"What the hell is the matter with you?" Crichton snapped.

D'Argo stubbornly looked away from him, seated at the other end of the long, curving table in the galley.

"Will you answer me?" Crichton waited. Nothing. D'Argo only continued to stare out at the starfield passing by, plate shoved back untouched. "D'Argo?"

/That's it/, Crichton thought. /I've had enough of this shit./ "Answer me, dammit!" he yelled.

"Is that an order?" D'Argo sneered, chair scraping back from the table as he rose to his feet, looking at Crichton for the first time since Crichton had walked in.

"Does it have to be? What is your problem, D'Argo?" He stood too, walking around the table to stand toe to toe with the tall Luxan. They glared at each other, neither backing down, for several moments before D'Argo surprised him by reaching out and shoving him back, roughly.

"I am tired of listening to you /attempt/ to give orders, Crichton." D'Argo grated out, hands curling into fists. Crichton stumbled back for a moment, a startled look on his face, and then moved in close, pushing D'Argo back a few paces.

"Is that what this hissy-fit of yours is about? Because you had to listen to me for a change? Well, get used to it, pal. You might want to remember the times that this 'stupid human' saved your ass." Crichton spat out, his own hands fisted. "You wanna get all pissed off because I'm challenging your authority? Fine. But get your brain wrapped around the idea that /things have changed./

D'Argo growled under his breath, unable to believe that Crichton was daring to face him down. The pattern of their relationship, up until the last few weeks, had been one of his dominance over Crichton. They had become sword brothers, warriors who fought side by side, bonded by a blood oath...and until now, Crichton had been willing to defer to D'Argo, acknowledging him as the stronger of the pair. But Crichton was right. Things had changed. /Crichton/ had changed.

No longer was he the confused, primitive human D'Argo and the others had believed him to be when he first arrived. He had become more like the PeaceKeeper he so resembled than any of them had ever believed was possible. Tougher, able to defend himself, capable of taking charge when the situation demanded...and no longer less than an equal.

Crichton stood insolently close to D'Argo, knowing he was pushing his buttons but unable to back down. He knew he was asking for a confrontation, and almost welcomed it. Anything to tear his mind away from the memory of the blood on his hands. Even though it had not strictly been his doing, he carried the knowledge that he had been responsible for Hassan's death, that he had beaten her, had ... murdered her. That ate at him, frayed his nerves. He was afraid of what he was capable of. Obsessed over it. And let that obsession push him toward the very thing he had wanted to deny existed in himself...anger, a rage that flexed and twisted, seeking out any target in reach. The others had seen it, felt it in the way he snapped at them, and left him alone. Aeryn had avoided him since her recovery -- whether from her own reasons, or because of the change in him, he wasn't sure which.

But D'Argo just kept pushing him. Couldn't he see that he was just barely hanging on? Always taunting him, always trying to shove him back down, into a role he could no longer play...trying to bully him back into the person he had been, and feared he would never be again. He felt the jagged edge of rage pushing at his defenses, enticing him to give in and bury all the ache and guilt under the sweet battle rush. His hind brain kicked in with the good old fight-or-flight response...and he chose to fight.

D'Argo was glaring at him with a dangerous gleam in his eye, one that Crichton would have quailed in fear from, not too long ago. But now, with adrenaline and a volatile mix of rage and guilt coursing through him, he reached out with both hands and grabbed D'Argo, pulling him close, face to face with him, and snarled, "You don't like me giving orders? Too fucking bad. Here's an order for you: Get the frell out of my face, or I swear to God I'll kill you." He released him, shoving him away. D'Argo reeled back, stunned, then sprang at Crichton, spitting curses.

Crichton rushed forward to meet him, knocking him down and wrapping his hands around D'Argo's throat. They grappled on the floor, D'Argo's anger bleeding away into first concern for Crichton, and then into fear that Crichton might actually mean to kill him. He pried Crichton's hands away, digging at the fingers crushing his windpipe as he stared up into a face he did not recognize -- Crichton's face, but not the one he had come to know as his sword brother, his lover. He finally managed to get Crichton's hands away, straining to hold him at bay. Crichton cursed, his voice deep and rough, unfamiliar, as he struggled to break D'Argo's grip, intent and enraged.

"Crichton! Crichton, stop it! /Stop!/" D'Argo gasped. "/John, STOP!/" That seemed to reach him, and he froze, some realization, some expression other than blind, murderous rage washing over his face. He pulled his hands free of D'Argo's grasp and stood shakily, backing away from where D'Argo sprawled on the floor.

D'Argo got to his feet, reaching out towards Crichton. "John, are you --"

Crichton shied away from his touch, stumbling , shaking his head back and forth slowly, as if he could wipe out the last few moments if he refused to believe. "D'Argo -- I'm sorry. I -- " He turned and fled, out of the center chamber and down the corridor. D'Argo ran to the door, meaning to go after him, but stopped as Zhaan came around the corner, a concerned look on her face.

"What's wrong?" he asked her. "Is it Moya's baby?" He could think of no other reason for Zhaan to seek him out with so much worry in her eyes.

"No. That --" She pointed down the corridor, in the direction Crichton had gone. "--is what is wrong, and I have kept my silence long enough."

* * * *

D'Argo sat on the floor in Zhaan's quarters, hands hanging loosely over his knees, head down. Zhaan sat perched on the edge of the bed, waiting patiently for D'Argo to collect himself. He looked up at her, his misery and fear for Crichton clear in his eyes.

"How long have you known about...John and I?" He asked.

"Since I shared Unity with him in the Delvian temple. It was not deliberate, D'Argo -- I would never pry in such a way. But...I was in his mind, and I saw what he felt for you, saw his memories," Zhaan said gently, smiling as she recalled her shock at the discovery, and the surprising sweetness and gentleness she had seen in D'Argo, through John's eyes. What an amazing creature Crichton was -- able to see the best in every being he encountered, able to feel such love. When she had joined with him, she had sensed that openness and generosity in him...what he would have thought of as "humanity."

It was that very quality she feared he was losing now. Crichton had been changed by his experiences of the last few weeks -- he had been used, been played as a pawn in a game with deadly consequences, been shaken to the very foundations of what he knew as himself. She sensed that he no longer knew himself at all...and no longer felt 54 the same ability to see himself, regard himself, with the same caring heart as he had before. Even though the virus had left him for other prey, it had left behind a lingering taint, not in his body, but in his spirit -- a contamination that would eat away at all that remained until nothing was left untouched.

"Why did you never mention it?" D'Argo asked her.

"Why should I have? It was a private matter. I felt happy for you, D'Argo. It is a great gift to you and John that you have found one other person with whom to share your days, especially in the situation we have found ourselves in. Who am I to judge? I only envy you." Zhaan said.

D'Argo sighed. "I do not know what to do for him, Zhaan. I have tried to speak with him about it, but it always ends in an argument about something of no significance. When I try to ask him about whatever is hurting him so badly, he challenges me, and my anger takes over. I should be forcing him to listen to me, to obey me, but I cannot, because he --"

"Because he is Crichton." Zhaan finished for him, and D'Argo nodded, smiling. "D'Argo, I understand about the ways of your people, about the bonds between sword brothers, about the importance of status and rank. But John is not Luxan. John is John. If you truly care for him, D'Argo, you must try to bridge the gap between your world and his. No one on this ship understands him as well as you do. Listen to your hearts. Do not try to force him to do what your culture says he must do, and that you must do. Do what you need to do, and what he needs you to do for him, whether he knows it or not."

D'Argo looked out the door, wondering where Crichton had gone, what he was doing. He shook his head as he turned back to face Zhaan. "I do not know what that is, Zhaan. I care for him, but I do not think I will ever understand him completely."

"Will any of us?" Zhaan asked, leaning toward D'Argo. "What has he done, from the very moment he stepped on board Moya? What is the one thing that we can always be sure John will do?"

"Talk." D'Argo answered. "Incessantly."

"He must not keep his guilt and confusion locked inside, D'Argo. It is poisoning him, and you must help him understand that. John needs to talk about it. It is his way. I have often wondered if John has ever had a thought that did not travel directly from his brain to his lips. He needs to put /into/ words whatever is keeping the words we have become used to from him locked away. Your training, your culture cannot help you to do that for him. Forget status and let it be only John, and D'Argo. As equals."

"I will try." D'Argo said, rising to his feet. He went to Zhaan and clasped her hand in his for a moment.

"I know you will." Zhaan answered, raising her other hand to his cheek.

* * * *

It did not take D'Argo long to find him. John sat cross-legged on the terrace, head back to watch the stars as they flowed by overhead. At first D'Argo thought John was not aware of his presence, and had decided to let him know he was there, but John spoke without turning around.

"Did you come to beat the crap out of me for what I did?" he asked tonelessly.

"No. I came to see if you were all right." D'Argo said.

He started to cross the terrace, but John stopped him with a tense "Don't."

"Why not?" John asked after a few moments had passed.

"Why not what?"

"Aren't you supposed to kick my ass now? Aren't those the rules? I thought you were supposed to rub my face into the carpet when I got out of line."

"I don't care about the rules, John." D'Argo answered.

"Really? That's new." John said, resentment creeping into his tone.

"I care about you, John. That has not changed." D'Argo paused for a moment, weighing his next words carefully. "What has changed is this: I do not care which of us is the stronger one. I don't care who is...how did you put it? The biggest and the baddest. I care about you, and I do not wish to see you in pain."

"Then leave me alone." John said, the muscles of his back and shoulders tightening as if he still expected a blow, either verbal or physical.

"I cannot do that."

John listened, waiting to hear D'Argo crossing the terrace to him, waiting to feel himself yanked to his feet and forced to go back to his quarters. Instead, he heard a muted rustling noise, a soft thud. Curiosity getting the better of his anger and hurt, he turned to look behind him. D'Argo had sat down on the deck, echoing John's cross-legged pose, just to the side of the terrace door.

"What the fuck are you doing?" John snapped.

"I am waiting," D'Argo said, crossing his arms and leaning back against the wall.

"For what?"

"For you to need me."

"I don't need anyone. I just want to be alone," John said, turning his back on D'Argo.

"Then I will guard you and keep the others away. I swore to be the shield at your back, John, and I am going to do it, whether you like it or not.. I will wait for you to need me for whatever may come. If you need to talk, I will listen. If you need to fight, I will fight with you, and bleed for you if I have to. If you need silence, I will be silent. If you need to hate someone, hate me. If you need someone to love you, even when you do not think you deserve that love, I will love you. But I /will not/ leave you alone."

There was silence for several microts. John stayed where he was, face turned to look out at the stars, and D'Argo stayed where he was, eyes focused on John. When John spoke, it was so soft and low that D'Argo almost did not hear it.

"I killed her."

"Your hands killed her, John. Not your heart. You had no control over what happened. Does a blade weep because it was used to kill? It was a tool...as you were. You bear no responsibility."

"Maybe. But a blade is /made/ to cut things...it's job is to cut things, to destroy. I wasn't."

"I know."

"It's killing me."

"I know."

"Do you even care? You stoic motherfucker. I guess I'm just supposed to be all right with this, huh? Just forget it, like it never happened."

"Of course I care. I love you," D'Argo said, in the same matter-of-fact tone a human might have said "I think it might rain."

"Why did you say that now?"

"Because it is true," D'Argo answered, puzzled.

John finally turned around, raising up on his knees. "No. I mean now, when I'm fucking ready to kill myself because I beat a woman to death with a metal bar. Why now? Why couldn't you say that when I wanted to hear it, before all of this happened?"

"Because I was stupid. I could only see the bond through the eyes of a Luxan warrior...not through the eyes of a Luxan named Ka D'Argo who loves a human named John Crichton."

John sagged back down, sitting on his heels. "I love you, too. Asshole." He rose to his feet and crossed the terrace to D'Argo, standing in front of him with his hand held out.

Instead of using John's offered hand to rise from the deck, D'Argo pulled John down to him, turning him so that John sat in the hollow of his crossed legs, John's back against his chest. John squirmed a little, trying to get up, but D'Argo simply wrapped his arms around him and held on. Finally John gave up and relaxed, feeling D'Argo's warm breath against the side of his throat as he leaned his head back against his shoulder.

After another stretch of silence, D'Argo said, "Do you really wish to kill yourself?"

"Yes. I don't know."

"If that is what you wish, I will do it."

John wrenched himself around to stare at D'Argo. "You would kill me instead of me killing myself? Do Luxans have some kind of taboo against suicide?"

"No. We simply have no concept of it. Among my people, it is considered a gift to be asked to end the life of the old, the weak, the diseased. It is the ultimate trust, to be given the task of ending another's life with honor."

"So, what? You'd just kill me, go 'Oh, well, that was great,' and shove me out an airlock?"

"No. I would end your life, if you asked me to, and then ask Aeryn to end mine."

"Why?"

"We are sword brothers. My life is bound to yours. If you die, I would die as well, even if I was still breathing. I would be /E'sai/, the dead brother -- no matter how long I lived beyond you, I would be considered to be walking with one foot in this world, and one foot in the next, beside my sword brother."

To D'Argo's surprise, John laughed, and his voice had lost some of the strained, hysterical note that it had so often held the last few weeks.

"I guess I'm stuck with you," John finally said.

"Mmm-hmm," D'Argo answered, and even as he said it marveled inwardly at how deeply he had let this human in his arms affect him. At times he heard John's own quirky human phrases and vocal mannerisms coming from his own mouth, and thought nothing of it. He carried John's scent with him everywhere, ingrained into his clothing, clinging to his skin and hair, permeating his quarters.

In some ways, he had allowed him closer to his hearts than even Lo'laan had been. When Lo'laan had died, he had thought of nothing but revenge, of killing Macton. He had not spared a thought to giving up his life to follow her -- even if he had not had Jothee to think of, it would not have occurred to him to do so. But to think of John dying, of not having him at his side -- unthinkable /not/ to follow him.

John spoke again, startling him out of his own thoughts.

"'For whither thou goest, I will go,'" John said musingly, and a shiver wrenched up D'Argo's spine at the echoing of his own thoughts, at the way his microbes had automatically translated John's archaic-sounding words into the High Speech of Luxan ritual.

"What was that?" D'Argo asked quietly.

"Hmmm? Oh, it's from the Bible."

"The Bible?"

"Yeah. It's -- let's just say it's a book about God. I'm not very religious, myself -- I quit going to Sunday school when I was ten, never been back."

D'Argo laughed, a rumbling in his chest that felt to John as if he were sitting against the side of a great purring cat. "I am not devout, either. If my life depended on my remembering the names of all the gods, I would be dead already."

"You and me both. I only remember that one because the guy who taught our Sunday school class made us memorize passages of Scripture, and if you got it right, you got a lollipop. I didn't want to pass up candy, so I memorized it." After a moment's thought, John recited, "'And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.'"

D'Argo murmured approvingly against the side of John's throat, smiling when John shivered at the touch of his lips. "I like that. It sounds very like the way the Bond was described to me when I took my Manhood Trials."

"It just seemed to fit, I don't know. What you said about dying if I died made me think of it. And the quote is from one woman to another -- but still, it seemed right."

D'Argo made another one of those approving rumbles, and John shivered again, laughing as he did so.

"I have to tell you, though -- my Sunday school teacher would have a hissy over me quoting Scripture to my alien boyfriend."

"Boyfriend?"

"Yeah. You got a problem with that?" John asked, mock-severely.

"Nope," D'Argo said, and after a moment of thought, he asked, "Do you still want to die?"

"Maybe later. Why? Do you want to kill me?" Laughing, John tipped his head back, rubbed his cheek against D'Argo's for a moment, and then turned back to look out at the stars.

"Sometimes," D'Argo growled, relieved and worried at the same time, but willing himself to let it go for now. "If you keep acting like a..." He paused, searching for another one of the words he had picked up from John.

"Like a jerk?" John suggested.

"Yes, a jerk."

John laughed again, the soft sound rumbling through his chest and into D'Argo's, the purr of a housecat compared to the deep resonance of D'Argo's laughter. "Don't hold your breath."

"I won't," D'Argo agreed. When silence fell between them, companionable and friendly, he closed his eyes and rested his cheek against John's hair, and thought, /As long as you keep breathing, so will I./

END