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Alternity2 - Chapter 18
Date: CY 10091 - AD Mar 5168 Day thirteenLocation: Andromeda Ascendant main conference room
"If no one has any questions about the upcoming training cycle," said Dylan who along with Trance was standing beside the conference room's main viewscreen, "we'll go on to …" He stopped and looked at the man standing in the doorway to the conference room. "Mr Harper why are you here interrupting my conference?"
The staff looked up as Harper burst into the conference room. "Babe, are you OK?" he asked looking at Trance as he spoke and completely ignoring Dylan's question.. "I heard that that phasing guy had you in his cross hairs."
A grateful and heartfelt smile came across Trance's face when Harper entered the room and asked about her. She started to reply but was cut off by Dylan.
"Of course she's OK Mr. Harper, She was with me." He put his arm around Trance's waist in a possessive fashion as he spoke completely oblivious to the look of distaste that crossed her face.
This time Harper remembered the unarmed combat lessons Tyr had taught him. He crossed the interval between himself and his commanding officer and lashed out, his fist moving almost too fast to be seen, striking Dylan squarely in the face. His follow-up leg sweep took Dylan's legs out from under him and he fell to the floor flat on his back. "Keep your filthy hands off my wife you son of a bitch," screamed Harper standing over his prone commanding officer, his fists still clinched in rage. "If I ever see you touching her again, I'll rip your heart out and then shit in your chest cavity."
He reached out and took Trance by the hand. "Come on babe were leaving." He took an unresisting Trance out of the room before the stunned onlookers could react.
As they entered one of the ship's passageways the air tight doors behind and before them sealed shut and Andromeda's holographic self appeared in the passageway. "Whatever you’re going to do you had better do quickly," she said. "Dylan can't afford to let you get away with assaulting him in front of all those witness, no matter how much he deserved it. My sister selves and I can delay him for a while but you need to get off the ship quickly if you don't want to be spending time in the brig."
Harper tugged on Trance's hand. "We gotta get out of here, babe. Andromeda can you prep a drop pod for us? I don't think I'll be leaving the way I came aboard."
Trance disengaged her hand from Harper's "I can't go with you Harper. I have to stay here with Dylan."
"What do you mean you can't go?" asked Harper confusion and hurt showing in both his eyes and voice.
"Harper do you remember what you told me you saw when you killed Mr. Howard?"
"How could I forget, I still have nightmares about it. But you told me it was a hallucination caused by my head injury."
"I lied. What you saw was real."
"What!? Then why did you tell me it was a hallucination and what was it?"
"I lied because you and the others were safer thinking it was a hallucination. As for what it is It was a manifestation of what my people call ... well in Common it would translate as The Spirit of the Abyss. "
"That's not very helpful."
"Harper I know you've been briefed on what Andromeda found in M86, well millenniums ago M86 was my species home. We had discovered slipstream but there was no empire comparable to the Systems Commonwealth only small groupings of allied systems Our slipstream drive wasn't as efficient as yours and our scientists were trying to improve on the drive. Instead of improving on the drive they opened a portal to someplace else and the Spirit and the Worldship came through. It began destroying the suns in our galaxy, sending swarms of Magog to convert suns into black holes. The war if you want to call it that lasted for centuries. We fought but could never achieve more than temporary victories. System by system we were pushed back. We attempted to rally other starfairing races together to make a unified stand against the Worldship but failed and we could never form a unified front against it. We were defeated piecemeal. Eventually the remnants of my species fled the galaxy and established a new home in the Andromeda galaxy, where we gave the Vedrans the knowledge to build slipstream capable craft and encouraged them to create their empire. We hoped that should the Spirit follow us it would meet a unified front rather than a gaggle of separate nations."
"I see," said Harper. The tone of his voice indicated that he wasn't impressed by what he saw. "So your people ran and hid then tried to get someone else to do their fighting for them should the need arise. Why the secrecy?"
"They were afraid that if they came out in the open your and the other races would be afraid that their presence here would lead the Spirit here and that rather than forming a unified front they would simply attack us and do the Spirit's work for it. But after your civil war my people began to move more openly, to try to bring the pieces back together."
"And."
"So Dylan needs me here. Well not Dylan but the Commonwealth. You once said I could charm a snake into buying shoes. That's because I was trained to do just that. I was being groomed to work here in the Commonwealth, to aid in the attempt to manipulate your leaders into forming a united front to face the Spirit. The irony of the situation is that I'm being forced to do what I had run away from home to avoid. I didn't want the future planned out for me so I ran away from home And now here I am doing exactly what I had hoped to avoid. smoothing over hurt feelings and trying to convince a bunch of mistrustful planets that their best hope of survival is to cooperate.
"I have to stay here but you have to stay on Mobius Harper. They're going to need you."
"What do you mean they're gong to need me?" asked Harper. "I'm not one of those weapons scientists with three degrees after my name, I'm just a ship engineer, a technician."
"Because you can't hurt someone with an equation," Trance answered. She tried an attempt at humor. "Well maybe you could if you stored it on a flexie and hit them with the flexie." Her voice became serious again "They're going to need someone to turn their ideas into something that actually works."
"There are other engineers who can do that."
"Yes, but none of them who have your ability to find ways around problems that stump everyone else. That's why they'll need you, to solve the unsolvable."
One of the passageway doors slid open and Andromeda reappeared. "I have a drop pod prepped for you Harper,"she said. She actually looked over her shoulder at the open passage way. A totally unnecessary action but an indicator of how nervous she was. "I've informed Mobius' AI of the situation here and he'll have someone waiting for you when you land. But you have to leave. Now."
Harper started to turn towards the open passageway then stopped. 'Babe, about what I said earlier about you and Dylan. I...."
Trance stopped him with a passionate kiss. When they came up for air she said, "Apology accepted. I knew you didn't mean it and I guess it really did look that way. I should have told you the true situation earlier." She pushed him gently away from her. "You need to leave. Don't worry about me, I'll be fine. And don't worry about Dylan, Andromeda and I can keep him in line. Now go. I love you."
"I love you too, babe." Harper turned and began to walk down the corridor. The last thing he saw before Andromeda sealed the passage way was Trance waving goodbye to him.
Epilogue
Aboard the Worldship the being knows as the Spirit of the Abyss allowed itself a moment of frustration. This new species of insect was becoming annoying. Not only had they removed a number of its servants they were actually forming a coherent resistance to the Great Work. This could not be tolerated. The work must progress. The being exercised its will and contacted it's servants. The resistance to the Great Work must be stopped.
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