A/N: Wooo It's time for another episode! I just wanna say thanks a ton for all of the lovely feedback I've gotten. It really makes my day! I hope you all enjoy The Naked Time; things go a bit better than they do in canon thanks to certain events but don't worry - they didn't go as well as they seem, which gets touched on in a couple chapters. :D

The Naked Time

Spock looked around the frozen base, determination mingling with uncertainty as he observed the dead, frozen woman felled at her post. Their mission was seemingly simple, but in actuality, incredibly difficult – far more difficult than the mission with Charlie three weeks ago had been: stay in tight orbit of planet Psi 2000, observe its death, and pick up the crew from the scientific base on the planet. Only, Spock had a sinking feeling that the crew would be long dead. They hadn't reported to Starfleet for months now, and he had had a disquieting certainty that they were dead even before he had come down to see for himself.

He turned to Tormolen, who was the only other member of the landing party, "Check out the life support systems."

Tormolen nodded underneath his biosuit and left the room, while Spock looked around. The biosuit did not protect them from airborne diseases, but that was what the scanners on the ship were for: detecting that kind of thing before they headed down. Of course, they didn't always work fully and properly, but it severely curtailed the likelihood of illness or death. He saw a form lying on the ground through a doorway and walked over, frowning as he crouched beside it – her, this one was a female like the first body – and scanned the area with a tricorder. He shuddered at the results – this woman had been strangled to death. He had almost done that to Jim – he could not imagine Jim lying somewhere, not breathing or moving, not even existing beyond an empty shell, all because of Spock. The idea was completely, totally unacceptable – utterly abhorrent – and he forcibly rejected it, controlling his breathing and ignoring his understandable unease.

Tormolen entered the room again and said, "All life support systems were off, Commander sir."

He had thought as much. Time to be thorough, even though he was loathe to expose anybody else to his own disquieting brand of thoughts, "This woman was strangled."

That sent a sharp spike of unease through the air, coming from Tormolen, and he gave the other man an equally sharp look. Thankfully, the look seemed to steady him, and he reported, "The other four are back there, sir. All dead."

"Was the engineer at his post?"

That got him a nod, "Yes, sir. He was just… frozen there like he didn't even care. Seeing that was just weird. Scotty would never do something like that."

Spock would have sighed if it were Jim here with him, but it wasn't Jim here with him so he just steadily asked, "The rest?"

"Well, better look for yourself, Commander Spock. One man was taking a shower fully clothed."

He nodded and left to observe. He would have to report this to the Captain as fully – but succinctly – as possible.

Joe Tormolen watched Commander Spock leave with a sigh of relief. He was good at reading people, and he hadn't liked how tense the Commander had been, crouched over the body of that woman. Everybody on board knew that Commander Spock and Captain Kirk were incredibly good friends by now, for all they had hated each other before Nero happened. Joe had no doubt whatsoever that the Commander had been thinking about how he had almost killed the Captain, when he had stumbled across the dead woman and found out how she died.

Sighing, Joe walked into the first room they had entered and began messing with his tricorder. Damn. His nose itched. Don't scratch, don't scratch, don't scratch.

Dammit! This was worse than feeling like you were about to sneeze and then being unable to sneeze! He finally took his glove off and scratched the itch, sighing with relief. Then he thoughtlessly crouched down to examine the underside of the control table, bracing his hand on the side of the table. After a minute or so, the cold got to his hand and he pulled it away, scolding himself for forgetting to put his glove back on before he did this. He was lucky his hand had only gotten cold. He put his glove back on, and just in time, too, as Commander Spock came back into the room, saying, "Be certain we expose ourselves to nothing."

He turned to his comm unit and said, "Spock here. Do you read, Enterprise?"

The Captain responded, "Kirk, affirmative."

Joe waited patiently as Spock informed the Captain, "All station personnel are dead, Captain. Not all of them naturally – one of them was strangled to death, but the others seem to have frozen in their positions, be it standing or seated."

He could almost hear the Captain's frown and had to smile a bit. Captain Kirk was incredibly expressive, compared to Commander Spock's being held back. They balanced each other out very well. "Any ideas on what happened to cause it, Spock?"

The Commander shook his head, "Negative, Captain. It's like nothing we've ever seen before."

It was time to beam out.

Jim idly watched his people work on the Bridge, shuffling the various data cards in his hand as he waited for confirmation that his First Officer and his assistant were beamed back up from the planet and safe on the ship. He shuffled the data cards again and placed two in his Command chair, reading his padd to confirm the changes he wanted to preview for their orbit around this planet. His in-chair comm unit beeped at him and he answered it, "Kirk here."

Scotty's voice filtered through the comm unit, "Spock and Tormolen are back aboard, sir. We're holdin' 'em in the chamber for decontamination."

He nodded and added, "Better have Medical look them over too, Scotty. We can't possibly be too careful out here with such a precarious position by the planet. Tell Spock I'll meet him there in ten minutes. Kirk out."

He watched the readings for another couple minutes before heading out the doors to walk to Sickbay.

Spock watched carefully as Tormolen was examined by McCoy, the readings all coming out completely normal. "You're fine, Joe, hop on down from there."

They tilted the biobed he had been lying on and Tormolen stepped down to the ground, Spock replacing him on the biobed before McCoy tilted it to lie back once more. "Alright Spock, let's get this job over with. Well… Your pulse is two hundred and forty two, your blood pressure is practically non-existent – that is, assuming you call that green… sludge in your veins blood."

Spock raised himself up to rest on his forearms as he replied, "The readings are perfectly normal for me, Doctor, thank you. And as for my anatomy being different from yours, I am perfectly delighted."

He raised his eyebrow at that and he saw McCoy's lips quirk into a near-smile from his teasing prod. He and McCoy might never truly see eye to eye but Spock could at least make sure that McCoy had a reason besides his friendship with Jim to keep Spock alive. Jim entered the room then, and Spock greeted him as he got up and stood beside the bed, "Captain."

Jim turned to McCoy after a smile and a nod towards Spock, asking, "How are they, Bones?"

"They're fine, Jim, even the hobgoblin here."

Tormolen, however, did not look or feel fine. He was rubbing his arm uneasily, and his emotions were disturbed enough for Spock to feel them from across the room. That wasn't a good sign – maybe he should not have brought Tormolen down with him, although at the time he had thought the man to be ideal for the job because he was usually so steady and emotionally stable – occasionally self-doubting, but not like this. He confirmed that with his words, speaking to Jim, "It was terrible, Captain, just terrible! They were just sitting, like they didn't care. Whatever was happening down there, they just didn't care. I keep wondering…"

Jim finished his thought, "You keep wondering if man was meant to be out here. You keep wondering, you keep signing on."

That caused Tormolen to give off a slight chuckle and smile. All cadets went on at least one training cruise to make sure they could handle being in the black. Usually it was two or three before they got a more permanent assignment after graduation. Then he turned to Spock, "Spock? Any idea of what happened down there? Or are you as in the dark about this as the rest of us are?"

He was teasing at the last, and Spock simply raised his eyebrow, hands resting on the small of his back as he responded, "I am indeed as "in the dark" about this as you are, Captain. The circumstances were quite bizarre, however our data cards and the ones we retrieved from the station may show us something that will give us a hint."

Tormolen's brief respite seemed to be over, as he muttered, "Six dead. Six people dead."

The Captain wisely suggested, "You'd better get some rest, Joe. Set up those cards, Spock. We'll see if the answers are there."

Spock nodded and they left the room.

Joe rubbed his palm against his side again, then his fingers against his palm, before looking dully at his hand, twisting it this way and that. It felt… wet. Sweaty, but cold. Strange. He felt strange, too. How odd. He could usually handle stuff like this. He'd been one of the most useful crewmen on his second training cruise after they had gotten attacked by Orion pirates; it wasn't as if he'd never seen people dead before. Sighing, he left the room and headed back to his quarters.

Jim watched the screen in the briefing room intently, examining the recorded images on it carefully. It was distressing, the loss of an entire team of researchers, but he couldn't let that affect his thinking. Spock motioned to the screen and stated, "Next card, please."

Janice handed him the next data card, with a steady, "Spectro-analysis card, sir."

Spock put the card in and another, different image showed on the screen, thorough and steady. "Thank you."

Jim mused to himself, before deciding that the whole group deserved to hear what he had to say. "It's almost as if they were irrational, even drugged. An engineer sitting there, apparently oblivious to everything. A woman strangled to death – right in front of another researcher. A crewman with a phaser in his hand… Almost like nothing important was happening around them except for their own worries and thoughts, even as they were freezing to death."

Spock added to this, "He'd used the computer room as if it were an amusement gallery, Captain."

He nodded thoughtfully before continuing. "And a fully clothed man frozen to death in a shower. If the image wasn't so ugly, it would be ridiculous, even laughable. Not even a theory, guys?"

Bones spoke up, "Definitely not drugs or intoxication. The bio-analysis on the cards proves that conclusively."

Then it was Spock's turn to muse a bit, as he thoughtfully stated, "It could be some form of space madness we've never heard of, but it would have to be caused by something. It would have to be instigated, triggered by something. and our spectro readings showed no contamination whatsoever, no unusual elements present."

"Or at least none your tricorders could register." Scotty pointed out.

Spock nodded his head in agreement, "Instruments register only those things they are designed to register, as you well know. Space, however, still contains infinite unknowns."

That raised an important question. "Look, guys. Starfleet needs the closest possible measurement of the breakup of this planet. In order to do this we need to keep the Enterprise in a critically tight orbit. So I have to ask: could what happened down there to those people create any unusual danger to this vessel and crew?"

There was a thoughtful silence, before Spock commented, "We will need top efficiency, Captain. It will be a tricky orbit. When the planet begins to go, there will likely be drastic changes in gravity, mass, magnetic fields, and other variables."

More inflection from Spock around Bones and Scotty! The first time wasn't much of a surprise, but twice in one conversation was a big step forward. He was loosening up more around them. However, that seemed to be the only thing anybody had to say. Jim sighed and thought, hard. He had a dilemma on his hands. On the one hand, they had nothing to go on, and it wasn't their fault. But on the other hand, he was frustrated as all hell and needed more information. The situation they were in was perilously dangerous. Finally, he spoke. "Guys, the purpose of a briefing is to get answers based on all of our abilities and experience. In a critical orbit, there is no time for surprises."

Oh, but Scotty's answer was great. "Well, unless you people on the Bridge start takin' showers with your clothes on, my engines can pull us out of anythin'. We'll be warping out within half a second of gettin' your command."

The comm unit embedded in the table went off, and Jim answered it, still smiling at Scotty's rejoinder. He'd needed that bit of amusement. "Kirk here."

"Scanners report a sudden four degree shift in the planet's magnetic field, Captain. There's also a change in mass, sir."

He looked over at Spock, who commented, "It's beginning. Those are unusually rapid shifts."

That made Jim nod and respond back, "We're on our way, Uhura."

Then he smiled over at Scotty, "I'll hold you to that half second, Scotty."

Joe Tormolen discontentedly grabbed his meal from the replicator, thoughts madly swirling around in his head. Six people dead. Just two days ago he had seen six people dead at their posts. They didn't belong here. He didn't belong here. His friends Sulu and Riley entered the room, discussing something, but Joey didn't care, wasn't paying attention even as their conversation filtered through his ears. What was he doing out here?!

They were talking about fencing. Sulu defending it as Riley questioned the practise. Good. We should question everything. Why are we even here?

A hand touched his arm, shaking it lightly, and he exploded, rage and fear swallowing his mind as rational thought became swept away. "Get off me! You don't rank me and you don't have pointed ears, so just get off my back! Leave me alone!"

He was barely listening as Sulu asked, "What's with him?" of Riley.

Joey answered even though Sulu hadn't asked him, "Nothing's wrong!"

He didn't pay attention as Lieutenant Uhura's voice came in over the comm unit in the Rec room they were in, he didn't really pay attention to Sulu asking if he was alright now, he didn't care that they were leaving. All he cared about was that his thoughts were bursting out of his head through his mouth. Everybody needed to hear them. "We're all a bunch of hypocrites! Sticking our noses into something that we've got no business messing with! What the hell are we doing out here anyway!"

He ignored Sulu and Riley, staring at the air in front of his face as he continued, not caring that everybody was watching him now. Fear, rage, pain, itching, itching, why did it feel like his hand was wet still! "We bring pain and trouble with us, leave men and women stuck out on freezing planets until they die! What're we doing out here in space?! Good? What good!? We're polluting it. Destroying it! We've got no business being out here. No business!"

Sulu and Riley were trying to talk to him, but he stared down at the butter knife. He could do that. Just… end it all. Right here. Right now. He picked it up and thrust it forward to make sure that Riley and Sulu were far enough away. They couldn't be allowed to interfere. "If a man was supposed to fly, he'd have wings! If he was supposed to be out in space, he wouldn't need air to breathe, wouldn't need life support systems to keep him from freezing to death."

Ha! They wanted him to put the knife down. As if he would do that! No, he was going to end this, as soon as possible. "We don't belong here. It's not ours. Not ours. Destroying and watching."

He turned the knife towards his stomach, "We don't belong. I don't belong. Six people died down there. What did I do to deserve to live?"

Riley grabbed his arm before he could finish the stabbing motion he was making, and he tried to jerk away, tried unsuccessfully to get out of his friend's grip. Then Sulu came and grabbed his other arm so he couldn't transfer the knife. Idiots! Didn't they see?! They didn't deserve to live here! He didn't deserve to live! All he had to do to end it was just die!

He tripped Riley and they all fell, the knife biting deep into his flesh even as he hit the ground with all of his weight. Sulu rolled him over with the help of Riley, and he stared at his hand as it came away from his stomach with blood on it. That was good. That was it, right? It was over now? He could just die now, right?

"Relative gravity increasing, sir."

Jim watched the screen carefully as he responded absently, "Compensate, Riley."

He barely heard the "Yes, sir."

He watched for a moment more before Sulu informed him, "The magnetic field is continuing to shift, sir. The planet is continuing to shift in mass."

"Spock?" he asked. He needed his First Officer's reassurance right now – the situation on board was creeping him out and making him nervous, his instincts going haywire. Something bad was happening, he just knew it. Sulu and Riley (who was substituting for Chekov, who was down in Engineering with Scotty) seemed to feel it as well, both of them flexing or rubbing their hands occasionally.

Spock had just come by to stand next to the Command chair, and easily rested his hand on the back of it as Jim looked at him and he met Jim's gaze, his posture, voice, and eyes radiating a comforting steadiness. He could rely on Spock to keep him from breaking under any kind of pressure. This was nothing. He could handle it, even if everybody went crazy, because either Bones or Spock would fix it. "All scanning stations are manned and all of our recorders are functioning, Captain."

He nodded and Riley said, "Our orbit is steady now, Captain."

Spock was the one to respond to that, his voice thoughtful and intrigued (although probably only sounding that way to Jim, who was becoming a master at reading Spock in many different ways) as he studied the screen. "Obviously, this planet is condensing more rapidly than expected, Jim. This will be a valuable study. We just might be seeing Earth's distant future."

If the situation weren't so tense he would have internally celebrated. Spock called him Jim while they were on duty! However, instead Jim just looked at him quizzically and Spock stated, "Before its sun went dark, this planet was remarkably similar to Earth, Captain."

That made Jim roll his eyes slightly and quirk a small smile as Spock left to go back to his station and Sulu reported, "The helm is answering nicely, sir."

"Good."

For a couple of minutes, he just gazed at the planet, before Uhura's voice registered, "Communication's status, Captain."

He went over and checked it over, flicking through the information on the padd before nodding firmly to her. "Good job, thank you. Keep it up, Uhura. You're the best we've got at this so we need all your effort. You're doing great so far, doll."

That was his new little nickname for Uhura, brought about by Jim unintentionally commenting that Uhura was so beautiful she could be a doll, in response to her asking why almost everybody – male and female alike – flirted with her. The other Command crew did it teasingly, but even Jim, Pavel, and Hikaru thought she was the most beautiful woman they had ever seen, and they all swung the other way – Hikaru was married to a doctor on Earth (Ben was pretty awesome), Pavel was so in love with Scotty that it was adorably ridiculous, and Jim himself had Spock whenever the other man was ready. Jim hadn't asked Spock about Uhura but he figured he'd probably get an agreement – they had dated, after all. Luckily for Jim, he himself was a guy and therefore would not have to try to compete with her. He would fail miserably if he had to do that.

Uhura rolled her eyes and lightly slapped his arm, "Oh, go get out of here, you flatterer."

Jim was about to head back to his Command chair when he noticed Spock tilting his head out of his peripheral vision and went over to his station, curious as to what it was. Then he realised: the records! This might explain why Joe went so off! The Joey he knew was not like that! "Tormolen's records?"

Spock nodded, and Jim bent over the terminal so he could read them. Spock added, "Psychiatric file and personality quotients."

Yes! That was just what he needed to see! "Was he trying to kill himself?"

He didn't want to know, but he had to ask. Just because you didn't want something absolutely did not mean that it was not necessary for you to have in order to operate things as smoothly as possible. If Joey had been suicidal and Jim had never noticed it, then other people could be in the same situation, just waiting for a disturbing mission to break their psyches. That was unacceptable. They were the best, dammit!

This time Spock shook his head, "It's doubtful that he actually meant to do it, that he would have gone through with it in the end. He was… confused. Self-tortured."

That made Jim look up, hating it but seeing it there anyway. It was something that developed just after the mission, based on the observation of all forty three people in that particular Rec room. But before this incident, just two days ago, he had exhibited no signs of anything like that. "That seriously does not sound like the Joey I know, and I talked to Hikaru; he was stunned that Joey broke like this too. Kevin was the same as well. And now Kevin and Hikaru are both of them acting just a little off, just a bit different. Something suspicious is going on, Spock, and we need to get to the bottom of it, one way or another, because if we don't fix something like this on a mission as dangerous as this, we will be destroyed just like that planet is."

Spock nodded, "Indeed Captain, I was thinking the same thing: he did occasionally experience self-doubt, but what puzzled me was what brought it to the surface so suddenly and with so much force."

Oh good! He had (probably stupidly) been worried he would have to convince Spock, when most of what he had to go on was a gut feeling with just a bit, a smattering, of evidence. "We'll have Bones get some samples, comm him when he's out of surgery."

Spock lifted an eyebrow and tilted his head forward slightly, "Aye, Captain."

Something was wrong, and they had to figure it out.

James Tiberius Kirk was tied in a knot, headachey, and nauseous. He'd had the feeling that the sword of Damocles was going to drop at any second now and instead of killing him, it would descend things into chaos the moment it hit – the planet was becoming exceedingly unstable now (Riley had been slow to respond to a gravity increase and Jim had had to do the compensation himself. He hated that they needed Chekov in Engineering right now – he would much rather have his plucky Russian navigator here than someone that had recently been traumatised by seeing his friend stab himself, no matter how protective Jim was over Kevin because they had been on Tarsus IV together), and the atmosphere on the bridge was getting tenser since they decided to see about Joe Tormolen. Something bad was about to happen, and the moment he heard Bones' voice the feeling broke over him. This was it. "McCoy here. Captain Kirk to Sickbay."

"Shit!"

Jim stood up and walked over to Spock, passing by Uhura and saying, "Uhura, monitor communications. Tell Bones I'll be there as soon as possible."

Then he arrived at Spock, who informed him, "Planet breakup is imminent, Captain. It is shrinking in size at an increasing rate. As the planet continues to shrink in size, its surface moves away from us."

Thoughtfully, Jim commented, "Forcing us to spiral down in order to maintain the same distance from it so our recordings are smooth."

"Exactly. We must be prepared to respond instantly to any sudden change."

Jim nodded firmly and moved over to his chair, pressing the comm button on it. "Engine room from Bridge."

Scotty's voice filtered onto the Bridge, his thick brogue comforting Jim for some odd reason, "Scott here, Cap'n."

Jim relayed his orders, "Tie into the helm, Scotty. If we should call for power, we'll want it fast."

"Aye, that's no problem, sir. You'll have it."

He turned to Spock, who let him know, "The rate of compaction seems constant right now, Captain."

Jim nodded tensely, "Alright then, I'll go see what Bones wants and pray it isn't a disaster. Keep me informed of any changes, Spock."

His First Officer nodded and turned back to his station as Jim left the room, "Understood, Captain."

That gut feeling had been right. This whole situation just went to hell. Joey was dead, and Jim had to get results better than what he had gotten so far. Time to lead Bones in the right direction – after he finished ranting, that is. "Dammit, Jim! The intestinal damage was not that severe! I got to him in plenty of time! The only reason he died," Bones said challengingly, "is that he gave up. He didn't want to live."

Jim injected a scolding tone into his voice and said, "That's a supposition, Bones. Not a fact."

Come on, Bones. Push it. "Maybe. I doubt it, though, Jim. I've lost patients before, but not like that. Not Joe's kind. That kind of man does not just give up!"

Now it was time to sow the seeds. "Coincidence? Maybe…"

It worked! Bones glared at him, accusingly asking, "You mean that Joe was down on the planet's surface and you're gonna ask me if it's connected. If maybe something did this to him."

So, he answered honestly, shrugging carelessly, "That's exactly what I was going to ask. We need more information."

This time Bones sighed, slumping against the biobed, "Jim, he was decontaminated. He's been medically checked. We've run every test we know for every thing we know of. I can't get you more information than that!"

He hated it, but he had to push it now. It was an absolute necessity. "That's not good enough, Bones."

He got a glare for that, before Bones said sharply, "Well we're doin' everything that's possible!"

Jim watched him evenly, stating firmly, "I want the impossible too."

He had work to do.

Something wasn't right. The ship was not responding properly. Spock looked up from his viewfinder only to see that Sulu was not at the helm where he should be. He grabbed one of the Ensigns manning a terminal, one who he knew could manage the helm – if only barely – in Sulu's place. Whatever had happened to Tormolen had happened to Sulu, and who knew how many others by now? "Take over here, Ensign Rand."

The Ensign nodded, "Yes sir."

Spock turned to Riley, demanding, "Where is Sulu, Riley? Why isn't he at his station?"

Riley swung his arm out and grinned widely, causing Spock to suppress a sigh. Damn. He would have to get another Ensign to man the navigation console, which one of them would be good enough? "Have no fear, O'Riley's here! One Irishman is worth ten thousand of you!"

Spock steadily pulled the man out of his seat, making sure to only touch his sleeve – just in case. Who knew how this… thing was spreading. "You are relieved, Riley."

Finally, he came to a decision, "Lieutenant Uhura, take over this station."

Nyota was gratifyingly swift, as she responded, "Yes, sir."

Meanwhile, Spock carefully dragged Riley away, and towards the doors to the Bridge. He was most displeased with Riley's comment of, "Now that's what I like! Let the women do the work too! Universal suffrage!"

Spock sternly commanded, "Report to Sickbay, Riley. Now."

If the universe had any reasoning capacity in this bout of insanity, Riley would obey a command… "Sickbay? That's exactly where I was heading, sir!"

Good. Spock did not need any more of this right now. He had a job to do, and something both mysterious and potentially dangerous was happening to the ship right now. Sighing, he activated his comm unit and patched to Security. "Security. Riley is headed to Sickbay. See to it he arrives."

Then he patched through to Jim's personal unit – no need to set the ship to panicking, he could explain it succinctly enough in person. "Captain Kirk to the Bridge, as soon as possible, please."

Kevin headed to Sickbay as ordered, but just as he was approaching the area an idea entered into his mind. Jim was an amazing Captain, but he'd always wondered what it felt like to be in command like that. Kevin knew enough about Engineering – it'd been his sub-focus at the Academy – to know that he could learn what it felt like! Smiling, he diverted away and headed in a new direction. Time to find out what being a Captain felt like!

Jim walked onto the Bridge directly following one of their navigators, and heard Spock tell the man, "Lieutenant Brent, relieve Lieutenant Uhura."

The man shifted into position and Jim walked over to the Command chair, Spock leaving it as soon as he saw Jim. He sat down and Spock leaned against the arm and back of the chair, Jim resting his arm along the edge and watching Spock intently. "What were their symptoms, Spock?"

Spock shook his head slightly, "I did not experience Sulu's departure, however Riley was – at this stage, anyway – non-violent, slightly confused, and seemed to be very pleased with himself. Just as if he were…"

He raised an eyebrow as he trailed off – Jim really appreciated that Spock was now allowing him more input, giving him more chances to prove his intelligence and cognitive ability. To begin with the half-Vulcan had only been somewhat confrontational and condescending, but time and hard work had changed that. Jim quickly connected the dots. "Irrational, or drugged. It's happening, then. Whatever happened to those researchers is happening all over again. Dammit! We do not need this right now!"

"Precisely," Spock quietly agreed. The situation wasn't easy for either of them. Joey's loss had been a deep hit.

Jim nodded; right, he had to get this contained, "Uhura, Security please."

"Done, sir."

Good. "Locate and confine both Sulu and Riley. I want every crewman who has been in contact with them taken to Sickbay, medically checked over, and confined there for the duration."

It was just a moment later that Uhura's incredulous voice came back to him, "Captain, there's a disturbance on level two, corridor three – Sulu is chasing people with his sword. The katana!"

Fuck! So much for not dangerous. "Have him restrained and confined immediately! Get him to Sickbay and make sure he is confined, even if he has to be sedated!"

He turned back to Spock for his thoughts, which were given promptly. "Intriguing. A pattern seems to be developing. First, Tormolen. Hidden personality traits being forced to the surface. Then Riley, who seems to fancy himself a descendant of Irish kings, and now Sulu, who is at heart a swashbuckler out of Earth's eighteenth century when he is not a ninja."

Before Jim could respond, the ship lurched unsteadily and he demanded, "Report!"

Spock had fled to his station at the lurch, and would hopefully be getting him what he needed soon. "The gravity pull is still increasing, Captain. We've shifted to two percent and need to stabilise our position."

"Helmsman, stabilise position."

"Helm isn't answering to control, sir!" The response was understandably panicked.

Fuck the recordings; they'd gotten plenty so far and needed to get out of here while they still could, especially considering the epidemic that was spreading. "Then warp us out of here!"

Ensign Rand was getting even more panicked now. "No response from the engines, sir! Either of them, the impulse engines are dead too, sir!"

Spock had arrived and hit the comm unit in the helm, "Engine room, we need power!"

No response. He went to the Command chair and commed Scotty from there. "Scotty, acknowledge! Our controls are dead!"

No response again. Dammit, they didn't need this right now! He turned back to Spock, "Take her, I'll go see if I can't find out what's wrong."

Before he reached the doors, however, Sulu (he couldn't think of the man as his friend Hikaru right now – not when he was deranged) burst in and swung his katana in a sideways arc. Dammit, how had he evaded Security?!

Well, his being shirtless probably didn't help – Sulu was incredibly attractive when he was without his shirt; he always had an impressive audience for his various practises, so that was a very distracting thing. The dangerously sharp sword definitely, absolutely didn't help either. They weren't exactly trained to take on swordsmen. (The universe had to be mad. Here he was, out in space, Captain of a starship, and he was facing a katana on the Bridge of his own ship. What. The. Fuck.) "Richelieu, at last."

"Uh, right. Sulu, put the fucking sword away."

Negative. All he did was raise his arm and yell out, "For honour, Queen, and France!"

Then he lunged, causing Jim to stumble away from him with a curse. Okay. Right. From now on he was keeping his own katana close to hand. Sulu began waving his sword around like it were a damned rapier, instead of a katana, which was just so ridiculous there were no words for it. Yes, Sulu also knew how to use a rapier, and had one, but he hadn't picked up one of his foils, which were overall far less dangerous than his katana. Spock approached, and Sulu recklessly waved the sword around to keep him away. Uhura approached him carefully, "Sulu, hey, give me that, okay?"

Sulu lunged for her, pulling her to his side as he exclaimed, "I'll protect you, fair maiden!"

If Uhura had been a cat, she would have had all of her fur standing on end. As it was, she bristled and pushed him away, "I don't think so!"

That distracted Sulu enough that Jim could (unfortunately, since he suspected whatever this thing going around was, it relied on skin contact – he'd be paying for this later, but he couldn't allow anybody else to get hurt: Jim could be replaced, after all, that's what the Command crew was for; all of them could fill in every Command position, even if only barely so) restrain the arm with the katana and soon Spock joined him, using the Vulcan nerve-pinch to disable Sulu. "Thanks, although I could have disabled him. You shouldn't have done that, at least one of us needed to not be exposed to this crap going around."

That gave Spock pause, and he tilted his head, "Indeed, Captain. I should have remembered that. It is, however, possible that it will not interact with Vulcan physiology."

Jim rolled his eyes, "Even though your physiology is mostly Vulcan, you still have human genetics, which means you're still vulnerable."

Then he beckoned to two of the men standing by, "Take Sulu to Sickbay and then stay there yourselves, because you might be contaminated. Be sure Bones is aware of this, understood? And don't worry," he added with a comforting smile, "Bones is the best; he'll figure out what's going wrong."

They left, and he sighed, walking back to his chair and tapping the comm. "Scotty, we need power. Engine room, acknowledge!"

Riley's voice came back over the comm, in a terrible Irish accent, "This is Captain Kevin Thomas Riley of the starship Enterprise. And who is this?"

Oh fuck no. Their previous relationship didn't stop Jim from being wholly, utterly infuriated that Riley had taken over Engineering. "This is Captain Kirk. Get out of the engine room, Riley. Where's Scotty?"

He turned the comm to broadcast ship-wide and walked to the doors so he could keep track of what was going on while he tracked down Scotty (and Pavel) and got them to fix the problem. Riley continued on, "I've relieved Scotty of his duties. Now, attention, cooks. This is your captain speaking. I would like double portions of ice cream for the entire crew!"

Dammit, they were locked! He slammed his fists into the doors and growled, "Uhura clear it, will you? I need out of here, and I need out of here now."

He ignored Riley's broadcast and his abominable singing, heading over when Spock motioned to him with a tilt of his head. "Captain, at our present rate of descent we have less than twenty minutes before we enter the planet's atmosphere."

He ran a hand through his hair, "And then promptly burn up. I know, Spock. I know."

The doors opened and he ran through them.

Scotty and Pavel, as well as a few other crewmen, most of them engineers but some of whom he recognised from Security, were waiting outside of Engineering. One of the Ensigns ran off as he arrived, instrument in hand. "How the fuck did Riley get into Engineering?"

Scotty shrugged and looked chastised, "He ran in and said you wanted us on the Bridge, sir."

Well this was a fine predicament. New rule: from now on, if Jim wanted to talk to Scotty, he would just comm him. They couldn't risk something like this happening again just because he could sometimes wait to talk to Scotty and sent someone to fetch him to let the Engineer know that he could wait if there was something more important going on. "From now on, Scotty, unless I comm you and ask for you, stay at your post. If I forget and send someone, comm me to make sure I sent them before leaving. I am not blaming you – I'm blaming myself. It was purely my fault this happened and I won't risk it happening again. Riley has shut off both helm and power. We're trapped."

Pavel bit off an exclamation and Scotty sighed, "Aye, he shut the door behind him and locked off the mechanism. Cannae get to the auxiliary, either, he's hooked everything through the main panel in there."

Then he turned to Pavel, "Get up to my office and pull the plans for this bulkhead. The only way to get that door open is to cut through to these wall circuits."

Scotty tapped the wall next to Jim as he explained why he needed the plans. Pavel was gratifyingly swift as he immediately left them with a tense, "Right."

"All decks, alert system B two. Repeat, go to alert condition Baker two. Seal off all main sections. Stand by."

Good ol' Spock. Kirk walked into the Bridge just as the alert stopped, and he looked over at Spock, who nodded to him, "More incidents being reported, Jim. We're going to seal off, see if we can't minimise the spread of… whatever this is."

"Good," he responded, turning to Uhura, "Continue the alert, Lieutenant."

She looked over at him, clearly worried. "I can't, sir! He's cut off the alert channels!"

Riley's voice came back over the comm and Jim ignored the verbal idiocy to tell Uhura, "Cut him off!"

But she couldn't, and he knew it. Riley was in control of the main power panels, which meant he controlled every single aspect of the Enterprise down there. From replicators to water temperature to engines to everything else imaginable. That was why, even though Scotty was hardly formal and often seemed like a complete drunk, nobody ever disrespected him or disparaged him. The man was the best Engineer there was – when he was only fourteen he disproved the Perera Theory and had his results published when he was fifteen; Starfleet then went crazy over recruiting him to save face from having a widely taught theory being disproved by a fourteen year old – and everybody respected the hell out of how fucking brilliant he was. Even Spock, although he didn't approve of the still that they had built and installed down there.

Uhura confirmed it, "I can't, Captain! There is just no way to do it."

He sighed and rubbed his face, "Right. If you can't, you can't. The little shit just has too much control of the situation. Don't stress too much about it, okay, Uhura? Scotty is working on it and I want you as calm as you can get right now. We need you here with us."

He didn't have to say, "not in Sickbay" because Uhura was too intelligent not to know that.

Then, without any warning, the ship jolted, flinging everybody away from where they were and all the way across the room for several – he could admit this – terrifying seconds. Fuck fuck fuck! Keep calm, Kirk. You can do this, and you have to stay calm, Jim. The more worried you get the worse your decisions will be because you are infected with an unknown something.

"Sickbay to Bridge."

Bones! "Hey, can you tie me in to Sickbay? Thanks."

His friend responded before Uhura could say anything, "I'm getting you, Jim. Look, can't you keep this beast level?! I'm trying to get some tests on Sulu and we have him tranquillised for that! I hate to say this, but so far there's nothing unusual in his blood stream. His body functions seem normal, too."

Right, well, Sulu wasn't the problem, Riley was. "So you don't have enough information to fix up something that can knock Riley out of it. Damn."

"No, I don't, Jim. Not until I get further on these tests. I'm working on it though, as are my nurses. We have other patients brought in by Security, and several Security here as well because of your quick thinking. Nothing like as many who have been exposed, but enough to speed up the discovery of anomalies."

Jim droned out the next announcements from Riley, although Uhura seemed pretty infuriated by them, which meant that Kevin was being sexist again. He usually kept it to himself and only dated girls that were of a "type", but he was a bit sexist in his views about what an ideal woman was like. The family Kevin had gone to after Tarsus IV had impacted his personality negatively. Unfortunately you had people like that who were on board the ship because Starfleet didn't reject people for things like that. Usually it got trained out, but some people were more resistant to training things like that out, and those people tended to stay in positions that were not super influential.

Scotty's voice filled his ears, "Engineering to Bridge. Try your helm. You'll have enough power to keep 'er stabilised."

Oh thank fuck. It wasn't everything he needed, but it was something.

"Sixteen minutes left, Captain. We've stabilised but we are still spiralling down."

He must have zoned out a bit. That wasn't a good sign. It was starting. Breathe in. Breathe out. Stay calm, Kirk. You can do this.

"Emergency signal, Captain, from both decks four and five. Fights and disorder."

Dammit! He needed this problem fixed. What can I do to speed up finding a cure to this shit?

Spock! The recordings could go to hell for all he cared, there was plenty of data to work with now; they needed Spock's brilliant mind working with Bones' brilliant mind. First though, he needed to see if any progress had been made. "Get me through to Sickbay."

"No can do, Captain. He keeps switching the channels. I can't get Sickbay."

Yeah, that was it. "Okay, Spock, get to Bones. See what you can do to help him out, we need your brilliant mind on this. Oh and while you're headed out, check on Scotty first. We need that done sooner rather than later."

He was gratified when Spock left without another word, and was privately glad that Bones' nurses were all level-headed and not inclined to be emotional. Many of them were likely infected by now, and it would have been a bad thing for all of them if one of them was nursing a crush on his XO.

Spock headed towards the Sickbay after getting through with Scott, who had been working as fast as possible at cutting through the wall – normally Spock would have disapproved of cutting through without a margin for safety, but Scott had been more than aware of how little time they had to spare, and had been cutting through the wall with speed and accuracy. Pleased with this information, he entered Sickbay, looking around for Doctor McCoy. He wasn't there, but Nurse Chapel, his most senior assistant, was carefully scanning Sulu, gloved hands hovering over his body. Spock approved of the professionalism. "Where is Doctor McCoy?"

Nurse Chapel looked up from her work just long enough to confirm who he was, before returning back to her work. "He's in the lab, Mister Spock. We assumed from the beginning that this was transmitted through touch and made sure to keep our gloves on, but not all of the other nurses and aides were able to be informed. Of course, most of them were gloved as well, but not all of them."

A smirk lined her face as she continued with, "The ones who weren't wearing gloves are going to get punished by Doctor McCoy when this is over. I'm looking forward to seeing what he will do. The good Doctor is certainly both creative and vengeful."

If it had been the Captain to whom he was speaking, Spock would have allowed himself his own tiny smirk. That was indeed incredibly amusing and he wished he could see this vengeance exac- damn. It was beginning. Just barely, but that emotion was stronger than normal, and he could – again, just barely – feel despair creeping up on him. He had to keep it together. He would keep it together. As it was, he just minutely tilted his head, "I am certain that it will be highly entertaining to those of you who are more professional, as well as be a learning experience for those who were less cautious in this. Well, I will go meet him in the lab then, as the Captain needs a cure sooner rather than later and I could possibly already be infected."

No need to let her know he was undoubtedly contaminated by whatever this was. She nodded firmly, "I'll let him know you are on your way in a second, I just have to finish up with Mister Sulu here."

"Good." Spock left and began cautiously heading towards the labs, making an active attempt to be sure to avoid other people. Hopefully Jim was holding up despite the pressure.

"Dammit, get him out of here!"

Jim Kirk was holding onto his control by the skin of his teeth as yet another person – this one laughing madly – was escorted off of the Bridge. Fuck. He couldn't do this! Rand-the-Ensign was gone by now, and Rand-the-Yeoman had replaced him at the helm, a job which she was barely trained for but which she was nonetheless in the best position to handle, being uninfected and thus able to keep a cool head. He was back in his chair now, slumped into his hands as the stress and the pressure eroded his control. He hoped Spock was okay – despite having touched Sulu, it had been nothing like the contact Jim had had with the man, so there was every chance that he was perfectly fine right now, unless he had come into contact with somebody else who was infected.

His in-chair comm unit chimed, and Scotty's voice let him know, "We're almost done, Cap'n! You said to let you know so you could be here, so I'm doin' my duty."

He had to smile. Scotty sounded perfectly normal, and his calm was infectious. Jim had already yelled at (and then apologised to) Uhura for being unable to cut Riley off, had yelled at or about every person taken off the Bridge, and had been in general far less calm than he would rather have been. However, his cognitive and reasoning ability still held strong, as did his determination to keep it together and not die. "On my way, Scotty. Uhura, get Spock here on the double, he'll take the conn from you once he gets here. Until then, I trust your competence to keep things together."

Uhura sent him a small smile and immediately bent to her task as Jim left the Bridge, swiftly making his way back down to Engineering. Sure enough, Scotty was busy prying the panel he cut into the wall out of it, and Pavel and two members of Security were with him. "Set your phasers to stun, but don't shoot unless he's armed. We need him out of there and escorted to Sickbay as soon as possible, you got that?"

He received their affirmative as Scotty plunged his hands into the open wall, fiddling with the wires until the door opened itself, at which point they all ran into the room. Riley stopped his singing and cursed, "No dance tonight," when he saw Jim, and the look on his face informed Jim that once he was cured, a private apology and explanation would be given. It was enough to make him forgive the kid already. Jim beckoned to the two Security crewmen. They pulled Riley away and escorted him out, while Scotty took the controls and began working furiously to get everything back on board.

After a few minutes his control was getting shot again and he was kept from bitching at Scotty again when Uhura commed him. "Bridge to Captain, we're entering the planet's outer atmosphere. Spock wants to know what to do."

Fuck! This was not good. In fact he would go so far as to say it was horrifically bad. "Scotty?" He asked.

Scotty looked up at him mournfully, "He turned the engines completely off, Cap'n. It'll take another half hour to get them back on line."

"We haven't got that much time left!"

"Well," Scotty said carefully, "We cannae start them up cold, mixing matter and antimatter cold will make us go up in the biggest explosion since-"

Wait! Wait a minute. Not necessarily! "That's it! We can balance our engines into a controlled implosion! That would get us away from the planet and out to a safer position!"

"Da! I can help with that, Captain! We will need Spock's help too, to double-check the intermix formula. It is a good idea, Captain!"

Scotty had an intrigued look on his face, and Jim smiled. Work was getting done. It was dangerous but staying where they were at would be even more dangerous. "Uhura, have Spock head back to Bones to help him out, but tell him to keep his personal comm unit open to help Scotty and Chekov as well. You have the conn until I get back to the Bridge."

When Spock headed back to Sickbay, he walked in to a screaming Sulu, and raised his eyebrow as the screaming stopped. He was barely capable of controlling his reactions right now, despair-horror-grief-regret swirling around his mind until he could hardly think straight. He hoped that his help was not needed so desperately here, so that he could attempt to focus on the intermix formula for starting the engines up cold. "We did it, hobgoblin! You were right, it was the water on that planet, it acts like alcohol and contaminates everybody that comes into contact with it – spreads through perspiration. No wonder we couldn't find anything off to begin with."

"What happened?" Sulu dazedly asked. "I was on the Bridge and then – I don't remember anything else."

"You were infected, Sulu, but I can guarantee they need you back on the Bridge again, kid. Go on, you're cured and immune now. Now that you're free, Spock, will you help me with this and work to get the cure spread around the ship?"

"Affirmative, Doctor."

He requested a hypo of the cure, which surprised McCoy before the doctor peered at him and tersely nodded. He understood. Now it was time to work again.

Jim watched as the Enterprise burst away from the planet thanks to collaboration between Scotty, Pavel, and Spock, who had arrived on the Bridge with Bones, the latter sticking hypos into people as he checked up on them. They had just barely gotten through this adventure, and it was a closer brush with death than he would have liked to ever experience – but somehow, he had a feeling that this wouldn't be the last time he almost died on a mission. It sure as hell wasn't the first.