Title: The Mohorovicic Incident

Author: Milliecake

Fandom: Star Trek (2009)

Category: Adventure/Drama/Hurt/Comfort

Rating: PG-13

Warnings: Mild swearing, violence

Disclaimer: Do not own, just a fan creation

Summary: The timeline has changed and Jim Kirk has had to fight for his captaincy. When an early away mission goes wrong and the life of the youngest crewmember hangs in the balance, he must fight once again for the Enterprise…this time to keep her.

Author's Notes: I was never a Trekkie who knew all the terminology, preferring the stories to the techie part, so apologies for any inaccuracies within Roddenbury's universe. This is pretty much based entirely on what the film shows and the ST wiki for filler material. Also, in my head, Mohorovicic is pronounced (incorrectly) Mohorovichic.

Additional: Just to add this story is complete upon posting because I'm terrible at keeping my stories going, so the story direction won't be changed. If you want to leave critical reviews, I'll keep them in mind for any future stories. If you want to add thumbs up reviews, thank you and glad you enjoyed.

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"Captain's Log." He paused, swivelling slightly in the spacious chair like an overgrown child, for a moment savouring those words. The Captain's log.

Some of these ship reports would end up declassified and in the eager hands of Starfleet Academy's best and brightest, their rapt, wide-eyed attention devouring every exciting, thrilling detail of life aboard Starfleet's newest flagship, of her now famous young Captain whose daring had saved Earth from destruction of cataclysmic proportions...not bad for a lazy, Midwestern farm boy.

A roll of eyes in beautiful, sculpted features roused him from his self-indulgent reverie, reminding him that not everyone was starry-eyed over Captain James Tiberius Kirk or his latest exploits and could fast see through his bullshit. Lieutenant Uhura - her Alpha Bridge officer status reminding him that he wasn't the only cadet who had seen a lightning promotion in the wake of time travelling Romulans and an aggressively expanding Klingon Empire - moved with her usual striking poise past his chair to her station at Communications.

Straightening from his slouch like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar, Kirk cleared his throat. "Stardate 22 58 point 128," he rattled off briskly. "Responding to a distress signal, we are currently on a humanitarian mission to Io X, a Class D moon within the Xenon star system."

The moon was a geologist's utopia, or so he had heard from various science crewmembers, including his own First Officer, though Spock had been less...emotive. It came as something of a revelation to Kirk that not all of space was about battling aliens and saving planets and discovering new civilisations. Some of it, well a lot of it actually, was flying from points A to B on various diplomatic, humanitarian or scientific missions, dropping off officials and ferrying Admirals or evacuating colonists when the hunk of rock they'd chosen to scratch a living off of decided to explode in a fiery ball of death.

Or maybe he and his crew were just scraping the barrel since he'd been promoted to Admiral Pike's relief four months earlier. A twenty five year old Starfleet Captain was making waves, didn't need to be genius level to see that the dinosaurs in Starfleet were being cautious, pervaded by that staid mentality that Pike had been so dismissive of on their very first meeting. But maybe, if he was honest, they needed this time to settle down. The crew was an odd bunch thrown together, a mixture of rash, rogue elements and budding brilliance within their respective fields. But youthful all the same.

"...lari gutworms. What are the odds, in space the size of god only knows what. You gotta be all kinds of unlucky to catch that. Or all kinds of stupid for not checking your food supplies."

Well, not entirely youthful, Kirk amended silently. The Enterprise's grimacing chief medical officer wasn't one to mince his words. No polite turn of phrase when a gruff, cutting remark would do. Arms folded, Leonard McCoy stared hard at the view screen, as if the blurred, warp speed scenery could feel his distinct brand of biting criticism. Kirk didn't blame him. If his own vision of space travel had involved something more idealistic than a heavily armed and armoured science vessel, then McCoy's had been dead on.

Space is disease and danger, the older man had once chewed out, cynical and fatalistic.

For McCoy space was exactly what he had predicted. His position had been inherited through his superior's death, his own only averted because he'd followed some out of his mind cadet onto the bridge during that initial, near crippling attack by the Nerada that had slaughtered half of medical bay on deck 6.

No, McCoy wasn't an optimist for good reason, even before he'd climbed aboard that first shuttle and met a cocky as hell kid named Jim Kirk.

"Bones." The nickname, it had stuck. McCoy flicked a scowl at him, but even now Kirk couldn't tell whether it was McCoy's usual sour demeanour. Nothing but the bones, the older man had warned him, but Kirk would take whatever he could get. "You set?"

His response was a huffed, "As I'm gonna be."

It was the transporter. McCoy was deathly afraid of the thing, again with good reason, they'd all seen footage of failed beaming incidents at the Academy. For some, it had instilled a lifelong fear of the technology. For others, an aspiration to create better, safer methods that didn't result in a sea of red inside the transporter room.

"If it's any consolation," Kirk offered, casually, "we'll be using the shuttle to bring you back up."

If looks could wound, Kirk would reporting to medical bay right now. Ok so shuttles weren't on the Doctor's list of fun things to do either.

"Captain. Arrival at Io X in one minute." Sulu's notification was calm, professional, his fingers dancing over his console.

Unconsciously, Kirk sat a little straighter in his chair. This far from the Neutral Zone there shouldn't be any...excitement. But Starfleet was almost always on a constant, brittle alert, waiting for the next incident to bring them all to the brink of a war none of them wanted. Things were less certain now since the incursion by the Romulans, a little less relaxed and optimistic since Earth itself had almost become a victim of what they were diplomatically calling a rogue terrorist attack.

"Captain, a maximum orbit would be advisable." Spock turned away from peering at his own instruments. "Like it's namesake within Earth's own solar system, Io X is subject to extreme gravitational forces. The gravity well, coupled with the instability of the system's star, will most likely cripple our navigational sensors."

Instability of the system's star...Kirk swivelled back to nod at Sulu. "Do it." He'd read the reports. The star at the centre was young, volatile and loved nothing more than shooting solar flares at every random opportunity, scorching anything in its path.

Luckily for the scientists on Io who had drawn the short straw - or the long depending on how crazy they were about studying forces that could crush a lesser ship on a bad day - their base was relatively sheltered, both by neighbouring moons and the best shielding tech the Federation could offer them. But Io was entering a long cyclic phase where the gravitational forces involved went beyond what even Starfleet technology could handle without due care and attention.

Sheets of ice thicker than anything found on Earth would rupture under the pressure and allow the molten core to erupt. Spectacular geysers of volcanic sulphur could shoot hundreds of kilometres from the surface into space, the sheer, awesome energy enough to take down an unshielded, unsuspecting starship.

Beaming down would be safe enough, as far as beaming down onto an unstable rock went. Beaming up once the moon entered its volatile phase and made every sensor go haywire...well, not even Mr Scott, who had postulated then proven trans-warp beaming, could put scattered subatomical particles back together again.

"Dropping out of warp in three, two, one..."

Sulu's countdown drew all focus towards the view screen as the blur of stars vanished and they emerged into a putrid, yellow gas cloud.

At least Sulu hadn't flown them into the moon. Or the planet. And the star hadn't toasted them. Yet. Bones was rubbing off on him. "Report."

"Entering geosynchronos orbit Captain."

"Ze magnetic distortion is disrupting most of our sensors Keptin." That was Chekov. Was his Standard getting better? Kirk couldn't tell.

"Captain, we're being hailed by the Mohorovicic." Uhura, clear as a bell, cutting through the rest of the background chatter

"On screen."

Kirk wasn't sure what he expected. Dirty, dust covered geologists and seismologists who poked around in the muck studying rocks that had been frozen, turned molten, stretched and crushed a billion times since inception by forces that even he could barely comprehend. Instead, and although interference was a bitch this close to a gas giant under constant bombardment by the star's erratic heliosphere, he was...pleasantly surprised.

"Enterprise, welcome to Io," the woman said, without so much as a smudge of dirt in sight. "It takes some getting used to, I know. I'm Dr Okoro of the science vessel the Mohorovicic."

Dark, tight features with surprisingly sharp eyes, competing with McCoy on age, but intelligence was always a timelessly attractive feature. "Dr Okoro," he acknowledged, rising smoothly from his chair. "I'm Captain James T Kirk of the USS Enterprise," and he ignored the faint, annoyed sigh Uhura made as he once again emphasised his rank, heck he just liked the way it sounded. "This is my chief medical officer, Dr McCoy. We'll be beaming down shortly as per your request with the vaccine and medical supplies."

"You'll both be...?" her eyes darted from one man to the other.

"We will?" McCoy raised his eyebrows at Kirk, clearly not expecting this.

"Regulations," Kirk said, quickly turning back to the woman. "We'll be able to better assess any further assistance you may require."

Dr Okoro nodded slightly, she looked strained, tired. Her image flickered and the communication ended abruptly.

"Wanna explain what that was about?" McCoy began, even as Spock rose to chime in, "Captain, I do not believe Starfleet regulations require your presence..."

"Boys, boys," Kirk cut them off, holding up his hands. "It's not a big deal. We beam down, Bones treats the sick people, we hand over the supplies, you send the shuttle down for us. Then we go do something more fun." It wasn't like he was abandoning the Enterprise for a hot date. Potential hot date, he amended.

"Why don't we just beam the affected people up?" Sulu asked and Kirk was grateful for his helmsman's change of topic.

But McCoy beat him to the punch. "Because that is regulations, real ones I mean," he sniped pointedly at Kirk. "And it happens to have to be me beaming down to treat them because I'm the only goddamn doctor on this ship with the experience to treat Callari gutworms. Trust me kid, if those things escaped onto this ship you'd be flying us to the nearest Starbase and not setting one foot out of bed for the next six months...unless you enjoy having your entire digestive system turning itself inside out and back to front."

The horrified expression on Sulu's face was enough to put paid to that idea. If Kirk hadn't already known the risks - and one of the downsides of being Captain was reading the reports on all the known things out there that could harm, kill, mate with or otherwise impair his crew - he'd be having second thoughts. As far as he knew, all Bridge crew had caught up on their vaccinations when they'd returned to space dock after defeating Nero. Hell, the things McCoy had pumped into him on that first mission were probably enough to protect him from anything he'd ever encounter.

And gutworms weren't transmittable through physical human contact, no matter how...robust that contact was.

"Keptin." Chekov was frowning slightly over his console. "I am detecting a problem with the Mohorowicic's deflector array. It does not appear to be fully functional. There is some...irregularity with ze computer."

Kirk exchanged a small look with Spock. Okoro hadn't mentioned damage to her ship's computer, only the medical problem. The Mohorovicic was doubling as the scientists' base on the moon, which made sense considering the molten volatility that lay beneath their feet. Should that volatility threaten to split the surface anywhere near them, they could simply fire up their thrusters and set down on a more stable location.

Unless their deflector array wasn't fully functional so that even low impulse could send them into debris hard enough to perforate the hull.

"Can it be fixed?" he asked his tactician.

Chekov swivelled to face him, stylus in hand. "Yes Keptin. A few minor adjustments should be enough."

"Can you fix it?"

Now that gained some interest amongst the Bridge crew, which seemed to be lost on the young Russian. "I believe it would be a simple matter to re-program the computer to restore functioning capabilities, yes."

"Good," Kirk cut him off, striding to the turbolift. "Then you're coming with us."

Chekov stuttered to a stop, all wide green eyes. "Me Keptin?"

"Captain is that wise?" Kirk heard Spock softly enquire, soft enough not to be overheard.

"Him? He's just a kid," McCoy hissed less tactfully from behind him, jerking a thumb at the young Russian.

Kirk looked from one man to the other, pointedly ignoring the way Uhura was pointedly ignoring them all though she could hear every word of their discussion.

He glanced between them at Chekov. The kid seemed torn between excited and shit scared and trying to downplay both, while Sulu was staring at the young navigator in alarm. No doubt McCoy's graphic depiction of the gutworm infestation wasn't helping anyone but Kirk wanted every main Bridge officer to have at least some away mission experience and their Russian whizzkid was the last on the list.

"Mr Spock you have the Bridge," he ordered. "Mr Chekov?"

"Yes Keptin?"

"Pack your parka. It's cold down there."

END OF CHAPTER ONE