Restock at the space station orbiting Ouroboros IV. Absolutely no qualms about that, Scotty thought to himself, taking a quick break from remotely re-aligning the ship's dilithium crystals to take a quick swig out of his hip flask.

    As always, the first to go during attacks on the enterprise were security and engineering. There was a bit of an urban legend going around, a rumor that there was a vengeful spirit aboard the ship that targeted people wearing red specifically. Thoughts on why ranged from a distressed bride who'd been murdered on her wedding day, to the ghost of a Phænesian, who's race was known for becoming violent when seeing that specific hue. One of the senior security personnel even claimed it was a malevolent  nine-dimensional being using them in some sort of big cosmic joke (although nobody really believed him, that guy was one hairline fracture from cracking).

    What this meant, in summary, was that scotty was now working double shifts, getting very little sleep, and experiencing mind auditory hallucinations. So a few days of shore leave could not have been more welcome, as far as scotty was concerned.

    "Attention all personnel," The all-too familiar voice of the captain echoed through the engine room. "We will be docking at fourteen-hundred hours, prepare for deplaning."

    "Ah, thank christ."

    A Captain and a Vulcan walk briskly through a ship corridor "Are you certain this is a wise decision, captain? We are still unsure of Theseus's capabilities. Exposing him to a large and chaotic setting would not be-"

    "Logical? Oh, come on, Spock, this guy has been locked up, pretty much completely alone for close to three days. He's done with quarantine, he's proven that he has no ill intent, and at this point, he's practically clawing at the walls."

Spock opened his mouth to speak, Jim cut him off "This is exactly what he needs to blow off some steam! Plus, Bones told me he's a bit of a history and culture nut, and the station has the largest databank on this side of the galaxy.  Wouldn't letting him take a breath of fresh air be the logical thing to do? We could also just, y'know... drop him off..."

    "Space stations do not have 'fresh air' captain. Air is circulated, in this instance through a central ventilation shaft."

    "Figure of speech, Spock." Jim smirked, finding the quirks of his alien friend mildly adorable. "If it makes you feel better, you can accompany him."

    Fuck, space messes with your sense of time. As Theseus was rudely awakened from what he thought was a regular night's sleep by Spock and Kirk, he made a cursory glance at the digital clock on his wall, expecting to say something like 'it's four in the fucking morning, assholes.' Instead, the clock read 13:57, which he was pretty sure meant almost two pm in military time.

    Theseus blinked a few times "Uh... Does this mean I can leave now?"

    "Yes!" Kirk said with a smile as he turned on the fluorescent lights "Even better, we're just about to dock at a space station, so you'll get to stretch your legs a little."

    "Sounds like you're all too eager to get rid of me, Captain." Theseus frowned.

    "Oh! No! of course not, I just meant-"

    "Relax, I'm just fuckin' with ya." Theseus waved him off, untangling himself from his blanket cocoon. "Does this mean I get to change out of this grey atrocity? It's really not my style."

    Both of them ignored that comment, Kirk more uncomfortably so.

    "I will be accompanying you throughout the duration of this excursion. If you do anything that may pose a threat to anyone aboard the station, know that I will not hesitate to stun you."

    Theseus shrugged "Fair 'nuff."

    The three men stood awkwardly for a more-than-slightly-uncomfortable amount of time.

    "Right!" Kirk clapped his hands together, slicing through the tension "I've got captain shit to do. Have fun, you two!"

    Despite what the captain had suggested, chaperoning Theseus did not make Spock 'feel better'. He kept asking questions the vulcan had no idea how to answer. Like right now, for example.

    "Ok so, vulcans are a completely logical species, devoid of emotion, right? So how come they play music?" Theseus sat across from Spock at a table, eating some sort of crunchy snack. Very loudly, "I mean, music is inherently an emotional practice, otherwise it's just... specific sound. So why play music?"

    Spock raised an eyebrow "I do not remember this information being conveyed to you. How did you acquire it?"

    Theseus shrugged "The music thingy on the computer? It had six vulcan stations. I got bored, and your database is horrifically lacking in the stuff I liked, so I browsed a bit." A pause. Crunch. "Relax, dude. I swear I'm not trying to kill you."   

    "That still does not explain how you came to possess knowledge on what a vulcan even is. If your claim that you hail from early twenty-first century earth is to be believed, then you could not possibly know any information regarding my species."

    "I... don't know if I can explain that right now? It's kinda... janky." The human rotated an open fingered hand back and forth, in a gesture that seemed superficially similar to a wave.

    "'Janky'? How so?"

The human took a deep breath, "Fuck, man. It's just... weird, and kinda stupid, and definitely creepy. Not to mention I really don't wanna think about its implications."

Theseus had begun to sweat, and was rubbing his eyes repeatedly, two early signs of a human panic attack. Spock concluded that continuing this line of inquiry within the current parameters had a high likelihood of causing a dangerous situation.

"I see." Spock paused, thinking on how to change the subject "Well, the notion that vulcans experience no emotion is fundamentally incorrect. We simply chose not to feel emotion."

"What?" the human removed his hands from his face "Oh, right. The music."

"Affirmative. Vulcan music is simply an outlet for said emotion. To use a human expression, it is how some choose to... 'blow off steam'."

Theseus seemed satisfied. "Well, I guess that makes sense."

"... Not to mention the fact that I've been slammed with patients for the better part of the last week! And then, some bastard comes into my office worried he's dying of andraxian flu. So I order a deck-wide quarantine... "

Jim was regretting telling Bones he could talk to him. He knew Bones liked to complain, but shit, this was just too much information about his crew. He'd focused his eyes on a point just to the left of Bones's head, nodding when it seemed appropriate but otherwise only half listening.

"Oh, and that's not even the best part!" Bones chuckled dryly "It wasn't even close to a strain of any. known. flu. It was herpes! Herpes, Jim. So now I've gotta have a talk with the younger staff, which is not going to be fun, because... Jim. Are you even listening to me?"

    "What?" Kirk blinked "yes, of course I'm listening! I said I would. You don't trust me?"

"Sure, Jim. What was I just talking about?"

Jim's mouth opened and closed a few times, scraping the dredges of his mind for some sort of memory as to what Bones had just said.

Thankfully, he never got to answer, because before he could say anything stupid, the lights began to flicker. And then, from somewhere to his right, an explosion knocked him unconscious.