Disclaimer: I do not own Farscape, DK, Jack, John, etc.
Author's Note: I've actually had this one for a while. I'm going to post both chapters tonight since they're both kind of short, and that'll be it for the story. This is probably the second fic I've finished that's not a one-shot. Kind of sad, since the other one sucks, and it's not even on this account.
"Canaveral, this is Farscape I, I am free and flying. Are you with me there, mama bear?"
DK let himself smile giddily as he primed the data tracking software. "Oh yeah, Farscape," he replied, sending a glance to Jack, "I'm reading you loud and clear."
"Authorizing flight computer to initiate acceleration sequencing... now."
He began the software. "Roger. Farscape, you are a go for insertion procedure."
DK's eyes almost lit up as the Farscape project took off. This was it, his and John's hard work finally paying off. "Approaching maximum velocity in 21 seconds," John reported.
He scanned the computer screen, watching both the video and the data. "
18 seconds. Entering critical apagy phase." DK could see his own butterfly excitement reflected in Jack's as they watched the screen.
Wait a second. DK's smile faded. "Farscape I, hold a moment," he said as he stood up suddenly. Something was spiking in the data, something that wasn't supposed to be spiking.
"Hold? Canaveral, what?"
He was intensely worried. This wasn't supposed to happen. "We're picking up some kind of electromagnetic wave." He glanced back at Jack's worried face which proved to him the sudden risk. "Repeat, some kind of wave. John, do you read me?"
"Yeah, I read you." His voice started crackling.
"Abort, John, abort!" DK said loudly, suddenly realizing there was no other way for John to get out of it. That wave was big enough to fry the Farscape module beyond repair, never mind the person inside of it.
A crackled voice was the reply.
"John, you have to abort!" Jack cut in loudly, leaning closer to the mic than required. "Abort now!"
The way he said this was confirmation - if he didn't abort, DK's lifelong friend would be incinerated. Suddenly his heart started pounding.
The data on the screen spiked. It bent and rolled and swirled and none of it was good. The lines on a graph in the corner colored its entire window. The sound coming from the communications speaker garbled and churned loudly.
Then it was quiet. The lines grew straight. The software recorded nothing. The silence was worse than the steady drone of a hospital machine.
Jack and DK stared at the screen.
"John?" DK called again, stuttering. Jack's eyes dropped, glazed over. "John, do you read me?" His dead calls rung through the silent lab. All technicians turned either to the screen or to him and Jack. "John!" His cries grew desperate and unprofessional. "John Chrighton, come in! John!"
DK felt his eyes tear up. Jack turned away and walked calmly from the room, but DK would not. "John!" he shouted, as though he could shout through to the reaches of space. "John!"
This was two years ago.
By now DK knew that his friend was dead. John Chrighton had died. Not even his module could have survived that... that.
At least, DK said that he knew it. He said that he accepted his best friend's death. But, if he were to be perfectly honest with himself, he would realize that a little bit of him still, after all this time, had hope for John's survival.
He had even kept the communicator. It was broken - something on that wave just messed up the thing - but it was the last connection he had to his friend. His last memory of John's voice. He had set it aside on his desk and soon it became a dust-collecting piece of furniture, a permanent fixture on his desk. Only once in a while would he finger it and think about the day his friend died.
But one day it crackled faintly.
DK was on his computer, checking his email aimlessly, when he heard it. The sound was soft and, at first, he couldn't find the source. He looked around the entire room, behind blinds, under the rug, between the cushions of the chair, but finally locked his eyes on the communicator.
The crackling grew a little louder. He heard an unintelligible voice speak from it. Slowly he picked up the little black device from its place on the desk and blew the dust away.
"Canaveral, this is Farscape I," it called faintly.
DK blinked. It couldn't have just -
"I'm okay, repeat, I'm... okay."
Was that John's voice?
"Hey, did you guys get video through all that?" it asked laughingly through thick static. DK held the communicator closer. "Canaveral?"
"J-John?" DK said softly. He fumbled for some kind of switch.
"DK?" it called uncertainly. "Dad?" That can't be John... can it?
"John?... but you're dead..." DK whispered.
"Where are you guys?" The static rose in volume a little, and DK held the device closer. "Where's..."
Silence. He gripped the communicator tightly. "John! What is it?" he called deliriously in a slightly louder voice.
"...Earth?" he finished.
DK let out a breath he didn't know he had. John's voice let out a startled yelp.
"What the hell..?" it wondered.
"What's happening?" DK questioned the communicator.
"Uh... Canaveral?" he called again.
Can John hear me? Can I talk to him? The world was forgotten as DK fumbled again for the switch or button. He found one and pressed it. "John?!" he called, and released it, waiting with his breath held.
He heard some kind of metallic noise through the static. "Canaveral, I've been hit!" John shouted. DK could hear both fear and surprise in his friend's hurried voice.
Silence. "John!" DK called again, "John! John Crighton, can you read me?" he shouted into the communicator. "John!"
"That's big," his friend said softly.
DK deflated. John couldn't hear him.
"That's really big," John clarified. He sounded distracted. DK itched to know what John was looking at.
"Oh, hell," he suddenly said, "Canaveral! Dad! DK! I'm being pulled, uh,"
DK stared at the communicator.
"Engine's not responding, and I can't break away. Can anybody hear me? Canaveral?"
"John!" DK shouted again, but no response. "John, I'm here!"
"Oh my God," John whispered.
"John, what is it?" he asked, despite knowing his friend couldn't hear him. "John, answer me!"
It was silent for a while. "John!" he shouted again.
Then he heard a switch and some kind of quiet mechanical whirr - landing gear?
More silence. More switches flicking. Then...
What sounded like a short-circuit... and nothing.
"John?" DK stared at the communicator. "John! No, you can't do this to me again!" He pressed in the button heavily. "John Chrighton! John, you can't do this! John! This isn't college!"
The little device said nothing. It looked dead.
"John!" he called again.
After a few minutes, DK's breath slowed to normal as he sat in his office chair, thinking about what had just happened. His eyes locked on the communicator as if it would disappear if he looked away.
He thought about the most plausible explanation for what had happened. One option was that it hadn't happened at all, and he was simply crazy. Another would be that someone played a prank on him. The third was that John had actually contacted him.
But why would he wait two years? And how would he have survived that electromagnetic wave?
DK thought for a second, entertaining himself with the notion that John had survived. If that were to happen, if his friend were still alive... then where was he? Invisible? Or just very far away?
That last thought struck a chord in his brain. If he were so far away, then maybe - just maybe - the fast-as-lightning communicator radio signals simply took a while to arrive, though why they wouldn't have died on the way was a mystery to him. But, if it took two years for the signal to get through, exactly how far away was John?
Then DK thought about the other options. If he were crazy, he should probably look into a psychiatrist. Or just start back up with the same one. What was her name - Paige? He couldn't remember.
If it was a joke... it was a sick one. And it would be impossible to get the signal on that communicator. It was dead, after all. And no one would be able to mimic John's voice so well.
So, either he was crazy, or DK had really just received a message from a thought-dead friend. He picked up the device. Crazy or not, there was that tiny chance that John was out there, and he wanted something for his friend to hold onto.
"John," he said into the device, "John. It's DK. It's, uh... it's been two years since... since you died. I, uh, I had to shut down the Farscape project. We decided - they decided it was a waste of money, too many risks, blah blah blah, you know how they are." He let out a laugh. "John, wherever you are... just know that I'm waiting for you." He drew a breath. "Well, if you're out there, then I'm waiting for you, impatiently. I uh, I don't know what to think right now..." DK brushed a finger along the device. "I got a message from you. If... if I'm right, then by the time you get this, that message will have been four years old. I..."
DK thought suddenly about what John may or may not have encountered out there. What had hit him, what had made him say 'oh my God'? What was pulling him? What was big?
"I don't know where you are, or how you are, or whether you're alive, or whether I'm talking into a dead communicator pointlessly. What did you find out there? If you're alive, how? What are you eating? Where are you staying? I want to know everything..." He swallowed and blinked back tears. "I'll be waiting for your message in four years, John. Please try to return before then."
He released the button and sighed.