Disclaimer: The below-mentioned characters are used with love, admiration and affection, and absolutely no harmful intent, malicious thoughts, or official permission.
Y'know what? I felt like posting. So I did. I would have been much better off if I'd wandered off to wash my hair at a decent hour instead of continuing on the computer, but my muse wouldn't listen to me. She thinks it's more important to post, and the hair can be dealt with later. Perhaps you agree.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
It was almost eleven when McCoy finally finished straightening out his files to get everything up to date. Even broken bones have to be entered in medical records. Finally he clicked off his computer screen, stood up from his desk, stretched, and wandered out into the main room. Sickbay was settled for the night, lights dimmed, monitors quiet, deserted save for a few sleeping patients and a single night nurse. Plus one extra person.
McCoy frowned in puzzlement and walked to the back of the room, where the line of biobeds was. And where the unanticipated visitor was. Kirk was perched on an empty biobed, studying the unconscious Lowell.
"What are you doing here?" McCoy asked in genuine bewilderment.
Kirk didn't look up. "I was thinking."
"About him? Why?"
"I kept hearing mentions of him today. And then I was talking to Spock, and… well, I just kind of got to wondering. What's he like?"
McCoy looked at him, puzzled. "What?"
"What's he like?" Kirk repeated. "You know…how does he think, what does he do with his time, why is he out here? What's he like?"
McCoy shrugged. "Why would I know?"
Kirk looked up then. "Why wouldn't you? You're a senior officer."
"I'm a doctor."
It was Kirk's turn to be puzzled. "And you don't know anything about the captain? Isn't keeping an eye on him, well, kind of important?"
McCoy shrugged again. "Sure, I keep an eye on him. That doesn't mean I'm a close personal friend or anything."
"Why not?"
"I don't spend a lot of time on the bridge. Why would I? And he avoids Sickbay like the plague. Anyway, why do you care what he's like?"
"Just curious. So who does know what Lowell is like? Somebody on this ship must know about him."
"I still don't see it. What's it to you?"
"Why does it have to be anything to me?" Kirk asked with a trace of asperity. "I just want to know about him."
McCoy was good at asperity himself, along with plain old-fashioned stubbornness. "And I still want to know why."
"Because he's a Starship Captain," Kirk said, just as though that was the definitive answer to everything. "I've never met a Starship Captain. I just…want to know about him."
McCoy took that in. He thought about it, weighed it against what he knew of Lowell and what he knew of Kirk, and accepted it. He reached into his memories of Lowell, considered the matter. After several moments of silence, he said something. "He's reading War and Peace."
Kirk blinked, glanced at McCoy. "War and Peace. You're kidding."
"I'm not. He's very neat. Precise. Prefers to think things out rather than make snap decisions. Not the most charming person I ever met, but not really unlikable either."
"He's boring," Kirk concluded.
McCoy chuckled. "Well, maybe a little."
Kirk went back to studying Lowell. "Starship Captains aren't supposed to be boring," he said quietly, an oddly naïve sounding statement made more to himself than McCoy. "Don't guess you know why he's in Starfleet?" he asked, trying and not quite succeeding at making the question sound inconsequential.
"Actually," McCoy said slowly, "I asked him that once."
"And?" Kirk said, just a little too eagerly.
"His father was an admiral."
Kirk's head snapped up. "Tell me you just made that up."
McCoy actually backed up a step from the suddenly dangerous tone in Kirk's voice. "I think he had a grandfather and an uncle who were commodores…"
Kirk turned a smoldering glare on Lowell. "Damn." Worlds of emotion made it into the single word.
McCoy shifted, uncomfortable before these new depths of emotion being evidenced. "I don't get it, what…?"
Kirk's glare remained locked on the unconscious and unaware Captain Robert Lowell. "I could hate him for that. It would be so easy."
"What?"
"He's in Starfleet because his father was in Starfleet? That's why you become an accountant, not why you become a Captain!"
McCoy didn't fail to note the slight hesitation Kirk put before the word 'captain,' as though to him it meant far, far more than its dictionary definition, that it was a word not to be used lightly. That hesitation warned McCoy that he was on dangerous, but important, ground. "Why…would someone become a captain?" McCoy asked cautiously, treading his way with care.
"Because…" Kirk stopped, answer ungiven. "Aw hell, I don't know, I'm just a pirate."
It was instinct more than anything that led McCoy to the right question, just about the only question that would get him anywhere with Kirk right now. "Well… strictly hypothetically speaking of course, why would you become a captain?"
"Because I had to," Kirk answered, almost automatically. His eyes took on a faintly dreamy expression as he contemplated the matter. "Because…that was the only thing in the galaxy I ever wanted to be. Because from the moment I first looked at the stars, I knew that that was where my destiny was. And that if I stayed on a planet, I would be spending the rest of my life looking at the night sky and dreaming. And always the same dream. Did you ever have a dream?" He didn't give McCoy a chance to respond. "A dream so real, so complete, so…perfect, that you couldn't possibly imagine anything else? That you couldn't fathom not living it? I did. And this was it." Kirk spread his arms to encompass the ship around him and all that it stood for, all the dreams of countless peoples over countless generations. "I was going to be a Starship Captain."
Kirk's voice was laced with pain, and with a self-ridiculing cynicism. "I was going to be Garth of Izar. Or later, when I got a little older, you know who I really wanted to be like? Who my hero was, when I was a teenager? Robert April." He shook his head. "I was all set to grow up and become Captain James T. Kirk of the Starship Enterprise. I was going to be something special. I was going to change the galaxy. That was my dream." He fell silent, eyes bright, no trace of a grin on his face.
After a moment, McCoy asked the question that had to be asked. "So what happened?"
Kirk smiled, a smile that was closer to a grimace. "I'm leading a gang of petty raiders. What the hell do you think happened?" Kirk's expression was bitter. "Not exactly my dream, no matter how much I wanted it. And then…there's him. With his father the admiral. Why? Why is he sitting in that chair? Why is he the one on that bridge? When it's all I ever wanted?"
McCoy didn't have an answer. There was no answer. "I don't know," he said sincerely.
"You know what?" Kirk said abruptly. "I talk too much. Next time I go on like this, do me a favor and tell me to shut up. I'm getting out of here." He started for the door. Stopped. "Do you have any brandy?"
"Some…" McCoy said, surprised. "For medicinal purposes."
"Where?"
McCoy didn't judge it wise to refuse to answer. "Back cabinet. Over there."
Kirk got it, a quart-sized bottle filled to the top with amber-colored liquid. He made for the door.
"Wait a minute," McCoy protested, "What do you want with—"
"Reeves still can't figure out what he did to the replicators so there's no alcohol there, and by now the Sharks have drunk through any we had on the ship."
"And you—"
"Plan to get very, very drunk tonight." He cast one bitter glance at Lowell, and shook his head. "His father was an admiral. Damn them both." With that he left.
"I don't understand him," McCoy informed Lowell. Except the truth of the matter was, he was beginning to think he did. And that was the real problem.
~~~***~~~
Isadax: Regarding Spock and McCoy retaking the ship: it's a completely legitimate point, and honestly it bothers me a little too. But there's nothing much I can think of to do, because they absolutely cannot retake the ship as this point if the story is going to work. And I don't think it's completely implausible. Keep in mind how well Kirk has set this up for himself. If Spock or McCoy retake the ship, the ship's still on self-destruct, and you can bet Kirk isn't bluffing about letting it blow up. And further, they don't have the history of narrow escapes and clever plans that they have on the regular show. They haven't done anything much more challenging than ferry ambassadors, at least since they came to the Enterprise. And as for working together, well, they've never done that. Regarding the language: you could have fooled me!
Wedge: Boot to the Head! I've heard of it, I have a friend who recites and acts out the entire thing. Though honestly, it had absolutely no bearing on that line. "The best defense is a good offense" is just one of those clichéd lines that works sometimes.
Hanakin222: I know, I feel bad for them too. Although Kirk's troubles just seem to keep getting bigger, and that was relatively minor…
Mimi: Yes to everything. I think. Is he a baddie? Kinda. Is he a mix? You could say that. Will you have to wait? Yep.
MySchemingMind: Well, sure I think you're a nut. But that's okay, because so I am, and so are the vast majority of the people I like and enjoy spending time with. Loons of the world unite! Ahem, sorry. And really, what writer doesn't enjoy hearing a long rambling review of her story, especially when it's positive? Holdings a conversation with a cat…that is a marvelously good analogy, I like. And I'm sure Vulcans refrain from discussing uncomfortable things. That's kinda what the whole "suppression of emotion" thing is all about. They just take it a step further and deny that the discomfort with the topic even exists, or that they feel anything about the topic at all. And you can stop waiting. And then start waiting again for the next one I guess…vicious cycle, ain't it, as I've observed in the past…
Mzsnaz: Absolutely not friends with the Doctor. Can't stand him, in fact. And I figure Spock would be very adept at deflecting questions regarding himself.
Alania: You are the first person to use "yummy" as an adjective for one of my stories. Congratulations on uniqueness! Sorry Spock's not in this chapter, he'll be back in a couple more though.
Cyrogenie: Absolutely not the Enterprise we know and love. McCoy's highly unlikely to sit with Spock in this universe. And you don't want Lowell healed and returned to his life and command? How sad. Not that I blame you, why do you think I knocked him out to begin with?
Samantha: Yes! That was basically the goal; let's throw off the readers by sending McCoy in the right direction then not having him sit with Spock. Had to remind you guys of the alternate-ness somehow. And I think Kirk got frustrated with Spock once in a while on the real show; he was just much better at taking it with a sense of humor than McCoy.
Whatshername: Chicken sandwiches, wow that's random…glad you liked the conversation, and the last line, which I worked hard to get him to say.
Anonymous: Y'know, my first thought on seeing you listed as "anonymous" was "oh no, it's a flame, isn't it, that's why they aren't giving their name." Except then it wasn't, so thank you right there. And I think Kirk would be very willing to abandon Lowell, except that going near a starbase might not be the wisest plan. And as for Trekkie Soul…I'll try, really. I have a day off coming soon, maybe I can give it some attention then, because it's being very high-maintenance.
That's all. More soon, and I think it's a chapter you've all been waiting for. What did push Kirk into his life of crime? One more flashback, coming up!