I do not own Star Trek 2009 or Supernatural.

"You can't have her!"

"I've got orders from Pike, it's all perfectly legit. Calm down, she'll be back in a week."

"And if she's not?"

"You'll know she likes the Impala better than the Enterprise."

There was a pause in which I snickered. Captains Kirk and Winchester, at it again.

"There is no possible way in heaven or hell she would like your little tuna can better than my awesome ship."

"Tuna can!" The doors to the rec room slid open as Captain Winchester sputtered in indignation. "Better a little tuna can than a blimp!"

Captain Kirk puffed his chest out. "Blimps are more useful than tuna cans."

"The hell they are! Tuna cans carry food!"

"Blimps can carry tuna cans and food and booze and girls."

I rolled my eyes in exasperation and set down their usual drinks with a little bit of a clink, just enough to break off the stupid argument. "Gentlemen," I greeted calmly.

Jim huffed and tossed back his beer with a growl. With an answering smirk, Dean slid a Starfleet Command PADD across the bar top. "You're coming with me to the Impala for a week," he announced cheerfully.

"You think so, do you?" I replied noncommittally, wondering what this was all about. "Can I have any more details or am I just getting kidnapped right off the bat?"

Dean fidgeted on his seat, immediately remembering that I was indeed a human being, not a toy to be shared (translation: fought over) with Jim. "We've got a very prickly diplomat to please. He likes fine alcohol and he says he won't attend these meetings unless we have a decent bartender. I said I knew just the girl for the job and thought my problem was solved. Until Jim here refused to share." He shot his friend an irritated glance.

I shrugged. "If I can help out, I will. Captain Kirk, we are in dry dock for the next few weeks and you dismissed most of the crew. I've got nothing else on the go."

Jim didn't look happy about it. "The last member of my crew that visited the Impala didn't come back. How is that ensign working out, by the way?"

"Excellent, thanks. And I can't help it if people recognize the awesome that is the Impala." Dean smirked until Jim kicked his knee and I rolled my eyes yet again, more than a little tempted to scold them.

"Captain Winchester," I began in serious tones, trying to bring them back to the issue at hand instead of noogies and punches. "Dean, I'll come over to the Impala but you don't have room for a bar, remember? I'll be in the way. So at the end of this, I'm definitely coming back to the Enterprise."

Jim grinned and Dean almost pouted as I passed them their drinks. "So no gloating from you," I ordered, pointing at the Enterprise's captain, "and I promise to make sure your diplomat is happier than a clam," I finished, causing Dean to brighten considerably.

Ten hours later I was cursing that promise fluently in several alien languages (the salty vocabulary courtesy of the Enterprise's colourful crew). This diplomat didn't like alcohol, he just fancied himself a connoisseur because it made him look smarter than he really was.

I could have told him he needed more than just an encyclopaedic knowledge of booze to appear intelligent. The man was dumber than a post. Admittedly he had a clever tongue, which was probably how he wriggled his way into his current position, but jeez.

I poured him a whiskey on the rocks and hoped that would be enough.

It wasn't. Carl Reddecker tasted my good whisky and promptly sneered in disdain. "It's not smooth enough," he complained.

I was tempted to throw my wet, dirty bar rag in his pasty, almost-handsome face. The Impala crew was hovering anxiously though so I fisted my hand in said rag and smiled professionally, feeling my teeth creak with the effort. "My apologies."

"Apologies mean nothing in my world!" Reddecker pronounced arrogantly and I almost screamed in frustration, tempted to pull my hair out. If this was par for the course on the Impala when it came to diplomats, no wonder Dean hated them with a passion. He slammed the glass down on my makeshift bar and stalked out.

"You're a jackass with the taste discernment of an over-fed cow suffering from a scalded tongue," I muttered nastily under my breath.

"Thinking about going back to the Enterprise?" Dean asked, half-joking and I jumped.

"Maybe. But then I'd be leaving you in the lurch. He's an ass." Dean's amusement faded and I shrugged. "Want me to drug his drink?"

It was the right note, as it caused Dean to throw his head back and laugh. "Not yet."

I made myself a new promise. I wouldn't air my exasperation to the captain. Dean didn't need to be distracted. That promise was one well made. As I stopped wallowing in self-pity, I noticed that Reddecker was influencing the whole crew. People were walking around quickly but with their heads down, frowns were evident and alpha shift was almost nonexistent. Sam was probably sitting on them so they didn't do anything stupid. I had head about their many shenanigans but this particular treaty had to go through or an entire planet of people would go hungry for months. There was no room for error.

So I served drinks and listened and absorbed emotions and did my job.

Right up until the jackass walked into my bar (even if it was temporarily) and I watched as the entire room emptied in minutes.

Not good.

The crew couldn't be allowed to feel hunted on their own ship.

I went through a rather torturous two hours of serving the diplomat until he left and Dean slunk back in. He looked like a man ready to bang his head off the plastic bar so I moved quickly to intercept, sliding a tall cold draft beer his way. No hard alcohol for the captain, not when the ship was out and active.

"You're a saint, Amanda," Dean muttered, sucking back an inch or two of foam and golden liquid.

I was tempted to ask him what he was going to do about the problem but knew that people didn't visit bartenders to get pumped for information. I trusted him to come up with a solution and hopefully it'd be sooner rather than later.

I hoped he would talk. It looked like he needed it. But I realized too late that my earlier mini-venting comment about Reddecker had made me into one of Captain Winchester's crew and that meant I was under Dean's protection.

I kicked myself. Hard. I was a professional and I had fallen down on my job. Bartenders didn't let their emotions negatively affect anyone they might serve until they were off the clock. Still, despite my best wheedling and poking, Dean stayed clammed up. He left an hour or so later and almost immediately after that, Castiel wandered in.

I pounced.

Squeezing information out of Cas wasn't hard, which is a rather unjust statement. Castiel can keep his mouth shut tighter than Dean or Sam if he thinks there's cause but I know that Cas trusts me. As such, he had no problem explaining how Sam's hands were tied by the very rude diplomat and the whole mess would be solved if only Reddecker didn't show up for the resumption of negotiation tomorrow morning.

A very bad, bad thought prickled at the back of my mind.

Illegal, even.

I let the idea grow, turned it over several times.

And decided I didn't give a damn.

When Reddecker returned for a second round of drinks, complaining that no one respected him and how he couldn't even get a good whisky on this tub, I smiled professionally and poured him a single glass of my finest vintage, the stuff that I only let true connoisseurs touch.

Sacrifices were necessary.

A quick twist of the wrist, the gurgle of a light green liquid, a slotted spoon and a square of sugar went to a great cause. Scotty and Bobby would probably cry when they found out I'd given it all away to this douche but Reddecker would be very seriously drunk inside of oh, half an hour.

When I went on shift the next evening, I immediately had to deal with a very hung-over Reddecker. "Dr. Harvelle said it's an infirmary rule that she doesn't deal with hangovers," he muttered with his hands shading his eyes, "but she suggested you might have a remedy.j And can you turn down the lights?"

Oh shit.

I had forgotten about Ellen, the best diagnostician in Starfleet and possibly the Federation. She'd pick up the high-octane substance.

With swift motions that would have betrayed my nervousness had Reddecker known me, I whipped up a glass of rather noxious-looking liquid. "My own secret mix. See if that helps," I offered courteously. Apparently it did, because Reddecker perked up just in time to see Sam striding in.

"Ambassador, your shuttle is waiting to take you back to Starbase 4. We managed to come to terms while you were…ill." Sam was almost obscenely cheerful at the idea of escorting the diplomat off his ship and Reddecker didn't look too disappointed either, following the tall officer out of the rec room immediately.

Three hours later, Ellen was sitting at my bar, swirling beer around in her glass. "So, do you incapacitate everyone who ticks you off with absinthe?"

I forced myself to keep on drying glasses calmly. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Sure you don't," she replied with a knowing grin.

I resisted the urge to crawl under the bar.

Ellen looked up as my cheeks flushed red. "Thanks," she said in low tones. I shrugged.

"I'll never do it again."

"Sure you won't."

"Never ever to a crew member."

"That, I believe."

I scooted back to the Enterprise twelve hours later with a deeper, slightly scary understanding of how far a person can go for family.