"Damn it Mr. Scott, I'm a doctor, not a park ranger! What in the world do you think I could possibly add to this damn machine that would actually help!?"
"Please Dr. McCoy, if you'll just sit down and input the biochemical signature- I don't actually trust the one programmed into it. For all I know, an intern may have plugged it in."
McCoy rebutted, "I happen to know the man who wrote them and he is most certainly not anyone's intern!"
"Alright, alright, your friend did it- fine. Fine. But don't come cryin' to me days from now when this ionic mess clears up and we find two bodies instead of executive officers!"
Mr. Scott was just a wee bit irked by the doctor's uncooperative behavior of the past few days. Yeah, basically that had been going on for days. Plural. Sad actually.
Now though, there was a moment of silence.
McCoy chanced a caustic glance at the machine's input terminal. His semi-permanent scowl deepened as he spoke, "I hope you've been wasting your time in more productive ways."
"Dr. McCoy, I've tried explaining the intricacies of locating an away team, keeping a constant safe distance from the planet whilst basically piloting the whole damn ship myself! You cannae sustain an orbit and stay exactly above the last spot someone the size of a germ was spotted without a very gentle touch. Autopilot just doesn't cut it!"
"Alright, Mr. Scott! By your standards I'll bet the medbay staff doesn't cut it!"
Scotty held his breath, hoping the doctor wasn't about to flee. This was the closest to help he'd gotten out of the troubled man since the search and rescue team was... lost.
McCoy shook his head, one hand attempting to smooth out the ever deeper worry lines running the width of his forehead. "I take it you've already bent M'Benga's ear?"
"Yes- yes I have, and he was very helpful, but-" he touched his nose in a nervous twitch. "Although he's spent time in the field - if you will - with the Vulcans in the... Vulcan baby hospitals or whatever," Mr. Scott shifted his feet, McCoy's fiery stare just a wee bit disconcerting. "You know what I mean!" The doc nodded, expression unchanged.
"Well, good. Uh, so- M'Benga is a great doctor - don't get me wrong -, but... you've," the engineer's face scrunched, "you've... worked with Mr. Spock longer! Oh god- is it hot in here?"
"Mr. Scott, the temperature is constant on this ship."
"Right. Righteo. So, M'Benga came down and recoded the scanner's outdated Vulcan bio signature search parameters but-"
"But our damned first officer's only half Vulcan."
Scotty gave a pained nod, hands tucked under opposite arms, looking almost as if he was giving himself a hug. "That is the problem exactly. You don't know how hard I've been working- I've pushed my team through two sleepless nights and we've still made no progress," the last word growled like a curse as he brought a thumbnail up to his overworked teeth. They needed a chew toy. "No progress at all."
His eyes refocused on the doctor. "We cannae scan through this blasted ionic disturbance yet, but I'll be damned before I give up an' leave Spock- Mr. Spock and Captain Kirk out there to die!"
Poor Mr. Scott. The head of an entire Federation star ship engineering department and he still had to do all the busy work himself.
McCoy's face finally broke. Not, though, the way Scotty expected it to.
McCoy's stringent scowl softened until the only ripples left were the wrinkles around his eyes. Then came the lopsided grin. "You mean: you'll be damned before you give up and leave Mr. Spock and Captain Kirk out there to kill each other. Because that's what would happen!"
The doctor had clearly gone mad with the stress. Scotty'd go so far as to say the man was showing signs of space madness; giggling and tearing at the eyes. It was really hard to catch early signs in yourself, even for a trained medical professional. Or so Scotty had heard.
Once.
In a bar back in Glasgow.
From a drunken Tellarite- on second thought; never mind.
"Mr. Scott, as chief medical officer aboard this ship, I prescribe a mandatory sleep cycle for you and your entire team." He raised a hand, cutting off any protests. "If I get word that any one of you crazy, self destructive bastards leaves your quarters before seven hours are up I will personally give the order to drug every last one of you."
Scotty took in a confused breath. "Wha-"
"Now shut up, man! Can't you see I'm in the middle of something important?!" With an ample huff, Dr. McCoy plopped himself into the provided chair and regarded the manual input PADD with a thick smothering of disdain. Then he grumbled, more to himself than the head of engineering, "Gotta find ourselves a crazy half Vulcan and his flesh colored punching bag."
"Doctor, I cannae stress how much this might end up expediting the search and let me-"
"Remember, Mr. Scott. Seven hours. Your entire team. I'm not joking about the drugs."
"Um, alright then. I'll leave you to it then... " He ducked a bit closer to McCoy, the doctor now taking out his frustrations on the projected keyboard instead of him. "All of them?"
Without breaking eye contact with the demon spawn of a machine into which he was busy downloading all of Spock's most personal information, he remarked, "You have ten minutes before the drugs come out, Mr. Scott."
"Ok," Scotty appeased, backing at warp speeds. "I'll uh- I'll be seeing you later... then. Good bye!" And all that remained of the head of engineering was a faint skid mark and the distant sound of frantic warnings.
McCoy cackled quietly. In his own mind. Cursing the while at the infernal machine to which he was handing over hard, hard won information. Information he was pretty sure the first officer would rather stayed confidential.
Vulcan's were infamous in there love of privacy and also for there ability to reap there revenge with a face completely devoid of unpleasant, gritty 'emotions'.
McCoy didn't want an angry half-Vulcan on his case but, on the other hand, he really didn't want a newly dead pair of pains in the asses. They were annoying enough alive.
Meanwhile, down on the surface of the planet, underneath the nigh on impenetrable pal of an upper atmospheric ionic storm, Jim Kirk and Mr. Spock had established a crude sort of dwelling with all the amenities of home. Though whose home, is anybody's guess… considering Starfleet wasn't in contact with many bipedal species who still called caves "home".
The one they found themselves in was halfway up a relatively steep hill. So...not prime real estate by most standards.
"Spock, are you sure this is the only thing we can eat?" The proud, captainly head of the starship Enterprise scrunched his nose and almost dumped the bowl out on the floor. The face his first officer displayed, looking like he'd failed his captain in an unforgivable kind of way, the only thing staying his tantrum.
"Reminds me of oatmeal," he added quietly, sneaking a peak to make sure the Vulcan no longer resembled a particularly pointy eared variety of kicked puppy.
He neglected to mention that oatmeal was among his least favorite wet foods known to man. Figured that wouldn't win him any field trip points.
"I assure you, Captain, that your meal is replete with nutrients guaranteed to keep a human in good health. In the short term. In the long term it will be necessary to widen your dietary intake to include cruciferous greens and citrus fruits, if at all possible."
"Mhm. Does the geo tricorder tell you whether this stuff you're feeding us will end up killing us? Or are you going off gut feeling on this one?"
Spock looked up sharply. "Gut feeling, Captain?"
"Yeah, when you get a feeling about a thing or... or situation as opposed to-," he paused to look at the Vulcan. "You've been living in a ship full of humans for years and you don't recognize the term 'gut feeling'?" Jim's brow quirked in curiosity.
"I simply had never heard it applied to such a situation. Captain." Jim watched as the chief science officer of the Starship Enterprise did his Vulcan best to not give off a very embarrassed green glow as he went back to fiddling with a stubbornly out of order, tiny medical tricorder. He wasn't too flustered to continue his explanation though.
"To answer your query; The geological tricorder analyzes the exact chemical composition of organic material and flora. From this raw data I am able to extrapolate the dietary density and values of the seemingly edible ground cover and therefore asses whether it is fit for human - or Vulcan - consumption.
"As to whether these things will kill us, you and I are prime examples of their influence."
The captain took a moment to poke at his slop before responding. "So... which of us was the guinea pig?" He made sure to catch Spock's reaction.
Brows above the brow ridge with an almost worried twist of the mouth.
"Captain?"
"Heh, it's a figure of speech, Spock. Just- never mind, alright? And," He tacked on, for the hell of it,"remind me never to let you perform surgery again. Your bedside manner is worse than Bones'."
"Captain, I would be relieved if the need never again arises."
Jim shook his head. "No," he pointed half-heartedly at his first officer and continued, "that's where you're supposed to say, 'You're welcome'." Then he shrugged, careful of his stitches. "Well, that's what Bones would say anyway."
The Vulcan hooked an eyebrow. "Why would I express tidings of welcome if I have not been thanked?" His features smoothed, then again grew quizzical as he took a moment to ponder the frailties of the human modes of expression. "You said I should never again perform surgery... Was I to take that as a form of 'thanks'?"
Jim's brow rose and fell as he sighed. "I guess not."
"Then I do not understand."
"That's ok, Spock. It was a joke- just, forget about it.
"On a completely separate note: Thanks for not leaving me behind." The captain took a second to pick at some irregularity in the weft of his mattress' cover. "I know the logical thing would have been to cut your losses and reserve the supplies; leave the dying guy behind but..."
"Captain, I assure you that the scenario you have just described is not at all logical. A first officer's main concern is the well being of their ship. What is a ship without its captain?" Jim looked over as Spock fiddled with the small device he was still holding. "Additionally, it would be irresponsible to leave anyone behind while there existed the possibility that they could be saved. It would be against the teachings of Surak and any morals that a Starfleet officer has sworn to uphold."
"Oh. Well, thanks anyway."
"No thanks are necessary, Captain, as I am sure that you would have done no less for any member of your crew had you found yourself in my position."
"Whatever," Jim huffed, as he laid back down. Spock was too busy being Spock to offer any kind of meaningful conversation, so he might as well get some more rest while the resting was good. Anyway, one more round with the preoccupied Vulcan was definitely going to bring his headache back full force. Jim wasn't looking forward to full force. So he took a nap instead.
Upon waking he was treated once again to the acrid scent of his new least favorite 'food'. The most unfortunate thing about the gruel like meal being the fact that it tasted the way it smelled and worse, half the time. Like drinking your own vomit out of an especially clean toilet.
"Captain, this is, regrettably, the only edible vegetation to be found in all the ground we have covered since our marooning. Further, it is rich in many of the minerals and enzymes necessary for sustaining humans and similar lifeforms." Spock offered. Assuring, or attempting to anyway, his patient of its intrinsic merits for the dozenth time in two days. Kind of creepy considering the guy was eating this stuff ten out of twelve times he'd given that lecture. With varying amounts and depths of detail. None of which made Jim one iota happier about having to eat it.
"Does it have a name or should I just call it 'shit'? Because this is, without a doubt, the worst stuff I have ever had the misfortune of subsisting off." At the raised eyebrow Spock sent his way he supplied, "You don't have to remind me of the spread at that one gaseous planet banquet we were required to show up and 'diplomat'. That stuff, I swear to god, had to be, literally, something's two day old feces. They even roasted the stuff. Gah!"
"Do I take it then, Captain," said Spock, a glimmer of what might have equated to the human emotion of hope in his eyes, "that this then, is somewhat more palatable?" The Vulcan's seeming earnest curiosity did nothing to quell Jim's misery. Nor his annoyance at his well meaning first officer. After all, the guy was trying to kill him with sensory repulsion. Who does that?
"I'm eating it. 'Nough said." Spock's glimmer burned out. Jim was a little less disgusted with the food for the next several minutes.
"Hey, Spock?" Jim asked, not looking up from the last dregs of gruel he was attempting to coax out of the crude bowl and into his revulsed mouth.
The stinking stuff had one thing going for it: Choke down enough of it and you wouldn't feel like you'd starve by nightfall.
"Yes, Captain?" Spock did look up.
"You can call me 'Jim'. Considering we might be stuck here a while." Spock looked about as worried over the prospect as he would were he just given the amiable invitation to 'jump off a cliff'. "Or not." Mumbling he tacked on an, "I should know better by now."
Then, remembering he'd meant to ask something, he looked up from his bowl.
"I've been wondering; you said we can't make any fire, right?" He received a nod. "Because the native fauna sniff out heat sources and attempt to eat any living thing that just so happens to be near it?" Another nod. "Alright. Then, how are you making this stuff?" He waved his empty bowl for unnecessary emphasis. "It's warm and goopy and I really, reeally hope it doesn't look like this when you find it." He tossed the bowl a few feet away, confident the sturdy thing wouldn't break. "And if it does, you are fired." He got an eyebrow raised in heavy doubt for his troubles. "Vulcans," he replied. Choosing to lay back, stare at the 'ceiling', and abandon the entire conversation. Knowing it would do him and his wants not one drop of good to continue.
Besides; Spock wasn't wrong when he mentioned the slop was keeping him alive. He could almost feel the stuff speeding up the reproduction of his recently lost red blood cells, which, no matter how weird that sounded, was almost comforting.
"I do what I must. As is the only logical solution to a situation such as that in which we currently find ourselves embroiled." Jim strained to hear, as Spock was speaking as if to himself.
Likely the Vulcan was experiencing his equivalent of 'peeved' at his captain's outward rejection of his valiant 'keep everyone alive' efforts.
Kirk, looking forward to a good fifteen minutes worth of attempting to wash the slop's repugnant taste out of his mouth with nothing but saliva, was content to leave everything the way it was. Spock's nonexistent feelings be damned!
By morning next, Jim was feeling the gentlest pangs of regret.
Over many different things, happenings, and circumstances. Such as; electing both the captain and the chief science officer slash first officer of the Enterprise to both fly down to the surface of an undeveloped, alien planet in a tiny shuttle through the middle of a violent ionic storm. At the same time.
Poor life choice really.
The freshest of such pangs though, was all Spock's fault. He was the one, after all, who'd woken early, stretched, creepily walked across the cave to adjust his captain's blanket whilst the man appeared to still be deep in sleep, and left without a word.
The tireless first officer was out there risking life, limb, and a sunburn to bring back enough… food… to keep them going until, a( the ion storm broke up and help came, or b( their eventual, though predictable, demise.
The factors keeping his guilt in check included:
The fact that his chest hadn't actually stopped hurting since he'd realized that sometime during the crash, he'd been perforated.
The fact that he was tired and cold and hungry in the morning because they were rooming in a damn cave.
Slop.
'Nough said.
Still… "No! Stand firm, Jim. He's not worth- he doesn't even have feelings, for crying out loud! Why am I… Why am I talking to myself?" Committing himself to a painful shrug, he lapsed into an uncomfortable silence. Kept company by the horrible, horrible knowledge that, in the end, this was all his own fault and that, eventually, he was going to have to inform the families of the two unlucky souls he'd dragged down into this.
He'd been the one to assign them to the mission and, in so doing, had unwittingly signed their death warrants.
Several early morning minutes wasted trying not to picture the two ensigns' mangled bodies as they'd fallen to 'earth' and Jim decided he'd rather put himself through some physical torture. Switch things up.
Standing took a while. Well, getting himself to a stand took a while. What with all the pain and the cursing breaking up his concentration and all.
Staggering his abused shell of a body to the cave entrance also took a while. Felt like it did, anyway.
Because he was impatient. Not because it was especially large.
Because it wasn't.
Sunlight assaulted his senses, so it took him a minute to locate the little Vulcan shaped figure some two hundred feet down the slope, wandering zig-zag patterns in a generally 'back to the cave' direction.
As Spock drew closer, Jim noticed the reason for his slow assent; the fellow was pausing every several feet to pick something off a specific variety of sparse growing, weedy looking, waist high… plant. Every picked piece was then evaluated, seemingly liberated from some sort of pod, and popped in his mouth.
The damn Vulcan was eating. Great.
"Well, who am I to judge? When a..." man wasn't quite the right word, "an officer's hungry, they're hungry." He turned away from the cave opening and felt along the surprisingly smooth wall back to his bed. Muttering the while. "I don't know why he'd lie about there being other food sources though. Then again, maybe he didn't? Yeah, he would leave out that he'd found a plant that was only safe for Vulcan consumption. So as, 'Not to upset the captain in his frail, hungry state'. He probably made the right decision though," he grunted as he lowered himself to the almost soft pad he'd been charitably gifted by the same… officer on whom he'd just been not spying.
Feeling both grateful and full of angst, he laid his head back for a nice, relaxing, nap. Knowing full well he was too aware of his injuries and far too awake to achieve sleep. "A man can dream," he informed the relative darkness of the cave.
As the soft fingers of slumber finally began pulling on the edges of his psyche, so did the sharp crunch of approaching boot steps.
Spock was almost back.
Jim wondered whether he'd managed to get his grubby, two timing hands on any breakfast since he'd stopped watching him. 'Cause it sure hadn't looked like he'd had anything on him at the ti-
Why was he stopping? And sitting down, by the sound of it?
Hm. Maybe he was photosynthesizing? Could Vulcans do that? No. That was a plant only thing. Right?
Next most likely thing; Spock was tired and taking a break, or meditating. Which amounted to about the same thing, way he'd heard it explained, when it came to the native people of that ultimately unfortunate desert planet.
He needed to stop thinking about depressing things.
Oh, geez. Now it sounded like Spock was hyperventilating.
Jim's heart rate spiked as he realized just how utterly dependent he was in his current, injured state.
If his first officer was in need of medical assistance, he wouldn't be able to reach him in time. Or, if he did, he didn't know near as much about Vulcan physiology as Spock did about the human variety.
Plus, the thought of trying to even crawl out there made his muscles tremble, having already pushed them hard earlier.
What kind of help could he possibly offer-
Huh. Now it sounded like the strait-laced officer was...
The captain of the Starship Enterprise relaxed back into his 'bed', nerves shot but falling back to normal.
Spock was just emptying his stomach. Vomiting. Upchucking.
Served him right for eating secret 'Vulcan only' food while his patient was 'sleeping'.
Oh shit! He was coming back in the cave!
Jim closed his eyes and pretended to still be fast asleep. Thinking the while that that was a pretty quick recovery for someone who sounded like they'd emptied their entire stomach.
Damn alien fortitude. Why couldn't humans be that resilient?!
Feigning sleep, without the blanket Spock'd adjusted on him before heading out, Jim craned his ears for clues as to what his first officer was up to.
"Captain?" Asked while paused just inside the cave opening.
Receiving no response, Spock padded with care through the space, right up to his superior's side.
Then Jim heard a noise which he didn't have it in himself to ignore: a bowl being set down. Right where he'd woken to find one several times over the past few days.
Uh-oh.
Eyes springing open, Jim sought with desperation for the bowl and the Vulcan, praying that what he now knew, just wasn't true.
"Captain, you are awake earlier tha-"
"Spock, what's in that bowl?" He asked. A cold desperation coloring his voice.
Spock straightened to a stand before answering. "The food which you have termed 'slop', or 'shi-"
"Don't play coy with me, Spock. I heard you outside just now," he said. Eyes accusing. "What is this stuff made of, exactly?"
The science officer with the ever ready answers appeared rather stunned by the turn of events. Voice closer to unsure than was comforting, he began. "Captain, it is 'exactly' what I have said from the first time you asked. The only edible ground co-"
"Okay, Spock. Then tell me how it's made, and no sidestepping this time."
"... Very well," said while walking to a rock he'd come to utilize as a perch. Spock sat, set down a second bowl by his feet, and turned his attention to the guy who was trying really hard to not freak out until absolutely necessary.
"The grain off which we have been subsisting is on the cusp of edibility. Dr. McCoy took every available moment during the medical course through which all bridge staff were put, to stress to me the reality that your system is as reactionary as a nuclear generator. 'Anything alien could be his doom,' were some of his... less intense warnings." Spock looked a little distracted for a moment, before refocusing on the reason for his explanation.
"You are correct, Captain. In order to remove the probability of an allergic reaction, I had no other recourse but to circumvent the plant's ability to attack your system, by beginning the digestion process myself. Confirming that-"
"Digestion? Really? This... 'slop' is your vomit! There's no justifying that! Next thing, you're gonna tell me we've been drinking your piss!" His eyes widened, "Oh, no. No! Spock-"
"Captain!" Jim's stomach paused its roiling, poised and ready, just waiting for confirmation before moving on to the heaving stage. "You are laying next to the condensation purification system, from which you have been drinking ever since you regained consciousness." Spock had brought it back to the cave along with the two thin mattresses and a few gadgets and gizmos, most of which he'd found broken, on his first and only expedition to the original Starfleet science teams' abandoned camp. "Captain-"
"Don't call me that. Not right now." The Vulcan looked almost startled by what he must have taken as more of an order than a plea. Coming from a superior officer as it had.
Jim, unperturbed went on, "What else have you been doing, without my knowledge, in the name of 'keeping me alive'?" He took a vague satisfaction in the way the Vulcan almost squirmed at the pointed question. Then, he remembered how much it took to make the staunch scientist uncomfortable and started praying that he wouldn't have to kill either of them out of pure mortification.
"Ca- Jim," and however the Vulcan had been planning on mollifying his distraught, bedridden patient, the starship captain would never know. As everything was cut off by a familiar white twinkle.
And, for Jim anyway, an unfamiliar splinching.
A/N:
I know there exist folks who have been waiting, patiently, since 2013 to find out what happens next.
To them: I apologize.
Also: I thank you for coming back after all this time! Your support has meant a lot and always puts a smile on this humble author's face! :D
Thanks a ton for reading, no matter new friend or old, and just so's everyone knows... There is a chapter four well under way!
Please feel free to weigh in on the story thus far, offer constructive criticism, or even drop a 'Hello'!
I hope life is going well for everyone out here in cyber space!
Sincerely, Anonymous