Chapter Text
God, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
He’d say it just like that, too. He’d say: I’m sorry, I’ve been awful. I should’ve known that you’d hate all those slurs, you are part human after all. No, that wouldn’t do either. Bringing out Spock’s humanity might be considered an insult. It made McCoy grit his teeth and give his chair another agonized spin. Spock was half human, yes, but he didn’t seem to want anything to do with that side of his heritage. Even though the thought was rising in his mind, it was unfair of him to say that Spock didn’t want anything to do with humans in general. He cared about them in his own way. McCoy just didn’t know if it was the human part that cared or if he was showing it in a way that all Vulcans did.
One of the many pens that littered his desk fell to the floor as his knee smacked into the corner. The pain did little to push away the feeling of guilty distaste. Finding Spock’s human side had always been an aspiration of his, but the thought had still occurred to him that what he saw daily was already a perfect combination of their two species and that it would just have to be accepted as such. The bits of his brain that urged him to quiet his teasing had been hastily overwritten by curiosity. He always wanted to see more. He wanted different expressions, a laugh here and there, a smile. The closest he had managed was a glare. He tried not to think about the implications of that too much for his own sanity. No, today was a day for apologies. He’d done enough introspection.
But, dammit, curse him if he couldn’t find a good enough time to say it. It wasn’t a proposal, it wasn’t a request. He should have been able to come up with something by now. God knew Spock was eating himself up over losing control of his emotions and throwing him against a wall. Disregarding the frost bite, that part hadn’t been so bad. It was the thought that Spock, despite having found someone to share his elusive compassion, he had chosen the Enterprise over her. His mind still coughed up residual chills at the inability to do anything useful while one of his friends was being swept away before his eyes.
He just couldn’t win. Oh, there was a preferred endgame, and McCoy didn’t particularly like the way his thoughts kept turning to it, thanks.
His frostbite had been hastily taken care of by Christine and he was no longer confined to sickbay. He knew exactly where Spock was, he knew that what he had to say was very, very simple, but it was so hard to go up there and say it. On the bridge. In front of everyone. Jim might enjoy seeing his efforts, but Leonard was certain that he didn’t want to see the resulting smirk.
His foot tapped against the floor. A cart wheeled by outside. Christine glared at him from the window to his office. She didn’t know what to make of his brooding state and wasn’t quite sure how to approach him about it, so she watched him like a hawk. He ignored her.
“Alright,” he said to the picture frame on his desk. He’d find Spock today. After shift, that would be fine. He’d ambush right before he and Jim escaped to go play chess.
- - -
Right, well. He probably should have expected things to go awry. They always did when something important was scheduled.
The ship stuttered to a halt and Jim ran full speed to the engineering deck, met by a slightly singed Scotty. Leonard dashed after him. Where there was smoke, there was usually an injured redshirt.
“What happened?” Jim asked, pushing his way through a cluster of ensigns.
“There happen to be a special anomaly on the scanner up there, sir?” Scotty asked. He looked deeply unhappy.
“As a matter of fact, there was,” Spock said, coming to stand next to Jim.
“Aye, well. All we know is that it shorted a relay coil.”
“Mr. Scott, I know well enough about mechanics to know that a relay coil does not do that,” he said, eyes flickering up and down the walls for a hint of what had gone wrong.
“Fried the internal scanner too, I’m afraid. We’re not sure how far down the line the power surge originated, so we’re going to have to peel away some paneling.” Scotty looked like the very prospect was sacrilegious.
Jim nodded. “Well, we’re dead in the water until you get her going again. Need any of us to lend a hand?”
Spock looked at Jim with a raised eyebrow.
Jim just shrugged. “Can’t do much like this, I might as well be of help somewhere,” he explained.
“I, ah, I don’t see why not, sir,” Scotty said. He looked to Spock for approval.
“Very well, Captain. I will return to the bridge and continue the scans.”
“Yes, please do, thank you Mr. Spock.”
Finding no bleeding or aching people of any kind, McCoy saw his chance.
“Wait up, Spock, I’ve been meaning to catch you.”
Spock slowed his pace but did not stop. “I do not believe that I have been hard to find.”
“Alone,” he clarified, feeling his ears burn.
At this Spock did stop, and McCoy nearly ran him over. He did a quick glance about for Jim and came up short. It was now or never.
“I’m sorry,” he blurted out, preamble entirely forgotten.
Spock showed no indication that he knew what issue McCoy was addressing. “I am unsure what you feel the need to clarify, Doctor, but I assure you, apologies are—”
“Quite unnecessary, yeah, yeah. Let me finish,” he said, grabbing the other man’s arm to trap him.
Spock wisely kept his mouth shut.
McCoy steeled himself. “I’m sorry that I’ve been an ass to you, Spock. I’ve been so focused on trying to pry a reaction out of you that I crossed a line. I’m a grown ass man, I should be able to control things like this,” he said, red creeping up his neck and down his forearms. “With anyone else I might’ve managed to ignore it, but—look. I’m making excuses. I’m sorry for all of those slurs over the years. I hope you know that I respect you as much as Jim—maybe even a bit more on some of his bad days—and that I never meant anything by it.”
Spock was silent for a minute and every second made his skin crawl. McCoy hastily let him go and wiped his palm on the side of his pants.
“Ignore what, Doctor?”
“What?”
“What was it that you find so perturbing? So difficult to ignore?”
He shifted uncomfortably. “Not, perturbing Spock, it’s nothing you’ve done. I’m just not used to you. I wanted to get a response, especially when we first met, to feel things out. To get to know you better. And damn, a sarcastic remark has been my greatest victory. But I don’t know how to deal with how…impartial you are to me. I know, I know, Vulcans don’t show emotion. I suppose I just want to see what you’re feeling, and that’s pretty shitty of me, too.”
He was feeling all to vulnerable, hands clutched behind his back, face red from shame, but Spock didn’t seem to pick up on his insecurities.
He raised an eyebrow. “You want to be able to evoke emotional reactions. From myself.”
“Well, yeah. Clearly I didn’t go about that right.”
“No doctor, you did not.”
Shit. “I really am sorry, Spock. I’m not asking for your forgiveness and I know this doesn’t excuse what I did, but I had to tell you anyway.”
The eyebrow raised further. It would have been comedic had McCoy not wanted to crawl into a hole. “It does not, but perhaps we can come to a compromise.”
“A compromise?”
“I’m sure you are aware that Vulcans, contrary to popular belief, have the capability to both feel and express emotion.”
“I know that, yes.” He did. He wasn’t that unreasonable. It was just hard to tell with how repressed they tended to be.
Spock nodded approvingly. “In that case, perhaps it would be beneficial to attempt other types of emotional provocation, Dr. McCoy.”
He swallowed. Was he offering…? “You don’t have to do that, Spock. I was going to stop with the nicknames regardless. It might take a while, but…”
“Negative, doctor. I believe that ceasing all attempts to extricate a reaction from me would damage our rapport.”
“Well, I suppose it might, at that,” he conceded, trying to tell himself that he agreed because it was logical, not because Spock just offered to slip him a smile once and again. Irony at its best.
“I am glad you agree. I am, however, required on the bridge,” Spock said, turning on his heel as if none of their conversation had just transpired.
“Yeah, of course, I’ll make sure Jim doesn’t trip over a hammer.” He took a step back. “See you later?”
“Indeed,” Spock called from farther down the hall.
He wasn’t sure what he could possibly do to get a response from the Vulcan but he was certainly going to try. He just wasn’t sure where to start. Spock hadn’t clarified what emotions he was comfortable with (if any) or who would be seeing them. Was it selfish of him to want whatever this was to be between them? Spock had grinned at Jim once, and McCoy couldn't blame him for that (even if he could tease hm). It had been a rather odd situation. But damn, did he want that smile focused on him. He’d seen pain, hysteria, horror and tears thanks to unwelcome alien interference and all of those had been expectedly horrible. Spock’s control had been torn away, leaving him raw, tied together with only threads of self-preservation. It had made them all sick. Jim had been jumpy for a week after. Mybe he'd get a chance to see the good things, too.
Thinking of Jim nudged his mind back to where it was supposed to be. McCoy slipped through the door to engineering, his medical bag at the ready. The hallway looked like a skinned animal: metal sheeting was piled up against the wall and a plethora of red wires were twisted like veins. Maybe Scotty was onto something when he personified his ship.
“Hey, Bones,” Jim said, completely covered in grease.
“You look like you rolled around in a Tellurian tar pit,” he exclaimed. “How long was I gone, five minutes?”
“More like ten. You and Spock have a good talk?” he asked, rubbing his hands on a cloth that was equally black.
“No.”
Jim grinned. “Right. Well, there’s an ensign with a burn on his hand if you want something to do.”
He sighed. “There’s no point in hoping I won’t be of use one of these days, is there?”
“Nope,” the captain said, receding back under the curl of paneling.
“You look like a cave-dwelling arachnid,” McCoy said. His eyes zeroed into a young man in the corner who appeared to be soldering several wires with one hand.
“You really have been spending too much time with Spock,” Jim said, voice muffled.
Leonard went out of his way to kick him in the leg as he walked by.
“Not yet,” he said.