Point of Origin, part 6

As much as I hate the BBC versions of Moriarty and Irene Adler, I do still love Sherlock and John for the most part. So I'm belatedly trying to finish my pon farr fic. This chapter turned out long, so I'll post the sex scene in part 7 instead.

Fandom: BBC Sherlock/Star Trek
Story: Point of Origin
Pairing: Sherlock/John
Warnings: slash, interspecies snogging, PG-13

When John came to, he wasn't in the car anymore, and he wasn't holding Sherlock either. He was lying on a hospital bed, with bright lights above him and some kind of electronic beeping sound nearby. He wasn't wearing a hospital gown, though, and still had all his clothes on. There was some woman in blue scrubs standing near him with a hypospray. A cap covered the top of her head and ears, but he could tell already that she was Vulcan from her pointed eyebrows and the slightly green tint to her skin.

"Sherlock?" John tried to speak and sit up, but he felt dizzy.

The woman pressed his arm and said, "Please stay calm and lie down again."

"John," came Sherlock's voice from nearby, so John turned his head to the side.

Sherlock was lying on his own bed and he was reaching an arm out to John, but Mycroft stood between their beds and was restraining his brother. "Sherlock, let the doctor finish examining John. You want to make sure he's all right, don't you?"

"Yes." Sherlock reluctantly withdrew his arm, but he still looked at John with longing and anxiety. "John."

"Sherlock," John sighed in return. He asked Mycroft, "Where are we? What happened? Did I faint?" Maybe he was sick after all.

Mycroft looked slightly askance as he said, "No, um, I was merely taking a precaution so that you would be unconscious while we transported to the ship. No need to show you more technology than necessary."

"Ship?" John asked and looked around him. Although he heard a pulsing sound much like an amplified heartbeat, he didn't feel any rocking motion like he would expect on board a ship. The room was full of similar beds, but they were empty. He could see that there were electronic panels above them with flashing bars and lights, much like an instrument panel with gauges. But as he couldn't read Vulcan, he had no idea what the symbols meant. He did think that the pulsing sound was coming from the panel on his own bed.

Mycroft asked the woman, "Your conclusions, Dr. Selar?"

She was now holding a different device in front of her, something computerized and box-like, and she appeared to be examining John with it. She occasionally glanced between her handheld device and the electronic panel above the bed. "Well, Myvock, I can only compare his tricorder readings to the limited data on humans that we have obtained already. His readings are somewhat elevated, and he is running a slight fever, but whether this is from stress or arousal I cannot be sure. His brainwave patterns do not appear to be very abnormal for his species. I do not think the mindmeld has damaged him, though I will continue to monitor him closely throughout your brother's pon farr."

"Then you do think it safe to go through with the mating?"

"Yes, I think it should be risked. If it is not effective for either or both of them, then we'll know it quickly and start seeking an alternative treatment before a further crisis."

"Very well. Thank you, doctor. Wife?" He turned, and John saw Anthea approach from a corner of the room that had not been in his view.

She had her Blackberry in hand, and she said, "They have the room ready."

"Good. Have them send an escort and make sure the hallways are clear."

"Yes, sir."

While they waited, Mycroft sat on a chair and leaned on his umbrella.

Dr. Selar walked to Sherlock's bed and scanned him with the tricorder as well. "Yes, definite symptoms that you haven't shown for many cycles, Sherlock. Since you were on Vulcan, in fact. And to think, you said your regimen would some day free us all from pon farr."

Sherlock pouted, then murmured, "There is no cure for love."

Dr. Selar raised an eyebrow and smiled slightly. "Speaking like a human."

Sherlock ignored her and reached for John again. "May I touch him?"

"Yes, so long as you avoid another mindmeld."

So Sherlock sat up and decided to actually climb onto the other bed with John.

Dr. Selar got out of his way, but scanned them both now, even as Sherlock kissed John intensely.

"Mmm, Sherlock." John kissed him back, but tried to stop Sherlock from being too familiar with the rest of his body. "Wait." He didn't want to be aroused in front of all these people.

Dr. Selar assisted by making Sherlock sit up instead of lying down and cuddling with John. She cleared her throat and said without embarrassment, "Better than your regimen, isn't it, Sherlock? Besides, pon farr should not be eliminated except in an emergency. Doing so on a routine basis for your entire life is not healthy. Nature devised this fever for a reason."

Sherlock just shrugged and held John in his arms.

John didn't want to continue snogging in front of the others, so he asked, "What does she mean, regimen?"

Anthea answered, "A regimen of drugs and meditation to suppress the symptoms of pon farr. Sherlock's own invention."

Mycroft added, "Yes, he wanted to eliminate the need to reproduce every seven years. He did not want to 'be slave to his hormones or an arranged marriage.'"

"Arranged marriage?" John asked.

Mycroft nodded. "You must appreciate, John, that the moment one suffers pon farr is not the ideal moment at which one is capable of choosing a mate rationally. Thus it is arranged ahead of time, and the couple is bonded during a betrothal ceremony, so that they will not be complete strangers when they do mate."

"Oh," John said, though he still didn't understand it.

Sherlock clung to John and nuzzled him. "Don't want anyone else. Just John."

Mycroft said sarcastically, "How very prescient of you to know, even as a child, that you were destined for a human mate."

Anthea smiled. "It's romantic."

"And illogical."

"And human."

Dr. Selar smiled as if she found the banter between husband and wife charming.

Just then, a door whooshed open and two uniformed guards stepped in the room; they too wore face masks and surgical caps to hide their pointed ears.

"Ah, your escort is here," Mycroft said, rising.

Dr. Selar helped John and Sherlock to get down from the bed. Sherlock seemed a little unsteady on his feet, but John wasn't dizzy anymore.

She scanned Sherlock one more time and gestured, "These two will take you to quarters where you both may mate and hopefully break the blood fever. Try not to stand too close to them, lest you infect them or they infect you with communicable diseases."

At last! John was eager for some privacy, and he didn't object to Sherlock taking his hand as they approached the door. "Quarters" surely meant bedroom, didn't it?

Mycroft added, "Speaking of which, we have provided sterile supplies in the bedroom, so do use protection. It is unlikely that you can actually reproduce, but it is best not to risk transmission of diseases from one species to another."

Dr. Selar nodded, "Yes, we would not know what effects these would have on your species. Let us just monitor how you progress with the pon farr for now."

"Monitor?" John asked, wondering if there would be cameras in the room. Mycroft did say that humans and Vulcans had never mated before.

Dr. Selar explained, "Our ship's computer can monitor each of your life signs to inform us if your heart rate is dangerous, or Sherlock's fever isn't breaking. We will only interrupt you if there is an emergency alert."

"Oh," John considered whether he trusted this woman not to lie to him, but Sherlock squeezed his hand reassuringly, so he shrugged it off.

The door whooshed open again, so John and Sherlock followed the escorts outside.

Anthea said, "Good luck!" to them as the door closed behind them.

---

End of part 6. Continue to part 7.

Dr. Selar is the name of the mostly unseen Vulcan doctor in Star Trek: The Next Generation who presumably works a shift that Beverly Crusher doesn't. She's not necessarily the same Doctor here, but maybe a relative. The regimen of drugs and meditation is what Tuvok used during Voyager, when he was apart from his wife.