Fan Fiction: Drowned Rats (Kirk/Spock version)

Drowned Rats (Kirk/Spock)

Aconitum Napellus

2015

(Rated: 18)

This is a non-profit work of fan fiction. No monies are being made. This story is based on and uses elements from Star Trek, which is trademarked by Paramount Pictures and CBS. I do not claim ownership of Star Trek or any associated characters or the universe of Star Trek. All other elements are my own.

 ‘Spock, you look like a drowned rat!’

The eyebrow that Spock raised was more cat than rat. Jim knew that Spock disliked rain. If he had not been worried about insulting him he would have gone as far as to say he hated it. Spock definitely disliked rain, especially cold rain, especially cold, wind-blown rain, especially rain that turned the ground into mud and plastered hair to the head and stuck clothes to the skin. Yes, Spock was a cat.

‘Captain, I fail to see how insulting me will help at this juncture,’ Spock said in a tone that Jim would definitely characterise as nettled. Despite his concern, he had succeeded in insulting the Vulcan anyway.

‘Mr Spock, I was merely expressing concern at your – ah – your current physical state,’ Jim told him in a conciliatory tone. ‘It’s just an Earth idiom, that’s all.’

‘Very often Earth idioms are insulting in nature,’ Spock pointed out.

Jim was struck by the urge to raise his hand and wipe away some of the water streaming down the Vulcan’s fringe and into his eyes, but he resisted. It wouldn’t do much good anyway, because the rain was coming down so quickly it would be replaced within seconds.

‘I promise you, next time I’ll check the met reports more carefully and make sure we beam down with the proper gear,’ Jim said with a sheepish smile. ‘I just didn’t anticipate that cold front turning into – ’

Spock’s raised eyebrow made him tail off. He knew there was no way he could placate Spock over this disastrous mission. They were already lost, they were already stuck on the planet due to a failure of the transporters that Scotty was apparently stumped over, they were woefully badly equipped, and Spock was soaked to the skin. Jim was soaked to the skin too, but that wasn’t concerning him so much. No matter how he, Jim, made light of the situation, Spock simply wasn’t built for such dank, cold conditions.

‘Look, Spock, we’ll find somewhere to shelter,’ he promised. ‘There are plenty of empty houses in this area.’

‘You mean – break in?’ Spock asked, raising a soaked eyebrow again.

Kirk shrugged. ‘Well, it’s not breaking in entirely. This sector has been abandoned for months since the radiation scare.’

‘The houses are still owned by Federation citizens,’ Spock pointed out.

‘Yes, and what Federation citizen wouldn’t extend hospitality to a couple of drowned rats on a night like this?’ Jim asked brightly.

Spock opened his mouth to reply. There were vast numbers of Federation citizens who would not welcome the presence of Starfleet officers in their home. Many human colony planets expressed resentment towards the interference of the Federation and Starfleet in their lives, and some had gone as far as to raise arms against them. The citizens on this very planet had been highly resentful at the order to evacuate while the planet passed through a period of intense solar radiation since they realised, quite rightly, that the evacuation could turn out to be permanent if the system’s sun was shown to be dangerously unstable. That was why Spock and the captain and a number of scientific survey teams were here on the surface in the first place, investigating the effects on the planet after the radiation had waned away.

‘Well, at any rate the radiation levels are acceptable here,’ Jim said in an off-hand way, before Spock could voice his views on the unrest of Federation citizens.

Spock glanced down at his tricorder, wiped water off the screen, failed to decipher the readings through the blobs of water that were left, and looked up again.

‘They are acceptable,’ he nodded. ‘However, I find the problems of the Enterprise disquieting. The suggestion is that the radiation is severely affecting the ship’s functions, even if it is failing to penetrate the planet’s atmosphere.’

‘Yes,’ Jim said, rubbing his thumb over his chin. ‘Yes, it is.’

He looked up at Spock again. The Vulcan was trying to look as dignified as he could with rain constantly running down his face. It was catching in his eyelashes and making him blink. His trousers were splashed with mud to the knees. If the weather had treated them equally, Spock’s boots would be soaked inside just as Jim’s were. As he looked at the Vulcan, Spock suppressed a shiver.

‘No, this is ridiculous, Spock,’ Jim told him. ‘We’re finding shelter, regardless of the morals of breaking in to someone’s house. I’m all for the sanctity of a man’s home, but I’m damned if I’ll let you die of pneumonia because of principles where there are houses left right and centre.’

This time Spock did not protest. Perhaps he had crossed some kind of threshold in the last few minutes. The sun was moving down towards the horizon behind its thick blanket of clouds and it was perceptibly colder. They were relatively near the tropic, although here that was only a definition of latitude, not an indication of a pleasant climate. When the sun went down it would do so rapidly, and they would be left floundering about for a place to shelter in utter darkness.

‘There,’ Jim said, pointing at an edifice that rose up beyond the trees a few hundred yards away. ‘That’s closest. It’ll do. We’ll shelter overnight and hope that conditions are better in the morning. You said this latest solar flare should subside in the next fifteen hours, didn’t you?’

‘Fifteen point seven three five hours, approximately,’ Spock corrected him.

‘How can you be approximate to three decimal places?’ Jim asked him, slightly irritated.

‘One can be approximate to any number of decimal places,’ Spock told him smoothly. ‘I don’t guarantee that the event will occur at that exact moment.’

Kirk harrumphed, and set out resolutely towards that distant building.

((o))

The place was nothing less than a mansion, built on mock Gothic standards, harking back to the late nineteenth century in Earth’s western hemisphere. The inhabitants must surely have missed Earth to recreate such a perfect example of antique architecture here. The flora and fauna were vastly different to Europe, but they had made up for that in every faced block of limestone, in every crenellation and carved mullion, even down to the artfully sculpted pineapples that topped the gateposts, which harked back to an era when the first pineapples had been introduced to Great Britain. A fascinating time to live, Kirk thought, although the mixture of eras in the architecture did make for a rather jumbled building.

‘You think this will suit us for the night, Spock?’ Jim asked playfully as they approached the high wooden door.’

‘It will provide shelter at least,’ Spock said. The water had got inside his tricorder screen now and misted it up from the inside, and he was not happy.

‘Come on now, my little cat,’ Jim grinned. ‘I’ll have you drying out in front of a log fire in no time. Did you see the chimneys on this place? They must have traditional fires.’

‘I am forced to agree,’ Spock said, not quibbling Jim’s appellation of cat. It was certainly better than rat.

The captain used his phaser to force the door. As soon as they were inside, out of the rain and away from the unlikely chance of any prying eyes, he reached up to brush the water from Spock’s forehead, and kissed him lightly.

Spock returned the kiss with more vigour than Jim had expected, putting his hands against Jim’s back and spending a long, languorous time engaged in the most illogical of actions. Then he sneezed.

‘No, come on, you need to get dry,’ Jim said. He could feel Spock’s shoulders shivering under his hands. He felt freezing. He turned in a circle, looking about at the various doors that led off the wide hall. ‘There must be a room with a fireplace down here.’

Spock looked about too. There was a decent amount of light coming in through the windows either side of the front door, but the light was slowly going. Jim could see the Vulcan mentally pulling up an image in his head. He was probably comparing the visual of the outside of the house with the inside. Then he nodded towards a door on the left and said, ‘I would try that one.’

Jim walked over to open the door, noticing as he did that he had left a trail of mud and water across the parquet floor.

‘I think you’re right, Spock,’ he said, opening the door further to reveal a well-appointed sitting room with a wide stone fireplace at one side. ‘And look, they even have wood stacked ready to use.’

‘The evacuation occurred during the coldest season,’ Spock said conversationally.

He came into the room himself and looked about, before pressing his palm to a panel by the door. Lights came on. The room was primarily lit by a high chandelier that hung glittering from the ceiling. The room seemed to have been divested of very few possessions, perhaps what could be packed quickly during the emergency of the evacuation. It still held all of its furniture and a good deal of decorative items.

‘There must still be power supplied here,’ Spock said. ‘Perhaps there is also powered heating. It will be more efficient than this – ’ He gestured at the fireplace, apparently unable to put his thoughts about the primitive heating system into words.

‘Perhaps there is,’ Jim said with a grin, going over to the fire. ‘But still, there’s something about an open log fire, Spock.’

‘Yes. There are sparks and smoke and draughts,’ Spock said.

Jim frowned at him. ‘Mr Spock, where is your sense of romance?’

‘Perhaps it is somewhere above the rain clouds, Jim,’ Spock told him.

Jim sighed. ‘Mr Spock, I am going to look around the house and see how we’re situated. I expect that fire to be burning merrily by the time I get back. I don’t care whether you use your phaser or rub two sticks together. I want fire.’

Jim strode out of the room, leaving Spock behind.

((o))

Spock stood before the fireplace, considering the most logical arrangement of wood to create the most heat. Fire building for warmth was not a skill often required on Vulcan. Lighting a flame for meditation was one thing, but 40 Eridani provided quite enough heat for the average person. Even during the cold desert nights heat had usually been stored enough during the day for a slow release in the evening.

He settled on a pattern and began to arrange the logs. The wood was unfamiliar to him, undoubtedly cut from native trees nearby, but it looked dry and not too dense, a promising fuel. Lighting it was another matter. There were implements by the fire that looked as if they might be fire lighting tools, but he settled on using his phaser to heat the whole pile until it spontaneously burst into flame. That was far more efficient than lighting one piece and waiting for the rest to catch.

The heat was instantaneous, and despite himself Spock relaxed. Water began to steam from his uniform tunic, and he stripped it off and looked about for somewhere to hang it. There was a kind of folding metal screen leant against the wall by the fire, so he unfolded that and used it as an impromptu clothes horse. Since his top was drying so quickly and the wet clothing was deeply unpleasant against his skin, he quickly stripped the rest of his clothing off and hung that up to dry too. He set his boots upturned on the hearth. A small trickle of water ran from each one.

Now that his feet were bare he noticed that the rug on which he stood was made of some kind of thickly-furred animal skin. He had assumed it was synthetic, but the tactile sensations were unmistakable. The idea of killing and skinning an animal in order to tread its pelt underfoot was deeply unpleasant to him, but on the other hand the sensation was definitely pleasant. Perhaps the animal had died a natural death and its pelt had been put to logical use?

He sat down on the rug so as to stay as close to the heat of the fire as possible. He was damp all over and his hair was still downright wet. The sensation of the fur against his naked thighs and buttocks really was pleasant. There was something comforting in it, like being held by one’s mother as a child. Spock closed his eyes and allowed himself to experience the sensation of dampness steaming off every inch of his skin.

((o))

Jim came back into the room clutching an armful of clothes, but he was arrested by the sight that met his eyes. Eyes closed, Spock was sitting in something approaching the lotus position in front of the fire, his back to the flames, his head tilted backwards slightly to angle his damp hair towards the heat. His arms rested loosely on his thighs. Entirely naked, his skin was bronzed by the ever-changing light of the flames.

‘Dear god,’ Jim said.

Spock’s eyes opened. A slight smile touched his lips and mischief sparkled in his eyes. Jim had almost dropped the clothing he carried.

‘Well, I thought we could get changed, but – ’ Jim began.

‘I didn’t expect there to be clothing left behind,’ Spock said. ‘And I thought it better to dry myself thoroughly.’

‘Well – yes,’ Jim said, still slightly flabbergasted. ‘Yes, much better. Much...’

Spock straightened his back a little more and stretched out his arms lightly, as if he had grown stiff.

‘Would you care to join me, Jim? It is most pleasant.’

‘I – Yes,’ Jim said quickly.

His clothes proved annoyingly resistant to being removed. They clung wetly to his skin and he almost ripped his tunic in the attempt to drag it off over his head.

‘Damn, this is good,’ he said when he was naked at last and the heat of the fire was washing over his skin.

Spock lay down on the fur rug, and after a moment Jim joined him. He lay like that against Spock’s side for a long time, until he felt himself becoming perilously sleepy.

‘Do you know, we’re probably the only humans for a thousand miles in all directions,’ he murmured drowsily.

‘You are the only human,’ Spock corrected him.

‘Yes, of course, I’m sorry, my Vulcan friend,’ he smiled lazily. He stroked his hand lightly across the down on Spock’s chest. ‘I am the only human. You are the only half human, half cat.’

He could almost feel Spock’s eyebrow rise.

‘I assure you, any genetic connection I have to the genus felis is contained entirely in my human ancestry,’ Spock said.

Kirk laughed quietly. Spock turned over on his side, just as lazily as Jim was feeling, and leant his head against his lover’s chest. Jim began to murmur;

‘Viens, mon beau chat, sur mon coeur amoureux;

‘Retiens les griffes de ta patte,

‘Et laisse-moi plonger dans tes beaux yeux,

‘Mêlés de métal et d'agate.’

He felt Spock’s momentary pause as much through his mind as through his body. Touching like this, their link was all the stronger.

‘Well, your accent leaves something to be desired,’ Spock began, and Jim swatted at him.

‘Spock, you have all the romance of a bulldozer. Do you have any appreciation for – ’

‘Charles Baudelaire, 1821 to 1867, a resident of Paris, France, Old Earth,’ Spock cut across him smoothly. ‘I have read his poems both in original and translation.’

‘Let me try it another way, and maybe my accent won’t interfere,’ Jim said, brushing his fingers through Spock’s now drying hair. The water had left something of a wave in it, which was quite appealing.

‘Come, my fine cat, against my loving heart;

‘Sheathe your sharp claws, and settle.

‘And let my eyes into your pupils dart

‘Where agate sparks with metal.’

Jim stopped, and Spock stirred against him. The fire crackled. ‘That is not the all of it,’ Spock said.

‘No, Spock, no, I was getting to the rest,’ Jim murmured. ‘I was just allowing myself a moment to consider your eyes. But I’ll have to change the gender. You may be a cat but you’re not a female one.’ He cleared his throat and continued, rather more self-consciously this time.

‘Now while my fingertips caress at leisure

‘Your head and wiry curves,’ he continued, his fingertips tracing down Spock’s flank to his naked hip,

‘And that my hand’s elated with the pleasure

‘Of your electric nerves,

‘I think about my Vulcan – how his glances

‘Like yours, dear beast, deep-down

‘And cold, can cut and wound one as with lances;

‘Then, too, he has that vagrant

‘And subtle air of danger that makes fragrant

‘His body, lithe and brown.’

There was silence. Spock appeared to be considering this music-less serenade in his deep and ponderous Vulcan way.

‘Do my glances cut and wound one as with lances?’ he asked finally.

‘My dear Vulcan cat,’ Jim said, smiling, his fingers still toying about Spock’s hip. ‘I think there will always be moments in a Vulcan-human relationship where Vulcan emotional control can cut, but I know – believe me I know – all about the fire underneath.’

Spock seemed satisfied. Jim’s fingers strayed further down from his hip, passing into the wiry hair about his penis, pleased as the action caused Spock to shiver in an entirely different way.

‘Actually, hold that thought,’ Jim whispered into his ear. ‘I’ll be back in just a moment.’

There had been a bathroom up on the first floor where he had found the clothes. He scooted upstairs, ignoring the cold that closed around him outside of the fire-lit sitting room. The rest of this house had not been heated in months. He ran into the bathroom, cold making his skin pimple all over, and looked quickly through the cabinet in there. There he found what he was looking for, and jogged back downstairs.

‘There, all done,’ he said, coming back to Spock’s side and setting the small bottle of massage oil in front of the fire where it might warm a bit.

Spock shivered as Jim’s cold skin touched his warm, but the cold seemed to spur him into action. He sat up and leant over Jim to kiss him, the warmth of his fire-heated body sinking into Jim’s surface cold. Jim’s mouth fell open to Spock’s probing tongue and he tasted the alien-spiced interior of the Vulcan’s mouth. No matter how many times they kissed he always loved that exotic taste.

Spock’s hands were moving over his body, hard and hot against his human-cool skin, brushing over the erect nubs of his nipples, down his smooth chest and into the fur of hair between his legs. He reached out for Spock with his own hand, finding him already part erect. He took hold of that heavy organ and moved his hand firmly against it, and Spock growled and kissed him with renewed force.

‘Whose turn is it this time?’ Jim murmured, but Spock was apparently beyond speaking. The Vulcan pushed Jim firmly down onto the fur rug and turned his attention to the human’s own slowly engorging penis, sinking his mouth down over it without preamble. Jim arched and gasped at the hot touch, feeling himself stiffen further, thrusting against the enveloping mouth and throat. Spock’s hand caressed his scrotum, his fingertips running over the cool ridged skin, and then moved lower down to pulse at the thickness beneath his perineum where the root of his penis was buried.

‘Oh – oh my god, oh my god, Spock,’ he gasped, hardly able to contain himself.

His hands were on Spock’s head, his fingertips in his hair. He could feel Spock’s arousal and delight through the touch as he continued to suck and pummel.

‘No,’ Jim murmured. This setting was so perfect. He wanted to be inside Spock, to be over him. ‘No, this time I want to – ’

With some difficulty he tried to pull Spock away. The Vulcan didn’t want to stop. In the end Jim became masterful, taking hold of his head with both hands and pulling it back. His erection ached with need and he turned Spock roughly onto the rug so he was lying on his back. Spock’s own member was huge, yearning, fluid glistening at the tip, and Jim rubbed his hand on it again so that Spock moaned aloud. Then he took the small bottle of oil and tipped some into his hand. He slicked it down over his own needful organ and then pushed at Spock’s legs with his knee. They fell apart with no resistance, and he slicked more oil into the puckered hole that was revealed.

He positioned himself to push into Spock’s tightness, leaning down over the Vulcan, kissing his parted lips and then pushing forward until he sank into the hot receptivity of Spock’s body. Dear god, it was like coming home. His entire body thrilled with the feeling, a sensation that was concentrated to an almost unbearable peak in his belly and groin. He thrust again and again and Spock moaned aloud, his own pleasure exploding like fireworks in a mind sensation that Jim could feel clearly through their link. Jim’s belly rubbed against Spock’s hardness each time he thrust, and he could feel the Vulcan building to a peak even as he reached his own.

Then an astonishing control built inside Spock’s mind. He could feel the Vulcan digging deep into his mental resources, putting down a kind of cordon around that part of his body even as he allowed the rest of himself to be delightedly responsive to Jim’s penetrations. He was holding himself, forcing himself not to come.

As the pressure built all thought of Spock’s own pleasure was forgotten. All he wanted was to withdraw and sink home again and again as the fire built to a crescendo, until he was jerking in completion and Spock was crying out his name in a soft, desperate sound.

He had little time to lie still in the blissful silence that followed, because Spock was urgently grasping at his shoulders, turning him over so that he was on his hands and knees, and he felt the warm slick oil trickling down his skin, channelled by his personal geography. Then Spock was over him, the hardness of his unsatiated erection pressing against Jim’s ass, and Spock was kissing his shoulders and back and sides in a way that made him think of cherry blossom spontaneously appearing on a tree.

And then Spock entered him, hard and fast and desperate in his own urgency. For a moment there was a tight pain, and then nothing but pleasure as Spock drove into him harder and faster. He called out the Vulcan’s name, called on god, called on hell, but Spock was silent except for wordless sounds of pleasure. When he came the sensation of it exploded through Jim’s mind too, and for a moment everything was blanked out and he was floating higher than the sky.

He came back to himself still kneeling on the rug with Spock over him, their bodies pressed together with a thin slick of sweat between them. His heart was thumping and his mind still felt disconnected and elevated with endorphins. In the silence the fire crackled and the colour of the flames leapt against his closed eyelids.

‘Oh my god, Spock,’ he murmured.

Spock gently put his hands on him, turned him around so that that both knelt facing each other on the rug, and kissed him. He melted into the heat. Spock’s head nestled onto his shoulder, and he put his arms about the Vulcan’s back, stroking his dry skin softly as if he really were that loving cat.

After some time, perhaps a long time, they pulled apart. The fire was growing low and cold was starting to push back into the room.

‘I don’t even know what time it is,’ Jim murmured.

‘Ship time or local time?’ Spock asked, and Jim realised how meaningless time had become.

‘You put some wood on that fire, Spock,’ he said. ‘I’m going to go and see if I can find something to – well – to clean up. I think we – ahem – mussed their rug a bit.’

‘Must you go?’ Spock asked in a very human way.

Jim kissed the tip of one pointed ear. ‘I must, my dear cat.’

((o))

When he returned Spock had piled logs onto the fire again and the heat was pressing through the room. He had noticed through the windows that the night was fully on them now, thick and dark with the blanket of cloud to block out even the stars. This planet had a moon, but it was small and would have given out little light even if it had been visible.

‘Here, I found a vacuum,’ Jim said as he came through the door, using the generic term for what was actually a particle disintegrater and would clean up what they had left on the rug so well that no one would detect it without forensic skills.

Spock was no long in front of the fire. Jim looked about, startled at first, and then saw him sitting at a baby grand piano near one of the high curtain-covered windows. His fingers were arched, hovering just above the keys. Spock looked up to meet his lover’s eyes and then began to play. Jim knelt on the rug and began to carefully clean up the mess, while music spread into the room. Spock was still naked, but above the piano he could just see the top of his chest, his collarbones fine and sharp, his face intent with concentration.

‘Do you have any idea how hot that is?’ Jim asked.

Spock raised an eyebrow. His playing did not falter.

‘You asked me to put wood on the fire, Jim,’ he said.

‘Not the fire – you, sitting there playing like that, naked as the day you were born.’

A slight smile touched Spock’s lips. ‘T’hy’la,’ he said tolerantly, ‘Were you not satisfied with our recent exercise?’

Kirk pursed his lips. ‘You know, I may be a human male, but I don’t always mean I want more sex. I can appreciate you in more aesthetic ways.’

Spock nodded, the smile still on his lips.

‘You know, their food stasis unit is still working,’ Jim said. ‘And I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.’

‘We have already broken into their home and stolen their firewood,’ Spock pointed out in a slightly disapproving tone.

‘Oh, Spock, Starfleet can replace anything we’ve used,’ Jim waved away his concerns.

Spock arched an eyebrow and continued to play. Jim took that as acceptance, so he left the room again and returned a few minutes later with a platter of food, vegetarian for Spock, but with a few pieces of Earth-style cured meats for himself.

‘Come on, Spock,’ he said, patting the rug before the fire. ‘Come break bread with me.’

Due to the excellence of the stasis storage the food was as fresh as it had been when it entered the house. Jim had also found a bottle of wine, of which Spock consented to drink a little. When they had finished he cleared away the things and they put more wood on the fire and then lay down together on the rug, flesh to flesh. They had been there for a long time now and the warmth and sex and food and wine were conspiring to make Jim sleepy. He nuzzled his face against the Vulcan’s back. With a far greater tolerance of heat than the human, Spock’s body was acting as a shield from the direct heat of the flames. The fire had brought a light green flush to his skin.

((o))

He did not notice himself slipping into sleep, but he must have, because the next awareness he had was of being pressed up naked against Spock’s warmth, with a pallid light coming through the curtains. The fire had died down to ashes and Spock was fast asleep. Jim lay there for a while just looking at the Vulcan’s face. His hair was still rippled by the rain of the night before. His eyelashes lay dark and long along his closed eyelids. His lips were very slightly parted and his breath came softly between them. His body was so relaxed that he looked like a cat in a sunbeam. Unwittingly Jim felt himself begin to harden. The little bottle of oil was still there on the hearth. How perfect it would be to have him here again, loose and lank on this fur rug.

Carefully and quietly so as not to wake the Vulcan he slipped away from him and went to put more wood on the fire. He noticed the automatic lighter control at the side, and smiled. Spock had told him he had used his phaser last night. He touched the control and instantly the wood burst into flame.

‘Ah, my perfect Vulcan,’ he murmured, kneeling down beside him again and kissing the tip of his ear.

Spock stirred a little, and his eyes blinked open. For an unguarded moment there was nothing of Vulcan control at all in his face as he gazed into his lover’s eyes.

‘You said you don’t always want more sex, t’hy’la,’ Spock murmured, ‘but there is little else in your mind at this moment.’

Jim chuckled, and reached out for the bottle of oil. They made love languorously and gently in front of the fire, with none of the bestial urgency of last night. Then, spent, they lay together on the rug again and let the heat wash over them.

‘I suppose I should try to contact the ship,’ Jim said eventually. ‘They must be worrying...’

Spock grunted in a non-committal way, most uncharacteristically unconcerned about duty. He was still warm and relaxed from making love and could not imagine moving.

Jim glanced at his communicator, which lay by the side of the hearth. He tried to remember if he had had a dream where that thing had been beeping insistently. It had been half a possibility.

‘Oh, hang it,’ he murmured, spooning close against the Vulcan again and wrapping his arm about his body. ‘The ship’s fine. It’s just a communications blackout. It’s not like I can do anything from here.’

‘I think I dreamt the sound of the communicator just prior to waking up,’ Spock said musingly.

Jim smiled. ‘Isn’t that funny, Spock? I did too. I suppose that shows how in tune we are, each feeling the other’s dreams.’

‘Perhaps,’ Spock murmured, but a slight frown furrowed his forehead.

A very familiar noise began to build in the air, very quiet at first, but growing. Jim’s arm clenched over Spock’s body for a moment. There wasn’t time to move. He closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable.

It came.

‘Jim, Spock, what in blue blazes do you think you – ’

It could be no one other than Dr McCoy. His medical tricorder was already warbling. The doctor’s voice stuttered off. So far, Jim and Spock had confided in no one about their relationship. They were, to public eyes, just very close friends.

‘The scanners showed an elevated – ’ McCoy stuttered. ‘I mean – And Spock was – Goddammit to hell, Jim, I’m a doctor, not a blasted mind reader.’

The silence stretched out. Spock did not move. Jim did not dare turn around. After all, all of his modesty, what little there was left, was protected by the shield of Spock’s body, and he really, really did not want to meet the doctor’s eyes right now.

The seconds dragged on. Finally McCoy flipped open his communicator.

‘McCoy to Enterprise. Yeah, Scotty, they’re both just fine. They’ll be – ahem – I’m sure they’ll be beaming up in a little while. Meanwhile, get me the hell out of here. Please.’

Jim closed his eyes as the sound of the transporter built again. Spock was very, very still.

‘Well,’ Jim said after a long silence. ‘I guess the cat’s really out of the bag now.’

Spock did not reply, but after a moment he made a sound very close to a purr.