A decade in space, much of it serving on vessels far less spacious than a Constitution-class starship, had left Leonard McCoy accustomed to living in cramped, enclosed areas.  But never, even in the confines of a bulky environmental suit, had he felt as claustrophobic as he did in the domed hexagon surrounding him.  

Living in space had accustomed him, too, to endless vistas that by human measure often seemed
changeless and eternal.  The cloudless blue sky arching above seemed as boundless and wide as the black expanses, spangled with stars, which he knew so well.  The undulating swells of blue-green waves encircling him were as monotonous in their constant motion as the stars which streaked by, pyrotechnic bright, when the Enterprise was at warp.

How often, homesick for Earth, he had welcomed the chance to visit M-class planets or more marginally habitable worlds, wishing for fresh air to breathe and solid ground beneath his feet.
Well, he was on a planet that was more Earth-like than most, with plenty of fresh air to breathe.  But never had he longed more ardently for solid earth beneath his feet.  He would have welcomed inertial dampers, to ease the constant rolling of the floor beneath him. 

McCoy turned away from the window of the life raft and eyed his companion, sitting a meter away.  He wondered if seasick Vulcans turned a brighter or lighter shade of green.  Thankfully,
in the two hours since they had been abandoned on the raft, neither had suffered from nausea.  Vomiting would accelerate the process of dehydration, which was the greatest danger facing them. 

Barely nine hours ago he and Spock had been walking together, on a planetside survey of an
unexplored world, when they had been beamed aboard an Orion pirate ship.  During the pair’s
brief imprisonment, their abductors had treated Spock and McCoy surprisingly well, plying the pair with refreshments.  Very little was said to them, but their captors told them repeatedly, with sly, knowing looks, “to eat and drink while you can.”  The admonishments reinforced their belief  that they were to be sold into slavery.  They both knew the Federation would refuse to negotiate with pirates, even for the return of two well-known Starfleet officers.

Seven hours after their abduction, they were unceremoniously hauled to the transporter room,
and beamed aboard a life raft on an open sea.

McCoy read the letter that had been left in the raft. 

Commander Spock and Doctor McCoy,

Because you both are reputedly brave and honorable men, I am extending the courtesy of
informing you why you will soon die.

Four years ago the Enterprise initiated hostilities against an unaggressive Romulan vessel patrolling the Neutral Zone.   The combat ended in your Captain ordering the destruction of the Romulan ship, and the death of all aboard. My two sons died on that ship.  Shortly thereafter, my beloved wife, wild with grief, committed suicide.

On that day, I vowed vengeance upon Captain Kirk.

I do not wish to kill James Kirk.  I wish him to suffer, as I have suffered, and as my wife
suffered, by experiencing the loss of those close to him.
 
I have sold all my holdings, which were considerable, and hired Orion pirates to capture
you, James Kirk’s closest friends.  You are being left to die in an isolated place of my choosing.

Your Captain will be informed that you have been abandoned, alive, in the Zeta Puppis
system.  Surely, he will be agonized as he searches for his friends in vain.

If you believe in any deities, I suggest you pray to them.  May they grant more mercy upon
your souls than your Captain offered to my sons.
 

                                                        Klandar of Romulus

“This is the third time you have read the letter aloud,” Spock said.  “Its contents are not
going to change.”

“We’re being murdered because of a misunderstanding!  That Romulan ship had been destroying
Federation outposts.  And Jim didn’t order the ship destroyed, or initiate aggressive action –
its commander did!”

“The ‘misunderstanding’ you refer to was probably a deliberate fabrication on the part
of the Romulan authorities.  It is likely that Klandar, and indeed the general Romulan
populace, was lied to about the incident at the Neutral Zone.” 

“Hold on – are you calling a Klandar a victim?”

“I would not have expressed it in that way, but in a manner of speaking, yes.” 

“Well, maybe you feel sorry for our kidnapper, but I sure don’t.”

“I assure you, Doctor, I don’t ‘feel sorry’ for Klandar.  I was merely pointing out something
that is, if not verified fact, highly probable.”      

“I just wish that blasted Romulan had gotten his damn facts straight.”
 

 

“Approaching the Zeta Puppis system, Captain,” Sulu said.  “Currently one parsec out.”

“Slow to warp four.”

“Yes, sir.”  This far out, most stars would only be bright dots.  On the viewing screen Zeta Puppis
was a luminous disk of cerulean blue.

“Which planet are we headed for?” Chekhov asked.

Kirk rose from his chair, his lips tightened in concentration.  He had had more than twelve
hours to make up his mind, and still he was undecided.  Twelve precious hours, spent rushing
to this system. 

Nineteen hours earlier, Spock and McCoy had disappeared while on a routine planetside 
survey.  Shortly after their disappearance, an Orion pirate ship had been sighted.  The Enterprise
had given chase, on the reasonable assumption that the officers had been abducted.  For seven hours the Orion ship successfully outran the Enterprise, never responding to the Federation ship’s
repeated hails.  Kirk, believing Spock and McCoy to be aboard, had refrained from firing upon
the fleeing vessel.  Unexpectedly, after seven hours of pursuit, a visual communication was transmitted to the Enterprise.  Even more unexpectedly, the speaker had not been a green-skinned Orion, but instead a green-tinged Romulan.

The Romulan, who had identified himself as Klandar, said that the ship the Enterprise had
been pursuing was a decoy:  Spock and McCoy had been secreted by a second Orion vessel
to one of the planets of the Zeta Puppis system.  There, they had been abandoned, unharmed
(for the moment), in revenge for the deaths four years prior of Klandar’s two sons in the incident
at the Neutral Zone, and the subsequent suicide of their grief-stricken mother. 

Kirk had naturally protested:  the Romulan Commander, not himself, had been the aggressor in
the action at the Neutral Zone, and the one who had ordered the destruction of the Romulan ship.  Klandar had dismissed the Captain’s claims.  “You think I will take the word of a Federation barbarian?” he had sneered.

“I do not wish your friends to have an easy death,” Klandar had said.  “I have personally chosen
a place where a human will be fortunate to survive a week, a Vulcan for perhaps twice that. 
Probably they will die slowly, of dehydration or starvation.  If they are lucky, the elements or native lifeforms will kill them quickly.

“I am an exile, now and forever, from my civilization.  I have cast my lot with these renegades. 
I live solely for my revenge upon you, James Kirk.  I wish I could see your face when, sooner
or later, you must leave the Zeta Puppis system and abandon your friends to their unknown fate.  Knowing you will never again see their faces, as I will never again see the face of my wife.  Knowing that you could not even retrieve their bodies, as I was unable to properly bury my two sons.”

Kirk had demanded to know how Klandar – assuming his story was true – could trust the other
Orion ship to deliver the two officers to the Zeta Puppis system.  Klandar explained that he had paid the pirates an exorbitant fee, and that they would be paid an additional large sum six months from now, when the Enterprise returned from its five-year mission without Commander Spock and Doctor McCoy.  “I was a wealthy man, Captain.  I liquidated my assets years ago, and have bided
my time.  At last I have my revenge.”

A scan of the Orion ship failed to detect Human or, aside from Klandar, Vulcanoid lifesigns, verifying at least the Romulan’s claim that Spock and McCoy were not aboard.  Klandar even invited Kirk to conduct a peaceful search of the Orion ship.

“But if you do so,” Klandar pointed out, “you will be losing valuable time you could spend traveling to the Zeta Puppis system.”

Briefly, Kirk considered beaming Klandar aboard the Enterprise.  But how, without torturing
the Romulan, would he obtain the information he needed?  He also thought about giving Klandar
a taste of his own medicine by destroying the Orion ship, but engaging the pirates in battle would take up precious time.  Reluctantly, Kirk ordered the Enterprise to reverse course.  The best hope for recovering Spock and McCoy, he knew, was to search for them where Klandar said they were.

And so the Enterprise had spent the past twelve hours retracing much of its prior course, as it
rushed to the Zeta Puppis system.
 
The system had four planets capable of supporting humanoid life, albeit all briefly; the extreme ultraviolet output of their sun, as well as the challenging environments of the planets, had impeded colonization. 

Zeta Puppis IV and V were twin planets, desert worlds with borderline Class M environments more arid and forbidding even than Vulcan.  Zeta Puppis VI was a pelagic world, a Class O planet of moderate temperature and open ocean, and lacking any land.  Zeta Puppis VII was a class M planet whose arctic environment verged on Class P conditions.

Kirk had already eliminated the system’s seventh planet from his prospective search; death from exposure, on a glaciated planet, was far more likely than expiring from starvation, much less dehydration, the fates that Klandar had predicted for Spock and McCoy.

The twin planets were the obvious choice.  Spock was desert-bred; in the desert, he and even McCoy might have a fighting chance.
 
And yet it was just as possible to starve – or dehydrate – stranded on an ocean as in the desert . . . .

Survival on the open ocean would be impossible without a boat.  Klandar had not mentioned providing any survival gear.  And if Kirk wanted to search for his friends on the ocean, well,
even Zeta Puppis IV and V had seas.

Boats.  Two seemingly unrelated memories, one vivid, the other elusive, pricked at Kirk thoughts.

“Lieutenant Uhura, check the databanks.  Give me the meanings of the various Terran
names for Zeta Puppis.  And of the informal names, if any, for its planets.”
 
“Yes, sir.”  Uhura pushed buttons on her console.  Puppis means “stern,” as stern of a ship,
in Latin.  The star was once part of the southern constellation Argo Navis, the Argonaut’s
ship, but in the eighteenth century the star formation was divided into three constellations,
one of those being Puppis.  The star itself was known in Arabic as Suhail Hadar, meaning ‘roaring
bright one.’  Zeta Puppis IV has become informally known as Suhail, Zeta Puppis V as Hadar.  The star’s Greek name was Naos, meaning ‘ship.’  The sixth planet’s informal name is related to that of its star:  Nautilus, the Greek word for “sailor.”  The seventh planet – ”

“That will be enough, Lieutenant,” Kirk said.  

Nautilus.  The sailor.  Yes, he had heard that name before.  From Spock, three weeks earlier.  The Science Officer had expressed hope the Enterprise might make an unplanned visit to the Zeta Puppis system, home to a “fascinating” blue giant star and an equally “fascinating” planet, one
of the few known worlds completely covered with water.  A planet named, like its star, for the maritime. 

A planet named “the sailor.” 

“Mr. Chekhov, plot a course to Zeta Puppis VI.”

“Aye aye, sir.” 

 “A hunch, Captain?” Sulu asked.

“You could call it that, Mr. Sulu,” Kirk replied.  “Based on a conversation I had with McCoy
and Spock a while back.”

Kirk’s memory of the conversation was vivid, although it had taken place two months prior. 
The three of them had been eating lunch together.  McCoy, frowning with distaste at the food on his plate, had said, “When this voyage is over, maybe I’ll vacation on a cruise ship.  Just for the food.  I’ve always wanted to go on an ocean cruise, but never got around to it.”

“I’ve never been, either,” Kirk said.  “Why didn’t you go?”

“I was too damn busy, with medical school and residency.”  The doctor paused.  “And other stuff.”
“Other stuff” was as close to mentioning his marriage, his divorce or his daughter as McCoy ever did in Spock’s presence.  Kirk had occasionally heard bits and pieces, mostly when McCoy was in a lugubrious, alcohol-fueled mood.

“Vulcans do not go on ocean cruises for entertainment,” Spock said.  “We do not see the point.”

“Of course you don’t,” McCoy said.  “Vulcans don’t take vacations, and you all hate water.”

“On the contrary, Vulcans do engage in periods of extended relaxation, often for the purposes
of physical, intellectual or spiritual self-improvement.”

“You call that relaxation?” the doctor asked.

“Yes.  And as a people living in a desert environment, we are attracted to bodies of water.  Riverside and seaside locations are popular destinations for what you term vacations.  But we travel to our destinations quickly and directly, by transporter or shuttle.  There is no logic in unnecessarily delaying one’s arrival at where one wants to go.”

McCoy said, “The point is the journey itself, Spock!  Not the destination.” 

“If the journey is the point, Doctor, why are you always complaining about how boring
our extended intervals of interstellar travel are, and saying you look forward to visiting the
next planet?”

“That’s different,” McCoy said.  “One, I like an occasional breath of fresh air.  Two, I’m not exactly vacationing on this ship.  Three, some of those planets actually have decent food.” 

Attempting to deflect the burgeoning argument, Kirk had asked, “Do Vulcans ever travel by
boat or ship?”

“Rarely,” Spock answered.  “Even our aquaculture specialists, who farm native seaweeds and
plankton, rarely utilize boats.  Amphibious shuttlecraft are much more efficient.”

“We were talking about vacations!” the doctor said.  “Vacations aren’t supposed to be efficient.”

And so the argument had continued.

Kirk looked at the luminous blue disk on the viewing screen.  “Looks like you got your wish,
Spock,” he said to himself.  “And maybe you, too, Bones.” 

“What was that, Captain?” Chekhov asked  

“Nothing,” Kirk said.  He returned to his chair.  “We’re going to look for Mr. Spock and Dr.
McCoy on Nautilus.  Stranded on the ocean.  Drifting in a boat.”

 

 

Their lifeboat was a blue rounded hexagon, roughly two and a half meters across in each direction, and constructed of a buoyant plastic.  The domed roof was just high enough to allow Spock to stand up straight in the center of the boat’s deck.  Two doors were located on opposite sides of the craft; circular windows, roughly twenty centimeters in diameter, were located on the other four sides.
 
Six ballast bags lay under the hull.  Spock said that as long as the vessel was structurally intact,
and the entrances sealed, the boat should be self-righting.

“Nice to know we won’t drown,” McCoy said, sardonic.

Their communicators and phasers, along with Spock’s tricorder and McCoy’s medical kit, had
been taken from the men when they had been abducted.  A hinged box built into one side of the
hull proved to hold, unexpectedly, some equipment:  two cups, two plates, two pairs of sunglasses
with elastic headbands, a flashlight, a sharp knife, an impermeable tarp that was “roughly one hundred and forty-two centimeters square” according to Spock, and a piece of netting of the same dimensions.

“What the hell?” McCoy said, holding the sunglasses.  “Do they think we’re on a vacation?”

“We are in the Zeta Puppis system,” Spock replied.  “Probably we are on the ocean planet Zeta Puppis VI, or possibly on a sea on one of the system’s twin desert planets.  In either case, the light from the star, even at this extreme distance, is dangerously high in the ultraviolet range.  We should wear the sunglasses during daylight hours.”  Spock took one of the pairs of sunglasses from McCoy’s hands and put them on. 

McCoy asked, “What do you mean, ‘extreme distance’?”

“We are roughly 800 AU from the system’s sun – twenty times Pluto’s average distance from Sol.  Zeta Puppis is an extreme blue giant, spectral class O4If.  It is one of the brightest, and hottest, stars in the galaxy.  Its surface temperature is approximately 42,400 K.  In comparison, Sol’s surface temperature is roughly 5,800 K, while the surface temperature of 40 Eridani A is 5,300 K.”

McCoy gave a low whistle.

“Visually, Zeta Puppis is 21,000 times brighter than Earth’s sun.  But its energy output per second
is 790,000 times that of Sol.  Most of that energy is in the ultraviolet range.  The light here is
damaging to most humanoid eyes – Human and Vulcan, included.”

“They’re trying to dehydrate us to death, and they’re worried about our eyesight?”  McCoy put
on the sunglasses, then picked up cups and looked at them in disgust.  “Why did the Orions leave us with these?  We have nothing to drink.”

Drinking seawater, with its salt content, would only hasten their deaths by forcing their bodies,
Human or Vulcan, to excrete more water than had been consumed to start with.  Waste products made ingesting urine dangerous for the same reason.  

“Perhaps to taunt us, when thirst hits us,” Spock answered.  “And I think the equipment, meager 
as it is, is intended to possibly extend our survival.”

“The longer we survive, the more we can suffer,” McCoy said.  “But no fresh water.  No way to desalinize the ocean water, or to collect moisture from the air.”  He tossed the cups back in the locker.
 
“True.  But if it rains, we could collect rainwater with the tarp.”

“We won’t be getting rain anytime soon,” McCoy said, glancing out the nearest window. The skies were clear in every direction.  They had checked as soon as they had been beamed down. 

“We can extend our survival by collecting food with the netting,” Spock said.  “Fish and seaweed are both high in moisture content.”

The temperature was mild, about 20 C.  In a temperate climate, a healthy adult Terran could survive without water for five days.  Under similar conditions a Vulcan might survive for ten. 

McCoy asked, “How long would it take to scan a planet this size for our life signs?”

“If we are on Zeta Puppis VI, sixteen or seventeen days.  For either of the desert planets,
thirteen or fourteen days.” 
 
“We better the hell hope it rains,” McCoy said grimly.

“And that the Captain chooses the correct planet to search.  There are four planets in the Zeta Puppis system with a breathable oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere.”

“You only mentioned three.”

“Zeta Puppis VII is a glaciated world.”

“I almost wish we had been dumped there.  At least we’d have fresh water.”  McCoy looked
down at the deck.  “Not to mention a surface to stand on that wasn’t constantly rolling.”

“It might have been preferable for us to have been left on one of the desert worlds.  As a
Vulcan, I am trained in desert survival techniques.”

“This reminds me of that time on Taurus II.  Jim looking for us, practically at random, in a
race against the clock.  Too bad we don’t have any fuel to burn up as a signal.”

“There is no reason to believe that such a course of action would prove successful in this
situation.” 

“As I recall, you didn’t think it would work that time.”

“I knew the chances were remote.  Not nonexistent.”

McCoy was quite certain Spock had said, “There was no chance,” but he chose not to
argue the point.  He had something else in mind.  “I’m going to christen this boat,” he
said, picking up one of the cups.  “Got any champagne, Spock?”

“No.”

“I thought not.  Guess I’ll have to use seawater, instead.”

McCoy opened a hatch and leaning out, scooped up a cup of water.  He stood and splashed
the contents of the cup on the outside hull.  “I hereby christen thee the Galileo 2.”  

As he watched McCoy close the hatch, Spock wondered if the doctor’s naming of the lifeboat
was based on magical thinking, an irrational hope that the tenuous luck which had led to their
last minute rescue from the shuttlecraft in a decaying orbit around Taurus II might somehow be transferred to a craft of the same name.  Humans, after all, could be superstitious.

“For old times’ sake, Spock,” McCoy said.  “I know Jim won’t find us.  Not this time.”

Not for the first time, Spock wondered if Leonard McCoy was, unknowingly, a telepath.

 

Spock spent the first day fishing, leaning out of one of the entrances, holding the net.  He had insisted on doing so, because Vulcans were less vulnerable than Humans to dehydration as well
as to ultraviolet light..  Orange 40 Eridani A actually produced slightly less ultraviolet light than yellow Sol did , but Vulcan orbited closer to its star than did Earth, and consequently received a higher percentage of its light, ultraviolet included.  Vulcans had evolved to tolerate their world’s more intense sunlight.
  
In late afternoon Spock announced, “I have caught a fish.”

McCoy thought Spock sounded suspiciously proud.  “Is this the first fish you’ve ever caught?”
he asked.

“Yes,” Spock said.  “Vulcans do not fish, we are vegetarians.” 

“Well, for all I know, you might have gone fishing sometime with your mother’s folks.”

They looked at the fish as it lay gasping in the net.  It was dark silver, with a lighter belly
and two reddish lines running its length horizontally.  Projecting from its caudal fin was a
wicked-looking spike.  The shaft had backward-projecting barbs, similar to those of a
porcupine quill, designed to embed deeply into flesh, and difficult to extract.   

McCoy said, “I bet the bigger fish don’t go chasing after these fellows too often.” 

“The fish is twenty-four point five centimeters long.”  Again the Vulcan sounded pleased
with himself. 

“Does the length include that spike on its tail?” 

“No.  The spike would add an additional five point two centimeters to the length of the fish.”

McCoy shook his head.  “You must be the only fisherman in the galaxy who underestimates
the size of your catch.”

After the fish had expired, McCoy cleaned and gutted it.  He urged Spock to eat some of his catch,
but the Vulcan declined.  “My digestive system is not accustomed to flesh.  Nausea or diarrhea would accelerate the dehydration process.”

“You tolerated meat on Sarpeidon.”

“It was cooked.  Also, at that time my entire physiology was regressing.”

Although McCoy had occasionally with relish consumed raw fish in sushi, he found the soft,
oily flesh on his plate unappetizing.  “I wonder if this would taste any better cooked,” he said,
wrinkling his nose in distaste. 
 
With false innocence, Spock said, “But you are always saying you want fresh food.”

McCoy glared at him. 

“You also said you wanted to go on an ocean cruise.”

“Spock, shut up.”

McCoy forced himself to eat the raw yellow flesh, carefully stripping with his fingers every oily
shred from the sharp bones.  More important than the nutrients it contained was its high water content.

Occupied by forcing down the unpalatable meal and avoiding bones, McCoy did not notice the
distinctly unVulcanish look of satisfaction on Spock’s face.

“There are a variety of scenarios in which you could survive longer than I do,” Spock said.
“If, for example, a storm or other phenomenon capsizes or compromises this raft.  You are a
much stronger swimmer than I am.  But I do not understand why one scenario is preferable to
the other.”

“As a human, and as a physician, seeing people die is hard on me.  Especially people I know.” 
McCoy hesitated. “Especially friends.”  Especially people I love, he thought to himself. 
 
“You are a physician.  You have attended many deaths.”

“I’ve never really gotten used to it.”  McCoy shrugged.  “Anyway, with your Vulcan stoicism,
you probably won’t even notice I’m gone.”

“Doctor, as much as you talk, I assure you, I could not help but notice your absence.”

Spock thought to himself:  I would notice.  I would miss your presence, Leonard.  For reasons
you will never know.

McCoy said, “If I die before you, you should eat me.  No point wasting water.  It’s the
logical thing to do.”

Spock’s moral and visceral repugnance strained his emotional control.  He replied, calmly,
“Dr. McCoy, I have refused to consume fish.  I am not going to eat your flesh.  If I die first,
are you going to eat mine?”

“I don’t know,” McCoy said, looking away.  “Maybe.”

“I am not going to eat you,” Spock repeated.

“Well, think about it.” 

No more was said was on the matter.

 

 

Late that first night on the ocean, McCoy woke.  The temperature had dropped, and he was chilly.  He pushed away the damp netting he was using as a pillow.  Spock was using the tarp.  McCoy sensed, rather than saw, that Spock was awake on the other side of the deck.

If I’m uncomfortable, he’s probably even colder, McCoy thought.  Hesitantly, he said, “Spock,
I’m cold.  Could we lie next to each other?” 

There was a short silence, but Spock answered:  “Yes.  You should move over here.  We can share the tarp as a blanket.” 

McCoy moved, and lay on his side, facing Spock’s back.  The two shifted some, as they got the
tarp positioned the best they could over both of them.  Tentatively, McCoy put an arm over Spock, on the outside of the tarp.

McCoy was thinking, How often I’ve wanted to do this.  And more.

Spock was thinking similar thoughts.

Neither man said anything.  Soon they fell back asleep.

 

In the morning they checked to see if dew had collected on the exterior of the hull.  It had
not done so.  And they lacked a way to secure the tarp to possibly collect dew.  Rain would
be their only source of fresh water.

Spock was fishing later that morning when McCoy said, “Spock, quick, give me the net.” 

Spock saw that McCoy was removing his clothing. 

“On second thought, I’ll use the tarp.”  McCoy, stripped to his undershorts, gathered up the square of material from the locker.    

“What are you doing?” Spock asked. 

“I saw seaweed, out that window there.  A field of it, practically.  I’m going to collect some.”

Spock looked out.  The edge of the floating mass of algae was at least two hundred meters away.

“It’s too far,” Spock said.  “Swimming for it is dangerous.”  Few Vulcans were comfortable
in the water.  Their denser musculature and skeletal system made them less buoyant than Terrans.
“Your skin will burn.  There could be predators.”

“And starvation and dehydration aren’t dangerous?  If I burn, I burn.  If I drown, I drown. 
At least the stuff showed up today, while I still have the energy to swim for it.”

Spock remained uneasy, but recognizing the logic of McCoy’s argument, he made no further objection.  Perhaps Spock’s concern showed on his normally impassive face, because McCoy paused to eye the Vulcan speculatively.

“Don’t worry,” the doctor said quietly.  “I’m a good swimmer – I worked as a lifeguard in high school and college.  If I get tired, I can float.” 

McCoy dived into the sea.

“Good luck, Leonard,” Spock murmured.  McCoy would not have heard him.

Half an hour later, McCoy returned, the tarp laden with algae. 

They argued about how to split the seaweed.  McCoy said Spock should get all of it, since
he was not eating fish.  Spock said McCoy should get two-thirds of it, since Humans
dehydrated more quickly than Vulcans.  Reluctantly, McCoy agreed to eat half the algae. .  

“Too bad we don’t have our tricorders,” McCoy said.  “We don’t really know if this stuff’s
safe to eat.”  That fact that Terran and Vulcan marine algae were nontoxic didn’t mean the
alien seaweed was.  “See, Spock, that’s why I didn’t want to eat any – I wanted you to be the guinea pig.”

“I’m honored you think my Vulcan physiology is qualified to be your personal poison
detector.” 

The seaweed was mildly bitter, but palatable.  “Tastes a bit like collard greens,” McCoy said. 
He worried about the salt content, but it was less than he had feared.   

After eating their fill that morning and again in the late afternoon, they stashed away the rest, hoping to eat it the next day. 

 

 

“You’re awfully quiet,” McCoy said later that evening as the stars appeared.  “Did the algae
upset your stomach?”

“I see no point in conversation.  I have been trying to meditate, to conserve energy and moisture. 
I recommend you do similar.”

The answer was truthful, but not entirely so.  There were other reasons Spock was unusually withdrawn.  The doctor’s constant, inescapable proximity, unrelieved by the presence of other
people, their huddling for warmth at night, the partial nudity necessitated by the intermittent demands of their excretory functions, all had made Spock’s sexual urges more difficult to control. 
He was grateful that his Pon Farr was not imminent. .

He was unsettled, too, at the prospect of witnessing Leonard suffer a protracted death.  There
had been other times, on Minara II and Yonada and Shirkochalit, that he had grieved in expectation of the doctor’s impending death; but those anxieties had proved fleeting, a matter
of a few hours, and Jim had always been present to act as a buffer to Spock’s emotions. 

The depth of his grief unsettled Spock.  He returned to his meditation.

 

 

The next morning they discovered the algae had decayed into a rancid, stinking mess.  “At
least we got two meals out of it,” McCoy said.  “Maybe we’ll find see more today.”

But they would not find any more seaweed, not that day nor in the ones that followed.

 

 

Their third afternoon on the ocean, Spock caught another fish.  The Vulcan was pulling
in the net when McCoy heard a sound like a grunt, and then Spock’s voice, tight, saying,
“Doctor, I need your assistance.”

Still thrashing in the mesh was a fish, the same species as the one caught two days earlier,
but several centimeters longer.  Its tail spike was impaled in Spock’s right wrist.  Like porcupine quills, the barb had released upon contact. 

“I could pull it out, but it’s lodged near an artery,” McCoy said.  “If that artery gets nicked,
you could lose a lot of blood.  Or I could excise it, with the knife.”  He frowned.  “The knife’s contaminated with seawater, not to mention that fish the other day.  Cutting the barb out would probably increase the chance of infection.”

“Do as you think best,” Spock said. 

“The wound is already contaminated, I’ll cut it out.  I won’t have any way to disinfect your
hand, though.  Shit, I wish those damn Orions hadn’t confiscated my medical kit.”

McCoy retrieved the knife.  “Sorry, this is going to hurt.”

“Doctor, you have a talent for stating the obvious.”

Carefully, McCoy excised the barb, cursing the rolling ocean the entire time.  “This is almost as bad as operating on your father during that battle.”  He wrapped the wrist in a rag torn from the sleeve of his black undershirt.  “Let’s hope it doesn’t get infected.” 

McCoy eyed the dying fish, which lay gasping on the floor of the raft.  “I ought to toss that
damn thing back into the ocean.”

“No,” Spock said.  “There’s no point in wasting a good fish.  Eat it.”  

McCoy scowled.

With a hint of humor, Spock said, “I’m still your commanding officer.  Eat it.”

“And I’m your doctor,” McCoy snapped.  “No more fishing for you, until that wound’s healed
over.”

Neither of them mentioned they expected to be dead before Spock’s wound could heal.

McCoy consumed the fish with a grim satisfaction more emotional than physical.  “My revenge
on what it did to you.”

“Taking revenge on a fish is not logical.”

“Who the hell ever said revenge is logical?  Look where Klandar’s revenge on Jim has gotten us.”

“Indeed.”

 

 

Kirk was spending most of his time, even more than usual, on the bridge, monitoring the
scanning of Zeta Puppis VI for Human or Vulcan lifesigns.  Though performed by computers,
scanning the planet’s surface square meter by square meter was a laborious task, and one that
had been complicated, albeit only slightly, by the lack of any landmarks.  The polar regions
had been eliminated from the search, for the same reason Zeta Puppis VII had been; even so,
the search was expected to take two weeks.    

One evening, as he approached a turn in a corridor on Deck 5, Kirk overheard Sulu and
Lieutenant Sayres talking.

“I hope we find Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy,” Sayres said.  “For the Captain’s sake, as well
as the ship’s.  Spock can be intimidating, and McCoy can be cranky, but they’re both damn
good at what they do.  I hope they don’t end up at each other’s throat without the Captain
around, though.”

“Oh, they just enjoy arguing with each other.  They’ll watch each other’s back.  Besides,
Mr. Spock won’t lose his cool.”  Kirk turned the corner, headed for his quarters, and the
pair’s conversation turned to other subjects. 

Sulu was right, of course.  Still, Kirk did wonder how Spock and Bones were faring with
each other. 

Assuming they were both still alive.
 
 

 

“Too bad you weren’t able to stay on Sarpeidon, with Zarabeth, the way you wanted to,”
McCoy said.  “At least you could have died with someone you loved.”  

Spock thought, you do not realize the irony of your words.  “I did not love Zarabeth.  As
you are well aware, traveling to the past caused my behavior to regress.  In any case, it is
probable that I would have outlived her.  But you must wish you had remained on Yonada,
with your wife.”  The faintest of inquiries was in his voice.

“With Natira?  Not really,” McCoy said.  “My marriage to her was just a way of running from
the prospect of a lonely death on Earth.  I grant New Yonada would be more comfortable than
this place.  But I never loved Natira.  I was in love with someone on the Enterprise.”  Shit, I shouldn’t have said that, he thought. He added, hastily, “But the person didn’t want me.” 
Maybe putting it in the past tense will make him think I mean Tonia.

“Yeoman Barrows,” the Vulcan said.  Her brief relationship with the CMO was well-known
on the ship. 

McCoy ducked his chin as if in assent, but remained silent.  Spock was mistaken, of course.
The truth was closer to the opposite:  Tonia had wanted more than McCoy had been willing or
able to give.

Spock said, “Our circumstances have parallels.  I, too, have developed an emotional attachment
to a fellow crewmember.  That individual does not share my attraction, however.”

Well, this was a surprise.  McCoy shifted, studying Spock.  “You’re sure the person isn’t interested?”

“I am certain.” 

Jim, thought McCoy with a sudden certainty.  He’s in love with Jim. How about that.  I could
see it working, too, if only Jim swung both ways.

What a mess, the doctor thought.  Tonia wanting me.  Me and Christine wanting Spock.  Spock
wanting Jim –  someone, anyway.  Jim and Rand wanting each other, but thwarted by Jim’s
command status. 

McCoy leaned back on the wall of the craft, his arms crossed.  “Love’s a bitch,” he said
emphatically.
 
“Indeed.”

McCoy cocked an eyebrow at his companion.  “Nice you agree with me,” he drawled.  “For once.”

 

 

When Spock woke the next morning, the throbbing in his right hand informed him of a fact he
did not need a doctor to tell him:  his wound was infected.

He would have said nothing to McCoy, but as soon as the physician woke he insisted on
examining the wound.  Spock’s wrist and lower palm were green and puffy. 

“I should have pulled that damn spike out, instead of cutting it out.”  McCoy was savagely angry.

“I might have suffered severe bleeding,” Spock said.  “And it is possible my wrist would have
become infected anyway.  As you said yesterday, the wound was already contaminated.”

McCoy spent the day fishing – and cursing the fish that Spock had caught and been injured by,
and all the fish that he, McCoy, was failing to catch, and alien bacteria and clumsy Vulcans and Spock’s “beginner’s luck” as a fisherman, and his own incompetence as a physician and his foolhardiness for having ever gone into space, and the lack of rain and the absence of seaweed,
and the ocean where the fish and the alien bacteria and the seaweed lived, and the bright blue sun that was burning his skin, and Klandar and Orion pirates and the Romulan commander who had ordered the destruction of his own ship, and the Romulan Empire for having attacked Federation outposts four years before, and the Romulan authorities for having lied to their own people, and even a certain James T. Kirk for not having blown up the helpless Romulan ship when he had the chance, “because at least then we’d be dying for a valid reason.” 

Also the object by the end of the day of several pointed imprecations was McCoy’s fishing skills, or more precisely, his lack thereof.  “I’m a doctor, not a goddamn fisherman.”
 
There was no meal that night, or in the days that followed.  

 

 

When McCoy examined Spock’s hand the next morning, they both saw the streak of green
tracing up the Vulcan’s arm to his elbow.  Wound sepsis.  Bacteria had entered Spock’s
circulatory system.  Without treatment, the infection would spread, inexorably, through his
body.      

“I don’t have antibiotics,” McCoy said.  “I’m sorry, Spock.”   His anger of the prior day had
drained away, leaving despair. 

“It is not your fault, Doctor.”

Spock’s going to die because of that fish he caught for me, McCoy thought.  

Of course, he was doomed, anyway.
 
McCoy found no comfort in the second thought.

 

 

McCoy despaired about Spock’s condition, but he was concerned about his own
condition, as well.  Saliva sat thick in his mouth, his skin was dry and warm, he was
dizzy sometimes when standing, he had a constant headache, his skin did not return to
to its original shape quickly when he would press or pinch it.  He had lost, he knew, at
least five percent of his body’s fluid.  Thirst and hunger were his constant, unwanted
companions.   

He hoped for rain, but only a few fluffy white clouds dotted the sky.  He hoped for fish,
but none found their way into his net.  He hoped for seaweed, but no mats of algae floated
within sight.  He did not bother to hope for land:  the absence of any satellite in the sky,
day or night, had made clear they were not on one of the twin desert planets of the system,
but on Zeta Puppis VI.  The planet was also called Nautilus, Spock told him, and it had
no land, not even volcanic islands. 

McCoy did wish that he might have died on solid ground.

Or that the Enterprise might find them.

 

 

Kirk looked at the blue and white world looming on the viewing screen.  Strange, to see
so much blue, unbroken by the brown of continents or even islands.  He wondered if
Spock and McCoy were on this planet named “the sailor,” lost on its lonely and literally
endless ocean. 

In the corner of the viewing screen shone the planet’s sun, the star the Greeks had long ago
named “the ship,” its aquamarine color equally unfamiliar to Kirk’s widely-traveled eyes. 
Most blue stars were blue-white, not the true bright blue of Naus:  class O stars were the rarest,
and hottest, of main sequence stars.  In terms of absolute magnitude, Zeta Puppis was the second brightest star visible from either Earth or Vulcan.  But the star’s glorious color was, Kirk knew,
a portent of impending cataclysm.  Though a young star, it was doomed to an early death by stellar standards, the inevitable consequence of its impressive size and almost unrivaled temperature.

Pushing away thoughts of premature death, Kirk contemplated anew the ocean planet Nautilus.   Safe sailing, my friends, if you’re down there. 

 

 

The blue sun was shining almost directly overhead when the Galileo 2 shifted with a sudden
jerk, as if it had collided with something.  McCoy, who had been fishing at the edge of an
entrance, was almost thrown into the water.
 
“Spock!  Did you feel that?”

“Yes.  It seemed to come from this side – ”   A harder jolt hit the lifeboat.

Hurriedly, McCoy sealed the door.  Spock was peering out a window.   
 
“McCoy, look.  There on the left.”

A curved dorsal fin, more than a meter high, sliced through the blue-gray water.  Under the
surface, a torpedo-shaped shadow more than five meters long moved, dark and half-seen and menacing.  Water-breather or air breather, the animal was built for speed. 

Built like a predator.

“The organism is sufficiently large to damage, or sink, our craft,” Spock said.  

“And snap us up for lunch in the bargain.”  McCoy shuddered, recalling how only moments
before he had been leaning out across the water.

The animal dived, disappearing from sight. 

A hard jolt from directly underneath threw both men off their feet, Spock falling on top
of McCoy.

“Are you all right?” the Vulcan asked, helping McCoy to a sitting position.

“Yes, I think so.”  Spock was oddly slow removing his good hand from McCoy’s arm. 
Probably just waiting for the next good  jolt, thought McCoy.  Spock looked at his left hand,
which continued to grasp McCoy’s arm, almost as if he had been unaware of his own action. 
He loosed his hold.

 “What about you?  Did you hit your hand?”

“I was able to avoid falling on my injured arm.”  About a minute later, another bump shook the raft.

McCoy said, “Looks like our version of Galileo might get taken out by Jaws, rather than
by King Kong.”

“I do not understand the references.”

“Monsters from some old horror films.  Twentieth century, I think.  King Kong was a giant ape
that terrorized New York City.  Jaws was a giant shark that terrorized a seaside town.  The films
scared the crap out of me as a kid.  An uncle of mine was a horror film buff.”

A lull of several minutes preceded a quick series of three relatively gentle taps.  

“Have any alternatives up your sleeve this time, Spock?”

“No.”

For almost an hour (forty-seven point nine minutes, according to Spock) “Jaws” nudged and bumped the Galileo 2 a total of thirty-eight times.  Finally, the attack stopped.  Amazingly, the
lifeboat appeared to have escaped damage.  

“Looks like we dodged a phaser,” McCoy said. “Or maybe I should say an organic
torpedo.”

But the doctor wondered if death by drowning, or even being eaten, would have been easier than
the lingering deaths that still awaited them. 

 

 

“I’m sick of blue.  Blue sky, blue sun, blue shirts, blue ocean.”  McCoy gave the hull
of the life raft a weak swat.  “Even this goddamn boat is blue.”

“There is no logic in being ‘sick’ of a color.  Things are the color they are.”

McCoy sulked.  “Gray skies would be good for a change.  Might bring us some rain.”

Spock would have welcomed gray skies and rain, but he was not sick of blue.  It was the
color of Leonard’s eyes.

 

 

The Enterprise had received a subspace communication from Starfleet Command.  The ship
was being ordered to proceed to Delta Draconis, to pick up a disaster relief team there and
transport it to Mirzam II, where a large meteorite had hit unexpectedly.

Kirk consulted with Chief Engineer Scott. The Enterprise would delay leaving the Zeta Puppis system for another twenty-four hours.  Scotty would make sure the engines were able to handle
the extra speed necessary to get to Delta Draconis on time.  

 

 

It was their sixth day on the boat.  Dehydration had taken its toll on McCoy’s body.  His eyes were sunken.  His urine was dark.  He was having tremors – the electrical impulses in his nervous system were misfiring, due to the lost of electrolytes through sweating. 

He looked longing at the ocean, wanting water in his mouth with desperation he had not known existed.  He wanted water even more than he had wanted to escape the agony the Vians had inflicted on him.  The pain after awhile had turned to numbness, while the thirst only
got worse.

Spock, too, was suffering.  He did not complain, of course, but he was surely in great pain.
He, too, was becoming dehydrated, his skin hot and dry to the touch, as fever burned through
his body.  The swelling of his arm now reached above the elbow.  His right hand was so
swollen that it was useless. 

McCoy wondered which of them would die first.

Late in the morning he lost the net when a large wave washed over him while he was fishing. 
He was distressed, but Spock was relieved that McCoy had not been washed overboard
along with the net.  It was unlikely the doctor would have been strong enough to have swum
back to the Galileo 2.

One or two fish would do little to extend their lives now, anyway, Spock knew.  He believed
McCoy had persisted in trying to catch fish in an effort to keep hope, rather than their bodies, alive.
 

 

McCoy had just finished dribbling meager drops of amber-colored urine into the ocean. 
“Damn ocean doesn’t need any water,” he mumbled.  “We do.”  His thirst was fierce, far
worse than the gnawing hunger in his stomach.  “‘Water, water, every where and not a drop
to drink.’  Didn’t Shakespeare write that?”

“No, Samuel Taylor Coleridge did so.  It is from The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.  You quoted the second line incorrectly.  It is ‘nor any drop to drink.’”

“But that phrasing doesn’t make sense.  How does your Vulcan brain have room for nineteenth century American poetry, anyway?”

“The poem is an eighteenth century English work.”

“You didn’t know about Jaws or King Kong.” 

Spock did not understand the look of satisfaction on McCoy’s face.  He welcomed
it, however, because the expression was the closest to a smile that had been on McCoy’s
face since he had lost the net earlier in the day. 

 

 

McCoy was looking at the alien night sky.  Zeta Puppis VI lacked moons, and the weather had continued clear, with no hint of rain, so the Milky Way was a glowing river in the inky sky. 
McCoy thought the galaxy somehow always looked prettier from a planet (one without
artificial lighting) than it did even from a starship; probably the atmosphere diffusing the
starlight.  Sol and 40 Eridani A were both far too dim to be seen from this sector.  We’ll never
see our homestars, or our homeworlds, again, he thought.
 
“Do you think the Enterprise is looking for us, Spock?”

“The probability is difficulty to calculate.  We do not know for a certainty that Klandar
even advised the Enterprise that we are in the Zeta Puppis system.  Perhaps the Enterprise
was able to follow an ion trail to the system, or even to Zeta Puppis VI, as it did when my
brain was stolen by the Eymorg.”

McCoy nodded, not that Spock could see him in the darkened raft.  “Jim won’t give up
easily.”

“True.  The Captain will surely search for us to the best of his ability to do so.”

 

 

“Captain, we need to leave this system.”

“I am aware of that fact, Mr. Scott.”  Kirk, scowling, did not look up.  Staring at him from
the PADD on his desk was a reminder that he was due for his six-month medical exam, his
final one of the Enterprise’s five-year mission.  Signed by M’Benga.  Not McCoy.   

“As it is, I’ll have to be pushin’ the engines to make Starfleet’s deadline for picking up the
relief team.  We’ve already lost one day of travel time.”

Kirk looked up at his Chief Engineer. “I said I know!  So why are you telling me?”

“Because Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy arnae here to do it.”
  
“No, they’re not.”  Kirk pushed the PADD away with such force it would have dropped off
the edge of the wide desk if Scott had not caught it.

“Jim,” the engineer said, his voice softer, “I don’t want to leave this system, either, not
knowin’ what has happened to them.  But neither Mr. Spock nor Dr. McCoy would want
you to jeopardize the relief mission – or your career – lookin’ for them.”

“I’ve jeopardized it before for less.”

“Your career?  Aye.”  This time, Scotty didn’t point out what the Captain already knew:  the
lives of thousands of people on Mirzam II were at risk.  The Enterprise, meanwhile, was searching for two men who were probably already dead, and would be very difficult to find even if they weren’t.

Kirk considered.  “Scotty – if we continue the search for another twelve hours, would it mean pushing the engines too much?” 

Scott calculated in his head.  “Take the twelve hours, Captain.  I’ll manage it.”

“We’ll leave in twelve hours.”  Kirk looked away.  “With or without them.”

Scott turned to leave.

“And Scotty – sorry for yelling at you.”

“Do not worry about it, Captain.  Worry about Dr. McCoy and Mr. Spock.”  Scott left.

Yes, while I still can, Kirk thought.  For the next twelve hours.

 

 

McCoy struggled to a sitting position.  He looked out the window at the sunrise.  Zeta Puppis glowed blue on a horizon of gauzy purple and pink.  Purple and pink were Joanna’s favorite
colors.  It would be the last sunrise he would ever see, he knew.  He and Spock would both be
dead before dawn tomorrow.  Possibly before sunset today.  Himself, of dehydration.  Spock,
of sepsis complicated by dehydration.  He was glad the sunrise was pretty.  And that he had something to remind him of Joanna.

I beat the odds, he thought.  Statistically, I should have been dead yesterday.  This was their seventh day on the Galileo 2, but due to the planet’s rotational period of twenty point nine
hours (as estimated by Spock), they had been here for the equivalent of six days Standard.
The meals McCoy had eaten, of seaweed and fish, had staved off terminal-stage dehydration
for the equivalent of one Standard day.  But now he was suffering cramps, and his heart was
racing, and he was having an increasingly difficult time focusing his thoughts.  He doubted
he was still producing urine.  His body had lost more than ten percent of its water content;
his blood was leaching fluid as his dying cells consumed what water they could get.    

Spock had not beaten the odds.  He might have survived an additional three or four days, had
he not developed the infection.  The infection he had acquired catching a fish for McCoy.

Spock lay on the deck, his breathing labored, his skin flushed green with fever.  His right arm
was bloated with infection, the sleeve hanging loose where McCoy had cut it the previous day
to relieve pressure on the swelling.  The tarp was draped over him. 

McCoy saw that Spock was shivering under the tarp.  Shakily and without rising, he stripped
off his pants, shirt and undershirt, and placed them between Spock’s body and the tarp.

“No,” Spock said, weakly pushing off the garments.  “You will burn.”   The windows
provided little protection from Zeta Puppis’s ultraviolet light.

“And you’re burning up with fever.”  McCoy’s voice was a harsh rasp in his dry throat.
He replaced the makeshift blankets. 

“Don’t.”

“I’m your doctor.  And your friend.”

“Yes,” Spock said, accepting the statement.  

But of course, that wasn’t all of it.  Why not tell Spock the truth?  McCoy had long feared
doing so would end their often contentious friendship, but their approaching deaths would
soon accomplish that, anyway.   

Haltingly, McCoy spoke.  “Remember how I said I was in love with someone back on the Enterprise?  I didn’t mean Tonia Barrows.  I meant you.”
 
“I am glad you have told me this.”  Spock was smiling.  At least McCoy thought it was a
smile, and not a grimace of pain.  “Because I reciprocate your affection, Leonard.”

“Spock, am I having a hallucination?”  Dehydration could cause hallucinations.  “Because
I thought I just heard you say you love me.”

“You are not suffering an auditory hallucination.”

“Are you delusional from fever?”

“I do not believe so.  I have loved you for several years.”  Spock stretched out the index and
middle fingers of his left hand.  McCoy shakily reached over, touching Spock’s fingers with
two of his own.  Hesitantly, McCoy leaned over and touched his lips briefly to Spock’s.  Their mouths were both so dry their lips stuck together momentarily when McCoy withdrew.   

“Best damn kiss of my life,” McCoy said.

“And of mine.”

Spock shifted to his side, and McCoy lay facing his back, the way they had spent the
six nights of their ordeal. 
 
McCoy said, “What a waste.”  Spock assumed McCoy was referring to them having acknowledged their mutual love so shortly prior to their deaths.  “Seven days of total privacy,” McCoy continued,
“down the drain.  We had a whole fucking planet for our own private waterbed.”

Engaging in copulatory behavior in their circumstances would have been ill-advised, Spock
thought.  Certainly, it would have offered no survival benefit.  The exertion would have drained their energy and used precious reserves of their bodies’ moisture. 

Spock did not point out these things.  He said, instead, “Love is a bitch.”

“Damn right it is.”

 

 

McCoy was hallucinating, Spock realized.  The doctor thought Spock was someone – friend? 
relative?  colleague? – named Owen.  He was ranting about how they were going to visit Lloyd
in Savannah.  Georgia, presumably.  Lloyd would take them to a bar with the best Kentucky Corpse Revivers in the South.  A mixed drink, evidently.      

Spock knew he and Leonard would soon be corpses.                       

Spock had been hallucinating, too.  Or perhaps it had been a dream.  He had been walking
his family’s grounds with his mother, along the river.

There was no river on Sarek’s estate, Spock knew.  Not even a stream.

“Let’s go swimming,” his mother said.  When he was seven Amanda had taken him swimming
on Earth.  In Lake Michigan.  They had been visiting relatives in Chicago.  Spock had refused
to wade in beyond his knees.  He had gone in that far only to please her.  It was not until almost
a decade later that he had learned to swim.  He did so in order to enter the Academy.  He had
not viewed the requirement as a logical one.  He saw the logic of it now.        

Amanda’s voice was very hoarse.  Spock wondered why his mother would want to go
swimming when she was ill. 
 
Spock noticed Leonard was crawling toward a door, which for some reason was open.
“Let’s jump into the pool.”  So it had been the doctor’s voice he had heard, talking about swimming.

Spock dragged himself to block McCoy’s path.  The movement made his infected arm
a flame of pain.  Feebly, McCoy began clawing his way over Spock’s body.  The weight on
the infected arm turned the flame to a bonfire.  With the last of his strength, in a move partly
deliberate to protect Leonard, and partly reflexive to escape the pain, Spock rolled his body
on top of McCoy’s. 

Spock wondered if in his weakened condition Leonard would suffocate under his weight. 
If so, it could not be helped.  They would die together. 

“I love thee,” he whispered in Vulcan.  Leonard gave no indication of having heard.

Soon they were both unconscious.

 

 

The mood on the bridge was subdued.  Seventeen minutes remained before their departure from
orbit around Zeta Puppis VI.  A course had been plotted to Delta Draconis IV. 

A sense of loss hung heavy in the air, oppressing Kirk most of all.  They’re probably dead,
anyway, he reminded himself.  

Stiles, who was monitoring the telemetry, suddenly tensed.  “Human and Vulcan lifesigns,
Captain.  At coordinates 621-774-314.”

“Relay those coordinates to the transporter room.”
 
“Already done, sir.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant.”  Kirk punched the communications button on the arm of his chair.
“Medical team to the transporter room.  Mr. Sulu, you have the conn.  Get us out of orbit,
and head for Delta Draconis IV.”

Only then did he bolt from his seat.

 

It was more than an hour before M’Benga spoke to the Captain.

“Well, they’re alive.  They’re both critical, and in multi-organ failure.  Leonard from severe dehydration.  We’re giving him fluid and electrolytes.  Mr. Spock is septic, from the infection
in his arm, and he’s dehydrated, as well.  We’re pumping him with multiple antibiotics as well
as fluids.  They’re both on life support.”

Kirk had seen his friends, limp and unconscious, rushed away from the transporter room by the medics.  McCoy, dressed only in shorts and socks and so ashen under blistering sunburn that Kirk might have thought him dead had he not been having a convulsion.  Spock, also badly sunburned, and with his right arm a hideous swollen rainbow of yellow and green and purple.

Incongruously, both men had been wearing sunglasses when they were beamed up. 

“What are their chances?”

“Less than fifty-fifty.”  M’Benga hoped the Captain would not ask how much less. 

He didn’t.

 

 

Kirk kept vigil in Sickbay, but he was not present thirty hours later, when McCoy regained
consciousness, and asked about Spock.  The Captain was present eleven hours later, when
Spock regained consciousness. 

“Leonard?  Alive?” Spock croaked.                               

“Yes, McCoy’s alive.  He’s in another room.”  Their ordeal must have pulled them together,
Kirk thought.  They must have bonded, for Spock to be calling Bones ‘Leonard.’ 

Kirk wasn’t sure, but he thought he saw Spock smiling before he fell back to sleep. 

He was pleased his friends had overtly acknowledged their friendship finally.  It took long
enough, he thought.
 

 

The crises had passed.  Both patients were expected to recover.  Kirk had resumed bridge duties.
The Enterprise would arrive at Delta Draconis IV the next day.

The Captain wondered what Klandar might do, when he learned his plan had failed.  Would he
go after Spock and Bones again, sometime in the future?  After Kirk’s three nephews, or perhaps
his mother, still alive on Earth?  Or would the Orion pirates turn on Klandar, when he refused to pay up?  The questions weighed on Kirk.  How often, how long, would his actions endanger those he loved?  He would have to address the matter of Klandar later with his friends and family.

M’Benga buzzed Kirk on the bridge, interrupting his thoughts.  “Captain . . . could you come to
Sickbay?”  Alarmed, Kirk said, “Has one of them gotten worse?”

“No.  Not that.  They’re both improved enough that they’ve insisted they be in the same room.”
M’Benga’s tone was odd.  “They have something to say to you.  Together.”

Probably they want to thank me for not giving up on them, thought Kirk.  “I’ll be there shortly.”

 

 

McCoy was sitting in an antigrav chair, near Spock’s bed. 

“Jim, we have something to say.”

Kirk waited. 

“It’s about me and Spock.”  Uncharacteristically, McCoy seemed at a loss for words.

“Yes?”

 “Spock and I . . . while we were gone . . . we found out we love each other.”

“Bones, I always knew the two of you were friends.”

“That isn’t what I mean,” McCoy said.  He exchanged a look with Spock.  “What we mean.  Exactly. We’re . . . more than friends.”

Kirk stared.  “Wait.  You mean you love each other?”

“We have for a long time.  We just didn’t let on to each other.”

Kirk stared at Spock.  “Mr. Spock.  Do you have anything to add?”

“No.  Leonard has stated the situation satisfactorily.”

Kirk whispered to M’Benga, who was standing next to him.  “Are you sure they don’t both
have brain damage?”

McCoy glared in indignation, but Spock seemed amused.  “Captain,” the First Officer
said,  “we are not have brain damage.  Nor are we suffering,” he added, slanting a look of obvious amusement at McCoy, “from hallucinations of febrile origin or other etiology.”  McCoy’s
scowl relaxed into an expression of shared amusement.  In a gesture familiar to Kirk from
Sarek and Amanda’s visit on the Enterprise, the two men crossed index and middle fingers.
 
Kirk was now the one at a loss for words.  “Ah . . . I’m very happy for the two of you.”

McCoy said, “When this voyage is over, we plan to go on a nice long vacation together.”    

“I see,” said Kirk, who still wasn’t sure that what he was seeing was real.  It did not seem
the right time to warn them about the possible continuing danger from Klandar.  “I suppose
it’s safe to assume it won’t be an ocean cruise.”
 
“Actually, that’s a good idea, Jim,” McCoy said brightly.  “I always wanted to go on a cruise ship.”

“But I do not wish to go on a cruise,” Spock said.

“It would be entirely different than what we went through on Nautilus.  We wouldn’t
be in danger, and we’d be traveling in luxury.”  McCoy grinned.  “We’ll have to take our sunglasses, as a memento of how we got together.”

“I did not say I was concerned about the dangers, or comforts, of ocean travel.  I stated
I do not wish to go on a cruise.”

“Give me one logical reason you don’t want to go on a cruise ship.”

“As you can see, Captain,” M’Benga said, “they’re not so brain damaged that they’ve
forgotten how to argue.  And by the way . . . you’re overdue for your medical exam.”
 
 

 

 

Authors note:  Zeta Puppis is a real star.  The author thinks it is cool.  Actually it’s very, very,
very hot, but it’s cool, anyway.  But too young for any planets it might have to have evolved life.