Disclaimer: Don't own rights, entertainment purposes only, etc.

A/n: We did another one-shot challenge over at The Beta Branch, and I was able to exorcise some of my Kirk and McCoy bromance/Into Darkness feels. :D Thanks for reading, feedback is love! (And bonus points if you know where I got the title.)

Prompt: "While in Klingon territory, Kirk was kicked, headbutted, slammed against the ground, tackled, strangled and got some serious beat downs. Gimme a short conversation between Jim and Bones, where Jim explains why he doesn't have the time for an examination. It doesn't even have to be connected to this scene." + an idea I already previously have had bouncing around my skull, about Jim being "fine" (as in the farthest thing from).

At first, McCoy waited, thinking his friend was simply running late. There was the aftermath of the attack on London and the attack on the Council to deal with, after all. Not to mention the new mission, according to the briefing that Spock had gone over with the doctor earlier.

Then, however, he started to think that Jim was being deliberately late on purpose. It wouldn't be the first time he'd done that, either. Kirk seemed to take particular delight in trying to find new ways to irritate McCoy for his own amusement, though the doctor was comforted in the knowledge that Kirk also enjoyed driving Spock crazy too, and that was something he and Jim both found amusing.

After an hour of waiting and attempting to contact Kirk without success, McCoy gave up with an agitated wave of his hand. By that point, he felt certain that Kirk's absence was directly related to Pike's death and the chaos surrounding it. McCoy had only briefly seen his friend in the immediate aftermath when the doctor had been called in to lend a hand with the wounded, and Kirk, not seriously injured, had been led away swiftly to give a report on what had happened. McCoy had caught a glimpse of the numb look on Jim's face and the stiff way he walked before he'd disappeared around the corner.

McCoy had booked Kirk for a medical exam as soon as he'd gone back to the apartment he was staying in while planet-side, and had tried not to worry too much about how his friend was handling Pike's death. He planned to speak to the captain about it when he showed up for his exam, which was probably exactly why Kirk was avoiding him.

McCoy was a busy man however, and he couldn't wait any longer. He frowned with concern and hastened to get on with his day. He was shipping out for the Enterprise in under nine hours, and hopefully he would be able to corner Jim then.

McCoy was on his way to the shuttle he was taking back to the Enterprise when he caught sight of Kirk, striding purposefully towards the same shuttle.

"Jim!" McCoy called and hurried to catch up with his friend. "Where were you?"

"For what?" asked Kirk, barely glancing at the doctor. He was tense and taut, the line of his shoulders uncharacteristically tight, like a compacted coiled spring ready to violently unravel at any moment.

"Your medical exam!" said McCoy with exasperation. He forgot about it, and he's avoiding. No surprise there, he thought grimly. Aloud, he continued, "Ten hours ago, you were in a damn firefight, and it's my duty as the ship's doctor – "

"I'm fine, Bones." Kirk tried to brush him off, but McCoy knew his friend too well. He didn't miss the way Kirk's features darkened for a flash, or the way Kirk was still avoiding eye contact with his friend.

McCoy stopped him and forced Jim to face him. "The hell you are," he said quietly.

Kirk glanced away and his voice was more unsteady than McCoy expected when the captain repeated, "I'm fine."

McCoy didn't believe him for a second as Kirk walked away, heading towards the shuttle. It was plain how hard Kirk was working to keep himself together, and McCoy knew from experience that fine meant anything but when it came to the two of them. His memory flashed to the bathroom of a dark pub, emptying his stomach into one of the toilets while Jim leaned against the stall door frowning, as McCoy grumbled that he was fine, so leave me alone, damn it and I just ate some bad meat or something (while Jim shook his head knowingly) and I didn't have too much to drink damn it and even if I did, you know what day it is and I can celebrate my anniversary however I want thank you very much.

Oh yes, McCoy was very familiar with being fine.

This wasn't the place for a heart to heart however, with the bustle of people in every direction, completing the necessary preparations for the departure of dozens of shuttles and ships.

You're anything but fine and we both know it, McCoy thought. With a heavy sigh, he followed Kirk onto the shuttle.

"Bones, meet me in the brig."

"Be right there."

McCoy flipped his comm shut and immediately left the med bay, but he didn't head for the brig. He'd received word from the bridge that Kirk, Spock and Uhura had Harrison in custody and were on their way back, less two crew members than when they'd gone down to Kronos to retrieve him, and he suspected he was needed to give Harrison a medical exam. He'd also received word there'd been a serious firefight down there and McCoy would be damned if he was going to let Kirk barrel full-speed ahead after getting his ass kicked – something Kirk was prone to doing. McCoy still couldn't forget the mission where Kirk had literally tore off into an alien jungle with two broken ribs and splintered nose after a petty thief.

So instead of meeting his captain in the brig as he'd been ordered, the doctor hurried down the corridors towards Engineering and the docking bays, and managed to intercept Kirk as he intended.

"Bones, I said the brig," Kirk said with a shake of his head and didn't slow his pace.

"Yeah, I heard you, I chose to ignore you," McCoy replied. "After Spock told us you ran into a bit of trouble nabbing Harrison – "

Kirk grit his teeth. He'd really have to talk to Spock about reporting things.

"I figured you'd need a check-up." He eyed the captain and added, "And I was right."

"I'm fine," Kirk retorted coldly, refusing to meet McCoy's worried gaze.

"You're bleeding, and I'm betting pretty bruised," the doctor pushed. "I'm patching you up before we go to the brig. It won't take long, Jim, you just have to stand still long enough for some hyposprays and stitches."

The pair climbed into the turbolift and Kirk jabbed at the buttons with unnecessary force.

"Think you can manage that?" McCoy crossed his arms over his chest.

Kirk insisted, "Bones, I'm fine."

McCoy stabbed at the emergency stop button and moved to stand in front of Kirk, blocking him from the panel.

"You going to keep saying that word until it's not a word anymore? Or until you believe it's true, Jim?" said McCoy. "Because we all know you're not fine."

Kirk swallowed and dropped his gaze to the floor.

McCoy's heart went out to his friend and he wished Jim would just let him help somehow. He knew how close Kirk had been to Pike, how the man had been the father figure Jim had never really had. McCoy had seen him bond with Pike through their years at the academy, he'd watched as Jim drove himself to strive for more under the other man's mentorship over the years, even if he occasionally stumbled.

The loss had visibly hit Kirk hard, but damn it, McCoy wished his friend would vent a little, open up about it, instead of bottling it all up and trying so damn hard to carry the weight of every world on his shoulders. He knew Kirk well, and seeing him breaking at the seams like this made McCoy fear his friend would do something exceptionally stupid and no one would be able to stop him.

"Jim," McCoy tried softly. "You're not fine."

Kirk gave his head a shake and cleared his throat, meeting McCoy's eyes with those baby blues of his.

"I have to be," he whispered and reached past the doctor to restart the turbolift.

McCoy clenched his jaw and moved aside, knowing he'd lost again, and Kirk wasn't going to let him in. Not yet, not this time. He cursed silently at the captain, but couldn't help thinking that if roles were reversed, McCoy would be just as stubbornly blundering forward. And there'd probably be alcohol involved.

"At least clean yourself up," McCoy said. With a grunt he added, "You look like shit."

This earned him a small smile and a chuckle from Kirk, and McCoy felt a little relieved at the sight.

"Doctor, it's… McCoy… it's Kirk, he's…"

McCoy could barely hear Scotty's pained tones over the roaring in his ears. It had nothing to do with the ship crashing around them, which had rather miraculously righted itself in the last several minutes. His heart was pounding in his chest and he couldn't find the words to reply, couldn't manage a thing because his mouth had gone paper dry and no, damn it, Jim, you can't be dead, I cannot lose my best friend, you can't do this to me…

Then a pair of stretchers came in bearing screaming, bleeding crew members, and McCoy hesitated, thinking of Kirk. If he let himself dwell on it, it might be real. If he left this med bay and sought Engineering, it might be real.

But maybe, if he kept going, continued in his duties, then it might not be real. If he pretended this – that Scotty's call was a vivid hallucination, a result of a bump on the head, or a lapse in the space-time continuum that fried his senses for a few seconds, then it might not be real. He could pretend, he could believe it wasn't real and that his best friend, Jim Kirk, was not radiation poisoned and dying several levels down.

So he shut the comm and fought his shaking hands, shoving away thoughts of his best friend and shutting out the memory of Scotty's voice saying Jim's dying. He was a doctor, and he saved lives, and he couldn't save these lives if he thought about Jim.

The moment when the bag was unzipped on the table, all McCoy could hear was Jim saying, "I'm fine."

He spent a lot of time cursing Jim in those two weeks. Cursing him for being an idiot, for being so damn heroic, for being himself and doing the right thing and leaving McCoy behind like this. Didn't Jim understand that he was McCoy's family? Didn't he think about what his dying would do to him before he had to rush in and save the damn ship and all of its crew? Didn't he realize how agonizing it was to sit in this room, day after damn day, watching the scanners and monitors and praying (even though he wasn't religious) for the readings to change, for a miracle?

He cursed Uhura a few times too, when she came by to see how Kirk was doing, and tried to convince McCoy to get some sleep or take a shower.

"You'll feel better," she'd say, a soft encouraging smile on her lips.

"He's not going anywhere," she'd say, her voice a mix of hope and sadness.

"I'll watch him until you get back," she'd say, trying to find a way to make McCoy rest.

She always lost, however, because McCoy wasn't about to let Kirk out of his sight until he was sure this plan of his with Khan's blood was working, that his best friend was going to live. He was terrified he'd let himself hope, and that this was all for nothing. The fear was palpable at the back of his throat and on his tongue, like the burn of a good scotch.

Sometimes when the others visited they tried to coax him to take a break too ("You should at least sleep," Sulu ventured cautiously, eyeing McCoy who assumed he must look as strung out and haggard as he felt. "Just go take a nap."), but the doctor refused to leave. He'd fallen asleep in the chair across from Kirk's bed a number of times, simply collapsing from sheer exhaustion, but he usually started awake after a short amount of time, frightened that something had happened while he was out.

The monitors remained steady, however, for the entire first week: Kirk was technically and medically alive, the super-blood slowly working to heal the irradiation, but he was pale and unmoving, his brain functions equivalent to a deep coma.

McCoy had handed over his duties as Chief Medical Officer temporarily and he though perhaps he should have felt guilty about dropping his patients into different hands, they were good hands. Besides, this was the captain he was treating, so he doubted anyone had a problem with the ship's doctor working exclusively to save him.

Perhaps the worst part about sitting around for hours on end, watching Kirk's life signs flicker across a variety of screens, was how still and quiet Kirk was. It was horribly unnatural to see him in this state – Kirk was always brimming with energy and life and conviction and charisma. It came off of him in waves, and it made people draw near to him.

Never mind that the reason for Kirk to be in this state was the result of him saving thousands of lives, McCoy still cursed him for taking that unique energy and life out of the universe.

It wasn't until the second week that the machines blipped and beeped with progress, god damn progress, and the relief was so acute that McCoy nearly cried at the sight. He let Uhura talk him into leaving the room that night, and when he came back the next morning, clean shaven and more rested than he had been for a very long time, he found that fragile thread of hope he'd been so desperately clinging to had become solid reality.

Progress changed into obvious improvement, and then there was a point when McCoy knew with the certainty that comes from years of medical experience, that Kirk was really going to come out of this. Scotty's voice was thick as he called McCoy a miracle worker and Chekov wiped his eyes while pretending he wasn't. Sulu nodded and couldn't seem to find the words to say, but the look on his face was expressive enough without any. Uhura gave McCoy's hand a squeeze and Spock's voice was tinted with emotion when he thanked the doctor for saving the captain's life.

McCoy was checking readouts and monitors when Kirk inhaled and blinked awake, his features flashing with confusion, surprise and relief.

"Oh, don't be so melodramatic," said McCoy with a smirk. "You were barely dead." He reached out to scan his friend, barely looking directly at him. "It's the transfusion that really took its toll. You were out cold for two weeks."

"Transfusion?" Kirk questioned, his voice coarse and rusty.

"Your cells were heavily irradiated. We had no choice," McCoy replied. He forced his thoughts away from the image of Kirk in the cryo-tube.

"Khan?" the captain said, his voice barely a whisper.

"Once we caught him, I synthesized a serum from his… super blood." McCoy almost shrugged, as if it was all no big deal. Like he hadn't spent several torturous hours working on the serum, or a number of agonizing days staring at flat readings. Like they'd been through this before. Like he was Kirk and could make light of horrible situations.

"Tell me," he continued. "Are you feeling ah, homicidal, power-mad, despotic?"

"No more than usual." Kirk shot his friend a weak smile. "How'd you catch 'im?"

"I didn't." McCoy's tone was proud as he gestured over his shoulder at the first officer, hanging back. As McCoy moved to the other side of Kirk's bed to fiddle with the machines situated there, Spock approached to fill the space where McCoy had previously been standing.

Kirk chuckled softly. "You saved my life."

Oh no, McCoy thought. Hobgoblin isn't getting all the credit on this one.

"Uhura and I had something to do with it too, you know," he piped up from Kirk's left.

Kirk quirked an eyebrow in McCoy's direction, as if to indicate he would have to get the full story later.

"You saved my life, Captain," said Spock earnestly. "And the lives of – "

"Spock, just…" Kirk cut the Vulcan off and exhaled. "Thank you."

"You are welcome… Jim."

Well how about that, McCoy thought with a note of amusement and affection. He gave Spock a hard time about things and the Vulcan drove him nuts, but he'd certainly grown on McCoy and it was heartening to see the guy opening up and loosening up bit by bit.

McCoy left Kirk under Spock's supervision and headed out to inform the rest of the crew that the captain had finally woken up.

At first, Kirk had tried to get details from McCoy about what exactly had happened.

"All I remember is the chamber," Kirk said. "And Spock…"

McCoy kept his tone light and breezy when he replied, "Well, it was a picnic, let me tell you. I had wounded crew members practically stacked on top of each other."

"But it was… I mean, it was okay? After I put the core back, the ship was okay?"

"We're here, aren't we?" McCoy shot back, still airy and almost joking. He couldn't look Jim in the eye as he said it, however, because Kirk very much almost wasn't here, and frankly most of the crew very much almost wasn't here either.

Kirk knew McCoy as well as McCoy knew Kirk, however, and the doctor could feel his friend's eyes on him.

"Bones…" he began, but McCoy made up an excuse and had to leave.

After that, Kirk hadn't tried to pry, but whenever McCoy came back to check on him, he could feel his friend's gaze on him, trying to discern what McCoy wasn't telling him. Thankfully the visiting crew members keep him occupied. They had been in and out all day to visit Kirk, keeping it brief so as not to wear the captain out, while McCoy kept himself busy.

Somewhere around oh-three-hundred, McCoy was back in Kirk's room, bustling back and forth and studying readouts. He thought Kirk was asleep and almost cursed when he was startled by the captain's voice, piping up from the bed that had until that day been so eerily silent.

"You gonna tell me what's going on with you?" he asked bluntly, peering intently with those brilliant blue eyes.

McCoy continued to avoid his gaze. "Well, Jim, I don't know if you know this, but you died."

"Oh, is that what happened?" Kirk retorted sarcastically. When McCoy didn't answer him, the captain sighed and said, "Will you look at me?"

McCoy stopped fussing with dials and scanners, his shoulders tensing, but he didn't turn around.

"Bones."

The doctor clenched his jaw, and felt like he was bracing himself against a hurricane as he stiffly faced his friend. Immediately the image of that damn body bag flashed through his mind, followed by those hours and hours of feeling physically unable to leave this room, lest doing so negate his chances of getting Kirk a miracle.

Kirk studied McCoy's tightened and frowning features. "I'm okay," he offered and then gestured down his front. "You fixed me, see?" He paused, then asked quietly, "So what is it?"

McCoy shook his head and chuckled bitterly. "I'm fine, Jim."

"You can barely look me in the eye."

"I'm perfectly fine."

"No, because you're doing the thing that I do, that you always say you hate, where I make jokes about terrible things that happened and say I'm fine and I'm not."

The silence stretched for several seconds as McCoy stared at the floor and fought for words, while Kirk stared at McCoy and waited with uncharacteristic patience.

"You were dead," McCoy finally said, barely managing to return his gaze to Kirk. "Scotty called up and… and you were dead, Jim."

He could feel the emotions of the past two weeks swirling and crashing in his chest and he struggled to bottle them back up, his voice wavering more than he would've liked.

"You had to go save the world and be a damn hero, and die in the process. You were… and I just…" He stopped, suddenly unable to continue.

Kirk lifted his chin, understanding dawning on his face. He opened his mouth to speak but McCoy swiftly cut him off.

"Don't you dare apologize, damn it. You did the right thing because that's who you are and you wouldn't be the closest friend I have if you weren't that person." He swallowed hard, his voice quivering again. "But you still died, and I… I wasn't… I'm not fine."

"I know," Kirk said quietly.

"And neither are you," McCoy added quickly and sharply. "You're not fine about Pike, and you shouldn't be. Not yet. So you need to stop acting like you are."

This time it was Kirk who looked away, but McCoy was right and they both knew it. The doctor crossed his arms over his chest and once again the silence between them expanded. This time it was Kirk who spoke first.

"Thank you for saving me."

McCoy waved his hand at him dismissively, but then said seriously, "Just don't make me do it again."

Kirk smiled. "I don't plan to."

"Oh, right, because your plans usually work out so well, do they?" McCoy raised his eyebrow.

"I come up with good plans, it's not my fault they don't work out." As an afterthought, he added, "Well, usually."

McCoy smirked. "So when you stunned our getaway beast on Nibiru – "

"That was an accident."

"And then we had to jump off a damn cliff – "

"There was water below! It was completely fine!" Kirk insisted, a grin creeping across his features.

"No, Jim, don't you see where fine gets us? Don't you know it's code for any number of things, and none of them actually mean fine?"

"Freaked out, insecure…" Kirk began listing.

"Neurotic and emotional," McCoy finished with a half-smile. "Among other things."

Kirk chuckled and the pair of them shared a look that said what words couldn't about what it meant for Kirk to be back from the dead, for McCoy to have his best friend back, and for the world to feel right again.

McCoy pulled up a chair next to Kirk and leaned back into it comfortably. "Don't even get me started on the Sandalorian mission…"

"Oh come on, that one wasn't my fault," Kirk protested with a laugh that betrayed whose fault it really was.

They were still bantering back and forth when the sun came up hours later.

-end-