"Mark, can you hear me?"

He always says that, was his first, confused, thought. Following rapidly on from that was how much he loathed the aftermath of anaesthesia; his head full of cotton-wool and every thought taking twice as long as usual. The ghastly blurriness somewhere between brain and breathing muscles wasn't back, though. And, for the first time in weeks, he was neither drugged to the eyeballs on relaxants nor having to fight his body's desire to spasm.

"Yes," he said, and it came out clearly, albeit croakily.

"Good. How are you feeling?"

"Anaesthetic," he mumbled, his head swimming horribly.

"I know. You were under for almost four hours. I'm washing it out of your system as fast as I can - the implant's not helping so much any more."

He hadn't bargained on that. "What's gone?"

"I think I should explain everything when you're feeling -"

"What's gone?" He put every ounce of command into it, and even with his eyes shut he felt Chris stiffen. Well, he hadn't lost that ability, at any rate.

"The part of the chip that regulates power transfer was very badly shot, and Mike's disabled it almost completely for now."

"Flat battery?"

Chris chuckled. "You are feeling better. Not exactly, but Mike can explain the details to you later. Basically, all your speed enhancements are down, and anything else which involves energy-borrowing. No fast healing. Nothing which would leave the chip needing to recharge."

"Jump?" he asked.

"If it was relevant - which it's not - you could take it for a short time. I doubt you have the power to transmute, though, or to fire a jump-drive."

His eyes opened, even though he knew it would make the world spin worse. "Tell me it's not permanent."

"It's not permanent. All we need is for everything to settle down, get you some normal reflexes back, and the next op will just be electronic repair. Now, I want you to sleep the rest of the anaesthetic off. Tomorrow we need to get you started on some rehab, make sure everything's working and coordinated, and I know some people who will be very pleased to see you."

Mark drew a shaky breath. "They must hate me."

"You want to know how many queries I've fielded in the last two days from a certain ready room not a million miles from here? They don't hate you. They're very glad to see you back. Now, go to sleep."

Waking up warm, relaxed and comfortable, not so drugged he could barely think straight, and in his own time, was something Mark hadn't experienced in, well, a long time. In fact, he wasn't immediately sure he was awake - he'd dreamed of recovery before now, and woken up shaking with the need to be back in the dream instead of an increasingly hellish reality.

He'd never remembered what that reality had been like inside the dreams, though. Mark opened his eyes cautiously, and was rewarded with the entirely normal sight of the Medical sideroom, lights dimmed to a level appropriate for sleep, white walls, white ceiling. A stand was positioned close to the head of his bed, dripping the colourless contents of two separate bags into him, and next to it stood a trolley holding a bunch of monitoring equipment wired to the patches on his chest and back, flashing silent indications that he still had a pulse as well as a variety of other things he didn't recognise.

He was just considering whether and how he should announce that he was awake (pulling off the heart monitor leads would get attention, he was fairly sure, but not exactly make him popular with the medical staff) when the door opened and Chris Johnson came in.

"How are you feeling this morning?"

"Better," Mark told him. "One hell of a lot better. And hungry and thirsty."

Chris stood where he was, half in shadow, but still showing a mixture of emotions playing across his features. "Mark, I let you down. I-"

"Doc -"

"No, let me say it. I screwed up. I didn't believe you had a physical problem, and I should have kept looking. I made a huge mistake. It won't happen again."

Mark opened his mouth and shut it again. Fought for self-control, and won, just. Chris's mistake had cost him five months of hell. It didn't matter that he knew intellectually that it had been just that - a mistake. Or that he could have come back much sooner had he chosen to. Emotionally he'd have liked nothing more than to plant his fist under the left side of the doctor's jaw. See him hit the back wall of the room and slide to the floor. Just once. Then he'd have found it a whole lot easier to forgive and forget properly. Since that wasn't a remotely acceptable way to interact with his doctor, he pushed the desire down. Hard.

Chris cleared his throat in the uncomfortable silence. "Before you eat, I'd like to test your reflexes. If you feel up to it."

"Sure, doc," Mark told him. "Just make it quick. I'd kill for toast and coffee right about now."

"Toast I can approve. Coffee - maybe not just yet." Chris lifted the head of his bed and folded the blankets down. "Okay. Now, can you give me your right hand?"

It worked. His left hand worked. Reflexes fine, control fine. Even a fair amount of strength. Chris was nodding, ticks were appearing in the right-hand column of the list, and Mark had started to feel a whole lot better.

And then Chris turned the page on his checklist and casually said, "Let's take a look at that right leg next. Can you pull your knee up for me?"

Nothing happened. Nothing at all. And Mark's world crashed around him.

"Not working?" Chris asked, and Mark couldn't speak at all.

The clipboard went on the bed, and Chris's steadying hand went down on his right knee. "Can you feel that?"

Yes, of course he could - did Chris really think he'd have taken this long to realise that he couldn't feel anything? "I can't move my legs."

"Can you feel -"

"I can't move my legs!" Absolute, white panic washed over him and his voice cracked in despair. This isn't happening. This can't be happening.

"Steady on there, Mark."

"What have you done to me?"

"I'm sure this is temporary -"

"Temporary? Or maybe it's psychological? Maybe I'm imagining it?"

"Mark -"

"Get out!" He knew, really, that it wasn't Chris's fault. He didn't care. "Get the hell out of here!"

He thought Chris had said something as he left, but it didn't matter what. Mark was doubled over, shaking with effort, trying again and again to get his legs to move. Feet. Anything. They wouldn't even twitch.

He had no idea how long he was there, desperation leading him to try one thing after another, the same thing over and over again, rubbing useless muscles, digging his fingers in hard enough to bruise, anything to try to make his legs work. The door didn't reopen until he'd abandoned all hope, slumped wretchedly forwards, too miserable to care how uncomfortable he was.

"Mark, I need you to lie back for me."

He simply ignored it. And Chris's subsequent pleading about how he was only recently out of surgery. It took Chris's assistant coming in and informing him they were going to lie him back, now, and for them to start doing so, for him to co-operate at all, and once he was lying back he simply stared at the ceiling until they left him alone.

When the ready room phone finally rang, Tiny was the one next to it. Heart in mouth, he picked it up. "Yes?"

"Chris Johnson here." The tone of voice alone told him that all was not well. His face must have done the same for the rest of them, because Princess and Keyop were alongside him in moments, Jason's eyes locked on his from the other side of the table.

"Chris? What's wrong?" He felt the phone receiver flex in his hand, and made a huge effort to relax his grip before it broke. Please, let him not be dead. This was supposed to be a relatively simple operation!

"The neurological rerouting hasn't happened as we'd expected. You remember what I said about -"

"Yes, I remember. How bad is it?"

"At the moment, he appears to be paralysed from the waist down."

The phone cracked in his hand and went dead, as time stopped. Paralysed.

"Your hand's bleeding," Princess said, wide-eyed.

"I don't care. You heard that?"

"Of course we did." Jason was already heading for the door, and Tiny hurried after him.

"Mark may not want to talk -"

"I'm damn sure he won't want to talk. I don't care. You want to stay here and read your magazine, be my guest."

Four of them entered Medical together, Jason slightly in the lead. He couldn't have looked more intimidating in birdstyle, Tiny thought as he matched step to his left. Princess, on Jason's right, was almost running to keep up. Keyop was running.

Chris looked up from his computer as the double doors slammed shut behind them, face haggard. "Why-"

"Where is he?" The voice was a Condor snarl, and Chris flinched back, briefly.

"In no state to talk to anyone."

"To hell with that. Tell me what's wrong and how you're going to fix it."

Chris opened his mouth to speak, shut it again, swallowed, and buried his head in his hands. That said all Tiny needed to know. Total disaster, no idea why, no idea how to put it right.

Jason disappeared into the sideroom which was, logically, the only place Mark could be, and Tiny decided that was probably for the best. He managed to catch Keyop by the back of his belt as he tried to follow.

"Leave it to Jason."

"Want to see Mark!"

"Tiny's right," Princess said, her voice high-pitched, fragile and unhappy. "Mark's had a terrible shock. Let Jason talk to him. Chris, can you tell us what went wrong?"

"I wish I knew." The doctor sounded as strained as Tiny had ever heard him - and he'd been bad after Mark had disappeared. "Mike Bennett's sure the nerves weren't damaged in the operation, initial tests confirm it - and Mark's got sensation, he just can't move."

"That doesn't make much sense. Can I do anything?"

Chris shrugged miserably. "I doubt it - but hey, a second pair of eyes on research can't hurt, while I get the neurospecialists in."

"Not your fault," Keyop put in suddenly. "Chris, you're good. We trust you."

The doctor managed half a smile. "Thank you, G-3. I do appreciate that. But I have to re-earn that trust. Mark thinks I failed him, and he's right."

That's all we need - our team doctor in a state of depression and self-doubt. Tiny sat down at the second terminal, trying to project support and enthusiasm. "Okay. So I need to look up...what? Cases of paralysis with normal sensation? I didn't know that was even possible."

"It's certainly rare..." Chris's voice tailed off as his attention shifted to a point over Tiny's shoulder. "Jason?"

"He didn't want to talk." The flat tone said more than any emotion could have.

"Maybe I should try?" Princess's voice was uncertain, and Tiny's "No" was simultaneous with Jason's.

"We need to leave him a while," Jason said decisively. "Chris, I'll be back tomorrow. Let me know if he wants to talk before then." His grip on Keyop's shoulder was uncompromising, and Princess followed the pair of them out, throwing one last regretful glance towards the sideroom before the door shut behind her.

Princess couldn't sleep that night. Couldn't get beyond the overwhelming waves of horrified sympathy coupled with devastated fury. Mark paralysed was awful beyond belief - but how much of it was Mark's own fault, for delaying his return for months instead of coming back after a few days, once he'd made his point? Jason had been even briefer than usual in his description of Mark's condition when he'd been called to the gatehouse, but it been obvious that there was something seriously physically wrong with him. If he'd come back earlier, maybe they could have fixed him?

And then there was the part of herself which she kept trying to suppress. The part which said that Mark had made a promise, months back, that once they weren't in the same chain of command they could have a relationship. If he'd meant that, it could have happened. Instead, she meant so little to him that he'd gone away for months without even letting her know he was alive. His promise had only ever been an excuse to keep her quiet. And that hurt more than she could ever admit to anyone.

Around five in the morning she gave up altogether, stripped a soaked pillowcase off her pillow, and left the damp pillow to dry in the early morning sunshine just starting to creep through her window. Mark knew that Jason hadn't given up on him, but he didn't have any idea how she felt. What if, right about now, he was waking up, alone and terrified, with nobody to talk to except a doctor who had no answers for him?

#

There was an alarm on the door of Medical, but she knew full well that it didn't trigger until the door was opened a normal amount. Princess pulled one of the double doors towards her a couple of inches, pushed its partner away a similar amount, and slipped sideways through the narrow gap. No bells, and no doctor rushing to see what had gone wrong this early in the morning.

The door to the sideroom was ajar, and Princess slipped through it just as easily, and stood in the almost-dark while her eyes adjusted. It was a bare, clinical room, containing only equipment and a bed. Mark lay sprawled on his left side, facing away from her, his breathing quiet and even.

He looked exactly the same as he always had when asleep. Completely relaxed, ridiculously young. But the bed was wrong. The top half was the same tousled mess Mark had always made of it. The bottom was immaculate. Not that Princess had exactly spent much time in her commanding officer's bedroom - but she'd shaken him awake more than once. She'd never seen him in a bed which didn't look as if the sheets had been used for tug-of-war by a pack of two year olds.

Paralysed. She'd been an idiot to come - and thank heavens he was fast asleep. Whatever would she have said if he'd been awake? He needed somebody strong to help him, not someone who would only weep on his shoulder. She had to get out of here now, before he ever realised she'd been here. The last thing he needed was her, her insecurities, and her need for him.

#

Only when he heard the double doors close with a near-silent click did Mark roll over, eyes wide open, to stare at the empty doorway.