Welcome to the Journal of Now and Forever. This Journal is a collection of my Star Control and Star Control 2 fiction. Note: Some of this material is, by necessity, extrapolation from the slim information provided by canon sources.

New fiction is posted first at My Livejournal before it appears here. This story is in response to 15 Minute Ficlets' Challenge #65.

"Dean?" I keep thinking I need to check on him, even though everyone – doctors, friends, Dean himself – keep saying he's going to be fine. How can you be fine after being shot in the head? "You need anything?"

"No, thanks," he answers from the other room. He's spending a lot of time by the window, looking out at the fields of small native flowers that gave Whitehills their name. Sometimes he reads, sometimes he looks at the portable imageviewer he brought from Earth. I don't know what pictures he has on there, because it feels like prying to ask. And before, I never really cared.

He's different since the accident. It's like someone else is trying to be him, but they can't quite do it. It's not just that he looks different. They had to shave his scalp where they worked on him, so he just had his whole head shaved and now it's growing back, maybe a half-inch long. If he lets it grow out again, it should cover the scar. Sometimes his eye twitches a bit and you can see him try to control it.

No, it's that he has weird gaps in his memory. He remembers nearly everything from Earth just fine, and remembers the third year on Eta Vulpeculae 2 with clarity. Other parts he has trouble with, like half his friends, and he can't remember our faces from one minute to the next. He's been doing mental exercises to keep track of us – I don’t think it ever occurred to any of us that having multiple people with the same face would be a problem for an Androsynth as well as a human.

He knows who I am by my hands. He told me – my hands are nicked and scarred, therefore I'm Nick. It raised the hairs on the back of my neck to hear him talk like that. I think he's scared of what's happened, but won't talk about it.

At least Jack arranged it so I can stay in Whitehills. Dean's not quite ready to go back to work, but he should be soon. I've got to take care of him until then. Hell, he was trying to help me, it's the least I can do. And mine – okay, so I've got some mental issues, but memory loss scares me, too. I've got to help him recover.

He looks up at me, and I realize I've been just staring at him while standing in the doorway. He's reading an old Bible; he must've brought it from Earth. He's been reading that a lot lately.

"Nick?" he questions. I'm guessing he means Do you want to say something? as opposed to Are you Nick? because after all, this is our place, and I'm the only other one here.

I shake my head. "Sorry. Lost in thought."

"Oh." He watches me for a moment or two, then: "Is there a priest around here? Someone... in charge?"

Whoa. Wasn't expecting that. "I don't think so." I scratch my head. "I don't think there's a church or anything, come to think of it."

"Can you find out for me?" His voice isn't the same, almost. It sort of sounds like him, but not. It's in the inflection, not the voice itself. It's still creepy.

"Sure, I can do that." Hey, he almost died, near as I can tell. It won't kill me to find him a fellow religious.

Comments? Email me: laridian at aol dot com