As Jim and Scotty tried to make their way to engineering, the erratic movements of the ship and constant strain to keep upright overwhelmed his exhausted body, causing him to double over and vomit without warning as they rounded the corridor, as soon as it was out of him the ship twisted again and the two were literally hanging onto the walkway railing for their lives. As the ship continued rolling they somehow managed to reach engineering.

Jim was ready to collapse and/or vomit again when they finally stopped to breath as they waited for Checkov to get to the manual over-ride and re-initiate the stabilisers, so at least the ship could stop rolling. When the computer announced that the over-ride failed due to a misalignment he got a boost of energy – it may have been survival instinct pushing his body further, or he may have been going on adrenaline simply because now he was pissed and ready for this nightmare to end. Whatever the reason, he found himself heading to the radiation containment doors. He was about to go charging in to fix things when he realized he was talking to someone, someone who, despite telling the captain all the reasons not too, was going to follow him. No. No one was going to die helping him. He would only risk his own life, not his crews or his friends.

After securing scotty into a nearby chair he entered the chamber.

The climb was hot and difficult on a normal day, but with a spinning ship and an exhausted, battered body it took longer than he wanted it too. Dehydration, low blood sugar, low blood oxygen levels, and low blood pressure meant he had to pause and force himself to breathe to clear the spots dancing around his blurring vision, but eventually he made it. It took literally everything he had to keep holding himself up while pushing his muscles to put force behind his kicks. Finally, just as he was about to pass out, the bloody heads aligned. He would have passed out with a smile on his face if he had not been thrown from his spot as an electrical charge shot him as the warp core fired up.

His back broke as he hit a large cable during his fall. Coming too all he felt was heat and pain. He commando crawled himself through the access tube to the decon chamber just as Spoke approached.

He knew it wasn't going to take long for him to die. Radiation aside, his whole body had been injured, it was broken and bleeding internally, and it was getting much harder to breath. He couldn't be treated until he had been decontaminated, but his body wasn't going to last that long.

He was dying. He knew it. And, for the first time in his life, he was not ready. He got to tell Spock what he needed to say, but not anyone else…and not Bones

Bones didn't believe it when he got the med call. They were able to remove kirks body when the chamber doors opened, but decon was designed for people wearing protective suits, his body was still heavily irradiated so it had to be put straight into a biohazard containment pod so he could be safely removed from engineering.

Upon seeing his friends lifeless body the reality hit him and for a moment he forgot he was Dr McCoy – CMO and medical professional; he was just Bones, and the loss of his best friend was too much. He wanted to scream, cry, break something, anything. Taking a seat to regain himself he heard a noise, then seen the previously dead Tribble move. It was alive! Kahns blood revived it – but how? Scratch that, who cares, maybe he can save Jim!? It was a hail Mary and he knew it, but he had to try.

A quick scan indicated Kirk had died from his internal injuries – not the radiation, so if they could remove the radiation and repair Jim's injuries he might actually have a chance! They just needed to put him into stasis to stop the effects of the radiation progressing, while they worked out how to get enough of Kahn's blood into him to regenerate Jim's broken body. They also needed to figure out how to remove the radiation from all his cells (that was going to be the tricky bit).

To be continued in a follow-up fic 'Shinedown Series: I'll Follow You'
Hope you liked it.
I have been away from the writing for years so I am a bit rusty but hopefully the story was OK
Thank you for reading
- DA