Happy 4th of July to Americans! Thanks to everyone who has read. Thanks to reviewers! I really appreciate having it pointed out where I've been unclear, or done something that doesn't make sense. It gives me a chance to fix it. Thanks! I believe there will be one more long chapter (or maybe two chapters) in this story.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Malcolm opened his eyes, only to slam them closed again at the brightness of the room. Raising a hand to his face to shield his eyes, he opened them again. Recognizing sickbay he sighed. He tried to remember what had brought him here, but he couldn't seem to follow a line of thought. He was becoming aware that he was thirsty, his throat hurt, and there was a vague ache in his left side, but these were only fleeting concerns. He closed his eyes again.

"Ah, Lieutenant. I see you're waking up. How are you feeling?"

Malcolm considered. "Not too badly," he said, or meant to say, but it came out a whisper. He swallowed, and tried again. This time he was more audible. He followed up with a large yawn, which drew a smile from Phlox.

"Still sleepy from the anaesthesia, hmmm? Well, that will last a little while longer yet. Are you in pain?"

Malcolm shook his head. No, he wasn't really in pain, just that vague ache, and his thirst. But something else was coming back to him. Something had happened to the ship. He should be on the bridge, he was certain. "What happened? Why am I here? What's going on?"

"Now, now, don't get upset. It seems you made the close acquaintance of the torpedo bay loading door. It hit you hard enough to break ribs and rupture your spleen. I removed your spleen. The ribs will heal with time. I've already had my osmotic eel working on the incision site, and it's healing nicely."

At mention of the eel, Malcolm became aware of something cold and slimy pressed against his side, and he tried not to think about the creature that was attached to him. He knew the doctor's methods worked—but sometimes it was better not to examine them too closely. To distract himself he asked, "How long have I been here?"

"Well, you've been recovering from the anaethesia for about six hours. You've been in and out, but you probably don't remember much of that. You were on the ventilator until about two hours ago, so I had to keep you sedated. Before that you had five hours of surgery… so all in all it's been about half a day."

Malcolm nodded. He felt his eyelids began to droop, and knew he would not be able to stay awake much longer, but he wanted to ask one more question. "Enterprise. Is she safe?"

"Yes, Lieutenant. Now go to sleep. When you wake up I'll fill you in. For now, though, you need to rest."

His patient was already asleep.

Archer entered the bridge and glanced quickly around. There was nothing out of the ordinary to grab his attention, so he moved to his seat. He had finally managed a nap, and was feeling much more alert. Rather than sit down though, he took a step forward to where Travis was manning the helm.

"How's it going, Mr. Mayweather?"

Travis shook his head. "Captain, I feel like a student pilot on his first solo. But I think I'm getting a little better."

"Good. I want you to spend as much time at the helm as possible, but if something happens, I want you back at the science station, and I'll take the helm."

"Understood, Captain." Travis went back to staring at the helm. Archer could see that he was playing with the ship, making gentle coarse corrections and reversing them, practicing, trying to get back the feel for steering the big ship.

"Hoshi? Anything new?"

"No, Captain. I've been working with the UT on the Actuarian's language, trying to get a more accurate translation, in case we encounter them again."

"Good idea," Archer told her. He glanced over at tactical, but the station was empty. "Is Commander Tucker in the armory?"

"Yes, Sir," Hoshi told him. "T'Pol was up here for a little while, then she headed down to engineering. She wanted me to tell you that they have been able to correct the ratio mix. Also, Captain, Cutler has reported that since we made the crew reassignments there have been no further accidents. Oh! I sent a message to your quarters but you were already on your way up here—Malcolm woke up, and Phlox says he's doing fine, but that you don't need to go to sick bay because he's asleep again."

Archer nodded, pleased. So far Malcolm was the only one who had been seriously injured. Archer knew that he should be very grateful for that fact; the situation was ideal for mishaps. He decided that since everything was under control on the bridge he would make a tour of the ship. He'd stop at sickbay last—by then Malcolm might be awake again.

Trip stood with his arms folded across his chest, observing the armory crew. Or was it the engineering crew? Whatever the group was called, they were running drills, refreshing their memories on how to load torpedos. Trip had already run them through the firing range, pleased that they had all been able to qualify. It was a source of pride that he kept his engineers Starfleet skills, particularly survival related skills, up to date. He made sure they all fired their weapons routinely, at least once a month. Loading the torpedos and manning the phaser cannons was another matter altogether. Most of the engineers hadn't done that since they were junior crewman. However, their training was coming back, and they appeared confident. Trip knew however that if the ship came under attack, it could be these rusty skills that might be required to save it. So when they finished the drill he simply nodded and said, "Again."

The crew seemed to give one collective groan, and Trip inwardly sympathized, but he only gestured for them to start again, while he reached to start the timer. As the drill began, Trip heard the door to the armory slide open. Without looking away, he called, "Can I help you?"

"No, I just wanted to see how things are going here."

Trip raised a finger without looking at Archer. "Just a moment, Captain." He glanced at the timer as the drill ended. "Better. Much better. Okay, let's take a break. After I talk to the captain, I'm going to give you the locations of your battle stations. Then we're going to review the battle plans. So everyone grab some water and a ration pack."

Archer watched as the former engineering crew moved to the ration packs that were lying on a table, talking quietly. They looked tired, and were moving a little slowly, but their was a growing air of confidence. Archer was pleased. Trip seemed more at ease as well, with non of the hesitancy that had been present in the crew before. This might not be Trip's greatest area of strength, but it was clear he felt competent here in the armory. Archer was relieved.

"Well, it looks like things are going well here. I'm going to stop by engineering, and then sickbay. After that I'll be on the bridge if you need me."

"Okay, Captain. By the way, have you heard anything about Malcolm?"

"Phlox says he's doing fine. He was awake earlier, but went back to sleep."

"That's great. I'll stop by and see him later." Trip turned back to his crew. "Fifteen minutes. Then we're back to work. So eat up."

Archer grinned, and headed out.

In engineering things were running smoothly, just as Archer would have predicted. Any section T'Pol was in charge of was sure to be running efficiently. He stayed in engineering just long enough to ascertain that, as in the armory, the transplanted crew was rapidly becoming comfortable at their new duty stations. Once again he was grateful for Starfleet training, which gave each crewmember basic skills in nearly all areas of Starship operations. Between that training, which was standing the junior members in good stead, and the fact that senior crew had often worked in both tactical and engineering departments, the engineering department was being satisfactorily manned. And, Archer thought, it didn't hurt that his ship had been given Starfleet's top people. Even the most junior members had been at the top of their training classes.

His people were rising to the challenge. Archer knew he had every right to be proud of them. There was no complaining about the long shifts they were pulling. Archer hoped that someday he could find a way to reward them. For now, though, all he could do was offer praise and encouragement. He walked around the section, making time to speak with each crewmember, and then he pulled T'Pol aside.

"I'm setting a course back to Earth," he told her. "We need to get to the bottom of this, medically, so we can make sure it doesn't happen again. For all we know we could have a virus that caused this problem. As well as the crew is doing, we don't know if there might be other effects that haven't shown up yet."

"I think that is a prudent course of action," T'Pol responded, meeting his gaze unflinchingly. "To do otherwise is to put the crew in potential danger. Not just from any alien source, but from internal accidents, such as happened to Lieutenant Reed."

"Those seem to have stopped," Archer reminded her. "Once we shifted the crew around, everyone seems to have settled down. I think we'd probably be fine, but I'm just not quite ready to take that chance."

"Whatever the reason for your decision, I think it a prudent one," T'Pol replied, and for just a moment he wondered if he would ever get in the last word with her. He decided it was unlikely, and he should just move on.

"I'm going to stop by sickbay, and then I'll go to the bridge and change our course." Archer replied. "And then I think I need to send a message to Starfleet".

Archer heard the raised voices from outside sickbay's doors. It didn't take much imagination to figure out who was arguing, or what they were fighting about. He stepped through the doors, vowing not to get involved.

"Lieutenant," Phlox was saying, exasperation clear in his voice. "You are not well enough to leave sickbay yet."

"I feel fine, and you said, not more than five minutes ago, how well I was healing." Malcolm was pulling a shirt on over his head as he spoke. He'd already managed to get get his pants on, but he didn't yet have any footwear.

"Yes, and you are. But that didn't mean I thought you were ready to go back to work! My eel has done a nice work on your incision on the outside, but you've got all sorts of healing to do on the inside yet. Not to mention that part of the reason you feel so well is the medicine you've been getting. Wait another few hours. We'll see how you feel then, after we stop the-"

"No." Malcolm was scanning sickbay, obviously intent on finding his boots. "I'm not going to stay here. The captain needs a full crew right now. What would happen if we needed to defend ourselves?" He spotted the boots under a cabinet and began gingerly sliding off the biobed, intent on retrieving them. When neither Archer or Phlox moved to assist him, he began making his wobbly way across the room.

"Malcolm, things are going fine," Archer finally jumped in, doubting anything he could say would help. "We haven't seen anything remotely threatening, and Trip is doing fine running the armory."

At his words, a look of shocked surprise, and a fleeting hurt expression crossed Malcolm's face. It was gone in an instant. "You've replaced me in the armory?"

"No! It's not like that, Malcolm. I've reassigned the crew, to areas where they have some level of training and experience that is not their normal area of expertise. We've figured that those areas don't seem to be affected. Everyone is digging down to find areas they can help out in. We've reassigned people to those areas."

"Where would you like me to go?" Malcolm asked, looking, Archer thought, a little lost.

"Well, I was planning on having you stay in sickbay, until Phlox says you're ready to return to duty," Archer replied dryly. "Then we'll figure out the best place for you."

Malcolm returned the captain's gaze for a moment and then dropped his eyes. "I'm sorry for this business, captain. It was entirely my fault. I should have been supervising my crew more closely, making sure they knew their jobs before I ran a live drill."

"Malcolm, this isn't your fault," Archer sighed. He'd known this was coming—it was exactly what he'd expected from his armory officer.

"Yes, it was," Malcolm quietly insisted. "I was too self-absorbed, worrying about my own loss of abilities. I wasn't focusing on my crew, and their problems. Someone could have been killed by my selfishness!" His voice had risen angrily, and he had straightened on his last words, nearly glaring at Archer, daring him to contradict him.

"Malcolm, it was an accident. They've been happening all over the ship. Blaming yourself doesn't help anybody right now. What you need to do right now is rest and recover, so that when I need you, you'll be available, not still in sickbay because you refused to let follow Phlox directions. If I have to make it an order, I will. I want you to stay here, and do whatever Phlox tells you to do. When, and only when, he releases you, I'll assign you somewhere. Is that perfectly clear."

"Yes," Malcolm mumbled under his breath. Archer was tempted to demand he repeat himself, but realized just in time that he would be taking his own frustration out on the armory officer. So instead he nodded at Malcolm, excused himself to Phlox and exited sickbay to turn his ship back toward Earth.

He had been hoping he could avoid it, hoping their would be some magical cure, and they would all miraculously be returned to normal. It was becoming obvious that wasn't going to happen. This mysterious ailment, that he suspected had been caused by the Actuarians was going to accomplish what the Klingons, Vulcans, Orions, and a myriad of enemies had been unable to do. It was sending Enterprise home.