TITLE: Full Circle
AUTHOR: Michael J. Gallagher ( mikejoe@odyssey.net )
SYNOPSIS: Is Rommie furiously jealous of Harper's new love?
DISCLAIMER: GRA is copyrighted by Tribune; ask me if you want to use this story.
COMMENT: Another "death story with Harper in it" challenge story
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"Those who say it is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all know nothing of pain."
--- Ulatempa Poetess, CY 9795
THEN
"Damn!" Beka rubbed her forehead and sat back on her heels in the pitch black maintenance tunnel. When she had volunteered to take over some of Harper's repair jobs while he recovered from the Magog attack, she hadn't realized it would mean crawling through blacked out parts of the ship and running into head-bangers.
As if that wasn't bad enough, she was lost.
"How does he do it?" Beka said, looking behind her before starting to crawl forward again, gripping her flashlight. The conduits all looked alike, and Beka had lost her bearings about ten turns back. Yet Harper could get through them to the right point on the _Andromeda Ascendant_ in under five minutes if Rommie so much as said "Ow."
"The again," Beka mused, "he couldn't have settled in faster if he'd slipstreamed, so why shouldn't he know his way around after a year?"
She saw something out of the corner of her eye at an intersection and turned her light that way, and saw Rommie, the _Andromeda's_ android avatar, crouching in another conduit. Just sitting. Not moving, not blinking. Just THERE.
"Rommie?" Beka crawled over to her, momentarily fearful that her systems had crashed. At first, Rommie didn't respond when Beka shined the light in her face. Then the android's head moved a bit, and her eyes focused.
"Can I help you, Captain Valentine?" Rommie's voice sounded small, distant.
"Are you ok?" Beka asked.
"I'm ... well."
"What are you doing down here?"
"Oh .... thinking." Rommie seemed to be a thousand slips away. "The memories Harper and Dylan reactivated, they are still falling into place. I have a lot to sort out."
"But you're ok otherwise?" Beka felt a block of ice twist her stomach. If Harper's masterpiece was on the fritz, she was in over her head.
"Yes. Don't concern youself. I will be fine. What can I do for you?"
Beka was almost glad to answer. "Yeah, I'm looking to work on some navigation links ... "
"You missed a turn back there."
" ... yeah, and then a way out."
"All right." Rommie seemed to perk up a little .... only a little. "Follow me."
Beka's heart reached out to Rommie as she crawled along behind her. _It must have been rough,_ she thought, _watching 4,000 "family members" die. No wonder she's out of it._
She didn't know the half of it.
NOW
"Before we go aboard, President Orteez ... "
"Isabella, Dylan, please."
" .... Isabella. My engineer is ... enthusiastic, and you may find --"
"Let me guess," the black woman said with a smile. "He'll praise my beauty six ways to Sunday, and then tell me he'll be available to tend to _all_ my needs?"
"How'd you know?" Beka asked.
"I know the type," Isabella said. "The Universe seems to have a thing for likeable, undersexed losers."
The _Maru's_ arilock swooshed open, and Dylan and Isabella lead Tyr, Beka, and Trance across the cavernous hangar. Isabella could not stop gawking; she was even more awestruck when they stepped into the inner airlock.
"Wow," the most wanted woman in the Galaxy said. "It's incredible. And you said Harper's in love with her? I can see why. She's a work of art, like the Mona Lisa. Or a Harley Davidson."
"Oh, God," Beka groaned. "You and Harper will get along just fine."
"Oh? Well, I don't swing both ways, so he won't have competition."
Just then, Rev and Rommie came 'round the corner. Dylan introduced them to Isabella. She was momentarily put off by the Magog monk, but said that she had heard nice things about him from his shipmates.
"And I have heard nice things about you, Madame President," Rev said.
"Rev, where's Harper?" Dylan asked.
"Well, uh, Dylan -- "
"Harper isn't with us anymore," Rommie said smartly. Too smartly.
Something cold twisted Dylan's intestines. "The Magog larvae? But I thought -- "
"The larvae are still dormant, and he has an adequate supply of medicine with him," Rommie went on. She might as well have been talking about the weather. "But Seamus Zelazny Harper is no longer part of this ship's company. He left back on Sayschells Drift. I do not anticipate he will ever want to return. We will have to find a new engineer."
Four jaws dropped all at once.
"Ok," Isabella said, "I guess this isn't the kind of reception you were warning me about."
********************
_Ok,_ Beka thought as she, Dylan, and Isabella stepped into Sayschells Drift's machine shop, _this place really *does* look like a tool box puked._
"Beka?" A young, twenty-ish red-headed woman speaking with a thick Irish brogue came over to them. "Beka Valentine? My God, is it really you?"
"Kate O'Toole!?"
Beka and the woman fell into a hug.
"Oh my god!" Beka said. "I haven't seen you since, what -- "
"Forever!"
"And look at you! You're all grown up; I guess that's not a training bra, is it?"
"Of course not!"
"Is everyone else here?"
"Aye! We moved out here last year. Sorry to hear about your Da." They disengaged. "So who's this?"
"Katherine Maureen O'Toole, meet Isabella Corteez, the most wanted woman in the Universe, and Captain Dylan Hunt of the _Andromeda Ascendant,_ the baddest ship in the Universe."
"You're Dylan?" Kate said.
"Yes," Dylan said with a smile. "I see my reputation has preceeded me?"
"Oh, aye! Me Seamus has said a lot about you and Andromeda, most of it good."
"Harper's here!?" Beka said, ignoring the "me" part for the moment -- that was another can of worms.
"Aye, just over there." She turned and called over her shoulder. "Seamous!? Ye've got visitors!"
Harper turned around, and smiled, but they could see how forced it was.
"Hey, Boss Bogg," Harper said as he came over from the work table he'd been at. He slapped his hand into Dylan's. "How's it shakin'?"
"Well, Mr. Harper."
Harper noticed Isabella. "And is this the lovely lady you were looking for? Enchantez -- "
"Mind your manners," Kate snapped. "Why don't you and Dylan go over there and talk while us ladies get acquainted?"
****************
"So, you've .... connected," Dylan said, after he and Harper had found their own corner of the machine shop.
"Yeah, can you believe it?" Harper said. "Kate and her dad came aboard to make the repairs, and we clicked -- I mean _really_ clicked. I thought I'd made cosmic connections before, but this was it. Know what I mean?"
"Yes, I know. I'm happy for you. But why did you leave the ship?"
Harper sagged a bit. "Beats me, Boss Bogg. Kate and I had a date and it was a blast. But I dunno, maybe Rommie got jealous, 'cause she turned _mean,_ man! I mean, she's given me the fourth degree before, but this was the four thousandth. She just ripped into me .... I don't want to think about it. I came back here -- Kate and her folks live in back, you know -- and cried on her shoulder. Then we went back to the arilock, and Rommie had dumped all my stuff there. Couldn't have been more subtle if she tried."
"My God ... "
"She say anything to you, Dylan?"
"No, Mr. Harper, she just said you left. I haven't been able to get anything out of her beyond that."
"Yeah, well," Harper said, "maybe it's just as well. I'm not exactly the heroic type, Dylan, and you could probably find someone better'n me here. And this place, it's like heaven. I love it." His mouth smiled, but his eyes told a different story.
"Well ... " Dylan said. "We don't have to leave for another day or two. Maybe this is all a misunderstanding, so we'll try and sort it out."
"Thanks man, but if you don't ..... don't sweat it. So! Tell me all about how you found yonder Neubian Goddess ..... "
********************
"And you really are in love with Harper?" Beka was still having trouble getting past that idea.
"Oh, aye," Kate said. "I know, he's brash and loud and chases skirts, but all lads do, don't they? But underneath all that, he really is the man I've been looking for all my life. And he loves me."
"Enough to leave the _Andromeda?_" Isabella asked.
"No, as I said, she kicked him out. Wasn't nice about it either. He's heartbroken. But if she got that jealous, she brought it on herself. She's the reason I was there."
"Really?" Beka said.
"Aye. Da wasn't going to take me aboad, but he said the ship's computer asked for me by name. She invites me over then throws a fit when I steal 'her man'? Where's the sense in that?"
Beka and Isabella exchanged looks.
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Isabella asked.
Beka nodded.
*********************************
Outside the machine shop, Beka and Isabella compared notes with Dylan, and told him their theory. He was stunned. "You mean she --- "
"Dylan, let us handle this," Beka said.
"Yeah," Isabella said. "It's girl stuff."
"I don't know; I want to know why .... "
"So do I," Beka said, "but there's a better chance of finding out if us girls handle it ourselves."
*********************
"My pretty tale," Trance said as she downed another shot of Denebian Vodka. She and Rommie were sitting at a booth in the drift's night club, the bottle on the table between them. It was almost empty; they were both plastered.
"It performed its functions well." Rommie downed her shot. "Whatever they were." She refilled the glasses.
"Hey!" Beka said as she and Isabella came up to the booth. "About time we found you. Mind if we join you?"
"I dunno," Rommie slurred. "This table has offcialally been annexed by the Argosy Fleet Drinking Division. Thas's me. Tea totlll ... tea totllll .... You c'n only sit here if you're gonna get bombed as an artillery range."
"Right!" Trance chirped, smiling stupidly.
"Well, seems you're already there. As for me ... " Beka flagged down a waitress and two more shot glasses were delivered to the table. Rommie filled all of them.
"In the name of the Vedran Empress!" the pickled android said. All four females downed their vodka. Rommie watched Beka for ill effects, but the blonde space pilot hadn't flinched. "Didn't think you could handle the hard stuff, Bek."
"I _don't_ drink, but that doesn't mean I _can't,_" Beka said. "Fact is, I coulda drunk Tyr under the table when I was sixteen. Now, you want to tell me why you're doing this?"
"Well, Trance is sad about her tail, and she didn't want to drink alone -- "
"No, that's not what I mean, Rommie. I mean about Harper. He didn't leave voluntarily, and you didn't kick him off the ship because you were jealous."
"Huh?" Trance said. "Wha's she mean, Rommie?"
"Don't make me make it an order, Rommie," Beka said.
Rommie looked at the table in front of her for a long time. "Trance, why don't you take a nap?"
"Oh Kaay." Trance was unconscious before her head thumped onto the table.
"Beka, have you ever wondered what it's like to be me?" Rommie asked.
"I try to wrap my head around it sometimes, yes."
"Well, I'll give you the crash course. You're born adult with more firepower than you know what to do with and a commission in the High Guard. You're given a crew -- a family -- of 4,000 and told to protect them at all costs; your mentor ship pumps you up with stories of the Argosy ships who went down in flames while their crews escaped. And you think, 'Yes, that will be me, that's how I'll go.'
"Then one day, you're on patrol, and you're lured into a trap, and your captain orders the crew to abandon ship while he dives you at a black hole. And you think, 'This is it.' The odds of survival are slim, but the crew's away. You'll be a hero, one of the honored fallen ships. Instead .... your crew's gone. Just gone. Your're here, but they're GONE. And you do some math and realize they've been gone for over 200 years while you were stuck in time like a fly in amber. And worse, the odds are most of 'em died in a horrible war, and you couldn't be there for them. And you know what you think? 'I've failed.'
"But then you have a new crew, this ... " Rommie smiled. " .... scruffy little band of misfits your captain is leading on an impossible quest. And you're not too sure about them at first, but some of them, especially that little mess of an engineer, grow on ya. And you decide, 'Ok, I'll make up for it. I'll do right by them.'
"And then one day, an old personality you'd forgot comes out. You forget the new little crew, and you try to kill them." Rommie started crying. "And then the magog come, and some of them are captured, including the engineer, and he's infested with Magog eggs ... "
Beka squeezed the android's shoulder. "Rommie, it's ok -- "
"No, it's not!" Rommie cried. "It will never be ok, because you remember how this other crew, the older persona's crew, died. The lucky ones were eaten by the Magog, but some, hundreds of them, were infected with Magog eggs. And you remember being helpless for days while they lingered, how they cried, and begged and pleaded, 'Rommie, please kill me. Please, it hurts so bad, Rommie. You said you loved me. Please, Rommie, don't let me die like -- '"
"Wait a minute -- back up," Beka said. "'Loved'? You mean, back then -- ?"
Rommie smiled. "There was ... someone. A young engineer's mate. He had a crush on me, and I was flattered. Sound familair? I ... encouraged him, a little. I enjoyed it. It made me feel human." The smile vanished and more tears flowed. "And the Magog infected him. And they took him to a conduit, and stuck him to a wall, and ... "
"Conduit?" Beka turned to Isabella. "I found Rommie in a conduit a few months back, almost dead to the world." Back to Rommie: "Is that where it happened?"
"Yes, Beka. That's where Ensign Sean Michael Harper died."
Beka couldn't speak for a second.
"Your engineer's ancestor?" Isabella said.
"I checked our Harper's DNA against Sean's after I remembered," Rommie said. "It's only 67.256% probable they're related, but Sean had fathered a baby. It's possible." Rommie's face and voice hardened. "I won't do it again, Beka. I won't watch another Harper die on my decks."
"So you hatched a plan to get rid of him," Beka said. "I bet you've been checking personel records and psychological profiles at every stop we've made, looking for a woman who'd be attracted to Harper. When you found Kate, you arranged for them to meet, and once they'd hooked up, you went ballistic on Harper and kicked him off."
"And after what I said to him, he won't want to come back," Rommie said. "But I won't watch him die. And Harper will spend his last months with a woman who loves him the way he wants. Everybody's happy."
"Except you and Harper," Isabella said.
"Rommie, you haven't fixed anything," Beka said. "Harper was the happiest I'd ever seen him since we found you; now, he's miserable. And you .... God, look at you. Is this what Sean would have wanted?"
"It's what I want, and it's done!" Rommie grabbed the bottle and got up from the table. "Harper has gone. He won't be back."
"That's not your decision, Rommie."
"Never is. But I don't think even Dylan could undo this one." And the drunken android staggered off.
"Oh, boy," Isabella said. "Is it always this fun around here?"
"Barrel of laughs," Beka said. "Listen, when Trance wakes up, get her back to the _Andromeda,_ ok? I have to take care of something."
**************
"Oh, my God!" Kate said, pulling a blanket around her as she and Beka stood in the chilly corridor outside the drift's machine shop.
"Yeah," Beka said.
"And I .... Beka, what do I .... "
"Listen, Kate ... I don't know if all I've done is make things worse. Maybe coming here was a mistake. At the very least, you can tell Harper that Rommie didn't hate him." She shrugged. "Or don't tell him. It's up to you."
"Uhm .... thank you, Beka."
"He's a good man, Kate. Take care of him." Beka hugged her and left.
Kate locked the machine shop's door behind her and made her way past the benches and work areas to her family's living area. Harper was looking out their bedroom window. Kate stood by the door; she could just see past his shoulder, out into space .... to where the _Andromeda Ascendant_ was birthed.
_You really are the man I've waited for all my life,_ Kate thought. _But your heart doesn't belong to me, not all of it, and there's a big, silver lady out there who needs you more than I do._
She walked up beside Harper and gazed out the window. With the sun glinting on it, the _Andromeda_ really looked more magical than mechanical. No wonder she had captured Harper's heart. _And no wonder I can't keep you. You're on loan; you belong to someone else. Even if she doesn't want you, you've already given yourself to her._
"Looks like the starboard bussard collector has a dent in it," Harper said. He was holding back tears. "They'll have to look at it."
"Beka was here," Kate said.
"Yeah?"
"Seamus ..... there's something you need to know .... "
*********************
"All right, Beka," Dylan said, "clear all -- "
"Just a minute," Rev said. "We're being hailed by someone on the drift."
A familiar face filled one of the big main screens.
"Mr. Harper!" Dylan said.
"Hello, Dylan. I understand you guys need an engineer. I may know where you can find one."
"Oh?" Beka said. "Well, where is he, Harper?"
"You're lookin' at him, Boss Lady."
"Oh. Well .... I think he can work out. What do you think, Dylan?"
"Welcome aboard, Mr. Harper. Someone will meet you at the airlock."
"Check," Harper said. The screen blanked.
"Rommie, why don't you go and meet him?" Dylan said. "Rommie? Did you hear me?"
"Yes, Captain. Is that an order?"
"It most certainly is."
"Fine." She left the bridge without saying another word.
*****************************
Rommie got to the airlock just as the big inner doors closed behind Harper. She stood a meter away from him and looked left, right, down, anywhere but in his eyes.
"Why'd you do it?" Harper asked. "You could have just told me, or talked to Rev, or -- "
"I can't." Her eyes found Harper's and she started to cry. "I can't do it again. It hurt so much to watch him die, and if we can't cure you.... And I don't want you to die like that, alone and scared. I want you to be happy ... "
"And where will I be happy other than here?" Harper was crying now; he walked up to Rommie and they fell into a hug. "I don't want to be anywhere else. You're the center of my universe, darlin'; you have been since we found you."
"I'm sorry .... sorry I failed you, sorry I'm taking you away from.... "
"Hey, I told Kate I'll be back whenever I can. And she wants to meet you; you can come along next time."
"Really?" Rommie squeaked.
"Really," Harper said. "But don't do anything like this again. Please. You got a problem, just tell me or yell at me, but don't try and send me away, not like that, not again."
"Ok."
They stood there, holding each other, crying on each other's shoulders.
"So what was he like?" Harper said.
"Who?" Rommie asked.
"Great, great-great-grandpappy Sean, that's who."
Rommie smiled. "He was .... he was like you."
THE END
To Michael J. Gallagher's Fan Fiction
Home