That's Why You Close Your Eyes: Chapter Nine, Part Two
They’d eaten first, at Leonard’s insistence, but their joint anxiety was palpable and contagious. Despite the late hour, Starfleet Medical was still bright and looming as they strode up the stairs and through security. Spock joined him in his lab, helping him meticulously prep and mark each slide, patiently enduring the mask Len forced on him as they readied the tests. Scouring the halls, Jim used his easy charm to chat up the staff, carefully identifying the name and rank of every person still on the floor.
And they waited.
Ten hours crept by. Jim slept, nodding off on a lab stool, his head slumped back against the wall. Leonard slept, too, much to his amazement, fitfully and restlessly on the couch. In his dreams, Spock disappeared down dark tunnels, choking and gasping on his own words.
“You should have left the two of us alone, Leonard. Look what your presence has brought.”
He tried to catch him but everything was black and clinging like burrs and Spock was vanishing right in front of him. He pushed and struggled but the cutting, burning sting became worse, dragging him down, pulling him away where he could give no aid, when hot hands suddenly grasped his face, warm and firm and healthy.
“Leonard, I am well.” The voice insisted as warm arms enveloped him and held him close. He relaxed into the hands, his eyes scanning the lab for any signs of slicing darkness but he saw only Jim, startled awake and staring at him with concern. “Sorry,” he mumbled sheepishly into Spock’s shoulder.
“Do not be. It is my understanding that human dreams often reflect their creator’s mental unrest, and you are certainly justified in some of that.”
He nodded groggily, sitting up straight on the little couch and glancing towards the test. “Where do we stand, here?”
Spock pulled him up carefully and strode over to the computer. “Forty-five point six minutes, to be exact, Doctor.” With a quirk of his brow, he nodded towards the door. “Might I suggest you go get some coffee?”
The minutes paced by, slow, infuriating, each one curling and drifting away like smoke. Forty, Thirty-seven, twenty-six, and the beat of each passing second became a prayer. Please, please, please, please, please let him be right. Ten minutes, five, please, please, two minutes…one…
Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep.
Len jumped. “Okay, that’s it. We need to examine the results by hand. Spock, grab that PADD. I need you to record each test.”
His hands trembled as he picked up the first slide and slid it onto the microscope stage. Gritting his teeth, he peered at the results.
“Leonard?” Spock’s voice broke through his haze. He sighed heavily.
“It’s negative, Spock. It’s close, I think, but definitely negative.”
“Okay, well, close is good,” Jim voiced from the desk. “Let’s keep going.”
He nodded, “Okay.” He quickly removed the slide and fitted the second one.
“Number Two?”
“Negative.”
“Number Three?”
“Negative.”
He felt his stomach clenching again, the jittery sense of hopeful anticipation taking on a tight and heavy feel. Please, he begged as he slid each slide in, please, please, please, as he discarded test after test.
“Number Seventeen?”
“Negative.”
“Number Eighteen?”
“Negative.”
“Number Nineteen? Leonard?”
“Wait a second.”
*
He’d have to re-test, he knew that, but they’d worry about that later. Pulling out the replicated test casings, he hermetically sealed the packages and the tri-corders that held the results. Jim was pacing. “I don’t like it. Why not just wait until we get back.”
“Jim, this is also a diversion,” he muttered as he placed another replication back on the microscope. “I want to keep the focus on me, not you, and if I’m calling the head of the program in for an emergency meeting, then it might draw all the attention. We still have no idea who’s behind this or what they’re capable of. You know, besides hacking in to top secret computer systems and destroying cures for pandemics. We have to get this to a secure location. C’mon, you know how this works,” he continued as he handed them the sealed packages. “Okay, this is the original. This one goes to Pike. I don’t want him to do anything but lock it in a safe environment. And this one,” he gestured to the package in Spock’s hands, “needs to be sent to the ambassador. He still isn’t showing any signs of illness and should be as immune as you. I want him to run a separate set of tests to corroborate our finding.” Looking up, he met their eyes. “Okay, any questions.”
Jim shook his head. “No, but you be damn careful. Don’t let anyone in here but Settle.”
Striding forward, he pulled the nervous kid into a hug, “Dammit, Jim,” he whispered, “I know how to handle this. I’ll be fine, but you need to get those results out of here. I want them secure as soon as possible.” Pressing a kiss to Jim’s cheek, he pulled back and met both their eyes. “Please.”
Jim gritted his teeth but nodded. “Fine.”
He hit send on his comm as he they entered the lift, his carefully worded message to Settle broadcasting over unsecured channels. Sinking down onto the couch, his eyes on the door, he waited.
His body felt depleted, run ragged by too many adrenaline rushes. He’d run an emotional gauntlet in the last twenty-four hours; fury, fear, misery, victory. They’d found it. He almost couldn’t believe it but they’d found it. A cure, a guarantee that he wouldn’t have to look into Spock’s face as the rest of his people died. He was almost electric with fury that someone had dared mess with his results, but even that couldn’t diminish his exhilaration. They’d found a cure and he wasn’t too stubborn to admit that Jim was the reason. Jim, with his unyielding faith.
His mind kept returning to the shower, to the curl of Jim’s hands around him and the earnest love in his eyes. Oh, fuck this. Fuck all this damn penance. The kid had believed in him when he’d needed it, had fought hard based on nothing but trust, and it was time he returned the favor. It was over, done, they were even. If Jim said he was sorry, well, that was good enough for him.
His air caught the faint hint of blips of a touchpad, the whir or the door, and he looked up to see Philip Settle standing in his doorway. The man’s face was a mishmash of complete joy and profound confusion as he stepped into the lab.
“Are you serious, Leonard?” he gasped, his voice tight and hopeful. “You’ve found it. Are you sure?”
Smiling, Len pushed to his feet. “Yeah, Phil, I’m sure.”
Settle closed his eyes, his head nodding gently. “Have you told anyone else,” he asked softly, his hands twisting uneasily. Len’s eyes took in his motions, his unease, and a sinking suspicion formed in his stomach. This wasn’t right. Sidestepping casually, he kept the desk between them as he threw out his bait. “Nope. I thought you deserved to be the first to know.”
Settle nodded, a flicker of relief skirting his features. “Show me,” he ordered evenly, pacing towards the lab table.
“It’s right there,” Len gestured toward the microscope. “Take a look.”
He kept his eyes fixed on Settle’s back as the older man strode forward and stared at the slide, his attention totally absorbed by the truth before him. Keeping his eyes up and steady, Len reached into his desk, fitting his hypo with a mild sedative and sliding it carefully up his sleeve. Settle’s reaction was weird, but by no means conclusive, and Len wouldn’t risk hurting him if he could help it. “You can see for yourself,” he said, as he strode carefully behind the distracted scientist. “The antibodies are already causing the reaction to recede. It won’t even be too hard…”
He froze. The familiar, cold pressure against his neck was quick and the result instantaneous as his legs buckled and he sprawled into waiting his arms. His body numbed and his vision swam but he fought the encroaching darkness long enough to make out the face hovering above his.
“You.”
“Honestly, McCoy, did you really expect someone else? Settle? Please.”
“But how? Why?”
The dark, black eyes peered at him curiously and he could feel invading hooks pressing into his mind. “You know the answers to both those questions, McCoy. Don’t play dumb, and stop trying to fight the drug. I need to get into your head. I’d prefer doing it without hurting you but I will if you make me.”
The edges of his mind were pressing in on him, pulling and sucking him down, but he fought and squirmed and swam desperately towards the light.
“Fuck you.”
“Oh, I hope so, Doctor, but that’ll have to wait until later. Now go to sleep.”
There was a hand on his head and an invader in his mind that seized him and pulled, down, down, down.
“No, no dammit, no!”
Down.
“Dammit, Jim, no, Spo…”
Part One