Title:
Sapphire Fire
Author:
Kia Lee, (trance_harper@yahoo.com)
Rating:
PG-13 (a little bit of swearing and violence, but not too much )
Summary: Gerentex returns to reap his revenge on the
crew of the Andromeda, but things don't go exactly as planned.
Disclaimer: I don't own Andromeda, those characters
belong to Gene Roddenberry. But Aiden,
Talen, Gerentex's new crew (though they are nameless), and others who are not
on the show (and never will be) are my own creation, so if you wanna use them,
just ask!
Feedback: Oh please... oh please, oh please, please,
please...
Prologue
The Nightsider
surveyed the team before him. There
were seven people aboard his ship: Himself, two other Nightsiders, a female
Cyborg, and three Humans (a rather large light-skinned male, a compact but
muscled dark-skinned female, and another female, though this one was
different.)
The third human was
a light-skinned, girl under the age of twenty. Her long brown hair hung midway down her back, and though it seemed to
get in her way a great deal, she insisted on wearing it down. The long chocolate coloured strands were
streaked with silver-white and electric-blue and seemed to glow even under the
dim lights inside the ship.
Somehow this girl
unnerved him, there was something not quite right about her. He felt as though her sapphire blue eyes
were secretly watching his every move, but whenever he checked, she was always
looking elsewhere, seemingly concentrating deeply on her work. She had barely said two words to him or
anyone else since the day he had recruited her, and he was beginning to wonder
if she had an ulterior motive for this trip.
Yes, this girl was
going to be a problem…
End Prologue
Part I
Something was
wrong. Trance could sense it, but no
matter how hard she tried, she just couldn't figure it out.
Everything had been
fine for the last few days on the Andromeda, and everyone had been keeping busy
with repairs from the battle they had recently found themselves in the middle
of.
Trance just couldn't
understand it, she was usually good at detecting things before they happened…
She was suddenly
jerked away from her train of thought as she felt a pair of hands grab her
shoulders. She jumped in shock and spun
around, only to come face-to-face with Harper. He raised an eyebrow at her as she gasped for air, trying to recover the
breath she had lost in shock.
"Are you okay
Trance?" he asked, concerned with his friend's welfare. "You've been really jumpy lately."
Trance rolled her
eyes and smiled at him. "That could be
because you've been sneaking up on me a lot, silly." She said, before turning
her attention back to the plant on the table. She had been studying it earlier, before her mind had begun to wander.
Harper smiled
sheepishly and leaned in behind her, his chin almost resting on her shoulder,
peering down at the plan before her.
"What's its name?"
he asked in mock seriousness, trying to hide a smirk. Trance looked at him through the corner of her eye, catching his
near-hidden smile.
"HIS name is
Frederick, Harper, and he's not an IT." She said in the poor plant's defense.
Harper chuckled
softly, and unconsciously leaned in closer behind her. It wasn't until his chest was touching her
back and he could smell her hair that he realized just how close he really was
to her, and began to get nervous.
Trance could feel
him standing behind her, pressed up against her, and wondered if she should do
anything about his close proximity. She
knew that she couldn't get too close to him, emotionally. It just wasn't safe, for him or her. But every now and then, she'd find herself
in a position like this, where she would give anything to have him hold her,
stroke her hair while she told him everything… But it was just too risky…
Harper suddenly
stepped away from her, as they heard the door slide open, breaking them both
from their reverie.
Beka approached the
two young crewmembers, not really paying attention, looking at the flexi in her
hand. It wasn't until she was standing
close to them that she realized they were there.
"There you guys
are." She said, looking up from the flexi. "Harper, Dylan wants you back on command deck, there's something wrong
with the slipstream driver."
"You got it boss,"
he said, starting towards the door, before turning back for a second to look
back at Trance and say, "see you later Trance," just before the doors slid shut
behind him.
Beka looked Trance,
and then at the closed doors that Harper had left through, then back at Trance
again.
"What was that
about?" she asked, eying the purple alien strangely.
Trance shrugged and
turned back to her plant, smiling slightly.
"I have no idea…"
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Harper sat on the
floor in the small corridors between the walls, rewiring the driver for the
umpteenth time, trying to get it just right.
He was still in a
state of shock about what had just happened between him and Trance in the
hydroponics garden. He couldn't get her
out of his mind, and was at a loss as to why.
Okay, it was
obvious. He cared about her, but just
how much was still a mystery to him. SHE was a mystery to him. She
was so quiet…secretive…beautiful…
No, Harper, stop. He
thought. He shouldn't think about
Trance that way, she was his best friend, and she would never—could never be
more.
Why not? His mind asked, and he
scolded himself, trying futilely to focus on his work.
I don't even know anything about her, he thought, trying to rationalize the
feelings he had for his sparkly purple friend. And it was true, he knew almost nothing about Trance, and he could tell
she wanted to keep it that way. She was
forever avoiding his questions, dancing around them in an effort to change the
subject to anything that didn't involve her.
It doesn't matter what you know about her, his mind said, all that matters is what you feel for her, the way you feel when you're
near her, the fact that you love her…
Harper unconsciously
let the wires he was working with slip through his fingers at that last
thought, his breath catching in his throat.
NO,
he thought. I can't be in love with her; she's my best friend. I mean, she's Trance, for God's sake. I can't be in love with her…
But you are, his mind said, forcing him to realize the
truth. Harper groaned, flopping onto
his back, lying on the floor. He rubbed
his closed eyes with his fingertips.
Life has just gotten a lot more interesting, he thought. And complicated…
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dylan stood in the
command deck, leaning against the railing as he stared out at the system they
were currently passing through.
"Enjoying the view?"
He didn't turn,
instantly recognizing the soft, comforting voice behind him.
"I've seen worse,"
he replied, smiling as Rommie came into view, leaning against the railing
beside him.
She smiled back at
him, and then turned her attention back to the view of stars and planets before
them.
"It really is
beautiful, isn't it?" she said softly, not expecting him to answer.
Just then, Rev's
voice came on the ship's communications system. "Um, Dylan, I think that you should get to the command deck. There's something I think you should see…"
This sounded
serious. "Be right there Rev," he said,
turning away from the stars to look at Rommie.
"Let's go."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The command deck
doors slid open and Dylan entered, with Rommie in close pursuit behind him.
"What's the problem
Rev?" he asked, approaching the Magog.
"We seemed to have
stopped," he said, not looking up from the console where he was working.
Dylan's eyes
narrowed on Rev, confused. "What do you
mean 'we seem to have stopped'?"
The Magog looked up,
at the captain. "Just that. We've stopped moving. We are no longer in motion."
He turned to
Rommie. "What's going on? Why have we stopped?"
The avatar shrugged
her shoulders. "I have no idea, I
didn't even know we had stopped until just now."
A holographic image
of Andromeda appeared beside Rommie, saying, "according to my sensors, we are
still moving at your requested speed."
"On screen," Dylan
said, walking towards the front of the ship. The holographic image nodded her head, and disappeared. Less than a second later, an image of the
system came up and he realized that Rev had been correct, they were no longer
moving. Dylan couldn't help but wonder
why he didn't notice this fact when he been on the observation deck.
But he hadn't really
been paying close attention to the stars. He had been thinking…
Over the last few
months, his constant thoughts about a new Commonwealth had been mixed with
tinges of sadness, of yearning. He had
been missing Sara. But recently, the
image of his heartache that had kept him up in the long hours had changed. The woman he longed for had, over time,
become shorter, her fair complexion turned darker, her hair had darkened and
shortened, and her eyes had gone from brown to near black. The image of Sara, the woman he had loved
with all his heart, had changed into someone else.
Rommie…
"Dylan, are you
alright?"
Rev's voice brought
him out of his thoughts and back into the real world. There was no time to think about that right now. They had more pressing matters to deal with
at the moment.
He turned to Rev,
and started giving orders. "Rev, get
Beka and Tyr up here, we need to figure out what's going on."
"Rommie," he said,
turning back to her, once again in control of his thoughts and emotions. "Run a full systems check and try to figure
out what's wrong. The last thing we
need right now is for one of your systems to go offline."
But Rommie didn't
seem to be responding. The dark brown
eyes of her avatar seemed almost glazed-over, staring straight ahead. Dylan's eyes narrowed in concern.
"Rommie…Rommie? Are you alright?" he asked, stepping closer
to her. But before he reached her, she
started to sway a little un-easily, and suddenly collapsed to the ground before
his very eyes.
"Rommie!" he yelled,
finding himself almost instantly at her side, kneeling down over her lifeless
form. Rev was close behind him,
standing over the seemingly dead Rommie.
"Harper!" he yelled
into the air around him, letting Andromeda's comm. System carry his voice
throughout the ship. "Harper, get down
to the Command Deck right now! There's
something wrong with Rommie."
To his surprise, the
voice of the young engineer did not respond. "Harper!" he barked again. "HARPER!"
But there was still
no response. Taking a deep breath, he
looked back down at Rommie, his heart catching in his throat. Reaching out, he gently stroked Rommie's
hair away from her face with a shaky hand.
"Come on Rommie," he
whispered. "Stay with me…"
Rev looked from the
captain to Rommie lying on the floor, then back to Dylan, suddenly realizing
the strength of emotions that Dylan had for Andromeda. He laid one clawed hand on Dylan's shoulder,
in attempt to soothe the man.
"I shall go see if I
can find Harper. I'm sure it's nothing,
perhaps only a small glitch in the system. He should be able to fix whatever is wrong with Andromeda."
Dylan nodded, still
gazing down at Rommie. "Call Tyr and
Beka as well, we need to figure out what's going on…" he said, repeating his
earlier order almost in entirety.
Just then, the doors
slid open behind them, and, so preoccupied with Rommie's condition, he paid it
little notice until he heard the person who had entered begin to speak.
"I really don't
think that those orders will be necessary, Captain. I already know exactly what's going on."
Dylan turned around
to see the owner of the voice standing at the entrance to the command
deck. The man stood there, surrounded
by three others, each holding a weapon that was aimed at the unarmed captain.
Dylan's eyes
narrowed at the man who held him at gunpoint. Through clenched teeth, he hissed the man's name…
"Gerentex…"
End Part I