Rating: PG
Genres: angst drama romance
Keywords:
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Summary: After their separation, Trip and T'Pol are reunited.
Disclaimer: All characters and Star Trek: Enterprise belongs to Paramount. There's no infringement intended and no profit wants to be made.
Author's notes: Just so you know, TATV did happen but Trip didn't die, and there never was a bond. Thank you so much pdsldl for your magnificent beta services, especially for putting up with all my mistakes! I'll start on chapter 2 when the whole exam mess is over. R&R and enjoy!
Trip walked up to T'Pol looking quite nervous. "Hey", he said. T'Pol was silent. She thought he was going to end their relationship. They were both given the option of commanding the two new starships, NX-03 Galaxy and NX-04 Traveller.
It was a logical decision if he was going to take command of Galaxy. Trip was never good with long distance relationships and their relationship had been quite unstable since the decommissioning of Enterprise.
The sound of his voice snapped T'Pol back to the present.
She thought he looked rather uncomfortable. "I've decided to take command of Galaxy," Tucker anxiously told her. T'Pol's eyes dropped as she tried to piece together a response. She saw this coming.
She took a breath and started, "Taking command of a starship is a great responsibility, and we'll be hundreds of light years apart, not to mention that you'll be in the expanse! You could get yourself killed, no; you will get yourself killed, considering your illogical and irrational path of thoughts and strategies. You wouldn't be a responsible captain if you got you and your crew killed, would you?" T'Pol tried to sound reasonable and persuasive but it sounded on the edge of desperate.
Trip just stood there wide-eyed, shocked beyond belief at T'Pol's behaviour. She was ranting, showing emotion, and defying logic. Trip knew this decision was very logical. What was wrong with her?
Then he broke out into a soft chuckle and started shaking his head. "I think ya might be exaggerating a little bit." He had a hint of amusement in the blue eyes T'Pol had come to love.
She managed a cold stare and with a voice that matched it, she replied, "Vulcans don't exaggerate." She was being very emotional today.
Trip suddenly felt exhausted. "Look, T'Pol. A lot has been going on and we ain't been running as smoothly as we could be...and, I just wanna take a break for a while. Maybe we can start again when the missions are done", he reasoned, nearly pleading.
T'Pol was quiet while she digested what Trip said. He said maybe they could resume their relationship, that's if he hadn't moved on by then. She thought five years was too long a gap, even for a Vulcan. She sighed mentally and tried to accept the fact that this was goodbye. If she must lose him, it won't be without a fight, she vowed to herself.
"But that's not for another five years minimum, if you even survive, T'Pol mumbled, sounding resigned, but trying to repress the memories of how many times Tucker was on his death bed. But sadly, no one could change this stubborn man's mind once it was made up.
Trip looked at the bright side of things. "Hey, maybe I'll meet you in space! You're gonna take command of the Traveller, right?"
"The probability of the occurrence of meeting you in space would be extremely close to 0, if not 0. I am still considering taking up the command of the Traveller. I'm leaning toward accepting." T'Pol was dreading the end of this conversation. She was filled with panic. They were supposed to spend the rest of their lives together. Get married, have children, grandchildren, grow old and die...together, even if she outlived him by a century.
T'Pol then prepared herself for the worst when she saw Trip close his eyes and take a deep breath. She waited...and waited. T'Pol actually admitted to herself she was afraid of losing him. But Vulcans don't feel. No, Vulcans claim they don't feel, but they do, even though emotions are repressed.
"I'm sorry, T'Pol," he choked out, his face the picture of anguish. "It won't be forever, but for now, I guess this is goodbye..." Trip reached out, brushed the back of his hand against her cheek and whispered, "You should take command of the Traveller, the name suits ya, Captain T'Pol." He took another deep breath, winked her favourite wink and walked away.
T'Pol just stood there, unable to move while two tears made their way down her face.
A sudden beep filled her mind and the scene morphed into the bridge of Traveller. She had been daydreaming about that fateful day two years ago... again. She must find a way to let go of the past and finally move on.
"Captain, there is an unknown alien vessel that just dropped out of warp and-", there was a violent tremor from weapon fire shook the ship, "-they're charging weapons, starboard nacelle is failing, hull plating at 60% and shields are fluxuating", announced a familiar British accent.
Captain T'Pol replied with intensity, "Return fire. Phase cannons, aim for the engines, weapons and both nacelles. Disable them all."
"Aye, Captain, with pleasure," Commander Malcolm Reed responded with his British accent. Another tremor rocked the ship. "Hull plating down to 35%, and the port nacelle is losing power. There is something preventing me from locking on to anything..."
"Then just fire manually. I trust that your aim is sufficient."
Just when T'Pol thought things couldn't get much worse, the comm sounded. "Engineering to the Bridge", the voice of Lieutenant commander (sub-commander is a Vulcan rank. Starfleet uses Lt. Commander or Commander) Hess said. T'Pol hesitated a second, remembering Commander, no, Captain Tucker saying those words...She mentally chastised herself for letting her mind to wander during an important situation like this. "T'Pol here."
An almost immediate response came, "We've lost three plasma injectors and the engine is being pushed to its' limit. We can hold another ninety seconds more of this, tops.
T'Pol nodded solemnly. "Thank you, Sub-Commander." T'Pol ended the transmission and turned to the helmsman. "Lieutenant Mayweather, do you think you could pull off an L-4 manoeuvre?"
Although he looked like a picture of uncertainty sitting at the helm Travis tried to sound confident. "I can certainly try." And his attempt was perfect.
This confused the alien vessel enough to allow Reed to fire weapons and damage their warp coil. They weren't crippled, just slightly wounded. The strange thing was, instead of shooting back, they sped off at low warp. In an instant, the mood on the bridge went from tense to relieved. But it changed when T'Pol asked for a report.
"Captain to Sub-Commander Hess."
"Hess here." The Sub-Commanders' tired voice answered.
"Status." T'Pol demanded.
"All plasma injectors have been fried except for one, which means we have to build three completely from scratch. That could take a few weeks, at a minimum, with everyone on triple shifts. Oh, and warp drive is out of the question. The best I can squeeze out of her is ½ impulse. We won't have full impulse for a few days. I'm sorry Captain, but we won't be getting out of here for a while."
"Acknowledged." T'Pol sounded resigned and turned off the comm system. She then announced, "I will put together a distress call. Ensign V'Sillia, scan for any ships within 10 lightyears."
V'Sillia nodded. Approximately 4 seconds later, her reply was, "There are no ships within the specified area. Shall I extend the boundaries of the search?"
"Yes," replied T'Pol, "try 15 lightyears."
"Yes, Captain." A few seconds later, a beep came from the station. "There isn't a ship within 15 but there is one 25.6736 lightyears from us. It is the Starfleet vessel, Galaxy."
Trip is out of character on some levels but on others he seems to be dead on. The TnT relationship was having issues. I do think they would try to work it out.
As for the dis on Archer/T'Pol lovers. One can like both pairing for different reasons.
Fire
After spending so much time working to finally get T'Pol to openly express how she felt about him, I don't think Trip would just dump her like that. It seemed a bit callous and really out of character. The Trip in this story gave me the impression of a self centered frat boy who's into use them and lose them type relationships. Idk. Just my opinion.
However, It was an interesting concept and I will continue to read the upcoming chapters. Perhaps its all a ruse. Perhaps Trip is taking this mission for some secert organization to save the planet against some unknown threat. Maybe the whole thing with T'Pol is like a cut ties keep her safe type thing. Maybe? Well anyway, can't wait to find out.
I am a bit confused too. I thought The Expanse no longer existed after the events of season three of ENT, when they took down the stations which had created it. And T'Pol is a bit to emotional for me in this story. I also was confused that Hess had a Vulcan rank. It is an interesting start and would be fun to see where you take this story in further chapters.
Agree, I cannot see any reason for Trip to go off. From what you write thye are in love and have been for some time. I can't see him just going. He should have a valid reason other than "I want to be alone"
Plot is a little light. Sudden attack, enemy breaking off for no good reason and then Trip shows up. Coincidental? However, it is written nicely and I enjoyed this chapter and want to see the rest of the story.
I agree with the others, especially Dinah put my feelings into words. T'Pol is very aware of the qualities of Trip as a professional (she praised him for instead in Precious Cargo for being such a great engineer) and she only has called him "careless" in season one (one instead when she was jalours) so I was a bit suprised by her outburst "that Trip will be irresponsible and get himself killed." It's get better when you describe her longing for Trip in the second piece, I could feel for her. A tip in writing that helped me very much is that in writing you show things and don't tell: by the emotions displayed you get the feeling of what is behind the story. I see a great potential in your writing and in this story, so I looking forward to the next chapter.
I have to say that this story felt like someone punched me in the gut... especially since there was no TBC! lol
I thought perhaps an A/T'P'er had gotten past security! :p And not before long we'd have Archer coming to show T'Pol a real man.
Trip seems to dump T'Pol in a very uncaring and harsh way... reminds me of my first dumping that occured 7 months ago now. It's still very raw, I'm livid, as I would imagine T'Pol would be too. If I were her I'd think "screw him!"
And yes I have no doubt that T'Pol would be heart broken, but unlike me I think she would firm the pain without even internally acknologing it hurts. But this Trip doesn't deserve T'Pol.
It doesn't seem that Trip cares much for T'Pol here, I'm not sure how you're going to fix this up but Trip better be ready to do some serious grovelling. On hands and knees, Vulcan green roses, choclates, vulcan poetry readings, an absolute SHIT LOAD of grovelling.
My love life's gone to Pot, don't let it happen to Trip and T'Pol, their love is strong.
You need to be careful about removing the editing comments. You left in the rank comment when you introduce Hess and unless she's a new character who is a Vulcan and not the Starfleet Hess from the show she shouldn't be a sub-commander. Looking forward to your next chapter.
I guess I need to pay more attention to author's notes. :s This is only chapter one. Good! ;)
Judging by the title, I'm guessing this is only the first chapter and others will follow. Am I right?
You've set up an interesting situation for your story -- Trip and T'Pol separated after a number of years together, each with his own ship -- but you're giving us only the bare bones here. To be enjoyable for the reader, an author has to put some meat on those bones. Take the time you take to flesh out your characters: their feelings, their experiences, their wants, their needs, their fears. In writing, the journey is every bit as important as the arrival at a destination.
You did a nice job of letting us see T'Pol desperation at losing Trip; however, I'm not sure I understand Trip's feelings. Why was he willing to take command of another ship and walk away from her for five years or forever with seeminly no regrets? Did they break up? Has he found someone else? Did she push him away one time too many, and this time he finally took the hint and moved on?
You have a few factual glitches here. For example -- "'Captain, there is an unknown alien vessel that just dropped out of warp and-", there was a violent tremor from weapon fire shook the ship, "-they're charging weapons, starboard nacelle is failing, hull plating at 60% and shields are fluxuating', announced a familiar British accent." You have weapons fire before the enemy has even charged their weapons and damage before the enemy ship has ever dropped out of warp. Who are these bad guys and why are they shooting at poor T'Pol?
Judging by the name Ensign V'Sillia, I'm guessing that T'Pol is no longer the only Vulcan in Starfleet. That's marvelous. It shows that Humans are really becoming more accepting of other species.
I hope there is a next chapter to your story. I interested to see how you manage to get our two favorite characters "Reunited."
Mh... I have to wait. I feel difficult to grasp this plot, frankly it seems to me made in order to show angst, once more, and, in my opinion, there's already such a lot of angst in RU that I feel slightly uncomfortable, seing that this story seems to have chose another way to describe other manners to have angst.
But you don't have to take my words too much seriously: the whole world rebukes me for my idiosyncrasy for many AU stories, specially if these stories involve angst, precisely.;)
Anyway, I'm interested. As I said, I will wait with real interest for your next chapter. :D
Darn The story didn't load right when I first read it. OK why is T'Pol screwing up Hess' rank? And why did you feel the need to explain the ranks right in the middle of the paragraph? I'm so confused.
OK I'm intrigued by the concept. But I have some serious concerns, 1. They're romantically involved and no bond. Color me confused, I'm assuming this is taking place *when* TATV would have taken place. So how is it possible they are not bonded? Also if Trip was in a serious relationship with any woman he wouldn't just go off without good reasons, and he doesn't dump the women he leaves. You neither explained his logical reasons, or why he was dumping T'Pol. 2. The tone of this bothers me a little all the sentences "sound" like they're texting or something. Everything is rushed like they're not taking breaths at all. It kind of negates the drama. 3. I've seen you write very "T'Pol" and I didn't get any of her here at all.
I'm sorry if I seem harsh, again I like the idea. But I'm confused. And I don't see the style that captivated me in your work before. So I am more than willing to give this a chance. I love your work, I just wanted you to be aware of what I saw.