Hope We Can Again

[Jack Ryder]

Jack watched from an almost scientifically detached point of view and yet, this was his wife, the woman he loved more than life itself, the mother of his children... and the impressions of the voices she heard seemed almost familiar... and yet so alien. In many ways it seemed as if they were a higher being. The last voice, a voice he did recall 'feeling and hearing' once when he met Kinsey's mother for the first time. It was far more Xenexian than the others and yet...

He mentally calmed Kinsey enough that he could feel more intimately what she felt. "It almost feels like... your power comes from somewhere else. I feel it too like... when you use it, it feels... right. Like how you should be."

[Kinsey Calhoun]

“I almost felt free but…he stopped me.” Kinsey said as she let Jack calm her. “I think I was about to kill Dominus.”

[Jack Ryder]

"Well that would be premature." Jack whispered. "Not yet."

[Kinsey Calhoun]

Kinsey gave him a look.

“I don’t think it was my idea.” She informed him. “These voices, my father’s voice…am I losing my mind? After I killed you-After I thought I killed you. I saw you. Hell, we had conversations. Maybe I’m going crazy.”

[Jack Ryder]

"Or you're evolving." Jack theorized. "I felt as if whatever Ophelia put us through... it pushed us beyond our limits, opened us up more than we allowed ourselves to. I controlled a population! You cracked a planet! Those are things we NEVER would have let ourselves do and we did it almost as casually as cracking open an egg and using telepathy to tell the kids to get their arses down for breakfast." he shook his head. "I HAVE studied you and your body in great detail in the past and there were always... things that I couldn't explain. Your mother... I can't explain it still even with her added to the mix. There's still something else some X factor I can't quantify." he ran his fingers through her hair and looked her in the eyes. "But you my glorious, amazing wife... are not crazy. And you probably heard me. We're still heavily telepathically bonded. I thought of you all the bloody time, saw versions of you, thought i saw versions of you. Although if anyone killed me I'd rather it be you than anyone else... not that I want you to suffer through it, but I'd rather my last vision before I died be of you and not some other person. Consider who the bloody hell knows what happens to a telepath's consciousness upon death. For all I know there are literally dozens of Ghost Jack's out there. Or all the Ghost Jacks are just me from different timelines and time zones. I... think we're not exactly... of this plane. Either of us. Our DNA comes from elsewhere... else when."

[Kinsey Calhoun]

“And I thought we weren’t going to involve headaches.” Kinsey teased and kissed him. “We still have four more planets to crack open for Dominus. Have they said when yet?”

[Jack Ryder]

"Not yet... I think you passing out and the mining operation took precidence... and Bellatrix coming back with another bonzo massive ship." Jack replied. "I sense that she's going to make things a bit harder for us... but as long as Dominus still has something she wants, I think she'll leave us alone. So for now... we listen to Ophelia and make the best of this and then... we're on our own and we can figure out who those voices are. Unless they talk to you again when we blow up the next world." he said with a hum. "Too dangerous to even consider any kind of push back against him, not when it's still too easy for him to wipe out the two worlds we care the most about. But..." he touched his forehead to her's ~ It will happen. We'll get our vengeance and wash our hands of this whole bloody affair.~

[Kinsey Calhoun]

“I know.” Kinsey smiled and kissed him deeply. “I love you.”

[Jack Ryder]

"I love you more than anything." Jack said as he kissed her again and held her close. "There was a reason why we found each other and really... everything we've both been through it's been like... prep for all this."

[Kinsey Calhoun]

“And we’ll survive this and them.” Kinsey said matter of fact.