Bottled Up – Part 5

The steady beeping of the sickbay instruments helped Jonathan Archer hold on to what little of his sanity was left. The intruders had left, and every member of his crew was safe. All except one. Trip had been lying on a biobed in sickbay for three hours now, and was showing no sign of getting better. Whatever the aliens had done to him had put him into some kind of coma. And while Archer was confident that Dr. Phlox and his machines were doing everything they could to heal the engineer, he couldn't hold at bay the thoughts that this might be it – that Trip might have faced danger once too often.

"Oh, Trip," Archer muttered. "Why couldn't you have kept yourself out of trouble, just this once?" Part of Archer knew that he was being irrational, that there was no way Trip, or anyone else, could have prevented what had happened. But the other part of him was angry, so angry, that Trip had allowed himself to end up in sickbay once again.

"Captain?" said Phlox's voice at his shoulder, startling him out of his melancholy thoughts. Archer mentally braced himself for the worst, before asking his question.

"What's the prognosis, Doctor?"

"Good, I am happy to say. The aliens took numerous tissue samples from Commander Tucker, which would account for his extensive bruising, and also for his coma-like state. His body went into deep shock at such an invasive procedure, but I am confident he will wake up once his body has started the healing process. Unfortunately, I cannot predict exactly when he will awake, so I would strongly suggest that you return to your quarters and get some rest, Captain."

"No, Doctor, that's alright. I'm staying right here until he wakes."

And so Archer sat by Trip's biobed all through the night, alternating between prayers for his safe recovery, and fear at what would happen when his friend awoke. Always assuming that Trip still was his friend, of course. Archer knew he had treated Trip terribly, and even though throughout that long night he tried to justify his actions to himself numerous times, he couldn't. There was no excuse for what he had done, not even trying to keep Trip safe. All he had done was succeed in alienating his best friend.

Eventually, morning came, and with it the realisation that Archer was due back on duty in less than an hour. But there was no way he was leaving sickbay. Slowly, his cramped and aching body protesting at every movement, he made his way to the comm panel on the wall.

"Archer to T'Pol."

"T'Pol here."

"Could you please assume my duty on the Bridge this morning. Commander Tucker is still unconscious, and I want to be here when he wakes up." Archer braced himself for a disapproving comment from his First Officer, but surprisingly T'Pol acquiesced to his request, and ended the transmission.

He was still standing by the comm panel pondering T'Pol's slight personality change, when the sound of a groan met his ears. He turned in time to see Phlox hurrying behind the screen that shielded Trip's biobed. A few seconds later, the Doctor's head reappeared.

"Captain, you'll be happy know that Commander Tucker is waking up. Give me just a few minutes to administer the necessary drugs, and then you can see him."

Panicked, Archer could only nod. Suddenly he realised he had no idea what he was going to say to Trip. He had tried out several speeches in his head during the night, but now none of them seemed quite right. And what if Trip wouldn't forgive him? He wasn't sure he could bear to see the hatred in Trip's eyes that he was sure would be there. Not that he'd been looking at Archer with a particularly friendly expression of late, anyway. Overwhelmed by his panic, Archer bolted from sickbay. Phlox looked around the screen again just in time to see the doors sliding shut behind his Captain.

"That's funny," he mused. "I'm sure I just heard him asking the Sub-Commander to take over his morning duties." Shrugging at the sometimes unfathomable nature of humans, Phlox returned to his patient.

Trip stirred groggily, and then winced at the pain his movement had caused.

"Lie still please, Commander," came the cheerful voice of Dr. Phlox. "You'll feel much better in a minute, once I've administered these painkillers." Trip felt the pressure of a hypospray against his neck, followed by the wonderful feeling of the drugs entering his system.

"What happened, Doc?" he asked, having trouble getting the words past his parched lips.

"You were attacked – again – by some aliens that had invaded the ship," replied Phlox, holding a straw to Trip's mouth and allowing some water to slip down the engineer's throat. "I must say, Commander, that you do seem to have quite a knack for getting yourself into trouble."

"Yeah, and you're not the only one who's noticed," Trip muttered, remembering once again his current differences with Archer.

"But everyone's been quite concerned about you," continued the doctor, oblivious to Trip's bitter remark. "Particularly the Captain."

"Yeah, right," said Trip sceptically. "I'm surprised he hasn't booted me off the ship already for endin' up in sickbay again."

"No indeed!" said Phlox, somewhat surprised. "He really has been very worried about you. I tried numerous times last night to get him to go back to his quarters and get some rest, but he insisted on sitting with you until you woke up."

Trip was surprised. Jon had sat up all night with him? That didn't fit in at all with his behaviour over the past few months. However, as Trip looked around sickbay, Archer was conspicuous by his absence. "So where is he now, Doc?"

"Well, that's the strange thing, Commander. Just as you were waking up, he rushed off. I assume he had some kind of duty to attend to, otherwise I'm sure he would most certainly still be here."

Trip frowned. Something didn't add up here. Why would Jon rush off when the thing he'd been waiting for all night had finally happened? Trip decided that it was time he confronted the Captain about everything that had been going on recently. And this time he wasn't going to take 'no' for an answer.