I don't know what is happening to me
Or if I'll die, 'cause I just never sleep

You awoke into my night
You could see the madness in my eyes

I've lost control, please save me from myself

- IAMX - Insomnia -

Time was meaningless to Lorna. Or rather, the passage of it was. The past meant nothing, and the future was something to be feared. What new hell would she see? And there were so many she'd gotten a glimpse into. Her mother's death. DeWitt, covered in beetles. Sebastian, shot, stabbed, burned even, one time. Counting all the things she had seen would have taken days, months. Who knew anymore.

He and Jim spent far more time together during the next few weeks than he thought either of them would have anticipated. He still worked long hours trying to track down Lorna, but when he needed a break he frequently found himself in Jim's company. Sometimes in more than that.

It wasn't until two weeks later that he finally found it. One memo, among thousands sent that day. One little note that gave him everything.

One complaint about ethics.

If he'd been softer, the details would have turned his stomach. As it was, he was out the door with his team in less than ten minutes.

Lorna was in the midst of a nightmare, or a hallucination - fuck, she wasn't sure which anymore. All she knew was that the thing crouched on the end of her bed looked like it was going to kill her. She took shallow breaths, staring at it with wide, bloodshot eyes, fear thrumming through her every heartbeat. Don't move, don't move, don't move...

It wasn't a high security building. Its strength was its secrecy, not its impregnability. It took them all of twenty minutes to break into the facility, and another five minutes to figure out where Harrison was. When he opened the door, she was staring at the end of the bed like her life depended on it.

"Harrison..."

She flinched, but she didn't look away from the creature poised over her feet, staring with terror at its gray, clammy skin, peeling in some places. She avoided its eyes. She was too afraid to see them. She knew they would be looking straight back at her.

He walked forward slowly, keeping careful eyes on her as he approached and stepped into the space that she was staring at. "Lorna. Look at me."

He clipped into the creature like a bad video game, and then it flickered, once, twice, and was gone. Her eyes dragged up to his face. Some rusty gear in her head shuddered into movement. He's... real. His hair is different. The hallucinations had all been off a template, like a scene had been drawn over the cardboard figures before they'd been given life. Change... change meant that he was in front of her. He was here. She burst into tears.

"Okay, okay, hey," he said, kneeling down on the bed and scooping her into his arms quickly, tucking her into his chest. She was so damn small, and thin...

"Get a damned doctor in here, for christ's sake," he shouted at the door.

She covered her face as soon as he wrenched her free of the restraints, her arms creaking with the movement, sobs still wracking her frame. He was so warm. She'd forgotten what that felt like, to be warm.

The medic on the team trotted in a moment later, a kit tucked under his arm. "What do you know so far about what was done to her?" He asked, trying to get a good look at her. It was hard; she was a bit engulfed by Moran.

"How the fuck am I supposed to know?" he snarled. "She doesn't have any marks, other than bedsores and marks from the restraints. There was an IV in her arm, no idea what the hell that was pumping into her." He relented his grip just a little to let the medic get a closer look, still keeping her close.

He gave her the best looking over he could under the circumstances, but after a minute he stepped back, shaking his head. "There's nothing I can treat here. Just have someone stay with her, watch her, make sure she's eating and all that. My guess is that they were putting her through extreme isolation and sensory deprivation. It drives people mad," he sighed, picking his kit back up.

She was slowly starting to quiet, mostly because it hurt to cry hard. She curled weak fingers into his shirt, pressed into his side. "Take me home," she requested, in a quiet, hoarse voice. "Please."

He didn't argue, just stood with her in his arms, heading out of the white, featureless room for the exit. There were sirens in the distance, but by the time they got here, he and his team would be long gone.

"I'm right here," he said quietly. "And I'm not going anywhere."

"I didn't think you were real. You came in and I didn't think you were real," she rasped, clutching onto him tighter, though that was startlingly difficult. She took a shuddering breath. "How long was I in there?"

"Just over three weeks," he said quietly as they loaded into the van, her still in his arms. "We just found you by chance... I was looking and looking..." He took a breath, shook his head and held her tighter.

The armed squad did their best not to stare, but it was difficult, so they ended up taking turns. They'd known Harrison and Moran were involved, but not that involved.

Lorna was oblivious to their bewilderment, soaking in his warmth, trying not to cry again. It was over. He was alive, and he'd rescued her from that awful room, and she was so relieved she was shaking. Perhaps that was her body reminding her that without an IV she was about a centimeter away from starving to death. "I'm so relieved to see you. The real you," she whispered.

"Right back at you," he said quietly, ignoring the stares of his team. They would know enough not to mention it, and if they didn't, he would deal with it later. Violently.

He rubbed her back slowly over the course of the car ride. He could feel her vertebrae, every one of her ribs, and it was a twist of the knife that this wasn't the first time she'd been like this.

You need to get better at your job, Moran. You're a bodyguard for fuck's sake.

She fell asleep in his arms, a sense of safety that had eluded her for the past three weeks finally soothing her mind enough that she could drift off.

The first place he went was the medical center, but he had no interest in keeping her there. It was too white, too sterile, and she fucking hated it. He had them look her over and got a bag full of nutrition supplements to start working her back towards food, and then he carried her up to his apartment, settled her into his bed, and climbed in next to her.

She woke only maybe four hours later. Her sleep schedule had been thrown completely out of whack in that room - four hours felt like a luxury. When she drifted back into consciousness she was quietly pleased to discover she knew exactly where she was. It probably helped that she had never once felt warm, strapped to that table, and now she was curled up with the warmest person she knew. She let out a long breath into his chest. It felt so good to be out of there.

He felt her stir, and smiled just a little. "Hey there," he rumbled quietly as she burrowed closer. "How are you feeling?"

"Not great," she sighed, though just hearing him speak - the real him - was more of a relief than she could have expected. "Christ, it feels good to be able to move..."

He nodded just a little, rubbing her back gently. "Your muscles are pretty atrophied... We'll work on that once we get you eating."

She nodded, a shuddering breath leaving her. Mentally, she was shaken. How many times had she seen him die, now? Die, or tortured, or having left her? "How did you find me?"

"Some idiot... some kind idiot I suppose... decided that what they were doing to you was unethical and reported it to another department. I intercepted the email and it gave us what we needed," he said quietly. He sat up. "I need to give you some nutrition supplements and some water, okay?"

She nodded, and swallowed, experimentally. She hadn't done much with her mouth besides scream for weeks. She didn't even attempt sitting up.

He sat up, and returned a moment later with a small glass of water, and some pills. "Here," he said gently, reaching out to help prop her up against his chest a little as he sat. "Take it really slowly, alright?"

"Okay," she agreed in a whisper, hating that it was necessary to treat her like a fragile piece of glass. She downed one with a tiny sip of water. It immediately soothed an ache she hadn't even noticed was there, though the feeling of the water hitting her empty stomach was uncomfortable. She took his words to heart and rested the glass against her leg. "At least no new scars, right?"

"Yeah, that's true," he said, handing her a pill. "I have some nutrition supplements. Take them one at a time with a little water. We'll get your stomach used to things again. Tomorrow we'll try oatmeal."

"Apple cinnamon, if you can manage it," she sighed, taking the next pill with a small grimace. She hated taking pills at the best of times. She was silent for a few minutes, just taking what he gave her. Then she cleared her throat a little. "I'm glad you're alive. I didn't know."

"Why don't we wait on the spices until we see how you do with it plain," he said calmly. He watched closely as she took the pills, in case she had trouble, but she seemed to handle it alright, and by the time she was done, about half the water was gone as well. He took the glass and set it aside. "Me, too... Things are fine here. Jim is..." he trailed off, suddenly unwilling to broach that topic. "...happy with this situation, I think. I'm glad you're alive, too."

She was too exhausted to notice his shift in that sentence, her eyes slowly wandering around the room, re-familiarizing herself with the place. It was mostly the same, except for an empty, expensive bottle of what used to be bourbon on the dresser. She didn't recognize it, even though she was usually the one who bought the liquor. "I don't even know what this situation is," she snorted softly, turning herself with a little effort so she was on her side, cheek pillowed on his chest. How sweet it was to relieve the pain in her back.

"Neither do I," he admitted quietly. "Eventually I'm going to have to go report to Jim, but I'll try to wait until you fall asleep again."

"You shouldn't have to wait too long. Now that there's nothing keeping me awake I expect I'll pass out in the next half hour," she murmured, listening to his heartbeat. It was a strange comfort to her. "I'll be okay by myself. I can move. That's enough."

He pushed a hand through her limp, greasy hair gently. "How's your brain?" he asked quietly.

"Weird, mostly..." she muttered, then sighed, eyes falling shut. "I'm not sure about some things, memory wise. Whether or not I made those up, in the delusions. But I don't know how much of the trauma is going to linger. Will I see something that will put me back in one of those nightmares? I don't know. As far as torture goes, I've had worse nightmare fuel."

He nodded a little. "Good, I'm glad," he mumbled. He was quiet for a while. "I'm sorry you were there for so long..."

"It's not your fault," she shook her head a little, sluggishly. She was tired as hell. "Nothing you could have done but wait for that memo."

He nodded a little. "I'm glad that you're back."

"I'm glad to be back," she yawned, half into his shirt. She was slowly rotating onto her stomach through a slow period of fidgeting. "That bed fucking sucked. This one has you, and sheets, and lights that turn off..."

"Were you alone the whole time?" he asked quietly, brushing his hand through her hair again.

"They held me in a... kinda waiting room, for a few days. But after they strapped me down to that bed, yeah. I never saw anybody. Real."

He frowned. "There weren't any hallucinogens in your system..." he murmured. "The isolation?'

She gave a weak shrug. "I don't know. Maybe. That room... nothing in it ever changed. No noise, no movement. And I couldn't do anything. Couldn't even itch. I think it just got to me."

"Fuck knows that you handled it better than I would have," he said gently, smiling a little though the topic was dark.

"I don't know about that. It was different. I could see around me. And had I been able to move, I would have spent more time trying to break the two-way mirror than anchoring myself down by hurting myself," she sighed, wrapping an arm around him.

"Precisely," he said wryly. "You didn't go batshit insane."

"I suppose I won't argue that," she sighed, letting her eyes close.

He nodded just a little. He rubbed her back gently, careful to avoid places where he knew there were bedsores. "Tomorrow you're going to need to go to the infirmary for a real evaluation."

"Other than taking blood work, I don't know what you expect them to evaluate," she sighed. "Physically, I'm just malnourished and weak. And I'm not doing a psych evaluation. Knowing Jim, they will ask way more questions than I want to answer, just so he knows what they were doing. I don't give a shit about that."

"Physically, you need to be evaluated for physical therapy. You also have bed sores that need to be treated. As far as a psych evaluation, I will be standing by to make sure they stick to the book, but you will take one. This isn't negotiable," he said, voice even.

She let out an annoyed huff, but didn't bother to argue. Arguing with him was useless at the best of times. "Fine. But I reserve the right to silence, if I don't like the question."

"We'll see," he muttered. He sighed, then extracted himself. "Alright. Get some sleep. I'll be back later."

"Okay," she mumbled, resettling herself down. She was back asleep within seconds.

He headed for the door, and up to Jim's office, straightening his clothes before knocking twice.

"Come in," Jim called, looking over the report on his desk. He had mixed feelings about Harrison's retrieval. On the one hand, he was getting back a valuable resource. On the other, he was losing some of Sebastian's personal time. That irked him. But getting rid of her wasn't really an option.

He stepped inside, closing the door behind him and walking over. "The retrieval went smoothly... there weren't any hangups."

"Good." He closed the folder, sitting back in his chair. "There isn't much about her condition in the report. What's her status?"

"Dangerously malnourished with serious muscle atrophy," he said, sitting down across from the desk. He'd grown to hate the chair less recently. "Mentally she seems... shaken but much better than I would be. It sounds like she spent her whole time there in isolation and moderate sensory deprivation."

He shrugged a little. "She used to be a heroin addict. I'm fairly certain it's not the first time she's been immobile in a quiet room for days on end. You had a traumatic childhood, as I understand it. You were predisposed to take isolation badly." He tapped the front of the folder a few times, looking thoughtfully down at it. What would she think of their arrangement? He was curious, but he didn't care enough to ask. That would imply he cared what she thought. The truth was far, far away from that.

He nodded just a little, ignoring the commentary about his childhood. "I expect to see a functional recovery within a few weeks, though total recovery will take longer."

"I won't need her for about a month, so that will be fine," Jim replied. "I assume you'll want to watch over her recovery yourself." It wasn't a question.

He nodded. "Yes. I'd like to take the next few days off, if that's possible. After that she'll be more self-sufficient." There was an elephant in the room, but neither of them seemed to care overmuch whether it was addressed or not.

"That will be fine," he agreed. Then he fell silent for a moment, just regarding Sebastian across the table. He looked like he was about to say something for a minute, then he gave a tiny shake of his head and waved his hand. "You're dismissed. I'll call if I truly need you."

He nodded and stood, giving a half-arsed salute and heading out the door and back towards the apartment.

Playlist: Squalloscope - Big Houses