Thera slowly started to reestablish a link to her senses like dawn slowly chasing away the night. She laid quiet at first and just listened. She could hear Carlin and Kaegan's subdued voices, too far for her to know what they were saying, but their familiar tones were a comfort and beat back the panic and fear that would have otherwise been on the heels of her returning awareness.

She was sore as all hell and the hollow stillness of her abdomen was a raw wound like no other. Then Thera was panicking anyway. Where was her baby?

Thera pried open her eyes and whites and grays rushed at her. She blinked and licked her lips as she tried to figure out where she'd been taken. Not the caves, not the administrative building, nowhere she'd seen before. Then again, there was something kind of familiar about the concrete ceiling high above her but she couldn't begin to place it. Faced with locating her child it wasn't important what snippet of unformed memory had been sparked.

Thera saw a movement out of the corner of her eye and turned her head. She sighed out a breath she didn't know she was holding and smiled in relief. Jonah. He was in a chair beside her, face down-turned as he stared at his lap.

"Jonah..." Thera said faintly.

Jonah's eyes jerked up at his name, his gaze shot to her, and he grinned. "Hey, you're awake."

Thera nodded. "Where are we?"

Jonah looked around and gave a shrug. "I'm not really sure, but the people have been nice enough so far, a few details not withstanding."

"The baby?" she croaked, almost afraid to hear the answer.

Jonah's expression grew infinitely gentle and he reached down and collected something out of his lap. He shifted in his seat, lifted up a balled white blanket, and gently laid it down next to Thera within the security of her arm.

Thera looked down and her lips parted in awe. Their baby. A tiny face, all scrunched up, was tucked within the white linens.

Thera stared down at it a long time then brought up her other hand to gently touch the angelic little face. The baby made a soft sound and cracked open its eyes. Slits of colored irises, too dark to say if they were dark blue or brown, tracked without focus over Thera's distant face.

Thera could hardly believe her eyes.

"Amazing, isn't she?" Jonah asked as he slid his chair closer and propped his head on one hand which he anchored on the bed to lean in and also admire their child. For all their strife in the past few days he looked almost boundless with barely-contained glee, his energy almost palpable and buoying Thera's own flagging reserves.

Thera looked over at him when his words registered. "She?"

Jonah smiled and said, "Yep, a little girl," and reached up to brush the back of his fingers against the baby's cheek. The infant, once again peeling open her stubbornly shut eyes, tried to turn her face into his hand, her mouth open and searching.

Thera basked in the moment. Her daughter in her arms, Jonah at her side. There was little else for which she could ask.

"Where are Carlin and Kaegan?"

Jonah glanced over his shoulder then ticked his head in the general direction of his recent gaze as he answered, "Back there. We've been granted pretty much free rein in this room by the people who captured us but we haven't been allowed to leave.

"How are you feeling?"

Thera gazed down at her daughter. "Great. Well actually, a little sore, but that's nothing." Thera could suffer a little bit of discomfort for the baby she now held, especially in comparison to the pain she remembered from before. Her current aching soreness was nothing compared to the agony of giving birth.

Jonah touched Thera's arm and only then did Thera realize she'd been fixated on her child to the exclusion of all else. She looked up at Jonah and he smiled crookedly as he said, "The doctor lady here said you and the baby are both fine."

The baby made a sound again, borderline impatient and demanding, and it drew the attention of both parents.

"You think you're up for breast-feeding?" Jonah asked.

Thera felt a strange tingle course through her at the thought and she gave a bashful nod.

Jonah stood up and proceeded to pull the curtain around the bed along its runner until they were secluded behind the sheet, mercifully afforded privacy. When they were alone he turned back to Thera and the baby. By body language alone, without asking, he intended to stay, and Thera was relieved; she didn't want to be left to possibly be expected to defend the baby alone in an unknown, possibly hostile territory. She'd seen no signs of danger to them or their daughter yet, but Thera had only been awake a short time and she wasn't feeling generous enough to give their 'captors' the benefit of the doubt. Maybe with her own life she would have been more adventurous, but not with her daughter's.

Jonah gently and carefully took the baby from Thera so she could gingerly sit up and prop the pillows behind her back to give her a brace upon which to lean. The baby, safe in Jonah's arms, let out a vocal huff and he smirked down at her.

Thera recognized the food-greedy baby she'd carried for nine months in a voice she'd not heard until today. She got comfortable (as comfortable as she could get considering) and held out her arms for the baby.

Jonah handed the infant back Thera looked up at him and asked almost shyly, "Um... sit with me?"

Jonah smiled, a warm and calming smile that made Thera feel at ease despite their largely unknown circumstances, and he climbed on to the narrow bed beside Thera. He helped her unbutton her shirt (the woman doctor, with obvious foresight for this occasion, had not given Thera a pull-over shirt like everyone else but rather one that opened down the front) and once bared Thera rearranged the baby in her hold until the tiny girl was positioned directly in front of a breast. At the offer of a nipple the baby first opened her eyes and stared forward blearily and then latched on and began to suckle.

Thera gasped and Jonah looked quickly at her. "What? Does it hurt?"

Thera, eyes fixed on her nursing daughter, shook her head and said, "No, it's... well, I don't know how to explain what it feels like but it's not painful."

Jonah, relieved, looped his arm around Thera's shoulders and watched, fascinated, while his daughter fed. It was more captivating than he'd thought it would be. He watched the flicker of a small darting tongue pulse rhythmically with the suckling action and white lactate form a filmy frame and bubbles around tiny puckered lips.

Thera dropped her head against Jonah's shoulder, in such a way that she could still watch the baby, eyes still locked on her infant, and she said in a small voice that was half statement, half query, "We're going to be okay, Jonah?"

Jonah squeezed her shoulders and reached up to trace his fingers along one of the baby's exposed arms. Such soft, delicate skin. "Yeah."

And Thera believed him. "Then I feel better."


Janet Fraiser reentered the infirmary and glanced around in a preliminary check of her patients. After so long learning to accept they were gone the habit reemerged with disquieting speed and accuracy.

Dan–no, Carlin and Kaegan were sitting side by side atop one of the gurneys near the back of the room. Carlin was saying something in a low-pitched voice. Janet couldn't hear what he said but she knew that face and his expressions were unchanged even if his memory could not boast the same. There was deep concentration and consternated confusion on his face. Kaegan was facing him, her body turned on the bed and one leg folded atop the gurney while the other dangled over the edge. Both looked up when Janet came into the room but she rated noting more than a momentary silence, speculative stares, then disregard as they turned back to one another.

Janet took her eyes off them and hunted for the remainder of her quorum of patients. The curtain around Sa–around Thera's bed was drawn, Jonah suspiciously absent else wise, and Janet had two guesses where she would find all of her unaccounted for wards. She headed in the direction of the curtained off bed to see how her other three patients were faring.

Janet slowly pulled aside the sheet to peek in and Jonah and Thera both looked up at her. They were crowded on to the gurney together, side by side, shoulder to shoulder and hip to hip, while the baby was held in its mother's arms, sleeping.

Janet's attention fixed on... on Thera first and foremost.

"Good, you're awake," Janet said and stepped into the private area.

Thera looked a long time at Janet then asked, "Are you the doctor?"

Janet swallowed uncomfortably and tried not to visibly show it. "Yes, I am. My name's Janet Fraiser, I've been taking care of all of you since you were brought in.

"How long have you been up?"

Thera gave a shrug and Jonah answered, "Long enough to nurse the baby."

Janet glanced down at the contentedly dozing infant and said, "Oh, good, you needed to do that. How are you feeling? Are you in any discomfort?"

Thera shook her head.

"Are you hungry?"

Thera, instead of giving a response, looked over at Jonah then back at Janet. "If you don't mind, Doctor Fraiser," she said evenly, "what I really want is to know what happened and where exactly it is we've been brought."

Janet sagged in exhaustion at the mere thought but tried to mask her displeasure and hesitance with a nod. "I know, and now that you're awake we can start to try and figure out all the details but first I want you to let me do a few things, just to check you out." Janet glanced fleetingly at Jonah then stolidly back at Thera as she continued to say, "we had some monitoring devices hooked to you before but, um... those were..." Janet searched for a tactful word.

Jonah touched one of the bruised spots on Thera's arm and he said, "I took them off."

Thera looked up into his face then at Janet. Janet had seen that sizing-up glitter in those blue eyes before. She seemed to be assessing Janet and how much she could trust her. Janet had not been on the receiving end of that cold, analytical look in a very long time.

"All right," Thera finally relented and it felt like a step in the right direction to Janet.

Thera looked down at her baby, reluctant to part with it, then she gave in and handed it over to Jonah. Jonah got off the gurney and backed away a pace with the sleeping infant cradled against him, never out of sight and watching Janet's every move. Janet understood his watchful presence was non-negotiable. In another time Janet might have pressed her authority but it had lost hold here and she let Jonah have his way. It would probably help Thera relax to have him and the baby in her sight, anyway.

Janet pulled out her stethoscope, crossed to the bed, and went about her customary checks. She was in no great rush to finish; she had a feeling the discussion that would follow would be a very, very long one and anything but easy. It was never easy when it came to these individuals, it never had been, and Janet doubted that had changed even when so much else was turned on its head.