A Bedside Matter
"Sub-Commander, it seems you've contracted nothing
more serious than Systemic Laralgia." The doctor's
brow wrinkled. Perhaps."
"Systemic Laralgia." When she was unfamiliar with a thing her lack of knowledge was evident in her inflection.
"A condition not all that uncommon following exposure to a parasitic agent." Phlox indicated that his skeptical patient should lie down. By her stormy look, the bio exam table could have been a bed of nails. "If you please, Sub-Commander. The evaluation won't take long." The good doctor seemed to be champing at the bit to run his scanner over her from head to toe.
"Doctor, my contracting anything is highly improbable." [Oh, no. Not again] she grumbled, fixing Phlox with a sharp, malcontented look. "I have not set one foot off the ship since the mission to apprehend Menos the Captain, Ensign Mayweather and I undertook." The swooning she'd been experiencing for several days now surmounted her as though on cue. Further back in the recesses of her compartmentalized mind she strove to push the image of the Commander...her Commander further back. "I am *fine*," she flatly maintained.
"We'll let my analysis be the judge of that." The doctor fixed her with an indulgent look. And then he changed tact with a non-medical conversation starter by harmlessly remarking, "You and Commander Tucker seem to be getting along famously these days..." The twinkle in the Denobulan's eyes was too obvious to miss.
Mulling over his remark, T'Pol remained silent. At the same time, thoughts of the Chief Engineer crowded out anything else extraneous. His feelings for her were strong, kindling within her the desire for completeness; fulfillment with him, as incredible as that notion would certainly seem to her people. As strange as it seemed, this practicable human made her feel whole. That wasn't as cold as it sounded. For the first time in her, what at one time she believed, unalterable life, she wanted more than being just one with herself.
Although...she couldn't decide whether or not she liked it when he referred to her as, "his woman." The way he said it did hold a certain raw, untamed charm; intimate and feral. She hoped Phlox was so absorbed in his preparations that her phantom of a smile would go unnoticed. Raw and untamed weren't necessarily bad things the Chief Engineer had happily helped her appreciate.
"I am *fine*," she reiterated.
"You don't look fine. Now lie back." Phlox raised the blunt-tipped wand above her head. His was a fair assessment despite the fact that she didn't look any greener than usual. He smiled in his uniquely Denobulian way, gratified that she had complied; wordlessly. The brooding scowl on her face though was a big hint that she was far from pleased about the fuss he was determined to make.
"Doctor..." He was such a stickler when he was in optimum physician mode. And to think that her father had wanted her to pursue formal medicine. T'Pol wondered if the administering side of the profession would have turned her into Phlox' example. He was a highly-qualified caregiver, she conceded, even if he could be overzealous in certain respects.
"This shouldn't take longer than it needs to, Sub-Commander."
"I am scheduled to debrief the Captain on trajection derivations and projected sequentials at zero eleven hundred hours. Which is soon."
"I'm well aware of the time, Sub-Commander..."
"How much longer is this going to take?"
"Nearly done," he coddled, his voice's mollifying uplift proving to be an irritant. T'Pol told herself to be patient. If she could be so for her blue-eyed Terran swain, catering to Phlox shouldn't be the chore she was making it. "Hmmmm..."
"Something?" T'Pol responded in the same beat. She averted her eyes from the faintly-pinging device to his contemplative visage.
The doctor passed the gently vibrating wand over the length of her trim figure again. He reminded her of one of those mythical characters in one of those, what Earth children commonly called, fairy tales.
"Sub-Commander, it appears your immune system has been compromised. More than what I thought at first." Phlox checked the readings again, and after another quick nod, looked her straight in her sobering eyes.
"Specifically how, Doctor?" T'Pol spoke, making it sound midway between a demand and an evenly modulated request.
"I'd like to run several series of tests."
"*Doctor*," T'Pol underscored with a look of, 'I haven't time for such extra-medical research. Not now, nor in the near future.'
Phlox waved her protest off with a waggish nod. "I'll require a moderate sample of blood."
Not mincing further words of dissent, she acquised, "Very well. Proceed." She had learned it was easier to give in rather than buck the determined doctor. Better to just get this over with as quickly as possible.
Phlox smiled cheerily at her but in the same space of consideration, he plucked his smile back. His precipitous frown took its place. "Strange..."
T'Pol braced herself upon bent elbows. She was a staunch appreciator of his directness. She missed his straightforwardness, wondering where it had gone. "What is it, Doctor?" She looked extremely slinky and fetching posing the suggestive way she was.
She wasn't trying to be either on purpose. She couldn't help being who she was...a siren in Vulcan form. The hormonal effect she had on many male members of the crew, including their fearless leader, had little to do with feminine wiles.
T'Pol was the genuine article; a beauty lacking the hauteur that sometimes went with it. Deceit and manipulation were beneath her. Despite her suitor's giving her the benefit of the doubt, she hadn't seduced Tucker. There had been no trickery whatsoever during the first time she had invited him to meditate with her two months ago.
It had been tempting, guiding him down the garden path, so to speak, leading him on with her mind. But--no. Chicanery wasn't her style.
She respected him. She respected his wishes about wanting to wait before taking the point-of-no-return plunge. He wanted them to get to know each other a lot better before getting intimate. Her curiosity about his sexuality was undeniably there, piquing her interest daily.
But she had given him her promise; no 'hanky-panky' (his ambiguous terminology) until he felt they were ready.
'I don't wanna go messin' up what we got by throwin' sex in from the get,' she heard his words of adviso echo through her mind.
She wondered if that meant right before the mission ended. They'd mate, shake hands, then go their separate ways; he back to Earth, she to Vulcan. It was moot to think that they could have anything lasting beyond the boundaries of Enterprise.
Their backgrounds were too different; too volatile. Prejudice on both sides would be brought to bear.
T'Pol clinically reflected, throwing herself deeper into the meditative state she had unwittingly led herself to. Nearly having had to say goodbye to him when her pre-arranged marriage had threatened to take her away had been difficult, and she'd only known him for a few days, compared to now.
Having to say goodbye when Enterprise's mission ended bordered on the impossible.
Their bodies hadn't joined as one as yet, but their minds and souls had quasi bonded in fragile form. If they parted, what would become of it...of them? Could she bear sensing his thoughts, his sensations with his being far removed? How could she endure the brushes of his feelings caressing her wherever she went?
Apart from him, she already perceived the strain it would be.
She shuddered a bit, forcing her mind to tear itself away from such defeatist thinking. What good was it doing her?
Would marrying the Commander be so wrong?
MARRIAGE??
He was a good man, but therein lay the problem. He was a man; Human, direct from the hotbed of Vulcan controversy and taboo...Earth. A union, marriage, between Vulcan and Human was unthinkable. It was an affront to all the generations of proud heritage coursing through her green-tinged veins.
How could she entertain such perverse feelings for an inferior?
He was anything but, the more empathetic side of her warred. That was Vulcan prejudice dictating. It was one of many assumptions that had held the Human race back all this time. It was an assumption that was without substance, groundless now, in her mind.
Tucker *is* a good *man*, she asserted, and caring for him *is* the logical way to *feel*. He is his own man, and has shown me that feeling is not inherently wrong, tempered with the proper restraint when called for...blocking out emotion is.
I care for Tucker...Trip, she acknowledged. I care about him...enough to desire fulfillment with him.
The realization was stunning, and she didn't bat an eye. The sultry notion struck her that if he kept kissing her the way he liked to, it wouldn't be long before their bodies succumbed to the inevitable.
When the day finally came for them, the Commander wouldn't know what hit him. T'Pol restrained her waking smile again. The day couldn't come soon enough to suit her. Charles Tucker the Third was magnetic; physical presence wasn't a prerequisite.
"Sub-Commander?"
"Emmmm?"
"I thought I'd lost you for a little while."
"No, Doctor, I have been here all along. Have you finished with me." It wasn't in the form of a question.
Phlox was eyeing the inflamed looking spot embedded a bit off center in the right side of her long-stemmed neck.
Indicating with fore and middle fingers, he reported, "It appears you've developed a form of rash I'm unfamiliar with. It seems localized to this one area, but I think a thorough corporeal examination is in order." He squinted at the attention-getting blemish again. "Curious."
Not so, the Vulcan knew. A 'hickey' the Commander had labeled it. His way of showing her how 'crazy,' his word, he was about her. All falling under the loose heading of 'heavy petting.' Those cryptic terms of his, T'Pol mused. They seemed to trivialize the importance of mating.
*Crazy*...T'Pol winced at his telling choice of word. Their way of saying *illogical*.
Was she any better whenever he nuzzled and sucked her ear points with his tantalizing lips and tongue, whispering how much he adored her? When his arms fitted around her, once they were alone after long tours of duty, there was no place else she yearned to be.
"It looks...very odd."
"It's not a rash, Doctor," T'Pol sternly assured, and instinctively, her hand blocked his prolonged study of the 'love bite.' Tucker's proud branding of her flesh. His claiming of her body and soul for all the crew to see. She felt herself tingle as her body temperature continued to rise.
"Oh?" Phlox angled the instrument of analysis closer to the angry-looking site. "Is it a Vulcan abnormality?"
"No," T'Pol sharply replied. "Trust me, Doctor. It isn't a rash, nor a Vulcan abnormality. It's just something I picked up." Even to her ears that sounded weak.
"Very well then. Perhaps after the blood analysis I'll be able to determine whether or not--" T'Pol didn't let him finish. "Sub-Commander, T'Pol," Phlox exclaimed, startled. "T'Pol!"
The First-in-Command had fainted dead away.
His hands, roughened by the nature of his work, were everywhere, rubbing, squeezing, kneading... driving her. And so were those demanding lips and versatile tongue--everywhere. The fever in her blood would consume her from the inside out, as he was surely going to but in reverse.
Hungrily, his thick, skilled tongue, saturated with her musky juices, swirled around the taut peak of her right breast's nipple. She felt the soft scrape of his teeth and she arched into the pit of his slick busy mouth. She'd never known the height, breadth and depth of such pleasure.
He was urgent about propelling her over the brink in dizzying swoops.
["T'Pol!"]
She couldn't answer in any coherent fashion. She wanted to, but he had reduced her to whimpering, gravelly gutteral sounds reminiscent of languages that Hoshi would describe as primitive in the extreme. Fine. The more primitive she, the unflappable Vulcan sounded, the wilder her willing partner's lust was fanned.
Yet, his lust differed from what she had expected. He was caring and respectful. He took his time, careful he wasn't hurting her. She rollicked in him each time he left her gasping for breath following every deep, full-bodied kiss...every deep riveting thrust. Her eyes fuzzed with tears.
["Ba-Baby--I can't--get enough of ya. You keep me wantin' more--ahgggg!"]
She wasn't complaining. He'd switched to the unsampled nipple, begging for his nibbles. The sweet torture, goading it to steeple, continued. His swollen shaft stoppered her clear to its pliant hilt.
She never wanted the command of his filling her so completely to end. He knew what made her feel good instinctively. He grasped her overly- stimulated nub delicately, but firmly after worming his fingers into her.
Leisurely, he extracted his fingers from her writhing body.
With tender care, he nestled his shaft within her again. Rocking against her supple body, cooing her name scores of times, he pumped into her convulsively. "I've ne-never known an-anyone c-could be th-this tight!"] he declared, gasping cathartically.
Her skin blazed everywhere his skin was one with hers. Her mind flooded with the rampaging inundations of raptuous emotions surging through her all at once. She slammed her eyelids shut as his seed burst into her procreative depths.
Throatily, they climaxed in unison. He was quick to begin shifting his weight off her but she wedged her hand in where his body perfectly aligned with her mons. In blissful satiety, she gently whispered in broken Vulcan, ["Keep your organ where it is..."]
["Keep it where?"] he murmured, sounding wobbily but as sated as she, and a little dumbstruck. They were as sticky as newly-drawn molasses. She had never felt so wonderful; all tingly with her skin feeling as though little electric shocks were scurrying over and through it.
His sweat-soaked head floated upon the rise and fall of her pillowing chest. ["Where it is..."] She squeezed her thighs in around him and made a sound so like muted laughter when she heard him yelp a bit and she said, ["Yes, 't'var'maa'k. Deep inside me.']
["What good is it when it's as limp as a wet noodle?"]
Her right hand melded itself to his firm left butt cheek. Spending a good deal of his free time in the gym had its merit. His body defined what virility was all about. ["We must do something logical about that..."]
["Why you sexy scamp..."]
His breath tickled her scalp, warming it when he chuckled. Slowly he made the slow slide down her body after he had murmured in her ear. The taste of his skin was intoxicating as he moaned her name. She felt him twitch, feeling him grow inside of her.
She was floating off the Starfleet regulation- sized mattress as his sweet, frenzied thrusting began all over again. She never wanted him to stop.
Yet, he did. Once his journey to his own satiety was resolved and when he was spent again, he kissed her forehead, then her eyelids. While stroking her peaceful face he whispered, ["I love ya, darlin'. Never stop bein' mine..."]
Softly, she rested all five fingers upon his face. His eyelids fluttered. The pupils beneath them rotated from side to side. He issued the deepest sigh as his mind melded with hers as their robust bodies had.
Yes, she thought, smiling inwardly...he *is* a good man...a very, very good man.
["*T'Pol*! Honey, *don't leave*! *Don't go*! Please--*stay*--I need you..."]
Phlox' voice was coming from a long way off. It sounded hollow, lacking the tenor and substance of being real.
But Phlox' voice was as real as he was, standing over the biobed she lay upon. He wore a pinched look of concern that he saved for the creatures he doted on and catered to. "Sub-Commander... that's right. You're going to be all right, but you're going to have to rest. The fever will subside provided you rest, drink plenty of fluids.
"I've given you the Monospot test in addition to several other routine blood tests. The results I'm afraid were positive in all instances. How is your throat feeling?"
T'Pol blinked as better awareness of her true surroundings came into sharper focus. "Scratchy," she said slightly above a whisper.
"I'll give you some lozenges to relieve some of the soreness."
T'Pol, flushed, with a feeling of embarrassment fording its way through her psyche, looked at him. Her comment was neither sharp, nor accusatory. "Doctor, what are your findings?"
"My initial diagnosis was incorrect. You aren't infected with viral Sys-Laralgia, as I previously suspected..."
His long pause only served to irritate T'Pol further. "Then what do I have?" she asked with eyes that broadcasted annoyance.
"Somehow, which is highly suprising to me, you've contracted Mononucleosis."
Her eyes widened in mild shock while searching her memory for when and where she'd heard the strange name of the malady before. "I have heard of it."
Phlox rolled his eyes, and scratched the side of his face with the sides of two fingers. "Mono...an infection caused by the Epstein-Barr virus. Symptoms of it include fever, which you are running one that's quite high, even for a Vulcan. Sore throat, headaches." Phlox requested that she open her mouth so he could examine the back of her throat. "Ah, yes...white patches at the back of the throat. Your's are a light green. And your glands...the ones that closely pattern humans', in your neck, are quite swollen. You've complained about feeling tired, and you do indeed look it, my dear. How's your appetite?"
T'Pol looked as though she'd been caught out in a driving wind- and rainstorm, and then had had cold water thrown in her face. "No. I have not been hungry for three days. I've only wanted tea."
The seasoned physician nodded sagely. "A normal symptom; the lack of appetite." His bumpy forehead squinched for her benefit. "It's very odd your contracting Mono, Sub-Commander." Knowing very little about the communicable condition not usually associated with Vulcans, T'Pol asked him why. The Denobulan dutifully followed up her question with a patient nod, then circumspect words. "It isn't spread as easily as some other viruses, such as the common cold. The virus is found in saliva and mucus..." He paused briefly, upon seeing her olive complexion pale. "Usually it is passed from one person to another through kissing," he said, sounding as clinical as all get-out. Jovially, he said with capering eyes that twinkled at her, "Anyone I know, hmmm?"
T'Pol gripped the sides of the biobed, waiting for the room to stop spinning. Closing her eyes wasn't helping. Just as she began slumping into the synthetic nape of the examining bed's sectional mat, the doors to the facility parted and her handsome tow-haired 'carrier' swaggered in.
"Hey there, Doc, got anythin' for..." Trip froze in his tracks. He gawked at his Vulcan 'numero uno' lying upon the biobed closest to the Decon. Before making a move or saying anything else, his eyes filled with inquiry. They raked over her form. His mouth rounded in a muted, 'oh.'
The infected one fixed him with a look he'd never seen her wear before. T'Pol looked cheesy, and greener around the gills than she normally did.
Putting an end to any further indecision, Trip was at her left side. Phlox gave him a wry expression, regarding how the Commander's hand had smoothly slipped into T'Pol's. "What's wrong?" His tone was all business; the I've got to troubleshoot the warp core before a warp five point two jump sort of business.
"Nothing a little bed rest and a prudent dosage of acetaminophen won't cure." Nodding at them both, the mannerly physician discreetly excused himself. "I'll see about getting you some Ibuprofen, Sub-Commander." Since Tucker's entrance into the facility, the twinkles in Phlox' eyes had ebbed.
Bending down closer to her ear, Trip asked, "I repeat...what's the matter?" He squeezed her hand, hoping it would make quick work of the blank look ingrained in her face. "It's nothin' serious is it?" Was it his imagination, or did she seem a deeper shade of olive since he'd come to stand at her side? "C'mon, T'Pol, ya haveta tell me." He jiggled the hand he clung to like a pair of needlenose pliers. "Talk to me. Please? Your number one fan has a right to know." The Vulcan turned her face to his, hers being unreadable. Looking chastened, Trip appealed once more. "T'Pol?"
Making her bottom lip taut, she uttered the words she had had no intention of speaking. "I am infected with the Epstein-Barr virus." Trip's jaw dropped when he gaped at her with a facial expression T'Pol couldn't help mellowing to. He hadn't purposely set out to give her this infection.
"You don't mean y-you've got Mon--"
"Onucleosis..." She'd pronounced the affliction in a low, monotonal voice.
"Oh..." Trip dropped his head, puzzled, and fully dismayed. "Damn." Chancing a peek at her, he belabored the point while balancing upon the balls of his feet. Sounding as though he was atoning for the crime of the century he branded, "The Kissin' Disease." His eyebrows raised heavenward. "The good Lord only knows we've been clockin' some serious, solid quality time in the liplock department."
"Yes," T'Pol remarked, remarkably careful she didn't sound as if she were pinning blame. In hindsight, she supposed electing to take her final immunizations would have been the better part of logic. The time she should have reported for innoculation was the hour her finance had contacted her, telling her it was urgent that they speak.
"And it ain't like you've been spreading yourself around." Trip shook his head looking as glum as he felt. He tried extracting his hand from hers but her vise-like grip wouldn't allow it.
T'Pol knew what he was implying and she returned several squeezes to his hand. "You are the only one. The only logical choice."
Yeah...right. Who the hell else, he fussed. That made him feel even worse. "I'm sorry, darlin'." With a slow-moving hand, he leveled the back of it against her forehead. "Damnit, you're burnin' up."
The owner of the mild fever didn't correct him. "I'll be all right. It is not your fault. It's the virus'."
Stunned, finding it uncomfortable coming to grips with the stigma that he was responsible, he stammered, "Y-yeah, but I gave it to ya." This conveniently played up the ignominious aspect of the human race's contaminating effects.
"I neglected undergoing final innoculations after being assigned to the mission," she absolved, noting a fleeting look of relief flit over his face. "Just because I am Vulcan does not mean I never make errors in judgment."
"Nope. That's my arena," Trip chided, wearing a frown.
T'Pol raised an eyebrow. "How do you feel?"
Contagious, he rued, glad she couldn't read his mind. Insisting, Trip replied, "Okay...aside from a little nasal congestion. I got sinus." All sheepish he fished, "Guess we'll haveta cool it...for a while." Her expression, especially the set of her jaw stiffened. Pushing down the lump in his throat, Trip quipped, half seriously, the rest in jest, "Like maybe for always..."
T'Pol riveted him with an incredulous look. "What are you saying?" She asked with a wealth of adamancy having its roots in knowing full well what he meant. He was nothing if he wasn't blunt whenever something wasn't a laughing matter.
If someone had hinted to him a year ago that the green-tinged 'ice princess' had a caring bone in her goregous body when it came to him, he would've laughed loud and long in the owner's face.
Why had Malcolm suddenly popped into mind?
Well, plainly, she did care. If Malcolm or anyone had the nerve to laugh, he'd make 'em spit shine the warp core. "The end of whatever it is we were tryin' ta have." The sizeable lump in his throat had returned with a vengence. "Way I figure, why would you want ta risk catchin' anythin' else from me?"
For such a perceptive human, he had his slow on the uptake moments. "Mister Tucker..." Trip arched an eyebrow at her, waiting for her to repeat what he wanted to hear minus the superfluous. "Hmmmm...Tucker." A smile touched his lips then, and it made what she needed to say that much more pressing. "I have come to appreciate that certain risks are acceptable when calculated." Her right eyebrow arched the way he'd arched his at her. The strenght of their handholding doubled in tenacity. "You, Tucker, are one highly-acceptable risk."
Trip jammed his fingers in-between those belonging to the woman who bore his pathogens.
In the next moment, Phlox re-appeared with the softly-smiling sufferer's meds. "Here you are, Sub-Commander." Pressing the silvery administerer at the base of her neck, he shot her up. "This should ease the pain a good deal."
"How much pain?" the Chief Engineer spoke as though the quiry was one syllable.
The doctor let his patient answer that.
"Very little," T'Pol assured her anxious doter.
"The virus normally runs its course up to four weeks." Phlox regarded the couple sympathetically but kept his curiosity well under wraps.
Trip's whistle broke the lull in conversation. "Four weeks. Oh, man..." He shook his head looking beyond woeful. ==I've screwed you up good, honey.== T'Pol looked at him oddly. ==I wouldn't blame ya if ya told me to take a hike out the handiest exhaust port. I'd never request that, she thought succinctly, unless of course you were a danger to the entire crew. "Will she have to stay here overnight, Doc?"
"No, no. Sub-Commander T'Pol is perfectly able to recuperate in her quarters. Call me, Sub- Commander if you experience any discomfort apart from what you've been experiencing thus far."
The Vulcan nodded and swung a leg off the biobed. She had trembled in the process and halted further movement. Her body language was a clarion of just how shaky she was right now.
"I'll go with ya," Trip interjected, looking all set to whisk her off the biobed into his ready and willing arms.
I do not wish to inconvenience you," she mumbled.
"You've gotta be kiddin'. C'mon. The sooner you're back in your quarters, the sooner that rest kicks off."
As the symmetrical couple, with a listing T'Pol leaning heavily against her eager supporter, neared the doors that were in the process of opening, Phlox informed with a good deal of amusement coloring his tone, "Oh, and once one has been infected, reinfection is impossible." The twinkles had returned to his eyes.
After the doors had shut, blocking the doctor's rapt observation, T'Pol looked at Trip and saw approval on on his face. She allowed him to lift her chin higher with the tilt of his index finger. She never looked more beautiful despite her looking this frail.
"We'll take it at your speed," he assured her.
His warm male scent was comforting. Taking it slow, they began the unhurried journey down the corridor.
Continued...
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