This story was inspired by some fantastic artwork by hamano_ayumi on Livejournal and is therefore dedicated to her.

Disclaimer: Alas, I have not woken up and discovered it's all mine. Darn!

Caught in the outbreak of a war, McCoy and Spock must work together to get an injured Kirk out alive.

Getting Out

“It's no good sir, ze interference from ze neutral ground's anti-transporter field is too strong. You need to get out of ze building...”

Leonard McCoy did not panic. Such a response had been trained out of him, first in med school and then at Starfleet Academy. Faced with a crisis, he simply got stuck in and dealt with whatever bodily fluids were leaking out of his patient...

...However, then he'd made friends with Jim Kirk and his life had never quite been the same. There was only one other person in the whole damn universe who could worry him so much, and that was his daughter. He thanked his lucky stars every day she did not attract (or seek) trouble quite like James T. Kirk managed.

“S'not so bad.”

“Jim, I dunno if anyone's ever told you, but your definition of 'not so bad' is messed up.”

It wasn't panic. He didn't panic. He was concerned, certainly, and worried too. But panicked? No.

“Really Bones I...”

“Not now Jim.”

Kirk was slumped against him, barely conscious. The building, a place designed for peaceful negotiations (and didn't that make McCoy laugh bitterly), shook and groaned as the battle raged on. The lights flickered before dying completely. Plunged into darkness, McCoy struggled to treat his patient as concrete rubble rained down. Spitting out a mouthful of the choking dust, McCoy let out an angry, “Damnit!”

“Bones...”

“Sh!” McCoy pressed hard against Kirk's bleeding side, the younger man crying out hoarsely. “Stay quiet Jim.”

Chaos screamed around them as rebels fought back against the planet's ruling elite. Booming explosions, clattering gunfire and the wailing sound of an emergency alarm polluted the air. McCoy cursed the order from Starfleet Command that had brought them here, even though he knew no one had known the situation bubbling beneath the world's perfect exterior was quite so volatile.

“Never trust anyone that well dressed,” he muttered.

“Huh?”

“Don't worry about it.”

Starfleet Command had sent them to Cuano, a wealthy and advanced world made up of five equally prosperous countries, to aid negotiations between the the national leaders and a rebel faction claiming every nation built their wealth off the backs of hidden yet extensive slavery. Cuano wanted to join the Federation, but Starfleet had recommended a full investigation before any kind of membership offer was given. It hadn't taken Kirk's away team long to discover the rebels' claims were true. Kirk, deep and terrible anger written across his young features, had confronted the leaders of each nation, only to find smug satisfaction where he'd expected to find regret and pleads for forgiveness. Disgusted, he had turned his back on Cuano's five representatives and thanked the rebels for bringing the slaves' plight to Starfleet's attention. But then everything had quite literally blown up in their faces and a battle had broken out, the two sides not caring who was caught between them. Even the rebels cared little for Kirk's open support.

“It's us versus all of them,” Kirk had grimly told Spock and McCoy. “We need to get back to the Enterprise...”

And so it was that Kirk, Spock and McCoy were stuck in a building that blocked transporter capabilities, trapped in a battle they didn't want to fight.

“'m serious Bones, s'okay.” A violent shiver passed through Kirk. He was going into shock. His eyes drooped. “S'okay...”

“No,” Bones said, swallowing thickly. He didn't need to see to know his friend's blood was coating his hand, and that was only from the wound in his chest. Kirk's head still bled freely. “No, you're not.”

McCoy held Kirk close, a hand pressed against the heavily bleeding chest wound. The gash to his head would have to wait, McCoy gambling on the fact that head-wounds, even superficial ones, bled badly...

Kirk's eyes opened widely. “Where'd Spock go?”

“He's trying to find a way out.”

“S'no doors?”

“We're on the fiftieth floor Jim.”

Kirk grunted. “Spock'll find a way.”

“Stop talking Jim. You're wasting energy.”

The lights valiantly flickered back on. McCoy didn't waste it. He checked the injury on Jim's side, saw it was still bleeding heavily, and reapplied pressure.

Kirk groaned. “Whatcha doin' tha' for?”

“Gotta stop you from bleeding out.”

“Bleedin' out? S'jus a scratch. Teeny... tiny... hey... s'all gone red. Izat bad?”

“You've got blood in your eye.” A slight understatement, something McCoy was quite gifted at. Blood was liberally gushing out of the gash over Kirk's eyebrow. Soon the flow would glue his eye shut, but McCoy wasn't panicking and he didn't really want Jim to start either.

“Oh... M'chest hurts. Am I havin' a heart attack?”

If only it were so simple. McCoy swallowed the guilt back down, taking a mouthful of dust with it. “You pushed me out the way and took a knife to the ribs, remember?”

One of the national leaders had had a bodyguard who was far too good with knives. McCoy had been in his path, only to be shoved away at the last possibly moment. Kirk hadn't had a chance to fire his phaser: the knife had caught his ribs and he'd only been saved from a gutting when a section of the ceiling crashed down on the bodyguard. Of course, Jim had copped a blow to the head but it didn't kill him. It didn't even knock him out, although his skull was clearly visible beneath the blood. McCoy was more focused on the knife wound: it hadn't gone deep enough to penetrate the lungs but that didn't mean Kirk wasn't in serious trouble.

McCoy suddenly realized Jim hadn't said anything in a while. It was how he'd allowed himself to become lost in thought. “Jim...?” Nothing. His eyes were shut, his head lolling against McCoy's chest. McCoy pulled him closer, checking for breathing and a pulse. Kirk had both, but neither were strong enough for McCoy's liking.

A dusty Spock came up from behind, crouching down alongside the pair. He spared a moment to look down at his Captain, a hand reaching out and drifting over Kirk's barely moving chest. Seemingly content to discover Kirk still lived, Spock delivered his news. “The way behind us is completely blocked. The rebels have brought that section of the building down. We have no choice but to proceed forward and try to reach the roof.”

“The roof?” McCoy echoed.

“I believe it to be closer than the main entrance.”

“What if the roof isn't there any more? Have you not noticed the damn building coming down around our ears?”

“If the roof is no longer solid, it only means open air and therefore the transporter beam are both closer. After all, it is only the building's built-in computer network that is stopping the Enterprise from beaming us up.” Ignoring McCoy's rolling eyes, Spock glanced down at the Captain. “I can cover you.” He held his phaser – set to kill – ready to fire. “Are you able to carry him?”

McCoy nodded. “But we need to get back to the Enterprise, otherwise...”

Gunfire interrupted him. Cuano was advanced, but apparently the people believed bullets were the most effective way of killing. Why waste the time researching other methods of murder when a single bullet already did the job just fine? From a theoretical standpoint, McCoy was in agreement: high-velocity projectile weapons (guns, his mind neatly surmised) had certainly killed enough people on Earth over the course of many hundreds of years.

More gunfire, worryingly close now, yanked him back to reality. Bullets peppered the walls, tearing new chunks out of the crumbling walls and shattering the lights. Plunged back into darkness, McCoy threw himself over Kirk, not trusting his friend to not take another injury for him even though he was unconscious.

“Their weapons are primitive, yet effective,” Spock commented as he turned around and fired his phaser three times. Three thumps could be heard as three bodies hit the ground. “We must move.”

“Oh, ya think?” McCoy muttered as he hauled Kirk over his shoulder. “Damn you're heavy,” he grunted. But the complaint covered his real concern, his real fears. But Leonard McCoy did not panic. “Don't go getting shot yourself Spock, I can barely carry Jim as it is.”

“I have no intentions of...”

More enemies were suddenly running at them, shouting threats. McCoy had no idea which side they were on and he no longer cared. There were no allies here. The Federation would not be getting a new member today. Utterly unruffled by the threats of violence, Spock dispatched these newcomers as easily as the other three.

“We must move,” he said again, before sliding through the dust and debris with an inhuman grace.

McCoy stumbled after him, stepping over crumbled walls and dead bodies, trying not to focus on the blood soaking into his uniform. He just kept moving, although with Kirk's body weighing him down, McCoy's momentum was severely hampered. But he didn't dwell on the problem, just focused on following Spock. They just had to get out of this building, back into the open air, and then the Enterprise could beam them aboard and he could get Jim to sickbay...

Spock's phaser was firing again. Through the murky dust McCoy could see the new bodies littering the ground. “Nice shooting,” he complimented. Spock had certainly cleared a path to the stairwell with ruthless efficiency.

The building gave another fierce quake. McCoy stumbled and hit the wall. The collision got a groan out of Kirk. McCoy smirked grimly. “Still alive then...”

Spock was there, helping McCoy to right himself. “Are you injured Doctor?”

“No. Just wish these damn idiots would stick to killing each other and leave the damn building standing. Some of us are trying to escape.”

Spock's eyebrow twitched. “Quite.”

McCoy nodded towards the stairs. “Let's...”

Eyes darting, Spock raised his phaser and fired over McCoy's shoulder. McCoy felt the heat of the shot pass him. However, he gladly took the mild burn when he heard another body drop down behind him.

“We must not waste more time,” was all Spock had to say before disappearing into the stairwell.

McCoy hurried after him. “Thanks,” he called.

“You are welcome,” Spock answered. He was already a flight up, eyes and phaser focused ahead. “I believe there are only five floors between us and the roof. We must...”

Shouts and yells came from below, followed by a steady stream of gunfire. Glass exploded from ruined lights and more concrete turned to dust. However, the volley was intimidation rather than anything aimed to kill, but it riled McCoy nonetheless. “Damn idiots! They don't care about anyone, they're just killing whatever moves. They're probably killing their allies too. Who needs an enemy when your own side is that thoughtless?”

“In a battle, one rarely stops to think.”

McCoy forced himself up the stairs, ignoring how much it hurt to run up them with so much extra weight. “So what, armies often taken out their own soldiers because they don't stop to think about who they're shooting at?”

“Consider your confusing environment.” Quaking, painfully noisy, dim, dusty, hot... “Taking down a colleague, a friend, would be easily done here.”

McCoy shook his head. “I can't believe we're having this debate right now.”

“I can,” came a voice from behind McCoy's shoulder.

“You're supposed to be unconscious,” McCoy observed.

“An' miss all the fun? Nah... 'Sides, can't sleep wi'all this noise... Who started the war? Was it me?” Kirk laughed, a breathy sound that sent a shudder down McCoy's spine. “Don' tell Command...”

“May I recommend silence Captain,” Spock called from ahead. “I believe we do not need to go as high as the roof and I do not wish to alert the enemy to our presence when I open this door.”

“Uh huh.”

Spock kicked a door down (“yeah, that won't alert anyone,” McCoy called out. Spock ignored him) and sunlight, bright and beautiful, burst into the darkness. “I do believe the outer wall of this level has been destroyed,” he called down, his calm voice cutting through the shrieking alarms. “The Enterprise should be able to beam us out.”

McCoy nodded. “I'm coming up. Cover me.”

“Understood.”

“Ready Jim?”

If there had been a response, angry shouts and gunshots blotted it out. People were coming from above and below and Spock could only take out so many. McCoy ran, bullets chasing his pounding feet, and didn't dare look up or back. He just focused on the steps. Five, four, three, two... His aching legs didn't make it. He tripped up the final step. Kirk's dead-weight pinned him down.

Feet, moving fast up and down the stairs. If McCoy didn't reach the door in time, he and Jim would be surrounded – trapped. There were shouts, followed by bullets streaming through the air as the two opposing sides traded fire.

Stuck in the middle, Leonard McCoy did not panic.

He reached around Kirk's waist and grabbed his phaser. Already set to kill, McCoy aimed at the people coming from below. He trusted Spock to take care of the others.

It was over in mere seconds, their would-be killers piled on top of each other, all dead. Spock hurried down to where McCoy and Kirk were. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, yeah. Help me,” gasped McCoy, still breathless from exertion. “Get him onto my back.”

Still on guard, Spock did as he was asked. His Vulcan strength enabled him to lift Kirk with ease and he settled his friend on McCoy's back. It was odd to see the Captain in a position Spock believed humans saved for their children, but he did not pass comment. When his hands came back bloody, something seemed to pass through his eyes but before McCoy could tag it with any emotion, Spock's detachment was back in place. “Are you ready Doctor?”

He winced as he stood. “Let's go.”

Out of the stairwell, it became clear that a huge chunk of the building had been blown away. Wind tore at their clothing and fires still smouldered from the wreckage. If McCoy looked down, he could see the splayed innards of several lower levels. Next to him, Spock was already on his communicator, hailing the Enterprise.

That was when McCoy saw them coming: tiny in the distance but growing rapidly. Fighter jets...

“I hev you!” Chekov declared triumphantly. “I can easily compensate for ze neutral ground's interference. Don't move.”

The jets fired.

“Torpedoes,” Spock calmly deduced.

“Almost zere!”

“They're firing torpedoes at us and we're just standing here?” McCoy could see them now, four shining weapons screaming through the air. His heart pounded, his brain screamed at him to get the hell out of the goddamn torpedoes way idiot! “There's not enough...”

“Energizing!”

As their bodies dematerialized, McCoy was certain at least one torpedo flew threw him. But when he opened his eyes and found himself safely aboard the Enterprise, he allowed himself to breathe again.

Spock was already moving, stepping off the transporter pad. “Do you require assistance getting to sickbay?” He asked.

“No I've got him.” But McCoy took one step and felt his knees begin to buckle, Jim's weight too much for him now the adrenaline was wearing off. Spock needed no further explanation and he lifted Kirk over his shoulder. Without words, they hurried to sickbay.

Once there, orders barked at his staff and treatment beginning, McCoy spared a moment to turn to Spock and offer the First Officer a brief grin. “You're a good man to have around in a crisis.”

“You have also proven yourself to be calm under fire.”

Leonard McCoy did not panic.

“I'll get the Captain back to you as soon as I can. You'd better go tell Command Cuano's a lost cause.”

Spock nodded. “Keep me informed.”

“Of course.”

Spock left and McCoy, face still smudged with the dust of a warring alien world, turned to his friend.

“Let's get you patched up Jim.”