Challenging History, Chapter 3
Author's Notes: When I was working on edits of this story, I couldn't help but think how much this piece has changed since I first jotted it down two years ago. In the original story, this chapter didn't even exist, something that my Kirk!muse finds rather tragic. I'm rather glad that it's happened to develop the way it did, because it found both balance and heart in the intervening years. Some of that might be attributable to the fact that I'm not as much writing with another author's characterizations in mind with this version as I was before (and if you all haven't tried that, holy HELL is it hard!), but also because I'm a lot more comfortable with the fandom as a whole.
Anyway, this is it for this particular story. I hope you all have enjoyed it as much as I've had fun dusting it off and reworking it. Any comments, whether you loved it, were indifferent to it, or thought it was the worst piece of shit that ever burned your eyes, would be appreciated. Thanks everyone!
Disclaimer: Yes, I work in accounting and finance. No, I'm not boring. No, really. I'm not. Just ask my coworkers. But either way, Star Trek is not mine and I make no monetary profit from my work. Please don't sue.
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Chapter 3
"So, do you think that'll do it?" Chapel asked in a hushed whisper as she and Kirk scurried around the corner of sickbay when Joanna made her sudden exit. "She didn't look pissed."
Jim pressed his ear towards the hallway, listening for any audible signs of life from his best friend's office. His sharp hearing detected scraping and shuffling as McCoy presumably cleaned his workspace. Broken glass and smashed objects hit the recycler, but not with any kind of forcefulness borne of anger or frustration. Satisfied, Kirk turned to Christine, leaned backwards and propped one foot up against the wall. Jim smiled coyly, nodding his head. "I think we can call tonight a success. Maybe not an outright victory, but hey, these two have a lot to work out."
"Still not willing to admit there might be such thing as a no-win scenario, are you, Captain?"
"Of course not. No win scenarios don't exist," Kirk answered succinctly, peering over the top of Chapel's head for any movement.
"Hmm," Christine replied, averting her eyes.
Ever sharp, Jim easily detected the nurse's shift in demeanor. He titled his head to the side and placed his body directly in front of Chapel's. Waiting until he had her full attention, his eyes searched hers. Jim's eyebrows furrowed at the center when he asked, "Christine? You're not thinking what I think you're thinking, right?"
Chapel pursed her lips. Flatly, she told Kirk, "What you thought was going through my head is probably pretty close to the truth, actually. No-win scenario at its finest? Yeah, I thought that was Len and Jo in a pretty handy nutshell."
Kirk did a double take and snapped his eyes down to Chapel's level. All the hope and elation he felt listening to the snippets of conversation audible through the cracks in the door of McCoy's office dissipated into a neat little puff of figurative smoke as soon as Christine's words computed through his brain. He searched the nurse's face for any signs of facetiousness before he squeaked, "Are you - did you just mean that? Please tell me you're playing."
"I wish I could, Jim," she said truthfully. Chapel closed her eyes and leaned against the wall, her own position mimicking Kirk's perfectly. The lack of sleep really was catching up with her. Sighing, she nodded once, turned her head and confessed, "I've known Len a long time. I know what his relationship - or lack thereof - with Joanna has done to him over the years. He tries to hide it, but he's shit at stuff like that. You know just as well as I do, and you know how he beats himself up over it."
Kirk shuddered involuntarily as flashes of years past raced through his mind. Jim recalled the day he decided to skip another boring Stellar Cartography lecture in favor of some extra "study" time. Intent on swinging by the dorm to change out of his cadet reds, Kirk instead walked in on a vociferous session of The Blame Game via comm. It was the first time Jim had actually witnessed what everyone on campus whispered about: McCoy had an unchecked temper that couldn't be tamed, he wasn't stable, he was running away from his life.
Everything in the room came to a screeching halt the instant Jocelyn and Len noticed Kirk in the doorway. McCoy, red-faced and breathless after nearly a half hour fight with his ex, quickly cut the connection and sat silently while Jim gathered his thoughts. Kirk chewed hard on his lip. He was ready to demand answers; instead, McCoy poured himself a generous drink, took a deep breath and spilled his life story to his shell-shocked roommate. He spared no detail on the path that led him to Starfleet and answered every question Kirk threw at him, no matter how personal or painful. The awkward aftermath was also one of the few times Bones had shown genuine embarrassment in their relationship, and it made Kirk feel marginally uncomfortable.
It was the same uneasy, slightly dirty feeling that was ticking the base of his spine nearly twenty years later, but this time for an all together different reason. Steeling his jaw, Jim took a deep breath, consciously lowered his voice to avoid attracting unwanted attention and answered, "Of course I get it. He's always been like that, and I don't think that'll ever change. But Christine, how long have you known Bones? I can't believe you'd even think something like that!"
Chapel looked contrite. "I feel so guilty about it. Believe me," she began, picking at a hangnail on her left hand. "I love the man to death, but God help me, I didn't think we had a chance on this one. He and Jo are virtually the same person, and she's just so angry with him. I understand why, but I guess I thought that no amount of explanation or groveling on his part would ever solve the problem."
Jim opened his mouth to chastise Chapel for her lack of faith, but as his brain caught up with his mouth, he stopped. Smiling sadly, he laid his hand on her shoulder. "I get it. You're trying to protect him. That's your job as his nurse, and his keeper."
"His keeper? Some days, that goes better than others." As if to assure herself as much as Kirk, Christine added, "You've seen what happens when things go south with them."
Shifting, Jim shoved his hands in the pouch of his sweatshirt and rolled his eyes. "I was his roommate at the Academy, remember?" he asked sarcastically. Jim cleared his throat and in a more serious tone said, "We both knew they'd have to deal with one another eventually. Joanna showing up on board my ship just moved that timeline up by a few years. It sucks right now, but it'll be good for them."
Christine chewed on her lip. "I just don't-I just don't know. How do you know? How can you be so sure all the time?"
"I have faith," Jim replied without hesitation. "Come on, Christine. You know that things are different now. Joanna's not twelve anymore, and Bones isn't the alcoholic deadbeat she thought he was."
"That's exactly my point!" the nurse hissed, blue eyes flashing hotly. "Things are different, yes, but under the surface it's still the same bullshit. It's just packaged in a neater way."
Confused, Jim screwed up his face and asked, "How? I'm confused here. Help a captain out."
"It's been almost twenty years, Jim! Twenty! Imagine if you'd been pulled away from your father for that long. With that much time to think about why it happened-" Chapel stopped herself and clapped one hand over her mouth. Her face burned with embarrassment, and if an airlock opened up beneath her feet, she might have considered jumping through it. "I can't believe I just said that. I'm sorry. Of course you know how that feels. That was really insensitive of me."
"Christine, you don't have to apologize for my dad's death. I made my peace with it a long time ago," Kirk told her candidly while his eyes bounced around the ceiling of sickbay. Softening his eyes, he allowed a boyish smile creep across his face. "Besides, what you said makes perfect sense."
"It does?" she asked, shocked.
"Yeah," Jim began with a smile. "You're right - I don't know what it feels like to be pulled away from my dad like that, and not because I never knew my father. I didn't have a choice, at least not in this universe. There was never any doubt why George didn't came back for me or mom or Sam, and I sure as hell didn't have to wonder if I was why he left. He did it because he had to. Jo didn't have the luxury, so I can understand why she's so upset. And Bones? Well, that's another story."
"Can I ask you a personal question, Sir?" Chapel asked almost meekly.
Jim snorted. "I think we're past the ranks now, Christine. Fire away."
She twisted her hands nervously at her navel. "Did you ever wish that it had been someone else on the bridge of the Kelvin?"
"Almost every day," he answered honestly and nearly instantaneously. "But then I think about what I wouldn't have become, and the people I wouldn't have met."
"You think about what you wouldn't have prevented?" she asked, reading between the lines of the captain's statement while she followed his line of sight towards McCoy's office.
"Yeah," he breathed out. "But I didn't do everything. Hell, I didn't even do 'some' of it. Most of the credit should go to Pike. The man's a miracle worker."
"I would think 'saint' would be a more apt description, putting up with you two without murdering either of you," she said, patting Kirk gently on his arm. "But seriously, Jim. I can't believe I'm about to say this - Len would hate me for it - but you're not giving yourself enough credit. You've had a lot to do with this resurrection of sorts."
Kirk laughed a light, airy chuckle that made Chapel's suddenly dreary mood lift just marginally. "Oh, I think I'm giving myself plenty of credit. Remember? I don't know how to give up?"
Christine returned the captain's genuine smile and replied, "Well, I guess it's good that one of us is too stupid to throw in the towel. No offense, sir."
"None taken. I've gotten used to all those insults over the years. They've actually become compliments," Kirk admitted as the pair fell into a comfortable silence.
Chapel leaned against the bulkhead of the ship and ran a hand through her hair. Eyes wandering around the quiet of sickbay, she said, "Deep down, I always thought Jo and Len were both too fractured, that it just wasn't meant to be. It didn't seem fair, but it was the scenario that seemed most logical."
"Please don't start talking like Spock. It's too late for that. Or early. Or…whatever," Kirk said, dropping his arm down to his side.
"Why didn't you ever give up on him, Jim? Lord knows there have been enough times in my life that I've contemplated how many ways I could murder Len and still get away with it," Christine asked after a long pause between the pair.
"You mean in general, or just this issue in particular?"
A rueful chuckle left her throat. "I think it might be a good idea to just stick with this particular issue for now. I have a feeling that if you were to tell me all the reasons you never bailed on my boss in general, we'd still be here during gamma shift tomorrow."
"Fair enough," he replied. Sobering, Kirk gathered his thoughts and said, "You know, no one's ever asked me that question before, so I've never had to think about it. But if you want the truth, I think I never gave up because they're both still breathing. They have the chance to get to know one another, and to fix what's gone wrong."
Chapel felt her heart constrict at the captain's words and the whimsical, faraway expression on his face. "So, you wanted to see them achieve what you never had the chance to?"
"Exactly."
"Oh, Jim," she breathed. "I don't know whether to hug you or to hit you, but that is the sweetest thing I have ever heard you say."
"Oh, God. You're starting to sound like Bones!" he exclaimed, hushing her with a frantic motion of his hands. "And, keep it down! I'm the captain! I'm supposed to be scary!"
Chapel rolled her eyes. "Yeah, right. This coming from a man who decided an ugly sweater contest on board the ship last Christmas would be good for morale!"
"It was! Everyone thought the senior staff's apparel was hilarious! I'll have you know the furry kitten sweater I was wearing was a gift from my grandfather Tiberius when I was about nine. It has special character, and special winning powers," he protested, arms out at his side and a mock-pout on his full lips.
"I still want to know how you got Spock into a sweater with a bunch of tinsel in the shape of jingle bells, let alone out in public in it!" Christine said, waving a finger at Kirk.
"That, my dear lady, is a trade secret."
"So you lied, then?" she surmised, leveling a disapproving glare at the captain.
"I bent the truth. Come on, it wasn't going to hurt anyone, and the result was epic!" Kirk the infant let out a couple of sarcastically hurt squeaks and waved one hand at the Enterprise's senior nurse. His attention switched when he heard the doors to McCoy's office whoosh open and then closed as the doctor's figure walked smoothly down the hallway. Pointing, he said, "Hey, he's gone."
"Yeah," Chapel agreed with a loud yawn as she followed the doctor's silhouette down the corridor. "Probably a good thing. I'm in love with my bed, specifically the one I'm not in right now."
"I don't know. I heard something about pizza during that argument, and I'm all for crashing the party. I mean, they got us out of bed. I think it's our right," Kirk proposed slyly.
Christine's stomach picked that second to growl. "Well, now that you mention it, pizza does sound kind of good."
Jim flashed the nurse his million-credit smile and offered his elbow in a rare gesture of chivalry. "Shall we?"
Predictably, Chapel rebuffed the captain with a playful shove of his arm. "Oh, get off it, Kirk. Your brand of flattery doesn't impress me."
"Fair enough," Jim agreed, laughing. The two set off in stride for Ten Forward, smiling and joking with one another. As they passed the doors of sickbay, Kirk and Chapel exchanged a surreptitious low-five. "Are you ready for round two?" he asked.
Christine snorted out loud. "Not until I have a beer first."
"Or twelve," Jim scoffed as the two wandered through the nearly deserted corridors of the ship.
Chapel tapped the side of her face with her index finger and placed one hand on her hip. "But I do think that next time, you should make Spock do the honors. He would talk those two into a dead sleep. Wouldn't that fall under captain's prerogative?"
Jim's face went blank. Ever so slowly, a mischievous glint took hold in his eyes that eventually spread throughout his entire face. Tilting his head to the side, he smiled as he said, "Nurse Chapel, I like the way you think. Tell me more…"
--FIN--