Jim's eyes threatened to flutter shut, his gaze drifting from the window to nothingness.

He had been staring out said window for the past hour, the sound of silence was comforting before he had to leave the house and go back to duty on the Enterprise.

Bones and Spock had gone down for shore leave with him at the beginning of the week, he was the last one up.

Secretly, he wished leave would last at least another day or so, he was still exhausted.

2100 hours, the PADD had told him, or alerted him three times. He was supposed to leave at 2030 hours.

Oh well.

He allowed himself one final glance out the window and into the night sky, before forcing his legs up to a standing position. He'd better leave before his crew started sending landing party's down to find him, no doubt they'd think he'd gotten himself into some unsolvable mess again.

Thee have little faith, he chuckled to himself.

Grabbing his suitcase which was definitely not containing any alcohol whatsoever, he dragged himself over to the door and glared at it expectingly, willing for it to open on its own. Seeing as it was an automatic sliding door; it did.

Darkness encompassed him as the door swooshed open, he didn't see the silhouette of a figure standing outside, subsequently walking into it with a quiet yelp.

"Jesus Christ!" he marvelled, stepping back suddenly, "It's the middle of the night, man! The hell'd you want?" he narrowed his eyebrows, trying to get a closer look at the intruder.

The figure moved closer into him, forcing Jim to begin stepping backwards, shuffling back the direction he came with each step, until finally the door recognised his presence and swooshed open again.

"Listen man, I'm just leaving, so if you're here to steal some shit, whatever, y'know?" Jim's heel collided with the concrete step behind him, causing him to move himself up onto the stairs and backing into the house.

It was fine, he was not come back for another year anyway. Plus, he could get the man arrested or something.

He threw the suitcase into the hallway and practically stumbled backwards into another room.

The silent figure moved closer, and Jim felt his fight or flight responses kick in.

Click!

Light burst out everywhere, throwing Jim's eyes into overload.

He drew in a sharp breath, grunting and raising an arm to his eyes, squinting carefully, his vision still blurry from readjusting.

As soon as he focused on the person before him, his eyes grew wide, and he held his hands out defensively.

Shit.

"I almost missed you again, didn't I? That's okay, you can stay now."

Now Jim understood why this man didn't speak beforehand. His voice would give him away, and Jim would have ran for it.

Frank.


Frank lay a steady hand on the door panel, his fingers discovering the correct button, that upon being pushed, set the door shut and locked it.

He turned his gaze to Jim and scoffed at the apprehension breaking through his confident mask.

"Pfft," he scoffed, taking a wide step towards Jim, causing the blonde to repeat the action backwards, "Didn't I teach you not to open doors to strangers?"

Jim visibly tugged his shirt down by habit, attempting to look smart somehow without a uniform on; just sporting a simple grey shirt.

"I was just leaving." Jim spat, his fingers running down the side of his trousers as if looking for something.

"You ain't leaving, Jimmy. I came all the way over here to find ya, and let me tell you, it ain't easy."

Kirk's hands stopped searching and fell to their sides, "I've gotta go, I have-" he tried to come up with the closest reasonable time, "-I have five minutes until I have to go."

Frank smiled. "Uh huh. Well, why don'tcha take a seat right here," he gestured to a sofa, the one Jim had just been laying on to watch the sky with.

Jim didn't want to be anywhere near Frank, let alone sit on a sofa with him. Ever since he was dragged back into the household from the ordeal with Tarsus, Frank, in his own words, 'Didn't know what he had been missing.'

Cautiously, Jim made his way to the grey rugged sofa, knowing it would not do to disobey anything that Frank asks. He scooted to the end of the cushions, dismayed when Frank followed suit and right next to him, despite all the space left.

"Listen, Frank, it's nice to see you and all," Jim lied nervously, "But if I don't show up to my duties soon then my crew are gonna start sending down landing parties to find me. And you don't want to be here for that."

Frank's face twisted into a deep frown before loosening into a smile again. "That's okay Jimmy, we still got a lotta time, you and me," he whispered harshly in his ear, a hand gripping tightly—too tightly, onto his shoulder.
Jim was now six minutes overdue for a beam-up. Any second now they'd try to comm him, and when the attempt would fail, they would come looking for him.

In the meantime, Jim forced himself to think about something else; the Enterprise. Perhaps he could sneak in a hamburger for dinner and not get dietary threats from his CMO.

Maybe an away mission gone right for once- a new astonishing planet for his tired crewmembers to gape over, that would agree to join the Federation. No quarrels, no debates, just pure and simple-

"Why don'tcha lie down, Jimmy?" Frank's voice dragged Jim back to his current nightmare.

"Not enough room," he muttered, unable to stop himself from fidgeting with his shirt collar.

"Sure there is, here let me scoot back here-oh, are you getting hot?"

Don't you fucking dare.

"So am I. I'd take my shirt off but, haha," Frank laughed at himself, gesturing to his own figure, "Not exactly the shape. You, however..."

Ah, crap.

"Here, let me help you, Jimmy," rough hands invaded Jim's personal space, pulling and tugging at his shirt, "Been a while since I've seen that nice...physique of yours."

Jim's heart thudded in his chest, his hands sweating but cold,
"I need to go, Frank." he tried helplessly, shuffling away from the man while somewhat managing to keep his shirt on.

"No," Frank licked his lips, sounding like a parent telling their child the difference between good from bad, "You're staying here now. I'm gonna live here with you, you get that Jimmy? We can be a family again," Frank snarled.

Living with Frank would be like reliving his abusive childhood.
In a fit of rage, Jim slapped the man's hand away from him, kicking violently, "I don't even want to breathe the same air you, you son of a bitch!"

Frank whacked a fist at him across the stomach, instantly bringing Jim's hand to his belly in pain, "Who the fuck do you think you are?" the older man spat, grabbing his shoulder and attempting to turn him over.

Jim recognised this move instantly, and like hell was he going to allow it to happen again; he was ten times the strength he had as a child.

"Fuck off me you sick bastard!"

"Not when I've got you right where I want you, you little brat," Frank slammed a heavy knee onto Jim's side, eliciting a silent gasp in pain from him, mouth agape, before manoeuvring him onto his stomach.

"Don't you dare move a muscle, not 'til I'm done."

Jim squeezed his eyes shut and blew out a heavy breath, trying to keep himself calm.

If someone could come find me any minute now, that'd be great.

"You wanna know what I have here, Jimmy?" Frank boasted, accompanied by some clicking noises.

Not particularly.

"I got myself my very own hypospray. I mean, it's yours really,"

Jim silently exhaled a sigh of relief. For a moment he was beginning to think Frank had something much worse in store for him.

"Talk to me then! Aren't you excited? I spent a lot of money on this you know!" Frank roared, digging an elbow in deeper to Jim's back.

Money hardly existed in this century, if at all. Frank got ripped off unless it was something absolutely amazing.

"What you smirking at, huh?" Frank urged, not noticing Jim's hand was sliding down his trousers, trying to find a pocket.

Jim tried to wipe the smile off his face, but it just grew bigger. He recognised the shape of the communicator, rectangular and small.

"I'll show you, you little-" the end of the sentence was missing, for something was jammed so hard into his spine, that his hearing was overtaken with the sensation of searing white hot pain. As another jab landed in the middle of two vertebrae, Jim opened his mouth and shrieked his lungs dry, willing himself to pass out.

Where were his crew?

"Yeah, keep screaming, Jimmy," a hand roughly grabbed at the hair on Jim's head, yanking his head down into the pillow of the sofa, slowly suffocating him. Ten seconds passed before the fingers wrenched Jim's head back to sharply inhale some oxygen before slamming it back onto the surface again.

Two ruthless hands latched onto his trousers, fingers attempting to yank them back before being loosened again by the wrathing Captain.

Jim desperately patted around his pockets for the communicator, trying to take it out and call for help, but struggled to even draw in breaths.

After six rising and slamming of Jim's head, a now lethargic blonde was hauled onto his back, now finally facing Frank, his face looming over him, a sadistic smile covering his expression.

With ease, the older man tugged the rest of the shirt off over Jim's head, scowling when the Captain coughed weakly from oxygen starvation, his mouth slightly hanging agape, a dazed look on his face.

"See, I told you we could stay together," Frank dug his knee into Jim's thigh, pressing a hand to his neck, "And now I'm gonna make it just that little bit easier," Frank retorted, holding up another hypo-looking device.

"A nice hefty dose of this every few hours should eventually change your brain chemistry," Frank explained proudly, "Oh, don't look so afraid, Jimmy! It's for the greater good. Now you see I got this friend who's into the drug business, and..." Jim became detached from Frank's blabbering about where he acquired the hypo and focused more on the fact it was hovering directly over his gut. He couldn't gather the strength needed to string a single sentence in reply, let alone a snarky one.

"...You'll lose your sense of self, your security, and that's left wide open for me to reshape, to protect you, Jimmy,"

Jim tuned back into the speech, but not before managing to fumble the communicator into his hands. "It'll be like having you as a kid again, Jimmy. You won't wanna leave, you'll want to live here with me. I'm so lonely, you know?"

With practiced muscle-memory, he imagined where the alert button would be and pressed the first button along, his fingers delicately glazing over the buttons.

Suddenly a fist collided with his face, leaving a burning red mark on his face, "Are you even listening, you little brat?"

Jim wanted to make a sound of acknowledgement but it came out more like a groan.

"Repeat back to me everything that's going to happen to you, otherwise..." Frank cranked his fists tightly over the hypo and held his arm back, ready to stab it into Jim's gut with force.

He swallowed hard and stuttered, "U-uh..."

Frank used his other hand to grab Jim's face, squeezing his skin between his fingers, hissing viciously into Jim's ear "You weren't listening, were you?"

WHAM!

The hypo was rammed into his stomach, and Jim lurched forward, screaming, but no sound came out. The pain was so severe, it was if someone had ripped his stomach out. His vision faded white, and he swore he could hear Frank shouting, no doubt lecturing him about not listening. His entire spine made him want to stab himself; a constant burning pinpointed in the middle of his spine.

His fingers curled up into fists, he could practically feel the sweat trickling from his forehead down the side of his eyes. At the back of his mind, Jim could feel furious fingers shoving his trousers down and finally over his hips. Frank had won. But somehow the pain was blissfully distracting.

In fact the movement seemed to have stopped.

Upon opening his eyes, he thought the drug was working already and his mind were playing tricks on him. The ceiling above him was no longer scratchy and grey, but smooth and prestige white, there were loud noises penetrating his ears but couldn't figure out what they are.

At this point, he tried to distract himself from his sobbing by cataloguing what else was hurting. His body was so damn tense that it was shaking, vibrating against the floor- and if he would relax, the pain would be ten times worse.

"Captain?" he heard a distant voice mutter, as if it came from the other side of the Sahara desert.

Frank had never called him by his new rank before; he internally berated himself for getting his hopes up.

"Captain?" the voice repeated, this time sounding a little closer. He was very aware of the cold metallic ground up against his semi-naked body, the hairs on his skin standing on end as a shiver wracked his spine; he let out a quiet groan from the movement.

The fuzzy white ceiling was replaced with a fuzzy blue blur, a face appearing above him and obscuring his vision. He focused intensely on it, trying to figure out who it was. Suddenly this figure was rolling him onto his side, attempting to pull at the trousers that were left around his ankles.

Frank was still here.

Immedietly, Kirk started kicking, attempting to push past the fuzzy numbness he was feeling from the drugs, desperate to get away from Frank. A hand practically shoved Jim into such a confined position on his side that he couldn't move, his arms pinned to the ground. While doing so, the trousers were pulled back up to his waist again. He couldn't even remember Frank successfully getting them past his waist.

"Did that mean...?"

He let out a mighty kick.

"Get Doctor McCoy."

The second those horrific three words left that guy's mouth, Jim shot upright and almost screeched with the agony in the centre of his spine.

His vision focused, and he could see he was exactly where he was begging the world to be.

Back on the Enterprise. He was in the transporter room.

"Don't get McCoy," Jim spoke, his voice hoarse and sore from screaming only minutes before.

Looking up, he saw Spock standing right next to him, rigid but his face accidentally leaking concern.
He was definetly back on the ship, he managed to tell himself. Now to seem in control and hide that anything was wrong.

Jim, with huge effort, stumbled onto his feet, hiding the slight swaying he couldn't control.

"Captain, if you don't mind my saying, you do not look healthy at all," the Vulcan spoke quietly, strangely aware of Jim's predicament.

"I'm alright Spock, just had one too many drinks, y'know?" he forced a smile and patted his shoulder, making his way to the door to avoid anything further questioning of his arrival.

Of course, Spock followed right behind.


"Captain, where are you going?" Spock pushed him, as both men clamoured into the turbolift.

"Bridge." Jim ordered the turbolift, catching Spock raising his eyebrow at the corner of his eye.

"Captain-"

"I'm fine, Spock," Jim interrupted, holding onto the lift rails with a grip firmer than was normal for him.

"Captain, I must warn you that—"

"Just… shut up, Spock, that's an order."

Spock looked at him in disbelief before bowing his head in acknowledgement, "Very well, Captain."

Jim sighed and slumped his head over to face the floor, shutting his eyes momentarily. He was required to attend a physical after every shore leave—every crew member was. How the hell was he going to explain that Frank had tried to assault him?
Who was Frank involved with that gave him access to all these drugs? He had tuned out from his speech earlier from the pain.

Pain that had magically disappeared since arriving in the transporter room.
He looked up slowly, very, very slowly.

"Spock," he began carefully, facing the stoic Vulcan, who was already looking at him, "Did you mind-meld with me?"

The expression on Spock's face was one to behold. His eyes grew wide for a split second and his grip on the rails visually grew tenser, "Affirmative. You were screaming, Captain, I attempted to alleviate some of that pain, hence why I suggest that you visit Doctor Mc—"

"Thanks Spock," Jim interrupted again, "But I'm good. Just don't tell anyone about this or what you saw. Please. Not even Bones." He watched Spock for a few more seconds, waiting for any give away in his expression to say he was not going to stay quiet about this.

"I will not disclose this information if you order it, Captain." Kirk sighed at Spock's request. And it was obviously a request. He wanted to tell someone, probably Bones, and needed an order to stop himself.

"Alright Spock," he breathed, "Make that an order." If Bones found out, no doubt he would be hauled into sickbay and be subject to a million unnecessary exams. Exams that he had never had to undergo before.

Because of Frank.

The turbolift doors finally opened after what felt like hours, unleashing the Captain and his first officer to the bridge. Only seconds after he stepped out did everyone within visual range turn around in their chairs and stare at Kirk. Not at Spock, but Kirk.

"Yeah, I'm on the bridge," he mumbled, striding towards his chair, "Return to your stations."

No-one except for an ensign turned back around, Jim scowled, "What's so interesting? Haven't you all seen me before?"

A hand on his shoulder almost made him jump, and would have done if Jim hadn't realised it belonged to Spock. The hand felt pretty cold for some reason.

"Captain," Spock muttered under his breath, "You may not be aware that you are not wearing a shirt."

What?

Jim threw himself away from Spock and stared down at himself.
It was true.
He was not wearing a shirt.
He'd walked onto the bridge, on duty, wearing nothing but trousers.

"S-Shit, Spock you take the bridge," he stammered, scrambling to get on top of all the platforms again. Everyone was going to be suspicious now; they're all going to be asking each other why the Captain of the Enterprise walked onto the bridge shirtless. It'll form into gossip, everyone on the ship will be talking about it. Then the friends of gossipers off-ship will learn about it, it would be a running joke, the admirals would laugh while decommissioning—

"Captain," this time Spock startled Jim out of his thoughts, "I must talk with you alone."
Shit, here it comes.

"Sure Spock," Kirk announced confidently, "Just let me uh… get a shirt on," Spock followed him back into the turbolift, no doubt making for yet another awkward conversation.


Inside Kirk's quarters, Jim made a mad dash for the yellow command shirt, completely ignoring Spock, having managed to successfully not speak a word in the turbolift.

He seized at the material with shaky fingers, hoping the cloth would hide his obvious trembling, and tugged the shirt on over himself as fast as he could, resisting the urge to practically hug himself for needed comfort.

"Captain, I will have this conversation with you now."
Shit.
"When I performed the mind-meld approximately an hour ago, when you had just arrived from emergency transportation, I saw various images in the meld, all filled with strong emotion. I must question if—"

"He didn't, okay?!" Jim blurt out, not wanting to talk about it, "I don't want to talk about what happened, and don't you dare mention it to anyone else." Bones must not find out. Bones must not find out.
He made his way to the door again, deciding to continue giving Spock the cold shoulder considering how tired he was getting from the whole ordeal. He'd forget about it soon enough, and he'd never beam down to that house again. He'd get a new house where Frank wouldn't find him.

"On arrival, your trousers were down to your ankles and your shirt was removed." Spock tried. Jim ignored.

"Was he successful in disrobing you completely?"

"SPOCK!" Jim bellowed in pent up anger, "One more sound about this from you and I'll confine you to quarters!"

Spock gave him the there is definitely no regulation for that look, offering a slight upturn of a lip corner, a lie to comfort Jim with the fact this would be ignored, before taking the lead out of the room back to the turbolift, and for the first time in the Vulcan's life, he was not eager to return to the bridge.


"Our next mission is to survey the planet Jevuka II," Jim sat in his beloved Captain's chair, having now returned to the bridge and everything returning to normal, "Starfleet believes the planet could be ready for first contact, uh… they developed something similar to warp speed, apparently."

Jim closed his eyes momentarily, feeling a dull aching forming in his lower back and abdomen. He made a mental note to run in and out of sickbay for painkillers while Bones was off duty.

Come to think of it, Bones was a required landing party asset to find out about the species residing the planet. Crap. Spock better keep his mouth shut.

"We'll arrive in uh… when will we arrive Mr Sulu?" he let his head fall back into the chair, noticing how difficult it was beginning to get to breathe. It was like inhaling water.

"ETA thirty-six minutes, sir," the helmsmen replied, not taking his eyes off the station.
Jim let out a grunt in reply, internally kicking himself for how weak he was sounding. People were bound to start turning around and looking if he didn't up his game.

"Okay, so how was everyone's shore leave?" he asked, forcefully breathing in, and out, taking note of every inhale and exhale. A distraction would be great for him and every nosy person in the room.

"Scotty didn't even leave his station," an ensign laughed, Jim couldn't bring himself to open his eyes and see who it was.

"I surveyed a bunch of new plants, found a dozen new species, even collected some," Sulu boasted.
Jim exhaled through his nose, furrowing his eyebrows at the buzzing noise the world was making.

"I bet Spock didn't leave either," someone else had said.

"I didn't have time to do anything else but drink whiskey."

"Didn't have time! You had a week!"

Jim smiled at the officers enjoying themselves, before letting his expression fall flat. The world seemed to be fading away.

"Bet….. be proud….."

"Hell…. Next…. Leave…."

"What….do…."

"I….you….shop…..leave…."

"Is….alright…."

"Cap…?..."

"Captain?"


Spock turned from his station to face Kirk after the two officers had called the Captain's rank twice with no reply. Kirk was always replied on time when his attention was needed.

Upon turning to face Kirk, there was a split second between digesting the Captain's current condition, which was sliding down the chair, and figuring out what to do.

In a hurry, he leapt up from his own chair with haste the other officers hadn't yet seen of him, and ran to the Captain's side, who was sliding down the chair in a slouched form, unconscious.
Seconds later, he hit the panel and called for sickbay,

"Bridge to sickbay, urgent assistance is required regarding the Captain," he began, looking down at Jim, who seemed to be struggling with each inhale and favouring his abdomen in his sleep,
"He has fallen unconscious."