"I can no more endure to view;
Wondrous sight of so celestial hue."
Final diary entry of Capt. Oswald Pierce,
CY 1116
Regarding his only love.
[Command]
(Andromeda and a smaller ship are rushing through space.)
HARPER: Whoo hoo! Nothing like a little victory to relieve the night
duty blues.
AGIO [on viewscreen]: If you're so sure you can beat me to the next
slip point, why don't we raise the wager? Life, mine for yours.
HARPER: I don't think so. Let's just keep it at a simple, and I use the
term loosely, gentleman's bet. In case you didn't notice, I've got a
new ship now, so prepare for a little anti-proton fusion tank
spillover.
TRANCE: You mean Harper's afterburner? Are you out of your mind? I
thought it might be nice to come up and see if you wanted some company.
See if you were getting into any trouble, and apparently you are.
HARPER: Trance, you remember Agio?
TRANCE: Oh, from the Cygnus Drifts. A group of Nietzschean Prides who
like to rule their corner of the galaxy like a gang of criminals.
AGIO [on viewscreen]: At least we rule our corner.
HARPER: He's such a bonehead. Come on, don't you want to see me beat
him just once? Just to the next slip point, I promise. That'll be it.
TRANCE: Dylan's going to kill us.
HARPER: Dylan won't know a thing, and Andromeda can't even hear us.
She's on a shipwide diagnostic.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: The Commonwealth has issued cautions when
dealing with anyone from Cygnus Drifts. Their numbers are growing. I
can always hear you, Harper.
HARPER: Yeah, well, I'm in command. Dylan said. And I command we give
snobio a dose of Harper's afterburner. Trance, shut the AP solenoid
valve, pretty please with a whole lot of love on top.
TRANCE: Closing the AP solenoid valves.
HARPER: Super-injecting more anti-protons into the accelerator tanks.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: The mass in the tanks rapidly swelling.
They're approaching capacity.
AGIO [on viewscreen]: What are you trying to pull, child?
HUNT: That's stallion to you. And in answer to your question, Agio, the
sudden jump of mass pouring into our core under super pressure will
give us a super burst of super speed.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: Exceeding capacity.
HARPER: Eat our protons. Trance, open the valve now.
(Harper and Trance are thrown backwards by the acceleration, and Hunt
is jolted awake. Harper pilots them through slipstream.)
HARPER: Whoo hoo! Agio is space dust. Harper's afterburner,
acronym-o-nomically known as, Ha! take that, you loser.
(Alarms.)
HARPER: What the?
TRANCE: The valve is wide open.
HARPER: What? But it's supposed to automatically re-close to regulate
the flow.
TRANCE: Well, it's not. It's wide open, and the spillover is spilling
over right back into the tanks.
HARPER: If fusion spills over into those tanks, we're going to spill
into the great wide beyond. Somebody has to wake Dylan.
TRANCE: I'm not waking Dylan.
HARPER: Andromeda?
HOLO-ROMMIE: Don't bother. I'm sure he's already awake.
HARPER: Andromeda, please, you've got to do something.
[Hunt's
quarters]
(They
come out of slipstream and Hunt gets thrown out of bed.)
HUNT: Andromeda, what's going on?
ANDROMEDA [OC]: Fusion from the core is beginning to spill over into
the accelerator tanks. Harper is in command with Trance.
HUNT: Oh. All right, cancel the monthly shipwide diagnostic and report.
Oh Harper, it's a simple night shift.
[Command]
HOLO-ROMMIE:
Containing spillover in the accelerator tanks. Harper, what were you
thinking, racing me, out here far from known Commonwealth space? You
two are lucky I don't
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: I'm picking up a signal. Attempting to
identify. It's coming from the distant globular cluster, far outside
commonly charted space.
TRANCE: A signal from that far away would take thousands of years to
reach us.
HARPER: Yeah. Whoever sent it is probably long dead.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: No. the signal is less than two hours old.
HARPER: That's impossible.
[Hunt's
quarters]
QUEEN
[OC]: Come to me. Fire and ice. Fire and ice. Come.
[Conference
room]
ANDROMEDA
[on screen]: Spillover in the accelerator tanks has been contained.
Core is returning to normal.
ROMMIE: We're picking up clicks.
HUNT: I'm hearing a voice.
ROMMIE: Well, these would be clicks. Perhaps a signal coming from here.
(A hologram of the globular cluster.)
HUNT: No, this is a voice. It's a woman's voice.
HARPER: She sound hot?
ROMMIE: That globular cluster is located in an area nearly beyond known
space.
HARPER: That cluster's gigantic. Who knows what could be there? I say
we don't go.
HUNT: Ahem.
HARPER: Maybe I'll just take a back seat in the decision making today.
ROMMIE: It will take us four days, five hours, and fifteen minutes, in
and out of slipstream, to reach there.
BEKA: It could take even longer to figure out which planet orbiting
what star sent the signal.
TYR: And getting there will take us straight through Nietzschean
patrolled space. Which is to say the occupied regions of the
surrounding galaxies are crawling with marauders.
HUNT: Who is curious about this voice?
TRANCE: I'm always curious when I hear voices.
HARPER: Finally, I'm not the only one with voices in my head. Sorry.
ROMMIE: Dylan, I am picking up no audio signals.
HUNT: Interesting. So there's a mystery here. You know, an adventure. A
new horizon, huh? Anybody want to investigate?
QUEEN [OC]: Fire. Ice. A cloud.
ROMMIE: Dylan?
HUNT: Fire and ice. Rommie, are there any two planet systems? You know,
one fiery and one frozen, or maybe a stormy planet with an icy moon?
ROMMIE: Yes, there is. One. Ymir. A giant firestorm of a planet with an
icy moon, Buri.
QUEEN [OC]: A cloud.
HUNT: A cloud.
ROMMIE: There is also a large cloud of charged particles.
HUNT: Of course there is.
ROMMIE: Dylan, your knowledge of the outer regions is quite impressive.
HUNT: Ymir. Our destination. Ha? Now who's with me? All right, we'll
vote. All of those against?
(Everyone raises their hand. Hunt stares at Rommie who lowers hers.)
HUNT: All of those for?
(Hunt and Rommie.)
HUNT: Hmm. I love democracy.
[Command]
(Hunt
enters, yawning, as Beka pilots Andromeda through slipstream.)
HUNT: Any sign of Nietzschean patrols?
BEKA: No, I kept us low and quiet. They're still out there, though.
HUNT: Right, nice work. Why don't you take a breather? My turn.
BEKA: Hold your water, cowboy.
HUNT: Cowboy?
(They come out of slipstream at Ymir and Buri.)
BEKA: Ta dah!
HUNT: You made up a whole day. I thought you weren't interested.
BEKA: Well, I did a little digging in Andromeda's archives on the way
here. The planet Ymir is supposed to have some pretty amazing auroras.
Colourful waves of brilliant light are said to wash over the Ymirian
atmosphere. Astronomers think it happens whenever the cloud of charged
particles collides with Ymir's moon.
HUNT: So the cloud and Buri are on colliding orbits?
BEKA: Every eight hundred years or so. The last witness of the Ymirian
auroras was about seven hundred and fifty years ago, which means we
could be due for another collision any time now.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: The next collision is going to occur within
thirty six hours.
HUNT: Coincidence? I don't think so. Somebody wants us to see this.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: The signal just jumped exponentially. And
Dylan, it's not coming from Ymir. It's coming from the moon.
BEKA: Buri? But it's frozen, extremely inhospitable. If anyone is down
there, what's going to happen to them when they get hit with that
cloud? What's going to happen to us if we go down there?
HUNT: Well, we've got less than thirty six hours to find out, and that
signal is the key.
QUEEN [OC]: You have done well. Now come to me. Quickly.
HUNT: You heard it.
BEKA: Heard what?
HUNT: The woman's voice. You know, the whisper.
BEKA: No.
HUNT: Tyr, you have Command.
TYR [OC]: On my way.
HUNT: We are going to go and find out what's inside that moon and who
is inside my head. I know you heard it.
BEKA: (silent) No way.
[Underground
tunnels]
(They go
down in the Maru and land in a cavern.)
HARPER: Boss, can we make this quick? It's freaking cold, chasing
delusions into the middle of a giant snowball.
ROMMIE: Harper, stop whining and keep walking.
QUEEN [OC]: This way.
BEKA: Which way?
HUNT: Ha?
BEKA: I heard that.
HARPER: Me, too.
TRANCE: So did I.
HUNT: Well, finally. You call me crazy.
QUEEN [OC]: This way.
BEKA: Maybe we're all crazy.
HARPER: All right, which way? It's kind of hard to tell from a voice in
our freakin heads.
HARPER [echo]: Kind of hard to tell from a voice in our freakin heads.
HUNT: This way.
[Cave]
(They
find a five foot tall broken egg on a plinth.)
TRANCE: There was a life form inside. There was more than one of them.
HARPER: What happened to this one?
TRANCE: Whatever they are, they're dying.
HUNT: How long do they have?
TRANCE: It's difficult to say.
HUNT: Take a guess.
TRANCE: Not more than thirty hours.
HUNT: Rommie, time until our cloud hits?
ROMMIE: Less than thirty two hours.
HUNT: Another coincidence. Any luck deciphering that signal?
ROMMIE: Yes. It's automated. My guess, timed by these beings to go off
when the cloud approaches their moon.
BEKA: Distress call.
HUNT: If so, then that cloud is endangering them, and we need to do
something.
BEKA: And if not?
HUNT: Well, then intervening could be a big mistake. It's never easy.
[Command]
HUNT [on
viewscreen]: Tyr, we've determined that the cloud may be destructive or
even fatal to the denizens of this moon. I need you to prevent their
collision.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Even a slight diversion of the cloud's course could be
detrimental to this system. Possibly catastrophic. Are you certain you
want to do this?
HUNT [on viewscreen]: No, but we don't have the time to wait and see.
Divert that cloud,
ASAP. Just make sure whatever you do is undoable, in case I'm wrong.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Acknowledged. Well, Tyr? How do you propose we divert a
giant cloud of charged particles?
TYR: Improvise.
[City
cavern]
(They
look out across a vast space with a neat walled city in the middle.)
BEKA: I don't know if I'm getting chills because I'm shivering or if
I'm shivering because I'm getting the chills.
HARPER: The Vault of the Heavens.
BEKA: Huh?
HUNT: What?
HARPER: Ymir.
HUNT: Ymir?
HARPER: I don't remember the myth exactly, but Ymir was born of fire
and ice, like this system. It's probably why astronomers chose the
name. Ymir's body became all creation. Ymir's skull became
HUNT: The Vault of the Heavens. Mythology? It's all Greek to me.
[City]
QUEEN
[OC]: Come to me. Closer.
HARPER: All right, am I the only one who's starting to feel like the
kid in the fable who's about to get cooked by the witch and her coven?
BEKA: Oven. He does have a point though, Dylan. How do we know we're
not walking right into a trap?
QUEEN [OC]: Come down. Closer.
HUNT: Look, I, er, I don't know how to explain this, but I can somehow
feel that we're not really in danger. And if you listen, you'll feel it
too.
ROMMIE: This environment has been prepared specifically for us. Well,
you. I've noted eleven different unused atmospheric venting systems,
each exhibiting deposits of various trace elements. The only venting
system being used is the one providing oxygen.
HUNT: Huh, great. So the black widow's made her web nice and comfy for
us.
(Their progress is being monitored.)
TRANCE: I don't think they would gone to all this trouble if they had
intended to harm us.
QUEEN [OC]: Thank you for answering.
(A figure nearly invisible in the ice walls suddenly starts glowing.
Everyone pulls their guns. More glowing female figures appear.)
HUNT: We heard your call, and we're here to offer our help.
QUEEN [OC]: You came quickly. You walked through our unprotected
territory and took nothing.
HARPER: I didn't even think of that.
QUEEN [OC]: You are worthy. Thank you for coming.
HUNT: It's our honour. It's okay.
(They lower their weapons, then everyone except Hunt gets zapped with
energy rays. One of the figures grabs him and energy streams into his
eyes. He collapses.)
[Conduit]
TYR:
These access ducts were built for lesser beings.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Are you sure you know what you're doing?
TYR: If we're going to push that cloud out of the way, I'm guessing we
need to build a gravity field generator.
HOLO-ROMMIE: By increasing the size and power of my point defence GFG,
you are decreasing my engine power.
TYR: And with it, we should be able to generate enough artificial
gravity to push that cloud away.
HOLO-ROMMIE: The next panel to your left, there's a set of cylindrical
multicoloured cables running into a circuit terminal. Disable the green
one. And be careful. That panel is delicate.
(So Tyr breaks the glass with his fist and removes a green component.)
HOLO-ROMMIE: What did you do?
TYR: Disabling the green cable?
HOLO-ROMMIE: No, what you did was disable output to my shields
completely. My systems are disrupted.
TYR: I'm assuming the jumpered gravitons will successfully couple with
the cloud's particles. It ought to push it out of the way.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Assuming, of course, you can find a way to jumper
gravitons to my shields now that you've destroyed that relay.
TYR: Just tell me when we've entered the cloud.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Coming about and entering the cloud. Now or never, Tyr.
Activating shields.
(Tyr joins the green cable to another one, and gets a shock.)
HOLO-ROMMIE: Shields saturated. Releasing the gravitons and exiting the
cloud. Tyr? Tyr.
[Queen's
chamber]
(The
handmaidens bind Hunt to a slab with ice ropes. There is an intact
giant egg on a plinth.)
QUEEN [OC]: At last.
HUNT: Get out of my head. Who are you?
QUEEN [OC]: I am, a queen, as you say. The queen of my kind.
HUNT: Your kind. Your kind is dying.
QUEEN [OC]: And I must see to it that they survive. You are very
strong. You resist our power.
HUNT: Of course I resist. Now release me.
QUEEN [OC]: I am sorry. I cannot. It is my duty to see that my race
survives, but I need one thing.
(The glowing Queen steps through the shell of the egg. She speaks
without moving her lips.)
QUEEN: I need to procreate. Now.
(She straddles Hunt, inhales his pheromones and briefly turns human.)
HUNT: Oh.
[Conduit]
(Tyr
begins to revive.)
HOLO-ROMMIE: That was interesting.
TYR: Did it work?
HOLO-ROMMIE: No. The cloud is still on a collision course with Buri.
TYR: Tell Dylan.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Communication with Dylan, my avatar, and the rest of the
crew, for that matter, has been cut off.
TYR: How much time do we have?
HOLO-ROMMIE: Less than two hours.
TYR: Well, that was a painful exercise in futility. Destroy that thing.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Dylan ordered us to divert that cloud with minimal
deviation, not destroy it.
TYR: And I am countermanding that order for his own good. Dylan, as you
just informed me, has been cut off from communication. Now, would you
rather ensure his safety or wait for an order? Hmm? Launch an EMP bomb
and detonate it in the centre of that cloud.
HOLO-ROMMIE: The electromagnetic pulse emitter was severely compromised
by your jumper cable attempt earlier. I can't activate it. Wait.
TYR: Yes?
HOLO-ROMMIE: I'm detecting a large Nietzschean cruiser coming from
behind Ymir. It's outfitted with a highly volatile gamma ray burster.
[Queen's
chamber]
HUNT:
You speak my language.
QUEEN: I do not. I can project the meaning of my thoughts. Because your
mind can understand, your mind interprets it as your language.
Interesting language, however.
(She turns human with white hair and clothes, then occasionally reverts
to light
again. She reminds me of a Blake's 7 alien.)
HUNT: That's incredible.
QUEEN: Your strength is incredible. Lesser men would not be able to
keep their right minds right now. You're much more solid, than the
average carbon based biped of your stature. I like it. How is it that
you're so strong?
HUNT: I er, come from a family of heavy gravity worlders.
QUEEN: Family? We do not have family at all. If you were to strictly
apply that concept to me, my family would be you.
HUNT: Me.
QUEEN: You were the best specimen of your race within reach. We have
taken the carbon based life form for thousands upon thousands of years.
We have come to depend on it.
HUNT: So, the right place at the right time.
QUEEN: No. The right man.
[Ante-chamber]
(Rommie
is the only one tied up.)
ROMMIE: You have extremely high serotonin levels in your brain, and the
fluid in your inner ear has become unbalanced. Somehow, these creatures
have managed to mentally disorient you. An extremely advanced form of
peaceful pacification, I might add.
[Queen's
chamber]
HUNT:
Look, it's not that this isn't an attractive offer. It is. I'm
honoured, but it's wrong to hold someone against their will.
(The Queen powers up his forcelance.)
QUEEN: This is a weapon?
HUNT: It's a. Yes, it's very dangerous. Look, why don't you release me
and I will show you how it works.
QUEEN: I cannot let you go. There is no time to find anyone else.
Besides, I like you.
HUNT: Thank you.
QUEEN: If you escaped
HUNT: I won't. I won't. I want to help, believe me. But not like this.
QUEEN: The risk is too great. You are too important now. Very soon, a
giant cloud of energy will embrace our moon. Us. When it does, I must
create. Whatever race I mate with, that is what form my kind still in
cocoons, shall take. You and I will mate, and my energy will be
absorbed through the cloud by my people, so that they may take shape
and live, until they grow old and weary, and return again to their
cocoons to wait for it all to happen again.
HUNT: Huh. I thought the cloud was killing you.
QUEEN: No. The cloud enables us to live.
HUNT: What would happen if the cloud did not embrace us?
QUEEN: That is preposterous. We are cyclically intertwined with the
cloud. It is how we have evolved over the millennia.
HUNT: But if it were diverted from its course and did not collide with
your moon?
QUEEN: Then we would all die.
HUNT: Ah.
[Command]
TYR: The
Nietzschean cruiser. Perhaps our opportunity has appeared right along
with it.
HOLO-ROMMIE: I wonder how many more cruisers are in hiding. There's no
telling how long this one's been there.
TYR: We may only need this one, if you'll follow my lead.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: I'm receiving a hail.
AGIO [on viewscreen]: Tyr? Tyr Anasazi? Are you still humiliating
yourself, Tyr? Humiliating Nietzschean people? Are you still playing
second fiddle to that human? To the Commonwealth?
HOLO-ROMMIE: Nietzschean Prides have joined the Commonwealth.
AGIO [on viewscreen]: We do what we must, for as long as it takes,
until the time comes when we can do what we have been waiting for. I
have an offer for you, Tyr. A private matter. Request permission to
come aboard.
TYR: Well, I doubt our Captain would appreciate your presence onboard
his vessel.
AGIO [on viewscreen]: Now, about that moon.
TYR: This moon. This moon, and particularly that cloud, are under the
protection of the Drago-Kazov. They seem to have some significant
interest in it.
AGIO [on viewscreen]: The Drago Kazov? Say goodbye to your cloud.
TYR: Do it.
HOLO-ROMMIE: If you fire on that cloud, I will be forced to fire on
you.
AGIO [on viewscreen]: Oh, I'm sorry, machine. Blood is thicker than
wiring. Gladly. We do what we must.
HOLO-ROMMIE: He's launched an EMP detonator. It's speeding toward the
cloud.
TYR: Good.
(The Andromeda Ascendant is rocked by an impact.)
AGIO [on viewscreen]: Didn't see that coming, did you? Gamma rays. The
most volatile energy in the universe. That blast? Two percent capacity.
Now, since you won't tell me what's inside that moon, I suppose I'm
just going to have to beat it out of you.
HOLO-ROMMIE: One of us is going to regret this.
(Andromeda fires at Agio's ship. One hits it, others ignite the cloud.)
[Queen's
chamber]
QUEEN:
The cloud. Something has happened.
HUNT: I changed its course.
QUEEN: You must put it back.
HUNT: Restore communications with my ship.
QUEEN: I cannot. You must understand. I do not have the luxury of
simply asking for a mate and hoping for an answer. Our whole world is
at stake. I cannot allow for the possibility of a refusal.
HUNT: The wrong path leads to the wrong end. I will only help if you
release me.
QUEEN: You do not know what it is like. This cave is all I will ever
see of the entire universe. For hundreds of years, I lay in my cocoon,
listening to space expanding, feeling suns dying. The music of the
universe, eternally. I never experienced ambition, fear, dread,
curiosity, until now, when I can finally see. But all that I can see is
this cave.
HUNT: What happens to you when the cloud hits?
QUEEN: You and I become one, and my energy is absorbed through the
cloud.
HUNT: And after that?
QUEEN: Can you really let my people die on principle? The entire race?
HUNT: Can you? The choice is yours.
[Ante-chamber]
HARPER:
I spy with my little eye something that is
TRANCE: White ice.
HARPER: What?
(Rommie shrugs off her bonds as Beka giggles. Two ice maidens attack
Rommie.)
ROMMIE: Oh, please.
(And head-butts her.)
[Command]
(Agio
shoots back at the Andromeda.)
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: I could obliterate that inferior cruiser
with one missile salvo if it were not for that gamma ray burster. My
engines are at less than one percent. Every shot floods the ship's
systems and renders me unable to attack. This pattern prevents me from
returning fire. I register the recent trail of a Nietzschean escape pod
entering Buri, and scan probability of zero life forms onboard the
cruiser.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Maybe the cruiser is in command of itself.
TYR: That would explain the obvious repeating attack pattern.
HOLO-ROMMIE: My sensors are down for thirty seconds after each hit from
the burster. That's just enough time for an escape pod to slip onto the
moon unnoticed.
TYR: The attack was just a distraction.
HOLO-ROMMIE: An effective distraction. I just experienced my first
hunch. That Nietzschean is already on the moon.
[Queen's
chamber]
BEKA:
Freeze.
ROMMIE: Don't move.
TRANCE: Stay right there.
HARPER: Oh, my god, you're hot. Harper, Seamus Harper. nice to
BEKA: Seamus?
HARPER: What they said.
HUNT: Lower your weapons.
BEKA: Dylan, you don't look like you're in a position to be giving
orders.
HUNT: I said, put your weapons down.
HARPER: Here we go again.
HUNT: Set me free. The choice you make is who you are, and what kind of
Queen you will be. If you create with me like this, your people will
absorb the energy of an unjust act. Instead, they could absorb the
energy of a fair and honest Queen. You choose. What kind of race will
you create?
QUEEN: Your kind.
(The ice bonds disappear.)
QUEEN: I have restored communication with your ship. You are free to
go.
HUNT: I'll meet you back at the Maru.
BEKA: But wait. Oh.
HARPER: Oh. Come on, boss, don't we get to watch?
(Rommie drags Harper away by the scruff of his neck.)
HARPER: Ow! Go easy on the threads.
HUNT: Andromeda, return the cloud to its original collision course with
the moon.
ANDROMEDA [OC]: There's one problem. It's been destroyed.
HUNT: What? Well, fix it, fast!
TYR [OC]: Correction.
[Command]
TYR:
Two problems.
HOLO-ROMMIE: I'm in the middle of a battle with a Nietzschean cruiser.
[Queen's
chamber]
AGIO:
Nice little dance you've got going here. Mind if I cut in?
HUNT: Make that three problems.
AGIO: I think it might be nice to father my own race. Oh, yeah, I've
been listening. She's mine.
(Hunt disarms Agio and they fight. Hunt finally get to his forcelance,
and Agio produces a remote controller.)
AGIO: I'll blow up this whole moon and everything on it.
ANDROMEDA [OC]: Dylan, the cruiser is powering up its gamma ray burster
and focusing it on the moon. I suggest you get out of there.
AGIO: Did you know that the most energetic eruption ever recorded is a
gamma ray burst? Harnessing gamma rays is a very volatile business, and
we only have a few minutes before the burster can no longer be shut
down, and then this whole moon and all these pathetic worms infesting
it, will die. Put down your forcelance.
(Hunt shoots the controller to pieces.)
AGIO: What are you doing? What are you, crazy? We're all going to die.
HUNT: Yeah, eventually. But not today. Gamma ray weapons, huh? You
know, any Captain stupid enough to arm a ship with a gamma ray weapon
faces one major snag. Should it ever overload, the ship literally
vaporises. The interesting thing, however, is what is left behind.
Andromeda, give us an example.
ANDROMEDA [OC]: Acknowledged.
[Command]
HOLO-ROMMIE:
Gravitons should easily overload that weapon. We tried them once
already. Right solution, wrong application.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: The gamma ray burster will fire in fourteen
seconds.
[Queen's
chamber]
ANDROMEDA
[OC]: Thirteen seconds.
(Andromeda zaps Agio's cruiser with gravitons.)
HUNT: Sorry about your ship.
[Command]
ANDROMEDA
[on viewscreen]: Six
HOLO-ROMMIE: Incorporating the cruiser's trajectory and velocity.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: Four, three.
HOLO-ROMMIE: Orbit parameters complete.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: Two
HOLO-ROMMIE: Activating the ramming field cushion.
ANDROMEDA [on viewscreen]: One.
(The Andromeda bumps Agio's cruiser towards Buri, where it goes
KaBOOM.)
[Queen's
chamber]
ANDROMEDA
[OC]: Captain, the charged particle cloud is reforming. It's
approaching the moon.
QUEEN: It is time.
HUNT: You heard the lady. Goodbye.
(Hunt knocks Agio out with his forcelance.)
HUNT: Actually, I meant to say good night. So, er, how do we er, do
this? I mean, I know how I do it, but
QUEEN; I'm sure, like your average carbon based biped, you'll get the
hang of it.
HUNT: I am not your average carbon based biped. Your people, will never
be human without humanity.
(Hunt kisses the Queen.)
QUEEN [OC]: Thank you for helping us. Thank you.
(The Queen gets on top of the fully clothed Hunt, goes into ecstasy and
transforms into energy which fragments and zooms off around Buri, into
the cloud then all the cocoons.)
[Brig]
TYR: So,
you persuaded Dylan to bring you onboard as his prisoner.
Congratulations.
AGIO: And I see Dylan has taught you to come when you're called. Good
boy. You even let them have you declawed.
TYR: Bone blades don't make the Nietzschean.
AGIO: But DNA does. The constant effort to evolve through good breeding
and better engineering. All of us on our own road to genetic
apotheosis. A road marked by bones.
TYR: You're wasting my time.
AGIO: Drago's bones. The mummified remains of Drago Museveni. The only
means to verify the true identity of the resurrected Progenitor when he
comes. Until eighteen months ago, the bones were held by the
Drago-Kazov Pride on Enga's Redoubt. Held there until they were stolen,
by you. They never belonged to you, or the Drago-Kazov. They belonged
to all of us, and we want them back.
TYR: We?
AGIO: We! The products of Drago-Kazov aggression. The bitter remains of
shattered Prides, like you, Tyr. Survivors. Superior. The seeds of a
better, stronger race.
TYR: Like the seeds of a Dragonia vine.
AGIO: All you have to do, Tyr, is give us the bones. They will become a
banner around which we rally to destroy the Drago-Kazov, and build a
great Nietzschean empire that our grandfathers could only imagine.
TYR: Because you're just so superior. So superior you've become
prisoner aboard a Commonwealth vessel.
AGIO: Imagine that.
TYR: Imagine.
AGIO: If you change your mind, Tyr, just look over your shoulder. We're
everywhere.
[Trance's
quarters]
(Tyr
shakes the vine seed out of a pouch.)
TYR: I thought perhaps you might find this interesting.
TRANCE: Thank you. Did Agio tell you anything useful?
TYR: Only that he's a fool, and that he should have died long ago.
TRANCE: Really.
TYR: Have you any intuition about this? Any sense? any fear?
TRANCE: No. I'm sorry, you're on your own.
[Command]
HUNT:
Yes?
HARPER: Andromeda reports the moon is full of humans.
HUNT: I'm having a hard time getting my head around this.
HARPER: It's just basic science, really. See, auroras occur when
charged particles collide with atoms in the magnetic field surrounding
a planet. Energy is released in the form of light.
HUNT: And the Queen?
HARPER: Okay. When the charged particle cloud envelops Buri, a massive
sheet of current flows between Buri and Ymir, bridging the two worlds
like an invisible flux tube.
HUNT: Harper, this isn't science. It's a miracle.
HARPER: I know. Boss, until today, as far as I knew, auroras did not
give life. It's incredible, isn't it?
HUNT: Yes. It's beautiful. We are looking at your myth, Mister Harper.
The Vault of the Heavens.
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