TITLE: The Unintended

DISCLAIMER: I own nothing from the Andromeda series, I'm just borrowing.

NOTES: Thanks again for the feedback, it makes me smile :D This is my favourite chapter of the story mwahaha

CHAPTER THREE The Blood

"Expect the unexpected and it isn't unexpected any more. The truth is, you can never expect a god damned thing that happens."

General Lucas Taylor

CY 568

Harper dangled his legs over the side of the bed in med-deck. He was silent, which only made Trance worry even more. Beka was also pacing up and down the room, having heard that Harper was not only in all likelihood infected with a virus, but that it could drive him insane. Dylan, Rommie and even Tyr had made an appearance, but Trance quickly ushered them away after seeing how uncomfortable Harper was with so many people surrounding him. Beka was the one who refused to leave.

Harper seemed to be taking the news strangely calmly. Trance wasn't sure if he was still in shock or he had contracted the virus and it was affecting his system.

"What are the chances that he's contracted the virus?" Beka asked, biting at her nail.

Trance glanced over at Harper, who looked like he wasn't even interested in the question, let alone the answer. He wore a sad, pained expression. It wasn't one Trance liked to see on any of the people she cared about. "I can't be sure. Even if the test comes back negative, I have no way of knowing how fast it can become apparent, or even how the symptoms would manifest themselves."

Beka took in the information and tried to deal with it. She needed to handle things, find possible solutions and courses of action. It was what she did. If she stopped to actually think about what could happen, the worst case, she wouldn't be able to function. She looked over at Harper. A rogue thought entered her head. He was covered in that woman's blood. She dismissed it and resumed her role. "It wasn't your fault," she said, reading his mind.

Harper looked up and wondered how she knew.

"You did everything you could, you told us," Beka continued. "It wasn't your fault."

Harper wasn't convinced. "I know," he lied. "She killed herself. I was talking to her, and then she was just dead." The words sounded unbelievable even as he spoke them. He looked down to the floor, shook his head and hopped off the bed.

"Where are you going?" Trance asked quickly. What she really meant was 'you can't seriously expect me to let you leave this room without my say so.'

"I can't stay here and wait to find out if I've got some stupid virus, which I haven't, by the way. I'm fine. I feel fine, so I'll be in machine shop four when you need me."

Trance and Beka could only exchange worried looks as Harper left the room.

On the Command deck, Andromeda reported what had transpired on med-deck. Dylan was disturbed by the news, and at how Harper was taking it. "I should have seen this. I should have prepared. Now Harper has to suffer because of my mistake."

"I scanned the air for toxins, it was clean," Rommie told him. "If there was any risk, I would have detected it. There was no way to know. And it's not confirmed that Harper is suffering at all," she finished, but regretted it. He might not have the virus, but he had seen someone, someone he knew commit suicide. Of course he was suffering.

Harper returned to his quarters before going to the machine shop. It felt like there was still blood on his hands, he needed to wash them again. As soon as he entered he noticed the folded clothes in corner, a symbol of the moment. He couldn't even look at them, because they drew his mind back to The Outset. Running his hand through his hair, Harper went into the shower room and made a mental note to burn the blood-stained reminders.
Trance hated waiting, because she had the time to search through possibilities. When a situation was as emotionally-charged as this one, her vision was often clouded and erratic to experience, so she tried to refrain from closing her eyes, and busied herself with tidying medicines and equipment.

Soon a beeping sound from the far side of the room drew back her attention. The results from Harper's blood test were ready. She steadily walked over to the readout panel and prayed to whoever would listen that they were negative.

Harper made it to machine shop four with slightly sore hands, but before he could find something to occupy his mind, Trance's voice sounded over the comm.

"Harper, please report to med-deck," she said.

All Harper needed to know was in that sentence. He had the virus. It wasn't just the fact that Trance would not have asked him to go to med-deck if he was fine, but because he could read her like a book. She liked to think she was this enigmatic mystery with secrets that would make anyone's head spin, but the truth was, Harper had her figured out. "No, Trance. I want you to tell me now," he demanded. "I'm infected, right?"

"Please come back to med-deck," Trance asked again, although this time it was more of a plea. She didn't want to tell him like this.

"Is there anything you can do about it yet?" Harper asked bluntly.

There was a pause. "...No," she replied. "Not yet, but I'm working on it."

"Then you work on it," Harper told her. "I'll be right here when you're done," he finished, and cut off the communication. "Rommie, can you give me some privacy please?"

"I'm sorry Harper, you're on medical watch. No privacy mode," Andromeda replied apologetically.

Harper was annoyed but wasn't in the mood to argue. He began to bury himself in a previously abandoned project, in an attempt to take his mind off things. It was effectively a portable 'answer machine'. He had been developing it for some time now. It was meant to be able to answer any engineering question and speculate on theories too. So far Harper had only managed to input half the information he wanted, then the memory capacitors blew and he had to start from scratch. Then he pretty much gave up when he realised he didn't need it. He was, after all, a genius.

This genius was now reduced to a mental numbness. Harper was conscious of the fact that he was avoiding thinking about what happened, and what might happen to him. But despite his efforts everything Trance had said about the effects of the virus came creeping back. It was actually quite vague now that he thought about it. The end of the infection was obvious - become a psychopathic murderer, kill himself or both. He remembered Shyla in her last moments. 'I lost it' she had said. He wondered what she was talking about. Maybe it was meaningless rambling, one of the symptoms.

Harper swore as his concentration wandered and a delicate piece of the machine broke off in his hand. He regained his composure and leaned over the table to see that it just needed soldering. Without looking, he reached out to where the tool was.

The soldering iron moved across the table and into his hand.

End of Chapter Three