Rating: T for this chapter
To Sleep, Perchance to Dream
Part 2
–Day One –
*
Chekov is running.
What he should really be doing is helping sort through the new star field readouts in Stellar-Cartography.
People tend to think of the Astrologation department and it's three sub-sectors as removed from the activity of the rest of the ship. As a quiet place full of quiet academics waltzing their way through equations and graphs, whose idea of heart pounding excitement is a round robin thought experiment expounding on the Theory of Relativity as it relates to Warp Theory and the possibilities of the interactions between the two. In reality Astrologation is noisy and always busy, always behind. The idea of a System Map is highly misleading. The notion that it's all drawn out, nice and neat, and doesn't change except for what's added along the edges as Star Ships venture further out couldn't be farther from the truth. System Maps are merely visual representations of data, mass and velocity, linked to equations, all alive and interacting and changing. There's always something new because you're not looking out over a valley or an ocean but over light years, hundreds of thousands of light years. So Stellar-Cartography is constantly adjusting their models for the location, velocity and physical state of stars and planets as their view of them skips from the long past, to the near past, to the present. It's beautiful and exhilarating and terrifying because if you miss anything, a new sun or a dying sun or a planet, if your model is off by even half a percent, you could fall out of warp into the center of a Class B sun where you thought there was just empty space.
It's important and Chekov is good at it but he can't sit still. It's his day off and he can spend it running around the recreation deck if he wants to.
He half hears other crew members shouting ahead to warn those further down the hall that he's coming at them fast. He doesn't think about it, barely even sees the floor and the walls as he sprints along them. He's trying to exhaust himself. He didn't sleep at all last night but that was okay because today is his day off. It won't be okay tonight, if the same thing happens, he has to man the helm tomorrow. He's tired but at the same time he's restless.
He's trying to exhaust himself. He's trying not to think about laughing eyes and callused hands holding his as the world spins around them.
Chekov keeps running.
*
– Day Two –
*
Sulu is watching 20th century game shows because he is just that desperate.
He's gone two nights without sleep now and nothing he's tried has made the least bit of difference. He's run through his kata, various fencing maneuvers, tried drinking tea and warm milk, stayed in a handstand until his vision got spotty and has even tried counting sheep. Sheep. He's never even seen them in real life.
So now he's watching Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy on his day off. When he'd normally be doing something interesting like cataloging the saplings the Tetrites had given them as an apology, or sparring with Anders from Security, or asking Chekov if his day at the helm without Sulu has been just as agonizingly boring as Sulu's day at the helm without Chekov was and hoping to God he passes out soon because if he's rambling this much after two nights without sleep he's likely to fly them straight into a black hole tomorrow if he doesn't sleep tonight.
Alex Trebek reveals 'Literature' for 600 as "The author of Eugene Onegin and father of modern Russian literature".
"Twentieth century as modern Lit. huh? Hey, I know this one! Who is Alexander Pushkin, right?" Sulu makes a little fist pump when he's revealed to be correct, thinks how pleased Chekov would be to hear that Sulu has remembered something about the history of the nation his friend is so proud of, realizes what he's just done and buries his head in his hands. "God, I'm so screwed."
*
Jim is almost exactly where he wants to be.
It's been a few days, what with one thing or another. Bones has been busy with inventory and requisition forms and then there was the Tetrite incident and the report on the Tetrite incident and, really, could Star Fleet paperwork be any more repetitive? So, it's been a few days and Jim has needs. In cases where he's been spending his nights fantasizing instead of doing he tends to come out with one insistent, usually quite specific, Need. This time, his Need involves a desk, a swivel chair and Bones calling him Nurse Kirk. Jim is almost exactly where he wants to be.
The trick is convincing Bones that he wants Jim where Jim wants Jim.
It shouldn't be too hard as they're already half stumbling in that general direction. Bones has his hands under Jim's shirt, stroking his skin, while Jim buries his hands in the doctor's hair, pulling a bit to adjust their angle so he can kiss deeper, to adjust their course. And there, the backs of Bones' knees hit the chair and he's falling back into it. Jim slides more gracefully into his lap and starts fumbling to get his friend's belt open. Bones breaks the kiss.
"Jim, we're not having sex in the damn chair."
"Sure we are. Chair sex is hot." Bones hasn't stopped stroking Jim's sides so he can't be that adverse to the idea. All Jim really needs to do here is lead Bones through the familiar territory of contrary, half-assed arguments so Bones can maintain that facade of responsibility and pretend he's not just as interested in seeing how far they can make the chair slide across the floor.
"It has wheels, Jim. That's not hot, it's dangerous. I've got a perfectly good bed we can use."
"Which is why we've got this handy desk here for me to hold on to." That's a no on the chair slide then. Still, Bones' hands are rubbing small circles on Jim's back and he's not moving to stand up, so the night isn't a total bust yet.
"I'm too old for this shit. I swear, I just about threw my back out when we had sex against the wall last week." Bones grumbles, but it's muffled by the skin of Jim's neck where he's leaving little bites and wet kisses.
"You're thirty-two, you did not and you know it, and I'll be doing all the work this time. Honestly, this totally turns you on. Admit it." Bones doesn't answer, which is just fine because Jim doesn't need him to at this point. He's finally gotten the stupid belt off but Jim leaves Bones' pants buttoned for the moment. He likes to make Bones ask for it after he's put up a fight. Instead he brings his hands to his own hem line and pulls his yellow jersey and black undershirt over his head. It's an open invitation for Bones to move his hands up over Jim's abs and chest. He digs his fingers into blue jersey as Bones slides one hand along his ribs, rubbing a thumb over a stiff nipple with the other.
"Yeah, just there. Mmmm, love your hands Dr. McCoy."
"Jim?" Bones pauses, his mouth barely an inch from Jim's collar bone, breath hot on his skin.
"Nurse Kirk, please." There's a pause, then quite firmly Bones says:
"Hell. No."
"Oh, come on! I've had a long week. The yeomen have been on my ass about the rotation roster and the helm's been radiating weird ass tension for the past two days. Can we please have some fun with this?" Jim realizes he's said something disastrous for libido when Bones pulls back and rests his arms on Jim's thighs, his hands hanging off to either side.
"The helm. As in, Sulu and Chekov." It's not a question.
"You know I've got more helmsmen than just those two, right?"
"Jim."
"No! Bones!They've got post plant-side jet lag. They're embarrassed cause they got caught acting like teenage girls. They're sexually repressed and need to jump each other already. Just like you need to jump me."
"You know, for the amount of times you've been fucked over by alien voodoo, you don't take it at all as seriously as you should. Those two are going to show up in my Sick-bay any day now and when I say 'I told you so' you don't get to whine about it."
"I don't whine and if I do it's because you're paranoid. If those two end up in Sick-bay because of 'alien voodoo' I'll never bug you about blowing me on the bridge during Delta shift again. Sex now?" Bones gives him a long look then relents.
"Fine, but I'm not calling you Nurse."
"How about Cadet?" Jim asks, takes another swing at it when the response is a raised eyebrow. "Ensign?"
"When did you develop an authority kink?"
"When you threatened to black-list me for away missions if I didn't stop avoiding my next round of immunizations."
"I can't do a God-damned thing without your mind heading south, can I?"
"You love it."
*
– Day Three –
*
Chekov is late.
He'd glanced up at the chronometer to find he was supposed to be at the helm ten minutes ago and dashed out his door, not even bothering to replicate a power bar. He could almost be happy about it if he could convince himself he'd slept in but he knows he'd merely lost time while staring at the same place on his wall trying to bore himself into blacking out. If his brain wasn't actively engaged, does that still count as sleep? He doesn't think so.
Chekov rounds the corner to see the turbolift doors just starting to slide closed. He picks up his pace and calls out. "Ожидание! Пожалуйста, я последний! Ai! The doors!"
A hand whips out to hold them, followed by a head. Sulu smiles tiredly at him as he slides in. The pilot removes his hand from the entry and the doors close with a hiss. "Hey, sleep in?"
"I wish." It's about all the reply he can manage at this point. Sulu hums his sympathies from his spot against the doors. Chekov thinks that looks infinitely better than standing on his own so he leans back as well. And because Hikaru looks so warm when he smiles like that, and because he's loosing his inhibitions and common sense as well as his ability to speak Standard, Chekov lets his body slide so he can rest his head on his friend's shoulder.
*
McCoy is waiting for the turbolift to come back up from the residence decks.
He's left Chapel in charge of Sick-bay so he can head up to the Bridge to make a few quick observations. It's not that he doesn't trust Jim to make accurate judgments on his crew's health, as far as their capacity to perform their duties goes. It's just that Command's idea of "fit for duty, for a few more hours anyway" tends to match up perfectly with Medical's idea of "should have been in Sick-bay hours ago, you morons".
To be fair, Jim is usually pretty good about that sort of thing when it comes to anyone besides himself. But Jim wasn't really in any position to judge the situation objectively last night when he'd brought it to McCoy's attention. And considering their... activities, it's not at all surprising that McCoy forgot to bring it up later that evening for a more articulate description of the situation.
So now he's headed up to the bridge for a first hand look at any unusual behavior Sulu and Chekov might be exhibiting. If it ends up looking like it really is just personal matters he'll leave well enough alone and deal with any teasing Jim cares to make about "southern mother hens" at lunch. And if not, he'll be there to drag their asses down to Sick-bay.
He's watching the tracker on the wall, the turbolift is only a few floors away, when his comm goes off.
"Chapel to Doctor McCoy."
"Here. What do you need?"
"Engineering has isolated Grav-Mag Beta proxy and will be starting their experiment in ten."
"Let's hope life doesn't get too interesting today." The turbolift is one deck below. McCoy takes a step back in case anyone on board needs to get off on his deck.
"If wishes were fishes Sick-bay would be swimming right about now. Troy and Dre'getk are already headed-"
This is where McCoy stops paying attention.
It's not because Chapel is telling him things he already knows, or because he's taking a moment to run through an internal list of training stats for the two trauma nurses who've been assigned as Sick-bay's first line of defense against the inevitable chaos that follows in the wake of Scotty's most insanely brilliant ideas. He's stopped paying attention so he can drop to his knees to check for signs of breathing and a pulse from the two helmsmen who've just slumped over backwards, unconscious, as the turbolift doors slid open.
"Doctor? Are you there?"
McCoy snatches his comm up from the floor where he dropped it.
"I need two stretchers at lift Tau 3, patients unconscious with regular breathing and heart rate."
"On their way."
*
End Part 2
