Great Deeds
by bluejay96
 
Disclaimer: Farscape is the property of the Jim Henson company and not me
:( I'm not making any money off of this
 
She looked out from behind the crates that were stacked at the entrance to
the alley on the commerce planet. Could it really be her? She reached into
her pocket and pulled out a hologram. It looked like her but she couldn't
be sure. Just then a Luxan approached her.
"Chiana are you ready? We've got enough food." He just called her Chiana!
It *was* her! Chiana put down the trinket she had been looking at.
"Sure," she started to walk off with him, "actually, can you give me ten
microts? I saw an outfit I wanted back there, this one's getting a little
old." She tugged at the shirt she was wearing.
"Fine, but hurry, we'll meet you back at the transport pod." The Luxan
walked off and Chiana walked past the crates.
"Chiana" she whispered as she peaked out from behind the crates. Chiana
looked around, "Chiana" this time a bit louder. Chiana turned to the
crates.
"Who are you? How do you know my name?" Chiana asked keeping a safe
distance from her.
The other Nebari stood up and tossed her the hologram, "Don't you recognize
your own sister-in-law?"
 
* * *
 
Chiana looked at the hologram of her, Nerri, and Armilna. She remembered
when it had been made. Nerri and Armilna had just been married and returned
to the abandoned building the small band of rebels called home. There were
8 of them including her, they were the non-conformists. They were a fairly
new group then, just trying to survive. There was an ultimate goal though,
a reason for them to be a group in the first place. They wanted to bring
down the government. It was their belief that people didn't really want to
conform and be the same, it was the fear of the "mental cleansing" that
kept them in place. That had been the day they were attacked. Nerri and her
had been captured. They had been split up, taking Nerri who knows where and
handing her over to Salis. It had been the last she saw of any of them.
"I was so surprised to see you! The rest of us figured you were dead! We
gave you and Nerri a memorial a few days after you were caught. How did you
escape?" Chiana told her the whole story, how she and Nerri had been split
up, how Salis was taking her to Nebari Prime when they collided with Moya,
how Salis had been murdered, how she joined the crew.
"Did you ever come across Nerri? We still don't know what happened to him.
I tried to break into the government files but I couldn't find anything
before someone noticed and I had to leave." She looked so hopeful thinking
that maybe her husband was still alive too.
Chiana reached out and held her sister's arm, " A few weeks ago I felt him
die through the life disks we had, I- I'm sorry Armilna."
She took a deep breath, "its ok, I knew they would kill him, kill him or
"cleanse" him, either way the Nerri I knew would die. I mourned him a long
time ago." She looked at the ground for a moment, "well I should be
thankful you're alive," she said with a sad smile, "could I meet these
people who saved your life?"
"Yeah sure." She led her sister back to the transport pod.
 
* * *
 
"There you are, what took you so long?" asked D'argo from the entrance to
the transport pod. Then, noticing her companion, asked, "who's that?"
"D'argo, this is Armilna, my sister in law. She saw me in the market, I
haven't seen her in over half a cycle! We were talking and she said she
wanted to meet everyone."
"You are Chiana's brother's wife?"
"Yes, I was married to Nerri," she said, then more quietly, "before he
died, that is."
"Come on, we can go back to Moya for a while, get something to eat." Chiana
said as she entered the pod. "Oh that's Rygel" she said as she pointed to
the little Hynerian.
"I am Rygel the 16th, Dominar of the Hynerian Empire, who are you?"
"I'm Armilna, Chiana's sister in law."
"Not another one!" was the rude comment from the hovering Hynerian. He
received a mean look from Chiana in return.
 
* * *
 
Back on Moya Armilna had been introduced to the rest of the crew with mixed
reactions. Zhaan seemed interested, as did Chrichton. Pilot had better
things to do, and Aeryn had been mostly keeping to herself after the whole
incident with the tape she had found. Despite the interest of a few,
everyone seemed to have decided to leave them alone to catch up. They
munched on left-over crackers in her quarters. "So what happened after I
was captured?"
"Well the six of us that were left decided that staying in one place was
too dangerous so we stole a small cargo ship and started traveling. We
picked up anyone that sympathized with our cause and now we're thirty
strong with allies on dozens of colonies. We're on this planet now because
there's a small colony on a nearby planet, our plans are really coming
together Chiana! We're going to liberate them, over through the government
there. Without the mental cleansing to force them to conform and be virtual
clones of each other they can do what they want, be who they really are.
This is huge Chiana, its the start of our freedom! Yes it's just a colony
of 200 or so but it'll be the first of many!"
She had such hope in her eyes, noted Chiana. She had never seen her sister
like that, before all she had cared about was herself, Nerri, and Chiana.
Now she wanted to free the whole population.
"And Chiana there's something else, I want you to join us. It could be
almost like old times, me and you sister, liberators of the Nebari!"
 
* * *
 
Armilna had gone back down to the planet for a while. Chiana had told her
she needed time to think about it and Armilna had understood. She hadn't
told anyone else yet, just asked them to stay at the planet for a while
longer, that she didn't want to leave just yet, and they understood,
well...most of them anyway.
Chiana laid on her bed looking up at the ceiling, thinking. Her sister was
doing something really important, something she had been a part of before
she met these people here on Moya. She could play a big role in helping
them, on Moya she had little say in anything. She thought back to when she
was younger, just a little girl. She had hated the way everyone had wanted
her to be. When she was born the government ran the tests that they did for
every newborn and decided she would be most successful in a heavy math
program with a future as an engineer. Her future was better than most
people, there were far worse occupations she could have been assigned, but
she wasn't happy. She had been 15 cycles when she had finally broke, told
her brother in tears that she couldn't do what they wanted her to and she
was so afraid that she would have a miserable life, die, then fade away,
having accomplished nothing. She talked for several arns and he just sat
and listened. Then when she was finished she realized what she had done. It
was now his duty to report her and she would be taken in for mental
cleansing. She started to cry all over again, but then he did something
strange. He told her to go back to her room and clean herself up, that he
wasn't going to report her, and he told her to wear her clothes to bed that
night. About an arn after neighborhood curfew he woke her and took her to
the group. They snuck out every night after that and about a cycle later
they left one night and didn't go back. They started living with the group.
That was when she met Armilna. She was more of a real sister than her
brother's girlfriend who he would later marry. Nerri had saved her that
night but so had Armilna. She later found out that Nerri had been worried
about her for months, but it was Armilna who had finally convinced him to
bring her to the group.
She had to go with her. In that colony there must be one girl terrified of
what she would become and to afraid to tell anyone. And she had left
because she was afraid she would lead a miserable life, die, and fade away,
here on Moya her life might not be miserable but she would still fade away
with no one to remember her name, no great deeds to keep her memory alive,
just another one among billions.
"Pilot?"
"Yes Chiana?"
" Can you tell everyone to meet me in the mess hall. I have something to
talk to them about."
* * *
 
D'argo, Zhaan, and Aeryn sat at the table. "What did you want to talk to us
about?" asked D'argo.
"Wait till everyone is here, then I'll tell you." Just then Rygel floated
in followed by John.
"What is so important that you had to wake me up from my nap?" grumbled a
grouchy Rygel.
"Sit down and I'll tell you." Then, looking around to see that she had
everyone's attention, "before you met me I was part of a group to over
throw the Nebari government with Armilna and Nerri. When I was talking to
her today she asked me to come back with her and I decided I want to." She
looked to see everyone's reaction. D'argo was the first to speak.
"So you'll be leaving Moya?"
"Yes."
"Is it dangerous?" Chiana looked at John who looked worried.
"Yes."
"Then why do you want to do it? You're away from the Nebari, you don't have
to go back. You could even ask Armilna to come on Moya if you want,
everyone would be ok with that right?"
"It's not just that I want to stay with my sister, I believe in what she's
doing. I want to help everyone else that's still trapped there."
"And what happens if they catch you?"
"I'll probably have to go through their mental cleansing."
"Then why are you doing this? Why run that risk? I don't understand."
"All of you have done great things with your life. Even frog lips here was
the ruler of six billion people!"
" I *AM* their ruler." Rygel interrupted.
"Whatever, my point is this is my chance to do something with my life.
Before I asked you what we were doing on Moya that was so great and you
couldn't answer me. I could help save my entire race! Is it so hard to
understand why I would want to do that?"
John just sat there, while she was waiting for him to reply Zhaan spoke up,
"what if you join them and it's not everything you thought, if they're just
anarchists with big words?"
"Yeah, you left them a long time ago Chiana, what if it's different then
you remember?" asked John.
"Well I don't know, I guess I'll leave the group then."
"Well then, where would you go? I have an idea. How 'bout you stay there
for a few weeks and then we'll come back and you can tell us then if you
want to stay or not."
Chiana looked at the people sitting around her, she didn't really want to
leave them. "All right, that sounds like a good plan."
 
* * *
 
"Well, I guess I'll see you all in a few weeks then" Chiana said as she
prepared to board the transport pod.
"Good luck with your cause, Chiana, and stay safe" said Zhaan teary eyed.
"Thank you, I will. Hey, what's everyone getting so sad about, I'm going to
see you all again, let's not say good bye until then."
"Agreed." said D'argo.
"Come on Chi, lets go" Called John from the pod. He was taking her to the
planet and dropping her off. She picked up the small bag of possessions she
had collected and headed to the pod. He didn't know it but she had left a
small trinket in her room that she had caught Rygel trying to steal before,
he would just think it was his good luck that she 'forgot' it. She was
definitely going to miss these people that had become her family. She sat
next to John. "Ready?"
"Yeah, lets go."
They rode in silence to the planet. Then just before they landed Chiana
spoke up, "John I wasn't lying before when I told you you saved my life,
you did." The pod landed. "I'll never forget you for it." She opened the
door, "good bye John." She bent over and kissed him on the cheek and ran
off.
 
* * *
 
She looked around the market for the sign Armilna had told her about. She
saw it, some words written in a strange language that glowed in the reddish
dusk light. She went below it and stuck her hand into the wall like she had
been instructed, to her surprise her hand appeared to go right through it.
[Must be a hologram]. She stepped through the "wall" and she was in another
place.
Dozens of Nebari hustled around the warehouse doing things, carrying boxes,
asking people have you seen so and so. No one noticed her yet. In the
middle of the room there were a few ships that looked like they shouldn't
be allowed to hold orbit much less fly between planets. She noticed a far
corner was filled with freestanding boards with words and diagrams written
on them. Finally some one noticed her, "who are you?" he asked cautiously
with his hand on his weapon.
"I'm a friend of Armilna's. Is she here?"
"Oh, you're the one she told us about, Chiana right? Come with me." He led
her to the corner with the boards, she saw Armilna looking of a piece of
paper and changing a diagram. She looked up from what she was doing.
"Chiana I'm so glad you decided to come, we really can use all the help we
can get." She gave her a hug. "These are the latest reports from our spies,
well our spy, there's only one. The colony has no real military force, just
a handful of law enforcement officers and a governor. Their base is here on
the outside of the town, which is good for us because there are trees to
hide in. We're going to attack, then make a broadcast to all the people
telling them that they're free."
"Wow, you have it all planed out. When are we doing this?"
"Three solar days." She let out a little laugh, "I'm being so rude, let me
introduce you to everyone. Well, everyone important anyway." She led Chiana
to a small doorway. Inside people lounged on couches and laughed at some
unknown joke. "Everyone, this is Chiana. Chiana, you remember Fiddan and
Onrei, they were here when you were with us, and this is Prandi and Vanowl.
That's all the senior members. The others you'll meet on your own, or
actually they'll meet you. You're a senior member too because you were one
of the first of us."
"Woah, really? I didn't know you were in charge of everyone like that."
"Yeah, actually I'm the head of the entire operation, but now I have to go
finish updating the diagrams, you can hang around here for a while." She
left and Chiana sat on one of the couches.
"Hey you two, it's nice to see some familiar faces around here."
"You don't know how good it is too see you! How did you manage to escape
Salis?" Chiana smiled as she started to tell her story.
 
* * *
 
Chiana awoke in her bunk. It was her second night here and she seemed to be
getting used to the place. She was slipping back into her old habits. It
had taken her a little while but by her second afternoon she was
comfortable. Armilna was right, it was almost like old times. The only
difference was that there was no Nerri. On Moya it wasn't as clear that he
was gone, but in this place she expected to see him around every corner. [I
wonder what woke me up] she looked at the room she was in.
It was a large room where everyone slept on portable bunks. The senior
members had a curtain separating them from the rest. [I'm probably just
worried about tomorrow]. Just then the curtain moved. Chiana put her head
down and closed her eyes so she could still see but it would look like she
was asleep.
Someone she didn't know entered and walked over to Vanowl. The person shook
him awake. He got up and they both left. Chiana waited 5 microts, then
followed them. She crept under the curtain and slipped out the door into
the dark outer room. She looked around, there was a dim light coming from
one of the ships. She snuck up to the ship next to it and jumped up. She
landed silently on top. On her stomach she crawled as close as she could.
She heard their voices but she couldn't tell who was who.
"Are they here yet?"
"Not to my knowledge sir."
"They're planing for tomorrow night do they know that?"
"I told them in the message."
"Fine, they still have a while but they better hurry."
"Would you like me to send another message?"
"That won't be necessary, we better go so we don't attract more attention."

At the last sentence Chiana was off moving as fast as she could to get back
to her bunk before they did. She had to be quite though, no use waking
someone up now and getting caught. She slipped back in the door and under
the curtain. She jumped in her bed and forced herself not to breath hard,
it would give her away when Vanowl came back. He slipped between the
curtains and crawled into his bunk. After Chiana's heart had settled she
allowed herself to breath normal again. What had she heard? Vanowl and that
other one were working together on something but what? They were sending
messages to someone. But that could be anything. She would talk to Armilna
in the morning. Whatever it was they were planing, they weren't planing to
do anything until tomorrow night and she needed to be rested if she wanted
to survive the attack tomorrow.
 
* * *
 
"No, Vanowl is one of my most trusted people, he's *not* a traitor."
"I never said he was a traitor, I just told you what I saw."
"Well you said it was late at night, you were probably dreaming."
"You know I wasn't dreaming."
"No, I know Vanowl's not a traitor, I don't know what you saw, or didn't
see last night."
"Fine, but will you watch him at least, see if he does anything weird?"
She looked at Chiana with a scowl, then finally giving in agreed.
"We have alot to do before tonight. I'm calling everyone for a meeting soon
to make a final plan."
"Fine." Armilna left the room and Chiana fell on the couch. She looked
around the empty room and tried to think. It wasn't a dream, she was sure,
but what could she do about it? Armilna didn't believe her and she didn't
know who the other person was so she couldn't just tell anyone cause it
could be them. For lack of anything better to do she would have to wait for
whoever they were to make their move. Armilna was yelling for everyone's
attention in the main room. Chiana got up with much effort and walked to
where everyone was gathering. Armilna had a board with a diagram of the
colonies base, this one with more detail, the rooms of the building were
drawn inside.
"There will be two teams. Team A will come from the town. Team B will come
from the woods. We'll break into the base at the same time and grab the
police and the governor. We don't want to kill them; there are jail cells
here so we're just going to put them in there until we decided what to do,
so we're not rushing in with weapons blazing, understood?" There were
murmurs of reluctant agreement. "Good, here are the lists, the leaders are
in red." She turned the board around to show two lists, "find your name,
group A meet off to the right, B to the left."
She hopped down from the chair she had been standing on and moved out of
the way so everyone could get to the list. Chiana was in Team B led by
Armilna. She was relieved to see that Vanowl was on team A. She walked over
to where her team was meeting. As she did she looked at everyone to see if
she could recognize the second person from last night. She didn't. As
everyone gathered around Armilna started talking again. "We're coming in
from the wood side so we're going to be in the trees waiting for the A team
to signal. Then we go in through the back door and capture anyone we can.
We'll have are weapons out but you are not to fire, that's what they would
do, not us. We don't plan to hurt these people. The guns are just a threat,
only use them if you must. If everything goes to plan I'll go into the
transmission room and tell the people what's happened. We leave in half an
arn so grab your weapon of choice and get ready."
The people dispersed and Chiana walked up to her sister. "What happens
after we capture the people and set the colony free, I mean, do we just
keep those people prisoners, do we turn them over to the colonists?"
Armilna looked surprised at her question. "There's no need to worry about
that now, not getting killed should be the only thing on your mind." She
walked off before Chiana had a chance to ask her anything else.
 
* * *
 
The ship was crowed. They had been traveling for two arns and were almost
there. There were a few quiet conversations but it was mostly silent.
Everyone was evicted about what they were doing but also recognized that
when they burst in the doors to the base there would probably be weapons
fire, and some would die. It wouldn't be her. There was a jolt as the ship
entered the atmosphere. The tension in the room was almost tangible. They
were on the right side. The quiet conversations had stopped. The ship
touched down and the door opened. People were slow to get up but they did.
Getting off the ship Chiana found herself in a field with the two other
ships. There were woods to the right and the faint outline of mountains
that could barely be seen in the dark. Everyone began to gather. Armilna
whispered but in the silence everyone could hear. "We're about a mile
outside town now. We'll walk together through the woods.When we get to town
we split up. Each leader has a map so you wont get lost. We don't have much
time so let's go. Be as quiet as you can. If you find a fallen tree walk
along it so you don't have to crunch leaves. Be light on your feet and be
careful not to trip."
With that they set out. The walk took them about half an arn because they
were going so slow to try to be quiet. They reached a small stream and the
town was visible through the trees. Armilna made some motions and the teams
spilt. Team A crept into the dim town and the B team began to walk parallel
to the town. Chiana motioned to the person in front of her to walk on the
edge of the creak to avoid the painfully loud crunching of leaves. He told
the person in front of him and the idea passed up the line.
After another ten microts of walking they had made a loop and ended up
behind the base. She found a suitable tree and jumped up to grab the lowest
branch. She pulled herself up to a branch about twenty feet above ground.
Everyone was in a tree. They sat and waited for the signal.
 
* * *
 
There was a slight breeze that brought a chill to the air. They had been
waiting for a while, and the other team had a shorter walk then they did.
"Armilna, where's the signal? They should have sent it by now."
"Shhh!"
Chiana turned away and looked again, then she heard a noise. She looked
around the side of the base. A woman she recognized from the A team ran
around the side. "Run its a trap! They have troops waiting! A hundred men!"
she staggered, out of breath. Everyone jumped down from their trees. Chiana
looked back and saw about two dozen men running from around front. She took
off into the woods and Armilna followed her. She could hear shouts of the
others being captured or shot, the second probably being the less painful
of the two. She ran as hard as she could but she could feel her legs
tiring. Her throat burned as her body tried to get enough air. She kept
going. She started to feel lightheaded dimly noticing the dark space a few
hundred metras in front of her. She realized it was a small canyon just in
time to stop. She looked down but it was too dark to see the bottom. She
turned around to see Armilna running up, with a gun in her hand. [A gun?]
"Oh, it seems you're trapped." she said with a smirk .
"What? what are you- what's going on?" She stammered out between breaths.
"All out of breath Chiana? I'm not. Wanna know why? I didn't have to run
for my life." She stood there with a smile on her face, "don't you
understand Chiana? I was working with them the whole time! Can you imagine
the reward I'll get for bringing in 30 rebels?! Too bad you won't be there
to see it."
[Think think Chiana, you gotta find a way to get away!] A plan popped into
her head, but she needed to buy time, she needed to get her breathing right
again. "That's why you couldn't tell me what you were going to do with the
police officers, you never intended to catch them in the first place!"
"Very good Chiana!" she said sarcastically, "and I bet you can guess who
you saw in the middle of the night with Vanowl too. But really its time to
go." She raised the gun a little. "Toss me your gun and I won't kill you."
She did, still trying to think of a way to buy more time. "Good, now hold
your hands in front of you and walk to me slowly."
"Wait. Armilna why did you do it?" Good, this should give me the little
time more I need.
"Come on Chiana, you didn't really think this rebellion would succeed did
you? And even if it could would you want it to? A universe where everyone
could just do what ever they want! Nothing would get done! The whole thing
would be counter-productive! Now I've spent enough time talking to you,
come here or I'll shoot you." Chiana took a step in the direction of the
canyon. "What are you doing?" she asked with little patients, Chiana just
took another step.
"Would it be much worse than the mental cleansing"
"Yes! After you were cleansed you could go on to be a productive member of
society, please just come this way." Funny, she seemed a little worried.
Chiana just smiled and took another step so she was right at the edge.
[Time to see if I learned anything from Molnon ] she thought with a smile.
She opened her mouth and le
t the note escape. She fell backward into darkness.
 
* * *
 
Chiana woke up in a old house that no one lived in anymore. She had stolen
a ship from the colony after she escaped Armilna. Moya was supposed to
return today to see if she was ok. She had spent the last week on the
commerce planet waiting. She got up and stretched. She walked the short
distance to the field where she was to meet the transport pod. Sitting on
the grass she let out a little chuckle realizing that in a way, Nerri had
saved her again. The dark shadow of the transport pod appeared. She smiled,
her real family was coming. The only family she had left. Going back had
been a mistake, but now her old life was really over and she was ready to
start again. The pod landed and Chiana walked up to the open door. The old
Chiana didn't have any amazing accomplishments after her name, but the new
one still had a whole life to go.
"Take me home John."
 
THE END