"We're going to detach the plating."
Trip's mind stops working for several seconds after he hears the Captain's words. When he had originally prepared to release the hull plating, he had considered it a possible, if slightly unfortunate, last resort.
That had changed the moment the mine had nailed Malcolm to the side of the ship. Now, decoupling the plating was a death sentence for a friend.
Trip wonders if it's just him and his apprehension, or if the seconds really are becoming longer and longer.
At the beginning of the voyage, he would never have tagged the Lieutenant as a potential friend, or anything else, for that matter. Malcolm was terse, angry, serious, and British (okay, maybe the British thing hadn't been that big a deal). He was essentially the antithesis of Trip himself; and while the Commander recognised the need for different personalities onboard a starship, socially, he had found it irritating.
To be honest, perhaps some of the tension between them had been his own fault. He'd never really made an effort to get to know the armoury officer, and had even avoided him on some occasions. Malcolm had just been too cold, too uptight for Trip's tastes, and it hadn't occurred to him that there might be more to the Brit than that. At least, until he'd been forced to become more acquainted with him.
Sure, their time in the shuttle had been rough at first, but in the end, it had been eye-opening for Trip. It had never really occurred to him that Malcolm's isolation was due to social awkwardness, even loneliness, rather than choice. It had also showed him just how much the ship and it's crew meant to the Lieutenant. This whole situation was made worse by Trip's knowledge that Reed would be more than willing to sacrifice himself for the ship.
During the shuttle incident, Malcolm had stopped Trip from committing suicide, despite the fact that it would have essentially ensured his own survival. Now, the Commander is faced with similar circumstances, but is being ordered to give up, for all intents and purposes. He can't be angry with Archer, of course—the Captain has to consider the safety of everyone on the ship, has to make the hard choices. He can tell from Archer's face that he doesn't like this anymore than his Chief Engineer does; but that leaves the horror, guilt, and rage building in the pit of Trip's stomach with no place to go. He feels ready to vomit.
T'Pol is already talking, something very Vulcan about being 'sure the Captain has done all he could.' Trip didn't want to feel animosity towards her, but the Romulans have already frayed his nerves with their disregard for life, making him snap angrily at them, and the Subcommander's words sound vaguely condescending to his ears. Looking down on the silly humans for their concern over one life. But it doesn't matter now, because the Captain has just given the order.
His friend is going to die, and it's starting to look like he's going to have to pull the switch to kill him.
More seconds crawl by, and finally, Trip feels like he can speak, though his emotions are still clogging his throat. Before he can utter so much as syllable, though, the Captain is talking again.
"I'm going with him."
Perhaps they're not giving up just yet, after all.