Summary: Beka deals with the fallout that Tyr leaves behind.
Codes: Beka/Tyr, Tyr/Harper, and Dylan/TRhade
Disclaimer: Tribune owns all rights to Andromeda. I just borrowed them for use in my twisted little tale.
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: "Soon the Nearing Vortex" and "The World Turns All Around Her," possibly for IP and TWG
Feedback: Please! I love praise and constructive criticism, but flames will be donated to the Burning Man Festival.
Archive: Ask first and I'll probably say yes.
Authors Note: I noticed a few holes in the story.
Betrayed
By B.L.A. the Mouse
Beka sat in the galley of the Maru in a silent staring contest with a bottle of tequila. "Dammit," she muttered. "I shouldn't. I wouldn't. But I wish I could." Finally, she stood and hid it in a cupboard, one that she was pretty sure Harper wouldn't find it in- beer did enough to his liver. She ended up doing this every night since- She cut that thought off before she got any further, but her brain finished it anyway. Since you got double-crossed and hung out to dry.
"Damn." She thumped her head against the cupboard door. "Damn, damn, damn-" She stubbed her toe on the stool as she turned. "Shit!"
"Beka? Is something wrong?" Trances soft voice preceded her into the room by only a moment.
"Trance? How long-"
"Have I been standing here?" Amused, she came over to Beka. "Only for the last two 'damns' or so."
"All right then." Not in a mood to talk, she tried brushing past her, but was stopped by an arm across her belly. "What?" she asked, as patiently as she could manage.
The alien suddenly looked forbidding, folding her arms across her chest. She was a perfect cross between a warrior goddess and a stern mother. Not going to think about mothers... "You're not properly accepting anything. Rhade, Tyr, myself... You're just hiding on the Maru."
"It's my ship. I'm allowed."
Trance let her by this time, but followed her. "You're going to have to accept change, you know."
"I may have to, but I don't want to. I mean, you alone is too much." She kicked her boots under the bed. "I've had a lot of suspicions about you, but Hell, you're a sun? How does that even work?"
Trance shrugged. "It's the same basic material. It's just put together differently." She focused again as Beka shook her head. "Its not me that you have a problem with. It's Rhade- and Tyr."
"Trance." Beka pulled her gun out and pointed it at her. She didn't want to hear this. "This won't kill you, but it will knock you out for a few hours. Now get off my ship."
Quietly, she nodded and left. Beka waited until she heard the airlock cycle closed before sliding the gun back into her belt.
She started to get undressed- she wanted a shower before bed. She hated pulling a gun on Trance, but there was no other way to avoid her now. The speech had been hitting a little close for comfort.
Rhade was a problem, and it was going to be tough dealing with him, but more so for Dylan than herself. He was only going to present difficulties if he acted Nietzschean.
If he acted like Tyr.
Beka stiffened as Rhade came to stand next to her. "What?"
"I need to adjust a sensor. If you'll excuse me" He leaned past her to tap a quick staccato of buttons.
She felt a shiver run down her spine.
"Is something wrong?" he asked, but before she could make up a lie Dylan called him over.
That had felt scarily familiar; the only way it could have been more disturbing is if he had informed her of a skill that he'd cultivated. She wondered briefly what his would be as compared to Tyr's.
Not going there!
This was going to be... stressful.
Beka was a tad startled that afternoon. She had been working on the Maru, repairing one of the innumerable damages it always sustained. This one- snapped wiring and a cracked casing- had been from right before they entered the Route of Ages.
Specifically, it was the junction Tyr had shoved her into.
She still couldn't remember much after that. She'd been trying for a week- everything she got after they'd entered the Route was dulled and far-removed. She remembered being offered up for slaughter- the cloud of the Abyss- her first glimpse of the Andromeda as she came out of it. She remembered Dylan calling her name, and Trance and Harper talking. She couldn't remember Tyr's death.
Rommie said that she was probably suppressing the memories, and that she would remember them eventually. Beka didn't want to remember, though, at least not the way Harper described it. She didn't want to know how he looked as he fell. She didn't want to see him shot in the back. She didn't want to think that that had to be it.
She jumped when she heard the communications beep. She wasn't expecting mail- her dad's debts were paid, her bills weren't due, and last time she checked Rafe was not in a position to get arrested, and therefore not likely to be calling for her aid.
When she checked, the situation got even stranger. The message was sent from the Maru itself, with a timestamp of only a few months before. It was addressed to her, with the sender blanked out. Just to be safe, she downloaded it onto a flexi, deleting the original from the Maru's memory banks. She sat in the pilot's chair and opened the message.
Beka stared at the flexi, disjointed phrases flitting through her mind.
Registry of my death will release this message...
When Dylan recorded Tyr's death in the Andromedas databanks, it triggered a delayed message that he had recorded long before he left, for her.
...my son, Tamerlane Anasazi, out of Freya by Tyr... Midden...
Tyr had a son with a woman from Orca Pride. That son was alive on a Dragon planet, under the care of the Orca matriarch and one of the humans of the planet. He was the Nietzschean messiah.
...your guardianship...
And she was responsible.
The message itself was basic, factual. She had to make sure that Tamerlane grew up, safe and well-doctrinated in Nietzschean tradition, but with an appreciation of the value of Humans. She didn't actually have to take care of him unless something extreme occurred that rendered Olma, the matriarch, incapable. She didn't have to pay for anything, as Tyr had given the number of and access to an account with adequate funds.
Footsteps clattered over the grating, pulling her from her thoughts. They were accompanied by loud, off-key singing. If she listened- and she didn't care to- she could hear Harper warbling, "You will sit and watch the sunrise over Claddagh..."
Forewarned, she shut off the flexi just as he came into view, warbling, "And see the sun go down by Galway Bay!" He checked himself as he saw her. "Hey, boss. What's happening?"
"Not much." She smiled, a little, at his attempts to be respectful. After she'd snapped at him the third time- and "accidentally" electrocuted him the fourth, during repairs- he'd tried to stem his normal flow of words around her. "So what are you doing here?"
"Getting something." Harper eyed her a little closer. "Beka? Are you okay?"
"I'm alright."
"I dont think so. You're white." He sat next to her. "So what happened?"
She decided to give him something to worry over, at the least to divert him. "Tyr happened."
"What? You're still out of it when it comes to him?"
"Not quite."
After a long pause, she started to think he'd dropped it when he ventured, "Uh, Beka? Youre not...?"
She looked over to see him pantomiming... something, she wasn't sure what exactly. She got the gist of it, though. "God, no!"
He visibly relaxed. "Good. I have no idea, though."
"I'm still reacting, I think, he did a hell of a job on me. Have you ever been used and abused by the one and only Tyr?" The comment was flippant, intended to be, but there was another silence following. And Harper was refusing to meet her eyes. "You?"
"Yeah..." he muttered, still looking away.
"When?"
"Once or twice..." Then, after a beat, he added, "A month."
"What! How long was this happening?"
"Um..." He squinted, thinking. "From the Magog attacks till right after he got back from visiting Missus Anasazi. I went to see him later and he told me I was getting 'too attached' and the 'arrangement is terminated.'" He mimicked the Nietzschean's tones.
She sagged back, trying to suppress the urge to do something to the flexi. "So he managed to play both of us."
"No." Harper shook his head, looking mournful. "He wanted you. I was the fill-in- whenever he wanted you, he'd come to me."
"Oh, Seamus... I'm sorry."
He looked at her like she was nuts. "What're you apologizing for? You didn't do it, and I figured out the score pretty quick. I just decided that I'd take what I could get." He frowned, suddenly, standing. "I gotta get that tool, or Rommie's gonna fry me. I'll see you later."
Long after he'd seen himself out (making anguished sounds that apparently passed as music) she stayed sitting on the bunk, staring at the flexi.
She'd had no idea the entire time- about Tyr and Harper, or about Tamerlane. Months, and she still had no idea, and they'd professed to be friends. And Tyr expected her to watch out for his kid after this?
After a few more days, Beka was no closer to a decision than before. Desperate, she waited until ship's night and went to the gym- she preferred to be alone while pretending punching bags had familiar faces. Eventually, she found herself, not working out excess energy, but beating the punching bag like she was trying to kill it. "Stupid uber!" she spat, driving her fists into it. "Lousy goddamned... double-crossing scumbag!" She punctuated each word with a blow.
It took an hour, but she slowly tired. Her jabs dissolved into tears of frustration, and she leaned against the bag; between breaths she sobbed jerkily, her throat catching. She felt exhausted, and defeated, and worn.
Her first sign that anyone was aware of her distress was the feeling of hands on her shoulders, leading her over to the bench. "Sit down, Beka," Rommie said, pressing on her shoulders till she had no other choice. "You need to slow down, your hands are bleeding."
Startled, she realized vacantly that there was dull pain radiating from her knuckles. "I didn't..."
"It's alright." Rommie efficiently rubbed a disinfectant into the wound, bandaging them gently. "I stopped by Med deck and got these. If they aren't better by tomorrow, come see me." She paused, letting Beka's hand rest in hers a moment. "If you want to talk," she ventured, "I'm here." After she got no response, she turned and headed for the door.
Beka watched her, out of the corner of her eye. Her mind was blank until Rommie reached the last step, then she blurted the first thing she thought of. "I was expecting it."
Rommie stopped. Silently, she turned and came back, sitting next to Beka.
"I was expecting it. I was waiting for something. But I thought he'd just lie or double-cross me, I didn't think he'd try to kill me." She felt choked. "I mean, dammit, I knew him, I thought I did. I spent so much time with the bastard... And he-" She was disgusted at the tears that began to sting her eyes again. "I mean, Harper? If he wanted me so damn much that he went to Harper for relief, why the hell would he try killing me?" Angry, she rubbed at the streaks down her cheek.
She felt an arm go around her. "You know, you can cry if you want to. I won't tell."
"It's not that, it's- I trusted him, I honestly thought that I could start to... He screwed me, in both senses of the word, and that's after three years of working together. How long does it take for a Nietzschean to not cheat you?" She felt disjointed, and let the words spill.
"A lifetime and at least one death on either side of the relationship," Rommie replied seriously. "Dylan knew Rhade for years before Haephaestos."
"Huh. And he trusts this one?" Beka snorted, then ruined the effect by sniffing slightly.
"He should, he's sleeping with him."
"What!" She sat up straight and stared at her. "Has everyone onboard decided to give me a heart attack?"
"No, but it's circumstantial."
Beka shook her head, distracted. "So Dylan and Rhade are enjoying themselves, Harper and Tyr were fooling around- anyone else? You and Trance discovering new uses for the hammocks on the Maru, maybe?"
"No, I don't find her especially attractive," Rommie commented thoughtfully, grinning at Beka's groan. She turned serious again. "Beka, you're upset over Tyr. You have a right to be, considering all that happened. Dylan may not notice, but everyone else does. Harper and I are worried, and Rhade's starting to wonder if you just dislike him."
"I know, but it's hard to deal with. You know, you went through the whole thing with Gabriel." She leaned against Rommie's shoulder.
After a moment, Rommie spoke. "Yes, I know, and your first job is to figure out why it's bothering you so much." She gave Beka a quick, one-armed hug. "The rest should straighten itself out. Now get some sleep."
The sleep did help. When Beka woke up the next morning, late, she felt human again, and vaguely more cheerful. She even went through an entire shift without snapping at anyone, especially Rhade.
Later, on the Maru, she picked up the flexi that she'd tossed aside only a few days before. She reactivated it, reading through it again. She could hear Tyr speaking every syllable slowly and precisely, in the velvety soft, deep tones he would use if he was standing behind her shoulder on Command deck, or wrapping her hands in the gym.
At the very end, he had written, Live well, Beka. She saw him extending his arm, open-handed, and pronouncing the words as a benediction. It was signed, simply, Tyr.
Beka shut it off, set it down. She brushed away the few tears that brimmed over the corners of her eyes. "Andromeda," she asked quietly, "can you tell Dylan that I'll be gone a few days?"
"Of course. Why?"
"I have... to visit relatives." She hesitated as she said it, but the words felt right in her mouth. "Apparently I have a cousin on my mother's side who wants to meet me, don't ask me why."
"Very well. We'll expect you back in a few days. Be careful."
Beka slid into the pilot seat, making sure that Andromeda had withdrawn.
She thought that she should at least meet the kid that she was responsible for. While she wasn't happy with the Tyr Anasazi she had parted company with, she had a great deal of affection toward the Tyr who had recorded this, and she felt that she owed him something when it came to family issues.
"Okay, Tyr," she muttered as she powered up the engines. "I'm giving you one more chance. It better be worth it."
The End