I know this one's kinda short, but I wanted to get it up so ya'll would have something since I'm going out of town this weekend anyway and won't have time to write. So here ya'll go. Thanks so much for reading and reviewing! I can't wait to hear from ya'll! Couldn't do it without you either. :)

Chapter 14

Fire was everywhere. Fire and magma, and a sense of hopelessness and despair. An attacker who would not yield; the sneering face that had ordered the death of his son.

Jim was sweating. It was so hot he could scarcely think straight anymore.

"Dad!"

Dad? It was David's voice but David had never just…called him that. And David was dead.

He spun anyway, and David was there, shouting to him, wanting to help.

Then the ground shook again and the young man slipped into a newly opened fissure.

Genesis. Life, but death—new life that was destroying itself, that would kill them all if they didn't get away from it now.

"David!"

He didn't question the fact that his son was alive. He only knew David would be dead if he didn't save him now—if he didn't succeed where he had failed only hours earlier.

He ran. He fell, and scrambled, and ran again, and dropped to his knees where he'd seen David fall.

"Dad! I'm here!"

He was, hanging from a tree root over the edge that would soon break or burn through. The root was several feet down. So was David. Jim searched desperately for somewhere else to hook his own foot, or anything—anything to give him leverage to pull his son up and to relative safety.

It should have occurred to him that Kruge should have been hindering him in this, but it didn't. Kruge wasn't a thought anymore. Maybe he'd fallen or burned somewhere himself. Maybe he was dead. It didn't matter.

He grabbed at another root with one hand and down for David with the other. So close, but it might as well have been a mile between them. He inched farther, and finally it was enough. A blast of heat from the bottom of the fissure, and for a moment Jim was blinded but when he could see again David was clinging to his hand. Now they were both falling. The root Jim had wasn't going to hold.

It was the oldest cliché in the book. Maybe that should have set off some sort of alarm, too, but it didn't.

David was slipping, but when he fell it wasn't David.

"Bones!"

The fire closed in. There was no more time.

Jim woke trembling and sweating. His face was streaked with tears that he didn't remember crying, even in the nightmare.

David…

The pain hit him with blinding new force. He tried to shove it back and realized that he couldn't. Not really. He was still trembling and he had no control. The pain washed over him, and his worry that Bones wouldn't come back, and everything else he hadn't wanted to worry about for the past week—since he and Spock had returned home, and dealt with things, and begun to put themselves back together.

He also realized, then, that the other side of the bed was empty, and the bathroom light was on. He felt a pull there, the need to follow his bondmate, and through the haze a thought forced its' way to the surface.

No control. The emotions…but…

The need to know what was wrong and to fix it finally drove away the lingering fear and despair of the nightmare. Jim stumbled from the bed and into the bathroom. He heard the shower and found Spock huddled there under the spray of cold water. He hadn't bothered even to remove any clothing. His t-shirt and sleeping pants were soaked. The door was open and the floor was damp around the alcove. Jim reached in, fumbled to turn off the water and dropped to his knees at his husband's side.

"Spock? Spock, why are you in here? You don't have to be in here; you have me…" He reached for the Vulcan's hands, pulling them out from where they curled and rubbing his fingers over them to warm them.

Spock's breath was harsh. "I…believed perhaps it was…temporary malfunction…a confusion of my regenerated body…but…"

"It's real. I know. I can feel it, too."

Jim had to coax the shivering Vulcan into his arms, but then Spock leaned into him and was comfortable there. Jim ran his hands up and down his bondmate's arms, and he could feel Spock's breath quickening and feel his own blood rising.

"It is not time," Spock protested once more.

"There's no telling how old your body really thinks it is, if it knows at all. I guess we should have expected something like this. Besides, we only had another year to go this time around anyway, right? It's not that far off."

Through their contact he could feel his husband's anxiousness—his worry that there was more wrong. There was nothing to keep him from worrying. The Pon Farr had already stripped him of any emotional control. That quickly. Jim thought perhaps Spock was a little more affectionate or subtly emotional at times the last day or two, and at other times maybe more short-tempered. But it hadn't been as noticeable as the onset usually was, and it certainly hadn't been as long. Usually it was easy enough to see it coming a mile away if one knew what to look for.

"It's all right. You're fine. The doctors and scientists on Vulcans gave you a clean bill of health before we left. This is just…a side-effect. Everything's going to be fine. I know it came on quickly, but it's all right. I'm here. It's no different than before."

He couldn't say he wasn't at all concerned, but it seemed logical enough. Just a confusion of Spock's body about his physical age…Vulcan biological functions kicking in when maybe they shouldn't, at least this time, but it was nothing unnatural.

"I don't suppose we have time to go anywhere, do we?"

This would be their third Pon Farr as a mated couple. The first, after their marriage, they'd had Spock's rooms in his family estate on Vulcan to lock themselves into. The second time they'd gone out to Idaho, to his uncle's farmhouse.

They hadn't gone there since what happened three years ago. With Antonia, and the failed attempt to conceive a child that was theirs. They'd found other places to be alone when they wanted to be. Jim always assumed when Spock's time came again they would go to the mountains again; that had been nice. Or they would go to Vulcan. Normally they would have had enough time to arrange that.

Spock was shaking his head against Jim's shoulder now. They didn't have time to go anywhere. There was no way at this stage Spock could keep himself composed long enough for that. Even to pack, get to a station, and transport somewhere on-planet.

"All right…all right. I'll set the doors and lock the computers. We'll be fine here. It's all right. I'll be right back."

He didn't help Spock out of the shower. If he did that he'd have to help to get him dried off, and the Vulcan's soaked clothes would come off, and that would be the end of any chance he had of getting anything done for a few days. Spock understood when he simply transferred his bondmate's weight to the shower wall beside them and climbed out.

It didn't take long, thank god, to set the doors against allowing any sort of entry and to turn off even notifications for both the door and the computers. They would not hear of any messages unless they were of ridiculously high priority. Emergencies.

When he returned to the bedroom Spock was waiting for him. He'd managed to get himself up and somewhat toweled off, and he all but jumped the human as Jim came through the door. They tumbled onto the bed. Spock was already naked and Jim was certain he soon would be. He chuckled. His Vulcan's eyes were dark with need, but there was humor there too, now—now that they both understood there was no crisis here. It was unexpected here and now, but it didn't matter. What was life if one couldn't roll with the punches and enjoy the surprises?

If they ever needed this out of sequence, it was now. Jim wasn't complaining.

The first day or more was the tiring bliss it had been the first two times. After that it was different.

Their minds were on a constant basis closer than they were usually. It was almost a continuous meld, but not quite. Often they did truly meld. The Pon Farr was more than a physical need, after all.

Right now, it was good for them, but sometimes it wasn't. They had melded since Spock's return, and they had hashed through the issues they needed to hash through. Or they thought they had. They were usually good enough at such things, but maybe this was too soon. Maybe they really had been fine and it was only the heightened emotions they had no ability to control.

But things came to the surface. For two days after the first they shouted and argued and fought as often as they made love. Some of it mattered and some of it didn't. In any case it didn't matter if they had already been through it or not. If it could be brought up, it was.

"How could you consider risking your life and your career and those of our friends simply for my life!"

"What kind of Vulcan are you using your telepathic abilities to alter memories! Isn't their some taboo against that? What the hell were you thinking!"

"I preserved our friendships! At the time such things were more important when anything else was uncertain."

"Uncertain?! I loved you from the beginning and you knew it! Insolent bastard—"

"I, at the least, have never come in any way near to infidelity. The same cannot be said for you."

"You really want to go over that again? You're the damned fool who wouldn't just come the hell home! Damned Vulcan stoicism!"

"Logic—"

"Logic my ass! You want to talk about logic when you can't think straight yourself right now? Look at us. Screaming at each other! What the hell are we doing? We don't do this!"

Then it would stop again, and they would make love again, and over and over and round and round. Different arguments, and the same arguments, all with the same result. They weren't getting anywhere because it had all been done and dealt with before, most of it, but maybe it was good just to do all of the shouting for once. It wasn't a usual thing for them. Sometimes Jim wondered if Bones's life philosophy of yelling at people when he felt like it wasn't healthier. At least it usually kept things out in the open.

By the fourth day or so the heatedness has burned itself out. Jim woke from their short rests more often than not with tears on his face again. This, at least, he was used to. It was never easier to cry than during this time. It had happened before. The first time he cried for Sam and his sister-in-law, and the time he and Spock lost because of what happened on that last mission—pent up emotions of years.

"Your son is dead…because of me…" Spock managed, in a more lucid moment.

Jim looked up from where he was huddled against his bondmate's chest, and this time there was a tear track across one side of the Vulcan's face. Just one. This, too, had happened before. Spock was half human. Even in the throes of Pon Farr he wasn't inclined to simply cry, but this had happened before. A few simple tears.

He reached to wipe away the dampness and to kiss his Vulcan's cheek where it had been.

"Not because of you. David died because the Klingons wanted Genesis. It isn't your fault."

"He died protecting myself, and Saavik."

"That was his choice. I think he loved Saavik. He almost told me, once."

When the haze began to clear Jim didn't know for certain how long it had been before it all began. He only knew the familiar feeling of the fog lifting.

This time, though, it was different. He could think clearly now, but there was still…something. It wasn't over. Not entirely. The closer bond to Spock remained, and it seemed troubled.

The chronometer by the bed had been on the floor where it fell for days. He leaned over the edge to find it and confirmed that it had been almost six days now, since the night the Pon Farr began. That was a usual length of time. What was it that tugged at him?
Jim shook his head to clear it further. He was about to turn over towards his bondmate when a pained gasp came from behind him. As a result he spun too quickly, was dizzy for a moment, and had to clear his head again.

"Spock?" he asked anxiously. "Spock, what is it?"

The Vulcan was half curled in on himself, facing away, but at his husband's voice Spock twisted slowly onto his back again and swallowed. "I do not know…"

He was sweating. That was usually strange for a Vulcan, though not in Pon Farr. This, however, did not seem like the effects of Pon Farr. Spock had confirmed as much by what he had said.

Jim asked again anyway, because he didn't want there to be a crisis now. He'd had enough of crisis. He didn't know if he could handle another crisis. "What do you mean you don't know? Do you need me? What—?"

Spock shook his head stiffly, jerkily. "No. I—it is not the Pon Farr. I…no longer burn." The breath he took between sentences was labored, and he did not seem especially willing to admit what he said next. "There is pain."

"What kind of pain? Where?"

"Not a place…just pain." He gasped again, more pronounced this time.

Jim was beginning to panic now. Or he would have if he weren't trained not to. He climbed out of the bed as quickly as he could, snatched a robe flung over a nearby chair, and came around the bed to his husband's side. "What do you mean it's not a place? You can't mean it's everywhere?"

He knelt at the side of the bed, and when he did Spock turned on his side again. It was clear he was trying to force himself not to curl up, but he was doing it to some extent anyway. Jim's heart beat faster, and he realized he was afraid. What's happening? What's wrong with him? Oh god, I lost him twice; I can't do it again. I really would die.

"Spock?" he questioned again. The Vulcan hadn't answered yet.

"Jim…something is wrong," Spock said then, instead if an answer. And it had to be true that the lingering effects of the Pon Farr were still preventing him from using any Vulcan techniques to control any pain, but even if he could have done that he would not have said something were wrong unless he were certain it was.

"What can I do?"

"I do not know." Spock tried to shake his head. He stopped instead and closed his eyes tightly.

"All right…all right, I'll call someone. Just hold on."

"Leonard…"

Jim was already halfway to his feet, and he paused. "What?"

"Leonard…Doctor McCoy…"

He hesitated. "Is that a good—is it all right to…?"

Spock nodded minutely and was silent again, apparently trying to control his breathing now.

Jim didn't ask anymore questions. He hurried out into the main room to a computer console and beeped for the line to Bones's family home in Georgia. Not that there was anyone there now save for Bones himself. There's hadn't been for a while, as far as Jim knew.

He waited for what seemed like forever, and for a frightening moment he was certain McCoy wasn't going to answer. The fears returned. There were other doctors, even plenty of other doctors here on Earth who had experience with Vulcan physiology. But as much as he complained about it, there was no one who knew more about Spock himself than Leonard McCoy. And Spock, of course, was different. He wasn't only Vulcan.

Besides all of that, Jim wanted Bones to pick up because he just wanted Bones to pick up.

"The hell, Jim? It's a perfect afternoon for a walk and you catch me on the way out the door. This had better be good."

His throat clogged when Bones was suddenly there, on the screen, glaring at him in that mock annoyance of his that looked impressively not so mock at all.

"Bones…god, you have no idea how glad I am to see you, but that's not why I—something's wrong. Something's wrong with Spock. I-I need you. We need you."

That brought the doctor up short immediately, and he was all business.

"What do you mean wrong?"

"I mean he's in pain, and he shouldn't be. It's nothing he can identify. It's nowhere he can identify. I don't understand it, either. I've never seen him like this. Except maybe at Deneva, but he has no control right now so it can't be as awful as that, thank god."

"Why doesn't he have any control?"

Jim made a face, and glanced down at the robe that was all he was wearing. Thankfully he'd remembered to tie it before running out here. "His body was…confused, maybe, from being regenerated. We don't know. But he went into Pon Farr a few days ago, and we were fine until it was wearing off—then this. I don't think it's related and neither does he, but it's not helping, either."

McCoy just stared at him for a few seconds, trying to take all of that in. "Damnit…all right. I'll be there as soon as I can," he said finally.

Jim relaxed a little—enough for it to be visible, at least, he was sure. "Thank you…Bones…"

"Don't get wishy-washy on me, Jim. Just take care of him until I get there."

He opened his mouth to answer, but a brief shout came from the bedroom. It wasn't much, but it was enough to shove his heart into his throat. On the screen Jim saw movement out of the corner or his eyes as he looked quickly toward the door. When he glanced back Bones looked as pale as he felt.

"I—" Jim began.

"Go. I'm on my way."

The transmission cut off from the doctor's end and Jim was back in the bedroom before he was aware he'd moved.

"Spock?" There was a new moan from the bed, and Jim climbed back into it and gathered his bondmate into his arms and against him. "I'm here…and Bones is coming. He'll be here as quickly as he can. You know he will. Should we really just sit here, though? Shouldn't we take you somewhere?"

Spock shook his head against Jim's shoulder, and the human held his Vulcan more closely and worried. "I love you…"

Nothing they'd said in the heat of the Pon Farr mattered anymore. It had hardly mattered then. There was nothing more to be said now, other than the truth; the truth that they had been to hell and back and they'd been shaken and cracked, but they weren't broken.

The answer came in Jim's mind, certain through the pain and anything else. I love you, Jim.