SCIFI.COM | Farscape: Journey Logs

Moya and I had grown weary of their incessant arguing, so I banished the Human and the Luxan from Moya, dispatching them to the pleasure planet LoMo for 10 solar days. It was to be an enjoyable exile — so enjoyable that Chiana and Jool went along voluntarily.

I hoped that Crichton and D'Argo would behave with greater calm upon their return. Instead, they came back eight days too early, with a story that strained belief. I was angry enough that they returned so early, but the untruthfulness of Crichton made me doubly so. Chiana and Jool were sleeping off whatever pleasure they had encountered on the planet, so I could get no accounting from them, and I was so angry that I couldn't bear to speak to either D'Argo or Crichton.

On LoMo, so Crichton's story went, they'd been seduced by women who spiked their drinks and stole all their currency. That much, I could believe.

But Crichton didn't bother to make the rest of the story even remotely plausible. He claims that, as they struggled to recover, an alien named Raxil warned them that Chiana and Jool were in trouble, and took Crichton and D'Argo to visit a Hangi. This detail in particular revealed Crichton's falseness, since no reasonable being actually believes Hangis exist. They are mythical creatures who supposedly can detach their eyes and leave them in various locations. The eyes send images back to the Hangis, who display the scenes for customers.

According to Crichton, this supposed Hangi displayed images of Chiana accepting a mysterious drug from a strangely seductive man whom Raxil identified as Fe'Tor. Despite Fe'Tor's reputation as a powerful and dangerous man, D'Argo took it upon himself to infiltrate Fe'Tor's mansion. There, he discovered Chiana and Jool, who seemed to be in no danger at all and, on the contrary, were having a wonderful time. That Chiana and Jool could find immense pleasure on such a world was another of the very few aspects of this story that I could believe.

Chiana and Jool refused to leave Fe'Tor's apartments, so Fe'Tor's guards escorted the Luxan out at gunpoint. Humiliated, D'Argo returned and assaulted Raxil. Raxil then spun around and sprayed him with the same substance that Fe'Tor had given Chiana, to demonstrate its qualities. According to Crichton, the drug had unusual, powerful properties. To speak delicately, although Crichton did not, the drug instantly made D'Argo crave intimate companionship.

Raxil explained that this drug, Freslin, came in many varieties and was a sexual attractant. The sadistic Fe'Tor made especially high-quality Freslin by milking its base element from the senil gland of sentient beings — a process he reportedly took to a deadly extreme. Raxil claimed that Fe'Tor was milking her mate, Sarl. In exchange for her assistance in rescuing Chiana and Jool, Raxil wanted Crichton and D'Argo to help save Sarl.

Then Crichton said that he and D'Argo used the Hangi to spy on Fe'Tor's compound. Next, they retrieved weapons and currency from the Transport Pod to plan a two-man raid on an auction of "pleasure slaves" Fe'Tor was hosting. Chiana was to be featured in the sale.

The following portion of Crichton's tale is so ridiculous, I actually felt insulted as he told it to me: D'Argo, who had already been identified and thrown out by Fe'Tor once, was sprayed with a special kind of Freslin that Raxil called an "aura morph." It created a sensory illusion that would completely disguise D'Argo in another form, at least until he metabolized the Freslin, which would happen more quickly if he became emotionally agitated.

Crichton, D'Argo, and Raxil attended the auction, where a weakened Chiana was sold like an animal to the highest bidder. D'Argo's anger at the situation sped up his metabolism, which caused his disguise to evaporate. He and Crichton then began shooting, and in the confusion, rescued both Chiana and Jool.

Crichton's tale continued further, but recounting it just increases my anger, for no matter what lies he tells, Moya and I are having none of it. Hopefully, another seven days on LoMo will calm his overactive imagination....