*****

Disclaimer: Not mine. I'm just playing. I'll put'em back when I'm done.

Rating: PG-13

Synopsis: John is good at getting in trouble, but Aeryn is almost as good at getting him out of it again.

Author's note: Yup, this is new. Very new. Will it ever go anywhere? Don't know, to be honest. I wanted to work on it, but then I read a post somewhere of how 'everybody and their uncle' wrote too much John!torture and the idea kinda fizzled out. I'm leaving it here for ... well, someone ... to consider. If you like it, let me know and maybe ... I'll continue it. I sure won't be posting it elsewhere if there's so much resistance toward this type of story. Oh well. Technically speaking, this is a drabble.

*****

The planet was not, per se, a commerce planet, but it had food and it had parts and as such was well within the range of what they needed. Aeryn had secured a few spare parts for her prowler, had stocked up on chakan oil and was on her way back to the pod when her comm badge chirped. With a vague smile, she tapped it. "John?"

"Holy hell, but this place is as close to Ancient Greece as anything I've ever seen before." He sounded excited, 'like a kid in a candy store' as he would say. "I mean, have you seen this? What are these people? Neat-freaks?"

The smile turned into a smirk. "Where are you?" She glanced around and noted that he was right. She hadn't paid attention to it before, but this city was immensely clean, tidy, orderly. It was a bit like a command carrier.

"No frigging idea. Just wandering around, taking in the scenery. Where are you?"

"Heading back to the pod. I found everything I need. We should stock up on food stuff too before we leave," she replied and stopped at the foot of the loading ramp of the pod.

"Good to hear it, babe. This place, as great as it may be, is a little too neat for my taste. You know me. I like it grubby."

His tone, the odd accent he pulled off so well, made deeper feelings stir in her. "Well, why don't you hurry back to the pod then and ... maybe ... if you get here fast enough ..." She smirked while biting down on her lower lip and let the rest of it hang in the balance for him to interpret.

"Dammit Aeryn, don't do that to me when I'm out in public. It's getting kinda awkward. Stay where you are. I'll be right there ... if I can find my damned way. Where the hell am I?" He still sounded excited, but for different reasons now. "Ho-wow! Shit!" This was followed by a hollow-sounding thud, which instantly rang her alarm bells.

"What? John? What happened?" she demanded.

"Oh, nothing. Just your poor old human flyboy being a clutz again," he said. "Damn, these lights are bright ..."

Before he could say more, a siren started wailing so loudly, it drowned out his voice. Even where she was, she could hear it across town. "John?" she asked and wondered what the frell he had done now. Why was it that they never could go anywhere without him getting in over his head? "John?" she repeated just a microt before the siren cut off again and the comm badge exploded in static. She stared down at it for a microt, baffled, then sent a long look around the immediate area. "Frell, John, what the frell have you done now?" she muttered and broke into a run toward the part of town where the siren had sounded from.



It seemed like the folks of this Greek-lookalike city were pretty fond of their art, John mused while he tried to fight off the guards that had turned up in excessive numbers and had overpowered him in no time flat. The warning lights around the damned statue had been bright enough to make his eyes water, but the siren ... well that had been a different matter. It had nearly knocked him out, but didn't seem to affect the guards.

"Get off me," he suggested gruffly and tried to rip his arm out of one man's grip only to be hit in the small of the back with what he assumed was the butt of one of their rifles. It brought him to his knees with a grunt and after that, it took the guards mere moments to disarm and handcuff him.

Without giving him a chance to state his case or even asking him why he had done it, whatever it was, they hauled him back to his feet and took him to what looked like a palace on the outskirts of town. The palace, if possible, was even more clean and tidy than the city, and he started to draw parallels to an ice castle before he was ushered into a big hall that appeared to be some sort of throne room.

"Kneel," one of the guys holding onto him said.

"Like hell I will," he countered while still keeping his tone fairly even. Before he could raise a stink about it, someone used a rifle to hit him in the back of the knees, which unceremoniously spilled him unto his knees on the unforgiving stone floor. "Ow!" he snapped and sneered at the guy in question, but was held down by two others, which prevented him from regaining his feet.

"You will only speak when spoken to directly," the first guy stated.

"Bite me," he offered and turned his attention to the obvious ruler of this world. And it took him a second or two to regain his composure, because she looked suspiciously like a green Delvian to him.

"What is this?" she asked, her attention solely on the guy who had told him what to do.

"Sovereign, this Peacekeeper ..."

"Hey, ho-wow, common mistake, I know I look the part, but I am not a Peacekeeper," John cut him off and again tried to get up without much luck. This earned him a sharp slap over the back of the head.

"You will speak only when spoken to," head honcho snapped, then returned his attention to his sovereign. "Pardon the interruption, Sovereign," he said, his tone downright mellow now. "This Peacekeeper has destroyed the statue in Liberty Square. No doubt intentionally."

John had to bite his tongue to not jump to his own defense on that one. For once, he probably should stick to the rules and do as he was told and apparently, neat-freak-city was so neat because it was a mortal offence to litter. "Might work in D.C. as well," he muttered and was instantly slapped over the back of the head again. "Would you cut that out?" he snapped up at head honcho.

"Silence!" the Sovereign demanded angrily and finally deigned to rise from her throne. And yes, the whole damned place did remind him of an ice castle. The rear wall was nothing but arches letting in the glittering sunlight of this world, with white flowing curtains hanging from the high ceiling all the way to the floor. The throne was of the same material as the floor; highly polished stone that looked vaguely like marble. And apart from the assembled handmaidens and roughneck goons, that was all there was to look at. Spartan was the word he was looking for.

The Sovereign took the two steps down from the dais her throne was sitting on in the very center of the hall and stopped right in front of John. Then she grabbed his chin in a vicelike grip and forced him to look up at her. "What you have destroyed is a priceless statue. It is unique, irreplaceable," she said, her voice as cold as her surroundings.

"So am I," he countered and gave her a halfhearted smirk.

She continued to stare at him for a moment longer, then released her harsh grip on his chin and took a step back. "Punishment is incarceration," she stated, turned around and strode back to her throne.

"Hey, wow, can we talk about this? I'll gladly refund you what you've lost. I mean, hey, it's my fault. I'm a clutz. I bumped into the damned thing. It broke. I'm sorry about that. But I am not going to jail over a frigging statue," he exclaimed and put a little more effort into fighting off the guards and finally managed to regain his feet.

She settled herself on her throne again and eyed him coldly. "Collar him," she said, completely ignoring his words.

"What?" He barely managed to say that before the guards grabbed him and forced him onto the floor on his stomach. "What the hell is wrong with you people?" he snapped and did his best to fight them off, but with his hands cuffed behind his back and six grown men holding him down, his odds were puny at best. One of them slipped something around his neck and he heard the chink of metal against metal when it clicked shut. Apparently, whatever this thing was, it was enough to make the guards back off because they all released him as one and stepped back.

With a bit of an effort, he got back up on his knees, craned his neck for a moment and found that this thing – without question a collar but nothing as excessive as those Nebari control collars – was flexible, tight enough to touch the skin all the way around, yet not confining enough to make him feel he couldn't breathe. He had no way to see it and could only guess at its application. "Okay, you people have got to learn to listen here," he started, got one foot under him and started to rise.

What happened next was not something he had been prepared for at all. The electric shock hit him like a two ton truck and sent him sprawling onto his side, completely incapable of controlling his extremities, and if it hadn't been for the fact that the current was strong enough to lock his jaw, he would have screamed his head off in pain.



The square was quiet. People passed by, but nobody spoke and some sent furtive glances toward a pedestal sitting in the middle. Aeryn looked around, searching for but not finding any indication of what might have happened.

Concerned for obvious reasons, she tapped her comm badge again. "John?" she tried, but there was no reply. The static from before was gone. The only thing she heard was low background noise that always seemed to permeate the comms. "John?" she tried again, still with no result. "Frell." It was in situations like these, when things went bad, that she missed her former life dearly. Among the Peacekeepers, there had always been protocol for how to respond. And if there was no protocol, there was always someone higher up to make the appropriate decision on how to handle the situation. Right now, she was alone. All she had to depend on was herself, her own skills and what she had learned along the way. And nothing had ever prepared her for this.

She double-tapped the comm badge. "Pilot?"

"Yes, Aeryn."

So the comms weren't on the blink then. "Have you heard anything from John?" she asked.

"No, not recently. He is not with you?"

"No, he isn't. Perhaps you can scan communication on the planet and try to find out if anyone's talking about him?" she suggested. She knew Pilot could do that and that it might yield a fast result. At least this wasn't a Peacekeeper outpost and so far she had seen no Peacekeepers in the city.

"I shall do so immediately."

"Thank you, Pilot. I will try and find more information here," she said and shut the comm off again before sending a long look around the square. "Where the frell are you, John?" she muttered, then focused on the pedestal. It was a craft in its own right, but she had the feeling that something was missing. She would have to find out more, but the people on this world seemed opposed to Peacekeepers. They would deal with them, but giving out information was always more delicate, which meant she needed a plan. One that would actually work.



When the current cut off, it took him a good long moment to get his act together again. Since his hands were still cuffed behind his back, he was on his side and every single muscle from his neck down felt over-strained and pulled out of proportions.

The first thing he moved was his jaw. Somehow, he had the impression that his jaw would be permanently locked because of the tenseness still present there, and he was somewhat relieved to find that he could open his mouth. At this point in time, he considered that any sign of weakness would give that green-skinned bitch another excuse to fry him and he wasn't going to give her that pleasure. So to prove to her that he wasn't that easy to break, but also in an effort to convince himself of this, he rolled over on his stomach, got his knees under him and got up on them. Everything jittered, but he managed to avoid a cramp and looked up at the Sovereign with what he hoped was an appropriate amount of pissed-off-vinegar in his eyes.

And she just sat there, on her throne, and watched him with what passed for mild interest reflected in her emerald eyes. And nobody spoke.

John sniffed, cracked his neck, got one foot under him and rose. "Are you done?" he demanded a little hoarsely, directing these words to the Sovereign.

"You will speak only when spoken to," head honcho reminded him sternly and slapped him over the back of the head again.

"KEEP YOUR DAMNED HANDS OFF ME!" he roared at the guy, intending nothing more than to scare that little twit into backing down.

Head honcho was not impressed by his tone or his words, but instead raised his left arm. The movement caused his sleeve to slip down his arm and this again revealed a sort of copper bracelet with a button on the inside of the wrist. Before John could even consider what it might be, the guy pressed the button down hard with one finger, which reactivated the shock-collar and sent him crashing back to the floor in another convulsive fit.

The moment this second little torture session was over, the remaining guards grabbed him and hauled him back to his now decidedly wobbly feet and then, to his immediate surprise, uncuffed him. Head honcho grabbed his chin, thereby forcing John to look at him. "You are now the property of the Sovereign and it is her prerogative to do with you as she sees fit." That said, the guy released his chin and stepped back. "Take him away."

Under normal circumstances, he would have cracked a joke, made a comment, said anything really, but he didn't trust his voice right now and was hard pressed to keep his eyes from watering.

The guards dragged him through the palace and ended up shoving him hard into a bare room. It was fairly big and there were windows, albeit locked ones, but that was all there was. No chairs, no bunks, not even a damned mattress on the floor. And he was completely alone.

The moment the guards were gone and the door had closed behind them, he slumped against a wall and slid down it until he was sitting on the floor. "Crap," he rasped and held up his now decidedly shaky hands for visual inspection. Part of him expected to see burns on his skin, but all he saw was the light shaking. He felt weak as a newborn kitten and the first smokey fingers of concern were rising in him. But then he realized one important detail. His comm badge was still pinned to his t-shirt and that raised his spirits and made him smirk lightly. He tapped it. "Aeryn?"

Nothing answered him but static silence. He tapped it again. "Aeryn?" he tried once more with the same result. "Shit," he added under his breath, then tapped it twice. "Pilot?" Still nothing. So either the comms were jammed or his comm badge had been damaged. He was more inclined to believe the first than the last, but either way it meant he was stuck here until Aeryn figured out what had happened to him. And, considering the collar around his neck, that was not good news. "Okay," he muttered and glanced around the bare room. "I just have to avoid pissing anyone off." That would have been good advice an hour ago. Right now, it didn't amount to much, though. "At least any more than I already have," he corrected himself and sighed. "Why is nothing ever easy?"

It took him a while to regain enough of his usual zest to get up and going again, but finally he climbed back to his feet and gave the room the once over in an attempt to find a way out. Then he stopped short in the middle of the room and frowned lightly. "First things first," he muttered. As long as that collar was in place, they could bring him down. He had heard it click in place and considered it a reasonably fair assumption that if it could close, it could open. But the second his fingertips made contact with the material, the shock brought him down in one second flat and left him utterly depleted afterward. "Aw, screw this," he rasped before he passed out.



For two solardays, Aeryn had tried to find any information on what had happened to John and nobody was talking. Her initial assumption that these people didn't like Peacekeepers seemed to hold and it annoyed her. But she knew better than to jeopardize her own presence on this world by threatening anyone. She couldn't help John if she got arrested and there was no doubt in her mind that he needed help in some manner or fashion.

In Pilot's den, she paced back and forth in front of his station while she tried to determine what to do now. "Nothing on the comms?" she asked and stopped briefly to eye Pilot.

"No, Aeryn, nothing," he confirmed. "If the Commander is still on that planet, they are not talking about him."

She sighed heavily and resumed her pacing. "Nobody is talking to me. They don't like Peacekeepers. How the frell am I going to get any information out of anyone if they won't talk to me?"

"Perhaps you should approach them dressed differently?" Pilot suggested.

"If I go back to the planet and buy different clothes, they'll still think I'm a Peacekeeper," Aeryn disagreed and stopped again. The idea wasn't half bad, but it would be difficult to pull it off if she arrived in her Peacekeeper garb.

"Then why not go to one of the other worlds in this cluster?" Pilot tried. "There are five habitable worlds in this cluster, after all. Perhaps the one furthest from the main planet would be advisable?"

Aeryn stared at him for a moment, then glanced briefly up at the display showing the world below them. "That's a good idea," she agreed. "Maybe I can barter away some parts to get some more currency, too."

You have GOT to continue. What the frell is going on that a Sovreign makes a slave of John for breaking a statue? So far he is in jail and nobody is talking. What's Aeryn's plan? Where is everyone else?

Please continue, Cathy. For me???

Thanks.