Today I met a giant talking python who's a brain and neurological specialist. Nexus, gotta love ya.

I know I haven't had much to say lately. You're all shocked, I'm sure. It's just that everything's been Same Old. Fighting Nietzscheans and other bad guys. Almost getting killed constantly when Captain Buttinsky gets a fly up his butt about somebody--most often a hot chick who'll totally ignore me--in danger. Rhade growls, Beka bitches, Trance flounces, and Dylan... tools.

And it's not like Tyr's gonna visit the Andromeda unless he's at the head of a conquering army of Prides, so.... Just Same Old. Pretty dull.

Sad that risking my life has gotten so routine again that it's dull, but that's how things are.

I already met a cool Rommie in the Nexus, now I know a cool old-school Beka. It's sad that I have to go here to talk to my real crew but I'll go with it.

Six months ago it was five years ago.

I never knew exactly how old I was so neither did anyone else, but now everybody's really off since Rommie and I were the only ones to end up in the Seefra system for five years, with Rommie being a head in a box living in cyberspace for most of it. Everybody, especially Beka, I am five years older than you first think. Really. Don't let my youthful good looks confuse you.

Heh. Dylan is so pissed. After weeks of circling around each other, the new chief engineer and I finally had a throwdown. Good thing for Vik that nanos clear black eyes right up, because I nailed him. There and other places. He got me too a bit, but I'm much sneakier and nastier.

I was just being me, not even picking at him or nothing, and he took a swing at me! I couldn't just let that go.

But, yeah, Dylan's pissed and everybody figures I said something to bring it on. Whatever.

The brawl had been fun though. Haven't had exercise like that in a while. Most of the fights I get into are dead serious, life-and-death situations.

It's a shame Vik's got a stick so far up his ass about me because he's not bad looking.

I'm back on the Andromeda for the foreseeable future. There was another kidnapping attempt made on me, and this time other people got hurt too. Nobody I knew personally, but it was getting ridiculous. My defenses are for obvious enemies, not for people hiding amongst legitimate visitors. They were gonna put me in a cold case and carry me out. (That rat bastard Gerentex smuggled mercenaries on board the Andromeda back when using the same method.)

The Commonwealth, terrified that all my knowledge could end up in the wrong hands, came back in and made demands. Since I don't want anybody else getting hurt and walking around Earth with bodyguards would kill me, I told Brendan privately that I felt like I had to go but he should bargain the hell out of the Commonwealth before letting me go. For letting me go into protective custody on the Andromeda, Earth got its own bit o' Commonwealth fleet for defense, more arms, and more engineers. Kemp is one of the engineers! He and some of the other Bellerophon folks got a way here. I'm glad they got to see the new pretty Earth instead of the hellhole it had become.

Sienna is taking over my spot as the official cynic on Boston's government, a position she can fill easily and ably.

So. Back on the Andromeda. Everybody's swinging between happy to have me back and wanting to kick my ass for being gone so long. The new Chief Engineer is fit to be tied but might calm down once he realizes that I don't give a damn about titles. Hell, I'm back because I drew too much attention.

I'm gonna miss Earth, but it's not like the Andromeda Ascendant is a terrible place to be in exile from it.

Well, Dylan and the Commonwealth came in when they heard about my near-kidnapping. Now they want to take me away because, get this, it's too dangerous for me to stay in the open on Earth. Dangerous for me, yeah, but really dangerous for my knowledge, particularly my experience with Commonwealth vessels. Mustn't get that in the wrong hands.

I know too much. Watch me while I try not to laugh.

There are huge arguments going on right now. Huge. I had to get away from it for a while. I don't want to leave Earth, and most of our fledgling government doesn't want me to go. And none of us like being told what we can do.

I'm half-worried the Commonwealth will kidnap me itself.

I was kind of almost kidnapped today. I'm fine. It's fricking insane. We have people interrogating the guys right now, and it looks like they'd heard that the Andromeda Ascendant had a new head engineer, figured out why I wasn't there, and come in on one of the plethora of trade ships we've been getting lately. Haven't gotten an employer's name out of them, though.

I walk around armed all the time for a reason. They must have thought "short guy, geek, how hard could it be?" Losers. One of them's gonna have to get his left kneecap replaced.

But, yeah, Dylan replaced me for real. I've been on leave of absence for months with no end in sight so... he's within his rights.

Hurts, though.

Now that I'm the official cynic in power in Boston (Brendan's official idealist and hero, John's official politician) as well as the former head engineer of the Andromeda Ascendant I seem to have some value.

The Barretts have come to Beantown, and it's funny how tan we all are now. I hadn't noticed it on myself until I saw them. With all our space travel we got a bit of that pasty spacer look. On Planet Paradise, we're outside a lot, them more than me.

On old Earth, the air was so polluted that you either didn't see much sun or there was a giant gap in the ozone layer above you and you quickly got skin cancer. Friendly sun is a great change.

Beka came to see me, finally. Just Beka, since Dylan isn't popular around these parts. We chatted a bit. She told me the current engineering staff is doing pretty good, which made me happy that somebody's taking good care of my baby but unhappy because who really wants to hear that everything's going fine in their absence. She told me that Doyle's mostly been on Seefra/Tarn Vedra/whatever-the-hell lately. I joked that Beka can't use "I'll dropkick you back to Earth" as a threat on me anymore.

Then Beka asked me to come back with her, and I had to tell her why I still can't. There's still so much to do here. We just got a monetary system starting up here recently, which is great since bartering sucks ass. We're still trying to consolidate the governments. I keep working on lethal surprises for any Ubers or Magog who'll want to show up to take a piece of us.

Brendan's great at the rabble-rousing and inspiring, but I have a role as the malcontent who reminds people of the practical stuff. They need me on Earth.

I don't think I'm needed as much on Andromeda Ascendant. I need more time here.

Beka wasn't happy with me, and she left.

I wonder how long it'll be before they give up on me and move on.

We're still working on the government thing here. A lot of the little enclaves have 'em now--and most of them are even some kind of democracy or republic as opposed to dictatorships (see, I have grown a bit out of my cynicism about democracy)--but we're still having trouble convincing people to join up for a kind of world government. I know some history, but I still don't know how United Earth came to be a few hundred years ago. I'm not a politician or a diplomat. How did I end up doing this stuff? I hate pushing people when they might not be ready for it--mostly because it's a waste of my time and temper arguing with people--but in our spot within the Known Worlds we really need to be unified against people who aren't us. Otherwise, outsiders can come in and negotiate with all our separate rulerships and set us against each other. I know that would make the Commonwealth happy since it would be easier to make a protectorate of us if we can't organize.

Speaking of, I haven't heard from Dylan since then or the rest of the crew for even longer. Nobody's answering my messages. When I'm being the mature one, things are bad. When the hell did everyone become a 12-year-old? (Yeah, in actual years Doyle's younger than that, but I patterned her to be an adult.) I'd love to know what's up on my ship/baby.

Sio and Shane Barrett came in to see the reborn homestead and were thrilled that Louisiana's swamps are back. Turns out that the Ubers drained the swamps 200 hundred years ago so runaway slaves had fewer good places to hide in. The Barretts are staying on the planet and giving concerts to try to raise interest in creating a world government. Sio was advocating for Earth as a lobbyist in the Commonwealth for years but she said that was like hitting her head against a brick wall. The Commonwealth is anti-slavery as long as they don't have to actually rescue slaves or challenge slavers. We all figured that a Commonwealth that wants to take our new Earth under its wing wouldn't be open to hearing her advocating anything else.



The Nietzscheans tried to attack us. I guess they finally heard about us being here. Fortunately, the satellites I hid through the outer edge of Sol system, camouflaged by space debris, gave us advance warning, and then our ships and the orbital missile defense system blew them away. The Harper was a busy boy. Thing is, that was a small test force. More will come.

There are nice people on the internet.



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A whole evangelizing group of Wayists led by Rev Bem found us. Probably some Wayist resurrected on the planet sent out a signal, even though Brendan and I specifically begged everyone via world-world teleconference--we're not tech-less here, thankfully--not to send out anything into space that might be intercepted and tell people that Earth is back before we feel secure in our defense.

The Wayists are telling people that the Divine recreated the Earth, which is really ticking me off since their Divine had nothing to do with it, which is what I'm telling people. I spoke to the God responsible, and that God ain't the Wayist Divine. The God who did this was a meddler with a sense of humor, my kind of god. Rev says the Divine is behind all things, while I remind him that he told us the Divine only helps those who help themselves and "loves us best during the broken times." Rev's my friend, but he's been working on me for years on this and all my explanations don't make a dent in him.

See, I believe in God, even before this. I see God under the microscope and in slipstream, in a beautiful sunny day and cool rain and a perfect wave. Look at space and try not to see God. God holds everything together. But I don't believe in religion, in preachers and penitents, shepherd and flocks, blessed are the meek and poor because they'll finally get theirs when they're dead so they shouldn't rise up now. Rev once told me that Earth's enslavement had a purpose in the Divine plan... and totally lost me. A religion that tells me to sit down, shut up, and revel in the brownie points my suffering might someday get me gets no love from me. I want a God who does not love me best when I'm broken and wanna die; I want a God who's happy for me when things work out too.

For too many people, faith means that you shouldn't strive to make things better for yourself or others and you should stop asking questions. The worst people of faith are the ones who assume faith means you know everything and are better than thou. One guy in antiquity once said that wisdom is knowing you know nothing, and he was right. If God didn't want us to question, we wouldn't be made as we are and the secrets of reality wouldn't be put in our reach. People who think they're wise are usually jackasses.

I have no trouble with Wayists. They do charitable work. But when they outright lie to people to try to get converts, I have to put my foot down, whether Rev's with them or not.

I haven't been contributing much here lately, but I've got good reasons for that. Dylan finally got permissions for a hush-hush trip for us to the Sol system. He didn't totally believe that a god reformed the Earth, but the flaming letters in space and hot pink doves in his office convinced him that something was going on. None of us wanted to make a big noise about going out there in case 1] I was wrong (fat chance) and 2] somebody was of a mind to go there and pillage if it was there.

It was there. Sometimes I rewatch the Andromeda's footage of the look on Dylan and Trance's faces when they saw my favorite planet sitting there pretty as you please where it should be. Their gobs were definitely smacked. Didn't God know that miracles didn't happen without Dylan's involvement?

He thought Tarn Vedra turning green again and getting access back to the Known Worlds was something? Ha. Get a load of this.

My new Earth is pretty too, lush and full of natural resources, the pollution gone. I still don't get how the supposedly Magog-repelling butterflies work, but they sure are pretty. The toaster defenses aren't as funny-looking as I expected. The satellite defense system let us through atmosphere. I figure I'll take a look at those later.

And the planet is populated. By people who used to be dead. They're all kinda "Whoaaaa." Therapy may be in order. Hey, I've been dead-then-not, and it's a bit of a head trip. We'll have to get some kind of census to see how many people are back and where they are. And Brendan's alive too. Damn, it's good to see him.

I didn't get killed by a mob because we got it across that I helped get this all back. I have enough of a weird reputation that people didn't doubt it much. Now I have to hope that the forming government doesn't turn into a theocracy. For some reason those tend to go bad a lot faster than a lot of other governments. People tend to abuse religion.

There's so much to do....

Dylan wasn't happy at all about me taking a leave of absence, but it's not like he can say much to dissuade me. This is Earth, and it needs help. It needs organization and defense and foresight. Foresight because all these natural resources and beauty are already making some people stupid greedy. People can suck. Plus we have to make sure that the Ubers don't come back. Nothing would give them a greater jolly than to pillage my beloved home again now that it's got goodies.

Trance tesseracted herself and Dylan to the Triumveres to keep it on the down-low and told us when they came back that we would have some help from the Commonwealth. Considering that neither the original or new Commonwealth gave a damn about Earth before, I'm skeptical. Then again, now that we have natural resources maybe they're genuinely interested.

My crew's gone, even Doyle, who seemed kind of interested in the planet until bitchy Dylan reminded her about all of her talk about Seefra being her home. Dylan's getting an engineer on a temporary basis to cover me while I'm gone. Maybe it'll make him appreciate me more to see the difference. Or maybe he'll like the newbie better.

I don't care. I have a future either way. I'm not stuck just taking whatever gets dished out to me on the Andromeda now. I even have my own little ship so I'm not grounded on Earth if I don't wanna be. It's... a lot.

Thanks, God.

I bitch about my crew at times, but today they surprised me with a birthday celebration. I totally forgot. I think I'm 32 or 33 now. By Earth human standards I'm an old man. I never expected to make it this far.

Beka, knowing this, decorated the room with black and "Over the Hill" signs. Ha ha. Still, she got me tickets for a surfing vacation--Vacation? What is this thing of which you speak?--on Infinity Atoll, so she gets to live.

Rhade, who got me a step stool, is gonna be screaming like a soprano once he tries his next shower. Nietzschean superiority should handle ice cold water just fine, but he'll still bitch about it.

Dylan got me a new, top of the line welder. Hell, after Seefra he could have brought me to a store with gear like that and left me there to drool for a few hours and I'd be happy, so I'm easy and pleased.

Rommie and Doyle bought me some music I wanted. The same music. The resulting catfight veered between entertaining and "oh damn, stop fighting over me like I'm turf."

Trance's gift meant that we did all this at a casino, because she gave me the gift of Lady Luck's hand for a few rounds of roulette. I haven't seen her do the "Oh my gosh, I won again?" routine in a while, and I think she enjoys it even more than I do. After that she let me play by myself with the winnings, which is cool because gambling isn't as much fun after a while when it's not actually gambling. I lost some but still came out way ahead at the end.

Mail call brought in a message tube that had a report about a big chunk of the Drago-Jerkoff fleet mysteriously blowing up. Looked like sabotage but by whom, right? The little rolled-up piece of paper with it had calligraphy on it and the message: Congratulations on surviving another year. No signature, but it didn't need one. Nice to know that Tyr's alive and in his right mind again out there somewhere. He probably did it just to clean house for his next attempt to put himself at the head of the Nietzschean Prides and because he hates the Dragans almost as much as I do, but maybe he did it for me too a little. Hey, he didn't have to let me know he's alive.

Wonder if I'll tell Dylan?

If this keeps up I won't need to bleach my hair anymore because I'll go white naturally.

First there was Thomas wooing the other me, and I helped him with a few hints because he seemed sweet and pathetic and his poetry was awful. Okay. But then he got possessed by something nasty and frightening weekly and started talking about killing Dylan, and suddenly I had the guilt of thinking that I'd helped this maniac nudge his way into (other)my heart.

But he's much better now. At least for now.

About three days ago, Thomas was locked in a room and worried about his Harper, so I helped him get out. It turned out that he was in the middle of one of my past events that I knew all too much about, so I tried to minimize the damage by telling him what I knew of the situation. A few hours later this message showed up in the Nexus by other me. It said that Trance had died.

(It also said that Rev was running nuts and Dylan was in a coma, but Rev had gone nuts in my timeline too and Dylan's as hard to kill as a cockroach, so I didn't worry about those.)

Now, I know that Trance had died a few times already and shouldn't have worried but I'd just woken up and wasn't thinking, so all I could feel was that Trance was dead and my meddling had killed her. Later it turned out that Trance was not so dead after all yet again and that by helping Thomas I'd saved other me from having something happen to him that was really... really awful when it happened to me....

So everything turned out well. And it's not like I changed my past because I never met Thomas at that time in my life and I still exist in the here and now. But I still lost 10 years off my life from that morning.

So....

Should I keep talking here? Can I even stop? I talk a lot in general, even when it's safer not to, and I came here to vent. One of my chiefest instincts is to fix things, so meddling is practically my default. But can I keep doing this when I keep feeling this enormous guilt every time something I get involved in takes that slide southward?

I needed to veg a bit, and there are always fun timewasters out here....

LiveJournal Haiku!
Your name:	the_harper1
Your haiku:	of the disunion confusion is in full swing and not the fun kind
Username:
Created by Grahame

Dylan’s getting antsy taking commands from the Commonwealth. I can see it. For a guy who spent a lot of sweat and blood getting it going, he sure hates actually following the chain of command he help set up. I think he was happier when he was a wanted man on the run.

We haven’t had any big, crazy situations to deal with either lately, just skirmishes with the Ubers and the Magog, boring war stuff. No glory, no fun.

Also doesn’t help that he’s either the new messiah or a thug depending on the day and the politician. That’d be annoying to anybody.

For me, life goes on. While we’re waiting for the Gang of Three to figure out whether to give us a full complement of crew again, something I think Dylan’s against, I decided to start recreating the Knights, our droid help, now that I can replace the parts I cannibalized while in the Seefra system. (The original Marias with their almost-breasts freaked me out. Some designer in the old Commonwealth must not have been Getting Some.) Maybe the crew wouldn’t have gotten its asses whipped so bad when the Magog invaded the Andromeda at Arkology if they’d had some unkillable, uneatable, unimpregnatable defense staff.

Of course, the way to least loss of life there would have been if we hadn’t done that badly-planned suicide bit at Arkology at all. I remember dying there, at the claws of one of the future Magog my time machine brought here.

So I’m maintaining the Andromeda and the Maru (no one else is allowed to touch them, says my captains), building Roseanne II, building the Knights, working on cole_rei’s stuff, worrying about death_by_snark and whatever’s possessed him this week, taking on the crisis du jour, and posting the occasional thought here or at sages_of_chaos. Sleep is for wussies. Aside from that concert I went to recently, lately my idea of downtime has been my daily 40-minute shower and maybe a little Nexus web-surfing. Kind of sad.

Doyle’s torn, and it’s hard to watch. On one side she wants to stay on Seefra or Tarn Vedra or whatever the hell you wanna call it now--which I totally don’t get since the place and people suck even if it’s getting greener--but on the other side she wants to stay with the Andromeda and Dylan because she feels a kind of link to them. And I only know this stuff at all because she’s aired it in public. I tell her that conflicting loyalties is part of the human condition.

She might go. She only stuck with us during the last battle against Ol’ Red Eyes because Dylan put the corkscrews to her in public.

I miss how we used to be: snarky conspirators, me and her against the world. She was warmer and less violent before she found out she was an android, and she let me dote on her like the proud daddy I am even if she didn’t quite get why I was like that. Yeah, some of the best stuff in my life has come through lying.