Red Rain

By Thalia Drogna

AN: Thanks to everyone who emailed, or reviewed to ask when the next update to this one was coming. Sorry it's so late but I've been blocked and I wanted to get some work done on my other story Let the Dead Bury the Living.

Trip woke up slowly and to great pain. His head either felt as if it was about to explode or collapse, he wasn't sure which but it was definitely one of the two.

Trip groaned.

"Finally decided to wake up, then," said Reed looking over at the dishevelled engineer from his makeshift bed on the floor. He'd scraped together enough blankets to make things a bit more comfortable but he was glad he didn't have to do this every night.

"Not so loud, Malcolm," said Trip in voice that was little more than a groan, "and turn down the lights, it's too damn bright in here." He covered his eyes with his arm, even with his eyes closed the light hurt.

Reed went to the light controls and turned down the brightness. He went to Trip's coffee machine and turned it on.

Trip uncovered his eyes for a second, a puzzled look on his face. "What are you doing here, Malcolm?"

"When you didn't turn up for our training session I came looking for you. Just as well, you'd practically drunken yourself into coma," said Reed. "Phlox thought you'd better have someone stay with you. It was either that or take you to sick bay."

"Phlox? You called the doctor because I was drunk?" said Trip in disbelief and embarrassment.

"You were more than drunk, you'd passed out. You drank a whole bottle of scotch. On your own."

"I did?" asked Trip, worriedly.

Reed waved the empty bottle at Trip. "Now do you want to tell me why?"

"Maybe when my head stops pounding," said Trip, putting both hands to his aching head in an attempt to keep it from falling off his shoulders.

"I think I might be able to help with that," said Reed and grabbed the hypospray the Phlox had left for Trip. He pressed it to Trip's neck before the engineer even knew what had happened. Reed waited a minute until he saw Trip relax, the pain draining out of him. "Trip, I read the letter."

Trip carefully sat up and Reed handed him a mug of coffee. "I didn't dream it after all, I really did get that letter from Ellen."

"I'm sorry, Trip," said Reed, picking up his own mug of coffee. "Were you and Lieutenant Arroya close?"

"We were friends. We used to make time to see each other when we were both on base, not that that was very often once I was posted to Enterprise," said Trip. "It just doesn't seem fair, is all. We went on dozens of dangerous missions while we were in Special Projects and she could have been killed any time. Instead she gets murdered in her own apartment when she disturbs some opportunist thief."

"Is that why you decided to hit the bottle? Drinking to numb the pain?" asked Reed.

"Nah, it started out as a wake, I guess I just got carried away. I'm not going to be able to make it to the memorial service and she never wanted a funeral anyway, wasn't really the religious type. This seemed more appropriate," said Trip.

"Next time it would be better if you did it in company and without getting through the whole bottle yourself," said Reed.

"I'll remember that next time," said Trip.

"So tell me about Arroya," said Reed.

"Terri, her first name was Terri. That took a lot to get out of her. I only found out because I beat her at cards and she'd bet her first name against why I was called Trip. She lost. Terri short for Theresa. Her family were from Mexico but she'd lived most of her life in Miami. She joined the MACOs when she was eighteen, straight out of school. I guess her childhood was pretty rough, although she never talked about it much, but she occasionally let slip some stuff about how she used to run with a tough crowd. The MACOs certainly didn't teach her how to break in to places, she already knew that. Taught me a few tricks too," said Trip.

"Then she was recruited to Special Projects," said Reed.

"Yeah, the way I heard it they needed an infiltration expert for the final member of the team, before they decided that they needed me anyway. Darwin and Hathaway interviewed lots of candidates but weren't happy with any of them, then this sassy dark haired kid turns up at their offices saying that she's heard that they're looking for an infiltration expert and she's the one that they need. She wasn't on their list or anything, and still just a Private. Darwin being Darwin, he put her through the tests anyway, thinking she'd screw up. Instead she aced them and he was so impressed that he gave her the job," said Trip.

"It sounds like she was fairly unique," said Reed.

"Yeah, she was. She was a pretty good fighter as well, actually everyone in the unit was," said Trip.

"Don't I know it," replied Reed. Last week Trip had decided to try to teach Reed a Nausicaan move which Colonel Darwin had taught him, Reed still had the bruises from where Trip had got a little over zealous.

"You know, that's what's been bothering me," said Trip. "It just doesn't seem possible that she'd get jumped like that and then thrown out of her window. She was part of Special Projects for seven years, she was so damn careful and she almost never let her guard down. Not to mention the fact that I bet there aren't many petty criminals who could take on a MACO with her level of training. I just have this feeling that there's more to this."

"Maybe you're seeing something where there isn't anything," said Reed. "I mean Special Projects folded over ten years ago now, people change, especially as they get older."

"She wasn't that much older than me, Malcolm, and my reflexes are still pretty good. Besides who would you bet on in a fight, some guy off the street or a trained, ex Special Projects, MACO," said Trip.

"Yes, but she hadn't been on active duty for over a year. I looked up her record," said Reed. "She was coming home after a night out with friends, she wasn't expecting trouble, he probably just took her by surprise."

"Yeah, maybe you're right," said Trip. "I guess the paranoia part of Special Ops training never does wear off."

"Better too paranoid than not enough," said Reed. He wondered if Trip did have a point though, Arroya had been a teacher so would have had to have kept her skills up. Something was missing from this picture and there was nothing he liked better than a good mystery. He wondered what her blood alcohol levels had been, if she'd been drunk then that certainly would have explained why she wasn't on her usual form. He suspected that Trip wouldn't be able to let this go until they found an explanation so he decided that a little digging was in order.

"I feel really awful," said Trip, leaning back against the wall.

"You don't get any sympathy for self-inflicted injuries, Commander," said Reed.

"Gee, thanks Malcolm," said Trip sarcastically.

"Phlox did sign you off sick today though," said Reed. "He thought you'd probably need the recovery time."

"Remind me to thank him next time I see him," said Trip.

"You might want to hold off on that, it means your name will be on the sick list and you know who gets to see that every morning," said Reed.

"Damn, the Captain. He'll probably want to pop down and check on me. I wonder if I can get away with pretending I've got food poisoning," said Trip.

"Chef would never forgive you," relied Reed.

"You're right and having Chef mad at me would be even worse than telling the Captain the truth," said Trip.

"I suggest that you start with the why you're sick and finish with the how," said Reed. "Hell, if he'd known he probably would have kept you company. If I'd known I would have been happy to have stopped you drinking alone."

"Sorry," said Trip. "I don't know, it just seemed to be one of those things that you don't do with friends. None of you knew her and it's a bit morbid going on about memories of dead friend."

"Trip, friendship goes both ways you know. You've done enough things for me, you have to let me repay the favour sometime," said Reed.

"I think you did last night," said Trip.

"You'd have done the same for me. Anyway I have to get back to my quarters to change and then get on duty. Just promise me that you won't do this again," said Reed.

"You got my word on that," said Trip. He hadn't exactly intended to do it this time so it was an easy promise to make. "No more drinking alone."

With that Reed left and Trip did his best to get comfortable in bed again so that he could sleep off the crashing hangover that he had, which seemed to be penetrating even Phlox's pain killers. Why was it every time he thought he had put Special Projects behind him, or at least reconciled with it, something reminded him of what it had been like when things were at their worst. Looking back, when he'd actually been part of Special Projects everything had been so busy that he never had time to think much about what they'd done. No, it was after their final mission that the problems had really started.

Life after the MACO's Special Project Unit hadn't exactly been easy for Trip. Their final mission before the unit was disbanded had caused the deaths of thousands of people, or that's what they had believed at the time. They'd lost a member of their unit in the process and their ship had been destroyed when they made their escape. The whole thing was a mess. The remaining members of the unit had been stranded on a nondescript planet for a week until the ECS Jericho came and rescued them. That had given Trip plenty of time to brood and realise that he was at least partly to blame for everything that had happened.

When they eventually got back to Earth, they'd all been called up before the General in charge of Covert Ops to explain their actions, but as what they had been doing was classified, there wasn't much the authorities could do about it without implicating themselves. In the end no punishment had been metered out, except for the disbanding of the unit. In some ways that had made things much harder, Trip would have taken any punishment gratefully since he really believed that they deserved it.

The Starfleet psychiatrists had him in for all the usual tests. They hadn't wanted to let him go back to duty, stating that he needed more time to recover from the traumatic experiences he had been through but Trip didn't want to wait around. He wanted to be back at work and thinking about something else, something which had nothing to do with covert ops. Through his well connected grape vine he heard that the NX project was floundering and Trip knew he had knowledge which could kick start it again. He spoke to his former commanding officer at Research and Development and explained that he was fine and it was just the psychiatrists being cautious. It took a lot of persuasion on Trip's part but after that R and D pulled some strings and got him released.

The only problem was that even though he was back at work, spending every spare minute that he had working on the warp engine, he still couldn't sleep. Most nights he had trouble getting to sleep and when he did finally close his eyes he was woken by bad dreams. The Starfleet doctor that he saw about his disturbed sleep prescribed him some sleeping pills for when the nightmares got too bad. Phlox told him later that he had been horrified to discover from Trip's records that he had been taking sleeping pills for so long, the Starfleet doctor hadn't seemed worried about it. If Kanatova hadn't come to see Trip one Saturday at his new apartment and found the pills he probably wouldn't have thought anything about it until it was too late. Sleeping pills were just a part of his life now.

"Trip, how long have you been taking these?" Kanatova asked, her Russian accent becoming more pronounced which Trip knew meant he was in trouble. He recognised the tone from when she had been Special Projects' Medic. She'd always given him a hard time about how he looked after himself.

"Don't know. Few months maybe," said Trip. "I haven't been sleeping too well lately." He was cursing himself for leaving the bottle of pills in the bathroom where she could find them. He should have known better with a doctor visiting him. He headed for the kitchen area and started to make coffee, hoping Kanatova would drop the subject.

"With these you are now sleeping fine again, I'm sure," said Kanatova. She tipped them out onto the counter top and began to count them out, forming triangles with the pills.

"Yeah, they knock me out like a light," said Trip.

"Have you any idea just how dangerous it is to be on these for a long period of time. I can't believe those Starfleet doctors are letting you do this to yourself. You're coming off them, and as of now I'm your doctor."

"Anna, you're worrying about me over nothing," said Trip. "I'm not sure Starfleet will even let me have a MACO doctor."

"I'm not worrying over nothing. I know your medical history, I'm on base, there's no logical reason for me not to be your doctor. I'll clear it with Starfleet on Monday," said Kanatova. "I'm not letting those quacks at Starfleet undo all my good work."

"Your good work? I spent the first three months when I joined Special Projects bruised black and blue and you didn't do a thing about it," said Trip.

"Is it my fault if you don't know how to duck?" asked Kanatova in retort. She remembered countless incidents when Trip had returned from missions with injuries and she had patched him up, but she didn't mention those because she knew that it would only stir bad memories. The worst fright that she'd had was when he hadn't come back at all and Darwin had pulled him out of a prison camp a few days later, very much the worse for wear. Neither of them wanted to talk about that incident. "You really should talk to someone," she added more gently.

"Yeah, I know, but who am I going to talk to? The whole damn thing is classified and we're not even meant to talk about it with each other. If anyone asks me what I've been doing for the last three years I'm supposed to say I was part of a classified research programme. A research programme! That's the definition of irony. God, if they only knew. I wake up screaming, Anna, and those are the nights that I manage to get to sleep at all," said Trip.

"I know, Trip, it's bad for all of us. We all regret what happened. None of us wanted to lose Antonia," said Kanatova.

"Yes, but none of you had to watch her die," said Trip. "Talking about it won't bring her back and I doubt it will make me feel any better."

Kanatova had changed the subject and they hadn't talked about it anymore. He went on with his life, carefully pushing away any feelings that emerged, pretending that Special Projects had never happened. It had almost worked as well. And soon after that he'd met a Commander Archer and suddenly his life was very full, not least with keeping his new friend out of trouble, although he was sure that Jon saw it the other way round.

Of course Jon hadn't seen the man in the alleyway that night. The man that was about to mug him on his way home from the 602 Club. Trip spotted him and dealt with him without even breaking a sweat, before Jon even noticed that Trip was missing. But then Jon had drunk a few beers so wasn't exactly on top observational form. MACO hand to hand combat training did come in useful sometimes. On his worst day, Trip was twenty times better than the mugger.

Trip had Jonathan Archer pegged. Jon was an idealist. The son of Henry Archer, one of the ultimate idealists, a man who had a dream which his son was determined to see through. Jonathan Archer was a clean cut poster boy for Starfleet, already marked out for great things. The kind of officer who made speeches and whose men would follow him anywhere. Not a rule breaker like Trip. In short, Jonathan Archer was exactly the kind of person that Trip needed to hang around with if he wanted to shake off his MACO past. Of course, the following night he came to realise that he'd only been half right about Jonathan Archer.

James Fenner had spent the last five years ferrying cargo between planets and enjoying it. He'd saved up for his own ship, knowing that he wasn't going to want to spend the rest of his life being shot at in the MACOs. He'd had enough of military discipline and covert ops to last him a lifetime, so he decided it was time to be his own boss. Of course the ship he had now didn't compare to the Andorian light cruiser that he used to pilot in his MACO days but then very little did. He certainly wouldn't have been able to have afforded anything comparable to the Thak Tikh. The ship he had was fine though, basic but exactly what he needed for cargo running. He specialised in short hops between planets which was perfect because it was a niche that not many ships filled. So far he was doing pretty well for himself.

He was on his way to a small planet called Veras, which was also home at the moment. He was looking forward to dropping off his cargo and then taking some well deserved vacation time. He was even daydreaming a little as he flew home about how to spend his free time. Suddenly a warning light flickered on on his control panel. It flashed urgently.

Fenner checked the control. "What the...?" he looked down at the scanner, it showed three ships behind him and they were closing on him fast. He opened a com channel.

"This is Veras Cargo Ship Bluebird out of Unas, please identify yourselves," he said. Silence greeted him. Whoever the ships were, they didn't intend to identify themselves.

He did some quick mental calculations. At the speed he was travelling at and the speed they were travelling at, they should overtake Bluebird in about thirty minutes. Something didn't feel right about this, his sixth sense was twitching. The ships had appeared almost out of nowhere with very little warning. The scanner showed that the ships were small and fast, not the usual type of freighter that moved around the system. He briefly thought that maybe the Nausicaan raiders had decided to enter the system, but he'd never heard of them venturing this close to an inhabited system before. The ships didn't match any Nausicaan raider ships that he'd ever come across either.

He decided to test out a theory. He input a new course into the computer and watched as Bluebird turned onto the new heading. He checked the scanner once the course change was complete. The three ships behind him had matched his course change, there was no doubt in his mind now that he was being followed. Except perhaps he wasn't being followed, perhaps he was being hunted. He needed to think of something and think of it fast.

It was a long way to Veras, he wouldn't make it before the ships following him caught up. He looked at his other options. There wasn't much that was nearer to him than Veras, just a few asteroids. If he could reach the asteroids then he might be able to use them to hide behind. He kicked in the thrusters to give himself an extra boost and watched his scanner as the three ships behind him also speeded up and matched his course.

Then he noticed something that was at the far edge of his scanner, something that was moving quickly at a tangent to the system. He interrogated the computer which produced an ID.

"Enterprise," said Fenner. "I hope you're listening, Trip."