Chapter 10

No Peace in the Silence

An arn later and John has Aeryn cooled, dressed in his shorts and a tank top, clean bandage tightly wrapped around her head. She is resting on the bunk above the soft covers. She's yet to stir, but she's no longer flushed and sweating. Her breathing isn't ragged and she appears to be in less pain, as if he can tell that when she can't even talk, can't tell him how she's feeling.

Gotta have a little hope in something.

It's so damn late, heading towards morning he's sure, but hell if he can sleep. He can't even sit for two seconds without his mind taking him in a thousand different directions; like a merry-go-round gone terribly wrong; the kind of ride that makes you nauseous and dizzy and not in a good way.

John hasn't left Aeryn's side. His hand is resting gently on her head, brushing back soft, dark wisps at her hair line with his fingers. God, he loves her more than anything.

He sighs and stands to stretch his back, if for no other reason than to get the blood flowing into his legs. He meanders out of their quarters and down the corridor towards first Jack and then D'Argo's room. They're both resting in their beds soundly sleeping. He palms the door open and walks in slowly without fear of waking either of his boys.

He stands over his eldest son's bunk, looking at his face, rubbing a thumb lightly under a cut on D's forehead. They've barely been back 4 arns and the boy looks like he's aged 5 years right before his eyes. He's not a boy any more, he's a man.

John quietly steps over to Jack's bunk and rests the back of his hand on his small son's cool cheek before brushing several pieces of blonde hair away from the boy's face.

Think I might try that idea Uncle Ralph used to spout about setting a damn brick on his head; see if I can keep him from growing any more.

He quietly turns to leave and follows his wandering thoughts a bit further down the corridor to Taly's quarters. She's not sleeping; he can see the soft light seeping from the grating on the door. However, he can hear her rustling around on the bunk and that satisfies him. At least he's sure she's actually there, though he's not sure if he's up to another "talk" with his daughter right now so he stays clear of her view.

He can't help but wonder as he walks back to his quarters, if it would have been this damn hard being a father and husband on earth.

"Of course it wouldn't have John, this is utterly insane. Your life is one big ball of insanity," He mumbles, kicking at the air.

But it also wouldn't be this amazing. He wouldn't have Aeryn by his side. And god does he need her. He wouldn't have these amazing kids. He wouldn't know anything beyond the smallness of that existence.

John Crichton, Human from Earth; that far away planet that no one has ever really heard of.

He can't imagine his life any other way. Screw that. He wouldn't trade any of it, not one second.

John wanders back in to their quarters to see Aeryn still out like a light on the bed. He watches her chest heave, up and down - up and down, as she breathes rhythmically. And he reclaims his perch beside her, resting his hand back on her forehead; as much to gauge her temperature as to gauge her existence, her presence.

He sighs and rests as much as his wired mind will let him. His body is begging for sleep, but his brain is demanding that he stay awake, focus all of his attention on her.

But that doesn't stop his mind from continuing to wander, thinking back to when he'd first landed out here. Back to when he'd first met Aeryn, the trip back to earth, losing her and finding himself, to D'Argo's birth and the beginning of their family.

Before he knows what's happening he is roughly slammed back against the bed, his head grazing the solid wall behind it with a loud thud on the way down.

"Shit!" he exclaims, reaching his hand towards the back of his head to feel for blood, but she catches it before it arrives at its destination.

Aeryn is straddling him, pinning him down; the strength of her body belying her slight weight.

"Whoa! Whoa there baby, it's just me. You're back. You're safe," John pleads, attempting to meet her frantic eyes.

Her breathing is heavy and her pupils are dilated. Confusion washes over her face as her movements become calmer. Regardless, recognition floods into her eyes and she lifts her hands to graze his face. The tables have flipped and it's her turn to confirm that he is really there, underneath her, alive and for the most part unharmed.

John grabs her hand with his and brings it to his mouth. He is so damn relieved to see her eyes open; he doesn't care if she kicks his ass straight out of the room.

"Well, this feels vaguely familiar, like a dream, from a long time ago," he smiles, rubbing her cool cheek with his thumb. "You gave me a hell of a damn scare there, wife."

Her posture relaxes and she slides off of him, resting her head against the softness of the bed, never letting her hand, or her eyes leave his face. She's rubbing his cheeks softly with her finger tips like she's trying to re-learn every inch of his skin.

"I don't know what happened. I thought you left," Aeryn whispers, fear evident in her voice as her reality mixes with heat induced dreams and long buried fears.

He lifts his head and kisses her gently on the lips. "No way, not a chance. I'm here, I'm right here. Doesn't matter what happened. You're okay, I'm okay, and we're back."

"Taly?" She questions.

She doesn't remember a single detail since they'd parted ways.

"She's right down the hall, ready for a good rumble." He chuckles with a smile. The relief is evident on his face, he's sure of it. He can't contain it and it feels like a drug. He feels high.

She smiles at him as her eyes flutter shut again. He leans up and kisses each of her eyelids, checking her bandage to make sure she's not bleeding again after the short burst of movement, and he lies down beside her.

His hand never leaves the softness of her hair and he finally allows his eyes to shut. She is going to be okay. It's all going to be okay and his mind can't deny his body any longer, it's fighting a losing battle.

He kicks his boots off, never moving from the bed, never opening his eyes, and let's sleep take over. Exhaustion mixed with the natural high is a potent combination and before he can process another thought he is lost deep in slumber. Dreams of color, light, and movement take him away from everything that has just happened. And they bring with them for a while, just a little while, peace.

- -

She wakes with a start, head pounding and heart thumping. She can't catch her breath and everything is a blur.

"Frell," Aeryn mumbles as she rubs at her aching head, abruptly grazing over the area of the gash before remembering why it is exactly that her head hurts so badly.

She slowly lies back down, trying not to aggravate the wound any more than she already has.

What a frelling brutal two solar days this had been. She can't decide if she is still suffering effects of the heat, of that frelling planet, or if she's just entirely frustrated at the situation as a whole; at the way her body familiarly reacted to the mixture of elements and exertion. She stairs at the golden ceiling of the quarters and grits her teeth in anger as memories of how exactly she ended up in this condition come trickling back.

Failure and weakness.

Her body is a machine, well trained and well honed. It has rarely let her down. If she can't depend on it then she is frelled; a realization that again stood to shake the very foundation of all of her confidence. The fact that it was something as natural as heat delirium that had brought on the comatose condition offers her little solace.

She rustles on the bed, turning to face John.

She remembers waking early, remembers the fear that coursed through her veins like a foreign substance freezing her insides.

Confusion.

Nightmares.

Pain.

It seems almost too good to be true, the fact that he is sleeping soundly beside her. He is still fully clothed, his hair matted to his head with sweat. There are smears of dried blood on his face and hands and there are traces of dirt on his forehead, his entire body it would appear.

She looks down at herself, fresh clothing and clean limbs and realizes that he must have cleaned her up, neglecting himself in the process.

Typical of him.

The concept of someone or something else coming before himself being one of the pillars of holding up everything he stands on.

It is still a strange feeling, even after all this time, that realization that she comes first to him and that he comes first to her.

Aeryn reaches over and rubs his cheek and he rustles slightly. Lines of exhaustion under his eyes, she's almost certain that he had been awake since they'd left for the planet.

She kisses him softly, a feather-light touch, as she considers what to do next. Thirst eventually prompts her movement and she crawls over John and out of the bed. She licks dry lips, frowns at the signs of her body's dehydration.

She's so thirsty and her lips are dry and cracked as she licks at them. She still doesn't feel entirely steady on her feet and she has to clutch the edge of the bed in order to keep herself from falling. She quickly dresses, clean black shirt and leather pants, and pulls her hair back with a tie as she wanders out of their quarters and towards her boys.

D'Argo is still sleeping deeply. Her mind wanders back to the situation he has just been through, what he has just accomplished.

He is a man, and he is going to be okay.

Jack isn't in his bed and she's not sure what time it is, how many arns she's been sleeping.

Her daughter; her daughter is finally back and she has no idea what to think, what to do.

Aeryn slowly, cautiously, wanders down the corridor and to the girl's quarters. She needs to see her, needs to look at her face. Needs to make sure this is real, not just another gut wrenching dream.

- -

Full Circle

Aeryn stands rigid outside the grated doors; finally finding the perfect spot to quietly settle out of her daughters sight but still able to see her clearly. She leans her body close against the hard bulkhead to her right, letting Moya's lining cool her forehead and her exposed skin.

Why is it so hot in here?

She is burning hot, so frelling hot, yet it isn't the environment that's causing the problem; it's her reaction to the girl; the girl who was gradually growing into a woman.

She was only a baby the last time Aeryn had seen her; a small child, all innocence and play. Small enough for Aeryn to hold the girl close to her chest, yet old enough for Taly to begin talking and hugging her mother back.

How the frell is this even possible?

She can't take her eyes off the bunk where the girl sits; they are glued to her, mesmerized. The girl is so much her father and so much…well, her.

Her daughter sighs, annoyed at the confines of her current situation, and blows a strand of loose hair from her face with the side of her mouth. Sandy blond hair pulled back tightly with a standard issue Peacekeeper hair tie, tendrils falling and softly sweeping the sides of her face. The gesture is a visible sign of her growing impatience that appears to be quickly leading to frustration.

She still has the same piercing blue eyes she had as a child, the same eyes of her father. They are sharp and unending, deep like a great body of water.

The blue reminds Aeryn of John's earth.

Something she'd always loved about him she now sees so clearly in their offspring.

The girl is tall and thin, like her body has decided to grow up before it has a chance to grow out and catch up with itself. Yet she is muscular from years of training as a Peacekeeper cadet. Hard, almost cruel training that Aeryn is all too familiar with. Training that has a way of turning small children into rigid, lean fighters. Taly's face still holds soft, fine features - so much of John, so much of herself.

Her daughter - she still can't wrap her mind around that glaringly overwhelming concept. Has her mouth, her cheek bones, and a few freckles spotted on her nose and forehead. Still in the process of growing, her leathers hang loosely on her chest and her hips, waiting to be filled out

Taly picks up a small, silver trinket that John had set at the foot of the bunk before the concept of her occupying it had even entered their mind. It is something from the girl's childhood that they were unwilling to let go of, unwilling to put away. A chapter of their life that they had left opened until they could continue it.

They had never lost the hope that they would be able to continue it, make it right. The trinket is a child's toy, something common and replaceable, yet she looks at it with a sense of wonder. Something that should have been so familiar to her, yet it is as foreign as a Luxan in water. The girl turns the small child's puzzle in her fingers gingerly and sets it down as if touching it will contaminate her.

She takes another quick look around her quarters and finally the dam of emotion breaks.

In the seeming privacy of the room, the girl doesn't even try to hide her confusion and fear. Small fists wipe at large tears, a dripping nose, tired eyes. She continues on like this for some time before finally giving up and lying back on the bunk due to sheer exhaustion. All Aeryn can think of is holding her, comforting her child the way she should have been able to all along.

Before she even has a chance to reign in her unhinging emotions, her own tears are wetting her face.

So much guilt; there is so much guilt waiting to come to the surface.

So much missed time, so much to make up for. So much that they can't change and so much that they'll never know.

These are feelings that she can't remember having dealt with in a very long time, if ever.

This is her child, part of her and part of John. A product of their love, a concept that used to be so frelling foreign to her, something she couldn't even wrap her mind around; didn't want to wrap her mind around. And then she held D'Argo in her arms for the first time and couldn't imagine her life any other way. Any hope of going back to the way things were before were lost at that point.

They are more than a part of her.

They are her.

This girl is her, and yet she doesn't even know the child. She hastily wipes at her cheek before deciding to just let the tears fall; fall into nothing because that's what she feels like doing. She has never, in all of her cycles, shied away from a task, a challenge. She is a soldier. But this task, this emotional task, it seems almost overwhelming to her.

She feels a soft brush on her bare shoulder, a sweeping dance of rough fingers and gentle touch.

"S'okay baby; Things are gonna get better from here. The hard part's over. We've got her- back and we won't let her go for a long time," her husband whispers in her ear, quite aware of her position as spy. He softly kisses her temple and she rests her hand on top of his as it sits on her shoulder.

She leans into him, relying on his strength, something she rarely feels the need to do, but this is bigger than even her. She shakes her head slightly, making her uncertainty known, and lets the tears continue to softly fall, cooling her cheeks. It's not okay. None of this is okay. It would take a long time before any of this could possibly be okay.