TITLE: Break
NOTES: Thanks to RuthlessStyleFreak, nureek, parisindy and everyone who gave me yummy reviews :D
iorekbyrn - I don't know why you're confused, did you read the first fic? I'm glad you're enjoying it nonetheless!
CHAPTER SEVEN ~ Secrets, Lies and Delusion
"Insanity is more frightening when you know it's happening."
Nemen Scoron, eighth servant of Tereten Selyek
CY 432
^~*~^
"The Commonwealth does not believe in capital punishment," Terren said. The ethics of Harper's Vengeance program had come into question shortly after he had taken the stand.
Beka was worried. Morality wasn't something Harper was good at explaining. 'Bad guys should die' had always been one of his philosophies - then again, Beka's image of Harper had been distorted recently. Before she would have never in a hundred years believed that her spunky sidekick was capable of murder - or suicide for that matter. She wondered briefly if Tyr was right - that Harper was weak - then realised that she was talking about Tyr. Nietzchean morality was severely different to anyone else's. Beka came back from her thoughtful tangent and listened to Harper's answer.
"Well, uh....when I built Rommie in all her aesthetic glory there was no Commonwealth and no enforceable, you know, 'laws' about that sorta thing."
"He's talking even faster than usual," Dylan whispered to his side.
"Probably just nerves," Trance returned.
"Mr Harper, do you feel regret for the deaths of two hundred and six colonists on Autriva?"
"What kind of a question is that?!" Harper snapped angrily. "Of course I do."
"Then would you say you feel responsible for those deaths?"
On the sidelines Tyr grew angrier and angrier with the line of questioning the representatives were using. It was like they *wanted* someone to blame, just so everything could be wrapped up nicely. Even though Tyr had lost a great deal of respect for the boy, he did not like the fact that he was being led into a trap.
"I feel guilty. Responsibility and guilt are very different things," Harper said philosophically. His mood swings were becoming more apparent. "I feel guilty because two hundred and six people died and they didn't have to."
"Yours and your friends stories are consistent, as is the remorse you seem to feel, but can you tell me - "
Terren went on, but Harper stopped listening. He was trying his best to concentrate and not lose his temper, but hallucinations were something he had no control over. Lane Farrow had appeared out of nowhere and was standing over Gidarn.
Gidarn didn't react to her presence at all, and Harper knew why. Because she wasn't really there. Be it drugs, a hangover or plain insanity, Lane Farrow was good and dead (more dead than good) and there was no possible way that she was actually in the room with him. Harper *knew* this, and yet, she was as real to him as the floor he was standing on.
Harper tried to force himself to not look at her, but he couldn't hide his heartbeat or his pulse which had quickened. Rommie knew something had spooked Harper. She was monitoring everyone in the room, a task she performed so constantly it had become like background noise. Even so, there was little she could do about it until the session was over.
"Mr Harper?" S'Ren prompted.
Harper realised he hadn't heard the end of Gidarn's question. "Uh, what...what was the question?"
Terren repeated himself, but Lane spoke loudly over him. "He said; "You're a lying little shit, aren't you, Seamus?"" She grinned.
Harper's hands were starting to tremble again, so he dug his nails into his palms in a vain attempt to stop them.
Lane started again. In reality - or wherever the other people in the room were - there was nothing but silence and a very panicked man at the stand. ""Responsibility and guilt are two different things,"" Lane mocked, imitating Harper. "Yeah right, and you got them both. Admit it, and this will all be over."
"Are you alright, Mr Harper?" Gidarn asked. Dylan and the others were wondering the same thing. Was Harper caving under the pressure? Was he ill?
"Seventy-one!" Lane exclaimed. "Seventy-one times someone has asked you that since you woke up from that coma. Tell them how you really are. Tell them about the Hex. The truth will set you free," she derided.
"I can't....I....I gotta go," Harper stammered and bolted from the room as fast as his legs would allow.
"Um...session will adjourn and reconvene at 1900 hours," S'Ren announced, unprepared for the sudden display of emotion from the engineer. He wasn't the only one.
^~*~^
Harper ended up in an empty room. It was an office of some sort, but he hadn't really noticed his surroundings. He was falling apart. Sweat formed on his forehead and his shaking hands had not stopped.
"Look at you. You're pathetic."
Harper wasn't alone anymore.
"You're not real," Harper told himself.
"I'm as real as you make me," Lane said.
Harper blocked out the sound of her voice and opened the door to leave, only for Lane to grab the back of his shirt and with the other hand grip his hair. "You haven't changed in six years. You were nothing then, and you are nothing now," she hissed through gritted teeth, swung him round and shoved him with all her strength into the mirrored wall on the far side of the office. It cracked where the side of his head hit it.
Harper fell to the floor and Lane was gone. A grand cut had sliced the right side of his face, from the corner of his eye to the bottom of his jaw, and he could already feel the bruises that were sure to make themselves known in a couple of hours. The blood oozing from the clean cut trickled down his face on its chosen path, and soaked itself into his shirt.
Harper shook off the brief shock and looked at the cracked mirror. It wasn't possible. How could it be? It was all in his head, but Lane had grabbed him as if she had physical form. It couldn't have been....no, he wouldn't let himself even consider that Lane had survived, that maybe this time it was really her.
As he scrambled to the door his mind was set on one thing - getting the hell out of there.
^~*~^
End of chapter seven