Author: Lorre
Title: Memories: A Kiss Before Dying
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: Spock/McCoy
Series: TOS with a bit of TNG thrown in for good measure
Summary: McCoy's reminiscing on his death-bed.
WARNING: While this may not seem the most happiest of fics, as it deals with death head on.  Just remember Spock came back from the dead.  I promise you it has a happy ending.
For kira-nerys to distribute as she sees fit.
Dedication: For those who don't think Spock is a sexual creature, and those who don't think that Bones could ever feel anything for Spock...If you dig hard enough, and pay attention long enough you can always find a way to put two characters logically together.
Disclaimer: Paramount/Viacom owns everything Star Trek, by writing this no copyright infringement is intended.

Memories:  A Kiss Before Dying
By Lorre

Friendship must be a prerequisite to eternal love,
because without friendship how can love last...?

--Romulus--

He could feel it.  Something was wrong, it whispered to him from the back of his mind.  He heard it calling to him from some far off distance.  He stepped outside of his small house, and looked at the stars.  There was something soothing about the night sky, but tonight even the somewhat unfamiliar stars of the Romulan night-sky couldn't take the terrible feeling away from him.

Something was terribly, horribly wrong, and the logic that was so fundamentally woven into his very soul did very little to explain the feeling.  All he knew was that someone intimately close to him was dying. This someone had to be so close to him that sometime in the past they had shared a soul, a Katra.

Spock felt a familiar emotion rise up inside of him, and his mind automatically squelch it.  Loneliness was illogical, and would only serve to hinder his progress here on Romulus.  However, something kept telling him that he needed to go home to the Federation.  More specifically, it was telling him to go to Earth.   It called to him like the specters of Ancient Vulcan, seducing him with the promise of the exquisiteness of  pain.

Spock returned to his Spartan room, and pulled out his meditation lamp.  Usually the plain oil lamp, common to any Vulcan household, provided solace to a turbulent mind. Today it didn't.  Just the same, he went through the motions of calming his mind, and reaching out to the empathic message that was bothering him.  Deep inside he began reliving the past, Khan, a bomb, and the Genesis project.  His mind, and his soul, had existed for a period in one of his closest friend's mind.  The one friend that everyone still seemed to believe they shared a certain level of dry animosity towards each other.  

Dr. Leonard H. McCoy.

Spock pulled himself out of his meditation and turned to the nearby communications terminal.  He had to get back to Earth before McCoy died.  In the haze of Spock's return from the dead, he had irresponsibly left something undone.  If McCoy died before Spock could get there, then something terrible would happen.  While the average humanoid might think it wasn't as horrible as it seemed, to a Vulcan it was the biggest slap in the face. He couldn't do that to McCoy.

*  *  *

-Somewhere high in Earth's orbit-

"Damn it, Doctor, why in hell can't I be transferred to somewhere on plain old Terra firma?"  A man, crumpled and wrinkled from over a century's worth of years, lay dying and all knew it.

Dr. Beverly Crusher stood over the bio-bed, her eyes flaming almost as bright as her hair.

"Now Dr. McCoy, you know why I can't transfer you down to Earth?   You, yourself asked for me to be your personal physician even though I have a whole ship to take care of.  With those 'connections' you hide up your sleeve, you had me yanked off without so much as a 'by-your-leave'. You're lucky, Jean Luc had taken it into his mind to give the crew some much needed shore leave." 

Even though Beverly was the epitome of spitfire, just what the dying man needed, she acutely felt the pain of the man's condition.

"I just want to lay eyes on Earth from below, one last time."  Dr. McCoy said, attempting to lay a guilt trip on Beverly, in only a way a dying crotchety old man could.

It didn't work, and it usually didn't. By now Beverly was used to his methods of getting what he wanted. If someone who didn't know the two had walked in at that moment, they would have labeled Beverly as having the worst bedside manner that they had ever seen.

"Oh, don't give me that Dr. McCoy. If you stopped refusing your medication, we could have you strong enough to be transferred to Deep Space Nine if that was what you really wanted."  Beverly attempted to hide a smirk that threatened to escape.

McCoy picked up on it anyway.  "Are you laughing at me, young lady?"

"No," Beverly responded with a certain air of dramatics that McCoy expected.   "Just telling you the plain and honest truth, Doctor. You need to stop sending the nurses out of here when they bring you your medication." 

Dr. McCoy's way of sending nurses bearing anything remotely looking like a hypospray away, was to throw the nearest object at them, following it with a string of curses that would make any Vulcan raise an eyebrow.

"I will stop sending them away, as you say, as soon as they start bringing me something that really works."  McCoy responded. He paused and then continued: "Have you ever heard the term 'whipper snapper'? It's an old Earth term, and you are starting to act like one."

Beverly only pretended ignorance, even though she knew exactly what the word meant.   Thus was the nature of their verbal battles.

McCoy turned serious all of a sudden. "Do you think he got my message?  You know how unreliable those 'spy' channels are."  They both knew exactly who 'he' was, it was something that McCoy had actually trusted her with the knowledge of.

Beverly laid a hand over McCoy's shaking boney hand.  "I know he did."  However, she wasn't as sure as her voice made her sound.  If Ambassador Spock didn't make it time, she didn't know what she would do. Even though Dr. McCoy hadn't trusted her with his secret unresolved pain, Beverly had been around enough terminal patients to know when something was up. While Dr. McCoy made being planet-side seem like his last request, she knew much differently. Even though he didn't make it seem like a big deal, his last request was to see his remaining close friend one last time.  It was obvious that they had unresolved business of a very personal nature.

*  *  *

- En route to Earth, still on the Romulan side of the Neutral Zone-

Ambassador Spock stood staring out the portal, watching the stars go by.  The Ferengi pilot had left him alone for most of the trip, which was a blessing. Even though he often didn't show his annoyance, as it was so very un-Vulcan, something about Ferengi in general just set him on edge. Perhaps it was the large amount of gold pressed latinum that Spock had pressed into the man's hand.

Memories of times long gone continued to haunt him, of times that had been or could have been. Even though Spock knew it wasn't a time for regret, he couldn't help but wonder what could have been if he had been less Vulcan and McCoy had been less professional.  It was a good chance that the years had wiped the incident from McCoy's aged mind. The human mind was much more susceptible to age than that of the Vulcan.

Even with the fire of pon farr upon him, Spock would never forget the cool hand that had checked for fever.  He would never forget the soft, warm, and yet somewhat stern voice that asked him how he felt.  He would never forget how McCoy had pushed Nurse Chapel out of the room, knowing how Chapel's arousal had bothered him, and cared for Spock personally so the others wouldn't see his utter humiliation. He would never forget how McCoy broke the rules that bound him as a physician. He had virtually slapped Spock just when he had needed it the most to regain the small amount of control that he had over the raging fever. He would never forget how he - himself - had temporarily lost control letting McCoy see a side of him he had promised never to show another living individual.

McCoy hadn't rejected him, nor had he ever held the lack of control against Spock. In some ways it had only strengthened the bonds of their friendship. McCoy had always seemed to know exactly what Spock needed to hear, but always privately-so privately.

Many people had thought that Spock's choice of leaving his Katra with McCoy was simply due to logistics and timing. This wasn't the case. McCoy was the only logical choice.  He had trusted Jim, but McCoy already knew the deep darkness that existed in Spock's soul.   McCoy hadn't treated Spock any less. Yes, it had been the only logical choice.

Spock rubbed his temples, remembering the night in sickbay after McCoy had sent Nurse Chapel away.  Spock had broken the restraints......

*  *  *

Friendship can bind people, even through the most difficult of
circumstances....and it can be the one thing that keeps them apart.

- Many years ago on board the USS Enterprise -

Dr. McCoy turned from the biobed, looking for the hypospray with the sedative that he knew Mr. Spock so desperately needed.  He heard the rip of the restraints before feeling two strong hands push him face first into the nearby bulkhead.

Calmly, McCoy began to speak to Spock. 

"Spock, do you really think this is a good idea?" 

His instinct had been to ask if Spock was crazy, but he stopped, knowing that it might not be the right thing to say to a Vulcan in Pon Farr.

Spock, near crazed by the flames of emotional desire, spat back,

"Anything is a good idea to get rid of this burning inside of me, Doctor." 

Spock's harsh breath rasped across the doctor's exposed neck, causing chills to travel down McCoy's spine. Spock could smell the faint hint of aftershave that the doctor had used many hours ago. He could taste the flavor of the doctor's skin even though he had yet to make contact with his tongue.  He ached.

Something inside of Spock told him that this was wrong.  It was wrong for the doctor to know his secret desire for men as well as women.  It just wasn't done on Vulcan, as homosexuality was frowned upon.  It was to be expected though, for a culture that frowned on sexual relations unless the uncontrollable pon farr had set in. 

The fire inside of Spock consumed any sense of restraint as he bit down on the doctor's neck.

"Spock, please I know you have a bit of control left. You don't want to do this."  Dr. McCoy told him in a forced calm voice. He didn't attempt to struggle, knowing full well he would set the Vulcan off with any attempt to evade his caress.  Deep down, even though he refused to acknowledge it, his shock at Spock's homosexual desire also kept him frozen in place.

"Control, what is control, Doctor?  It is only something invented by my kind to hinder the possibility of fully experiencing life,"  Spock muttered into the skin of McCoy's neck as he continued to taste it. He could feel the beginnings of McCoy's desire.  He didn't know how he could feel it, and he didn't care. All he knew was that McCoy wasn't as repulsed by the contact as Spock thought he might be. Spock arched his hardened pelvis into the curve of the other man's ass. So sensitive was Spock that he felt the skin ease slightly to each side
of hard length.

He moaned softly in McCoy's ear. "That feels good doesn't it, Doctor?   It's been a long time since you had a real male humanoid between your legs."   Again, he didn't know how he knew McCoy's past sexual history, but he did.

"Stop this insanity now, Spock, while you still can.  You don't want me, you don't even like me all that much."  McCoy unconsciously arched against Spock, attempting to gain further contact.

"Your body betrays you, Dr. McCoy, as does your mind.  How little you know about Vulcans. I do like you, as you put it. Do you know so little about anatomy not to know what desire feels like, when it is pressed into your delectable round ass?"   Spock replied grinding into McCoy.  "Do you think that Vulcans are so uncontrollable during the blood fire, that they are attracted to anything that walks?"

McCoy relaxed even further, trying not to dwell on how many times he had fantasized this very scenario. It was hard enough to admit it to himself, but now that it was happening it was as if a flood gate of sexual desire cascade over him.  "Spock, now is not the time.  Please let me go.  I know you are in there somewhere, with some amount of control left."

Spock growled.  "How many times must I tell you?  I am in perfect control, and I can feel just how much you desire me."  Pinning McCoy to the wall with his body, Spock slid his hands up under McCoy's tunic and began to rasp his short fingernails across the bare skin.

McCoy bit his lip, knowing just how easy it would be to give in, how easy it would be to give into the craving of his flesh.  He could feel Spock's desire now, and it was beyond simply feeling the physical symptoms, he had begun to feel something deeper. He wanted Spock.  He couldn't ignore his desire, even though his mind was telling him to. The feel of the impassioned Vulcan, pressed up against him from behind ignited a current of desire that threatened to pull McCoy over the edge of insanity.

So little was known about Vulcan pon farr.  However, if McCoy wasn't mistaken, it also involved some good old-fashioned Vulcan telepathy.  He had to break contact with Spock before a full mind-meld was instigated.

Spock seemingly read McCoy's mind.  "Do not fight it, Doctor, it will go easier on us both."

"I have to fight it, Spock.  I'm first and foremost a doctor, and you're my patient.  I'm not a sex slave."  McCoy began to struggle, attempting to get free.

Spock chuckled with an emotional darkness McCoy had never heard.  "Little do you know."  He used his brute strength to force McCoy's arms between the doctor and the wall, thus making it easier for Spock to follow the call of his blood.

McCoy felt the cold air of Sickbay hit him, before he processed that Spock had ripped his pants enough so that he could pull them down over his hips.  Spock's hands traveled between McCoy's thighs, and began to stroke the skin behind his scrotum. The desire increased in the lower part of McCoy's belly.  "Spock, this has got to stop."  McCoy knew from the increasing telepathic connection that Spock wasn't listening, and his cock tightened even more in response.

*  *  *

- Somewhere above Earth-

Leonard McCoy felt Spock's hands caress him.  Spock's aroused voice echoed in his ears. Somewhere in the back of his mind - in the part of him that had years of medical training ingrained into him - he knew he was hallucinating and he didn't care. He knew his time was close, so very close. So much had been left unsaid, so much had been left undone due to circumstances and fear. At this moment he would indulge himself in enjoying things he had never let himself even think about enjoying.

Even now he could feel Spock's unknowingly welcome violation....

*  *  *

"I know you desire me to take your rock hard cock into my mouth." Spock whispered huskily into McCoy's ear as he rubbed the sensitive flesh behind McCoy's scrotum.  "Just imagine my tongue running over it, sliding up and down."  Then Spock, as if reading the doctor's mind, slipped his tongue into McCoy's ear.

McCoy couldn't help but moaning out loud.  It only served to inflame Spock even more.

"Stop it, Spock.  This can't happen."  He was being redundant and he knew it.  However, he was at loss as how to deal with it.  His training did little to help him deal with situations as this.

"But it can, Doctor, and it is."  Spock finally slipping his hand the last inch between McCoy's legs, forcing them apart.  Then he wrapped his hand around McCoy's hard length, continuing to grind his own into McCoy's firm ass.  His pleasure continued to rise, as did McCoy's.

God help him, McCoy became more and more frustrated.  He was frustrated with the situation, he was frustrated with his life, but more over he was just plain sexually frustrated.

Just when McCoy thought Spock was going to take him over the edge, he unexpectedly flipped McCoy around so that his face was mere inches from Spock's.  Then McCoy changed his tactics, he grabbed Spock's head, forcing the Vulcan into a hungry kiss.  The kiss was just as effective as if McCoy slapped him.

Spock stepped back, logic easing back into his eyes.  "I apologize, Doctor, for my inappropriate behavior.  I suggest that you give me something strong enough to knock me out."

McCoy quickly grabbed the nearby hypospray. 

"Your apology is accepted, Spock. I understand the nature of your condition more than you know. He administered the hypospray and watched Spock crumple to the floor.  "I just don't understand the nature of my condition." Ignoring the physical and emotional pain, McCoy called for security.

*  *  *

-Somewhere above Earth-

Spock entered the outer part of the ward.  The trip had been long, but something inside of him told him that McCoy wouldn't die until he arrived.  He was just that stubborn. Spock glanced over, not surprised to see Dr. Beverly Crusher hunched over a computer terminal.

"Dr. Crusher, I wish I could say it was nice to see you, but under these circumstances I hope you understand."  Spock spoke from out of nowhere.

Beverly jumped a little. The first thing Spock really noticed about her was the strain very much apparent in her eyes. She tried to smile at Ambassador Spock's appearance, but even Spock could tell it was forced. 

"He's much better today."

"Doctor, we both know what he is waiting for."  Spock replied. 

Beverly nodded ever so slightly.  "I realize he has lived a long and fruitful life, but..."  Her voice let the last work hang in the air between them.

Spock nodded knowing exactly what Beverly meant.  "May I see him?"

Beverly sat for a moment, not wanting to recognize that the fight was over.  Spock waited.  Even though his logic fought the human emotion that always laid below the surface, he understood the affection that she held for Dr. McCoy.  She then stood, as if making up her mind, and lead the way.

*  *  *

McCoy heard a voice, it's dryness seemed to be calling him out of the fantasy land that seemed to be his constant companion as of late.

"Dr.  McCoy, you have a visitor."  Dr. Beverly Crusher said as she squeezed his shoulder.  His internal temperature had spiked over the last few hours, and she could see that his fingernails were turning blue.  It wouldn't be long.   She looked at Spock, then nodded.

"Don't let him wear you out old man."

McCoy coughed, "What makes you think that I would allow this damned Vulcan the pleasure, missy mouse?  Just because I am dying, doesn't mean anything when it comes to my feistiness."

Beverly nodded, knowing that the old man didn't want to be coddled, and yet she knew that this would be the last time she would ever see him alive. It seemed to go against the very core of her ethics, but she couldn't help it.  "

Goodbye, Dr. McCoy, it has been a pleasure knowing you."

"To hell with it, Missy. Wwhat makes you think I won't come back to haunt you? You know, patient malpractice and all that."  McCoy rasped back.

Beverly smiled, simply because she couldn't help it.

"Now let me attend to this famous pest, as he has come a long way to see me."   McCoy said, verbally pushing Beverly out of the room.

As Beverly left, Spock approached McCoy's bed.  "I have found that I have become too accustomed to your presence, McCoy." It was Spock's way of telling McCoy that he had missed him.

In a way that could only be described as very 'McCoy', McCoy cut to the chase.   "I never have asked you for anything, Spock, at least anything that would violate those damned Vulcan values of yours, but I need you to do something for me."   He looked Spock in the eye.

"What do you need me to do, Doctor?"  Spock raised an eyebrow.  So much was being left unsaid. Even with all the barriers they had between them, one would think that they would be able to get past them given the fact that McCoy was dying.

"Spock, you cold-blooded Vulcan.  Don't let me die alone."  McCoy's voice grew weaker with every moment.

"How could I let you die alone, Doctor?  Being here is the least that I can do for you, after all you have done for me."  Spock pulled the dying man into his arms.  "I am here now, Leonard.  It is time to make your transition."

McCoy coughed, the death rasp that much more obvious.  "I don't want to go, Spock.  We have so much unfinished business.  How can I go, when there is so much undone?"

Spock slid onto the bed, holding the dying man's head against his chest, touching his temple. Unobtrusively, he established a mind-meld. He felt fear, even though McCoy didn't show it. 

Then McCoy felt Spock's mind.  His fear eased.  "Is everything really left undone between us, McCoy?  Would what could have been realy have been the best thing for us?"

"I honestly don't know, Spock. Iit could be the death in me talking.  I don't know how you could have done this 'dying' of your own free will.  I don't think I could have willingly given up my life for that of the crew.  I do know I wouldn't have traded your friendship for anything, unless it was something infinitely more deep."  Each word was punctuated by the rattling of his lungs.

Spock pulled McCoy closer, if it was possible, reinforcing the other man with his own mind. He knew that McCoy could no longer see, as the cells involved in vision were dying. They were usually the first of the senses to go. 

"I, too, valued our friendship, more than you will ever realize. I will miss you, my friend."

He paused as if the next words were the most difficult to say.  He knew he had to say it, even though his ingrained logic screamed at him not to. 

"I, too, wish we could have taken our relationship to the next step."

McCoy smiled.  "I know, Spock, but this old man needed to hear it."   He let down his mental block, and finally allowed Spock to completely immerse himself in his essence.

Spock knew McCoy had no more energy to speak.  Instead, he allowed the dying to man to feel how deep his friendship ran, and how Spock had allowed himself -subconsciously- to love him.

*  *  *

- Somewhere again above the Earth-

Beverly Crusher opened the door to Dr. McCoy's room.  She knew hours ago that it wouldn't be long before the famous doctor had left this reality for another one.

Spock sat on the bed, cradling the limp body of Dr. McCoy in his arms.  It was then that Beverly knew that he had passed on.

Passed on, it was such a sterile word used to describe perhaps one of the most important events in a humanoid's life.

Spock looked up, catching Beverly in the eyes. The first thing that hit her was the redness of the Ambassador's eyes.  The second thing that hit her was the tears that streaked his calm face.  Severe sorrow filled the room, and it didn't take an empath to know it.

Beverly closed the door, leaving the half-Vulcan/half-human to his grief.  There was so much to do when someone died.  It was her least favorite task, it make life seem so meaningless. Tears began to fall. Hiding her face in her hands, she slipped to the floor by the door of McCoy's room, realizing just how much the doctor's life had really affected her own.

She would miss the crotchety old man.

*  *  *

Spock stood stoically in his finest clohes, surrounded by his friends, and people that he didn't know.  He knew that even his friends from the Enterprise would never know just how close Dr. McCoy and himself had been. At least McCoy could join Jim in the afterlife, drinking bourbon and talking about the old days. Who knew what kind of trouble they wouldget into without him?

Soon the service was over, but still Spock didn't move. Scotty walked over and placed a hand on Spock's shoulder. Spock turned to Scotty, seeing the concern in the former engineer's eyes.

"Will you join me in a drink, toasting his farewell?"  Scotty asked.

"Captain Scott, I cannot think of a better way to say farewell."  Spock replied, turning to leave. He paused for a moment, and turned back to face the fresh grave, knowing it would be the last time he laid eyes on Leonard H. McCoy's final resting place.

*  *  *

A cliche- "True love never dies"

*  *  *

- Coming full circle, Romulus-

Again, Spock found himself standing under the night sky of the planet he was rapidly beginning to call his home.  It had been a full year since his trip to the Federation, and sometimes he almost wished he was still there. Life seemed just too lonely, even though his logic wouldn't allow him to recognize the feeling. He was fulfilling his purpose, and yet...

"You really think that I would leave you behind, while I went on my merry way to the afterlife, you stoic old fool?"  The familiar voice called out from behind him.

Spock, logically not wanting to believe what his heart was telling him, refused to turn around. 

"I don't know who you are, but your poor rendition of my former friend is not very amusing."

"Spock, I find your Vulcan logic less that amusing.  Now turn your disbelieving body around and face me as a man."  McCoy replied.

Spock turned to face what could only be described as an apparition, of a middled aged man he recognized as Dr. McCoy. Ghosts were not real, but the individual standing before him could only be described as that. 

"I suppose, if I said that I did not believe you, you would probably harass me until I admit I know who you are."

"What makes you think I'll stop harassing you, ever?  What makes you think that I would ever want to stop harassing you?"  McCoy smiled.

For the first time in a long time, Spock allowed a smile to touch his lips.

-fin-