A Letter to My Daughter
by FarAnya
Author's note: Well, someone had to write this! Disclaimer: John and all the rest of Moya's inhabitants are the creations of the wonderful team of Brian Henson, Rockne S. O'Bannon, et al. They very graciously allow us (as fan fiction writers) to play in their world, knowing (I hope) that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. As a writer, I promise I will try to deal gently with their toys and that I will send them home at the end of the day, maybe a little tired, but really none the worse for wear. Oh, and I 'borrowed' John's sisters from Kelly Hill's and Sarah Wait's story, "The Living Years" – again. Kelly said she didn't mind. Thanks for everything, Kelly! And also thanks to Mary for her great insights and ideas. Rating: G.
Spoilers for Look at the Princess, pt. 1: A Kiss is But a Kiss, pt. 2: I Do, I Think and pt. 3: The Maltese Crichton and various references to Seasons 1 and 2.
This is stupid, I know. You'll probably never get this. And even if somehow, someday you do get it, your government may not want you to know that I am your… biological… father. Like your mother's marriage to the man you will love as your father, I'll probably be one of the best-kept secrets of your world.
But I wanted you to know a few things about who I am… and how much I already – and always will – love you.
One secret they may not tell you is that I'm not Sebacean. I look like a Sebacean, but I'm not… I'm human. That's why your mom and I were compatible. It sounds weird, I know; it's kind of complicated.
You see… it was like this. We were visiting your planet and I kissed this girl at a party. I mean… she asked me to kiss her; I didn't start it. I didn't know she was the princess – your mother. Then all of a sudden, people were telling me I had to marry her. I tried to think of someway to prevent it, but everything and everybody was against me.
Anyway, that kiss brought me more enemies than any one person needs. After three attempts on my life in one day, your mom and I had a shotgun wedding – almost literally. Empress Novia – your grandmother – really pushed to get the wedding and investiture done before the bad guys finally hit the jackpot; your mom and I were married – and turned into pigeon perches – just one solar day later.
But even being converted into bronze didn't stop the assaults against me. One of the combatants still managed to slice my head off. But, thankfully, after a short three-arn bath in foundry acid, someone succeeded in retrieving my head, sticking it back on my body, and revitalizing me. And sister, was I glad.
That's when I learned about you. And although I wasn't real keen on being recast as a garden gnome again, I didn't want to leave you – or your mom. It was like a Pantak jab to the solar plexus when Counselor Tyno – the man you know as your father – said that the procedure would kill me if I stood under the device again. I think part of my heart died at that moment. A lousy, thoughtless machine was denying me the chance to know my daughter.
But it can't stop me from loving you… ever.
Walking away from you and your mom was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do, but when Tyno explained that I couldn't be freeze-dried again, I knew I wouldn't live long enough to see your birth. I've always believed that a child should have – if at all possible – two loving parents. And it just wracked my heart and soul to know that I wouldn't be able to be there for you. That's why I suggested Counselor Tyno as my replacement. He and your mother had loved each other for a long time and it was his compassion for my circumstances that lead me to believe that he would love you too.
I suspect that at some point in your life, they may have to tell you about me. It will probably be determined by your DNA… whether or not you will be compatible with any of the Sebacean men on your planet… or if the Scarran's poison affected you as well. I hope that – for your sake – the blending of my DNA with your mother's will enable you to find someone who can give you healthy children.
On my home world of Earth, I am not a king or a ruler of any nation. I'm just an ordinary guy… a scientist and an astronaut. I'm 34 years old (we measure time a bit differently there) which makes me about 36 cycles by your reckoning. I've been aboard Moya for just over a cycle now and I've had so many incredible experiences that if I even tried to tell you half of them I'd run out of tapes long before I finished.
So instead, I want to tell you a little about my family… your family – people who have played important roles in my life.
My father – your grandfather – is John Robert Crichton – better known as "Jack." He was an astronaut too, but he's retired now. That is, I'm assuming he's still retired. I mean, they brought John Glenn out of mothballs, so who knows. Dad was one of the few men to walk on our moon. That may not sound like much here, where space travel is commonplace, but it was pretty significant back home. When I left Earth, our only efforts at space exploration were unmanned probes to some of the other planets in our solar system and the building of an international space station.
Anyway, Dad is a pretty good guy, but it wasn't until after I found myself here in the Uncharted Territories that I really learned to appreciate the things he tried to teach me. I always thought that I could never live up to my image of him. I even told him once that I couldn't be his kind of hero. I was stunned when he flat out told me that no, I couldn't be… that I had to be my own kind of hero. He was right of course. Nowadays I just hope I can be a positive influence out here among these strange stars I now call home.
Being an astronaut, Dad was always involved in some long-term mission or project that kept him away from home for long periods of time when I was young. It always seemed to me that he was never around when I thought I needed him. But somehow, he always managed to be there for me when it really mattered.
And that is what is tearing me up inside… knowing that I'll… never… be able to be there for you. Humans don't live as long as Sebaceans. The average life span is about 75 years and I'm already almost halfway there. So unless I find the fountain of youth or make a bargain with the devil, I will be dead long before you are even born.
But I did get to see you… sort of. It was cool – just about broke my heart though – but it really was cool. Before I left your planet, your mom and dad were able to show me what you might look like someday. I know that the image probably wasn't exact, but I'll carry that beautiful picture in my heart and in my mind and in my eye until the day I die. And in my mind's eye I will watch you grow up.
I can imagine holding you in my arms, rocking you to sleep and singing you the lullabies my mom sang to me. I can see your snagglepuss years when you're missing your front teeth; your skinned knees and elbows; your first two wheeler… or whatever kind of vehicle children on your world use for recreation. Year by year, I can see you getting taller, more beautiful and more confident.
I can even imagine you going on your first date – if that's something they let princesses do on your world. I can picture going to the door to meet the young man. I'll try not to be too hard on the guy, I promise. But he'd better have you home by midnight, young lady!
Oh… sorry. I got carried away there for a moment.
But it is a beautiful life I'm dreaming of for you, full of happiness and joy… and maybe just a touch of sorrow to help you appreciate the good times.
But most of all, I pray that you will find a man who will love you as much as I do.
Ahem… anyway, back to the family. My mother was Nora McDougall Crichton. She was a scientist too, and like my dad, she was very influential in my decision to go into science. Throughout high school, college and grad school, she was the baseline against which I measured my scholastic achievements.
She taught me all kinds of things besides science though… things that I would have loved to teach you. Things like how to make southern style biscuits… how to find pictures in the clouds… how to slow dance.
Mom would have gotten a real kick out of knowing she was going to have a granddaughter. She would get this… look… in her eyes when she saw other women showing off their grandchildren. I know she hoped the cancer that was killing her would spare her long enough to see at least one grandchild. But she died five years ago – long before her time should have been up – with that hope unfulfilled.
She was such a loving and compassionate person, I know she would have adored you and your mom.
I have two younger sisters – twins, Annie and Laurie. They are almost 10 years younger than me. When I left Earth, they were just finishing college and starting their own careers and families. Annie was engaged and planning to be married in six months when I was thrown across the galaxy. I hope they didn't postpone the wedding. Aaron's a great guy… he's good for Annie. Anyway, after the wedding, Annie was headed to graduate school to get her Master's degree in Library Science. Laurie was also planning on going to grad school; she wanted to be a theatrical set designer. I really hope everything has worked out for them.
Annie and Laurie always teased me about having kids someday. They couldn't wait to be aunts, so I'm sure they would be thrilled to learn about you. Trust me, they would spoil you rotten. Maybe someday, I'll get to tell them a little bit about their niece.
I just had a crazy thought… if I happen to have any other children, you could be a great-great-great-great aunt on the day you are born! I don't know if twenty cycles is considered a "generation" here in the Uncharted Territories like it is on Earth or even how you indicate family relationships, but that's what you'd be back home to your half-sibling's children's children's children.
That's all the actual family I have. But I have friends who are as close as – if not closer than – family.
First off, there's DK. I hope that someday you have a friend like him; he's my best friend back home. We grew up together, almost like brothers. Don't ask me how we managed to survive all the usual arguing and fighting that best friends usually go through, but we did. I think it was our shared dream of reaching farther out into space than anyone had ever gone before that kept our friendship stable and secure. And we did it – reach farther, I mean. A little more drastically than we had planned… but we did it.
Even though we hoped to work together in the space program, we ended up going to different colleges… I went to MIT and DK went to Cal Tech. I know you probably have no idea what "college" is, but suffice it to say that DK is the more… hmm… flamboyant of the two of us. MIT was just a little too … stuffy… for him; Cal Tech was more his style. He ended up finishing almost six months – sorry, monens – before me… which he never let me forget.
After grad school we did finally get to work together. We developed the Farscape project and managed to get it funded. It was while I was testing our theory – that a spacecraft could use the gravitational pull of a planet to boost its speed – that I was shot through the wormhole and catapulted to this end of the universe. I wasn't supposed to come anywhere near this part of the galaxy.
I still don't know where I am exactly and I haven't recognized anything familiar on the star charts I've been able to examine. So, odds are that I'll never get back there, although I will always hope that eventually I'll make it home. That hope is what keeps me going. Now I have another hope – another one that will probably never happen – that somehow, someday, I will be able to see you in the flesh.
Well, that pretty much sums up the folks back home. There were others, but Mom and Dad, the twins and DK… they are the ones I wanted you to know.
Now for my friends – my family – here on board Moya.
First of course, is Moya herself. She's a leviathan, a bio-mechanoid ship; a living ship. I do believe she's the most incredible creature I have ever seen. If you ever get a chance to go aboard a leviathan, you'll understand what I mean. She's immense by any standard – I mean they don't call them leviathans for nothing – but she's so very graceful. Every opening, every line, every living space is a perfect example of beauty. But you never get the feeling that you're walking around inside a live creature, you know? No squishy floors or oozing walls. Everything looks like a regular ship… except that she's alive. And although we've had a few rough rides, Moya would never willfully hurt any of us. She lives to serve others.
Along with Moya is Pilot. I have no idea what kind of creature Pilot is exactly, or even what his species is called. He is symbiotically bonded to Moya and even though his species can live for a thousand cycles or more, when bonded to a leviathan they live only as long as the ship – about 300 cycles. He considers it a fair tradeoff to be able to travel among the stars. He has, like Moya, a pure soul and would never actively seek to harm us.
From what we've been able to piece together from various sources, he is not Moya's original pilot. The original pilot was murdered by the PeaceKeepers who wanted to use Moya as a lab rat in a test that would – under most circumstances – have killed her. Thankfully though, she survived the experience. Our Pilot has only been aboard Moya for about three cycles now but their bond is a strong one and continues to grow.
Next there is Zhaan. Pa'u Zotah Zhaan, a 10th level Delvian priest; about 800 cycles old – but doesn't look a day over 300! And she's as blue as they come. Oh, in case your education skips over this – mine sure did – she's flora not fauna… a plant.
Zhaan has helped me maintain my sanity since I came through the wormhole. She has been my counselor and teacher in so many ways. Sometimes I find myself jealous of her inner peace. But it hasn't been easy for her to gain that peace… it has cost her dearly. She spent 17 long cycles locked in her cell meditating to achieve it.
Hmm… perhaps I should explain that Moya is – was – a PeaceKeeper prison transport ship and that Zhaan, D'Argo and Rygel were prisoners aboard her. They were attempting to remove the control collar and escape from PeaceKeeper custody when I came through the wormhole… smack in the middle of their firefight. They brought me aboard thinking I had knowledge of a technology that would allow them to break free. Unfortunately at that time, I didn't know what they needed to know. But eventually we did manage to escape – using the slingshot maneuver DK and I had theorized about – and since then we have been travelling the Uncharted Territories looking for any information that will lead us each to our homeworlds.
Okay, where was I? Oh yeah… Rygel. His Eminence, Dominar Rygel the 16th of the Hynerian Empire. Well, he's the deposed Dominar actually and he's the smallest thief I've ever met. If I'm ever missing any of my equipment, I can usually find it in Rygel's quarters. He can be a real pain in the a… er… neck, but every now and then, he manages to rise to the occasion and display true nobility. But generally, all Rygel is interested in is what he's going to get out of the situation. And food.
Rygel isn't the only one on board Moya who is an artiste of the five-finger discount. Chiana is every bit as good as Rygel… and a lot more subtle about it. Thankfully, she doesn't employ those talents often… at least not aboard Moya… and generally she gets away with it. Don't ask me how.
Chiana escaped from her homeworld when she refused to undergo the treatment to wipe her mind clean – which would leave her under the control of her government – something that everyone on her world endures… and accepts. She's from Nebari. I'm not exactly sure how old she is, but most of the time she acts a teenager. Well, a teenager on Earth that is; obnoxious, know-it-all, rebellious, endearing, opportunistic, and generally optimistic. Then, occasionally, she'll let loose with a thought or an insight that someone twice her age would never have imagined. She's amazing sometimes.
Now we've come to D'Argo. He and I didn't start off on the right foot, as far as relationships go. It took a while, but we were finally able to overcome those differences and become friends. D'Argo is a Luxan, one of a warrior race, but – now don't ever tell him I said this – I don't think he really has a warrior's heart. He's way too sensitive.
He was married once… to a Sebacean… and has a son he hasn't seen in over ten cycles. He was convicted – and imprisoned on Moya – for killing his wife. But he didn't do it; her own PeaceKeeper brother killed her and then arrested D'Argo for the crime. It's hard to imagine the pain he has endured. I think it is only the hope – that one day he will find his son – which keeps him moving forward.
Finally there is Aeryn Sun. How can I explain Aeryn to you without seeming to betray your mother?
I really admire Katralla – your mom. Her determination and dedication to your people and form of government is incredible. I only knew her a few days really, so love – true love – never even had a chance to be part of our relationship. But if I had been able to be made into a statue again, I would have done my best to love her as she deserved. I'm glad for her sake – and yours – that Tyno was there to take my place.
Aeryn is Sebacean… like you. She was the first person I saw – after I came through the wormhole – that looked "like" me. And although she used to be a PeaceKeeper, she was declared "irrevocably contaminated" by her superiors because of me. They were going to condemn her to death simply because we had spent the equivalent of one solar day together and I was an unknown alien life form to them. She lost everything… because of me.
But that's not why I love her.
Yes… I love Aeryn. You would too if you ever got to meet her. Even though she beat the crud out of me the first time we met, I think I was attracted to her from the very beginning. She's come so far since that day. Would you believe it? When we were captured by the PeaceKeepers and she was condemned, she actually wanted me to abandon her to her fate that day. Man, she had a lot to learn about humans… and me.
Part of Aeryn's problem is that her social skills – for lack of a better term – aren't the best. That's not her fault though; blame it on her PeaceKeeper upbringing. They taught her how to plan and carry out military assaults, how to deal with pain and all that garbage. But they didn't teach her how to deal with emotions. She still tries to be the "Tough Chick of the Universe," but I think even she realizes that her training was somewhat deficient. It hasn't been easy for her, but I think she's getting there.
Yet sometimes, she knocks my socks off with her sensitivity. When Chiana's brother died it was Aeryn who realized that Chi had to work through the grief on her own. I know… now… that Chiana probably wouldn't have taken the Prowler to the burial planet if I had taken the time to talk to her when she needed me. Afterwards I was too busy deep-sixing my own guilt by trying to get Chi back to Moya to see that I was only pushing her further away. It was Aeryn who made me stop and listen to Chiana, so I could understand what was driving her to prove herself.
I want you to know Aeryn because there's a chance… an outside chance… that you might actually meet her some day. I haven't asked her to but I hope that she will want to come back to your planet to see you. I think she knows how much it would mean to me. And to help, I've asked Pilot to "mark" – as best he can – this area of space so she'll know where to come.
The more I think about you, the more I realize that it may not be safe for you and your mom for a while if certain factions ever find out you're my daughter. As long as I am alive, they could use you as hostages to try and get the information they think I possess. But I will do my best to protect you both always… even if that means denying publicly that you are mine. So – as much as I may want to – I probably won't ever come back here again. But I know you'll understand. And hopefully, by the time you're born, those hunting me now won't care anymore.
I know this will probably never get to you, but on the remote chance that you might get it, I just wanted you to know that my love is – and always will be – yours. I can't say that enough. I will never forget you… even though I'll never get to see you. Just knowing that you're going to be out there some day fills me with incredible pride.
So, be good and know that – somewhere out there in the universe – your father loves you very much.
THE END