Disclaimer: Okay, I can't think of a sarcastic comment to make so . . . I don't own "Andromeda" or any characters. The only one I do own is Agrona.

A/N: Thanks for the reviews! Sorry that I haven't updated in a really long time. Writer's block got to me.

Title: "The Girl Who Hated All"

Summary: When the Andromeda comes across a very young, and very strange, girl, they have no choice but to allow her to come with them. Harper soon discovers her secret; unfortunately, no one believes him . . .

Genre: Supernatural/Horror

Rating: PG-13 for language and supernatural occurrences.

Chapter Seven

Harper sat on his bed and leaned against the wall. Agrona's words were replaying in his mind over and over again: I could kill you now if I wanted to, but I don't. Not right now.

And that song she had been humming. He had definitely heard it somewhere before, when he had been a little boy. How had it gone again?

Ring around a rosie . . .

Harper looked at the doorway. Agrona was in his mind again; he could feel it. She was singing that old Earth folk tune in an eerily sweet voice.

'Get out, Agrona,' he thought desperately.

A pocket full of posies . . .

'Stop!' his mind screamed. He ran a hand through his hair, wishing for her voice to disappear.

Ashes, Ashes . . .

He shook his head, as though it would block Agrona's voice from his mind.

We all . . .

Fall . . .

Down . . .

Harper looked up; the voice had gone, but he could not shake away the feeling of utter horror at hearing Agrona's voice in his head.

Harper remembered how some of the people of Earth, before it had been taken over by Magog and Nietzscheans, of course, had joked that that song had secretly been about the Black Plague:

How "ring around the rosie" had signified first symptom: the round, red rash. How "a pocket full of posies" had signified the practice of carrying flowers and placing them around the infected person for protection. How "ashes" had been an imitation of the sneezing. And how, obviously, "we all fall down" signified the many deaths resulted from the plague.

Harper had truly never believed in any of the urban legends he had heard when he had been a child, but he now felt that the nursery rhyme "Ring Around the Rosie" did, in fact, represent death, in its finest form.

He stood up and walked towards the door. He pressed his ear against it, listening for any movement outside.

S I L E N C E . . .

The sheer quietness that he received upon putting his ear against the door was terrifying. It was as though there was nothing beyond the door; a dark, empty nothingness . . .

A shot of nervousness was sent up his stomach to his chest. 'Oh, God,' he thought, wetting his lips, 'What if . . . what if there is no one out there? What if Agrona . . . killed them all?'

The mere thought of the possibility that Agrona had destroyed everything beyond his room made Harper actually want to open the door. Just for a minute, to prove that it was all in his head; everything was still there, everyone was still alive. Still alive . . .

He took a deep breath. 'But what if she's standing there?' he thought. 'What if she's standing right there, waiting for me to open the door so that she can jump on me and place whatever curses she has on me and watch as I die slowly and painfully . . . and then everyone'll see me and then she'll kill them too . . .'

But he had to open the door. Had too. He had to convince, prove to himself that everything beyond the door was okay.

He took hold of the doorknob and slowly turned the knob . . .

The door opened a sliver and Harper could see nothing but the empty hallway. He opened it further; more of the hallway came into view, but there was still no one around.

'Hey, maybe she's gone back to her room,' Harper thought, hopefully, standing up and opening the door the entire way.

Suddenly, a shooting pain was sent up his spine. He froze. He couldn't move; his entire body was paralyzed as it stood there in the doorway, but his mind was racing with regrets: 'What the hell was I thinking? Oh God oh God oh God I can't move . . . shit, shit, shit . . .'

His skin felt as though it was contracting. His muscles began to ache and throb. A pulse went racing through his head, pounding repeatedly in his ears.

Ring around a rosie . . .

His body swayed slightly, but stayed balanced. For a split second, Harper could have sworn that Agrona was standing right in front of him, her green eyes flashing at him, her mouth curled up in a menacing smile.

A pocket full of posies . . .

Another shock went flying up Harper's spine, causing his stiff body to give a slight jerk. 'Oh, God,' he thought. Everything was getting darker. And darker.

Ashes, ashes . . .

Darker . . . his eyes had begun to throb along with his head. He closed his eyes tightly.

We all . . .

His body loosened and he

Fall . . .

fell limply to the floor.

Down.

'Oh, God,' he thought. 'What the hell was that?' He was still lying on the ground; he could feel the hard, smooth surface below him. He moved to get up, to push himself into a standing position, and found that he could not.

His body was still paralyzed. 'Oh great,' he thought, sarcastically. 'Now what do I do?'

His eyes glanced around the darkness, hoping to find some form of light that could tell him where he was. Some form of light that would tell him where someone would come in to look for him . . . someone like Agrona.

He tried to swallow the knot that had formed in his throat and simply could not. His body refused to comply with any movements he commanded it to perform.

His eyes danced wildly throughout the room. There had to be some exit from . . . wherever he was, right? There was always a way out, wasn't there?

Not always . . . the voice in his head told him. Sometimes people wait and wait and wait for someone to find them, to rescue them. But no one ever does. They just wait and wait and wait and-

'STOP IT!' his mind screamed. 'Just STOP it, God damn it! . . . stop . . .' He thought the last word meekly, almost pitifully. He knew that the voice (that God damn voice) was right. Sometimes people are found and rescued, sometimes they stay where they are and die and rot and then, one day, someone finds them, but it is too late . . .

Harper inhaled deeply, and exhaled. 'Calm down, Harper,' he told himself. 'It's the Andromeda, remember? If someone wants to know where I am, they just ask Rommie.'

The thought relaxed him a bit, but his eyes continued to roam the dark room (was it even a room?) for any source of light. Any at all would tell him that he was safe.

His eyes could not find any light at all. He was trapped in a (room?) place without doors or windows or any possible exit. Or at least an exit that was lit.

There's no exit, Harper, the voice told him. You're going to be trapped in here with me forever. Forever and ever and ever-

'Don't worry,' he told himself. 'It's the Andromeda, remember? The Andromeda is safe-'

But how can you be so sure? the voice asked.

'I know it's safe. I built nearly everything in it,' Harper replied, not realizing that he had replied to the voice (that God damn voice) in his head.

I mean, how do you know that that's where you are? the voice asked. How can you be so sure that you're in the Andromeda?

'I have to be . . . I was just in my room with-' He cut off the rest of his thought. Agrona. Who knows where the hell she could have put him? He could even be in Hell, for all he knew.

Agrona could have put you anywhere, the voice continued. You could be dead, even. Just lying in your room, dead.

Harper tried to shake his head, but failed. 'No, there's no way that I . . . died. Is there?'

The voice paused before answering. In his mind, Harper could picture the voice shrugging its nonexistant shoulders. It's possible, isn't it? She has power to kill everyone around her. Why couldn't she have killed you when you were just lying there?

'She . . . she could have,' Harper thought. 'But she didn't, did she?'

Another pause. I can't tell you that, it said, finally.

'Why?' Harper demanded, angrily. 'Why can't you tell me if I'm dead?!'

Because, it said, simply.

'Because why?' He wanted to scream it aloud, but knew that he could not.

Because . . . The voice paused and, for a moment, Harper was sure that it had disappeared. Because she'll kill me, too.

'What?' Harper said, confused. 'Kill you? How . . . who are you?'

Silence. The voice had disappeared, leaving Harper alone in the cold, dark (room?) place. He sighed deeply. What the hell was going on?

He closed his eyes and tried to relax. Maybe it was all a dream, a long, horrible dream. He would wake up and everyone would be standing over him, saying, "Oh Harper, are you okay? We believe you about Agrona!" Ha, that would be a laugh . . .

Harper felt his muscles untense and relax. He could feel a light pouring down upon his face. 'Oh, thank God,' he thought. 'Light.' Relief spreading over him, he opened his eyes . . .

Harper's eyes slid open and he was greeted with a warm light emptying down onto his body. He used his arms to push himself into a sitting position. He rubbed at his eyes. How wonderful it felt to actually be able to use his limbs again.

He looked around his room, slightly surprised that there was no one around, saying stuff like, "What are you doing? Did you try to kill Agrona again? What is wrong with you?" Or anything else in that ballpark.

He stood up and left his room; it was the last place he wanted to be. Well, second-last, if you included wherever he had been earlier. Just thinking about it sent a chill up his spine. And who, what, was that voice? At first, he had thought that it was simply his conscious, or something like that, but now it seemed to be a . . . person. Someone real. Very real. And Agrona wanted to kill it, too.

Harper walked down the hallway silently, hoping that maybe, maybe, the voice would come back. He needed to figure out who it was. Maybe it knew more about Agrona. Maybe . . .

As he rounded a corner, Harper smacked directly into Dylan. "Mr. Harper, where have you been?" Dylan asked, raising an eyebrow as he looked Harper over.

"Oh, in my room," Harper replied, honestly. Hey, it was the truth, wasn't it?

Dylan nodded. "Are you feeling . . . okay?" he asked.

"Yeah, sure Boss. Why?"

"It's just that, lately, you've been a little . . . I don't know, different," Dylan replied.

"Oh, no, I'm fine. Just peachy. I've just been preoccupied lately. Don't worry about me, Boss." Harper began to walk past Dylan when Dylan grabbed a hold of his shoulder.

"Harper," he began, keeping Harper in place as he looked over his back. "What's-" He traced his finger along Harper's spine. As he did so, Harper could feel a slight stinging sensation. "-this?" Dylan finished, letting go of Harper's shoulder and allowing Harper to turn around.

"What-" Harper cleared his throat. "What's what, Boss?"

"This." Dylan lifted up his forefinger, and Harper saw a faint smudge of red (blood) on the tip of his finger.

"Umm . . ." Harper shrugged his shoulders and began to turn around again, wanting to get away from the current conversation.

"Wait," said Dylan, grabbing Harper's shoulder again. "You don't know where this came from?" he asked, looking into Harper's eyes seriously.

Harper shook his head. Again, the truth; he didn't know that he was bleeding. Had he really fallen that hard?

"Turn around," instructed Dylan and Harper (reluctantly) did as he was told. Dylan gently lifted up the back of Harper's shirt . . . and quickly let it fall back into place. "Harper, go to Med Deck," he commanded.

"What? Why?" Harper could see the concern (fear?) in Dylan's eyes and it made him even more nervous.

"Just go. Now!" Harper nodded and walked quickly down the hall towards Med Deck, leaving Dylan standing alone, the same look of concern (fear?) in his eyes.

Harper walked quickly down the hallway. As he neared the Med Deck, he gently slid his hand up the back of his shirt until he felt something on his fingers. He removed his hand and looked at it; the tips were coated with fresh blood. His eyes widened and he wiped his fingers off on the leg of his pants.

He walked into Med Deck, where Trance was setting up an examining table. "Hello Harper," she greeted. "What's wrong?" she added, upon seeing the look (fear?) in his eyes.

"Dylan told me to come here," Harper replied, trying to sound calm and unknowing. "Apparently I'm bleeding, or something . . ." He waved a hand as if to say, Nothing too serious.

Trance gave him a small smile. "Okay, lie down here, then," she instructed, gesturing towards the examining table.

Harper did as instructed and laid down on his stomach. "Now, where did he say you were-"

"-my back," interrupted Harper. He had to know why he was bleeding. His stomach was knotted because of the anxiety.

"Okay." Trance gently lifted up his shirt . . . and gasped. "H-Harper," she stammered. "Where d-did this come fr-from?"

"What do you mean?" he asked, suddenly crossing the line from nervous to completely scared.

"Did you fall, or-"

"Trance, what's wrong?" Harper's heart was pounding madly in his chest. What had that little bitch done to him? He leaped up off of the examining table and walked swiftly over to the opposite side of the room, where a mirror-type object had been installed.

Harper took a deep breath and turned around. What he saw nearly made him black out again; on his back, scratched deep into his skin, was the word Iluzija. Red droplets dripped down from each letter, causing it to glisten at him menacingly.

"Harper?" Trance asked, quietly. "What is-?"

Harper did not hear the rest of her question. He bolted from the Med Deck and sprinted down the hallway towards his room, the place where he would be able to talk to the Voice. The Voice who knew something he did not. The Voice who feared Agrona as Harper did.

But Harper knew that, in order to talk to the Voice, he would have to go back to the (room?) Place. The Place without light. The Place without life.

To Be Continued . . .

A/N-I hope that it was worth the wait. :-) Anyways, please review! Thanks to all who do!!