Infection (Kirk/McCoy NC-17) 4/4
Master Post & Mix - Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3
Illness
+
McCoy is on the observation deck, staring out at the hodgepodge fleet that is made up of the Enterprise along with the Klingon and Cardassian ships.
“I don't know how you did it,” McCoy says, still facing the window, and he can sense Kirk moving closer even though he can't hear his footsteps.
“I don't know how you've brought me back from the brink of death so many times, but it doesn't mean I question it,” is Kirk's answer, and it makes McCoy smile sardonically.
“Careful, Jim, or I might think you're talking about faith.”
He feels Kirk press forward against him, can feel that Kirk's cock is hard between them, and doesn't even pretend to resist when Kirk's hands move to McCoy's front to undo his pants, reaching through the fabric to slowly caress McCoy's dick.
“This is what you wanted, isn't it?” Kirk asks, voice low in McCoy's ear. “You wanted to see the empire burn only to rise stronger from the ashes.”
McCoy grinds his hips, creating more friction for the both of them. He turns his face towards Kirk's. “It still hasn't happened yet, darling.”
The endearment sets a snarl loose from Kirk as he roughly spins McCoy, slamming his back against the window. He tugs their pants and underwear down to their knees before surging forward, rubbing their cocks together and biting at McCoy's lips until he gives into the kiss, gasping into Kirk's mouth when he takes them both in his right hand.
McCoy feels two of Kirk's fingers from his left hand between their mouths, the digits getting wet from the kiss, and McCoy spreads his legs wider, leaning further into the window so Kirk can step closer into him. Kirk removes his fingers, reaching between McCoy's legs to have the spit-soaked pads circle and tease at McCoy's entrance before penetrating him, fucking in and out until McCoy's muscles relax, and only then does he curl them to glide against McCoy's prostate, McCoy hitting the back of his head against the window as he tries to push himself both onto Kirk's fingers in his ass and into the hand on his cock.
There's that momentary pull at his stomach as the Enterprise goes into warp, the spike in adrenaline sending McCoy's body into an orgasm. Kirk pulls his fingers out, jerking himself quickly, and when he also comes, the stars that are streaking by behind McCoy are reflected in Kirk's eyes, which are open wide in anticipation of the destruction they are about to unleash on the empire.
It's only a matter of time now.
+
Sickbay is kept on battle alert even though they haven't reached the Sol system yet. McCoy's still waiting for those who are loyal to the current emperor to make their move, to try and get to any of the senior bridge crew like McCoy suspects Lieutenant Harding would have if he and Chekov hadn't gotten to him first.
The entire ship goes into yellow alert once they cross into the Alpha Quadrant. The Enterprise has been in communications silence with the Imperial Fleet since their arrival at Qo'nos, and while McCoy doubts the admiralty will be willing to publicly admit that they've lost their flagship, he knows there's likely been a reward posted for any ship that comes across the Enterprise's warp signature.
McCoy's going over with his staff the roles each and every one of them is going to play once they drop out of warp when he sees Chapel going for the blade strapped to her leg just below the hem of her skirt out of the corner of his eye. He follows her gaze to see the chemist who had tried to kill him in his own sickbay, her hair growing back in irregularly, dragging a dead command ensign.
“He spoke to me about mutiny,” she says, eyes and voice steady. She drops his dead weight to the ground, and the blood still spurting from the wound across his femoral artery has McCoy wondering if the ensign had been on his way to the bridge just now when he'd been stopped.
McCoy points to the nearest orderly. “Take the body from Lieutenant Moreau and dispose of it.”
The orderly responds with a, “Yes, sir,” that McCoy only half-hears. His attention is instead focused on Moreau, waiting for her to make her next move, but all she does is hold his gaze before saluting and leaving sickbay.
Chapel's hand relaxes, and they get back to their preparations.
+
“We're going to drop our speed, let the Klingons and Cardassians arrive first.” Kirk's lying naked on his stomach, propped up on his elbows to watch McCoy go over the thin cuts on his back and shoulders with a dermal regenerator. “At 1300 hours, I want you there.”
McCoy slides down so he's straddling Kirk's thighs to work on his lower back. “I need to be in sickbay.”
“I can make it an order,” Kirk says, his tone laced with an underlying threat that has McCoy leaning over to bite Kirk's shoulder, worrying the skin with teeth and tongue until Kirk's breath starts to stutter. “You'll be there,” he keens, and it isn't a question.
Kirk writhes as McCoy slides further down his body, biting and sucking down each of Kirk's vertebrae, using his hands to hold Kirk's hips steady, following Kirk's spine until he reaches the end of his coccyx and moves his hands from holding Kirk down to holding him open, spreading open his ass cheeks to lathe at his entrance. He can feel Kirk quivering under and around him, and McCoy knows with certainty that he's the only one who has seen Kirk like this, the only one Kirk would ever allow to.
McCoy reaches between Kirk's pelvis and the mattress to grasp his cock, synchronizing the movements of his hand with that of his tongue, drowning himself in Kirk to push away the sense of foreboding that is tomorrow, when either of them could be killed in the heat of battle.
It's been so long since Pike had forced the two of them to keep each other alive with a clause in their files that meant more to McCoy than his marriage ever had.
“Bones,” Kirk groans as he arches his ass closer to McCoy's face like he needs McCoy's tongue to penetrate him even deeper. “Bones, just fuck me already.”
Nearly a decade that our lives have been intertwined, McCoy thinks once his cock is fully seated in Kirk's body. His thrusts are steady, pressing against Kirk's perineum with one hand to stimulate his prostate from both sides while the other still jerks him off, Kirk's dick still sticky from the orgasm he'd had earlier when McCoy was cutting into his flesh.
“I'm going with you,” McCoy growls, his thought of I'm dying with you left unsaid. “When you beam down to Paris, I'm coming too.”
“Only if you're - shit - there tomorrow.” Kirk has his hands fisted into the sheets, ripping holes in the fabric, his ankles hooked around McCoy's.
McCoy pulls out, moving away so he's kneeling on the bed, and drags Kirk back with him, his fingers resting in the middle of Kirk's chest as puts his thighs on either side of McCoy's before lowering himself onto McCoy's cock, his back and neck curving into McCoy.
Neither of them are sentimental enough to comment on what this means, how this is very possibly their last night together, but McCoy thinks it anyway, and he's certain that Kirk does, too, when he reaches his left hand back to tangle in McCoy's hair, forcing him to turn his head so their mouths press together into a kiss that's nothing more than lips clumsily stroking, brushing and sliding together, as they pant heavily into each other.
McCoy presses his face into Kirk's neck, able to feel his pulse thrumming just under the surface of his skin, and he licks it, trying to taste the flush as he wipes away Kirk's sweat with his tongue. He bites at the apex of jaw and throat, sucking in a bruise that he'll just have to heal later, but in the meantime he wants Kirk to be able to see it when he looks in the mirror.
With a moan and a buck of his hips, Kirk comes in McCoy's hand, his entire body tightening as he rides out his release, and it tips McCoy over the edge right along with him.
+
McCoy's on the bridge when they drop out of warp within firing range of Terra.
The Klingon and Cardassian ships seem to be everywhere, battling the Terran fleet, and it's just sheer chaos with all the burning wreckage and the lights of weapons fire.
“Captain, we're being hailed by every Imperial ship and the capital.” Uhura's flipping through channels as Sulu coaxes the Enterprise into performing this tight spiraling maneuver that gets them away from the flaming debris of what looks like the ISS Avenger's disc.
McCoy's wondering how Kirk managed to threaten each and every one of them that his bridge crew isn't questioning the fact that they aren't getting shot at by any Cardassian or Klingon ships and neither has Kirk given the order to engage in the battle.
“Put me through to all channels,” Kirk pauses like he's mulling something over. “Audio only, Lieutenant.”
Kirk rises to stand in front of his chair, cutting an intimidating figure out the bridge even though the emperor can't see him. “This is Captain Kirk of the ISS Enterprise. I've made a deal with the regent of the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance that ensures the future of the Terran Empire. Step down, and I will give the command to stop the attack. Anyone who opposes me will become slaves of the alliance as part of our deal, and, your majesty,” Kirk's voice lowers to a deadly calm, “I'll come and kill you myself.”
“It seems as though we'll be meeting face-to-face, then, Captain,” the emperor responds, and if he had planned on saying anything more, Kirk signals for Uhura to cut off the transmission before he gets the chance.
“Bones, Spock, come with me. Uhura, you have the conn. I want a list of every ship that surrenders to the Enterprise along with their acting captains.”
“Yes, sir,” Uhura responds, masking any surprise she might be feeling.
They take a turbolift down to the armory; Kirk grabs a phaser rifle from where it’s mounted on the wall and hands it to McCoy.
For a Vulcan, Spock doesn't do nearly as good a job at hiding his surprise. “Captain, I strongly recommend that you consider taking a security team.”
“I'm not taking anyone with uncertain loyalties, and yes, Spock, that includes you. I haven't forgotten that you kill me in another universe, and even with the older you being here to let us know what a shitty decision that was, I still can't trust you.” Kirk takes a phaser pistol for himself, strapping a thigh holster to his leg as he speaks. “I want Uhura to keep receiving all surrenders, but you'll be giving orders to the alliance until we return.”
Spock quirks an eyebrow, and McCoy has to tamper the urge to try and slap it off of his face. “Hypothetically speaking, Captain, but I could give the order for the alliance to continue firing on Terra, particularly the Imperial Palace, while you and Doctor McCoy are on the surface.”
“That's the idea, Spock,” Kirk replies, looking mildly amused that he has to spell this out for his first officer. “If you kill me on Terra, there won't be any witnesses, and you could get away with it. If you give the order on my ship in front of my crew, however...” He trails off, and McCoy's not sure how much of an imagination Spock has, but his own is trying to decide if it would be Sulu or Chekov that would get to the Vulcan first, and which of them would do it out of loyalty and which out of his own desire to rise in the ranks.
McCoy follows Kirk out of the armory, leaving Spock behind as they head for the transporter room. He checks over the weapon as they walk, hoping that Kirk knows what the hell he's doing. McCoy doesn't believe the honor codes these Cardassians and Klingons claim to live by, but he just needs to do what he's always done - everything in his power to keep Kirk and himself alive.
+
Paris is burning when they beam down, but McCoy hadn't expected anything else considering that the Enterprise is in orbit and had been firing at the city. The emperor had refused to hand himself over and give up his position, so Kirk is having everything around his palace systematically destroyed.
Kirk's attempt at symbolism is not lost on McCoy. Sometimes the forest needs to be burned in order for a better one to grow. It's just the way things are.
McCoy adjusts the phaser rifle in his grip, but no one threatens them or even bats an eye. Everyone's running, concerned about saving themselves as they try to find safety or any sort of shelter even though it's been a few minutes since the Enterprise last fired a shot. The air is still rife with the scent of burning flesh, though, and if he takes a minute to look in the rubble, McCoy can see bodies charred like roasted pigs.
There's no trouble until they reach the Imperial Palace. Kirk hacks the main gate's security system easily enough, and all it takes to get by the starved guard dogs is to leave one of the palace's security personnel struggling to get away after McCoy shoots his leg off below the knee. The dogs howl at the smell of fresh blood, and McCoy can hear the snarling and screaming and the sound of muscle tearing under teeth, but they move quickly.
Kirk draws his phaser pistol once they've reached the main building, and they shove through the large double doors at the same time, scanning with their weapons but the entryway is completely empty.
“Where the fuck is everyone?” McCoy's imagining bombs hidden in the palace walls to be set off once they're far enough inside. It's too damn quiet, and it's setting him on edge. Kirk doesn't answer him, though; he just continues onward with deadly focus.
They check rooms as they move, but every one that McCoy looks into is empty. They reach a huge marble staircase with two bodies slumped at the bottom. Both are dressed in red.
Kirk gets to them first, kicking the closest body as if to make sure it really is dead. “Bones,” he calls, then motions for McCoy to join him.
Both men are bleeding out of every orifice, their bodies rigid in death as if they'd died in wracking pain. The blood is still seeping out of them; they haven't been dead for very long. McCoy bets the bodies are still warm, but he's not going to touch them to find out.
“Calicivirus tablets,” McCoy says, both admiring the work of the virus and disturbed by how impersonal a death it is. “Stainless steel capsules get injected in the body and release the virus once the code is given. Death is painful and in a matter of minutes.”
Kirk almost looks impressed. “So the emperor kills his personal staff before one of them decides to pick the opposite side in a coup.” He looks up the stairs and around at the floor above him. “That means he's still here.”
McCoy lets Kirk lead. Neither of them have been in the palace before, but McCoy doesn't doubt that Kirk has the floor plans committed to memory. Everyone they pass is dead and in a puddle of their own blood, even people who look like they were kitchen staff, maids, and the emperor's personal shuttle pilot.
They enter the throne room, McCoy raising the rifle and automatically training it on the figure standing in front of the floor-length windows, watching Paris burn.
“Little Jimmy Kirk,” the emperor begins, and even if McCoy can't see his face, he recognizes the voice easily enough. “I'm honestly surprised that you grew into the man you are now. I might not have listed you for execution had I known.”
McCoy forces his face to remain impassive but only to not give the emperor any ammunition. He feels like he's lost his footing suddenly; he has no idea what's going on. How the hell does Kirk know the emperor?
He turns from the window to look back and forth between Kirk and McCoy. “I've heard stories about your pet doctor, Jimmy. Has he heard your stories about me?” Kirk's stony silence seems to be answer enough. “You see, Doctor, Jimmy and I go way back, back to when I was the governor of a little colony that had a special school for breaking in problem children and making them good citizens of the empire.”
McCoy had been nineteen when Empress Sato was murdered and Kodos took over, so he remembered the genocide clearly. It had been the only time in recent history of Terrans wiping each other out instead of lower humanoid species. Kodos had been hailed as a hero for ordering the deaths of four thousand colonists in order for the rest of them to survive until the Imperial Fleet arrived and evacuated Tarsus IV.
He had no idea that Kirk had been on Tarsus.
McCoy glances over at Kirk, who's standing within arm's reach so McCoy can see that dangerous shark smile he gets when there's blood about to be shed that isn't his own. His phaser is lowered, his stance wide. “I've been waiting nearly twenty years for this, Kodos.”
Kirk drops the phaser and lunges, not for Kodos, but for McCoy, going for the blade McCoy keeps strapped to his thigh and throwing it with the bionic arm, its freakish strength providing enough momentum for the knife to clear the distance between them before embedding in Kodos' chest. There's the hiss of air, the blade perforating Kodos' lung.
Kirk's running as Kodos is pulling the knife out of his own chest, and Kodos is too old, Kirk too fast, for him to get the knife turned and raised against Kirk before Kirk is slapping it out of Kodos' hand.
McCoy watches with a white knuckle grip on the rifle, ready to kill the emperor if Kirk gives the word, but it doesn't happen. Kirk leans forward into Kodos, and McCoy can't tell what's happening until he sees the sword, a symbol of the position of emperor, sticking out of Kodos' back. Kodos slumps to his knees, gurgling on his own blood, as Kirk pulls away, bringing the sword with him.
McCoy doesn't get the satisfaction of watching Emperor Kodos take his last shuddering breath as there's a sudden flare of pain in his back and then darkness.
+
It takes McCoy a minute to register where he is when he comes to. He's familiar with the setting but not with feeling absolutely nothing in it, but in the Empire there is very little variation in the design of the agony booths. There's no point in changing something once it's been perfected, and if the Imperial Fleets doctors have perfected anything, it's how to inflict the maximum amount of pain drawn out for as long as possible.
He's in the booth, crumpled in a half-sitting position like he had just been dumped in here, but it isn't on. McCoy can see the row of booths lined up to his right, and he bets there's more to his left, but he's unwilling to turn his head just yet, not wanting his captors to know if he's awake. But he needs to know where Kirk is, what happened to him, or if he is also dead in the throne room with Emperor Kodos.
McCoy hears the whine of a machine powering up before his nerves are screaming in pain, muscles spasming under the onslaught, and he bites down on his tongue until he tastes blood to keep himself from yelling in pain.
“Wake up, McCoy,” commands a voice that he would recognize anywhere. The booth is shut off, his body going limp.
McCoy forces himself away from the back wall of the booth so he can stand and face Admiral Pike. “What the hell do you want?” McCoy snaps, his own blood spraying against the glass in front of him as he speaks. Now that he's standing he can feel a tightness of the skin between his scapula like he'd been burned, but agony booths don't literally burn you or cause any external damage at all.
Stunned by a phaser, he realizes. He'd been so focused on Kirk that he hadn't even registered anyone else entering the room.
McCoy can't help but notice how Pike isn't using the cane anymore, just has it to be intentionally misleading, and he also can't help but feel like there should be some goddamn common courtesy about not torturing the doctor who saved your life.
Pike just smirks, shifting to grab his communicator off his belt. “Number One, he's awake.”
“Yes, sir,” responds a woman's voice before Pike puts his communicator aside.
“We'll just wait for your other half, shall we?” Pike says, leaning against his cane. He's twisting the pommel on it, the end that McCoy knows untwists to unsheathe a sword hidden inside. Pike had always tended towards the dramatic, but McCoy doesn't say as much, even if he'd like to. He doesn't need Pike turning on the booth before he can gauge the situation.
Kirk is shoved into the room by a severely beautiful woman holding a phaser at his back. She's smart enough to not holding it against him, though, to give him the ability to feel where it is and try to disarm her accordingly. Kirk's hands are bound behind his back with metal cuffs that are covering most of his forearms, ones that are fused together instead of connected by a chain that Kirk would have no problem breaking with his bionic arm.
He wonders how they knew, who it had been on the Enterprise reporting back to Pike, telling him about Kirk's new and improved arm. Even in the booth McCoy can smell the blood and sweat in the air, Kirk's face moist and pale, and only when Kirk twists his torso does McCoy notice that the skin graft has been cut off of his forearm. What's left is covering Kirk's right hand like a morbid glove, the tissue no longer pink and healthy now that it's been cut off of the blood source that McCoy had extended with regenerators from the rest of Kirk's arm.
McCoy's heard of Number One or at least the rumors around her, how she had no name until Pike gave her one. There's parallels to him and Kirk in that, McCoy supposes, but he had a reputation of his own even before Kirk had dubbed him Bones.
Even though she's a captain now, she still goes by her previous title.
McCoy bares his teeth when he sees his rifle slung across her back, mocking him with his failure at actually watching the damn doors like he should have been.
He catches Kirk's gaze on him, completely unreadable, which makes McCoy relax a little, crossing his arms across his chest and adapting a more intimidating stance. Kirk still thinks he's in control here, and McCoy has no reason to doubt him yet.
There's blood all over Kirk's bare arms and uniform, his gold vest stained brown and still wet in places, but it doesn't look like any of it is from his own injuries. Aside from the straining angle his shoulders are at, Kirk looks unharmed.
Whatever Pike is here for, it seems like he doesn't want them dead, at least not right away.
Number One forces Kirk down so he's kneeling in front of Pike. Pike grabs him by the jaw, forcing Kirk's gaze to lock with his own instead of keeping his eyes trained on McCoy.
“McCoy asked me an interesting question before you arrived,” Pike says, releasing his grip on Kirk once he seems satisfied that he has his attention. McCoy can't see the expression on Kirk's face from the angle he's at, but he can see Pike's and Number One's faces clearly. “He wanted to know what the hell I want.”
Pike destroys any chance of acting the cripple for Kirk when he shifts his balance, kicking out to hit Kirk squarely in the ribs, knocking him to the ground. Pike has his sword out and at Kirk's neck before Kirk can retaliate, and McCoy can tell that he was going to, can see the tension in Kirk's arms and legs.
“I wanted the Enterprise,” Pike hisses through his teeth. “She was supposed to be mine. Why else do you think I wouldn't just let you two kill each other? I made a deal that I would assemble the best crew to get the best ship. And then you,” he kicks Kirk again, “took her away from me.” He shifts his focus to McCoy, eyes narrowing. “And you made sure I lived to see it.”
The agony booth is turned back on, stronger this time, knocking McCoy's legs out from under him, making him twitch and writhe as it activates nerves, his body trying to get away from the pain but finding no relief in any direction. The body doesn't know what to do when it can't fall back on fight or flight.
McCoy finds himself in the fetal position when the booth is turned off. The large muscles in his legs are still jerking, and he feels like he's going to throw up, but McCoy forces himself to think about the effects of rapid dehydration and how that will kill him faster, take away most of his fight.
He forces himself into a sitting position, and McCoy can see that Kirk has risen to his feet but his hands are still bound together.
“I'm well within my rights to kill the both of you right now,” Pike is saying. “You murdered the emperor and have been working with the Klingons and Cardassians, races that we know are plotting to take over the Terran Empire and enslave her people. Give me what I want, and you'll be pardoned.”
“No,” Kirk seethes, sending McCoy back into a dark place where there's a roaring in his ears that might be his own screaming and all he knows is pain.
The setting is higher this time, he can tell. He knows precisely which effect each has on all sorts of humanoid forms, both from personal experience and from what he's watched, what he's inflicted. McCoy can hardly breathe as his diaphragm doesn't draw air into his lungs, the muscles in his throat choking, and there are spots of light dancing in front of his eyes.
Level nine, he knows, will kill a man in five minutes. The next setting is the highest, and it will kill him in about a minute, but in that minute his cell membranes will dissolve until he's nothing more than a puddle of remains.
And then I won't even have my bones. McCoy would laugh if his jaw wasn't clenched tight, further hindering his body's attempts for air.
The roaring in his ears gets louder and then the booth turns off again. He can tell from the smug look on Pike's face and the almost desperate way that Kirk is looking at him that Kirk gave in, gave Pike whatever the hell it is he wants.
“Dammit, Jim,” he says, but it comes out mangled with the searing pain in his throat. McCoy coughs, rolling onto his side. He sees Pike and Number One leave out of the corner of his eye, hears the heavy thunk of Kirk's restraints falling to the marble floor, and McCoy closes his eyes, trying to will his body still and back under his own control.
Fucking booths, he thinks, hearing a hiss of releasing pressure, and then there's an arm hefting him upright.
“Come on, Bones, we have to get back to the ship.”
It feels like forever to McCoy for them to get out of the palace, to get to where the transporter can get a lock on them. “I'd rather go back in the booth,” McCoy grumbles when Kirk comms Scotty with the order to beam up two.
“You must be feeling better already,” Kirk comments as their particles disassemble.
+
McCoy jolts awake to fingers running through his hair. He's been on edge since they returned to the Enterprise, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
The touch is cool and not quite familiar, still strange with its inhuman strength, but it's accompanied by a breathing pattern he recognizes even before the voice. “Shh, Bones. Go back to sleep.”
He can't remember getting to the captain's quarters, and he's not sure why Kirk's still dressed and McCoy isn't, why his head's resting on Kirk's thigh instead of a pillow, but there's comfort in the darkness, in the sound of the Enterprise's engines at full warp as they put as much space as possible between themselves and Terra.
McCoy drifts, letting his body sleep off the lingering effects of the agony booth.
+
The live broadcast takes over every channel and is repeated during the news broadcasts for weeks on end.
“This is Admiral Christopher Pike. Kodos is dead; I am the emperor now.”
+
Convalescence
+
Bones kills Lieutenant Henderson in the crew mess, an efficient slice across his throat that sends arterial spray into the stew of the man sitting next to him. Kirk knows even though he hadn't been there to see it; he wouldn't be a very good captain if he didn't know, but it's a little disappointing that he didn't get to watch. There's just something really fucking hot about Bones using all that surgical precision when he intends to be lethal, the complete lack of hesitation marks when he uses a blade.
Henderson had been one of Pike's students. Bones, it seems, can't trust any of them, especially the ones with bridge access.
“You'll have to kill everyone that's been on since Vulcan was destroyed,” Kirk says in his ready room, spinning in his chair like a kid in a candy store, which he may as well be since that's what the Enterprise is to him. “That's about one hundred people, Bones, and some of them might wise up and try to kill you before you can get to them.”
Bones is standing on the other side of the desk, eyebrows twitching like he just wants Kirk to get to the point. “Are you telling me to stop?”
Kirk smiles. He'd been hoping Bones would have caught on by now, but he's willing to wait for that moment when it all dawns on him. “I'm telling you that it's unnecessary.”
“You really expect me to believe that Pike will just let us get away with it?”
So maybe he is going to have to spell it all out for Bones. Or at least lead him to the answer so the man can be a little less paranoid. “I know you weren't in the right state of might to pay attention at the time, but we did make a deal.” Kirk stands, crossing his desk to be directly in front of Bones, who doesn't seem assured in the least. Kirk leans against the desk, hooking his fingers in the sash at Bones' waist to draw him closer. “I let him claim the throne, and I got to keep my ship. Neither of us are allowed back on Terra again, but I prefer space anyway.”
Kirk can see the exact moment it all clicks for Bones, and it makes him smile even wider. “You...” Bones is staring at him with his mouth gaping, and Kirk can't resist leaning forward to bite his bottom lip. Bones brings his arm up, pushing Kirk away. “You wanted this to happen,” Bones accuses.
“You're the one that said we could control the empire, Bones. Just wait until Pike figures it out - he'll be in our back pockets.” He puts his bionic arm around the back of Bones' neck, pulling him close again. “Why the hell would I want to be the emperor, feared by the Terra-bound lower classes, when I can remain captain of the flagship and be feared by every sentient in the universe? Pike's power will barely reach beyond the Sol system. With the Enterprise, we have so much more.”
Kirk doesn't say anything, letting it sink in. Bones couldn't have thought that Kirk actually wanted the empire. He just liked the chance to prove that he could overthrow it, and he had. He watches Bones' face, sees the questioning glare slowly fade into Bones' default cantankerousness.
“You're a son of a bitch, you know that?” Bones snarls, and Kirk just grins at him, still riding the thrill of victory at proving all of them wrong.
Now the Kirk name will be said with a mixture of fear and awe instead of blatant mockery.
This time when Kirk captures Bones' mouth with his own, he isn't pushed away. Kirk sits on the desk, reveling in the feeling of Bones' fingers working at his sash and then the fly of his pants. Bones' lips are red and swollen when he backs away, the sight of him sending the heady rush of arousal through Kirk's veins along with the sheer adrenaline of victory.
Kirk's too impatient from delaying this for days to let Bones do more than jerk him a few times before he's pulling Bones' pants down, needing the sharp bite of cold metal edges in his skin as Bones fucks him into the desk.
He wraps his legs around Bones' back, Kirk laughing as he thumbs the scar that runs across Bones' face with the hand that had caused it. “I told you that none of them would be able to stop us.”
Illness
+
McCoy is on the observation deck, staring out at the hodgepodge fleet that is made up of the Enterprise along with the Klingon and Cardassian ships.
“I don't know how you did it,” McCoy says, still facing the window, and he can sense Kirk moving closer even though he can't hear his footsteps.
“I don't know how you've brought me back from the brink of death so many times, but it doesn't mean I question it,” is Kirk's answer, and it makes McCoy smile sardonically.
“Careful, Jim, or I might think you're talking about faith.”
He feels Kirk press forward against him, can feel that Kirk's cock is hard between them, and doesn't even pretend to resist when Kirk's hands move to McCoy's front to undo his pants, reaching through the fabric to slowly caress McCoy's dick.
“This is what you wanted, isn't it?” Kirk asks, voice low in McCoy's ear. “You wanted to see the empire burn only to rise stronger from the ashes.”
McCoy grinds his hips, creating more friction for the both of them. He turns his face towards Kirk's. “It still hasn't happened yet, darling.”
The endearment sets a snarl loose from Kirk as he roughly spins McCoy, slamming his back against the window. He tugs their pants and underwear down to their knees before surging forward, rubbing their cocks together and biting at McCoy's lips until he gives into the kiss, gasping into Kirk's mouth when he takes them both in his right hand.
McCoy feels two of Kirk's fingers from his left hand between their mouths, the digits getting wet from the kiss, and McCoy spreads his legs wider, leaning further into the window so Kirk can step closer into him. Kirk removes his fingers, reaching between McCoy's legs to have the spit-soaked pads circle and tease at McCoy's entrance before penetrating him, fucking in and out until McCoy's muscles relax, and only then does he curl them to glide against McCoy's prostate, McCoy hitting the back of his head against the window as he tries to push himself both onto Kirk's fingers in his ass and into the hand on his cock.
There's that momentary pull at his stomach as the Enterprise goes into warp, the spike in adrenaline sending McCoy's body into an orgasm. Kirk pulls his fingers out, jerking himself quickly, and when he also comes, the stars that are streaking by behind McCoy are reflected in Kirk's eyes, which are open wide in anticipation of the destruction they are about to unleash on the empire.
It's only a matter of time now.
+
Sickbay is kept on battle alert even though they haven't reached the Sol system yet. McCoy's still waiting for those who are loyal to the current emperor to make their move, to try and get to any of the senior bridge crew like McCoy suspects Lieutenant Harding would have if he and Chekov hadn't gotten to him first.
The entire ship goes into yellow alert once they cross into the Alpha Quadrant. The Enterprise has been in communications silence with the Imperial Fleet since their arrival at Qo'nos, and while McCoy doubts the admiralty will be willing to publicly admit that they've lost their flagship, he knows there's likely been a reward posted for any ship that comes across the Enterprise's warp signature.
McCoy's going over with his staff the roles each and every one of them is going to play once they drop out of warp when he sees Chapel going for the blade strapped to her leg just below the hem of her skirt out of the corner of his eye. He follows her gaze to see the chemist who had tried to kill him in his own sickbay, her hair growing back in irregularly, dragging a dead command ensign.
“He spoke to me about mutiny,” she says, eyes and voice steady. She drops his dead weight to the ground, and the blood still spurting from the wound across his femoral artery has McCoy wondering if the ensign had been on his way to the bridge just now when he'd been stopped.
McCoy points to the nearest orderly. “Take the body from Lieutenant Moreau and dispose of it.”
The orderly responds with a, “Yes, sir,” that McCoy only half-hears. His attention is instead focused on Moreau, waiting for her to make her next move, but all she does is hold his gaze before saluting and leaving sickbay.
Chapel's hand relaxes, and they get back to their preparations.
+
“We're going to drop our speed, let the Klingons and Cardassians arrive first.” Kirk's lying naked on his stomach, propped up on his elbows to watch McCoy go over the thin cuts on his back and shoulders with a dermal regenerator. “At 1300 hours, I want you there.”
McCoy slides down so he's straddling Kirk's thighs to work on his lower back. “I need to be in sickbay.”
“I can make it an order,” Kirk says, his tone laced with an underlying threat that has McCoy leaning over to bite Kirk's shoulder, worrying the skin with teeth and tongue until Kirk's breath starts to stutter. “You'll be there,” he keens, and it isn't a question.
Kirk writhes as McCoy slides further down his body, biting and sucking down each of Kirk's vertebrae, using his hands to hold Kirk's hips steady, following Kirk's spine until he reaches the end of his coccyx and moves his hands from holding Kirk down to holding him open, spreading open his ass cheeks to lathe at his entrance. He can feel Kirk quivering under and around him, and McCoy knows with certainty that he's the only one who has seen Kirk like this, the only one Kirk would ever allow to.
McCoy reaches between Kirk's pelvis and the mattress to grasp his cock, synchronizing the movements of his hand with that of his tongue, drowning himself in Kirk to push away the sense of foreboding that is tomorrow, when either of them could be killed in the heat of battle.
It's been so long since Pike had forced the two of them to keep each other alive with a clause in their files that meant more to McCoy than his marriage ever had.
“Bones,” Kirk groans as he arches his ass closer to McCoy's face like he needs McCoy's tongue to penetrate him even deeper. “Bones, just fuck me already.”
Nearly a decade that our lives have been intertwined, McCoy thinks once his cock is fully seated in Kirk's body. His thrusts are steady, pressing against Kirk's perineum with one hand to stimulate his prostate from both sides while the other still jerks him off, Kirk's dick still sticky from the orgasm he'd had earlier when McCoy was cutting into his flesh.
“I'm going with you,” McCoy growls, his thought of I'm dying with you left unsaid. “When you beam down to Paris, I'm coming too.”
“Only if you're - shit - there tomorrow.” Kirk has his hands fisted into the sheets, ripping holes in the fabric, his ankles hooked around McCoy's.
McCoy pulls out, moving away so he's kneeling on the bed, and drags Kirk back with him, his fingers resting in the middle of Kirk's chest as puts his thighs on either side of McCoy's before lowering himself onto McCoy's cock, his back and neck curving into McCoy.
Neither of them are sentimental enough to comment on what this means, how this is very possibly their last night together, but McCoy thinks it anyway, and he's certain that Kirk does, too, when he reaches his left hand back to tangle in McCoy's hair, forcing him to turn his head so their mouths press together into a kiss that's nothing more than lips clumsily stroking, brushing and sliding together, as they pant heavily into each other.
McCoy presses his face into Kirk's neck, able to feel his pulse thrumming just under the surface of his skin, and he licks it, trying to taste the flush as he wipes away Kirk's sweat with his tongue. He bites at the apex of jaw and throat, sucking in a bruise that he'll just have to heal later, but in the meantime he wants Kirk to be able to see it when he looks in the mirror.
With a moan and a buck of his hips, Kirk comes in McCoy's hand, his entire body tightening as he rides out his release, and it tips McCoy over the edge right along with him.
+
McCoy's on the bridge when they drop out of warp within firing range of Terra.
The Klingon and Cardassian ships seem to be everywhere, battling the Terran fleet, and it's just sheer chaos with all the burning wreckage and the lights of weapons fire.
“Captain, we're being hailed by every Imperial ship and the capital.” Uhura's flipping through channels as Sulu coaxes the Enterprise into performing this tight spiraling maneuver that gets them away from the flaming debris of what looks like the ISS Avenger's disc.
McCoy's wondering how Kirk managed to threaten each and every one of them that his bridge crew isn't questioning the fact that they aren't getting shot at by any Cardassian or Klingon ships and neither has Kirk given the order to engage in the battle.
“Put me through to all channels,” Kirk pauses like he's mulling something over. “Audio only, Lieutenant.”
Kirk rises to stand in front of his chair, cutting an intimidating figure out the bridge even though the emperor can't see him. “This is Captain Kirk of the ISS Enterprise. I've made a deal with the regent of the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance that ensures the future of the Terran Empire. Step down, and I will give the command to stop the attack. Anyone who opposes me will become slaves of the alliance as part of our deal, and, your majesty,” Kirk's voice lowers to a deadly calm, “I'll come and kill you myself.”
“It seems as though we'll be meeting face-to-face, then, Captain,” the emperor responds, and if he had planned on saying anything more, Kirk signals for Uhura to cut off the transmission before he gets the chance.
“Bones, Spock, come with me. Uhura, you have the conn. I want a list of every ship that surrenders to the Enterprise along with their acting captains.”
“Yes, sir,” Uhura responds, masking any surprise she might be feeling.
They take a turbolift down to the armory; Kirk grabs a phaser rifle from where it’s mounted on the wall and hands it to McCoy.
For a Vulcan, Spock doesn't do nearly as good a job at hiding his surprise. “Captain, I strongly recommend that you consider taking a security team.”
“I'm not taking anyone with uncertain loyalties, and yes, Spock, that includes you. I haven't forgotten that you kill me in another universe, and even with the older you being here to let us know what a shitty decision that was, I still can't trust you.” Kirk takes a phaser pistol for himself, strapping a thigh holster to his leg as he speaks. “I want Uhura to keep receiving all surrenders, but you'll be giving orders to the alliance until we return.”
Spock quirks an eyebrow, and McCoy has to tamper the urge to try and slap it off of his face. “Hypothetically speaking, Captain, but I could give the order for the alliance to continue firing on Terra, particularly the Imperial Palace, while you and Doctor McCoy are on the surface.”
“That's the idea, Spock,” Kirk replies, looking mildly amused that he has to spell this out for his first officer. “If you kill me on Terra, there won't be any witnesses, and you could get away with it. If you give the order on my ship in front of my crew, however...” He trails off, and McCoy's not sure how much of an imagination Spock has, but his own is trying to decide if it would be Sulu or Chekov that would get to the Vulcan first, and which of them would do it out of loyalty and which out of his own desire to rise in the ranks.
McCoy follows Kirk out of the armory, leaving Spock behind as they head for the transporter room. He checks over the weapon as they walk, hoping that Kirk knows what the hell he's doing. McCoy doesn't believe the honor codes these Cardassians and Klingons claim to live by, but he just needs to do what he's always done - everything in his power to keep Kirk and himself alive.
+
Paris is burning when they beam down, but McCoy hadn't expected anything else considering that the Enterprise is in orbit and had been firing at the city. The emperor had refused to hand himself over and give up his position, so Kirk is having everything around his palace systematically destroyed.
Kirk's attempt at symbolism is not lost on McCoy. Sometimes the forest needs to be burned in order for a better one to grow. It's just the way things are.
McCoy adjusts the phaser rifle in his grip, but no one threatens them or even bats an eye. Everyone's running, concerned about saving themselves as they try to find safety or any sort of shelter even though it's been a few minutes since the Enterprise last fired a shot. The air is still rife with the scent of burning flesh, though, and if he takes a minute to look in the rubble, McCoy can see bodies charred like roasted pigs.
There's no trouble until they reach the Imperial Palace. Kirk hacks the main gate's security system easily enough, and all it takes to get by the starved guard dogs is to leave one of the palace's security personnel struggling to get away after McCoy shoots his leg off below the knee. The dogs howl at the smell of fresh blood, and McCoy can hear the snarling and screaming and the sound of muscle tearing under teeth, but they move quickly.
Kirk draws his phaser pistol once they've reached the main building, and they shove through the large double doors at the same time, scanning with their weapons but the entryway is completely empty.
“Where the fuck is everyone?” McCoy's imagining bombs hidden in the palace walls to be set off once they're far enough inside. It's too damn quiet, and it's setting him on edge. Kirk doesn't answer him, though; he just continues onward with deadly focus.
They check rooms as they move, but every one that McCoy looks into is empty. They reach a huge marble staircase with two bodies slumped at the bottom. Both are dressed in red.
Kirk gets to them first, kicking the closest body as if to make sure it really is dead. “Bones,” he calls, then motions for McCoy to join him.
Both men are bleeding out of every orifice, their bodies rigid in death as if they'd died in wracking pain. The blood is still seeping out of them; they haven't been dead for very long. McCoy bets the bodies are still warm, but he's not going to touch them to find out.
“Calicivirus tablets,” McCoy says, both admiring the work of the virus and disturbed by how impersonal a death it is. “Stainless steel capsules get injected in the body and release the virus once the code is given. Death is painful and in a matter of minutes.”
Kirk almost looks impressed. “So the emperor kills his personal staff before one of them decides to pick the opposite side in a coup.” He looks up the stairs and around at the floor above him. “That means he's still here.”
McCoy lets Kirk lead. Neither of them have been in the palace before, but McCoy doesn't doubt that Kirk has the floor plans committed to memory. Everyone they pass is dead and in a puddle of their own blood, even people who look like they were kitchen staff, maids, and the emperor's personal shuttle pilot.
They enter the throne room, McCoy raising the rifle and automatically training it on the figure standing in front of the floor-length windows, watching Paris burn.
“Little Jimmy Kirk,” the emperor begins, and even if McCoy can't see his face, he recognizes the voice easily enough. “I'm honestly surprised that you grew into the man you are now. I might not have listed you for execution had I known.”
McCoy forces his face to remain impassive but only to not give the emperor any ammunition. He feels like he's lost his footing suddenly; he has no idea what's going on. How the hell does Kirk know the emperor?
He turns from the window to look back and forth between Kirk and McCoy. “I've heard stories about your pet doctor, Jimmy. Has he heard your stories about me?” Kirk's stony silence seems to be answer enough. “You see, Doctor, Jimmy and I go way back, back to when I was the governor of a little colony that had a special school for breaking in problem children and making them good citizens of the empire.”
McCoy had been nineteen when Empress Sato was murdered and Kodos took over, so he remembered the genocide clearly. It had been the only time in recent history of Terrans wiping each other out instead of lower humanoid species. Kodos had been hailed as a hero for ordering the deaths of four thousand colonists in order for the rest of them to survive until the Imperial Fleet arrived and evacuated Tarsus IV.
He had no idea that Kirk had been on Tarsus.
McCoy glances over at Kirk, who's standing within arm's reach so McCoy can see that dangerous shark smile he gets when there's blood about to be shed that isn't his own. His phaser is lowered, his stance wide. “I've been waiting nearly twenty years for this, Kodos.”
Kirk drops the phaser and lunges, not for Kodos, but for McCoy, going for the blade McCoy keeps strapped to his thigh and throwing it with the bionic arm, its freakish strength providing enough momentum for the knife to clear the distance between them before embedding in Kodos' chest. There's the hiss of air, the blade perforating Kodos' lung.
Kirk's running as Kodos is pulling the knife out of his own chest, and Kodos is too old, Kirk too fast, for him to get the knife turned and raised against Kirk before Kirk is slapping it out of Kodos' hand.
McCoy watches with a white knuckle grip on the rifle, ready to kill the emperor if Kirk gives the word, but it doesn't happen. Kirk leans forward into Kodos, and McCoy can't tell what's happening until he sees the sword, a symbol of the position of emperor, sticking out of Kodos' back. Kodos slumps to his knees, gurgling on his own blood, as Kirk pulls away, bringing the sword with him.
McCoy doesn't get the satisfaction of watching Emperor Kodos take his last shuddering breath as there's a sudden flare of pain in his back and then darkness.
+
It takes McCoy a minute to register where he is when he comes to. He's familiar with the setting but not with feeling absolutely nothing in it, but in the Empire there is very little variation in the design of the agony booths. There's no point in changing something once it's been perfected, and if the Imperial Fleets doctors have perfected anything, it's how to inflict the maximum amount of pain drawn out for as long as possible.
He's in the booth, crumpled in a half-sitting position like he had just been dumped in here, but it isn't on. McCoy can see the row of booths lined up to his right, and he bets there's more to his left, but he's unwilling to turn his head just yet, not wanting his captors to know if he's awake. But he needs to know where Kirk is, what happened to him, or if he is also dead in the throne room with Emperor Kodos.
McCoy hears the whine of a machine powering up before his nerves are screaming in pain, muscles spasming under the onslaught, and he bites down on his tongue until he tastes blood to keep himself from yelling in pain.
“Wake up, McCoy,” commands a voice that he would recognize anywhere. The booth is shut off, his body going limp.
McCoy forces himself away from the back wall of the booth so he can stand and face Admiral Pike. “What the hell do you want?” McCoy snaps, his own blood spraying against the glass in front of him as he speaks. Now that he's standing he can feel a tightness of the skin between his scapula like he'd been burned, but agony booths don't literally burn you or cause any external damage at all.
Stunned by a phaser, he realizes. He'd been so focused on Kirk that he hadn't even registered anyone else entering the room.
McCoy can't help but notice how Pike isn't using the cane anymore, just has it to be intentionally misleading, and he also can't help but feel like there should be some goddamn common courtesy about not torturing the doctor who saved your life.
Pike just smirks, shifting to grab his communicator off his belt. “Number One, he's awake.”
“Yes, sir,” responds a woman's voice before Pike puts his communicator aside.
“We'll just wait for your other half, shall we?” Pike says, leaning against his cane. He's twisting the pommel on it, the end that McCoy knows untwists to unsheathe a sword hidden inside. Pike had always tended towards the dramatic, but McCoy doesn't say as much, even if he'd like to. He doesn't need Pike turning on the booth before he can gauge the situation.
Kirk is shoved into the room by a severely beautiful woman holding a phaser at his back. She's smart enough to not holding it against him, though, to give him the ability to feel where it is and try to disarm her accordingly. Kirk's hands are bound behind his back with metal cuffs that are covering most of his forearms, ones that are fused together instead of connected by a chain that Kirk would have no problem breaking with his bionic arm.
He wonders how they knew, who it had been on the Enterprise reporting back to Pike, telling him about Kirk's new and improved arm. Even in the booth McCoy can smell the blood and sweat in the air, Kirk's face moist and pale, and only when Kirk twists his torso does McCoy notice that the skin graft has been cut off of his forearm. What's left is covering Kirk's right hand like a morbid glove, the tissue no longer pink and healthy now that it's been cut off of the blood source that McCoy had extended with regenerators from the rest of Kirk's arm.
McCoy's heard of Number One or at least the rumors around her, how she had no name until Pike gave her one. There's parallels to him and Kirk in that, McCoy supposes, but he had a reputation of his own even before Kirk had dubbed him Bones.
Even though she's a captain now, she still goes by her previous title.
McCoy bares his teeth when he sees his rifle slung across her back, mocking him with his failure at actually watching the damn doors like he should have been.
He catches Kirk's gaze on him, completely unreadable, which makes McCoy relax a little, crossing his arms across his chest and adapting a more intimidating stance. Kirk still thinks he's in control here, and McCoy has no reason to doubt him yet.
There's blood all over Kirk's bare arms and uniform, his gold vest stained brown and still wet in places, but it doesn't look like any of it is from his own injuries. Aside from the straining angle his shoulders are at, Kirk looks unharmed.
Whatever Pike is here for, it seems like he doesn't want them dead, at least not right away.
Number One forces Kirk down so he's kneeling in front of Pike. Pike grabs him by the jaw, forcing Kirk's gaze to lock with his own instead of keeping his eyes trained on McCoy.
“McCoy asked me an interesting question before you arrived,” Pike says, releasing his grip on Kirk once he seems satisfied that he has his attention. McCoy can't see the expression on Kirk's face from the angle he's at, but he can see Pike's and Number One's faces clearly. “He wanted to know what the hell I want.”
Pike destroys any chance of acting the cripple for Kirk when he shifts his balance, kicking out to hit Kirk squarely in the ribs, knocking him to the ground. Pike has his sword out and at Kirk's neck before Kirk can retaliate, and McCoy can tell that he was going to, can see the tension in Kirk's arms and legs.
“I wanted the Enterprise,” Pike hisses through his teeth. “She was supposed to be mine. Why else do you think I wouldn't just let you two kill each other? I made a deal that I would assemble the best crew to get the best ship. And then you,” he kicks Kirk again, “took her away from me.” He shifts his focus to McCoy, eyes narrowing. “And you made sure I lived to see it.”
The agony booth is turned back on, stronger this time, knocking McCoy's legs out from under him, making him twitch and writhe as it activates nerves, his body trying to get away from the pain but finding no relief in any direction. The body doesn't know what to do when it can't fall back on fight or flight.
McCoy finds himself in the fetal position when the booth is turned off. The large muscles in his legs are still jerking, and he feels like he's going to throw up, but McCoy forces himself to think about the effects of rapid dehydration and how that will kill him faster, take away most of his fight.
He forces himself into a sitting position, and McCoy can see that Kirk has risen to his feet but his hands are still bound together.
“I'm well within my rights to kill the both of you right now,” Pike is saying. “You murdered the emperor and have been working with the Klingons and Cardassians, races that we know are plotting to take over the Terran Empire and enslave her people. Give me what I want, and you'll be pardoned.”
“No,” Kirk seethes, sending McCoy back into a dark place where there's a roaring in his ears that might be his own screaming and all he knows is pain.
The setting is higher this time, he can tell. He knows precisely which effect each has on all sorts of humanoid forms, both from personal experience and from what he's watched, what he's inflicted. McCoy can hardly breathe as his diaphragm doesn't draw air into his lungs, the muscles in his throat choking, and there are spots of light dancing in front of his eyes.
Level nine, he knows, will kill a man in five minutes. The next setting is the highest, and it will kill him in about a minute, but in that minute his cell membranes will dissolve until he's nothing more than a puddle of remains.
And then I won't even have my bones. McCoy would laugh if his jaw wasn't clenched tight, further hindering his body's attempts for air.
The roaring in his ears gets louder and then the booth turns off again. He can tell from the smug look on Pike's face and the almost desperate way that Kirk is looking at him that Kirk gave in, gave Pike whatever the hell it is he wants.
“Dammit, Jim,” he says, but it comes out mangled with the searing pain in his throat. McCoy coughs, rolling onto his side. He sees Pike and Number One leave out of the corner of his eye, hears the heavy thunk of Kirk's restraints falling to the marble floor, and McCoy closes his eyes, trying to will his body still and back under his own control.
Fucking booths, he thinks, hearing a hiss of releasing pressure, and then there's an arm hefting him upright.
“Come on, Bones, we have to get back to the ship.”
It feels like forever to McCoy for them to get out of the palace, to get to where the transporter can get a lock on them. “I'd rather go back in the booth,” McCoy grumbles when Kirk comms Scotty with the order to beam up two.
“You must be feeling better already,” Kirk comments as their particles disassemble.
+
McCoy jolts awake to fingers running through his hair. He's been on edge since they returned to the Enterprise, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
The touch is cool and not quite familiar, still strange with its inhuman strength, but it's accompanied by a breathing pattern he recognizes even before the voice. “Shh, Bones. Go back to sleep.”
He can't remember getting to the captain's quarters, and he's not sure why Kirk's still dressed and McCoy isn't, why his head's resting on Kirk's thigh instead of a pillow, but there's comfort in the darkness, in the sound of the Enterprise's engines at full warp as they put as much space as possible between themselves and Terra.
McCoy drifts, letting his body sleep off the lingering effects of the agony booth.
+
The live broadcast takes over every channel and is repeated during the news broadcasts for weeks on end.
“This is Admiral Christopher Pike. Kodos is dead; I am the emperor now.”
+
Convalescence
+
Bones kills Lieutenant Henderson in the crew mess, an efficient slice across his throat that sends arterial spray into the stew of the man sitting next to him. Kirk knows even though he hadn't been there to see it; he wouldn't be a very good captain if he didn't know, but it's a little disappointing that he didn't get to watch. There's just something really fucking hot about Bones using all that surgical precision when he intends to be lethal, the complete lack of hesitation marks when he uses a blade.
Henderson had been one of Pike's students. Bones, it seems, can't trust any of them, especially the ones with bridge access.
“You'll have to kill everyone that's been on since Vulcan was destroyed,” Kirk says in his ready room, spinning in his chair like a kid in a candy store, which he may as well be since that's what the Enterprise is to him. “That's about one hundred people, Bones, and some of them might wise up and try to kill you before you can get to them.”
Bones is standing on the other side of the desk, eyebrows twitching like he just wants Kirk to get to the point. “Are you telling me to stop?”
Kirk smiles. He'd been hoping Bones would have caught on by now, but he's willing to wait for that moment when it all dawns on him. “I'm telling you that it's unnecessary.”
“You really expect me to believe that Pike will just let us get away with it?”
So maybe he is going to have to spell it all out for Bones. Or at least lead him to the answer so the man can be a little less paranoid. “I know you weren't in the right state of might to pay attention at the time, but we did make a deal.” Kirk stands, crossing his desk to be directly in front of Bones, who doesn't seem assured in the least. Kirk leans against the desk, hooking his fingers in the sash at Bones' waist to draw him closer. “I let him claim the throne, and I got to keep my ship. Neither of us are allowed back on Terra again, but I prefer space anyway.”
Kirk can see the exact moment it all clicks for Bones, and it makes him smile even wider. “You...” Bones is staring at him with his mouth gaping, and Kirk can't resist leaning forward to bite his bottom lip. Bones brings his arm up, pushing Kirk away. “You wanted this to happen,” Bones accuses.
“You're the one that said we could control the empire, Bones. Just wait until Pike figures it out - he'll be in our back pockets.” He puts his bionic arm around the back of Bones' neck, pulling him close again. “Why the hell would I want to be the emperor, feared by the Terra-bound lower classes, when I can remain captain of the flagship and be feared by every sentient in the universe? Pike's power will barely reach beyond the Sol system. With the Enterprise, we have so much more.”
Kirk doesn't say anything, letting it sink in. Bones couldn't have thought that Kirk actually wanted the empire. He just liked the chance to prove that he could overthrow it, and he had. He watches Bones' face, sees the questioning glare slowly fade into Bones' default cantankerousness.
“You're a son of a bitch, you know that?” Bones snarls, and Kirk just grins at him, still riding the thrill of victory at proving all of them wrong.
Now the Kirk name will be said with a mixture of fear and awe instead of blatant mockery.
This time when Kirk captures Bones' mouth with his own, he isn't pushed away. Kirk sits on the desk, reveling in the feeling of Bones' fingers working at his sash and then the fly of his pants. Bones' lips are red and swollen when he backs away, the sight of him sending the heady rush of arousal through Kirk's veins along with the sheer adrenaline of victory.
Kirk's too impatient from delaying this for days to let Bones do more than jerk him a few times before he's pulling Bones' pants down, needing the sharp bite of cold metal edges in his skin as Bones fucks him into the desk.
He wraps his legs around Bones' back, Kirk laughing as he thumbs the scar that runs across Bones' face with the hand that had caused it. “I told you that none of them would be able to stop us.”