The walk through the forest was very quiet. Tyr's mood had not lightened;
he had returned from foraging to dump a few pieces of fruit at her feet and
then had waited without words for her to finish. As soon as she was done,
he began walking, and with a shrug she had followed him.
She huffed out a quiet breath. No hand-holding today, that was for sure! With a frown etching her brow, she looked at the tall figure she was following. He'd tied his hair back in that engaging way he had, using his own locks as a tie. His figure swung easily through the woods - more easily than hers, she admitted with a wince as her blisters began throbbing - but the set of his shoulders betrayed his fundamental tension. No matter how easily he moved, Tyr was not at ease.
It wasn't too difficult to figure out what had happened. Now that she was relatively certainly nothing external had occurred, Beka was pretty sure that something had reminded Tyr that he was Nietzschean and she was inferior - only a kludge.
Not that she was unused to his feeling like that. On the contrary, even though they'd become closer since that disastrous dinner so many months ago, Beka's belief that he'd been telling the truth as he knew it - that any kind of serious inter-species relationship was, quite simply, unthinkable - had not wavered.
Not, that is, until this sequence of events. She supposed, when she thought about it, that this was the most intensive, dangerous, and stressful interlude they'd ever shared. And the sheer exuberance of their survival had probably led Tyr to act in ways he otherwise would not have.
It had felt good, no question. For months she had fought the attraction she felt for him, knowing that he was unlike to welcome it. The sense that he was open to that kind of feeling, that he might even reciprocate, had been dangerously seductive in itself. Beka shook her head a little as she walked at the folly of letting that particular part of her guard down.
Because, fundamentally, there couldn't be anything between them. She knew that. She'd known it for months.
And fundamentally, she asserted to herself, she was OK with that, no matter how hot Tyr sometimes seemed to her. Beka was her own person. She didn't need anyone else, she reminded herself. She was rated to fly solo, and solo was how she would fly. Yes, she'd lend herself to Dylan's quest, and yes, she could admit that she really cared for all the crew, but.. She was still rated to fly solo.
Lifting her chin unconsciously, Beka squared her shoulders and followed the silent man in front of her through the forest.
Klaxon-like, alarms shrilled through the Com Deck as the Andromeda hurled again through Slipstream. Dylan raised his voice to be heard over them. "What's going on?"
Harper's face was set, and he did not vouchsafe an answer. Trance, golden features unusually mobile, looked very distressed as she responded, "We're out of control in the 'Stream! Harper can't get us through!"
"Damn it! Harper, can't you get us back to normal space?"
"He's trying, Dylan! Yelling won't help!" Dylan looked at Trance in surprise, then turned his attention back to the ship's viewscreens where the eerie blue lines representing the slipstream wove by in complex, rapid patterns.
Sweat dripping down the side of Harper's face attested to the effort he was expending. Andromeda's cool voice spoke from a holograph beside him. "Something blocked our path through Slipstream, and now we are being forced away from our destination."
"What blocked us? What's forcing us? What is going on?" Dylan's voice was demanding, but carefully without the edge that had brought Trance to Harper's defense.
"We're not sure, Dylan, but - " Andromeda's words were interrupted by the ship's abrupt exit from Slipstream. "OK, we're out of Slipstream. Analyzing location.. We're in the Govrian System."
"What? That's a long way from where we wanted to be!" Dylan was exasperated. "I don't know what's going on here, but we are going to get to the bottom of it. Now, people!" Marching over to the science station, he began to concentrate; wiping the sweat from his brow, Harper moved to join him.
As the day progressed, Beka's feet grew worse, until her face was twisted into a grimace of pain. By mid-afternoon she'd gotten much slower; glancing back impatiently, Tyr caught the pained look. Clearing his throat, he spoke for the first time in hours. "What's the matter, Beka?"
"My feet are sore, that's all," she spoke briefly and did not meet his eyes.
Tyr frowned, concern nudging through the careful wall he'd made around his feelings. "Let's see." He was just as brief.
"It's fine," she replied.
"Let's see," he repeated inexorably.
With a sharp sigh of acquiescence, she sat on a nearby log and pulled a shoe off. Her sock was brilliant with blood, and the gasp she stifled attested to the pain of removing the shoe. For a moment, Tyr looked at her foot, face still, then he spoke. "Why didn't you say anything? It is foolish to let yourself be injured in this place; we have no first aid supplies!"
Beka's eyes flashed, but she shrugged. "It's no big deal."
For a moment, Tyr was silent, then, with a resigned grimace of his own, he said, "Put your shoe back on and stand on the log."
"Huh?"
"Stand on the log!"
With another shrug, Beka carefully put her foot back into her shoe, rose shakily and stood up on the log where she had been perched. Tyr came up beside her, turned around and said, curtly, "Climb on my back."
Not speaking a word, Beka climbed piggy-back onto Tyr's back. Moving his long locks to the side, she circled his strong neck with her arms as his reached around and clasped her thighs, holding her in place. Both were instantly aware of the intimacy of her position, and both immediately thrust that realization out of their minds. Bending forward slightly to balance her weight, Tyr walked on through the forest.
"Damn it, Rommie, that's the third time!" Dylan had gone way past exasperation now, and Trance's pale, wordless urgency was not helping matters any. "I know you know a lot of ways *not* to get us back to the system, but why don't you and Harper surprise us and figure out a way *to* return, huh?" Gaze fierce, he raked the Com Deck with his eyes before walking toward the door. "Trance, a moment?"
They strode off the deck together, then Trance spoke before he had a chance to. "Dylan, I don't think snapping at them will help."
"Then what will help, Trance? You've been here before, right? Tell me what we can do to get Beka and Tyr back, Trance, 'cause frankly, right now, we seem to be fresh out of solutions!"
Trance was silent for a moment, looking at him with unreadable eyes. "C'mon, Trance."
"Actually, Dylan, I never have been in this exact situation before," Trance spoke with dignity. "However, I am quite certain that it would be in their best interests for us to return soon to Beka and Tyr."
"So how do we do it?"
Trance was silent for a moment, then said slowly, "I wonder what has happened to the Eureka Maru?"
Dylan eyed her for a moment, thinking. "The Maru? Hmmm.." He thought some more. "Do you think the Andromeda's path is blocked but some other ship's would not be?" His voice gained excitement as he thought it through. "Good thinking, Trance! Let's go reclaim the Maru!" He whirled around and headed back to the bridge to give Harper the revised orders.
The sun was setting as Tyr carefully let Beka down. Except for one barked, "Don't!" when she'd allowed her head to drop onto one arm, and inadvertently brushed her lips against his ear, Tyr had not spoken. He remained silent as he kicked needles into a mound for a bed in the sheltered area he'd found, and just as quietly melted away into the underbrush.
With a sigh, Beka buried her head in her hands. She sat like that for a time, then carefully began to remove her shoes and peel her socks from her feet. Since Tyr had disappeared, she took no care to monitor her expression, and her expression was pained in the extreme as she carefully freed her second sock from the dried scabs on her heel.
Tyr, from the brush, saw that look and his own grew even darker in response. Dumping the armload of firewood he had gathered, he walked to her and knelt before her, carefully examining the injuries. Shaking his head, he held his hand out for the blood-stained socks she was still holding. Still without exchanging a word, she handed them to him with a puzzled look. Still clutching her socks, he disappeared again.
Beka gazed blankly at the sticks Tyr had dropped, then hobbled over to a clear area where she could safely make a fire. Awkwardly, she arranged the sticks in a rough shape like she'd seen Tyr make; she had some difficulty in the arrangement but finally stood back, pleased with her efforts.
"What are you doing?" He was still holding her socks, but now they seemed cleaner and very wet.
"Working on the fire."
"Leave that to me. Come here."
"Tyr, I think you've forgotten who you're talking to. I don't take orders from you."
For a moment, they locked eyes; then, with an elaborate sigh, Tyr waved an exaggerated arm at the rock where she'd been sitting. "If you could please," his tone made the word particularly sarcastic, "be seated?"
Eyeing him challengingly, Beka limped over and plopped down ungracefully. Tyr knelt before her; using her sopping socks as washrags he began to wipe the blood and dust from her feet. At her indrawn breath as he hit a particularly sore area, he looked up, his locks hanging. Again their eyes met and the sense of intimacy was inescapable. Then, Tyr's mouth tightened, and he bent resolutely back to his task.
When Tyr finished his ministrations, he disappeared again with her socks. Beka frowned after him, then just sat on the rock, staring into space as she thought through their situation. This could not go on, she concluded. Who knew how long they would be stuck together on this rock? Dylan would find them eventually, she was sure, but in the meantime, she had no interest in trying to survive with this distant, faintly hostile version of Tyr. She had to do something to snap him out of this mood.
Tyr was gone for a while, and when he returned he bore not only her washed out socks, but an animal of some sort that he had, thankfully, cleaned and spitted somewhere out of sight. Drawing the blaster, Tyr started the fire with a short shot, then carefully set up sticks to brace his spitted catch. Soon, the smell of roasting meat filled the clearing.
Tyr hung Beka' socks on a bush to dry, then disappeared again, wordlessly assuming the Beka would tend their dinner and the fire, she noted with a twinge of resentment. The smell of the cooking meat was so good that she quickly swallowed her frustration, carefully turning the meat on the spit to roast all sides equally.
In another while Tyr was back, this time with his shirt filled with fruits and greens. Beka reflected wryly, as she turned the spit again, that in terms of what they'd had lately, this was a feast. Tyr joined her by the fire, touching the outside of the meat to test its texture.
"I think it's almost done," Beka offered, and Tyr nodded wordlessly in return. Gathering a handful of the produce he had gathered, Tyr retreated to a seat on the far side of the fire from her rock and began eating.
Wordlessly following suit, for now, Beka picked up a couple of pieces of fruit and ate them, rising to again tend the fire. "I think it's done."
Tyr set aside his food and came back to the fire. Thrusting his knife into the flames, he quickly sterilized it, then used it to hack a piece of meat from the roast. He nibbled on it a bit, testing its doneness, then, holding it between strong teeth, he bent and cut another piece, which he offered to Beka.
Struggling to forget what the meat had looked like before being cooked, Beka crinkled her nose while accepting it. Both retreated to opposite sides of the fire in silence as they ate their fill, Tyr disposing of an astounding amount of protein and greens. For a long while they sat in silence, then Beka, sated, stood up and walked gingerly over by where Tyr was sitting. Standing before him, she cleared her throat and spoke.
"Anasazi, I'm gettin' pretty tired of the silent treatment here." Tyr said nothing in return, so Beka continued. "I kinda thought we were friends, but I'm willing to settle for acquaintances -" her voice sounded mocking on the word - "if that's what you want. But this totally quiet, hostile thing you got going, you gotta let that go.
"Who knows how long we may be stuck here, and if that weirdo Niet's gonna try something again? We've gotta work together, and that won't work if we're not even speaking to each other. So, c'mon, Tyr, knock it off, OK?"
For a moment, Beka stood eyeing him challengingly, waiting for his response. When he continued to sit in silence, no longer meeting her gaze, Beka huffed out a breath and stomped, as well as she could with no shoes and sore feet, back to the other side of the fire. With a final angry glare, she wrapped herself in her cloak and lay down, determinedly closing her eyes and willing sleep to come.
Tyr watched her as she stormed away, and kept watching as she lay down, her back turned resolutely toward him. How had she known? It was clear from her words that she'd figured out what was bothering him, and he gritted his teeth at her perceptiveness.
He supposed that he was hardly being fair, acting as though she had done something wrong when it was he who had strayed beyond the line. He sighed a little, and, as she was safely turned away, passed his hands through his locks in weariness and frustration. OK then. She had characterized them as friends, and, he was forced to admit, they had become friends. Friends with a bit.more, he supposed. It was the "more" part that had gotten to him; even the purest Nietzschean could admit to having friends, so long as the relationships were mutually beneficial.
So, friends it would be. But no more, no matter that the sight of Beka's body through the open front of the cloak she had appropriated continued to incite. No matter that her husky voice could awaken some fundamental part of himself that he'd long thought asleep. No matter that her determination, courage, strength and will to survive were as primal as any Nietzschean's, as his own.
With another sigh, Tyr threw a few more branches on the fire and lay down. Closing his eyes, he too charged himself to go to sleep. Perhaps another day would make things easier between them.
Tyr awakened several hours later, instantly aware. He was not sure exactly what had roused him, but whatever it had been brought all his senses into high alert. The fire before him had died down, and across its embers he could see the prone figure of his crewmate. As he looked at her, he saw her shiver, then give a short, sharp moan.
Tyr took a quick inventory: nothing else was moving in the clearing around them, but the temperature had fallen to a new low. His own metabolism, fueled by the enormous meal, was compensating, but clearly Beka, even wrapped in the cloak she had taken, was feeling the effects of the cold.
Silently, Tyr rose and slipped some more wood onto the fire, blowing on the embers to ensure the new timbers caught. After a brief internal debate, he crossed over to where Beka was sleeping and lay down behind her, sandwiching her between the warmth of his body and the fire in front of them. With a fatalistic mental shrug, he gathered her to him, once again wrapping her in his warmth. Her shivering quickly stopped; even in sleep she smiled, snuggling closer to him and pillowing her head on his arm. Shaking his head slightly, Tyr prepared to go back to sleep, not even acknowledging to himself how much better it felt to be lying this close to her.
Wormhole Drift looked jarringly busy to the anxious, intent crew of the Andromeda, its cheerful bustle all the more alienating given the continued absence of the Maru. Dylan, wishing briefly for Tyr's intimidating presence, took the unusual step of donning his High Guard armor not for its protection, but for its threatening appearance.
When he and Rommie appeared in the Office of the Portmaster, Dylan took the lead at first. "We're here to get some information?" he said to the woman seated at the desk in the outer office.
"Yeah?" responded the clerk, looking up briefly from her reading.
"We need to know about a ship that was docked here several days ago."
"Can't help ya." The woman turned back to her flexi.
Rommie, with a frown, came close to her Captain. "Dylan, let me," she whispered, placing a cautionary and unaccustomed hand on his arm. With a bemused shrug, Dylan stepped back and watched as his normally mild-mannered ship concentrated an amazing air of menace. Dylan blinked a few times, then quickly assumed the role of even more menacing backup as Rommie approached the receptionist.
"We're here to trace a ship," Rommie said clearly, her voice low and smooth.
"We don't give no information 'bout ships here," the gum-chewing woman retorted, punctuating her statement with an enormous bubble.
Without a blink, Rommie smashed the bubble back into the woman's mouth. "We don't care what you normally give, you'll give us some information."
With widened eyes, the woman reached for her desktop communicator. Her eyes widened even further as she watched Rommie, apparently without effort, crush the unit in her hand. "Now you can tell us easy, or you can tell us the hard way, but either way, you're going to tell us what we need to know, is that clear?"
"Y - yes, OK, that's clear. Whaddya need?" The clerk's manner had undergone an astounding change toward the cooperative, Dylan noted ironically. "The freighter Eureka Maru docked here the day before the Salvager's Ball. Her crew was abducted. Who filed the papers to undock her?"
"Wh - what Salvager's Ball? There ain't been no Salvager's Ball on Wormhole long as I've been here, and that's been more'n six years!"
Rommie, puzzled, looked at Dylan for clarification, whose eyes widened slightly at the implication of that revelation. For a moment he paused, then he nodded. "OK, we docked CY 10003.86. You and Harper looked for us by CY 10003.92, right? So sometime in that period."
The woman, gaze traveling between the two, nodded hastily at the clarification and bent to her terminal to look up the answer. "The Maru was released CY 10003.90 by one.hmmm... that's odd. By the Portmaster's Authority. I don't know who took her out."
"Hmmm," echoed Rommie. "And where is the Portmaster now?"
"Well, he's out to lunch." The clerk's eyes, glued anxiously to Rommie's normally impassive complexion, widened again at what she saw there, and she hurried into speech. "He usually eats at the SpacePort Grille, you might try him there."
"We will. But if we don't find him, we'll be back." Rommie's tone skirted nicely between threat and promise, and the woman nodded hastily in agreement as Rommie and Dylan left the office.
The SpacePort Grille was a dive, with a greasy, synthetic atmosphere that left an unpleasant taste at the back of Dylan's tongue. It wasn't hard to track down the Portmaster - Fillian was his name - and this time Dylan just stepped back and let Rommie take it from the top.
"We're looking for information about a vessel that was docked here. You released it under your authority CY 10003.90. The freighter Eureka Maru. Who took it?" Rommie's tone was implacable.
Looking at the two figures before him, the skinny, orange-skinned figure's eyes darted back and forth in his sloping forehead. "I - I.." He stuttered, clearly trying to buy time.
"Spit it out." Dylan couldn't believe Rommie's voice could be so menacing.
"C - can we talk about this someplace else?"
"Nope. Now."
Motioning them closer, the Portmaster whispered, "It could be my head if he hears I've told you, but. I got a - err - message that that ship was available, so I let Thorlo Sepp, a salvager from around here, have it. What he did with it, I don't know."
Dylan frowned. "Where'd you get the message - it was wrong, by the way - that the Maru was available?"
"Erm, a little birdie?" The Portmaster's smile had a pleading edge, but Rommie was not inclined to be sympathetic. Taking his hand, she bent back a finger just enough to start hurting.
"Where. Did. You. Get. It?"
"From the Ogami!" The Portmaster gasped, clearly not big on physical courage. "They gave me the access codes."
Dylan's brows snapped into a frown, but he contained his comment. "Where can we find this Sepp?"
"If he's on-planet, wh-which I'm sure he is," the Portmaster quickly added as he saw Rommie's face change, "he's got an office in Quadrant 3, Section 12. You can find a directory at the Quad border."
Rommie released the Portmaster's hand. "Thank you. And next time someone - even the Ogami sisterhood - tells you that a vessel is mysteriously available, you might consider the peril in disposing of it so quickly."
"I certainly will," he replied promptly. "Err - have a nice stay on Wormhole Drift."
"If we don't," replied Dylan, "you're going to hear about it."
"I'm getting tired of this wild goose chase," growled Dylan as they strode quickly through the streets of the Drift.
"It should end soon," said Rommie, comfortingly. But when they got to Sepp's office it was closed and locked.
"He just ran out!" croaked a voice from the office opposite. "Dunno what got his knickers all in a twist." The high pitched voice cackled a bit, and Dylan nodded.
In an undervoice, he said to Rommie, "I'll distract her, you break in and see if you can find anything." He flicked a glance at Rommie to catch her nod, then walked smoothly across the hall while Rommie got to work.
In a matter of minutes she'd found the right record. The Maru had been sold to someone on a nearby drift, Karipa, and they would probably be able to find her there. With a satisfied nod she closed the office door back and rescued her captain from his conversation.
".and then my great aunt Fanny took us all out into space and."
Dylan's eyes were glazed, but he managed to nod in goodbye as Rommie took his arm - again - and led him from the room. Once they had left the building, Dylan looked at her enquiringly.
"I got it. We have to head for Karipa Drift.'
"Let's go. And Rommie - nice work all round! I think you've been taking lessons from Tyr."
"Why.yes, yes I have."
"Just another reason to get him back in one piece." The two ran for the Slipfighter to head back to the Andromeda.
She huffed out a quiet breath. No hand-holding today, that was for sure! With a frown etching her brow, she looked at the tall figure she was following. He'd tied his hair back in that engaging way he had, using his own locks as a tie. His figure swung easily through the woods - more easily than hers, she admitted with a wince as her blisters began throbbing - but the set of his shoulders betrayed his fundamental tension. No matter how easily he moved, Tyr was not at ease.
It wasn't too difficult to figure out what had happened. Now that she was relatively certainly nothing external had occurred, Beka was pretty sure that something had reminded Tyr that he was Nietzschean and she was inferior - only a kludge.
Not that she was unused to his feeling like that. On the contrary, even though they'd become closer since that disastrous dinner so many months ago, Beka's belief that he'd been telling the truth as he knew it - that any kind of serious inter-species relationship was, quite simply, unthinkable - had not wavered.
Not, that is, until this sequence of events. She supposed, when she thought about it, that this was the most intensive, dangerous, and stressful interlude they'd ever shared. And the sheer exuberance of their survival had probably led Tyr to act in ways he otherwise would not have.
It had felt good, no question. For months she had fought the attraction she felt for him, knowing that he was unlike to welcome it. The sense that he was open to that kind of feeling, that he might even reciprocate, had been dangerously seductive in itself. Beka shook her head a little as she walked at the folly of letting that particular part of her guard down.
Because, fundamentally, there couldn't be anything between them. She knew that. She'd known it for months.
And fundamentally, she asserted to herself, she was OK with that, no matter how hot Tyr sometimes seemed to her. Beka was her own person. She didn't need anyone else, she reminded herself. She was rated to fly solo, and solo was how she would fly. Yes, she'd lend herself to Dylan's quest, and yes, she could admit that she really cared for all the crew, but.. She was still rated to fly solo.
Lifting her chin unconsciously, Beka squared her shoulders and followed the silent man in front of her through the forest.
Klaxon-like, alarms shrilled through the Com Deck as the Andromeda hurled again through Slipstream. Dylan raised his voice to be heard over them. "What's going on?"
Harper's face was set, and he did not vouchsafe an answer. Trance, golden features unusually mobile, looked very distressed as she responded, "We're out of control in the 'Stream! Harper can't get us through!"
"Damn it! Harper, can't you get us back to normal space?"
"He's trying, Dylan! Yelling won't help!" Dylan looked at Trance in surprise, then turned his attention back to the ship's viewscreens where the eerie blue lines representing the slipstream wove by in complex, rapid patterns.
Sweat dripping down the side of Harper's face attested to the effort he was expending. Andromeda's cool voice spoke from a holograph beside him. "Something blocked our path through Slipstream, and now we are being forced away from our destination."
"What blocked us? What's forcing us? What is going on?" Dylan's voice was demanding, but carefully without the edge that had brought Trance to Harper's defense.
"We're not sure, Dylan, but - " Andromeda's words were interrupted by the ship's abrupt exit from Slipstream. "OK, we're out of Slipstream. Analyzing location.. We're in the Govrian System."
"What? That's a long way from where we wanted to be!" Dylan was exasperated. "I don't know what's going on here, but we are going to get to the bottom of it. Now, people!" Marching over to the science station, he began to concentrate; wiping the sweat from his brow, Harper moved to join him.
As the day progressed, Beka's feet grew worse, until her face was twisted into a grimace of pain. By mid-afternoon she'd gotten much slower; glancing back impatiently, Tyr caught the pained look. Clearing his throat, he spoke for the first time in hours. "What's the matter, Beka?"
"My feet are sore, that's all," she spoke briefly and did not meet his eyes.
Tyr frowned, concern nudging through the careful wall he'd made around his feelings. "Let's see." He was just as brief.
"It's fine," she replied.
"Let's see," he repeated inexorably.
With a sharp sigh of acquiescence, she sat on a nearby log and pulled a shoe off. Her sock was brilliant with blood, and the gasp she stifled attested to the pain of removing the shoe. For a moment, Tyr looked at her foot, face still, then he spoke. "Why didn't you say anything? It is foolish to let yourself be injured in this place; we have no first aid supplies!"
Beka's eyes flashed, but she shrugged. "It's no big deal."
For a moment, Tyr was silent, then, with a resigned grimace of his own, he said, "Put your shoe back on and stand on the log."
"Huh?"
"Stand on the log!"
With another shrug, Beka carefully put her foot back into her shoe, rose shakily and stood up on the log where she had been perched. Tyr came up beside her, turned around and said, curtly, "Climb on my back."
Not speaking a word, Beka climbed piggy-back onto Tyr's back. Moving his long locks to the side, she circled his strong neck with her arms as his reached around and clasped her thighs, holding her in place. Both were instantly aware of the intimacy of her position, and both immediately thrust that realization out of their minds. Bending forward slightly to balance her weight, Tyr walked on through the forest.
"Damn it, Rommie, that's the third time!" Dylan had gone way past exasperation now, and Trance's pale, wordless urgency was not helping matters any. "I know you know a lot of ways *not* to get us back to the system, but why don't you and Harper surprise us and figure out a way *to* return, huh?" Gaze fierce, he raked the Com Deck with his eyes before walking toward the door. "Trance, a moment?"
They strode off the deck together, then Trance spoke before he had a chance to. "Dylan, I don't think snapping at them will help."
"Then what will help, Trance? You've been here before, right? Tell me what we can do to get Beka and Tyr back, Trance, 'cause frankly, right now, we seem to be fresh out of solutions!"
Trance was silent for a moment, looking at him with unreadable eyes. "C'mon, Trance."
"Actually, Dylan, I never have been in this exact situation before," Trance spoke with dignity. "However, I am quite certain that it would be in their best interests for us to return soon to Beka and Tyr."
"So how do we do it?"
Trance was silent for a moment, then said slowly, "I wonder what has happened to the Eureka Maru?"
Dylan eyed her for a moment, thinking. "The Maru? Hmmm.." He thought some more. "Do you think the Andromeda's path is blocked but some other ship's would not be?" His voice gained excitement as he thought it through. "Good thinking, Trance! Let's go reclaim the Maru!" He whirled around and headed back to the bridge to give Harper the revised orders.
The sun was setting as Tyr carefully let Beka down. Except for one barked, "Don't!" when she'd allowed her head to drop onto one arm, and inadvertently brushed her lips against his ear, Tyr had not spoken. He remained silent as he kicked needles into a mound for a bed in the sheltered area he'd found, and just as quietly melted away into the underbrush.
With a sigh, Beka buried her head in her hands. She sat like that for a time, then carefully began to remove her shoes and peel her socks from her feet. Since Tyr had disappeared, she took no care to monitor her expression, and her expression was pained in the extreme as she carefully freed her second sock from the dried scabs on her heel.
Tyr, from the brush, saw that look and his own grew even darker in response. Dumping the armload of firewood he had gathered, he walked to her and knelt before her, carefully examining the injuries. Shaking his head, he held his hand out for the blood-stained socks she was still holding. Still without exchanging a word, she handed them to him with a puzzled look. Still clutching her socks, he disappeared again.
Beka gazed blankly at the sticks Tyr had dropped, then hobbled over to a clear area where she could safely make a fire. Awkwardly, she arranged the sticks in a rough shape like she'd seen Tyr make; she had some difficulty in the arrangement but finally stood back, pleased with her efforts.
"What are you doing?" He was still holding her socks, but now they seemed cleaner and very wet.
"Working on the fire."
"Leave that to me. Come here."
"Tyr, I think you've forgotten who you're talking to. I don't take orders from you."
For a moment, they locked eyes; then, with an elaborate sigh, Tyr waved an exaggerated arm at the rock where she'd been sitting. "If you could please," his tone made the word particularly sarcastic, "be seated?"
Eyeing him challengingly, Beka limped over and plopped down ungracefully. Tyr knelt before her; using her sopping socks as washrags he began to wipe the blood and dust from her feet. At her indrawn breath as he hit a particularly sore area, he looked up, his locks hanging. Again their eyes met and the sense of intimacy was inescapable. Then, Tyr's mouth tightened, and he bent resolutely back to his task.
When Tyr finished his ministrations, he disappeared again with her socks. Beka frowned after him, then just sat on the rock, staring into space as she thought through their situation. This could not go on, she concluded. Who knew how long they would be stuck together on this rock? Dylan would find them eventually, she was sure, but in the meantime, she had no interest in trying to survive with this distant, faintly hostile version of Tyr. She had to do something to snap him out of this mood.
Tyr was gone for a while, and when he returned he bore not only her washed out socks, but an animal of some sort that he had, thankfully, cleaned and spitted somewhere out of sight. Drawing the blaster, Tyr started the fire with a short shot, then carefully set up sticks to brace his spitted catch. Soon, the smell of roasting meat filled the clearing.
Tyr hung Beka' socks on a bush to dry, then disappeared again, wordlessly assuming the Beka would tend their dinner and the fire, she noted with a twinge of resentment. The smell of the cooking meat was so good that she quickly swallowed her frustration, carefully turning the meat on the spit to roast all sides equally.
In another while Tyr was back, this time with his shirt filled with fruits and greens. Beka reflected wryly, as she turned the spit again, that in terms of what they'd had lately, this was a feast. Tyr joined her by the fire, touching the outside of the meat to test its texture.
"I think it's almost done," Beka offered, and Tyr nodded wordlessly in return. Gathering a handful of the produce he had gathered, Tyr retreated to a seat on the far side of the fire from her rock and began eating.
Wordlessly following suit, for now, Beka picked up a couple of pieces of fruit and ate them, rising to again tend the fire. "I think it's done."
Tyr set aside his food and came back to the fire. Thrusting his knife into the flames, he quickly sterilized it, then used it to hack a piece of meat from the roast. He nibbled on it a bit, testing its doneness, then, holding it between strong teeth, he bent and cut another piece, which he offered to Beka.
Struggling to forget what the meat had looked like before being cooked, Beka crinkled her nose while accepting it. Both retreated to opposite sides of the fire in silence as they ate their fill, Tyr disposing of an astounding amount of protein and greens. For a long while they sat in silence, then Beka, sated, stood up and walked gingerly over by where Tyr was sitting. Standing before him, she cleared her throat and spoke.
"Anasazi, I'm gettin' pretty tired of the silent treatment here." Tyr said nothing in return, so Beka continued. "I kinda thought we were friends, but I'm willing to settle for acquaintances -" her voice sounded mocking on the word - "if that's what you want. But this totally quiet, hostile thing you got going, you gotta let that go.
"Who knows how long we may be stuck here, and if that weirdo Niet's gonna try something again? We've gotta work together, and that won't work if we're not even speaking to each other. So, c'mon, Tyr, knock it off, OK?"
For a moment, Beka stood eyeing him challengingly, waiting for his response. When he continued to sit in silence, no longer meeting her gaze, Beka huffed out a breath and stomped, as well as she could with no shoes and sore feet, back to the other side of the fire. With a final angry glare, she wrapped herself in her cloak and lay down, determinedly closing her eyes and willing sleep to come.
Tyr watched her as she stormed away, and kept watching as she lay down, her back turned resolutely toward him. How had she known? It was clear from her words that she'd figured out what was bothering him, and he gritted his teeth at her perceptiveness.
He supposed that he was hardly being fair, acting as though she had done something wrong when it was he who had strayed beyond the line. He sighed a little, and, as she was safely turned away, passed his hands through his locks in weariness and frustration. OK then. She had characterized them as friends, and, he was forced to admit, they had become friends. Friends with a bit.more, he supposed. It was the "more" part that had gotten to him; even the purest Nietzschean could admit to having friends, so long as the relationships were mutually beneficial.
So, friends it would be. But no more, no matter that the sight of Beka's body through the open front of the cloak she had appropriated continued to incite. No matter that her husky voice could awaken some fundamental part of himself that he'd long thought asleep. No matter that her determination, courage, strength and will to survive were as primal as any Nietzschean's, as his own.
With another sigh, Tyr threw a few more branches on the fire and lay down. Closing his eyes, he too charged himself to go to sleep. Perhaps another day would make things easier between them.
Tyr awakened several hours later, instantly aware. He was not sure exactly what had roused him, but whatever it had been brought all his senses into high alert. The fire before him had died down, and across its embers he could see the prone figure of his crewmate. As he looked at her, he saw her shiver, then give a short, sharp moan.
Tyr took a quick inventory: nothing else was moving in the clearing around them, but the temperature had fallen to a new low. His own metabolism, fueled by the enormous meal, was compensating, but clearly Beka, even wrapped in the cloak she had taken, was feeling the effects of the cold.
Silently, Tyr rose and slipped some more wood onto the fire, blowing on the embers to ensure the new timbers caught. After a brief internal debate, he crossed over to where Beka was sleeping and lay down behind her, sandwiching her between the warmth of his body and the fire in front of them. With a fatalistic mental shrug, he gathered her to him, once again wrapping her in his warmth. Her shivering quickly stopped; even in sleep she smiled, snuggling closer to him and pillowing her head on his arm. Shaking his head slightly, Tyr prepared to go back to sleep, not even acknowledging to himself how much better it felt to be lying this close to her.
Wormhole Drift looked jarringly busy to the anxious, intent crew of the Andromeda, its cheerful bustle all the more alienating given the continued absence of the Maru. Dylan, wishing briefly for Tyr's intimidating presence, took the unusual step of donning his High Guard armor not for its protection, but for its threatening appearance.
When he and Rommie appeared in the Office of the Portmaster, Dylan took the lead at first. "We're here to get some information?" he said to the woman seated at the desk in the outer office.
"Yeah?" responded the clerk, looking up briefly from her reading.
"We need to know about a ship that was docked here several days ago."
"Can't help ya." The woman turned back to her flexi.
Rommie, with a frown, came close to her Captain. "Dylan, let me," she whispered, placing a cautionary and unaccustomed hand on his arm. With a bemused shrug, Dylan stepped back and watched as his normally mild-mannered ship concentrated an amazing air of menace. Dylan blinked a few times, then quickly assumed the role of even more menacing backup as Rommie approached the receptionist.
"We're here to trace a ship," Rommie said clearly, her voice low and smooth.
"We don't give no information 'bout ships here," the gum-chewing woman retorted, punctuating her statement with an enormous bubble.
Without a blink, Rommie smashed the bubble back into the woman's mouth. "We don't care what you normally give, you'll give us some information."
With widened eyes, the woman reached for her desktop communicator. Her eyes widened even further as she watched Rommie, apparently without effort, crush the unit in her hand. "Now you can tell us easy, or you can tell us the hard way, but either way, you're going to tell us what we need to know, is that clear?"
"Y - yes, OK, that's clear. Whaddya need?" The clerk's manner had undergone an astounding change toward the cooperative, Dylan noted ironically. "The freighter Eureka Maru docked here the day before the Salvager's Ball. Her crew was abducted. Who filed the papers to undock her?"
"Wh - what Salvager's Ball? There ain't been no Salvager's Ball on Wormhole long as I've been here, and that's been more'n six years!"
Rommie, puzzled, looked at Dylan for clarification, whose eyes widened slightly at the implication of that revelation. For a moment he paused, then he nodded. "OK, we docked CY 10003.86. You and Harper looked for us by CY 10003.92, right? So sometime in that period."
The woman, gaze traveling between the two, nodded hastily at the clarification and bent to her terminal to look up the answer. "The Maru was released CY 10003.90 by one.hmmm... that's odd. By the Portmaster's Authority. I don't know who took her out."
"Hmmm," echoed Rommie. "And where is the Portmaster now?"
"Well, he's out to lunch." The clerk's eyes, glued anxiously to Rommie's normally impassive complexion, widened again at what she saw there, and she hurried into speech. "He usually eats at the SpacePort Grille, you might try him there."
"We will. But if we don't find him, we'll be back." Rommie's tone skirted nicely between threat and promise, and the woman nodded hastily in agreement as Rommie and Dylan left the office.
The SpacePort Grille was a dive, with a greasy, synthetic atmosphere that left an unpleasant taste at the back of Dylan's tongue. It wasn't hard to track down the Portmaster - Fillian was his name - and this time Dylan just stepped back and let Rommie take it from the top.
"We're looking for information about a vessel that was docked here. You released it under your authority CY 10003.90. The freighter Eureka Maru. Who took it?" Rommie's tone was implacable.
Looking at the two figures before him, the skinny, orange-skinned figure's eyes darted back and forth in his sloping forehead. "I - I.." He stuttered, clearly trying to buy time.
"Spit it out." Dylan couldn't believe Rommie's voice could be so menacing.
"C - can we talk about this someplace else?"
"Nope. Now."
Motioning them closer, the Portmaster whispered, "It could be my head if he hears I've told you, but. I got a - err - message that that ship was available, so I let Thorlo Sepp, a salvager from around here, have it. What he did with it, I don't know."
Dylan frowned. "Where'd you get the message - it was wrong, by the way - that the Maru was available?"
"Erm, a little birdie?" The Portmaster's smile had a pleading edge, but Rommie was not inclined to be sympathetic. Taking his hand, she bent back a finger just enough to start hurting.
"Where. Did. You. Get. It?"
"From the Ogami!" The Portmaster gasped, clearly not big on physical courage. "They gave me the access codes."
Dylan's brows snapped into a frown, but he contained his comment. "Where can we find this Sepp?"
"If he's on-planet, wh-which I'm sure he is," the Portmaster quickly added as he saw Rommie's face change, "he's got an office in Quadrant 3, Section 12. You can find a directory at the Quad border."
Rommie released the Portmaster's hand. "Thank you. And next time someone - even the Ogami sisterhood - tells you that a vessel is mysteriously available, you might consider the peril in disposing of it so quickly."
"I certainly will," he replied promptly. "Err - have a nice stay on Wormhole Drift."
"If we don't," replied Dylan, "you're going to hear about it."
"I'm getting tired of this wild goose chase," growled Dylan as they strode quickly through the streets of the Drift.
"It should end soon," said Rommie, comfortingly. But when they got to Sepp's office it was closed and locked.
"He just ran out!" croaked a voice from the office opposite. "Dunno what got his knickers all in a twist." The high pitched voice cackled a bit, and Dylan nodded.
In an undervoice, he said to Rommie, "I'll distract her, you break in and see if you can find anything." He flicked a glance at Rommie to catch her nod, then walked smoothly across the hall while Rommie got to work.
In a matter of minutes she'd found the right record. The Maru had been sold to someone on a nearby drift, Karipa, and they would probably be able to find her there. With a satisfied nod she closed the office door back and rescued her captain from his conversation.
".and then my great aunt Fanny took us all out into space and."
Dylan's eyes were glazed, but he managed to nod in goodbye as Rommie took his arm - again - and led him from the room. Once they had left the building, Dylan looked at her enquiringly.
"I got it. We have to head for Karipa Drift.'
"Let's go. And Rommie - nice work all round! I think you've been taking lessons from Tyr."
"Why.yes, yes I have."
"Just another reason to get him back in one piece." The two ran for the Slipfighter to head back to the Andromeda.