I dunno what it is about the whole Academy-era but there's something about it calling out to me. We'll have to see what other plot bunnies hop my way...

Disclaimer: Not mine!

The night before a midterm Kirk gets into a fight and it's left to McCoy to fix him up.

First Aid

McCoy was coming to the realization that it was usually in the wee hours of the morning that he felt a pang or two of regret that he had befriended Jim Kirk. The kid had a fiery intelligence that was matched only by his bizarre need to prove himself in a fight with just about anyone he could provoke... and so far in their brief six months at the Academy, McCoy had dragged Kirk home after three such fights.

“Seriously, is it really that hard to avoid these situations?”

Whatever Kirk's response was, it was lost behind a haze of alcohol and probably a nasty concussion: the kid's head had bounced hard off that bar. McCoy winced at the memory. How the hell Jim had stayed conscious and then gone on to send the other guy sprawling after that was beyond his understanding. He let loose a long-suffering sigh. Since when was he the guy who dragged idiots out of fights?

Oh. Right.

“You owe me Jim, again.”

Kirk was the reason McCoy had a medkit in his room. After the first fight, a whole one week into the academic year, and the trip to the Academy sickbay that had resulted in a disciplinary hearing for Jim with threats of further action should he continue to display such behaviour, McCoy realized he would probably be the only way for his friend to avoid detection and avoid suspension and expulsion. McCoy would never admit, not in a million years or under any form of torture, that so far Kirk's friendship (slightly odd and unexpected though it may be), was the main reason he hadn't managed to convince himself the whole Starfleet idea was complete and utter madness. Someone his age in a class with kids, some of whom were half his age? It was ludicrous.

“Bones?”

“What Jim?”

“Ima freakin' legend.”

McCoy felt an eyebrow raise in response to that statement. “A legend huh?”

“Yeah. Ima goin' down in Academy history.” Jim's sincerity was almost childlike in its intensity, which made it all the more laughable.

“Oh, you're going down for something all right. Most bar fights started in your first year? Most bar fights started before you got booted?”

Kirk seemed affronted by the idea. “I'm not gettin' booted!”

McCoy wasn't sure he agreed with that. The kid was lucky enough to have someone like Captain Pike fighting his corner but that would not be enough, not if he kept finding trouble at every turn.

Kirk's legs gave out and he nearly took McCoy down with him. “Whoa Jim. Not helpful.”

“Huh? Oh, right, sorry.” Jim locked his legs and started walking again. “Where we goin'?”

“My place.”

Kirk gave a drunken smile. “That's nice.”

McCoy just rolled his eyes.

Thankfully Kirk stayed silent the rest of the way back to the Academy's dormitory district. McCoy dragged him into a lift that took them up to the level McCoy's room was on. Once there, the door to McCoy's dorm room slid open and he dragged Kirk through, leading him to the bed. The kid dropped onto it like a sack of rocks and didn't move again. A cursory exam proved his injuries were superficial but even utilizing the most basic of first aid meant McCoy knew better than to treat a concussion lightly.

He shook his friend awake. “Jim, you've got a concussion.” Kirk grunted in response. Well, that was something. Brain damage had been avoided. “I'm gonna have to keep waking you.”

Kirk's response was surprisingly lucid, if more than a little unrestrained. “You're a good guy Bones. I like you.” He laughed; a tipsy cackle that bordered on an outright giggle. “You're so dramatic all the time!” He composed his face until it looked deadly serious. “Damnit Jim I'm a doctor, not a plumber... Damnit Jim I'm a doctor not a hair stylist... Damnit Jim...”

“I get the idea.”

Kirk snorted. “Gets me every time man!”

Oh he was three sheets to the wind all right.

“My eyes are kinda wonky,” Kirk went on. He ran his tongue around his teeth before an easy grin spilled across his drunken features. “I still got 'em all.”

“Don't ask me how. That guy did his best to knock them all out.”

Kirk scoffed. “Better men have tried.”

“And will try again, the way you're carrying on,” McCoy responded as he used a sterile wipe to clean away the blood. He checked his kit but realized he had nothing to cover Kirk's knuckle-split skin was After all, there was only so much you could sneak out of a sickbay before someone started to question it. McCoy didn't want to be pulled in for taking medical equipment illegally. He didn't want anyone suspecting he was involved in anything illicit...

...Okay, fine: anything more illicit than the bar brawls of Jim Kirk.

“Don't you have a midterm tomorrow?” McCoy asked as he began treating the various contusions Kirk had attained. “Have you even studied?”

“Yes and... uh... probably not.”

McCoy rolled his eyes. He didn't expect anything else. If there was one really, really annoying thing about Jim, it was his ability to pass anything with the minimal effort. Damn geniuses...

And the fact that Jim was that intelligent made his behaviour even stranger.

“I can get through it juuuuuuuuuuus' fine,” Kirk slurred, absently waving a hand as if McCoy's worries were flies in his face. “Jus' fine.”

“Oh, right, with a concussion?”

“Sure, why not?”

“And a hangover?”

“Yup.”

“Don't ask me why Jim, but for some reason I actually believe you.”

Kirk's smirk was aggravatingly broad. Bloody, yeah, but still containing every drop of the kid's cockiness. McCoy was glad when the kid drifted off into a grunting slumber, because at least it kept Kirk quiet long enough for his overworked friend to clean him up. And when the new day dawned bright and clear, Kirk donned a pair of sunglasses from the wrong end of the Twentieth Century and stumbled off to take his midterm.

McCoy had one last piece of advice to dish out: “Don't come crying to me when they refuse to let you in to the exam hall in that state!”

With Kirk gone, McCoy revelled in the resulting peace. He gladly disposed of his bloodstained sheets and crashed out, only to be woken far too soon by a gleeful Kirk who, of course, had sailed through the midterm with a concussion and barely any sleep and goodness knew what other aches and pains he had neglected to mention.

“How the hell do you do it?” McCoy demanded, bleary-eyed and more than a little grizzly.

Kirk kicked back in McCoy's desk-chair. “I dunno, but if I figure out how to bottle it, I'll share some of my unimaginable fortune with you.”