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Chapter 24

Trip gasped. Darkness surrounded him and it was cold, so cold that it hurt. There was a roar in his ears and something knocked into him, tumbling him over and turning him upside down. He tried to catch his breath and suddenly his mouth was full of ice-cold liquid. Water. The place seemed to have no up and down, only water that roared and raged around him, tossing him back and forth. His head came up and he tried to scream, but the water in his mouth and throat choked him. This could not be real, it had to be a nightmare. In a flash of light, he saw a gigantic wall of water looming over him and he squeezed his eyes shut – it's a dream, it's just a dream. The wall crashed down on him and cold water engulfed him from all sides, pushing him down into the darkness. He flailed wildly, yet there was no surface for him to struggle up to. There was only dark and cold and Trip thought with a strange detachment that this must be what madness felt like. A madness that was going to pull him under. Malcolm was dead, drowned, and now it was his turn. Somewhere, there had to be Lendon pushing his head under, not knowing that Trip had passed to another place entirely. A bad place, a mad place where he talked to people in blue overalls who had come out of nowhere before he drowned - which was happening now. Trip closed his eyes and surrendered to the cold and the darkness, knowing that it would not be long.

"What do you mean, lost?"

Jon felt Phlox' hand on his arm and only then noticed that he had taken a threatening step towards Daniels.

"I'm trying to locate his signature, Captain," Daniels said. His fingers seemed to blur as he worked on his transporting device. "If he's lost the tag, though..."

This could not be happening. Jon knew what the victim of a transporter accident would look like; during the testing phase, he had seen enough pieces of equipment mangled and turned inside out to get an idea of the resulting horror if a person were caught in a malfunction. An image appeared before his mental eye and he quickly pushed it away. This wasn't happening to Trip, it couldn't be.

"Captain," T'Pol said quietly. He turned his head to find her looking at him with unusual intensity. "If Commander Tucker is caught somewhere in the timeline, it does not necessarily mean that he-"

"I believe I've got him." Daniels' voice was strained. "He's alive, but-"

"Can you bring him back?"

Daniels frowned down at his device. "I'm trying, Captain, but there seems to be some sort of vortex rapid..."

Jon had no idea what the man was talking about and he didn't care either. "Daniels, if you lose Trip I swear I'm gonna..."

He broke off. Trip lay on the sickbay floor in a growing puddle of water, dripping wet and very still. Phlox was immediately at his side, kneeling in the salty-smelling water.

"A scanner, quick!"

T'Pol handed him a medical scanner and doctor activated it, running it over Trip's body and pale, blue-tinged face. Then he laid it aside and rolled Trip on his back, placed a hand on the unconscious man's brow and tilted his head back, beginning CPR. Jon noticed that he wasn't pausing for chest compressions, which meant that Trip's heart was still beating. Wishing he could do something to help, he watched as the doctor breathed air into Trip's lungs until the man on the floor finally gave a weak cough. Phlox sat back and helped his patient onto his side. Trip coughed again and began to retch, then leaned forward and vomited water onto the floor. Jon knelt down next to him and rubbed Trip's back, as a means of comfort and also because he wanted to feel the steady heartbeat, reassurance that Trip was still alive. The pulse he felt was anything but steady, fluttering under his fingers like a nervous bird, but it was there and Jon smiled.

"It's okay," he said and pulled the shivering man into a hug. "It's okay, buddy, we've got you now."

Trip was too weak to offer resistance, but Jon could feel him stiffen as he became aware of his surroundings.

"Wh-what..." He coughed again, his face turning even paler as he glanced around. "What's g-goin' on? What is this?"

Sensing that he was scaring Trip even more, Jon let go of him. "It's okay," he repeated and laid a hand on Trip's arm. Out of the corners of his eyes, he saw Phlox approaching with a hypospray. "You're safe now."

Trip didn't seem to think so. His breathing quickened rapidly and he seemed about to go into full panic mode when Phlox stepped up from behind and pressed the hypospray against his neck. Trip's eyes widened in surprise and shock, then he went limp. Jon caught him before he fell face forward into the puddle of water that was spreading around him on the floor.

"It's for the best," Phlox said apologetically. "I don't want Mr. Tucker upsetting himself after the trauma his body has suffered."

Jon nodded and began to get to his feet. "Do you have a towel or something?"

"Of course, Captain." Phlox handed him one of the large sickbay towels and Jon wrapped it around Trip's shoulders, wincing again at the bruises that covered the half-naked body.

"Let's get him onto a bio bed."

He expected T'Pol to take Trip from his arms, but she didn't and merely assisted him by lifting Trip's legs. Together they carried the unconscious man over to the bio bed next to Malcolm's and laid him down. Phlox followed them with another towel in his hands and began to dry off the wet body as soon as they had him settled on the bed.

"Cold shock," he said with a glance at the bio monitor that had sprung to life as they laid Trip down. "We have to remove the wet clothes."

T'Pol turned away and Jon gave her a nod, silently thanking her for her discretion. As he pulled off Trip's soaked grey shorts, he noticed the temporal tag that was still clinging to wet fabric. He had no idea where the hell Trip had ended up, but there was no denying that the innocuous-looking little gadget had saved his Chief Engineer's life.

"I'll need that, Captain." Daniels had appeared at his side and nodded at the tag. Jon unclipped it and handed it to the other man.

"What happened, Daniels?"

Daniels sighed and ran a hand through his short-cropped hair, looking more harassed than ever. "The timeline has suffered a lot of damage, Captain," he said. "Leaping through time isn't exactly the safest way to travel right now. Which is why I used these," he held up the temporal tag. "Just in case something like this happened."

"I can't remember you telling me to wear one myself." Jon couldn't quite suppress the caustic tone that had crept into his voice.

Instead of an answer, Daniels reached up to Jon's shoulder as if to adjust his collar. A moment later, he held another tiny black device in his hand.

"No, I didn't." The corners of his mouth twitched as if he were suppressing a smile. "I decided not to risk you refusing to wear it and attached it when you weren't looking."

Jon narrowed his eyes at the man. "I may not understand thirtieth century technology, but I'm not stupid, Daniels."

The smile which had never quite been there faded. "I never said you were, Captain. But I know that you don't exactly trust me, for which I don't blame you. I needed you to wear the tag though."

I would have if you'd asked me to, Jon thought but did not say. Daniels was right, he didn't trust him, and there wasn't much he could say in reply.

"What happened to Trip?" he asked instead, following Daniels as he walked over to Malcolm's bed. "Why wasn't he transported here with the rest of us?"

Daniels unclipped the temporal tag from Malcolm's shorts. "I don't know for sure, Captain. As I said, the timeline isn't exactly predictable at the moment. It's like a river whose dam has broken; there are a lot of shallows and rapids we can't calculate. My guess is that the Commander was caught in one of those rapids and flung to another point in the time space continuum, while the rest of us arrived at the destination I had programmed."

The idea was unsettling, to say the least. "You mean he could have ended up anywhere?"

"Not exactly anywhere, but... I'm afraid I can't explain all the details, Captain. It seems that Mr. Tucker was on Earth at approximately your time, in... in a large body of water."

Jon took a sharp breath. "Trip was dropped in the middle of an ocean?"

Daniels sighed. "I'm sorry, Captain. We're trying to do our best, but the damage done to the timeline was quite extensive. Our operatives are risking their lives every time we rescue a victim."

Jon held his eyes for a moment, then nodded. "I appreciate what you did," he said and it wasn't a lie, matters of trust and responsibility aside. "Thank you for rescuing my officers."

Daniels smiled a little, although there was no real humor in the expression. "You're welcome, Captain. Please let the Commander and the Lieutenant know that we deeply regret the ordeal they had to go through at the hands of the rebels. We'll make sure this kind of thing won't happen again."

I'll hold you on that promise. "How long is it going to take until they've regained their memories?" Jon asked aloud.

Daniels took out his transporting device, and Jon could see that his mind was already on his next assignment, God only knew where – and when. "I've given Dr. Phlox all the necessary information," he said evasively. "You might want to keep them under sedation for a while. We've noticed that the recovery is less stressful for the victims that way."

Jon remembered the panic on his officers' faces and had to admit that Daniels was probably right. Sedation was better than restraints, although he didn't like the idea of drugging the two men into compliance.

"Captain," Daniels said. Jon raised his head and saw that Daniels' hand was resting on his device, ready to activate it.

He nodded again and even allowed himself a smile. "Good luck... Crewman."

Daniels grinned a little and lifted a hand in return. "Safe journey, Captain."

With that, he was gone. Jon blinked, then shook his head and turned back to Malcolm's bio bed. As he touched Malcolm's arm, he noticed that the Lieutenant's skin was almost as cold as Trip's after he had returned from his little dip in wet hell. Jon took a blanket out of a drawer next to the bed and spread it over the still body, smiling a little when he thought of Malcolm's expression if the Englishman knew that his Captain was tucking him in. His grin quickly faded again at the sight of Malcolm's bruised, unconscious face. The dark hair was still slightly damp, tousled and falling into Malcolm's forehead. Trip was not the only one who had been through wet hell today.

Jon sighed. As much as he would have liked to stay, there were places he had to go and calls he had to make. He smiled a little at the thought. The Reeds and the Tuckers would be more than happy to see his face on the comm screen today.

An hour later on his way down to sickbay, the smile was back on Jon's face. During the last sixty minutes or so, he had watched at least six faces going from disbelief to confusion to incredulous joy as he told and re-told his story. Hoshi and Travis had wanted to go down to sickbay immediately, looking crestfallen when Jon told them that Trip and Malcolm weren't up to having visitors yet. He had noticed that Lieutenant Inga Carlsson wasn't quite as enthusiastic, although her smile at the news seemed genuine. Jon couldn't really blame her; if everything went well, Trip and Malcolm would take up where they had left off four months ago, which, of course, meant that Carlsson and Narayan were no longer needed as stand-ins. A fact made even harder by the reaction of their crewmates, who were overjoyed at the return of their former Chief Engineer and Armory Officer.

The Captain included, Jon added, feeling a little guilty at the thought. Maybe he could work something out for Mahish and Inga; if they wanted to stay on Enterprise, that was.

His smile widened as he remembered calling Trip's and Malcolm's families. Stuart Reed had actually apologized for his "rude remarks" of before, and from Mary's shell-shocked expression Jon concluded that this was a first. They had both thanked him profusely, Mary from behind her tissue while Reed senior rubbed his eyes, muttering something about his bloody allergies setting in.

The Tuckers had been less restrained in the response. Charlie had sniffled helplessly and Susan laughed and cried at the same time as she tried to wheedle more details out of Jon: "Is he gonna be okay? Can we talk to him? Can we leave him a message?"

Eventually, after many assurances that he would call as soon as Trip was feeling better, Jon had cut the connection to make a call to Starfleet Command, who were happy to learn that the two officers were back safe and relatively unharmed.

There was a bounce in his step as he left the turbolift and walked down the corridor to sickbay. As he entered, he noticed that the lights in the main room had been dimmed.

"Doctor?" he asked quietly, and a moment later Phlox appeared from behind the white privacy curtain.

"Ah, Captain." He smiled. "I take it everybody has been informed?"

Jon nodded, returning the smile. "Yes, it's all party, party, party back there." He glanced at curtains that were drawn around the two bio beds. "How are they?"

"Resting," Phlox replied, his smile fading a little. "Their injuries were more extensive than I had thought."

Jon frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Except for the cold shock, Commander Tucker has a hairline jaw fracture and a bruised kidney, both obviously the results of an assault. Lieutenant Reed has two broken ribs and a number of large haematoma on his back and legs, where he seems to have been kicked repeatedly. They are both slightly hypothermic and malnourished."

When Phlox had finished, there was little left of Jon's high spirits. "Can I see them?"

Phlox inclined his head. "Of course, Captain."

He went back inside the closed-off space, holding open the curtain for Jon to follow him. Both patients were sleeping, clad in the long-sleeved versions of the mint-green sickbay gowns and buried under a heap of blankets to keep out the cold. A bandage was wrapped around Trip's head, supposedly to keep his injured jaw still. The pale, blue-lipped face of before had returned a slightly healthier shade of pink. Except for his head, Trip's left arm was the only part of his body not covered with blankets, resting next to him on the bed. An IV line snaked up from his hand to a pole that stood between the two beds. Jon looked at Malcolm and saw that he was also connected to the IV, thankfully unaware of this state of affairs; there were few things that nettled Malcolm more than having medical equipment attached to his body. Like Trip, he was no longer as chalky white as he had been, although he did look ill, his blackened eye glistening with some kind of gel Phlox had applied.

The doctor had followed Jon's gaze. "The Lieutenant has developed a slight fever," he said. "It seems that he suffered from pneumonia at some point during the last four months, and his lungs never entirely recovered. The antibiotics I'm giving him should take care of that, however."

Jon shook his head. "I'm not surprised he didn't have a chance to recover." Noticing Phlox' enquiring look, he added quietly, "We found them in a... mental asylum of sorts. Reminded me of a prison more than anything else. They were tied up, and there was this man, Lendon..." Jon raised his head to look at the doctor. "The one they killed, or were going to kill. He was drowning Malcolm in a vat full of water."

Phlox looked at Malcolm. "That explains the residue of liquid in Mr. Reed's lungs."

Jon sighed. "I wish I knew what was going on."

Phlox met his eyes. "All we can do is wait, Captain. I'm sure the Lieutenant and the Commander can explain what happened to them."

"How long is this treatment going to take?" Jon wanted to know.

"I'm afraid Mr. Daniels could only give me an estimate," Phlox replied. "In his experience, it took most victims about two weeks to recover. He gave me a formula and a schedule at which intervals to administer the injections. I can't say I fully understand the way the formula is supposed to work, but I'm synthesizing it as we speak."

Jon said nothing. He didn't like having to rely on Daniels and his advanced knowledge, any more than he liked the idea of mere human beings in charge of time and space. Supposedly he should be grateful that Daniels and his superiors were helping the victims, yet he couldn't help but feel resentment at the thought of injecting Malcolm and Trip with some sort of concoction that even Phlox didn't fully understand.

"Captain."

Jon met Phlox' eyes, and saw that the doctor had been reading his mind again.

"I may not comprehend all the details of thirtieth century medicine, but I can assure that I have thoroughly checked all compounds of the formula. The Commander and the Lieutenant will not be harmed by it."

"Doc, I never meant to imply you weren't doing your job. It's just that I don't feel comfortable, relying on things that I don't understand."

Phlox smiled, the corners of his mouth almost touching his ears. Jon was sure that he did it on purpose. "No offense, Captain, but I daresay you did not understand how a lizard's brain could replace your bugle's limbic cortex, yet you allowed me to go ahead with the procedure."

Jon didn't correct the doctor. "Point taken, doc. But I trust you, while I can't really say the same about Daniels."

Phlox' smile returned to a less frightening dimension. "Well, Captain, I assure you that the Lieutenant and the Commander are in good hands."

"I know." Jon smiled back, then sobered again as he looked at the two sleeping men. "Are you going to keep them sedated for a whole two weeks?"

"I don't believe I will, Captain, although Mr. Daniels suggested that it would be "easier" that way. From what I gained, though, their memories aren't going to return all at once. It's a gradual process, and I believe it is better to allow Mr. Tucker and Mr. Reed to stay awake once they have received the first five or six injections. It'll help them readjust and may even speed up their recovery."

Jon nodded. Phlox' assessment made sense, and he had never liked the idea of keeping Malcolm and Trip drugged into a mindless stupor. He tried to recover his earlier good mood - after all, Phlox had basically told him that things were going to be all right – but found that it was gone for good. Maybe, in spite of knowing better, he had believed in a miracle after all, expecting to find Malcolm and Trip sitting up and talking as he entered sickbay. The longer Jon thought about it, he had to admit that it was so. Hell, part of his mind had already rearranged next week's duty roster to include his Armory Officer and Chief Engineer.

"A little patience, Captain," Phlox said. "It's what we're going to need."

Jon raised his head. "You never told me Denobulans were telepaths, doc."

Again, the smile flashed up, and this time it did reach the ears. "As Mr. Tucker would say, I don't want to become boring."

Jon grinned a little. "No worries in that respect, doctor."

TBC...

You didn't really think I'd lose Trip for good, did you :)? Please let me know what you think!