Blood Ties - part 6b/6
Blood Ties, part 6b
2255, Riverside Shipyard
The kid’s eyes sweep Leonard’s face as he babbles and rants, looking away almost shyly when Leonard fixes him with a scowl.
His face is fucked up, he’s practically buzzing with contained energy, and Leonard knows from the moment he first catches sight of Kirk that he’s going to have trouble shaking him off - not that he necessarily wants to.
Leonard hands Kirk his flask and part of him hopes the kid’ll keep it; since this might give Leonard an excuse to look him up later. In fact, he’s already constructing a story in his head - how the flask’s got sentimental value - sorry to bother you, Kirk, but it used to belong to my father.
He finds his gaze lingering a little too long on the fight-bruised plush lips and the tongue sweeping across them. He shoots a side-long look at his flask, and Kirk’s bruised knuckles - Kirk’s quite the little punk it seems, and Leonard feels an instant tightening in his groin. But what’s with the antique looking ring? It hardly fits with the whole rough-rider vibe.
Then, dammit, Kirk hands the flask back; it serves Leonard right for lying even if, at this stage, he was only planning to lie; he didn’t want to admit that the flask is all he has left to represent a promising medical career, a parting gift from Piedmont, and not something important.
Despite his rant, despite appearing not to hold off on the details of his life, Leonard won’t tell Kirk how everything’s shot to shit because of his drinking, because of the acrimony with Joss, because he let this happen to his life, how he caved over custody for Joanna, how he sobbed when the papers came; how stupid he was to give everything to his patients, his career, how it was all his fault, not Jocelyn’s.
But then, if he told Jim all this, he’d come off as a crazy man, right?
“Quit staring at me, kid,” he says mildly, tucking the flask into his inside pocket.
The kid scrutinizes Leonard from under thick eyebrows which make him look too damn serious and old. And then he winks, damned winks at Leonard, which makes him equal parts mad and amused.
Two emotional reactions to one person, well isn’t that a pleasant surprise? “What’s your story, kid?” he drawls. “I’ve told you mine.”
“Yeah, you have at that!” Kirk laughs, and slouches in his seat. His teeth are brilliant white.
Leonard tries to quash the desire to check Jim’s safety harness is correctly adjusted because yeah, Starfleet may have spent years investing every last credit into its new trophy wife Starship, casting its glowing shadow over the new recruits as they filed - or in Leonard’s case, crawled - into this shuttle, but Starfleet sure as hell isn’t going to spend on the little things; and this kid, while he’s all sass and attitude, looks like he could do with someone to look out for him.
Then he mentally slaps himself upside the head because making friends isn’t precisely why Leonard’s here in this shit-bucket, about to be fucking miles above beautiful, solid ground. Which reminds him...fuck...They’re about to take off, and Leonard feels panic rising in him again. He grips the arm rests, presses his back into the seat and grits his teeth.
Kirk taps Leonard’s hand with a pale finger and leans close; there’s something in the kid’s cologne which reminds him of the overpowering aroma of lilies at his daddy’s funeral; it makes his throat almost raw.
He’s glad that if they’re going to die in a ball of flame, he’s next to Kirk; they’re the only two on the shuttle that aren’t in reds, in a uniform of their own, one that says ‘losers’, ‘runaways’; they might look like chalk and fucking cheese but somehow, somewhere they’re cut from the same cloth.
They’ll have to work this out over a drink or something; Leonard just gets this feeling they aren’t gonna be ships in the night. Like they should be friends. It’s weird, this sense of...he searches for the right word...recognition.
Kirk looks him in the eye all knowing, and it’s like he’s read Leonard’s mind the way he half nods. Damn, doesn’t the kid need to blink? Kirk’s pupils are pretty dilated and it crosses Leonard’s mind that maybe he’s some fucked-up drug user as well as a delinquent. Another knot of worry forms among the layers of fear he’s already dealing with.
Then, unaccountably, Leonard relaxes and sinks down into his seat a little; he feels his eyes closing, and the rumble of the shuttle becomes muffled as if a blanket’s been wrapped around his head, though he can hear Kirk’s voice clearly enough, soaking through him like rain-water into parched soil.
“You’ll be fine, Bones, I gotcha, just sleep, go on, I’ll make sure everything’s okay…”
+++
A mere two hours after they’ve landed, Kirk’s become ‘Jim’, and he’s become ‘Bones’.
Leonard finds he’s having to fight tooth and nail to hang onto his trademark scowl, since they haven’t stopped with the banter since they checked in and were assigned their rooms. The kid’s like a ray of fucking sunshine which is weird because Leonard doesn’t connect. He doesn’t make friends. He doesn’t need friends for the love of all that’s holy but, here they are, comfortable and easy, like they’ve known each other for years not hours.
They’re sitting in a bar knocking back mineral water and espresso: much as they want to christen their first day with shots, there’s a silent agreement that somehow they’ve both turned over a new leaf and they’d better start how they mean to go on. Clean.
“Sorry I fell asleep, kid,” Leonard says, drawing invisible little circles on the side of the glass.
“Don’t worry about it,” Jim says with a small smile.
Something has been niggling at the back of his mind since they met. Leonard, who doesn’t tend to be tactile, has been fighting the urge to lean into his new friend since they landed.
He sneaks a look at the kid’s face in the mirror opposite; the image is a little blurred and he puts this down to the fact that he’s hung over, or most likely that the glass needs a wipe like everything else in this dive.
He doesn’t say anything about it, but he wonders at the fucking paleness of the kid, his elegance and this fucking charisma radiating off of him even while he’s sitting here, dressed in jeans and a leather jacket; it has the bartender serving them first every time, and Leonard watches in amusement how Jim’s hit on by half a dozen men and women within the first half hour.
His eyes rest on the fine veins on Jim’s wrist, the tissue-fine translucent skin, and something suddenly occurs to him. He shakes his head - can’t be - he’s not met a vampire in years, and even then the poor bastard was in a cell somewhere, waiting out his time until he was sent off to the vamp colony on Re Kots. Still, there’s no reason why a vampire shouldn’t join Starfleet anymore than any other sentient being.
“You didn’t have anything to do with that, did ya, me falling asleep on the shuttle, when minutes before I was just concentrating on not hurling all over your boots? And mine,” he adds with an eye-roll. Because if Jim is a vampire, he would be taking suppressants to stop compelling folk - it’s the goddamn reason most leave the planet: they don’t like to. At all.
“Why? You saying I bored you to sleep, Bones?”
Leonard likes his new name; it’s fitting after all now he’s got a new life.
“Yeah, there’s that.” He fights another smile and he feels his neck color when he realizes he hasn’t felt this comfortable around another human being outside of a professional context, in years. “There’s something you’re not telling me, kid. I have my theories,” he says with a raised eyebrow. “I think you made me go to sleep. It was good, it stopped me freakin’ out, but... you made it happen. And you didn’t ask my permission to get into my mind, but seein’ as how I made it through, I’ll let it slide this once.”
Jim’s staring at the shiny bar surface and when Leonard glances down, there’s barely a reflection there.
“That’s your theory, that I’m some master hypnotist?” Jim’s voice is tight, evasive.
“Maybe, but there’s more-”
“Hit me, Bones, tell me what you think.” And Jim swivels his bar stool round to rest his hands on Leonard’s upper arms, gazing intently into his eyes.
Leonard’s mouth falls open and he can feel the thoughts struggling to the forefront, “Alright...only, it doesn’t add up - we flew here in the daylight, you were out there, in the sunlight...if you’re a...” He blinks. Dammit. He can’t for the life of him remember what he was going to say. “I...I should go check into my dorm…”
“My thoughts exactly,” Jim says, and he looks sad for a moment like he’s…but shit, Leonard can’t finish that thought either.
+++
When Leonard wakes in the morning, he’s slept twelve hours straight, and - fucking great - he’s going to be late for orientation if he doesn’t hit the shower this second.
He stares at his clean-shaven face in the mirror and applies moisturizer, checks his nose hair because if anything Joss has done, it’s trained him well, and as he turns away from the mirror something in it catches his eye. He thinks he sees a face, a subliminal image, a flicker, a flash of blue like sunlit seawater. Of course there’s nothing there.
Shit. He’s really been overdoing the drink. Despite how he’s pressed for time, it seems important he go get his flask. He worriedly checks the chrono; it’s okay, he’s got fifteen minutes yet; he removes the stopper with shaky hands and almost gags at the residual scent of bourbon in there. And that’s the good stuff.
As he rinses out the flask, he wonders where this new found, damned useful, revulsion comes from. He closes his eyes, tries to remember something, then tosses the flask onto the towel he dropped on the bathroom floor. He thanks the powers that be that he doesn’t have to have a roommate in his senior position, then removes the cover off his new uniform.
While he dresses, he considers how fresh he feels; it doesn’t make sense; he’s not as young as he was and he ought to be hung over. Also, he thinks as struggles into his boots, shouldn’t he be suffering from exhaustion? From the emotional trauma of the flight at least? Damn, he’s not had time to adjust to the change in time zones even - Atlanta to Riverside, now here - all in two weeks.
But, despite all this there’s a spring in his step when he walks into the orientation room; the smell of ‘education’ is like goddamn nectar, he feels all... hopeful... though one of the cadets nearby, idiot, is wearing some very strong cologne - it reminds him of lilies.
+++
Other than fleeting glimpses and nods across the campus, he doesn’t see Jim Kirk for several weeks. No surprise - they’re both damned busy. Jim’s leap-frogging command track in three years, and Leonard’s got his own classes, plus compulsory hours at the infirmary as well as a research project to pitch for.
Sometimes he thinks he sees Jim; a blink and he realizes it’s a shadow cast by a bird, or reflected light in his mirror. The goosebumps he gets at random times in the day when he thinks someone’s watching him, well, he’ll put that down to getting used to doing without the booze. Either that, or he’s going mad.
Sleep, though, that’s a problem. He’s plagued by dreams and wakes up in a sweat, clawing at his throat; he can’t make head or tail of it. It’s a return to normal, he guesses, with the one night of good sleep an aberration.
Then one day, Jim Kirk lands in his lap again. Well not literally, although he’s starting to think that would be kind of nice.
“Bones!” he says, grinning like fucking sunshine, like they just finished up talking five minutes ago. “I need your help!”
“You got dick rot? Sure, I can help you with that.” Leonard doesn’t look up from his soup but rests the spoon on the side plate and fiddles with his napkin. Jim can’t just swan in here and act like they’re best buddies when they’re not. He feels his neck color when Jim’s intent stare seems to act like a tractor beam and his eyes are winched up and across to meet brilliant blue.
“What?”
“You’re grumpy this morning, Bonesy.”
“You call me that ever again and you won’t see in the afternoon, asshole.”
Jim doesn’t look offended - if anything his grin gets even shinier. “Not going to ask me what I need help with?” he says brightly. He drags his chair round and sits right up in Leonard’s personal bubble and looks at the spoon.
“Help yourself,” Leonard grumbles pushing the plate towards him. Jim’s already making headway on his crackers.
“I thought you didn’t eat solids.” He watches Jim closely for a reaction to his comment but Jim doesn’t miss a beat.
“Because I’m an infant, I get it.”
“I repeat: what do you want help with? I’m busy, Jim.”
“The Kobayashi Maru, man!” Jim bites his bottom lip, nodding enthusiastically.
“I thought you had to be in year two to qualify, or did you hypnotize the admirals too?”
“Only with my devilish charm and genius test scores, Bonesy!”
Leonard slaps his arm, noting how Jim winces like it actually hurts. Good.
“When?”
“Three weeks,” Jim says through a mouthful of soup. “That’ll give us plenty of time. I’m gonna win this, Bones - like a boss. So, you in?”
Leonard folds his arms, sits back in his chair and slides his legs under the table. “Let me get this straight? You’re offering me a front row seat to the inevitable deflation of your monstrous ego? I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”
+++
“It’s a cheat, Bones, fucking unfair. How’d they beat me?”
Jim’s slumped against him, drunk as a skunk, his arm round Leonard’s neck and head lolling like a rag doll. Leonard presses his knee into Jim’s thigh, maneuvers him so his weight’s half against the door frame, leaving him free to press a thumb against the ID panel.
“Come in, Jim, so you can sober up,” Leonard says, proud of how he just did the whole vampire invitation thing so subtly. He drags Jim inside a little roughly and leaves him swaying in the center of the room while he removes his coat.
“Ouch! That hurt - thought you were a healer…”
“And I thought you were human, Jim.” He says it softly, almost hoping Jim won’t have heard, but if Leonard’s theory’s correct, Jim would be able to hear a door click a kilometer away, let alone his passive-aggressive mumblings.
“What do you mean?” Not a vowel slurred. Interesting...
Leonard swallows. Jim looks like he’s grown a hand-span since they’ve entered Leonard’s moonlit rooms. No slurring, no wobbling; he’s sobered up in a snap, like the drunkenness was all an act in the first place.
“You know what I mean, Jim. I’ve long suspected you’re a vampire even though you don’t fit the usual mold - it’s the only reason I haven’t called you on it before, but I could feel you just now, feel how you don’t have a heartbeat, how you don’t breathe.” He pauses, heart pounding in his ears, an excitement thrumming under his skin which doesn’t make sense.
Jim moves to the bed and sits utterly composed, his arms folded and legs crossed, listening in silence while Leonard rants...
“But there’s stuff I don’t get.” He’s on a roll now, drink loosening his tongue. “How do you walk in the sun? How come you don’t sleep in the day? And why the hell did you eat my soup?” He jabs a finger in Jim’s direction. “You’re supposed to eat blood, dammit, that stuff’ll make you sick...well, not ‘sick’ but...”
Something shifts on Jim’s face and his eyes appear to glow amber in the dark; Leonard suddenly feels a little awestruck - sure he’s had as much to do with alien species as anyone who’s never been off planet, treated a few even, but none who came complete with a whole goddamn mythology attached, and most have functioning organs.
Now he’s been busted Jim no longer looks like a kid in his twenties. The frat-boy act is over, everything’s changed: how he moves, his voice even, so much so that Leonard’s wondering how he could have ever doubted this was a vampire. Jim looks scary and beautiful, with his skin striped iridescent with light coming in through the blind.
“I didn’t want you to know,” Jim says finally, voice smooth and melodious, with sharp edges of intent. “I thought it might come between us...” He stands, takes a step closer.
“Why? You think I’m some kind of backward, hill-billy bigot? I’m flattered. Thanks.”
“No, of course not. Never that.” He cocks his head. “The few of us left on earth are pretty tame these days, have to be. That’s not the problem. Pike recruited me and knows all about me, how could he not? But I neither advertise it nor hide it... It’s just...”
“But you never once said anything to me - why, Jim? You lied and we’re supposed to be friends-” the lie of omission. Leonard’s scared now, the look on Jim’s face, it feels like he’s gonna say stuff he won’t want to hear.
“You’re not the first McCoy I’ve known,” Jim says simply. “I…well, I don’t wanna freak you out, but we’ve met before, so to speak. I wasn’t going to mention it, well not yet. I tried to keep away from you. I didn’t want to get in your way...I want you to be happy, Bones.” He lowers his eyes, looks like there’s a weight in his unbeating heart or something, the way he sighs and shakes his head.
“Met? Met how? When? This is creepy, Jim.”
“It doesn’t have to be, Bones” Jim takes another step towards him. “I’m trying here, trying to fit in, not stand out, not be different. Trying to be equals, friends.”
His eyes are fierce and Leonard is suddenly consciously aware of their pull. An ache forms and only touching Jim will soothe it. He wants to bare his neck and give himself. Only he doesn’t trust any of this, nor anything Jim’s said - how can he when he’s obviously being compelled?
“You’re compelling me,” he says, trying to sound all medical diagnosis rather than moral judgement. “Are you taking your suppressants?” He drags his eyes away, goes to find his medical tricorder. Jim is instantly behind him and the speed of his movement, the way he silently appeared, that is fucking scary.
“You don’t need that, Bones, I’m not sick. This isn’t a fucking condition. I’m a vampire. It’s like giving a fucking Vulcan medicine because he can’t help being logical, have you thought about that? Those...the suppressants, they’re...I feel like a dog got taken to the vet - so I give myself a break sometimes, or they wear off; and I could be better at remembering too, sure - but imagine this, Bones, imagine drawing people to you for hundreds of fucking years, imagine that taken away, I...”
He’s never learned how to connect any other way? Is that what he’s saying?
“But you can’t control it, can you? That’s why you gotta take them...”
“I can, just not around...around you. And Bones, I’ve gotta take them because if they find out sometimes I don’t, I’ll be thrown out. They’ll send me to Re Kots. I thought I wouldn’t care, but I do, for lots of reasons...”
He trails off and Bones wants to trust him, wants to earn Jim’s trust too, but Jesus, the way Jim’s looking at him now, reverent...it’s...shit, he had no idea. Damn, this is the feeling he’s been having...this déjà vu or whatever it is.
Then Leonard’s mind struggles to tease out a foggy memory, a vague recollection of something, that time in the bar. Then it’s gone. Maybe Jim’s compelled him before, wiped his memory of it? That must be it. Now he’s mad, real mad.
They’re staring at each other, two paces apart, Jim’s eyes sweeping him, his face suddenly possessive, eyes filled with desire, but for what? Him? His blood? Jim is a vampire after all - one denied human blood for god knows how long though he may have fed from bleeders, or fang-bangers as some call them. Leonard knows you can always get what you want at a price, as long as you know where to look. The replicated blood, so he hears, isn’t good enough. They don’t heal in the same way.
“Yeah, I drink human blood sometimes,” Jim admits, proving he’s also reading Leonard’s mind, “but I don’t kill, haven’t for so long - even after the war - and I was pretty fucking desperate in those days. It was hard to get animal blood even, the way things were. Till I met one of you - you McCoys...healers...so fucking selfless and beautiful to the last.” Without warning, Jim’s right up against him, the length of his body pressed against Leonard, his hand on the back of his head. “Jesus, you’re the one should be medicating yourself, so I can be free of you. I tried to keep away, I’m...”
Their eyes lock and Leonard feels an ache of lust in his chest that completely side-swipes him. One minute they’re friends, drinking buddies, and yeah, maybe he was attracted, more than, but now, everything’s moving too fast. He parts his lips, panting slightly, so overwhelmed with feeling that wasn’t there before and he closes his eyes, turns his head away, and makes a mental break for it.
“Get out of my fucking head, Jim, this isn’t how it’s done - you’ve got a hold on me but it’s not honest, it’s not me giving, it’s you fuckin’ taking. Let go of me, dammit, lemme go!”
Jim parts his lips, his canines have descended and Leonard can see his eyes flicker amber, violet, his pupils huge and drawing him in and he feels his legs crumple a little, like his bones have dissolved and the only thing holding him upright is Jim’s hand, his gaze.
Jim sniffs his neck, inhales him deep and Leonard can see how he’s fighting with himself and he manages to breathe out. “That’s right, Jim, do the right thing…”
Jim closes his eyes, cants his head back and lets out a howl of frustration.
He loosens his hold on Leonard who drops to the floor, heart pounding, sweat breaking out over his chest and arms. He looks on helplessly as Jim growls, “Computer, open window!” Then he spins on his heel, leaps to the sill in one movement, and steps out into the night air, leaving a sweet, acidic scent of lilies behind him, and Leonard sprawled on the floor like a pile of leaves waiting for a breeze to stir him into action.
He gets onto his knees, his head in his hands and pauses, thinking about Jim, how fucking terrifying yet vulnerable he looked, how he could have just taken Leonard there and then and made him forget that he had. But he didn’t and that’s something to hang onto even if it’s like trying to stitch up a spider web.
He gets to his feet, unsteady, on the verge of hyperventilating, and he throws himself on the bed where he stares up at the ceiling trying to make sense of what just fucking happened.
He saw something in Jim then; he wanted to do the right thing and he managed to control himself and then leave.
It’s obvious Jim’s got no one behind him, nothing to support him and, from what he’s said, Jim wants to be at the academy.
And Jim said he wanted Leonard to be happy. But what did he mean when he said they’ve met before, about McCoy healers? Is this why it feels like they’re old friends when they’ve only known each other a few months?
He is suddenly filled with resolve - if all Jim wants is someone to believe in him, that he can work on, even though he’s not quite sure what the hell’s in it for him.
+++
Leonard resists comming Jim; he really has no fucking idea what to say to him, how to make it better. He will, he just needs to gather, take stock, work out what the hell he wants.
He puts aside a couple of hours to research Jim on the nets; what he reads fills him with horror. Jim was a killer, of course he is - while vampires these days are totally under control, any that don’t reform are sent to to the colony, Jim’s elected to stay on Earth for now, to be a citizen of United Earth - but none of this washes away the blood on his hands of all the people he must have killed in his time. The stark reality is he’s a fucking serial-killer.
And since vampires aren’t in the news these days, Leonard hasn’t given them much thought, no more than any other alien species, although technically they’re human-alien hybrids. The virus came on the ship which crashed in what is still referred to colloquially as the Hellmouth; it adapted best to human hosts, a branch of it evolving to werewolves. The rest of the ‘demons’ as they were then called, have integrated. Vampires are a unique problem and have to be chipped and monitored to prove they’ve reformed, and so the rest of society feels safe. And he’s seen first hand what they’re like when they don’t take the suppressants - Jim had absolute power over him.
Leonard’s annoyed and surprised at himself that despite the way Jim compelled him that night - how it was clear he could have drained him in minutes if he’d chosen to - Leonard never once thought about his past, which is dumb really, because vampires are all past.
And Jim’s old - one of the oldest known vampires - almost five hundred years old, though there are long gaps in his history. He reads about him on countless bleeder sites, most full of poetry and art containing records of sightings, and including scans of ancient documents and the occasional poor quality photo.
Then, to his surprise, he finds a link for an illegal download of some medical journal which would normally require security clearance to access. His mouth falls open when he sees the name of the doctor who wrote the paper: Leah E. McCoy. He runs a cross-check in another tab and sees she is indeed a distant ancestor. He worries about the download being traced to him, then shrugs - he’ll deal with that if and when it happens.
He fixes himself a coffee and scans the text; it’s an incomplete study into vampire self-healing, just notes at best and when he sees the date, it makes sense - it was written during the post-nuclear chaos. She’d have found it impossible to get funding, maybe found it just as hard to find other subjects to complete the research - it’s like she just wanted to put the link somewhere for posterity. After downloading software to convert the ancient file format, he watches the vid with bated breath.
It’s definitely Jim, though an old, depleted version of him, and he feels his heart pounding in his chest when Jim drinks a bag of blood - the old synthesized kind - and the transformation begins. It’s a miracle is what it is, how quickly it works, how Jim moves, how the image begins to fade as he becomes younger, more beautiful, like the Jim he is now.
The camera lurches at one point and Leonard tsks, thinking it’s over when he wanted to see the re-generation complete, then his fucking heart leaps into his throat.
The sound is terrible and he makes a note to see if he can get one of the geeks in communication to enhance it for him at some point, when he sees the camera is now in Jim’s hands. He sees a woman walking away from it then Jim Kirk’s face fills the screen, those unmistakable blue, hypnotic eyes brimming with happiness. He winks and then says, “Missed you, Bones.”
Mind fuck doesn’t even begin to cover what this is. Jim said he didn’t want to go into it, what he meant by his connection with Leonard's family. He’d said it would freak Leonard out if he explained. Damn straight. This is so fucking weird he doesn’t know what the hell to do with it. He’s been drawn to other McCoys for at least a hundred and fifty years. But why?
He’s in over his head here - he doesn’t even know if he has a choice to be with Jim or not. Jim’s maybe been looking for him; Jim must have known he’d enlisted in Starfleet; and there he was thinking their meeting on the shuttle was just random. He feels like he can’t breathe, like he needs to talk about this with Jim, though he gets the feeling that if he broaches the subject, given Jim’s intense reaction the other night, he’ll just disappear from the radar. And why does that fill him with panic? It must be another symptom of the compulsion, he decides.
Then he has a brainwave and thinks about the only person who might know: Captain Pike. He drafts a quick email and before he can change his mind, hits send.
+++
Leonard hasn’t spoken to Pike since he was recruited by him in a Riverside pub.
“I believe in fate, McCoy,” he’d said. “You didn’t just wander in here, into the middle of nowhere to get wasted. You’re a man who likes a challenge - you’ve been living too comfortably these past six months.”
“Kinda busy getting divorced, having my own private vasectomy, yanno?” (Leonard couldn’t imagine speaking to him like that now.)
“Starfleet needs people like you, needs brilliant minds like yours; you give us three years and we can help you find yourself. Take the papers at least.”
Leonard downed his bourbon and left to finish off his drinking in peace, in his motel, wondering how many poor losers Pike hit on that night, thinking how recruitment must be real low if they’d resorted to sending out one of their most decorated captains as a scout.
Now of course, he knows it isn’t like that; it’s just that Pike, well, he’s something else, and likes to do things his own way; he seems to prefer a touch of the maverick in his cadets. But, thinking back to that night, Leonard wonders whether Pike’s right; maybe it was fate that had him leaving Atlanta, coming to Riverside of all places, just so he could bump into Jim Kirk on that shuttle - like he was drawn to him by an invisible force, though it goes against the grain of every way he’s ever tried to make sense of the world up until this point.
Now, in Pike’s pristine, spartan office, he wonders where the hell he should start. Leonard isn’t used to being in awe of anyone and he feels short in this man’s presence, somehow unworthy as he listens.
“You understand that I’m reluctant to reveal anything about cadets,” Pike’s saying. “But from what I can read in-between the lines, you’ve got Jim’s back and if anyone needs someone behind him, it’s Kirk.”
“We connected instantly, we, er...we’ve become friends but then... well, things have gone to sh...gone wrong.” Then he adds hurriedly, “Sir.”
“Please, McCoy, at ease.” Leonard tilts his chin a little and looks at his shoes. “It’s pretty difficult knowing how to act around Jim, I know. He’s quite the package,” Pike says and shares a half smile while regarding him with piercing blue eyes. He walks to the front of his desk and leans on it easily.
“Ain’t that the truth...” Leonard concedes.
Pike smiles wryly. “There’s things you should know about Jim; he went a little wild the past few years - he’s not responded well to the integration. He’s pulled his chip out each time they put it in and he doesn’t heal like he should. If I didn’t know better I’d say he had an eating disorder. He takes as little replicated blood as he can get away with, and he’s weak - it takes him hours to heal if he’s hurt, you might have noticed he looked a little worse for wear on the shuttle that time.”
“Well, sir, he did look kind of beat up.”
“He hasn’t told me much about what he’s done since the war, but I think he went to ground. Imagine that, McCoy, missing great tracts of time and change like that; rising from hibernation then adjusting to a new era, a new century. I’m not good in the mornings but that’s something else.”
And always alone, Leonard thinks with a tightness forming in his throat. Jim’s attempt to connect with him may have been shit, but understandable; he’s a man from a different time and culture.
Pike goes on, “Then he spent twenty years fighting the system. God only knows how he managed to evade being sent to the colony for so long, but it seems medieval to send anyone off-planet because they get into a lot of fights. Long as he didn’t feed off humans, I guess he was safe. And he hasn’t - not as far as we know.”
“That’s what he told me too,” Leonard is quick to say. “He said that if it happened it was always bleeders, always consensual and he never compelled anyone, though we can’t know that for sure.”
Pike looks pointedly at McCoy and he feels that itch on his neck again, shifting in his seat and wishing Pike would sit the fuck down so he can breathe already.
“You know something, McCoy? His heart’s in the right place. There’s records of a brief involvement with the Neo-Transcendentalists at the turn of last century; he did some voluntary work as far as Liam Dieghan’s journals show, but there weren’t any details other than he helped out in a clinic for a couple of months.”
“He knows medicine?”
“Not as far as I know, you’ll have to ask him. And he’s a musician: he’s been teaching violin though he asked me not to put that on his record; god knows why.
“Science has ironed out many supernatural phenomena - how good or evil an individual vamp is - well it varies. Seems to have a lot to do with the circumstances when they were turned, what characteristic they had in the first place.
“Nature nurture,” Leonard nods. Then he asks, “He said he’s known McCoys before. Do you know anything about that?”
Pike’s eyes widen very slightly though his granite demeanor doesn’t falter. “Can’t say I do, McCoy. You’ll have to ask him about that. I know nothing of his personal life, or of his relationships...but, if you want to know if can you trust him? The best I can say is probably.
“He’s a genius, add to that an immortal life of study and observation of human history and he’s going to be an incredible asset to Starfleet. He’ll be the first hybrid to come through the ranks and he’ll need to learn how to inspire loyalty and trust in his crew; but he’s working on that, and he’s aching to prove himself. It’s going to be hard for him; we’ve come a long way but there are still pockets of prejudice out there, unfortunately.”
Leonard nods, his mind whirling, filled with questions.“I don’t understand a few things. He’s not your usual vampire: he eats, he operates in the daytime - how the hell does he do that?”
“Ask him about the ring, McCoy. Sounds to me like you two have a whole lot to talk about. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a meeting to prep for…anything else, email me.”
“Thank you, sir.”
McCoy stands and, just before he reaches the door Pike adds, “One thing you can do, McCoy-”
“Yes, sir?”
“Help him with his social skills.” And Pike doesn’t hide his amusement at the look on McCoy’s face. “And you’re thinking horse-shit, aren’t you McCoy?”
“Permission to speak freely, sir?” Pike nods. “Okay…first off, Kirk’s more than able to get on with everyone he comes across. You could say,” and the word almost sticks in his throat, “he has charisma...” and Leonard doesn’t want to contradict a superior officer, but still, “and sir, with all due respect, have you seen me attempting to get on with folk?”
“Not exactly, McCoy, however your bedside manner is legendary.” He smiles, “That’s not what I’m talking about. It’s your compassion - no one who’s known you, worked with you for more than five minutes can question how much you feel for your patients, how you always put them first, how when you’re under pressure, whatever the challenge, you won’t give up, ever; you’ll run yourself ragged to fix them.” Then he adds, reacting to Leonard’s bemused expression, “It’s all over your file.”
“I’m a doctor,” Leonard says irritably, “That’s what doctors do.”
Pike shrugs. “It’s what good men, do. Show him; show Jim what it’s like to connect with other people and care whether they live or die. As an end in itself, not like he’s acted in the past, always for his own purposes, to satisfy personal needs...coax out the human in him.”
+++
[i’m sorry] the text message says.
Leonard huffs. For what? For being Jim Kirk? Two days since he’s seen Jim, or heard from him and he can’t stop thinking about him, dreaming about him and how does Leonard handle the first sign of life from him? He doesn’t mention any of that, but carries on like you do when you’re friends and ‘these things happen’.
[Yeah, you should have paid for the last round] Leonard replies and looks up when he gets to the steps.
[har har that’s not what i mean & u know it]
[Punctuate your fucking texts, Jim, or I’ll stake you.]
[so we’re good? and - NO! :D]
[Vampires texting... Bram Stoker must be spinning in his grave.]
[I met him. I’ll have to tell you all about it one day. Over coffee!]
Met him? That’s...then he writes, [Thing I’m most impressed about, is that you’re now punctuating your messages. Looks like you’re in MY thrall now, kid!]
The comm beeps and Jim’s face pops up on the screen, vague and wishy-washy, proof he’s on the vervain again. He can hear the clatter of crockery and voices behind Jim in the canteen.
“Hi, Bones!”
“And as if to prove you can’t be any more annoying...what the hell are you smirking about?”
“Because you’re talking to me again.”
“I never wasn’t talking to you, you infant - what is this? A school yard?” A cadet bumps into Leonard and he nearly drops the comm. “Actually...”
Jim laughs and it makes his chest swell, so Leonard scowls at him. He finally broaches what’s really bothering him. Sort of. “You need to come and work the mo-jo on me, Jim. I’ve been having dreams...” he lowers his voice, not wanting to say what about. “And it’s a... you know... ‘side-effect’ of the other night.”
Jim considers this for a second, brings the comm closer to his face so just his eyes fill the screen. Shit as the image is, Leonard feels a rush of blood to his groin, “Wanna see if it works long-distance?” Jim winks.
“Don’t joke about it, Jim. This is your fault and I want you to fix it.”
Jim zooms out again and his eyes are all crinkly. “There’s nothing to fix, Bones, if you’re thinking about me it’s because you loove me.”
“Jesus, Jim, don’t you care if people overhear you acting like an adolescent?”
Jim’s smile drops. “Bones, joking aside, I’m sorry, okay, but if you want me to fix it, I’ll have to...you know...” Yeah, take the anti-vervain. “...and I’m trying to...” then he mouths the rest, “be good.”
Damn, his lips are so pink...maybe he could make this one exception.
Leonard sighs. “Jim, I gotta go, we’ll hook up later.”
“Just one thing, Bones?”
“Dammit, what? I’m late,” Leonard whispers, “I’ve got to turn this off, I’m outside the lecture theater.”
“I got a priority message from Pike-”
Oh, fuck. “Really...?”
“Says I’m rooming with you from now on. Did you have anything to do with that? You know, because you looove me?”
Unbelievable.
Leonard cuts the connection, and comm in hand, squeezes past half a dozen cadets to take a seat. His PADD clatters to the floor when his comm beeps. He glances at the screen and looks apologetically at the teaching assistant standing a few meters away. “Sorry, just an update on a patient...critically ill...” Or Jim being an asshole, most likely. He glances down at the screen; there’s a photo of Jim taken inside the canteen, time stamped a few minutes ago, of him blowing a kiss and the words, [I’m moving in tonight, Bones. I’ll be there when you get back from clinic; won’t that be spiffy?] All nicely punctuated. There’s hope for him yet.
+++
end of part 6b and onto part 6c