Walk in the Dark

By Drogna

Chapter 8

AN: Thanks to everyone who took the time to review the last chapter. Things will of course get worse before they get better, this is me writing this.

Trip had been working in Engineering on repairs to the EPS grid when the summons to sickbay had come over the com. It was unusual for Phlox to ask to see him outside his scheduled appointments. He was in sickbay so frequently that Phlox shouldn't have had any reason to need to see him again before his next check-up. He entered sickbay to find T'Pol waiting with the doctor.

"Do you want me to come back later?" he asked, thinking that T'Pol was there to consult with Phlox.

"No, no," said Phlox. "T'Pol is here because this was a result of her research."

"Research?" Trip wasn't aware that T'Pol had been doing any research.

T'Pol clasped her arms behind her back. "I have been assisting the doctor in his attempts to find a cure for your condition."

"T'Pol has located a Vulcan treatment for a similar disease within Vulcans," said Phlox.

"And you think it might work for me?" Trip didn't want to get his hopes up but this sounded promising.

"That is my theory," said T'Pol.

"Great, where do I sign up?" asked Trip, smiling.

Phlox still looked grave however. "It's not that simple, Commander. This is an experimental treatment even within Vulcans and completely untested on humans. It's possible that it might not work at all."

"If that was the only problem you wouldn't be looking so damn miserable, Doc," said Trip.

"It could be deadly. The treatment itself is not pleasant and uses a Vulcan mutagen to repair the damaged genes. If it were to harm other genes in the process you could die or be severely disabled. It also won't do anything to repair the damage to your nervous system already caused by the disease."

"So I could die and I won't be any better off than I am now if it does work."

"You won't deteriorate any further," said Phlox.

Trip leaned against a biobed, taking some weight off his weak left leg. "What are the chances of it working?"

"Current cases have seen a twenty percent complete cure rate," said T'Pol.

Trip's heart sank. "And the rest?"

"Another ten percent had serious physical disabilities post treatment," said T'Pol. "A further five percent experienced serious brain damage."

"And the other sixty-five percent?" He had to ask, but he already knew what she would say.

"Did not survive," confirmed T'Pol.

"Could you do this treatment on Enterprise?" asked Trip.

"No, it's too experimental and complex to be able to carry out in sickbay," said Phlox. "We'd have to take you to Vulcan."

"For how long?"

"It is a six month course of treatment," said T'Pol.

"Could I wait until I've finished my time on Enterprise?" asked Trip. He knew he had about another six months before his disabilities would force him to transfer back to Earth.

Phlox shook his head. "The Vulcan doctors have limited resources and won't accept patients who don't have at least have some chance of survival. If the damage already done by the disease is too much, then you won't be strong enough to take the therapy. Judging by your current rate of deterioration, you can't delay more than another month or so."

"No, no way. I don't want to spend my last few useful months sitting around in a hospital. I want to be on Enterprise and you know as well as I do that once I leave, I'm not coming back, even if it works. I won't be well enough by then to be allowed back onto a ship."

It hadn't even taken him a second to know where his priorities lay and that surprised him slightly. Only a few days ago he'd been talking to Catherine about how he hated being so useless and how much being on Enterprise hurt, seeing everything that he couldn't have. Apparently he wasn't prepared to give it all up for a thirty-five percent chance at life.

"I think you should consider this carefully, Trip," said T'Pol.

He knew it was serious when she called him Trip. It had taken her long enough to start using his nickname and she only really used it now when she was talking with him about something important and personal.

"It's not even a fifty-fifty chance, T'Pol. I'd rather have six months on Enterprise than six months in a hospital with a good chance that I'll die or be permanently brain damaged by the end of it."

"It is a thirty-five percent chance that you do not currently have," said T'Pol.

"It's not enough," said Trip. "I don't just want to go through the motions of living, I want to be out here doing everything I can. I know that Vulcans can see everything in percentages and odds but that's not me. Being a part of Enterprise's crew is the most important thing in my life and I'm not going to trade in a short life on Enterprise for a longer life anywhere else."

"It's your choice, Commander," said Phlox. "We won't force you into this, but I would like you to take the literature away with you to read through. I want to make sure that you're fully informed before you turn it down."

Trip nodded. "Okay, give me the data and I'll read it through, but I doubt I'll change my mind." He took the offered padd.

"Don't take too long to decide, Commander," Phlox added. Trip just nodded in acknowledgement and left, reading the padd as he went.

Archer had just had a visit from T'Pol and was now on his way to see his Chief Engineer. He didn't know what he was going to say, but he knew that he had to say something to make Trip see that this was his only chance. He walked through the grey corridors of Enterprise towards its heart, Main Engineering. He stepped through the hatch and saw Trip sitting at the workbench in the corner working on a component of some type.

"Hey, Captain," greeted Trip, smiling as he saw Archer approaching.

"Trip, T'Pol came to see me," said Archer. There was no point in approaching the subject gently. Trip had known Archer too long not to know when he was working up to something.

"I'm not doing it," said Trip, turning his attention back to the component.

"She told me, and I didn't come down here to persuade you," replied Archer, leaning against the bench.

"You didn't?" Trip was confused now.

"I just want to make sure that you have thought about it," said Archer. He was slightly ashamed by the lie, but he knew Trip was blinded by the desire to remain on Enterprise. It was the prize that he was working for and everyday he stayed on Enterprise was another day he won against the disease.

"The way I see it, a thirty-five percent chance is pretty much the same as no chance. It's not going to fix anything even if it works, I just won't get any worse. We both know that I'm only still here because it's a long way back to Earth, so once I leave this ship, that's it for my Starfleet career."

"I wouldn't say that. Research and Development would love to have you back," said Archer.

"It's not what I want and it's not what I signed up for," said Trip.

"Can't you wait a bit, until you'd be leaving Enterprise anyway?"

"Nah, according to Phlox, I'll be past the point where the Vulcan doctors take patients. The more I deteriorate, the weaker I get, and I have to have some chance of getting through the therapy to be accepted onto the program."

"Staying on Enterprise isn't worth your chance of a cure."

"Have you read what this therapy involves? Basically it's six months of lying around while some alien mutagen rewrites my genetic code. If it works, which is a hell of a big if, then I get to live, if it doesn't then I'm either dead, physically disabled or brain damaged. I can swap six months of time doing something I love, for six months in a hospital bed with the small chance I might be cured at the end of it. It's not much of a choice."

"No, it isn't, but I don't want to lose you, Trip," said Archer, quietly.

Trip was slightly taken aback by the change in tone. If this wasn't trying to persuade him then he didn't know what was. He wondered if he was being selfish by refusing the only hope he had of living. He didn't want to sacrifice his remnants of a career in Starfleet for a slim chance at life but perhaps friendship was more important. Trip was well aware how his illness tore at Archer and what his death would mean to the Captain.

"You really want me to do this?"

"It can't be worse than what you're already facing," said Archer.

Trip looked directly into his eyes and Archer saw the fear there that Trip usually hid so well. "I guess it can't hurt to ask Phlox to set up the consultation," said Trip. "I'm not making any promises but at least we can see if they'll take me on the program."

Archer placed a hand on his friend's shoulder. "That's all I wanted."

The Vulcan doctors answered Phlox's request for a consultation swiftly and with the nearest that Vulcans could come to excitement. Trip's case interested them. It would be the first time they had attempted to adapt their therapy for a new race and it would be an amazing breakthrough if it worked.

They requested Trip's medical history and held a long subspace communication with Phlox to discuss the questions that they had. Trip guessed that might have something to do with the large number of injuries and interesting medical conditions he'd suffered over his five years serving on Enterprise. Not many men had been pregnant or cloned to produce tissue to heal a head injury or brought back from the brink of death at the hands of a silicone virus. Trip could see why the Vulcans had a lot of questions for Phlox.

After a week of discussions and subspace communications, they sent a ship to rendezvous with Enterprise. It carried two Vulcan doctors and a plethora of medical equipment to assess Trip's condition and suitability for treatment. Enterprise altered course and would meet the Vulcan ship in three days time at their present speed. This had now become a matter of interspecies co-operation as well as a potential cure for Trip's illness.

Archer did his best to keep Trip's mind off the approaching consultation and his likely departure from Enterprise. Nothing was certain as yet. Trip still hadn't given his final agreement to trying the treatment, but it was looking more and more likely that he would. Archer tried to keep everything normal, but he could see the nervousness under Trip's falsely calm exterior.

Work was the only thing Trip had to keep him going at the moment so Archer made sure that he was kept occupied. He arranged a meeting with Trip to discuss his proposed changes to the warp engine to optimise plasma consumption ratios. The upgrades were complicated, as was the system they were trying to alter, so it was a project which needed Trip to put some thought into it. It required a feasibility study to be submitted before work could be approved, so Trip would have to prepare a report and that would definitely need his full attention.

When 1500 ship's time arrived Archer waited in his ready room for his Chief Engineer to appear, but half an hour later he still hadn't arrived. There had been no call to cancel or give an excuse for his lateness. This was most unlike Trip. Archer decided to head down to Engineering and find out what had happened. He entered the usual bustle of Engineering and stopped the first crewman that he saw to ask for Trip's whereabouts and was directed to the Chief Engineer's office.

Trip's office wasn't really an office at all, it was a converted storage area that Trip had co-opted during their second year out. There was barely room for the desk and chairs that Trip had installed. Space problems were made worse because Trip insisted on piling his desk high with padds, small components and random tools. It was a stark contrast to the larger ready room that Archer used, and felt purely utilitarian. Trip didn't spend much time in it, except when he needed to blitz the paperwork that he kept putting off.

The main advantage it had was that it had a door that could be shut, so when Trip needed some peace and quiet he could be found in his office. Trip's crew dreaded being told to shut the door when called into his office, because they knew they were about to get a reprimand that they wouldn't forget. It also had the only source of coffee in the whole of Engineering, although woe betide anyone who thought about taking coffee out of the office.

Archer approached the heavy metal door and found it slightly ajar, as normal. Even when Trip wanted quiet he always left the door slightly open so that he could hear what was going on out in the main area. Archer tapped on the door and stepped through to see Trip staring into space.

"Hey, Trip," said Archer. Trip didn't move.

"Trip?" Archer was beside his friend in a few quick strides. He shook his shoulder and Trip blinked and turned to Archer with a look of puzzlement.

"Where did you come from?" Trip looked like he'd just woken from a dream.

"Maybe I should ask you the same question. You were miles away. We had a meeting scheduled for half an hour ago to talk about warp plasma consumption ratios," said Archer.

"Damn." Trip grabbed the chronometer on his desk and looked at the time. "Sorry Captain, I guess I'm a bit preoccupied at the moment." Trip paused again for a moment. "What was it you wanted to meet about?"

"The warp plasma ratios project," repeated Archer again.

"Oh, yeah, I've got the erm…thing…on a padd," said Trip, searching his desk.

"Report?" asked Archer. Trip was very rarely distracted enough to have trouble with words.

"Report," confirmed Trip. "It's somewhere in this lot. Do you mind going through it here?"

Archer looked a little worriedly at Trip. His common sense was telling him that this was more than just Trip getting distracted, but he didn't want to believe it, so he ignored it. He moved a pile of sensor report padds off the only other chair in the room and sat down to go over the plasma consumption ratios with his Chief Engineer.

Trip kept losing time and he didn't know where it went. One moment he'd be doing something and the next he'd be jerking himself out of a reverie that he didn't remember slipping into. Minutes would usually have passed but sometimes he found he'd lost more than an hour to a dark nothingness that he didn't understand. He put it down to tiredness and the stress of their approaching rendezvous with the Vulcan ship. He certainly had a lot to contemplate at the moment and it wasn't surprising that he daydreamt a little.

The slight tremors in his hands had become an ever-present annoyance that even Phlox's drugs couldn't deal with. He also seemed to be getting more forgetful. He had never forgotten a meeting with the Captain before and it worried him that he had now. It was the loss of concentration that he was most concerned about as he had never experienced such a loss of focus before, and even though he tried to blame it on stress and fatigue, at the back of his mind was that this was another symptom of his CS. If it was a symptom then it represented the first impact on his cognition and it was something that would mean he'd have to give up his post on Enterprise.

He was lost in a moment of missing time when Lieutenant Reed came looking for him in the mouth of a Jeffries tube on D deck. He came back to the real world to find Reed shaking his shoulder.

"Hi, Malcolm," said Trip, hoping he hadn't been too obviously distracted.

"You looked like you were deep in thought," said Reed.

"Yeah, just got a lot on my mind at the moment."

Reed nodded in understanding. "The Vulcan ship is arriving in two days. How much sleep have you been getting?"

"Not much," confirmed Trip, maybe that was why his thoughts seemed so muddled lately.

"So you thought you'd get some work done."

"Nothing else to do, and, yeah, I know Phlox is going to kill me when he finds out." Trip turned back to the circuit that he had been trying to fix and realised that the tool he needed was on the other side of his visitor. "Hey, will you pass me that…thing." He was momentarily lost for the word he wanted.

"What thing?" asked Reed.

"You know, metal, you use it to undo retro-bolts," said Trip. He couldn't for the life of him pluck the word he needed from he recesses of his brain.

"Hyperspanner?" asked Reed.

"Yeah, the hyperspanner." Trip held out his hand, but was concentrating on the circuit assembly in front of him, so missed Reed's worried look. "I guess I must be more tired than I thought."

"Maybe you should call it quits for today," suggested Reed.

"Yeah, I really need to get some… erm…." Something really didn't feel right today and he couldn't work like this.

He crawled out of the Jeffries tube and waited for his usual dizziness at sudden movement to subside. He felt Reed put out the normal hand to steady him. Trip seemed to be having a lot of trouble with words today. He'd already tried to tell one of his people to fix something and forgotten the name of the part that they needed. Now he couldn't even remember the word "sleep", which he was sure was all he needed to get back to normal. It was then that he realised that the room was doing alarming things around him, tilting and distorting at the edges of his vision. He felt nausea rising within him, and suddenly the noises of Main Engineering were louder and more intrusive.

"I don't feel so well," he managed and that was the last thing he remembered.

When Trip awoke he had no idea where he was, he didn't recognise the bed he was on or the muted beige and cream of the décor. It took him several attempts to concentrate enough to work out that he was in sickbay on Enterprise. He felt rung out and weak, barely able to keep his eyes open, and he had no memory of why he was in sickbay. That scared him more than the fact that he was in sickbay.

"Commander Tucker, how do you feel?" asked a familiar voice.

He tried to move his head towards the voice and realised that it was just too much effort. "Not so good," he replied.

"That's to be expected after a seizure," said the voice. "Don't worry, your strength should return in a few days."

"Seizure? What happened?"

"What do you remember?"

Trip searched his memory. He was in sickbay so something bad must have happened. "I was being forced to help the Therans with their engine repairs. Is Malcolm okay?"

"Lieutenant Reed is fine. Just rest and we'll talk again later," said the comforting presence.

Trip was unable to do anything but comply since sleep was already dragging him back under. He closed his eyes and soon had drifted off.

Phlox moved away from his patient's bedside and went to report to the anxious man who had been waiting on the other side of sickbay during the whole conversation.

"Why doesn't he remember?" asked Archer.

"Disorientation is common after a seizure," said Phlox. "As is memory loss and weakness."

"Will he get those memories back?"

"Most probably, although it's always difficult to tell with his Clarke's Syndrome complicating things," replied Phlox.

"I don't remember my father ever suffering from seizures," said Archer.

"It's not common, but it is within the range of symptoms, especially in some of the more acute cases. From your description of his dissociative state earlier, it is probable that he has been suffering from minor disruptions in brain activity for a while now. They are often known as absence seizures because it appears that the person is in deep thought."

Archer nodded. He'd read the literature and knew that Phlox wasn't lying to him. Clarke's Syndrome attacked the nervous system and that could lead to seizures in a few rare cases. Trip had been one of the unlucky ones.

Phlox paused a moment and pursed his lips. Archer knew that this pose meant his doctor was about to give him some very bad news.

"What else, Doctor?" asked the Captain.

"You realise this means that I can no longer declare the Commander fit for duty," said Phlox. "His seizures, even when not tonic-clonic, could lead to accidents and are a serious health risk. This is the end of his career as a serving officer on a starship."

"I know," replied Archer. He'd already worked that one out. "As soon as he's well enough, I'll talk to him. The Vulcan ship will rendezvous with us tomorrow and they can take him off Enterprise."

"At least he may still be accepted onto the Vulcan mutagen treatment program."

Archer nodded his head solemnly. The Vulcans were Trip's one last hope and Archer's last hope of saving his friend. The idea of Trip leaving Enterprise was not one that he had really wanted to consider, but had known it would happen. He hadn't expected to be forced into it this soon. This had all happened far too quickly, and he didn't really have any other choice than to send Trip away with the Vulcans.

Lieutenant Reed didn't believe that he had ever been as scared in his entire life as he had when Trip began to seize in front of him. Alien boarding parties he could cope with, his friend falling over and convulsing in front of him for no apparent reason, was something else entirely. His first instinct had been to hold Trip down, but he dimly remembered that this was the wrong course of action, so he settled for making sure Trip didn't hurt himself and calling Phlox.

The whole episode was alarming to say the least. Trip had fallen to the floor and begun shaking uncontrollably. He didn't seem to be breathing, but once the seizure had stopped he had drawn in deep lungfuls of air. Phlox had arrived a few seconds before the seizure had ended, enough to see that Reed hadn't exaggerated, but had done nothing until the seizure finished, much to Reed's consternation. Once the seizure ended, Phlox had checked vital signs and moved in to get Trip stabilised before moving him to sickbay.

Reed followed the gurney to sickbay, although he wasn't sure how he expected to be able to help. It turned out that Phlox needed to ask him questions about Trip's state of mind prior to the seizure so it was just as well that he had decided to follow them. He didn't know how much help he actually was, it had been very quick and Trip had seemed fine before it started. The only thing that he could tell them was that Trip seemed not to be paying attention beforehand.

He watched as Trip was transferred to a bed and attached to an IV, but there was little else to be done.

Now Reed sat beside Trip's bed waiting for him to come round again. He'd awoken in short bursts but hadn't remained awake, which Phlox said was normal. A seizure was debilitating and, even without the complicating factors of CS, he would still have been lain up for a few days. Reed just wanted Trip to wake up and talk to him. He didn't care what Trip said to him as long as it wasn't "what happened?" which had been the first thing he had asked the past couple of time. Reed needed to know that Trip really was okay, or as okay as he got at the moment.

As if on cue, Trip's eyelids fluttered and peeled open, blinking furiously.

"Trip?" asked Reed.

"Hey, Malcolm," replied Trip, tiredly.

"How do you feel?"

"Like I was hit by a shuttlepod. I'm in sickbay, aren't I?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so."

"All I remember is talking to you in that Jeffries tube on D deck."

"You had a seizure. You'll have to ask Phlox for the details."

"Damn, my nervous system has got to be one hell of a mess to make that happen," said Trip.

Phlox appeared at the bedside and heard the end of their conversation. "That would be one way of putting it, Commander. I prefer to be more clinical in my diagnosis, however."

Trip blinked at his latest visitor. "I already know the diagnosis, Doc, and I know that a seizure isn't a good thing."

"Indeed and we need to discuss medication options as soon as you're well enough, but for the moment you just need to rest and recoup your strength."

"Understood, Doc," said Trip. Reed was momentarily taken aback by how easily Trip agreed to rest but he supposed that his friend was tired.

"Do you feel up to talking with the Captain?" asked Phlox.

"Sure," replied Trip. "Might as well get it over with."

"Get it over with?" asked Reed.

"He's going to tell me that I can't serve on Enterprise anymore," said Trip.

Reed didn't know whether to be more shocked that Trip had accepted it so easily or that he had already worked out what his seizure would mean. Reed himself hadn't really thought about it, and Trip's blunt verdict took him by surprise. Enterprise without Trip would feel very empty. They had stretched the rules until they broke to keep Trip on board. He was far too gifted not to keep around, even before the enduring loyalty of his staff and friends was taken into account. The physical aspects of the disease they could work around, but this was the final nail in the coffin.