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Linn's head shot up from her console when she heard the klaxon sound. She was one of the safe areas, trying to bypass some of the faulty circuitry in the Bridge's communications system. *I TOLD them, NOT to link the system into the bypass, but NO....Mr. Smarty-pants an' his best friend the WSRK jock know--*
She gasped as a white hot stab of pain shot through her side. She could barely breathe, the sensation was so powerful. "Tim," she whispered. She dropped the sensor relay in her hand and took off towards D deck in a flat out sprint.
"GET HIM OUT!" Miguel yelled at Bridger and Ford as they barreled towards him.
"I can't BREATHE!" Tim screamed in panic. His chest felt like it was being compressed. It hurt...everything ached as the air was being pushed
out of his body. Yet it wasn't his slowly ebbing life that was on his mind. "Linn," he whispered. It couldn't end like THIS...he couldn't believe her would never see her luminous face, her gentle smile, ever again while he was alive. "Linn...."
Aislinn Elizabeth MacMurdo could have been a runner. She had been an Olympic level athlete once. She had the fastest 400 meter in her training group in Parris Island. Her daily workouts included a jog around the boat. But she knew she was moving faster than she ever had in her whole life. It was automatic, the pump of her legs. She didn't see anything, not even the people she was roughly shoving aside in her haste. She could only see ONE thing--and she was heading towards it as fast as her feet could carry her.
Timothy Andrew O'Neill could only see flashes of things. Her eyes. Her gentle, grass green eyes, that held so much within them. Her smile. The toss of her head that make her long hair flip over one shoulder--especially when she knew she was right about something. His weakened mind wandered back to the last day they has spent at home...
"I think that's the last of it, eudail," she said as she bounced down the attic stairs. They were packing up their house, Poseidon's Point, setting everything in order before they left for their next tour on the just finished seaQuest.
"I just hope Carl doesn't TRASH the place," Tim joked.
Linn rolled her eyes, and they laughed.
Tim wrapped his arms around Linn's waist, and them moved so that he was behind her. "I'm gonna miss this place," he said wistfully. "Home, I mean...my REAL home."
"Och, Tim," she said, snuggling into him, "dinnae get all emotional on me now..."
Tim laughed and kissed her cheek. "Seriously, eudail," he said, "this has been the best summer of my whole LIFE." He squeezed her tighter. "We finished seaQuest--I got to play 'house' with the sexiest woman alive--I got a TAN--"
"An' such a NICE tan it is, too," Linn teased.
"Do you MIND, Aislinn?" Tim asked crossly. "I'm trying to be profound here...."
"Oh, I'm so sorry, m'love."
Tim sighed, trying to be mad at her. He failed. The playful bickering was just one more part of why this was the best summer of his life...it was a visible sign of the completeness, the RIGHTNESS, he felt when he was with Linn. "Aw, to HELL with it," he said. "I love you too much to bicker."
Linn pouted. She looked back at him as she said, "Ye DO realize that bickering is one of the pre-eminent foundations of our ENTIRE relationship?"
Tim grinned. "So is total and complete over-the-top, sugar-shock, make everybody-around us-wanna-puke, sappy super-sentimentality," he said, nuzzling the back of her neck with his nose.
She giggled, then sighed. "Tim?" she asked.
"Hmm?"
"Is it me--or do ye feel married?"
"It's not you," he replied.
She turned enough so that she could look into his deep brown eyes. "Is that a BAD thing?" she asked.
Tim smiled as he kissed the tip of her nose. "Nope," he said. "It's not bad. It's WONDERFUL."
Linn smiled. "Y'know, Tim," she said, "I've nae been happier in my whole life, as I've been these last eighteen months, being yer girlfriend. I wasn't this happy MARRIED. Does that sound daft?"
Tim smiled, and shook his head. "No," he said. "It doesn't. But, that's cause you're NOT my girlfriend."
Linn raised one eyebrow. "An' WHAT, might I ask, am I?"
Tim gave her a winning smile as he said, "You're that little piece that helps make me complete," he said quietly. "And I love you for it."
Linn smiled, then laid her head against Tim's shoulder. They nestled together like that for long moments. They said nothing. They didn't need to. The warmth that passed between them, the wholeness they felt in their embrace was more powerful than any spoken word.
Tim saw--FELT--the turbine lifting up, the pressure of air being pushed OUT replaced with a rush of air IN.
"TIM! GET OUT OF THERE!" Bridger hollered.
Linn slid down the banister of the stairs to D deck. She hit the deck running---
And slammed into the biggest man she had never seen. She was moving forward fast and as she hit the immovable object, the law of inertia kicked in. She went flying, the impact launching her a good ten feet backwards, forcing her off her feet. She landed on the deck butt first, a loud 'OOF!' escaping her lips.
The giant took a few steps forward and reached down to help her up to her feet. "Um--are you OK?" he asked in a strangely sing-song voice.
"I have--my friend--he--WHO?" she panted out. As her eyes adjusted to the low light of D deck, she started for a moment at the sight of the mottled skin. *A GELF? on seaQuest? What in hell??*
"Lieutenant O'Neill is fine," the GELF answered. "He is with the Captain Sir."
Linn grasped his huge hand, and he pulled her gently to her feet. "Thanks," she said.
"Welcome. You should be--mmm-careful, Miss...."
"Lieutenant," she corrected absently.
"Um--Lieutenant Miss..."
Linn looked past the GELF and caught Tim's gaze. He was bent over, sucking air into his lungs.
Each breath ached, but it was bearable for now. Tim looked up, and saw a pair of troubled green eyes. He nodded at Aislinn, and then started coughing.
"I have to see about my friend," she said to the GELF.
He moved slowly to one side. "Mmmm--I am--Dagwood, Lieutenant Mi--"
Linn smiled at him. "How about you just call me Linnie?" she asked him.
"Mmm-Linnie. That is better," he said.
She smiled at him. "Thank ye, Dagwood," she said warmly. "And I will be more careful, next time."
"OK," Dagwood said. He sort of nodded at her, then moved back down the deck.
Linn scrambled to Tim's side. "Och, Sainted Behgorah, Timothy, leave ye alone for three seconds, and see what ye've gone and done," she teased. She looked over to the man holding Tim up. "Hello, Nathan," she said, acknowledging her captain.
"Hello yourself, Mac," Bridger said. "Come on, Tim. Let's get you to MedBay."
"Absolutely, sir," Tim said, one arm around Bridger's shoulders, the other around Linn's.