NaNo 2007: Chapter 8

Chapter 8: Explanations

John Crichton and his fingerprints are completely unknown to anything either Duncan or Joe has access to. Since the Watchers have access to a lot of law enforcement databases, this is surprising.

"Either he's not only never been arrested, but he's never gotten a driver's license, or he's somehow been erased," Joe opines.

"He knew he wouldn't show up," Duncan replies. "I thought he was just crazy, but…"

"Just because he's right doesn't mean he isn't crazy," Joe says. "Remember, he was surprised to be on Earth, and he was talking about wormholes."

"Immortals usually aren't insane like that, though; delusions like that have a physical cause, which even if he had it before he died he shouldn't have it now."

"So maybe his hallucinations stopped and that's why he was surprised to find himself on Earth."

"Maybe, but it seems like more than that. If he was hallucinating and then stopped, why does he still treat that gun like it's real? The little ball seems to be important to him, too. He wouldn't let either of them out of arm's reach, even when he went to sleep. And why would anybody go through the trouble of erasing a crazy man? He hasn't even claimed there were any government conspiracies or anything; in fact, it seems like he's trying to avoid having to tell me anything other than generalities."

"I don't know; the whole thing seems fishy to me. You'd better watch your back if he might be involved in the kind of thing that merits erasing identities, though. They might decide to check into your background with a bit more depth than you'd prefer. It doesn't even take that much effort to find out about your involvement with several unsolved police cases, and they might use that as an excuse to dig deeper."

"If they even need an excuse," Duncan points out. "If somebody really did erase Crichton, they might take a close look at anybody he gets close to if he resurfaces."

"Is his ID going to be ready soon?"

"Yeah, the guy I have do IDs for me understands the need for a rush job if you give him enough money. I don't know what he's going to do for a job, though. He says he was a bartender to help pay for college, and after that he didn't do anything that would help him get a job. He refused to elaborate on what he did do once he graduated from college, although apparently he has a Ph.D. in physics."

"Eh, I just had one of my bartenders quit. Send him over an hour before opening and I'll give him a try. It doesn't pay very well, but it'll give him a reference and it's better than nothing."

"You don't have to do this, Joe. Won't you get in trouble again?"

"The Watchers' Council has pretty much stopped trying to keep me from being friends with you, as long as I still Watch you. Trust me, there won't be trouble over this."

"You know them best," Duncan says. "But if there's trouble, tell me, okay? We can find him another job, or he can just stay at my place. That would probably be the best for training, actually, but I don't know him well enough to trust him entirely."

"You only met him yesterday, Mac, most people wouldn't trust him at all at this point," Joe snorts. "Speaking of Crichton, where is he? Did he run off on you already?"

"I've started his training by having him go running to the park and back. It's a straight shot so he won't get lost, and running helps with cardiovascular health."

"I thought immortals couldn't get heart disease."

"We can't, but sword work is really athletic, and I figure it's best to get him used to that level of working his body before he starts swinging around something heavy and starts complaining about it being too much work. He might have taken a head, but I don't think it's sunk in yet that he's going to have to work to stay alive. A lot of people these days don't ever really think about how much effort it takes to sword fight, or think it's just swinging a sword around randomly for a few minutes until somebody gets lucky." Duncan feels the Buzz. "Ah, I believe my student has returned."

Crichton enters the dojo, sweaty and still in his leather ensemble. "I'm going to grab a shower before we start playing with pointy objects, if you don't mind," he says. "This jacket was not made for going jogging in summer in." He disappears up the stairs to the dojo's locker room and showers.

"You made him go running in leather pants?" Joe asks. "And with that jacket? In the summer? Your files never said anything about you being a sadist."

"They're his only clothes, and he has to wear something. And he might have to fight in something just as unsuited for fighting, someday. It would have been better without the jacket, but I wasn't about to send one of my students out without a sword to protect him, even if he doesn't know how to use it yet. If anybody decides they want his head, he probably isn't going to have a choice about using the sword, no matter what his skill level is."

"I suppose you're right," Joe says.

"All those years have to be good for at least some wisdom," Duncan replies.

Joe snorts. "Then why do you still associate with Amanda? He's going to need some new clothes soon, though. It's fine for today, but Joe's really isn't the kind of a bar it's normal to wear leather pants in, even for the bartenders, and I'd prefer to keep it that way."

"I dunno, Joe, you might make more money that way." Joe gives him a dirty look, and he relents. "I'll take him to the mall tomorrow. He can pay me back when he's earned some money."

"I still think you're too willing to trust him."

"What am I supposed to do, Joe, just kick him to the curb to have his head taken off by the first reasonably skilled immortal he runs into? He came to me, even after he thought we were insane kidnappers. I can't just expect him to trust me without trusting him in return. And if he does take the clothes and the sword and run, well, it's not like I'd be strapped for cash anyway. And I doubt he could kill me, even in my sleep."

"I don't make a habit of stealing from people who help me," Crichton says from the top of the stairs. "And I have a strict policy against killing people unless it's them or me."

Duncan startles; he hadn't known Crichton was there until he spoke. "I didn't mean-" he starts, but Crichton waves him off.

"I know you didn't," he says. "I've been on the other end of it, not sure of the stranger's motivations, if they're going to try to kill you in some strange and inventive new way, if they're going to try to steal the ship, if they're eventually turn on you even though you haven't done anything to them, and especially not on purpose. A little paranoia is healthy. Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean the newcomer isn't a bounty hunter willing to sell you to the highest bidder. Though for what it's worth, I'm not."

"I doubt anybody would pay much for me in any case."

"No, probably not. But I was speaking from personal experience."

"Are there still bounty hunters after you?" Duncan asks, hoping he isn't about to hit one of the many conversational landmines that make Crichton clam up. He'll willingly talk about anything that doesn't involve his past, although he does seem to have a complete lack of knowledge about anything from the past eight years with the exception of the really big things like 9/11. It's bizarre, like he's been living somewhere since 1999 and only heard about current events when people told him about them, and they never even mentioned pop culture. His past he won't say anything about except in the most maddening generalities.

This time he doesn't have a problem with the subject. "Nope, everybody stopped coming after us about three years ago, around the time my son was born. Which was really good, because on the run is not the best environment to raise children in, especially when some good friends of mine died because we were being chased."

"You adopted?" Joe asks, and Duncan groans internally. This is one of the subjects Crichton will neither budge on nor talk about in depth.

"No," Crichton says shortly. "I already told MacLeod this. D'Argo's my son biologically, as is the baby Aeryn's supposed to have tomorrow, as is Katralla's daughter. I don't fit your pattern in anything other than actually being immortal- or, technically, the quickening and healing parts and probably the living until I'm beheaded part, but I haven't lived long enough to know about that one for sure."

"So what makes you different from any other Immortal?" Duncan asks. "And if Aeryn is supposed to have the baby tomorrow, why aren't you with her?"

"I didn't have a choice. On any of it. Story of my life," Crichton says. "You really want to know? You'll just think I'm crazy when I tell you. Of course, since you probably think I'm crazy now, that really isn't much of an issue, now is it?"

"We want to know," Joe says. "Even if it sounds crazy. I mean, it sounds crazy that the two of you are immortal unless you see the proof, and Immortals aren't prone to actual insanity, even if some of them do spend time in mental institutions." Duncan grimaces at the bad memories of Immortals who had sent time in mental institutions.

"Okay, then, gather around and I'll tell you the story of the past eight years of my life," Crichton says, and plops down on a weight lifting bench. Duncan and Joe sit down on an adjacent bench. "To start with, my dad was an astronaut. Walked on the moon, the whole nine yards. So I followed in his footsteps, with a more scientific bent. My friend DK and I had a theory, and I was testing it in space in my module when a wormhole opened in front of me and I popped out the other end in the middle of a battle between some ships. Long story short, I ended up on Moya, a living ship, on the run from the Peacekeepers, which is one of the major militaries in Known Space. For the most part, they're not nice people, especially since it barely took them a year to decide they wanted to know everything I knew about wormholes, that some other people known as the Ancients put in my head, at any cost. Stuff happened, the Peacekeepers and the Scarrans started a war, I got married, Aeryn had D'Argo, I built a wormhole weapon to convince them to stop the war. Then the Ancients removed all of the wormhole knowledge from my mind, and I think they made me immortal, because that's the only explanation I can think of. Like I said, I know I'm related by blood to my kids and my parents."

"So if you were in space like you claim you were, why are you here now?" Duncan asks. "And I never heard about any shuttles or modules disappearing."

"That is an excellent question, but not one without an answer," Crichton replies. "I was on Moya, having just returned from a shopping trip, when a, a, miniwormhole opened in front of me. As far as I know, miniwormholes aren't supposed to exist, not that I'm an expert anymore, and especially not inside of ships. But I guess they do. So I got sucked down the miniwormhole, and since wormholes can go to alternate realities, I ended up in a reality I never existed in."

"Do you have any proof?" Joe asks. "I'm sure you understand, this is difficult for us to accept without proof."

"Well, I know you think my gun is a toy, but it works. But that isn't really proof, after all it might just be some sort of new technology. How about…" he reaches into his pocket and pulls out the metal ball. "This?"

"A metal ball? I don't see what's so special about it," Duncan says.

"This, my friend, is no ordinary metal ball," Crichton says. "Well, I mean, it is pretty ordinary in some parts of the universe, but not on Earth, which is the point. Anyway…" He squeezes the ball, and out of it comes light, but light in the form of an image. "This is actually fairly cheap technology; you can get ones that are more expensive, reliable, all that good stuff. But hey, I got it for free, and beggars can't be choosers, right?" He flicks through a few bad still images. "It took me a while to figure out how to work it properly, but what do you really expect? It took me ten microns- minutes- to figure out how to open a door on Moya when I first got there, and I almost shot myself the first time I used a pulse pistol." He finally stops on a picture of a dark-haired woman holding a baby. "Aeryn and D'Argo a few monens- months- after he was born."

"There are humans in space?" Duncan asks skeptically. Sure, it's impressive technology, but it might just be the latest being developed somewhere on Earth. He'd been amazed the first time he'd seen electric lights, too, but they were made on Earth. Advanced technology is proof of nothing.

"Not human, Sebacean. They look just like us on the outside, but they have a Sebatic nerve and go into heat delirium if it gets too hot. Probably some other things, but that's what I know about. But if you want aliens who look like aliens, I have pictures of some other people on here." He flips through the pictures. "I've got a lot of baby pictures, so bear with me." Finally he reaches pictures with more than just the woman- Aeryn- and the baby in them. The first one's a squat green alien in a hovering chair, almost the same size as the by now familiar baby he's holding. The alien has what can only be a smug expression on his face. "That's Rygel," Crichton says, pointing to the alien, as if there could be any doubt after fifty pictures of D'Argo. "Rygel the sixteenth, Dominar of the Hynerian Empire and over 600 billion loyal subjects. He's smug because, well, he's always smug. But in this case, it's because he carried D'Argo for most of the first trimester- long story- and he's one of his godfathers, along with Pilot."

"Pilot?" Joe asks. "He doesn't have another name?"

"He does, but it's impossible for anybody who isn't one of his species to pronounce." Crichton switches to another picture, a hard-shelled alien with a big head and claws holding the ubiquitous baby. "Pilot's, you know, the pilot. He flies Moya, keeps her healthy, that sort of thing."

"I thought Moya was the ship," Duncan says.

"She is."

"So then what do you mean he keeps her healthy?"

"She's a Leviathan, a living ship. She can get injured, be scared, have children, all the usual things."

"Do you have any pictures of her?"

"No, she's really too big to get a good picture of unless you're far away. I do have pictures of the module and Aeryn's Prowler somewhere in here, and the transport pods, but they're not quite as impressive. They're just for short trips, like going down to planets; Moya's meant to be lived on, to contain everything her passengers need from a kitchen to an infirmary to sleeping quarters. But first, everybody else: Chiana, D'Argo's godmother; Jothee, the son of the D'Argo we named our son after, and Noranti. We were paranoid enough that we didn't let anybody else near him, and I'm still not sure we should have let Grandma get that close, even if she was part of the crew for a while." The next picture has Crichton in it, a candid shot of him kissing Aeryn somewhat awkwardly over D'Argo between them, a planet in space visible through the large window behind them, surrounded by stars Duncan's mind tries to recognize the centuries-familiar patterns of constellations in and fails. "Have you seen enough to convince you?" Crichton asks. "Because I have plenty more pictures, but if you aren't convinced by now the rest of them probably won't convince you, and I really should learn this whole swordfighting thing as soon as possible, if you haven't changed your mind about teaching me."

"Yeah, uh, I think I believe you," Duncan says, his accent thicker with shock.

"Just tell us more about it later," Joe adds. "I suspect there's a lot more to it than you told us."

"That is the understatement of the century," Crichton says, and turns the ball off. "In comparison with those first five years, raising D'Argo has been a breeze, which is saying a lot, especially since he hasn't exactly been a little angel and we've had more than a few unrelated minor crises. Of course, these days anything short of likely death is only a minor emergency to me."

"Speaking of likely death," Duncan says, and picks up his sword. "Come on, we're going to train outside, because you never know what conditions you might have to fight in, so it's better to prepare for the worst. You won't always have the advantage of even footing. I know a place."

"I've got some work to do, so I'll see you both later," Joe says, pushing himself to his feet and leaning on his cane.