Title: After the Rescue

Part: NEW 28/73

Author: Karmen Ghia, karmen_ghia@yahoo.com

Series: TOS

Romance Code: S/Mc and then some.

Rating: NC-17

Appendices: http://members.tripod.com/karmen_ghia/atrappendices.html

See part one for disclaimers, etc.

Maja hadn't a clue how long a harag was but it seemed to him this woman had been alone for a long time so he decided to chance it: "Why haven't you married again, Fara? Smart pretty woman like you should have her pick of men," he said between bites.

She smiled: "Can't find one I like well enough to keep around. Either they're lazy and want me to do all the work or they're after my business. You can't imagine what a problem it is." She watched Maja clear the table and wash up with approval. "Gotta name, pretty one?"

"Maja," he said, pouring more water for Sarek.

"That makes you the, let's see, fifteenth Maja I've met so far," she informed him.

"Oh? What does it mean in your language, Fara?" Maja asked.

"It means 'prosperity' where I come from, I knew a girl in school named Maja," she said. " What's it mean where you come from?"

"'Little jewel'," Maja told her, hoping he wasn't telling her something that would identify him as an enemy. Evidently not; she seemed delighted.

"Well, you need prosperity to get big as well as little jewels, don't you?" she laughed and rose. She crossed the room and drew back a screen, revealing a tub. She turned on the taps and put some clean towels nearby.

"Do you have a name, Sait?" she asked Sarek.

"Sait is all," he answered, ignoring Maja's impressed but ironic grin.

"Well, that's easy to remember," she said. (Maja had to look away for laughing.) "You can bathe first," she continued, tossing a sheet to him. "You can sleep in that. Let's see if I can't get your stinky clothes cleaned for you." She called 'Nroty' out the back door as Sarek stripped and slipped into the hot bath.

An ancient woman Maja assumed was Nroty appeared at the door and she and the woman had a conversation neither vulcanoid could understand. Some agreement was reached and the woman tossed Maja a robe: "Wear this while she washes your clothes."

Maja slipped quickly out of his clothes and into the robe as Nroty disappeared with both his and Sarek's garments. The woman had watched him undress and liked what she'd seen. She brought out a bottle of wine and poured two glasses. Turning to hand him one, she saw he was by the tub washing Sarek's back.

"How goes it, Sarek?" Maja whispered in Vulcan.

"Better than before, 'Little Jewel'," Sarek informed him. "I believe there is a glass for you over there."

"Yeah, and that's not all either." Maja shook the water off his hands and handed Sarek a towel.

"Where does he sleep?" Maja asked, sipping his wine and enjoying it.

"Over there," she gestured to the bed.

"Thank you," Sarek said, crossing the room. "Good night."

Watching him cross the room, Maja was almost overwhelmed with memory of Spock crossing rooms. Father and son had the same gait indoors Maja now saw. He looked up and found the woman's eyes on him. He smiled weakly and hoped she'd attribute his distraction to shyness, not nostalgia.

"Your turn," she said meaningfully and refilled the tub.

Maja had nothing against women, he just preferred to have sex with men. He'd had sex with one or two women in the Commune just to be certain that he knew what he was missing. Not much, he'd concluded.

He stepped into the tub and the woman applied a soapy, hard bristled brush to his back. He scanned her to see what she wanted and relaxed when he read that she'd do all the work. She preferred it that way.

She unbraided his hair, rubbed some oil into it and secured it in a bun on the top of his head. She pulled his feet out of the tub and scrubbed them. Maja began to enjoy himself in earnest.

She slipped out of her clothes and into the tub, straddling him. Maja caressed her full breasts and ran his long fingers over her back. She tightened her strong thighs on his hips and ground her cunt against his hardening penis. She adjusted her angle, Maja assumed, to better arouse them both.

He held her close and ran his fingers through her thick red hair. He let his mind float and his body respond to the stimulus. He was hard in moments and she sank down to the root, sighing with pleasure.

Maja let her bounce up and down a few times before he got bored. He brought his fingers to her temple and she was still. He looked carefully and thoroughly around her mind. It was a nice mind: honest, hard working, no nonsense, rather lonely but optimistic overall. He probed a little further: her school girl education told him they were in the city of Bikz on the planet Imk in the Nohyar system (wherever that was). Bikz was the major city on this continent and one of many bases for the Tziviian pirates on this planet. Her husband's vehicle had been crushed between two joyriding Tziviians. A painful memory; she had loved him very much. Maja blunted the sharp edges of the memory but did not remove it. He paused to look at the husband: her father's choice, they'd married young, a good man but she'd never pick him for herself knowing what she knew now. He learned that a harag was one solar rotation in this system, how ever long that was. He moved on. The pirates: not much information, they were avoided, a neighbor's pretty daughter had been kidnapped by them, raped and returned pregnant, the child was beautiful but the girl would have nothing to do with it so they gave it to the childless couple on Wezna street and they adored it. Maja sighed mentally and damped down his annoyance with these pedestrian thoughts. Bikz: also avoided, much vice, violence and other nonspecific scary things. She knew of ships traveling offworld but she had never even wanted to go offworld so there was no data there.

Maja gave up. He shifted about in her mind for a good sexual fantasy and let her go. He slowly closed the meld and held her tight as her frantic humping brought them both off. She leaned against him for a moment, breathing hard and shining with pleasure. Maja smiled and let his cock slide out of her. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed Sarek awake and covertly watching them.

The woman poured water over Maja's ebony curls and rubbed a fragrant shampoo into them. She rinsed them with clear water and wrapped them up in a towel. They rose from the tub and sat by the fire, dry and warm, as the woman combed out Maja's silky hair. She combed and fluffed it by the fire until it was dry and then led him to the bed. They crawled in next to Sarek.

"There's only one bed, Sait," Maja whispered to the surprised Vulcan and turned to the woman. He pressed his fingertips to her temple and murmured: "Sleep, Fara, sleep awhile."

Maja turned around and curled up next to Sarek, who surprised him by putting his arms around him.

"I believe you are abusing your gifts, Maja," the Vulcan scolded softly.

"Which ones?" Maja asked sleepily, dodging the issue.

"Your telepathic gifts," Sarek clarified. "You received training on Vulcan that I have seen you use in a promiscuous and unsanitary manner."

Maja was far too tired to react profoundly to this remark, maybe tomorrow.

"Okay, I'll stop," he said, yawning, "I'm sleeping now." And he did, for the first time in days.

Sarek, finding the conversation at an end, dropped off himself. He, too, was very tired.

* * *

I need you.

Kirk's hand stroked McCoy's flank and squeezed the firm flesh of his ass.

I need you.

He thrust his tongue a little further into the doctor's mouth and sighed with pleasure.

And relief. Two hours earlier he'd made the serious miscalculation of telling McCoy that he and Spock had wagered the night with him on the outcome of a chess game. Kirk had won.

McCoy had simply shown him the door and locked it behind him. He then sat, composed a request for transfer and sent it to Captain James T. Kirk of the USS Enterprise.

Kirk (suspecting such an overreaction and compulsively checking his mail until he got it) had immediately commed Spock and almost begged him to talk McCoy out of it.

I need you.

3.17 minutes later Spock, receiving no answer to his hail, overrode McCoy's doorlock and stepped into the room. He clasped his hands behind his back to steady them but he was otherwise the picture of composure.

"Spock, Terrans lock doors for a variety of reasons, but primarily because they do not wish to be disturbed," McCoy said acidly, returning to his perusal of vacant CMO positions in Star Fleet.

"Leonard, I need you."

McCoy put his forehead on the table and closed his eyes. 'The magic words,' he thought miserably.

Spock moved forward to check his vital signs and run his fingers through the thick brown hair. He knelt next to McCoy's chair and turned the blue eyes to his.

"I need you. I need you both. This is a difficult time and I need you." Spock came to the end of his rehearsed appeal.

McCoy put his arms around the Vulcan's neck and pulled him close. He did love him, still loved him as much as when the air in the Galileo had begun to burn and he tried to put that into this hug. He felt Spock relax microscopically. He leaned back and looked into the black eyes.

"Will you please tell him about the bond?" he asked.

Spock paused for a moment and said no.

"Why not?" McCoy snapped. In spite of all his tender feeling for the Vulcan, Spock could still be exasperating.

"It would distress and confuse him," Spock said quietly. "I intend to terminate it on Vulcan; there is no need for him to ever know."

"He's very confused right now," McCoy shot back. "He thinks he's in love with me."

Spock nodded, silently hoping McCoy would veer off the subject on his own.

McCoy unknowingly obliged: "It's not the same with us, Spock, this afternoon you weren't really ... involved."

"The difficulty lies in my mother's reaction to my father's abduction," Spock honestly explained. "As well as my own reaction to it and to the return of the Talljets into my life. I am distracted. It will pass."

McCoy felt like the lowest form of life in the galaxy.

"I'm sorry, Spock," he murmured, "you've got a world of trouble and all I can think about is my hurt feelings. Please forgive me." He tightened his arms around his lover.

Spock patted him and sat in a chair to give his knees a rest: "Will you withdraw your request for transfer?"

"Is that why you're here?" McCoy asked softly.

"Yes. I need you here, with me." 'And Jim,' Spock added to himself.

"Then, yes, I'll withdraw it."

They were silent. Spock was waiting to see if McCoy would spare him the trouble of making the next logical request: that the doctor go to bed with Kirk tonight.

"Why are you throwing me at Jim?" McCoy asked after a longish silence.

"You both enjoy the sexual contact."

"Does he tell you about it?" McCoy asked, surprised.

"No, never," Spock answered.

"Then how do you know?" McCoy was curious.

Spock hesitated, he searched in vain for something to say other than the truth and hoped that a long enough silence would cause the doctor to change the subject. This had worked before but not this time.

"Then how do you know?" McCoy had a suspicion he now wanted confirmed.

"I experience your coupling in the bond."

McCoy stood and walked over to a cabinet where he poured himself a large Klingon brandy. 'I thought so,' he told himself savagely. He slowly sipped the fiery liquor to give himself time to calm down.

"So you watch ..." he began furiously, not looking at the Vulcan.

"I feel," Spock cut him off. "What you feel in your coupling. What you both feel. I," he paused. "Enjoy it."

McCoy took a moment to think about this. It was significant because Spock so very seldom admitted feeling any kind emotional or physical gratification from anything. 'Then he does need us,' he thought resignedly. 'But how can that ever end, even breaking the bond on Vulcan? If he will.'

He felt the Vulcan behind him, very close, and let himself be pulled into the warm, strong arms. McCoy relaxed, surrendered. He'd do what Spock wanted, for now, it was not onerous. He put his glass down, turned and laid his head on Spock's shoulder. He knew what was needed.

"I'll go tell Jim to disregard my transfer request," he said quietly. "Now," he added, "I'll go now," and stepped back from the Vulcan's arms.

"Thank you," Spock said softly.

I need you.

McCoy was welcomed with open arms and swept directly into Kirk's bed. It was sweet between them, McCoy did not deny it and now there was the added spice of knowing Spock was there, too, somehow.

'I've been in space too long,' he thought, wrapping his lips around the head of Kirk's cock. 'This is all making far too much sense.'

* * *

"You could stay here." The woman recalled Maja's tender ministrations to the Sait. She saw it as evidence of a warm heart and good character. "I've got tenants upstairs but I'll ask them to leave and your Sait could live there." She remembered the feel of his silky hair in her hands. "I make a good living but I could use some help." The way his long fingers felt on her breasts. "But you wouldn't have to work too hard, I've got it under control." The way he ran the tip of his tongue around and around and around her clitoris as she'd only fantasized about. "I... I like you. I'd like you to stay with me."

"Oh, Fara," Maja picked up her hand and held it to his cheek so he wouldn't have to look at this woman, who hadn't asked a man for anything in five harags, asking him to stay. And being refused. He tried to remove the desire but it wouldn't budge. It had become firmly rooted partly due to what she thought had happened between them sexually last night. He looked at her with warm eyes and told her honestly that he could not stay with her; that they did not plan to linger on Imk and would go into the city to find transport off it as soon as possible.

She nodded, adjusting to her disappointment.

'Love someone again, Fara, you are so full of love,' Maja prayed. 'Let yourself share it again.'

"What's that on your hands, Maja?" she asked to change the subject.

Maja looked down and told the lie he'd prepared since he'd lost the concealing cream with his cloak: "Just some decorations I had put on when I was younger."

She nodded and offered them more bread and jam. She tried to give them some money but neither of them would take it. She made them some sandwiches and insisted Maja take one of her husband's old coats. Noticing Maja hide his hands in the sleeves, she brought him a pair of black mittens she'd made for her husband. They were a little big but kept his hands warm. Maja took them because he could feel her joy in giving them to him. She walked them to the door and gave them directions into the city. She hailed one of her neighbors and got them a ride to one of the outer gates at least. She might have held Maja longer except a buyer from one of the big mills arrived to buy her floss. They said goodbye and Maja knew he'd never see her again.

'Oh well, this life,' he thought sadly, 'my choices are always either/or, this or that, yes or no. I should be used to it by now but still, I'm not.'

He gently scanned their driver for useful information and came up with nothing.

Their driver left them at a bazaar as close to the gates as he would and roared off, back to the safety of the suburbs.

Maja and Sarek moved slowly through the bazaar. Sarek was examining merchandise and trying to form an idea of this culture. The array of textiles, pottery, foodstuffs and whatnot did not give him much data to work with. It all looked much like what one saw in bazaars in non regulated non Federation planets. The vendors were primarily women. This fact and the floss vendor, incorrectly led him to speculate that this was a matriarchal planet. The truth of Imk, or Bikz at least, was that the Imkian women ran the lesser economy while men held the larger power of transport, labor and heavy production, primarily shipbuilding and raw materials for the Tziviian pirates, who had the real power: brute force. The pirates seldom used it, the Imkians were a highly intelligent, well developed and fairly good natured species that had turned their pirate 'domination' to their own advantage. In learning how to mine and process raw materials as well as build ships for the pirates, they had taken this knowledge and become one of the major spacefaring economies in the quadrant. The pirates came, went and did as they pleased here but they were never stupid enough to destroy what was for them a major port. They had even defended it from their enemies, the Hovra, once or twice. Five hundred years hence it would be one of the jewels of the Federation. But for now, the Imkians walked lightly around the Tziviians and devoted themselves to commerce.

Maja was wondering how they were going to get off this planet at all. He could feel Tziviians nearby and didn't dare let down his shields even to determine where in the city to start looking for transport. For the moment he was content to wander through the bazaar with Sarek and examine merchandise they had no use for.

"What now?" Sarek asked in Patois.

"Don't really know," Maja answered in the same. "I'd like to know where the transports leave from."

"Could we not ask someone?"

"Not here." Maja was wary. "There's something I don't like here..."

He trailed off and they wound deeper and deeper into the city. As they came into a square, Maja saw what had been bothering him. Hanging upside down and beaten to death were two of the guards from the prison transport. He pulled Sarek into a doorway to listen to the knot of pirates discussing the bodies.

"... told us nothing about the invasion before they died. Too bad; that bastard Talljet and the Federation won't get far here. Those fucking Klingons had better stay out of it, too, we'll eat their useless brains for breakfast. There were three little ships come here yesterday - means there's more invaders about. We'll find 'em, we'll find 'em ..."

Maja and Sarek listened carefully, watched the pirates move off and then headed in the opposite direction. They threaded their way through narrow streets, navigating by moving away from the pirate energy when they felt it bump against their shields.

Maja was almost exhausted from shielding. The Talljets were wired up significantly different from the Vulcans in that they never shielded for protection from the thought energy of others, they filtered it and in many ways were nourished by it. When they did shield, it was only for short periods of time and usually not from such powerful and invasive telepaths as the Tziviians.

Feeling but not understanding Maja's distress, Sarek led him as far away from the pirates as possible and sat him on a curb in a deserted residential street. He sat next to Maja and offered him half of one of the sandwiches the woman had given them. Prudence told him to conserve food; this might be a long day.

"You are working too hard, Maja," Sarek said after he'd finished eating.

Maja looked up from his food. He was almost overwhelmed by the half sandwich and had only taken a few bites.

"What?" he asked vaguely.

"You are working too hard at shielding," Sarek told him quietly. "You are fighting the natural state of things, pushing your shields out instead of letting them expand and surround you naturally." He looked into Maja's blank face. "Did you not learn how to do this with the breath at school? I am sure you did."

Maja thought about this for a moment. He had learned something like this at school but had thought it useless since it didn't apply to him. However, he cast his mind back and after taking a quick scan to assure himself there were no Tziviians around, dropped his shields but did not let his telefield expand to its usual fullness. He rested for a moment and centered himself in his breath as he'd been taught on Vulcan. With each calming breath he polarized the outer layer of his natural energy field so it gently repelled the thoughts of others. He allowed a rhythm to develop so that each natural breath he took renewed and sustained the field. He remembered the Vulcans comparing it to good posture, how standing up straight allowed the skeleton to naturally support the flesh. He realized he unthinkingly shielded like this when he worked, so focused he was on following the vision he was creating. He now knew why his brothers complained about it. This, however, was less pleasant. He felt closed and isolated with neither his work nor the flow of thought energy around him. But for now it was necessary. He looked at Sarek and saw a glimmer of approval in the old Vulcan's eyes. It made his heart jump a little but only because Spock, damn him, had his father's eyes.

Seeing that Maja was in better shape, Sarek stood and surveyed the street. For want of a better idea, he decided to continue deeper into the quarter they were in.

end of part 28

This story also lives at http://members.tripod.com/karmen_ghia

Appendices: http://members.tripod.com/karmen_ghia/atrappendices.html