Chapter Seven

The day before he was discharged from the hospital, his father came to see him. Trip was expecting him to be there to pick him up and take him home to Florida the next day. But, for some reason Charles had come early.

"This is a surprise," Trip said to his father when he showed up at his room. "Wasn't expecting you until tomorrow."

"I know. Thought I'd come a little early, thought maybe we could talk. Your mom is really looking forward to having you back home. She wants to take care of you." Trip smiled as he sat on the bed. "Your sisters are anxious to see you too, and glad you're moving back home. Danny feels terrible…"

"It's not his fault, I've told him that several times," Trip interrupted. "He didn't know. Anything can trigger a bad reaction, I'm just not sure what those things are," he said looking away.

"Son, I've got something to say to you," Charles said as he stiffened his back as if strengthening his resolve. Trip looked at him curiously. "And trust me when I tell you that this is not easy for me… You can't come home," Charles said. Trip was shocked. This was the last thing he expected his father to say.

"What?" Trip replied. "I can't come home?"

"What I mean is that you shouldn't come home. You're my son, and my home will always be your home, you are welcome there, but you shouldn't come, not now, not under these circumstances."

"Dad, I don't understand, I thought you wanted me to come home. That's all I've been hearing for the last two years; how much you hated me being out in space and how you thought it was too dangerous. In the last few weeks, since everything that's happened, you've practically begged me to come home. Now you tell me that I shouldn't come, that I can't come!"

"I know what I been sayin'," Charles replied. "But I thought about it, thought about it a lot, and I realize, it's not about me, or your mother, or anyone else. It's about you, and you've wanted to be out in space all your life. Before those bastards took you, you were happy and full of life. You loved it out there, and you were so damned good at what you were doing. Jon's told me, all your friends on the ship have told me, I was at your ceremony when you won those engineering awards. And I know you! You're good at every damned thing you do, always have been. Smart, efficient, diligent and damned hard workin!"

"Trip, you can't quit, not like this. You just can't give in to this thing. So that's why I'm tellin' you that you can't come home. If you do, you're never gonna leave again, and all that talent, all your hard work, will be wasted. No, you've gotta go back aboard Enterprise; you've gotta see this thing through. If not, you're gonna be lost forever." Charles then rose and started toward the door. Trip sat there in tears. He couldn't believe what his father was saying to him. Before Charles left he turned back for a moment.

"Almost forgot," he said and he reached into his jacket pocket. "I have something for you." He set a small box on Trip's table, smiled a small smile at his son, then turned and left. Trip did not move, he just sat there on the bed in the same spot and let the tears roll down his cheeks.

The next day, Charles did not return to pick Trip up when he was discharged so he returned to the Starfleet housing facility where he had been assigned a small apartment. He put his things away and came across the box his father had left for him. He had not even opened it.

He sat down on the sofa in the living area and stared at the box. He had no idea what was in it. He finally opened it. It was a statue of a bird, about five inches tall. It had very colorful feathers and blue eyes. When Trip pushed a small button, the bird's wings began to spread out wide, then slowly rise up in the air. On the placard where it rested, the inscription simply said "Rise Above." Hadn't Jon said something very similar to him just a few days ago? he thought.

Trip went to his computer console and began to try and find out what type of bird this creature was. Perhaps it would make sense to him as to why his father would give him a statue of a bird. He found several that looked very similar. He read:

"The Phoenix; in classical mythology, a unique bird that lived for five or

six centuries in the Arabian desert, after this time burning itself on a funeral

pyre and rising from the ashes with renewed youth to live through another cycle; The Phoenix was, generally, believed to be colorful and vibrant; this was one aspect of the bird that made it stand out from all other birds. Some thought it had peacock-like coloring, and that its eyes were blue like sapphires; In modern times the Phoenix was a person or thing regarded as uniquely remarkable in some respect."

Trip looked at the figurine his father had given him, he read the description on his computer screen again, and he thought about what Jon had said to him. He clicked off the computer screen, set the figurine on his coffee table, took a long hot shower, and went to bed.

Sleep however, didn't come quickly. He kept thinking about everything that had happened to him in the last couple of weeks. He thought about his melt down at his parent's home, and the therapy session he had with Dr. Houston where his memories of his tormentor had fully returned. He thought about Vendria, and how she had saved his life; for what? He thought about the challenge T'Pol presented to him; the things Jon had said to him, but mostly the things his father had said to him.

Right then he made a decision, a big decision. But, if he was going to do this, he was really going to do it, no half-stepping. In addition, he resolved to do something that would ensure that nothing like this would ever happen to him again. He did not want to be a liability. It had long been a running joke about his penchant for getting into trouble on away missions, and having the record for sick bay visits. That would have to change. Could he do this? Could he take control of his life back and reinvent himself? Could he become a better Charles Anthony Tucker III? Could he find a way to live again?

The next day Trip went to the Starfleet training facility and resumed his workout regime and his plan for regaining his health and strength. He continued psychotherapy as well because he knew that if his plan was going to work that his head had to be on straight.

When he was strong enough, Trip began his next phase of reinventing himself. He did strength training, and continued to run for miles every day, testing his endurance. He took hours and hours of kick boxing, Jui jitsu and Vulcan martial arts classes as well. But, on this particular day, things were not going so great.

Trip fell to the floor again, nose and mouth bleeding.

"Get up!" his trainer said. Trip lay there on the gym floor a few more minutes, then slowly pushed himself up. He had wanted to learn Vulcan martial arts, but this was ridiculous. His trainer had to be the biggest Vulcan he had ever seen, about 6'4, 220 pounds of nothing but muscle, not to mention that Vulcans were already about twice as strong as humans anyway. And today, Trip was really getting his ass whipped.

"Commander," Vakai said. "You are going to need to learn to take a punch. It is well that you have learned blocking techniques, but you are going to be hit at some point. You cannot simply crumble and fall to the floor each time."

"Easy for you to say," Trip replied and resumed his stance.

"Incorrect," Vakai stated. "Must we go over this each time? Can you not retain anything I have taught you from one day to the next?"

"Hey! I'm tryin!" Trip shouted. Vakai simply raised his eyebrow and walked over to show Trip the correct stance.

"Now, once again." Vakai threw several punches which Trip blocked. But then, Vakai threw a kick at Trip's chest, connecting and throwing him backwards to the floor. Trip lay there. He had had the wind knocked out of him and was trying to catch his breath.

"Pathetic," the Vulcan said, glaring down at Trip. When he finally was able to get to his feet, Trip grabbed his shirt and began to walk toward the lockers.

"I told you, you were not suited for this training!" the Vulcan shouted at his back. "Do not bother to return tomorrow, you will never master the technique, few humans can." Trip stopped in his tracks. He could feel his anger rising up. He swirled around and faced Vakai.

"Well, I'm no ordinary human!" Trip shouted.

"Really!" Vakai taunted.

"Look, you smug son-of-a-bitch!" Trip shouted. "I'm paying you to teach me how to fight! Not to insult me and piss me off! Now I'm sick of it, and I'm not gonna listen to anymore of your arrogant garbage!"

"Unfortunately, Commander," the bigger man said, "there is very little you can do about it!" With that Trip attacked him. Vakai blocked most of Trip's blows, but he got a couple in. They were good hits too, making Vakai's nose bleed and leaving a small cut above his right eye. But a few moments later, Vakai easily put Trip on his back, and held him there. Trip struggled to get up for several minutes. When his trainer finally let him up, Trip let out a string of expletives, kicked a couple of chairs on the sideline and banged his fist against the wall. Vakai rolled his eyes.

"Commander," he said in a much softer tone. "You are correct, you are no ordinary human. I knew that the first day I met you. I have trained many officers and individuals in this technique and you have shown more determination and discipline than I have ever seen. For two weeks you have shown up here every day and endured my taunting and harshness with you, yet this is the first day you have had a breakdown."

"Whadda you mean?" Trip asked, wiping his face with his hands.

"Many of my students breakdown and attack me within the first three days of this training. Many do not return. You have shown remarkable restraint and resilience. I believe you have the skills to master this fighting technique."

"But, you just said I' didn't! As a matter of fact, you been saying a lot of crap that's not helpin', it's just pissing me off!"

"And do you think that your opponents, a hostile alien species, an assassin, or a warrior trained to kill since birth are going to say nice things about you while kicking your ass?" Trip had to raise his eyebrows at that. He knew that Vakai had surely been living on Earth too long, and had picked up some of their bad habits.

"Your opponents will be trying to harm you, possibly kill you. If you can be so easily shaken by insults, then that is a disadvantage. Just like the physical blows, you must learn to block it out. And the anger, you have it, plenty of it, you just don't know how to use it to your advantage."

Trip was curious now. "I don't follow," he said.

"You must learn to harness your anger, control it, compartmentalize it. Store it away for use at the appropriate time. When a situation arises, say your life is threatened, or perhaps a family member or colleague's life is endangered. Then you must reach in deep inside yourself and summons forth your anger and fury. Remember those who hurt you, see them, smell them, recall the pain. Then propel all of it onto your opponent and use it to dispatch him."

Trip sat there on the floor with his hands resting on his knees trying to process what Vakai was telling him. "As for the physical pain, you must also learn how to disconnect from it. You must not allow yourself to experience it during the fight. It's a matter of control and mental discipline. If you can master these two things, you can master the Vulcan martial art, only then." Vakai then arose from where he had been sitting in front of Trip. "Same time tomorrow," he said, reaching his hand out to Trip to help him up. "And Commander, come with your "game on."

From that day forward, Trip was never the same. He had come with his game on every day since then. He learned how to put Vakai on his back, because he discovered he was faster and more agile, and because he learned how to fight dirty. He used this to his advantage. Over the next few weeks he also learned to control his anger and disconnect from physical pain.

When everyone returned to the ship, Trip did not return with them. He had told Captain Archer that he wanted to stay aboard Enterprise after all, but wasn't quite ready, that he still had a lot of work to do. He did keep in touch with Captain Archer and Dr. Phlox as well as Malcolm, and they could see the positive change in him, that he was in fact better. Eventually, his family began to think he was okay too, changed, but not nearly as crazy, just half-crazy.

Trip stayed on Earth three more months, training and getting his head straight. Finally, he did something he never thought he would do. He went into the back alleys of San Francisco, and into dive bars. He talked to people he wouldn't usually talk to or even associate with, but he was looking for something, someone. When he found him, a rouge Starfleet Section 31 operative, he knew there was no turning back. He knew the old Trip Tucker was gone for good, because the old Trip Tucker would never, ever, have wanted to do what he was doing… learning how to kill.

Trip sat in a dive bar in San Francisco with his new "friend." It was dark and dirty, and oh the smell! But Trip sat in the back of this establishment nursing a beer. He had been there for over three hours now, and he was getting restless.

"Just what the hell are we doing here?" Trip asked JC for the third time.

"I told you already, now learn to relax. This is observation 101, learning how to size up a room. Now, look around, tell me whadda ya see," the short, New Yorker with dark hair and a five o'clock shadow said to Trip.

"I see a $20.00 prostitute working the room. A guy that's five bottles short of a six pack, begging, with a military jacket; fly boy, or at least he coulda been at some point in his life. I see a busboy clearin' off tables, like he's been doing since we got here. See a couple over there look like they're about to get it on right out here in front of all of us. There's the bar tender, a couple of waitresses, and a guy reading a padd."

"That all you see?" JC asked looking at Trip warily.

"Well the scene hasn't changed much since we got here."

"Oh? Look CT, I know you're a novice at this. But, if you're gonna uh, excel, in this line of work, you got learn a few tricks. Like, learning how to be aware of your surroundings, knowing how to see what others don't see, and how to size up the situation in just a few minutes."

"What? Trip asked.

"Okay, okay, watch this. See your $20.00 prostitute over there?" Trip nodded. "Now look at her hands and her feet. She's got a $100.00 french manicure and a pedicure. Now what $20.00 whore have you ever seen that pays that much attention to her nails? A high classes call girl maybe, but not in this dive." Trip frowned, considering this.

"Now look at your fly boy over there. Been begging for change all night, right? Now look at his hair. The top is all mussed up, but check out the edges, all tapered down, side burns trimmed. It's a professional cut."

"And what about your hard working bus boy? Sure, he's making so much money in this dump that he can afford to wear $200.00 wing tips while he's cleaning off tables. No bus boy's gonna be working in shoes like that I tell ya."

"Lastly, your guy in the corner with the padd. He's been in and outta here for the last three hours. He's looking for somebody, or waiting for something to go down."

Trip was amazed. He had not noticed any of those things. "How do you do that?" he asked his companion.

"Practice, and lots of it. That why for the next few days, anywhere you go, everywhere you go, you gonna be looking, watching, sizing up. Learn to do it as soon as you enter a room, and not by looking around either. Never, ever call attention to yourself. Use your peripheral vision, your gut, your instincts. But try to look normal, or at least half-way normal. This is a bar, so order a drink, just don't drink it. You wanna stay alert. But make sure you tip the waitress or buy some female a drink or something so you don't start to look suspicious. You wanna be like a puff of smoke."

Just then the prostitute, the fly-boy beggar and the bus boy pull out weapons and pounce on the guy with the padd and his companion that had entered the bar just a few minutes earlier and slid something to the padd guy. It turns out the prostitute, the beggar and the bus-boy were undercover police offers that had been working the bar for several weeks. They had finally gotten their man.

For the next few weeks Trip shadowed JC to various "hot spots," or bars, restaurants, hover car stations, and the like, watching, observing, and sizing up. JC also taught him certain specialized, but lethal fighting techniques. Trip practiced them over and over in simulation. During his last couple of weeks in San Francisco, JC took Trip on three real life "excursions," as JC referred to them. Trip surprised himself at what he did during those three events. They were in themselves, life changing.

St Croix, Virgin Islands.

It was late, in the middle of the night, and just starting to get a little cold. They had taken a shuttle pod to the Virgin Islands. From the landing spot, they took a hover car. Trip had not been given any details about why they were there. He was simply told that JC had a job, and that they had a location on some pretty bad guys who had stolen something very important to some important people associated with Starfleet who wished to remain anonymous.

Thirty-six hours ago, a terrorist organization had stolen data discs obtaining information about Section 31 Operatives in the field. If this information fell into the wrong hands, it could be disastrous. JC and his team had to steal the discs back. The terrorists had spent the last few hours trying to break the decryption codes, but had been unsuccessful. Therefore, time was of the essence.

"Okay CT," JC said to Trip outside what looked like a vacant warehouse. "This is it. This is what we been working on all these weeks, the real deal. Are you ready?'

"Ready as I'll ever be," Trip replied. He and JC, as well as three other individuals whom were only known by initials, were all dressed in black and wore black skull caps. They were all armed.

"You sure, cause, once it's done, it's done, and you can never go back. Once you become an expert in this field, you can never be normal in the way you used to be. That part of you will be gone forever."

"Most of who I used to be is already gone," Trip replied. "Gotta fill the empty holes up with somethin', might as well be somethin' that may save my life or somebody I care about one day."

"Alright then," JC said and looked at Trip squarely in the eyes. "Once we enter the building, there's a guard at the desk. Your assignment- take him out. Then you have to locate the discs for the rest of the team and disable all the systems inside that building. We need to get in without being detected and so they can't power up their ship or blow us out of the sky. RJ will be covering you until it's done and we're back in the car. If anybody else comes through, take 'em out. Once we have the items in question. We'll head straight to the shuttle after that. You got ten minutes, go." Trip nodded.

"Gotta remember not to think too much," Trip told himself. "I don't know the guy, don't need to know him or what he's done or not done. Don't worry about whether he has a wife or kid; if he's a good guy. I'm operating on a need to know basis and I don't need to know. He's the enemy, and the enemy needs killing. That's it and that's all. No time for knocking the guy out, or tying him up. Got a job to do, just focus on the job. You can do it Trip, you can do it. It just needs to be done, so stop yaking to yourself and get to it!"

Trip entered the building right behind RJ. He quickly observed his surroundings, checking out where the cameras were, if anyone else was present, where the escape routes were. He saw the guard and headed straight for him.

"Hey! What are you doing in here!?" the guard asked. But, before he could react or do much else, Trip leaped over the desk and was on top of him. He applied a blow to his neck with his fingers, cutting off the guard's air supply instantly. He then got to the computer console and studied it for a few minutes. Being the brilliant engineer that he was, it didn't take him long to figure out how to break into it. That's why he had been chosen for this particular assignment. He entered a few codes, and the door to the main computer slid open. Trip quickly located the items in question, disabled the alarm, the lights, the elevators and pretty much everything else. He then reached for a communicator.

"It's done," he called out to JC. And it was.