Summary: What happens when Andromeda gets the proverbial baby left on the doorstep?
Codes: None
Disclaimer: Tribune owns all rights to Andromeda. All I did was borrow it for use in my twisted little tale.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: None
Setting: It diverges from the show between IP and TATEOTL.
Feedback: Please! I love praise and constructive criticism, but flames will be used for a light source during power failures.
Archive: Ask first and I'll probably say yes.
Author's Note: In order to give credit where credit is due, this was inspired, in part, by a scene from Andromeda and two fanfics. The scene is from the beginning of "Dance of the Mayflies", where Rommie is helping the one, apparently alone child. Of the two fanfics, the first is Cassie Valentine's Unexpected Joys, an Andromeda piece, and the second is J.A. Toner's Fostering, a Star Trek: Voyager piece. I found these two extremely interesting, and they fueled the idea, to a degree. The rest of it was me operating on a couple quarts of Kool-Aid.
Author's Note 2: This is my first stab writing in the third-person omniscient point of view, so it may be a tad awkward. If you have any suggestions as to how I can make it easier on myself and, by extension, you, please send them in, by all means!
The Child
Chapter One: Carmen
By B.L.A. the Mouse
Nobody expected Carmen to arrive on that particular day. In point of fact, nobody expected anyone named Carmen to arrive on any day at all. That's probably part of the reason she did.
One more thing to consider would be that one runs around the known worlds assisting people, one should expect the occasional backlash resulting from your gratitude. In other words, one should wait for your good deed to get punished. Unfortunately, nobody aboard did that. That's the rest of the reason.
In the crew's defense, it was an overall normal day, which would explain why nothing was anticipated. Dylan and Rommie were in his office, fine-tuning the final details of an agreement with the system they were in, over the comm. Beka and Tyr were trading barbs on the Command deck, Harper was playing with a new toy in one of the machine shops, and Trance was tending to her plants. As said, a regular day.
The first sign of anything unusual was Andromeda picking up an in-system distress signal. It was the usual "oh, crap, help me," message, audio only, a few hours old. The next was Beka announcing shipwide, "Okay, people, we just got a distress signal. You know the drill. Trance, Harper, both of you get to the hanger. The Starlight's requesting medical and technical assistance. We'll be there in half an hour."
By the time they arrived at the location of the other ship, Trance, Harper, Dylan, and Tyr had assembled at the hanger bay, while Rommie readied Med deck. Beka, still in Command, authorized opening the hanger doors, and a small one- or two-man craft landed. It appeared to be in decent shape, except for a dent in the starboard side big enough to disrupt any systems running through that section.
The hatch opened and a ramp descended to the deck below. Smoke billowed out of the opening, thick and dark, heralding the exit of the ship's sole occupant.
The woman was coughing heavily, probably from the smoke, and limping, favoring her left leg. When she looked up, they could see her face more clearly. She was young, early twenties easily, with a caramel complexion and hair streaked an improbable blond and black. It wasn't her looks that caught her attention, though; it was her extremely distended and very pregnant abdomen. "Hi," she gasped, in obvious pain, "I'm Carmen. My ship needs an engineer, and I need a doctor and a delivery room. Right now."