Sorry guys it's sort of another filler but I will get to Tup, there are just a few things in the way of Tup at the moment. Once again I don't own Starship or the characters I don't even own a certain nurse who appears in this chapter. As usualy reviews are always appreciated.
Also keeping in the spirit of today's shameless self promotion that I am doing I've just posted a Lucas/Skye fic called Forgiving You so if there are any Terra Nova fans out there check it out and let me know what you think :)

Chapter Ten

Taz stood in her bedroom hoisting a chair above her head. Being in the gym reminded her too much of Up but that wouldn't stop her from getting her daily workout. She put the chair down and dropped to the ground where she began a series of push ups. Taz missed Up like crazy. She missed her strong brave Commander Up, not the crying Up she had seen in the hospital. But this was the new Up, she reminded herself, her Up was gone. She finished her push ups and stood up to go for a run around the ship.

One step. Two steps. Three steps. Four steps. Five steps. Today's session had started off the same as every other day. Doctor Isabelle had walked into Up's room and he had immediately asked about Taz. Her answer was the same: She's not here. Up liked Isabelle. She was kind to him even if she did disappoint him every day by saying that Taz wasn't there.

"Congratulations Up!" exclaimed Isabelle as Up finally reached his goal of five steps without falling. She wrapped her arms around Up. He hugged her back. It felt nice to have someone caring about him.

The long ride was finally over. After two weeks Taz was finally about to reach the first stop. Here Taz and her team would have to collect a group of robots, load them onto the starship and then travel to the next planet. All up there were five planets to go to. If Taz was lucky then the mission would only take six months.

Taz jumped off the starship and with her team began making her way to the robots. She stopped just before she was within their sight and pulled a small remote control out of her pocket. This remote control was made using the information that Up collected. It allowed her to reprogram the robots. She pressed the button which would temporarily turn off the robot's desire to kill. This would allow her to get the robots back to base safely. Instantly hundreds of robots shut down only to restart seconds later, this time without the blood thirsty look in their visual sensors. Taz and her team began herding the robots towards the starship. Soon the robots were loaded and Taz pressed the button to turn them off. They instantly shut down. Taz smirked; they didn't look so tough anymore.

All in all it was a boring day's work, especially for Taz. Right at this moment hundreds of teams of rangers were out killing robots and ending the robot wars. With the help of the new technology turning off the robot's longing to kill it was easy work for the rangers. The robots were dropping like flies. Taz wished that she were out killing the robots but no, luck would have it that she was on the only mission where they weren't allowed to hurt the robots.

Taz finished locking the robots in the cargo area before climbing aboard the starship. She made her way back to her room just as the starship took off. Taz now had two weeks aboard the ship before she reached the next planet. Two weeks where she wasn't allowed to torture one robot. Two weeks where she was left to think about Up.

Up sat in his room. The days were so long without Taz. The nights were even longer. Up lifted his head as he heard a knock on the door. The door opened and in walked Isabelle followed by a man.

"Commander," Isabelle began cheerfully as she walked over to Up's bed. "I've decided that since your mobility has improved so much recently you are strong enough to go and have a bath. You've been doing some great work, you deserve it.

"I do deserve bubbles on my skin," said Up thoughtfully as he imagined how good the bubbles would feel.

"I've asked a nurse to be here in case you need any help. This is Joey."

"Oh ok," replied Up, "hello Nurse Joey."

"Don't call me that," whined Nurse Joey.

"I'll leave you two to it then," said Isabelle as she turned to leave.

Up sat back in his bed. He was very relaxed after his bath but now that Nurse Joey had left he was alone and there was nothing to distract him from the thoughts of Taz that flooded his mind. Why did she leave him? How could she leave him? Had she stopped caring about him?

Up hid his face in his hands as the tears slid down his face. He hated that he was crying. He hated that he was half robot. He hated that Taz had left him. He wanted to hate Taz for leaving him like this but he couldn't hate her. He could never hate her no matter what she did.

Taz stomped back into the ship. She had just finished collecting the second group of robots. It was just as boring as it was on the first planet. Catching robots was no fun when you couldn't shoot them and being on a mission was no fun without Up. Taz missed Up. She wouldn't admit it but deep down she missed him. She wished that she was back with the old Up, but that Up wasn't there anymore and Taz didn't know what to do about the new Up.

The next three months continued in much the same way. Everyday Up would ask for Taz and everyday he would get told that she wasn't there. Everyday Taz would miss Up and everyday she would throw herself into exercise and training to avoid thinking about him.

Taz had visited two more planets in the last three months and she had collected thousands of more robots. She had almost reached the fifth and final planet that she would visit before making the long two month journey back to base. Back to Up. There were only a few thousand robots and a couple of months of flying between Taz and Up. Then she could finally see him. She could be tough, she would be tough. She wasn't going to run away this time.

Taz and her crew finally reached the last planet. Here she was collecting a group of robots know as Ultrabeam Megagirls. They were a relatively new breed of robot, one that was nearly impossible to kill, one that Taz had never seen before which was saying something as Taz had seen a lot of robots in her time.

Taz stared out at the sea of robots in front of her. The radar sensors that were designed to look like hair on their head shone in the light creating an eerie glow in the evening light. Taz could hear the robots talking in hushed tones. The caught the words 'Optimus Prime' and 'the famous Commander Up' followed by cold monotonal laughter. This was when Taz really lost it. She grabbed her knife from her pocket and rushed at the nearest robot, plunging the knife into its metal chest. Simultaneously the robots turned towards Taz and began firing. Taz jumped to the side and grabbed her zapper. As she jumped the remote that she was supposed to use to reprogram the robots fell out of her pocket, but that was the last thing on her mind as she fired at the robots. It was like an outburst of pent up aggression. Taz was in a rage and so she was taking her anger out on these robots.

Michael tried to reach the remote from his hiding place behind a rock. His fingertips brushed the remote. It was just out of his grasp. He turned to Stella.

"Cover me," he said as he stood up preparing to run. Stella raised her zapper and got ready to fire. Michael dashed out from behind the rock dodging zapper beams as the robots fired at him and Stella fired back at them. He bent down, grabbing the remote as he ran to the safety of another rock.

Meanwhile Taz was shooting robots left, right and centre. Another robot hit the ground. Taz wasn't even counting how many she had hit anymore. Suddenly all the robots shut down. Taz turned to see Michael standing behind her with the remote. She looked around at all the robots that lay on the ground. She was slightly angry at Michael for ruining her fun but also glad that he had stopped her. Every robot that she shot was more time spent getting lectured by Space Claw and more paperwork. She wasn't quite sure how she would explain this when she got back to base. Of course the robots weren't actually dead, as everyone knows the only way to decommission a Megagirl is to slowly lower it into lava. But they were critically injured, enough to make Space Claw quite mad. Taz followed her team as they herded the now docile robots to the starship. Stella could hear Taz complaining constantly about a lack of volcanos on planets like these as they made their way back to the ship.

Across the galaxy back at base Up wasn't doing so well. It had finally sunk in after four months in hospital that Taz wasn't there. He might never see her again, Up wasn't taking this so well. He was refusing to eat, he wouldn't drink, he wasn't doing his exercises. He was becoming weaker with every passing day. He was going downhill fast. Four months without Taz was torture for Up and he didn't want it to continue.