McCoy had never anticipated so much blood in his career. In medical school he'd marveled at the difference between contemporary medical technology and the medicine of two hundred, even one hundred years ago. He imagined he'd hardly see blood at all, what with the last fifty years' incredible leaps in the sealing and repair of blood vessels.
Then again, when he was in medical school he had not imagined that he'd end up on distant planets which were far behind Earth's cultural development, that he'd be treating people who were still subject to the ravages of cordite and steel.
Sometimes he was tempted to weep for these unfortunates, but he admonished himself for such thoughts: You'd have made a lousy doctor on Earth in the old days, if you had to stop and cry every time someone suffered.
It was bad for morale to walk through the corridors in a blood-spattered uniform, so McCoy disposed of his clothes, used the sickbay shower, and since he was going off-duty he replicated simple civilian clothes to walk back to his quarters in. He'd hoped this cleansing ritual would make him feel better, but no; ten minutes in the shower doesn't wash away sixteen straight hours of surgery.
To leave sickbay he had to pass through the room where they had treated that little Theta Seven boy. A spray of blood remained on the wall. Orderlies milled about, tidying up and sterilizing instruments.
"Somebody clean that blood off the wall!" McCoy barked. He was in his civvies, but he considered it his final order before he went off duty.
The human body is capable of reacting to stimuli so quickly, it can barely be measured by any instrument. Some reflexes border on pre-cognition. But reversing these chemical reflexes, returning the body to its normal state, takes a lot more time. McCoy could snap instantly into surgeon-mode, setting aside his sentimentality in order to treat the most gruesome of maladies. He would not get tired, he would not get hungry, he would feel no pain, he would feel nothing at all. All this, his mind could steel itself for in a second. But it came at the expense of his other cognitive abilities, and to leave this state took him hours. When he exited sickbay that day (night?) he did not know how he would get to his quarters, and once he was inside his quarters he did not know how he'd arrived there, but somehow his body had done it.
He stood in the middle of the room, understanding the state he was in and wondering how he would find his way out of it. Something to eat? No, not hungry. Sleep? No, not tired. Correspondence? No, he could not compose a letter when his thoughts were so dark. Maybe a trip to the gym, or one of the rec rooms? No, he wanted to stay here, sheltered away.
McCoy was out of ideas, so he just laid himself down in his bunk and ordered the lights off. He thought about Joanna, his sisters, Jocelyn, all the people he had ever loved, even if he did not love them anymore, and hoped that they were safe and well. He hoped they would never see a spray of blood on a wall.
Minutes, days, hours. Time does not mean anything in a dark room when you cannot fall asleep. He was not sure if he had heard the door chime, or if he was dreaming. When he heard it a second time, he realized he was not asleep, and was in fact certain now that he would never fall asleep again.
"Enter." He didn't know who had said that. He never said "Enter," he always said "Come in."
So Spock did not come in. He entered. The doorway, open for a brief moment, spread cold light over the room, but back in the alcove where McCoy's bed was, there was light enough only to transform the empty darkness into shapes of gray, not into actual objects.
McCoy had a little reading lamp behind his bed, and he switched it on. "Spock?"
Spock was also out of uniform. His traditional robes were simple but subtly rich; there was no script or insignia to indicate his social status or ancestry, but the stitching was fine and the fabric had a sumptuous nap.
"Doctor," Spock began.
"Oh, please don't remind me." McCoy curled up on his side, away from Spock, and pressed his face into the pillow.
"Leonard," Spock said instead. "Do you not desire my company? You did admit me into your quarters."
"I did, didn't I." McCoy decided to uncurl himself from the fetal position and act like an adult. "What's on your mind, Spock?"
He always said that. He never said "What do you want?" or "What's going on?" because Spock did not see the world in simple desires to be fulfilled, or banal events to chatter about. But he always, always had something on his mind.
Spock sat at the foot of the bed, folding his robes around his body and giving himself a thoughtful, dignified air. "I am preoccupied by the increasing intensity and certainty of our discussions lately, about…consummation." He reached out and gently gripped McCoy's ankle. This gesture was hardly referred to at all in Earth's erotic literature, but to hold onto a person's ankle, Spock had learned, was actually quite intimate. You wouldn't let just anybody touch you that way, particularly when your ankle was bare, as McCoy's was at the moment.
"Oh, Spock, please, we can't do it tonight. Why would you even ask, after what happened to the colony on Theta Seven?"
"A change has occurred in me, which I do not understand. After witnessing the deaths of many of the Thetan people, I was overcome by a desire for sexual contact with you."
"Yes, that sometimes happens to people. To humans," McCoy corrected himself. He sat up a little, and his eyes darted back and forth, as if retrieving data from someplace in his mind. "When we come face to face with death, we're reminded that our time here is limited, and we start to think about…the things that really make us feel alive."
Spock typically had two nods: one to indicate that he did not comprehend the logic of something but was willing to accept it, and another to indicate that he did indeed understand, and had just learned something valuable. This time, when he nodded, it was the latter variation.
"Sometimes I feel it too," McCoy said. "But not tonight, okay? I'm having an out-of-body experience right now."
Spock's hand slowly slid up McCoy's calf, under his trouser cuff, then back down, feeling the tight cord of his Achilles tendon. "Do you mean to say that I have interrupted a meditation ritual?"
"I mean I've dissociated. I have to do it when things get rough. Right now my senses are out of whack. I feel like…like I'm not really here."
With the sinewy smoothness of an alligator moving into the water, Spock slithered up next to McCoy in the narrow bunk. "Your body is currently present. I am off-duty, so I may stay with your body until you return to it. Then we will copulate."
McCoy tried to pull away, but there was little room to move now. "It doesn't work that way, Spock! It doesn't…" He trailed off, finding that it felt better to have Spock's warmth than it did to struggle against it. "I guess it couldn't hurt for you to stay. That is, if you're sure you don't have anything better to do with your off-duty hours."
Spock did not dignify that with an answer.
"Mmm, you're warm. I can feel that much, at least." McCoy's hands found their way clumsily through the folds of the robe, and he pressed his palms flat against Spock's bare skin, one on his side and one on his belly. His thumb reflexively stroked the little whorl of hair around Spock's navel. His mind wandered here and there, but then he would be reminded of where he was and who he was with, and he would hum a little sigh of satisfaction.
McCoy caressed the front panels of Spock's robe, and murmured, "Why don't you have any sigils on your robe, like other Vulcans do?"
Spock put his hand over McCoy's. "It is my choice, until I determine how much honor I can bring to my House. I am well-known on Vulcan, but not entirely for my deeds."
"Well, you've saved the galaxy a few times, haven't you?"
"But I am no closer to understanding it, or being one with it. Until I distinguish myself in Vulcan ways, I fear that when I die, and my body is returned to my home world, it will be placed in a tomb with the inscription, Khinik Ulef-Kosh-ves."
There was a long silence, and McCoy continued to stroke the smooth fabric. "Do you really want to?" he asked finally. "Because I think maybe I could, if you think it's the right time."
Spock pulled McCoy more tightly to him. "Ah, hello, Leonard. It is agreeable that you have returned to your body."
McCoy smiled self-consciously and craned his neck to get a good look at Spock. In the low light, the Vulcan's eyes were inscrutable and seductive. McCoy inhaled deeply, as if his senses were returning all at once through the act of respiratory intake. His ribcage expanded and strained against Spock's grip. "Yes, I want it," he whispered. "Let's do it now."
He reached out to take Spock into his arms, but Spock resisted, placed a hand on McCoy's shoulder to push him back down on the bed. "I will return shortly," Spock said as he rose. He took three steps over to the replicator, pushing a few buttons, and the door slid open.
"I asked the computer to replicate a substance made specifically for this purpose." He showed McCoy a bottle which, considering the circumstances, most likely contained a lubricant.
"The computer already had that in its databanks?"
"We are on a five-year mission into deep space with a mixed-gender crew of four hundred and twenty-three. The computer must know everything."
The oil was viscous, and in the low light appeared to be colorless. Spock opened the bottle and held it under his nose. He nodded in approval, then held it out for McCoy to smell. McCoy seemed to understand why it was important that he agree with it: for both of them, from now until forever, this scent would be associated with sex.
McCoy did not know much about scents, but he knew what he liked. The oil smelled dark and spicy, more like something pulled from the earth than something plucked from a tree. He nodded his approval and smiled, tilting his hips just slightly. This pleased Spock. It meant McCoy was already making the association.
Spock set the oil on the shelf behind the bed. He had not planned to use it right away. He wanted McCoy to get used to it being there, and the idea of what it was for. Spock could feel McCoy's ambivalence. Oh, it was slight, but it was there, and growing, and Spock understood.
McCoy often desired aural comfort of some sort, and so as Spock slid McCoy's shirt up and pushed it over his head, he muttered, low and deep, in Vulcan. He had taken up this habit lately. Sometimes he wanted McCoy to know something, something that was not meant to be spoken aloud, something so private it ought only to be expressed when two minds were joined. Since McCoy was averse to this, Spock instead would say it in his native tongue. McCoy would not understand it, but he could at least be comforted by the caress of Spock's voice.
But tonight, he asked, "What are you saying to me?" His voice was soft, and a little higher than usual.
Spock took McCoy's hands in each of his own and invited him to remove the voluminous Vulcan robes. "If you would allow me to meld with you, you would understand everything I have to tell."
The dark, rich fabric rustled under McCoy's fingers. "I don't know. I don't think I can." Seeing Spock unclothed seemed to confirm this, judging by his expression. "It's already almost too intense for me," he breathed.
"I believe you are underestimating your body's capacity for pleasure."
Hearing this, McCoy groaned involuntarily. But melding remained a sore topic. It was too soon, he still believed. He changed the subject. "Why did you choose me?" he asked.
"You are fascinating to me."
"So is everything. Come on, there must be something specific you can name." He looked down at himself with some resignation. "I realize I don't have the most attractive body…"
"No," Spock said, "it was not your body that first attracted me to you."
McCoy hugged his knees to his chest. "Really? Not even a little bit?"
"I think that I could live my entire life with you close at hand, and still not learn everything there is to know about you."
McCoy stopped fidgeting. "Do you intend to try?"
Spock grabbed one of McCoy's ankles in each hand, forcing him to unfold his body. "Not only will I try, but in doing so I will utilize a variety of methods." And he took up the oil again. "Do you have a preferred position?"
McCoy mumbled, "It's been so long, I'm not sure I remember any." They both sat there, looking at each other. Both were too aware of their own awkward, indecisive selves to really get excited about each other.
"Why do they call it 'the missionary position?'" Spock asked suddenly.
McCoy laughed in spite of himself. "That never came up in your Earth research? I thought everyone knew. When the Christian missionaries went to the heathen lands to spread the gospel, they often took a shine to the native girls. They surprised the natives by initiating face-to-face intercourse. The natives preferred rear-entry, you see. So face-to-face was called 'missionary style.' Alright, now ask me a tough one."
"Will you lie on your back and let me kneel between your legs?"
It took a second for McCoy to smile, but then he said, "I told you to ask me a tough one." And he moved to comply, but slowly, scooting down, spreading first one leg, then the other. It was tougher than he cared to admit.
Spock matched McCoy's languid pace, as he too rearranged himself. When McCoy spread his legs, Spock tilted forward and touched his knees to McCoy's, nudging his thighs just an inch farther apart. His ability to move at McCoy's exact speed made them appear as one creature, twisting and curling around itself.
Considering the bottle for a moment, Spock decided to leave it on the shelf for the time being. Instead, he touched McCoy with his dry, warm hands, massaging the flexed thigh muscles, swooping up and under to caress his buttocks, which remained taut with nervousness. He squeezed, feeling the hard muscles underneath the thin, soft layer of fat.
"You will relax now," Spock said, "or else I will be unable to complete this task."
"Hell of a way to get a man to relax," McCoy said. His voice was still too high, but it retained a grainy sweetness, like crystallized syrup.
With two fingers, Spock gently moved in to probe McCoy's perineum. He had
hoped this would prove pleasurable, but instead he had to pause, in order
to once more pry apart McCoy's thighs, which were now clamped together around
Spock's hips. As Spock gripped each knee, a primal panic shot straight up
the McCoy's spinal cord, and he cried out, "Wait! Wait. Kiss me."
He tilted his head invitingly.
"Don't you know how to kiss? Come on, warm me up a little."
Now it was Spock's turn to become tense. He was not averse to kissing. Only, Vulcans were not wired to experience the same pleasure from the act that humans were. For their race, kissing was like asking a human to lock elbows: not unpleasant, but more or less pointless. He had received kisses from McCoy, all over his body, and enjoyed the tactile and psychoactive effects, but this human was now clearly asking to be kissed on the mouth, and that was different. But Spock was unable to refuse him anything. He lowered himself and set himself to the task of kissing McCoy.
At first, the kisses elicited a few whimpers, but ultimately it was no good. Spock had technique, but no passion. He could not empathize with the human desire for this conjunction of mucous membranes. Trying to be tactful, McCoy put a hand on Spock's chest and whispered, "Okay. Go ahead."
Spock leaned back and examined the unmasked, vulnerable human face. The widening of the eyes, the opening of the mouth. Oh yes, the pink, open mouth. McCoy was a very receptive being. Spock would further explore that premise now. He took the bottle and tipped it, so the oil trickled over his fingers. It was warm, and quickly got warmer as it absorbed Spock's body heat. He placed his fingers where they had been, on McCoy's perineum, then pushed down into the crevice. But when Spock pressed against the little dent, McCoy flinched, evading him. He said nothing, so Spock waited for him to settle down, then tried again. A second time, McCoy seized and pulled away.
"I'm sorry," McCoy said. "I can't help it."
"Do you want this to happen?"
"Yes…?"
"I do not believe you. Say that you want it. Say out loud exactly what you want. And if you lie, I will know it."
"I can't say it." McCoy turned his face away and held his fist to his slightly open mouth. But he did not want to make Spock upset, so he said it before he could be prompted again. "I want you to be inside me."
"Very well." Spock placed his free hand on McCoy's hip and pinned him while he pushed his first finger inside. McCoy cried out, and a trickle of saltwater escaped from the corner of his eye.
Even without a meld, Spock had become exquisitely sensitive to McCoy's emotional reactions, and he felt this tear as if it had come from his own eye. Do not cry, he thought, but said nothing.
Inside McCoy's body, a large vein throbbed against Spock's finger. The human pulse was so slow and powerful, for a moment Spock was lulled by it. He pushed in further, to follow the path of the vein, and encountered something else. McCoy's voice pitched higher still. Ah. Spock had read about this. A reproductive gland which boasted a significant bundle of nerve endings. The human body hid things in strange places.
McCoy's reaction was difficult to decipher. Spock read many thoughts and emotions rippling through his body. "You are alarmed?" he asked. Surely the doctor was familiar with this gland.
"No one's ever touched me there before." McCoy knew how silly this must have sounded. Since he'd been with Spock, a lot of things had been happening to him that had never happened before.
At first, Spock tried massaging the gland, but McCoy soon screamed at him to stop; that was too intense. Instead, Spock applied rhythmic pressure, so McCoy had time, in between pushes, to process this deep pleasure in his guts.
Spock understood that he was preparing his lover, and he understood what it was that he was preparing his lover for, but nowhere in the literature had it specified how long this stage should last. He waited for McCoy to ask to move on to the next stage, but that did not happen. However, he saw now that McCoy's penis was becoming erect. Soon, as Spock continued the metrical stimulation of his prostate, McCoy began to touch himself, boldly, as if he were all by himself in the room. Spock interpreted this as an indication that this stage had run its course.
He removed the finger slowly, as he saw no reason to be hurried about things now. He had to take both hands off McCoy, so that he could use the oil to prepare himself, and in those few moments Spock missed a sudden fluctuation in McCoy's state of mind.
When McCoy saw Spock leaning in, his oiled, erect cock in hand, panic set in. He wasn't ready. He was still sore from the finger. His sphincter muscles squeezed involuntarily, and he swore he could feel the finger there still, with the strange, sharp mix of pleasure and pain that it had caused.
But it was too late. Spock's slippery erection was pushing on that muscle as it squeezed. And when it released for half a second, Spock managed to get inside. McCoy thought that he must have been out of his mind to say what he'd said a minute ago. It was so painful, he was nearly beyond thought. He grasped at the idea that if he could just relax, it would hurt less. He tried, he even managed to bear down a little, but then Spock slid further in and it was even more excruciating. He wanted to be brave, he knew it would pay off if he could tough it out, but such thoughts were fleeting, pushed from his mind by the pain.
Spock was having no easy time of it, either. He was touching McCoy, and could feel the agony radiating from him. Even if Spock hadn't had the physical awareness to feel the tension in every muscle in McCoy's body, his sixth sense was bombarded by the terrible, confused scramble of the doctor's brain waves. Everywhere he touched McCoy's skin, he took some of that pain with him. Finally, he removed himself and lay alongside McCoy, who continued to gasp and whine for a few seconds more.
"I'm so embarrassed," McCoy whispered, and Spock had to take him at his word. He had not felt the embarrassment, only the physical sensation of pain.
"Maybe," McCoy said, "maybe if I had a drink. Or two."
He started to sit up, but Spock grabbed him fiercely by the arm and forced him back onto the mattress. "I have yet to encounter a problem to which intoxication is the solution," he said. He leaned toward McCoy, his fingers sliding up the doctor's throat, and suggested, "If you would let me…"
McCoy swatted the hand away. "No. You have your line that you draw, and I have mine." He sighed. "This was a bad idea. You should go, and we oughta forget this thing ever happened."
"Ten minutes ago you desired the completion of this act," Spock said curtly. "And nothing of any significance has changed between then and now."
"I'll tell you what's significant, you -" McCoy was certain, when he began the sentence, that he would have a racial epithet all ready to go, but when the time came to utter it, he found himself at a loss. The Vulcan, damn him, was right. The pain had not changed the way he felt about Spock, or the way he wanted to express that feeling.
"We will make another attempt," Spock said. "Medical texts and historical record make it clear that this activity is not only possible, but pleasurable to both parties so long as they are willing."
McCoy was hurt by this clinical attitude. "This isn't supposed to be something out of a medical text!" he snapped.
Spock could sense that distance again, growing between the two of them, but he would not be discouraged. He would just have to practice a discipline taught to him years ago by his piano instructor: "playing it by ear." He rolled onto his back, so that he and McCoy both were now gazing at the ceiling. This change of position was a physical cue on his part, to indicate that the topic of discussion was also shifting somewhat. "It is to our advantage," he said, "that we live in this time and this place. For many centuries on Earth, a man who took a wife was obligated the following morning to display the sheet that had been spread under his virgin bride, to prove that he had completed the act and had no predecessor. How would you and I prove that we had fulfilled our connubial obligation?"
As a doctor, McCoy could recognize this technique from a parsec away: distraction. But that didn't mean he would resist it. "I would have hoped," he said, "that at least one of us could prove it by leaving this cabin with an irrepressible smile of satisfaction."
Spock had understood that this situation might call for drastic measures. And now, he felt the time had come to take one. He had a recollection of feeling only the faintest traces of this particular emotion, but he had seen it displayed on enough human faces that he felt qualified to imitate the corresponding expression: a smug grin.
When McCoy saw Spock do this, he burst out laughing. Spock's grin was so incongruous, so ridiculous, and so endearing, that McCoy momentarily forgot his misery.
"That is what you were hoping for?" Spock asked, after his expression returned to that of no expression at all.
"Spock," McCoy said, between howls of laughter, "I could never have even imagined what you just did."
When McCoy's laughter faded to a fond smile, Spock said, "We have made only one attempt and employed only one technique. Would you give up so easily in any other situation?"
McCoy's smile disappeared entirely. "No," he admitted.
Spock turned McCoy onto his left side, and spooned him. McCoy understood what was happening, and was immediately tense again. But he did not resist. With his free hand Spock lifted McCoy's thigh back and over his own. From where he was, he could not reach the bottle of oil, so he asked McCoy to open it and hand it over. He applied the oil liberally, but did not attempt to penetrate McCoy. Rather, he pressed himself against McCoy's buttocks, the length of him fitted along the cleft. Spock knew that human behavior was quite vulnerable to alpha-conditioning, and so he took McCoy's hand and guided it, encouraging the doctor to pleasure himself. While McCoy did this, Spock slid his erection slowly back and forth, and he could feel those stubborn muscles squeezing shut, determined for the time being not to permit him entrance. He continued to rub.
The excessive lubrication made everything slippery, and it gave McCoy a slippery feeling under his ribcage. It made his balls tighten, to feel it, and arousal finally overcame the fear. Spock was still in no hurry, willing to wait as long as he must to sense McCoy's comfort. And indeed, as McCoy continued to pleasure himself Spock detected a change: that crucial ring of tight muscle was no longer contracting so sporadically, to reflect the doctor's fear, but rather now rhythmically, to reflect his excitement.
Spock tilted his hips, so that he could aim properly for the entrance to McCoy's body. He predicted that if he could just penetrate deeply enough to stimulate the prostate, the doctor would be entirely won over.
"Accept me," Spock whispered in the doctor's ear, provoking a shiver. "Accept me into your body."
McCoy groaned and he admitted nearly Spock's entire length on the first stroke. He began to struggle, but the garbled, alarmed signal that Spock had received before was more subdued now, and contained a scattering of pleasure. He deduced the location of the important gland, and thrust against it as best he could. McCoy began to wail, which Spock interpreted as positive, because when he had been in his greatest pain, McCoy had been almost silent.
It was not long before the pattern of muscle contractions changed again, this time to point-eight second intervals, too fast to be voluntary. McCoy was having an orgasm. Spock opened his eyes to watch over the doctor's shoulder as he ejaculated.
For a moment, Spock understood why humans did not feel the need for a bond, why they were satisfied with the mere physical experience. To see McCoy so vulnerable, to see the last little tremble which ran through him before he stilled, a splash of pearly fluid on the bedspread before him, made Spock feel very emotionally close to him, indeed.
He did not comprehend why, for it served no practical purpose, but now Spock had a specific and overwhelming urge to put his seed into the doctor. The desire was self-fulfilling, as imagining this act taking place caused him to execute it, quite suddenly.
McCoy was having the same thought he always did after orgasm: if he just held very still, his circulation would stop entirely, and all the nice chemicals would settle where they were in his body, and he would feel good forever. But he was still thinking. He was thinking about the things that made a person feel truly alive. He was only now realizing how patient Spock had been with him tonight. Maybe he hadn't always come off as being the most trusting of Spock, but the trust he'd given had never been betrayed. There was a warm glow about him, which remained even as the chemicals ebbed away. He suddenly felt very cared for, very protected by Spock. And that was better than the sex had been.
Spock was still inside McCoy, but he was soft, and an involuntary contraction of muscles was all it took to push him out. But he was not ready to be finished with touching his lover. He continued to hold McCoy tightly, feeling the twitches of muscles as the human descended into sleep.
He, too, was considering what made him feel truly alive. This was something he had pondered many times before, but now he felt that his conclusions could only have been erroneous, for he'd been sorely lacking in data until quite recently. These days, information was coming at him almost faster than he could process it.
Which was certainly a new phenomenon.