Given the circumstances, this time I *did* chase after Spock. I couldn't be an observer of their problems anymore. The whole situation was getting out of hand and they needed a solution *now*.

They had to have something to stabilize that damned bond of theirs. If that something had to be me, then so be it. Maybe the bond would settle down after I slept with them. Hell, Jim always felt better after sex, so that was probably the most I'd have to do.

It was easy to convince myself that one night of sex was not breaking my vow, especially since, in my imagination, I saw them being less than satisfied with what they got. So I soon was in pursuit of Spock, who was heading straight for their quarters.

Although he never turned toward me until he got to their door, he didn't look surprised to see me. He simply stood aside so I could walk into their living room. "Jim is finishing his report on the negotiations with the Reffertini. He should be here momentarily. May I offer you a drink?"

I blinked in surprise. The genteelness was so unlike him that I reacted, well, badly. "This isn't a social visit, you idiot! I'm worried about the two of you! The way you stormed out of sickbay...I was afraid I had hurt you."

Spock nodded and sat down at one of the desks in the corner of the room. "We are also concerned about your well-being, as we could also injure you unintentionally. The bond is demanding your presence in a way I do not understand, and our attempts to satisify it have caused you distress. This is most disturbing and our ignorance of the reason why is dangerous."

Agreeing with him, I sighed and flopped down on their couch. It was also rather disturbing to see the worry and exasperation in Spock's eyes. So, true to my nature, I attempted to ease him by making him angry. "This is impossible. Leave it to you two to have the strangest connection in all of history."

But Spock, like his husband, wouldn't give me the satisfaction of getting under his skin, not when he had a problem to solve. "We can and will discover the reason for its inconsistencies. It will simply take time."

"What will take time?" a voice asked from behind me.

Spock and I both turned to see Jim walking through the door and taking in the sight of Spock and I talking in their shared space as if I was meant to be a part of it. My heart skipped a beat when he smiled gently. Hell, if he reacted that way every time he saw me, well, I might just be convinced to drop my vow.

But in the next second, out of the corner of my eye, I caught Spock's non-smile to his husband. That small gesture caused a small flare of jealousy in me and I ended up scowling in Jim's direction without meeting his eyes.

Then again, keeping my vow was the right thing to do. Humans aren't made for three-way relationships. We tend to want our lover's attention completely focused on us.

Jim frowned when he saw my expression. But he didn't say anything about it. He just came over to stand by me, as if to protect me (or to keep me from running away), and turned to Spock.

"What needs time?" he repeated curiously.

"Another problem has developed in the bond," Spock replied with a coldness that was disturbing. That is, until I looked at his face and realized he was trying to hide his frustration.

Of course, Jim didn't bother trying to hide his feelings. His eyes turned bleak at the news. "Damnit, now what?"

"He can't kiss me without the bond breaking," I said quietly.

Jim looked from Spock to me and back again before flopping in the chair across from the couch I was on. Instead of the frown I expected, my friend had a small grin on his face. "Spock kissed you and I missed it? How could you?!" he exclaimed in a mock-whine.

"Jim! This is serious!" I hissed at him. I hated when he acted immature during a serious conversation. I knew he was trying to cope with the stress, but it pissed me off. When he fooled around, it was hard to get him to listen.

But Jim had grown a lot in the last year. His smile died quickly when he saw my serious face, and he sighed. "I know. But for one minute, let me look at the bright side. What was it like? Did he make you weak in the knees?" He grinned laviciously.

I rolled my eyes at him, tolerating the teasing for the moment. Hell, we all needed a moment to breathe here. "You kiss him everyday."

"You're right. I guess I need to take a different approach." With a wink, Jim turned to Spock. "So what was it like?"

My jaw dropped when Spock responded in kind instead of scolding him like I did.

"Quite satisfactory," the Vulcan replied seriously. "His technique is very arousing."

"High praise from my husband," Jim said as he turned back to me. "I wasn't sure even I could live up to his expectations."

I snorted. Now Jim was being ridiculous. The three of us knew Jim had me beat hands down when it came to sex or its preliminaries.

Even though I wanted to smack him for it, I think he accomplished his goal with that little stunt. I was no longer angry and we were all a little calmer when Spock revealed the problem to Jim. "As adequate as his response was, the bond began objecting to the action. It began to tear at both connections. Therefore, it was necessary to cease."

Jim groaned, voicing the frustration we were all feeling. Then he narrowed his eyes as the wheels inside his head started turning. "You didn't pressure him, did you?"

Spock shook his head. "Leonard revealed that he found me physically attractive."

"Well, you are," Jim said softly. "It's about time he noticed."

Spock inclined his head in acknowledgement of his husband's compliment. "I kissed him to allow him a chance to explore this new development further."

Suddenly, Spock's earlier actions didn't look right to me. They seemed too...calculated. "You wanted to bowl me over, you mean. You want me in your bed, so you tried to seduce me."

Okay, so I forgot for a moment that I was talking to a Vulcan. Everything they do looks calculated.

As I mentally smacked myself for drawing such a dumb conclusion, Spock shook his head. "We want you to be part of us. Sex is a miniscule part of what we wish to share with you. I apologize for suggesting to Jim earlier that it would be the best way to convince you to join us. I was wrong."

He held out his hands again, trying to tell me of his sincerity as he continued, "I was simply attempting to ascertain your willingness to accept this attraction and explore the possibilities it allows."

"What else was he supposed to do? You tend to back away unless someone makes a real effort to convince you you're wanted," Jim sighed as he watched me frown at that statement, then turned back to Spock. "So why is the bond fighting us?"

"I do not know. I have found no instances of similar difficulties in the Starfleet databases as of yet."

"Your people don't like to talk about this stuff to others. Do you really think Starfleet would have any information on it?" I asked.

Spock nodded. "A core archive transfer between the VSA and Starbase 3 was initiated before Vulcan was destroyed. One one-thousandth of the archive arrived at the Starbase."

"In other words, Starfleet has enough of the VSA's archive that it was worth a shot," Jim sighed and shook his head. "I want to try something, Spock." He stood up and stretched, eyeing me in a way I couldn't decipher. "Keep an eye on the bond, okay?"

Spock closed his eyes to better see within. Then Jim came over to me. It took all of my effort to not back away from the intense look in his eyes. I knew what he was about to do, and it scared me. But we had to try it.

So, with me trembling in front of him, Jim leaned down and kissed me. As far as kisses go, it was a Kirk special, with all the technique he could muster.

But despite the pleasure it gave me, it felt wrong. The bond apparently didn't find kissing Jim as wrong as kissing Spock, but it was wrong enough that I pushed him away. "Stop it."

At my resistance, Jim automatically straightened up and shook his head. "That was...weird."

"No, kidding," I grumbled. This was getting ridiculous.

We needed answers, so we turned to Spock, who opened his eyes and gazed at us thoughtfully. "The bond was again beginning to tear."

"I don't get it," I said, exasperated by the stubbornness of the link in our heads. "Doesn't it 'need' me to be with you?"

"Perhaps it needs for you to initiate any intimacy," Spock replied, puzzled by all of this.

"Yeah, if you start it, maybe it'll be better. We don't want to force you into anything," Jim agreed.

"You should have thought of that before you started stalking me," I shot back, taking my frustration out on him. But looking at them, I knew this was too much for them to handle. So I stopped my argument before it really got started.

Knowing they were done trying to convince me, I straighted my shoulders with a sigh, and put on my best med-neutral face. "Okay, I'll do it."

Again, I watched Spock close his eyes to see the bond better. Then I turned to Jim and brought his lips to mine. This time the warning overpowered any pleasure I was getting from being this close to one of the beings I loved.

One of the beings?

I pulled back and opened my eyes and looked straight over at Spock, whose eyes were still closed.

Yeah, I admitted it. One of the beings. I had been hiding the truth from myself. I loved the goddamn Vulcan. I don't know when my heart had betrayed my common sense, but this feeling didn't just show up two minutes ago.

With that revelation, the bond's problem became clear to me.

"Spock, get the hell over here," I barked, trying to keep the same demeanor that I always had with him. But even without looking in a mirror, I knew the expression on my face negated every insult I had ever thrown at him.

They were all lies anyway. I had had no real conception as to why I used them. But now, that too, was pretty obvious.

I had been covering the truth. I hadn't been ready to handle it until now.

When I first met Spock, he seemed to me to have two settings, frigid and raging.

But within months of meeting him, I started seeing those subtle hints Jim had alluded to about Spock being happy, sad, bored, whatever. Soon, I began to forget that before I had only seen the same cold expression every time I looked at him.

Then I began to notice the hints of emotion Spock directed at me. At first, it was only annoyance, which irritated me. But after awhile, I realized even Jim could piss him off with an emotional outburst. His Vulcan training made him uncomfortable even when he watched someone else give in to extreme emotions. To be fair to Spock, I admitted that I tended to have a lot of them.

But the rest of the time, he actually seemed content to be around me. We worked well together, and we both knew what the other could do to support Jim. So we often tag-teamed him.

But it took a little while until I realized it was more that just work that drew us together. When we were 'fighting', there was pleasure on his face. The green-blooded idiot was having fun exchanging insults with me.

About the time I noticed that was when my insults started to get worse, more stinging. To the point that Spock started to back off.

I wasn't anything he did. I was getting defensive. It wasn't only because I loved Jim and Spock was marrying him. Hell, I've dealt with Jim being in someone else's arms practically since the day we met. But now I was starting to find that I *liked* my competition.

That disturbed me to the point that I didn't talk to Spock for a few weeks, other than in an official capacity.

I know he noticed, because although he didn't seek me out, when we did speak, he seemed cautious, almost gentle with me. I knew now that he thought he did something wrong and didn't want to make matters worse.

But in the couple days leading up to being trapped in my own head, he went even further than just being cautious. He was kind, considerate, *loving* towards me. I didn't notice it until now though, because his actions were subtle.

Vulcan love is a kind word here, a small touch there. If you're not looking for it, it can pass right over your head.

My relationship with him didn't help me recognize the signs. With all the insults we pass back and forth, it was easy to believe we hate each other. Which, in turn, made me want to dismiss his every kindness as a way to annoy me.

But as I watched him come over to us now, I remembered a thought that had been nagging at me. I knew now that my gut had been telling me the truth. When he was in my head, he had most definitely lied to me about not loving me. He did it *because* he loved me.

He knew that was what I wanted to hear. He knew I hadn't been ready to face the truth at the time.

I was a fool. How could I have missed that he was in love with me?

It was probably due to my preoccupation with the weird thoughts I hid from him as he had subtly tried to convince me to be part of his and Jim's lives. I had my hands full pushing away the part of my mind that told me to take them up on their offer, that I'd be better off with them than I had ever been with Jocelyn.

That voice was bad enough. So let's not even talk about the voice that told me how much it liked Spock's poise and dignity...and how gentle his hands were on the few occasions they touched me.

How could I have missed that I loved him? Honestly, I didn't miss it. I ignored it because I had believed I was more likely to survive a trip into a sun than to ever act on my love. I was so convinced that my mind found a way to hide my feelings from me even as they grew stronger.

As I stared into his eyes, I realized it was time to admit the truth to myself and to him.

But before I could get a word out, I found my eyes tearing from the force of my emotions.

Damnit, he was Vulcan. He wouldn't understand the tears.

So I wiped at them and tried to calm down. But Spock stopped my hand with a soft "No."

I watched with a sense of awe as his sensitive hand traced the trail of one tear down my cheek. Then his eyes met mine, and I gasped. In them, there was a fire. A fire that before, I had only seen when he looked at Jim.

I melted under that gaze, letting the feelings I just discovered show on my face. Then, going with the instinct that had me calling Spock over in the first place, I wrapped a hand around Jim's.

Because I needed to keep a physical connection with him as I kissed Spock with every ounce of my newly discovered feelings.

This time the kiss was right. It was hot, it was loving...it was us. I felt like I was drowning in him. If I was, I never wanted to surface for air.

As I pulled out of the kiss and looked at my two best friends, my eyes told them that this was what the bond needed.

We had a three way bond. The thing wanted all three of us together, for Pete's sake.

end part 3