Archiving older fic: Pilot Thoughts
May. 6th, 2002 07:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eve11Pilot Thoughts by Eve11
Summary: John isn't the only one to have an alien residing in his mind.
Author Notes: Thanks to cofax for the beta.
Story Notes: Missing scene between LGM:Plan B and Die Me, Dichotomy
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"Keep it safe," he says. "I can't . . . we can't trust him with it, and I can't keep it either."
The pulse pistol looks sharp and black against Moya's brown curves. Her fingers travel its cold, smooth lines, noting irregular nicks and a standard issue-nine grip for larger hands, but leaving the context behind. Nothing-- it means nothing. It is an alien thing examined by alien means; as though she herself is held fast in a dark, hidden place and has grown her own interface of ten tiny DRDs.
"Aeryn?"
Frell it all, those are Pilot thoughts. Crichton's madness affects her, Scorpius stirring her mind with frightening ease. Empathy, John would say. A foreign word -- this is empathy twisting her stomach and surprising her with Pilot thoughts.
D'Argo says again, "Aeryn."
Pilot thoughts flee, Winona is lethal again and Aeryn Sun wants to shoot something. She hefts the pistol, easily compensating for the larger grip, but she can no more aim and fire at D'Argo than he could aim and fire at Crichton.
"He can't hurt himself." Words instead-- precise, clean as a blade. "The chip won't let him."
D'Argo growls in sudden anger. "I do not want to argue about this!"
He raises an arm and she throws an elbow into his chest, succeeds in driving him backward more through surprise than strength. She pins him between Moya's ridges, the heel of her hand threatening his ribs. Reflex, standard hand-to-hand combat against Luxans -- snap the bone and drive it inward, pierce the lower heart.
His clothes still smell of dust from the ruined depository. She can't press any harder; she can't use the gun but she aims her words.
"Now you don't want to argue. Why stop now?"
D'Argo counters with a hiss, leveraging height and weight against her hold and they are a wary pace apart again in the middle of the corridor. "This is not my fault," he warns. "The chip was going to send him to Scorpius sooner or later-- he can't fight it forever! He's been slipping, he's been losing himself for half a cycle!"
She expects rage-- fury and blows in the face of this betrayal. Instead she remembers a plate of smiling food cubes and John, staring at his hands.
"What was the worst part?"
"It was me. The real me."
"No." Her voice is brittle bone and she hates it. Hates D'Argo for having his son back, whole. "He's stronger than that."
"Aeryn, he's not." The words are the slow rumble of a carrier's engine, shuddering the walls in sleep-cycle silence. "He's not, and you can't expect him to be. It's dangerous. It's not fair to John."
Winona trembles and she stills her hands, spits venom in words.
"Don't you dare talk to me about fair. You have no right, you have no idea what's fair!"
She came back for John, that was fair. After NamTar, the days spent painfully separating herself from the alien inside -- each sensation categorized, each thought bracketed as Pilot or not. What was not Pilot was Aeryn, and Pilot was forced aside. All it took was strength; John saved her from NamTar and she recovered Aeryn Sun. And now she saves John from Scorpius, storms a shadow depository to rescue him, and he sings and stutters and still sees Scorpius. That is not fair.
But she can't say any of this.
"Keep the pistol," D'Argo says, and her fingers twitch. "Don't trust him, no more than you trust Scorpius."
He turns to go and she thinks for a microt, maybe she could shoot him in the back, maybe he'll look enough like any other Luxan. But Winona is impotent, useless again. All she has are words, and she has fewer and fewer of those.
"Fine."
She holsters the weapon, alone in the corridor. Pilot thoughts attune to Moya's pain, a humming agony coursing through the walls. John must get stronger, she thinks, he's taking her apart one piece at a time and soon there will be nothing left of Aeryn Sun, only Pilot thoughts.
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Summary: John isn't the only one to have an alien residing in his mind.
Author Notes: Thanks to cofax for the beta.
Story Notes: Missing scene between LGM:Plan B and Die Me, Dichotomy
------------------------
"Keep it safe," he says. "I can't . . . we can't trust him with it, and I can't keep it either."
The pulse pistol looks sharp and black against Moya's brown curves. Her fingers travel its cold, smooth lines, noting irregular nicks and a standard issue-nine grip for larger hands, but leaving the context behind. Nothing-- it means nothing. It is an alien thing examined by alien means; as though she herself is held fast in a dark, hidden place and has grown her own interface of ten tiny DRDs.
"Aeryn?"
Frell it all, those are Pilot thoughts. Crichton's madness affects her, Scorpius stirring her mind with frightening ease. Empathy, John would say. A foreign word -- this is empathy twisting her stomach and surprising her with Pilot thoughts.
D'Argo says again, "Aeryn."
Pilot thoughts flee, Winona is lethal again and Aeryn Sun wants to shoot something. She hefts the pistol, easily compensating for the larger grip, but she can no more aim and fire at D'Argo than he could aim and fire at Crichton.
"He can't hurt himself." Words instead-- precise, clean as a blade. "The chip won't let him."
D'Argo growls in sudden anger. "I do not want to argue about this!"
He raises an arm and she throws an elbow into his chest, succeeds in driving him backward more through surprise than strength. She pins him between Moya's ridges, the heel of her hand threatening his ribs. Reflex, standard hand-to-hand combat against Luxans -- snap the bone and drive it inward, pierce the lower heart.
His clothes still smell of dust from the ruined depository. She can't press any harder; she can't use the gun but she aims her words.
"Now you don't want to argue. Why stop now?"
D'Argo counters with a hiss, leveraging height and weight against her hold and they are a wary pace apart again in the middle of the corridor. "This is not my fault," he warns. "The chip was going to send him to Scorpius sooner or later-- he can't fight it forever! He's been slipping, he's been losing himself for half a cycle!"
She expects rage-- fury and blows in the face of this betrayal. Instead she remembers a plate of smiling food cubes and John, staring at his hands.
"What was the worst part?"
"It was me. The real me."
"No." Her voice is brittle bone and she hates it. Hates D'Argo for having his son back, whole. "He's stronger than that."
"Aeryn, he's not." The words are the slow rumble of a carrier's engine, shuddering the walls in sleep-cycle silence. "He's not, and you can't expect him to be. It's dangerous. It's not fair to John."
Winona trembles and she stills her hands, spits venom in words.
"Don't you dare talk to me about fair. You have no right, you have no idea what's fair!"
She came back for John, that was fair. After NamTar, the days spent painfully separating herself from the alien inside -- each sensation categorized, each thought bracketed as Pilot or not. What was not Pilot was Aeryn, and Pilot was forced aside. All it took was strength; John saved her from NamTar and she recovered Aeryn Sun. And now she saves John from Scorpius, storms a shadow depository to rescue him, and he sings and stutters and still sees Scorpius. That is not fair.
But she can't say any of this.
"Keep the pistol," D'Argo says, and her fingers twitch. "Don't trust him, no more than you trust Scorpius."
He turns to go and she thinks for a microt, maybe she could shoot him in the back, maybe he'll look enough like any other Luxan. But Winona is impotent, useless again. All she has are words, and she has fewer and fewer of those.
"Fine."
She holsters the weapon, alone in the corridor. Pilot thoughts attune to Moya's pain, a humming agony coursing through the walls. John must get stronger, she thinks, he's taking her apart one piece at a time and soon there will be nothing left of Aeryn Sun, only Pilot thoughts.
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