Part VI - Physical

Kirk's first surprise of the second day at the Academy was when he woke up to find that McCoy was already gone. Kirk considered himself a light sleeper, so he wasn't sure how McCoy had managed to get up, get dressed and leave without waking him. Part of him was alarmed at that. If McCoy had wanted to do something to him, he would have been defenseless. Oddly enough, the rest of him really wasn't concerned. Which made him wonder if McCoy had already managed to slip him a 'happy pill' of some sort.

The second surprise of the day was when he entered Medical for his physical and heard an already familiar voice call out.

"I've got this one."

McCoy gestured Kirk into the examination room he was standing next to.

"Shirt and undershirt off, then hop up onto the biobed, kid."

Kirk started to comply, but stopped.

"Wait - can't the machines scan me through the clothing?"

"If you want a machine to dictate your health to you? Sure. You want this doctor to give you a clean bill of health, this doctor is going to look you over himself. Oh - sign this."

Blinking at the order, Kirk took the offered PADD.

"What's this?"

Continuing to look over what he was going to be using for the exam, McCoy spoke without turning around.

"You don't have a primary contact listed in case of emergency."

"That's because I don't have a primary contact."

"You do now. Me. If I'm going to be responsible for keeping you in shape, I want to be called any time that treatment is needed for whatever reason. It will also help prevent another doctor from dictating his own treatments without going through at least one of the two of us."

For a moment, Kirk studied McCoy, then he turned his attention down to the PADD, read it over quickly and signed it. Taking it back, McCoy gave it a quick glance and made a grunting noise that sounded vaguely like approval before setting it to the side.

"Now - off with the shirts."

Mentally shrugging to himself, Kirk pulled off the shirts and then contented himself to watch McCoy as if he was watching a wild animal in its natural surroundings. He was a bit surprised when the doctor began running his hands over one section of his upper body at a time. Even more surprising was the number of times those sensitive hands stopped at the site of a former injury, whether any external signs of that injury still remained or not.

After finishing his above the waist examination, McCoy finally began talking again.

"You know, your official medical records have holes in them that a shuttle could fly through. Skillfully done enough to prevent the computers from spotting them and putting up a flag, but obvious enough to someone that likes to check things out for themselves. Your work, I take it?"

Kirk's voice took on a decidedly chilly tone.

"There were things I didn't consider to be anyone else's business."

Neither that admission nor the tone seemed to bother McCoy in the least.

"So long as we can both agree that I need to know your full unedited history, I can follow behind you and fill in those holes so that no-one else that might look will see anything suspicious."

"What if I told you I didn't keep any of those records?"

"What if I told you that I didn't fall off of a turnip truck yesterday? I believe you're bright enough to hide the records. That means I also consider that you're intelligent enough to know those records might be important to your health one day."

Sighing, McCoy finally stopped doing anything else and turned to meet Kirk's blue eyes full on.

"Look, Jim - the only way this agreement thing of ours is going to work is if you trust me where Medical shit is concerned and I trust you where the crap involving physical shit is concerned."

The blue eyes studied McCoy intently for a moment before Kirk burst out laughing.

"You have a way with words, Doctor McCoy."

A snort answered that remark.

"Yeah, I'm the poet laureate of Peach County, Georgia."

"Peach County? Seriously?"

That earned Kirk an eye roll from McCoy.

"Like I'd make that up? Pike hauled my ass out of the county jail there."

It took McCoy a few moments to notice that Kirk seemed to freeze at that.

"What? Surely you can't be that shocked that I was in jail? The charges were faked, but by your record, you weren't exactly a model citizen yourself."

Kirk made an impatient wave with his hand.

"Not that jail stuff, Bones. Pike. You said Pike came to you?"

The emphasis was lost on McCoy and his confusion was obviously genuine.

"Yeah - so? You said you heard Pike shoving me onto the shuttle."

"Well, yeah, but I thought that was because he was in charge of the shuttle. I didn't know he was the one that recruited you."

"And what possible difference does that make?"

"He recruited me too."

"I still don't get it, Jim. What's the big deal? He's a recruiter - he recruited."

"You don't think that Pike might be after something where the two of us are concerned?"

"Hell, he's a Starfleet officer, Jim. Of course he's after something. Look, he might have thrown us together, but that's about the limit to what he could control. Yeah, you and me sort of clicked, but hell - even we couldn't have predicted that. Anybody had described you to me, I'd have bet on us hating each other on first sight."

Narrowing his eyes, Kirk re-thought over his initial meeting with McCoy and then their unexpected second meeting as roommates. Then he began to laugh again. While McCoy preferred an amused Kirk over an irritated one, the sudden shift had him narrowing his eyes.

"Care to let me in on the joke?"

Blue eyes practically dancing, Kirk rested his hands behind him on the biobed as he leaned back.

"You're right. Pike couldn't have known the two of us would have hit it off. Doesn't that make you wonder about what he might think of this?"

That question got a smile from McCoy.

"If he was after us killing each other, he's likely beating his head against the wall. If he actually preferred that we would have at least tolerated one another? Well then, he's either happier than a pig in slop or he's starting to wonder just what the hell he'd been thinking about when he decided to toss us together."

"Me? I'm thinking he may be getting more than he bargained for, Bones."

"Maybe so. Drop your pants."

"Whoa - now what?"

"I've only examined half of you, genius. Don't worry. I doubt you have anything I haven't seen before. And if you do, I've likely got a shot that can clear it up."

Eyes going steely, Jim lowered his pants with a slight flourish. Because he was James Kirk, dammit! He was not bashful about his body - even if he wasn't used to someone checking him over the way he'd check over a bike.

McCoy examined every inch of Kirk's lower body in the same forthright methodical fashion as he had the upper body. Kirk oddly found himself relaxing a bit. The clinical way McCoy was dealing with everything made his very exposed position feel less vulnerable somehow.

"Run any future conquests through a shower and then by me when you think about it. You could have avoided that scarring with a little prevention. Does it bother you?"

Kirk looked down at the top of McCoy's head.

"Bother how?"

"For pity's sake, kid. Does the scarring negatively affect your performance?"

"Oh. Never had any complaints."

"Don't guess we need to bother with it then."

It was a slightly unnerving sensation for Kirk and it felt as if everything he'd ever done was written on his body is some sort of braille that McCoy was able to read with his touch. It also suddenly dawned on him that since he was twelve, he'd never been this physically close to anyone without sex being involved in one form or another. He forced that thought down as McCoy lifted his right foot to examine, even checking his toenails and between his toes before giving the same detailed attention to his left foot.

McCoy allowed Kirk to lower his foot again and got up, moving to the nearby sink to wash his hands.

"You can slide your clothes back on if you like, Jim."

There was a definite mischievous tone in Kirk's response.

"What if I prefer not to?"

Drying his hands, McCoy glanced over his shoulder.

"Then just swing in the breeze, kid. Makes no nevermind to me. So - how many years ago was it that you went through a period of not enough food?"

The reaction from Kirk was so fast that McCoy was slightly disoriented when he was grabbed and shoved against the wall. Kirk got nose to nose with McCoy, a growl very plain in his voice as he spoke.

"Who the hell told you about that? I erased all of that from the records."

McCoy was startled by the vehemence in Kirk's voice, but he didn't cower from it.

"You want to know who told me? You told me. Or, more precisely, your body did. If a person skips a meal here and there, it's nothing in the overall scheme of things. But a prolonged period of poor nutrition? That leaves signs. All I had to do was read them."

Backing away slightly, Kirk looked a little stunned.

"Hell, you were reading braille."

Exasperated, McCoy gave Kirk enough of a shove so that he could move away from the wall.

"Am I going to need to hire a translator to understand what the hell you're talking about?"

Not answering immediately, Kirk paced for a minute before stopping and turning back to McCoy.

"Tell me what else you read. If you can really do that, that can't be the only thing you noticed."

Crossing his arms, McCoy pursed his lips for a moment, then gave a nod.

"Fine. You seem to have either been a bit of a daredevil or you were on somebody's bad side in your youth. You've had too many breaks and there's too much scarring for what I'd deem that a normal childhood would have provided. If I had to make a guess, I'd say your period of too much time between meals occurred in your teens and unfortunately coincided with a growth spurt that made the effects that much worse. Lasted at least six months, but I'd wager closer to a year. Also, there are a couple of little things here and there that would have been attended to by most docs while you were growing up if you'd had regular checkups, but they weren't. So I'd also guess that there was a certain amount of neglect in your upbringing."

The shaky breath Kirk took told McCoy all he needed to know about how accurate he was. Then Kirk seemed to suddenly recall his state of undress and moved to put his clothing back on.

"Bones . . ."

His voice trailed off as he pulled his dark undershirt over his head, then he looked back to McCoy and continued.

"Do I pass the physical?"

"Yep. You do."

Taking a deep breath, Kirk stepped up to McCoy again, who understandably tensed before Kirk simply laid a hand on his shoulder.

"The holes in my history? We'll talk once you're off-duty. Over drinks. Many, many drinks."

McCoy signaled his agreement by reaching over for the PADD and signing off on Kirk's physical.

"In our room or we finding a bar?"

"If my suspicions about Pike are right? A bar. A noisy one."

"As long as the seats aren't sticky and the whiskey's not watered."

That got a chuckle out of Kirk again and he gave McCoy's shoulder a pat before taking the PADD and leaving. As he exited Medical, he decided that if he was going to be telling McCoy about Tarsus IV, then he intended to hear the story about how McCoy ended up in jail in exchange. It was likely to be an interesting tale.