TITLE: Hidden Truths - Part Six

SUMMARY: The title of the chapter kinda sums up this part :)

DISCLAIMER: See Chapter One or Two

NOTES: Wow, I can't believe I actually used the word idiosyncratic in this chapter. Heh-heh. I've just noticed that italics aren't showing up on my chapters and I've asked the support people to help but they haven't yet so in the meantime I just put thoughts *enclosed in stars*

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Chapter Six

AFTERMATH

"I know many of you will have heard rumours and speculation about the events on Rigis Jata. It's my duty to inform you that the surface suffered total devastation after the power source for the entire planet overloaded. The Nistet lead us there under false pretenses and Ensign Hoshi Sato....was killed as a result."

"Hoshi was a fine officer. One of the finest I've ever known. She had gifts and talents some of us couldn't even dream of, but she also had a warm and kind personality. I was proud to know her and I know many of you feel the same. A service will be held tomorrow at 1200 hours."

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Travis had lost people in his life and the thoughts that ran through his head each time were never the same. He was on the bridge when Captain Archer sat in his chair without a word and asked him to open a ship-wide channel.

Travis had heard the rampant opinions about what had happened on Rigis after they witnessed the ring of fire devour the whole planet from Enterprise - but nothing had prepared him for what he'd just heard. Archer had left straight after delivering the message and sealed himself away in his room. Travis didn't blame him.

He'd been sitting in stunned silence while the news worked it's way into his brain. It was going to take a long time.

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Jon had been playing the 'if' game for over an hour now.

*If I saw that building coming down and just warned them...*

*If they had kept up*

*If I handled the situation better*

*If I had seen the Nistet for what they really were*

*If I was a better Captain this wouldn't have happened.*

"Captain." Came T'Pol's empty voice. Sometimes she really did make him sick. How could she be feeling nothing for Hoshi? They had been on numerous missions, by a stretch you could have called them friends, *but here she is, just like every other meaningless day.*

"What is it?"

"We are receiving another a communication from Earth. You need to talk to Starfleet and explain what happened."

"What did happen?" Jon snapped. "One minute we're going down to a new planet to peacefully meet with a new race and the next - the next minute someone is killed." It was too soon to repeat her name. He felt as though if he even whispered it his voice would break and he'd start taking out his anger and sorrow on anything within arms reach. "I thought Phlox told you to rest."

"I will meditate later."

"I expect you to follow the Doctor's orders as much as I expect you to follow mine."

T'Pol nodded in acceptance. "Will you be speaking with Starfleet?" She questioned.

"Not yet. Not until I know exactly what happened."

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It was strange, though he didn't much notice. The hum of the engines that had been like his own heartbeat for so long were gone but the silence that was clinging to the very air seemed to fit somehow. Something was no longer there, something that he took for granted and didn't really see until it left.

Tears had never been commonplace during Trip's life. It wasn't for any of the inane reasons that other boys did not cry - a sign of weakness, a display of cowardice or some such - it was simply because he'd forgotten how. By some idiosyncratic fluke, Trip's eyes would not allow tears to fall. And so, as if it were a substitute for them as they died, unwept, he leapt from his bed in a storm of sudden rage and began to destroy the inanimate objects that had so many a time derided him with their worthlessness. The whim had arisen out of the blue, perhaps from the nest of undefined emotion subdued in his mind that he had been keeping for so long now.

The one sentence replaying over and over is his head was *Hoshi's dead and it's my fault.*

In the blur of chaos and intense anger Trip's mind was moving at a slower pace to his body. He recorded his actions mentally, seconds after they occurred. The table that once sat by his bed was now strewn across the floor in pieces after he had hit it so hard against the door frame there was actually an indentation. The shelf upon the wall that housed a number of picture frames and books was now rid of them all, swept clear by Trip's wild, violent impulses.

Then the rage diminished as swiftly as it had arrived, like it were nothing more than a sudden torrential downpour. The detrimental feelings had not left, however, and instead morphed once more into a silent stupor after Trip's limbs gave way and allowed him to slide willingly down the wall.

He didn't know exactly how long he was sitting there but the next event to disturb his trance was a knock at the door. "Trip?"

Archer. He didn't knock again and entered. Trip suddenly felt a wave of stupidity. What was he thinking, trashing his room? What did he expect to achieve? He pried himself from the floor and began to pick up the mess, deliberately not meeting his Captain's eyes.

"What happened?" Jon asked, after seeing the disarray. He was careful to keep his voice devoid of emotion.

"I fell." Trip replied, his heart not in it and his mind elsewhere.

"It's not your fault, you know that." The other insisted, ignoring the poor explanation.

"I know." Trip lied.

"Do you?"

Trip couldn't bear to meet the man's eyes for more than a second, but it was enough.

"Nothing could have stopped what happened. Not you, not me, nothing." Jon finished.

"Really?!" Trip suddenly exploded, giving up his attempts to tidy the room. "Then do you mind tellin' me why I feel so goddam guilty? Why I keep living through it endlessly in my mind and thinking that maybe if I had done things differently Hoshi wouldn't be dead?"

"You had decisions to make and you made them. Hoshi made them too, and I made them. All of our choices defined what happened, not just yours and it's no-one's fault."

"I made the wrong choices."

"There are no wrong choices. Only different ones." Jon said, philosophically. In any other situation Trip would have pointed that fact out, maybe with a witty retort but this time it seemed appropriate. "You couldn't have foreseen what happened and you couldn't have changed it.

"You're right." Trip said but there was a change in his voice, in his disposition. Jon had noticed it because it had come so swiftly. The words he spoke were not of acceptance. The utterance wasn't a lie but it wasn't quite the truth either. It seemed as if Trip had come to a separate truth of his own. In a scathing tone, into the air he uttered; "I couldn't have changed it. You can't change time."

A twisted, unexpected smile formed upon his face. The words he spoke were to no-one but himself. Jon wouldn't understand. The words were the bitter 'truth' that he had always abided by and respected.

But Trip knew, as only he could, that time was entirely at his disposal.

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End of Part Six

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