Gigi Sinclair

I couldn't take food from the female. It was our job to provide for her, so that she would be strong enough to bear young when we arrived at Urquat. The survival of the pack-of the species-depended on it. I didn't know how our pack had become so small. I could remember a time when it had been much larger, with many females and subordinate males, some even subordinate to me. But the memories were vague, and seemed to be getting less and less clear. I didn't concern myself with it. Only the present mattered, and getting to Urquat.

The leader knew this, as well. I didn't understand why he kept wasting so much time with the stranger, the one wearing the white skins. I considered taking the female and heading for Urquat without him, but of course, I could never do that. Survival was hard enough already. I had no desire to try life as an outcast.

We slowly made our way to the city. After all that walking, I was hungry enough to forget my place, and to challenge the leader when we came across a food source.

I didn't succeed, of course. The leader was stronger and larger than I was. It was how he had become the leader in the first place. He knocked me to the ground, and the look in his eyes reminded me that my position in the pack was tenuous. I was of no real use to anyone, and he could kill me or cast me out without damaging the group. Only the leader and the female were important.

So I surrendered the food to him. Better to go hungry now and live to see another day than to be killed, either outright or through banishment. I growled to myself when he offered the food to the stranger, but the stranger refused. I didn't understand why-the stranger had been walking, too, and surely it was hungry-but I was pleased. I was even more pleased when the leader retreated to eat alone.

I gave him a moment, then began a hesitant approach. Making sure to keep my head bowed, I crawled over to him. From the corner of my downcast eyes, I saw him jerk his head, and moving in beside him, I began to cram grubs into my mouth, trying to eat as much as possible before he changed his mind.

Despite this charity, I knew he hadn't forgiven me, and I knew what was coming next. When the leader had eaten his fill, he tossed the shell onto the ground and pushed me down. I didn't fight him. It would only have prolonged the inevitable, and I had brought this on myself. I had challenged his dominance, and he needed to re-establish it in the eyes of the pack. Well, in the eyes of the female and I. The stranger didn't matter.

The leader sat back, growling, and I obediently rolled onto my stomach. The female, seeing we were occupied, scuttled over, grabbed the discarded shell, and returned to her place in the trees, scrabbling for any scrap of food we may have missed. From this position, I could also see the stranger sitting quietly on a rock, watching. I felt the cool night air hit my body as the leader removed my skins, roughly but without ruining them, for which I was grateful. Although I suppose I could always have challenged the stranger for those white skins.

The stranger's eyes grew wide and it looked quickly away as the leader entered me. Although it was meant to be humiliating, I found myself enjoying it. I couldn't remember if I always did, or if it was just this time, but the feel of the strong, powerful leader on top of me soon led to the release of my own seed. He released his shortly after, filling my body and marking me, inside and out. As he pulled out, panting, he bit down on my neck, not hard enough to injure, but enough to remind me of my place.

As if I could ever forget.

If the stomach cramps didn't kill me, the embarrassment would. I had never been so humiliated in my life, not even when I lost the communicator and nearly ended up executed for it. The entire ship had seen me, Lieutenant Self-Control, the man who has, if I do say so, made an art out of being repressed, running around in a panic, like a frightened animal. No, not "like." There was no simile about it. I was a frightened animal.

Phlox was less than sympathetic. He treated my headache, joked about my gastrointestinal agony, and asked if there was anything else I needed seeing to. There was, but I wasn't about to mention it to him, or anyone else on board. As far as I could tell, the other crewmembers thought my strange walk was another after-effect of being transformed into a semi-aware feral creature. Which it was, indirectly.

Grunting, I climbed down from the biobed, the pain in my lower back (lower, lower back) briefly distracting me from the pain in my stomach. I was hobbling towards the door when Captain Archer came in.

"How are you feeling, Lieutenant?" He looked so concerned, I had no doubt he remembered exactly what had happened when we were in our alternate forms. There was no reason why he shouldn't. I remembered all of it vividly.

"Not bad, sir," I lied politely. He didn't look any less guilty. I glanced down, a quick reminder that he was the captain and not the "leader", and asked: "How about yourself?"

He paused. For a moment, I was certain he was going to apologize, and all I could think was, "I hope Phlox doesn't hear." Because he would ask, and I would have to tell him, and I would much rather just forget. But Captain Archer didn't apologize. Instead, he said: "Getting there."

I could have stayed there and traded polite lies with him all day, but he mentioned that T'Pol and Hoshi had taken a day off, and suggested I do the same. For the first time ever, I agreed. At least being in my cabin would keep me away from the sympathetic, but nevertheless intrigued and often amused, looks of the crew.

As I headed out, the captain grabbed my arm and held it, tightly. For a moment, my mind went back to the planet, to "the leader", a creature Monkey Malcolm had feared, respected, submitted to, and…desired.

I was halfway out the door before I realized I'd automatically bowed my head as I left. Old habits die hard. And I guess it only takes a few hours to get into a habit.

I went back to my cabin, collapsing on my bed as soon as I arrived. Painful as the physical repercussions of my little jaunt into The Wild Kingdom were, the mental repercussions were far worse. My headache and my stomachache and my sore arse would heal, and eventually, I'd forget about them.

What I couldn't forget was that my alter ego had loved having hard, uninhibited, literally animal sex with the leader. In front of Hoshi and T'Pol.

I hadn't seen either of them since they arrived back on the ship, and I was grateful for small mercies. I had to be, since I had bugger all else to be grateful about. I'd spent two years neatly ignoring my embarrassing, increasingly persistent and entirely inappropriate feelings for the captain. Now, I couldn't ignore it. I got a vivid reminder every time I moved.

***

It had been so long since I'd had a day off, I didn't know what to do with it.

Not that this was an award-winner in the history of days off. I woke up curled up in the middle of the bed, the blanket clutched around me protectively and my legs moving like a dog's. Things only got worse from there.

My stomach felt a bit better, so I thought I'd try one of Phlox's bland protein shakes, the ones I lived on after every surgery. It stayed down (and up), so I thought things might be improving. Until the door chimed and my head snapped up, my entire body seizing like I had come face to face with my worst nightmare.

Which was just around the corner. Firmly ignoring my very insistent instincts, I forced myself to answer the door to Captain Archer.

Immediately, I straightened up. There was a worried expression on the captain's face that only got worse when I arranged myself at attention, my hands clasped behind my back. "Malcolm." He reached out as if he was going to touch me, but stopped before he made contact. He clenched his fist and brought his arm back to his side. "How are you feeling?" He finally said.

"I'm fine," I answered, automatically.

"No…aftershocks?" It was a strange word to use, and one that didn't help me out one bit. My treacherous mind, the same one that had frozen at the sound of a doorbell, began to helpfully supply me with other situations in which Captain Archer and I could enjoy aftershocks, ones that didn't involve devolution and digestive problems.

"There have been a few," I admitted, when I regained control.

"Did you have the dreams?"

"Dreams?"

"I guess not." He sighed, staring at the carpet. "About Urquat. And those bastards with the flame throwers." His eyes came up, looking into my own. For a split-second, I cast them down, then brought them up again. "I woke up in the middle of the night, and I was completely terrified because I wasn't with you and Hoshi."

I didn't know what to say, so I fell back on the all-purpose: "Sir."

"I didn't want to be alone. It didn't feel…right," the captain continued. I shifted uncomfortably. Despite how I felt, how I'd always felt, he was still the captain, and part of me was screaming that it was inappropriate for him to talk to a subordinate like this. That was the part that didn't remember the feel of the animal captain fucking me into the forest floor.

"You managed yourself admirably, Captain," I replied, because I didn't know what else to say. Even to me, it sounded hopelessly sycophantic, like a brown-nosing school prefect.

"I treated you terribly."

"It wasn't your fault." It wasn't. Captain Archer was the leader, I was the subordinate. I had accepted it. At the time, it had been instinctual, the natural order of things. Now, I wondered if anyone had ever really looked at how closely military society resembled the societies of wild animals.

The captain looked at me so long and hard that I had to glance away, not through any residual reflex but because I was worried that, if I kept looking into his eyes, I would give myself away.

"I would never hurt you, Malcolm." He said it simply, like he was stating an obvious fact.

"You didn't, sir."

"When I lost you down there…" From the corner of my eye, I saw his tongue come out to lick his lips. Out of nowhere, a bead of sweat appeared on the back of my neck and began a slow, meandering voyage down my back. "I mourned you. Not like a subordinate or a dependant or whatever. Like a…mate."

I swallowed hard. "Sir…"

"Malcolm, just let me say this, OK?" I glanced at him, which was a mistake. His expression was intense, just like it had been when he knocked me to the ground over that pile of grubs. "I care about you. I always have. Even when we were…down there, I did, only I couldn't. But I did." It had been more than a year since the gazelle speech, but his eloquence hadn't improved. I tried to be inwardly scornful, but I couldn't. He sighed heavily. "Things were a lot simpler down there."

I completely agreed. If you overlooked the virus that had ravaged our bodies almost beyond repair, and the trigger-happy aliens who wanted to brutally murder us, and the intense driving ambition to find a city that was destroyed before we got there, life had been very simple.

There was a lengthy silence. Finally, Captain Archer said: "I can do better, Malcolm."

I wasn't sure what he meant, but I couldn't ask. This entire conversation was impossible. He didn't know what he was saying; he'd admitted himself that his brain was still addled, and mine was no better. The only thing I could say was: "If you don't mind, sir, I'd like to take a shower." He looked at me a moment, then shook his head.

"Of course. Sorry to take up so much of your time." Then he was gone.

By mid-afternoon, I was bored senseless. Finally deciding to risk the open stares and poorly concealed gaping of my crewmates, I ventured out to the gym.

I hoped it would be empty, but of course, it wasn't. That would have been too easy. Hoshi was there, working with the punching bag. Her technique was good, but at the moment, I was too preoccupied with my own humiliation to feel any pride. I thought about turning around and leaving, but she saw me and said: "Malcolm!" And it was too late.

I went into the gym instead and sat on the end of the weight bench. Hoshi turned to face me, flexing her taped-up hands.

"How are you doing, Malcolm?" I wished people would stop asking me that. It made me wonder how they were expecting me to feel.

"Surviving," I answered, lying back.

"Have you spoken to the captain?"

I sat up again, fast enough to make myself dizzy, another great aspect to a fantastic day. If things got any worse, I would end up with terminal pneumonia and a lengthy letter from my father, detailing yet again exactly how I had let down the entire family including those who had died in the Battle of Trafalgar, before the day was out.

"Why?"

Hoshi shrugged. "I thought he'd speak to you, that's all. After what happened…"

"Nothing happened, Hoshi, so I'd really appreciate it if you just stopped asking inane questions and minded your own bloody business."

Hoshi looked at me like I'd lost my mind. Which I very possibly had. In fact, I was sure I remembered leaving it in the jungle, along with my dignity and self-respect.

"Fine." Hoshi snapped, compressing her lips into a thin line. I was struck by the sudden, incongruous memory of her, Captain Archer and I huddled in the underbrush, starting at the sound of T'Pol's communicator. "I just thought it was time at least one of you woke up. Life's too short, Malcolm, especially here. I thought you of all people would know that." She went back to beating the living hell out of the punching bag. I attempted to lift the weights, realized my arms weren't quite up to scratch yet, and nearly crushed myself to death.

I decided not to risk the mess hall. The way things were going, I was liable to choke on a chicken bone or something. Instead, I went back to my quarters and sat, reading over a weapons journal that I'd been sent before we entered the Expanse, until the doorbell rang again.

I had never been so popular. I yelled, "Come in," expecting Trip, who I was sure had been working on a series of snappy, animalistic one-liners since he got back from the surface. Which was fine. I'd been working on a few snappy one-liners of my own, most to do with "neural node stimulation." I was poised to deliver the first when the door slid open to reveal the neural node stimulator herself.

"Sub-commander T'Pol." I stood up automatically.

"Please be seated, Lieutenant." She glanced at the carpet. "I am not here in an official capacity."

I sat down, too shocked to do anything else. She clasped her hands behind her back. For a brief, insane moment, I wondered if she was going to offer me some of those "relaxation" techniques. Instead, she said: "In my experience, humans are one of a very few species who attach strong emotions to the act of sexual intercourse."

If I'd been drinking tea, I would have sprayed it across the cabin. It was lucky that I'd finished eating some time earlier. The carpet was already tea-stained from the time Trip had told me he was pregnant.

Instead of spraying, I coughed. T'Pol continued, as if I hadn't interrupted. "While I have observed some benefits to this emotional attachment, by and large it adds unnecessary complications to what should be a simple biological process." She paused, as if she wanted an answer. If she did, she was disappointed, because I had absolutely no idea what to say. "I believe you feel an acute discomfort regarding the mating that occurred between you and the captain when you were both in alternate form."

I shifted in my chair. She was right, of course, in more ways than one. "This is not a logical reaction," she continued. "It is not your fault. Guilt and embarrassment are natural byproducts of the emotions humans insist on placing on the act of intercourse."

"Sub-commander, was there a point you wished to make?" Because if she had come here just to tell me off for being embarrassed I'd been fucked by the captain in front of two of my crewmates, she was even more cold-blooded than anyone had given her credit for. Pathological, almost. I'd have to think about revoking her weapons certification.

"Yes," she conceded. "While the virus overtook the vast majority of your systems, you and the others retained something of your prior selves. It is how Dr. Phlox was able to return you to normal. If you had been entirely consumed by the virus, you would have been lost." I knew that. Phlox had already told us. "I witnessed this for myself when you and the captain were engaged in intercourse."

"I don't remember you watching all that closely." Not that I'd wanted her to, but it annoyed me that she was acting all "more mature and well-balanced than thou" about it. She had her own hangups about sex, I was well aware. I remembered the incident with Tolaris, even if she'd conveniently forgotten it.

"I did not wish to intrude on your privacy." But it was fine to barge in here and start berating me. "In any case, that is immaterial. I observed a sufficient length of time to determine that there were certain characteristics of yourself and Captain Archer evident in the creatures as they were sexually intimate."

"What are you saying, Sub-commander?"

She raised an eyebrow, for the first time since she'd arrived in my cabin. Something of a record for her. "I am saying, Lieutenant Reed, that what Ensign Sato and I witnessed was not the act of emotionless intercourse, as may have been expected between members of that species. Nor was it uniquely a symbolic act designed to reinforce group hierarchy."

I snorted. "I'm afraid you're mistaken, Sub-commander. That's exactly what it was…"

Another eyebrow raise. Now, she was apparently going for the opposite record. "Lieutenant, I am inexperienced in the matter of human attraction, but even to me, it is obvious that you and the captain have a more than professional interest in each other. By coming here, I wished to inform you that I have meditated on this point and, based on my study of humans, I believe it would bring further harm to the captain's morale and to the safety of the ship if you persist in ignoring this attraction. However, the decision is yours to make." She inclined her head slightly. "I hope you will consider what I have said. Good night, Lieutenant." Then she was gone, leaving me to stare at a closed door.

Apparently, my ill-conceived and fantastically inappropriate lust for the captain was obvious, so obvious that T'Pol, hardly the matchmaker of the crew, had noticed. And, apparently, given us her blessing.

And 'us' was the operative word. Because, according to T'Pol, Captain Archer returned the lust that was, arguably, even more inappropriate for him.

I turned this over in my mind, trying to get used to it. I tried to think when Captain Archer had acted in a way that showed he thought of me as more than a subordinate officer. Apart, obviously, from that time, several hours ago, when he'd come to my quarters and all but declared it.

I couldn't think of many examples. The captain had always questioned my judgement, and did so even more frequently since we'd entered the Expanse. He berated me openly, in front of the crew and even in front of the MACOs. We had nothing in common, no shared experiences, like he had with Trip. On the rare occasions we were in decon together, he went about his business briskly and efficiently. He'd never once, for example, let his hands linger on my back. Much as I may have liked him to.

On the other hand, I admitted to myself, he did touch me a lot in every other context. He'd saved my life, more than once, he'd given me a birthday party, and he touched me every chance he got. A hand on the shoulder, a pat on the back, the arm squeeze in sickbay. He had even, on one occasion, stroked my hair, although that was partly because it was covered in microscopic particles of plastic from a console that had exploded in my immediate vicinity.

These thoughts led me back to images, I wasn't sure if they were memories, of the leader and the Monkey Malcolm grooming each other. The Monkey Malcolm enjoyed the feel of the leader's hands picking through his hair, and he enjoyed the feeling of community, of being part of a group, that such an act inferred.

More than that, though, Monkey Malcolm enjoyed that it was the leader who was performing the act. He admired the leader-I wasn't sure if "admire" was the right word, but it was the closest I could articulate-because he was strong, because he protected the pack, because he would do whatever it took to get them to Urquat. Monkey Malcolm, I remembered, got angry with the leader's methods sometimes, especially when it came to wasting so much time with T'Pol, but he still respected him, and not just because he had to.

By the time I realized this, I looked around and found myself halfway down the corridor, with no idea of how I'd gotten there. The logical, human part of my brain told me to turn back around and go back to my quarters before I ran into someone and had to parry concerned glances and sympathetic noises. Or before I went to Captain Archer's quarters and did something irreparably stupid.

The other part, though, the one that had brought me here in the first place, told me I was stupid to think so much. Captain Archer was right, that part of me insisted. It had been simpler on the planet, and it could be simple here, too.

I believed that until I reached the captain's quarters, when I was seized by panic. This was insane. I was a fully evolved human, a Starfleet lieutenant, not some kind of instinct-driven lower primate. I knew why it was a bad idea to ring the doorbell. I could explain in three languages, including semaphore, why it was a bad idea, but nevertheless, every fibre of my being wanted to ring the bell.

I was standing there like an idiot, my arm outstretched and my hand hovering over the door chime, when the door opened. I put down my arm quickly and looked at the captain.

It wasn't late, only about 2100, but he looked like he'd been sleeping. Not very well, judging from the rumpled T-shirt and shorts and the disarranged hair, but then I remembered him telling me about nightmares. The sight of him stirred something in me, although I couldn't tell if it was Lieutenant Reed or Monkey Malcolm reacting to it.

He looked at me carefully, frowning a little.

"Malcolm. I knew you were here." He blinked. My Starfleet personality wanted to discuss this, at great length thoroughly examining all possible repercussions, but that personality was quickly drowned out. The remaining aspects of Monkey Malcolm launched me forward, put my arms around the captain, and kissed him.

Some hours later, I awoke with a start from a vivid, realistic dream of Urquat, my breathing shallow and my body tense. I looked around in a panic, unsure why my eyes weren't adapting to the low light quickly enough for me to make out any trees or rocks. Then I inhaled deeply and caught the reassuring scent of the leader. I glanced down and saw Jonathan sleeping beside me. Sighing with relief, I lay back down, snuggling into his embrace. He tightened his arms around me and within minutes, I was asleep again, completely comfortable and entirely at home.

Call it animal magnetism. Or maybe a Darwinian revelation.