Chapter 3

Day Three

Harper banged his head against the wall, he had avoided talking to Beka or Dylan but thankfully they seemed to avoiding him as well.

Rommie had been extremely quiet and he wondered whether or not the incident with Tyr had got to her, but her internal sensors were working so she must know.

Harper had taken too long sleeves and his sowing job wasn't too well; it throbbed painfully and itched uncomfortably. Harper resisted scratching it but every now and then the impulse took over, and one time it did it seared painfully.

Harper pulled his hand from his sleeve and cursed at himself for scratching; not looking and the fingers of his hand Harper punched the flexi then the console on the wall.

He banged his head again since they had been working for three hours and it very boring work.

"Harper can you please not bang your head," Rommie said and she turned to the look at him.

There was blood on the console from Harper's impulse scratching.

"Harper!" Rommie exclaimed and Harper turned with a confused expression.

Rommie walked over and turned Harper palms facing up, his left hand, the uninjured arm, was covered in blood.

Harper looked surprised at it.

"What is that from?" Rommie demanded.

Harper dropped the Flexi which was also had blood on it, the right hand sleeve of his shirt was damp and a small drip could be heard.

Harper rolled up his right arm to look at what had happened.

Rommie gasped at the abysmal medical ability.

But what had caused the bleeding was two of the stitched and ripped clean through the skin and had opened that part of the cut again.

"Harper why did you go to Trance?" Rommie demanded.

"I didn't want to," Harper growled.

"Well, you're going now," Rommie said.

"No I'm not," Harper said.

"Yes," Rommie said, "you are!" and she gripped Harper's uninjured arm and dragged him off to the medical.

Rommie held fast to Harper's wrist all the way down.

Trance was working in the far corner when the two walked in. Trance turned at the entrance and one glance from Rommie holding on to Harper told her that the A.I. had figured out what had happened, but like Rev and Trance she also didn't know the details for neither Harper nor Tyr had spoken about the incident and Rev Bem and Trance had taken their lead.

"Yes," Trance said focusing on Rommie a little intimidated of Harper from what had happened the night before. "Is something wrong?"

"This is what's wrong," Rommie said angrily and grabbed Harper's other wrist and pulled it up wards to reveal the two stitches that had broke.

Trance flinched slightly as Harper did when his arm was brought up.

Trance gulped at walked forward glancing at Harper every few seconds. Harper showed no hostility and she looked at the cut.

"What did you do to burst them, I mean they were fine last night," Trance said not aware that Rommie didn't know that Trance knew about the encounter with Tyr.

"What!" Rommie said rounding on Trance.

Trance looked shocked.

"You knew about this!" she demanded.

"Well," Trance began and looked Harper for some help, but he just stared so Trance took it as an okay to tell Rommie. "Yes I know, I saw what happened."

Rommie raised her eyebrows. Trance didn't say anything and glanced at Harper who decided to take lead.

"Look Rommie," Harper said and she turned her head towards him as he took his arm from her grasp. "It was an accident," Harper explained, "Tyr didn't mean too."

"That doesn't mean you should have come to Trance-" Rommie stopped "Wait, you said Tyr did that?"

"Yes he did but it's nothing," Harper dismissed.

"He could have cut off your arm with those, I assume he used his arm spikes," Rommie almost yelled.

"Yes and he didn't cut off my arm, so stop it," Harper said.

"That still doesn't explain why you didn't come to Trance," Rommie said quieting down slightly.

"I didn't want to bother her," Harper made up quickly.

"It wouldn't have been a bother," Rommie argued, "That's her job,"

"I was busy," Trance said suddenly.

Both Rommie and Harper looked at her.

"I wasn't in medical, Harper couldn't have gone running all over the ship looking for me," Trance said "He did what was best."

"Sowing up his arm!" Rommie exclaimed.

"Its better then letting it bleed," Harper said storming from the room.

Harper stalked to the engine room trying to find more wire to fix the broken stitches.

Not bothering to leave for his quarters, Harper went through the excruciating pain just to sow the two broken stitches on the catwalk.

Once he had finished he turned to the console only to see a small light blinking innocently at him, frowning he punched a few buttons and it showed him that someone had an unauthorized access to the Andromeda.

Making a split decision Harper ran for the air lock that lead to the Maru. Inside Beka's ship Harper took the cable that connected him to the Andromeda's computer core. He had decided to connect here to prevent interruption.

Materializing inside Rommie's computer core Harper didn't have to wait long before the A.I. appeared.

"Harper!" she exclaimed surprised.

"What's the matter?" Harper asked.

"I suppose it couldn't be you snooping through my files," Andromeda said.

"I wouldn't need to snoop," Harper said.

"True," Andromeda evened.

"But is that what's wrong?" Harper asked.

"What do you mean?"

"I saw that you had an unauthorized presence," Harper explained, "someone trying to snoop?"

"I wasn't anywhere I told anyone," Andromeda frowned slightly.

"Well maybe the sneak got the better of you," Harper suggested.

Andromeda frowned at him.

"I'll help you look for him," Harper said disregarding his previous statement.

They began to walk through Andromeda's core.

"You know my human form is looking for you," Andromeda said conversationally.

"Yeah, I know, I've been avoided her, and Dylan and Beka as a matter of fact," Harper added lightly, "Just don't tell them I'm in the Maru."

Andromeda frowned slightly but didn't say anything.

Harper impulsively scratched his injured arm. He frowned, that wound was a flesh wound he should be feeling it in here. He stopped and undid his sleeve. Andromeda stopped as well.

"What are you doing Harper?" she asked.

Harper didn't answer he just stared at his arm; the wound was there. Andromeda looked shocked.

"What's that?" she asked.

"I've cut my arm," Harper began and he looked up, "but I shouldn't be feeling it in here."

Andromeda walked up to examine it.

"That's very deep," she said.

"Don't you start too," Harper said exasperated.

"Alright," she said.

"I just want to know why it's here," Harper said looking at it. He rubbed his hand along it and a dark substance that could only be a recreation of blood was on his fingertips.

"Is your Data Port working right?" Andromeda suggested.

"I think so," Harper replied.

"Maybe your arm's infected," Andromeda guessed.

"So it would show up here?" Harper shot down.

Andromeda shrugged her shoulders.

Harper looked down again when a flash of white caught his attention. Staring at a point where he could be sure a person had just been standing he spoke to Andromeda.

"Did you see that?" he said.

"I didn't detect anything," Andromeda stated.

"Well, I sure did," Harper said and he strode to the place he saw something.

There was no one there now but he had the strange feeling that someone was watching them.

"Harper," Andromeda said coming to him "are you sure you saw something here?"

"Yes," was his stubborn reply.

"I mean this wasn't the area that was being tampered with," Andromeda reasoned.

"Well, then maybe this is where they were tampering from," Harper suggested sifting through the files.

"Are you saying something inside of me is doing it?"

"Hey, look at this," Harper said frowning, "all these files have nothing to do with each other. Have they been copied?"

"None of them have been copied or deleted," Andromeda stated.

"This stuff, its just nothing really, maintenance logs, minor systems, personal logs," Harper said looking up, "nothing important."

"Perhaps there searching for something," Andromeda suggested.

"But what?" Harper asked.

He looked down; he was unconsciously rested on a console projection that he had never seen before.

"This isn't yours is it?" Harper asked.

"No, I don't know what it is," Andromeda answered.

Harper bent down to examine it.

"I think it must be coming from the station," Harper concluded.

"It could be coming from one of the many ships-"

But Andromeda never finished her sentence because an energy force hit her from behind knocking out the A.I. system.

"Andromeda!" Harper exclaimed and darted out from the console.

A hazy figure swam before him and the same energy forced him out of the system.

Harper yelled and opened his eyes only to find himself back on the catwalk in the engine.

Stunned he looked behind him and around trying to remember coming back to the engine room. The console still blinked in front of him but then it stopped and disappeared.

Harper frowned totally confused and put his hand up to the data port on his neck; it burned uncomfortably under his fingers.

Dylan stood with Beka on the command; Harper had been hiding since he had knocked Tyr over the banister, the station loomed in front of them and many ships surrounding them heading for the stations resources.

Neither Dylan nor Beka had tried to contact Harper and Tyr had reappeared but didn't say anything trying to hide his right spikes, unfortunately for Dylan and Beka he did it well.

"What has gotten into Harper?" Dylan asked trying to get Beka off guard and answer him.

"I told you I can't tell," Beka said not taking the bait. "But I can tell you he's never flipped out like that."

"Really?" Dylan asked surprised.

"Yeah, all the times before he just fixed everything on the Maru, but the Andromeda too prefect to fix everything," Beka said.

"Thank you," Andromeda said as her hologram appeared.

"Your welcome," Beka said smiling slightly.

"You have something Rommie?" Dylan asked.

"No, didn't you call me?" Andromeda asked.

"No, we didn't," Beka said slowly.

"Are you sure?" she said, "I was positive-"

"No, we didn't call you but now that you're here," Dylan glanced at Beka; she didn't catch on to what he was saying. "Where's Mr. Harper?"

"He is currently not on board," Andromeda stated.

Beka and Dylan exchanged confused looks.

Harper looked around the station platform, his instincts told him to come here although he never remember leaving Andromeda's computer core and waking on the Maru and leaving for the engine room, but he was sure that someone was tampering with the ship's systems, at least searching through them.

The area was as crowded as ever and possibly even more so since a large ship of holidaymakers had arrived and disembarked.

A small voice in his head, one that usually kept him out of danger, the one he ignored the most, spoke loud and clear in Kao's voice.

He stopped, it was unlike any other voice he had heard, almost as though it wasn't him that was speaking, but he followed it all the same to a small room that had the sign;

Do Not Enter.

Strange as it was; if no one could enter this room then why was it there, Harper had never seen anyone even go near it.

Pushing the door open he suppressed a cough and disappeared into the darkness of the room.

On med deck Trance stared wide-eyed at the startling discovery she had made. She had taken a sample of Harper's blood from the cut in his arm and had screened it for infection.

Dancing in front of her was the most deadly virus she had ever seen, and some how it had found it's way into Harper's systems even though Rommie checked for such deadly viruses.

She darted from the room and headed for Command to inform Dylan and Beka.

Dylan stood with Beka consulting Rev Bem as Trance burst her way through the door looking hysterical. Tyr standing at the second in command post with Rommie looked up in surprise.

"Where's Harper!" Trance gasped reaching Dylan, Beka and Rev.

"We don't know," Dylan answered, "we can't locate him."

"You have to find him!" she cried.

"Why? What's the matter?" Beka asked.

"He's dying," Trance said leaving a shocked silence in the sentence's wake.

Harper's humming was occasionally broken with a hacking cough. He was inside the Do Not Enter room where he found a console in a coded language; he was steadily translating the text then trying to decode it at the same time.

He coughed again putting his hand to his mouth, there was a coolness on his palm as he removed it but the room being dark he assumed it was spit and rubbed it on his pants.

He was surprised, as no one had bothered him and he had been here for almost three hours, Neither Dylan, Beka or the security teams of the station seemed to know he was here.

The were stabbing pains in his stomach they usually appeared around the fourth day and Harper ignored in thinking that it was just his stomach growling so much that the acid had probably started eating the walls of his stomach, he wasn't bothered by this because it did it every year and he still wasn't dead yet.

He was light headed and began wondered if his trip into Andromeda's computer core was imagination or not.

Suddenly a projection of systems on very detailed information appeared in front of him and surprised he took a step back unaware that he had triggered the coded password and broken through the firewall.

Taking a closer look Harper could see that this wasn't just showing information the programs on the station, Harper could clearly pick out the information that he had seen on the Andromeda, the maintenance logs and other things.

This is where the initial instructions to search were issued.

Suddenly the door opened behind him and Harper whipped around blinded from the light that came through the door and a shadowy silhouette was standing facing him.