Okay so I also updated chapter 25 so please check to make sure you didn't miss anything… enjoy

sorry it's a short one…

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Harper was lost in his own memories. He remembered running from Beka. Blindly with out thought, he dodged through the late afternoon crowd. The Highgaurd relics that chased were only seconds behind him.

Then inexplicitly there was an explosion, a very large one. Debris littered the ground the buildings around him shook. Dust filled the air and Harper started to wheeze and cough. Wiping the dust from his eyes he suddenly realized he was kneeling on the ground. He knees and palms were burning. He must have fallen… his heart beat a punk rock rhythm. 'I need to move.' He told his weary body as he tried to get it functioning once again.

Then he heard the magic words that never failed to set him moving. Some one in the crowd yelled "Magog!" Then he heard more shrieking as the crowd started to panic. The Highgaurd that chased him quickly forgot him as hundreds of furry bodies invaded the town. The men that had guarded him on the flight from Tran Vedra were two of the first to fall.

Harper ran even when his body thought it was finished. "Not again." He sobbed as memories of his cousins, his aunts, his uncles on earth flooded his mind. Making the realty he was drowning in even more severe.



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Ten days after the Magog massacre

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Harper had lived through yet another Magog raid. He had been scratched up a bit but he wasn't infested. Over three quarters of the planets population was either killed of infested. Infested was as good as dead for statistics and for facing up to the inevitable. Harper wandered through the devastated town scrounging for food and a new shirt when he found himself back in the shipyards. A small ray of hope shot through his mind. Maybe the Maru was still here. Surely Beka would be dead but his clothes were there, food, blankets! He nearly ran to where he had last saw the ship that once had been his home. The Maru was missing. 'Maybe' he thought 'I'm wrong, maybe it was closer to the west side?" Harper looked for over two hours draining what little energy he had left. Finally his legs buckled and his unused arm throbbed as he sat in the middle of the Tarmac utterly defeated.

"Someone must have stolen it." He whispered. But who? Beka had so many securities and firewalls; no one could unlock them but her. Finally he lay down. Resting his forehead on the warm cement and he cried.

He cried for Beka and because he left her. He cried for the Maru and because he had been happy for a while. He cried for VexPax who thought Harper was too important to go out side. He cried because the blood sucking Magog existed in his universe. He cried for all the awful things that he had done. He cried because the universe was inherently unfair.

He cried because he was lost and alone.

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Present time on the Andromeda medical deck.

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Beka stood in the doorway looking over to where Harper lay. He stared straight foreword. He didn't move. He barley blinked, he barley breathed. Beka found it unnerving. Dylan wanted her to stay behind to watch him but Beka was more then convinced Trance had some how arranged it. Finally she took a deep breath and entered the room.

"Rommie, privacy please."

"Engaged." Confirmed the urethral voice.

Beka felt exhausted, like she had been hit by an over sized transport. Of all the things that could have happened she hadn't seen this one coming. Harper had been the king of loyal.

She placed her hand on his forehead. He felt warm alive but he certainly didn't look it.

"Harper what happened to us?" He didn't respond.

She turned and pulled up a nearby chair. She held his hand lightly. "It's okay I'll wait." She told him. She would keep her promise. "I won't leave you."

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TBC