Confusion and Romance

The words were like blows, striking not her body but her spirit. Rommie had experienced prejudice before, but nothing so completely unexpected and unwarranted as this. Her vision began to grow misty, and she blinked back the tears. She made an effort to stand a little taller, unwilling to let that man know how much his words had hurt her.

It was Beka who first came to her defense. "Rommie's no machine, she's an artificial intelligence, self programming, and fully sentient. More importantly, she has the same feelings and emotions as any other person, and is as much a crew member as anyone else on board the Andromeda."

Dylan's defense was a little less emotional but just as strong. "Andromeda has the status of a warrant officer in the New Systems Commonwealth military, and has taken an oath of allegiance to the Commonwealth. You will treat her with the same respect and courtesy that you would give to any other member of my crew, or this visit is terminated."

General Hammond proceeded to show that there is truth to the old statement that while sheer military skill may get you the first star, you need diplomatic skill to get the others. He stepped in front of Colonel O'Neill, and began a smooth apology. "You have my apologies for the Colonel's comments. I'm afraid that the Colonel's previous experiences with artificial intelligences have all been uniformly bad, and have colored his emotions." Turning to O'Neill he continued. "Colonel, your thoughts about machine intelligences are well known. I may not be able to control what you think, but I can control how you act and speak. You will treat….. What should I call you Ms? Andromeda? Avatar?" The last was directed to Rommie.

"Andromeda will do, General Hammond."

Thank you, Andromeda. As I was saying, Colonel O'Neill, you will treat Andromeda the same way I expect you to treat a member of Stargate Command. Is that clear?"

"Crystal, Sir", replied O'Neill.

"Good, now that that is out of the way, shall we proceed to the conference room?"

The two groups started off, the Earthmen taking the lead. Several members of both parties were deep in thought. O'Neill was mentally fuming about the dressing down he had received, Hammond was thinking that whatever faults the crew of the Andromeda had concerning uniforms, the ship's senior officers looked after their subordinates and Rommie was imagining various creative and painful deaths for Colonel O'Neill.

Tyr was observing his surroundings carefully, and had come to two conclusions. One, the underground complex they were in was obviously a fortress. There were multiple blast doors, some with firing slits in them, surveillance equipment and plates in the walls, which he suspected covered emplaced weaponry. And two, Harper was paying an inordinate amount of attention to the one called Carter.

While they were walking Major Carter said, in a low voice, to Dr. Jackson. "Daniel, did you see the avatar's eyes after Jack called her a machine? I could swear she was fighting back tears."

"Sophisticated programming?" asked Dr. Jackson?

Teal'c had overheard the conversation. His comment silenced the Major and made her start thinking about the implications of Rommie's tears. "I do not think that what you saw was programming, Daniel Jackson."

After they arrived in the conference room and were seated, an orderly arrived with coffee. Much to Carter's surprise Rommie accepted a cup. Seeing the Major's expression, Rommie explained. "I don't really need to eat, though I do have the capacity to ingest small quantities of food and drink, but I find that sharing a meal or a drink helps in social situations, and I do enjoy the aroma of coffee.."

Conversation commenced, and soon degenerated into total confusion. Both groups claimed to operate in the same region of space, or at least have allies who did, but neither one had heard of the races or planets that the other group described. While a galaxy is a big place, and planet names would be different, the lack of contact between the different races seemed impossible considering that they were all galaxy spanning. The Andromeda crew had never heard of the Asgard, Jaffa, the Goa'uld or any of the other races that Dr. Jackson and Major Carter described, while the members of Stargate Command were equally ignorant of the Than-Thre-Kull, the Magog, the Perseids or the other races describe by Dylan.

Harper opened the can of worms even further by bringing in the time travel aspect. "Boss, didn't Rommie say that these folks were speaking an ancient version of Common?" Maybe we're so far back in the past that all the other races have died out and new ones have shown up."

Confusion degenerated into chaos. During the conversations, Rommie had been sitting quietly, apparently enjoying her coffee but actually communicating with her alter egos on the ship. Finally she spoke up. "General Hammond, what year is it by your calendar?"

"Two thousand and four," replied General Hammond. "Why?"

"Captain," said Rommie, According to my calculations, based on star positions, we have been transported approximately 3,000 years into our past, hardly enough time for entire species to fade into oblivion without a trace and others to evolve. Also, the Vedrans have had slipstream travel for over 10,000 years now. Well 10,000 years from our time 7,000 years from when we are now. More importantly though, according to Commonwealth records, the planet Earth developed translight travel in the year 2165 ,when they joined the First Commonwealth Yet analysis of the drive systems of the ships we encountered on our arrival indicates that they possess a form of translight propulsion. Captain, I am afraid that we are not only no longer in our own time; we are no longer in our own timeline."

Carter and Harper both began to talk at once, the conversation covering such things as, strings, intersecting three dimensional spaces embedded in N-dimensional membranes, quantum time and Schrodinger's cat. With the exception of Rommie, the rest of the group were lost within the first minute, and even Rommie's eyes glazed over within three. The white board in the room quickly became covered with esoteric formulae and symbols. After a bit Carter stopped and took a breath.

"Harper, I just don't see how it can be done. The odds of recreating the conditions that sent you here are so remote as to be impossible."

Dylan looked at Harper. "Harper?" there was a question in his tone of voice.

"Boss, it's me you're talking to, Harper. If the job was difficult I'd have us back home already. Since it's impossible, give me ten days, twelve at the most to get us back."

General Hammond decided that this was a good time to adjourn the meeting. "Captain Hunt, if you and your crew members will accompany me, I'll see to it that you are assigned quarters here in the complex. That is, assuming you want to stay here and not return to your ship. Major Carter, if you will take Mr. Harper to the labs after he gets settled in, perhaps the two of you can come up with something that will do the impossible."

"I expect that our duties will require us to put a fair bit of our time on the Andromeda, General", replied Dylan. "But quarters would be appreciated, since I expect that we will be spending a few nights here."

Dr Jackson followed them as the orderly showed them their quarters. For some reason he wanted to insure that the purple girl was comfortably settled in. After she had inspected her room and pronounced it acceptable, he took the plunge.

"Ms Gemini, the mess hall is still open. I have about a million questions I'd like to ask you. Perhaps we could talk over dinner?" Damn it, did he sound as nervous as he felt?

Rommie overheard Dr Jackson's proposal. She didn't know if she should be sad or happy. She had immediately noticed the similarity in appearance between Dr Jackson and her deceased lover Gabriel, but she had also noticed that Dr Jackson hadn't been able to keep his eyes off of Trance, and that the purple girl had been returning his looks. Dr Jackson was not the person she had once loved; he was someone else; someone who had eyes for a woman other than her.

Trance followed Doctor Jackson to the mess hall. She wondered how this was going to play out. The doctor wasn't bad looking, and there was a certain charm to his obvious nervousness, yet she instinctively knew that there was tempered steel in the man, there was something else as well, and it was that something else that interested her.

They walked through the mess line, Trance taking small samples of all the fruits and vegetables, while Dr Jackson selected a more traditional meal of roast beef and mashed potatoes. Trance's appearance attracted a few stares from some of the other diners, but they were mostly appreciative ones. This wasn't the first time an off-worlder had taken a meal at the mess hall; Trance just happened to be an unusually attractive one. As she expected, Dr Jackson began to ask her the standard questions, and she gave him the standard answers. Her species was purple, she came from far off, and no, Trance wasn't her real name, but he wouldn't be able to come close to pronouncing her real one, so why not just call her Trance. Oddly enough he didn't seem to be annoyed by her answers. instead he surprised her by asking her if she had any questions.

"Tell me about yourself", she said.

Dr Jackson started talking about the Stargate, the Goa'uld and the conflict between them and the other species when she interrupted.

"No, Daniel," she said using his given name, "that's not what I want to hear. Tell me about yourself."

He began talking again, but this time the subject was different. He talked about his childhood, his days at the university, and how the academic community had scorned his work, the same work that got him a place on the first Stargate expedition. He told her of his teammates, of friends made and friends lost, and of his wife and how he lost her to the Goa'uld. Trance never interrupted him, except to encourage him to continue speaking, nor did her eyes ever leave his.

Then it was his turn. "What's it like out there where you live?" he asked.

She hesitated before speaking. What should she tell him? After a moment she began. She didn't tell him about the Long Night, of the horrors of Magog raids or the Nietzschean slave camps, nor of battles and the deaths she had seen, he had seen enough of those types of things himself. Rather she told him about the little things. About basketball games on the hydroponics deck, how the Lancers held the annual Lancer Ball on the flight deck, and how she had danced the night away. She talked of walking along the beaches of Arzawa II when the lantern fish were spawning, and how their bioluminescence turned the ocean into a fairyland of light. She spoke of the botanical gardens of Halycon and the smell of the flowers, of surfing on Infinity Atoll, and of the Shouting Cliffs of Krishnamurti. She even told of shopping with Rommie and Beka in the Mendocino Drift. She told him of standing on the observation deck looking out into space, and seeing the countless stars glittering like diamonds on black velvet.

When she was finished Dr Jackson glanced at his watch. "Ms Gemini, the base theater will be showing a movie in about thirty minutes. Would you like to watch it with me?"

"What's a movie?" asked Trance.

"A form of drama where the actions of the actors are recorded and then replayed to a viewing audience. It's really more entertaining than it sounds. This particular movie is considered a classic of its type. It's called 'High Noon'."

"That sounds like it could be fun," said Trance. "Lets do it.. And, my name is Trance, not Ms Gemini."