Hermione Granger studies harder than you. (her_my_nee) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2013-07-21 21:39:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, hermione granger, james kirk |
Who: Jim Kirk and Hermione Granger
When: Recently, after the Husks
Where: Their Place
What: Reunited and it feels so good?
Rating/Warning: Low, surprisingly
Status: Complete!
Hermione was home with Crookshanks. She was curled on the sofa with a book, as was her usual, wearing some stretchy jammies and trying to ignore how warm her feet felt in her socks. The cat wasn’t helping, as he was curled behind her knees, keeping those feet very warm. It was just about time to get up and take off those socks. Though, every time she considered it, she decided just one more page, and that led to a whole ‘nother chapter.
Jim didn’t beam in. He came in the normal way, like he’d just come back from a very long shift at work. He walked a little stiffly - even with future medicine you still ended up banged up and sore. He paused in the door way as the sound of it closing resounded, content to watch her for a moment.
It was Crookshanks who saw him first. He jumped up from the sofa and jogged over to Jim, purring. His bottle brush tail was high up in the air as the cat curled around Jim's ankles.
Hermione lowered the book to look once she realized thta Crookshanks was gone. When she saw Jim there, she sat up abruptly.
He grinned at her, stooping to give the cat some lovings before he walked over to his wife and leaned down to kiss her.
Hermione’s book was forgotten the instant Jim came over and bent above her. She returned his kiss, letting the thing drop to the floor. Both of her hands came up to cup his face. “God, you have no idea how good it is to see you,” she whispered, resting her forehead against his after the kiss.
“I have an idea, considering how glad I am to see you. I’m glad you seemed to hold up well during all of … that.” He kissed her again, then sat down.
“I’m made from good stock, I suppose.” Hermione said, playfully, as she turned to give her husband her full attention. “Are you all right?” She’d noticed the way he walked, and wondered why he was so stiff. Couldn’t McCoy fix him up?
“A little sore. Banged up and then trying to help with some things before Scotty kicked me out. I think he’s still mad I banged up his wee bairn.” Jim snerked. “Haven’t gone to see Bones yet.”
“You should. You should go see Leonard. And while you’re there, ask him why he hasn’t brought his girlfriend around for us to meet yet.” Hermione responded, reaching a hand over to take hold of one of his. She laced their fingers together.
“Wait. Bones has a girlfriend? How haven’t I known about this?” Jim said, blinking his eyes. This was a crime of highest proportions!
“...I assume so. Her name is Elizabeth? I bumped into her randomly at the coffee shop. He called while I was picking up my tea, and she overheard me and said hello.” Hermione frowned a little. “I was going to scold you for not telling me. How do you not know?”
“I think I’ve had my head in the clouds too much lately. Hard to pay as much attention to what’s going on down on Earth.” Jim frowned. It took a lot for him to realize that.
Hermione nodded once. “...I’m still down here.” She said, giving his hand a squeeze. Perhaps she could help him be a little more grounded?
He laughed, taking her hand and kissing it. “Think I need it. Or I’d end up sailing off into the stars. It’s tempting sometimes. Lately, I haven’t felt like I’ve belonged.”
“You’d better not sail off into the stars without me.” Hermione said, bringing her other hand to rest against his arm. “Are you having more dreams?”
Jim nodded with a sigh. “It’s getting tougher, and darker, and the choices are becoming harder.”
Hermione sat up a little, moving closer, and squeezed his hand again. “Do you want to talk about it?” She asked, hoping that if he did, she could help in some way.
“Don’t know. Not too proud of myself.” Jim glanced up at the ceiling.
That made Hermione pause. “...I could make you some dinner. Would that help?” She offered, then stood to move to the kitchen. She didn’t want to put pressure on him, but she wished they could talk about it. Whatever it was. She had Dream stuff on her mind, too.
“You don’t have to make me anything, Hermione.” Jim got up, and walked after her. “My mentor died. And I nearly did something really bad because of it.”
“Oh, Jim.” She stopped in the doorway to the kitchen to wrap her arms around him. “I’m sorry.”
He sighed, exhaling out his nose and wrapping his arms around Hermione. “Then Scotty resigned, and..it just got worse from there.”
“Scotty resigned?” She said, sounding shocked. But she hugged him close, resting her chin on his shoulder. “...what? Why? How?”
“He didn’t like my orders, so he resigned his commission,” Jim explained, shrugging a shoulder. “I gave him his job back. Here at least. Don’t know if I did in the dreams.”
"I'm sure you did." Hermione said, running her hands up and down his back. "You're a good captain. You wouldn't let an engineer as amazing as Scotty slip through your fingers like that."
“It was a really stupid idea.” Jim grimaced. God only knew how badly he’d messed up. The direction the dreams were going - pretty damn badly.
Hermione tightened her arms around him. She wanted to tell him that everything was going to be okay, but she wasn't sure she could. "Does Scotty remember?"
“He’s been too busy to ask. There’s so much damage, it’ll take a long time to get her space worthy again. We’ve got help. More help than we’d have otherwise.” And Scotty was a miracle worker. If anyone could make the Enterprise sail the stars again, it would be him.
“What do you mean by more help?” Hermione asked, pulling back a little so she could look into his eyes. Those eyes she loved so deeply, the ones she couldn’t live without. “Is there another Federation Vessel around?”
“Not federation. Someone else. Some other dream world. There’s even a big base cloaked in orbit. Big enough to house the Enterprise while we repair her.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Hard part will be hiding the gouge we left in the moon.”
“Wow. Someone else is Dreaming about space stations and whatnot? And another one showed up? That’s amazing.” Hermione said, nodding. “And a good thing. I’m sure the help will be appreciated.” She paused. “...you left a gouge in the moon?”
“Seems like it. Don’t know much about their dreams. But it’s pretty big.” He darted his eyes and sat down, leaning against the back of the couch. “When that thing tore through us like butter, the ship went out of control. We crashed.” He could still envision the moonscape on the cracked view screen as it rushed up to meet them. It had seemed as though he couldn’t hear anything, not the alarms, not Scotty on the comms, nothing.
Hermione moved with him to the sofa and sat down, taking hold of his hand in both of hers. Her silence was an invitation for him to go on.
“Spock was banged up, Scotty was worse. I’m grateful that Bones wasn’t on board that day. And that you weren’t.” If he had to make a choice, he’d have been up there alone. Better to risk only himself and no one else.
She squeezed his hand. “Sounds scary.” She said, softly. And oh, the guilt. She could only imagine the guilt.
“I should have warped out as soon as we picked up the signature,” Jim said. There wasn’t much conviction in his voice. He’d never abandon the planet.
“I can’t imagine you doing that.” Hermione said, quite honestly. She knew how loyal he was to his planet, how strong the Enterprise was in general.
“If I thought I could get a tactical advantage...Warp out, warp back in. There wasn’t time to think of anything but to be a delaying action so that Shepard could get to Earth.”
“Shepard wasn’t on Earth?” Hermione asked. See how little she knew about what happened?
“Her own ship came in, she was taking it around.” Jim grinned. He remembered watching the Normandy doing her maneuvers. Didn’t matter what powered the ship, a starship was pretty.
Even if it wasn’t as pretty as the Enterprise.
There was no such thing as a ship as pretty as the Enterprise. Hermione’s love of the ship came long before she married in to it. “So, there are more ships now.”
Jim nodded. “Nothing from my universe. Just the Enterprise. It’s going to make repairs difficult, but not impossible...” He pulled her closer, kissing her soundly. “Lets talk about other things.”
Hermione let him wrap her up in his arms, returning his kiss. “Okay. What do you want to talk about?” She asked, letting her fingers thread in his hair.
Trailing fingers down the back of her neck, he asked. “Was anyone hurt? Your friends?” Okay maybe not entirely different.
Hermione shook her head a little, eyes falling closed at his fingertips against her sensitive neck. “No. I don’t think so. I haven’t heard, anyway.” She’d been a bit out of the loop. More worried about Jim than anything else.
“Good. Hate to see that happen. You know good people, Hermione.” Jim nodded his head. “You know, when things settle down, we should do something drearily mundane.”
Hermione gave a little laugh. She cuddled close against him and sighed. “Drearily mundane, huh? Like... buy a house... get a dog... go on holiday?”
“I was thinking more like dinner party. Buying a house isn’t that mundane!” Jim laughed. The idea of a holiday sounded really good. So did a house, for that matter. Really, he wanted to do anything that didn’t have to do with strange occurrences.
“Dinner party? That sounds great, actually. We could get Draco and Zuko over... and Leonard and Elizabeth?” Hermione said, giving Jim a smile. She loved the smile on his face when he laughed. They should do that more often.
“I’d like to meet this Elizabeth. And warn her appropriately.” Jim smiled innocently. It was Bones, he’d have to be razzed.
Hermione chuckled. “Well, that’s settled. You do the food, I’ll do the invites. And tidy up some of this cat hair.” Crookshanks was shedding. Poor guy.
Jim looked at her with a deadpan expression. “Shave the cat. Got it. I do love shaving your cat.”
Hermione’s eyebrows raised.
Jim’s expression remained perfectly deadpan.