AN: Though compliant with the universe created in Confessions of a Teenage Starfleet Cadet and A Tale of Two Ensigns, this is not necessarily set in that universe. It can be simply read as being post-movie.
Nyota Uhura knew that falling in love with her half-Vulcan Instructor was a bad idea. In hindsight, she should have stopped herself from falling. She'd managed very well for years. She'd frozen her heart and kept it under lock and key. She'd kept her mind to her studies, stayed focused. She had watched her peers fall head over heels with boys who had chased them for only one thing, immature boys who had viewed them only as conquests. She had watched their hearts break. She saw them distracted from their work, only able to think of those same boys. She swore she'd never fall like that.
Then she entered Starfleet Academy. Then she met Spock. She knew that he was nothing like those boys, and against her better judgement, she fell in love with him.
When they'd begun their clandestine relationship, it was against both of their better judgements. He did not want to be accused of misconduct and she never wanted to be that girl, the girl that crossed the line between students and teachers. But they had done it anyway, love was illogical after all.
Leonard McCoy really had loved his ex-wife Jocelyn, despite what he told everyone. When their marriage had disintegrated, he had been heartbroken. When she took everything in the divorce, he had really only cared for one thing: his daughter Joanna. When Jocelyn had got full custody, he felt as though he had lost everything. He loved his little girl, just like he loved her mother long ago. He was a Doctor, he was supposed to heal people, but he couldn't heal himself.
So he had enlisted in Starfleet. He had done so on impulse, and as he looks back, probably under the influence of alcohol. He had done so to run away and start afresh, to forget Jocelyn, and even, he thinks guiltily, Joanna. He had run away from the two things that were most precious to him. Perhaps he unconsciously punished himself, electing to enter Starfleet, despite his fear of flying. He hopes his little girl will forgive him when he returns.
He had told himself that he was over Jocelyn, but perhaps he hadn't been. He told himself and he told everyone else that he had given up on women, but he hadn't really. Somewhere, deep down, he still hadn't gotten over the woman that he had loved for all those years.
Then he met Christine Chapel. If the Doctor can't fix himself, then it's the Nurse's job. He found himself falling in love all over again. This time, he's not going to allow it to fall to pieces, no matter what.
Spock had never understood why his father married his mother. When he had asked, his father had told him that as the Ambassador to Earth, it was logical that he marry a Human to better observe their culture. He came to understand marriage as a logical partnership. But there was a lot that he had yet to comprehend.
Spock had always wondered why humans placed so much value on the illogical emotion of love. He had never understood it beyond the scientific, hormonal, chemical level. Then he took a teaching post at the Academy. Then he met Nyota Uhura, and he changed his observations.
It was only after Vulcan's destruction and Amanda's death that Sarek told him the truth. He married her because he loved her, as illogical as that seemed. But Spock had learnt the necessary lessons now, the lessons that Nyota taught him, and he could understand now.
So later, after making what would have seemed the most illogical decision of his life in marrying Nyota, he justified it as a logical decision. His father had done so prior, so he was simply furthering Vulcan studies of Human behaviour, as well as providing an interesting experiment on the dominance of Vulcan DNA.
Hikaru Sulu took up fencing out of a childhood fantasy. He wanted to be a hero, like the knights in shining armour in fairytales, or like the Musketeers, or like the samurai in the old Japanese tales his grandfather told him. His cause for taking it up wasn't exactly noble, it was childish. He wanted to be a hero, to be a handsome swashbuckling young man who saved fair maidens.
He had outgrown that fantasy eventually, outwardly anyway. But his passion for fencing remained, and it would stay with him his whole life. But the part of him that ached to be a hero stayed too, dormant. When Captain Pike called for Officers with Advanced Combat Training, he seized the chance. He had seized his chance to protect, other Officers had Advanced Combat Training, and fencing didn't really qualify. He had seized his chance at heroism, though in retrospect, it had been slightly foolish and reckless.
But then he was reckless. He was a Pilot after all. He got a kick out of the excitement, the exhilarating feel of speed, of narrowly dodging asteroids. He was, after all, quite the adrenaline junkie.
Pavel Andreievich Chekov had never told anyone why he ran. As a child genius, he had been bullied at school. He had first started training so that he could become faster than his tormentors, so he could escape them. But he found that it made him feel better, it made him feel free. When he ran, he wasn't Pavel Chekov, child genius, he was just Pavel Chekov. He ran for the release it gave him, the chance to let out his anger.
And so he kept running. He never ran to get anywhere, he just ran for the sake of running. Often, his runs would take him to some field far from his home and he would sit there for hours at a time, watching the stars. There was just something comforting about them, something comforting about these bright pinpricks of light that were really giants, plasma held together by gravity. He knew many of the constellations, and the planets, and the stars, and he would just sit there pointing them out to himself. Throughout the years, even when he entered the Academy, he sought comfort in these two things, running and the stars.
Then he met her. She becomes the first person he ever tells why. She is the first person he feels understands. She is his first love. He doesn't have to feel alone ever again, he won't run alone anymore. She'll run with him.
Montgomery Scott did regret using Admiral Archer's beagle as a test subject. He really did. The Admiral had trusted him, and he had betrayed that trust. At the time, he had been younger and less wise. He had enough faith in his own abilities that no harm would befall the dog. He was right in the end; the beagle had rematerialized on the Enterprise, completely unharmed. But the damage had already been done.
He considered that he had already payed enough penance and immediately returned the prized beagle to the Admiral with an apology. He had, after all, had his status as top of his class revoked, suffered six months on Delta Vega with only Keenser for company and several other indignities. He thought, now that the beagle was back, the Admiral would forgive him and they could go back to the days when he had been the Admiral's protégé.
But he had been wrong. The trust was broken and was not going to repair itself just because the beagle was returned. Scotty's status as top of his class was reinstated and all black marks removed, but the Admiral never forgave the Engineer. Scotty was saddened, but in true Scotty fashion, announced that the man was too obsessed with the beagle anyway.
James Tiberius Kirk went through a period of time when he blamed his parents for abandoning him. His father made the greatest sacrifice aboard the Kelvin and his mother had left him and his brother in the care of their abusive uncle. During the turbulent periods of his life, they were frequent causes of frustration, something that he would feel great guilt and regret for later in life.
One of the greatest regrets was that he would never be able to apologise to his father for this. His father had died a hero, died saving lives, including his own. But he had done his father's memory harm, he had blamed him, he had broken laws, done things that no son of George Kirk should have done.
He had told his mother this, he had apologised to her, when he returned home after the Narada. She had forgiven him, easily. Perhaps it was what mothers did. She had told him that he was honouring his father's memory now, in service at Starfleet. He would have forgiven his son. That was what he would have done. He would have been proud of Captain James Tiberius Kirk.