Jim half carried Spock to the bed, easing him down into the soft blankets and pulling the coverlet over his naked body, before returning to the fresher to hang the towel and tap off lights.

As Spock settled deep into the blankets, burying his face in a soft pillow, he listened to the soft hum of the engines in the wall. The low, multicolored lights of the traditional Vulcan sculpture in the corner of the room shone dim, casting the space in long shadows. His breathing slowed, and a sense of calm gradually took over in the wake of the trembling anxiety that had troubled him before. He could not deny the comfort he took in these simple trappings – the warm blankets, the soft pillow, the sensation of being wrapped up in the coverings; protected.

Jim returned from the other room, a glass of water and a plate of something in hand.

"Here," he said, "You should try to eat something. You haven't eaten all day."

Spock rolled over in bed, sitting up against the pillows. He did not argue. Jim was right, and now that he had directed his attention to it, a gnawing hunger twisted in his belly.

He took a sip of the water, and accepted a wheat cracker directly into his mouth from Jim's own hand. At any other time, perhaps he would have recoiled at being hand fed like an incompetent child, but at the moment he did not have it in him to protest. After the momentary reprieve he had initially experienced from the comforting surroundings of his own quarters, his own bed, he now felt the undeniable twinge of anxiety pressing in again at the corners of his mind.

He chewed the cracker and accepted another, almost eagerly. He was quite hungry, after all.

Jim smiled. "Would you like something else? Maybe some of that soup you like?"

"Yes," Spock nodded. "Perhaps I could eat some."

"Good," said Jim, stooping to kiss Spock's forehead before disappearing into the other room again. Spock listened to the sound of the food synthesizer working, and leaned back into the pillows, closing his eyes. The anxious feeling was growing again, and concentrate though he might, he found himself unable to suppress it.

The synthesizer had fallen silent. Spock opened his eyes to find Jim standing across the room, a tray laden with a bowl of plomeek soup and a hunk of bread in his hands. The man's face was a mixture of surprise and concern.

"Ah, Spock?"

"Jim?" Spock said, his voice trembling with the renewed tremor now shuddering through his body again. "Is something wrong?"

Jim seemed to mentally shake himself, and approached the side of the bed, setting down the tray on the night stand. "No, Spock it's fine."

Only now did Spock glance down, intending to smooth the coverlet. Instead, he was shocked to realize his sexual organ was misbehaving again. He had effectively accomplished something he once heard Jim lightheartedly refer to as, 'pitching a tent.'

His knees impulsively jumped to his chest again, and he wrapped his arms around them as he had done before in the tub. His cheeks burned green and he hid his face in the blanket. "Ah—I am sorry, Jim! I did not mean to—" he stammered, humiliated.

Jim chuckled at his side, dipping a spoon into the soup. "It's okay, Spock. We knew that was going to happen eventually, didn't we?"

Spock nodded furiously, his face still pressed hard into his trembling knees. "Yes," he said, his voice muffled in the blankets. "But not yet—it is not yet time…"

He could hear the sound of Jim shuffling dishes around, and glanced over to see the captain placing a cover over the bowl of soup. Jim turned to him then, smiling warmly, before sitting down on the edge of the bed. He bent over, tugging out of his boots, and shifted closer, rolling over onto one side to face Spock.

"Spock," he said softly, "I know this is all… a little overwhelming for you."

Spock hugged his knees closer, now visibly quaking with nerves. Inwardly, he cursed his own body, that it should betray him like this, that he should be so completely incapable of his usual calm and composure, that his penis and his own biological imperative should have so much sway over his involuntary bodily reactions. It went against everything being Vulcan represented – control, logic, the importance of the mind over the body – and yet, he knew, this was perhaps the most Vulcan imperative of all. He could not ignore it and he could not avoid it. It was happening and the alternative was a slow and painful death by adrenaline overload.

And then when he thought things could not possibly get any worse, he began to cry.

Jim's arms went around him and pulled Spock close, tucking his face into the curve of Jim's shoulder. "Hey now, we don't need any of that…" he said, rubbing Spock's back in a steady, comforting motion. "Shhhh…"

His breath came in gasps, and he buried his face in Jim's shoulder as if he could melt into it, never to be seen again. That he should feel so vulnerable and ashamed even now, after so many years of calling this man his friend – after clasping hands and saying out loud in so many words exactly how they felt for one another –that he should still fear this, after everything they had shared already? It was illogical.

But of course this was an entirely new and different thing – a thing that Spock had dreaded his entire life.

He had never craved sex the way so many others seemed too, especially the humans that surrounded him in his everyday life on the Enterprise. And far from passing judgment against them for their wants and desires, he simply never could relate to the drive. It was an alien thing. He had no interest in any of it.

Until the pon farr. Until that biological imperative took over every other bodily system, cancelling out every other need.

He hated it. The entire affair. It was disgusting. Un-Vulcan. Unseemly.

"Spock?"

He looked up to find Jim watching him, a concerned expression on his face, his hazel eyes gleaming in the soft light. "Are you all right?"

"No," he managed to say in a shaky whisper. "I mean, yes."

Jim cocked one doubtful eyebrow in reply.

"That is," Spock struggled to find the correct words. "I am not, but I shall be. Allow me a moment to compose myself, please."

"Well," Jim said, "Why don't you try eating some of this soup while you get composed?"

So they sat there, huddled together in bed, while Jim fed him soup and Spock gradually stopped shaking.