See Prologue for Ratings and Disclaimer.
So I had a hectic week - seven of us in our particular unit were huddled together in the center of the 4x4m hole yesterday when a violent storm with torrential winds knocked three giant trees down around us (5 feet away at most) at thesame time. Luckily we were unharmed, but we had a nice cleanup today, then we hauled huge limestone boulders all day (and when I say huge, I mean larger than my torso), creating a hole about 7 feet deep. So very tired, but now I've got a few days to spend in Guatemala for some R&R, and I really wanted to get this out now before hitting the bed for what will be a very deep sleep. So here you are, the next part! Hope it's up to standard - and thanks for the reviews, they make my weekends as always.
Any and all mistakes are mine alone (or quite possibly "Quick Edit" - nothing quick about it, since I have to triple check everything, considering everytime I save it alters something I don't want altered - some serious issues with italics).
Contains some content from the episode Home Fires.
PART NINE - Interpretive Wandering
The Captain of the Andromeda Ascendant tossed the flexi to the desk with a sigh. He leaned his head back behind the chair he sat in, his eyes closing and his palms coming to rub the tension from his face.
After an awkward conversation with his First Officer about her conduct, while at the same time trying to be sympathetic, he had turned to the latest report for the team deciphering the Majalla's Heart. Apparently the ship's radioactive cargo had been destined to live out its half-lives on some backwater dumping planet. When the crew had…died…the unmonitored cargo had breached the containers and contaminated the hold. Only some brilliantly practical engineer's years-old design had kept the mess confined from the other decks.
And, for some strange reason, Dylan was having a real hard time trying to keep his focus on the report.
It wasn't that this particular detail was the furthest thing from his mind - it was - but his thoughts continued to wander. In the last year he had reconditioned himself to the meticulous and often dry reports that constantly graced his desk, but today it was as if he'd never dealt with them before in his life.
His mind kept returning to that moment, less than a day before, when he heard his tortured officer, a good man, refer to himself as Dylan's former First Officer - his former best friend - long-since a betrayer, and long-since dead. At first he thought he had been hallucinating; that even after all these years, he just expected the first name of a Rhade to be Gaheris.
When he realized, however, that Telemachus was serious in his identification of himself with his genetically identical ancestor, Captain Hunt knew there was a problem. And even though it had been partially explained to him, that memory had been the proverbially breaking of the dam that preceded the flow of memories from two years ago - a lifetime ago - that first brought the relationship between the Old Commonwealth's betrayer and his descendant, one of the saviours (Dylan hoped) of the New Commonwealth, to his attention.
-o-0-o-
"I've heard of Nietzschean genetic reincarnation, I've just never seen a documented case."
Captain Dylan Hunt stood on his ship, staring at two very familiar faces - they weren't just familiar to him, but to each other. He compared the framed picture of himself and Gaheris Rhade, taken over three-hundred years ago, to the one with Telemachus Rhade, direct descendant of the former, with an unknown friend. Aside from the different demeanour of this much younger Rhade, they were virtually indistinguishable.
The dark-skinned Nietzschean beside him looked over at the images. "It's quite rare, but it does happen," Tyr explained.
Dylan wasn't sure he believed it. "What are the odds?" He gesticulated with the pictures. "My own First Officer reincarnated on a planet settled by my fiancée?" He began to pace.
Andromeda's voice filtered through the room. "The chance of a specific human DNA combination reoccurring is approximately one in three-times-ten to the fifteenth power."
"Telemachus Rhade isn't just any human. He's the product of sixteen centuries of selective breeding." The fellow Product sat down and began to analyze the picture - a human and a Nietzschean as true partners and friends? Those odds were even more remote, a fact attested to by the very nature of the man who's descendant now sparked their conversation.
Dylan just wasn't buying it. "And the odds are still in the trillions."
Tyr shrugged - who was he to argue? Sixteen centuries, and they were still awaiting the reincarnation of Drago Museveni. It was amazing the Rhade line could produce such a result in only a fraction of the time. "It's a big universe."
"Yeah, and a bigger coincidence." Dylan looked to the flexi of the Admiral of Tarazed. "You know, I don't trust coincidences, especially ones named Rhade."
-o-0-o-
Dylan sat upright once more, his tired eyes wandering to the framed picture of himself and that former friend, out of the way in a far corner. He wasn't sure whether it was for some psychological reason, or the need to constantly remind himself of the shifting balance of the universe, but he could not bring himself to completely remove it from sight.
Slowly, his mind tricked him into seeing the small changes, the slight differences that set the current officer from the former, so that the man beside him in that ages-old picture was the one currently lying in his Med deck.
"I did learn to trust you, didn't I?" he asked aloud.
Andromeda's hologram appeared before his desk. "Captain?" she inquired.
He shook his head. "Nothing, I'm just…talking to myself," he finished, sounding positively exhausted.
The hologram thought for a moment. "We have him back, Trance has said he'll be alright."
Dylan got up out of his chair, slowly pacing the room. "Oh, I don't doubt Trance's abilities," he replied, rubbing the back of his tensed neck.
The hologram frowned. "Then what is it?"
He let out an incredulous laugh. "Now why would you assume…" he stopped at Andromeda's raised eyebrow. Sighing in defeat, he tried to explain. "None of this is right. Not just what they did, but why they did it. And the state of the Commonwealth?" He shook his once more and sat on the edge of the desk.
Andromeda wasn't sure how to respond. She'd known her Captain for years - longer than any other Commanding Officer she'd had. But there were still times when she wasn't sure how to handle his emotions. She didn't like it, but she had to admit that the increasing personality separation meant her android avatar would likelybe of better help, but Rommie was back on the damaged cargo runner, looking for any additional information and helping Harper with repairs.
Finally, she offered, "You could go see him. The only one in Medical with him is Trance."
Dylan pondered the idea, but silently declined. His eyes locked back on the framed photo, and he walked over to pick it up. He stared at it intently. The man accompanying him had returned to that face which would forever be etched into his mind as the person who had been his greatest friend, greatest confidant, and his greatest disappointment. Even Tyr Anasazi couldn't hold a candle to Gaheris Rhade.
"I don't think I'm in the right frame of mind to do that right now."
Andromeda needn't have known him all these years to figure out what he was thinking. "He was wrong," she supplied. "Telemachus Rhade is nothing like his ancestor. You can make him realize that once again."
"Because I've been successful with Rhades before," he muttered sarcastically.
Andromeda's holographic eyes narrowed. "Why do I get the feeling you're no longer thinking about the present?"
He turned to her, still holding the frame. "Why don't you tell me?"
She ignored his petulant tone. "Telemachus did not betray the Commonwealth, but Gaheris did. It wasn't your fault."
He looked back down at the three-hundred year old picture. "Right."
From the AI's perspective, he did not sound convinced.
To Be Continued...