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Summary: Aeryn decides that Harvey has to go, and finds that the illusion of distance is the same as distance, and that distance has consequences.
Rating: PG-13 (for language)
Spoilers: This takes place in the future, roughly one cycle after the events of Fractures. Specific spoilers for Infinite Possibilities and Different Destinations, but general knowledge of everything up to and including Fractures is assumed.
Disclaimer: The characters and universe of Farscape do not belong to me, and I make no profit by my temporary use of them.
_______
"I am part of you, John!"
"I know, and I'm sick of it!"
- Infinite Possibilities
"Of course you don't understand. You live in the country, but you do not speak the language."
- Revenging Angel
_______
Aeryn Sun had held her position for five arns. With nothing else to do, she fell back on her training. Stand at her post, guard against possible dangers. Not that there was much danger here -- not from the outside, anyway. The Delvian retreat was well-hidden, peaceful. But she'd seen too much in the past four cycles to take peace for granted ever again, and lost too much to be lax in the performance of her duties now.
It had taken a lot to find this place. A Pa'u of this level was a rarity even on the Delvian home world. But she'd managed it. She'd been afraid that they'd be turned away, with the aura of blood and violence that clung to them, the war that these people had closed their doors against. In the half-cycle since the destruction of Scorpius' Command Carrier, events had added a wildness to the Uncharteds, a place she'd been certain couldn't get any more unpredictable. What was it Crichton had said? Like someone had thrown a twister into a Kwee-zen-art. The bizarre words didn't matter, she'd known what he meant. More uncertainty, more chaos, more cruelty in an environment that already had more than enough of all three.
But the problem of the neural clone had intrigued the ancient Priest, and he'd agreed to help with a speed that had made her retrace her steps, reexamine the man and his motives to make sure that it was safe. It had been so long since someone had simply wanted to help. It had reminded her of Crichton, before time and experience and too many betrayals and too much suffering of his own had made him less trusting, less eager to lead with an open hand. He'd changed. Everything had changed. But this -- maybe this was where they would start to change back.
The real danger, she knew, was what was going on behind those doors, where she couldn't go. She wanted to be there, wanted to be there so badly it was an itch in the muscles of her calves, urging her to leave her station, walk through the door to the inner chamber. But that wasn't the place for a soldier. Her only contribution now could be to guard the door while the priest did his work.
Hezmana, how she wished Zhaan were here.
Zhaan would have known the necessity of this, would have been the first to help. Aeryn had known better than to ask D'Argo or Chiana. Jool was useless. Rygel had done what she'd asked and kept Chiana distracted. One of the Nebari's frelling visions and it would have been over. Rygel had wanted to do more, but he lacked the muscle if muscle proved necessary. That left Crais. Across the room, her former captain was resting, his head leaned back against the wall.
She hadn't doubted her course of action, not once, since deciding on it so many monens ago. She hadn't questioned until five arns ago, when she'd seen Crichton's face as he realized what she had done, and what was going to happen. It had been too close, too clear a reminder of the lover she'd lost -- the one she'd thrown away. From a time in her life when such betrayals were not merely understood, but admired.
Her past was cycling in upon itself. A betrayed lover, understanding too late that he was cornered, that she was the instrument. That she was not to be trusted.
Her lover. She'd always been honest with herself, at least. Crichton might not share her bed, but he was more her lover than Velorek had ever been. She was bound to the human in ways that she hadn't even known were possible when she'd whispered Velorek's secrets to her Captain, trading love and life and trust for rank and assignment and the safe familiarity of duty.
Velorek had forgiven her even as he was pulled from her bed, had even admired her audacity. But Crichton -- Crichton was different. Better than anyone, she knew how little Crichton thought of betrayal.
It wasn't a betrayal, she reminded herself. This was what he wanted. She knew his mind on this matter, and so she had to act without his knowledge.
Her lips twisted into a sardonic smile. He'd given her this goal himself, not long after she'd returned to Moya. Find something to live for, he'd said. And so she'd lived.
****
In the first few weekens following her return from Talyn, she never sought Crichton out. They moved around the ship as if in separate worlds, only rarely making contact. And yet, when Crais approached her about beginning work on Crichton's insane scheme, she knew exactly where to find him. In the maintenance bay, working on the Farscape.
As they entered, his head came up from where he was working, and he offered a tenative smile and greeting to the two new arrivals.
"Hey."
His gaze flickered to her, then away, back to Crais, back to safety. They hadn't really looked at each other since her arrival back on board; eye contact, if made, was uncomfortable, fleeting.
"What's up?"
Crais cleared his throat. "We need to find a workable plan. The task will not be an easy one."
Crichton chuckled. "Hell, if it was easy, it wouldn't be interesting."
"Interesting?" She was startled into speech. "You think this is going to be interesting?"
"Well, I wouldn't exactly say it's gonna be dull." Crichton levered himself up and out of the module. In the absence of any real resolution, they'd fallen back on their earliest patterns. She expressed little besides annoyance; he answered her impatience with studied good humor. It was pointless, she thought, but there was nothing else for it.
It wasn't exactly where they'd started, though -- the old patterns were masks they wore, and they both knew it. She hadn't realized how much he concealed behind his smile and laughter, not until now, when she was faced with the familiar flippancy that deflected everything, that gave nothing to push against, even had she been inclined to push. It was in the loss of things that she recognized their presence. The unguarded depths she'd seen on Talyn were no longer open to her.
No, she thought, readjusting her thinking, as she had to do so often. In this man, they'd never been open to her. She had seen them, but he had never allowed her to see. She knew things about him that he had never felt comfortable enough to tell her. It made her feel like an eavesdropper, a spy.
"I am forced to admit," Crais said, speaking into the tension, "I have been unable to think of a way to get onto the Command Carrier. Approaching a ship in space is far different than approaching a gammak base. Every prowler is accounted for."
"Right. Which is why we don't approach them. We let them approach us." Crichton took a deep breath. "I have an idea -- well, it's not really my idea, I stole it from Obi-Wan Kenobi, but it might work. But we're going to need a ship. Preferably a Peacekeeper ship."
"My prowler is long gone."
"Wouldn't have worked anyway," Crichton shook his head. "We need something bigger. Something I can hide in and escape detection."
Aeryn understood his plan immediately, saw the flaw. "Even if we were able to hide ourselves, mask our life signs, they'd never bring a derelict ship on board." He had spoken only of himself; she had deliberately made it into a collective; neither of them pointed that out.
"Aeryn is right," Crais said. "Peacekeeper Command initiatives would require that the ship be destroyed. They would not break that protocol."
"Not normally. But what if we put a really juicy worm on the hook? Say, another ship in the area, one that Scorpius was particularly interested in?"
Understanding settled heavily, with a nauseating lurch. "The Farscape. You're going to use your module."
Crais frowned, and she knew that her shock baffled her former Captain. To his mind, no doubt, it made sense. The little ship seemed to serve no real purpose except to keep Crichton busy during quiet arns -- to use it as bait would be to finally put it to some real use.
"Yeah." Crichton looked away, covering the magnitude of his suggestion with a rush of words. "We find a second-hand PK ship somewhere. We fry up the control systems on the Farscape, give her some carbon scoring, or whatever you call it out here, make it look like she was shot up in battle. Make it look like whoever was in the Farscape -- me, who else? -- tangled with the Peacekeepers and had to punch out. And something beat up the ship, killed the crew. Knowing what he knows, he'll think Talyn. But the data stores on the wrecked ship are the only think to tell Scorpy what happened, so if he wants the details, he has to bring it on board. He'll go for it."
"But your module-"
"That's the cherry on top. We load her up with explosives. Rig her to go off -- in a big way. If I can't find and destroy the data, I can still trigger the Farscape to blow and take the command carrier with her. If I do manage to wipe the data, she's my ticket off the boat."
Even as he pretended nonchalance, he spoke of the module as a living being. Did he think she didn't notice? That she didn't know what the Farscape meant to him? After nearly four cycles in the Uncharted Territories, three cycles after he'd finally bowed to necessity and armed himself, he still stubbornly refused to add even the most rudimentary weaponry to his module. The Farscape was a scientific vessel. More than a ship, it was everything he once was. Everything he wanted to be. His last tie to home. And now he was going to make it into a bomb. A bomb that would kill thousands.
"That's insane. Your module-"
"Given the goal here, my module is expendable."
She didn't ask whether or not he thought *he* was; she'd long since learned not to ask questions that she didn't want to know the answer to. "You aren't going to go alone, you know that."
"It's the best way."
"Aeryn is correct." Crais was forever agreeing with her. "You would surely be recognized."
"And what about the two of you? For God's sake, Crais, you used to *command* the damn ship. You really think no one's going to recognize you? And Aeryn, you served on that ship for how long?"
"And your face has been adorning wanted beacons all over the Uncharted Territories for the past three cycles," she said. "You're hardly inconspicious yourself."
"But I'll be out of context. They're looking for me on commerce planets, looking like a renegade. They won't expect to see me on their command carrier. I'll go in as a tech, keep my head down. You know how often officers look at techs. If they notice me at all, they'll just think I look vaguely familiar. The only thing I have to worry about is Scorpius seeing me, or Braca. Scorpy would pick up my energy sig even if he didn't see my face -- but that's true no matter how many people go, and I'm still the one with the best chance of getting in and out unrecognized. And hiding one person on a derelict ship is a hell of a lot easier than hiding two, or three. Like it or not, this is the best way."
"And how do you expect to find your way around that command carrier? You need us to guide you."
"No, Crais, I don't." Crichton sighed. "Look, I know it's the elephant in the living room no one likes to talk about, but I've got my own source of information."
"The neural clone," Aeryn said, and Crais raised an eyebrow as Crichton nodded.
"Right. Harvey can give me all the inside information I need, and a lot more quickly and quietly than either of you can. And he can keep me one step ahead of Scorpius."
"Do you really think that the neural clone will help you?" Crais was astounded. "You know what that thing is-"
"Yes, and I know what he's done. But I also know that the person he hates most in the universe isn't me. Scorpy made a huge mistake. When the chip had done its job, Harvey was supposed to get a ticket out of my head. Instead, Scorpy not only broke his promise, but cut him off at the knees. Harvey wants two things. He wants to live, which means keeping me alive, and he wants Scorpius to lose -- and know why he lost." He smiled. "Harvey's big on the whole revenge thing."
Crais spoke grimly, mercilessly. "The neural clone killed Aeryn."
"I know." Old pain cut through Crichton's eyes, but he didn't falter. "But then he had the chip to back him up. He still had his eyes on the prize -- getting out. Now he's dependent on my survival, and he knows it."
Aeryn felt the sting of tears, all too familiar in the past few monens, but didn't let them fall. She hadn't let tears fall since Valldon. "I've seen that... thing. On Dam-Ba-Da, it tried to trick me into killing John-"
"Because he was threatened. Believe me, if I'd been in the same position, I'd've done the same thing, and tried to get Harvey out. But that's what made it a fight to the death. He didn't try to kill until... until John tried to kill him. Harvey -- my Harvey -- has accepted coexistence. And that's what I've gotta do. For the good of this mission."
"Fine," she said. "But after this is over, we will find a way to remove it."
"No," Crichton said, bringing her head up sharply. "Harvey stays."
"You're not serious. I saw his face -- your face -- when he was free of the clone. I know what it meant to him. And you're going to give that up? Even the possibility of it?"
"Aeryn..." he struggled with the words, then sighed. "Why would Harvey help me, if he knew I was just going to have him killed when it was all over? I have to give him something, and this is it." He hesitated for a moment, then pushed on. "Don't you see? It isn't enough just to have a cause worth dying for. If that's all it is, you might as well do it with a pulse pistol and get it over with. We all need to find something worth living for, or else there's no chance."
She straightened. "Don't change the subject. You're not going alone."
He rubbed a hand over his face, a familiar gesture. He was tired. "Trust me, you're not going to like the other option any better."
"Which is?"
"That you guys hide in the PK ship, and I stay in my module."
"You..." Crais hesitated, taking in Crichton's meaning. "You would allow yourself to be captured by Scorpius."
"And keep him busy. He'd be so jazzed about getting me back that you two could move around more freely."
"While you were in his Aurora Chair. Or worse," she said. She didn't like to think of what might be worse than the Aurora Chair, knew that he didn't, either.
"Right. Which is why I'd really rather stick with the original plan. Besides, if he had me, that'd pretty much eliminate his reason for bringing the PK ship on board. He'd just blow it up, and the two of you with it. And then we'd all be screwed."
"If something goes wrong-"
"If it goes wrong, I'm dead. Look, I figure that either this is going to work, or it's not. And if it's not, two more people won't make a difference against a command carrier full of peacekeepers. They'll just be two more dead people."
Just as they had since her return, he spoke around it. Spoke of two people joining him, as if either of them was really thinking about Crais. But including Crais made it safe, preserved the illusion that it wasn't really about the two of them.
He sighed. "Look. I need you for the planning and the setup. I can't do this without you. No way I can do this without you. But when it comes to getting on the ship... I've got to do this alone. Alone or not at all. And not at all isn't an option."
"It's suicide."
"No, it's not, and that's the point."
He looked at her then, really looked at her, for the first time in weekens, and it was as if Crais had vanished.
"I might die, but it's not part of my plan. This isn't a suicide mission, and I don't want anyone along who thinks it is. Living or dying -- that's your choice to make. But I'm not gonna make it for you, and I'm sure as hell not gonna make it easy for you." Then he smiled. "Aeryn, I don't want to die. I'm not *ready* to die. I've got too much that I want to do, too many things that are fucked up in my life that I want to set straight. If I die now, I'm not going quietly, or gracefully -- there's going to be one pissed-off John Crichton stomping around the afterlife throughout eternity, and I've gotta believe that the powers that be are gonna want to try to avoid that."
Incredible. How could the man smile about this? Or make her want to smile? She didn't, though. "That's foolishness. If you're hoping to live through this, you won't do what's necessary."
"And if all you want to do is die, you'll give up too soon."
****
That had been nearly a cycle ago. She and Crais had tried to devise an alternate plan, but they were limited in their options. Confrontation, or infiltration. And they weren't powerful enough for confrontation. And so when the time came, they'd gone with Crichton's plan, and he'd gone alone. He'd said goodbye to them all -- without actually saying the words, of course -- with a calm voice and eyes that were steady and determined and shielded something else, something that she knew was watching in smug satisfaction as her desire to see it die was denied by the one person who should have agreed with her.
He was dead, she knew it, the moment he left Moya for the Command Carrier. In order to succeed, he would need the clone to do everything he expected it to, and more. And there was no chance of that. The clone would betray him into Scorpius' hands. Crichton had made provisions for his capture, she knew -- Jool knew her medicines, and her poisons. However it played out, whether she was there or not, he would die, and die unpleasantly. At least this time, she wouldn't have to watch.
She'd never believed that in the end, Crichton would remain standing while Scorpius died. So she'd let him go, and waited, numb, for the word. His continued existence was a formality -- when that was gone, she'd be free, finally.
That he'd want to leave them behind when it came time to die -- well, he was Crichton, after all, and that was typical. But this was different. This time, he hadn't wanted her there at all.
After he'd gone, she'd sat in the darkness of her quarters and examined the hurt, prodded it and inspected it with deliberate ruthlessness, needing to understand it. What she'd found surprised her. She'd been closed off to him since the death of the other, refusing even a gesture of intimacy. But to find suddenly, unexpectedly, that it worked both ways -- she hadn't been prepared for that. It was the first time he'd ever refused her that, the right to fight by his side.
No, not the first time. Memory came with the chilling cries that still followed her into sleep on the hardest nights. Cries that could have been her own voice from the ledge, screaming his name, begging for something -- recognition, mercy, reprieve? Perhaps simply begging for *him*. His presence, his borrowed warmth. The assurance that all the demons that threatened could be kept at bay by a single determined spark of hope. The first time had been what seemed a lifetime ago. When there had been fire and madness and Veneks at the gate, howling for blood, and the walking dead who looked at them with frightened, trusting eyes and asked for nothing more or less than to be allowed to live. It had been an illusion, she knew, that they could somehow preserve lives that had been over hundreds of cycles before either of them had been born. But they'd been caught up in that illusion and had stopped listening to each other, and he'd taken her anger and turned away and tried to do it alone.
They'd gotten past that, though...
She was too honest to coddle herself. She had, and the Crichton on Talyn had. They'd turned back to each other and began listening again. Listened so hard that, for a time, they'd been able to block out every other sound, even the sibilant whispers of guilt that came in the shadowy place between sleeping and waking. But this one... this one had been left behind, with recriminations still lingering and reconciliations half-complete. He'd been left behind and when she'd returned, she'd been as cold and dead as the nurses who'd screamed his name as they died 500 cycles before. And so he'd taken her anger and turned away and was, again, trying to do it alone.
It was as she became aware of the true depth of their estrangement that she realized how much she still relied on their connection, depended on him to be open to her when she was ready. Which meant, she realized with mingled dread and liberation, that somewhere within her bruised and damaged heart, she expected, someday, to be ready.
She'd thought of him as already dead, but perversely, he hadn't died, and as he'd stepped out of the Farscape, dirty, bloody, triumphant, she'd felt the certainty of his loss relax its grip. He had greeted them all, even Crais, with a fierce embrace, and his voice had been weary and proud. "We did it. Unbefrellinglievable, but we did it." How typical, she had thought, for Crichton to include them all in his victory.
Scorpius was finally dead -- Crichton had made certain of it this time -- his insane pursuit dead with him. Crichton had survived Scorpius. And if he had survived this, perhaps his death wasn't inevitable after all.
But even as she'd wanted to return his exuberant embrace, curl into his arms and forget about the others who surrounded them, she couldn't, because they weren't alone. Even if all the others left, they still wouldn't be alone.
The dying taunts of the neural clone on Dam-Ba-Da had dragged into the light something that she couldn't ignore. The shade was there, behind his eyes, watching everything. Sharing everything. And laughing. If Crichton ever knew -- if she asked him to choose between her and the clone -- as soon as he'd made the choice in his mind, the clone would be his enemy. And this time, the Ancients were dead, or gone, or indifferent. Crichton would die again, and this time she would have to kill his body. If she had to do that, she knew, there would never be a "ready" for her, never again.
She'd found her goal then. This was something well worth taking one breath after another. He did want this, she was sure. "Why would Harvey help me," he had said, "if he knew I was just going to have him killed when it was all over?" and she'd seized on the words. Not "If I was," but "If he knew I was." Crichton had been trying to tell her. Tell her without saying the words. Without even thinking them, because for him, there was no such thing as privacy.
So she'd pulled back, and ignored the hurt on his face, and maintained the pretense that nothing had changed, maintained the distance between them. Only now she had known that it was pretense, and that the distance between them was an illusion.
In the half cycle since the command carrier, she had learned that it was possible to be someone's lover without his ever knowing. The indifference she had clung to lasted only so long against the physical reality of him, the sight of him every day, the reaction of her body and heart whenever she came upon him unexpectedly, without time to prepare her careful defenses. He was no longer a ghost to her, but a living, breathing presence.
She could put her body between him and the myriad dangers he insisted on encountering, protecting him and keeping him safe. She could think of him before sleep claimed her at night, find him in her thoughts when she opened her eyes in the morning. She could put his safety and well-being and regard above all others. She could put him on the other side of a door, and watch him from the doorway. But she could never let him know -- otherwise he'd throw the door open and pull her inside. That or lock the door entirely, denying her even that stolen closeness. So she'd kept silent, not letting him know that she was there, but always watching.
The doors swung open, and she shifted immediately to attention. Across the room, Crais climbed to his feet.
The ancient Delvian stopped in front of her, gazed at her for a long moment with an impenetrable stare. She paid no attention to his four disciples, who left the room silently, not even glancing in her direction.
"Well?" she asked, "is it done?"
Xifer sighed wearily. "It is done. As you asked."
She nodded, felt the relief sweep through her. "The clone is gone? And Crichton?"
"He... fought most tenaciously. Crichton will need time to recover."
"He's strong." She prayed that she was right.
"He has had to be." Regret weighed the Delvian's voice. "There have been so many unwanted visitors in his mind."
"But he will recover."
The old man's eyes were sad. "He will."
"Your services are greatly appreciated," Crais said.
At the old priest's fleeting frown, Aeryn knew Crais had said the wrong thing, moved quickly to repair the damage. "We thank you for your help and generosity."
Xifer nodded graciously. "You were correct, child, in what you chose to do. The specter was an unnatural thing, an abomination, and needed to be eliminated. His mind is his own now, as is right."
She took a deep breath. "Can we see him?"
The inner chamber was lit by torches set in golden sconces that cast a burnished glow upon the walls. It was very Delvian, Aeryn knew, from her memories of Zhaan, and of Tahleen's enclave on the New Moon of Delvia. But it didn't matter.
The only thing that mattered was the man on the low table in the center of the room. The restraints had been released, and he was sitting with his elbows on his knees, his head in his hands. She wanted him to look up. She wanted to see the joy in his eyes, the same happiness that had graced the same face on Dam-Ba-Da, only arns before he would lose it all.
On the desert planet, she had been reminded who John Crichton was, who he had been before Scorpius, before the chip. When every day wasn't a struggle for sanity, when every thought and experience wasn't spied upon by a greedy and malevolent spirit. She had stood close, her hands moving almost of their own accord, memorizing his face, his form. Aching for them to be alone together, truly alone together for the first time since he set out for the gammak base. To find out what it was like to touch him, have him touch her, and have it be pure.
They'd never had that chance.
Now, however, the way was clear. There had been so many things to get past. Her fear, his hurt. The unbridgeable chasm between their experiences of each other -- she'd already watched him take his shy first steps forward, already heard the words he'd struggle to find. He knew his most spontaneous gesture would seem practiced to her; she knew that each repeated experience would only bring fresh pain at memory of the first time. But this -- this was new. This was a Crichton untainted and undiluted, a man she could discover as he discovered her. And maybe now, a cycle after the other's death, they could each shake off their respective ghosts and make a new beginning.
She needed to see his eyes. "John?" He looked up, and her heart stopped. Stopped, then started again with a nauseating lurch. This is what he meant by rattlers. She was sure of it.
"Why, Aeryn?" His voice was husky, raw, as if he had been screaming. She was sure he hadn't been -- she would have heard it from outside.
"It needed to be done. Surely you didn't want-"
"What I want-" He bowed his head again, waved a hand in her direction. "Forget it."
Behind her, Crais cleared his throat. "Crichton, you cannot be displeased by this."
"Displeased?" Crichton leaned forward, grabbed his coat from the floor where it had been laid carefully before the procedure, yanked it on with brusque motions. "Yeah, you could say I'm *displeased*."
Aeryn didn't flinch. He'd been unprepared, and the experience had no doubt been difficult. He often responded with anger when he was cornered. She could wait out his temper. Crichton was a man of sudden anger, loudly expressed, quickly abated. She knew the pattern. He would yell, then retreat, then forgive, seek forgiveness himself. His anger would fade, and when it did, he would understand. She knew this man.
Crichton slammed Winona into her holster. "I made a decision, Aeryn. And you decided that that wasn't good enough for you. I made a promise. And you made me break it."
"A promise to a neural clone." She could hear the skepticism in her own voice, almost winced. She needed to be calm. Be smart, a voice echoed in her mind, and she nearly smiled. Don't push.
"A promise to Harvey. That he would live."
"You know what it was-"
"Yeah, I know. And I knew it when I made the promise. And I promised anyway. But he'd changed. Was changing." He looked up and at their expressions, his mouth twisted. "Surely the two of *you* aren't going to stand there and tell me that people can't change."
"People?" She raised an eyebrow. "It wasn't a person, John."
His eyes were hard, unforgiving. "You made me into a traitor, Aeryn."
"It was what you wanted."
"Why? Because it's what *he* wanted? Don't give me that. Different situations, different decisions. This was about what *you* wanted. Just like always."
"John, think about this." She kept her voice level, patient, although his agitation seemed to grow with every word. "To finally have it gone, isn't that a relief to you? To have your mind to yourself? After everything it did-"
"He *helped* me, Aeryn. When no one else could, or would, he held up his end of the deal. The only reason that Scorpius isn't alive right now and that wormholes aren't making dustballs out of inhabited planets in the name of Peacekeeper superiority is because Harvey kept his end of the bargain and *helped me*. He did everything right, he did everything that was asked of him, and more, and you came along and squashed him anyway." His eyes narrowed. "And I can't say that there isn't a *big* part of me that *really* identifies with that."
"Crichton! You have no right-"
"I don't have a *right*?" Crichton's laugh was brutal, bitter. "Let me tell you something, Crais. You two are the last people who should be talking to me about *rights* right now. Ever since I got to this screwed-up, beaten-down end of the universe, people have been screwing with my mind. Putting things in, taking things out. All without my knowledge, or my permission. The Ancients. The Delvians. The Scarrans. Scorpy and his damned chip. I've had more aliens marching up and down inside my frontal lobe than I even knew *existed* five years ago, and they've all had one thing in common -- they've all felt that what *I* wanted just wasn't important when it came to my own mind." He shook his head. "Guess you two have just been added to that list. Hope you like the company."
"I couldn't tell you," Aeryn said, standing firm. "If we told you, we told the clone, and then it would have fought."
"He fought anyway, Aeryn," John said, his voice suddenly weary. "We both did."
Realization flooded in. He fought most tenaciously. She'd thought Xifer spoke of Harvey. But she could see it now, lined on his face. Exhaustion, so extreme he was about to collapse. Remnants of pain in his red-rimmed eyes.
She had expected many things. She'd expected his anger, his sense of betrayal at not being consulted, at her making this decision for him. But she'd expected that when faced with the reality of what he had wanted for so long, that he'd seize the chance to be free. She'd never expected this.
The fight hadn't been between John and Harvey, not this time. This time it had been the two of them, together, resisting an intruder who sought to separate them. It hadn't been a rescue, it had been an invasion. Crichton had spent the last five arns strapped to a table while the Delvians systematically ripped his mind apart and put it back together again.
Like the Scarrans. Like Scorpius.
At her bidding.
As he stood, he staggered, and she reflexively put a hand out to steady him. As he'd been doing for her for the past cycle. Except this time, he was the one who flinched away from her touch.
"No, Aeryn."
She knew that tone. She'd used it enough in speaking to him, when speaking couldn't be avoided, in the dark days when she'd returned to Moya. It had said to him that no matter how desperately she wished it could be otherwise, something was broken, beyond repair, and that she would never be his.
He straightened. "Let me do it on my own, or not at all." And not at all wasn't an option. Not for him. Turning away, and doing it alone, just as he had for the past cycle.
Not alone, she thought suddenly. The clone, the enemy, had somehow become an ally, something Crichton listened to. Something he trusted. Some*one* he'd fought to save. How had that happened?
Even as she asked herself the question, she knew the answer. It had happened because there was no one else. She hadn't been there. Even after she returned, she hadn't been there. And Crichton, who lived in need of connections, had forged one. Not wisely, perhaps, but well. While she waited outside the doorway, someone else had been inside the room.
She drew herself to attention, nodded in her now-customary military style. "Understood."
Crais looked at her in concern as they stood back to allow Crichton to pass, but she ignored him and fell in behind the human. Her doubts evaporated as she turned over the implications in her mind.
Even in their new openness, it was one of the few things that her Crichton had refused to discuss in depth. But he'd said enough. They joked so often about him being insane that it was startling, and frightening, to hear him voice fears of just that - that the clone was even more unreal than he assumed, that it was an invention of his own. But she had held him and helped him find his way, and he'd looked at her with grateful eyes and loved her and asked what he would ever do without her. That he saw the clone as part of him, yet unreal, had made his situation both harder and easier. Harder, because he was terrified that the lines between them might blur; easier, because he could kill it without remorse.
This Crichton... he thought of the clone as having a life. Having *had* a life, her mind corrected with cold satisfaction. At some point he had discovered for himself that the clone wasn't him, that it was separate from him, and that the division was unbreakable. And so it became something he could talk to, reason with. Someone capable of change.
Perhaps the clone *had* changed. Isolated, trapped within and confronted by the whole range and force of John Crichton's incomprehensible mind, of course it had changed.
But it hadn't been real.
She knew better than anyone the bonds that were forged in battle. What was it her John had said? "Nothing says I love you like a perfectly timed pulse blast." That was what she had taught him. Connections were forged with those you fought beside, who chose to fight beside you. And Crichton -- this Crichton -- had chosen Harvey, and left her behind.
But connections weren't just made in battle -- that was what Crichton had taught her. They were made in quiet moments, in loaded silences, in listening and caring and raised voices and honest opinions and warm arms and shared meals. In time spent together, when moments could be worth an entire cycle, and entire cycles were filled with such moments.
She would take her time, and be ready. She would watch, and listen, and stand guard. Crichton needed connections, and he was alone now. Sooner or later, surely, he would have to reach out again.
