Chapter 5
The two officers stood in silence, an aghast look on both their faces.
„Sheesh, boss, what the hell did you do to the poor guy?"
Harper's excalmation pulled Beka out of the stunned reverie the scene she had just come to witness had left her in.
„Oh, shut up, Seamus, I didn't do anything to him. Just told him what was on my mind."
„Oh yeah? And what exactly was on your mind? Slaughter?"
„Harper! I – didn't – do – anything," the Maru's captain repeated in an annoyed and rather helpless tone. „Hell, I have no clue where this... this... whatever-it-was came from." Judging by the puzzled look on her face, Beka Valentine clearly spoke the truth. Resolution set into her traits as she went on. „I do however intend to find out this very instant. Harper, you have command."
The same moment she had finished, Andromeda's holographic image popped up in front of the two them.
„Captain Valentine, do you really think it appropriate to leave the crew member who just got lectured twice within an hour in charge?" The even tone of the AI suggested nothing more than a polite inquiry.
„Relax, Romdoll, our last meeting wasn't exactly a lecture, according to my book," Harper quickly fell in.
„Well, it sounded like one according to mine," the Andromeda's avatar replied from the door.
„Oh, Rommie, you're here! I didn't notice."
„Never mind, Harper. Like I said..."
„Listen, both of you," Beka interrupted what began to look like another one of those interminable banters between Harper and his proudest creation, „say whatever you like. I need to go see Dylan, check if he's all right."
A thoughtful expression appeared on Andromeda's beautiful holographic face.
„You don't have to go to him for that, Beka, I'm monitoring him. He is, well, sort of all right. Although his heart rate is a little elevated, his temperature a bit high, his leukocythes are increasing and his breathing..."
„You know," her avatar cut in, „I don't think they were referring to his physical condition."
„Nonetheless, you know that physiological data... OH!" the hologram suddently exclaimed.
„What?" the others asked in unisono.
„He went into the shower and engaged privacy mode. Sorry, but – that's all, folks!" she exclaimed with a mocking smirk.
„Well, never mind," Harper threw in, „but from what you already said, he didn't sound all that all right to me, though!"
„Forgot the scrubber, Harper?" Rommie asked, almost instantly regretting her words upon seeing the young man's guilty looks.
„Oh, shut up, the two of you..." Beka barked, and added, when confronted with a reproachful frown from the hologram, „I mean, the three of you... that is... oh, whatever!" With that the former salvage captain threw her arms up in an exasperated gesture and left in a rush.
Seamus Harper looked at the Andromeda's avatar, his face wearing an astonished expression.
„So, Romdoll," he finally stated, „you think she's loosing it?"
„Watch it, Harper!"
„Oh-kay. Do you think he's loosing it?"
„Harper!"
„I'm serious, Rommie!"
„Well, so am I. I have no intention whatsoever to discuss my commanding officers mental or emotional stability with a member of their staff. And a reprimanded member, at that," she added with yet another scournful smirk.
„I wasn't referring to the captain, Romdoll. I was talking about Dylan."
The avatar closed her eyes in a very accurate expression of a woman rapidly approaching her patience's limits.
„I am a warship, Harper. He is my commander. And you are my chief engineer. When I talk about him with you, I always talk about the captain. You want to talk about Dylan, go to Trance." She waited for him to answer, but he seemed lost in thought. „However," she carried on after getting no reply for some time, „with her being a member of the senior staff as well, the two of you will probably also end up discussing the captain, no matter what your initial intentions might be." And with that, Rommie left Harper to his brooding.
„Well," the young man finally said in a pensive tone, „this could be part of the problem."
„I beg your pardon?" Andromeda's hologram inquired politely. Harper looked at her as if seeing her for the first time in a long, long period.
„Don't you see? When I look at him I always see ‚the guy with a plan that works'; Rhade sees his ‚lord and master'; Trance... Actually I don't know, what she takes him for. But for quite some time now Trance has decided that Dylan is the ‚Saviour of the Universe'; so whatever load is left around for someone to carry, Trance just makes sure that Dylan's there to pick it up. And Beka thinks him to be the fellow she has to keep in line, a task she is in charge of, while he is in charge of everything else. You know, even in the old days... Even independent, arrogant, insubordinate Tyr believed Dylan to be there mainly as the universe's ultimate challenge for the last of the Kodiak. It's not just you, Rommie. It's all of us. Whenever anybody thinks or talks or gossips about him, we all relate to him as 'the captain'. Since Rev left nobody seems to have been giving a thought about... Dylan."
Tbc
