Old Dog, New Tricks

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Aeryn sat on the cool stone bench surrounded by some of the most fragrant and colorful flowers she had ever seen on any planet she had previously visited or occupied. Brilliant shades of blues and magentas wove their way between thick green vines dotted with white and yellow blossoms. Beyond this garden were several others- equally as dazzling with their scarlet, orange, and deep violet blooms-all leading to a grove of thick-trunked trees laden with silvery-lavender flowers that bent the gnarled branches under their weight.

On any other day, Aeryn may have enjoyed the tranquil setting and the way the breeze shifted and rippled the colors of the vista, but her mood was as black as the leathers she wore again. And like her dark presence in the sea of color, she was as out of place on this planet as she was the day she was pulled away from her Peacekeeper life and onto Moya. She had just returned from the barren planet where she waited several solar days for the mist to reopen. She waited, longing to hear the voices of her shipmates- comming them every few microts-even wishing for John's teasing voice on the other end telling her she couldn't get away that easily. Anything. But there was no response, no answer. If this had been the first occasion she waited, the frustration at having to return would have been bearable. But her hope was beginning to falter after so many cycles of this ritual being performed with no result.

Staring at the ground in front of her, Aeryn watched a lonely jimali beetle trudge through the thick carpet of grass toward his prize-a tall, fiery-red, double petal meenavi. He pushed his way slowly between the blades, stopping now and then to get his bearings. Each time he paused, his antennae wriggling in the space above his thick skull, he became fixated on that one flower to the exclusion of all the others thriving along his path. Aeryn reached down and plucked the jimali from his purpose and stared into his multi-colored, speckled face. At first they regarded one another with almost the same look of disappointment, but Aeryn understood all too well the growing sense of alarm the beetle must have felt as she continued holding him up, watching his legs flail about, looking frantically for the comfort of the ground beneath him.

Upon each return from the barren planet, Aeryn found herself wondering how she was going to stay sane on this peaceful planet without a familiar purpose of her own. There was no military, no need for security, no help to be given. Nothing in particular to do. Just endless days of nothing special. So many times she had imagined jumping into the transport pod and getting away from this place that was the complete antithesis of her Peacekeeper upbringing. But as willing as she was to leave, the transport pod was woefully under-powered to reach beyond the proximity of the two planets. As far as she knew, there wasn't anything else out there worth finding. Just Moya. So Aeryn returned cycle after cycle hoping for another opportunity to contact her friends.

She actually missed the day-to-day conflicts that came from living in close quarters with such different species. She missed John and his stubbornness most of all. Despite the amount of time she had been on the Favored Planet, she politely avoided becoming too emotionally attached to the people around her. She always thought that she would be leaving soon. But soon had become maybe never and she was now mentally flailing--at a loss as to what to do next--and looking for some small comfort of her own.

She placed the beetle, now completely squirming between her fingers, on the palm of one hand, and with the index finger of her other, flicked him off into the general direction of the meenavi and silently wished him luck.

The sound of footsteps on the gravel path snapped Aeryn out of her reverie. Reflexively, she reached for her pulse pistol and trained it in the direction of the sound. She dropped the weapon down as quickly as she had unholstered it when she saw who was coming towards her. A young man, looking about her age, wearing a beige tunic and dark green trousers was making his way over to her. His hair, usually a dark reddish-brown, glowed warmly in the sunshine- almost the same color as the bronze skin of Moya's hull.

"Back again, I see," Cerric said to her, a sympathetic smile on his lean, tanned face. Cerric had offered her a place to stay on his family's property when she realized she wouldn't be getting back to Moya immediately. He was as close to a friend as she was likely to have there on the favored planet, but she rarely thought of him, or treated him, in the same way she did her companions aboard Moya.

Aeryn sighed and stood up, replacing her weapon in its cradle. "Yes. I waited as long as I could. I ran out of food..."

"And nothing happened. The mist didn't open this time either?"

"No."

Cerric reached out and put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed it lightly. "I'm sorry, Aeryn. But perhaps now you can begin to enjoy your life here? So many cycles have passed...you have yet to really accept this as your home."

"I just never thought they would abandon me. Certainly not Crichton anyway. They must think I am dead."

"Maybe then, it is time to move on. And I think I know just the thing to ease your mind and occupy your hands," Cerric said patting her on the back. "Something to pass your time."

They began the winding walk out of the garden area and into a meadow of tall grasses as Aeryn asked, "Do you have something that needs to be fixed? Problems with your farming equipment? I'm sure I can work on it after I've completed the maintenance to the pod."

Cerric laughed his deep rumble and shook his head at Aeryn, "You mean the plow? No, no. How could I possibly have problems with it when you are constantly keeping it all in such good repair? I barely do enough work in the fields these days to cause problems. No, this is something different for you, I think."

They had reached a clearing where the light from the sun seemed to glow brighter than anyplace else. Floating clouds of pollen, bugs and spores hovered and migrated around the field with the light breeze that blew across the grass. She squinted against the glare and could just make out stakes sticking out of the ground at regular intervals. They stopped a few metras away from the closest stake where a small stand of saplings was gathered.

Cerric motioned to the land in front of them and looked at Aeryn. "I thought perhaps you might help me plant this orchard. It will be hard work-but work that will help you heal. There is nothing quite so fulfilling as watching something grow and flourish over time."

Aeryn gave a quiet laugh and glanced over at Cerric who was taking in all that was possible before him. "I think you have asked the wrong person to help. Surely Laran is a more capable gardener than I am."

"Laran hasn't been feeling well lately. It was her suggestion to ask for your help."

"And I thought she was a fool for marrying you," Aeryn teased.

"A fool with a keen eye for potential, my friend." Cerric retorted.

"I know nothing of making things grow. I spent my life either killing or imprisoning. I am likely to ruin your plan." Aeryn countered.

"So you say. But, you do know how to take orders, don't you?"

"Well, yes..."

Cerric shrugged and looked at her sidelong, "Then just do what I tell you to do. Will that make it easier?"

"I suppose. What do you need done?" Aeryn's eyes, now adjusted to the light, were surveying the area in front of her, trying to picture what it was that Cerric envisioned. All she saw was the perfect location to get one's self killed. No cover, high ground on three sides, only one entrance in, and little worth fighting for once inside.

Bending down toward a pile of tools, Cerric said, "First thing we need to do is make the holes to plant the trees in..."

Aeryn gave a quick nod and stepped in front of Cerric. Before he could finish his sentence, she pulled out her pulse pistol and with several short bursts, shot holes in the ground where the wooden stakes used to be. Clumps of dirt and splinters flew in every direction as she completed the first row. The sound of pulse fire echoed through the clearing, scattering birds and small animals from their perches and burrows. As she was about to start firing at the next row of stakes, Cerric quickly reached out and gripped her upper arm, stopping her.

"Uh, well, that was not exactly the way I had planned to do that. You have very good aim, Aeryn, but it would be a bit more...organic if you used this," he said holding out a spade for her to take. She looked at him and could see he was trying very hard not to laugh. The glint of amusement in his hazel eyes was so familiar to her, so like the looks John often gave her when he jokingly harassed her for her Peacekeeper ways. Cerric's barely suppressed chuckle at her choice of gardening implement was strangely comforting to her. At least he didn't glare at her like she was some sort of abhorrence of nature. Looking out at the mess she had made of the clearing, she couldn't help but laugh herself.

"See? I told you I am not meant for this particular hobby. I'll just stick to my mechanical repairs if it's all the same. Unless, of course, you want to turn this into a target range. If that's the case, I'll be more than happy to give *you* lessons on how to defend yourself from invading forces."

"Last time I checked, banta bugs didn't carry pulse weapons. Although, their bite is fairly irritating..."

Cerric reached down and picked up a sapling. "Let us go see what we can do with your Peacekeeper ingenuity, shall we?"

He guided Aeryn over to the first burned out hole in the ground. He gently placed the tree on the ground nearby and pulled Aeryn down next to him.

"Now, I *know* you can do this. You just need to give yourself a chance. Just try it. I'll show you how to do it."

Aeryn watched as Cerric dug down deeper into the hole placing the dirt in a small mound next to him. She noticed his hands for the first time, and, again, the familiarity of them brought an ache to her heart that she had never felt before. Aeryn could see the veins bulging close to the surface of his skin; coarse, reddish- brown hair growing up towards his long, tapered fingers barely masking the light freckles that were the result of long hours spent in the sun, taming and coaxing beauty out of the rich, dark soil of this planet. They were so similar to the hands she had watched bring life to dead circuitry and conduits so often aboard Moya. John's hands.

After placing the small tree into the hole, Cerric began piling the dirt back in over the clump of roots, protecting them from the elements. He patted the dirt down, making sure that the tree had a firm cover that would keep it from shifting or becoming easy pickings for the small creatures that foraged nightly.

"There. Now you try one." He said, wiping the dirt from his hands, smiling at her broadly, and nodding at the hole next to him.

"If you insist. But don't blame me when it's the first to die."

"I do insist. And I'm sure it will be the strongest of the lot."

Aeryn took a deep breath and walked over to get another sapling from the stand of trees. She spent several microts inspecting them-pushing aside some, lifting up others to look at the tangle of roots, even sniffing a few. She stood back and scanned them all again. Finally she reached down into the group and pulled one out and brought it over to where Cerric was waiting with a bemused look on his face.

"This one looks like it knows how to stand at attention," she explained, dropping it gently to the ground.

"You would know best," Cerric said.

She knelt down and began digging first with the spade, but then with her hands. The feel of the cool, damp, loose soil between her fingers spread throughout her body, and was surprisingly calming to her. The task was so simple that it allowed her mind to briefly move beyond the impenetrable mist and think clearly about her present situation.

It could have been worse here. It could have been a hostile society or completely alien even to her. She was lucky to have found a place where survival was not a struggle. In fact, most days, when she thought about it, were pleasant enough. But most days she wasn't able to stop thinking of how to get back to the others. To John. But now she was faced with the reality that she may never find them. She started her life over once before, perhaps she could do it again. If there was no alternative.

Cerric joined her, patting the soil down around the small tree. When it looked like the sapling was there to stay, Aeryn looked over and smiled at him. She pulled out her pulse pistol again, looked at it rather wistfully, then tossed it aside saying, "I guess I won't be needing this for a while."

"Oh, I wouldn't get rid of it too quickly, Aeryn. We may need you to fend off the weeds, too. They are a stubborn lot, not to mention invasive, you know."

"Much like you, Cerric," she laughed, then stood up to pick out another tree. There was work to be done.


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ScapeArtist

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Author's Afterword, Old Dog, New Trick

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