A Life Less Ordinary

Hey there, feeling a bit melencholoy due to real life dren and this is what came out. I always thought Olivia knew about John and Aeryn whether they actually discussed it or not. She's his sister after all. And Aeryn was so MISERABLE on Earth that I had to try to make her feel a bit better... even if it's in a melencholoy sort of way.

Title: A life less ordinary
Rating G
Time Frame: During Terra Firma

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The book was dusty and heavy and smelled faintly of time. The binding creaked when she opened it and she had to run her hand across the wrinkled covering in order to see clearly.

Pictures, snapshots, photographs. Flat representations of a moment in time. One-dimensional insights into a life before her.

It was the closest she'd felt to him in Monens.

She stared closely at the chubby faced white haired baby held so closely to its mother's breast and so proudly in its father arms. At the small boy in short pants and clunky shoes that smiled at her with an innocence that the man had lost long ago. An innocence she could still remember if she tried hard enough. A hand glimpsed through a haze of pain, a pair of bright blue eyes and words that would change her world forever.

"My name is John."

She turned the page and looked at the same boy older now with the arrogance of the young in his posture. Chin up thumbs tucked into the waistband of his jeans and glaring at the lens through half closed eyes. And she smiled for a moment because she remembers such days from her own youth. Old enough to want approval from your elders and young enough to pretend you don't care.

Another page and more cycles gone and he's older than the boy she glimpsed so briefly when they visited his past. There is a confidence in him now seen in the way he grips the oblong ball, stands in the midst of his smiling family with a cap and tassel and grips the woman with the long yellow hair.

And then there were the women. Lots...of women.

Short ones, tall ones, some curvy some thin but all soft and yellow-haired and delicate of disposition. It was like looking at Gelina in countless incarnations. Tech smart and puppy eyed and oh so admiring of him.

Half way down the page was a picture of Caroline. Caroline who had taken him away for a "rest" that very morning. Who had kissed him with such familiarity the night before. Caroline who like all the rest was soft and yellow-haired and no doubt smart. Who knew nothing of war or weapons or battles or scars.

She had asked him one night about that. On Talyn. He'd been absently fingering one just under her navel garnered in a knife fight with a Vacarian on Bemethi Prime and she'd asked him if it bothered him that her body was marked and hard and so different from the endless stories he'd told her of his planet and it's people and how the women for the most part did not fight.

He'd stared at her for a moment his face shifting with emotions she had no name for and then he'd laughed and traced the hard white line with the edge of his tongue until she'd arched into his mouth with a groan. Then he'd told her that her scars told the story of her life, they were part of who she was and he cherished every one.

And he'd been in her world then and she loved him and it wasn't important anyway so she'd believed him and let it go.

But now he was home and off with Caroline's soft unblemished form.

The sound of footsteps jerked her head up and she watched as his sister entered the room. She moved instinctively to hide the book as though she'd been caught spying but Olivia saw it anyway and merely smiled.

"Found the old family album I see."

She nodded and held it out for Olivia to take.

Olivia glanced at it but did not take it from her turning to open the closet instead.

"He was a cute kid wasn't he?"

"Yes."

Something in her tone must have struck a chord because the girl turned and looked at her again.

"You've been up here a long time... did you find what you were looking for?"

She looked up prepared to give the girl some calming platitude but stopped when she saw her face. There was friendship there and Crichton's smile and suddenly she found herself swallowing hard against the lump in her throat.

"I was... I was just..."

Olivia sat down. "What?"

She shook her head and looked down at the book in her hands again. Moments frozen in time like she'd frozen him out after the other died like he was freezing her out now. They were like these photographs's the two of them. Unmoving and unmovable stuck in a moment neither of them seemed to know how to get out of.

She sighed. "I thought perhaps if I saw where he came from I might understand better where he is now."

Olivia frowned and flipped her dark hard behind one ear. "He's not that boy any more."

She shook her head realizing that Olivia misunderstood but not knowing exactly how to put the sentiment into words. "He told me endless stories when we met. Of this place and these people... of his family, of you. I got sick of it. My life was different. Regimented no... connections, no books to catalogue the moments. I just wanted to understand the need."

Olivia stared at her for a microt and then took the book from her hands. "Pictures Aeryn, they show you who a person was at that moment in time. And that's good, because it lets you remember. Good, bad it doesn't matter. It lets you remember so you won't forget, the event and all the feelings that went with it. But it doesn't show you who they are now. And as long as you're alive, now is what's important. I know he's changed, my brother. I can feel it. See it in his face. These pictures they will show you who John Crichton was but I doubt they'll tell you anything about who he is. You're a far better candidate for that."

She sniffed hard and looked at the pictures again. "He never stopped looking for Earth you know," and although Olivia has taken the microbes she used English. Because it was his planet, his words and the feelings he had made her feel, "Years he spent, years. There was room for nothing else."

"Nothing?" Olivia said with a hint of a smile.

The blush flooded her face and she turned her head in embarrassment. "Well maybe one other thing. At least there was... once."

Olivia put her hands over hers and her fingers were warm and firm and they melted the ice that had been building in her heart since he'd told her to get her story straight and for the first time she felt a bit of hope.

"These are pictures of an ordinary life Aeryn Sun. Ordinary people and places and things. John always dreamed of a life less ordinary, it's why we couldn't keep him here in the first place."

"But..."

"No don't," Olivia pressed on. "Don't take it for more than what it is. Memories and triumphs. Love and loss. It's the past and it needs to be protected, but it's the future that matters most."

And she wanted to believe her but doubt still clouded her thoughts. "He wanted to come back here so badly."

Olivia pulled her chin up and smiled at her. "No. He wanted only what he thought he should. Before he knew what wanting really was."

She found herself wanting to smile back even though the sentence made no sense. The sentiment was clear and welcome nonetheless. "And what is it you think he wants?"

Olivia's smile turned into a grin "I think you know quite well. Now come on. It's a beautiful day and only two more till Christmas. You haven't bought any presents yet, lets go to the mall."

And she smiled and agreed and tried to hand the book back. But Olivia stepped away. "No you keep it."

"I can't."

"Yes you can. We've got loads of family albums. You keep that one."

She shook her head and tried to force it into Olivia's hands. "It's your family, your memories."

Olivia pushed the book back against her chest pressed her fingers into the cover and then took a step back.

"That's right. So you add to it when you can."