Title: Timelines
Author: Lina
Rating: G or PG, I can't tell the difference...
Pairing: hints for Harper/Trance and Tyr/Beka
Summary: This story is written as a response to a challenge - to use a sentence "Lately, I wear worry like a blanket... it covers and smothers and on occasion it keeps me warm." It is series of drabbles, purple Trance's POV after she changed places with her future self.
Disclaimer: I don't own Andromeda characters, and I don't own bonsai tree also because Trance owns it!
Spoilers: from Ouroboros to The Dark Backward
Lately, I wear worry like a blanket... it covers and smothers and on occasion it keeps me warm. My fears are the only indication that I am still alive, that I am still me. Ever since I exchanged places with my future self, I can't stop wondering, what mistakes had I made to create such a horrible future? What had I done to make everything to go wrong? Beka is trying to be there for me, but she is different - like she fears me, like I am not her friend anymore. I am starting to forget how beautiful she is...
***
I asked Beka today why is she afraid of me so much? Why is she looking at me as if I am omnipotent being? She didn't answer, just mumbled something and left to run one more check on Maru systems. I found some weapons, left for me by my older self. I need to learn how to use them, even though I don't want to. I don't want to kill, I don't want to see blood on my hands... Yet, something inside me is stirring, awakening, itching to feel the cold merciless steel in my hands. Waiting for the power...
***
Something is rapidly changing within me and I am both scared and thrilled by this change. I started to train with my new weapons and the more I use them, the more I feel the transformation. How naive I was to think that the best possible future can be achieved by just guessing and waiting... I often notice Beka looking at me. She doesn't seem to be surprised with my change. Is it possible that I am becoming the Trance she knew and feared, the Trance who made all those horrible mistakes that brought me here? I feel scared again...
***
My body is changing too. Gold is flickering through purple and my hair turn bright red sometimes. Beka watches me warily in such moments. She seems scared and I am scared too, but I want to embrace the change, I need to embrace the change to understand what happened to this timeline. I need to know. Maybe I still can do something to repair the damage, to turn this universe to its best possible future. Even though Beka is reluctant to talk, I will have my questions answered and she is the only one who has the knowledge I need.
***
I know the facts now. The facts as Beka sees them, that is. Her view feels flawed somehow. Oddly enough, I only notice these flaws when my hair is turning red... I am not afraid of the transformation anymore, because I know it will allow me to see more clearly what needs to be done to perfect this timeline and save it from its miserable state. I learn the art of fighting and wait – very soon, I will be ready to start. Somehow, I know - the other me couldn’t do much for this timeline, but I can. And I will.
***
My transformation is almost complete. I can feel how the Universe is constantly feeding knowledge to me - the knowledge of this timeline. Here, Andromeda crew is dead except for Beka and myself and Andromeda herself is destroyed. I sit in my quarters on the Maru, trying to find the turning point, trying to understand when did everything start to crash. Somehow, I know that once I distinguish this turning event, I will be able to repair the timeline. I still don't see the perfect future, but I am getting close. Strings of possibilities are more and more clear to me.
***
The turning point... Was it when thousands of alien ships appeared from the tunnel and Beka somehow fired too early? Her mistake resulted in the destruction of entire Commonwealth Fleet including Andromeda and death of Dylan Hunt. I survived, but I am almost impossible to kill. This is when I started to change in this timeline. This is when I started to see possibilities more clearly. Beka was falling apart under the weight of self-blaming, her formidable will to live became almost unexistant, and I had to take matters into my own hands. Maybe I took my interfering too far?
***
No, the destruction of Andromeda and Dylan's death is not what I am looking for. It is the result, not the reason. Beka fired too early because she was distracted by the alien on the Maru and noone could take care of the intruder. None of us - Dylan, Rommie, or me - was qualified to be Beka's protector in this fight. Rommie and Dylan were needed on Andromeda and me - the other me - still didn't undergo the transformation and was unable to protect Beka. There was the only one person who could protect her and he was already dead - Tyr Anasazi.
***
So, is it Tyr's death that I am looking for? As the knowledge of this timeline enters my mind, I obtain all experiences and memories of my other self... I was there when Tyr died. I saw possibilities crashing and dissolving as his heart slowed its beat. He would have protected Beka - as much as they both denied it, separate strings of their lives were entwining into one string. But, for some reason they denied this possibility even more adamantly then they did in my timeline. Something was missing for both of them, but they refused to share their grief...
***
The grief, the pain... I feel it as memories of other me settling in. I felt it too. It is a grief of loosing someone you love but can't be together with. It is a pain of knowledge and inability to do anything to prevent the death. Me... other me thought that the best had to live, but it is unbearable to know that it was all in vain. Everyone felt responsible for Harper's death. If only they knew... I am the only one guilty - I could have saved him and I didn't. I thought it was for the best.
***
Everything was for the best - overlooking every Beka's move, playing mind games to make her acting just right, using her guilt to create what I wanted to create; letting her go into the tunnel alone; letting Tyr die because I didn't want to interfere; choosing Hohne's life over Harper's… It was all for the best. Every little step. This is the mistake I made - I acted when the Universe needed me to think, and hesitated when it needed me to act. I failed and now I reap what I sow - I have only one friend left and she fears me.
***
I see the turning point now - the reason and the core of my every mistake. It all started to fall apart when Harper died. I made a decision then and interfered for the first time and my decision turned out wrong. The result was too personal. Too painful. Too close to me. I lost focus then and started to doubt my intuition, which only leaded to more mistakes. More deaths. More pain. Then I lost patience and used my friend as a tool. I wanted to make the Universe a better place, but I only succeeded in making it worse.
***
I can not fix this timeline - it is damaged beyond repair. And yet, I refuse to believe that me... the other me just left me here for no reason at all. It has to be something that I can do... I only have to understand what this something is, I only have to decipher mysterious words that Universe whispers to me. I will not repeat my own mistakes - I will be patient this time, I will listen carefully before I act. I have the knowledge of my other self to guide me and I will try to use it well.
***
I meditate a lot - meditation helps me to tune into the Universe and listen, listen, listen… I hear soft whispers of space, screams of collapsing stars, songs of myriad of suns... Yet, something is missing. Something important, essential even. Something that makes the Universe a being rather then creation, something that makes everything alive. Without it, the universe seems plain and dark, and I hear it feeling lonely. The Universe in this timeline is very alone - like a planet without the sun, like a branch without the tree. Like me without people I love. The feeling of loneliness enveloping me...
***
I remember that Harper once told me about the ghost towns, abandoned by all life. This is how it feels here. Instinctively, my mind tries to reach out and find familiar presence of my friends, but there is none. Except for... is it possible? Tiny sparkles of the furious fire that was Beka Valentine are still here! The Beka I knew is still here, under the ashes! But, in this timeline, her fire will never burn again - the Human life is too short to correct all that damage I made, playing my friend as if she was my obedient puppet.
***
This timeline is doomed. Like a dying star, it can't ever recover. Somehow, I remember it happening before, in the other timeline, many lifetimes ago. And before that. And even before. It happened million times in the past, but I never learned my lessons. Now, quantity of timelines reached the critical number when they can't exist separated anymore. Strings have to be merged into one timeline. To achieve this, two points are needed - I am one of such points and Beka Valentine is another. The Universe will be whole again if the other me will succeed in keeping her alive...
***
Finally, I feel ready to start. I have all the knowledge I need. In the depths of the Maru, I found small bonsai tree that belonged to other me and I am ready to prune it. I know, that millions of Trances Gemini in different timelines are ready too. If everything works well, numerous Universes will reconcile soon. The possibility of failure is five millions to one - more or less. Not bad. I raise my scissors and my mind reaches out for my other selves in different timelines. Soon the Universe will become alive again. Soon, I will be whole.
***
As our minds slowly tangle together, I remember that there were much, much more timelines then I thought at first. To merge them, we need to establish a second point. I thought that is Beka, but other Gemini are not sure. We search and search, pruning one possibility after another, out minds working as one to maintain weakening connection. The time-space continuum is stretching, ripping, producing paradoxes that should have never been born. One of them enters the main timeline and moves backwards, struggling to find and destroy our goal. Suddenly, everything snaps into place. We found the second point.
***
I was right - besides me, Rebecca Valentine is the only person alive in every timeline I am trying to merge. She is the one - my only option. The possibilities are dancing, swirling, separating and reconciling, disappearing and surfacing again – each one is real and each one is not. I wait, and slowly, one at a time, timelines begin to fuse together, melting into the main Universe. One at a time, Gemini merge with me and I feel how the Universe is becoming alive, how loneliness dissolves from its song. The main timeline is changing, shaping, morphing into its intended form.
***
It's done. There is the only one timeline now and the only one Trance Gemini. I look around, delighting in familiar presence of my friends for a moment. I feel two lives dancing around each other, trying to melt - Beka and Tyr. I feel Harper's presence – close, yet unobtainable. They all are so young - young people, young races... Funny how they spend fleeting moments of their lives, debating if I exist and if I have weird sense of humor. They will never know that this Universe is a test on my way from Chaos of youth to Cosmos of adulthood.