Originally posted 9/30/07This story was written for the 19th Starburst challenge at
Terra Firma. The requirements were to kill a Farscape villain, and someone must sing in the story. For extra cosmic brownie points, you should write in present tense. Since Crash said the challenge was inspired by my old (I think it must have been in the long hiatus after "Fractures") Kill Furlow Challenge, and since I didn't actually
kill Furlow for that challenge (TJohn's ghost talked Aeryn out of it), I thought it was only fitting that my villain be....Furlow!
Rating: PG
Setting: A few monens after PKW
Spoilers: Through PKW
Disclaimer: Not my characters, not my universe, no money changing hands....
Thanks very much to imloco2, MadScientist, and shipsister for the beta duties! Crash, first person is hard, but I rather like my solution for singing. (And THAT was hard to get the way I wanted it, LOL!)
P.S.
"Batchin' It" is a sequel/companion piece, but definitely read this first.
Mockingbird
The greeting rings through the bustling commerce center. “Well, well, well. If it ain’t Johnny Crichton’s Peacekeeper tralk!”
The oily female voice startles Aeryn Sun, busy as she is trying to soothe the cranky infant in her arms. She recognizes the owner immediately, and her blood freezes, not with fear, but with cold fury. The presence of her helpless child prevents her from doing something John would probably call stupid, and she keeps her hands in plain view as she turns to face the voice. "Furlow," she says, with as much disdain as she can get into one word, and pauses when she actually catches sight of the bitch who cost her so much in the past.
Standing almost near enough to touch, jumpsuit sagging, Furlow obviously sees Aeryn’s shock as she takes in the wormhole mechanic’s much reduced and battered form. "Oh, yes," Furlow says. "This is
your fault." She gestures with a grotesquely twisted left hand towards a pattern of terrible scars that slash across her face, then shifts her stance in a way that suggests permanent injury to at least one leg. "Yours and Crichton's," she reaffirms, gesturing with the pulse pistol she holds confidently in her right hand.
Like frell it is! Aeryn doesn't dare reach for her own weapon, not with the baby in her arms. She doesn't dare give her old enemy an excuse to fire. Unfortunately, her fellow shoppers appear inclined to studiously ignore both the weapon, and the two women. "We did
nothing to you," Aeryn blusters, just to keep the conversation going. Despite the bluster, she means those words. After all, it was Furlow's treachery that tore John from her, and then kept them apart for far too long! D'Argo lets out a squawk, but Aeryn keeps her eyes on Furlow and her pulse pistol.
The woman's pale blue eyes burn hot. "Those frelling lizards thought I was the one destroyed their dreadnought at Dam-Ba-Da. Blamed your dirty work on
me. Said I betrayed them!" She pauses just long enough to thump her clawed hand on her chest. "They did all
this tryin' to get me to give ‘em the secret of wormholes. Which I did not have because
somebody was too selfish to share!"
Aeryn's stomach clenches, not in sympathy, no, this woman will never have her sympathy, but because the Scarrans might have done that to John, looking for the same information. John.... She stops herself from sighing his name. What a frelling inconvenient time for him to be thousands of metras away, on Moya.
As if reading Aeryn's mind, Furlow demands, "Where's Crichton?"
"I don't know," Aeryn lies automatically.
"Don't frell with me, missy!" She coughs, and points her gun directly at D'Argo. "He's the daddy, right?"
The calculating gleam in the woman's eyes scares Aeryn to death, and she begins to contemplate trying to make a run for it despite the risk. If she can keep the element of surprise, if she can turn quickly enough, her backpack and her own body will be between D'Argo and any pulse blast this crazy woman might unleash. Better odds than just standing here and hoping that someone will call the security force. On a planet like this one, few people are willing to get involved in someone else’s trouble. In Aeryn’s experience, that's usually a good thing – until you
need someone to call for backup.
Apparently unaware of Aeryn’s weighing of the odds, Furlow offers another thought of her own. "Johnny's done well for himself these days, hasn't he? The Hero of Qujaga." She doesn't just spit out the words, she actually spits on the ground, foamy saliva landing between them. "Bet the Qujagans don't see it that way!"
No, Aeryn knows the Qujagans – Eidelons – don't see it that way...not all of them, anyway. But she's not going to tell Furlow that, and feed the woman's self-righteous anger. Desperate to get D'Argo away from this danger, Aeryn calculates the time she needs to whip her body around and run, begins to watch for any sign that Furlow's attention is diverted, even a little. "Look," she says, on the off chance that words will help. "You obviously don't need any more trouble. Be smart. Walk away."
Furlow lets loose a bark of laughter and shakes her head. "I think you're a wee bit mistaken about who has the upper hand here."
And then the fates smile on Aeryn Sun and her son: A pair of drunken fools, too wrapped up in some personal quarrel to notice anything except each other, drift in their direction. Aeryn counts silently as they get closer, one, two, three, four, five.... Furlow opens her mouth to order them away, but Aeryn, clutching D’Argo tightly to her chest, throws her body, shoulder first, into the pair, sending them sprawling towards Furlow.
She doesn’t take the time to see the results. She runs. She runs, and a howl of rage follows her.
* * * * * * * *
She runs with all her strength, holding her son tightly, tightly enough that he is unhappy, and frightened, perhaps even in pain. His cries tug at her heart, but she steels herself against them as she dodges past pedestrians and tries to remember the layout of the center. She’s cautiously optimistic, but she is also too far from the spaceport to head straight for it; she needs a place to hide, to be sure she’s lost Furlow, before she ventures out again to reach her prowler.
Heart pounding with the exertion of running flat out carrying the weight of both her child and her pack, she avoids the occasional startled shopper. Her blood pounds in her ears, and she can’t really tell if Furlow has managed to keep up. Breathing hard, she rounds a couple of corners and ducks behind a stack of crates.
A loud screech from the little one announces their stop.
“Shhhh,” she gasps to D’Argo, as she pulls her pulse pistol from its holster and peers around the crates to look back the way she came. She feels better with her weapon in her hand, but the baby’s cries are going to give away their hiding place. “Shhhh,” she manages again, trying to soothe him. She rocks back and forth, hoping to hear some lessening of the ear-piercing sound coming from tiny lungs and vocal cords. But D’Argo continues to bellow his displeasure with her tactics, and she’s got to do something, quickly, and from somewhere in her mind comes the thought,
John can always quiet him down with a song.
Half of her is cursing the very idea, the other half is desperate enough to try singing – yes,
singing. “Hush, little baby,” she begins softly, then stops and takes a huge breath, both because she needs air, and because she’s terrified that she can’t do this. She knows she’s not anywhere near the proper tune, but D’Argo pauses momentarily in his screaming to study her, his face wrinkled up in puzzlement. With a spark of hope she continues, the words spaced out with gasps. “Don’t say a...word...Mama’s...going to buy you...buy you...” Frell! The earth word refuses to come to her, and D’Argo’s wails start up again. If anything, the baby’s cries are louder. In desperation, she substitutes a Sebacean word that sort of rhymes: “Mama’s going to buy you a heeow'vaugh.”
Gaining a little confidence, she flashes her son a reassuring smile.
Remember the words. You can remember the words, she tells herself.
You’ve heard the frelling song hundreds of times! With that admonition, she begins again, keeping her almost-rhyme, but trying otherwise to stick to as much of the original English as she can come up with. “And if that heeow'vaugh doesn't sing, Mama's going to buy you...another thing.” Frell! But D’Argo doesn’t seem to mind her mangling his father’s song, indeed, he’s actually listening, so she keeps improvising. She bounces her son lightly in her arms and tries another verse:
“And if that other thing doesn't...float,
“Mama's going to buy you a...rowing boat!”
Where the frell did
that come from? But D’Argo rewards her efforts with a smile, and Aeryn exhales in relief. Just as she’s congratulating herself, however, she is reminded that the fates are capricious: a shadow falls on the wall beside her, and frelling Furlow appears again.
The two women stare at each other, and at Furlow’s weapon, hanging between them. With a lopsided grin, Furlow takes aim at mother and son.
Fighting down panic, Aeryn stealthily raises the hand that’s holding her pulse pistol, keeping it hidden behind D’Argo.... She licks her lips, doesn’t have to feign the pleading in her voice. “Don’t do this,” she says, trying to get through to this old enemy. “Let me put the baby down. He’s done nothing to you.”
Furlow shakes her head, dismissing any possibility of mercy for a tiny child. “This is going to hurt Johnny Boy way more than you,” she says, with a slight wave of her weapon that does nothing to change its aim.
“You are mad,” Aeryn tells her, appalled.
“Prob’ly,” Furlow agrees.
Chilled, Aeryn accepts the self-assessment, slips her weapon from behind the baby, and shoots.
With a look of total astonishment on her face, Furlow topples to the ground, her once-corpulent form landing with hardly a sound.
Aeryn takes a deep breath of mingled satisfaction and regret, and looks down at D’Argo.
The baby looks back at her.
“You all right?” she asks him, concerned about his reaction to the weapons fire.
He waves his arms at her cheerfully.
Oh, right. He’d been born in the middle of a battle. He was obviously right at home with the sound of pulse pistols.
But she’s just killed a woman, no matter that it was self defense and the bitch deserved it, and it’s time to get the frell out of here. She kisses D’Argo, nudges Furlow with her foot just to be sure, and adjusts her pack on her back. Satisfied, she holsters her pulse pistol, and heads out of the alleyway, towards the spaceport and the safety of her prowler.
D’Argo begins to fuss.
“Oh, no you don’t,” she tells him as she walks. “I’m not shooting anyone else just to amuse you. Shall I sing again?” The baby gurgles what she takes to be an affirmative answer. Without the pressure of singing for their very lives, her brain manages to dredge up more of the words this time. “Hush little baby, don’t say a word, Mama’s going to buy you a mockingbird. And if that mockingbird doesn’t sing....”
She’s safe, and more importantly, D’Argo is safe, but her knees are wobbling, her heart is pounding, and her eyes are filled with tears. Her throat is tight, but she continues to sing as she walks, to distract herself as much as her son.
D’Argo is sleeping by the time she reaches her prowler. Aeryn straps him into his seat, flies home to Moya, and buries herself in John’s arms.
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