Chapter Text
My name is Alicia Agneau and this is WAZ San Francisco Ellipsis, picking up where the story left off. For those of you just tuning in, we’re investigating the case of 32 year-old Leonard McCoy charged with the death of his soul mate.”
“Who doesn’t know the tragic tale of Kirk and McCoy? Gods, it’s positively Shakespearean, if people still read the Bard.” Louisa Wantabee, Cultural Historian at University of Cambridge
“The thing you have to understand is that this case is to high profile to push aside. People are itching to know what happened to Captain Kirk and Doctor McCoy. Not only because of their celebrity but because we believed in them. We wanted them to work.” –People Magazine editor, Ashley Morgansteen
AGNEAU: Here’s what we know: On January 18th, 2262, Captain James T. Kirk went out for a run. He was on a three-month shore leave before the USS Enterprise returned to their Five-Year Mission. Two days later, he was reported missing and a week later his body was found. While his memorial was underway, his husband and soul mate, Chief Medical Officer Doctor Leonard McCoy was arrested. He was found guilty in the shortest trial Starfleet has ever seen, despite the case being dragged out in the press for eons. McCoy was sentenced to life without parole in the New Zealand Penal Colony, striped of his commission, his doctor’s license and his family. Two weeks ago, an appeal was granted.
And the world wondered, why? What was it about this case that some jury, a Judge had decided to look into an appeal on the first decision?
AGNEAU:Aristela Obonheur, a law student at and a member of the school’s Innocence Project, has been trying to get the project to pursue McCoy’s case for a long time.
Agneau: Can you tell me what it is about this case that makes you think the appeal was granted? Or made you think McCoy was innocent?
Aristella Obonheur: Oh, definitely. The lack of DNA at the crime scene. I mean, McCoy was a doctor and I’m sure he would have handled it well, but there was no permissable evidence. It was odd that it took five years for them to figure this out but I’m glad they did.
We were all shocked by the court’s decision. Many, like retired Starfleet Judge Eliza Ro called it “unprecedented” while Admiral Barnett put in a motion to stop the proceedings. People clamored in support and disbelief. The Bridge Crew, which had once stood in strong and in support, the Enterprise Six, as they were known, declined interviews. Winona Kirk asked for privacy. No one was sure what to believe, no one was sure how to cover this story.
But then we received a note. I was gearing up to do a short radio piece, something simple about the case in an effort to wrap my head around the recent developments. But the note was too simple and forceful to ignore. It read simply: Leonard McCoy is innocent.
So is he?
AGNEAU: I’m a Starfleet dropout. One of many in the intervening years between the Narada Disaster and what’s known as The Age of the Enterprise. Most of my generation joined up. We felt a call toward something not only greater but somewhat reckless. We wanted to be like the young, diverse and highly talented crew of the Enterprise. We wanted to save the world.
My hero was Nyota Uhura. Her aptitude for linguistics is truly unmatched and I needed to be like her. To put my communications skills to use like her. But when I realized my Klingon was parse at best and that I cared more about reporting on what I saw than taking an active part in it; I dropped out. I got into the Journalism program at UCLA. And I started telling stories about real people. Mostly about the people somehow, through six degrees of separation, the Enterprise crew had touched. It all came back together in the end.
The point is I’ve always had a vested interest in the Enterprise and her crew. I was too old to hero worship them the way my little brother did with holos on the walls of his bedroom and autographs etched into his PADD, but their stories stuck with me. Especially about Captain Kirk and his CMO and soul mate, Leonard McCoy.
I was a year into my first serious reporting gig when the news first broke. There had been a rippling of tension in the world, starting with leaks from the higher ups that reverberated down the chain of command. Something big had happened but no one knew what. I had been tasked with finding out.
It all happened so fast, leaving people confused. I had been late to the memorial and I had a glance of a perfect row of security officers, a sea of red, hauling McCoy away from the memorial procession. Whatever noise the exchange brought about, was drowned out by the flyover.
-
WAZ San Fran Office- 12:33 on January 12, 2267
“No.”
“Jesus H. Christ, Agneau, you haven’t heard what I said.”
“I’m not asking him if he remembers the day he was arrested for his husband’s murder, fuck.”
“Why not? The man’s a goddamn murderer.”
“Agneau, do not tell me you believe this man.”
“He didn’t do it, Charlie.”
“Remember SERIAL? Remember this mission here? You set out to report. Not exonerate.”
“We have different ideas of what the mission is, sir.”
“Sir! Fucking hilarious. Sir. Just fucking ask him or I’ll cut your funding in half. You want to take a supply transport to the penal colony, go the fuck ahead.”
“Ever heard of a swear jar, Charlie?”
“Get the fuck out of my office, Agneau.”
-
AGNEAU: In journalism, we have to ask the difficult questions whether or not we get the response we expect may tell us more about the person and story we’re investigation than we’d expect. I didn’t want to ask Leonard McCoy about one of the worst days in his life, the day Jim was put to rest and he was arrested for his murder, but I had to. I had to know and so do you.
Agneau: Do you remember? That day?
McCoy: Which one?
Agneau: The day you were arrested.
McCoy: Of course I remember. Even if I didn’t want to. It’s there.
Agneau: And-
McCoy: I’m guessing you’re going to want me to tell you about it.
Agneau: If you can.
McCoy: Not much to say. Everything was going by so fast. They say things slow down with grief. And it did. When they first came to tell me that they had found Ji-when they had found the remains. But then, that morning, I felt like I was on to many stims. And then one of our friends, a security officer came to come get me. Came to warn me, I guess. I’ve never gotten like that.
Agneau: Like what?
McCoy: I was trained to triage. But I couldn’t focus. They arrested me and I couldn’t focus. I don’t remember what happened. They said I assaulted a guard. But I don’t remember that.
AGNEAU: He did assault a guard. The same man, who saved countless of lives in both the Narada and Harrison disasters, sent a security officer to med bay. This isn’t surprising to some. McCoy has been described as acerbic, sarcastic, biting, a bit rough around the edges. In our first conversations, he told me in so many words, “Fuck off.” But in our interviews since, he’s always been polite. From what I can tell, it’s as if his rough edges have been brutally cut off. There’s nothing left sharp about him. He doesn’t have the fight left in him. It got used up right before he was arrested, he says. He’s dejected.
McCoy: Hard not to be when so many people don’t believe me.
AGNEAU: Believe what, you ask? In the first years of his imprisonment, he vehemently denied his indictment. He even insisted Jim was alive. Alive! And how could he tell? Well, by the same things that made him so famous. His soul mate markings.
-
Unknown M Class Planet-January 20, 2267
James T. Kirk scratched at his arm. It looked like the arm of an eighty-year-old man, men he’d seen in old holos of military veterans, scorched marks done in solidarity barely recognizable from age. His were no such marks. He was thirty-two-years old and had the tattoos of someone twice, maybe three times his age. And they hurt.
He missed his husband.
“Any luck yet?” A voice---wispy and throaty all the same--- carried from somewhere behind him. Despite himself, he jumped.
“Jesus Christ, Lenore.”
The blonde ducked under some sheet metal that had been buckling for months, sidestepped a dusty crate and toed a chair over to set beside him. She sat backwards, of course, straddling the chair like she straddled most of her enemies before killing them. “How’s it going?”
“Almost.” His fingers were the color of rust, crusted with grease and particles he’d rather not think about inhaling. Bones would have a heart attack if he knew what-he swallowed the thought and tried to grab at the smallest wire he needed to reattach. His fingers shook.
“Let me,” Lenore said.
He turned his back on her. “I’ve got it.”
“Jimmy, will you just-“
“I said I’ve got it!” He snapped and dropped the circuit onto the makeshift table. It clattered. Dust whirled around and he sneezed.
She huffed a breath. “Your sausage fingers aren’t going to do the trick, you know?”
“And your dainty ones will?” He picked up the piece again. “You know, you’ve taken everything else from me. This is the only thing I can do.”
She sat back down. “That’s not fair. We both decided-“
“When did I decide to be taken, huh? When did I decide to get everything ripped away from me?”
Five years ago, he’d been abducted. It was like being in a coma, perhaps a haze most of which he couldn’t account for. A year and a half ago, he’d woken up from what seemed like a bad dream, to Lenore Karidian breaking him out of captivity. She’d told him what the men who took him told him; there was nothing to go back to. Everyone who mattered thought he was gone. Everyone who mattered had forgotten.
Except the ones who still held Jim’s crew and Bones over his head. The ones who knew how to make Jim ache, more so than he had already done. He thought Bones was dead already; they assured Jim that he’d wish he were.
“You just wait. We’ll get our revenge.”
“I’m not looking for revenge!” He closed his eyes, tight, counted away the migraine that threatened. Jim’s head hurt like it did most days. The light from the auxiliary lights making every twinge becomes a pounding problem behind his eyes. But he needed to focus. Lenore thought they were waiting for an opportunity to get back home. Jim was waiting for an opportunity to be heard.
“You should be. If anything, my father taught us-“
“Your father didn’t teach me anything.”
“He taught you to survive.”
Jim got up to push past her. If he couldn’t create a separate power source for the radio, he’d have to plug it in. “No. I taught myself that.”
He risked overloading the scrap heap their ship was. It was one of only a few pieces that they could risk using, God knew how long they’d be here and they still needed the main support systems--the makeshift bridge and mess. But he needed this to work.
Lenore jumped up, the metal chair scraping the floor with jerky movements. “What are you doing?”
“I’m plugging it in.”
“Fuck, what if you electrocute yourself-“
Jim reached down, blew on the jack and prayed. “I’m alright.”
“Don’t you fucking dare!”
The last person to say that to Jim cared so much more. And he died because of it. Jim plugged in the radio.
It sparked.
A loud pop.
Jim hissed as his fingers took a brunt of whatever just happened and the lights dimmed with the whir of a shut-off generator. The last extra one they had.
Lenore swore.
And then static.
But through it, when there was a second of clarity and the static dimmed, Jim heard a woman’s voice:
“This is….Francisco…Ellipsis picking up where the story left off…we’re investigating…”