TITLE: Hidden Truths - Part Eight

SUMMARY: Can Trip really succeed in saving Hoshi?

DISCLAIMER: See Chapter One or Two

NOTES: Don't get fooled, this ain't the end! Do you like the title for this chapter? I thought it was rather amusing myself.

^~*~^

Chapter Eight

THEN AGAIN

Navigating a time rift was a tricky and insanely accurate skill. It didn't help that Trip had only been through one once before, many years ago. To make matters even worse, his ribs were making it increasingly more difficult to breathe.

It came back to him promptly thought, and he soon found the correct path that would take him directly to where and when he wanted. In theory.

Sure enough, a blinding light caused Trip to shield his eyes. When it dies down he was no longer in the shuttle. He was on Rigis Jata. It worked - he was back. The place was correct, he was in the alley where the Nistet confronted him and Hoshi. As for the timing.....it was obviously before the explosion, which was needless to say, a good sign. There was no fire damage and the sound of distant screams and urgent cries were present.

But precisely when was he? His question was answered when he heard a familiar voice. Hoshi. Her voice was like a sweet sonnet after the choked whisper that Trip had heard from her last, which was now embedded deeply into his memory.

"Trip? Commander, where..." She was saying. When Trip went through the rift and showed up here, his other self would have disappeared. It must have been a strange sight but Trip couldn't help that.

"Hoshi." He said as he rounded the corner. On seeing her face he couldn't help but allow his face to break into a massive smile. Her warm and beautiful features, albeit contorted with confusion, looked angelic.

"That was so strange....."

"What was?" Trip asked, as innocently as he could muster.

"I was talking to you and you just.....you were just gone."

Trip stumbled, but he was more than used to covering for himself. "Uh, you must have blacked out. Are you feeling alright?"

"Yeah, fine.....I think." Hoshi replied as she looked around with a furrowed brow, trying to recall what happened.

"Come on we have to leave." Trip said, the reasons for his being there flooding back.

"But which way?" She asked.

Trip had forgotten in all his grief how scary the situation had been. But this time Trip knew which way to the shuttle and they needed to move it if they were going to get back before the Nistet arrived.

"You, over there!" Came that familiar cry. The Nistet were already coming.

"Hoshi, go hide behind that building and don't come out until I tell you."

"But Commander......" Hoshi began.

"That's an order ensign, do you understand me?" Trip countered quickly.

"Yes Sir." The other acknowledged, and moved away.

"Not until I get you." He called back. He didn't want her seeing what he was about to do. It would raise too many questions.

"We heard you came here in a starship."

"Actually I came here through time." Trip whispered as he plunged his hands through the creatures head.

Hoshi was not usually one to disobey a direct order, but how could she hide after the scream she just heard? On peering round the corner and swarm of disturbing and confounding images invaded her vision.

Her immediate thought was that she was hallucinating - after all, she'd seen Trip disappear, then reappear a few feet ahead, and that was impossible. She must have blacked out, like Trip said. But his wasn't as easy to explain. Trip actually seemed to have his hands embedded in a Nistet's skull. The point of 'entry' was blurred, like an invisible force was warping the space around it. The alien was roaring in pain, two others were running. What was she looking at?

Trip then pulled his arms from the Nistet and it slumped to the ground. Hoshi sensed he was going to turn round, and quickly returned to her previous position - from which she wouldn't have seen anything. Was this why Trip had told her to wait there? *What am I thinking? It's Trip! I must be ill or something. Those toxins we all got jabs for....maybe I'm experiencing side-effects.*

"Hoshi, let's go."

Hoshi was on the verge of telling Trip her theory when she realised she'd disobeyed a direct order. Perhaps she might have pondered for a while longer if it weren't for another quake, and all the danger they were still in.

They seemed to walk for miles, through endless crumbling alleyways and seas of rubble. Trip appeared to know exactly where he was going and at one point even managed to go around an area in which a quake destroyed another building. Hoshi could stay quiet no longer. Maybe talking would get her mind of the fact that her legs were about to buckle under her own weight.

"Commander, I think those injections Doctor Phlox gave us might have some side-effects." She said between heavy breaths.

"What do you mean? You alright?" Trip asked. He didn't stop, or even slow. It was just a quick glance back.

"I'm not sure." Hoshi continued. "I think I had a hallucination."

This time Trip did stop. "What did you see?" The question was more focussed than she'd been expecting.

"I saw you, in that alley with three Nistet. You had your hands, uh, inside it's head." Hoshi only then realised how ridiculous that sounded. Trip raised his eyebrows.

"I think the sooner we get to that shuttle the better. I've been feeling dizzy ever since we got those jabs. Maybe the side-effects are different for everyone." Trip assured.

*Of course that's what happened. Had she actually thought that what she'd seen was real? But why wouldn't Trip mention the dizziness before? Oh, of course. Because he's Trip.*

Still, the uneasy feelings wouldn't leave Hoshi, they were merely shunted aside by the chaos that surrounded them as they ran back to the shuttle.

^~*~^

*Where are they? They should be here....*Malcolm thought. His head was killing him, but he was too worried to care about that. Trip and Hoshi were nowhere to be seen.

"They should be here by now." Jon said, only moments before two figures appeared through the billowing clouds of dust.

"Are you alright?" Jon asked as soon as his two crewmembers were close enough to hear.

Trip took a great deal of pleasure in replying; "We're fine."

^~*~^

End of Chapter Eight

^~*~^