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Emotionally Compromised
Ch. 5
It was nearly evening, ship-time, before McCoy found Shahtau again.
She wasn't on-ship, though. She was on-station. Which meant McCoy had to beam over -- an action that never left him all bright and chipper and filled with tra-la-la and hey-nonny-nonny.
"Y' do know I arranged a room for you on the Enterprise, don't you?" he said, arms crossed as he confronted her. She was sitting on a park bench in a green belt. She had been watching Toto run after one of the pervasive rats that had followed man into space and taken up whatever niches were available -- in this case the rat seemed to think it might be a squirrel or a pigeon.
That was all she had been doing until McCoy materialized a few feet away, looked around till he spotted her, and stomped on over.
"No," she replied, reasonably. "It will make things much more convenient, though. I'm going to be with you awhile longer."
He looked more dour than ever. "You worked things out with Uhura and Spock, then?"
She frowned. "I suppose. We are in alliance. But I am afraid the Enterprise is going to be forced to remain here at the space station for an indefinite period of time." She didn't look pleased.
Unfortunately McCoy, being tra-la-la deficient himself, failed to note the symptoms of incipient death by depressive collapse. "What 'indefinite period of time'? Until you…until I get to congratulate you all on an incoming generation of green blooded Spock-spawn?"
"Well that would be one resolution to the current situation," she replied, seeming to miss the acid of his reaction entirely. She put her elbows on her knees, her chin in her hands, and stared down at the toes of her travel boots. "I am not sure it would be a better resolution than many others. But it would be significantly better than I suspect I am going to get." She sat in silence for a moment, and then added, "It has been an exceptionally difficult day."
"Tell me about it. I don't know about yours, but mine has been spent dealing with an outbreak of a new strain of Andorean mumps, thanks to one of the doctors here on the station catching a patient who was chock full of virus. Full scale epidemiological red alert throughout the quadrant. Testing crew members to see if any had come in contact. Working with all the med crews locally to develop containment plans. You know if you get the stuff your gonads swell up like avocados and the insides turn just as green and mushy. Same with your neck glands, but that just hurts like hell. The gonad thing can leave you sterile. Just so you know how much I care, I thought about giving you a case just long enough to let you opt out of the elder's Plan B-for-Breeding program…but decided you deserved better." He managed to make it sound like he regretted the decision. He also made it pretty clear he thought he held the winning hand in a game of winner-take-all Rotten Day Poker.
He was not prepared to have her look up, suddenly hopeful. "Oh, could you?" she asked. "That might solve everything. Or, no," she added, and slumped down again. "I'd be fine, but that poor boy and Nyota would still have to deal with the elders, and they'd just send Tsla or worse." She thought about it, and then said tentatively, "Damn."
He never did know if it was the "damn" or his own outrage that she was even remotely willing to consider contracting Andorian Mumps just to get out of her situation that finally forced him to realize she was as depressed as he was grouchy. "Damn? I didn't know Vulcans swore."
"We don't, generally. But humans seem to get such a lot of comfort out of it, I thought I would try. I must be doing something wrong, though. You seem to enjoy it much more than I did."
He sighed, and squatted on his heels, looking at her in dismay. "Ah, hell, Schatzi. That just screws the pooch. Unless I'm completely blind my guess is you had an even worse day than I did…which sucks because I don't get to feel righteous and I have to feel sorry for you."
She quirked her eyebrows high. "'Screws the pooch'?"
"Nothin' to do with that black mop -- and you'd better call him back or that rat is going to have puppy chow for dinner, and I don't mean chow for puppies I mean chow of puppies. It's just a figure of speech, Schatzi. Like 'takes the cake' only it pretty much always means that bad just got a whole lot worse."
"Then, yes, I believe my day has 'screwed the pooch'," she said, fishing in the folds of her tunic. She pulled out a small ball, whistled until she caught Toto's attention, then tossed the ball in a direction well away from the rat. The little terrier went bounding after it, searching for it in the long grass at the verge of the green belt. "Without first consulting with me, Spock sent a message to the elders on Kaiidth refusing to take part in their, what did you call it? B-for-Breeding program? In return they have filed a formal accusation of treason against him, have demanded that the Enterprise be held up until they can come and hold a hearing, and are threatening to lay associated charges against anyone believed to be 'aiding, abetting, or giving comfort.' I believe that they might consider you, me, Nyota, your captain, and possibly every living thing Spock has ever come in contact with to qualify for suspicion on those terms. Oh -- they are debating whether the appropriate penalty is death or life imprisonment."
"You are joking, aren't you? Vulcans are non-violent, logical, and, and…."
She met his eyes and he suddenly realized she was not just depressed, she was furious. "Vulcans, and I include myself, are a bunch of barely civilized madmen a mere centimeter from ripping your lungs out for the way your hair is combed. And that was before Vulcan died. Len, unless I have missed some vital element of Earth history, you ought to be able to understand that when a cataclysm the magnitude of Vulcan's destruction occurs a certain amount of paranoia, reactive hysteria, acting out, and general mayhem is likely to ensue. Consider it to be ensuing here, now, and in wrap-around holovision."
To which he responded in his inimitable genius fashion, "You called me 'Len.'"
"I think you have failed to understand the true significance of what I just said."
"No, I got it: Vulcans are crazy, the elders are setting up torture chambers and planning witch hunts, and you called me 'Len.'"
Toto trotted up carrying his ball, which he dropped exactly halfway between McCoy and Shahtau. McCoy absently picked it up and tossed it over his shoulder, sending the terrier off on another hunt. The smile on his face was quite obviously completely unassociated with the dog.
Shahtau sighed. "Perhaps you could tell me which of those has the highest priority rating in your world?"
"You called me 'Len.'"
"It is your name."
"Yeah. But I knew you were just jerking my chain with all that 'Leonard McCoy' business. Even Vulcans aren't that literal minded. I just…I figured you weren't ever gonna let down the joke and call me…just…" The words he wanted to say -- that the intimacy of his own, real name, not 'Bones' or the friendly joke she had made of his full name, was as heady as a double shot of high proof whiskey taken straight up -- were too dangerous to say, even now. Maybe especially now.
She put her hands over her face. "Oh, Len. Don't you understand? Spock and Nyota and my womb and I are in the middle of what may turn out to be the biggest diplomatic disaster of the past five hundred years or more. I do not see any way out of it that leaves any of us with our lives or reputations intact -- or that leaves my people with even a shard of respect or honor. Compared to this my affection for you is of remarkably little importance."
"To everyone but you and me. And did you really just say you have affection for me?"
"You realize I feel affection for Toto, too, and he is not only a dog, but neutered?"
"It's a place to start. I gotta admit I hope to work my way up from there…"
"Len, you have only known me a day. This is not love, it is infatuation."
"Yeah. I hope to work my way up from that, too."
She stood and strode down the walk, whistling for Toto, leaving McCoy to scramble to his feet and hurry after her. He had no sooner brought himself up even with her than she began to speak.
"Leonard McCoy, there are times, places, and reasons for not giving in to one's emotions…and rules of wisdom that indicate when one is being a fool. Among those rules is to never, ever become dangerously involved with a healer when he thinks you are in need of healing -- and for a healer to never, ever allow himself to become…emotionally… involved with a patient. It is too easy to confuse the nature of healing with the nature of the bonds of true relationship. Further, it is too easy to build the storm of injury into a relationship, making it impossible to maintain balance unless a level of pain and despair is held constant. Hurt and comfort are quite addictive, but they constitute a terrible basis for a long-term bond."
He pushed on a bit faster until he was ahead of her, and turned into her path, reaching for her shoulders. Stopping her, he shook her gently. "I know that, sugar. Really. I do. I know this is the wrong time, and I know I have to stay back right now…just the way I knew I had to walk away last night. But come on, darlin', at least let me hope a little."
"Len, you are going to wake up some morning and realize you have made the most terrible mistake."
"Maybe. Lord knows I've done it before. But tell me, if we get through this, and maybe get through a bit more than this -- say wait a couple months to see how the dust settles? -- and you got a recorded letter from me…would you be happy about it?"
"I am Vulcan. Vulcans are not 'happy'."
"Hell you say." He shook his head and sighed. "Ok. Let it go for now. You've got enough on your plate. Just think about it, Schatzi, ok?" She hesitated, then nodded, briefly. "Good. And you'll let me be your friend while this goes down?"
She nodded again.
They walked silently together for a time.
"Len?" she said, eventually.
"Yeah?"
"Please listen. You are not -- now -- in love with me. You are infatuated, but you do not actually know me. I am not…I do not yet know you, either. What we share, and I will not deny we do share something, is at best a prelude, and at worst an illusion built out of loneliness and hope mingled with minor appreciation. Would you consider this a fair assessment?"
He stomped along beside her, wishing he could break into full Southern-gentleman verses of poetry, convincing them both that he was in love, pure love, love incomparable, love divine. Unfortunately he was a pessimist, a realist, and too damned honest for his own good. After a minute he sighed. "Yeah. Fair enough."
"Good. Then you will understand my caution. But…if we do find a way out, and we do have time to think, and understand ourselves better, and at some point I receive a recorded letter from you…then yes. I would be happy."
Unable to find a word to say, he slipped his hand into hers.
Her fingers wrapped around his and held on.
It was enough. Even after they beamed up he still felt a bit of tra-la-la and hey-nonny-nonny.
***
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These are the truths that cannot be said, the feelings as tightly guarded as a Vulcan's passions:
The tears shed at a father's slow and brutal death, tied to a machine that would not allow him to die properly. More tears shed over years at the many lives lost, in spite of the best care McCoy could provide. More, still -- a river of tears -- cried in long, humid summer nights waiting for the divorce he knew he'd earned to conclude, praying it would come, praying it would never come. The shame and the anger at the mistakes he had made but could not bring himself to apologize for, because life is hard and love rare and kindness a grace when it is given freely, and his lover had given great kindness when his wife had not.
The truth of the bottle: knowing he hovered, always, just short of abuse. The truth of the blade: knowing that every day he did something wrong, because no eye can be perfect, no hand completely stable, no diagnosis infallible, no medication foolproof.
He knew himself better than he ever would say, knew his own flaws and failings, knew his own needs. He knew he was warded by sharp words and sharper wit; that he cut deepest those he admired most. That the loneliness bored into him like maggots in dead flesh. The pain was so bad that all it took sometimes was a flash of warmth, a shared laugh to send his heart spinning out of control, less stable than when he'd been ten years old and so mad for a long-legged girl named Irene that his throat would close up and his heart pound just to see her run across the softball field to catch a fly ball.
He knew right now he was in love with love.
But, he thought, what better thing to be in love with?
Maybe, someday, if he was lucky, the love he loved would be the right love. He hoped so. It was damned lonely in here with his truths.
End Ch. 5