Falling for You

Summary: Leonard McCoy is working his way through this long mission into the depths of space when there's an explosion in the lower engines. That's the day he meets Cass Orion, an engineer who has a love of space to even out McCoy's hatred of it. Almost immediately they realize they're attracted to each other and begin a relationship, somewhat hesitantly. McCoy worries his failed marriage means he's bad for any woman, while Cass's own past haunts her every day. But once they're together they only bring out the best in each other and soon fall in love. Together they work through Cass's secrets, McCoy's insecurities, a serious injury and a deadly attacker set on destroying both of them.

Rated M for language, violence and sexual content.

A/N: This fic is based in the Alternate Reality of the current set of films. (Long live Karl Urban xx.) It takes place after Into Darkness and before the events of Beyond. The Enterprise is into their 5 year deep space mission, but I've left the exact amount of time open. This story will be over 20 chapters. Hope you enjoy! -demonmermaidwizard

CHAPTER 1

Leonard McCoy looked up as the alarm blasted through the speakers. He turned in his chair and looked at the communication board. An alert blinked on the screen saying there was an explosion in the lower engines.

"Shit!" he cursed, jumping up from his chair. He punched the emergency button to signal all medical personnel to their stations before grabbing a medic bag and racing down the hall at full speed. Halfway to the engines Captain Kirk ran around a corner and the two men raced beside each other.

"What happened?" McCoy demanded as they ran.

"No idea," Kirk breathed, his arms swinging powerfully at his sides.

They turned a corner and skidded to a stop. Dark smoke filled the hallway as dozens of people ran towards them coughing and bleeding.

McCoy jumped into action. "Are you alright?" he asked a crew member with a small cut on her cheek.

Kirk ran into the smoke. "Scotty!" he shouted. He looked around the engine room but saw nothing out of place and no fire. Smoke filled the room but was quickly being filtered out.

"Scotty!" Kirk shouted again.

McCoy came up next to him. "Someone said it was the bravo generator."

"Over there," Kirk said taking off through the engine room. McCoy followed close behind. As they came up to a large double door marked BRAVO, outside the closed door lay Scotty in a pool of blood. Kneeling beside him was a woman in her bra while applying pressure to his head with her shirt.

"Mr. Scott!" Kirk yelled.

The woman looked up as the two men slid up to them. "It's not all his blood," she assured them.

McCoy looked over the woman. Her one arm was black and red from burns, she had a deep cut on the front of her forehead and across her abdomen.

"You're hurt," McCoy said.

"Here, Captain," the woman said grabbing Kirk's hand and putting it where she was pressing her shirt to Scotty's head wound. "It's not too bad, but keep pressure on it. I have to make sure the space door is closed," she said jumping up.

"What?" Kirk yelled after her.

He looked to McCoy. "Bones, is he alright?"

McCoy leaned over and checked Scotty's vitals, his tricorder beeping softly. Scotty moaned. McCoy nodded. "Looks like just a bump that's knocked him out." He looked up to see some of his medical aids walking towards them.

"Quit going around your ass and move!" he yelled at them. They burst into a run. "They're as useful as a screen door would be on this ship," he mumbled with a shake of his head as they approached. Then he barked orders at them as they got Scotty on a gurney. He told the one to get Scotty to the bay and patched up before he sent the other two around the room to make sure there was no one else hurt.

Then McCoy and Kirk went after the woman. She was just going through the large Bravo doors as they opened. She hurried around a very blackened generator. McCoy and Kirk hurried after her to see her pulling herself up on top with a painful moan.

"Hey! What's the big idea?" McCoy said.

"Cadet, explain yourself," Kirk ordered.

"I believe something was misaligned and that was causing the sparks. Then it caught fire and it was right next to the radiation cylinders. We tried to put it out but one of the cylinders exploded. I then made sure everyone was out of the room, closed the doors and then opened the escape hatch to space just as the other two cylinders exploded."

Kirk jumped up on the generator. "You can't just climb up here when it it was exploding moments ago!" Kirk argued.

"Jim, get her down! She's hurt," McCoy barked.

"I'm fine!" she yelled. "Just let me do this!"

Instead of pulling her down Kirk helped her quickly look over the machine. He helped her pull the main power panel and cut it free as a safety precaution. Nothing was going to be working on this thing any time soon. "It all looks good to me."

"Yeah. I think we'll be safe now," she breathed.

"Good," McCoy grumbled. "Now get down."

The woman pulled away a scorched piece of metal and tossed it aside. Kirk looked in as she pulled out more blackened metal. "Alright, alright. The fire's out, now go get yourself checked out," Kirk ordered her. "You're still bleeding."

"I'm just checking," she mumbled still reaching into the generator.

"Enough," Kirk said taking her arms.

"But-"

"Enough, Cadet," he said louder.

The woman looked at him wide-eyed.

He softened his voice. "You've done very well. The ship is safe and no one's died. Now get down and get yourself checked out with Dr. McCoy; that's an order."

The woman blinked and then nodded. "Yes, Captain." She turned and carefully crawled back the way she'd come. She turned and sat on the edge where McCoy stood ready.

"Slide off. I've got ya," McCoy said holding up his arms. He scowled deeper as he got another good look at the deep cut on her abdomen.

She slid down and he caught her. As her feet hit the ground her knees buckled. "Woah, there," McCoy said catching her.

"I don't feel so good," the women said, swaying and bringing a hand to her forehead. She cringed as she touched her cut.

"Come on," McCoy said picking her up. "You've lost a lot of blood. I need to get you closed up." He then carried her through the engine room and up to an emergency medic panel in the hallway. He popped it open with a kick. A gurney slowly folded open and McCoy laid the woman on it. "You doing okay?" he asked her.

"I - uh... Everything's going blurry," she said as he strapped her on.

"Hang on," McCoy said and started running behind the gurney. He kept a close watch on her abdomen. It had mostly stopped bleeding, but all the red down her front and on her pants worried him. He turned into the hospital bay and hurried over to the surgical area.

McCoy started giving orders to the nurses that came over to assist. As the woman's eyes started to flutter McCoy leaned over her. "I'm going to give you a sedative. When you wake up, you'll be all better."

"I'm allergic to oranges," she mumbled.

"Oranges?" McCoy asked. Something gripped his stomach as he worried she may be slipping into delusions.

"Make sure there's no oranges in my medicine."

The corners of McCoy's mouth twitched. "Sure thing, Darlin'." He injected the sedative and watched her quickly nod off. "Come on," he said to his nurse and quickly pulled on a surgical cover.