A/N: Thanks for the reviews and sorry for the wait. Now back to the story....

Chapter 33

As the drift shop's doors began to show signs of life, the four crew members were already treading down the awaking streets.

"Are you sure you can get him out?" Beka looked next to her at Dylan. Trance and Rommie were following up in the rear and Tyr had stayed behind to man the ship.

"Let's just say I will do all that's in my power to get Harper out of that hell hole." He paused with a sigh. "This is all my fault, isn't it? I mean if I had just understood earlier, if I hadn't been so dense, so pig headed, than Harper wouldn't be in there. Some captain I am."

Silently Beka agreed with him and couldn't find the words to comfort her guilt-laden friend. This is where having an eavesdropping android comes in handy. A soft cool hand fell onto Dylan's shoulder. "Dylan, you have to stop blaming yourself. You thought Harper was out to hurt us all. Your actions were understandable under those pretenses. What's done is done, all we can do now is to try to help him."

Trance now stepped up besides Dylan. "And plus, even if you did understand from the beginning, Harper still could have easily ended up in this situation. He could have ran away from Andromeda as easily as he ran away from Rev. It was not only your actions that caused him such pains." Trance said that last sentence with a heavy heart.

Releasing a large sigh, Dylan tried to let go some of his guilt. "Ok, I guess I really should concentrate on what I'm going to say in the negotiations...'Please let our psychotic murdering engineer go free. We realize he brutally murdered a drug dealer, but hey, that's one less piece of scum for your lovely prison system.'...yah, that will go over great." His hand went to the bridge of his nose as he tried to massage out some of the building stress. As many times as he tried it, the massage never seemed to help.

The group neared a large building and Beka spoke out. "Well, whatever you decide to say, now's the time." They all stopped in their tracks and admired the only non-graffitied surfaces on the drift...the drift's government building. The bronzed walls shimmered even under the faint light, almost acting as it's own source of illumination.

"Great," Dylan sighed. "Oh, Beka, before I forget. The deal that got us into Harper's cell the other day won't work today...or any other day. And before you even say anything, I know, it sucks. Just do what you can for him through that stupid grating." Taking a deep breath to bury his guilt, frustration and fears, he took one large step towards the impressive building. "Let's go Rommie. Wish us luck." 'We'll need it,' he added to himself.

"Good luck," both women whispered under their breaths as they watched Dylan and Rommie disappear into the shinny clean interior of the drift's government building.

Trance and Beka walked the rest of the way to the prison in complete silence as they each were consumed by their own nightmares of what awaited them.

After weaving their way through the drunks stumbling out of the bars on their way home for the "night" and dodging all the men, and women, who mistaken them for hookers, the two women finally made it to the depressing doors to the prison.

"Ready?" Trance asked knowing full well of the battle they had ahead of them.

"As much as I'll ever be. Let's go get our shorty back."

With as much determinations as they could muster, they entered the mouth of the hellish prison and were led to Harper's living nightmare.

"H'ya Harper!" Trance announced in her fake cheerful voice as she and Beka made themselves as comfortable as one can on hard metal filthy floors.

Beka looked down at her lost little brother only to see that he hadn't moved an inch since last night. His head still hung low and his knees still were drawn tightly into his chest. The tremors that wracked his body earlier seemed to have died down some. 'That's a start I guess,' she thought as she tried the foreign idea of being optimistic...it wasn't working. "Hey shorty. See, we came back." She paused hoping for any response, but all she got was more silence. "I hope you want company today 'cause we ain't leaving until they throw us out."

"We even brought lunch...see." Trance pulled out a bag of warm, fresh food. "Are you hungry? Do you want anything? A Sparky?" She waved a can over the grate.

Still no response.

"Come on Seamus. Are you just going to ignore us all day?" Beka's heart was shattering as she looked down on the non-responsive Harper below. She could only keep up this fake-happy-nothing-is-wrong routine for only so much longer. A lump was already beginning to form in her throat.

Trance stepped in as Beka shoved the lump down. "Are you feeling better today? Did the medicine I gave you help any?"

Nothing.

The lump rose back up and was joined by it's sister in Trance's throat.

"Please Harper, just say something, or move, or look up, or hit on us...anything...please." Beka was quickly losing the battle with the rising lump.

The huddled figure below finally responded by dropping his head lower.

"Argh!" The lump beat Beka into submission. "Damn it Seamus! We need you! You don't get the luxury of shutting down! You saved us! You don't then get to leave us! Say something!" She screamed as tears raced down her face and fell on her fingers that tightly griped the barrier that separated them. "TALK!! THAT'S AN ORDER!"

Silence...then a faint whisper. "Go away." It was Harper's voice, only much deeper, lower and very much dead.

"No." Both women answered in unison.

"Leave me alone, just go away." Harper prayed that they would listen to him. That they would just get up and leave him to his accepted fate. He prayed for once the universe would let him have his way...of course he knew he was never that lucky.

Beka's gentle voice filled his cell. "No matter what you say, we will not leave you. Ever. Do you understand that shorty?"

No, he really didn't. Why would they want him back? He tortured them, attacked Rev, and killed a human in cold blood. He was a druggie, a lush, a loser...a murderer. Why did they come back? Why would they want him back?

"Seamus? Well, do you understand?"

He couldn't answer. All he could do was to stare at his bare knees that peeked out of the large holes in his filthy pants.

"I'll take that as a no." Beka sighed as she wiped away her tears. "I guess we will just have to prove it to you then. I know my Seamus is still in there somewhere and we are here to rescue him."

'Ha!' Harper laughed to himself. 'Good luck.' Seamus was long gone, locked away huddling in some dark corner of his mind.

"Well Trance, I guess we are just gonna be sitting here all day."

"Yep, looks that way."

"Sport, when you are ready to talk we'll be right here, okay." Beka stated knowing that asking would be pointless.

"Please. Just...leave...me...alone!" Harper almost yelled through gritted teeth.

"No," they both answered back in harmony.

Harper heard the women's backs rest against the rusty metal bars of the cells above him. 'Please just go, leave me to die, why won't they go?' He questioned his confused mind.

Hours passed in udder silence as all three sat and waited for the other to break. A tense stillness overtook the otherwise empty cell block until a faint rumble echoed in the air breaking the silence.

Beka blushed. "Sorry. Hey Trance, hand me the food, will ya?"

"Sure," Trance replied cheerful which made Harper think for a second that it was his beloved purple Trance that sat above him.

Rustling could be heard over Harper's head and then the sweet scent of fresh warm food wafted down into his cell. He stomach screamed "NO" the second it got a whiff of the food and a wave of pain radiated through his body.

"Harper, do you want any?" Beka asked through a mouthful of the sweet, delicious veggie filled dumplings.

Harper kept his tearing eyes locked onto his bare knees as he tried desperately to control his gag reflex. But no matter how hard he fought, his stomach managed to reach up his sore throat to send a stream of bile over his tongue. Lurching over quickly, he let the dry heaves overtake him as a small puddle of fowl smelling vicious liquid slowly grew on the filthy metal floor.

"Seamus!" Beka screamed as she and Trance both realized something was wrong. Their bodies were begging for access through the barrier that only their line of sight could pass. "Are you ok? What is...it..." A pause of realization. "Oh, my! Trance, put the food back in the bag!"

Over the sound of his heaving, Harper could hear frantic rustling of the food containers and the bag. Soon the overwhelming sweet aromas faded leaving only the acidic smell of his bile and urine. 'Mmm, yummy,' he thought.

"Oh Seamus, I'm so sorry! I-I didn't....realize.." Harper heard sobs choking off his sweet Beka's voice. Was there nothing he could do that wouldn't cause them pain? As self pity and hatred threatened to overtake him once more, somewhere deep inside him a small bubble of courage and honor rose up from the darkness. 'If I have to cause them more pain, then I should at least be able to face them.' Taking a deep trembling breath, he pushed his weak body off the floor. His torso slowly rose as his filthy bare souls of his feet made contact with the cold floor. A shaky hand reached up to the grate to steady his wavering body.

"B-Beka...I-I'm sorry." The low weak voice rose from the hole of the cell and filled the void above. Only empty cells and a dingy ceiling stared back at him.

A duel gasp answered back followed by Beka's beautiful face jumping into his view as she stared down at him. Trance's marvelous face followed. Huge grins lit up both of their teary eyes faces.

"Seamus!" Beka cried out in joy. To see any movement in the boy was a miracle.

"I-I'm sorry." His voice was horse from lack of use and his eyes were only interested in their foreheads.

"Shh, no Seamus. You have nothing to be sorry for." Her hand twitched on the grating as it yearned to reach out and touch his fingers that were wrapped around the metal. She was only inches from her Seamus and yet he seemed light years away.

His blue dead eyes hid behind his dropped lids. "I hurt you...I left...you...on that...table...to-to...die." He swallowed hard. "Go, please...just go." His will left him just as his legs gave out and he fell back to the darkness of the depressed cell. "I don't want to hurt either one of you anymore." He croaked out in little more than a whisper as he crawled back to his darkened corner.

A weather system moved over his cell as it started to rain tears.

"God, S-Seamus..." Sobs cut off Beka's voice until the sounds of her fleeing boots on the metal floor cut off her sobs. Trance's lighter steps were heard racing after Beka.

"Good...go," Harper whispered to himself as he resumed hugging his legs.

********

"Beka!! Wait!" Trance called out right as Beka descended into nothing but sobs and collapsed to the floor of the next cell block. The few prisoners that were nearby quickly scurried to the fronts of their cages to watch the unfolding soap opera.

Trance raced to Beka's side and gathered the crumbling captain in her arms.

"I-I can't do this Trance...I just can't. Did you see his face? His eyes?" Sobs threatened to overcome her every word. "Those eyes will haunt me forever. And what is that idiot doing?! He's apologizing!" Beka's tear-soaked face looked up to Trance's mirrored face. "We should be the ones apologizing! US!! Not him!" Her head fell again as her eyes closed tightly hoping to stop the torrent of tears that wouldn't stop pouring out.

In the darkness behind her lids all she could see was Harper's haunting face staring up at her. The hard edge shadows of his sunken cheeks, those dark endless circles that lived under his aged eyes. And those eyes...such eyes should never grace any face - any living face that is. So much pain, guilt and loneliness filled those orbs and yet somehow nothingness managed to show itself as well. They were so empty, almost like the eyes of a corpse.

Beka wanted that face to go away and be replaced by that vivid, cocky face that lit up a room upon entrance. Yet, a part of her didn't feel she deserved the latter face. She had helped to make the empty soul that occupied Harper's body and she didn't deserve one minute of redemption.

"Beka?" Trance's voice broke though the darkness of the ghostly eyes that held Beka in her mind. "Beka, we have to go back to him. We have to be strong." Trance's warm tears fell onto the side of Beka's face and rolled down until they merged with Beka's own tears. "We have to stick together. Together we can still save him. He needs us and we need him."

Beka silently nodded as she wiped away the river of tears. Trance stood up first and offered Beka a trembling golden hand. Accepting with a likewise trembling hand, Beka was pulled upward off the cold floor.

"Be strong... I can do that." Bravado filled Beka's voice as she continued wiping away the signs of her breakdown.

"Yes, strong," Trance mirrored as she too fixed herself up.

Beka took a hesitant step forward before she stopped. "Um, how do you think we should approach this?" She had never saved Harper from all of his demons at once and especially not these new monstrous demons that she had helped to build.

A blank look washed over Trance's golden face.

"Just great," Beka swore as she started back down the depressing hallway towards her shorty. "Wing it like normal huh? Because that always works so well."

After they had left the cell block, the meager audience of prisoners groaned as their entertainment for the year had just walked away.

*******

'Alone again,' Harper thought as he traced a cut on his bare knee. As his dirty finger ran over the wound, a stinging sensation cursed through his skin. Pain was all he could remember feeling and now he was even beginning to find normalcy in it.

The sound of footsteps woke him from his cut tracing. They were coming closer, and closer...then silence. Looking up he was greeted by what some might think was the most beautiful view in the known galaxies. Beka Valentine's and Trance Gemini's gorgeous glowing faces were looking down towards him. Their expressions ones of determination and love, but all Harper could see were their reddened, teary eyes that held such grief and heartache. 'Great, way to go Seamus. Make them cry...you useless piece of shit.' He dropped his head once more as the women above dropped back down to the floor.

"Harper." It was Beka. "Harper, I'm sorry I lost it...It's just...well... you shouldn't be the one apologizing. You did nothing wrong. We should be apologizing." Her eyes closed tightly as she futilely tried to keep her emotions in check. "God Harper, what we did to you...what I said to you..." Tears snatched her voice from her.

Trance tagged in. "What she's trying to say is that we are all wracked with guilt over what WE did to YOU. We don't hate you for what you did. We know you always had our best interests in mind. Hell, you almost overdosed to save us. Never, ever apologize for what you did." She paused. "We just want you back. We need you back. Can you understand that?"

Her question hung over Harper's head like a fifty ton brick.

"No." Harper whispered out as he still kept his face shrouded in darkness. "Trance...Beka...y-you have to leave me. I-I just cause pain and death to everyone around me...you guys, my parents, Hohne, all my cousins...Rev. I'm death, I'm pain, I'm a freak'n monster. I don't deserve you...I don't deserve anything but this cell and a long painful death. J-Just leave me...save yourselves...just go." His last words escaped only as weak whispers as his dirty bare foot searched for comfort in contact with it's partner. "Just go."

A loud bang of flesh on metal directly above him made his heart skip a beat. "DAMN IT SEAMUS!!" Beka yelled with her face only inched above the barrier. "You're a freak'n genius!! Why can't you understand this simple concept! You good, we love you, we want you back. Simple enough!?" Timidly, the huddling man below peeked his head out of the darkness and looked upward. Beka's angry watery eyes answered back. "Yes! Look at me! Do you see me? I'm still here! Not hurt, not dead. I've been closer to you than anyone else for almost eight years!! Eight years!! And I'm still here! Yes, you did torture me, but think of what would have happened if you didn't. Think of what would have happened to all of us. We'd be prisoners locked in our own bodies, not even able to blink as we would slowly watched out lives slip by as we go insane. You, Seamus Zealanzy Harper, saved us from that! From a lifetime of pain or possible death. You are not at monster. You are a hero!"

The words slowly invaded his mind and created a storm of conflicting emotions. "B-But..." He tried to speak through the chaos.

"No 'But's' Seamus. You are a hero. You saved us twice against insurmountable odds both times risking your own life...almost dieing. You, the hero, saved us! Is this getting though your thick skull?!"

The self proclaimed monster looked back down as the word 'hero' kept resonating thought his darkened mind. He didn't know up from down, good from bad, life from death. Chaos and confusion took over his mind in a whirlwind of questions and doubts. 'Monster, hero. Hero, monster. Killed, saved lives...' The words raced through his mind in a hectic rhythm as his body began to rock to the beat.

"Damn it!" Beka hissed as her fingers turned white as they tightened around the metal barrier. The lean muscles twitched up her arm as the yearning to rip the stupid door off it's hinges and jump down to comfort her brother threatened to overwhelm her. "Come on Seamus, I know you can get past this," she pleaded with the only part of her that could reach her shorty.

The rocking continued as his arms raised up to cradle his head. "Monster, hero, killer..." The words now audibly escaped his tortured mind in the form of a mad chant.

"Come on kiddo! Snap out of it!" Panic stripped all color from both Beka and Trance's faces.

"Monster, hero, killer, saved, monster..." The mantra grew to match the increased speed of the rocking.

"Fuck," Beka whispered. They were losing him quickly.

"Ok, come on ladies. Visiting hours are up. Let's go!" The prison guard announced as he approached unnoticed through the thick fog of tension that hung over Harper's cell.

Beka remained glued to the cell as Trance jumped up to handle the unwanted order to leave. "NO! You have to let us down there now!!"

"Sorry, but no, I don't. Now let's go, I got places to go, people to hurt." He grabbed her arm roughly.

"NO!" Trance yelled out in pain, fear and anger. They could not leave Harper like this.

'Monster, hero, kill, save, monster, hero....NO!' Trance's scream broke through the darkness and shattered his trance. All the conflicting ideas, emotions and self images fell away as the lone image of Trance in pain took over his mind.

"TRANCE!!" He screamed as he jumped to his feet and his fingers dashed to the grating above. Filthy, cut finger rose up through the small opening in the metal barrier. "Trance!?"

Breaking her arm away from the guard's strong grip, Trance rushed down next to Beka as her face glowed with hope.

Both women saw the small vulnerable digits that protruded from below. Almost instantaneously, two pairs of delicate clean fingers made contact with the lone set. Fingers wrapping around fingers in the only type of embrace that was humanly possible at that moment. All eyes locked as they expressed everything that words could not.

"NOW!! Let's go!" The guard screamed as his pistol could be heard charging behind the women.

Fingers and eyes remained locked.

"NOW!!"

One set of eyes and fingers were torn away as Beka was yanked up by the guard and thrown against the row of empty cells nearby.

"We'll be back," Trance quickly whispered as she squeezed Harper's fingers tighter. A second later the grip was lost as she too was pulled up by an enraged guard.

"I said now!! Let's go!"

The sound of stumbling footsteps as the group retreating from his cell was all that Harper could hear as his fingers still gripped the grating for dear life. "Come back...please..." he whispered as his finally released his death grip on the metal. He fell back down into the cell and dropped farther away from what he had just found...true comfort. Tirelessly, he crawled back to his corner and resumed his standard position as a slow rocking took control of his body.

"Please...come back." The words fell like dead leaves from his lips as he let his nightmares and agonized haunting sleeplessness overtake him once more.

********

Dylan sighed as he wearily rubbed his eyes. Behind him was the brightness and cleanness of the conference room and government building, ahead of him was the darkness and filth of the drift's corridors and streets.

"I see them," the android next to him pointed out. Her voice was electric and chipper showing no signs of the endless hours of negotiating they had just both experienced. Dylan hated that. Here he was about to collapse and Rommie sounded like she could run an 50K marathon.

All he could mutter in response was an affirmative grunt.

Beka and Trance approached the rest of their make-shift family. He hated to admit it to himself, but Dylan was glad that they looked just as exhausted and worn out as he felt.

Beka eyed the other captain. "Didn't go well, did it?" Fear was just under the surface of her words.

Reluctantly he answered back with a small nodded. "But it's not over yet. I was able to get at least another day of negotiations out of them." He noted the rush of panic that raced across both Trance's and Beka's eyes. "But don't worry. I will get him out." 'I hope' "How'd it go with Harper?" He asked as they all began walking back towards the ship they called home.

Silence answered back until Trance stepped up to take one for the team. "He talked, he looked up, and let us touch him...but...he still has a long way to go." Hunt notice the tears she was fighting back. "Dylan, he looks horrible. We have to get down into his cell, for both medical and psychological reasons."

The captain sighed. "I know, I know." His head dropped and his hand instinctively went up to the bridge of his nose even though he knew he would find no comfort in the action. Some habits were hard to break. "I'm working on it."

The day's stress and drain quickly showed itself in the group as silence replaced all conversion. All but Rommie dragged their feet though the filth and trash that lined the drift's floor. As Dylan sneaked glances at his exhausted and downtrodden crew members, all he could hope for was that somehow he could pull of a miracle tomorrow.

TBC