Old Friends,
Part 7: Harper and Mary
Tyr
awoke in medical. He looked up to see Rev Bem, Rommie and Orion looking down at
him. Rommie smiled, "Back with us I see." Tyr raised a hand to his
throbbing head, "What happened to me?" Orion chuckled, "You made
a pass at a young woman who didn't like your advances." Tyr sat up,
"The last thing I remember is I was in a bar on the drift. I saw a
Nietzschean woman sitting alone at a table, and I asked her what pride she
was." Orion's eyebrows narrowed, "Did you tell her what pride you
where?" Tyr nodded, "Of course I did: Kodiak."
Orion
winced, "There's your problem: Mary hates Kodiak pride." Tyr pulled
his shirt on, "Why?" Rommie drummed her fingers on the bed, "Her
mother was human: a Kodiak pride Alpha raped her, and Mary was the result."
Tyr was confused, "Why should she hate Kodiak pride for that? It improved
her genes." Orion's face fell, "She dose not see it that way, and I
don't recommend you put it to her like that."
Deep
in one of Andromeda's service conduits, Harper and Mary where busy fixing some
of the damage done by the Balance of Judgment. Harper was knee deep in an
access-port, "Can you hand me the nano-welder please?" Mary handed him
the tool, "What's it like, living on a warship?" Harper thought for a
second, "Long periods of pleasant quietness interrupted by the occasional
life-or-death situation." Mary laughed, "Well, it sounds more fun than
my life: shipping cargo from one deep-range colony to another, week's spent
sub-light, months between ports. I swear, if not for the modifications I've made
to our ship, I'd go mad!"
Harper
pulled himself out of the access-port, "What sort of modifications?"
Mary shrugged, "Well, I talked my brother into allowing me to turn one of
the cargo-bays into a swimming pool. I then got Orion to adjust the AG field
under the diving board to increase the free-fall time. Things like that."
Harper whistled, "Man! There is no-way that Dylan would ever let me do
something like that to Andromeda!" Mary laughed, "Mark can be like
that, but I can normally talk him round."
Harper
suddenly found the conduit uncomfortably hot, mainly because of Mary's smile,
and the closeness of her body. He backed away slightly, "Maybe we should
split up, get twice as much work done?" Mary moved forwards, a mischievous
look in her eyes. "What's the matter Seamus, don't you like me?"
Harper found himself flush against the conduit wall, "It's not that, its
just, well, you scare me, the way you beat-up Tyr and all." Mary leaned
forward further, "I can do soft too you know."
With
that, she kissed him.