(Authors disclaimer: The characters of Farscape belong to Henson Productions. I just borrowed them for a short time.)

(This is in response to SciFiChick66’s scenario challenge on the ultimatefarscape bulletin board and dedicated to all the Crais’ Cohorts. Enjoy! Love, Lady Crais)

WARNING: HAVE A BOX OF TISSUES HANDY WHEN READING!!!!

SCIFICHICK66’S CHALLENGE: Another difficult challenge (a very sad one) would be if he (Crais) had to give up Talyn.

THE RESOLUTION: (Timeline: This story takes place 100 cycles in the future and is written from Crais’ point of view.)

Talyn is dying. It has taken me monens to admit what my constant companion for the last one hundred and two cycles has known for ages. His systems, systems I designed, systems I helped enhance when we bred him, have been no match for the devastating disease that he has contracted. A disease we discovered too late to cure.

I slowly make my way to the terrace on Moya, stopping just denches from the viewport to gaze upon the gunship floating soundlessly in space near his mother. Finding her was the promise he forced from me, wanting to die near her, to bask in the warmth of her unending love in his final days. His once beautiful mottled brown steelskin is gray with infection, the tips of what could only be described as tails blackened with dead tissue. Talyn used what little energy he possessed and that I could spare for one final starburst to meet with Moya. That was three solar days ago. It is now just a matter of time.

He made me leave him, forced me to transport to Moya and give up the transponder that connected us all this time, engaging in a form of permanent privacy mode. I left it on the system’s console and I can no longer hear his thoughts, his endless questions that were driven by the need for knowledge, the sound that passed for Leviathan laughter. It disturbs me that my own mind is so silent, silent except for the thoughts that now seem to be my only companion.

I can’t help but to smile in remembrance of the day I bonded with Talyn and stole him away from Moya. He was still a baby, childlike in his thought processes, unsure of this strange being who suddenly shared his mind. I was first his father, in more ways than one, his mentor as I taught him the art of warfare, his strength when his own failed, his friend, his brother.

Talyn’s own grief mirrored mine the day Crichton died in Aeryn’s arms after sacrificing his fragile human body to keep the Scarrens from going through the wormhole. He is the only one who truly knew what I was feeling. Oh, Crichton and I had our differences, but he was an honorable man, someone I might’ve been able to call a friend in time. Even Talyn had learned to respect him. Upon reflection, I think our grief was more for Aeryn than anyone else. Maybe not.

My heart tightens as I watch him spasm in pain, shuddering before me in the light of a yellow sun that is just clearing the horizon of the uninhabited planet we orbit. In frustration, I grip the handle of the cane I am forced to walk with, for I know there is nothing I can do to ease Talyn’s suffering. I turn away, tears in my eyes. Yes, the once great Peacekeeper Captain Bialar Crais is crying.

When I look up, my throat raw with unexpressed emotion, I find myself no longer alone. Slowly, her own body now frail with age, Aeryn approaches, her once black hair pure white. Her daughter, a beautiful woman with her father’s ice blue eyes, helps her, a steadying hand clutching Aeryn’s thin elbow. Aeryn waves her away in annoyance and she leaves us as Aeryn reaches out to wipe a tear from my cheek. I grasp her hand in mine as our eyes meet in understanding.

Ironic that we are the only two left now. D’Argo found his home world and the last we heard of the towering Luxan warrior, he had married and settled down. Chiana found some pleasure planet that suited her and who knows what mischief she has got into. Jool’s whereabouts are unknown to us, and Rygel left this existence some time ago. All that’s left is Aeryn and her family. And of course, Pilot and myself.

She walks past me to gaze upon the Leviathan she named after her father, and my mind wanders to the day the other Crichton died. He lived well beyond the normal lifespan of a human, longer here in the Uncharted Territories than what he would have had he returned to Earth, dying of extreme old age only a few cycles ago. Twice, now, I have watched the woman I had once wanted for my own grieve over Crichton. If anyone taught Talyn and I what it was to love and be loved, it was Aeryn and Crichton.

“What will you do now?” she asks softly, her hands folded at her waist. “What will you do without him?”

I step up to stand next to her, shaking my head. “I do not know Aeryn.”

She glances at me, reaching out to take my hand in comfort. “You could return home.”

I nod, knowing that my own son would welcome me with open arms. I found out about him fifty cycles ago, a boy born to a Peacekeeper woman I had recreated with during my career. Even he had managed to somehow escape their corrupt influence, taking over the farm I was raised on during my youth. But I do not truly know my son and it saddens me.

Aeryn faces me, her head canted at that angle I have always loved, her eyes questioning as she contemplates me. She lays her other hand against my cheek. “You won’t leave him, will you?”

I look at Aeryn, her face so firmly etched in my mind, and her words, spoken so softly, devoid of accusation or grief, light the path that deep within me I always knew I would take. “He’s a part of me Aeryn. My place is with him. I could never leave him.”

A single tear slips slowly down her face as she leans forward, gently pressing her soft lips to mine. “Then go, Bialar.”

I gaze at her, still loving her in my heart. “Good health to you, Aeryn,” I whisper as I squeeze her hand and walk away, slowly making my way through Moya’s corridors to the waiting transport pod.

As I step aboard Talyn, I know that he is relieved that I am there. I do not need the transponder to tell me that. I run my hand along the bulkhead, his life force slow, rapidly declining and I hasten my way to the comfort of the bridge. I look out and see Moya standing guard over her dying son and my fingers wrap around the transponder, easing it back into the cradle at the base of my neck, smiling softly at the sound of Talyn’s voice.

“You know I could never let you face this alone, my friend,” I answer, easing my own deteriorating body to the deck as the first wave of pain shoots through me. “You are never truly alone as long as I am here,” I whisper.

My body curls into a fetal position of its own volition and I close my eyes, sobs wracking through me as we both convulse in agony, the last of his life slipping away as he tells me he loves me, as a brother, as a mentor, as a friend, as a father. The deck below me grows cold and I clutch my fists to my eyes as the last vestiges of his soft, musical voice fades.

And then it happened. I felt my heart skip a beat. And then another and I feel it slowing in my chest, slowing to a stop as I die within the confines of my own beloved Talyn.

Sebaceans never believed in an afterlife, but we have been wrong before as I hear a voice, far off at first, then louder, more insistent.

“C’mon Captain. We’ve been waiting for you.”

I look up to see Crichton’s annoying human face staring down at me. Slowly I rise, confused at first, then realizing I am dead, gone on to another existence. I look at my hands, the wrinkles that time had left upon them smooth and strong again. And Talyn, he is once again vital and full of life.

I turn and stop, smiling. Waiting at the bridge doors is my brother Tauvo and I know that Talyn and I have come home.