"Oh, my," Ziggy muttered as he looked at Captain James T. Kirk. Even in his sedated state, the man reached out blindly muttering Spock's name until the Vulcan went by his bedside and held his hand. Ziggy followed behind him slowly, not fully wrapping his head around the situation. So they had gotten together, reconciled at least, that was good. "Hmm… so what exactly happened?"

"He went ape shit that's what happened," Doctor McCoy said as he walked into the room to check up on the Captain. Ziggy turned to the doctor with a raised eyebrow. "That eyebrow don't work on me, mister! I know who you are and what you did and I don't like it. Therefor I don't like you. Now, you just get Jim better cuz I damn well can't figure out what happened and then scurry off back to your planet."

"I can assure you Doctor," Ziggy said as he neared Jim, his hands fanned out in front of him inches away from Jim's face. "I had nothing to do with this." He turned to Spock. "Can you tell me what happened or shall I infer?"

"Ji- Captain Kirk was found unconscious in his quarters three point one hours ago and taken to Sick Bay. Doctor McCoy informed me when the Captain was awake and I –"

"Yes, I know that," Ziggy interrupted. "What happened when you got here? How did this – him laying in a bio bed all dying like – happen?"

"Dying?" McCoy whispered. "He's dying?"

"Or eternally sleeping, have it your way. The point is, I need to know what happened. What led to his collapse?"

"He was recalling events that have not happened in this time line," Spock said. "Incidents that occurred in a time line that was distorted and developed into this one. It is difficult to explain."

"He had no knowledge that he was mixing the two up?"

"No, he seemed rather ignorant of our comments. Insisted that the time line could repeat itself and would repeat itself no matter what."

Shit, Ziggy thought, this is bad. Too much powder, I must be loosing my touch. He turned away from the men and said, "Okay I'm going to need something from my cabin down in Anthea… a bottle... Mr Spock will you get it or shall I?"

In the end it was McCoy who beamed down to the planet and trudged through the thick foliage until he found a cabin. Spock had wanted to come but his hand was occupied being Jim's pillow and that left McCoy to do the dirty and find whatever in hell the alien who caused all this needed. He had instructions to the cabin but somehow 'turn at the funny looking tree' and 'when you see a pink seashell facing east, turn right' wasn't very helpful.

But he found it eventually. But that's where the tricky thing began. Ziggy had no idea what this bottle looked like. All he could remember was some strange voodoo crap about it glowing the brightest against skin but being the darkest to the eye. If you asked McCoy the alien was playing them. He would rather be back on the Enterprise on their way to Vulcan with a mind healer, that is what Jim needed after, his mind healed. Spock had rejected that idea of course, not wanting to be the cause of breaking everyone's shore leave. McCoy suspected it had more to do with his father than anything but he wasn't one to pry into a Vulcan's business.

The moment he walked into the cabin, he knew he was fucked. Hundred and hundred of bottles were shelved along the walls and there were more of them in cabinets in practically every surface. A few even hung from the ceiling via thin glowing pieces of rope. There were different colours too. Some were white and dusty looking, whilst other were dark and smooth. He touched a few and felt the weight difference as well as the texture. Some were little tiny bottles, other giant industrial size bottles.

"This is gonna take a while…"

Meanwhile, Spock held on to Jim's hand for dear life. It didn't matter that in Vulcan this was considered heavy petting or that Ziggy was intently watching their joined hands. All that mattered was Jim's safety and nothing more.

"When did you know?" Ziggy asked from across the room, his long legs draped over the arm of his chair. Spock turned to him and blinked. Ziggy tried again, rubbing his face and running his hands through his coloured hair. "When did you know that you loved him?"

The way Ziggy said loved, his tongue on his top lip and the slight twitch on the right side of his lip, but answered nonetheless. He had nothing to hide anymore. "I knew the moment I touched him during our fight on the deck. He was trying to emotionally compromise me by bringing up my recently diseased mother into our fight. He succeeded and I reacted on instinct. I attacked him and managed to choke him again the console." Spock looked at Jim. "I felt heat coming from him. Vulcan's have a higher body temperature so I knew that the possibility of Jim's body heat to be higher than mine was unlikely. I looked into his mind and saw images of many things - unspeakable, wondrous things. I have not been the same since then."

"That was… more than I expected but also very helpful," Ziggy said. "I think I know what's wrong and I think only you can fix our dear captain once the good doctor returns."