Like a fella once said, "Life is what happens when you're having fun." So it has gone for me. Apologies for those following this series of mine for the bloody long wait between the last and this. It's not as much as I would have liked, but I hope to have more up in a far more reasonable time. I felt I owe those still reading at least something.

Thanks for reading, and as always, feel free to comment.

Standard disclaimers apply. I own nothing Farscape but my own inventions therein - everything else is Henson & CO's.

FARSCAPE

UNREALIZED REALITIES:

THE FREEBOOTER ERA

Previously, on Farscape:

Scorpius has arrived. The Monitor, a autonomous watch station of the Ancients buried in Earth's Moon two billion years ago, has been manipulating events as it gathered information, only to be attacked and disabled by Scorpius' Carrier. Peacekeeper troops instantly assault NORAD and Area 51 – and the War for the Wormhole has begun...

AND NOW, ON FARSCAPE: THE FREEBOOTER ERA:

SLEDGEHAMMER:

ROCK THE CASBAH

To hope is the first sign that you've lost your grip on reality.

- found in the Vael'lath War Tome of N'sharrast, attributed to the Kha'jhav

PROLOGUE

HIS COMM CRACKLED, AND THEN WENT SILENT.

All Crichton could hear was his suit creaking, the slow, near-silent hiss of air escaping from... somewhere. He checked his HUD. Nope, pressure steady. Then he realized that that hissing sound was his open comm picking up stellar noise, and he listened for a little while, to the sound of the universe chattering, shut it off. It had nothing to say that he wanted to hear.

Now just the creaking of his suit, and his own breathing. In the distance - flashes, the destruction - he trusted - of a few ambitions, some twisted dreams and hopes.

Maybe some of them could have been his, but he didn't let it trouble him. All the right people were angry, all the deserving people had got what they deserved, and everyone else got what he'd felt like giving them, so for the most part, things had gone as he'd wanted – more or less, there was a glitch here and there, and it wasn't perfect, but, all things considered it turned out rather well.

Well... except for this last bit. He was floating further and further away, and his suit was pretty fried, or so the onboard damage report told him: comm could only receive, actuators were locked, so he couldn't move, air supply an arn. He really should have checked to have made sure the damn thing had been fully charged. Oh, well. No atmosphere this time, no plunge and happy coincidences.

There was a huge flash in the distance, that ballooned out and out until he thought it might reach him, then it abruptly extinguished itself. Unlike TV and the movies, any non-nuclear explosion in space quickly dissipated. Crichton nodded to himself, set his visor to opaque, smiled crookedly at his own reflection on the inside of the plate. He was in a black suit against the blackness of space with no locater beacon and an arn of air, drifting at a rather decent clip away from all the activity. It wasn't his suit, but it was the same kind and it had served him so well and would serve him one last time as an armored coffin to bear him eternally through space.

He liked it. Drift into legend, the body never found, like King Arthur: out there somewhere, just waiting to rise again. He laughed softly to himself.

Yeah, sure. Gone, damned and forgotten. The Creature leaves without a fuss. They were better off.

Why not? There was a certain kind of symmetry to that he liked. He was tired, so very tired. He slept but never rested.

He told his suit to power down to bare reserves, scanned again for leaks and did the only thing he could in this situation.

He closed his eye and went to sleep, for the first time in a long time feeling as if – at last – rest might come.

It was over.

I

TIME RAN OUT. Close on the heels of his attack on the Monitor, Scorpius had launched several waves of Prowlers and Marauder troop transports at Earth, and they hit Cheyenne Mountain like a fist. It was a precision strike and everyone except Crichton wondered how he knew where to strike first. Crichton had his suspicions as to the hows.

The neural chip. Harvey had surmised. Among other things.

He'd explained long ago that he – meaning Harvey backed up by the chip – had spent his time in that form scanning Crichton's brain for all it was worth. "Reciprocity", he'd called it wryly. So, there was no wonder in Crichton's mind as to how and why, but he didn't care enough to tell anyone and certainly had no desire to explain it. As the "War Room" exploded around him, and he'd stepped a few steps back to observe. He had zero interest in what they were going to do about Scorpius. He had his own plans for that bastard. He needed to find Shiv and get the frell off this rock.

There was no frontal assault of troops. Two Frag Cannon shots had sheared the face of the mountain off the base, and soldiers in "drill tubes" - armored troop carriers equipped with plasma "bores" on their noses - had been launched at the base and had burned their way through rock, concrete and steel to disgorge Peacekeepers directly into the base.

If the troopers had expected easy pickings they were quickly disabused of that conceit. Tungsten-coated bullets of the base's security and marines and the depleted-uranium slugs of the internal auto-defences decimated the first wave – but succeeding ones began pushing their way out into the base, and humans began to die.

"Find Crichton!", had been Akanke's first order, followed by trying to organize the chaos and mount a defence. Crichton had managed to back off to one of the war room's heavy doors just as his comm chirped.

"Hey, Boss. You know you've got big heaps of trouble headed your way?"

"Already here. Where the frell are you?" Aeryn had noticed, but she made no move to say anything. She just watched him, and he wished she wouldn't – shouldn't she be hunting for Johnny? Things had gone straight to Hezmana a little faster than he'd planned, cursed to himself.

"I, ...uh... went kinda farhbot there for a smidge," Haxer told him. "The Monitor was in my head pretty good." Silence for a moment, and Crichton could just make out Chak'sa's voice, muffled, as if Hax had put his hand over the comm. "I guess Cha was kinda deep in it too. We're in orbit." There was a pause, and then a sheepish follow-up. "We'd come and get you, but the stealth systems are kinda fried, thanks to a very subtle code bomb Miriya left behind, one I can't believe I missed and am totally going to steal - and Cha says there's about two hundred and fifty Prowlers and about that many Marauders coming your way. We're heading to the southern pole to hide until we can get the stealth fixed. Sorry. We'll be there as soon as."

Crichton growled out a sigh.

"Right. Figures." Crichton noticed Akanke looking back at him and waving at a couple of MP's. One appeared to be speaking into his radio. "Do what you have to, just get it done, be ready. Send me one of the Wing Fighters on remote. Now will do. Drop it somewhere close, but not too close. I'll have to risk it." He looked steadily at Akanke, thought, Don't set precedents, lady.

"You got it. There's an area about two motras on a heading of Relka 595. It's a decent-sized depression, heavily forested. Should hide it well. I'll have to send it the long way to avoid any forward active scans."

Almost three klicks due west from the base. Not great but better than nothing. It'd be tight.

"Fine. It'll do. We'll play it by ear."

"Two quick things – Lamm ran for it – to Scorpius. We tracked her ship straight to him." Yeah – limp back to the kennel. See you again one day, Sweetheart.

"Frell her. Next?"

"Next - we're not risking any actives scans, but it appears both Moya and Talyn have run for it."

"They're the frelling smart ones. " Crichton eyed the MP's who was heading his way. Where, he wondered, were Heavy D and Chi?

"Somehow I doubt they've run that far." He paused, looked over at Sun. She apparently just noticed the MP's vectoring toward him. "Chak'sa – break out Synwynd's little gift and get it ready. " At her affirmative, he closed with, "I've gotta pretend I give a damn." He closed his comm.

Aeryn raised a hand to protest just as Crichton casually pulled a pistol. The MP's slowed, looked at Akanke. She nodded. They came on. Crichton sighed to himself, crossed to the Director, jabbed his pistol into the back of Akanke's neck. The MP's stopped.

"Lady," Crichton told her. "You and your men can commit suicide any way you want, but 'Death By Crichton' has become a little too common for my liking, so why don't you just cut this crap and play smart?"

Unfazed - and damned if Crichton didn't admire her for it – she simply asked,

"Do you have any recommendations?" She waved her hand at the monitors that showed Peacekeepers and Marines battling.

Crichton snorted his appreciation and nodded.

"Where's John?"

"At last report, he and your crew member were in maintenance bay 112A. We lost contact with them twenty minutes ago." As if on cue, a disgruntled John and a smiling Miriya were escorted running into the room. Shots splashed against the steel-cored door. Let the PK's straight to them. Figures.

"Son of a bitch!" John yelled as the door slammed behind them. "This as bad as it seems?"

"It will soon be worse," Akanke told him, calmly nodding.

"This base can't hold out against them. I am not going into the damn tomb, so we'd better figure out how the hell I'm – we're - getting out of here."

"There is a lot of disorganization, ma'am," a tech told her. "We've got reports coming in from all over the base of personnel not being anywhere they should be. They are rallying, but the invaders are starting to take a toll."

"The Monitor," Crichton muttered. "I had thought it was just us."

"Apparently not." Akanke overheard him, waved the MP's away. "Do you mind?"

"Don't do it again." Crichton told her, with a slight tap with the barrel of the pistol to remind her.

"Sound the evacuation alert. Tell all non-essential personnel to get out by any means necessary. We need to hold them until we can get everyone out."

"No." Crichton corrected her. "Shut everything down, tell everyone to stand down and offer no resistance. Surrender. Broadcast it."

"Excuse me?" There was a general consternation. Only Aeryn and Miriya nodded, he noted.

"They only want John. You resist troopers who will not hesitate to slaughter everyone in this base, and they'll do just that. On the plus side, and I can't believe I'm calling it that, we're dealing with Scorpius, not your average Peacekeeper captain. He'll be reasonable – as far as that goes."

John had marched up to him by then. The pulse shots were ramping in intensity.

"Are you nuts? Scorpius reasonable?! This is a goddamn disaster! Just what the hell...?" Crichton gave him a look of withering contempt, cut him off, directing it to Akanke.

"All you can do is try and mitigate damage. Scorpius only wants John and his head." He jabbed a hard finger against John's temple, who winced, stepped back. "Those troopers are here to seize anything Scorpius thinks John will have had a hand in. Let them ransack the place – trust me, you have nothing technical they want and your 'secrets' are meaningless. You offer no resistance and they'll have no need to kill any more personnel."

"These are Peacekeepers we're talking about here!" John interjected. "The soldiers here can..."

"They can martyr themselves for you some other time." John scowled, but shut up, realizing what he had been about to advocate, and stepped back, fuming. Crichton's comm chirped again. The frell...?

"Crichton. I am free and mobile." Hot frelling damn. Shiv. "Give me your location, and I shall endeavour to join you."

"I'm in their idea of command. Did you kill that Peacekeeper?"

There was a moment, possibly Shiv wondering how he knew. She was far too practical to let it bother her for long, though.

"No. I will explain later. I also have a Stykera who insists on accompanying me."

"Let him. No doubt you're aware this base is currently under attack. There are floor maps and routes on the walls all over this place. I'm in the room marked 'D4'. I expect you here ten minutes ago. Do what you have to, just get here. We'll fight our way out."

"Acknowledged."

"Shouldn't we be leaving?" Aeryn asked, casually. She watching John and Miriya, as if studying them. Miriya was watching Crichton.

"There's an idea!" John agreed. "I vote for now."

Crichton wasn't finished however. Aeryn found herself admiring his calm. She could neither see nor sense any anxiety around him at all. John, she noted, was sweating profusely. As for herself, she felt her nerves vibrating, anticipatory, a call to action sorely missed.

"Wipe anything he put in any of the computers. Plans for everything even remotely wormhole-related – including the stuff you were planning without him." Crichton smiled crookedly. "No point in making it too easy."

"This is a disaster, isn't it?" Akanke asked him. "Earth will tear itself apart if he invades more than this base."

"It's not a disaster yet." Crichton told her, turning as walking calmly toward the exit, stopped in the doorway. "And he is invading – if he doesn't find what he wants. Earth has to grow up sometime. Remember one thing: Scorpius is smarter than you, but he admires sense, the more ruthless it is, the better." In his head, Harvey nodded. He smiled half-a-smile at her. "Stay calm, play it smart, and tell the truth. Well, as near to it as you can get. It'll save you, if anything will."

As he stepped out, Shiv, Stark and Menshaf turned a corner at a trot. John, Miriya and Aeryn followed him.

Crichton looked back at Akanke, glanced at a fuming and still-silent General Williams sulking in a corner, a red phone to his ear.

"Fight the fights you can win."

"And if I lose them all?" Akanke asked with a sigh. It was rapidly becoming too much of a possibility. Nothing was more frustrating than losing a battle before it had even really been joined. He knew how that felt.

"Do what I do," he replied, slap-checking his coat. He directed his companions to move on.

"Which is what?"

"Keep fighting."

He followed them out the door.

IN THE CORRIDOR, he hurried them along.

"This went fezzik'd in a hurry," Miriya muttered.

"Has it?" Crichton wondered. "For whom, exactly?" Miriya frowned at him, said nothing further.

"Where are we going?" Aeryn asked, her stride steady.

"I have a ship coming. An A101- Nimah." Aeryn nodded. She knew that designation: Veddik-class Vigilante Wing Fighter. Armed heavily, extremely agile, and she could fly one in her sleep. It had definite possibilities.

"Everyone that doesn't have 'em should grab a gun on the way out. You'll need 'em. Base specs say there's a weapons store by the main security checkpoint."

Crichton looked down for Shiv - whom it seemed as a natural occurrence was at his side. Behind her the "Peacekeeper". Without preliminaries, she said,

"This is Thadon No'Halladan. He is Thantados, like myself. A Blade Mage." Crichton looked him over. He nodded at Shiv's Captain. The guy looked nothing like a Thantados.

"Helluva disguise." Thadon just nodded. "Gotta admire your persistence." Behind them it seemed as if the pulse shots were continuing. They weren't, for the moment, getting any closer.

"It got me here. It was a genetic modification and necessary. I have taken the catalyst to reverse the alteration, as it is no longer needed. It should take about three arns." Shiv nodded at that. She did not like his current appearance. Crichton looked back at Shiv.

"Nice to see you. You look good. Feel alright?" She gave him a short nod. "This the asshole who tried to kidnap you?" She blinked, silently admired his deductive reasoning, looked at Thadon. Crichton stopped, nodded to the armoury as they passed. John, Miriya and Stark went in. John took a moment to explain the particulars of Human ballistic weapons to them.

"Yes, to all." The slightest of smiles ghosted her lips. Thadon was watching them. He did not like her seeming-casual relationship to the pirate. She stood too close to him, her body language far too relaxed for his liking.

"Hey, Stark – still with us?" Crichton asked as Stark returned, a shiny Desert Eagle .50 calibre pistol in his hand. A nod and a smile from the Stykera. He seemed calmer and more self-possessed since his encounter with the Monitor. Every little bit helped. John had slung an SCAR-H combat rifle over his shoulder and jammed a Kimber-ICQB into his belt. Miriya was carrying a similar pistol and two HK MP5's. She handled them like a pro. That was both a nice thing and an annoyance about her, Crichton thought. She was a damn quick study.

Crichton nodded slightly to himself. This could work after all. Folks would soon be very angry with him, but The Plan was The Plan. He almost laughed out loud.

"Damn." Crichton told her, glancing quickly at Thadon and then back at her, and she did not miss it. He leaned in with a smile. "Smart women are seriously sexy."

"Where will this ship be?" Thadon asked pointedly, his dislike of what Crichton had said obvious. Jealousy from Thantados? Not typical then.

"Shiv – These boys are definitely Scorpius', and the tricky bastard's running a full Carrier. Intel was definitely wrong on complement." Ignoring Thadon. "Got a ton of ships and many more troops on the way." She nodded, finding herself oddly enough enjoying Thadon's discomfort. "This planet won't last two hours, simply because it'll go nuts, and do most of the damage to itself by itself."

"Understood. What can be done?"

"What's necessary." He said, his smile fading. She nodded, not knowing the particulars, but willing to follow his lead. Shiv turned her fire-eyes to Thadon.

"You will assist us," she told him.

"Of course."

"The Vengeance?" She asked.

"Hax and Cha are on it. She took some damage. He says ASAP. We'll see."

"This has been a very bad day, so far" Aeryn said behind him, John and Miriya behind her. She directed the next to Crichton. "Are you as confident as you're putting forth?"

"You'd better hope I am." A smirk for Shiv Aeryn did not see.

She sighed. "You're not helping." Crichton just shrugged. It was done so casually, with such utter indifference, she was honestly surprised by it. She simply couldn't read him, and that irritated her to no end. Time may walk on, but Crichtons didn't change that radically. Why then, she started to wonder to herself, did this one get under her skin so readily?

What troubled her more was how readily the Crichton behind her irritated her even more profoundly.

"Sure I am." A smirk. "He was warned." A thumb jerked to the man behind her.

Aeryn sent him a steely gaze.

"Are you gloating?"

"Hardly. Might when I win though. Haven't won yet."

"Will you?"

Crichton sent her a cold gaze.

"I'd better."

Behind them came Akanke's voice on the PA telling the base to surrender.

THEY WERE OUTSIDE just as the first Marauders dropped to the ground. Overhead, a dozen Prowlers tore across the sky. In the distance they could see approaching specks. Fighter planes.

They'll get slaughtered, Crichton thought to himself. He and his companions were inching along an outside wall when a Prowler suddenly detonated into a bright ball of orange, a Hellfire missile slamming into it from five miles away.

...Or maybe they'll give 'em a decent fight. Crichton amended. He wished them luck, and turned his attention back to saving his own hide. The roar of Marauders was deafening. They'd made it off the base and were pell-melling it on foot toward the surrounding forest when they were spotted. Shots chased them, followed by soldiers. Crichton knew the only edge he had currently was a still-living John and his functioning brain.

"Don't stop!" Crichton yelled. "That way!" He skidded to a stop as the rest raced past him. He fired a few shots to keep his pursuers interested. A moment later, he was diving for the ground as a fusillade answered him.

"Yeah, that's expected," he muttered to himself as pulse-made gravel rained down. He was up and running again, only a minute behind his companions. They'd made the trees. Crichton stopped again long enough to try and count his opposition. Frell. At least thirty on foot, and several vehicles dropped by the Heavy Marauders. Damn it. At least two klicks to go, and it was all frelling uphill.

Crichton caught up, brought them all to a quick halt. He pointed further up the treed slope.

"We're gonna split up. Shiv and I will move cross-slope and hope we can draw enough off you to get you to Relka 595 before they arrive in force." He saw Miriya, Aeryn, Shiv and Thadon all look in roughly the right direction. John was taking their word for it. Stark had slipped back into his customary anxious face. "With any luck at all, there'll be a ship there by the time we arrive."

"I am not leaving Shiv." Thadon insisted, and Crichton just shook his head.

"Guard them," Shiv ordered him.

"I have come a very long way..." he began to protest, but sudden pulse fire blazed at them, so intense they scattered. A solid beam sliced through tree and rock like they were made of paper. Crichton roared at them to run.

Dodging in and out of trees, slipping and climbing, they managed, barely, to keep ahead of the Peacekeepers. Hunkering down behind a large outcropping of boulders, Crichton sucked in heavy breaths and realized that not just Shiv had accompanied him – Aeryn Sun panted in a shadow not far away. Shiv looked no worse for wear, nor was she breathing heavy. Some days, Crichton mused, he was just a little jealous of that lady. He must have scowled or something because Aeryn wiped her face and told him,

"It wasn't my idea." She spat dust. "That was a Ventar Cannon, plasma-based. It's going to make things very tricky." They could hear footsteps clatter downslope. Crichton edged his eye up, took a quick look.

"Damn. At least a dozen down there." He contemplated, decided. "Shiv - we need at least some of these bastards off our backs, and running away from John and the others. If you and your new boyfriend wanna team up for it, I wouldn't say no." He rubbed a patch of raw skin on the back of his hand, a result of spillage from that cannon. Another close call. "Guns are just gonna give us away." He nodded behind them as ballistic gunfire rang out in the distance. "Case in point."

Shiv pulled two blades from her cuirass, fashioned them into wickedly pointed long daggers.

"I shall attempt to expedite matters." She disappeared, sliding into the shadows of the rocks. His comm chittered twice, and he knew by that signal that the Wing Fighter had found him and was on its way. That was the good news. Downslope, he heard Peacekeepers scream and shout, and knew Shiv was at work. He heard Aeryn adjust her position behind him. He glanced back at her. She was staring at him again. Shots were still shattering rocks and setting the odd tree ablaze. The Ventar Cannon tore up the slope a few motras from them.

"What?" he asked, tired of being stared at - "Say it already."

Aeryn blinked, unaware he'd noticed.

"I just wanted to say that..." she hesitated. It was one thing to say it in your head, but to have him a motra from you was something else. She amended what she was going to say, said instead, "...that I apologized to everyone on Moya. I tried to apologized to Talyn, but..."

"He's young yet." Nice cover.

"Pilot told me what you did for them..."

"I didn't do anything of relevance." He heard the clatter of feet approaching their temporary shelter. A glance showed him Stark and Miriya. In the distance, Thadon and Shiv escorted a limping John. She said nothing, he noticed, about apologizing to him. He certainly didn't expect one.

Aeryn tried a smile.

"I know what you did. It was a very Crichton thing to have done." Crichton blinked once, and his face hardened. Stark and Miriya dropped into the cover just as shots began to pepper the slope again.

"I would have thought the Crichton thing to have done was run away." He growled, standing and motioning them to follow him. Aeryn opened her mouth, shut it. Yes, the wrong tack to have taken with him. Crichton grabbed Miriya. "Go and swap places with Shiv, the rest of you follow me."

Without waiting, he broke from cover, sending a few shots downslope. Aeryn followed suit, Stark seemingly forgetting he had a gun. Shiv seemingly appeared at Crichton's side. His comm chittered again. The Wing Fighter was only a few hundred microts away. Behind them, the shots were getting closer and he heard John yell for them to "move it", and Crichton smirked to himself. The crunch of heavy vehicles got louder and a Marauder circled overhead. A few seconds later, it took two hits from what Crichton was sure was the Wing Fighter, and careened out of sight. There was no explosion. Behind them, Thadon grunted and fell, his shoulder smoking from a pulse blast. He scrambled back to his feet, only to be hit a second time. A tree behind him exploded from a round from a troop transport. Shiv glanced at Crichton and Thadon cursed.

"Get him," he told her, and swore he could see relief in her eyes. And annoyance, which made him grin to himself, and she fell back. Thadon was gonna find her one serious nut to crack.

Miriya took a shot in the arm, cursed, and killed the Peacekeeper who had shot her. Shots kicked up dirt all around her, but she managed – barely – to stay ahead of them. Next to her, John tried to grab her arm and force her to run, but she shook him off and yelled at him to get moving himself. They were losing ground to the others, behind by several motras easily. Crichton bounded over a large rock just a blast hit it, shattering it to pebbles, the shockwave kicking him to the ground and rolling him into a tree. Aeryn skidded to a halt beside him, just as the welcome site of the A101-Nimah roared overhead, an auto-cannon causing Peacekeepers to scatter for cover. One shot disabled the closest vehicle.

Crichton shook the fuzz from the impact he took and hauled himself to his feet.

"You fly one of those?" He asked her as the Nimah began to land.

"In my frelling sleep," she huffed at him, to his nod. He pushed her toward it, shoved Stark after her.

"Activation code 313 Nouka 313 – it's been modified with heavier engines, bigger cannon, weight's different." Aeryn nodded, and he waited as Aeryn and Stark ran on, and Shiv and a wounded Thadon caught up. "We'll repair him in the ship – go!"

About three meters to the rear, John and Miriya were running to catch up. He nodded once to himself, followed the rest. Shots began to explode around them as the realization that they might escape dawned on the Peacekeepers. Aeryn had the Nimah growling into launch and hovering just above the ground as Crichton hit the hatch. He turned in the hatchway, saw that John was in the lead, Miriya just behind, about a metre away. Plumes of dirt and rock were exploding everywhere, and shots were beginning to ricochet off the ship. Crichton frowned.

"A Crichton thing to have done," he muttered. John was almost in reach. Crichton smiled at him...

...and drove a heavy boot into John's chest, just as he'd reached the door. John was so surprised he didn't make a sound until he ploughed into an even-more-surprised Miriya close behind him, sending them both flying back.

He stepped inside, and the hatch slammed shut. He gestured at Shiv, who told Sun to take off – and unknowingly, Aeryn 'hit the accelerator' and they were knifing into the sky.

"All the bullshit and none of the perks." he growled.