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The simulated heartbeat of the medical monitor acts as a siren to awareness. Spock is greeted by the antiseptic scent of sickbay, the blissfully heated bed. There is lethargy and there is pain, but it has mutated from what it was planetside, from when he was rescued. It tugs and pulls across his chest down to his navel, but does not threaten with death. He holds his eyes closed to give himself space to orient his mind.
Dr. McCoy’s voice is close by, overhead. “Sickbay here. He’s coming around.” Then the chirrup of the communications channel being closed.
The tell-tale monitor has given him away. Spock must bear up under it and, if he opens his eyes, also under an ice-colored gaze.
Spock settles his devastated body into sensory limbo in order to liberate mental capacity ahead of his captain’s arrival. Barring an emergency with the ship itself, there is nearly one-hundred percent likelihood that Kirk is already on his way.
Even to a Vulcan who has been knocked down by the ejected digestive exo-stomach of what on a scan appeared to be a complicated tuberous plant, Kirk’s frantic concern was undeniable. Something inside of Spock longs to answer that concern, even as he attempts to rest. Logically, a visit to sickbay is a misuse of Kirk’s duty time. Yet Spock anticipates Kirk’s presence in an aching way that defies well-practiced control.
Spock meditates as well as he can, turns the unfamiliar problem over. Understanding his situation would gain him a great deal of power over it, but these are pathways of thought he is unfamiliar with.
“He awake?” The voice is gentle, directed elsewhere.
Spock has unintentionally drifted into shallow sleep. He rises out of it, opens his eyes. A hand touches his upper arm, squeezes hard enough the muscles shift against each other. The hand rests fully there. Spock’s focus is drawn to the outline of it, traces each finger and its pressure.
Kirk’s voice is silk. “How are you feeling?”
Spock nods.
Contrarily, Kirk’s tone with McCoy is commanding. “Status?”
McCoy steps closer. “We’ve sewn him up, replenished his blood, but we have to clear a stew of toxins from the wound site before he can enter a healing trance.”
The hand tightens, remains that way, as if to fix Spock in place.
Kirk looks up at the monitor, looks it over as if trying to glean the unfamiliar there. “He in a lot of pain?”
McCoy tips his head to the side. He looks down at Spock. “You want something for the pain?”
Spock shakes his head. Far worse than the pain would be to lose control.
Kirk hitches a hip on the medical bed. Leans over Spock. His gaze takes in all of him above the coverlet.
“You sure?”
Spock has to clear his throat to talk given how close Kirk is. “I believe I am all right.”
“If you’re sure.”
Spock ineffectually licks his dry lips. He wants to say something meaningful, to connect with Kirk in turn to match how Kirk is connecting with him at this moment, but his mind is not performing well. He wants Kirk to remain nearby, swallows against the illogical need of it.
“The surface study…” Spock manages.
Kirk sits up, but stays put. “We held a quick debriefing but not a planning meeting. We’re regrouping right now.”
“It is incomplete,” Spock estimates. The notion of that given his own sacrifice stresses him enough to shift the pace and tone of the monitor.
“Jim,” McCoy warns.
Kirk stands and shifts his hand to Spock’s forearm. “It’s being taken care, Science Officer. I want you to rest.”
Spock swallows a sigh. He is misunderstood, but should have no expectation that Kirk will take this new aching hollowness into account.
“How long?” Kirk’s voice is directed elsewhere. “Before a healing trance?”
A shuffle of fabric indicates McCoy has crossed his arms. “I’m hoping twelve hours, could be twenty. Partly depends on the lab concocting a better antidote. He’s stable right now, and he’s healing, albeit slowly.”
The healing trance will be a test. Spock will have to free himself, at least temporarily, from the grip of this strange appetite in order to focus his mind. He is both relieved as well as strangely empty when Kirk returns to the bridge.
Spock meditates lightly, sleeps lightly. Minor physical and medical needs are dealt with upon his person and around him. Shifts change and the lights and voices become lower. The external pain continues to fade.
When there are two point one three hours remaining in gamma shift, the door to sickbay hisses open.
Kirk enters sickbay the way he does every area, fully surveying it while striding purposefully. He commands his environment just as he commands the people in it, without conscious thought.
He finds Spock’s gaze and smiles the way he does when no one else is looking, as if willing to be vulnerable at that moment as a gift.
“You’re awake.”
Some centering is required before speaking. “I am somewhat tired of resting.”
Spock is rewarded with a deeper smile.
Spock has healed overnight and finds it considerably easier to talk. “May I speak with you while we are alone?”
Kirk steps closer, presses his hip against the edge of the bed, keeps his hands behind his back. “Of course.”
Spock stares at the overhead, at the strut impinging on the room. “Apologies. This is a difficult topic.”
Kirk looks down at the coverlet. “Take your time.”
“I am not particularly skilled at human relationships, but I am certain that I should not unilaterally alter my relationship with you.”
Finely shaped human eyebrows furrow as Kirk puzzles this, but he does not look up.
Spock breathes in slowly until his wounds tug against the movement. “Everyone on this ship relies upon you. And I have strictly avoided doing so. In part because it is my nature to be fully self sufficient and in part because you do not need the additional burden.”
Kirk’s upper back tenses, pulls his shoulders back. “No one on this ship is a burden.”
“I do not have the proper words for what I wish to express.”
“I shouldn’t have interrupted.”
Spock regroups. “I find that I am altering my thinking on how you and I should relate. There are numerous unknowns surrounding this issue in light of that change. But I am unable to express myself to resolve them.”
In the silence that follows, Kirk reaches out and adjusts the edge of the coverlet. He straightens the folded edge so it is even.
“I shouldn’t speak for you. But I could take some guesses and you could nod yes or no.”
Spock raises his left brow slightly. “That in itself may be an illuminating exercise.”
Kirk laughs faintly, drops his hand to his side. “Difficult or not. Whatever the topic is. It is nice, as always, to be so comfortable with you. I can’t imagine how you could ever be a burden.”
“Perhaps that is a way I can express my meaning: I am increasingly comfortable with you. What exactly changes due to this, I do not know. And that large unknown is an issue for my logic ongoing.”
The bed monitor shifts into a rising tone.
Spock closes his eyes and calms his vital signs. He does not want to spur someone from medical to come and investigate.
“We can talk about this when you’re better,” Kirk says.
Spock shakes his head. “I may have difficulty with a healing trance due to this given its strong emotional component.”
Kirk starts to reach out but shuffles his muscles and locks his hands behind himself again. “Now that’s a problem. What can I do for you?”
“I do not know.” The simulated heartbeat increases again. “I have no experience with this.”
“I promise to be open to anything you need to discuss when the opportunity arises. You can rest easy on that. If that helps.”
“It is not just you.” Spock rocks his head away, then stares overhead again. “I must adjust my own mind in conjunction with your responses in a re-iterative process that—”
“Spock. Spock. Spock.” Kirk’s knuckles rap the edge of the bed before retreating. “Listen to me. Please lay a burden on me for once. I promise we’ll work through this if not in a few days hence then when we have leave. Okay?”
Spock considers this while observing how the full spectrum overhead lighting of sickbay highlights the golds in Kirk’s hair. Kirk is extremely reliable. And if Spock is not to be wholly self-reliant then he must rely on others when it is warranted. Just as he does with regard to his shipboard duties. A simple matter, then, of allowing his internal world to match his external one. Logically, this should be enough to ease Spock’s mind sufficiently for a trance.
Spock nods.
“Good. I was about to order you to get better as a last resort.” A mischievous smile graces Kirk’s face. His emotions are not like others’. They are not irksome. They round him out into something more interesting.
“Unnecessary. I estimate now that I can manage when I am cleared by medical to do so.”
Kirk’s expression becomes soft again. “It will be good to have you back on your feet again. I dearly miss you on the bridge.”
“Acknowledged,” is all Spock can manage without disturbing the monitor’s now slow and steady pace. He closes his eyes, practices cleaving himself from his emotions, find it easier than expected.
Footsteps retreat, then scrape faintly as Kirk turns back to the bed. The psychic heat of being watched rises, then recedes.
“Get better, Spock,” Kirk whispers, low enough he may be speaking to himself, or to the universe.
Spock breaths in slowly and deeply and then out again slowly to avoid audibly sighing. He must give even more of himself away to this being if he is to have sufficient space to heal as well as to function.
Logical. In its own way.