Against the Odds
Against all the odds, Talia Winters has come back to her… but she's not quite the Talia Susan knew.
Telepathic speech is in ~italics~
She wakes in the night. Every night.
The day after she came back she was due to report to Dr. Franklin at 0900. When she didn't show, I went to her quarters. My heart stopped when there was no answer at the door. I could just hear an indistinguishable something on the other side of the door and grew frantic as the seconds passed. Finally, heart racing, I overroad the security system and entered. There were too many emotions flying through me to categorize when I saw Talia sitting on her bed, arms wrapped tightly around her legs and face hidden behind the long blonde hair falling down across her knees, rocking back and forth. I felt terror at the sight of her so broken, yet there was a sense of relief in finding her still here, still safe—at least physically. I went to the edge of her bed and knelt before her, calling her name as I had outside her door. I could hear her muffled sob, but she didn't look up.
"Talia, look at me," I pleaded helplessly.
"Not real," she muttered. "Never real." A chill ran through me. Hadn't I had the safe fear? Hadn't I worried just moments before that I would find her quarters empty, find that she was still…gone? I reached out for her then and placed my hand against the top of her head. She jerked away as if scorched, her head snapping up and eyes boring into my with the most anguished fear and the most joyful hope I've ever seen, emotions clashing against each other.
~Susan?~her mind whispered against mine, even her psychic voice trembling with fear.
With a lifetime of suppressing my telepathic ability, I had never learned how to send thoughts, but I poured all my energy and love into screaming the thought, ~I'm here, you're safe!~ I didn't know whether my mind managed to breach the gap between us, or she simply could no longer hold out against the hope that I was real, but suddenly she had fallen against me and my arms were around her, feeling her tears soak through my shirt as the sobs coursed through her body. After a few minutes I started to pull back and felt every muscle in her body tense. I reached out and cupped her chin, promising I'd be back.
Slipping into the next room, I used my Comm link to tell the Captain that Miss Winters needed me and I would take her to MedLab later and make it into work when I could. After we disconnected I found a glass and filled it with water before returning to Talia.
"Drink," I ordered, holding the glass out to her as I sat beside her on the bed. Her brow furrowed in confusion for a moment before she reached out. Once the cool liquid reached her lips she drank hungrily, and I felt a small wave of relief that she was at least capable of this much. When the water was gone, she stood up and walked to her night stand to set down the glass with something approaching her old grace.
She turned back to me and tried to smile, but it didn't take a telepath to see she was like broken glass pieced back together, ready to shatter at any moment. I went to her and reached out my hand. She clung to it for dear life and I led her back onto the bed. I held her, stroking her hair and trying to remind myself that she wasn't going anywhere, until I finally felt her tension begin to ease.
"What happened?" I finally asked, uncertain if I was ready to hear the answer.
She was silent for so long I began to fear she wouldn't respond, but she didn't withdraw and I tried to be patient. Finally, she looked into my eyes, her gaze a silent plea, but a plea for what I didn't know. "I woke up," she murmured, her voice thick from crying, "and I was alone and I thought… And then I heard you calling, just like in my dreams, and I thought I was still trapped, and none of it was real." Talia didn't seem to notice as the tears spilled over once more. I gently wiped them away with my thumbs and cradled her face, channeling all my affection into that simple touch.
"Every night I dreamed of you," she continued softly. "I dreamed you were just out of reach and calling out to me but I could never get to you. Sometimes I'd wake to Control's cruel laugh, torturing me in my own mind. Every night I dreamed I was trapped and I woke up and it was true. Then yesterday… Yesterday I wasn't trapped anymore, and I wasn't… I could reach you again. And when I woke up I thought it was some new game of Control's, a new torture to give me back what I wanted most just so she could rip it away again." Talia clung to me tightly as she finished this speech, and I squeezed her more tightly in return. There was so much I wanted to tell her, about my own nightmares in the time she was gone, my own fears when I woke that morning, my own desire to never lose her again. There was so much to say, and none of the words to say any of it, so I simply held her.
That night I had her stay with me. She woke with a whimper, and in the dark she didn't believe it was me until my lips found hers and I kissed her gently, drawing her back to the present. She cried as she kissed me, but in the morning she smiled and laughed and teased.
After a week or two passed, I stopped inviting her to my quarters. I would meet her for dinner each evening or come home to find her there each night, and every time she saw me a smile bloomed and lit up her whole face, and each night we fell asleep in each other's arms, no invitations needed.
Once, I had a mission for three days. I came back to find her in bed, middle of the afternoon, clinging to my jacket with her eyes tight shut. Her head was on my pillow and it was still wet with the tears she could no longer cry. She had lost 5lbs in 3 days; I still don't know when she'd last had water, I was too frightened to ask. Her body and her mind were consuming themselves from the inside out. When my arms wrapped around her, painfully aware of how thin she had become, she jerked away, fear rolling off her in waves.
"Talia," I murmured soothingly, "it's me sweetheart. I came home to you." Her wild eyes stared at me in confusion. ~Home?~ "Home," I promised as I once again wrapped her up in my embrace. When a little life had returned to her eyes, I got her to drink and eat a bowl of soup. By the end of the day I even got a smile out of her. But that was the last time I went on a mission over night.
She wakes in the night. Every night.
The cool, collected, detached telepath I first new is gone. Talia Winters came back, but not the Talia I knew. Not the Talia who never showed fear or grief, who was patient and caring to a fault. There are moments when I still see the strong, brave, stubborn woman I first loved. And there are moments where I can't find any trace of her inside the terrified shell that clings to me. Every night the nightmares take her away from me again. Sometimes I convince myself it's getting easier to bring her back, but it's never easy. There is little peace in this life, for either of us, but there is love. Each time she comes back to me, each time her body calms and stills, and she pulls back and looks at me with that mixture of gratitude and embarrassment and unabiding love, I hold her just a little bit tighter and thank God that against all the odds she's come home to me.
She wakes in the night. Every night. And every night I'm there to hold her, to remind her that she's safe, and free, and loved. To remind her that nothing will ever again keep us apart.