Choice and Chance and Change

by Jane Carnall

Tenaya: for Jethro Tull. hJc

Scuttlebutt usually takes forty-eight hours to reach the Captain. When he heard it, he didn't believe it. Even staring at the flat statement in the record, it was difficult to believe. Spock had acquired McCoy as -- a bedmate, said scuttlebutt; the record, inserted by Spock presumably, called McCoy his bondmate.

It was none of his business who Spock had in bed. It was none of his business who McCoy had in bed, either. It was only that whatever Spock had done before, no one had known anything about it (which was practically impossible on a starship, so Kirk had always reckoned he saved it for shoreleave); and McCoy had never shown any interest in anyone at all. Nor had it occurred to Kirk that anyone might be interested.

Still and all, though it was curious, it was none of his business. Only it niggled away at him. Spock was a commander. McCoy was a lieutenant-commander. They were only a step apart in rank, and that form of liason, though not forbidden, was not comfortable for any sensible captain. A commander acquiring an ensign, or a lieutenant, or even one of the ranks, a yeoman or a security guard -- that was obvious and simple; no power-base could possibly be created. A matter of rank privileges.

McCoy wasn't even in the line of command; that went from Spock to Scott in Engineering to Uhura in Communications. His rank was nominal; he'd joined Starfleet as medical personnel in his thirties, not as a cadet. And Kirk had long ago realised that Spock was not a threat to command. Separately, they were no cause for worry; linked, the two names niggled at him.

He knew Spock, he thought, as well as a human could; well enough to know that there were some parts of him he'd never know. He didn't know McCoy. He'd never troubled to investigate his background further than the Starfleet record. He'd never worried about him, until now. An unknown quantity as Chief Medical Officer; allied with his First Officer, who still remained mostly unknown to him.

An alliance that could, conceivably, be dangerous. Nominal or not, McCoy was a lieutenant-commander; it would take only one step to bring him to higher rank, only a couple of side-steps to make him First Officer. More improbable things had happened in Starfleet's bloody history.

=@=@=

McCoy's first impulse, when the message came, was to call Spock through the bond. He quelled it immediately; running to Spock for help would never solve any of his problems. Bad enough that everyone assumed he did anyway.

He wiped it off the screen -- he was in no danger of forgetting it. The Captain wanted to see him. In his cabin. As soon as would be convenient -- translated, it meant now.

Chapel was due through in a few minutes. When she arrived, he gave her an update on the only patient, an engineering ensign in regen, and left. She made him uncomfortable; professionally, she was as qualified as he was, and it was only Starfleet rank that gave him the right to give her orders. He wasn't, and never would be, enough of a Starfleet officer to consider degrees in rank significant differences. Chapel was a Starfleet officer to her backbone, but she hated him.

Thinking about this -- he was safe enough from assassination now, but the means of his safety made him queasy -- he was at the Captain's cabin door before he realised it. He hit the signal.

"Doctor McCoy to see the Captain."

Kirk's voice came over the yeoman's shoulder. "Yes, I sent him a message. You can go, Yeoman."

"Sir." Picking up a couple of records, she left; McCoy faced the captain, feeling nervously on edge and damnably uncertain what to do with his hands. It didn't help that Kirk said nothing, staring at him, playing with a stylus, for seconds that stretched to aeons.

"So you're ambitious, McCoy."

Speechless, McCoy shook his head almost frantically. Finding horrified voice, "No. I'm happy as I am -- no ambitions at all."

"Oh, really?" Kirk smiled, standing up, moving out from behind his desk to circle McCoy slowly. The other man willed himself to keep still. "Then your... liason... with my First Officer is purely sexual?"

McCoy understood. The captain was worried about power bases; when captains worried, senior officers tended to die. Reassurance would cost him nothing but pride; and it was even true, though not as Kirk would interpret it. Neither he nor Spock were conspiring against the captain. "Yes," he said stiffly.

But he'd hesitated too long. The captain stepped back and was eyeing him thoughtfully. "And suppose I don't believe you? Shall I confirm with Mr Spock that you're simply his bedmate?"

At the thought, McCoy's control on his temper slipped. "It's not like that!"

Kirk smiled. It was not reassuring. "Then you have formed an alliance."

"Yes, but I'm not -- I don't want -- "

The door signalled. Without waiting for a response, Spock entered. "I have the data analysis required, Captain." Stepping around McCoy, he laid the disks down on the desk, and without so much as a lifted eyebrow, turned to go.

"Wait a minute, Mr Spock."

"Captain," the Vulcan acknowledged, turning again to face him.

"Doctor McCoy has just confessed to forming an alliance with you," Kirk said abruptly. "What have you to say?"

"That 'alliance' is hardly the appropriate word," Spock said evenly. "Doctor McCoy misspoke himself, surely. A bond has been formed; an exchange of services."

McCoy felt a sudden wave of heat, furious embarrassment. He slammed down all shields, wishing fiercely for neither the first nor the last time that the damned Vulcan was in hell where he looked as if he belonged.

Kirk was leaning back against the desk, relaxed again, a broad, almost lecherous grin being firmly brought under control. "Services, Mr Spock?"

"I have agreed to protect him against harm, up to and including assassination."

"And what has he got to offer you?" Kirk murmured, and then, with a grin, shook his head. "Never mind, Mr Spock. All right, Doctor McCoy, you can go. If you wouldn't mind staying, Spock, I'd like to discuss the analysis with you -- "

McCoy left without looking at either of the other two.

The analysis was predictable; Kirk scanned it in minutes, and pulled the disk out of the slot with a frown. "Mr Spock, there's nothing here to warrant your bringing it up personally. I assumed that one of the low-probability matrices had fractured."

"I was on my way to my own cabin in any case, which would necessitate passing yours."

"Oh yes?" Kirk hesitated. "Spock, did you know I'd sent for McCoy?"

"Yes." Spock folded his hands behind his back. "You sent him a message through the computer."

Kirk nodded. "Would that have had anything to do with your opportune arrival?"

"I was...concerned that he might, unjustifiably, incriminate himself."

"Just as well," Kirk admitted. "I can't see him as co-conspirator to mutiny, and I'd hate to have to lose him."

Spock lifted an eyebrow. "You did not suspect me?"

There was a longer pause. Then Kirk shrugged. "Spock, the first few months I was Captain here I suspected you of wanting to kill me. I thought you might believe me responsible for how Pike died. Since then -- you're a damn good Head of Science, you're a better First Officer, and it would be a waste of my time being paranoid about whether you want to be Captain."

"I never suspected you of murdering Captain Pike," Spock said, sounding faintly surprised. "If I had, you would long since be dead. I do not want to be Captain."

=@=@=

McCoy wanted to smash something, especially if it belonged to the Vulcan, preferably glass. Unfortunately, Spock owned nothing particularly satisfyingly breakable, except possibly the firepot, which he did not dare touch. Glaring at the long meditation stone, he turned over various obscene graffiti in his mind.

He was about to slam out again, when the door opened and Spock came in. "Well, Leonard?"

"You needn't worry -- I was just going," McCoy spat. "I only came in here to find something to break."

"Indeed." Spock lifted an eyebrow and glanced around. "And did you?"

"What would you do to me if I had?" McCoy wondered flatly.

"It would depend what you found to break. I intended to ask you to remain here tonight."

McCoy shook his head and made to brush past the Vulcan to the door; Spock took hold of his arm. "Why?"

"You should know. After what you said to the Captain I don't even want to look at you, let alone touch you. Let go of me!"

Spock released him, moving slightly so that the only way McCoy could reach the door was through him. "If I had not, you certainly, and possibly myself as well, would now be in the security cells facing the death penalty for mutiny. An alliance between senior officers is considered tantamount to mutiny, or had you forgotten?"

"Very logical," McCoy said tiredly. "Let me go, Spock."

"Did you want to be shot?"

"Not particularly. I didn't particularly like Kirk looking at me as if I was your doxy, either. And I don't particularly want to be your doxy tonight."

"You are my bondmate." Spock was aware of the meaning of the word McCoy had used, and could find no words to express the revulsion he felt at it. "Yesterday I gave you a print-out of the rights and duties bondmates bear to each other. Did you read it?"

"Looked at it."

"It is my right to request you to remain with me, and your duty, if you have none more pressing, to comply."

McCoy felt a wave of freezing loneliness engulf him. Spock, here and now, was the day Spock, cold and logical and terrifying. He had grown used to loneliness, in Starfleet, but he longed suddenly, vastly, for the night Spock, warm and close and comforting, holding him. Even if he had to stay with the day Spock until then. "Yeah. My duty." He turned away from Spock and sat down on the bed, burying his face in his hands and rubbing his eyes ferociously.

"Leonard. Are you hungry?"

The human shook his head.

"Then go and shower. Use the sonic setting."

=@=@=

It makes sense, Kirk thought. It makes perfect sense, except that if it gets out Starfleet will have my neck. But if it works, maybe we can just all get on with our jobs, instead of wasting time wondering about assassination. Spock and McCoy are safe; knowing what I know about them, they aren't likely to turn this offer down. Scott's a fairly safe prospect; man's got no ambitions further than his engines. Uhura and Flynn... well, those two are a bigger risk, but if it's going to work at all I can't afford to leave them out of the alliance. Besides, if Spock and Scott come in, it will begin to be as much a risk for them staying out as it would be coming in. McCoy isn't a factor; if Spock came in, he would bring McCoy with him, and in any case, McCoy isn't a threat.

Kirk was a gambler, not by choice but by necessity; every command decision was effectively a gamble with his life on the line. And there was never any point in taking the least risky choice; if he chanced the ship and lost, whether he survived or not Starfleet, if not a pack of annoyed senior officers, would pull him down. Chancing his life was no new experience; choosing to chance the lives of his senior officers, each picked for excellence, was nothing new either.

The stakes were high; the winnings would be high also.

He would gamble --

Five carefully worded messages, one to each head of the five main departments, were sent. An invitation to drink wine with their Captain; poison possibly, but still not to be refused.

=@=@=

His human bondmate was lying under the covers with his back to the room. Spock came through from the shower, ordering the light down to dim, and lay down beside him. McCoy rolled over with a sigh almost of relief, taking Spock into his arms.

The Vulcan quirked an eyebrow, but did not resist as McCoy's hands ran down his back, exploratory and seeking. "Spock -- "

"Leonard. I must admit ignorance. Why are you behaving like this?"

"Like what?"

"Earlier you expressed an entire absence of desire to touch me."

"I don't want to talk about it."

"I do."

McCoy let go of Spock and shifted onto his back, staring into the dark. What could he say? I like you better when I can't see you. No. I don't trust the way you behave in the day-time, but I trust the way you behave in the night-time. Hardly. "So talk."

"The day before yesterday you admitted, through the link, that you divided my personality into two parts; the 'day Spock' and the 'night Spock'."

McCoy drew in a sharp breath; it hadn't exactly been an admission, only that the last night he and Spock had spent together, worn out emotionally, he could no longer resist the mindmeld; through the meld, he had sensed Spock sensing the dichotomy of his feelings for Spock -- and Spock had admitted that neither, and both, were real.

Spock waited for McCoy to say something; when the human remained silent, he went on. "I admit that on a superficial level there is some truth to your observations. But you are my bondmate. It is not proper for you to attempt to relate to me superficially. Do not divide my personality up into two halves and expect me to react as if they were truly separate."

"So that I'm to assume that when you use the agoniser on someone, or when you talk about me the way you did to the Captain, you're doing it in exactly the same way that you make love to me?"

"I will do what is necessary to maintain discipline on the ship -- and to preserve your life," Spock said harshly. "Your life is more important to me than my own."

"Only because if I die, you die," McCoy said heavily. "Gods, Spock, can't you just shut up? I don't want to have a fight with you now."

Spock hesitated; but there would surely be another opportunity to question his bondmate, and a better one. "Very well. For the present." He wondered whether McCoy would resume his advances, but not until the human was far enough into sleep to move unthinkingly did a cool human arm encircle him, and McCoy curling into his arms.

=@=@=

Not surprisingly, all his guests had arrived at almost the same time: Scott, straight from the engine rooms; Spock and McCoy at the same time, though not visibly together; Uhura, the head of Communications; and Flynn, Security chief, the only one to come visibly armed. It was the mark of her rank; and, making certain that Kirk noticed, she unbelted the gun and dropped it on the deck by the door before moving further into the room.

"Wine?" Kirk offered, pouring a single glass from a caraf‚ of his best Denebian blue. He sipped from it, deliberately, and held it out to Spock, who received it with a lifted eyebrow and also drank. None of the other officers refused; Kirk tasted each glass before he passed it out. "Would you all sit down, please," he suggested.

He himself took the chair in front of the starscreen, where his face would be less visible and the others' faces quite clear. Spock sat down on one end of the couch, to the Captain's right; McCoy chose the other end. Scott settled himself in the chair opposite Kirk. Uhura and Flynn seated themselves to Kirk's right.

"I have a proposal to put to you all," Kirk said at last. "I believe that you are each the best officer in Starfleet in your own speciality; and I believe that you all enjoy your work. Is that so?"

"Aye," Scott rumbled, managing to sound non-committal even so. Spock nodded, once, as Kirk's eyes lit on him for a moment. The other three made sounds of agreement.

Kirk took the chance. "I do not wish to lose any of you due to an over-ambitious subordinate, with more skill in assassination than in the ability I value you for; and I think that together, we can ensure that this does not happen."

There was a silence, as each of them absorbed this. Kirk glanced around the circle, catching Spock's eyes for a moment, and thought that he caught a glimpse of approval -- as though he were doing what Spock expected him to do. Frowning, he looked at Scott as the man set his glass down deliberately.

"Captain. Are ye proposing an alliance between us six officers?" Scott's barbarian accent was out in force; a listener (as was no doubt intended) could not have read whether Scott was approving, or disapproving, or neutral.

"Yes, I am," Kirk said clearly. "Are you with me?"

Scott paused, taking up his glass and drinking a slow mouthful. "Very good wine, Captain. Aye. So I stay with my engines, I've no wish to advance further. And no wish to lose it all for some idiot wi' more bloodthirstiness than sense."

"I concur with Mr Scott, Captain," Spock said smoothly.

"Good. Uhura? Flynn?"

Uhura had been sitting still as a basalt statue, her face that of a Bantu warrior of ancient times. "No deal."

Flynn shook her head. "No alliance."

"What? Why?"

"Neither of us will tell Starfleet of this meeting," Uhura said impassively. "But there is a prior alliance to be considered."

"Between you and Ms Flynn?" Spock asked.

"Between myself, Uhura, and Chapel," Flynn said directly. "Since all three of us were first ensigns."

Kirk had to think for a moment. Oh yes, Chapel was McCoy's second. Well, it would be worth the extra risk bringing in a seventh member of the alliance, to gain Uhura and Flynn. "Then why not all three of you? Scott -- Spock -- any objections?"

"None," Spock said readily. Scott shook his head.

"That isn't possible," Uhura said, looking directly at McCoy. "Is he a part of this alliance?"

McCoy, sitting silent in gathering annoyance, suddenly found all eyes on him. "I was beginning to wonder that," he muttered.

"Because if he is," Uhura continued, to Kirk and Spock equally, "Chapel will not consent to join, and neither will either of us."

Spock's voice was cold and dangerous as absolute zero. "Leaving out the matter of this alliance, let me make it clear that who harms my bondmate dies, as slowly and as painfully as I can devise."

McCoy's hands clenched on his glass, and he put it down hastily before he broke it. Listening to Spock threaten had never been something he enjoyed; it was worse when Spock was threatening in his defense. And he didn't like being treated as an adjunct of Spock either. Leaning forward, he said "Leaving out my bondmate's threats, what does Chapel have against me?"

There was a glint of appreciation in Flynn's eyes. "You're in her way, McCoy."

"McCoy is only technically a Starfleet officer," Uhura added. "He never came through the Academy. He came straight in as a lieutenant from civilian life and he got bumped up to lieutenant-commander only because you can't have a CMO who's only a lieutenant."

"He was made CMO because he's the best medical officer in Starfleet and I wanted him in charge," Kirk said dangerously.

"Chapel's a damn good medical officer as well. And she doesn't deserve to be ordered around by a jumped-up civilian!" Uhura snarled.

"Now wait a minute," McCoy snapped. "I know Chapel's a good a doctor as I am. I don't order her around. I didn't choose to be made a lieutenant-commander and whatever she thinks, I don't take that as a gods-given right to give her orders!"

"Too bad," Flynn said succinctly. "Like it or not -- "

"Flynn, fetch Chapel here," Kirk said abruptly. "I think I've got a solution that'll let us put this alliance together."

Four minutes, Spock timed it; a little over, but not by much. The medical staff were trained in reaching any part of the ship from sickbay in under five minutes. Flynn must have wasted at least half a minute explaining things to Chapel. The security officer re-seated herself by Uhura; Chapel stood between them, looking warily at Spock. Flynn had obviously passed on his threat as well.

Kirk gave a brief explanation, and continued "Supposing McCoy was transferred into Science? He could still do the work he does now, and you, Chapel, could be promoted to CMO. That is, if you are willing to enter into this alliance."

"For mutual protection against outsiders," Chapel considered, "and a mutual agreement that all of us will do our jobs the best we can without needing to look out for a stab in the back."

"Yes. Are you with us? Uhura? Flynn?"

"Agreed," Uhura said, after a quick glance at the other two women. Flynn and Chapel nodded, the medical officer with a swift look at McCoy.

McCoy stood up, turning to go. "You hadn't asked me, Captain. No." He was glowing so warmly with illtemper, he had reached sickbay before reaction hit him. In a cold, chilly sweat, he went straight into his office and sat down behind the desk. There was paperwork, but he couldn't do it; couldn't do anything but wait.

If he had been provoked to this five days ago, he would have been expecting to be dead before his next watch; but Spock had too much invested in him to lose. Spock had made it clear, the morning after they had bonded, that he would not allow McCoy to impair ship's discipline. That if Spock felt it necessary, McCoy could be removed from Starfleet and shipped to Spock's family home on Vulcan. To have his bondmate aboard the same ship was a convenience to Spock, no more.

McCoy remembered, with a sudden pang of longing, his own home, on Earth. That was banned to him now; if he went back, even Spock's family didn't have a strong enough arm to protect him from the Terra Nostra. But there were other worlds; some almost as green as Georgia. If Spock arranged to have him transferred out, maybe he could talk Spock into letting him go to Thorn, or Keezarn. Maybe.

=@=@=

"The alliance still holds," Spock said, quiet and grim, after McCoy's abrupt departure. "My bondmate spoke in anger."

Scott stirred. "How much control d'ye have over him, Mr Spock?"

"These things are not spoken of with outsiders."

"I mean," Scott said equally grimly, "can ye guarantee that he's no betraying us all to Starfleet now?"

"Yes," Spock's voice held utter certainty. "It is impossible for one bonded to betray his bondmate."

"He's bound to you?"

"And I to him. He will not betray this alliance; and he will join it, willingly."

"And if he doesn't?" Uhura interjected. "Let's consider all eventualities, Mr Spock."

"He will, but if he does not I will ensure that he does not become a threat. It is my condition that I, and I alone, deal with him."

There were nods of consent around the room; Kirk took up the threads again.

"We all agree, then; none of us will seek to harm any of the others in this alliance; we will all protect each other against outside assassination; and should any of us attempt to betray the alliance, the rest of us will unite to remove the traitor. On the condition that Chapel is promoted to CMO and lieutenant-commander while McCoy is transferred to Science; and that Spock always deals with any problem posed by McCoy."

"I agree to that," Spock said aloud. Scott and Uhura echoed him. "I agree," Flynn added a moment later, and Chapel last of all.

"To answer your next question," Kirk grinned, "yes, I have been taping this meeting. I'll make a copy for each of you; make sure it's kept securely."

"Not for me," Scott said briefly. "I made my own copy."

Uhura smiled. "So did I."

So had Spock. He did not advertise the fact, though Kirk only laughed. "My efficient officers."

"There's another matter," Flynn cut in. "Sulu. He's dangerous. I think he's Starfleet internal security; I know he reports direct to Starfleet at times. He's certainly psychotic. He's the real threat; I think we should dispose of him."

"Internal security? Are you sure?" Kirk asked.

"No. I don't know anyone who could be sure. I do know he's dangerous as a viper."

"Vipers are only dangerous when trodden on," Spock observed.

Kirk cast him a glance, but continued "I agree, Ms Flynn. What do the rest of you feel?"

"He's never done me any harm," Scott observed neutrally.

"I think he's poisonous," Uhura snapped. "Get rid of him."

"I don't think he's in internal security," Chapel said thoughtfully. "If you'd mentioned it before, Mandala, I'd have said. He was born on a frontier world, he never went to the Academy. I.S. only takes Academy graduates -- and I'm pretty certain that they have to be Earth-born as well."

"How do you know?" Spock asked.

Chapel turned an expressionless look on him. "I have heard some things from patients... in delirium."

"Delirium, or torture?" Scott rumbled.

"I am a trained medical officer," Chapel said distinctly. "I am not a butcher. I do not torture, and I do not kill my patients."

Kirk cut into what might have been a colder silence than even Spock could convey. "Well, that leaves us with three for disposing of Sulu, three against or neutral."

"It should be considered that, if Mr Sulu is connected with I.S., his death will inevitably arouse suspicion," Spock said in a neutral tone.

"Not if we do it right," Uhura cut in. "Send him down on a landing party with one of us, and make sure he falls into a poisonous bush or down a crevasse."

"We still havna decided to do it at all," Scott said quietly. "He's never threatened me; I'd require evidence before I butchered a man."

"If you two both see him as a threat," Chapel said at last, "then I'm not against it. He has his eye on your rank?"

"On mine, anyway," Uhura's hands clenched on the arms of her chair. "Remember when we went into that other universe? It was after that, I knew for certain."

"And if he can't get yours, Nyota," Flynn nodded, "he'd settle for mine."

"On the route up to mine," Kirk confirmed. "Maybe he wouldn't touch you, Spock, or you, Scott, or see you as a threat at all, Chapel, but if this alliance means anything we don't just deal with our own individual enemies."

"I suggest we do nothing," Spock said slowly, "for the moment. I will investigate. On fuller knowledge, we can make a more correct decision." It would also give him a chance to talk to his prickly bondmate.

The first meeting broke up in reasonable accord. Spock and Chapel were the last to leave: Kirk had registered her field-promotion in the records, and confirmed her as new CMO.

In the corridor, in an instant's privacy, Spock said evenly, "I think that the changeover will go more smoothly if you would allow me to arrange Doctor McCoy's transfer."

Chapel nodded. "Yes, certainly. Tomorrow, or the next day, if you prefer."

"Tomorrow should be time enough."

"I left my second, M'Benga, in charge. I wasn't sure when I'd be back. My watch is over in half an hour anyway; if you would tell him that I'll be in my quarters."

"I will tell him. Thank you, Doctor Chapel." It was a rare human who could resist the temptation to triumph over a defeated opponent. Spock stepped into the turbo-lift to sickbay.

=@=@=

"Leonard."

McCoy didn't look up. "Come to move me out?"

"Yes."

"Where to?"

"I am creating a new post for you, directly under me in the other half of the Science department. Effectively, you will do the same work under another name."

"Oh well, that makes it all right then," McCoy drawled. Then he did look up. "I'm staying in Starfleet?"

"Why would you think otherwise?"

"You told me at one point that you wouldn't permit ship's discipline to be impaired -- you'd sooner transfer me out of Starfleet."

"Your outburst, while untimely and illconsidered, did not impair ship's discipline. All those present were officers of your rank or senior to you."

"Except Chapel -- oh yes. Kirk just promoted her into my job."

"As Chief Medical Officer, yes."

McCoy stood up and looked tiredly round. "When do I have to move out of here?"

"By tomorrow, or the next day if you feel it necessary."

"Wonderful." McCoy punched in a request for several large cartons, and moved to the shelves, beginning to sort through and stack the records and hard-copy he had stacked there. He had his back turned to Spock; while the Vulcan moved softly as a cat, he could feel through that of the bond that he couldn't shield out that Spock was still standing there; could even feel, if he wanted, that Spock was standing formally, hands clasped behind his back, his eyes fixed on his human bondmate... the room went dizzy. McCoy found himself gripping hard at the shelving (as though with Vulcan strength), pulling himself back to his own body. He wasn't used to that dizzy feeling of two-bodiedness. He didn't think he ever would be. To see yourself out of alien eyes --

//Leonard.//

"What is it?" McCoy asked aloud, not through the bond.

//I have duties; I cannot remain here. We will talk later; in my cabin, after change of watch.//

McCoy grunted. Spock could take that as an affirmative if he liked. He felt the Vulcan turn and go; adding aloud before he went, "I will post your new office assignment to your terminal."

"Thank you. Sir."

Out of the office, another Vulcan might have seen the tiny frown that briefly disturbed Spock's implacable calm. No human would have noticed. His bondmate called him 'sir' only when deeply angry and resentful of him; Spock had thought that they had uprooted the causes of the anger and resentment, leaving them to wither and die, three days ago. Leonard was necessary to him; even after only four days, the steady awareness of his healer's mind was part of Spock's psyche. Anger, fierce and blue-blazing, was part of that mind, and so was stubborn stonewalled resentment. Leonard was a healer; he resented death, pain, loss, illness, with a cauterising fury of which Spock thought he was probably consciously completely unaware.

It shouldn't be directed against Spock, though. Healer's rage could be deadly, turned on itself; and, mindmatched as the two of them were, any harm to Spock's mind would be reflected in his bondmate's. But trying to explain mind to a nontelepath, Spock had discovered, was like trying to explain the deadliness of coherant light to the blind.

=@=@=

McCoy went to bed in his own cabin, alone. He would have liked to sleep with Spock, but did not want to talk. It did not matter to Spock how McCoy felt about him; the Vulcan wanted logic, cool clear calm thought, and he felt neither cool nor clear nor calm when he thought about the Vulcan. It would be of no use to talk. He did not sleep well.

In the next cabin, Spock did not sleep at all. It was no hardship; he frequently remained awake for up to forty-eight hours when he had work to do. At present he was working on a biomapping of the last world they had surveyed, a final confirmation that it would be safe for colonisation by Terran humans. In point of fact, the world would have been ideal for Andorians; the gravity was just above the optimum range for Terrans. This recommendation, however, would do no good: Andorian colonisation was severely restricted to worlds on which only Andorians could survive. Even more severely than most non-humans. The High Command of the Federation was ninety-eight percent human, eighty-three percent Terran-born, and no non-Terrans or non-humans in any of the highest ranks. The policies of Terran-human colonisation priority would be, in the end, self-defeating; Spock had studied history in secret, and had understood its lessons. Sooner or later, the Federation would be forced either to turn its policies or turn to genocide, and the latter would destroy it eventually.

Spock was aware of the paradox of his position, a Vulcan in the armed forces of a human government. His father had ceased to speak to him, though the senior members of his family had accepted his reasons for joining Starfleet and had not precisely disowned him. Starfleet was the only chance for xenoresearch, except on strictly supervised and controlled investigations for the Federation Science Academy. He was a scientist, not a soldier. And he was only a man, the son of a son, and did not matter much.

He had sent them record of his bonding for the family archives. Response, along a shielded priority channel, had been almost instantaneous, given the distance; acknowledgement of the bond, confirmation of Leonard son of Eleanora as a member by marriage of the clan and eligible for Vulcan citizenship. The fact that Leonard was a healer might have helped, but Spock considered that the most probable reason was still that he was not of any real importance.

The next day, and the next, Spock made no attempt to contact his bondmate, either across the link or through more normal channels. McCoy's new office, while technically in the Science Department, was practically next to sickbay.

McCoy's new job was essentially the same as his old. He stood the same watches; he worked on the same patients he would have worked on had he still be CMO. He was not, however, responsible for any of the paperwork. Nor had he authority. Chapel was being startlingly tactful about it; she had not even, as he had assumed she would, arrived to turn him out of his old office at the beginning of her first shift.

Furthermore, his unexpected demotion had had one benefit that he should have expected; the hostility of the other crew was fading fast. They had expected McCoy to use his newly-acquired influence to gain power; when, between one watch and the next, he lost instead what power he had, many of the crew stopped perceiving him as an extension of Spock, and seemed almost sympathetic, since First Officer's bedmate or not, he was still subject to authority's erratic and frequently unjust whims.

McCoy had never made any close friends aboard the Enterprise, or aboard any other ship he'd served on, but other crew who chose to eat at the same table and who preferred to come to him for minor injuries had been company of a sort. They had all deserted him in a body the day Spock had registered their bonding (for reasons he could understand) and now, one by one, most of them were drifting back.

=@=@=

The second meeting of the alliance was considerably less tense; Kirk didn't bother to taste each glass of wine, simply pouring himself out a glass first, and drinking from it, before pouring out of the same bottle into the other five glasses. "Well, Spock?"

"Ms Chapel is quite correct," Spock said evenly. "Mr Sulu is not in Imperial Security. He is, however, quite determined to command, and appears to have no scruples about the methods used to attain it. I agree that he should be disposed of, and quickly; he is not a stupid man."

Kirk glanced around the other four. He, Uhura, and Flynn had been for disposing of Sulu from the start; at Spock's level condemnation, Scott was nodding.

"I never had nae doubts about your ability, Mr Spock. Well, if you're for it, I'm no against it."

Chapel shrugged, glancing sideways at Uhura and Flynn. "All right."

"Any suggestions?" Kirk murmured. "Or shall we just leave it to -- "

"The planet we're surveying now may have no poisonous bushes," Uhura interposed, "but it does have a good many crevasses. We just arrange for Sulu to be lost, believed killed."

"It would make the security aspects of his death simpler, too," Flynn said thoughtfully. "Nyota and I can deal with him, if the rest of you agree."

"I believe that I can arrange a still simpler solution," Spock observed. "With the aid of a minor memory erasure, and misleading computer testimony, Starfleet Command will order Mr Sulu's arrest, and once he is confined to a prison colony, it will not matter what he knows, or says."

There was a brief silence. Spock was still, knowing that he had either wrecked or confirmed the alliance, and his place in it, with that one damaging admission. One part of his mind was calculating, with cold crystal precision, how to collect Leonard from his work and reach the shuttlebay; another part, their chance of reaching Vulcan safely from here; while yet another was focussing all he had learned about human emotion and paranoia on the reactions of these five humans.

He knew that they had accepted him a moment before Kirk nodded and asked generally "That's another solution. Opinions, or any other offers?"

Flynn's head jerked in an almost reluctant nod. "If you can do it, Mr Spock, that would be the most untraceable way."

"Of course he can do it," Uhura answered. "He wouldn't have suggested it, otherwise. I agree, it's the best way."

"Death would be cleaner," Chapel murmured. "But yes, there'll be no suspicion on us if Command do the work."

"Aye," Scott said deliberately, folding his arms and leaning back. "I cannae say I like the means, either, Mr Spock, but I'll no pretend to clean hands."

"We seem to be in agreement, Mr Spock," Kirk finished. "We'll leave it to you, then."

Spock nodded, stood up, setting his glass down. "I will do what is necessary."

With the Vulcan's departure, the meeting broke up, the three women leaving together and Scott a moment after them. Kirk was due on watch in half an hour; he showered and changed, and left for the flight deck.

Sulu left an hour's margin before entering and removing the small audio relay. It was almost invisible, but it wasn't worth the extra risk of leaving it. He had lived much of his life on the edge of death; he had learnt in the best school never to take an unnecessary risk. With Uhura and Spock both in the conspiracy against him, there would be no chance of sending the information to Starfleet Command in less than twenty-four hours, and by then Spock would have caught up with him and he would not know what information there was to send, nor even see the trap they had prepared for him.

Hearing his fate decided for him over the relay; moments had changed everything. He had planned a long career in Starfleet; now that was over, and he had at maximum twenty-four hours to choose for his life. A high gamble, then, for a high stake; his life and memory.

=@=@=

It had been three days with no word when McCoy entered his cabin, late off-watch, to discover Spock seated at the table, scanning pages of notes. He looked up and set them away as McCoy still stood frozen in the entrance.

"Shut the door, Leonard."

Automatically, the human stepped inside and touched the door control. The door slid shut. "What are you doing here?"

"If you are unwilling to come to me, it appears that I must come to you."

McCoy shook his head slowly. "Spock -- let's just admit this was a mistake."

One eyebrow slanted slightly. "Indeed. Why is it a mistake?"

"We haven't any common ground. We don't share anything."

"We have been bonded for eight days."

"Long enough."

Spock steepled his fingers and looked, not quite at McCoy, for a long moment. "Sit down," he said finally, sounding like the First Officer, icily remote.

McCoy obeyed, a chill of sudden fear running down the back of his neck; fear that Spock would release him, then deal with him as senior Starfleet officer to recalcitrant subordinate. And even simple fear of losing what he had of Spock and loneliness again.

"I made it clear, I thought, that I was prepared to help you with the telepathic component of the bond. Despite the fact that you are still having difficulty, you have not asked me for help. It is illogical to complain that we share nothing when you are denying all your psychic capability except your ability to shield.

"However, whatever you may think of this bonding, I do not consider it mistaken. Dissolving it would not be a simple matter even with mutual consent, and I do not and never will, for any reason less than my imminent death not at your hands, consent to the dissolution of this bond. You will have to learn to live with it, for I will not permit you to live without it."

McCoy closed his eyes and bowed his head, his arms folded tightly across his chest. He might have known Spock wouldn't let him go. "It's all part of the same thing, really," he said wearily. "You treat me as if I belong to you, and all the other officers at that meeting of the Captain's assumed that I didn't have a thought apart from yours. None of them asked me how I felt about the Captain's damned alliance. He didn't even bother to ask me about moving Chapel into my position."

"That is true. It seemed the most logical alternative. Captain Kirk's alliance would require Uhura and Flynn if it was to work at all, and since they refused to come in without Chapel, and since Chapel harboured an animosity against you as Chief Medical Officer, it seemed logical, since you cared most about your healing work and least about the status that being CMO gave you, to transfer you to another post so that both you and Chapel could do the work you wanted."

McCoy lifted his head and looked at Spock suspiciously. "You say that as if it was your idea, not the Captain's."

"A small telepathic suggestion," Spock said with perfect blandness.

"So demoting me was all your idea?"

"As I said, it seemed logical."

"You could have asked!"

"Not through the bond. You were deeply shielded at that moment."

McCoy sighed, seeming to slump a little in his chair. "Yeah, it all sounds so damned logical, coming from you. Still doesn't change anything. You treated me as if I belonged to you, and so did everyone else."

"I do not consider you my property. If the other senior officers do so, then they are fools."

"Not foolish," McCoy snapped. "Just unobservant enough to think that if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck then it's probably not a mongoose!"

"I fail to grasp the idiom."

"I mean," the human said with sudden open anger, "that however you say you consider me, when have you ever asked me anything when you could order it?"

Treating it as a serious question, Spock steepled his fingers and reflected. "I did ask you," he said after a while, "some time ago, your opinion of the experiment being carried out on the native of G'hasij 4."

It had been one of Starfleet's prescribed experiments; the apparently dominant lifeform of G'hasij 4, a Class L planet, appeared to have a nervous system entirely different from that of any other intelligent lifeform. Starfleet Command was naturally anxious to find out if it reacted to stimulation differently, and if so, what the difference was. So the captured creature had been kept alive and in agony for several weeks; until Spock had appeared in sickbay and demanded to know if McCoy found what he was doing enjoyable.

McCoy rubbed his nose. "I wondered about that," he said slowly. "At first, when you just asked, I -- it felt as if you were vivisecting me."

"You resented it."

"Can you blame me?"

"I never said that I did."

"Anyway, when I yelled at you that I hated it, the whole damned useless business -- and you just went over to the machine and switched it off and told me you'd inform Starfleet of a computer malfunction -- I didn't know what to think."

"I told you that Vulcans do not inflict pain unnecessarily."

"I wondered then," McCoy muttered moodily, "and I still do now, just how Vulcans define necessity."

"Necessity knows no law is a human saying, not a Vulcan one."

"So what are the laws of Vulcan?"

It was half-snarled, half-rasped, but Spock answered it again seriously. "The law of Vulcan derives from the teachings and example of Surak, a great man philosopher who dealt in peace, logic, and passion's mastery."

"Why are you in Starfleet, then, peaceable Vulcan?"

Spock ignored the heavy sarcasm. He did not understand how else to handle this fierce human, except by answering each question or taunt as if it were seriously prompted by a hunger for knowledge. "Because I am unimportant to my family, a son of a younger son who bonded with a human."

"What -- your mother was human?" At Spock's nod, McCoy snapped "Starfleet would have your ass if anyone in Command knew that!"

"I am aware that Starfleet regulations prohibit hybrids."

"More than that! -- by Terran law halfhumans can be forcibly sterilised, and killed if there's evidence they had sex with a pure human -- Spock, you shouldn't have told me."

"There are no audio relays in this room, no more than in mine; and my life is already in your hands, Leonard."

McCoy rested his elbows on the table and dropped his face into his hands. "Yeah. I can't take this, Spock. You make it clear I can cause your death any time I'm prepared to risk my own, and you make it so damned clear how much you trust me, and you make it absolutely goddamned clear that you feel nothing at all for me."

"Feel? I am a Vulcan, Leonard -- "

"Yeah," McCoy interrupted. "I know. Logic, peace, and get rid of all those illogical messy emotions. Spock, we've been talking for an hour and I was tired when we started. You're never going to just let me go, so we're going to have to talk some more, but right now, I just want to go to sleep. You can stay if you like."

"Are you again dividing me into day and night halves?"

McCoy stopped at the door to the bathroom. Without turning round, he said as nastily as possible, "If you like, Spock, I'll assume that you're the same cold son of a bitch at night as you are in the daytime. In that case, I'd prefer you not to stay, not that what I want would stop you."

"You want me to stay," Spock said evenly.

McCoy did not turn; his shoulders slumped. "Yeah. That's the hell of it."

Climbing into bed next to McCoy, this time Spock did not protest when McCoy turned to hold him in his arms. Remembering that reciprocation seemed to be an essential part of human sexuality, he copied his bondmate's slow caressing touches, conscious of the other's arousal. When his bondmate convulsed, crying out and spurting cool liquid, Spock still held him.

"Don't you feel anything?" McCoy knew his voice was raw with pain and anger. "Spock, what are you trying to do to me?"

"Relieve your arousal." The Vulcan sounded remote.

"Then forget it! I'd rather you just held me, for gods' sake, Spock -- what do you want?"

//What you do not want to give and what I will not take. The mental intimacy.// He felt the human flinch, but answer, this time telepathically //It's like taking off my skin -- //

//Believe me, Leonard; there is nothing that is you that I do not desire. You are my bondmate, never and always touching and touched. I accept you, human, Healer, as you are.//

"I wish I could believe you," McCoy said aloud, and to any listener it would have sounded like a cynical snap; but Spock caught, and was bewildered by, the contradiction of sound and feeling, the utter longing that lay beneath.

//Share with me.// He felt his bondmate's barriers give way even as he thought it; and, infinitely careful, let the tendrils of his mind and Leonard's interlace. They had never spent long at this level before; the level of conversational telepathy, surface touching, which was the minimal level of the bond, was easy for an atelepath to cope with: and at the deepest level of all, utter intimacy, they became one person, not feeling any barrier to mind or body between them. Once, and Spock hoped again, they had been one together; now they were two, but each feeling the other's body, the other's mind and thoughts, as if they were his own. But two-bodiedness made Leonard confused and dizzy; Spock felt the confusion as his own, trying to pull away or to link closer, and knew he must balance them both, as he tried to show his other self how he perceived himself, his human self, his Vulcan self -- cool human embrace/heated Vulcan touch -- brown eyes cold and still as ice/blue eyes blazing Healer's fire -- desire/loneliness -- loneliness/desire -- need matching need -- and love.

Hidden, deep and secret in half-shame, half-fear -- a Starfleet proverb for foolishness, to love a Vulcan.

McCoy jerked away as Spock saw it, and suddenly, abrasively apart, Spock realised that they were both sitting up in bed, McCoy pressed against the wall, not even touching him physically, all shields clamped down. "All right," he snarled. "So now you know. I know it wasn't what you wanted. Well, I didn't particularly want it either."

"You were lonely," Spock said, still shaken and not choosing his words, "and you had need of someone."

"Gods!" His bondmate's rage struck at him like a blow. "Gods, Spock, I know you don't feel anything at all for me, but do you have to rub it in?"

Spock controlled himself, refusing to react to the rage and hurt. "It is illogical to decide that I feel nothing at all for you, Leonard. Vulcans do not permit feelings to rule them, not to deny that the feelings exist."

"No, but you'd rather they didn't."

"That is not true. You are what you are."

"I -- want -- " McCoy's voice cracked harshly, and he fell silent, lying down, pulling the covers over his head in an obvious attempt to shut out Spock. The Vulcan lay down close beside him, pulling the human to lie against him. //What do you want, Leonard?//

Out loud, McCoy said nothing, perhaps could not; silently, he answered //You to love me. And you don't. You can't.//

//That is true.// Failure was staring Spock in the face; he did not like the look of it, could not see how to change it. //I am sorry. This also is true; you are my mindmatch, a Healer, a wholly admirable man. I would die rather than bring you harm. I wish that I could make you happy.//

Consciously, McCoy did not say it, did not even think it; it floated up complete from his unconscious, communicated itself to Spock almost before McCoy had realised what it said. You could let me go. Free.

"Very well, Doctor McCoy," Spock said out loud, after a time that seemed long. "In future, I give you my word, I will leave you alone unless and until you contact me. Now go to sleep."

Stunned, speechless, McCoy felt Spock pull away, turn over, and apparently follow his own instructions; and tired as the human was, he could not stay awake for long.

=@=@=

When McCoy woke up, Spock was gone as if he had never been. The link was still there in his mind, but quiescent. It would not wake until he called. He was afraid that he never would, and still more afraid that sooner or later he would need Spock too much to hold away.

There was a final survey of this planet to be done today; he might as well go down with the last group himself. It would just be a final check on the swampy area's insect fauna; the possibility of a malarial-type virus hadn't been wholly ruled out in laboratory tests. Good solid routine work that would leave no time for thinking.

In the transporter room, an hour or so later, standing amidst the bustle of a downplanet team making sure that the vital widget wouldn't be left back up on the ship, McCoy saw Spock enter, with Kyle, the transporter technician. McCoy hoped that he'd recovered from the last Agoniser treatment, and cast no very kind look on Spock, who'd ordered it.

Spock remained impassive, clasping his hands behind his back and looking aloofly on the crew, who somehow managed to speed up the bustle with an increased efficiency rate. M'Benga, who was responsible for it all, turned and asked Spock "Commander, is Doctor McCoy going down?"

The Vulcan lifted one eloquent eyebrow. "He is over there, Doctor M'Benga; I suggest you ask him yourself."

M'Benga went hot, turned sideways and muttered the question at McCoy, who nodded, looking at Spock. He could perceive no change in the Vulcan's expression, no acknowledgement of what he had just done. Yet it would have been just as logical to answer 'yes' on McCoy's behalf, since he would hardly have been standing there with a tricorder under one arm and a specimen case under the other if he hadn't been planning to join the survey team. M'Benga's question had been more of an attempt to distract Spock than anything else.

The planet's air was pleasant, even in the swamps; after a while you never noticed how the recycled air of spaceships smelt, only that fresh air tasted wonderful. One eye on the pathfinder, which traced the solid ground for him, and one on his tricorder display, McCoy hardly noticed that he was becoming isolated from the others. The familiar sound of a phaser on stun was the last thing he heard.

=@=@=

He was still on the planet; the gravity was the same, and the air. He was lying on the rocky, uneven floor of what a romantic writer might have called a cave; a niche in a cliff, barely shelter from the rain providing that the wind was blowing the right way; as it happened, it was not raining now. The rocky floor sloped downward towards a stream, that flowed noisily through a brief band of lush greenery. Sulu was sitting on the opposite side of the niche, barely a metre away, his phaser resting on his knees, his eyes fixed on McCoy.

Stiff and aching in every muscle, he managed to roll into a more comfortable position, and to ask, raspingly, "What the hell is going on?"

"You're unarmed. You have no communicator. You're quite helpless, Doctor McCoy; I hope you realise that."

"Perfectly," McCoy said with sarcasm, "thank you. Why?"

"Doesn't Commander Spock talk to you of nights?"

"Far too much," McCoy muttered. "Listen, if you're planning to trade me for a promotion, it won't work -- "

"I'm planning to trade you for my life. Are you trying to convince me you don't know about the conspiracy of senior officers?"

"Oh, shit."

"I thought so."

"I'm not involved in it, though. I refused to join -- I walked out of the first meeting. Why threaten me?"

"I never thought you were involved," Sulu sneered. "You're too little of a threat to be of any real value to a conspiracy. But how much are you worth to Spock? How much does the Commander value his bedmate?"

McCoy was silent. He was remembering a dozen things Spock had said Your life is of more value to me than my own... You are my mindmatch, a Healer, a wholly admirable man... I would die rather than bring you harm... Suddenly realising, probably too late, that it did not matter whether Spock called what he felt for him love, or not; if Spock were human, it would be love; since he was Vulcan, perhaps it wasn't, but it might as well be.

"...they were plotting to have me sent to a prison colony. Well, given the choice, I'd rather try to survive on this world than on the damn A-Swan or another of the hellworlds. And I can, with what I have; phaser, tricorder, and a few other things. This is a good world." Sulu leant forward, showing his teeth. "You're just my trade for equipment to make it easier. Do you think you're worth that much to the Commander?"

McCoy didn't answer. Sulu shrugged. "Well, we'll find out. I left your communicator with a message stored for the Captain and the First Officer. I warned them that if they didn't send down what I'd asked for, exactly what I'd asked for, I'd kill you. I brought a portable sensor-shield along; there is no way they could find you in time to save your life."

Isn't there? McCoy thought. He concentrated, feeling for the bond, thinking //Spock.//

=@=@=

Kyle was terrified. Spock did not consider that a jolt with the Agoniser would help his memory, though. He stood back and let Kirk ask the questions.

"Sir -- please! How was I -- how was I to know? Lieutenant Sulu -- "

"What exactly happened," Kirk repeated.

"He came in and wanted a hardcopy of the transporter records of the past twenty-four hours. I -- I couldn't see any reason for him not to have it, and, and I was just requesting the console when he pulled out his phaser and I turned round and he shot me. Then -- then when I woke up he'd blanked the terminal records and zeroed the controls, at least I assume it was him. Captain, I -- how was I to know?"

"Under the circumstances, I can't see that you were at fault," Kirk said at last.

Kyle nearly sagged with relief. "Sir, thank you -- "

"Was he carrying anything?" Spock asked.

"Sir?"

"Apart from his phaser, did you notice if he was carrying anything?"

Kyle frowned, but he seemed to be honestly trying to remember. "He had a tricorder on his belt, I remember noticing because I thought it was odd. Oh, and he had a lot of hardcopies with him."

"Did he?"

"Yes, sir. In that pack the computer issues for hardcopy of more than a thousand sheets."

"Then you did not actually see the hardcopies?"

"No sir."

"You can go, Kyle," Kirk ordered, since Spock seemed to have finished his questions. "Consider yourself lucky."

"Yes sir. Thank you, sir." Kyle backed out the door in a hurry; Kirk turned to Spock.

"You think Sulu might have had something else in the pack?"

"Survival equipment seems the most logical possibility."

"He's escaped to the planet," Kirk nodded. "He's going to be difficult to find."

"I think," Spock said carefully, "that perhaps we should not try. To inform Starfleet Command that Sulu has deserted would be far simpler; and we would be as effectively rid of him. There will probably be no colonists here for five Standard years, and Sulu will not wish to be found, in any case; desertion from Starfleet is a capital offense."

Kirk nodded, seeing the sense of it; but adding "For discretion, we should make the effort. I'll have a sensor search of the planet made; with any luck, they'll find nothing, and if they do -- well, Mr Spock, you won't need to fake that computer testimony."

"Indeed, Captain," Spock agreed.

The door signal sounded; Kirk sat down behind his desk again. "Come in."

A security guard, carrying a communicator. "Excuse me, Captain, but I found this in the transporter room, and the computer said it was Doctor McCoy's."

Kirk glanced at Spock, who lifted an eyebrow. "Then return it to Doctor McCoy." Then it struck him. He was still completely expressionless, even as the security guard continued; "Sir, the computer says he's with the survey team. And when we got in touch with them, they said he was back on the ship."

The Captain snapped out orders for a shipsearch, the guard left; and Kirk turned and looked up at Spock. "You think -- ?"

"I think that Sulu has chosen to insure his safety," the Vulcan said emotionlessly. He had picked up the communicator from Kirk's desk, and was fiddling with it. After a few moments, a voice, Sulu's, spoke from the device.

"Commander Spock. You would be less than I had believed if you were unable to retrieve this message; so I imagine that you alone, or possibly the rest of the conspiracy, are listening to it. I overheard your decision of yesterday to dispose of me. I prefer to take my chances on this planet, rather than rot on a hellworld. I have a sensor shield; it would take you months to find me, and I suspect you'll decide it would be more logical to let me go. I also have some other basic survival equipment; including something that I think you value. Your bedmate, Doctor McCoy.

"If you wish to see him again, alive and unharmed, you will arrange for the equipment in hold 4B.7, that I checked over myself earlier, to be delivered to the planet's surface at the coordinates of the first arrival. I included a beacon in one of the items of equipment; if I do not hear its particular signal, a modulation I devised myself, within five hours from this time -- " he gave it " -- I will kill Doctor McCoy.

"The beacon will continue to signal for another five hours. I will stun McCoy for five hours or so and leave him my communicator. If at any time in the five hours the beacon ceases to signal, I will return and kill him.

"Since the Enterprise is due to leave orbit in eight hours, I assume that your logic will conclude that you will have no time to find me after you have rescued McCoy; and while you could, naturally, blast that area of the planet into hell with the Enterprise phasers, you would have to account for that to Starfleet Command, who would not, I think, regard one deserter as sufficient reason for destroying so much fertile land.

"Then again, perhaps McCoy is not worth that much to you; in which case, while I will still survive on this world, he will not."

Kirk had thought that he had seen Spock angry before. The pale, dark-bearded face could look quite satanically threatening; evidently, that apparent anger was an act to frighten human crew. Spock's face was quite completely frozen; his hands were gently bending the communicator in half. When it snapped, Spock stared down at it with lifting eyebrows, and set the remains on his desk.

"It would have been unnecessary evidence," Kirk said.

"Indeed."

"What are the contents of hold 4B.7?"

"Hold 4B contains emergency colonisation equipment," Spock said flatly, routinely. "I assume that Sulu has ensured that .7 has everything he would require to colonise alone."

"Yes," Kirk said. He had come to a decision. McCoy wasn't worth that much to him, but he evidently was to Spock; and Spock was worth considerably more than a whole hold's worth of colonisation equipment. "Well, Spock, while you're working out how to convince the computer we lost it, I'll arrange to have the lot transported down to the coordinates Sulu mentioned."

"Thank you, Captain. If you would not transport any of the equipment down until I request it; it may be necessary in order to save Doctor McCoy's life, but not until then. I have no time to deal with the computer now; I must go down to the planet's surface immediately. There are only four hours left."

"To do what? What can you do?"

"I will find Sulu," Spock said as if stating an elementary proposition in algebra, "and kill him. As slowly and as painfully as I can devise."

=@=@=

//...Spock.//

//Leonard!// The familiar touch in his mind was welcome as water. //Leonard, are you unharmed?//

//Fine. Spock, I'm fine.//

//Is Sulu with you?//

//Sitting within a metre of me. Where are you?//

A pause. //If my calculations are correct, approximately twenty kilometres away. I will be with you in two hours. Do not allow Sulu to suspect that you can communicate with me.//

Silence, then; McCoy realised Spock had lightly shielded. It was sensible, but it left him feeling lonely. He leant his head back against the stone and realised his mouth was dry. Swallowing didn't help.

"Thirsty?"

McCoy was about to snap something, when he realised that Sulu was holding out his canteen to him. "Yeah. Thanks," he said grudgingly, accepting it and drinking with pleasure. He handed it back, and was aware of Sulu's eyes -- and the mouth of his phaser -- on him, even as the other man drank. He shifted to make himself more comfortable on the gritty rock.

After a while, Sulu asked, almost conversationally, "How did a man like you come to join Starfleet?"

It wasn't something McCoy usually talked about. Under the circumstances, though, that hardly seemed to matter. "You might say, because of my wife... my ex-wife."

"Joined Starfleet to get away from her?" Sulu was grinning.

"She runs the Southern US branch of the Terra Nostra," McCoy said evenly. "Two days after we divorced, one of the Managers on the step below her, I think this one ran Georgia, came round and suggested that I would find the air offworld much healthier. There's a waiting-list four years long for emigration, but Starfleet can always use trained medics."

"Terra Nostra's a myth!"

"Half my patients at the Atlanta General Hospital were victims of a myth, then. Counting all the muggings committed by people high on Shadow or Bliss, a lot more than half."

"Then why'd you marry her in the first place?"

"She said she was a businesswoman. And it took me two and a half years to put three and three together and come up with exactly what her business really was. And I don't know why I'm telling you all this."

"Because you know I'm going to kill you," Sulu said, just as evenly, "if I don't get what I want; and even if I do get it, you'll never see me again."

There was another silence. McCoy rubbed his hands, which were sweating, down the side of his trousers. "Are you really going to do it? There wouldn't seem to be much point..."

"You're useless to me," Sulu said with deliberate callousness. "Be sure, I would kill you." He knew -- it was common talk -- that Vulcans had a mental link with their mates. He did not know whether that link was presently operative (though if it were, McCoy would probably be either less, or far more, apprehensive) nor whether actual words could be passed through the link. It was safer to convince McCoy that he would indeed kill him.

And he had, apparently, succeeded; McCoy said nothing else for a long time.

=@=@=

//Leonard.//

//Spock!//

//Control yourself. Leonard, I am, I think, almost directly above you. Below me and to my right, an uneven cliff-face; sloping down to my left, a stretch of scree. Below the cliff, an uneven plateau runs sharply down to a deep stream-bed. Where the stream runs, there is greenery, but nowhere else.//

//What I can see is the same. Sulu and I are both in a small niche in the cliff.//

//Find a small stone, a piece of gravel, and throw it.//

McCoy fidgeted, stretching as well as he could in a sitting position, shifting a little and raking up some of the grit in his hands. Sulu tensed. "Throw that away."

"What?"

"You picked up some gravel from the floor. Throw it away. Out of the cave." McCoy obeyed.

//I heard the sound of your voices, as well. I am sorry, Leonard; I cannot see how to proceed further.//

//You brought your phaser, didn't you?//

//Sulu is not in my line of sight. Nor can I approach so that he is, without coming down either the scree or the cliff. Neither is impossible, but both would make a considerable amount of noise. There is only half an hour left; I have no time to circle and approach from another direction, nor do I see what I could accomplish if I did. I will not risk your life.//

There was a pause. Then Spock added, almost hesitantly; //But if you would consent to link with me -- not the deep melding, but the one in which we share our bodies -- then I think it might be accomplished.//

McCoy sat still, his eyes not seeing Sulu's tense face. He could not allow his own face to reveal anything of the turmoil that filled him. Of all the aspects of the bond, linking with Spock so that the Vulcan could use his body as his own was one that pleased him least. But he knew how Spock hated failure, and did not tolerate it in himself; yet Spock was willing to give up, rather than risk McCoy's life or link more deeply without his consent.

//All right.//

He was Spock son of Sarek, kneeling on the rock above... he was McCoy, Leonard H. McCoy, leaning against the rock below... he was Spock, in the cave, watching Sulu with intent Vulcan eyes... he was McCoy, kneeling above, feeling a terror and an anger not his own (but his own, for whose else could they be?)... he was Spock seeing the vital nerve-patterns below the skin... McCoy recognising them from a medical diagrams... both of them, both as one, McCoy's body animated with Vulcan speed and knowledge, moving (to Sulu's eyes with blurring, shocking speed) and the necessary pressure, the vital point, on Sulu's neck. And it was over; McCoy knelt above Sulu's body all asprawl, alone in his own skull but feeling the bond active and warm again like clasped hands, like love.

Spock came down the scree like a hurricane, straight towards McCoy. The human had just stood up, feeling shaky, when he reached him. Spock said nothing, only seized hold of McCoy's arms, gripping him; feeling the living, solid flesh beneath his hands. "Leonard," he said at last, and that was all.

McCoy pulled him in against himself, hugging his bondmate as close as possible. "Yeah. Spock." He rubbed his hands up and down the skinny back, feeling the tension in the muscles, part fear for him, part simply Spock. He felt Spock's arms round him like hot hard living steel, and didn't resent their strength.

"The Captain," Spock said after a while, relaxing his grip, "will be expecting our return. If you would let go of me, Leonard, I can reach my communicator."

McCoy grinned, pulled back a little. Spock pulled it out and flipped it open. "Mr Kyle."

"Yes, Commander?"

"Doctor McCoy is standing next to me. Prepare to bring him up."

McCoy grabbed the communicator and turned it off. "Spock, why -- what are you planning to do?"

"I have some tidying up to do," Spock said evenly. "It won't take long."

"Then why are you sending me back to the ship?" McCoy demanded.

Spock lifted an eyebrow, looking briefly at Sulu, slumped on the rock. McCoy had been a victim of the Vulcan nerve-pinch once before, on another ship, and knew that he was conscious, though unable to move a muscle; he could hear, and feel, and perhaps see, everything.

"I did not anticipate that you would want to watch," Spock was saying, dryly and coldly.

"What -- what are you going to do?" McCoy started, then caught his breath, catching Spock's mind, and finished impatiently, "No, never mind, I don't want to know -- " I wish I didn't know -- Who harms my bondmate dies, as slowly and as painfully as I can devise.

"No," McCoy heard himself say. "No. You're not doing that."

Spock was holding a laserknife thoughtfully in one hand. He looked at McCoy as coldly and as implacably as a glacier. "I fail to see how you can prevent me."

"Look, Spock, I'm not asking you. I'm not pleading, I'm not begging, I'm not promising. I'm just telling you. You're not doing that."

There was a long, long silence. The two standing, stared at each other; the one on the floor of the cave only waited for the painful death to come. There was a flick and a shimmer of sunlight on polished metal and the laserknife landed in McCoy's hands. Spock flipped his communicator open again. "Mr Kyle, are you ready?"

"Yes, sir. Co-ordinates locked on."

"Bring us both up."

"Yes, sir." Seconds later, the transporter effect took them; they were back on the Enterprise.

=@=@=

"And you couldn't find Sulu," Captain Kirk said, not as a question.

"No. He was not with McCoy when I reached him, and I did not think that it was worthwhile to hunt him down."

"No, we're well rid of him. I've logged him as a deserter."

"He hasn't any of the equipment he thought he could trade McCoy for," Uhura added. "I doubt that he'll survive until the colonists arrive."

"And even then he'd want to stay out of the way until the colony grew large enough that he wouldn't be instantly identifiable," Flynn agreed. "That may be a safe planet, and he may be one tough son of a bitch, but he'll be on his own for years."

McCoy was aware that Spock agreed with him, thought that Sulu would survive, though McCoy's reasons were less logical than Spock's. In an odd way he wanted Sulu to survive.

"And now," Kirk said, "Doctor McCoy, Spock gave me to understand that you might reconsider your decision not to join this alliance."

"I hadn't been asked."

Kirk glanced around, gathered up the nods (no one opposing, not even Chapel) and said "Well, we are now asking."

"In that case, very well."

"You agree to abide by the following terms and conditions; none of us will seek to harm any of the others in this alliance; we will all protect each other against outside assassination; and should any of us attempt to betray the alliance, the rest of us will unite to remove the traitor."

McCoy was nodding, and about to repeat his agreement aloud for the benefit of the tapes that were certainly being made, when Uhura said dryly, "You should add the condition Mr Spock made. That he always deals with any problem posed by Doctor McCoy."

Spock lifted an eyebrow. So did McCoy, looking from the Vulcan round the circle of other officers. "Well," he drawled, "I have a condition of my own. That I always deal with any problem posed by Mr Spock."

A brief, almost unnoticeable pause. "That seems acceptable," Spock said with perfect blandness. "I can assure you all that Doctor McCoy is quite as capable of coping with me as I am with him."

End

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