Author's Note: Just a little somethin', somethin' that will probably/hopefully turn into a little more.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot.

I am officially a cheeseball. Reviews would be greatly appreciated.

Chapter 1: What's in a Name?

Synopsis: In which Yeoman Rand considers transferring off of the Enterprise, and Jim Kirk is misunderstood.

Grace [greys] –Idiom: to be in someone's good/bad graces = to be regarded by someone with favor or disfavor.

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place." –George Bernard Shaw

Jim loathed paper.

"How many more of these do we have left, Janice?" he groaned, slumping back into his chair.

"I'll need your signatures on at least four more forms, Captain," she emphasized the last word.

"And it's Yeoman Rand, not Janice, sir."

First names were so informal, yet Captain Kirk insisted on referring to everyone on the Enterprise by their first names (or nicknames) during off-duty hours or times when he was speaking with a crewmember one-on-one. Janice didn't like it. She wanted to be Yeoman Rand—she'd worked her ass off for that title.

The Captain's blasé treatment of rank titles didn't impress her. He might very well be attempting in some way to boost cohesion and morale among the 400-plus Starfleet personnel on board, but in her eyes it was degrading. Even more, she took it personally when he called her Janice, resenting the charming twinkle in those cerulean eyes.

She knew of the Captain's history—his name had always been a hot one in the gossip mill back at the academy—she'd heard through grapevine stories of his often-dangerous escapades and wild debaucheries. How this troublemaker ever made it to the Captain's seat was beyond her, and she wrote off his informalities as nothing but rebelliousness; just another example of Jim Kirk 'sticking it to the man'.

No matter how many charming smiles or witticisms Captain Kirk threw her way, she could not bring herself to respect the man. To him, she was just a woman, and not even one of high rank (though she was damn satisfied with her position); to him she was an object—something pretty to look at and to wait on him hand and foot. With any other Captain she wouldn't have minded, but she had it in her head that James T. Kirk was nothing but a reckless womanizing chauvinist. And so now whenever Captain Kirk called her 'Janice', all she could think was that he used her first name because he did not respect her as a professional, nor as a woman who had worked her way into a prestigious position—'I'm Yeoman Rand damn it, is it too much for him say?'—and it grated against her nerves.

In fact, she had been considering transferring of late. She knew people on U.S.S. Templeton, a smaller vessel but a starship nonetheless, and would be perfectly content to work anywhere but underneath the authority of her current Captain. The only thing that stopped her was her own stubbornness. She'd never quit anything in her life, and wasn't about to start now just because things were difficult. Deep down though, she wondered if she could last the next four years of the Enterprise's voyage without cracking.

She sighed, watching her Captain's sluggish movements, the way he kept yawning every couple minutes, as if this was the most boring task in the universe.

Again, she took it personally. She had pleaded for this meeting to go over stacks upon stacks of backed up paperwork. He finally agreed to meet with her this late in the evening (now the wee hours of the morning), which she interpreted as an act of procrastination. Still, at least she had shown up alert and ready to do the work. He, on the other hand, looked disheveled, tired, and unprepared. Obviously he didn't value the administrative tasks that were so necessary in order for a starship to function. Obviously he did not think her job or her time was important.

It wouldn't be the first time. Over the past nine months he had made a habit of not showing up to her appointments, taking an inordinate amount of time to return her communications, and whining about almost every task she asked him to perform. He avoided her, and in doing so, avoided the work. She really had her hands full, and he didn't seem to care. Eventually all this pent-up tension was going to come to a head, she knew, resulting in either her getting transferred or getting fired. She certainly hoped it was the former.

Tonight the Captain seemed to be doing everything possible to communicate to her how boring this was to him. She noted the way he held a document really close to his face, squinted his eyes, and sighed loudly.

"What's this one say?" Kirk asked dully, handing the paper back to her.

'Oh of course. Trying once again to brush the work off on me.'

"I'm quite certain you know how to read, sir," Janice snidely retorted before clamping her mouth shut in horror.

'Did I just say that?' Such disrespect was grounds for insubordination and even dismissal.

He just looked at her, and for the first time she noticed the exhaustion written in the lines on his face, around his eyes, and the dark smudges underneath them.

It was then that her mind recalled the reason why he was so backed up on paperwork—the reason why she was in the office of his quarters at 0100 trying to get his scribbled penmanship on a stack of official forms and documents.

The Captain had been badly injured on the last mission, and had spent no less than a week in sickbay. He'd been released from the watch-care of Dr. McCoy only yesterday, and was no doubt still recovering. She'd been on leave that week—a much needed break spent with her family and friends back on earth. Having only heard about the horrors of the last mission in brief, she had certainly not considered the notion that the Captain's fatigue tonight was due to his weakened physical state, rather than laziness or boredom or the usual lack of respect for authority.

A bit chagrined, she tried to stammer out an apology. "Captain, I—"

He cut her off with a lethargic wave of his hand. "Never mind. It's late. I'm sure you're tired."

His gaze wandered, and she watched him wince as he shifted in his chair. Compassion and guilt bloomed suddenly in Janice's chest. She cleared her throat.

"Did you need me to clarify something in that report, sir?"

He frowned slightly, set the paper down on the desk, and scrubbed at his eyes with the palms of his hands.

"Yeah…I'm having trouble reading it…must be the poor lighting."

She did not bother to point out that the lights in the room were at 70 percent, and that his inability to decipher the print on the page was most likely due to his extreme fatigue.

Gently, she picked up the paper from the desk and began to read it to him, line by line.

By the time she was done she could tell he was close to dosing off, but she said nothing as he signed his name on the dotted line. She absently wondered how he would last through the next three forms.

"Paper," he mumbled suddenly, shaking her from her thoughts. "How does it even still exist?"

"Sir?"

He looked at her with bright, glassy eyes. "It's what, like, the 24th century? Why the hell do we still have paper?"

"I'm not sure I follow you, sir," she said slowly.

"Paper was invented a really, really long time ago," he sighed, speaking in a tone one would use if explaining a difficult concept to young child. Really it was probably just the exhaustion—his fatigue was making it so that even speech was a tiresome undertaking.

"….And now we have all this technology, and yet paper's still here."

He looked at her pointedly. "Don't you ever wonder about stuff like that?"

She didn't know how to respond. Surely other captains did not ramble to their yeomans about the philosophical implications of the resilience of paper.

"I believe Starfleet is just taking extra precautions in regards to its records, Captain."

Paper had almost become obsolete by the end of the 21st century; however, that was before a cyber terrorist hacked into the Federation's mainframe computer system, deleting literally trillions of files and destroying millions of hard drives all via one well-crafted virus. It was not long after this incident that the Federation decided that having tangible records on paper was beneficial should ever computers fail them.

"Yeah, but look how much paper this is!" he said dramatically. "If you think how much paper has been used and reused since its invention—that's a lot of paper."

"I suppose it is, Captain." Curiously, Janice found herself smiling at the Captain's child-like musings. Why was she not annoyed like usual?

"You probably think I'm nuts," Kirk said with a chuckle, running his fingers through tousled dirty-blonde hair. "Ah, I don't know what I'm saying. Sorry."

Janice just shook her head. As she went to reach for another report, her hand brushed the side of his forearm.

He was burning up.

"Captain!" she gasped, alarmed.

"What? Wha'd I do?" he slurred, oblivious to his state.

Ignoring all formality, she quickly placed her hand against his forehead, frowning at the heat she felt.

"You have a fever!" Her tone was almost accusatory.

"M'fine. Just a little tired."

"Captain I really do think—"

"Just read me the next form, Janice, 'kay? The sooner we get this done the sooner we can both get some sleep."

She hesitated, but eventually acquiesced. "Yes sir."

It took a good 45 minutes to get through the next three reports, and by the time they were done the Captain could barely keep his eyes open.

She was packing up the forms and preparing to leave when she glanced at the slumped form in the chair. Noticing the flush of his cheeks, she made the decision to contact the ship's CMO.

Reaching for her communicator, she quietly slipped out of the room and commed sickbay.

"McCoy here."

"Doctor McCoy, this is Yeoman Rand. I thought you might want to check on the Captain—he seems ill."

"I'll be right there. McCoy out."

No less than ten minutes later, McCoy showed up at the door, medkit in hand.

"Well what's wrong with the boy wonder this time?"

"He has a fever," Janice explained softly.

She was a bit surprised that the Doctor's arrival and booming drawl did not awaken the Captain.

"It must be a high fever—Jim's normally a light sleeper," McCoy diagnosed before even reaching the desk. "It's a good thing you commed me."

After scanning the Captain with a tricorder, the doctor frowned, then deftly deposited the contents of a hypo into the younger man's neck.

Kirk was awake immediately, arms swinging and shouting gibberish.

"Jim—Jim!" McCoy, with a skill borne of years of practice, firmly latched on to the Captain's wrists. "It's me!"

Abruptly, the younger man stilled, slumping back into the chair.

He looked at McCoy in confusion. "Bones? What are you doing here? Where're the other kids?"

"Jim—you're on the Enterprise. You have a high fever."

Jim squinted his eyes shut, his breathing increasing. "No—Kevin was with me. They didn't take him, did they?"

"Jim, Kevin's dead," the doctor said gently. "He's been dead for years. You're delirious."

"Bones—Bones, you gotta help Kevin. He didn't look too good last time I saw him…his head was chopped off."

McCoy looked stricken. Janice, having been observing the whole scene with growing concern, let out a tiny gasp.

And suddenly, the Captain's bleary focus was on her.

"Aunt Lanae?"

The doctor let out an involuntary groan. Janice stood where she was, thoroughly confused, and a little bit frightened.

"No sir…it's Yeoman Rand."

He didn't seem to hear her. "Aunt Lanae…how did you get here?"

She shook her head. "It's okay. It's me, Janice. Remember?"

"Janice?"

"Yes. Janice. We were going over paperwork earlier."

Absently Jim nodded, mulling over her words, the distraction allowing McCoy to pull one of his arms across the doctor's shoulders. "Time for bed, Jim."

"Wha--?"

"You've got a high fever," McCoy explained again. "You're lucky Yeoman Rand called me."

"Janice commed you?"

"Yeah."

"Huh," the Captain sounded mildly surprised as McCoy maneuvered him to his bed. "Thought she didn't like me."

McCoy, remember the Yeoman's presence, met her now guilt-stricken gaze from across the room.

"And she doesn't like it when I use her name," Kirk continued, oblivious to Janice's continued presence. "Why is that, Bones?"

"Well maybe she doesn't like her name, Jim. Some people don't," McCoy responded lightly.

Then, "You need to sleep, Jim. I'm gonna give you a mild sedative."

"No."

"I'm your CMO. I say you're getting a sedative," McCoy retorted, and the familiar hiss of a hypo reached the Yeoman's ears.

"Damn it, Bonesss," came the heavy, sleep-induced response.

The doctor exited the room moments later, fixing Janice with a glare.

"What you saw and heard here tonight does not get repeated to anyone, understand?" he hissed.

"Yes," she answered mechanically. Inside she was churning with questions.

"Good."

She waited until they were in the hallway to snag his sleeve.

"Who's Aunt Lanae?"

McCoy briefly closed his eyes. "Don't."

"I want to know," she insisted.

He turned on her then. "Why? So you can spread it around the gossip mill?"

"No. Because I care."

He snorted. "Pardon my French lady, but bullshit."

"Look I know I can't prove it to you. All I can say is that, from what I've seen tonight, I feel like there are some things I need to know. I feel like if I knew more about him, maybe I could better understand him."

"Whatever happened to accepting people for who they are?"

"Just tell me his story," she insisted, ignoring the rhetorical question.

"It's not my story to tell."

"The bare minimum. That's all I'm asking. Please. And I won't tell a soul." She paused. "I believe I deserve at least some explanation after witnessing what I did in there."

He studied her for a moment, then leaned up against the wall with his arms crossed in front of his chest.

"Jim's lost a lot of people in his life. His Aunt Lanae was one of them. Jim lived with her for few years when he was a kid."

Janice could tell the doctor was holding back a significant bit of information, but knew she'd better not press her luck if she wanted to get the information she sought.

"How did she die?"

McCoy gave her a hard look. "You want the gory details? She was dragged out of her house, raped and killed right in front of him. Jim was very young."

Janice covered her mouth with her hand.

"She apparently looked a lot like you—or so Jim says."

"He said—he said I look like her?"

McCoy just nodded.

"Do you think—that's the reason why he avoids me all the time?"

The doctor shrugged. "Could be. Or he could just be avoiding paperwork. Jim's a complicated man."

"Doctor…this may sound silly but…do you know why the Captain always insists on calling us all by our first names?"

The older man was silent for a minute, as if considering how he should answer.

Finally, he spoke, deliberate and slow.

"Rand, all I can tell you is that the Captain carries inside of him a long list of the names of those he's lost over the years. Each and every one of those names is important to him. You'll even find that he knows the first names of every crewmember on this starship."

"All 400?" she wondered aloud, skeptical.

"All 416," McCoy corrected. "Jim's past taught him that life is valuable but fragile. He's one of the few starship Captains who realizes that underneath the formalities of title and rank are human beings with stories and families…" he trailed off. "Most starship Captains can't see past the mission, the strategy, the big picture. Either that or they're blinded by the prestige from the discoveries made and battles won. They forget about the lives they put in danger on their so-called missions. Jim's different."

The doctor suddenly looked at her with a something resembling a combination of pity and scorn.

"You'd want him to know you by your first name too, if you were going to die on a mission."

The words hit her like a million tiny darts—goose bumps all over her body.

She had been wrong. Very wrong. The magnitude of her error in judgment—the resentment she'd carried these past nine months—it had all been based on faulty assumptions.

It wasn't that the Captain did not respect her; rather, that he valued her enough to insist on calling her by her first name. He was merely putting a name to a face—adding a bit of humanity to strict, ordered life of the starship.

Things were complicated though, by the fact that she reminded him of the aunt who'd died such a horrible death—probably why he avoided her so much.

"I feel like a fool," she admitted to McCoy. "I judged him unfairly."

The doctor smiled softly, patting her on the arm. "Don't feel too bad. Jim does tend to bring a lot of that on himself."

Janice smiled understandingly before turning to head back down the hall to her own quarters.

She had a lot to think over.

3 Days Later….

"Feeling better, Captain?" She asks as she strides purposely into his quarters.

"I'm feeling great, thanks for asking," he responds, a smile gracing his features.

He is looking much healthier, she notes, pleased to see the return of the ruddiness to his cheeks and the sparkle to those cobalt irises.

"Yeoman…" he begins, only to be interrupted by her sudden frown.

"Janice," she corrects, and watches the surprise and confusion morph his features.

Then she is dazzled by a Kirkian smile—the smile of a thousand suns—and wonders how she could have ever hated this man.

"Alright, Janice. I just wanted to apologize for any discomfort I might have caused for you that night when I was sick. I honestly don't really remember too much, but Bones told me you had to call him."

"That's true sir, but it caused me no discomfort."

"Well, at any rate I'm sure it was awkward. Hopefully it won't happen again."

"Hopefully not, sir," she agreed with a compassionate smile.

"What do you got for me today, Rand?" he says, slapping his palm on the table.

"Just three forms to sign, requisitions for supplies."

"Good—I hate paperwork."

Janice laughs. Some things would never change; but she doesn't think she wants them to anyway.

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