Shore leave in Sickbay
Bones was working late in sickbay, far into Alpha shift. It was a quiet night, no nurses and no one else was in sickbay, shockingly no one had gotten injured from the away mission, not even Jim surprisingly; and McCoy loved working alone every once and a while.
He had requested some of the samples taken from the away mission that day on Troligate. Just some soil and water samples, nothing living; He'd opted to take the samples to escape from paperwork and give his mind something else to concentrate on
"Thank god those idiots didn't bring me back a devil lizard or something to bite my face off…" McCoy muttered to himself. He peered into to microscope at the various water samples and stifled a yawn, glancing up at the chronometer, he had no idea it had gotten so late, he was too busy with his work.
Despite the time, his hand hovered over the lid of next specimen jar; inside was a very dark red rock with squash yellow moss stuck to the side of it. When he picked up with his gloved hand (He took all the precautions when it came to what McCoy called "Space Junk") the rock began to glow and emit a low audible hum that changed pitch when the rock was tilted. He quickly put the rock down back inside the containment field of the collection capsule. "Jim's going to want to see this one!" Leonard said to himself excitedly as his eyebrow rose and a delighted smirk filled his face. He glanced up at the chronometer again "Jim might be awake now" he said to himself. It was 0600 he had worked all night.
Kirk was milling around in his quarters, getting ready for his morning duty shift, when he heard his door chime. "Come in" the captain said, standing at his dresser, slicking his hair back.
McCoy waltzed through the door a cup of coffee in hand and a Padd in the other, the stylus from the Padd hanging loosely from his mouth like a cigarette. He stared at the carpet in the Captains room when he entered, somewhat lost in thought. "Jim, put a damn shirt on" McCoy said mid thought, not having to look up to know that Jim was shirtless "Stop parading around here like Casanova, your shift starts in 20 minutes. Plus I've got something to show you"
"Alright Bones" Jim says huffily. He grabs a fresh gold out of his dresser and pulls it over his head as he follows his Chief Medical Officer down the hallway. McCoy doesn't even look back as his friend and he strode purposefully down the corridor to Sickbay. He's too excited to show the Captain what he has found.
~Moments later in Sickbay~
"Bones…it's a rock…" Kirk says, deflated and unimpressed "Bones, I'm going to be late for my shift…" He patted his friend on the shoulder as he starts to leave sickbay and head for the bridge.
"Jim wait, I'm not done!" McCoy grabs Kirk by the arm. "look, it glows and makes noise!" McCoy quickly slipped gloves on and picked up the rock. Sure enough it started humming and begun glowing a bright yellowish green. "Now, that's interesting!" He shook the rock for emphasis.
Kirk was obviously intrigued, but tried not to sound too gleeful "Have you shown Spock?"
"No, that green blooded hob-goblin is still on the bridge" McCoy handed a pair of gloves to Kirk, knowing he'd want the satisfaction of rolling it around in his hands. Kirk took them graciously and grabbed the rock from McCoys hand and began to tilt the rock, inspecting the yellowish moss on the bottom, and the different frequencies of sound it was making.
That's when everything went wrong. Delighted by its noise, Kirk turned the rock once more; causing the rock to crack open and spew a cloud of yellow dust everywhere. All at once, alarms and lights began to go off all around them in sickbay.
"*Caution, unknown pathogen released in medbay, Initiating quarantine protocol 7*" The computer voice informed them
McCoy and Kirk looked at each other "Well shit…"
The doors of Sickbay slammed violently shut behind Kirk and McCoy.
"Damnit Jim!" McCoy slammed his hand against the lab table.