Summary: "Anyway, the rule is no bashing each other's movie choices. Some of the things I put up with from you three—well, you put up with my zombies... And if I do happen to get a little scared, then...I suggest sleepover at Spock's."
Notes: Written for the st_xi_kink meme on lj. Prompt: "Kirk/Uhura/Spock/Bones...Something sweet 'n' relationshippy. Maybe a movie night or remembering how they're pairs switched into four..."
Disclaimer: I do not own Star Trek, Spock, Kirk, Uhura, Bones, or the Enterprise.
x
Dr. McCoy and Lieutenant Uhura nod politely in greeting when they meet in the hall. When they realize they are both headed for the turbo lift, the Doctor steps aside to let the Lieutenant step in first. They stand a comfortable distance apart. The doors close.
"Stop the lift?" McCoy asks casually, finger hovering over the button.
"I think that would be wise," Uhura answers lightly. The lift stops with a slight bump, and she allows herself a smile. "It's been a while," she says, "since we've been alone, just the two of us."
"Mmmmm-hmmmm," McCoy answers, pulling her close. "I did miss you."
They kiss slowly at first, gently—then a slip of tongue—and then—and how her arms feel curling around his back—and how his body feels strong against hers—and yes, yes, this.
Slowly she pulls away and drapes her arms over his shoulders, smiling kind of tired and sweet. "We should probably go," she says, and kisses him once more. "Our boys will be waiting for us."
"Oh, I wouldn't worry about them," McCoy answers, untangling himself reluctantly and starting the turbo lift again. "I think they'll find some way to occupy themselves."
x
When Spock opens the door to his quarters and finds Jim Kirk standing by himself in the corridor, he raises one eyebrow in a question. "You are alone. I was expecting you to arrive with Leonard."
"That was the plan. He had some last minute forms to fill, though, so I went on ahead. Are you disappointed?" Kirk asks lightly, arching an eyebrow up at the last word.
"On the contrary," Spock answers, and steps back, motioning Kirk in.
The Captain bounces onto Spock's bed, and Spock lets him, because in a moment Kirk stills again, and as Spock approaches he puts up his hand. Their fingers touch at the tips and then press closer, palm against palm. Spock's eyelids flutter and then close, and then Kirk feels Spock pull him up by the waist. They topple down again together, mouth against mouth now, hot and confused. In a few moments Spock regains his grace, the fingers of his spare hand curled around the back of Kirk's neck, his lips parting softly for Kirk's tongue.
x
McCoy knocks first, the usual two short, one long, one short signal, but when there's no answer, Uhura punches in Spock's security code and the door slides open.
"Guess you were right," she sighs, but the annoyance in her voice is all act, and marred by the smile that follows her words. "They do know how to keep busy."
"I'd say." McCoy smirks in answer, coming to stand next to Uhura over the bed, where Spock and Kirk are entangled, all hands and mouths. Finally, as if just then noticing, Kirk pulls away and, arms still wrapped around Spock's torso, flashes the other two a grin. "Good evening lovers," he says. "Or should I say voyeurs?"
Uhura rolls her eyes but has no retort, just leans down to kiss Spock hello.
"None for me?" Kirk whines.
"Of course not," she answers, and kisses him too.
McCoy clears his throat loudly—Jim's never been good at the quick hello kiss—and asks, "So are we having movie night or aren't we?"
Jim flops back on Spock's bed, kicks off his boots, stretches out with his feet on Spock's lap and crooks his finger in McCoy's direction. "Only if you and the lovely Lieutenant get your fine selves over here."
"Why do we put up with him?" McCoy asks the other two.
"I do often contemplate how one such as our Captain has managed to enter into a relationship with the three of us," Spock answers, carefully undoing his boots while McCoy toes his off. Uhura is ahead of them, already climbing the short way over Kirk and ruffling his hair as she settles.
"Don't give us that pouty look," she says. "You know there's nothing but love here."
"You say so in that voice and it makes me doubt myself all over again," Jim sighs dramatically, then turns his pouty face to Spock, who is removing Kirk's restless feet from his lap.
"Merely making myself more comfortable, Jim," he explains, and then, though he tries to recline slowly, in a dignified manner, between Kirk and Uhura in the center of the bed, he is pulled suddenly and roughly down by two pairs of hands. A moment later, McCoy has joined the general pile, grumbling a little about the lack of pillows, and then grumbling wordlessly because he has no argument when Kirk volunteers his body instead. There was a time when Spock found this unruly piling up of bodies, this confused and tangled knot, where you're never sure whose legs you might crush or who might crush yours—there was a time when Spock found this unpleasant. Even distasteful. But that has changed. The feeling he has now, of a soft and enveloping warmth, Nyota's arm curled around his chest, his own head against Leonard's heart, Jim's hand absently skimming through his hair and tracing the point of his ear, this feeling is one he has never known before. He feels it all the way from his toes to his heart.
During their lunch, Leonard helped him wheel in a screen from the rec room and now it's sitting, waiting blank at the foot of Spock's bed.
"So," McCoy asks finally, "whose turn was it to pick the movies this week?"
He's asking Spock, mostly, not because he's forgotten that Spock picked last time, but because he has the best memory for lists and such things. But Kirk answers first.
"Mine, Bones," he says, his voice excited like it gets when they discover some new planet and get to get exploring. "And I'm sure you'll all appreciate my choices. Screen on. Movie selections."
The screen lights up at his command and a list of three movies appears. At the sight of the titles, two loud groans echo from either side of the bed and Spock twists around to arch one eyebrow at Kirk skeptically.
"What?" he whines, incredulous, trying to meet each stare at once.
"We are merely expressing disbelief that you continue to choose horror movies for our film nights, even though you know that such stories routinely cause you to stay up all night with nightmares," Spock explains.
"I don't understand how you can face death defying situations every day and a few ghosts or zombies still rattle you every time," Uhura adds, stretching slightly, her face close against Kirk's neck.
"Hey, okay, first of all—zombies eat people's brains. That is scary. Second of all, I love horror movies, I've been watching them since I was a kid. Sam used to watch with me." He pauses for a moment, remembering. Staring down at the shine of Spock's hair, feeling the comforting weight of Bones's body on his, Uhura's hand through his hair. "Anyway, the rule is no bashing each other's movie choices. Some of the things I put up with from you three—well, you put up with my zombies."
There are vague murmurs of apology but Kirk waves them away. Then he allows himself a small smirk. "And if I do happen to get a little scared, then…I suggest sleepover at Spock's."
"A suggestion I can get behind," McCoy answers, discreetly slipping one of his hands beneath Spock's and pressing his palm up. The corners of Spock's mouth twitch and he twists his body around to kiss Leonard back on the mouth.
"And who was it who said, 'Are we having movie night or not?'" Uhura questions lightly as they pull away.
McCoy clears his throat and finds his grumbly voice again. "Yeah, are we or aren't we?"
x
One haunted house, one resilient serial killer, and one invasion of the undead later, Kirk shuts off the screen, signs, and says, "Yeah, there's no way I'm sleeping tonight."
"I hope I don't sleep," Uhura answers. "I don't even want to know what I would dream about."
"I believe that Jim has surpassed even his previous efforts at finding horrific films," Spock adds, trying to keep his voice light.
McCoy just huffs, unimpressed. "I saw worse my first year of med school," he says.
"It's not about gore, Bones," Kirk tries to explain. "We've ALL seen worse on some of those planets out there. It's the suspense, the uncertainty of it—"
"See plenty of that in space, too."
"Anyway," Kirk continues, unconcerned with the dismissal, "the three of us are staying up, so you are too. That's the deal."
Bones wants to say that he doesn't remember making any such deal, but he doesn't, because Kirk's warm against him and grinning and Spock's even warmer on top of him and absently twisting his fingers through McCoy's, and Uhura, on the other side of the bed, has stretched her arm behind Kirk's head and is playing softly with McCoy's hair, and he knows what deal it was he signed up for, and when.
So all he says is, "And how are we going to pass the time if we're not sleeping?"
A long, almost peaceful silence follows, as they wait for Kirk to make the obvious suggestion. They'd dimmed the lights for the movie and now the brightest light comes from the crystal flickering, multicolored, in Spock's statue. Finally, Kirk silent and waiting too, dipping his nose into the hollow above Uhura's shoulder sleepily, Uhura suggests, "We could reminisce."
"Reminisce about what?" Kirk asks. Spock can hear the raised eyebrows in Jim's voice and he thinks Leonard probably can, too.
"Oh, I don't know," Uhura answers lightly. "About us. I mean, have you, any of you, ever found yourself wondering how we all ended up together? I mean, I remember what happened but sometimes…" she yawns, shifts slightly, and hooks her ankle around Spock's discreetly. "Sometimes it just seems too crazy."
"I find it quite natural that we should have developed a relationship in this way," Spock answers, his voice as calm as ever, and the other three try to hide their surprise, and Kirk asks, "Really?"
"Yes," he answers. "It was, of course, quite natural that Nyota and I should find each other. You were," he continues, shifting between her and Jim, curling their hands together, meeting her eyes, "the only person in San Francisco who would speak to me in Vulcan, the only one in my whole life who would look at me and see more than the sum of my parents. You allowed me to be totally honest. You were, and are, intelligent, beautiful, unafraid…"
He trails off and no one knows what to say. None of them has ever heard Spock speak like this before, his usual calm thrumming through with deep emotion. In the flicker of the crystal's light, they see his eyes flutter closed.
In the pause that follows, McCoy whispers, "Wish I could say something like that about falling for you, darlin."
"Except that it was mostly lust at the beginning," Kirk answers, a hint of a grin on his lips but his voice still soft. "Nothing romantic there."
"Well, not at first," McCoy corrects, a bit gruffly. "But we're certainly not just two cadets fucking around on our afternoons off anymore. And there's something romantic about sticking around, isn't there?"
Kirk murmurs, sort of contented and sleepy and wordless, and slides his hand down to drape across McCoy's chest. For several long moments, they are all four silent, the artificial night of the ship heavy and calm all around them.
"Hmmm," Uhura mutters, "the two of you, the two of us, everything was…pretty simple then, calm. At least, in our private lives."
"And then I almost ruined everything," Kirk finishes, his voice more resigned than anything. The mood in the room lowers. Spock twists around to look at Kirk properly, not speaking until Kirk meets his eyes.
Then he says, "On the contrary, Jim, I believe the fault was both of ours equally."
For several long moments, Spock refuses to break the stare, and the silence that falls is more tense than before. No one wants to discuss it, those days when every visitor to the bridge could see the way the Captain held his hand too long on the First Officer's shoulder, the way the First Officer kept his gaze always on the Captain, no matter where he was. The way their eyes met during debriefings, the quirk of their mouths like smiling at each other that seemed to send a secret message, one only they two knew—
"I remember the night you came back to your quarters late," Uhura whispers. "I had been waiting for you. You said you had been with the Captain and I knew—"
"Nothing had happened yet," Kirk tries to tell her again, speaking louder than any of them has in a while, but she just nods and ruffles his hair, bringing somehow a melancholy to the gesture that quiets him.
"I know," she says. "I know. But I knew what you two wanted, knew about your almosts, and it started to feel like I was in the way. And," she buoys up her voice, even moves her body higher up toward the headboard, "and I don't want to be anyone's second best, anyone's alternative."
"You were never a second best, Nyota," Spock whispers against her stomach.
And she murmurs again, "I know, I know," so low it's like chanting, and Kirk closes his eyes and wraps one arm around McCoy just to feel him, feel him, and remembers the evening McCoy left him, one long conversation after another, broken by long silences, the whole room between them, then they'd reach for each other again until neither could breathe for the other, but in the end it didn't matter, the conclusion was simple, inevitable. The sliding shut of the door, the empty room.
He realizes he's whispering, his mouth forming words ("It was wrong, we went about it all wrong") that he doesn't notice until Bones finds his hand and squeezes.
"I think I preferred the zombies to this kind of storytelling," McCoy grumbles. "Let's talk about something else or all just go to sleep. We had SOME good times, getting here, didn't we?"
"Of course we did," Uhura answers, optimism now in her voice, and warmth, watching McCoy over the two men lying between them. "Even after I thought Spock and I were over, I realized at least there was someone who knew how I felt. And I found you. I was bitter about all of it, I was, but I also wanted just as much to move on, and I could see you understood that. And you had a sense of humor that I could appreciate, and a deeply passionate and caring nature beneath that…that gruff exterior."
Kirk wonders if, in a better light, he would be able to see Bones blushing.
"It was really something, seeing you two together," is all he says. "I thought I would be relieved we'd all moved on, but—mostly I was just jealous. Wouldn't have given up my Spock—"
"I am hardly yours, Jim. I am not a possession."
"My Spock," he repeats, unrepentant, and skims his fingers through Spock's hair and then around and over the point of his left ear, "not for the entire universe, but I missed Bones. And of course I had never gotten over the lovely Lieutenant Uhura." He flashes her a grin he hopes she can see properly in the dim light.
"Jim Kirk," McCoy says, a bit of a laugh under his breath, "greedy bastard, as always. Wants to take to bed everyone he sees."
"Yes, and considering that I am currently squashed onto a bed with three of the most brilliant, most gorgeous, most…flexible," someone pinches him and he's not sure who, but he continues anyway, "most wonderful officers in Starfleet, I'd say I've been pretty successful in this goal."
"In Jim's defense," Spock adds, "I too, at that time, was aware of an unpleasant feeling of regret at the unsatisfactory conclusion of my previous relationship. Our reactions were not illogical. My relationship with Jim had erased nothing of my feelings for you, Nyota."
"There was a time I would have found it hard to believe you," Uhura answers. "Until I started feeling the same way."
Bones coughs, a short clearing of his throat. "I think we were all missing our old—old flames a little."
A short pause, and Kirk opens his mouth to speak, closes, it, then starts again, and something, some crack or undertone to his voice, tells all three that he's not sure why he's saying this, now, out loud at all. "I felt pretty guilty, you know, then. Like there was something wrong with me. Like I'd never be happy, because I didn't know how to do anything but want more, want something—someone—else, you know."
"I know," Bones answers. Just that and the other two are silent. But Kirk feels them, the continuing warmth and closeness of them, and a bit of his confidence returns.
"And then we had that conversation, remember?" he continues, more upbeat now, glancing down at Spock.
"Over chess, if I recall."
"As all the best conversations are."
"Indeed."
"And you told me you'd been thinking about Uhura a lot, too, the same way I'd been thinking about Bones. Which was reassuring. And then," he smirks a little, they can all hear it, "then you mentioned an interest in Bones. Which was…intriguing. Unexpected."
This time, he's sure Spock's the one blushing, and if it wouldn't ruin the soft storytelling atmosphere of the night, he would turn the lights on right then and there just to see that green tinge at his ear tips.
"I feel like I need to hear more about this conversation," McCoy says, lightly and grinning.
Spock's body stretches against his, resettling as he promises, flatly, "Some other time, perhaps, Leonard."
"It was great, though," Kirk insists, "because I knew crazy things were possible—"
"You're crazy," Uhura interrupts, a giant yawn chasing her words and almost swallowing them.
"And I was right. I convinced Spock to talk to Bones," he recites happily, "and speaking of conversations that should be recounted, I've always wondered about that one—"
(This time it's Bones who promises, "Another time, Jim," and wraps their fingers together.)
"—and I spoke to Uhura, and somehow, somehow, we all came to an agreement." His voice is satisfied, full with conclusion like at the "happily ever after" of a fairy tale. He twists and maneuvers until his left arm is free and then he curls it around Uhura like his right is around McCoy, and squeezes tight, then bends so he can smack a kiss awkwardly, loudly, to Spock's temple. "I love you three. Man, I am so awake. Which can only mean I'm going to fall asleep at any moment, so does anyone have anything to add?"
"That it took us a while, even after all that, to spend a night together, all four of us," Uhura offers, and moves herself closer still to her boys. She can feel her eyelids, heavy now, falling over her eyes and all she can see is the skin of Kirk's neck above his collar, the tip of one of Spock's ears.
"The logistics of such an arrangement were difficult to predict," Spock says. "It is understandable that we were nervous to attempt—"
"Understandable but stupid," McCoy interrupts. "Think of all the nights like this we missed out on. Also don't think I'm going to forget that you just admitted to being nervous."
"A remark taken out of context. I will deny it later."
McCoy's laugh, low and tired but content, is the only answer. Spock mutters a command and the lights turn off all the way, just the crystal now, flickering bits of light over them. They move, adjust, an arm here and a leg there, wherever there's room. Uhura mumbles goodnight and incoherent mumbles are returned. Kirk falls asleep first, saying something like, "Really do love you," so quiet he's not sure anyone hears, just as he's drifting off, warm and secure and complete, safe from the zombies and the ghosts.