Detente

[sharpestscalpel]

It had chaffed at first. Jocelyn had left him to rot, pissed as hell about the kid. He’d mulled over vivid revenge fantasies until, the first time he saw her afterwards, he’d had to clench his fists in his pockets so they wouldn’t reach out of their own accord and settle over her fine collarbones and reel her in for a taste old-fashioned McCoy justice like spit in her eye.

But in the end, he hadn’t blamed her. She was a conniver and he hadn’t ever been as willing a participant in her scheme as she’d have liked. Jocelyn had deserved a shot a making it on her own terms. She’d taken that chance.

She hadn’t done half-bad for herself, McCoy had to admit. But then, neither had he. Especially considering where Pike had found him. Every day spent in solitary – it had worn on him, made him tired and angry and hungry for hurting things in ways he’d never been on the outside.

Pike had come, waving a shiny new medical license and a Fleet uniform, an offer too good to pass up. CMO of the Fleet’s fancy new darling of a flagship or shitting his bed out of boredom inside four walls with no windows? At least in space he’d see the stars.

The stars and pretty little officers all dressed up like they were real shitting captains. Uhura strode over to his table, tiny body full of energy and violence in a way that made her extra appealing to look at, and took the other seat without asking.

“McCoy, what the hell?” Uhura hadn’t really counted on Kirk coming back. She surveyed the emaciated man – she’d teased him about his slim hips but this was ridiculous – sitting slightly behind the doctor, watching everything from those haunted blue eyes.

Uhura was the one chaffing now, all the power she’d thought she had coming with a ride-along, circumscribed from being absolute. She had the ship. But McCoy had his sickbay. And she’d eventually need it, need him. Pike had given McCoy more than he’d expected – but he’d still fucked them both because they were stuck with each other.

“You want to make this an official conversation, we can take it back to your office… Captain.” The pause was significant, not quite insulting but certainly not currying favor.

Her headshake was minimal but definite. Their dependence on one another wasn’t known – and she’d prefer to keep it that way. McCoy had never made a play for power that Uhura knew of but he’d have all of her enemies rallying behind him if the stalemate became common knowledge.

“Kirk.” Uhura acknowledged him at least. He had his rank, she’d checked the computer records. He’d need McCoy to clear him for duty before he could set foot on the bridge and even then Uhura wasn’t about to trust the blond man. But it wasn’t entirely unpleasant to see him alive, especially if being in the good doctor’s care mean McCoy had something invested in him. There was some sort of opportunity here, she just had to sniff it out.

Comments

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Kirk drew his eyes away from Uhura's retreating form to look calmly at McCoy. It certainly was not true that he had no fear of the man. He was not complacent.

"I think it's fucking useful to make her think I think so," he replied quietly.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

McCoy grunted his approval, raised his glass in a brief salute.

"I knew you weren't fucking stupid."

It was as close to praise as he'd come with Kirk. But he was still watching him. This was their first outing, after all. If Kirk was going to do something stupid...

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Kirk tamped down the dull glow in his gut at the near-praise. It was ridiculous, useless. Dangerous, even.

"And neither are you. She won't let this lie." And maybe, neither would Kirk, but there was no reason he couldn't discuss Uhura's plans with McCoy.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

"You reckon I figure to let it lie?"

McCoy tossed the rest of his drink back and rose.

"Come the fuck on. We got a few more rounds to make."

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Kirk took a last sip--juice, actually, he didn't want to risk any fuzzy thinking, his first day out--and stood up. They hadn't discussed the other destinations, and he wondered if McCoy was deliberately trying to keep him off balance. No, that wasn't even a question. Of course he was.

"Where we going?"

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

"We need to pay a fucking visit to Engineering. Scotty and me got a little business to tend to."

Kirk was along for the goddamn ride one way or another - meant he didn't need to fucking know ahead of time if there was a change in their agenda. Not yet. Not until he earned it.

Uhura thought she'd undermine him, that much was crystal goddamn clear. He needed to step up the work on Blue.

He turned left out the door to lead them into the bowels of the engineering department through a series of ladders and tubes. One of the first things Scotty had done was disable the turbolift access to his lair.

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Kirk quickly erased the frown as he followed. Fuck if he knew what McCoy wanted with that lush, but Kirk figured it was a demonstration for him, too, as much as anything. He just needed to figure out what it was McCoy seemed to want him to learn.

But soon he was having to concentrate on something other than McCoy's hidden motives. He wasn't in shape--there was no way he could be, really--and the ladders and tubes were a strain. His muscles were trembling by the time they reached the bottom, and he was working to hide the extent of his fatigue. He had stamina, however, and the ability to push past his own limits.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

Kirk looked a little goddamn pale under the collar by the time they made it to Scotty's door. McCoy stopped him, well back from the fucking cameras, checked his pulse the old-fashioned way with two fingers at Kirk's wrist.

"Don't drink anything that asshole offers you, even if you have to throw it in his fucking face."

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Kirk stared at him. He knew that. He was still alive, wasn't he?

But "got it" was all he said, getting his breathing under control and nodding to McCoy. He'd take things as they came--so far, every step had brought him to a place better than the one before.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

McCoy banged on Scotty's door for the satisfaction of it. The drunk bastard hadn't left Engineering since Pike had left.

Scotty's call to admit them was incoherent, indecipherable.

"You dumb fuck."

The Scotsman had fallen halfway between the door and his bed - the stinking pile of mattress and bedding looked like he'd been nesting in it - and now he was sprawled, legs at uncomfortable angles and his bottle of homebrew spilled on the already slick floor.

"You fucking dumb fuck."

McCoy hoisted him up enough to toss him back onto the bed.

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Kirk hovered, wrinkling his nose at the stink and wondering how the ship was still running at all, if this douchebag was in charge of her inner workings. Did Uhura know it was this bad? Had Pike?

What use he could be to McCoy would be interesting to find out. Kirk had, at least, progressed enough in his recovery to find other people useless.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

He'd never seen the Scotsman totally sober - hell, maybe his genius depended on his drunkeness. But McCoy had never seen him this bad.

Scotty fucking stank.

"She's nae my beauty naemore."

He belched and McCoy reared back to avoid the foul breath. So that was the shitting problem. The ship, Scotty's only love, was responding to Uhura now.

"What's the fucking matter, Scott? She ain't singing to you anymore?" He hit the man in the neck with a detox hypo.

"She doesn't need me." It was almost a wail. "I cannea even access the warp core."

Uhura again. Watching her own back, stirring up the status quo.

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Kirk had always thought the man had an unhealthy relationship with the ship. Then again, that was sort of a redundant observation around here. He'd always found Scotty vaguely creepy, obsessive, and pointless.

Then again, if Uhura had literal control of the ship, maybe Scotty's years of pining or whatever would manifest in some stroke of genius. If he was sober enough to recognize it.

"Can she literally do this on her own?" he wondered aloud. Not even Uhura had ever talked about anything that ambitious. What was the point, if she didn't need her crew?

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

"Shut the fuck up, Kirk." McCoy's voice was a sudden hiss of anger directed back over his shoulder at Kirk. The last thing they needed was Scotty with information or ideas.

On the plus side, Kirk had just given McCoy his excuse. He tucked away his satisfaction for a moment.

"Scotty, shut up, man." The detox hypo could only do so much and the chief engineer was moaning low. "Shut up and mind your fucking ship. She's been seduced away but I'll bet you a quart of your finest that you can win her back."

Nothing like sowing a little discord in the morning.

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Things happened when Kirk was bored, though they'd been happening less frequently these past months. Survival took the edge off, as it were.

Perhaps, with a little less to worry about on that front, he was starting to feel restless again. McCoy's anger was startling less in the context of the situation and more in the context of McCoy himself, whose moods seemed more subtle, hard to fathom, than that. But it was enough to shut him up again, for now. And remind himself that he was being allowed to witness that, however it fell into McCoy's plans. However it chafed to have to be "allowed" to do anything.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

Scotty was nodding now. If anyone had a chance at testing the complete control of the probes, it was this one - he'd all but been a lover to the Enterprise.

And McCoy wasn't taking any bets on whether or not Scotty had found a way to express his obsession in a physical way. At least he'd never shown up in sickbay with suspicious burns.

McCoy soothed the drunkard, whispered suggestions in his ear until Scotty was asleep and murmurring plans to win back his love. It might not work, but if it didn't, Uhura would track everything back to Scotty - who wouldn't remember a thing thanks to the drugs mixed in with the detox.

When the chief engineer was snoring, McCoy turned his attention back to Kirk. A jerk of his head directed the blond man back to the door without a sound.

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

His mouth a thin line, Kirk followed. He didn't know what McCoy had said to him--just murmured words here and there had floated back to him. Nor did he know what had been in the hypo--you never really did, with him.

But he could be it was brilliant, whatever had just gone on. Kirk stepped outside, holding his tongue.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

Kirk wouldn't last the walk back to sickbay, weak fucker that he was. McCoy sighed, slung a supportive arm around Kirk's waist, hitched one of the other man's arms around his shoulders.

"We got us a little bit of a walk and I'd hate for you to be fucked out at the end of it."

They walked the long hall to the ladder where McCoy boosted Kirk up first. "There's a turbolift at the halfway point of this hall."

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

The sudden contact had startled him, put him on his guard until he realized what McCoy was doing and the shame of it washed over him for a moment. Help walking. Fuck. If anyone saw them, he was fucked. He wanted to fight, to shove McCoy away, but on top of knowing he wouldn't be able to, he knew that even if he did he probably wouldn't have any strength left over for the walk itself.

He tried not to think about the last time anyone had touched him other than to fuck with him, or clean up the mess. Which, intellectually, he knew this was, too. He couldn't bring himself to thank McCoy, but he didn't complain, either. Though the set of his jaw spoke to his unhappiness with the situation.

Kirk knew the Enterprise as well, but he tamped that back too as he climbed, concentrating on putting hand over hand and coordinating his legs.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

Kid was unhappy. Good. Let him stew in his own weakness at the moment. Let him remember how much he depended on McCoy.

McCoy wasn't really angry, had felt the flare of it fade almost as fast as Kirk had shut his damn mouth after his trangression. But rules were rules.

He helped Kirk to the turbolift, let his hand touch gently and supportively, kept his mouth closed on the topic.

"Sickbay."

M'Benga should be on duty. He'd be just fine.

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

The mixed signals were going to be Kirk's undoing; layered over the anger in McCoy's eyes was the calm touch of his hand, dulling Kirk's vigilance. And everything now had a veil of fatigue over it, not yet debilitating but fuzzing the edges of his responses. He needed to get back on top of things. He would.

He glanced sharply at McCoy at the order, his mouth snapping open and then just as sharply shut again. But the question in his eyes was clear.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

McCoy let Kirk stand on his own, make his own way down the halls that had a chance of being populated. He just led the way in silence.

M'Benga was stocking shelves - McCoy waved and pointed him back to the iso room. He dropped the box of gauze he was fumbling with - the man was no damn kind of nurse - and met them there.

"Kirk ain't learned to keep his damn mouth shut. Figure you might want to have a little shitting talk with him about it."

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

And there is was, the shoe drop-kicking him in the gut. The fact that it took him by surprise was surprising enough in itself. M'Benga's abject slavishness to McCoy's demands was reason enough to be worried, if nothing else. And there was plenty else.

His eyes shot to McCoy, mingled defiance and fear he could not hide in his haunted expression.

[sharpestscalpel.livejournal.com]

McCoy's own eyes were kind. His hands were soothing as he led Kirk back into the iso room where he'd been caged for so long, following M'Benga's eager back, every line of it tense with excitement.

The door locked with an ominous finality. McCoy slumped in his chair as though Kirk had never left this room, never slept on his couch.

"M'Benga here got himself on my shit list. But he's a fuck up as a nurse. This here is his opportunity to earn himself back in my damn good graces, Blue. You wouldn't want to deny him that, now would you?"

The man in question knew better than to open his mouth. M'Benga had learned his lesson. Now he just waited for a chance to prove it.

[behnd-blueyes.livejournal.com]

Kirk did not want to be here. He hadn't realized until just now how much he hated this room--as much as he would have hated that cell, when this was his sanctuary. McCoy's kindness was suspect, as was M'Benga's poorly concealed excitement. McCoy slouched, but Kirk stood stiff and straight. Waiting. It was interesting that McCoy felt the need, or just interest, to couch it like he was doing M'Benga a favor. Kirk didn't want to ever be the third man in that room, cowed and so beaten he was eager even for the blow.

"Guess not," he said. Thing was, he would, he'd deny him hard, but he had no goddamn choice. Kirk knew McCoy well enough to know that whatever he had in mind, he could think of something worse.