Title: Asclepius Revisited
Author: Still Waters
Fandom: Star Trek TOS
Disclaimer: Not mine. Just playing, with love and respect to those who brought these characters to life.
Summary: 76 McCoy episodes. 76 McCoy-centric reflections, codas, and missing scenes.
Notes: My apologies for the long hiatus. This project is certainly going to be a long term one! After spending over a year and a half in a very time intensive job, I'm hoping to achieve a balance again in my new position. While watching "The Arena", I found myself focusing on touch, particularly how McCoy keeps his hands in contact with the captain's chair just before, and during, the time the Metrons make contact and start showing video of what's going on between Kirk and the Gorn. There is a brief moment where McCoy and Spock brush hands, followed by McCoy's hand trailing after Spock's on the armrest of the chair that grabbed my attention and led to this chapter. As always, I hope I did the characters justice. Thank you for reading and thank you to all who have continued to follow this series over the years. I truly appreciate your support.
16.
No matter how advanced human society became, the need for touch remained a constant. Whether its purpose was tactical or therapeutic, conscious or unconscious, physically stabilizing or emotionally grounding, touch was a cornerstone of humanity.
McCoy was no exception.
Surrounded by the unexpected shells of buildings on Cestus 3, the acrid smell of burnt construction mixed with early organic decay, McCoy allowed Kirk to take his arm and pull him in the direction of Spock's tricorder reading. The physician understood that Kirk's initial touch was to keep McCoy close to the group in hostile territory, knowing McCoy's penchant for rushing toward the ill or injured without thought of his own safety. Which McCoy did, of course, hurrying ahead of the team as soon as his eyes found the survivor more accurately than any further tricorder reading could have. But within a Captain's tactile focus on physical safety was an equally important emotional connection; a few seconds of contact with the warmth of life, the reassurance of a friend's steady presence in the midst of uncertainty and death. It was the same duality McCoy sensed in Spock's touch when the first explosion hit. Throwing himself over the lone survivor, McCoy maintained his protective position in preparation for another blast. With the dust settling around them, Spock moved to Kirk's side, passing McCoy with a light, but solid hand on the physician's back; the brief touch simultaneously the Vulcan officer taking a headcount, and the human checking in on a friend.
Within the heightened sensory input of routine visit turned battlefield medicine, McCoy drew as much strength and comfort from the touch of his friends as he gave.
As a physician, McCoy was no stranger to physical touch. With the injured man, his touch began as clinical - tricorders and hypos and quick, concise assessments to his commanding officer. Shock, radiation burns, internal injuries….even with medicine as advanced as it was, McCoy could only do so much out in the field. So while Kirk, Spock, and the away team began assessing the tactical situation, McCoy brought his touch back to the basics, to the old days of country medicine, to parents and sick children in the middle of the night, far from hospitals and clinics. He began gently wiping the man's face with a cloth - a touch partly the clinician removing dirt and grime to better assess lacerations and radiation burns, partly the simple reassurance of human touch to a man lying injured and alone against stone and sand; a memory of a loved one's hand behind a cool cloth on a fevered brow, a touch as important as any antipyretic. A sense of security that brought light to the darkest of places – from the unexplored reaches of space to a childhood closet on a stormy night.
People often forgot the importance of touch to a human's sense of security outside of childhood. It was easy to picture children holding onto a loved one's leg, or gripping a special blanket or toy during upheavals in routine - from storms, new schools, and new homes, to divorce, war, and death. White-knuckled fingers grasping that person or object in a desperate attempt to ground themselves, to try to connect with who or what was missing, to try to make some sense of the chaos, to find a speck of hope that all would be all right.
After years in medicine, McCoy understood that the need for tactile reassurances of security didn't expire with age. The sickbay team kept a mental file of what brought crewmembers comfort, compiled from casual observations over time. So while it wouldn't be found in the patient's medical chart, a certain crewmember recovering from surgery would wake up to find their well-worn prayer beads at the bedside. Another would find their personal quilt, passed down for generations, on the bed during a painful dressing change, or a photo of their baby daughter to kiss before going to sleep. McCoy employed and received touch every day in his professional life, but hadn't given much thought to his own personal use of tactile security in years.
Until the Metrons took Jim.
Hovering near the captain's chair on the Bridge, Kirk's presence tied to the chair even when he wasn't physically in it, McCoy and Spock, with varying levels of frustrated helplessness, did the only thing they could do: wait. McCoy found himself keeping both hands on the back of the chair, even as it sat empty, his left hand keeping contact even as he gestured with his right. When Spock turned the chair to sit down, McCoy's hands stayed in place, guiding the chair back to midline with Spock in it. As the Metrons made contact and McCoy moved to the front of the chair, his left hand kept contact along the chair's back, then along its side, briefly losing contact before being pulled back again by an unspoken need, ending with a grip on the edge of the armrest as he appealed to the aliens to let life prevail. While the Metrons spoke, his hand slowly drifted backwards on the armrest, coming to lay on the communication console he had initially skipped over, closer to Spock's arm – nearly brushing up against the uniform fabric, but not crossing that invisible line.
It was Spock who, consciously or not, initiated the contact - something that McCoy always made sure to allow.
As the Metrons began video of the planet below and Spock pushed forward to stand, his right hand brushed against McCoy's left. McCoy's face never left the screen as he shifted his hand to the inner aspect of the armrest, following just behind Spock's, moving forward along the dark fabric until coming to rest at its empty edge. He barely felt himself doing it. Whether McCoy was unconsciously seeking the touch of a physically present friend while keeping his hand on the chair and the absent friend it represented, or whether he was subtly guiding Spock forward as he often guided Kirk, he couldn't say. All he knew is that it wasn't until Spock was no longer touching the chair, and that Kirk showed up on the screen, that McCoy was able to break contact, hands at his sides and back to the chair.
When Kirk was returned to the ship, McCoy couldn't keep the grin off of his face. In a spaceship regulated by tight atmospheric control, the entire crew could feel the room get warmer, the air lighter, once their Captain was returned. Satisfied with his initial visual inspection of Kirk's well-being, McCoy reached the command chair first, gladly taking up one of his usual posts, placing both hands on the back of the chair just as he had with Spock. But unlike the worry and tension in his hands during Kirk's absence, McCoy's relief was palpable, the joy plain on his face at the sight of Jim in his chair and Spock at his side. McCoy looked down at Kirk and moved his left hand to rest on his friend's shoulder - the touch a clinical check, a friend's relief, a child's reassurance, and a faithful man's gratitude for an answered prayer, all in a few seconds' contact.
With a smile still on his face, McCoy left the Bridge for sickbay, reflecting on touch, security, and friendship. On the growing connection between himself, Kirk, and Spock that led to a largely subconscious need to be in physical contact with those two men over the last several hours, either physically or symbolically.
As he reached sickbay, McCoy's grin grew even wider. His world was restored. The elevator doors had closed to the sound of Kirk and Spock talking. The sickbay doors were opening to the sound of Christine and Mara laughing.
And as he took a breath to join them, the air really did feel lighter.