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Disclaimer: I don’t own Farscape, I wish I did, but I don’t.
Spoilers: mild, but everything up through Fractures
A lot of things can happen in the course of a microt. I mean, it’s just one microt. In that small microt, you can, let’s say, sneeze. You can step on a piece of metal that a DRD left in the middle of the corridor and get a pretty nasty cut on the sole of your foot. You can even kill one of your crew members.
When Talyn and Moya met up again, I wasn’t expecting anything to happen. I could only imagine how the crew would react to the news of Talyn’s return. I knew what He would do, and I wanted to stay away from it all. I wanted to stay away from the haunting look in His eyes, because I knew it too well.
I knew the way He moved too well. I knew the way He licked His lips right before He said something insanely stupid, and then blamed it on Earth and southern metaphors. I knew that half the time I wouldn’t understand Him when that happened. I also knew that after that He would grin, shake His head, and put His arm around me, squeeze, and say, “Never mind,” before walking down the corridor.
I would remember it. I would repeat it to myself. And when He happened to mention it again in conversation, I would be able to finish His sentence, and He would smile. I loved that smile; first it was because it was so full of hope; later on, though, it was because He kept grasping for hope in a desperate situation.
And His situation was desperate. I never really saw Him give up hope, though. I could see when He was on the brink of it and I always tried to touch Him, give Him comfort, and draw Him back in.
He would notice my attempts every once in a while and He would give me a half-grin that would say, Hey, I’m okay. I would believe Him, not because it was the truth, but because I wanted to.
Life is and will always be strange. And now Talyn was back with Moya and I was afraid of everything. I was afraid of the Other, was afraid of what I would see when I confront this twin of Him. I was afraid that what I felt for Him would warp itself into a sort of twisted love for the Other. I couldn’t handle that.
Mostly, though, I was afraid of Her. It was something that I dreaded. It was this sort of sickening feeling, that He would be snatched up as soon as She was there and available and everything would fall into place like pieces of those puzzles He used to construct as a child.
It’s odd how things fall into place. My love for Him was there, but I could see Her detachment from Him, how She tried to hide Her love. It was painful. I saw the look in Her eyes when she watched Him; how She tried to hide it when I watched Her watching Him. But her eyes always told.
Damn those eyes.
It was a mistake. A total and idiotically simple mistake. We were all working on the area around Pilot‘s den where a DRD had spontaneously burst into flames. The three of us, and we were careful not to say a word to each other. It was so quiet I could hear the beating of my heart in my ears. Thud. Thud. Thud. It was an accident. It was my heart, beating in my head, and I didn’t see Him as I stood. I didn’t see how His legs were draped on the floor in that awkward manner. I honestly didn’t see them.
I tripped. It was an accident. An honest to goodness accident, as He would say. I reached out to steady my fall and He caught me, and for a moment I stayed in His arms, inhaling his scent.
We hadn’t noticed that She had also reached for me, and when I wasn’t there, She continued the motion. I watched as She fell and reached down, but, too late. My fingers brushed Hers and I curled them swiftly into my palm, hoping to bring them up.
She didn’t scream. It was eerie, the way Her eyes sought out His as she fell. I stepped closer toward Him, arching my body into His. I was afraid, but I was also . . . something else. Was it a sort of gladness that she was gone, and I could pursue whatever feelings I had for Him in peace? I closed my eyes, quickly, before I could keep in my memory the vision of Her face forever.
The death of Aeryn Sun was an accident. I promise.
