SCIFI.COM | Farscape: Journey Logs

Talyn, still limping from his brush with the Peacekeeper Retrieval Squad, needed to find a safe place to hole up for a while, and we found a pretty good one. It was some sort of chia-planet covered in the most amazing vines I've ever seen. Once Talyn landed, these plants grew fast enough to hide him from view within a few arns, and the bonus was they had these cool healing properties to speed his recovery. With Talyn powered-down to recuperate, there was nothing for us to do but wait.

This suited me and Aeryn just fine.

When the Retrieval Squad tracked Talyn to the planet, Aeryn and I were doing the kinda waiting where you don't want interruptions. Bad timing. Bad news. Not only was the Squad out to capture Talyn, it was also commanded by Senior Officer Xhalax Sun — a.k.a. Aeryn's mom.

Crais, Aeryn and I hiked into the jungle. Our plan was to play Rambo loud enough to divert PK attention from our hidden gunship. Stark and Rygel stayed behind to try to keep Talyn calm. I say "try" because, well, we're talking about Stark and Rygel here. Calm ain't exactly their strong suit.

Health benefits for Talyn aside, for the rest of us this planet was like Hell, only worse. Its gravity and temperature were cranked to the max. Toxic gas poured out of vents like helium out of a Hynerian. Even the fruit was scary. (Acid-filled and chock full o' Vitamin Dead.)

The Retrieval Squad followed us, with a vengeance. After an intense firefight, we ended up separated and lost. So I didn't know whether Aeryn was having a heartwarming reunion with Xhalax or if she was dead.

I found Crais, and he had a big, gaping wound in his back. Crais warned that Xhalax had a pair of Colartas — big ugly critters, expert trackers. They would trace his blood trail in no time. Hearing that, I was kinda tempted to ditch el capitan. Instead, I dumped the acid from one of those Oarusk fruits onto the wound. There was some hollering and the smell of seared, Sebacean flesh, but it did the trick — it stopped his bleeding.

Meanwhile, Aeryn had found her mother. Or, at least, she'd found Xhalax; mommy turned out to be a cold-blooded killer who considered her daughter a disgrace.

I'm sure that moment would've made Jerry Springer proud, but I missed it because Crais and I were still lost and the Colartas were on our heels. Luckily, I found some slime with a reek that would've made even Rygel weep. We smeared it on to mask our scents.

Momentarily safe but completely exhausted, Crais passed out. But before I could enjoy the quiet, the Scorpy clone in my head decided this was his kinda party, and showed up to announce the complete non-revelation that Crais was hiding something. I can't believe it took me that long to figure it out, but of course — the Retrieval Squad was also here for Crais. No way were the PKs gonna let him run renegade around the universe. He knew top-secret, Her Majesty's Secret Service-type stuff. That was why he'd seized Talyn and used him to get our help. We were his bodyguards whether we knew it or not.

Only one response to that: I cleaned the muck off Crais and tied him up as bait for the Critter Squad. Crais woke up and started sweating while I hid, still doused in eau de slime. When the Colartas arrived, I killed the buggers, then I found out one had a positioning device that could guide me back to Talyn. Smelly as things were, they were lookin' up....

Or so I thought. One of the Colartas was only mostly dead. And back on Talyn, Xhalax had severed the Leviathan's higher functions and gutted Rygel just for fun.

Oh, and Aeryn and her mother were about to kill each other.