[Fic] A Fucking Greek Tragedy (M) - Part III
Because dammit, this wouldn't leave me alone!
( Part II)
Part III - Theseus
[ Olduvai - Hall 356.B ]
Reaper knew they should have taken a left.
The map was old, and didn’t include any changes to the original structure that had been implemented over the twenty-some years it had been operational. If they turned left instead of right, they could bypass a lot of annoying, vulnerable crosswalks and intersections, as well as not having to worry about the rusting framework as much. Also, it smelled better to Reaper’s nose, meaning there were fewer corpses that way.
Bones didn’t know this, no possible way that Bones would know that there were changes to the base, didn’t have the training to be able to note the subtle differences in architecture, didn’t have the advanced senses to lead them. Bones was a normal human surgeon, if a somewhat brilliant one, from Georgia who couldn’t fight if his life depended on it.
It made John wish that he had thought that part of his persona out a little bit more, especially after joining Starfleet.
Regardless, Jim had clearly stated that they were in no position to go traipsing around unmapped halls in the dark, and that was that. In any other situation, in any other place, Leonard would have jokingly accused him of miraculously managing to pick up a modicum of common sense. This was Olduvai, however, and John was cursing the disappearance of his CO’s brashness.
They passed the monkey that had scared the shit out of Destroyer. John couldn’t help it: he smirked as he recalled just how flustered and embarrassed Destroyer had been when he realized that he’s been scared shitless and emptied half a round on a damned monkey.
“Bones?” McCoy snapped out of John’s gaze, schooling his face into a customary scowl once more. Jim was looking more than a little concerned that he was smiling (Bones? Smiling? Poor kid must be traumatized) at the sight of a withered monkey. “You okay there?”
“Just remembering,” he coughed to clear his throat. He’d started talking like John again. “Just rememberin’ something from way back,” he pulled out his tricorder to scan the monkey, a legitimate enough excuse to avoid looking at Jim in the eyes. He idly tried to think of a Handle ID for the kid. Suddenly remembering a shot to the throat (IT WAS HIS FIRST MISSION!!!) he came crashing back to reality. He didn’t have to fake his grim attitude anymore. “Friend of mine, big ol’ tough guy, was scared shitless by one of these things. Never lived it down.”
“Doctor,” Ensign Brennan furrowed his brow when he too scanned the monkey. “Doctor McCoy, these readings don’t make any sense. Its glutamate and acetylcholine levels are off the chart, and it has a higher number of 5-HT2 receptors. It’s too deteriorated to get an accurate reading on its genetic composition, but what I am able to decipher doesn’t seem possible.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” Jim may be a tactical genius with a gift for engineering and physics on a level that he could almost hold his own against Scotty and Chekov, but he was no geneticist or neuroscientist. McCoy was all that and more.
“What he means is that this thing’s brain and body has been rewired to make it stronger, faster, and more aggressive than Spock after a ‘your Mom’ joke.” Even stick-up-his-ass Ensign Sora’s lips twitched into a smile at the joke. Jim groaned that it was only one time, dammit, stop bringing it up! “I’ve been looking at the DNA too. A shit load of genetic markers were active in a way I’ve never seen before.”
“Genetic mutation.” The Captain’s eyes grew dark and calculating at one of the Ensign’s statements.
“I don’t think so,” Jim said, his voice low and thoughtful. It made the hairs on Leonard’s arms raise pleasantly. “Not exactly. Two plus two still equals four. We’re in a lab, gentlemen. Labs plus mutated animals smells suspiciously like genetic experimentation, don’t you think?”
“Jesus Christ.” Finnegan made a vague crossing motion over himself in a way that smacked of Goat. It threatened to let Reaper to the forefront again, sending an itch to John’s fingers, making them ache to hold the G36 assault rifle hidden in his (suspiciously large) medical bag. Jim flips out his communicator, beeping as it searches for the right frequency.
“Kirk to Enterprise, do you read me?” There are a few seconds of silence before they get an answer.
“Spock here, Captain.” McCoy lets out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding in. Their communicators still worked. At the rate those things had cut out on other missions, he thanked whatever god was deemed responsible for him for this small blessing.
“Spock, I need you to dig up anything and everything about UAC and their projects on Olduvai. Archeology, research, weapons development, everything.”
“Captain, you have already been given all pertinent information on the base’s operations available at this time.” Jim grumbled under his breath,
“Listen Spock, I’m starting to think that there’s been some weird shit going on over here that UAC would’ve been all too glad to have ‘disappeared’ during the war. There’s gotta be something. Old government files, research notes, something.” There was a pause as Spock considered what the Captain said.
“Of course. I shall endeavor to find out as discretely as possible. I will contact you when I have more information.” Jim’s face lit up with a grin.
“That’s great to hear. Kirk out.”
“We should keep moving,” McCoy insists, letting the tricorder rest in its pouch slung over his shoulder. “The sooner we get the hell out of here, the better.” Jim grins cheekily at him, patting McCoy’s shoulder in an infuriatingly unsatisfying way. McCoy should probably be bothered by how much that bothers him (or rather, how not bothered he is by Jim’s touch, despite being the furthest things from a ‘touchy-feely’ person) but this is neither the time nor the place.
“Good idea Bones.” John’s starting to think that ‘Brat’ would be an appropriate Handle ID. Not that he’s going to give him one, of course. This is entirely hypothetically speaking. Dammit McCoy, he shouts at himself. You’re a professional, not some hormone-driven teenager! John and Leonard both know that Jim is attractive. Even if he was blind (which is physically impossible, but moving on) he’d still know that the Brat was gorgeous. He’s genius, he’s brash, he’s a damned infant and an idiot, and completely off limits, even without the 24th chromosome.
He’s younger than him, not much, but enough to notice and make him feel every single year of his long life some days. He’s sociable and personally demanding in a way Bones can’t provide. He’s his Commanding Officer, and he’s mortal. John didn’t want to get attached that way. He’s lost too much, too many people to think that he could survive outliving a lover again.
“Cheer up Bones, we’re almost there.” McCoy snaps out of his daze and realizes that they are indeed almost there. Just a few more turns and they’d enter the Genetics Lab. A hop and a skip away from that is the Airlock, the Atrium, then the Arc Room.
The doors are still twisted open when they get there, though far more rusted than John recalls. There is a faint stench of rot coming from the darkened lab, and Reaper remembers the remains of devoured animals and the scientist that was gunned down there.
To their credit, none of the Ensigns or Lieutenants are sick this time around, despite the smell being much more severe. The labs are a mess, gore and upturned furniture and loose papers everywhere, making it tricky not to step or trip on something. More than once, John hears the tinkling of glass being crushed under regulation footwear. He stops to consider the computer terminal in front of him, only to have someone (Jim, he can smell that it’s Jim) bump into him from behind.
“Jesus Bones!” Jim reached out blindly in the gloom, fingers searching blindly for purchase. Bones grabs Jim’s shoulder, and his arm is quickly latched onto. “I can’t see shit over here, and you move as quiet as a fucking cat.” John curses to himself. He’s slipping up far too much.
“Then use a damned light stick like everyone else instead of crashing into me you infant.” He doesn’t point out that McCoy had been without a light stick, and Jim has the courtesy of keeping his mouth shut for once. Leonard rustles through his bad, grabbing what were essentially giant glow sticks, cracking them in his hands before handing one over to Jim. The green-yellow light made the young man’s eyes look more electric than usual.
“Whoa! Is that a computer?” The Brat’s face would look more appropriate on a four year old at Christmas instead of a twenty-something Starfleet captain. “Man, that is ancient! I wonder if we can get it to work.” Bones is practically shoves aside as the man starts fiddling with the antique monitors, wiping dust away and stroking keys, but ultimately unsuccessful in his attempts to revive the old machine.
“Right, no power. Dammit. Hey, what’s that?” Leonard had been inspecting the cages when Jim said this. He saw a glimpse of clear liquid in a vial, the yellow-green light making the substance look as sickly and dangerous as John Grimm knew it to be. In a flash, faster than he was supposed to move, he was by his Captain’s side, hand gripped tight around the outstretched arm.
“Holy shit!” Jim’s hand recoils in surprise when Reaper lets go.
“Don’t. Touch.” The Doctor and the Marine both growl. The gold-shirted man raised his hands in surrender.
“Alright Bonesy, I get it. Don’t touch unknown shit in creepy ass labs.” He smiles at the CMO’s threat to jab him full of hypos and never let him out of his sight again. The Captain leaves and continues helping the rest of the away team with their investigation of the lab, leaving John alone with the computer and the vials. He pries one from its stand and reads the label.
C24. The font is so unassuming it makes him want to either laugh or cry. With the vial in his hand, there are two empty places in the rack and, John thinks grimly, he’s in possession of both of them. One in his blood, the other in his hand.
He hears a crash and a familiar mumble of pained curses coming from further within the lab. McCoy tries not to think of why it is he slips the compound into his medical bag.
( Part IV)
( Part II)
Part III - Theseus
[ Olduvai - Hall 356.B ]
Reaper knew they should have taken a left.
The map was old, and didn’t include any changes to the original structure that had been implemented over the twenty-some years it had been operational. If they turned left instead of right, they could bypass a lot of annoying, vulnerable crosswalks and intersections, as well as not having to worry about the rusting framework as much. Also, it smelled better to Reaper’s nose, meaning there were fewer corpses that way.
Bones didn’t know this, no possible way that Bones would know that there were changes to the base, didn’t have the training to be able to note the subtle differences in architecture, didn’t have the advanced senses to lead them. Bones was a normal human surgeon, if a somewhat brilliant one, from Georgia who couldn’t fight if his life depended on it.
It made John wish that he had thought that part of his persona out a little bit more, especially after joining Starfleet.
Regardless, Jim had clearly stated that they were in no position to go traipsing around unmapped halls in the dark, and that was that. In any other situation, in any other place, Leonard would have jokingly accused him of miraculously managing to pick up a modicum of common sense. This was Olduvai, however, and John was cursing the disappearance of his CO’s brashness.
They passed the monkey that had scared the shit out of Destroyer. John couldn’t help it: he smirked as he recalled just how flustered and embarrassed Destroyer had been when he realized that he’s been scared shitless and emptied half a round on a damned monkey.
“Bones?” McCoy snapped out of John’s gaze, schooling his face into a customary scowl once more. Jim was looking more than a little concerned that he was smiling (Bones? Smiling? Poor kid must be traumatized) at the sight of a withered monkey. “You okay there?”
“Just remembering,” he coughed to clear his throat. He’d started talking like John again. “Just rememberin’ something from way back,” he pulled out his tricorder to scan the monkey, a legitimate enough excuse to avoid looking at Jim in the eyes. He idly tried to think of a Handle ID for the kid. Suddenly remembering a shot to the throat (IT WAS HIS FIRST MISSION!!!) he came crashing back to reality. He didn’t have to fake his grim attitude anymore. “Friend of mine, big ol’ tough guy, was scared shitless by one of these things. Never lived it down.”
“Doctor,” Ensign Brennan furrowed his brow when he too scanned the monkey. “Doctor McCoy, these readings don’t make any sense. Its glutamate and acetylcholine levels are off the chart, and it has a higher number of 5-HT2 receptors. It’s too deteriorated to get an accurate reading on its genetic composition, but what I am able to decipher doesn’t seem possible.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” Jim may be a tactical genius with a gift for engineering and physics on a level that he could almost hold his own against Scotty and Chekov, but he was no geneticist or neuroscientist. McCoy was all that and more.
“What he means is that this thing’s brain and body has been rewired to make it stronger, faster, and more aggressive than Spock after a ‘your Mom’ joke.” Even stick-up-his-ass Ensign Sora’s lips twitched into a smile at the joke. Jim groaned that it was only one time, dammit, stop bringing it up! “I’ve been looking at the DNA too. A shit load of genetic markers were active in a way I’ve never seen before.”
“Genetic mutation.” The Captain’s eyes grew dark and calculating at one of the Ensign’s statements.
“I don’t think so,” Jim said, his voice low and thoughtful. It made the hairs on Leonard’s arms raise pleasantly. “Not exactly. Two plus two still equals four. We’re in a lab, gentlemen. Labs plus mutated animals smells suspiciously like genetic experimentation, don’t you think?”
“Jesus Christ.” Finnegan made a vague crossing motion over himself in a way that smacked of Goat. It threatened to let Reaper to the forefront again, sending an itch to John’s fingers, making them ache to hold the G36 assault rifle hidden in his (suspiciously large) medical bag. Jim flips out his communicator, beeping as it searches for the right frequency.
“Kirk to Enterprise, do you read me?” There are a few seconds of silence before they get an answer.
“Spock here, Captain.” McCoy lets out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding in. Their communicators still worked. At the rate those things had cut out on other missions, he thanked whatever god was deemed responsible for him for this small blessing.
“Spock, I need you to dig up anything and everything about UAC and their projects on Olduvai. Archeology, research, weapons development, everything.”
“Captain, you have already been given all pertinent information on the base’s operations available at this time.” Jim grumbled under his breath,
“Listen Spock, I’m starting to think that there’s been some weird shit going on over here that UAC would’ve been all too glad to have ‘disappeared’ during the war. There’s gotta be something. Old government files, research notes, something.” There was a pause as Spock considered what the Captain said.
“Of course. I shall endeavor to find out as discretely as possible. I will contact you when I have more information.” Jim’s face lit up with a grin.
“That’s great to hear. Kirk out.”
“We should keep moving,” McCoy insists, letting the tricorder rest in its pouch slung over his shoulder. “The sooner we get the hell out of here, the better.” Jim grins cheekily at him, patting McCoy’s shoulder in an infuriatingly unsatisfying way. McCoy should probably be bothered by how much that bothers him (or rather, how not bothered he is by Jim’s touch, despite being the furthest things from a ‘touchy-feely’ person) but this is neither the time nor the place.
“Good idea Bones.” John’s starting to think that ‘Brat’ would be an appropriate Handle ID. Not that he’s going to give him one, of course. This is entirely hypothetically speaking. Dammit McCoy, he shouts at himself. You’re a professional, not some hormone-driven teenager! John and Leonard both know that Jim is attractive. Even if he was blind (which is physically impossible, but moving on) he’d still know that the Brat was gorgeous. He’s genius, he’s brash, he’s a damned infant and an idiot, and completely off limits, even without the 24th chromosome.
He’s younger than him, not much, but enough to notice and make him feel every single year of his long life some days. He’s sociable and personally demanding in a way Bones can’t provide. He’s his Commanding Officer, and he’s mortal. John didn’t want to get attached that way. He’s lost too much, too many people to think that he could survive outliving a lover again.
“Cheer up Bones, we’re almost there.” McCoy snaps out of his daze and realizes that they are indeed almost there. Just a few more turns and they’d enter the Genetics Lab. A hop and a skip away from that is the Airlock, the Atrium, then the Arc Room.
The doors are still twisted open when they get there, though far more rusted than John recalls. There is a faint stench of rot coming from the darkened lab, and Reaper remembers the remains of devoured animals and the scientist that was gunned down there.
To their credit, none of the Ensigns or Lieutenants are sick this time around, despite the smell being much more severe. The labs are a mess, gore and upturned furniture and loose papers everywhere, making it tricky not to step or trip on something. More than once, John hears the tinkling of glass being crushed under regulation footwear. He stops to consider the computer terminal in front of him, only to have someone (Jim, he can smell that it’s Jim) bump into him from behind.
“Jesus Bones!” Jim reached out blindly in the gloom, fingers searching blindly for purchase. Bones grabs Jim’s shoulder, and his arm is quickly latched onto. “I can’t see shit over here, and you move as quiet as a fucking cat.” John curses to himself. He’s slipping up far too much.
“Then use a damned light stick like everyone else instead of crashing into me you infant.” He doesn’t point out that McCoy had been without a light stick, and Jim has the courtesy of keeping his mouth shut for once. Leonard rustles through his bad, grabbing what were essentially giant glow sticks, cracking them in his hands before handing one over to Jim. The green-yellow light made the young man’s eyes look more electric than usual.
“Whoa! Is that a computer?” The Brat’s face would look more appropriate on a four year old at Christmas instead of a twenty-something Starfleet captain. “Man, that is ancient! I wonder if we can get it to work.” Bones is practically shoves aside as the man starts fiddling with the antique monitors, wiping dust away and stroking keys, but ultimately unsuccessful in his attempts to revive the old machine.
“Right, no power. Dammit. Hey, what’s that?” Leonard had been inspecting the cages when Jim said this. He saw a glimpse of clear liquid in a vial, the yellow-green light making the substance look as sickly and dangerous as John Grimm knew it to be. In a flash, faster than he was supposed to move, he was by his Captain’s side, hand gripped tight around the outstretched arm.
“Holy shit!” Jim’s hand recoils in surprise when Reaper lets go.
“Don’t. Touch.” The Doctor and the Marine both growl. The gold-shirted man raised his hands in surrender.
“Alright Bonesy, I get it. Don’t touch unknown shit in creepy ass labs.” He smiles at the CMO’s threat to jab him full of hypos and never let him out of his sight again. The Captain leaves and continues helping the rest of the away team with their investigation of the lab, leaving John alone with the computer and the vials. He pries one from its stand and reads the label.
C24. The font is so unassuming it makes him want to either laugh or cry. With the vial in his hand, there are two empty places in the rack and, John thinks grimly, he’s in possession of both of them. One in his blood, the other in his hand.
He hears a crash and a familiar mumble of pained curses coming from further within the lab. McCoy tries not to think of why it is he slips the compound into his medical bag.
( Part IV)