L&S 5

Light and Shadow 5

You'll Feel Right at Home

Paxx Palandjian, member of the Guild of Traders, captain of the ship Dragonfly, and friend of the mysterious Margassans, groaned as he began a reluctant ascent toward consciousness. He'd been floating in a cocoon of peace and quiet and comfort and the first thing he noticed now was that the quiet had been replaced by the muted sounds of .. what the hell? He opened his eyes and bolted upright, reaching for where his blaster usually sat on his hip.

Well, at least he tried to bolt upright but a paw the size of his entire chest - and its size was not inconsiderable itself - held him down. It took a second for his eyes to work right and register that the paw holding him down belonged to a male humanoid's body and that that body was familiar. The last thing he remembered was being on Pensa V and glad he still had a ship even if it wasn't necessarily in one piece. He himself had been nearly in two pieces at the time.

"What the hell?" Paxx asked through a raw throat.

"Aaru brought you to my sick bay, friend Paxx," Kalket explained patiently. "You nearly died of blood loss. You are mostly healed now, although you are in need of fluids and food."

Paxx looked around rather wildly. "This doesn't look like Aaru," he replied suspiciously, after he'd gladly drunk the water Kal had offered.

"Ah, yes, friend Paxx. That is the other part of the story," Kal replied, now handing Paxx more water. "Drink. Then shower and dress and we'll discuss it."

That was when Paxx realized he was lying there naked. He glared up at Kalket, who unfortunately laughed that booming laugh of his. Paxx searched for a sheet or something. Kal struggled to stop laughing when Paxx's eyes narrowed.

"I beg forgiveness, friend Paxx. Until a moment ago your thigh," he motioned toward where the wound had been, " was wrapped in Skin. It is a healing technique my people developed. Alas, it does not work well with clothing, requiring a direct connection to the violated body part."

"Oh, yeah. Right," Paxx muttered, flushing as he got his head back together. He remembered his thigh had been pretty much torn open to the bone. He stared down at the violated member and his eyes went wide. There was newish looking skin where the wound had been and a scar he could barely see. "But I.. It was a pretty serious wound." He paused and looked up at Kalket, "How long have I been here?"

"Do not worry. It has been perhaps two of your days. I am sorry, but this ship does not provide the proper visual cues to help us assess the passage of ship's time, so that is as close as I can get."

Paxx's eyes narrowed further. "What ship?"

"Marc calls me Sam," came a male voice from the aether.

"Oh, great. Another one," Paxx commented darkly.

Kalket explained, "We are no longer .. Sam has carried us back through time."

"What?" Paxx asked, his mouth agape. "I've gotta get back to Dragonfly. I gotta talk to ..."

"Marc has a task here. Once it is complete I will return you to your own time," Sam replied, interrupting Paxx. "You may not leave until then."

Paxx was sputtering not to mention cursing in several languages.

"No arguing with him," Kal said mournfully. "Marc's tried. It is my people he's brought us here to help. They are in trouble. The ship thinks it is Marc's job to repair things."

"Why?" Paxx asked.

"Because he changed things," Sam replied. "So he must fix them."

"When are we?"Paxx asked.

"About 6 million years before our present," Kal replied, showing Paxx where the bathroom was and handing him a towel.

Paxx's eyes went wide. "And this is somehow Marc's problem?"

Kal sighed. "It's a long story I'll tell you over food. Shower first."

"Clothes?" Paxx asked.

"Sam made you some new ones based on what you'd been wearing," Kalket replied. "They're in the bathroom awaiting you. Go."

Paxx complied.

Later, cleaned up, dressed and sitting in front of a table full of food, Kal tried to explain. Paxx, skeptical at first, and growing moreso, sat there quite often forgetting to eat as he listened.

"So, let me get this straight. Marc took on an entire galaxy and damn near won, then went back through time, meddled with what was going on with your people, and then, what, went to their - your- home galaxy to help them achieve their full mental potential?"

Kal wiped his mouth and nodded. "Yes. I went back to Duat with him and assisted. He repaired their minds, making these," Kal touched the golden torc at his throat, "unnecessary. Of course it took several thousand years to do so. He could not help the adults, you see. We had to manipulate the genetics over time, generation to generation."

"Six million years..." Paxx said. "So... You and Marc are, like, ancient."

Kal nodded.

"More than six million years old?" Paxx's voice came out a rather strangled thing.

Kal frowned. "No. There was some time manipulation in there somewhere. I don't understand it. Marc does. I am perhaps... 20,000 years old. I think. I have no idea how old he is."

"Okay, don't let's go there. Not sure I wanna know. But Marc thinks he is somehow responsible and now the ship at least thinks he has to help?"

Kal nodded. "Marc saw helping my people on Duat as a sort of atonement for the billions he killed during his Rebellion. He began to accept that he was not the Angel of the Abyss, not Abaddon - or at least that there was a good side to himself. That he was a man who had made wrong choices and that for hope to be reborn in him it meant finding a way to pay for his sins, so to speak.

"After our stay on Duat he left. I am not certain what all he did in the interim. Many thousand years ago he took on the role of an Awakened, like those at the Refuge. At least he could pass himself off as one of them. He saw them as am integral part of the future he was shaping for humanity. A future only he knew of, of course. One he'd been actively enabling over all that time.

"Then not long ago, the Refuge was attacked, and he was forced to defend it. The result was an entire planet of Awakened destroyed, more millions of lives lost, and the destruction of all the things he's been trying to arrange over all that time. His dreams died."

"But he didn't," Paxx replied.

"No. But it was very close. He very nearly died." Kal didn't add that the choice had been entirely Marc's. "He blamed himself, even though the risk to the planet was caused by another. Still.. He feels guilt over it."

"Jesus."

"Indeed," Kal replied rather complacently. "He is a formidable fellow."

"No doubt. Well, I knew that from what I've seen of him, but I had no idea about the rest. I feel bad for the Barons now."

Kal grinned. "Marc can kill quite efficiently when he sets about it."

"So don't get on his bad side," Paxx summed up.

"To help you understand, I should explain that Marc is now outside of time in a very real sense. He will never be born, his world will never exist. And something engendered by those changes has been rippling along through time and now has changed things here on Pliocene Earth. Someone here called for him. Aaru heard the call and Sam has brought us back to help my people."

Paxx ate his dessert and pondered that. "And I'm here because?"

"Because I was saving your life when I was unceremoniously taken and I swore by Tana's tits that I would not cooperate unless you were saved. I did not, I admit, anticipate that you would then be kidnapped as well. I had in mind rather a sudden healing."

"Ah. So, this place is ..."

"Uncivilized. You will, I believe friend Paxx, feel right at home."

"Uncivilized..."

Kal nodded. "My people came here because they had been driven from the Duat galaxy. We follow a primitive battle religion. We came here to live in our own way, to fight and die. A ship, like Sam, brought us. He died finding Earth for us, announcing with his dying breath that this planet was the best possible solution for us.

"Brede, the woman the ship was bound to, foresaw this and helped to steer us toward help. Marc's return to Duat to save my people from an evolutionary dead end, seemed to be the Goal she'd had in mind all along.

"Now... Well, now that will not happen. What she thinks will, however, ah, that is the question."

"So now she wants Marc to do something. He's to have no say?"

Kal gave that some thought as he poured each of them some brandy. "I think, deep in his heart, he feels he has to. Despite his own life. Despite Dinah, even."

"Man, she's gonna be pissed. His life might be forfeit if he ever manages to get back."

Kal let out a booming laugh. "If I were Sam, I'd worry."

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Marc, lying on his bed, had listened to the entire conversation, an unwilling eaves-dropper. Sam, for whatever reason, had seen fit to be sure he overheard it.

He frowned and fought down a wave of anger, not to mention embarrassment. True that Paxx, suddenly stuck here, had the right to understand. Even so...

What was it he wanted? He wished he knew. Was there hope of expiation? Forgiveness? Self-forgiveness had never seemed really possible, despite all he'd done. His self-hatred might ease some, but it was always there deep inside, waiting for the least crack in his resolve to surface.

He envied the Collinses of the universe. Able to come to terms with their actions, never to give in to the indulgence of regret or guilt. Bloody Jesuits and his Canuck sensibilities.

Bloody God who told him he couldn't die quite yet. Was this why? This one last chore that was required of him? Was it necessary that he renounce his own life, leave Dinah, doomed to go back to Duat to do it over again, spending his energies on raising them to operancy? Another six million years of penance? Or was there something else he could do differently now?

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