A/N: SO here is the next part.I'm trying to flesh out the characters and their interactions a bit in this one, let me know how you think I did.Lady Sloane - haha, I suppose anything is possible! Enjoy! - pj
A disembodied buzzer sounded from somewhere in the gym and Jo sighed deeply, ripping her mesh helmet off her head.
"Dammit," she cursed, as she threw it to the floor and pushed her epee under her arm. Sulu took off his helmet less violently and watched Jo rip off her left glove and start flexing her hand.
"Your still hand bothering you?"
Jo only nodded, she'd been unnaturally quiet all day.
Sulu came to stand closer to look at her hand. The areas where it had been mended were still pink and sensitive. "The Dermal Regenerator accelerates the body's natural healing process but it'll probably be sore for the next few days-"
"I know," Jo grumbled, shoving her glove back on, not even wincing as the material rubbed against the new skin, "this is not the first time I've seen the business end of a DR."
She didn't look at him, but if she had she would have seen the confusion that crossed Sulu's face. DRs were expensive and only commonly used on Star ships. He watched as she reached for her discarded helmet. It was rare that they were used on Earth, one would have had to have a very serious injury where the risk for infection was too high to use traditional stitches to warrant it.
He narrowed his eyes he'd learned that the CMOs daughter was nothing if not a mystery.
Jo didn't notice Sulu's stare and was starting to put her helmet back on when he stopped her.
"I think that's enough for one day, Jo."
She frowned, protesting immediately. "C'mon, Sulu four out of five," she looked at her hand, "it doesn't even hurt that much."
Sulu just shook his head "Yeah sure, that's why you haven't landed one solid hit all day."
Jo glared at him.
Pursing his lips, Sulu considered a moment and then lowered his voice, "are you sleeping at all Jo?"
He waited and, judging by the fish-out-of-water impression she was now doing, she thought no one had noticed her subdued behavior and the bags under her eyes. Or at least, she had hoped no one would think to call her on it.
"Look, I know how it is after something like what happened on that planet. You need to give yourself some time."
Jo was biting her lip and her stomach clenched under the intensity, the understanding, in his stare. She swallowed hard, and for a moment the emotions she'd been fighting for the past three days bubbled to the surface.
"Don't waste energy worrying about me Sulu," she said. Then, as if realizing the raw emotion in her tone, she drew back her shoulders and forced a smile to her lips, "Anyway, I can take care of myself."
But she could feel the heat rising to her cheeks and, not wanting to stick around and see what else he might say, Jo shrugged, "you're probably right though, I think I'll call it a day. Same time tomorrow?"
She didn't wait to hear him agree and turned to leave. Just before she'd made it to the shower entrance she saw Uhura out of the corner of her eye. She was leaving one of the multi-purpose rooms with the rest of her Tae Gua class and taping up her hands, preparing to work out with a body bag on the other side of the room. Jo veered off toward her.
"Lieutenant," she said by way of greeting.
Uhura whipped her ponytail out of her face and dropped her foot from the bench where she was retying one of her shoes.
"Yeoman," she nodded, then, glancing down at her thick white garb, "working out with Sulu?"
"Oh, yeah. We just finished," she continued in a rush, "I wanted to ask you for a favor."
Uhura stiffened a bit but managed a polite, "what is it?"
Jo bit her lip and smiled as charmingly as she could, "I want you to teach me to use a phaser."
Uhura didn't even hesitate, "no," she turned to jog across the room to the body bags.
Jo dropped her helmet and sword and started pulling off her gloves as she took off, falling into step beside her.
"But why not?"
"Because it's career suicide. No way."
"Please Uhura," Jo insisted, "please help me with this."
The Lieutenant stopped suddenly and Jo had to dodge to one side to not run into her, "why?"
Jo bit her lip, hesitant to answer. Uhura rolled her eyes and started off again.
"Wait wait!"
Uhura looked back, her eyebrow raised in expectation.
"Look," she swallowed hard and glanced around, as if to see who was standing nearby, "what happened on that planet…I just don't…" she sighed at her tongue's betrayal and Uhura's eyes softened minutely, "It really shook me up, okay? I've been through a lot of messed up stuff but…nothing like that." She cleared her throat, her eyes darting around nervously, "And I was completely defenseless. I don't like that. So I'm asking you to teach me how to use a phaser so it won't happen again. Please."
Uhura dropped her arms from being crossed over her chest and shifted on her feet.
"Why me?" she asked, her voice exchanging challenge for curiosity.
"You're the best," Jo said simply. "Well, technically the Captain is the best marksman on the ship, but he would never teach me. He's too afraid of my Dad. Next to him it's you though, and you're not afraid of some old grumpy doctor…right?"
She saw the defiance light briefly in Uhura's eyes and grinned.
---
"Oh my god," Jo sat back from the table in Jim's quarters, rubbing her eyes roughly, "how is it possible that in this day and age there is this much paperwork left at the end of every day. I'm exhausted."
Jim took his queue from the girl and sat back from the table, that was covered in PADDs and styluses and yawned. He reached his hands up over his head and arched his back in a stretch sighing when it cracked satisfactorily. \
"Starfleet Regs, kid."
"Why don't they just watch the VidRecords?"
"VRs can only tell you what someone did, not why they did it." Jim muttered, rubbing his fists against his eyes. He was met with silence and opened his eyes to find Jo staring at him.
"Did you just defend this," she motioned meaningfully at the table and raised an eyebrow.
Jim looked thoughtful, "Yeah…you're right. Sorry. It wouldn't be Beaurocracy if it didn't have paperwork." Jo grunted in agreement and Jim scratched his head and pulled his hands down over his face, "I need a drink."
He got up, his bare feet silent as he padded across his quarters to the cabinet beside the replicator.
Jo perked up, "I'll take one."
"No," Jim gave her a look, "water, juice or milk?"
Jo rolled her eyes, "water please. And ice."
Jim relayed her order to the replicator and brought it to the table. Then returned to the small kitchen to busy himself preparing his drink, keeping his eyes glued to the bottle.
"So how are the marksman lessons coming?" he asked with feigned nonchalance.
Jo answered without thinking, the late hour overcoming her self control, "really good, Uhura thinks I'm ready to-"
She stopped short and her eyes snapped up to Kirk's.
"You did that on purpose."
Jim didn't deny it, he merely sat back down at the table and sipped his drink. He raised his eyebrows at her, urging her to explain.
Jo's shoulders slumped, "how did you know?"
The corner of Jim's mouth lifted in a smirk. "There's nothing that happens on my ship that I don't know about, Yeoman."
Jo sighed and sat back further in her chair. Somehow, she didn't doubt it.
"And," he continued, glancing down briefly, trying to sell his façade of indifference, "all weapons requests have to be personally approved by me."
Jo looked away, mouthing a curse at the floor, "I meant to intercept that one."
Jim shook his head at her and Jo shrugged. If anyone knew about breaking bad habits it was him. And she'd been forging signatures since she was eleven. She was pretty good at it by now.
She waited, but he didn't continue with a lecture as she thought he would. He didn't even ask why she'd done it.
Finally, able to stand the silence no longer, she asked quietly, "Are you gonna tell my Dad?"
"I can't lie to him." He said immediately.
"You don't have to," Jo bit her lip, "just…please don't say anything. I don't want to screw up…whatever it is that we've started."
Jim swirled the ice in his glass, watching the amber liquid rush out of the way around it, "you guys still having lunch together?"
She nodded, "once a week," she smiled slightly, "it's funny, I thought we'd run out of things to talk about after like an hour but," she shrugged, "it's not so bad."
Jim nodded and then looked up and smiled, "I'm glad. He wants to know you Jo. He feels bad about what happened between him and your mom."
She bit her lip and watched droplets of water condensate on the side of the glass and slide down to the table, "I never blamed him for that."
Silence descended, dark and heavy on the room, both caught up in memories of parents that always seemed to be substandard.
"So are you gonna tell him?" she asked finally, looking up at him with tense blue eyes.
Jim sat back after finishing off his drink and ran a hand through his hair, causing the blonde locks to stand on end. "Does it make you feel safe?"
She blinked, startled by the question and unable to respond right away. She kicked herself mentally, she really shouldn't have been surprised that he was able to read her mind. Hell, she was pretty sure there was nothing James Kirk couldn't do if he really wanted to.
"Yeah," she nodded, "it does Jim."
He sighed and looked down, buying time by rearranging a few of the PADDs on the table and getting up to put his glass in the DishCleaner.
He turned around and locked eyes with Jo's anxious gaze and she looked so hesitant, so much like a frightened child that he couldn't deny her.
"No. I won't tell him."
Immediately the knots in Jo's stomach released and she forced her jaw to relax.
"Thanks," she whispered, rubbing her left hand unconsciously.
She didn't notice Jim watching her, or the protective understanding in his eyes.
"It's late kid, why don't you get to bed."
Jo looked up at the time displayed on one of the PADDs.
0130. That explained the exhaustion.
She smiled gratefully and stood, grabbing her discarded boots and walked toward the door that connected her quarters to the Captain's.
She stopped just as they opened and turned back, "Wait a minute, nothing on your ship you don't know about?"
"Nope," he shook his head playfully and then, "Well, except for the floating poker game Chekov runs every other Friday night. I don't know anything about that." He dipped his chin and slid his eyes from side to side as if looking for eavesdroppers, "it's still in Uhura's quarters this week, right?"
Jo grinned and nodded. He winked and gave her the 'thumbs up' to which Jo just shook her head.
"Goodnight Captain."
"G'nite Jo."
TBC