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Spock has had three years to grow accustomed to the command style of one James T. Kirk. In that time, he has found his captain an inventive, audacious, and compassionate man. He knows that Jim, in turn, has found Spock a capable, competent, and stringent second.
It has not always been easy. Sometimes Jim is too brash: sometimes Spock is too cold. But they regain their step. Jim adjusts for Spock’s neuroses; Spock learns his captain’s mind. He is able to chart its leaps and shifts. He is able to perceive it, even displaced, suppressed, or otherwise altered.
So he is able to detect that something has changed.
It was not an abrupt change. It has taken place over time, subtly, slowly. Day to day he has noticed no difference; however, when he thinks over the years of their acquaintance, he is aware that their relationship has gained some new element.
Spock is not the only one who has noticed.
He can see it in the glances of the bridge crew. He can see it in the sideways look that Lieutenant Uhura will sometimes give to Nurse Chapel. He can see it in the deepening scowl of Doctor McCoy, who tuts and fusses and bounces on his heels whenever Jim says something particularly warm to Spock.
They are all consummate professionals: no one comments on it, at least not in Spock’s hearing (and his hearing is quite more acute than his human crewmates often realize).
Jim, himself, is a professional. He does not flirt with Spock. He does not moon or sigh or insinuate. He will tease, lightly, as is his way, and this is not unique to his conversations with Spock.
But there is something different in it.
“Well, what do you make of it, Spock?”
They are in the entrance hall of the Council of Estimation of the planet Xiv, home of the Xivians and host to the Enterprise crew for their shore leave. There was a dinner—a boisterous midwinter celebration with the Council, during which Spock ate very little—and the invitation of lodgings for the night.
The hall is large and full of late evening light. The walls are hung with tapestries in iridescent fabric. They put Spock in mind of the late antiquity style of Vulcan—airy fabric against stone.
The hall is also, however, unthinkably cold; while the major rooms are heated with roaring fireplaces, the passages between them are open to the night air and therefore frigid at this point in the year.
The Enterprise crew have been loaned heavy robes for their visit. Spock is currently wrapped in two of them.
“They must have a burgeoning textile industry,” he says blandly.
Jim hides a smile. “That they must. Shall we?”
His hand alights on Spock’s shoulder for the briefest moment. They depart the hall together.
Spock cannot quantify exactly what has changed between him and the captain. It is not the length of time that Jim spends looking at him; it is perhaps the quality of the look. It is not the tone of voice with which he speaks to Spock; it may be the spark in his eye when he speaks.
There has been a change. Spock notices it and responds like a planet to the gravity of a star.
The maze-like passages are more of the same as the building’s entryway—arched openings to the sky, late twilight colors, lush tapestries of nature and hunting scenes. Spock is not surprised that the evening meal involved so much meat. “Your room is there,” Spock says, as they pass the appropriate doorway.
“I’ll check in with the others before I turn in,” Jim says.
“As you wish.”
Jim has been given his own quarters, as befits a captain. The rest of the shore leave party resides in a roomy chamber nearby—one large space with sleeping alcoves—which they are to share. Spock mildly resents the lack of privacy, but contents himself with the knowledge that he can retire elsewhere for meditation if need be.
“Well, Bones, what do you make of Xiv hospitality?” Jim asks, wading into the group of seated officers as he and Spock enter the mercifully warm room.
The Xivians favor low cushions scattered around equally low tables, and so the Enterprise’s officers are sprawled about in various groupings. Uhura is playing cards with three other lieutenants. The doctor is nursing a drink. Two ensigns are sharing a plate of some Xiv sweet.
“Can’t say I mind it,” Bones says easily. “I like a Council that stocks their bar with a few choice Terran favorites.”
“No telling where they got brandy out this far,” Jim says. He crouches down next to McCoy at his low table; Spock skirts the party and sheds his heavy robes in the sleeping alcove designated as his for the evening.
“And you, Jim? Having a good time?”
“Oh, I’m content enough,” Jim says. “It’s good to have the chance to stretch my legs.”
Spock nods to himself. This shore leave is almost entirely for Jim’s benefit, after all, though he is not to know that. McCoy felt, and Spock agreed, that the man had to have rest. Or, if not rest, then a more pleasant place to expend his indefatigable energy. He has been through much, of late.
“Well, sit down. Do you want a drink?”
“Not tonight.” Jim rocks on his heels a bit. “I think I’ll retire early, actually.”
“Good,” McCoy says approvingly. “Get you some rest. No chasing after any Xivians until at least tomorrow, you hear me?”
“Not in the cards for me this trip,” Jim says lightly. He catches Spock’s eye. “There are other diversions.”
Spock is seated on the edge of his alcove. He does not know why he has not departed to meditate. Jim is still looking at him. Spock tips his head to one side; Jim smiles.
“Right, I’m off,” he says, standing. He nods at his first officer. “Spock. Come with me?”
Spock stands. McCoy lifts his head and looks indignantly at Jim, then scowls when Jim winks at him. Uhura starts to smile as though she knows something. The other lieutenants, grouped around their low table, are catching each other’s eyes.
There is a feeling arising within Spock. A quite familiar feeling: the humans are undertaking that unspoken form of communication that will explode into gossip as soon as he leaves the room. He is being observed. He is going to be discussed. He is not entirely ignorant of the reasons for this.
He looks at Jim. Jim points him towards the door. Spock goes. “Goodnight, all,” Jim says gaily, and then he and Spock are free of them.
“The doctor seems to think that you will spend your shore leave ‘chasing Xivians,’” Spock comments as they retrace their steps down the cold hallway. Jim’s rooms aren’t far, so Spock neglected to put the heavy robes back on. He is regretting it now. He can’t feel his hands.
Jim, seeming unbothered by the temperature, shakes his head with a small smile. “I meant it. Not what I have in mind this time.”
“Is there something else you plan to do?” Thankfully they’ve reached Jim’s accommodations; Jim waves him inside. A fire is already lit in the deep stone hearth. The room is smaller than the one shared by the officers, but it is more sumptuously furnished. There is a low couch before the fire. There is a fine copper tub, if Jim has want of a bath. There is a bed.
Jim shrugs and goes to stand before the fire. “Oh, chase my impulses. Find pleasure in the unexpected places. I find a rigid itinerary can ruin the delights of surprise and discovery.”
This makes sense to Spock, even though his personal preference does include itineraries. He intends to visit the Xiv bio-libraries tomorrow. Despite his own protests, he is also on shore leave; Jim all but refused to accept the Xiv offer of hospitality unless Spock joined the first shore leave party with him. “I thought perhaps you had enough of surprises, lately,” Spock says tactfully.
They have had several difficult missions of late.
Jim looks into the fire. It sets him alight, making his profile stand out against the dark tapestried walls. “I wouldn’t say so, no,” he says.
Spock considers his captain. He feels it running between them again: the undercurrent that has characterized their recent interactions. The bright, nebulous charge that he feels but does not comprehend. Alone like this, it is stronger. Almost tangible. Almost as if they are teetering on the edge of something inevitable.
“I should let you rest,” Spock says, turning away.
Jim’s voice makes him halt. “No, Spock, I’d like you to stay.”
It isn’t an order. It isn’t said like an order. Jim has a mild expression on his face—but his eyes are sharp. If Spock leaves now, he’ll be courting his captain’s displeasure.
Spock says, “The others will notice if I do not return to the sleeping chamber.”
“They’ll be sleeping, won’t they?”
They were beginning a new game of cards when Spock left. The doctor had just topped up his glass of brandy. They will all be awake for some time yet. “Nonetheless,” Spock says.
“What are you so worried they’ll think, Spock?” Jim settles himself casually on the low sofa and looks Spock up and down. “It’s not so unusual for a captain and commander to stay up late talking. Strategizing.”
“We are on shore leave,” Spock parries. “There is nothing about which to strategize.”
“Maybe we got new orders.”
“You would have mentioned any new orders to the others.”
“Maybe it’s a sensitive mission.”
“So sensitive that it must be concealed from even the senior staff of the ship?”
“Maybe it’s none of their business.” Jim is leaning forward now, arms braced on his knees, looking at Spock with that firebright expression he gets sometimes. “Maybe it has nothing to do with them at all.”
“That will not stop them from discussing it, sir.”
Jim smiles indulgently, shaking his head a little. “You’re a stubborn man.”
Spock quirks one eyebrow. “You have told me that before.”
“Yes, I have.” Jim leans back on the sofa. “My point stands. It’s not unreasonable for a captain to confer with his first officer, even on shore leave. That conversation might go late into the night. The first office could perhaps stay—to protect the captain, of course, on an unfamiliar planet.”
“The Xiv have indicated no ill will towards your person,” Spock says calmly.
“Call it a precautionary measure,” Jim says, eyes twinkling.
“Of course. Are you currently afraid for your life?”
“No. But I should like to have my first officer with me, all the same.” Their eyes meet and hold. “It simply makes sense,” he continues, and his voice is lower now. “We’re in a new place, far away from the nearest starbase. Anything could happen.”
Spock takes a step that brings him closer to the captain. “You suggest that I should remain alert.”
“That you should stay close to me, at the very least.”
Another step. “Yet you have not ordered me.”
Jim smiles. “Would you like me to?”
Spock considers. Slowly, he says, “It is not necessary.”
Jim shifts on the low sofa, making room. “Sit down with me, Spock.”
Spock sits next to him. They are not touching, but he can feel the heat of Jim’s thigh a mere one point one inches away from Spock’s own. He fixes his eyes on the tapestry that covers the wall above the hearth. Another pastoral scene. There is a creature very much like a unicorn, pursued by Xivians with nets and spangled cloths.
He can tell that Jim is looking at him. “Tell me what you’re thinking,” Jim says. The grammar is imperative, but the words are still not an order. They are an offer. They are an opening. He has shifted to face Spock more fully. His knee brushes Spock’s knee.
“It was generous of the Xivians to offer their planet for our shore leave,” Spock says. “I believe a period of rest will be beneficial for the crew.”
This is only partially true. Mostly, he is gratified to see his captain looking so relaxed.
Their recent missions have not been simple.
Jim isn’t always this loose, this languid. He is an exacting captain, one who demands the best from his crew; not even Spock is safe from the sharp side of his tongue when the captain isn’t getting what he needs.
Spock, however, does not care. He is not like a human. He does not need coddling. Jim’s ire and Jim’s warmth are the same to him: they are Jim, the essence of him. Jim is singular. Jim is responsible for so many, many lives.
He is looking at Spock. “Tell me what else you’re thinking,” he says.
Spock quirks his brow. “Do you think I am withholding?”
“I know you’re capable of multiple tracks of thought at once,” Jim says. “I want to know them.”
Spock looks to the creature in the tapestry again. “I am gratified to see you looking so relaxed,” he finds himself saying.
Jim’s voice is warm. “Oh, yes?”
“You have been tense, of late.”
“I have.”
“A period of rest will surely be beneficial to you as well.”
“Undoubtedly. Though I can’t say I intend to spend the next few days only sleeping in that bed.”
Spock parses the captain’s emphasis. Carefully, he says, “You said you did not intend to chase the Xivians.”
“I don’t.”
Before he can respond, Spock feels the lightest touch to the back of his neck. He pauses. Jim also pauses, holding still with his fingertips on Spock’s nape. Spock closes his eyes for one beat.
The fingertips brush his skin. They venture into the soft lines of his hair.
Jim shifts closer. Spock does not turn away. He remains still as Jim presses a soft, careful kiss to the side of Spock’s neck. His hand is on Spock’s nape and his mouth is warm. Spock closes his eyes again and keeps them closed. One of his hands finds Jim’s knee. “Keep talking,” Jim murmurs. He kisses Spock beneath his jaw.
“I should return to the others,” Spock says again. His voice, he is pleased to note, is perfectly steady. “I am their commander.”
“Mmhm.”
“It is not wise to encourage…prurient speculation.”
“We’re not encouraging anything.” Jim kisses Spock on the jaw again: a warm, lush kiss. “We’re just talking.”
“Rumor runs rampant on a starship.” Spock’s hand is on Jim’s knee. He moves it to Jim’s thigh. “They will suppose untoward behavior even where there is none.”
“If they’re going to think it anyway,” Jim murmurs, “then it doesn’t matter what we do, does it?”
“Even beyond the scrutiny of your crew,” Spock says, “there are the regulations of Starfleet to consider.”
“We’re just talking.” Jim repeats this even though he is spreading his thighs just so, making space for Spock’s hand, and indulging in flickering his tongue over the rapid point of Spock’s pulse. “Nothing untoward.” This strains credulity. Spock tells him so. Jim laughs and adds, “Anyway, we’re on shore leave.”
“Shore leave does not mean a suspension of regulation.”
“If you really want to get technical,” Jim says, with a tone of voice like he knows that Spock loves getting technical, “while all Starfleet operatives are always expected to conduct themselves well in public spaces, there is a distinction drawn between behaviors that occur on a starship, on duty, versus on a planet’s surface, off duty.” He hisses a breath in between his teeth when the back of Spock’s hand presses against the swell of his groin. “Starfleet operatives of comparable rank are not in any breach of regulation for what they choose to do in private on shore leave,” he adds, slightly breathier.
“Indeed?” Spock presses harder. “If I become aware of any burgeoning attraction between two comparably-ranked officers, I will be sure to tell them.”
“You do that.” Jim decides to take that moment to insinuate himself between Spock’s legs, kneeling on the floor to manage it. Backlit by the fire, he looks like a hellsprite in a Xiv morality play: the same smile. The same bright mischief.
“You know, undoubtedly, that it is fruitless to attempt to seduce a Vulcan,” Spock informs him.
“Yes, of course,” Jim says. He is unhooking the catch of Spock’s trousers. “Vulcans want for nothing when it comes to pleasures of the flesh, is that it?”
“Any mammal desires to procreate, naturally. A Vulcan controls this urge.”
Jim looks up at him and raises his eyebrows. “Completely?”
“If there are exceptions, they are not admitted.”
“I see.” His hand delves inwards; Spock regulates his breathing. “A Vulcan is nothing without his restraint.”
“Exactly.” Spock closes his eyes. It is late, after all. It has nothing to do with the—ah—deft motions of Jim’s hand.
“Humans are rather more unbridled, I’m afraid.”
“I have—noticed this.”
“Mm, have you?” Spock’s eyes fly open as his captain—as Jim puts his mouth to the crown of Spock’s lok. Kisses it, licks it sloppily, and then smiles at Spock with the whole gleaming length of it pressed against the side of his face. He has one hand wrapped around the base, holding Spock captive in the circle of his hand. “How good of you to indulge us.”
Spock refuses to inflate this man’s ego by telling him just how attractive his human brashness is to a Vulcan. “I serve at your pleasure,” he says evenly, borrowing an old turn of his phrase that he knows Jim will appreciate.
And Jim does. He smiles wider, and then favors his first officer with a long, sweet suck at the head of his cock. Spock’s thighs go tense and he tries to keep himself from grabbing for Jim’s hair, but Jim seems to want him to; he takes Spock’s hand and leads it to the back of his head. Then he takes Spock further into his mouth.
“Jim.”
“Yes,” Jim pulls off to say. “Just like that, Spock, say my name like that again.” A wet kiss to his inner thigh. Jim’s hand, wet with spit, sliding over the length of Spock’s lok. He thumbs at the head, and Spock has to clench his jaw rather hard to avoid making an involuntary noise.
“The others,” he says instead, “will be missing me.” Jim is kissing now at the slick opening of Spock’s sheath, getting curious with his tongue in a way that Spock can’t fully quantify.
“Mm,” Jim says, kissing the wet folds of skin. “Should I go tell them that you’re okay?”
Spock manages to suppress something like a scowl. “Certainly not.”
“We wouldn’t want them to worry, after all.” His free hand comes up to trace two fingertips around Spock’s opening. “Or come looking…”
“They would not,” Spock says. He tilts his hips to encourage those fingers; Jim, to his consternation, dances his fingertips away instead and goes back to licking Spock open.
“It would be quite a scandal if they did,” Jim says mournfully. He lifts his head to meet Spock’s eyes. “Goodness. What will Starfleet think?”
“Jim.”
“Yes?”
“Cease speaking.”
“Yessir,” Jim says, and he has the audacity to wink at Spock, and then he goes back to the task of opening Spock up with his mouth and his fingers, oh yes, Spock gets fingers now; two of them slide into his sheath with little resistance. Spock’s breath leaves him in a long sigh. The heels of his boots skid along the carpet that Jim kneels on. The tapestry above him shows a progression of scenes: the creature running. The creature caught. The creature, docile in a garden.
Jim draws away to pull his command tunic and undershirt up over his head in one movement. Spock finds the sight of his bare chest and ruffled hair pleasing. Jim grins at his first officer. His mouth is wet and obscene. “Get on the bed,” he says. This is a command.
“I really ought to be going,” Spock says.
“Get on the bed,” Jim says, leaning closer, “or I’ll make you.”
Spock considers him. Jim is breathing hard and still smiling. One hand has alighted on the ankle of Spock’s left boot. He squeezes slightly. “Yes,” Spock says, “sir.”
Jim shifts back on his knees. Spock stands. “Does that make it easier?” Jim asks, tugging Spock’s boots off. “If I order you?”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” Spock says, calmly taking off his own blue science tunic as Jim pulls down his slacks.
“Of course not.” Jim stands, takes Spock’s face in his hands, and kisses him full on the mouth. His mouth has a wet, sharp taste; this is the taste of Spock’s body on his captain’s tongue. Spock is wearing his undershirt and nothing else. His lok brushes the front of Jim’s black trousers; Jim spreads a hand on Spock’s bare hip and pulls him closer.
The pressure is gratifying. Jim’s mouth is as well. Spock puts his arms around his captain’s neck. He has never been kissed like this. Vulcans do not kiss like this. Vulcans do not…grope each other like this. Vulcans do not—
Jim steers him backwards to the bed. Spock hits the edge and allows himself to fall back upon it. He gazes upon his captain. Jim, whose broad chest is moving with his breath. Jim, who pauses to remove his own boots, and then joins Spock on the bed with his trousers still on. He crowds Spock up closer to the pillows, stripping the undershirt from him, getting Spock laid out on his back and placing himself between Spock’s spread legs. “I know you’d like to keep appearances up,” Jim says casually, “but I have half a mind to not let you leave this room for the next three days.”
“I am going to the libraries tomorrow,” Spock informs him.
“Mm. I might keep you here.” He strokes Spock with one hand wrapped around the slick length of his lok.
“We will need to emerge for meals, at the very least.”
“Someone can deliver them.”
Spock arches his brows. “You would have them enter and see you in this state?”
“Are you sure it’s my modesty you’re protecting?” Jim is grinning again. Jim is also fingering Spock’s sheath again, this time with three fingers. “Not a thought for yourself?”
Spock fists his hands in the bedspread. “The Xivians seem to have a special interest in a man of your rank,” he says, trying to keep his tone even. “I am—less important to them.”
“Important to me, though.” Jim pulls his fingers out and slaps at Spock’s thigh. “Turn over.”
“This shore leave is for your benefit,” Spock says, positioning himself on his stomach as Jim wants him. He props himself up on his elbows and looks over his shoulder, watching with interest as Jim finally sheds his trousers. “It was arranged almost entirely on your behalf.”
“Yes, you and the doctor conspired quite handily,” Jim says. He is drawing his cock from with the confines of his undergarments. It is flushed and hard and wet at the tip. “I’ll have to let him know his efforts are appreciated.” He strokes himself once, slow, from root to tip. He bites his lip and closes his eyes.
Spock shifts. “Only his efforts?”
“Are you feeling neglected, Spock?” Jim asks. His eyes come open and he smiles, lazily, as he continues to stroke himself.
Spock does not say anything. He drops his head. He adjusts his body, just slightly.
“Do you want to be told that I appreciate it?” Jim asks. His voice is low and dark. “That you did an exemplary job?” He leans over Spock’s body, bracing himself with one hand at Spock’s side. With his other, he presses the head of his cock to the wet opening of Spock’s sheath. Spock inhales. “I do appreciate it, Spock,” Jim murmurs. “I appreciate all the work you do.”
He presses forward. The head of his cock pushes in. He pauses there, rocking slightly, toying with the opening of Spock’s hole. “Jim,” Spock says.
“Shh,” Jim says. He pushes in further. “I was telling you what a good job you’re doing… Arranging shore leave, I mean. Usually—” and saying so, he draws away and then thrusts back in— “it’s nearly impossible to get you to…agree to a break.”
Spock is panting with his face pressed into the pillows. He does not whine when Jim gives another firm thrust in. “It is—frustrating,” he manages. “To be interrupted in my duties—” He breaks off with a moan when Jim fucks into him again, and again.
“You said you serve at my pleasure,” Jim reminds him. He is settling into a pace now, thrusting deep into Spock. One of his hands is braced on the bed. He places the other over one of Spock’s hands and intertwines their fingers. Spock clutches at him. “Even on shore leave—”
“You are—my captain,” Spock manages. Jim fucks him harder for that; Spock can’t help the way his words emerge as though punched out of him. “I would—be of use to you.” He turns his head to the side and presses his mouth to the tangle of their fingers together.
“Is that what you want?” Jim pants. He is fucking Spock ruthlessly, heavy over Spock’s body, pistoning his hips to drive his cock in and out of Spock’s wet, sensitive sheath. “To be useful to me?”
Spock closes his eyes. Jim tucks his face into Spock’s neck.
“You always know,” Jim breathes. “You always know me. You know what I need.” His hips slap against the flesh of Spock’s ass. Spock is a mess: his hair is in disarray, his face is hot with a green flush, his thighs are wet with the moisture oozing from his sheath. The sound of Jim fucking him is lewd and obvious, louder than the low crackle of the fire and the sound of their breathing.
There is a tremor beginning to overtake Spock’s knees; he can hardly keep himself braced against the soft mattress. “Jim,” he says. “I—I am—”
“Are you gonna come for me, Spock?” Jim asks. He releases Spock’s hand and grabs instead for a fistful of Spock’s hair, pulling his head back so he can smear a kiss across his first officer’s cheekbone. “Gonna come with my cock in you?”
“Jim—”
“You take it—so—good, Spock, you’re so good…” He drives into Spock’s body even harder, fucking him breathlessly, relentlessly. Spock hasn’t touched his lok this entire time; he wraps a hand around it and has to swallow another unrestrained sound. “Don’t do that,” Jim pants. “Make them hear you.”
“It is—not—”
“Seemly? Not Vulcan?” Jim bites at the rim of one of Spock’s ears. “Yet you let me—do this to you.”
Spock strains against the grip Jim still has on his hair; the tug of it sends sparks across his scalp.
“We’ll tell them we were arguing,” Jim promises, low in his ear. “Nothing but a spirited debate. That’s all.” He punctuates this with such a fierce thrust of his hips that Spock has to inhale sharply. He should have expected that Jim—bold, brave, clever Jim—would also be unlike any other lover Spock has ever known. No: the others did not deserve the term: Jim is the only lover Spock has truly had.
“They will not believe you,” he says, breathless. “They will—know—”
Jim releases Spock’s hair and lays the full weight of his body onto Spock’s back, pinning him in place as he fucks into him. The short, sharp thrusts of his cock are destroying Spock’s ability to think. One of his hands is on Spock’s nape. “Should I stop, then?” he pants. “Send you back to them like this—all wet—dripping—”
Spock’s entire body flushes hot with embarrassment to imagine it. “No,” he says forcefully.
“No,” Jim agrees. He bites Spock’s shoulder. “I’m keeping you…right here.” He plants his hands on either side of Spock and changes his rhythm—the short thrusts turn into a smooth, slow, rolling motion that has Spock’s mouth dropping open and his second eyelid flickering down to blur his vision.
“Ah—ah, Jim—oh—”
“Mm, you’re so wet—I didn’t know—”
How utterly like Jim, to jump headfirst into a sexual encounter with a being whose genitalia were a mystery to him. If Spock had the wherewithal to feel anything but blinding arousal, he might be amused. As it stands, he can only scrabble for purchase in the smooth bedsheets as his knees shake and his body begins to convulse. “Jim—Jim, I—”
“That’s it, come on Spock—you look so fucking good, taking my cock—”
Spock wraps his hand around his lok again. He feels hypersensitive everywhere—the slickness of his fingertips and the smarting bite on his shoulder and the stretch and fullness of Jim inside him, Jim’s cock inside him, fucking him open—
Jim is panting in his ear. Jim grabs for Spock’s hand again and holds it as he fucks into his first officer, hard, and this is what makes Spock grit his teeth around a wail and come all over the fine bedsheets below him. His body jerks and jolts. “Yes, Spock, yes,” Jim breathes. He settles his weight back on his heels and pulls Spock with him, pulling Spock back onto his cock again and again as Spock shudders and comes. “So good, so good, Spock—just a little more—I’m gonna fuck you just a little more Spock, okay? I’m almost there—”
“Jim,” Spock pants, and Jim groans.
“The way you say my name,” he breathes. “Fuck, Spock—”
He clutches hard at Spock’s hip and thrusts into him twice, thrice more, and then more wildly as he begins to come. Spock’s shields are low; he feels it like a shudder of electricity going through Jim’s body, lighting him up in ecstasy as he comes.
They collapse together, Jim half on top of Spock and still inside him, breathing hard. He runs his hand up and down Spock’s side, a light touch, and Spock cannot tell which of them it is meant to soothe. He can feel the low hum-burn of Jim’s contentment, Jim’s curiosity, Jim’s—concern.
Spock, for his own part, does not know what happens now. His analytical mind feels muffled, stunned, unable to stagger to its feet, as weak-kneed as Spock’s body is. He breathes. He feels Jim’s breath on the back of his neck, Jim’s legs tangled with his own. Jim slips out of Spock and resettles their hips to nestle together. Like spoons—Spock has heard this metaphor. They are a mess of come and sweat. Spock will need to bathe. Someone will have to change the sheets.
A quiet huff against his ear. “Are you thinking about—the bedding?”
Spock doesn’t open his eyes. “I do not easily abandon practicalities,” he says. Then: “You can hear my thoughts.”
“Not quite hear,” Jim says. “A sort of fuzzy sense. It’s already…fading, somewhat.”
Undoubtedly due to Spock’s shields coalescing once more around the contours of his mind. He holds his breath for one moment, trying to hold himself open just a little. Just enough to brush against the golden glow of Jim’s thoughts.
Jim settles his palm flat on Spock’s hip. He kisses the back of Spock’s neck. Spock does not draw away from him, and Jim understands this tacit acceptance for what it is. He gathers Spock more fully in his arms. They rest together, and breathe.
“Are you truly so worried about what the others will think?” Jim murmurs, after some time has passed in contented silence. “I can’t tell if you would prefer to go back or not.”
Spock considers this. He blinks his eyes open lazily and takes in Jim’s room—the low-burning fire, the tapestries, the copper bathtub. Leaving would mean enduring the frigid hallways once more. Spock can’t quite muster the desire to do so. “I am on shore leave,” he rumbles. “I found myself engaged in conversation with my captain until quite late. We had much to discuss.”
Jim chuckles into his shoulder. “Pity they don’t seem to have chess on this planet,” he says. “Would have given our story some verisimilitude.”
“I do not plan to lie,” Spock says. “It is true that you said many things to me.”
Jim shrugs, unapologetic. “I’m talkative in bed.”
“Quite.” Spock hesitates over his next words. He manages to say, “It was not unpleasant.”
That gets a fuller laugh from Jim; he presses his face to Spock’s shoulder. “’Not unpleasant,’ he says—it’s a wonder I have any ego left at all, after three years of serving alongside a Vulcan.”
Spock does not feel offended. Nonetheless, he starts to say, “If you have need of a partner who can more easily say—”
“No, I’ll stop you there.” Jim shifts so he can run his nose along the rim of Spock’s ear and then kisses him there. “I don’t ‘have need’ of anything like that.” It is true that—through the light touch of their minds—Spock can still feel a sense of Jim’s delight. “I won’t embarrass you with sweet nothings. I don’t think you’ll like them. But you—Spock, I don’t need you to be anything other than what you are.”
Spock turns in his captain’s arms so that he can look him in the eyes. “And what am I?”
“My first officer,” Jim says promptly. “And my friend. My companion, and very dear to me.”
Spock thinks it over. “That will suffice,” he says. Jim laughs again and kisses him on the tip of his nose; Spock does not know how to react to that, which makes Jim laugh all the more.
There is language now, for the change that has occurred between them. Spock is content to know the words, even if he does not say them aloud. He knows that Jim is aware of them too. In three days, they will no longer be on shore leave—they will need words for that moment as well. For now, Spock says, “I would bathe.”
“Yes, please,” Jim says. He sits up and stretches his arms; he is all tawny skin and round muscle. Post-coital, his eyes are bright. Spock experiences a positive reaction to seeing him thus. “I’d like to wash your hair,” Jim says. He looks down at Spock, still laying boneless on the rucked-up sheets, and grins. “Can you move?”
Spock sniffs. “In a moment.”
Jim runs his thumb along Spock’s lower lip. “And if I ordered you to?”
“You could certainly try. Captain.”
Jim chortles and goes to run the bath. Spock watches his nude form in the warm light—the flex and tense of muscles in his back, the bright burnished gold of his hair, the quiescent cock that hangs, unembarrassed, between his thighs. Spock finds him—handsome. He can place that word into his understanding of Jim.
There has been a change between them. It has deepened and evolved into this: this intimacy, this closeness and knowing. Jim knew it was coming. He knew the logical end of such a feeling, and brought them here. Spock did not know it would be like this. His body feels sore and deeply sated. His mind, still lightly touching Jim’s mind, feels buoyant.
Jim goes to stoke the fire. “To keep you warm,” he says, when Spock sits up to watch him. “I don’t know why they keep the damn hallways so cold.”
“The Xivians have a long architectural history—”
“Don’t defend them, you looked nearly blue when we got in here.”
“As I am a Vulcan—”
“It’s a saying, Spock. Will you come here?”
Spock goes to him. He is not accustomed to striding about in the nude, and he wants badly to avail himself of the bath that Jim has drawn. But Jim seems delighted to take Spock into his arms and kiss him deeply. His mouth is soft. His skin is warm.
“Darling,” Jim says softly, and Spock does not know how to respond—but he does not mind being addressed so. Jim, he thinks, can tell. Jim can always tell. Spock closes his eyes and allows himself to be kissed.