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His thirty-first birthday starts with a very dicey encounter with a pair of rogue Klingon warbirds. It ends with him staring at his own blood smeared across the bar top of a musty pub that mostly caters to testy workers of a Federation mining colony on the edge of the Neutral Zone. They don't seem to care much for his Starfleet uniform or his off-color jokes, and the only high point of the evening is that it's Spock that fishes him out of the fray, not the local law enforcement.
Spock says, “Pardon, I believe this belongs to me,” then takes out the two largest men, drops them where they stand, and turns a look of mild irritation on the remaining three, all the while holding Jim up by the torn collar of his uniform. The large Andorian's antennae wilt and Jim just dangles there feeling proud of Spock’s one-liner.
"Next time pick on someone your own size," Jim follows up, unwisely, and then attempts to shrink back when Spock's disappointment in the entire universe is redirected at him. The effort is humiliatingly unsuccessful because Spock is still holding him like he's a particularly belligerent dog on a leash.
Jim tries not to call any more attention to the fact that his face is bright red with sudden shame and mutters, "Sorry," towards Spock's left knee. His nose is still bleeding in a sluggish trickle, and he has a split lip and a sizable collection of knuckle-shaped bruises that are going to feel much worse in the morning.
"It is advisable that we leave this establishment," Spock says, his mouth a flat line that implies it isn't a suggestion, and that he'll drag Jim out over his shoulder if he needs to. Jim tries to struggle back to his feet, but can't quite get his footing. Spock hauls him up -- with one hand, like Jim's just a Human-shaped bag of air -- and presses his palm flat between Jim's shoulder blades, not so much encouraging him towards the door as bodily blocking any other routes of escape.
They emerge onto a broad avenue that's dimly lit and sparsely populated, and Spock urges Jim towards the small Starfleet base of operations on the outskirts of the settlement. The whole mining colony is subterranean, built inside an enormous geode, glittering and purple when the colony’s day cycle lights flood the main cavern with warm artificial sunlight; now, they’re just an amethyst suggestion far above. Jim walks with his eyes fixed on the twinkle of false stars, tracking the distant reflections of midnight light off the crystal formations. The only other people out at this hour are bar patrons making their way home or the occasional malingering drunkard that's already pissed all their credits away.
"Don't look at me like that," Jim says weakly, after Spock’s silence grows unbearably stifling. "I haven't been in a bar fight in years. I was overdue."
"Gamma Polaris?" Spock's brows drift upwards and together. He must be in an unholy Vulcan snit if he isn't even using complete sentences. Jim raises his face to the sky, because of course Spock would remember every minor disagreement Jim has ever participated in since they've met.
The air is cold and the winter bite of it feels good on his hot skin. He runs his tongue along the inside of his teeth, tasting blood, and tries to determine if the ache in his cheek is severe enough to indicate a fracture. He can touch it without seeing spots, so he probably won’t need a full round in sickbay.
"That wasn't even a bar fight, that was a misunderstanding," Jim protests. "It was also three years ago."
"Risa?" Spock asks mildly, and Jim knows he's been had. Risa had been a disaster of monumental proportions. They hadn't even been on shore leave; Jim had nearly ruined a trade agreement by complimenting a Tellarite ambassador's beard while a few too many drinks into one of the most boring afternoons of his life.
He'd been extremely lucky that Commodore A'dei had only recommended medical leave for the duration of his recovery, instead of a court martial. Evidently Starfleet considered Bones and Spock tormenting him every time he tried to do anything resembling work a far more severe punishment for misbehavior than being tossed in the brig.
"It wasn't that bad," he attempts. It isn’t an outright lie if he averages it in with the rest of his career.
"The assistant undersecretary to the Tellarite ambassador was incensed enough to break your arm, Jim. Tellarites are not known for their physical prowess," Spock observes. His tone is frosty in a way it hasn't been in years.
"I'm fine, Spock. It's fine," Jim insists, even though he’s crossed the line into outright lying. He stops abruptly, fists clenched at his sides, angry at himself because none of it is fine. He’s ashamed he's in his thirties and still struggling under the memory of a man he never knew. Some leader he is. His head spins unpleasantly – he thought he’d sorted himself out at Yorktown, but now he wonders if this paralyzing doubt can ever be dispelled.
Spock doesn't budge from Jim's side, spine straighter than an iron rod. He could be a statue, for how still he is, except his eyes betray a wealth of emotion that Jim can't parse out for analysis. None of them seem to indicate he's particularly pleased about the current situation; Spock elevates silent disapproval to an art form, and Jim suspects his captaincy will be a museum filled with monuments to Vulcan disapprobation.
"You are bleeding from multiple locations and you are a Starfleet captain who can be charged with assault of a Federation civilian," Spock says. “It is not fine.”
There's really no way to protest either point, even if it had been five against one and even if the other guy had swung first. Jim was highly trained in hand to hand combat and Starfleet tended to look down on drunk and disorderly when you could kill a person with your bare hands. "They won't press charges."
Jim touches his hand to his face to check but Spock pushes it away and hisses, "Cease. You cannot know they will not retaliate with legal action." His mouth is squashed and unpleasantly shaped for a moment, but he continues with more composure, "I will see to the damage when I am certain you will not cause further injury to yourself.”
“Not dragging Bones in on this? That’s unlike you,” Jim says, nastily, and immediately wishes he could claw the words back from the air. Spock turns to face him, face inscrutable, eyes blank. They really haven’t fought like this since the beginning, when Jim was a resentful, insecure ass and Spock had the mostly accurate impression Jim didn’t know what he was doing. He mumbles a half-hearted apology that is mostly lost in the night air; Spock will hear it anyhow.
“Dr. McCoy has spent seventeen point nine hours assisting the colony’s medical team treat crew members injured in the Klingon attack,” Spock says, voice flat and even and washed of all inflection. He doesn’t say, and look what you were off doing instead of helping, but Jim’s mind fills in the heavy silence that follows with a nasty little voice that sounds suspiciously like his stepfather.
It's not something Spock would say. The medical team has it covered; Jim’s field triage knowledge is helpful in pinch, but he would only be in the way. That’s the logical approach.
Jim swallows the acid feeling in his stomach and Spock just keeps staring at him. There isn’t a single line of expression, everything about him cool and Vulcan and detached. Jim feels ill. It’s not even a kilometer back to the Starfleet outpost, but progress is slow in the low light. They make the hike without exchanging another word, Jim scratching periodically at the blood drying on his skin.
Around the halfway point, they pause over a wide bridge which spans one of several chasms marring the cavern, steel-grated and built for heavy ground transport. A waterfall rushes down the cavern wall, almost close enough to touch if Jim were to lean out over the railing; the water disappears into some deep well too far below them to catch any glimpse of the bottom. The spray is slick beneath their feet and mists them in fine, icy droplets. The roar of the cascade drowns out all of Jim’s doubt, just for a moment, so he stands and listens to it until he begins to shiver. Spock’s hair is dampened and refracting light by the time they cross, glossy and black like the small crow feathers Jim used to find in the cornfields back in Iowa.
They’ve got berth in the officers’ quarters in a small, climate controlled building near the entrance to the cavern, and when they reach it Jim stumbles against the outer wall, trying to compose himself. Spock inputs his passcode and swipes the visitor badge. Jim fumbles through the doorway into the empty dormitory hall, facing down a line of locked doors. It’s quiet and carpeted and feels like a hotel late at night. His room is somewhere near the back of the building.
He doesn’t register the moment that his knees give out, but Spock’s hands are broad and strong under his arms, and Spock stops his descent with a soft, “Jim.”
He levels off, but doesn’t let go, bowing his head and leaning against Spock’s chest. The alcohol is gone, and he’s just faintly nauseous with pain now, any remnants of the pleasant buzz he’d been chasing all burned away, his head far too clear. Even the adrenaline is long faded, and the right side of his face throbs with concrete proof of his foolishness. He hasn't slept for over a standard Earth day and it's all starting to catch up to him.
What would your father think if he saw you like this? Winona Kirk has never said those words out loud, but the way she had held ice to his face, her mouth pressed into the same flat line Spock’s now echoed had been enough for him to know what she’d really been thinking. He’d always thought he’d say too fucking bad he can’t if she’d ever managed to get it off her chest. Instead he’d picked fights and fucked around with strangers and got himself hauled into the slammer on the regular while she played house with her latest deployment conquest.
Little Jimmy Kirk always loved his mama, corn-fed Iowa boy that he was, but that didn’t mean he had to like her all the time, didn’t mean he didn’t know what kind of poison George Kirk’s death had sown. He’d always loved his mama and he’d always known she couldn’t stand to look at him.
“I think,” Jim says, as he staggers back to his feet, Spock’s shirt bunched under his hands, “that I should probably sleep tonight off.”
“That is wise,” Spock says, and when Jim is brave enough to look up, his expression has softened immensely. There’s no pity or disappointment lurking there, just steady, gentle concern. “You are not well, and you will let me assist you.”
No one interrupts them through the building. Spock is half carrying him, Jim’s arm slung across his shoulders and a hand pressed to Jim’s hip to brace him. The tip of his thumb is pressed to bare skin, a cool circle of pressure just under the hem of Jim’s shirt. Jim tries very hard not to think about how nice it feels to be touched, tries not to think of the last time that someone slid their hand up under his shirt, because the circumstances are pretty pathetic and it’s been long enough that small contact makes his heart speed a little.
They stop halfway down the hall, and Spock places his hand on the scanner outside the door. Jim must look like he’s about to ask a question, because Spock explains, “I do not presently require sleep. I will tend your injuries and ensure you come to no additional harm.”
The door chimes and slides open, revealing a room functionally identical to Jim’s, but with the addition of a small bundle of Spock’s personal effects placed neatly at the foot of the bed. He balks, frozen in the doorway until the door intercom buzzes for him to move so it can close, and Spock gives him an insistent tug. Jim feels miserable and all he wants to do is crawl under his messy blankets and fall asleep.
Spock gestures for him to sit in the desk chair and disappears into the attached bathroom. From where he’s standing, Jim can see Spock’s reflecting in the mirror over the bathroom sink, and watches him sift through a small first aid kit. Jim rakes his gaze down the long line of Spock's torso, watching the way his clothes shift, and then averts his eyes when the urge to touch starts to creep in.
He’s shouldn't be thinking things like that. He fights the urge to bolt, because as soon as Spock touches his bare skin he’ll feel the ghost of that longing.
Jim’s never run from a fight though, even if he thinks he’s going to lose. He toes off his boots and peels off the ruined mess of his gold officer’s shirt, discarding it on the floor. He ignores the available seating in favor of following Spock into the small bathroom, and settles on the counter. He’s crowded right into Spock’s personal space when he suggests, “You can just doctor me up in here.”
Spock pauses his search, seemingly unperturbed by how close Jim is, and regards Jim with a tilt to his head. “Very well.”
Out of the first aid kit comes a series of items – sterile antiseptic wipes, gauze, a mild painkiller pre-loaded in a disposable hypo, and a dermal regenerator. It will help with the worst of his cuts and scrapes, probably his split lip, but the deeper bruises will need to be treated separately. The hypo is on him before he can protest otherwise, and Spock discards it while Jim mutters his half-hearted complaints to the floor – the tile is more likely to be openly sympathetic to his plight, at least.
“You have demonstrated little regard for your own safety,” Spock says, peeling the plastic packaging off of the sterilizing agent. It's not an accusatory statement; it's just factual, and Jim can't disagree. Spock unfolds the antiseptic wipe methodically, then applies it against Jim’s lower lip.
It stings massively even with the hypo, so Jim hisses and jerks back. Spock waits patiently, unmoved, and repeats the process with each tender spot on Jim’s face.
“Sorry,” Jim says, with more grace than he really feels. “I didn’t mean to worry you.”
“Your behavior tonight has been cause for concern. However, I am given to understand I am not the target of your frustrations, and the date has some historically negative significance for you. While I do cannot endorse your methodology, I can, perhaps, empathize with the impetus to seek out inappropriate methods of catharsis,” Spock says. His eyelashes flutter and mouth tightens in the way Jim knows means he’s talking about Vulcan.
The tell is subtle, but potent.
Jim doesn't have any response to that, except maybe another apology, so he just bends his head and flexes his fists. He didn't even hit them back, and he knows that will look just as reckless and troubling on a Starfleet psych eval as starting the fight in the first place. He didn’t fight back when Spock had his hands around Jim’s throat, either – Starfleet would be troubled by any implication their youngest captain had a latent need to have control taken away from him.
He shouldn’t still be pissing away his birthday just because his dad died; Jim didn’t think he needed to prove himself again, but he’s tired and all his old doubt has snuck up on him. Eleven of his crew are now space dust, killed in the Klingon ambush, and Jim has run through the events of the day over and over again, trying to find where he could have won for them when he lost.
There’s nothing he’s turned up; they couldn’t have known, Jim couldn’t have known, but he snuck out to find penance for his failure to be prescient instead of writing the letters to his crew’s family.
The letters might be the worst part. After Altamid there had been so many. At Yorktown, he’d worked himself up to writing them while ensconced in the visiting captain’s quarters, surrounded by the too-plush luxury of a Starfleet captain treated like a hero, rather than a man who had made a series of choices that had gotten a full third of his crew killed.
Some of the best and brightest of Starfleet had just vanished, smeared out in a blink. A ship had gone back to the nebula to retrieve the bodies for burial. They had found corpses hanging in the black of space, suspended in escape pods with damaged life support, or drifting unfettered, frozen, like space debris. He would have slept in mud and rain if it had meant bringing just one of them back alive, but Jim was crowded into a polished uniform and made to stare at his brass-trimmed reflection at a borrowed desk while he struggled for words.
With a guilty heart, he had sat in that chair and hand wrote each of them, until he felt sick with grief; Spock had stood watch in the doorway with dark, thoughtful eyes. He hadn’t offered to help, but when Jim began to doze at the desk, he had touched the nape of Jim's neck; it had been just the once, the gesture there and then gone, and Jim had been left wondering what had changed.
Jim doesn’t know what he thought would come of antagonizing some working men with lives and wives and things to anchor them to this fixed point in space; he’s ashamed he thought he could find any sort of absolution. The colony isn’t some seedy dive bar back in San Fran, where he can disappear anonymously into the crowd when he gets a little bloodied.
The bathroom light is poor, too harsh, and Jim can see the hard lines around Spock’s mouth, the divot between his brow. It’s smoother than a Human’s face, but even his Vulcan impartiality hasn’t completely spared him from the stress and loss of space exploration.
Spock is looking at him steadily. He’s done prepping the rest of the supplies, everything sorted into a neat line, and he says, “Please remain still.” He stands between Jim’s dangling legs, penning him in.
Jim closes his eyes when Spock’s hand cups his jaw in the cradle of his fingers, exhaling into the touch, and sits perfectly motionless while Spock cleans the blood from his face. He’s covered with dried flakes from cheek to jaw, his mouth a bloody mess, but Spock just works slowly, using light touches that counter the medicinal sting. A warmth fills Jim’s chest, lodging behind his sternum, and won’t be banished no matter how many times Jim tries to solve quantum computing puzzles in his head.
The hand on his face lingers overlong when Spock finishes his cleanup, the contact straying into unscientific territory; Spock stills completely when Jim leans into his touch, pressing his nose into the crook of Spock’s thumb and forefinger. Jim is feeling foolish and heartsick so it’s pretty much par for the course when he presses a chaste kiss to the heel of Spock’s palm. He’s crossing a line, but that itself is familiar territory with Spock; they’re constantly redrawing the parameters of their friendship.
“Jim,” Spock says. There’s the slightest quiver to his voice. He knows he’s not imagining it, like he isn’t imagining the curious sideways looks Spock has given him with increasing frequency; like he didn’t imagine Spock by his biobed in San Francisco (after Khan nearly broke Starfleet in two and did break Jim in two) or the quick caress of his fingertips over Jim’s knuckles, just once, that retreated when Bones returned; like he didn’t imagine that ghost touch at the nape of his neck late at night in Yorktown, or the warm way Spock’s eyes crinkle when Jim says something he thinks is novel.
They’ve sat across from each other in the mess hall for years, trading long looks and quiet words. Jim always stands too close, the only body in Spock’s orbit when Spock drifts a safe distance away from every other crewmember.
And Spock is the one who wrangled him out of trouble when no one else could be bothered to move after a hard day’s work.
In hindsight, it seems obvious.
Jim opens his eyes and closes his fingers around Spock’s wrist. Spock’s pulse, already Vulcan-fast, races at the abrupt contact; Jim tracks the quivering rush of it with his thumb. “You keep saying my name.”
“If I do not finish, this may scar.” Spock indicates the gash across Jim’s brow, where a miner’s large fist landed the first blow, with a brush of his knuckles. It’s an intimate touch. He doesn’t extricate his captive hand from Jim’s grip, but flips the dermal regenerator on with his free thumb, his brow faintly pinched.
“Let it,” Jim says because he could probably use a few reminders to keep his head down, but he’s disinclined to be disobedient.
He cautiously works his fingers down the back of the hand Spock has on his face, tracing his nails over the knuckles, dipping into the little valleys between each finger and skating down the delicate lines of tendons towards Spock’s wrist. He sneaks a touch beneath the sleeve of Spock’s uniform shirt and is rewarded with a sharp intake of breath, faint and whispery, just an insinuation of rushing air.
Jim is riveted as a faint blush colors the high points of Spock’s cheeks and the elegant tips of his ears green. Spock’s mouth parts slightly, hinting teeth and tongue just past his lower lip. Jim stares at it, the acid fear of failure and self-doubt in his belly slowly beginning to dissolve. Spock looks momentarily flustered, but his hand does not tremble as the dermal regenerator knits together a line of scuffs on Jim’s chin.
"Your attempts to divert my attention before my task is complete will not be successful," Spock says.
"What about after?" Jim asks, licking his lips. It earns him a slightly impatient look, which is as good as a scolding from Spock, and the regenerator sting returns. It itches madly, but the worst evidence of the evening’s brawl is slowly erased. The accelerated healing always makes his skin crawl.
"You are intoxicated," Spock observes.
"Not so much. Getting your head half bashed in and a nice long stroll through a dark city on winter night is just the thing, turns out," Jim says.
"Your judgment is impaired, Jim." Spock lowers his gaze to Jim's mouth.
"My judgment is always impaired when it comes to you, and you're not stopping me," Jim points out gently. He's fairly sure he’s right on the mark about this, but he's prepared to drop it and walk away if Spock says the word.
He presses his thumb more firmly to the flutter of Spock’s pulse and thinks about turning that hand over and licking the tender skin there. Spock’s hand stays steady, though he looks up at Jim through his eyelashes in a way that makes him think Spock knows exactly what’s going through Jim’s head. Jim releases his hold but Spock tracks him with an intensity that had not been there moments prior.
"Not desiring cessation of an action is not mutually exclusive with that action being advisable," Spock says, after a lengthy silence. He flicks the regenerator off. Jim massages the renewed skin; tender, still bruised, but like it happened a week ago, not less than an hour.
"So, you're saying I've met my bad decision quota for the day and shouldn't push my luck?" Jim likes this conversation. He's flirting, and Spock isn't slamming a door in his face, and his chest feels warm and full.
Spock looks up and huffs a soft breath, the corners of his eyes crinkled subtly. Jim, who is highly suspicious the sound is a suppressed laugh, grins broadly back at him. Spock follows with, "As it is after midnight, I believe it is acceptable to consider any actions presently taken to be counted towards a new quota."
Spock drops the regenerator onto the counter and Jim leans in and kisses the corner of his mouth, movements clumsy and breathing shaky. He panics for a slim moment, rooted in place with his lips crushed against a hint of stubble and cool, soft skin, but Spock lifts both hands and sinks them into Jim’s hair with a surprisingly hungry sound.
Jim slithers from his perch to stand between the counter and the long line of Spock's body, pressing them together from chest to hip, and groans into the wonderful softness of Spock's mouth. The kiss is awkward, messy, and frustrating; Spock makes the most impatient noise Jim has ever heard out of a Vulcan, then tugs insistently on Jim’s hair, easing the urgent press of Jim’s mouth. He sucks at Jim's lower lip with a gentleness that makes Jim feel like he’s just been dropped a few thousand feet in low atmosphere, zero G and floating, the sensation slightly surreal.
He slides his tongue into Spock’s open mouth and licks against him, nipping at his lower lip in a way that inspires a slow, burning arousal low in his belly which drifts upwards. He slips both hands beneath Spock’s shirt and strokes two long lines up the smooth skin on either side of Spock’s spine, making a soft, helpless sound when Spock bites at his lower lip.
Abruptly, Spock pulls away and rests his forehead against Jim’s, eyes squeezed closed, his breathing labored. Jim cradles his head and plants a smattering of butterfly-light kisses across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose.
“Sorry. Too much?” Jim asks hoarsely. He runs his thumbs over the lines of Spock’s jaw, trying to moderate his breathing.
“Negative,” Spock responds. When he opens his eyes, they’re all pupil, limned brown. “It has simply been some time since I last engaged in physical intimacy. It is unnecessary to apologize where no offense has been given.”
A curl of sharp desire threads through him, and Jim leans forward. He wants to kiss Spock, wants to hang his arms around those strong shoulders and forget his own name. He steadies himself against Spock instead, his forehead pressed to Spock's. “Do you want me to stay tonight? We can do anything you want.”
“Your company is always gratifying, Jim,” Spock murmurs, voice dark and rich with desire, and Jim is glad he’s braced against the countertop, because the low sound goes straight to his cock.
Jim presses his mouth against the angle of Spock’s jaw, tasting, savoring the faint metallic tang of his skin for the sheer newness of the experience. “Yes,” he counters, breathing hotly down the cool slope of Spock’s neck, “but do you want me to stay?”
Strong fingers curl around the nape of his neck and tip his head back. Spock slides them into his hair and tugs insistently. “If you were to leave now, I cannot confidently conclude I would not follow you. Your query is appreciated, but unnecessary.”
Then, Jim’s mouth is being plundered, and he melts against Spock with a groan, bending beneath the firm, solicitous touches. Spock distracts him with a demanding bite and uses the opportunity to sneak both hands right down the back of Jim’s pants to cup and squeeze his ass. It's possibly the hottest thing Jim’s ever had done to him -- partially because it's Spock, but partially because he’s never imagined a Vulcan being half so forceful. He had this strange impression Vulcan sex might just involve hand stroking and half-chaste kisses and -- holy shit, Spock is nestled the vee of Jim’s legs and rock hard in his uniform pants.
“You are surprised.” It isn't a question; Spock looks thoughtful when he pulls back. He doesn't go very far, because Jim snags the collar of his shirt and halts further retreat with a fistful of blue fabric. Spock bears Jim hungrily sucking at his skin with easy interest, caressing the curve of Jim’s ass.
“Thought you’d be more --” Jim pauses his oral exploration and searches for a word that isn't insulting.
“Civilized?” Spock supplies mildly. He bites down on the lobe of Jim’s ear, eliciting a strangled sound for his efforts. Anyone who bought that Spock didn't understand how to deploy sarcasm was missing out. “Inexperienced?”
“No, disinterested,” Jim says, snorting against the fine line of Spock’s clavicle. He insinuates a hand between them and flips Spock's flies open; Spock rocks into the touch, pressing the thick line of his cock against Jim’s passing knuckles.
“My sincerest apologies for any disappointment,” Spock says, and doesn't sound the slightest bit remorseful. His face is placid, but the very corner of his mouth twitches upwards when Jim lands another kiss there, betraying his amusement. Jim is laughing when Spock releases his massaging grip and undoes Jim’s pants as well, then peels Jim’s undershirt off like Jim is a gift to be unwrapped.
Jim wraps his fingers around Spock’s wrist when he rolls down the waistband of Jim’s pants, halting him. “You’ve already taken care of me tonight. It's my turn.” He carefully palms the warm bulk of Spock’s restrained erection through his underclothes. “Let me?”
There’s an unfamiliar heat in Spock’s gaze, and Jim decides he likes it there. “You may.”
Spock takes a half step back and Jim slides to his knees in the space afforded. The bathroom floor is hard tile and he’ll pay for that, too, in the morning, but for now he doesn't mind earning these battle wounds. He’s had bruised knees for less interesting reasons.
The narrow cradle of Spock’s hips smells faintly earthy and delicious, like arousal and loamy sand -- like that last, baking hot gasp of breath Jim took on Vulcan. Jim slides Spock’s pants down, exposing him from navel to knee, and pushes his face reverently into the crease of Spock’s thigh, the weeping head of his cock dragging across Jim’s cheek. Fingers sift through his hair in a way that makes his scalp tingle, caressing, offering a gentle suggestion to proceed.
He palms the length of Spock’s erection, testing the heft and feel of it. The skin is soft, warmer than the rest of Spock’s cool skin, and stone hard. The length of it is flushed a gorgeous green, and Jim knows he’s never going to be able to look at Spock again and not think of it. He runs his thumb over the head, teasing at the tip, then carefully fists the foreskin back to expose the slippery glans.
It tastes musky and slightly sweet, and Jim’s careful application of tongue earns him his first soft groan, low and throaty. The sound of unrestrained pleasure sends a rush down his spine that lingers. He sucks Spock down with relish, swallowing until the head of his cock bumps the back of Jim’s throat. Spock’s fingers twitch in his hair, his jaw slightly slack with pleasure.
Jim pulls off with a wet sound and looks up. “Tell me how you like it?”
Spock responds with a firm touch to the back of Jim’s head, and Jim reapplies his mouth obediently. The length of cock presses past his slick lips, grazing his cheek, rubbing wet over the back of his tongue. Spock likes it deep, then, and rocks his hips when Jim massages the underside with the flat of his tongue.
“Jim.” Spock says his name like it's a lifeline, like he’s coming undone, and the only thing Jim wishes is that he had a better view of Spock’s expression. Jim wants to watch him unravel. There’s time for that later, though, so he sets aside his wish list of dirty deeds and sucks and licks and caresses Spock until Spock's fucking helplessly into his mouth.
He presses his palm over his own aching cock when Spock tightens the grip on Jim’s hair. Jim can mark the exact moment when Spock relaxes into the motion, using Jim’s mouth, each roll of his hips strong and precise, like he’s worked out exactly what he likes and exactly what Jim can take.
Jim closes his eyes and strokes himself, riding the shuddery edge of pleasure while he memorizes the way Spock’s skin feels when it slips easily past the back of his tongue, the way he tastes, the way the head of his cock nudges the back of Jim’s throat; he swallows on every long stroke, not at a good angle to take him any further, but he wants to, wants to lie on his back and let Spock bury all that long, sweet slickness down his throat.
Spock groans audibly as soon as Jim thinks it, a tight, sharp sound, and Jim is giddy for it. He chokes a little on the end of a hard thrust, throat constricting, and Spock holds him there by a thick hank of hair while he thumbs the stretched curve of Jim’s mouth, then releases Jim to pant. Jim’s eager for it, though, and works his mouth back down the delicious length of cock as soon as he can draw a breath.
A sharp tug warns Jim that an orgasm is impending, and he cups the tight, silky mound of Spock’s testicles with his fingertips, applying judicious suction around the whole length of his cock. Spock comes on the back of Jim’s tongue, sweet and citrus-tart and creamy, like sash’savas tea or lemon custard. Jim rolls it in his mouth for a moment and then swallows, licking the length of Spock’s softening cock before he’s being hauled back to his feet.
Spock crowds him back onto the counter and reaches for his undergarment with trembling fingers, licking the taste of himself out of Jim’s well-used mouth. His lips feel swollen and the tender way Spock bites and sucks at him is a wonderful kind of torture that leaves him a little dizzy and aching.
“You are incomparable,” Spock murmurs against Jim’s lower lip. The words send a sharp jolt of pleasure through Jim that isn't entirely sexual, but his belly burns with heat when Spock’s slim fingers find his exposed erection.
“I thought I was troublesome,” Jim says, smiling as he leans his head against Spock’s shoulder.
“Incomparably troublesome,” Spock amends. His thumb circles the head of Jim’s cock. Jim searches blindly for purchase when Spock draws the blunt tip of his thumbnail up the underside. “Will you observe?”
Before Jim can answer, he’s being maneuvered around to face the sink and Spock’s sliding one long leg between Jim’s to support him. Jim’s cock and balls crest the sink surround, so he has an excellent view of Spock’s hands in the large ceiling-to-countertop mirror. One roves his chest, stroking sweetly over his bruises and unblemished muscle alike, the other wrapped firmly around Jim’s cock. Spock shoves Jim’s pants down to his ankles and hooks a foot over the fabric, effectively hobbling Jim.
Jim’s higher brain functions come screeching to an abrupt halt when Spock strokes him long and hard and says, cool breath ghosting across his ear, “If you are unable to extrapolate meaning from existing data points, perhaps you will find it instructive to see how much you are cared for.”
He can't tear his eyes away even if he wanted to. Spock kisses a line up his neck and worries at his ear with a sharp nip. The curve of Jim’s ass is pressed tight up against Spock’s groin, and there’s a noticeable stirring when Spock forces a throaty, helpless groan from Jim. Spock’s watching Jim in the mirror hungrily, like he wants to crawl on top of Jim and devour him from head to toe, and the intensity of it makes Jim clutch at the counter until his knuckles are white with strain.
Jim had always hoped, but never known. They had never done anything by half measures, and all of his sweet fantasies of pushing Spock into a dark corner of the Enterprise and kissing him until he blushed seem juvenile and unimaginative beneath the current of dark intensity that grips them both. Jim is being taken apart, studied, examined in the deeply Vulcan manner that Spock has about him; everything is too much and not enough all at once, and Jim can only fuck jerkily into the wonderful curl of Spock’s fist. Spock is all hard angles and unyielding strength under silk skin and Jim wonders why he ever thought fucking him would be anything other than slightly terrifying and utterly fantastic.
Teeth sink briefly into the curve of his neck, just below where his uniform collar normally sits. The bite is hard enough to bruise, raising a red welt on his skin, and Spock accompanies it with a tight squeeze of his fist. It takes Jim a dizzy second to notice that Spock is panting and fully erect against his ass again, and he thinks touch telepath just as Spock tucks himself between Jim’s asscheeks and slowly drags the head of his cock over the sensitive ring of Jim’s asshole. “Do you find this encounter edifying?”
“Yes,” Jim says, releasing an explosive breath he didn't realize he was holding. He shudders from head to toe and is grateful for the hard line of Spock’s body supporting him because his knees give briefly on a firm downstroke. In a moment of clarity, it occurs to Jim that he may have gotten more than he bargained for.
Spock applies his mouth to Jim’s shoulder and sucks a bruise into it. “You are very wanted, Jim.” His voice is full of heat and emotion, and an edge of something darker, maybe a touch of anger. “Should you desire to be treated this way, it is a service I would be pleased to provide without the troublesome consequences of picking fights with strangers.”
He wraps his free hand around Jim’s throat, thumb over Jim’s pulse; he doesn't clamp down, but holds firm, commanding and careful, just enough to remind Jim of the last time he held Jim that way, crushed by the weight of his body, bent hard over the console of the Enterprise. Jim recalls the moment; the scent of Spock’s skin burned into his memory, the rage and grief and improbable strength that have become a talisman against failure in Jim’s less savory, self-flagellating fantasies, indulged in moments of doubt.
Spock squeezes hard and Jim is spilling into his hand, panting helplessly with the pleasure of it. When Spock releases him, Jim crumples forward, stunned and shaking, breathing like he’s run ten kilometers in full tactical kit. He braces his elbows on the counter and hangs his head between them, limbs trembling; Spock keeps an anchoring hand in the middle of his back and turns the taps on, running cool water into a hand towel.
“Jim?” Spock queries gently, working the damp cloth over Jim’s overheated skin. There’s come and sweat and dried flakes of blood, and Spock tends to all of it with a methodical tenderness that is almost too much, washing Jim with even touches until his body is cool and tingling.
“Yeah, okay,” Jim says, after he catches his breath, voice muffled by the crook of his elbow. “I’m fine.”
“I do not make a habit of restating facts which I have already presented. You are not fine,” Spock says. When Jim looks up at the mirror, Spock is watching the curve of Jim’s back and smoothing a gentle hand down the length of it, like someone might soothe a spooked animal. “However, given the current situation, I would concede that improvement of your emotional state is imminent, given a measure of patience.”
Jim tries to stand and stumbles. Spock catches him, and Jim is divested of the remainder of his clothes and then hoisted from the ground, one deceptively strong Vulcan forearm beneath his bare ass. Spock carries him out into the main room before Jim can protest, and follows Jim down onto the bed when he lays him against the pillows.
“You don't have to take care of me,” Jim says, even knowing Spock has a rebuttal prepared. It'll be a good one, Jim knows, from the way his token protest inspires an exhalation of breath that can't be anything except a sigh.
But Jim does have to protest. He’s always held this part of himself at a distance. Spock having his back isn't something new, and Jim is willing to accept Spock’s hand in almost every aspect of his life -- as his Commander, as his Science Officer, as his friend, but this is uncharted territory. It's two steps and a running dive past anything he ever expected -- hoped, dreamed -- their friendship could be, and Spock has just wrung him empty in a poorly lit bathroom on the edge of nowhere after saving his life twice in one day.
“Jim, caring for you is the most gratifying experience in my life,” Spock says, like it doesn't cost him anything to spill his deepest thoughts. Says it about him, Jim thinks; Spock, who is only awed by the mysteries they find between the stars, who is possessed with a startling amount of wanderlust and a singular Vulcan craving for comprehension. Spock, with his dark, subtle passion and strong hands and expansive mind, finds caring for Jim the most rewarding.
Spock sheds his clothes and slots himself between Jim’s thighs, covering him with cool Vulcan skin. He kisses Jim, slow and thorough, until Jim’s chest feels like it’s going to explode. He’s dizzy with it, being caressed, coddled, wanted, cared for. This isn’t how Jim does things, isn’t some quick fuck or a bar fight or gunning for hundreds of lives while cold, impartial space closes in around them, but his heart speeds all the same.
This is his best friend, the best person he knows, this is everything, and Jim is wanted, Jim belongs. He closes his eyes against the weight of it.
“Thank you,” Jim says, because he can’t think of anything better. Spock drapes over him, blanketing Jim with his body; he fits against Jim as if he had done it a hundred times.
“Jim,” Spock begins, “it has always been my understanding that, between Humans, it is acceptable to share an emotional burden with a companion.” Long fingers stroke a path from his sternum to hip, detouring to explore the dip of his navel. Spock is surprisingly tactile in the warm, post-coital haze. “Perhaps you would allow me the privilege?”
Jim blinks away a surprising rush of emotion, starting like all the lights have been turned back on in his brain. He lifts his hand to his face and presses the heel of his palm into his brow, fighting the sudden memory of another Spock’s warm, dark eyes and the sly sweep of a knowing smile. Had it been trapped in his skull all along? Old, strange clips of knowledge buzz there, lurking beneath the surface of his life; no, the meld hadn’t betrayed this as a potential, hadn’t planted the incipient roots of this thing between them. That had been his Spock, dark and pale at once, lovely with his alien tidiness and crisp edges.
Spock is breathing slowly into the curve of his neck, the sound trapped between their bodies, a tidal rush of air. “You mean –” He waves his hand in a vague claw shape over his face.
“If you are agreeable, yes,” Spock confirms. He maps a constellation of kisses across Jim’s torso; Jim thinks they have no real pattern, until he realizes that Spock is pressing his mouth to each of the dark freckles on Jim’s ribcage. Emotion stops up his throat, a sudden weight on his chest.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea for you right now,” Jim says hoarsely, pressing his hand tightly over his eyes to block out all the light. “I can’t turn it off and on like you can. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable. I don’t –”
Spock carefully pries Jim’s fingers away and kisses the center of his palm, forestalling further objections, and says, “Kadiith, Jim. Your emotions are not a deterrent.” He skims soft fingertips up the length of Jim’s throat, past his lips, and cups them delicately over Jim’s psi-points. “I find no fault in your passions. I would not change this about you; Surak teaches differences are to be celebrated.”
He exhales into the lingering silence after Spock's declaration. “Okay. Let's do it,” he says, because in the end Jim isn't afraid of the unknown, and this is just one more unsolved-for variable.
Spock slots his fingers into place, and for a moment there’s nothing -- but then it's like plunging into a fire. He is swallowed, consumed, cradled, cherished. It's like nothing else, and he’s all wrapped up and, for a moment, entirely loses his sense of self.
“I am here, Jim,” Spock says by his ear and in his head, everywhere at once. It's not like the hard, horrifying emotional rush on Delta Vega; instead, his mind rocks on a sandy sea. He feels like his skin is made of dust. He can smell the sharp salt scent of himself, rendered potent and exotic through heightened Vulcan senses; Jim catches bright flashes of the way Spock sees him, pliant and golden.
As much as Jim wants to press the boundaries, he is mind blind, fumbling about lost. Memories bubble up like oases in the flat, logical sweep of Spock’s consciousness, providing familiar anchors. He flounders in the emotionless expanse, thoughts wheeling out of control until Spock offers him an anchor point in a stretch of dispassionate emptiness.
With a frame of reference, he amends: not emotionless, controlled. The depth of it stuns him, the trancelike beauty of it. Myriad lines of thought lay beneath him, each feeling clear and separated, cataloged; pain, anger, and loss are marked and well-worn, dog-eared and picked apart until cause and effect have been painstakingly documented. Vulcan’s destruction and, equally ugly, the loss of Spock’s mother, crater the orderly landscape, grief perpetually burning a hole through all that careful work, though Jim senses that the smolder is abating.
Jim’s own ancient pain is shared, halved, shouldered. Spock takes it easily. A mother who loved him, but not enough to banish her demons; a childhood with a man who resented him; a ticket into his dreams paid for with the coin of his father’s death.
But there’s happiness, too, and Spock helps him unearth it; it is theirs together. Spock's joy is unasked for, unyielding, but restrained and treasured. Jim has the sense that it is unexpected, but the lines of joy and mirth and affection are well-tended, coveted, welcomed. Fondness swells at memories of Jim, little impressions of his sloping smile and the odd, intense blue of his eyes cherished in equal measure.
“Spock,” Jim says, thinks, conveys though tender touches. He feels like reality is flattened and Spock’s thoughts peak above it, heavy and intense; Jim’s mind struggles to describe the indescribable, running through improbable comparisons for lack of better options -- Spock's mind is sunlight and the desert and coming into the shadow of sprawling rock cliffs at midday.
Spock plants a delicate chain of kisses from his navel up to the hollow of his throat, and Jim clutches at the broad, pale shoulders above him. A hand creeps between Jim’s legs, and Spock must have done some sleight of hand while Jim was distracted, because his fingers are already slick with something when he teases two of them at Jim’s entrance. He remarks, “If you are amenable, I would also have you this way,” and the crackling drive to sink into Jim’s body sparks between them.
The only logical response is to bear down on Spock’s fingers, lost in the crush of Spock's sweet desire. Two fingers are a tight fight, but his body is heavy with endorphins, limbs loose and relaxed. The sudden stretch and burn of it makes him exhale, but Spock is there to lick the faint sounds of pleasure right out of his mouth while he works Jim open. He is in Jim’s mind, behind Jim's eyes, and he craves Jim so much that Jim’s palms itch with a sympathetic compulsion to touch.
“Are you always like this?” Jim groans, but knows the answer as soon as the thought has formed; yes, for you Jim.
He threads his fingers through Spock’s hair, too tired and wrung out and transported to do more than squirm. He hasn’t been this handily fucked in a long time -- maybe ever -- and a deep thrill runs through him at the idea of Spock moving over him, taking him while he’s worn out and well-used. Spock's answering need echos through the base of his brain, not so much a coherent thought as an animal impulse to bury himself in Jim and take.
Spock crooks his fingers and Jim gasps. He’s in absolute control, and Jim has a window into that stunning iron grip Spock has on himself despite the coiling, predatory hunger. “Attentive?”
“Insatiable,” Jim says, around a desperate laugh. He drapes his free arm over his eyes, grinning from ear to ear. He feels like he’s floating, flying, falling, undone and unraveling. “You’re insatiable.”
Archly, Spock replies, “I am given to understand that my libido is perfectly in line with a healthy male of my species.” The curl of amusement in Jim’s belly isn’t his own, the emotion surprisingly vibrant, a perfect arrangement of vivid delight and appreciation for cleverness.
“Spock, you’re the only one of your species,” Jim is gasping now, because Spock has found his prostate and snuck a third finger into his ass. Jim’s back arches off the bed and he moans through a clenched jaw. Spock's thumb is stroking the weight of Jim’s balls and he’s radiating satisfaction.
Spock lifts his mouth from Jim’s right nipple and says, very seriously, “Given your parameters, I am operating well within a healthy range.”
It startles another laugh from Jim, and he’s still panting with unrestrained mirth when Spock bundles Jim up against him and presses the head of his cock slowly into Jim. There are faint, fascinating traces of stubble when Spock rubs his cheek against Jim’s shoulder, and Jim can’t think of much else when he slings his legs around Spock’s waist, a hand in his soft, black hair.
Voice pitched low, Spock murmurs soft words in Vulcan; Jim can’t understand more than one word in twenty, but it’s the most wonderful sound, a mellow rumble of affection. That much, just that much, is enough to banish the lingering shadows that even the drink and the adrenaline-laced thrill of five pairs of fists couldn’t chase away, and Spock is giving him so much more.
And he’s full, so full, stretched and taken, mind and body, and his thoughts go flat and soft and pleased as Spock thrusts into him (careful at first, then building). He surrenders all control, he’s here where it’s safe, where it's all Spock, and Jim can fill his own skin with just himself instead of the burden of responsibility.
Spock moves with care, powerful; Jim can feel the strength in him this way, Spock’s restraint and control redirected into the tireless thrust of his hips. He can hurt Jim, crush him – will, if Jim wants, he offers that, too – but he’s delicate now, plying Jim’s pleasure with clever fingers and the hard length of his cock and the warm sweep of his tongue. Jim wants for nothing.
“Spock, fuck, please,” Jim begs when Spock ruts into him harder, angling his cock so it sweeps long and deep across that sensitive cluster of nerves each time he drives home. His body flexes and he shudders with overstimulation, mind hazy with a resurging need that he wasn’t even aware he could muster. Spock presses his mouth over lingering bruises, like he can make them vanish beneath his ministrations; the flat of his tongue chases a line of beaded sweat up the side of Jim’s neck, and Jim turns his face to press blind kisses to Spock’s cheek and jaw when he’s back in range.
Lube-slick fingers grasp at Jim’s painfully hard cock, and tug. Once, twice, a handful of times, and they’re coming together, Jim’s orgasm wrung out of him by force as the ripples of Spock’s intense pleasure electrify the inside of his skull. Spock flexes and buries his cock deep into Jim with an expression of unbridled bliss.
They lay tangled together in a damp heap, Spock sprawled artfully over Jim, weighty and wonderful. After a moment, he extricates himself and slides into the crook of Jim’s arm, head pillowed comfortably on Jim’s chest. The meld dissipates slowly and leaves only satisfaction behind, all the other clamoring pain and doubt relegated to background noise. Even his bruises are a comfortable throb, and Jim floats blissfully in utter clarity. He is faintly aware of Spock tidying up the mess they’ve made, but Spock’s efforts are half-hearted in a sex-lazy, pleased way.
He twines his fingers in the fine hairs at the nape of Spock’s neck, impulsively, runs his finger up the elegant, pointed shell of Spock’s ear. Spock shivers at the touch, a whole body motion, entirely involuntary, and makes a rumbling noise against Jim’s pectoral.
Spock says, “You require sleep before initiating further physical intimacy,” and traps Jim’s hand with his own.
Jim smiles at the ceiling.
After his skin cools, Jim says, “This is going to make things interesting.”
Spock replies, sleepy and charming, “If Mr. Scott is to be believed, it is a virtue of service aboard the Enterprise.”
Jim laughs breathlessly, and rolls to press the length of his body against Spock’s. “I like it when you make jokes.”
“I assure you, my statement is in earnest,” Spock counters, but Jim can feel the small, amused twitch at the corner of Spock’s mouth where it's pressed to his shoulder. Spock is quiet so long that Jim thinks he may have fallen asleep, but he says, “The injured have been stabilized, we are in Federation protected territory, and the Gamma shift crew is sufficient to operate a stationary vessel without your supervision, Jim. We may sleep. This day has been trying.”
Jim eases, releasing the small worries he had already begun to accumulate. “Thank you,” he says.
Spock pulls a blanket over them both. Jim waits for Spock’s breathing to even out before he lets himself drift; there will be time enough for letters in the morning.