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It only takes him like six weeks or something to get used to the bling to the point where it stops freaking him out sporadically, which Hikaru is going to take as a win. Sure, that’s six weeks longer than it takes to get used to having Jim around all the time and, like, five-and-a-half weeks longer than it takes to have Jim admitting publicly Top Gun is so the shit, but Hikaru’s been bling-phobic since Asphorax.
Fuck what he’s told, man, that ring could totally kill him in his sleep.
What really wins him over is how he gets to use it like a threat; they’re on some dustbowl of a colony and the locals seem less than willing to let Jim leave and this time when Hikaru pulls the pocket ace of brizzah, he’s got that eye-gouger ring to wave. No surprise they let Jim go quickly; Hikaru’s ring is scary.
Jim thinks it’s hilarious but Jim’s ring is not so bad, smaller and darker and more self-contained. Hikaru’s ring looks like the wild metal spike-things are trying to escape, like just flee in fear of the gleaming stone set in the middle, and he can only call those blueish bits feathers; his ring is like a world of nightmares right there on his hand. Jim’s sort of looks Federation-made, a bit unusual compared to Hikaru’s dad’s ring but not sentient or anything.
Nyota says it’s unnerving, how easily Hikaru says brizzah these days, and Nyota would know, but as Hikaru keeps pointing out to her, it beats the shit out of the alternative. Botany’s nice and all but Hikaru belongs on the bridge.
And maybe that’s arguable to some people but it just isn’t to Nyota.
In retrospect, Hikaru’s going to think he has it coming, because everybody on the Enterprise knows damned well the perils of tempting fate. Just, he’s happy and Jim is, too, and after everything they’ve been through already, it feels so damned good to be settled. To know they’ve got wingmen for life, however much of it space lets them have.
Because about the time Hikaru starts feeling like one of those annoyingly happy couples that drive everyone around them nuts, about the time Spock starts making tentative inquiries into the optimal timeline to request Nyota’s hand and Nyota’s the one who needs to vent, about the time it seems like Hikaru’s finally got his shit together, Jim’s ring disappears.
Not that Jim says anything at first. Instead, Jim embarks on a search and rescue mission in quarters, like Hikaru won’t notice anything unusual in Jim’s sudden desire to clean before he comes to bed. Like Hikaru’s somehow going to miss the lack of something shiny-gleaming-his on Jim’s hand, or how hesitant Jim is to touch him now. No question Jim still wants to, Hikaru’s not even worried on that score, but it’s pretty obvious something’s holding him back.
Hikaru puts up with that for a few days. Then he snags a hand in Jim’s shirtfront and sort of pins him to the turbolift wall after work.
“Something you want to tell me?” he asks as mildly as he can, an inch away from Jim’s face, that mouth he can’t kiss enough.
“I was hoping not to have to,” Jim says when he’s flinched, his whole face twisting-twitching frustration and remorse. “I swear, I don’t know what happened. I didn’t take it off.” Jim’s hand hovers just off Hikaru’s shoulder, naked and unsure. There’s just something wrong about a tentative Jim Kirk and Hikaru hates that Jim’s tentative about him.
“Hey, I know that.” Hikaru frowns. Lifts his hand up to cup Jim’s neck, lightly thumbing the curve of Jim’s jaw. Jim closes his eyes and takes a slow breath; he doesn’t pull back or anything but he’s not touching back, either. “It’s okay.”
Jim cracks an eye to peer at him. “You’re not mad? Why aren’t you mad?”
“Wingman, Princess. You’re stuck with me until you tell me otherwise.”
Fuck, what that does to Jim’s face is just gorgeous, Hikaru could totally get used to seeing it. Jim’s whole body relaxes and that is a totally new smile, small and simple and just for him, and Jim’s eyes crinkle in the corners when he meets Hikaru’s gaze. Yeah, whatever’s between them isn’t so much about the rings.
“Not going to happen,” Jim says and maybe Hikaru already knows it but it’s still really good to hear. “You’re really okay with this? Because you seem pretty happy about showing yours off…”
Hikaru snorts. “What, this thing? I’m just happy I haven’t gored someone with it yet.”
“It’s not that bad,” Jim starts up, diplomatic the way he always gets when the details of that last marriage come up, and Hikaru snorts again.
“Yeah, it is.” He wiggles his finger a little as proof. A thin metal-feather-thing scrapes against Jim’s cheek, which makes Jim shiver as his eyelashes flutter low.
“I like it,” Jim says, husky and low. “Tells people you’re mine.”
And because Jim sounds just like the sex they’re going to need to have now, hot and rough, Hikaru turns his gaze deliberately to that sweet spot on Jim’s neck, tests-teases over it with his thumb. “Don’t need rings for that.”
He’s not really surprised when Jim swings a hand out toward the turbolift controls.
::
Jim runs scans of the Enterprise, because he’s sure he had his ring when he got back from his last mission and he swears he’s dead sure he didn’t take his ring off, and Hikaru has to keep reminding him it’s okay. Not that Hikaru objects to dragging his husband into dark corners all over the ship to suck bruises on Jim’s neck or anything but it’s a bit worrying how much this whole thing seems to be bothering Jim.
On one hand, it’s awesome because it’s like a constant show of how much he means this marriage, how very invested he is in making it work, but on the other, it keeps Jim distracted and stressed. Jim has enough going on as it is, they both do, and this is just one more stupid thing weighing on Jim’s mind.
Hikaru is not cool with that.
Nyota swears the whole damned ship is ring-obsessed, which is probably at least partly Spock dropping helm-sized hints, and because Hikaru can tell she’s flustered and clinging to denial, he tells her about Jim’s ring hunt so she can distract herself with that.
He’s only halfway through telling her about Jim’s misadventure with the flashlight and the Jeffries Tube when she’s crying with laughter and waving a hand up to make him stop.
“Just call Asphorax already,” she manages. “Before he kills himself.”
Hikaru winces. “Yeah, I don’t think that’s a good idea.” The Asphoraxii people were pretty happy to see them married and Hikaru’s not sure how well they’ll take Jim losing his ring. Last time Jim pissed their Chancellor off, man, they’d tried to kill him, and Hikaru thinks maybe this ring-losing is another beheadable offense. Just, he can’t rule it out.
Nyota looks at him like she thinks Hikaru’s being ridiculous but, well, it’s not like the Asphoraxiis tried to kill Spock and anyway, Hikaru’s having fun leaving the really interesting marks. This ring thing is really no big deal.
::
To his credit, he actually means that until his ring starts acting up.
::
Their rings are weird and alien, made of who-knows-what, and there have been indications they react strangely with Starfleet’s standard technology. They do funny things to the medical scanners sometimes, show up as faint, unidentifiable energy signatures and the ship’s computer thinks Hikaru’s ring weighs a pound more than it does. And that’s just the quantifiable shit.
His ring’s always been slick and warm on his hand, a little higher than skin temperature but not uncomfortable, and it fits like it was made for him, though Hikaru’s sure he wasn’t measured. When they’ve brushed rings in the past, locked their fingers together or just spooned at night, it’s felt…nice. Kind of like having someone to curl around at the end of a long day, only not like that at all.
He doesn’t realize the distinction until he doesn’t have that feeling anymore. It’s still awesome having Jim around, still hot and comfortable and amazing even when Hikaru’s just fighting Jim for space to stretch out on the couch, and Hikaru still loves the stealth groping like he loves making Jim laugh; it is definitely not them. Just, when their ring hands brush lately, he knows there’s something missing, it just feels wrong in his gut. A bit colder than it should, and sort of hollow.
So fantastic, Jim’s made him crazy, too. Hikaru’s sure he wasn’t ring-obsessed before.
He’ll get over it eventually because that’s what he does, man, no point worrying about things he can’t change, rings don’t matter like just having Jim there does, he will tell himself that for as long as it takes to fly the message home.
Probably that would take less time if Jim weren’t off ring hunting all the time but whatever, Jim is a man possessed and no matter how much Hikaru tells him it’s not a big deal, really, it is to Jim.
And, see, he knows he’s crazy and that it’s all in his head because seriously, sometimes it feels like his ring is sulking and trying to slide off his finger to escape and even Hikaru’s life isn’t that ridiculous, that’s just not something rings do.
Except apparently it is.
::
“I’m sorry, what?” Hikaru rubs his forehead like maybe that will make the crazy go away. He can’t look up yet, not when he knows he’s going to see Jim’s earnest expression when he does. There are levels of crazy he can tolerate but he’s just about at his limit, because maybe-sulking bling and an absentee Jim do not a happy Hikaru make.
“Ghiva says it’s nesting.” Jim laughs, sheer relief with absolutely none of the horror Hikaru thinks belongs in that sentence.
He peers up at Jim cautiously. “You called Ghiva?” There’s a flutter of wild panic in his gut, a cold spike of fear. Hikaru’s not good with fear, man, not when he can’t do anything useful with it, and he’s really not good with Jim’s self-destructive tendencies. “What. Why would you do that? Jesus.” Hikaru has to rub his forehead again before he says something he’ll regret.
Jim settles beside him, thigh to thigh, closer than he’s been in days without actually being in bed. Hikaru has a crazy urge to hold on to him, keep him this close until the wild panic goes away. They don’t worry about each other when it’s the job—at least, he’s pretty sure they don’t, they both know the score—but this isn’t, this is just a stupid risk and it’s a lot less funny than Jim going spelunking in the Jeffries Tubes.
Hikaru just. Needs to look at him, needs to see him in one actual piece and not in a stunned slump on the Asphoraxii Chancellor’s floor all chained up and ready to be hauled off.
The sight of Jim’s frozen smile doesn’t help at all.
“Wait. Why wouldn’t I?”
Sometimes, Hikaru could cheerfully throttle Jim Kirk. “Last time you offended them, they tried to kill you, asshole.”
“Off—How is calling Ghiva offending them?” Hikaru has absolutely nothing to say to that that doesn’t make him sound deranged. Jim frowns in confusion and tries again. “Look, I told you, my ring just disappeared.” He hesitates slightly, then scrubs his hands on his thighs. “My ring just took off on me and there’s something wrong with yours, and who else would know anything about it but Ghiva?”
It’s on the tip of Hikaru’s tongue to ask when the beheading feast is until he realizes what else Jim’s just said. “Wait, you can tell something’s wrong with mine?”
Jim nods, serious and soft. “Yeah. It’s, uh, it feels like it’s sad?” Jim turns tentative again, like what he needs most now is to hear Hikaru acknowledge it, which makes a crazy lot of sense under the circumstances. Hikaru nods. Tries not to think too much about how they’re both projecting actual emotions onto an accessory. Jim clears his throat. “We think it might be pining.”
Hikaru is not touching that with his sword. “You didn’t feel anything weird from yours? Before it left, I mean.” Stupid as it feels to attribute free will and action to a ring, Hikaru has spent the past few days shoving his back up his finger, feeling it creep away in defiance of the ship’s gravity.
“Ah, not…Happy? Really, really happy?” Jim’s face scrunches as he pulls his words together. Hikaru gets that. “Ghiva thinks that might be the problem, actually. That they were that happy, that fast. Apparently it’s supposed to take a lot longer before they. Uh.”
Hikaru’s eyebrows wing up. “Before they what?”
Jim mumbles something that sounds awfully close to breed. Hikaru prays he’s heard wrong.
He doesn’t realize his ring’s creeping away again until Jim covers Hikaru’s hands with his own. “Has yours been doing that a lot lately?” Jim asks carefully, like he’s not sure how Hikaru will react. “Because Ghiva says you should let it go. If it is.”
God, it feels so good to have Jim’s hands on him, and there’s still that itch of wrong, and if it turns out that’s the fucking rings, Hikaru is going to be pissed.
Because fun as it’s been to show them off and joke about their eye-gouging potential, they’re not worth feeling wrong when Jim touches him.
There’s an obvious answer Hikaru isn’t quite ready to acknowledge, because it’s counterintuitive, getting Jim back by taking the ring off. “What is in these rings?”
“Not really a Starfleet equivalent, but maybe think of them as bugs? She said the stones are sentient.”
“Highly prized on her world?”
“Of course they are. Leave it to Planet Stupid Rules to find a new way to make me keep my hands off you.” Jim snorts a humorless laugh. “Fuck, I hate that planet sometimes. We’re this many warp jumps away and married and they still won’t let us touch.”
“Let us?” Hikaru parrots mildly, because those just aren’t words that should apply to them.
“It feels wrong when I touch you lately, Hikaru. Sad, and it shouldn’t.” Jim ducks his head slightly, cocks a brow. “You didn’t think I enjoyed spending all my time out there tracking the runaway when I could have spent it here, did you?”
As it turns out, his ring is really easy to take off.
“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Hikaru says and he’s easing his ring up past his second knuckle, helping it slide over his fingertip and setting it aside.
“I’ll take it any way you want,” Jim counters easily and he’s already grinning when Hikaru pulls him in.
::
Four days after Hikaru’s ring takes off for parts unknown, Scotty comms the bridge with news.
“Captain, we’ve solved the mystery of the power fluctuations in quarantine four,” Scotty says, then trails off reluctantly. “There appears to be a wee colony of…something nesting behind an access panel.”
Hikaru cranes around in his seat to look at Jim, who breaks into a gorgeous grin. “Excellent, Mr. Scott. You’ve found the ringlings.”
“Ringlings?” Scotty repeats. Nyota slaps a hand over her mouth, so probably she’s laughing in disbelief, which is exactly what she deserves for thinking he was kidding about this ring-nesting thing.
“Ringlets?” Jim tries. “They don’t look like rings to you?” Scotty doesn’t say anything, probably because Scotty is sane and Jim is Jim and Hikaru has rings that are breeding. “You’ve seen my wedding ring, right?”
“Aye, captain,” Scotty says faintly, then there’s humming and throat-clearing and Scotty’s alarmed, “Don’t touch that, Mr. Koo!” and the sound of squawking. Hikaru cannot wait to answer questions about how his wedding bling attacked an engineer.
“Yeah, I think they’re territorial,” Jim says, rubbing his hands together thoughtfully. “Seal it back up, Mr. Scott. We’ll monitor the situation from here.”
From the sounds coming through the comm, the ringlings aren’t happy about the intrusion. Hikaru’s kind of waiting to hear medical attention’s required. It’s not that he thinks his ring could get seriously violent but there are all those sharp bits and the engineering team seems remarkably accident-prone.
And when Hikaru’s biting down on his laughter and trying to pretend he’s busy eyeing his helm, when Jim’s thanked Scotty and his team and made sure everyone’s okay, when everything’s over but Jim’s relentless debate about what the little rings should be called, Scotty comms back one last time. “Excuse me, captain, but if we’re breeding pets on this ship, sir, was there some reason I couldn’t bring my Tribble?”
~ f ~