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In the Stars
By : Bebe
Category: 1 through F > Andromeda
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Chapter List
- 5
- 6
In the Stars
Chapter Six: We're Bound to Break and My Hands Are Tied

Beka didn’t understand what was happening. She didn’t understand why Nietzscheans were harrying a target rather than destroying it. She didn’t understand Tyr’s insistence on being at the hangar rather than in safety decks away in Command and his rush to get there. She didn’t understand why he would so abruptly change his mind as to whether there was a threat, or why he’d walk so boldly into it immediately after. She didn’t understand why he’d be standing so close to the woman that had disembarked, touching her shoulders like he had Beka’s and pressing his hand protectively, possessively over the swell of her abdomen.
About all she understood right then, watching him kiss a Nietzschean woman she’d never known about before, was that she was pretty sure she didn’t have the right to feel her heart breaking when they both knew it wasn’t forever.
Somehow she was walking next to Dylan. She had to be the first officer, had to pretend she wasn’t dying inside or wanting to go to the Maru, lock out the universe and never come out. Had to focus on the so-very-young pilot in front of them, standing nervously ramrod straight, and not the couple behind him, absorbed in each other. Oh God, why did she do this to herself?
“So,” Dylan said, superficially friendly but with an unmistakable air of authority, “care to fill us in?”
“The Nietzscheans were— I mean, the lady had asked—”
He held up a hand, forestalling the babble. “Let’s start with who you are and where you’re flying from.”
That worked, the defined question giving him a solid answer. “Sal Menard, flying for Clausen’s Shipping, Courier, and Short Hop Fleet, off Paris drift.”
“I’ve heard of Clausen,” Beka interjected, grasping for the familiar. “He’s supposed to run pretty aboveboard.”
Sal nodded fervently. “He does.”
“Okay, so. Kid. Sal. Now that we’ve got who and where down, start from the beginning. The short version.” She could be the first officer. Had to be. Getting nervous newbies to listen to her she’d done before on the Maru and could do again now.
“I was, uh, making a delivery. On Wichita drift. I’d just gotten back to the Four and was doing the external preflight checks,” he swallowed hard, nerves or the memory or both, “and then I turned around and the lady was just there. I didn’t even hear her come up. And she told me she needed a ride off that drift now and she gave me coordinates and said if I could take her there— here— then she’d make it worth my time.”
“Did she say how she’d make it worth it?” Dylan asked, voicing the same question Beka had.
“Money. Said her husband was there and would pay me way more than my usual rate.”
Beka felt her stomach plunge. She managed to ignore it, and the lady and her husband steps away. “You took her word for it?”
“Not really, but she kept looking around like she was scared, and I didn’t really wanna find out what was scaring a Nietzschean that badly. I figured I’d rather get the cost of her ride taken out of my pay.” Sal shrugged, though he was nowhere near as relaxed as the gesture implied. “Clausen’s fair, he tells us to use our best judgment, but he still wants to make money.”
“Makes sense,” Dylan commented. “So you agreed to take her?”
“Yeah. And we got going no problem but we didn’t get far from dock before getting chased. I was going to turn around and let the port deal with it but she wouldn’t let me. Told me we had to keep flying and get to the Andromeda and,” he gulped, “she’d kill me before she’d go back.
“So, um. I kept going. I lost a couple of them on the jumps, but I couldn’t get rid of all of them, and they started shooting after the last one. And then you were here like you were supposed to be and now we’re here and I really really never want to do that again,” he finished, sounding like he was on the verge of hysteria.
Right. Shock or adrenaline crash or both. Beka looked knowingly at Dylan and got the same look back; she really appreciated it when they were on the same wavelength. “I’ll take you to the mess?” she volunteered, and when Dylan nodded she continued. “You did a lot of flying even without being shot at. Let’s get your blood sugar up.”
“We’ll have our engineer double-check your ship,” Dylan assured him. “I’ll need to check, but I think we might be able to drop you off at Paris drift on our way to our next stop.” He knew as well as Beka did that Paris was out of the way, but they may as well take it easy on the kid. “And we’ll see about getting you paid.”
“Thanks.” Sal was wilting as they watched, so Beka got him moving. She really didn’t want to stay here longer than she had to anyway, with Tyr and the woman turning toward their little group. Let Dylan deal with them; she didn’t think she could stand to. She got Sal out before Tyr got close enough for her to hear whatever he was going to say.
Fortunately, her assessment of what was wrong with the courier pilot appeared to be correct, as he stopped sagging halfway through the large mug of strong tea she handed him and actually seemed to recover some once he’d started on the heaped plateful of food she’d plunked in front of him. He may have been either younger than she thought and still in the phase of eating everything not bolted down or else he was a fairly inexperienced pilot not to make sure he’d eaten enough for the draining task of navigating slipstream. It could be both. Of course, if he’d planned a single hop and then had to do multiple jumps plus evasive maneuvering in a ship not designed for it… Either way, she just topped up his mug and waited until he slowed down from inhaling the food to even try talking to him, the whole time trying not to think about his passenger.
“How many jumps did you do today?” she ventured. She knew how she’d get here from Wichita, but there were a lot of variables.
“Five. One to Wichita from Paris, four from Wichita to here. And one was by the edge of the Carina Nebula. I think one of the Nietzscheans got lost there.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised. That’s a tricky spot even if you know what you’re doing.” She leaned back and studied him. That route would explain the appetite if nothing else did, considering she knew experienced pilots who’d sworn off that slipportal. “How long have you been flying?”
“A year, about. Clausen trains us as long as we’re willing to work for him for five years. Can I get more?”
“Autochef’s on the wall.” When he came back she said, “A year and you made it around the nebula. How many times have you gone by it before?”
“Just once.”
“Huh. You know, when your contract’s done, look us up. If we get this Commonwealth thing going, we’ll need good pilots.”
He was spared a response by Harper coming in and announcing, “Your ship’s good to fly whenever. Whoever maintains it does a good job, and I couldn’t find any obvious damage.”
“Thanks,” Sal said through a mouthful. He swallowed hard. “But I still need my fee.”
Beka and Harper glanced at each other uneasily. It wasn’t like either of them had the cash to cover it for Tyr, and right now she wasn’t inclined to do that even if she could. “Outside our scope,” she told him finally. “Harper, do you know where Tyr is?”
“He was headed to Med deck with Missus Tyr when I got to the hangar, that’s all I know.”
“Is she okay?” Sal asked. “I mean, with the baby and everything— I don’t think she actually got hurt.” Which, in Beka’s opinion, was a pretty charitable approach to take to someone who had threatened to kill him, but then he was young.
“I think it was just in case.” Harper looked at Sal’s plate. “Hey, you know, that looks good, and it’s about dinnertime. Hang on.” He darted off to the autochef and Beka barely contained the sigh of relief. If Harper was here and could take over with the kid, then maybe she could make her excuses and go off to lick her wounds in peace. She really needed not to be around Tyr or anyone talking about him right now, because every thought threatened to catch her breath in her throat, and trying to swallow the lump there did nothing. Talking piloting had let her forget about it for one moment, but it still hadn’t eased it, and she didn’t know what would.
Once Harper came back and started talking about the Four with Sal, she decided to take the chance. She pushed her chair back and started, “I’ll go—” before the door to the mess deck sliding open interrupted her. Of course, the universe’s cruel sense of timing was on display, and it was Tyr. She froze.
Harper didn’t. “Hey, Tyr, how’s it going? Anything new?”
Tyr met him with a withering glance. Beka could see in his stride a barely-there interruption as he met her eyes, a flicker of his eyelids before he looked away, and she wondered how to interpret that. No matter how, she’d blinked back the sting of emotions by the time he reached the table they were sitting at. He nodded to her, an acknowledgement in front of the others but no more, and she dug her fingernails into her palm to distract herself. It wasn’t much of a comfort that he did no more for Harper, either. He instead addressed his attention to Sal, who unsurprisingly shrank back. They might have gotten used to Tyr’s presence aboard, but he could be intimidating, especially for someone who’d not only never met him before but had spent the day being threatened by other Nietzscheans. “I have been told,” he said assessingly, “that I owe you a fee.”
Sal nodded, mutely.
“How much?”
Intimidated he might have been, but Sal was not dumb. He quoted a price that seemed fair to Beka, maybe even a little on the low side if anything. Tyr nodded as if he’d expected as much and produced a credit chip. When Sal didn’t reach for it, apparently stunned, Tyr set it next to his plate. “Your fee, as well as the extra promised by my wife, and a significant bonus for getting her safely to me.” He held Sal’s gaze for a moment longer, apparently giving him the chance to say anything, before leaving without further comment.
The three of them at the table were mute, Beka and Harper exchanging bewildered looks while Sal started disbelievingly at the chip. Tyr didn’t part with his money easily, and to give the extra with only a mention? The woman saying she was his wife must be not only legit but important to him. And Beka hadn’t known at all.
“Right,” she said finally. “I was going to go. Sal, glad to meet you. Let us know if you want to stay the night before heading back to the drift or if you want us to drop you off. Harper, you’ve got him?”
“Yeah, it’s fine, go.”
When she got out into the corridor, Tyr was gone, unsurprisingly. She took a deep breath. He was probably with that woman—his wife— and she was fine with not seeing him right now anyway. “Hey, Rommie?”
“Yes?” The hologram appeared in front of her.
“Can you update Dylan? And if Sal decides to stay, get him taken care of?”
“Of course. Anything else?”
Beka sighed. She felt a lot more tired now than she thought she should be. “Unless I’m needed for something, I’m going to the Maru for the night.”
“There’s nothing that needs attention. Beka?” And the hologram seemed concerned as she asked, “Do you want me to send my avatar down? Or Trance or Rev?”
The concern was welcome, if unexpected. Apparently there was some small benefit to the AI knowing. “Thanks, but no. I just… want to be left alone tonight.” She managed a thin smile, though it may have been more of a grimace.
“I’ll see to it you’re not disturbed, then. Good night.”
“Night.”
Once the hologram disappeared Beka started walking, and was beyond glad that she didn’t encounter anyone between the mess and the Maru. Whether it was Rommie’s doing or not, she was grateful. Either way she breathed a sigh of relief when she was aboard, the airlock closed securely behind her. Safe, alone, away from any chance of seeing Tyr that night. She couldn’t quite believe that only hours ago she’d been wondering how much time they could steal together, and now…
She made her way to the cockpit, sitting and hugging her knees to her chest. Now he had a wife, a Nietzschean one. And a very pregnant one, so that had to have happened right before or right after they all joined up with Dylan. Which meant he had to have known this whole time, for months. And he still hadn’t told her. The others he could see, he was so private, but her? The woman he’d been sleeping with for months now, the woman he’d been saying earlier today he viewed as essentially his wife? Not a word. And she knew in his culture he could have more than one, but in hers he couldn’t, and she knew for damn sure that in both he shouldn’t have kept her in the dark about it. She swallowed hard, rubbed against her suddenly prickling eyes.
No, he could tell her she was like his wife all he wanted, but even if she wanted to he still wouldn’t actually do it, not even in the heat of the moment. His wife would get all of his body, all of his life. She would get his children, his time, his attention. The truth. He knew she wanted honesty; she’d told him months ago, told him on that same trip that that was why she’d ended things with Bobby years ago. He knew she expected not to be lied to because she’d told him herself. And yet he’d still lied, never telling her about the wife he already had and telling her that she was as good as one to him when he wouldn’t admit to even thinking about making her one in reality. Not that she wanted to be, but—
She sniffed. She didn’t want to marry him, didn’t want a baby, but she wanted truth, and trust, and affection, maybe even actual love, and he’d given her none of it in reality. She’d been more right than she knew weeks ago when she accused him of using her. He’d been lying all along. She’d thought that maybe she had something good, even if it wasn’t going to last, but instead he was just one more person manipulating her for his own ends. Again. Only this time she couldn’t just fly away and leave him behind, never to see him again; this time she was going to have to see him every. Single. Day until one of them left the Andromeda. With Rommie knowing she maybe had someone on her side, but there was no way she could avoid him successfully without everyone else knowing how one more time she’d let her libido— and her heart— overrule her head in yet another Valentine screwup.
Beka dropped her head to her arms and stopped fighting the urge to cry.

Tyr was in a daze. His wife, the woman he’d married to save his life, who he had assumed would discard him for what he had done to her people, had not only continued to wear his helix but had kept his child, and beyond that had come to him, had gone against her people pursuing her in order to protect his blood. His awe at her was beyond words. “Our… Our child?”
“Yes. He’s… There are things you should know about him, about his genetics. Not here. But I had to protect him from the others,” she said, her last words urgent. “The rest of the Orca can’t be let near him.”
“You’re protected here. He is.” His son. He couldn’t entirely believe it, wanted to know more of what she hinted at, but all he could do was to drink in the presence of his remarkable wife, there being far more to her than he had ever had an inkling of, and the idea that she had his child within her. He touched her stomach, tentatively, marveling at the life growing there. For a moment he forgot Dylan, waiting for an explanation; for a more unforgivable moment he forgot Beka, who deserved far more than that.
When he did remember them, when he turned with his hand at Freya’s back, afraid to look away lest she disappear like a mirage, Beka immediately turned away. Escorting the pilot, it seemed, and he had not been listening to know whether it was her choice or Dylan’s. Whoever’s decision it had been, Dylan stood alone to meet his wife.
The captain didn’t blink at either her status or her pride, although Tyr had no doubt there would be a discussion later— much later, if he had any choice in it. “Missus Anasazi. It’s a pleasure to meet you, although I admit your arrival was a bit of a surprise. If you need anything, please let me or Rommie know. Or Tyr, of course.”
“Of course.” She looked Dylan over, not saying anything else, but definitely assessing the man who’d contributed to the destruction of her pride’s asteroid.
“I’m going to take her to Med deck, make sure they weren’t hurt,” Tyr told him. Less because he thought Dylan absolutely needed to know and more so the ship could send Trance to assess her and also, he admitted to himself, that he could tell Beka if she asked, though he did not know if she would.
“Go ahead.” They all looked back at the airlock as Harper came in with a clatter. “Harper, good. Can you look over the courier ship and make sure our friends didn’t damage it?”
“Sure, I— Oh. Hi.” The engineer’s eyes got big and he seemed to be about to make a remark, but then he caught the menace Tyr was showing him and stopped. “I’ll go… fix that. Bye.” He skirted them carefully.
Dylan continued, “I’ll let Trance know to meet you. Welcome aboard.” He stepped aside to let them by.
Trance was in fact waiting when they reached Med deck, with her instruments and her disarming chatter, and while he had warned Freya on the walk what to expect she still seemed taken aback. He had yet to inform her of the Magog. Freya submitted to the quick exams nonetheless, confirming that she was unharmed, as was their son, healthy and strong in her womb. Neither of them asked about his genetics, the prospect that Freya had hinted at driving her from her pride. He wanted to know more, seeing nothing wrong with their child, hearing no suggestions from Trance’s scans of a problem, but on a ship where the walls had ears he would wait.
At last he closed the door of his quarters behind them, ordered privacy from the ship, waited for acknowledgement. “Now,” he began, intending to ask for more information, but could not get past his own immediate concerns. “You should rest, eat. If you’re not comfortable here, we can find you your own quarters, but for tonight…”
Freya was studying the room, hands against her lower back, but she turned to him when he spoke. “For tonight I want you with me.” She searched his eyes and he nodded.
“Whatever you need.” Everything else could wait. “You can rest for now,” he told her.
“The courier should be paid. I didn’t have anything, but he brought me anyway after I told him you’d make it worth the trip.”
“I’ll do that, and find you something. You should eat.”
She agreed and went to lie down, closing her shadowed eyes. He retrieved a credit chip, one that he was confident had enough, and a second as a precautionary measure and left. “Ship,” he said, after he was safely out in the corridor and unlikely to disturb her, “is the courier still onboard?”
“The courier is on the mess deck.” Voice only and no further information, both he was fine with. He needed to get back to Freya. He also knew he had to find Beka, sooner rather than later. He didn’t anticipate finding her in the mess with the pilot and Harper, and he felt himself hesitate at how stricken she looked. He wanted nothing more than to explain, but with the others there it was impossible. Especially with Harper there: at his snippy remark, Tyr thought he saw Beka flinch, but could do nothing. He paid the pilot and left, both knowing his first responsibility was to his wife and suspecting his presence was only causing Beka pain. Despite that, as he walked back to his quarters by way of a storeroom, he thought he heard her voice in the distance and wanted desperately to turn back.
But he kept walking. He would have to find her another time and instead honor his obligation to his wife and unborn son, no matter what obligation he felt toward the woman he wished could be his wife.
It was a surprise to see the android standing in front of the door to his quarters when he rounded the final curve. “Tyr,” she said before he could comment on her appearance there or the bundle of fabrics she held, “we thought your wife would like a change of clothing. This is just from the ship’s stores and my old crew, and if she needs or wants something different we can arrange that.”
He tucked the box he was already holding, the one of dried goods he’d retrieved, under his arm so he could retrieve the stack. “I’m sure she’ll appreciate these.” She had come empty-handed, after all, with only what she could tuck away on her person by the time she reached the Andromeda. As Rommie turned away, he hesitated, then asked, “Where’s Beka?” the question unbidden but pressing.
The android did not turn back. “Somewhere she wishes to remain alone.”
He watched her as she walked away, doubting that Beka was pleased with him even before that comment. There was precious little that could be done at that moment, though, and so he opened the door to his quarters and went in. Freya appeared to be asleep and so he quietly set down his burdens and began to prepare a simple meal. By the time it was finished she’d stirred from her sleep and so he brought the bowl to her bedside. “Eat,” he urged her when she hesitated, “and then we can talk.” He ignored the memory of bearing a bowl similarly to Beka. Once he was sure she was satisfied with what he had given her, he retrieved his own portion and sat at the edge of the bed. He talked lightly as they ate: the clothing brought for her and the assurance of finding something else at their next stop if she wanted, showing her around the ship as soon as she wished, nothing that could not be repeated later if necessary.
When she had finished, setting the bowl aside, he waited, letting the thread of unimportant topics fall away to give her the room to explain, if she wished. After a long silence, one in which she assessed him, she spoke. “I had thought you would come for me.”
“I had thought you would reject me, after.” And he had been convinced of that, enough to set aside his helix.
“Only because I knew our child would be a survivor.” She tilted her head questioningly. “How could he not? The rest of them weren’t pleased with my choice until the initial genetic tests were completed.”
“What did they show?” he prompted, desperate to know. What could have changed the minds of an entire pride and prompted her flight? What could be that drastic?
“He may be the reincarnation.” Freya curved her hand protectively over her stomach. Before Tyr had fully absorbed that bombshell, she continued, “We can’t confirm it yet, not until after he’s born, and not without testing against the remains of Drago Museveni. I don’t know how to do that without exposing him to everyone, especially now that there’s a rumor among the prides that the Drago-Katsov no longer have them.”
“I’d heard that rumor.” But the response was barely thought of, his attention on her abdomen where even now he could see the restless movements of their child. “But if they accepted it—”
“They didn’t. They wanted to take him. Olma, Dmitri, they were planning to take him away from me as soon as he was born.”
“Dmitri? Not Gudarian?”
She shook her head. “Dmitri killed Gudarian and took over. They want to influence him in their image and use him to dominate the prides, if the tests are right. I couldn’t let them take him away from me.” She was pleading, not that she had to, not if they were trying to take her child away regardless of his genes. “I knew I could find you if you were still on the Andromeda, so I waited until I had a chance to hide aboard a cargo ship to Seneschal. I only had enough in pay and barter to Wichita from there.”
“You are…” Words failed him. There was no description adequate. “Everything you have done for our son already… I was more fortunate than I could have known when you chose me.”
She inclined her head, faintly regally, a Nietzschean woman who knew her worth. “Even if he isn’t the reincarnation, he will be an alpha.”
He stroked his hand over her hair, kissed her, with nothing else to say to express his overflow of pride in his wife.
That night he stayed with her, watching as she slept, still disbelieving. He would tell her soon enough about the remains, that he was the only one who could verify if their son was the reincarnation, but for now he would bide his time. His fortune already felt unreal.
Come the morning she had not vanished as a dream, and so Tyr led her around the ship. He would find her somewhere safe planetside soon enough, but for now she needed to know the Andromeda and its crew. It was largely uneventful, as with the Magog not aboard she had encountered several of the crew the day before, save the android— and Beka. He harbored trepidation over the latter, which only grew as they traversed the ship with no sign of her.
At last they reached the Maru’s hangar and he knew there was no more avoiding it, especially when he could hear her music as soon as they crossed the outer airlock. In her usual attention to her ship, it shut off as the inner lock opened, and he heard from the engine room, “Harper, if that’s you, get in here and explain what you were not thinking when you did this to my ship!”
“I would if I were Harper.”
There was a long silence. He could imagine her taking a deep breath and bracing herself before he heard movement. He had seen her do that before prior to an unpleasant encounter and he could easily believe that she would not find this pleasant. Neither would he. But she was absolutely expressionless despite her fast heartbeat when she reached the archway to the galley. “Tyr. And… I don’t think we’ve actually met yet.”
“Freya.”
“Right. Good to meet you.” She hid her dismay well, and it was only knowing her that let him understand that her responses were not fear, as many would feel at being effectively cornered by two Nietzscheans. “Getting the grand tour?”
“I thought she should be familiar with the Maru as well as the Andromeda,” Tyr supplied, and wondered what she bit back in response to that, seeing her press her lips together briefly.
“Of course,” she said after a beat. “Be prepared, right? And on that note, I’m going back to fixing something. If you see Harper before I do, send him down here.” Tyr nodded and she disappeared back into the engine room. He almost went after her, wanting to ask if he could meet her later to at least explain and let her vent her emotions at him, but realized that would not be the best plan, especially with Freya with him and not solely because Beka had been wearing her forcelance. Instead he chose to guide Freya away from the engine room to the rest of the Maru.
The day passed after that, albeit not quickly: finding Freya her own quarters, returning the courier pilot and his ship to Paris drift, Dylan summoning him for an uncomfortable conversation about Freya and the Orca. The captain did tell him to take the next few days to help Freya adjust, and so excused him from Command duty that night. While Tyr understood the intent, his wife turned in early that night in her own quarters, still exhausted from her flight and settling into her own space on top of her pregnancy, and he was left with a greater quantity of time than he had anticipated. In days past he would have gone to find Beka, but now… He didn’t know how she would react to him arriving at the Maru or her door, and was reluctant to do so unless she gave him some indication of how she would respond. Cowardice, perhaps, but he valued his life, and her anger could end it or at least make it very difficult extremely quickly. He also didn’t want to spend the evening alone in his quarters, the room feeling oddly sterile and empty with neither woman there, and so he made his way to the Obs deck with a book in his hand, intending to read until he might be able to sleep for the night.
It was not to be. He crossed the threshold and stopped. Familiar figure silhouetted on the bench, familiar scent in the air, familiar heartbeat in his ears. She must have heard the door open and he gave her a moment to tell him to go away, and another moment after she looked back over her shoulder for the same, once she knew it was him. She might be willing to see one of the others but not him, after all, not after the last two days. “Beka,” he said at last, quietly, acknowledgment of her presence but no more. He didn’t want to press.
“Tyr. Coincidence or intentional?”
“Coincidence.” He hesitated, then asked, “Would you like me to leave?”
“That depends.”
“On?” He came closer, stood behind the bench close enough to touch her. He didn’t, despite the considerable temptation.
She still wasn’t looking at him, not after that initial glance to determine who had disturbed her solitude. “On what you’re going to tell me if you stay, I guess. Whether it’s going to be the truth or more lies.”
“I haven’t lied to you.”
“Except about being married. Lies of omission are still lies, Tyr. You’ve had a wife, a Nietzschean wife, this whole time, with plenty of chances to tell me before she turned up. Instead you let me think you didn’t, which is a pretty big thing to not let me know before she’s standing in the hangar bay!” Beka shook her head— disbelief? ”That pretty speech about trusting me yesterday and you can’t even tell me something that important.”
He sighed and sat next to her, facing the door. He thought he might give her that small measure of discretion, given her refusal thus far to face him. He set the book down carefully next to him. “I did not lie.” Before she could make more than a noise, a small syllable of derision, he continued, “If I thought she still wanted me as her husband after destroying the Orca’s asteroid, I would have been wearing her helix all this time. If I had known I was still a husband and father, everyone would have known. If I had been able to bring her back with me without being shot before I even set foot on that miserable rock afterward, I would have had her with me since the day we left the Ashlight Theta. I did not know, and with no word I assumed she had chosen to divorce me. So no, I did not know I had a wife, and I did not lie to you, unless you consider me to have been lying to myself as well.”
Beka was silent after he finished. He didn’t know if she believed him or not. He also didn’t know if it mattered at this point. Quietly, finally, she said, “It might be easier to swallow that if if you’d ever mentioned any of this before.”
“It might. But that would mean admitting weakness and failure in front of another woman I wanted to consider me worthy of her time and attention.”
“Yeah. Like a wife, right?” She snorted. “Only I’m not good enough for that. I’m only Human.”
“A remarkable Human.”
“And that won’t get you so much as a throne with most Nietzscheans. Even with you: you can tell me that all you want, but if you really thought I was worth as much as she is you’d be begging me to have a baby, too.”
He hesitated. Of all the statements he had expected from her, that was not one. “You don’t want children.”
“No. I don’t. But you do, and you’ve never said you would want ours. In fact, you’ve been careful to make sure ours wouldn’t happen. So I have to assume that you really, really don’t, just like you really don’t want me as a wife or you’d actually have sex with me rather than—” She cut herself off. It might have been because of the thickness he could hear clogging her voice.
When he put his hand on hers, on the bench between them, she stiffened but didn’t pull away. Now he was the one who wouldn’t look, couldn’t look, knowing that this would hurt to say and to hear both. “I never said I didn’t want our child. And I’ve never said I didn’t want you as my wife. I’ve wondered, often, what our babies would be like. But what I want… and what I can have… are not the same.
“I want you as my wife. I want our children, if you would have them. But I want to rebuild the Kodiak. I want Freya, and our son. And I can’t have both you and the Kodiak.”
“And you can’t have me and Freya. Even if you were willing to give up on your pride, which I know you aren’t, you can’t have us both because I don’t share. And you’d pick her, if I made you choose, because she’s your wife and she’s pregnant and she’s Nietzschean, and I’m none of those. If I were, if I were Nietzschean, I know I’d have to share, but I’m not, and I can’t and won’t. I want you, all of you, and just for me, and I can’t have you.” Beka pulled her hand from his. “No matter how much I want to.”
“I…” But there was nothing to say. He couldn’t give her that. Maybe, if he were willing to give up his pride and his wife, but he had been working toward the Kodiak since he had seen his family falling around him, and he could not give that up for anything or anyone. And now that Freya was with him, had confirmed her choice of him? Now that their son was coming soon? He would no more abandon them than he would convert to Wayism. Even for Beka. “I wish you could.”
“Me, too.” She swallowed, hard, then stood and walked out, still never facing him. Slowly, as if she were giving him a chance to change his mind and call her back.
But that was impossible. He held his silence until the doors slid shut behind her. Even then Tyr didn’t say a word, but watched the closed panels for a long time, the metal rippling through the tears in his eyes.

The End
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In the Stars	By : Bebe Category: 1 through F > Andromeda Views: 302 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
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In the Stars