*
"You're killing my people."
Dylan Hunt stared at the creature before him. Unbelievable, he thought. "No." Finally, his voice came, steady and unyielding. "No, I'm not. You are. They are. Your people are killing themselves, and you can't help them. You screwed up somewhere. And you want someone to blame it on. God knows, I don't exactly reproach you. Bearing the weight of the universe does tend to bring out the ugly in us all."
"You have no idea what you're talking about." The delicate blonde in the white dress wheeled, pacing the room.
"If I had shot you..." His smile was quirky, humorless. "Would you have stayed dead?"
"Dylan!" Turning, she stared at him.
"It's an honest question, considering what you are, who you are." Glancing around, he shook his head. "It's a damn good illusion. Ethan was a damn good illusion. Or was he? Did he just not exist, or did you do away with him?"
Something seemed to die in the brilliant blue eyes, and almost immediately they transformed into inky darkness. The voice lowered, retaining the same girlish lilt, but of a more familiar type. "You don't understand, Dylan. To my kind creation and destruction are of the same coin. Everything is illusion. Everything can be born and destroyed at our hands, if we make the right choices. I made bad ones; bad mistakes that made everybody mess up. And I can't fix them here. In another universe, maybe I did…but not here. I made things much worse. We just have to live with it. And I wanted you to be able to...I wanted to take care of you like I promised. I just forgot that the one thing beyond my kind is love." Turning, she sat on the floor.
"Trance." The name made her jerk, and he straightened, somehow both relieved and disappointed by the affirming reaction.
She inhaled, gaze straight ahead. "How did you know?"
"Aside from the melt down?" Sitting by her side, he considered. "I guess it was the little details. Your voice…not totally Trance, but close enough at times to warrant curiosity. Your innate habit of anticipating exactly what it is that makes me tick, that ability to trigger just the right memories. The eyes, such alien eyes, and the damned pin on my tunic. Your tattoo pattern, isn't it? Very obvious. Almost as if you wanted me to figure it out. I think you did. I think you wanted someone to protect you as much as you've been protecting me."
Her smiled was edgy. "You were all my responsibility. I was supposed to save you."
"And you've tried for the past few years. But you're right." His voice was quiet. "Happiness isn't enough for me. Not when it's at the expense of my family. You don't want this any more than I do...it's tearing you apart. Whatever promises you made have long out-lived their worth. We have to accept the universe we live in. Let go of the bogus dreams. Let go. For once in your life, lose control, Trance."
"I lost control." She remarked. "And we lost everything."
"Look, Trance." Gripping the illusory human arm, he tugged her around to face him. "Maybe this universe isn't perfect. Maybe I can't even make it good. But I can make it better than what it is now, if I try. Someone's been keeping up the facade of a High Guard, it's a start. We just help them."
"I'm not very certain you'll want to." Her lips pursed, expression taking on a very familiar concentration. "Dylan, the High Guard leaders are Tyr and Rommie."
His expression shuttered.
"You remember."
"Every moment, I'm afraid." A wry, self-castigating smile crossed his lips. Hunt sighed, deeply, and then released her arm.
She considered, her head lowered, cloud of pale hair flying loose. "I'm sorry. I could still bring back Ethan."
He touched her shoulder, sifting trembling fingers through the mass of blonde ash, shaking his head. "But it wouldn't be the same, would it? Trust is something you earn."
"Then give me the chance."
His response was immediate. "I'm not certain I can give any of you the chance again."
She glanced up at him, shoulders huddled together, brows knitted. "You know that's really not fair. I'm not the Trance you think I am. But then again, maybe I'm not even the Trance I think I am anymore. I've been living in this silly illusion for so long..."
"So take it off."
She managed an enigmatic, wry twist of the lips. "I really can't do that now. What would poor Ethan think?"
"I thought we agreed he was an illusion best left alone."
"Dylan..." A little of the impatience of his golden Trance and Liandra began to creep back into the formerly childishly, remorseful tones. "It isn't that simple anymore. I can destroy what *I* create permanently, but *you* and I created Ethan. He's only half mine, no real illusion. Our son is half human. I can't make him go away for good, and it was really selfish of me to make him go away at all."
"So I really have a son." Dylan absorbed the fact, eyes crinkling in bemused amazement.
"Yes, you do." She touched his shoulder, fingers morphing just ever so slightly into a familiar gold tint. "But it won't be enough, will it?"
"I have to go see Rommie." He continued; gaze distant and absorbed in thought. "And Tyr as well, I suppose. I'd be surprised if either of them ever wants to lay eyes on me again, but I have to try. And who else...Molly?"
"Captain of the High Guard flagship."
"I knew she could do it." Brief peace flashed in Hunt's eyes. "Rev Bem?"
"He acts as Rommie's advisor. He...uh...pulls her one way when Tyr is jerking her the other. At least that's how she puts it."
"Bless him for being her heart." Dryly spoken, the words nonetheless echoed gratefully. "What about Beka, and the ship?"
"Oh." She hadn't wanted that to come up.
"Trance?" His tones sharpened.
She sighed slightly. "Dylan, the Andromeda really was lost in a black hole. I wasn't lying."
"And Beka was aboard her." He shut his eyes, tones growing wearied.
"Actually." She admitted, hoping Beka would understand the broken promise. "Beka was outside her, in an EVA suit. Saving you. She unhooked her tow line, Dylan; I couldn't pull you both in before the black hole's gravity trapped us all. I'm sorry."
"Don't be." Voice rough, he lifted both hands to pull her in for a hug, and the alien recognized for the first time that she was shaking, and how utterly scared she was he'd reject her. "Don't be." He repeated; voice as soothing as he could make it, strained. "It's over, Trance. It's all over."
*
The desert edifice from which both the Commonwealth and the combined forces of the Nietzschean prides operated was vast, clean, and airy. Glancing back briefly, Dylan caught the reassuring smile Liandra...no, make that Trance...shot at him, and settled into a more placid frame of mind. Smile breaking, he took the arms of the Magog stepping towards him.
"Rev Bem."
"Dylan." The alien Wayist acknowledged, eyes saying perhaps more than the single word could have ever encompassed.
"Captain Hunt." Familiar, politely restrained tones echoed from nearby shadows, and Tyr Anasazi stepped forward.
"Tyr." Halting in his tracks, Hunt stared at the man who had always been so much more than crewmember or nemesis to them all. Wears power well, he thought with amused savagery. Will play humble host in exchange for absolution of past sins.
The Nietzschean parted his lips to speak, then clearly back-pedaled, instead smiling darkly, briefly, nodding his head towards the vast building behind him. "I believe that what you are looking for is within. Her gratification at this reunion extends to all of us, I am certain."
"Well, Tyr, from you, that's something. Are things that simple, then?" Eyes bearing down on Anasazi's face, the High Guard captain schooled his tones to softness.
The Nietzschean shrugged shoulders, brows lifting expressively. "Things have apparently never been more simple, Dylan."
"Go on." Trance said encouragingly, touching his back.
Once again, he fought back a wince, wondering just what it was about her small, intimate touches that suddenly sent him into automatic recoil. Hell, they hadn't bothered him for years...hadn't bothered him at all, unless in the most shameful ways. She's not my Trance, he realized, the idea taking root and refusing to let go. Not the Trance I spent time with in the mists, not the Trance all grown and ready to be a lover and a companion, not the Trance who seemed...older. Knowing. An equal. A better, a guide.
Not the Trance who had abandoned him without a second thought to pursue a mission she had already failed at once, abandoned what small pleasure she might have found with him to make sure the relationship need never come about in a better future.
No, he sighed. This Trance, the one who hid behind illusions and self-doubt, wasn't his Trance. The universe had won another round, and somehow, it didn't matter. He regretted very little now, except that she, the ancient one, was out there, somewhere, and alone.
Just to assure that he wouldn't be, in this universe or any other she could get a grasp on.
Turning, he gripped delicate elbows, spinning away from the Magog and Nietzschean and well out of hearing. "Thank you."
Eyes lighting vividly, his alien companion smiled, a peculiar peace shining through the elegant human exterior. "Go on to her, Dylan. You've been without your soul and Rommie her heart long enough."
"Tell Anasazi that." He muttered.
"Careful, he might hear you." Tyr's voice drifted from behind, liberally threaded with amusement. "And take righteous offense. I do not believe that you will find your avatar in any worse condition than when she last left your side, Captain Hunt. Nor do I believe you will find her unhappy."
"Just unappreciated?"
"Oh, very appreciated. Ascendent is satisfactory in every way."
Ignoring the deliberately jabbing undertones, Dylan smiled. "Pity it won't pass down. I always thought she had the perfect maternal disposition."
The Nietzschean's brow flicked up, lips curving. "So I have often observed." Tones rising, he pointed their gazes to a cluster of distant children. "Tamerlane!"
Briefly, one of the elder children turned from the group, husky skin glowing in the sunlight. Smile breaking, he lifted an arm in an unaffected wave, before settling to a more discreet salute.
"Your son." Dylan stiffened as the realization hit.
"And the reason every bit of this exists as it does this day, I should point out. I do not play games with my blood in the balance, sir. Everything that I did...well, this will someday be his legacy. A worthy cause, wouldn't you say?"
"I'm actually reminded of a little quote from Nietzsche, Tyr." Hunt glanced into the sky, blinking at the scorching sun. "'It's beginnings were, like the beginnings of everything great on earth, soaked in blood thoroughly and for a long time'. Wasn't it, your new Commonwealth? Is it something he'll ever really be proud of, or is he too Nietzschean to care?"
"Where there is to be greatness there is always to be blood, Captain Hunt, do not attempt to fool yourself into believing otherwise. There was blood spilled. Seamus Harper's fell by his own foolishness and yes, by my recklessness. Rebekah Valentine's life was taken by her ever unending valor. Yours by sheer persistence of cause, and you have become a martyr for it...and do not think that this Commonwealth is built upon any foundation but that of your legacy. Ascendent would allow nothing less. Go to her, sir. It is time that her loyalties reaped gratification."
*
Pausing just inside the monumental doors to the general conference room, Captain Dylan Hunt straightened his High Guard uniform and settled his gaze on the sole figure walking towards him from yards away. Rommie was beautiful, unchanged, her own High Guard uniform set off disturbingly well by the Nietzschean arm helix, and she was crying.
Opening his arms, he allowed his eyes to fall shut as her inhumanly strong arms wrapped around his neck, using all that remained of his strength to lift the android from the ground and squeeze in a bear hug. Finally releasing her, he smiled, holding out a hand and accepting hers.
"Shining Path to Truth and Knowledge. It's good to see you're still around."
FIN
"You're killing my people."
Dylan Hunt stared at the creature before him. Unbelievable, he thought. "No." Finally, his voice came, steady and unyielding. "No, I'm not. You are. They are. Your people are killing themselves, and you can't help them. You screwed up somewhere. And you want someone to blame it on. God knows, I don't exactly reproach you. Bearing the weight of the universe does tend to bring out the ugly in us all."
"You have no idea what you're talking about." The delicate blonde in the white dress wheeled, pacing the room.
"If I had shot you..." His smile was quirky, humorless. "Would you have stayed dead?"
"Dylan!" Turning, she stared at him.
"It's an honest question, considering what you are, who you are." Glancing around, he shook his head. "It's a damn good illusion. Ethan was a damn good illusion. Or was he? Did he just not exist, or did you do away with him?"
Something seemed to die in the brilliant blue eyes, and almost immediately they transformed into inky darkness. The voice lowered, retaining the same girlish lilt, but of a more familiar type. "You don't understand, Dylan. To my kind creation and destruction are of the same coin. Everything is illusion. Everything can be born and destroyed at our hands, if we make the right choices. I made bad ones; bad mistakes that made everybody mess up. And I can't fix them here. In another universe, maybe I did…but not here. I made things much worse. We just have to live with it. And I wanted you to be able to...I wanted to take care of you like I promised. I just forgot that the one thing beyond my kind is love." Turning, she sat on the floor.
"Trance." The name made her jerk, and he straightened, somehow both relieved and disappointed by the affirming reaction.
She inhaled, gaze straight ahead. "How did you know?"
"Aside from the melt down?" Sitting by her side, he considered. "I guess it was the little details. Your voice…not totally Trance, but close enough at times to warrant curiosity. Your innate habit of anticipating exactly what it is that makes me tick, that ability to trigger just the right memories. The eyes, such alien eyes, and the damned pin on my tunic. Your tattoo pattern, isn't it? Very obvious. Almost as if you wanted me to figure it out. I think you did. I think you wanted someone to protect you as much as you've been protecting me."
Her smiled was edgy. "You were all my responsibility. I was supposed to save you."
"And you've tried for the past few years. But you're right." His voice was quiet. "Happiness isn't enough for me. Not when it's at the expense of my family. You don't want this any more than I do...it's tearing you apart. Whatever promises you made have long out-lived their worth. We have to accept the universe we live in. Let go of the bogus dreams. Let go. For once in your life, lose control, Trance."
"I lost control." She remarked. "And we lost everything."
"Look, Trance." Gripping the illusory human arm, he tugged her around to face him. "Maybe this universe isn't perfect. Maybe I can't even make it good. But I can make it better than what it is now, if I try. Someone's been keeping up the facade of a High Guard, it's a start. We just help them."
"I'm not very certain you'll want to." Her lips pursed, expression taking on a very familiar concentration. "Dylan, the High Guard leaders are Tyr and Rommie."
His expression shuttered.
"You remember."
"Every moment, I'm afraid." A wry, self-castigating smile crossed his lips. Hunt sighed, deeply, and then released her arm.
She considered, her head lowered, cloud of pale hair flying loose. "I'm sorry. I could still bring back Ethan."
He touched her shoulder, sifting trembling fingers through the mass of blonde ash, shaking his head. "But it wouldn't be the same, would it? Trust is something you earn."
"Then give me the chance."
His response was immediate. "I'm not certain I can give any of you the chance again."
She glanced up at him, shoulders huddled together, brows knitted. "You know that's really not fair. I'm not the Trance you think I am. But then again, maybe I'm not even the Trance I think I am anymore. I've been living in this silly illusion for so long..."
"So take it off."
She managed an enigmatic, wry twist of the lips. "I really can't do that now. What would poor Ethan think?"
"I thought we agreed he was an illusion best left alone."
"Dylan..." A little of the impatience of his golden Trance and Liandra began to creep back into the formerly childishly, remorseful tones. "It isn't that simple anymore. I can destroy what *I* create permanently, but *you* and I created Ethan. He's only half mine, no real illusion. Our son is half human. I can't make him go away for good, and it was really selfish of me to make him go away at all."
"So I really have a son." Dylan absorbed the fact, eyes crinkling in bemused amazement.
"Yes, you do." She touched his shoulder, fingers morphing just ever so slightly into a familiar gold tint. "But it won't be enough, will it?"
"I have to go see Rommie." He continued; gaze distant and absorbed in thought. "And Tyr as well, I suppose. I'd be surprised if either of them ever wants to lay eyes on me again, but I have to try. And who else...Molly?"
"Captain of the High Guard flagship."
"I knew she could do it." Brief peace flashed in Hunt's eyes. "Rev Bem?"
"He acts as Rommie's advisor. He...uh...pulls her one way when Tyr is jerking her the other. At least that's how she puts it."
"Bless him for being her heart." Dryly spoken, the words nonetheless echoed gratefully. "What about Beka, and the ship?"
"Oh." She hadn't wanted that to come up.
"Trance?" His tones sharpened.
She sighed slightly. "Dylan, the Andromeda really was lost in a black hole. I wasn't lying."
"And Beka was aboard her." He shut his eyes, tones growing wearied.
"Actually." She admitted, hoping Beka would understand the broken promise. "Beka was outside her, in an EVA suit. Saving you. She unhooked her tow line, Dylan; I couldn't pull you both in before the black hole's gravity trapped us all. I'm sorry."
"Don't be." Voice rough, he lifted both hands to pull her in for a hug, and the alien recognized for the first time that she was shaking, and how utterly scared she was he'd reject her. "Don't be." He repeated; voice as soothing as he could make it, strained. "It's over, Trance. It's all over."
*
The desert edifice from which both the Commonwealth and the combined forces of the Nietzschean prides operated was vast, clean, and airy. Glancing back briefly, Dylan caught the reassuring smile Liandra...no, make that Trance...shot at him, and settled into a more placid frame of mind. Smile breaking, he took the arms of the Magog stepping towards him.
"Rev Bem."
"Dylan." The alien Wayist acknowledged, eyes saying perhaps more than the single word could have ever encompassed.
"Captain Hunt." Familiar, politely restrained tones echoed from nearby shadows, and Tyr Anasazi stepped forward.
"Tyr." Halting in his tracks, Hunt stared at the man who had always been so much more than crewmember or nemesis to them all. Wears power well, he thought with amused savagery. Will play humble host in exchange for absolution of past sins.
The Nietzschean parted his lips to speak, then clearly back-pedaled, instead smiling darkly, briefly, nodding his head towards the vast building behind him. "I believe that what you are looking for is within. Her gratification at this reunion extends to all of us, I am certain."
"Well, Tyr, from you, that's something. Are things that simple, then?" Eyes bearing down on Anasazi's face, the High Guard captain schooled his tones to softness.
The Nietzschean shrugged shoulders, brows lifting expressively. "Things have apparently never been more simple, Dylan."
"Go on." Trance said encouragingly, touching his back.
Once again, he fought back a wince, wondering just what it was about her small, intimate touches that suddenly sent him into automatic recoil. Hell, they hadn't bothered him for years...hadn't bothered him at all, unless in the most shameful ways. She's not my Trance, he realized, the idea taking root and refusing to let go. Not the Trance I spent time with in the mists, not the Trance all grown and ready to be a lover and a companion, not the Trance who seemed...older. Knowing. An equal. A better, a guide.
Not the Trance who had abandoned him without a second thought to pursue a mission she had already failed at once, abandoned what small pleasure she might have found with him to make sure the relationship need never come about in a better future.
No, he sighed. This Trance, the one who hid behind illusions and self-doubt, wasn't his Trance. The universe had won another round, and somehow, it didn't matter. He regretted very little now, except that she, the ancient one, was out there, somewhere, and alone.
Just to assure that he wouldn't be, in this universe or any other she could get a grasp on.
Turning, he gripped delicate elbows, spinning away from the Magog and Nietzschean and well out of hearing. "Thank you."
Eyes lighting vividly, his alien companion smiled, a peculiar peace shining through the elegant human exterior. "Go on to her, Dylan. You've been without your soul and Rommie her heart long enough."
"Tell Anasazi that." He muttered.
"Careful, he might hear you." Tyr's voice drifted from behind, liberally threaded with amusement. "And take righteous offense. I do not believe that you will find your avatar in any worse condition than when she last left your side, Captain Hunt. Nor do I believe you will find her unhappy."
"Just unappreciated?"
"Oh, very appreciated. Ascendent is satisfactory in every way."
Ignoring the deliberately jabbing undertones, Dylan smiled. "Pity it won't pass down. I always thought she had the perfect maternal disposition."
The Nietzschean's brow flicked up, lips curving. "So I have often observed." Tones rising, he pointed their gazes to a cluster of distant children. "Tamerlane!"
Briefly, one of the elder children turned from the group, husky skin glowing in the sunlight. Smile breaking, he lifted an arm in an unaffected wave, before settling to a more discreet salute.
"Your son." Dylan stiffened as the realization hit.
"And the reason every bit of this exists as it does this day, I should point out. I do not play games with my blood in the balance, sir. Everything that I did...well, this will someday be his legacy. A worthy cause, wouldn't you say?"
"I'm actually reminded of a little quote from Nietzsche, Tyr." Hunt glanced into the sky, blinking at the scorching sun. "'It's beginnings were, like the beginnings of everything great on earth, soaked in blood thoroughly and for a long time'. Wasn't it, your new Commonwealth? Is it something he'll ever really be proud of, or is he too Nietzschean to care?"
"Where there is to be greatness there is always to be blood, Captain Hunt, do not attempt to fool yourself into believing otherwise. There was blood spilled. Seamus Harper's fell by his own foolishness and yes, by my recklessness. Rebekah Valentine's life was taken by her ever unending valor. Yours by sheer persistence of cause, and you have become a martyr for it...and do not think that this Commonwealth is built upon any foundation but that of your legacy. Ascendent would allow nothing less. Go to her, sir. It is time that her loyalties reaped gratification."
*
Pausing just inside the monumental doors to the general conference room, Captain Dylan Hunt straightened his High Guard uniform and settled his gaze on the sole figure walking towards him from yards away. Rommie was beautiful, unchanged, her own High Guard uniform set off disturbingly well by the Nietzschean arm helix, and she was crying.
Opening his arms, he allowed his eyes to fall shut as her inhumanly strong arms wrapped around his neck, using all that remained of his strength to lift the android from the ground and squeeze in a bear hug. Finally releasing her, he smiled, holding out a hand and accepting hers.
"Shining Path to Truth and Knowledge. It's good to see you're still around."
FIN