Learning to Live

By: Arbitrary Blackness

A Star Trek 2009 Fan Fiction Piece

DISLCAIMERS:

Star Trek and Star Trek 2009 © Gene Roddenberry, J.J Abrams and Paramount Pictures

Rebecca Sanders © Arbitrary Blackness

Anything and everything else © respective owners

NOTES: Although this is set in the alternate reality established by the latest Star Trek movie, there will be instances wherein events that happened in the prime reality will also happen here, just because they're ridiculously fun. Please take note, though, that instances involving the planet Vulcan and the Vulcan race in general will have to be severely edited, given what happened to the planet and a majority of the race.

Oh, and I know that Kirk was supposed to have a brother, but since I'm playing in the alternate reality I decided to cut him out entirely, since there was no indication of the brother having existed in the first place.

RATING: PG-13/T; might go higher if I feel like it.

TEASER:

Rebecca Sanders has a good life ahead of her. Her cousin, James Kirk, is Captain of the starship Enterprise, and she herself is a senior medical officer aboard the Enterprise's sister ship, the Excalibur. But when her life takes a dramatic shift, she is left to pick up the pieces, learning to live again.

Chapter One

Uhura collapsed on her bed in her dorm room, her heart numb and cold. The trip back to Earth after the crisis with Nero felt like a blur. There had been celebratory feelings, true, but after the initial high, everything had faded away, and she was left to think on what had been lost: not only in terms of material losses, but in terms of lives.

She turned her head to the side, and looked at the empty bed standing across the room from hers. Gaila's bed was empty – but of course it would be. Her roommate had been assigned to one of the other starships that were sent out when the distress signal from Vulcan had arrived. Those starships had been destroyed by Nero and his powerful futuristic weapons. There had been no survivors from that encounter except the Enterprise, which had arrived late on the scene and hence had been spared.

The intercom on the outside of her room beeped, and a soft, worried voice drifted in. "Uhura? Nyota, it's me."

Uhura closed her eyes, not wanting to respond. She didn't think she wanted anyone near her right now.

"Sorry, but I'm coming in."

Uhura heard the door sliding open then, but the footsteps that followed were relatively silent. She only opened her eyes when she felt her bed shift, and when she did so, she found herself gazing up a very familiar pair of blue eyes.

She smiled wanly. "Hey Becky."

Rebecca Sanders smiled back, but it was a worried smile, the one she got when she thought Uhura was working too hard or wasn't feeling too good. "Hey yourself."

Uhura sat up slowly, knowing why Rebecca was here. If it had been anyone else, Uhura would have asked that person to leave. But since it was her best friend, she welcomed Rebecca's presence, though somewhat reluctantly. And besides, she knew Rebecca would have come in anyway even if she wanted to be left alone. Better to spare them both an argument.

"How're you doing?" Rebecca asked, placing a hand on Uhura's knee: a gesture of comfort, a reminder that they were both alive.

"I don't know," Uhura replied, shrugging her shoulder slightly. "Glad to be alive, but… I don't know. Dead inside, too."

Rebecca nodded, her dark hair shifting slightly in the room lights. "You were lucky."

"I know. But then I think of the others… God, Gaila…" Uhura's hands flew to her mouth, suppressing the choked sob that tried to escape her, but she could do nothing to stop the tears that burst from her eyes. She turned sideways, seeking Rebecca's warmth, and suddenly she was glad that Rebecca was there, that she was alive, that they were both alive.

"I was so happy when I learned you weren't on the Farragut," Rebecca murmured after a while. "I'd heard you'd been assigned to that ship, and when I heard about what happened at Vulcan…" She laughed softly, guiltily. "I was so happy when I knew you were safe. I mean, anyone else, I didn't mind, and you can call me cruel for that, but I'm just glad you didn't get caught up in that mess."

Uhura couldn't help but laugh at that. She looked up at her best friend, and gave her a look. "What happened to all those oaths you took, huh?"

Now Rebecca smiled back brightly. "What, you mean the Hippocratic Oath? I'd throw it out the window if I knew it would keep those I valued safe."

"You know, I don't think Captain Harris made a good choice when he allowed you to come on as a trauma medic for the Excalibur."

"What're you going to do about it? Tell your boyfriend to request my transfer elsewhere?"

Uhura reached out, and smacked Rebecca with her pillow, to which Rebecca responded by grabbing Gaila's pillow and smacking her in turn. They laughed and went that way for a while, but soon enough, sobriety settled in again, and Rebecca sat down on Gaila's bed, looking at Uhura with the look that said she had something important to say.

"I'm being transferred to the Excalibur permanently." Rebecca smiled then, and her eyes glowed. "Dr. Gamble petitioned for me personally, after seeing my work while I was on fellowship."

That was the most wonderful thing Uhura had heard all day, and with a squeal of delight she grabbed onto Rebecca, and hugged her. "Oh my God, Rebecca, that's great! And you're working with Dr. Gamble…" She wiggled her eyebrows teasingly. "You sure there's no conflict of interest there?"

"I'd ask the same of you! What's it like, being an officer on the Bridge of the Enterprise, and having your boyfriend nearby? At least I can get away from Ethan when I feel my professional façade crumbling. You, on the other hand, can't leave the Bridge unless absolutely necessary."

"It's easy when my boyfriend is capable of maintaining his professional stance almost indefinitely."

"You mean he can act like a stick in the mud almost indefinitely."

Uhura let out a sound of mock-disbelief, and smacked Rebecca again, who smacked her back. This time it turned into a full-blown pillow fight, the likes of which had not happened in a long, long time. But it was good: at least, for now, Uhura could forget about the complications of what had recently happened, and instead, focus on just being thankful she was here, now, alive, and able to have a pillow fight with one of her dearest friends.

--+--

Jim Kirk sank down in a chair at the cafeteria, looking – and feeling – downright pleased with himself. What he had just accomplished with the Enterprise and the incident with Nero was more than enough to get that Kobayashi Maru test issue dismissed completely, he was sure. And since that was out of the way, he was also pretty sure that his actions would give him a reward of some sort.

He was thinking big. He was thinking in terms of "Captain." And he would just love to get his hands on the Enterprise for himself.

Now that he was thinking on it, maybe he ought to think out whom he wanted on his crew. Scotty was in, definitely: he couldn't think of anyone better to be Chief Engineer. The fact that Scotty was practically head-over-heels in love with the Enterprise settled the decision for him. For Communications Officer, he was definitely keeping Uhura. She was the one who had intercepted that Klingon message, and if she could do that, he was pretty sure she was a damn good choice. Of course, he was keeping McCoy for CMO, even if the man was a grouch sometimes, but hey, he'd gotten Kirk on the Enterprise in the first place, and if it weren't for Bones, he wouldn't be where he was. Plus, Bones was a damn good doctor.

That left the issue of First Officer and Science Officer. Jim knew he couldn't make a better choice than Spock, and the older Spock had said as much, too. But he knew that the choice would ultimately be Spock's, and if he chose not to go, then there was nothing he could do – or maybe not. Kirk figured he could convince the Vulcan, if he tried hard enough…

"This is the first time I've seen you thinking so hard."

Kirk looked up, and grinned brightly as he shifted in his chair, opening his arms to the person approaching. "Becky! Get over here."

Rebecca Sanders smiled, and quickly walked the last few feet before colliding with him hard, almost toppling him out of his chair, and wrapping her arms around him in a tight hug. After a while, though, she moved back, and smacked him hard on the chest.

"Ow! What the-"

"You idiot!" she exclaimed, blue eyes so much like his own blazing as they looked back at him. "What the hell are you? Suicidal?!"

"Nice to see you're happy I'm alive," Kirk muttered as he rubbed his chest where she'd hit him.

"I am happy, but… God, Jim, do you know how worried I was? Aunt Winona looked for me while I was on the Excalibur and she was crying, Jim, crying! And I didn't know what to tell her." She smacked him again for good measure, before plopping down huffily on the chair next to him. "Don't scare me like that!"

Kirk laughed, though his chest still hurt. That's going to leave a bruise, he thought. He'd almost forgotten how hard she could hit. "Hey, call to duty, right? And where the hell were you? I called you but your roommate said you were out."

"I was with my best friend." She continued to maintain an annoyed expression on her face, but after a few moments, she softened, and she reached out to hug him again. "I missed you, Jim."

"Hey," Jim murmured, hugging her again. Rebecca was his cousin, and the closest thing that he had to a sibling. They grew up together in Iowa for a time, before his mother remarried, and in that time he had come to consider her as more a sister than a cousin.

If there was one woman aside from his mother whom Kirk considered most important in his life, it would have to be Rebecca.

He pulled back from the hug, and couldn't help but smile when he saw the tears that flecked on Rebecca's lashes. "Hey, don't cry doll," he said softly, lifting a hand to cup her face and wipe away the tears. "It's all okay now. And I don't like seeing you cry. You look much prettier when you smile."

She smiled then – a vast improvement over the tears, as far as Kirk was concerned. "Don't call me doll. I'm not a toy and I'm not made of porcelain."

Kirk laughed, since that was the standard answer she gave to him whenever he called her "doll." It was a nickname he'd given her when they were children – mostly to get a rise out of her. But now, it was an affectionate sort of name, used only when referring to her, and never to other women. He leaned back, and grinned. "So I hear you're going to be assigned to the Excalibur. That's great news, you know."

Rebecca grinned back, and nodded. "I know. And I hear that you are to be commended for what happened." Her grin widened. "Talk's going around that you're going to take Captain Pike's place."

"Yeah, well, that's what I'm hoping for. Hey, you know, if you want, I could have you transferred to the Enterprise."

"How sure are you they'll give you the Enterprise? I mean, you nearly broke her on her maiden voyage."

"We were getting away from a black hole, Becky. And besides, it's just a couple of cracks."

" 'A couple of cracks'? Try 'close to total hull failure' and you'd get a more accurate description."

Kirk rolled his eyes. "She came back in one piece, didn't she? Plus, considering that most of her crew made it back alive, I think a cracked hull is a better bargain than having everyone onboard die. And soon enough she'll be fit for flight again." He sighed. "Look, I know I made you and Mom worried, and I'm sorry, okay?"

Now Rebecca laughed, and the sound of it made Kirk smile, because it was the laugh that told him she was really okay. "You, sorry for what you did? No way in hell you'd be sorry. You weren't sorry for running your stepdad's car off the cliff, and you aren't sorry for this either."

The conversation took a turn for the better then, with the two of them discussing the future that lay ahead of them both. Though Kirk knew Rebecca had gone into Starfleet with the hopes of following him onto a ship, he knew as well as she did that to serve on the Excalibur was a high honor. She might not have been the Enterprise, but Captain Nathan Harris was a good man, and was known for taking care of his crew. Rebecca would be in very safe hands.

In a moment of silence in the conversation, Rebecca made that little "Oh!" sound she made when she had just remembered something, and Kirk watched as she fished around in her pocket to produce a small stack of tickets.

"These are for you and anyone else you might want to come along," Rebecca said, pride in her voice as she pushed them over to Kirk. He glanced at them, and grinned when he read the details. They were tickets for a grand dance concert, to be staged by the Academy's Dance Troupe, and Rebecca's name was listed as one of the soloists.

"It's for tonight, and I ship out on the Excalibur day after tomorrow," his cousin murmured. "It'll be the last time I dance onstage, so I want you to be there."

"It's not as if it's going to be the last time you'll ever dance," Kirk said as he put a hand on top of hers, "so don't talk as if it were."

Rebecca shrugged. "I know, but I've got to put that part of my life aside for now." She straightened, and Kirk saw the pride in her stance, the determined glow in her eyes. Aunt Jackie, Rebecca's mother and his father's younger sister, always said that they had the same pride and determination in what they did and what they tried to accomplish, and he could see that now.

"After tonight," she murmured, "I'll be Doctor Rebecca Sanders of the USS Excalibur. If I dance again…" She smiled a little, and shrugged. "Well, not really if, but when."

"Now that's what I wanted to hear." Kirk took the tickets, counted them, and put them in his pocket. "I promise to bring a crowd to cheer you on."

"So long as you're not bringing a gaggle of girls, I'll be cool with it."

"Ouch, Becky. I was planning on bringing my entire command staff – just, you know, so you could see the people who're going to be taking care of me while I'm out there. Thought you'd like that."

"If your promotion's made permanent." A sly smile crept onto Rebecca's face. "You planning on bringing Uhura then?"

"Yeah I- Wait, how do you know Uhura?"

"She's my best friend. No need to give her a ticket, I already gave her one when I went to see her."

Talk about a small world, Kirk thought wryly. "Who else do you know on my command staff, since we're on the subject anyway?"

She shrugged. "Give a ticket to Hikaru. It's been a while since I last saw him."

"Hikaru? You mean Sulu? How the hell do you know him?"

"His parents are my godparents. Lola (1) Lupita is related by marriage to someone in Hikaru's father's family, so it was kind of natural that his parents become my godparents. I visit them a lot on weekends, since they live nearby."

"So what does that mean? I'm related to Sulu?"

"Not really, no – though by his family's standards, you would be, since you're related to me."

That was weird. "Okay, just checking." Kirk counted the number of tickets, and knew just whom he was going to invite: Scotty, for one, and Chekov, because the kid had accomplished a miracle by pulling him and Sulu onto the transporter while they were in the middle of freefall. Sulu was getting a ticket, since Rebecca had asked him to, and because he'd saved Kirk's life, too. And definitely McCoy, especially since he figured the man needed a life so he could stop being a grouch, and in Kirk's mind, that meant a woman – Rebecca, in this case, though she didn't need to know that.

He also thought he should send a ticket Spock's way, then wondered if the Vulcan would show up at all. Well, it doesn't matter if he comes along or not, Kirk thought, but he believed it would be a nice show of friendship if he introduced Spock to someone who was family, particularly someone he'd grown up with and considered a sister. He'd read up on Vulcan culture on the trip back to Earth after the encounter with the Narada and Nero, and he learned that the Vulcans valued family ties - even if, true to form, they didn't show it. Family, as a rule, was not brought up unnecessarily – unless amongst people one trusted. And since the whole point of Spock being around was to show that Kirk now trusted the Vulcan, introducing Rebecca to him would hopefully reinforce the message.

That settled it. He turned to Rebecca, and asked, "Do you know Commander Spock?"

There was something in the way she raised her eyebrow, in the way the left corner of her mouth turned up just so, that made Kirk realize that, not only did his cousin know who Spock was, she knew quite a few details besides that, likely from Uhura. "Sure I do. You inviting him?" This time, the right corner of her mouth went up, and she looked like nothing so much as a mischievous cat that had gotten into a big jug of cream. "I know someone who'd like that."

"Yeah, so do I." Kirk glanced at the digital clock display on the cafeteria wall, and realized that he needed to go. He had a meeting with Starfleet Command in a couple of minutes, and he didn't want to be late, not when there was the possibility that they were going to make his promotion to Captain permanent.

Rebecca sighed as he got out of his seat, but it was a satisfied sigh. "Looks like you got to run, huh?"

Kirk nodded. "Meeting with Starfleet Command." He pulled her in, hugged her tight, and planted a kiss on her brow. "Wish me luck?"

"Good luck." She kissed him on the cheek, and stepped away, smiling. "Keep the ticket stubs after the show, okay? There's going to be an after-party for the Troupe at Fusion (2), so just show those at the front door and they'll let you in."

"Will do. Thanks, Becky."

As he headed off, Kirk couldn't help but grin as he looked at the tickets. After-party, huh? Well, that was definitely enough reason to make sure Spock came along. He wanted to see what it would take to get his stiff-necked future First Officer onto the dance floor.

NOTES:

1 – Lola means "grandmother" in Filipino. It is never declared for certain if Sulu is indeed Filipino, but since the name "Sulu" itself is also the name of an island in the Philippines, I think it is reasonably safe to assume that Sulu is likely Filipino on his father's side, and Japanese on his mother's (hence the name Hikaru).

2 – Not to be confused with the club of the same name that appears in one of the episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise. They might have the same name, and they might be located in the same city, but they are nothing alike.