Adam stopped short in the doorway to the lab. He was feeling better even after only a few hours of sleep. Everything was feeling a little more solid, the haze of bone-weariness fading as the world reformed. He found all the inhabitants of the lab asleep as he entered, Jesse leant uncomfortably back in the chair, Emma curled into a ball beside the mattress - Shalimar's hand still tight in hers - and Brennan, returned after a short sleep, laid out at the end of the mattress. Shalimar had shifted during the night, now tight against the two walls at her back, only the arm whose hand was held tight in Emma's extending out from her body, all other limbs tucked tightly into herself. He thought about the kind of effort that must have taken with the pin still tight in her neck, restricting all attempts at movement. How frustrating it must have been for her, subjected to who knows what horrors with no chance to lash out except in her own mind. Shalimar stirred as he took another step into the room. She didn't open her eyes - his moment of hope was quenched - but she was somehow visibly awake and completely aware.
"Good morning." He murmured, moving to the console - stepping carefully over Brennan - to reopen the scans from the previous night. They didn't look any more encouraging in the fresh light of the new day.
"Well then, lets have a look at this." Going over the scans little by little he outlined the small things that he could do, muttering as much to himself as to the feral as he did so.
The small flesh wounds which he could speed up the healing of, the concussion which might need a few scans to ensure no long-term damage. The more thorough scans would need her conscious, those might have to wait... A broken wrist - from the manacles with which they had chained her to the floor no doubt - that might require plaster to make sure it set straight. Her left unfortunately, as she was left handed. Her desperate thinness, and obvious malnutrition. When he was sure he had covered everything he could find that he could do something about he turned his attentions to the device. He had taken a few rough scans for the computer to process the previous night, but they weren't really enough to work with. He looked over at Shalimar on the new bed that had been set up for her. It was a sensible idea, and safer too, but it did mean he couldn't scan her until everyone else was awake. She was effectively surrounded, with Jesse guarding the door, Emma at her only exposed side and Brennan at her feet. Adam wondered if the protective formation was intentional. He could still see the tension in her, the only thing alerting him that she was awake.
Resigning himself to the scans he had, Adam took a seat and began to think.
She had woken at the Soft Voice's footsteps. Momentarily disoriented she had remembered a time when such things hadn't been unusual - waking amongst slumbering friends. She could hear the sleep-filled breathing of all three of those around her and she realised that she had to have slept through the Sharp Voice's return. Thoughts and memories of old dreams were swept to one side in momentary panic at this. How could she have slept through his entrance? She had slept through much after the Fist had hit her, but that was days ago now, maybe weeks. Her mind was hazed and the worry faded a little as she realised that still she was unbound and warm, protected. Her brief slumber had left her feeling more tired than she had before as her body gave into its fatigue, adrenaline and fear no longer enough to sustain her. She followed the Soft Voice's progress around the room and heard him take a seat. Satisfied that he didn't seem to pose her any immediate threat she allowed the soft warmth to overtake her once more and slipped back into oblivion.
Brennan awoke slowly, taking a moment to remember his move back into the lab when he found himself unable to sleep with the knowledge that Shalimar was so close and yet still not with them. After an hour of unprofitable rest he had returned to the lab to find Emma asleep and Jesse watching over the two of them with a smile on his face. Taking a seat at the foot of the mattress he had taken Jesse's post in watching over them, acknowledging Jesse's own tiredness and allowing him rest. He hadn't intended to fall asleep himself.
Sitting up slowly he glanced around at the shuffle of papers and found Adam close by. He offered a silent smile in acknowledgement and continued sorting through the file he had just retrieved from the drawer. Standing as quietly as he could Brennan headed out into the kitchen for breakfast.
Jesse woke moments later to the smell of coffee brewing and, with Adam's nod of consent stretched and headed out of the small room himself. Adam paused a moment in his research and looked back down on Shalimar and Emma where they lay. The psionic had been loaded with sedatives over the last few weeks as the dreams that haunted her became worse and worse, making her almost physically ill in the waking world. But now it seemed she might have been right, that Shalimar had indeed been contacting her, connecting with her. Or at the very least her subconscious mind was reaching out to her in sleep and finding her. At least with Shalimar nearby and sleeping too she would have time to succumb to the drug's affects and for a time at least sleep with only her self for company.
Brennan reappeared in the doorway with a steaming mug and placed it down beside Adam.
"Thought you might need this." He smiled softly.
"Do you think you could carry Emma through to her own room? She can't be comfortable sleeping like that and I think she's going to be down for a while."
"Of course." He replied, quickly moving to do that, separating their two hands gently, trying not to wake either of them, and lifting the red head effortlessly to carry her out to her room.
Alone again in the quiet of the lab, Adam wondered if the soundness of Shalimar's sleep was anything to do with knowing - even subconsciously - that she was home and safe. The tension that they had seen in her since she had arrived back was stilled in sleep, the bruises and scars on her face not so noticeable with the blanket pulled up close around her, placing her in shadow. If he looked without thinking it was possible to imagine that she had never left, that they had never thought her dead. Never abandoned her to the hands of those men.
But then the eyes saw the position she took, shaping her body to the smallest it could be in the corner of the room. One arm a lifeline that had fed back to Emma. Everything else pulled in tight and defensive.
No. Not Shalimar at all.