Mosaic
Author: ShaViva
Rating: T+
Season: season 4, between Reunion and Doppelganger
Summary: What is it that initially draws your attention to another person? What is it that helps you realise your place? For Evan and Jennifer the answers to those questions come at almost too high a price.
Classifications: Drama/Romance
Pairings: Evan Lorne/Jennifer Keller pre-ship/ship
Key warnings: Implied character death; investigation of alleged sexual assault
Other warnings: Unbeta'd – errors minimized as best I can but some minor ones will probably creep in.
Spoilers for: HUGE honking spoilers for the SGA audio drama Impressions, narrated by Kavan Smith. General spoilers for SGA up to the beginning of season 4, and in particular Sunday, First Strike, Adrift, and Lifeline.
Acknowledgements: I used Gateworld transcripts to check details here and there. Researched many details for this as well – I'll mention sources at the end of the chapters they apply to.
Disclaimer: I am unfortunately not associated in any way with the creators, owners, or producers of Stargate or any of its media franchises, which is obvious because one, SGA would still be on and two, Lorne would be there ALL the time! All publicly recognizable characters, settings, equipment, etc are the property of whoever owns them. Any original characters, plot, settings, and anything else I made up are the property of me, the author. No copyright infringement is intended.
Copyright (c) 2011 ShaViva
Authors Note:
If you haven't listened to the SGA audio drama Impressions and you have some inclination to do so in the future, then you might want to reconsider reading this. The story contains HUGE, 'spoil the ending' SPOILERS – seriously, I will ruin it for you if you read this and then listen to Impressions for the first time later. This starts as a tag to Impressions and I do reference the key events that happen during the audio drama. Of course, if you haven't listened to Impressions and don't think you will but always wondered what it was about, this is the story for you!
As many of you know, I've listened to Impressions a time or two … all right, a LOT. Every time I do, new things get me thinking. This time it was a scene where Lorne comments that everyone gives the same response when he asks them what something he painted makes them feel. At the same time I was thinking about Jennifer – she goes from wanting to be replaced as CMO at the beginning of First Strike to piping up with the answers in Doppelganger, just three episodes later. How did that happen? These combined musings spawned this story. Note that if there are lines that sound VERY familiar to you, they're deliberate – a 'shout out' to my fellow Impressions fans ;)
Finally, this is all written, so there shouldn't be major posting delays – probably won't post over the weekends but otherwise will try to keep this one moving quickly.
Chapter 1: Sadness
"There is no grief like the grief that does not speak"
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
"Major Lorne!"
Jennifer Keller stared at the balcony Major Lorne had just disappeared over, her face twisted with horror and disbelief, the echo of Doctor Heightmeyer's anguished cry still pounding in her ears.
For a moment it was as though everything froze – even amidst the chaos of the city bucking and tilting in the water like a restrained prisoner trying to escape. It wasn't the first incident – over the past two days they'd suffered progressively more serious problems with Atlantis, starting with a city wide power surge and ending with the current instability in the structure itself. The city had literally thrown itself from side to side, lurching up and down, like there was a thorn in its side it was trying to dislodge.
It took a few moments for the city to settle, during which it was impossible for any of those present in Kate's office to get to their feet. As soon as it seemed the current 'fit' was over, Jennifer and Kate both stood and rushed to the balcony, grabbing the railing as they looked below.
Swallowing hard, Jennifer quickly turned away from the sight of metal so far beneath them. Kate's office was really high, with nothing between her balcony and the floor of the city at sea level. It was a long way down. Jenn couldn't see the Major's body from so far away but her brain supplied images sufficient to have her tamping down on a wave of nausea.
There was no way anyone could have survived that fall.
"Oh God," she muttered weakly. They'd just lost the city's second in command and it was her fault. She should have known something was wrong when he'd come to the infirmary the previous day.
Even before Carson's death Jennifer could have counted on one hand the number of times the Major visited the infirmary outside of post mission check-ups. And yet he'd come in yesterday. He'd been acting strangely too – Jenn was well aware that to the Major she had been mostly invisible, a condition that hadn't changed much after she'd been forced to take over as CMO. He wasn't invisible to her. She'd be embarrassed if anyone knew just how much time she spent 'noticing' Evan Lorne – in the Mess with his team, in the Gateroom before and after missions, leading training … doing security rounds. She'd noticed many things about him. The obvious, like how good looking he was, the compelling blue grey of his eyes, the dimples that flashed into view on the rare occasions when he laughed outright, the muscles in his forearms. Many details struck her but they were accompanied by general impressions too. His strength. His control. How capable he seemed. How nice he was to everyone. He never had a harsh word, never spoke in anger, but more than that, he had a way of speaking that put even the most nervous person at ease.
And yet in the infirmary with her yesterday he'd been abrupt, impatient even as he's revealed that he'd felt dizzy and had fallen to the ground – he'd been sullen and cranky and frankly a bit of a jerk. She should have realised that meant something! Instead she'd written off his behaviour as well as the mild elevation of activity around his hippocampus as nothing more than stress. Carson would have insisted the Major stay for more tests – and for Carson Major Lorne would probably have agreed. Then they'd have found whatever the Major's problem was before he'd been thrown off a balcony to his death.
She couldn't hold back the moan of despair that gripped her. It wasn't like she'd expected to ever be anything but the doctor who replaced his friend to Major Lorne. Still, she felt the loss of something precious. The grief overwhelmed her – she felt suffocated within the confines of her hazmat suit. With quick, almost jerking movements she ripped off the gloves and then the helmet and dropped them to the ground, unzipping the suit and just as quickly removing it to join the pile of discarded protective clothing. A cool breeze greeted her, moved over her face almost caressingly, but it didn't take away that feeling that there was no longer enough air, that the world had just gotten smaller.
"Jennifer?" Kate put a hand to Jenn's shoulder in concern.
"I'm so sorry Kate," Jennifer met her friend's eyes guiltily. "Major Lorne came to the infirmary yesterday. I examined him but there wasn't anything to indicate a serious problem. I thought it was stress – I put a note on his file recommending he come and see you. That – what we came in on – that wasn't stress. I missed something crucial." She glanced down at the medical scanner she held, her emotions dipping even more when she realised what the readings were telling her. "His hormone levels are all over the place," she admitted weakly, looking to Kate again. "How could I have missed that?"
"You didn't," Kate said bracingly, putting an arm around Jennifer and leading her back into her office.
The room was a mess – chairs knocked over, some thrown far enough that they rested upside-down against the wall. Jennifer's emergency medical team were still there – their red hazmat suits looking alien in the confines of the psychiatrist's office. As soon as they saw both doctors return the team seemed to wake up, moving to help right the furniture before Jennifer told them to return to the infirmary in case they were needed elsewhere. The city had shaken them all and it was likely there would be minor injuries from all around Atlantis.
Once they were alone, Kate took her customary seat and motioned for Jennifer to sit across from her.
"What happened before we got here?" Jennifer felt compelled to ask. Nothing was going to assuage her guilt. She just … needed to know.
"Major Lorne seemed fine at first," Kate began. "He was clearly troubled but at the same time he was coherent, logical in his explanations – he didn't give me any cause to suspect there was anything physically wrong with him."
"And then?"
"And then the alarms went off and it was like Major Lorne was connected to them in some way," Kate's face paled as she relived the scene in her mind. "He went rigid, like thousands of volts of electricity were going through him." She looked down at her clenched hands. "He stared at me but I don't think he could see me – what he could see was more horrific than anything he'd ever seen before but he couldn't look away. His eyes were wide open and then he squeezed them closed so tightly tears came out, only they weren't tears, they were blood. Then he began to spasm. Blood seeped from his ears and nose ... from his mouth too." She met Jennifer's anguished gaze with her own. "I thought he was going to die right there, in the chair across from me. I've never seen anything like it Jennifer."
"And that's when you called the infirmary," Jennifer's tone was low as she pushed back her personal feelings and tried to consider what Kate had shared from a medical point of view. No wonder Kate called in a full hazmat team – she'd feared some kind of haemorrhagic disease. "I've never come across a case with this particular set of symptoms. The dizziness and the additional activity in the hippocampus yesterday could indicate some kind of brain condition but that wouldn't cause raised hormone levels or the behavioural changes we saw in the Major, not so quickly. A pathogen or even something as simple as a vitamin K deficiency might explain the bleeding but the sudden onset from a completely normal state is extreme, even for the most serious cases. His apparent recovery from that state doesn't fit either."
"He talked about some paintings he'd done," Kate offered the detail with a frown, doctor patient confidentiality put aside because Lorne was gone and they still might have some kind of biohazard threat to deal with. "One before he went to see you yesterday and the rest overnight, in his sleep. He had no memory of creating any of them – that's what prompted him to come and see me this morning."
"Memory lapses are consistent with neurologic syncope – if the electrical discharges in the Major's brain were disordered, he would lose consciousness and awaken disorientated or confused," Jennifer frowned at the addition of another symptom that just didn't fit. "Somnambulism isn't unusual either but undertaking such complex tasks while asleep is rare. I don't know of any kind of virus or pathogen that would cause someone to do that."
"Do you think it could be contagious?" Kate asked. Both were aware they were on a new planet, untried and untested. It was impossible to know if there was anything new that would threaten their people. The ocean surrounding the city and the distance to the mainland should provide some level of protection from native illnesses but there were no guarantees.
"No one else has presented to the infirmary with anything like this and with the other symptoms it seems unlikely but … I don't know," Jennifer replied. "I'll consult the ancient database, see if there are cases documented with similar symptoms there." She pushed herself to her feet, feeling decades older than she'd been when she got up that morning.
"And I'll go and look at these paintings," Kate offered. "Maybe there's a clue in them."
"Good idea," Jennifer agreed. She hesitated a moment and then continued. "I'll report what happened to Colonel Sheppard." Colonel Carter had gone off world with Doctor McKay earlier that day and John was in charge until she returned.
"I could -," Kate began.
"No," Jennifer interrupted. "I missed something yesterday Kate, and Major Lorne paid the price. It's my responsibility to inform the Colonel." She didn't add that she had every intention of stepping down as CMO while she was there – she wasn't up to the demands of the job, had never wanted to take it on in the first place, not permanently. What happened to Major Lorne proved that her instincts had been correct.
"Jennifer, it wasn't your fault," Kate insisted. "Go back and look at the scans you took yesterday and compare them with the ones you just got. You'll see."
"Maybe," Jennifer allowed, not convinced. Giving Kate a forced smile she quickly left her friend's office, dreading what she had to do next.
Authors Note:
Since I'm not a doctor and have no medical training at all I researched Lorne's symptoms, and in particular causes of bleeding like he had (from wikipedia) and non epileptic seizures (from www dot epilepsysociety dot org dot uk).
Robert Plutchik created a wheel of emotions in 1980 which consisted of 8 basic emotions - I used these to form the basis for each chapter of the story, with the addition of a set of secondary emotions added to the simple model when I worked out I needed a lot more than eight chapters (source also wikipedia).
Thanks for reading!