This one's a quickie that sort of wrote itself between working on chapters of my D&D fic, "Unwelcome." The song "Insomniac" is by Billy Pilgrim (or, if you're into college a capella, The Virginia Gentlemen), and if you haven't heard it before, it's definitely worth a listen. Am only using half of the song, because the second verse would have been harder to incorporate into the story (and, like all things, I wanted to keep it short). This fic happens right after "Path of Sorrows" (What a wonderful episode. I can't believe I lost my tape of it) (*sob*). As always, none of the stuff below is owned by me. Except Galen. Yum. Ahem, did not just say that. Anyway . . .
Insomniac
Matheson slept.
Before his encounter earlier that day, he hadn't even connected that thing in the bubble to . . . whoever she was
God. He couldn't even remember her name.
I can see you, don't even know you
Falling into the sheets at night
Looking back, he wasn't even sure what it was about his meeting with that one rogue that made him so ashamed. Still thinking about it was painful, so damned painful. On any night but tonight, even calling her face to memory would start an ache in his chest, building in intensity until he thought his very soul would break out.
Her face. So full of anger, and energy, and life . . .
And his responses to her. Cold. Robotic. Indifferent, at best.
Some nights, he would lie awake for hours, hating himself for not acting sooner, for not seeing what was really there instead of what the Corps showed them. To some degree, he even hated himself for only being able to rescue the few that he did before the base was attacked.
Place my hands flat on my chest
I feel the heart beat back the night
But whatever the alien healer had done, it had worked. Matheson slept on, visions of rolling hyperspatial clouds dancing through his dreams.
* * *
Gideon slept.
It was such a rarity for him, uninterrupted sleep.
I've tried counting sheep and I've talked to the shepherd
And played with my pillow forever, ever,
Not a day went by that he didn't finger the edge of the plaque bearing the faces and names of his shipmates aboard the Cerberus. After its destruction, doctors back home had warned him that bouts of survivor's guilt would be imminent. They'd predicted a few weeks of symptomatic behavior.
Those weeks became months. Years.
He thought about them every night. Like a bad penny or a nervous habit, thoughts of them simply would not leave him be. Hours would go by, and he would be forced to entertain himself with mindless activities until bodily exhaustion finally overcame him and he collapsed into a dreamless slumber.
He no longer cried over them. He simply had no tears left.
He knew that as the seconds stretched out into individual lifetimes, he would never be rid of their ghosts.
I sit alone and I watch the clock
I breathe in on the tick and out on the tock
But somehow, for right now, he would be alright. He didn't know how or why, but he was sure of it. Gideon slept on, and dreamt, and for just a few hours, the crew of the Cerberus was alive again.
* * *
Galen lay in the darkness, eyes fixed on the ceiling, unable to sleep.
That leech.
That damned leech.
I can hear your bare feet on the kitchen floor
No more. He refused to think on it, on that . . . thing . . . any more.
Or on her . . .
I don't have to have these dreams no more
The trouble, of course, with vowing not to think of something is that the damned thing, whatever it is, always keeps coming back at you.
There was a nervous energy that had been shooting through his body ever since he conjured that fireball. He had not been so tormented by it since before he went to Z'ha'dum. It was screaming to be let out; destruction was in the nature of the tech, and in his own nature. Once roused, it would not go back to sleep.
Decisively, mechanically, Galen stripped off his clothes. Fists clenched, he visualized the spell for scouring. White-hot flames burst out over his skin.
And I found someone just to hold me tight
He could see Isabelle as she lay dying. My only regret would be if the fire that I see in your eyes now were to burn your soul to ash in the future. Your soul is too beautiful for that.
Gritting his teeth against the pain, Galen called down the searing heat again.
And again.
Hold the insomniac all night . . .