The Edge

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Part IV

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Spock looked like he was sizing up that statement, or perhaps as McCoy would say, computing it, but Jim did not move to clarify. He had been plain, he saw no reason to explain further.

"Jim," Spock said after a good minute of silence, and Jim almost jumped at his own name, "this is my decision."

Jim wanted to get in his face again, but some part of him was still aware that that was unwise. "Bullshit," he spat instead. "This affects us both. You've been making all the decisions until now, it seems; I think I can make one."

"Jim-"

"No," Jim said, "no... no. You don't just do this to people, okay? You don't just get someone all used to you, and then go all, 'oh, hey, by the by'. No." Spock watched him, wide-eyed, but Jim felt little sympathy for him anymore. "I don't know how to be just me anymore. Do you know what that's like? For someone like me? I spent my whole life avoiding this place." He gestured back and forth between them. "And now I remember why!"

"Please stop shouting."

It was the way Jim had often said it to McCoy after a night of drinking back at the Academy, and it did deflate him. Yelling was probably not the best idea right now, when Spock was already worried that he would attack him... to whichever result. Jim sighed and made himself breathe.

"I want you any way I can get you," he said. "If that means only as a first officer and friend, then... okay."

Spock stood there a moment and then slowly and cleanly lowered himself to the bed, hands between his knees. "Jim, I... considered undergoing the Kolinahr."

Jim went to answer and then realized he had none. He had no idea what that meant. Was that what the ambassador had said he had returned to Vulcan for when his Time had come? Jim knew it had been something with a K. Was Spock conceding that he had at least thought about marriage? "Is that a wedding?" he asked, and he had meant it when he had, but now it was out of his mouth, no, that sounded wrong.

"No," Spock said. Had he been anyone else, Jim thought he would have been receiving a mirthless laugh right about now. "It is the Vulcan discipline which purges all emotion."

Jim had not even known such a thing existed and really, he thought, he should not have been surprised. "Okay..." was all he knew to say.

"I considered it even more after I met you; for my anger, then my grief, and then for... and then when you returned my sentiments, so that we would never face this situation."

Jim took that in. "So there's a way to get through it alone."

"None that I could come back from any more than I could from a marriage to another, and nor would there be sufficient time for it now. But in any event... I could not force myself."

"... I don't get it." It was nice to hear, but what did it have to do with anything?

"If I had believed living without you an option... I would have done it long ago."

Jim knew he should not be approaching him again, but he was a tactile person by nature, and words were rarely how he comforted. Spock's eyes were downcast, but as soon as he perceived Jim's nearness, he looked up, giving the impression of drawing back even though he had no where to move to.

"And what the hell," Jim said, cupping Spock's neck, thumbs brushing the curves of his jaw, "makes you think that doesn't go both ways?" Spock's eyes slipped closed, both relishing and resisting the touch. "You wouldn't be living without me this way."

"Jim," Spock whispered.

Jim watched him, moving a hand up to press a thumb to Spock's bottom lip, rapt. "You don't look like you're about to kill me."

Spock's eyes snapped open, and Jim almost thought it was surprise he saw in them. "I am not," he said. "The fever will not come upon me for days yet. I reject you for fear of my inability to resist bonding with you."

That was interesting to know, something Jim could actually exploit if he saw fit. He could make Spock let him help; it was nice to feel some measure of control over the situation again. Spock was lucky Jim would not do that to him, had surely known he would not or he would not have told him that. And even if he did, and then somehow survived the fever when it came, that would always be between them.

Jim swallowed, eyes on his roaming fingers. Spock must have been feeling it like kisses pressed to his face. "I want that," he admitted, like Spock did not know that, and maybe he didn't. "So there's option number one. Though considering I'm not risking you dying, I guess I can understand you not risking me either. So that leaves option number two -- finding you another mate. I'm not granting you leave otherwise. And you can try to hide out, but I'll lock you in here and seduce you 'til you snap." He jerked his head back toward the door. "I got access."

Spock stared at Jim's midsection, level with his eyes, and Jim petted at the back of his head, combing his fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck. "... Make love," he said, reaching for Jim's waist and settling his hands there, "Bond... with someone who is not you."

Jim stepped closer, between his legs, without thinking. "That's right," he said.

"And never-" Spock licked his lips, gaze still falling toward the bottom of Jim's chest, "never make love with you again."

It was the obvious result, and yet, Jim had not considered it that way. This did not just apply to after Spock was bonded to someone else; if he feared bonding with Jim, it applied now as well. The last time they had had sex was the last time they ever would.

Jim could not even remember when it had been.

He stepped away from Spock, suddenly claustrophobic, and Spock's hands dropped from his waist. He wanted to punch Spock, hurt him, to cling to him and never let go. He could not move with it. He shuffled backward again.

"I'm going to call your father," he said. "You should be meditating anyway, and I'll make sure it gets done. I'll tell him our ETA and he can find you a mate." He glanced at Spock, because he could not stare at him. "Right?"

Spock's hands settled on his knees. "He can."

Jim nodded. "Okay, then."

He turned and hot-footed it to the bathroom door and to the other side of it, leaving Spock locked in his quarters, but then he was not likely to be leaving them anyway and Jim could not stay in there suddenly. He moved through the bathroom, past the shower, avoiding his face in the mirror where he would normally seek it out, and back through to his own cabin, sealing the door behind him.

He stood just inside, eyes bouncing over the room, chest heaving. His breathing kept speeding up and he swiped his hand at his mouth, bending to place both on his knees. He was still for a moment, focusing only on his lungs, the rise and fall of his shoulders.

"God," He straightened, "damn it!" And he grabbed the nearest object -- an unopened bottle of Starfleet issue shampoo -- and threw it, hard. It sailed across the room and into the book shelf just above his bed, knocking several old tomes down, bouncing on the mattress and thunking on the deck.

It was no where near enough. He tugged the blankets and clothing from the wall shelves, kicked his desk and swiped at the contents of it, and when a data PADD clattered onto his foot, he snatched it without a thought and hurled it as he had the shampoo. It smashed the screen of the desk's comm unit with an explosive shatter and the noise was ridiculously satisfying.

Gasping for breath, he clutched at the corner of his desk and sank to the floor.

---

McCoy was, expectedly, busy when Jim arrived. He glanced up from the nasty-looking burn he was studying (Ensign Harris -- Engineering; Jim made a point of remembering them all), dermal regenerator in hand, then back down again. "Well, look who it is," he snorted, bending the young girl's knee carefully. "Never thought I'd see th-" He looked up again, and his eyes caught this time, smirk fading. "... You look like shit," he observed eloquently.

Jim did not respond to that, offering a terse smile for the ensign that he hoped his friend would not miss.

"You feelin' all right?" McCoy asked, still paused over her leg.

"I'm fine," Jim said. "I came to use your office. If that's okay."

He received a suspicious look for that, and the doctor looked ready to ask him why, but wisely backed off at a shake of Jim's head. McCoy blinked. "Uh, yeah. Sure. Anything in your way, just push it aside. There's no method to my madness."

Jim nodded without a hint of amusement and moved back through the biobeds to the door to the office, letting himself inside and shooting a brief look at the cluttered desk before settling himself behind it.

He banged at the side of the comm unit. "Bridge," he said. "Navigation."

"Yis... Keptin?"

Chekov had clearly been expecting Doctor McCoy. Jim was not about to explain. "ETA to the colony, Mister Chekov."

"Therty-six hours, fifty-three mwinutes, sir."

Less than two days. Jim did not linger on the thought. "Good. Pass me to Lieutenant Uhura, please."

"Yes, sir?"

"Get me a channel with Ambassador Sarek again," Jim instructed. "Direct with him, this time. I don't care where he is." He reached up to rub at his forehead.

"... Yes, sir. One moment."

"Patch it here to Sickbay when you have it, please."

"Yes, sir."

Jim waited. He could not bring himself to be nervous, this time. How mundane this all seemed now. Hell, when he really thought about it, what did it matter now if Sarek didn't like him? If he ever did?

He would get to pick someone he liked.

---

It did not take long, all in all. Vulcans, Jim had found, were surprisingly economical with their words. Spock used to be that way, before Jim had gotten him to open up more, or maybe it was just that he was half-Human and Sarek was not. Either way, he had rather taken the news in stride, especially considering that the way Spock told it, this pon farr business had come early. Sarek had agreed to have someone ready by the time they arrived; apparently, as Jim himself had postulated, this situation was not uncommon in the past year or so.

Sarek had paused before cutting the transmission, observing Jim's appearance again. He had said nothing else, but Jim could have sworn he had nodded at him.

Maybe Spock had told him about them. Maybe Sarek felt sympathy. Who knew. It hardly mattered.

When McCoy came in, Jim was still seated at his desk, staring at the wall.

He paused just inside the door and leaned back against the wall. "Don't you have work to do?" he ventured, definitely not serious.

The hand that had been holding Jim's chin fell to his lap, elbows placed on the armrests. "Tons," he said. There were plenty of reports waiting on the desk... or the floor in his cabin. They would no doubt be all the more time-consuming with Spock in no fit state to give them the once-over before Jim submitted them. At least they would keep him occupied later.

"So why are you in my office?" Not annoyed, but a real question in there.

"Because my desk's comm center is broken."

McCoy glanced off to the side, thinking about that. "What happened to it?"

Jim shrugged one shoulder. "Unfortunate encounter with a PADD."

McCoy, to his credit, took that in stride. He had surely seen worse during Academy days, Jim was sure. The doctor knew there was no one Jim could hit on board -- something had to give. "Did you talk to the ambassador yet?"

It took Jim a moment, encounter with Sarek still fresh in his mind, to realize that McCoy meant the elder Spock. To remember that McCoy knew nothing outside of the seriousness of Spock's condition. "Yeah," he said. "I got done with him a while ago; I've been with Spock."

"What'd they say?"

Jim opened his mouth with the intent to answer, really, but what came out was a laugh, bubbling up before he realized. Another one followed it until it was uncontrollable and just shy of hysterical.

McCoy watched him, expression growing ever more wary. He was probably trying to pinpoint where he had left the nearest sedative. Jim was in no mood to be hypo'd.

"Well," he said, laughter dying down, "you're not gonna believe this one, Bones. Turns out Mister Spock needs to get laid."

McCoy's expression was priceless, a mixture of revulsion and bemusement; he never liked to hear details of Jim's relationship with Spock, understandably enough. "Aren't you, uh..." Jim would have loved this, any other time, "I mean, if memory serves, you're no slouch in that department."

Jim scoffed. "It's some... mating drive."

The corner of McCoy's mouth curled up in a funny little grin. "No... seriously?"

"Seriously. And here's the hilarious part." Jim leaned forward, over the desk. "Vulcans get really violent during this, and both of him are pretty sure he would kill me if I took care of it, so we're on our way to the colony -- still -- to find him another mate."

McCoy's smile faded. "Another mate."

"Yeah. He's gonna marry her -- Sarek's setting it all up -- so we're completely over. Then he'll come back here totally fine and start working again."

McCoy stared. "Over?"

"S'what I said, yeah." Jim spun in the chair. "Where's the bourbon I'm not supposed to know you keep in here?"

"Screw the bourbon." McCoy stepped forward and shoved Jim's chair over, tugging open the bottom drawer on the left side of the desk. He emerged with a curved rose-colored bottle and two shot glasses.

"Why Bones, you do care."

"Anyone asks you, this is Scotty's," McCoy told him, popping out the cork.

"And he keeps it in your desk."

"That's right."

"Sneaky of him."

"Yeah, well," McCoy handed him a filled glass, "he's a sneaky bastard."

Jim gave a noncommittal mmph, downing the shot in one gulp with what he thought was going to look like practiced ease, but fuck, it burned, and he could not help the cough that escaped him. McCoy smacked at his back as he drank his own.

"Bracing, ain't it?"

Jim just clanked the glass back onto the desk, ready for more, and McCoy arched a reluctant eyebrow at him. "Don't give me that look. I'm not on duty 'til the morning. Detox me after, for all I care."

His friend's lips pressed together in some watered down form of exasperation, but he obediently poured another shot into Jim's glass. "Just be careful," he cautioned. "It'll go right to your head before you even realize it."

Jim swallowed the drink, glaring at the glass. "Good," he said, swiping a thumb over it.

---

McCoy did not, in fact, detox him, but he did help Jim to flop onto the couch in his office after he had had his fill of Romulan Ale. Jim did not want to try to sleep with a clear head and McCoy had conceded that since no one could get a hold of Jim in his quarters anyway, that here was as good a place as any.

He sighed and tucked a throw blanket around Jim's shoulders. He snatched the small trashcan from under his desk. "I'm putting this here in case," he told Jim. "You do anything, it can just go down the chute in the morning."

Jim shouldered himself down into the cushions. "Yur good fren."

"Yeah, yeah." McCoy patted at his head and then hesitated, fingers hovering. "... I'm sorry, Jim."

"S'okay," Jim murmured to his square pillow, eyes slipping closed. "Too good to last..."

After a moment, there was another scratch at his head, and then the sound of McCoy leaving. The lights fell to zero percent.

Jim dreamed then, things he would not remember come morning, of playing hide-and-seek with Spock, through a cornfield back in Iowa. He never found him.

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