Day 49: Early Afternoon - Main Street

[hes_deadjim]

Other than catch a glimpse of a few book spines and the first floor, McCoy hadn't gotten the chance check out the store fully. He'd still managed to uncover a few interesting things before he left. It wasn't exactly the answer, or even close to it, about how to get out of here, or what they had planned for them, or even who these people really were

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[doneinthree]

"I am, actually." Kirk leaned out to look up at the sky, then ruffled one hand through his drenched hair, doing little to dry it. Yet for the simple pleasure of being outdoors instead of trapped inside brick walls, he looked delighted. True, this field trip held only the illusion of freedom, but the choice to refuse to stay out of the rain was still a choice. His choice, in defiance of the daytime staff and their deceptive concern. If James T. Kirk excelled at only one thing, it was rebellion. "There weren't as many buildings to check out in the southwest, so I had plenty of time to explore the whole area. I know, I'm awesome."

Kirk managed to pull enough of his attention away from himself to look Bones over, and while the smile on his lips didn't vanish, it did appear a touch less self-satisfied. Having fallen into a puddle himself earlier today, he'd pretty given up on ever having his jeans feel dry again, but the raincoat and rubber boots they'd given him had served him well so far. The clothes he wore now, while probably warm enough, didn't seem all that suited to extensive time spent in the rain.

Had they still been at the Academy, Kirk admittedly wouldn't have cared so much - there were far worse things in life than getting wet - but today wasn't simply another weekend where he could blissfully drag Bones away from studying. "What about you?" he asked. "Where are you headed now?"

[hes_deadjim]

He didn't see why Jim looked so thrilled at being outside and rained on.

McCoy frowned at him. He still hadn't put that hood back up. That scarf could use some adjusting too, it could cover more of his neck. At the way he was going, Kirk was setting up a perfectly fine breeding ground for a cold. He might as well invite the thing in. And if it came down to it, it'd be up to McCoy to see the captain through it, something he'd prefer to avoid. Prevention was key, just as awareness and knowledge was, and he didn't like having patients landing in sickbay when they could just as easily avoided the visit if they'd been more careful.

Jim was a bad enough patient when he was perfectly healthy. He was even worse when he was actually sick. He either got fussy or insisted that he wasn't sick, as if willpower could make his body recover whenever he felt like it, and that he was perfectly fit for duty.

"You mind putting that hood up?" McCoy finally asked. "And I'd say you just had the luck of the draw on your side. You'd still be looking if you'd gotten a different quadrant."

The sector he'd been assigned looked more like a commercial zone, probably some residential areas spread around, but it looked populated enough. McCoy stuffed his hands in his pockets, trying not to shiver too much. This wasn't the coldest planet or conditions he'd been through, but it still wasn't too comfortable either. The rain would clear the streets, make it easier to cover more ground, but McCoy found himself wishing for just a glimpse of sun.

"Still covering the rest of my area." He wished he had more to report, more so since he was trying to make up for earlier, for being distracted like that, especially when it'd never happened to him before. Things hadn't turned out the way he'd expected.

The doctor shifted his weight, more to jog some feeling back to his toes and regretted it. The soaked pants grazed against cold shins uncomfortably. McCoy suppressed a grumble as he went on. "I only managed to investigate the bookstore. I ran into the doctor they assigned me there. He had a few interesting things to say about the facility."

[doneinthree]

Kirk didn't roll his eyes at Bones' fussing, being as he was extremely used to this even before his friend had became his CMO, but his expression might've suggested that he was thinking about it. Nonetheless, Kirk flipped his hood back on without even a comment about how Bones was being a killjoy, because he was the captain now, and therefore totally mature.

Admittedly, luck did deserve some credit for the amount of ground he'd been able to cover since their meeting their morning. The only two buildings of note in his quadrant had been the spa and the furniture store, neither of which had appeared to contain anything too out-of-place for the era Doyleton was imitating. A bookstore would contain considerably more sources worth investigating, but evidently what Bones had discovered wasn't found between paper sheets.

"Your doctor?" Kirk's posture straightened at that, instantly shifting from absurdly boyish to something more resembling the man McCoy knew. "What did he say? Wait," he interrupted himself, eyes narrowing as he caught sight of one of a white poncho moving in their direction. "Hold that thought."

With practiced casualness, he reached out for Bones, hand landing on his arm and turning him in the direction of where Kirk had come from. "Come on." Not even bothering to wait for a sign of acknowledgment, Kirk headed back eastward down Main Street at his usual brisk pace, fully expecting the doctor to follow.

Despite his enjoyment of the rain, he wasn't particularly against going indoors, but the nurse would most likely force them to take shelter in the bookstore and they didn't need to check it out twice. No, he had a better destination in mind, which didn't lay in either of their assigned quadrants, but rather in Chekov's. Yet he had a feeling the two of them would have better luck learning things from the bar regulars than a seventeen-year-old ensign, no matter how well-trained by Starfleet.

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