leftwithmybones | (no subject)

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jim kirk

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Jim's been a kid for days now and hell if it isn't getting on every one of his damn nerves. Without his memories, McCoy is just another stranger to him and it's taking all his energy just to make sure Jim doesn't do something stupid like run off and get himself into trouble. Even feeding him, which is priority, is taking energy that McCoy barely has.

He's half grateful, though, that Jim doesn't know him to understand what's happening. Whatever disease is ravaging his body is getting worse. His white blood cell count this morning had been beyond goddamn terrible and he'd barely been able to get up out of bed. That's why when he'd woken up and kid-Jim hadn't been in sight, he decides not to chase him.

Sitting up slowly and trying not to pass out from dizziness, he notices something under the covers.

Something round, squeaking, and moving.

"What in the hell..." He flips the covers back to reveal a tribble. That, or the dogs in Darrow have gotten really strange-looking. Reaching out with weak fingers, he corrals the critter back into his arms to look for eyes, but when he doesn't find anything that makes this a dog, he knows that it's from back home. The thing is, he doesn't understand why. He's had this thing in his lab for ages in an inert, non-reproductive state, but it's here now.

Is this some kind of stupid message that he needs a service tribble for the last days of his life? It's not a good joke, if he's heard of one. It occurs to him, then, that he better run some blood tests and a scan and make sure this is actually the one from his lab and not just a random tribble, because otherwise, Darrow's about to have a population problem.

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Jim leaves the house for as long as he dares.

More than a week of being a child. A hungry, traumatized child, more full of rage and hate than his small body should have been able to bear - how is it that being that child is preferable to this?

He's grown, he's able, he's smart. He's a widower and he's about to lose the second love of his life. Being a damaged kid has nothing on this pain.

It's late morning when Jim finally drags himself back, letting him into the home he shares with Bones for as long as he's got left. Jim opens his mouth, but it's a moment more before he manages to call, "I'm here. I'm - normal, again."

Relief floods him and every shred of common sense floods away when he hears Jim's voice, sees him in the doorway. He's on his feet, ignoring the dizziness, and closing in on the distance between them to wrap his arms around Jim and hug him as desperately as he damn well can, cupping his cheeks to kiss him because it's been a week and normally he's not this needy, but god, he's missed Jim.

"Where'd you go?" he murmurs, barely taking his lips off Jim. "Wait, I don't care, you're here, you're grown. Shut up and don't let go."

How long? Jim can't help but think as his arms come around Bones. How many more times will they hug or kiss before it's over? How many more times will Bones even be able to stand? He's worse with every passing day, and between them they've come up with nothing, not even the hope of a cure.

How long? Jim holds Bones carefully and tries to remember the shape of him, how he feels beneath his hands, tries not to think of how he's smaller every day. He holds him, and he doesn't let go. "Guess that was a fun week for you," he mumbles.

"What, rushing around feeding you and making sure you didn't get into fights? How the hell was it different than a normal week?" he tries to joke, but now that Jim's grown again, he knows all too well how much energy McCoy expended doing that, because he couldn't let him go out there alone.

He slides a hand up his back, both for the warmth and to hold on. "Hey, come to the bedroom, I got something to show you."

Jim raises a brow, mustering a smile for a missive that once would have sent the blood straight to his dick. "What is it?" he asks, heading there with a supporting hand against Bones' shoulder. He's not going to lose him early to a head injury against the wall.

He makes it back to the bedroom and sighs with relief for the sheets when he hits them. Reaching out for the little fluffball, he hands the tribble over to Jim while reaching for his tricorder, beeping with a finished scan. "Turned up in the bed this morning, for a second I thought maybe you'd gone and found me a dog."

He drifts off as he studies the results of the bloodwork, a furrow in his forehead because this doesn't make sense.

Dumbfounded, Jim lets the creature be pushed into his waiting hands. After so long in Darrow he thinks it's a cat at first, but then the damn thing coos. "Is this a tribble?" he asks, not requiring an answer because of course it is. They could have received anything from home, but a tribble is what they got.

Against his conscious wish, Jim cuddles it. "The hell, Bones?"

"Yeah, it's a tribble. I always kept an inert one in my lab," he says, scanning through the readings as he glances back at the tribble, shaking his head. "This isn't possible," he says. "This tribble is in perfect health," is what he says.

"Why's that impossible?" asks Jim, putting the tribble up on his shoulder so he can look down at Bones' scans. Smart as he is, the medical ones are half incomprehensible, and this one is no exception. "Maybe this isn't the same tribble."

"No, Jim, it's..." He opens his mouth and gives him a dubious look at Jim wearing the goddamn tribble like a parrot. He swipes it away as gently as he can and sets it back on the bed reverently because this is insane. "I don't mean good health for a tribble. I mean perfect health. I mean, the disease that was going through it when I had it is gone, but there's genetic markers I recognize. Cell counts, organ strength..."

"It's like it was just born, but the thing is years old," he says, furrowing his brow. "It must have been treated with something."

"Maybe it's from when it was just a baby," says Jim dubiously, because it wouldn't be the weirdest thing in Darrow. But Bones is talking like he can accurately age the creature, and it's somehow even better than in its prime.

"What could do that, though?" he asks. "Besides the fountain of youth."

He's staring at the thing, reaching for his medkit, because he doesn't know what could do this, but it's nothing he's ever seen before. "I need to pull blood and marrow, or the tribble equivalent of marrow," he rambles, his heart rapidly thumping in his chest as his hope grows.

"Jim, if these readings are accurate, then I think, I think I could fabricate a treatment out of this for me. Maybe even a cure," he says. He just needs to replace his white blood cells, that's it.

Jim nearly reaches for the tribble when Bones mentions marrow - that sounds painful, moreso than Jim would wish even on a small, mindless creature - but he stills for this talk of a cure.

"Is that possible?" he asks in a suddenly even voice. He might not be his twelve year old self anymore, but Jim knows how to clamp down hard on hope lest it run away with him. "Has anyone done that kind of thing before?"

"Has anyone ever extracted a life altering cure from a tribble to prevent death? No," he says, not even getting close to the lie that of course it's been done. "Then again, you keep reminding me that I'm a genius doctor. And I've got a hospital full of equipment to help, a sample, and ..."

He thinks about it, really and honestly thinks about it pragmatically. "Yeah, Jim," he says, hopeful. "I think I can do it."

Jim sits down on the bed, his face blank as his mind reels. Bones is a genius, it's true, and if he's amazed by the tribble then so is Jim, but to beat death? No one can do that.

It's too much to hope for, but Jim meets Bones' hopeful face and manages to smile. "How can I help?"

He looks up and remembers, then, that this is the first time that he's seen Jim as an adult in days. He sets the tribble aside and extends a hand to Jim, trying to coax him to come in a little bit closer. "Come say a proper hi to me," he says. "And tell me what the hell kind of trouble you got up to the last week."

Jim's smile warms, and he leans in to press a gentle kiss to Bones' lips. "Oh, you know," he murmurs. "Stole a few cars. Rerouted some bank accounts. Standard kid stuff. I'm sure Jo got into it all the time."

"Yeah, that's not anyone's normal childhood," McCoy feels compelled to point out, sliding a hand under Jim's shirt to enjoy all that warm skin. "You exhausted the hell out of me, running around after you to make sure you ate, didn't get arrested..." He shakes his head, a tender and sympathetic look in his eye. "I'm sorry it was like that for you, kid."

"I'm sorry you had to see it," says Jim, leaning back with a sigh. "I destroyed every picture of me from that time, even the records they had of Tarsus. So naturally that's what this place picked as the right time to revisit."

He shakes his shoulders before he can sound too bitter. "You were really good," he says. "Kind. I wish there'd been someone like you way back then."

"I am a father," he says, easing back and stifling his groan at how much his body aches right now, seeing as none of that is romantic. He makes sure the tribble is set aside and out of their way before it can get too crushed before he slides his fingers through Jim's hair. "Maybe it meant that you were supposed to live through it so that you could deal with it better. Sort of like a redo, but this time, with proper coping mechanisms."

"Maybe," Jim murmurs, and no matter how sick Bones gets, his fingers never stop feeling like heaven against Jim's scalp. He resists the urge to close his eyes.

"Do I seem better adjusted to you?" he asks with a small smile. "I'm not ready to get rid of my leather jacket."

"I don't want you to get rid of your leather jacket, I love that damn thing," he promises, his arm getting a bit heavy so he switches to the other to keep stroking his fingers through Jim's hair. "I hope I wasn't too scary," he says. "I know sometimes kids get a little nervous around the big scary doctor, especially when he's brandishing needles."

"Only at first," Jim assures him, "And only because you were an adult. You've always had a good bedside manner, Bones." He pulls Bones' hand from his hair and holds it between his own before Bones gets overtired. "Still hated the hypos, though."

"Yeah, well, given the vitamin deficiencies you were sporting, it was that or you weren't eating anything but bland mushy bananas," is his reply, exhaling in gratitude when Jim takes his hand between his own. He closes his eyes for just a moment, curling in against Jim before opening them. "Made me miss my own kid," he admits. "Running around after you, even being frustrated. Made me miss it."

"I wish you could see her," says Jim, not adding one last time like he's thinking. This tribble idea is still too miraculous to be trusted, and Jim draws a breath.

He reaches for Bones' PADD and puts it in his hands. "Start making lists of what you need to work on this tribble. I'll get everything back here."

"Yeah, me too," is his sad response, reaching for the PADD in order to start making notes. "I'm gonna need a centrifuge and a lot of supplies for samples. Blood, marrow, urine if we figure out how a tribble does that. Once I figure that out, I'm going to need to adapt whatever's in these cells into something that I can use. Probably need some stuff in case of immuno-compromisation," he rattles.

"You're probably going to have to help withdraw the samples, if my hands shake too much," he admits.

"Of course," says Jim. He's not squeamish exactly, but it does turn his stomach to think of jabbing things into that little tribble. If it helps Bones, though, he won't hesitate.

"We've got some of that here. The rest I can lift from the hospital and the labs on campus. You want me to go right now?"

"If you're okay to travel," is his only clarification, seeing as Jim's just come back from being a kid, as far as McCoy's concerned and he doesn't want him running off before he's ready. "But, yeah, we could start working on synthesizing the blood into a first trial by this evening," he says, hope glimmering in his eyes.

"Jim, I swear to god, I'm not dying. Okay? Not with a chance like this."

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