The Best Laid Plans--By PKTechSquirrel pktechgirl@fuse.net
Spoilers: Unrealized Reality
Disclaimer: The characters you recognize belong to Jim Henson and affiliated companies. I am not making any money from their use. Please do not sue, I have nothing you'd want.
Classification: Alternate Universe/Angst/Romance
Rating: R. Language, Adult themes.
Feedback: Much appreciated.
Archiving? Sure, but please ask first, I'd like to drop by and visit.
Summary: What might have happened had Crichton not been sucked into the wormhole
Inspired by Unrealized Reality.


Prologue:


Dr. John Crichton awoke with tears pooling in his ears. What had once been a regular occurrence was now only reserved for the anniversaries. His wife's death. His daughter's disappearance. His unfulfilled destiny as he watched his life with IASA dissolve into a million could have beens.
A recurring dream had been his constant companion in the four and a half years since Kate's disappearance. He is gripping the controls of the Farscape module, watching achingly beautiful nebulae spiral and shimmer before him; the expanse of space going beyond beyond. When words fail him, Kate comes to him and slides her hand into his.
My gift to you daddy. Without fail, he awakens at that moment, and bursts into tears.

For twenty-seven years Dr. Crichton, head of the Astro-Physics department at the prestigious Sagan University, has toiled; tending to students and faculty alike. Occasionally, an ambitious yet uninformed student would ask the most disturbing question of all. What Happened? And Dr. Crichton would merely shrug his shoulders and answer,
Most, sensing his obvious discomfort, would be satisfied. But for the relentless, those who were small children watching world famous astronaut John Crichton climb out of the Farscape module, his trip scrubbed due to a malfunctioning life support computer, he would answer with the slightest hint of threat in his voice. How could he confess to anyone that the real reason he never ventured into space was a terrible cliché. Twenty seven years ago, on a Wednesday evening three days after his mission was delayed, consolation led to conception. How could anyone understand the crushing disappointment that allowed him to let Caroline into his barracks that chilly evening?

Six weeks later, the day before what was to be the start of a three year study aboard the newly completed International Space Station, Caroline phoned to say that she was pregnant and afraid, and with him leaving for three years, she didn't think that she could keep the baby. But Crichton, being an honorable and optimistic young man, withdrew his name from consideration for the mission and settled into what he thought would be a brief sabbatical of sorts. He believed that he would have the opportunity to fine tune his theories, and to propose new ones. Others, such as D.K., could carry out his experiments and report their findings directly to him keeping him in the loop--but that was not to be. Ambition and greed destroyed the relationship between the two friends, and Crichton found himself unemployed.

Desperate to care for his small family, he took a dignified, but low paying position with the university, expecting to return to the Space Program after Caroline gave birth. But even the best laid plans are subject to fate. On a crystal clear evening in late July, Caroline's car was struck head on by a teenager crossing the center line. The young man, who had been reaching for his cell phone, survived, while Caroline was ejected on impact. Dr. Crichton arrived at the scene of the accident to find his week old daughter howling in the back of a police cruiser, but otherwise unharmed.

Crichton threw himself into parenthood with a fervor usually reserved for addicts. Kate was his shadow often napping on his office sofa, attending lectures well beyond her years and lunching with faculty. The staff adopted the poor frazzled scientist and his beautiful golden haired daughter. Gifts of books outnumbered teddy bears and dolls, and music was a constant in the Crichton home. Jack, a well meaning grandfather, would take Kate on tours of his office at the Cape Canaveral Space Center, where he remained a consultant. As the years passed, Kate became more comfortable in the world of numbers, wormholes and theories than with boys and dances. She and her father would spend hours debating the color of the universe, the importance of quarks, and the existence of beings in the vast darkness outside her tiny bedroom window.

No one was surprised when Kate announced that she would study Astronomy and Physics at Sagan University. Dr. Crichton couldn't have been more proud. For on the anniversary of his wife's death, his only child, his grown daughter, was offered the opportunity to work on the Farscape project that had defined his life nearly three decades ago.

Kate called him every evening with updates on her progress through the rigorous astronaut training. She sounded exhausted, yet exuberant. Crichton took each step with her as his own, and celebrated her achievements as leaps he was never meant to take. On the morning of the launch, the three generations of Crichtons gathered to say a heartfelt and tearful goodbye. Kate, in isolation, kissed the glass separating her from the man that she admired with her whole heart; and on that day she told him so. Crichton, beaming with pride, gave her a thumbs up just as he had when she'd learned to walk, to hit a ball, to pirouette, to sing, and at graduation, at Astronaut Training and now her first real mission.

As he and Jack watched from the enclosed observatory reserved for IASA employees, a mighty roar quieted the crowd, as seconds froze and the world stood still. The rocket carrying the module seemed unable to lift off until the power of the propellants accelerated and the flame grew. Then the black that engulfed the module pushed way to blue as the rocket made its way into the heavens. As the boosters dropped away and began their long steady descent into the ocean, the Farscape module, the fifth of its kind, flew under Kate's power. Dr. Crichton watched as Kate began the first turn that would put her in line with the wave that would propel her into a low orbit. Three minutes into the flight, John Crichton, and his father Jack, watched as silky blue tendrils began to coil themselves around the module carrying his daughter. His pride at once turned to horror as he watched what he believed was the first wormhole ever witnessed by humankind. Time stretched to forever as Crichton called to his daughter, but her radio was silent. The sky went almost purple before it sealed shut, as if nothing had ever happened; but Kate's module was nowhere to be found. The Farscape 5 module had simply disappeared from the radar, and ceased to exist. Crichton, for the first time in 27 years cursed out loud, cursing a fate that would rip his daughter from him on the cusp of realizing her dreams. And so, that one simple word of four letters would come to be his nemesis, his downfall, and eventually his savior.