"Mr Spock, would you date me if I was a worm?"
Spock paused in his inspection of Jim's pupils, which refused to dilate properly. Jim had managed to sustain an allergic reaction to some of the fauna on the planet, and while he was in no severe danger, it would be a few minutes until the Enterprise drew close enough to beam them out.
Jim's eyes were completely intent, hazel depths locked unblinking onto Spock's own.
This would appear to be one of Jim's denounced 'no-win scenarios'.
"...If you were born a worm and I am… as I am now?"
Jim nodded, biting his lip.
"...No. I would not."
Jim gasped, rocketing backward as his eyes welled up in horror. "You wouldn't?!"
"Jim, it would not be logical for a Vulcan to engage in a romantic relationship with… a less-evolved lifeform."
Tears were actually starting to spill now, and Spock was close to engaging in the human emotion known as panic.
"B-but… but I would still be me," Jim entreated, catching Spock's hand in both of his own. "It would still be my soul. In the worm."
Spock's mind raced as he tried to find a way to salvage the situation.
"...Perhaps if I made contact with your mind… I would keep you… as a pet?"
"I don't want to be a pet!" Jim cried, more distraught by the second. Spock frantically hoped that he would not remember this incident after an appropriate stay in sickbay. "What about…" Jim licked his lips, "What about… if I turned into a worm right now. And I only had wormy thoughts. But I was still me. Would you still date me then?"
Spock patted Jim's shoulder in what he hoped to be a comforting manner. "I would not. But I would take good care of you."
"You would break up with me if I was a worm?"
The tears were in full force now, Jim curling into himself to shove away the tracks on his face. There was no possibility for logic here. No appeal he could make, no way to stem the increasingly disturbing distress…
No way save one.
"You nerve pinched the Captain while he was sick? On an alien planet?"
"A regrettable necessity, Doctor. Believe me, had I not… the damage could have been much more severe."