AN: Once again I find that Goldstranger is my saviour in the review department. I'm fairly sure my fic isn't bad enough to deserve only one reader some more reviews, please? I don't know when the next update is going to be as it depends on whether my computer decides it can live without the lovely broadband it's become used to and go back to dial-up for a month.

"So how is she?" Emma asked as Adam emerged from the lab. He sighed and took a seat, waiting while Emma sat down beside him.

"Not good, not good at all." He began, frowning deeply. "The wounds on her wrists and ankles are deep and infected," She had meant her mental condition, but she knew Adam needed to get this all straight in his mind and so she let him talk. "And there's cuts all over her - but almost all of them look surgically clean. Most will heal nicely but a couple will leave scars. She's had a recent concussion that hasn't been treated. Everything's bruised, swollen, there's a few old broken bones, a couple of new ones."

"The man we saw" Emma wasn't sure how she wanted to phrase what she needed to ask.

"We were much to late to stop that I'm afraid. But it looks like he was clean - in the sense that there's no sign of STDs - and she's thankfully not pregnant." He paused.

"Adam, what are you holding back?" She pushed, turning in her seat so that she could face him.

"The metal pin that's visible at the back of her neck isn't a subdermal governor. I mean it's based on exactly the same principle, but"

"Adam, stop dancing around it and say what you mean."

"They crippled her and I'm not sure if I can right what they did." He replied a little more bluntly, a sharp edge to his words that made Emma flinch, he sighed as he brought his emotions back under control. "I'm sorry, I'm tired"

"Explain." She demanded.

"It's directly connected to her spinal cord, like the governors, but it's placed so that it compresses specific nerves, to restrict movement or her control over her movement. It's mechanical not electrical, there's no shocking-device or anything like that, it's just there to stop her moving about. I can try to remove it but I don't know how successful it will be. There's a possibility that after being compressed for so long the nerves might be damaged. There's a possibility I won't be able to get it out without doing more damage. This could cripple her permanently." He sighed. "And I'm not even sure she's still there." Emma looked up at him. "I can deal with her physical wounds, that bit is easy in comparison to finding her again, getting her back with us. I don't think she even knows who we are at the moment."

"That can't be done with machines. That just needs us and a whole lot of patience." Emma offered. Adam smiled at her softly.

"You know sometimes you would do anything just to see one thing. Today I just want her to open her eyes. Somehow it seems like it will all be better then. I just want to see her eyes. Maybe maybe I'll be able to see something there I can fix."

It was strangely noisy in the room around her. It felt odd being in such an exposed space with people and unrestrained. The others had so rarely been in the room with her more than one at a time, and now there were four people in the room with her all at once, all talking, voices raised and quieted. But not the Knife's voice. It could not have been him, her mind assured her. It was impossible. He wasn't there in the room. But still thoughts of him haunted her.

For a while two voices faded into the background, the soft voice worried, the woman's voice consoling. She found her hearing followed them instinctually, without straining she could hear them as loud outside as she could when they were by her side. The other two remained by her side, restraining without chains. They were quiet but she could sense their tension, their anger. They would be like the Fist, she knew, if they were alone. She could feel their violence there on the surface. She was scared of these people, she realised, though they had done nothing to her yet. She had come to know the three's moods, their ways. She knew what would come next and there were few surprises. She didn't know what these people were capable of, she didn't know how to keep them happy, how to avoid their anger. She was scared.

Jesse was angry, very angry. He could see that Brennan felt the same from the tension that showed all over his face. They had taken down the two people that they had found there with her, but it had been more important to get Shalimar back to Sanctuary at the time than go out on a revenge hunt. And she needed them for now. He glanced at the delicate scars that lined her exposed arms, neck and face. If he could look at them with detachment, not seeing the creamy skin and soft features underneath that was Shalimar's beauty, he could see they formed patterns, pictures on her skin. He knew from what he had seen when they had first found her - uncovered and chained to the floor - that they ran the length of her body. They were spoiled, marred here and there by bruises and swelling - obviously the work of one of the others. He was thankful of the light pyjamas they had wrapped her in and the blanket that covered her skin, still a little cold to the touch. He wondered at her reaction to Adam trying to clean out her wounds. How could something so innocent and relatively painless, compared to the other injuries he could see, become something that scared her so badly? He looked up as Adam and Emma reappeared, both looking worried. He didn't need telling that Shalimar was in a bad way. He hadn't seen her open her eyes since they rescued her and her failed attempt to escape told them that she didn't know who they were or that she was safe now. That her escape had failed at all had told them what a bad way she was in physically. But Adam would know what to do. He always did.

Adam didn't know what to do. If he tried to remove the pin when Shalimar was still in the state of mind where everything was a threat he risked allowing her to escape if the procedure worked or causing her more damage if it didn't. But it seemed sound logic that restoring her physical health would be the first step in bringing her back to them, showing her that she could trust them. He needed to sleep, he thought, scrubbing at his eyes with the back of his hand. He wished he'd been able to sleep while Shalimar had been away. It was hard to think now, that they'd thought her dead. Taken her passing as a harsh blow and moved on past it. They had abandoned her. He sighed softly and stood quiet in the doorway. He had asked Jesse and Brennan to stay where they were - one on either side of Shalimar so that she couldn't slip from the bed again - and they stood there dutifully, both of them with faces full of anger. He looked to Emma to see how she was coping with their emotional turmoil, only to find her with a similar look on her own face, eyes hard as she watched Shalimar, still shaking on the bed. Mutant X was baying for blood, revenge was high in all of their minds. Adam sighed. He was going to have to find something to keep them occupied. Shalimar needed them all nearby right now, even if she didn't know it herself. Emma looked up at his sigh, eyes soft once more.

"What ever you decide Adam, there's going to be ups and downs. We'll just have to roll with it." Adam smiled, thanking her with a nod.

"There are several things that need doing as soon as possible. I'm going to get some rest. I want you working shifts and sleeping," this at Emma, "in between. Two people in here with her at all times. Talk to her. She's there somewhere, the sooner we find her the better. When my head's a bit clearer I'll be back and we'll start working towards getting her better." They all nodded, glad to be moving in any direction, having a purpose. They sorted out a simple rota for their sleep and, under Jesse and Brennan's insistence, Emma headed to bed first. Adam was glad to see a little of their anger fade as the determination set in and was smiling as he headed to his room. Shalimar was home. It was going to take an awful lot of work to get her truly back with them, but for now he was just happy to have her home.

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