TITLE:KFF:  TRIBBLE TRAP (Or: How Captain Kirk Got the 'Clap')
AUTHOR:  melissa
CONTACT:  meister@sprint.ca
CODES:  Kirk/Tribble, rated PG, 1/1
SERIES: TOS
DISCLAIMER:  Paramount is never cruel to Tribbles.  And they own everything and everyone and take very good care of them :)
SUMMARY:  A midnight briefing over an apparent crisis.
Author's note:  Some small reference to the story 'Freshman Physics Lab' by Sileya for the Spock-Fuh-q Fest.
Very special thanks to Kathy P. for beta-ing this for me.
This story is part of the Kirk-Fuh-q Fest.
 

TRIBBLE TRAP (Or: How Captain Kirk Got the 'Clap')
by melissa

 Uhura walked out of her bathroom dressed in an oversized orange terry cloth bathrobe.  She walked barefoot over the blue shag rug beneath her feet, carrying her orange fuzzy slippers in front of her with an outstretched hand.

 "I won't be wearing _these_ again," she said to Sulu as she dumped the slippers into the recycler.

 "I don't blame you," Sulu said.

 "I still can't believe it," Chekov insisted,  "and I saw it with my own two eyes." He grimaced.  "It vas something so horrible I never vish to see it again.  If I could rinse out my brain with soap, I vould."

 Uhura rolled her eyes and sat down in on a comfortable looking blue chair shaped like a mushroom.  "So, tell me again why you two feel this is such an emergency you had to interrupt my shower?"

 Chekov looked up at Uhura sheepishly, "Ve figured it would be better if you heard it from one of us, rather than an acquaintance.  It is going to be very difficult for the Captain for the next little while, now that the secret is out."

 Uhura yawned,"I still don't know what the big deal is.  So you found him in bed with a..."

 Just then, her door slid open, and Scotty stood in the frame, still wearing his pajamas.  "Just what the hell is going on here?" He blurted, his Scottish accent rolling heavily from his tongue, made thicker from his interrupted sleep.  "You call me out of bed on an emergency in the middle of the night for this pajama party?"

 Chekov looked over Scotty's shoulder nervously, hoping no-one heard him, as Sulu ushered the Highlander inside, gesturing for him to hush.

 "Look, Scotty," Sulu said, "this really is important.  It's about the Captain."

 Scotty watched the intent, worried expressions on his fellow officer's faces.  Uhura felt a little sorry for him, he would take this news worst of all.  She yawned again, and wondered if it would be a good idea to get a bottle of whiskey from out of her liquor cabinet.  She wasn't sure if it was still any good, Scotty had given it to her as a Christmas present when she first arrived on the Enterprise seven years ago.  She hoped the seal hadn't broken and turned it to vinegar.

 "What's wrong with the Cap'n?" he asked.

 Sulu and Chekov exchanged knowing glances.  Uhura sighed and closed her eyes, all she really wanted to do right now was sleep and pretend this night had never happened.

 "You'd better have a seat, Scotty," Sulu said, and motioned to the blue couch, shaped like a flower.

 Scotty sat down on a petal, and then moved a couple of other petal cushions out of the way to get more comfortable.

 "So tell me," Scotty said.  "Out with it now.  What's going on?"

 Sulu glanced at Chekov, and Chekov, panic stricken, looked at Uhura who only shrugged and nodded back at him.

 "All right, but be warned.  This isn't going to be easy for me to tell again..."

***
 "I was just getting off my shift.  I had been vorking for forty eight hours straight, you know how it is sometimes."

 Scotty nodded.  Chekov swallowed hard before continuing.

 "As you know, the lights have been kept low recently in light of the fuel leak in engineering.  Although the next station is only a few planets away, engineering has felt it necessary to conserve energy where we can. The easiest route to that, of course, is to dim the lights.  You'd be amazed how much power they eat up when they are fully functioning.  I'm not sure the ship would even make it the two days it vould take to the next operating space station if ve didn't take that precaution."

 "Hunk of junk," Scotty mumbled.  Chekov shot him a look.  "Sorry lad, continue with your story."

 "I vas valking down Deck 9, the red lighting made the valls and the corridor look like the inside of a dragon's mouth.  Though I've valked down that corridor countless times to get to my quarters, it has never looked less than inviting.  This evening, however, I walked through that corridor vith an ever increasing sense of dread.  Perhaps it was just the lighting, it did cast some very long and twisted shadows on the valls.  Still, there was some part of me that recognized all was not right.  I heard a scuffling noise behind me, and I spun around to see who it vas."

 Uhura yawned anew.  Chekov's story was getting more and more descriptive the more he told it.  And he'd already gone through it twice.  By the time the lower decks officers heard about the incident, it would be a novel.

 "There was no-one there.

 I continued onward.  The corridor had never seemed so long before.  In a dim red corner, one of the red lights vas flickering on and off, until finally it died.  I remember thinking to myself that I would have to replace it tomorrow morning, since it cast a few feet of the corridor into complete darkness.  I walked through the shadow of that unlit light, the darkness like cold soil.

 And that vas when I heard it.

 It started off barely a whisper, and then it grew louder.  I stood, frozen in fear at that horrible sound, blanketed in that small, dark section of the corridor.  It was accompanied by a strange clapping sound, at once familiar but I couldn't quite place where I had heard it before. The moaning became stronger, like an injured man, and then, to my horror, whoever it vas let out a piercing shriek that struck me to my soul.  I ran down the corridor, hearing this man's cries of torment.  Though my heart was beating so fast I could see it pumping through my uniform.  I had to help that injured man.

 I finally pinpointed where the sound was coming from.  I tried to enter, but the door was locked.  Using my security clearance I managed to get it open, and I dove inside.  The man's cries had now turned to tortured whimpering, and I vas terrified of what I was about to see.

 It turns out I vas vise to be so apprehensive.

 There, naked, sprawled on the bed, was our Captain Kirk." Chekov bit back tears, "With a large, furry creature between his legs.  It was making this veird, clapping noise...The Captain was obviously in agony, he kept shouting to me in a horribly twisted voice, 'Chekov, get this goddamn thing off of me....'"

 Scotty stared at Chekov. "What was..."

 "It was a tribble," Chekov said quickly.  "It was in the light fixtures, and when the power was dimmed it got colder.  It was looking for somewhere varmer to roost and, unfortunately, it sensed our Captain's body heat and dropped down on him from the ceiling."

 "I don't understand," Scotty said.  "Why was he screaming?"

 "The tribble," Chekov closed his eyes and took a deep breath to give him the courage to continue, "the tribble thought Captain Kirk's...thought  his...the  tribble thought it was something edible."

 The men in the room shivered collectively.

 "By Mother Mary," Scotty said, "I need a drink."

 Uhura walked over to him, a whiskey and water already prepared for him.  He downed it one fell swoop.

 "Aye, I think I'll need a 'tother after this," Scotty said, shaking his head.  "Where is he now?"

 "In sick bay of course," Sulu replied.

 "Is he..."

 "It's fine." Uhura assured him.

 Scotty nodded, "Good, good." He frowned as he looked at the faces in the room.  "There's just a couple of things I don't understand."

 Uhura handed him another tumbler of whiskey, stronger this time.

 "Why was he naked and spreadeagled on a bed?" Scotty sipped at the whiskey absently, and sighed over it.  He placed it carefully on the coffee table shaped like an orange kidney.  "And another thing, the Captain's quarters aren't on Deck 9, they're on Deck 7.  Spock's quarters are on Deck 9."  Scotty frowned, clearly thinking.  He looked up at the assemblage of faces staring at him expectantly.

 "Where's Spock?" he finally asked.

 "With the Captain," Uhura said quietly.

 Scotty bit his bottom lip, his face turning a new shade of red.  He pounded a petal cushion with his fist.  "Sonofa..."

 "Scotty..."Uhura said, reaching out to touch his arm.  Scotty pulled away.  He stood up and began to pace the room.

 "How could that cold-hearted, Vulcan ass do this to me?" he said as he paced, "After all these years, after all our time together at the Academy..."

 "It was a long time ago, Scotty," Sulu reminded him.  "I would think you'd be happy for him, finding someone as good as the Captain to have a relationship with.  He couldn't pine for you forever."

 Scotty downed his drink with a grimace.

 "I suppose you're right," he said, "but I dinna think I'll ever be happy o'er it."

 And so, the officers brooded in Uhura's quarters.  Sulu wondering how he would manage to keep Chekov from blurting too much of what he knew to other officers,  Chekov wondering how he was going to get the horrifying image of his injured Captain out of his mind, Scotty wondering how he would be able to serve Kirk now when all he wanted to do was beat him to a pulp for taking his ex-lover.

 And Uhura, biting her lip in concentration, wondering how she was ever going to look at her Captain again without thinking of tribbles and collapsing in hysterical laughter.

END

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