notabricklayer | (no subject)

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The lights of their apartment come up in the way he is used to lights coming on the way he is used to lights coming on - smoothing increasing from dark to light with barely a hitch inbetween. The apartment is the same as before - a naturally quirky Victorian that's slightly stark thanks to the driven surgeon who had made this his home once upon a time.

He always meant to take time off, decorate the place a little more elaborately, set it up to be more of a home than a place to collapse after long shifts. Maybe now's time.

But right now he can do something about these damned boots. Some day he is going to both fund and write a paper outlining the evils of these boots, and he'll stuff it down the throats of every lazy ass on the Starfleet Surgeon General's board.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Most ships of the line lose ten percent of their crew complement within the first three months." His tone is flat, a recitation of details he hates with every fiber of his being. "Ships that patrol the Romulan and Klingon Neutral Zones are more likely to be destroyed entirely. Ships on exploration missions, understandably, tend to be the most lethal."

Olga gets one guess as to what the Enterprise is up to.

If she couldn't taste his disgust with the words, if she couldn't read the pull of his emotions beneath this words, his ability to reel off those statistics with such a cool demeanour would send a chill down her spine.

But no. He is not Gesar.

He is something entirely different.

She lays her head back on his chest, her fingertips idly stroking the fabric. "So your ship -- is not at war. But others are."

"The Federation is not at war, officially." His voice is dry, unimpressed. "But there are quite a number of species that either don't know, or don't care."

That gets a dry chuckle.

"Just as we are 'officially' under Truce. And have been for five hundred years. Still, the Opposition moves."

"Suppose it does, darlin'." He is not some super-enlightened being of the future. He grew up on a human-centric planet, and the rest of the universe is a wild adventure. But he also is decidedly against unnecessary violence - regardless of species involved.

And he definitely doesn't understand why there needs to be an Opposition. Surely they've gotten beyond that by now.

Except, apparently, they haven't. Which is a very depressing thought.

She's quite content to rest here on his chest, and he can feel each part of her body giving up its burden of stress. Her thighs, her back, her shoulders. Her neck is the last to go, and a proud neck it is, too.

She's still a bit on the stiff side, but just being here is doing her a world of good, he can tell.

He doesn't mind being used as a pillow - not at all. He's glad she feels she can relax around him (or on him, whichever).

It also makes him wonder if, perhaps, he could convince her to let him help with that stress, sometimes.

It's a very distracting thought. Intergalactic conflict gets tabled for the time being.

She feels his smirk.

"What are you thinking, Lyonya?"

"I'm thinking that you're still too tense." He informs her, matching her earlier bluntness. "There are knots on top of knots, darlin'."

She quirks an eyebrow, shifts just enough that she can peer at him with one eye.

"Don't suppose this place has a bath tub big enough for two?"

Not quite what he had in mind, but it's also a very nice mental image.
"Don't think I ever tried it with two." He muses, cheerfully. "Perhaps two close together."

He shifts a hand up to rub over her shoulder, gently, feeling the muscles underneath. Gently, because the sort of massage that actually does some good shouldn't be unleashed on someone without permission. Not if you don't want to get hit in the face, anyway.

"We should try that. A good long soak and then... mmmph."

There were words. They were nice words. But whatever he's doing makes it very hard to speak, at least with any hope of coherence.

Oh really? McCoy raises an eyebrow, and decides peremptorily that this requires further experimentation. He's never had any doubt her job is stressful - she was hunting vampires for God's sake.

She'll do better if she can go back relaxed.

So he presses harder, just a bit, pushing at the tenseness she has built up in that shoulder.

She melts. Well, as much as she can melt, considering she was already pretty melted to begin with.

After a few moments, she holds up a finger.

"If I run back to the bar for oil, could I coax you into a proper rub down?"

"Let's let the rats run. They gave us those handy-dandy tubes for a reason." Then he can get some other things too, and she won't have to go away.

"I like the way you think," she drawls, leaning up to steal a kiss, languid and soft.

"Mmmm. Now. Hold that thought." She is making it hard to move away, but there's a massage to think about (and he can think of an oiled Olya for a very long time). He does manage to disentangle himself, and heads to the kitchen to hunt up the pad of paper and a pencil.

His handwriting lives down to the stereotype, we're afraid. But he feels it's clear enough in this case. The note is folded and sent off, and he starts gathering other things they'll need... like water. Now, she might be a vodka gal, but water is important.

No, the doctor part never really does switch off. And sometimes he doesn't try.

She's stretched out fully on the couch when he returns, head pillowed on her arms, eyes closed. She opens one eye to look at him, the corner of her mouth curling up.

"You drink that stuff? I hear it can kill you."

"Mmmm, the wonders of modern plumbing." He drawls, rolling his eyes at the comment. "Water without cholera."

Luckily the doorbell rings before he can actually ramp up to the battle of getting her to drink the stuff. He sets the two tall glasses of water down on the table with an emphatic thump, and heads to the door to collect the order.

She sits up, and takes one of the glasses, holding it up to the light and peering through it. No tint of rust, no sediment. She takes a sniff. No sulphur or other foul odors.

She takes a sip. Mmm, that's not half bad. She drains the glass in a few swallows. (She's not stupid.)

He returns a few minutes later, notes the glass, and says nothing. He does place a tightly capped bottle on the table though, before setting up the other thing he ordered.

It rolls out flat in front of the fire, and inflates quickly - sure, StarFleet meant for this to be more of a easily-stored comfort for long term planetside missions... but McCoy believes in multi-use. Especially when it's so comfortable.

She watches, chin on her hands, eyes bright.

He's really taking this seriously.

She doesn't know quite what to think.

Once he's sure that's stable, he sits back on his heels and studies her in return. Something isn't quite right.

He nods, to himself, and heads off to the kitchen again, humming to himself in a distracted manner. He could have sworn he saw in there...

After a short search through the cabinets he finds what he was hunting for, and there's a quiet crinkle of cellophane. He returns, and tosses the package to her.

She snatches it out of the air, smirking at him.

"Spasiba."

She very carefully sets it down beside the water glasses.

"After." She wets her lips and eyes the pad he's spread out in front of the fire. "Where do you want me?"

His eyes darken precipitously at the question - not something bound to help him maintain any sort of professionalism here.
"Where-ever you want." He answers without thinking, honesty beating current events.

After a moment his brain catches up.

"I think you'll be more comfortable here." This really doesn't make the first comment less true. Ever.