TITLE: The Unintended

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

NOTES: Thank-you hugs and sweets to all those who left comments :D Not quite at the end yet but it's drawing ever nearer...

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE Gone

"Leave this world behind for another

But don't leave your demons behind."

Anon

Harper walked hastily with a one-track mind. He was well aware that Andromeda would have detected him leaving med-deck but he would be at his quarters before anyone could reach him.

When he first opened his eyes the onslaught on his mind and body was unbearable. At first the waking world was filled with so much pain he actually thought he may have died in Command, and was sent to his own personal hell. When Trance had touched his arm, he was thrust into the waking world with such velocity his mind rejected it. From then he was 'in shock' as Trance called it. Yes, he had heard every word that was said to him. But it was as if he was on a different plain to the others. He heard them on some physical level but his mind was still not accepting the reality it had been plunged back into.

He had experienced unimaginable power and now it had been taken from him. Living with such a loss was agonising. He had already seen what he had to do to end it. His final vision had showed him. Harper made his way to his quarters where his gauss gun lie, and to the end of his suffering.

Andromeda had alerted the others of Harper's activities as soon as she had become aware of them. Each of them were already on their way to stop him.. Beka had just managed to drift off when Andromeda woke her with the news. If anything was going to wake her, that was it. She leapt out of bed as soon as his name was even mentioned. "Where is he going?"

"It looks like he's headed for his quarters."

Beka had a plethora of questions, like how had Harper broken free of his restraints and where was Trance, but her mouth didn't want to work while her mind was racing with paranoia. Had Harper been waiting for his moment to escape? Waiting to...to what? Why was he going to his quarters? There was an answer that seemed to be nagging at her, but she didn't even want to grace it with consideration. Even so, it was that thought that kept her running.

Harper made it to his destination but he could hear the footfalls of someone close behind. He stepped through the doors and repeated a security lock-down code, which Andromeda had no choice but to implement.

Beka was out of breath but was the first to arrive just as the doors to Harper's quarters were closing. She managed to slip in before they shut completely. Harper already had the gauss gun in his hand.

"You shouldn't be here," he said, with his back to her.

"I wouldn't be anywhere else," Beka replied, still breathing heavily. She could hear the others had arrived outside. They would probably try to override the security lock-down but knowing Harper, they would have to work at it. "What are you doing?" she asked, knowing full well.

Harper didn't look at her. He wished he could have done this alone but it was her choice to be there. "I knew it was coming but...I didn't know it was going to be this hard." His voice cracked when he spoke and Beka could tell he was starting to cry. "It has to be this way."

"Why?" She was still breathing heavily from her run, and tried to get her mind under control as it raced with fear and worry.

"I was a god and now I'm nothing," he said, loathing what he had come back to. He turned around to face her. His eyes were raw with pain and anger. "You have no idea what it was like, Beka. I could feel everything, I was connected to everything and I had the power to do whatever I wanted. Now...now it hurts just to be awake. All the power in the universe and I lost it...I lost it..."

Beka wasn't sure what to say. She wasn't sure there was anything she could say to make it all better. "It hurts now but...but over time it will be okay, you'll get used to it," she tried, but she could see her words were no consolation to him.

"Do you get used to being without Flash?" he asked through angry tears.

"Honestly? No," Beka answered. "But I'm still here. You don't want to die. And you especially don't want to do it in front of me," she said. She had no game plan, no idea what she was doing. She was running on adrenaline, speaking without careful thought. At this point even stalling him would be a worthy cause.. "Remember when Shyla killed herself? Remember how you felt?"

Harper stared vacantly ahead.

"Do you really want to put me through that? Because I honestly don't think I could handle it," Beka continued. "I know there still a part of you that cares about me, and the others. Because if you were completely gone...you would already be dead by now."

Harper considered it for a moment. He didn't want to put Beka through what he had been through. And it was true, when he had realised Beka was in the room, he could have just pulled the trigger then and there, fulfilling his vision. Instead he had stopped. He shook the thoughts. They didn't matter. "You don't understand...I saw it."

Beka didn't understand. "Saw it?"

"I had...visions. I saw things before they happened. I saw this."

Beka took a moment for the information to sink in. Harper had the ability to see the future? She briefly wondered what else the virus did to him, before returning to the urgent reality of the situation. "So you think you have to do this? You don't, Harper, you can change what happens. You have a choice."

Harper considered her words. His visions hadn't been wrong yet. Could he really change one?

Beka could see he was in two minds. "Knowing the future changes it, right? It's not fate just...something that could happen, a possible future," she said, stepping into Trance's territory.

Harper was more confused than ever before. His eyes scanned the floor, randomly searching for answers. They fell upon the clothes he had been wearing when Shyla killed herself. They were still unwashed, covered in her dried blood. A sudden sadness caught him off-guard. He had become exactly like her. And now Beka had adopted the role he had played. It dawned on him that he didn't want his life to end the same way.

Harper was tired, weak and hurting but Beka was right - there was still something left inside him that told him he didn't want to die.

He fell to his knees. Suddenly exhausted, body wracked with tremors, he began to sob uncontrollably. Beka dropped to the floor too and embraced him, and for a while they just held each other.

"I don't know what to do Beka," he wept openly.

Beka too was crying, both tears of joy and sadness. "You just have to forget," she said. "And keep on surviving."

End of Chapter Twenty-Five