I could probably walk but I don't see why I should make the effort, and besides, it splits the enemy's forces. So I make them drag me, snivelling and shaking, and by way of a reward for putting them to the trouble they pull me into my quarters and put the boot in a bit more, only stopping when I'm curled up in a ball and screaming that they're killing me.

It's a few minutes after the door hisses shut that I stop sobbing, and some of them are in case they're standing outside listening to see if I've been putting it on. Some of them … aren't.

I'm a mess. Once I'm certain they've gone, slowly and painfully I manage to get to my feet and stumble into the bathroom. I don't look in the mirror; it won't tell me anything I don't know.

Standing in the shower cubicle, where at least the blood will trickle down the drain rather than pooling unsightly on the decking, I start trying even more slowly to peel off my uniform. There must be one or two places on my body that don't hurt, but frankly I'm having a problem finding them. I manage to get the zip down far enough to let me take a piss – I can't be bothered to struggle over to the head, though I deplore using washing facilities as a urinal – and the dark colour of the urine tells me there's blood in that, too; I try to distract myself from the fear by wondering what wondrous member of the Denobulan menagerie will be pressed into service to put that lot right.

I wish I'd been in the corridor outside my room when Hoshi dropped through without her vest…

The chuckle at that ungentlemanly thought turns into laughter that's verging on hysteria, and I don't even think it was particularly funny. I lean against the wall, gasping for breath, with my broken ribs stabbing me again and red going splat-splat-splat around my still booted feet.

The chronometer on the wall I can see through the doorway says I bought thirty-eight minutes, allowing for the time it took to bring me down here and a few more while I got the kicking on the floor. We'll call it thirty-seven, to be on the safe side.

Enough.

I hope it was enough…

I cough, and have to clasp my ribcage in the effort to minimise the damage. Fucking hell, better not do that too often.

I don't know what's going to happen now. I know what T'Pol and Trip intended to do, but everything depends on Silik, what he'll do, how much of what I told him he'll believe.

I don't know how long it'll take before anyone can come to look for me. I don't know, and I'm afraid. I can admit it to myself if no-one else, I'm afraid.

With everything else that's going on, will people forget about me till someone notices I'm not there?

While there's life, there's hope.

There's no life on Paraagan now, and no hope.

I can't evade or forget my involvement in what happened. I'm not guilty in any court of law, even mine, of wishing or intending to harm them, or even of doing so by any act of negligence. I'm not responsible for the Suliban taking advantage of the craft I was flying to attempt to sabotage Enterprise's mission and having us sent home in disgrace – and they damn-near succeeded, and still may do if we don't manage to get those bloody discs back to Starfleet. Even then the Vulcans may not believe it, or pretend not to; Soval, for one, would like nothing better than to have the project mothballed for the foreseeable future.

We can't say he hasn't got a point if he tries. Hell knows we haven't covered ourselves in glory so far, even if we manage to dig our way out of this particular crisis; and whether or not we were directly responsible for what happened, if we hadn't been here the colony would still be alive and thriving.

If I hadn't been here.

But if I hadn't, it would have been someone else loaded with this guilt, this inescapable feeling that they should have known, that somehow they should have done something differently. The overall story wouldn't have changed. In the end we're all the toys of fate, and

'Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

And then is heard no more. It is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.'

'Signifying nothing…'

Wearily I let myself slide down till I'm sitting in the cubicle.

Trip's face was eloquent as he watched me walk away to buy those thirty minutes. He won't forget I'm here.

As for the rest, the play isn't finished, but my part in it is. And even when ours is, one day, the search will go on; there will be good characters and bad strutting and fretting across the boards, as there have been throughout history. It won't stop because we're not there to see it; and if what I've done has gone some small way towards paying whatever debt is owing, at least I tried.

And in the end, that's all any of us can do.

THE END.

Acknowledgement: 'Life's but a walking shadow' etc is from Shakespeare's Macbeth, Act 5, Scene 5.