(A/N: I think I just committed some kind of sacrilege by writing this thing. For one, I've only watched the first two reboot movies and only read fanfics. I was never a fan of Star Trek and only just began respecting the ingenuity of the series and because I didn't like SciFi I've completely deprived myself of this wonderful canon. For two, I've done no official research and my knowledge is strictly from the fics I've read. So I hope it's at least a little accurate and entertaining. Also, I have a bad habit of naming my fics after songs. Anyway, mushy, angsty goodness ahead. Enjoy.)
Between the Raindrops
He was well adapted to the emotional turmoil that swept through his body during that time between nightmare and hazy awareness – nightmares that had picked up in frequency since being brought back from death.
So it was only natural that he had perfected hiding that darkness, snuffing it out and wrapping his body in the jubilant smiles and laughs his crew had come to know as fact. Jim Kirk was a dynamic human. The facets of his intellect and startlingly sharp wit kept his crew alight and when their Captain's mood took a nose dive, it was like the sun had suddenly stopped shining and imploded like those 21st century scientist had so wrongly predicted.
It was an imperceptible change.
So infinitesimal that they hadn't noticed the tense air settling down around them until it was a common place thing and somehow had been weaned off the bright smiles and bubbling laughter. The air in the bridge was thick and stifling, unnaturally quiet now.
The little jokes, both flirtatious and snarky, had ceased.
The Captain's eyes, once the most expressive thing on him, were dull and glassy. No longer bright and sparkling as they stared unseeingly into the vast darkness of space, his body tight and controlled in his chair.
The quiet was beginning to become oppressive and it was heartbreaking for many of the crew to come to the realization that their Captain was what was causing it and guilty that they wished he would relieve himself of their presence.
Jim shifted through his thoughts steadily, trying to come to a conclusion but none came. He'd been thinking and meditating, not that he'd ever confess to the latter, in order to contain and remove these foreign and unwanted feelings and thoughts.
His whole world had ground to halt when he died behind that thick containment glass, watching as Spock, of all people wept at his loss. His heart twisted viciously in his chest, settling heavily and painfully.
James Kirk was not worth the emotional compromise he had caused his First and it left a sour taste in the back of his throat.
He loved his crew fiercely and he had yet to wrap his head around the concept that maybe they could love him back just as much, if not more.
He blinked back at the dryness settling over his eyes.
No, his deep seated self-depreciation kept him from believing that. He was not capable of being loved. A shaky smile worked at his lips as he spouted something vaguely light-hearted, not noticing how flat it fell, before giving Spock the conn.
He missed the frowns and worried eyes falling at his back as he stood and walked out of the bridge.
The feelings he was experiencing were scary and foreign, because Jim did not love anyone romantically. It was impossible. He didn't let himself become tangled in messy relationships. It just wasn't done. Not after the loss and lack of them growing up.
His feet had taken the long way to the gym and he stood just on the inside of the room, letting the door swish close behind him.
He needed to get his shit together before he was reported to the Admiralty for being unstable. He watched as he wrapped his knuckles, mesmerized that he hadn't even realized he was doing so.
Ten minutes later, the full length of his arms, tendons, muscles and joints were rattled and ached so deeply in ways he'd never felt before. He stood numbly before the punching bag he'd just destroyed, the sand spilling from the torn hole where his fists had mercilessly pummeled it.
He brought his hands up and watched in dumb fascination as they quaked before him. They were sore, gruesomely bruised and possibly broken.
It was a great distraction for the time being.
He didn't want to think of the tumultuous ideas and feelings racing about in his head. He was tired of chasing his tail, tired of coming up short on a solution to his problem.
He was tired of trying to deny his feelings, tired of feeling like his whole world depended on one person.
He was – just tired.
/
He ran his newly healed hands over his face, exhaustion was beyond him and he was in that next step of emotional and physical collapse.
Jim couldn't see straight, couldn't eat and most definitely couldn't do what his body and mind so desperately needed; Sleep.
He stared blankly at the PADD in front of him, not noticing the tremor that ran up his arms that made the words all the more unreadable than they already were.
He was hiding away in his office, keypad recoded to keep everyone out, especially that hypo-spray welding maniac. Bone's had nearly gotten him when he went to get his hands healed. Distracted by his bitching, angered that his friend was so callous with his health, Jim had made a run for it and had he been any slower he'd been knocked out for an indefinite amount of time.
Jim scowled at the PADD and tossed it to the side of his desk.
Had he been more aware of his surroundings, he might have heard the door to his office swish open, the code to the room being overrode by the very person he was trying so desperately to compartmentalize and file away into something far less frightening for him.
Had he been more aware, he'd have had a witty comeback to the, "Intervention, sir," that had come in answer to his disbelieving and slightly angered, "What is this?", before the hypo depressed into his neck.
He was suddenly very aware of falling forward as his body went slack and then all the hands on him. They had the control, keeping his head from smacking the shiny desk of his office and keeping his body from tumbling out of his chair as his neural system disconnected from his brain. When had Bone's gotten so bloody fast?
He thinks a slurred and clumsy hiss of, "Mutiny," came from him but he was too busy fighting the darkness from claiming him to really put much more effort into thoughts of betrayal at the hands of his crew.
In the end it was futile.
In the end it was once again Spock's dark and piercing eyes that he saw as he succumbed to the darkness.
/
It felt like his brain was swimming – bobbing and twisting in the storm of sedatives and nightmares.
He wanted out but he couldn't escape the cold grasp of his past. How everything in his entire being was revolting against the last snapshot he had saw before he went under. Reminding him exactly why he was nothing but the universes toy to shit on. A toy beaten, tugged and torn apart countless times, only to be re-stitched together to have it done all over again.
He wasn't allowed to have these feelings! Everything that he kept closer than arm's length was destroyed. His mere presence on Tarsus IV, his childhood, even his birth had proven that. Hell he almost cost the crew their lives countless times because he had invested too much of himself into the Enterprise and its crew.
He was an excellent Captain. That was, when he wasn't neck deep in his turbulent emotions.
Maybe it was time for him to be reassigned.
He clawed at the darkness defiantly. A resounding gravelly, 'No!', echoed through the pitch black. The Enterprise and its crew were his! His responsibility, his atonement and his reason for being – he needed them.
More than they needed him.
The righteous anger he felt previously left him like a breath that had been punched from his gut.
A calm washed over him so suddenly he knew it wasn't his own and he had to fight yet again on the brink of awareness and blackness as the intruding wave of lethargy pushed him back under.
/
Jim woke to someone carding their fingers through his hair and he moved his neck stiffly toward them.
"Uhura," he greeted, voice hoarse and cracking mid second syllable.
Her smile was warm and worried, "Captain."
He cleared his throat and moved to sit up, "Mind explaining why my crew decided to mutiny on me?"
As precise and logical as the damned Vulcan she had dated, she coolly replied, "Because you were killing yourself."
He quirked a brow, perturbed that he hadn't been hiding as well as he hoped he had been, or maybe he had hid too well, "Explain."
The glare Uhura leveled on him could have chilled even Khan's blood, "Sir, you weren't eating or sleeping. Care to explain?" She redirected.
Jim did not fidget. Jim did not chew on the inside of cheek, nor lip. Jim did not evade eye contact, but at this moment, Jim Kirk didn't feel like himself.
He sighed and did everything the rulebook of Jim said not to do as he ducked his eyes from Nyota's and bit down on his chapped lips, fingers running across the stitch of his blanket, "Just readjusting."
He didn't see her narrow her eyes or purse her lips. She folded her hands in her lap in order to keep from strangling her superior, "Care to try that again, without lying this time?"
His startling vivid blue eyes snapped back to his Lieutenant, "Excuse me?"
"Stop lying to me Jim," she expounded through tense lips and then he watched her soften, the only indication was the straight line of her shoulder slumping slightly, "What is going on?"
He snorted in a self-depreciative sort of way that had his communications officer's eyes widening, "How can anyone begin to explain the feeling of dying, the emotions that it stripped raw and then being brought back to deal with everything that was left in its wake? How could anyone be prepared for the onslaught of just how flayed open their soul is when they reawaken, picking up right where it ended with their last thoughts filled with doubts and regrets." He looked at her hard, "Tell me how, Nyota."
His Lieutenant looked stunned, her dark eyes glassy and mouth slightly parted. She reached for his arm and he couldn't help but think how cold she felt. He always felt like he was burning now, the new blood in his system keeping his heart and organs working exponentially hard.
"What regrets and doubts, Jim?" She asked softly as she squeezed his arm.
He shook his head and smiled at her ruefully, "Even I'm not ready to admit it to myself yet."
/
The Captain was almost back to his normal self, albeit more subdued, much to his crew's delight. It had taken a couple weeks after their 'intervention', but he seemed to be on the mend.
His chess games with his First, his witty and teasing banter as he avoided hypo's from Bone's, his fencing lessons with Sulu and his drink his Scottish engineer under the table parties had recommenced.
But something dark and haunting crept in the back of his blue eyes and as illogical as the thought of emotions playing out in ones iris was, Spock couldn't keep himself from seeing it. Just like the way his Captain sometimes watched him with a frown tugging at his lips.
He wanted to know what his person had done to cause such a reaction. His Captain had never looked at him like that, not even when he was being dressed down after the Kobayashi Maru debacle. No, that had been stiff backed, angry and desperate need for understanding from Spock.
No win situations. That is what the Captain seemed to see when he looked at him now.
He had never known Jim to back down on anything, even his own death. Though he had accepted it, he had fought against it. Spock had known that when Khan's blood had been transfused into his burnt veins, known it the second the startled jump of Jim's chest happened when he's body began to heal.
It still brought back – not unwanted, but feelings he did not know how to act on.
They were half-way through their weekly chess game while he was contemplating these issues. Multitasking so many things – thoughts at once was easy and logical, "Your imminent loss will be in three moves, Sir."
He watched as his Captain shook his head and sat back in his chair, a defeated air hanging around him.
Spock's high-arched brows quirked subtly at this, "Captain, what is troubling you?"
Jim merely watched him, his blue eyes distant as he dismissed Spock's concern with a wave of his hand, "One more."
Spock nodded minutely and reset the board. He carefully studied his Captain, noticing the slight thinning of his cheeks, the dark hollows under his eyes and the sallowness of his skin.
His Captain was not well.
Jim seemed like he was in a trance as he reached out across the board, hand hovering uncertainly over a chess piece.
Jim was never uncertain.
Spock's mouth thinned in reaction to his thought and he had to fight the urge to grab his Captain's wavering appendage to comfort him. He was quiet surprised when his arm had moved on its own volition, graceful hand splayed a mere nine inches from Jim's.
"Spock?"
His dark eyes swept up to meet his Captain's blue, "Yes, Sir?"
Jim was watching him with a stunned expression, full lips parted and eyes wide as he watched the Vulcan's hand spasm close as he extracted his arm back to his side, "You ok?"
Spock inclined his head, "Of course."
His Captain seemed hesitant to let it drop. He finally snapped his mouth shut and nodded his head before returning his attention to the chess board.
"I am worried about you, Jim."
The Captain's head snapped up so quickly Spock feared he may injure himself, "What?"
Spock inclined his head ever so slightly, eyes flickering over the chess board and back to Jim's face, "You are not yourself."
His Captain withdrew from the board and from Spock, his walls slammed tight together and tall to keep prying, intelligent and logical Vulcan's out, "Have you not talked to Uhura?"
"I do not see how that is pertinent to this discussion."
"Oh it is," Jim retorted, crossing his arms across his chest as he leaned back in his chair, "Talk to her, she'll explain."
"Why can you not tell me, Captain?" Spock was trying to find the logic in having to run after Nyota for information on Jim when Jim himself could tell him right now.
His Captain seemed to be contemplating something, "Here, I'll show you." And with that, Jim stood quickly and grabbed Spock's hand and the Vulcan had to fight against the recoil of such an action. He had wanted answers and Jim was giving them.
And he was almost lost to his Captain's violent typhoon of emotions.
There was so much there. So much to sift through and try to comprehend, but he got just the most superficial meaning of the emotions passing under Jim's pale skin. To understand them truly would require a meld.
He did not understand the pain, the confusion, self-doubt and hazy affection that the Captain seemed to be most displeased with.
"I do not understand," he iterated from his thoughts, "Why should you feel such negative emotions, Captain?"
Jim sank to his knees in front of his First and brought Spock's hand to his face, "I give you permission," he whispered, eyes wide and begging, "I can't do this anymore."
"Jim," Spock breathed, his elegant fingers moving to position on his psi-points, hesitating just short of actual contact, "Are you sure?"
Jim's eyes closed and he nodded slowly, "I'm so tired of trying to hold everything together." He swallowed hard and moved his face closer to Spock's hand. He felt the tips of the Vulcan's fingers brush his face and he opened his eyes to stare into Spock's piercing gaze.
The Vulcan inclined his head and pressed his hand to his Captain's face and was immediately assaulted with memories.
His own face was predominant in them. Then it was a spiral downwards. The loneliness that had rooted so deep in his Captain's heart made his own ache. Tarsus, his childhood, his fears and the way he kept himself away from the crew, how he distanced himself to keep from hurting others, himself.
Spock could not understand why this man, his fearless and compassionate Captain, felt this way about himself. Felt that he deserved to be alone, to be left. Felt that he was not worthy of affection.
Spock locked his eyes with his Captain's, with Jim's, and reversed the flow of emotional transference, giving him what he believed the Captain needed.
Respect and loyalty so fierce it made those blue eyes widen and that perfect mouth part in a gasp. Then he pushed the most visceral and illogical feelings and thoughts toward the man, the mixture of pure anguish and fear of losing him.
The very human feeling of grief, the hot tears that leaked from his ducts as all hopes of telling him the things he'd wanted to tell him was ripped from his hands. Then the all-encompassing rage he felt for Khan when Jim's life passed before his eyes. The vengeance and hate he felt when he pummeled Khan to a bloody pulp.
Then the surge of hope at Nyota's statement, that Khan could be used to revive the Captain. Then the relief and affection when Jim's painfully still chest heaved in a gasp, unconscious but alive. Spock nearly jumped when the Captain's own feelings, suppressed as they were, surged forward at the last thought he had shared.
That's when Spock felt it, saw it, the beautiful torment that his Captain was hiding from himself and everyone else. He searched those blue eyes, vulnerable and scared, "You love me."
His Captain's eyes squeezed shut and his face turned away from the Vulcan's hand, taking a shuddering breath he exhaled sharply, "Now you know."
Jim sat on his aching knees, his insides in tatters and mind ragged. He, in a way, had been washed clean by letting the Vulcan before him know his most painful secret without having said the words.
Maybe now he could begin to piece himself together.
"Why did you no tell me?"
Jim looked up at Spock, settling down on his legs, knees popping painfully, "I – ," he hesitated and swallowed hard, "It wasn't right."
Spock looked as confused as a Vulcan could, "I do not understand."
The Captain rubbed his hands over his face and head, mussing his thick blond hair, "It wasn't right for me to foist my feelings on you let alone acknowledge it."
"Jim, you have suffered a great deal because of this," the Vulcan began, leaning forward, "Why did you feel like you could not come to me?"
Was the hobgoblin trying to make him say those damned words? He sighed in frustration, "You know why, Spock. It was awkward enough being around you. I couldn't very well began spieling my feelings to the person I had them about."
Spock sat back and looked as calm and cool as ever, "I do not know why, Captain. Explain, please."
Jim narrowed his eyes, "I can't say it."
"And why is that?" He prodded, long sinewy arms crossing his chest.
"I can't say it because that will make it real!" Jim exploded, heaving himself off the floor and hiding the fact that his legs had very much fallen asleep as he paced around the room.
"I was in your mind, Jim and not saying it makes it no less real."
Logic made sense, but saying it meant that it existed and Jim hadn't even admitted it to himself yet, he couldn't let himself be that vulnerable, couldn't bear to be rejected, "Why does it matter?"
The Vulcan stood, hands clasped behind his back, "It matters a great deal, Jim."
The Captain sighed and dropped to his chair, causing it to scoot across the glossy floors with a squeak, "To who?"
Spock was now in front of Jim, his legs standing between the Captains knees, "To me."
Jim whipped his head up towards his First and gaped at him, "What?"
The Vulcan dropped to a squat and tilted his head up to meet the Captain's astonished face and reiterated, "It matters to me."
Jim leaned forward, his face dangerously close to Spock's, "Why does it matter to you?"
The Vulcan's lips quirked ever so slightly, "Why do you believe it matters to me, Jim?"
And now they were just going around in circles because Jim was not going to say those words only to have them thrown back in face, "I don't know, Spock. It could range anywhere from making sure I'm emotionally stable to wanting to report me to admiralty for having unseemly feelings towards a subordinate."
Spock looked a little taken aback and angry, "You think me so disloyal I would report you for something you have no control over?"
Jim started to apologize but Spock held his hand up, "You are correct, I want you to be emotionally healthy and keeping your crisis to yourself has caused you great harm. You have not slept nor ate well since coming back onto the Enterprise."
Jim sank back down into his chair, "However," Spock continued, "Since you are stubborn and unlikely to admit to yourself what I myself already know to be true, it is only logical to end this circular discussion, as it is getting us nowhere."
Jim nodded numbly and Spock laid his long fingered hand on his knee, gripping it lightly to bring his attention back to the Vulcan, "Jim, I have never shown emotion as I have around and because of you. You have continually led me to emotion compromise and it took me months of meditation to even begin to fathom why someone so infuriatingly brash and illogical could do that to me."
Spock shifted closer and Jim was suddenly aware of the heat that the Vulcan side of him radiated between his legs. He swallowed and wondered vaguely who this was and what they did with his First.
"Do you wonder, Jim?" Spock asked, leaning ever farther toward him. His hands were on his thighs now and chest brushing the apex of them. Jim swallowed hard again and blinked, this wasn't happening, this was some sick twisted dream his depraved mind had made up, it had to be. "You have to be curious."
And fuck him if Spock didn't sound like he was teasing him. "Can you give me a hypothesis, Jim?"
The Captain chuckled breathlessly, "Well," he smiled shakily, "if you being halfway in my lap and completely out of character is any indication, I would have to say you're harboring some pretty intense feelings for me."
The micro-smile that flashed across his First's lips gave away his serious posturing, "You are correct, Captain."
"Care to elaborate?"
"Certainly," he replied without a beat. His hand came up to Jim's neck and tugged him down toward his face, "Jim, I realized, too late, when you were dying before my eyes that everything I had been feeling previously had – clicked," he said, pausing as he tried to find the right word to describe his thought.
Jim nodded and the Vulcan continued bringing his face closer to him until he was a breath away from his First's lips, "I realized too late that I loved you."
Jim took a shuddering breath leaning the rest of the way in to rest their foreheads together, "Your mind is a magnificent thing to feel, Jim." The Vulcan's voice sounded awfully husky and he belatedly remembered that Spock's hand was touching his skin.
"You love me," Jim repeated, trying to make it sink in by using his voice. He flickered his eyes up to Spock's fathomless ones and took a breath, steeling himself as if he were facing a firing squad, "I love you too," he whispered.
Spock closed the distance and their lips met, validating everything they had admitted. It was tender and Jim felt the sting of tears behind his eyes and Spock's hands moved to and pressed closer to the sides of his face, breaking away from his Captain, "I have wished to that for more months than I care to admit."
His lips descended upon Jim's once more, "I will never leave you," he murmured against his Captain's full, pink lips.
The surge in emotional transference from Spock's side sealed the promise and Jim fell into his Vulcan's arms and let himself open up to this feeling he had been denying himself for so long.
He was in love.