Double Vision

Chapter 32: A Kaleidoscope of Visions (RU)

A/N:  Bondspeak in italics        

"T'Pol, are you here?"  

"No, Trip it's me.  We left Commander T'Pol back on the ship.  You insisted.  Don't you remember?  The captain wanted us all to come down but you argued until he and the Commander stayed behind. We brought Major Hayes instead."

"Since when has the captain ever let me win an argument that meant it was okay to disobey an order?"  Trip stood scrutinizing Malcolm.  Captain Archer had been acting a little off but he'd never changed the makeup of an away team when Trip objected in the past and he didn't see him doing it now.  And T'Pol would never stand by and let him dictate how she was going to do her job.  Major Hayes was here.  How was that possible when Hayes had been killed months ago by the Reptilians? 

"I don't ask questions I just follow orders Commander."

"Are you alright Malcolm?"

"Fine, sir."

Was there anything of substance to hang onto in the last several days? "When did we come down to the planet?" Actually when had they left the research facility and how had they escaped from that cell? Trip looked around the unfamiliar world ...He studied the architecture of the nearby building and wooded area.  Well, maybe it was a little familiar.  But it wasn't because he'd ever been here before.  It all felt unreal somehow.

"We've been here for hours.  Maybe it's you who isn't alright."

Hours.  How was that possible?  "I was just in a cell with T'Pol, talking to the captain, who was in a cell with you and Hoshi. . . down the corridor from us.  Any word on Fric and Frac?"

"Who are Fric and Frac? And I haven't been anywhere with Hoshi in months."

"We just played cards the other night."

"You and I played cards together?" Malcolm's laugh left no doubts about how unbelievable he thought the prospect of spending off-duty time with the engineer was.

"Yes, with T'Pol and Hoshi in the office."  

"Office? Whose office?"

Trip dropped back against a nearby tree feeling a little queasy and disoriented until that familiar tingle made its presence known. That feeling that let him know he was not alone.  "T'Pol, what the hell is going on?"

She stirred slightly he could almost feel it but there was no answer. "T'Pol, I know you're nearby but why doesn't this feel right?"  No response came from T'Pol so Trip looked back at Malcolm.

"Mal, did you find the problem with the sensors?  And why didn't they transport us to Enterprise?"

What was wrong with their chief engineer? Since when did he call him Mal?   "What problem are you referring to Commander and why would we transport back to Enterprise.  I'm quite sure Starfleet and the captain would object if we were to just abandon the shuttle we brought down."

They hadn't used a shuttle.  T'Pol had determined it was outside the acceptable limits of safety to land a shuttle near enough to the research facility.  "I thought T'Pol said it was too risky for a shuttle."  

"Since when do you refer to the first officer as T'Pol?" Concern flooded the tactical officer's face.

"It's been a long day maybe I just need to get more sleep..."  At the last minute, Trip realized he had no idea what time of day it was.  He didn't know where he was or what had happened to Malcolm.  Was this his dream or Malcolm's?

"The captain mentioned you seemed wrung out and stressed.  You're supposed to be setting an example for your junior officers and the crew in general.  Maybe you should try taking better care of yourself."  

Trip could see that same look on Mal's face in his memories of their first year or so.  That tactical officer wouldn't understand why Captain Archer let the Commander get away with not keeping himself in peak condition.

"I'll take that under advisement Lieutenant."  Trip hadn't missed the prim and proper Malcolm Reed who first came aboard Enterprise and this was only making him miss their closeness more. If the old Mal were still around, they would not have become the best of friends.   With no options but digging himself deeper into this hole, Trip decided to be more careful.  He focused on Malcolm.  He tried to use the bond and his heightened senses to feel him but there was nothing. 

"So how far are we from completing our mission?"  Trip needed to find out what he and Malcolm were here to do.  

"We won't know until the Captain comes back with Gralik."

Gralik that doesn't make any sense as he wasn't part of the away team on that mission.  Archer, Reed, T'Pol, and Hayes were the ones who went to the refinery.   He tried to remember what they'd told him after they returned.  "Has the captain decided how he wants to proceed?"  He didn't even know for sure if this was where they'd sabotaged the Xindi's shipment.

Trip's words were like a whisper in her mind.  So far away she couldn't reach him.  

"Sub-Commander T'Pol."

Sub-Commander?  No one had called her that in years she thought as she turned toward the voice.  "Where am I?"

"Sub-Commander T'Pol if you are unable to perform your duties step away from your station."   Her Vulcan captain ordered.

T'Pol looked down at the console with no recognition of any of the dials or screens in front of her.   This was not Enterprise nor was there anything Vulcan here but herself and the Vulcans manning the bridge.  Vulcans yes, but something wasn't quite right about them. One part of her mind searched for Trip.  Where had he gone?  Was he nearby or somewhere else?  Where was she?  The other more logical side began working out how to navigate in her surroundings, moving backwards into the mode of being a Vulcan Sub-Commander on an unfamiliar ship.  She could do this.  She had done it before when they thrust her aboard Enterprise without any experience on a Starfleet starship.  

She had never been the totally unemotional Vulcan, as expected and often felt somewhat isolated serving on a Vulcan ship and once again the disapproving vibes were poking at her.  Serving on a human ship had made it less vital that she spend the hours meditating to suppress her emotions enough to get by with her people and since she had bonded with Trip, her meditation time had lessened.  After their bond was completed, she only suppressed the strongest of her emotions, allowing the bond and Trip to assist her with the rest.

The console looked like nothing she'd experienced before but the ships on the viewscreen were all too familiar.  Klingons were moving in to attack.  This wasn't real, it couldn't be.  Earth wasn't at war with the Klingons and neither was Vulcan. The longer she stared at her station and took in the rest of the bridge the more she felt she'd seen this ship before.  But where?  An alarm sounded then the swish of the door opening caught her attention and for reasons she couldn't explain, something in the back of her mind left her half expecting to hear "Danger, Danger" coming forth from the robotic being that slide onto the bridge.

"This test is telling us nothing except that your subjects do not believe them to be real."  The Regent complained.

"The data came from what we were able to retrieve from their computer without detection, not their memories like the others.  We cannot access their minds and we have no idea why."  Several attempts had been made but the pair continued to resist with what appeared to be little if any effort was needed at all.

"If they fail to perceive their environment as their reality then we are wasting our time."  They must break through their resistance. 

"We must have engineers and soon or our power will be depleted and soon all our resources will be depleted.  Continue and use the other humans to see if they have information or can be useful in breaking through the human and Vulcans resistance."

Trip sat there staring at the latest rendition of his mate.  His own personal 'Twilight Zone' had been playing before him for some unspecified amount of time.  Scenarios kept being enacted with him as the main player.  The captain, Malcolm, Hoshi, and T'Pol were rotating as minor players in what he had finally decided was someone's elaborate series of movie sets.  The familiarity of the scenes threw him for a while but then he recognized one of the worlds he'd been placed in.  They were subjects in some experiment but what he couldn't figure out was the objective or the reasoning behind placing him in these imaginary scenes.  He studied the T'Pol standing across the room from him dressed in some weird futuristic outfit from another unidentified made up world and laughed.  The first time she appeared he'd reached out to touch her to ascertain if she were real.  She'd been with him when this started so he reasoned she must be part of this too.  The skin-to-skin contact was made and nothing.  The tingling in his head remained constant though.  Fear could have overcome him at this point but it didn't.  That sensation was present and that meant she was alive and for now that was enough.  Several more scenes and she appeared again.  By then he was tired and his mind was losing it's ability to take in his surroundings and adapt.  He'd been going along gradually playing his part, except that he never went near T'Pol again when she appeared.  He relied on their bond from a distance to let him know she wasn't really there.  

The scenes had changed more rapidly as if they came to realize he was tiring so they stepped up the search for the one that would let him accept his new reality.  This new T'Pol moved towards him.  He looked straight into her eyes, said "I'm not playing anymore"... and sat down, positioning himself as he did for meditation.  His eyes remained open and his emotions receded.  The exhaustion left him with nothing but that sensation.  He sought it out, focused, and waited for her to answer his call.  

He didn't know why they had been unable to connect in their normal fashion and had avoided this until so much had been taken from him that the fear he had refused to acknowledge was also gone and all he was left with was the belief in their connection.  The calm floated through him and he felt her, knew she was with him.  "Missed you."

"It took several of their attempts to draw me in before I realized what they were doing."  

Trip smiled.  "Sorry it took me so long.  I tried to figure this out and I think I was a little afraid you wouldn't be here.  That I couldn't reach you."

He hadn't let fear overcome him as it had in the past.  He let the bond assure him she was still there and did his best to understand what was happening.  It was the most logical course for a Starfleet officer to take. "You did well and you're here now so let's concentrate on that.  We are test subjects of some sort but the purpose is unclear.  I came here after the fifth scenario when I recognized the world I was in from that animated movie you and Malcolm agreed was the worst kind of science fiction.  I was the astronaut placed on that alien world likened as 1950's Earth. I refused to interact with the likeness of you who replaced the boy who should have discovered me and instead found a quiet place and began meditating.  Have you been able to discover the purpose of this experiment?"  The movie T'Pol described was the last one they'd watched.  Trip and Malcolm had gotten into a discussion bordering on an argument about their taste in movies and TV.  They'd each selected examples for the group to watch starting with science fiction.  Those movies were loaded into the computers memory and must have been mistaken as actual footage of life on their home planet. T'Pol figured that much out but not why their captors had done this to them.

"No.  I knew none of it felt real from the beginning and I started off trying to fit into each scenario hoping to figure it out but there's no explanation I can come up with."    Trip gathered her up into his arms and held on letting the relief wash over them both.

"Is there anyway you can use your mind to control them like you do to me?"  She only tickled and teased him but he knew she was capable of more.

"I was unable to on my own but with your assistance I may be able to break whatever hold they have on us."

"How can I help?  I don't know anything about Vulcan mind control."

"When you next feel them in your mind all you need to do is lend me your strength through our bond.  I will do the rest. It may cause you some pain so you will need to protect yourself and let me know when if it becomes necessary for me to stop."  

"I'm tired of them treating us like their own private puppets so do what you have to do."  Trip turned inward concentrating on putting up barriers to protect the most vital areas of his brain.

"Where are we now?"  T'Pol asked as she became aware that they were no longer in their minds and that their surroundings had changed.

"This is sci-fi hell.  All they missed was Frankenstein and the Bermuda triangle." Trip screamed in frustration, as he took in their surroundings.

Trip looked outside the cave taking in the ocean, mountains, and jungle like terrain. "Well, maybe they didn't miss the Bermuda triangle after all.  This looks like 'The Lost World'.  Maybe we should let them know this isn't going to work and we'll never believe it's real."

"That would seem logical as I believe whatever they intend depends on their ability to recreate a reality that we find believable.  And it has become apparent that they cannot access our own memories and must rely on what they were able to steal from the computer."  

"Too bad it was only the early movies.  The special effects got better later on and it would have been nice to see some of those worlds close up."

"I cannot believe you find anything about this acceptable."  She said as she took in his smile.

"I don't but if we had to go through all this it would have been nice if the quality of films was on the higher end of the scale. . ."  His voice trailed off but his thoughts continued.  If they had to go through this why not wish for better quality movies.

"Being thrown into a world full of zombies who made me feel as if I was lunch is logical to you?"  The look of incredulousness in her eyes told him how exasperated she really was with him.

"It's not about logic it's about . . .oh never mind."  He could see the far away look that said she was no longer listening because she found his line of reasoning faulty. "Let's just sit here and meditate.  Maybe they'll get as bored as we are and stop."

The pair sat knee to knee. "Commander Tucker that won't be necessary."  The voice boomed from the far corner.

"Who are you and what are you trying to accomplish here?"  The agitated engineer yelled back at what he assumed was a speaker.

"That is not important.  You and your crew will be returned to your ship.  It would be best if you left this region of space immediately."

"So you play with us for your own amusement and then expect us to just go away."

Trip and T'Pol heard another voice.  "We do not have time for this.  Send them back to their ship.  We must widen our search and find replacements."

"Guess we didn't fit their requirements."  Trip was amused at this revelation.

"I find that highly unlikely.  You are an excellent engineer as are the Andorians.  There must be another reason they are setting us free."

"And everyone accuses me of having a big head."

"There is nothing wrong with having pride in my mates' abilities."

"Well thank you and I won't tell anyone."

"What would there be to tell?"

"Vulcans aren't supposed to be proud are they?  They do what is expected without regard to pride or kudos--I mean recognition."

"It was not pride in myself. . ."

"No but you're encouraging me to be proud and that reflects on you."  He caught the regret and her pulling back from him.  "I was teasing T'Pol.  Don't take everything so seriously."  She'd come so far in understanding him but he still needed to be more aware that she didn't always take his sarcasm in the teasing manner he intended.

The captain waited to see if his chief engineer was going to seek him out to discuss the events of the past several days.  Archer, Malcolm, and Hoshi had spent hours talking through the weird scenarios they'd been through, trying to sort out the real from the fantasy.  But Trip and T'Pol begged off when it came time for them to discuss their experiences. They'd written their official reports, but hadn't talked to anyone as far as the Captain knew. When Trip didn't seek him out Archer went in search of his friend.  "Hey Trip you got a minute."  He found him sitting quietly in the Mess Hall staring out at the stars.

"Sure. What's up?"

"I just wanted to see how things are now that everyone's back on board." Archer knew Trip had T'Pol to talk to but he still worried when he appeared to be keeping things inside.  It never ended well.

"I'm not sure. I haven't talked to my crew yet. There are some questions and consequences we still need to sort out."  There had been much to sort out in his own head before he could consider what to say to his staff. The detailed reports of Malcolm, Hoshi, and the Captain lead both Trip and T'Pol to understand that their experiences had been very different. The trio had been in a cell where the Revans, if that's who they really were, attempted to pull memories from them involving Trip and T'Pol.  They had been somewhat successful but the most accessible and vivid memories of each had come from their experiences with the Xindi while in the expanse.   Trip and T'Pol had been subjected not to memories pulled from their own minds, but to those from their fellow officers and what their captors had stolen from the most recently accessed entries in the database, which had mistakenly been interpreted as the world the pair had come from.   

"What did Admiral Gardner have to say?"  Not that he needed the captain to tell him what Starfleet's reaction would be.  He could still hear Gardner's insistence that the Andorians should not have been allowed to be in charge on this mission.  The captain had to alter his reports leaving out the details surrounding the beginning and ending of the attempts to alter their perceptions with mind games.  Archer knew the worst of it had to do with their bond, Trip had confirmed that much. He also knew that same connection was what had prevented any of the crew being held captive as the Revans had finally relented after trying to get the Human and Vulcan to tell them why none of their techniques that had been successfully used on other species worked on them.  When they were released, the Revans explained that they knew the coordinates of the station had been relayed to Starfleet and they could not hold so many of the crew of Enterprise and risk Earth, Vulcan, and Andoria sending ships to search for Enterprise.  

"He didn't apologize for his earlier comments but he did say the whole area has been designated as off limits and warning buoys are being deployed."

"Are they going to try to find out what the hell they need to do to stop them?"

"They're working on it. He had another bit of news."  

"Where are they sending us now?" 

"We're heading back to Earth for a few days."  Trip said he hadn't talked to Fric and Frac so he must not know.  "Your lieutenants' time on Enterprise has come to an end."

They still had almost a month left.  "So are the Andorians reneging and asking for them back early.  And why go back to Earth?  Can't Shran just rendezvous with us?"

"They applied for extended service with Starfleet but have requested that their new assignment be on another Starship."

"What?  Did they say why?"   Trip felt a twinge of hurt that they hadn't talked to him about this.

The hurt, surprise, and confusion on his friends face concerned him.  "No. I assumed they talked to you because the request also stated that you be consulted as to which ship they were to be assigned to."

Trip fought back the surge of emotions threatening to overwhelm him.  Instantly he felt T'Pol there offering to assist him. "Well I guess we have a lot more to talk about than I thought."  He switched totally into his professional persona and pushed all his emotions back.  "Any advice?"

Archer had some but kept it to himself even though he knew Earth may be the last place Trip wished to be.  "You're a senior officer so I think I'm going to just let you work this one out.  You and Shran agreed to this little arrangement and while there have been more than a few issues for the most part you've done a good job with this whole assignment.  You know your people so you're the best man to deal with this."  This wasn't an assignment to Trip and Archer understood that. If the Andorians were leaving at their own request then Trip needed to speak to them on his own so they had a chance to explain why.

"Are you sure you're not just mad at me?"  Jon got upset and yelled so if he was mad this was a new way of handling it.  

"No. I'm just trying to heed some very good advice."  He and Erika had discussed this further once he'd had a chance to really consider what she'd said to him.  And he decided maybe she was right.  For years now, he'd complained to Trip that he needed to grow as a commander but he hadn't seen how his interference had worked to prevent that from happening.  But Trip found T'Pol and did it anyway.  Until recently, Archer had not acknowledged his growth.  If they were heading towards a conflict with the Romulans, like many in Starfleet feared, his officers were going to need all the experience they could get if they and Enterprise were going to survive.  The Xindi had let them roam around the expanse for months until they got close to locating their homeworld.  Things wouldn't be that calm with the Romulans as the location of their home was known and the Romulans were an aggressively violent, warrior race.  They might not know much about them but all their encounters proved that to be true.  So Archer was going to let his officers stretch much more than he had allowed in the past.

"Well just don't step back too far.   I appreciate you're letting me handle things but I still need to be able to ask for advice."  Trip shouted at his captain who was quickly fading from view. To Trip it was as if his captain was all hands on or all hands off and what he needed was a balance that worked for them all.

Archer stopped and turned at the end of the corridor.  "I'll keep Gardner off your back if he becomes a problem but I don't think you'll need my help."  Trip had his own network of friends.

"The Admirals all hate me.  I attract all the wrong kind of attention according to them."  Reporters, cameras, and 24-hour news flashes made Starfleet nervous and Trip and T'Pol attracted them all.

"That may be what they say to your face but have you really thought about how much things have changed for you?  You have more friends, real friends, who are not human, than any crew member on this ship.  Probably more than any other Starfleet officer."

"So do you."

"No, I have professional acquaintances.  Shran considers me a friend but that's about it.  The rest are more diplomatic relationships, not friendships. You've even managed to make friends with Soval.  He and I have mutual respect for each other and we talk but he still doesn't trust me like he does you and I doubt he ever will."  Archer knew his past feelings, actions, and attitudes were well known, and Vulcans were slow to forget.

"That has more to do with T'Pol than me."

Archer had been forced to examine a more realistic view of the development of the relationship between his senior officers, removing his emotional reactions from his observations and he saw that Trip had challenged T'Pol, at first, because she was a Vulcan.  But that changed early on in their first year together. The young engineer began to respect her for her intelligence and then accepted her leadership.  No longer challenging but assisting or questioning when he saw the need.  Archer may have come to see T'Pol as the capable First Officer she was and let go of his preconceptions and prejudices but many Vulcans were and always would be wary of him. 

"No it doesn't.  You first impressed him on Vulcan and with how you've handled yourself since with all the controversy, publicity, and criticism from Terra Prime and Starfleet."  As frustrating as it was to stand back and watch Trip during that time Archer was proud that he stood up for his beliefs and protected T'Pol.  "Soval helped you when you asked, not T'Pol."  Archer was impressed that Trip had managed to get to a place where he felt comfortable asking the Ambassador for assistance.  

Archer might be right.  T'Pol hadn't even been aware he'd asked Soval for help.  And Soval had stood up for both he and T'Pol with Starfleet.  "Yeah I guess maybe you're right. But that doesn't mean I don't need my oldest friend and captain's advice."

"I'm not going anywhere but don't forget I'm not your only friend who has influence with Starfleet."  Archer knew Trip's inclination would be to ignore his advice because he would not impose on his friends and because of his fear of being drawn into future conflicts between Earth and Vulcan.  Trip insisted he was an engineer, not a diplomat.  He behaved professionally and even diplomatically when meeting new species but that was as far as he wished to develop those particular skills.  He signed on to explore, build, and maintain warp engines.  Let Archer be Earth and Starfleet's representative and deal with all the headaches.

Trip sat in the lobby awaiting his summons to Admiral Gardner's office.  While he waited, he tried going over the months since the two Andorians came aboard Enterprise preparing himself for the Admirals inquisition.  He needed to be prepared to deal with the fallout from the incident at the research facility.  Fric and Frac had tried to protect Enterprise and Trip by sacrificing themselves to the Revans once they knew what they were up to.  Trip spent hours trying to make them understand that while he understood why they'd done what they'd done that as officers they should have known better.  That they could not operate on their own and had to learn to rely on their crew.  Getting through their Andorian stubbornness had taken time but they finally agreed that they were wrong and accepted that Trip was going to insist they be required to complete Starfleet's officers training while they were on Jupiter Station.  He'd considered it before but now saw it as imperative that they understand and operate under the same rules as their human counterparts if they were going to remain in service as officers on a human starship. 

The researchers on Revan turned out to be a combination of scientists and what translated to magicians. That wasn't how they described themselves but that was essentially, what they were.   They used techniques to make suggestions to a subjects mind and potions, drugs really, to force compliance from whomever they deemed necessary to further their cause.  The power stored under their facility was to be used for some sort of device to aid in extending the range of their mind control.   The Andorians were their most recent attempts at replacing staff that had expired or were no longer acceptable.  They had been destroying whole star systems to gather power for their purposes.

It had taken days to sort it all out and once they were transported off the planet, the crew of Enterprise never returned to the surface.  Instead they did what they could to remove any signs of their having been there and made sure they destroyed anything that would be of assistance to the Revans ongoing research.   

No intervention was needed on Trip's behalf.  In fact, it all worked out in Trip's favor.  Starfleet was satisfied that a threat to the quadrant had been discovered and thrilled that a trilateral agreement had been reached for Earth, Vulcan, and Andorian scientists to investigate the Revans and prevent them from destroying anymore systems. 

The Andorians, Fric and Frac, were to remain in Starfleet for two more years.  Their first official commission was on the NX-03 Challenger.  It was due out of space dock in six months and they were to be Starfleet Lieutenants and share the position of seconds in engineering.  In the meantime, they would be receiving some additional training while assisting the crews with the construction and testing of Challenger.  The Admiralty was pleased and hopeful this would mean the engineers at Jupiter Station would learn what they'd done wrong with Columbia and get this ship and future ships out into space without Trip's assistance.

"Your package has arrived, Trip."  Malcolm Reed smiled as he entered Engineering having just returned from HQ.

My package?  Then something in his manner told him what Malcolm was referring to.  "Where?"  

"The office.  Thought you'd want the privacy."  

Trip gripped Malcolm's shoulder.  "Did you talk to him?"

"Yes.  He wasn't angry, actually he seemed relieved."

"Thanks.  I'll talk to you later."  Trip quickly moved to the hatch.  On the way, he let T'Pol know that Malcolm was back and had brought a message from John.  He was on his way to view it and wanted her to join him.  

Malcolm had delivered a message to Trip's brother asking that he allow Malcolm to bring him to Enterprise.  Reed for his part guaranteed no one, not even Trip, would know of John's location.  Trip had made him promise not to divulge anything about John that John had not given him permission to.  The plan had been to get him to come see Trip, then to convince him to come to San Francisco with himself and T'Pol.  If he couldn't be talked into any of that, at least Trip wanted to open up two-way communication between them. If he didn't trust that Trip wouldn't inform their parents of his whereabouts then Malcolm had agreed to set up a way for them to communicate that would keep John's location hidden.

T'Pol entered the room to find Trip staring at the blank screen of the computer he'd attached the recorder to.   She could feel ripple after ripple passing through his system as the fear of what he might hear grew.  She reached out hitting the start button on the device.  

A young man dressed in a pullover and jeans sitting on a stool appeared.  His hair was slightly darker than Trips and longer.  The blue Tucker eyes, were tinted with a tinge of grey but they were just as piercing as his brothers.  

"Still documenting your life on film I see.  You must see some pretty incredible things out there.  It would be a shame to forget anything."

Trip had hoped to see him in person but this was better than nothing.  All his childhood memories of his sibling were still fresh.  He'd told Tucker about John because in his universe his mother had lost her second son during childbirth and Tucker wanted some idea of what his brother might have been like had he lived.  Trip slid his chair back.  

"I know you wanted me to come there or let you come here but I have a quiet life.  I own my own business.  Started repairing shuttles and vehicles as a side job and ended up doing it fulltime."  Trip could see his thoughts drifting for a minute.  Maybe he was remembering all the hours he and Trip spent working on anything mechanical as teens.  Trip's skills were far superior to John's but his older brother never made him feel inadequate.  In fact, Trip spent time teaching him as much as he could until he left home. 

"I want to see you too but I'm just not ready.  It still hurts too much to think about...and I just can't.  Your friend Malcolm gave me the letters you sent to Mo... you sent home and I watched the video message on the other disk and then destroyed it like you asked.  Congrats on your news and thanks for trusting me with it."  Trip had warned him about discussing private matters on a subspace transmission.

T'Pol had readily agreed to his request to tell his brother that they were husband and wife.  Telling him felt right and he wanted it to be the first step in rebuilding a relationship with his brother.  

"Let me know how things go in San Francisco.   If you can find a way to reconcile with them maybe, there's hope that I can too.  After reading what you wrote to them about what happened to you after the Xindi attack I decided it might not be a bad idea for me to find someone to talk to.  It's been long enough trying to do this on my own without much success.  Maybe if it gets to where it doesn't all feel so raw I'll take your friend up on his offer to come visit. In the meantime, Malcolm set up the system he told you about so keep in touch.   If you write, I'll respond and I'll try to write more often myself.  Oh and thanks for all the pictures. It makes me feel like I can share a little of your life out there.  Be safe Trip and take good care of T'Pol.  I don't know her but the way you talk about her in those letters I know how much she means to you.  Do-nv-da-go-hv-I  Di na da nv tli."

"Damn T'Pol he's in the States.  He just said 'until we meet again, brother' in Cherokee.  He's living on or near a reservation.  Probably in North Carolina."  Just knowing a general location made Trip feel better.

"We spent time there with our grandparents almost every summer.  John loved it at their house and they had this cabin in the mountains."  That's where he was.  John was living in one of their grandparent's places.  His parents would never think to look there.  His father left as soon as he was old enough and never went back.  Charles Jr's parents had always come to visit them until the year Trip turned thirteen.  Maybe being a freshly minted teen gave him some bravado but he spent weeks hammering away at his father's resolve to get him to agree to let the kids spend time at their grandparent's home.  After that, they spent two weeks every summer there camping and fishing, and tinkering as their grandfather called it, in his workshop.  They had no responsibilities beyond making their beds and being kids.

"Are you going to look for him now that you know where to start?"

"No.  He's trusting me a little here, testing me, and I'm not going to do anything to spook him.  I'll ask Malcolm if I'm right and for now just knowing he's okay is enough." If John really needed time to get himself sorted out, that Trip understood.  They could spend the time sending recordings and letters back and forth and get to know one another again.