Okay everyone, here's part 8. I hope I've made it worth the four month wait!

See chapter one for disclaimers.

The Universe Blinked

Chapter 8

Susan maneuvered the shuttle into a cavern in the Geneva ruins and scanned for Draal's signal. There were no active satellites in orbit due to the current anti-tech political shift, so the uplink was slow. She had about five minutes to kill so she started scanning the easier to find radio signals. There were several music stations, a talk station discussing the recent Presidential debate, and a news station reporting that the government was finally getting the upper hand against the extremists. Just before the uplink was completed, the news station switched stories, and her heart leapt into her throat. There was a glitch in the plan.

She turned off the newscast and opened the audio-only receiver as the connection was made.

"Draal? Are you there?"

"Ah, you've arrived safely. Good. How was your trip?"

"It was fine, but this really isn't the time for small talk. I just heard a local news report that the Geneva demolition plans have changed."

"Changed? What happened? Do we need to make other plans for the shuttle?"

"No, the shuttle will be destroyed. The problem is that I don't have nearly as much exit time as we'd hoped. It happens in three hours, and I'll need at least two and a half to clear the blast radius."

"I won't keep you, then. Make sure you have your signed orders out to show to Edward. He'll meet you 5 miles outside the city limits with money, official documents, including a bank account number and identification papers, several days' worth of clothing, a plane ticket to Cairo, and the child. Obviously, he hasn't been told who you really are. No one has. You and I are the only living beings who know your true identity, and since this will be our final contact , you will completely cease to be Susan Ivanova. I admit, though, that your choice of name causes some concern for me."

"We've been over this," she said warmly. "You know it's the only name I could possibly have that won't trip me up, and even now, my first name is so common that no one will ever make a connection."

"That is true, but I worry that you are still punishing yourself. Especially because of the name you have chosen for the child."

"You worry too much. I stopped beating myself up about that a long time ago. It just wasn't meant to be. This was. I think it's an approproate tribute."

"Well," Draal sighed in resignation, "Marc is a lucky little boy to have such a wise, insightful mother. And speaking of destinies, it is now time for you to meet yours."

"It certainly is," she said as she checked the ships clock. She paused for a moment before continuing. "Draal, I just want to thank you for being such a good friend. I'll miss you."

"And I you. It was wonderful having you with me, but now we must both move on to the next stages in our lives. Now go, or it will all have been for nothing."

Susan placed her hand on the speaker, as if the could feel her old friend through it, before severing the connection. She made sure the letter from the current Ranger One was in the front pocket of her jacket, picked up a small backpack with food and water from beside her seat, and made her way up to ground level for her first real look at what Earth had become.

The com alert sounded as Robyn shut her suitcase.

"Answer," she barked at it without turning around. "Where the hell are you? You were supposed to be home hours ago!"

"Do I want to know what my darling cousin has done to make you sound like that?" Kate asked with a slight smirk as Robyn turned to look at the screen.

"Entil'zha, I apologize! It's just that Jathenn's been at the hospital all night, and I still haven't told him about my assignment." Robyn's concern for her own situation was not eased as a look of panic slowly replaced the smile on her superior's face.

"This isn't going to postpone your arrival, is it? The Council is anxious get you started. Intelligence is coming in quickly, and they want you to start analyzing it immediately."

"No, nothing's changed. My flight doesn't leave for another four hours. I have plenty of time to go to the hospital and talk to him there."

"Good. I'll see you tonight, then." The screen went blank, and Robyn sat on the edge of her bed. She took a few minutes to calm her frustrations, and then left the house to get the dreaded conversation over with.

Jathenn closed the lid of the cryo-unit as Vicari helped Alisa to a nearby chair. He turned to look at this amazingly strong girl as his assistants wheeled the unit from the room. Her hair was matted with sweat, her skin was flushed, her breath was coming in ragged gasps, and she was trembling slightly. She was pushing herself much harder than she was willing to admit.

"Maybe we should take a break," he suggested. "You should get some rest, and you need to eat something."

Her head snapped up from its slumped position, and all signs of strain left her face. She adopted the "don't mess with me" look that Jathenn had quickly become familiar with.

"No, we're not stopping. Bring in the next one."

"But-"

"No. Every one we confirm dead brings us that much closer to the survivor. I want him found. I was too late for the rest, but I will save him."

Sensing the futility of arguing with her, Jathenn nodded and went to the com panel to have the next unit sent up. The tech on the other end looked confused when he saw Jathenn's face on his screen.

"Is something wrong, Doctor?"

"No, just tired," he said, assuming he must look like death warmed over, "but we're ready for the next unit."

"What next unit? I already sent the last one."

"That's impossible," Alisa stated firmly. Jathenn nearly jumped out of his skin. He hadn't heard her walk up.

"Alisa, listen to me. If he says that was the last one, then that was the last one. It's all right, everyone makes mistakes."

The frustrated girl took a deep breath through clenched teeth. For a moment, she looked like she was about to throw a temper tantrum of toddler proportions. Then she calmed down and started pacing the room.

"Take me down there," she demanded after a few minutes. "I want to see for myself."

"Fine, let's-"

"Dr. Sheridan," his receptionist interrupted via the intercom, "your wife is in your office. She says she needs to talk to you immediately."

"Damn. Tell her I'll be right there." He'd completely forgotten about Robyn having something to tell him. He knew it was nothing good if it couldn't wait for him to come home. He turned to Vic, who was updating the log. "Can you take Alisa downstairs? I have to take care of something."

Robyn was standing in front of her husband's desk, looking at the family photo he kept there, when she heard the office door open behind her.

"It's about time," she snipped at him, not even trying to hide her annoyance. "I've been here for almost an hour."

"I'm sorry." He crossed the room and slid his arms around her. "We thought we were on the verge of a major breakthrough. I lost track of time. I'm here now, though. Why don't we go down to the cafeteria and talk over a late breakfast?"

"There's no time, Jay. That's what I needed to talk to you about. I've been called to Yedor for a high priority assignment, and I leave in half an hour."

"An assignment? Since when do you get assignments? You're a teacher!"

"A teacher who was once the top analyst in the Alliance, if you'll recall." She tried to remind herself that her usually brilliant husband was under a lot of stress right now. Besides, beating him senseless for a moment of stupidity wouldn't really help. "I also have more experience than anyone else as far as the subject of the assignment goes."

"You're absolutely right," he apologized, pulling her closer. "When did this assignment come down?"

"Yesterday. I tried to tell you then, but you got that emergency call. How's that going, anyway?"

Robyn almost wished she hadn't asked as Jathenn's face fell. He pulled away from her and ran his fingers through his hair.

"The girl is fine. She's awake, aware, and off the sleepers."

"That's great news. What's with the long face?"

"Long story short? All of the telepaths are dead. We confirmed the last one just a few minutes ago. Alisa, the girl in the stasis unit, insists we missed something, but three different lab techs confirmed that we'd seen every unit. But," he sighed, half-heartedly attempting a smile, "at least I'll have plenty of time to spend with Michael while you're away."

"Speaking of which," said Robyn, looking at the chronometer on the wall, "I have a transport to catch." She leaned forward and kissed him hard. "I'm sorry I have to leave like this. I'll call you first chance I get."

She held on to his hand for an extra minute, as if she could pass supportive energy to him through her fingertips, then hurried out the door before she changed her mind about leaving.

Jathenn's mind was reeling as he took stock of the last couple of days. He'd found a five thousand year old adolescent human touched by a race that who'd been gone almost as long as she had, had his life's dream dashed, and now his wife was gone on Ranger business he thought she'd retired from. He didn't really begrudge her the opportunity to spread her wings again, but he'd been hoping to have her help now that Alisa needed to be dealt with.

He walked down the main corridor of the cryo-ward, heading for the elevator that would take him to the storage room, when he heard a muffled crash coming from the vicinity of the OR. He burst through the doors of the waiting area and saw Alisa pacing by the security door with a smug smile painted across her face.

"I told you there was someone still alive in that room," she said without looking at him. "They're resuscitating him now."

Jathenn couldn't find words. He quickly keyed his passcode into the security system and pushed through the door. The number two flashed brightly in his mind as the door swung shut. Assuming this was a direction sent my Alisa, he went straight to the second operating theater and shoved violently into the auto-scrub room.

As he waited for the scrub process to complete, he stood in the madness on the other side of the glass. There were about nine support staff in the room, running back and forth, comparing monitor output from the various systems, and delivering them to a very frazzled Vicari Marray. Vic, while taking in the various figures being shouted to him, was standing over the operating table, giving the occupant an injection.

As the door slid open, Jathenn almost slipped on a bolt and looked down to see where it had come from. There was a cryo-unit lying on the floor in several pieces, like it had been thrown. He looked up at the table and saw a human male with long, dark hair. He appeared to be in his mid-thirties, and there was something abstractly familiar about him.

"In Valen's name, Vic, what are you doing?"

"She was right," he said without looking up. "There was one more unit in that room. We're just about done bringing him up, but we can't get his brain to firmly register on the EEG. All we're getting are ghost waves. If they don't get stronger soon, we're going to lose him."

"Then why isn't Alisa in here helping? If she could pick him up through the cryo-unit, she can probably pull him up."

Vic's head shot up, but left the bottom of his jaw behind.

"Get the girl!" he demanded of no one in particular.

Within minutes, Alisa was escorted into the OR. Without waiting for instructions, she crossed the room and laid her hands on either side of the man's head. Almost immediately, she went pale and started to shake. Jathenn rushed to her side to keep her steady.

"He's in there," she whispered through clenched teeth. "He's buried so deep I can barely feel him, but he's definitely there." She spent the next few minutes concentrating all of her energy on him. She broke out in a full body sweat, and her knees sagged. Jathenn tried to pull her away when the tear of blood ran down her cheek, but she tightened her grip. She raised her head and stared at a spot on the wall just behind his head.

It took a staggering amount of will power to keep Jathenn from backing away from her eerie gaze. Besides the fact that she was looking straight through him, her eyes had done something he'd never seen before. They had turned a shade of black so deep it made her pupils look gray; or would have, if the black didn't cover the entire eyeball. They made him feel transparent in a way he had never imagined.

"Don't you dare," she told him in the same tense whisper. She looked back down, but continued, "I've found him. He's locked behind a door in the very center of his mind, but I'm almost in…yes, that's it…show me what's got you too busy to come out and play."

After Susan had made her way out of the ruins of a city that had once been something akin to home, she'd found a very agitated Edward waiting for her in what looked like a poor reproduction of a classic automobile. Without saying a word, she'd showed him her papers, and he'd helped her into the front passenger seat. He'd gotten behind the wheel and pulled hard on a lever that sent the car careening down the deserted road leading back to civilization.

He hadn't said anything for the first few minutes, so she took the opportunity to take a peak into the back seat. All she could see was the back of an infant seat. She heard some soft, fabric on fabric sounds that she assumed were caused by the baby's movements, and relaxed a bit. When Edward did finally speak, it was to tell her that her flight was now leaving an hour earlier than they'd thought. He showed her the large duffle bag at her feet, which included everything she would need to start her new life, and then told her about the false background the local Anla'shok chapter had created for her.

At the airport, she'd grabbed her bag and started to get out of the car, when she turned back with a look of horror on her face.

"Where's the baby?" She couldn't believe she'd almost forgotten him. The poor thing had been so quiet, he'd actually slipped her mind in the rush of information.

"Right here," Edward had said in a much calmer tone as he lifted the infant seat, complete with tiny child, from the back seat of the car. "Don't worry," he told her as she stared at him anxiously, "he's a good baby, and I'm sure you'll do fine by him. After all, you were requested by Ranger One herself." He handed her the carry-seat, and gave her a soft nudge toward the front door of the airport. "Hurry now, or you'll miss your flight."

Now, after almost missing her flight and needing help securing the baby's seat, she thanked the stewardess who had helped her, and she finally had a chance to look at him. He was tiny. Three months old, she'd been told. He had light brown hair that waved softly over his forehead, and light blue eyes the color of the sky. He was wearing a gray one-piece sweat suit and a white baseball cap. She found herself wondering if Earth had baseball anymore. These were the kinds of things she would have to learn quickly, both for safety's sake, and the sake of giving this little boy as normal a life as she could. He was waving a small stuffed cat around with one tiny fist, content to amuse himself.

She had, ironically, managed to be early, so she took advantage of her wait time and picked him up out of his seat. She settled him into the crook of her arm, and he stopped shaking his toy. He just looked at her expectantly. A wave of fear washed over her as she realized for the first time that she was actually going to have to mother this child.

She'd never realistically thought of being a mother. In her old life, there never would have been room for it. She wasn't emotionally capable of being nurturing. Now she just hoped that the hole in her heart had healed enough over the centuries to finally be able to love a child. She understood all too well the unique position she was in to scar this child permanently.

Susan tentatively wiped a stray curl away from his eye, and ran the pad of her finger over his soft cheek. He reached up with his small fist and grabbed her finger, squeezing it tightly, and giving her a smile that was almost too big for his little face. The fear subsided almost instantly.

"You know, little guy, we'll be just fine. We'll figure it out together."