Disclaimer: I own no part of this ever expanding franchise.

Everything's Relative

They were back in the briefing room. This time a McCoy was now at either end of the table having the whole mess explained to him, and James was amused when he saw that both of them turned the exact same shade of purple when pissed off.

"If you tell me I'm stuck here forever, Spock, don't stop me from doing a lot of good!" McCoy said angrily, while trying to edge his chair closer to Jim.

Spock made no mention of it as McCoy moved away from him. Only they knew that they had left one another on less than complimentary terms.

"Good is a relative term, doctor, we could also do untold damage doing what we believe is right."

"Don't give me that you green-blooded calculator! So many lives could be saved with what we know!"

"Bones, knock it off. If we tell them everything they'll never grow on their own. In fact we don't even know how much of our knowledge is even relevant to them."

"That is true, Jim, many events have not happened as they did with us and that means everything we experienced from this point on will likely happen very differently here; if they happen at all."

"Well you've certainly had a lot of time to think about this, Spock, haven't you? But of course you're the immortal one."

Spock leaned back in his chair.

"Now that is something to be avoided."

"What is?" James asked.

"You come across a ship called the Botany Bay?" McCoy asked.

"No."

"When you do, blast it!"

Jim and Spock glanced at one another before siding with him. "Agreed."

"See, Spock? We can tell them things and you can't deny me what you've already done."

"Specify."

"I know you, Spock, this pack of kids didn't get on this on their own. You mucked around with something here and called it logical."

"It was logical."

"In a pig's eye!"

"As much as I hate to disagree with…me there are differences between us and we can't ignore that," the younger McCoy spoke up.

"Specify, doctor," the younger Spock said.

"Well just look at us for one thing. You and Jim hang out on off duty hours sometimes. Those two act like they're married!"

"We are married," Jim answered simply.

"What!"

"You called it a friendship!" Spock looked at his counter-part; his gaze demanding an explanation.

"It was a defining friendship long before it became what it now is."

"Hah! I was right you did tell them something!" McCoy shouted, standing up in triumph.

"Spock, you knew about this!" James yelled.

"I was aware of it when your counter-part described the ambassador as his t'hy'la."

"His tequila-what?" Bones asked.

"T'hy'la, it means one who is considered a friend, brother, and lover. Or if one wishes to use sentimental human terms, his soulmate."

"My soulmate? Oh, jeez!"

"Don't flatter yourself, captain. I do not consider you such a prospect in my personal life."

James ran a hand through his hair in frustration. "No according to him it's just destiny."

"I beg your pardon?"

Jim whistled loudly and the room went quiet.

"That's better. Now let's all just calm down and talked about this rationally shall we?"

Everyone eventually nodded and sat back down.

"As you can see our emotions run high in this situation, doctor, we must be cautious."

"Our- our emotions," the older McCoy couldn't believe what he was hearing. Spock was speaking about his own emotions, openly, publicly. It was nothing like the day he had left. "What's the matter with you, Spock?"

"I am at the high side of a hundred, doctor, and I have found a marvellous internal balance in the near century since we parted. I'd have thought you would be pleased."

"Well you know what they say, be careful what you wish for."

Bones let his eyes roam over the older men.

"Okay, guys, what if we worked smaller on this instead?"

"Explain," the ambassador requested.

"Big universe bending things are out, but apparently personal relationships aren't. I mean what if we desire families?"

McCoy looked at his younger self, plainly shocked.

"You don't have a daughter?"

"You do?"

McCoy was quiet for a moment. "I did once. I love her with all my heart, but the circumstances being what they were it just…well it just would have been easier if..."

"What about me?" James asked, intrigued by this personal turn of conversation.

"Have you been with Carol Marcus?"

"Carol? She was my neighbour, we grew up together. She's like my little sister! And you're saying that you and her, oh god that's disgusting!"

"Well there's two down," Jim said.

Spock now looked curiously at his counter-part. With his planet gone the need for children had crossed his mind once or twice. He frowned a moment later though when he noticed that his older self remained silent; as pain filled his face and his eyes misted over in memory.

Jim looked over at his lover in shock; when he didn't give a prompt response that he had no children. "Spock, are you a father?"

"I am."

"You can have children that late, Spock?" McCoy asked.

"Vulcans remain fertile for their entire lifespan."

"Wait! You're saying you left children behind?" James asked, thinking back to his own childhood, and wondered if they would wonder and dream of the father they would never see again.

"You needn't alarm yourself so, James. My children have children of their own. Their children have children, or they were about to, to be more precise. I'm sorry, Jim, that-"

"No, don't apologize, Spock. I mean I disappeared, was presumed dead, I don't begrudge you for finding another and building a family and a life with them. It was always my sincere wish to see you happy."

"No, no, you proceed from a false assumption. There was never anyone else. There never could be anyone else. They were yours, Jim."

"What?" he asked softly, in complete disbelief.

"They came not long after your disappearance and provided a…balm, if you will excuse the metaphor, over that wound. Despite the chaos of the early years there was also a great serenity to my life when they were small." He let his lips twitch up into a small smile. "They grew up to be so much like you, Jim, and I am sorry you could not be with them to see that."

"Them?"

Before he could answer the other Spock spoke up, clearly impressed.

"You are most exceptional."

James turned to his first officer. "Spock, care to explain this for the less logical crowd?"

"To be his, naturally, logic would dictate that conception occurred only once, and twinning is very rare in Vulcans. The constant touching in the womb is most often overwhelming for the developing minds and one or both will die. Were they identical?"

"Fraternal."

"Now wait just a goddamn minute! You were pregnant when I…and you let me just go off on you in that state! You-you…you idiot!"

"You were in great emotional distress from losing Jim I had no desire to make it worse."

"But they were okay weren't they? I mean I didn't-"

"They were perfectly healthy, doctor, you caused no lasting damage."

McCoy placed his hand on Spock's shoulder.

"I'm sorry, Spock, if I had known I…"

"You would have shown nothing but pity, which I did not wish to receive. Forget it, Bones."

McCoy lowered his eyes, just staring at the table, still not use to such an open Spock and still feeling guilty about what was said.

"Don't suppose you have a picture of the little darlings?"

Spock reached into the collar of his shirt and pulled out a necklace with a bright blue orb on the end of it; and within the orb swirled a thin white mist.

"Not as such, though this is something similar. Thought patterns are encased within it and can be recalled by another. Ingenious really, my daughter was a wonderful scientist as a past time."

McCoy scowled and folded his arms across his chest. "Scientist as a hobby should have known you'd push them to full Vulcan logic. What was her full time job, chemical engineer?"

Spock turned to McCoy and, looking positively smug, answered, "she was a doctor."

"My daughter the doctor," Jim said, biting his lip and looking like he didn't know whether to smile or cry.

"Indeed they are both very bright; but I expect no less from the line of Solkan. They put several memories in here and gave it to me as a gift. I have added to it extensively over the years. If you wish to see, perhaps I could."

"Could what?" Jim asked.

"If this were combined with a holographic imager perhaps the images could be projected outside so that you may see them. Would you care to assist me science officer?"

"I would be honoured."

XXX

As the two Spocks headed off to one of the labs to work, James went to check on the bridge, while the McCoys dragged Jim off to the mess hall to get food. Jim just sat at the table staring at a wall, too anxious to eat. Who wouldn't be after finding out they were a father again; and to twins no less. He sighed and once again he had missed everything.

"What is it, Jim?"

"We've had children, Spock and I, I can hardly believe it; a girl this time…and a boy."

"What makes you so sure it's a boy?"

"He indicated that he had a daughter, not two. You know how precise Spock is. The other one must be a boy."

McCoy just shook his head and smiled. "You know I hope they do get that thing working because I just can't picture it, daddy Spock."

Daddy. How he had wanted to hear someone call him that, and he would have too. It wasn't like it had been with David and Carol. They had been together and were going to remain together.

"I'm a father again," he said quietly.

"More than that aren't you?" the younger McCoy asked. "The ambassador did say his kids have kids right?"

Jim eyes widened as the meaning of Spock's earlier statement hit him full force. "Oh, my god, kid, you're right! I'm a grandfather!"

They had probably been married. There were weddings he had never been to. Births, graduations he hadn't…and funerals, oh god the lady Amanda would surly have died by now, Sarek too perhaps, and he hadn't been there to be the comforting shoulder as Spock had been to him.

"Oh, Jim, don't look that that's a good thing."

The universe has given him back his ship, his husband, and his best friend; and now somewhere out beyond those stars was a family all his own. He deserved none of it.

"He raised them all alone, Bones."

A lifetime, he had been gone his children's entire lifetime.

"For nearly eighty years he carried on and I…why the hell does he want anything to do with me?"

"Well isn't he just a bright ray of sunshine in his golden years," the younger McCoy said, frankly amazed at how different this man was to his best friend.

"Brightens up any room in an instant I tell you. Look, Jim, you didn't do it on purpose and you aren't the first dad to miss things I mean just look at me I-"

"It's not the same, doctor, don't you dare act like it is! You got to be with Joanna daily for ten years! You got to write to her, call her, she knew you! You know how beautiful she looked the day you walked her down the aisle to marry that goofball from Canada you hated so much! I don't even know their names!"

"Leonard and Amanda," Spock said, as he came up behind them.

Two forks were dropped and clattered against the table.

"You named him for me?"

"You are my friend; I felt it appropriate, and I felt you would have wished it, Jim."

"You shouldn't have done anything with my wishes in mind. They aren't my children they're yours. They never knew me," Jim told him sourly as he stood up from the table.

Spock took Jim's hand firmly in his own and looked him in the eye.

"They knew you, Jim, I made sure of it."

"A ghost, a man in pictures, and a name in stories long forgotten… they couldn't possibly-"

Spock pulled his husband close to him.

"You forget, Jim, I am a Vulcan, as are they. We melded many times. They knew what I knew, felt what I felt, watched all that we did together; and were entranced to put it mildly. In fact Leonard made it his life's ambition to be you."

"Really?"

Spock nodded as the group left the mess hall.

Jim couldn't help but be intrigued by that. With David Carol hadn't wanted her son to be anything like him. Leonard on the other hand seemed to have seen him as a kind of role model. He supposed it was only natural to want to know of his accomplishments.

"How'd he do?"

"He made captain at twenty-eight years of age."

The older McCoy laughed and clapped his friend on the shoulder. "Bet he even looks just like you, Jim."

"Indeed he does," Spock answered, as they stepped into the briefing room once more and an image flickered to life on the wall.

(End chapter 3)