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Part 13
With a start he felt himself being carried, and it had been the bumpy ride that had stirred him back to consciousness. Immediately he struggled, and felt those carrying him put him down with haste.
"Harper?" Beka's concerned voice spoke quickly.
The memories rushed back with force, and he tried to get up but felt hands stopping him. The local gang, the yobs, were out there, and he needed to check that Rev had returned, Harper now remembered Rev moving away sounding as though he wasn't intending to return and he'd been too weak to stop him.
"Rev," Harper finally gasped.
"He's not here, its ok!" Beka stressed as she strongly held Harper, mistaking his panic.
"Where is he?" Harper asked, breathing heavily.
"Not here, calm down, it's ok now, you're safe," Beka insisted with concern.
"No!" Harper managed, but exhaustion was threatening him again, and he was unable to shake Beka's hold from him.
"Relax, Harper, please," Beka pleaded and her words coincided with Harper collapsing back in her hold as he lost his focus once more.
Beka held him in a tight embrace, not letting go and fearing how she had interpreted his reaction. Inside Harper felt frustration at being unable to focus enough to remain coherent, cursing his depleted energy, and desperately wanting to speak so he could tell them the truth. Tell them that Rev was in danger whilst the yobs were still on the loose, but he had failed and only succeeded in making the situation seem a lot worse as he unwillingly closed his eyes to the darkness.
Rev Bem remained out of sight, silently praying to the divine for guidance as the local gang continued to look for him, baying for his blood and his death. They had spotted him not long after leaving the energy works compound, and they had given chase. Rev had got lucky, having lost them momentarily, and long enough to find the hiding spot where he now hid in silent prayer.
Even in his plight, Rev's thoughts remained with Harper and he prayed that the others had found him quickly, knowing the boy was weak, and suffering the effects of his ill treatment by the gang, and the ongoing illness. Rev couldn't recall a time he had seen Harper looking weaker, even with the radiation poisoning he had seen more colour in the boys complexion than he now had.
Closing his eyes, Rev tried to banish the lingering thoughts that remained about Harper. He could still smell the blood, some of which had been caught on his fur from the cloth the yob had taunted him with, but most of it was trapped in his mind. Never before had he considered Harper as anything else but a friend and colleague, but now there were these alien thoughts that went deeper into his psyche, and it was these thoughts that he worked hard at quashing before they became too vibrant in his natural need.
'Fight the hunger' Rev mentally instructed himself, but his food supply was far from here on the Andromeda and his fasting was now working against him. He had to stop thinking of those thoughts he had been forced to have, to stop thinking like a Magog and more like a civilised being. Rev had made himself leave Harper behind, even though sick and in need of his help, Rev could not have stayed, and it was for the boys own sake that he had done that. That simple fact concerned him more than anything he had had to face since finding the way.
"By the divine please help me," Rev murmured with determination. "I wish no harm to any being, I need guidance, please help me," he pleaded to the nights air.
Beka paced the small space on the Maru that now doubled as a makeshift infirmary. Trance was busy administering various drugs and checking Harper's readings.
Looking up, Trance attempted a reassuring smile. "It's ok, Beka, the main symptom is just exhaustion, and some mild blood loss."
"Ok?" Beka checked. "Those marks, Trance, are not ok!" she snapped, gesturing to Harper's clawed chest. "That stab wound is not ok!" she added with anger, seeing the deep wound in Harper's stomach.
"We can not jump to conclusions," Trance warned.
"Who's jumping?" Beka demanded. "Magog claws did those marks and damage, Trance, and there's only one Magog in this vicinity!"
"Still," Trance attempted to reason, her tail shifted anxiously by her feet. "Rev is our friend, is Harper's friend and it doesn't seem right to me that he could do this," she offered, avoiding Beka's glare.
"I would usually be agreeing with you, but you saw him, Trance, you saw Harper display that raw fear when he was barely conscious and those injuries speak for themselves," Beka explained, a little calmer. "Rev has been consumed by this illness, Trance, and we have to accept that maybe we've lost the Rev we knew."
"We should also accept that there may be a good explanation for this," Trance tried again to be reasonable.
"How can anything good be said about this?" Beka stressed. "Maybe you should forget being so concerned about Rev for a moment and think of Seamus," Beka now spoke evenly. "His worse nightmare is Magog, he fears them like nothing else and Rev knew this, and that makes what we see now just despicable."
"Beka, Harper is not seriously injured," Trance shrugged.
"Maybe not physically," Beka countered, and then looked troubled as her hand ran through her hair. "But I'm looking at him now, looking like this and I feel like crap, ok?" Beka snapped. "This is my fault because I made him work with Rev, to trust Rev, and look where that's got him."
"These marks and cuts, they aren't life threatening like Magog inflicted injuries usually are, and there's something about them that doesn't make sense," Trance spoke with confusion with her eyes fixed on the injuries that she still needed to tend to, but lacked the belief in her words to be taken seriously.
Beka in turn took no comfort from Trance, "Look if you're serious about doing medicine, Trance, then you should remember that not all injury is skin deep," she added with conviction before moving to the exit. "I'll be with Dylan and Tyr if you need me," she stressed, leaving the tense room and Trance to tend to the rest of the wounds.
Dylan could tell Beka was not in the mood to talk; her actions were abrupt as she prepped the Maru, but he needed to speak to her.
"Beka, we can't leave," Dylan stated.
"On my ship, I call the shots and I say we're leaving," Beka stressed. "We have Harper, and now we get the hell out of here."
"Stop for a moment," Dylan requested, as he moved down beside the pilots chair. "Rev is still a member of our crew, and he sounds like he needs help."
"Has everyone forgotten about Harper?" Beka snapped angrily, turning to face Dylan.
"No one has forgotten about Harper," Dylan returned strongly. "But you have forgotten about Rev, the same Rev that just a few months ago you were convincing me to have on my crew."
"Yeah, I'm the universes biggest fool," Beka stressed, looking around.
"No, Beka," Dylan insisted now. "But you will be if you abandon Rev Bem now."
Beka took a deep breath. "He abandoned us the moment that he attacked Harper."
"We should give him a chance," Dylan requested firmly.
"A chance for what?" Beka questioned harshly. "To attack us too?"
"Beka!" Dylan snapped now. "This is Rev Bem we are talking about, not some mindless Magog!" Dylan stressed with conviction. "Now I might not have known any of you for very long, but I thought I at least knew you to be fair, and you have asked me to trust you on so many things and now you throw that trust in my face?" Dylan questioned with controlled anger.
Beka looked away as Dylan continued. "Are you telling me that your assurances of 'trust me' have been nothing more than flaky promises, that you don't really trust any of your crew?" Dylan asked with shocked surprise. "Maybe I should leave Trance and Harper behind too, because I'm not sure if I can trust your judgement any more!"
Beka glared at Dylan, and hated that his words were affecting her like they were. Taking a moment to compose her response, Beka realised that she was letting her emotions control her actions and she relaxed, as she powered down the Maru.
With sigh she finally looked back to Dylan. "I'm sorry," she frowned. "I just take one of my crew beating on another badly, ok?" she offered. "Many a crew member has been sent packing for not playing along nicely."
"And how many of those ex-crew members were sent packing because of their reaction to Rev?" Dylan questioned, but didn't wait for any answer. "Beka, all that we are going on here is what we are seeing, we have no actual proof of what actually happened," Dylan explained.
Beka was about to argue when she remembered Trance's words. "Trance said something about Harper's injuries not making sense," Beka offered with distraction, as her calmer mind put things into perspective.
"How so?" Dylan asked with interest.
"She wasn't sure, the ironic thing is we need Rev here to do this stuff, Trance is still learning," Beka gestured with an amused then sad smile. "But she seemed to find something confusing," she shrugged. "I just never thought to question what."
"Let's give ourselves a few more hours here to just get the whole picture before we make any decisions that we might regret later," Dylan said softly, and Beka began to nod her head.
"Thanks," Beka offered as she released the pilot restraints, no longer in a hurry to leave. "I'm just so mad at Rev right now that," Beka tried to think of the words. "It's just personal ok, Rev has always been my rock, we looked out for each other so many times," Beka sighed, as Dylan but his arm around her shoulders for comfort. "But now," she didn't find the words to finish.
"We all look out for each other, for all our crew," Dylan simply said as he walked with Beka back to where Trance was working.
End of part 13