I am a terminator."
"A terminator?"
"Yes."
Jim missed a few classes at the Academy, sure. No point turning up if he was too hung-over to hold his PADD the right way up. But he's sure he didn't miss anything that sounded as critical as a terminator. "What exactly is a terminator?"
"An autonomous humanoid robot from the twenty-first century, designed with the specific purpose of terminating human life forms." Cameron provides the details as though she's reciting them from an encyclopedia.
Bones gives him a pointed look, like it's his fault they have what is apparently a time-traveling robot assassin in the form of a beautiful woman on board.
"But I have been reprogrammed," Cameron adds. "Although my basic circuitry still contains an underlying desire to kill you, I have been overwritten with the command to preserve humanity, so I am unlikely to kill anyone. Intentionally. Unless I malfunction."
Kirk can't help it. It's been that kind of day. He bursts out laughing. "That's a relief," he says.
v.
Sometimes, Jim really, really doesn't want to ask.
But he's the captain now. He has to.
"Why are my quarters completely filled with water?"
It comes out more plaintive than authoritative, but he's tired, damn it. He's off shift, and he shouldn't have to be back on the bridge trying to find out why there's a force field across his door and water on the other side, all the way up to the ceiling.
Scotty beams. "It's amazing, isn't it?"
Jim takes a deep breath. He needs his chief engineer, and unfortunately there are rules about assaulting fellow officers, however annoying they might be. That's why he and Spock only come to blows roughly once a week instead of daily.
"What's amazing?" he asks with considerable restraint, especially since he still hasn't had an answer to his first question.
"She is," Scotty says, as though the answer's obvious.
"You didn't read the report, Captain?" Spock is smirking, though as ever it's sufficiently subtle that Jim can do little more than narrow his eyes in response.
"And which report would that be?" he replies with his last remnants of patience. He has an inbox full of reports, all tagged somewhere between urgent (the least important) to life-and-death (try to read today if at all possible), and so far he's only managed to wade through the life-and-death pile. Honestly, he'd rather be experiencing life or death, hanging off a Romulan drilling platform by one hand with a Romulan boot about to crush his fingers, than reading reports all day.
Spock likes sending him reports.
"The report I sent you regarding our guest."
"I do believe I must have overlooked that one," Jim says with all the dignity he can muster.
"Ah," Spock says, and returns to his console.
"Is anyone going to tell me?"
"Ay, sorry, Captain. She's a giant squid."
"There's a giant squid in my quarters?" His life's a fucking space opera. And not even the erotic type that airs on New HBO. No, it's the animated comic type where the captain goes splat against the wall every episode and the pointy-eared bastard quirks his pointy eyebrow and steps on the captain's flattened remains.
"There wasn't room for her anywhere else - your quarters are the largest, obviously." Uhura looks far too happy - she's not actually smiling, but there's a glint in her eye that tells Jim she's smiling inside.
Jim sighs. "Couldn't you have put it in the hold?"
The entire bridge looks at him in horror. Sulu's the first to speak. "She's- she's not cargo. You can't put her in the hold. Sir," he adds as an afterthought.
Scotty looks downright hurt. "We went to school together. She has a great personality," he says, as though he's setting Jim up or something, which is downright crazy, because Jim has never in his entire life needed to be set up, and even if things are a bit lacking on that front at the moment, he's a captain and it's a price he has to pay and he can still get his own goddamn dates.
Okay, so maybe he's a little more tired than he realized.
"Her name's Wanessa," Chekov says.
Great. Normally Jim would be more than happy to have a Vanessa in his quarters in his off time. And it's not that he's sizist or xenophobic, he'd just prefer a Vanessa without tentacles. And smaller. And an air breather. Ideally hour-glass shaped, but he's been playing solo in his rare off-time since his promotion, so he's not really that picky. Except about the tentacles. Tentacles are out.
Unless they vibrated. Vibrating tentacles might be interesting.
Thankfully Spock interrupts his thoughts before Jim can do something ridiculous like pop a boner on the bridge while thinking about vibrating tentacles. "You may use my quarters if you require sleep, Captain."
"And where will you-" Jim shakes his head. Uhura is standing right behind Spock, arm brushing his. "Scratch that," he says wearily. It just gets better. Spock gets to cuddle up with Uhura, while Jim gets Spock's quarters, which are probably minimalism taken to the extreme. Knowing Jim's luck he'll find that Spock sleeps on a bare sleep platform in some sort of Vulcan masochistic desire to eschew comfort along with emotions, and he can only imagine what his replicator is programmed to serve.
Jim sighs a put-upon sigh. If he has to have Plomeek broth for breakfast, Vanessa's going in the hold, friend of Scotty's or not.
//
Prompts were 'tentacles' and 'Spock and McCoy and Uhura making fun of Kirk'. They were supposed to be in the context of Kirk/McCoy - I'll try better next time!
The Impala was borrowed from kellifer-fic's Two Men Walk Into An Intergalactic Substation.
I had fun writing that! I wish I had more holiday Mondays.