"This cinches it," Jim said. "The universe is dead-set on making me the first man to have a monogamous three-way."

Neither his own Spock or the one with the beard seemed terribly impressed with him over that comment. He was too busy gaping between them to care very much, though. This new Spock – and damn, but how many Spocks did the universe need? – was younger than the other… other Spock. The old one. But he was still older than his regular Spock, looking to be in about his thirties. Jim promptly dubbed him 'Beardy-Spock'. He was starting to think that he was on the verge of obtaining a collection. Beardy-Spock, Old-Spock, and Spock-Spock. Or maybe he should be Scarred-Spock, except he didn't want to make Spock-Spock self-conscious over that.

"We can't fight fate, guys. It's just gonna keep flinging Spocks at me until this happens," he insisted. He didn't really mean it – his Spock had a real jealousy thing for his other selves. Well, and other men. And women. Also, sometimes, houseplants if Jim looked at them for too long. But presented with this kind of situation, it was all he could do to keep from falling on the ground in peals of hysterical laughter.

"What are you raving about, Kirk?" Beardy-Spock asked, and Jim noticed right away that he had a lot more hard-edges than his counterparts. "And what is this location? You will tell me now." At that, he took an aggressive step forward, and Jim's eyes widened as he felt a hand close around his neck.

It was only there for a second. Then Beardy-Spock promptly found himself thrown into the transporter room's console as good old regular Spock reacted.

"You will not touch the captain again," Spock said sharply.

"Unless that was foreplay," Jim added, earning himself two glares. He threw his hands up. "Alright, fine, shutting up. You can't blame me for trying." He couldn't help it – he was naturally predisposed towards Spock. In any form.

Beardy-Spock began sizing up regular Spock. Then he turned his assessing gaze towards Jim. "I am in another universe," he concluded after a moment.

"Probably," Jim confirmed.

An eyebrow quirked. "Fascinating. I also appear to be in another time."

"That too," he agreed.

"The transporter malfunction was likely responsible," his Spock reasoned. "If we ascertain the source of the disturbance and attempt to reverse the process, theoretically, we will be able to return you to where you belong."

Beardy-Spock straightened a bit, recovering from being flung and fixing up his sash.

Jim wondered if it would be possible to talk Starfleet into sashes. Shiny sashes. Maybe with gold trim.

"You are assuming that I would be amenable to returning to my own universe," Beardy-Spock pointed out. "What will you do in the event that I am not?"

"Hey, the more the merrier!" Jim said. He was starting to think that, eventually, every universe's version of Spock would make his way here.

His own Spock seemed to take offence at that idea. "Then you will be confined until we are able to forcibly eject you from our plane of reality," he replied sternly.

Jim hung back a little to watch the stare-off.

This was gonna be fun.

---

Author's Note: This really is just intended to be a tidbit, but I realize it's open for continuation, so there might be another one-shot (or more) in this series to follow up after it. Also, yes, I did tie it into my story 'Home', which is where the scar reference comes from – because scars and beards are the marks of alternate universe selves!