TITLE: Break

NOTES: If you enjoyed this you may be interested in the third in the Vengeance trilogy - A Past to Outdo which you can find via my profile. Thank-you so much for reading!

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE After All

"When all is silent, think of me."

Emperor Jaren N'Ral

CY 1297

It was quiet in med-deck - a contrast to the chaos that had filled it only two days ago. Trance took care of an engineer with a minor burn on his arm. They had all been working overtime since their chief was resting. Andromeda was running at about 80 but she dearly wished Harper was there to help her recover. They were orbiting Fehu, the planet in the Ferran system whose population were battling a plague. The cure was now in circulation and the Andromeda was staying to make sure the people got back on their feet.

Dylan came in to med-deck, as he and the rest of the crew had been doing every few hours since Harper had been saved. "How's he doing?"

"I think the treatment is helping, but I'll know for sure when he wakes up," Trance replied.

"The Ostarian ship just left," he told her. Adonai, Elrik and Nalan were taken back to Ostara to be tried and sentenced separately. As for Syla, Dylan made sure the authorities knew she was trying to stop Adonai from destroying the ship before she was killed. Dylan sighed. "What a week, huh?"

A shuffle from Harper's bed made them turn. He was stirring.

"Hey sleepy," Trance smiled.

Harper opened his eyes to bright lights, and found that they were not the same ones that had enveloped him in the core, but the ones in med-deck. "Not dead..." he mumbled. "...interesting." His body ached but what he felt now didn't even come close to the level of pain he had been in recently. Which reminded him... "How long?"

"A couple of days," Trance replied. Harper tried to sit up, a little too fast, and she helped steady him. "Not so fast, you're not fully recovered just yet."

"Understatement," Harper replied painfully, as his body protested to being moved. Then the memories started coming back, like punches and kicks to his mind. Suddenly the pain didn't seem to matter that much. "Oh my god...is everyone okay? Andromeda? Rommie?"

"Andromeda's running on 72. Crewman Ros had been working on Rommie, but I'm afraid she hasn't quite reached your level of expertise. Rommie's walking around with a limp and twitch," Dylan said, mildly amused at the image.

"I'm so sorry..."

"It's okay. You were pretty out of line, but you managed to save us all even at great risk to your own life. It's exactly what I expect from you or anyone on this crew."

Harper still didn't feel any better about it.

"Now, even though Trance has managed to come up with a treatment, it's not gonna do all the work for you. You've got a tough time ahead. And there's going to be a few changes," Dylan began. "Until further notice no longer have authorisation to use privacy mode. Access to Andromeda's systems will be limited to essential repairs. As for Rommie, no more hidden programs, and all existing ones are to be permanently deleted. Should Rommie become damaged you will only perform supervised repairs, until she feels that she can trust you again. Is that clear?"

Harper nodded. He knew his actions would have consequences, and in a way it felt good to finally be able to pay off his debt, as it were. He would earn Rommie's trust back if it took forever.

"I'm glad you're feeling better. Report to me when Trance says you're fit for duty," Dylan said happily and left.

"Part of your program is to report to me every six hours too," Trance said.

"That's okay. I could never get tired of seeing your face anyway." Harper smiled weakly and Trance returned it..

"What is it?" Trance asked, noticing that something was still bothering Harper.

Harper paused for a moment. "Lane Farrow...did you get her out of my head?"

"She was never there," Trance told him.

"No, she had to be. The holo-imager, it put a copy of herself inside my head, that's how she could speak to me," Harper insisted.

"Andromeda scanned the imager, it was just a hologram, nothing more. I've run every possible scan on you, and you're fine. I've been studying the drugs you were taking. They're the most sophisticated and powerful hallucinogens I've ever seen, even though they were unstable. They tap into your own psyche and create vivid delusions from your own memories," Trance explained.

"But she attacked me in the halls," Harper persisted. He was still drowsy from the long sleep.

"Maybe someone did attack you in the halls, and the drugs tricked you into thinking it was Lane," Trance suggested. "You kept her alive in your mind. She was just a manifestation of your guilt."

"I guess that's good news..." Harper said, though he wasn't entirely sure what he was supposed to feel about it. Lane had felt so real, but perhaps it was the fear that she was still alive combined with the paranoia the drugs caused that created her incarnation. It would still take time to accept that Lane was really dead and gone. In the meantime there was something else on his mind.

"Go ahead," Trance permitted. Harper looked up at her. "She'll be happy to see you, I promise."

Rommie was in the machine shop, attempting to repair herself, seeing as crewman Ros was making such a bad job of it. She couldn't walk around with a stupid twitch any longer, and she was fed up with everyone smirking as she limped past them.

The doors opened and Harper was standing there self-consciously. "Hey Rom," he said hesitantly.

"You're awake," Rommie pointed out, unsure how to react. She wasn't expecting him.

"I got a hard time ahead of me. Nothing I didn't bring on myself though," he said, staying in the doorway. The distance between them was more than physical.

"Good to see you awake," Rommie said eventually, but her voice was still removed and cold. She was glad to see him up and about, but she wasn't ready to forgive him just yet.

"For what it's worth, I had to tell you I'm sorry," he began, then started talking very quickly. "I know you probably don't believe me, and I wouldn't blame you if you didn't want me anywhere near you but - "

Rommie stopped him. "Harper." He looked at her with those relentlessly sorrowful eyes. Rommie paused for a few moments, then spoke gently. "Would you help me get rid of this twitch?"

Harper silently picked up his tools and went over to her, a hint of a smile appearing across his lips.

Early in the morning, in a seedy bar somewhere in the Thalia system, two men were engaged in conversation.

"I heard some survivors from Autriva tried to destroy the Andromeda."

"Yeah," the other acknowledged. It was hard to ignore the wild gossip about the Andromeda, everyone was talking about it. Even though no details were officially released, nothing could stop the rumours. "There's more to that story than we'll ever hear."

"Sounds like a little suspicious to me. I wouldn't be surprised if it was some kind of conspiracy. I heard the chief engineer went insane."

"No kidding," the other responded, taking another gulp of his beer.

In the shadowed corner of the room, a dark-haired woman listened. A corrupt smile contaminated her lips.

END