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TITLE: This Path Taken
AUTHOR: Karolyn Gray <kmgray3@aol.com>
TYPE: Story
RATING: G
DISCLAIMERS: The characters and situations in Earth: Final Conflict do not belong to me, but to Tribune Entertainment,
Kirshner-Roddenberry, Atlantis and related companies.
SPOILERS: Possibly Season 3. See notes below.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Short speculative fiction based upon rumors of Season 3 regarding Lili Marquette, Wil Boone, the
Jaridians etc. If it turns out false, then consider it an alternate universe story. I'll let you decide whose thoughts these are.
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This Path Taken
by Gray

I see the shuttle before us as we crest the hill. It's not too far and I know we'll make it long before the Jaridians catch up I can hear you labored breath as we continue over and back down the hill. It's reassuring to hear after all this time. I still can hardly believe it's you. Here. Beside me.

I remember seeing my own feelings mirrored in your eyes. Shock. Disbelief. Then joy as we realized this was not a dream, but a wonderful reality. For how long? Who can say? I don't really care. I've learned to appreciate the little things, the brief moments. Fate it would seem has brought us together again

Funny, I never really believed much in fate until lately. Being alone out here has a way of changing people. There's the Jaridians, of course. The game of hunter and hunted, cat and mouse. But it's not them I fear or think about.

It's home. Earth.

My friends. My family, what little remains. Do they know what happened to me? Does anyone remember me? Does anyone even care? What of them? What are they thinking about me?

We haven't spoken much since we crossed paths. You never were one for idle conversation, but things seem different now. Is it me or you? Or is it that all the barriers between us no longer exist out here? Here it's us against them. No one else to rely on. No one else to trust.

Whatever it is, words no longer matter. We communicate in volumes with a single word, a gesture, a look. And that's enough. Your a fellow soldier, a comrade, and most of all my friend. I haven't told you that yet. Somehow, I think we both know that it doesn't need to be said. That, inspite of everything, that one thing has remained the same.

We're almost at the shuttle now. Only a few meters more.

I feel a grin come to my face, something I haven't done in awhile. I know..*I know*...now I will see the blue skies of Earth again. Smell the winds of home, feel the rain. Look up into the sky and recognize the stars I view. I feel the spark within me again. Something I had thought died.

Hope.

The shuttle is up in the air, creaking and groaning in a way no shuttle should. She's taken a beating but always pulled through. I couldn't ask for a better ship. I know it sounds foolish but to me she's a comrade. A friend. Just like you. But I can see in your eyes, you think of her this way too.

The jump to interdimensional. I hear and odd rumble. It's me? I'm laughing. Why am I laughing?

You look at me, at first concerned then puzzled. Then understanding. You grin and nod, the irony all too clear.

Others placed us here, set us on this journey, but they never said which path we had to take. And now that you are beside me what they've done doesn't matter. I know you'll be beside me on the way home.

This is the path we've taken.

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Copyright 1999 Karolyn Gray and Skrillwerks