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Spock threw himself behind the broken wall mere seconds before the homemade missile landed on the exact spot he had been standing, sending debris flying as the ground shook with the force of the explosion. He moved his hands away from his head, blinking rapidly at the sharp pain that shot through his lower abdomen.
Doctor McCoy knelt beside him; the broken remains of his tricorder still clutched in his hand. “You okay?” His voice sounded somewhat garbled underneath the ringing in his ears.
Spock gave the doctor a quick nod. The pain was already easing and the ringing would go away in a day or two. Neither were serious.
“Umf!” Spock turned sharply to watch Jim scramble over the wall, albeit with much less grace than Spock had. Despite his ripped shirt, he appeared uninjured. Spock let out a soft breath as the worry he refused to acknowledge loosened from his chest. “Hey, Bones. Spock.” Jim attempted to sound casual, but the heavy breathing gave him away. “So, the negotiations didn’t go so well.”
“Yeah, thanks, we got that already,” Doctor McCoy snapped, hunching down lower to avoid oncoming artillery. “What the hell did you say to them?!”
“I didn’t do anything! It wasn’t my fault! Spock, tell him.”
Spock opened his mouth to comment on the matter, when the dull ache in his abdomen flared suddenly. It lasted only for a few seconds, but the pain tore through him with such ferocity that Spock could do nothing but clench his teeth together and breathe. Like before, the pain died down, and when he was finally able to lift his head, he found Jim kneeling next to him, his hand grasping the sleeve of his uniform. “Spock, are you alright?” Jim asked, his eyes raking over him again and again as he searched for the problem. The grip on his sleeve was tight and Jim’s thumb rubbed small circles into his wrist.
Over the last year, their relationship had changed. What exactly it had changed into, Spock wasn’t sure. They frequently indulged in sexual relations, but they were not bonded nor were they even dating. Their relationship was too casual for that, and yet also too intimate and affectionate to be described simply as “friends with benefits.” It was complex and thrilling and unnerving, all at the same time.
“Yes, Captain, I--” Before he could say anything else, Spock felt himself doubling over in pain. It was somehow even worse than before, lasted longer, and Spock had to concentrate to keep from making any noise.
Doctor McCoy fluttered around him, growling. “Dammit! You told me you were fine! C’mon, we need to find shelter so I can check you over.”
Heavy gunfire still rained over them as they half-ran, half-crawled through the battlefield; Jim led, still gripping Spock’s sleeve as he picked his way over rubble, and McCoy followed at their heels. Jim took a sharp turn, taking them into an abandoned shop that had its windows blown out. The pain in Spock’s abdomen was increasing, the time between each flare-up shortening, and he found himself unable to focus as he should. Jim cleared away broken glass and pieces of concrete while Doctor McCoy helped ease Spock onto the ground.
The doctor began pressing on Spock’s lower half, Jim hovering behind his head. “It hurts here?” He grunted out, fixated on his work.
“Yes.”
He lifted his shirt, his fingers still probing at Spock’s flesh. His stomach wasn’t quite as flat as it had been before Vulcan’s destruction, but still within acceptable parameters. He had been alarmed at first by this sudden weight gain, but both Jim and Doctor McCoy had brushed it off as a sign of stress. It was a very... human response to trauma. “Huh,” McCoy said. “This area feels harder than it should be, like the skin is stretched over something, but I don’t see any injury. Not even a bruise. Dammit, if they hadn’t shot my tricorder I’d know what was going on in there.”
“Is he going to be okay?” Jim asked.
Doctor McCoy shrugged. “I don’t know. It could be caused by a number of things.” The doctor turned back to Spock. “There’s not any chance you could be pregnant, right?”
Spock lifted a brow at this suggestion. “Highly unlikely. I am completely aware of my body at all times. I would be able to tell if that was the case.”
“Also,” Jim interjected, louder-than-necessary. “You are very responsible and I’m sure you used a condom every time.” Spock fought the rising blush, because he and Jim had most certainly not been using condoms, despite Doctor McCoy’s ship-wide mandatory lessons on safe sex. McCoy leveled his gaze on the captain, his eyes narrowing, and Jim grew even more nervous. “Uh, not that you even need condoms, because you haven’t been seeing anyone. You know, since it takes two people to make a baby. Two people having unprotected sex. Which you haven’t had.”
"Jim." Doctor McCoy drawled out. "Are you trying to tell me something?"
"No?"
The doctor's glare shifted between the two officers. "When we get back to the ship, I'm going to kick both of your asses."
“In any case, Doctor,” Spock broke through, willing his blush to go away. “Despite the Captain’s inadvertent revelation, the fact remains that the source of my pain is not a fetus.”
"Thank God for that,” McCoy muttered under his breath before rising to his feet. “The only thing to do then is wait until we can make it back to the Enterprise. I can’t fix the problem if I don’t know what it is and, short of exploratory surgery, there’s no way of finding out. We’ve lost our communicators, what about you, Jim?”
The Captain shook his head and pulled out what remained of his communicator. It had been shot through. “Bad luck all around, though the bullet would have gone through my spine if my communicator hadn’t been there to stop it.”
McCoy sighed. “Then the only thing I can do is give you some painkillers to take the edge off.”
“That would be much appreciated, Doctor,” Spock responded in a breathless voice as the pain began to increase once more.
Jim peeked through the broken windows as Doctor McCoy readied his hypo. “The fighting’s died down,” he said. “We could probably make it back to the rendezvous point without getting shot.”
Spock heard the hiss of the hypo and felt his muscles relax despite themselves. “Spock won’t make it there,” McCoy said from somewhere above him.
Jim came back to where Spock was lying. He knelt down and clutched his wrist, mindful not to take his hand while McCoy stood next to them, but close enough that it still sent a jolt through Spock. “Hey,” Jim said. “I’m going to the rendezvous point. Hopefully Uhura will have a working communicator and I can get Scotty your coordinates. You’re going to be just fine, you hear me?” Spock did not believe the Captain could order him into being well again, but Spock indulged his illogical whim and nodded anyway. Jim smiled and stood up. “I won’t be long.”
Over the next hour, the pain battered against the drugs, overwhelming Spock’s senses. He could do little except curl onto his side and clutch his torso in an illogical gesture to alleviate the pain. McCoy continued to dig through his medkit over and over as though that would make another tricorder magically appear. “How much longer will it take Jim to reach the rendezvous point?” The doctor asked.
Spock tried to push past the pain to do the necessary calculations. “Depending on the amount of fighting, it could take him another two hours.”
Doctor McCoy huffed and shook his head. “That’s too long. You’re getting worse. I’m cutting you open.” He began muttering something about ‘medieval conditions’ as he rolled Spock onto his back, holding up two hypos in front of his face. “Look, this is all I’ve got left. It’s a muscle relaxer and another painkiller. You’re still going to feel the incision, I can’t help that, but these will provide some relief.”
“Just do it, Doctor,” Spock gritted out. He was Vulcan. He could handle an incision. Whatever was happening inside of him, however, was beyond his control.
The doctor nodded before helping Spock divest himself of his shirt and shifting him into position. McCoy quickly administered the hypos, moving on to rub his hands over the strangely stretched skin of his abdomen in search of a place to make the first cut. He made a mark, dabbed the area with alcohol, and shrugged on his gloves. Now all that was left was the cutting.
McCoy sucked in a deep breath as he unwrapped the scalpel from its packaging. He put the edge of the knife against the skin, watching it bend with the scalpel before being pierced. Green blood oozed from the wound, but McCoy couldn't spare a hand to wipe it away. He heard Spock cry out, but it sounded far away. His attention was focused solely on his hands. It didn't take long for him to discover the root of the problem.
"God dammit, Spock! I thought you said you weren't pregnant! 'Completely aware of my body', my ass."
"Uhura to Enterprise."
"Aye, this is the Enterprise."
"I have Captain Kirk with me and I'm sending you Spock and McCoy’s coordinates. Prepare to beam up."
"Aye."
Uhura shut off her communicator as she turned to look at Jim once more. He had briefly informed her that Spock had been injured, but refused to give her any details. She couldn't help but resent him a little for that. They might have broken up, but she was still his friend! She deserved to know. The only thing that kept her from prodding the issue was the strained look on the Captain's face. It looked like he was barely holding it together. She wondered if maybe there was something going on between the two that Spock hadn't told her about.
She didn't have much longer dwell on it as she felt the familiar sensation of her atoms disassembling and reassembling themselves back onto the ship. It wasn't painful in any way, but there was definitely something unpleasant and off-putting about it.
Apparently, she wasn't the only one to think so.
A sharp, high-pitched cry pierced the room, causing Uhura to swing her neck around in search of the source. McCoy was kneeling next to Spock, who was lying shirtless on the pad while clutching a squalling, angry infant in his hands. There was a stitched incision running across his abdomen coated in dry, crusted blood.
What was most surprising, however, was the blatantly shocked expression on his face.
"What?" Kirk gasped, his gaze transfixed on the sight. "What?" He couldn't seem to stop repeating the phrase. Uhura didn't blame him.
McCoy turned away from Spock, who didn't even seem aware that he was back on the Enterprise let alone that anyone had spoken, to sneer at Kirk. "Well, Jim, I guess it's time to have The Talk." McCoy drawled. "See, when two people are very, very stupid-"
"What?" Kirk asked again.
"Oh, for the love of-" McCoy rolled his eyes, before barking orders. "Scott, get a med team in here."
"Oh... right..."
A med team was there in no time to whisk Spock, Kirk, and the newborn away, leaving only Uhura and Scotty left in their wake.
"So... what just happened?"