A/N: So here is the update, thanks so much again to the reviewers. Love you guys!! Mango - yeah, I toyed with the timeline for this one. Thanks for the R&R!. Em - very true, on both accounts! Thanks for R&Ring! Awesomeness. This is a little short, but there's some nice McCoy/Jo interaction that I wanted to get in and I haven't got the next part done yet, so...this is it for now. lol. Enjoy! - pj

The silence of the transporter room was deafening after the chaos of the ballroom and Jo was finding it hard to regain her sense of balance and a regular rhythm of breathing. She'd been clutching Jim's uniform in her hands, but had to let go when he immediately jumped off the transporter pad and ran toward the console where Scotty sat.

"Bridge, this is the Captain. Hail the council; they've got some explaining to do."

Jo watched him giving orders over the comm, first to Spock, then Uhura and then she'd zoned out, no longer hearing him. Scotty was watching her from behind his tracking glass and she hugged her arms to herself, wincing when she painfully remembered her burned hand.

"Jo?"

She blinked and looked up, surprised to find the Captain standing directly in front of her. Hadn't he just been on the other side of the room?

"You okay?" he asked, his eyes narrowed in concern.

She swallowed, her throat suddenly very dry, and looked down distractedly, "Um…my hand."

She heard him hiss in sympathy as he quickly looked over the red, blistering flesh and put an arm over her shoulders, "C'mon, let's go get that looked at."

The next thing she knew she was settled on a BioBed in Sick Bay, a red headed nurse gently cleaning the burns on her hand. The Captain was nowhere to be found.

"Where's Jim?" she asked, a little surprised at how hoarse her voice sounded.

The woman looked up and met her with soft brown eyes, "he had to retake the bridge."

Jo's lips formed an 'o' and she watched in silence a moment longer, watching as the nurse carefully picked pieces of debris from the raw wound.

"My dad?" It came out in a whisper and she blinked carefully as her vision went blurry.

The Nurse looked up again, this time her whole face softened and her hand moved to rest against Jo's arm, "Lieutenant Roy needed an emergency appendectomy."

Jo nodded felt her heart sink. She looked away, finding it hard to swallow and pretty sure it didn't have to do only with the fact that whatever the woman was using to clean her hand hurt like hell.

"Dammit," the nurse muttered, "I need to go get a new battery for the Dermal Regenerator," the nurse told her, and Jo glanced down at the marred, raw red flesh of her palm, "wait right here, okay?"

Jo just nodded. Her head was pounding and her chest hurt and she really really just wanted to sleep but she had no intention of leaving.

"Jo?"

She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up, expecting the Nurse with the red hair and soft eyes. Instead, she was met with craggy, curiously familiar male features and blue eyes hiding a level of concern she wasn't used to.

"Dad," her voice cracked and she fought the forthcoming tears only for a moment before bowing forward, letting her head fall on his chest, "daddy."

She felt his arms wrap around her and rub her back, and she realized she felt safe and warm for the first time since accepting that stupid dance.

"Shh, baby. It's okay now," he cooed in her ear and as much as Jo wanted to resent the concern and the safety and the 'I'm his baby girl' feeling welling up inside her, she couldn't. Because his concern was genuine, his arms were safe and she had always been, would always be exactly that.

"Doctor?" She pulled back and saw the Nurse hand her father the Dermal Regenerator.

"Thank you Nurse DeBellio."

Jo sniffed and held out her hand as her father carefully ran the blue beam of the tool over the wound, mending the burned skin.

"There, all set."

Jo nodded, flexing her hand experimentally.

"You okay?" McCoy asked, studying his daughter. It wasn't like her to sit so still, or stare so blankly. But then, she hadn't called him 'daddy' since she was eight years old either.

Jo looked up at him, her eyes unnaturally bright and shadowed.

"I just wish I knew what went wrong on the planet." Jo sighed, and allowed her father to stroke her hair back from her forehead. It reminded her of when he comforted her as a child, "First nothing and then wham! it's that scene from The Empire Strikes Back."

McCoy frowned, almost certain he should understand that reference and had decided to ask Jim about it later when he saw him walking through the doors.

"How is she?" Jim asked his CMO, glancing between the two.

"'She' is fine," Jo responded, "a little shaken up and more than ready for bed, but I'll live." She looked up to find both men staring at her with troubled expressions of worry. It made Jo feel like a goldfish in a bowl and she shifted her gaze to look at the stars outside.

"Jim, what the hell happened down there?" McCoy demanded.

"Well I was talking to Uhura and apparently," his gaze dropped, "well..."

McCoy sighed, if there was one thing he couldn't stand it was when someone stalled instead of telling him what he wanted to know. "Dammit Jim, out with it."

"Alright alright," he sighed, "apparently when you accepted the Prince's dance…you accepted his hand in marriage."

Jo's eyebrows shot up, "excuse me?"

"It gets worse," Jim cleared his throat, his gaze bouncing between McCoy and Jo's, "when the song was over, he was leading you away so you could…consummate your union."

"Goddamn," McCoy turned away a step, rubbing a hand down his face at the same moment Jo leapt off the bed.

"He wanted to get laid!?" Jo shook her head, "he could've just asked!"

"Joanna McCoy!" Bones whirled around, his entire face red.

Jo shrugged, her hands up in defense, "I didn't say I would've said 'yes' I just mean it's the 23rd century and there's no need to kidnap me when he could have just asked."

"God almighty," Bones turned away again and Jim looked uncomfortably caught between being amused and horrified.

"Look, Jo, why don't you go back to your quarters. Get some rest, okay?"

Jo nodded, her previously injured hand still tingled a bit from the Dermal Regenerator and she pressed it to her side. She lingered a moment before moving toward the door, watching her father's back and she looked as though she might say something. But instead she closed her mouth, turned and left.

Jim watched for several moments, but his friend kept staring out into the vasts of Space.

"Bones?" Jim said quietly, coming to stand beside his friend. He laid a hand on his shoulder, seeing the muscles in McCoy's jaw flex and jump.

"Dammit kid," McCoy took a ragged breath which Jim pretended not to notice, "it's hard enough when you go on these ridiculous missions and come back in pieces…and now with Joey too I don't …" he trailed off, shaking his head.

Jim just squeezed his shoulder, nodding. Being a captain with a crew of more than 400 to look out for had taught him many things, not the least of which being what 'worry' really was.

And he knew there was nothing he could say to ease it.

TBC