Oh, Trip. What have you done?
Thanks for your comments and reviews. I love reading them.
x-x
"Trip."
Trip pulled his covers in closer, rolling onto his side.
"Trip."
He jerked awake, then froze, listening. Someone had called his name. Hadn't they? When he heard nothing, he relaxed and let himself drift again. It was probably one of those normal near-sleep, almost-dream things, like the feeling of falling, or...
Wait.
Whispers, nearby. He stilled himself, quieting his breathing. Definitely voices, murmuring... he couldn't quite catch it. Something.
Heart hammering in his chest, he sat up slowly, gaze tracking around his darkened room. He listened carefully. Sounds, nearly inaudible, but definitely there. Voices.
Shit, shit, shit, he thought, feelings warring within himself. Dread. Fear. Elation.
He clenched the blanket in his fists. He knew what had happened to Malcolm. Now he simply needed to learn how to shut it off.
x-x
Trip sat at his desk, papers and padds strewn across its surface, the desk lamp creating an island of light in the dark room. The voices were still a mild buzz in the background, and once he'd gotten over the strangeness of having them there, he was able to focus on his work. He knew he had no time to waste. Malcolm's disability had come on fast. Maybe Malcolm's hallucinations had started like this, but he wasn't sure - Malcolm had seemed to ramp from zero to sixty in, like, thirty seconds flat. He wasn't sure if the progression would be the same for him, but he'd best work under the assumption that his time was limited.
He hadn't told Phlox yet. He knew the doc wouldn't approve of what he'd done. Or Jon; God, Jon would rip him a new one. But he couldn't tell them, not yet, because if he did, they'd make him stop working, and neither he nor Malcolm could afford to have him stop.
He'd give it until morning, or until things got worse. Then he'd tell them.
He moved on to the next padd, still looking for definite evidence that this thing, this illness, was actually caused by what he thought it was caused by.
Jon was going to kill him.
The whispers got louder, or closer, maybe, and he thought, if he just stopped for a moment and listened, they might tell him what he needed to know.
He shook his head, standing and walking to the bathroom. No, no. That was all he needed. He needed to keep his head clear. He needed... He splashed water on his face, purposefully avoiding his reflection in the mirror over the sink. He needed to keep working. And he felt okay right now, right? At least he wasn't seeing anything. Not yet, anyway.
Returning to his room, he started pacing, hoping the movement would help keep his thoughts on point. From his work with Hoshi and Nar, he'd gone with his assumption that this thing was a device. He'd spent enough time trying to figure out what it was supposed to do. It didn't matter what it was supposed to do. He simply had to figure how to turn it off. Hadn't there been something...?
Sliding into his chair, he began pouring through the translated documents Hoshi had given to him. He'd thought he'd read something... There. Nar's ancestors had turned it off. So what had turned it back on? It had to be drawing energy from something. Trip looked up at the sticky notes that covered the far wall. Standing, he went over to one section. Of course. The shield. It was the damn shield. When they'd turned that on, that had probably reactivated the devices, and now, the power from the shield was keeping them going. Maybe, once they got far enough away? No, they were light years away now. There was no way the devices were still feeding from the shield. So what if...? What if they were drawing power from Enterprise, now? Or from Malcolm's own body? God, that had to be it. Phlox, he had to talk to the doctor. If that were the case, how could they turn the devices off without turning off Malcolm himself? Or...
Trip stood and hit the comm.
"Doc?"
"Yes," came Phlox's bright voice.
"Can you meet me up here?"
"Is there an emergency?" Phlox asked, seeming concerned.
"More of a consultation. I need to ask you some questions."
"I'll be there in a quarter hour."
Trip returned to his desk and, head in hand, sat staring off into space. He'd tell Phlox his theory. He'd tell him how he thought the nano-devices could be deactivated. Then he'd tell him... Oh, this wasn't going to be pretty. And please, God, let him be right about this. Let this work.
They'd fix Malcolm. Then, maybe, they'd fix him. And he'd swear Phlox and Jon to secrecy. They couldn't tell Malcolm what he'd done. There was no need for the man to have that on his head as well as everything else. Later, maybe, he'd tell Malcolm, once his friend was well, once he'd had time to get readjusted. Until then, this was the best he could do.
His actions wouldn't be without cost, but the risk had been worth taking. He'd been right. Thank God. Please, God. Let him be right.
x-x
Trip braced himself, and then slid the window's cover open, revealing the small decon chamber beyond. Malcolm was sitting on the bench, arms wrapped tightly around his shins as he stared off into space. His mouth was moving in a silent conversation, fingers twitching occasionally as he spoke silence at whatever vision had him trapped.
His plan was risky, for all concerned. If it didn't work, both he and Malcolm would be sick. Hell, the treatment itself was risky. Phlox was very good at his job, but there was always that chance that Malcolm wouldn't come back, or he'd come back changed. Still, he knew Malcolm would want him to try. That conviction, probably more than anything else, had been what had convinced the captain to agree to the plan.
God, the look on Jon's face when he'd told him what he'd done. The poor man had looked torn between being royally pissed and desperately worried. Trip was just grateful there hadn't been anything heavy around, because Jon would probably have thrown it at him.
Trip watched Malcolm from behind the clear divider. He'd tried to get Phlox to let him into the room with Malcolm - he'd have rather delivered this news in a more personal manner than from behind a partition - but the doctor had refused, saying, "the patient is still unstable." Phlox had said that the meds were helping, but that clearly didn't mean Malcolm was okay. Not really. Today was obviously not a good day. Phlox had warned him of that fact, and had told him not to expect much. But still, he felt like he had to try.
"Malcolm," he said, keeping his voice gentle and quiet. When his friend didn't respond - didn't even stir - he murmured a soft swear, then went on. "I'm not sure if you can hear me, but I have some news, and I wanted to tell you in person."
He sighed, shifting uncomfortably on the chair. He wasn't quite sure how to begin. But, figuring that Malcolm probably wasn't hearing him anyway, he decided to just start talking.
"I got to thinking. Then I got to asking." He put a hand on the glass, peering down at his friend. "I know you could have been having symptoms for years, and..." He sighed. "But I didn't think so. Things only went really bad for you after we visited that archaeological site, so I asked them to send me everything they had. Kind of a last-ditch effort, shot-in-the-dark kind of thing, you know? And they did, but that's not..." He shook his head. The voices were worse, today, then they'd been last night, and he was having trouble staying focused. "You remember our guide, Nar? You know, short guy, light hair, long ears?" Trip motioned with his hands, sketching out his words in the air before him. "When he heard you were sick, he thought there might be something. Turns out, he was right. In his translations, he -" Trip rubbed a weary hand across his face. He was messing this all up. He'd been up most of the night, trying to ignore the damn voices while he poured through the data they'd been sent. He'd spent most of the morning in meetings with Phlox, the captain and T'Pol, as they'd tried to figure out what they could do with the information, as he tried to convince them of the validity of his plan. Now he was here, and he was well and truly wiped. But even if he wasn't saying this clearly, even if Malcolm couldn't hear him, he wanted to be the one to tell him.
"Nar sent up translations of the Xandtian writings, from the building you were in, as well as from elsewhere at that site. Ends up, some thousands of years ago, they'd left their planet and tried to colonise another world, bring people into the fold, create an empire, but something had forced them back."
Trip took a careful breath, trying to slow down. He wanted to be clear, if only so he could understand it better himself. "That planet they'd tried to colonize? We think that was Earth. At least, T'Pol thinks so, and I think Hoshi was right about the connection between the local language and that of the Thracians.
They designed these...devices. Problem is, they didn't know human physiology very well. Or maybe, who knows, back then maybe it could have worked, but either it's changed or we have, because now all it can do is..." Trip stopped and looked away. Malcolm knew very well what it could do.
"Remember that basin you touched?"
Malcolm made no response.
Trip bit the next words out, trying not to choke on them. "You were in their fucking lab, Malcolm. And it, and you..." He shook his head, thinking that if he hadn't risked that stupid question back on the bridge, risked touching the basin himself, Malcolm would have ended up back on Earth, locked away in some hospital, taking drugs that couldn't help him because they were for something else.
Trip dropped his voice to a whisper, talking to himself now, more than anything. "You're not schizophrenic, Malcolm. But you are sick."
He raised his voice again. "But I spoke to Phlox. We're going to cut off their power supply. Problem is, kid, that power supply is you. So... Phlox thinks he'll be able to, to stop your heart, and to... Well, hopefully, that'll be enough." Trip had to take a moment. It was almost overwhelming, thinking about the import of that. What if Phlox couldn't restart Malcolm's heart, or... lots of what ifs, there. "But Phlox thinks he can do it. And you'll still have to taper off the drugs you're on. But then...?"
Trip dug his nails into his palms as his breath hitched. Even so, he felt tears streaming down his cheeks. He gave up trying to fight them. Instead, he released a breath and smiled.
"You might be okay."
x-x
"Clear!" Phlox shouted.
Trip heard the thump of the defibrillator as the doctor tried to revive his friend, and the high pitched whine as the monitors warned of, of...
Trip turned away to face the wall. Arms up against it, he kicked out, boot impacting hard against its surface.
"Trip?"
He didn't turn, unsure if the voice was in his head or real. In the stress of the moment, he'd lost track.
Feeling a hand on his shoulder, he looked up into concerned green eyes. Jon.
"Promise me you won't tell him," Trip said in a desperate whisper, thinking of the basin, and the voices, and the voices, they were...
"You've killed him."
God in heaven.
"I already said -"
Trip jerked away. "Promise!"
Jon stood still with is hands up, palms out. "All right, Trip," he said, voice soft and even, as if he were speaking with a skittish animal.
"Clear!"
Trip heard the punch of the device again, and he put his hands over his ears, frantic. Still not looking at the nearby scene, he slammed his eyes shut. He couldn't listen. He wouldn't listen. It didn't help. Nothing helped. The voices were accusing him of killing his friend, of being wrong, of destroying everything around him.
He knew Jon was going to kill him if he was wrong. What he'd done to Malcolm, to himself. He'd lied. He'd deliberately touched the basin, infecting himself. He'd killed his friend. And himself, he'd infected himself, Malcolm had to survive, this treatment had to work, or he'd be stuck like, he'd have to, God, stupid God-damned voices, he couldn't get away from them. Jon would kill him if he was wrong.
His eyes flashed open, and he stared at Malcolm lying lifeless on the biobed.
No. No. If he was wrong, he'd take care of it himself.
x-x
We're nearly done, now. Please let me know what you think of this so far.