Come Fly With Me (Part 1)
This was my first real action/adventure fic. Upon re-editing it, I found myself enjoying this story all over again. It's an earlier fic, written after Memento Mori. John, D'Argo and Scorpius try to retrieve Stark from a sticky situation. It's also the story of an ancient oracle called Xanthe. Beta'd by the beta queen herself, apathocles. Rating PG-17.
Come Fly With Me
It was an old gesture born of theatricality, meaningless but impressive. Practiced for so long that even she has come believe in its conclusive finality. Palms up, sinking forward onto her knees, brittle grey hair spilling over her face - Xanthe indicates that the session is over.
The sudden silence in the open-roofed chamber is overwhelming as she pauses and listens from within her womb of hair. The embarrassed questioners blink in surprise and scramble awkwardly to their feet. After allowing time for the usual stammering obeisances, Julta glides noiselessly towards them and leads them away. In the circular room their retreating voices echo with awed excitement as they begin to distil their own kind of sense from the stream of Xanthe’s inner vision.
She counts time, then smiles when their heavy coins clink and oil into her blessing tray. The weak will always pay well for the reinforcement of delusions - she is only required to provide comfort for their own pretence. They ask only that she lift the veil half-way, to assuage their half-belief. No matter that their lives, though admittedly fortunate, will be short - or the longed for child shall soon return to the Goddess.
She waits as their shuffling footsteps meld back into their stumbling lives, then lifts herself back to upright, tilting her sightless eyes into the cobalt night. She can smell the ink blue like a flooding wet stain, and count the stars as their energy rains upon her face. But tonight there is something more - she strains to hear...and there, faint but unmistakable - the strange song of unfamiliar Gods.
A scuffling noise scrapes at the edges of her concentration; the girl’s soft slippered feet as she returns with the laden tray. Xanthe frowns angrily. “Julta?”
“I am here.”
“You must cultivate the art of silence; I cannot tolerate interruption.” Julta does not reply, and she nods to herself in satisfaction - the girl is quick to learn. “Tonight, Julta, I wish to consult the Anite Stone; make the preparations.”
-------
Her arthritic hands perform the sacred movements mechanically, gnarled fingers move smoothly as if they’re not her own. Completing the sequence of esoteric symbols, her cracked voice drops with the weight of indecipherable incantation. She ends with the whisper, ‘Xerenxa kala xerenxa’.
A small bowl of beaten gold, brimming with water and petals from the Lhosa, rests by her knees. Guided by Julta, she dips her fingers in, swirls and shakes off the richly scented drops that fall to the floor like quick little pearls. Wiping her hands dry - the purification complete - she reaches reverently for the silk wrapped Anite Stone.
The heavy wand of white anite snaps apart easily in the fragile strength of her hands, revealing spidery veins of red anite, stone frozen, arching and branching in imitation life. The fossilised veins begin to throb and swell upon contact with the incense laden air.
“Xerenxa, xerenxa,” she intones as the red anite pulses and throbs from the stone to drip viscously onto the incised pattern on the ritual floor. After the final drops fall, she lays down the shell of broken stone and begins to trace the scattered drops - still catalyst warm - her fingers caressing sense from the random pattern.
Her shallow breath rises and catches in her throat. Finally, it is time. The Banik slave briefly touches her consciousness, and though sightless, she turns her head to where he lies - silent and unmoving. Banik, the one you have called has come.
She sighs and calls for Julta. It is time to contact the Peacekeeper.
+++++
Aeryn Sun, Special Peacekeeper Commando, Icarian Company, Pleisar Regiment.
Aeryn Sun...
Aeryn’s voice. Peacekeeper hard. An unyielding mantra; far off and insistent.
By the time he makes out the words, he’s been hearing them for as long as he can remember. A carousel of simmering memories, poultice warm, drawn upward, out, and around. Snicked laughter, snatches of carnival music. Closed doors, closing doors. He can glimpse her white face if he’s lucky, more often it’s a glimpse of her blue-black hair.
Someone is running. Shadows warp though flowing manes of wooden horses. Flaring nostrils, rearing legs. Someone has taken his body, wound it up, and set it down in a place too small. They watch it thump against the walls in a whirlwind of frenzy. Someone is laughing. Closed doors, closing doors. A scream starts and echoes for ever, in a voice that sounds like his, and she runs from every ambush, looks back and smiles through unseeing eyes.
Aeryn Sun, Special Peacekeeper...
“You’re too easy, you were always too easy, Crichton. Always here, always there, always around, in two places at once, and always on *my* side... Do you like me? Do you even remember me? Once, I helped you die, took away your pain. Now, do you remember?”
Sometimes, his hands hold nothing - somehow that breaks his heart. Other times, his fingers slip over the warm sticky foetus. Nothing should be this fragile. The child breaks and cries, paddling hands circling for his finger, half-formed eyes brimming with trust. He forgets to breathe and all around him someone’s screaming.
Aeryn Sun, Special Peacekeeper Commando...
The tiny child, glazed with amniotic fluid, red and pink transparent flesh, spills from his too large hands. It falls mile upon mile, small mouth frozen open in a soundless scream.
+++++
“The Banik is dreaming,” Julta says in awe, guiding Xanthe over to the frail form, sketchily outlined in the Lhosa’s twisting flames.
“He will create dreams while the Lhosa burns,” she says brusquely, her withered hand tracing the hollows and ridges of his face and coming to rest on the worn metal mask. “He will create dreams, to call the one he seeks.” A small smile flutters around her frayed lips as she leans over and whispers into his ear. “Those dreams, Banik, do they torment you too?”
“His dreams are unpleasant?” Julta asks quickly, moving forward to better see the Stykera’s pale face through the cage of Xanthe’s trembling fingers .
Xanthe sighs and turns her head towards the girl, her hand stroking the Banik’s straggly hair. “Stykera are like unruly children with scattered thoughts; only Lhosa can discipline him and provide direction for his mind.”
“What you are about to do - is it safe?” Julta enquires meekly.
Xanthe considers before laughing gently. “Child, Stykera are unknowable. Their thoughts spill out; their thoughts spill in. This Stykera directs his thoughts to only one. The Lhosa defiles this one’s mind with hate, a hate so strong that I can feel it.” She lifts her fingers from his hair and traces out the outline of his lips, bends down and kisses him softly. “Do not worry. The Stykera will not even know I am there.”
Gently, she lifts at a corner of the mask and a fierce orange glow erupts from beneath and pierces the night sky. “Describe what is happening,” Xanthe barks out tersely. “Is the light diffuse or has it direction?”
Julta licks her lips nervously. “It courses into the sky.”
“That is good ...” She pats him on the cheek and croons, “...that is good, my little one.”
Gingerly, Xanthe lowers her head into the Stykera’s light, which washes over her like warm water. She blinks in awe, unaware she is holding her breath as the room - never seen - coalesces into view. A circular room with no beginning and no end - xerenxa kala xerenxa. Bordered with carved stone pillars, its central stone seat staring mutely into the abyss of night. This is where she sits, her time eroded face turned to the stars, plucking words like fruit from the sky and bestowing them on spell-bound listeners. And all the while those cruel Gods look down and smile in amusement at the misuse of their words, which come with a built-in obsolescence. Those words that fade and die in the hard light of day.
A dust worn rug, provided for the illusion of comfort, clings to the carved stone floor, and richly stuffed cushions offer a buffer from harm. And underneath it all, stained anite red from the endless cycles of regular ritual, the carved prophecy stones.
She blinks with cool green eyes for first time in two hundred and thirty cycles, and stares at Julta, who stands blankly, watching her. With a rush of joyous shock she realises that Julta cannot see her - that the girl watches her lifeless shell, the age roughened hands stilled in mid-caress around the Stykera’s face. But her own hands are smooth, the skin clear and firm. Her long black hair coils around her shoulders. She lifts her hands to stroke it and revels in its silky thickness, feels its close warmth hugging her face. She is a child again, like the time...before. With a soaring sense of exhilaration, she can see herself dissolve, surging upward and into the Stykera’s trained energy; feels herself streaming into the cold starry night.
+++++
John tears open his eyes to find himself adrift in the vastness of space. An onrush of noise; a fat tornado of sighing wind. Deafening echoes of ten thousand still-born screams. The ice-blue noise permeates his skin, turning his bones to ice.
Rough-edged silhouettes sway and tumble around him, stretch away as far as he can see, and somewhere further. He tries to close his too cold eyes.
“Watch, Crichton...and see...
He watches, and the cold stiff figures rotate slowly, hungrily twisting to catch the fragile light of a far-off sun.
“Ten thousand of my people...ten thousand.” Stark’s voice edges into a gleeful rhyme, “One, two, three, and look at me. Four and five, I’m still alive.” His voice draws in and becomes bitter. “Ten thousand - vented into space.”
The bodies float, embrace, and gently collide. A mother extends her brittle arms to a non-existent child; a baby lies entangled in her dress.
“Stark, this was not my fault, I never wished for any of this...don’t...please don’t do this to me.” He gazes in horror at the sight, voice breaking.
“How big is your heart now, Crichton? Is it big enough to hold the souls of ten thousand? Ten thousand for one - and now only one of me. Only one can’t put it right. And for Jothee. Jothee.” He spits the name out. “Jothee. Betrayer. Child. Ten thousand...for him.”
“Stark...please, we never wanted this...we had no way of knowing...”
“Never thought...never thought. Only playing wormhole games - climb the snakes, fixing broken ladders. Baniks, Banik slaves. Spillets, spillets...remember? Who remembers them? Who grieves? Do you? Do you dream of them like I do?” He hums a snatch of song as the desiccated bodies jostle against each other. “See, they dance. Do you think they’re happy? Look, Crichton, they want to meet you. You’re the one they’ve been waiting for.”
The bodies begin to glide silently towards him, arms outstretched, pleading fingers and bones. An onslaught of black holes in the dried flesh of ten thousand faces, shrivelled mouths grinning into teeth and yellowed bone. They swarm against his body, suffocate him with their unseeing nearness. He pushes them away, beats them away, breaks them into choking dust - and screams.
.....
“You are Crichton?”
He turns his sad face to the strange child floating beside him. Pooling large green eyes drill into his. Jet black hair floats weightless, invisible against the blackness of space, and she wears the stars like jewels. Her skin is white as if she has never touched a sun.
“The Stykera calls to you. He waits for you.”
“His name...is Stark.”
“Then, Stark waits for you.”
+++++
“No! We are not going down to that planet! Why? One word, so even you will understand: Peacekeepers!”
“D’Argo, since you became Captain, I’ve hardly been allowed off Moya. I merely wish to stretch my legs.”
“Stretch your legs!” D’Argo laughs incredulously. “You never get off that thronesled, I think it’s permanently bolted to your eema. Come here...” he reaches out with both arms and grabs the portly Dominar, “...I’ll stretch your legs for you!” He allows the stunned Rygel to slip through his fingers and drop unceremoniously to the floor. “Whoops!”
“D’Argo put me back at once! The insolence...” Rygel, rising up on his toes, strains his small hand upward for the hovering thronesled that rocks just tantalisingly out of reach, even when attempting a few half-hearted jumps. His voice quavers in indignation, “Put me back at once.”
“Put you back? I don’t think so. In fact, I’m pushing that noisy piece of crespa to the maintenance bay, let the DRD’s look at it. Time it had an overhaul, the frelling thing keeps me awake at night. A few days without it will...” he bends over and grins at the Dominar in satisfaction, “...stretch your legs.”
Rygel jumps up again, his small fingers almost touching the base of the implacably droning chair. He stands for a while and considers, small chest heaving from his previous efforts. Looking up into the Luxan’s smirking face, he bestows D’Argo with one of his most imperious stares. “I demand that...” but suddenly the words cut off as he reels and chokes, his pudgy hand fluttering for his heart.
“Rygel! Rygel...?” D’Argo stands rooted to the spot in horror.
The well-rounded Dominar collapses to the floor and thrashes about, groaning loudly, froth bubbling thickly from his mouth.
“Rygel?! What in hezmana have I done?” D’Argo snatches up the convulsing form and places him gently back into his thronesled, intending to push it to the medical bay.
“Ah, got ya!” The pathetic bundle suddenly bursts into life, frantically manipulates the thronesled’s switches and hurtles out of Command at top speed, laughing in shrill triumph. At the door, he almost bumps into Crichton.
“Ha! How did Luxans ever win that frellin’ war?” Rygel shouts over his shoulder as he zooms past the startled Human.
“Whoa Sparky, keep to the speed limit. You could take someone’s head off.” But already the manic laughter is echoing down the corridor, and the thronesled is nowhere to be seen.
D’Argo, his face suffused with rage, dashes up to Crichton. Panting for breath and his tentas swinging in agitation he puffs, “I swear...I’ll kill that Hynerian. Dominar...or no Dominar.”
“What did he do this time?”
“He made me think I’d killed him.”
“Oh,” John pulls a knowing face and walks away from D’Argo to the viewing window, where the orange and blue planet has been cut into a neat quarter. As he watches, his fingers tracing the filigree of clouds, the first glimmer of sun begins to fuzz along its gentle curve. He sighs wearily and now draws an arc where the clouds are blushing in its apricot light. Slumping back, he lets his arm fall heavily to his side, and turns a tired face to D’Argo. “D, we’ve got to go down there.”
“What?” The Luxan sputters. “But I’ve just informed that royal pain in the eema-”
“Stark’s down there. He’s in...some kind of trouble.”
“How do you know?”
“Because last night he took me on a magic carpet ride, and I don’t want to repeat the experience.”
D’Argo regards John closely, his red rimmed eyes and the small lines etched around his mouth. “You are sure? It’s not a trick? Another mind-frell?”
“Oh, it’s Stark alright. My side, your side.”
“You’re really sure, John? We’re talking about risking lives here.”
“Who else manages to work ‘spillet’ into every conversation?”
D’Argo grunts in acknowledgement. “Only Stark.”
“What’s this about Stark?” Aeryn’s voice cuts into Command like a blunt knife. Both John and D’Argo turn around guiltily. Aeryn stands and eyes them quizzically from the doorway, Scorpius looking on from over her shoulder.
Great. GI Jane and The Ghost That Walks. John kicks at the floor like a schoolboy searching for an excuse. “Nothin’, ‘cept that Stark’s down there an’ we have to go an’ get him.”
“With guns blazing, I presume?” Scorpius adds sardonically.
“You been talking to Harvey?” John asks rhetorically, eyeing the hybrid with distaste.
“You are aware of the Peacekeeper presence...?”
John glances at him in irritation. “I’m aware of a lot of things.”
“Then you must be aware that this is sheer suicide, Crichton, and I must...endeavour...to restrain you from this folly.”
“Endeavour away, Scorpy, but last time I looked, Stark was family. Okay, he’s probably the loopy maiden aunt we keep locked in the attic, but nevertheless, he’s family. And we’re going down there, and we’re going to bring him back.”
Aeryn takes a half-step forward. “I want to come with you.”
John looks at D’Argo and rolls his eyes. “Tell her, D.”
“Umm, I...er think that er...Crichton is concerned about the baby.”
“Yeah, honey, why don’t you stay at home and work on that maternal instinct? Maybe crochet up some baby booties.”
Aeryn leaps over her struggling translator microbes, and rounds on John. “The child is not a hindrance,” she says coolly, “neither physically or mentally. My performance will be unimpaired.”
“Spoken like a good little Peacekeeper. When did you regress, darlin’? ‘Cause I must’ve blinked and missed it. Couldn’t handle all those nasty emotions, eh?”
“At least I don’t have to take drugs to hold on to my sanity.”
“Ouch. Direct hit, babe.” He winces comically and leans over, patting his ass invitingly. “Come on, darlin’. Come and and kick my butt, for old time’s sake.”
Aeryn glowers at him, then shrugs. “Eema.”
“I prefer butts, and but me no buts.” He stands up and gives her his most ingratiating smile. “Sorry hon’, you’re not wanted on this trip. The good Captain has spoken.”
D’Argo looks puzzled. “Have I?”
John looks at him with affection. “Oh yeah, big time!”
The hybrid’s voice cuts in with silky insistence. “If I may, I would like to accompany you. I have proven myself...worthy...on more than one occasion.”
John narrows his eyes before sighing in exasperation. “Momma wants to check I’m wearing clean underwear.”
Scorpius moves forward purposefully. “John, this is no time for childish humour.”
Standing his ground, John watches the approaching hybrid and considers, rubbing his thumb across his lips in concentration. “Okay,” he says abruptly.
“So, he’s coming too?” D’Argo asks in amazement.
John glances towards Aeryn’s still glowering face, before turning to back to D’Argo. “I don’t think we should be leavin’ him behind - if he’s with us, at least we can keep an eye on him - if he stays on Moya...well, there’s no tellin’ what he’ll get up to. I don’t trust him. We might come back to any number of nasty surprises.”
“So, we’re dumb if we do and dumb if we don’t?”
“Yeah, something like that.”
+++++
Julta pushes back Xanthe’s matted hair and wipes her bony brow. The ancient face contorts under the cool water that runs and gathers in the dark puckered sockets of her eyes. Xanthe pushes herself with difficulty to an upright position, the false tears flowing down the corrugations of her cheeks, lips grimacing from the pain of her worn out body.
Julta can restrain her curiosity no longer. “What did you see?” she asks deferentially as she props a pillow behind her back.
“I saw, Julta. I saw.”
+++++
D’Argo dances and shuffles to one side as a small hovertray, heaped with over-ripe Djelnet fruit, shudders its way past him, the ripe skin leaving sticky trails across his coat. “Frell, look at this.” He wipes at it ineffectually and lifts his hand to his nose. “And guess what? It stinks.” But already John and Scorpius are disappearing into the thronging crowd, and D’Argo has to hurry to catch up with them.
“Did you see ...?” he pants out over the battering noise, while pulling John back by the shoulder.
“See what?” Crichton shouts back at him.
Aliens from a hundred different worlds jostle and barge their way through the narrow streets edged with rickety open-fronted emporiums. Bolts of rich material spill out onto pavements, squeezed between collections of new and used mechanical parts, next to sprawling bunches of aniline coloured fruit and vegetables. ‘A bizarre bazaar’, Crichton had called it.
Every so often, throbbing music claws its way out from exotic doorways. Scantily clad tralks, their erogenous zones painted white with powdered opiates, slouch listlessly and watch the passersby with calculating eyes.
Every step envelops them in a new scent; fragrant incense, pungent smoke and rich spices from open pots of roasting meat, the warm smell of tobacco. Raised voices, haggling and arguing, spill into whatever space is left.
Through a break amongst the bustling bodies, Scorpius notices a small side alley and works his way towards it, while beckoning to John and D’Argo. Finally, they erupt from the surging crowd and into the relative peace of the small thoroughfare.
All three struggle to get their breath back, leaning heavily against the flaking stone walls. Almost immediately, a small green tinged alien with a shock of white hair sidles up to them. He holds out three brimming drinks on a wooden platter and smiles at them enquiringly.
“These guys never let an opportunity slip,” Crichton grunts with admiration, while searching for his wallet. He flips three coins on to the platter and takes a glass. “What is this stuff?” he asks, sniffing at it tentatively before holding it up to the scanty light. “It’s...uh...purple. Do you think it’s fit for Human consumption?”
“You will find it most refreshing,” Scorpius assures him, taking a glass for himself.
“It’s made from Djelnet fruit,” D’Argo grumbles, looking ruefully at the glistening streaks on his coat. “It must grow on this planet like...” He grimaces while he searches for a simile.
John can’t resist, and jumps in. “That’d be like Earth tomatoes. Can’t stop ‘em growing. We juice ‘em and drink ‘em, boil them into pastes and sauce, use them in pizza,” he flashes a look at Scorpius, “but not in margarita’s. Toss ‘em into salads, dry ‘em, fry ‘em...”
“Okay, okay - like tommytoes,” D’Argo concedes.
“Crichton, as educational and as enjoyable as this is, I suggest that we prepare some kind of plan if we are to find the Banik and get off this planet intact.”
John glances at Scorpius and scowls in irritation - the bastard’s probably right. “Yeah, maybe this time just winging it ain't gonna be enough.”
“‘Winging it’, John? Is that how you evaded me for so long?”
“Don’t be too down-hearted, Scorpy. Think of it as lateral thinking. Sorts the men from the boys.”
“John, I relish this...insight...into the workings of the Human mind. However, it only confirms my opinion that your actions are dictated more by luck and circumstance than by good planning.”
“Sorry that I’m not the criminal mastermind you wanted me to be. If I was, I’d probably still be strapped to the Aurora Chair...” his voice rises in sarcasm, “...’cause you understand the criminal mind sooo well. But I’m just a confused li’l astronaut tryin’ his best to get through another day.”
“So it would seem,” Scorpius replies sardonically.
There is a sudden awkward pause in the conversation. D’Argo drains his glass swiftly, the gulps ringing loud in the small space. Scorpius rests against the wall and closes his eyes in distaste at the Luxan’s lack of manners.
Cautiously, John takes a sip of the Djelnet liquid. “Hmm, not too bad. Hey! Er...drink guy!” He beckons to the green-skinned waiter and turns to D’Argo and Scorpius with a ‘watch this’ kind of look on his face. The short alien bustles up with an attentive smile spread from ear to ear. “Have you seen a Banik? A Stykera?” The smile wavers into bewilderment. Crichton sighs and places his free hand over the right side of his face. “Wears a mask like this. Glows in the dark.” The waiter shakes his head and shrugs.
Crichton steps over to Scorpius. “On this planet, that means no, right?”
“Precisely.”
“Oh well, one down...” he glances at the passing crowd and takes another sip, “...another hundred thousand to go.”
Scorpius pushes himself off the wall and grabs John by the arm. “It’s time to be serious. I suggest-”
John shakes off his hand and shoves him away. “You suggest nothing, Scorp. Stark brought us here, so he’ll be the one to find us.”
D’Argo crashes the glass down on the wooden platter, causing the small alien to wince. John and Scorpius both turn to face him, and he opens his mouth to speak but stops when he notices a look of acute surprise flash onto John’s face.
“Whoa, D’Argo, you ain’t gonna like this.”
“Like what?” He follows John’s gaze and looks behind him.
“Oh man, this is bad.”
“What?” he asks, a hint of anger edging into his voice.
“Your Qualta Blade - it’s gone.”
The Luxan instinctively reaches for his weapon, only to grab a handful of air. His mouth opens and closes like a goldfish out of water as the enormity of the loss sinks in. “Frell,” he stammers out finally, “that incident with the hovertray and the Djelnet fruit...” He closes his eyes and recalls the shifty look on the slim alien’s face as he barked out a terse apology.
Scorpius views the Luxan with disdain. “This is most unfortunate.”
D’Argo swings round with mounting hyper-rage etched on every feature. “Unfortunate? Unfortunate?!” he bellows, his words rising to a shrill crescendo.
“D’Argo, calm down, man ...” but John’s voice trails away as he glances at the streaming forms passing the alleyway. “Be back soon,” he mutters, flinging his glass to the ground, and diving back into the crowd.
Scorpius and D’Argo eye each other for a brief instant.
“After you,” the hybrid intones with mock politeness. D’Argo growls out a curse in ancient Luxan and ploughs into the heaving mass of disparate life-forms, the frailer figure of Scorpius riding behind in his bow wave.
+++++
Come Fly With Me
It was an old gesture born of theatricality, meaningless but impressive. Practiced for so long that even she has come believe in its conclusive finality. Palms up, sinking forward onto her knees, brittle grey hair spilling over her face - Xanthe indicates that the session is over.
The sudden silence in the open-roofed chamber is overwhelming as she pauses and listens from within her womb of hair. The embarrassed questioners blink in surprise and scramble awkwardly to their feet. After allowing time for the usual stammering obeisances, Julta glides noiselessly towards them and leads them away. In the circular room their retreating voices echo with awed excitement as they begin to distil their own kind of sense from the stream of Xanthe’s inner vision.
She counts time, then smiles when their heavy coins clink and oil into her blessing tray. The weak will always pay well for the reinforcement of delusions - she is only required to provide comfort for their own pretence. They ask only that she lift the veil half-way, to assuage their half-belief. No matter that their lives, though admittedly fortunate, will be short - or the longed for child shall soon return to the Goddess.
She waits as their shuffling footsteps meld back into their stumbling lives, then lifts herself back to upright, tilting her sightless eyes into the cobalt night. She can smell the ink blue like a flooding wet stain, and count the stars as their energy rains upon her face. But tonight there is something more - she strains to hear...and there, faint but unmistakable - the strange song of unfamiliar Gods.
A scuffling noise scrapes at the edges of her concentration; the girl’s soft slippered feet as she returns with the laden tray. Xanthe frowns angrily. “Julta?”
“I am here.”
“You must cultivate the art of silence; I cannot tolerate interruption.” Julta does not reply, and she nods to herself in satisfaction - the girl is quick to learn. “Tonight, Julta, I wish to consult the Anite Stone; make the preparations.”
-------
Her arthritic hands perform the sacred movements mechanically, gnarled fingers move smoothly as if they’re not her own. Completing the sequence of esoteric symbols, her cracked voice drops with the weight of indecipherable incantation. She ends with the whisper, ‘Xerenxa kala xerenxa’.
A small bowl of beaten gold, brimming with water and petals from the Lhosa, rests by her knees. Guided by Julta, she dips her fingers in, swirls and shakes off the richly scented drops that fall to the floor like quick little pearls. Wiping her hands dry - the purification complete - she reaches reverently for the silk wrapped Anite Stone.
The heavy wand of white anite snaps apart easily in the fragile strength of her hands, revealing spidery veins of red anite, stone frozen, arching and branching in imitation life. The fossilised veins begin to throb and swell upon contact with the incense laden air.
“Xerenxa, xerenxa,” she intones as the red anite pulses and throbs from the stone to drip viscously onto the incised pattern on the ritual floor. After the final drops fall, she lays down the shell of broken stone and begins to trace the scattered drops - still catalyst warm - her fingers caressing sense from the random pattern.
Her shallow breath rises and catches in her throat. Finally, it is time. The Banik slave briefly touches her consciousness, and though sightless, she turns her head to where he lies - silent and unmoving. Banik, the one you have called has come.
She sighs and calls for Julta. It is time to contact the Peacekeeper.
+++++
Aeryn Sun, Special Peacekeeper Commando, Icarian Company, Pleisar Regiment.
Aeryn Sun...
Aeryn’s voice. Peacekeeper hard. An unyielding mantra; far off and insistent.
By the time he makes out the words, he’s been hearing them for as long as he can remember. A carousel of simmering memories, poultice warm, drawn upward, out, and around. Snicked laughter, snatches of carnival music. Closed doors, closing doors. He can glimpse her white face if he’s lucky, more often it’s a glimpse of her blue-black hair.
Someone is running. Shadows warp though flowing manes of wooden horses. Flaring nostrils, rearing legs. Someone has taken his body, wound it up, and set it down in a place too small. They watch it thump against the walls in a whirlwind of frenzy. Someone is laughing. Closed doors, closing doors. A scream starts and echoes for ever, in a voice that sounds like his, and she runs from every ambush, looks back and smiles through unseeing eyes.
Aeryn Sun, Special Peacekeeper...
“You’re too easy, you were always too easy, Crichton. Always here, always there, always around, in two places at once, and always on *my* side... Do you like me? Do you even remember me? Once, I helped you die, took away your pain. Now, do you remember?”
Sometimes, his hands hold nothing - somehow that breaks his heart. Other times, his fingers slip over the warm sticky foetus. Nothing should be this fragile. The child breaks and cries, paddling hands circling for his finger, half-formed eyes brimming with trust. He forgets to breathe and all around him someone’s screaming.
Aeryn Sun, Special Peacekeeper Commando...
The tiny child, glazed with amniotic fluid, red and pink transparent flesh, spills from his too large hands. It falls mile upon mile, small mouth frozen open in a soundless scream.
+++++
“The Banik is dreaming,” Julta says in awe, guiding Xanthe over to the frail form, sketchily outlined in the Lhosa’s twisting flames.
“He will create dreams while the Lhosa burns,” she says brusquely, her withered hand tracing the hollows and ridges of his face and coming to rest on the worn metal mask. “He will create dreams, to call the one he seeks.” A small smile flutters around her frayed lips as she leans over and whispers into his ear. “Those dreams, Banik, do they torment you too?”
“His dreams are unpleasant?” Julta asks quickly, moving forward to better see the Stykera’s pale face through the cage of Xanthe’s trembling fingers .
Xanthe sighs and turns her head towards the girl, her hand stroking the Banik’s straggly hair. “Stykera are like unruly children with scattered thoughts; only Lhosa can discipline him and provide direction for his mind.”
“What you are about to do - is it safe?” Julta enquires meekly.
Xanthe considers before laughing gently. “Child, Stykera are unknowable. Their thoughts spill out; their thoughts spill in. This Stykera directs his thoughts to only one. The Lhosa defiles this one’s mind with hate, a hate so strong that I can feel it.” She lifts her fingers from his hair and traces out the outline of his lips, bends down and kisses him softly. “Do not worry. The Stykera will not even know I am there.”
Gently, she lifts at a corner of the mask and a fierce orange glow erupts from beneath and pierces the night sky. “Describe what is happening,” Xanthe barks out tersely. “Is the light diffuse or has it direction?”
Julta licks her lips nervously. “It courses into the sky.”
“That is good ...” She pats him on the cheek and croons, “...that is good, my little one.”
Gingerly, Xanthe lowers her head into the Stykera’s light, which washes over her like warm water. She blinks in awe, unaware she is holding her breath as the room - never seen - coalesces into view. A circular room with no beginning and no end - xerenxa kala xerenxa. Bordered with carved stone pillars, its central stone seat staring mutely into the abyss of night. This is where she sits, her time eroded face turned to the stars, plucking words like fruit from the sky and bestowing them on spell-bound listeners. And all the while those cruel Gods look down and smile in amusement at the misuse of their words, which come with a built-in obsolescence. Those words that fade and die in the hard light of day.
A dust worn rug, provided for the illusion of comfort, clings to the carved stone floor, and richly stuffed cushions offer a buffer from harm. And underneath it all, stained anite red from the endless cycles of regular ritual, the carved prophecy stones.
She blinks with cool green eyes for first time in two hundred and thirty cycles, and stares at Julta, who stands blankly, watching her. With a rush of joyous shock she realises that Julta cannot see her - that the girl watches her lifeless shell, the age roughened hands stilled in mid-caress around the Stykera’s face. But her own hands are smooth, the skin clear and firm. Her long black hair coils around her shoulders. She lifts her hands to stroke it and revels in its silky thickness, feels its close warmth hugging her face. She is a child again, like the time...before. With a soaring sense of exhilaration, she can see herself dissolve, surging upward and into the Stykera’s trained energy; feels herself streaming into the cold starry night.
+++++
John tears open his eyes to find himself adrift in the vastness of space. An onrush of noise; a fat tornado of sighing wind. Deafening echoes of ten thousand still-born screams. The ice-blue noise permeates his skin, turning his bones to ice.
Rough-edged silhouettes sway and tumble around him, stretch away as far as he can see, and somewhere further. He tries to close his too cold eyes.
“Watch, Crichton...and see...
He watches, and the cold stiff figures rotate slowly, hungrily twisting to catch the fragile light of a far-off sun.
“Ten thousand of my people...ten thousand.” Stark’s voice edges into a gleeful rhyme, “One, two, three, and look at me. Four and five, I’m still alive.” His voice draws in and becomes bitter. “Ten thousand - vented into space.”
The bodies float, embrace, and gently collide. A mother extends her brittle arms to a non-existent child; a baby lies entangled in her dress.
“Stark, this was not my fault, I never wished for any of this...don’t...please don’t do this to me.” He gazes in horror at the sight, voice breaking.
“How big is your heart now, Crichton? Is it big enough to hold the souls of ten thousand? Ten thousand for one - and now only one of me. Only one can’t put it right. And for Jothee. Jothee.” He spits the name out. “Jothee. Betrayer. Child. Ten thousand...for him.”
“Stark...please, we never wanted this...we had no way of knowing...”
“Never thought...never thought. Only playing wormhole games - climb the snakes, fixing broken ladders. Baniks, Banik slaves. Spillets, spillets...remember? Who remembers them? Who grieves? Do you? Do you dream of them like I do?” He hums a snatch of song as the desiccated bodies jostle against each other. “See, they dance. Do you think they’re happy? Look, Crichton, they want to meet you. You’re the one they’ve been waiting for.”
The bodies begin to glide silently towards him, arms outstretched, pleading fingers and bones. An onslaught of black holes in the dried flesh of ten thousand faces, shrivelled mouths grinning into teeth and yellowed bone. They swarm against his body, suffocate him with their unseeing nearness. He pushes them away, beats them away, breaks them into choking dust - and screams.
.....
“You are Crichton?”
He turns his sad face to the strange child floating beside him. Pooling large green eyes drill into his. Jet black hair floats weightless, invisible against the blackness of space, and she wears the stars like jewels. Her skin is white as if she has never touched a sun.
“The Stykera calls to you. He waits for you.”
“His name...is Stark.”
“Then, Stark waits for you.”
+++++
“No! We are not going down to that planet! Why? One word, so even you will understand: Peacekeepers!”
“D’Argo, since you became Captain, I’ve hardly been allowed off Moya. I merely wish to stretch my legs.”
“Stretch your legs!” D’Argo laughs incredulously. “You never get off that thronesled, I think it’s permanently bolted to your eema. Come here...” he reaches out with both arms and grabs the portly Dominar, “...I’ll stretch your legs for you!” He allows the stunned Rygel to slip through his fingers and drop unceremoniously to the floor. “Whoops!”
“D’Argo put me back at once! The insolence...” Rygel, rising up on his toes, strains his small hand upward for the hovering thronesled that rocks just tantalisingly out of reach, even when attempting a few half-hearted jumps. His voice quavers in indignation, “Put me back at once.”
“Put you back? I don’t think so. In fact, I’m pushing that noisy piece of crespa to the maintenance bay, let the DRD’s look at it. Time it had an overhaul, the frelling thing keeps me awake at night. A few days without it will...” he bends over and grins at the Dominar in satisfaction, “...stretch your legs.”
Rygel jumps up again, his small fingers almost touching the base of the implacably droning chair. He stands for a while and considers, small chest heaving from his previous efforts. Looking up into the Luxan’s smirking face, he bestows D’Argo with one of his most imperious stares. “I demand that...” but suddenly the words cut off as he reels and chokes, his pudgy hand fluttering for his heart.
“Rygel! Rygel...?” D’Argo stands rooted to the spot in horror.
The well-rounded Dominar collapses to the floor and thrashes about, groaning loudly, froth bubbling thickly from his mouth.
“Rygel?! What in hezmana have I done?” D’Argo snatches up the convulsing form and places him gently back into his thronesled, intending to push it to the medical bay.
“Ah, got ya!” The pathetic bundle suddenly bursts into life, frantically manipulates the thronesled’s switches and hurtles out of Command at top speed, laughing in shrill triumph. At the door, he almost bumps into Crichton.
“Ha! How did Luxans ever win that frellin’ war?” Rygel shouts over his shoulder as he zooms past the startled Human.
“Whoa Sparky, keep to the speed limit. You could take someone’s head off.” But already the manic laughter is echoing down the corridor, and the thronesled is nowhere to be seen.
D’Argo, his face suffused with rage, dashes up to Crichton. Panting for breath and his tentas swinging in agitation he puffs, “I swear...I’ll kill that Hynerian. Dominar...or no Dominar.”
“What did he do this time?”
“He made me think I’d killed him.”
“Oh,” John pulls a knowing face and walks away from D’Argo to the viewing window, where the orange and blue planet has been cut into a neat quarter. As he watches, his fingers tracing the filigree of clouds, the first glimmer of sun begins to fuzz along its gentle curve. He sighs wearily and now draws an arc where the clouds are blushing in its apricot light. Slumping back, he lets his arm fall heavily to his side, and turns a tired face to D’Argo. “D, we’ve got to go down there.”
“What?” The Luxan sputters. “But I’ve just informed that royal pain in the eema-”
“Stark’s down there. He’s in...some kind of trouble.”
“How do you know?”
“Because last night he took me on a magic carpet ride, and I don’t want to repeat the experience.”
D’Argo regards John closely, his red rimmed eyes and the small lines etched around his mouth. “You are sure? It’s not a trick? Another mind-frell?”
“Oh, it’s Stark alright. My side, your side.”
“You’re really sure, John? We’re talking about risking lives here.”
“Who else manages to work ‘spillet’ into every conversation?”
D’Argo grunts in acknowledgement. “Only Stark.”
“What’s this about Stark?” Aeryn’s voice cuts into Command like a blunt knife. Both John and D’Argo turn around guiltily. Aeryn stands and eyes them quizzically from the doorway, Scorpius looking on from over her shoulder.
Great. GI Jane and The Ghost That Walks. John kicks at the floor like a schoolboy searching for an excuse. “Nothin’, ‘cept that Stark’s down there an’ we have to go an’ get him.”
“With guns blazing, I presume?” Scorpius adds sardonically.
“You been talking to Harvey?” John asks rhetorically, eyeing the hybrid with distaste.
“You are aware of the Peacekeeper presence...?”
John glances at him in irritation. “I’m aware of a lot of things.”
“Then you must be aware that this is sheer suicide, Crichton, and I must...endeavour...to restrain you from this folly.”
“Endeavour away, Scorpy, but last time I looked, Stark was family. Okay, he’s probably the loopy maiden aunt we keep locked in the attic, but nevertheless, he’s family. And we’re going down there, and we’re going to bring him back.”
Aeryn takes a half-step forward. “I want to come with you.”
John looks at D’Argo and rolls his eyes. “Tell her, D.”
“Umm, I...er think that er...Crichton is concerned about the baby.”
“Yeah, honey, why don’t you stay at home and work on that maternal instinct? Maybe crochet up some baby booties.”
Aeryn leaps over her struggling translator microbes, and rounds on John. “The child is not a hindrance,” she says coolly, “neither physically or mentally. My performance will be unimpaired.”
“Spoken like a good little Peacekeeper. When did you regress, darlin’? ‘Cause I must’ve blinked and missed it. Couldn’t handle all those nasty emotions, eh?”
“At least I don’t have to take drugs to hold on to my sanity.”
“Ouch. Direct hit, babe.” He winces comically and leans over, patting his ass invitingly. “Come on, darlin’. Come and and kick my butt, for old time’s sake.”
Aeryn glowers at him, then shrugs. “Eema.”
“I prefer butts, and but me no buts.” He stands up and gives her his most ingratiating smile. “Sorry hon’, you’re not wanted on this trip. The good Captain has spoken.”
D’Argo looks puzzled. “Have I?”
John looks at him with affection. “Oh yeah, big time!”
The hybrid’s voice cuts in with silky insistence. “If I may, I would like to accompany you. I have proven myself...worthy...on more than one occasion.”
John narrows his eyes before sighing in exasperation. “Momma wants to check I’m wearing clean underwear.”
Scorpius moves forward purposefully. “John, this is no time for childish humour.”
Standing his ground, John watches the approaching hybrid and considers, rubbing his thumb across his lips in concentration. “Okay,” he says abruptly.
“So, he’s coming too?” D’Argo asks in amazement.
John glances towards Aeryn’s still glowering face, before turning to back to D’Argo. “I don’t think we should be leavin’ him behind - if he’s with us, at least we can keep an eye on him - if he stays on Moya...well, there’s no tellin’ what he’ll get up to. I don’t trust him. We might come back to any number of nasty surprises.”
“So, we’re dumb if we do and dumb if we don’t?”
“Yeah, something like that.”
+++++
Julta pushes back Xanthe’s matted hair and wipes her bony brow. The ancient face contorts under the cool water that runs and gathers in the dark puckered sockets of her eyes. Xanthe pushes herself with difficulty to an upright position, the false tears flowing down the corrugations of her cheeks, lips grimacing from the pain of her worn out body.
Julta can restrain her curiosity no longer. “What did you see?” she asks deferentially as she props a pillow behind her back.
“I saw, Julta. I saw.”
+++++
D’Argo dances and shuffles to one side as a small hovertray, heaped with over-ripe Djelnet fruit, shudders its way past him, the ripe skin leaving sticky trails across his coat. “Frell, look at this.” He wipes at it ineffectually and lifts his hand to his nose. “And guess what? It stinks.” But already John and Scorpius are disappearing into the thronging crowd, and D’Argo has to hurry to catch up with them.
“Did you see ...?” he pants out over the battering noise, while pulling John back by the shoulder.
“See what?” Crichton shouts back at him.
Aliens from a hundred different worlds jostle and barge their way through the narrow streets edged with rickety open-fronted emporiums. Bolts of rich material spill out onto pavements, squeezed between collections of new and used mechanical parts, next to sprawling bunches of aniline coloured fruit and vegetables. ‘A bizarre bazaar’, Crichton had called it.
Every so often, throbbing music claws its way out from exotic doorways. Scantily clad tralks, their erogenous zones painted white with powdered opiates, slouch listlessly and watch the passersby with calculating eyes.
Every step envelops them in a new scent; fragrant incense, pungent smoke and rich spices from open pots of roasting meat, the warm smell of tobacco. Raised voices, haggling and arguing, spill into whatever space is left.
Through a break amongst the bustling bodies, Scorpius notices a small side alley and works his way towards it, while beckoning to John and D’Argo. Finally, they erupt from the surging crowd and into the relative peace of the small thoroughfare.
All three struggle to get their breath back, leaning heavily against the flaking stone walls. Almost immediately, a small green tinged alien with a shock of white hair sidles up to them. He holds out three brimming drinks on a wooden platter and smiles at them enquiringly.
“These guys never let an opportunity slip,” Crichton grunts with admiration, while searching for his wallet. He flips three coins on to the platter and takes a glass. “What is this stuff?” he asks, sniffing at it tentatively before holding it up to the scanty light. “It’s...uh...purple. Do you think it’s fit for Human consumption?”
“You will find it most refreshing,” Scorpius assures him, taking a glass for himself.
“It’s made from Djelnet fruit,” D’Argo grumbles, looking ruefully at the glistening streaks on his coat. “It must grow on this planet like...” He grimaces while he searches for a simile.
John can’t resist, and jumps in. “That’d be like Earth tomatoes. Can’t stop ‘em growing. We juice ‘em and drink ‘em, boil them into pastes and sauce, use them in pizza,” he flashes a look at Scorpius, “but not in margarita’s. Toss ‘em into salads, dry ‘em, fry ‘em...”
“Okay, okay - like tommytoes,” D’Argo concedes.
“Crichton, as educational and as enjoyable as this is, I suggest that we prepare some kind of plan if we are to find the Banik and get off this planet intact.”
John glances at Scorpius and scowls in irritation - the bastard’s probably right. “Yeah, maybe this time just winging it ain't gonna be enough.”
“‘Winging it’, John? Is that how you evaded me for so long?”
“Don’t be too down-hearted, Scorpy. Think of it as lateral thinking. Sorts the men from the boys.”
“John, I relish this...insight...into the workings of the Human mind. However, it only confirms my opinion that your actions are dictated more by luck and circumstance than by good planning.”
“Sorry that I’m not the criminal mastermind you wanted me to be. If I was, I’d probably still be strapped to the Aurora Chair...” his voice rises in sarcasm, “...’cause you understand the criminal mind sooo well. But I’m just a confused li’l astronaut tryin’ his best to get through another day.”
“So it would seem,” Scorpius replies sardonically.
There is a sudden awkward pause in the conversation. D’Argo drains his glass swiftly, the gulps ringing loud in the small space. Scorpius rests against the wall and closes his eyes in distaste at the Luxan’s lack of manners.
Cautiously, John takes a sip of the Djelnet liquid. “Hmm, not too bad. Hey! Er...drink guy!” He beckons to the green-skinned waiter and turns to D’Argo and Scorpius with a ‘watch this’ kind of look on his face. The short alien bustles up with an attentive smile spread from ear to ear. “Have you seen a Banik? A Stykera?” The smile wavers into bewilderment. Crichton sighs and places his free hand over the right side of his face. “Wears a mask like this. Glows in the dark.” The waiter shakes his head and shrugs.
Crichton steps over to Scorpius. “On this planet, that means no, right?”
“Precisely.”
“Oh well, one down...” he glances at the passing crowd and takes another sip, “...another hundred thousand to go.”
Scorpius pushes himself off the wall and grabs John by the arm. “It’s time to be serious. I suggest-”
John shakes off his hand and shoves him away. “You suggest nothing, Scorp. Stark brought us here, so he’ll be the one to find us.”
D’Argo crashes the glass down on the wooden platter, causing the small alien to wince. John and Scorpius both turn to face him, and he opens his mouth to speak but stops when he notices a look of acute surprise flash onto John’s face.
“Whoa, D’Argo, you ain’t gonna like this.”
“Like what?” He follows John’s gaze and looks behind him.
“Oh man, this is bad.”
“What?” he asks, a hint of anger edging into his voice.
“Your Qualta Blade - it’s gone.”
The Luxan instinctively reaches for his weapon, only to grab a handful of air. His mouth opens and closes like a goldfish out of water as the enormity of the loss sinks in. “Frell,” he stammers out finally, “that incident with the hovertray and the Djelnet fruit...” He closes his eyes and recalls the shifty look on the slim alien’s face as he barked out a terse apology.
Scorpius views the Luxan with disdain. “This is most unfortunate.”
D’Argo swings round with mounting hyper-rage etched on every feature. “Unfortunate? Unfortunate?!” he bellows, his words rising to a shrill crescendo.
“D’Argo, calm down, man ...” but John’s voice trails away as he glances at the streaming forms passing the alleyway. “Be back soon,” he mutters, flinging his glass to the ground, and diving back into the crowd.
Scorpius and D’Argo eye each other for a brief instant.
“After you,” the hybrid intones with mock politeness. D’Argo growls out a curse in ancient Luxan and ploughs into the heaving mass of disparate life-forms, the frailer figure of Scorpius riding behind in his bow wave.
+++++