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1lostoneTitle: If You Can’t Be With The One You Love, Honey…
Rating: NC-17 overall
Word Count: Erm idek. Probably longish. 3989/???
Paring: K/S (Background Uhura/Bones)
Warnings: none
Summary: Spock has a… not all together logical reaction to Captain Kirk’s constant disregard for his own safety on away missions.
Beta: The amazing![[info]](https://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=1)
jademac2442 . I mean it guys. You should see what this looks like before she gets her hands on it! ♥♥♥
A/N: Thanks tojademac2442 and jlm121 for cheerleading and letting me bounce ideas off of their heads. This process was occasionally painful.
Chapter 1 Chapter 2
Three days later found Jim in the gym. With Bones still being a adamant about Jim not allowed to do work on the Bridge, he’d found himself at loose ends. Jim had signed off on his part of the paperwork from the last mission. He’d called all the loved ones first. Starfleet policy gave him access to the last wishes of all of his crew members, along with any religious wishes, but Jim still preferred to talk to the deceased’s loved ones. It might not have helped them really understand why their child or brother or lover was dead, but it did make Jim feel less like an asshole. Hell, in some cases it gave them someone to blame for their loss. Either way, Jim figured it was the least that he could do.
Scotty wouldn’t let him near engineering, Chapel chased him out of sickbay whenever he popped his head through the doors, and the one time he’d managed to sneak onto his own damn Bridge either Chekov or Sulu had ratted him out to Bones.
Sometimes it was really fucking annoying that his crew took his health so damn seriously.
So that left him here, running in place like a hamster on its wheel. He didn’t understand how that was okay but sitting on his ass in his chair was a health risk, but he didn’t have a medical degree either- let alone the several that Bones had. He’d already stripped off the soaked Starfleet Academy t-shirt and was just running in his shorts, socks and running shoes. He’d nabbed a treadmill in the back of the gym, behind a beginning combat class. Jim had tuned Cupcake and the rest of the class out, focusing on the grey material of his sweaty shirt where it lay over the controls.
“Computer. Increase incline by 15%.”
That was better. It worked different muscles in his legs, and Jim quickly found that he had to work a little harder to keep his previous pace. All he could hear was his heartbeat and the sound of his breathing- a little increased but not out of his normal level.
As usual, the calm, repetitive action let Jim’s mind focus. At the academy, when he’d been this twitchy, he’d usually gone bar crawling or looking for a fight. After Bones had patched him up a few times, he’d started to force Jim into running around the campus whenever he needed to calm down his mind so that he could focus on what needed to be focused on.
Bones been absolutely insufferable at the fact that it worked like a charm.
Now, Jim was able to really think about what had happened on Huxtor III. The first thing that bugged the shit out of him was the fact that things had been arranged so that he took Nytoa down onto the planet with him. Maybe he was being too suspicious, but it just seemed to perfect that their jailers just happened to speak in a dialect that Nytoa wasn’t familiar with and they just happened to be speaking where she could hear them in the first place.
He was so intent on his work that when one of the younger women in front of him, one who should have been focusing on Cupcake’s demonstration mentioned ‘Spock’, it jarred Jim out of his little world. He blinked the sweat out of his eyes, just barely catching himself from falling and jerked his head, staring over at her.
“Commander Spock called it something. A Loopa.”
“Wow. Look at that.”
Jim opened his mouth to bark something at the two yeomen about how inappropriate it was to be gawking at another officer, when he happened to look up and see Spock wearing tight-fitting black workout clothes, raising his arms to strike at the hologram with the lirpa and immediately forgot what he was going to say. The weight of the weapon and the force with which Spock wielded it caused the muscles in his long back and broad shoulders to tighten, the black material defining each and every curve and plane of his body.
Jim’s pace slowed down as he watched Spock jump and spin around. Jim blinked, stunned at the gracefulness by which Spock moved. All at once his heart tightened. His hand swiped out, cutting off the treadmill with a sharp jab. He grabbed his shirt and slung it around his neck. It wasn’t fair that Spock was so alone here. He was using a weapon that had been around for eons before Jim’s people had figured out where their dicks were, and here Spock fought, graceful and proud, fighting against an imaginary enemy with a weapon that was now as much of an endangered item as its wielder was an endangered species.
Jim walked past the two yeomen, barely acknowledging their blushes and Oh, Captain! We didn’t see you there!s. He absently nodded at Cupcake, clapping him on the shoulder as he passed. There were an Ensign and a Lieutenant from Engineering tumbling on the the mats, and what looked like a few crewmen from the galley using something that looked like a cross between a mace and a sword with a nervous-looking woman in science blues standing near them.
Spock was in the far corner of the room. It didn’t surprise Jim that he hadn’t noticed Spock’s entrance. He felt vaguely disappointed in himself for the bolt of pure lust that had gone through him at watching the play of muscle on Spock’s back, but wrote it off as an abundance of testosterone. He felt amazing, almost buzzing with the endorphins from his run by the time he tossed his sweaty towel into the recycler and drank down a few gulps of water as he watched Spock finish up the sequence that he was working on.
“Hey there! Need a partner?”
Spock must have been extremely focused on his task, because he actually jumped a little at Jim’s voice. Spock stared at him for so long that Jim began to feel a little awkward. Spock looked slightly rumpled, while Jim stood there half naked, drenched in sweat.
“I did not know you were familiar with the lirpa.”
“I’m not. But we can spar if you want. If you don’t want me using that then we can just practice regular hand-to-hand.
This time he recognized the look Spock gave him. The nursemaid look. The same one he probably learned from Bones and half his bridge crew.
“Oh come on. It’s been three days! I’m fine. I’ve been asleep by nine and eating all my veggies, just like a good little boy. I can tell whether or not I’m ready for this, Spock.”
Spock raised an eyebrow. It was amazing to Jim that just one little muscle in Spock’s face could make him look so superior.
That he definitely learned from Bones.
“As a Vulcan, my reflexes are far superior to yours. To use the human colloquialism, it would not be much of a fight.”
Jim just laughed.
“Well, maybe we can save the lirpa for next time then. I’m not sure if I should be handling something so important anyway. Oh come on Spock. I promise to try to make you work for it a little bit.”
Spock’s bottom lip twitched just slightly and the unexpected sight made Jim feel like he’d won some sort of victory. His grin stretched a little wider as he rocked back on his feet.
The only warning Jim had was the slight tensing of the line of Spock’s torso before he was twisting and catching Jim in a hold. One foot swept Jim’s feet out from under him, and the startled squeak he emitted was not exactly one of his finer moments. He managed to twist so that he landed correctly, using Spock’s momentum so that he could roll away. He jumped up in his defensive stance, and stood weight just slightly on the front of his feet so that he could move quickly if he needed to.
He definitely needed to. Fucking hell, Spock was fast.
He had Jim on his back, one knee holding his legs to the mat and the other holding one wrist to the floor. His arm was across Jim’s chest, forcing their heads close together. From this angle, he could see the different shades of brown in the iris of Spock’s eye and for a moment was caught, mind going blessedly blank.
“Do you yield?”
Jim arched, moving sharply so that he came up into Spock’s space. The movement brought their pelvises together and was just unexpected enough that Spock loosened his grip on Jim’s wrist with a small grunt, allowing Jim to surge forward and use Spock’s greater weight against him. Jim’s scramble away wasn’t exactly dignified, but it did the job.
Spock’s natural inclination was to move so that he would not come in contact with bare skin. As Jim moved back to his area of the mat, he had a split second to think of how he could exploit that. It was a small weakness, but it might be the only thing to give him an advantage. Spock was right. Jim was getting his ass kicked, and Spock didn’t even look like he was breathing hard.
“Come on, Spock. You ready to take me on?”
“Your taunts are exceedingly juvenile, Jim.”
Jim blew a raspberry.
Then attacked.
Spock did not anticipate Jim being so aggressive, but was able to keep his balance when Jim slammed into him, hanging on to Spock’s wrists and trying a quick jab at Spock’s knee. Jim twisted the hold on Spock’s wrist, tangling their fingers together to try to jerk him off balance. Spock made a strange sound in the back of his throat and jerked his hand away. In the next heartbeat, Jim was completely surprised when he went airborne, landing on his stomach, spread-eagled with a thud, Spock’s heavy weight on top of him sending all of his air out of his lungs with a painful wooosh.
Jim’s arm was bent behind his back, held carefully so that the arm wouldn’t break, but solidly enough that Jim couldn’t have wiggled an inch if the room was on fire. Spock’s breath in his ear caused Jim’s eyes to widen.
“Do you yield, Jim?”
The perverse part of Jim pushed his ass up as he tried to bring his legs together, but Spock held him too tightly. Jim felt the grip on his arm tighten slightly enough that he winced.
“I asked you a question, Captain. Do you yield to me?” A tiny droplet of sweat landed on the back of Jim’s neck. It was so hot that for a second, Jim could imagine he could feel its path as it trailed down his spine.
And that was about the time that Jim realized he was rock hard.
“Yes, damnit. I yield.”
Spock’s weight was off of him in an instant. Jim would have gotten up, but was afraid that the athletic shorts he was wearing wouldn’t do much to preserve his captainly image at the moment, should any of his crew see him like this.
“Captain? Jim? Are you injured?”
Jim had a really rude remark on the tip of his tongue, but didn’t exactly relish the sexual misconduct reprimand he’d get when Spock reported him. “Yeah. I’m good. You’re right, that wasn’t much of a workout. For you, I mean.”
“I found it satisfying.”
That made Jim laugh and he hauled himself up to his knees, doing sort of a pushup bend. It caused the shorts to pull a little at his ass, but it also allowed him a few seconds for his body to calm down. He turned the stretch into a series of stretches, all with his back to Spock and the rest of the crew, refusing to blush at the way his stupid hormones were reacting.
He really needed to get laid.
*******************
“Bones, Bones Bones Bones Bones Bones Bones!!”
“Jim, you Goddamn infant, sit down and I’ll be with you when I’m ready.” Bones’ growl made Jim grin. The Ensign sitting on the biobed smiled a little shyly back, blushing a bit at direct attention from her Captain. Jim could practically hear Bones grinding his teeth. He caught an amused glare from Chapel and ducked back towards Bones’ office, helping himself to his friend’s bourbon. He wouldn’t actually drink it, given that he was planning on being on-duty in a few minutes, but it would be worth it to watch Bones’ face.
Jim had to keep himself from humming under his breath. Finally, finally Bones was going to allow him back in the saddle. Between his yeoman and Spock and the hours upon fucking hours of time to get everything organized he was out of shit to do. He’d not only caught up on his paperwork, but he’d managed to change up the crew shift rotations (even Spock would be pleased at the projected 11.5% increase of efficiency by the new schedules), catch up on his correspondence, and had approved the backlog of ship and crew requisitions. Scotty’s alone had taken him almost six hours. Jim had only found eighteen different “hidden” ship and engineering components, which meant that he had to have missed at least twelve things that Scotty had snuck in there. Oh well. Spock could go over those later.
And okay, if some of that was because he didn’t want to think about his reaction to being pinned on the gym’s mat by Spock, that was just fine. It was normal. It didn’t mean anything- well, other than maybe it was really time for them to shuttle another Ambassador somewhere. Shore-leave wasn’t for another month or so. First Chapel and now Spock. It wasn’t any big deal; just some weird reaction to stress or something.
When Bones entered some times later, it was to Jim kicked back in his special, ridiculously comfortable chair (Jim should know since he’d signed off the requisition paperwork) with his booted feet up on his desk, Bones’ “secret” stash of bourbon in his hand.
He could practically see his friend’s blood pressure rise.
“Hey, Bones! Glad to see you can make it!” Jim stood up, indicating his uniformed body with a sweep of his hand. He set the bourbon down with a soft clink. “As you can see, I’m totally fine.”
“Right, kid. Let me be the judge of that. Get over here and get your damn feet off of my desk.” Bones went over to a cabinet and picked up a tricorder, running it over Jim with a small, long-suffering sigh.
Jim knew when not to push his luck, and managed to stand still for the full exam.
“Well, Jim. I see some areas that look like they’re still gonna be a mite tender. And as far as I’m concerned, you need your damnfool head examined. Don’t think I didn’t hear about your little asswhuppin by that pointy-eared hobgoblin.”
Jim felt his face start to heat. He knew there was no way that Bones could possibly know about his reaction to Spock’s body against his, to his voice in Jim’s ear, but still. Bones had this annoying habit of being able to read him like a book.
“Yeah, that didn’t go how I planned. It’s hard to look completely awesome when you have your giftwrapped ass handed to you.”
“I told you at the academic hearing that I liked him.” Bones’ smile was fond. “Anyone that takes down your ego should be treated as a treasured resource.”
“I’ll recommend that to the Admiralty. So? Am I good to go?”
Bones sucked his teeth, looking at the readout on the tricorder. “To tell the truth, Jim I’m feelin’ a little worried about how often you’re getting hurt lately. Spock came in here while you were passed out before. Telling me how often you’d been smashed up.”
“Come on, Bones. It’s just that I have a dangerous job. You know that.” Jim didn’t like the way Bones was looking at him. It wasn’t his usual grouchy scowl or his self-deprecating smirk. Bones was solemn, his hazel eyes worried.
“That’s just the thing, Jim. Statistically, well. You know that one of my jobs is to make sure that you’re fit for duty. And if it looks like you’re taking on a little too much, or that you’re looking for some kind of adrenaline-”
Jim sucked in a shocked breath, feeling like he’d been punched. Bones thought, what? That he was trying to hurt himself? Wait, no. He and Spock had “discussed” him. Discussed how poorly he was doing as a captain. Fuck. It wasn’t like Jim was trying to screw everything up. That was happening nicely on its own.
Jim had a strange, squirming feeling in his stomach when he imagined all the other conversations they must have had about him. He ignored what he was feeling and tried to focus on just what it was that Bones was implying. All the southern drawl in the world didn’t hide the fact that basically, Bones was accusing him of fucking up.
It wasn’t like he didn’t have confidence in himself, but somehow it hurt more knowing that Bones and Spock didn’t have the same confidence in his abilities.
“Bones, if you have something to say, you better just say it.”
Bones raised his eyebrow, looking for a moment eerily like Spock. Betrayal hit Jim hard, making his stomach clench.
“Now, Jim....”
Jim took a step away from Bones’ desk and forced a smile. It must have looked as brittle as he felt because Bones’ wary reaction gave him a fierce sort of satisfaction.
“Look. I don’t know what sort of circle jerk you and Spock have going on, but I’m not going to discuss my choices as Captain with you. Report whatever the fuck you need to report up the food chain. I’ve got to go do my job. Assuming I still have it.”
With that Jim walked around his friend, keeping his face carefully blank. He made his way to the Bridge blindly, going over Bones’ words in his head. Did he and Spock think he was incompetent? That somehow infuriated Jim more than anything. He nodded absently to Cupcake as the security officer left the turbolift, slumping against the back of the lift as his thoughts raced around his head.
The ride to the Bridge was short enough that Jim had just enough time to stand, assuming what he had adopted as his ‘captain stance’ before the doors slid open. He took a quick breath and shoved the maelstrom of feelings away, refusing to let them bring him down.
“Keptin! Is wery good to see you back!” Chekov’s smile was so bright that Jim couldn’t help the answering grin. He strode into the room, loving the buzz of the ship’s engines under his boots. His mood lightened immediately as he walked towards his chair. He grinned at Sulu’s wave, at the ensign at the secondary science station, nodded at Spock and gave Nyota his customary leer, to which she responded with her customary eye roll and flip of her ponytail. Spock had been working as acting captain from his science station.
Jim sat down.
“Report.”
“All systems reporting as normal, Captain.”
“Awesome, Spock. Glad to see you didn’t break her while I was gone.” He tried to keep the fact that he was annoyed out of his voice, but Jim wasn’t sure his voice was as free from inflection as he had intended.
“Indeed not, Captain.”
Jim couldn’t help the smirk that he shot over his shoulder, but was surprised to see the answering eyebrow. Spock wasn’t smiling, but Jim had the feeling that he was amused.
He turned back at a beep on his PADD and the smile slid off his face when he saw that it was a message from Bones.
“Captain?” Incoming message from Starfleet.”
Fantastic.
“I’ll take it in my ready room. Spock, you’re with me. Sulu you have the con.”
“Aye Sir.” Sulu’s shoulders straightened.
“Yes, Captain.” Spock stood as the secondary science officer moved from their station to Spock’s.
Jim made himself not notice the amount of heat that Spock put out. Somehow, in all the times that they’d touched while working together, Jim had never really noticed just how very warm Spock was. He could feel Spock next to him, and it made him swallow uncomfortably. He cleared his throat and crossed to his desk, settling himself with Spock to his left so that he would not be visible to the viewscreen.
Jim entered his sequence and the subspace communication queued up with a small blip of sound.
“Admiral Komack.”
“Captain Kirk. You have new orders. Starfleet Intelligence-”
Jim absolutely did not make a rude sound in the back of his throat.
“-- has picked up rumors of Klingon aggression. From the reports, we believe that they are working to design a weapon. A powerful weapon, based on the amount of raw materials we suspect they have amassed. Two hours ago we received a distress call from the colonists on Praxis. You are ordered to investigate and extract the colonists.”
Komack paused in the way he did, raising his eyebrows in case Jim had any questions, without actually asking if he had any questions. It was a habit of his that usually drove Jim absolutely bugshit.
“None, sir.”
“Acknowledged. Komack out.”
Jim exhaled, leaning back in his chair and staring sightlessly up at the ceiling. “Captain Kirk to Ensign Chekov. Chekov, at maximum warp, how long will it take us to arrive to the Beta quadrant. Specifically, the moon, Praxis.”
There was a moment while Jim licked his lips, still staring up at the ceiling.
“About six hours at maximum warp, sir.”
“Plot a course and go, Ensign.”
“Yes sir.”
There was a moment of silence as Jim spun around in his chair, finally turning so that he could stare at somewhere over Spock’s left shoulder.
“There’s something... off about this, Spock.”
“Captain, the Admiral’s orders were quite specific.”
“Mmm. Yeah, I know.” Jim was silent again, his eyes unfocused as he thought. After weeks of nothing- not even a hint of movement well, okay not a hint of movement that Jim had heard,- and he kept his ear pretty fucking close to the ground out of necessity’s sake- after three days of flailing around with their collective thumbs jammed merrily up their asses while they tried to figure out which direction to go, now there were suddenly clear-cut orders? Orders implicating Klingon aggression even?
“Captain?”
“It’s just- I don’t trust this, Spock. You said that the minerals on Huxtor III were most likely to be used for communications. Now we’re being sent to a moon in the middle of fucking nowhere- a fucking nowhere that just happens to be barely in Federation space that’s used for mining?”
Jim noticed Spock go very still and watched as the realization caused his intelligent gaze to sharpen even more.
“You are proposing that this is a trap of some sort.”
“Spock, I don’t know. I just know that whatever the hell is happening on Praxis can’t possibly be good.”
NEXT
… and a bit of a cliffhanger. :D
TOS fans might recognize where I'm going here. Maybe. ;)
Rating: NC-17 overall
Word Count: Erm idek. Probably longish. 3989/???
Paring: K/S (Background Uhura/Bones)
Warnings: none
Summary: Spock has a… not all together logical reaction to Captain Kirk’s constant disregard for his own safety on away missions.
Beta: The amazing
jademac2442 . I mean it guys. You should see what this looks like before she gets her hands on it! ♥♥♥A/N: Thanks to
jademac2442 and jlm121 for cheerleading and letting me bounce ideas off of their heads. This process was occasionally painful. Chapter 1 Chapter 2
Three days later found Jim in the gym. With Bones still being a adamant about Jim not allowed to do work on the Bridge, he’d found himself at loose ends. Jim had signed off on his part of the paperwork from the last mission. He’d called all the loved ones first. Starfleet policy gave him access to the last wishes of all of his crew members, along with any religious wishes, but Jim still preferred to talk to the deceased’s loved ones. It might not have helped them really understand why their child or brother or lover was dead, but it did make Jim feel less like an asshole. Hell, in some cases it gave them someone to blame for their loss. Either way, Jim figured it was the least that he could do.
Scotty wouldn’t let him near engineering, Chapel chased him out of sickbay whenever he popped his head through the doors, and the one time he’d managed to sneak onto his own damn Bridge either Chekov or Sulu had ratted him out to Bones.
Sometimes it was really fucking annoying that his crew took his health so damn seriously.
So that left him here, running in place like a hamster on its wheel. He didn’t understand how that was okay but sitting on his ass in his chair was a health risk, but he didn’t have a medical degree either- let alone the several that Bones had. He’d already stripped off the soaked Starfleet Academy t-shirt and was just running in his shorts, socks and running shoes. He’d nabbed a treadmill in the back of the gym, behind a beginning combat class. Jim had tuned Cupcake and the rest of the class out, focusing on the grey material of his sweaty shirt where it lay over the controls.
“Computer. Increase incline by 15%.”
That was better. It worked different muscles in his legs, and Jim quickly found that he had to work a little harder to keep his previous pace. All he could hear was his heartbeat and the sound of his breathing- a little increased but not out of his normal level.
As usual, the calm, repetitive action let Jim’s mind focus. At the academy, when he’d been this twitchy, he’d usually gone bar crawling or looking for a fight. After Bones had patched him up a few times, he’d started to force Jim into running around the campus whenever he needed to calm down his mind so that he could focus on what needed to be focused on.
Bones been absolutely insufferable at the fact that it worked like a charm.
Now, Jim was able to really think about what had happened on Huxtor III. The first thing that bugged the shit out of him was the fact that things had been arranged so that he took Nytoa down onto the planet with him. Maybe he was being too suspicious, but it just seemed to perfect that their jailers just happened to speak in a dialect that Nytoa wasn’t familiar with and they just happened to be speaking where she could hear them in the first place.
He was so intent on his work that when one of the younger women in front of him, one who should have been focusing on Cupcake’s demonstration mentioned ‘Spock’, it jarred Jim out of his little world. He blinked the sweat out of his eyes, just barely catching himself from falling and jerked his head, staring over at her.
“Commander Spock called it something. A Loopa.”
“Wow. Look at that.”
Jim opened his mouth to bark something at the two yeomen about how inappropriate it was to be gawking at another officer, when he happened to look up and see Spock wearing tight-fitting black workout clothes, raising his arms to strike at the hologram with the lirpa and immediately forgot what he was going to say. The weight of the weapon and the force with which Spock wielded it caused the muscles in his long back and broad shoulders to tighten, the black material defining each and every curve and plane of his body.
Jim’s pace slowed down as he watched Spock jump and spin around. Jim blinked, stunned at the gracefulness by which Spock moved. All at once his heart tightened. His hand swiped out, cutting off the treadmill with a sharp jab. He grabbed his shirt and slung it around his neck. It wasn’t fair that Spock was so alone here. He was using a weapon that had been around for eons before Jim’s people had figured out where their dicks were, and here Spock fought, graceful and proud, fighting against an imaginary enemy with a weapon that was now as much of an endangered item as its wielder was an endangered species.
Jim walked past the two yeomen, barely acknowledging their blushes and Oh, Captain! We didn’t see you there!s. He absently nodded at Cupcake, clapping him on the shoulder as he passed. There were an Ensign and a Lieutenant from Engineering tumbling on the the mats, and what looked like a few crewmen from the galley using something that looked like a cross between a mace and a sword with a nervous-looking woman in science blues standing near them.
Spock was in the far corner of the room. It didn’t surprise Jim that he hadn’t noticed Spock’s entrance. He felt vaguely disappointed in himself for the bolt of pure lust that had gone through him at watching the play of muscle on Spock’s back, but wrote it off as an abundance of testosterone. He felt amazing, almost buzzing with the endorphins from his run by the time he tossed his sweaty towel into the recycler and drank down a few gulps of water as he watched Spock finish up the sequence that he was working on.
“Hey there! Need a partner?”
Spock must have been extremely focused on his task, because he actually jumped a little at Jim’s voice. Spock stared at him for so long that Jim began to feel a little awkward. Spock looked slightly rumpled, while Jim stood there half naked, drenched in sweat.
“I did not know you were familiar with the lirpa.”
“I’m not. But we can spar if you want. If you don’t want me using that then we can just practice regular hand-to-hand.
This time he recognized the look Spock gave him. The nursemaid look. The same one he probably learned from Bones and half his bridge crew.
“Oh come on. It’s been three days! I’m fine. I’ve been asleep by nine and eating all my veggies, just like a good little boy. I can tell whether or not I’m ready for this, Spock.”
Spock raised an eyebrow. It was amazing to Jim that just one little muscle in Spock’s face could make him look so superior.
That he definitely learned from Bones.
“As a Vulcan, my reflexes are far superior to yours. To use the human colloquialism, it would not be much of a fight.”
Jim just laughed.
“Well, maybe we can save the lirpa for next time then. I’m not sure if I should be handling something so important anyway. Oh come on Spock. I promise to try to make you work for it a little bit.”
Spock’s bottom lip twitched just slightly and the unexpected sight made Jim feel like he’d won some sort of victory. His grin stretched a little wider as he rocked back on his feet.
The only warning Jim had was the slight tensing of the line of Spock’s torso before he was twisting and catching Jim in a hold. One foot swept Jim’s feet out from under him, and the startled squeak he emitted was not exactly one of his finer moments. He managed to twist so that he landed correctly, using Spock’s momentum so that he could roll away. He jumped up in his defensive stance, and stood weight just slightly on the front of his feet so that he could move quickly if he needed to.
He definitely needed to. Fucking hell, Spock was fast.
He had Jim on his back, one knee holding his legs to the mat and the other holding one wrist to the floor. His arm was across Jim’s chest, forcing their heads close together. From this angle, he could see the different shades of brown in the iris of Spock’s eye and for a moment was caught, mind going blessedly blank.
“Do you yield?”
Jim arched, moving sharply so that he came up into Spock’s space. The movement brought their pelvises together and was just unexpected enough that Spock loosened his grip on Jim’s wrist with a small grunt, allowing Jim to surge forward and use Spock’s greater weight against him. Jim’s scramble away wasn’t exactly dignified, but it did the job.
Spock’s natural inclination was to move so that he would not come in contact with bare skin. As Jim moved back to his area of the mat, he had a split second to think of how he could exploit that. It was a small weakness, but it might be the only thing to give him an advantage. Spock was right. Jim was getting his ass kicked, and Spock didn’t even look like he was breathing hard.
“Come on, Spock. You ready to take me on?”
“Your taunts are exceedingly juvenile, Jim.”
Jim blew a raspberry.
Then attacked.
Spock did not anticipate Jim being so aggressive, but was able to keep his balance when Jim slammed into him, hanging on to Spock’s wrists and trying a quick jab at Spock’s knee. Jim twisted the hold on Spock’s wrist, tangling their fingers together to try to jerk him off balance. Spock made a strange sound in the back of his throat and jerked his hand away. In the next heartbeat, Jim was completely surprised when he went airborne, landing on his stomach, spread-eagled with a thud, Spock’s heavy weight on top of him sending all of his air out of his lungs with a painful wooosh.
Jim’s arm was bent behind his back, held carefully so that the arm wouldn’t break, but solidly enough that Jim couldn’t have wiggled an inch if the room was on fire. Spock’s breath in his ear caused Jim’s eyes to widen.
“Do you yield, Jim?”
The perverse part of Jim pushed his ass up as he tried to bring his legs together, but Spock held him too tightly. Jim felt the grip on his arm tighten slightly enough that he winced.
“I asked you a question, Captain. Do you yield to me?” A tiny droplet of sweat landed on the back of Jim’s neck. It was so hot that for a second, Jim could imagine he could feel its path as it trailed down his spine.
And that was about the time that Jim realized he was rock hard.
“Yes, damnit. I yield.”
Spock’s weight was off of him in an instant. Jim would have gotten up, but was afraid that the athletic shorts he was wearing wouldn’t do much to preserve his captainly image at the moment, should any of his crew see him like this.
“Captain? Jim? Are you injured?”
Jim had a really rude remark on the tip of his tongue, but didn’t exactly relish the sexual misconduct reprimand he’d get when Spock reported him. “Yeah. I’m good. You’re right, that wasn’t much of a workout. For you, I mean.”
“I found it satisfying.”
That made Jim laugh and he hauled himself up to his knees, doing sort of a pushup bend. It caused the shorts to pull a little at his ass, but it also allowed him a few seconds for his body to calm down. He turned the stretch into a series of stretches, all with his back to Spock and the rest of the crew, refusing to blush at the way his stupid hormones were reacting.
He really needed to get laid.
*******************
“Bones, Bones Bones Bones Bones Bones Bones!!”
“Jim, you Goddamn infant, sit down and I’ll be with you when I’m ready.” Bones’ growl made Jim grin. The Ensign sitting on the biobed smiled a little shyly back, blushing a bit at direct attention from her Captain. Jim could practically hear Bones grinding his teeth. He caught an amused glare from Chapel and ducked back towards Bones’ office, helping himself to his friend’s bourbon. He wouldn’t actually drink it, given that he was planning on being on-duty in a few minutes, but it would be worth it to watch Bones’ face.
Jim had to keep himself from humming under his breath. Finally, finally Bones was going to allow him back in the saddle. Between his yeoman and Spock and the hours upon fucking hours of time to get everything organized he was out of shit to do. He’d not only caught up on his paperwork, but he’d managed to change up the crew shift rotations (even Spock would be pleased at the projected 11.5% increase of efficiency by the new schedules), catch up on his correspondence, and had approved the backlog of ship and crew requisitions. Scotty’s alone had taken him almost six hours. Jim had only found eighteen different “hidden” ship and engineering components, which meant that he had to have missed at least twelve things that Scotty had snuck in there. Oh well. Spock could go over those later.
And okay, if some of that was because he didn’t want to think about his reaction to being pinned on the gym’s mat by Spock, that was just fine. It was normal. It didn’t mean anything- well, other than maybe it was really time for them to shuttle another Ambassador somewhere. Shore-leave wasn’t for another month or so. First Chapel and now Spock. It wasn’t any big deal; just some weird reaction to stress or something.
When Bones entered some times later, it was to Jim kicked back in his special, ridiculously comfortable chair (Jim should know since he’d signed off the requisition paperwork) with his booted feet up on his desk, Bones’ “secret” stash of bourbon in his hand.
He could practically see his friend’s blood pressure rise.
“Hey, Bones! Glad to see you can make it!” Jim stood up, indicating his uniformed body with a sweep of his hand. He set the bourbon down with a soft clink. “As you can see, I’m totally fine.”
“Right, kid. Let me be the judge of that. Get over here and get your damn feet off of my desk.” Bones went over to a cabinet and picked up a tricorder, running it over Jim with a small, long-suffering sigh.
Jim knew when not to push his luck, and managed to stand still for the full exam.
“Well, Jim. I see some areas that look like they’re still gonna be a mite tender. And as far as I’m concerned, you need your damnfool head examined. Don’t think I didn’t hear about your little asswhuppin by that pointy-eared hobgoblin.”
Jim felt his face start to heat. He knew there was no way that Bones could possibly know about his reaction to Spock’s body against his, to his voice in Jim’s ear, but still. Bones had this annoying habit of being able to read him like a book.
“Yeah, that didn’t go how I planned. It’s hard to look completely awesome when you have your giftwrapped ass handed to you.”
“I told you at the academic hearing that I liked him.” Bones’ smile was fond. “Anyone that takes down your ego should be treated as a treasured resource.”
“I’ll recommend that to the Admiralty. So? Am I good to go?”
Bones sucked his teeth, looking at the readout on the tricorder. “To tell the truth, Jim I’m feelin’ a little worried about how often you’re getting hurt lately. Spock came in here while you were passed out before. Telling me how often you’d been smashed up.”
“Come on, Bones. It’s just that I have a dangerous job. You know that.” Jim didn’t like the way Bones was looking at him. It wasn’t his usual grouchy scowl or his self-deprecating smirk. Bones was solemn, his hazel eyes worried.
“That’s just the thing, Jim. Statistically, well. You know that one of my jobs is to make sure that you’re fit for duty. And if it looks like you’re taking on a little too much, or that you’re looking for some kind of adrenaline-”
Jim sucked in a shocked breath, feeling like he’d been punched. Bones thought, what? That he was trying to hurt himself? Wait, no. He and Spock had “discussed” him. Discussed how poorly he was doing as a captain. Fuck. It wasn’t like Jim was trying to screw everything up. That was happening nicely on its own.
Jim had a strange, squirming feeling in his stomach when he imagined all the other conversations they must have had about him. He ignored what he was feeling and tried to focus on just what it was that Bones was implying. All the southern drawl in the world didn’t hide the fact that basically, Bones was accusing him of fucking up.
It wasn’t like he didn’t have confidence in himself, but somehow it hurt more knowing that Bones and Spock didn’t have the same confidence in his abilities.
“Bones, if you have something to say, you better just say it.”
Bones raised his eyebrow, looking for a moment eerily like Spock. Betrayal hit Jim hard, making his stomach clench.
“Now, Jim....”
Jim took a step away from Bones’ desk and forced a smile. It must have looked as brittle as he felt because Bones’ wary reaction gave him a fierce sort of satisfaction.
“Look. I don’t know what sort of circle jerk you and Spock have going on, but I’m not going to discuss my choices as Captain with you. Report whatever the fuck you need to report up the food chain. I’ve got to go do my job. Assuming I still have it.”
With that Jim walked around his friend, keeping his face carefully blank. He made his way to the Bridge blindly, going over Bones’ words in his head. Did he and Spock think he was incompetent? That somehow infuriated Jim more than anything. He nodded absently to Cupcake as the security officer left the turbolift, slumping against the back of the lift as his thoughts raced around his head.
The ride to the Bridge was short enough that Jim had just enough time to stand, assuming what he had adopted as his ‘captain stance’ before the doors slid open. He took a quick breath and shoved the maelstrom of feelings away, refusing to let them bring him down.
“Keptin! Is wery good to see you back!” Chekov’s smile was so bright that Jim couldn’t help the answering grin. He strode into the room, loving the buzz of the ship’s engines under his boots. His mood lightened immediately as he walked towards his chair. He grinned at Sulu’s wave, at the ensign at the secondary science station, nodded at Spock and gave Nyota his customary leer, to which she responded with her customary eye roll and flip of her ponytail. Spock had been working as acting captain from his science station.
Jim sat down.
“Report.”
“All systems reporting as normal, Captain.”
“Awesome, Spock. Glad to see you didn’t break her while I was gone.” He tried to keep the fact that he was annoyed out of his voice, but Jim wasn’t sure his voice was as free from inflection as he had intended.
“Indeed not, Captain.”
Jim couldn’t help the smirk that he shot over his shoulder, but was surprised to see the answering eyebrow. Spock wasn’t smiling, but Jim had the feeling that he was amused.
He turned back at a beep on his PADD and the smile slid off his face when he saw that it was a message from Bones.
‘Don’t think for one damn minute that we’re done with our conversation. Untwist your panties and get your ass down here after your shift.’
Jim frowned down at the small device. Deciding that Bones would just hash his groove, he just closed out of the message without responding, instead opening up Spock’s latest shift report. Spock always tidied up the acting officer’s reports from Beta and Gamma, and Jim hadn’t had a chance to read it yet. The word ‘Klingon’ caught his eye,a transmission picked up on Gamma that looked to just be some kind of mining report. He sighed.
“Captain?” Incoming message from Starfleet.”
Fantastic.
“I’ll take it in my ready room. Spock, you’re with me. Sulu you have the con.”
“Aye Sir.” Sulu’s shoulders straightened.
“Yes, Captain.” Spock stood as the secondary science officer moved from their station to Spock’s.
Jim made himself not notice the amount of heat that Spock put out. Somehow, in all the times that they’d touched while working together, Jim had never really noticed just how very warm Spock was. He could feel Spock next to him, and it made him swallow uncomfortably. He cleared his throat and crossed to his desk, settling himself with Spock to his left so that he would not be visible to the viewscreen.
Jim entered his sequence and the subspace communication queued up with a small blip of sound.
“Admiral Komack.”
“Captain Kirk. You have new orders. Starfleet Intelligence-”
Jim absolutely did not make a rude sound in the back of his throat.
“-- has picked up rumors of Klingon aggression. From the reports, we believe that they are working to design a weapon. A powerful weapon, based on the amount of raw materials we suspect they have amassed. Two hours ago we received a distress call from the colonists on Praxis. You are ordered to investigate and extract the colonists.”
Komack paused in the way he did, raising his eyebrows in case Jim had any questions, without actually asking if he had any questions. It was a habit of his that usually drove Jim absolutely bugshit.
“None, sir.”
“Acknowledged. Komack out.”
Jim exhaled, leaning back in his chair and staring sightlessly up at the ceiling. “Captain Kirk to Ensign Chekov. Chekov, at maximum warp, how long will it take us to arrive to the Beta quadrant. Specifically, the moon, Praxis.”
There was a moment while Jim licked his lips, still staring up at the ceiling.
“About six hours at maximum warp, sir.”
“Plot a course and go, Ensign.”
“Yes sir.”
There was a moment of silence as Jim spun around in his chair, finally turning so that he could stare at somewhere over Spock’s left shoulder.
“There’s something... off about this, Spock.”
“Captain, the Admiral’s orders were quite specific.”
“Mmm. Yeah, I know.” Jim was silent again, his eyes unfocused as he thought. After weeks of nothing- not even a hint of movement well, okay not a hint of movement that Jim had heard,- and he kept his ear pretty fucking close to the ground out of necessity’s sake- after three days of flailing around with their collective thumbs jammed merrily up their asses while they tried to figure out which direction to go, now there were suddenly clear-cut orders? Orders implicating Klingon aggression even?
“Captain?”
“It’s just- I don’t trust this, Spock. You said that the minerals on Huxtor III were most likely to be used for communications. Now we’re being sent to a moon in the middle of fucking nowhere- a fucking nowhere that just happens to be barely in Federation space that’s used for mining?”
Jim noticed Spock go very still and watched as the realization caused his intelligent gaze to sharpen even more.
“You are proposing that this is a trap of some sort.”
“Spock, I don’t know. I just know that whatever the hell is happening on Praxis can’t possibly be good.”
NEXT
… and a bit of a cliffhanger. :D
TOS fans might recognize where I'm going here. Maybe. ;)
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Date: 2011-02-09 09:58 am (UTC)Excellent update :)