My Darling

John Harrison

It had been ten hours since Pike's death. They were setting out to catch him, and things didn't look very good. They were apparently going to fire 72 torpedos on the Klingon world, Scotty had resigned, and there was a new science officer who Spock didn't seem to like. Charlotte was going on the mission. Bones had given her permission. He knew she was ready. She caught up to Kirk and Uhura.

"I'm sorry to hear about Scotty, sir." She said.

"We all are." Kirk said. They got in an elevator together. Kirk sighed. "Actually, Scotty just quit."

"I knew that." Charlotte raised her hand. "He told me. He also told me that we shouldn't fire the torpedos."

"And Uhura's boyfriend is second-guessing me every chance he gets." Kirk said. He looked at Uhura. "I'm sorry, that was inappropriate. It's just, sometimes, I wanna rip the bangs off his head. I don't know, maybe it's just me-"

"It's not you." Uhura shook her head.

"It's not?" Kirk tilted his head.

"Are you two fighting?" Charlotte asked.

"I'd rather not talk about it." Uhura asked.

"Oh my God, you poor thing!" Charlotte said. "What is that even like that?"

The elevator doors opened to reveal Spock standing right there. Uhura held her head up high and stalked past him. Kirk walked past him too.

"Your ears burning?" He asked.

"Keptin on ze bridge!" Chekov said.

"Mr. Chekov, you've been shadowing Mr. Scott." Kirk asked. "You are familiar with the engineering systems of this ship?"

"Affirmative, sir." Chekov nodded.

"Good." Kirk nodded. "You're my new Chief. Go put on a red shirt."

It took Chekov a moment to process this. "Aye, Keptin."

"Hey, congrats!" Charlotte said, slapping him on the back.

"Zank you, Charlotte." Chekov said, smiling at her.

"Captain, permission to go to the med bay." Charlotte said.

"Granted." Kirk said. "Just stay there until I call you, 'kay?"

"Okay." Charlotte nodded.

She went to the med bay. Bones nodded at her. She laid down on one of the beds for their paitients so she could sleep. Bones didn't say a word about it. Charlotte yawned and fell asleep. She awoke several hours later to Bones shaking her.

"Hey. You have to get up." He said. "Kirk needs you. Good luck."

"Thanks, Bones." Charlotte said.

She changed into uniform and reported to where Spock, Uhura, and Kirk were. They took off in the small pod that would take them to the Klingon world. Sulu had sent Harriosn a message. He had two minutes to comply with them. The four took off into space. The silence between them was deafening. Spock and Uhura then started arguing. Charlotte and Kirk sighed.

"You two are really gonna do this now?" She said.

"Yeah, seriously?" Kirk said.

"Sorry, Captain, just two seconds." Uhura said.

"Okay." Kirk nodded. The couple continued to argue.

"What it would do to me if you died, Spock! You didn't feel anything. You didn't care." Uhura said. "And I'm not the only one who's upset with you. The Captain is too."