Disclaimer: Not mine, not making any money.

AN: This story is for volley, a little thank-you for a big favor she did for me. It officially takes place after Season 4, but there isn't a lot of reference to the canon story arc and very little angst.

Betaed by Gabi – thank you!

Enjoy!

Chapter 1

Ever since he was a child, Malcolm Reed valued a predictable existence, and so it was perhaps no wonder that most of the trauma in his life resulted from unpredictable people springing bad news on him.

When he was six years old, his father told him that he'd enrolled him in a weekend swimming class. That had been on Wednesday, and at six years old Malcolm hadn't yet developed a habit of worrying about things that would happen at some distant point in the future. In fact, he hadn't worried about it until Saturday morning when he found himself standing at the edge of a very large and scary pool, with a smiling instructor who told him that half the fun was jumping right in. That had been bad news, all right.

Just like the boat trip when he was twelve. Fishing with his father, watching the sunset, a nice day out, just the two of them. They did all that, too, and Malcolm tried very hard to pretend that they were on a snowmobile, or perhaps a space shuttle. It didn't work so well. Water was generally hard to ignore, especially up close.

At fourteen it had been his English Lit teacher, who gave him a love sonnet to learn and recite the next lesson, because he had "such a nice voice". The next day his allergies had been really bad, and he'd stood in front of the class sneezing and coughing his way through undying declarations of love, putting himself at a zero on the cool scale (where his ratings hadn't been stellar to begin with). And Jamie Hall had been watching, too. Bad news, all in all.

Another unwelcome surprise had come when he'd received his schedule at Starfleet Training Camp and discovered that swimming was a compulsory exercise for Security trainees. He'd somehow survived the lessons, even gotten a passable grade. It had been bad news, though.

Strange, how often these incidents seemed to involve swimming pools. He knew, of course, that pools – all large bodies of water for that matter – were bad news, but it did seem to be a recurring pattern in his life. Whenever he was relaxed and fairly unsuspecting, the universe decided that it was time for another swimming pool in Malcolm Reed's life. Or lake. Or river. Or... well, sometimes it seemed content just to throw a puddle of rain his way. But there would be water, and there would be a lot of it. That was just how it was.

He'd thought that it might be different once he was out in space. Not much water out there, and if there was, it usually appeared in a consistency that didn't bother him. Like ice, for example. He didn't mind ice. He'd been happy enough to join the away team that went to the ice comet; hell, he'd even built a snowman. They hadn't visited many water planets, thank God, and the only water he encountered on Enterprise either came out of his shower or out of the drinks dispenser. He'd assumed that he was safe enough out here.

That, of course, had been his mistake.

"Hey Malcolm, wait up!"

Malcolm turned around. There was Trip, grinning like a happy hamster and struggling with two heavy bags and a backpack which he tried to keep from slipping down his shoulder. He'd acquired a deep tan over the last fortnight, and was wearing one of his Hawaiian prints to go with the holiday look; snorkelers and coral reefs, if Malcolm wasn't completely mistaken. The shirt's bright colors clashed rather dramatically with its owner's sunburnt nose. All in all, he looked like Trip Tucker usually did after two weeks of home leave.

"You need help with these?" Malcolm asked, nodding at the bags. He himself only had a small duffel which he carried over his shoulder.

"Sure, thanks." Trip handed him the smaller of the two bags, and Malcolm, who hadn't expected it to be quite so heavy, nearly lost his grip on the handle.

"What's in there, your brick collection?"

"Just some tools I picked up," Trip said rather mysteriously, and Malcolm decided not to press the subject.

"Did you have a good time?" he asked instead, although he knew the answer. Trip always had a good time; it was his default condition on shore leave.

"Yeah," Trip smiled. "My brother's got this new boat..."

He launched into a detailed description of a day out on the lake, and Malcolm thought that it sounded quite pleasant. Boats and lakes were fine, as long as it was someone else using them.

They walked rather slowly because of the heavy bags, and it took them almost ten minutes until they'd arrived at Trip's quarters. By the time, Trip was describing his niece's performance as Maid Marian in her school's drama group, and Malcolm changed his earlier assessment. Trip hadn't only had a good time, he'd had a great time. Considering the events of the past few months, Malcolm was glad to see the Chief Engineer in such good spirits.

"So how was your conference?" Trip asked, and his backpack slid down again as he reached for the button to open his door.

"It was very interesting," Malcolm replied, catching the backpack and hoisting it back onto Trip's shoulder. "Commander Donaldson presented a new kind of phase-modulated weapon, which made quite a splash at R&D. He asked me if I'd like to have a look at the schematics some time."

"That's great, Mal!" Trip seemed honestly pleased by the news, and Malcolm allowed himself a proud smile. Being invited to contribute to Donaldon's project was quite an honor, and he'd been thrilled by the Commander's request.

"Have you told the Cap'n yet?"

"Yes, I informed him that I'll do the research in my spare time so it won't interfere with my duties aboard."

Trip shook his head dismissively. "I don't think he'd see it as a problem."

Archer hadn't; in fact, he'd congratulated Malcolm and asked if he could have a look at the schematics himself. Malcolm had been embarrassed by the overt praise, and secretly pleased at the same time. All in all, it was turning out to be a rather good day; a rather good week, in fact.

In retrospect, he should've expected trouble to hit home. Except that he hadn't. He never did.

Trip began to take clothes out of his bags and stack them in a rather sloppy heap on his bed. "Seems like we're gonna stay in dry dock for another week or two, anyway."

Something about his tone told Malcolm that Trip had more news to share than the great time he'd spent with his family, and that all this time he'd been bursting to bring it up.

"Oh?" he asked.

Trip turned around and smiled, holding something up for Malcolm to inspect. It took him a moment to recognize what it was: two pairs of swimming trunks, as garishly printed as Trip's collection of shirts.

"Which one do you like better, the pineapples or the submarines?"

"Which one do I like?" Malcolm repeated cautiously. "Are they for me?"

Trip nodded. "I figured you might not have any, and you're gonna need them."

"Need them?" Malcolm realized that he sounded stupid, repeating Trip's words like that, but he couldn't for the life of him see where this was going. Except that he didn't like it one bit.

"Yeah." Trip smiled, as happy as Malcolm had seen him in a long time. "The Cap'n's been keeping it a secret for the last few months. He didn't want anyone to be disappointed if Command refused his request."

"What request?" But by then he already knew, of course. It was surprising, actually, that it should have taken the universe that long.

"To have a swimming pool installed. They're just now bringing the equipment aboard."

TBC...

Poor Malcolm, he doesn't get a break, does he? Please leave a review and let me know what you think of this so far!