Chapter Text
Only Jim would be allergic to the mud flea vaccine, the odds of it he was pretty sure Spock would know (probably tell him if asked), but even without that green-blooded walking computer, Bones knew it was pretty rare. Rare enough that he noted it with asterisks and bold fonts in Jim's medical file in case Jim had the misfortune of getting an incompetent doctor treating him (he tried to make sure that never happens though, but it was better safe than sorry).
God damn away mission on a jungle-like class M planet. Of course Jim insisted on going down there because the bastard was still too young, too new sitting on that damn captain's chair to remember maybe it wasn't practical for a ship's captain to go exploring. But did Jim Kirk listen? Hell, no. And was he as careful as he'd promised Bones he would be? Fuck, no! Jim had to lunge too far, too quickly to yank Uhura off the crumbling edge and dropped ten feet below into a ravine himself. And cut his hand, right across the wrist, nearly down to the bone, bleeding out like a suicide.
"Forget Klingons and Romulans," Bones grumbled as he waved the dermal regenerator over the tiny stitches he made on Jim's wrist, now clean of the blood that spilled out despite Uhura's white-knuckled grip over the wound. Sometimes he felt more like a mother than his best friend as he slapped Jim's other hand away from indulging in that little boy's morbid fascination to poke at cuts and scabs.
"All they need for you to do is to stand still on a big red X and a satellite will probably fall on you." Bones rubbed a thumb over the raised healing pink line and tried not to think about how warm Jim's hand felt cradled in his.
"You're your own menace," Bones added gruffly. He brushed a palm over the scar that he knew would soon fade to join the other fading scars Jim never told him about. Bones was always afraid to ask. He asked once during their second year in the Academy. Jim never answered but that night, Bones had held his head up over the toilet after Jim nearly drank himself to death.
Bones never asked again.
"I prefer to think of it as mission-prone," Jim quipped and the smirk he gave Bones was grating on his nerves. It was the same one he usually gives Bones before leaving the bar with someone else, showing up at his dorm in the worse hours, doing something absolutely reckless, stupid and careless. It was the grin of the abashed, sheepish, but downright secure in the fact he'll be forgiven of anything by Bones. And damn that bastard, he usually is.
Bones rolled his eyes and before Kirk could react, jabbed a hypospray under Kirk's left ear. He felt oddly vindicated when Jim started.
"Ouch!" Jim yelped. He nearly slid off the biobed until Bones settled a hand on his chest, halting his descent. "What was that for?"
For a lot of reasons, Bones thought but out loud, he said, "Mazentrocillin. Antibiotic because God only knows what disease or bacteria you picked up down there."
"Spock deemed it fine," Jim laughed. "It's a virtual Eden. You should have gone down there with me, Bones."
Bones growled, more to exorcise the image of him and possibly a naked Jim down on a deserted paradise out of his head. "Sure, Jim. Maybe tempt me with an apple while you're at it," Bones muttered as he studied the wrist and watched the pink line, a blush across Jim's wrist, slowly erase from skin to its final white stripe.
"Uh, you can stop holding my hand now, Bones," Jim said with a chuckle. "I'm a big boy."
Bones realized he's been stroking the hand and the scars Jim wouldn't tell him about with his knuckles, up and down like those antique paintbrushes. He dropped the hand as if it burned him. Bones opened his mouth to give back some snappy remark when Jim's hand abruptly reached out and grabbed his.
"Bones..." Jim whispered.
Bones closed his eyes and swallowed. Ah hell. "Jim, listen, whatever you think it is, I—" He dared to raise his head. Almost immediately, he swore when he saw the tinge of gray on Jim's lips, his blue eyes shrunken to pinpoints.
Jim couldn't breathe.
"Ah, dammit!" Bones hollered for Nurse Chapel as he ducked under Jim, catching him as the young man sagged forward, wheezing.
He shouldn't have been surprised Jim was also allergic to mazentrocillin. It was only the most common antibiotic Earth developed after the MRSA pandemic of 2179.