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“Come in,” Archer calls when he hears his door chime, not looking up from his padd as he writes his report from the last few days, seated at his desk.
The door hisses open and Shran steps inside. The door slides shut behind him.
Archer looks up and concern instantly paints his expression.
“Are you supposed to be up?” he asks, a hint of a suspicious and warning tone in his voice.
“Your doctor says it’ll be good for me to get up, move around a bit.”
Archer doesn’t seem convinced.
“I’m fine , pinkskin. We Andorians are far hardier than you humans.”
Archer gives Shran an unimpressed look, but he relents, not willing to push the subject further. He makes a mental note to check in with Phlox later to get the information directly from the horse’s mouth.
Shran moves slowly, but purposefully, still obviously uneasy on his feet from his time of bed rest, but unwilling to show vulnerability to Archer. He looks… strange. He’s dressed in light, borrowed Starfleet casual attire: a loose white T-shirt, a pair of grey sweatpants, and gym shoes. The dissonance in the visual throws Archer for a loop, unused to seeing the other dressed so unprofessionally. The clothing truly looks odd in comparison to Shran’s typical sharp, leather Imperial Guard uniform. His arms from fingertips to roughly his elbows are mottled white and blue, demonstrating the chemical burn scars.
Shran moves to sit in the chair next to Archer’s bed and Archer turns in his chair to face the other. Shran attempts to stifle a wince as he lowers himself into the chair, and Archer lifts himself slightly in an attempt to help, arm extending.
“Back off,” Shran warns. “You worry too much.”
Archer frowns but relents again, and settles back down.
Once seated, Shran scans the room.
“I’ve always found your quarters unimpressive,” he says before looking back at Archer.
Archer scoffs and rolls his eyes.
“I don’t need a lot of space. Besides, not everything is about size.”
“I’m not talking size, I’m talking prestige. A captain’s quarters should demand respect. Where’s your show of prowess? Mounted weapons, for example?” He glances around the room again, noting the water polo ball, various photographs, knickknacks and other keepsakes. “Yours is so… cozy .”
Shran wrinkles his nose up in distaste as he speaks the last word.
“Humans like cozy,” Archer explains, mirth twinkling in his eyes, amused by their cultural differences. “Our habitats are, generally speaking, supposed to be comfortable and give off a sense of safety and ease.”
“Quarters are for rest. Nothing more.”
“If you say so,” Archer replies, additionally amused by Shran’s pragmatism.
A comfortable silence comes over the room.
“How’re you feeling?” Archer then asks.
“How am I feeling ?” Shran repeats incredulously. He bristles for a second before relaxing and letting out a small sigh.
“Sore,” he mutters. “Your doctor did a fine job of patching me up. My arms itch a little, though. He has me applying this atrocious cream every few hours.”
Archer hums in acknowledgement. It’s good to hear an honest update instead of Shran simply soldiering through all the pain and putting up his typical stoic front.
“I’m glad we found you when we did. You were in rough shape.”
“I’m still not entirely clear as to why I wasn’t sent back to my ship.”
Archer stops, his eyes widening a little. A gentle blush threatens his cheeks and he swallows thickly before he gives a casual shrug, attempting to brush off the feeling.
“Like you said, I worry too much. Besides, like you also said yourself, Phlox did a fine job.”
Shran grumbles, but then nods once.
A beat of silence.
“I should return to my duties,” Shran declares firmly, yet rather quietly.
“Not until you’re completely cleared,” Archer counters, unable to remove the almost fatherly tone of concern in his voice. “We’ve made sure to keep in touch with your ship and send regular updates.”
“An Andorian would never be on bed rest this long. For a species as careless and headstrong as you, you also seem to fuss on rest and recovery too much.”
“Of course! Think about it. If we’re the type to get ourselves into danger often, we’d naturally care more about our survivability afterward.”
Shran hums thoughtfully. “I suppose that makes sense.”
Archer suddenly realizes that, according to Shran, his doctor’s orders were just to get up and move around a little.
And yet Shran chose to find and visit Archer.
He smiles softly.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” Shran snaps, but his words don’t have true bite.
“I’m just glad you’re alive.”
“Oh.”
Shran huffs.
“Me, too.”
Archer’s smile fades at that, though he’s unsurprised that his affection either goes unnoticed or purposely ignored. He shuffles awkwardly in his seat.
Shran looks around the room again, antennae searching, before his attention lands on a small beagle snoozing on a purple pillow at the foot of Archer’s bed.
That was something Shran didn’t understand. The keeping of pets. On Andoria, most of the wildlife was wholly unfit for domestication and extremely dangerous, with the exception of a few, such as the zabathu. Even still, the concept of keeping a pet seemed impractical at best and a complete waste of time and resources at worst.
Archer notices Shran’s focus and glances at Porthos. He smiles.
“Hey, buddy,” he calls and Porthos perks up from his nap before trotting over. Archer leans down in his chair to give him a gentle scratch on the head.
“What is its name again?” Shran asks, looking back and forth between Archer and the dog and their strange ritual.
“His name is Porthos.”
“Why do you refer to it as a he?”
Archer gives Shran a look of confusion.
“Because he’s a he?”
“But it’s an animal.”
Archer laughs gently.
“You should know by now that humans like to personify things, including animals. Anthropomorphize.”
Shran didn’t understand the last word. It’s clear the UT didn’t have a suitable translation.
“Besides,” Archer continues, “humans tend to sometimes still conflate sex and gender. Porthos is a he because he’s a male dog.”
Shran hums in understanding.
“Do you want to pet him?” Archer offers.
“Absolutely not,” comes the quick reply. Shran had no interest in anything to do with the creature.
“C’monnn,” Archer goads, looking at Shran with a lopsided grin. “Just once. For me.”
“For you ?” Shran echoes, quirking a brow. “Is that supposed to convince me?”
“Consider it me owing you another favour.”
Shran tilts his head, his eyes narrowing slightly as he considers this. Pleased with the terms, he smiles a wry smile.
“Very well. I accept.”
Archer’s smile grows impossibly wider and he gestures with a finger to Shran, murmuring a quiet, “go, boy.”
Porthos, ever the well behaved pup, obliges immediately and trots over to Shran, beginning to nose and sniff at the cuffs of his sweatpants.
Shran hesitates for a moment before leaning over as much as his tender injuries would allow and gingerly drops his hand to Porthos’ head, mirroring the action he’d seen Archer perform before.
Porthos is soft, but not as soft as Shran anticipated. The beagle’s fur is more smooth than fluffy, but the texture is not altogether unpleasant.
Archer beams. Porthos suddenly lifts his front paws up to rest on Shran’s knees and licks the Andorian’s nose.
Shran immediately recoils and sputters, his face scrunching up and his antennae whipping back in disgust.
“Are they supposed to do that?” he spits, sounding offended.
Archer can only laugh. “If they like you, yeah.”
Shran glowers at the canine for a moment, but Porthos seems unperturbed.
Sensing Shran’s discomfort, however, Archer commands a “down boy” and “go lay down”.
Porthos again obliges, dropping himself to put all four paws on the ground again before ambling over to his pillow to obediently lay down.
“At least it- he’s well behaved,” Shran remarks.
“Yeah,” Archer agrees, smiling at little as he notices how Shran corrected himself. “It takes hard work and effort, but it’s worth it.”
There’s another pause and a sudden whim overcomes Archer.
He stands from his chair at his desk and moves to his bedside before sitting down again, next to where Shran was seated, effectively closing the distance between them.
He doesn’t particularly notice that his right knee is in direct contact with Shran’s left.
Shran doesn’t readjust nor move away.
“I know you didn’t have much say in the matter, but,” Archer says softly, “thank you for letting us help. I know we were just answering a distress call-“
“Distress call?” Shran exclaims.
“Uh, yeah. You didn’t know?”
“Those idiots sent out a distress call without even attempting a rescue on our own!?”
“Shran,” Archer says placatingly, placing his right hand on Shran’s knee.
Shran grumbles irritatedly, looking away from Archer and thinking about the reprimands he would be administering once he returned to his vessel.
“Like I was saying,” Archer continues, “we didn’t even know who we were rescuing or what we were up against. We just came to help.”
Shran hums before looking back to meet Archer’s striking green eyes.
“Seems the alliance between our species wasn’t for naught after all,” Shran notes.
“Seems so,” Archer agrees.
Another comfortable silence falls over the room. Shran shuffles awkwardly under the too-warm heat of Archer’s hand on his knee. Archer takes this as a hint to withdraw, not wanting to make Shran uncomfortable, but before he has a chance to remove his hand, Shran is placing both of his over Archer’s firmly. Archer looks down in surprise and notes the cool temperature difference, the dexterous strength of the tendons and muscles in the hands, the striking juxtaposition of pinks, whites, and blues.
When he looks back up, Shran is staring at him with that same paradoxically soft intensity he’d seen reserved only for Talas. Archer breathes a shaky breath.
Archer’s gaze flickers down to those damned blue lips and he finds a familiar temptation bubbling up inside of him. He finds himself involuntarily leaning forward, closing the small gap, and notices in equally pleasant surprise that Shran is doing the same.
Do it. Just do it. Just do it!
He hears a voice yelling in his head.
“Phlox to Commander Shran.”
The pair whip away from each other abruptly, as if burned, and promptly remove all points of contact.
Shran presses a button on the comm, embarrassedly looking away.
“This is Shran.”
“You’re to return to sickbay immediately,” Phlox informs, full well knowing his authority as a doctor.
“Understood,” Shran replies gruffly, and somewhat reluctantly.
Shran quickly pulls further away from Archer, stands, and — with only a press of his lips together in an attempt of an awkward smile — leaves Archer alone in his quarters.