Chapter Text
A lot of people think that Jim is an absolute amoral slut; it just looks that way because he’s nondiscriminatory. If you turn down a possible partner due to something arbitrary like planet of origin or genitalia you miss out on a lot of interesting experiences. Jim has met a lot of eclectic individuals and has learned cool things. He can speak six different languages due to various bed partners. Also the knowledge that he has picked up in the bedroom regarding various cultural practices have come in handy during several diplomatic situations i.e. this knowledge has already kept them from dying at least twice. In addition, there is just something inherently great about any species where the people have breasts and dicks. Jim loved that species. There’s a reason that Jim was able to test out of all of his xeno-biology classes. (Although Vulcans still eluded him and as much as he would like to study that firsthand Jim knew that was never going to happen. He knows about how they kiss but that’s about it.)
He was not a slut, he was a connoisseur of diversity and he loves sex in all its many forms. Maybe his choices in partners said more about his inner desire to discover new things more than anything else. In general, most people did not see it that way. There was this one telepathic psych major hook up that suggested Jim was a sex addict and urge Jim to see a therapist but Jim solved that problem by not sleeping with the guy again.
Contrary to popular belief, just because he’s open to a lot of things does not mean he doesn’t have standards and rules. For example he has learned the hard way not to sleep with med students who are already planning your wedding by the first date and telepathic psychiatry majors. That leads to restraining orders, crying, and dodging therapy sessions. He doesn’t want to deal with situations like that again so Jim has developed rules that govern his hookups.
The rule tied for number one is he does not fuck his crew. Jim respects the people that he works with too much to turn anybody into a one night stand. (In addition, he needs them to respect him and fucking with everybody is not conducive to that.) Also, casual doesn’t work well when you have to work with somebody on a daily basis for however long the mission is going to last. Really, it’s just common sense not to fuck with (literally and figuratively) the people who may rescue you from the local inhabitants after they decide to kidnap you, drug you, and chain you up to a bed for a sex ritual that you did not consent to and that may result in your death. (He’s cool with bondage as long as he actually trusts the person but trust goes out the window when they drug him first. There’s a reason why Jim doesn’t do much bondage.)
So even though he may stare at the asses of his communications officer and first officer a little too often he wasn’t going to do a thing about it because he does not fuck his crew. Besides nothing could come of it, so it didn’t matter.
His next rule is he doesn’t sleep with people who are under the influence or in situations where consent is obviously very dubious. There was something that happened to Jim when he was a teenager that he never talks about that led to this rule. That’s why when some idiot drugged his favorite communications officer when she was on a ‘break’ from her boyfriend (and his Spock) he took her to his apartment (after she kicked the guys ass), called Bones to check on her, and let her sleep it off in his bed as he slept on his absolutely horrible couch. He adored Nyota and has always thought she was the hottest woman in Starfleet but Jim respects her too much to take advantage of her. Despite what everybody thinks about him, he doesn’t screw the unwilling or those who are unable to say that they’re unwilling.
That’s another reason why he doesn’t fuck his crew. He’s in a position of authority and is a little worried that someone may sleep with him just because he’s technically their boss and he doesn’t want that. There was an incident like that with his mom where she said no to her commanding officer and she and husband number three ended up assigned to the colony of the damned (Jim was dragged along for the unpleasantness). He could never put somebody under his command in that position.
The other reason why he didn’t do anything with Nyota even though she was technically on a break was he doesn’t mess with other people’s relationships. Jim learned this one the hard way during the lost years. When he was living in this really shady apartment he started sleeping with his next-door neighbor. Unbeknownst to Jim, she was sleeping with him to get back at her husband who was screwing around with the babysitter and like to beat the hell out of her for the fun of it. The husband found out and Jim ended up with two black eyes, three broken ribs, and bruises all over his neck (the other guy was actually worse). The only good thing that came out of that disaster was the wife (along with her two kids) decided to finally get the hell away from the bastard husband.
Jim could just imagine how much worse it would be if he managed to piss off a Vulcan. At that point, his neck was still hurting from the last time he made Spock angry. He was also equally afraid of Nyota because campus legend had it that she broke a guy’s foot for asking her to go down on him in Klingon and he saw her knock out the idiot who tried to drug her. For that reason, both were hands-off.
Even if something happened and Nyota and Spock were no longer together, he still wouldn’t try anything because he does not fuck his friends and both were friends. He and Nyota became friends after he was a perfect gentleman during the ‘getting drunk and accidentally drugged because your boyfriend is leaving you to make Vulcan babies with some stranger’ fiasco. He even knew that the only reason she started learning Klingon was to understand the stupid pickup lines of a certain idiot. She continued taking classes when she realized she was good at it. Despite what other Spock said and his desire to strangle his Spock on a regular basis, something like friendship has actually developed with his Spock (or it did before the lizard girl incident and saving Spock from the volcano of doom before said Vulcan threw him under the metaphorical bus.)
He likes both relationships where they are and he doesn’t want to mess that up. Okay, that’s a lie. It is more like he doesn’t think more is ever going to happen with either person, so he’s going to be satisfied with whatever little crumbs he can get. That one time he was brave enough to suggest that he wanted something more Jim played it off as if he was drunk and joking. He was completely sober because again contrary to what everybody assumes, he’s not the reckless idiot that they all think that he is (except for recent actions that have resulted in him having ‘time’ to re-examine things). Spock never said anything and Jim never mentioned it again.
Jim’s no fucking friends rule came out of high school and the destruction of his longest lasting platonic relationship until he met Bones. His preteen and teen years in general were pretty horrible but the destruction of that relationship is probably the worst part. After surviving the famine and a governor with a genocidal god complex, he was sentenced to spend out the rest of his teenage years in a group home until his then best friend’s family took him in (because Jim’s brother was too ‘flaky’ to consider stepping up and taking care of him himself). The reason why Jim became a ward of the Federation was because his mom kind of lost it after all the shit that went down on the planet they do not speak of. Over a decade later, she was still living in a Starfleet rehabilitation center for ‘mental issues’ and most of the time when he actually visit her she assumed that he was George.
Natalia was sweet, kind, and wickedly smart. She studied ballet and martial arts. Her two dads were Starfleet engineers who were working on the design of what would one day become his baby. Everything was good for almost a year until Natalia was convinced her boyfriend was going to dump her at any moment because she couldn’t give a good blow job. Jim felt she should just dump the loser and she felt that due to his reputation he could help her ‘practice’. Because he was a teenage boy who thinks way too often with his dick, he agreed. The casualties were one black eye by the bastard boyfriend, one ruined friendship, and a couple of nights in jail for assault. Things were so awkward that Jim successfully applied to become an emancipated minor and spent the next four years working odd jobs and taking online classes until the bar fight that changed his life.
Jim’s most important rule(s) that govern his hookups are he doesn’t do relationships and he doesn’t fall in love. This relationship rule came about during his early 20s after he dated a guy for about four months until he caught said boyfriend with his pants down literally fucking one of Jim’s supposed friends. (That may also play into his why he does not mess with other people’s relationships rule. Cheating is horrible when you’re the one being cheated on.)
The rule about not falling in love comes from the fact that he believes love doesn’t last. Outside of his parents, Jim knows one person whose marriage lasted till death do us part and that’s because Pike was mur… Pike was no longer alive. His mother’s relationships all ended in absolute disaster. Her first marriage ended in widowhood. Her second marriage ended because Frank liked to beat the shit out of both of them. Her third marriage ended when her bastard husband turned her and Jim over to members of the protection forces during that famine they do not speak of for an extra month of rations. (This was after her loyalty to him landed everyone on that planet in the first place.) Thankfully, the man didn't make it off the planet alive. That was the thing that pretty much broke his mother sanity. The incident with Natalia and the cheating boyfriend pretty much cemented in Jim’s mind that love was a delusion and something that Jim would never have.
So, yes, contrary to popular belief Jim does have standards and rules and therefore Spock and his girlfriend were completely off-limits. Of course, if Pike were still alive he would tell anybody that Jim was absolutely horrible at following the rules, even his own.
So somehow Jim sort of broke every single one of his own rules by falling in love with his first officer/sort of friend, who is dating Jim’s sort of friend/communications officer, who Jim wouldn’t be that averse to sleeping with too (okay maybe he cared about her as well in a more than a friend sort of way). This revelation came when he was forced to choose between observing the Prime Directive and letting Spock die. He was really glad that nobody asked him why he didn’t leave Spock in the volcano because the real answer scared the hell out of him.
His solution to this problem was to pretty much ignore everything he felt. The next few days were filled with alcohol, self-loathing, and meaningless sex. It was so meaningless that he actually had to picture Spock to get it up for the Kitty Twins (it’s a bad sign when a threesome just doesn’t do it for you anymore). In the 11 years that he has been sexually active, that has never happened before (during a consensual encounter, anyway). Of course, it became a little harder to ignore when he realized that despite losing his ship, he didn’t regret saving Spock.
Battle situations are great for denial, unless the object of your affection’s girlfriend decides to bring you into one of their lover’s spats (especially if you like her too). Also, if Jim isn’t that freaked out about the two kissing then obviously he can’t be that into Spock. (He decided not to examine the fact that he thinks it’s kind of hot. Those thoughts will do no one any good.)
Okay, battle situations are not that good for denial because he almost kissed Spock, more than once. Before leaving for Marcus’s ship he almost kissed Spock goodbye. He just knew things were going to fall apart and he wasn’t going to see Spock again. He was right.
Now that he sort of died, he kind of regretted not doing it. He regretted a lot of things including falling into Marcus’s trap, but he didn’t regret falling in love with Spock. What’s the point of being afraid to fall in love when you are already facing death? In that moment, he knew he was going to die because his body was on fire. He realized there was no point in lying to himself anymore. Maybe he did regret not telling Spock. After everything that went down during the volcano incident, he should have pushed Spock up against the nearest wall and kissed him as if he were the air that Jim breathed. Even if Spock had laughed him out of the room, in a very Vulcan way, Jim would not regret it because at least Spock would have known. (At least he wouldn’t regret it until Nyota kicked him in the balls for making out with her boyfriend).
“I'm scared, Spock... Help me not to be... ” His words were low and in a whisper. He paused because it was getting hard to breathe let alone talk. “How do you choose not to feel?”
“I do not know,” Spock said as his voice broke, and Jim never expected to see Spock like this. “Right now, I am failing.” As the tears fell from Spock’s eyes, Jim wondered just for a second if his Spock crush wasn’t so one-sided. If you have slept with as many species as he has, you can recognize a Vulcan kiss when you participate in one. His pain was getting worse and he knew he only had minutes if not seconds left. If he didn’t tell Spock now he never would.
“I wanted you to know why I couldn't let you die... why I went back for you...” Jim started but he did not have enough air in his lungs to continue.
“Because you are my friend,” Spock supplied for him.
If his body wasn’t burning from the inside he would have laughed at the absurdity of it all. Then he noticed Nyota crying in the background and he lost his will to tell Spock those three little words. He couldn’t die stabbing his friend in the back. He kind of loved her too in a different way and he couldn’t do that to her. He couldn’t leave this world screwing up Spock’s relationship. He cared about her too much to leave her behind with her relationship in tatters. Instead, he stayed silent as everything went to black.
xxx
Like most of his generation he believes that death is a state of nonexistence. Most no longer believe in an afterlife in a torment dimension or some perfect utopia. Of course, Jim was not so sure about that since he has had a lot of time to think especially about those rules that he was now questioning the purpose and practicality of.
He's not exactly sure where he is. Things are dark but he can still hear words. He hears Bones calling him an idiot a lot. He remembers all the things that he wished he did differently from the fiasco with the med student to not kissing Spock. He thought of all the relationships that he screwed up. Jim thinks about completely fucking up and realizing that his only solution to keep everybody from dying is to pull a play from his dead daddy's book. Of course what he thinks about the most is Spock and Nyota. He's pretty sure at some point he feels Nyota’s lips on his but that must be some death induced hallucination.
He mostly thought that because before that Spock mentioned that he loves him and Nyota talked about all the dirty things that she wanted to watch him and Spock do together. So apparently his version of post life reality involved him having crazy fantasies about things that will never ever happen (especially because he was now dead and because of what he did, they were thankfully not). That makes sense because it’s his life.
Except this was not his post life reality, because he was not dead. He realized that when he woke up to Bones being his regular sarcastic self. He’s never been so happy to hear his friend’s grumblings. He’s happy to be alive even if he is worried about the consequences of using the blood of a megalomaniac to bring him back.
Of course, he was very happy that Spock was there when he wakes up. (Honestly, he’s happiest about actually waking up.) He wanted to kiss Spock but he did not. He didn’t want to give Bones a heart attack.
Okay, that was a lie. Jim was sure that everything that happened between losing consciousness (dying) in the warp core and waking up was just some delusional figment of his imagination. There was no way that Spock was in love with him and Nyota would try making out with him just to get him to wake up. No, it was just all a crazy delusion even if he swore he could taste the strawberry on her lips. Yes, even though he survived death he's too much of a coward to do anything as stupid as stretching out his hand and wrapping it around Spock’s fingers. (Jim kind of remembered somebody holding his hands a lot during his not-a-death but there's no way that could be Spock.)
Some would argue that you should not waste a second chance. However, Jim decided that this time around he wasn’t going to be so reckless. He was going to think before acting and in this case that meant not making out human or Vulcan style with the guy that he was sort of (definitely) in love with who is not available. (Okay, yes he really was a coward).
After about two hours, Bones somehow managed to kick Spock out to run a bunch of tests that Jim really doesn't want to think about. Also, he was so not looking forward to the mandatory psych evaluation for almost dying in the line of duty (mostly because from their five-minute meeting, he discovered that the guy doing it, Dr. Soren, was Jim’s former half Betazoid ‘hook up’ that pretty much told Jim that he really needed to see professional help and that was before dying).
Spock told him in a very Spock way that as far Starfleet was concerned Jim’s over exposure to radiation was triggered by a faulty radiation suit and not by being an idiot and you know, actually dying (excluding their new admiral that Spock trusts implicitly). Jim would really love to know why his very Vulcan first officer lied through his teeth to Starfleet but he’s kind of afraid of the answer (okay, maybe he’s afraid that the answer would give him some sort of hope that he’s trying not to have right now).
At some point he fell asleep, which is pretty funny considering he’s been essentially asleep for the last 14 days. During that blissfully wonderful place between dream and sleep he thought that he saw Spock at his bedside holding his hand with Nyota on the other side but obviously he was dreaming or stone. Considering he died 14 days ago, Jim is going to go with stone. Everything he was seeing had to be a drug-induced hallucination.
When he woke up Nyota was there, which would surprise him more if his scary nurse didn’t mention that Nyota and Spock were there a lot when he was unconscious. Okay, they were there so much that the scary nurse thought that he was dating one or both (he may have risen from the dead but the ideal of dating both Spock and Nyota was too far-fetched for even him).
He didn’t ask where Spock was because he was afraid of the answer and maybe a little terrified of her reaction to him asking that question. Jim was not going to do anything to mess this up (whatever this was). He told himself it was because they’re both his friends and he will not do anything that would screw up that type of friendship (like pushing either of them up against the nearest flat surface and fucking him or her senseless.)
He was happy that she was there mostly because she brought him good food. Granted, he can’t eat anything more hard-hitting than broth and rice but at least it’s real broth and not out of a replicator. She also brought him real old-school books and his PADD loaded with movies. Conveniently, anything involving government conspiracies, cities getting blown up, and the hero dying to save the day are conveniently removed from his collection, even the pre-warp stuff that requires subtitles. He’s pretty much left with the romantic comedies that he refuses to admit that he has and the Disney films that he claims he only downloaded for those miraculous times when Bones’ ex-wife lets his daughter spend the weekend despite the court order. For some reason his extensive porn collection was still there (if he’s going to follow his number one rule of not fucking the crew he needs something) but considering he was informed by his favorite grumpy doctor that he wasn’t allowed to do anything more strenuous than physical therapy for the next month he wasn’t going to be accessing those files anytime soon.
Just like Spock yesterday, Nyota would not talk about anything related to why Jim will be stuck in this hospital for the next week, why he ended up being acting captain of Enterprise after his massive fuck up or why Mrs. Pike is now their new admiral, the reason why San Francisco is still under a state of emergency 14 days later, and the casualties on Enterprise. Because they were also trying to avoid the Spock shaped elephant in the room there really was not that much he and Nyota could talk about except for their love of pre-warp earth poetry and music. He got her to listen to the Beastie Boys and she has filled up his personal PADD with files from Pink, Bruno Mars, and various boy bands that he doesn’t admit listening to and refers to as music to cry or get laid by.
Because they were pretty much avoiding talking about anything of importance they ended up watching a modern remake of an adaptation of the Taming of the Shrew. The difference was this version did not require subtitles and everybody was of different planets of origin except for the sisters. Both he and Nyota thought it would just be easier if Bianca just went with both guys until they realize that the other guy was a complete ass.
“You remind me a lot of Kat,” Nyota said, grabbing a handful of the salt free, fake butter free, flavor free popcorn that his evil doctor so graciously let him eat. “Except you simultaneously screw around with everybody, while keeping everybody at arm’s length. When you think about it, it’s the same thing. ”
“I’m not a slut,” Jim said defensively. “It’s like that old song you gave me ‘I’m not a player, I just fuck a lot’.” He said translating the lyric into standard. He smirked at her for emphasis.
“I should have never sent you that song as a joke,” Nyota said with a sigh. “I’m not saying that you’re a slut. I know you’re not. I’m saying you never let your bedroom partners really get close to you. Also you are non-discriminating.”
“Just because I don’t care about stupid things like gender or planet of origin doesn’t mean I don’t have standards. I have all these rules. I don’t fuck my crew. I don’t sleep with people who are in relationships. I ‘dated’ a married woman one time and well it just ended up with broken bones. Although in my defense, I didn’t know she was married.” He was expecting Nyota to start laughing at him. That didn’t happen.
“And what if both parties are interested in dating you?” Nyota asked. This almost caused him to choke on his popcorn. For the sake of his own sanity, he’s going to assume this was a purely hypothetical question. There was no way that question meant what he wanted that question to mean.
“I’ve done threesomes, recently.” He actually winked at her when he added the last part, as he deliberately chose to focus on the just sex aspect of something like that. He wasn’t going to touch the R word. “But usually it is not with two people who are in love with each other. Maybe if it was two people that I actually trust but considering I don’t fuck my friends, that probably is never going to happen.”
“I have a feeling there’s a story there.” She said grabbing his hand. Her touch seemed oddly familiar. At least she didn’t mention that he deliberately misinterpreted her question.
“You know I’m good at learning from my own mistakes. From sixth grade until we both did something really stupid at 17, I had this best friend named Natalia. We were pretty much inseparable despite me getting shipped off halfway across the galaxy when my mom pissed off the wrong Admiral and I got thrown into the system after everything went really bad,” Jim started before he told her the whole insane story. Nyota knew some of the details regarding what happened on the planet of the damned before this conversation. That stuff came out when Jim explained why she laid untouched after the drunk breakup fiasco incident. The only person who knew more about Tarsus was Spock. (Bones only knew what was in his medical file and most of that was redacted.) However, he never talked about losing his childhood friend before.
“So that explains why you have been in denial about your Spock related feelings for the last year.” Nyota told him after he was done speaking.
“Shit,” Jim exclaimed under his breath. He didn’t think his Spock crush behavior was that obvious. Apparently, he was wrong. It wasn’t what Nyota said but the way she said it that was the most surprising of all. There wasn’t an ounce of malice in her words. Although, maybe she was taking emotion suppression lessons from her boyfriend and would strangle him at any moment for kind of, sort of, being in love with her boyfriend.
“Are you going to smother me with a pillow now?” He asked as he paused the film. This discussion was too serious to have the movie going on in the background.
“Okay, I’m going to take that as ‘yes, I’m completely in love with your boyfriend but to terrified to make an actual move’,” she said, smirking. Why was she smirking? She was going to kill him. “Jim, it was a little obvious. I’m pretty sure we’ve both been dating Spock for the last six months at least.”
“You’re scaring me. Shouldn’t you be yelling or throwing things? Are you only being nice to me because I’m still in the hospital?” he asked after a moment, because that was the only logical explanation for her not screaming at him.
“You know, it surprises me how much you and Spock are alike sometimes. Spock expected me to act the same way. I’m trying to be incredibly mature about this. You are completely in love with my boyfriend. I get that,” she said as she still held his hand.
“I’m not in love. I don’t do love,” Jim wasn’t sure he was telling that to her or to himself. It was a lie regardless, the first part anyway.
“So what was the real reason you wouldn’t let Spock die in that volcano?” She asked looking him directly in the eye, as if trying to read all the things that Jim kept hidden. She knew.
“Shit,” he said in a whisper. “You must hate me.”
“If I hated you, I wouldn’t be watching questionable Shakespeare adaptations as our boyfriend deals with another round of 20 questions with the admiralty. The original was so much better. Why do they remake everything?” Again, her demeanor was not angry but more playful.
“This isn’t necessarily worse than the original, just different. Wait; did you say ‘our boyfriend’?” Jim asked tentatively.
“I don’t know if you realize this but you have kind of been dating him since you guys began your middle of the night get-togethers the second week we were in space.” If it was anyone else, he would deny it but she was right. Looking back on it now he did behave like Spock’s boyfriend. “Remember that last treaty we negotiated. The entire time you were leaning over to whisper and Spock’s ears every 30 seconds.”
“I did not act like that,” Jim told her defensively.
“Yes you did and everybody but you and Spock noticed it. I’m sure there’s a video file of it somewhere. Every single member of the other side asked me if you two were married or dating,” she told him in all seriousness.
“If it was that obvious, why didn’t you say anything?”
“Why didn’t you?” she asked in response.
“You know it’s a bad sign when you answer a question with a question.”
“Probably,” she shrugged.
“I don’t fuck my friends literally or figuratively. I really do like you. I wasn’t going to screw up your relationship with Spock. It was just better for everybody if I keep my mouth shut,” he told her honestly.
“Except for that one time when you were drunk.” He decided that it was in his best interest for her to never find out that he was actually sober when he jokingly propositioned her boyfriend for a threesome.
“He told you about that?” he asked instead.
“Yes, and I’m not sure which one of the three of us was more in denial but I’m going with myself. I could see what was going on. I have for months. I just didn’t want to deal with figuring out what to do about it. Just so you know, it’s not one-sided, Spock is kind of in love with you.” He was very thankful that he wasn’t eating the popcorn anymore because he really would have choked that time.
“What’s different now?” Jim asked, avoiding any reference to her last statement. Jim just doesn’t believe her.
“You died. I watched you die and then I watched Spock go off the deep end because you died. There’s nothing worse than realizing how you feel about somebody as the object of your affection takes his last breath. I can’t keep quiet anymore.” Nyota said as she shut her eyes.
“You mean him actually crying,” Jim said sardonically as Nyota stared at him darkly.
“No, I mean Spock trying to kill he that will not be named with his bare hands and the only reason why he didn’t do it was because I somehow managed to convey to him that we needed him alive. Not that Spock remembers actually doing it.” That part was mumbled under breath. This does not surprise Jim because he vaguely remembers hearing Spock say something about that during his not-a-death, but he thought he just imagined it.
“What?” Jim asked more for clarification than anything else.
“There’s a reason why they’re making you meet with a certain psychologist that specializes in telepathic bonds despite your objections and past ‘relationship’. Spock doesn’t remember a thing between you dying and you coming back to life. Because of that they are suspicious. Apparently, these rooms are miked for sound and Leonard heard the interesting parts of our private conversations.” Again, Jim vaguely remembered this.
“While I was out, I kind of remember certain things but I thought I was dreaming. Did you kiss me?” Jim asked still surprised.
“It was 13 days at that point and we were all getting a little desperate and I decided to take the sleeping beauty approach,” she said sheepishly.
“I thought I was imagining that,” he whispered.
“You remember that?” she asked, smirking.
“I think. Did you actually suggest that Spock date both of us?” Jim asked tentatively, sure that part was some crazy hallucinations/wishful thinking on his part.
“I think I have already stated you and Spock have been dating for months. I just told Spock it’s okay if you added a sexual component to the relationship, as long as I get to watch or participate sometimes. I kind of like you. You grow on a person. Also, I think you heard him say that he loved you a few minutes earlier.” She wasn’t joking even if she tried to make it sound that way.
“See that entire part of the conversation was why I thought the whole thing was some death induced fantasy. I thought that was my version of paradise,” he told her, and she just gave him a sad smile.
“I believe your hypothesis is erroneous, Jim.” Jim would recognize that voice anywhere even if the speaker was a good century and a half older. When Spock said his name like that, it resulted in most blood going south. Before he had time to think, Spock’s lips were on his. He did not think a kiss could be like this, it was all fire and passion. He was gasping for air but didn’t want to break apart until he had no choice but to. He looked up to see Nyota with an all too smug expression on her face.
“I told you he was in love with you,” Nyota said smirking.
“Apparently,” Jim said in a whisper as Spock’s hand snaked around his. This gesture felt just as intimate as the kiss before. “You’re okay with me making out with your boyfriend?” Nyota’s response was to lean in and kiss him as well. She tasted of the popcorn and the diet strawberry soda she was drinking during their movie marathon. It was softer, but still intense.
“If I wasn’t okay with it, I wouldn’t have done that,” she said, pulling away just as Spock placed his fingers to his lips. They were both going to kill him or maybe he was still dead. This type of stuff only happened in his private time fantasies.
“I don’t do relationships. I don’t fall in love,” he said, looking at both with hooded eyes.
“Yeah, well, you don’t come back from the dead and you’ve already done that. Why stop there. You don’t follow Starfleet’s rules. Why should you follow your own?” Bones stated from the door.
“You know that eavesdropping is a bad thing?” Nyota asked with annoyance.
“Not when I’m his damn doctor. You made his heart rate go skyhigh and I needed to see what was going on. I will kick you both out again, if you don’t keep your hands off your boyfriend,” Jim did not find the doctor’s words as strange as he should have. He would never be one for monogamy but this really wasn’t monogamy.
“Fine, we promise to behave,” Jim said, smirking.
“I don’t trust you,” Bones said dubiously.
“Nothing inappropriate will happen with the captain,” Spock said, trying to reassure him.
“I don’t trust you either. It’s always the quiet ones and your judgment is never the best when he is concerned,” Bones said staring him down.
“We won’t do anything to jeopardize Jim’s health,” Nyota chimed in.
“I’m sure you will,” Bones said still rolling his eyes. “Light i.e. chase kisses are fine, but no sex by any definition of the term for at least 8 to 10 weeks,” Bones barked out before he started to run more scans.
“I hate you,” Jim spat out sarcastically. The only thing that made Jim feel slightly better was his boyfriend and girlfriend looked equally irritated; more importantly, he really did like the sound of that and the concept wasn’t as scary as he thought it would be. Maybe he could do this, maybe.
The end
(or maybe this is just the beginning.)