"Life is waiting for you.
It's all messed up,
but we're alive."
~ Our Lade Peace
'Life'

Part V


THIS ONE FELT DIFFERENT.

Commander Charles 'Trip' Tucker felt a realism he hadn't felt in a long time, a certainty that couldn't be mistaken. And everything else, now that he was back, felt like a dream. A very vivid dream, but a dream none-the-less.

A wave of relief flowed through him as he turned his attention to those around him. He was sitting back in the captain's private dining room; T'Pol's briefing. And more importantly- no storm before Enterprise. Lieutenant Malcolm Reed, Sub-Commander T'Pol, and the rest of the bridge crew including Captain Jonathon Archer himself, were all staring at him.

Trip was back where it had all began.

"Nice of you to join us again, Mr. Tucker," said T'Pol, her arms crossed behind her back. "I can only assume it was an intense nap."

Trip smiled.

"And something I don't want to have happen again," came Archer's voice, loud, irritated, yet alive.

Trip's smile broadened.

T'Pol motioned for everyone to take there seats. "Are you all right, Commander?" she asked, turning her attention back to the disturbance of her briefing.

Trip nodded, sitting back in his chair. "Yeah, I'm okay now," he said with assurance. He looked around the room, taking in all the staring faces, then he turned back to the Vulcan. "I'm definitely okay."

"Good," replied the sub-commander, looking down at her PADD. "I'd like to continue now."

Trip didn't pay attention to the rest of the briefing, and it didn't appear the Vulcan cared. Or at least she didn't show it. Which was fine with Trip. He needed the time to gather himself, figure out how he was going to broach a certain topic with T'Pol after the briefing.

When it concluded, he told Archer he would meet up with him on the bridge shortly, there was just a little something he wanted to speak to T'Pol about first. With her Vulcan discipline, Trip regarded her as the single most authority concerning the ways of the mind. And there was something nagging at him that he needed to clear up.

Arriving at her door, he keyed the chime and waited for an answer. When the door hissed open, he poked his head in. "Hey, T'Pol," he said apprehensively. "I'd like to talk to you for a moment, if I could?"

T'Pol nodded. "Come in, Commander" she replied, indicating the chair.

Trip sat himself down tentatively. "I wanted to talk to you about what happened during your briefing," he started, fidgeting in his seat. "While I was..." He paused, searching for the right words. "While I was, napping, I kept hearing these voices." He turned his gaze upwards, locking eyes with the Vulcan. "Incessant voices, urging me to come to them."

A look close to intrigue swept across T'Pol's face. "What exactly were these voices saying?"

Trip sat up straight in his chair. "Well at first they were faint and kinda disjointed. I couldn't really make out what they were saying. Just that they wanted me... Them and the clouds..."

"Clouds?"

"Yeah. I saw this storm off the bow of Enterprise."

T'Pol raised an eyebrow. "I can check our scanners, but I do not recall any storms in the area."

Trip waved his hand dismissively. "Not important," he said. "I fell asleep staring at a nebula last night, I must have sub-consciously turned it into a storm when I was dreaming. Anyway, it was like this storm was there just for me. And near the end, I felt like it was a part of me. It was, well, disarming." Trip paused to let T'Pol speak, but she didn't.

"And these voices," he continued. "They eventually started to sound like you. Well, like you an' Archer an' Reed. They were saying things like. 'come on, Trip'. And 'you're starting to scare me.' At one point I heard you say 'he's too deep'."

T'Pol arched an eyebrow. "That was us," she assured. "We did say those things."

Trip looked at her shocked.

"It assure you, it's true, Commander," continued T'Pol. "We were trying to wake you."

"So, my subconscious was hearing you the whole time?" asked Trip. "That whole time- that whole time I was afraid of the voices, I should have been listening to them instead of trying to shut them out? No wonder I started to wake when I learned to accept them."

Severed from reality too long.

T'Pol crossed her arms behind her back and studied the young man before her. "You may not have been ready to at first," she began. "You had to find your own path out of what ever was controlling you- dream or not."

But Trip, still in a daze, wasn't seeing things clearly. Trip squinted, heart pounding, trying to spot his friend in the dark murky water.

Trip jumped in his seat. "Yes!" he cried, jabbing a finger at the Vulcan. "You said, 'find his own path'."

"And this storm," continued T'Pol. "You think it became a part of you?" Trip nodded. "In your mind, it just may have well been, Commander. The part connecting you to us, to the real world around you."

They would follow him where ever he went.

Trip furrowed his brow, tilting his head. "You mean like a sort of metaphor?"

"It's possible," replied T'Pol. "Or possibly it was just a fabrication of the nebula you said you were staring at last night."

Trip laughed. "But there's one other thing..." He took a deep breath. "Have you ever had a dream where you wake up and go back to sleep. Wake up and go back to sleep- over and over again. And then you actually wake up, and realize all those previous times had all been part of the original dream? And you know when you're actually awake, because you just feel it?" He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "But then all those vivid images and emotions just seem to disappear? You start to forget things in your dream that had once seemed so real?"

Loss of time. Loss of place. Loss of perspective.

"I understand dreams are capricious that way," replied T'Pol.

"Well, I still remember everything," Trip said, lifting his eyes. "I remember every image. Every feeling. Every landscape and place I went. And I'll never forget what I did, and what I said."

I can't let people think I'm scared and insecure about my capabilities as an engineer.

T'Pol tilted her head. "Maybe you weren't just sleeping, Commander?"

Trip pushed the notion aside. "Of course I was," he laughed. "I fell asleep in your briefing. It's not unusual, ya know," he continued playfully. Then he sat back, taking a deep breath. "How long was I asleep anyway?" he asked, eyeing the Vulcan skeptically. "I mean, if you guys were trying to wake me up- and I wasn't- weren't you guys startin' to worry something was wrong? I mean, usually I'm not that hard to wake up?"

"There was no need for concern.... yet," stated T'Pol, stepping behind her desk. "Any longer and Doctor Phlox may have intervened, but you were only out for a moment or so."

Trip's mouth dropped, his eyes widened. "That's it? Are you serious?" he asked, but T'Pol didn't have to answer, her lack of expression was enough to convey her response. "So... What was this you were saying 'bout my not being asleep?"

Paranoia. Everyone counting on him.

"The mind works in mysterious ways, Commander," remarked T'Pol, her voice low and cautious as she entered fragile territory. "We can't always explain the things it does. How it works. Or how it controls us. We have to accept it as a powerful tool and hope it stays with us till the end. As you are aware, the constant quest for mental discipline is key amongst Vulcans."

She made him feel safe. He needed to feel her. She had mental discipline which hid her true Vulcan self.

Trip leaned forward again. "You think I had some sort of mental breakdown?" he asked, the words heavy on his lips. He didn't want to articulate the fact that at this point, it seemed very likely.

"That, you can only answer for yourself," replied T'Pol. "It may have been a dream- they can come fast and furious with no sense of time or reason. Or... it may have been something entirely different. Maybe life is not as casual as you portray? Maybe this was a way for your mind to tell you it's had enough of masking, and to observe your life at a different level?"

Life and engines.

"I repeat, the mind works in mysterious ways, Commander. Perhaps this should not be taken so lightly? Perhaps you should investigate what thoughts and deeds were most prevalent in your dream? Have you ever taken the time to look inside yourself?"

Trip remembered his outburst of introspection in the sub-commanders quarters. He remembered losing his captain.

Job. Loved ones. Life.

He remembered all his fears surfacing. But what left him ultimately disarmed was that he had let down his guard. Trip had dropped his exterior wall, the one he had spent a lifetime building. Vulcan vase. Shattered. And he hadn't liked it. It had been so long that he had expressed his true self, that he had almost thought it dead.

Empty cargo bay.

But Trip preferred the person he had become, not the one he truly was. He preferred a world of confidence to a world of uncertainty. And masking his true self with arrogance was much easier than being the apprehensive man he was...or so he thought. "Sometimes you tell a lie so much, you actually start to believe it," he said softly.

T'Pol studied the engineer quietly. "And sometimes when others also tell the lie, you become it. You embrace that mask."

You're a god, sir.

Trip propped his elbow on T'Pol's desk, rested his forehead in his hand. The weight of the question was definitely not lost on Trip. He had contemplated this before, and he was pretty sure most humans had also. He believed people were who they were for a reason. And he believed he was the way he was because he needed to be. He could never let people around him know he wasn't perfect, that he had fears.

The thin line that holds the ship together.

And he tried his hardest to never think about them, never let anyone around him know he even had them. That would only help them surface No one wants to face their biggest fears. And Trip feared not so much his imperfections, but rather the consequences of his imperfections.

Raging river.

And he also knew he wasn't going to mention any of this conversation to anyone. There were just some things that didn't need to be shared. And if in time he figured out he had temporarily lost his mind, he didn't need the rest of the crew to find out.

Not once did he consider dropping the weapon.

With that to ponder, Trip left T'Pol's quarters. There was one place he wanted to go, one thing he wanted to see. So he headed to his own quarters, wanting some privacy.

Tentatively, he stepped up to his small window. Taking a deep breath, he looked out at the universe. It was dark, speckled with tiny white and blue stars. It was peaceful. With a smile on his face he turned away, but something stopped him.

He rushed back to the window, pressing his forehead against the thick Plexiglas. In the far distance, floating away inconspicuously behind Enterprise...

Dark clouds. Churning silently.

~End~


Author's Note: This note was not originally attached to the end of this story. But then something happened during it's beta stage- I saw the episode 'Vanishing Point'. Any and all coincidences with plot and themes were exactly that, coincidence. Really! This story wasn't even inspired by the 'Enterprise' episode. I actually wrote it years ago. And before I even saw 'Vanishing Point' I was already re-calibrating it for science fiction. I swear.