Disclaimer: I own absolutely nothing of any importance except for my character
A/N: Thanks to CarlieHitachiin, LaVieBoheme76, and Fairy Skull for reviewing! Much love! Anywhoo on to the second to last chapter. :( Terribly sad to see this end but keep a look out for the first chapter of In Love and Life, which is the sequel to this. And look for What Could've Been, which is my present to all of the Bones shippers! (Including myself…) Cheers!
Oh and the title comes from a little song by James Morrison. Lurve him!
Fix the World Up for You
Heroes. Every single individual that was on the Starship Enterprise was now a hero, myself included. We saved Earth, along with billions of lives. The only thing was I couldn't enjoy this new status with the deaths of so many others looming overhead.
Only a forth of the graduating cadets were left. The arrival wasn't one of joy for most, it was more bittersweet.
I stepped off the landing platform with James on one side and Leo the other. Cheers from civilians greeted us along with flashing bulbs that reporters had. James was the main hero; the new poster boy for Starfleet. He would be the face and hero that would encourage little boys to grow up and join Starfleet. He would be the promise of dashing male cadets to the females that wished to join.
And he was mine. Mine and mine alone. A silent agreement ran through us and it intensified whenever he did simple things in public to mark him as a taken man. His arm went around my waist as he waved to all of the reporters that were shooting off question like there would be no tomorrow.
I smiled at the reporters and James led me off of the platform and into the building. Spock, Leo, Jim, Chekhov, Sulu, Scotty, Uhura, and I were all expected to meet with the admirals as soon as we stepped off the Enterprise.
Jim, Leo, and I were the first few off and for once James was being an adult. Instead of running from the authority figures and his duty he was walking straight to it, dragging Leo and me with him.
The halls were clean and pristine. It felt amazing to be back on terra firma and to not have our lives in peril. I smiled as Jim's arm tightened around me, his eyes met mine and he smiled at me. Finally we were an 'us'.
We headed away from the big auditorium and towards the smaller meeting where we would be meeting with Admiral Barnett and the other Admirals. We entered through huge doors and was met with a round of applause.
"Congratulations Mr. Kirk." Admiral Barnett boomed. I smiled apparently the cheating fiasco had been forgotten. James saluted him and his arm left my waist.
"Thank you Admiral." He smiled his dashing smile to the council.
"Congratulations Dr. McCoy and Dr. Black." Barnett added after the applause died down.
Bones and I muttered out 'thank you' and James began soaking up the limelight.
"The other members of our crew will be joining us shortly." James sat as he took his seat. He sat down like he was king and it was scarily reminiscent my darling ex-husband Henry VIII. Leo just rolled his eyes as sat down. I was sitting between the two like always when Spock and Nyota finally came in.
"Commander Spock. Lieutenant Uhura. Welcome." Admiral Barnett said as he gestured for them to sit.
Spock sat on the other side of James and Nyota sat next to him. Sulu, Chekhov, and Scotty came in seconds later and sat down too.
"Welcome and congratulations to you all again." He said smiling. "I am sure you are all wondering why you have been requested here. Well as I'm sure you can guess, we have important matters to discuss. Each of you will need to complete a file over everything that happened from the second you stepped on to the Enterprise. Also from Dr. McCoy and Dr. Black I'll need detailed reports over every death and over every injury."
Leo looked mutinous. He hated paperwork more than anything else and this amount of paperwork would take us a week to complete.
"Yes Admiral." I said answering for both Leo and myself.
"How is Captain Pike?" He asked. I turned to Leo.
"He is in recovery. He is paralyzed for a few weeks, but his nerve ends will grow and fix themselves and he will be up and walking in no time after that."
"Good, good." Admiral Barnett nodded his head. "Oh and look around at each other."
Leo looked at me quizzically and I just shrugged my shoulders. None of had a clue what he was meaning by that.
"All of you will be serving aboard the USS Enterprise, under her Captain…James T. Kirk." I gasped as James hand grasped my own. "Very well, we will be having a ceremony in a week. Resume your studies and prepare to graduate. You are dismissed."
--
The bar we were in was smoky and a questionable joint. It was the only one in town that would let Pavel enter through the doors so we took it and had been drinking for the past two hours. Leo and Scotty were fighting for the title of Champion Drinker.
I couldn't quit laughing at the Scotsman who held his liquor considerably better than the southern gentleman. Nyota was out dancing with Pavel and Hiraku, and Spock sat sulking in the booth that we left him with.
James and I were judging the drinking contest and he had his arm around me and for once he wasn't looking at other women, he had eyes for no one but me.
"I 'aven't drunken this much since my thirteenth birthday!" Scotty exclaimed as he knocked back another shot. I burst out laughing and Leo's eyes widened at the drunk Scot.
"Well I haven't drunken this much since the leech left me." Leo said as he downed another shot.
"Bones I haven't ever seen you this drunk before." James said as he slurred some of his words together.
"I haven't seen any of you this drunk before." I said giggling.
Bones snorted and tipped back as he gulped down his beer. "Why our little Tempe is a giggly drunk." He said as he pushed another shot towards me.
I felt a hand on my shoulder and Nyota quickly came into view. "One more round in celebration!" She shouted as she tried to wave Spock over.
"Pointy-eared bastard is missin' all the fun." Leo said actually sounding sorry for him, or I was too drunk to gauge what he was meaning.
We all crowded into each other as we stood around our drinks.
"To life!" I shouted starting off the toasts.
"To Jim, even though he is an insufferable twit." Leo followed.
"To the Enterprise, the finest lady I've ever seen." Scotty bellowed.
"To the five years we will spend together!" Nyota said smiling.
"To the friendships we have and the ones to come." Hiraku shouted.
"To zee Romulans for bringing us togezer." Little Chekhov said.
"To my crew!" James shouted loudest of us all.
"Hear hear!" We all shouted as we downed our last round of the night.
We all left the bar completely pissed, except for Spock. He was the only who had refused to drink and seemed to not enjoy the night on the town. He eyed us all warily as he herded us back to the Academy.
James had his arm around me and was leaning on me heavily. I was giggling constantly as I staggered underneath his weight. Spock came over and lifted James' other arm over his own shoulder and took all the weight off me.
I giggled out a 'thank you' before Leo tossed me over his shoulder. "You are too drunk to walk." He slurred.
"So says you!" I said smacking him on his back as I broke into another fit of giggles. He walked in a horrible zig-zagged pattern but somehow managed to carry me all the way to the dorm. Sulu, Chekhov, and Scotty all went one way while Spock continued to support Jim to his and Leo's dorm.
Uhura and Spock left us at the door. "Thanks hobgoblin." Leo muttered. James looked a little green in the hallway and when we were in the light of their dorm he looked even greener. Leo dumped me on Jim's bed and fell on to his own.
"Men." I muttered as Leo began to snore. I pulled his shoes off and pulled his sheets over him; tucking him in gently before I went to James. He was leaning over the toilet and he lost the entire contents of his stomach.
"Poor baby." I murmured as I washed off his face. "Tempe." He mumbled as the cold water hit his face.
"Shh. James let's get you in bed." I drug him to his bed and helped him pull off his shirt and pants before helping him crawl into bed. I pulled off the little black dress I was wearing and pulled on one of his shirts before I crawled into bed next to him.
His arm went around my waist and he pulled me into his chest, burying his face in my hair. "I love the way you smell." He murmured as he inhaled deeply.
"You love the way anything smells as longs as it has breasts." I said as I snuggled deeper into his arms.
"No you've got it all wrong. I love the way you smell, it's perfect. You smell like vanilla, coffee, and rain." He kissed my neck.
"I love you James." I whispered softly.
"I love you too." He said before his breathing evened out and fell asleep.
--
The sun was hot against my back and the thin dress I wore was stifling in the intense heat. Dust clouded my airway as I wandered down the rural dirt path. It was a world I hadn't seen in over a hundred years. It was back when the South wanted to win a war and all the girls wanted to be a Southern Belle.
I, myself was a Southern Belle, and a very scandalous one at that. No parents, no past, no lineage, only a future and a husband ahead of me. I was heading home to my fiancée and his family, we were all on the brink of war, and every true Southerner was raring at the bit to go to battle.
"Miss Anne." The charming doctor called from his front porch. I waved and gathered my shawl and pulled it tighter around me. He left off the porch and I stood waiting patiently for him to join me.
"Dr. McCoy." I said demurely looking up at him through my thick eyelashes. "It's so good to see you this evening." He offered his arm and I took it, he pulled my dainty hand into the crook of his elbow and held it there tightly.
"Miss Anne you really shouldn't be walking home all by yourself, especially at this hour." He said gesturing to the red sky.
"I'll be fine Doctor, really." I said smiling softly. He just looked at me and continued to walk with me down the red dirt road.
"We have hard times ahead of us." He said softly, mostly to himself but he was speaking to me too. "A war is on the brink, and I am sure I'll get thrown into it. Who knows if I'll even make it out alive?" I squeezed his arm and he continued. "Would you think of me while I was away?" He asked quietly.
Louis McCoy was a great man, a man of high esteem and of flawless lineage. His family, the McCoy's had been in Georgia since the area was first settled and had owned the very land we stood on for as long as I could remember.
"Of course I will Leonard, I'll worry about you and Jackson every day, but you know I won't be Miss Anne much longer. Soon I'll be Mrs. Kirk." We stopped at the edge of the drive that led down to the Kirk's plantation and house.
"Of course you are right madam, pardon me." He kissed my gloved hand gently. "I'll see you at the barbeque." I curtsied as he traced his footsteps down the road, a cloud of red dust following him.
--
The dream was too vivid, too real, it was almost as though it was a life I had already lived and it was repeating itself, over four hundred years later. Cold sweat doused my body and I reeked of alcohol along with James and Leo.
I gently untangled myself from Jim's arm and tip-toed into the bathroom. I needed a shower and I needed Leo's famous hangover medication. I stepped under scalding water and washed away the scent of alcohol that oozed from my pores.
I could almost still smell the scent of red dirt, cotton, and the peach orchards that surrounded the dirt road. Had I forgotten a life that I had once lived and had that life contained the ancestors of the men that were fast asleep in the room next door?
I shook my head and decided that the dream was a crazy concoction of too much alcohol and too many near-death life experiences that seemed to follow James Kirk around.
--
After I had showered and cleaned up I woke up James and made him go get in the shower while I cleaned his side of the room. I stripped the sheets and threw almost every clothing article into the dirty clothes bin. He was an absolute pig that couldn't keep his stuff organized if his life depended on it.
He walked out of the bathroom smelling loads better but his eyes were still blood shot and puffy. "My head is going to explode." He whined as he crashed onto his freshly made bed.
"Yours and mine both, I think our partying days are coming to an end." I said as I tried to ignore the pounding in my head.
"Both of you need to fucking shut up. I'm the old man here." Bones groaned as he finally woke up.
"Good morning to you to grumpy. Now go shower, you smell disgusting." I said as I pushed him out of his bed.
"Damn it Tempe, you need to work on your bedside manner." I raised my eyebrow at him in an extremely Spock manner. "Don't look at me like you're that pointy-eared bastard." He said as he sat up.
"Get your ass in the shower." I said as he finally stood and walked towards the bathroom.
"Where does he hide that damn medicine?" James groaned into his sheets. I stood and the room spun. I walked towards the cabinet that always held the magically elixir that would make the pains of last night disappear. I pulled out a bottle and three glasses. I filled each up about half way.
"Get up." I said nudging him gently. I handed him the glass and he gulped it down before coughing.
"Damn stuff taste like shit, but I swear it's a miracle worker."
I knocked mine back quickly trying to ignore the acidic taste that burned my throat. Finally the pounding dulled and the room no longer spun whenever I looked around.
Leo walked out of the bathroom. "Drink. Now." He said as he rubbed his bloodshot eyes. I handed him the other cup I had and he knocked it back like a practiced veteran. "Such a caveman." I muttered rolling my eyes.
"I need food." James said sitting up like an eager puppy. "Let's go get breakfast." He said excited.
"Sweetie, I hate to burst your bubble but it's three in the afternoon." I said pointing to the clock.
"Damn it! I have a meeting with Pike and Barnett in fifteen minutes." He shouted as he jumped off the bed. He ran out of the room with a short 'bye' and 'see you later'. Leo just rolled his eyes at the James.
"Let's go to that diner that serves breakfast all day." I said as I took in his disgruntled form. He nodded his head once and I pulled on his arm as I drug him out of our room.
--
Leo was wolfing down an omelet and I was demolishing a stack of pancakes when James slid into the seat next to me. "Ceremony is set for Friday and we will be leaving Sunday." He said smiling as he grabbed a fork and began to chow down on my pancakes.
"That is great dear, but get your own food." I stole his fork and he looked at me like a wounded puppy.
"Don't even think about it." Leo growled as Jim's hand neared his bacon.
"Aww come on Bones, is that anyway to talk to your Captain?"
"Captain my ass, I'll just jab you with a hypospray then we will see who is in charge."
I laughed at the horrified expression that James wore. "Leo don't scare the man, he isn't even officially Captain yet." My PADD buzzed with an unread message and I dug around in my purse for it.
It was flashing with three unread messages. One was from Pike and two were from Spock. I opened the one from Pike.
Temperance, we need to discuss your career soon. I need you to come see me Wednesday at 1700 hours.
Chris
I couldn't help but to worry about what the meeting would entail. I blocked those thoughts as I opened message one from Spock.
Temperance, it is imperative that we speak today at 1600 hours. There is someone whom you need to become an acquaintance with.
-Spock
I glanced at the clock. It was a quarter past four. I opened the other message.
It is 1615 and you are not here. I am just reminding you again.
-Spock
"I gotta run boys." I kissed James quickly. "Enjoy the food." He stood to let me out of the booth.
"Where are you going?" James asked as he grabbed my hand to stop me from leaving.
"Spock's. He sent me two messages and they sounded urgent." He let me go.
"Ok. I'll see you later then, alright?" I nodded my head and walked out of the diner. I practically ran to Spock's room. Nothing could be so important that I would he would message me twice. I finally reached his door and pressed the chime to enter.
The door slid open to reveal an elderly Vulcan that I didn't know. "Temperance McCoy." He said smiling.
