WARNING for descriptions of PTSD. So far it's been limited to irritability, hypervigilance and dissociation, but this chapter contains a description of a flashback and mention of triggers.
Also, I'm not a therapist, I'm just making stuff up, so don't take my word for *anything*.
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For some reason, when she was feeling well, Chapel gravitated towards reading upside down. Currently she was sprawled crossways over the sofa, legs in the air, hair tumbling off the cushions to form a halo around the PADD she was reading, entirely engrossed. La'an made it to within a few inches of her upturned head before the screen flicked aside to reveal bright, inverted eyes smiling up at her.
"You're early."
She hadn't made 21:00. Nowhere near. After Una she'd just… "I need you to make this stop."
She wasn't even sure what she meant, but Chapel caught at her hand, twisting up onto her knees to pull her close, fingers tickling into her hair as she leant in and kissed her, soft and gentle in a way that made the whole world fade.
"They've discovered this tube worm on Titan with a whole section of dormant DNA that codes directly for formaldehyde, and no one knows why."
Her eyes were so alive, her fascination so infectious, so utterly genuine. La'an felt the space inside her swell as wide as the smile she could feel splitting her face, lighting up her mind, because this was… all of it… Chapel was just… "I-"
The impulse died, the world sucking vertiginous perspective around her, suddenly unreachable, echoing through a veil. The screaming had started behind her, just on the edge of hearing. The screaming, and then the stench, the heat, the shaking that came with the creep of an uncontrollable, savage terror. No. She pulled away, numb limbs resisting as everything began to choke, the fetid air too thick to breathe. NO.
"Hey, look at me."
The smile had gone. Chapel looked absent, small and slight, so far away. It was getting closer.
"It's ok. It's not real."
She could feel the hands on her arms. The smell of the room. Screaming death the colour of torture. Closer. Closer. NO.
"La'an." Chapel's eyes were suddenly right there, piercing through the distance. "What do you need to do?"
Water. There was water. The bathroom lights were harsh, a whine of static over the noise, high and white over the screaming, the crushing heat. The override fought her, her fingers unmanageable, but the handle was smooth, easy to jam home, all the way to freezing, all the way to full as the shower erupted a deluge of ice-cold water and the illusory pursual shuddered out, leaving just the echoing, empty terror, the searing, screaming heat. There was nothing coming. There was nothing here.
She let herself sink to the floor, shaking as the water soaked into her uniform, down through her hair, freezing her skin, breath coming in tight, choking gulps that pulled her throat raw, lungs burning, adrenalin pounding through her veins making everything blur. It's not real. None of this is real.
The overhead lights dimmed, dipping carefully below glaring. It was easier to see like this. Easier to breathe. Chapel knelt at the edge of the spray, her whitened knuckles catching stray droplets as the water danced. She'd only had the shower put in last week. Just in time. La'an hadn't… It had been so long since…
She pressed her nails into her thighs. It shouldn't have happened. She'd been seeing Sanchez for months now, she should be getting better, not worse. But instead…
It shouldn't have happened. There was nothing here. The shaking was beginning to make way for shivering, rigid and jagged, tightening her jaw as her teeth tried to chatter. She closed her eyes.
"Still with me?"
"I'm fine."
Chapel shifted quietly. "If I touch you, will I make it worse?"
Would she... No. La'an's voice wouldn't work. She shook her head.
"Ok." After a moment the flood began to slow, turning tepid, then pleasant, then gradually warm. La'an kept herself still as the splatter of water changed, as Chapel moved in close enough to cover her fingers. To lean in until their foreheads pressed together. "You're ok." A careful weight settled beside her. An arm wrapping around her, drawing her in. La'an let herself melt into the safety of it, let the coiled tension wash though her shuddering limbs as steady arms pulled her close. "You're ok."
She was ok. She could sit here, and be this, and Chapel would sit with her. Wouldn't primarily need it to stop. It was that, more than anything, that made the voices fade. That made the world inch back together, narrowing as it came back into view. The colour of the tile. The texture of wet fabric. Her wet socks in her wet boots. A pattering drumbeat, a breathing rhythm, and toothpaste and soap and honeysuckle.
The water was warm against her skin, seeping into her hair, easing her loose as Chapel wove a quiet landscape into her ear. An endless summer sunset tinting gold over a wide hushed lake, whispering rushes and shimmering water, a jetty and a picnic and citronella keeping the mosquitoes at bay, lighting the slowly gathering darkness as the world around them came alive with tiny, faceted noises, vivid in the perfect stillness of the air.
Soothing. Mesmerising. A distraction that wasn't just for her. It was awful, watching it happen. La'an knew from the way Una's face had changed over the years. And this had… they'd been… "It wasn't you."
Chapel's fingers stilled against her hair, quiet for a second under the rainfall. "Do you know what it was?"
"No." Sometimes she did. It was noises, mostly. Movement behind her. A face. But this… It had blanked, instantly. Mercifully. She wasn't going back. She felt the darkness stir. An echo of an echo. A viper in a box. "I used to hurt people."
"And now you don't."
That was true. Even when those things had shown up… But she had. Teeth and nails. And fists, later. "You get to run."
Chapel squeezed her gently. "When I do, it won't be about this."
Maybe it should be. She was broken, and it was getting worse. If she ever…
A soft cheek leant into her hair, warm and safe against her forehead. "We're going to sit here until it's over, and then I'm going to make tea, and we're going to do all the things that make you feel better. I can show you the tube worms."
The tube worms. La'an pulled back as Chapel hesitated, nose wrinkling to cover the worry behind her eyes, trying so hard not to be seen.
"They glow."
Of course they did. "It really wasn't you."
Chapel smiled, sad in a way that was briefly, viscerally terrifying before she found La'an's hands, leaning her head against the shower wall. "It was. It's all of it. But it doesn't matter. Not backing out, ok? Not unless you tell me otherwise."
She never would. Not if the world came down around her. She never would, because none of this had anything to do with… none of it was…
But nothing, suddenly. A wall of blank. A fog she couldn't wade through, auguring a senseless drop. "I can't…"
"Then don't." Chapel squeezed her hands, easing her backwards, into the light. "It doesn't matter. All of that can keep."
She meant it, eyes gentle with affection. There was no lie. And yet, something lingered under the tea and the science pages, the tube worms with their tentacles like fireworks. An uncertainty she couldn't shake. That La'an had no capacity to process, never mind allay.
She was seeing Sanchez tomorrow. And this time, she was taking Una's advice.
0 0 0
The vase was shattered into what had to be a hundred pieces, a jagged, half-formed shell that seemed to present an unwelcome metaphor for the state of her own psyche. Sharp edges. Ragged points. Cracked beyond redemption. Sanchez had set it on a low table, shards spread out over a sheet beside him as he worked.
"You aren't helping me."
"Tell me why you think that."
La'an stared at her thumbs where they pressed into the screen she was holding. Pressed harder so the ridges hurt. None of this was helping. All of it was getting worse. She'd been faltering for weeks now. Months. Everything too raw. Too close. She couldn't focus anymore. Couldn't function without thinking. Couldn't breathe sometimes, with no idea why.
"Can you tell me what happened?"
"No." Chapel had been right there, and then everything…
"This vase was a wedding gift." Sanchez slotted another piece into place with a soft chink, testing the fit before he applied a delicate layer of glue. "I have always been rather fond of it. My uncle brought it back from the Middle East when he retired. I believe it cost him considerable credits to have it shipped." He paused, holding the shard in place while he passed a UV wand over the seam, setting the bond hard.
"Since Christopher grew tall enough to reach he has been throwing objects in here, only to become inconsolable when they cannot be immediately recovered. It has been the cause of a series of truly impressive tantrums. I will admit his mother and I were on the cusp of giving in. Blocking it up. Removing it, you know?" He glanced up at La'an briefly to smile, to gesture at the mess he was currently perusing.
"Yesterday, he came up with his own solution. From my perspective it is less than ideal. But it was effective. Much as it inconveniences me, I must take it as a sign of growth. My son has staying power, lieutenant. My task is simply to have more."
La'an watched him select another shard from the debris. Slot it into place.
"I heard them. Screaming. I felt it. Everything."
"You experienced a flashback."
La'an nodded tightly. She hated that word.
It wasn't real.
"You are not there now."
No. She was in Chapel's quarters. She could smell the makeup. The perfume. Feel the throw Chapel kept over the sofa. "She thinks it was her."
"And what do you think?"
She didn't. She wasn't… "That's supposed to be your job."
He looked up at her then, properly, but the door hissed open.
Chapel.
"Sorry, I'm sorry, I forgot my data, I'll just be…"
"Is that Christine?"
"Yeah, sorry, I just need my PADD and I'll be…"
"Could you join us for a moment?"
Chapel hesitated, PADD suspended, because this was entirely unorthodox, but all La'an wanted was to be able to take her hand, and all she could do once she got it was grip too hard. Blank her eyes against the sudden flood of everything.
"This doesn't work."
"You are afraid." Sanchez often provided labels like that. Little points of clarity, waypoints through the storm. "You are also safe. The one does not negate the other."
Afraid. She didn't use to be. She had just…
But she couldn't breathe. Rage surfaced, finding nowhere to go. There was nowhere to run. There was nothing to do. She couldn't breathe here, and then she was crying, ragged and sharp in jagged sobs. "This doesn't work."
"Unfortunately, this is what it looks like when it does."
Chapel wrapped an arm around her, pulling her in close until warm lips ghosted her temple. "This is ok. It passes, and then you're ok. You can move on."
"It won't."
"It always does." Chapel's thumb stroked gentle sweeps against her arm, matching the rhythm of her breathing until everything began to slow. Until the vestigial panic began to ebb. "You just live through it, and it passes. It doesn't last."
She'd known this. She never remembered. La'an flexed her fingers, a fist and then not, splaying outward over Chapel's palm. "It wasn't you."
"It was. It's happened before, just not…" Chapel hesitated, shifting until she could meet her eyes. "It's always happened. You go blank. Everything turns inwards. Whenever I get too close."
"That's not the same."
"Isn't it?"
La'an stared at her, helpless in the silence. Her perfect, flyaway hair. Her smile, so familiar, so fragile suddenly, tinted as though she might cry. The squeeze of her fingers as she moved away.
"I should go."
This wouldn't keep. La'an used her sleeves to wipe at her face, pressing back into the cushions, propping the screen so Sanchez remained in view.
"You love her." He supplied after a moment. The words settled onto the empty room, hanging in the air like a fog. La'an focussed on his face through the blur and felt… nothing. Mercifully nothing. But that wasn't…
"What's wrong with me?"
"Consider. You lost everyone who loved you. Everyone you ever loved. That leaves a mark, wouldn't you say?" Sanchez bunched his hand loosely against his chest, over the spot La'an recognised. The spot behind which a space swelled, ratcheting open every time Chapel smiled. "This feeling, of safety, of happiness, you have not known it without loss. The two are inextricably linked. When you feel one, your mind reaches for the other."
"So I'm broken."
"You have a choice. The mind can be rewired, re-educated, but it will take time, and it will not be pleasant. Repression has served you well for many years. As you have noticed in recent months, releasing that hold is not without consequence. Allow yourself to feel and you will feel everything. It is up to you to decide whether that freedom is worth the cost."
Freedom. Her life had always been a fortress. Reinforced duranium, miles thick on every side. It kept everything out. It kept everything in. It had never felt like a cage. But Chapel… She couldn't live with walls. And La'an couldn't… "I don't know how."
"You simply live your life. And when you reach those points where your mind pulls away, note them. Examine them, when you have the time. Decide whether you wish to lean in to them, even just a little."
"And if I do? When it goes wrong? How do I…" No one wanted a colleague with mental health problems. No one wanted a chief of security with a demon on their back. That was why she was here. That was why she was fine.
"Your trauma does not define you. But it is real. You may own it without fear of prejudice."
"Liar." Don't make a scene, La'an. Only bad girls make a fuss. "This is my job."
"You are in no danger of losing it." Sanchez paused, folding his hands, giving her time to breathe. "You are not a liability. If I had any doubts on the matter, I would not hesitate to voice them."
"I'm a good liar."
Sanchez actually smiled at that, entirely genuine. "I regret to inform you that you are not. You are simply intimidating enough that people do not call you on it. And also, I suspect, vulnerable enough that they do not wish to. People will go to great lengths to avoid causing others pain."
She had no idea what to say to that, but he went back to the vase easily. "It is your choice. And you may change your mind, at any time."
La'an sat and watched him fit a couple more shards into place, unhurried. Careful. It was beginning to regain some of its shape now. To look like it might be salvaged, if he persisted.
"I don't want to go back there."
"You will never go back there. You may see it again, but it will never be real. You are capable now. Well resourced. Forewarned. And your mind will protect you, as it has before. Loosening your grip does not mean a loss of control. It simply means a change."
She ran her fingers over the cushions where Chapel had sat, pinching at the fabric. "How much will it hurt?"
"Less than you fear it will. More than it should. The question is, I think, whether it will be more painful not to."
His hands were large. The work delicate.
"I'm afraid."
"Everyone is. It is a hardwired human response to uncertainty."
She watched him work a little longer, piece after intricate piece.
And then she switched him off.