BIRTHRIGHT 2 – THE GATHERING

by Soledad

Title: Birthright 2 – The Gathering

Author: Soledad

Fandom: Andromeda

Genre: Action/Adventure, Drama, maybe a touch of Romance – take your pick. My stories are rarely limited to any specific genre.

Rating: PG-13 most likely – and not for sex. Personally, I find violence much more harmful for young readers.

Disclaimer: Andromeda is the product of Gene Roddenberry's genius. The other rights belong to Tribune Entertainment and to the individual screenwriters of the chapters on which this story is based. I own nothing, except the weird plot idea and a few OCs.

Archiving: Please, ask first. I want to know where stuff is going.

Dedication: To the members of the Memory Alpha Yahoo Group. Without their support I'd never have been able to write this story.

Timeframe: the first season of Andromeda, from the episode The Ties that Blind up to The Pearls that Were His Eyes.

As you can see, this is actually Part 2 of a longer series. Part 1 – a one-shot – will be added, soon. Blame the muse for her weird working style.

AU-WARNING

This is an AU and the prequel to my upcoming Andromeda/Star Trek – TNG crossover. Some events, circumstances and persons might be – and will be – different from the series. If that possibility bothers you, please hit the Back button now. I have zero tolerance for people who ignore clear warnings and then complain afterwards.

PROLOGUE

Tyr Anasazi, out of Victoria by Barbarossa, last surviving member of the Kodiak Pride, stared out the window of his quarters on the last High Guard warship, Andromeda Ascendant – well, the last one that he knew to be still in active duty anyway. The symbolism of the fact that they were both the last of their kind didn't go by him unnoticed. He was certain about the significance of this fact – but he was uncertain about the actions that should result from this significance. That worried him, ad indecision wasn't usually characteristic for him… for any Nietzschean. Determination was part of their genetic code.

When he'd let himself be talked into Dylan Hunt's noble crusade, he did it for his own purposes. He believed that having access to a ship this powerful would serve him better than hanging around a ragtag band of human and alien mercenaries. That living aboard the Andromeda would help him rebuild Kodiak Pride, fulfil his vengeance on the Drago-Kazov Neanderthals and re-claim his birthright.

So far, he had failed.

Granted, he had become a husband, if only for a short time, and he had even tasted a small amount of vengeance, making Orca Pride pay for their betrayal on the Kodiak and make them as homeless as he had been made. But at the end, Guderian's parting words did contain a great deal of bitter truth. Homeless and on the flight, Guderian still had his Pride, his wives and his children to support him.

Tyr, on the other hand, had nothing.

His quarters aboard the Andromeda – once those of the ship's Nietzschean First Officer – were large enough for a big family, and yet he lived alone in this abundance of space. Childless.

Had Guderian not been so maddeningly inferior, so narrow-minded and overconfident, Tyr would have considered to actually go through with their plan and seize the Andromeda. It would have been doable – if not exactly easy. After all, he had started to sabotage the ship on the very day he had declared to join Hunt's case, and Guderian had about three hundred combatants – trained Nietzschean warriors, who'd have put up a much better fight than his fellow mercenaries had. Theoretically, they could have succeeded.

But Tyr realized that Guderian's strategic skills never extended beyond hijacking and robbing Than transport ships. With barbaric fools like him Tyr could never have overwritten the AI's programming and take control. So, self-preservation demanded that he took sides with the winner – even if it meant to let his wife go and remain lonely among strangers again.

Now, shortly after the Battle of the Witchhead Nebula, when history had re-aligned itself, despite all hope, Tyr began to wonder whether he shouldn't have thrown his lot in with his own people, after all. Even though they were just Orca. As his wife, Freya would eventually have followed him when he had gathered enough people to re-found Kodiak Pride, with her as the new Matriarch on his side.

Re-evaluating his decision concerning the Orca, Tyr now found his reasoning at that time wanting. Had he been able to relinquish his vengeance, Freya would be here with him now, in this elegance and luxury that few people he knew could call their own in these times. This was a way of life Hunt undoubtedly took for granted – and tried to bring back to the shards of what had once been the Commonwealth. A noble goal, indeed; only Tyr never really believed it to be possible. Nor did he really care about it, beyond the question what good it would do him, personally.

He turned away from the window to give his current quarters a cursory glance. They were eminently Nietzschean, with the open spaces and the sparse handful of furniture – he found them that way and kept them that way, as his tastes seemed to harmonize with those of the former owner. The floor was covered by thick rugs of a deep blue-grey, with a pattern of black leaves scattered across them. They enabled him to move around noiselessly, though he couldn't help but wonder what it'd be like to have his barefooted children romping around, rolling on the rugs and laughing.

There was a low, large couch with deep blue and black velvet cushions standing at the wall opposite the entrance, inviting to sit down with his wife in his arms and watch their children play. Only that he had no wife and no children. He'd sacrificed them to a short foretaste of vengeance, wasting precious time in which he could have spread his genes and worked on rebuilding his Pride, while there were whole worlds full of Drago-Kazov primates, with dozens of children around their knees.

And while he lived here in these comfortable quarters alone, the Orca fugitives he had betrayed were most likely cramped together aboard their small ships, looking for a place they might be able to call home one day. Freya, who'd chosen him before the males of her own Pride, among them.

Tyr shook his head so vehemently that his long braids flew around him like a whirlwind. Guilt was a wasted emotion and brooding over decisions made – even if those decisions proved wrong – was counterproductive. He needed to look into the future now. Make new plans, new decisions. First and most important of which was to re-evaluate his loyalties.

He'd begun to think of Andromeda as his home. He'd even brought his few personal items from Haukin Tau Drift, where he'd had a small apartment for ten years: weapons, painting utensils and books. Books were very important for him, and unlike most people, he preferred them in hard copies and in original. He'd even learned a few ancient languages, just to read his favourites – Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil, Ayn Rand's Fountainhead, Sun Tzu's Art of War, Hedas of Thonia, and Machiavelli – in the language they'd been written long ago. There were always nuances lost in translation, and he preferred the untainted source.

Currently, he was reading The Artha-Shastra by Chandragupta Maurya – the ancient Indian emperor better known as Chanakya – and enjoyed greatly not only the wisdom of the book itself but also the complexity of Sanskrit, a language almost as old as mankind itself. Contrary to common belief among other races, not all Nietzscheans were grunting barbarians with the single purpose of killing and breeding. Those things had their place in every Nietzschean's life, of course, but some of the Prides cultivated other pastimes as well. Kodiak had been one of those Prides, although they never lowered themselves to the decadence that had become so characteristic for Jaguar Pride.

Tyr sighed impatiently and shook his head again, forcing his attention back to the question at hand. He needed to understand his own actions – or the lack thereof. Today, he could have made a difference, changing history. He could have sabotaged the Andromeda. Could have killed everyone aboard and saved one hundred thousand Nietzschean lives. Yet he did not. Why?

He thought back at the heated arguments among the crew when they'd been discussing what to do – or not to do – and Dylan Hunt's argument rang in his head like an alarm bell.

"Make the wrong decision, and three hundred years later, we could prevent Tyr's birth or Andromeda's rescue from the black hole. Anything."

There was his answer. He'd let his own need for survival outweigh the fate of an entire people. His people. As Dylan said, it was a very Nietzschean thing to do. He didn't really buy Hunt's theory about knowing on some level that what they had done would have somehow been necessary and right. He never really cared about right or wrong – that was a human concept. It had been pure self-preservation that had motivated his actions, nothing more and nothing less. And no matter of wasted guilt would make him regret his decision.

Life was the only steady fact he knew. He couldn't sacrifice it for a vague promise that maybe the changing of history would have provided his Pride – or himself – with a better future. He had survived the diamond mines on Zokotl at the age of sixteen. He had clawed his way out of the collapsed mine, through two hundred meters of dirt, through the bodies of the dead, just to escape into a deadly desert, where he had lived on seep-water and sand rats for an entire season. Despite all this, he had healed and exacted his revenge on the overseers. He couldn't give up all that for maybe.

Tyr walked over to the bedroom, opened the metallic box in which he kept Freya's double helix and held it in his cupped palms for a moment, weighing his choices. The memory of Freya still warmed his heart – she was so fair, her bloodline so promising, despite the fact that she belonged to Orca Pride. Maybe once there had been more to the Orca. Maybe one day there could be more to them again.

Freya descended from a long line of Alphas, starting with Saladin Cree, the founder of her line. It was Tyr's duty to both his own bloodline and to the Nietzschean people to mix his genes with those of worthy females and create strong, intelligent and resilient offspring that would one day recreate his now-extinct Pride. It was high time that he began with that. He had wasted too many years already.

He put the double helix back into its box, pulled out the black leather chair that once had belonged to Gaheris Rhade and switched on the log that was now his. The message he was creating seemed, for the casual reader, just some business information for Ferahr Kalinga, his reliable contact and almost-friend on Haukin Tau Drift. However, for someone who was able to decode it – and currently Ferahr was the only such person – it contained a second layer, which Ferahr was supposed to forward to the addressee.

Considering the fact that Tyr himself had no idea where said addressee could be right now, it wasn't an easy task. But he knew Ferahr's abilities to find persons nobody else would be able to hunt down. That was why he asked Ferahr, instead of a number of other possible contacts, to deliver the message. It was of paramount importance that this message be delivered.

It was a highly formal request to Freya to re-establish contact with him.

TBC