Beyond This Life (rated G)

Author: Nerys (ki-nerys@SWBell.net)

Classification: Short Story/character death
Summary: Zhaan and Aeryn have a chat in the maintenance bay
Spoilers: Um, tiny spoilers for 'Rhapsody in Blue' and 'The Flax'
Rating: G
Feedback: Yes! Most emphatically, yes!
Flames: Smoke if ya got 'em!
Archive: To anyone who sees fit. Please keep all headers attached and if you could notify me and send a URL along, that'd be great.
Disclaimer: Farscape is owned by Hallmark, Number 9 Australia, Henson Television, yadda, yadda. I own nothing and dream about a great deal.
Author's Note: This is what happens when I can't sleep. It's a bit depressing, sorry!

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"Aeryn? Aeryn?"

"What, Zhaan?" Aeryn asked with no small amount of irritation as she pulled the hech drive interface out of Crichton's module.

"I merely wondered if you had planned on eating. Chiana's made some--"

"No, thank you. I'm not hungry."

Zhaan's brow furrowed in concern for a moment as she watched Aeryn. "By my calculations, this makes three days since you've eaten. Do you plan on starving yourself then?"

"Hardly. I ate earlier. Crackers," Aeryn replied shortly. She pulled herself out of the Farscape's @#%$pit and ran a hand down its pale side. "Piece of dren," she whispered with a faint, longing smile on her face.

Zhaan joined her, placing her hand on the small module as well. She too smiled, though it was a sad one. "Why do you trouble yourself, Aeryn? With the module?"

"Because it helps," Aeryn replied. "It keeps me close to him."

"Yes, I suppose I can understand that," Zhaan replied. "And I think it would please him. Though I doubt starving yourself would."

Aeryn gritted her teeth and sighed in irritation. "I am fine, Zhaan. Just fine. When I am thirsty, I'll drink. When I'm hungry, I'll eat. At the moment, I'm neither."

"Aeryn, that is hardly--"

"Zhaan, please. Please. I'm fine. Just let me be."

"What is it that you're afraid of Aeryn?" Zhaan asked as she sat down on the floor of the maintenance bay, with her back to the Farscape.

Aeryn set the interface console down gently and stepped over it, going to one of the tables to grab a set of tools. She returned to the console and sat down in front of it, a stone's throw from Zhaan. "Nothing."

"You are not alone in this, Aeryn," Zhaan said to her. "We need each other at moments like this."

"No," Aeryn replied as she tested the power on the console. "I don't need anything, anyone right now. Except to be left alone, that's all I need."

"You don't know what it is that you need, Aeryn," Zhaan replied gently. "Have you ever had to deal with loss such as this?"

"I am acquainted with loss," Aeryn replied brusquely.

"Like this?" Zhaan persisted.

"Frell, Zhaan!" Aeryn snapped. "What is that you want from me? Do you want to know that food has no taste? That I can't sleep? That I wander every inch of Moya searching for something that just isn't there? Is that what you want to hear?"

"I only want to help, Aeryn," Zhaan replied gently.

"Thank you, but you can't help me."

"He'll always be with you, Aeryn. You know that."

Aeryn was still for a moment and then she threw the small tool she'd been holding across the maintenance bay viciously. "What frelling good does that do me, Zhaan? Does it mean that I can talk with him? That I can touch or see him? No, it means nothing to me, nothing! I have no sense of spirituality that you do. All I know is that Crichton is dead and I am left here," she closed her eyes, "aching, burning, reeling. And worse, filled with an emptiness that I cannot explain or fathom. The whole center of me has been ripped away, Zhaan," Aeryn said. "Ripped away and now there is nothing."

"That's not true, Aeryn," Zhaan replied softly. "You have us, Pilot, Moya. As I said you are not alone in this. And you have memory, Aeryn. Nothing can take that from you. Every moment with Crichton is there for you as well. Draw from that."

"I can't," Aeryn whispered harshly as she brushed an errant tear from her cheek. "I can't because remembering only makes it worse. So much worse. Every moment he made me smile, every moment that-that we touched, every conversation, every look, everything…it blinds me, Zhaan. Blinds and burns. I don't want to remember. Right now, I don't want to remember a thing."

"And yet, you're here," Zhaan replied, "working on John's module. You don't want to forget, Aeryn. You just don't wish it to continue to hurt."

"Of course I don't want it to hurt," Aeryn replied.

"Do you think forgetting would make it easier?" Zhaan asked. "Because I could do that for you."

"What?"

"Yes," Zhaan replied, remembering what she had learned from Tahleen. "I could do that. I could take John from your memory, from your thoughts and your heart. And then, then there would be no more pain. Is that what you wish? It's a simple enough thing to do."

"You could do that?" Aeryn asked, sliding closer to Zhaan. "You could take it all away?"

"Yes."

Aeryn looked up at the Farscape for a moment, biting her bottom lip. "Then do it."

"As you wish," Zhaan replied. She moved forward and reached a hand out to Aeryn's head, only to have the former Peacekeeper take it and push it away. "I suppose it is not required to touch you if that is your wish."

Aeryn stared at Zhaan for a moment, saying nothing. Then her face crumpled and she uttered a low, harsh cry. She bent double, her body racked with sobs. "No," she said. "Leave it."

Zhaan bent over Aeryn, holding her gently. "It gets easier."

Aeryn clung to Zhaan, certain that she'd be consumed by this misery. "I don't believe that. I don't believe that it can ever get any easier. Not when all I want is one more moment that I cannot have. If I only could have told him, Zhaan. There was so much, so frelling much that I should have told him."

"Aeryn," Zhaan said gently, "he knew. Crichton was many things, but he was no fool. He knew."

With a wordless cry Aeryn surged to her feet. She kicked the interface console soundly, sending it skittering across the floor of the maintenance bay. "I wish I had known! I wish he would have told me so that I might have understood before it was too late! Before he was gone and I was left here so empty…so frelling empty!"

"It was not his way to force anything on you, or anyone," Zhaan said as she stood. She put a hand on Aeryn's shoulder. "He wanted you to come to understanding in your own time, in your own way. Don't fault yourself, or him, for that, Aeryn. You cannot change the past and wishing that you could will only make this worse. You have memories, Aeryn. That's so much more than some people will ever have. And, in time, they won't cause you so much pain. In fact, you may find yourself glad to recall them."

Aeryn drew in several deep breaths, attempting to quell her sobs. "I want him back, Zhaan. That is all I really wish for. I want John back here, with me, with us."

"So do I, Aeryn. So do I. But we cannot have it. Not now, not in this life. We must trust that the goddess will be kind and that in another life, in another time, we may get what we want. For now, we are left with this one. We have each other, Aeryn and we have our memories. It may not seem like much, but it will get us through. It can get us through. And some day, long from now, you might just wake in a new life and find him there."

"I don't believe that there is anything beyond this existence," Aeryn replied morosely.

"Then it is time that you did. What did John believe?" Zhaan asked.

Aeryn trembled slightly. "He-he believed that when you die there is a light. That inside of it you find those that went before you. Family, friends. And that you can be with them there, for all time."

"And is this not something to cling to, Aeryn?" Zhaan asked gently. "Is that not a good hope?"

"I'm not human," Aeryn replied. "Who is to say what I will find? Perhaps it is as my people believe for me. Perhaps we believe that there is nothing after life because for a Sebacean there is nothing."

Zhaan shook her head. "So stubborn. By the goddess, must you be so stubborn, Aeryn? What does it matter what breed you are? Do you think that after death our composition matters in the spiritual realm? That there is a separate afterlife for each race in existence?"

"I am not trained in such matters," Aeryn replied softly. "I don't know what to believe."

"Then believe in what you know. Believe that your love for John is strong enough that there is no amount of death that can separate you forever. You can believe that, can't you?"

"No," Aeryn said, "but, I can try."

"Then that, Aeryn, is a start," Zhaan said. She took Aeryn's hand and led her out of the maintenance bay. "And food is a start. Chiana is as heartbroken as you, dear, though for different reasons perhaps. As are we all. We all loved him, Aeryn. But, if you don't eat the poor girl's soup, she may fall to weeping again and I'm not certain that I have enough strength for more tears today."

Aeryn managed a smile. "Now that I don't believe, Zhaan. But, I'll eat Chiana's frelling soup. And then I want to come back here. There's no reason for that console to not work. I may have to replace it all together."

Zhaan inclined her head. "Then we'll all do it, Aeryn. We'll do it together. We might even find a use for Rygel in this instance."

"Now, don't go telling me that you're going to have Rygel underfoot or I may just go back in there and hide," Aeryn replied with a weak grin. "Zhaan?"

"Yes?" the Delvian asked.

"Thank you."

Zhaan smiled sadly. "There is nothing to thank me for, dear. I needed to talk as much as you did. Though I said little perhaps. You stay with John's module because that makes you feel closer to him. Being with you does the same for me. I look at you and I see him in your eyes. Like he's something you wear, somehow."

Aeryn rubbed her eyes as more tears threatened to spill forth. She could say nothing for a moment and only nodded. As they continued down the corridors of Moya, both of them looked at each darkened intersection, looking, hoping for something, someone, that was no longer there.

End