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Len stared down at the motionless body in front of him with his heart in his throat. It was too close to just a few short years ago, when the same body had been carried into his medbay, unmoving, breathless, cold.
Now though, Len could see the steady rise and fall of Jim’s chest with each breath. There was a healthy color to his cheeks and his heartbeat thrummed steadily on the monitors. Jim was very much alive, but for all that the doctor could reach him, that didn’t mean much. Carefully, Len stroked his hand over Jim’s forehead, brushing back the shaggy blond hair. He had been trying to get the kid to get a hair cut for weeks…
“Doctor McCoy.” Spock moved into Len’s line of vision, he had obviously been trying to gain the doctor’s attention for a while. “Is the captain still unresponsive?”
Len closed his eyes and nodded slowly. Whatever the Gorsee had done to Jim, it wasn’t letting up. It wasn’t even suppose to be Jim. An over excited science officer had stepped past the clearly marked bounds of the Goresee holy grounds. Jim, being the noble fool that he was, had insisted on taking the punishment. Bound and determined to protect his crew at any cost. Even if the cost was his own life.
“What did the high priest say exactly?” Len forced himself to look at Spock. He had brought Jim back from the dead, he would fix this. “What exactly is the punishment?”
Spock glanced at the captain. “The Goresee believe that the holy grounds are the consciousness of their planet. Lieutenant Marks trespassed on the consciousness and in turn his punishment was to have his consciousness imprisoned, a punishment that was taken on by the captain.”
“How do they do it?” Len scowled at the PADD in his hands. Everything that should have made Jim, well, Jim, was there. There was no reason for him to be in a coma, and yet here he was, completely unresponsive. Spock shifted nervously, doing little to set Len at ease.
“I do not know. From what Lieutenant Uhura managed to translate, it seems that the Goresee have somehow removed–for lack of a better term–the captain’s soul. They did speak of a trial to have his consciousness retrieved, however I only know that it is a trial that can only be done by his most trusted of companions.” Spock leveled Len with a meaningful look. “After some thought, I feel that you would be the best candidate to complete the trial.”
“Are you out of your mind?!” Len nearly dropped his PADD. “I’m a doctor not some kind of white knight! Jim trusts you better than anyone, why aren’t you doing it?”
“I am overseeing the ship, Doctor.” Spock paused. After a few moments he started to speak again, his voice lower and tinged with the slightest hint of pleading. “I also do not believe that I am Jim’s most trusted companion. He doest trust me, we share a bond of friendship that will never compare to any I have had before or will have after. However, when it comes to his most personal matters–not just ones of morals, logic, or life and death, but also matters of the heart, home, and person–he goes to you. It is my firm belief that for all Jim and I share, your bond is...different, and in its way, more profound.”
Len scoffed and rubbed his face. “You’re full of it, Spock.”
The vulcan simply shook his head. “There are very few people who would risk trying to bring a man back from the dead, Doctor. I could not count myself among them.”
Daring one more glance at Jim’s still form, Len took a deep breath and nodded slowly.
“Alright. What do I have to do?”
[-------------------------------------------------]
The Goresee were an earthy people. Broad and sturdy with thick features and wide hands. The high priest, wrapped in his rich blue robe, looked over Len with guarded sage-green eyes. His ruddy orange skin stood out starkly against the pale purples of the foliage surrounding the platform he stood in front of.
“You are the captain’s most trusted companion?” The priest’s standard was rough but understandable through the heavy accent. Len nodded with more confidence than he felt.
“I am Doctor Leonard McCoy.” He tried to remember the script that Uhura had given him before the ceremony started. “I have known Captain James Kirk longer, and better, than any other here. He has known me the same way. I am the one who can call him from the Depths.” God only knew what the Depths were, but apparently Len had to pull Jim from them if they ever hopped to have their captain whole again.
The high priest nodded in approval and moved to the side as he gestured for Len to step onto the low platform. The stage had a space for him to kneel and place his hands, which he did with some trepidation. The Goresee had refused to fully explain what the trial entailed. They only ensured that Len wouldn’t be in any danger by attempting it and if he failed there would be no other opportunity to get Jim’s soul back. Apparently if he failed to pull Jim from the Depths, he was not the friend he claimed to be and the lie would not be rewarded with a second chance.
A current ran up Len’s arms as he placed his hands into the shallow grooves in front of him. The priest’s voice rang out in the high vaulted room.
“Call to the consciousness of your lost companion.”
The energy rocking through his body made it difficult to recall what he was supposed to do next. Len looked up to Spock, who stood in front of the crowd of people had come to watch the trial. Next to him was a long low table that held Jim’s unresponsive form. Spock nodded to him once. With a deep breath he focused his thoughts on Jim and forced his mouth to form the words.
“I call to James Kirk.”
The world blurred in front of Len’s eyes, colors swept past a dizzying speeds. His stomach threatened to twist up right out of his throat, but his chest was being squeezed too tight for it to get past. And as suddenly as it started it stopped.
Len lurched to his feet, half expecting to stumble off the platform and onto his face, but his feet hit nothing but flat, solid stone. Gathering his wits, he managed to look around himself and found that he was in an endless space. The stone floor beneath him was the only anchoring surface, everything else moved, shifted, and rumbled around him in an array of colors, sights, sounds, and the phantom sensation of touch.
“Jim?” He called out into the endless shifting world around him. “Jim!” The flurry of movement seemed to skip a beat and a voice echoed back.
“Bones?”
Len’s breath caught. He had no idea where he was, he didn’t know what he had to do or even if Jim knew what was going on, but at least he had Jim’s attention. Somehow.
“Jim, what’s going on?” The colors glowed warm greens and calming blues when he spoke. Images of his own face flashed by him, he could feel hands brush across his shoulders, set on his leg, and even the pinch of a hypo at his neck. That’s when Len started to understand.
This was Jim. This was his conciseness. His soul.
Stark blacks and muddy browns flashed in front of him. “I don’t know.” Jim’s voice was all around him.
“Do you know what happened?” The muddy browns overtook the black, a bit of yellow shown out from underneath, like a light caked in dirt. Len struggled to understand what it meant, the colors flaring up around him. “Do you know why you’re stuck here?”
The yellow disappeared and was replaced with a much stronger, wider spread red. Bright and angry.
“I’m always stuck here.”
Angry. Bitter.
The colors were emotions. Len wracked his brain for the code. He knew Jim, he knew Jim better than anyone. Red was angry, bitter. Muddy brown, it had to be confusion. Jim didn’t know what was going on.
“Jim.” The emptiness glowed into blues and greens again. “You’re here as a punishment, you can get out.”
The yellow was back. Intrigue? Curiosity? Maybe Spock had overestimated Len’s ability to read Jim. Right now he felt as lost and confused as the colors of Jim’s mind.
Jim’s mind.
“I’m always stuck here.”
Shit. Jim couldn’t get out. Jim would never get out of his own head, he hadn’t as long as Len had known him and Len seriously doubted there was any chance of that now.
“I am the one who can call him from the Depths.” No one could pull Jim from the depths of his thoughts. The kid had lived and died in his own head so many times that even Len didn’t know how to break the cycle. He could only disrupt it from time to time.
“Bones?” Images of his own face flashed when Jim’s voice rang out. They were tiny pictures and movies of him smiling, laughing, healing, and even one of him placing a comforting kiss to Jim’s head. It made Len’s heart ache.
“You have to come back, Jim. You’re stuck in your head and we need you. Spock said I was the only person who could get you and…” He trailed off at the stern images of Spock moving over him. A dark blue and deep red mixing and blending to a rich purple before separating again. Spock’s voice whispered in the space, speaking of logic problems, ethics, and friendship. “The crew Jim...the Enterprise. We need you.”
Golds and reds, blues, greens, Uhura’s flowing words, Chekov’s fast hands, Sulu’s dry smile, Scotty’s rich laugh, the hum of the Enterprise. Len’s breath caught in his chest, as the black of space swept over the other colors, stars blinking in and out. Clouds of colors the same sky and earth floated by. The sound of Len’s own voice, low and comforting, murmured in the background. Jim’s pure thrill from the feel of the bridge beneath his feet ran up Len’s spine.
“You don’t have to keep punishing yourself.” And like that everything shattered. The colors fractured and a pitch black oozed out to cover them. The smell and taste of blood, dirt, and metal filled Len’s senses. Somewhere a child screamed. Another begged for food. Dread settled deep in Len’s stomach. “Oh God. Jim, no.” His strained voice didn’t register in the colors of the room. It stayed that sticky black and more voices called out in pain. The emptiness of hunger and fear pressed in on Len like a landslide.
“Jim!” Only black. Black that clung to him like the guilt and fear Jim still carried from Tarsus. “Jim, stop!”
Len was drowning. He couldn’t breath. The touch of cold needles hit his skin. “Jim, please! You’ll kill me!”
The world whited out. The stone floor disappeared for a heart beat only to come up fast under Len’s knees. He fell forward onto his hands with a grunt that gave way to a hiss as his knees throbbed where they had hit the hard ground. White. White everywhere. Jim might as well not exist for all Len could see in the blank space.
“Jim?”
Nothing.
Carefully, Len pulled himself to his feet and called out again. “Jim? Where are you?”
Not even the palest color or blurriest image came out. Had he failed?
Len moved forward, unsure of what to do and having trouble thinking past the ache in his chest. Jim was gone. There was nothing of him here. Len swallowed roughly and sat down hard. He was in over his head. Spock was wrong, he couldn’t do this. This onslaught of emotion, memories, and sensation was too much, too familiar. Too Jim.
There was so much of it that Len wish he could take away and leave nothing but the warmth and happiness that Jim so deserved. There were too many things that Len hated to see, made all-the-worse because now he knew exactly how Jim felt them. He had always been able to see the pain in Jim’s eyes, the shake in his hands, but there was no coming back from this.
“I’m sorry, Jim.” He buried his face in his hands and let out a shaking breath. “I’m sorry that you’ve had to live through so much. I’m sorry that you’re so damned self punishing. I’m sorry I can’t do more for you, that I can’t make you see that there’s nothing wrong with you. I’m sorry I couldn’t do this for you, whatever I was supposed to do here. I’m so sorry.”
There was the barest flash of green and blue at the edge of Len’s vision where light slipped in around his hands. He let out another shuddering breath.
Strong hands wrapped around Len’s wrists. He looked up into the sharp eyes of Jim Kirk.
“Come on, Bones.” Jim squeezed his wrists lightly. “You know you don’t have anything to apologize for. You’re the only person who ever bothered to know me before expecting anything of me. You know me better than anyone.” There was a fondness in Jim’s voice that Len couldn’t recall hearing before. It wasn’t the tone Jim usually used with him, the one that was light and caring, but nothing more than friendly. “That’s why you’re here. You’re always who I go to when this place gets to be too much. You’re my rock, my foundation.”
Jim released one of Len’s wrist to set his hand on the stone floor they kneeled on.
“You’re my sky and my earth.” The soft blues and greens that had accompanied Len’s voice glowed warmly again. “You’re my home, Bones. That’s why I always come here.” He pressed a soft kiss to the side of Len’s mouth.
Len brushed a hand along Jim’s jaw.
“You never said anything.”
“In here I say it every time I see you. Out there I can’t. Not without losing what friendship I already have from you. I would though, if you asked. Anything you ask, I would do it.”
Len still wasn’t sure how all of this worked. He didn’t know if Jim knew he was being held captive in his own mind. There was no way of telling if Jim knew that Len was real and here and not just something Jim’s head had made up to comfort him.
But he saw a chance he wasn’t willing to risk losing.
“Come back, Jim? I need you to come back.” He leaned forward and rested his forehead against Jim’s. “I need you.”
The world came rushing back to Len in the sick swirl of color and sensation it had left him. His hands were shaking and sweating in the grooves he had placed them in and his knees ached. The priest was pulling him to his feet before he could fully orient himself.
Spock was helping Jim sit up.
“You have called your captain from the Depths.”
Jim’s eyes met Len’s across the room, confusion creased his brow and he was nodding absently to something Spock was saying.
Len swallowed hard and offered him a smile. Jim licked his lips and returned it with one that looked as weak as Len’s felt. They would have to talk about it, but for now Jim was awake, alive, and safe.