Thank you so much for the incredible response to the first chapter! I was originally going to complete the next chapter for my other story before this one, but your responses changed my mind. Please comment, please send ideas, and above all, PLEASE ENJOY!
The first of the senior officers to snap out of their dazed reaction was McCoy, who turned and grabbed the PADD off the table, glancing at it to see just what had so upset his normally unflappable friend. When his eyes fell on the highlighted names the doctor let loose a volley of curses that had half the officers blushing.
"Doctor McCoy, may I take your judicious use of non-regulation language to indicate that you understand the unfavorable effect Lieutenant Uhura's data had on Captain Kirk?" questioned Spock.
"You bet your green-blooded-", McCoy cut himself off with a sigh followed by a deep breath. "I'm sorry Spock, I didn't mean to go off on you. I know that's your way of saying you're worried about Jim, I just- I can't believe that he's going to have to deal with this."
"Deal with what, Doctor?" came the question from Scotty.
McCoy looked torn. "I- I can't say. It's not my place, this is Jim's story to tell-"
"Doctor, the Captain's reaction as well as your own suggests that some aspect of this mission will place Captain Kirk under a great deal more stress than was initially anticipated. As his senior officers, it is our duty to take all necessary steps to alleviate that stress, particularly on a mission of this duration. Something we cannot be expected to do if we are unaware of the situation."
"Look, Spock, I know you're worried about Jim and want to help him, but I can't just violate his privacy like that. It's not-", whatever else McCoy was planning on saying was interrupted by a ping from his personal PADD. Looking down, the doctor's eyes widened for the second consecutive time looking at one of the data devices. On his was message from the object of their concern.
"Bones, on the off chance you didn't grab the PADD off the table already I'm sure Uhura has told you what was on it. I know the others are probably curious. If this were any other situation I'd say a little extra curiosity never hurt anyone, but they're coming ABOARD, Bones. Aboard the Enterprise. For TWO FREAKING WEEKS. As much as I wish more than anything I could keep this private, they need to know. The only thing I ask is that you tell them. I need some time to take this in right now and I don't want to see those looks of pity. I don't. I CAN'T, not now, not on this whole trip. Beg them if you have to, but please, keep those looks away from me. You decide what to tell them, I trust you."
McCoy gulped as he read the contents of the message. He knew just how much trust his friend was putting in him with this request. He finally looked up at the officers waiting somewhat less than patiently. "Jim says it's ok, so I'm going to tell you a few things, but you listen carefully! Nothing, NOT ONE THING that I say leaves this room, or I'll hypo you all so badly you'll never get out of bed ever again."
"Doctor, no one here is likely to reveal this information, and to keep a patient living but never getting out of bed would require-"
"Shut up and sit down you green blooded memory bank! All of you!" Having been chosen as senior officers for the Federation flagship, everyone in the room was far too intelligent to argue with the look on the doctor's face.
McCoy rubbed both open palms up and down his face as the rest of the room retook their seats. "Look, the first thing you need to understand is that I don't know much, and what I do know is only out of a combination of being Jim's roommate, being too stubborn to take some of his runarounds and denials, and a healthy dose of reading between the lines.
You all know about Jim's birth. The sacrifice his father made. Well, Winona Kirk, the woman who gave birth to Jim, because I won't call that woman a mother for the life of me, never recovered from it. She did a lot of drinking. A lot of throwing herself into work. I know for a fact that she was very rarely around, having gone off on other missions for Starfleet most of the time, but that's not the worst of it.
You see, James Kirk is not only the son of George Kirk, he's also the man's spitting image. Whenever she looked at him, she could only see the ghost of the man she'd lost, so after a short while, she just stopped looking. Jim learned very early on that he and his mother don't make direct eye contact.
But after a while, Winona ran into some trouble. As she was going into space all the time, she kept having to make arrangements for Jim and his brother Sam to be looked after. This became harder and harder. Then, on Jim's tenth birthday, Winona went into a bar in Iowa to get plastered. She had gotten sober to go back into space, but there were times when she still went back the alcohol, and seeing as Jim's birthday was also the anniversary of her husband's death, this was one of the most common times. While she was there she met a contractor by the name of Frank Garson. One thing led to another and by the next week they were married, which meant the week after when she took off back into space she left her kids with them. Only Frank wasn't exactly a good fatherly type. I don't know exactly what happened, and unless Jim was feeling the need to open up I don't want to. All I do know is that he treated them like his personal work staff, and was verbally and physically abusive." At this point Uhura gave a small gasp, not one of horror like the others had been and were making throughout the story, rather the sound of someone who'd just come to a particularly unpleasant conclusion. However McCoy either didn't notice or didn't care, and the rest of the crew was too horribly engrossed in the tale to consider what it was she seemed to have realized.
"Eventually Sam, who had been taking care of Jim as much as he could for pretty much all of Jim's life, couldn't take it anymore, so he ran away when Jim was twelve, leaving him there alone. I think it was either at that point or soon after that he started getting into trouble, a habit which just got worse and worse as time went on. Don't ask me about his teenage years, I have no idea. Except for the occasional prank story, my knowledge skips to when Admiral Pike found him in a bar in Iowa and got him to join Starfleet on a dare. If Pike hadn't taken the time to talk to Jim, hadn't seen his potential, hadn't figured out the only way to enlist, I don't know where he'd be today. Pretty sure I don't want to know either."
McCoy trailed off, his eyes staring unseeing, as he tried to block out fantasies he really didn't want to have. The rest of the crew was not in great shape either. Carol and Uhura were both crying silently. Chekov and Sulu were both clearly struggling to keep the tears in their eyes from falling. Scotty seemed to have been able to keep his own tears at bay, but the raw emotion was still visible on the engineer's face. Spock sat in silent contemplation, his features frozen to anyone who didn't know him extremely well, although had either Uhura or McCoy been looking at him they probably would have noticed the subtle signs of his own struggle to hold down his emotions, until at last he broke the silence.
"Doctor, what you have told us is indeed… disturbing, but may I ask exactly what bearing this has on our current mission?"
McCoy turned to him, his features alight with a malice that he knew, in the small part of his brain that cared at the moment, that Spock would realize wasn't directed at him.
"Because you pointy-eared hobgoblin, Winona Kirk and her dear, sweet husband husband are coming aboard this ship!"
The cries of outrage were nearly simultaneous, barely restrained by Spock's command.
"How can that be possible? If, as you say, Frank Garson was physically and emotionally abusive, should he not still be in a detention facility?"
McCoy snorted in disdain. "Yeah, he probably would be if anyone had ever been willing to believe it happened in the first place. But the one time Sam tried telling someone apparently ended very badly, and neither of them saw fit to try again." The entire room was silent as they all tried to force away images of just what ending very badly must have meant.
"We can't let this happen," Sulu broke in. "We can't let those two- (he visibly struggled with finding an appropriate adjective and just gave up) come aboard! The Captain doesn't need to have that on his own ship for two weeks!"
"Unfortunately there is little we can do Mr. Sulu. The guest list has already been approved at multiple levels. To change it at this time would require a significant explanation, something I strongly suspect based on my own personal knowledge of him as well as the lack of legal action against Mr. Garson, which the Captain does not want."
The rest of the table paled at Spock's rebuff and the realization that he was absolutely right. Jim Kirk would never want to bring this out into the open, which meant there was nothing they could do. Their beloved Captain was in for an emotional roller coaster none of them could imagine and they were helpless to stop it.
"So vhat do ve do?" interjected Chekov.
"All we can do is try and be there for him, to keep him as well as the other two distracted and not stand for them throwing anything at Jim" came Carol's reluctant response.
"We will have to be careful however. The fact that they are on the guest list for the conference suggests they are quite well connected politically. Our responses will have to be handled with the utmost care, otherwise in the long term we will simply create more problems for both the Captain and ourselves" cut in Spock.
"Above all though, do not pity him! That is the one thing you could do that will make this situation already harder than it is. He even asked me to beg you not to pity him when he gave me permission to tell you."
The officers nodded solemnly at McCoy's exclamation. When it became clear nobody had anything else to say, Spock dismissed the meeting and the crew walked out, wondering how the boy McCoy had told them had been so badly wronged could have grown up to be the Captain they loved so much.
Don't worry, this isn't the last you'll be hearing about Jim's past. It's just most of what Bones knows.