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Sickbay never really slept. It hummed -soft, constant -biobeds glowing, scanners whispering, the low thrum of the Enterprise vibrating through the soles of your boots. You’d been on your feet for… you weren’t even sure anymore. Your shift had ended hours ago. Maybe longer. Time blurred when triage alerts stacked and patients kept coming and McCoy kept barking orders while trusting you with his entire damn heart.
You rub at your temple, fingers slick with antiseptic, and force yourself to focus as you recalibrate a scanner. The numbers swim. You blink. Hard. Once. Twice. The room tilts anyway.
“Easy,” you mutter to yourself, steadying a tray that wobbles dangerously close to the edge of the counter. Your hands are shaking. That’s new. Or maybe it’s not and you’ve just been ignoring it like everything else.
McCoy is across the room, arguing with a nurse about protocol, dark brows pulled low, sleeves rolled up, exhaustion carved deep into the lines around his mouth. He hasn’t noticed you yet. Good. You don’t need him hovering. You just need to get through this -one more patient, one more chart, one more-
Your vision tunnels.
The floor rushes up to meet you.
You don’t remember falling. Just the sound -metal clattering, a sharp cry of your name ripped straight from McCoy’s chest. Then hands are on you, strong and frantic, cradling your head before it hits the deck.
“Goddammit- hey, hey, I’ve got you,” he says, voice cracking right down the middle. “Stay with me, sweetheart. Look at me.”
You try. You really do. But the lights are too bright and your body feels impossibly heavy, like gravity has doubled just to spite you. Your mouth opens. Nothing comes out.
“Bones,” nurse Chappell says, tight with panic. “Vitals are-”
“I can see the damn vitals,” he snaps, already hauling you into his arms like you weigh nothing at all. He moves fast -too fast for someone who claims his knees are going. He lays you on the nearest biobed, hands trembling as he activates the scanner overhead.
Your eyes flutter open just long enough to see his face above you. Fear strips him bare. No sarcasm. No bluster. Just raw, naked terror.
“Hey,” you whisper. “I’m… okay.”
“Don’t you lie to me,” he says, softer now, thumb brushing your cheek like he needs to prove you’re real. “You scared the hell outta me.”
The scanner chirps angrily. Dehydration. Hypoglycemia. Exhaustion stacked on exhaustion, stress piled so high it finally tipped you over. McCoy exhales through his nose, jaw tight, guilt settling heavy in his chest.
“Son of a bitch,” he mutters -to himself, this time.
He injects fluids with practiced ease, but his other hand never leaves you. Like if he lets go, you might disappear. When your breathing evens out, when the color starts creeping back into your face, his shoulders finally sag.
“You’ve been pushing too hard,” he says quietly. Not accusing. Just worried. “And before you argue -yes, I know. Hypocritical. Welcome to marriage with a workaholic doctor.”
A weak smile tugs at your lips. “You love me.”
“I do love you,” he agrees immediately, like there was never any doubt. “That’s the damn problem.”
He pulls a stool close and sits, forearms resting on the edge of the bed, forehead dropping briefly against your knuckles. You feel the weight of that gesture more than any lecture he could give.
“I should’ve seen it,” he murmurs. “You’ve been running on fumes. Skipping meals. Staying late. And I let you.”
You squeeze his hand. “You didn’t let me. I chose to.”
He looks up then, eyes shining, fierce and tender all at once. “Then I’m choosing something now.” He presses a kiss to your fingers. “You’re off duty. Doctor’s orders. And if you try to sneak back in here, I will sedate you.”
“Threatening your girlfriend,” you mumble. “Very professional.”
He huffs a shaky laugh. “You collapse on my sickbay floor, professionalism goes out the goddamn airlock.”
He helps you sit up slowly, careful, attentive, like every movement matters because it does. A blanket is tucked around your shoulders. A cup pressed to your lips.
“Drink,” he says gently. “All of it.”
You obey. Because it’s him. Because he’s scared. Because you love him just as fiercely.
When you’re stable, when your body stops screaming quite so loud, he finally relaxes enough to lean back, eyes never leaving you.
“Next time you feel like this,” he says, voice low and serious, “you come to me. Not the floor. Me.”
You nod. “Promise.”
He exhales, then leans in and presses his forehead to yours, private and intimate in the middle of a bustling sickbay.
“Damn it,” he whispers. “I can handle broken bones, alien plagues, the universe falling apart -but you?” His thumb strokes your cheek. “You’re my weak spot.”
And for the first time all shift, all day, all too many weeks -you let yourself rest. Right there. With Leonard McCoy watching over you like the most precious thing in his universe.
Because you are. 💙