Title: Standby

Author: d8rkmessngr

Pairing: Kirk/McCoy

Warnings: implied past abuse, attempted non-con, strong language

Author's Notes: This was a prompt from st_xi_kink: I will miss that meme! Also, many apologies for not having replied to the wonderful feedback on the previous two stories. I'm embarrassed to say I am completely new to this FF thing. A friend on LJ just walked me through replying reviews! (face red)

"...so this guy here turns around, reaches over and bam! Hyposprays the Andorian. The blue guy's antennae twitches and then he drops to the floor!"

Hyposprays don't go bam, Jim thought as he drained his bottle of beer. The music in the bar was actually too loud for his tastes this time, but he didn't pick the place for once. It was too mainstream, too popular with cadets; a place he and Bones would never had normally gone to.

"That's not the sound a hypospray makes," Bones grumbled but his mouth quirked at the storyteller and he chuckled deep in his throat. Something funny twisted in Jim's insides and he grabbed the Cardassian Sunrise to try and drown it. The sour taste of cold alcohol mixed begrudgingly in his stomach. Great.

Blue eyes, sun streaked blond hair, the athletically built third year cadet flashed Bones a shit-eating grin before leaning in and—whoa!

Bones rolled his eyes but returned the kiss with a nip of teeth before he gave the guy a gentle push back with a hand, like pushing back a big dog from bowling him over.

"You're scaring the kid, Adam," Bones laughed throatily, sounding like a complete stranger to Jim. He shot Jim an embarrassed grin across the table. Jim smirked faintly, but said nothing.

Adam gave Jim a passing glance, his eyes crinkling, his mouth curled up to a smug smile as if he knew no one else knew. "Nah, he's probably taking notes." Adam snickered when Bones sputtered into his drink.

"Or just reviewing notes," Jim drawled and felt a wiggle of satisfaction when Bones coughed into a fist, his eyes wider.

"God damn it, Jim!" Bones managed as Adam pounded his back helpfully. Adam gave Jim a grin that Jim didn't feel like giving back, but he did anyway because he hadn't seen Bones smiling this much in the eight months they knew each other so far. Well, he did tell Bones repeatedly he needed to get laid, but geez, Jim wasn't expecting him.

"I guess everyone weren't kidding about you being a manwhore, Jimmy," Adam chuckled as he swung his beer bottle towards Jim for a toast.

It wasn't anything new, nothing that hadn't been tossed out at him before from many faces, but somehow it left a bitter taste in his mouth when Adam said it in front of Bones. And Bones probably didn't like the reminder of who his classmate was because Bones pulled back, the smile pretty much gone from his face.

"Not something I would toast to, Adam," Bones muttered, reaching over to lower his arm.

"I would," Jim quipped.

Before Adam's bottle dropped, Jim shrugged one shoulder, pushed back the lump in his throat and reached over to lightly clink the amber bottle with his drink. He drained the rest of his Sunrise in a single gulp and damn if that didn't make his eyes burn. It was the drink that made his eyes water, his throat clench. Jim grabbed his last beer and tipped it towards Adam again then to Bones.

Bones grimaced and he twisted around to stand.

"Need another drink," Bones muttered and gave Adam another kiss on the mouth, Jim a halfhearted slap to the back of his head before he disappeared into the crowds writhing to the loud twenty-third century's answer to hiphop.

"Get m-us another one too!" Jim hollered behind a cupped hand over his mouth as he gestured with an empty bottle in his other hand. Bones verified these orders received with a hand gesture rude enough to probably destroy three planetary truces. Jim smirked and dropped back into his seat. Adam mirrored him, nodding and smiling to those who walked by and smiled hello. Adam eyed some, winked at others and Jim grimaced as he finished his beer because he could remember nights when he had dragged Bones to other loud and crowded places where he did the same. Only he preferred townies and not cadets. Too much of a chance of trouble following him back to the Academy.

Jim watched the dancing, too tired to try and think up conversation with Adam. There was only so much polite banter he could make with a guy he really didn't care to talk to for the past three weeks. Jim rolled the now empty beer bottle between his hands as he stared into the crowd, trying to pinpoint Bones. He watched the dark head weave around the crowd, pulling further away and somehow, it made his insides knot and his chest ache.

The squeak of leather to his left was his only warning. Jim blinked and Adam, with that crooked lazy smirk of his was just there, his hip pressing hot next to his.

"So," Adam purred and Jim felt a large hand slide slowly around his upper thigh, down to cup his groin with a hard squeeze, hard enough to hurt. Adam leaned forward, his breath hovering over his mouth and Jim could smell the tang of whatever pissy-ass fruity drink Adam had. Another hand slithered behind his back, edging along the waistband of his jeans.

Oh no fucking way.

Jim could see his reflection in Adam's eyes as they darkened. They looked like the sky before a storm approached.

"So," Jim just said evenly and reached down a hand and pulled Adam's away, out of sight under the table. But then Adam narrowed his eyes and using his other arm, yanked Jim closer until Jim was halfway on his lap. Jim grimaced when he recognized a classmate from Advanced Transporter Programming frowning at them. He was leaving with group of friends, all cadets (just his luck). Jim gave the guy a nod even as he fidgeted away from Adam and smiled to show nothing was wrong but Jim was ignored as they walked past their table.

"Maybe I should see if Bones is back there having our drinks," Jim said stiffly and he made to rise.

"Or," Adam said in a deep voice, his hand back on his left thigh. His fingers dug deep into Jim's leg with surprising strength and pinned him back down on his seat. Jim looked sharply at Adam.

"You can stay and show me how much of a manwhore you really are," Adam breathed next to Jim's ear and his fingers flexed, digging deep enough to draw blood.

There were two responses Jim usually relied on when faced with a hand touching him where it shouldn't. As a child, there was nothing he could do about it, because doing anything more than agree meant him running into "another door" or "falling down the stairs".

Jim had always been such a clumsy and graceless child.

If the owner of the hand was pretty, an encouraging smile usually got that hand off and that meant Jim could decide where he wanted that hand to go next. If the owner of the hand was a stranger who thought seeing Jim smile was an invitation to shove anything into Jim, Jim decided where his hand would go; i.e.: across a jaw, into the solar plexus or if he was being a real son-of-a-bitch, a good grab of whatever hurts the most, which usually lies between the legs.

Adam, unfortunately, was pretty but he was also not a stranger. Both of Jim's options were no longer options but definitely not a situation Jim couldn't handle. Sure, he failed his first Kobayashi Maru, but this wasn't a no-win situation.

Jim smiled tightly, the opposite of Adam's hungry one. He wondered if he himself ever looked like that (he hoped not, it left an oily film on his skin) and he clasped Adam's wrist with a strong grip, over the sleeve. Jim learned at a very young age that skin doesn't bruise as easily that way but it can still hurt.

"I don't think so," Jim said evenly as he removed the hand. His eyes narrowed at the flicker of something that twisted the normally jovial face to something less...jovial. But it was gone so quickly Jim shook his head. Damn bar lights were giving him a headache. Everything felt surreal.

"Sure I can't convince you?" Adam's voice dripped with invitation.

Jim rolled his eyes. Adam had been friendlier the past few weeks. Jim had hoped it was because he was warming up to him. Jim really tried to include Adam into a routine that both he and Bones had enjoyed when there weren't any classes. If Bones didn't look so relieved they were getting along, Jim wouldn't have bothered.

"Bathroom's in the back. I think we can be pretty good."

...This was not what Jim was aiming for.

Adam slid back to his seat, his knees slightly apart and he slumped back, echoing eerily like how Jim used to hog up the sofa in Bones's room when they used to hang out pissed drunk in the med dorms.

Used to.

"I don't think you should be having this conversation with me," Jim commented, his tone even and flat. Maybe Bones should order some coffee for Adam instead. He glanced over to the bar in the back. He could make out Bones still trying to get a bartender's attention. Jim turned back to Adam, an eyebrow arched. "I don't think," Jim said slowly as he nodded towards Bones's direction, "you should be coming on to me like that." Adam's eyes hardened and his knowing smirk faltered. Jim flashed a full-toothed grin at Adam.

"Not that I'm not flattered, but Bones might not be too happy if he hears—"

"That you came on to me?"

Jim's smile faded but then returned sharper, more brittle.

"I think you should stop drinking, because your memory's starting to get shot. I'm buzzed but I can still remember that you came on to me." Jim glared as Adam shuffled back closer again.

"And who do you think Leonard will believe?" Adam breathed close to his face. Blue eyes glazed and darkened as they crawled over Jim's body. "His boyfriend? Or a guy like you?"

Jim narrowed his eyes.

Adam's hand crept back over to his upper thigh. Adam's smile was sure, almost feral and it distorted his face. Youth warped and suddenly Adam looked older, more calculating, demon-like under the pulsating reds and blues the bar lights were flashing above them.

Then, just as quickly, when the rotating colors switched from red to blue, Adam's face smoothed out to that lazy, careless grin again. Smug bastard.

"You wanna try telling him? Go ahead." Adam's fingers kneaded Jim's thigh under the table and Jim's skin crawled. "Ruin the one good thing he's got after so long. Even if he forgives you despite who… well…" Adam sneered. "Who you are, he's going to look at you with doubt after that, because you destroyed this for him."

"Might as well have some fun," Adam whispered into Jim's ear. "Not like someone like you hasn't taken it up in the ass in a place like this before." Adam's thumb pressed into his inner thigh. "I saw how you've been watching me. I know what guys like you want, Jim."

Jim's lips curled back and he leaned in close enough that their noses touched. Adam smirked, parted his mouth and inched closer when Jim hissed.

"It'll be pretty hard to jerk off if both of your hands are broken," Jim sneered.

The touch on his leg thankfully retreated and Adam glowered at Jim. Somehow, Adam looked insulted more that there was possibly someone out there who wouldn't gladly take him up on his offer.

Jim caught movement approaching their table out of the corner of his eye. Adam did as well because in a blink he was back by his seat, grinning up, warm and glad when Bones eased into his seat next to Adam with a drink tray.

"So what I miss?" Bones asked with a crooked grin as he grabbed his usual: bourbon with no ice.

Jim ignored the smug look he could feel pointed his way. He reached over, took his beer and nearly dropped it when he felt a socked foot pressed into his inner thigh. Geez. Jim very calmly reached under the table with his other hand and pinched a nerve just under the Achilles' tendon. Hard. He hid his smirk behind his beer when Adam jerked. Jim scowled though when Bones accepted Adam's explanation of a cramp easily enough.

"What took you so long anyway?" Adam asked, moving to the next topic with an ease that annoyed Jim. If he tried it, Bones would have seen through it and called Jim on it.

"Whole bar was mobbed with panting, drunk, grabby, horny kids over there, trying to get me to buy them a drink," Bones grumbled.

"Oh," Adam snickered as his eyes slid towards Jim's way, "you didn't tell us your friends were coming too, Jim."

Jim smiled tightly and tried to not think about how much his chest ached when Bones rolled his eyes. Jim took a long draw of beer, enough so his head floated, his body numbed and the knot in his chest dulled.

"Jim?" Bones frowned mildly when Jim stood.

"Going to say hello?" Adam quipped, his eyes on him as he draped an arm around Bones's shoulders. It wasn't pushed away.

"Sure," Jim said, shrugging, his throat working, "why the fuck not?" He waved off Bones's frown with a smirk that hurt on his face. "Don't wait up."

"What else is new?" Bones joked, his smile easy even as he lightly punched Jim's arm.

Jim scoffed but didn't reply. He turned around, got as far back to the bar until he knew he was hidden in the crowd.

And slipped out the back.

More tomorrow!