Chapter 4
AU for Damage
A/N: I have no idea how an impulse engine is supposed to work. If you're an engineer or mechanic who does understand the theory, please forgive my inevitable mistakes.
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"Watch out!"
Trip yanked at a crewman's elbow, pulling him out of the way of falling debris just in the nick of time.
"Sorry, Sir!"
As he let the dust settle, Trip looked up to survey yet another bit of damage that was going to have to be added to the to-do list. The Xindi had done a number on them—nearly obliterating the Enterprise in less than 15 minutes. If it weren't for the captain's efforts, and the intervention of some sympathetic Xindi, they all would be a faint memory.
Letting go of the crewman's arm, Trip forced a comforting smile as he took in the scared kid's expression. He couldn't be a day over 20—no doubt he'd been fresh-faced and eager to take on the world not long ago. Trip felt a pang of sadness for the kid—this was a helluva way to cut his teeth.
"It's okay, O'Connell," he reassured him. "Just watch where you're goin'. Today you need to look up and down, not just around, huh?"
"Yes sir," he said earnestly, eyes darting around in every direction before he cautiously took a step.
"Where you headed?" Trip asked before the crewman could leave.
"EPS grid on B deck," O'Connell said, eyes still wary. "Lieutenant Kelby ordered me to report there to start repairs."
Trip slapped the kid on the back. "Get on up there, then."
As he watched him go, Trip took a deep breath and tried desperately to find some mental footing.
The ship might as well be held together with bailing twine. They'd used every emergency bulkhead they had, and it was a miracle they hadn't lost more people. Almost every system had near-catastrophic damage.
Grabbing the Padd tucked in his jumpsuit pocket, Trip scanned the live list of repairs. It was depressingly long. His crew was spread thin—they were going to have to pull people from other departments just to get the ship livable again.
"Report, Commander," he heard, and looked up.
T'Pol was stepping into Engineering, face smudged, hair mussed. Reed followed her inside, looking worriedly around Engineering.
"It's not good," he said bluntly. "The warp coil's fried."
T'Pol seemed to deflate in front of him. Her lips were trembling, and he watched her press them hard together. "How long will it take to repair?"
"Two weeks if we were in spacedock and had the parts. We don't."
T'Pol crossed her arms in front of herself, gripping her forearms tightly. "What about impulse?"
Trip frowned. "I might be able to get you that, but I gotta inspect it from outside the ship just to tell you if it's possible."
"Do what you can."
Nodding, Trip held up the Padd. "It's on the list. Life support takes first priority, but we're almost done with the worst of that. Impulse is next." He paused, taking in their weary faces. "How's the captain?"
"We just left him in sickbay," Malcolm said. "Phlox says he'll be okay."
Trip felt relief wash over him again, another wave to follow all the others he'd had in the last few hours. When they'd discovered the tiny ship with their captain safely ensconced inside, banged up but still alive, a huge weight had lifted off his shoulders.
"Should I expect to see him down here?"
Malcolm let out a humorless laugh. "First thing he asked for was a status report on repairs."
"He want me to come to him?"
T'Pol answered for Reed. "You're needed here. The Captain knows that. I'll provide him with a copy of the report, but no doubt he'll come find you."
Trip raised an eyebrow. "I didn't think Phlox would let him."
Malcolm scoffed at that. "And you think Captain Archer would let that stop him?"
"I guess not." The corner of Trip's mouth quirked up. "I'll keep an eye out for him."
A shower of sparks cascaded beside them. Trip grabbed T'Pol's arm, pulling her out of the way.
"Engineering isn't the safest place on the ship right now," he said, sliding his hand down her arm until his fingers hooked briefly around hers.
A jolt coursed through him, his connection to her opening like a camera aperture letting in light: a flash and a burst of riotous, violent sensation.
He dropped her hand, startled. T'Pol took a shuddering breath, closing her eyes briefly.
Trip stared at her, feeling trapped. Helpless. God, that emotion—a tidal wave of anxiety, frustration, despair, panic—everything negative coalescing and building into a jumbled, disorganized mess inside her mind.
Just yesterday they'd been on that catwalk in the launch bay, in the biggest fight they'd ever had, right before the Xindi descended and the world fell apart. Trip had thought then that he'd never seen her so unbalanced. He had been wrong. They'd all lived a lifetime in the last 24 hours, and the stress had taken its toll on T'Pol, more than the rest of them. Her tenuous control was manifesting itself physically—her fingers were quavering against his.
Even so, despite the hell of the attack, Trip knew with certainty that this was not just stress—this was something more. Something deeper.
Something that could ruin her.
Her presence in his mind seemed fractured, like light through a cracked kaleidoscope.
T'Pol was again oblivious to his connection to her. She took a deep breath.
"Carry on, Commander," she said, raising her eyes to his briefly before turning away.
Malcolm headed for the door, T'Pol behind.
"Hey," Trip whispered for her ears alone, dropping his hand against her shoulder. She turned her head slightly, giving him her profile, but otherwise did not respond.
He stepped closer. "You okay?"
His question felt inane. Inadequate. But he didn't know what else to say. How do you help someone bail water from a sinking ship with a teaspoon?
She straightened her shoulders, shrugging him off and resolutely facing the hatch again.
"I am fine," she said through gritted teeth, and strode away.
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"Good to see you, Cap'n," Trip said with feeling a few hours later as Archer gingerly picked his way down the catwalk to the section of the impulse drive where Trip was working on repairs. He clamped the conduit he was working on before turning to face him.
"How you feelin'?"
"I've been better," Archer said, his voice gravelly. "I'm sure you've got one of those southern sayings that could describe it."
Trip's mouth spread in a grin, the first genuine smile he'd felt in days, at least. "Oh, I've got a few."
Archer sank down onto a closed container near Trip.
"Let's hear 'em," he said.
"Like you've been drug through a knothole sideways?"
Archer rolled his eyes and motioned for Trip to keep going.
"Like the southbound end of a northbound pig?"
Archer cracked a smile at that one.
"Like the devil's been dancin' on your spleen and eyein' your liver for breakfast?"
The captain grimaced. "Well, that one's not funny, but a bit too close to the truth anyway."
Trip dropped his smile and sighed. "Sure am glad you're back, Sir."
"Me too, Trip, me too." Archer scanned the open panel behind Trip. "How are the repairs going?"
"Slow." He pulled the Padd from his pocket again and checked the status of repairs around the ship. "My team is making good time, all things considered, especially now that T'Pol has assigned some additional crew to repairs. Life support is stable. Hull integrity has been reinforced, albeit temporarily."
"Emergency bulkheads holding okay?"
"So far, so good." Trip put the Padd back in his pocket. "But it's the warp coil that's the problem. We aren't leavin' this neighborhood until that's fixed." He gestured to the impulse drive behind him. "And the impulse engine is a bit worse for wear."
Archer grimaced. "But fixable?"
Trip sighed. "I took a gander at 'er from the outside. Seems like the damage isn't beyond saving. Wanna lend me a hand?"
"Sure," Archer said, rising wearily from the container and easing down to the catwalk floor.
"Grab that spanner and hold this while I change out the damaged relay."
They worked together in silence for a few minutes.
"You talked to T'Pol lately?" Archer said, grunting as he tightened a bolt.
Trip paused. "Saw her this morning," he said. "She checked in for a damage report."
"She seem off to you?"
Trip looked at Archer's profile, debating how much to share. Most of what he knew was private—T'Pol didn't even know about his insight.
"Yeah, a bit," he said carefully. "But I think it's understandable."
"Meaning?"
"We thought you died," Trip said bluntly. "All of us were shaken by that, T'Pol included."
"That's what I mean, though. She never would've let emotion influence her before."
"Before when?"
Archer frowned. "Before the expanse."
Trip laughed. "So you're saying that haughty attitude of hers before this Xindi mission was entirely fueled by logic?"
"Well—"
"Vulcans suppress their emotions, Cap'n," Trip said, tightening another bolt with a grunt. "But they've definitely got 'em."
"Still, she's not herself. I'm worried about her."
Trip stopped what he was doing and met Archer's gaze. "I am, too. Even Vulcans have their limits. She seems like she's bumpin' up against hers."
Archer rubbed the space between his eyebrows and let out a small groan. "She's always been rock steady. Someone I can count on. I need that right now." He looked back up at Trip. "When I saw her in sickbay, she was shaking. Handed me a towel and I thought she was going to drop it."
Trip frowned. So he wasn't the only one to notice. "Did you call her on it?"
"She says she's fine," Archer answered, voice flat. "Like I believed that."
Trip sighed. "Maybe give her some time," he said, knowing he had no real answers. "What else can you do?"
"Relieve her of duty? Order her to get some rest?"
Trip scoffed. "If that isn't the pot callin' the kettle black…"
Archer laughed. "Point taken."
They resumed work on the impulse engine. Trip thought about what the captain had told them in the situation room.
"You really think you got through to one of them?"
"I think so, yeah," Archer said. "Degra."
"The one we memory wiped?"
"Yes. He has a conscience, at least. And I pricked it."
"Hand me that sensor, will you?" Trip gestured toward the tool he wanted. Pressing it up against the points on the relay, he checked for power. "What makes you think Degra's going to be on our side? Didn't he design the weapon?"
"Yeah, but he doesn't feel good about it. I think he's starting to question whether he's making the right choices."
When all the power points checked out, Trip sat up and put the sensor back in the tool box. "Well, I hope you're right." He stood up. "I think it's ready to fire up."
Archer stood off to the side, and Trip went to the panel. He pressed a few buttons, then hit the ignition. The engine flared, sputtered, and caught, only to surge and spark seconds later.
Trip grunted, shooting Archer a grimace. "Maybe not."
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"Damn it!" Trip growled, shaking the thumb he'd just pinched to push away the sting.
This impulse engine was starting to get on his nerves. Archer had left to respond to the distress call from an unidentified ship, and Trip had been convinced he was almost finished with the engine.
Two hours later, back aching from his contorted position on the unforgiving catwalk, he was still fiddling with it.
"How's it going, Commander?"
Kelby stood nearby, squinting into the guts of the engine.
"Not good," Trip said. He sat up, looking at Kelby. "You have a knack for this. Think you could take a crack at it?"
"What's the problem?"
"Everything's fixed but these relays. Just when I think I have them all lined up and firin', one of 'em shorts out. But the power input isn't overloading."
"I'll take a look at it."
Trip tiredly rose from the floor and Kelby took his place. Trip watched as the younger man surveyed the tools, selected the one he wanted, and began methodically checking each relay.
Kelby was really good at this. Trip had a knack for the quirks of an engine, learning its nuances and making it operate at peak efficiency. But Kelby had a talent for finicky repairs. Set the man in front of a faulty injector or a glitching relay, and Kelby would have it purring within minutes.
Too bad his interpersonal skills needed so much work. Everything about the guy screamed leadership potential, except for his temper. Just last week—
Trip jerked, a moan escaping him before he could stop it. Bright white light flashed behind his eyelids and then dissipated, leaving little rainbows dancing across his vision.
What the hell was that?
Inching backwards, Trip leaned against the railing of the catwalk to steady himself. He pulled in deep breaths and took inventory. He was fine. A little tingly. Vision still a little wonky. It took him just a few more seconds to pinpoint the source—but when he did, it felt like a vortex sucking him in.
That little innocuous quiver in the back of his mind—T'Pol's presence—had swelled, swirling. Desperate. No longer a feather, now a conflagration.
She was in agony.
Trip took off at a run, ignoring Kelby's startled call after him, sliding down the ladder into main engineering. He bolted through the hatch, down the corridors, down the access tube to E deck. He didn't have to search for her, knew without a doubt she was in her quarters—she was lit up, pulsing in his mind, his very being tuned toward her, a divining rod to water.
He halted in front of her door, panting. Unlocking it without signaling, knowing she was in no shape to let him in, in seconds he was inside. She was shrouded in darkness, perched on her bunk, shaking. Eyes wide with terror, the whites gleaming in the dark as she stared at him, whimpering, her knees pulled up to her chin as she rocked back and forth.
"T'Pol—" he whispered, and reached for her.
She cried out and skittered away, pushing back against the corner of her bunk, trying to press herself into invisibility into the corner.
The sounds that were coming from her—they broke his heart.
Cautiously, he eased himself down on the bunk and reached out a hand. Her face was turned away and she didn't see him, but he carefully wrapped his fingers around her forearm, loosely holding her, thumb gently sweeping back and forth across her skin.
She froze. And then, after a moment of silence that seemed interminable, took a big shuddering breath, and relaxed.
Trip waited until her breathing evened and then pulled slightly on her arm. She followed, unfolding herself and coming closer, raising huge, tremulous eyes toward him.
Trip felt his heart stop at the raw anguish he saw there.
"Darlin'—" was all he could manage before his voice broke. He pulled her fully into him and wrapped his arms around her. She nestled her head into his neck, her forehead coming to rest against his pulse, reaching up to clutch at his other shoulder.
Trip gripped the back of her neck, his thumb once again running gently back and forth against her soft skin. The rhythm of it, aligned to their breathing, seemed to calm her.
Cautiously, Trip turned his attention again toward the presence in his mind. She was still there, still bright and pulsing, but a soft glow now, the furious flare from earlier lessening.
His presence was different this time, too, he noticed. He could feel his own energy there with hers. Before, it had always seemed as if his mind were a cave surrounding her, she a small vibration within. She'd been back in a corner, visible but unreachable. Now, he could sense his own energy beside hers, near hers. Closing his eyes, Trip pushed his own presence closer to hers, settling beside her, a support on this emotional plane just as he was trying to be on the physical one.
They balanced there, physical and emotional, intertwined, for so long Trip felt himself begin to drift, like floating calmly on a warm, placid lake at dusk.
The only ripple in their serenity was Trip's certain knowledge that it wasn't meant to last. Not now.
Not yet.
Before he was ready, when his thirst for her nearness had just begun to be quenched, T'Pol reached up and pulled his hand away from her neck. She lifted her head from his shoulder and eased away from him, scooting down the bunk until they were completely disconnected. In his mind, her glow had faded back to a flutter.
The loss made him ache.
She raised shuttered eyes to his but didn't speak. As the silence stretched, a roar rather than a comfort, Trip realized she probably wouldn't speak, not unless he asked. And maybe not even then.
"What happened?"
T'Pol looked away. "I had a nightmare."
Trip's eyes widened in surprise. "It seemed—intense."
"It was." T'Pol looked down at her hands, still shaking.
He let the silence stretch, considering.
"I think you should go see Phlox," he finally said, yet knowing her refusal was sure to follow.
"I'm fine."
"You're not fine." Trip grabbed her wrist, holding up her hand and they both looked at her fingers trembling. "This is not fine."
She yanked her hand away, saying something so softly Trip couldn't make it out.
"What is it?" When she didn't repeat what she'd said, Trip felt frustration begin to well within him. If only she would let him help her. "What do you need?"
She stood up, heading for her closet and pulling out her uniform. Taking a deep breath, she squared her shoulders before answering. "I just need to go to Cargo Bay 2. Then I'll be fine."
Trip gaped at her, nonplussed. "Why?"
Her spine stiffened. "That is my personal business."
"Not when the Cargo Bay is so heavily damaged it's inaccessible, it isn't."
She raised a hand to her pajama top and paused, glaring at him. Trip stared at her for a moment before he realized what she wanted. He stood, turning away to give her privacy to dress.
"You can't go in there," Trip said, crossing his arms over his chest as her clothes rustled behind him while she changed.
"I will get an EV suit."
"It's not just the decompression. The whole thing is unstable. You could get killed!"
"I'll be careful."
Frustration boiled over, Trip's raised voice bouncing off the walls of her quarters. "What is so damn important that you have to risk your life?"
There was a long pause, and he was tempted to turn around and confront her, nudity or no.
"My medicine is stored in Cargo Bay 2."
Her what? He couldn't have heard that right.
"Medicine?"
"That's what I said."
This time he did turn around. She was pulling her zipper up the last few inches.
He studied her, studied the presence in his mind, and all the signs were there. He was getting maybe 5% of the truth here. And she wasn't about to fill in the rest.
T'Pol turned on a heel and walked out, headed toward EV storage. Trip followed her.
Maybe he needed reinforcements. "If it's medicine, all the more reason to visit Phlox."
"Dr. Phlox does not know about this."
They stepped into the newly-repaired turbolift.
Trip turned on her, getting into her space, crowding her back against the wall. "You mean to tell me that the ship's doctor doesn't know about a medicine you're taking? A medicine you need so much that you're sick from not taking it?"
She wouldn't meet his eyes. "It is a supplement. I see no reason to inform Dr. Phlox when he did not prescribe it."
"You—" Trip let the sentence die. What more could he say? She wasn't listening to him. Not 20 minutes ago she was falling apart, in tears, just shy of a manic episode, and now she was going to risk her life over some vitamins?
"I can't talk you out of this."
"No," she said firmly, and stepped off the turbolift.
He followed her into the EV storage and stood next to her, pulling a helmet off the shelf.
"What are you doing?" she paused.
"I'm comin' with you."
"I cannot allow that."
"Oh, yes, you can. Somebody has to protect you from this idiocy." Trip yanked the EV suit off its hook and stopped, turning to face her. "It's either this, or I report you to the captain and recommend he let you cool your heels in the brig."
"Under what charge?"
"Endangering the mission."
"I am the only one in harm's way. And I will be perfectly safe with precautions."
"You're second in command. You shouldn't need precautious. You should have enough damn sense to stay out of an unstable section of the ship."
Her only answer was a glare.
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Cargo Bay 2 was more damaged than even Trip had imagined. The stairs were broken. Half of the catwalk had fallen, and none of the crates were stacked as they had been.
T'Pol resolutely found a way down onto the main floor, once nearly toppling a dozen feet if Trip hadn't caught her at the last minute.
Still, she acted like he wasn't there, yanking her arm away from him as fast possible and determinedly heading toward the teetering stack of containers ostensibly containing her so-called medicine.
It was dark, and their helmet lights didn't give Trip enough illumination to orient himself. He hadn't been in this cargo bay in a long time. He more or less knew the manifest, having sent crewmen down here to retrieve various parts and supplies, but he hadn't been here himself, not since their last on-loading of supplies.
In short, he had no idea what she was looking for.
At her side, Trip watched as T'Pol shoved one container off another, opening the next and pulling a tray of empty storage cylinders out and setting them aside. One in the next tray was askew, and as she pulled it free, he could tell it was heavier than the rest. She clutched it to her chest and turned, heading back toward the exit.
Trip grabbed another cylinder, pulling the top off and upending it, letting the contents spill into his gloved palm. His eyes widened at the glittering black mineral, and he couldn't hold back the expletive that escaped him.
Rushing toward her, he grabbed her shoulder, turning her to face him.
"Trellium? Are you kidding me?"
"Let me go!" She yanked her shoulder away from him, shoving him back. Scrambling up the containers, she latched onto the railing and started pulling herself up.
Trip grabbed her ankle, fury and desperation fueling him. She cried out, a sound of rage more than pain, and viciously kicked at him.
Trip went sprawling, hitting the deck hard from several feet up.
He couldn't breathe. He watched as T'Pol didn't look back, swiftly scaling the stack of containers until she was safe above on the catwalk.
His vision wavered, and nearly too late he realized what had happened—his oxygen hose had disconnected. Gasping, he groped for it, looking up at the catwalk.
She was there, frozen, a look of terror on her illuminated face as she realized he was suffocating, and she was too far away to help him.
Trip's floundering hand caught the hose and he clicked it back into place.
Relief fluttered across T'Pol's features before she schooled them back into blankness, turned, and disappeared.
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A/N: I split this episode into two chapters. Part 2 will be up soon. Real life is a cruel master lately. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯