Don't owe them.

Set after S2's "Lava and Rockets"

Vanity matters?

Strange... Everything is unchanged. Then why does it feel so different? For the better part of the past hour I've been looking around all over the place, and there is nothing misplaced, nothing missing, nothing broken. When you asked for the Maru, I remember thinking 'No, don't give Dylan your ship - he'll hurt her... again!', but you haven't.

It's not the first time it happened: you, Tyr, Harper, Trance, you all borrow the Maru every now and then - sometimes even without asking - and you mostly return it in pieces. But not this time. So why do I have this feeling of it being somewhat less my ship this time? It feels 'lived in' by a presence I never wanted here.

I cannot spot anything out of the ordinary - apart from this piece of paper I found in the captain's cabin. It doesn't look thrown away; I found it on the shelf, neatly folded - she must have forgotten it there. Maybe she wasn't too impressed with it - with you, after all.

I shouldn't have looked. But I have. I found it on my ship, in my quarters. It's mine by every right. Except it's not, it's hers. Or yours, I guess, since she's forgotten it here. Oh well, what the heck...? Okay, I looked. So what? Apart from it being a bit ridiculous... I mean - come on, a poem? You wrote her a poem? Sheesh... Captain Dylan Hunt, reshaper of the Universe, founder of the New Commonwealth, genuine living hero and... a poet? Give me a break! And such a pathetic one, too:

„ShalI I compare thee to a summer's day?
Though art more lovely..."

Rommie says you didn't write it yourself. She says it's by this Shakespeare-guy from Earth Tyr appreciates so much. I wonder why? I mean, it's not as if sensitivity and a romantic nature were Tyr's second names, Renaissance man or not. Unless, of course, they serve his purposes...

The two of you have that in common, actually. The charming, flirting, easy going routine - helping you to waltz your way from Elsbett Mossadim to Madam Triumvir to... Molly!

You kept her a secret, kept her to yourself, Molly! I didn't even get so much as a single glimpse of her. As didn't the others.

That you didn't show her to Tyr, I understand. One look at him and you'd have been out of the race. Especially if she is the young and impressionable type. Which according to the logfiles on your... adventures, she is rather not. Still: you kept her to yourself.

That you tried to avoid a meeting between her and Harper I can also understand, somehow. No one really wants Harper's comments on the girl one falls for following one around for as long as one lives. Not that Harper would have cared right now; he is much too busy coping with his cure and Trance's change to really bother at the moment.

And Rommie - well, Rommie is jealous. She was terrified that she might have lost you. Finding out that she didn't, and then finding out that you found Molly... I suppose it was a bit stressful for her, emotionally speaking. The more so as she is the only one to actually have seen the young lady in question. She's gorgeous, says Rommie.

I didn't get to see her. Not even after giving you permission to take the Maru in order to take her to the Academy. You had my ship for 3 days. But I didn't meet her. And now something feels... off. With the Maru. With you. I wonder why? I'm anything but curious - and I'm certainly not... Or am I? Nah, I'm not, I never have been. Besides: there isn't anything between you and me other than a very solid, deep reaching friendship. We like each other, respect each other - and I never wanted anything beyond that. Nor did you. Right? Except maybe that one time when you walked in on me in that towel. You looked at me so... hungry... And I didn't like that. I... Hmm... No, I didn't. But I'm wondering: did you look at her that way, too?

I would have liked to meet her, though. To know what she's like, her past, where she comes from. And since I'm not curious by nature, I do find this curiosity about her a bit strange, but I guess that I would just have liked to see her, because somehow having to picture her this way is... worse.

I already know her scent, as well as her hand-writing. She wrote your name on the back of the paper I found: „Dylan", as if afraid she might otherwise forget who it was from; well, since she's forgotten about it altogether, I guess she does have a problem memorizing all... Oh, stop it, Beka, that is really mean! Maybe she left it on purpose, for me to find it... Why should she, though?

Oh yes, I would have liked to see her, see if she's really that gorgeous, if she's pretty. And I would have liked to be able to take my time watching her. Watching you with her... There. I've said it.

I don't quite understand it. Something hurts a bit. So then why do I wish to have seen her at all? Just to see if it hurts even more? If I can stand it? If I break? I wonder what it would feel like - to see the two of you together. Like losing, like bleeding, maybe a bit like... dying? How melodramatic, Beka! Who do you think you are? Shakespeare?

But I still would like to know... What hotel you took her to, this last night before leaving? Did you pay a handsome price for it? Was it a pretty room? With a large, big doublebed?

I'd like to know it all. How old she is and what her skin feels like. If there is a lot of difference between her and... me, or if we're a lot alike. It's idiotic - and embarrassing.

I would have even liked to walk in on you, see you fool around with her, see you being gentle with her, listen to you making promises to her. Did you tell her about us?

I know, I know, tell her what about us, there isn't much to tell. I would have liked to see you like in a mirror image, you and yet not you, see you kissing her, see the way your bodies moved together, catch one or two of those rare, hidden looks you sometimes had for me when you thought yourself unobserved... I haven't seen them in a long time now, but I remember how much I used to... love them...

When you kissed her good-bye - did you have that luminous tenderness in your eyes you had after the Magog attack? Or did you square your shoulders, straightening up to full height in this defiant way of yours... like a boy impersonating one of those ancient bull-fighters. What did Harper call them? Matadores?

I would have liked to meet her, because I'd like to understand: how she managed to capture you, what she is, that I'm not - and why she took my place...