Fog
by Setcheti

Disclaimer: Paramount owns them. They don’t deserve them, but they own them just the same, more’s the pity.
Author’s Note: This started as an answer to Lt. BlackFire's 5 minute 'fog' challenge, which required the answer to start with the provided first line (which it does). And then it just sort of went on from there. If you'd like to take the idea and run someplace with it beyond this story, be my guest.

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It was getting foggier by the second, Trip noticed. He also noticed that he could still see the captain and T'Pol, but where was Malcolm?...

Trip started to call out to Archer and then thought better of it. No loud noises, he remembered. It wasn't about drawing attention to themselves - there was nobody else here, after all - but T'Pol had said that where they were right now was sort of unstable. An avalanche kind of thing, only with water and forest debris falling out of the dense canopy overhead instead of snow and rock falling from the side of a mountain. Still, Trip didn't want to find out just what was up there, so he kept his mouth shut.

But where was Malcolm?

Suddenly a strong arm wrapped itself around his chest, pulling him backwards, and a hand covered his mouth before he could make a sound. "Oh no, can't have noise, remember," the familiar voice of his lover murmured in his ear. "Now you just be a good boy, a good quiet boy, and we'll rejoin the rest of the party at the shuttlepod."

Sure enough, Trip saw the last glimpse of Archer being swallowed up by the thick fog. He kissed the palm covering his lips and it withdrew. A low chuckle sounded in his ear, and a hot tongue licked the rim of his ear. "You need me for somethin'?"

Another chuckle, and the arm around his chest pulled again and then swung him around. Trip found himself backed up against a tree he couldn't see, nose to nose with an armory officer he could barely see either except for a glitter of feral grey eyes. "You could say that," Malcolm told him in throaty voice, reaching for his uniform fastenings. "Now just hold still, I'll be done with you in a minute."

Trip threw back his head and bit his lip when a warm hand and a tendril of fog slid inside his uniform, demanding, possessive. He only vaguely noticed that the fog seemed to be caressing him much the same way Malcolm's hand was...

******

Trip was still a little shell-shocked - or maybe that was Malcolm-shocked - when the landing party got back to Enterprise and was herded into decon by Phlox. T'Pol's scanners had said there was something in the fog, but the only thing Trip remembered being in the fog was an armory officer with five hands and a demanding mouth. He'd come so hard he'd almost passed out, only the tree behind him keeping him from falling flat on his butt right there in the forest. The experience had been...intense.

And damned if the afterglow didn't seem to be lasting a really long time, too. Not that he was complaining, of course, even if it was making it a little hard to focus on anything the captain or T'Pol might be saying. Trip was sure they'd repeat it if it was important, once his brain had recovered from he and Malcolm's encounter in the fog.

Trip was just about to dip his hand into the container of blue gel when another, smaller hand stopped him. Malcolm's hand, which wasn't shaking like his still was. Damn, but that had been some orgasm...

Malcolm's hands started to rub the gel into his skin, firm and thorough but with enough of a caress in them to make Trip purr. He looked up into his lover's face and saw the intense look there that he liked so much, especially when it meant Malcolm was focusing on him. Still, he didn't really have anything left after the last time and they weren't alone in decon... "Mal, shouldn't we wait..."

"I don't see a need for that," the armory officer growled softly. The feral look was back, and something else besides that Trip in his increasingly disoriented state couldn't quite put his finger on. "Just relax, luv, and let me take care of you."

And Trip did, slumping back against the wall and closing his eyes, letting Malcolm possess him by touch alone. He vaguely heard Archer say something, but couldn't really make out the words through the cascade of sensations pouring through his skin. He must be really wiped out, it felt like Malcolm had hands everywhere...

Through the cotton in his ears Trip vaguely heard a startled outburst from Archer and what might have been an expression of alarm from T'Pol, but he wasn't really too worried about it. Malcolm would deal with whatever was bothering the two of them, or Phlox would - there were monitors in decon, the doctor usually kept a pretty close eye on things. Another outburst from Archer, this one a little more panicky-sounding and maybe a little angry too. Hmm...Trip pried up one eyelid and didn't see anything but Malcolm, whose back was to him, and fog. Putting out a heavy hand, he brushed at a diaphanous white tendril and found it semi-solid and pleasantly warm. The tendril stretched forward and brushed his cheek affectionately with a touch Trip recognized as Malcolm's, and with a smile he let his eye close again; his lover was taking care of things, just like Trip had known he would. The tendril trailed down to his shoulder and started stroking soothingly, as did another that touched his chest, and Trip let himself drift off into happy oblivion with a sigh of pure contentment.

*****

Captain Archer felt like a man caught in a nightmare, his only consolation the fact that they were sealed in decon and whatever it was that had possessed Lieutenant Reed was sealed in here too. Unfortunately, there weren't any weapons in decon or anything that could be used as a weapon, and even if there had been Archer wasn't sure they'd do any good against something made of fog.

Not just fog, though. That was how he'd noticed something was up. He'd seen Reed go over to Trip and start rubbing the blue decon gel into his skin, but Archer hadn't minded at first; Trip had seemed a little out of it when he'd arrived at the shuttlepod and he hadn't really come back to himself yet. But when he'd heard the engineer make a too-pleased sound in response to what Reed was doing he'd been about to order the two men to save it until they were alone...when a semi-transparent white tentacle had extruded itself from the armory officer's body and joined in the rubbing, followed by several more that did the same thing.

Malcolm had turned around when he and T'Pol had yelled, very obviously keeping himself between the two of them and Trip. The look on his face was grave and possessive, almost feral, but not really aggressive. A standoff, then. Archer had been relieved when he'd seen Trip shift slightly behind the armory officer, but to his utter shock the engineer had lifted a hand to pat at one of the fog-tentacles which had promptly snaked back to return the favor. "Trip!"

Malcolm scowled, but again without overt hostility. "He's mine," he said, very matter-of-factly, and pointed at T'Pol. "You have your own."

"I do not belong to Captain Archer," T'Pol stated, her flat tone a match for Malcolm's. "Who or what are you and what are you doing to Commander Tucker?"

"I'm Lieutenant Malcolm Reed, of course," the armory officer said. "My other name would have no meaning for you, and this body couldn't reproduce it anyway. And I'm not hurting Trip, he's just tired from our bonding. He'll be right as rain once he's had some sleep."

"Bonding?" Archer's eyebrows went up. Reed had been scouting ahead of them in the fog down on the planet, but then had showed up at the shuttlepod with Trip in tow not long after he and T'Pol had started warming the engines up for takeoff. And come to think of it, Trip had looked a little shell-shocked when they'd gotten back... "When did you take over Lieutenant Reed?"

Malcolm made a face that was almost disgusted. "I wouldn't do that, it wouldn't be right. We have a symbiotic relationship."

T'Pol interrupted before Archer could comment on that. "Did the lieutenant agree to this joining?"

Now the armory officer's expression turned puzzled, and Archer sighed. "He wouldn't have, but maybe whatever this is didn't realize that." He addressed Malcolm again. "Did you ask before you initiated this...symbiotic relationship?"

Even more puzzlement. "Why?"

"That's what I was afraid of." Archer moved cautiously to the other side of the room and activated the comm panel. "Dr. Phlox, I don't suppose you're watching this, are you?"

"Oh yes," the doctor's voice came back immediately through the speaker. "I am aware of the...problem, Captain, although I'm not certain what if anything can be done about it. Lieutenant, is your symbiot looking for more hosts, or is it attached solely to you?"

Malcolm made another face. "Well of course it's only attached to me, I'd have hardly come back to the ship if it was looking to branch off, now would I? Now can I go back to taking care of Trip or do we need to continue this pointless silliness some more?"

To Archer's surprise, Phlox chuckled. "No, you can return to Mr. Tucker. Is he in need of any help from me?"

"He's just tired," Malcolm repeated, turning back to Trip and going down on one knee beside him. Archer couldn't help but cringe when the rest of the fog-tentacles wrapped the sleeping engineer in their embrace. "He'll need to eat something once we're out of here, though - he skipped breakfast this morning, his blood-sugar is bound to be low."

"I'll have to have a talk with him about that - skipping meals, that is," the doctor responded. "Very well, all of you just try to relax, you've only got another hour of decontamination to go."

Archer found himself staring at the now-silent speaker in shock. "But we can't just..."

"There is really nothing else we can do," T'Pol told him, drawing him over to the nearest bench and then sitting down beside him. "If the creature is truly bonded to the lieutenant, it is no threat to us unless we threaten it." She frowned slightly, though. "I do wonder, however, why it chose to bond with Lieutenant Reed instead of you or I or Commander Tucker, and why no other creatures attempted to bond with us either." Malcolm was ignoring her, though, and she shrugged. "Perhaps it has to do with the connection between he and the commander."

"I don't really care, just so long as we can get it out of here and back where it belongs," Archer told her. "And all we have is its word that it won't try to take over any more people - or that it isn't hurting Trip."

T'Pol cocked her head, watching the armory officer and his symbiot fuss over the sleeping engineer, and then she shrugged again. "It appears to be very protective of him - they both do." There was just a hint of reprimand in her voice, just a hint; she'd informed Archer several times that romantic fraternization on board ship was illogical and could cause inefficiency among the crew, but he and Phlox had overruled her. "And the creature said they had bonded with the commander while on the planet, so it is unlikely that it will harm him now. Were it going to do so, like those Earth insects which eat their mate after joining, I believe it would have done so before returning to the shuttle - nor would it be caring for him now."

"I guess you're right." Archer still didn't like it but had to admit that there really wasn't anything he could do about it right now anyway. He made himself a little more comfortable on the bench and settled in to watch, determined to keep a close eye on the creature in spite of what Phlox and T'Pol seemed to think. But he almost reconsidered when hands and tentacles started stroking Trip's gel-covered skin again, feeling like a voyeur and becoming uncomfortably aware of T'Pol sitting so close on the bench beside him. It was going to be a very long hour.

*****

When Trip woke up - really woke up, not the half-awake state he'd managed in Sickbay after getting out of decon - he realized he was in his own bed curled up with Malcolm, He smiled; this was just the way he liked to wake up, actually. He cuddled up a little more to his lover's comforting heat and tried to remember exactly what had gone on.

His mind filled with fog. Oh, that was right. They'd been down on the planet, the fog had rolled in, Malcolm had surprised him with a spontaneous sexual encounter, and then they'd gone back to the shuttlepod and flown back to Enterprise. Trip didn't remember much of decon except for Malcolm helping him rub the cool blue gel into his skin and hearing the captain getting upset about something, but he wasn't really worried about that. He knew T'Pol didn't like crewmembers fraternizing, and they'd never been able to make her understand that humans couldn't do without that sort of contact on long voyages the way Vulcans could - for one thing, humans didn't only need to mate every seven years. Trip shuddered slightly at the thought.

Malcolm's arms tightened around him, and Trip noticed for the first time that they were skin to skin. His smile widened. "Mornin'. Or is it afternoon?"

"Middle of the night, luv," the armory officer murmured in reply. "You haven't been sleeping that long - although I'll take the implied compliment, if you like."

Trip chuckled. "Everything okay? Heard the captain in decon, seem to remember some yellin' later on, too..."

"Oh, that." Malcolm shrugged, using the movement to pull his lover in closer to his chest so he could nuzzle the soft blond hair. "Just a bit of difficulty with something we picked up down on the planet. Dr. Phlox had a devil of a time getting it to let loose, I'm afraid that was me you heard yelling in Sickbay. Hurt like the very devil, you know."

"Somethin' hurt you?" Trip tried to bolt upright to look at his lover, but Malcolm wouldn't let go of him so he had to be content with tipping his head back so he could scrutinize the other man's face. "Are you okay?"

"Right as rain." It was Malcolm's turn to chuckle. "Our good doctor thinks the symbiot chose me because of my feelings for you, he thinks that must have drawn it to seeing me as an acceptable host. It really wasn't a bad sort of thing, it just didn't realize that it needed to ask before latching on."

Trip didn't relax. "But you're okay, right?"

"I am, I promise." Malcolm pushed Trip's head back down onto his chest and dropped a kiss on his hair. "Apparently it was our...encounter in the woods that wiped you out so thoroughly, because of the creature's involvement, but Phlox said a night's rest and you'd be good as new. I believe he meant the whole night, though, so back to sleep with you. I've set the alarm already."

"Oh good." Trip was already feeling sleep tug at him again, mostly due to his lover's warmth and the strong hand stroking up and down his spine. He kissed Malcolm's chest. "Glad you're okay, sorry I was asleep."

"Not your fault, luv. It was me that left you so knackered in the first place, anyway." Malcolm smiled when Trip murmured something about armory officers with huge egos into his chest and kept up his stroking until he felt the engineer slide back into sleep again. It hadn't been an easy day, for either of them, but he'd been glad he'd been able to make it a bit easier on his lover than it had been for himself. He wouldn't have initiated their woodland encounter if he'd known what effect it would have on Trip, but in a way that had been for the best; it had made it easier for him to keep Trip from waking up fully and witnessing what had happened when Phlox had tried to separate the symbiot from him.

His smile took on a mischeivous tilt. Probably one of the better performances he'd ever given, at that, if Archer's reaction to it had been anything to go by. He twitched out a foggy tentacle and pulled the sheet up higher around his sleeping lover's shoulders. He'd let Trip in on their secret later, until then he'd just be very careful when they made love. More tentacles burrowed under the sheet, exploring every centimeter of Trip's warm skin in an ecstasy of possessive feeling while Malcolm's hands remained tangled in his hair and stroking up and down his back. They had plenty of time. Bonding, after all, was for life.