Star Trek
Kirk/McCoy
Star Trek: The End Of A Mission
Usual Disclaimers: I own nothing.
This is one of my old fics I have finally decided to finish.
Captain Kirk stormed down the corridor. Supposedly he should have been starting shore leave. In some alternate dimension he would no doubt in fact be doing so. He was probably drinking in a beer garden, with the sunshine and some new friends to keep him company. Or he was having a BBQ next to a pool with lots of lovely ladies around. Possibly, he allowed, he was doing some small amount of work after which he was planning a night out with Bones and Scotty. In this reality, however, due to admiral Nogura, his normal boss, taking a (in Kirks considered opinion) very long and undeserved holiday with his family, he had been jumped on by various other admirals at the base, all wanting to use his high security clearance and experience in the field to be put to use, and why, he thought, are there so many damn admirals at this base anyway. Specifically all this meant that Kirk innocently arriving at the star base had suddenly been landed with an enormous amount of reports to write, most of which needed extensive and thereby time-consuming background research.
Due to Nogura's absence no-one seemed to know exactly how much work he was actually given and due to the rather unorthodox approach to his last mission, nobody seemed to care. It was he thought grumpily, not at all his fault, even if it had meant a restructuring of star fleets presence in the area. He had done the best he could with bad intelligence and very little support from Earth. For the moment though he was, he thought sourly, persona non-grata within star fleet, or at least this area of, at least until they desperately needed him again.
Nogura he thought may be a cold-hearted bastard, but, he was only one man and along with never seeming to especially care about paperwork he never severely over-worked Kirk. In fact he always seemed to know just how much he could handle. Suddenly Kirk had three new bosses all giving him huge amounts of work, none of which were inclined to listen when he tried to tell them that there was no possible way he could manage everything for the deadlines. In fact, to a man they simply told him that their work was vastly more important then anybody else's and that he was simply to prioritize. They had then gone ahead and given the impossible deadlines. In all, thought Kirk, it was even more unfortunate that apparently, other then seeming to hate him, the only thing all the admirals had in common seemed to be their utter distaste for each other.
Nogura might yell at him occasionally, okay a lot, he thought. But he knew how to use a man of Kirks particular talents and for the moment at least this wasn't behind a desk. Nogura never seemed to micro-manage him either, he would give him objectives and Kirk himself would determine how best to achieve them. Usually with many last minute changes too, he thought wryly. He didn't know these admirals and couldn't predict their responses the way he could with Nogura. One of them in particular, admiral Westwood had given him such detailed instructions he may just have well have done all the work himself.
Of course, Kirk didn't know it, but Nogura after many years of working with Kirk was just as good at anticipating Kirks reactions to a given situation. Nogura had also had many years of experience with Kirk's weaknesses, the main one being Kirks reaction to being micro-managed. The results of which always tended to be unfortunate, with a very memorable occasion at the academy whereby half his crew wouldn't speak to him for weeks.
There was no way he could possibly get any shore leave now, although he was very much in need of it; in fact Bones had as much as said as much at breakfast. Kirk brightened, now that he thought about it, Bones could make it all go away. Perhaps he could put him on medical leave for stress. After all if he weren't stressed before he started all this work he certainly would be afterwards and preventative medicine and all that. Kirk then sighed, he knew he would never really do it, he knew that most of the reports were in fact very important in their own way and he would never shirk his duty. Never mind how sadistic his bosses were. He Kirk would get this work done if he dropped dead whilst doing it, besides, he wouldn't give them the satisfaction. He directed a particularly vicious scowl at the direction of the lift thereby terrifying ensign Chekov who happened to be standing there. Kirk smiled. It was petty, but sometimes the perks of being a captain could really cheer a person up.