Originally posted 10/13/03This little ficlet, set between the destruction of Scorpius' command carrier and DWTB, just demanded to be written.... It's not very Bunnyish, but the wheel will turn, if slowly -- count on it....
Shock
John Crichton had his arms buried up to his elbows in the engine compartment of his module. He told himself it was because it was the first chance he'd had to check it out since they had escaped from Scorpius' dying command carrier, but that was a lie. He just couldn't stand the quiet, now that they'd dropped the last of the refugees they'd rescued off on a commerce planet where they could find transport home.
Home.
He sighed loudly.
There was a time when the maintenance bay was a place he shared with Aeryn. He'd work on his module, she'd work on her prowler. It had been....comfortable.
But that was before.
Before....everything.
He sighed again, softly this time.
Aeryn had, if anything, withdrawn from him more since the destruction of the command carrier than she had when she'd first arrived back from Talyn. No, that wasn't really true, he knew it. It just seemed like it because he'd thought, for a while, that she was coming out of it, getting over -- well, at least learning to lighten up a bit, live again, a little....
And he understood, he really did, that while the only thing that had been on
his mind had been destroying Scorpius' wormhole project, Aeryn had been back on the only home she'd ever known, among people who'd been her friends and comrades.
He peered at the hetch drive, checking the connections.
At dinner a couple of nights ago, Chiana had asked, "Hey, Aeryn, do you think your friend, what's her name, Hentel, do you think she got off the command carrier okay?"
Aeryn had paled and said only, "No."
Shit.
And then there was Crais, and Talyn....
She'd made her peace, somehow, a long time ago, with Crais having condemned her to death. He could understand that she mourned him now, as a comrade at least, especially after that damned heroic sacrifice he'd made.
The bastard.
But Talyn, well, John shared her sorrow at Talyn's death. The poor kid had never had a chance, kidnapped by Crais as a newborn, just a baby, really.
Hell, Aeryn almost certainly blamed herself, still, for letting Crais make away with Moya's child.... She loved Talyn, almost as much as Moya and Pilot did.
So he understood she was grieving again, and if he was honest with himself, he knew she'd withdrawn from them all, not just him.
But he'd hoped, he'd truly hoped, if he gave her time and space....
He recognized the footsteps behind him instantly, he heard them in his dreams, Aeryn's steady, measured strides, boots echoing off Moya's floors. He bit his lip and held his breath, and kept his face in his work and his mouth shut so he wouldn't say something he'd come to regret. Let her speak first.
"Crichton," she croaked, and then cleared her throat and started again. "John."
He turned and looked at her, determined to keep the hope he felt every time she initiated a conversation with him off of his face. "Hey," he said quietly.
Her hair was pulled back and tightly braided, leaving him no choice but to focus on her face, awash with emotions, none of them settling for more than a microt. He steeled himself for bad news, but when it came, it was worse than he'd imagined.
She worked her throat, he could see her swallow, and finally managed to say, "I'm leaving."
His stomach turned to lead, no, ice, and he stared at her. Finally he managed to take a breath and force a few words out. "Leaving, huh? When?"
She took a deep breath then, and looked him in the eyes, the way she had when she'd returned from Talyn and made herself say hello to him. "After Talyn's remains are laid to rest in the sacred space," she said.
His brain wasn't working at all, he supposed it was shock. "Uh-huh," he said, apropos of nothing.
She bit her lip, and said, "I just wanted you to know, before I told the others."
Well, that was something, he supposed. "Okay. Um, thanks," he said, and turned back to his module so she couldn't see his face -- or he couldn't see hers. He prayed that she'd leave before his brain processed what she'd told him, because he knew, he knew, that this was like hitting your leg with the blade of an ax. For just a little while you had the chance to think, Shit! This is gonna hurt like hell in a minute!
And maybe she understood that, or maybe she just didn't have anything more to say, but she left, he heard her footsteps as she retreated out of the maintenance bay....
One microt passed, two, three....
And he put his head down on the module and cried.
Free Fall - The Aeryn companion to this fic.....
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