A pitifully small collection, but it was large enough, McCoy mused as he surveyed the liquor cabinet by his office. He noticed a few spirits that he particularly liked; at least he shared some things in common with his trans-universal counterpart. Just as he uncorked one bottle, the Captain hailed him from the bridge. McCoy blinked for a moment, the bottle still in his hand. He felt his hackles rise as he held the button down to answer. "Ya?" he grunted into the wall communicator.
"I've been waiting for the medical reports for an hour now, Bones," Kirk said patiently, softly. In McCoy's experience, any time someone used a kind tone like that, they were usually after something more than what they were asking for.
"O, yes, uh," he stammered a bit, and cleared his throat to add some confidence in his voice. "Everything's right as rain down here, Kirk," he said, addressing the captain by what he'd normally call him back in his own universe. To his face, anyway. "No changes."
A slight pause on the other end, then Kirk said, "Very well." McCoy took in a breath and was about to get back to studying the liquor cabinet, but Kirk added, "You're more than welcome to come on up here, you know, Bones. That is, if you're not too busy."
McCoy couldn't tell what that tone meant, but he didn't trust it. Why would the captain ask him up there? He had no business up there. In fact, if his Kirk had specifically asked him to the bridge, it would usually be a very specific purpose, one that wasn't hard to guess.
He realized he'd been standing there, staring off into space for a while, and still had not tasted his counterpart's brandy. Without even bothering to look for a glass, he took a hefty swig and grunted. It tasted like shit, he thought. Must be the cheap stuff. But it burned on the way down, which meant it would do the intended job, and that's all that mattered. He vaguely heard the captain try to tell him something over the communicator, but he ignored it. Kirk had not ordered him up there, he got his reports...what else was there to discuss?
Besides, McCoy was still not comfortable speaking to anyone if he didn't have to, at least not until he could get a better feel for this place and his role in it. So far the few people he'd come across had been nice, but that was only his first impression. He still hadn't had a chance to guess anyone's motives yet.
He was bent over at a bureau, ruffling through the shelves with the stress of not belonging there. There were mostly just clothes in there, a few data discs. Not much to give a clue as to his assumed identity. Back in his own office (McCoy realized he should stop thinking of it that way; he was here now, in this universe. As far as anyone was concerned, this was his office), anything of value was hidden in obscure places like a hole in the overhead, or a hidden compartment behind one of the medical beds.
"What are you looking for?"
McCoy jumped back from the bureau and faced the intruder with wild eyes. It was Nurse Chapel, her hair a soft, yellow blond, cropped short around her jaw. Her eyes were soft, even her lipstick was a far softer, lighter shade than he was used to. He wasn't sure he liked it. "Nothing," he said, slowly backing away from the bureau. He watched her, almost glaring, the bottle tight in his fingers.
Chapel frowned and tensed, her eyes flicking to the bottle and to his tense face. "Doctor," she said quietly. "You're not drinking are you?"
Why would she ask that, he wondered? Maybe she'd assume that he was in a weakened condition, his defenses blurred with drink. He was actually very good at keeping on his toes even while drunk, but the woman he faced in this universe didn't necessarily know that. She wouldn't ask if she did, right? "No," he snapped, and went to replace the bottle. He didn't take his eyes off her, didn't even fully turn his back. "What do you want, anyway?"
She was flustered now. Good. Anything to put her off guard, shift the advantage. McCoy still felt like he was caught stealing someone else's property, although this was his office. She had surprised him; he couldn't let that happen again. But now she looked genuinely distressed, and even better, ready to leave. "I-I just wanted to see how you were doing," she said. "Looks like you're not doing very well at all!"
His harsh demeanor softened, just a little bit. It was just so unnervingly strange to see her like this. He kept his distance from her, silently cursing the fact that she was blocking the door, but he experimented with a kinder tone of voice. "No, I suppose I'm not," he said with a crooked, half smile.
"Did he hurt you?" she asked, and took a few steps closer. She stopped, though, when McCoy visibly stiffened. "Leonard, what did he do?"
McCoy grimaced. "Who?"
"Spock!" she nearly yelled. "When you and the Captain-"
"O, right, right," he interrupted, taking a seat by his desk. He did this to make the impression that he was relaxing, although he felt anything but as his mind raced. This was a risk, but he took it. "What have you heard?" he asked carefully, gazing up at her with his jaw on his knuckles.
"No one knows exactly what happened," she said in a whisper. Now her hands were fidgeting with each other. "The captain and the others left you alone with-with that other one, and then he was taking you back to the transporter room."
"Uh huh," McCoy grunted, and already he began to work it out in his head. The fact that no one else knew exactly what happened was valuable.
"Well," she began. "Spock told me that you looked distressed when you came back here, I just thought-"
"You thought the other Spock did something to me?" McCoy asked, giving her a hard look. Why does she want to know? he demanded of himself. The question tore at him. How could she use this information, or more important, how can I?
"Yes," she said with discomfort. "You can tell me, Leonard. I'll keep it between us."
Part of his trembling was genuine; she was coming closer to him. But the nurse took the doctor's discomfort the way he intended it. "I'd rather not talk about it," he said. He let her get closer to him, his instincts screaming at him to get away at any cost. He was still far from trusting this woman, but figured it would not look good to creep away from her now. She was unarmed, but that didn't have to mean anything. There was a pen on the desk, for example.
"If you need time off duty-" she suggested, leaning her hip against the desk. McCoy breathed easier, seeing that she did not get any closer or try to touch him. He took the pen off his desk and pretended to fidget with it, but he was merely aiming to keep it from her grasp.
"No, I should be fine," he said, after deciding it would be best not to appear too weak in front of the nurse. "Just let me cool off in here for a while, and come get me if anything happens." He attempted a smile. He was never very good at that.
Her smile, though, was warm and like velvet. If this really were all an act, he mused, than she was far more dangerous than the other one. He'd have to be even more vigilant. "Alright," she said, and left.
He let out a deep breath even before she got out the door, like a weight had been lifted. His heart was still pounding, and he could feel his pulse rage between his arm and the desk he rested it on, but a few more swigs of that terrible brandy helped him calm down. He began to imagine what his story should be, if he were ever pressed to tell it. He couldn't be sure what kinds of interrogation methods the people here had, but if he could escape interrogation in his own universe, he could do it here, too. The trick was to be vague enough to have the room to add or change details of your story later, but to be specific enough to make them think you were telling the truth.
His thoughts wandered as he sipped from the bottle and crept up to sit on the desk. Let's see, he thought, what did Spock do? He mentally put himself in his counterpart's supposed position, although interrupted his own thoughts by chuckling with Shadenfraude. Supposedly, he had been left alone with a version of Spock that these people couldn't imagine. From the nurse's suggestion, they would most likely believe anything, and that was a boon. If anyone started to become suspicious of his behavior and called him on it, he could always make the excuse that he was still stressed from what happened.
The Spock he'd known for several years was easy to imagine, and soon he was lost in his thoughts. It was very easy to imagine himself alone with him, and to predict what could have happened. Spock must not have injured his counterpart, or the nurse would have mentioned it, so it must have been something else. McCoy wondered if it would be shocking enough if he told these people that he'd been raped.
He still hadn't come to a decision, but he was rather enjoying fantasizing about what could have happened. His imaginings shifted from possible scenario to scenario without warning or pattern, just jumping around from one thing to another. His fantasies all had violence and force in common, however. Now that he was forever free from that man, he could go ahead and fantasize without having to worry about it potentially coming true the next time he turned his back.
He was just at a good part when Nurse Chapel came back, this time with blood on her dress. "Doctor, we need you," she urged, heading back out before she finished her sentence.
One of McCoy's eyebrows raised as he gazed at the empty doorway after her. This could definitely be a trap, as crude as it was, but he was too curious to pass it up. If there really were a medical emergency, then at least he'd have a chance to distract himself. So he grabbed the bottle from the cabinet, gulped some down, and half stumbled out of his office.
Nurse Chapel and a few other nurses surrounded a man on one of the medical beds, with the vital signs monitor giving erratic readings. There was a flurry of activity, but all in all, the staff looked rather calm. McCoy's lips tightened when he saw the patient lying on the bed, with a pipe sticking out from his chest.
//Now that's a novel way to do it,// he thought to himself, watching the activity from a few safe steps away.
"Doctor," Chapel snapped, grabbing him by the arm before he could react, and pulled him closer. "Get scrubbed up!"
They both went into a side room to wash. Chapel was scrubbing her arms furiously, while McCoy went through the motions as if in a trance. "What's the situation?" he asked. He was watching her without making it seem like he was. If she met his eyes, he'd cast them back down to the water at the sink.
"The pipe's missed his heart, but it's far too close," she said harshly while an orderly put gloves on her. "Are you fit for surgery?"
McCoy made a face and shrugged, wiping his hands dry on his pants. "There's really no need," he said idly, gazing out into the main space. "The man's dead."
Chapel stared in shock. "What?" She pushed past the orderly and McCoy watched her check the monitor and speak to some of the nurses, and then she came back, as flustered as ever. "Doctor! He's in critical condition, but he's not dead! He will be if you don't--"
McCoy cut her off. "He's not even an officer, let him die. Oughtta save us some time and resources." While the nurse gaped, droplets of blood dribbling off her gloves, McCoy shook his head and frowned and strolled back to his own office.
He had recognized that man on the bed. He knew him as a nobody, a freshly recruited enlisted boy. There must have been a dozen of others exactly like him, all of them expendable, not a single one worth the clothes on their back. Even the slaves were worth more; they at least had their worth to prove, their dignity to try to win back. McCoy was amazed that his team were spending a second's thought on the result of some idiotic...
McCoy paused, the lip of a different bottle brushing cold on his lip. What if that man were someone important here? But then why the ratty clothes? Where were his pins, or at least a braid, if he were worth the resources of the medical team? It was all very confusing, so he settled back in his chair and enjoyed what looked like vodka but tasted rather like that obscure Romulan lager he once had in that obscure Romulan bar not even a year ago.
The noises increased out there, with Chapel's voice ringing out clearly above the rest. As her orders and demands for tools grew grew sharper and gruffer, she started to sound like the way he was used to.
"That's my girl," McCoy smirked to himself, and took another drink.