Spock took a deep breath. He had to play it smooth on this one. He was the worst at that, therefore he wished good luck to himself, even though he knew such a thing as luck didn't exist. He estimated at 62% the chance of something going wrong in that encounter. Great. He entered the medical bay.

A dark-haired man who did not at all look like a doctor slided over in an office chair with caster wheels, looking like Spock had interrupted him in the middle of something. His uniform did indicate he was indeed a doctor.

"Hi, what can I do for you?" he asked him

"Hello." Spock answered, measuring his words. "I was wondering if you could help me..."

"Well that's kinda my job yeah, you can cut to the point."

"I've been having these dreams…"

"Are they about that brunette from the bio lab? Because me too…" he laughed

"No?"

Spock frowned, but it was the only sign of irritation he allowed himself to have.

"Do you have anything to block dreams?" he declared with a serious tone

"Well… what's your name ?"

"Walding. David Walding."

"Well, Walding. Everyone dreams. It's human to dream."

Yes, it's human. Why did that part of him suddenly start bothering him about dreams now when it never had before ?

"You can't just swallow a pill to stop them."

Then his idea of coming here had been useless. He still thought there could be a chance he would be able to do something about that. He figured some of the crew members came back from complicated missions with traumatizing images that didn't go away and probably haunted their dreams in some way. Therefore he thought there could be some sort of treatment. He didn't answer anything and simply nodded, thinking he should get to the tech room and forget about it. He had been having the same horrible dream two nights in a row and felt like it wasn't over.

"Are they really bad dreams?"

"Endangered ship. Fire. Pain."

Undressed captain.

"Oh. These ones."

"Are they frequent on the ship?" he asked, out of sheer curiosity

"I wouldn't say that. For some people in particular they are."

He wanted to ask for who but he felt the man wouldn't answer.

"Ask yourself why you have them and try deconstructing them. Relax before bed, do something fun to change your mind. If they aren't away in a few weeks come back here." he advised

The doctor had gone from light-hearted to slightly concerned. Though Spock felt he wasn't worried about him but about someone else with a similar problem that he had just reminded him.

"Fine then. Thank you for your time, Doctor… ?"

"McCoy."

He had said that with a smile. He found this Walding guy a bit…weird, and stuck-up. There wasn't a lot of people like that around here. They had been on this ship for two years now and people were at ease with each other. This guy was probably new.

Spock gave him a sight serious nod and left the room.

"Ya gaun t'night?" Scott asked, later that day

Spock, or rather Walding, slightly lifted his head from the computer and seemed to take a moment, then went back to looking at the computer.

"I guess yes."

"Ye don't seem excited." she said, turning to raise an eyebrow at him.

"I'm not."

"How come ye gaun, then ?

"I promised our captain to go."

She had a little laugh. She was about to say something but it started ringing and a red dot popped on her screen.

"Shite. Breach on level 4, tunnel A-502."

She started for the door. Spock didn't move, he supposed she wanted to handle this by herself like she had done the previous day.

"Shift yer bahookie Walding." she said to him, impatiently, before leaving the room.

Spock gazed at the door, puzzled, for a second, then decided the highest probability was that she had just asked him to come, and followed her. After walking through a few hallways, they engaged in a darker part of the ship. Spock knew what is was for, how it was conceived, but he'd never actually gone. He had to admit there was a bit of a thrill to that. He did not try to share that feeling with his colleague, because it was daily life for her and she probably wouldn't care, but also because he had already observed her behavior very well and knew she had two radically different moods : on the one hand joking, smiling and, well, vulgar, on the other deeply-concentrated-if-you-say-a-word-to-me-I'll-cut-your-throat. And judging by her silence and clenched fist there was no doubt she was currently in the second one.

Finally, they engaged in the problematic tunnel. She seemed to be looking for a particular spot, as her gaze went a few times between her portable device hand the walls around. The tunnel was very poorly lit up and one could say it created a rather gloomy atmosphere. At one point she stopped to look at something like an electric switchboard, but Spock continued walking a few meters, curiously looking all around, pretending he was inspecting or something of the sort. He was passing under one of the pipes when it suddenly burst into an enormous spurt of liquid which hit his head and face so hard he fell ridiculously on his bum.

"Walding !"

Scott was walking towards him looking pissed off.

"Fuck ye dain ?"

She looked like she was about to scold a child. And Spock really thought she was going to. But something else had catched her intention and she suddenly frowned and kept her mouth open for an instant. Spock hadn't hurt himself, he had simply made a total fool of himself, and also his hair and face were soaked with a liquid that smelled weird and itched a bit. He got up and tried to recover a bit of dignity by getting some of the liquid away from his face with his sleeve.

"What's it with yer heid ?"

"Nothing, just this... "

That's when he noticed. Trying to wipe some of the liquid off his shoulder, he saw that there were drops on it. They were of orange color. It was his hair dye. Which was highly waterproof so what was this liquid, some kind of acid ? As an immediate reaction, he touched his ears, hoping the fake ones were still there but it was already too late. The brunette was picking up something from the ground. He could have explained the hair, he knew some humans dyed them for beauty reasons, but the ears... he was fucked. No other words. There was not any lie that had a decent level of logical plausibility, and she was a very clever woman. He had kept it hidden for three earth days. Three. He was probably going to lose his position. But it was his fault, after all, he had not done well at his job, he deserved it. She clenched her fists and looked at him. The slight anger she had demonstrated quickly faded away, replaced by curiosity and suspicion.

"Who are ye?"

Spock felt there was no use lying at this point. He cleared his throat and joined his hands behind his back.

"Commander Spock. I work for Federation Central."

A cold shiver seem to go through Scott at the two words.

"I'm an inspector. The Federation has been very worried about the unstable activities of the Enterprise since Captain James Kirk took command two years ago. They needed proof and insight on the situation on board. That is why I have been sent here under a false identity."

She still didn't say anything.

"From what I have seen, they are not worried without reason."

Scott lifted her eyebrows like she was offended.

"I do not say this for you, chief engineer Ally Scott, I believe you are a very strong asset to this ship and I have reported that also."

The tone of his voice had been different. More like himself, maybe. Also, he held a superior position on that situation, and not just administratively.

"Thank ye. I guess." Scott said, apparently not knowing exactly how to react to that revelation.

"I understand if you decide to tell your Captain about me, you would only be following your duty."

"But ye are also following yer duty, Commander."

"You are right."

"This is too funny as it is to tell."

"Excuse m…"

"A Vulcan from Federation Central pretending to be a fuckin bampot aff a human cadet in front aff Jim's face."

She started laughing loudly. Spock hardly understood the reasons for it and kept still. Then she stopped and tapped her hand on his wet shoulder affectionately.

"Nae, nawt telling. Too guid like this."

Now, that wasn't what he had expected at all. And it meant she could reveal his cover to everyone at any moment she wanted. At least she didn't try to blackmail him. It would've been useless anyway, these three days had already given his service enough information to get Captain Kirk out if they wanted. He liked his experience here, in a way, away from the boring day-to-day office life at Central, but it would have to end anyway, tomorrow or in six months it didn't make enough difference for him to care.

"New guy!"

Kirk went towards Spock as soon as he had passed through the lounge room door. The lights were tamed and people were discussing and drinking in small groups. The Captain seemed genuinely happy to see him, even though he still didn't call him by his name. Or maybe he didn't remember it? Spock didn't exactly understand why or how the man had developed this fondness for him, since he had barely said ten words to him. He had to admit the behavior of James Kirk was quite the mystery to him. Though he didn't admit he liked that about him.

"Good evening, Captain." he greeted respectably

"God, call me Jim. Everyone does."

"I am not sure."

"Call me Jim and I'll call you Dave." Kirk said with a grin.

So he did know his name.

"I am not sure I want you to call me that." He answered in a serious tone.

Kirk started laughing and took him by the shoulders to guide him through the room, pointing discreetly at people and telling him their names and sometimes some kind of anecdote about them. Spock had to admit he found impressive how he knew his crew so well and how he seemed to like everyone in here in their own way, but also how he made a point to get him, the new guy, to blend in with everyone. He would make sure to report about that. That was not what could save his case but… Wait, why did he suddenly thought about saving his case?

"Don't you want to know what we're watching?" Kirk asked him at one point, when he seemed to have finished with the presentation.

"Of course."

Spock had said that out of pure politeness, and need to appear normal, but frankly, he didn't care.

"It's set in like 2150 so it's like vintage and stuff. And you follow that couple from like teenage years to adult life. A lot of stuff happens, funny stuff, also she ends up living like so far away and it's not like they had transporters back then or anything, but they always still think about each other. It's pretty romantic."

Judging from how Spock had seen him act with the two women on his first day, he didn't really believe him to be of the romantic type.

"Looks like it is." he just said, not really knowing what to answer.

"Pretty stupid if you ask me, but making fun of it is mostly why I like it."

There it was. What could he discuss though ? How fascinating it was how stories, roleplay and, yes, romantic films played a significant role in human mating and the perpetuation of the species ? That's what he would have said, usually, but he had his cover. Also, he would probably have been boring.

"You know, I like you Walding. You're a good guy. You're gonna love it here." Kirk said, tapping his shoulder with a wide smile before leaving him in front of the buffet.

Spock felt a bit bad about having to lie to him, for an instant. He barely had any friends back at the Federation Bureaus, except for Dox maybe but Dox was friends with everyone so did that count? Anyways, as silly as it sounded in his head, it felt nice to have someone liking him. He did not like him though, but his fake identity, which was another issue.

Spock didn't really like movies. He didn't understand what was so enjoyable about them. He had a hard time enjoying fiction in general. He did found interesting the effect storytelling had on people. Some of them believed in what stories teached them more that in what logic teached them, even the most skilled engineers and scientists. That power was both fascinating and dangerous.

The film was ending. But people hadn't really been watching so much, some had been talking the whole time on another side of the room, others engaging in…various preliminary acts of human sexual arousal socially and publicly acceptable. Meaning human kisses. Spock was sitting on a chair near a wall. He was highly uncomfortable in such social settings and he had no way of getting drunk to forget how uncomfortable it was. Which was torture. He had been offered a few drinks and had discussed with a few people, but he saw very well they found him weird, and as the night went on the fact that he was sober made it difficult to properly communicate with anyone. It felt like they were on a different dimension. This weird feeling had occupied his thoughts more than the fact that all of these people were drinking on duty for no particular reason or event. He thought maybe it wouldn't be suspicious to leave, now that the movie was over. He had stayed for a while and pretended to fit in. It was enough.

"Fuck off Jim!"

The exclamation had emerged from a darker side of the room. Spock had gotten up by instinct. A very good looking male yeoman hurried towards the door, his face entirely red with rage. Everyone looked at him as he left the room, then all the eyes turned to the other side of the room. To Kirk. He didn't display any sign of unease, which was very impressive to Spock. The man could keep an act. Instead, he had put his hands in front of him in a gesture of reassurance and had advanced to the center of the room.

"It's fine. No biggie. Everyone get back to having fun, ok?"

Spock looked puzzled. That guy Chekov from the first day was near him, on his right, also looking at Jim. He momentarily turned to Spock.

"Zat vas Hamza. Good kid." he said quietly, like he was confessing a secret.

Spock assumed he was talking about the yeoman. He didn't ask further information, but apparently Chekov was going to tell him anyway.

"He has zis huge crush on Jim."

He wanted to think he couldn't care less about hearsays, but strangely he was curious as to why the young man would cause a scene. He thought it could help solving the enigma that was the Captain to him.

"And? Why is he like this?" Spock asked, seeing Chekov apparently needed a push to reveal more, like an old lady spreading rumors at the hairdresser.

"Apparently zey slept together and…"

Chekov stopped as Jim was coming towards them with a suspicious look on his face.

"Blabbing about me Chekov?"

"No, I…"

"You shouldn't listen to him, Dave, he's just having his revenge because I crushed him at the chess tournament."

Spock raised an eyebrow. Romantic movies. Chess. Shrek slippers. How all of this could melt into a single man was a definite mystery.

"Do you play chess, Dave?" suddenly asked Jim, turning to him

He wanted to say he used to be president of the chess club at the Academy but who knows, that could spoil his cover. Also, he desperately wanted him to stop calling him Dave, but he already knew it was too late.

"I do, in fact. And I have to say in all modesty I am quite the player, Captain."

A wide smile appeared on Jim's face.

"We'll see about that. Tomorrow, night shift, my quarters."

Spock frowned and was a bit surprised at this very sudden offer. Chekov had a little laugh that said a lot about the ambiguity of the proposition. Or said a lot about the fact that both men had had a bit too much to drink.

"And it's Jim." He said, pointing a finger at him before leaving the room.