Title: Standby

Author: d8rkmessngr

Pairing: Kirk/McCoy

Warnings: implied past abuse, attempted non-con, strong language

Author's Notes: This was a prompt from st_xi_kink: st_anon, thank you for this meme and getting me into writing in this fandom!

Despite what Bones said, it wasn't like before. Then again, if Bones did come around acting like nothing had changed, then Jim might have gone nuts and maybe start swatting Spock's ass. (Bet Nyota would have liked that.)

Two days of junior medics meekly handing in shift reports, two days of eating meals alone (it was then Jim realized how often they ate together in the Mess or in his quarters) and hearing Bones only through the coms like a ghost wandering the corridors. Jim had about enough. He wasn't sure why it was suddenly a big deal that Bones wasn't standing around in the Bridge, grumbling as usual. Or that every time Jim said something he thought was funny, his chest clenched every time he glanced over and Bones wasn't there. Jim should march into Sickbay and...and...

And what?

Jim idly sat in his command chair and watched the muddy brown planet spin languidly on its axis on screen. They were still orbiting the planet of bug people because they needed to retrieve the dead scientists, try to find all of them, because their families need something to bury under carved tombstones inscribed with "Beloved (Fill-In the Blank)".

His throat worked and he couldn't help but glance at the black beyond the planet and think about exploding starships and atomized corpses. Jim abruptly stood up and gave Spock the con and entered (escaped) his ready room. He sat down behind his desk and stared blankly at the walls of his ready room and thought how cool it might be to have some fish.

His mind was jumping like those antique pachinko machines. He thought about how the stone surface cut his cheek, how he couldn't distinguish faces in the death pit they found, how brick walls are cold against his back, how when Bones smiled his eyes seemed to get greener, how the callus on Bones's left thumb against his skin made the pit of his stomach warm and...

"Sickbay. McCoy here," Bones answered tiredly.

Jim blinked. He hadn't realized he'd activated the com.

"Hello?"

"He looked nothing like me," Jim blurted out. "And he called you Leonard like you were some old fart and...and...he was too slimy looking." Okay, that last one wasn't true.

There was a pregnant pause on the other end. Jim's left knee bounced under his desk.

There was a rustle, Bones distantly telling someone he was going into his office and the distinct beep of a channel transferring to a more private line.

"What the hell, Jim?" Bones hissed.

"Oh," Jim said weakly. "Were you busy?"

Bones's response was really impolite.

Jim scratched his desk lightly with his fingers. He watched his fingerprint, a heated smudge on the polished surface fade until there was nothing left. Jim gulped.

"Jim?" Bones asked, suddenly quiet, low like he was crouched by his ear again in a dark bathroom, trying to tug him back to the here and now.

Jim breathed out slowly.

"I don't think I want things to be like before," Jim muttered. He rubbed his hands on his thighs.

"Oh." Bones fell silent. Seconds later, he cleared his throat.

"Want me to transfer?"

"No!" Jim startled himself by jumping to his feet.

Bones sounded surprised enough to stammer. "Okay, then what?"

Jim shot his com an irritated look. "I don't know."

There was a sigh. "Me neither, Jim."

And that pretty much summed up how fucked up this was.

The next time, after their 'talk' (Jim counted it as a talk even though decks lay between them), things between them went a little better.

Sort of.

"If you step in front of another charging, rabid, horned quadruped beast thing to save some foolish ensign who should have known better than to mess with its nest, I'm not patching you up again."

Jim hissed as Bones splayed a hand to brace his left shoulder blade while he rubbed a thumb into the spot where the ball joint met socket. Nurse Trip winced in sympathy, batted her brown eyes at him and passed Bones a hypospray like she just fluttered over a veil. She missed Bones rolling his eyes, didn't get why Jim sputtered out a laugh.

The rest of the away team had already been treated and released. It always felt like Bones saved him best for last even though Bones always treated him first, often hypospray in hand, waiting in the transporter room as soon as he'd beamed aboard. CMO's priority is to the ship's captain, he supposed.

"Ouch," Jim griped, mostly because he was trapped here and his First Officer still had the conn. He could only imagine the glee Spock was feeling as acting captain, rubbing his hands together thinking of all the logical ways he could do the captainly duties. In a very non-gleeful Vulcan way, of course.

Bones pursed his lips as he prodded the joint. He kept frowning, making Jim think maybe it was a lot worse than he thought, but then again, Bones always acted like that.

Jim fidgeted. Bones had very warm hands that seemed to brand his skin even through his uniform. He used to get a funny feeling in his gut whenever Bones had put those hands on Adam because it was just weirdfuckedupbizarre to see Bones with that guy.

"It's not dislocated. I know what that feels like," Jim mumbled, a little lightheaded by the sudden déjà vu that smacked him upside the head. Bones furrowed his brow. He'd made the connection too and guilt made him clear his throat and avert his eyes.

The corner of Jim's right eye twitched. Even now, Adam intruded. Jim was surprised at a rage he hadn't felt since he was thirteen, clutching the wheel of an antique car, steering for a quarry.

"Get a lot of those, do you, sir?" Nurse Trip teased, flirted and despite the bile that wanted to come up Jim's mouth, he smiled faintly back even as his shoulder throbbed.

"All my life," Jim joked weakly, thankful his voice was steady but Bones still gave Jim a meaningful look, a look everyone else around them might read as exasperation but read as something else entirely for Jim. And when no one was paying attention to them, Bones slipped a hand over his knee and gave it a brief squeeze. Jim thanked him with a curt nod. He didn't dare do anything more.

Jim found himself leaning towards Bones. He blinked, disconcerted, when Bones backed away to tell Nurse Trip to get something Jim couldn't pronounce. Jim watched Bones, his legs swinging over the edge of the biobed as he chewed his lower lip.

The past few months on the ship had slipped them into a new normal that echoed the Academy and despite what happened days before, Bones seemed to slip back into the role (Jim just couldn't seem to get back into his). This was what they did, now. Jim did all the things a captain needed to do to protect his ship and Bones bitched about Jim doing his job. And Bones was his usual acerbic self as always, as personable as a porcupine yet he always looked at Jim with a silent query before doing anything that might invite a bad memory. Because Bones knew. Not everything, but more than Jim had let anyone ever know about him. And Bones was still around despite all he'd learned.

That was good, right? He liked Bones as a friend. Three years in the Academy and Jim had gotten so used to the fact that Bones was going to be a constant in his life, he could barely remember a time when Bones wasn't. It was something that still set his insides twisting because acknowledging it, getting used to it, could only jinx it.

Bones tsked as he waved his tricorder at Jim.

"And when were you going to tell me about that broken finger?" Bones grumbled as he lowered his tricorder.

Jim lifted his right hand up. He swung his hand a bit and grimaced when his index finger's bones slid the wrong way.

"Oh. Forgot."

"Forgot, my ass. You'll wander around the ship bleeding all over the place until someone mentions it. I ought to tag you and..."

Jim studied the top of Bones's head as his friend went on and on even as he held Jim's injured hand carefully with his right, the bone mender humming in his left as it floated over his hand.

This was Bones, Jim thought. This was the same. They were, just like before.

So why was Jim staring at his mouth, wondering if Bones still tasted like coffee?

Bones still obsessed with what Jim put in his mouth.

....

Okay, why did his gut feel funny thinking that just now?

"At least it's green," Bones muttered as he speared a broccoli and chomped down on it like it was a carrot. He scanned the Mess behind Jim as if he could see a germ coming.

Jim's mouth snapped shut and he considered the thin slivers of green flecked with red chili flakes. Whatever it was, it was spicy, crunchy and dripping with something sweet so Jim forgave it of its possible origins.

"It's good," Jim mumbled as he shoveled another forkful in his mouth. He nodded solemnly as Scotty darted by to grab yet another sandwich (third so far this shift) because the engineer claimed working in the engine room gave him an appetite.

"Dammit, Jim, were you raised in a barn? Keep your mouth closed." Bones made a face, nudged Jim's tea closer to him. "Wash that down with this."

"Thought you want my mouth closed," Jim remarked, smirking as he drank. No beer, just smelly tea because Bones was currently concerned with a new strain of strep throat going around engineering. Jim was allergic to the vaccine. Big surprise.

Bones glowered, pushed the bitter tea closer towards Jim, and went back to his eggplant whatever thing he tried to get Jim to order instead of the medium rare burger. The medium rare was a compromise since their second year. Bones thought Jim should eat meat well done; Jim wanted it to still be mooing.

Jim watched Bones cut up his eggplant into neat little pieces, always a surgeon, and he absently thought about how careful Bones's hands would be on his body. Precise strokes gliding across skin, a nail gently scratching the underside of his co—

"I told you to keep your mouth closed," Bones scolded when Jim sputtered. Jim held up a hand because the last thing he needed was Bones's hand pounding his back.

"Spicy," Jim wheezed and he grabbed his tea and drained his mug and that really didn't help because it tasted like how his tongue got after a hangover.

"For crying out loud."

This time, Bones did pound his back, neatly avoiding the spew of tea as he leapt up to stand over Jim. What made it worse were the scattered crewmen standing up from their seats with growing alarm.

"Okay, okay," Jim wheezed. He wasn't really, but when Bones backed away, everyone returned to their seats, no longer looking like a red alert was just issued.

"Better?" Bones had his damn tricorder out again. Always with that tricorder. Did Bones sleep with it? Oh, that was a thought he shouldn't have had.

"Your body temp's up three degrees," Bones noted. "Not surprising after choking on seaweed salad."

Jim eyed the green death trap on his tray with disgust now. "Well, I lost my appetite," Jim grumbled.

Bones scoffed as he dropped down back into his seat. "Good. You wouldn't want me to perform mouth to mouth over seaweed anyway."

The memory of stubble against his jaw floated over him and his mouth went dry. Jim smiled weakly. "Yeah, wouldn't want that."

Liar, liar.

He still tasted blood when he woke up for the fifth time two evenings later and it wasn't clear whose name was stuck in his throat, whether he was warning him or her back, or pleading for them to come forward. He stared into the dark, his voice too dry, too raw to form the command for the lights. In the dark, his memories tasting sour in his mouth, Jim couldn't breathe.

Jim found himself standing in Bones's office minutes later, barefoot, his sweats clinging to his sweat-dampened skin. He stood there, staring at Bones's bowed head, hunched over a scope, his fingers drumming the PADD recording his experiment. Jim kept staring, not sure why he was staring in the first place, not sure why he didn't just go back to sleep.

"God, Jim!" Bones yelped when he finally looked up and he reared back, a hand grabbing his chest. "Are you trying to give me a heart attack? I'm the only doctor on duty this shift!" Bones narrowed his eyes when he got a better look at Jim.

"What?"

Jim opened his mouth, closed it then suddenly became very aware of the fact that the sweatpants he currently wore hadn't fit him right since Adam put him in the hospital for a second time, since Bones told Jim that he wouldn't be able to get rid of Bones that easily, since Frank showed up in his head after...after...

"I can't sleep," Jim blurted out and damn it, he sounded five except he'd never sounded like that even when he was five. His brother used to clamp his mouth shut, hissing to him to shut his whining before he woke Frank up.

Bones said nothing about Jim reverting to an age Jim never truly knew. He studied Jim, an unreadable expression on his face and there was this weird, cold feeling that Bones was going to suddenly say that he'd never believed Jim after all.

"I never liked Adam. I don't know why, but I didn't ever since you two were—I mean...I just didn't like him," Jim stumbled out next. He froze. What the fuck was with his verbal diarrhea tonight? Jim snorted in self-disgust and turned away.

"You know what? Never mind. I—" Jim blinked when Bones suddenly appeared next to him.

Bones didn't smile, didn't frown but he looked at Jim like he knew what Jim was going to say even if Jim didn't know himself. That's how it always was. Sometimes Jim never even had to say anything. Damn annoying. It was like Bones was perched at his shoulder.

"Bad?" Bones rumbled because this had happened too many times before to waste time on questions anymore.

Jim shrugged. Suddenly, he realized what a weak ass he must look like, standing in the middle of the room. He stood up taller and coughed.

"Look, got bored, figured I'd come in here and see what you're doing." Jim grinned as wide as he could. "Figured that would put me to sleep."

The corner of Bones's mouth quirked. "That bad, huh?"

Jim was grateful Bones didn't at least ask who it was this time. The fact that there was a list was bad enough.

"I could give you a sed—"

"No," Jim said sharply and he jerked away from Bones's steadying grip. "I just—I just couldn't sleep so I thought I would—"

"Come and make sure I don't get anything done." Bones rolled his eyes. "I know, I know. Every exam time you were popping up everywhere to make my life miserable."

Jim's smile faded but then Bones shook his elbow with a snort to show he was kidding.

"Cot or chair?" Bones murmured, sobering. He nodded towards the narrow bed Bones often used during long shifts behind his chair, when leaving Sickbay meant giving up on a patient.

Jim's shoulders sagged. "Chair," he yawned.

"Cot it is," Bones, as usual, cheerfully vetoed Jim. He smirked as he steered Jim to the cot and all but pushed him on it, grinning when Jim fell into the flimsy furniture with an oof.

"Just who's captain of this ship anyway?" Jim grumbled.

"Luckily, it isn't me," Bones declared as he tossed a pillow towards Jim's head. "You snore and I'm throwing water on you again."

"I don't snore," Jim growled half-heartedly and he glowered at Bones because second year, when Bones poured water over him, the fucking bucket was cold. He dropped with a disgruntled face as he laid across the cot. He stared at Bones's back from his new position. Bones never said anything else, just returned to his research. Were the lights dimmer now, though?

Jim thought about how many times he woke up to find Bones hunched over a PADD in their dorm room, across in his bed, never commenting about how Jim would suddenly sit up, gasping for air. Bones would just sit there, reading under his breath until Jim went right back to a dreamless sleep. It wasn't every day (he would fucking go insane if it was), but enough times that it was almost automatic between them the longer they stayed roommates.

"Was it Adam?" Bones asked quietly. He never turned around.

Jim folded his hands behind his head. He didn't know how to say he simply didn't know so he just grunted.

Bones sighed. "Hell, I am sorry, Jim."

"Wasn't your fault," Jim murmured as he watched Bones's shoulders sag, then straighten. "You can't help having bad taste in men—well, excluding me."

There was a snort.

Jim ran the tip of his tongue across his lower lip. He stared at the neckline of Bones's blue uniform.

"Is this enough though?" Jim asked hesitantly. He blinked at the blurry profile swiveling around to him. "Right now? I mean, you dated Adam because—"

"It is," Bones interrupted harshly as if he didn't want to hear the rest. "How about you? You okay about this? We okay?"

Jim yawned and thought he felt a hand on his hair. Mm. Jim shrugged deeper into the cot.

"Sure," Jim slurred but wasn't sure why it felt like a lie. "I don't want you to go because of this," he mumbled. Jim grimaced because it sounded pathetic out loud.

"Go where? We're in space and Sulu's driving wherever you point." This time, Jim was sure he felt a hand in his hair. "I told you. I'm staying so long as you're okay about all this."

"'m okay." Jim tried to widen his eyes. "I just didn't like Adam."

"So you told me. Honestly, I don't blame you after what he tried."

"No, I mean...before...before..." Jim's tongue felt thick and stuck to the roof of his mouth. Jim blinked blearily up at Bones. "He said I was leading him on." Jim turned his head and pressed his cheek to the pillow that smelled faintly like Bones. It loosened his tongue further.

"Maybe I did," Jim confessed and his chest tightened. "I wasn't exactly a shy sort of guy."

Bones sighed. He turned completely around and rested his elbows on his knees as he studied Jim.

"No," Bones agreed, "you're definitely not shy." His voice deepened. "But that doesn't excuse him for what he tried to do," Bones blew out sharply. He shook his head.

"Get some sleep, Jim."

Jim watched Bones with half-mast eyes and a stirring in his chest he hadn't felt in a long time. "I should go back to my quarters," Jim slurred.

Bones shrugged as he turned back around. "Go right ahead."

"This bed sucks," Jim added with a lisp at the end.

"Uh huh."

"And it smells funny."

Bones snorted.

"Maybe just a few minutes though," Jim yawned. "Keep you company. Gamma shift sucks."

"Thanks," Bones drawled.

"Mm," Jim murmured as his eyes drifted shut. His limbs tensed, readying for yet another night visitor but then he felt something warm and heavy draped over him. He felt himself smile, thought he could see Bones in his mind and he relaxed into a dreamless sleep. This time, Jim fully expected to see Bones when he woke up and oddly enough, that was okay.