- "No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted." –
Aesop
"Good Lord, Laurel, did you have to do that to me?" Chris groaned in exasperation. "You know I hate surprise parties, and much more so when they are being held at the hospital while I'm confined to my sickbed with no hope of escaping."
His sister grinned at him, holding up the huge chocolate cake she and Malin had prepared. "Love you, too, Chris."
"You did not paint a heart on that cake…!"
"No, Freya did. She thought it would best express how happy we are to have you back. It's a little crooked, but I think she did very well. It's not that easy, you know?" Laurel said, setting down the cake and ruffling her youngest daughter's blond hair.
Freya tore herself from her mother's grip and rushed over to the bed, more throwing herself at Chris than hugging him. "I am so glad you're better, Uncle Chris. I would never have forgiven you for dying! And besides, Mom and Dad were all cranky while you were sick and Jojo was all worried and no fun at all!"
Chris could not help but smile at the blond hurricane, who was now snuggling up to him, gazing at him from wide, all-too-innocent grey eyes.
"There was never any question of me dying. I know better than to leave the lot of you unsupervised, little elf. You'd give poor Balder a heart attack if I weren't around to relieve him of you all sometimes." He sent a knowing look to his brother-in-law, who stood behind Laurel, his arms crossed, and acknowledged the comment with an amused wink.
"Where's Leonard?" Laurel asked, pointedly ignoring her brother's comment.
"At home. "
Laurel raised her brows. "How come? Did you hit him over the head and have someone drag him home by his ankles?" She laughed at the look of disapproval on Chris' face. "He was stuck to your bedside, Chris. I don't know what he did here – watch you sleep, for the most part, I guess – but he sure as hell refused to leave the hospital. Sort of reminds me of the first time I met him."
Chris smiled a soft, slightly melancholy smile at that. "We never managed to fool you, did we, Laurel?"
Laurel snorted. "No, but I grew up with you, so I'm used to your sneaky ways. You kept it very, very quiet, though, I'll give you that. I don't think anyone at the hospital knew that you had fallen for your doctor, and they were with you twenty-four-seven. As for him – well, I didn't know him very well back then. Otherwise, I'm sure I'd have noticed it a lot earlier. Leonard is utterly incapable of hiding his feelings. It's really cute, actually."
"Depends on your definition of cute, I suppose," Balder, muttered. "It's a good thing he's gay, otherwise it'd be somewhat embarrassing in a grown man."
"Technically, Leonard isn't gay," Malin corrected him lightly, "and really, Dad, you ought to get rid of some of those prejudices. They are positively medieval."
"Leave an old man be," her father huffed, "we all have our own set of misconceptions, don't we?"
"Yeah, well, I just thought I'd mention it. Laurie and I aren't playing soccer and cutting our hair short, either."
Her youngest sister started to giggle.
"What's so funny?" Malin asked.
"I just imagined you playing soccer," Freya replied, grinning broadly.
"You wait, little brat!" Malin reached out for her, catching her in her arms and submitting her to a merciless tickle-attack.
"Girls! Try to calm down a bit, will you?" Balder chided. "I'm sure Chris would appreciate a little peace and quiet."
"You bet," Chris murmured, thinking that the one thing he really longed for was to be at home with Leonard and Joana. He felt that he had seen quite enough of Starfleet Medical for a lifetime.
Chris had another visitor that day, but she stepped into his room much more quietly than Laurel and her family. She slipped through the half-opened door, made two steps into the twilit room, then hesitated. Chris watched her from his bed, staying very still, so he could see what she would do without scaring her off.
A minute went by, then another. She took a step forward, hesitated again, and seemed ready to turn back and leave.
"I'm not asleep, you know," he pointed out.
She started and instinctively shrank back, before regaining her composure.
"I'm sorry I startled you. What are you doing here, Delia? According to Leyla, you should still be in quarantine."
"I… I wanted to see how you were doing," the girl murmured.
"That is very thoughtful of you. I am feeling a lot better already, and I hope they'll let me go home in a couple of days. It still doesn't explain how you got out of a sealed room, though."
"I watched Nurse Dolan enter the airlock combination," Delia admitted, sounding a little guilty.
"Right. And since you have a photographic memory, you remembered it." Chris supposed that he should have suspected something like that.
"How do you know?" Delia asked, obviously surprised.
"All Vulcans and the only other Vulcan-cross I know have it. I assume it's a racial thing. Besides, it isn't hard to see that you are exceptionally clever and advanced for your age. Leyla should have known that she couldn't lock you in permanently."
"She said I made you sick," Delia said, hanging her head.
"Not on purpose, though. And I don't hold a grudge. It's hardly your fault that they didn't test you properly on the Avicenna."
"Your family probably hates me now," Delia replied sadly, "I know your husband does."
"Leonard? No way. He's a doctor; he knows better than anyone else that it wasn't your fault."
"I heard him tell Dr. Maliki that I had been nothing but trouble ever since I came here. He blames me for making you sick," she insisted.
Chris sighed inwardly, thinking that he and Leonard were going to have a serious conversation regarding Delia. "I'm sure it's a misunderstanding. Leonard can be a bit gruff sometimes, but he doesn't mean it that way. He was probably just upset and worried about me."
Delia didn't look convinced, though. "I want him to like me," she confessed, "I want all of you to like me so badly. I try to be good, but maybe that's not enough. I'm not even human."
Chris felt sorry for her, even more than he had before. "Come here, Delia," he said kindly, pointing to the chair that stood next to his bed. Timidly, she stepped closer and slipped into the chair, sitting uncomfortably on its very edge, as if ready to jump up and run out of the room any moment.
"No one has a problem with you not being human," Chris told her firmly. "In fact, some of my closest friends aren't human. I really need to introduce you to Spock the next time he's around. You'll like him. He's part Vulcan like you, and I'm sure, you could beat him at chess if you tried hard enough. It's his favorite pastime, apart from being a smartass and preventing his fool of a Captain from getting himself killed. Speaking of Jim – I'll introduce you to him, too. He was in your mother's class at the Academy, and rumor has it that they knew each other quite well."
"Isn't Jim your son?" Delia asked, raising a very Vulcan eyebrow.
"Yes, but unfortunately, that doesn't mean he's less of a fool. He has a penchant for getting into potentially life-threatening situations. Of course, Leonard would say that I do, too. The difference between Jim and me is that he gets to do all the fun stuff, while I get kidnapped by madmen or catch rare alien viruses." Chris smiled wryly.
"How come you got kidnapped?" Delia asked curiously.
"It's a long story, and not very pleasant. The same guy who is responsible for your mother's death and the destruction of Vulcan took me hostage. Jim and Spock sort of blew up his ship and pushed him into a black hole."
There was an appreciative gleam in Delia's dark eyes when she answered: "I think I'd like to meet them and say thank you."
"Leonard? What the hell have you been doing for the last five days? I tried to contact both you and Chris; at your offices, as well as at home, but I only got voicemail. Is everything all right?"
Leonard put down the cup of coffee he had just gotten from the kitchen on the table in front of him, before replying: "Chris is at Starfleet Medical, and I stayed with him as much as I could."
"What happened?", Nyota asked, looking worried now.
"He caught a very nasty alien virus. He's better now, and he more or less forced me to go home and get some sleep. Dr. Maliki is keeping him at the hospital just in case."
"Oh, Leonard, I'm sorry. How did Chris manage to catch that virus? He hasn't been offworld, has he?"
"It came to him, so to speak. Do you remember your roommate at the Academy, Gaila?"
"Of course I do! She died when Nero attacked her ship."
"Well, the crew of the Avicenna recently found her daughter when they were on a relief mission to Geltsun Colony. The girl's name is Delia and she was a carrier of the Modlari virus. Chris caught it from her, when he went to see her at the hospital."
"I never knew Gaila had a child," Nyota said, sounding very surprised.
"Neither did anyone else, it appears. There's something else: she's part Vulcan."
"Come again? She wouldn't be Spock's, by any chance?"
"As far as I know, it was Jim, not Spock, who had an affair with Gaila during their Academy days. Besides, she's half Vulcan. If Spock were her father, she would be part human, too."
"Well that's good. We've got enough problems as it is."
"Is something wrong with Spock?"
"Other than him having an epic crush on his captain and best friend? No."
"See, and Chris wouldn't believe me. Shows how well he knows his friends… so it's getting worse?"
"Progressively. Sometimes I just want to lock them in a room together and tell them that they won't get out until they have resolved their relationship issues. By now, I'm almost positive Jim knows. Hell, almost everybody else does!"
"It's a good idea, but it won't work, since they both have override codes. You might want to try using ad old-fashioned padlock, though. "
"I'm serious, Leonard. It's starting to be a real problem. Spock is miserable, and he's making me miserable in turn. Jim is either in denial, or absolutely not interested, and the latter would surprise me. Spock is drop-dead gorgeous, after all."
"Maybe Jim values their friendship too much to risk anything…?"
Nyota snorted. "That would be sensible; and when has Jim ever been sensible in matters of love…?"
"Okay, you do have a point there. Chris and I need to talk to Jim, anyway. Maybe the four of us ought to sit down and have a nice little chat. We could chain Jim to his chair, so he won't be able to run from the conversation."
"We are due for a routine checkup in a couple of weeks. Scotty wants to do some modifications on the engines while we're docked, so we will probably have a few days off."
"Perfect. Chris will be very pleased to hear that he's getting a chance to take Jim apart in person."
Nyota rolled her eyes. "What did he do now?"
"Trust me; you don't even want to know. Sufficient to say that Chris is really mad at him."
"Oh. Well, I'll see you then, won't I?"
"Of course."
"Tell Chris I said hi. I hope he gets well soon."
Hi everyone! Now I finally managed to update this story, and I apologize for the long wait. I guess there aren't any big surprises in this chapter - apart from Balder being a little more prejudiced than he first appeared to be and Cris hating surprise parties (he'd probably get allong real well with Worf, at least in that respect...).