A/N: OMG! I'm back! I have survived the first semester of grad school and have high hopes for the new year. My abject apologies for taking so long to continue this poor neglected story, but here you are! Right now it looks like there will be this chapter, and two more to go. I hope you enjoy; this is a bit longer than usual but there was a lot to cover!

Seventh Circle

Chapter 14

Even under the best conditions, rifling through anyone's intestines was a pain, Dr. Leonard McCoy decided as he collapsed into his office chair with a heart-felt sigh. He slumped forward onto his elbows wearily, easing his bruised face into his hands. Doing so under emergency circumstances was far worse. Piecing his best friend's innards back together on so little sleep he could hardly see straight had been the stuff of nightmares.

At least Jim was out of danger now. He had been badly wounded, much worse than McCoy had first thought when he had seen his friend staggering down the dim hallway of the Janusian prison. What he believed to be a single wound had turned out to be far more complex. Kirk had been stabbed with a glass blade, which had been deliberately snapped off inside his body and shattered into several smaller pieces. Those shards razed the flesh around them every time Jim moved, working deeper into his abdomen. McCoy had spent several hours fishing bits of glass out of the wound and repairing the additional damage caused by the razor-sharp fragments.

He closed his eyes against the pounding in his skull. God, he'd spent so many hours staring at Jim's wounds that the whole mess felt burned into his retinas. The doctor grimaced and massaged his temples. Whoever had stabbed Jim had been either extremely lucky or extremely clever. His injuries were serious, but not immediately lethal. A centimeter or so to one side could have changed that. McCoy supposed he should be thankful.

The doctor had no idea why Kirk had ended up with a knife in his gut. He was curious (mostly so he knew what to bawl Kirk out for later), but knew he wasn't likely to find out anytime soon. Jim was still unconscious and he was going to stay that way until McCoy decided otherwise.

Spock was the only other member of the away team capable of speech at the moment. He had barely spoken two words to the doctor since their fight and his terse recitation of Jim's escape instructions. McCoy had not had time to question him properly, but he got the impression that Spock hadn't known much more about anything than he did.

The Vulcan was long gone from Sickbay. He had escaped Janusia more or less physically unscathed. McCoy had his hands full between Kirk and Chekov, so he had passed Spock off to that new junior doctor, M'Benga, to be checked out. Of course, the first officer still wasn't approved for duty (that was one responsibility reserved for McCoy himself), but that probably wouldn't stop him from going to the bridge. Spock was just as pig-headed as Jim about such things.

McCoy knew that the decision to release the Vulcan had raised a few eyebrows around Sickbay, but he trusted the junior doctor's judgment. M'Benga had experience with Vulcans and he wouldn't have let Spock leave Sickbay if he thought the first officer was liable to blow his top again. McCoy snorted. Either way, he was out of Sickbay. The duty-obsessed Vulcan was Scotty's problem now.

Come to think of it, he should probably call up to the bridge and let the acting captain know Kirk was going to be okay. McCoy reluctantly pried his head loose from his hands. He stubbornly stifled a yawn and reached out to thumb the comm system. "McCoy to bridge."

"Uhura here, Doctor, go ahead."

"Tell Scotty that the Captain is out of surgery," McCoy hesitated for a moment, weighing whether or not to say anything about Chekov. He had nothing good to say about the navigator's condition. "He'll be fine," he finished lamely, trying to cover his pause. Uhura murmured a slightly disappointed-sounding acknowledgment, but did not question him. The communications expert could read between the lines well enough.

McCoy sighed after he cut the transmission. The lack of information was going to cause a fuss on the bridge. Ensign Chekov was popular among both the officers and crew, and they would quickly realize that no news was not good news. But there just wasn't much he could tell them, even if he had wanted to.

The doctor grumbled a curse under his breath. His relief at Jim's successful surgery had been short lived due to that damned Russian kid. He was initially hopeful when his staff had somehow managed to stabilize the ensign until he had patched Kirk up. Then he'd seen the kid's scans.

Ensign Chekov was in very bad shape and he only seemed to be getting worse. He suffered from severe dehydration and an extremely high fever. Most of the unconscious teenager's body was covered with grotesque purple bruises, some of which bled openly in places. He had lost a nearly critical level of blood through extensive hemorrhaging both in his skin and internally, though his brain seemed to have been miraculously spared. As if the situation were not grim enough already he had four broken ribs, a fractured right collarbone, and a couple of broken fingers.

Even though McCoy had ordered every test he could think of, so far they had only determined that Pavel Chekov was slowly but surely bleeding to death. They'd hit the poor kid with clotting factors, transfusions, an intense barrage of broad-spectrum antibis and antivis, but all they had done was slightly slow the deterioration of his condition. Until they could determine what was ravaging his young body, McCoy was reduced to treating the symptoms. And not very effectively, at that. It was frustrating as hell.

The doctor gritted his teeth. They hadn't even been able to patch up Chekov's other injuries. Every time they tried to close a wound or knit a fracture, it would work apart again within a few hours. The worst part was that they still had no idea why.

McCoy had three of the Enterprise's labs working on a last-ditch series of tests, but results would not be ready for another few hours. He was privately worried Chekov wouldn't last that long. The doctor sagged forward again into his palms with a grimace. God in Heaven, he hadn't been this exhausted since the Narada.

He didn't even realize he had fallen asleep until one of the nurses burst wildly into his office, calling his name. McCoy's head jerked up from the desk. Someone had better be dying, he thought sourly, rubbing a hand over his bleary eyes. Even before he finished the thought, he realized he could hear the shrill squeal of alarms coming from the ward. Someone was dying, and there were only two people it could be. The doctor swore under his breath and bolted for the ward.

People rapidly converged on Chekov's biobed. Even from across the room, McCoy could see the dreaded flat line on his monitors. Adrenaline sliced through his mind-numbing exhaustion.

The kid was dead.

Time slowed as he joined the frenzy of activity around Chekov. The crowd parted for McCoy. The ear-splitting squeal of alarms seemed muted, as if coming from a great distance. He felt his mouth move, and heard his voice giving instructions from far away, but the only sound he was truly aware of was his heart pounding out the words not the kid not the kid not the kid oh god not the kid not the kid...

Pavel Andreievich Chekov was dead for exactly two minutes and fifty-three seconds before they managed to revive him. McCoy could breathe again. God, it had been close.

Exhaustion threatened to overwhelm the doctor as he slumped wearily against the bulkhead near the foot of Chekov's biobed. After another blood transfusion, a lot of drugs, and some Kirk-magnitude luck later, the kid was weak but stable again. Something had gone wrong with the drug cocktail keeping him alive and he had gone into cardiac arrest. They had cobbled together another concoction out of second-line and experimental drugs, but it was a very temporary solution at best. McCoy hoped to God the labs would have something soon. Chekov had more systems failing than working now. The doctor squeezed his temples vainly against the pounding in his skull. They needed a cure or an antidote, and fast.

"Doctor McCoy?"

"What?" McCoy growled, opening his eyes. Nurse Chapel was looking at him with an eyebrow raised Spock-fashion.

"Looks like you need this more than I do," she said, and handed him a steaming cup of black coffee. McCoy accepted it and sipped gratefully, ignoring the protests of his coffee-saturated stomach. He blinked down at his chrono and realized with a jolt that he'd lost three minutes. Christ. He'd actually dozed off standing.

"The Captain is waking up," the blonde woman said as she circled back around Chekov's biobed. She studied his monitors briefly and took a seat by his side. "Annie told me to let you know."

McCoy glanced at his chrono again in surprise. It was later than he thought. He could see Chapel eyeing him with concern, but she said nothing. She seemed to understand why McCoy insisted on dealing with the kid's case despite his total exhaustion. "Yeah. Thanks, Christine."

He glanced over at Chekov, his stomach twisting uncomfortably. The kid was a mess. What little of his skin that was not black and blue was sickly pale, his wide eyes shut and swollen above the respirator mask covering his mouth and nose. His face looked puffy from all the fluids they were pumping into him. As he watched, Chapel reached through the sterile field and softly stroked Chekov's sandy curls. McCoy swallowed hard and looked away. The kid was in good hands. He could leave for a minute.

The doctor dragged himself to his feet and headed over to Kirk's bed. Nurse Annie Katenga hovered nearby. She gave McCoy a tired smile. He glanced down at Kirk. Jim was still pale, but his vitals were strong. It appeared the surgery had been successful...though McCoy had long since learned to rule anything out with Jim Kirk.

Kirk's eyes moved beneath their lids, and he stirred slightly. A moment later his blue eyes opened. The young captain glanced from side to side, looking disoriented. He quickly recognized Sickbay, however, and visibly relaxed. McCoy smiled in spite of himself.

"Think that's the first time I've ever seen you happy to be in Sickbay, Jim," he said. "How y'feeling?" He only asked out of habit. Kirk's previous flirtations in Sickbay were well-known to the staff, and Kirk had to feel truly lousy if he couldn't even muster the energy to wink at the gorgeous Nurse Katenga.

McCoy buzzed him with the tricorder and glanced over the readings. All systems go, thank God. He folded his arms across his chest, briefly relishing a feeling of triumph. "Next time you decide to get stabbed, do your favorite surgeon a favor and pick something that doesn't bust itself to pieces."

Kirk's throat worked and he tried to lick his lips with a dry tongue. "Don't, Jim," McCoy said warningly, but as usual the captain did not listen.

"Chekov?" Kirk managed to croak.

McCoy felt the smile stiffen on his lips as his feeling of triumph wilted. It was typical of Jim to be more concerned about the others than he was about himself, but McCoy did not relish telling him he was afraid the navigator would not make it through the night.

"I don't know yet," he admitted. "He's in real bad shape, Jim. We're doing what we can."

As he was speaking, Chapel caught his eye and nodded towards the door. McCoy recognized the blue-uniformed Lt. Cramer, one of the lab techs, as he walked into Sickbay. Cramer paused, looking for the CMO. McCoy squeezed Kirk's knee gently. "Get some sleep. I'll keep you posted."

Jim's eyes closed. The doctor bit back another sigh as he turned away from his friend. He signaled the lieutenant with a wave and strode towards the younger man. The young officer quailed visibly as McCoy approached. The doctor's heart sank. People with good news didn't quail. He crossed his arms over his chest and scowled. "Well, spit it out."

The lieutenant muttered something about results being inconclusive. McCoy squeezed the bridge of his nose and prayed for patience. It didn't work.

"Don't know?" The last of his frayed nerves finally snapped. "WHAT DO YOU MEAN, DON'T KNOW?" he bellowed at the quaking lieutenant.

He ignored the stares from across Sickbay. McCoy did not have time or energy to be diplomatic. He skewered the scientist with a green glare until the kid (God, they were all kids, he thought venomously) found his voice. "I'm sorry, sir, but we just need more time. Everything came back negative; cultures, the Starfleet poison database, everything, sir. All we've got left is molecular sequencing, and that alone could take another day, if we're lucky—"

Christ Almighty. Molecular sequencing meant they were literally back at square one. McCoy gritted his teeth. He tried to remember that it wasn't the kid's fault; that he had certainly not wanted to tell the formidable CMO something he did not want to hear; that he had drawn the short straw of rank and the duty had fallen to him-

McCoy felt his body swell with rage anyway. "Another day? Another day? We don't have another day! He doesn't have another day! A few hours, maybe, if we're lucky! He's dying, Lieutenant!"

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the movement of the door as someone entered Sickbay. With a fresh slap of irritation, the doctor recognized the point-eared silhouette of Spock as he approached Kirk's biobed and was intercepted by Nurse Katenga. McCoy's scowl deepened. Losing his temper in front of Jim or his own staff was one thing, but McCoy particularly loathed losing it in front of the Vulcan. Spock didn't need to yell at his people.

He looked back at the terrified lieutenant. "I want you to speed it up. Yes, I know it's difficult!" he snapped before Cramer could open his mouth to protest. "I don't care if you have to get every damn lab on this ship involved, get people out of their beds, whatever. But you figure out what this is and God help you all if you don't have results by morning!"

The kid stammered out a "yes, sir" and fled for the comparative safety of the lab. Katenga was gesturing in his direction now, waving Spock towards him. He crossed his arms defensively over his chest, feeling nettled. "Did you need something, Commander?" he asked acidly before the Vulcan could speak.

Spock froze. He suddenly looked stricken, but the expression was gone almost before McCoy could register it. It was weird as hell seeing any expression on that face, McCoy thought. He wondered for a very brief moment if he had been too nasty.

"I thought I might be of assistance in determining the cause of Ensign Chekov's ailment."

There was something different about Spock's voice, something in the inflection that suggested hope, fear…God, who knew? Jim was better at this sort of thing; he could read the hobgoblin better than anyone on the ship. McCoy fought down his instant urge to tell the Vulcan to butt out and get back to his quarters. As science officer, he didn't need to ask to be included in the lab work, but he was asking anyway.

The doctor reluctantly swallowed a scathing retort. Even he acknowledged that Spock undoubtedly had the best scientific mind on the ship. Much as it galled him to accept Spock's help, his feud with the first officer was certainly not worth Chekov's life. "Yeah, sure. Find Cramer, he can fill you in."

Spock nodded and turned to leave. McCoy's instinctive dislike of the Vulcan warred ferociously with his Georgia manners.

"Spock?" The word burst out of him. The first officer paused and turned to look at McCoy.

"Yes, Doctor?"

"Thanks," McCoy said, and to his surprise, he actually meant it.

Please review! Reviews = next chapter previews