Hey all, probs forgot to mention Trance may be a bit OOC, same as Harper. Also, definitely AU from here out.
As always not mine, just wish it was. I hope you've watched the series 'cause there are quotes and references you won't get if you're coming in cold turkey.
Also to the lovely reviews thank you very much, as to the soul sucker, if you've seen the later seasons of Andromeda, the black hole they got stuck in has an avatar who wanted Dylan to stay with her, I just changed it so she fixated on Harry instead of Dylan, as mentioned in this chappie.
May your salt be stocked, and iron on hand, your holy oil full and your holy water in shot glasses. – Blessing of the Hunters
Enjoy the story!
Long Lived Promises
Chap 2
Reunion
It had been over a year now that Grimm had left and Trance had joined the crew, and while Harper adored his purple friend, he missed Grimm with a fierceness that sometimes stole his breath. The only person he could count on to never leave him had left, though through no fault of their own, but still at nights when Harper couldn't fix things or keep his mind busy, then crept in the thoughts of Grimm, leaving Harper depressed til the next engineering emergency arose. Luckily, this was the Eureka Maru, captained by Beka Valentine, emergencies happened all the time. They had just pulled into another drift, Beka had heard about a huge job going, and they needed the work. A few hours later, after insulting Gerentex and his heritage, Harper had a list of equipment needed to pull off the job.
"Harper, he will be free soon, by the time we complete this job your voice will be back."
"Whoa, Trance you can't just say something like that and then walk off. When, where, how long til he's back?" Seamus yelled after her.
"Who's back?" Seamus spun around to see Beka behind him, "Boss, oh that, just an old friend of mine and Trance, he's apparently going to pay us a visit after this job. Anyway here is the list of stuff we need, most we can pick up here, but if we are going up against a black hole I'll a specialise piece of equipment from the next drift, then we'll be all set to go our salvage."
"Okay, then let's get this done." Beka swirled around and headed for the cockpit, leaving Seamus to chant softly in his head, 'he's coming back, he's coming back.'
About a week later the Eureka Maru arrived at the Hephaistos's black hole. The crew set up and got to work, after combing the area for hours, Harper finally spotted the Andromeda Ascendant, on a course that would eventually free them in a few years. Needless to say, their employer was very happy. The buckey cables were fired and attached, and the Andromeda was slowly freed, but not without danger, three of the cables had snapped and it seemed at one point that the mission would fail, until Harper's roman candle gave the engine that extra burst to get it done. Down in the air lock, Beka was attempting to ensure her crew was as paranoid as her about their suits, mentioning Vexpac as an example.
Entering the ship the smell of burnt carbon and blood hung in the air, giving the ship an unwelcoming feeling. Setting up in the bay, Harper jacked into the computers, in awe of the connectivity surrounding him. He came back to himself and with a flourish opened the doors. "I give you, the Andromeda Ascendant."
"You have control of the ship?" Beka asked.
Seamus looked back at her sheepishly, "Nah, but I've got all the doors. If anyone could find some control schematics, it would really help." With that Harper went back to his computers, while Trance and Rev Bem went off in search of the schematics.
Backup on the command deck, Dylan was lamenting the loss of everything he had ever known, when Andromeda picked up on the intruders. "Dylan, we've been boarded, as far as I can tell there are 5 of them." The pictures of the Eureka Maru's crew and their temporary employer came up on the screen. "Dylan, my sensors are down over most of the ship. I know there is another life form on board but I can't find them."
"Well, in that case, I better go introduce myself." Dylan headed down to the armoury to equip himself before going to confront the intruders.
Meanwhile, with Harry,
Harry came back to himself with a shock, after fighting the avatar of the black hole for so long, is was confusing to be all together in his body and free of the draining influence. Cursing the moment, the avatar found him more interesting than the Captain, Harry set about ensuring everything was working, arms, legs, magic, eyes. Thank Merlin he had gotten his eyes fixed before he joined the commonwealth, glasses were just so retro these days, not to mention dangerous in his line of profession. "Okay, time to see what wrong with the ship." Harry muttered to himself, with the lights flickering and no Andromeda hologram showing up, something was definitely wrong, and if they were still in the proximity of the black hole, well, disaster waiting to happen. Harry could sense Shay down in the bay, but figured an abandoned ship in the middle of nowhere? What could go wrong. He'd meet up with him later, first priority, was to fix the engines. Some days, it was good to be a wizard, few high powered reparos, and the engine would either go like a dream or blow up. Hopefully, today wasn't a blow up kind of day, after all surely the universe owed him one by now.
Dylan had encountered Harper going through the schematics, the news the engineer had given him was like a Nietzschean punching him in the gut. The commonwealth was gone, Andromeda and him were the only ones left. 300 years, Nietzschean treachery and Magog barbarity had brought the tri galaxy commonwealth to its knees, before quickly snuffing it out. Well, the hell with that. He was Captain Dylan Hunt, commander of the Andromeda Ascendant, ex-Argosy forces, a member of the High Guard and a Tarn-Vedren, the commonwealth may fall, but it will not stay down. It was a dream, a beautiful idea, and they could not be killed. Captain Dylan Hunt and the Andromeda Ascendant would bring back the Commonwealth. After captain's passion filled speech, Gerentex revealed his cargo, mercenaries, not just any mercenaries but one led by a Nietzshchean. It was almost too much for Dylan, after all it seemed like only an hour ago that his best friend, his second in command had betrayed him. No, it wasn't going to stop him, he would take back his ship!
Dylan set out, trusty force lance in hand, at first it was easy, the first mercenary stood no chance against an Argosy trained High guard, but the second, well "I hate cyborgs." Dylan picked himself off the ground, it was embarrassing, he was black ops and a heavy worlder, but the cyborg still got a few kicks in of her own before she crashed into the wall and temporarily fried her systems. Dylan looked up, the other female was at the top of the ramp, he chased her to the ladder before admitting defeat, and very quietly that he might be a touch out of shape.
Down in engineering, Harry had managed to repair most of Andromeda's systems, but left them unconnected for the moment. He didn't need Harper and his friends tracking him down just yet. He was just finishing of the final touches on the next lot of systems when he felt it, like a punch in the gut, but no one was there. He quickly checked in on Shay, his mind was filled with anger and sorrow, when Harry reached for Trance there was something blocking the connection, similar to when Trance had met Seamus, Harry should be able to reach her on the ship. Trance was either no longer on the ship or she was…she was dead. The thought hit Harry like a knife to the heart, before his mind kicked in and realised this was Trance, he was the Master of Death, and they were unbeatable. Harry left off what he was doing and tapped into Andromeda's security feeds, watching the android take Trance's body to medbay. Harry quickly made his way up to the medbay, his green eyes shining like the curse that had made him famous. Someone had hurt his sister, and they were going to pay.
Harper's plans of revenge had been talked down, and he was dragged off to the Maru to finish up his work. Beka and Rev set to work making sure that when the ship was up and running, it would be ready for them to upload some new tricks, Gerentex wasn't getting his hands on the Andromeda after this. Harper sat down in the pilot's seat and jacked into the computer, using it to take him into the Andromeda's mainframe. The interconnectivity in there was unbelievable, why would a ship need these many connectivity nodes, and the connections between systems didn't make sense until, "Welcome to my mind. Now go HOME." Harper looked up; the screens were filled with the face of the beautiful AI, the comm systems filled with a static screeching noise, the airlock controls blinked on and off. "That is the Andromeda Ascendant, and she is pissed!" Harper helpfully informed Gerentex. Gerentex overcome by his innateness pettiness, which drove him to shove Harper out of the way and take over the Maru's controls. As he pushed the Andromeda backed towards the black hole, he explained away his cold blooded murder of 8 people as "If I can't have the Andromeda, than no one can."
Down on the Andromeda, Beka and the others realised their plight when the ship lurched and began to move back from it came, as they ran through ideas to save themselves, trying to make Tyr see sense, they were given help from an unexpected source.
Harry finally made his way to the medbay, where the purple lifeless body of one of his oldest and closest friends lay. The sensors in medbay were one of the things Harry hadn't gotten around to fixing; they were blinking on and off monitoring only half the room. Harry walked up to Trance's body and in a loud voice said, "Trance Gemini Potter! Get your lazy arse up before I hit you with an augamenti!" Before Harry had finished speaking Trance was scrambling to sit up, intent on not getting wet. "That's horrible, I haven't seen you in 400 years and that's the first thing you say Harry?" Harry smirked, "What did you want me to say, you were dead. Now who killed you and how slow can I kill them?" "You haven't changed at all have you Harry?" "Nope, listen we'll catch up later there is one more thing I have to fix before we can say we're safe. Now Dylan's headed down here, you can trust him, but you already knew that didn't you? I'll see you on the bridge." With that Harry disappeared down the corridor, if they wanted to survive, he'd have to fix the launch system for the Nova bombs, and quickly too.
Dylan walked into the room holding Beka, Rev and Tyr, letting them know that the stasis pods would never work, and that if they wanted to survive they would have to work with Dylan and do exactly as he said. Taking that as her cue, Trance stepped out into full view. Trance's rise from the dead and her subsequent support of Dylan, had the rest of the survivors quickly hearing out Dylan's plan to make it out alive. The absurdity of the idea seemed almost too much, therefore it had to work; at least that's what they hoped. While Harry was finishing up on the Nova deployment systems, the rag tag team headed to the bridge to put the audacious plan into action. Dylan authorised the Nova deployment, "let's bring it."
"Acting first officer Beka Valentine Nova deployment authorised zero zero strike red zero."
"Acting Arms master Trance Gemini Nova deployment authorised retro nine blue strike five nine five." Alarms started going off at Trance's station, "Dylan, she's blocked out of the system, my codes won't accept an acting arms master for some reason" Andromeda relayed. A dark laugh came from the hallway, "Probably because you still have the original Arms Master on board hey 'Dromeda?" All the bridge crew turned in surprise at the young man standing in the shadows at the door. "What how who are you" came the cries from all except Trance. "Arms, weaponry and engineering master Harry Potter reporting for duty, captain. Andromeda, Arms and Engineering Master Harry J Potter, Nova deployment authorised Break alpha whiskey whiskey whiskey. Your turn I believe Kodiak." Tyr shook himself from his shock and entered his code as firing control officer and armed the 40 devices. "Captain Dylan Hunt commanding officer Nova deployment authorisation ten break alpha strike strike strike. Missiles tubes 1 through 10, fire! Second salvo, fire. Third salvo, fire. Fourth salvo, fire." Tyr reported that all missiles were away, as the crew turned their gazes to Harry, he gestured to the systems and said "'Dromeda, I've got all sensors working both external and internal you just have to activate them, also, the engines are delicate but they'll work, just enough to get us out of the lovely predicament we're in." As Dylan turned to face him, "Dylan mate, I'll explain everything later, I think we should be currently running for our lives right now." The crew turned to face the screen, the newly formed white hole growing on their view screen. The shockwaves hit and everyone was flung around, the worst past quickly but it was still a one in a life time ride, as in I never ever ever want to go through that again, ever in my life. They rode out the waves and when the gravitational force reversed they slammed down on the accelerator, giving the engines all they had and them some in their desperate bid not to be sucked in again. When everything finally settled down, Harry looked around, before spinning on Trance. In a sing song voice, that once meant death for all who heard it, especially for Death Eaters, Harry asked, "Where's Shay?" Trance looked decidedly nervous before telling Harry that Shay was on the Maru. It was then that Beka broke in with, "Gerentex he stole my Ship! We have to go get it!" Dylan looked bemused at her order. "Let me get this right, you break into my ship, try to take my ship away from me, then I save all your lives and now you want me to help you get your ship back?" He looked incredulous at the idea. Trance with a wide grin informed Dylan that Beka was like that, Dylan's good guy persona hit him and with a defeated sigh agreed in returned of a unnamed favour, to be discussed later. Beka wasn't keen but it was her ship on the line so she agreed. Tracking the particle trail that Harper had left, they quickly found and apprehended Gerentex and what was left of his body guards. When Beka was all set to leave, Dylan reminded her of his favour. Ten minutes of their time, and then they were free to go.
Dylan finally cornered Harry on the bridge where the Arms Master was keeping watch. "Harry, where have you been this whole time? The ship was taken over and Rommie and I were the only high guard left and then you came out of nowhere, seeming to know Trance?" With a sad smile, Harry told Dylan about being stuck in engineering trying to make sure the ship didn't explode and fix the sensors, and then having to fix the Nova deployment so that the bombs would actually load and launch, before making his way up to the bridge. As for Trance well, as Dylan knew Harry was 100% human, and obviously neither was Trance, suffice to say Trance was older than she looked, and had known Harry almost his whole life. They had to leave it there as it was time to meet the others on the obs deck.
Harry hung back when they reached the observation deck, hiding in the shadows as Dylan laid out his request for a crew for the adventure of a lifetime in trying to restore the Commonwealth. Beka looked at her crew undecided, when Trance spoke up, "It's your decision Beka, but Harper and I will be staying. This is where we belong, our family is here." Everyone, including Harper turned to look at Trance, disbelief clear on all their faces, but Trance had her eyes firmly fixed on the door. Once again a dark chuckle interrupted them.
"Hello Luna."
"Hello big brother"
At this exchange everyone stared back and forth behind the only other commonwealth officer and the bewitching purple alien. "Harper," Trance spoke, "I'd like you to meet someone. This is my brother, Harry, he is you great great great great to the two hundredth god father, you might know him as Grimm." At this introduction Harry walked forward to stand in front of Harper. "Hello Shay, it's good to finally meet you face to face. Thank you for coming to save me." At Harry's words Harper's face cycled through emotions so fast it was hard to say what he was feeling, in the end after just staring at Harry for a minute he just hugged Harry. When harry lifted his arms to return the embrace, Harper sagged leting go of all his worries and fears, with just one phrase repeating in his mind, "He's here."
After a minute or so, both Dylan and Beka, cleared their throats, before demanding an explanation. Trance spoke up once again. "A long time ago, I was bored, and I decided to travel. I found myself on Earth, and was enrolled in a specialised school. This is where I meet Harry, He protected me when those who were supposed to be my friend abandoned me. We became close and then three years later I went to war with him. We became very close and my adopted father died, so Harry adopted my as his sister, so I would be protected by my position in society if he didn't make it. However due to the intervention of the Nargles, Harry won the war. We fell in love, married our sweethearts, but eventually the truth came out, while all our friends grew old and eventually died Harry and I remained the same, as neither of us were human. While I left after everyone we knew died, Harry remained. He had made a promise to his older sister to watch over her family. He didn't realise it at the time, but he had bound himself to her family, all the children and grandchildren. Any one descended from 'Mione was linked to Harry. He felt all of them, when they were born and when they died, eventually the continued death grew too much and in the hope that distance would lessen the pain, Harry joined the Commonwealth. The bond though was too strong and manifested as The Voice, as he became known. I'll Harper explain from here."
At his name Harper perked up, having been staring at Grimm, throughout the explanation. "He is our inheritance. A legend handed down through the ages for as long as any one knows. We always called him The Voice, because that's what he was, a voice in the back of our heads, taking care of us. I don't know how it used to work, but when I was on earth, the voice was present in the oldest's head. He was in my cousins head, until my cousin didn't listen and died in an ambush on Earth. The next morning I woke up, knowing I was now the eldest, because Grimm was in my head. For a long time I ignored him, blaming him for the death of my family. Then he apologised and I realised that my cousin could ignore him like I had been doing. After that we always talked, for hours sometimes. He's the reason I left Earth, he is the reason I'm still sane, though I know Beka would say that's debatable."
After two hearfelt speeches like that, Beka knew her crew wouldn't be the same if she tried to force the issue and leave. "I'm not saluting you and I'm not calling you Captain."
"Dylan, Dylan will be fine." Dylan turned his attention form the Maru's crew to the lone Nietzschean in the corner. "If we're going to restore the Commonwealth, we're going have to restore it for everyone."
"He'll join." Everyone looked at Harry at that statement. He shrugged, "It's true. He's a Kodiak, one of the last I believe, they were always the best of the clans. That's why I selected them as the guardians. They took after me, they embodied my Slytherin traits as well as my Gryffindor traits, ambitious but honourable, cunning but brave. The Kodiaks always had purpose, it's part of their genetics, they can only reach their full potential when they have a cause or a purpose, it doesn't matter what it is. It's why when they were never attacked before, because if you left anyone alive, their cause would empower them, give them a physical and mental boost they would make them undefeatable."
Tyr scowled at Harry, the one who gave all his secrets away. "It is as the Standard says, I will join you, I believe you to be a fool, but your cause is noble."
And with that, the Andromeda Ascendent and Captain Dylan Hunt, once more had a crew, and they would bring back the Commonwealth, or at least as sure as hell shake up the Tri-Galaxy.
Woot, finished another chapter. Yes they will be ages in between updates 'cause I work 10 hour days and spend my days off catching up on sleep. (Translation= I'm very very lazy and my muse runs away for weeks at a time to the coast where I can't afford to go) Next chapter Interlude! Find out about Harry joining the commonwealth or maybe I'll just skip to chappie 3 where Rommie finally comes into her own.