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Chapter Text

The doors to sickbay swooshed open as Doctor McCoy tended the small but severe burns Engineer Scott had sustained keeping the Romulan cloaking device operational until they had crossed the Neutral Zone back into Federation Space.

“How are you feeling, Mister Spock?”

“Revolting,” Spock answered solidly, despite the lack of departure of Mister Scott.  Though if McCoy had any patient Spock could risk losing his composure in front of, it was Scotty.

He shared a quick glance with the engineer before expanding his scope of practice.  “Oh?  Care to tell me about it?”  McCoy used the mildest tone he had that wasn’t absent or patronizing, but Spock seemed not to notice.  McCoy still wasn’t sure Spock had noticed they weren’t alone.

“Upon our meeting, the Romulan Commander immediately began attempting to seduce me; through both sexual and egotistical means.”  Neither of which would have appealed to the Vulcan.  “I played into that.  Finding truths that could sound like what she wanted to hear was more taxing than I anticipated.”  Spock did look exhausted, as much as he ever looked like anything.  “She appeared to have no preference, so long as I chose her, but when I escorted her to her quarters, she told me that my desires would be our secret.”

“And what desires where those, Mister Spock?”  McCoy squeezed Scotty’s arm warningly as he ran the dermal regenerator over the engineer’s wrist.

Spock spoke to his hands, articulating his fingers as if they might belong to someone else.  “I told her that I hoped she and I had exchanged something more permanent than military secrets.”  Scotty’s dancing look died a quick death when he met the deep disturbance hidden in his doctor’s face.  Spock continued, oblivious to the exchange.  “I believe she interpreted that to mean something far different than I did.”

“You were still telling her half-truths, then, Mister Spock?”  The Vulcan went unnaturally still but McCoy did not look away from his work.  “What did you mean?”

“I was referring to an understanding about the potential for peace between Romulans and Vulcans.”  Spock turned his hands over, still appearing baffled by their presence.  “Despite our societal differences, we are fundamentally alike.  Peace must be a probable outcome.”

“Why did you not simply say that?” McCoy asked, carefully cutting Engineer Scott’s third and fourth digits apart with a laser scalpel before turning the dermal regenerator on them.

“She appeared… personally hurt by my actions.”  Spock spread his fingers, examining the backs of his hands in the light.  Apparently finally finding the answer stamped on his skin, Spock continued, “It served no purpose to damage her further.”

Well, wasn’t that fuzzier than a peach on Tuesday.

“Now that you’ve worked that out, are you still revolted, Mister Spock?” McCoy asked, still deliberately mild because it was never that easy, especially not with Spock.  Or Jim.  Maybe with Scotty, who stayed patiently quiet as the dermal regenerator slowly knit up a centimeter-deep crater in his palm.

Spock’s hands clenched into fists.  “I investigated everything I could, but it was incredibly difficult to find clues as to the Captain’s intention, and then later to his mission.” 

McCoy remembered Kirk choking out the words ‘hand,’ ‘orders,’ and ‘delivered’ in the minutes before Spock had entered the cell and melded Jim into pseudo-death.  McCoy’s guess that then was the first Spock knew of Jim’s plan appeared to be correct.  Jim’s crazy-act had been quite effective, though the shock from the Romulan-strength stasis field had genuinely addled him.  Spock had been flying by the seat of his pants, and their silent communication in that cell had been barely passable.  Though the so-called ‘Vulcan Death Grip’ had been an excellent tell.  Spock continued before McCoy could flagellate himself further for not immediately understanding. 

“After contacting the Captain with the approximate location of the device, I resorted to encouraging, and participating in… guvik gestures with Commander Charvanak in order to allow the captain time to carry out his plan.”

Great Gorgon’s Ghost.  Bones knew approximately seven Vulcan words off the top of his head.  Guvik happened to be one of them.  If Spock had resorted to —the phrase translated, crudely, to ‘hand sex’— as a diversion, this was only the tip of the illogical iceberg.

“I could not read her mind from such a contact, but the emotions I sensed were… shallow, and… unappealing.”  Spock looked up from his own hands to find Scotty’s sympathetic gaze looking back.  He went stiff.  “Apologies Mister Scott, I did not intend to make you party to such… indecorous concerns.”

“Not a’tall, sir,” Scotty said, hopping down from the table.  He flexed his new skin, which was too pink and not quite healed, yet.  McCoy didn’t protest his patient’s attempt at an early departure; the chief engineer was more than capable of caring for his just-healed wounds the old-fashioned way.  Scotty reached out to Spock, stopping just short of the Vulcan’s hands, new flesh gleaming in the harsh lights.  He continued with a brotherly smile as Spock unexpectedly turned his palm up.  “We all need the care and comfort of a well-meaning touch sometimes.”  Scotty took Spock’s right hand in both of his own.  “I daresay the good doctor is the wellest touch upon this ship, but if you find yerself t’ be needing more hands than his, you know where t’ find me.”

Spock nodded in such a way that Bones suspected he was both grateful and greatly confused.  Flashing another sympathetic smile, Scotty slipped away.

Chapter Text

“Sometimes you just have to wash things off.”  McCoy led Spock down to the geoponics lab.  “Ensign Rowe, Yeoman Husker, would you mind knocking off early?  Officer Spock and I have a rather sensitive research project to conduct.”  Rowe and Husker gave them funny looks, but quickly concluded that their curiosity was not worth forty-five minutes free time.  “Well, they skedaddled quickly.”  McCoy bounced jovially on his feet.  Sometimes he liked stirring up rumors aboard ship, and his wording had certainly turned questionable in the open air.

Spock turned to him, a consternated micro-expression on his face.  “You intend to continue our experiment, now?”

McCoy halted mid bounce.  “Ah…”  He settled to the floor.  “Experiment?”

“The experiment we began on Magna Roma testing the sense perception of emotions.”

Magna Roma?  That place had been a nightmare riddled with near death experiences…  Oh!  It made sense that Spock would rationalize their interaction in the cell that way.

“I hadn’t been thinking of Magna Roma, no, but I suppose my intended course of treatment could give us some datapoints.”  He swept Spock toward the garden sink.  “I planned for you to wash your hands with good-old-fashioned soap and water.”

Spock raised a challengingly inquisitive brow but took the proffered bar and did as he was bade without protest.  After a few seconds of rote cleaning, the half-human suddenly lost himself to the task, lathering to his elbows and scrubbing until the foam turned faintly yellow.  He rinsed and repeated, giving every indication that he had forgotten anything beyond the sink.

McCoy caught Spock’s hands as he lifted the soap for a third time.  “Sense memory still lingering?”  Spock looked up, wild-eyed, then nodded meekly.  “Here, let me try.”  McCoy loaded the antebellum-style milk-soap onto his hands, gently massaging them over every nanometer of Spock’s hands and wrists.  He worked the lather into each and every nook and cranny trying to leave good things in his wake, beginning with his amusement at Spock’s ‘experiment’ and fading into fondness, concern, trust, and a million other things simmering at the back of his concentration.  McCoy bonded to the task of kneading away the emotional dirt beneath the suds.

“Thank you, Doctor,” Spock said, having finally regained his words.  His voice was roughened.  “I believe that is enough.”  He rinsed himself once more, only scowl at the skin on the backs of his hands and the insides of his arms, no doubt prickled and tight.

McCoy patted Spock dry with a soft cloth.  “I have something for that,” he offered, indicating Spock’s aggressively cleansed flesh.

“Thank you, Doctor.”  Spock followed him back to sickbay without a word.

Picking up an unmarked jar from the burns cabinet, McCoy motioned Spock into his office.  “Hands, please, Mister Spock.”  The restorative was supposed to be aloe, honey, and coconut oil, which Spock would probably appreciate, but it smelt like rosemary which often caused the doctor to wonder what else was truly in it.  Since he had never bothered to answer that question, because it worked damnit, he opted to remain silent as he spread the concoction over Spock’s skin.  Still simmering good things on all his back burners, McCoy massaged tense forearms until the restorative was fully absorbed before moving on to Spock’s hands, which were calloused and stiff.

Task finally complete, the doctor looked up to find Spock’s mouth slightly parted and his eyes severely dilated.

Right.  Touch telepath.  Vector through the hands.

Indecision flickered in McCoy’s stomach.  He had treated Spock’s hands like a human’s.  It was hard to remember that while Spock used his hands like any other person, actually making skin contact was disproportionately intimate.  Unfortunately, with the Magna Roma Experiment still on the table, McCoy had no idea whether or not he should apologize as he would to any other Vulcan.

Spock blinked, coming back to himself with a twitch.  He licked his lips, now staring at McCoy’s hands as if they were some new and bizarre thing.  The doctor let him process, unsure how to proceed beyond that. 

“Doctor, if I may be emotive with you?” Spock asked, now fixated on McCoy’s right hand.  The Vulcan raised his left.

“Always.”  McCoy moved to match the gesture, though he did not touch Spock.  He had done plenty enough touching already.  In other circumstances, McCoy would point out that Spock had been doing plenty of emoting since he’d interrupted Scotty’s treatment, but as it stood the doctor became apprehensive.  If that wasn’t emotive, what was the Vulcan about to do?

Suddenly having the presence of mind to investigate McCoy’s face, Spock froze.  “Apologies, Doctor.  I am aware that your actions were clinical in nature.  I was unprepared for such… human contact.  I will add this interaction to my meditation on today’s events.”

“Spock.”  McCoy halted the first officer before he could attempt to leave.  “I’m not just your doctor, I’m your friend.  No, I hadn’t meant to wind you up, but I’m certainly not repulsed by the effect.”  He sighed, searching Spock’s face for clues.  Emotive or not, he still read like a marble tablet.  “If there’s anything I am capable of granting you that will help, I want you to take it.”

Spock hesitated, his hand sinking further as he studied McCoy’s expression.  Then a firmness came over him and he pressed their hands together resolutely.  Staring back into Spock’s eyes, Bones did his best not to flinch at the terrible jumble of negative emotions that tumbled into his awareness.  Confusion dominated, shot through with swirls of self-loathing and anxiety.  And a million other things that Spock did not deserve to be feeling.

Bones pushed back with as much affection and surety as he could muster.  “You didn’t do anything to her that she wasn’t willing to do to you,” he whispered.  “That makes you even.”

Spock’s emotions did something that very much resembled a flimsy picket fence cartwheeling down the street in a hurricane.

Oh, no.  Nope, nope, nope.  Stepping close, Bones pulled Spock into a hug with his free arm.  Let her go.  Bones imagined the ball of fencing rolling into the distance and out of sight.  Slowly, the tension drained out of Spock and he sagged, allowing his forehead to rest against McCoy’s.  His arm settled awkwardly around McCoy’s shoulder and Bones had to choke back a snicker.  He was a doctor, damnit.  He was not going to laugh at a half-Vulcan’s attempt at physical affection.

“Doctor,” Spock murmured, and if he moved at all, it was only closer.  “Thank you for not laughing.”

“Nothing funny here, Spock,” McCoy assured around a giggle.  “Just a bout of illogical human emotion.”  He verged on panic when Spock chose that moment to disentangle their hands, but to his relief and amazement, found that hand settling around his waist.  Crowding even closer, Bones wrapped himself around Spock until they were pressed tight from shoulders to knees.  And if the world stopped for a few minutes as Bones basked in the little glow of amusement in Spock’s slowly warming mood, who was going to know?

“Data point of one,” Spock muttered.

Bones had no idea how that sentence was supposed to end, but when Spock left it hang, he started to chuckle.  “There are two of enjoying this hug, Mister Spock.”

“Your ability to count astounds me, Doctor.”

McCoy bit back a bark of laughter, shaking with mirth from head to toe.  “I didn’t even have to take my shoes off this time.”

A vacant pause.  “Indeed.”