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"It Makes a Lovely Light" - Episode #121 (spoilers below!) (Click here for review)

Alerts sounding out about an imminent engine meltdown, Dylan sprints for the Engine room only to find a surprise birthday party staged there for him. Later, Dylan tells Beka about his last birthday, celebrated with Sara on his homeworld of Tarn-Vedra, which has been cut off from slipstream for 300 years. He also relates how he was raised there, his mother a high gravity shuttle pilot and his father an Imperial gardener.

Beka surprises Dylan with a gift, a 46 slipstream route list to get to Tarn-Vedra. She gleaned them from ramblings in the diary of Hasturi, a mad Perseid who claimed to find Tarn-Vedra. With conventional routes gone, these are dangerous, but Beka says she can handle it. Later, embarrassed at finding Beka just out of the shower, Dylan reminds her of the psychological strain of a trip 70% spent in slipstream, but she is adamant that she is able to do it.

Beka finds Tyr on the Maru, wanting to leave while they go on this useless dangerous mission. She convinces him to stay by saying there are likely vast arms depots to be found. Meanwhile, Harper is preparing tools to loot the wealth he hopes to find. Rev Bem reminds him the Vedrans are an ancient powerful race who conquered an empire and that they many not want to be found.

Soon they begin their trip, with Beka piloting through ten slipstream transits in rapid succession. Dylan then insists she rest since the jumps are taking a toll on all of them. She reluctantly agrees and leaves, shaking as she does. Later, Beka seems wired, but successfully gets them to the Andromeda galaxy's core, where there are two central black holes that will be difficult to slipstream away from.

Once again ordered to rest Beka goes to the Maru and finds Trance not feeling well and soon fainting. In Med Bay Rev explains that the local energy fields seem to be draining Trance's energy and killing her. When he leaves to pray Beka engages privacy mode and Trance catches her mixing up "Flash" to enhance reaction time and reflexes.

Having hid her Flash use with contact lenses, Beka safely pilots them away and Trance begins to recover a bit. However, Beka becomes snappy at people, and when Harper on the Maru finds she is on Flash, Beka threatens to dump him back where she found him.

Back on the bridge she insists she can still get them to Tarn-Vedra, though Dylan says it is too dangerous, bringing them within a few light minutes of a charged plasma nebula. Beka refuses to back off, but Tyr has used his heightened smell and sight to detect signs she is on Flash and Harper confirms this. Dylan demands the drug, but Beka soon jumps in the pilot's chair and transits them back to the Andromeda core.

Later, both Trance and Rev feel guilty for not stopping Beka, but remind each other that they are not able to always do and say just the right things. Rev then goes to comfort Beka, who only wants more Flash to ease the withdrawal.

Harper gets them extra power and Dylan slipstreams, but only closer to Tarn-Vedra! They soon find Rev was overpowered and that Beka is piloting locked in the slipstream drive room. Rommie did not even know this was possible due to security protocols overridden when the Maru first encountered her.

Beka is using more and more Flash and seems crazed, telling Dylan she will keep her promise and get him home.

As the radiation builds to critical levels a holographic image of Dylan distracts her, allowing Harper to sneak in and override the console. She struggles to continue, but Dylan forces her to see herself and realize she can't do it. Overdosed and bleeding from her eyes she falls and Dylan is able to get them to the galactic fringe in safety.

When she awakes much later, Beka is told the chemicals are cleansed from her system, but Dylan knows she will always want Flash. She is deeply concerned for Trance and Rev (who she shot), but finds they are all right. Dylan assures he will be there for her to help her with her now daily battle to "hold off the night".

Synopsis 05/15/01 by Larry Kramer

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