Andromeda is copyright of Tribune Entertainment. My use is in no way meant to challenge their copyrights. This piece is not intended for any profit on the part of the writer, nor is it meant to detract from the commercial viability of the aforementioned (or any other) copyright. Any similarity to any events or persons, either real or fictional, is unintended.
Wish Upon a Star
by
Nevermore
Trance looked around her quarters carefully, hoping that there was no sign of any listening devices that Andromeda might use to monitor the safety of her crew. Sometimes, Trance dared not go to sleep, for fear that she might mumble something as she slumbered, and give something away. It was imperative that she never reveal her true nature. No one on the ship was ready for that yet. Indeed, she wondered whether they would ever be ready. How does one tell another that she's a magical creature? How would the crew ever believe her if ever did say anything? She had already been with them for so long that they accepted her as just another common life form. If only my father could get a load of that, she pondered for a moment, enjoying the delight the thought gave her. Actually mixing with outsiders. Oh, the scandal of it all.
Trance grinned broadly as she skipped across her quarters to a small plant on the windowsill. She knew the plant would not get as much light as it would under the artificial growth-stimulation lights in the hydroponics bay, but in her quarters it would be close to her. Rather than light, it could feed off of her life force. "Are you feeling better, Spock?" she asked, stroking the brown edges of a small leaf. She herself wondered at the name she had chosen for this tiny rhododendron. Something about the name sounded right, though. It just seemed like there should be a 'Spock' on a starship that was navigating through unknown territory.
Sometimes Trance marveled at the fact that no one had gotten more curious about her. In fact, the first time she had set foot on Andromeda she had ended up getting shot dead. No one had batted an eyelash, though. Luckily for her, everyone attributed her amazing recovery to the superiority of Andromeda's medical technology. Then, later on, had come her unlikely selection of the one-in-an-over-500 shot in picking the penal colony that had received Dylan and Rommie. She almost had some explaining to do that time, but wiggled out of it. The only one that had ever really asked about her past was Harper, but he seemed almost more curious for curiosity's sake than because of any deep suspicions.
Overall, Trance found the crew to be everything she had foreseen they would be. There was an incredible amount of strength and potential, it only needed to be kept intact and directed slightly. That is what her master had wished, even if he had not been aware that he did so. Her instructions had been to rebuild the Commonwealth, and she had selected Dylan as the vehicle of her achievement. Eventually, she knew, Dylan would get more successes than failures. He would build up inertia in his cause, and then the time would come for her to quietly step to the side and let history take its course. Her kind guided history, but never received even second-fiddle billing for their roles.
What a perfect man for the job, she thought, absently raising her arms across her chest, hugging herself comfortably, wishing for only the briefest of moments that it was Dylan's arms that embraced her. Silly thoughts, she reminded herself, disappointed in her infatuation for the commoner. Somehow, she did not find the thought of her father's anger over that transgression to be quite as amusing. Running amok with outsiders was one thing, becoming romantically involved with them was quite another. She knew better than to push her luck. Still, though, she had to admire the Highguard captain. He was a man of principle, a true anachronism in the dark times. She knew in her heart that, without her, Dylan would likely get himself, and his cause, destroyed before he allowed his vision to be compromised. That was why she was there. She would see to it that he never needed to compromise, and that he would never be destroyed.
Of course, he would never know. Neither would anyone else. Those thoughts made her somewhat lonely. Still, she knew, if Dylan was to build the reputation and following that he needed, he would have to appear to be brave and invincible. It had to be Dylan Hunt that people feared, and not the purple girl with the spooky tail. As the last Highguard officer in the universe, Dylan Hunt alone could command the respect needed to give the Commonwealth rebirth.
She would make it happen. Ten years ago, a small boy on Earth had read a story about the old Commonwealth, and made a wish upon a star that peace and justice would return and banish the night. Trance had been on that star looking back at the boy as he spoke, and she had heard the wish. She was a genie, and her new master had spoken. That boy would never know that it was his wish, made so long ago, that helped recreate the Commonwealth. Likewise, no one would know that it was Trance, the apparently insignificant ship's gardener, that answered the wish. In the end, though, none of that mattered. All that did matter was that the Commonwealth would, in fact, live again. Trance would never allow a child's selfless wish to go unanswered.