Disclaimer: See chapter one.
I love all the reviews thank you, sorry for the delay but I've this thing with too much work and too little time. Mid-term next week though! Here is chapter 8:
"You can only realise the value of something when you don't have it. Friendship, time, love. These all apply. To know the value of friendship ask the person who is alone. To know the value of time ask someone who is dying. To know the value of love ask someone who know what it's like to hate. To know the value of hope ask someone who doesn't have any"
Harper had been working for hours. Trance wasn't much help so she just stood by and watched. He was very good at what he did, even though she really had no idea what he was doing.
It took her an hour to convince him to have a break. He just refused saying that Dylan had told him to get this done and he'd do it. Of course Trance didn't know that he had been used to working a lot longer than eight hours. He barely took ten minutes of a break and he had a glass of water and a piece of fruit, at Trance request.
He didn't know what the fruit was either. It was strange to think he'd actually never eaten or seen pineapple. He'd heard about it but he just thought it was an apple that tasted a bit like a pine tree. And Trance could almost understand how that made sense, to Harper at least.
He'd gone back to work and the thing, whatever it was was beginning to take shape. He was running a few diagnostic programs checking for problems, stress areas and other faults that would stop it from working. Trance was monitoring the environmental systems and the radiation levels. They were getting quite high.
That was when Tyr walked in. Harper jumped to his feet the moment he walked into the room. From her console Trance could see that Harper was almost shaking with fear. Tyr paused inside the door and looked from Harper to Trance and back to Harper.
Harper was trying to think of somewhere to run to, anywhere but here. He didn't know any kind Nietzcheans and so he presumed there were none and that this one was no exception to the rule.
Tyr had paused inside the door. Captain Hunt had requested that he stay away from their new engineer and Tyr now understood why. He was very frightened, like a frightened rabbit that instead of doing the smart thing and running away, just froze where they were and hoped they wouldn't be seen.
He should probably leave before the situation worsened but first he needed to talk to Trance.
"The radiation levels, how high are they?"
Trance was still trying to sort out the situation. Harper was standing very still staring at the floor. She checked her readings and told Tyr the level of radiation.
"Refresh my memory if you will, what is the recommended level of radiation that is tolerable for a considerable period of time?"
Trance checked her console again and gave him a figure much lower than the second.
Tyr mused for a moment. Captain Hunt seemed to have a dearth wish, they couldn't stay for much longer in these levels of radiation or the effects would be irreversible.
"You, boy. Whatever it is you are doing I'm sure is relevant to the current situation. I believe it would be beneficial to everyone concerned if you continued working. And since you seem unable to work while in my presence, I will leave."
Tyr strode purposely out the door meaning to have a few word with Captain Hunt. The man was insane if he thought Tyr Anasazi was going to sit around in a sun waiting for radiation to slowly disintegrate his DNA. If necessary Tyr would take matters into his own hands.
***
Both Harper and Trance breathed silent sighs of relief as Tyr left. Trance because the Nietzchean looked angry and Harper because Tyr was a big, scary, evil Nietzchean.
An hour later Harper tried to get Trance's attention.
"Uh..... Ms.Trance, ma'am?"
Trance looked up from where she was worriedly monitoring the console.
"Oh, no, just Trance, not ms. or ma'am. Was there something you wanted?"
Harper hesitated looking at the thing he'd been making and then back to Trance.
"I think I'm done."
Trance looked at him questioningly. "You're finished?"
He shifted slightly. "I think so."
Trance raised her eyebrows at this, either he was finished or he wasn't. Obviously Harper understood the expression because he continued. "I did everything it said to do in that and all the parts and right and I've run all the tests but..... I'm not certain that it works."
Trance understood. He was afraid he'd gotten it wrong. He'd checked and double checked but there really was no way to be sure.
She understood what it felt like to be insecure, to be so uncertain that what you were doing and had done was right. She sometimes felt like that and she knew what Atlas felt like holding the weight of a world on his shoulders. Even gods had great burdens, even heroes got it wrong.
She was about to reassure Harper when he collapsed for the second time. Only this time it wasn't from fear.
***
"Is he going to be alright?" Beka, Dylan and Trance were standing by Harper's bedside. He was very pale and very still.
"That depends." Trance paused. Dylan looked at her his expression voicing his 'on what?'. Faces said a lot more than words ever could or would.
"On whether we get out proximity to this sun soon or not. His immune system is a lot less developed than most humans, I guess growing up on earth had that affect. He can't tolerate the radiation."
Tyr was leaning against the door and Rev was standing away from the bed. There wasn't much chance of Harper waking up but they didn't really want to take that chance.
"Look Captain Hunt, I'm not sure exactly what your plan is but unless you can cause miracles I think I've a better way out of this."
Beka was angry, tired and fed up with this mans way of doing things. She knew they needed to take action now. Captain Hunt simply waited for her to continue.
"I'm taking the Maru and anyone who wants to come with me and we are getting out of here."
"And why do you think you have less chance of getting killed than the Andromeda leaving." Hunt crossed his arms and stared at her. He couldn't really understand her reasoning.
"Because my ship is not the Andromeda."
The next twenty minutes was a full blown argument between Beka and Hunt. It ended with Beka agreeing that they should put the thing Harper had made into one of the small transport ships. Hunt had revealed it to be a footprint magnification system after Beka accused him of keeping information from the crew.
Beka was going to take Tyr and Rev with her in the Maru because they weren't sure it was going to work and they believed being in the Maru gave them a better chance to survive. Trance refused to go with Beka on the principal that because Hunt refused to let them take Harper, her patient needed her. Beka said it was her own choice.
It worked, just about. The two ships survived the Andromeda in worse shape overall. It was what happened afterwards that was surprising though. When Dylan informed the Maru that they could dock, Beka announced she had other ideas. She, Rev and Tyr were not willing to be part of his commonwealth anymore and were going their own ways.
And that was it. No talking about it, no goodbyes. Beka cut the link and the Maru headed for the nearest slipstream exit. Dylan just stood for a moment shocked. He wasn't expecting that.
He had come to realise in the last few days that he needed this crew, even though they were unconventional and not really commonwealth material, he needed them. And now most of them were gone. He hit the console in frustration. He was back to square one, alone again or almost.
***
This was bad very bad. All the hints of a good future disappeared the moment Beka left. How had she let this happen? How had she made such a huge mistake? And how was she going to fix it?
The future looked as bad as she'd ever seen it. It was without hope now just like the people on this ship were. A displaced Captain, who's whole universe had been turned upside down, a terrified human ex-slave who didn't know the meaning of kindness and her, a person who'd made a stupid mistake and she didn't even know exactly what it was.
And in the med-bay, next to a still unconscious Harper, sat a purple girl crying like the universe was dying. And maybe it was.
***
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