Mouth full of Ash

The remaining crew of the Interceptor powered up the engines and got underway once more, leaving the methane planet behind them. Jordan had already left the bridge, and Kilowog followed him soon after setting a course back to Ysmault, the scene of the last battle with the Manhunters, and... Aya. Razer stayed at his console, too tired and numb to go to his room just yet. Moving displays attracted his wandering attention; his eyes registered the name of the planet as they left the system; Fluer'Beos, territory of the Syndicate of... His eyes closed of their own accord, as he could no longer bring himself to care.

He sat with his head bowed in the light of the stars speeding by, and it finally hit home with Razer, like a burning stone in the pit of his stomach. Aya was gone. Really gone, and it was his fault. Ever since she'd blasted them away from the Red Lantern armada, he and the others had been on the go, non-stop action and survival, and no time to think. And now... now there was time, and he still didn't want to think. His gut soured with crippling stress, guilt, and remorse. He hadn't meant it like that when he said he'd shut down emotions; it was just an offhand comment in a moment of distraction... He just wanted to help her get through the battle at hand... not abandon her to that... icy contempt. What had he done to her?

His eyes burned, but he refused to shed any tears. He was pathetic enough, without weeping for a... mere machine. Oh, Aya... He got up and exited the ship from the lower ramp, and sat on the upper hull just ahead of the Engine bubble. The pulsing Green glow that shone over his shoulders reminded him of her. Every part of the ship reminded him of her presence, even his cramped quarters. '...Let no one else decide your fate...' Confusion and recriminations swirled around his mind and he'd get no rest anyway until he fought his way through them. Here, he could still see the stars, and not risk the others asking dangerous questions, as they might if he stayed on the bridge.

He was a coward and a cad, that much was certain. But how had it come to this? His memory cast back to his visit to Volkreg. Was it only days ago? Less? His footsteps in that dusty ruin that was once his home had brought him full circle. It was the last place he had seen his Ilana alive. The place where he found that she was gone; The Errant Storm, striking again. And, of course, Aya had followed him, full circle once again. It was, after a fashion, also the place he'd first seen the AI in a humanoid form, literally possessing the avatar of his wife. He'd seen then how willful she was. 'What you want is irrelevant', she'd said as she heartlessly expelled him from his welcomed torment.

How had he not seen that she wore Ilana's face, only scarcely altered? When Queen Aga'po pointed it out, he'd been angry, yes, but not revolted, as he'd been when Aya returned with a twisted mockery of that same visage on a mangled Manhunter. He'd accepted her usage of Ilana's form, and gradually had become fond of the AI. When his fear and need to see her safe drove him back to Zamaron, the meaning of the Violet portal by which he'd saved Aya left him conflicted and guilty. Under the stars of Volkreg he had sworn to love his wife eternally. How had his faithless heart been stolen by a... computer?

When her lambent body had faded from his desperate grasp, he was shattered. Physically he was whole, her sacrifice made sure of that, but his heart and soul left raw and bleeding. Losing his first love drove him to accept the curse of the Red ring. Losing this fragile new connection to Aya made him wish he could delete himself. He laughed bitterly to himself. Her resurrection was so easy, for her. As soon as she crawled aboard like a misshapen golem, his crewmates accepted her easily. To them, she was just a mind who occasionally had a body. It didn't matter to them whether it was the Interceptor, her regular form, or... that halting pile of junk. It mattered to him, though. As attracted as he was to her ordinarily, he could overlook their fundamental organic/artificial differences... but now with that grotesque face burned into his mind's eye, he could no longer ignore them.

He'd felt the same searing agony as when he lost Ilana, but to Aya it was like stubbing a toe; a momentary inconvenience, easy rectified by a swap of components. She put him on the spot then, wanting to pick up right where they left off, when he was still reeling from the shock of losing her, and from the manner in which she'd returned. There was a fleeting moment when he was going to swallow his pain and give her the answers she was looking for... but it was too much, too soon, too raw! Instead, he'd given in to his weakness, and inability to risk such heartache again. He wanted... no, he needed some distance; time to lick his wounds and put things in perspective. Time, she didn't seem to want to give him.

So the only thing he could think of in that burst of existential panic was to tell her that no, he didn't love her. She'd back off then, he'd thought, give him time to heal, cope, then he'd fumble an apology, and maybe they could start again later on a better footing. If she didn't love him, she wouldn't risk herself to save him, again. Charitably, he could excuse the lie as meaning to protect her. Never again would she be nearly destroyed for the sake of a worthless being like himself. But deep in his heart, he knew that the one he was really protecting was himself, from ever feeling that emotional destruction again. But he hadn't considered the pain he was causing her...

He'd never been very good at expressing his affections aloud. He looked down at the hand that gave Aya the rambler rose. Back in his old life, he used to give such blossoms to Ilana. She pretended not to like them, and she would frown at him. They were an aggressive weed; seeking out precious moisture that their war-torn world needed to devote to beast fodder, fiber bolls, or medicinal plants. Later he would see her setting the blooms in a tiny glass of scarce drinking water, because they were a gift from him. She told him not to bother, and that his time was better spent killing the vines. He'd laughed, and told her he was a hunter born, and every rose he gave her was a trophy from a rambler vine that had succumbed to his newly learned farming skills. After that, she only smiled when she received them.

He remembered offering flowers, and having them cradled in two very different sets of hands. Unlike Ilana, Aya had no animus towards the rose; she told him it was beautiful. You are beautiful, he thought, as her inherent pull drew him nearer. He'd always been better at demonstrating how he felt. He looked deep in her glowing eyes, and leaned in, intending to show her his feelings with a kiss... and that damned interruption from Jordan! He couldn't help but think that maybe things wouldn't have gone so wrong if that moment had turned out differently.

He hadn't meant his lie to be unbearable to her, or even to be the end of matters between them. He just felt things were going too fast, and if they went back to being friends, they both might grow into a more mature relationship. But it was too late now to salvage anything like that. Maybe even too late to save her. He stared past the stars, until he caught himself nodding off from weariness. With nothing new to ponder, he reentered the Interceptor, starting in surprise when he saw Jordan sitting at the table, waiting for him.

"The sensors said you were out there, kid," the human said quietly. "Anything you want to talk about?"

Razer stood stiffly still, his head turned away from the pilot. I can't even look you in the eye, what makes you think I can talk to you about my feelings? "No, thank you" he said hoarsely. "I appreciate your concern, though."

Hal stood up, and stretched, trying to muffle a yawn with one fist. "Okay, Razer. I just thought I'd make the offer. We will speak later, though, just... not today."

Razer nodded his acknowledgement, still frozen in place. When Hal went into his room, Razer opened up a medicine cabinet, and looked longingly at the supply of sleeping pills. Surely, just one, or two, wouldn't hurt... Firmly, he closed it, no. He earned this suffering; the least he could do is endure it like a man.

He went to his room and when the dim lighting shrouded him, his attention was drawn back to his right hand. The Red ring was glowing brightly, flaring crimson light in the small chamber. He shook his head with a humorless grimace, and then collapsed onto his pallet.

The ring was powered by hate, and rage. It seemed that self-hate worked just as well.

-tbc

Notes: (My Writing Jam - Elo "Time")

Remember in ST:TNG when Data was testing the aphorism that "a watched kettle never boils"? In his tests, however, it always began to boil at the same amount of time according to his internal chronometers, so he asked Cmdr. Riker about it. Riker said, 'Most people don't have internal chronometers, try turning yours off'. So, what happened to Aya is like that, only with Feels. People can't really turn off their feelings, but they can temporarily lie to themselves. And, as it turned out, the same was true for Aya, and Razer.

*Name of the methane planet taken from the talkback thread on the toonzone {dot} net/dc animation forums for Babel, and massaged a bit. The Errant Storm refers to something in my gl:tas fanfic "Marking Rites".