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Trip is not dead. He's not dead, he can't be, because T'Pol can still feel the little spark of something in the back of her mind where his presence has never quite faded away. She tells herself she's not rushing to sickbay, she's not running, but if she's walking briskly then that's acceptable.
When she gets there, the spark is starting to fade.
Phlox is shaking his head, and the Captain is clenching his fists. The hyperbaric chamber door opens and the bed slides out, and T'Pol doesn't feel tears prickling her eyes at the sight of Trip because Vulcans don't cry.
T'Pol is not sure how she ends up at the side of the bed because she has no memory of walking further into the room, but she is there, and the Captain is on the other side, and that hint of Trip's presence in her mind is slipping away. She takes his hand to try to sustain the contact, closes her eyes to reach out for him, and finds him there, in the white space of her mind. The distance between them seems to be growing greater every moment. He smiles at her, and says, "I guess we're going to lose touch after all."
"I'll miss you," she says, and just like that, he's gone.
T'Pol opens her eyes to sickbay and blinks, once, twice, three times. Her mind is quiet for the first time in years. It hurts more than she expected.
She licks her lips and tastes salt.
