Chapter 14:A Troubled Past

After having Lorne take Edana back to her room Carson examined the cat-scans he had just taken. It seems there is slightly more activity through out the whole brain, while the bright isolated patch that shown on the first scan was getting smaller. While he really had no idea what exactly was going on, he had a feeling the answers lied in the encrypted database. What ever happened in that lab was bad, and Carson couldn't help but think the Ancients were trying to work out some kind of mental attack on the Wraith. This of course, to him, meant that she was probably going to degrade and end up in a coma, or worse. After reporting to Weir, Carson thought it best for Lorne and Alexa to know, so he walked himself down to her quarters. He knocked before entering, which was good because it gave Lorne a moment to pop out of the bed on which they had been cuddling. Carson explained the details to them both and took notice that Lorne seemed much more un-eased by the information than Alexa. He gave her a concerned look.

"I don't believe it," Edana spoke. "I don't think the Ancients would have gone that far. Besides, why would they leave all of that behind for the Wraith to find?"

"Well I believe that is the reason for the encryption, so even if they found it, it would be of no use," Carson theorized. "Are you alright Major?"

Lorne wiped the concern from his face, "Yeah, Doc, that's a good thought. Guess we better keep our fingers crossed that McKay and Zelenka can figure it out. Um, yeah, its getting late, I think we just all need some sleep."

"Aye," the Scotsman agreed and turned to Edana. "Especially you my dear, I want you in bed as much as possible, or at least taking it easy and relaxing until we figured this out. If this is some sort of attack on the brain there's no telling what might happen." He turned to Lorne, "And I trust you'll keep a close eye on her?" The Major nodded. "Alright, well hopefully we'll have something solid by the end of tomorrow. Good-night," and with that Carson took his leave.

"Finally," Edana sighed. "I thought he was never gonna leave. Now, where were we?" She smiled.

Lorne shook his head, "Lexa this is serious, you… You could be dieing." He sat next to her on the bed. "I just got you back. I can't lose you again." He fought back tears, and it was then that Edana realized how much he cared, and that he really loved Alexa.

She kissed him gently and then whispered, "I'm not going anywhere," as they settled back into their embrace, and soon fell asleep. The realization of how strong Lorne's feelings were caused Edana to dream about her past. Several memories of before she was an astral being flashed through her mind; many of them of her and a handsome young man, both very happy, and in love. Then they turned to the experiments. She found she had the ability to astral project and offered to be studied, in hopes they could all learn the ability, and use it to fight the Wraith. Edana used to be an Ancient. But the men in charge gave her drugs to make her astral for longer, with out her permission. Her astral self could handle it, but her body could not. Her brain and heart had shut down from lack of a conscious, and she couldn't return to it. In essence she was alive, but with out a body, her life was gone. She hated them for what they had done and turned to revenge. She possessed them to kill their consciousness and then left their bodies as they had left hers. They ruined her life, prevented her from marrying her fiancé, and with her being so powerful it turned her cold.

Alexa could see all of this since she had a residence in her brain, and felt sorry for Edana. She was young, in love, with her whole life ahead of her, and it was taken away, just like that. While Alexa did feel for her, she still wasn't going to give up on evicting Edana from her body. She wanted to live out her life, with her soul-mate. Wait, that's it, the soul. Alexa had an epiphany. The eyes are the window to the soul. If Marc could look into my eyes filled with compassion and love, looking to see me! Then maybe it would be enough to bring me to the surface, allow me momentary control, get him a message. Alexa had finally found it, the plan she'd been searching for. Now she just had to hope that something would happen to make Marc look at her endearingly.

After some time Lorne could no longer sleep so he took a seat on the couch and watched her toss and turn for the rest of the night. As he finally started to fall asleep at about 0800, he was startled by a knock at the door. Half asleep he walked over to see who it was, and to his surprise it was McKay.

McKay was also surprised. "Oh Major, didn't expect to find you here. Um, is Madison around?"

Lorne motioned to the bed where Edana was finally sleeping peacefully. "She's asleep. What did you need?"

"Well, um. Why are you here?" McKay asked receiving only a stare in reply. "Uh, right, well uh, Radek and I may have figured out the first entry in the database, but it's still rather screwy in context. And Madison offered her help, so I figured she could take a look at it, see if she could make anything of it. If we're right about the translation then it won't take long to divvy up a program to automatically decipher the rest." McKay was most definitely on a caffeine high.

"Yesterday you didn't want her help. What changed your mind," Lorne questioned.

"Um, yeah. Well I've talked with Beckett and he's told me what's going on with her, and it could also be the 7 cups of coffee I've had this morning," McKay answered anxiously.

"Right, well when she wakes up I'll let her know. Why don't you keep working at it in the mean time, see if you can't get anything else deciphered." Lorne ushered McKay out the door. He turned back to Edana, smiled, and then lied down next to her to try to get some sleep.