Title: The ZzZz Discussion
By: X
Disclaimer: I own nothing and am getting no money
A/N: A very, very short piece that takes place shortly after the Maru crew joins Andromeda.
"Ahem" interrupted the hologram of the ship. Beka wasn't surprised to be interrupted, it happened on the Maru too. There she was lucky if they gave a yell before they barged into a person's room. Beka couldn't help but smirk at the memory of the time she brought that freighter captain back to her quarters. Over the right shoulder of the man nibbling her neck she saw Harper enter, raise his eyebrows and militarily turn on his heel and leave. It had to be less than ten minutes before Trance had wandered in, clutching a data display. Even though her skin was purple her blush was still bright red on her cheeks. The freighter captain had mistaken the little purple alien's yelp of surprise for something else by Beka and had just intensified his work. Beka had never seen Trance leave a room faster, yelling, "Harper!" before she was out of earshot. Beka smiled. Yep, things on the Maru were a little different.
"Yes?" she acknowledged and looked up from the book she had been reading. Holo-Rommie was standing in front of her at the end of the bed.
"I am having a problem with Mr. Harper."
"Hitting on you? He really doesn't mean it; it's just the way he is. Just ignore him, shoot him down, eventually he'll quit."
"No, this is more of a health matter."
Beka had jumped off the bed in less than a second. "The measles back? Something else? Damn that planet! How bad is it this time? He's allergic to methiphylin, it closes his airway and..." Beka was talking very fast as she hurried to the door.
"No, no it's not an immediately life threatening condition."
Beka stopped and scrubbed her hands over her face. "He's OK?" She gently slapped the image but her hand passed right through the air. "Don't scare me like that; Shorty doesn't have the best medical record." That last part was slow and sad. She remembered the Rigulan flu, the Blaxon retrovirus, even the methiphylin reaction. That body of his was hardly reliable.
"I wouldn't go as far as being OK, but I thought I would talk to you about the problem before reporting it to Dylan, as you are more familiar with Mr. Harper."
"What's the problem?" Beka sighed and sat back down on the bed. Rommie remained standing.
"Mr. Harper doesn't sleep."
"Sure he does"
"Your crew has been on board for 9 days now. In that time he has not once gone to his quarters after his shift and slept."
"Well Harper is unique. He hasn't slept at all in 9 days?"
"He sleeps, but hasn't slept for any more than 4 hours at one time. He crawls around, making repairs, works on one of his little side projects, then he'll sleep a little while and head back to work."
"That's just Harper, don't worry that's normal. Well, normal by Harper standards."
"Human beings require 8 hours of sleep nightly."
"He gets enough, he takes it in little cat naps."
"But he doesn't ever really sleep. Why?"
Beka glanced around. She didn't want to share all Harper's secrets, but Rommie deserved to know, if just so she would stop worrying. Maybe it would also help her understand how the universe had changed in 300 years. "He grew up never sleeping long. He couldn't stay in one place that long. There, you were vulnerable while you slept. They'd beat you, rob you blind or do something else if they caught you asleep. He's told me some pretty gruesome stories about life down there."
"In all his time with you he never got out of the habit?"
"Well, also, when you don't sleep long you don't dream as much. His dreams aren't pleasant." Beka sighed inwardly recalling a few of the times his nightmares had woken her, or the haunted look his eyes had sometimes.
"So he never has a typical nights sleep?"
"Very rarely"
"He's a very odd little man. Not like any of my other engineers."
"It's just Harper, you'll get used to him. Heck, for some reason he's pretty likeable, you'll wonder how you ever did without him."