As they turned a corner, Trix began to get an odd feeling tingling down her spine. She stopped walking as she tried to make sense of why she was feeling odd. Half of her was thinking it was something to do with healing, but half of her was sure it was something else.
Malcolm noticed she'd stopped and turned to her. "Are you all right?" He asked, gently placing a hand on her shoulder. He was slightly concerned it was something to do with Trip, knowing the two were somehow connected.
"I don't know." Trix looked into Reed's eyes and shook her head slightly.
Suddenly a yellow hand with black speckles appeared around Malcolm's throat. He gargled and he was strangled from behind. Trix was thrown to the ground as two Suliban locked in combat with the British Armoury Officer. One anchoring Malcolm down by strangling him while the other threw punches at him face.
As Malcolm was pulled and pushed around the corridor he lost his grip on his phase pistol. It fell to the ground and clanged on the hard floor. He flipped the Suliban that was strangling him, to the ground and made a quick dash for his phase pistol. However he had forgotten about his second opponent who punched him again and kicked the weapon away from Malcolm's reach. It skidded across the floor and stopped just short of where Trix lay.
Once again Malcolm was being strangled and punched. His face getting bruised with every punch.
The young girl scrambled to the Reed's weapon and picked it up. She aimed it at one of the soldiers and fired. The beam narrowly missed reed's head and struck the forehead of the soldier behind him. He fell to the floor with a load THUD. The second Suliban seized his chance. He clenched his fist and hit Malcolm squarely on his lower jaw. With the force of the blow Malcolm fell back and hit the floor. He laid there in a slight daze, sub—consciously wiggling his jaw around to make sure it wasn't broken or severely damaged, and so far it seemed to be all right.
Trix fired again, hitting the second Cabal squarely between the shoulder blades. He too fell to the floor with a THUD.
Regaining his senses Malcolm stood up. He inspected the two bodies, lying still around him. One flat on his back, the other one lying on his front. His raised his eyebrows, twitching his head to one side and then lowered them.
"Are you all right?" Trix called as she lowered the weapon, looking Malcolm's wounds, he had a fairly blackened eye and his lip was bleeding, blood dripping down his chin and falling onto his uniform, staining it.
"Yeah thanks." He coughed to clear his throat, placing the back of his hand on his lip, feeling the blood trickling down. Malcolm's voice was hoarse. He massaged his throat with one hand. He then turned his attention back to the bodies. A sudden clatter from down the corridor forced him to turn his head sharply.
The phase pistol that was once in Trix's hand was now lying on the floor, the young girl looked like she was about to cry. Malcolm quickly rushed over to her and bent down. "Trix? What's wrong?"
"I've killed them! I've become a murderer!" A tear fell down her face. She hadn't noticed it when she had first picked up the phase pistol but after he had shot both the Suliban she realised that it had been set to 'kill', something she didn't want to do, but now she had.
"You did what you had to do." There was a short pause as Malcolm watched a couple more tears fall down Trix's face. He sighed and picked up the weapon. He then helped Trix to her feet. Together they continued their search for Commander Tucker.
The pair walked around for a couple of minutes, but there was no sign of Trip. They were starting to wonder if he had been captured by the Suliban. They were about to turn a corner when a familiar voice was heard behind them.
"Hey! Malcolm!" Trip ran along the corridor to catch them up. "You two ok?" he asked looking back and forth between Trix and Malcolm, inspecting their wounds.
"We're fine, but we've got to get back to the ship." Malcolm said, only slight relief at seeing his friend was in his voice, more was worry for Enterprise.
"I can't argue with that. The sooner we get away from here the better." Trip replied as he massaged the back ofhis neck. Reed noticed a small cut on the Commander's cheek, indicating hat he had been in a fight.
"It's not that sir."
Trip looked at Reed with a puzzled face. "Then what is it?"
"Auto destruct sequence." Trix managed to say before collapsing in tears. She fell to the floor, dragging Reed down with her.
"She gave them the codes." Malcolm added, bringing Trix into a light hug.
Trip looked at them blankly. He knelt down on the floor next to Trix and gently placed a hand on her shoulder. "A truth serum?"
All Trix could do was nod her head.
Footsteps were heard at the other end of the corridor. Reed quickly readied his weapon, waiting to shoot. After a few seconds three soldiers appeared.
Reed began madly shooting at the enemy, hoping to hit them. Upon hearing the shots Trix quickly cowered up against the wall with Trip protecting her, helping to move her out of any line of fire.
Two of the soldiers went down from Reed's hail of discharge, the third quickly hid and began to fire back at Reed, who immediately ducked out of the way of the Suliban's shots.
