Into the Unknown

by aprettysmalldose

Summary:

With Sevastopol behind them, Jim had thought the worst was behind them as well. But no. Apparently his choices are jail, jail for his crew, jail for his ship, or join the Federation on a delightful pleasure cruise to Acheron. Jim's survived the impossible before, more than once, in fact, but how long can one man's luck hold out? And then, of course, there's Spock. Spock that Jim yearns for. Spock that Jim longs for. Spock that Jim will absolutely get a grip about. Yes. He will. The Mission will go fine, he will get over Spock, and he and his crew will go on their merry way.

This time for sure.

Notes:

And here we go! Thank you to the Betafish, itsme-theborgqueen!

I hope you all are as excited as I am! Posting from a different place than usual so might have to come back and tweak some things later.

We'll meet some new characters, so the chapter after they get introduced I'll tag them, u know, keep some mystery heheh.

Chapter 1: The Mission

Jim is going to go insane. It’s been three, maybe four cycles since he first walked through the door into the interview room, and every cycle has been the same. He tells his story. Again. The same way, maybe a detail added or dropped here or there. They pause for a mid-shift meal break. Those flavored meal cubes the Federation is so proud of, and water. Then they reconvene for questioning. Why? Why this? Why that? Why did you? Why didn’t you? Why, why, why? Until Jim is ready to beat himself senseless if it will just stop the endless barrage.

 

The square synthesized wood table. The opaque beige-colored walls. The same two bland Vulcan faces, cycle after cycle. He hasn’t seen his crew since he first entered the interview room. The only people he has seen are the two Vulcan interviewers, and the helmeted pair of Federation Forces that escort him to and from the featureless room where he spends his sleep cycle. One of the interviewers has a mole. The other has elaborate hair in coiled knots. Both refuse to answer any of Jim’s questions. 

 

“And then I woke up in Medical on my ship after the 48-hour quarantine had lapsed,” he finishes this cycle’s narration. Neither of the interviewers do so much as blink. Stuck in a room with these two has given Jim new insight into Spock’s hybrid status. Spock is positively effusive compared to these Vulcans. 

 

Jim’s mid-cycle meal is brought in by one of his helmeted guards, and set on the table before him. He sighs. The brightly colored cubes are quite flavorful, even if he has trouble identifying what the flavours actually are. It’s the texture he can’t get past. Spongy. He’s not a fan.

 

Without saying a word, as is their custom, the two interviewers stand in tandem, and exit the room through the opposite door that Jim comes in and out of. The guard stands at attention against a wall, watching over Jim as he eats. Jim sighs again and glares at the cubes, then begrudgingly picks up his fork and stabs one. His mouth twists at the feel of it. Tasty, but so…springy. 

 

“How you doin’?” He asks the guard in between bites.

 

No response, as per usual.

 

“My day is garbage, thanks for asking though,” he says, spearing more cubes violently on his fork.

 

Silence.

 

“Well, I’m sure guarding me is the best part of your day, anyway.” Jim finishes off the last cube and shoots a provocative smile at the guard, as he stretches out in his chair, and runs a hand through his hair.

 

The guard shifts position slightly.

 

Jim smirks. He has no idea if it really is the same two guards everyday or if they’re exchanged out in a rotation, or what species exactly is under the helmets, but some mid-meal flirting usually gets some kind of a response. 

 

He picks up the water and downs it, keeping his head tilted so the guard can see his throat working. 

 

After he finishes the water and sets the cup back on the table, Jim stretches again, tilting his head back further. He trails a hand down his throat, letting his eyes fall half closed. Through his eyelashes, he can see the guard shift again. Jim tries not to gloat too much. Small victories are still victories though. And right now, that’s all Jim has going for him. 

 

The far door opens, and the two interviewers return to their positions on the other side of the table.

 

The guard steps forward, picks up Jim’s plate and fork, and exits through Jim’s door behind him. 

 

Without any fanfare, the Vulcan with the mole asks, “Why did you decide to conduct an EVA to board Sevastopol?”

 

Jim holds back a groan, but just barely. And so it begins.

 

---

 

Jim lies stretched out on the hard cot of the tiny but fully outfitted room they stow him in during the off-cycle hours. He asks the same questions day in and day out, sticking them in different places during the recitation of his time on Sevastopol, or in answer to one of their questions. Thus far, it hasn’t yielded any results.

 

He doesn’t know where his crew is, or their status. The Enterprise and her status remains a mystery. He even cracked like an egg last cycle and demanded to see Commander Spock. Nothing. Not even a muscle twitch. 

 

He rolls on his side, and stares at the bulkhead. Cooperation is getting him nowhere. Beginning next cycle, he’s going to try silence and glaring, see where that gets him. 

 

His sleep is uneasy and shallow, and he jerks awake several times, straining to hear if there’s anything crawling in the vents as his heart pounds in his chest. 

 

---

 

He’s keyed up and ready to say absolutely nothing when the pair of guards fetch him to walk through the maze of bland hallways to the door of his interview room. Jim takes his seat. 

 

He blinks. His two interviewers are different today. There’s no sign of Mole Vulcan or Elaborate Hair Vulcan (as he’s come to think of them). The Vulcan on the left is wearing a dark Federation uniform that he doesn’t recognize, but the Andorian on the right is clad in what Jim thinks is the Diplomatic Corps uniform. They’re both ridiculously attractive. The Andorian’s skin tone matches the blue of her uniform perfectly, creating a silhouette that is somehow provocative, yet demure. Her hair is like a fluffy white cloud, framing her face in swoops and swirls. 

 

The Vulcan is ruggedly attractive, with a thick pair of slanted brows, full lips, and ears shaped more bluntly than Spock’s elegant curves and tips. The severe cut of his dark uniform suits him.

 

“Greetings, Captain Kirk,” the Andorian says, her antennae waving welcomingly. 

 

Jim nods. 

 

“I am Diplomatic Attache Zisha Zh'zhellon,” She says, and gestures with her antenna to the Vulcan next to her. “This is Lt. Commander Stonn, of the Federation Special Tactical Operations and Security Forces.” 

 

Shit. He needs Sulu. Is that Federation black ops, or Federation special ops? There’s only like one word difference between the two…he thinks. Nope. No good, he can’t remember. Either way, military. 

 

“We would like to ask you some questions about Acheron,” Zisha Zh'zhellon finishes pleasantly. 

 

Aha. Now it’s going somewhere. There have been relatively few questions pertaining to Acheron that Jim has fielded over the last four or so cycles. He knows that Acheron is the focus point of Spock’s investigation, even if he’d never said so in as many words. Or in any words, actually, but Jim can read between the lines. All the Starfleet ships were routed to Sevastopol, but they all picked up their cargo from Acheron. They know what the cargo is now. They know what caused all the disappearances. It’s only logical to turn the investigation’s attention to the source. Or finding the source. 

 

“I want to see my crew,” Jim replies bluntly. 

 

“Your crew is waiting for you,” she agrees, “and you will be taken to them after our session here is complete.” 

 

Jim leans forward, and props his chin up with an elbow. “And my ship?”

 

She relays as serenely as if the two of them are enjoying a comfortable yet flirty lunch in a swanky restaurant in Cloud City on Bespin. “The Enterprise has been fully resupplied, and I can assure you that you will find it in the exact state that you left it after you and your crew disembarked. Nothing was removed or altered as a result of the Investigation.”

 

Jim’s eyes flick to Lt. Commander Stonn’s, who regards him with a steady, yet impassive gaze. His eyes are dark, though they don’t seem to have the depths that Spock’s do. 

 

Jim cuts his eyes back to Zisha Zh'zhellon’s, which are silvery, and welcoming. “I’ve never set foot on Acheron,” he says, using her pleasant tone of voice, “but I’ll answer what I can.”

 

“Thank you, Captain Kirk,” she murmurs. Jim snaps his eyes back to meet Stonn’s. A flicker of something there. Interest?

 

If Jim was across from this pair in a bar, the power dynamic would definitely be in his favor. Oh to be across from this pair in a bar, wearing some skin tight pants, a shirt with a deep v-cut, and his ‘fuck me please, captain’ boots. All in black. Hampered as he is by the frumpy cut and boring grey of the shirt and pants he’s been provided with, he keeps it low key and gives Zisha Zh'zhellon an inviting smile as he waits for the first question.

 

She checks her PADD. “Would you mind explaining what is meant by the Enterprise ‘always coming in under’ on resource consumption, when routed to haul ore from Acheron?”

 

“My XO and I ran the numbers every which way on our warp-jump to Yel-Rihk. The Enterprise’s resource consumption, especially Dilithium degradation, was reduced from what the Mainframe had projected for our previous four hauls from Acheron. Those numbers, however, only correlate to 5 to 15% deficiency in the weight logs across all Platform Towers. They do not compare to the numbers the Enterprise was showing from a warp-jump with 75% of the capacity of a single tower missing,” Jim explains. 

 

“So you believe that this was the first time that unknown materials were transported in the place of the ore logged in the manifest?”

 

Jim hesitates slightly then answers. “The data bears that out, yes.” 

 

She nods, and Lt. Commander Stonn makes a note on his PADD.

 

“Did you believe that an ore loading time of four standard earth days was excessive?” Is her next question.

 

“I thought it was ridiculous, but it didn’t surprise me. Acheron is a backwater. Nobody working there wants to be there,” Jim answers. “In long haul shipping, there are always delays in loading. That by itself wasn’t an indicator of anything other than the type of mismanagement endemic in these far-flung mining outposts.” 

 

Zisha Zh'zhellon makes a few notes on her PADD while Lt. Commander Stonn continues to regard Jim calmly.

 

She hits him hard with the next question. “Do you believe the creatures you encountered on Deep Space 13, Sevastopol, originated from Acheron?”

 

A memory of the nest—its design, smells, collection of bodies—flashes through his mind and he closes his eyes briefly against it. He places his hands flat on the table, bracing himself. 

 

“No,” he says shortly. 

 

“Do you believe the eggs were loaded onto the Transport Platform from Acheron?”

 

Jim thinks on that. He can’t be positive but… “Yes,” he answers.

 

Her antennae do a little inquisitive dance. “Why?”

 

He shakes his head. “The loading time plus the weight discrepancies leads me to believe that they were loading up the egg…things from the surface of Acheron.” 

 

She tilts her antennae. “How certain are you of those weight discrepancies?”

 

Jim leans forward in his seat. “Scotty—Mr. Scott, my XO and Engineer, keeps a somewhat…fervent watch over the logs for the transport platforms we haul. He has records of the weight logs for Tower 4 proceeding normally until about 25%, then they were not updated for, I believe it was around twenty-six hours. At the end of that time, the weight logs jumped straight from 25% up to 100%, as if the sensors had been manually manipulated. He was concerned about it at the time,” Jim sighs, “but I didn’t view it as anything other than the afore-mentioned general incompetence.”

 

Both Zisha Zh'zhellon and the Lt. Commander make notes on their PADDS.

 

“In any of your ship’s previous hauls which originated from Acheron, you never had cause for suspicion or any sense of danger?” Her antennae tilt to the left. 

 

It’s a thought that’s plagued Jim on and off since Spock first revealed his investigation to him. 

 

“I’ve never liked hauling from Acheron. But if I had cause for suspicion, I never had any sense of danger, no.”

 

“Please explain what you mean by ‘never liked,’ Captain Kirk,” Lt. Commander Stonn speaks for the first time. His voice is bassy, but flat. 

 

Jim shrugs at him, trying to come up with the words. “Nothing rooted in logic,” he says at last. “I’ve just always felt uncomfortable looking at it through the viewport.”

 

“Thank you, Captain Kirk,” Zisha Zh'zhellon says smoothly. 

 

And just like that the session is over. One of the guards steps up to Jim’s chair, and he stands, caught off guard. He leaves the pair of them sitting there and follows the guard from the room. 

 

He’s led to a set of double doors down a different series of hallways than normal. The doors open to reveal a nicely appointed lounge, complete with couches, a meeting table, replicators, vid screen, and his entire crew ranged about the room, waiting for him.

 

“Keptin!” Chekov cries delightedly and hops up from his seat to grab Jim for a quick hug, which he quickly releases, cheeks tinged red. 

 

“Good to see you too, Pavel,” Jim laughs, and musses his curls. 

 

He gets a short wave from Keenser, a handshake of greeting apiece from Sulu and Scotty, and a nod of hello from Uhura. 

 

And that leaves—Jim is pulled from behind into a crushing bear hug—Bones.

 

“Ouch,” Jim wheezes. 

 

After a moment Jim is released from the hold almost violently, and turns to see Bones glaring at him, pretending like neither he nor Jim are fighting back the onset of tears in their eyes.

 

“You look thin and pale,” he grouches.

 

“I’ve been eating my cubes!” Jim protests. 

 

“Hmph,” Bones garumps, like the old curmudgeon he is, folding his arms across his chest.

 

“You are such an old curmudgeon,” Jim says fondly.

 

“You’re only about five whole minutes younger than I am,” Bones protests.

 

Jim mutters under his breath, “Five whole years more like.”

 

“And how old are you again?” Bones asks dangerously, eyes flashing. 

 

Jim coughs into his fist and turns back to the rest of the room. His crew are clad in the same frumpy grey shirts and pants he's been forced into, and while they are comfortable, the bulky cut renders everyone more or less potato-shaped. Especially poor Keenser. The shoes provided are little more than slippers. But they all look healthy, and they’re all present. “Yes, well, how is everyone?” He asks, as he completes his review of them.

 

“We are fine, Keptin!” Chekov assures him, resuming his seat on one of the couches.

 

“They’ve kept us cooling our heels here for days,” Bones growls, walking around Jim to lean against the side of Chekov’s couch.

 

Jim blinks. “Interviews?” He asks.

 

Sulu sits at the table to the right of Chekov’s couch and thinks. “I think they kept Scotty the longest, what? Maybe five hours?”

 

Scotty shifts on his feet, standing next to where Keenser’s seated on the couch across from the Chekov couch. “Aye, that sounds abou’right,” he agrees. 

 

“Have you been in interviews zis whole time, Keptin?” Chekov asks.

 

Jim nods. “Interview, eat, sleep, and repeat.”

 

“So what now,” Bones drawls, “they give you time off for good behavior?”

 

Jim shrugs, then decides to needle him. “No idea, maybe I’m getting time off for a conjugal visit.” He grins and waggles his eyebrows at Bones.

 

“Ugh,” Bones and Uhura say together, look at each other in surprise, and then quickly look away again. 

 

Jim tries to disguise his hysterical laughter as a series of coughs, but isn’t very successful. The two of them are giving him the same dirty look now, Bones from one side, Uhura from the other, from where she’s sitting down across from Keenser on his couch. This only makes Jim laugh harder. Before Bones can break out an emergency hypo or something, he makes an effort to get it together, and cuts his laughter off. With nothing to mask it, Scotty’s snickering is the only sound in the room. 

 

Bones ignores him, but Uhura snaps her death glare from Jim to Scotty, who chokes, and then tries to pretend he’s never seen any of them in the room before, and he has no idea how he got here.

 

“Something was different today though,” Jim says. “I had a new pair of interviewers who actually introduced themselves, and the session was only them asking me a few questions about Acheron. Something has changed, I think.”

 

“They’re nervous,” Uhura agrees, “The Rineikau-Yehat is currently in a holding orbit around Yel Rihk now.”

 

“The Invincible ?!” Scotty flails his arms. 

 

“Big,” Keenser comments.

 

Scotty snaps his attention to Keenser instantly. “It’s only t’biggest ship in t’ entire Federation! You just live for t’understatement, don’t ye?”

 

Keenser gives Scotty a blank, yet pointed stare, which Jim thinks probably means that Keenser lives just to wind Scotty up.

 

Scotty must get that impression too, because he swells up. Jim steps in and pops him before he can burst or give himself an aneurysm or something.

 

“It’s the flagship, right?” He asks.

 

A gleam fills Scotty’s eyes, which only relaying the specifications of starships can bring. “Nae, that’s that old junker Discovery or some such, this ship is brand-new, what? Only two years in the black?”

 

Keenser grunts the affirmative. 

 

“Built entirely in space, at an undisclosed station—” 

 

“Tycho,” Sulu says, pretending to cough.

 

Ignoring him, Scotty continues on, “a joint venture of Vulcan and Terran minds, ten years in the making!”

 

“Ok, ok,” Jim holds up his hands to stem the tide of fervor. “If it’s here related to the investigation, yeah, obviously something’s come to light.”

 

“Agreed,” Sulu nods. 

 

Uhura nods as well, and Keenser grunts in the affirmative again.

 

Scotty continues undeterred, however, “Has its own Engineering Bay! Big enough for a cruiser, or two to three smaller ships—”

 

Only the opening of the doors behind Jim succeeds at cutting him off.

 

Jim turns and sees Zisha Zh'zhellon standing in the doorway, flanked by two guards. 

 

She waves her antennae soothingly. “Captain Kirk, we would like to conduct a meeting with you at this time. You may, if you so choose, bring your command crew.”

 

Sulu springs to his feet instantly, and Scotty shuffles forward. Jim nods at them both. 

 

“Lead the way,” he says to Zisha Zh'zhellon.

 

“Now wait just a damn minute,” Bones begins, taking a few steps forward.

 

“Oh no,” Jim laughs, “if you want back on the command circuit of this ship, you’ll have to schedule a meeting with the current command crew and submit your application.”

 

Bones gives him a nasty glare, but doesn’t press it, because they both know that Bones would rather swallow a live octopus whole than have Enterprise command duties ever again. The advent of Scotty freed Bones from XO duties, and he pirouetted away into Medical and has remained there ever since. 

 

Jim follows Zisha Zh'zhellon out of the room and down the hallway outside it, Scotty at his right, still vibrating with excitement over the Invincible, and Sulu at his left, cool as a cucumber. They turn down just one other hallway before Zisha Zh'zhellon stops at another pair of doors. 

 

Jim’s expecting Lt. Commander Stonn, again, and maybe a few other extraneous Federation Negotiators.

 

But when the door opens, he stops in surprise. There are indeed a few extraneous Federation types present. And by a few extra Jim means maybe twenty or so, ranged against the walls of a simple meeting room. It’s an eclectic gathering of Vulcans, Andorians, Tellurites, and even a few humans. He spots several variations of Federation Uniforms. The grey uniform from the Investigative Forces he recognizes well, and a few more blue of the Diplomatic Corps. There are several attendees wearing what looks to be a ship’s dress uniforms, though he can’t parse out the insignia. He spots a statuesque Vulcan with a pile of curls half-tied back wearing one, with what Jim is sure is Captain’s braiding along the shoulders. Standing in a corner, far too tall to be hidden by the crowd is Ambassador Sarek. Oh yeah. Something, as they say, ‘is up.’

 

Eyeing the group ranged around the walls of the meeting room warily, Jim takes the center of the three chairs on the other side of a rectangular meeting table made of a lustrous synthesized wood. Scotty and Sulu follow him, and Zisha Zh'zhellon takes the empty chair opposite Sulu. The chair opposite Scotty is taken by a pinched-faced man in an extremely expensive suit, and in the center, wearing a grey Investigative Forces uniform so studded with medals and braiding it’s almost unrecognizable, is another human, his distinguished face creased with laugh lines. He’s got that stern aura of a disciplinarian around him, and, in a different setting, he’s the type of silver fox that Jim definitely goes for, when he’s in the mood. Alas for professionalism. And these goddamn frumpy outfits.

 

Zisha Zh'zhellon’s antennae wave in introduction to the man in the suit. “Ambassador Udina, from Earth,” she says, and the suit gives Jim and company a superior look. Jim is not impressed. “Colonel Christopher Pike, Head of Operations for the Federation Investigative Forces,” she says as her antennae indicate the decorated man in the center.

 

“Gentlemen,” Pike greets them with a genial nod. Jim raises his eyebrows. He is impressed. The corner of Pike’s mouth twitches up, just the slightest bit. 

 

Zisha Zh'zhellon’s antennae lower in deference, and Pike begins to speak. “I’ll keep this brief. All contact with the mining outpost on the moon Acheron has been lost.” He fixes Jim with a piercing stare. “What do you think is the possibility that a contamination event like Sevastopol has occurred there?”

 

Jim’s heart seizes in his chest. “High,” he says flatly. 

 

Pike nods. This is not a surprise for him. No doubt the exact percentages have been calculated out for him by any number of Vulcans. Jim shoves the image of Spock away, when it tries to take hold.

 

“The Federation Investigation into the involvement of the Enterprise is not complete yet, and there are no findings of innocence to be released as to yourself or your crew,” Udina addresses Jim in a condescending voice.

 

“Bullshit,” Sulu says, and crosses his arms over his chest.

 

Udina’s mouth snaps closed.

 

Jim meets Pike’s gaze and raises his eyebrows up as if to say, ‘well it is.’

 

After a beat Pike smoothly resumes the conversation. “The Investigative Forces are currently prepping to send a mission to Acheron, to determine the nature of the communications loss, and to further investigate the provenance of the strange cargo loaded onto the transport platform you were hauling.”

 

Jim does not like where this is heading. Sulu shifts next to him and folds his arms over his chest. 

 

When neither Jim nor his command crew offer any response to Pike’s statement, Zisha Zh'zhellon speaks. “Captain, if you and your crew are willing to cooperate as consultants on the investigative mission to Acheron, any possible pending charges will be dropped, your ship will be released, and all of you will be free to go, with the Federation’s good wishes.”

 

Jim’s mouth tightens. After a moment he catches a questioning look from Scotty out of the corner of his eye, and gives a short nod in response. 

 

Scotty clears his throat. “Ah, yes, when is this mission leaving?” He asks the table. 

 

Pike raises an eyebrow. “Soon.”

 

Another period of silence, broken only by the creak of Udina’s chair as he shifts, and the slight noise of the other extraneous attendees. The whisper of the fabric of a uniform, a stifled cough, the slight creak of boots as someone shifts on their feet. 

 

“How exactly ,” Sulu stresses as he breaks the silence, “does the Federation define ‘consultant’ in this instance?”

 

Pike leans forward. “We want you to accompany the Investigative team to Acheron, and provide them with any support you are able to offer.”

 

“You think we have support to offer?” Jim questions.

 

“You and your crew are the only ones who have any contact with this species,” is Pike’s dry response. The ‘everyone else is dead’ he leaves unsaid. “That makes you the only offer of support available, and experts by default.”

 

Jim taps his finger for a moment on the table as he thinks. “I assume Lt. Commander Stonn and his squad will be providing the military escort?”

 

“That is correct,” Pike says. 

 

“Just out of curiosity,” Scotty begins, “The Invincible wouldnae happen to be the ship slated to transport the investigative team on this venture, now would it?”

 

The absolute silence that follows is answer enough.

 

Jim exchanges a wordless look with Sulu, then with Scotty. “If I could have a moment to discuss this with my whole crew?”

 

Udina’s pinched look intensifies, but Pike nods and Zisha Zh'zhellon answers, “Certainly.”

 

The guards approach, and Jim and his cohorts stand, and follow them back to the room where the others wait.

 

Bones jumps on them as soon as the doors close behind them. “Alright, spill the beans.”

 

Jim lays it out. “Contact has been lost with Acheron. They’re sending a team to investigate, and they want us to go as consultants.”

 

Bones is speechless for a full minute. “Christ on a cracker ,” he mutters at last. 

 

Sulu sits on the couch next to Chekov. He shakes his head. “I like nothing about this situation.”

 

“Well what’s to like?” Bones snorts.

 

Jim holds up a hand. “Realistically, what are our options? The subtext was pretty clear. If we comply, we’re free as birds. We don’t do this in good faith, and they’re gonna slap us with some kinda charges. Deep Space 13 is gone, all hands lost. Someone has to be held responsible.”

 

“Well it the hell sure ain’t gonna be us!” Bones growls. 

 

Uhura speaks up. “I think the Investigative Forces really need us for this. Specifically, Jim.”

 

Jim gapes at her. He thinks that’s the first time she’s ever called him by his name.

 

“It’s leverage you can use,” she continues earnestly. “You have first-hand experience. You know what those things are capable of, what to look for, how to survive, if the worst has happened.”

 

“I can’t believe I’m about to agree with you,” Bones says to Uhura, then turns to Jim. “Those things and the threat they represent is unprecedented. That level of contamination. Sevastopol may have been a small fry outer reaches station, but they weren’t helpless. Those things brought it down in what…less than two weeks?”

 

Uhura nods. “That’s the timetable I gathered from the civilian logs, which of course I submitted to the Investigators during my interview, along with my notes.”

 

“The Federation is probably desperate to have any kind of experience not to go in blind with,” Bones finishes. 

 

Jim sighs. “Colonel Pike said as much,” he agrees. 

 

“There’s one other thing,” Uhura says. “There’s a rumor that Starfleet has called out a Klingon contract on the Enterprise.”

 

“Ach, out w’ye, Starfleet doesnea actually dispose of long-haul crews that lose their contracts, that’s just outer reach tall tales,” Scotty Scoffs.

 

“No, ze do,” Chekov nods seriously, “My grandmother, she had a luchshiy drug once whose husband lost a Towing Platform to a gravity anomaly, and zen a few months later his ship crash-landed on Noveria, and ze never found him or his crew.”

 

“True,” Keenser agrees.

 

“I think it’s safe to say that sticking with the Federation is our best bet,” Jim says hurriedly, before Scotty can pounce on Keenser and really derail the conversation. “Leverage…” Jim thinks. “We want pay for sure.” 

 

“You bet your ass we do,” Sulu says.

 

Jim thinks. “Ask for consulting fees, and hazard pay on top of that?” One by one his crew nods. “I want the Enterprise with us. They can tow her or stick her in that fancy Engineering Bay, either way, my ship comes with me.”

 

Scotty’s nod of agreement is so effusive, Jim has concerns for his brain, sloshing around in his skull. 

 

“What else?” Jim asks.

 

“They want us to consult, that’s what we’ll do,” Sulu says, “no boots on the ground, we advise from space.”

 

Jim nods. “Agreed.”

 

Bones gives him a sharp look, but, “Guarantees we’re free to go with our fully resupplied ship after the mission to Acheron is complete,” is all he says. 

 

“Ok, anything else?” Jim asks, looking at each of his crew in turn. Everyone appears as satisfied as they can be with the arrangement. “Let’s get back then,” He says to Sulu and Scotty. 

 

Sulu shakes his head. “Captain should negotiate alone.”

 

“I think so too,” Uhura agrees.

 

Scotty grumbles incoherently for a moment, then says, “Ach, s’probably for the best.”

 

Bones makes an unhappy sound, and his eyes search Jim’s face when he looks over to him.  

 

“Give me a kiss for good luck?” Jim asks, and gives Bones the flirty eyes.

 

“ Ugh , git the hell outta here you lil shit,” Bones says, searching expression dissolving into a grimace, jerking his thumb at the door.

 

Jim laughs, and walks out up to the double doors to exit the room. They open to reveal Zisha Zh'zhellon waiting just outside with the two guards. “Ready,” he nods at her, still grinning over his success at riling Bones up. The tips of her antennae quiver, but she gets them under control, and leads the way serenely back to the meeting room. 

 

The crowd standing around the edges seems to have grown by a few people. There’s definitely a few more grey uniforms in attendance then there were before, and Jim is unable to stop himself checking to see if Spock is here. He’s not. Jim does spot Stonn, though he’s the only attendee other than Ambassador Sarek that Jim recognizes. 

 

Jim and Zisha Zh'zhellon sit back in their seats, and Jim leans forward on the table to address Pike, whose expression says he is all ears.

 

Jim says, “The Enterprise will agree to serve as consultants for the Acheron Investigative Mission, but these are our terms.”

 

Pike nods for him to go ahead.

 

“The Enterprise and her crew will be compensated with the standard Federation consulting fee, with an extra 20% added for my personal expertise.”

 

Pike counters, “Investigative Forces will compensate you and your crew for your time, and will add a rate of 10% for your personal expertise.”

 

“The crew will be compensated commensurate with the positions they hold on my ship, at the rate of their corresponding Investigative Forces roles. 15% extra for my personal expertise,” Jim returns. 

 

“10% for expertise, and your crew will receive signing bonuses on top of their pay,” Pike says, after a moment’s contemplation.

 

“I can agree to that,” Jim says cautiously.

 

“Any other terms?” Pike inquires. 

 

“We’re free to go after the mission, and any ‘possible pending charges,’ Jim makes air quotes, “will be dropped, and my ship will be returned fully resupplied.”

 

“The Enterprise has already been fully resupplied, and shall be returned to you upon successful completion of the mission to Acheron. No charges will be filed against you or your crew,” Zisha Zh'zhellon says. 

 

“Ok,” Jim nods, then takes a breath in. This is gonna be the kicker. “We don’t set foot on Acheron. Any expertise or advice we have to offer in our roles as consultants will be from the command and control center on the ship in orbit.”

 

Pike crosses his arms over his chest and leans back. A few looks are exchanged here and there between various personages. 

 

“ If there are any…creatures to be found in the mining complex on Acheron,” Pike says after a minute, “wouldn’t you agree that you are the best, perhaps the only person able to identify the signs?”

 

“I think the signs are gonna be pretty obvious,” Jim snorts, and holds up a hand to forestall Pike’s response. “I get it. You want me down there as some kind of insurance.” Jim had seen the writing on the wall the moment Pike had said the word Acheron. It’s all about playing for the Enterprise now. “What about Commander Spock?” Jim manages not to stumble over Spock’s name, but it’s a near thing.

 

“Commander Spock has been placed as head of the investigation, and naturally will be a part of the landing party. However, comparing his account to yours, it appears that you have a greater amount of experience dealing with these creatures. If they are to be found on Acheron, the investigation is going to need your eyes and ears on the ground.”

 

Jim thinks for a moment, then looks over at Stonn. “Your squad is armed with more than phasers, right?”

 

“Yes,” Stonn replies as he steps forward slightly. “My squad is currently undergoing simulations with the use of slug ammunition, in the place of laser-based weapons which have been noted to be ineffectual.” 

 

Jim rubs his hands along his temple. Guns good. Bullets, better. Team unfamiliar with the weapons? Not great. He takes in a breath. Ok. Don’t over sell it. Keep it simple. 

 

“I, and only I, will accompany the landing party. All the other terms stay in place as agreed, but if I’m gonna descend back into that kind of danger, I want my ship with me on this mission, not sitting here in dock.”

 

“I do not think we can allow that kind of freedom—” Udina begins to say with a sniff, but Jim interrupts. Time to seal the deal. 

 

“You’re dispatching the Invincible, right?” Jim doesn’t expect a response and doesn’t get one. “Dock the Enterprise in that giant engineering bay, lock the clamps, take her with us, and I’ll knock off that extra 10% in hazard pay I was gonna ask for in response to joining the landing party on Acheron.”

 

A ripple seems to run through the room. Pike turns to look behind him. The Vulcan with the crazy curls wearing the uniform with the Captain’s braiding gives him a short nod. 

 

“Very well, Captain Kirk,” Pike says. 

 

“The contracts for you and your crew are being drafted as we speak,” Zisha Zh'zhellon adds.

 

“We’re adjourned, people,” Pike calls over his shoulder, and the various attendees begin to file out. Stonn shoots a last look at Jim, and he holds his gaze until Stonn turns to exit.

 

“There will, of course, be some standard NDAs attached,” Pike says offhandedly as he stands.

 

Jim snorts. That went without saying. 

 

The Vulcan with the Captain’s braiding approaches Jim, and he stands and turns to her. She has strong, no-nonsense features, and a calm, appraising gaze. Jim likes her immediately. “I am Captain Saavik,” she says. “Your Pilot will be allowed to take your Captain’s authorization and complete the maneuver transferring the Enterprise from its dock with Yel Rihk to my ship.”

 

“Thank you Captain,” he says.

 

“An escort will be sent when it is time,” she informs him, then turns and leaves.

 

Pike gives Jim a nod, and follows her out. There’s only one person left in the room now, other than Jim and his waiting guards. 

 

Ambassador Sarek approaches Jim from his corner. “Commander Spock is in command of this mission, Captain Kirk. Do you foresee any difficulties serving under him?” he asks bluntly.

 

Jim gapes. His mind flashes a plethora of scenarios where Jim can ‘serve under’ Spock. Which are, of course, supremely unhelpful. And never going to happen, he remembers with a pang. 

 

“Huh?” Jim responds intelligently. 

 

The Ambassador clarifies. “It seems there were tensions during your ship’s docking with the Yel Rihk. You and your crew perhaps believed that Commander Spock wasn’t as forthcoming about your circumstances as he could have been.”

 

“Wasn’t ‘forthcoming?’ Well that’s one way to put it,” Jim says wryly, “but no, Ambassador. I have great respect for Commander Spock. He’s a professional, and so am I. I foresee no difficulties.”

 

Ambassador Sarek nods, then proceeds calmly out of the room.

 

Jim winces and turns to see one of his guards waiting for him by the door he entered through.  What a lie that was. Jim doesn’t so much have aspirations towards professionalism as pretensions.

 

Oh boy. Bones is not gonna be happy. Two bombshells to drop; Spock in Command, and Jim going down to Acheron. 

 

Jim’s stomach churns in knots. It’s a toss up between which is worse: having to walk on that planet, which is most likely crawling with those fucking creatures, or having to work in close proximity with Spock. To be near him, but denied him. To have shared a moment that redefined the word ‘intimacy’ forever for Jim, but then to realize it was nothing more than tension relief for Spock. A relief that Spock regrets even partaking of. 

 

Jim still aches for him. His fingers flex, remembering the feel of Spock’s fingers intertwined with them.

 

Yeah, if it were a choice between them he’d definitely have to take the planet. There’ll be a military escort this time, with guns. Pretty good protection. But Spock? Jim has no defense against Spock.

 

But in the end, there’s no choice.

 

He gets both. 

Notes:

TAH DAH! and we're off!

Fun Fic Fact: When the Betafish reviewed this chapter for the first time, at the end, when Jim is like 'oh woe, for which is worst' she left the comment 'THE WORST IS OBVIOUSLY THE FUCKING ALIENS' and I'm still laughing about it omg.

Easter Eggs: 7

Chapter 2: The Rineikau-Yehat

Summary:

The Enterprise is snuggled nice and cozy in the Invincible's Engineering Bay, Jim has access to his own tried and true replicators (no more spongy cubes!), he's shed the frumpy detainee clothes like a caterpillar from its cocoon, and no more bureaucratic meet-wait.

Notes:

It chapter 2! Oh sweet Betafish! How do I love thee! (itsme-theborgqueen).

I have, at long last, finished the snafu that was the chapter 4/5 hangup writing debacle thing. WE ARE FREE AND CLEAR and into chapter 6 fear not! (well actually maybe a little fear there are aliens in this fic. probably.)

Thank you all my followers from part 1, and welcome any newcomers to part 2! (you should def read part 1 first).

I love you all and your comments give me LIFE <3

Captain’s Log Stardate 2268.0616

 

The * Redacted * has completed her jump to warp, with the Enterprise locked inside her Engineering Bay. Executive Officer Scott has confirmed the Enterprise’s power linkup with the * Redacted *’s systems, and we are clear to perform non-intensive maintenance. My XO is not pleased we won’t be able to run any warp drive tests or checks, but Warrant Officer Sulu was immensely gratified to learn we will be able to perform the thruster spot checks from inside the docking bay. Aside from those larger Engineering issues, the standard maintenance list for the Enterprise, as ever, needs tending to. Following an upcoming meeting with the Command Teams for the * Redacted *, Lt. Commander Stonn’s ‘Tihet’ Squad, and Commander Spock’s Investigative Team, a coordinating schedule will be attached to this log, detailing the roles of the Enterprise's Crew during the warp jump to Acheron.   

 

Jim leans back in his chair at his desk and sighs, closing out his latest Captain’s log. He turns in his chair to avoid looking out of his viewport. The brightly lit interior of the Invincible’s Engineering Bay outside of it weirds him out. There have only ever been stars visible through it before, or very rarely, the open sky of Iowa when they dry dock on Earth. Jim can’t stand seeing the confirmation of just how far his life has slipped from its moorings. 

 

He rubs his temples and tries to will away the stress headache that’s trying to build. However long this upcoming Command meeting is going to last, it will be a million years longer than Jim wants it to. 

 

Spock will be there. And Jim really is going to have to be a professional, and pretend like Spock hasn’t hurt him in a way he didn’t even think it was possible for him to be hurt. James Tiberius Kirk with a wounded heart? Ridiculous. Fuck. Why can’t Jim just get over him? 

 

He leans forward and viciously keys open his personal logs. 

 

Captain’s Personal Log Stardate 2268.0616

 

I believe Spock will be there in the Command meeting scheduled in just a little while. I don’t know how to face him. I don’t want to. I do want to. I haven’t seen him since the day we docked at Yel Rihk, and every day that’s passed since, where I haven’t seen him, the more wound up I get over it. It’s been some two or so weeks since—I can’t say he broke it off, because there wasn’t anything to break off. Regardless, I still feel him, phantomlike, his fingers in my hair, his presence in my mind. I need to forget him, but I…just don’t want to. For a moment I had something, I thought I had someone…Oh for fuck’s sake Jim stop being a whiny little teenager about it and grow up!

 

Jim takes a deep breath in. “Computer, erase entry.” With a short beep, the log is cleared. Jim’s personal logs are fucked. He still hasn’t updated them about his time on Sevastopol. Why choose now to break the trend?

 

His PADD beeps a ten minute warning from where it sits on the edge of his desk. Time for the Command Meeting. God help him. He pauses before the mirror and zips his Captain’s jacket up. Jim really hopes none of the Federation contingent are gonna be in their dress uniforms, because the Enterprise is a towing vessel. She doesn’t have a dress uniform. 

 

Chekov had stopped by earlier to ask earnestly if Jim wanted everyone to wear their collared shirts. It would have presented a united front, but Jim didn’t have the heart to subject anyone (most of all himself) to those damn shirts anymore. He’d said everyone’s specialized jackets, with the olive green Enterprise undershirts would be fine.

 

It says some worrying things about the crew’s thoughts on Jim’s morale though, that they A. wanted to know if he wanted them to wear the damn shirts and B. sent Chekov to ask about it. 

 

Jim pauses before the door. Oh, fuck it. He kicks off his standard ship-wear boots, stomps over to his boot wall locker, and pulls out his calf-high ‘fuck me please, captain’ boots, with their bitch heels and flirty caps at the top. After he puts them on, he unzips his jacket to his collarbone. 

 

The Jim that stares at him in the mirror now is more familiar. He’s a small-time starship Captain of a towing vessel, and very fuckable. And he looks it. 

 

Besides, wasn’t it the legendary T’Pau of Vulcan herself that taught everyone 58 years ago how to be both professional and a sex symbol? Jim used to have a poster of her in her iconic A-line dress with the high waist and collar from when she told the Federation to go stuff itself.  

 

Jim checks his butt in the mirror. Tucking his pants into the boots has tightened them. His ass looks fabulous. ‘This one’s for you, T’pau,’ he thinks, grabs his PADD, and strides from his quarters. He has to double-time it to make it off the Enterprise and out of the Invincible’s Engineering Bay to get to the appointed meeting room on time, but he feels 1000% more confident than he had been, so…worth it. 

 

The corridors of the Invincible are large, sleekly paneled, and brightly lit by white-spectrum lighting that Jim doesn’t particularly care for. The floor paneling is smooth, which gives the whole thing an ultra-modern feel, but Jim personally thinks that main access corridors without any kind of gripping on them is just asking for trouble. 

 

Following an abbreviated map that he had been allowed to upload to his PADD, Jim takes one elevator up to the command level of the ship, and then walks down a few more corridors to reach the designated meeting room. 

 

Chekov, Uhura, Keenser, and Sulu are standing just outside the door, waiting when he arrives. He blinks. This may be the first time he’s seen Uhura in her Comms jacket. It looks good. He grins. While her boots have a sensible low heel, they are calf-length, just like his (though they lack the flirty little pirate tucks at the top).

 

He opens his mouth, but she glares at him and warns him with a, “Don’t,” before he can say, ‘twinsies!’ like he wanted to. 

 

Jim notes with approval that Sulu is keeping a close eye on Chekov, on his toes like he’s ready to dive full-body in front of any possible Federation recruiting schemes.

 

He looks around, and is just about to ask after the two missing members of the crew when they appear from around the corner of the corridor, heads bent together over something. Given the way that they lock it down when they spot Jim, it was probably about him. Jim gives Scotty and Bones a suspicious look, but lets it go. 

 

“Ready?” He asks the group.

 

Hearing no dissent, he leads the way into the meeting room. His PADD alerts him that the meeting is set to commence just as he steps through the threshold. Ah. Perfect timing. Go Captain Kirk. That should please the Vulcans. 

 

The room he and his crew have entered into is a large conference room, complete with shiny vid screens along the walls, a grouping of fancy-looking replicators on a break-style counter to his right, and is dominated in the center by a large, asymmetrical V-shaped table. 

 

The attendees are all in the process of getting seated. Captain Saavik takes the seat at the point of the V, with four officers taking seats flanking either side of her and a smattering of administrative aid types standing behind her. They are all clad in Federation pullovers in command gold. No dress uniforms. Thank God. Lt. Commander Stonn and two others in dark fatigues are sat at the left half of the long end of the V, which is across from Jim. Jim swallows. Down from them at the end, there’s a small cadre in blue Federation Pullovers. Spock sits at the center of that group. 

 

Ok. Jim can do this. The shorter side of the V table sits empty in front of him, and he walks forward to take a seat, his crew ranging on either side of him, Scotty on his immediate right, and Sulu to his left. 

 

Once everyone is seated, Captain Saavik gives a short nod. “We will commence now,” she says in her surprisingly sweet voice, “with introductions.” She looks at Jim.

 

Even though Jim knows that every person in the room is perfectly aware of the identities of himself and his crew, he nevertheless introduces his crew one by one. Ah, the Federation and their, ‘for the records’. He’s careful to avoid looking directly at Spock. The memory of Spock’s eyes, staring at Jim like he was a stranger of no import, needs no refreshing. When he’s finished, he nods to Captain Saavik, and she begins to introduce her command team. Only a few stand out to Jim of the flood that follows. Captain Saavik’s XO is a Vulcan whose name Jim immediately forgets. Her Chief Science officer is an imperious-looking Vulcan with sharp eyes and hair coiled even more elaborate than Jim’s Vulcan interviewer. Her name is T’Pring and he is immediately terrified of her.

 

Captain Saavik introduces her CMO and Chief Engineer as well, but Jim is still distracted by the laser-like gaze of T’Pring, and misses the names of the Human and Caitian respectively. 

 

Then it’s Lt. Commander Stonn’s turn. His XO is a relaxed human by the name of Hudson, who grins and waves irreverently as he is introduced, and Jim misses entirely the name and rank of the officer on his other side. Steadfast and Vulcan is Jim’s only impression. 

 

Jim fixes his face in a pleasant look of inquiry, and turns to look at Spock, keeping his eyes on the column of his neck, and trying desperately not to think about how Jim had touched him there, once. Spock’s delivery of the introductions of his team is crisp and precise and Jim doesn’t catch a word of it. He focuses back in from the slight daze he slipped into, caught up in the sound of Spock’s voice, to realize his gaze has wandered up from Spock’s neck, and he’s currently contemplating the lovely shape of Spock’s mouth as he finishes speaking. Jim vaguely catches the last intro, the lone human in Spock’s team. She’s a tiny woman by the name of Tam, Jim thinks is what he heard.

 

Well…Jim caught some of the names. He foresees Uhura having to restrain herself from beating him to death over the next couple of days, because he’s going to be asking, ‘which one was that one again?’ a lot. 

 

Jim turns back to Captain Saavik. There. He looked at Spock and was a complete professional. What Spock actually said, Jim has no idea, but baby steps. 

 

Captain Saavik waits a moment more, then speaks. “Our warp jump to the moon Acheron will be a long one. We will be at warp for a total of seventeen days.”

 

Scotty does a little wiggle of excitement on Jim’s right. Jim does his best to keep his face neutral, but isn’t sure how successful he is. It would take the Enterprise two separate warp jumps at nearly three weeks apiece to make it back to Acheron. What a monster this ship is.

 

“With that time frame in mind, a series of consultation assignments has been drafted for the crew of the Enterprise.”

 

Jim taps on his PADD, and gets ready to take some notes. 

 

“I have reviewed the qualifications of yourself and your crew, Captain Kirk. You are to be commended,” she says.

 

Jim blinks. He’s just a run-of-the-mill starship Captain, but yeah, his crew is the shit. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Sulu scooch his seat over a little bit closer to Chekov’s. ‘Atta boy, Sulu,’ he thinks.

 

“We will start with the assignment for Specialist Uhura,” Captain Saavik says, and Uhura sits up a little straighter down on Jim’s right. “You will join the communications team which has been formed to catalog and consolidate all of the civilian logs that you yourself retrieved from Sevastopol, and the corrupted administration logs that Commander Spock was able to wrest from the A.I. core.”

 

Uhura nods, and Jim adds Uhura’s name and assignment to his PADD.

 

“Investigator Kynes will be heading the special team, coordinating with Chief Science Officer T’Pring.”

 

There’s a flurry of fingers on PADDS as everyone updates their notes.

 

“Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott has been requested by Chief Engineer M’Mett B’rrown, for his expertise on streamlining Dilithium convergence and maximizing warp coil diffusance.” Captain Saavik briefly meets Jim’s eyes, and they share a short moment of solidarity. Vulcan she may be, but she doesn't have any more idea than Jim does of what the hell that project is or means. Nevertheless, both she and Jim nod wisely as if they, as Captains, know all, and agree that this is a perfectly natural thing for their Chief Engineers to collaborate on. 

 

“How ya doin, Monty old boy! And bless my mane, Keenser too! Still shacked up together!” The Caitian sitting to Captain Saavik’s right bellows, interrupting whatever she had been about to say next. Jim and half the room jump a little in their seats, but she doesn’t look surprised at all, even though it was right next to her ear he’d bellowed from. He’s an elderly looking chap, slightly stooped, with a wild mane of shock white hair.

 

“Doc Brown, so it’tis you, ye old whiskers!” Scotty exclaims delightedly, and Jim thinks the awkward configuration of the table is the only thing keeping the two from jumping up into an excited embrace with a lot of back thumping. 

 

“I thought you’d be stuck planetside after the whole—” ‘Doc Brown’ begins to say, but Scotty interrupts with a hasty, “ Ahem , no need to rehash that whole incident, here and now laddie.”

 

“Painful,” Keenser agrees. 

 

“ Very, ” Jim can’t help himself from adding with unholy glee. Scotty gives him a filthy look, and so, at the prompting of his inner devil, Jim asks the Invincible’s Chief Engineer, “Did they ever put the FEV-1899 Beagle back into service?”  

 

Doc Brown chuckles, “Oh yes, no need for fretting, the crew passed all their psych evals after three or so Terran months, they slapped a new interior nacelle on her, and she was off again, just fine. I hear she’s off somewhere around the Perseus Veil, scanning for some kinda ‘dark matter’ or some such. Only one of the Exploratory class still in operation for the Federation, ya’know!”

 

“I still maintain that if Captain Archer hadn’t ordered the emergency shut down of t’core, the Beagle wouldnae have run into any difficulties,” Scotty says stubbornly. “It was really all a wee misunderstanding.”

 

“Well…” the Caitian says, shaking his head so his mane fluffs up a little.

 

“‘Difficulties,’” Sulu snorts, entering the fray, “didn’t she enter an uncontrolled roll that was so high in g-forces, the inertial dampeners failed, and the ship’s mainframe had to deactivate the gravity wells?”

 

“Just a wee lil bug, unforeseen,” Scotty protests, then adds, “and no one was nae more upset than me over it!”

 

Keenser grunts, then says, “Yeah. Me .” Oh boy. Two words. Time to intervene. 

 

Jim clears his throat and leans forward on the table, hopefully blocking Scotty from leaping across Jim to get to Keenser where he’s sitting on the other side of Sulu and Chekov. “I’m happy to share Keenser and Scotty for rotations, but the Enterprise does have her own maintenance schedule to oversee.” 

 

Doc Brown shakes out his mane again. “Of course, Captain Kahn? Was it?”

 

“Kirk,” corrects Chief Science Officer T’Pring, her voice sounding out like a whip crack. That was a little…tetchy for a Vulcan. She is sitting on the Chief Engineer’s other side, so she’s probably just had one of her eardrums assaulted as well by his initial bellow. 

 

“Yes, yes,” he agrees, “set your maintenance schedules as you see fit sir! I’ll take ol’ Monty and Keenser whenever they’re free.”

 

Jim nods a little dazedly. ‘Monty?’ He shakes his head and joins the flurry of PADD tapping to update the assignment list.

 

“If we can now move on to the subject of Chekov, Pavel Andreivitch, Specialist,” the Invincible’s XO says. Jim can’t remember his name, and he is characterized only by the sort of Vulcan blandness that Jim associates with Federation committee testifications, and Jim subsequently switching off the vid screen.

 

“Certainly,” responds T’Pring, and Jim blinks as she leans forward slightly in her chair. He looks at Captain Saavik. It’s impossible to be sure, with Vulcans, but she seems to be struck by a sudden weariness. 

 

T’Pring continues, “Specialist Chekov would be best suited for assignment to the subspace anomalies lab.”

 

“Logically,” the XO returns, his voice just as bland as the rest of him, “Specialist Chekov’s talents are most suited for Navigational plotting and minutia course correction on the bridge.”

 

Well butter Jim’s butt and call him a biscuit (to paraphrase Bones), are the Vulcans fighting over who gets Chekov?

 

“It is my understanding,” T’Pring counters, “that Specialist Chekov’s ‘quick and intuitive’ grasp of subspace mechanics, and his ability to arrive at conclusions requiring the ‘formation and execution of unanticipated calculations—”

 

She is cut off by the XO, who begins to talk over her. “Specialist Chekov’s training and experience— ” Holy shit was that actual emphasis? “Ensure that his proper place is—”

 

“Be silent now,” Captain Saavik commands. Jim picks his jaw up from where it’s fallen on the floor. He exchanges a ‘what in the heckin?’ look with Sulu. T’Pring and the XO stare at each other with no expressions on their faces, but Jim doesn’t find it hard at all to imagine the two of them standing up and logically stabbing the other to death.

 

Jim shakes himself and glances over at Chekov, who is giving Jim a wide-eyed and slightly panicked look.

 

“Specialist Chekov,” Captain Saavik addresses him, and Chekov jumps a little and switches his gaze to her. “I put it to you. Where do you believe you can best serve in a consulting role?”

 

Chekov leans back in his chair to look around Sulu. Jim leans back to meet his even more panicked look and mutters, “Halfsies,” to him.

 

Chekov gives him a relieved nod, and they both lean forward again. Sulu gives Jim a nasty glare that plainly says that if Sulu were in charge, Jim would be fired.

 

“I believe I can best serve by splitting my time between zem,” Chekov says, nervous, but meeting both T’Pring’s and the XO’s eyes in turn.

 

Jim smoothly interjects. “As Mr. Chekov has still to reach the age of his majority, he will be shadowed by Mr. Sulu to ensure his well being." Sulu’s glare turns to an approving look that says if he were in charge, Jim would be getting promoted.

 

T’Pring’s turns her head and brings the full force of her laser-gaze on Jim. He softly gulps and squashes down the urge to flee from the room.

 

“Underage?” She inquires, and Jim knows, he just knows that she’s envisioning him clapped in irons, heading to jail on MS One on charges of child labor and endangerment.

 

“Specialist Chekov serves on the Enterprise with the full-knowledge and consent of his legal guardian. He is the main wage earner for his family,” Spock inserts calmly. “His safety and care are of paramount importance to the crew.”

 

Jim’s jaw clenches. Goddamn Spock, goddamn him. Jim’ll never be able to get over him or whatever if he decides to say stupid, supportive shit like that.

 

T’Pring blinks at Spock, but stops lasering Jim with her beautiful, yet terrifying eyes.

 

Likely spotting an argument before it can happen, and deftly moving out in front of it, Captain Saavik says, “I will accept proposed schedules from both departments, and arbitrate an equitable division of Specialist Chekov’s time. It will then be forwarded to Captain Kirk and Warrant Officer Sulu for final approval.”

 

A message pops up on Jim’s pad from Sulu as he enters in the relevant information next to Chekov’s name on his list. 

 

<I thought I was going to have to murder you for a minute. Good job.>

 

Jim snorts and sends back, < who you gonna trust? me. because i'm trustworthy!>

 

Sulu rolls his eyes so hard when he reads it, they’re in danger of getting stuck in the back of his head. Jim grins at him.

 

Captain Saavik straightens from her PADD and Jim puts himself on red alert. He’s starting to feel meeting fatigue, and they’ve saved the most difficult for last. Rookie mistake. Get Bones out of the way first, at full strength; it’s the only way to fight him. But there’s no way Captain Saavik could have known, and there was no way for Jim to warn her that wouldn’t end with him stuffed into Zero-G therapy or something, like Bones threatened him with once. Jim’s pretty sure a ship this big has a Zero-G therapy chamber. 

 

“Chief Medical Officer, Doctor Leonard McCoy,” Captain Saavik begins. “I see you have multiple doctorates: Internal Medicine, Xenobiology, Psychology, with a specialization in rare infectious diseases. I am assigning you to work in the Rineikau-Yehat’s Medical Bay, to update our quarantine procedures to reflect the level of danger posed by Acheron, to serve as a supplementary attending physician, and to assist in preparation for any casualties that may arise.”

 

Oh boy. It was going so well too, but that ending. Jim looks at Bones with a wince. He’s glaring threateningly at Lt. Commander Stonn. 

 

“Expecting many casualties, are you?” Bones inquires aggressively, addressing Stonn.

 

Hudson shifts in his seat and gets a belligerent look on his face, but Lt. Commander Stonn responds swiftly and reasonably. “If Acheron has or is experiencing an outbreak at the level that was recorded on Sevastopol, it is only prudent to prepare the Rineikau-Yehat to receive civilian evacuees. From the notes you submitted as part of your interview, it seems you have pioneered a theoretical procedure to remove any creatures implanted in their larval stages. It has been given an estimated probability of success of 83.07%.”

 

Jim sighs fondly. Of course he did. 

 

Bones seems slightly mollified, though still grumpy. That may just be his resting face coming in to play though, it’s hard to tell from this angle.

 

“Certainly Doctor McCoy will be most welcome to my department, and amongst myself and my esteemed colleagues.” Jim identifies the man who speaks as the Invincible’s CMO. Name? Who knows. Jim does not.  Now that he looks at the man though, he’s superficially similar looking to Bones, which is kinda weird. He lacks Bones’ superb jawline and raw, forceful presence though. If they stood next to each other, the Invincible’s CMO would definitely be overshadowed.

 

Bones stares flatley at the CMO. 

 

“Leonard,” the CMO greets, with a genial smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. 

 

“Norbert,” Bones returns in the same manner, though his smile is more shark-like than anything.

 

Wait a second. Norbert? Weasel Norbert? Former ‘best friend’ Norbert who threw Bones over after Bones’ graduation and Doctoral thesis were delayed? Norbert the Weasel who slunk in and stole the cutting-edge posting at the Van Gelder Memorial Hospital on Jupiter Station that had been slated for Bones?

 

Jim slaps a hand over his mouth so he doesn’t blurt out something like, “Weasel Norbert?!” or “Norbert the Weasel?!” Why does Captain Saavik’s command crew know his command crew?! He pretends to cough. Poorly. Jim’s eyes flick to Spock for a moment before he even realizes he’s going to do it. 

 

Jim’s eyes widen, and he’s glad his hand is de-facto concealing whatever look has come over his face. For a moment, for the briefest of seconds, there had been something in Spock’s eyes when they met Jim’s. Jim didn’t imagine that, right? But, if it had been there, it’s gone now, and Spock is back to regarding Jim with that same impartial look from the bridge, which, (and Jim was very clear on this), he did not need to have updated.

 

He jerks his eyes away from Spock’s face like he’s been burned, and tunes back into a conversation that has slightly passed him by.

 

“I’ll have a duty roster with you added, Leonard, just as soon as I can get it to you,” Weaslbert has just finished saying, somewhat incenserely. 

 

“You do that, Norbert,” Bones drawls, at his most urbane.

 

Captain Saavik, (demonstrating a sense for danger and taking decisive action under pressure that likely got her her posting), adds, “I will have my yeoman schedule a Medical Briefing 48 hours out from Acheron. I will expect Medical’s updated quarantine procedures, and an actionable, tailored plan for them to be relayed to me then.”

 

Don’t add Jim, don’t add Jim, please don’t add Jim.

 

She nods to Jim. “Captain Kirk will join us.”

 

Damnit! The curse of professionalism strikes again. Resigned, Jim updates his PADD, and confirms the meeting on his schedule when it pops up just a few moments later. Whoever Captain Saavik’s yeoman is, damn they work fast.

 

“Captain Kirk,” Lt. Commander Stonn says. Shit. It’s Jim’s turn. He looks up from his PADD over to the Lt. Commander. “I anticipate the need for squad briefings with yourself in attendance, in order to prepare for any and all possible conditions we will face on Acheron.”

 

Jim winces. Next to him, Sulu crosses his arms over his chest, and glares savagely at the far wall. Knowing better, but still unable to help himself, Jim checks on Bones. He also has his arms crossed, but his savage glare is pointed right at Jim. They’ve both made their opinions of Jim accompanying the landing party unequivocally clear. 

 

Jim sighs, then answers, “Schedule your briefings as you see fit, Commander Stonn, I’ll work my schedule around yours.”

 

Jim braces himself. He knows what’s coming next. 

 

“I also anticipate the need for your presence for a briefing on the creatures with my team, Captain Kirk,” Spock says. 

 

The added ‘Kirk’ is like a slap to the face. Jim’s mouth thins as he struggles to keep a neutral expression, forcing himself to look over at Spock, focusing on the straight line of his bangs.

 

“I am at your disposal, Investigative Commander,” Jim answers, trying to keep his voice toneless, though he can’t help the sleight weight he puts on the word ‘disposal’. 

 

Jim’s PADD vibrates in a series of rapid-fire beeps, and he looks down at it with relief. Not caring particularly when or where these briefings happen, he accepts them en masse, after his schedule confirms no conflicts. 

 

He looks over to Captain Saavik. Please, please let this interminable meeting be over.

 

“Our business here is concluded,” she says. “All Invincible crew are to return to their duties.” She nods to Jim. “I ask the Enterprise crew keep only to the sectors of the Rineikau-Yehat which have been made available to your clearance level.”

 

“Of course, Captain Saavik,” he assures her, and gives Scotty a warning poke with his boot underneath the table. 

 

Scotty gives him a wounded look, but Jim knows better. He knows exactly what was going through Scotty’s mind, and the answer is, ‘don’t you dare.’

 

“This meeting is adjourned,” Captain Saavik says formally, and there’s a slight thronging as some attendees make for the door, others for the replicators, and a few gather into small groups for quick discussions. Scotty hops up and makes a beeline for Doc Brown and the two of them do indeed engage in much back-thumping. Keenser joins a moment later, and all three exit together, headed (Jim fervently hopes) not for disaster.

 

“Sulu,” Jim mutters as Sulu stands, and he leans down to hear. “Set up a quick crew meeting 0900 Enterprise time, just to get everybody on the same page.” 

 

Sulu nods, then marches over to where two of Spock’s team are talking to Chekov and inserts himself straight into the conversation, whatever it is. 

 

The minor stampede out of the room has passed, so Jim stands and begins to leave. On his way to the door, Jim passes Uhura speaking with T’Pring and another Vulcan in a blue pullover, who must be the head of the comms research team. The name doesn’t immediately come to Jim’s mind. Both of the Vulcans are intent upon Uhura who is saying something in a language that Jim can only assume is Vulcan. 

 

Just beside the door, Lt. Commander Stonn is exchanging words with Hudson. As Jim approaches, the two finish and Hudson exits the room as Jim walks up. Stonn turns to Jim and his gaze sweeps Jim from head to toe, lingering on Jim’s boots. When his eyes lift to meet Jim’s, he can see it again. A spark of interest. 

 

“Lt. Commander,” he murmurs proactively as he passes him, giving him a knowing smirk as he does. Stonn’s gaze sharpens, and Jim turns to leave, feeling pleased with himself. Spock is standing to the left of the door as Jim goes through, doing his best impression of a plank of wood. For some reason, Jim’s cheeks flush as he passes by him, and he stares resolutely ahead. 

 

He swears he feels the weight of Spock’s gaze upon him as goes through the door. 

 

Which is stupid and fanciful and 97.24% likely to be untrue or something, but Jim can’t convince himself otherwise. 

 

Spock…was watching him. 

 

Jim is sure of it. 

End Chapter TWO

Notes:

Fun fic fact: My memories of writing this chapter are like just 'heeeeeeeeeee' I had so much fun with it.

Easter Eggs: 7

I'd say this was my favorite chapter i'd ever written, but then i went on to immediately write chapter three which is just *chef's kiss own chapter* even more fun (for me i hope you guys enjoy it when it gets posted). Also i hope you liked this one!

A little while back I decided to start a new Alien game (most of them are like...awful) but! I chose one that had decent reviews. Upon starting the game there was like a little note from the developers something like *pay attention to the tutorials this is a difficult complicated game to learn to play* My face>>> >.< needless to say, they weren't kidding but what they also didn't mention is that it is not particularly enjoyable (at least so far). siggghhh. It does have some environments I really want to be able to use but then I have to be able to PLAY the freakin game to access those environments. Maybe I should pick one of the suckier, but easier alien games and see what those environments are like. LE SIGH.

Chapter 3: Cease

Summary:

On one hand, Jim is living the dream, bouncing around the Enterprise without a care in the world, doing as he pleases, flouting the general absence of both Bones and Keenser. On the other, Spock is grinding Jim's pathetic heart to pieces under his Vulcan boot heel. ...Or is he?

Notes:

Thank you betafish! :D (itsme-theborgqueen!)

I wanted to have chapter 6 done by today, but I was sick yesterday and wrote...nothing :( Goal is to finish by this weekend, and then chappie 7 should just crank itself out because (not to tease u guys or anything but) there's some exciting stuff I HAVE BEEN DYING For eheh.

Thank you all for your lovely comments, it's amazing to hear what each one of you thinks! :DDDDD

The first two days under everyone’s new consulting schedules pass in a quiet kind of bliss for Jim. For most of his shifts, he has the Enterprise almost all to himself. He wears what he wants, eats what he wants, and works happily on several minor little issues that have been bugging him for literal Earth years. Which, under the iron thumb of Keenser, would never have been slated so high up on the maintenance list. The loose grating in the entryway to the crew quarters? Fixed. The flickering light in Storage Room A? Fixed. Water pressure in the water Shower? Fixed. Jim is on a roll.

 

And then it gets old. The absence of Bones in particular makes the ship feel hollow and lonely, as opposed to freeing and momentarily empty. Jim, sitting alone at the replicator counter, wearing his ‘My Other Ride is a Starship Captain’ T-shirt and actual jeans, sighs at his slowly congealing pizza. 

 

It takes all the fun out of screwing with Bones if he’s not here to witness said screwing around.

 

And of course, the briefing with Spock and his team over the Aliens is set during his shift this cycle, with the first briefing with Lt. Commander Stonn and his squad set for almost directly after. 

 

In the words of Jim’s forebears…this sucks. He stands decisively, and chucks the remains of his pizza. Maybe this is the shift he’ll get his personal logs in order. He heads to his quarters, and then stops dead in the doorway. There. Lying on his bed is a brand-new Federation-style pullover in Command gold, with the Enterprise's patch affixed over the left breast.

 

Who dares!? There is no way, no way! Jim is wearing one of those. Who was it? Was it Bones? Or is it a part of Uhura’s dastardly pullover conspiracy? 

 

Jim paces back and forth in front of his bed. No. He cannot possibly. …It does look soft though. And he knows the cut is so slimming. And command gold! No . Bad Jim. That’s how they get you. He stops his pacing and stands before the bed, arms crossed over his chest, tapping his foot. ‘Aw what the hell,’ he thinks, ‘may as well try it on.’

 

He exchanges his T-shirt for the pullover and takes a breath in, then turns to look in the mirror. The command gold brings out the burnished highlights in his hair, makes the blue of his eyes pop, and emphasizes the broadness of his shoulders. Damnit. He looks radiant. There’s no going back now. 

 

Curse you Bones and/or Uhura!

 

Jim looks from the mirror to his desk, where his console seems to look reproachfully at him. Well…he could sit at his desk for a while and pretend like he’s gonna talk about his experiences on Sevastopol for his personal logs, and then go pay a visit to Bones in the Invincible’s Med Bay. Or he could just skip straight to the going to bug Bones before his briefings option.

 

Ding ding, Jim has a winner. He changes his jeans for a standard pair of Space Slacks. “Space pants, pants for Space,” he absently sings the advertising jingle under his breath as he fusses with his hair a bit after pulling on his ship-wear boots.

 

Alright. Jim is heading out. Seize the shift! Or something like that.

 

Jim’s journey through the gleaming corridors of the Invincible is gratifyingly peppered with appreciative looks from various Invincible crew members he passes. ‘Alright, Bones,’ he thinks as he stands before the doors to Med Bay, ‘eat your heart out.’

 

Jim enters. An orderly reception area, well-lit and appointed with various seating and vid screens all displaying different status updates greets him. A pretty little Andorian nurse is all too happy to point him to Bones, who is manning the on-call room, just down a small corridor to the left. Jim thanks the nurse, whose antennae spread in the V-formation denoting an Andorian blush. He grins and heads over to the on-call exam room and wonders what the heck Bones is doing assigned as the on-call doctor, fielding sneezes and sniffles when he could be doing surgeries, or something more specialized, anyway.

 

“Bones!” Jim greets happily, interrupting Bones who is sitting at the on-call desk, and appears to be playing some game involving Q-tips and synthetic cotton-balls.

 

Bones jumps half-out of his seat, scattering little bits everywhere. “Jesus wept ,” he curses, attempting to hunch over and conceal his play pieces, “what are you doing here?” He blinks, and relaxes, giving up trying to shield his playing field from view, and takes in Jim’s appearance. “And since when do you wear the ‘traitor’s pullover?’”

 

Jim laughs at Bones’ scowl as he bends to start picking up some of Bones’ scattered game bits. “I could ask you the same thing,” Jim says. He straightens up from bending down to snag a Q-tip and his gaze pans around the tiny exam room; just the desk and chair, a console, and the simple exam table. He dumps a fistfull of Q-tips and cotton balls back on the desk. “Since when do you moonlight as the on-call?” 

 

“I’m interning Jim, getting back into the swing of things,” Bones says boisterously. He chuckles, “Interning! Me? At my age? Can you believe Jim? Feel like a spring chicken or a squirrel outta hibernation, bright eyed and bushy-tailed.” 

 

“Really?” Jim asks doubtfully, eyeing Bones’ somewhat manic grin. 

 

“No, not really Captain Idiot,” Bones’ face darkens like a thundercloud, resuming his naturally grumpy expression. “It’s boring as fuck and that damn CMO won’t let me play with their fancy biobeds.”

 

“The Weasel!” Jim exclaims. “I knew it!” 

 

Bones snorts, looking momentarily amused before he slumps and resumes hunting down stray bits of fluff. 

 

“How did that loser get a posting like this?”

 

Bones waves a hand. “He’s qualified, technically, but his real area of expertise is the petty politicking and ass-kissing it takes to lobby. He always excelled at that. Ergo, he’s CMO on the most advanced ship in the Federation.” 

 

Jim leans against the side of the on-call desk. “Bones, level with me. Do I need to shove him down a laundry chute? Because I can make that happen.”

 

Bones raises a sardonic eyebrow. “Oh yeah, how would you make that happen? Mr. fancy consultant who’s also probably under some kind of probation.”

 

Jim waves a hand. “Easy. I’m just a lil starship captain from the outer reaches. I’m sure they expect it of me.” Jim straightens and assumes a sheepish expression. “I don’t know what happened, Captain Saavik, we just sorta got tangled together and down he went. Guess I’m not used to these fancy corridors yet, the no anti-slip gripping pulled my feet right out from under me.” He finishes with his earnest, of good Iowa stock, trademark, ‘Jim would never’ look.

 

Bones rolls his eyes and turns away, busying himself with sweeping the last of the little pieces of debris into the trash chute. Jim grins. Bones can’t fool him. Jim knows he’s hiding a smile.

 

Bones grunts and turns back to face Jim. “Your first briefings are this shift, right?”

 

Jim grimaces. “Yeah.”

 

“How you gonna handle Spock?” He asks bluntly.

 

Jim shrugs. “The same way Spock is handling me. Like we’ve never even met before.” Bones regards Jim with a steady look. “I’m over it, Bones,” Jim assures him. When Bones refuses to look convinced, Jim decides to go with some distraction.

 

“Where’s the fawning gaggle of nurses? I can’t believe the Medical contingent on this ship is letting you walk around unmolested when you’re wearing scrubs with an actual white doctor’s coat on, it’s your best look.” Jim batts his eyes at him. “So handsome,” he teases.

 

Bones throws Jim a filthy look but doesn’t respond. Jim’s eyebrows shoot up. “Wait. Wait, wait, wait.”

 

Bones groans, drops into his chair, and hides his head in his hands. 

 

“You like someone here, oh my god.” Jim leans forward and peppers Bones with questions. “Is it a he? A she? Non-gendered? Nurse? Doctor? Science Division? How cute? Like ‘tap that’ cute, or ‘please help me Jim,’ cute?”

 

“Shut up,” Bones says into his hands.

 

“Wow,” Jim says. “So we’re at ‘this is an emergency, Jim’ levels of attractiveness here.”

 

Jim tries to sit in the chair with Bones, climbing half on him. “I can’t help you if you won’t tell me anythi-oof!” Bones shoves him straight to the floor, and scoots the chair to the wall, and starts rummaging through storage drawers. 

 

Jim scrambles away. “Well, you know I’ll find out eventually Bones, but I gotta start heading to that briefing room.” Bones’ unfamiliarity with the on-call room, and Jim catching him in a rare moment of unreadiness are the only reasons Jim hasn’t been stabbed with a hypo yet. He knows this, and yet he can’t resist throwing a parting shot (which he will pay for) over his shoulder as he leaves. “Keep looking Bones, they’re in there somewhere, like you said, gotta get back in the swing of things!”

 

He’ll be a few minutes early, but he may as well head to the briefing room. If Spock isn’t there ready and waiting with an eyebrow raised for whomever walks through that door last, Jim will go kiss an Alien down on Acheron. Best not to be the eyebrow raise-ee.

 

The Invincible has what must be miles of corridors, but, with the support of his PADD and a helpful Engineering (ensign? Is that what they’re called?) Jim makes it back to the admin wing, and stands in front of the door to the designated meeting room. He nervously straightens his pullover, runs a hand through his hair and walks through the door. 

 

Straight into Spock’s eyebrow raise. Jim gapes. The Investigative team is ready and waiting, seated at one side of an oval table, with Spock in their center. “I’m ten minutes early !” He says indignantly to Spock’s eyebrow. The lights in the small meeting room are glaring and he blinks rapidly, trying to adjust.

 

“The Invincible follows Federation Standard time,” Spock informs him, in his ‘I am judging you, but you’ll never prove it’ tone.

 

“My PADD is synced to FST,” Jim glares, “and so is the Enterprise.” 

 

Both of Spock’s eyebrows raise up. “Ah. However, today is The Time of Harvest on the Andorian calendar, so Federation Standard Time has jumped ahead by 20 minutes.”

 

Making Jim 10 minutes late . He savagely yanks an empty chair out from the opposite side of the oval table. “Those addendums to the FST are the most illogical thing that ever passed through the Federation Cultural Subcommittees, and everyone in this room knows it.”

 

He juts his chin out, daring someone to try and fight him on this, but no one challenges him. Jim plops himself down in the chair, crosses his arms, and throws his right knee over his left leg.

 

---

 

The briefing that follows will stand out as one of the most awkward and uncomfortable meetings in Jim’s life. And there were some extremely painful moments around middle school after…well.

 

There are four Vulcans, Spock, Jim, and the only other human, Lt. Tam. Jim remembers none of the Vulcan’s names, but quickly labels them with other identifiers. Uber Nerd. Superior Vulcan. Snooty Vulcan. ‘Better than you’ Vulcan. The briefing focuses on the side of the investigation concerned with the creatures themselves. Their behavior, possible origins, and their bizarre life-cycle, which is where the conversation has bogged down now, almost two hours later. 

 

“The siphoning of genetic material by a larval form to evolve into a specialized form is unprecedented in the annals of the Federation,” Superior Vulcan is saying coolly, from her place to the far right of Spock.

 

“Which was itself implanted by another form, the parasite form!” Uber Nerd inserts into the slight pause, her tone slightly less bland than the other Vulcans at the table. She has four PADDS before her, where she sits to Spock’s left, and swaps between them almost constantly. 

 

“Which originated from an evolutionary structure,” Superior Vulcan continues placidly. 

 

“Yes, the eggs,” Jim says wearily. Two hours of this. Vulcans Vulcaning back and forth, regarding Jim as if he were some species of quite common and uninteresting bug every time he tries to impart some fact or observation. 

 

“I do not believe at this time that there is enough evidence to definitively classify the objects as eggs,” Spock informs him solemnly. And Spock. If he wasn’t in his role of the most Vulcan of the Vulcans right now, Jim would suspect Spock of trying to fuck with him, winding him up on purpose.

 

Jim gapes at him. “ You’re the one who said they were.”

 

“I, at all times, classified the objects as ‘egg-like,’ Captain Kirk,” Spock informs him, with a slight arching of his eyebrow.

 

Jim thinks back on that, then says, through gritted teeth. “Yeah, but you didn’t correct myself or anyone else when we referred to them just as ‘eggs’ either, did you, Investigative Commander?”

 

“Perhaps they are more of a cocoon? The parasite builds them, or they are built by some other as yet unknown form?” Lt. Tam inserts anxiously. Tiny adorable Lt. Tam, with her bouncing bob cut. Her, Jim likes. Unfortunately, she appears to be at the bottom of the Investigative pecking order. 

 

“Whatever,” Jim says dismissively, still glaring at Spock, “They’re ovoid, they open up, creepy crawlers come out and latch onto people’s faces. I haven’t actually seen one, so I have no observations to offer you on that front.”

 

“I thought you, yourself, were implanted, Captain Kirk?” Asks Spock’s XO, the Vulcan who has readily earned Jim’s classification of ‘Snooty.’

 

“I was. It happened while I was unconscious. I only have a sort of…sense memory to go off of,” he responds.

 

“So where do the ovoid objects originate from?” asks the ‘Better than you’ Vulcan, from the other side of Lt. Tam.

 

Originate? Jim doesn’t know. But they came from Acheron, their current destination. He’s learned a lot in two hours, so he keeps that opinion to himself. Opinions are not Vulcan-approved.

 

“We have only observed a portion of what may turn out to be an extensive life-cycle,” Spock replies. “We do not at this time possess the requisite knowledge to answer that question.”

 

The Uber Nerd asks earnestly, her large, almost bulbous eyes alight with curiosity, “What purpose could such a life-cycle and the accompanying behavior serve on the creature’s world of origin? Amidst their own evolutionary contemporaries?”

 

Their behavior. Their bizarre tenacity. The strange construction of the nest. The metallic sounds of their breathing. A stray thought finds its way out of Jim’s mouth. “It’s almost like they were designed, somehow.”

 

He looks up to find all pairs of eyes riveted on him. 

 

“That is a large investigative leap to make,” says the Snooty XO, stiffly.

 

Superior Vulcan shakes her head, “That is quite a ‘wild’ theory, I believe.”

 

“Indeed,” Mr. Snooty adds, with what is almost a lip curl. “Captain Kirk does not possess the evidence necessary to submit such a conclusion.”

 

Jim leans forward slightly, his leg sliding off of his knee. “A first-hand account is evidence,” he says softly, dangerously.

 

The XO, reaching new heights of snootiness replies, “Your survival, Captain Kirk, while notable, does not qualify you to leap to fanciful, emotionally driven conclusions.”

 

Oh. The Vulcans think they’ve seen emotion, have they? Jim slaps both palms on the table and braces his arms.

 

“Oh? You were there, on Sevastopol? You’re qualified to pass judgment on the quality of the observations I made and their relevance to the conclusions I’ve drawn?” He asks pointedly.

 

The silence is thick with tension. Ah. Very good. Get Vulcans to shut up by asking them to confirm obvious facts that don’t support their conclusions. Another life lesson learned.

 

“You were not there,” Jim reminds him, “and so you do not understand what it is to be hunted by one of them. Relentlessly. Purposefully. To the exclusion of all else. Predators conserve their resources in order to catch their prey. They kill only what they need to survive. These things kill indiscriminately, and if at first they don’t succeed, they try, try again. Distance, danger, sudden changes in their environment do not alter their behavior from their hunting pattern. That is not natural .” Jim says, his voice tight and his body coiled with tension. 

 

“Am I emotional over my experience on Sevastopol? You’re damn right I am. But that doesn’t mean my contributions to this discussion can be disregarded as without value. You can quibble over classifications, and life-cycle lengths, but the only question that concerns me as we approach Acheron and another possibly equivalent situation, is this: Where are the damn eggs coming from? Because it’s possible whatever it is, is down there waiting for us.”

 

Jim’s PADD beeps. Jim nods at Spock. “Commander.” He straightens and picks up his PADD. “If you’ll excuse me, I am late for my briefing with Lt. Commander Stonn and his squad.”

 

“Logically, he has a point,” he thinks Uber Nerd murmurs as he stands and turns to leave. Ooo dissension in the ranks. Too bad Jim can’t stay for the fallout. 

 

---

 

The briefing with Lt. Commander Stonn and his squad is much more enjoyable by comparison. They start off going over the purely physical elements of the creatures. Yes, Jim is still having to go over some of the worst experiences in his life, but it helps to  A. be listened to, B. have his input taken seriously, and C. be asked questions like, ‘how can we kill it?’ 

 

They are also not in a stuffy meeting room, but in a simulator prep room, with everyone ranged around on bench seating, or leaning up against lockers. The lighting isn’t as bright, and it helps to not feel like he’s literally sitting under a spotlight. All the squad are in those dark fatigues, and Jim thinks they look both functional and comfortable, and they hit just the right note of badassery too. He wouldn’t mind some for himself. 

 

“So the acid blood is a game-changer, obviously,” Jim is saying. 

 

The squad gives him serious, intent nods. 

 

“If I’d been able to shoot that last creature while it was on top of me I’d have taken a face-full of acid, and I'd be dead.”

 

“Is it worth requesting an acid-resistant armor plating from the Science Division, do you think Captain?” asks a Vulcan named Lodzhal, who has the longest eyebrows Jim has ever seen, and is the squad medic. Jim thinks he’s a Lance Corporal? He thinks he’s got most of the squad’s names down, but the ranks still elude him. That’s the other thing! Stonn’s squad is a blend of humans and Vulcans, with the humans outnumbering the Vulcans. And these Vulcans are like…relaxed. Stonn’s squad are all comfortable with each other. The humans aren’t making snide computer remarks, and the Vulcans don’t feel the need to demonstrate their superior recollection of facts and numbers every other minute. 

 

Jim regretfully shakes his head in answer to Lodzhal’s question. “The acid ate through the hull of an ambulance docking bay in less than a minute. Any acid-resistant plating isn’t going to be acid-resistant enough.” A few murmurs of surprise from some humans, and even one Vulcan.

 

Stonn raises an eyebrow. “You all read the report?” And though he frames it as a question, he clearly means it as ‘you all had better have read the report.’ 

 

Stonn, Stonn, Stonn. Jim likes him more and more.

 

There are some guilty-sounding ‘yes’s in answer to him.

 

Jim bites his lip in an effort to stop the grin that wants to break free. 

 

“You know us humans boss-” Hudson begins to say, “and Rekan!” someone adds. The Vulcan who had murmured in surprise earlier, and who must be the ubiquitous Rekan, gives a sigh. Jim notices he is sporting a fancy fade undercut with some kind of script edged on. Hudson continues on with a smirk, “Seeing is believing, or in this case gettin’ it straight from the horse’s mouth.” 

 

“What is a horse?” A Vulcan named Arev asks, the only one of the Vulcans of Stonn’s squad to be sporting the standard Vulcan razor-edge bangs.

 

“Later,” hisses a Private named Ocampo, a woman who looks like she could bend Jim into a pretzel. If he begs her pretty please.

 

If they are close enough for them to spray acid blood on you if you shoot them, you are in serious trouble,” Jim warns, bringing the discussion back on track. “You want them at a distance. Ten or so feet, that’s what? Three meters?” None of the Vulcans feel compelled to correct him with an exactitude. Jim loves this squad.

 

There are nods all around, and a flurry of note-taking on PADDS.

 

“Ok,” Jim thinks out loud, “we’ve covered the speed, the height, the claws, the tail, and the blood. That leaves the final surprise, the mouth within a mouth.”

 

“The what now?” asks Fry, a spunky blonde who has been taking her notes on Lodzhal’s PADD, which he allows each time with only an indulgent eyebrow raise as comment. 

 

Jim explains, “If it gets on top of you, that’s what it attacks with. A smaller fanged mouth lunges out from the larger mouth like it’s spring-loaded.” Jim swallows, remembers Morley’s body, with its ruined face. “Some of the bodies I saw… It has enough force to puncture straight through a skull.”

 

A round of furious note-taking follows. 

 

Frost, a lithe man with light brown skin, who has been cleaning his gun throughout the briefing asks, “How the hell do we counter that?”  

 

“I was able to block a couple of strikes with the side of my rifle, but if Commander Spock hadn’t pulled it off of me, again, I’d be dead. Best advice is really, do everything you can not to let them in that close.”

 

An insistent beeping emerges from Stonn’s PADD. “We must conclude this briefing,” he says. “Are there any last questions on the physical makeup of the creatures?”

 

Silence and a few head shakes greet him. Stonn nods to Hudson, who leaps to his feet. “All right boys and girls, let's get locked and loaded, we are in the simulator in three minutes, move your butts, ammunition is live, watch those synthetic rubber rounds!”

 

The prep room erupts into orderly chaos as the squad jumps to attention. Locker doors are thrown open, and boots thump around on the ground. There’s a bit of a rigamarole when it looks like a private? called Roaché accidentally drops something that lands on Lodzhal’s hand. He bites off a cry. Roaché flails about babbling apologies, and then follows the medic’s calm instructions to retrieve a topical anesthetic from his bag. Jim blinks. Lodzhal gets a shoulder pat of sympathy from Frost, and Fry fusses at Roaché as he fumbles through Lodzhal’s bag for the medicine. He carefully places it on the bench next to Lodzhal, and Fry hovers over the medic anxiously as he applies the anesthetic. “There has been no injury,” Lodzhal calmly states, and Fry slumps a little in relief. He says something further in an undertone to her, in a language that Jim is pretty sure is Vulcan.

 

“Vulcan hands are…sensitive,” Stonn murmurs from where he’s moved to stand beside Jim. Jim remembers Spock’s fingers laced with his own with a pang. Yeah, he is…getting that.

 

He returns a few nods and waves of farewell, and then heads to the door, followed by Stonn. 

 

They stop just outside, the closing of the door cutting off the clamor of weaponry and the further bitching of Hudson, getting into Roaché over his clumsiness.

 

Stonn comments, “I believe the next briefing should cover the behavior of the creatures.”

 

Jim nods. “I’ve got oodles of material for that.”

 

A faint crease in Stonn’s brow. “I have not heard of an ‘oodle,’ that is a new one.” 

 

“Ha! Found one that Hudson hasn’t subjected you to yet. It just means ‘a lot’.”

 

“I see,” Stonn nods wisely. “There is also a third briefing planned. We will be going over tactical placement and the positioning of the non-military members of the team in preparation for planetside deployment, however as that briefing will be primarily military in nature, you are not slated for attendance. A summary report will be sent to you after.”

 

Jim gives a nervous laugh. Planetside. Fuck. What kind of moron goes back for a round two with those things? The answer is of course, Jim. Though he guesses it’s technically going to be round three. A shiver runs through his body.

 

“You have fears about landing on the moon Acheron,” Stonn observes.

 

Jim gives a little laugh, “Stonn, may I call you Stonn?” Stonn angles himself directly at Jim, and gives a nod, eyes again revealing a glint of interest. Jim grins at him. “That, Stonn, was an egregious understatement. I am batshit terrified of going down to the surface of Acheron.” 

 

Stonn steps forward, deliberately breaching Jim’s personal space. “Jim, may I call you Jim?” he asks. 

 

Jim nods, with a little smirk. 

 

“Don’t worry Jim, I’ll protect you,” Stonn assures him, and while his tone is more earnest than flirty, the blatant once-over he follows it up with doesn’t leave a lot of room for ambiguity. There’s the sound of a step behind Stonn, and he turns to reveal a blank-faced Spock, standing in the corridor on the other side of him. 

 

“Captain Kirk,” Spock says, “If I may speak with you.” 

 

Stonn gives Jim a last lingering glance and then goes back inside the prep room, giving Spock a nod of recognition as he leaves, which Spock woodenly returns.

 

“How may I help you, Investigative Commander?” Jim tosses over his shoulder as he starts heading down the corridor, to make his way back to the Enterprise.

 

A few quick steps and Spock falls beside him. “It was not my intention that you should have been made,” he hesitates slightly, “upset, by the Investigative Briefing earlier.”

 

“No, I didn’t appreciate being treated like an infant child every time I tried to make a contribution,” Jim agrees. “I’m not sure why I was even at that briefing. None of your team seemed to believe I had anything of value to add.”

 

Spock stops, clasps his hands behind his back, and becomes even more rigid. Jim stops as well and turns to face him. One of these days, Jim swears Spock’s gonna lock like that and they’re gonna need an Engineering team to come in with drill bits or something to get him moving again. 

 

“Perhaps it was a mistake to include you,” Spock allows.

 

Jim doesn’t think Spock meant it like that, exactly. Subtle digs are not, after all, a part of Vulcan culture, but he can’t help the way his body recoils in response, any more than he can help the bitter rejoinder that follows. “A mistake, right. I remember.”

 

An intense expression flashes over Spock’s face, there and gone in less than a second. Frustration? Spock’s mouth opens, then closes. When he says nothing further, Jim clenches his jaw, turns, and leaves. 

 

Spock does not follow. And neither does Jim receive any further Investigative Briefing Schedulings. 

 

The next briefing schedule with the Tihet Squad is sitting in his console inbox by the time Jim makes it back to the Enterprise. 

 

---

 

That night, Jim has his first real nightmare. The trauma-induced kind that he wakes from with a cry, covered in cold sweat. Fuck. In his nightmare, Spock hadn’t been there to pull the Alien off of him, and the inner mouth had lunged for him a third and final time and Jim was going to die….fuck. His chest heaves as he struggles to catch his breath. Fuck.

 

He doesn’t leave the Enterprise for the entirety for his next shift, and really does make some headway on the non-critical maintenance list. His sleep that night is just as troubled. When he tries to cheer himself up with a breakfast of french toast, it sticks in his throat, and he isn’t able to finish it. Scotty and Keenser are going to be locked-in to some intensive nacelle care for most of this shift, and Jim doesn’t really feel like knocking around outside the corridor of the ship’s Mainframe tackling the next item on the Maintenance list. A troublesome transistor. No, Jim has absolutely zero desire to hunt it down, armed with only a tiny probe that won’t rotate left, and a remote control half on the fritz. 

 

It would be far easier to search for it manually, but both Keenser and Bones ganged up on him. They seem convinced that sticking his bare hands into transistor nodes is going to electrocute him into heart failure. Well…they’re probably right. Jim hears that’s how Houdini died. 

 

No, Jim needs a real pick-me-up. Maybe it’s time for a check-in with Chekov. Hey. That was funny. Chekov will appreciate that. Jim checks the scheduling on his PADD, and heads back into his quarters to change out of his maintenance smock and into the gold pullover. He’s not addicted to its soft and flattering design, he’s not!

 

It looks like Chekov’s scheduled to be in the Science Division for this portion of his shift. Off Jim goes. 

 

He’s wary of somehow running into Spock, but the corridors are almost empty as he travels through them. Two Vulcans in Science pullovers are conducting what Jim has to classify as a logical argument when he arrives just outside the lab where Chekov is scheduled to be working. He pauses for a moment, catches the sound of numbers calculated to the thousandth decimal place, and quickly moves away. Yikes. Logical? Yes. But those numbers had been calculated, dare Jim say it? Viciously. 

 

“As my efficiency ratings are .546% higher than yours, young consultant Chekov will be joining my team for the final 1.1 hours of his shift.”

 

The beginnings of the rejoinder, “As always, your logic is calculated within three decimal points less than-” is cut off by the door closing behind Jim. 

 

Holy crap they were fighting over Chekov. Guerilla Vulcan warfare in the corridors. Jim shivers. Double yikes. He pouts for a moment. No. The Vulcans cannot have Chekov! They can’t. Jim calms himself. No, Sulu will have the situation well in hand.

But when Jim stops by Chekov’s station, made up of several consoles and a small mountain of PADDS, Sulu is nowhere in sight. 

 

“Keptin!” Chekov greets him from his seat, wearing his own pullover in Enterprise olive green, looking proudly at Jim. “You like your command pullover! I had it made for you!”

 

It was Chekov? Not a Bones and/or Uhura Conspiracy? Jim thought Bones had just been playing it cool over the whole thing, but the pullover is from Chekov!

 

Jim laughs helplessly. “Yeah, it’s great, gives me a captainly boost, yeah?” 

 

Chekov nods solemnly. “Very keptainy-Keptin,” he agrees. 

 

Jim zones out a bit over the whole pullover thing. Pavel out of left field, Jim did not see it coming. But Chekov’s slightly anxious, “Is zere something you need?” snaps him out of it.

 

“No, no, just here for a check-in with Chekov,” Jim says breezily. 

 

Chekov grins delightly. “Check-in Check-ov Ha!” 

 

Jim knew he’d like that. He doesn’t get to inquire into Sulu’s whereabouts until after Chekov has happily introduced Jim to the experiment he’s working on. Jim understandably becomes excited at the phrase ‘molecular disruption’, but Chekov is quick to assure him it’s theoretical only.

 

“Alright,” Jim has to laughingly interrupt him at last, “we’ve moved way beyond numbers I have the ability to comprehend.” He ruffles Chekov’s curls fondly. ‘How much longer will he let me do that?’ he wonders as Chekov blushes happily. “Where has your designated chaperone run off to?”

 

“Hikaru went to view ze exotic botany lab, just on the other side of ze theoretical matrix chamber,” Chekov informs him. 

 

Oh, Sulu, seduced by the siren song of the seed. Jim’s gonna tell him that too. Innuendo intended.

 

He leaves Chekov to the heady thrill of his calculations and heads past the whatsit chamber, which has some sort of dark, mysterious reaction occurring inside, with a team of Science personnel monitoring it. Jim doesn’t know what that is, but he feels an almost Bones-like distrust of it. Don’t look so theoretical to Jim. Huh. Is this what it is to be Bones? Goodness. Next thing you know Jim’ll start carrying around hypos in his pocket or have a massive freak-out about space lightning or something. 

 

The exotic botany lab is overflowing with dangerous-looking vines and carnivorous type flowers, all thankfully secured behind holding chamber plexiglass. Reassuringly clad in his Pilot’s jacket, Sulu is standing enthralled in front of a particularly nasty vine, which appears to have teeth and is dripping in venom? Uhg. Sulu has the grace to look slightly guilty when he catches sight of Jim, but it quickly turns to a scowl as Jim begins to say, “Oh Sulu, seduced away by the siren song of the-”

 

“Don’t you dare,” Sulu warns, cutting him off. 

 

Jim pouts. 

 

Sulu stares him down. The nasty vine thumps against the inside of its chamber and Sulu breaks his staredown to look over at it.

 

“Seed,” Jim says quickly, with a dirty inflection.

 

“I hate you,” Sulu grumps at him.

 

“Nuh uh, no hating Starship Captains, Demora says so!”

 

“So help me Jim, I will feed you to this Venunum Tentacular ,” Sulu threatens. 

 

Jim waves a hand. “Yeah, yeah.” He waits a moment, then gives Sulu a questioning look. 

 

Sulu grimaces. “I know, but he gets nervous if I’m there hovering over him, every time he gets asked something, looks at me for permission to answer.”

 

Jim’s face scrunches up in an answering grimace. “Well, that’s no good.”

 

“I check on him every 15 minutes or so, disperse any Science or Bridge nutjobs as the situation demands.”

 

“You check-on Chek-ov?” Jim waggles his eyebrows.

 

Sulu responds with a flat look. “Yeah. I check on him. Like I just said.”

 

“Chekov is way more fun than you are,” Jim informs him.

 

The venom tentacle demon plant thunks against the plexiglass again.

 

“It doesn’t like you.” Sulu folds his arms across his chest and gives Jim a smug look.

 

Jim shudders “I don’t like it either.”

 

Sulu’s PADD beeps where it sits on a freestanding monitor cart. Must be Chekov time. Jim walks with Sulu back to where Pavel is still immersed in a string of calculations. 

 

“I’m good to hang close when he has no idea I’m actually here,” Sulu murmurs to Jim.

 

Jim claps him on the shoulder, “I’ll leave you to it, then,” and starts to head out of the Science Division. He exits the series of labs where Chekov has been assigned and stops. Wait. Isn’t the team Uhura’s working with set up in some fancy communications lab around here?  

 

Jim grins. While he’s here he may as well annoy—that is, see how Uhura’s doing. He checks her schedule on his PADD and reorients himself. Ok. This a-way. A few steps later he realizes his error. Nope. That a-way. Jim follows a corridor down into a series of computing labs, characterized by frazzled-looking science personnel grouped around various consoles, stacks of PADDS, and abandoned thermos cups everywhere. 

 

Yeah. Seems like the place. Jim strides through the door the PADD informs him as Uhura’s designated station this shift and immediately dances backward to avoid T’Pring, who is exiting at the same time. 

 

“Captain Kirk,” she greets, a little stiffly, but then…Vulcans are a stiff people. 

 

“Chief Science Officer,” he returns her greeting, and steps to the side to let her pass. He blinks. The tips of her ears? Were they? No. Jim shakes himself. Not a lot of sleep lately. That’s what it was. He heads through the door. 

 

Uhura chases him out from her well-organized sanctum almost immediately. “Absolutely not,” she says, cutting off Jim’s smarmy, “Hey Uhura!”

 

She points back towards the door. “Out.”

 

“Hey,” Jim protests, “I could have something really important to discuss with my Communications Officer!”

 

She arches a brow and waits.

 

“I mean, ok, there’s nothing in particular, but I could have,” Jim tries to defend.

 

“Out,” she says again, emphasizing her point with another jab of her finger toward the door.

 

Jim knows when he’s been beaten. “Ok, fine,” he grumbles. Uhura’s such a meany! “I hope you didn’t chase Chief Science Officer T’Pring off like this,” he calls back over his shoulder.

 

It was a real shot in the dark, but he catches sight of a dull blush rising in her cheeks before she snaps back around to the console she’d been working on.

 

Well, well, well. How interesting. Jim will log that away. 

 

Thwarted, and not willing to expose his buttcheeks to any kind of Doctor on Captain Hypo Retaliation, Jim heads back to the Enterprise, re-dons his smock, and resignedly begins the search for the troublesome transistor, which consists of Jim removing one section of paneling inserting the probe deep inside the maze of wires, connections and feeds running to and from the mainframe, and every time he needs it to look to the left, recalling it, manually repositioning it, and inserting it back in.

 

---

 

Jim is able to snag a few hours of sleep after his shift, but he dreams of looking upward, the alien reaching for him, and the terror of the dream doesn’t recede when he jerks awake, because it had got him, it had got him . Like being dragged away by the monster under the bed except that hadn’t been real and this was. Fuck. He remembers the vertigo of being yanked upside-down and up through the vent. His stomach churns. 

 

Briefing number two with the Tihet Squad is scheduled for this shift. Jim sonics so long his skin tingles all through the breakfast he forces himself to eat. He tries oatmeal, but only manages to finish it because he’s paranoid the Vulcans will be able to hear his stomach growling if he doesn’t.

 

He has time to spend an hour or so searching fruitlessly for the damn transistor of troubles in the corridor outside the mainframe. When the 10-minute warning beeps on his PADD, he greets it with a heartfelt, “Thank fuck .” He recalls the probe and then leaves the kit there next to the bulkhead panel on the floor. There are some perks to being locked in the Engineering Bay. Relaxed safety measures are one. Surely there are some more to be found. If he thinks about it.

 

The briefing is set for the simulator prep room again, and it was a pretty relaxed atmosphere before, so Jim decides to keep his maintenance jumpsuit on. Nothing has leaked on him (though the shift is young yet). His v-necked blue undershirt has shrunk a little bit since he got it, so if Jim unzips the jumpsuit to his navel, there’s the barest hint of skin when he stretches. Always good to have options.

 

---

 

The squad is once again attired in their dark fatigues, and their attentiveness to what Jim has to say has not diminished, and is still immensely gratifying. (Though Hudson saying ‘No way man!’ in response to some new bit of bullshittery that Jim reveals was validating at first, it gets kind of old after a while.)

 

Jim goes over the Alien hunting patterns, how impossible it is to shake off their pursuit, how they retrace previous routes and like to double-back when searching, how important it is to be able to identify the sounds of them crawling around through the walls and ceilings.

 

“They favor ambush, but they do make a lot of goddamn noise. If it’s quiet they probably aren’t around,” he finishes explaining.

 

“Probably?” Ocampo queries.

 

“Yeah, about that,” Jim sighs. “It could also be quiet because they’re waiting up ahead of you. Either in a vent opening or on the other side of a door.”

 

There’s a silence as that tidbit is observed, then, predictably, “No way man, that’s bullshit. These things are bullshit,” from Hudson.

 

Stonn looks at Jim and taps on his PADD. After a moment Jim gets it. Wrap it up. Probably about to be designated simulator time.

 

“They cooperated enough to build a nest, and I saw three together, distracted by the device Commander Spock crafted when the two of us escaped, but the ones that fled the reactor purge of their nest did not group up. My experience on Sevastopol was with solitary hunters. But is that the species norm or just behavior due to the constraints of their environment? If there is a similar situation on Acheron…I can’t say how they might behave, planetside.” Jim finishes with a sigh, and gives a nod to Stonn.

 

Stonn stands, and those of his squad sitting jump to their feet, and those standing or leaning snap to attention. “That is why the simulation slated for this shift will be a series of tactics and responses to swarm encounters.” He steps back and Hudson jumps forward.

 

“Okay, yeah, this is all bullshit,” he reminds the squad, “But you heard Commander Stonn, lock and load special forces, let's get rockin and rollin’! ”

 

“How does one ‘rockin and rollin?” Arev asks the giant of a man beside him. 

 

Bronze-skinned and muscled like a god, Palmer answers him most mysteriously, “It is the sum of the human experience, the meaning of which cannot be conveyed by a simple explanation.”

 

Arev blinks. Frost sets his pack on the bench next to where the two are standing and begins checking its contents, imparting his musical wisdom to Arev as he does. “Tall Man here listens to Orion pop quintets, and XO listens to 22nd century American heartbreak twang, they don’t know anything about actual rock and roll.”

 

Arev looks as befuddled as Jim is ever likely to see a Vulcan look. Ocampo strolls up, ready to go by the looks of it, rifle slung over her shoulder. “I dunno, legend is that XO went to a Diva Plavalaguna Concert once. Wore a tux and everything.”

 

Arev mouths the word, ‘tux’, as almost the entire squad says in chorus with Hudson, “No way man!”

 

Jim laughs along with everyone, returns a few waves and nods farewell, just like the last time, and exits the prep room, once again followed by Stonn. “I have a briefing to submit via long-range comms,” Stonn comments. “If it is your intention to return to the Engineering Bay, our paths will converge until Deck Transit Hall A.”

 

Jim gives him flirty eyes. “Well if our paths converge, then, by all means.”

 

Stonn nods, and they walk side by side down the hallway. Jim lets Stonn take the lead, because…Transit Hall A? Maybe he’ll recognize it when he sees it. 

 

Stonn is a solid presence beside him, ruggedly handsome, interested, and obviously well-attuned to human interactions. A month ago Jim would have been all over that. But now…he’s not sure if Stonn makes an offer what he’ll answer. 

 

The fact of the matter is, he could have jumped into bed with a number of interested individuals, both on Yel Rihk and here on the Invincible. Frankly, Jim needs some sex, and his body is letting him know that Stonn is right there or! That Andorian nurse, what an armful she had been! But there’s still, still a pang of ‘not Spock’ in his breast when he seriously contemplates it. Jim’s not sure if Stonn deserves to be his ‘not Spock’ quite frankly. Not that anyone deserves that, per say, but it smacks a little too close to a Vulcan stand-in for Jim’s tastes.

 

And he can’t really explain it to Stonn, of course, because Spock had asked him not to speak of it. Yeah, it sucks being the guilty shame secret or whatever, but like Jim had said, it’s not his first rodeo. He doesn’t out anyone about sex. For any reason.

 

With a start, Jim realizes he’s zoned out, and has been walking along completely ignoring Stonn. It’s probably not the cultural insult it is for a human though, he hopes. He flicks his eyes over to Stonn, who is walking placidly beside him. 

 

Maybe he’s overthinking this. He has some recreational fun with Stonn, the end. If Stonn wants to do the mind telepathy thing, Jim will just politely decline. Just sex, one and done. Their corridor empties into the Transit Hall, which Jim does recognize, it’s the elevator bank he comes in and out of for the Engineering Bay. It’s mostly deserted, only a couple of Engineers engrossed in comparing something on their PADDS on the other side of the hall from Jim and Stonn.

 

“This is my stop,” Jim says, hits the call button for the elevator, and stretches, leaning back against the bulkhead beside the elevator when he’s finished. He’s gratified to see Stonn’s eyes flick to his waist when the little strip of skin is revealed.

 

The elevator dings incoming arrival, and Stonn says mildly, “I have noticed that only Orions, as a species, engage in stretching more than humans do.”

 

“ Do they?” Jim purrs, and stretches again, drawing it out for Stonn’s benefit, exaggeratingly reaching up and rolling his neck to get the kinks out. 

 

The clip of a boot heel and Jim drops out of the stretch to see that Spock has just exited from the elevator. 

 

Stonn turns to him. “Commander,” he greets.

 

“Commander,” Spock returns almost before Stonn’s greeting is finished. 

 

Jim is reminded unwillingly of the Sevastopol Robots. 

 

“I must continue to the long-range communications array to submit my report,” he reminds Jim, and takes his leave, joining the two Engineers as they enter an elevator down and across the hall from Jims. The elevator to the Engineering Bay is called away, and when the doors shut on Stonn’s elevator, he and Spock are alone in the hall. 

 

Jim glares at the area over Spock’s shoulder and turns to call the elevator again. Spock’s hand slams against the bulkhead, blocking Jim from reaching. Jim blinks. Uh. What? He reaches a hand up to…he’s not really sure, push the arm away or something, but Spock grabs it and pins it against the wall. His fingers begin stroking the inseams of Jim’s fingers. A current runs through him. The skin between his fingers, which he doubts he’s given a thought to in his life before this moment, lights up with sensation. There’s not even time to feel shock at how such a subtle, simple touch is turning him on like a switch has been thrown: Jim’s cock fills with blood so fast he actually gets lightheaded. 

 

Oh, Jim aches for Spock anew. He’d thought he’d been making some progress, but his contemplations of rebound sex are swept away, and seem shallow and petty compared to the sense of fulfillment that is throbbing through him. His head thunks back against the bulkhead and his eyes flutter closed. He curls his fingers around Spock’s where he’s able to. 

 

“Cease,” Spock commands, as his thumb traces patterns on Jim’s palm. Jim’s eyes flutter back open and meet Spock’s, which are pools of darkness. “Cease,” Spock repeats, softer. 

 

“But what cease?” Jim croaks out, not very coherently. Spock is close enough to smell, closer than he’s been since that brief moment they shared in Jim’s quarters. Jim breathes him in, an unfamiliar sterile smell which must be the Invincible’s laundry, and there, under it, that unique heavy scent that makes Jim’s mouth water. Abruptly, Spock releases Jim’s hand, turns on his heel, and leaves, striding away down a corridor. The heat of his presence begins to dissipate almost immediately. Jim turns his head against the bulkhead to follow Spock as he rounds the far corner at the end of the corridor. “Cease,” Jim murmurs, and his eyes flutter closed again.

 

End Chapter THREE

Notes:

Fun fic fact: The uh...little scene at the end there came to me as I was driving so I was just SWEATING as I desperately tried to hold it in my head until I could get to a medium to take it down.

RANDOM ALIEN UPDATE: THERE IS AN ALIEN TV SERIES COMING THIS SUMMER (fx i think?) SAW IT ON HULU I AM CHOMPING AT THE BIT PLEASE DONT SUCK PLEASE DONT SUCK PLEASE DONT SUCK

Easter Eggs: 11 (I was not kidding about cranking it up in part 2 lmao)

Chapter 4: Transistor

Summary:

Jim is surrounded by people who can't take a joke (Bones), hypo wielding maniacs (Bones), and people who won't acknowledge that Jim is the modern day Emma and let him manage their love lives (also Bones).

Notes:

I love my betafish! <3 (itsme-theborgqueen)!

CHAPTER 6 is done! VIVE LA CHAPTER 7!!! :DDDD

And here we have a lovely chapter that absolutely did not take 3 years off the top of my lifespan.

I adore all of you and your amazing comments!!! Please enjoy this surprisingly long chapter! :3

Jim’s eyes snap open. What the hell was that?! He feels like he could melt into a puddle of delirious happiness, and his cock is insistent that it needs some attention but what the hell was that though?!  

 

Cease? Cease what? Flirting? Trolling around the Invincible? Being his attractive self? 

 

What in the mixed signals was that?!

 

Jim fumbles for the elevator call button again and makes his way back to the Enterprise in a daze. He isn’t aware of who he passes by on his way to his ship, but is thankful that when he wanders into her airlock (depressurization process disabled due to her docked status) that his maintenance jumpsuit, unzipped as it is, is loose enough to hide a multitude of sins. Hopefully no one noticed his awkward gait. He makes his way to his quarters and stands just inside for a moment, mind blank, then reaches a hand behind him and manages to hit the manual lock for the door.

 

Spock. Spock. Goddamn him. Jim wants him, wants him .

 

Jim stumbles forward and sinks to his knees. With trembling fingers, he unzips his jumpsuit all the way down and peels it off his shoulders. He gets the waistband of his boxer briefs down just far enough to pull his cock out and fists himself, crying out and falling down onto his free elbow. 

 

“Fuck, fuck!”

 

His fingers scrabble on the worn utilitarian carpet as his back bows. His hand is rough and dry on his aching, heated flesh but it doesn’t matter, oh god, Spock!

 

Images flash through his mind. Dark eyes. Curved lips. Pointed ear tips. That cock, fuck! The heavy nodes, the rounded slit! Spock’s hand pressing his against the bulkhead, fingers entwined with his.

 

He works himself without mercy, too much, too fast but he doesn’t stop. “Yes,” he groans. He's gonna! He reaches out with his free arm, manages to snag the edge of a discarded maintenance smock and pulls it awkwardly under him just as his cock begins to spasm in his hand. He tilts his head down to see his dick shoot out heavy ropes of cum onto it. He grits his teeth as he keeps coming, working himself still, hand becoming slick with his own seed as he shoots again, and again and again. 

 

At last it tapers off, and Jim releases his sensitive, weeping cock and collapses on his side, a sweaty shuddering mess, half in bliss, half in shock.

 

Jim is not seventeen, and hasn’t been for more years than he’s comfortable with, and even then, fuck has he ever come that fast in his life?

 

He lies there in a sort of lassitude, which between the sweat and semen cooling on him and the rock-hard surface of his floor, doesn’t last long.

 

Ugh. He needs a shower. Does it count as a walk of shame if it’s from your own room? What is Jim doing ? He was making progress, he was! But Spock’s little hand fondling stunt has kindled a flame of stupid hope in him. Maybe, Spock wants…?

 

‘You’re an idiot, James Tiberius,’ he tells himself as he sits up and zips back into his jumpsuit and then stands and gathers up a change of clothing, awkwardly tossing the soiled smock in the trash chute as he does. ‘If he does want, why the hell should you agree?’

 

But of course, that’s his inner Bones talking. Jim will take whatever is offered to him. Just like he always does. And this time, oh he wants it so bad this time. 

 

---

 

Jim’s next two cycles pass in a haze defined by brief moments of hunger and the interminable search for the transistor. When he’s not teamed up with Keenser, tackling more intensive maintenance issues, he searches for that damn thing, with no results (Jim is beginning to take it personal). 

 

His sleep is categorized by nightmares, and the effects begin to show by the slight bags under his eyes. Every hour that passes is an hour closer to Acheron. He eats when his body demands it, but can never manage more than a few bites here and there, his normal favorites becoming completely unappetizing even as the bite finds its way into his mouth. 

 

Bones is pulling double shifts himself, formulating the new quarantine procedures for the Invincible’s Medical Bay and preparing the report thereof for Captain Saavik. They barely see one another, and when Jim does catch sight of him, he looks just as awful as Jim feels. There’s a sort of mutual unspoken truce where they don’t mention it to each other. 

 

And of course, there’s Spock. Always at the edges of Jim’s mind. Added to the constant low-grade wanting of him and the ache of loss renewed in his chest, there’s an element of confusion. Is Jim being rejected? What is going on in that Vulcan mind of his? Does he think about Jim at all?

 

He’s groggy when he enters Ship’s Living at the start of his third shift cycle since Spock went off his Vulcan rails and threw any semblance of order Jim had been able to organize himself into once more into shambles. His sleep was, as Demora would say, doodoo, and he’s wondering if he can maybe wrangle a hot chocolate or something out of Becky in lieu of breakfast.

 

He’s not even got the one metaphorical cylinder up and running, so when Uhura accosts him with a sharp, “Captain Kirk,” before he’s made it three steps into the room, it’s safe to say he’s not at his best. 

 

The “Waugh, Uhura!” He yelps in response is demonstrative of this.

 

She doesn’t even appear to notice.

 

“When were you going to tell me, Captain, that Commander Spock’s mother is Amanda Greyson ?” Uhura asks, and then waits expectantly. 

 

She is obviously operating under the assumption that Jim A. knows who Amanda Greyson is, and B. knows that this is Spock’s mother.

 

“Uhhh,” he says, “I knew his mother is human and her name is Greyson, but Uhura that is the extent of my knowledge.”

 

He makes to dodge around her to Becky and the promise of a warm beverage of some caloric value.

 

She blocks him. “Amanda Greyson. The Amanda Greyson?”

 

Jim attempts to convey his complete lack of knowledge through his gaze. ‘Look at me,’ he thinks, ‘there are no higher thought processes for you to interrogate at the moment.’

 

Uhura makes a frustrated sound. “The woman who practically invented galactic standard? The forefront of linguistic ancestral tracing? The lauded genius who just submitted a prototype for a universal translator to the Federation Ministry of Communication?”

 

“Wow,” Jim says. “She sounds really great?”

 

Uhura makes a noise that Jim hasn’t heard since she threatened to stuff him into one of the Enterprise’s torpedo tubes and fire him off into space. (Jim had to regretfully inform her the Enterprise is not armed with Photon Torpedos).

 

“I spent weeks, weeks, at warp jump with her child and I had no idea! All of that time, wasted!”

 

Suddenly she slumps, and plops down at the replicator counter. “I could have asked what coffee she prefers or whether it’s true she developed all of the verb conjugations in a single night,” she says mournfully to the counter.

 

“There, there,” Jim says awkwardly, and gives her a couple of hesitant pats on the back. Uhura rounds on him with murder in her eyes.

 

Jim holds his hands up in surrender. “Don’t murder me, I don't have any spare brain cells at the moment, I had alien nightmares all night.”

 

The look she gives him is full of suspicion, and then she seems to take in his somewhat rougher than normal appearance. A sympathetic look appears in her eyes, and she programs him a steaming cup of something from Becky.

 

“Brown sugar milk tea,” she informs him. “Or rather, its replicator equivalent,” she qualifies after a moment. 

 

Jim takes it and sips cautiously. Ooo. That’s really nice. He sighs. 

 

Uhura’s PADD beeps from over on one of the smaller tables and she stands. “Try to take it easy Captain,” she says, and then she gives him a couple of soothing pats on the back. 

 

Oh boy. Jim’s appearance must be several levels more dire than he’d thought. 

 

She collects her PADD and exits Ship’s Living. 

 

Jim reflects on this fantastic tea, Spock, Spock’s apparently legendary mother, and his chances of ever getting to have anything with Spock again. After a revelation like that, he thinks they’ve gone down a bit. 

 

He’s excited to team up with Keenser to tackle Bridge console maintenance, but it’s short lived. They were both expecting to burn two shift cycles on it, at least. Instead, the work is completed in a mere half of a shift. Jim stands beside the Pilot’s console, arms crossed, boot tapping the ground, face scrunched up in confusion. “I don’t understand it. These bulky monstrosities should have had us troubleshooting so hard we were in tears.”

 

Keenser grunts, checking something on his PADD. “Commander,” he says, and hands the PADD to Jim, who takes it in reflexive surprise.

 

He blinks. Calibration logs run during their warp-jump to Sevastopol. Signed by Science Officer Spock Greyson, with an addendum added during the warp-jump to Yel Rihk, correcting the signature to Commander Spock of the Investigative Forces.

 

Keenser rubs his hands together. “Easy,” he says with no small amount of satisfaction and begins to pack up his tool kit. Not that they had to use much of them anyway. 

 

Jim shakes himself out of his Spock induced stupor. “What’s next?”

 

Keenser points at himself, “Core,” and then at Jim. 

 

‘Oh no please,’ Jim thinks.

 

“Transistor,” he says.

 

Goddamnit.

 

He doesn’t manage to locate the transistor, though it’s no surprise. He’s just going through the motions, stuffing the probe in and then recalling it over and over. He’ll have to redo this whole section next shift.

 

His time is spent picturing Spock, buttoned up in a collared shirt, ridiculous wig and all, methodically running test after test, calibrating each of the bridge consoles in turn. Maybe the Enterprise really does need a Science Officer. Or she just needs Spock. Or Jim does. On his ship in his bed in his mind. Whenever wherever however. Jim is beyond trouble now. There’s in deep and there’s wherever it is that he’s hanging out.

 

Fuck. 

 

Bones cannot find out about this.

 

As he preps for his sleep cycle, (such as it is at the moment), he glares at himself in the bathroom mirror over the sink. ‘I will not have nightmares about Sevastopol. I will not have horny Spock dreams,’ he tells himself, and nods sharply. 

 

That night, he has both.

 

----

 

He wakes feeling like one of Scotty’s less satisfactory conductor coils for the warp core. All shriveled up and twisted into knots. A whimper tries to emerge from his throat but he clamps down on it. 

 

When he stumbles over to the head he catches a glimpse of himself in his mirror and winces. The space under his eyes is shadowed and his cheeks are starting to look slightly hollowed. 

 

He forces down a breakfast of fruit that doesn’t sit all that well with him but he vaguely feels that fruit is good for the skin or something. It can’t hurt at least. He also chokes down one of Bones’ foul health drinks he has the audacity to label as ‘smoothies’ in Becky’s replicator menu. According to Bones they’re chock full of vitamins and antioxidants and all kinds of good for you nasty stuff like that. 

 

Jim feels a brief sense of pride after he finishes it. He can so take care of himself. Bones is just a giant mother hen, complete with the clucking and the brooding over the eggs. 

 

The first part of his shift passes. The transistor remains troublesome and un-located. Which is just par for the course. ‘Act like you don’t want it,’ Jim tells himself as he retrieves the probe for what is probably the millionth time. He shrugs, dumps the probe kit on the ground, and tells the bulkhead, “I don’t give a shit about the transistor, keep it. Also fuck you.” And he turns and marches away. 

 

Good. Let the innards of the bulkhead sit on that for a while. Lull it into a false sense of security. Jim needs a break. He’ll pop in on Chekov. Seeing Chekov always makes Jim feel like he’s doing something right. 

 

Anticipating the unsuccessful nature of his transistor search, Jim has worn an Enterprise flight suit instead of a maintenance jumpsuit or smock. (Though really, the only difference between the flight suit and the jumpsuit is a few less pockets and zippers, slightly less sturdy material). He fiddles with the zipper for a moment then zips it up to his collarbones, which tightens the flight suit over all, and does fantastic things to his ass. Jim turns slightly and looks down at his rear. ‘It’s all up to you, buddy,’ he thinks, ‘you’re gonna hafta carry us today, the face is looking rough.’ It really is such a nice ass. Does Spock appreciate what’s on offer here? Jim shakes himself before he can descend once again into the Spock melancholy depression loop. Chekov. Right. Jim strides off purposefully.

 

---

 

Jim stands before Chekov’s empty station, arms crossed, tapping his foot. Sulu runs his hands frustratedly through his hair. 

 

“He was right here, I swear!” Jim looks pointedly at the empty chair. No Chekov. 

 

Sulu groans. “He’s like a hamster! A science hamster! Cute! Adorable! Scampers all over the place! Pokes his little hamster nose into every experiment!”

 

Jim snorts and scans the open floor plan of this area of the science labs. No sign of him. Jim sighs. “I’ll check around here. You make sure no one kidnapped him to the bridge; he’s not scheduled there today.”

 

Sulu nods and strides off. 

 

Jim heads for the exotic vegetable monster lab or whatever they call it. Maybe Chekov went there looking for Sulu. He’s halfway there when a particularly Russian-sounding laugh jerks his head to the side. Acute Mathematics Lab. Oh boy. Obvious in retrospect. They might as well paste a picture of Chekov’s face next to the sign above the open door. 

 

As Jim draws closer he can make out a rapid-fire conversation, the subject of which gradually becomes clear.

 

Spock. They’re talking about Spock. Chekov and…Jim peeks around the edge of the open door to the lab. Lt. Tam. They’re both clad in Federation pullovers, though Chekov’s retains his Enterprise patch. 

 

“Yes! Specialist Uhura told me about ze Commander’s mother,” Chekov is saying.

 

“Aha! Yes, but did you know that his father is Ambassador Sarek?” Lt. Tam responds mischievously.

 

Chekov practically vibrates in excitement. “We saw ze Ambassador when we docked at ze Yel-Rihk!”

 

“And guess which Vulcan House they hail from?” 

 

Chekov looks every inch of his seventeen years as he gazes at Lt. Tam in rapt wonder, eyes wide.

 

“The Ancient and Most Noble House of Surak,” she proclaims solemnly. 

 

Chekov gasps. “Surak? Ze Surak? Ze founder of Logic?”

 

Even Jim knows who that is and what that means. A fog descends over his thoughts. Ok. So Spock is Vulcan royalty. Or thereabouts. And his mother is Amanda Greyson (he’s done some research). Oh boy. 

 

“Keptin!” Chekov cries delightedly, spotting him where he’s lurking in the doorway. Jim gives himself a little shake, and steps into the small lab, which is little more than a giant computing module, lines of numbers continuously being calculated running down every screen. Every so often a happy sounding little ‘beep’ will chirp. He lifts a hand in greeting. “Lt. Tam,” he says.

 

“Hello Captain Kirk!” She says cheerfully.

 

“Keptin, guess what?” Chekov grins at him.

 

Jim dredges a somewhat abstracted smile up. “What?”

 

“Lt. Tam is ze one who designed Mr. Spock’s wig, Ketpin!”

 

The fog lifts somewhat from Jim. He gives her a grin that comes easily. “You’re responsible for the hair?” He laughs when she nods. “Great job, it was so stupid, I loved it! If someone had told me he was a Vulcan I would have pointed to the hair and said, ‘no he’s not you’re an idiot.’”

 

She grins back at him. “It was weeks in design, it had to hide the eyebrows, the ears, and he had to be able to attach it and make sure it layed properly by himself, and then he would veto everything and so it would be back to the design board!” Lt. Tam pauses to take a few breaths.

 

Jim grins again. He understands the delight that comes with finding an outlet to vent your frustration to; Clearly Tam has been dying to find a sympathetic ear to listen to her wig troubles.

 

“And then suddenly he was being inserted into his cover without warning and it had to be fabricated and he was just stuck with it because he had to ship out to Acheron in thirty minutes!”

 

It hits Jim over the head like a two by four.

 

“Spock was on Acheron. I…forgot about that.” Jim goes slightly rigid as he suppresses a shudder. How close was Spock to…to Jim never even meeting him .

 

Lt. Tam’s voice cuts through the slightly panicked direction his thoughts have taken. “Only for two hours, Captain Kirk. He noticed nothing more than that the Starfleet employees who had to accommodate his transfer appeared to be disgruntled for some reason.”

 

Jim snorts. “If he was informing them about their lack of efficiency or how best to convey him to the Enterprise, I’m sure they were disgruntled.”

 

She laughs, then looks guilty. She says earnestly, “He was raised on Vulcan, and I’m afraid the only humans he knows have lived and worked with Vulcans so long, we weren't very good examples of…of…”

 

“Actual Humanity?” Jim jokes.

 

She laughs again. “Yes,” she says ruefully. 

 

“How was Spock inserted into Starfleet as a Science Officer?” Jim asks, his curiosity really piqued. 

 

“A Starfleet executive facing Orion slave trafficking charges was offered a deal by Federation Prosecutors.”

 

“Well that sucks,” Jim says flatly. 

 

Tam looks unhappy for a moment, then her face brightens up. “Yes, we weren’t pleased how they delivered, but I heard that he was caught trying to skip out to a Romulan border planet and thus forfeited his deal with the Federation! He may already be doing time on MS One.”

 

“Happy ending,” muses Chekov. All three take a moment to contemplate the satisfying karmic nature of the story. 

 

After a moment, Lt. Tam gives Jim a hesitant look, and upon meeting the encouraging glance Jim gives her in response says haltingly, “Captain Kirk, about the other day, during the Task Force Briefing…”

 

“Yeah, ok, what was going on with that?” Jim fills in her silence when she trails off. He can’t pretend that that whole fiasco doesn’t still sting a little.

 

“I want to apologize for Tolek’s behavior, if I may.”

 

Jim doesn’t pretend to not know who she is talking about. “He had it cranked up into Vulcan high gear,” he says, trying to stay somewhat diplomatic.

 

Chekov looks back and forth between them, avidly following the conversation.

 

Lt. Tam rubs her hands along her thighs, “He’s actually very protective of the Commander. Spock faced a lot of difficulty in his early days in the Investigative Forces, other Vulcans have sometimes not been very welcoming towards Spock, because he excels at just everything, and is very good about letting other Vulcans know about it, which I personally think he gets from Ambassador Sarek because this one time..! But anyways, Tolek has always stood by him and respected him and supported him, he’s very devoted! His behavior during the task force was…” She trails off again, searching for the right word.

 

“King of the bitches?” Jim inserts, diplomacy be damned.

 

“Unusually harsh,” She finishes, giving Jim an unimpressed look. He gives her a ‘what can you do’ shrug in response. 

 

She swallows and twists her hands together. “I think among the Vulcans in the Commander’s team, there’s some kind of erroneous belief that Spock was mistreated by the crew of the Enterprise when his true identity was revealed.”

 

Jim gapes. 

 

Chekov gapes.

 

“Huh?” They both say together intelligently.

 

“The Commander, he…isn’t the same as when he left,” Tam does her best to explain.

 

“He went through something…ah…pretty traumatic,” Jim hedges. They’ve all heard the reports, but Jim doubts very much that Spock has shared how it has affected him any more than Jim himself has.

 

Tam bites her lip. “There’s a sense that it was something more…personal,” she hedges her words as well.

 

Jim does his best not to go white as a sheet. He swallows.

 

“Whatever it is that Commander Spock is…having difficulties with, I can assure you that it doesn’t have anything to do with my crew and their treatment of him pre or post Vulcan revelation,” he says seriously.

 

Chekov nods furiously next to him, his cheeks puffed out earnestly, and Jim does his best not to recall Sulu’s hamster comment.

 

Jim’s PADD beeps and he pulls up a message from Sulu confirming Chekov isn’t on the bridge. Jim responds with Chekov’s actual location, and then checks the time.

 

He sighs. “Well, that’s it for my break, I’ve got to get back to my maintenance issues.”

 

“Good luck and Godspeed Keptin,” Chekov salutes him seriously. 

 

Jim laughs. “Guess Keenser has been filling you in.”

 

“We are confident zat you will emerge wictorious!”

 

Jim snorts.

 

“Have fun…” Jim gives up trying to guess whatever it is that Chekov’s doing and just waves a hand generally at the computations ongoing around him.

 

Chekov nods happily.

 

“Oh yeah, and let Sulu know when you’re hopping from one station to the other, yeah?”

 

Chekov looks guilty. “Oops, yes, I will do zat Keptin.”

 

Jim and Tam exchange a cordial farewell and he heads back to the Docking Bay and his ship. If only he had Chekov’s confidence about that damn transistor. Jim is preoccupied on his walk back to the Enterprise, but not so preoccupied that he doesn’t notice the two or three booty checks he gets on the way. Alone in the lift down to the Docking Bay he gives his ass a grateful pat. ‘Thank god for you, buddy,’ he thinks.

 

The weight of his continual failure to locate the transistor presses on him as he walks through the Enterprise back to his designated searching area. He feels so heavy that he might as well take a face plant into the floor plating of the corridor when he arrives at his spot. 

 

Forcing himself to remain upright, Jim picks up the search where he’d left off. Deploy probe. Recall probe. Manually turn probe. Repeat. 

 

Jim sighs and tries to stay focused but the monotony is just…! He winds up abandoning the search after about half an hour and finds himself sitting in the mainframe running (completely legitimate and useful!) code checks when a sound from behind him (judgmental Roylan breathing, he identifies belatedly) causes him to turn and then fall out of the chair in surprise because Keenser has yet again snuck up on him. 

 

“Find,” Keenser says to Jim, whose hand is over his heart, doing his level best to prevent it from leaping free from his chest.

 

It’s not a question because they both know the answer. “No,” Jim says sullenly anyway. Keenser half turns to stare pointedly at the probe kit lying back in the corridor. 

 

Jim bites back a wail of despair. “Need any help in Engineering?” He asks hopefully.

 

“No,” Keenser grunts.

 

“You sure?” Jim coaxes, “No fluid lines that are waiting to go and cover me in oil or gunk or what have you?”

 

Jim knows Keenser always enjoys those moments. 

 

Keenser looks visibly conflicted for a split second before giving a sniff and grunting, “no,” again. 

 

Damn. Jim sighs. “Fine, fine, I’m going.”

 

Keenser nods and starts to leave.

 

“Can’t boss me around, I'm the Captain,” he mutters as he picks himself off of the floor. 

 

An unimpressed “sure,” floats back down the hallway. 

 

Jim glares. Sassy little…! Scotty may be a Scottish drama queen, but Jim is starting to think he’s onto something when he starts ranting and raving about Keenser and his cheek.

 

With a groan of defeat, Jim gets back to it. He tries to keep his thoughts focused on his job, he really does, but it’s not long before his mind turns to his conversation with Lt. Tam, and he’s once again obsessing over Spock. 

 

And Spock is…a rare and exceptional being. Unique in all the universe in a way probably no other being can claim. Brains, talent, mental and physical beauty. The pedigree alone! The son of a Federation Ambassador, descendant of Surak himself, if Tam is to be believed. The son of Amanda Greyson, the shining star of humanity’s progress on the galactic stage. A bridge between two worlds.

 

He’s…objectively as close to perfect as a being can get. 

 

Jim is lucky he got what he got. 

 

The facts are the facts. 

 

Spock is too good for Jim. 

 

---

 

Post-shift finds Jim reviewing his crew’s schedules in the mess, nursing a bowl of what Roberto has the nerve to label as ‘soup’. He notes that Bones is synced up with him at the moment, meaning Bones should be in here for his dinner, but there’s no sign of him. Jim gives it two more bites of his soup and fifteen more minutes of Spock pining before he goes in search of him. 

 

Surprisingly he doesn’t have to go far, Bones’ schedule has him logged in Medical on the Enterprise. 

 

It’s a quiet and lonely walk to Medical. There’s no hum of the engines at warp, no subtle vibrations beneath his feet, no intermittent comms to and from the Bridge or Engineering going off. It’s not that Jim usually runs into his crew when he walks through his ship, everyone has their stations and duties and that doesn’t usually cover wandering the corridors, but it feels empty because Jim knows the majority of them aren’t even on board at the moment, instead of just working out of sight at their stations. 

 

He shakes himself. Just…get onto Acheron, get off of Acheron (in one piece and with no hijackers), and they are free and clear to fly where they will, with a decent enough compensation package. Jim shoves the worries of the Enterprise’s future career from his mind. One crisis at a time.

 

He reaches his destination and the door to Medical swooshes open to reveal Bones, looking fantastic in a blue scrub-style pullover (Enterprise patch on the high yet loose collar of his neck), conducting a review of the Enterprise’s medical supplies. 

 

“How’s it look?” Jim asks conversationally as he hops up on a counter by the entrance.

 

Bones grunts. “First damn chance I’ve gotten to make sure the Yel Rihk resupplied us like they said.”

 

Jim gives a noncommittal hum in answer. 

 

“Whatdyou want?” Bones throws over his shoulder crabbily. 

 

Jim will be magnanimous in victory. “It’s dinner time, gotta make sure you eat something.” Butter wouldn't melt in James T. Kirk’s mouth. 

 

Jim swears he can hear Bones’ teeth grind. But he has no response which is, of course, utter capitulation in Bones-speak. 

 

Jim smirks but has the sense to wipe it from his face when Bones whips around to glare at Jim like he can sense how Jim’s thinking he’s gonna report this moment to Uhura and Scotty and well… everyone. Ah, Karma. The Doctor receiving a taste of his own medicine. Smart enough for once not to push his own luck, Jim stays silent, watching with relish the irritation simmering in the tense lines of Bones’ shoulders.

 

“Apparently,” Bones snaps, breaking the silence, “the Commander at some unknown point in time took it upon himself to arrange for a full medical resupply, because his signature is on the transfer documentation from the Yel Rihk.”

 

“Spock?” Jim says in surprise. Well that has got to be just killing Bones. On one hand, shiny new medical supplies that they didn’t have to pay for. On the other hand, Bones brooks no encroachment upon his domain, and for it to have been Spock in particular! (Jim doubts that Bones will ever forgive Spock for daring to (and succeeding!) in thwarting Bones’ medical checkups and masquerading as a human right under Bones’ nose).

 

Jim can’t stop his face from softening at the thought of Spock, conscientiously attending to the Enterprise’s every need, silently and efficiently.

 

“Oh for!” Bones glares at him irritably.

 

Jim tries and fails to gain control of his dopey look.

 

“Damnit Jim, you made it weird but in an even worse way, You’re the one haunting me , begging for Spock scraps, I can’t believe it.”

 

Jim flinches. It’s obvious even to Bones. Jim is not special, and beyond his luckily above-average (for a human) physical attributes, there’s nothing much memorable about him at all. 

 

“You’re right, I need to get over it. The guy is way out of my league. I’m good for the one fuck around and that’s it.” Jim nods sharply and reiterates, “I need to get over it.”

 

“What the hail- !” 

 

Jim blinks as Bones seems to swell up like a bullfrog, but is interrupted by a chirp from his pants. 

 

Jim gapes as Bones pulls out a shiny Federation-issued communicator from his front pocket. 

 

“McCoy here,” he answers tersely. 

 

“Dr. M’Benga is requesting you for a consultation on an emergency surgery Doctor,” a voice on the other end relays swiftly. “An Ensign has had an aneurysm.”

 

“I’m on my way,” Bones replies, and snaps the communicator shut in one move. 

 

Jim is already moving forward to take Bones’ inventory PADD from his hands. “Go, I’ll finish up for you here and no I will not accidentally hypo myself and die, Captain’s honor.”

 

Bones relinquishes the PADD, gives him a sharp nod, and departs Medical at a swift trot. 

 

There’s something really to be said for that Vulcan efficiency and obsession with perfection because everything is where it’s logged in to be, nothing is missing, and all of it is labeled with ruthless precision. Jim finishes it up, slaps his Captain’s credentials on it, and heads to his quarters, determined to get A. Sleep and B. good sleep.

 

---

 

Well he succeeds at A. but not so much at B. Upon waking Jim feels…not great. He can’t recall any specific nightmares, but he just feels like…he’s grieving something, somehow. Weighted and sad. He rolls over to check his schedule on his PADD and sees that the Bones Medical Meeting with Captain Saavik is upcoming this shift.

 

Jim has got to shake this…whatever it is off. He feels like he spent all night searching for something precious, only to have lost it forever. It’s a damn sight better than reliving some of the more choice moments from Sevastopol, but the heavy feeling it leaves him with is hard to shake. He knows just what to blame for this stupid state of affairs too! Dumbass transistor! For fuck’s sake, this is getting ridiculous. He doesn’t even care if he finds it or not. …Okay, maybe he cares a little, but still!

 

He doesn’t look as awful as yesterday in the mirror, when he splashes water on his face at the sink, so that’s something, anyway.

 

Jim pulls on a nice pair of slacks and one of his new gold pullovers (three more have appeared in his room since the first, and Jim does his best to banish the image of Chekov scampering around in Jim’s quarters like a…dammit Sulu!). He fusses in the mirror until he’s crisp and clean, not a hair out of place. They are headed into professional battle with the Weasel, and so help Jim, they will not lose. He will do everything in his power to support Bones. 

 

Jim is sat at the replicator counter, sipping on one of those foul ‘smoothies’ when Bones strides out from crew quarters, pristine and shining in his crispest medical whites. He’s not sure that Bones notices the smoothie at all, because he makes no comment, only giving Jim a grunt of acknowledgement in lieu of greeting. He replicates himself a bowl of oatmeal and then proceeds to ignore it in favor of his PADD until Jim pokes him and unsubtly takes a giant slurp of his smoothie.

 

Bones grumbles something unintelligible at him but stuffs a few spoonfuls of oatmeal into his mouth.

 

Hmmm. Risk it for the biscuit? Always. “C’mon,” Jim coaxes, “just a few more bites, you can do it.”

 

Bones’ look would strip carbon buildup from an aged circuit board, but he shovels the rest of his oatmeal into his mouth.

 

Ha! Jim knew he wouldn’t have a hypo on him yet!

 

His smirk twists off his face as he takes another slurp of the god-awful ‘smoothie’. Ugh. He may have got one over on Bones this time, but at what cost?

 

Jim’s PADD dings, and he looks at it to see that Bones has forwarded him and the other participants of the meeting his proposal for the updated quarantine procedures. He starts reading it, and absentmindedly takes another sip of the drink still in his hand. 

 

“Christ,” he mutters, making a face. Each sip is worse than the last. Chocostrawberry fusion Jim’s luscious ass. 

 

It doesn’t take him too long to review the report. It’s detailed (exact specifications and medical inventory lists Jim just skims over anyway) but streamlined. He looks up to find Bones watching him impatiently, his foot tapping and his arms folded across his chest. 

 

“Relax, would you? Your report’s unassailable.”

 

Bones breathes out and relaxes a little. “Anything you see that I missed?”

 

Jim opens his mouth to disclaim any medical knowledge whatsoever which Bones knows , but Bones rolls his eyes and clarifies. “Containment-wise, I mean.”

 

Jim shakes his head. “I agree with the methods you’ve proposed, and didn’t think of anything that could be done differently when I read through it.”

 

Bones gives him a long evaluating look.

 

“What?” Jim asks defensively. 

 

“I thought you might be a little more…invested in the quarantine procedures,” Bones says cautiously.

 

Jim winces. “Look…if it’s not alien creatures, we don’t need the quarantine. If it is…” he shifts uncomfortably.

 

“You think we still won’t need the quarantine,” Bones finishes for him.

 

“I…yeah.”

 

“So this meeting is academic for you,” Bones says, his face neutral.

 

“I wouldn’t say that,” Jim protests, “That asshat from your past is gonna be there trying to screw you over, and I don’t plan on letting that happen.”

 

Bones ‘harumphs’ like a 90-year-old grandpa instead of the vital man in his prime Jim knows him to be. “Finish your health smoothie,” he gripes, which naturally causes Jim to shudder. 

 

“I’ve had,” he jiggles the cup, “mostly half.”

 

Bones’ PADD beeps, followed a half second later by Jim’s. Oh thank god.

 

“Saved by the bell,” Jim chirps as he chucks the filth masquerading as what is normally a delightful human beverage into the trash and then straightens his pullover as he stands. 

 

Bones rolls his eyes but refrains from commenting as he stands and disposes of his oatmeal bowl and smooths down his shirt. Jim falls into step with Bones and they exit Ship’s Living and head off the Enterprise into the Invincible.

 

Bones outlines his plan for the meeting as they walk. “It’ll be a lotta medical minutia of detail flying around, so don’t feel you have to wade into unfamiliar waters.”

 

Jim snorts. “Your plan has my ‘consulting expert’ seal of approval, and I’ll say that as many times as it takes to get it through Norbert the Weasel’s thick skull.”

 

Bones chokes on a laugh, and then looks furtively around, which makes Jim roll his eyes. “No, no one heard me, Dr. Boy Scout.”

 

Bones’ fingers twitch at his side but Jim isn’t fooled. Bones may or may not have snagged a hypo on their way off the Enterprise, but he’s not gonna go for Jim out here in the open. They walk on in silence until they stop to wait for a lift. 

 

“How long do you think we’re gonna be stuck in this meeting, anyway?” Jim asks. 

 

Bones answers as the lift doors open and the two of them step inside, his brows furrowing as he thinks. “It shouldn’t take more than an hour, hour and a half tops, but if Norbert can drag it on until we’re all wishing quietly for death, he will.”

 

“Uhhhggghh,” Jim groans, “I’m already wishing quietly for death.”

 

The lift door opens and Bones gives Jim a sharp look.

 

“That was a joke, in my dramatical Jim way, it was a joke, relax,” Jim attempts to soothe.

 

Bones doesn’t respond until they’re right outside the administrative room set aside for the Medical Quarantine Review. “Your jokes suck,” he says flatly, just as he steps forward and triggers the meeting room door open. 

 

Jim’s gasp of outrage, of shock, of betrayal, of et tu brute, is drowned out by the whoosh of the automatic door. He, by the barest of margins, manages to restrain himself from flicking the back of Bones’ ear as they walk in the door. Professionalism. United against a Weasel foe. Jim guesses Bones has to channel all that thwarted hypo energy somewhere, and if he feels he needs to take cheap shots at Jim as they walk into meetings to do it, so be it. 

 

Saavik, her XO, Norbert, and a smattering of yeomen? Is that what they’re called? As well as various medical personnel are all waiting, clustered around a large round meeting table. (The round table has got to be driving Norbert loony tunes, nowhere for him to try to sit at an advantageous position in relation to Bones—Jim’s estimation of Saavik goes up another notch).

 

There’s a counter against the far wall sporting a few replicators, and the chairs at the table look cushy enough, but this is another one of those Invincible rooms with the horrific lighting, blazingly white and always glaring in the eyes. 

 

There's a round of empty greetings and pleasantries exchanged (Jim recognizes the name M’Benga from the emergency comm Bones got), and then as Captain Saavik takes her seat, they all follow. 

 

After a moment in which everyone situates themselves, Saavik nods. “We will begin when you are ready, Doctor McCoy,” she says. 

 

“Right,” Bones says, jumping into it feet first, “We’ll start with the inventory of medication and medical supplies necessary to—”

 

Jim tunes out immediately. He nods along, looks serious and involved at all the right moments, but most of his thought processes are devoted to Spock, how much he needs to stop thinking about Spock, but then how much he enjoys Spock’s (insert attribute of Jim’s choice here), but no he really should stop thinking about Spock, etc. 

 

Saavik looks just as focused as Jim’s sure she would if a flight of Klingon warbirds showed up, but he’d be willing to bet a lot she’s doing the same thing he is. Well, not the Spock thirst/shame spiral (hopefully) not that part, but the thinking about other things. She was forwarded the report. She’ll have read it. If she had any concerns she’d be bringing them up right about now. 

 

Nope. Bones has this in the bag.

 

It’s apparent after the first ten or so minutes that Bones isn’t going to need Jim’s support anyway. Norbert and his transparent attempts to misinterpret and confound the meeting are thwarted at every turn by Bones’ masterful redirects and extensive knowledge of the subject matter.

 

Jim hides a smirk behind his hand as Norbert the Weasel is once again rendered speechless, his mouth opening and closing like a fish. Jim guesses Norbert has him to thank for this state of affairs. Bones appears to be venting his spleen on Jim by channeling it into countering his nemesis at every turn. He’s like a goddamn force of nature, medically speaking. 

 

It’s the cherry on top when at the end of the meeting Saavik approves Bones’ entire plan without reservation, and dismisses out of hand the caveats and addendums Weaselbert had tried to introduce. And then, to make it that much sweeter, Norbert has to stand by and smile sickeningly as Bones is personally thanked by Captain Saavik for his surgical consult; his intervention has saved the life of an Orion ensign named Galia, one of their finest new recruits. 

 

Jim pays attention sharply for a moment to where Bones is standing next to Dr. M’Benga, as a slight flush is staining Bones’ cheeks, (one of Bones’ tells when a crush is near) but no. He’s holding firmly onto his PADD instead of dropping it, and he’s not even scowling all that particularly. No, no, looks like it’s just Bones’ standard inability to take a compliment. It’s a shame, M’Benga is a handsome man with his dark skin and strong cheekbones, and he was very supportive of Bones during the meeting. Jim could see himself giving his approval and blessing to that union easily, but oh well.

 

Jim is thrilled when they exit, containing himself until he and Bones are alone in a lift again and then bursting out with, “Weaslebert looked like a gibbering idiot!” He thumps Bones happily on the shoulder. Bones attempts to look as grumpy as ever but does not quite succeed in hiding his pleased smile and the twinkle in his eye. 

 

“Where you headed now?” Jim asks when the lift doors open. 

 

“MedBay,” Bones replies, “have to look in on that ensign, make sure the post surgery is going well.”

 

Jim nods, and escorts Bones to Medbay, the two of them discussing meeting for dinner after shift, and then walking in companionable silence. 

 

Upon their arrival, the doors to MedBay open and treat Jim to the sight of what must be the Orion ensign from the surgery, making what looks like an escape attempt, arguing with a nurse just past the check-in desk. Jim shakes his head as Bones descends upon her, shaking his finger and berating as only Bones can. Poor girl. Bones just has a sixth sense about these things. No patient stands a chance.

 

Jim lingers at the doors to MedBay a moment more, watching Bones fuss at her as he starts to bear her away, back to her room (presumably). Hmmmmm, could she be the one that Bones is gaga over? She’s fucking gorgeous, her red curls and green skin a striking combination. Could Bones have met her before her emergency surgery yesterday? Jim isn’t sure. Bones has a grumpy enough scowl on, though when is Bones not scowling, honestly? It’s not much of a tell! But there’s no accompanying blush on his cheeks. And while he’s set his PADD down and is no longer holding anything to drop, if he’s got it really bad, he may start to trip over his words. Jim listens carefully. Nope, just standard Bones bullying a patient with a torrent of Georgian fussing. Damn. No matter. Jim will find out in the end. He always finds out. 

 

---

 

Back on the Enterprise, Jim avoids his search for the transistor by catching up on various reports, updating his Captain’s Log, and sitting in on one of Chekov’s rare Engineering lessons that Scotty gives out when he has time. Scotty is pleased as punch, Jim knows (from the reports he’s just caught up on) that there’s not much more Scotty can fuss with while they’re in dry dock. The Enterprise has been given the spaceship equivalent of a full Spa treatment and she’s ‘purring like a kitten, sir!’ 

 

The three of them share a meal, joined for a while by Sulu, and then go back to their various assigned duties. Jim’s unfortunately, is the transistor search. He’s out of reports to review. 

 

Predictably, he does not manage to locate it, but he’s resigned to that at this point. If he can’t find it by the time they hit Acheron, Jim’s just gonna put in for him and Keenser to re-wire the whole damn corridor. They’ll need something to do on their jump back to Sol, anyway. (Jim tries not to think about what a bored Scotty will mean for his ship during warp jump). 

 

He’s in a pretty decent mood, all things considered, when he hits up Ship’s Living for his agreed-upon dinner with Bones. Jim’s plans include trying to tease Bones mercilessly about that exquisite patient of his, as well as the dashing Dr. M’Benga, to try and sniff out if who Bones’ actual crush is, and then go to bed after being stuck like a pincushion, but Bones is in a strange mood.

 

His responses to Jim’s digging and poking into his love life (usually a guaranteed flash point) is distracted, non-combative, listless almost. Jim prods subtly about how Bones likes working with M’Benga. He gets a grunt. He enquires disingenuously after Galia's health. That gets a him a ‘fine’ and a sign of life via a glint in Bones’ eye, but he quickly slumps back down.

 

That’s it, Jim has had it with this Georgian brooding.

 

“You know, Orion-human babies are consistently voted cutest in the Federation,” he says offhandedly, pulling out the big guns.

 

“Maybe,” Bones says, staring vacantly at the blank vid screen. 

 

Okay, what is going on here? Bones should have squawked like a maiden aunt with that one. Procreation always gets to him. 

 

“Ok, out with it,” Jim demands.

 

“Out with what?” Bones asks, looking slightly shifty.

 

“Did the Weasel get back at you somehow? Has there been petty retaliation?” Because if there has been, Jim has a perfectly actionable plan involving him, Norbert, and a laundry chute.

 

Bones traces a circle on the table. “No,” he answers.

 

“No?”

 

“No.”

 

“Then what the hell is going on with you?” Jim asks, throwing his hands up in the air.

 

Bones takes a deep breath in. “Saavik stopped by The Invincible’s MedBay. She’s offered me Norbert’s job.”

 

Jim tries to process this. “Captain Saavik,” he pauses, “has offered you,” he pauses again, “the post of CMO on the Invincible, in the Federation Forces?”

 

“Yes,” Bones answers, then winces.

 

Jim struggles to reign in the rage. Ok. So. The Vulcans haven’t gotten the memo about the crew poaching. Bones is his Doctor. On his ship. If Saavik thinks she can just waltz in here and serenade him away like ‘zat’ (as Chekov would say), she has another think coming!

 

Suddenly the rage drains from him. Chief Medical Officer on the largest, most advanced ship in the entire Federation. Think of the life Bones could lead, the respect and acknowledgement he’d receive that he has always deserved, the impact he could make, the people he would save. Jim can’t compete with that. He shouldn’t even try.

 

“Lotta shiny toys in that MedBay,” he says noncommittally after a moment.

 

Bones grunts, and stabs a spear of a green leafy something with his fork.

 

Jim sighs and shakes his head. “You should take it.”

 

Bones drops his fork, the leafy bits still attached to it. “ What?”

 

“You should take it,” Jim says again, more firmly this time.

 

Bones starts to get a thunderous look on his face. “Jim, don’t be a—“

 

Jim stands and cuts him off with, “Let’s face it Bones. The Enterprise is sinking. Sulu’s halfway out the door, Chekov’s gonna be gone when he hits eighteen, Uhura hasn’t set foot on this boat since we docked with the Yel Rihk, and Scotty and Keenser will have to be pried off of the Invincible’s warp core casing with blunt force trauma. It’s the brilliant career move that you’ve deserved since med school. Take it.”

 

He shoves himself away from the table, leaving a white-faced Bones sitting there, and strides back to his quarters and slaps the lock with the back of his hand as he enters, and then irritably has to rub the sting from his knuckles.

 

Jim tries his best to think about nothing at all. Not Bones, crew, ship, Spock…or Acheron drawing nearer and nearer with each breath he takes. He strips to his briefs and dumps himself into bed face first.

 

Nothing, nothing, nothing, think of nothing.

 

-----

 

He wakes like a man rising from the grave, and the less said about his ‘sleep’, the better. In a fog, he performs his morning routine and pulls on a pair of work pants and a maintenance smock. He stalks into Ship’s Living, ready to throw down if he has to, and then nearly collapses in relief when he sees it’s empty. 

 

“Keep dreaming,” he tells both Roberto and Becky as he passes them up in favor of pulling out a pouch of drinkable IV fluids from one of the lesser-used compartments in the counter.

 

When he rocks up to his transistor search site, he forces himself to backtrack to the start of his search, and begins to go over all of it again. It’s here. It has to be. Readouts don’t lie, and Keenser’s never been wrong yet about the placement of one of these fiddly little issues.

 

He’s half-heartedly continuing in that vein when Bones ambushes him. One moment Jim is vacantly staring at the probe read-out, the next Bones is upon him, rounding the corner cloaked in wrath.

 

Bones jerks to a halt and crosses his arms in front of him, wearing an expression Jim’s come to think of as ‘Southern Belligerence.’

 

He tries to bluster through it. “Something I can help you with, Doctor McCoy?” he asks as he turns back to his probe read-out. 

 

Bones comes right back with, “I dunno, you done with yer little pity party yet?”

 

Jim throws the probe control on the ground and whirls around. “Goddamnit Bones,” he starts, but Bones cuts him right off.

 

“No, you listen to me. The only way this ship goes down is if you give up on her. So we’re outta long haul shipping, so what? There’s plenty of Sol and Sol adjacent shipping to be had, and we’ve built up the contacts for it. Which, to accommodate Sulu, you were gonna look into anyway, right?”

 

Jim glowers.

 

“You know damn well Scotty and Keenser ain’t going anywhere, and neither, fer that matter, is Chekov. This ship has his grandmother’s seal of approval, and that boy don’t wanna leave. Now I can’t speak for Uhura’s plans, but whether she stays or goes has to do with her life, and that don’t got nothing to do with us or this ship, and you know that. ”

 

Jim’s glower is forced from his face, and stares at the flooring of the corridor and shuffles his feet awkwardly, feeling about three feet tall and a disappointment to boot. The more Southern Bones is, the more upset he is. And…Jim feels as though he can see the generations of Meemaws and Pawpaws ranged at Bones’ side, nodding sagely in agreement and wielding rolling pins threateningly. 

 

“And, I, by the way, ain’t goin’ nowhere neither. Them shiny biobeds are tempting, I’ll give you that, but if you quit captaining a boat, I quit space and go back to whatever planet like god intended. I’m only out here for you, and where you go, I go.”

 

“You shouldn’t be out here just for me,” Jim mutters sullenly, not able to meet Bones’ gaze. 

 

Bones jabs a finger at him. “I didn’t mean it like that and you know it you stubborn-ass fool. You’re the only one in all the universe I trust to fly me around in a little metal can out here in this void of death and disease and darkness, and that’s a fact.”

 

“Aw shucks Bones,” Jim starts to say but Bones cuts him off again.

 

“Don’t deflect,” he snaps. “I know Sevastopol’s caught up with you a bit. Nightmares, trouble sleeping now? Maybe some flashbacks? Appetite fucked? Mood swings?”

 

Jim winces with each question, and then sighs, head hanging. He gives a miserable nod. 

 

Bones grips him firmly around the shoulders and gives him a little shake. “It’s normal Jim. You went through something horrific, and you’re processing that trauma. Also, incidentally, that’s what yer goddamn doctor is for.”

 

And then, like lightning, Bones sticks him with a hypo. 

 

“Yikes!” Jim yelps, jumping a bit in surprise. Though, in all hindsight, he has probably had that coming.

 

“Help reign in some of your levels,” Bones says, at his most inscrutable. 

 

And then, as Jim’s hand finishes rubbing over the attack site and he drops his guard, like some deranged ninja wearing white instead of black, Bones stabs him three more times with three other hypos.

 

“This and this and this!” Bones says triumphantly over Jim’s howl of outrage.

 

“Vitamins, allergy booster, and an Acheron inoculation cocktail, gotta get a head start, we’re eighteen hours out!”

 

Jim grits his teeth and takes it because he knows from bitter experience if he runs, Bones will only chase him down, and he’s not above using his CMO credentials to tell the ship to lockdown a bulkhead ahead of Jim to trap him in. 

 

Jim opens his mouth to let Bones know how much of a bully he is, and exactly what Jim thinks of that when Bones whirls him around, bends him over, jerks his pants down over one hip, and hypos him right in the asscheek.

 

“Oweeiii!” Jim yipes, and hops a few steps away from Bones, yanking his pants back up.

 

“Standard immuno booster, god knows your delicate little system needs it.”

 

“You stabbed me in the ass!” Jim accuses, rubbing the tender spot gently.

 

“Ha!” Bones snorts, “I’da taken a belt and whupped on you, if I didn’t know you’d enjoy it so much.”

 

“Bones!” Jim gasps, laughing in surprise and shock.

 

“And let me tell you one thing, you get your head in the game! I know you don’t got the sense god gave a rock, but you go down there, it damn well better be with the intention of making it back up!”

 

Jim is still laughing about Bones ‘whuppin up on him’ but sobers up when Bones makes a motion like he’s going for another hypo. 

 

“Yeah, ok. Ok, I promise, there and right back again Bones, you got it.” 

 

Bones just ‘harumphs’ again like a curmudgeonly old man. 

 

Bones pulls out a scanner and takes some readings of Jim, and they stand there for a few minutes in silence as Bones frowns and grumbles at the scanner.

 

“Bones?” Jim asks softly. 

 

“Yeah?” Bones grunts back. 

 

Jim swallows. “Thanks.”

 

Bones gives him a sharp nod and they both take a moment to stare in opposite directions. Then Bones takes a breath in. “Jim,” he warns.

 

“Yeah?” Jim asks nervously.

 

“We’re gonna have a nice long chat about Spock when you get back.”

 

Jim winces. “There’s nothing to talk about,” he tries, just for form’s sake.

 

“You forget I’ve been through this rigamarole before,” Bones reminds him.

 

Jim deflates. He knows they’re both thinking about Gary. “I don’t think it’s quite the same as that,” he protests, and while in a lot of ways, it’s not, Jim’s handling it about just as well. Which is to say…not very well at all.

 

Bones reaches forward, grips his upper arms and gives Jim a little shake. “Your worth is beyond price, Jim,” he growls, and then, before either of them can burst into manly tears, he departs, whirling around and beating a hasty retreat. 

 

‘Nope, nope, nope,’ Jim thinks, ‘not gonna cry nope not gonna do it.’

 

He reaches back down to pick up the probe interface.

 

Oh, look at that! He blinks at the screen. There it is, as clear as day, fizzling between two crossed wires.

 

He has found that damn faulty transistor!

End Chapter FOUR

Notes:

Fun Fic Fact: So originally this chapter (and the fic) had a different storyline, there was a joint briefing with Stonn Squad and Spock Team where they all practiced in the simulator and I could not write that fucking scene. Eventually I decided the difficulty was trying to stick it onto chapter four, so I ended chapter four after the Chekov/Tam/Jim discussion, and moved that scene to chapter 5, which was going to have that simulator practice, a receipt of a last transmission from Acheron and a whole bridge scene with Jim consulting, and then finish it off with the Bones scene. Other than that last Bones scene, I could not write ANY OF IT. It was awful. I eventually had a patchwork of stuff down that happened in the simulator (mostly the squads not getting along and Snooty Vulcan bullying Jim). Anyway, to make a long story short, I slashed and burned ALL of that, wrote the Bones and Jim focused chapter you have just read, and wrote chapter five completely differently as well. IT WAS ALL SO MUCH BETTER. (MVP BETAFISH THANK YOU BETAFISH).

And so the actual fun fact lol: part II was originally named 'Acheron has Fallen', which was contained in the last transmission scene I scrapped. So I came up with the Into the Unknown name (which I like a much better) and tah dah! Lesson Learned: The outline is NOT the sacred text, you do NOT have to follow it or else lmao.

Easter Eggs: 7!

Every day is Spirk day on ze Tumblr!

Also surprise! miniporn! at the start of a chapter is becoming my signature move????

Chapter 5: Really Deep Shit

Summary:

Ok. No. Jim was wrong. He can admit it. Spock in Command has been great, a joy even. He's learned lots of things about Vulcan fingers. Going down and walking on that planet. Moon. Whatever. Is obviously worse.

Fuck.

Notes:

Betafish! Betafish! Everybody wants a Betafish! (mine is itsme-theborgqueen <3).

Chapter 7...is not done and it's my mom's birthday this weekend so unlikely to get to work on it this weekend oohhhh I'm posting chapter 5 next week is 6 omggg (*hyperventilates*) I've been re-reading The Unknown Kind omfg i was like writing 2+ chapters a week then holy CHRIST what was I on.

I love you all my dearest darling readers mwua muwah mwahhhh! (if u ever see someone like...wriggling deranged in a chair...it's me, reading ur comments going 'heeeeeee')

Oh. Yes. We may be entering a time in the story where I spontaneously write the wrong name for my OCs I'M TRYING TO MAKE SURE I HAVE CONTINUITY but, for example, if you notice that between paragraphs Lodzhal has become something else that starts with an 'L' lol, please let me know!

The eighteen hours pass like a fever dream.

 

He replaces the evil transistor from hell, informs Keenser of his success and then…time seems to slide by, and Jim’s really only conscious of two things after that: an ever-growing feeling of dread, and Bones’ steadfast presence at his side. He eats when Bones puts something in front of him, sleeps when Bones shoves him towards his bed and then, when he wakes, he knows. Even on the Enterprise, locked in dry dock, he can feel that the massive engines of the Invincible are silent. They are out of warp, and in orbit. For a moment he closes his eyes and pretends that none of this is real. 

 

When he opens them again, he catches sight of the blinking light of his console, indicating high-priority messages. He heaves himself out of bed and slides into his chair, rubbing his face as he does.

 

It’s the confidential pre-mission briefing packet. None of it is good. That snaps him awake. 

 

According to the Invincible’s scans, the system is deserted, not a ship in sight. Acheron’s orbital ore exchange platform is dark and unmanned. 

 

“Delightful,” Jim mutters as he reaches the weather report for Acheron. It can pretty well be summed up in two words. Death storm. Of course. Going through the rest of the packet doesn’t reveal much more. The storm is preventing penetration by the Invincible’s scanners. The status of the Olduvai Mining Facility, Acheron Administration, and the small spaceport are all variable or unknown. There has been no contact. 

 

His PADD beeps on the bedside shelf, and he checks it to see a message from Bones, summoning him to Medical for his final mission clearance checkup. 

 

Fuck. Okay. One task at a time, just don’t think about the big picture at all. 

 

Jim stands up, stretches and shuffles over to open his underwear drawer, and there, on top, sit his SUNSHINE sparkle undies. Fuck it. If ever a pair of underwear could be called lucky, the SUNSHINE sparkle briefs are it. Jim defiantly shoves them on. For his checkup with Bones, he throws on a pair of sweatpants and then his matching sparkle CAPTAIN shirt, because why not?

 

Ship’s Living is empty when he passes through to Medical and he feels a twinge of uncertainty, but no. His crew have duties to attend to, and Jim’s glad they’re off doing them. 

 

Jim ignores Bones’ eye roll at his chosen outfit when he enters Medical, and hops up on the exam table without even being prompted. Bones himself is attired in his Surgeon’s flight suit, a piece of clothing he rarely wears because he complains it makes him look fat. (What it does is highlight his broad shoulders and strong arms, but Bones will test an experimental viral anti-agent on himself before he’ll just accept a compliment.) Jim is then attached to various monitoring equipment, scanned, fussed at, and scanned again before Bones hypos him gently once with some more vitamins and boosters and declares him cleared for landing, as begrudging as if someone held a phaser to his head.

 

Then it’s Jim’s turn to roll his eyes. Bones glares, but when Jim asks, “Alright, what’s for breakfast?” He perks up a little bit, and clucking like a mother hen, leads Jim right back to Ship’s Living.

 

“Bacon?” Jim asks hopefully as Bones sits him down at the large round table and goes to ponder over Roberto’s menu.

 

Bones doesn’t answer and punches something in. But when a plate of steaming waffles, glistening with butter and syrup emerges from Roberto and Bones sets it before him, Jim knows Bones loves him. When Bones follows it up with a cup of chocolate milk and a plate with one strip of bacon, Jim realizes that, at last, it’s time to make his own feelings known. 

 

“Marry me,” he propositions Bones with his most sultry eyes. (The romance of it all is probably marred by the piece of bacon he’s chewing on at the same time but… bacon .)

 

“Aren’t you two already married?” Uhura asks as she walks past the table to the replicators. 

 

It’s a miracle, but Jim manages not to choke on his bacon. When the hell did she get in here?

 

“What?” Bones laughs, turning in his chair to look at her, “No!” 

 

Desperately Jim tries to convey to Uhura telepathically ‘joke joke joke you were joking!’ Surely now, in his time of most desperate need, psi-abilities will conveniently awaken within him.

 

Uhura keys something into Becky and turns to give Bones a confused look, completely ignoring Jim. “But Jim has you registered as spouses on Rukbat III?”

 

Or not. 

 

“Jim has us registered as spouses on Rukbat III,” Bones repeats thoughtfully, and he slowly turns back around in his chair to look at Jim. 

 

Jim goes for cute. Jim goes for innocent. Jim goes for anything other than guilty.

 

The basilisk stare Bones affixes him with tells him it’s not working.

 

Jim swallows a heavenly bite of waffle with difficulty. 

 

“It was an accident,” he says feebly. 

 

“Oh?” Bones questions politely, and gestures for Jim to continue.

 

“You see,” Jim does his best to explain, “their forms are very complicated, and of course we didn’t have Uhura back then, and I just needed clearance to hop down there real quick and sign for our cargo delivery, because you know, they wouldn’t let us do it over vid screen,” Jim pauses for breath and gauges Bones, who is nodding along pleasantly, if a bit ominously to Jim’s story. “So I was in a bit of a hurry, just trying to get through the paperwork, and their medical section was a little dense so I just slapped your name on everything! I thought I was, you know, designating you as CMO, as my primary care physician, as my emergency contact, etc! But um, one of the places I stuck your name in was for designation of spouse and well um thus we were registered as a married couple on Rukbat III.”

 

“You are,” Bones takes in a deep breath, “an idiot!” He leaps to his feet and begins ranting. Jim cowers before him and Uhura sips her coffee or whatever Becky has delivered to her with both composure and enjoyment. Jim glares at her and she gives him a wink. She did it on purpose! He sticks his tongue out at her. She’s such a meany!

 

“I am married to an idiot, I can’t believe it!” Bones is really working himself up. “Why didn’t you just divorce us you numbskull!”

 

“We have to both appear in-person before a Weyrwoman or Weyrleader and swear to it and honestly, when are we ever going to go back to Rukbat III? Never, that’s when, so I really don’t see how it’s even that big of a deal; they’re not members of the Federation so there’s not even any tax issues to worry about!” Jim sucks a breath in after his impassioned defense of himself.

 

Bones collapses back into his chair. “I’m married to an idiot,” he moans into his hands.

 

“Hey,” Jim protests at last, “I’m a hot piece of ass and a starship owner to boot, you should be so lucky!”

 

Bones continues on melodramatically, “Oh the indignity, oh the shame!”

 

“What about me? Married to a grouchy old sourpuss?” Jim thinks about all the hypos he’s taken over the years and adds, “Violent one too!”

 

Bones snaps his head up and glares at Jim. “You just asked me to marry you three seconds ago!”

 

“That was the waffles talking. You got me into a compromised state and then took advantage,” Jim accuses. 

 

A bark of laughter draws Jim’s attention away from Bones to where Chekov and Sulu have been standing and watching over by the vid screen wall for who knows how long. “Zat is a good one Keptin!” Chekov says.

 

“Don’t sit there and take that from the likes of him,” Sulu eggs Bones on.

 

Jim points his finger at Sulu. “I will get a new pilot!” He threatens.

 

Bones and Sulu both snort at the same time. “No you won’t,” Sulu says with a smirk.

 

“No I won’t,” Jim agrees with a sigh. 

 

Bones rolls his eyes. “I can’t believe you, when were you going to tell me?”

 

“Uh…never?” That was the wrong answer and both Jim and Bones dive for his last bite of bacon at the same time. Bones gets the plate, but Jim emerges with the bacon, chewing furiously. 

 

“Unbelievable,” Bones mutters. 

 

Jim’s PADD beeps and the mood, homey and warm, dampens a little. Jim gulps down the last of his chocolate milk and stands. 

 

“I better go,” he gestures to his CAPTAIN sparkle shirt, “get changed.” 

 

“Stonn delivered some fatigues for you to wear while you were still sleeping earlier,” Bones says and jerks his head to the couch. “I left them there.”

 

Jim nods. “Right.” He stands on wooden legs and heads over to the couch to scoop up the packet of clothing lying there. In somewhat of a daze, he wanders back to his cabin and undresses. The SUNSHINE sparkle undies he keeps, because if he commits to the sparkle underwear then they will commit to him and get him through this alive. He hopes. The package of clothing from Stonn is the whole kit and kaboodle: shirt, combat jacket, combat pants, socks, and steel-toe combat boots. 

 

One by one he puts each article of clothing on, then turns to survey himself in his mirror. Wow. The dark black and tan color scheme is very flattering, and who knew the things that combat pants could do for the ass! Look at it pop!

 

When Jim returns to Ship’s Living, Keenser and Scotty have arrived, and his whole crew is ranged around their shared living space, waiting for him. With a bit of surprise, Jim realizes everyone, even Uhura, are zipped up into their Enterprise flight suits. 

 

Scotty and Bones seem to be having some sort of freakish eye communication, but even as Jim opens his mouth to call them out on it, Bones claps his hands together and says, “alrighty cupcake captain, listen up.”

 

Jim rolls his eyes but listens all the same.

 

“Scotty and myself have coordinated with Stonn. The HMWA Master X rifle is waiting for you in your assigned locker in the shuttle locker room. You’re familiar with it, it got the job done, so Stonn allowed us to swap it out with the standard-issue civilian rifle they were going to send you out with. I fussed over it, Stonn fussed over it, she’s in perfect condition.” 

 

While Jim tries to take all that in, Bones nods to Chekov who pipes up with, “I have fabricated wery nice bullets for you Keptin, during one of my shifts in ze science labs. Fiwve magazines, plus ze one loaded into ze rifle already.”

 

While Jim concentrates on not opening and closing his mouth like a fish, Bones adds, “Those are secured onto the rifle strap, just like before.”

 

Then Uhura steps forward and hands Jim a headset which he takes on auto pilot. With a start, he realizes it’s the one he’d brought back from Sevastopol. She nods at him. “It’s a very nice model, Captain. I’ve done some fine-tuning, and a few upgrades. It’s already set to the mission frequency.”

 

Jim can only stand there holding it and stare at it, not particularly able to meet anyone’s eyes.

 

She continues on. “I’ve encrypted the Enterprise’s usual channel, and I’ll be monitoring that frequency if you need us for anything.”

 

Still holding the headset like a dummy, Jim can only nod.

 

Keenser steps forward and rolls out Jim’s toolkit on the table in front of him. Ah good. Something for Jim to focus on that isn’t emotionally fraught. Keenser pulls out a wicked-looking hack tool from the kit. “New,” he says as he points at it. When Jim nods, he stows it back away in the customary pouch, then holds out his hand for the headset, which Jim hands to him like a robot. Keenser stows the headset in its customary spot then holds up the whole tool kit to Jim, who takes it and straps it about his waist after a moment of hesitation. 

 

Scotty clears his throat. When Jim looks at him, he holds out a piece of tech that Jim thinks looks something like a sniper scope, though he doesn’t see any lens. He holds out his hand and Scotty drops the dark piece of metal into it, and Jim is taken aback at its weight. 

 

“The heckin?” He is surprised into saying.

 

Scotty clears his throat again. “Rifle attachment.”

 

When Scotty declines to elaborate any further, Jim prompts with, “what kind of attachment?”

 

“Illegal,” Keenser inserts, not very reassuringly. 

 

“Best to ah, attach that after ye get planetside sir,” Scotty says. 

 

Jim looks at it more closely. Suddenly it clicks. The canister has been painted black to disguise it, but once he sees it he can’t unsee it. “Are you insane ?” He hisses at the pair of them. Keenser has the grace to shuffle his feet, but Scotty is unrepentant. 

 

Compressed Diethyl Ether has been banned for half a century for a reason. 

 

“It’s perfectly safe captain,” Scotty assures him, when Jim continues to eye it extremely dubiously.

 

Jim wonders if that’s what he’d told the captain of the Beagle. At Keensers urging, Jim drops it gingerly into a pouch on his tool kit. 

 

“Jim,” Sulu says lowly, drawing his attention. “Be careful .”

 

“You know me,” Jim jokes, but it falls a little flat.

 

Sulu sighs, then says, “Chekov’s assigned on shifts to the bridge while you’re planetside, so that means I’ll be there with him. If there’s anything I think you should know, I’ll hail you on that encrypted Enterprise channel Uhura set up.

 

Jim blinks at him. “Discreetly,” Sulu adds.

 

God the Vulcans may be onto something with the whole ‘we don’t emotion thing’ because there’s a lot of feelings right now, and Jim’s pretty sure he’s not equipped to deal with them appropriately.

 

He clears his throat nervously, and after a few moments where everyone looks at him expectantly, he has to shrug with a little laugh. “What can I say? You’re the finest crew anyone could hope for? Never been a Captain as lucky as I am? Raises for everyone?” That last gets a few snorts and eye rolls and breaks the tension a little. 

 

Jim’s PADD beeps. He takes a breath in. “Time to head to that shuttle departure locker room thing.” There’s time for him to ruffle Chekov’s hair, exchange a handshake with Scotty, and a manly hug with Sulu, complete with much back thumping. He even gets an unexpected gentle pat on the shoulder farewell from Uhura.

 

Keenser sniffles, and Scotty says, “Ach don’t cry ya wee lil fire hydrant, ye’ll set us all off.”

 

Jim points at Keenser. “Keep Scotty in line,” he directs.

 

“Aye,” Keenser agrees with another sniffle, and they both ignore Scottys sputters of Scottish outrage.

 

Then Bones grips Jim by the arm, and leads him out of Ship’s Living. They walk in silence out of the Enterprise. Jim makes to pause at the open airlock to stroke the side of his ship but Bones snaps at him, “Don’t you dare.” 

 

Jim tries to protest that it was just going to be a love pat and not a good-bye pat but Bones just ‘harumphs’ and ‘garumphs’ his way through it until Jim rolls his eyes up to the cavernous ceiling of the Engineering Bay and gives up. 

 

Jim keeps waiting for Bones to initiate his good-bye, but he walks step in step with Jim all the way into the Shuttle Docking Bay, and when they arrive at the door to their designated locker room, he shows every sign of intending to follow Jim inside. 

 

Catching Jim’s unsure look, Bones snorts. “Don’t flatter yourself princess, I’m here to take final baseline scans of everyone on this mission.”

 

Bones keys open the door just so that Jim’s offended squawk will reverberate through the shuttle prep room, Jim knows it. 

 

The open door reveals a long room that stretches to end in a connecting partition to the shuttle docking bay itself. Rows of lockers sit on the right and left, and a set of bench seating for each side follows the lockers down. The room is cool, and although well lit, gives an appearance of darkness, as everything, from the benches to the ceiling plates is sleek, cold metal. Stonn’s squad is peppered throughout, in various stages of undress. 

 

A clang jerks his head over to where Hudson has just banged on a locker. “You’re over here, Jim,” he calls.

 

Jim lifts a hand in greeting, thumps Bones a good one on the back, and heads over, ignoring the hissed threats that follow him from Bones. After a surreptitious check over his shoulder to make sure Bones isn’t following him (he’s not, he’s turned and started scanning Fry, fussing at her to make her stand still), Jim sits on the bench next to Hudson.

 

He gets an almighty thump on his back from Hudson for his troubles. 

 

“You’re all dressed already,” Hudson accuses. “There were a few in here placing money on what you got under wraps there man!” A few catcalls and whistles follow this announcement. Jim thinks of the sparkly briefs currently gracing his ass, blesses Stonn for sending the fatigues over ahead of time, and wills the blush trying to rise on his cheeks away. He laughs along with Hudson, and then, before he can help himself, looks around for Spock. 

 

He spots him at the far end of the room, along with two of his investigative team, nerd Vulcan and snooty Vulcan. Damn. Spock appears unconcerned with the attention Jim is getting, and, as Spock is already fully dressed in what must be investigative forces fatigues in black and grey, Jim turns back to his locker with a sigh. He cracks it open, and sees the Master X rifle waiting for him. It evokes mixed feelings of both dread and comfort. The clatter of something being dropped jerks Jim out of his contemplation, and he looks over to where Bones has apparently just dropped his scanner. 

 

Bones who has just dropped his scanner, and who has a high flush on his cheeks, and is scowling furiously. Jim zeroes in on Bones with a laser focus. Bones’ crush! It’s someone here, in this locker room, a part of this mission! Who was he talking to? Jim’s eyes dart around frantically. Fry is to his right, but Bones had already scanned her, so it can’t be her. Ocampo is a possibility, she’s standing next to Fry, and it looks like Bones may have been scanning Frost. Now Frost could be Bones’ type! All liquid feline grace, he does have that slender frame Bones seems to go for. Stonn steps forward and picks up the scanner, and hands it to Bones. 

 

Hudson’s voice diverts Jim’s attention from Bones’ possible romantic entanglements. 

 

“Alright man, lay it out, what are we getting into, really?”

 

Jim buys some time by pretending to inventory his locker for a few seconds. When he looks back to Hudson, the attention of the entire locker room is on him. Even the Vulcans, even Spock and his group. Oh they’re putting on a good show, heads not turned towards him, Jim’ll give them that, but the ears give them away, slightly pricked in his direction. Jim gets a stranglehold on the direction his thoughts were racing down (Spock’s ears god they’re so gorgeous the things Jim could do if he could get his mouth on them), and answers Hudson carefully.

 

“We’re heading into the unknown, we could be getting into nothing,” Jim pauses.

 

On the opposite side from Jim, Palmer prompts him with, “Or?”

 

Jim sighs and finishes, “or, some really deep shit.”

 

“Deep shit?” Arev, on the other side of Hudson, questions, his eyes darting over to Spock’s team and back again.

 

Down the line, Fry jumps up and opens her mouth to explain but Rekan, a few squad members up from Palmer, holds up a hand and addresses Arev.

 

“Think about it literally. What would your experience be, wading through a large pile of feces?”

 

“Oh.” For a brief moment, a slightly disgusted look flashes across Arev’s face; his eyes dart back over to Spock’s team and it is smoothed away instantly. 

 

“You got it kid,” Ocampo laughs, still next to Fry, “It’s a place no one wants to be.”

 

“Special forces,” Stonn interjects, Bones scurrying around to get at the squad members on the other side of him with his scanner, “if there is a large pile of feces to be waded through, I have no doubt of our ability to do so, and also of our ability to successfully clean ourselves off afterwards.”

 

There are grins on all the humans' faces, and even a relaxed quirk of the mouths on Rekan and Lodzhal, and Stonn’s squad jumps to their feet as one and salutes.

 

“Yes, sir!”

 

Jim shakes his head. Stonn is amazing. 

 

Stonn nods to Hudson, who bellows for everyone to gear up. And yes, that was Jim’s ear that he will be needing later, thank you Hudson. Bones continues his circuit around the room, scanning each squad member as he goes. The space fills with the sound of ammo being locked into magazines and the click of safeties being checked and rechecked. 

 

Jim is worried his nerves will get the better of him as he reaches for the rifle, but his hands are steady and his movements sure; as if it’s his hundredth time gearing up with this rifle instead of the second. He slings the rifle on, checks the magazine in the rifle, and confirms that the five others are attached to the strap, just as Chekov had said. His thumb presses the safety, the click as he does so joining the others. Safety on. When he settles the rifle in a rest position over his hip and looks up, he’s right in step with the other members of the Tihet Squad. (Nerd Vulcan and Mr. Snooty are still in the process of slinging their rifles over their shoulders, Jim notes smugly). 

 

“Turn out!” Hudson roars, but this time Jim is ready for him, hunching up his shoulder to protect his ear on that side. The squad hustles towards the opposite end of the locker room, and exits through the partition. Once the last squad member has left, Bones comes trotting back down the length of the locker room, and stops briefly to consult with Stonn, probably to affirm the squad’s medical clearance. They finish their short conversation, and Stonn looks over Bones’ head to nod at Jim, then he turns on his heel and follows his squad out.

 

Spock and his two lackeys remain, waiting on nerd Vulcan as she fiddles with her rifle strap. They fade into the background as Bones approaches. He’s flushed from his exertions and doing his best to hide his worry with a fierce scowl. He stops right in front of Jim, and Jim smiles fondly at him.

 

“I swear to the almighty Jim, if you and yer damnfool hide don’t come back in one piece…!”

 

“Look, you already know you can’t get rid of me that easily,” Jim jokes, and then is swept up into a spine crunching hug. 

 

Jim gets one good return squeeze of his own in and then Bones is shoving him towards the exit with a, “Go on now, git.” 

 

Jim reaches blindly behind him for one last pat on Bones’ shoulder and then he’s walking to the end of the room. He exits through the connecting partition and almost bounces right off of Spock, who is waiting in the antechamber to enter into the shuttle docking bay, the access door still cycling from the last group that must have gone through.

 

Spock turns, and with an intake of breath Jim realizes this is the first time they’ve seen each other since the elevator incident. 

 

“Spock,” he greets cautiously and a bit breathlessly.  

 

A formal nod and “Captain Kirk,” is what he gets in return. Great. Back to the Vulcan ice treatment.

 

Angry at the unfairness of it all, Jim glares at Spock. He wishes he knew some way to ruffle that Vulcan facade of Spock’s. Longingly, he remembers Spock’s reaction to Jim’s fingers along his cock, how desperately his fingers had tangled with Jim’s next to the elevator. Then he thinks about Vulcans and their sensitive hands in general. God how he would love to take two or three of those slender, elegant fingers into his mouth and just suck, seriously fuck up Spock’s perfect composure.

 

Their eyes meet, and there’s a brief sensation of heat behind Jim’s eyes, a subtle vertigo, and then the door beeps the conclusion of its cycle and Spock turns his back, and walks as stiff as a board through to the shuttle bay. A bit dazed, Jim follows behind him. Anger and yearning war with each other for a moment, then Jim catches sight of Stonn’s squad lined up in front of their shuttle, and icy dread sweeps everything else away.  

 

They look competent and deadly, bristling with weapons and wearing not only the same black and tan fatigues that Jim is now sporting (courtesy of Stonn) but also a layer of composite armor covering their chests, arms, and legs. 

 

Hudson finishes his briefing as Jim reaches them, “By the numbers you lot!” he’s yelling. Then Hudson steps aside and Stonn steps forward.

 

“Conditions on the planet are not ideal,” Stonn begins. Jim bites back a snort. What an understatement that was. “Storms are frequent on Acheron, cycling over the whole of the moon's surface for days or weeks at a time. We appear to have arrived in the midst of one such occurrence.”

 

Jim has got to keep it together. He can cry like a baby after they get back at the unfairness of it all. 

 

“Our shuttle is The Lewis & Clarke.” And Stonn gestures to the shuttle behind him. Jim appraises it for the first time. It’s an older model, slightly boxy in shape, especially compared to some of the newer, sleeker-looking models docked next to it. She bears signs of innumerable atmospheric entries and to be honest, she looks a bit like a hunk of junk, but Jim tries not to judge her too harshly. It’s what’s under the hood that counts, and in the battered lines of Lewis & Clarke, Jim sees a workhorse of a ship.

 

“It is the only shuttle on the Rineikau-Yehat which is rated for the atmospheric conditions present on Acheron. Lieutenant Aran and Ensign Moreau will be our pilots.” Stonn gestures to them as well, and they step forward and back quickly, suited and helmeted up, preventing Jim from gleaning the slightest bit of information about them.

 

Stonn continues, “We will have a descent angle of 48 degrees.”

 

Jim’s lips purse in a soundless whistle. That’s gonna be rough. 

 

“We will then proceed head-on,” The slightest pause as if Stonn is unsure of his language usage; Hudson gives him a thumbs up and Stonn smoothly proceeds. “To our landing coordinates.”

 

Stonn then inclines his head to Spock, and cedes the floor to him.

 

Spock steps forward to take the place that Stonn vacates, and Jim does his best to stare at Spock’s knees and not any other part of him. (It turns out Spock’s knees are provocatively too close to Spock’s groin, so Jim has to switch his focal point to Spock’s chest and actively not think about the broadness of his shoulders or what the shape, color, and texture of Vulcan nipples is like).

 

“The storm currently engulfing Acheron is a Class 9 extra-planetary cyclone; it has variable ion penetration from the planet Calpamos’ magnetosphere. It is possible Acheron’s long range communications have been disrupted, and thus contact with the Rineikau-Yehat will not be guaranteed. Our landing zone is the Acheron spaceport. The data available to us allows for a 87.06% chance of it remaining clear for shuttle docking.”

 

A loud warning tone buzzes in the shuttle bay, and an echoing announcement in another language plays, likely Vulcan. 

 

Spock steps back and Stonn gives Hudson a sharp gesture. “On the boat, on the boat, on the boat!” Hudson barks at the squad, and they double time it in two sharp lines over the ramp and into the shuttle. The two pilots follow immediately after, and Jim falls into step with Stonn, Spock, and the two other Vulcans. 

 

They walk in silence up the ramp into the well-worn interior of the shuttle. It’s just as dark and cramped-feeling as Jim had expected from viewing its exterior, otherwise it is unremarkable. An aft cockpit, unsealed, and two rows of seating along each side. Jim follows Stonn, who leads him and Spock’s group to their seats. Jim gets to sit next to Lodzhal, whom he quite likes. On his other side is Mr. Snoots, whom he does not like. Across from Jim is Spock, which is arguably worse for all sorts of reasons. 

 

Jim stands awkwardly for a moment until Arev, across from Jim and next to Spock catches his eye. He mimes a placing gesture, and taps something behind his seat. Jim squints and makes out what appears to be the butt of Arev’s rifle, stored away. Oh! Nodding his gratitude, Jim unslings the Master X, and after a few unsuccessful tries, gets it slotted down into whatever rack for weapon storage is behind the seat, then plops down on the seat with a thunk.

 

He stares morosely across at Spock, and only realizes he’s doing it when Spock’s eyes flick to his and he has to jerk his head to the side. Damnit.

 

“Strap in!” Hudson yells, from somewhere down the line. Jim reaches around behind him and finds the straps of the harness that goes with his seat. The sound of harness’ being tightened and locked in fills the shuttle.

 

There’s a whoosh, and the pop of pressure in his ears. The outer door has been secured. Jim’s not too far down from the cockpit; if he cranes his head, he can see a sliver of the forward viewport, and hear the indistinct voices of the pilots as they run through their checks. 

 

Oh god it’s really happening what in the ever-loving fuck has possessed him he cannot possibly do this descend down into this nightmare again. Again, without even thinking about it, Jim’s eyes dart back over to Spock.

 

Spock has his eyes closed, and is sitting calmly. Jim swallows and draws strength. Spock may feel an attraction to Jim that he has no wish for, and probably wishes Jim was out of his life, but seeing Spock sitting across from him is the only thing that keeps Jim from leaping out of his seat and begging Stonn to let him off of this shuttle and generally having an absolute freak out.

 

He grips the harness tight and screws his courage to the sticking place. 

 

From the cockpit come the unmistakable sounds of a countdown. 

 

Breathe. Jim fixes his eyes to Spock’s chest, and does his best to match his breathing.

 

In. hold. Out. hold. Breathe.

 

The whine of the engines fills the shuttle, and a dull clanging reverberates. The shuttle shakes a little, and Jim’s stomach turns over slightly. They’re free of the docking clamps, and they’re exiting the Invincible’s docking bay. 

 

Jim checks the sliver of viewport he can see in the cockpit. Darkness, then pinpricks of light. For a moment, Jim drinks in the sight of space, pristine and eternal, and then the curve of a planet appears and all too swiftly. Acheron covers the whole of the screen. The day the Enterprise had left, transport platform in tow, it had been grey and dirty-looking, sullen, but approachable. Jim blinks in surprise at its current state, a snarl of storm, ugly dark blue and purple, like a vicious bruise. 

 

Jim turns away from the view and stares blankly at the worn and scuffed flooring of the shuttle. His knuckles are white where he’s holding onto the harness for dear life.

 

The shuttle’s smooth gliding is interrupted by a small vibration which rapidly grows to a violent shaking. The engines rev up and the roar at atmospheric entry fills the inside of the shuttle.

 

This is it.

 

They’re going down.

 

Down to Acheron.

 

Jim devoutly hopes he lives to regret it.

 

End Chapter FIVE

Notes:

fun fic fact ‘seriously fuck up Spock’s perfect composure’ is a line riffed from Alien: Covenant and, as such, is the sort of ‘in house’ easter egg I tend not to count.

(*ALien: CovenanT SPOILERS ALERT*)

It’s got to be top three most badass lines in the ENTIRE series, which whathisface the Captain IMMEDIATELY ruins by dying what has got to be top three stupidest fucking deaths of the ENTIRE series (and considering the competition in Prometheus and his own fucking movie, that’s saying something) he says this epic ‘fuck up your perfect composure line’ and you’re like yeah alright man u got it and then proceeds to IMMEDIATELY let himself be led LITERALLY to the slaughter. ‘You’re not gonna kill me right?’ *unsettling and enigmatic laugh* ‘follow me captain’ *obediently follows* that’s it that’s the scene. He died a completely preventable death.

Like the gist of it is the Captain is all 'ur not an evil murderer, right?' and instead of lying and being all 'nono, i swear u can trust me android mouth safe for humans' David (the android) is all 'i dunno maybe....come this way' and the Captain's like 'oh cool' and does.

Anyway in conclusion this line works much better in my fic as it relates to certain Vulcans and Jim’s feelings about them than it does for Captain idiot from the film. imo. lol.

Easter Eggs: 6 :)

If I do not get the recommended serving of Spirk per day, I become irritable, listless, and dull. Don't let it happen to you!

 

*Ok so Ahem.* Yes as you lot may have noticed, the ratio of chapters written to chapters posted is shrinking dramatically. I thought I had solved my ch4/ch5 issue when I started posting, but I hadn't so that fucked up my plans. And I'm not writing as swiftly as I was for The Unknown Kind. It is possible that upon the posting of chapter 7, that I will have to enter into an 'intermission' state while I get the chapter count back up there. (chapter seven will be a good pause point) I'd rather just have one break in my posting schedule than multiple ones chapter to chapter (especially when we get into actiony bits). I thought chapter 7 was gonna be the kinda *zoom zoom* point, but that hasn't quite been the case. NOW it's possible chapter 8 will be that point, and we'll be fine. If not though, I most likely will have to do the whole pause thing. I'm really sorry if I have to break with my posting schedule, I know a lot of you look forward to and count on it, but I'd rather do it once than multiple times :(

Chapter 6: Abandoned

Summary:

Visit friendly Acheron!

Notes:

Thank you sweet betafish! (itsme-theborgqueen)! <3

Ok. So. Chapter 7 is not done but just by a bee's dick like I'm about to hop over after I post and finish it up (More on that situation in the end notes lmao)

But yay chapter 6! As always, thank you guys so much for your comments I friggin LIVE for them I love hearing what you think! <3<3<3

Jim focuses very hard on maintaining control of his breathing. This is it. It’s really happening. He’s on a shuttle, breaking atmo on Acheron. ‘How did I do this? On Sevastopol?’ Jim wonders. It’s all a little fuzzy. Of course, if he’d ever sat down and updated his personal logs, he might have an answer to that very important question. 

 

Fuck.

 

Breathe.

 

The shuttle shudders and dances as it continues its journey inexorably down, down to the surface of Acheron. 

 

Breathe. Jim can do it, he’s been doing it his whole life. He knows how to breathe. 

 

His blood is like ice in his veins. Distantly the sounds of the cockpit filter through to him, the shuttle’s automated announcements, and the calm back and forth between the pilots and the Invincible’s Bridge as they make their landing approach.

 

Breathe. He tilts his head for another peek at the viewport.

 

Acheron up close is a lot like Acheron from afar. An unwelcome snarl of dirt and vicious wind. The pings of icy particulates speckling the sides of the shuttle change to the slightly different dings of dirt and rock hitting the sides of the shuttle as they descend from the upper layers of the atmosphere to the troposphere. Otherwise that’s the only indication they’ve gone anywhere since they started their descent. Jim wishes it was Sulu up there flying it. In an abstract sort of way, Jim doesn’t want Sulu any closer to this hunk of rock than he currently is. But flying through a maelstrom with almost null visibility and scanners that may or may not be able to penetrate to the planet’s surface makes him long for steady and known hands at the controls.

 

Keep it together. Breathe in, breathe out. Also don’t look at Spock, serene in his seat across from Jim.

 

He looks at Spock. Spock’s eyes haven’t opened once as far as Jim’s been able to tell since they entered atmo. Hell, for all Jim knows he’s taking a Vulcan nap. 

 

A gust of turbulence causes the shuttle to drop, jerking them all in their seats against the harnesses. Lodzhal stiffens next to Jim, and he turns to reassure him instinctively. However Fry, sat on his opposite side, has beat him to it. She has a careful hand on his upper arm, and is speaking lowly into his ear. Lodzhal is leaning just the slightest bit into her, and even as the shuttle drops again due to turbulence, Jim can feel some of the tension leaking out of the frame next to him.

 

Jim doesn’t know why, but his eyes flick back over to Spock. Spock’s eyes have opened, and he is staring at Fry and Lodzhal, the slightest of creases on his brow. His eyes flick to Jim’s but this time Jim holds his gaze, wondering what it is that Spock is thinking. And this time, it’s Spock who darts his gaze away. 

 

There’s never a moment where Jim is able to pinpoint the shuttle’s completion of its descent and the start of its head-on approach to their landing coordinates. Gradually he becomes aware that the shuttle is not vertically inclined anymore, but the storm seems not to have lessened one iota.

 

There’s a flurry of indistinct communications between the pilots, and Jim looks over to see Stonn unstrap himself from his seat next to the cockpit and stand, leaning into the cockpit as much as his solid form will allow him. Jim shifts in his seat. After a moment, Stonn turns and meets Jim’s questioning gaze, gesturing for Jim to join him. 

 

Maybe there’s aliens crawling on the ground, Jim can identify them, and then they can all fuck off out of here. Jim unsnaps his harness, carefully stands, and then nods gratefully to Lodzhal, who places a careful supporting hand on Jim’s back when a lurch of the shuttle causes him to stumble. One shaky step at a time, he eases his way to the cockpit. 

 

A moment after he reaches it, he becomes aware, hyper aware, that Spock has followed and is standing just right on Jim. Fuck. Jim scrunches against the opposite frame of the entrance to the cockpit from Stonn as Spock inserts himself between them. Side to side they are pressed up against each other, and simultaneous waves of longing and relief move through Jim’s whole body. He swallows, and does his best to tune into what Stonn is saying.

 

“Remote attempts at connection have failed,” Stonn is in the middle of relaying, “the spaceport is sealed.”

 

Jim bites his lip hard on the ‘oh well, let’s go back then,’ that almost leaps out from his mouth. Spock shifts next to him and Jim forces himself to concentrate on the present moment as Spock begins to speak. 

 

“My sojourn on Acheron, though brief, did allow me access to many features of the facilities on this moon that are not a part of its records in the public archives. There was a small landing pad present on the far side for maintenance and cargo deliveries.” Spock pauses, and consults the instruments on the pilot’s console. “Approximately 23 degrees northwest of our current position.”

 

A different hum fills the interior of the shuttle as the pilots swing her around to Spock’s mark, and as they do, the featureless lumps of prefabricated construction modules that make up what Jim can only presume is the spaceport become dwarfed by the shape of an immense tower which seems to loom over the whole facility. 

 

Jim opens his mouth to ask, ‘what in the hell is that thing,’ but Spock is already answering his unasked question.

 

“That is the terraformer, a remnant from the failed colonization effort by the previous owners of Acheron, an offshoot of the Cochrane-Yutani Collective.”

 

Even though it extends what must be several thousands of feet into the air, its design is squat and chunky, a relic from the first waves of terran expansion. A few dull red obstruction lights blinking slowly along the bulky body are just visible through the interference of the storm, otherwise the construction is a featureless outline.

 

“It’s ugly,” Jim is unable to stop himself from muttering.

 

The shuttle continues its maneuvers, and revealed beneath them is a retrofit landing pad, which, after the pilots scan it and Spock performs some quick calculations, is deemed fit to hold the shuttle’s weight and allow for disembarkation. 

 

Jim himself eyes it dubiously. The storm outside is unrelenting, and it looks rickety to him. 

 

Fuck he hopes when the inevitable screaming and running portion of this mission arrives, they won’t have to wait around because the shuttle had to retreat back to orbit.

 

“Initiating final landing procedures, all passengers secure themselves,” one of the pilots throws over their shoulder. Jim’s long past being able to tell which is which. Stonn swings himself back into his seat just outside the cockpit and Jim turns to head back to his own seat, Spock right behind him. 

 

‘I am not 14 years old,’ he tells himself, ‘I will not pretend to stumble so that Spock is forced to catch me and put his arms around me.’ Besides, the shuttle will probably do it for him anyways. 

 

And the shuttle does. Sort of. A gust of wind slams into it, and swings it briefly sideways, and Jim is dumped without ceremony into Ocampo’s lap. She sits on the other side of Mr. Snooty, who gives Jim a superior look and then pointedly looks away. Ugh. Jim hates him so much.

 

“Hey, cutie, fancy seeing you here,” Ocampo jokes, and then with one arm, pushes Jim back into a standing position.

 

“You can bench press me anytime sweetie,” he winks back at her as he steadies himself once more.

 

What a hunk of woman. Damn. Too bad Jim is committed to pining over Spock and swearing eternal love to his Vulcan ears for the rest of his life. Jim awkwardly shuffles the last few steps to his seat and stumbles ungracefully back into it. The Spock in question stiffly sits back down opposite Jim and stares somewhere over his left ear as he straps back in. 

 

Jim looks at him fondly. He can’t help it. ‘I’m ceasing!’ he thinks at him. ‘That was just joking around because we’re all about to die a gruesome death!’

 

Speaking of which, reality comes slamming home to Jim in the form of his stomach, twisting itself into knots, as with a last rattle and shake, they touch down on the landing pad. 

 

Fuck. 

 

Jim will not not lose his shit inside this shuttle. He’d like to not lose it outside it either, but one area at a time. Carefully, he releases his death grip on the straps of his harness. Thank god no one else is standing up out of their seats, Jim doesn’t think his knees will support him just now.

 

Every ounce of concentration Jim possesses is going towards keeping his whole body from shaking. Desperately, his eyes fix back onto Spock’s face, calm and impassive, his own eyes once again resolutely closed. Spock is here. Jim is not alone. There’s guns and bullets and everything. And if Spock can (obviously) handle it, so can Jim. 

 

Stonn’s voice breaks Jim’s reverie, where his eyes have been tracing the shape of Spock’s ears in a kind of meditative exercise that he hopes was neither creepy nor obvious to anyone else.

 

“Captain, Commander,” Stonn calls them back to the cockpit.

 

Obligingly, Spock unstraps and stands smoothly, and with more hope than certainty, Jim gingerly mirrors him. His legs hold. Hot damn. This time he follows Spock to the cockpit, and when Spock doesn’t move over to allow Jim to peek in between him and Stonn, Jim has to shuffle to the side and sort of shove his head in, wedging his body between the frame of the cockpit and Spock’s body, biting back a moan at the contact between them once more. Jim does his best to focus on the issue at hand, helped by the comfort of the heat and strength of Spock’s body, and yet also hindered by the same.

 

Spock is studying the readouts from the shuttle’s scanners intently, and Jim scans the battered walkway stretching in front of the shuttle. It’s more of a scaffolding, honestly, set up a few feet off the ground. Visibility is god awful, Jim can see the outline of what must be the main Administrative Facility at the end of it, but can make out no details. The wind buffets the shuttle constantly, from one side then the other, alternating between sheets of rain and hails of dirt and tiny rocks. 

 

Jim looks over and catches Stonn’s slightly questioning eyebrow raise. Jim shrugs his shoulders helplessly. “It looks clear,” he says, “for what that’s worth.” Stonn nods seriously, and turns to look down onto the walkway below, forehead slightly creased.

 

“The Lewis & Clark’s scanners are reporting no life signs within the facility,” Spock at last relays.

 

“And the outer environs?” Stonn murmurs a moment later.

 

“The scanners report negative as well, however the margin for error is 50.23%,” Spock answers, just as lowly.

 

Well, that’s a terrible number. 

 

God Jim hopes Stonn doesn’t ask him what he thinks because Jim is going to have to say, ‘I think we should just fuck off out of here,’ which of course, they’re not going to do, so it would just be a free hit on morale, so Stonn should just not ask him. 

 

Stonn looks at Jim and Jim doesn’t quite know what’s on his face, but it appears to be enough for Stonn, who asks nothing further of him or Spock.

 

“We will begin disembarkation procedures,” he informs the pilots, “Prepare to seal the shuttle until further orders.”

 

Only one of the pilots nods confirmation of Stonn’s orders, and a lackluster kind of ‘yea yea’ at that, which is just…no.

 

“Completely,” Jim adds sharply. “Exhaust ports, engine intake, externals for air cycling, everything.”

 

One of them (Jim thinks it could be Mareau but who knows), snorts. “Nothing’s getting at us through the engine intake valves,” maybe Mareau says. 

 

A memory surfaces in his mind, and he brings his wrists together and presses his palms out, stretching his fingers, mimicking the very same gesture Spock once used on him. He mimes it leaping at the pilot’s face. The guy jumps slightly in his seat.

 

“That,” Jim says, “will crawl happily through any point of ingress you leave open and attach itself to your face. Then, probably right around the time that this landing party is clustered around the door clamoring to be let back in, a fucking alien will claw its way out of your chest, and be standing over your corpse to greet us when we step back inside.”

 

Silence greets Jim. The other pilot flips several switches and keys in some codes. “Full quarantine procedures in effect, the shuttle will remain sealed until Commander Stonn gives the all clear order to return to orbit.”

 

A breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding escapes Jim. “You’re damn right,” he mutters.

 

The creaking and groaning of the shuttle as it is blasted by another gust of wind doesn’t quite manage to cover up Spock’s added, “Indeed.” Almost. But not quite.

 

Stonn straightens, and reflexively, both Jim and Spock follow suit. “Gather your team, Commander,” he informs Spock. “Captain, with me.” Jim nods.

 

There’s a jolt of sensation through his whole body as he and Spock turn from the cockpit, and their knuckles brush against each other. Christ, what a hot mess Jim’s life has turned into. He’s playing the Vulcan version of a flower petal ‘he loves me, he loves me not’ game while he prepares to exit onto hell’s moon to wait his turn for ‘insert horribly gruesome death here’. 

 

Doing his best to get a hold of himself, Jim obediently shadows Stonn as he confers with Hudson, who immediately begins turning out the squad. The shuttle fills with the sounds of the stamping of boots and of magazines being slammed home, punctuated by a savage stream of warnings from Hudson regarding live ammunition, checking corners, and staying in formation. 

 

Stonn waits for Jim to retrieve his rifle from behind his seat, and then leads on to the open space in front of the shuttle door. His body, by some miracle, and completely independently of his mind, slings the rifle strap over his shoulder and secures the rifle on his hip.

 

Distantly, Jim is aware of Spock and his two other team members coming to stand on the side of Stonn opposite Jim. The Tihet Squad forms up around Stonn, and Jim realizes they are preparing to exit the shuttle, with Stonn, Jim, Spock, and the two other Vulcans at the center.

 

This is really happening. Jim has a moment of epiphany, and wow it kinda sucks to realize that Bones has been right all along and Jim really is an ‘unmitigated dumshit’. This is, without a doubt, the stupidest thing he has ever done. And it’s not like his career has been defined by its moments of non-stupidity. 

 

“Clear,” says Palmer, arm over the manual release for the shuttle door.

 

Hudson confirms with Stonn, who gives the go ahead. 

 

Palmer hits the release. The shuttle door begins to open and the noise slams inside like a physical blow. Jim is reminded unhappily of the reactor on Sevastopol. Acheron howls. The wind rips into the shuttle, forcing Jim to lean forward against it. His face is peppered by grit, and he squints his eyes against the sting. Fuck they were supposed to be in a cushy enclosed spaceport, not this nightmare.

 

The ramp finishes extending from the shuttle and locks into place.

 

Stonn makes another gesture at Jim’s side, and then Jim hears Hudson’s voice, sounding small and distant, even though he’s only a few feet from Jim, and must be bellowing at the top of his lungs.  

 

“Move out!”

 

As the squad advances out from the shuttle, rifles at the ready, taking ground in the military fashion of a few feet at a time, he sticks to Stonn like glue, unashamedly using the Vulcan’s superior height and bulk to shield himself from that one direction at least. Jim has never felt so exposed in his life. Anything could leap on him from any direction, and there’s fuck all anyone would be able to do about it. 

 

Foot by foot, the squad covers the ground over the landing pad to the connection walkway, skirting abandoned loading equipment and a few beleaguered crates, all left to the elements. The wind seems like a calculating enemy instead of a neutral force, changing directions maliciously, and without warning. They are all alternately pelted with dirt and rock from one direction, only to be lashed by intermittent patches of rain from another. The temperature Jim would describe as ‘gross’. Not hot. Not cold. Lukewarm. Except, of course, for the rain. The water that the wind dumps on them is freezing. Because Acheron. There was a reason Jim always hated looking at this chunk of rock from the Enterprise’s viewports, and this. This is the reason. Miserable hell-planet. Moon. Whatever.

 

They move as swiftly as they are able across the rickety walkway, which shimmys from side to side underneath them. It’s not very high, but Jim has no intention of finding out what a fall from it would be like. After what seems like hours, but can’t have been more than a minute or two (Jim would ask Spock, if it were possible to make himself heard over this insanity), the squad arrives where the walkway dead ends at the entryway to the facility. Locked down, to the shock of absolutely no one. Hudson kicks the door ineffectually, and does a couple of those hand signals to Stonn that Jim will absolutely never admit to Sulu are really fucking cool.

 

Jim huddles in place and does his best to pretend it’s the wind making his body shake like it is, as Stonn turns and via another set of gestures, directs Roaché towards the door. Jim will not be afraid! Ok, no, he is terrified . Fine. But, he’s done this before. ‘The nest was worse, the nest was worse,’ he repeats over and over to himself. He peeks under Stonn’s arm to get a quick glance at Spock. He gets a glimpse of Spock’s face, set stoically against the elements, and then Stonn is ushering him forward toward the still-closed door. 

 

Jim shuffles to the side to make room as Roaché stows away some gear, then heads back towards the rear of the squad. Was that the MHD-995 Hacking Device? Fancy. And temperamental. 

 

Stonn raises an arm up, creating something of a protective cover for Jim between himself and the slight overhang at the entryway. 

 

“There has been an equipment malfunction,” Stonn informs him, speaking only as loudly as he needs to for Jim to hear him. “Perhaps it would be possible for you to gain access to door control, in the same manner as you accomplished on Sevastopol.”

 

Jim blinks. He thinks he gets where Stonn is going with this. Canny of him to have guessed (or logically calculated or whatever) that Jim is once again packing a somewhat non-Federation endorsed hack tool. Jim meets his eyes and nods.

 

Stonn turns and calls something out over his shoulder, the wind whipping it away before Jim can hear. Then Stonn steps a little over to allow Spock to come stand next to him. And so, as the two of them appear to have their heads bent together in an impromptu command conference (oh so conveniently obscuring Jim from the rest of their company), he nimbly pulls out his hack tool from its pouch, and gets to work. 

 

A veritable bucket of rain is swept under the overhang, drenching Jim and his tool and answering the question of what had befallen Roaché’s attempt at gaining them entry. Thank god for Keenser’s obsession with waterproofing. The security routines he’s interacting with were actually written sometime this technical generation, but they’re still outclassed by Jim. He has a gift (he has been informed, by some rather unscrupulous characters!) And, of course, tools provided by the Roylan species’ version of a mad scientist.

 

Distracted by hurrying to stow away the hack tool, Jim didn’t quite think ahead to what having to stow away his hack tool means, vis-à-vis the door, so when it whooshes open to reveal a dark interior he freezes. It’s only moments before the vanguard of the squad is spilling in around him, but he stays stuck in his half-crouched position before the door. The hand that curls around the back of his neck is the only thing that gets him up and moving. 

 

He’s propelled forward, and when he instinctively flinches back from the darkness to run away, he’s kept in place by unyielding strength. It’s only when the door closes behind Jim and the cacophony of wind and debris is cut off that he realizes it's Spock’s hand. Even as he turns to look at Spock standing just behind him in the gloom, the hand falls away. Jim swallows.

 

‘This is neither the time nor the place to fling myself into his arms and beg for him to logically give it to me,’ he tells himself. 

 

The ringing in Jim’s ears gradually subsides; from the muted sounds of the storm outside, the shield plating of the facility seems to be holding. There’s a round of softly uttered, ‘clears’ from the vanguard up ahead, rifles carefully covering every angle. Nobody moves. Jim looks to Stonn, but then Hudson hisses, “Jim,” from the front and Jim realizes they’re waiting on him. Oh right. Consultant. Absolutely, no problem.

 

Only slightly feeling like his lower half is detached from his upper, Jim walks over to stand next to Hudson. He breathes in and out as slowly as he can, and listens carefully.

 

Dripping, from the sodden members of the squad (himself included…although annoyingly, his left side from the leg down seems to be completely dry). The now distant background howling of the wind, a muted clang here or there as some larger piece of debris strikes the outside of the facility. The creak of struts in the ceiling as they push back against the pressure of the storm. And the silence of an empty, unoccupied space, from the hallway that stretches before them. Slowly Jim acclimatizes himself to the sound profile of the interior. He hears no hissing, no ‘thud thud’ of heavy steps, and no scuffling or squeaking of an alien crawling around above him.

 

He looks back to Spock, who appears to be listening just as intently. After a beat, Spock looks over at him. They need no words for what passes between them, because whatever has passed between them, this, this connection, this understanding, is still there. 

 

It’s safe to move.

 

Gritting his teeth against the desire to turn tail and run back to the shuttle, Jim gives an encouraging pat to Hudson’s shoulder and turns to Stonn and gives him a stiff nod.

 

“Advance,” Stonn says softly, flicking his fingers forward and Hudson begins to direct the squad in angry whispers. Section by section, they move along the hallway, pausing for Jim and Spock to listen, then resuming movement once one or both of them has indicated the all clear. The door to the landing pad was still receiving power, but the interior seems completely powered-down. The only illumination comes from the various lighting sources utilized by Tihet, lights attached to various points. Headsets, chest plates, rifle attachments, etc., Rekan has one on his elbow, of all places.

 

The dancing lights illuminate patches of the walls and floor, revealing bare metal and grating, stark and unvarnished. All the doorways they pass are open, showing empty or half-filled storage areas, carefully checked and cleared. Not that it means anything. Like any self-respecting outpost not on a home planet, Acheron’s Administration facility is designed with redundant internal air cycling measures. As in, a large pervasive system of air ducts and vents. If the Aliens want to come up behind them, they will. Those air cycling systems haven't been activated in a while though, Jim is guessing. The air they breathe is dry and stale, dusty as well. Every once in a while, someone has to muffle a cough.

 

Hudson guides them using schematics accessed via a bulky wrist PADD, holding a whispered conference with Spock every so often at intersections, and every moment they aren’t ambushed by aliens from the vents paradoxically makes it that much worse.

 

They pass small stacks of cargo and boxes here and there, abandoned PADDS (all dead), everything left lying, waiting for someone to come right back. Of course, no one did come right back. Fuck.

 

The similarities to his arrival on Sevastopol do not escape him. If Jim sees a mattress lying in the hallway though, so help him, that’s it. He’s out. Jim will be waiting for them safe and sealed in on the shuttle, consulting contract be damned.

 

Jim blinks as he realizes the structure of the walls has changed from the bare metal of an access or maintenance hallway to paneling reserved for public areas, in a scuffed off-white. They seem to be particularly insulated Jim realizes, the noise of the wind reduced to only a background hum, or resonance. The only other thing his ears can identify is quiet and emptiness. 

 

They move up another section of hallway and Jim blinks when they don’t move forward again. Someone’s light illuminates the sign over the closed double doors Hudson has stopped at. ‘Administrative Control’ it reads. 

 

Hudson fusses with the access pad for the doors, then Roaché is called up to fuss with it unsuccessfully as well. Once again Stonn steps forward to the entryway, and summons Jim. He bends his head down as if to confer with him and says lowly, “If you please, Captain.”

 

As Spock joins their little huddle like before, Jim angles himself a little bit to the side to access the door controls. It takes him all of a hot second to realize the problem. Critically low power. He doesn’t even bother to pull out his hack tool. 

 

“Oh, hey, I see the problem,” he says, just loud enough for the rest of the squad to hear, assuming the air of an interested third party. 

 

Jim double taps Stonn on the shoulder, and he obligingly steps out of the way. Jim goes straight for a small panel on the wall next to the door that is practically screaming, ‘critical wiring located here’.

 

He pops it off with the ease of practice, and when he makes to set it on the ground, Spock’s outstretched hand is there instead, so Jim hands it off without a word. Jim and Spock attacking a door together, just like old times. 

 

Jim is unable to stop himself from shooting what is honestly a pathetic puppy-dog look at Spock for a second, then he catches himself and turns back to the wall. At least he can be sure that his rising blush is obscured by the shadows cast by the various light beams, the squad, rifles at the ready, constantly checking along the walls and ceiling. Focusing back on the problem in front of him, Jim pulls out his wire cutter and deftly severs the power to the door. There, now it can be pried open with good, old-fashioned strength.

 

“Any Vulcans with a pry bar around?” Jim whispers.

 

He wasn’t really serious, but he’ll be damned if Rekan doesn’t step forward, stow away his rifle at his hip, and pull out a  piece of metal of indeterminate shape from his boot like a knife. Jim is just going to call that a ‘space prybar: Vulcan edition'. Rekan jams it into the seam of the doors, and with a grunt, begins to lever them open. With a complaining of metal that makes Jim wince, they resist for a few moments before springing grudgingly apart.

 

The vanguard passes by Jim as they begin to check the room, and Jim is left gaping at the space Rekan just vacated, because he swears, as the Vulcan had stowed his space prybar away, he’d winked at Jim. A gentle pressure on the back of his shoulder gets Jim moving again, and he swallows against the wave of emotion that wants to overtake him.

 

Spock. 

 

God Jim wants to turn around and climb Spock like a tree. And not even in a sexual way! Just in Spock is Vulcan shelter from the storm kinda way. As Jim steps forward into the control room the gentle pressure of Spock’s hand slips away. 

 

Fuck this. Jim is not going to die a gruesome and inevitable death. He is gonna make it through this so he and Spock can have themselves a discussion, so help him. Preferably followed by more of that Vulcan finger play. 

 

The control room they have just entered is just as dark and empty as the hallways they’ve just left. Blast shutters have descended along the entire wall to the left of Jim, where a bank of windows must have looked out over something. A fine layer of dust has settled over every surface, on the consoles, the stacks of PADDS and tape decks, and even a few abandoned mugs here and there. 

 

The shuffle of boots and sounding off of whispered ‘clears’ trails away into silence once more. Swiftly and efficiently, directed by Hudson, the squad splits, some to assume various overwatch positions, and others to commence scanning of the room and consoles. Those on watch are showing an alarming tendency to keep their lights and weapons trained on the various doors leading off from the control room, and Jim (fairly alarmed) steps over to Hudson and whispers, “We need cover on the ceiling, man.”

 

Hudson curses under his breath, and hisses viciously over at a pair Jim recognizes as Lovar, (a fierce-looking Vulcan), and Schofield, (a human crony of Palmer's and Frost's), though he doesn’t recall having spoken to either before. They jump guiltily (well Schofield does, Lovar’s shoulder twitches…Jim thinks), and turn their attention from the ground-level to the ceiling, their lights revealing a high ceiling with a troubling number of vent openings.

 

Jim shudders, then a tap on his arm from Hudson turns his attention to a whispered conference that’s being held between Stonn and Spock and his team. Hudson heads over, and groaning internally, Jim joins the throng.

 

“There is still power to this facility,” Uber nerd Vulcan is saying, and Jim blinks as he sees a helpful nametag on her right breast, in both standard and the squiggly flowing script of Vulcan. T'Sala, Lieutenant. “However,” T'Sala continues, tapping at her wrist PADD (a much sleeker version than Hudson's), “this room is not receiving that power.”

 

Jim frowns. The Facility has power. The doors to the control room had some power, before Jim severed it. But the control room itself is not receiving power. Hmmm. Power reroute? That could be a problem, god knows where from or to the power network could have been spliced into. The Vulcans continue their power debate, and Jim catches mention of power cells being brought from the shuttle for a manual hookup and—ding— lightbulb goes off. Not a reroute, an unhook!

 

He cuts right in on whatever Mr. Snooty (Tolek, his name tag reads), was saying. “I think they’ve just unhooked the control room from the power grid.” Four Vulcan heads swivel to him, blank expressions on their faces. Blank, with a hint of sneering, in the case of the snooty Tolek. Hudson grins and gives Jim a discreet thumbs up. “The facility has power,” Jim continues, “But you can’t just switch-off power to the damn control room, it—”

 

“Must be manually decoupled via the dedicated internal power grid,” Spock finishes for him. Jim nods. 

 

Hudson taps furiously at his PADD. “Not in the plans, dumbass Starfleet bitches,” he curses. 

 

Stonn masterfully ignores Hudson with the ease no doubt born of long practice. “Is it possible to restore power?” He questions. Jim nods.

 

“Per Federation regulations, the dedicated internal power grid should be in a self-contained unit, in a room adjacent to the area it is calibrated for,” Spock says, but he’s looking at Jim as he says it with a raised eyebrow.

 

Jim snorts. “Yeah, no, I can guarantee you they didn’t do that. Best bet is a jerry-rigged hookup scheme, most likely under the floor paneling.” 

 

Hudson summons Fry with a wave of his hand, and he, Fry and T'Sala commence scanning the floor. A minute later, Fry calls out lowly, “here,” where she’s standing on the right side of the control room. 

 

“No,” Jim informs Tolek, who still hasn’t lost that hint of sneer whenever he looks in Jim’s direction, “I don’t ever get tired of being right all the time.”

 

There’s a definite tension to Tolek’s body as Jim brushes past him to where Rekan has been summoned to pry up the floor paneling. He cracks it open with ease, and sure enough, there’s a snarl of cables and switches which is certainly not Federation regulation for the set up and distribution of power to a control room. It doesn’t even pass Starfleet’s own regulations. In fact, Jim’s pretty sure it’s illegal. 

 

Jim can also see that the term ‘unhook’ was more literal than he’d thought. There are two actual plugs detached from the main power bank. What a shit show.

 

Fry reaches forward to the nearest plug, and Jim’s heart seizes in his chest. He drops to his knees and gets his hand around her wrist, her fingers inches from the plug. She jumps in surprise, and looks at him with wide eyes. 

 

“Watch those flow switches,” Jim says grimly, indicating with a nod where further down the cables the plugs are attached to, the two flow switches are in the open position. “They’re live.”

 

“Fuck,” she hisses, and snatches her hand away. She takes a few breaths, and after looking at Jim for his nod to go ahead, she flips the flow switches to the closed position. 

 

“Give it ten seconds,” he murmurs. She counts under her breath, and then with slightly shaking hands, attaches the plugs back into the main power bank.

 

“Thirty seconds now,” he advises in a murmur again. When the thirty seconds have passed, she takes a breath in, and flicks the switches back to the open position.

 

The control room immediately fills with the sounds of electronics powering up: the sharp crack of connections, the fizzle of emergency lighting, and the beeps and whirs of the consoles coming back online.

 

Jim levers himself to his feet, nodding to Lodzhal as he approaches, and leaves him, Fry and Rekan to close the paneling back up. Looking around for something else he can help with, Jim spots Stonn, off to the side, a communicator held closely to his face. As he walks up, he catches the tail end of the what can only be a report from the shuttle. 

 

“The storm is exceeding the Lewis & Clarke’s safety limits,” one of the pilots is relaying, just legible through a garble of interference.

 

“Stand by,” Stonn replies, then calls over to where Frost is engaged at a nearby console. “What is the status of the spaceport?”

 

Frost stands, and gives the bulky console a frustrated kick. “The mainframe won’t accept an emergency override and is refusing to unseal the spaceport, citing planetary weather regulations, lack of administrator overrides, and my personal favorite, ‘error, request not recognized’.”

 

“Hudson!” Stonn says sharply, making Jim jump a little, “What is the status of long range communications?”

 

Hudson trots over from where he was breathing down Fry's neck where she has started working at one of the consoles. 

 

“It's coming back online now boss, but we don't know the status of the systems yet.”

 

“Connection with comms tower confirmed,” Fry calls over her shoulder.

 

Across the room, T’Sala straightens from where she's syncing some her wrist tech to a console. 

 

“Remote linkup with the Rineikau-Yehat initiated,” she reports.

 

Jim knows what Stonn’s going to say before he even says it.

 

“Shuttle Lewis & Clarke, you have leave to disengage, return to holding orbit,” Stonn orders.

 

Because. Of course. Of. Fucking. Course.

 

Jim resists the urge to say something extremely pessimistic like, ‘we’re all going to die down here.’ 

 

He folds his arms and stalks over to glare at the blast shielding still covering the windows. After a bit, he realizes that Spock has appeared, and is working steadily at the console next to him.

 

“Disengaging shutters,” Spock calmly informs the room. His alert is followed almost immediately after by the groaning and clanking of metal as the shutters begin to retract upwards. It makes an absolute racket. The room waits in silence for a few moments, and when the continuing quiet is the only response to the noise of the shutter retraction, they return to their tasks. The view from the  window bank is revealed to be the cavernous space of the inside of the Acheron spaceport, the glow shining in from the control room illuminating not much more than the section before them, but Jim just knows. It’s a ghost town. Abandoned, vacant, deserted. 

 

Beams of light from the members of the squad checking down into it slide over empty walkways, empty berths, and empty relay stations. The whole interior is completely clear, there’s not so much as a planetary skiff in dock.

 

Spock continues working at the console, and as Jim looks away from the interior of the spaceport and scans the room, he sees that Frost, T'Sala, Hudson and Fry are all busy at their own consoles of choice. He rolls his eyes when he catches sight of the snooty Tolek, advancing towards Spock, still busy at the console next to Jim. Ugh. Jim heads over to stand by Palmer, who is guarding the door. They stand in companionable silence as Jim listens intently, but all he hears is the continuing emptiness of the facility. 

 

“That first creature,” Palmer breaks the silence, “how long did it follow you around before it attacked, again?”

 

Jim lets out a breath. He shakes his head. “A good hour or so? Stalked me up in the vents.”

 

Palmer nods grimly, and adjusts his two-handed hold on his weapon. Jim is not himself a weapons expert, but he’s gonna go ahead and call that monster a minigun. 

 

“Captain,” Jim hears from behind him, and he turns to answer the summons, moving join up where Stonn, Hudson, and Spock’s team Vulcan have converged around T'Sala's console, clapping Palmer on the back as he leaves.

 

“Anything?” Jim asks Spock as he joins the group.  

 

“Negative,” he responds. “Before the main power was decoupled, the memory banks were wiped, and the system was purged before undergoing a factory reset. Whatever has happened here, the control room now holds no record of it.”

 

Spock turns to T'Sala. “Will data recovery be possible, Lieutenant?” 

 

“Negative,” she says, her fingers dancing over her wrist PADD. “There is only a 7.02% chance of recovering any data, and only a 2.23% chance of recovering data pertinent to this investigation.”

 

Spock turns to Stonn. “As this avenue is closed to us, physical evidence remains our only recourse. We must learn the cause for the abandonment of operations here. We cannot abort this mission until we have exhausted all avenues to determine whether further contamination has been shipped off of this moon, or if it remains.”

 

Spock is loyal and duty bound. Jim finds these to be admirable and desirable facets of Spock’s personality, even if, in this particular moment, Jim is resenting those facets a little bit. Because Spock is right. They have to know if the fuckers shipped any more eggs off-site, and where they even got them from in the first place, if they can. Jim knows this. He even agrees with it. 

 

He just wishes to god that it didn’t require them staying on this damn moon. 

 

Fuck.  

 

“Where do you think they all went?” Hudson abruptly asks Jim.

 

Jim flicks his eyes to Spock, and then away again. “They could have gotten a decommission order or the ore dried up, and they all abandoned the place, or some variation thereof.” Shaking off a feeling of deja-vu, Jim continues, “or there has been a contamination event here, and they all holed up somewhere more defensible than a pre-fab facility. Either way, you don’t memory-wipe a control room unless you’ve got something to hide.”

 

“We will proceed under the theory that a contamination event has occurred, and attempt to locate where the miners and staff would have relocated to,” Spock announces.

 

“Affirmative,” Stonn agrees. 

 

“I’ve got two likely candidates,” Hudson announces, eyes darting over his PADD. “That old junker terraformer, or the Olduvai Mining facility.”

 

“We will continue our investigation at the Olduvai Mining facility,” Spock says swiftly.

 

T'Sala questions him, a slight crease in her brow. “Would they not have attempted to retreat to the terraformer? It would have a far more reliable power source.”

 

“The mine is the more defensible position. If a contamination event has occurred involving the creatures encountered on Sevastopol, the chances are higher that the miners would have retreated there to familiar ground. The terraformer is unconnected and too far from the main facilities to be a viable option,” Spock responds, speaking swiftly again.

 

Jim blinks. No percentages for those chances? No decimal points? Spock’s face is just as composed as ever. Jim looks at T'Sala, whose eyebrow twitches, but she does not question Spock.

 

The group then turns to look at Jim expectantly, even Tolek. 

 

Like. Jim doesn't wanna go to either of those places, they sound horrible. He sighs. “If Commander Spock thinks the mine is the more viable option, then we should investigate the mine.”

 

Stonn nods, and turns to Hudson and begins issuing orders.

 

Nothing good has ever, once, in the history of mankind, come from venturing into a cave, Jim is sure. Like. Jim exists because human beings tried it for awhile then said, as a species, ‘fuck this shit, we're out’. 

 

As Hudson begins relaying Stonn’s orders to the squad, Jim tries not to think about the shuttle, miles above them in orbit, or Bones’ reaction each time he hears the places where Jim had the chance to say ‘let’s just leave’ and didn’t, or what Spock’s reaction would be if Jim were to beg him for a hand hold. Just a small one. 

 

Before they go inside a mine. A fucking mine. God, he bet it has a million vents for air flow. 

 

Acheron sucks. 

End Chapter SIX

Notes:

Fun Fic Fact: a game! take a shot every time Jim utilizes Spock as his Emotional Support Vulcan! :D

Easter Eggs: 6! :D

OK YES ABOUT CHAPTER 7, (ya'll would not believe the words I've typed and then deleted I'm making it so complicated lmao) LONG-ASS STORY SHORT = Chapter 7 is looking to clock in at around 10k, it doesn't need to be that massive, I shall very likely split it into two enjoyable parts. The planned Chapter 8 shall become Chapter 9 and so on and so forth. That will give me some breathing room to see if chapters are gonna start flowing faster, and an extra two weeks with which to type! So! Yes. Nothing really has changed honestly. Chapter 7 shall be posted on schedule next week, and then I'll be able to share more about if/when a break shall occur.

 

*A few moments later*

ANOTHER FUN FIC FACT: Chapter 7 was the doc I have tabbed open bc...working on it but u know how it be so many tabs so the name was cut off I just went by the Google Doc icon jumped in and ctrl a ctrl c jump back to ao3 post ctrl v doo doo doo lalalal preview scrolling down I catch a word that is not supposed to be in Chapter 6!!!! ...wtf?? THIS IS NOT CHAPTER SIX ABORT ABORT ALL STATIONS ABORT anyway. yes. Carry on. I promise you have just read the correct chapter.

*SDKLFJSDLFJ jeebus fric I tried to do it again OPEN UP THE CHAPTER 6 DOCUMENT YOU ABSOLUTE WALNUT*

Chapter 7: Trouble

Summary:

See the friendly wildlife!

Notes:

Thank you betafish <3<3<3<3 (itsme-theborgqueen) <3<3<3

Chapter 8 is written whoohooo! (more on that in the end notes which contain SPOILERS DO NOT READ UNTIL FINISHED WITH CHAPTER)

You cannot comprehend how LONG how IMPATIENTLY I have waiting to post this chapter a;skdfjsdk this chapter omg. Ahem. Please enjoy! Thank you all so much for your continuing interest in and support of this fic I love you guys!!! (CANNOT WAIT TO SEE YOUR REACTIONS TO THIS OMG SDKFJSDLKJ WMAAHAHAHA)

Things move swiftly once the mine is selected as the next point in their investigation. It is decided that T’Sala will remain behind in the control room with a small guard to maintain communications, attempt data recovery, and oversee what facility systems they may need. Jim objects to this division and is overruled. (It can and should be done remotely, in his opinion.)

 

Then Stonn and Hudson and Spock have themselves a little conference, and it is decided that Stonn will take half of the squad to investigate the facility’s medical suite before joining the rest of them at the mine. Jim objects most strenuously to this division and is once again overruled. (They should stay together, splitting up is death, in his opinion.)

 

Jim reminds them that if they were just going to ignore his consulting expertise, there was no need to drag him down here, he could have just as easily been ignored from up on the Invincible. Stonn responds to his accusation of ignoring him by…continuing to ignore him. Jim probably has Hudson to thank for how good Stonn is at that. Spock ignores him too (though it’s harder to tell if that’s related to his previous comment, or if they’ve just cycled back around to that in the Vulcan treatment playbook). Tolek gives him a superior look. Hudson gives him a sympathetic pat on the back. 

 

Jim crosses his arms, taps his foot on the ground and glares back and forth between Stonn and Spock.

 

“Again, for the record,” Jim says, “I think splitting up is an abysmally stupid idea.” 

 

Spock glances at him just long enough to say, “noted,” and then turns back to where he is giving directions to T’Sala. Stonn doesn’t even bother to look over from where he is issuing a stream of instructions to Hudson. Great. 

 

Even Palmer isn’t on his side. “The sooner we accomplish our objectives, the sooner we can leave,” he says sympathetically to Jim as he switches out with Ocampo as door guard and moves to join Stonn and Hudson. 

 

Jim clenches his jaw on his response which is, ‘dead people accomplish no objectives and are also dead.’ 

 

“Comms check,” Hudson calls, breaking the general quiet of murmuring and preparations, causing Jim to jump a little. Shit. Jim reaches into the pouch which contains his headset, and manages to get it on, fumbling only a little. 

 

“I am certain, Captain Kirk, that if you had asked, a Federation communicator would have been issued to you,” Tolek says, his fingers stroking his own communicator where it is affixed to his chest, like all the rest of the landing party. He’s standing off to the side of Jim, with one of his spidery brows raised in extreme judgment. Jim settles the mic more securely against his cheek, and tests the attached flashlight on the far wall.

 

“If I wanted a Federation communicator issued to me,” Jim responds at last, his tone bored with a hint of insolence, “I would have asked for one.”

 

“Captain,” Jim hears Hudson’s voice in his ear.

 

“Copy,” Jim responds.

 

He flicks his eyes over to the snooty Tolek and confirms with satisfaction that he is currently the recipient of a spectacular example of a Vulcan glare. (No, there’s no ‘expression’ per say on his face, but it’s the tightness of his jaw that gives Tolek away.)

 

Jim heads off to the side of the room, out of the way of the logistics being tossed back and forth between those at the consoles and those planning their forays to the medical suite and into the mine. He cocks his head to the side as if he’s listening intently for alien creatures (which…he is) but the head cock is really for show so that it looks less like he’s stewing in his own juices and more like he is fulfilling his mandated function as a consultant. 

 

‘Professionalism is the goal,’ Jim reminds himself. ‘Professionalism is the journey I have entered upon and I shall see it through, verily, like a good boy.’

 

The only sounds are the clicks and shufflings of the squad as they make preparations, a soft exchange of conversation here or there, the hum and beeps of the control room consoles, and more distantly, the sound of the storm outside, relegated to a mere buzz by the insulation of the control room. No aliens. Now, why does that make Jim feel worse?

 

“Captain.”

 

Jim jerks his head over to see that Stonn is summoning him. The squad is ready to move out. Fuck. Just. Fuck his life. Jim sighs and trots over to take up his position on Stonn’s left, and they begin to exit the control room, Jim, Stonn, Spock and Tolek once more at the center of the formation. T’Sala remains behind, busying herself at her console of choice with Nomikh (a delicate-looking  Vulcan who hasn’t said ‘boo’ to Jim) and Schofield (who says something to Frost to make him laugh as he exits the room) as her guard.

 

Jim nervously grips his rifle where it’s settled over his hip. 

 

His eyes not breaking from the hallway ahead, Stonn taps Jim twice, gently, on his wrist. “Calm,” he says softly, out of the corner of his mouth. Right okay. Jim releases his grip on the rifle and lets his arms fall back to his sides. No freakouts. No friendly fire incidents. Yup. 

 

With facility power re-enabled from the newly restored control room, the hallways they walk through and rooms they check are brightly lit, revealing worn paneling in off-white and faded blue, and aged facility amenities. Their party continues forward, led by Hudson at a steady pace, with squad members on each side peeling off to check rooms as they come, the quiet relay of their ‘clears’ and Hudson’s coordination on comms with T’Sala the only conversation.

 

They come to a ‘Y’ branch, with a sign posted that looks to be made of real metal (probably cast from the ore they mine here, Jim never has confirmed what it is) that reads simply ‘Olduvai’. There’s a faded red arrow pointing to the right painted below it. 

 

Stonn steps up to the front of their column and announces softly, “We shall divide here.” Stonn nods to Hudson who directs the squad with a series of hand and arm signals. Palmer moves into the head of the column that’s forming on the right, and Hudson takes Stonn’s place in between Jim, and Spock and Tolek. 

 

Jim internally cheers as Ocampo, Fry and Frost join their team, and then internally boos as Lodzhal and Rekan join Stonn’s side, but then perks up a little when the last to join their squad is Arev. 

 

“We will maintain steady contact via comms,” Stonn is informing Hudson. Jim steps forward and gives each of them a significant look, and then tries to meet as many eyes in the two squads as he can. 

 

“If I, or anyone, calls for hold comms, no transmissions of any kind until you get the all-clear.”

 

“We are understood,” Stonn does his own visual check of the squads. After the soft murmurs of assent trail off, he nods. “Move out.” He turns on his heel and begins leading his column away down the left hallway. 

 

Hudson signals Palmer, who says, “Team 2, on me,” and begins to lead them down the right hallway, towards Olduvai. Their progress is slowed somewhat, as without a full complement, the entire squad stops and waits for Ocampo and Arev to clear each room they pass. As they continue on however, the rooms become few and far between, and they move swiftly down a narrowing corridor, which of course, is absolutely riddled with open ceiling vents. 

 

After another minute or so, Ocampo hisses, “Where is this stupid place?”

 

“Zip it, Ocampo,” Hudson hisses back.

 

Jim pretends like he’s using his shoulder to itch his nose to hide a smirk at Arev’s mouthing of ‘zip it’ next to Ocampo, one eyebrow quirked in confusion.

 

After a beat, Hudson whispers, “Thirty more feet.”

 

Jim looks up ahead to where the hallway curves. The entrance must be just around the bend.

 

A clanking sound in the ceiling above stops him dead, and he instinctively crouches down, flailing his arm at Hudson to stop, who then does, and motions the squad to do the same. They follow suit and crouch down too, and Hudson murmurs into his communicator, “Hold comms.”

 

The clanking sound repeats and Jim listens intently. The sounds of the outside are louder, he realizes. They’ve moved away from the insulation of the control room, and the howls and gusts of the wind are audible again. The clanking sound repeats once more, and Jim hesitantly identifies the sound of metal against metal, something outside, loosened by the wind.

 

He leans around Hudson to meet Spock’s eyes. That thing they do, their ability to communicate without words, god Jim loves that. Spock agrees. He just knows it somehow in the core of him. It’s just the storm. He lets out a breath and some tension drains from his body.

 

“Storm,” he says, looking back at Hudson. “All clear,” Hudson relays the same through comms. They all stand, and at Hudson’s signal, Palmer begins leading them forward once more. They round the curve in the hallway and come right up on a checkpoint. An empty security station greets them on the right. “Mine Entrance” reads the sign set up above the sealed doors in front of them, to what could be a decontamination chamber. The doors were probably clear once upon a time, but they are clouded and scuffed from years of use. He can’t see much into the empty space behind them. Scanning the area, Jim sees a chart posted on the outside of the security station. It’s a numbered protocol for a contamination-free mine entry. Yup. Decon. 

 

Jim is really not concerned with them bringing contaminants in . “Can we just override this thing?” He asks.

 

Hudson shrugs and looks at Spock, who appears deep in thought. After a few moments of awkward silence, Spock blinks, looks at Hudson, and nods. “The mission parameters do not require us to follow mine entry procedures. We will dispense with the decontamination protocol.”

 

Good. There’s like twenty-something steps on that damn chart. Jim has absolutely zero desire to enter that mine, but now that they’re here, he just wants to get it over with. 

 

Jim and the squad wait as Spock consults with T’Sala over comms, then gains entry to the security station. Jim estimates Spock will need only twenty seconds to interface with the program and override the system. Spock does it in sixteen. Damn that calculation thing the Vulcans do is hard.

 

The doors slide open with a grudging squeaking, revealing a boring white decontamination chamber. Then the double doors on the opposite side open too, and the noise of the storm jumps up in volume. There’s a small antechamber with viewports set forward on the wall and bizarrely into the floor, with a long hallway running off from it. A weird metal hallway that is…swaying. Jim blinks, and realizes what he’s seeing through the viewports, and why there’s viewports set into the floor at all. 

 

They’re overlooking a hideous gorge, of which the bottom is completely not visible, just a pit of darkness. The weird metal hallway is nothing more than an enclosed conduit, connecting this facility to the mine, which is apparently on the other side of the gorge. 

 

“Fuck me,” Frost whispers, summing up Jim’s feelings completely. 

 

“Amen,” Jim whispers back, and they share a fist bump. 

 

After a moment, Arev haltingly holds an awkward fist for Frost to bump as well. “Affirmative,” he says.

 

Grinning broadly, Frost shows him how to do the fist bump. A particularly strong gust of wind buffets the walkway, and it creaks ominously as it sways even more noticeably back and forth. That’s how the miners and staff get over to the mine? Wow, they did not get paid enough. Jim doesn’t even have to know the numbers in question to know that. 

 

He squints, trying to make out more details on the other side of the gorge. The visibility they have is surprising. Jim wouldn’t have thought they’d be able to see the other side. The gorge must have some sort of natural buffer against the weather of Acheron. The conduit creaks and jiggles. Not that it’s that much consolation, honestly. 

 

Static crackles in Jim’s ear, and he listens intently as someone (Lodzhal, he’s pretty sure), begins to deliver a report.

 

“Medical is clear. No evidence of trauma or intensive patient care. However, all supplies and basic medical instruments are missing.”

 

There’s some indistinct conversation, and Jim catches the word ‘ransacked’. 

 

Lodzahl resumes his report. “Current location of the medical supplies, and motive for their removal is unknown. Medical’s logs and patient profiles were downloaded remotely from the server. Lieutenant T’Sala has been notified, and will attempt to trace whether the records remain onsite, or were downloaded off-moon.”

 

“We read you, Team 1,” Hudson responds, “confirm position?”

 

This time it’s Stonn’s voice in Jim’s ear. “We will conduct a general sweep of the area, then rendezvous for a coordinated search of the mine.”

 

“Copy,” Hudson says, “We are prepping to enter the mine now.” 

 

“Establish an uplink to the mine systems with the control room, and then report to me,” Stonn says.

 

“Orders received, Team 2 out.”

 

Jim stares out blankly at the gorge, then movement out of the corner of his eye causes him to look over to where Ocampo has just nudged Fry with her elbow.

 

“Think someone got rich off of those supplies?” She whispers.

 

Fry shrugs. “Or dead,” she whispers back.

 

That’s the question, isn’t it? Was medical ‘ransacked’ because they needed medical supplies wherever they set up their camp to fortify themselves against alien invasion, or did it get raided because taking shit for yourself to sell is just step number one when you get a decommission order in the Outer Reaches?

 

“Commander,” Palmer says, and Jim turns to see Spock is standing beside him. 

 

“Diagnostics and sensors are online, and have been routed to Lieutenant T’Sala in the control room. The bridge is deemed safe for passage.”

 

“Aw man,” Hudson whines, forgetting himself. Palmer clears his throat pointedly. Hudson jumps guiltily and motions to Palmer. “Alright, you heard the Commander move-out.”

 

Palmer steps out onto the metal death trap, and is followed by Arev, then Hudson, who waves for Jim to follow him.

 

Jim doesn’t move.

 

“Captain,” Spock says, “I shall proceed after you,” and he waits patiently for Jim to step forward.

 

Which Jim will do. Probably. In a minute. Holy fuck what a time to get a thing about heights. 

 

“Captain Kirk,” this time it’s Tolek’s voice, and Jim’s body tenses up in reaction, “It is your turn to cross. The rest of Team 2 is waiting.” He has no emotion in his voice, and yet all indications are he himself is waiting both impatiently and judgmentally. 

 

“When it’s your turn to cross over the gorge of eternal peril, you can take as much time as you need, and I’ll sit back and wait for you, how about that,” Jim snaps. Damn he really thought it was gonna be vent noises that were going render him a useless jellyfish but no, apparently it’s this needlessly terrifying gorge out of left field. Jim did not see that one coming.

 

“Jim,” Spock says, gently, and Jim sighs as a wave of calm seems to move through him, and he finds that he can move forward again. 

 

He’s halfway across the bridge, gritting his teeth as the whole contraption swings to the right, clenching his hands into fists as it sways back to the left, hunching his shoulders against the constant sound of dirt and rain and rocks and fuck knows what else hitting its exterior when he realizes.

 

Spock’s mouth had never moved.

 

He stops dead, but only for a moment, a soft press against his lower back, Spock’s hand, (because Spock has proceeded after him, because Spock has been at his back guarding him and supporting him the whole time), gets him moving again.

 

‘Thank you,’ Jim thinks, and wonders if it’s possible that Spock can hear it. He can’t mean nothing to Spock, he just can’t! He makes it the rest of the way without incident (as does the rest of their team) and his reward is…abject misery, apparently. 

 

The mine is just as awful as Jim was expecting. The decon chamber on the opposite side of the gorge sits open (thanks no doubt to Spock’s efforts) and beyond it is a rock tunnel. Dark. Cramped. The stale, acrid smell of metal fills the air. The power is off, and air cycling does not appear to be running. One by one, the team switches on their various light sources, and Jim reaches up to do the same with the light attached to his headset. 

 

And yes. It does indeed have a million vent openings. At every layer and angle imaginable. At their ankles, in the sides of the walls, at their necks, their shoulders, their hips, and tilted in at all angles on the uneven ceiling. Each one they pass is different from the last. As they move away from the gorge and the conduit across it, the noise from the storm lessens once more and Jim begins to pick up on the sounds of the mine around them. 

 

A little further in, they stop as Fry takes a reading with her scanner, and Jim turns a little to see that Spock is doing the same behind him. 

 

“I’m reading that these upper levels should be safe,” she whispers.

 

“Breathable gasses are registering within acceptable deviations for both Vulcans and Humans,” Spock affirms.

 

As they move forward once more, Jim carefully catalogues the sounds of the environment around him. A dead quiet, even more pervasive than the Administrative facility they’ve just left. It’s broken only by the trickling of rocks or sediment down the walls or from the ceiling every so often, and the soft shuffle of their feet on the loose sand that covers the tunnel floor as they move further down the tunnel.

 

It’s not long before they come to a ‘T’ junction, and Hudson is able to confirm the map on his wrist PADD with the signage on the wall. ‘Olduvai Administration’ is indicated by an arrow to the left. They go left. 

 

It’s dusty and dry in the mine, but with the air cycling off, the air seems to cling to them. Soon, Jim has sweat at his temples, and begins to feel moist all over, generally. Great. He’d pretty much just started to dry out from the damn storm crossing too. 

 

“This should be the place,” Hudson says softly, and ahead, Jim sees the hallway end in a large metal door. As the squad reaches it and begins to fan out to guard positions, he sees that the hallway doesn’t end, but instead continues on after taking a hard right just before the door.

 

Hudson attempts access, but a rude sounding error noise is all he gets for his troubles. 

 

Spock steps forward, and makes his attempt, but encounters the same noise. 

 

T’Sala responds over comms to Spock's query, “As the control room has suffered a reset and wipe of all systems, the access codes for the Olduvai mining complex are no longer stored in the memory banks, without a re-granting of access or a remote linkup, I can provide no assistance.”

 

“Shit,” Hudson sighs.

 

Jim heaves a gusty sigh of his own. “All right,” he says, “nobody look.” He gets a few blank looks from the humans and calm blinks from the Vulcans. 

 

“Turn around,” he says, with emphasis, and gives a significant look to Hudson and then Palmer, and makes a twirling motion with his finger.

 

“Oooh, right,” Hudson says. Palmer nods. “Watch those vent openings, cover the rear,” Hudson hisses, and the squad turns their backs on Jim and begins scanning both angles of the hallway.

 

Jim shares a look of perfect understanding with Spock, who then turns and draws Tolek into conversation, summoning Hudson over to bring up schematics on his wrist PADD.

 

Right. Jim turns to the door, draws out his hack tool and gets to work. He’s not fooling anybody, but plausible deniability is good enough for him. 

 

“Just whistle while you work, doo doo doodoodoodoodoo,” he hums under his breath.

 

And…in.

 

He stows the hack tool away, gives a little cough, and Spock turns smoothly to the door. 

 

“I believe the door is open,” Spock says stiltedly. “Now,” he adds, making it even more awkward. Jim disguises his laugh by pretending to cough some more into his elbow. Seriously. How did Spock convince the Enterprise that he was human? Seriously . Spock is just about the Vulcanist Vulcan to ever Vulcan. ‘Your honor, in my defense, I just thought he was weird ,’ Jim thinks.

 

“Would you look at that?” Hudson interjects smoothly, (obviously far more skilled in the arts of subterfuge than Spock), “It’s open.”

 

He performs a dizzying array of hand signals, and Palmer proceeds inside, followed by Ocampo and Arev. 

 

“Clear,” Palmer calls back lowly after a minute. Another round of hand signals from Hudson, and then he starts inside, beckoning Jim and Spock and Tolek to follow. The rest of the squad comes in after, and Palmer falls back to take up a guard position at the door, keeping a watchful eye on the tunnels.

 

The Olduvai control room is much smaller than the main one across the gorge. A single row of consoles sits in the middle, with a few supporting stations set against the side walls. A row of defunct replicators sits against the back wall, alongside a counter with a few lonely cups and empty plates. The front wall is dominated by a massive vid screen, dark and empty.

 

Jim sneezes, followed quickly by Fry. It seems especially dusty here. Jim sneezes again. Fry sniffles. They exchange a shared look of misery. Fry has to venture deeper in to try what she may with one of the unpromising-looking consoles. But Jim…Jim is gonna hang out by the door with Palmer. The air in the tunnels isn’t exactly a breeze in his face, but it’s a damn sight better than the inside of the mine control room. 

 

He lets the soft chatter between Fry, Frost, Spock, and Tolek at the consoles and their exchange of comms with T’Sala and Team 1 fade into the background. He listens for any indication that something could be stalking them from the walls or ceiling or floor even. This place is probably worse than a honeycomb with all those vents. 

 

Nothing. 

 

“Think they’re out there?” Palmer asks.

 

Jim shrugs helplessly. “I don’t fucking know,” he sighs. 

 

“Hope for the best,” Palmer says sagely. 

 

Jim knows that saying, he gives a weak grin and finishes, “Prepare for the worst.”

 

A thunk draws his attention to the bank of consoles arrayed in front of the blank vid screen. Frost has kicked an uncooperative piece of machinery again. The squad begins forming up at the door.

 

“No go?” Jim asks Hudson.

 

“There’s some breakers or something somewhere that have to be manually flipped or something, I dunno man,” Hudson informs him wearily.

 

Ah, the runaround. In no way shape or form reminding Jim of his time on Sevastopol.

 

Not. 

 

Jim reviews the conversation he’d been slightly tuned out of. 

 

“We’re headed down to the second level? Team 1 is crossing over now and taking this level?” He leans into Hudson to confirm, speaking as low as he can, hoping to god Tolek can’t hear him with that sharp Vulcan hearing.

 

“You got it,” Hudson says out of the corner of his mouth. 

 

The pointed eyebrow arch Tolek directs at Jim makes it obvious that the Vulcans do indeed hear all. Fuck. 

 

Hudson directs Palmer to lead them down the tunnel where it continues on to the right. Team 2 resumes their quiet advance into the mine. There’s silence and that’s about it. A bunch of rock and stone. Nothing for Jim to do but butter his biscuit over Tolek’s attitude. He’s got this aura about him, when it comes to Jim. As if Jim has been weighed, measured, and found to be wanting or something. 

 

They pass few rooms on either side, their doors closed tight.

 

“If they’re locked, leave them for Team 1,” Hudson answers Ocampo’s query, and they continue on uninterrupted to another ‘T’ junction, as the doors they pass do indeed prove to be locked.  

 

Hudson consults his map. “This is us,” he says and indicates the tunnel off to the right. 

 

They continue on in silence and stillness, the tunnel quickly developing a steep downwards slope. Well, that’s gonna be a bitch to come back up, but at least it’s not an elevator. Jim has been pleasantly surprised at the lack of elevator usage so far on this mission. None. Perhaps the silver lining he’s been looking for? 

 

His eye’s flick to Spock’s profile, and light from someone’s arm or rifle catches on the point of his Vulcan ear. Ok. Maybe not the lining he’s been looking for, but it’s the only lining Jim has at this point, silver or otherwise. If there are any other types of lining. Fuck if he knows.

 

They keep on trucking down the sloped tunnel, and just when Jim thinks his ankles and knees can’t take another step down the fucking incline, the ground levels out into a small antechamber of some kind, with an empty directory on one wall and a few tunnels branching out in various directions.

 

A small beep draws Jim’s attention to Frost, who grunts, checks his scanner, and says, “small power spike, could be a breaker, down 2 o’clock tunnel.” 

 

“I know that one,” Arev whispers excitedly to Ocampo, “the old Terran clock?” 

 

“You got it kid,” she says, and gives him a fist to bump, which he executes flawlessly. 

 

“Come in Team 2,” Stonn’s voice sounds over comms.

 

“We read,” Hudson responds.

 

“We have begun our sweep of Level One. First breaker located.”

 

“Copy, Team 2 commencing sweep of Level Two, following a power spike to a possible breaker.”

 

“Acknowledged, Team 1 out.”

 

Hudson directs their squad to circle up, and after Fry and Spock check air safety once again with their scanners, and Jim listens for a full minute (he hears nothing, Spock also hears nothing), Hudson gives their team the go ahead. 

 

“Lead on, Frost,” he says, and Frost sighs as he takes the lead from Palmer, tracking the power signal on his scanner.

 

Their little foray is a bit anticlimactic. The tunnel doesn’t go down very far before it dead ends (Jim really needs to reevaluate his word usage) in a power control panel, with their problematic breaker switched into the ‘off’ position, clear as day. There’s only a few closed off doors connecting down this tunnel, with signs above their doors like ‘Purity Testing 1’ and ‘Ore Sampling’.

 

Once Frost flips the breaker, the mine begins to show signs of life at last, emergency lighting switches on (dim and sparse), emergency overrides for the doors activate in a series of light beeps and tiny green lights, and the slightest trickle of air flows past Jim’s cheek, air flow being directed in from somewhere.

 

They hit up the few rooms on their way back to the main hub, taking advantage of the emergency overrides, and all prove to be empty, except for various chunks of rock and equipment. They form back up into a circle in the antechamber. 

 

Hudson looks expectantly at Frost. “Anything?”

 

“I dunno…maybe?” Frost squints at his scanner and gives it a thunk with the heel of his palm. “There’s some kind of reading from the 8 o’clock tunnel. Not sure about it, though.”

 

“I can confirm a variable heat reading,” Spock says, reviewing his own scanner. “The origins of which remain unclear.”

 

Jim will not be sick all over the tunnel floors. He won’t, he won’t, he won’t.

 

Hudson apprises Stonn of the suspect reading, and he clears them to investigate.

 

This time, when Hudson directs Frost to lead on, Frost complains. “Aw shit man, I don’t wanna go first.”

 

“Suck it up, buttercup,” Hudson advises.

 

“How ‘bout you suck my—” 

 

“Gentlemen,” Palmer interrupts them pointedly. 

 

With a muttered curse that only the Vulcans possibly catch, Frost takes the lead. 

 

“Remember I outrank you, bitch,” Hudson hisses at him. Now that, Jim heard.

 

“Only ‘cause Sarge is on maternity leave,” Frost hisses right back. Jim heard that one too.

 

“Quiet,” he says firmly, and they both simmer down.

 

Their trek down the left tunnel is uneventful, broken only by two storage rooms which are quickly cleared, and an update from Stonn on the successful activation of another breaker. This time the switching of a breaker on Level One has observable results down in Level Two. The air cycling system fully cranks on with a begrudging chugging sound, followed by a real rush of air through Jim’s hair. He tilts his face into it slightly. Thank fuck, it was stifiling in here. The air cycling adds a new layer of sound to the mine: the distant whir of fans, and an arrhythmic mechanical thunking that tells Jim that the system isn’t necessarily running all that well. 

 

Frost stops abruptly before a door with a faded sign that reads, something something ‘Access’. The ‘Access’ is just barely legible. The other two words are lost to time. 

 

“That weird reading is in here, maybe,” he says.

 

“I concur,” Spock says after consulting his scanner once more.

 

Hudson motions Frost away from the vanguard position and Palmer takes point once more. “Slowly, quietly,” Hudson directs. “You three, stay on me,” he tossed over his shoulder to Jim, Spock and Tolek, and deploys the rest of the team with a few hand signals. 

 

On Hudson’s finger count to three, Palmer activates the emergency override, and slowly begins to advance into the room, followed by Ocampo and then Arev. Over Hudson’s shoulder Jim can see their lights dancing around what looks to be a round sort of room, cut straight out of the rock and completely bare. It has three sullen emergency lights set into the floor around its edges.

 

At their soft ‘clears’ the rest of the team begins to move in, and Jim follows Hudson, knowing Spock has taken up position at his back without even looking. 

 

Inside the room, Frost is thumping on his scanner once more. “Some kind of interference I think,” he whispers as Hudson stalks up to him.

 

“Get that thing working,” Hudson begins to berate Frost. Behind him, Jim hears Spock step off to the right, no doubt beginning to circle the room with his own scanner in an attempt to circumvent the interference.

 

Jims eyes trace the light of Palmer’s minigun as it passes over the ceiling above Jim, revealing the blocky metal shape of some sort of enclosed transport line.

 

Jim slashes his arm at Hudson and Frost. “Shut up,” He hisses. Silence descends. 

 

“Team 1, report,” Stonn’s voice sounds with a crackle over comms.

 

“Hold comms,” Jim murmurs into his mic.

 

He listens intently. His ears pick up the creak of armor as Palmer shifts slightly. A trickle of dirt. Those upset sounds of the air cycling system. 

 

There! A ‘thud’ or a ‘thump’. Above them. Jim motions upwards and all the lights focus on the ceiling, a round of clicks as the squad clicks their safeties off. It’s a web of struts and ore or mining waste transport lines above them, all set at various levels. The metal of their bulky shapes gleams where they crisscross the entire ceiling.  

 

A voice Jim doesn’t recognize sounds out over comms. “Found the last breaker!”

 

Many things seem to happen simultaneously.

 

“Hold comms,” Stonn says sharply in his ear, “hold position.” Whirring, thunking, and buzzing noises fill the air. Lights switch on, illuminating the room. There’s a grating, clanking noise from the ceiling. 

 

Then a torrent of noise right above him. The lighting of the room reveals what the various lights from the squad had imperfectly traced, and Jim realizes with horror that he hasn’t been standing under an enclosed ore transport line, he’s been standing under some sort of transit delivery tube, and it’s open.

 

He thinks he yells as shapes burst from the opening above him, and he instinctively covers his head. Terror makes his body rigid. Jim doesn’t know what’s happening, but slowly, he realizes that there’s not an alien creature trying to attach itself to his face, no monster has leapt upon him and pressed him to the floor. He’s…covered by something. Many somethings.

 

With a start, he notices he’s stopped breathing, and he draws in a breath with a startled gasp. The air comes into his lungs reluctantly, thin and humid. Jim is buried, he’s buried! It’s dark he can’t see! There are warm shapes covering him, surrounding him. They’re wriggling, and hot, they press all against him, squirming movement. He can’t breathe he’s / smothered hot smothered / compulsively he swallows and gags, the spit in his mouth dried up.

 

‘Spock!’ he wails in his mind, ‘Spock!’

 

Something grips him hard around his shoulder and pulls, and Jim emerges from the dark cave he’d been somehow buried in back into light, and the metallic stale air of the mine tastes as sweet as wine.

 

He gasps and clutches at the strength that has pulled him free, and even now drags him away to safety.

 

Jim rolls a terrified eye to look behind him and sees a mass of shapes, a huge pile taller than a man and three times as wide on the floor.

 

What? What?

 

“They are Tribleustes ventricosus Jim. Commonly known as ‘tribbles’, they originate from the planet Iota Geminorum IV. This gathering is quite homogenous, I estimate variations in color and size range from only .015 to 1.7 for what appears to be a colony comprising several generations.”

 

Jim’s breathing begins to slow, syncing up to the measured ins and outs of Spock’s breath. Spock. Spock has him. 

 

“There is a 85.26% chance that this room is the dispensary for the moon’s grain stores, Jim. As the only material dispensed from the silo are Tribleustes ventricosus themselves, we may conclude with a certainty of 97.43% that the colony has consumed the entirety of the grain that was stored for the sustenance of Acheron’s mining operations.”

 

Gradually, Jim becomes aware of Spock’s voice, imparting information in a soft murmur. Tribbles. Grain silo. Slowly Jim comes back to himself. Nothing attacked him. There’s nothing attached to his face. Tribbles in the fucking grain silo above. Fuck. Jim shudders at their cooing and rocking in the heaping pile under the dispenser where he had been standing. One wibbles forward to nuzzle at his boot and he jumps, pressing his body more firmly to Spock’s. 

 

“What the hell,” he manages to gasp, “are tribbles doing in Acheron’s fucking grain silo?”

 

“Unknown,” Spock answers calmly.

 

“And for that matter, who puts a grain silo in a mine?”

 

“I theorize that the original settlers utilized the natural rock of the moon to secure a resource that may otherwise have been vulnerable to its destructive elements. It seems that Olduvai’s mining operations saw fit to enact no change upon that decision.”

 

Little by little, Jim can feel the rush of adrenaline fading. With a start he realizes he’s clinging desperately to Spock, and has been since Spock yanked him out of the tribble avalanche. With a pang, and a real heroism of spirit, he gently peels himself off of Spock. 

 

“Thank you,” he pauses, unable to decide between calling Spock ‘Spock’ or ‘Commander’ and then gives up and just repeats, “thank you.”

 

Face impassive, Spock inclines his head in a nod toward Jim.

 

“Jim you ok?” Someone asks and Jim looks to see Fry at his elbow, scanning him. He nods, then gives her a weak smile when her scan finishes and she gives him a thumbs up for all clear. 

 

“You good man?” Hudson calls from his position where he and Palmer are still covering the opening of the dispensary. 

 

“Yeah, yeah I’m good,” Jim says and rubs his hands along his face. 

 

Jim sighs, and taps his earpiece. “Comms check, Team 1,” he says.

 

“Confirm status Team 2,” Stonn’s voice comes through immediately.

 

“Tribbles in the grain silo, no other contacts, all clear,” Jim says.

 

“Acknowledged,” Stonn returns, “All breakers located, Team 1 confirms integration of Acheron Administrative Control with the Olduvai Mine systems, proceeding with full sweep of Level One. No contacts reported.”

 

“Copy boss,” Hudson says, “Team 2 continuing sweep of Level Two, Hudson out.”

 

Nobody moves to continue their sweep of Level Two, as they all seem to be fascinated in some shape or form by the massive pile of tribbles in the center of the room. Jim swears the pile’s growing bigger as he’s looking at it.

 

“Sweet Space Jesus, what a horde,” he can’t stop himself from commenting.

 

“Apocalypse,” Spock says.

 

Jim swivels his head to look at him. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see a few of the others doing the same.

 

“The correct nomenclature for a group of tribbles is ‘an apocalypse of tribbles.’”

 

Jim swallows down a laugh but can’t keep the fond smile from his face. “Thank you Mr. Spock, I did not know that,” he has to say at last. God, he’s missed Spock. These moments of Vulcan precision.

 

“Certainly,” Spock responds.

 

Hudson gives himself a visible shake and urges the team on. “Okay, we still have this tunnel and three others to clear,” he says, reading off his map. “Move it or lose it.”

 

Palmer jogs to the exit and they form up in their positions and follow as he leads them from the room. 

 

“Lose what?” Arev asks Ocampo, who sighs.

 

“You know, it ,” Fry whispers.

 

“What ‘it’?” Arev asks again, brow slightly furrowed.

 

“Shut up over there,” Hudson growls at them. 

 

Arev mutters something before subsiding and Jim’s pretty sure he catches the words ‘highly illogical.’

 

Palmer leads them down the tunnel, the lights tracing corners and vent openings noticeably more jumpy. 

 

They stop before the next door they come across, which is labeled with a sign reading ‘Canteen’. As Palmer activates the override and Ocampo and Arev step forward, Jim feels something wriggling against his buttocks.

 

“Oh holy Christ what the,” he cuts himself off from yelling at the last minute as he lurches sideways, bounces off of Hudson, and reaches out to clutch at Spock’s arm.  

 

“Shit shit shit,” he hisses as he fumbles his free hand behind him into a back pocket he hadn’t even known was there. His hand comes out with a small toffee-colored fluff ball, which wobbles back and forth on his palm.

 

“Oh for fucks sake,” he whispers viciously at it. 

 

“That’s the trouble with these little critters,” Fry says softly, stowing away her scanner with a relieved smile, and then stepping over to him to hold out a hand for Jim to hand it over, “They just get everywhere, don’t they?”

 

She coos at it and it coos back. Jim watches with revulsion as Ocampo stops by Fry to fuss over it as well, and is joined by Frost, Arev, and even Palmer, the traitor. 

 

Jim and Hudson share identical looks of disbelief and disgust, so at least Jim has some solidarity going on. 

 

“All right, break it up, Jesus Christ, they’re space vermin, Fry, drop it,” Hudson orders.

 

She gives him a challenging look, but he remains firm. “Drop it,” he says again.

 

She sighs, rolls her eyes, and kneels down to place it on the ground, where it chirps, and happily rolls off, presumably back to its giant colony apocalypse ball.  

 

“Unbelievable,” Jim mutters. Fry sticks her tongue out at Jim as she passes him, taking up her position in the formation once more.

 

He looks over at Spock, who raises an eyebrow at him pointedly, and guiltily, Jim jerks his hand back from Spock’s arm. 

 

“Sorry,” he mutters, and it’s either look at the floor or give Spock the puppy eyes so Jim looks at the floor. 

 

The Canteen is just as empty and dusty as the rest of the mine, a collection of tables and chairs and a bulky replicator that Jim thinks may be one of the god’s honest first ever invented. 

 

There are a few other doors before the tunnel comes to an end, but they are welded shut, and judging by the state of the welds, were sealed off sometime back when the friggin dinosaurs still roamed Ireta V. 

 

The next two tunnels are as short as the tunnel with the breaker was, one containing a series of storage rooms (all empty except for rocks) and the other with a single room with much more exciting sounding name of ‘Gemstone Review’, which contains no gems but also no aliens, so…no harm no foul Jim guesses. 

 

Once again they convene in the central antechamber, and Jim observes the tunnel they’ve saved for last, which is slightly larger, and appears to start down at a steep slope.

 

“Connection to Level Three,” Hudson reads off from his PADD, “Drill systems and access to Primary shaft.”

 

Oh goody. Deeper into the bowels of the earth. The moon, that is. Acheron. Fuck. 

 

“Come in Team 1,” Hudson hails Stonn’s group.

 

“Copy,” Stonn responds.

 

“Sweep of Level Two complete, clear, no other contacts reported.”

 

“Confirmed,” Stonn says, “Proceed to Level Three, Drill Control, and hold position until our arrival, Team 2.”

 

“We copy,” Hudson says, “Team 2 out.”

 

Everyone else seems to share Jim’s general energy about their new goal which is ‘don’t wanna.’ 

 

Spock clears his throat pointedly.

 

Hudson jumps. “Right, down we go boys and girls,” he says cheerfully. There’s a general shifting and resettling of weapons. Notably no one moves.

 

“Down we go,” Hudson repeats, sounding less cheerful the second time.

 

Jim sighs. Well he survived being buried alive by tribbles, he guesses he can survive going down another level in this damn mine. 

 

Hopefully.

 

End Chapter SEVEN

Notes:

Fun Fic Fact: the tribbles. Bro. i have been waiting. So long. For the tribbles. PSYCH this is a tribbles fic and nobody dies and everyone goes home happy the end.

 

BWAHAHAHAHAHA.
Ah man. You guys WISH lmao. But no. I can very much promise alien terror at some point *jazz hands*

(AHEM i hope everyone enjoys the tribbles as much as I enjoy the tribbles lmao)

Right ok. Writing update! Chapter 8 is ready to go! SO one more week of chapter posting than I thought, but since the stopping point I thought would be best for a break is at the end of ch8 now, I will institute a posting pause there (alskdfjd f i hate this so much) Chapter 9 is coming along (it's very likely it will be finished by chapter 8 posting time but I needs more chapters in mah hat i think). ANYWAY next week I'll let you know how long the break is going to be for and then yes. :( fic break *scuse me* *muffled sobbing in the distance*

Easter Eggs: 6

Chapter 8: Emergency Backup Power

Summary:

First of all, tribbles are Satan’s fluffballs, and second of all if Tolek opens his stupid Vulcan mouth one more time, so help Jim!

Notes:

ALL PRAISE THE BETAFISH bc I was like ok 'here's the final draft for checkin' and...it wasn't the final draft. I forgot to share the right document. And realized this about 1 whole hour ago. BUT NEITHER SNOW NOR SLEET NOR IDIOT FIC WRITERS AMIRITE itsme-theborgqueen??? <3<3<3

See notes at end for status on ze chapters and ze break :( *sniffles* (SPOILERS in the end notes, don't go there first)

BEHOLD CHAPTER 8 THO (which was once part of chapter 7 so ... THERE'S A THING I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOREVER FOR IN HERE TOO MUWAHAHHA)

I love you guys and your comments so much :3 I live live live for your reactions and theories some of you are like....getting close like *gulp* and others i'm like...u only THINK that's what's gonna happen *vreen off the glasses* (that is an extremely old meme, does it still check out lol?)

There’s a minute or two more of noticeable inaction that even Spock doesn’t feel the need to draw attention to. Then with a groan Hudson gets in gear and directs Palmer to the front once more; their reliable vanguard. Jim would feel bad for him, except he is the one with big fucking gun so…no. Palmer can stay in front, thank you. 

 

As they start down, Jim’s thoughts jump all over the place. Did nothing happen here? Did they all just fuck off because tribbles ate their food? Why the dog and pony show of wiping the memory banks? Jim draws in a frustrated breath. No answers, no relief for the tension in his muscles and the intermittent dashes of adrenaline that make him feel jittery all over. 

 

The tunnel proceeds along a gentle curve, and it’s spacious enough for Team 2 to walk three abreast, but the slope quickly becomes just as steep as the connection tunnel they’d followed down from Level One. Jim has just turned his thoughts to how fucked his ankles and knees are going to be after this mission, and how Bones will probably milk that into months of checkups and physical therapy and ankle braces (Bones is convinced Jim has weak ankles. Jim does not have weak ankles, thank you very much) and just general fussing, when the gentle curve of the tunnel ends abruptly at a massive blockage of pure stone and rock.

 

Jim blinks at what looks to be a cave-in as Hudson curses, then swiftly sets Frost to scanning and the others on overwatch. 

 

“I can’t read an opening behind it, the scanner's getting nothing but impediment,” Frost says.

 

Honestly, Jim’s not sure they needed a scanner to tell them that. The tunnel has been fucked . It looks professional, intentional, the blockage complete and impenetrable. 

 

“Minor fluctuations recorded in the surrounding strata,” Spock reports, eyes intent on his own scanner. “The environment is not stable.” He steps forward and continues taking readings. “Sensors report these rocks have occupied their current locale for an approximate time of 7.5 days. Unable to theorize a possible cause without further data collection. All available data sets within the range of the sensor have been collected.”

 

“Son of a bitch,” Hudson says. 

 

“They sealed it off,” Jim thinks out loud grimly, and eyes the pile of rubble with extreme prejudice.

 

“That is unlikely,” Tolek says, at his most patronizing. “Given the state of the facility and the character of the operations here, the most probable scenario is an accident, arising from negligence or incompetence. Those that survived obviously wiped the memory banks of the control room to disguise their own culpability, and all evacuated the moon rather than face the consequences that their actions or inactions wrought.”

 

“Tolek here has observed three whole things, and decided he knows what has happened on this moon and there’s no need for any sort of evidence or independent verification,” Jim says, finally snapping and giving into the urge to do battle with his nemesis. 

 

“What an extraordinary accusation, especially coming from one who has a penchant for formulating theories based on only the barest modicum of verifiable evidence. It really is exemplary, even for a human,” Tolek says, sniping at Jim from the other side of Spock.

 

Spock holds up a hand before Jim can leap on Tolek and attempt to rip his Vulcan bangs off. Which probably would not have gone that well for Jim, considering that whole three times the strength of a human thing they have going on, but a broken bone in exchange for Tolek’s perfect bang line would have been worth it. 

 

“This is unproductive. No evidence has been collected with which to advance a working theory at this juncture. It is all supposition.” 

 

Tolek straightens his posture and nods regally at Spock, like he’s not the Vulcan asshole starting all this shit in the first place. 

 

Spock raises an eyebrow at Jim, who shrugs and turns away from Tolek, doing his best to pretend like he never gave a shit at all. 

 

Spock turns to Hudson. “There is nothing further to be gained by remaining here,” he says.

 

Hudson sighs, and clicks on his communicator. “Come in Team 1,” Hudson says over the comm line.

 

“Copy,” Stonn responds. 

 

“Level Three and Primary Drill Site Access are sealed off, cave-in of some kind, we’d need drilling equipment to get through, plus a team of specialists to operate it.”

 

There’s a beat of silence before Stonn responds. “Return to Level One. We will fall back together to the Administrative Control Room and reassess.”

 

“Understood, Team 2 en route now.”

 

They’re leaving the mine. They’re leaving the mine? They’re leaving the mine . It takes Jim a few moments to fully appreciate that, his body falling step behind Hudson automatically. 

 

The return trek up to Level One is (thankfully) uneventful, and (unfortunately) just as painful as Jim had thought it would be. He’s not the only one breathing a little hard when they make it back up the steep slope of the connecting tunnel, and his thighs…they burn . Planetside is the worst. Gravity, thou heartless bitch. 

 

Stonn checks in and informs them Team 1 is waiting for them on the other side of the gorge, and Jim screams internally. Fuck . He’d conveniently blocked out the part where if he wants to leave this hellhole, he has to go back over the bottomless gorge via that floating metal death-trap. 

 

He does his best to mentally prepare himself as they retrace their steps through the tunnels back to the entrance. For fucks sake, he’s been sent ass-over-tea kettle tumbling through the void of space multiple times now, and it terrifies him each time, but does he freak out about going out for an EVA, ever? No. Jim should be able to handle a simple gorge crossing. It’s a metal conduit even, he can’t even see anything once he’s inside! 

 

Jim’s mental pep talk turns out to be a waste of his fucking time. The sight of the open decontamination room and the metal conduit swaying out from it does distressing things to his stomach, and severely impacts his ability to use his legs. Palmer starts across the contraption, followed by Frost, then Hudson, who motions Jim to follow. No. Yes. No. Ok. He can do this, he can. Spock will be right behind him. Jim hangs onto that thought like a thruster pack in Zero G. Spock will be right behind him .

 

‘Vulcan shelter from the storm,’ he repeats like a mantra in his head, and manages to force himself forward onto the enclosed bridge.

 

He’s a few steps out onto the swaying metal conduit when the length of his spine prickles and his shoulders hunch down instinctively. Something is wrong. Jim turns to look over his shoulder, and it’s not Spock behind him, it’s Tolek. 

 

Mother fuck. Jim can see Spock just beginning to step onto the enclosed bridge behind Tolek. Jim jerks his head back around. There’s nothing necessarily in Spock’s face to give him away, but Jim knows all the same that Spock is stressed. He didn’t let Tolek step in front, Tolek must have pushed past him before Spock knew what he was about. And now Tolek is between them and Spock does not like that. Jim does not like that. The only thing that gets him across the rest of the way is that his anger with Tolek’s entire existence has momentarily overwritten his fear of crossing. 

 

Jim sets foot on the solid ground of the Admin side of the gorge feeling like his fight or flight response has been jacked up to the max. He wants to turn and flee straight into Spock’s arms as soon as Spock has cleared the bridge. He wants to turn and belt fucking Tolek right across his smug, always slightly sneering mouth. Hudson and Stonn are already conferring off to the side by the security room, and instead of indulging in either fight or flight, Jim chooses that noble third option, professionalism, and steps forward to stand next to Hudson, his movements jerky and a little uncoordinated. 

 

Unfortunately, Tolek stays right on his heels, but Spock follows right behind him.

 

Jim’s not sure exactly what his face is doing when Tolek comes to stand next to him, pushing into his personal space, ensuring that Spock can’t stand next to him, but it makes Hudson look over at him warily. 

 

“Status?” Stonn questions Spock, but it’s Tolek who answers. 

 

“There has been a tragic accident in the mine. We have uncovered no evidence of the presence of the creatures encountered on Sevastopol, and the only reason an investigation was sent onto this moon was on the word of Captain Kirk, who swore that they were loaded onto his transport platform from the surface. There is nothing further to be gained here, the time has come for our departure.”

 

Furiously, Jim jumps in, struggling to keep from yelling. “First of all, you are not in command here, secondly, it was not my transport platform, and thirdly, I never ‘swore’ to it, the preponderance of the evidence suggests the ‘egg-like’ objects were loaded on from Acheron, which is the conclusion that I drew and shared. Just because we haven’t come across—”

 

Tolek interrupts him with, “If there was something to discover, this party would have done so, but there have been no signs, no struggles, no natural, biological leavings of any—” 

 

“I keep telling you, these things aren’t natural, ” Jim snarls as he cuts Tolek off. 

 

Tolek’s lip curls the slightest bit. “Ah yes your ‘pet’ theory Captain Kirk. Starfleet designs a bioweapon of superior form and function and unleashes it on the Federation.”

 

“I never said Starfleet designed them, I said it’s like they were designed . Check your memory banks ass—”

 

Stonn intervenes. “We will not devolve into unproductive argumentation. This party will maintain cohesion and order,” He gives each of them a significant look and then orders, “We will discuss the manner in which this investigation will progress upon our return to the Control Room.”

 

“There is no need for further investigation,” Tolek rounds on Stonn. “I question the logic of your decisions.” Jim and Hudson both catch sight of each other’s mouths, fallen open in shock. Oh no he didn’t!

 

Jim snaps his mouth closed, and glares. Someone is going to have to teach Tolek a lesson, and it’s looking more and more like it’s going to be Jim. 

 

“We will return to the control room, and discuss the next steps in our investigation, as Lt. Commander Stonn has ordered. His logic has been and remains unassailable,” Spock admonishes Tolek.

 

Spock nods to Stonn, who inclines his head as well, and proceeds to the front of the column. With a flurry of activity the squad (a single unit once more) is directed by Hudson back into formation, and begins to move out. Hudson takes up Stonn’s usual post in the center of the column, and motions to Jim, Spock, and Tolek to join him. Spock turns away from Tolek and moves towards Hudson. Jim’s still looking at Tolek suspiciously, waiting for him to move first, and sees the spasm that crosses his face. 

 

“Spock,” Tolek says hoarsely, an actual expression on his face that Jim views with disbelief. Longing? Desire? On the face of a Vulcan? Tolek steps forward and grabs Spock’s hand, aggressively linking their fingers together. Pulled back around, Spock’s eyes widen a little with shock, and as Jim watches, the tips of his ears flush green. 

 

And suddenly, instantly, Jim is incandescent with rage. He sees red, the books weren’t wrong, that is a thing that does actually happen to people, because his vision is red . The next thing he knows, Jim has forced his way between the two of them, and pulls Tolek’s fingers from Spock’s, flinging the offending hand away. 

 

“How dare you!” Jim hisses. “He is not yours to claim! How dare you?!”

 

Another expression telegraphs itself on Tolek’s face. Open rage. “You challenge ,” he says, voice throaty, his tone unsettlingly…eager. And then Stonn has inserted himself between Jim and Tolek, and all Jim can see is the backs of Stonn’s broad shoulders. 

 

“Lodzhal,” Stonn calls, and the medic steps forward, stowing his rifle along his back and bringing a scanner out to take readings on Tolek. 

 

What follows then is a stream of Vulcan, flowing back and forth between Stonn, Lodzhal, Spock, and T’Sala on comms. One by one the Vulcans in the squad approach until they have surrounded Tolek for the most part, screening him from view.  

 

Stonn turns to Rekan, hovering at the edge, and gives him some instructions which are also in Vulcan. Rekan pulls out a separate communicator from somewhere and begins hailing the Invincible (Jim presumes), because he doesn’t switch from the Vulcan language at all. 

 

The human half of the squad has assumed a perimeter guard, except for a few clustered around poor Arev, the lone Vulcan not gathered around Tolek.

 

“Why can’t I understand what they’re saying?” Fry is hissing at him. 

 

“It’s high Golic,” Arev says, looking as miserable as it’s possible for a Vulcan to look. Though based on whatever’s going on with Tolek, Jim may have to re-evaluate those standards.

 

“What the hell is going on?” Frost demands.

 

Arev shakes his head. “We do not speak of it.”

 

Hudson strides up and jerks his head towards Roaché, who decamps from the group and takes up Hudson’s previous position at the perimeter. 

 

“Spill,” he demands.

 

Arev gives him a blank look.

 

“Oh for—” Ocampo rolls her eyes at Hudson. “Tell us what they’re saying,” she says to Arev.

 

“Tolek is…ill. He must be evacuated immediately to the Invincible. They are informing the Invincible of the situation, and calling for the shuttle to return.”

 

“Is it—” Fry begins to ask, her eyes wide as if with sudden knowledge, but Arev cuts her off with a shake of his head and a most un-Vulcan like pleading gesture, and she quiets.

 

“Fuck,” Hudson curses, “back in formation all of you, watch that damn perimeter.”

 

They disperse, and Jim can hear Ocampo’s voice behind him as he turns to look back at the Vulcan huddle. 

 

“Fry? What do you know, if you know something you have to tell me, Fry?!” 

 

Jim listens in while trying to pretend he’s not listening in, but Fry has clammed up, and he angles his head a little bit to see her shake her head miserably out of the corner of his eye.

 

Jim turns his attention back to the Vulcan huddle and catches sight of Stonn and Spock exchanging a look that Jim can’t even begin to decipher the meaning of. ‘Extremely Vulcan’ is the best he can come up with.

 

Things happen swiftly after that. The Vulcans (still minus Arev) maintain a ring around Tolek, and Stonn orders Hudson to the head of the column to lead the squad not to the control room, but to the access door to the shuttle landing pad. Palmer takes a guard position next to Jim, and they move swiftly to their destination, the Vulcans quiet, and the humans on edge. 

 

They reach the entryway quickly, and then it's a tense twenty minutes or so until the shuttle arrives. Jim clenches his jaw at every strange groan and moan of the wind, and twitches at every bang of something striking against the facility from the outside. The storm is not getting any less worse, that’s for sure. There are no further outbursts from Tolek, but the ring of Vulcans around him allows for no glimpse of his current status. 

 

At last they receive transmission from the shuttle. “Make it fast!” One of the pilots shouts over comms, “we can’t hold this position for long!” 

 

“Hudson, maintain the perimeter,” Stonn orders, and signals to Arev, waiting at the door control, to key it open. The door slides open and Jim winces. The shrieking of the storm has increased to an almost painful level (again Jim is reminded unhappily of Sevastopol). The lights of the shuttle are just barely visible across the walkway through the wind, dirt, and rain. Tolek’s Vulcan guard struggles forward, and Jim quickly loses sight of them, his heart in his throat as Spock is swallowed up by the storm.

 

Behind Jim, Hudson yells himself hoarse at the rear guard to keep their eyes, “on our actual fucking rear!”

 

Jim spends the entire time the Vulcan contingent is gone straining his eyes on the walkway, waiting for Spock to reappear. Something in him eases as Spock’s form re-emerges with the rest of the Vulcan group as they approach the door. They spill back into the entryway in a clump, and Jim’s last glimpse before Arev closes the door are the lights of the shuttle rising up into the air. Relative silence returns to the entryway. Jim reviews the Vulcans before him, his eyes lingering on Spock, searching for some clue as to his status, but Spock is as composed as ever. His hair is barely even mussed up by the wind. Jim blinks, noticing something else. 

 

Rekan has not returned. 

 

“Rekan?” Jim questions sharply.

 

Lodzhal, standing quietly with Fry huddled next to him, answers. “He was needed to secure and monitor Tolek during transport to the Rineikau-Yehat.” After a moment, Lodzhal adds, “Tolek is very ill.”

 

Yeah Jim is getting that.

 

Stonn, breathing slightly raggedly, says, “We will return to the control room.” With a start, Jim notes a dark green and brown bruise blooming around Stonn’s eye. He rakes his eyes once more over Spock, checking his skin for marks of any kind, but spots nothing amiss. Stonn takes back his central position, and motions to Hudson. 

 

“All right, we’re moving squad,” Hudson says, and begins to lead them back through the facility. 

 

Upon their return to the control room, Hudson busies himself with assigning various posts and tasks to the squad, likely to avoid getting stuck in the inevitable ‘what happens next’ command conference, the coward. T’Sala is already stepping forward to where Spock and Stonn are standing on the right side of the control room. When Jim doesn’t move to join them, Spock raises an eyebrow at him. With a sigh, Jim heads over.

 

T’Sala begins a breakdown of the areas of the facility they’ve already secured. Medical and Living Quarters were secured earlier by Team 1, The Olduvai connection complex was secured by Team 2 as they moved through to the mine entrance, and the Cargo and Maintenance wing was done when they first entered the facility. Jim sighs again. He can’t believe he got into an argument with Tolek about nothing being here. That’s a good thing for fuck’s sake, Jim doesn’t want there to be anything here, damn Tolek’s hide (as Bones would say).

 

“The terraformer—” T’Sala starts to say but Spock cuts her off with a shake of his head.

 

“The spaceport is the next, most logical point for investigation.” Jim blinks. Damn thing looked pretty empty to him. 

 

As if sensing Jim’s disbelief, Spock defends his position. “It was sealed for a reason, which we must attempt to discover. The Shift Foreman’s Offices are located there as well, which were the primary logistical hub for ore loading and long haul transport. There is a probability of over 70% that relevant data may be found there.”

 

Jim frowns, something about Spock’s words niggling at him, but before he can put his finger on it, the console behind Spock catches his eye. He peers at it suspiciously, leaning forward to see better. Spock blinks at him. 

 

“Uh…” Jim says, “we have a problem here.”

 

“What problem?” Stonn asks calmly.

 

“We’re losing power,” Jim points grimly at the blinking alert in the top right corner of the console. He can see it being replicated on screens around the room.

 

T’Sala whirls around and returns to her main console in the center of the room. Spock strides swiftly up to the console he’d deactivated the shutters from.

 

Stonn summons Fry and Frost who return to their earlier stations, and Hudson darts back and forth between them, fussing and fretting at them for results, which they both bear stoically. 

 

“Do not tell Hudson,” Stonn murmurs next to him, and Jim looks over with surprise. “But I find the absence of my Sergeant to be…difficult.”

 

An exclamation from Frost draws Jim’s attention over. 

 

“We’ve been running on emergency backup power,” Frost says, looking stunned, his hands motionless on the console inputs.

 

“Impossible,” Fry asserts, doubling her efforts at her station.

 

T’Sala, stands up from her operations. She faces Stonn and Jim. Jim blinks as he sees her lips tremble slightly, “It is entirely possible. Full power has not been operational since we landed on this moon. With the memory wipe and system reset, the mainframe lacked the necessary programming inputs to inform us of this fact.”

 

Jim gapes as the implications of that hit him. The Control Room hadn’t been unhooked from main power, it had been unhooked from the backup. Wait, how is that even possible? What the fuck happened to the goddamn main power?

 

It's Spock who answers Jim's unasked question, straightening up and turning away from his console. “Main power was maintained and generated through an ore synthesis reaction chamber in the mine. It will not be possible to re-activate it. It has most likely been offline since the incident that sealed the mine.”

 

There is no main power. There is only backup power, for emergency use only, and they’ve step by step turned everything in both the Administrative facility and the upper levels of Olduvai back on. 

 

“This facility will deplete the backup reserves within thirty minutes, variable with our system usage,” Spock asserts. 

 

“If the power goes,” Jim says thickly, his mind racing, “the blast shielding goes.”

 

The ‘and we go with it’ he leaves unsaid. 

 

“We will also lose the ability to communicate off-planet with the Rineikau-Yehat,” Spock adds calmly, as if they're not all about to die, his arms clasped behind him.

 

“Can you perform the procedure in reverse?” Stonn asks, turning to Jim, and Jim tries to focus on him. “Is it possible to unhook the control room from the backup power once more, in order to conserve it for the blast shielding?”

 

Jim shakes his head no. Even if he had Keenser with him and they could diagram out something, they’d never get power off in the mine in time as well. He looks back and forth between Spock and Stonn. “It can’t be done, not in the time we have. The power’s gonna go, then the shielding, then this place. We can’t stay here.”

 

“It will be approximately two hours before the shuttle is cleared from quarantine and is able to return for our evacuation,” Spock says, in a strange, almost detached manner. 

 

“We can fall back to the mine,” Palmer offers.

 

“Negative,” T’Sala says, her eyes never leaving her wrist PADD. “The conduit connecting the Olduvai Mine entrance to Acheron Administration will de-couple and retract upon full loss of power. We would be trapped.”

 

“The shuttle could airlift us out from the gorge?” Fry offers.

 

Jim shudders, gooseflesh prickling over his skin at the thought of that scenario.

 

Hudson shakes his head, “No way man, Commander Spock said the area was unstable! Who knows what could cave in next?”

 

“The terraformer!” Frost says excitedly, bent back over his console. Hudson hustles over to hover at his back. “The old reactor is still active, the terraformer has power! Its blast shielding is intact!”

 

Jim freezes. “The terraformer is powered by a reactor?” he asks, carefully. “Which is online?”

 

“Yes,” Frost relays, “control room’s not receiving much information, the hard-line for link up appears to be severed, but the place is online with sustainable power, and the damn plating on that terraformer is rated for the apocalypse.”

 

“How will we cross?” Fry asks, stepping away from her station over to Frost, forcing Hudson to make room for her, his hovering much more ineffectual now that he has two people at the same console to negotiate.

 

“There’s some sort of point to point access,” Frost mumbles.

 

“No good,” Hudson says, checking his wrist PADD. “Map says it’s an above-ground connection.”

 

“The mainframe specifies that it is rated as safe for traversal,” T’Sala corrects him.

 

“I dunno,” Hudson says doubtfully, “It’s about 1.5 kilometers to that terraformer. We can’t cross that in the open.”

 

“It is not open to the elements,” she responds, then qualifies, “Though the mainframe is lacking the details as to the manner of shelter that is provided.”

 

Stonn and Spock exchange a long glance. 

 

Almost reluctantly, Spock says, “The terraformer is the safest option.”

 

“Communications?” Stonn questions.

 

“The terraformer possesses the necessary capabilities to achieve a link-up with the Rineikau-Yehat,” Spock pauses, briefly calculating, “There is a 78.67% probability that communications can be re-established.”

 

Stonn nods.

 

Spock adds, in that detached-sounding voice again, “We will also be able to continue our search for evidence of contamination.”

 

Jim is certain, his heart sick in his breast, if there has been contamination, that reactor is where they’ll find it. There’s a reason the aliens chose Sevastopol’s reactor for their nest, and Jim is willing to bet that whatever that reason was, it probably holds true here as well. 

 

As Stonn and Hudson begin to coordinate the squad’s transfer to the terraformer, Jim is sure of another thing as well.

 

Spock knew about the existence of that reactor. And if he knew about the reactor, he knows damn well that’s the most likely place to find evidence of contamination on this moon. 

 

But Spock had them go to the mine instead. 

 

Why?

 

End Chapter EIGHT

Notes:

(Just did the thing where I wrote out a chapter summary ahead of time, forgot I had done so, and wrote a new one aldkjfd)

'Well, what else can go wrong on the Satan's Outhouse of moons? ...Jim should not have said that, He should not have said that.' That's the new one, the one up there at the top is the original intended one. Pfffff.

Fun Fic Fact: Not much of a secret lol, the whole Tolek/Pon Farr plotline used to be part of chapter 7 MAN that chapter was LOADED wasn't it? But it had to be split. For my sanity. ALSO, Man I love how Jim is just THAT good a riling up Vulcans that none of the other Vulcans noticed Tolek was going off the pon farr rails until he tried to sex Spock up hehe.

Easter Eggs: 4

AND nOW the poopy part.
Break Time.
I didn't get Chapter 9 finished by today which was kind of my goal - I know everything that happens in it, and the plot of it is written out, but I have to write in all the details still so boo on that.
What the Break is for: My plan for the break is to get a nice cushiony backlog of at least 4 chapters written.
How long it will last: end of August. I'll take the summer, write write write, and start posting again the last Friday in August (whatever date that is).
If you guys have any questions for me, let me know!
ALSO ALSO: I'll probably do sporadic text posts here and there on the Tumblr on the status of the writing, but would you guys like a filler chapter where I update it with the progress or anything like that? Or a regular weekly Post on Tumblr re: fic status? I don't want to leave you in the fic void. I hate the fic void. it sucks.

Chapter 9: The Terraformer

Summary:

To the shock and surprise of absolutely no one, the terraformer sucks ass.

Notes:

*Confetti Popper* AND WE'RE BACK WOOO!!!

Thank you betafish: itsme-theborgqueen and sweet sweet jexibug! <3<3<3 thank you thank you thank you sexijexi for pushing me to keep working and helping me make this fic better and better! <3

I am happy to report chapters 9-12 are complete and ready for posting, and chapter 13 is (despite being the most difficult chapter to write to date which considering the chapter 4/5 fiasco is saying something) is over the hump (do not fear this is NOT a repeat of the chapter 4/5 hubris situation, EVERYTHING IS UNDER CONTROL). AHem. yes.

So, welcome back everyone! Buckle up...murrhurrrr. As always, I'm desperate to know what you think askdfjsdjf MUWAHAHAH! <3<3<3

The squad is a whirlwind of activity and efficiency. Equipment is consolidated and checked and then rechecked. Hudson is a dervish, whirling around from one responsibility to another, supervised quietly by Stonn. Jim looks over and sees that Spock and T’Sala are debating something in undervoices next to Spock’s console up by the window bank.

 

Jim sidles up to Stonn, where he is monitoring Hudson’s efforts to get the squad shipshape.

 

Jim swallows and says quietly, “I would be remiss in my duties as a consultant if I didn’t tell you that if there’s contamination on Acheron, the terraformer’s reactor is where it would be.”

 

Stonn considers this for a moment, then observes, “You have not mentioned this before.”

 

Jim carefully does not look over at Spock.  “I didn’t know there was a reactor powering that thing,” he says in response.

 

Stonn nods, and summons Hudson to his side. “We will proceed across the connection and into the Terraformer on high-alert.”

 

Hudson confirms cautiously, asking, “Hostile-territory scenario?” 

 

Stonn holds his gaze and nods.

 

Hudson swallows and trots off, gathering Palmer and Lodzhal to himself for an impromptu briefing. 

 

“Weapons hot,” Jim hears Hudson murmur to them, “safeties off.” 

 

Jim swallows and works desperately to reign in the terror that is trying to build. It seems like he blinks, and the entire room goes from frenzied preparations to waiting in formation by the exit. He blinks again and he’s in place at Stonn’s side. 

 

Another blink, and they’re walking through the hallways of the cargo & maintenance wing.

 

‘Wake the fuck up James Tiberius Kirk!’ he screams at himself.

 

A hand descends on his shoulder and grips him tight, anchoring him. 

 

Like he’s just dove into icy waters, Jim leaves the dreamy fugue state he’d been in and emerges back into reality, his senses rooting him in the here and now.

 

“The exit to the terraformer access should be up here on the left,” Hudson says.

 

Jim can see it, up ahead. Little more than a side door, set down a few feet behind some railing with access stairs on the left and right, off on the left of the hallway they’re moving down. 

 

He jerks his head to the side, twisting to see the hand gripping him. There is no hand on his shoulder. The feeling dissipates, phantomlike in his mind. No one has touched him, but he felt Spock all the same.

 

Upon reaching the door, the squad comes to a halt.

 

The storm is fierce outside, though Jim thinks it sounds a little less severe here than the entryway to the landing pad.

 

“We have only 15.3 minutes until full power loss,” Spock updates them.

 

T’Sala steps lightly down the stairs and enters in a code on the door’s access panel. 

 

“Lovar, Palmer, take the vanguard,” Stonn directs. “Hudson, on them.” 

 

Silently the squad moves into formation as he continues to direct them. “Lodzhal, center formation. Ocampo, with me, rear guard.” 

 

Jim sidles awkwardly next to Spock where he is waiting quietly to be directed as well, and totally focuses on the directions Stonn is giving. He is absolutely not wondering if he can brush his and Spock’s fingers together and make it look like an accident. 

 

“Frost, Nomikh, Schoefield, right flank,” Stonn says. The three move into position, ranging themselves on the right access stairs.

 

“Arev, Blain, Roaché, left flank.” The next three take up position on the left access stairs.

 

“Fry, center guard with Lodzhal,” Stonn finishes. She nods, and joins Lodzhal down in the small empty space before the door.

 

Stonn turns to Jim and Spock, “Commander, Captain, move to the center with Lodzhal and Fry.”

 

Jim and Spock head down the stairs to move in behind Fry and Lodzhal. Jim has to give up on his ‘accidental fingering’ plan. With everyone looking at them as they walk down the stairs, he’s not sure he’ll be able to get away with it now.

 

“Lieutenant,” Stonn turns his attention to T’Sala, still standing off to the side by the access panel, “On my signal, open the door and join the center.”

 

“Ha,” she says. Or at least…that’s what Jim thinks she says because if ‘ha’ is an actual word in Vulcan, Jim’s future in his burgeoning career of annoying Vulcans is going to be assured for a long, long time. 

 

Stonn nods to Hudson. 

 

“Weapons check,” Hudson barks. Jim doesn’t jump at that but he does twitch a little when something strikes the roof above them with a particularly loud ‘bang’.

 

He and Fry share a moment of understanding as he sidles minutely back into place and she lets out a low exhale, steadying herself. 

 

Jim watches as a small smile quirks at her mouth, and her eyes flick over to Lodzhal before fixing on the exit door.

 

“Double time,” Hudson says. “We are gonna book it to that terraformer.”

 

“Later,” Jim hears a hushed whisper behind him, which sounds like Ocampo. Probably in response to poor Arev, confused by Hudson’s word choice yet again. 

 

T’Sala waits for Stonn’s signal at the access panel. 

 

“Keep moving,” Stonn says, “maintain proximity.” He says something in Vulcan to T’sala. The door opens and she darts over to stand on the other side of Spock.

 

It’s loud. But again, not as loud as the shuttle entryway had been. Jim expected to see the frenzy of the storm in front of them, like the landing pad, but instead, he sees rock. Rock on either side of the door, arching up and over, forming a tunnel that almost immediately curves to the left before them. No, not quite a tunnel. More like a crevice. It’s not completely enclosed, there are gaps where the rock doesn’t meet above them, or tapers off to a point.

 

Spock’s hand grips him around the upper arm, and this time it’s real, falling away as soon as Jim stumbles forward to move at the quick pace the vanguard is setting. They’re out. They’re outside, on the surface of Acheron. The wind does gust down into them at intervals through the gaps with rain and or dirt and grit, but they are fairly insulated by the natural barrier of the rock. 

 

They are able to advance swiftly as there are no impediments, just the crevice twisting around, snakelike to the right, to the left, and back to the right again, just wide enough to walk three or four abreast (for the most part), the right and left flanks moving up or falling back as the space dictates. The walls and ground are smooth, whether from years of use or as a result of some natural phenomenon on Acheron, Jim doesn’t know. Spock probably knows the answer. 

 

Jim looks over at Spock, keeping pace easily next to him. Spock who knows a lot of things. Like the existence of a reactor powering the terraformer. No matter how Jim hashes it, it seems like Spock has deliberately kept them from investigating the terraformer. Is there a logical reason why, when the whole purpose of this mission is to find if there is an alien presence on this moon? Jim told Stonn he hadn’t mentioned the reactor because he hadn’t known, which was true. But if he had? Would he really have directed them towards it? Would he be able to move towards it under his own power if circumstances hadn’t removed all other choices?

 

A sick worry gnaws at his stomach. Jim’s been leaning on Spock this whole time, taking his Vulcan stoicism at face value. He remembers his thoughts in the shuttle docking bay, about Spock’s ‘Vulcan facade’. He had thought it out of anger, but what if it was more true than he knew? What if Spock is not ok?

 

The journey to the terraformer seems to exist outside of time. The curved shape of the rocks overhead protects them from the majority of the storm, but the gaps are perfectly sized for something to reach in and just…

 

Fuck.

 

Between his fear over whether or not they’re about to be ambushed by aliens, his terror about what they’ll find inside the terraformer, and his worry about Spock, Jim is surprised there’s anything left of him by the time they come to the end of the connecting passage. He feels like a freeze-dried Jim caricature, ready to crumble and blow away at any second.  

 

The rock overhead has obscured all but the faintest of glimpses of a massive shape rising up in front of them. A blinking red light high above them here or there is all Jim has been able to glimpse, and he blinks stupidly at the massive wall that seems to have just appeared, dwarfing them as they stand at its base. He cranes his head up, up, up, but cannot see the end of it, especially not through the storm.

 

He focuses ahead, where Palmer and Lovar are taking up guard positions on either side of a small access door, helpfully labeled ‘Access 13’ in faded yellow above it. Hudson motions to T’Sala, and she steps forward with her wrist PADD at the ready. She turns away after a moment. “I do not possess the codes to circumvent the security protocol!” she yells, and even with the relative shelter of the stone around and above them, it still sounds as if she’s just barely speaking at all.

 

Goddamnit. Well, the time for plausible deniability has passed, that’s for sure. Jim stalks forward to the access panel, where T’Sala blinks curiously at him, but obligingly steps back out of his way and pulls out his hack tool and gets to work. Someone’s updated the security here, definitely more advanced than the other doors he’s spliced into on Acheron, but it’s still not going to be enough to keep him out.  

 

He glances up and sees that Palmer is looking at the hack tool with interest.

 

“What?” Jim barks at him belligerently. 

 

Palmer shrugs, and flicks his eyes back to the closed access door. “Nothing. Just thinking that the storm will probably cause a malfunction in this door, pop it open for us in a minute or two,” he shouts just loud enough for Jim to hear him.

 

“Second!” Jim corrects, focused on his runtimes.

 

Palmer makes a questioning grunt. 

 

“Second or two!” Jim clarifies. And…they’re in. 

 

The door unlocks, and he thumps Palmer lightly on the arm. Palmer signals Lovar, and they move in front of the access door, weapons at the ready. Jim glances back at Stonn, who gives Jim the go ahead. He keys the door open. 

 

He gets a glimpse of a dark interior, and then Palmer and Lovar move in, beams from their lights tilting crazily on the walls and ceiling as they begin a sweep. Hudson moves up, right in the threshold, and after a minute, waves to the squad to advance, stepping inside himself. Lodzhal and Fry enter, and Jim follows on their heels, with Spock right behind him. His comforting presence is something that Jim swears he is not going to take for granted. If there’s something wrong, Jim will—but his train of thought is interrupted as he only makes it a few steps in before he fetches up right against Lodzhal’s back. 

 

Jim can feel the rest of the team squeezing in behind and around him. Someone must get a hand on the internal door controls, because the howling of the storm cuts off, far more completely than even the Administrative Control Room. Blessed quiet, and Jim’s ears ring with it as they slowly adjust. The ambient light provided from the squad’s various light attachments reveals not much more than a ceiling (no vent openings, how about that) and some metal walls, boxing them in on either side. 

 

“Damn,” someone says up ahead (Jim thinks it was probably Palmer).

 

“It’s a fucking barricade!” That was definitely Hudson.

 

As the ringing in his ears tapers off, he can hear how much goddamn noise they’re making.

 

“Inside voices,” he hisses, and why that phrase is even in his vocabulary, let alone what he chose to go with here is beyond him. He blames Sulu.

 

“Yes, dad,” Fry (he thinks it’s Fry) whispers cheekily. Jim’s view of the front of the room is entirely blocked by Lodzal’s back. Stonn eases up from the rear to stand beside Jim, and then he slides forward, moving in front of Lodzhal. Jim is impressed, despite his size, Stonn manuevers through the pack like it’s nothing. Now those, those are skills.

 

After a moment, Jim hears Stonn order quietly, “Push through it.” A pause. “Here. Then hold positions. On my mark.”

 

Jim holds his breath, and then there’s a god-awful screeching noise followed by an almighty crash. He can feel his own pulse jump wildly in his throat.

 

Nobody moves. Jim listens, his ears straining. One minute. He shakily lets out his breath. Then two. At the three minute mark, he shuffles around to look at Spock. Even in the gloom, with most of Spock’s face obscured by shadow, that connection is still there. Jim blinks. This time the information is different. It takes Jim a moment to understand. Spock is looking to Jim to confirm. Okay. Jim takes a careful breath in, and makes the call.

 

“If there was something around to hear that, we’d know about it by now,” he whispers, leaning around Lodzahl’s back, “but keep it quiet, they didn’t put the barricade up for the tribbles.”

 

“Acknowledged,” Stonn replies softly from up ahead. 

 

Jim hears some rustling and quiet boot steps and then finally Lodzhal moves forward, which then allows Jim to move forward. He gets his first look at the barricade, a stack of bulky machinery and parts, none of which he can identify, that’s how fucking old they are. They’ve made enough of an opening where he can move through without getting caught on anything. The other side of the barricade is revealed to be the landing at the bottom of a metal stairwell, which ascends up into the dark, with a single door off on the right, just past the barricade. 

 

Jim moves over to where Stonn is conferring with Hudson, both of them bent over his wrist PADD, making room for everyone else. The squad quietly moves through, and takes up various guard positions, mostly focused on where Palmer and Lodzhal have gone up a few steps in the stairwell, and are carefully scanning. Spock joins Jim, like a shadow at his side. 

 

“—viable area?” Jim turns his attention to Stonn and Hudson’s conversation, and just catches the end of Stonn’s question.

 

“Plans say there’s a basic control or admin floor here,” Hudson whispers in answer, “that’s where I’d put the main communications array, and also where I’d set up camp if I was fleeing an alien menace.”

 

“I concur,” Spock responds lowly. 

 

Jim gives a shrug when Stonn looks at him. Sounds legit to him. 

 

“We proceed there,” Stonn decides. “Hudson, take point, Palmer and Ocampo on your flank.”

 

“You got it boss,” Hudson answers and moves off to the front, Ocampo falling into step just behind him on his right when he signals her on his way past. He starts up the stairs, and motions Lovar to fall back, and Palmer to take his left flank.

 

“On me,” Stonn informs Lovar, then says to the rest of them, “resume formation.”

 

It figures that they have to go up the stairs instead of taking the door. The door is dank looking with an unpromising ‘Overflow’ sign above it, but at least it would have been level. Why is Acheron set on giving Jim cardio? It really is the Satan’s outhouse of moons.

 

Hudson and the vanguard start up the stairs, and the rest of them follow. And they keep going up the stairs. And up. It’s humid and gross and dark. Jim thought this place was powered by a reactor. There’s not even emergency lighting. Jim begins to hear grunts of effort from some of the squad, and he does his best to tamp down on his own. He’s got a single light rifle and a little tool belt, he’s not weighed down by 30lbs of gear. Still they go up. 

 

“Ah, Hudson,” someone behind Jim whispers (he thinks it might be Schoefield), “We’re not climbing these stairs the whole way are we?”

 

Which, god bless him, because he saved Jim from having to ask.

 

“Five more levels to the elevator bank.” Hudson hisses back.

 

Five more levels? Shit. Five more levels will probably finish Jim off. Then he processes the rest of Hudson’s sentence.

 

Elevators? So much for his silver fucking lining. Acheron seems determined to give Jim the Sevastopol experience as best it can. Worst moon in the entire galaxy. One of those circulars has a poll or something like that. Federation Today or Our Galaxy or something like that. Jim is submitting Acheron to it first chance he gets. And if it doesn’t win…hoo boy. Jim’s hypothetical ‘Letter to the Editor’ he composes in his head gets him up those last five levels, so that’s something at least.

 

The stairs end in a small landing with no guardrail, which Jesus H. Christ, Jim did not use to have a thing about heights, but leave it to Acheron to ruin everything. Lodzhal peels off from the center to stand carefully in a guard position as the squad sidles slowly by him one at a time. Hudson is holding the door open, and Jim walks through into a dark stretch of hallway. Palmer and Ocampo are carefully scanning the ceiling. There are vent openings. Jim shudders, and stands quietly by Palmer, listening carefully. 

 

Nothing. Just…quiet. Goddamn, he hates this so much. Jim blinks, realizing that his eyes have fallen on Spock, who is looking at him calmly. Jim nods cautiously at Spock’s unasked question. 

 

“Clear,” Spock murmurs to Stonn, and the squad resumes formation and Hudson begins leading them through a maze of dark hallways. They proceed much like they had when they first entered the Administrative Facility, gaining ground, pausing to listen, then continuing on. Doors which are locked are bypassed, the few that are open reveal dusty storage or long defunct monitoring stations of some kind. There are no traces of alien presence, or of the miners. 

 

The cloying humidity doesn’t let up, and on top of the constant low-grade terror, the strain he’s feeling in his legs and ankles, and the other general physical discomforts making themselves known, Jim gets to add ‘sticky’ to his overall status list.

 

“Here,” Hudson whispers from the front, and the squad turns into a small alcove with an elevator on either side.

 

Well, calling it an elevator ‘bank’ was a little generous. There’s two. And one is non-responsive. Hudson just manages to stop himself from punching the dead access panel in a fit of rage. Forced to merely glower unhappily to display his anger, Hudson taps the panel on the opposite elevator aggressively. 

 

Oh god please don’t let the elevators be dead. More stairs will kill Jim, they’ll finish him off before the aliens even get their chance. He’s wasted on all this trudging around planetside. Starship captains are natural floaters! Jim’s very dangerous in lower g’s!

 

After a moment the elevator powers on, the access panel glowing with a cool blue light and a recorded voice plays, “Retrieving, stand by.”

 

Oh, thank fuck.

 

So the terraformer does have power. The lights are just…off. For…reasons unknown. Jim’s pretty sure he doesn’t really want to know the reasons, to be honest. Re-establish communications, get that shuttle turned around, and get off this fucking rock. Those are the priorities. As the squad forms a defensive perimeter around the elevator alcove, he eyes both Spock and Stonn unhappily. Spock’s strange behavior aside, neither of those two have shown any interest in cutting the mission short before all available avenues of investigation are exhausted. 

 

The elevator arrives with a pleasant ding, reminiscent of a different era, and they all stare at the cramped space unhappily. They are not all fitting in that in one go. Jim sighs.

 

“We will split according to our previous demarcations,” Stonn announces quietly. “Team 1 will proceed first, and secure the destination point. Team 2 will follow after.”

 

Jim will not add upchucking to his status list. He won’t, he won’t, he won’t. 

 

Team 1 barely does just fit, (minus Rekan of course, but plus T’Sala and Nomikah).

 

Team 2 (minus Tolek (yay) but plus Schoefield) watches miserably (well, Jim does at any rate) as the elevator doors close and Team 1 is borne away. And so…they wait. Jim swallows and tries not to look as jumpy as he feels. 

 

“Mission time?” Palmer queries softly, his eyes on the ceiling where several lights are on the two vent openings sitting in the ceiling over the elevator alcove. 

 

“2.4 hours,” Spock responds.

 

Jim blinks. He feels like he’s been here forever, but really…all they’ve had to do is walk around and look through a bunch of empty rooms and areas with no information or evidence to review.

 

“Jim,” he hears a whisper at his elbow, and he looks down to see Fry helpfully holding up a small water container to him. ‘Thanks’ he mouths at her and takes a few grateful gulps, and then finishes it off when Fry urges him to continue.

 

She continues around to the rest of the humans, pulling the water containers one at a time out of her pack as she does. Jim imagines Lodzhal is probably doing the same with Team 1 up ahead. Some sort of ‘hydrate the humans’ timer probably. 

 

They wait the rest of the time in uneventful silence (and as per Acheron usual, the uneventful nature of the experience does not decrease the stress, but increases it).

At last the elevator returns for them, then it’s Team 2's turn to squeeze into it. Jim makes sure to squeeze into it right next to Spock. He even (in the guise of making more room) angles himself sideways, so half of his chest is pressed up against the full length of Spock. If they’re all about to die a horrible elevator related death, Jim will do it mashed against his Vulcan, thank you very much. 

They do not die a horrible elevator-related death, so it’s really just another win-win to add to Jim’s list. No death. Vulcan touches. Very good. And, as a bonus, it’s a long elevator ride, and there’s nothing for Jim to do but stand there smushed up against Spock and enjoy the experience. Spock’s arm is warm and solid where it presses against his chest and Spock’s fingers are resting lightly against Jim’s inner thigh. ‘Behave, behave, behave,’ he begs his dick. He’s no sooner finished thinking that then Spock’s fingers twitch, pressing just for a moment up into the crease of his thigh. Jim intakes a swift breath and just as he’s got up the courage to look up from where he’s been ogling the line of Spock’s neck to his eyes, the elevator slows, stops, and the doors open to the whispered ‘clears’ from Team 1, and Team 2 begins to spill out of the elevator. Jim mournfully trots out when his way is clear.

Fucking Acheron, couldn’t let the elevator go for just thirty seconds more. Couldn’t let Jim have even one nice thing. 

 

The squad reforms once more, and Hudson resumes point with the vanguard and leads them out of an actual elevator bank (Jim counts six). They are obviously advancing from the outer environs to the center mass of the terraformer.

 

They continue down a series of nondescript hallways—vacant, constructed of the same dull metal as the ones down below, and then they turn a corner straight into another barricade. It’s as pristine and unviolated as the first, and Jim swallows, a memory of a barricaded door surfacing in his memory. He shudders. He has to, they have to…Jim doesn’t think they should be here. No.

 

He taps Stonn on the shoulder as soon as he has finished directing the squad to their guard positions.

 

“How much longer until the shuttle can return for us?” 

 

Stonn shakes his head, and they both turn to Spock, who joins them, saying, “Another 1.2 hours, though until we re-establish communications with the Rineikau-Yehat, that is unconfirmed.”

 

Jim swallows. He doesn’t want to say it, but he’s terribly afraid they don’t have another 1.2 hours to wait. 

 

“We should proceed,” Jim swallows again, “with extreme caution.” He nods to the barricade. “There’s some more of that evidence Tolek was saying didn’t exist.”

 

Stonn meets his gaze, and nods once grimly. 

 

To breach the barrier this time, Stonn has the squad carefully dismantle the barricade, piece by laborious piece (storing most of the bulky junk in some sort of defunct admin room from whence it probably came in the first place.)

 

It takes longer, but is much quieter. Jim appreciates it. His nerves appreciate it. 

 

Once it is clear, Hudson leads on and they pass through the now unblocked hallway and turn into some sort of a reception area, and immediately signs of habitation become clear. The lights of the squad dance around, revealing various articles. A heavy coat just visible, thrown over a chair. A mussed pile of blankets in a corner. An abandoned thermos reading ‘Olduvai’, and several plates left on the reception counter. Jim swallows. The miners did retreat here. He clenches his hands, gripping the sides of his fatigues to hide the shaking. They aren’t here now. 

 

“Control room,” Stonn directs Hudson, and they follow him as he leads them down first one hallway, then another, some rooms still dusty and abandoned when checked, others clearly repurposed. A makeshift galley. A bunk room. And then, a medical area, retrofitted from what was once a simple medic’s station. The supplies are half haphazard, half organized. Whoever started sorting them and setting up shop never finished. This is so bad. This is so, so bad. 

 

Like the lower areas, all of the lights are off, but power is still available, as there are blinking lights in the gloom here and there, indicating equipment or consoles of some kind or other. 

 

“Why are the damn lights off?” Someone finally hisses. It sounded like Ocampo. 

 

A light beam glances off the side of Jim’s face. Oh come on guys, he doesn’t know! He sighs. “They might have thought lights, or the power draw of the lights was attracting the aliens or something,” he says softly.

 

“Was it?” Roaché asks.

 

Jim shakes his head. “They investigate noise, that’s really all I know for certain.”

 

They continue their slow advance, and no sounds break the absolute stillness other than the shuffle of their boots and the soft sounds of their breathing. And then Hudson stops.

 

“Here,” he whispers, and indicates a door, a little larger than the others they’ve seen up here. 

 

T’Sala steps forward, almost hesitant, and Jim readies himself to play ‘heist on Acheron’ once more, but for once, he isn’t required. The door is unlocked, and T’Sala opens it to reveal a cramped, bare bones control and monitoring room. 

 

It’s too small for the bulk of the squad to fit in there, so Stonn sends in Palmer and Ocampo to clear it, and once they return, orders Frost to assist T’Sala and Spock with the communications uplink procedures. Frost follows Spock and T’Sala inside, and all three of them step up to the aged bank of computers which must house the main control systems.

 

Jim turns his attention back to Stonn, who nods to Hudson, who hisses, “Circle up.”

 

The squad draws together in the hallway, and Stonn begins issuing a round of soft orders, lightning-fast.

 

“Palmer, Ocampo, continue on, secure an outer perimeter ahead.” The pair of them nod and peel away from the group and continue down the hallway.

 

Jim opens his mouth to protest, but Stonn is already moving on to the next set of orders.

 

“Blain, Lovar, secure the outer perimeter behind us.” 

 

Jim attempts to interrupt Stonn but is railroaded over again, and Blain and Lovar turn and head back down the hallway from the way they arrived at the Control Room.

 

“Fry, Roaché, conduct a scan of our inner boundaries. Attempt to recover any records or digital data that may have been uploaded or entered into the hardware here.”

 

“Now wait just a damn minute,” Jim hisses, doing a (quite frankly) uncanny impression of Bones.

 

“Your objections to ‘splitting up’ as you put it, have already been noted, Captain,” Stonn replies calmly. “Tihet Squad will proceed as ordered.”

 

Fry and Roaché both look nervous, but they turn and follow the route that Blain and Lovar took, back the way they came from.

 

“Hudson,” Stonn looks to his second-in-command, “Establish a guard around our immediate vicinity.”

 

“You got it,” Hudson whispers, and begins assigning guard positions to the squad still standing in the hallway.

 

Stonn turns on his heel and enters the Control Room, and Jim follows him, mad as a hornet. 

 

“Lieutenant Commander,” he hisses to Stonn’s back. 

 

Stonn turns and looks down at Jim gravely. 

 

“I don’t appreciate being dragged down here as a consultant only to have my consulting ignored,” he whispers furiously.

 

“I understand your frustrations, Captain Kirk,” Stonn replies softly, “but the establishment of a perimeter is necessary. Tihet Squad has trained for this moment. Allow us to do our job.”

 

Desperate to do something that isn’t attempting to shake Stonn back and forth like a Vulcan bobblehead, Jim stalks over to an open doorway, notes the vent opening right overhead the bulky machinery set up in there and nopes right back out. The next open doorway he peers into is free of vent openings so he seats himself at the console he finds inside, and blindly begins poking at it until it switches on. 

 

He looks up, back into the main room, and sees that Stonn is observing where Frost, Spock, and T’Sala are working steadily. It doesn’t look like comms with the Invincible are reestablished yet, but it also doesn’t look like there are any major problems going on. 

 

Jim looks back down at the console. And…it’s still powering on. Ugh. The last time this thing was probably used was back when his grandparent’s generation was going through their cringe 21st Century revivalism. 

 

At last the console finishes powering up and Jim begins to investigate its functions halfheartedly. Atmospheric report. Literally 100 years ago. Atmospheric Report, 99 years ago. He starts flipping through the available data at a faster rate. Useless. Nobody has used this thing in…wait. That’s a recent stardate. 

 

Jim opens up a folder of logs, and selects one in the middle, still half-sure there won’t be anything of value, so it takes him a moment to understand what he’s reading, to realize what he’s found. 

 

Personal Log of Dr. William Birkin Stardate 2268.0511

 

I awoke this morning to discover that Administrator Ryan, Head of Operations Ganon, and Ore Loading Foreman Jack have all disappeared. At first we were in a panic, sure that they had been taken much the way of the others. However, we soon discovered that the shuttle Axiom was missing from the spaceport. Further investigation revealed that the control room had been completely wiped, and all records from Starfleet’s operations here destroyed. It seems that—

 

Jim tears his eyes away. This! He checks the list of entries, their stardates. From just before the Federation reported lost contact with Acheron to a week or so ago. Jim swallows. Spock has to see this! He stands and takes an aborted step towards the door.

 

But first. He reaches up to his headset and switches over mission comms to the Enterprise’s encrypted channel and sits back at the console.

 

“Uhura?” he asks.

 

“Captain,” she instantly responds. Note to self: Raise for Uhura. 

 

“Can you piggyback this signal like you did on Sevastopol, get access to this console I’m at? It’s ancient but-”

 

“Of course Captain,” she answers cooly, and then a few moments later, “I’m in.”

 

“Recent logs file,” he says lowly into his mic, “spliced into some old atmospheric survey reports.”

 

“I see them,” she says.

 

“Review those as quick as you can and summarize for me.”

 

“I’m on it,” she promises.

 

“Kirk out,” he says.

 

Jim takes a deep breath in, and strides back out into the control room. A few basic portable lantern-type lights have been set up and Jim sees that T’Sala is in the process of running connection tests with Frost, with both Spock and Stonn observing. Hudson is prowling around, ducking in and out of the control room, checking in with those at their guard posts. 

 

“Uplink confirmed,” T’Sala is saying, “calibrating for full-access communications with the Rineikau-Yehat now.”

 

“Spock,” Jim hisses, “Stonn.”

 

They both turn and present him with almost identically quizzically raised eyebrows, which is a little disconcerting but Jim doesn’t have time to explore whatever that is.

 

“I found something,” he finishes, and motions them both to follow him back into his little whatsit room.

 

“Lieutenant T’Sala, with me,” Spock informs T’Sala calmly. 

 

Stonn nods at Frost. “Proceed with tower calibrations.” Frost nods, and turns back to the console.

 

The three Vulcans follow Jim to the aged console, and he shows them the logs he’s found. Since there’s only room for one person at a time to fit behind the console, he summarizes briefly for T’Sala and Stonn as Spock begins reviewing the logs.

 

“Personal logs for a Dr. William Birkin,” he explains.

 

T’Sala blinks. “The registered medical provider for this moon’s mining operations,” she says. 

 

Spock looks up to T’Sala and says something in Vulcan to her. She steps forward, and brings up her wrist PADD, likely trying to download from the console.

 

“Come in Captain,” Uhura says softly in his ear.

 

Jim angles himself slightly to the wall and cups a hand over his mouthpiece.

 

“Go,” he whispers.

 

Uhura reports in a low, clipped voice, imparting the salient points as succinctly as she can. “Acheron’s long range communications went down, and within a day, disappearances were reported, just like the civilian logs from Sevastopol. A few days later there was a confirmed, recorded contact with the creatures, resulting in casualties. They thought the creatures were coming from the mine, and they wanted to shut it down, seal it off, but admin wouldn't authorize it.”

 

Jim listens intently, his sweat turning icy and his heartrate ticking up with each word she speaks.

 

“Then admin fled, marooned the miners and support staff, 216 total souls, so they sealed the mine, and decamped to the terraformer. But then the disappearances started again, almost immediately, as if the number of creatures was increasing instead of decreasing.”

 

“They were never in the mine,” Jim says lowly, and in his heart, the thrill of terror grows.  

 

“The last entry is a report of their intent to discover the creatures’ point of entry into the terraformer and seal it. No other entries.”

 

“Standby,” Jim says grimly, and switches back over to mission comms. 

 

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

 

They are here. Fuck. 

 

Jim interrupts Spock and T’Sala’s conversation. Stonn blinks at Jim’s tone, and straightens from where he was apparently reading upside down on the console. “Where the fuck is the reactor located for this behemoth?”

 

Spock looks up as well and blinks at Jim, almost dreamily. His eyes are suddenly unfocused. He does not respond. Stonn turns to look at Spock, an eyebrow raised in question. When the silence continues, T’Sala looks up from her work on the console to give Spock her own questioning stare. Jim’s heart stutters in his chest. It feels like Spock is drowning right in front of him, and he doesn’t know why. 

 

He opens his mouth to say Spock’s name and at last, Spock answers, speaking in a detached tone. “It is located inside the terraformer itself, Jim. I estimate it is a hundred meters or so directly underneath our current position, and offset by a hundred meters or so in either direction.”

 

Jim gapes at him in shock. He has assumed, he realizes, that the reactor was located in an attachment of some kind to the terraformer, or at least on the far side of the construction from the control area. But they are literally right on top of it, and have been for maybe thirty minutes or more. And Spock had said nothing, until Jim asked him. 

 

Dread seizes in the pit of his stomach as he realizes several things at once.

 

They’re in the worst possible place they could be.

 

They cannot stay here. 

 

And something is terribly, horribly wrong with Spock. 

 

End Chapter NINE

Notes:

Dun. Dun. DUNNNNNN. cliffhanger is cliffhanger. I am maybe the teeeeniest tinnniest bit sorry. but mostly I'm cackling to myself, mad with power, in my fic-writing dungeon. u kno how it be.

So happy to report that it is back to business as usual, chapter posting every Friday, chapter previews posted on ze Tumblr on Tuesday and reblogged through Thursday! :D

Fun Fic Fact: So yea this is this fic's 'HHHHAAAAAA, yes now, you will have actual aliens, yes? in-in your alien fic yes? hello? HAHHHH, hello?' moment lmao 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Easter Eggs: 9! :D

Thank you so much to everyone following this fic, flailing at me in the comments, I love you all so much! <3<3<3<3

Chapter 10: Contact

Summary:

Boy does Jim hate being right all the time.

Notes:

Thank you thank you thank you my sweet betafish, itsme-theborgqueen, and sexijexi (jexibug ) <3

I am happy to report that the chapter 13 situation is NOT a repeat of the chapter 4/5 situation, it is coMPLETE it is SHMASSIVE and I am very happy with it. In other news, chapter 14 is almost complete as well, feeling amazing and writing writing writing WOOO!

Ok so, this chapter. We have added some new tags. AHem. so yes. Watch out for those end notes, some le spoilering, don't go there before chapter reading (just an fyi)

Let's b real. Ya'll are absolutely gonna come for me in the comments and I am HERE FOR IT. WOO!

Jim manages to tear his gaze away from Spock to look over at Stonn, who is himself still looking at Spock, his brow creased and a slightly pronounced frown to his lips. Jim thinks that may mean that Stonn is extremely concerned. Jim is also extremely concerned, but they can figure out what’s wrong with Spock back on the damn ship. They have to leave now. Jim’s not going to be budged on this one.

 

He opens his mouth to tell Stonn it’s time to fucking go.

 

“Commander,” Frost calls from the other room.

 

Stonn strides from the room. Spock follows. Jim exchanges a look with T’Sala as she straightens up from the console, her wrist PADD giving a cheerful ‘beep’ indicating download complete. He thinks she may be just as worried as him, but it’s a little hard to tell. The pair of them hurry after Stonn and Spock. 

 

“Calibrations are complete,” Frost is saying, “attempting to raise the Invincible now.”

 

No more interruptions. Jim walks right up into Stonn’s personal space. 

 

“Tell them to send that shuttle back, we need to evac, now.”

 

“The shuttle will still be undergoing quarantine procedures,” Stonn reminds him.

 

Jim pitches his voice low. “Tell them to abort the damn quarantine lockdown, or there won’t be anyone alive down here by the time the shuttle makes it back.”

 

Stonn’s eyes widen, and his mouth opens, but before he can say anything, static crackles in Jim’s earpiece. 

 

“Lovar, Lovar!” A voice hisses. Jim recognizes it as the one that had broken comms silence in the mine. 

 

“Come in, Commander,” the voice says, and then hisses again, “Lovar!” It must be Blain, he was the one assigned with Lovar.

 

“Report,” Stonn says, his voice clipped.

 

“Commander, I’ve lost visual on Lovar, he was right here! But he’s not responding and…” A pause and some muffled sounds. “His rifle is here on the ground,” Blain whispers, “it’s…” Another pause and some more indeterminate sounds. “It’s sticky? There’s some kind of residue on it.”

 

“Stonn,” Jim says lowly, urgently, “call everyone back.”

 

“Fall back,” Stonn says instantly over comms. “All teams fall back to primary mission point, Terraformer Control Room.”

 

“Copy,” Blain says shakily. 

 

“We copy,” Jim hears Palmer’s voice say over comms.

 

Stonn is looking at Jim, and Jim is pretty sure he knows the question Stonn is not voicing. He shakes his head once, in the negative. Lovar is gone. Jim doesn’t think there will be any getting him back.

 

A voice, thready with fear, speaks over comms, “Jim.”

 

“Fry?” he responds.

 

“Jim I…think I hear something, above…up in the ducts. Roaché is missing, he was right here a second ago.”

 

“Fry,” Jim says, struggling to keep his voice soothing and calm, speaking as loudly as he dares, “Stay low, no noise. Keep moving.”

 

Elevated breathing is the only thing audible over comms for a few moments. She’s gonna be okay, she’s doing it, she’s moving.

 

And then Fry whispers, “It’s…no, I hear something up there, Jim what do I do?”

 

“Leave the room,” Jim whispers back, “quietly, now.”

 

“I c-c-c-an’t,” she whimpers, “it’s right above me.”

 

“Move, now,” he hisses.

 

“I c-c-can’t move,” she sobs, her distress raising the volume of her voice. 

 

“My wife,” Jim recognizes Lodzhal on the comms, his voice quiet and calming, “you must listen to Captain Kirk.”

 

She moans. “Oh, Lodzhal, I can’t!”

 

Jim hears a commotion which follows Fry’s last communication almost immediately, and even distorted over comms, he recognizes it. The sound of an alien descending from a vent is not something he could ever forget. 

 

“Shoot it Fry, you have to shoot it,” Jim commands her, desperate to break through her fear.

 

She screams, and over that, Jim hears the shriek of an alien. A series of sounds, thuds and some scuffling, then three wet sounding thunks. Fry’s screams cut off.

 

Jim’s hand falls to his side, where he’d been desperately gripping his earpiece. He knows…he knows what someone being murdered over comms sounds like. Fry is gone.

 

Jim turns back to Stonn. “We have to leave here.”

 

Stonn’s face is set into grim lines. He turns to the console bank, where T’Sala has once more joined Frost. “Status?” He asks calmly.

 

Frost shakes his head, his hands off of the console, gripping his rifle tight. “Comms still not re-established.”

 

T’Sala interjects. “We are fully integrated with this facility. Our presence in the Control Room is no longer required to initiate and maintain communications.”

 

Stonn nods. “Form up,” he commands. Jim squeezes his eyes shut momentarily, like that will somehow have any effect on dimming the sound of Fry’s screams still ringing in his ears. 

 

As they all form up out in the hallway once more, Jim reviews the squad members. Some, like the safely arrived Blain, are pale and shaking. Others, like Palmer, posture rigid and gun raised, are clearly out for blood. Lodzhal stands slightly unbalanced, his skin a sickly pallor. Stonn has paused next to him and is murmuring lowly into his ear. Spock stands calmly in his customary pose, with his hands clasped behind him, his eyes looking down the hallway, his gaze slightly unfocused. 

 

“Spock,” Jim hisses. Spock doesn’t so much as twitch. “Spock,” he hisses again, angrily. No response. It’s like he’s shut down completely. 

 

Despair claws at his throat. Jim cannot do this without Spock. It’s not possible. He can feel fatigue, weighing down his limbs, making his thoughts feel syrupy and thick, like molasses. The desire to step back, put it on autopilot, let other people take control is building; a honeyed poison within him. Jim shakes his head. No. A stray thought has him putting his hand inside a front pocket of his fatigues. The exact pocket he would have placed a packet of caffeine pills, if he had thought to ask Bones for them. He almost can’t believe it when his fingers actually close around something.

 

Retracting his hand from his pocket reveals a small pack of four caffeine pills, identical to the one Bones had sent him off with to Sevastopol. This tiny evidence of the depth of Bones’ care almost sends Jim over the edge. He is loved, and still alive to experience it, and Fry is…

 

Jim gives himself a small shake. Mourning is a luxury afforded only to survivors. Jim knows this. He pops a pill and drops the packet back into his pocket. Spock has been carrying Jim throughout their time on this fucking moon, now Jim is going to return the favor. Jim is not going to fold in on himself like a failed warp-core reaction. 

 

The squad is ready to move, Hudson and Stonn communicating fully by hand and arm signals, Hudson on point with Palmer and Arev, and Stonn once more in the rearguard, this time with Schoefield. Ocampo has taken Fry’s place as the center guard next to Lodzhal. Angry tear tracks glisten on her cheeks, and she stands close to Lodzhal. She and Jim nod at each other, in perfect understanding.

 

Jim hooks his fingers into the excess fabric of Spock’s sleeve at his elbow. Spock doesn’t seem like he’s entirely in the present moment. There is not going to be a repeat of Sevastopol, Jim isn’t going to let him out of his sight. 

 

A large forward chop of an arm motion from Hudson, and the squad begins to move, everyone on their toes, as quietly as humanly (and Vulcanly) possible. They retrace their steps back through the hallways and out through the reception area. As they move past the mostly deconstructed barrier, Jim raises his free arm up to swipe at the sweat gathering on his forehead and stinging at his eyes. All is silence, save for their breathing and the slight sounds of their movement. He tries not to think about what’s happened to Lovar, or about Fry’s body, lying somewhere in a pool of her blood.

 

Adrenaline sings through his veins, making his thoughts feel fragmented and dizzy as the silence and emptiness of their surroundings presses in.The grip he has on Spock’s sleeve anchors him, keeps him from flying into a million pieces. 

 

He thinks they are getting close to the elevator bank, when from behind them, he hears the pounding of steps. His heart leaps up into his throat, his body is slow to understand the sound that his brain has already identified. Boots. The squad is circling up, rifles pointed behind them, but Stonn has already raised his hand to signal a hold.

 

Roaché rounds the corner and skids to a stop, raising his arm to shield his eyes from the myriad of light beams that are trained on him. A strange rumble, a growl almost, jerks Jim’s eyes to Spock for a moment before he realizes it came from behind him, from Lodzhal. 

 

Jim looks back over at Roaché, who swallows, and begins to plead, his eyes fixed on where Lodzhal is standing right behind Jim.

 

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t…I didn’t!” 

 

“Shut up.”

 

“Silence.”

 

Both Jim and Stonn hiss at the same time. Stonn signals in a sharp motion at Roaché, and he slinks into the right flank.

 

Stonn motions, and the squad begins to turn back around. Jim looks at Ocampo, who is staring anxiously at Lodzhal. His face is set into grim lines, etched with pain, emotion peeking out from within him like water spilling from cracks. His movements are wooden and jerky, but he complies with Stonn’s directive, turning back and resuming his guard position.

 

And Spock. Jim looks over at Spock, his fingers reflexively tightening their grip on the fabric of Spock’s sleeve. Spock has barely reacted at all, he walks with the group and stops with the group, but his eyes are almost vacant, and stare blankly ahead wherever his head is pointed. Jim doesn’t know if Spock would even be moving without Jim towing him along, but by god, he is not going to find out. 

 

Hudson leads them on.

 

“Roaché was too loud,” Jim says grimly into the quiet. “We need to pick up the pace.”

 

Stonn agrees softly behind him. “Double-time.”

 

Hudson increases his speed and the rest of them follow, moving at a trot now. The tap and squeak of their boots on the metal floor sounds obscenely loud, but Jim’s sure the time for subtly has passed. Speed is their only ally now. They cover the rest of the ground to the elevator bank swiftly, and without incident, but Jim knows that cannot last.

 

Hudson summons the elevator, his finger tapping rapidly on the call button. “Where the fuck did it go?” He mutters.

 

The squad circles up, and their lights bounce nervously along the walls and over the ceiling of the rectangular alcove. Jim wonders if they should have turned some facility lighting on. It obviously doesn’t seem to matter, and at least they’d be able to see. He thinks about it some more. They don’t want to make any sudden power draws from the reactor—who knows what’s going on with that thing, or how it might affect the nest Jim is now positive is located there. It’s possible most of them are sleeping or inactive right now. Maybe they can get away with emergency lighting?

 

He shuffles around Spock, keeping his careful grip on his sleeve, and mutters to T’Sala, “Can you get us emergency lighting?”

 

She blinks, then responds. “Affirmative.”

 

They both look at Spock. “Can we risk it?” Jim hisses at him, desperate for Spock to weigh in with his knowledge. When Spock doesn’t respond, Jim tugs on his sleeve insistently. Spock blinks, and his eyes focus on Jim.

 

“It should be fine,” Spock answers after a few more moments, sounding distant. 

 

Jim swallows his worry over that very un-Spockian answer, and looks over at Stonn, who spares a quick glance at them from his overwatch position.

 

“Do it,” he says.

 

T’Sala’s fingers dance over her wrist PADD. Jim braces himself, but still jumps when a few dull yellow lights, inset into the floor, switch on with a crackle.

 

“I have illuminated only this sector,” she whispers. Jim nods. As ambient lighting goes, it’s not much, but it’s better than the pitch black they had before. 

 

The cheerful tone of the elevator arriving chimes out. 

 

“Hudson, Palmer, in,” Stonn says tightly, his back to the elevator, still scanning the empty hallway outside the alcove. Hudson and Palmer step in. “Raise the Rineikau-Yehat, call the shuttle back, and locate an evac zone,” Stonn orders the pair of them. They both nod seriously. 

 

“Nomikh, Arev, Schofield, Lieutenant T’Sala, Ocampo.” As each name is called, its owner steps swiftly into the elevator. Ocampo’s bottom lip trembles as she steps away from Lodzhal, but she goes no less quickly than the others. 

 

“Spock, Captain,” Stonn finishes his division of the team. At Jim’s nudge, Spock begins to step forward into the elevator and Jim readies himself to follow. Stonn, Lodzhal, Blain, Roaché, and Frost won’t fit, and will have to wait for the elevator to return. 

 

As Jim steps into the elevator, it makes an unhappy sound; a groaning of metal followed by some ominous creaking. He freezes. It’s old. The last time it had maintenance was probably fifty years before Jim was born. And they still need it for one more trip. A sharp crack, like a wire snapping, sounds out.

 

Jim steps back out of the elevator immediately, his arm stretching out now in the space between Spock and himself. The warning sounds cease, and with a swallow, he relaxes his fingers and his arm falls away. Spock seems to give a little start, and the last thing Jim sees as the elevator doors close is Spock’s face, eyes wide as he blinks once, twice, his gaze fixed on Jim.

 

Jim grits his teeth and clamps down hard on the mental wail of ‘Spock!’ that his mind wants to spiral into. He will keep it to—fucking—gether. It’s torture to stand and wait, when all Jim wants to do is pace back and forth, release some of his nervous energy, but he manages.

 

“Stonn,” Hudson’s voice sounds over comms, “T’Sala has raised the Invincible.”

 

Stonn jerks his head to Frost, who takes his place watching over the hallway. Stonn steps back by the elevator and says, “Go, Hudson.”

 

“They want authorization codes to abort shuttle quarantine and send it back for evac.”

 

“Is Lt. Tolek secure?”

 

“Yes, he’s been moved off of the shuttle.”

 

Stonn then begins to relay a series of codes to Hudson, but a chime over the comms cuts him short. “We’re exiting the elevator,” Hudson says, “Sending it back to you.”

 

“Jim,” Frost hisses. Jim looks over at Frost, who jerks his head for Jim to join him. Jim steps over. 

 

“What is it?” he asks.

 

Frost swallows, “Do you think we’ll make it?” he asks, his voice small.

 

Jim looks blankly over at the elevator, where Stonn has resumed his recitation of the authorization codes for Hudson to relay to the Invincible.

 

“I’m going to—” he starts to say, turning back to Frost and then freezing, his body reacting to details even as his mind struggles to assimilate them, time slows and warps like a bubble around him. Something seems to grow out of Frost’s chest, a dark blade almost glistening. Jim blinks and jerks back as liquid hits his face, hot points of sensation. Frost grunts, and then makes a gurgling, wet, choking noise. Jim jerks back another step as Frost’s body begins to rise up, his feet leaving the ground, his rifle dangling on its strap, his arms hanging limply by his sides. A hissing, nightmare menace is revealed behind him, stepping out of the gloom. 

 

‘Contact,’ Jim tries to say, but finds he cannot speak. The smooth oblong shape of the alien’s head lifts up, a dull yellow reflection from the emergency lights gleaming along the curve, revealing the silver of its teeth as its lips curl, saliva pooling from its mouth.

 

“Mother. Fucker,” Frost grits out, blood burbling down his chin, and his fingers fumble at his hip, releasing the clasp on a sidearm. The shot breaks the silence, the alien’s shriek following right on its heels. A glancing blow on its shoulder. Jim hears the hiss as the blood comes in contact with the metal of the floor outside the alcove. The time bubble pops and then everything happens all at once. 

 

“Contact!” Someone yells behind him. Frost’s body is flung across the alcove, where it strikes the far wall and crumples to the floor. 

 

A hand grabs Jim’s shoulder and he is yanked backwards and pressed up against the still closed elevator doors, Stonn’s broad shoulders blocking the space in front of him. 

 

Gunfire erupts, and the shrieks of the creatures fill the air. Jim’s hands fumble at his own rifle, and his eyes dart around. He doubts his ability to aim around Stonn and the others, and his finger sits unmoving on the trigger.

 

“Backs to the wall!” Stonn is ordering, and Jim thought he knew terror, but this! There are aliens crawling into the elevator bank, horizontal on the walls from either side, and Jim trembles as even through the gunfire, the shrieks and the splatter and hissing of their blood, he can hear the thud thud thud of more feet out in the hallway, drawing nearer. He glances up and sees only darkness. “Up!” He yells, raising his rifle, “Cover the vents!” 

 

“Fuck!” someone yells. It’s Roaché, and it’s too late. Jim sees as Roaché jerks his light up that he’s standing right under a vent opening, and the hissing form of an alien is revealed, its arms outstretched. It grabs Roaché and he screams, kicking ineffectually as he’s lifted off the floor.

 

Roaché struggles to bring his rifle up to bear, the muzzle point blank in the alien’s face. 

 

“No, don’t!” Jim shouts, but it’s too late. Roaché pulls the trigger, and the alien’s head explodes into chunks, raining its deadly blood straight down into Roaché’s face. His body falls to the floor, his face already melting from the acid of its blood, the alien’s corpse tumbling down on top of him. His screams are high pitched and terrible, but they don’t last for long. The blood does its job too quickly, and Jim turns away from the sight of Roaché’s body twitching in his death throes. 

 

A yell of terror from the left, and Jim jerks his head around to see Blain, flailing madly, disappearing up into another vent.

 

“Grab him!” Jim cries to Lodzhal, and they both jump forward to grab for Blain’s legs, but it’s too late, he’s gone, gone.

 

They’re all going to die. Jim’s going to die, even though he promised Bones, and Spock isn’t safe yet. He’s going to die. 

 

Stonn turns and shoves him, and he stumbles backwards into an open space. The elevator. Belatedly Jim realizes he’d heard it ding behind him.

 

“Lodzhal!” Stonn calls, beginning to back into the elevator, shooting an advancing creature down from the ceiling. 

 

Jim realizes there’s no one left for him to accidentally hit, and he raises his rifle, aiming at an alien priming to leap at Stonn, just off to the side. He clips it in the upper torso, and it jerks back, its tail swinging forward, the bladed tip catching on the edge of the elevator door with a clank, inches from Jim. 

 

“Fuck your reach!” Jim screams at it, firing another burst at its midsection. “Lodzhal!” He adds his voice to Stonn’s, calling for the medic. 

 

“Haltor hakfam nashve natevak, heh dungi faltor nemut wek nashve!” Jim hears Lodzhal shout as he ignores both him and Stonn and charges forward into three of the creatures—drawing the attention of two more that were advancing on the ceiling and one on the wall as he does. He has abandoned his rifle entirely, and wraps his hands around the head of the alien closest to him. Its secondary mouth springs forward, but he holds it away from him and it snaps furiously on thin air. With a roar, Lodzhal flings it bodily away, twisting its neck around with a crack as he does. 

 

A violent hiss yanks Jim’s attention from Lodzhal, towards another alien advancing on the elevator from the opposite wall. 

 

“Rai, RAI!” Stonn shouts. Jim jams his elbow into the door close button, and fires on the closest target, his bullets tearing a path from its middle torso up into its head, huge chunks torn out by whatever kind of bullets these are that Chekov cooked up. 

 

Jim's last view is a clump of aliens converging on Lodzhal where he still stands, two alien corpses at his feet, grappling with another, their tails striking, green blood flowing freely, and Lodzhal’s body spasming with each impact, and then the elevator doors close and he sees no more. Jim opens his mouth to scream in rage, but—

 

“RAI, LODZHAL!” Stonn is already howling at the ceiling. Jim reaches out to hit the correct floor button, but his hand is shaking so bad it takes him several precious seconds to hit the right one. As the elevator begins to descend. Jim becomes aware that Hudson’s voice is sounding desperately in his ear, “Boss, Boss! Come in, what’s your status, someone fucking answer me!” 

 

“We’re coming down, hold comms,” Jim cuts him off. There’s a shuffling sound, some mutterings he doesn’t catch, and then it’s Palmer who replies softly, “Affirmative.”

 

Jim takes a few shuddering breaths, and sets his rifle down on his hip, secured by the strap. He feels wetness on his face and jerks his hands up to wipe himself, his body reacting even though he knows if it were alien blood, he’d be dead already.

 

His hands come away red, his fingers trembling. Frost’s blood from where it had—No. Jim jerks his thoughts away. He can’t think about that now.

 

He turns his attention to Stonn, who is standing still, head bowed, shoulders slumped. Jim knows what to do. He’s done it before, hopefully it works with Vulcans, too. 

 

“He’s gone,” he says softly, stepping up to Stonn. “He’s gone. Stay with us, we need you, the squad needs you, you’ve got to get us through this.” At first he reaches out to clasp Stonn’s shoulder, but then thinks better of it. Jim keeps up his murmured entreaties and reminders of Stonn’s duties and responsibilities, and by the time the elevator slows, reaching their destination, Stonn has straightened, and is once more in command; competent, calm, and resolute, his rifle at the ready.

 

The elevator doors open on the tiny two-elevator alcove, lit now with a few emergency lights. Jim’s eyes immediately search out Spock, standing next to Hudson, right in front of the elevator. Safe. He’s safe. 

 

“The others?” Nomikh asks, and even though Jim thinks it’s the first time he’s ever heard her speak, she sounds alarmed. 

 

“Gone,” Stonn answers. 

 

“You are injured?” Spock asks, and makes an aborted gesture at Jim’s face.

 

“It’s not mine,” Jim says shortly. 

 

“Mother fuck!” Hudson curses. “This is bullshit!”

 

“Can it Hudson,” Palmer says, glancing worriedly at Ocampo, who is visibly struggling to keep it together. 

 

“No way man, they got Lodzhal? And Frosty?” Hudson’s voice cracks. “This is—”

 

“Hudson,” Stonn interrupts, his voice icy, “remember yourself.”

 

Hudson cuts himself off with a strangled noise. 

 

“Status report,” Stonn says. 

 

“On the go,” Jim interjects, “we have to keep moving.”

 

“But how fast can they…?” Arev starts to ask then trails off. 

 

“I promise you, they’re right behind us,” Jim answers grimly.

 

“Hudson,” Stonn prompts, and Hudson starts, then takes the lead, Palmer at his side. They set the pace at a light jog. Jim falls in right beside Spock. He can’t hold on to Spock, secure his rifle, and maintain a jog, so he compensates by jogging as close to Spock as he can without knocking them both over, bumping into him lightly every so often. If Spock has any complaints, he doesn’t voice them. He’s moving under his own power now, so that’s something, at least.

 

Hudson updates them as they move, making their way back through more worn, dark hallways, alleviated only by the emergency lighting that T’Sala seems to be activating on the fly. “Shuttle’s en route, but estimates are still putting it at thirty minutes or so out. They have to break atmo from a different vector due to the storm.”

 

“Our evac zone?” Stonn questions.

 

“There’s an open area in front of the main entrance to the terraformer, on the plans it’s clear, but we won’t know until we get there,” Hudson answers.

 

“How do we reach it?”

 

“We’re on the other side of the damn terraformer from the main entrance, fastest way would be to cut through the reactor—”

 

Jim stumbles, but before he can say anything, Hudson has continued on with, “But that’s not an option, right?”

 

“Right,” Jim manages to gasp out. 

 

“We’ve worked an alternate, going under the terraformer, using some access and reactor overflow tunnels.”

 

That does not sound any fucking better, but Jim guesses they’re out of options, unless... “Outside?” He questions.

 

Hudson shoves open a door, answering Jim and warning everyone in the same breath. “We’d never navigate the terrain and the storm—watch the gap!”

 

They’ve entered into the dark metal stairwell once more, this time to descend straight back the way they’d come. Their boots clang on the metal steps as they make their way down, going as quickly as they dare in the dark. There doesn’t seem to be any lighting T’Sala can activate here. 

 

A crackle of static, and an unknown voice demands an update. “Arev, take comms,” Hudson delegates, doing his best to check the map on his wrist PADD, negotiate the stairs, and keep his rifle pointed somewhere other than the floor.

 

Arev says, "Proceeding to evac zone now, descending to tunnels underneath the terraformer.”

 

“Copy,” the voice replies, then says nothing more. 

 

One minute they’re clanging their way down the stairs, sounding like a horde of Ferengi beating feet for the opening of the galactic market; the next, they are spilling onto the concrete floor of the landing, and Hudson is attempting to access the dank-looking ‘Overflow’ door Jim hadn’t been particularly impressed with on their first pass through here.

 

“Hey, Jim!” Hudson calls helplessly. Jim trots over and tries to interface with it. 

 

“Dead,” he grunts. “No power.” He gives an experimental shove with his shoulder at the door, which predictably doesn’t budge. “We need Rekan’s pry bar, shit,” he curses.

 

“Arev,” Stonn calls, “Nomikh,” and waves Jim away. The three Vulcans line up together, and as one, they slam against the door. It gives an encouraging sounding groan. They hit it again. It crumples a little. The next time is the last time, and it bursts open with a bang. That works too. Someone gets a light trained on what lies inside, revealing a cramped cement staircase, descending sharply down. Verticality can suck Jim’s dick. When he makes it big and retires, he’s building a one-story compound. No stairs. No elevators. No vents. If Spock wants one of those Vulcan meditation spots on a hill, he’s gonna hafta go a long-ass way to find a hill. 

 

“Hudson, Palmer,” Stonn says, not even out of breath, and the two of them take back the vanguard, Hudson squinting down at his map as he goes. “Schofield,” Stonn orders, and Schofield follows after. “Lieutenant T’Sala, Commander Spock, Captain,” Stonn nods his head for them to follow after Schoefield. T’Sala enters first, and this time it’s Jim’s turn to guard Spock’s back as he urges Spock down the stairs in front of him. Two steps down on the staircase, Jim freezes. 

 

Distantly, and faint above them, but still audible, he hears the shriek of an alien. 

 

“Move,” Stonn says tightly behind him, and up ahead, Jim hears Palmer hiss, “Go, go, go!”

 

The clatter of their boots on the stairs fills the narrow space, and Jim hears a squeal of metal back at the top that must be Stonn forcing the door back into some kind of closed position. It obviously won’t hold, if the aliens will even need to use it. When the terraformer was built, Acheron had no breathable atmosphere. It will have been designed with the same redundancy of a space station, interconnected and full of goddamn air ducts.

 

A splashing sound from just below Jim, a curse, a few steps more and he reaches the bottom of the staircase, stepping into a good six inches of tepid water. The lights of the squad reveal a tunnel that is no wider than the stairs they’ve just come down. Murky water soaks their boots and pants up to their calves, adding yet another layer of misery to the situation. Metal grating conceals the full makeup of the ceiling, but Jim’s gonna go with, (just a hunch), full of holes.

 

Up ahead, the lights reveal what looks to be a cross junction. 

 

“Which way, Hudson?” Stonn asks.

 

“Gimmie a sec,” he mumbles back. 

 

“One second,” Arev counts. “Which way?”

 

Hudson mutters a few sentences under his breath, but doesn’t look up from the small glow of his wrist PADD. 

 

“Hudson, man, pick a direction,” Schofield says, looking uneasily up at the ceiling. 

 

“Left,” Hudson directs, and they start down the left tunnel. “Wait, no, straight,” he corrects, and they have to awkwardly reorient to start down the straight tunnel.

 

“Come on, man,” Arev says. 

 

Hudson stomps past Jim to take up the vanguard with Palmer muttering under his breath as he does. “Now. He picks now, of all the fucking times to figure out what a fucking attitude is, are you fucking kidding me.”

 

They slosh forward, Jim keeping Spock in front of him and his own head on a swivel, in a thrall of terror that the threat will come for Spock, and Jim won’t be able to intercept it in time. The pace the squad is able to move is annoyingly a cross between a slight jog and a power walk. 

 

“Is this as fast as we can go?” Jim asks, peering around Spock’s shoulder to see Hudson once more staring intently at his wrist PADD. 

 

“Some of these tunnels aren’t on the damn map,” Hudson says, sounding a little petulant. 

 

“Man, do not get us lost in here,” Schofield says.

 

A clanging sound from up ahead stops them all in their tracks. 

 

“Fuck,” Arev says.

 

Jim feels a pang. Frost would have been so proud.

 

“I think I can route us around,” Hudson says nervously, “gimmie two secs.”

 

Jim hears an intake of breath from Arev. 

 

“Don’t,” Ocamp warns. Arev releases the breath in what sounds like a remarkably bitchy sigh. 

 

They wait in silence for a minute, water lapping at their feet every time one of them shifts, lights keeping careful watch behind, above, and ahead.

 

“Hudson?” Palmer starts to ask.

 

“Quiet,” Jim hisses.

 

Everyone stills. He thought he’d heard…something mixing with the faint sloshing of the water.

 

More lights come to bear on the grating above them, but Jim tilts his head to the side hearing it, faintly, searching for the source, the light from his headset panning over the wall. A dull gleam! He jerks his head back, and reaches for Spock, pulling him behind Jim. 

 

“Schofield!” Jim shouts in warning, and the faint hissing raises in volume, recognizable now, an alien reaching out from a side tunnel that none of them knew was there, hidden in the darkness, an opening barely wide enough to squeeze a single person. 

 

It grabs Schofield, who shouts in surprise and fear. He fires, but the shots go wide and pepper the wall to the right. T’Sala gets a hand on the rifle strap crossing his back, but then it snaps, and Schofield is dragged into the darkness with a wail. Palmer charges towards the small opening with a yell of rage, but as he does Schofield lets out a scream that is quickly cut off, and Jim’s body reacts viscerally, jerking back with each wet stabbing sound that spills out from where Schofield had been taken. Palmer fires at whatever he sees inside, cursing indiscriminately. 

 

“Hudson!” Stonn yells from the back, and Jim hears the shriek of an alien from behind.

 

“This way!” Hudson yells, starting forward, “Palmer, let’s go!”

 

With a last yell of fury, Palmer turns from the opening and follows Hudson, and then they’re running, Jim shoving Spock forward to follow Hudson as he takes them left, and then left again, the water rising until it’s just below Jim’s knees, forcing all of them to struggle through it, reducing their speed. 

 

A crash of metal above Jim; he looks up in shock, straight into the face of an alien. The metal grating of the ceiling holds, and powerful hands jerk Jim forward, out from underneath it. It hisses violently, its secondary mouth jutting forward, snapping ineffectually at the metal separating it from the tunnel below. 

 

“Keep moving!” Stonn shouts, and Jim stumbles forward, pulled along by Spock, whose face is blank and whose eyes are distant again, the only sign he even knows what’s going on is his hold on Jim. 

 

“Up here!” Hudson shouts, “There’s a flow gate!”

 

A cry of pain from behind Jim and he whirls back around. 

 

Arev is clutching his shoulder, green spilling around his fingers, the blade of the alien’s tail caught in the grating from where it must have tried to strike at Arev again.

 

Arev snarls, the expression startling on the face of a Vulcan, and he raises his rifle up.

 

Roaché flashes through Jim’s mind, his face dissolving, his screams of agony.

 

“Don’t!” He yells.

 

An instant of terror where Jim is certain he will shoot, and then logic reasserts itself, and Arev staggers forward, out from under the alien. Jim turns back to Spock who doesn’t move until Jim begins to struggle forward through the water again, and the pair of them run to where Hudson and Palmer are guarding the entrance to…something off to the left, the opening bracketed by solid concrete. Spock and Jim slosh as quickly as they can past Hudson and Palmer, followed by Nomikh and Ocampo, then Arev, Stonn last of all, turning one last time to fire down behind them. T’Sala stands at the ready in front of some kind of control panel just inside.

 

“C’mon boss!” Hudson yells as Stonn continues to fire, the unearthly shrieks of the aliens filling the air. 

 

“Stonn!” Jim shouts, an alien charging at his flank from another side tunnel, illuminated by his own headset light. 

 

Stonn turns and wades the last few steps to where the rest of them are waiting, and T’Sala slams her hand on a button as soon as he clears the entrance. A solid wall slams into place, sealing the opening completely, before Jim even has time to worry about what’s supposed to happen. 

 

“Flood gate,” Hudson gasps. “We’ve sealed them out.”

 

“No,” Jim says bleakly. “There’ll be another way in here, and they’ll find it.”

 

“Agreed,” Stonn says, his voice clipped. “Lead on Hudson.”

 

Hudson swallows, “This area isn’t on the map.”

 

Jim glances up ahead, where Palmer and Ocampo are holding guard positions, their lights illuminating a long stretch of tunnel, with no visible side connections of any kind.

 

“We must follow this route until we are able to return to the mapped areas,” T’Sala says. “We have no other choice.”

 

“Palmer, Ocampo, take the lead,” Stonn orders. “Hudson, keep checking that map.”

 

Palmer and Ocampo start off, and Hudson follows right behind them, frustratedly stabbing his fingers at the screen of his PADD. The rest of them fall in as well, pushing forward through the dirty water.

 

“Hold,” Stonn calls, and they pause while he affixes a field dressing to the wound on Arev’s shoulder. 

 

“Pain is a thing of the mind,” Arev says, and makes as if to shake Stonn off of him.

 

Stonn easily holds him steady and replies calmly, “Blood, however, is not.”

 

Arev looks briefly as if he is going to argue that point, but subsides when Nomikh toes him lightly on the leg with her boot, and raises a judgmental eyebrow.

 

Once Stonn finishes his first aid and releases Arev, they resume moving down the tunnel.  

 

Arev slinks over to walk next to Hudson, and mutters something to him that Jim doesn’t catch.

 

“I dunno man,” Hudson responds absently, still focused on his wrist PADD, “bleeding out doesn’t sound all that logical to me.”

 

For several minutes they walk in silence while Jim listens carefully, hearing nothing over the sound of splashing of the water and their own varied breathing. As the tunnel continues to stretch before them, with no sign of any offshoots, Jim begins to wonder exactly where it is they’re heading.

 

“We appear to be heading in the direction of the Administrative Facility,” Spock remarks calmly. Jim snaps his head around to look at him, but he says nothing more, his face bearing no expression. 

 

Hudson swears. “Our fucking evac is in the opposite direction.”

 

“Arev, get in contact with the shuttle, update them,” Stonn orders.

 

They continue on, the murmur of Arev’s conversation on comms with the shuttle and the Invincible largely drowned out by the sound of the water as they force their way through it. Jim blinks worriedly as he realizes suddenly that the sound of the water is louder because it’s rushing somewhere, but even as he starts to panic that they’re all about to be sucked into some heinous Acheron-style waterslide or something, the water starts shallowing out until it disappears entirely and they’re walking on the same style of metal grating that covers the ceiling. Jim and T’Sala point their lights to the floor, revealing a sharp incline that drains the water away down into another tunnel running parallel underneath them. It looks pretty deep. Jim swallows. Fuck, he hopes the grating holds. He does not want to have to find out what’s down there. 

 

They’re able to increase their pace, free from the difficulty of having to wade through knee-deep water. For all their strength, the Vulcans didn’t seem to have any easier time navigating the water than the humans. Jim wonders if it has something to do with Vulcan being all desert-y. 

 

“The shuttle is still twenty-five minutes out,” Arev updates them. “It is taking them longer to navigate to us than estimated. Without a secure landing zone, they will not be able to wait around for us. If they are not able to evac us within five minutes of arrival, the shuttle will have to return to orbit.”

 

Great. There’s silence as they all process that. A tiny window for getting off this rock, and they’re heading in the wrong goddamn direction. 

 

“Maybe the spaceport is still standing? Maybe they can pick us up from there?” Ocampo asks.

 

“Unlikely,” T’Sala says. “Without the blast shielding provided by the power grid, the spaceport would stand little chance against the storm. I estimate by this time, there is only around 50% of the structure left.”

 

The only thing surprising about that information is that T’Sala is the one conveying it, and not Spock. Jim sneaks a worried glance over at him. He walks along, face serene and untroubled. 

 

“We must discover where this tunnel is leading us. Then we may formulate a plan for a rendezvous with the shuttle,” Stonn says. “Double-time.”

 

“With pleasure.” Jim hears Ocampo mutter, and then they’re jogging forward at a ground-eating clip. 

 

Jim doesn’t know where the hell it is that they could possibly be going, but he knows one thing at least. 

 

They’re heading away from the reactor. 

 

End Chapter TEN

Notes:

You're probably mad. Understandable! BUT We all knew this day was coming. DON'T BLAME ME BLAME THE CHARACTERS I gave them a few snappy lines just so ppl could distinguish between them and then they just demanded their own personalities and backstories and lovability and whatnot so. THEY KNEW THEY WERE SLATED FOR ALIEN TIMES but nooooooo they demanded to be memorable and I caved, I caved like an improperly mixed soufflé. So I guess what I'm saying is blaming me is fair. SORRRYYYY :(

Drink some water, snuggle a blankie or furry friend, have a shot, self care!

Fun Fic Fact: There is a cheat sheet for who lives and who dies, I wonder if anyone has picked up on it? :3

Easter Eggs: None :(

Vulcan translation, brought to us by Moreta!<3 Thank you thank you thank you for your help! Haltor hakfam nashve natevak, heh dungi faltor nemut wek nashve: 'Fearless, I go to death, and my many enemies shall proceed me'

I'm wondering who everybody's fav OC is? I know Stonn is probably frontrunner, any others? <3

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 3 of The Unknown Saga