"Benecia, Captain?" Spock asks, eyebrow cocked, "Are you sure that is wise?"
Kirk fixes him with a strange look, asking in return, "What do you mean, Mr. Spock?"
"We have a scheduled rendezvous with the Potemkin in only a week's time at Beta Aurigae. If Miss Lester and Dr. Coleman are indeed suffering from celebium poisoning, then Starbase 2 would be more suited to our purposes. Coleman and Lester would receive better treatment for their condition and our rendezvous would not be affected by that short of a delay."
"My orders are to change course for Benecia," Kirk grinds out, "Do not question me. Understood?"
Spock quirks his eyebrow a bit higher, replies, "Understood, Captain," and returns to his seat. Something is very wrong with the captain. His behavior is suddenly unusual and uncharacteristic. Kirk is never rude to his crew and officers, always treating everyone from his second in command (Spock) to the lowest yeoman with the utmost respect. He has never been one to hand down unflinching orders. Spock hazards a glance to Chekov and Sulu. Neither one speaks, which is highly unusual for them. The helmsmen typically spend their shift on the bridge whispering to each other and making light conversation with the other crewmembers. Kirk encourages it more often than not, generally joining in himself to keep up with his crew's lives.
Today, however, he sharply reprimanded Chekov for asking Lt. Douglass about her brother, who is currently living on the Mare Imbrium colony where he grew up. Kirk rounded on him, ordering to keep his mouth shut unless he was spoken to or for official business. Chekov had looked ready to burst into tears. Sulu still looks angry.
The bridge remains shrouded in tense silence for entirety of the eight hour shift, and Spock finds he is not amenable to it one bit. It bothers him on a psychic level, fills his mind with anger and frustration, makes him feel frustrated, too. Perhaps he will speak with Kirk after the shift… or maybe Dr. McCoy. McCoy is more acquainted with fluctuating human moods than Spock. He may be better able to interpret the sudden black mood that has Kirk in its grip. He isn't sure he can handle another day of such behavior and animosity on the bridge.
When Spock arrives in the main medical bay, he finds Kirk has beaten him there, and he and Dr. McCoy are arguing.
"Look, Jim, I checked this Coleman fella out," McCoy is saying, "I don't like it. You know he was a medical officer in Starfleet some years ago? They gave him the boot, Jim! They discharged him for incompetence, and you wanna put him in charge of a patient in my med bay? I won't allow-"
"I don't really care what want to allow, McCoy," Kirk hisses, "This is my ship, not yours, and you'll do as I say. I will not have this insubordination, do you hear me?"
McCoy's face is hurt and angry as he replies quietly, "Yeah… yeah I hear ya."
"Good. Dr. Coleman is in charge of Miss Lester's care. That's final."
Spock briefly makes himself scarce to observe Kirk as he passes by. An evil smirk twists his lips, one he has never seen on Kirk's face before. Even as he just brushes by Spock, he feels wrong. That bothers Spock more than anything else. He approaches McCoy briskly upon Kirk's exit.
"Didja hear that, Spock?" McCoy declares, "I mean, didja ever hear such a thing? Since when does the Chief Medical Officer's opinion mean so little to his captain?"
"I heard the captain give you an order which you were expressly against," Spock tells him, "His behavior has become most unusual in the past twenty-four hour period. I was hoping you would be able to provide some insight into his conduct, but it appears that you have no more information than I at present."
McCoy has surely heard him but continues to grumble to himself about being told how to run his medical bay. After a moment, he shouts for a nurse, Houlihan, and orders her, "You and the other head nurses will watch Lester and Coleman like hawks, got it? There's somethin' real fishy goin' on here, and I don't like it. Report to me directly on anything that's even remotely suspicious."
She nods and hurries off. McCoy turns back to Spock, saying, "I know there's somethin' wrong with Jim. I can feel it in my bones, Spock, and I don't like it. No, I don't like it one bit."
"For once, doctor, we are in total agreement."
"I don't like that even more."
xXxXx
Kirk feels as though there is a fog in his head. His limbs feel heavy and alien. His mouth is dry, his tongue thick. His eyelids refuse his command to open. Somehow, it doesn't bother him.
He dreams of pleasant things in the fog, things that make him happy. He dreams of Christopher Pike smiling at him from his wheelchair in front of hundreds of people as he gives him command of the Enterprise. He dreams of the father he never knew grinning at him proudly, seeing him become captain of this fine ship. He dreams of McCoy guffawing at stupid joke he'd made when they were out one night. He dreams of his crew safe and happy and healthy, of Sulu and Chekov and Scotty and Uhura and Carol and Chapel… and Spock.
Oh, in his dreams, Spock offers him barely there smiles and quirks of his eyebrow. He rests his hand on Kirk's should and leaves it there for a time. He brushes his fingers over Kirk's hand. They play chess, explore new worlds, watch the stars fly by their ship. Kirk loves every moment spent with the person who has become his closest friend. The dream shifts. Spock is now an old man, his face wrinkled and his hands gnarled, and god he's so sad. It's all he can feel and it chokes him and smothers him until he wakes and cries out for Bones and for Spock because they're the only ones who can make this better.
The voice he calls out with sounds shrill and unfamiliar. His body feels wrong but he can't tell why because the fog is still so heavy over his mind. He cries out until the strange voice cracks from misuse. Dr. Coleman appears in his fuzzy vision.
"No!" Kirk chokes, "No! Bones! I want Bones!"
Coleman leans in close, whispering, "You're insane, Miss Lester."
There is a soft hiss, and something warm rushes into Kirk's bloodstream, returning him to his happy dreams. Spock is young and whole and not at all sad…
xXxXx
McCoy sends in a nurse shift after shift to spy on Lester and Coleman, and he only sends those he's sure are trustworthy. They report during and after each shift for a day and a half on Lester's condition and Coleman's behavior.
"Every time she wakes up, even a little," Nurse Baker tells him, "Coleman just administers a sedative. He says she's paranoid, delusional, and dangerous, but…"
"But what, Baker?"
"Well, the last time she woke up, she asked for you."
"It doesn't surprise me. She may have overheard me talking to Coleman when we were down at the outpost."
"Doctor, she didn't just ask for you… she asked for 'Bones'."
McCoy's stomach twists into an uncomfortable knot. He asks quietly, "You're sure?"
"Yessir, I'm sure. I heard it myself. Coleman just gave her another sedative."
His mind sets to whirling. The only person who calls him 'Bones' is Kirk. Lately, Kirk has only been calling him 'McCoy', which doesn't quite sit right. This young women he hasn't seen in over six years and barely knew even then is calling him by a nickname only one person has ever used. Something is very, very wrong here, and McCoy wishes he knew what it was.
"Alright, Nurse Kellye is on next, I believe. Tell her to send Coleman to me for a check-up. I'm sure he's tired from keeping vigil over Miss Lester. While I have Coleman, I want Kellye to wait for Lester to wake up. I'll deal with Coleman. Understood?"
"Yessir."
Thirty minutes later, Coleman stomps into McCoy's office, looking disgruntled and maybe even a bit frightened.
"What is the meaning of this, McCoy?"
"Why, you've been so worried over Miss Lester this last day, and I'm just mighty worried about your health," McCoy drawls calmly, using a honeyed tone to reassure Coleman, "I just wanna give you a nice check-up. I realized I never gave you one when you first boarded, so I wanna make sure you're good and healthy. Won't take long at all."
After a couple of hours, Coleman is decidedly annoyed, but Kellye has plenty of information.
"It was very strange, doctor," she tells him quietly, "Miss Lester persisted in asking for you as 'Bones,' and when I asked her if she meant McCoy, she said, 'Of course I mean McCoy. Who else on this ship is called 'Bones'?' She was very upset, sir, quite hysterical."
"What else did she say? Anything?"
"Well… she… I asked her what her name was, and… well… she told me her name was James Tiberius Kirk," Kellye explains.
McCoy feels his eyebrow shoot up his forehead: "She said what?"
"She told me her name was James Tiberius Kirk. I asked her if she was sure, and she got very upset, started yelling and demanding to see you. I had to sedate her for her own safety, sir."
"No, you did the right thing, Kellye. Thank you. I owe you one."
She nods and goes back to Lester's room under the pretense of checking the diagnostics, but McCoy has more to worry about. Again, Lester called him by Kirk's nickname for him, and now she was saying that she is Jim Kirk. People don't just claim to be other people for no reason. They always had a reason, mental or physical or personal. Always. It's up to McCoy to figure out Lester's reason.
xXxXx
Two full days have passed since they left Camus II, and the captain's behavior is increasingly troubling to everyone on the bridge, especially Spock. Kirk sits too tall and too proud in the captain's chair. Jim Kirk never sits in his chair like a throne but lounges in it, seeming relaxed but knowing everything his ship was doing while they cruised. The only time Kirk ever sits straight-backed in the chair is when he needs to command respect from someone who has not already given it to him and from whom he deserves it. This Kirk is using the chair like a throne, treats the ship as a kingdom and the crew as subjects to whom he hands down unyielding laws. Such behavior is troubling.
Kirk has also leveled several insults at Spock based on his heritage and seems to have forgotten his first officer's hybrid condition altogether. For Kirk not only to forget his first officer's heritage but insult it is unthinkable.
Spock brings his concerns to McCoy once more, convinced there is something medically wrong with Kirk. Once he explains the captain's behavior, McCoy is inclined to agree.
"There's something weird goin' on with Lester, too," McCoy explains in a low voice, "Nurse Kellye told me that when she wakes up from the sedative coma Coleman keeps her in, she always asks to see me."
"You are the Chief Medical Officer. It is only logical."
"No, Spock. She asks for 'Bones'."
Spock lifts an eyebrow.
"That is the name she uses to refer to you, doctor?" he asks.
"Yep. I mean, I knew her for a bit at the Academy before her discharge. Not well, but I knew her, but no one but Jim Kirk has ever called me by that name. Hell, Jim's the one came up with it. Even crazier, she says she is Jim. She could be lyin', of course, but-"
"Of course she is lying," Spock butts in, "There is no scientific or logical way she could be James Kirk. It is impossible to transfer the mind or soul between bodies. The technology does not exist, doctor."
"But what if it did?" McCoy whispers excitedly, "They were working on a now extinct, very advanced civilization down there. What if those beings had that technology and they found it? I mean, I don't how they would figure out what it did or how to use it, but what if they did?"
McCoy's expression is at once amazed, confused, and frightened. The doctor wets his lips and struggles for words while Spock digs into his own thoughts. While McCoy's theory makes the most sense to explain the captain's odd behavior, it simply cannot be the truth. It is a fantastic solution to what is an infinitely simpler problem. He speaks up during McCoy's silence, "A total switch of mind and body cannot be, doctor. I am of the opinion that there may have instead been some form of mind control instated on the planet, perhaps by Dr. Coleman-"
"That's not it," McCoy dismisses quickly, "Coleman obviously won't tell us even if he did have something to do with it, but I don't think he did, not willingly anyway. And we can't ask Jim or Lester, their answers are gonna be skewed."
McCoy lapses once more into silent thought, and Spock does some thinking of his own. There is only one way to test McCoy's theory, and he doubts very much McCoy will like it.