Title: Lost In Darkness

Authors: Sita/T'eyla

Genre: Angst/Drama

Rating: PG-13

AN: Thanks to Exploded Pen, The Libran Iniquity (sorry, no igloos ;-) ) und Gabi (hast du unsere e-mail bekommen? Vielen vielen Dank für deinen persönlichen Review!!) for reviewing. Here's Chapter 6 - sorry, it's a little short, but they are about to get longer again! - please r&r!

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Chapter 6

Trip didn't know whether he was still walking in the right direction. He didn't even know if he was still walking in any direction; at times it felt like he wasn't moving at all. It was getting dark by now, and the wind seemed to be blowing with even more force than before. Most of the time Trip couldn't even see his feet, snow being blown into his face and his eyes watering in the biting cold. The tears on his cheeks were frozen already, but Trip didn't really notice. He'd lost all feeling in most parts of his body and while he sometimes wasn't even aware of his surroundings anymore, he somehow still found the strength to keep moving. The weight of Malcolm's body on his shoulder hadn't lessened, but by now, Trip didn't think about it anymore.

It was getting increasingly harder to focus on anything but moving, raising his feet and setting them down again. His mind was empty, and the only thing he was actually aware of was the relentless cold, the biting sensation of the icy air in his lungs and the pain in his stomach that was getting worse and worse. Again, it felt like someone had stabbed him and was now driving the knife deeper into his insides with every step he took.

Trip didn't know how many hours had passed since the guard had kicked them out, and he didn't care, either. He knew, though, that this would soon come to an end, one way or the other. While he hadn't yet reached the point of consciously yielding to the weariness that was clouding up his mind, he felt that soon he would have no other choice anymore.

The pain had gotten almost unbearable, and by now it wasn't only the cold wind that made his eyes water. Trip squinted them shut, trying to blink away the tears, and that moment he stumbled, letting go of Malcolm in a desperate try to keep his balance. Reed slipped off his shoulder, and with the heavy weight suddenly gone, Trip lost his balance completely and crashed into the snow, almost blacking out as fresh pain wrenched his guts. For a moment or two he simply lay there, holding his stomach, waiting for the pain to pass. Snow was seeping through his clothes, and the cold was getting worse, but all the same it was a relief, simply lying there, not having to move or carry that weight anymore.

When the worst of the pain had subsided, Trip carefully sat up again, looking over to where Reed was lying motionless. The feeling in his legs was completely gone by now, leaving them numb and frozen, but still Trip knew he had to try and keep going. He couldn't let Malcolm freeze to death there in the snow.

He's dead already. The small voice in the back of his mind didn't sound at all optimistic anymore; now it had taken on a spiteful tone, as if his own mind were turning against him, trying to make him surrender to the temptation of simply giving up.

"He's not," Trip mumbled, awkwardly getting to his feet and stumbling over to where Malcolm lay. "What the hell are you talkin' about, anyway? Of course he's not dead."

Realizing what he was doing, Trip shook his head, fighting to force his confused thoughts back into order again.

Talking to people who aren't there, he thought. Seems like I'm really losing it.

If he wanted to know if Malcolm was still alive, then he had to check his pulse, not listen to crazy voices talking rubbish inside his head. Trying to focus his attention only on that one simple task, Trip got to his knees beside Reed's still form, taking him by the shoulder and rolling him onto his back. In the light of V'nera's small moon, Malcolm's drawn features seemed to have a corpse-like look to them, and when Trip put a hand to his neck to feel the pulse, Reed's skin felt icy under his fingers. Like the skin of a-

"No, you're wrong. He's not dead."

Realizing that with his numb fingers he wouldn't be able to feel anything, Trip rubbed his hands to reanimate the blood circulation, blowing on his fingers to get them warm again.

"He's not dead."

He repeated the words like a mantra as he frantically searched for a pulse, and when he finally detected a weak throbbing under his fingers, Trip felt not only relief, but also something like triumph rise within him.

"See?" he said. "I told you, he's not dead."

The voice, however, remained silent, a sneering malicious silence that made the hair on his neck stand on end. But Malcolm wasn't dead, was he? He'd felt a pulse, after all. He couldn't be dead.

"Well, fuck you. He is not dead," Trip mumbled, wrapping the blanket around Malcolm's shoulders again. They needed to get going.

Slowly getting to his feet, Trip bent down to lift Malcolm onto his shoulder again. He succeeded in getting him off the ground, but as he tried to straighten up, pain exploded in his stomach and drove him to his knees again. Reed slid off his shoulder, but Trip managed to catch him in the last moment before he hit the ground.

You're too weak to carry him, the voice spoke up again, sounding quite pleased. Just leave him here. He's dead, anyway.

"No!" Trip got up again. "Shut up! I won't leave him!"

He wrapped his arms around Malcolm's upper body again, but this time he didn't even manage to lift him onto his shoulder. Trip fell to his knees, panting, pain stabbing his guts. Reed was hanging in his arms like a dead weight, and he realized that he wouldn't be able to carry him any further. He simply didn't have the strength left to do so.

I told you. You can't carry him.

"Doesn't mean I'm gonna leave him, though," Trip said defiantly. "Whatever you say, I'm not gonna leave him behind!"

Settling down in the snow, Trip pulled the blanket off Reed's shoulders and wrapped it around them both. He'd just sit here and rest for a while until he was able to get going again.

"Well, Mr. Reed," he said, "here we go again. It's cold, we're freezin'... only this time we don't have to worry about runnin' out of air. There's plenty of air all around."

He suddenly felt the mad urge to laugh. There were few things he'd found less funny in his whole life, but still he felt like laughing out loud.

"And we don't have any bourbon either," he said. "Pity. I could use some now."

Trip fell silent for a moment. The pain in his stomach had reduced to a dull throbbing, and it felt as if the wind had lost some of its biting edge. He was actually getting warmer.

"You know, Malcolm," he said, "I never apologized for what I said back then on the shuttlepod. When I called you the grim reaper, remember? I know I really hurt you, sayin' that. See, I didn't really know you then. I thought you were that repressed, paranoid guy who was so fixated by death that he wouldn't admit that there was even the slightest chance of gettin' out of this alive. I never knew..."

He broke off. Then, he hadn't known the man who had pointed a phaser at him to keep him from killing himself. Who hadn't hesitated to join him in exploring that alien space station only to be given a dressing down by Captain Archer afterwards. Who had gone bar-hopping with him on Risa, who never stopped teasing him about T'Pol and who had accompanied him when he'd stood at the edge of the smoldering hole that was all that remained of his former home, the place where his sister had died. The man who had become one of his closest friends and who had now sacrificed himself to save Trip's life.

"I just wanted to thank you for savin' my life," Trip said. "You shouldn't have done this, but it's no use tellin' you that, is it? You would have done it, anyway."

He blinked a few times, trying to get rid of the tears that were blurring his vision, cursing the damn wind that made his eyes water all the time.

"I'd never thought it would end like this," he said. "Not like this, not at the hands of people like them. It doesn't... it doesn't seem right..."

Trip heard his own words echo in his ears, but only after a moment realized what he was saying. He shook his head. This was crazy, they weren't dead yet, he was still alive and Malcolm was, too...

"We're not dead yet."

As if to reassure himself of that fact, Trip raised a stiff numb hand to feel the pulse on Malcolm's neck again. He couldn't find one and flexed his fingers to get some feeling back into them, then tried again. Again, he wasn't able to detect a heartbeat and felt panic rise at the back of his mind. Forcing himself to concentrate, he once more pressed his fingers against Reed's cold skin, but there was no pulse. Fear gripping his insides, Trip bent down and put his ear to Malcolm's mouth to hear whether he was still breathing. First he couldn't hear anything but the blowing of the wind and the sound of his own blood pounding in his ears, and held his breath, listening with desperate concentration.

But there was nothing. Malcolm wasn't breathing anymore. Straightening up, Trip grabbed Reed by the shoulders and shook him, not wanting to believe this was happening, that the voice had been right.

"Malcolm! Come on, Malcolm! You can't be dead, you can't do this to me! Malcolm!"

Looking at Reed's still face, Trip felt a sob rising in his throat.

"Please no... Malcolm..."

But there was no reaction and even the voice in his mind kept silent. This all-embracing silence was worse than everything else, and overcome with grief, Trip pulled Reed's lifeless body closer and wept brokenly.

TBC...

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