Race Across The Universe That Separates The Space Between Us.
Just for the record, when I started writing the sequel to Burn These Bridges From The Other Side, it was not supposed to turn into a 13,200+ word retelling of the entire fucking movie. I don't even know what to do with myself some days, except headdesk endlessly.
A warning: I don't usually post warnings, but this one has a secondary character's death, and I don't want people to be taken unawares in case it upsets them, but I also don't want to spoil it for people that don't want to know in advance. So, uh, for those who don't want to know: a secondary character dies off-screen and it's mentioned in here; for those who do want to know, highlight to read: Gaila dies in this story. It wasn't a decision lightly made, and I did my best to not play it for cheap melodrama, but just so you're aware, that's what's going on.
Eternal gratitude to superjoydrop for editing my stories, always encouraging me, and making me a better writer with each comment, critique, and correction of hers. I tweaked it a bit more after she beta-read this, so if you find any mistakes in here, they're all on me. For traveller because she wanted to see what would happen to Pike and Christine after the movie. I hope you like, bibi. ♥ The blatant Futurama reference is for charliehey because she is a continual delight. Kojack Sulu loves ya, baby!
disclaimer: so not mine, so not real, but can I keep them anyway? They're the best action figures ever!
And So We Run
When Christine is sixteen years old, she gets into a car accident.
It's a school night and she's out with her boyfriend Andras (pronounced And-rash, as he is quick to always point out, his ancestors coming from Hungary many centuries ago) in his beat-up Beamer that they're calling "vintage" to spare his feelings because he loves the car a little more than he loves Christine since he'd gotten the car first. Christine would feel jealous, but she knows better than to begrudge someone their obsession, even when it's not hers. Plus, Andras likes having her around to help him fix the car, so it's not like he's abandoning her for a hunk of metal that moves.
Andras is Christine's first real boyfriend, a blond giant who looks like a Viking, gets all her jokes and references, is captain of the football team, and is the most gentle, sweet boy she's ever met. He holds her hand as he walks her to her classes, carries her books on the way home from school, and kisses her like she's delicate, spun glass, something that she doesn't really enjoy because she knows she's tougher than that, but puts up with because she likes the way his mouth feels against hers.
Right now, they're driving down a long, winding road with the moon lighting their way, talking about nothing and everything, him smiling at her like she's hung the moon, and it's as close to love as Christine's ever going to admit to getting. She reaches up into the night sky, laughing delightedly at the fireflies glowing above her head, looking like stars that have come down to get a closer look at the world, and tries to catch the little dots of light that fly just out of reach at her fingertips. Andras divides his attention between her and the road, laughing because she's happy, glowing almost as bright as the fireflies as he watches her.
Christine doesn't remember much about the accident. One minute, she had been laughing and trying to touch the fireflies, listening to Andras say something about how beautiful she looks in the moonlight, and the next minute, there had been a sharp turn and the squeal of tires as the car had careened out of control down a ravine, rolling over and over until it had hit the bottom. Christine remembers the dizzying roll as the car had gone over the ravine, the sickening feeling of spinning out of control and being helpless to stop it, the sharp crack as her head hit the dashboard in front of her, and then everything was blank and blessed silence.
When she wakes up, she's in the hospital and her mother is by her side, looking even more bruised and hurt than Christine while her father stands silently behind her and looks like he's aged ten years in a day. It turns out that she'd had a skull fracture along with all the broken ribs and limbs, and it had taken five hours of tricky surgery and a week of dermal and osteo-regeneration to get her back from the edge of death. Andras hadn't done much better than her, receiving a mouth full of broken teeth to go along with his busted up leg and cracked ribs, but both had survived, despite all the odds.
It takes Christine six months of intensive therapy and crutches to walk normally again, and she still feels a sharp pain in her knee when the weather is bad; Andras' football career is over because, despite the surgery, his leg doesn't heal right and he can't ever play again. The car is totaled and has to be trashed, and that hurts him more than the loss of his football future.
Their relationship doesn't last past the first week of being let out of the hospital. They break up with regret in their hearts and hurt in their voices, and Christine cries every night for two weeks because she knows she won't ever love this freely again. It's the death of an innocence she hadn't even known she possessed, and it changes everything for her.
Eventually, his parents move him away and Christine never hears from him again, and she thinks that if she could go back and stop herself from reaching for the fireflies, from distracting Andras, from the whole accident happening, maybe her life would be different. Maybe she'd still be with him, maybe they'd be married and have kids and she'd be a pediatrician and take care of kids at work and come home to take care of their kids, and she'd have a completely different life than the one she ends up having. Her therapist keeps telling her that the accident isn't her fault, but she doesn't listen to him; she knows what she feels and what happened, and it's something she's going to have to learn to live with all her life.
She buries her grief in her studies, taking science and math and biology, studying new lifeforms and viruses and retro-viruses and trying to find the meaning of life in all of it. She goes to the Academy and specializes in alien physiology, medical archaeology, and bio-research, determined to prove something to herself, even if she doesn't know yet what that is. She meets Roger and falls in love, despite knowing better, and when he leaves her standing at the altar, her face red with humiliation and anger, she simply pushes past her sense of betrayal and resignation and goes back to her research, refusing to let herself cry over something she'd never really had to lose.
She doesn't let herself feel anything until she becomes a lieutenant and Pike fucks her on top of his desk in his office, kissing her like he's waited forever for her, touching her like he's afraid she'll disappear if he lets go. Two months and three dates later, she's on the Enterprise where everything goes wrong in every possible way, and it takes Kirk and Spock risking their lives to get Pike back onboard.
Right now, she and McCoy are in surgery and have been for the past six hours, working carefully on detaching the goddamn slug from Pike's spine and re-attaching the nerves and connections that had been severed when the thing had latched on. Both of them are past exhaustion, past fear and emotion, just focusing on keeping Pike alive and making sure he can walk again at some point in the future, even though their medical bay isn't set up for this kind of delicate, tricky surgery and McCoy's taking a huge risk in even doing the operation on this shiny tincan in space.
Christine doesn't calculate Pike's chances of survival, doesn't think about all the ways this can go wrong and how being crippled for life is the least worst options for Pike, doesn't think about the fact that two weeks ago, she was naked on his lap and he had his hands fisted in her hair as he'd fucked her enthusiastically. She keeps her emotional distance from him as she's been taught to do, thinking of him only as a patient and not the man who'd kissed her so tenderly it had almost broken her heart, because if she thinks of him as Pike, as Christopher, she's going to break down and fuck everything up, and Pike needs her at her best right now, McCoy needs her at her best right now, and she's not going to let a madman's rage take away their captain when she can help save him.
It's five more hours in surgery before McCoy declares that he's done all he can and they close him up, the medial aides wheeling him to the critical care section of Sickbay and setting him up with antibiotics and a watchman while McCoy and Chapel go wash up. McCoy looks like ten miles of bad road as he scrubs blood from his hands, his eyes rimmed in red and his face hollowed by fear and grief over Dr. Puri and Vulcan, Jim and Pike. Christine knows she doesn't look any better, with her shaking hands and the gasps of air she takes as she tries not to cry, experiencing that same awful, helpless feeling she'd had when she was sixteen and a car had rolled down a ravine and her entire life had changed.
She tries to keep it all inside, knowing that she can fall apart when she finally gets to her quarters, but not before seeing to her patients, but McCoy looks at her, makes an impatient sound, then gathers her in his arms and holds on as tight as he can without hurting her. "Stop being so goddamn stoic," he says gruffly, pressing her head down onto his shoulder. "It's not good for you."
"I hate crying," she says in a wavering voice, her fingers clutching at his tunic.
"So do I," he says quietly, and if his voice doesn't sound as steady as it usually does, she doesn't say anything. "But I think it's called for at this time."
She pushes her face into his shoulder and lets herself cry, trusting him to keep her safe while she loses control for just a little while, mourning the loss of Vulcan and the pain of its people, crying for the crew who died without ever knowing why, for Pike and the way he looked so fragile and broken on McCoy's operating table. It's ugly and messy as emotions usually are, sobs wracking her entire body, but McCoy holds her through all of it, murmuring soothing words in her ear and wrapping himself around her like he can keep her safe with just his will.
When she's done, she pulls away from him and scrubs at her face, feeling embarrassed and wrecked. "Fuck," she sniffs, trying to wipe away the tear stains on McCoy's shirt.
He takes her hand away and holds it, keeping her steady, keeping her here when she wants to float away into the ether of space. "Well put, as usual, Nurse Chapel," he says dryly, and she lets out a choked-off sound that might have been laughter in another universe.
"You're such an ass, McCoy," but she's smiling as she says it, feeling a little more even and stable than a few minutes ago.
He rubs his thumb over her knuckles in something very close to a soothing gesture. "It's what I do, sweetheart," he says easily, gentle in a way she hadn't expected after the bluster and fury and fear of the past eighteen hours. "It's why I'm CMO of this godforsaken bucket of tin and rusted bolts."
She doesn't mention how his voice hitches when he talks about his 'promotion' and how his eyes darken with grief at the thought of Dr. Puri; she just squeezes his hand back and stands there with him for a while, feeling them come to a silent understanding of the parameters of their relationship and how it's not going to be anything close to traditional or typical. She's glad for it, for him and the way he stays strong when she isn't, the way he hides his heart behind gruff words and snarling anger, except around her and Jim.
"Thank you," she says softly, leaning up to kiss his cheek, smiling when he ducks his head in a shy gesture that makes her laugh. "You're almost cute, McCoy."
"Shut up," he says, rolling his eyes at her laughter. "You're gonna ruin my reputation if you keep talking that shit."
She pinches his cheek, giggling when he playfully slaps her hand away. "So cute."
"Christ, you're worse than Jim," he groans, tugging her toward the door and pushing her out into the hallway.
"Ah," she says knowingly, "so the rumor that you're together is true then?"
He stops for a moment and looks at her, an appalled look on his face. "There's rumors about Jim and me?"
She snorts. "Really, this surprises you? You practically live in each other's pockets, for God's sake."
"Starfleet uniforms don't have pockets," he growls, gesturing for her to move as they head toward their quarters.
"Stop being such a damn literalist, you know what I mean."
"I do, and I deny all of it." He looks sideways to glare at her. "My private life is not up for gossip, Chapel."
She shakes her head at him. "Honey, I hate to break this to you, but starships operate on gossip, rumor, innuendo, and illegal hooch. If you want people to stop talking about you and Jim, you're gonna need to either come clean or give them someone else to gossip about."
He looks disturbed by that. "How the hell am I going to do that?"
She grins at the disgruntled look on his face. "There is also the booze option."
"Tell me more," he says slowly.
"It involves talking to Scotty," she warns.
He makes a face. "Does it have to be a long talk?"
"You know nothing about engineers, do you?" When he shakes his head, she sighs. "Of course you don't. Damn doctors. Okay, look--" She lets out a yelp when he stops abruptly and pulls her back when she would've kept going. "What?"
He points at her door. "We're at your quarters," he says blandly, his lips quirking up in a smile when she just says, "Oh."
"So," he smirks, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest, looking smug enough to make her want to hit him. "You were saying about Scotty?"
"Engineers are big gossips," she shrugs, "and Scotty seems to be the worst, according to the medical staff. Just get him a nice bottle of something and put a bug in his ear about someone else hooking up, and in about five minutes, no one will remember about you and Jim."
McCoy frowns. "But who?"
"Jesus, McCoy," she says exasperatedly, "do I have to think of everything? Weren't you some sort of genius at the Academy?"
"Medical genius," he says dryly. "Not delinquent genius, you're thinking of Kirk."
She waves him off. "Whatever, just think of someone else. And," she says warningly, pointing a finger at him, "not Nyota or Spock or I will personally shove a hypo in a very uncomfortable place."
"The back of a Yugo?"
She scowls at him. "You're not actually funny, you know."
He grins at her, looking heartbreakingly young and carefree for just a moment. "I think I'm hilarious," he says cheerfully.
"You would," she grumbles, punching in her keycode and waiting for the door to open. Before she goes in, she levels a stern look at McCoy. "You're going straight to bed, right? Because if I hear you went back to Sickbay instead of resting--"
"You'll stick me full of hypos and beat me with the tricorder." He rolls his eyes. "I got it, Chapel. Stop acting like my mother."
"God, you're an ass."
"You love it."
"Leave before I forget myself and punch you out."
He grins at her, lightly tapping her shoulder in camaraderie, which actually hurts a bit since she's bruised there, but she says nothing because she appreciates the gesture. "Take care of yourself, Christine."
"You too, McCoy."
And then he's gone and she's left alone with her thoughts. Everything is too quiet as she takes a shower, cataloguing all the bruises left on her body from this mission and trying not to think of all the indefinable ways she's been changed by it. When the tears come again, she lets them fall, silently wishing for a real shower so that at least the water could disguise her crying. When she's done, she gets dressed and heads out, knowing that she's never going to be able to sleep, not in that empty, quiet place that isn't really hers, at least not yet.
She doesn't know where she's going until she gets to Uhura's quarters and announces her presence. For a brief moment, she's sure that Nyota won't let her in, that she's with Spock and they're having a quiet moment that Christine's interrupting, but then she remembers that Spock's still on duty along with Jim and Nyota's never had a moment where she didn't want Christine around. The door slides open and Nyota's standing in the doorway, looking exhausted and worn-out, tear tracks still evident on her face because she hasn't had time to wipe them away.
"Oh, baby," Christine says sadly, coming inside to wrap her arms around Nyota and hold her close as the door shuts behind her.
"Oh, Chrissy," she cries softly, her arms wrapped tightly around Christine, her face pressed against Christine's shoulder as she tries to hide her tears. Nyota has never been one to cry when she can just strap on her boots and go get things done to make it all better, but even the strongest of the strong has a breaking point, and Nyota's been holding it together since they'd launched into space. It's a long time to be brave, to keep it all inside for the sake of duty, and Christine can be strong enough for the both of them for a little while.
"I got you, baby," she says softly, holding her steady like McCoy had done for her, murmuring soothing words and rubbing circles against her back until Nyota subsides into a hiccupping cough and pulls away, wiping away tears with shaky hands.
"God," she says tearily, "I'm so fucking tired of crying. It's like I sprung a leak and I just can't plug it up."
"Tell me about it," Christine sighs. "I got snotty all over McCoy's tunic a few minutes ago and then I cried in the shower, and it feels like I'm never going to stop."
Uhura walks over and slumps down in her bed, looking exhausted and worn out, patting the empty space next to her to indicate that Chapel should sit down. "McCoy, huh?"
Chapel drops down next to her with a muffled "oof," sighing with relief as her ass sinks into the soft mattress. "The good doctor himself," she says wearily. "Talk about embarrassing."
"How'd he handle it?"
Christine smiles a little. "Told me it was gonna be all right and then annoyed me into threatening to punch him."
Nyota laughs lightly and rests her head on Christine's shoulder. "That sounds about right."
Christine presses a kiss against the top of Nyota's head, wishing she had some way of making her forget the pain and the hurt, something to give them a moment's rest from everything that's happened. And then she knows and she hopes that McCoy will forgive her for using him to distract her best friend from her worry. "Hey," she says with as much cheer as she can muster up, "did you know that Kirk and McCoy are together?"
Nyota lets out a rude noise. "Who didn't see that coming? Honestly."
Christine pulls back a little to look down at her. "Seriously?"
"I would've been more surprised if they weren't together," Uhura grins. "They're practically joined at the hip. In some cultures, they'd be married already."
Christine giggles helplessly. "Well, they fight like a married couple anyway. Every time Kirk does something stupid, McCoy does the eyebrow thing--"
"Oh, God," Uhura laughs, covering her mouth like she's trying to keep it inside, "the eyebrow thing. He's almost as good as a Vulcan when it comes to expressing emotion with his eyebrows."
"Can you imagine him and Spock having arguments with their eyebrows?"
"An eyebrow-off?"
"It would be epic," Christine says with mock solemnity.
"I would pay money to see that."
"I would sell my soul to see that."
"I would sell Kirk to see that."
They're laughing so hard that Chapel's having trouble breathing and Uhura's whole body is shaking, both of them clutching each other and wheezing with laughter. She knows that it's verging a bit on the hysterical side, both of them needing to let out some of the leftover tension that crying hasn't gotten rid of, but it makes them forget and makes them feel good, and she can't bring herself to care if they sound hysterical; it's what they need and that's all that matters right now.
"So," Nyota says once they've calmed down, "should I ask about Pike?"
Christine shakes her head, feeling something inside her clench at the memory of Pike on the operating table, looking pale and fragile and somehow older than before, like the slug had stolen his years along with his spine. "He's stable for now, but we have to get him to a real hospital for recovery." She rests her head against Nyota's, feeling comforted by the solid weight of Uhura against her and her hand curled up in Christine's. "I'm trying not to think about his chances for survival," she admits quietly, "because if I do, I may never be able to go back into Sickbay again."
"He's a fighter," Nyota says reassuringly, squeezing Christine's hand comfortingly. "He'll make it through just to be a contrary prick, you know he will."
"Will he, though?" It's a question she doesn't want to really think about, doesn't want to consider how she's going to deal if Pike doesn't make it. They'd only just started to get to know each other, to get close, when the Enterprise had been launched, and three dates and a lot of sex do not make a relationship, as much as she wishes it did. "What am I gonna do, Nyota?" she asks, feeling her belly clench as she thinks of Pike, thinks of Roger, thinks of all the men she's loved and lost and how she's sworn to never do this again.
Nyota presses her head against Christine's, solid and reassuring and there, always there when Christine needs a friend and a comforting presence. "You hope, baby," she says softly. "You hope and you pray and you argue and bargain with your deity of choice, and whatever happens, you live with it."
"What if that's not enough?"
"It has to be, Chrissy." She holds Christine's hand tight. "It has to be enough for all of us."
Chapel's quiet for a few minutes. "Can I stay here?" she asks quietly. "Just for a little while? My quarters are too empty and--"
Uhura makes an expansive gesture toward the pillow. "Stay as long as you want. It's not like I'm going to get to sleep any time soon. I'm just gonna be doing some translations so rest up, okay?" She pats Christine's hand and moves off the bed to go sit at her desk, picking up a pad and reading through it, making notes every few minutes.
Christine stretches out on the bed and just watches her for a while, letting her mind flit and wander, remembering bits and pieces of her old life at home, academic life with Gaila and Uhura, the first dissection she'd ever done and how she hadn't thrown up, even though she'd wanted to, because the instructor had expected her to and she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction. Scenes of a life that used to be hers, scenes of her life only two months ago, and how different it is from the last few hours where everything has been chaos and fear and blood and anger. She wonders if Starfleet will be able to recover from such huge losses, if she will be able to ever recover from this enough to stay on at Starfleet and continue to do her job, or if she'll rabbit back to the safety of academic life and research like she always seems to do when catastrophe strikes.
She falls asleep to the sound of Nyota humming a familiar tune, something about a soft, sleepy kitty, that she used to sing to Christine when Chapel was sick and cranky and needed to be lulled to sleep. It's the only time Christine sleeps all the way through the night for the next few months and she's grateful to Uhura for giving her that much.
***
Once they get back to Earth and the Academy, everything becomes a blur, it moves so fast. Pike is quickly shuttled to the nearest Starfleet hospital while the rest of the crew is shuffled back to the Academy for endless debriefings about the Narada and Nero and the Command staff have endless meetings about what to do with Jim Kirk now that he's helped save the planet.
Christine gets sick of talking to admirals about what's happened within the first hour of her debriefing. It's the same question asked a hundred different ways, and she feels her jaw ache from clenching her teeth down on saying something angry and disrespectful. No matter how much she hates this, she knows it's part of Starfleet protocol, even if it seems more like a court martial, and really, she knows Admiral Barnett is being a lot more gentle and patient with her than he is with the actual command staff since she was in Sickbay for most of the mission and therefore, doesn't know as much as everyone else. She's pretty sure that Spock and Kirk are being interrogated thoroughly, 'debriefing' being a misnomer for them since Kirk broke all the rules and regs, and Spock helped him (albeit somewhat reluctantly, according to ship gossip, but Christine supposes that wouldn't matter to Starfleet), and McCoy is probably not going to be treated with kid gloves either since he'd snuck Kirk aboard, despite his not being assigned to the Enterprise.
She finally escapes the debriefing after repeating the facts for the tenth time, feeling her mouth go dry and her head ache when another admiral asks about Kirk's actions for the umpteenth time. She's at the end of her patience when Admiral Komack, taking pity on her, tells her she can finish this up tomorrow at nine hundred hours. She flees with a hoarse "thank you" and a sense of relief as she walks out the door and into the cool, empty hallways of the Academy. She hangs around the empty corridors for a while, waiting for Kirk or McCoy, Uhura or Spock, or any of the others from the Enterprise to come out and keep her company; she's not ready to face her empty dorm room right now, to see the clutter her roommate would've left as they'd rushed off to battle, to know that she'd thought she'd be coming back to clean it up before Chapel yelled at her for making a mess again.
Further down the hallway, it opens up into a fairly large atrium with skylights overhead to let in natural light and a big screen against a far wall that's usually used for Academy announcements, like grades and student council appointments and who's been chosen as lead for this year's play. Today the screen is covered with writing, scrolling up in a precise, measured pace, and when Christine goes closer, she sees that the blocks of letters are all names of the crew lost to the Narada, arranged by ships and ranks. She reads through them all, feeling an ache in her heart as she thinks of all the young, eager faces she's never going to see again, thinks of all the people she's known and said hi to that will never wave at her and ask her how she's doing and laugh at her responses ever again.
She gasps when she finds Gaila's name in the scrolling list, tears blurring her vision as the enormity of her loss hits her all over again, and she buries her face in her hands and tries not to cry, knowing that if she starts, she's never going to stop. Too many losses in too little time, and Gaila is the most painful of them because she had been a cornerstone of Chapel's world, a fundamental part of her existence, and Christine doesn't know how to deal with losing yet another person she loves and needs. She just stands still while the names scroll on by, shaking and hurt and trying not to break down as another hole opens in her heart.
Kirk comes up behind her and slings his arm around her shoulders in that casual, comforting way he has when he's not trying to be an obnoxious jackass. Chapel feels grateful for the weight of him against her, feels like she needs something to steady her, keep her grounded, and Kirk's easy grace and touchy-feely habits do exactly that. They look at the names for a while, remembering lost school and crewmates, maintaining a silence in honor of the fallen, and then Kirk gently nudges her away from the screen, his arm sliding down to wrap around her waist because he's Kirk and he doesn't believe in personal space.
"So," she says, grabbing his arm and yanking it firmly back up to her shoulders, trying very hard not to sound like she's still on the verge of tears, "are you being court-martialed for stealing a flagship?"
Kirk lets out an amused noise. "I'm being suspended for a few weeks for cheating on the Kobayashi Maru--"
"I heard about that. Is that why Spock doesn't like you?"
"One of many reasons," he says dryly, leaning his hip against hers because again, he has no concept of personal space with anyone. "Since I helped save Earth from Nero, though, I'm just being suspended, not expelled, and I'm getting a commendation for almost dying at least five times while trying to save the planet." His mouth twists in a sardonic grin. "Komack's not happy about it since he thinks I'm a reckless asshole who just got lucky, but the council outvoted him. I never thought I'd see the day when Barnett was on my side, but I guess stranger things have happened. I mean, I got choked by a Vulcan."
"Only you could piss off someone with iron-clad control over their emotions to the point of them trying to kill you," Christine sighs, resting her head on his shoulder, feeling inexplicably comforted by his solid, brash presence.
He presses a kiss to her head because he's just like that. "You've been talking to Bones, haven't you?"
"He's been too busy having a heart attack over every cut and bruise you have for him to talk to me about what a pain in the ass you are."
Kirk winces. "We're the worst-kept secret on the Enterprise, aren't we?"
Christine laughs, and it's shallow and not as steady as she'd like it to be, but it's still a laugh, which is more than she thought she'd be capable of right now. "Baby, you're the worst-kept secret at the Academy. Everybody--" And she stops abruptly because she realizes all over again that more than half of the people who'd known and gossiped about Kirk and McCoy are gone now; the evidence is scrolling on a screen behind them.
Kirk seems to sense that she's getting lost inside her own head again because he bumps his hip into hers and says, "Hey," in a soft voice. "Stay with me, all right? I just got my ass handed to me by Starfleet Command and I need someone to make me feel better."
"What about your boyfriend?" she says wearily, not really feeling up to indulging Kirk, but at the same time, realizing that she doesn't want to be alone with her grief either. For all his swagger and anger, Kirk's actually pretty good at reading people and knowing how to give them what they need, so if it means spending a few hours talking to him and verbally sparring with him, Chapel doesn't mind because she knows it'll take her thoughts off the constant anxiety and sorrow that live inside her now.
"Bones is still in debriefing." He doesn't sound too happy about it, which makes Christine smile because really, when was the last time the two of them were apart for longer than five minutes? Besides when Kirk had beamed aboard the other ship to rescue Pike? It occurs to her that Kirk is trying to avoid being alone in his grief as well, that he's just hiding it better than her because he's seemingly had years of practice, and somehow, the thought of him waiting alone for McCoy to be done his debriefing hurts something inside Chapel.
Making her decision, she slaps a friendly hand on his back and points him in the direction of the cafeteria. "C'mon, hero," she says more cheerfully than she actually feels. "You can buy me lunch and tell me all about your tales of derring-do."
He beams at her, slips an arm over her shoulders again, and swings them toward the cafeteria where he buys her a meal that has the nerve to call itself lasagna when it isn't even close and regales her with tales of his misspent youth. They trade stories about breaking and entering (Kirk breaks into a comic book store for a copy of Vulcan Tales of Science, Christine sneaks into the penny-movie theater to see Spaceballs for the eighth time), petty larceny (Kirk steals candy bars and his dad's antique car, Christine pockets cheap, shiny rings that turn her skin green and lip gloss that tastes like cloying strawberry), and lost teenage loves (Jim was in love with a sweet, funny Indian boy named Mohinder who broke his heart by leaving when Jim was fifteen, Christine had Andras and she doesn't want to talk about how it ended).
Eventually, the rest of the bridge crew trickle into the cafeteria, Sulu and Scotty sauntering in, laughing over some joke that only they understand, followed by Uhura and Spock walking close together but never actually touching, and Chekov, McCoy, and an Ensign Rajagopal from Engineering bringing up the rear. They all sit down around Kirk and Chapel, McCoy shoving in between Christine and Jim without any shame or apology, after getting completely inadequate meals that none of them really touch, conversation devolving into murmurs of "Did they ask you about the...?" and "You told them about that?" and "God, my ass went numb sitting in that fucking seat for so long. How many times can they ask the same question?"
Halfway through Kirk's recounting of his own debriefing, Scotty and Chekov break into a quietly heated argument over which booze is better, whiskey or vodka. Distracted from the story, McCoy, Uhura, and Rajagopal come down firmly on the side of whiskey, arguing for its dignity and history, while Sulu and Kirk argue vociferously for vodka as both have very fond memories of being drunk and stupid on it. Spock stays out of the conversation entirely, having had no experience with either, but his eyebrows constantly move up and down as each team makes their passionate defense of their drink of choice, occasionally murmuring "Fascinating" under his breath; Christine isn't sure, but she thinks he may be amused, or at least as amused as Vulcans get.
More crew filter into the cafeteria, grabbing chairs and pulling up beside the bridge crew, complaining and laughing and exchanging names and ranks and stories. One of the crewmembers, an engineer named West, gets into an animated conversation with Kirk about music, specifically the Beastie Boys, one of Kirk's favorite bands from the twentieth century, and both of them start rhyming about brass monkeys while the rest of the group just looks on with some confusion and a lot of amusement.
"Amazing," Sulu says sotto voce to Uhura. "They're laying down mad beats at 80% accuracy."
Spock raises an eyebrow at him. "I believe that qualifies as 'ill'," he says in that precise, measured voice of his, "at least from a technical standpoint."
Christine does not want to know who taught Spock some of the more colorful aspects of twentieth-century North American slang and how to use it properly, but his mouth is quirked up in the tiniest of smiles, so Christine thinks that he may be making a joke that only he and Sulu get. Uhura looks like she doesn't know whether she wants to laugh at Spock's matter-of-factness or hide her face and pretend this isn't happening. "What the hell is a brass monkey anyway?" she finally asks in a vaguely disgruntled tone.
"It's a really terrible drink," Christine says with a shudder, memories of her past bar exploits coming back to haunt her. "And it gives you a bitch of a hangover."
Nyota makes a face and pushes her plate away. "Figures he'd know a song about it."
Much, much later, the group collectively decides to move this party to one of the nearby pubs, arguing that a caf is no place to have real conversations and pubs have booze at them, which makes them better than cafeterias. By the time they make it over to the Thirsty Toad, most of the Academy that is not comprised of admirals or captains have joined them. The pub is packed to the rafters by the time everyone has made it in, and extra chairs and tables are hastily put out to accommodate as many people as can be accommodated. There are toasts to everything from the serious to the ridiculous, from their fallen comrades to Captain Pike to Vulcans to making it safely back home and Starfleet skirts and how blessedly short they are.
The evening passes by in a blur of new people, good friends, and memories of lost friends and colleagues, punctuated by alcohol and the occasional bout of tears and a sense of community that keeps building as the night goes on. It's not an official tribute to the people of Vulcan or the people lost to the Narada (that will come in the next few days), but it's their own way of honoring the memory of them, and it keeps them going for a while.
Christine basks in the noise and the chaos, feeling them drown out her ever-present worry and her fear, letting Kirk and McCoy buy her drinks that she tosses back with an abandon she doesn't really feel. She and Uhura make quiet, private toasts to Gaila, telling each other stories of her and her friendship and the way she'd fit so perfectly into their lives, absently wiping away tears when they fall without permission. Christine wraps her arm around Nyota's shoulders and squeezes lightly whenever she thinks Uhura's feeling as lost as she is; it's not much, but it makes Nyota lean into her, keeps her in the present, and it's enough for the both of them, at least for now.
***
The next few days are filled with memories and speeches and funerals and inconsolable relatives. Christine is so exhausted from weeping that it takes McCoy, Kirk, and Uhura working in a steady rotation to keep her standing at the memorials, and everyone does the same for Uhura when it's her turn to break down. After that, there are more meetings with Starfleet Command as they determine what to do with Kirk and the Enterprise and the crew.
Christine skips all of it and heads out to Starfleet San Francisco General to visit Pike. She's been keeping in touch with Doctor M'Benga, who's in charge of his case and whom Christine knows from one of her alien physiology classes where he'd acted as her TA, and she's been assured that Pike is recovering quite well, considering what he's been through. He's been conscious for the past two days and has been in meetings with Starfleet Command for most of them, which seems to aggravate M'Benga judging from his disapproving tone. Christine feels like cheering him when he informs her that he has dismissed all Starfleet personnel from Captain Pike's room so that he can get some actual rest but will let Chapel in to see him for a little while if she'd like that.
"I'd kiss you if you wouldn't be so appalled, Doctor M'Benga," she says, grinning at him through the comm.
He gives her a stern look. "That would be very inappropriate behavior, Nurse Chapel," he says primly, although Christine can hear the amusement lurking in his words.
"Inappropriate is my middle name, honey."
"I thought it was Alicia," he says smoothly, smiling when she laughs and tells him she'll be there in twenty minutes.
True to her word, she's there with about thirty seconds to spare, and M'Benga greets her at the reception desk and takes her up to Pike's room, a good-sized private room in one of the more quiet wings of the hospital. "He is not in the best of moods right now," M'Benga warns her diplomatically, which Christine takes to mean that Christopher's aggravated, but too polite and proper to really lay into any of the hospital staff.
"Oh, this is going to be fun," she sighs, remembering what she was like the first few days when she'd woken up in the hospital after the accident. Guilt and anger and frustration aren't a good mix, and she knows she's not going to be able to make things better, but she just wants to distract him from his troubles for a while; it's all she can do for now, time and distance and therapy will take care of the rest.
She takes a deep breath and shoves down her anxiety and misgivings, plasters a smile on her face, and walks into the room. "Hey, sailor," she says cheerfully. "Miss me?"
First thing she notices is that Pike doesn't look like death warmed over, which eases some of the tension inside her; she still remembers him from McCoy's operating table, so seeing him look fairly healthy and recovered does a lot for her state of mind. Second thing she notices is that he's propped up in bed, his head bent over a pad that he reads with a pair of old-fashioned, slim, wire-rimmed spectacles sitting squarely on his nose. He looks up at her with surprise, pulling his glasses down briefly to look at her over them, and a wave of lust hits her so hard, her knees almost buckle. Fuck, she thinks to herself, leave it to Pike to drive her crazy with nothing more than just a look and a pair of glasses, the utter bastard.
"Christine?" he asks in a disbelieving tone of voice, like he hadn't expected her to come and see him while he was in the hospital, and that annoys her enough to make her straighten up and march over to his side. "What are you doing here?"
She leans her hip against the bed rails and glares at him. "You're kinda clueless sometimes, aren't you?" she says acidly.
He grins irrepressibly, and it's almost enough to make her forget herself and climb into bed with him. "I make up for it with my stunning good looks and charm."
She rolls her eyes at him just to hear him laugh. "I used to think the ego thing was just Jim, but it's really all starship captains, isn't it?"
"Could be." He shoves the pad onto the table next to him, removes his glasses and carefully places them on the table, and holds out his hand to her. "So do I get a kiss or what?"
"What's the magic word?" she teases, even though she's already leaning forward, her body curving toward his as his hands reach up to cup her face.
"Now, goddammit," he growls impatiently, kissing her hotly and thoroughly until her knees are weak and she has to pull away just to be able to breathe again.
"Wow," she says weakly, wondering if she'll get banned from General if she climbs into bed and seduces the hell out of Pike before M'Benga gets back to check on his patient. If Pike still didn't have lines of fatigue drawn around his face, if he hadn't only regained consciousness two days ago, if Command hadn't worn him out with their endless fucking meetings, she might have seriously considered it, especially knowing that Pike would've jumped at the chance, exhaustion or not, to be between her thighs once again.
Instead, she reluctantly pulls back, skimming her fingers over the tired lines of his face, smiling as his dark curls fall over her fingertips like they're rebelling against being put in their place. He turns his face and presses his lips against her palm, making her heart skip a beat for just a moment. "I missed you, Christine," he admits softly, and it's like a vice around her heart as she hears the longing in his voice.
"I missed you too," she murmurs, feeling something vast and unnamable and frighteningly sharp move inside her at the admission. She's promised herself to never do this again, to never be this open and vulnerable again, but he looks at her like she's hung the moon, like she's something good and precious and real that he can't believe he's found, and she's never known how to refuse him anything.
M'Benga interrupts them with a polite knock on the door, saving Christine from confessing something she isn't sure she should be admitting out loud and the sentimentality of the moment is lost as he tells her that her time is up. Pike quietly argues for her to stay a little longer, but Christine and M'Benga both shake their heads, knowing that he needs the rest, even though Christine wants so badly to stay. "You are still recovering, Captain," M'Benga says in that calm, baritone voice of his that soothes all patients, no matter their disposition. "You need the rest. Nurse Chapel will be back tomorrow, and she can stay longer next time."
"Promise?"
"Christopher," Chapel says sternly, "if you make him pinky-swear, I will not be held responsible for my actions." She's pleased to hear Pike's laughter, sounding stronger and smoother than before. "I'll come back tomorrow, I promise."
"Wear a skirt for me," he grins wickedly, laughing softly when she rolls her eyes at him and walks out of the room, carefully closing the door behind her.
"He is a handful," M'Benga admits once they're outside, his mouth quirking up in a smile despite his words. "Woke up, demanded water, demanded a meeting with Starfleet, against my orders, I should add, and hasn't slowed down once until I told him to cut down on the meetings or I'd ban Command from setting one foot through the doors."
"Starship captains," she says with exasperation.
M'Benga nods. "Exactly. Although that arrogance and drive is going to come in handy once his physiotherapy starts."
Christine looks at him sharply. "So he's going to be all right? He'll be able to walk again?"
"I don't know about all right," M'Benga shrugs. "He's going to be in a considerable amount of pain for the next few months, even with painkillers, and the physical therapy is going to be even more painful because there was so much damage to his spine." He catches the look on Christine's face and tries to soften the blow. "You and Dr. McCoy performed a miracle with the surgery," he says with admiration, "and he's going to be able to walk again, which by rights, he shouldn't be able to do, but he will never be a hundred percent. There was just too much damage done for a full recovery."
"So his career as a captain is over then," she says softly, almost to herself.
"Unfortunately," M'Benga says, sounding apologetic. "That was one of the things that Command was in here to talk to him about, his future in Starfleet."
"What did they decide?"
M'Benga looks unsure, like he's torn between telling her and keeping Starfleet Command decisions secret. In the end, he decides to tell her because she looks impatient and hospital gossip wins over Command privacy any day. "He's going to be promoted to Admiral," he whispers, leaning in so that no one else will hear it. "They're giving the Enterprise to Kirk and letting him pick his crew with Pike's recommendations."
Christine's jaw drops. She isn't an expert in the inner workings of Starfleet and the machinations of its Command staff, but even she knows this is impossible. "They can't," she whispers furiously. "Kirk's too young and inexperienced, they'll never be able to push that through."
"Half the fleet is gone and they don't have enough cadets to take their place, Christine," he says quietly. "They're going to need every available body to either be recruiting and training new cadets or flying into space to start on the missions already scheduled for this year. They don't have much of a choice but to make Kirk captain and give him the Enterprise."
"Jesus," Christine whispers softly. "How the hell is Pike taking this?"
"It was his suggestion, from what I heard when I walked in the last time. He's going to be part of Command once they make him admiral and he'll be in charge of recruitment and mentorship. They need to shore up the numbers and fast."
She shakes her head. "How the hell do you know all of this?"
He smiles, and it's a little sad and resigned. "You'd be surprised by how much you hear when people don't consider you a threat, even when you are a doctor and command respect."
"Starfleet Command," Christine sighs.
"Not very nice people," M'Benga says in that polite but disapproving way of his that makes Christine like him even more.
She jerks her head toward the closed door of Pike's room. "How is he really? He put on a good show for me in there, but it doesn't look like he's doing all that great."
M'Benga inclines his head in a nod. "It's only been two days, but like I said, he's not in the best of the moods right now. He's still angry and suffering from post-traumatic stress, he'll probably go through all the Kübler-Ross stages of grief for all the losses in Starfleet and Vulcan and his career..." He trails off as the enormity of the situation hits Christine, her face going pale as she realizes how much he's lost and how much he's going to go through to get some of it back. "He's going to be very volatile and traumatized for a long while, Christine," he says gently. "He's a stubborn, proud man who's used to being in control of most of his life, and the complete loss of it is going to make him lash out when he's hurting and say things he won't mean just to make himself feel more in control. It won't be easy for you to deal with, but if you truly care--"
"We're not--" she starts, but she can't bring herself to deny what they have, not even to save their reputations. M'Benga may not have seen them kiss, but it's obvious that he's seen something between them, and Christine is too tired to try and hide it for the sake of regulation.
"You are," M'Benga says firmly, reaching out to hold her hand in his. "And he is going to need you."
She looks up at him, feeling very small and afraid in all the ways she knows she isn't, in all the ways she hasn't felt since she was sixteen and she lost her first love. "I don't know if I can handle it, Geoffrey," she whispers, feeling ashamed to admit to her weakness out loud.
M'Benga holds her hand tightly. "You, my dear," he says in that calm, quiet voice that she remembers from her classes, "are made of stronger stuff than you think. You will do just fine."
She squeezes his hand back, finds the strength to give him a faint smile. "What would I do without you, Geoffrey?"
He smiles back at her. "You would find a way to go on, Nurse Chapel, and to make things better for everyone else."
She leans up to press a quick kiss to his cheek. "I owe you a good lunch at a real restaurant. Don't let me forget." She waves goodbye to him as she makes her way out of the hospital, getting into her run-down little Volkswagen Beetle that she'd bought when she'd first moved out to San Francisco for a hundred credits she didn't really have, but spent anyway because she couldn't stand the thought of public transportation. She sits at the wheel and buries her face in her hands and cries again, even though she'd thought she'd run out of tears by now, cries for Pike and her and how everything has changed for them because of one man's actions.
When she's finally done, she angrily wipes the tears from her face and backs out of the parking lot, resolutely ignoring the fact that she's going to be back for Pike tomorrow and the next day and the day after because it's too late to back out from this; she'd had her chance when he'd offered her a place on the Enterprise and had her on top of his desk, could've said no and pretended it had never happened and she wouldn't be here right now. But she'd said yes, had shouted it at the top of her lungs, and she's here with him now, and she isn't leaving until she's damn good and ready or he gives her a reason to leave.
Christine has never backed away from a challenge, and she's not about to start now. Pike had better watch out, she thinks with a burgeoning lightness that wasn't there before, because she's coming for him, whether he's ready or not.
Part 2 is here.
A warning: I don't usually post warnings, but this one has a secondary character's death, and I don't want people to be taken unawares in case it upsets them, but I also don't want to spoil it for people that don't want to know in advance. So, uh, for those who don't want to know: a secondary character dies off-screen and it's mentioned in here; for those who do want to know, highlight to read: Gaila dies in this story. It wasn't a decision lightly made, and I did my best to not play it for cheap melodrama, but just so you're aware, that's what's going on.
Eternal gratitude to superjoydrop for editing my stories, always encouraging me, and making me a better writer with each comment, critique, and correction of hers. I tweaked it a bit more after she beta-read this, so if you find any mistakes in here, they're all on me. For traveller because she wanted to see what would happen to Pike and Christine after the movie. I hope you like, bibi. ♥ The blatant Futurama reference is for charliehey because she is a continual delight. Kojack Sulu loves ya, baby!
disclaimer: so not mine, so not real, but can I keep them anyway? They're the best action figures ever!
And So We Run
When Christine is sixteen years old, she gets into a car accident.
It's a school night and she's out with her boyfriend Andras (pronounced And-rash, as he is quick to always point out, his ancestors coming from Hungary many centuries ago) in his beat-up Beamer that they're calling "vintage" to spare his feelings because he loves the car a little more than he loves Christine since he'd gotten the car first. Christine would feel jealous, but she knows better than to begrudge someone their obsession, even when it's not hers. Plus, Andras likes having her around to help him fix the car, so it's not like he's abandoning her for a hunk of metal that moves.
Andras is Christine's first real boyfriend, a blond giant who looks like a Viking, gets all her jokes and references, is captain of the football team, and is the most gentle, sweet boy she's ever met. He holds her hand as he walks her to her classes, carries her books on the way home from school, and kisses her like she's delicate, spun glass, something that she doesn't really enjoy because she knows she's tougher than that, but puts up with because she likes the way his mouth feels against hers.
Right now, they're driving down a long, winding road with the moon lighting their way, talking about nothing and everything, him smiling at her like she's hung the moon, and it's as close to love as Christine's ever going to admit to getting. She reaches up into the night sky, laughing delightedly at the fireflies glowing above her head, looking like stars that have come down to get a closer look at the world, and tries to catch the little dots of light that fly just out of reach at her fingertips. Andras divides his attention between her and the road, laughing because she's happy, glowing almost as bright as the fireflies as he watches her.
Christine doesn't remember much about the accident. One minute, she had been laughing and trying to touch the fireflies, listening to Andras say something about how beautiful she looks in the moonlight, and the next minute, there had been a sharp turn and the squeal of tires as the car had careened out of control down a ravine, rolling over and over until it had hit the bottom. Christine remembers the dizzying roll as the car had gone over the ravine, the sickening feeling of spinning out of control and being helpless to stop it, the sharp crack as her head hit the dashboard in front of her, and then everything was blank and blessed silence.
When she wakes up, she's in the hospital and her mother is by her side, looking even more bruised and hurt than Christine while her father stands silently behind her and looks like he's aged ten years in a day. It turns out that she'd had a skull fracture along with all the broken ribs and limbs, and it had taken five hours of tricky surgery and a week of dermal and osteo-regeneration to get her back from the edge of death. Andras hadn't done much better than her, receiving a mouth full of broken teeth to go along with his busted up leg and cracked ribs, but both had survived, despite all the odds.
It takes Christine six months of intensive therapy and crutches to walk normally again, and she still feels a sharp pain in her knee when the weather is bad; Andras' football career is over because, despite the surgery, his leg doesn't heal right and he can't ever play again. The car is totaled and has to be trashed, and that hurts him more than the loss of his football future.
Their relationship doesn't last past the first week of being let out of the hospital. They break up with regret in their hearts and hurt in their voices, and Christine cries every night for two weeks because she knows she won't ever love this freely again. It's the death of an innocence she hadn't even known she possessed, and it changes everything for her.
Eventually, his parents move him away and Christine never hears from him again, and she thinks that if she could go back and stop herself from reaching for the fireflies, from distracting Andras, from the whole accident happening, maybe her life would be different. Maybe she'd still be with him, maybe they'd be married and have kids and she'd be a pediatrician and take care of kids at work and come home to take care of their kids, and she'd have a completely different life than the one she ends up having. Her therapist keeps telling her that the accident isn't her fault, but she doesn't listen to him; she knows what she feels and what happened, and it's something she's going to have to learn to live with all her life.
She buries her grief in her studies, taking science and math and biology, studying new lifeforms and viruses and retro-viruses and trying to find the meaning of life in all of it. She goes to the Academy and specializes in alien physiology, medical archaeology, and bio-research, determined to prove something to herself, even if she doesn't know yet what that is. She meets Roger and falls in love, despite knowing better, and when he leaves her standing at the altar, her face red with humiliation and anger, she simply pushes past her sense of betrayal and resignation and goes back to her research, refusing to let herself cry over something she'd never really had to lose.
She doesn't let herself feel anything until she becomes a lieutenant and Pike fucks her on top of his desk in his office, kissing her like he's waited forever for her, touching her like he's afraid she'll disappear if he lets go. Two months and three dates later, she's on the Enterprise where everything goes wrong in every possible way, and it takes Kirk and Spock risking their lives to get Pike back onboard.
Right now, she and McCoy are in surgery and have been for the past six hours, working carefully on detaching the goddamn slug from Pike's spine and re-attaching the nerves and connections that had been severed when the thing had latched on. Both of them are past exhaustion, past fear and emotion, just focusing on keeping Pike alive and making sure he can walk again at some point in the future, even though their medical bay isn't set up for this kind of delicate, tricky surgery and McCoy's taking a huge risk in even doing the operation on this shiny tincan in space.
Christine doesn't calculate Pike's chances of survival, doesn't think about all the ways this can go wrong and how being crippled for life is the least worst options for Pike, doesn't think about the fact that two weeks ago, she was naked on his lap and he had his hands fisted in her hair as he'd fucked her enthusiastically. She keeps her emotional distance from him as she's been taught to do, thinking of him only as a patient and not the man who'd kissed her so tenderly it had almost broken her heart, because if she thinks of him as Pike, as Christopher, she's going to break down and fuck everything up, and Pike needs her at her best right now, McCoy needs her at her best right now, and she's not going to let a madman's rage take away their captain when she can help save him.
It's five more hours in surgery before McCoy declares that he's done all he can and they close him up, the medial aides wheeling him to the critical care section of Sickbay and setting him up with antibiotics and a watchman while McCoy and Chapel go wash up. McCoy looks like ten miles of bad road as he scrubs blood from his hands, his eyes rimmed in red and his face hollowed by fear and grief over Dr. Puri and Vulcan, Jim and Pike. Christine knows she doesn't look any better, with her shaking hands and the gasps of air she takes as she tries not to cry, experiencing that same awful, helpless feeling she'd had when she was sixteen and a car had rolled down a ravine and her entire life had changed.
She tries to keep it all inside, knowing that she can fall apart when she finally gets to her quarters, but not before seeing to her patients, but McCoy looks at her, makes an impatient sound, then gathers her in his arms and holds on as tight as he can without hurting her. "Stop being so goddamn stoic," he says gruffly, pressing her head down onto his shoulder. "It's not good for you."
"I hate crying," she says in a wavering voice, her fingers clutching at his tunic.
"So do I," he says quietly, and if his voice doesn't sound as steady as it usually does, she doesn't say anything. "But I think it's called for at this time."
She pushes her face into his shoulder and lets herself cry, trusting him to keep her safe while she loses control for just a little while, mourning the loss of Vulcan and the pain of its people, crying for the crew who died without ever knowing why, for Pike and the way he looked so fragile and broken on McCoy's operating table. It's ugly and messy as emotions usually are, sobs wracking her entire body, but McCoy holds her through all of it, murmuring soothing words in her ear and wrapping himself around her like he can keep her safe with just his will.
When she's done, she pulls away from him and scrubs at her face, feeling embarrassed and wrecked. "Fuck," she sniffs, trying to wipe away the tear stains on McCoy's shirt.
He takes her hand away and holds it, keeping her steady, keeping her here when she wants to float away into the ether of space. "Well put, as usual, Nurse Chapel," he says dryly, and she lets out a choked-off sound that might have been laughter in another universe.
"You're such an ass, McCoy," but she's smiling as she says it, feeling a little more even and stable than a few minutes ago.
He rubs his thumb over her knuckles in something very close to a soothing gesture. "It's what I do, sweetheart," he says easily, gentle in a way she hadn't expected after the bluster and fury and fear of the past eighteen hours. "It's why I'm CMO of this godforsaken bucket of tin and rusted bolts."
She doesn't mention how his voice hitches when he talks about his 'promotion' and how his eyes darken with grief at the thought of Dr. Puri; she just squeezes his hand back and stands there with him for a while, feeling them come to a silent understanding of the parameters of their relationship and how it's not going to be anything close to traditional or typical. She's glad for it, for him and the way he stays strong when she isn't, the way he hides his heart behind gruff words and snarling anger, except around her and Jim.
"Thank you," she says softly, leaning up to kiss his cheek, smiling when he ducks his head in a shy gesture that makes her laugh. "You're almost cute, McCoy."
"Shut up," he says, rolling his eyes at her laughter. "You're gonna ruin my reputation if you keep talking that shit."
She pinches his cheek, giggling when he playfully slaps her hand away. "So cute."
"Christ, you're worse than Jim," he groans, tugging her toward the door and pushing her out into the hallway.
"Ah," she says knowingly, "so the rumor that you're together is true then?"
He stops for a moment and looks at her, an appalled look on his face. "There's rumors about Jim and me?"
She snorts. "Really, this surprises you? You practically live in each other's pockets, for God's sake."
"Starfleet uniforms don't have pockets," he growls, gesturing for her to move as they head toward their quarters.
"Stop being such a damn literalist, you know what I mean."
"I do, and I deny all of it." He looks sideways to glare at her. "My private life is not up for gossip, Chapel."
She shakes her head at him. "Honey, I hate to break this to you, but starships operate on gossip, rumor, innuendo, and illegal hooch. If you want people to stop talking about you and Jim, you're gonna need to either come clean or give them someone else to gossip about."
He looks disturbed by that. "How the hell am I going to do that?"
She grins at the disgruntled look on his face. "There is also the booze option."
"Tell me more," he says slowly.
"It involves talking to Scotty," she warns.
He makes a face. "Does it have to be a long talk?"
"You know nothing about engineers, do you?" When he shakes his head, she sighs. "Of course you don't. Damn doctors. Okay, look--" She lets out a yelp when he stops abruptly and pulls her back when she would've kept going. "What?"
He points at her door. "We're at your quarters," he says blandly, his lips quirking up in a smile when she just says, "Oh."
"So," he smirks, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest, looking smug enough to make her want to hit him. "You were saying about Scotty?"
"Engineers are big gossips," she shrugs, "and Scotty seems to be the worst, according to the medical staff. Just get him a nice bottle of something and put a bug in his ear about someone else hooking up, and in about five minutes, no one will remember about you and Jim."
McCoy frowns. "But who?"
"Jesus, McCoy," she says exasperatedly, "do I have to think of everything? Weren't you some sort of genius at the Academy?"
"Medical genius," he says dryly. "Not delinquent genius, you're thinking of Kirk."
She waves him off. "Whatever, just think of someone else. And," she says warningly, pointing a finger at him, "not Nyota or Spock or I will personally shove a hypo in a very uncomfortable place."
"The back of a Yugo?"
She scowls at him. "You're not actually funny, you know."
He grins at her, looking heartbreakingly young and carefree for just a moment. "I think I'm hilarious," he says cheerfully.
"You would," she grumbles, punching in her keycode and waiting for the door to open. Before she goes in, she levels a stern look at McCoy. "You're going straight to bed, right? Because if I hear you went back to Sickbay instead of resting--"
"You'll stick me full of hypos and beat me with the tricorder." He rolls his eyes. "I got it, Chapel. Stop acting like my mother."
"God, you're an ass."
"You love it."
"Leave before I forget myself and punch you out."
He grins at her, lightly tapping her shoulder in camaraderie, which actually hurts a bit since she's bruised there, but she says nothing because she appreciates the gesture. "Take care of yourself, Christine."
"You too, McCoy."
And then he's gone and she's left alone with her thoughts. Everything is too quiet as she takes a shower, cataloguing all the bruises left on her body from this mission and trying not to think of all the indefinable ways she's been changed by it. When the tears come again, she lets them fall, silently wishing for a real shower so that at least the water could disguise her crying. When she's done, she gets dressed and heads out, knowing that she's never going to be able to sleep, not in that empty, quiet place that isn't really hers, at least not yet.
She doesn't know where she's going until she gets to Uhura's quarters and announces her presence. For a brief moment, she's sure that Nyota won't let her in, that she's with Spock and they're having a quiet moment that Christine's interrupting, but then she remembers that Spock's still on duty along with Jim and Nyota's never had a moment where she didn't want Christine around. The door slides open and Nyota's standing in the doorway, looking exhausted and worn-out, tear tracks still evident on her face because she hasn't had time to wipe them away.
"Oh, baby," Christine says sadly, coming inside to wrap her arms around Nyota and hold her close as the door shuts behind her.
"Oh, Chrissy," she cries softly, her arms wrapped tightly around Christine, her face pressed against Christine's shoulder as she tries to hide her tears. Nyota has never been one to cry when she can just strap on her boots and go get things done to make it all better, but even the strongest of the strong has a breaking point, and Nyota's been holding it together since they'd launched into space. It's a long time to be brave, to keep it all inside for the sake of duty, and Christine can be strong enough for the both of them for a little while.
"I got you, baby," she says softly, holding her steady like McCoy had done for her, murmuring soothing words and rubbing circles against her back until Nyota subsides into a hiccupping cough and pulls away, wiping away tears with shaky hands.
"God," she says tearily, "I'm so fucking tired of crying. It's like I sprung a leak and I just can't plug it up."
"Tell me about it," Christine sighs. "I got snotty all over McCoy's tunic a few minutes ago and then I cried in the shower, and it feels like I'm never going to stop."
Uhura walks over and slumps down in her bed, looking exhausted and worn out, patting the empty space next to her to indicate that Chapel should sit down. "McCoy, huh?"
Chapel drops down next to her with a muffled "oof," sighing with relief as her ass sinks into the soft mattress. "The good doctor himself," she says wearily. "Talk about embarrassing."
"How'd he handle it?"
Christine smiles a little. "Told me it was gonna be all right and then annoyed me into threatening to punch him."
Nyota laughs lightly and rests her head on Christine's shoulder. "That sounds about right."
Christine presses a kiss against the top of Nyota's head, wishing she had some way of making her forget the pain and the hurt, something to give them a moment's rest from everything that's happened. And then she knows and she hopes that McCoy will forgive her for using him to distract her best friend from her worry. "Hey," she says with as much cheer as she can muster up, "did you know that Kirk and McCoy are together?"
Nyota lets out a rude noise. "Who didn't see that coming? Honestly."
Christine pulls back a little to look down at her. "Seriously?"
"I would've been more surprised if they weren't together," Uhura grins. "They're practically joined at the hip. In some cultures, they'd be married already."
Christine giggles helplessly. "Well, they fight like a married couple anyway. Every time Kirk does something stupid, McCoy does the eyebrow thing--"
"Oh, God," Uhura laughs, covering her mouth like she's trying to keep it inside, "the eyebrow thing. He's almost as good as a Vulcan when it comes to expressing emotion with his eyebrows."
"Can you imagine him and Spock having arguments with their eyebrows?"
"An eyebrow-off?"
"It would be epic," Christine says with mock solemnity.
"I would pay money to see that."
"I would sell my soul to see that."
"I would sell Kirk to see that."
They're laughing so hard that Chapel's having trouble breathing and Uhura's whole body is shaking, both of them clutching each other and wheezing with laughter. She knows that it's verging a bit on the hysterical side, both of them needing to let out some of the leftover tension that crying hasn't gotten rid of, but it makes them forget and makes them feel good, and she can't bring herself to care if they sound hysterical; it's what they need and that's all that matters right now.
"So," Nyota says once they've calmed down, "should I ask about Pike?"
Christine shakes her head, feeling something inside her clench at the memory of Pike on the operating table, looking pale and fragile and somehow older than before, like the slug had stolen his years along with his spine. "He's stable for now, but we have to get him to a real hospital for recovery." She rests her head against Nyota's, feeling comforted by the solid weight of Uhura against her and her hand curled up in Christine's. "I'm trying not to think about his chances for survival," she admits quietly, "because if I do, I may never be able to go back into Sickbay again."
"He's a fighter," Nyota says reassuringly, squeezing Christine's hand comfortingly. "He'll make it through just to be a contrary prick, you know he will."
"Will he, though?" It's a question she doesn't want to really think about, doesn't want to consider how she's going to deal if Pike doesn't make it. They'd only just started to get to know each other, to get close, when the Enterprise had been launched, and three dates and a lot of sex do not make a relationship, as much as she wishes it did. "What am I gonna do, Nyota?" she asks, feeling her belly clench as she thinks of Pike, thinks of Roger, thinks of all the men she's loved and lost and how she's sworn to never do this again.
Nyota presses her head against Christine's, solid and reassuring and there, always there when Christine needs a friend and a comforting presence. "You hope, baby," she says softly. "You hope and you pray and you argue and bargain with your deity of choice, and whatever happens, you live with it."
"What if that's not enough?"
"It has to be, Chrissy." She holds Christine's hand tight. "It has to be enough for all of us."
Chapel's quiet for a few minutes. "Can I stay here?" she asks quietly. "Just for a little while? My quarters are too empty and--"
Uhura makes an expansive gesture toward the pillow. "Stay as long as you want. It's not like I'm going to get to sleep any time soon. I'm just gonna be doing some translations so rest up, okay?" She pats Christine's hand and moves off the bed to go sit at her desk, picking up a pad and reading through it, making notes every few minutes.
Christine stretches out on the bed and just watches her for a while, letting her mind flit and wander, remembering bits and pieces of her old life at home, academic life with Gaila and Uhura, the first dissection she'd ever done and how she hadn't thrown up, even though she'd wanted to, because the instructor had expected her to and she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction. Scenes of a life that used to be hers, scenes of her life only two months ago, and how different it is from the last few hours where everything has been chaos and fear and blood and anger. She wonders if Starfleet will be able to recover from such huge losses, if she will be able to ever recover from this enough to stay on at Starfleet and continue to do her job, or if she'll rabbit back to the safety of academic life and research like she always seems to do when catastrophe strikes.
She falls asleep to the sound of Nyota humming a familiar tune, something about a soft, sleepy kitty, that she used to sing to Christine when Chapel was sick and cranky and needed to be lulled to sleep. It's the only time Christine sleeps all the way through the night for the next few months and she's grateful to Uhura for giving her that much.
***
Once they get back to Earth and the Academy, everything becomes a blur, it moves so fast. Pike is quickly shuttled to the nearest Starfleet hospital while the rest of the crew is shuffled back to the Academy for endless debriefings about the Narada and Nero and the Command staff have endless meetings about what to do with Jim Kirk now that he's helped save the planet.
Christine gets sick of talking to admirals about what's happened within the first hour of her debriefing. It's the same question asked a hundred different ways, and she feels her jaw ache from clenching her teeth down on saying something angry and disrespectful. No matter how much she hates this, she knows it's part of Starfleet protocol, even if it seems more like a court martial, and really, she knows Admiral Barnett is being a lot more gentle and patient with her than he is with the actual command staff since she was in Sickbay for most of the mission and therefore, doesn't know as much as everyone else. She's pretty sure that Spock and Kirk are being interrogated thoroughly, 'debriefing' being a misnomer for them since Kirk broke all the rules and regs, and Spock helped him (albeit somewhat reluctantly, according to ship gossip, but Christine supposes that wouldn't matter to Starfleet), and McCoy is probably not going to be treated with kid gloves either since he'd snuck Kirk aboard, despite his not being assigned to the Enterprise.
She finally escapes the debriefing after repeating the facts for the tenth time, feeling her mouth go dry and her head ache when another admiral asks about Kirk's actions for the umpteenth time. She's at the end of her patience when Admiral Komack, taking pity on her, tells her she can finish this up tomorrow at nine hundred hours. She flees with a hoarse "thank you" and a sense of relief as she walks out the door and into the cool, empty hallways of the Academy. She hangs around the empty corridors for a while, waiting for Kirk or McCoy, Uhura or Spock, or any of the others from the Enterprise to come out and keep her company; she's not ready to face her empty dorm room right now, to see the clutter her roommate would've left as they'd rushed off to battle, to know that she'd thought she'd be coming back to clean it up before Chapel yelled at her for making a mess again.
Further down the hallway, it opens up into a fairly large atrium with skylights overhead to let in natural light and a big screen against a far wall that's usually used for Academy announcements, like grades and student council appointments and who's been chosen as lead for this year's play. Today the screen is covered with writing, scrolling up in a precise, measured pace, and when Christine goes closer, she sees that the blocks of letters are all names of the crew lost to the Narada, arranged by ships and ranks. She reads through them all, feeling an ache in her heart as she thinks of all the young, eager faces she's never going to see again, thinks of all the people she's known and said hi to that will never wave at her and ask her how she's doing and laugh at her responses ever again.
She gasps when she finds Gaila's name in the scrolling list, tears blurring her vision as the enormity of her loss hits her all over again, and she buries her face in her hands and tries not to cry, knowing that if she starts, she's never going to stop. Too many losses in too little time, and Gaila is the most painful of them because she had been a cornerstone of Chapel's world, a fundamental part of her existence, and Christine doesn't know how to deal with losing yet another person she loves and needs. She just stands still while the names scroll on by, shaking and hurt and trying not to break down as another hole opens in her heart.
Kirk comes up behind her and slings his arm around her shoulders in that casual, comforting way he has when he's not trying to be an obnoxious jackass. Chapel feels grateful for the weight of him against her, feels like she needs something to steady her, keep her grounded, and Kirk's easy grace and touchy-feely habits do exactly that. They look at the names for a while, remembering lost school and crewmates, maintaining a silence in honor of the fallen, and then Kirk gently nudges her away from the screen, his arm sliding down to wrap around her waist because he's Kirk and he doesn't believe in personal space.
"So," she says, grabbing his arm and yanking it firmly back up to her shoulders, trying very hard not to sound like she's still on the verge of tears, "are you being court-martialed for stealing a flagship?"
Kirk lets out an amused noise. "I'm being suspended for a few weeks for cheating on the Kobayashi Maru--"
"I heard about that. Is that why Spock doesn't like you?"
"One of many reasons," he says dryly, leaning his hip against hers because again, he has no concept of personal space with anyone. "Since I helped save Earth from Nero, though, I'm just being suspended, not expelled, and I'm getting a commendation for almost dying at least five times while trying to save the planet." His mouth twists in a sardonic grin. "Komack's not happy about it since he thinks I'm a reckless asshole who just got lucky, but the council outvoted him. I never thought I'd see the day when Barnett was on my side, but I guess stranger things have happened. I mean, I got choked by a Vulcan."
"Only you could piss off someone with iron-clad control over their emotions to the point of them trying to kill you," Christine sighs, resting her head on his shoulder, feeling inexplicably comforted by his solid, brash presence.
He presses a kiss to her head because he's just like that. "You've been talking to Bones, haven't you?"
"He's been too busy having a heart attack over every cut and bruise you have for him to talk to me about what a pain in the ass you are."
Kirk winces. "We're the worst-kept secret on the Enterprise, aren't we?"
Christine laughs, and it's shallow and not as steady as she'd like it to be, but it's still a laugh, which is more than she thought she'd be capable of right now. "Baby, you're the worst-kept secret at the Academy. Everybody--" And she stops abruptly because she realizes all over again that more than half of the people who'd known and gossiped about Kirk and McCoy are gone now; the evidence is scrolling on a screen behind them.
Kirk seems to sense that she's getting lost inside her own head again because he bumps his hip into hers and says, "Hey," in a soft voice. "Stay with me, all right? I just got my ass handed to me by Starfleet Command and I need someone to make me feel better."
"What about your boyfriend?" she says wearily, not really feeling up to indulging Kirk, but at the same time, realizing that she doesn't want to be alone with her grief either. For all his swagger and anger, Kirk's actually pretty good at reading people and knowing how to give them what they need, so if it means spending a few hours talking to him and verbally sparring with him, Chapel doesn't mind because she knows it'll take her thoughts off the constant anxiety and sorrow that live inside her now.
"Bones is still in debriefing." He doesn't sound too happy about it, which makes Christine smile because really, when was the last time the two of them were apart for longer than five minutes? Besides when Kirk had beamed aboard the other ship to rescue Pike? It occurs to her that Kirk is trying to avoid being alone in his grief as well, that he's just hiding it better than her because he's seemingly had years of practice, and somehow, the thought of him waiting alone for McCoy to be done his debriefing hurts something inside Chapel.
Making her decision, she slaps a friendly hand on his back and points him in the direction of the cafeteria. "C'mon, hero," she says more cheerfully than she actually feels. "You can buy me lunch and tell me all about your tales of derring-do."
He beams at her, slips an arm over her shoulders again, and swings them toward the cafeteria where he buys her a meal that has the nerve to call itself lasagna when it isn't even close and regales her with tales of his misspent youth. They trade stories about breaking and entering (Kirk breaks into a comic book store for a copy of Vulcan Tales of Science, Christine sneaks into the penny-movie theater to see Spaceballs for the eighth time), petty larceny (Kirk steals candy bars and his dad's antique car, Christine pockets cheap, shiny rings that turn her skin green and lip gloss that tastes like cloying strawberry), and lost teenage loves (Jim was in love with a sweet, funny Indian boy named Mohinder who broke his heart by leaving when Jim was fifteen, Christine had Andras and she doesn't want to talk about how it ended).
Eventually, the rest of the bridge crew trickle into the cafeteria, Sulu and Scotty sauntering in, laughing over some joke that only they understand, followed by Uhura and Spock walking close together but never actually touching, and Chekov, McCoy, and an Ensign Rajagopal from Engineering bringing up the rear. They all sit down around Kirk and Chapel, McCoy shoving in between Christine and Jim without any shame or apology, after getting completely inadequate meals that none of them really touch, conversation devolving into murmurs of "Did they ask you about the...?" and "You told them about that?" and "God, my ass went numb sitting in that fucking seat for so long. How many times can they ask the same question?"
Halfway through Kirk's recounting of his own debriefing, Scotty and Chekov break into a quietly heated argument over which booze is better, whiskey or vodka. Distracted from the story, McCoy, Uhura, and Rajagopal come down firmly on the side of whiskey, arguing for its dignity and history, while Sulu and Kirk argue vociferously for vodka as both have very fond memories of being drunk and stupid on it. Spock stays out of the conversation entirely, having had no experience with either, but his eyebrows constantly move up and down as each team makes their passionate defense of their drink of choice, occasionally murmuring "Fascinating" under his breath; Christine isn't sure, but she thinks he may be amused, or at least as amused as Vulcans get.
More crew filter into the cafeteria, grabbing chairs and pulling up beside the bridge crew, complaining and laughing and exchanging names and ranks and stories. One of the crewmembers, an engineer named West, gets into an animated conversation with Kirk about music, specifically the Beastie Boys, one of Kirk's favorite bands from the twentieth century, and both of them start rhyming about brass monkeys while the rest of the group just looks on with some confusion and a lot of amusement.
"Amazing," Sulu says sotto voce to Uhura. "They're laying down mad beats at 80% accuracy."
Spock raises an eyebrow at him. "I believe that qualifies as 'ill'," he says in that precise, measured voice of his, "at least from a technical standpoint."
Christine does not want to know who taught Spock some of the more colorful aspects of twentieth-century North American slang and how to use it properly, but his mouth is quirked up in the tiniest of smiles, so Christine thinks that he may be making a joke that only he and Sulu get. Uhura looks like she doesn't know whether she wants to laugh at Spock's matter-of-factness or hide her face and pretend this isn't happening. "What the hell is a brass monkey anyway?" she finally asks in a vaguely disgruntled tone.
"It's a really terrible drink," Christine says with a shudder, memories of her past bar exploits coming back to haunt her. "And it gives you a bitch of a hangover."
Nyota makes a face and pushes her plate away. "Figures he'd know a song about it."
Much, much later, the group collectively decides to move this party to one of the nearby pubs, arguing that a caf is no place to have real conversations and pubs have booze at them, which makes them better than cafeterias. By the time they make it over to the Thirsty Toad, most of the Academy that is not comprised of admirals or captains have joined them. The pub is packed to the rafters by the time everyone has made it in, and extra chairs and tables are hastily put out to accommodate as many people as can be accommodated. There are toasts to everything from the serious to the ridiculous, from their fallen comrades to Captain Pike to Vulcans to making it safely back home and Starfleet skirts and how blessedly short they are.
The evening passes by in a blur of new people, good friends, and memories of lost friends and colleagues, punctuated by alcohol and the occasional bout of tears and a sense of community that keeps building as the night goes on. It's not an official tribute to the people of Vulcan or the people lost to the Narada (that will come in the next few days), but it's their own way of honoring the memory of them, and it keeps them going for a while.
Christine basks in the noise and the chaos, feeling them drown out her ever-present worry and her fear, letting Kirk and McCoy buy her drinks that she tosses back with an abandon she doesn't really feel. She and Uhura make quiet, private toasts to Gaila, telling each other stories of her and her friendship and the way she'd fit so perfectly into their lives, absently wiping away tears when they fall without permission. Christine wraps her arm around Nyota's shoulders and squeezes lightly whenever she thinks Uhura's feeling as lost as she is; it's not much, but it makes Nyota lean into her, keeps her in the present, and it's enough for the both of them, at least for now.
***
The next few days are filled with memories and speeches and funerals and inconsolable relatives. Christine is so exhausted from weeping that it takes McCoy, Kirk, and Uhura working in a steady rotation to keep her standing at the memorials, and everyone does the same for Uhura when it's her turn to break down. After that, there are more meetings with Starfleet Command as they determine what to do with Kirk and the Enterprise and the crew.
Christine skips all of it and heads out to Starfleet San Francisco General to visit Pike. She's been keeping in touch with Doctor M'Benga, who's in charge of his case and whom Christine knows from one of her alien physiology classes where he'd acted as her TA, and she's been assured that Pike is recovering quite well, considering what he's been through. He's been conscious for the past two days and has been in meetings with Starfleet Command for most of them, which seems to aggravate M'Benga judging from his disapproving tone. Christine feels like cheering him when he informs her that he has dismissed all Starfleet personnel from Captain Pike's room so that he can get some actual rest but will let Chapel in to see him for a little while if she'd like that.
"I'd kiss you if you wouldn't be so appalled, Doctor M'Benga," she says, grinning at him through the comm.
He gives her a stern look. "That would be very inappropriate behavior, Nurse Chapel," he says primly, although Christine can hear the amusement lurking in his words.
"Inappropriate is my middle name, honey."
"I thought it was Alicia," he says smoothly, smiling when she laughs and tells him she'll be there in twenty minutes.
True to her word, she's there with about thirty seconds to spare, and M'Benga greets her at the reception desk and takes her up to Pike's room, a good-sized private room in one of the more quiet wings of the hospital. "He is not in the best of moods right now," M'Benga warns her diplomatically, which Christine takes to mean that Christopher's aggravated, but too polite and proper to really lay into any of the hospital staff.
"Oh, this is going to be fun," she sighs, remembering what she was like the first few days when she'd woken up in the hospital after the accident. Guilt and anger and frustration aren't a good mix, and she knows she's not going to be able to make things better, but she just wants to distract him from his troubles for a while; it's all she can do for now, time and distance and therapy will take care of the rest.
She takes a deep breath and shoves down her anxiety and misgivings, plasters a smile on her face, and walks into the room. "Hey, sailor," she says cheerfully. "Miss me?"
First thing she notices is that Pike doesn't look like death warmed over, which eases some of the tension inside her; she still remembers him from McCoy's operating table, so seeing him look fairly healthy and recovered does a lot for her state of mind. Second thing she notices is that he's propped up in bed, his head bent over a pad that he reads with a pair of old-fashioned, slim, wire-rimmed spectacles sitting squarely on his nose. He looks up at her with surprise, pulling his glasses down briefly to look at her over them, and a wave of lust hits her so hard, her knees almost buckle. Fuck, she thinks to herself, leave it to Pike to drive her crazy with nothing more than just a look and a pair of glasses, the utter bastard.
"Christine?" he asks in a disbelieving tone of voice, like he hadn't expected her to come and see him while he was in the hospital, and that annoys her enough to make her straighten up and march over to his side. "What are you doing here?"
She leans her hip against the bed rails and glares at him. "You're kinda clueless sometimes, aren't you?" she says acidly.
He grins irrepressibly, and it's almost enough to make her forget herself and climb into bed with him. "I make up for it with my stunning good looks and charm."
She rolls her eyes at him just to hear him laugh. "I used to think the ego thing was just Jim, but it's really all starship captains, isn't it?"
"Could be." He shoves the pad onto the table next to him, removes his glasses and carefully places them on the table, and holds out his hand to her. "So do I get a kiss or what?"
"What's the magic word?" she teases, even though she's already leaning forward, her body curving toward his as his hands reach up to cup her face.
"Now, goddammit," he growls impatiently, kissing her hotly and thoroughly until her knees are weak and she has to pull away just to be able to breathe again.
"Wow," she says weakly, wondering if she'll get banned from General if she climbs into bed and seduces the hell out of Pike before M'Benga gets back to check on his patient. If Pike still didn't have lines of fatigue drawn around his face, if he hadn't only regained consciousness two days ago, if Command hadn't worn him out with their endless fucking meetings, she might have seriously considered it, especially knowing that Pike would've jumped at the chance, exhaustion or not, to be between her thighs once again.
Instead, she reluctantly pulls back, skimming her fingers over the tired lines of his face, smiling as his dark curls fall over her fingertips like they're rebelling against being put in their place. He turns his face and presses his lips against her palm, making her heart skip a beat for just a moment. "I missed you, Christine," he admits softly, and it's like a vice around her heart as she hears the longing in his voice.
"I missed you too," she murmurs, feeling something vast and unnamable and frighteningly sharp move inside her at the admission. She's promised herself to never do this again, to never be this open and vulnerable again, but he looks at her like she's hung the moon, like she's something good and precious and real that he can't believe he's found, and she's never known how to refuse him anything.
M'Benga interrupts them with a polite knock on the door, saving Christine from confessing something she isn't sure she should be admitting out loud and the sentimentality of the moment is lost as he tells her that her time is up. Pike quietly argues for her to stay a little longer, but Christine and M'Benga both shake their heads, knowing that he needs the rest, even though Christine wants so badly to stay. "You are still recovering, Captain," M'Benga says in that calm, baritone voice of his that soothes all patients, no matter their disposition. "You need the rest. Nurse Chapel will be back tomorrow, and she can stay longer next time."
"Promise?"
"Christopher," Chapel says sternly, "if you make him pinky-swear, I will not be held responsible for my actions." She's pleased to hear Pike's laughter, sounding stronger and smoother than before. "I'll come back tomorrow, I promise."
"Wear a skirt for me," he grins wickedly, laughing softly when she rolls her eyes at him and walks out of the room, carefully closing the door behind her.
"He is a handful," M'Benga admits once they're outside, his mouth quirking up in a smile despite his words. "Woke up, demanded water, demanded a meeting with Starfleet, against my orders, I should add, and hasn't slowed down once until I told him to cut down on the meetings or I'd ban Command from setting one foot through the doors."
"Starship captains," she says with exasperation.
M'Benga nods. "Exactly. Although that arrogance and drive is going to come in handy once his physiotherapy starts."
Christine looks at him sharply. "So he's going to be all right? He'll be able to walk again?"
"I don't know about all right," M'Benga shrugs. "He's going to be in a considerable amount of pain for the next few months, even with painkillers, and the physical therapy is going to be even more painful because there was so much damage to his spine." He catches the look on Christine's face and tries to soften the blow. "You and Dr. McCoy performed a miracle with the surgery," he says with admiration, "and he's going to be able to walk again, which by rights, he shouldn't be able to do, but he will never be a hundred percent. There was just too much damage done for a full recovery."
"So his career as a captain is over then," she says softly, almost to herself.
"Unfortunately," M'Benga says, sounding apologetic. "That was one of the things that Command was in here to talk to him about, his future in Starfleet."
"What did they decide?"
M'Benga looks unsure, like he's torn between telling her and keeping Starfleet Command decisions secret. In the end, he decides to tell her because she looks impatient and hospital gossip wins over Command privacy any day. "He's going to be promoted to Admiral," he whispers, leaning in so that no one else will hear it. "They're giving the Enterprise to Kirk and letting him pick his crew with Pike's recommendations."
Christine's jaw drops. She isn't an expert in the inner workings of Starfleet and the machinations of its Command staff, but even she knows this is impossible. "They can't," she whispers furiously. "Kirk's too young and inexperienced, they'll never be able to push that through."
"Half the fleet is gone and they don't have enough cadets to take their place, Christine," he says quietly. "They're going to need every available body to either be recruiting and training new cadets or flying into space to start on the missions already scheduled for this year. They don't have much of a choice but to make Kirk captain and give him the Enterprise."
"Jesus," Christine whispers softly. "How the hell is Pike taking this?"
"It was his suggestion, from what I heard when I walked in the last time. He's going to be part of Command once they make him admiral and he'll be in charge of recruitment and mentorship. They need to shore up the numbers and fast."
She shakes her head. "How the hell do you know all of this?"
He smiles, and it's a little sad and resigned. "You'd be surprised by how much you hear when people don't consider you a threat, even when you are a doctor and command respect."
"Starfleet Command," Christine sighs.
"Not very nice people," M'Benga says in that polite but disapproving way of his that makes Christine like him even more.
She jerks her head toward the closed door of Pike's room. "How is he really? He put on a good show for me in there, but it doesn't look like he's doing all that great."
M'Benga inclines his head in a nod. "It's only been two days, but like I said, he's not in the best of the moods right now. He's still angry and suffering from post-traumatic stress, he'll probably go through all the Kübler-Ross stages of grief for all the losses in Starfleet and Vulcan and his career..." He trails off as the enormity of the situation hits Christine, her face going pale as she realizes how much he's lost and how much he's going to go through to get some of it back. "He's going to be very volatile and traumatized for a long while, Christine," he says gently. "He's a stubborn, proud man who's used to being in control of most of his life, and the complete loss of it is going to make him lash out when he's hurting and say things he won't mean just to make himself feel more in control. It won't be easy for you to deal with, but if you truly care--"
"We're not--" she starts, but she can't bring herself to deny what they have, not even to save their reputations. M'Benga may not have seen them kiss, but it's obvious that he's seen something between them, and Christine is too tired to try and hide it for the sake of regulation.
"You are," M'Benga says firmly, reaching out to hold her hand in his. "And he is going to need you."
She looks up at him, feeling very small and afraid in all the ways she knows she isn't, in all the ways she hasn't felt since she was sixteen and she lost her first love. "I don't know if I can handle it, Geoffrey," she whispers, feeling ashamed to admit to her weakness out loud.
M'Benga holds her hand tightly. "You, my dear," he says in that calm, quiet voice that she remembers from her classes, "are made of stronger stuff than you think. You will do just fine."
She squeezes his hand back, finds the strength to give him a faint smile. "What would I do without you, Geoffrey?"
He smiles back at her. "You would find a way to go on, Nurse Chapel, and to make things better for everyone else."
She leans up to press a quick kiss to his cheek. "I owe you a good lunch at a real restaurant. Don't let me forget." She waves goodbye to him as she makes her way out of the hospital, getting into her run-down little Volkswagen Beetle that she'd bought when she'd first moved out to San Francisco for a hundred credits she didn't really have, but spent anyway because she couldn't stand the thought of public transportation. She sits at the wheel and buries her face in her hands and cries again, even though she'd thought she'd run out of tears by now, cries for Pike and her and how everything has changed for them because of one man's actions.
When she's finally done, she angrily wipes the tears from her face and backs out of the parking lot, resolutely ignoring the fact that she's going to be back for Pike tomorrow and the next day and the day after because it's too late to back out from this; she'd had her chance when he'd offered her a place on the Enterprise and had her on top of his desk, could've said no and pretended it had never happened and she wouldn't be here right now. But she'd said yes, had shouted it at the top of her lungs, and she's here with him now, and she isn't leaving until she's damn good and ready or he gives her a reason to leave.
Christine has never backed away from a challenge, and she's not about to start now. Pike had better watch out, she thinks with a burgeoning lightness that wasn't there before, because she's coming for him, whether he's ready or not.
Part 2 is here.