Chapter 70: Animosity
Snake Eyes sat beside Shana's bed and watched her.
He was confused. He had not expected to see her come out of the bathroom looking so…defeated, like she'd lost her best friend, and he'd also not expected her to start crying when she saw the photos. She'd just walked out of the bathroom, saw the photos papering her walls, and started crying.
Since it was so unusual to see her crying, he'd immediately rushed to her side, thinking maybe she'd hurt herself in the tub. But even as he'd tried to hug her, she'd stiffened and ducked away from his arms, her hands coming up in a purely defensive 'don't touch me' gesture. He'd backed off right away, confused, leaving her alone on the bed to cry until she was spent.
It had taken a while; he'd had enough time to continue papering the walls with another box of photos, until every inch was covered. Somewhere in the middle of that operation, she climbed out of bed to look at some of the photos. And they were all of her; her at Coney Island before his accident. Lots and lots and lots of pictures of her up at their cabin in the Sierra Nevadas. Photos of her at base.
He wasn't all that surprised to hear a knock at the door just as he was finishing; Shana paused in her inspection of a photo of her in front of one of the Humvees in the garage (he remembered that one; he'd walked in and seen Shana in a …'spirited discussion'…with Courtney about the mechanical parts all over the garage floor. She really was cute when she blushed) and then Shana herself reached for the doorknob and turned it.
Doc stood on the other side. At the sight of Shana standing there, he broke into a broad grin. "Shana. It's wonderful to see you up and about."
Shana looked at him for a long moment, then hesitantly brought her hands up. Thank you.
If Doc was nonplussed at the fact that Shana was now awake, aware and communicating, he didn't show it. He simply smiled and said, "I wanted to make a house call and see how you're doing. Can I come in?" Shana stepped back after another long moment and allowed him in.
He pulled over Shana's desk chair and commenced a cursory physical examination; listened to her heart, chest, lungs; took out a tiny vial and needle. "I want to see how your body's adjusting the levels of Oxytocin," he said, and Snake Eyes saw tears glitter in Shana's eyes at the mention of the drug. And then saw her have to fight not to flinch away from Doc's touch. He came over to the side of the bed, intending to hold her so Doc could finish, but at the swift movement Shana's control broke and she cringed away from them both.
Doc immediately sat back, and at a slight nod of his head, Snake Eyes stepped back too. "Shana," Doc said pleasantly, "I need to take a blood sample. I understand if this is uncomfortable, but it does need to be done. I know you got injected with a lot of needles while you were …gone…but you know me. You know I'm not going to hurt you. You know Snake Eyes isn't going to hurt you." Tears filled her eyes at that, and she nodded slowly. "Let him hold you if you can't bring yourself to stay still for this, but I have to do this, Shana, please."
And she slowly held out her arm.
She turned her face away as she saw Doc approaching her with the needle, her entire body tense; Snake Eyes, to distract her, grabbed the small album off the bedside table and put it next to her on the bed, opening it to the first picture. When he'd gone to visit Clayton in the medlabs he's been unaware that Allie walked in behind him in the middle of that, retreated silently to grab a camera, and snapped a picture of Snake Eyes holding Auggie. The sight of a picture of Snake Eyes holding a baby grabbed Shana's attention, and by the time she'd finished studying the baby's features and realized who the baby had to be, Doc was done and pressing a square of gauze to the inside of her elbow.
"Oh, yes," Doc said lightly when he saw her interest. "Liv had her baby. I swear I will never ever have any more babies in my infirmary, ever, because that boy is well on is way to having the same powerful set of lungs his father has! They named him August Alexander Abernathy—big name for a baby, but he seems to be trying to live up to it with his lungs and his impact. Alex and Courtney and Allie are taking turns trying to watch him while Liv's in a coma, but the little guy knows they aren't his mama and just howls for her for a good ten minutes after he wakes up."
And Shana's natural compassion for others took over, as Doc had known it would. What happened to Olivia? Shana signed as Doc took her right foot in his lap to check her ankles for signs of infection in the ligature marks around the limb.
"She had a rough time delivering. Everything seemed to be going well until just as August was crowning; then one of the scars she sustained after the tears healed ruptured, and with that much stress on her soft tissue, she just…tore open. She hemorrhaged badly. I had to give her massive transfusions just to keep her alive. Clayton even donated some blood for her." He'd put her right foot down and checked the left ankle, and now gently unwrapped the waterproof bandaging around her lower arms to check on the healing progress of the stitches he'd placed in her arms. Healing well, and she might not even need any tissue grafts, although she was going to be wearing long-sleeved shirts until the angry red of the scars faded.
He was re-wrapping the bandages around her wrists when they all heard a knock on the door of the room. Snake Eyes quickly assessed that everyone was decent and then went to the door, opening it.
Charlie stood there with Cam. She was upright, dressed and walking, though she looked thinner than ever, and was leaning on Charlie a bit. Charlie was supporting her, arms wrapped protectively around the thin shoulders. "We went to the medlabs looking for Doc. Cam's got this pain in her back—she says she's okay but I really wanted to get Doc to look at her." He spotted Doc right behind Snake Eyes and smiled with relief. "There you are. Can you have a look—"
He stopped speaking abruptly as Cam pushed off him, her eyes alight. "Shana," she breathed. Then, louder, "Shana!"
She—well, you couldn't call it a run, but she was definitely moving faster than she had been as she crossed the threshold into Shana's room. "Shana, oh Goddess, you're back!"
Shana rose from the bed and grabbed Cam's wrists, stopping the other woman just before Cam would have hugged her. In disbelief Snake Eyes, Doc, and Charlie watched as Shana took several rapid steps forward, pushing Cam backward as she advanced, until Cam was backed up against the hallway wall outside Shana's door. Shana then turned wordlessly, stepped back into her room and slammed the door.
Charlie stared in astonishment as Shana shoved Cam out into the hallway and slammed the door. She didn't even see she was hurting Cam, who had grimaced in pain when her mutilated back hit the wall opposite the door. The pain in her back was, apparently, eclipsed by the pain in her heart as she threw herself forward at the now-closed door, sobbing. "Shana, Shana, please, please, forgive me, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you! Shana, please!" Her balled fists pounded Shana's door weakly. "Shana, please," she sobbed helplessly as her legs gave out under her and dumped her to her knees in front of the closed door.
Charlie couldn't bear to see her like that. He bent over, gently, trying to take her arms and help her out, but she was suddenly weak, and could barely stand. Or maybe she didn't really want to; there were tears streaming down her face and she was whimpering in despair. "Oh Goddess, Charlie, I knew she was mad at me but I didn't know…I swear I didn't know…I just wanted to help her, I didn't mean to hurt her, I just wanted her to survive long enough for you to find her and bring her home…"
"Her? What about you?" he asked quietly as he gathered her up in his arms and headed for their quarters. Doc knew now that Cam needed to be looked at, and he'd be there as soon as he was done with Shana. Seeing Cam's sudden despair made him want to be angry at Shana, but he just couldn't. He knew Shana had been through a lot, she'd been in captivity longer than Cam, and Cam had gone into this willingly.
"I…gave up. I didn't think I was going to make it out. I…wasn't prepared for how hard it was going to be, Charlie, I thought it was going to be just like living with my Aunt and Uncle but this was so much worse…please don't hate me." She wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her face in his shoulder.
"Ssh. I could never hate you. Don't be silly. Come on. Let's get you back to bed, you'll feel better." He couldn't be upset with Cam either, no matter how much he wished she'd never come up with this plan. This entire fiasco had taken just as much out of her as it had Shana, and both women were hurting right now. He would just have to have faith that time would heal the rift between the two women, as he would have to have faith that time would heal their wounds, both physical, mental and emotional. "Come on. Let me get you back to bed. Doc'll be by soon to take a look." But she didn't say anything, and he wondered if she even heard him as he laid her down on her side in the bed and covered her gently.
She buried her face in the pillow and cried.
Doc didn't say anything further until he'd finished re-wrapping Shana's wrists. Then, "Shana?"
Don't say anything. Shana's sign language was forced out in angry, jerky movements. Keep her out of my sight. I never want to see her again.
"She was hurt just as badly as you were, Shana. Whatever happened that made you upset with her, she's just as much a victim of it as you were."
She had a choice. She had lots of choices. She made the wrong ones and now she just has to live with them. Well, she can do it herself. I'm done with her.
"She had choices about what?" Doc's voice was gentle, coaxing, but Shana simply turned her back on both Snake Eyes and Doc. After a moment, Doc beckoned Snake eyes out into the hall and closed the door so they could talk privately.
"What happened? Did she tell you anything that could help us figure out what the hell happened on that island?"
Snake Eyes shook his head. When I came back here last night she was running a really high fever. I took her to the bathroom to try and cool her off in the shower and she just woke up. Started signing to me. She hasn't said a word but she signs. We haven't really had a chance to talk—she got a bath last night and when she got up this morning she took another shower. And then you came in. Cam and Shana—I don't know what's going on between the two of them.
Doc said quietly, "I don't know if we'll ever know the whole story of what happened to them, there, but I'm going to go see Cam and check up on her. See if you can quiet Shana down and get her to talk to you." He started to turn away, then stopped as something occurred to him. "Oh…I saw a note that said the audio chip Cam had implanted on her scalp has been decrypted and the recordings analyzed. Maybe that'll provide a clue. Would you want to listen in when they're done decoding it?"
Snake eyes nodded emphatically. It would kill him, hearing Shana in pain, but if listening to it would help him understand what she was going through now, he'd deal. Unquestionably.
"I'll let you know." And Doc headed for Cam and Charlie's quarters.
Cam leaned against her desk this time instead of Charlie, despite his protests that he could help her. She seemed torn between wanting him to help her and wanting simply to be left alone, and Doc was alarmed. He'd been worried about Shana's fugue state before—now he was horrified at the look in Cam's eyes, a look of despair and hopelessness and defeat.
The day before she'd finally gotten out of bed and tried a few halting steps, head high, shoulders squared, as if determined to keep going. Now she seemed…smaller somehow, hunched into herself, as though she'd finally given up. And that worried Doc terribly. Her optimistic determination had been carrying her through what he'd considered to be the worst of her recovery—the first few days—and he'd been hoping that optimism would carry her through the rest of it. At the moment it looked like it might not.
"It's okay," he said to Charlie's worried look and to Cam's flinching shoulderblades. "It looks like you simply pulled a couple of stitches here on your back when you climbed into the bathtub. Nothing to really worry about since your skin's mostly all closed now. In fact, I was planning on taking the dressings off today and the stitches out maybe another couple of days. So that's what we're going to do. Go ahead and lie down on the bed."
Charlie helped ease her down on the bed. Doc watched the slow, painful process of getting Cam just to sit, and winced. He knew Shana had been through a lot, and none of them knew exactly what had happened to either one of them, but he still didn't understand Shana's anger at Cam. They'd both been prisoners and had to do what they could to survive, and Cam had clearly taken the worst of the physical punishment. The scar tissue on her torso had torn more quickly, more readily, than regular skin would have, and now he was certain she was going to need to have surgery done because she had scar tissue layered on top of scar tissue all over her back, from her shoulders to the back of her knees. She'd had some deposits of body fat before their captivity, but not much, and that was practically gone now too.
"How are you sleeping?" She shrugged. He raised an eyebrow, tried a different tack. "Are you eating well? Drinking plenty of fluids? Having any nightmares?" when he didn't get any response, he leaned forward deciding to try a direct approach. "What happened when you were on that island? Why is Shana angry with you?"
Cam stirred. "I did what I thought I had to," she whispered. "I knew she'd be mad at me but I couldn't stand to see her like that. They shot her with an overdose, and she was so hungry for it…and they couldn't keep up with the need they created so they were going to let her suffer. Until they brought me in. And I knew I could do it, and she was suffering so much that I figured the least I could do was try to help her. I knew she'd be mad but...I never thought she was going to hate me." Her voice broke on the last word and she buried her face in the pillow to hide her tears. "Please just leave me alone."
Doc stepped into the hallway with Charlie so they could talk. "She's waking with screaming nightmares maybe once or twice a night," Charlie said in answer to Doc's earlier question. "And in the morning she's so exhausted she sleeps through practically half the day. I wake her up to try and get her to eat, but she doesn't have much of an appetite. It's been mostly bread, fruit, and warm broth, mostly bland, simple foods that won't upset her stomach. I don't dare give her anything heavy—I don't want her to throw up. I can't imagine what that would do to her body.
"The slightest movement gives her pain, but I know you can't up the dose until she gains some weight, so I've been sleeping in the cot next to the bed." Doc nodded—he'd seen the folding army cot next to their bed. "She cries a lot. Not really for a reason I can see, just sometimes she just starts crying. All I can do is hold her hand and just be there for her until she goes to sleep. I've been trying to get her to talk to me about what she went through, but she refuses to talk and she's not strong enough for me to push for some of the answers I need to try and help her heal."
"Answers." Doc sighed. "I got a note earlier saying that the analysis of the audio chip is almost done, and I am going to ask Flint if you, Snake Eyes, and I could listen to it first so we can try to reconstruct what happened between them after Cam found Shana. Flint can listen to it later and decide how much of it he can tell the rest of the team, but I think it's important that the three of us sit and listen to it together so we can figure out how to handle their treatment."
"I'll be there," Charlie said. "Just let me know."
