Chapter 8

John Crichton laid his blanket over Aeryn and kissed her forehead. She had cried herself to sleep and he found that he couldn't lie there knowing that his daughter had killed someone to save her own skin. He made his way down the passageway to Kate's room and knocked on the cell's door. Kate stood in the doorway, but did not open it.

We need to talk.
Dad, I don't know what you want to talk about. It's like you've always said, A done bun can't be undone.
We're not talking about spilled milk here, you killed someone. You killed Aeryn's daughter. Now open this door before--
Before what? I'm not thirteen. You don't know what it's been like out here for me. I owe Aeryn my life because of that Bastard Scorpius. I can't even consider marrying D'Argo until Aeryn says my life debt has been paid. Do you think we were just able to walk away from what happened and be mother and daughter?
You're right, I don't know what you've been through, but I sure as Hell know that I didn't raise you to take someone's life to spare your own. Now I know I didn't cover murder when I taught you how to treat people but somehow, I just thought it went without saying. Kate, why don't you open this door so that we can talk like adults. Make me understand. Tell me your side of it.
Kate opened the door and pulled her robe around her. She always did this when she was being defensive, and Crichton sensed that if he pressed too hard, he'd never hear her side of it.
After my module exited the worm hole, I was adrift in space for a few days. I had the supplies that you insisted I carry, but I had no way of knowing how long I would be adrift. I thought I might still be in our solar system. When I saw a ship approaching, I knew that I was going to be in desperate trouble. The ship that captured me was inhabited by beings who called themselves Ancients of Wisdom. They said that they were being hunted and killed off by a Half Sebacean monster named Scorpius. Scorpius was trying to get his hands on worm hole technology; knowledge the Ancients had acquired over the last thousand cycles. An Ancient named Baellion asked if I would bear the knowledge so that if they were indeed killed off, someone would be able to pass the knowledge on. I was to go to the Sarcuus sector to-- in a manner of speaking, download the worm hole information from my head, and I agreed.


Because I thought I was doing them a favor. They rescued me, fed me, gave me translator microbes. This is a huge universe, I didn't have any reason to believe that this Scorpius creature would ever find out about me but he did. He had been monitoring the worm holes in the Astrallen area and he discovered that a craft, my craft, had successfully navigated one. He sent a retrieval squad after me and they placed me in custody.
I told Scorpius repeatedly that I had traveled through by accident and I didn't know a thing about worm holes but he persisted. I was tortured in the Aurora chair for hours. It's this chair where they hook electrodes up to your scalp and send jolts of electricity down your spine. The machine extracts conscious and subconscious knowledge. It has clamps that hold your eyes open--remember Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange? It's like that, only you want to die so badly that you're willing to chew through your own wrists. By the fourth hour, Scorpius had found out what he wanted, what the Ancients gave me, and I was jailed. That's where I met Aeryn Sun.


She was absolutely skeletal when I first saw her. She just lay there crying with her back to the door. I tried to engage her but she was too far gone. I just assumed that she'd been in the chair so many times that she was...vacant. So I talked to her the way one talks to a pet; you don't expect a response you just want to hear a voice, any voice. I don't remember when it happened but I said something that made her laugh, and I burst into tears. She put her arm around me and eventually I got her to trust me a little.


Day by day, she trusted me more. I was taken to the Aurora chair for the second time and when I returned, Aeryn cared for me. Kate wipes her eyes and Crichton holds her.
Dad, I didn't want to kill Maddia, I swear, I would never have killed someone of my own volition. Scorpius said that she was a traitor and a spy. He said that if I killed her he would ensure that I was released. I didn't understand Sebacean law...he had this pulse pistol, and I just, I was in that chair for so long, I was spiraling out of my mind. Daddy, I --god, I shot that poor girl.
It's okay Peanut, you don't have to go on. He didn't know if he could stomach anything worse.
No, I want to. I need you to understand. Afterward, after I shot Maddia, I was returned to my cell where Aeryn cared for me as she always had. She had no idea that I was her daughter's killer. I didn't know anything about Aeryn and she didn't know anything about me, so I never would have dreamed that I was being used to punish her.
If this Scorpius creature is such a bad ass, why didn't he kill her himself? And Waru for that matter?
He calls it his Maximum Kill Strategy. The way Sebacean law works is that if a man or woman is accused and convicted of treason, the spouse must be the executioner. This directive maintains absolute loyalty to Peacekeeper ideals. However, if the accused is later found to be innocent of the charges, the witnesses and the spouse are put to death for having failed to determine the true nature of the accused. Scorpius had the perfect plan and I stumbled into it. Scorpius framed Waru and he was convicted of treason, Aeryn executed him. Scorpius leaked that Waru was innocent, and Aeryn was sentenced to death. The three witnesses, men who stood between Scorpius and his command carrier, were executed on the spot. He had me kill Maddia so that he would be rid of the threat of her seeking revenge for her parents deaths. Then he publicly accused me of her murder and had me sentenced to death. With one move, he would have had seven people killed without soiling his hands; Seven people who could ruin his chances for getting worm hole research underway. He hadn't counted on loyalty working against him. Aeryn had friends, she and Waru were well respected among the Peacekeepers. Two of her former servants helped us get to a Prowler and we took off.

And now you owe Aeryn a life debt. How did she find out it was you?
After I found out that Maddia was her daughter, I wanted to die. I was already wracked with guilt over what I had done, and to find out that she was my best friend's child...it was surreal. I had come to think of Aeryn as a mother figure and here I had done the unthinkable. I had to tell her. I couldn't let our friendship deepen with that secret between us. I thought for sure that she was going to kill me but she never even tried. She resolved herself to hating me and I understood it; I hated me. But Zhaan, beautiful Zhaan, she begged me to take the bonding tattoos and offer my life to Aeryn. She accepted, but only so that she could remind me of what I had done to her she said. That was the most miserable year I have ever had in my life. And even though I am only her symbolic daughter she has final say over what happens to me in life. She won't even consider allowing me to marry D'Argo until she says it's all right and she thinks that the right time is after we stop Scorpius.

I got the impression that you were happy here.
I am happy, now that I have you and D'Argo. Besides, it's not like I could have stayed on Earth. Aeryn has forgiven me, but I'm still trying to learn to forgive myself.
Kate, I'm so sorry. I wish that you had never gotten involved with the Farscape project. I would have been just as happy to never have seen outer space.
But you would have missed out on knowing Aeryn. She has so much love to give Dad. I'm sure that her feelings for me don't extend to you.

I wish you had been able to tell me this before.
Aeryn wanted to tell you. She wanted you to know her before you had sympathy for the situation that she and I are in. She doesn't want me to be bound to her for the rest of her life anymore than I want to be, but Sebacean custom requires that she have an heir or her spirit will wander Tormented Space for eternity. I don't believe it, but she believes it, and that's what's important. They're an equi-lineal society, you take your father's name but your customs and practices are taught to you by your mother.
I'm liking these Sebaceans less and less all the time.
It's not a bad system, there are just some bad Peacekeepers.
Goodnight Peanut, I've got to go, I have a lot to think about. He kisses her hand and hugs her, leaving her standing in the passageway.
I didn't mean to disappoint you, Dad. Kate closes the door to her cell.