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"Have you lost your damn mind!?" McCoy stared at the roommate he wasn’t supposed to have. “I don’t know what kind of liquor you’ve been drinking, but you can’t beat the Kobayashi Maru. No one has, no one will. End of story.”
Kirk hiccupped just slightly and then spread his hands to the sides of his face and waved them around. “You don’t understand, Bones. I have a plan. Brilliant plan. You’ll see.”
“Brilliant plan my ass,” McCoy said, shaking his head. “I know what I’ll see. What I’ll see is you, on my couch, with the hangover from hell in the morning. If I’m here in the morning.”
Kirk was about to defend himself from McCoy’s admonishment but then stopped. His face screwed up in confusion for a moment as his heavily inebriated mind tried to grapple with what he’d said. “You don’t have clinic duty tomorrow.”
“No, I don’t,” he said.
“And no stupid classes, since you’re a doctor and they figure you know most of this shit,” Kirk said, tilting his head and narrowing his eyes. “So that leaves...” Then his eyes got wide and a grin spread over his face. “Bones, you’re getting laid!”
“Like that will ever happen as long as I’m your friend,” he said, rolling his eyes. “On the contrary, I’m talking to someone about going...” He made a face. “Out in space. For a semester abroad.”
The grin dropped off Kirk’s face. “You can’t leave the Academy,” he said.
“Why, so you won’t lose this sweet set-up?” Bones said, heading towards the coffeemaker. “Look, I hate space. I hate it with every fiber of my being. But since staying on Earth really isn’t an option and I am currently enrolled in the Starfleet Academy, I figure I better get used to it before I’m stuck on one of those disease-laden ships heading God knows where for years at a time. Besides,” he said once he got to the coffeemaker and started setting up for the coffee he knew his friend would need, “medical students with dorms like these get to keep them even if they do the semester abroad. So you’ll get the place to yourself. I may even tear up the rules while I’m gone. Just don’t destroy anything I leave behind.”
He glanced over at Kirk and wondered if the coffee would even be necessary. Kirk looked rather sober at this point, and not just in the alcoholic sense. “I guess that could work,” he said glumly.
“Hey, it’s not like we’re joined at the hip,” McCoy said as a joke, trying to get a laugh out of his friend, but it didn’t work. Once he got the coffee started he turned and looked over at Kirk. “Look, are you okay? And don’t give me the BS answer. I’ll know you’re lying.”
“Everyone leaves,” he said, shrugging. “I’m used to it.”
McCoy blinked. Crap. He should have guessed. Kirk’s mom and brother had left him and it had left its mark on Kirk. The few times the topic had come up he’d gathered his mother hadn’t even bothered to reply to most of his messages since he went into the Academy and he had no clue where his brother could be or if he was still alive. Abandonment issues,; James Kirk had them.
Although…
“You know, nimrod, if you’re sober enough in the morning you could come with me and we can see about getting on the same ship,” he said, acting like he was trying not to roll his eyes. “Who knows? Maybe when we get back they’ll give you a halfway decent roommate so I can have my dorm back.”
Kirk perked up at that. “You’d take me with you?” he said.
“Why not? I mean, who the hell else is going to keep you out of trouble? I disappear for a semester, you could burn the damn place down. The way you like to work on all those gadgets and stuff, all those antiques, and the crap way you take care of yourself, I could see an accidental fire definitely being a thing, with my dorm being ground zero.”
Kirk grinned at that. “I wouldn’t be that bad. I’d use my own dorm and blame it on the roommate.”
McCoy chuckled at that. “You would, wouldn’t you?” He leaned back against the counter a bit more. “You know, though. It’s not all fun and games going up there. You can’t dick around like you do here.”
Yeah, I know,” Kirk said, running his hand through his hair. “I still pull top grades, though. Still one of the top in the class.”
“Yeah, but I’m being honest. You can be a real little shit sometimes, and we’re going to more or less be crew. That means you need to respect your commanding officer,” McCoy said. “I have some pull to get you on the same ship with me. Don’t make me regret it by making an ass out of yourself and embarrassing us both.”
“I won’t.” Kirk went to the sofa and laid down on it, adjusting the pillows till he was comfortable. “Bones?”
“Yeah?” he said, turning to look at the coffee.
“You ever wonder what might have happened if we hadn’t met on that shuttle?”
“I’d have this dorm to myself and less gray hairs,” McCoy quipped.
“No, I mean...seriously.”
McCoy was quiet for a long moment. “I probably would have bailed after the first year, to be honest. I know I said my ex got custody of Earth, but I’ve had it okay here. I know there are a few people at this academy who wouldn’t mind me joining the staff as opposed to being a student, if it came down to it.”
“You’d scare half the students away,” Kirk said.
“Yeah, but the ones that were left would be the best damn med crews going into space. But if not, settle into a clinic here, go back to just being Doctor McCoy. Maybe focus on a field other than general medicine. Go back to school for that.” He shrugged. “Or I’d have drunk myself stupid and been kicked out faster than you.”
“I wouldn’t have been kicked out,” Kirk said. “It’d just take me longer to captain my own ship, that’s all.” He yawned. “I’m gonna do it in three years, you know. Like I told Pike.”
“Yeah, I know,” McCoy said. “Let’s see how you like space, first, alright?” But there wasn’t an answer, and when he looked back he saw Kirk had passed right out. He shook his head and waited for the coffee to finish. They could have it cold in the morning before they went off to see about the semester abroad. It’d do them both good.