[ST] Broken Folk 1/6

[castofone]

Desperate But Not Bold

Unknown Planet - September 2272
The purplish sun was setting for the day when he heard it. Or at least when he thought he heard it. That quiet beep echoing through the vast desert plateau shaking him from a nice dream that he couldn’t quite hold onto. (He never could keep the good ones.) It took too much energy to pull himself into a standing position, his muscles shaking as insisting on moving with that sound. And he was awake now, so he couldn’t just lie there.

Jim Kirk knew he was going to die. It was only a matter of days now (and maybe not even that long). Rather than fear, there had been a false sense of peace and hopefulness at least in the simple thought that it would be over soon. Then there was that damn beep again like the ping of the radar when something came into range. There was every possibility that it was just his mind messing with him, but it might just be the shuttle’s radar. And if he were to die, it would be better to die by the shuttle rather than in his sad little rock shelter. Running on empty and powered by something he vaguely remembered as hope, but felt more like annoyance, he stumbled back toward the crash site.

At the very least in a generation or two when some eager ensign came across his remains they might be able to identify the lost body of Captain James Tiberius Kirk, USS Enterprise. But even that was too optimistic for his soggy brain. The more likely reality was that he was just going to waste away to nothing but his bones. (And at least that thought merited a hollow laugh from his cracked lips.) Although there was the possibility that Starfleet would still use his likeliness for the recruitment videos, but that would always be the Jim Kirk who saved Earth and avenged his father’s death nearly fifteen years ago ignoring the bulk of his career and not the man he had become or even truly was. That man would be forgotten.

Each footfall became heavier, his bones like lead sinking further into the scorched ground. All he wanted to do was sleep and never wake up, but the continuous beeping compelled him to keep going just a little bit further.

With a sigh that sounded more like a death moan his legs finally gave out from under him. The beeping was still there, steadier now like the monitors in sickbay. Maybe if he closed his eyes he could hear Bones there too.

“But there’s no one else, kid. Hasn’t been anyone else in a while and I don’t think there will be ever.” The voice was just as solemn as had it been all of those years before, but not without traces of hope. “Think you could handle coming home to us?” It was so entirely Bones, saying so much in so few words.

At least if went out with those words in his mind it would be okay.

San Francisco - September 2268
Jim showed up two days after the data packet from their lawyer. And if McCoy didn't have needy medical students or dying populations to save from Topaline Sickness, he might have spent the past two days in a constant state of inebriation. Instead, he spent the past two days with less than four hours of sleep and an overabundance of work to keep him busy. It was a different sort of vice, but at least Starfleet and the hospital didn't frown so readily on overworking himself.

For once Jim didn’t just let himself in even if he could because technically these were his quarters too, but he rang the bell. McCoy wasn’t expecting company because it was a Tuesday, Joanna had class and Reynolds was doing whatever she did when she wasn’t keeping his life in order and really that was the only sort of company he received at the apartment. In fact, he had just arrived there from his office with the intent to up the number of hours of sleep to a solid six.

Not for the first time McCoy wished that he had doors with hinges that slammed shut. Had Jim been three days earlier that gut reaction to seeing him standing there would have been the exact opposite. For as much space as they had put between each other, clinging to their issues and pride, they would always be wrapped up in each other, snarled right down to the core. And at the end of the day that was the difficult part now that they had walked away from each other.

“Did you request these?” Jim shoved the PADD with the data packet from the lawyer into McCoy’s hands. “Because I didn’t.”

(They didn’t say hello, because saying hello would imply that they had time to say goodbye, when all they did was run, leaving behind a note and a heavy heart.)

"Fuck, Jim.” He sighed and stepped aside to let the other man in. As much as he didn’t want to do this right now, he would rather not have this conversation in the hallway. “I signed these once."

He was tired, but looking at Jim he could see the other man was tired too. And because he had no other way to deal with this, he went over to cupboard and poured two drinks. It was better than acknowledging the look on Jim’s face because he didn’t know if he wanted anger or something that wasn’t quite happy, but similar to it.

"I know,” his voiced cracked. It was thick with emotion and his usual syntax disturbed with a pregnant pause. “Len, I never wanted you to have to sign them again."

McCoy was not sure if he felt relieved or pissed off because it was a little too late. "Well, that's just great because here we are." McCoy pressed his eyes closed and threw back the rocker of high quality whiskey and took a sip from the next glass. He wanted it to end there. But hell, Enterprise would be shipping off in a few weeks, and this might be the only chance he got for the next five years. "You just left, Jim."

They both knew that was a lie, but at the very least it was a place to start.

Jim sighed, but didn’t immediately say anything. Instead he took the now empty rocker from Bones and walked over to the bar to pour himself a drink. Although he had never been in this apartment before Jim had no trouble acting like this was something he did every day (and maybe it should have been). He wasn’t going to get drunk, but at least whiskey would be a burn he could control.

Back still turned from Bones he started. “We both know that it was over a long time before the tour ended.” He raised the glass to take a sip. His shoulders relaxed as the single malt liquor raced down his throat, giving him something other than the twisting in his stomach to focus on. “It…you used to be like a shower with real water after a long day, but then after… you know, it started to feel empty.” Glass in hand he turned around, not sure if he wanted to see the other man, but they were here now and he wasn’t going to run (yet). “Len, I was empty for so long, I was going to do anything to feel full again.”

The comment wasn’t supposed to spark laughter, but it did. That dry empty sort of laughter that always put Jim on edge. At least it was easy to guess what came next from that sound that had become too familiar over the past couple of years. “Like Janice?” It was two mere words filled with dozens of unspoken implications between them.

“Yes, like Janice.” Jim was surprised as how sure his voice sounded, but more so that he didn’t immediately snap to go on the defensive. By this point he knew that Janice was mistake, but she was his to make just like all the others he made. “She gave me what you couldn’t.”

“What’s that a warm hole and perfect compliance?” The words came before he really had time to stop them because McCoy didn’t really mean them. He liked Janice just fine. It wasn’t her fault that she caught the attention of Jim Kirk. Or that she might have actually been able to give Jim what he couldn’t, and while it might be painful to admit part of him might be bitterly glad that someone could.

Still, the words earned him a sharp glare from Jim that had made many a Romulan go running. “You know it wasn’t like that.” His voiced raised and there went the hope for discussing this like adults. But adults yelled, fought and threw around petty points while playing the ‘I am going to hurt you more than you can hurt me’ game. So, he would play too because it was clear Bones was.

“Then what was it like, Jim?” The words were heated, but still in the false calm range he used when things would get dicey in sickbay. “You knew the rules going into this, knew it wasn’t going to be easy and fuck-” McCoy pressed his eyes closed, shaking his head. “Jim do you ever think with anything besides your goddamn dick?”

They might as well be professionals at that game by now.

“This coming from the man who is guilt ridden enough to appease all of the Jewish grandmothers and mothers in the history of existence?” This was a fight they easily should have had four years ago, but they were too careful then, things were too fragile. But now when everything was shot to hell? It was a no holds bar. “So, you messed up, we all mess up, the problem was you never moved on from it! You still carry Dramia around like it’s surgically attached to your back.”

The sad part was that the mere mention of that planet still made McCoy freeze, his gut sinking to his feet. “I wiped out half the population.” He wasn’t yelling now, which was okay because Jim could yell enough for the both of them.

“You didn’t do anything! You didn’t engineer the virus, you tried to stop it!” Maybe if he screamed it loud enough the truth would finally sink into that thick skull. “But before you could you were evacuated because it wasn’t safe for you to be there. So they named a plague after you, your research saved them in the end. Only you don’t see that part, you never did.” Jim paused long enough to shake his head, needing to catch his breath and take another drink. “You’re afraid, Bones, you’ve always been afraid, but after Dramia you stopped fighting that fear.”

Maybe he was afraid, and maybe fear was fueling the anger boiling inside him. Only it wasn’t the sort of fear that Jim was talking about. This fear was the same fear he had been filled with since he returned to San Francisco. It was the fear that he went and mucked up the one good thing in his life after the divorce. (Fuck, he was going to have to start calling that the first divorce now.)

“And you were always too busy with the ship who you always picked before me and I got that, fuck, I loved you for that because I am the same way, but when I needed you- in all those dark times…you stopped being able to look at me.” And wasn’t yelling anymore. McCoy didn’t want to yell anymore. What he really wanted was to simply fall into Jim’s arms and pretend like this fight was done and they could just slide back together again all sins forgiven. (Only it felt like this fight might be their last.) Really more than anything he just wanted to reach out and touch the man standing too far from him in their kitchen. “I was always willing to take whatever you could give me.”

McCoy set his glass down, fighting the urge to start pacing. He needed to be a stone now because there things he needed to say. He kept his gaze focused on Jim’s feet because he knew looking into those blue eyes would finish all of his resolve because it had been too long. “And look I get it, it was easier for you to be alone then deal with my shit sometimes, but you forced that solitude on me,” said McCoy. “You didn’t give me a chance, you turned away and stopped fighting too.”

For a brief moment his eyes flickered up to look at Jim. Here they were two fully-grown men and distinguished Starfleet officers looking and acting like petulant children.

“I let you go, Bones.” Jim finished his glass off and set it down on the counter. “I let you go because you weren’t going to go on your own and you weren’t happy.”

“Well maybe I didn’t want to be let go of!” McCoy was already closing the distance between them before the words were fully out of his mouth. It took a Jim a moment to react, but he did, meeting McCoy halfway between the sink and the table.

It was a hard clamping of limbs and lips, fueled by desperation and requiem for something that possibly no longer existed. Their movements were sloppy, physically clamoring for dominance over an uneasy situation. They used to fall so easily into each other, now it was all awkward angles, bumped noses and fingers unable to undo buttons. In some ways it felt a lot like the first time, but it was clear the foreplay was over. It was a miracle they even managed to stumble over to the sofa - because the bed was too far of a distance to traverse for this frantic disrobing.

While the hands were familiar it all felt different.

Each man tried to devour the other, hands becoming greedy and filled with a passion that they hadn’t experienced for a long time. It was limbs and teeth pressing hard enough to leave fast fading marks, but never enough to last longer than morning. Then it was a fumbling of hands over buttons and zippers not once slowing down. To slow down might allow a thought in the span of a breath that would stop this before there was anything more to regret.

Clothes were lost in the course of minutes, thrown hastily to the floor with the need to fill the urge for more - more skin, more contact, and maybe even more love. (Although what they were spiraling into was not love, not really.)

McCoy straddled Jim’s legs, his weight grounding the other man, but not looking him in the eyes. It was cowardice, but it was easier to pretend this was something else when he didn’t have to look at Jim. Rather than think, he just wanted to feel. He bent his head forward, mouth pressing hotly onto Jim’s chest, tracing invisible lines he created years ago, teeth pressing just to scrape the surface and hear Jim’s breath hitch.

Jim had never been particularly vocal when it came to sex, at least not in words that the normal person could understand. Instead his sex language was moans and half-words caught in the back of his throat. It was something that McCoy had been proud of once, being able to reduce the normally verbose captain to the language capability of a caveman. Now, he was just grateful to not hear a litany of empty promises.

The doctor paused in his work to lean back and witness the beauty of Jim unraveling under him and had to bite his tongue to not give utterance to his own litany. However, before he really had time to admire, Jim attempted to roll them over for his turn, but that didn’t go as planned.

Well, at least McCoy assumed that Jim didn’t mean to roll them onto the carpeted floor with a loud thunk. And before McCoy even had a chance to think he was too damn old to be having sex on the floor Jim’s mouth was on his.

The thing about sex with them was that it could be a lot like riding a bike. You never exactly forgot how, just sometimes you stumbled and wobbled a bit before you really got anywhere. And when they did it was worth a few bumps and scrapes along the way even if this was goodbye.

***
Blinking into consciousness as his alarm went off the next morning, McCoy was immediately aware of three very important facts. He didn’t feel hung over. He was certainly naked. And he was very much alone.

Of the three, the last one probably hurt the most because for a few moments he wondered if the events of the past twelve hours had been nothing but an elaborate dream. (And worse, a part of him hoped they weren’t.)

However, there was only so long where he could attempt to exist as Schrödinger’s cat.

Pushing out of the bed, the pleasant stiffness in his body confirmed the dream as reality. Then that pleasant, sated feeling was tainted with the taste of regret in his mouth. It would have been easy to wallow, but he had work to do and that meant there was coffee to be drunk before he appeared as a functioning human being again.

While Jim might have left him alone there was the crisp smell of coffee from the coffee maker he didn’t remember programming last night. McCoy padded across the kitchen to where his favorite science blue mug sat waiting for him along with a brown paper bag that he knew had to be filled with cornbread from the café down the road that he used to go to all of the time because they made it almost as good as his grandma.

It might have been the second worst day of his life, but the last time around he didn’t get coffee or cornbread out of the divorce, so it had to count for something.

Jim was nowhere to be found. Not that McCoy expected to find him at this point, if they hadn’t woken up in bed together, he knew the kid was long gone. Instead he found a tented piece of paper behind the paper bag. He almost didn’t want to read it.

What forced him to pick it up was the glint of mental sticking out from under the paper. Coffee mug in one hand, he reached for the metal dog tag with his other. McCoy closed his eyes tight, fingers running over the indented words: my bones. It was such a simple and silly thing, but at the time McCoy thought it suited them far better than each of them wearing rings.

The note was simple, as most Jim notes were (with one exception). All it read was: “I thought you might want these back. Take care of yourself.”

It wouldn’t be until later when he was looking through his PADD that he realized the papers had been deleted and purged from all of his files. McCoy wasn’t sure what to make of it, but decided that mutated genes were far more interesting a cause than the workings of Jim’s mind. And if it gave him a small parcel of hope to keep going, well, that was okay too.

Unknown Planet AKA Maru - September 2272
For longest time Jim Kirk had wished for Delta Vega. He longed for the biting cold and the ability to see for miles and miles, but not quite feel his toes. He would even taken some large reptilian monster trying to eat him because at least he wouldn’t have been alone and heat sick.

But he had been alone. With no sentient life forms on the dozen nameless worlds in this system there was no one for light years. It hadn’t been his first thought as shuttle crashed through the atmosphere, but he had come to call the planet Maru, as in the Kobayashi Maru, because it had felt like an unbeatable test where they wanted him to fail. And unlike the real test he didn’t quite have a grasp on the operation codes so he could change the parameters in order to win.

His academy survival training course had been up in the backcountry of Alaska with nothing more than a quart sized bag of what he deemed necessary and the clothes on his back. Jim Kirk knew how to insulate against the cold, to build shelters out of snow and stave off hypothermia for as long as possible. What he didn’t know how to do well was to keep hydrated in a harsh sandy desert with no above ground water sources. He had found two drip wells in what he considered sandstone canyons, but he had no equipment to determine the water quality. So with a throat that felt more like sandpaper, he had to test the water a sip at a time spread out by hours. He had quite literally been a man dying of thirst staring at a pitcher of water through a thin glass wall.

There were times when he had wondered why he bothered to keep fighting, and struggled to find reason to keep going on this god forsaken planet as his body started to become evidently weaker. While the water turned out to be safe, he was about 85 percent sure he was slightly allergic to his only accessible food sources. For now, it was enough to sustain him, but not without some interesting side effects that made dying a strange event.

By day forty-two, or at least what he thought was day forty-two, the hallucinations really started to set in. Unlike all the previous ones where he couldn’t quite tell if he was dreaming or awake in a Salvador Dali world sort of way, these were his memories come to haunt him. He saw that damn lizard man who fought him to the death and the stupid salt vampire. Gratefully he didn’t see any pieces of Tarsus in front him, although many of the skills he learned there were what kept him alive this time.

Of course none of that matter now.

Now, he was nothing more than a sun burnt captain who wasn’t going anywhere else. This was the end of the line. His face coated in the coarse sand of Maru, his body barely moving with the shallow inhale and exhale of breath, and from the tatters of his desert uniform was the glint of metal. On that chain along with the dog tag listing his allergies were two rings. At least if he couldn’t be with Bones, their rings would be together.

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