Star Trek: The Original Series - 082 - Federation by Judith Reeves-Stevens, Garfield Reeves-Stevens Page A

to take their toll on him.
    Sarek reached out to scoop up the tongue depressors. “I believe the cultural incantation required at this time is ‘Come to poppa.’” “That is correct,” Spock said.
    At the sound of those words coming from the revered Vulcan diplomat, Kirk clamped his hand to his mouth to try and contain his laughter, but he knew he wasn’t going to make it. It erupted from him with a barely contained snort. He tried to cover his unfortunate reaction with a series of coughs, but that just made the knife wound in his back flare with sharp pain, bringing tears to his eves.
    In their most subdued Vulcan manner, Spock and Sarek looked alarmed.
    “The incantation is not ‘Come to poppa’?” Sarek asked.
    Kirk waved his hand. If he even tried to open his mouth, he’d go on a laughing jag that could set Earth-Vulcan relations back by a decade.
    “Captain?” Spock said with Vulcan concern. “Are you all right?” Kirk nodded. He wiped the tears from his cheeks. “Water,” he gasped in what he hoped was a convincing simulation of something caught in his throat. He started to get up from his chair.
    The door to the examination room puffed open, taking Kirk by surprise. It was too early for Nurse Chapel and far too late for Dr.
    McCoy.
    But it was McCoy who entered, eyes bleary, hair mussed, uniform obviously just thrown on. Kirk instantly knew that whatever had brought McCoy to sickbay at this hour, it had also wakened him unexpectedly.
    The ship’s surgeon came to a stop in the middle of the ward. He stared at his three patients with an open mouth. “What in God’s name are you two doing out of bed?!” Sarek folded his hands in his lap. It was clear the doctor was referring to Kirk and Spock.
    Spock answered the question. “Playing poker.” McCov’s eyes dropped to Sarek’s bed, took in the deck of cards, the piles’of tongue depressors. “So help me, I’ll sedate the lot of you! Put you in… restraints/” Kirk finished getting to his feet. “Bones, it’s all right. Your treatment made us feel better even faster….”But then he winced. The knife wound in his back seemed to twist in place, as if the knife were still in it. He felt the blood leave his face. From the look on McCoy’s face, it was an alarming departure.
    Kirk suddenly felt Spock’s arm slip under his, steadying him.
    But McCoy disapproved of that, too. He grabbed Kirk away from the science officer and manhandled the captain across the ward, telling Spock to get back to bed before he was put into isolation.
    Kirk flopped back on the medical diagnostic bed and felt his breath escape him. McCoy activated the diagnostic board and Kirk heard his own heartbeat racing. “I told you this could happen,” McCoy snapped as he held a whirring medical scanner over Kirk’s chest.
    Kirk mouthed the words “What could happen?” Now he really couldn’t talk. He felt as if the bandages around his chest were solid duranium, slowly constricting, cutting off any chance he had of breathing again.
    “The knife was treated with a protein inhibitor.” McCoy deftly clicked a drug ampule into a hypospray. Kirk heard his heartbeat accelerating. “It’s an old Orion trick. Keeps the wound open and bleeding with no poison to show up in an autopsy. Makes sure there’s no blood left on the weapon, either.” The cold tip of the hypo pushed against Kirk’s shoulder and he felt the sudden pinch of its high-pressure infusion. “Fortunately, you were lucky enough to get in here before you needed an autopsy. Barely.” Though Kirk didn’t feel as if his condition had changed, the sudden caustic tone in McCoy’s delivery told him he was going to be all right. He felt his breathing ease. His heartbeat began to slow. He recognized the effect from his last visit to Vulcan.
    “Tri-ox?” he whispered.
    McCoy glared down at him “When I hear that you’ve earned your medical degree, I’d be happy to discuss drug therapies, Captain. Now stay