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Title:McCoy Secret Family Recipe
Series: Star Trek: XI
Characters/Pairings: Spock/McCoy, Joanna, everyone else
Rating: PG-13 for now
Warnings: none
Wordcount: 2,115
Summary: Spock is very good with children. Luckily for him, Leonard has a curious and inquisitive daughter for Spock to show off his awesome child-rearing skills.
Totally and utterly unbeta-ed, so mistakes and whatnot are all mine.
i
Joanna McCoy inherited her mother's photographic memory and the talent certainly had its advantages.
Adults in general were forever impressed by the amount of information she knew and would coo over her budding genius.
For the most part, she felt grateful for it. She doesn't ever want to forget certain things, like the sound of her father softly singing a lullaby into her ear after she had a particularly bad nightmare, or her grandfather's warbling laugh whenever he deems something to be particularly funny.
If she wanted to, she could remember the exact details of the day her father left.
It was late morning during a hot summer's day when even a refreshing dip in the pool didn't help the sweltering heat wave outside. Her father was throwing together a small travel bag, but he didn't pack any of the formal clothes, hygiene products or data discs he usually took when he went traveling. Besides a few travel essentials, like his passport and ID card, there was a small stash of alcohol lying at the bottom of the bag, she knew because she saw him put it there, and an old, worn paperback novel with a lopsided spine and a bent cover. She wasn't quite sure what was going on, but she knew it had something to do with the dark bags under his eyes and the slump of his shoulders.
As he packed, she asked him if he was coming back. He never gave her a straight answer. No one told her directly, but she knew, felt a pull in her chest, telling her that once he left, he wasn't planning on coming back.
So she threw a fit, begging and crying for him to stay, clung tightly onto his leg and vowed to never let go. He looked at her with such hopelessness, such resignation that her fingers slacked a bit in their grip. It was the first time she had seen her father cry.
"I wish things turned out differently, Jo." he told her, "I'm sorry."
He kissed her forehead and left.
She resented him for a long time after that.
When she had finally started returning his letters about half a year later, she had tantrumed and cried out most of her anger as her mother held her tightly and whispered apologies and platitudes and 'it has to be this way'.
-----
It was during the end of the first summer of the Enterprise's five year mission that Joanna gets a letter from Starfleet on top of the usual package from her father. The letter itself had been addressed to her mother. Jocelyn had her lips set in a grim line while she read the letter and threw curses under her breath at her ex-husband and Starfleet in general when she thought Joanna couldn't hear.
Apparently, Joanna was going to spend the entirety of her summer vacation aboard the Enterprise. With her father.
In a spaceship.
Her friends were going to flip out when she tells them. Joanna spent a good hour or so screaming into her pillow in joy.
Then, hours later in the middle of the night, she suddenly remembered she was terrified of space travel.
ii.
The first impression Spock had of Joanna McCoy was that she was truly her father's daughter.
He had first met the junior McCoy when waiting in the transporter room to receive the arriving party.
Leonard acted rather desolate during certain weeks of the year and hid in his quarters without presence or visitors. Spock would learn later that Leonard moped around because he couldn't take his daughter on their (what used to be) customary trip to the carnival for her birthday. No one knows what happened behind closed doors, but that year must've been particularly hard because when the anniversary passed, Jim got a look in his eye, the one that either spelled complete disaster or miraculous salvation for everyone involved.
Sometime between their first supply drop off at the new Vulcan colony and the insane bash the crew threw for Chekov's eighteenth birthday, Jim asked many strange questions and lurked in dark corners for a few months without telling anyone what he was doing. Most people thought he cracked under the pressure of his duties and half the crew had a standing bet on who he would murder first when he inevitably snapped. One day he showed up on the bridge with a wise crack grin and a fist full of legal documents. Jim somehow managed to pull a few fancy legal acrobatics to get Joanna aboard the Enterprise for a few months. Jim even managed to secure Leonard quite a bit of extra off duty hours for the duration of her stay. No one knew too many details about what he had done or how he did it, which was probably best for everyone involved.
Though he never indicated as such in public, Leonard was very grateful for the chance to see and spend time with his daughter.
For the most part, Leonard showed his gratitude by nagging Jim a bit less frequently about his atrocious dietary habits.
The date for Joanna's arrival came quickly enough.
Jim tagged along because beneath the gruff exterior and biting insults, Leonard was a nervous wreck about the whole thing. The man practically begged for moral support the way he snipped at his staff the week leading up to the pick up date.
Leonard had requested they fly in by shuttle, but Jim waved off his concern because according to him all kids loved the transporter pad. They took a shuttle down because damnit Jim, I'm not having my molecules rearranged if I damn well don't need to. But Joanna refused to get into the shuttle. She cried and flailed all the way to the station, until Leonard finally gave up and relented on the transporter idea. Apparently, Joanna liked the shuttle even less that her father did, which said quite a bit considering he still attempted to hide in the lavatory when he used the shuttle on a regular basis.
Jim looked vaguely guilty about the whole thing and offered to carry the luggage.
He was the only one to beam up at first because Joanna refused to let go of her father's waist on the transporter pad. Her thin arms locked together like steel and no one could pry her off. Eventually, they just beamed up together.
When Leonard fully materialized with an armful of sobbing young girl plastered onto his hip, he stumbled forward a bit as he always did from the odd shift in weight. Leonard looked a little green around the gills, but that wasn't a surprise to anyone. He was infamous for his trips to the lavatory right after a session with the transporter and didn't seem to be losing his streak any time soon. He held his daughter tightly to his side, an arm held across around her narrow shoulders.
It was a toss-up as to whether he was steadying her or steadying himself.
Joanna had her head buried into her father's shirt while she continued crying miserably. She was still not over the whole shuttle thing. Sobs wracked through her body in large, whole-body shudders and tears mingled with hiccups and snot that left streaks of wetness down her cheek as she clung to her father's waist in a death grip. She felt her materialization in the pit of her stomach. She promptly hunched over and pulled away from her father, not wanting him to bear the brunt of her imminent biological imperative. Leonard let go of her with an inquiring face, and she immediately moved back a few steps. Her arms were now free from her father's waist, immediately went to cover her mouth.
"Daddy," the girl mumbled through her fingers, "I think I'm gonna-"
She chose that moment to let go of her lunch and even made the point of aiming away from her father’s boots.
It shouldn't have been a surprise that she inherited her father's stomach. It also should not have been a surprise that a child was not as inclined to find appropriate receptacles for said stomach problems. But then again, hindsight would always be 20/20.
And truthfully, it would have been fine if the whole debacle ended at that. A little girl throwing up on the way up would've just elicited a few chuckles and head shakes while it faded away into one of those cursory ‘remember when’ anecdotes.
However, the crew of the Enterprise would have no such luck.
Leonard's already weak stomach turned over at the sight of his daughter projectile vomiting her (rather large) share of the rotisserie chicken she inhaled during lunch. He lost his own losing battle with nausea right alongside his daughter. As if a child puking wasn't gross enough, both father and daughter lost their meals on the floor of the transporter pad in tandem.
The two McCoys expelled their stomach contents in rather rhythmically timed heaves, like the tick-tock of a clock.
The transport room stared in awe, alternating between being appalled and fascination.
Jim gave the rest of the day off to the ensign dutied to clean up the mess.
iii.
Leonard McCoy watched as his daughter slept peacefully, buried underneath a heap of blankets. The temperature controls weren't broken, but Joanna always liked to bundle up in a cocoon when she slept.
Nurse Chapel had temporarily relocated herself for the duration of Joanna's stay because her room was right next to Leonard's. Christine waved off any resistance that Leonard offered and settled into one of the guest suites. She insisted that Joanna needed to be close to her father but that 'such a fine young lady such as this shouldn't be encroached on by an overprotective parent'. He didn’t complain about it, mostly because he was grateful that she offered up her room.
Joanna twitched and muttered to herself in sleep. Leonard ran his hand through her blond bangs, pushing the locks from her forehead.
It had been a tiring day for everyone.
The animosity between the ex-spouses had not faded, even with time and distance. They had left things at such a bad place that neither had truly recovered from the divorce.
The lunch was a formality because neither wanted to come off as bitter or resentful in front of their daughter, but such deep seeded ill feelings were not so easily hidden. It was a much more subdued environment than the usual volcanic affair it had been during the end of their marriage, but the silence barely covered the tension in the room. Leonard and Jocelyn spoke very little during the meal and never directly to each other, instead they allowed Joanna and Jim to fill in the gaps of silence with some small talk and banter.
Jim, although Leonard would never admit it to his face, was a godsend for tagging along. The captain had claimed busboy duties, but he served as a proxy when the conversation got too heated and he distracted Joanna during the meal.
Mostly, though, everyone tried to tread lightly around the subject.
Joanna didn't need to suffer through their problems. She had already seen too much for her age.
Leonard couldn't quite blame Jocelyn for the failure of their marriage; they were both equally at fault. The blizzard of romance during their initial years just wasn't enough to make up for the faults in their clashing personalities, Leonard for his single-minded focus on his career and Jocelyn for her inability to communicate her feelings well. They hadn't been very compatible to begin with, but they were young and stubborn and selfish, the both of them, out to prove the world wrong.
No matter how much Jocelyn bitched and moaned during the final leg of their relationship, she was not the one to suffer the worst from the whole mess.
In the end, the divorce had hit Joanna the hardest because out of all of them, she was the most innocent.
Joanna played mediator to their arguments when she should’ve been playing outside and getting mud caked between her fingers. She was the rope to their tug of war of obstinacy and she grew up more than any child should’ve grown for it.
There was a lot to make up for.
In many ways, there just wasn’t any way to remedy past mistakes. There were years of her life they took away with their selfishness and those were the kinds of things no one could just give back. He’d try, though, because he was her father and he loved her more than anything.
But he’ll be damned if he knew where to begin.
[Next]
Series: Star Trek: XI
Characters/Pairings: Spock/McCoy, Joanna, everyone else
Rating: PG-13 for now
Warnings: none
Wordcount: 2,115
Summary: Spock is very good with children. Luckily for him, Leonard has a curious and inquisitive daughter for Spock to show off his awesome child-rearing skills.
Totally and utterly unbeta-ed, so mistakes and whatnot are all mine.
i
Joanna McCoy inherited her mother's photographic memory and the talent certainly had its advantages.
Adults in general were forever impressed by the amount of information she knew and would coo over her budding genius.
For the most part, she felt grateful for it. She doesn't ever want to forget certain things, like the sound of her father softly singing a lullaby into her ear after she had a particularly bad nightmare, or her grandfather's warbling laugh whenever he deems something to be particularly funny.
If she wanted to, she could remember the exact details of the day her father left.
It was late morning during a hot summer's day when even a refreshing dip in the pool didn't help the sweltering heat wave outside. Her father was throwing together a small travel bag, but he didn't pack any of the formal clothes, hygiene products or data discs he usually took when he went traveling. Besides a few travel essentials, like his passport and ID card, there was a small stash of alcohol lying at the bottom of the bag, she knew because she saw him put it there, and an old, worn paperback novel with a lopsided spine and a bent cover. She wasn't quite sure what was going on, but she knew it had something to do with the dark bags under his eyes and the slump of his shoulders.
As he packed, she asked him if he was coming back. He never gave her a straight answer. No one told her directly, but she knew, felt a pull in her chest, telling her that once he left, he wasn't planning on coming back.
So she threw a fit, begging and crying for him to stay, clung tightly onto his leg and vowed to never let go. He looked at her with such hopelessness, such resignation that her fingers slacked a bit in their grip. It was the first time she had seen her father cry.
"I wish things turned out differently, Jo." he told her, "I'm sorry."
He kissed her forehead and left.
She resented him for a long time after that.
When she had finally started returning his letters about half a year later, she had tantrumed and cried out most of her anger as her mother held her tightly and whispered apologies and platitudes and 'it has to be this way'.
-----
It was during the end of the first summer of the Enterprise's five year mission that Joanna gets a letter from Starfleet on top of the usual package from her father. The letter itself had been addressed to her mother. Jocelyn had her lips set in a grim line while she read the letter and threw curses under her breath at her ex-husband and Starfleet in general when she thought Joanna couldn't hear.
Apparently, Joanna was going to spend the entirety of her summer vacation aboard the Enterprise. With her father.
In a spaceship.
Her friends were going to flip out when she tells them. Joanna spent a good hour or so screaming into her pillow in joy.
Then, hours later in the middle of the night, she suddenly remembered she was terrified of space travel.
ii.
The first impression Spock had of Joanna McCoy was that she was truly her father's daughter.
He had first met the junior McCoy when waiting in the transporter room to receive the arriving party.
Leonard acted rather desolate during certain weeks of the year and hid in his quarters without presence or visitors. Spock would learn later that Leonard moped around because he couldn't take his daughter on their (what used to be) customary trip to the carnival for her birthday. No one knows what happened behind closed doors, but that year must've been particularly hard because when the anniversary passed, Jim got a look in his eye, the one that either spelled complete disaster or miraculous salvation for everyone involved.
Sometime between their first supply drop off at the new Vulcan colony and the insane bash the crew threw for Chekov's eighteenth birthday, Jim asked many strange questions and lurked in dark corners for a few months without telling anyone what he was doing. Most people thought he cracked under the pressure of his duties and half the crew had a standing bet on who he would murder first when he inevitably snapped. One day he showed up on the bridge with a wise crack grin and a fist full of legal documents. Jim somehow managed to pull a few fancy legal acrobatics to get Joanna aboard the Enterprise for a few months. Jim even managed to secure Leonard quite a bit of extra off duty hours for the duration of her stay. No one knew too many details about what he had done or how he did it, which was probably best for everyone involved.
Though he never indicated as such in public, Leonard was very grateful for the chance to see and spend time with his daughter.
For the most part, Leonard showed his gratitude by nagging Jim a bit less frequently about his atrocious dietary habits.
The date for Joanna's arrival came quickly enough.
Jim tagged along because beneath the gruff exterior and biting insults, Leonard was a nervous wreck about the whole thing. The man practically begged for moral support the way he snipped at his staff the week leading up to the pick up date.
Leonard had requested they fly in by shuttle, but Jim waved off his concern because according to him all kids loved the transporter pad. They took a shuttle down because damnit Jim, I'm not having my molecules rearranged if I damn well don't need to. But Joanna refused to get into the shuttle. She cried and flailed all the way to the station, until Leonard finally gave up and relented on the transporter idea. Apparently, Joanna liked the shuttle even less that her father did, which said quite a bit considering he still attempted to hide in the lavatory when he used the shuttle on a regular basis.
Jim looked vaguely guilty about the whole thing and offered to carry the luggage.
He was the only one to beam up at first because Joanna refused to let go of her father's waist on the transporter pad. Her thin arms locked together like steel and no one could pry her off. Eventually, they just beamed up together.
When Leonard fully materialized with an armful of sobbing young girl plastered onto his hip, he stumbled forward a bit as he always did from the odd shift in weight. Leonard looked a little green around the gills, but that wasn't a surprise to anyone. He was infamous for his trips to the lavatory right after a session with the transporter and didn't seem to be losing his streak any time soon. He held his daughter tightly to his side, an arm held across around her narrow shoulders.
It was a toss-up as to whether he was steadying her or steadying himself.
Joanna had her head buried into her father's shirt while she continued crying miserably. She was still not over the whole shuttle thing. Sobs wracked through her body in large, whole-body shudders and tears mingled with hiccups and snot that left streaks of wetness down her cheek as she clung to her father's waist in a death grip. She felt her materialization in the pit of her stomach. She promptly hunched over and pulled away from her father, not wanting him to bear the brunt of her imminent biological imperative. Leonard let go of her with an inquiring face, and she immediately moved back a few steps. Her arms were now free from her father's waist, immediately went to cover her mouth.
"Daddy," the girl mumbled through her fingers, "I think I'm gonna-"
She chose that moment to let go of her lunch and even made the point of aiming away from her father’s boots.
It shouldn't have been a surprise that she inherited her father's stomach. It also should not have been a surprise that a child was not as inclined to find appropriate receptacles for said stomach problems. But then again, hindsight would always be 20/20.
And truthfully, it would have been fine if the whole debacle ended at that. A little girl throwing up on the way up would've just elicited a few chuckles and head shakes while it faded away into one of those cursory ‘remember when’ anecdotes.
However, the crew of the Enterprise would have no such luck.
Leonard's already weak stomach turned over at the sight of his daughter projectile vomiting her (rather large) share of the rotisserie chicken she inhaled during lunch. He lost his own losing battle with nausea right alongside his daughter. As if a child puking wasn't gross enough, both father and daughter lost their meals on the floor of the transporter pad in tandem.
The two McCoys expelled their stomach contents in rather rhythmically timed heaves, like the tick-tock of a clock.
The transport room stared in awe, alternating between being appalled and fascination.
Jim gave the rest of the day off to the ensign dutied to clean up the mess.
iii.
Leonard McCoy watched as his daughter slept peacefully, buried underneath a heap of blankets. The temperature controls weren't broken, but Joanna always liked to bundle up in a cocoon when she slept.
Nurse Chapel had temporarily relocated herself for the duration of Joanna's stay because her room was right next to Leonard's. Christine waved off any resistance that Leonard offered and settled into one of the guest suites. She insisted that Joanna needed to be close to her father but that 'such a fine young lady such as this shouldn't be encroached on by an overprotective parent'. He didn’t complain about it, mostly because he was grateful that she offered up her room.
Joanna twitched and muttered to herself in sleep. Leonard ran his hand through her blond bangs, pushing the locks from her forehead.
It had been a tiring day for everyone.
The animosity between the ex-spouses had not faded, even with time and distance. They had left things at such a bad place that neither had truly recovered from the divorce.
The lunch was a formality because neither wanted to come off as bitter or resentful in front of their daughter, but such deep seeded ill feelings were not so easily hidden. It was a much more subdued environment than the usual volcanic affair it had been during the end of their marriage, but the silence barely covered the tension in the room. Leonard and Jocelyn spoke very little during the meal and never directly to each other, instead they allowed Joanna and Jim to fill in the gaps of silence with some small talk and banter.
Jim, although Leonard would never admit it to his face, was a godsend for tagging along. The captain had claimed busboy duties, but he served as a proxy when the conversation got too heated and he distracted Joanna during the meal.
Mostly, though, everyone tried to tread lightly around the subject.
Joanna didn't need to suffer through their problems. She had already seen too much for her age.
Leonard couldn't quite blame Jocelyn for the failure of their marriage; they were both equally at fault. The blizzard of romance during their initial years just wasn't enough to make up for the faults in their clashing personalities, Leonard for his single-minded focus on his career and Jocelyn for her inability to communicate her feelings well. They hadn't been very compatible to begin with, but they were young and stubborn and selfish, the both of them, out to prove the world wrong.
No matter how much Jocelyn bitched and moaned during the final leg of their relationship, she was not the one to suffer the worst from the whole mess.
In the end, the divorce had hit Joanna the hardest because out of all of them, she was the most innocent.
Joanna played mediator to their arguments when she should’ve been playing outside and getting mud caked between her fingers. She was the rope to their tug of war of obstinacy and she grew up more than any child should’ve grown for it.
There was a lot to make up for.
In many ways, there just wasn’t any way to remedy past mistakes. There were years of her life they took away with their selfishness and those were the kinds of things no one could just give back. He’d try, though, because he was her father and he loved her more than anything.
But he’ll be damned if he knew where to begin.
[Next]