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“Ow,” she said. Not her best line, sure, but she definitely deserved some slack. Getting thrown out into the vacuum of space did a wallop and then some to the body -- and the less Christine thought about oxygen deprivation and its correlation to decreased brain function, the better. She opened her eyes, wincing at the fluorescence as the familiar overhead of the medbay came into view. She didn’t know if this was her first time coming to, or if she’d experienced other moments of lucidity. If she had, she no longer remembered them.
“You are awake,” a familiar voice said to her left. It was Spock. He went to his feet. “I will summon--”
She reached out to place her fingers on his unexposed wrist, halting him. “The doctor?” she asked. Her voice came out scratchy and rough. “The same doctor who also had the misfortune of being tossed out an airlock? Let him rest. I can take care of myself. Nurse, remember?”
Spock loomed silently for a moment, then inclined his head in a familiar move that meant acquiescence, if not wholehearted agreement. “As you wish,” he said, and smoothly sat on the stool that was pulled up next to her bed.
Christine ignored her ability to categorize his mannerisms and their nuance. She was simply glad M’Benga wouldn’t be bothered. With some difficulty, she sat up. She expected a fussy corpsman to arrive to take her vitals or poke her with a hypospray, but none came. Other than her and Spock, Medical was empty. The familiar hum of the ship’s life support systems filled the quiet. By the looks of it, it was the dead of night.
“Where is--?” She waved her hand vaguely.
“After ensuring you were stable, I dismissed the duty personnel,” he said. Spock wasn’t usually in the habit of assuming -- you couldn’t apply logic to a question that wasn’t properly asked, after all -- but it seemed he could read her easily tonight.
“Hooray for them,” she murmured. Duty meant a full cycle of on-call work and sleeping in a cramped bunk behind a flimsy partition. Dismissing them, however, was a breach of protocol for when a patient was in-house. Which she was, and which he wouldn’t do. Meaning he’d assigned himself the responsibility of looking after her in their stead, sitting on the galaxy’s most uncomfortable chair as she recovered. She pressed her hand to her forehead. Spock didn’t make it easy for her to shake off those pesky feelings that had careened dangerously into… something else… these past few months.
“You are exhibiting signs of discomfort,” Spock remarked. “Are you certain I do not need to alert medical personnel?”
She tried not to laugh. “That defeats the purpose of telling them ‘kick rocks, I got this,’” she said. “I’m alright. Really, Spock. Just a touch on the side of feeling like I got hit by a phaser on high and then steamrolled by a bus, but… yeah, I’m fine. How long have you been here?”
“Approximately four hours,” he said evenly.
“I’ve been knocked out for four hours ?”
“Not quite.” If there was ever a time that Spock looked reluctant, it was now. “Upon your and Dr. M’benga’s retrieval from among the space debris, you were placed in a medically-induced coma.”
“Mm. Define that time for me, please.”
Spock took a few seconds to respond as though calculating exacting times and figures. “Twenty-three hours,” he said, “and sixteen minutes.”
“Yikes,” she said for lack of anything better. Her stomach swam.“Can I see the PADD?”
“In light of recent events, I am not sure if you should review your medical file at this time,” he replied. “I have been told that… a brush with certain death… can be difficult to view objectively, especially if it is in regards to oneself.”
Christine tried to smile. He wasn’t wrong. Under normal circumstances, she might have heeded his advice, but a dark curiosity urged her on; her lizard brain asking to know, to see, exactly how close they had toed that everlasting point of no return. Nevertheless, she appreciated his concern. “I know,” she said, “but I’d like to see it anyway.”
Dutifully, Spock did as she asked. She scanned through the lengthy report. At the mention of broken ribs, her hand slid to her side as she winced from phantom pain. A flash of memory came then. Strong hands against her chest and a desperate voice above her. She went hot and cold, and numbly set the PADD to the side. She’d had her fill. It wasn’t pretty. Everything pointed to the fact that she shouldn’t be alive and yet she was.
“I’m surprised I’m still in one piece,” she said lightly, falling back on tried and true humor to get through the churn of emotional turmoil that inched up her throat. “And before you say anything… yes, I know I’d freeze into a solid chunk of ice.” At the hint of confusion, she continued on, “There used to be a, um, theory that if a human body went out into space without a suit on, all the little gas bubbles in our body would make us… explode. Hence: my bad joke. Sorry.”
“It is human nature to cope with distress in myriad ways. Humor being one of them.” No apology needed being the imperative theme of his reply.
“I knew you’d understand,” she teased. Sobering, she said, “Thank you for staying with me when you didn’t have to. This is probably cutting into your sleep time. I know how busy you are.”
“Christine…” He looked away. The corners of his mouth turned down, the muscle in his cheek twitching. When he finally turned back to look at her, he had composed himself. “By stealing the Enterprise, we prevented a war, but… I put the crew in harm’s way. My actions put you in harm’s way.”
Her heart skipped a beat. The traitorous vitals monitor pinged with an alert. “You can’t blame yourself,” she said. “We all knew what we signed up for.”
It was a lame excuse and an even colder comfort. She knew that. Even as she’d wrapped her arms around Joseph’s shoulders, fleeting hope and burning fear beating in her chest, she had to face the inevitable: That Spock would have to fire on the ship to prevent the loss of millions of lives in exchange for theirs, and she was the one who had waved the flag and strung up the bullseye. And it had scared the hell out of her. She could only imagine his choice. The weight of responsibility that had sat on his shoulders, thinking he had condemned two of his own to death as he gave the order to fire.
“I was the first to arrive at the transporter room. When I saw you unconscious on the deck, I felt… fear. And hopelessness. Knowing that I had caused it.” He paused. “To have been the cause of my pain, it was… almost intolerable.”
A little piece of her heart cracked open. Compelled to comfort, Christine reached out again. This time she placed her hand over his. “I’m here, Spock,” she said, “and I’m a little roughed up, sure, but no worse for wear. I’m okay. It’s not your fault.”
She sensed that he intended to argue. By all accounts, everything that transpired had been, in fact, Spock’s doing. It had been his plan to take Enterprise from space dock by means of subterfuge. And if they had never answered La’an’s hail… She quieted the noise in her head. There was no use in hypotheticals. Not right now. She squeezed his hand, trying to force every fiber of forgiveness into the touch. She could feel him relax as the tight knuckles under her palm smoothed out. That was better. Perhaps a minute or two passed before Spock altered his grip, rotating his hand so that they came palm-to-palm. His skin was dry and warm. She tried not to look too deeply into what the change meant, nor read into the foreign emotions that began to bleed through their connection. Still, try as she might, it was impossible to fully ignore the feeling that their friendship was rapidly tipping over into a category neither one of them could yet define.
Eventually, and wordlessly, they drew away from one another.
“So,” she started, after a sufficient time had passed and her stomach began to twinge with hunger pains; a surefire sign she was well on the road to a full recovery, “I’m going to break into the galley and synth the biggest grilled cheese ever created by man. Woman. Care to join me?”
For a split second, she swore she saw him smile. “I believe it is in my best interest to accompany you. I do not want to provoke the ire of the medical staff if they discover I let you freely wander after they put you in my care.”
Christine rolled her eyes fondly. “Just say you want me to make you one too.”
Like a rubber band, they had snapped back into old habits, old banter. Deep down, she knew it was better, safer, that way. But every now and again, when she looked at him, she wanted to reach for something new.