A/N: Wow, I was astonished by the immense response to the first chapter! I'm sincerely elated that you've all enjoyed it so much, and you have no idea how much I appreciate your reviews. I'm sorry to say that this chapter is far shorter than the pilot, but this week and the next are shaping up to be immensely busy for me, and although I didn't have time to write much more than this offering, I figured that something was better than nothing. I hope you enjoy it, and I'd be delighted to hear any opinions. Thanks for reading!
Disclaimer: Still own nothing. Still pining after owning Chris Pine.
Garden Variety: Chapter Two
"Maybe it'll clear up on its own," Jim offered optimistically as the wheelchair passed through the automated, glass-paneled doors of Sickbay. He had spent the entirety of the short expedition vilifying what he believed were the manipulative tendencies within Spock that had originated in the exposure of his deception, all the while hunched protectively over his core. The exact moment in the space-time continuum that he entered Sickbay, he launched headfirst into the expected (and wisely prepared for) subterfuge of old: whining, undermining McCoy's authority, and doing everything and more within his power to extricate himself from the abominable clutches of modern medicine.
"I highly doubt it," McCoy responded with a saturated tone of displeasure and irritation. He had been privy to this evasive song and dance numerous times throughout his Starfleet career, and he never failed to be victorious so long as he entertained Jim's foolishness long enough to tire him out.
"Really, if we just leave it alone and don't do anything radical, it'll pass," Jim insisted, cautiously swiveling in the wheelchair only far enough to connect his intense stare with McCoy's. His passionate blue eyes were innocent and youthful in comparison to their normal allocation of wickedness, but at the same time, they conveyed a beseeching and desperate expression of puppy-dog neediness. He couldn't help but pity the farm boy's poor mother and curiously wonder how she could ever have denied him anything.
"And what medical school did you go to, again?" he questioned, quietly instructing the nearest nurse to scrub in for the surgery. He briefly left Jim to his own devices to gather a select few hyposprays, but he maintained a watchful eye trained upon his friend as he sorted through the seemingly infinite stock of medication. It wouldn't be the first time that, even bleeding and broken, the captain attempted to bolt.
"Haven't you heard? I'm an expert at everything," Jim retorted absentmindedly, observantly scanning the expansive infirmary with a vigilant eye to pinpoint the nearest route of escape.
"Of course," McCoy conceded, pocketing the pharmaceuticals and steering the captain into the OR. It was a considerably small room composed of minimalist, brushed steel and harsh overhead lights lowered to a tolerably dimmed level, but despite its barrenly humble outward appearance, it was well equipped to patch up the members of the ship. As cleared the door, Jim visibly tensed, shoulders locking into a drawn posture of rigidity.
"For the last time, it's a simple surgery," he soothed in a comforting tone of undeniable logic, gripping his friend beneath the arms and encouraging him to use his own shoulders for support in order to rise. He could see the intensifying panic materializing within Jim's wild eyes, and no matter how incessantly his exasperation seemed to cloud the fact, he knew full well that his friend's distaste for medicine went far beyond a ridiculous level of stubbornness to veer into the territory of unwarranted phobia. "People undergo this procedure every day and complications are extremely rare. It only takes two hours, and you should be back to bossing everyone around in three days or so."
Jim pulled in a sharp, jarring intake of breath when he rose, one hand clutching McCoy's shoulder in a clasp fierce enough to bruise and the other coming reflexively to lay on his abdomen with great pressure. As he was helped to delicately lift himself onto the edge of the metal table in the center of the dimly lit room, a characteristically languid, lascivious smile unfolded across his face. "Talk dirty to me like that again, Bones," he gasped, voice hoarse and roughened as sandpaper grating across uneven wood. "I like it."
"In your dreams," McCoy lobbed back, gently tugging at the soft fabric at the hem of his friend's shirt. He carefully lifted and paced himself at a slow crawl to accommodate the rampant, ratcheting pain that caused Jim to bite his lip near bloody, cautiously removing the supple material while allocating extra consideration to avoid twisting his friend too suddenly. That done, he tossed the discarded shirt in a nearby clothing bin and knelt to remove the captain's boots.
"Stop," suddenly came the timid, trembling command.
His hands stilled and he looked sharply upward to find Jim even more ashen than before, tinged with an unpleasant shade of faint mint green, eyes dully feverish and apologetically frightened.
"Aw, hell," he muttered, propelling himself out of the crossfire just soon enough to avoid the ejection of thin, pungent vomit that splattered unpleasantly upon the sterile tile floor. He instantaneously transformed into the epitome of the concerned doctor, all previous whimsical banter stymied in favor of soothingly cupping the back of the captain's neck with his broad palm and whispering nonsensical reassurances. When Jim finished, he looked even worse than he had earlier, drenched in a thin patina of cold sweat as he shivered convulsively and blinked dull, guilty cerulean eyes. His brow was knotted in pain, his expression the utter personification of abject misery.
"Don't worry about it," McCoy assured him supportively while beckoning through the open door to the nurse from earlier to clean up the mess, sidestepping the vomit and continuing the strip the unexpectedly limp, wilted captain to his boxers. "It's a common symptom of appendicitis. If you would have let me sedate you from the start, we could have avoided this." His heart truly ached for his ailing friend, but he couldn't wholly banish the reproach from his tone.
"And miss all the fun? Never," Jim drawled tiredly, submitting to being lowered to a supine position and allowing his eyes to fall shut.
As McCoy crossed the room to wash his hands and the nurse took his place to mop the floor, he couldn't help but be astonished by the unprecedented transformation in the captain's demeanor. He did a double take back to the ailing man wilted upon the metal table and almost couldn't believe his eyes. Could he finally have won without the necessity of a fight of epic proportions? It made brilliantly logical medical sense to assume that illness had at long last exhausted Jim, but it was unlike him to be so submissive after such a brief argument. He had expected exceptionally grand escape maneuvers and had prepared accordingly, but with a swelling sensation of pride, he couldn't help from congratulating himself for ultimately taming the beast.
Turning back to the lanky body stretched prone upon the table and depositing his hypos on the adjacent tray as the soft hum of air announced the nurse's departure, he was startled to hear the rough voice rise once more.
"What the hell?" came the quiet, indignant introductory query from the captain. His face remained a stagnant mask of fever flush and serenity, save the knotted forehead so furrowed that his brows almost touched.
Just when he thought he'd won. How many ledges would he have to slam into on his way down this cliff?
"What now?" he huffed irritably.
"You cock-blocking son of a bitch," he charged indolently, eyes snapping open to reveal vivid, accusatory blue. "I've been trying to get with that nurse since the last time you imprisoned me here, and making her clean up my vomit doesn't exactly help my chances."
"If only I'd known," he drawled sardonically in response, combining the contents of three hypos to curtail the agonizingly prolonged process of subverting and often manipulating the captain into a medicated sleep. "After all, I exist solely to cater to your romantic whims."
"Damn straight," Jim responded confidently, eyes roving nervously over the various surgical instruments positioned on a tray near his forearm. His voice was soft and hoarse, but still very much electrified by its characteristically dramatic intonation.
"If she's been resistant to the patented James T. Kirk charms for this long, I don't think that she's ever going to get with you," he advised wryly, stirring a small brush in a metal basin of thick, viscous amber liquid.
"Never say never," he intoned sagely with a wicked grin.
McCoy gave a long-suffering sign in response, earning a glare that would send lesser men scurrying in the opposite direction when he folded down the waistband of the captain's boxers to paint a smooth stroke of the coagulated, gelatinous liquid on youthful golden skin. He skillfully evaded the groping hand that attempted to stymie his efforts and continued to liberally saturate the lower right quadrant of the patient's abdomen in thick fluid.
"What the hell is that?" Jim gasped in shock and frustration, stiff and shivering beneath the cold liquid and chilly, sterile air.
"Relax, it's just Betadine. It's a disinfectant," McCoy assured, replacing the brush in the basin after a final ochre stroke and abandoning it upon the tray.
"It smells," he complained petulantly, childishly wrinkling his nose. His sporadic, nervous blinks began to grow more numerous and increase in their duration as the conversation progressed.
"Why the hell won't you just pass out already?" McCoy exclaimed, twirling the scalpel between skilled fingers and itching to get started. "You're obviously tired, and most people would have fainted from the pain, by now."
His suggestion seemed to have had the opposite effect; Jim was lively and reanimated due to his unwise insistence to scratch the eternal itch of his excessive pride. "First of all, I'm not most people," he asserted confidently. "And second, I'd hate for you to get lonely."
"I rather enjoy my time away from you, believe it or not," McCoy stated before quietly commanding the computer to raise the lights.
Jim squinted irritably in response. "All work and no play makes Bones a dull boy," he recited. "Will this thing scar?"
"Most likely, yes. But it shouldn't be too noticeable," McCoy counseled, counting the seconds until Jim's legendary endurance finally ran dry or he slit his throat with the scalpel; whichever opportunity presented itself first.
"Aw, hell," the captain whined childishly. "Women hate that stuff. Now I'll never have sex again!"
Exasperated, McCoy ignored the comment and beckoned the nurse forward. "Nurse Chapel, would you assist?"
Jim rolled his head to the left on the thin pillow, shivering sporadically and watching with a lustful gleam as the petite, lusciously shaped blonde nurse hesitantly sauntered in their direction, visually stripping the woman naked with his penetrating, licentious gaze of approval. With the right side of his patient's neck exposed, McCoy seized the golden opportunity and jabbed the hypo into the captain's prone jugular, depressing the plunger and allowing the transparent contents of the syringe to drain.
The captain turned his head and eyed McCoy with a hurt that may or may not have been dramatized. "That was low," he whispered, blinking torpidly as the light dimmed from his expressive eyes.
"You've always been a fool for a beautiful woman," he quipped, breathing a long-withheld sign of relaxation when Jim's eyes at last fell closed and his breath evened into a soft, peaceful rhythm.
"I thought he would never fall asleep," McCoy joked to the bewildered nurse, carefully analyzing the captain's tawny, presently amber skin before sliding the scalpel through skin and muscle like a knife through room temperature butter. Viscid scarlet blood welled in the incision, vivid and brilliantly colored beneath the harsh, sterile light.
"Let's get started."
A/N: More to come in the next few days- you'll see the aftermath of the surgery, the recovery, and yes, for those of you who were asking, certainly a dose of Spock/Kirk friendship. I've got one or two more chapters in mind- I have yet to determine that, and I may or may not invoke a bit more of Christine Chapel. I hope that you've enjoyed this much so far, and I'd love to hear what you think. Thanks for reading!