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TJ crammed two fingers deep into his mouth and gnawed while he wandered Moya's command deck. Every once in a while, the toddler looked back at his mother and whimpered.
Aeryn sighed. "I can't make it better, TJ," she told her son. "You just have to wait until the rest of those teeth are through. It will stop hurting then."
Although the baby seemed perfectly healthy at a cycle and a half of age, Aeryn, John and Jool all worried about his unique Human/Sebacean/Pilot genetic heritage, and thought it was safer to avoid medication unless necessary.
"You could try some ice," Rygel advised, looking up from the missives from Hyneria that he was studying. "That seemed to help last time he was teething."
Bless you Rygel, Aeryn thought, but didn't say. Her brain wasn't working well. She'd been up the last several nights with the baby – Wouldn't you know he'd cut his frelling molars while John was away? – and she'd forgotten there *was* something she could do to ease his pain. What she did say was, "Keep an eye on the readouts, then, right?"
"Yes," the Hynerian said, keeping things as simple as she did.
"Come on, TJ," Aeryn said, picking him up and kissing the top of his head. "Let's go to the galley and find you something cold to chew on, okay? Maybe that will make your teeth feel better."
She was rewarded with a smile from him. "Chew," he said, the word barely understandable around the finger he was twisting in his mouth. "Teef."
Aeryn smiled and settled him on her hip. She moved off as briskly as if she were making rounds or starting a 2-day march.
But before they got halfway to the galley, two competing voices came over the comms.
"There's something happening just off our course," growled Rygel, and Chiana yelled, "There's a ship! Someone needs help!"
"Rygel, you first!" Aeryn commanded, all thoughts of the galley and ice forgotten. "What do you see?"
"Pilot says it's a wormhole," Rygel reported from command.
Frell. "Chiana? Do you know something specific?"
"No," the Nebari reported promptly. "I just saw a ship coming out of some disturbance in space. I guess it could be a wormhole. But they were in trouble."
Pilot spoke up directly. "There *is* a ship emerging from the wormhole," he said. "It appears to be having difficulty with its propulsion unit."
"Scarran? Pathfinder?" Aeryn asked.
"Unknown configuration," Pilot responded. "But it is small, no larger than a prowler. And I detect no weapons."
Aeryn made the decision then. "Deploy the docking web, Pilot! Chiana, Jool, meet me in the docking bay!" She slid TJ from her hip to the front of her, and he put his head on her shoulder and his arms around her neck so she could run, left hand holding him close, right hand with her pulse pistol drawn, ready to fire.
Just outside the docking bay, she stopped to open the door to a small bolthole. She set her weapon on the floor and pried her son from around her neck. "Okay, TJ, time to play hide," she told him, setting him down. "You wait here and be very quiet. Mama will be back soon."
The child reached his hands for her and screwed up his face as if he was going to cry, but when Aeryn whispered, "You be brave, all right? I need you to be brave for a little while," he stuck his fingers back into his mouth and settled on the floor, picking up a soft toy that was part of the room's provisions.
Aeryn heaved a sigh of relief, closed the door, snatched up her pulse pistol, and charged into the docking bay just as the docking web lowered the alien ship to the floor. The propulsion unit, whatever it was, did sound like it was malfunctioning. It was rough and full of hesitation. The pilots seemed to have some sense, though, because they shut it down once they were on the floor of the docking bay.
With the propulsion shut down, Aeryn walked closer to the ship. The closer she got to it, the more unhappy she got – because she could swear the frelling thing was from Earth!
* * * * * * *
It didn't exactly look like John's module, but it wasn't that different, either. It had that same aerodynamic shape, as if designed primarily for flying in an atmosphere, the same flat dark underside, the smooth, white upper portion. . . . Judging by the windows and the hatches, it carried at least a two-man crew, seated side by side. Aeryn couldn't read the markings on the nose, but she recognized the letters, and the IASA symbol.
Aeryn's first thought was that it was frelling inconvenient for an Earth ship to pop in when John was off with D'Argo. He could have reassured the pilots, who were likely to be frightened and therefore likely to do something stupid. Her second thought was that he would be thrilled to meet them, the first humans he'd seen in five cycles. . . . She didn't let her thoughts go further than that.
She stood in the shadows and held her pulse pistol steady as the hatches popped and two figures in very familiar orange jumpsuits climbed out of the cockpit and jumped to the deck. They apparently hadn't noticed her yet, as one ducked under the ship to join the other. Aeryn waited, observing them while they made a quick check of their craft and began to look around.
One of them, shorter than John and with brilliant red hair, caught sight of her, and his eyes widened. She imagined she was quite a sight, in her leathers and her ponytail, pointing a weapon at them. Even John had recognized a pulse pistol as a weapon the first time he saw one. The man with the red hair hit his fellow pilot on the arm, and the other man whirled around.
It was a toss-up who was more surprised, the gray-haired man who found himself looking down the wrong end of a gun, or Aeryn, who found herself looking into the distinctive features of John's father, Jack Crichton.
"Frell!" she whispered, her blood turning to ice water. She was suddenly very afraid that something had happened to John. Someone had captured him, pulled the image of his father from his mind, sent these people here to capture her, or TJ, or even Rygel, whom they were trying to help regain his throne. Or maybe it was the Ancients again. The Ancients *always* meant trouble for John, and for her. She took a deep breath, set her jaw, and tightened her grip on her weapon.
At that moment, Chiana and Jool came skidding in. They responded to Aeryn's stance first and aimed the weapons they had been carrying, then actually looked at their guests.
The two men exchanged nervous glances as they now found themselves facing three weapons instead of just one. They held their hands out in front of them, and the older man said, "We come in peace. We don't mean any harm."
Aeryn stared at them, trying to decide what to do.
The two men looked at each other again and started to edge forward.
"Don't move!" announced Jool, waving her gun at them.
The pilots spoke to each other in low tones. "Did you understand that?" the younger pilot said to his companion.
"I'd say the meaning was clear enough," the one who wore Jack Crichton's face replied. He spoke up again. "Look, we're kinda lost here. I'm Jack," he said, touching his chest. Then he pointed to his companion and continued, "This is Ron, and. . . and you have no idea what I'm saying, do you?"
Aeryn was still lost in thought, and Chiana, with an annoyed glance at her, answered, "Of course we can understand you, you frellnik! Honestly, Aeryn, can we just lock them up or something?"
Aeryn finally shook herself out of the spell caused by the face and the voice. Still, she ignored her shipmates and addressed the men in front of her. "Do you understand me?"
Before anyone could answer, a sharp wail came from outside the docking bay. "Is TJ in the hole?" Chiana asked.
Aeryn nodded and said, "He'll be fine."
The two men looked puzzled by the sound, which grew steadily louder.
"Aeryn," Jool began diffidently, "Don't you think you should go get him? We could lock them up first."
"He's safer where he is," Aeryn snapped.
As the baby's wails grew even louder, Chiana said, "Frell you, Aeryn," and stomped off.
While she was gone, Aeryn continued her interrogation, ascertaining that the two men appeared not to have translator microbes. Apparently they assumed that since they couldn't understand the women, the women couldn't understand them.
The two men had a whispered conversation, easily overheard by Aeryn and Jool.
The younger man said, shaking his head, "I don't know where we are, but I have never seen so much leather and legs!"
Jack grinned slightly and said, "I know what you mean. I keep thinking we've stumbled into 'Cat Women of the Moon.'"
The one called Ron looked at Aeryn and Jool and said, "The dark-haired one is nervous."
"Yeah, but she looks like she could handle a weapon in her sleep. And she seems to be in charge. I don't know what's going on here, but we need to be careful. A nervous opponent is a dangerous opponent," said Jack.
Chiana walked in then with the sobbing toddler, and the two men's eyes went wide again, looking back and forth between the women, trying to figure out which one the child belonged to.
Aeryn refused to let herself look at her son, trying not to give away any information. She snapped, "Chiana, I told you he was safer where he was!"
"He's in pain!" Chiana snapped back, trying to comfort the baby. "He wants his mother."
At the word 'mother,' TJ flung himself towards Aeryn sobbing, "Ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma. . . ."
Chiana was barely able to hang onto him, and Aeryn gave up the fight. "Don't take your guns off them," she said to both Chiana and Jool. She holstered her own weapon and took her son from the Nebari, stepping back a few paces so that her armed shipmates were between her child and the newcomers. Then she turned her attention to TJ, whispering comfort, brushing damp tendrils of dark hair out of his eyes, kissing the top of his head. She gave him a knuckle to chew on, and he settled down quickly and laid his head on her shoulder, sniffling.
Chiana looked smugly satisfied with herself, and Jack Crichton leaned over to his co-pilot and whispered, "Ah. That's what's going on with her. It's mama bear protecting her cub. . . ."
That sounded so much like John that Aeryn almost decided to believe in him. If she closed her eyes and concentrated, she realized she could hear the distinctive cadence of English under the translation provided by the microbes in her brain.
Jool had been waiting patiently, but had finally had enough. "Look, Aeryn, I know you want to be cautious, but why are we standing here pointing weapons at these people? They're obviously not Peacekeepers," she said. "They don't have weapons, they don't even have translator microbes. And their ship looks more like. . . . Frell," she announced, her eyes going wide, as the similarity to Crichton's module hit her.
Chiana finally looked at the men a little more closely. . . . Sebacean-looking, orange flight suit. . .funny blue and white patch. . . . She exchanged a chagrined look with Aeryn. "Human? From Earth?"
Jack and Ron looked alarmed at hearing the words for their species and their planet, unmistakable among the gibberish being spoken by these three apparently alien women.
"If they're real," Aeryn sighed.
"Why wouldn't they be real?" Chi asked.
"That one," Aeryn said, pointing with an accusing finger, "looks exactly like Jack Crichton."
The two humans took a step backwards, a look of serious alarm crossing Jack's face.
"Crichton's father? Are you sure?" Chiana asked
"Yes." Aeryn's face was stone cold, even as she continued to rock and soothe the baby.
Chiana winced, remembering Aeryn's tales of the times she had met an alien wearing the face of Jack Crichton. But she decided it was time to cut the tension in the room. "Aeryn," she said, "I understand why you're worried. But we're scaring the Hezmana out of the humans, which kinda makes it seem like they're real."
Aeryn took a deep breath and shifted TJ in her arms. Well, it was either shoot them, lock them up, or provisionally trust them. Chiana was right. The two humans seemed nearly as bewildered as John had been when she'd first met him.
She made the decision and nodded. "All right. We'll trust them, for now. We need to find out how they got here, and why."
Holstering her weapon, Jool called out, "Pilot, could you please send a DRD down here with translator microbes for two."
The humans flinched as Pilot's disembodied voice replied, "It is already on its way, Joolushko."
