James T. Kirk was a lucky son of a bitch.

Of course, luck was only the half of it. Any idiot could be lucky; it took someone of Kirk's intelligence, cunning, and utter ruthlessness to actually make something of the opportunities luck presented. Discovering the Tantalus Field had been luck, but using it to get where he was today took skill.

Most humans, had Kirk been stupid enough to take his glove off to let them see, would consider the Vulcan name written in exacting black script across his palm to be a reversal of his usual good fortune. Most humans preached avoiding one's soulmate at all costs – might as well just rip out your heart out and hand it to your enemies – and could not comprehend Vulcans' insistence on doing the exact opposite. But Kirk wasn't most humans; Kirk had vision. There was no loyalty so fierce or unswerving or protective as that between a Vulcan bonded pair. And the beauty of it was, Kirk himself wasn't a Vulcan. So he could bind Spock to him and have all that blind loyalty without it costing him a damn thing. And now that Kirk had maneuvered himself as the Captain of the Enterprise, getting S'chn T'gai Spock to fall in line would be easy.

1. Seduction

Or, at least, it should have been easy. Kirk was, after all, a master of the science and art of seduction, and rarely did he not get someone he put his mind to. Granted, he was a bit hampered in this particular instance, firstly because he wasn't in a position to just take what he wanted – Kirk might be trying to fuck a Vulcan, but the only person who fucks with a Vulcan was one with a death wish, either of their own or on behalf of said Vulcan. And aside from that, most of his more overt techniques were out: he couldn't give the impression that sex or a partnership with Spock was something he actually wanted, just that it was something he was open to. Because if it was something he wanted, then Spock would be the one with the power to choose whether or not to give it to him, and while Kirk had faith in his own ability to wrest power back if need be… well, best just to start as you mean to go on.

Despite that disadvantage, it still should have been easy. After years of studying Vulcans in general and their opinions on soulmates in particular, Kirk had discovered this: Vulcans, for all their vaunted logic, which Kirk was pretty sure was just something they were putting on so they could feel like they were superior to everyone else, were still very much a warrior race. A warrior race that placed a good deal of emphasis and value on the idea of bondmates, which seemed to have a fair amount in common with the shield mates of yore, though without the gender bias that ancient Earth would give to the term. It was very unusual to find an adult Vulcan that was unbonded, and if they were so due to death or divorce, they rarely stayed so for more than a few years. While these bondmates obviously weren't always soulmates as well, one's soulmate was the preferred bondmate when possible. So all Kirk should have to do is drop a couple of hints that he, unlike most humans, didn't have a problem with the whole soulmate thing, and Spock should have been all over him.

Should have, but every single hint Kirk dropped was completely ignored. Not to say that Spock ignored Kirk, the man wasn't stupid, but he somehow managed to seem oblivious to any possibility of innuendo.

Despite his mounting frustration, Kirk found himself getting a bit excited too. He did so love a challenge.

2. Chocolates

The problem, Kirk eventually decided, was that Spock was far too uptight. While Kirk still wasn't completely sold on the idea that the Vulcan race as a whole weren't just using logic as a front to be smug about, it was clear that Spock had bought into the idea completely. It was possible that the only way Kirk was going to get his hands on that admittedly attractive body – Kirk hadn't been very taken with it at first, but the tall, dark, and serious look had definitely grown on him – was to get Spock to loosen up first.

He appealed to McCoy, who at first gave off a laundry list of different poisons that could harm or seriously impair a Vulcan – a list that Kirk was certainly going to keep handy for any future Vulcans that pissed him off. But once Kirk made it clear that he had no intention of harming Spock, at least not unless he did something to really deserve it, McCoy finally provided him with information that Earth cacao beans, and their derivative cocoa, had the ability to induce an intoxicated state in Vulcans similar to that caused in humans by alcohol. Saying that it was a simple matter from there to slip a bit of cocoa into Spock's meal the next time he and Kirk ate together – a tradition that Kirk had started ostensibly so they could discuss ship's business, and in reality in order to afford himself another opportunity to try to seduce Spock – would be understating the matter greatly, but he was the captain of this ship, and more importantly, he was James T. Kirk, and when he wanted something done, it got done.

After taking only one bite of his food, Spock placed his fork back on the table and announced, "Someone is trying to assassinate me."

"Hardly an unusual occurrence," Kirk noted sanguinely, but inside he was seething. If some stupid ensign had just ruined all Kirk's planning by poisoning the same meal that Kirk had already drugged, there was going to be hell to pay. "Poison in your soup, Mr. Spock?"

"Cocoa," Spock corrected. "While it is not typically classified as a poison, as it does not cause death in Vulcans except for in extremely large quantities, it does induce a state of intoxication. Presumably the assassin wished to put me into a vulnerable state that he or she could then take advantage of."

"Well, we can't have that," Kirk said, getting up from chair. "Come on, I'm in the mood for a good interrogation."

"Prior experience has shown that you are always 'in the mood' for interrogation," was Spock's dry comment, and Kirk barked out a laugh.

Even after judicious use of the agonizer, Rand disavowed any knowledge of how the cocoa had gotten into Spock's food, as Kirk had known she would. However, when threaten with the agony booth, the clever, clever bitch broke and confessed to having seen Sulu hanging around the kitchens earlier. Sulu was promptly thrown into the agony booth instead, something that Kirk was sure he deserved regardless of his technical blamelessness in this particular situation. Rand, for her incompetence in failing to detect the drug before she delivered the food to Spock, was demoted from personal yeoman to the captain of the flagship, to a general yeoman position on the Farragut, a punishment that coincidentally got her off the Enterprise before Sulu could kill her for pointing the finger at him.

"That was unusually compassionate of you," Spock commented in a private moment after the whole affair was said and done.

"Incompetence aside, Rand was a loyal yeoman. And I believe in rewarding loyalty," Kirk replied.

Spock considered this for a moment, then said, "Highly logical."

Kirk was inordinately pleased.

3. Showing Off

It occurred to Kirk, perhaps belatedly, that it was possible Spock didn't know that Kirk was his soulmate. Sure, James Kirk wasn't exactly a common name, but nor was it so uncommon that it would be reasonable for Spock to automatically assume that any James Kirk he met was necessarily the correct James Kirk.

Kirk had, of course, already done the work of confirming his and Spock's status as soulmates, back when he had been originally been searching for his soulmate. He had had an instinct about this particular Spock for a long time before they met, an instinct that he had been finally been able to confirm once he gained access to the Tantalus Field and the ability to spy on anyone at any time – while Spock always wore his glove in public, as was custom among unbonded Vulcans and required of on-duty Starfleet officers, in his private quarters he seemed to prefer the greater dexterity of a bare hand. Kirk had forgotten in a way that Spock would not be privy to the same absolute confirmation of knowledge that Kirk had been. As such Spock, being logical to a fault as he was, would want to see his own name written on Kirk's hand before being willing to conclude that this James Kirk was the correct James Kirk, something he had yet to have the chance to do as Kirk, like most humans, only ever removed his glove while bathing.

It would be a bit embarrassing if Kirk were to discover that this was the thing that had been holding Spock back this whole time. It was, after all, such an easy fix.

In all his time aboard the Enterprise, Kirk had never been able to decide whether the fact that the Captain and the First Officer shared a restroom between their two quarters was a design flaw by some grossly incompetent engineer, or a masterfully cunning way of culling those Captains and First Officers that were too weak for the job. Both doors could be locked from either side, of course, meaning that it wasn't all that much less secure than the doors in the hallway, save the fact that it wasn't practical to have security guards stationed in the bathroom at all times, but it was still something that most officers would consider a liability. Despite this, from day one Kirk had never bothered to lock his door and, as far as Kirk could tell, neither had Spock. For Kirk's part he didn't lock it because he was trying to encourage, without explicitly doing so, Spock to encroach on his personal space, as he understood that was a requisite for bondmates. He wasn't particularly worried about Spock taking advantage of the opening to kill Kirk, because Spock had shown an interest in Kirk's continued livelihood on multiple occasions and if push ever came to shove, Kirk could always play the soulmate card. Kirk never asked Spock why he didn't lock his own door, but assumedly he didn't because he was equally sure that Kirk wasn't going to kill him. After all, Spock was indisputably the best First Officer in the entire fleet, and Kirk would accept nothing less than the best for himself. Besides, where in the galaxy could Kirk possibly find a First Officer who didn't want to take his position as Captain?

All this meant it was a very simple matter for Kirk to, after taking a shower one day, open the door to Spock's quarters and speak to him while wearing nothing but the smallest towel he could find. "Spock," Kirk said, leaning into the room with his elbows braced against the doorway and his bare hands held loosely open in front of him, palms facing out toward Spock.

"Yes, Jim?" Spock replied, looking up from his console. His hands, Kirk noted, were also bare, and while he wasn't showing them off like Kirk was, neither was he making any obvious attempts to keep them hidden.

"I want to discuss some things with you about our upcoming mission. My quarters, in five minutes," said Kirk. He stretched his arms out in front of him and the motion caused his towel to slip just a bit lower. The latter wasn't something Kirk had planned, but it was a nice addition to the overall picture, he decided.

"Understood," Spock replied, seemingly unperturbed by anything that Kirk was doing. But then, Kirk had seen recordings of Spock in the agony booth – only recordings, as Kirk had yet to have sufficient reason to throw him in there himself – and he was seemingly unperturbed by that too, so clearly that meant nothing besides Spock had a hell of a poker face.

Kirk lingered in the doorway for a few moments more, then turned around and sauntered back to his quarters, leaving both doors open behind him. He pulled on a pair of pants, and, after a brief internal debate, a t-shirt, but his gloves he left off.

Five minutes later, to the second Kirk was sure though he didn't bother to check, Spock entered Kirk's quarters, also through the bathroom and also with his hands ungloved, both of which Kirk considered promising signs. Despite that and despite the fact they spent three hours talking, only twenty minutes of which were related to their next mission, no mention was ever made of the names written on their hands and what that meant.

This was getting infuriating.

4. Gifts

There had to be something else going on. As far as Kirk could see, there was absolutely no reason why Spock shouldn't have jumped him by now. Spock was far too old to still be going around unbonded, and Kirk was his fucking soulmate, a fact that Kirk knew Spock had to be cognizant of by now. Just those two things alone should have Spock falling all over himself to get with Kirk, a course of action that Kirk had made quite clear he would be open to. But on top of all that, Kirk and Spock had built up a fucking fantastic rapport over the last ten months – fucking ten months Kirk had been trying to get into Spock's pants. No, there definitely was something else going on, something that Spock wasn't telling him. Just the thought of Spock keeping things from him made Kirk want to rip the agonizer off the belt of the nearest crewman and press it up against their bare skin to listen to them scream.

With no small force of will, Kirk kept himself from doing that. Wanton punishment without clear cause tended to make people frightened, and not the helpful sort of frightened that kept them obedient and their wits sharp, the cringing, shrinking sort of frightened that made them as liable to startle as rabbits, and just about as useful. Instead, Kirk managed to hold back until he could root out some hapless crewman who had made a stupid mistake and deserved to be punished for their incompetence – there were always such crewman, if one was willing to look, though to Kirk's pride and occasional frustration, they were harder to find aboard the Enterprise now than they had been when he first took over. Once his fury was quenched, for the moment anyway, Kirk settled in for some research.

He had skimmed Spock's Starfleet files before, back when he was trying to find the particular S'chn T'gai Spock whose name was written on Kirk's hand, but now he combed them in depth, looking for whatever it was the Spock wasn't telling him. He read everything in Spock's personal file, down to each last annotation and footnote, and even looked over all the linked files describing incidents that Spock had been involved in, but he found very little that he didn't know already – having heard most of it from Spock himself – and nothing of relevance. Certainly nothing that would explain Spock's behavior; Kirk would have to dig deeper.

Something that very few people knew about Kirk, because he didn't tell them and only made use of it as an absolute last resort, was that Kirk was a reasonably good hacker. His skills in the field weren't nearly as prodigious as the ones he had in other areas, but they were nothing to sneeze at either. And while Starfleet's security was very good at keeping potential enemies, like the Romulans or Klingons, out of their systems, it was less capable of keeping people who were already in from sticking their noses were they didn't, strictly speaking, belong. As such, Kirk soon found himself with a whole new cache of highly classified files to search.

At first there was nothing of interest – well, there was plenty of things of interest, but nothing of relevance – in those files either. But just when Kirk was starting to think he'd have to find his answer another way, he stumbled across a bit of information that made his vision go briefly red with rage and some other emotion that wasn't jealously. Or rather, Kirk admitted to himself, it was jealousy, but only because Kirk was a very jealous man; he didn't like it when other people tried to touch his things. And yet, apparently some Vulcan bitch who had no idea what she was in for had gone and married Kirk's soulmate.

Kirk wanted to divert the ship to Vulcan right then and there, but he wasn't stupid enough to think 'I need to strangle the woman who married my soulmate with my bare hands' was the kind of excuse that would fly with the Admiralty, even if Kirk was willing to admit to something like that in the first place. Still, Kirk did have other ways of ridding himself of pests that were just as effective, if less viscerally satisfying.

It took a few minutes to pull the woman up on the Tantalus Field, Kirk having never needed to search for her on it before. When he did finally get her up on the screen, by an odd and, Kirk decided, fortuitous coincidence of timing, it was right as T'Pring was busy fucking someone. The angle of the view screen obscured most of the Vulcan man from sight, to the point that it would have been understandable if, through his haze of anger, Kirk had briefly mistaken him for Spock. But that thought never occurred to Kirk, any more than it occurred to him that Spock might share some of the blame for his wedded state.

Instead Kirk felt himself overtaken with a vicious kind of glee; not only was Spock's soon-to-be ex-wife an upstart bitch, she was also a cheating whore. It was only a shame, Kirk thought as he pressed the button that vanished T'Pring right out of existence, that it wasn't near Spock's birthday. Discarding that piece of waste on his behalf would have made an excellent present.

Kirk waited four days without any change in Spock's behavior before casually asking Spock if there was anything new going on in his life.

"Nothing you are not already aware of, and certainly nothing of import," was Spock's reply, and if Kirk didn't know any better, he'd almost think Spock looked amused as he said it.

Damn Vulcans.

5. Jealousy

There was one upside to the whole T'Pring debacle, one upside aside from Kirk killing off his supposed competition that was: it gave Kirk an excellent idea. If Kirk had reacted that badly just to the fact of T'Pring, imagine what Spock might do if Kirk were to take himself a regular lover from the ship's crew. And maybe Kirk didn't quite hold Spock as blameless in the previous incident as all that, because honestly the idea of putting Spock through the same thing that Kirk had to deal with was very appealing.

Luck was on Kirk's side in this venture, as it always was, in the form of the Enterprise's new crewman, Lieutenant Marlena Moreau. Her newness in itself worked in Kirk's favor – it meant she would be less missed if she were to be, say, killed by a Vulcan in a jealous rage – and her eagerness to become a captain's woman was helpful as well. Kirk could have most any member of the crew if he so chose, of course, but he had never understood the desire to force someone when it was so easy to find a bedpartner who was just as enthusiastic, or in the case of Marlena more enthusiastic, about the proceedings as he was. To her own personal credit, Marlena also had the look of someone Kirk might have chosen for less disingenuous reasons under different circumstances: slim, with delicate features, long, nimble fingers, pale skin that was wonderfully offset by her dark hair and dark intelligent eyes. Kirk found her coloration especially drawing, for reasons he didn't like to dwell on.

Marlena was also very good at what she did, though that may in part have been the near year of near celibacy talking. She was quite vocal and very loudly so, a trait which Kirk did his utmost to encourage. They fucked frequently, especially when Kirk knew that Spock was in his quarters next door. Often Kirk found himself wishing he could also leave the door to the adjoining bathroom open to help the sound carry, but Marlena was not a completely stupid woman. While she was willing to accept the lack of a lock with no more than a raised eyebrow – after which Kirk immediately took her to bed for other, or maybe the same, reasons he didn't like to dwell on – she was sure to question the door being left entirely open.

This time Kirk made it almost a month with no reaction from Spock before he felt compelled to bring it up himself. Originally, given that Spock was typically very good at refraining from showing any emotional reaction to anything at all, Kirk had been planning on giving it three months, but he had apparently severely underestimated how obnoxious Marlena could be when he first picked her out.

"I'm surprised you haven't commented on my no doubt very illogical choice of taking a captain's woman yet," Kirk said in an affected casual tone as the two of them were playing chess one evening. Marlena, by what Kirk hoped was not a coincidence, given who was in charge of the scheduling for the science department, was stuck in the chemistry labs that shift. Coincidence or no, it was very convenient, given how jealous over Spock she got – a cruel sort of irony. Of course, she was completely right to be jealous, but that didn't make any of her little fits less annoying to deal with.

"To the contrary, there have been a great many studies that have shown the benefits in humans of regular intercourse," Spock responded. "Since current circumstances have placed certain limits on your options at the moment, it was highly logical of you to come to an arrangement with one of the members of the crew to see to it that your needs are met." After that there was a pause so infinitesimal Kirk might not have even noticed it was there if he hadn't known Spock as well as he did. "I would need to express some reservations if it appeared you were becoming emotionally entangled with Lieutenant Moreau, but, of course, you are not that foolish." Spock's eyes locked with Kirk's and Kirk found himself suddenly reminded what a dangerous threat Spock could be, if he so chose.

Kirk looked away first. "Of course."

That night Kirk fucked Marlena harder than he ever had before. Afterward, he whispered sweet nothings in her ear that Marlena, with her inflated sense of her own self-importance, believed. He didn't mean any of it, obviously, and was only saying it as a sort of petty revenge against Spock's presumption in telling Kirk what to do earlier – because there was no doubt that that was what Spock had intended to do, no matter the particulars of what he had actually said.

Kirk didn't allow himself to question where the words, words of genuine caring and affection and… other things that Kirk would not name, that sprung to his lips unplanned and unscripted were coming from. Just like he didn't question a great number of things that had been happening to him and within him of late. Kirk was quickly finding very uncomfortable to be inside his own head.

+1 Spock

Kirk looked up sharply when the door to his quarters opened, then forced himself to relax, or to appear relaxed at least, when he realized that it was only Spock coming in through the adjoining bathroom. Apparently it had only taken three weeks to become unaccustomed to Spock letting himself in like a welcomed guest when he wanted to speak with Kirk. Even when Marlena had been around, Spock had shown an uncanny ability to know when she was in Kirk's quarters and Kirk should be paged over the intercom, and when she was busy elsewhere, allowing Spock to simply walk over to have the conversation in person. But for the past three weeks, Kirk hadn't seen Spock at all beyond what was required to complete their Starfleet duties.

"Spock, what a surprise," Kirk said with a nonchalant-ness that hopefully masked the writhing mass of feeling in his gut.

"I wish to speak with you on a matter of some importance. Is now an acceptable time?" Spock said, standing at the pseudo-attention that communicated that this conversation would be a personal one, rather than the full attention that heralded a professional one.

Kirk wanted to tell Spock that it absolutely was not an acceptable time, and that he could come back in another three weeks if he wanted to talk to Kirk, but when his mouth opened he found himself saying, "Now is fine Mr. Spock; have a seat. What did you want to tell me?"

Following Kirk's instruction, Spock took a seat on the small loveseat opposite Kirk's desk and folded his hands neatly in his lap. "Before we begin our discussion, I believe I should alert you that I have disabled all the recording devices in your quarters for the time being." Now that was interesting. Both the quarters and offices of all heads of departments and officers of commander rank or higher in any Starfleet facility had been bugged by Section 31 to watch for potential dissidents. It was Starfleet's worst kept secret, aside from the existence of Section 31 in the first place, and was widely considered a rite of passage of sorts: any officer not smart enough to learn to disable the listening devices when need be, or at least develop a code to talk in, was clearly not smart enough to be allowed to continue to be an officer for very long.

"What could you want to talk to me about that warrants that degree of caution?" Kirk asked.

Spock's answer came as straight-forward and blunt as it ever did. "Treason."

Well, well, well. From literally any other officer in the fleet, that answer wouldn't have been a surprise, but from Spock… it still wasn't surprising, per se, but it certainly wasn't what Kirk had expected from him either. Kirk grabbed his desk chair and pulled it over closer to Spock's seat. No matter his personal feelings on the man at the moment, Kirk was always up for talking about treason. "So Spock, what pray tell has gotten my straight-laced First Officer thinking about treason?"

"I have had some misgivings about the Empire for a long time, however it was our four visitors from the other universe that served a catalyst for my current conclusions," Spock said.

Kirk felt his lips thin into an unforgiving line. He loathed that other Jim, despised him with a passion that Kirk hadn't even know was possible. In the few hours that Kirk was gone from his universe – rotting in a cell because the other Spock had been tipped off by the lack of the bond that existed between him and his Jim – that Jim had ruined Kirk's life and then skipped back to his own universe with, as far as Kirk could tell, nary a care in the world. Because of the behavior of that soft, emotional fool, half the crew of the Enterprise was convinced that Kirk had also gone soft, and Kirk had had to deal with four times more assassination attempts in the last three weeks than usual, and he had no doubt it would take months before that got back down to normal levels. And then there was Marlena, who had broken up with Kirk because 'she deserved better.' True, it hadn't pushed up Kirk's plans to kill her by all that much – her death had been imminent since the day that her poking around in Kirk's quarters led to her discover the truth of the Tantalus Field – but it was the principle of the matter. No one broke up with Jim Kirk, and certainly not because they thought they could do better.

And then there was Spock. Kirk had spent just over a year now trying to seduce Spock into asking Kirk to be his bondmate, to no avail. And then that other Jim, who already had his own Spock as a bondmate, had waltzed in, and now Spock was barely speaking to Kirk anymore, completely erasing all the progress Kirk had made toward his goal. It didn't matter if that progress was measured in inches, not miles, it had been Kirk's, dammit, and that other Jim had taken it from him. It was beyond infuriating.

"I realize your time spent in the other universe was not pleasant," Spock began, having apparently read the expression on Kirk's face, and misdiagnosed the cause. "But I have meditated extensively on my meld with the other Doctor McCoy and the conversation I had with the other Jim Kirk right before they left, and I have come to the conclusion that much of the way that they approach things is more logical and far superior to the way they are done in our universe."

"You think that bunch of weakling cowards are superior to us?" Kirk asked incredulously. "Personally, I'm surprised they didn't all get wiped out by the Romulans back during the war. Or maybe, since they obviously defeated the Romulans, that victory made them overconfident and that's why they're all so soft now."

"Certainly their way of doing things isn't superior in every respect, and I would be interested in having an ongoing discussion regarding the specifics of each case. But surely you must admit, especially given your own stated preference of rewarding loyalty and punishing only those who have done something to merit it, the benefits of fostering such behavior, and furthermore a sense of trust in each other, throughout all of Starfleet, and eventually the entire Empire."

"I admit in theory, there might be some merit to that suggestion" – certainly Kirk would be able to get a lot more done if he weren't always looking over his shoulder for the next assassination attempt, and the reason he had sought Spock out in the first place was so that he would have one other person that he could always trust absolutely – "but just because something looks good on paper, doesn't mean it will be effective in the real world. You can't possibly think you're going to go before the Cabinet and present a logical argument, then suddenly all the people of the Empire will join hands and start singing 'Kumbaya.'"

"Given the significance of hand touching in seven of the species controlled by the Empire, including Vulcans, I would deem such an outcome highly unlikely," Spock said dryly and Kirk allowed himself a snort of laughter. "I am well aware that such a revolution takes time and careful planning, and I project that most of our desired changes won't occur until after you're named Emperor."

"After I'm named Emperor?" Kirk echoed.

"Yes," Spock confirmed. "I would be willing to take on the role myself if you prefer, but I assumed you would want it. Additionally, as I have told you on many occasions, I have no desire for command, which applies to being Emperor as much as it does captaining a starship."

"That part I understand," Kirk said. "But why and since when am I the lynchpin of your plan to overthrow the Empire from within?"

Spock seemed nonplussed by Kirk's question. "As I have previously stated, you have a number of values that make you an ideal candidate to be the instigator of this change, while still having traits that are prized in the Empire as it exists today. But beyond that, you are my soulmate and, while I've held off out of deference for your need for sexual stimulation and my current lack of ability to provide it, we will soon be bondmate as well. Who else would I choose?"

There were a great many pieces of information in what Spock had just said, some of which Kirk had been waiting a very long time to hear. And maybe it was too many at once because the first thing out of Kirk's mouth was, "You're incapable of having sex?"

"Correct. While it is a myth that Vulcan males are incapable of having sexual relations outside of their time, it is true that they are impotent until their first time is upon them," Spock told him showing no hesitance in discussing the Vulcan race's most private matter – it had taken a full fifty years of ruling over them before the Terran Empire realized there was even a secret to uncover, and another fifty to find out what it was. Maybe it was that openness that allowed Spock's comment about wanting him and Kirk to be bondmates once he was capable of rising to the occasion, so to speak, to finally sink in.

Now, off the top of his head, Kirk could think of at least ten different ways Spock could see to Kirk's 'need for sexual stimulation' without Spock's dick having to come into the picture, and he was sure he could come up with more given a little time. Not that said dick wouldn't be a happy addition once it started working properly, but it was hardly necessary. "So, just to make sure I'm understanding you, the only reason we aren't already bonded is because you're under the impression that you needed a fully functioning cock first?" Kirk asked.

"At this point, yes. There had also been the issue that, without the assistance of a Vulcan mind adept, my previous bond with T'Pring could only be severed by me forming a new bond with my chosen in the fires of pon farr, but that is a concern which I believe you have already seen to," Spock said, giving Kirk that dry slightly sardonic look of his which always made Kirk want to jump him. Something that Kirk abruptly realized he could do now.

Kirk stood up from his chair and stalked the few steps over to Spock. Then he brought his legs up to kneel on the loveseat on either side of Spock's so that he was sitting down on Spock's lap. Kirk paused there for a moment, allowing Spock time to place his hands on Kirk's hips before raising on challenging eyebrow. That look was even hotter than the sardonic one and Kirk swooped in and took his lips in a bruising kiss.

The kiss was hard and furious, all tongues and teeth and want and need and take, all of which Spock meet in full measure – despite his virginal state, Spock was a fucking fantastic kisser. After a minute, Spock let go of Kirk's hip with one hand and used it to grab one of Kirk's so he could so that Vulcan finger thing, the ozh'esta. Kirk didn't think he could possibly be as good at that as Spock was at human kissing – obviously Kirk had some people to hunt down and kill, because no one was this naturally gifted of a kisser – but he was willing to learn. And Kirk was a very fast learner.

Eventually, Kirk had to pull away and pant for breath. Spock, for his part, looked completely unruffled and god dammit if that wasn't the hottest thing yet.

"Taluhk nash-veh k'dular," Spock said to Kirk gravely.

Kirk gave a fearsome grin and replied to Spock, who wasn't yet aware that Kirk was fluent in Vulcan, "Same to you, k'diwa."

This time it was Spock who surged up to kiss Kirk, and after that there wasn't much in the way of conversation for a while.

Much, much later while Kirk was laying in his bunk still in a post-sex languor and poking at the new awareness in his head, Kirk turned to Spock and said, "So, tell me more about these plans for the two of us to take over the galaxy and instate me as Emperor."

James T. Kirk was a lucky son of a bitch.

Taluhk nash-veh k'dular - I cherish thee

k'diwa - term of endearment, a shortened version of a word that translates to 'half of each other's heart & soul'