DISCLAIMER: The Star Trek characters
are the property of Paramount Studios, Inc and Viacom. The story contents are
the creation and property of Djinn and are copyright (c) 2005 by Djinn. This
story is Rated R.
Reopening Old Wounds
by Djinn
Chapel walked down the
corridor of the USS Pensacola, nodding to the passing cadets as she took
in the bright fixtures and immaculate bulkheads and flooring. It should have
felt too pristine, like it needed seasoning. But for a newly commissioned
training ship, the Pensacola had a surprisingly lived-in feel.
"Commander Chapel."
She smiled. She never got
tired of hearing that. Even if she'd made commander some time ago, it was still
a thrill. Back in her nursing days, when she'd been a lowly ensign, she'd
barely hoped to make lieutenant, much less commander.
Turning, she saw Captain Neimann watching her from an open door. "Want to see
your office?" he asked.
"Are you going to give
me the private tour, Ross?"
He laughed. There'd been a
time when he would have locked the doors and given her an extremely private
tour. But they'd fallen out of that habit over a year ago. Friendship was
easier. And safer.
Besides, he'd spent the whole
time he'd been with her trying to live up to the man she'd been with before
him. And no one could hope to outshine James T. Kirk—or at least none of her
recent lovers had seemed to think so. She hoped she'd never given any of them
that idea.
"I've got a surprise for
you," he said with a laugh as he bowed her into the office.
"Good or bad?"
"I'm not sure yet."
He watched her walk around. "Is this okay?"
"It's fine." It was
odd to be in an office and not a sickbay. But she wasn't a doctor right now. She
was here in her new capacity as a rep of emergency ops. It was heady and
terrifying all at once. "Is this the surprise?"
"Nope." Ross smiled
at her, an easy expression utterly lacking in pressure or recriminations. Not
all of her relationships had ended this well. "I'm glad you're here."
"Me, too." Even if
she and he were on different sides of the fence when it came to his
"chosen" cadets.
"You know the mission,
Christine. We're going out beyond the range of normal training runs. We're
going to give this group something to write home about."
"Or not." Some of
the training missions he'd proposed weren't the kinds of things you wrote home—or
anywhere else—about.
"Or not," he said
with a laugh.
"So
they're that good? Your Red Squad?" she asked, loading the question with
more than just curiosity.
"I know you don't
approve."
"An elite group? Isn't
the Academy elite enough?"
He frowned. "There's a
time and place for the very best. Missions that will only work if our top men
and women carry them out. Isn't it a good idea to identify the very best
now?"
"Based on what? Entrance
exams?"
"They're not
fourth-class cadets, Christine. They're second- and first-class cadets. We've
had ample time to assess their potential."
"Potential. That's a
loaded word, Ross."
He moved closer. "Don't
tell me you haven't benefited from people assessing your potential favorably. Or
from that touch of elitism—from being part of something golden. You really
think old man Cartwright would have given you your ops assignment without the
luster of the Enterprise behind you? And maybe without a good word from
her former captain?"
She sighed. "I never asked
Jim for a rec. And the Enterprise isn't golden, Ross. She isn't
everything."
"I don't know if I'd
agree with that assessment," a very familiar voice said behind her.
Chapel turned, saw Jim standing
in the doorway, and could feel her mouth dropping. She forced it closed. "Captain
Kirk."
He smiled tightly. "It's
admiral. Again."
"My mistake."
"I doubt that."
"And here's my surprise,
Christine." Ross waved Jim in.
"Good or bad, huh?"
She pretended to glare.
Ross winked at her. "I'll
leave you two to get reacquainted. We launch in an hour, and I'd like you both
on the bridge. I know we're not all agreed about this mission, but we need to
show at least the appearance of solidarity."
Jim nodded easily. "Wouldn't
miss it, Captain."
Ross headed for the door,
then turned back. "Admiral, if you'd like to take her out...?"
Jim waved the offer away. "She's
your ship, Ross." As the other man walked out, Jim shot Chapel a bland look,
but she sensed a question in it. Was she still Ross's woman, perhaps?
She stared blandly back. "So,
you don't agree with the 'Red Squad' concept, either?"
"You know how I feel
about elitism." He walked to the view port and seemed to be drinking in the
stars, not just looking at them. "I'm an Iowa farm boy from all the wrong
schools. Where would I have been if there'd been a Red Squad when I was at the
Academy?"
"Probably leading
it." Laughing softly, she joined him at the view port. She knew she didn't
look as enthralled with the vista as he did.
He glanced over at her. "How
long has it been?"
"I don't know, Jim. How
long were you with Antonia?"
"Mrrrowww."
He grinned, but then it faded. "You weren't exactly alone while I was with
her, Chris."
"No, I wasn't. But you
hardly have room to talk on that score—all your women. I mean before the
sainted Antonia, of course. Where is she, anyway?"
"Yeah, I missed those
claws." His grin turned cockeyed; his voice was less tight than she
expected.
"You almost sound like
you mean it."
"I almost do mean it."
He sighed. "And it wasn't just before Antonia, you know. It was before
you, too. You and I were exclusive—or at least I was." There was something
sharp in his voice.
"I was, too. You know
that."
"Do I?"
"You should."
They'd been together three
years. Two wonderful, passionate, crazed years—and then one more where they'd
slowly fallen apart. They'd nearly killed each other at times, nearly died in
much nicer ways other times. And they'd never quite
trusted each other the way they should have.
She watched him as he moved
around her office. "I didn't know you were going to be here. When Ross
said he had a surprise, I didn't think you'd be it."
"I didn't expect to be
here. But I objected enough in principle that the brass told me to come along
and observe."
"That'll teach
you."
He laughed, seemed glad to be
on easier ground. "It sure will."
"I was surprised to hear
you'd come back to Starfleet."
He shrugged. "Space is
in my blood."
She moved closer. "And
Antonia wasn't?" She could see his jaw tighten. "Should I leave it
alone?"
"Yes." His tone
made it clear he was serious.
"So
the Academy? That was a surprise, too."
"It seemed the right
place." He smiled. "My ship's there."
She laughed softly. "And
most of your crew."
"You have Rand."
"Actually, she has
me." At his surprised look, she elbowed him. "Not like that, you lech."
"It was a very
interesting picture." He slowly lifted his eyebrows.
Laughing, she turned away. "I
mean she got there first. I'm the newbie."
"I'm sure you'll do
great. I didn't have anything to do with you getting the assignment, in case
you were wondering. Cartwright didn't even ask me for a recommendation."
"No?"
"No." He smiled at
her gently. This had been one of the things she'd always loved about him. Even
when he was irritated with her, he could be so damned fair—and generous.
"But you would have
given me one, if he'd asked...right?"
"Oh, absolutely."
She laughed. "Very wise
answer, Admiral."
He was back at the view port.
"It's Jim, Chris. We were together too long for you to fall back on titles
when it's just us."
"I wasn't sure."
He looked back at her, as if
surprised that her voice lacked any sarcasm. "You should have been."
"Once in the inner
circle, always in it?"
"Something like
that." He grinned; it wasn't fair that the expression still made her heart
stop. "You look good, Chris."
"And you know you do,
too." When he shrugged, she found herself grinning back. "I can't say
I'm sorry you're here. Especially not if you're on my side."
"I've always been on
your side."
He was staring at her, and
she found it impossible to look away from him.
"How long has it been
really, Chris?"
She knew he was aware of
exactly how much time had passed since they'd been together. "Three
years."
"And...?"
She rolled her eyes. "And
four months or so. Not that I'm counting. We broke up right before our
anniversary. It's easy to remember."
He looked down, and she heard
him sigh softly.
"Go ahead and ask about Ross
and me, Jim."
"It's none of my
business." He walked past her.
She put her hand out,
stopping him. "But you want me to just volunteer the information, don't
you?"
He looked over at her. "Is
that so hard to understand? You left me, remember?"
"You made it impossible
to stay." As his face tightened, she said softly. "I'm not with Ross
anymore."
"I'm sorry. He's a good
man." Jim pulled away from her. "Did you leave him, too?"
"I wasn't the bad
guy."
"And I was?" He was
to the door now, his feet moving fast, carrying him away from how they were
cycling down to that bitter, jagged place they'd lived in at the end of their
relationship.
"Jim..."
"It's a long mission,
Commander. We'll have loads of time to cover old, tired ground. For now, let's
quit while we're ahead, okay?" His eyes were hard; his voice was, too.
She didn't look away. Could
feel the old emotions coming up. There was a reason they weren't together. In
the first rush of seeing him, she'd lost sight of that. "Fine."
He nodded and walked out, but
she thought she saw him hesitate for a moment. Then the door closed behind him,
and the room seemed suddenly smaller and cold. Walking to the view port, Chapel
stared down at the one thing Jim hadn't looked at: Earth spinning below the
ship.
She could get off, get out of
this mission now before things went any farther, before she and Jim had the
chance to hurt each other more than they already had. Ross could get another
ops person.
It was tempting. But she
wasn't a coward. Or maybe she was just a fool. Maybe, despite how much hurt
loomed ahead, she couldn't just walk away from Jim.
Whatever her reasons, she was
staying.
##
Kirk nodded to the cadets bustling
around him as they headed for other parts of the small ship. They were the best
of the best, Starfleet Academy's elite. He wasn't sure why it bothered him so
much that they'd been plucked out of the general ranks for this special
training regimen, but it did.
"Admiral," a young
man said in hushed tones as Kirk hurried past him. "That's him. That's
James T. Kirk. He's a living legend," Kirk heard the cadet say to someone.
That was him, all right. A
living legend. He grimaced as he turned into the office Neimann
had told him was his to use for the duration. Legend implied old. And Kirk was
feeling old these days. He'd be fifty in just a few weeks. It wasn't a day he
was looking forward to—he'd court-martial the first person who threw him a
party.
Sitting down at the desk, he
turned on the terminal and hit the sequence of commands that would engage the
privacy channel—a perk of being one with Command again. One of the only perks
other than being able to book time in space whenever he wanted to go out on
training cruises. This one had been a surprise—he'd almost had to cancel the
cruise he really wanted to go on with Spock and his graduating cadets. Spock
hadn't commented on Neimann's pulling his top cadets
out of regular classes for this mission.
Spock generally had an
opinion on everything. His silence was no doubt significant.
Kirk dialed into the Command
comm system and called Cartwright's office. For a moment, he worried that it
was too late, but the ops center hardly worked banker's hours.
"Jim?" Cartwright
beamed at him. "Where are you?"
"On the Pensacola."
"Uh-oh." Cartwright
looked like he was trying to bite back a laugh. "How the hell did that
happen?"
"So
you didn't know I'd be here?"
"Do you think I'd have
sent Christine up there if I had?" He grinned, but it was a shaky
expression.
"We're not going to
fight."
"Right. Because the two
of you would never fight." He shook his head.
"I'm curious, Matt. Why
did you send her? She's pretty new to ops be up here as your rep."
"She is. But she has
great instincts. I wouldn't have sent her otherwise." Cartwright's eyes
narrowed. "But that's not what you're asking, is it? Neimann
requested her specifically."
Kirk smiled tightly. "Was
this before or after the last training board?" He hadn't been shy about
kicking apart Neimann's Red Squad proposal. It was
what had earned him a berth on this boat.
Cartwright started to laugh. "Ooh,
boy. Ross is more devious than I gave him credit for."
"So
it was after the meeting?" At Cartwright's nod, he shook his head. "He
thinks she'll distract me."
"Well, Jimbo, since you're sitting at some terminal bumping your
gums about her rather than observing his cadets doing their thing, I'd say he
was right." Cartwright leaned back. "It's sort of flattering, don't
you think?"
"Flattering?"
"He thinks you're
powerful enough that you need distracting."
"Real flattering." Kirk
sighed. "This program's that important to him?"
Cartwright nodded. "He
wanted your job. Now that it's out of reach, the best he can do is make this
the pet project of the training board. That way you can't shut it down before
it's even had a chance."
Kirk frowned. "You
believe in this?"
"I'm a cautious supporter.
I like the idea of having a crew I can trust."
"Knowing you, you'd post
them all on the neutral zone to wait for Klingons to rush the line."
Cartwright shrugged, no smile
in sight. Klingons weren't ever a joke to him.
"I better go, Matt. As you
pointed out, I have cadets to observe."
"And an ex to
avoid."
Kirk smiled. He didn't intend
to avoid Chris. Let Neimann think he was distracted
if it would make the man happy. Using their mutual ex-girlfriend against him
didn't irritate Kirk as much as Neimann's having felt
the need to do it in the first place. Had he really thought Kirk wouldn't give
his program a chance before he judged it?
"I don't want to know
what you're thinking," Cartwright said. "But think about the avoiding
part. I wasn't precisely joking."
"Matt, Chris and
I..."
"Christine and you
nearly ripped each other to shreds, Jimbo. I was
there to pick up the pieces, remember? A lot of good scotch—my good scotch—was
drunk in the cause."
"Nothing's going to
happen. But there's no reason she and I can't be friends, now. We've changed. Both
of us."
"Uh huh." Cartwright
shook his head. "Just...think before you leap, all right?" At Kirk's
look he held up a hand, as if forestalling the rest of the argument. "Godspeed
and fair winds, Jim."
Kirk smiled at the ancient
goodbye. "Kirk out."
He sat for a moment, tapping
out the command to disengage the privacy channel. Then he got up and walked to
the view port. Space—he was back. Home. Everything he loved. Well almost. He'd
left one thing he loved back on Earth. Antonia and he hadn't broken up so much
as just let go. She'd given up trying to compete with his other love—unlike
Chris, she couldn't share him with the stars. She'd had to sit back and watch
space swallow him up. But Chris...
Damn it. Neimann
was no fool. He couldn't have picked a better time to bring Chris around. Kirk
hoped he hadn't known that, had just been lucky figuring she would be a distraction
on her own merits, which were considerable. Kirk hoped he wasn't broadcasting
his discontent with life to all and sundry.
Even back in Starfleet
something was missing. Something wasn't right. He felt old.
Felt. Such a safe word but not the right one. He didn't
just feel old. He was old.
Sighing, he dialed down the
birthday angst and turned away from the view, walking slowly to the turbolift that would take him to the bridge. Several other
officers—trainers from various departments—were headed up to watch the launch,
too. They nodded to him and he nodded back, the ride was too short for much
more.
The bridge was a mass of
controlled activity, cadets manning the senior stations calling out commands to
various sections. An advisor stood near each station, close enough to act if
there was trouble, not so close they'd seem to be hovering. Neimann
sat in the center seat, entering something in a padd that he handed to a cadet
who appeared to be his exec.
Kirk stopped in the back,
watching Neimann. He heard the lift doors open behind
him and sensed, rather than saw, Chris come up to stand next to him.
"It's no accident your
being here," he murmured.
She moved closer. "No?"
"Your beau there thought
you would distract me."
"We've been over this. He's
not my beau." She smiled at him. "A distraction, huh?"
He nodded.
"Is it working?"
"Too well. Witness how
our first meeting went."
Looking down, she nodded. He
studied her, noting how she'd put on weight, how there were more laugh lines
around her eyes, and her hair was shot with gray. It should have made her less
attractive but it didn't. He felt more alive standing next to her than he had
for a long time.
She looked up slowly, their
eyes meeting as she smiled the slow, crooked smile that had won his heart when
he'd first realized she could be more than just one of his former crew. "So what do we do?"
"We behave ourselves,
that's what. While we're on duty, we'll do what we came here to do: observe his
cadets. We'll be model Starfleet officers."
She dipped her head, said
even more quietly, "I notice you specified while we're on duty?"
"Caught that, did
you?" He laughed softly.
"I don't miss
much."
"No. I know you
don't."
Their eyes met again and
held. He could feel the old fire starting between them, pheromones flitting
around them in the air. He remembered how startled he'd been to find that kind
of passion with her. She'd always seemed solid and dependable. Someone he could
be sure of. Not someone who, at times, he'd feel like he was burning up with
because of the passion—both good and bad—in the relationship.
For a woman who appeared to
be the salt of the earth, she was damned ephemeral. Like trying to capture
light. Or fire. He'd been burned trying. Not that it had ever stopped him from
demanding another round in the fire dance. Because when she did decide to
settle and let the fire turn into simple warmth or the heat of passion, it was
sheer bliss.
She seemed to wrench her eyes
away, looking around at the others on the bridge as if she needed to focus on
something—anything—but him. Finally, she turned back and her expression was
wry. "I have to admit I'm a little annoyed. Being used to distract you is
hardly flattering to me as an officer. Or to the weight my voice carries."
Kirk eased her toward the
side as more officers crowded onto the bridge. "Oh, I think your voice
does carry weight. Cartwright isn't fully on board. If you had reasons for not
endorsing this, he'd listen to you. I bet Neimann was
counting on you being too distracted to come up with those reasons."
She thought about that and
started to smile. One edge of her mouth turned up first, the way it always did.
He used to trace her smile.
"You always say the
right thing, Admiral."
He grinned, forcing himself
to forget about tracing anything. He was not going to be distracted by her. "I
do my best."
Looking over at Neimann, she said, "I don't think he meant any harm. He
just cares so deeply about this program."
There was a fondness for Neimann in her voice that made Kirk more than a little
jealous. "I know."
The bridge grew quiet as the
crew finished the pre-launch protocols and waited for Neimann
to give the word. Chris swallowed whatever she was going to say and moved away
a bit from Kirk, as if suddenly concerned with decorum. Neimann
glanced back just as she did it, and Kirk saw him grin. He probably thought his
grand plan was already working.
Not that it wasn't working to
some extent—but Kirk was going to be damned if he'd let Neimann
know that.
##
Chapel watched the cadets
completing their surveys as the wind whipped and lashed sand at them. She'd
taken temporary shelter from the biting grit between two trees, but the relief
was limited. She supposed the driving sand was better than the cold rains that
had drenched them all a few hours ago. Neimann swore
the weather was naturally chaotic on this little planet, but she was willing to
bet he had a control module that was currently set for sandstorm.
"Nice day," Jim
said, pushing in next to her. "This weather has to be contrived."
"Ross says no."
"And we believe
him?"
"Well, no."
Laughing, he moved closer. "Dinner
tonight?"
They'd been on the ship for
four days now. He'd monopolized her for dinner every single one of them.
"I thought I'd eat with
the cadets," she said in the most serious tone she could muster. "Him
and her and him," she said pointing out the three most attractive cadets
in visual range.
He looked over at her, a
frown starting, then he saw she was trying not to laugh. "Witch."
"You used to call me
that under different circumstances." He'd always loved the way she could
conjure life into things he'd thought dead from overuse.
"I did, didn't I?" Jim
smiled at her, then took a deep breath and went back out into the storm.
She followed suit, heading
off in a different direction, watching as one of the cadets assigned to the
science team cataloged the native flora. Another cadet was taking readings of
the soils and geology and had climbed partway up a small hillock. He was
checking the strata while blinking furiously against the pelting sand. Chapel
smiled. They were driven, these cadets.
The wind began to lessen, and
Chapel imagined she could hear all the cadets let out a collective sigh of
relief. For a moment, there was no sound as the sun beat down and dust settled
around them.
Then the ground began to
shake. She looked over at Ross, trying to figure if he had dialed this up, but
the look on his face was one of shock. Atmospheric chaos was one thing, but
seismic instability was another.
The shaking intensified.
"Emergency transport
formations," he shouted to the cadets, then pulled out his communicator. "This
is a code-three emergency. Beam us up according to established protocols."
She noticed he didn't tell
the cadets working the transporter to make way for more seasoned officers. She
was glad he had that much faith in his special cadets but wouldn't have minded
if he'd switched them out.
The cadets in the immediate
area began to form into beam-out patterns, the cadets at point calling up to
the ship as soon as their groups were all assembled. The first group
disappeared as the trembling again increased in magnitude.
Seeing that Ross was busy
talking to the ship and knowing that a few of the cadets were well beyond voice
range, Chapel pulled out her communicator and set it to wide alert, repeating
Ross's command. A moment later, a handful of cadets began running in from all
directions. She saw Jim helping to form them into beam-out groups—although they
didn't need much help.
There was no panic, just
focused—and probably scared—cadets doing what they'd been trained to do. Chapel
had seen seasoned pros handle emergency beam-outs with less composure than Red
Squad was showing.
"All cadets accounted
for, sir," she heard one of the cadets on transporter duty report. "Ready
to beam last party up."
Chapel hurried over to where
Ross, Jim, and several other officers were assembling.
"Energize," Ross
said as a really nasty temblor started.
They rematerialized on the
pad a bit cockeyed, and she reached out instinctively to try to grab hold of
something to steady her. Her hand met Jim's, and he winked at her as they
pulled each other upright.
"Damn it," Ross
said quietly. "Starfleet assured me that planet was safe. The weather's
unpredictable, but they never said it was a seismic menace." He motioned
to Commander Korohama, the main observer for the
science department. "Have your cadets get all of their readings downloaded
and analyzed. I want to know where that quake came from and if there'll be
more."
"Yes, sir," Korohama said, hurrying off; the others followed him,
leaving Jim and her alone with Neimann and the cadets
at the transporter.
Ross looked over at Jim. "Don't
say it."
"Say what?" Jim
walked over to the transporter, smiling at the young men who were trying to
look nonchalant at the controls. "Nice work, cadets."
"Sir, thank you,
sir." A smile threatened to burst through the one who'd been doing the
bulk of the beam-outs.
Ross seemed to relax.
"Everyone did well on
the beam out. Very orderly." Chapel smiled at him. "Are you sure you
didn't plan that?"
He glared at her. "I
told you, I don't control the weather—or earthquakes, either."
She held up a hand. "Just
checking."
Smiling in a way that seemed
designed to dig a little, Jim said, "So that was more excitement than you
planned for?"
Ross nodded, irritation plain
in the tight way he moved his head. But it didn't seem to be irritation with
Jim. "Back to the drawing board on the location for the 'challenging
planetary survey' scenario." He looked over at Jim. "If there is a
drawing board, that is?"
Jim shrugged. "A little
early to tell. A few days of normal ship's operations drills, and now this, are
hardly a test."
"But if you were to
report today...?"
"Your cadets are good,
Ross. That's not the question, and we both know it. This program may be
counterproductive."
Chapel saw the cadets at the
transporter console look down, their mouths tight. The ears of one turned a
bright red.
Ross's ears weren't exactly
pale either. "Counterproductive? If you think that then you're a blind
fool not just an ol—"
She didn't think she'd ever
seen Jim's expression go quite so cold.
"Would you like to
finish that sentence?" he said in a voice made more dangerous by how quiet
it was.
"No, sir."
Jim leaned in. "I've
logged more star hours than you ever will, Ross. I've seen people under every
conceivable circumstance. The good, the bad, and the truly horrible. And it's
not the ones you've tagged as having the most potential that always rise to the
occasion. Sometimes they're the ones who freeze....or
run."
Ross looked straight ahead,
his eyes unblinking, spine ramrod straight—he would have made a marine envious.
"Yes, sir."
"At ease, Captain."
Jim sounded frustrated now. He turned to the cadets, "If you'll excuse us
for a moment?"
The more senior cadet looked
at Neimann.
"That was my polite way of
telling you to get out, not to ask your C.O what to do." Jim's voice fell
to the low, dangerous tone again.
The cadets fled.
Turning back to Ross, Jim
said, "If we have a problem, Captain, we need to air it now."
Chapel found herself standing
straighter at the tone in Jim's voice.
"You've prejudged this
program, sir," Ross said.
"We all prejudge things,
Captain. That's called having a first impression. It doesn't mean it's the
final impression."
Ross didn't look convinced.
Jim paced away, walking to
the transporter and staring down at the controls as though they offered up some
kind of focus for his thoughts. He touched a few, then looked up at Ross. "You
believed you had to distract me with Chris. Are you so unsure of your cadets'
abilities that you have to play games like this?"
"I'm completely
confident in my cadets' potential."
"Their potential has
never been in doubt. In any scenario, these kids will have a bright future. They're
the best of the best." Jim walked back to them. "The question is
whether pulling them out of the general ranks is the right thing to do."
"Why should they be kept
back?" Ross held out a hand, a conciliatory gesture that fell flat when
Jim turned away. "You skyrocketed through the ranks, Admiral. Youngest
captain ever. More commendations than you can probably remember. Hell, you
stole your ship back after you defeated an invincible machine...again. What
would your career have been like if they'd recognized that brilliance early on
and pointed you accordingly?"
Chapel smiled. Jim would have
been commanding in diapers. He shot her a look, and she wiped the smile off her
face.
Turning back to Ross, he
said, "We learn who we are by how we lead everyone, not just the best and
brightest. We learn what we're made of by making a team out of everyone—the
weak links and the others—and by developing those who need it. What kind of
leadership challenge are you going to have with Red Squad other than keeping
the loose cannons from bouncing off the bulkheads?"
"Is that what you think
they are? Loose cannons?" Before Jim could answer, Ross said, "And I
don't care if I don't have a leadership challenge when I'll have the best
cadets Starfleet has to offer. I don't care if I don't have to worry about
anything except keeping these young people from getting bored. In fact, I
welcome it. That's the kind of challenge I crave. You can stick with trying to
make the mediocre shine."
A hail rang out. "Korohama to Neimann. We have the
results you wanted. Starfleet missed something vital when they did the initial
survey."
"I'll be right
there." Neimann smiled at Jim. "One of your
less shiny, mediocre officers, maybe?" He turned and walked away, then, as
he reached the door, he turned back. "I assume I'm dismissed, sir?"
"You're dismissed."
One of the cadets peeked in,
and Jim gestured for him to enter. As Jim headed for the door, he motioned for
Chapel to follow him. "Take your post," he said to the other cadet,
who still lingered in the corridor.
"So
what do you want to observe now?" Chapel asked quietly, taking in the way
he had his hands clutched behind his back, the harsh snap of his steps. She
could see that Ross's comment had hit hard. But she couldn't make that better. Jim
needed to figure out how to deal with getting older. "Jim, let's go to the
bridge."
He looked at her, and his
expression cleared. "I am old, Chris."
"Well, you're
older."
He smiled. "But I'm not
a fool."
"No, you're not. Ross is
just rattled. Today didn't go his way, and he's angry it fell apart in front of
us."
"But it didn't fall
apart. Those cadets were fantastic. Am I wrong? Thinking it's bad to pull them
out?"
"I don't know,
Jim."
He sighed. "I guess we
just keep observing and find out."
She led him onto the lift. "Bridge,"
she said, then glanced at him. "There's another way."
He started to smile. He knew
her well enough to know what it meant when her voice took on that tone, that it
generally preceded something a little sneaky. "Yes?"
"Oh, yes." She
leaned in closer. "You might want to get rid of the other observers?"
His grin grew bigger.
The doors opened on the bridge,
and Jim nodded to the two officers observing. Chapel thought they looked like
they'd welcome a break.
"We'll be here awhile. Why
don't you two go grab some joe?" His smile was the solicitous one of a
concerned admiral for the crew.
Chapel bit back a laugh as
the other two happily left the bridge. Taking on the most casual attitude she
could, she walked around the space, observing the cadets at duty. She stopped
frequently, asking questions, noting the way some of the cadets stared at her
challengingly, while others simply answered the questions and went back to
work. Looking back at Jim, who was trying to hide a smile, she walked to the
helm where the most confrontational-seeming of the cadets was working and stood
to the side, watching him for a long time.
Jim stood next to her. Frowning
slightly, he moved his eyebrows in the way that she knew meant, "What
now?"
"It's an interesting
experiment," she said to him, as if they weren't surrounded by a whole lot
of lab rats who could understand every word.
He began to grin.
"Daring, even." She
moved a little bit away from the cadet she'd picked as her victim. As if she
wanted privacy. She didn't lower her voice at all, and they were still easily
in his field of vision. "But I'm not convinced it's a good idea."
The cadet stiffened.
"You have different
ideas, Mister?" Jim's voice was like a whip, and again Chapel saw him
trying not to grin.
"Sir, no, sir."
"You agree with
me?" Chapel asked. "That's a surprise. Why are you on this ship
then?" She tried to make her voice sweet and soft, the one that had lulled
many a patient into letting her do something painful, or possibly humiliating,
to them.
"I mean, no, I don't
agree, sir." He was stammering and was probably blushing—he was lucky his
very dark skin hid the flush.
Chapel could tell the other
cadets were listening closely even as they pretended to be intent on their
stations. Just like in ops...or on a ship. Dynamics were dynamics.
"Permission to speak
freely, Cadet"—she glanced at his nametag—"Endoya."
He turned to her. "I
think it's an honor to be here. But more than that—this challenges me. And all
of us."
She saw a bunch of heads
nodding.
Jim pursed his lips, moving
around to the front so that the cadet could easily see him, and probably so
that most of the others could, too. "I know organizational dynamics are
part of the required curriculum since I'm the one who approves it." His
grin seemed to make Endoya and the others relax just
a little. "I want you to think in terms of Darwinian dynamics."
"Isn't that what this
is, sir?" A young female cadet at navigation looked down as if embarrassed
at the way she'd blurted out that comment.
Jim nodded to her. "Go
on."
"We're the
fittest." She met his eyes and didn't look away. "We're the best. Our
grades, our test scores, the way we perform in activities. We are the top
cadets."
"Alphas," Chapel
said softly, remembering how Jim loved to boil things down to pack dynamics. She
could see where he was going with this but didn't think that the cadets could.
He smiled. "Exactly,
Commander. What we have here are alphas. This entire room is filled with them. Hell,
this entire ship is." He turned back to the woman. "You may be alpha
female among these other alphas, Morris." He didn't appear to even glance
at the woman's nametag as he used her name like they were old pals.
Chapel had always wished she
could be that smooth.
Jim moved away. "In any
case, one of you is first among equals. Or maybe two of you if you buy into the
true pack model where gender is a factor." He looked at Chapel, grinning. "For
the record, I don't. For all we know, Morris, you may be alpha, period."
Chapel smiled. She didn't
think Morris was the alpha here. It was obvious that Endoya
and a young woman at tactical agreed with that. But Morris would be high
ranking in this pack, even if not the top. She'd spoken her mind to an admiral.
Either she was confident of her role—or she was an idiot when it came to
protocol. And the best and brightest were never idiots when it came to that. They
might run around protocol with abandon, but they were always aware of it.
Jim sighed as if he was
thinking and had reached a rather disturbing conclusion. "It doesn't
matter who's alpha here. But I want you to consider something. If you're all
alpha, then odds are excellent that no matter what group you'd found yourself
in at the academy, you would have been the leader." He walked over to Endoya. "I bet you were the best pilot in your
class."
Endoya nodded. "Three years in a row."
Jim smiled, sharing the young
man's accomplishments. "See, you were leading from an early age. Typical
alpha behavior." He walked away, then he turned back so quickly that Endoya jerked a little. "What happens to the rest of
them now? I assume you and the number two pilot are here?"
Endoya nodded.
"What happens to the
rest? Who's the leader now?"
Chapel smiled. Now was when
he'd close the trap.
"The number three
person," Morris said softly.
"That's right." Jim
moved to stand in front of her. "Is that a good thing?"
She considered the question,
and Chapel gave her credit for not blurting out an answer. "I guess that
would depend on how close in ability that person was to the two taken
away."
Jim smiled. It was the right
answer. "And if that person isn't close? What happens to the group?"
"A group is only as
strong as its weakest link, not its strongest." A new voice. The woman at
tactical. Bylakov.
Jim looked up over at her. "Interesting
premise. Do you believe that?"
"I said it, sir." Her
eyes sparkled.
He smiled. "That's not
the same thing as believing it." He walked around the bridge, catching
each person's eye. "I want to posit something. Just for you to think
about. Throughout the cadet ranks there are gaps now because all of you are
gone. What does that do to the graduating class as a whole? I can see clearly
how this experience benefits all of you. But you're already at the top. What
does having you here and not with them as an example—as
a catalyst for ideas and top performance—do to the teams and squads that are
left in the ranks?"
Bylakov opened her mouth, then seemed to think better of what
she was going to say.
"Spit it out,
Cadet," Chapel said with a smile. "He loves the free exchange of
ideas."
Jim smiled. "She's not
wrong."
Bylakov smiled nervously. "Your bios were made available
to us, sirs. The bios of all our observers and trainers were. There isn't a
person among you who hasn't risen quickly, who wouldn't have been in Red Squad
if it had existed when you were at the Academy."
Chapel smiled. "I think
I'm safely out of that group."
Bylakov looked at her like she was a little bit stupid for
saying that. Like she'd disappointed her. "Sir, at the risk of appearing
to be apple polishing, you've risen faster than anyone with the exception of
the admiral. A circuitous route, it's true, but if you look at the
accomplishments in going from nurse to doctor to ops officer, and from ensign
to commander in such a short time, it's impressive. For someone who, according
to the personal notes in your file, never intended to be in Starfleet, it's
quite inspiring."
Chapel stared at the woman.
Jim smiled. "I've tried
to tell her that. I think you may have finally gotten it to sink in, Cadet. If
so, well done." He paced around the bridge. "So, that's a good point.
We all rose among our peers."
"And garnered resentment
in the process, sir." Endoya was staring at Jim
with an intensity that just bordered on hero worship. "I've read your
memoirs. I've read the comments of your fellow officers, sir. They're jealous
of you."
Morris nodded softly. "Maybe
if you'd been with your own..."
Bylakov laughed, and all eyes turned to her. She stared at
Jim and shook her head. "Captain Neimann is one
of your own. He doesn't appear comfortable with you." It was a dangerously
honest opinion to put out there. It seemed to float for a moment all alone, and
Bylakov began to look embarrassed. Finally, the
others nodded a little.
The door opened, and Ross
walked in. All noise ceased as the cadets went quickly back to work. Taking the
center chair, he looked around, then back at Jim and her with suspicion. "What's
going on?"
"We're getting to know
your cadets," Jim answered.
"That's great." Ross
didn't sound like it was great.
"They have interesting
ideas," Chapel said, and saw Bylakov flinch
slightly. "I'm sure you've heard them all, though. Your cadets are bright
and not afraid to share their opinions."
Jim smiled. "We'll get
out of your hair, Captain."
Ross nodded tightly.
Looking around the room, Jim
caught the eyes of a few of the cadets and grinned. "Ross, I have to tell
you, no matter what I feel about the program, I'm not worried about the future
of Starfleet. These are the finest cadets I've ever seen."
Chapel thought every cadet suddenly
sat a little straighter. She also thought that every one of these kids would
now follow Jim into the depths of hell if he asked.
"Most kind, sir." Ross
was staring at them both, a little perplexed.
Jim walked to the lift, and
as she followed him, she murmured to Ross, "Admiral Kirk's a fair
man."
His soft smile made her glad
she'd said it.
This wasn't a war. It was
just a question of how best to position their resources for the future. Once
they all started to focus on that and stopped trying to win, they'd finally
begin to get the job done.
##
Kirk walked over to the view
port in his quarters and stared out at the stars going by at warp. He never
tired of this view, not even when the ship wasn't his or when the crew was made
up of strangers—very young strangers. It was still space, still home.
His chime rang, and he walked
over rather than just calling admittance. Palming open the door, he saw Chris
waiting, her head down.
She looked up at him. "Hi."
Before she could continue, he
said, "I know it was my idea, but would you mind if we skipped dinner
tonight?"
"No."
"Thanks." As he
turned away from her, she surprised him by pushing past him, walking well into
the room before she turned to stare at him.
"I meant not at all. Not
something else in lieu of dinner." He walked past her to the view port.
"I know what you meant. What's
wrong?"
He could hear her walking toward
him, could sense her bringing her hand up to touch him. He should tell her to
stop, but he wanted to see if she'd touch him where he thought she would, on
the back of his neck, running her fingers hard up under his hair, over his
scalp. Antonia had never gotten the hang of this; Chris had never lost it—he
had to stifle a moan.
Then he pulled away. "Don't."
"You used to love
that." She leaned in closer, her breath warm on his ear as she said,
"I can tell you still do."
"Chris, I'm feeling a little
too vulnerable tonight for sexy repartee."
"You mean you're feeling
a little too old." Her voice was caustic, as if she had no time for his
wallowing.
"I do wish you'd get
over your tendency to sugarcoat things." He turned to look at her.
She stared back,
arms folded across her chest. Then she smiled and walked over to the small
couch, sitting down and tucking her legs under her. "So, tell me what's
eating you."
"I don't want to."
"Yes, you do. Or you'd
have commed me and cancelled. You can never resist me in person. I doubt you've
forgotten that."
"You think rather highly
of yourself."
"No. I think rather
highly of our chemistry together. On my own, I'm not that exciting." She
patted the space next to her. "Come sit."
He thought of all the times
they'd sat on a sofa. He couldn't remember very many that they hadn't ended up
engaged in nasty activities. He could tell by her smile she was thinking the
same thing, so he moved to the bed, sitting down across the room from her. "I
believe I'm safer here."
She laughed, the deep,
throaty, "I'd like to have sex now please" laugh he'd never
forgotten. "It's slightly scary that you're safer on the bed."
"Yes, it is." He
began to grin. "And no, it's not."
She leaned back. "So what's wrong? Is it just what Ross said?"
"I won't deny that's
bugging me."
"You're going to be
fifty, Jim. Not a hundred and fifty."
"I know." He looked
down. Why the hell hadn't he commed her to cancel? Was she right? Had he wanted
to have this conversation?
"Are you all right
medically?"
His head shot up, "I'm
perfectly capable—oh, that's not what you're asking, is it?"
She laughed softly. "No,
but I'm glad to hear that all systems are in working order." She shifted a
little. "Otherwise, you're feeling okay?"
"Eyes are bothering me. I
wish you'd taken that grant to find an alternative to Retinax."
"Sometimes I do, too. Maybe
we'd have done better if I'd been with you more?"
"Maybe so." He took
a deep breath. He didn't like to talk about the year he and Chris had spent
falling apart. He'd been grounded, and she'd been flitting all over the
quadrant doing biochem research in support of several
high-profile projects. He'd thought they were finally going to settle down, but
she'd left him missing her more than he had in space.
He looked at her and saw she
was staring at him, her expression wary. That period of time was a minefield
for them. Both when they'd lived it and now looking back.
"I never stopped loving
you," she said.
He nodded, the motion terse,
which he regretted. He tried again, but it didn't come out much better.
She smiled gamely, but he
could see the buried pain in the expression. "You told me to take the
position I wanted. You didn't tell me it would bother you if I was gone that
much. You'd been gone and I'd been on Earth and we'd done fine. I guess I
expected it to be the same if we reversed it."
"I don't do well on
terra firma."
"I know that now."
"You should have known
that then. You saw me before V'ger."
She swallowed hard, and he
had the feeling she was biting back a retort. Narrowing his eyes, he studied
her.
"Not going to
fight?" he finally asked.
"No, I'm not. I'm tired,
Jim. And I'm feeling pretty vulnerable right now, too." She got up and
walked to the door. "I'm sorry I busted in here," she said as the
door opened for her.
"Don't go." There
was nothing particularly friendly in his voice; it was almost an order.
She didn't turn, but she did
stop, and the door closed. "Are you sure about that?"
He moved to the couch and
smiled when she turned. "See. I'm not afraid."
Her eyes were almost bleak. "Then
you're a fool. We'll rip each other to shreds again."
"We haven't done it yet."
"Give us time."
"I'd like to. Wouldn't
you?" He stared her down, could see by her eyes that she was fully aware
of what he was saying.
"Isn't this the
distraction Ross wanted?"
"No, this is real life. We
just happen to be on his ship playing it out." He held his hand out. "Chris,
come back to me."
His voice cracked a little,
giving his words more meaning, and he almost wanted to take them back. But then
she was walking toward him, a lost look on her face. She sat down next to him,
her hand on his thigh—he could feel her touch in every nerve ending on his
body.
He pulled her to him, drawing
her closer and closer. He could feel her resisting a little, so he let go of
her. "If you don't want to do this, then go away, Chris. Or go back to Ross.
I'm sure he's a prince."
Her eyes narrowed; he'd made
her mad. Smiling, he waited as she moved closer to him.
"What about your
princess, Jim? It took you no time to find Antonia. I've always wondered—did you
meet her before or after we broke up?"
"After," he said,
the word coming out as a growl. "I told you I was faithful. But I can see
how it might have been tough for you to know that. You weren't ever home."
Pushing away from him, she
stood and stalking to the door. But she didn't go out, just turned and paced to
the view port. Then across the room again and back to the view port—an endless
cycle until he stood up and got in her way. She tried to move around him, but
he drew her close.
"I never stopped loving
you either," he said as he pulled her to him.
She didn't resist the kiss,
melting into him the way she always had. Her hands roamed over his back, across
his hips, up into his hair, pulling him closer. He explored her body, getting
used to her fuller hips, opening her uniform so he could appreciate how other
parts of her were fuller, too. She moaned as he pushed her to the bed and
tugged off her uniform, then his own.
He tried to pin her, but she
pushed him to his back, kissing down his chest to his belly, then to other,
more sensitive, parts. If he hadn't been in full working order, her attention
to his nether regions would have made sure that he was. As she kissed her way
back up to him, she was smiling in the sexy "Look what I did" way he
loved.
"Bad girl," he said
to her, pulling her close and kissing her, his hands finding places that he
knew she liked to be touched. He didn't break the kiss as he pushed her to her
back and began to play in earnest. She was breathing hard by the time he
finished, moaning her pleasure loudly into his mouth as he kissed her while she
bucked against him.
"Jim," she said,
running her fingers through his hair, pushing down the way he loved, making him
close his eyes. "I never thought I'd be with you again."
"I know," he said,
moving over her, the pleasure he'd given her rejuvenating him the way it always
had. Their bodies joined, and it was like the years apart had never happened.
She ran her fingers down his
back, causing him to shiver at the light touch. Then she ran her fingers down
her own chest, stopping to linger, making him grin. She knew he was helpless
when she did this. As she alternated between touching him and herself, pulling
him down for frequent fleeting kisses, he could feel himself losing control.
"Chris," he
breathed as he collapsed on top of her and felt her hug him close, as if he was
going to try to escape. As if he could even move?
"I love you," she
said, and he looked at her, surprised to see she'd teared up.
"Did I hurt you?"
he asked, brushing away a tear that escaped.
She shook her head, blinking
furiously. "I've missed you. I've missed this. No one else is like
you."
"I know." No one
else was like her either; no sex was ever like this. Kissing her, he rolled off
and pulled her in close to nestle against him. "Stay here tonight?"
She nodded, kissing his
chest. He could hear her stomach rumbling.
"You're hungry."
"I'll survive without a
meal. I'd rather be here with you."
He pushed her away gently and
walked to the closet. "It doesn't have to be either/or." He pulled
out one of the bars he'd brought for breakfast. Tearing one open, he took a
bite, then crawled back into bed and held it out to her, smiling when she took
a bite. "They're not very good. But they're very nutritious."
"They'll keep our
strength up," she said, her smile almost shy. He loved this tender Chris. She
tended to appear only after sex or when he'd been hurt or sick.
"That's right. We have a
lot of night ahead of us." He frowned, worried suddenly that they were
doing this—that soon their friends would know they were together again and
would be waiting for what they would probably think was the inevitable
explosion.
Chris was watching him, and
he smiled with an assurance he wasn't sure he felt.
"What?" She took
another bite from his bar, her fingers soft on his as she steadied his grasp.
"I want to be with you. Back
together again. A couple."
She smiled, pushing the bar
toward his mouth. "That's nice."
He kissed her fingers before
taking a bite. "Our friends... So many expectations."
She shrugged. "Let's not
tell them. It can be our secret for a while, can't it?" She snuggled against
him. "I've had longer to think about what I'd do if I had this back,
Jim."
"Don't bet on
that."
She pulled away so that their
eyes met. "You thought about me when you were with her?"
He didn't want to nod, but he
did.
"I almost feel sorry for
her."
"How big an almost is
that?"
She held her fingers up about
a centimeter apart, and he laughed, the bark of sound filling the room.
"Remember when we used
to do that?" she asked. "When laughing wasn't something other people
did?" She nuzzled his neck. "Remember when love didn't hurt?"
"Barely." It wasn't
true. Love with Antonia hadn't hurt. Trouble was, even when he'd been happy
with Antonia, he couldn't get Chris out of his mind. He'd still conjured up her
face when he was alone and touching himself.
He kissed Chris, wondering if
she was thinking the same thing—that love with her other men hadn't hurt the
way love with him did.
Her face was troubled as she
pulled away. "You think that would work? To not tell anyone for a while? Just
have this for us?" Her voice was a little shaky, as if she was afraid he'd say no.
"I think it will." He
held the last of the bar to her, and she took it, but then she lifted her mouth
up, offering the food to him.
He bit into it gently, taking
half. Their lips met for a moment, then he pulled away. Her smile was very soft
as she finished eating, taking the wrapper from him and placing it on the
bedside table.
"We can do this,"
he said as he pushed her to her back and followed her body with his lips,
disappearing under the sheet in his quest for parts south.
"Yes, we can," she
said. Then she bucked under his mouth and didn't say anything coherent for
quite a while.
##
Chapel woke slowly, started
to stretch and felt someone pull her closer. Jim. She was with Jim. She rolled
over slowly, sliding under his hand. He was still asleep, was pulling her
closer, his dreams perhaps interrupted by her movement.
He used to lie with her like
this. A hand on her, often holding her close. She loved sleeping next to him.
Glancing at the chrono, she
saw they had plenty of time before they needed to be up, so she closed her eyes
and nestled in closer. She lay in a drowsy haze, caught in some pleasant place
that wasn't quite sleep.
A little while later, she
felt him run his hand through her hair and heard his whispered, "Good
morning."
"How do you know I'm
awake?" She smiled and nuzzled his chest.
"Well, that's a good
indication." He pushed her away a little bit, then kissed her.
Moving her hands down his
body, she began to play.
"That's another good
indication." He started to say something else, but the words turned into a
moan.
"Good morning," she
said, as she pulled him on top of her. The feel of him with her again was
overwhelming, and she saw him watching her intently as he moved.
"Too much?" he
asked with a gentle smile.
"No. Just right." She
knew that neither of them was talking about the sex. Since the day she'd left
him, she'd never stopped thinking about him, had never gotten over him.
She'd always wanted him back.
She'd been sure she'd lost him forever when he'd left Starfleet and taken up
with Antonia. But here Chapel was—in his bed, in his arms, moaning underneath
him and clutching him to her as if she could pull him any closer.
"I love you," she
said, capturing his ear, biting it gently then letting go.
"I never thought I'd
hear you say that again." He smiled gently. "Life lacked a certain quality
without you."
She wrapped her legs around
him, keeping him from pulling away from her. "It was quieter, I
imagine?"
"Oh, yes." Staring
down at her, he sighed. "We're a little bit insane to do this again."
"I know." She
didn't look away. "Want me to let you go?" She unwrapped her legs so
he'd know she wasn't talking about just for the moment.
"No." He rolled off
her, pulling her in close. "I missed you, Commander." Kissing her
nose, he chuckled. "I was so proud of you when you got promoted."
"You weren't speaking to
me."
"Doesn't mean I wasn't
proud of you, Chris." He touched her cheek, his finger trailing down her
neck, then down her chest. "I paid attention to what you were up to. I
knew I shouldn't, but I couldn't stop."
She found it hard to meet his
eyes.
"What?" he asked.
"It's bad."
He just waited.
"I rented a flitter and
drove into the mountains. I saw the two of you..." She closed her eyes,
trying to push back how much it had hurt to see him with Antonia. He'd been
holding the petite woman close, hands running down a body that had looked
luscious even from where Chapel had been sitting. "It was right after you
two started."
"That couldn't have felt
good."
"Hurt like hell."
Nodding, he nestled against
her. "I saw you and Ross together last year. You looked happy. It damn
near tore my heart out." He sighed. Loudly. "Will we do any better
this time?"
"I don't know." She
could feel him tense. "We can try."
"We can try."
"But we don't have
to." She could feel herself tense, even as part of her whispered that it
might be for the best to abandon this now, jump ship while she still owned her
heart—and it was still more or less in one piece.
"Neither of us are
cowards." There was something in his voice. Something unutterably sad. He
turned his face away, as if he was a coward. As if he couldn't bear to look at
her.
"I don't know if we'll
make it this time, Jim. I don't know if we're supposed to."
He nodded tightly.
"I only know that I love
you. I tried to forget you. But..."
"But..." Taking a
deep breath, he turned to look at her. "I love you, too. I don't want to
get any older without you."
"You're really wallowing
in this getting old business, you know?" She let her fingers roam down and
down until she ran into a part of him that had no time for such nonsense.
He groaned. "God. How do
you do that?"
Smiling, she kissed him. "He
loves me."
"He really does." He
pulled her onto him. "I love you, too."
"I know." She
closed her eyes, feeling less need to try to make sense of it while they were
this close, this connected. "When we're making love, everything seems so
simple."
"When we're making love,
everything is simple." His smile was easy, uncomplicated.
She had to kiss him, had to
move harder, faster. Had to make his smile change, grow less dreamy, more
possessive as he clutched at her. She'd missed him so. Having him now was all
that mattered. She didn't care if she regretted it later. She didn't care about
anything except trying to squeeze as much loving into what they had left of
their morning.
##
Kirk refilled his coffee, watching
as Neimann and Chris sat talking over breakfast. They
had an easy rapport, and he felt a surge of something that he hated to admit
was jealousy. Chris was with him now. She'd always been with him in some sense,
just as he'd always been with her.
Their love seemed enduring—if
not terribly healthy at times.
As if she knew he was
thinking something negative, Chris looked over at him, her eyebrows screwing
down into a question. He smiled at her, trying to make it an easy expression. One
that would mean only that he loved her. That he wanted her. That he was glad
they were together again.
Neimann got up and left Chris at the table. As Kirk walked
back to her, he wondered if the cadets scattered throughout the mess had any
idea what kind of dynamic was running through the interactions of their advisor
and his visiting officers. He wasn't sure he entirely understood all the
dynamics.
Yawning, Chris reached for
the mug he'd refilled for her.
"Someone didn't get
enough sleep," he murmured.
"Someone didn't let
me." Her smile was so sexy that he was sure everyone in the room could
tell they were lovers. "You and Ross aren't friends, are you?" she
asked.
He sipped his coffee,
thinking about how best to answer her question. "We get on fine—or we did
before he started escorting you hither and yon. But we're not friends,
no."
"What do you think of
him?"
"He's a fine officer, a—"
"No. Not the party line.
What do you really think of him?"
Kirk took a deep breath. This
was how he first noticed her. When she'd been willing to press him, to stop him
and make him regroup, rethink, redirect. She called him on things. Not many did
that. It was what had gained her admittance into his inner circle. A very small
circle of those he'd commanded—a slightly larger circle where his peers were
concerned.
"You still care for him,
Chris. Why ask me this?"
"Because I want to
know."
"All right. I think he's
stubborn to the point of pigheaded. This exercise is typical of the way he
finds a project and turns it into a crusade. He's not above playing games to
ensure his success—as we've both found out this trip. And I don't trust him. But
he's good to his people, and his instincts seem right on as far as captaining a
ship go."
"When he's not on a
crusade, you mean?"
"When he's not on a
crusade." Kirk leaned forward. "And he has great taste in
women."
"Don't try to distract
me." But she grinned, clearly pleased that he was bringing the personal
into the discussion. "You say you don't trust him. How can he be a good
captain if you can't trust him?"
"I'm not saying his
people can't trust him most of the time. Just that as his peer, or slightly
higher"—he smiled tightly; Endoya hadn't been
wrong that those who should have been his peers resented his rapid rise—"I've
seen him leave folks to twist in the wind. Especially if it was a choice
between his crusade and the greater good."
She stared at him, then took
a deep breath.
"You don't agree with my
assessment, Chris?"
"Actually, I do. His
crusades were one of the reasons I stopped seeing him. He let me twist in the
wind one too many times, emotionally speaking." She looked down. "That's
a nasty expression, by the way. I'm not sure he meant to leave me
hanging."
He watched her as she played
with some spilled salt, moving it into small little dunes. They made him think
of the ones they'd made love behind on a beach west of Seattle. They'd gone
north one weekend, back when they'd still run away together on a lark.
"Why do you think he
cares so much about Red Squad?" She looked up at him, her blue eyes a
little dull from lack of sleep.
"He was a hard
charger." Neimann had been a rival squad leader
back in their Academy days. He'd risen fast once he'd hit the ranks.
He'd risen fast, but Kirk had
still left him in the dust.
"He's jealous of you. That
was the other reason we broke up. I got tired of the competition between you. Especially
when you didn't even know there was one." She met his eyes. "Although
maybe, from what you said this morning, you did?"
"If I'd known he was so
worried about me coming to take you back, I might have actually done it." He
grinned but could feel there was a touch of bitterness in it.
She didn't seem to mind. "And
I'd have come out to the pretty pines and bopped your lady love over the
head."
"Kidnapping me in the
process?"
She nodded. "Would you
have gone with me?"
"I don't know."
The answer didn't seem to
surprise her. "I know. I probably wouldn't have left Ross for you. You and
I were too...raw."
"Good word for it."
Raw—like their relationship had rubbed at them until their skin had torn off. Or
halfway so. Leaving each other had been what had torn it all the way off.
"Do you think Bylakov was right?" she asked softly. "That my
rise is something inspiring?"
"How many times have I
told you that?" He hadn't been teasing the cadet. Chris never seemed to
believe in her own potential. Or maybe she believed in it, but didn't think of
it as potential. Just the ability to press on until she got what she wanted.
"I'd have never made Red
Squad," she murmured.
He laughed softly.
"What?"
"Sweetheart, you did
make Red Squad. You talked your way onto my ship."
"Oh, yeah." Her
grin was the one that had made him fall in love with her. Cockeyed and sweet. Full
of wry humor and promise. She'd been a woman he'd known slightly for a long
time. A woman he'd gotten to know well only after V'ger, before she'd left the
ship again to take a position back on Earth. A woman he'd taken to his bed
after a night of laughter and truths—her telling him about Roger and him
telling her about Carol and his son. They'd been sitting in his temporary
quarters, in front of the fire. He'd been back for meetings at Command, had run
into her at Starfleet Medical, had asked her to dinner at his favorite romantic
restaurant before he could think the whole thing through. When dinner was over,
he'd invited her back to his room.
He hadn't intended to seduce
her, and she'd told him later that she hadn't intended to seduce him. It had
just happened. She'd leaned in when he'd finished telling her about David, her
eyes sparkling with unshed tears, and he'd loved her at the moment. She'd moved
him with her sweet sympathy and her willingness to feel the pain he'd long ago
locked away.
"I'm sorry," she'd
said.
He'd kissed her. That was all
it had taken.
"Chapel to Kirk."
He looked up at her and
realized he'd been moving the salt around for her. "Sorry. I was in San
Francisco. The VOQ. With a certain doctor?"
Her expression grew very
soft. "She liked you a lot."
"She doesn't
still?"
"Oh, she does." Leaning
back, she studied him. "That moment had potential."
"Potential we mined
extremely well."
"But..." She looked
down and to her right, the way she did when she was trying to put together a
puzzle. "It's sort of what you said. Who would have ever put us together? Yet...we
work."
"You're saying we're not
Red Squad material?"
"I'm saying no one would
have picked us for a couple." She laughed softly. "Granted, we've not
proven to be the ideal couple."
"False start." He
grinned. It felt good to feel this way. Happy. He was happy. They were still
far from the ideal couple—but he felt like he was floating.
"I don't think I'll use
us as an example with the cadets, though." She swept the salt dunes into
her empty mug. Looking up at him, she smiled a bit wickedly. "Remember
that beach?"
"I do."
"Those were good times,
Jim. Maybe we won't lose them if we try harder this time."
"Maybe not." He
stood up. "Ready to go assess cadets?"
She nodded.
Turning to her as they hit
the door, he said, "Chris, we don't have to keep this a secret if you
don't want to."
"I think we
should." She bumped up against him as they entered the lift. "We've
got enough to do without worrying about what our friends think."
"I just..." He
touched her cheek. "I just don't want you to think I'm hiding this."
"And you don't want to
think that I might be doing that, either?"
"You know me too
well."
"No such thing,"
she said, leaning up against him for a moment, her warmth a reminder of every
good thing they'd ever known.
Funny—now that he let
himself, he could recall so many.
##
"You seem pensive."
Ross tossed Chapel an apple, a green one. She was surprised he remembered she
liked those.
"Just relaxing."
"No admiral in
tow?"
"He's down in engineering."
She studied him. "Why did you do this?"
"Do what?" Sitting
down, he bit heartily into his own apple.
"Your cadets are good. All
on their own. You didn't need to set me up." She bit into the fruit,
enjoying the stinging tartness.
"Who said I was doing
that?" Ross seemed to relax, leaning back in his chair. "And don't
tell me you're not enjoying the set up. You and I might have fizzled, but I did
get to know you well enough to see when you're having fun."
She smiled slowly.
"A lot of fun." He
took a deep breath, looking at the cadets scattered around the mess. "They're
going to make the finest officers."
"Probably so. That's not
what Jim's debating with you."
"I know what he thinks. But
what do you think?"
Frowning, she bit into her
apple again, buying time. She met his gaze and saw the need
to know which way she would go. "You didn't bring me here just to
distract Jim. You thought I could influence him, didn't you?"
His grin was almost innocent.
"Influence him?"
She exhaled, the sound loud
with frustration. "Why are you playing these games?"
He leaned forward suddenly, the movement almost violent. "Because he
always wins, Christine. Always. I needed an ace. You were it."
"Where I come from,
that's called cheating."
"Where I come from, it's
called covering your ass."
"He's not aiming to kick
your ass, Ross. So quit covering it."
He put the apple down on a
napkin then pushed it aside. "Christine, these are the finest cadets, the
very best Starfleet has to offer. I intend to mold them and test them and make
them even finer."
"I understand that. But
what about the rest of the cadets?"
"They'll be fine. They'll
get along."
"They're not all mediocre.
Some of them lack direction, but they'll find it." She thought of Rand,
charging so hard now. "Some of them will discover a dream and chase it for
all they're worth." Sulu came to mind, with his dream of being a starship
captain. "But they won't start out that way."
"I accept there are late
bloomers. But they'll bloom with or without my program. This is for those who
shine now."
"You should ask Jim
about Gary Mitchell. He shone early. Very, very bright."
Ross looked down. "That's
not a fair example. Gary would never have done what he did if he hadn't been
taken over by some kind of power."
"Doctor Dehner was taken over. She fought the power. He
didn't."
"So
you're saying my Red Squad cadets are going to become megalomaniacs?"
"No, I'm saying that the
potential exists in any cadet, but especially those for whom it comes so
easily. And when you take them outside the system like this, when you give them
this rarified air, you cut their ties to other officers. Normal officers."
"Now I know what your
pillow talk with Jim is like. You're quite the sponge."
She laughed, the sound hard
and angry. "That wasn't Jim talking. That was me. Do you know what I did
on the Enterprise, Ross? I watched. I watched everything. The dynamics,
especially. Jim excelled at that, you know? Bringing
people together. Giving them a common cause no matter what their abilities. He
molded them, taught them, inspired them. And he led by example."
"The king of the
fleet." Ross smiled bitterly. "He's not a good example. Everything he
touches turns to gold."
"Do you think that's
without effort? Do you think he doesn't work at it?" She leaned in. "I've
seen him so exhausted that he could barely stand, and yet he stayed upright,
making sure his crew was all right before he collapsed."
"You worship him,
Christine. You're his lover. I'd expect that."
"When did this become
about him?"
Ross sat back, taking a long
slow breath.
"Ross. I'm serious. What's
going on?"
"This idea has merit,
Christine. He opposed me in front of everyone. Didn't even give it a chance. He'd
kill it on principle if I didn't have some key admirals in my corner."
"I don't think that's
true."
"But you don't know for
sure." Ross leaned in, almost whispering, "Has it occurred to you
that a man like Jim wouldn't shine in a Red Squad? Maybe that's why he opposes
it? Because he doesn't want to find out how ordinary he is when he's faced with
a level playing field."
She got up slowly, shaking her
head. "Ordinary?"
"Ordinary." His
eyes were hard.
Chapel realized this had
nothing to do with her. It was just possible her relationship with Ross had had
nothing to do with her. "Why do you hate him so?"
"I don't hate him."
"You pursued me because
I was once his, didn't you?"
He didn't answer her.
"Well, this is one fun
voyage, Ross. Thanks for including me in it." She put her hands on the
table, leaning over. "You're obsessed with him."
"I want to win. I want
to beat him. That doesn't make me a bad guy."
"No? It sure puts your
cadets in the middle—your cadets...and me." She turned before he could say
anything else, pushing past one of the other advisors. Hurrying to the lift,
she let the doors close before she said, "Engineering."
Jim looked up as she came in.
"Commander, come look at this."
She smiled at the cadets as
she walked up, saw their easy grins back. They were completely at ease with Jim
and with her. One of them started talking again, explaining the inner workings
of a new warp something-or-other.
Jim grinned at her. "Scotty
would be green with envy."
"Scotty probably
invented it," she murmured.
"Actually, no," the
cadet said. "But Commander Tavrek did use
Scott's research as a jumping-off point."
Jim followed two of the other
cadets to one of the Jefferies tubes. The first cadet hung back with Chapel.
She glanced at his nametag. "Something
on your mind, Fusai?"
He was watching Jim. "It's
an honor having him aboard." The cadet seemed to blush. "He's always
been a hero of mine."
She smiled. "Of mine,
too." Leaning against the console, she watched the other cadets in
engineering, all going about their business so confidently. "Tell me something,
Fusai. Do you feel ordinary?"
"Ma'am?"
"Among all this
excellence. Do you still feel outstanding?"
He thought about that. "Yes,
ma'am. But I also feel...challenged. And when I rise to meet the challenge, I
feel better about myself than ever."
"Because it's
hard?"
"Because it's
harder." He grinned. "I've never had to try very hard to impress
anyone. Here...here I have to work at it."
She smiled. It was the answer
she imagined Jim might have given her at that age. Men like him—and like Fusai—viewed things as challenges, not problems.
"You're our future
leaders."
He nodded. He'd no doubt
heard that plenty of times.
"Do you know what
defines a leader?"
He ran through the standard
list. "Integrity. Courage. Resourcefulness."
"All things within
you."
"I hope so." His
smile was very earnest.
"I'd like to offer
another answer."
He waited.
"What if a leader isn't
defined by things inside himself? What if he's defined by the willingness of
others to follow him?"
Fusai frowned, obviously considering the idea. Then he
looked past her, at the other cadets. "It's an interesting idea."
"Yes. Tell me, Fusai. Where are those who will follow?" She touched
his arm, trying to show him there was no malice in what she was saying. "How
will you know what moves them, what motivates them, if you're never with
them?"
He met her eyes.
"Someone else is
learning that. Back at the Academy. Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does any
group. Someone is learning to lead them. How will you fit into that equation
when you get off this ivory tower?"
"You don't approve of
us?"
"Cadet, I tested out of
half my M.D. prerequisites. I left my peers far behind. I don't have to approve
of you to understand you."
He swallowed. "I like it
here."
"I imagine you do."
She saw Jim waiting for her at the door. "Just...think about what I said. I
don't expect you do anything except that."
She walked away quickly, not
waiting to see what his answer to that would be.
##
Kirk watched Chris as she
stood at the viewport, looking out at the stars. She was naked, the soft glow
from the overheads lighting her hair and skin. He was pretty sure she thought
he was asleep, that she didn't know he'd roused as she'd climbed out of bed.
She stood as still as a
statue, then began to rub her arms as if trying to warm herself. Was she cold
here in his bed? Was she...unhappy?
"Have you ever been obsessed
with someone?" she asked, surprising him.
"Not that I know of. And
how did you know I was awake?"
She turned and didn't appear
the least bit self-conscious about standing in front of him naked. "Your
breathing changes. I always knew when you were faking sleep." She smiled.
"Always?"
"Why do you think I was
such a good nurse? I listened." She sighed. "I watched. I
listened."
"You did things,
too." He smiled, unsure where she was going but hearing a note of
something that sounded like self-pity. "You patched my sorry ass up more
times than I like to think about."
"I did do that." She
walked toward him, smiling as he pulled her back into bed, back into his arms.
"You okay?" He
wanted to kiss her but decided it would be prudent to get the answer to his
question before he did.
She just nodded, cuddling
against him in a way that seemed out of character.
"Chris, what's
wrong?"
"Ross is obsessed with
you. With beating you." She looked up at him. He almost expected tears,
but her eyes were dry. "I think that's why he was with me. To have what
you had."
"It may have started out
that way. But once the man slept with you, I'm sure he ended up wanting you for
you." He thought about his interactions with Neimann
over the years. "Do you really think that's why he did it?"
"He as much as admitted
it today." She moved until she could look at him and stared at him as if
he was a particularly troublesome sample. "Did you humiliate him at the
board? When he presented the Red Squad concept?"
"I challenged him. I
wouldn't say I humiliated him."
"He thinks you
did."
Kirk sighed. "It's
gotten so anything I do, anything I challenge, is a bigger deal than it has to
be." He met her eyes and didn't look away. "It's worse since I came
back."
"You resigned. And then—poof!—they welcome you back into the ranks. Just like
that." She smiled. "What did you expect?"
"I don't know. These men
and women...they were my friends. My classmates."
"Your rivals."
"I guess. I never saw
them as that."
She laughed softly. "Maybe
that's the problem? You never did, and they wanted that from you. To be taken
seriously as rivals?"
"I didn't mean it like
that. I meant that I see collaboration—"
She put a warm finger on his
lips. "It's possible to be too good at what you do."
He pulled away. "I don't
believe that. And neither do you."
Leaning down, she kissed him.
It was a strange kiss. Devoid of passion, but still warm. "No, I don't
believe it."
She nestled against him
again, and he could feel her shaking. "Chris? What's wrong?"
"Being here. With you. It's
wonderful."
"It is."
"And it's terrible. I'm
afraid." She stopped, and he could hear her take a deep breath. "I'm
afraid of us. What we'll do to each other."
"You think I'm
not?"
"I'm not sure I ever got
over you." She kissed him again, and this time there was passion in the
mix. "I'm afraid, but I'm even more afraid that if I walk away, I'll never
love anyone again. That I'll be alone till I..."
"Till you die." It
wasn't a question. He'd thought the same thing himself when he left Antonia. Almost
hadn't left her for just that reason.
She nodded. "Morbid?"
"Yes. But maybe
realistic, too?" Pulling her closer, he kissed her hair. "We
shouldn't be together just because we're afraid of being alone."
"We shouldn't not be
together just because we're afraid of crashing and burning."
He started to laugh. "You
can argue any side, Doctor Chapel."
"Sometimes"—her voice
was barely a whisper—"I wish I didn't love you so much. It wouldn't be
scary, then. It would be safe."
He thought of the Enterprise.
How much he missed her. She'd never been safe. "Is that what we want? Safe?"
He could hear how he spit the word out, as if safe was something that twisted
in his craw.
"I don't know
anymore." She began to rub his leg, working her way over, and he grabbed
her hand, stopping her.
"Do you trust me?"
he asked.
"With my life." Her
answer was too fast, too glib.
"What about with your
heart?"
She pulled her hand away. "That's
harder."
"I know." He rolled
away from her, lying on his back, staring at the ceiling, their arms the only
part that touched. "I'm not sure I trust you, either."
"I guess the giddy reunion
phase is over?"
He began to laugh. She amused
him at the oddest times. Rolling back to her, he said, "I guess it
is."
"I don't trust
you," she said. "But I love you. And I'm not sure I care about the
trust part. Not right now, anyway."
"I know," he said,
as he pulled her on top of him, over him.
Groaning, she closed her
eyes. "If we could just have sex all the time, we'd be fine."
"Yes, we would." He
touched her cheek, waiting until she opened her eyes to say, "I don't want
to lose you."
"I don't want you to
lose me." Leaning down, she kissed him. A good kiss. The right kind of
kiss. "We can be happy, can't we? We're capable of that?"
It was a question he'd
pondered many a night. Was he capable of that? "If I am capable of it, I
think it would be with you."
She smiled softly. "Such
a good answer." Then her smile faded. "And such a sad one, Jim."
"I know." He didn't
look away, let her see the truth in the statement. He didn't know anymore if he could be happy. He didn't know anymore if he would even recognize happiness. "I'm
old, Chris." Even as he said it, he felt the irony of the statement. The
part of him currently inside her didn't seem to be aging.
"No, you're not. You
just feel old. There's a difference." She moved faster, pressing him
harder. "Let me show you, Admiral."
Throwing his head back, toes
curling and fingers clutching the sheets, he let her take him to a place where
he felt young again.
For a moment.
But as they lay together,
quiet at last, he found himself wrestling with old thoughts. Used up thoughts.
"Stop thinking,
Jim."
He smiled. "How do you
know I am?"
"You're sighing a lot. You
do that when you wallow." She kissed his cheek. "I love you. No
matter what happens, I will always love you."
"Me too," he said,
pulling her close.
They were on the verge of
another chance, a new life together. It should be a happy thing. So why did
everything she was saying suddenly sound like goodbye?
##
"So
how's it going up there?" Cartwright glanced away, nodding to someone
Chapel couldn't see.
"It's going." At
his look, she shrugged. "I'm not sure what I think of Red Squad."
"Well, that's clearly not
an overwhelming endorsement."
"No, it's not." She
took a deep breath. "I question the wisdom of pulling the best away from
the others."
"Is that Jim
talking?"
She shot him a sharp glance. "Did
you know he was going to be here?"
"I'd have warned you if
I'd known." He waited for her to answer his question.
"Jim and I are in
agreement on this one, I think." She leaned in, as if she could convince
Cartwright of her sincerity by moving closer on his screen. "They're
missing out on too much. It's a safe environment for now. And they challenge
each other. But at the end of the day, they won't be leading each other. They'll
be leading the very people they've been separated from. They won't even know
them. And that won't be safe at all. It'll be a recipe for disaster."
He sat back. "That's been
said about prep-school kids for years. That they didn't live life but some
rarified version of it. That all the fine learning couldn't make up for actual
living."
"Do you buy that?"
"In some cases, perhaps."
He stared at her, as if he could read her mind over the distance separating
them. "Would you want to serve with these cadets, Christine?"
"Serve with them? Without
question." She took a deep breath. "But I'm not sure I'd want them
leading me."
He nodded slowly. "Who's
leading now?"
"Excuse me?" He'd
lost her, and she wasn't able to read the look on his face.
"Who's in charge up
there?"
"Ross is." She
started to smile, seeing where he was going. "Ross and his section
leaders." She saw him grin. "Maybe it's time some of the squad
led?"
"Maybe so." His
grin faded. "Peers work fine together, but once one gets the
advantage..."
"You were Jim's
peer."
He nodded.
"Ross's, too,
then."
"Yep." He leaned in
toward the screen. "Jim's sin is success."
"I know. Continued
success."
Cartwright nodded. "You
realize that if you side with Jim, Ross may say your personal relationship with
him is blinding you."
"So
I have to side with Ross or he cries collusion?" Shaking her head, she
laughed softly. "There are only so many sides to this. If I side with
Ross, couldn't it also be because of a prior personal relationship?"
Grinning, Cartwright nodded. "That's
what I like about you, Commander. You do know how to play the game."
"I hate the game."
"Doesn't matter if you
like it or not. Just that you're proficient."
"Then I better go
play." She reached for the switch that would cut the connection.
"Christine?"
Her hand paused in mid reach.
"Go easy on Jim."
She could feel her eyebrows
going up.
"He's...vulnerable right
now."
"And I'm not?"
He had the grace to look
sheepish. "You're a survivor."
"So is he."
"Once. I'm not sure he
could survive you twice."
His words stung. A lot. "Thanks.
That's flattering."
"I'm his friend. And
right now, I'm just your C.O., but someday I bet I'll be your friend,
too." As she started to protest, he raised his hand. "I'll shut up
now, Commander. I expect a progress report soon."
She nodded but could feel her
mouth set in a tight line.
"Christine, no one will
be happier if you two can make this work. It's just...I'm worried about
him."
"I'm not going to hurt
him."
"Okay." He nodded
once, very tightly, as if that was all that needed to be said. "Good luck
with the assessment. Cartwright out." The screen went blank.
Her door chime went off,
startling her. "Come."
Jim came in, his smile gentle
as he sat down across from her. "What's wrong?"
She shook her head, unwilling
to tell him that his ersatz big brother Matthew was warning her off him.
"Chris? Was that Matt
you were talking to?"
She nodded, trying very hard
to keep her look out of the miserable zone. Did her boss really think she'd
hurt Jim?
Jim sighed. "What did he
say?" Leaning forward, he took her hand in his, rubbing gently.
"He said we should solve
the leadership question by having the cadets start leading each other."
"Pick alphas for the alphas?"
She nodded, not meeting his
eyes.
"It's a good idea—at
least it will simulate some portion of the challenges of leadership. We'll
suggest it to Ross next time we see him. Now, what did Matt say about us?"
Sighing, she looked up. "He
thinks I'm going to hurt you."
"I'm not sure I don't
agree with him." His expression was neutral. "I may hurt you, as
well."
"I know." Her tone
was almost belligerent.
He laughed softly. "At
ease, Chris. Neither of us cares what he thinks about our relationship. Although,
we may look back on this moment and wish we'd listened to him." He let go
of her hand, stood up, and motioned for her to do the same.
"Is there an 'or' in
that statement?" she asked as she walked around her desk.
He pulled her close. "I
was getting to that." Kissing her, he held her so tightly she thought she
could feel his heart beating through their uniforms. "Or he may be dead
wrong and we'll live happily ever after."
"I like that
version."
"Me, too." He shook
his head. "So much for keeping this from our friends."
"Let's not tell anyone
else for a while." She couldn't imagine what a field day Len would have
with this.
"Officer thinking,
Commander." He let go of her. "Let's go do our jobs and worry about
this later."
"Or not at all."
"Even better." Grinning,
he pushed her gently out of her quarters, the feel of his hand on her back both
comforting and exciting.
"We don't have to hurt
each other," she murmured as she preceded him into the lift.
"No, we don't. Let's
not."
The door opened on the
bridge, cutting the conversation off as she followed him out.
They didn't have to hurt each
other this time. Not if they didn't want to. That was all they had to remember.
##
Kirk watched the play of
emotions over Neimann's face. The man wasn't liking
the idea of pulling out certain cadets to play captain. He probably liked it
even less that they were having this conversation in Kirk's office instead of
his own. It was a power play, and not a nice one, making the man come to him.
"I'm not sure I see the
problem, Ross. It's done all the time in the regular training exercises." Kirk
resisted adding "with our more mediocre cadets," knowing it would
just inflame the other man.
"These kids have been
teammates. To pull some of them out now would be to ruin the dynamic."
"How else are we going
to see if they can lead?"
"You've seen them. You
know they can."
"Know? I don't know
anything. I might sense it. But I've thought that before and been wrong. People
don't always respond in a positive manner to having leadership thrust upon
them. Others take to it naturally. If it were something we could predict, we'd
have a lot fewer bad leaders in the fleet." He glanced over at Chris, who
seemed to be sitting this out for the moment, watching the two of them like a
spectator at a tennis match. Her expression wasn't giving anything away.
Neimann looked at her. "You have nothing to say?"
"I have plenty to say. Just
not yet." Her expression didn't change, and Kirk wondered when she'd
perfected that poker face. Was it in her last assignment? Or had it been when
they'd been falling apart? Had she learned it to avoid hurt?
"Try chiming in now,
Commander," Neimann said, his tone sharper than
it needed to be. "I'd like you to prove you're not just his echo."
"Okay, then. I think
you're afraid," she said, not reacting when both men turned to look at
her. "I think you're afraid that they might not be able to lead each
other. Or rather, they might not be able to follow each other."
Kirk could feel his mouth
turning up and fought the smile. Damn, she'd grown a pair, or grown a bigger
pair—she hadn't been a shrinking violet when he'd been with her.
Neimann laughed, the sound low and scornful, but Kirk could
tell he was buying time. He stared Chris down, but her expression stayed bland.
"Fine. Pick some
leaders." Neimann sat back, as if he was washing
his hands of the whole notion.
"No. You do it." Kirk
could hear his voice tightening, as if he expected a fight. He realized he was
having fun. Baiting Neimann was fun—what did that say
about his current job if this was entertaining? What did it say about him?
"Why should I do it? You're
the brass here."
"Because that's how it's
done, Captain." Chris sighed. "Command decisions usually are made by
those who know the people to some degree. And how suited they'd be for the jobs
at hand."
Kirk nodded. "It usually
works."
"Sure
it does. Just ask Will Decker."
Kirk fought his reaction,
forcing his mouth not to tighten. "I relieved Will with Nogura's full concurrence."
"He was the duly
selected leader, Admiral. And you couldn't follow him." Neimann leaned in. "And you wanted your ship back. There's
a time and place for all things, isn't that the saying? Your time was over;
your place was back on Earth. But you wanted your ship back."
Chris leaned forward. "That
was entirely different. V'Ger was a threat that Will
Decker wasn't ready for. I knew Will. I knew what he was capable of. I felt
better with the Admiral in charge."
"The admiral you were
soon sleeping with." Neimann turned to Kirk. "I'd
always heard you didn't shit in your own nest, but I guess for Christine you
made an exception."
Kirk started to answer but
heard Chris say, "Sir, don't." He expected her to get red, really mad
the way she'd gotten at him more than once during their affair. But she
surprised him. She turned to Neimann, her voice low
and soft, as if she was the nurse again, offering solace. "You've gone on
the attack because you're afraid. This is beyond irrelevant. Pick your damn
leaders and let's get back to business."
"I don't like your tone,
Commander."
"I apologize for my
tone, sir. But my suggestion stands."
Kirk decided to be the
peacemaker. "We know your cadets can function as a team. We've seen it. But
they won't always be together, and they won't all get promoted at the same
time. Some of them will have to lead. And some will have to follow." That
was a dig at Neimann, and Kirk winced a little at how
low it was to remind the man that he'd made admiral twice while Neimann was still a captain.
Neimann didn't seem to like it much, either. Standing, he
said, "I think we've talked enough about this."
"You'll have the list of
section leads to us by dinnertime?" Chris was pushing damn hard. It was
probably payback for Neimann's interest in her being
spurred by his competition with Kirk.
"I didn't say I was
going to play along with th—"
"Choose some leaders,
Captain," Kirk said. "Make sure they're in the briefing room at
twenty-one hundred hours because I want to talk to them. Is that clear?" He
could hear the steel in his tone. It was rare he had to use that steel. He
didn't like to use it, but he wasn't afraid to even if it felt odd—he'd grown
used to having people want to do what he said. Expected people to be eager to
obey. Because they trusted him. Because they respected him.
Because they liked him.
Neimann hated him. It was that simple. And when they got done
with the next exercise, the cadets Neimann chose
might be hated, too, by their peers.
Good. Let them get used to
it. Jealousy was a reality, but the mission didn't stop just because someone
else wanted what you had. Life didn't work that way.
"Is that clear?"
Kirk asked again.
"Very clear, sir." Perfectly
regulation, Neimann rose and pushed his chair in. Then
he waited.
"Dismissed," Kirk said,
hating that their dynamic was devolving this way. Once upon a time they had
been almost friends. Never like he and Gary, but not so at odds. Not enemies.
As the door closed behind Neimann, Chris turned to Kirk, her eyes a bit bleak. "The
line in the sand."
He nodded.
"Do you think this'll
get ugly?"
"That depends on how
much he wants his cadets to succeed."
"He wants to beat you. To
beat you, they have to succeed." She took a deep breath. "I wouldn't
want to be the one of the cadets he picks."
"Neither would I." He
stood up, suddenly unable to sit another minute in his chair. "Let's go
run the scenarios. I want to make sure we know every parameter of this exercise
backward and forward."
"Aye-aye, sir," she
said, the words teasing but her tone gentle.
"When did you become
such a ball buster?"
"I learned it from
you." She grinned at his expression. "And there were lots of marines
on my last tour. They have an interesting way of dealing with things."
Laughing, he touched her arm.
"Have I told you how glad I am that you're here?"
"You might have
mentioned that last night. I think I indicated I wasn't displeased at your
presence, either?"
"You might have." Grinning,
he leaned down and kissed her, even though they were on duty. "Let's go
get smarter than Ross."
By the look on her face, she
was biting back a rude comment as she got up.
It was probably just as well.
##
Chapel watched as the chosen few
filed into the briefing room. She was back-benching in a chair to the side. Curious
about what Jim was going to say to the cadets, she was content to just be an
observer.
Fusai and Bylakov nodded to her. Two
other cadets she'd talked to briefly on a recent landing party also
acknowledged her. Glancing at the list Ross had given them, she paired their
faces with their names: T'Velik and Sanchez. T'Velik was one of three Vulcans in the program, and she
was different from the other two in that she carried herself with ease—like
Spock had learned to only in his later years. She seemed comfortable around all
these other, more emotional, species.
Jim looked at Chapel, and she
laid three fingers on her thigh. He nodded ever so slightly. Of course, he'd
know how many were missing. He probably knew exactly who, too. Turning back to
the padd, she saw that they were waiting for Ndilia, Guttersen, and Ling.
A blonde cadet hurried in,
straightening her nametag—Guttersen. "Sorry,
sir. Game went over." Her face was flushed from whatever activity she'd
been participating in. Probably volleyball. These cadets had resurrected the
old game and played it with vicious intensity. Chapel had seen Guttersen among those trying to kill each other with the
dirty white ball.
Ndilia and Ling came in together. They looked suspicious, as
if they weren't sure why there were in the group. Chapel hadn't seen much of
them during the inspection, but they were from parts of the ship she hadn't
made much time for. "Sirs," they both murmured, taking seats at the
far end of the table.
"Why are you here?"
Jim asked, practically before they'd settled in.
"Because Captain Neimann told us to be," Ndilia
said. His file listed him as half Andorian. His
features, which had only a light blue cast, were nearly as stoic as a Vulcan's.
But his abbreviated antennae quivered slightly, and Chapel realized he was
nervous.
Jim nodded, staring at the
young man until his light blue skin turned much darker. "Why else?"
"Because for our next
exercise we need section heads." Bylakov spoke
softly, but her voice was steady. She wasn't afraid of them, not after all the
hours they'd spent on the bridge.
Chapel smiled. She liked the
young woman, had spent time talking to her one evening when she and Jim and had
been making the rounds of the cadet lounge. He'd had to remind her to move on,
a quick tilt of his head telling her to leave the girl who seemed to hold
Chapel in such high regard and get to know some of the other cadets.
"I want us to speak
freely here." Jim turned to Ndilia. "Do you
need section heads?"
"We're a team, sir. We've
been doing fine as a team."
"So, you don't need
section heads?"
"You want us to have
section heads," Guttersen said.
"Why?" Jim turned
to Sanchez. "Why would I want that, Mister Sanchez?"
"To mirror a regular
ship, sir."
"Regular." Jim
whirled, focusing on Ling. "Synonyms for regular, cadet?"
"Normal, sir." At
Jim's look he kept going. "Ordinary."
"Run of the mill," Ndilia murmured.
"You can't think of it
like that." A new voice. Fusai's.
Jim looked at him. "Why
not?"
"Because they're fellow
officers. And crew. We're all Starfleet."
"We're all
Starfleet," Jim said, his voice dipping into the seductive tones he used
when he was about to unleash a very large point. He turned to Ndilia. "You realize that by virtue of being picked by
your captain for these positions, you've just became the cream of the
crop?"
Ndilia looked down.
Jim glanced over at Chapel, a squint told her to say something.
She obliged him. "That
makes you uncomfortable, Cadet. Why?"
There was a swishing sound as
the cadets on her side of the table turned to look at her. She wondered if
they'd forgotten she was there.
"They're my teammates."
"It happens all the time
on regular ships," she said. "One minute you're
peers, the next you're managing the same people. You have to learn to deal with
that. To adapt to your new role."
"But,
we've spent months working together." Bylakov
looked at her, then at Jim. "Sir, like any team, we have a certain
dynamic."
"Yes. Group norms, even.
But you're not a normal group"—he held up a hand as seven mouths started
to open—"which is entirely the point, I know. But you won't stay together.
All this time being made into a team...for what?"
"For maximum
efficiency," T'Velik said, but her eyes were
wary. The way Spock often looked when he was defending something Vulcan that he
didn't entirely agree with.
"Well, we may examine
that concept again. For now...for this exercise,
you're not a team player, anymore. You're the leader. I'll expect you to
lead." He nodded to the padds he and Chapel had
set on the table. "Take one, pull up your directory. You'll find the parts
of the simulation you're in charge of."
Reaching for the padds, the cadets began to read. One of them made a little
noise of protest. From where she was sitting, Chapel couldn't tell which cadet
it was.
"Problem, Mister
Ling?" Jim asked.
"I can't possibly do all
this."
"Not alone. You'll need
your own section subheads. I expect you to have them chosen by tomorrow
morning." He smiled—a dangerous smile.
Sanchez frowned. "You
want us to choose?"
"Yes. You have a
concern?"
"Our choices could
alienate some of our teammates."
"Welcome to real
life." Jim sat down, leaning in, his expression his most dangerous one. The
"we're all in this together" look that usually meant bad news was on
the way. Or he was going to pull a fast one and needed help. "How do you
choose?"
When no one answered, he said
with a grin, "That wasn't a prelude to a speech. How do you choose these
subheads? What are you going to look for?"
"Ability," Bylakov said.
"That's a given on this
ship," Chapel said, winking at her.
"What else?" Jim's
tone was very patient.
Chapel took pity on the
cadets as they stared down at the padds, probably
trying to think of qualities that equated to more than just proficiency. "Why
do you think Neimann chose you to be the section
heads?"
"I have no idea why I
was tagged," Guttersen blurted out, then turned
an even deeper shade of red than before. "We're all so good here."
"Well, you better figure
that out...and apply it to your own choices," Jim said with a gentle
smile. "I want you back in this room, with your subheads, at oh nine
hundred. Any questions?"
Six heads shook; T'Velik merely stared.
"Then go to it."
All but T'Velik
stood and filed out.
"You have a
question."
"Permission to speak
freely, sir?"
"Granted."
"I am ambivalent about
this program."
"I would never have
guessed," Jim said, motioning for Chapel to join them at the table.
As she sat, she saw that T'Velik seemed to be struggling and said, "Cadet,
you're not betraying Captain Neimann by having your
own opinion."
T'Velik looked at her in what seemed almost like surprise. "It
is not Captain Neimann I am concerned with. What I am
about to say...it is not said to outsiders." She paused, as if
considering. "This program is similar to one on my world. You may have
heard of it. It is called Kohlinahr."
"We've heard of
it."
T'Velik's skin flushed a slightly darker green. "Of
course, you are friends of Captain Spock's." She spoke of friends with
remarkable ease.
"Very good
friends," Jim said, his voice gentle. "You were speaking of
Gol."
She nodded. "The program
separates Vulcan from Vulcan. Those who master the disciplines are..."
"Unreachable,"
Chapel said, remembering how Spock had been when he'd shown up on the ship to
find V'Ger.
"Forever out of
touch," Jim said, glancing at her. Spock hadn't been lost forever, but
Chapel knew it had been close. "You don't agree with the disciplines,
Cadet?"
"It is not that. The
discipline is for those who are called strongly. For those who wish to separate
from society. But I have studied the works of many leaders from many worlds. It
is what made me choose Starfleet over the Vulcan Science Academy. I wished to
learn how to effectively lead." She stopped, took a breath. "That is
what we are for, is it not? Officers lead."
"They do." Chapel
smiled. "We also do things, occasionally." She grinned at Jim. "Save
the planet, stop unstoppable machines. That kind of thing."
"I am aware of the
Admiral's exploits." T'Velik's almost sounded
like she was teasing them. "But to separate those who must lead from those
who must be led is not logical. How can we understand them?"
"That's the issue
here." Jim sighed. "And it's not just understanding them. It's
understanding yourself. You get that more from dealing with people who aren't
like you, than with people who are."
She nodded, obviously
considering that. "I am, however, constantly challenged to excel by my
classmates on this ship. There's a level of excellence in this environment that
would be difficult to duplicate any other way."
"And if this were a
think tank—or the Vulcan Science Academy—that would be great." Jim leaned
back. "But this is Starfleet. And I'm not sure it's great. I'm not sure
it's teaching you what you need to know most. How to relate. How to lead. How
to develop others to become leaders, too."
"You are expecting that
we will make unwise choices in our selections for subheads, are you not?"
"They don't have to be
unwise," Chapel said. "The mere act of choosing will change the
dynamic."
"Irrevocably?"
"Probably." Jim
nodded at her padd. "Do you know who you will choose?"
"Yes." There was no
hesitation in T'Velik's voice. She pushed her chair
out and rose slowly.
Jim waited until she was near
the door, then asked, "Cadet T'Velik, do you
talk about your concerns with your teammates?"
"I do not. Team morale
is crucial."
Chapel could tell she was
parroting Ross.
Jim only nodded. "Get to
work, Cadet."
Once she was gone, he slumped
a little in his chair. "They exhaust me, Chris."
She smiled in sympathy. "It's
hard work, this leading."
"It's because they're so
young."
"It's because you're
destroying them." At his startled look, she touched his hand gently. "You're
destroying their unity. And you're right to do it. This isn't a think
tank."
"No, it's not." He
closed his eyes. "It has merit. Bringing them together this way. But not
for so long. Not to such an extent that it isolates them."
"Some kind of summer
seminar, instead?"
"That's what I'm
thinking. Something that builds them up without tearing down their ties to
their other classmates."
"Ross won't like
it."
"I don't care." He
rubbed his eyes, and she saw that he really was exhausted.
"We haven't been
sleeping much," she said, knowing that was his fault as much as hers.
"No, we haven't." He
grinned as he dropped his hand from his eyes. "Not that I'm
complaining."
"Let's go to bed—let's
go to sleep." She picked up her padd. "Come on, Jim. Tomorrow's a big
day."
He stroked her hair, his hand
lingering for a moment on her neck. It was warm and loving, and she leaned into
his touch, eager for even so small a thing after so long away from him.
"She makes me miss
Spock," he murmured as they headed for the lift.
"Me, too." When
she'd been with Jim, she'd had a chance to get to know Spock. Not the man she'd
been infatuated with, but the real Spock. The Spock who Jim had always known. And
the real Spock was a man she liked very, very much. A man who had managed to
stay her friend even once she and Jim had split apart.
"Let's go to bed,"
Jim said, as they came to his door. He pulled her inside, kissing her for a
moment very passionately.
"If we start..."
"I know." Letting
her go, he patted her rear softly as he aimed her in the direction of the
bathroom, letting her have it first as he moved to turn down the bed.
Just like old times in their
apartment on Earth. Maybe just like future times in some apartment on Earth
that could again be theirs not just hers or his.
It was a nice thought.
##
The exercise wasn't a complete
disaster, but then Kirk hadn't expected it to be. This was Red Squad, after
all. They were bound to rise to the occasion; it was just, for the first time
since he'd been observing the cadets, they didn't rise as a seamless unit.
Neimann was drumming his finger on the railing at the back of
the bridge, until he realized Kirk was watching him and stopped. "They'll
learn what's needed to lead. They'll learn quickly."
"I don't doubt
that." Kirk wondered if Chris was seeing the same thing down in
engineering. He had a feeling Fusai might have spent
a little more time getting his troops prepared for this. He seemed to get it—what
it took to lead, what it meant in terms of they and we.
He wondered how T'Velik was doing. Were her many studies of leaders paying
off?
Roaming the bridge, he
watched as Endoya took them out of warp, the cadet
reaching for the controls to make the next move.
"Did I give you a new
order, Cadet?" Bylakov sounded harried.
"No, sir, but—"
"You don't know all the parameters.
Wait for my order."
Kirk smiled. He'd changed the
test, and he could see Neimann was fuming over it as
he glanced the other man's way. In this new version of the exercise, there were
some small, but at times crucial, new variables that only the section heads
knew about. He or she could share some of them, but only with their subheads. Bylakov obviously hadn't chosen Endoya
as a subhead, and Endoya seemed a bit stung.
"Your orders, sir?"
"Wait. For now." Bylakov looked over at Kirk, and he could tell she was
frustrated.
Walking over to her, he
murmured, "Yes, it would be easier to just tell him the situation."
"So, why can't I?"
"It's restricted
information. Not everyone has access to that level."
She sighed but didn't argue. She
was doing a good job. She probably didn't realize how good, but Kirk could tell
that she'd be a damned fine officer. She didn't like keeping her people in the
dark. That bode well for her command skills, for her ability to bind people to
her through loyalty, not just the rank on her uniform.
Kirk moved back to where he'd
been standing and could hear Neimann grumbling. Grinning
at him, he said, "What's that? I can't hear you."
"It's not a fair
test."
"You've never had orders
you couldn't share, Captain?"
Neimann shut up.
The day wore on, and Kirk
moved around the ship, watching the other section heads. Red Squad was
technically performing well on the exercise, even with the variables. But the
morale had shifted tangibly. Smiles were not in evidence, and the cockiness of
the bulk of the cadets was gone. It was hard to be smug when you hadn't been
picked to lead—especially when you were used to being picked first for
everything.
He saw Guttersen
arguing with one of her subheads. "We don't have any of those."
"Requisition them,"
the other cadet muttered.
"From who? We're days
from an outpost, let alone a Starbase."
That was Chris's variable. Kirk
loved it. Let them budget their resources. Let them learn to share. So far,
sharing wasn't going all that well. They were too focused on themselves and
their status to do what had come so naturally before.
It was a dose of reality. It
was a day in the Starfleet life complete with ego and shortages. And bureaucracy—he
couldn't wait to see their faces at the after-action reports they'd have to
complete.
Getting hungry, Kirk went to
the mess and saw Chris eating with Korohama.
"Admiral," the
other man said, getting up, his plate empty. "You've made an interesting
exercise even more so."
Kirk eyed Korohama
suspiciously, but the man seemed sincere. "The cadets are having some
trouble with it."
"I know. It's
mesmerizing to watch." The man rubbed his hands together like a mad
scientist from an old vid, then left to dump his tray.
"He's very
disturbed," Chris said as Kirk sat down across from her. "And having
way too much fun with this."
"Are you having
fun?"
She nodded. "They're
doing well, Jim. Despite the problems."
"I know they are. Ross
built a hell of a team here."
She smiled, as if pleased
he'd give the other man that.
"Did you think I
wouldn't give him his due?" He took a bite of his lasagna, then a bigger
one—he was starved.
"I wasn't sure. Once you got...in the
chase."
"In the chase?"
"The competition. The
hunt. You do like to win, Jim."
"I don't like to lose. There's
a difference."
She laughed. "There
is?"
"Sure
there is." He grinned at her. "Other people can win, too. It doesn't
have to be a zero-sum game." He let his grin grow wicked. "Kind of
like sex."
"Ahhhhh."
She laughed and bit into a cookie. "But given that it's you and Ross, will
your 'everyone wins' scenario work?"
"I think so. But...he's
still not going to like it much."
She laughed. "Because it's
a zero-sum game to him, you mean?"
He nodded.
"What if nobody
wins?"
"I don't believe in that
scenario." He'd proven it when he'd been these kids' age. But it had been
risky. That commendation for original thinking could have just as easily been a
notice of expulsion.
"So
win-win, huh?" She sat back, watching him as he ate.
"Stop that. You know it
makes me self-conscious."
"I'm remembering those
things."
"Did you forget
them?" He was remembering things about her, too. Like how she'd choose a
cookie with nuts and then pick all around them. Or how she liked her coffee
roasted dark and then smothered all that rich blackness with cream and sugar.
"Some of them I did forget,"
she said softly. "I didn't mean to, but time took them."
"I know."
"I was all right
until..." She stopped, looking up, meeting his eyes. Hers seemed terribly
sad. "When you and Antonia got together. You looked so happy. And people
would tell me that you were happy. As if they got pleasure in hurting me."
"I know. I had friends
who told me about you and Ross."
"We never looked that
happy."
"I know that, too."
He grinned, knowing it wasn't the best reaction, but it was a real one.
"Do you miss her?"
He decided to be honest. "Sometimes."
"Oh." Judging by
her expression, honesty might not have been the best policy.
"I miss Carol sometimes,
too. It doesn't mean I want to get back together with her." He reached
across, stopping Chris from ripping her napkin into shreds—something she did
when she was nervous. "I never did get back with her, and I don't plan to
go looking for Antonia."
"Would you have looked
for me? If I hadn't been thrown in your lap?"
He wanted to lie to her. But
his mouth wouldn't cooperate. "I don't know."
She swallowed hard.
"Chris, we hurt each
other so spectacularly well. Even now..."
"Even now what?"
"Even now, I'm
scared."
She exhaled loudly, the breath ragged. "I scare the great James T.
Kirk. I'm not sure if that's flattering or not."
He didn't answer, was afraid
of what might come out of his mouth if he did.
"You think I'm not
scared?" she asked. "You think I don't wonder what the hell we're
doing?"
They sat in silence for a
moment. He finished his meal and pushed the plate aside. Without him asking,
she held out her cookie—what was left of it.
He broke off a piece. "I
missed you. I was cut up and down from what we did to each other, but I still
missed you." He took another piece of cookie. "We weren't finished. That's
what I felt the whole time I was with Antonia. That you and I weren't
finished."
She wiped at her eyes. "I
know. I felt the same way." Shaking her head, she laughed a little harshly.
"Sorry. Didn't mean to get all mushy."
"Mushy's
okay. We need to talk about this. Being with you, it was like flying blind into
mined space."
"Okay, that's definitely
not flattering." She looked down. "At least it wasn't dull, there's
that."
"Definitely not
dull." Antonia had been dull. Sweet and loving
and very beautiful. But not simpatico, not make your heart beat in triple time
and get you furious like Chris could. "Did you find our relationship different
than what I just described? Was it a warm, safe place?"
"It could have
been."
"Yes, it could have
been." Touching her hand, he tried to ease the tension that had sprung up
between them. "I think this time...we've both changed. Maybe enough that
we won't wreck what could be."
"We are in sync now,
aren't we? Not just in bed, but in the way we look at things—work-things as
well as others."
"We are. That's
good."
"I hope so." She
saw his look and sighed in what sounded like frustration. "Why are we
talking about this?"
"Because we're
masochists." He grinned at her. "I want you; you want me. It should
be simple." He took the last of the cookie. "But it's not."
"Does that mean you want
to call this off?"
He touched her hand again,
rubbing gently. "No. It doesn't mean that." He saw her smile and felt
something inside him relax. "We have cadets to observe, Commander."
"Thank God." She
turned her hand over and grasped his almost convulsively. "I do love you. I
don't want to hurt you."
"I don't want to hurt
you, either." He gave her hand a squeeze. "I love you, too."
"We can make it,"
she said as they got up, and she bumped up against him a little, as if in need
of assurance.
"We can make it," he
said, letting her dump her tray first before walking her to the lift. She
seemed as unwilling as he was to be parted, so they observed the rest of the
exercise together.
##
They sat in Ross's office,
Jim and she in the guest chairs in front of his desk. Chapel knew Ross had
wanted it that way, since he hadn't suggested that they sit at the more
egalitarian table in the corner of the room. Jim hadn't pressed it; Jim didn't
need to.
"So?" Ross wasn't
bothering with small talk. "What will your recommendation be?"
She already knew—they'd
talked it through last night, going through all the arguments, each playing
devil's advocate—but she pretended to be fascinated with what Jim might say. Ross
didn't need to know how simpatico they really were on this matter.
"Your cadets are without
a doubt the finest group of young people I've ever seen Starfleet put
together."
Ross didn't preen. He was too
smart not to see the other shoe dropping.
Jim continued,
his eyes boring into Ross's. "They're too fine, in fact, to be pulled out
of the ranks for a two-year program. Too fine to be isolated from those they
need to learn how to lead."
"The program...could be
shorter." Ross looked at her, and she knew her face must have registered
her surprise. But he was fighting for his program's life. Shorter was no doubt
better than terminated.
"Yes, it could be."
Jim's voice was silky, the voice he'd used with so many hostile species back on
their first missions together. She'd heard him talk down the most volatile
aliens. Milk and honey, she'd dubbed that voice in her mind.
Ross looked away. "I
mean a year, not a week."
"I mean a summer, not a
week. That's my recommendation to the board. I don't want to kill Red Squad,
per se. You've done a fantastic job with them, Ross." Jim seemed surprised
at the look Ross shot him—did he not realize he'd stopped calling Ross by his
given name? "I'm going to suggest that the Red Squad program be instituted
at the Academy as a summer seminar. With you in charge."
Neimann looked confused. As if he'd expected less...and more.
"And the rest of the year? I'm on my own?"
"No, I want you to apply
those same skills to the rest of the Academy population. I want you to develop
some teambuilding classes using the techniques you've perfected here."
"You want me to
translate this for the masses?"
"I do. I want you to
branch out. Show how flexible you are. How creative. Call it team-building,
creative problem-solving or something else—I don't really care what you call it.
Just show me what kind of leader you really are."
"You want me to work for
you?"
"I'm giving your program
a chance. I'm offering you the opportunity to stay at the helm of it. But yes,
you'll be working for me." He leaned back. Waiting.
Ross glanced at Chapel. She
didn't look away but offered nothing, not to him and not to Jim, either.
"I can fight. I can tell
the board you're prejudiced. That she is, too."
"You can. You can make
this a war only one of us will win." Jim shrugged. "I'm offering a
compromise that both of us should be able to live with. Barring standard
reviews, you'll have complete control of the curriculum the way you've had
here."
"It's a sweet deal, sir."
Chapel was careful not to call Ross by name, not to trade on their association.
"I have a feeling cadets will vie for the chance to get in your
classes," Jim said. "I have a feeling you'll be a very popular
instructor. You have the opportunity here to change the lives of not just the
best, but also those who don't quite measure up to your standards. You can make
them better. Doesn't that appeal to you, even just a little?"
Ross started to smile—a
slightly tired smile. A smile of defeat. "You're the devil, sir."
"I have been told
that." Jim seemed to relax. "I look forward to watching the career of
these cadets. I feel like I've really gotten to know a lot of them."
"They've enjoyed having
the opportunity to get to know you." It was a grudging compliment, but
still a real one.
Chapel could feel herself
relax. This was going to be okay. Ross wasn't going to go ballistic and fight. It
made her feel better about having been with him. She liked thinking that he was
a reasonable man. That whatever his motive for pursuing her had been, her
reasons for being with him were that he was a good, decent, if way too driven,
man.
He might even view this as a
challenge. Might even stretch enough to change the lives of more than just his
elite cadets. Jim had thrown down that gauntlet: make the mundane better. She
knew Ross would find it nearly impossible to resist picking it up and running
with it. If only to show he could.
Maybe, in time, he'd do it
solely because Jim asked. But for now, competition could be milked in positive
ways as well as negative.
##
"Energizing," the
transporter tech at Space Dock said, nodding at Kirk and Chris.
Beaming down to Earth seemed
like losing part of his heart. Even though he had Chris next to him.
"You okay?" she
murmured.
"Miss the stars." He
gave her a sheepish grin. The one he'd perfected with Antonia, and started
using with Carol.
He should have known better. He
didn't need that smile with Chris.
"Get back up there,
then." She looked at him like this was basic arithmetic. "If you want
space back, get it back."
"Just take it?" He
smiled at her confidence in him. "Take my ship?"
"You've done it
before." Grinning, she bumped against him as they walked to his place.
"Well, I had an admiral
in my corner, back then." But it was a nice thought. Just take his ship
back. Only he'd have to take it from Spock and that didn't seem a very friendly
thing to do. Not that Spock would mind. He'd probably just lift an eyebrow,
surrender the conn, and ask for orders.
"What are you thinking
about?"
"Stealing the Enterprise
and turning it into a pirate ship." He winked at her. "Spock would
make quite a dashing first mate."
"I can see him with an
earring and bandanna. You could paint a big skull and
crossbones on the hull."
"Nothing like a Jolly
Roger to make people think twice about messing with you."
"What do you think a
Klingon would make of a Jolly Roger?"
Kirk laughed. "Probably
think it signified a floating restaurant. Or maybe a first aid station—they're
not known for their medicine."
"They're not known for
their food, either."
"True." He turned
her into the walkway for his place. When she hesitated, he asked softly,
"You do want to come in?"
"I do." She took
his hand. "I'm afraid that if I come in, I'll never want to leave."
"Who said you have
to?" He leaned in, kissing her in front of the apartment. Let the whole
damn world see that they were back together.
Except Bones. He wasn't ready
for that lecture, yet. But Bones' place was on the other side of town. Or in
Georgia on the weekends. Far enough away in either case that his friend
wouldn't see them and wouldn't feel the need to rant at how stupid they were
for reopening hearts they'd nearly ripped out of each other.
"Besides," Kirk
said with a grin, "I'll be on another training cruise in five days. So you won't have too much time to get tired of me."
"True."
Pulling her close, he said,
"Come in." He tried to use his "don't argue with me, this is for
your own good" voice.
She obeyed...for once. Wrapping
her arm around his waist, she came inside with him. They let go of each other
as they waited for the elevator, and Kirk saw her smile at a young girl and her
boyfriend who were also waiting. They were new to the place—or maybe he'd just
been away too much to get to know them. He didn't know most of his neighbors.
The kids got off before they
did, and Chris snuggled close. Despite the nice way she was rubbing against
him, he could feel that she was tense—they'd once lived in this place together.
When he'd left Starfleet he'd rented it to another
officer, keeping the apartment—he told himself—as an investment. But he
wondered now if he'd always known he'd be coming back.
When they got to the door,
she waited for him to open it. He turned to look at her and knew his expression
was letting out a lot more emotion than he really wanted it to. "You do
it."
Frowning slightly as if in
confusion, she palmed the identity scanner. The door slid open soundlessly.
"You never took me
off?" She looked touched, as if he'd just given her a very nice present.
He shrugged, suddenly
embarrassed that he'd shown her this. "I lived in hope the first week. Then
I turned your access off and on for about a month, depending on my mood. Once
it was clear we were over, I should have just deleted you from the
system." He swallowed. "But I couldn't." He shrugged again—a
"what kind of fool am I?" shrug.
"Well, I am a doctor. That
extra thirty seconds that I don't have to use my medical override might save
your life someday." She grinned, taking them to lighter ground.
"Good point,
Commander." Pushing her inside, he locked the door.
She walked around the front
room, as if getting to know the room again. He'd changed very little. The
things on the walls mostly. She'd never had much furniture, but they'd both had
art—although she'd never been a fan of his weapons-as-art concept.
"Some things never
change," she said as she walked to the wall of antique firearms. "The
marines at my last post would be salivating."
He wondered if any of them
had been allowed to salivate over her.
"New couch?"
"Re-covered." The
officer who'd rented it had a bad habit of falling asleep with a glass of wine
in his hand. He'd been the one who re-covered it before he moved out. Kirk
wasn't fond of the new color.
"I hate the color."
She closed her eyes. "I mean..."
"It's okay. I hate it,
too. My renter picked it out."
"Right. When you were
with her—Antonia."
"Is it hard to say her
name?"
"It's hard to know she
exists. She's a beautiful woman, Jim. I'm not beautiful and no matter how
attractive I might be, I never will be beautiful. So
I'm a little...threatened, I guess."
"She was
beautiful." He took her hand. "But she didn't make my skin
tingle." Which wasn't strictly true. Sex had been fine, plenty of tingle. But
he thought Chris would know what he meant.
"Really?"
He nodded.
"I'm glad." Then
she frowned. "I mean, I'm not but..."
"I understand." He
was pushing her into the bedroom.
"Oh, do you want me to
comment on the redecorating in here, too?"
"No, I want you to get
out of that uniform and fu—"
"Why, Admiral!" In
typical contrary fashion, she was pulling off his uniform instead of her own. "I'm
not sure that's a proper suggestion."
He let her make him naked,
then yanked off her uniform, pushing—nearly shoving—her onto the bed. This had
been a game they played. They both liked it a little rough. It had been one
he'd played with Antonia once and once only. It had scared her—and he'd been
holding back. A lot.
Chris stared up at him,
moving up the bed, laughing as he grabbed her ankles, pulling her legs apart. They'd
been very restrained on the Pensacola, had kept the noise down. And
they'd been still too tentative with each other to trust themselves to these
kinds of games. But here, in this place they used to live, on this bed they
used to share, it seemed the natural thing to do.
He tightened his grip on her
ankles, pulled her back down the bed, bringing the covers with her. She giggled
at the impromptu bed surfing, and he found himself grinning like a fool. "God,
I missed this, Chris."
Pulling him down to her, she
captured his face with her hands. "Me, too."
He let go of her ankles, felt
her legs wrap around his waist, pulling him down to her, no preliminaries, no
niceties, just raw, elemental sex.
It was total bliss.
As they lay sated, she curled
around him, her leg wrapping over his. Sighing, he turned to kiss her gently. "I
only do that with you."
"Antonia would have
broken."
He nodded. It seemed the
safer answer than saying he'd tried to play their games with his new lover. "Did
you and Ross...?"
"Uh, no." That was
all she said, and even though he wanted to know more, he liked her discretion.
Sighing, she burrowed more
tightly against her.
He felt her shiver. "What's
wrong?"
"I don't know." She
leaned up and kissed him gently. Very tenderly.
Smiling, he watched her,
wondering what thoughts were making her expression so pensive. "Are you
worried? About the future? Our future?"
"I don't know, Jim. I
just feel on edge." She smiled, a silly smile. "We Chapel women have
the sight, you know."
"I didn't know
that."
"Oh, yes." She
closed her eyes, made a little humming noise. Her hand was traveling lower and
lower. "I know, for example, that parts of you are more awake than
others."
"Wow, you really are
psychic." He groaned as she left his arms, traveled down the bed to the
more awake part of him. "Forget psychic, you're magical." Or her
mouth was, anyway.
When she popped back up to
lie against him again, she was grinning a very satisfied grin.
"You enjoy having me
under your spell." He began to play with her, watching as she closed her
eyes, then began to writhe. "On the other hand, I do like having you in my
power, so I guess we're even."
A moment later, her strident
cries told him they were very even. He was glad he'd soundproofed the place.
##
Chapel watched the comms
start stacking up—medical crises and more medical crises. It was why Cartwright
had hired her initially, but even in her first weeks in ops, she'd covered a
lot more than just medicine and health issues. This work came naturally to her
for some reason. She thought it was like triage—you had to figure out what
could wait, what couldn't, and go from there.
She glanced over at Janice
and saw that she was running a sim.
"Anything
interesting?"
"Not yet," Jan
said. "But I am going to find a link between that rash of tornadoes on
Darvis V and those freak ion storms in the neighboring sectors."
"Of
course you are."
Janice usually did find them.
She didn't understand the science behind half of what she was looking at, but
she was exceptionally good at making connections, finding linkages where others
just saw random occurrences. Chapel knew it was a skill her friend would never
have known she had if she hadn't come to ops.
"So, you and
Jim...?" Janice asked, glancing up from her sim.
Jan could put things together
about people, too. After a day of questions as to why Chapel had looked so
relaxed and happy, and what Admiral Kirk was up to, Chapel had finally told her
the truth. Jan had hugged her and didn't say much, but it had been more because
she was distracted by work than upset. Janice had long since given up on James
T. Kirk as anything but an occasional mentor.
"How's that going?"
She waggled her eyebrows.
Chapel smiled the smile of a
well-pleased woman.
"Harlot." But Jan
was grinning. She looked away, her attention diverted
to the entrance to ops. "Newbie at the main gates."
Chapel turned around and saw
Cadet Bylakov scanning the room. Getting up, she
walked over to her. "Lina?"
"Commander. I was hoping
you'd be here." She handed her a padd.
"You're assigned
here?"
Bylakov nodded, her smile huge. "Just an interim. We
finished up before the other cadets. Most of the first-class have reported to
their assignments, but I'm second-class. Admiral Kirk said we could start our
interims early. I requested here." She grinned.
"Because you're insane
and think ops will be fun?"
"Mainly because here is
where you are. And I think I can learn a lot from you. And yeah, I think ops
will be fun." She shrugged and grinned and lifted her eyebrows in the
innocent jubilation only a twenty-year old can manage.
Chapel scanned the padd. Cartwright
had signed off on this. Normally, they didn't take cadets in ops. The pace was
too hectic, the stakes too high. But Bylakov was Red
Squad and Cartwright knew what that meant. Plus, Chapel may have mentioned her
by name.
"Well, let's introduce
you to the old man."
Bylakov stifled a smile. "That's not a term you use in
front of him, right?"
"Uncanny gift for the
obvious." Chapel grinned to show she was teasing. "Actually, he knows
we call him that. And he sort of likes it, I think—in
his warped Cartwright way, he considers himself our unofficial father."
Cartwright looked up as they
got to his door, which was perpetually in the open position. He hated to miss
anything. "Chapel, who've you got there?"
"Found this rug rat
loitering, Admiral."
"Cadet Lina Bylakov reporting for duty, sir." There wasn't a
single thing about Bylakov's delivery or stance that wasn't
perfectly regulation.
"My god, Cadet, at ease
before you break something." He looked at Chapel. "Styles would have
an orgasm over this one. See that she's never assigned to him, okay?"
"Roger that." Nobody
liked Styles.
"Thank you, sirs," Bylakov said, sounding much too grateful not to know who
they were talking about. At their looks, she said, "He was a guest speaker
at our initial Red Squad lectures. He and his riding crop. He likes to hit his
leg hard, and a lot. If I were Starfleet, I'd have the headshrinkers look into
that."
Cartwright burst out
laughing. "I like her, Chapel. I can see why you're so high on her."
Bylakov blushed a charming pink. "It's an honor to have
this opportunity, sir. I appreciate your confidence in me."
"Jim Kirk spoke highly
of you, too. Between the two of them..."
Chapel smiled. Trust Jim to
do that.
"Let me show you around
the place." Chapel decided she'd seat Bylakov in
the station next to her. If she was going to be a sort of mentor, she'd need to
be able to see what the young woman was doing.
She introduced her to Janice,
explained how they'd met.
"So
you're the tippy top of the Academy pyramid, eh?" Jan didn't sound
impressed. Then again, despite her rapid rise, she was still a little
intimidated by those who came out of the Academy and might be overcompensating.
"That's what they tell
me, Commander." Bylakov leaned in. "I know
your history almost as well as Commander Chapel's. Why did you divert to
transporter chief?"
Janice looked taken aback. She
blurted out, "Because I chickened out of OCS the first time," and
then turned a startling shade of red.
"But you did go. The
next time you could?"
Jan's flush was fading. "I
went the next year, yeah."
Bylakov seemed to be processing that. Then she leaned in even
more, talking to Janice with Chapel in the middle. Maybe Chapel should trade
seats with one of them? "I've seen pictures from when you were a yeoman. You've
changed your look."
Chapel suddenly realized that
Bylakov would probably be a stunning young woman if
she hadn't gone to such pains to look...pressed and controlled. Her dark red
hair was skinned back, her lashes were darkened, but other makeup was missing,
and her porcelain skin showed through, making her look clean cut and young. Attractive,
still, but not drop-dead gorgeous.
"I had to," Janice
said, appearing to take in what Chapel had missed. "You're smart to go for
a more low-key look from the start."
"My first year I didn't.
Back in Odessa, looks didn't matter so much. So many people in Ukraine are
attractive. When I got here, the attention I was getting wasn't the kind I
wanted."
Chapel realized that she'd
pared down her own beauty routine. The nurse with the extreme makeup and the
elaborate blonde hairdos probably wouldn't recognize this fresh-scrubbed
brunette with the sensible haircut. But she hadn't done it to get rid of
attention or to get past some perceived barrier to success. She'd done it
during med school, when she'd constantly run out of time and something had to
give. Since studying was a lot more important than curling her hair, beauty
lost.
Except...she felt prettier
now. She felt more competent, more appreciated. Crewmen didn't stare at her
legs anymore—hell, in these uniforms, who could tell what kind of legs you had?
But there was a different type of appreciation she saw in the eyes of people
she interacted with. An appreciation for the whole woman.
"Christine? Where the
hell did you go?" Jan was waving her hand in front of Chapel's face. "I
said we should have a beauty night. Mud packs, makeup, hair. The whole nine
yards." She was clearly kidding. Janice didn't have any more time for that
kind of nonsense than Chapel did.
"Why is it nine yards? Why
not five or ten?" Bylakov asked.
"I don't know. Consider
it a homework assignment." Chapel grinned at her. "Now, pay
attention." She checked the access level at the top of the screen. Bylakov had been given access to everything but the most
sensitive chatter. "The benefits of clean living," she murmured as
she showed the cadet the various queues for comms coming in, and let her start
reading up on the latest crises.
"You didn't tell me
you'd adopted one of the puppies." Janice shot her a snotty grin, but her
voice was very low, as if she was trying not to hurt Bylakov's
feelings.
"I didn't adopt her. Besides,
you were lapping up that adulation."
"Yeah, it was
nice." Laughing, Jan leaned back. "We were that young once. Younger,
even."
"Well, you were." Chapel
smiled at the sound Janice made. "Some of us had already busted our humps
in school before signing up."
"I think that's why the
Admiral likes you so much. All that brainpower. He does like smart girls."
She shrugged, then looked down at her sim. "Damn it. I was sure this
version would work. Back to the drawing boa"—she glanced at the main doors
with annoyance. "What is it with the visitors today?"
Chapel turned and froze. Antonia
stood staring at her.
"Another new
friend?" Janice asked.
"Oh, no." She was
about to get up, when Antonia turned away, heading down the hallway, following
a tour group. "She's touring the building? No goddamn way."
Chapel hurried out of ops
until she caught up with the group and could slow, trailing behind Antonia. "What's
the occasion?" she finally asked her rival.
The woman didn't turn. "I
heard he was back with you."
"Good news travels
fast." Chapel winced a bit at her tone. She wasn't usually this bitchy.
"So does bad." Antonia
sounded a little unsure about the whole bitch thing, too.
"Well, this has been fun—the
not catching up part, especially. Let's do it again sometime." Chapel
turned to go.
"Ms. Chapel..."
"It's Commander
Chapel."
"Sorry. I'm not
Starfleet." Antonia looked down. "But then, we all know that, don't
we?"
"Look, I had nothing to
do with him leaving you. I'm sorry that you lost him—well, as sorry as I can be
given that I wanted him back. But I'm not to blame."
"I know. That's the hell
of it. I want to blame someone. Instead, I have to blame this place. This...thing."
She made a gesture that somehow encompassed all of Command. All of Starfleet.
And Chapel realized that
Antonia wasn't there to see her. She was there to check out her real enemy: Starfleet
Command. The big, bad, seductive thing that had lured Jim away. Chapel was
probably just a byproduct in her mind. She turned to go again.
"You love him,
right?" Antonia's voice was so sad.
"I do." Chapel
turned around and gave her the nicest smile she could muster. "I'll take
good care of him."
"See that you do." She
seemed like she was about to cry. "Look, now the tour guide is cross with
me for not keeping up."
The lieutenant acting as tour
guide was, indeed, making rather urgent hand gestures at them.
Chapel turned so he could see
her rank. "Sorry, Lieutenant. We were just catching up."
He suddenly turned down the
ire. "No problem, Commander."
Smiling slightly, Chapel
murmured, "Rank does have its privileges."
Antonia turned to her, her expression surprised. "Thank you."
"You're welcome. Enjoy
your tour."
"Will I see Jim?"
"I doubt it." Although
if the gods were feeling unkind...
"Oh." Again the tragic look in Antonia's eyes.
"Do you need to?"
"Yes."
She wanted to ask why. She
wanted to say no. She opened her mouth to say goodbye, but said, "I'll
have him meet you when the tour's over." She felt like cutting her big
dumb tongue out. "You have about a half hour to go before you're done
seeing this place."
Antonia didn't look like she
cared about seeing any more of the place. "Why are you doing this?"
"Well, I haven't done it
yet. I could be lying that I'm even going to do it."
"Why?" Antonia's
eyes were sad again, and Chapel got the impression of an amazing passivity to
her. As if her beauty had been enough to get her by in life. As if she'd never
had to expend any energy to be lively. Or maybe not calling attention to
herself was a way of shining a light on something other than how she looked?
"Well, either I'm very
nice, or I'm a great big fool." Chapel turned on her heel and left Antonia
to catch up to the now foot-tapping lieutenant.
"Who was that?" Jan
said as Chapel took her seat back in ops.
"Antonia."
"Jim's ex Antonia?"
Chapel nodded. "Hold on
a sec. Something I have to do." She commed Jim and put on her headset,
speaking quietly when he answered. "Antonia is in the building."
"Is that a joke?" He
sounded confused.
"Oh, I really wish it
were."
"Okay. Why is she in the
building?" There was more idle curiosity than interest in his question.
"She's on the tour,
actually. She wants to see you. I told her you'd meet her after the tour."
"You told her
that?"
"Well, I was trying to
be..."
"Stupid?" He
laughed.
"If you get back
together with her, I will hunt you down and kill you. Slowly and very
painfully."
"Okay, stupid may have
been the wrong word."
"Very much the wrong
word." She laughed, a nervous, too loud laugh
that made Janice roll her eyes—why was Janice listening in? "Just meet her
and get it over with."
"Aye-aye, sir." His
tone was full of amusement—and maybe a little bit of concern. "You never
fail to amaze me, Chris. Just when I think I've got you pegged..."
"I never fail to amaze—or
horrify—myself, either. Chapel out." She cut the line before she could
tell him to blow off the meeting with Antonia.
"Did you bump your head
in space? Maybe took a spill off the bed during the wild sex and went
insane?" Janice was looking at her like she was the stupidest creature on
the planet.
Which she very might well be.
"Oh, shut up and get back to work."
Janice glanced over at Bylakov. "Are you getting all of this?"
"Uh, yes. But I'm light
on context." The cadet glanced at Chapel as if she was betraying her.
"I'll fill you in
later," Janice said. "It's a great story. Starts with Christine
stealing my man and goes downhill from there." She winked at Chapel. This
was an old joke between them.
"I look forward to it,
Commander." Bylakov caught Chapel's glare and
said, "I mean, gossip is bad. Very bad."
"Both of you. Go back to
work." Chapel turned up her headset and tried to forget how terrific
Antonia had looked in that little formfitting dress she'd been wearing.
Could Chapel get a dress like
that? Did they even make dresses like that for her shape?
She was going insane. She
slowly took a deep breath. Held it, then let it out gently. Peace and
tranquility were supposed to fill her.
"So, zen-girl,
that working for you?" Janice was still shaking her head at Chapel's
stupidity.
"No, but beating you senseless might."
Janice just laughed as she
turned back to the comms. Bylakov threw Chapel a
sympathetic if oblivious grin. Chapel thought beating herself senseless might
be a better idea.
##
Kirk saw someone hovering at
his door and said, "Yes...?"
"Do you have a
minute?" Neimann walked farther into the room. Not
all the way, but no longer just hovering.
Kirk had about twenty minutes
before he needed to go find the tour Antonia was on. Why in the hell had Chris
said he'd meet her?
"If this is a bad
time...?"
"Nope. It's fine." Pushing
his padd to the side, he gave the other man his full attention. Or most of it. Antonia
was here? The idea of Chris and her talking, much less arranging this little
get-together was so bizarre. "What can I do for you, Ross?"
Neimann seemed to be having a hard time meeting his eyes. "I
wanted to say that I'm sorry. I did bring Christine up to the ship to distract
you."
"I owe you for that, by
the way." Kirk grinned. "Big."
Neimann looked torn—as if he was relieved
he was going to get off that easy, but also a bit annoyed that Kirk was back
with Chris. "It wasn't professional of me."
Kirk let them move off the
personal. "No, it wasn't. You should have had more faith in your
cadets."
"And in you?"
"Well, that might have
been asking too much." Kirk could feel his smile tighten. "We were
classmates, Ross. I used to loan you my notes in physics. Why this
rivalry?"
"I don't know." Neimann sat back, getting comfortable as if he was really
going to talk about this. "Maybe because I needed to borrow those notes in
the first place?" He shook his head. "No matter what, I was never as
good as you."
"In physics?"
"In anything. You were
always the golden boy. My God, you cheated on the Kobayashi Maru test, and they
commended you for it. Anyone else would have been kicked out."
"I can't help the way my
life has gone."
"No, you just take it
for granted it's always going to be easy. Have you ever had to work at
anything?"
Kirk looked down. "Oh,
yes."
"Oh, come on. I mean
really work—sweating blood and worrying about it until you think you might
explode—that kind of work. At anything?"
"How does survival rate
in your book?"
Neimann looked confused.
"Tarsus IV ring any damn
bells, Ross?" Kirk's voice rose, and he forced it to a more restrained
level. "What were you doing at thirteen? Because I was trying to avoid
getting killed."
There was a silence in the
room, punctuated only by the click-click of Kirk's old-fashioned chrono and the
rustle of Neimann's chair as Ross moved back a
little.
Kirk pushed on. "How's
that for really working at something?"
"I didn't know."
"I saw people butchered.
Do you know how bad carnage like that smells when bodies have sat out for days?
Can you imagine hiding under them to avoid the brute squads? I did. I couldn't
get the smell out of my head for weeks. I didn't eat; I could barely drink
anything but water. I lost forty pounds so fast the doctors had me on special
high-calorie supplements."
This was more than he usually
shared. He forced himself back from a memory that was turning into a slide he
might never get off of.
"Jim. I didn't
know."
"I thought everyone
knew. I always think everyone knows. There's Kirk: the poor kid who survived Kodos." He looked at Neimann
and refused to let up the stare. "You think I didn't try harder just to lose
that...label? You think I didn't want to shine so I could forget when I stank
with other people's blood?"
"You hid." Neimann was finally getting it. "You hid."
"I hid." Kirk could
feel his eyes getting tight, the burning feeling of suppressed tears starting,
and he took a deep breath. He hid—when he should have fought. When he should
have done something, helped someone. "Some leader." He looked down.
"You were thirteen years
old. What were you supposed to do?" Neimann
blinked, and Kirk realized he did have tears in his eyes. "My God, that's
why you never give up. That's why you hate to lose so much."
"They say one event, if
it's traumatic enough, can inform your whole life." Kirk took a deep
breath, forcing the past back where it belonged. "I don't hide anymore. I
live life on my terms. That's just how I am. Maybe it's how I would have been
even if I'd never set foot on Tarsus IV. Or maybe that planet shaped me into
who I am. It doesn't matter."
"Knowing matters. Thank
you for sharing that."
Kirk felt suddenly very
uncomfortable. "I'm not sure I meant to."
"I'm not sure you meant
to, either, Jim." Neimann's sympathetic smile
was a real one.
Kirk laughed, but it was a
feeble sounding thing. "Look, go work wonders with our cadets, all right? The
past's past. Let's move forward."
"Aye-aye, sir." Neimann got up, his motion lacking the stiltedness of their
previous interactions. He got to the door, then turned. "Do you play
handball, Jim?"
"I do."
"How would that kind of
competition strike you?"
Laughing, Kirk nodded. "Much
healthier. How about when I get back from the training cruise."
"Okay. Brush up, if you
can. I'm very good." Neimann shot him a smug
grin and left.
Kirk waited a moment, letting
his dredged-up emotions settle a bit before heading out to find Antonia. He saw
the tour at the memorial area, so he bypassed that area and went to sit in the
lobby where the tour ended. A few minutes later, the lieutenant leading the
tour brought the visitors into the lobby, did a quick head count, then left
them to leave at their own pace.
Antonia was in the back of
the group, looking as beautiful as ever. Kirk analyzed his reaction to her. She
didn't make his palms sweaty. She didn't make him worry he might say or do
something stupid. She was...soothing. That had probably been the kiss of death
for their relationship.
She saw him and walked over,
a tremulous smile on her face. "Hi."
"Hi." He started to
get up, but she motioned him back down.
Sitting in the chair across
from him, she said, "Your Commander Chapel is a woman of her word."
"Yes, she is." He
didn't debate the "his" part. Chris was his. He hadn't left Antonia
with that in mind. It had just...happened, with a little help from his rival.
Maybe he could hook Ross and
Antonia up?
She sighed. "I had to
see this place for myself. I hate it, you know?"
"I imagine you do."
This was easier than he expected. Easier to talk to her. Easier to not feel bad
that he'd left her for the stars.
"It's not very
pretty." Her house had been pretty. Her garden, her world. All pretty.
"It's not supposed to
be." His tone was harsher than he meant it to be.
"What did I do wrong,
Jim?" She was crying, crying hard, and he wondered how he'd missed her
tears starting.
Moving over to sit next to
her, he put his arm around her. "You didn't do anything wrong."
"I just didn't do
anything right, either, did I?" She sobbed softly.
"I loved you." He
had. When they were together, he'd loved her. But he'd forgotten her, and he
didn't want her back even though she was so close and smelled like soft flowers
and gentle rain.
"She's everything I'm
not." Antonia smoothed the fabric of her red dress. "But she wanted
my pretty dress, I could tell. I bought it to impress you. In case I saw you. But
as soon as I got here, I knew I'd made a mistake. Everything's red here,
already, and nothing's soft. If you'd wanted soft, you'd have stayed with
me."
She was probably right.
She turned to look at him. "The
Commander's hard."
"No, she's not." Chris
was harder than she'd used to be. Certainly harder
than Antonia. But hard? No. Hard was someone like Carol. Hard was the mother of
your child making you choose between the job you loved and the child you wanted
to love but would never get the chance.
"I'm sorry, Jim. I'm
striking out because I'm hurting."
Even now, even hurting,
Antonia lacked fire. And he needed fire. He needed to feel alive. Every minute
of every day. That was his curse. This need to prove he was alive. That he
wasn't just another dead body on that cursed plain on that blood-drenched
planet.
"Jim?"
He realized he was clenching
his fists and let go. "Antonia, I wish I could say that things would be
different if I did this or you did that. But I can't. This is my life. And you
didn't want to live it with me."
"No. I didn't." She
sighed and stood up. "I was going to bring you a present, but you don't
like birthdays."
"I like birthdays. I
just don't like my own."
"I can't even get that
right..." Leaning down, she kissed his cheek. "I'll miss you. Probably
forever. But I'm not going to wait for you. You've lost me. I want to be clear
on that." Then she laughed, and the sound was slightly hysterical. "I
know you don't care, but I need to put that out there for my own pride's
sake."
"Antonia..."
She backed away from him. "It's
all right, Admiral Kirk. I can see myself out." Her back straight, she
walked to the exit. And out of his life.
All he could feel was a faint
nudge of sadness. And a great deal of relief.
##
Chapel watched as Kirk lay
dozing, a sleepy post-sex smile on his face. He'd hustled them into bed as soon
as they'd gotten to his apartment. She wasn't sure if that was a good sign or a
bad one.
"You're staring." His
voice was so husky and sexy she had to lean in and kiss him.
"Am not," she said
when he finally let her pull away.
"Are too." He
sighed. "You smell good."
"It's the same perfume I
always wear." A tropical floral—sweet, heady, a little spicy.
"I know. I love
it." He frowned. "It's not soft."
"Did you want me in
soft?"
"God, no."
She smiled. Antonia was soft—she
guessed by his reaction that the visit with his ex hadn't
spurred any reunion yearnings in Jim's heart.
"So, I haven't asked how
it went."
"Are you asking
now?" He grinned, and she knew he was fully aware what a question like
that did to her.
"No, not interested. At.
All."
"Liar." He pulled
her close, kissing her, his hand roaming in a southerly direction.
She pushed it away, eyes
narrowing. "Are you trying to distract me? Because that could be seen as a
bad thing."
"I'm trying to make love
to you. If you get distracted, well..." He grinned again, but the grin
faded. "She wanted closure."
"I know. I think that's
why I helped her. I want her to have closure."
He laughed. "You're so
altruistic."
"That's me. Little miss
generous." She kissed him this time, her hand roaming down and down.
"What are you
doing?"
"Tomorrow's your
birthday. I've got the late shift, so I won't make your little fete with Spock
and Len. I know you're crying buckets over that."
He started to protest, and
she stopped him with a finger on his lips.
"It's okay. I'm not
ready to face the McCoy rant yet, either."
"I want to tell the
world. And I don't. It's confusing. But where were you going with the birthday
line?" He reached down, got her hand moving again.
"Well, I can either be
late with your present or early."
"Why not be both?" He
waggled his eyebrows.
"You're very bad. Very,
very, very bad." She punctuated each of the 'verys'
with her hand.
"Compared to you, dearest,
I'm an amateur. Don't stop, by the way."
"Wasn't planning on
it." She let him enjoy what she was doing, disappeared under the covers to
ensure he really enjoyed it, then snuggled up against him again. "Seriously,
what do you want for your birthday?"
"You. In my bed."
"That's too easy."
"Not to be fifty?"
She laughed. "That's too
hard."
He seemed to think about it. "Raspberries."
"That's it?"
"A lot of them." Laughing,
he began to kiss down her body. "I want to eat them in bed with you tomorrow
when you do finally get home."
"Home." She smiled
at the thought. Then she smiled at what he was doing to her. Then she became
very noisy.
He crawled back up to her, a
pleased grin on his face. "When I get back from the training cruise, I'd
like you to move in."
"I thought I had."
He shook his head. "I
mean for real. Get rid of your place, move your stuff in here, be with
me."
"But then how will we
fool Len?"
"We won't. That's the
idea."
"You're sure?"
"I am." He seemed
sure. But something was off.
"Jim, what happened
today?"
"I'm a day away from
turning fifty. I stared deep into the eyes of a woman I don't want. I revisited
hell—"
"What?"
"Nothing. Chris, I'm
old. I'm alone. I'm in love with you. So why the hell aren't I with you?"
"As romantic
declarations go..."
"Screw romantic
declarations. This is real life." He was agitated in a way she wasn't used
to. But before she could say anything to calm him down, he said, "I don't want
to hide anymore. I don't want to live life halfway."
"When have you ever
lived life halfway, Jim?"
He sighed. "I want us to
get married."
She stared at him. "You
do?"
"You don't?"
"I didn't say
that." She lay back down next to him, in part to not have to look at him
since he was managing to act both depressed and manic at the same time.
"Marry me, Chris."
"Ask me again. Once
you've been fifty for a while and the sky hasn't fallen in. Okay?"
He shook his head.
"I promise I'll say yes.
Just...ask me later. All right?"
When he finally nodded, he
looked like a teenaged boy agreeing to eat his peas before dessert.
"I love you, Jim."
"Not enough to marry
me." When she stuck her tongue out at him, he finally laughed. "I
love you. I'll miss you."
"I'll miss you, too. I
wish Spock would let me tag along the way Ross did."
"Spock doesn't want me
distracted the way Ross did." His expression was clearing.
"True." She took a
deep breath. "We don't have to have any kind of elaborate wedding, do we? Just
something small, a little ceremony, just our friends."
"Just our friends."
He kissed her, pulling her on top of him. One friend in particular seemed to
like talk about the wedding. It was nice tat it got
him excited. It could have been just the opposite reaction—Roger had hated
talking about weddings. Ironically, she'd loved that topic of conversation back
then. But that had been a long time ago, and she'd been a different Christine
Chapel.
"I love you, Chris. I
want you in my life all the way." He was fierce as he helped her move, his
eyes holding hers.
"I believe you." She
moved faster, finding a rhythm that would send them both into bliss. "I
love you," she said as she lay quietly on top of him, watching as he got
very sleepy and mumbled something back. She finally crawled off him once there
was no danger of any more wedding talk.
She hoped she didn't have
this much angst when she turned fifty.
##
"So. Good birthday
despite your bad humor?" Bones grinned at Kirk.
Kirk grinned back. Raspberries
fed to you by the woman you loved tended to make any day grand.
"See. Romulan ale does
wonders."
"You're a genius,
Doctor." Kirk bit back a sigh. He wanted to tell Bones about his
rapprochement with Chris, but he just wasn't ready for a lecture. He'd had
enough lectures from McCoy to last a lifetime. And the hell of it was that
Bones wasn't usually wrong when he felt the need to give a lecture.
"You didn't tell me you
were integrating Red Squad into the curriculum. From naysayer to true
believer?"
"It's going in as a
summer seminar. And Ross will be teaching similar classes for the
non-elite."
"Hmmm."
"What's that supposed to
mean?"
"Didn't think you two
got along. I mean after Christine..."
"We patched up our
differences. Or he wanted to save his program at any cost. Whatever the reason,
Bones, it worked out."
"Sounds like a good
solution." He was suddenly diverted, and Kirk turned to see what had
caught his attention.
Saavik. "She fascinates you, doesn't she?"
"It's her relationship
with Spock that fascinates me, Jim. Who'd have guessed he'd end up with a daughter,
even an adopted one?"
"She caught his
heart." Kirk could remember the little girl Spock had rescued from Hellguard. She'd been a wild thing. Vicious and smart as a
whip. Only Spock could reason with her. Only Spock had been able to tame her.
Now, she excelled. Now, she
was here, already commissioned and just completing her graduate studies at the
Vulcan Science Academy, back under Spock's tutelage to finish out her command
training. One of the few lieutenants to take the Kobayashi Maru test. Being a
lieutenant hadn't helped her on the test.
"Hello, sirs," she
said, her low voice resonant.
"Lieutenant." They
both murmured.
"If I were a younger
man..." Bones said once she was safely out of earshot—human or Vulcan. "Don't
tell me you don't find her attractive."
He wanted to tell Bones that
he wasn't interested. That he had Chris now. "Bones, I—"
"Captain Kirk to the
bridge. Captain Kirk to the bridge." It felt like old times hearing Uhura
page him that way.
"Gotta
go, Bones." Hurrying to the bridge, he felt his heart speed up. God, he
loved this ship.
Spock tried to relinquish the
chair, and Kirk waved him back into it. He didn't need to be in charge. He was
happy just being a passenger on the Enterprise.
The bridge crew was bustling,
getting ready to turn things over to the cadets. Spock turned to Kirk, his face
pensive, as if he was considering whether he wanted to say something or not.
"Something on your
mind?"
"I am unsure."
"You're unsure?" Kirk
grinned, loving being with his old friend again. "That's got to be a
first."
"I am sure of what I am
referring to. I am just not sure that I should verbalize it." At Kirk's
impatient look, he said, "Vulcans have an excellent sense of smell."
Kirk suddenly worried he'd
forgotten to put on deodorant.
Spock looked amused, and held
a hand up. "I am referring to your apartment. Unless you have taken to
wearing floral scents, I believe someone is staying there with you. Someone we
are both acquainted with. Someone who has missed you for some time now."
Kirk found himself grinning. "It's
possible."
"Ah."
"Ah? That's all you're
going to say?"
"Congratulations, Jim. I
believe the two of you can be good for one another—if you concentrate."
Kirk laughed. Spock was so
damn funny when he was being earnest. "We're concentrating."
"That was not a veiled
reference to sex, Jim. You both hurt each other last time. Perhaps this time
you will take more care to not do that."
It was a simple concept and
very good advice. "You should open up a love line, Spock."
"I think not." He
watched the screen for a moment, then he asked, "Have you told Doctor
McCoy?"
"He won't approve."
"I am not sure that is
true. He is a friend to both of you."
"I'll tell him later,
Spock. Let me enjoy sneaking around for a while."
"Humans and their
propensity for subterfuge..." Spock let the statement hang, the two of
them silent as the ship progressed on and the cadets started to file in.
"Guess it's time to start
the inspection?"
"I believe you will find
all parts in working order."
"I certainly hope
so." Kirk made a face, then turned it into a smile. "It's good to be
here."
"It's good that you're
here. I have missed you."
"Me, too. We're both on
Earth. Let's take advantage of that."
Why hadn't they? Spock could
become immersed in his cadets, but he'd always found time for dinner. But Kirk
had been so busy obsessing over getting older and not being where he wanted to
be that he'd shut himself away from his friends.
As he walked off to start the
inspection, he resolved to do better.
##
Chapel rubbed her eyes. She'd
been crying so much they felt permanently swollen. She'd given up on makeup. Who
cared how she looked after what had happened to Spock and those poor cadets?
"Stop rubbing your
eyes," Bylakov told her. She was starting to
order Chapel around the same way Janice did. Like she was the older one. "Sir,
please."
Chapel dropped her hands in
time to see a message appear on her queue. "Be there?" was all it
said.
The ship was due to dock in
about half an hour. Janice had already gone up, trying to get a good spot to
view the ship. Chapel had planned to stay away, afraid
she'd cry again and embarrass herself and Jim.
But he wanted her there. He
needed her there. And she needed to be there for him. She keyed in, "Of
course," and sent it back to him.
Cartwright came over, laying his
hands on her shoulders for a moment and squeezing gently. "Why don't you
go up?"
"I think I will. Jim
wants me to be there."
"You go, too, Cadet. It's
not a sight you'll see again—the Enterprise coming home."
"It's true about the
decommissioning, then?" Chapel asked.
He nodded. "Morrow's
going to tell him."
"Today? He doesn't need
this now."
"The news won't be any
more welcome later, Christine. Now, why don't you get up there?"
She turned to Bylakov. "Let's go."
"If you prefer to go alone...?"
"Come with me. I could
use the company."
They waited their turn to
beam up to space dock, then Chapel pushed into the observation lounge, staying
near the back where it would be easy to get out again and head to the
transporter room to meet Jim.
"You knew Captain Spock,
didn't you?"
"I did. He was a
wonderful man."
"I never knew him. I was
pulled into Red Squad, and we were off by ourselves. I was looking forward to
having him as my instructor next year."
"You've missed out on
learning from a master. He was the smartest man...the sweetest man." Chapel
took a deep breath, getting control of herself. She wasn't sure why she was
having such a hard time mastering this grief. She needed to be strong. For Jim.
"Oh, no." Bylakov's cry of dismay was only part of a larger one from
everyone gathered in the lounge. The Enterprise—the damage. Bylakov looked at Chapel, her expression stricken. "They
were mostly cadets. It was just a training cruise."
"I know, Lina. A lot of
them didn't make it."
"Was the admiral right?" Bylakov's
voice was barely a whisper. "Would it have been different if we were
there? Part of that crew and not pulled out by ourselves? We were the smartest—could
we have stopped some of this?"
Chapel looked over at her and
saw that the cadet's eyes were filled with tears. "I don't know." She
put an arm around Bylakov and pulled her close for a
moment. "Even if you could have, it wasn't your
doing that you weren't there. You had no say in that."
"I could have said no to
Red Squad."
"You wouldn't have. No
one would have." She squeezed Bylakov again,
then let her go. "There was nothing you could have done to make this
better."
"There still isn't
anything I can do. I can't even offer comfort. I've been away from them. I
don't know what they went through."
"I don't know what they
went through, either. But I can offer comfort. And so
can you. You just have to get out of your own head long enough to feel their
pain." Her voice was a little harsh and Bylakov
looked stung.
"I—I didn't
mean..."
"I know what you meant. But
part of being a leader is empathizing with pain you may not understand. If you
see someone who was on that ship and they look like they could use a shoulder,
or just a willing ear, you give them one. You don't need to have been there to
listen."
"Yes, sir."
"Lina, my name is
Christine. Start using it in private." She smiled at her, then turned and
left her to watch the ship dock as she headed for the transporter room.
She pushed through people in
a way the old Christine Chapel never would have. When another commander turned
around to glare at her, she just stared her down until she moved out of the
way.
Morrow beamed over to the
ship first, and Chapel knew that there would be some kind of ceremony. Short,
probably. The crew was in no kind of shape for speeches and other formalities. She
waited, leaning up against a pillar near the transporter controls.
Finally, the crew started
beaming in. Young people, with haggard faces and tired eyes. She gave them
encouraging smiles—they'd done their best. They'd done all they could. Too many
of them had paid for that effort with their lives.
She'd seen the Enterprise's
vid logs. She knew what had happened to it. She'd watched Spock die, had seen
Jim with him, the barrier separating them, Jim sliding down the side as Spock
did, too. One leveled by grief, the other giving his life to make sure that his
friend could still experience grief. She could feel tears welling up again and
fought them down.
"It's him," someone
said.
She looked up and saw that
Jim had beamed in. A blonde woman was with him. Scanning the crowd quickly, he
saw Chapel waiting and hurried over. Seemingly uncaring of the people watching,
he took her in his arms, not kissing her, just holding her.
"Jim, I'm so sorry. I'm
so sorry." It was all she could think to say.
He pulled her with him,
tucking her under his arm. No one watching would fail to know they were
together. And if they did miss the message, the sweet kiss he gave her as they
walked over to the blonde would have been the final clue.
"I love you,
Chris," he murmured, as he stroked her hair.
"Love you," she
managed to get out, feeling a lump form in her throat she didn't think she'd
ever get past.
"This is Carol," he
said as they reached the blonde. "Carol Marcus. Carol this is Christine
Chapel."
Chapel tensed, and she felt
him give her a squeeze. The message was clear—he was with her—and she forced
any fear away, smiling as brilliantly as she could at the woman.
"Hello."
"Hello." Carol's
voice was even. If the sight of Jim holding another woman upset her, it was
impossible to tell.
Jim turned to Chapel. "Something
is wrong with Bones. I need to go with him. I've made arrangements for Carol to
go to the VOQ, but it would be easier if you could take her."
"I will. Of
course."
"Then I need you with me
at the hospital. For Bones. I don't know...I don't know if he's all
right."
"Physically?"
"Mentally."
"I'll come as quickly as
I can."
"Okay." He followed
them out, taking Carol's hand. "Everything will be all right."
"It will, Jim. You'll
see." It sounded like this was a conversation they'd had before.
As Jim left them to head down
to the transporter room that was reserved for casualties, Chapel studied the
other woman.
"You don't have to do
that." Carol sighed. "After what we've been through, I wouldn't mind
getting back with Jim. But it's clear his heart is already spoken for."
Chapel smiled. "I'm
sorry. He and I...it's still new. Well, not new. Old,
but..." She stopped talking since words seemed to be refusing to come out
in a coherent manner.
"He told me. I
understand."
"Good." She wasn't
sure what to say. She'd spent so long resenting this woman on Jim's behalf that
it seemed odd to be making nice now, even if the circumstances were so extreme.
"You two have made up?" she finally said, then wanted to kick herself
for how childish it sounded.
"We have." Carol
didn't act like it had been a stupid thing to say. "He had a chance to get
to know his son, too. He told me you know about that. And if you know, then you
no doubt dislike me for keeping David away."
The way Carol said things was
so matter of fact. No judgment on Chapel for thinking badly of her. And no
judgment on herself for having deprived the boy of his father for this long. No
guilt—it must be an easy way to live.
"I know that look. You
disapprove of what I've done."
"I just know it's hurt
Jim over the years."
"We'll never agree on
this, Christine."
"No, we probably
won't." She led Carol to the transporter that would beam them to Earth. "Do
you know what you're going to do now that your project is over?" The
details had been sketchy, but she'd seen enough data in the reports coming back
from the Enterprise to know what had been at stake. And that it had worked.
"It's not over. They're
keeping me away from the project. I'm not sure why."
"They've closed
everything down. It's a forbidden subject now."
"It's my project. Mine."
Carol took a deep breath. "And it's not closed down. David's there
now."
"Oh. I didn't
know."
"Well, now you do."
Doctor Marcus was intense, that was for sure. "I'm sorry. I'm just very
disappointed and very angry that they're shutting me out of this stage. You're
a scientist. Surely you can understand?"
"I can. I do. And I'm
sorry."
Carol seemed to wave away the
sympathy. "I'll put this behind me eventually."
Somehow Chapel doubted she
would ever put this behind her. She'd spent too many years of her life first
postulating, then proving, her theory. The result of her work was out there in
space, and she wasn't allowed on it. That had to be killing her.
The VOQ loomed ahead, and
Chapel pointed. "This is it. Home, dull home."
"It's that bad?"
"No. It's just
very...gray and military. But it's functional. And you'll only have to stay
there until you secure some other place to live."
Carol nodded thoughtfully,
and Chapel decided that the good Doctor Marcus would prefer her new quarters to
be on the Genesis planet. Leading the woman into the VOQ, she was glad to sign
her in and use Len as an excuse for fleeing.
Heaving a sigh of relief, she
hurried out of the building. She wasn't sure what it was that bothered her
about Carol, but it bothered her a lot.
##
Kirk was pacing—feeling like
he might come out of his skin—when Chris came in. "How was he?"
"Not good. You know they
found him in a bar trying to book passage to Genesis?"
He stared at her. It was
slightly disconcerting she could get more info between ops and her ability to
pull out the doctor card, than he could as an admiral. "I didn't know
that. They just said he had a relapse."
"Relapse, my ass." She
poured herself a drink, then looked over at him. When he nodded, she poured him
one, too. "Len's completely lucid, Jim, or he would be if he were Spock. To
those who think he should be sounding like his old self, which would include
the Starfleet psychiatrists working his case, he's been judged crazy."
"So much for our subtle
escape plan." He took the drink and downed it. "Damn it."
Putting her glass down, she
reached for him, massaging his shoulders, her thumbs digging hard into tangled
muscles.
He sighed in relief. "Chris.
What am I going to do?"
"What you planned. You
just have to get him out of detainment first. And it has to be tonight. They
plan to move him to the psychiatric facility tomorrow."
"Tonight? I'm not sure
we're ready."
"You're ready. You have
to be, Jim. For Len's sake."
He'd told her what he was
planning. Everyone else was coming along, but he'd asked her to stay behind. To
stay clear of it. He needed someone on the outside—or the inside, depending on
how you looked at it.
She handed him a data
recorder. "Thought you might like to know what you're up against."
Playing it, he saw where they
were keeping Bones. "You didn't have to do this."
"Consider it a wedding
present."
"Best one ever." He
pulled her to him, suddenly desperate to have her close. "I may not come
back. You know that. None of us may."
She swallowed hard. "I
know."
He waited for her to ask him
why he had to do it. Why this was so important. But she didn't ask, and she
never would. She knew why. She'd go, too, if he'd let her.
"I love you," he
said. "If anything happens to me..."
"I've never loved anyone
the way I love you, Jim. I never will." Pulling him to her, she kissed him
desperately.
He pulled down her pants and
his own, taking her quickly, using time he didn't have to do it but unable to
leave her without making love one last time. She was crying as she came.
"I'm sorry," he
murmured, then realized he'd teared up, too. So much had gone wrong. So much at
stake. And he was doing it all the wrong way—and the only way he could. The
only way left open to him.
Pulling their clothes back
on, he pushed her hair off her face, memorizing the way her eyes sparkled, her
tears turning them an even more vivid blue. "Go back to ops. You need to
be seen. There can be no question that you were involved."
"I know." She
touched his face, staring at him as if she too was memorizing his features. "You'll
survive. I know it." She nodded, blinking so that her tears ran down her
face.
He brushed them off. "Chapel
women have the sight."
"We do." She kissed
him gently. "Godspeed, Jim. I know you can do this."
"Go. I love you."
She touched his lips with her
own and then she was gone. The apartment seemed very quiet, very still. His
apartment—it might never be their apartment, not if he didn't come back.
Taking a deep breath, he
murmured, "Here we go." Then he set out on what might be his final
adventure.
##
Chapel sat at her station in ops,
trying not to show how worried she was about Jim.
Cartwright came in from a
late staff meeting and walked over. "You're working late."
"Got called away to
check on McCoy. Lost time. Making it up." She was terse, but that wasn't
out of the ordinary in ops.
"Anything interesting on
the panel?"
She pointed to several comms
that had come in from the Strivara sector. "Looks
like we might have a Lorkus Plague outbreak. Too
early to tell for sure." She knew Starfleet Medical was watching the situation,
because she'd commed them as soon as she'd come back from being with Jim. He'd
been very clear. Leave as bright a trail as she could so no one could say she'd
been involved in what he was about to do.
Cartwright continued on to
another station, and Chapel relaxed—until she felt a hand fall heavily on her
shoulder.
"You're here,"
Janice said, sitting down at her station.
Chapel frowned; this was
unexpected. Then she realized Bylakov had come in,
too.
Janice leaned over, her voice pitched only for the three of them. "Lina
said you were acting weird. Since she worships the ground you walk on and
notices these kinds of things, I was inclined to listen. Especially since Ny
abruptly cancelled our dinner tonight. Some kind of emergency comms thing, she
pled. Does that sound right to you? Do comms officers currently between
assignments have emergencies?"
Bylakov was doing something on her terminal. She looked over
at Janice. "She's logged on at an auxiliary transporter room."
"Which one?" Janice
asked. "And make sure you're not leaving a trail."
"I'm not leaving a
trail," Bylakov said. "And it's Old City
Station."
"Hmmm. A comms emergency
there?" Janice smiled at Bylakov, then turned to
Chapel. "Interesting, don't you think?" She turned back to her panel,
whispering, "Old man on the move."
"What are you two doing
here?" Cartwright handed Chapel a padd, glaring at the other two for not
being where he expected them to be.
"We came to keep
Christine company." Janice smiled up at him in her old yeomany
way—Chapel could almost see the basket weave hair and short skirt. "We're
going out to dinner later."
Cartwright looked disturbed
by the warmth in that smile. "Well, carry on, then."
They worked for a while in
silence, only the sound of their panels and the pings of incoming comms filling
the space.
"This is
interesting," Bylakov said softly. "Unauthorized
access on a ship in spacedock. It's the Enterprise."
Janice turned to Chapel, her expression afraid this time. "What the hell
are they doing, Christine?"
"What they have to, Jan.
Please, leave this alone."
Klaxons started ringing on
every monitor as the alerts notified everyone who needed to know that someone
was trying to steal a ship out of spacedock. Chapel
looked at the big screen, attempting to seem as confused as everyone else. But
she was silently cheering as the Enterprise headed for the spacedock doors.
Doors that stayed very
definitely closed. "Oh, shit," she said under her breath as she stood
up, unable to tear her eyes away from the screen. She doubted anyone could look
away at that moment as the distance shrank between the ship and the unmoving
doors.
Bylakov moved close and murmured, "You have full access
from your panel, right?"
"Yes."
"Tactical can get
boring. And boredom can lead to bad habits...like playing in the system where
you're really not supposed to." She reached down, her fingers flying on
the pad of Chapel's panel. "You can find out the most interesting things. Such
as, for instance, where the controllers for Space Dock entry and egress are
kept." She hit a short sequence and eased her hand away.
The doors started to open.
Bylakov looked smug. "When you see the Admiral, tell him
that was a present from Red Squad."
"Thank you." Chapel
felt her eyes brimming with tears.
"Nicely done,
junior," Janice said, winking at the cadet.
"Thanks, grandma."
Chapel rolled her eyes. "You
two..."
"Don't make us mad,
Chrissie. We're your alibi." Janice sat down. "Now, I guess we have
to work awhile to make this look good, eh?"
"Can we go out to dinner
afterwards?" Bylakov asked. "I'm
starved."
Chapel felt sick at the
thought of food. "I can't eat anything—"
"You're not going to be
alone tonight, Christine. Just get used to that idea right now." Janice
nodded her head firmly, as if it was all settled.
"Thank you, both of
you."
"Get to work, sir. Or
I'll never get to eat." Bylakov laughed. "I
can't wait for the 'What I did on my Summer Vacation' presentations when
classes start again." At their dual glares, she turned back to her panel. "Okay,
maybe not."
Chapel felt Janice's hand on
her forearm, squeezing just once. Her friend didn't look over, didn't even say
anything. She didn't have to. She'd already said and done everything she needed
to.
##
Kirk sat underneath the
bird-of-prey, drinking heartily from a bottle of scotch.
"I told you it was the
good stuff, sir." Scotty patted the other bottle he'd pulled out of a hat
or something. Kirk couldn't imagine where on Vulcan he'd found single malt.
"Have you seen Spock
today?" Bones sat down next to Kirk, reaching for the bottle. No one
seemed to care about hygiene, they all just wanted to take a long pull off the
bottle, and a quick wipe with the hand was good enough.
"He's better, I
think." Uhura was trying to sound optimistic. She'd been losing her lilt
though. Two weeks since Spock had been returned to them, and he was still a
virtual stranger.
"He's alive. And you're
not crazy, Doc. That's what's important." Sulu smiled at Kirk, and Kirk
smiled back, not surprised that Hikaru would find the
heart of the matter.
"I don't know. It was
interesting when he was crazy." Chekov took the bottle from McCoy.
Kirk looked around the group,
wishing Chris were here. She'd commed him, had told him she was on her way. But
there'd been an inquiry and she'd had to stay back until it was done. She'd
been cleared, although apparently there was some question about how the spacedock doors had opened. Scotty may not have been the
miracle worker in that instance.
She'd been ready to come
then, but Starfleet still didn't trust them, apparently. She was grounded. No
flight for her unless she wanted to try to smuggle herself off the planet. Kirk
thought Starfleet was doing it to punish him. They knew he needed her, so she
was the last thing they'd let him have.
Turning his eyes to the fire,
he remembered their last, quick time together. It only made him want her more. He
needed to lose himself in her body and her love and forget that he'd traded his
son's life for his friend's.
"I went wrong," he
kept hearing David say. His son had cheated. Used protomatter.
Reprogrammed the scenario so it was possible to win.
A chip off the old block. Only
he'd been punished. Kirk would have taken that punishment. He'd have taken it
for both of them. Why did his son have to be dead when he sat here drinking
with friends?
"It may have been
interesting for you when I was crazy, but it wasn't a joy ride for me."
McCoy nudged Kirk. "Or for you, either, eh, my friend?"
"Or for me,
either."
The bottle passed around
again, the mood sobering even as they got drunker. Scotty opened the second
scotch, started it off. They all watched him tip the bottle to his lips.
"I'm getting
married," Kirk said into the silence.
"That's nice, sir. Who's
the lucky girl?" Uhura giggled.
"I'm not kidding around.
Chris and I are getting married."
"You're back with
Christine?" Bones was sort of weaving as he turned to look at Kirk. "Why
didn't I know that?"
"Because I didn't want a
damn lecture, Bones."
"Why would I give you a
lecture on that? You should have married her the first time, you damn
fool." Bones took the bottle, bypassing Kirk altogether. "To the
happy couple."
Everyone chimed in with some
version of "Here-here."
"You're not going to
lecture me?"
"Nope." McCoy
laughed. "Will they let you get married from the stockade?"
"I think so. But the sex
won't be good." Uhura giggled again, and Kirk ordered the others to cut
her off.
"Sir, I think this is
wonderful news. Christine should be here so we can toast her." Sulu stood
up, pulling out a communicator. "Let's call her now."
"We're cut off,
remember?" Uhura said, proving she was back in the pass the bottle game. "We
have to use Sarek's comm system." She grabbed
the scotch from Chekov.
"Hey!" He made a
grab for it and fell over onto the sand. Since he immediately started snoring,
they let him be.
"I love her so
much." Kirk knew he was getting wasted. He needed to stop drinking. Now.
Scotty pressed the bottle
into his hand again. He took a deep swig then gave it to McCoy.
"I miss my boy." The
declaration sat out unanswered. This was why he should have stopped drinking
about a bottle ago.
Then Bones turned to him and
patted his shoulder. "Jim, Saavik said David
gave his life for her and Spock. We're trained to do that. He wasn't. I say he
was the bravest among us." He held up the bottle and drank.
"I went wrong,"
Kirk heard his son say.
"The bravest of
all," Kirk murmured, as he lay back, and watched the stars go by until he
passed out.
##
Chapel stood in the
Federation Council chambers, relief flooding her as Jim and the others were
hugged and slapped on the back and generally forgiven for the sins of the past.
She saw Jim glance over at her, his eyes held a promise of a night with little sleep.
They'd been apart for three months. And then he'd disappeared into the past,
and she hadn't been sure she'd ever see him again.
But she should have known
better. He always triumphed. Always.
Getting ready to join him,
she saw Gillian rush up to him, all smiles and sweet glances. Chapel liked the
woman, but she was very glad that she had somewhere else to be. She wasn't
precisely sure how Gillian qualified to be on a science vessel, but she didn't
plan on complaining.
At least Gillian kissed Jim
on the cheek, not the lips. She'd seemed to get the messages Janice had been
laying down rather thick about Jim being taken, while they'd all sat talking
before the council was called into session.
Sighing, Chapel turned and
left the two of them alone.
"Christine,"
Spock's voice was harsher than she remembered it. And her name sounded a little
awkward, like he would much rather call her by her title but didn't think he
should.
"Spock. It's good to
have you back."
He nodded. "Jim has
indicated that you and he are to wed."
Her eyebrows went up. "He
has, has he?"
"He has. That was a
question?"
She laughed. Obviously he wasn't quite back yet. "We are going to
get married. Or we were till he brought the lovely Doctor Taylor back with
him."
"Oh, they are not
romantically involved."
"They're not? Well,
that's good to know." Although she wasn't sure Spock was exactly up to
speed on the subtleties of romance.
"I will not keep
you." He moved aside. "I only wished to say hello." He looked slightly
pleased with himself, as if that saying had been a hard one to pull out of the
memory banks.
"I'm glad you did."
She touched his hand and was happy he didn't pull away. "I like you much
better alive."
"I prefer this state, as
well."
Laughing, she left him in the
chamber and found McCoy lounging against the wall, one foot propped up.
"Lying in wait?"
"Yep."
"For Jim?"
"Nope." His look
was that of a disappointed uncle. "So someone's
getting married?"
"I would have told
you."
"Jim had to be rip-roaring
drunk on scotch to tell me. What was your drug of choice going to be?"
"Len, that's not fair. I
didn't want a lecture."
He pushed himself off from
the wall, stalking toward her. "Now, why in damnation do you and Jim think
I'm going to lecture you? I've been rooting for you two idiots since you got
together the first time." Pulling her into a tight hug, he whispered,
"Am I that scary that you both were afraid to tell me?"
"Well, when you get a
good rant going...yeah, you are." She pulled away enough to kiss his
cheek.
"I better get to give
you away."
"It's not going to be
that formal."
"No? Well, why in hell
not?"
She laughed. "God, it's
good to hear you swearing again. Spock's voice in your mouth was very
disturbing."
"Try having his brain
inside your head. Now, that's creepy." Len nodded to Sarek as he left,
then smiled as Jim and Spock walked out. "So, the conquering hero again. You
dodge more bullets, my friend..."
Jim smiled, then he pulled
her to him. "Hello there."
She tried to get some reply
to his greeting out, but it wasn't possible since he was kissing her quite
thoroughly. In the middle of the corridor. Outside the Federation Council
Chamber.
When he let her go, she
smiled and said softly, "No more hiding?"
"No more hiding." His
grin was so bright it was infectious.
Giving him a little squeeze,
she said, "Let's talk about Gillian, shall we, Jim?"
He took her arm, patting it
as if she was his senile old grandmother. "Spock, I told you to tell her
nothing happened."
"I did tell her that,
Jim. I was quite convincing, was I not, Doctor Chapel?"
Jim leaned in, not letting
her answer Spock. "Nothing happened."
"I know. It's
just...your exes I can deal with. But new ones..."
"Not a new one. A new
friend. And not one I intended to bring with me. She stowed away."
"That she did," Len
said, winking at Chapel. "She was very determined to be with her
whales."
"Yes." Spock nodded
solemnly.
Chapel wasn't sure how
Gillian being on a science vessel qualified as being with her whales, but she
decided to keep that to herself. "Okay, I believe you all." She
leaned into Jim and smiled as he kissed her cheek. "I missed you." Three
months without him had seemed like forever.
"I missed you,
too."
As they passed ops, Janice
and Bylakov were standing at the entrance.
"Congratulations,
gentleman," Janice said, a broad grin on her face. She nudged Bylakov. "Ask him."
Bylakov turned red but laughed and asked, "Did you like
your present from Red Squad, Admiral?"
"It's captain now,"
Janice said quickly.
"Captain?" At her
nod, Bylakov frowned but turned back to Jim. "Captain."
"It's a long
story," Jim said a little sheepishly.
"They demoted him,"
Len said.
"Not that long a story."
Janice laughed, winking at Chapel.
"My present?" Jim
squinted at Bylakov, as if trying to figure out what
she meant. Then he smiled. "So you were behind
the doors?"
"One overachiever to
another?" Her voice was a little tentative.
"My recently demoted
friend is taking far too much time to tell you it was much appreciated,"
Len said.
Bylakov smiled and followed Janice into ops.
"If I were a younger
man," Len said softly.
Chapel hit him.
"What?"
"She's like a kid sister
to me or something. Don't ogle."
I wasn't ogling." Len
glared at her. "I don't ogle."
Jim pulled her close. "Do
you have to go back to ops?"
"Your buddy Cartwright
told me to take a very long lunch."
"He's such a good
friend." Jim's grin was blinding. "Spock, when do we need to meet at
the shuttle?"
"In two point five
hours."
Jim's eyebrows went up.
"It's not much but..."
"Why are we wasting it
talking?"
"What about lunch?"
Len waved them off. "Fine, go act like hormone-addled kids. See if we
care."
Chapel pulled Jim after her,
and then he was pulling her. She didn't think they'd ever made better time back
to his apartment. He had her clothes off before she'd finished locking the
door, taking her up against the wall, kissing her as if he thought he'd never
see her again.
"Love you," he
said, and he made her melt inside with his words and what he was doing to her.
"I was so worried about
you," she said, clutching him as he sent her over the edge, then holding
him up as he followed her.
They sank down to the floor,
lying curled around each other, unwilling to let go, to stop kissing and
touching and moaning. Their time was over much too quickly, and they got
dressed and headed back to Starfleet Command.
"I'm going to be up on
the ship for the next few days."
She nodded.
"Wanna
sneak on board and break in my new quarters? I'm not sure what kind of quarters
they'll be, but they'll need to be inaugurated."
She began to laugh. "I
don't know. I hear the captain runs a pretty tight ship. You think you can
sneak me on board?"
"Have your little friend
do it," he said, winking.
"Bylakov
is a wonder. You should think about her for your new crew."
"I may do that. I'd like
to get a lot of those kids on my ship."
"Your ship. I love the
sound of that."
She'd never seen him look
more touched. "You do, don't you?"
"I do. It's what you
were meant to do. And I want to be the wife of a starship captain."
"You will be."
She kissed him, knowing she
should show some restraint in public but not really caring after so long away. He
didn't seem to care, either.
"I love you." He
kissed her one last time.
"I love you, too." She
touched his face, making him look at her. "I'm sorry about David."
"I'm dealing with that
in my own way. I'm not sure I'll want to talk about it."
"That's fine. But if you
do, I'm here."
"I know you are." He
turned to go, but then looked back at her. "Our friends are happy for
us."
"I know. It's
nice."
"We can do this."
"Yes, we can."
"Spock says to
concentrate. To take care not to hurt each other."
"Spock said that? Recently?"
"Well, pre-death. But
I'm sure he'll say it again someday. He's really much better."
"I'll take your word for
it." She walked with him to the shuttle loading area. "Did you tell
him to reassure me about Gillian?"
"I expressed some
concern on that front. He volunteered. I think he feels guilty for all the
times he spurned you."
She laughed.
"Right."
As they turned the corner,
she saw his crew waiting for him. "This is where I head back to my job. Go
enjoy your new ship."
"I'll send you a message
when I'm done. Tell Cartwright you need leave. You can hide out in my new
quarters when we aren't touring the ship." He kissed her quickly. "I'll
beam you up myself if I have to."
"I'll be on the lookout
for your signal." She pushed him toward the others. "I hope it's a
nice ship."
"Well, nice or not. It'll
be mine." Winking, he hurried off.
She turned to go to ops and
saw Ross, just rounding the corner.
He took in the assembled group
at the shuttle area and asked, "So, he's back in space?" He sounded
both happy and a little disappointed.
"Already bucking for his
job, Ross?"
"It's possible."
"Then why do you look
disappointed?"
He smiled. "I was
looking forward to creaming him in handball." He walked with her to ops. "You
don't play, do you?"
"No."
"Now that he's gone. Is
it over for you two?"
"He's not gone. And yes,
we'll stop dating." She could tell her smile was too silly for him to fall
for it. "We're getting married."
"Congratulations. You
deserve to be happy. Both of you do."
She stopped at the door to
ops. "I thought you didn't like him?"
"I'm not sure I do. But...I
understand him better. I think he'd tell you that's what matters."
"I think you're
right."
"How's my cadet working
out?"
"She's the best. You
know how to pick 'em."
His look was nostalgic and
trained on Chapel. "I sure do. I'll see you around."
Nodding, she walked into ops.
Cartwright came out of his office, smiling indulgently. "That wasn't the
longest lunch ever."
"That's because I'm
going to take leave. Jim said you'd approve it."
"Jim's taking advantage
of me."
She refrained from telling
him she hoped Jim would be taking advantage of her soon, instead.
"Fine, take leave. Your
two buddies have already reassigned your shifts, anyway."
"They have?" She
was touched.
"Get to work, Chapel. While
you're still on the clock."
"Aye-aye, sir."
Sitting down between her two
friends, she said, "Thanks."
Janice glanced at her. "We're
big fans of true love."
Bylakov nodded.
"Besides, you're going
to transfer us a lot of replicator credits."
"I am?"
"You are. It'll make up
for us working those long, lonely hours while you're with the living legend
getting sweaty."
"Well, when you put it
like that." She leaned back in her seat and sighed happily. She was going
to be with Jim.
"Commander, could you
put in a good word for me with the Ad—Captain?"
"I already did, Cadet
Pushy." Chapel winked at Janice.
"Fusai
and T'Velik would like to serve with him, too."
"I'll let him
know." Then Chapel grinned—it wasn't a nice smile. "But it won't be
the first thing I do."
"Understood, sir. It's
good to know your priorities."
"First rule of
leadership, Lina. First rule of leadership."
FIN