Under the Infuence
Title: Under the Influence
Fandom: SGA
Characters: Lorne, Parrish, and a tiny bit of Sheppard
Pairing: Lorne/Parrish - pre slash, Lorne/Heightmeyer
Word Count: 1,772
Orientation: Slash
Rating: PG -13
Warnings: Talk of suicide
Prompts:
For Lornefest: Lorne/author’s choice- (Doppelganger tag) Lorne was infected by Heightmeyer from a prior counseling session-where Lorne was having problems with the DADT
For Kinkbingo fill: "Hypnosis/mind control"
For HCbingo fill: "Nightmares"
Major Lorne stood at attention beside the rest of his team and paid his respects at Doctor Kate Heightmeyer’s memorial service. He nodded and chatted with people afterwards, listening to other people’s memories of the good doctor, singing her praises, lamenting her passing. He pressed his forehead to Teyla’s to honor her Athosian custom and then gave her a hug to honor his.
After the service, he returned to his quarters and downed half of a fifth of Jack Daniels he had stashed away in his footlocker. That night, Lorne slept without interruption, courtesy of the alcohol.
The next morning, he rose, showered and shaved, dragged on his uniform and forced himself to go to work. When his duty shift was over, he declined an invitation from David Parrish to go to Movie Night in the mess hall and returned to his quarters. He downed the remainder of the Jack and passed out across his bed, still in uniform. Again, Jack let him sleep.
Two days after Doctor Heightmeyer’s service, Evan was out of alcohol. He attempted to sleep, but the nightmares woke him as they always did. The nightmares were the thing that sent him to Doctor Heightmeyer in the first place. His sleepwalking and the nightmares were connected according to the doctor, and she had been working with him trying to get to the source of the issue.
The most telling thing that had come out of long therapy sessions of talking were that Evan had a problem reconciling his sexual identity with his rank and position in the military. DADT made it impossible for Major Lorne to act on the attraction he had for his teammate, Doctor Parrish. But Evan wanted to pursue David; he wanted a relationship deeper than friendship. He was torn between what he felt in his heart and what his head told him was right and proper and lawful. Major Lorne could not willfully disregard an order, and it was tearing Evan apart.
His nightmares clued her in. He had dreams of being caught and publically shamed for his sexual proclivities. In the worst of the dreams, he was stripped of his rank, court-martialed and sent to prison, to the disgust and censure of his family and friends. Evan had not told anyone about his sexual preferences and being outed was one of his deepest fears. Most of his nightmares had a similar theme; people finding out and the consequences that followed. He had a few irrational nightmares too, and those were the ones that frightened him the most and woke him screaming. He dreamed of being tortured, of being raped in prison, of monsters chasing him, of being marooned and shunned alone on an alien world. The nightmares had sent him crawling to Kate Heightmeyer begging for help.
She had been helping him. She had a new technique that she had developed using a piece of ancient tech in combination with regular talk therapy and hypnosis. He did not know the specifics, all he knew about the way the therapy worked was that she had a small device on her desk that flickered blue and green and after their talk session she would put him into a hypnotic state. He knew that since starting the therapy with Doctor Heightmeyer, he had been sleeping through the night. That made it all worth the time he was putting into the therapy.
Three nights after Doctor Heightmeyer’s memorial service, Evan tried again to sleep. He was exhausted after a full day on duty. The nightmares that woke him screaming, shaking and sweating were the bad kind - the rape and torture ones. He couldn’t bear to put his head back on the pillow, so he sat on his sofa with his laptop and played one hundred and sixteen games of Spider Solitaire. Then at 05:30, he showered, shaved and went to his office.
At the end of the day, Sheppard brought him a dozen reports that had to be redone because he had done them wrong. The Colonel told Lorne to knock off early because he looked a little ragged, and that he needed to rest up because AG-2 was going off world the next day. Regular operations were resuming on Atlantis.
On the way back to his quarters, Lorne took a detour to the physics lab and bribed Zelenka with the last of his black market reserves; three chocolate bars, a box of condoms and a tube of KY Jelly for a pint of Radek’s moonshine. A third of the moonshine was enough to knock him on his ass and let him sleep. Lorne started to fear that he was probably becoming an alcoholic.
On the fourth day after Atlantis paid tribute to the lost therapist, Lorne went off world with his team. During the fight that erupted, he got clubbed with a bar stool and suffered a concussion. Doctor Keller prescribed him some of the good pain pills. He hoarded his moonshine and rationed the pain pills to use at night to help him sleep.
Eleven nights after Heightmeyer’s memorial, Lorne was out of alcohol and pills and had not slept at all in two nights. Knowing it was a futile attempt, he curled up in his bed anyway and let sleep claim him.
He woke when someone slapped his face, hard. Then he was being shaken by the arms. … Lorne! Major, look at me!” Why was Parrish shouting at him? “Major Lorne!” Parrish slapped him again.
“What?” He pushed Parrish away. “Stop shouting at me.”
“Oh, thank God, you’re talking again. Evan, what in the hell is wrong with you?”
Evan looked around; he was on the balcony where Kate Heightmeyer had been when she jumped. “How’d I get here?”
“That’s what I want to know.” Parrish was holding his arms and staring up into his face. “You didn’t turn up for work; they had to use your sub-q transmitter to find you.”
“You found me?”
“Chuck found you; he told me you were here. Evan, you had your gun in your lap and you were sitting on the ledge.” David’s lower lip quivered a little and his eyes were very bright. “I pulled you down. Your gun is down two levels, it fell over onto a lower balcony.”
Lorne turned and looked over the railing. What the hell?
“Evan, what’s going on? Why would you…?”
“I wouldn’t! I mean, I don’t think I would.” He rubbed a hand over his face. He didn’t know anymore. “I guess I was sleepwalking again. I haven’t been sleeping very well.”
“With your sidearm?”
“I don’t know why I had it. I’m not suicidal, David, I swear.”
David’s hands fell away from Evan’s arms. “You need help.”
He snarled at David, “I was getting help. And then she went and took a dive off that stanchion over there!”
Spooked, Parrish backed away, his eyes wide. Evan realized he’d just yelled at the guy who had probably saved his life. “I’m sorry, David. I’m so sorry. I don’t know what to do. I can’t sleep; I can’t control this thing anymore.”
David grasped his arm and tugged him towards the doors. “Let’s go to the infirmary. Tell Doctor Keller about your problem with sleeping, see what she says. If Doctor Heightmeyer was treating you, they can look up your records; get you back on the same course again.”
Blinking stupidly, Evan shook his head. “I should have thought of that.”
“You said you haven’t been sleeping. You probably haven’t been thinking clearly.” Parrish led him through the doors into the hallway. He was in his sleep pants and t-shirt, and barefoot, again. He was going to get a reputation if this kept happening. He followed Parrish quietly, letting the doctor drag him along by his arm. He’d scared David; he owed him his cooperation, at the very least.
Keller waved him over to an empty gurney and made him sit. She listened to his halting explanation of what had been happening. She frowned when she heard the part about Heightmeyer using Ancient tech. The doctor said she would get Heightmeyer’s records and see what she could do to help him until the SGC sent a new therapist to replace her. She then shot him with a sedative and pushed him down on the gurney.
Twelve days after Kate Heightmeyer’s memorial service, Evan Lorne woke up in the Atlantis infirmary to see David Parrish sleeping in the chair beside the bed, his head resting on his arms which were pressed against Evan’s hip. He had Evan’s right hand clasped in his.
Evan jolted completely awake and nearly panicked.
“Easy, Lorne. Don’t wake him; the nurse said he was up all night watching over you.” Lorne looked to his left to see Sheppard leaning against the wall. The Colonel tossed his chin at Parrish. “You gave him quite a scare. He wasn’t going to tell me what happened, but Chuck pulled up the security footage and squealed on you.”
“Damn it.” In his mind he added a few more colorful descriptive words about Chuck and his ancestry. Evan wiped his left hand over his face.
Sheppard reached over and punched his shoulder lightly. “Funny thing, we had this freak electrical surge and lost all our security footage from the last two days. I guess we’ll never figure out how your service revolver ended up on that balcony.”
“I guess not. I sure don’t remember anything.”
“Yeah, that’s what the doc told me. It seems you were under the influence of some gadget that Heightmeyer was playing with; she brought it in from the SGC with her. It was still running, but you weren’t getting the post hypnotic suggestions that she had been feeding you, so you kinda went a little haywire. I turned it off. Listen, she had some really freaky thing going on. When you’re feeling better, we’ll go through it and you can decide what you want to do about it.”
“So, this wasn’t just me?”
“No. You were under the influence of alien technology, Heightmeyer was playing a bit of a game with you.” Sheppard pushed away from the wall and started to leave. He looked indecisive for a moment and then turned back and said, “Listen, I didn’t ask, but your botanist there sure told me a lot. I’m the last guy on this planet to throw rocks in the glass house, if you get what I’m saying.”
Surprised, Lorne just nodded.
“So we’re cool?” Sheppard asked, tilting his head.
“We’re cool, sir.”
Sheppard left and Lorne glanced down to see that David was awake and staring up at him, though he hadn’t moved a muscle while he’d been talking with Sheppard.
“Are we cool?” David asked, squeezing Evan’s hand.
He squeezed back. “I think maybe we will be.”
Fandom: SGA
Characters: Lorne, Parrish, and a tiny bit of Sheppard
Pairing: Lorne/Parrish - pre slash, Lorne/Heightmeyer
Word Count: 1,772
Orientation: Slash
Rating: PG -13
Warnings: Talk of suicide
Prompts:
For Lornefest: Lorne/author’s choice- (Doppelganger tag) Lorne was infected by Heightmeyer from a prior counseling session-where Lorne was having problems with the DADT
For Kinkbingo fill: "Hypnosis/mind control"
For HCbingo fill: "Nightmares"
Major Lorne stood at attention beside the rest of his team and paid his respects at Doctor Kate Heightmeyer’s memorial service. He nodded and chatted with people afterwards, listening to other people’s memories of the good doctor, singing her praises, lamenting her passing. He pressed his forehead to Teyla’s to honor her Athosian custom and then gave her a hug to honor his.
After the service, he returned to his quarters and downed half of a fifth of Jack Daniels he had stashed away in his footlocker. That night, Lorne slept without interruption, courtesy of the alcohol.
The next morning, he rose, showered and shaved, dragged on his uniform and forced himself to go to work. When his duty shift was over, he declined an invitation from David Parrish to go to Movie Night in the mess hall and returned to his quarters. He downed the remainder of the Jack and passed out across his bed, still in uniform. Again, Jack let him sleep.
Two days after Doctor Heightmeyer’s service, Evan was out of alcohol. He attempted to sleep, but the nightmares woke him as they always did. The nightmares were the thing that sent him to Doctor Heightmeyer in the first place. His sleepwalking and the nightmares were connected according to the doctor, and she had been working with him trying to get to the source of the issue.
The most telling thing that had come out of long therapy sessions of talking were that Evan had a problem reconciling his sexual identity with his rank and position in the military. DADT made it impossible for Major Lorne to act on the attraction he had for his teammate, Doctor Parrish. But Evan wanted to pursue David; he wanted a relationship deeper than friendship. He was torn between what he felt in his heart and what his head told him was right and proper and lawful. Major Lorne could not willfully disregard an order, and it was tearing Evan apart.
His nightmares clued her in. He had dreams of being caught and publically shamed for his sexual proclivities. In the worst of the dreams, he was stripped of his rank, court-martialed and sent to prison, to the disgust and censure of his family and friends. Evan had not told anyone about his sexual preferences and being outed was one of his deepest fears. Most of his nightmares had a similar theme; people finding out and the consequences that followed. He had a few irrational nightmares too, and those were the ones that frightened him the most and woke him screaming. He dreamed of being tortured, of being raped in prison, of monsters chasing him, of being marooned and shunned alone on an alien world. The nightmares had sent him crawling to Kate Heightmeyer begging for help.
She had been helping him. She had a new technique that she had developed using a piece of ancient tech in combination with regular talk therapy and hypnosis. He did not know the specifics, all he knew about the way the therapy worked was that she had a small device on her desk that flickered blue and green and after their talk session she would put him into a hypnotic state. He knew that since starting the therapy with Doctor Heightmeyer, he had been sleeping through the night. That made it all worth the time he was putting into the therapy.
Three nights after Doctor Heightmeyer’s memorial service, Evan tried again to sleep. He was exhausted after a full day on duty. The nightmares that woke him screaming, shaking and sweating were the bad kind - the rape and torture ones. He couldn’t bear to put his head back on the pillow, so he sat on his sofa with his laptop and played one hundred and sixteen games of Spider Solitaire. Then at 05:30, he showered, shaved and went to his office.
At the end of the day, Sheppard brought him a dozen reports that had to be redone because he had done them wrong. The Colonel told Lorne to knock off early because he looked a little ragged, and that he needed to rest up because AG-2 was going off world the next day. Regular operations were resuming on Atlantis.
On the way back to his quarters, Lorne took a detour to the physics lab and bribed Zelenka with the last of his black market reserves; three chocolate bars, a box of condoms and a tube of KY Jelly for a pint of Radek’s moonshine. A third of the moonshine was enough to knock him on his ass and let him sleep. Lorne started to fear that he was probably becoming an alcoholic.
On the fourth day after Atlantis paid tribute to the lost therapist, Lorne went off world with his team. During the fight that erupted, he got clubbed with a bar stool and suffered a concussion. Doctor Keller prescribed him some of the good pain pills. He hoarded his moonshine and rationed the pain pills to use at night to help him sleep.
Eleven nights after Heightmeyer’s memorial, Lorne was out of alcohol and pills and had not slept at all in two nights. Knowing it was a futile attempt, he curled up in his bed anyway and let sleep claim him.
He woke when someone slapped his face, hard. Then he was being shaken by the arms. … Lorne! Major, look at me!” Why was Parrish shouting at him? “Major Lorne!” Parrish slapped him again.
“What?” He pushed Parrish away. “Stop shouting at me.”
“Oh, thank God, you’re talking again. Evan, what in the hell is wrong with you?”
Evan looked around; he was on the balcony where Kate Heightmeyer had been when she jumped. “How’d I get here?”
“That’s what I want to know.” Parrish was holding his arms and staring up into his face. “You didn’t turn up for work; they had to use your sub-q transmitter to find you.”
“You found me?”
“Chuck found you; he told me you were here. Evan, you had your gun in your lap and you were sitting on the ledge.” David’s lower lip quivered a little and his eyes were very bright. “I pulled you down. Your gun is down two levels, it fell over onto a lower balcony.”
Lorne turned and looked over the railing. What the hell?
“Evan, what’s going on? Why would you…?”
“I wouldn’t! I mean, I don’t think I would.” He rubbed a hand over his face. He didn’t know anymore. “I guess I was sleepwalking again. I haven’t been sleeping very well.”
“With your sidearm?”
“I don’t know why I had it. I’m not suicidal, David, I swear.”
David’s hands fell away from Evan’s arms. “You need help.”
He snarled at David, “I was getting help. And then she went and took a dive off that stanchion over there!”
Spooked, Parrish backed away, his eyes wide. Evan realized he’d just yelled at the guy who had probably saved his life. “I’m sorry, David. I’m so sorry. I don’t know what to do. I can’t sleep; I can’t control this thing anymore.”
David grasped his arm and tugged him towards the doors. “Let’s go to the infirmary. Tell Doctor Keller about your problem with sleeping, see what she says. If Doctor Heightmeyer was treating you, they can look up your records; get you back on the same course again.”
Blinking stupidly, Evan shook his head. “I should have thought of that.”
“You said you haven’t been sleeping. You probably haven’t been thinking clearly.” Parrish led him through the doors into the hallway. He was in his sleep pants and t-shirt, and barefoot, again. He was going to get a reputation if this kept happening. He followed Parrish quietly, letting the doctor drag him along by his arm. He’d scared David; he owed him his cooperation, at the very least.
Keller waved him over to an empty gurney and made him sit. She listened to his halting explanation of what had been happening. She frowned when she heard the part about Heightmeyer using Ancient tech. The doctor said she would get Heightmeyer’s records and see what she could do to help him until the SGC sent a new therapist to replace her. She then shot him with a sedative and pushed him down on the gurney.
Twelve days after Kate Heightmeyer’s memorial service, Evan Lorne woke up in the Atlantis infirmary to see David Parrish sleeping in the chair beside the bed, his head resting on his arms which were pressed against Evan’s hip. He had Evan’s right hand clasped in his.
Evan jolted completely awake and nearly panicked.
“Easy, Lorne. Don’t wake him; the nurse said he was up all night watching over you.” Lorne looked to his left to see Sheppard leaning against the wall. The Colonel tossed his chin at Parrish. “You gave him quite a scare. He wasn’t going to tell me what happened, but Chuck pulled up the security footage and squealed on you.”
“Damn it.” In his mind he added a few more colorful descriptive words about Chuck and his ancestry. Evan wiped his left hand over his face.
Sheppard reached over and punched his shoulder lightly. “Funny thing, we had this freak electrical surge and lost all our security footage from the last two days. I guess we’ll never figure out how your service revolver ended up on that balcony.”
“I guess not. I sure don’t remember anything.”
“Yeah, that’s what the doc told me. It seems you were under the influence of some gadget that Heightmeyer was playing with; she brought it in from the SGC with her. It was still running, but you weren’t getting the post hypnotic suggestions that she had been feeding you, so you kinda went a little haywire. I turned it off. Listen, she had some really freaky thing going on. When you’re feeling better, we’ll go through it and you can decide what you want to do about it.”
“So, this wasn’t just me?”
“No. You were under the influence of alien technology, Heightmeyer was playing a bit of a game with you.” Sheppard pushed away from the wall and started to leave. He looked indecisive for a moment and then turned back and said, “Listen, I didn’t ask, but your botanist there sure told me a lot. I’m the last guy on this planet to throw rocks in the glass house, if you get what I’m saying.”
Surprised, Lorne just nodded.
“So we’re cool?” Sheppard asked, tilting his head.
“We’re cool, sir.”
Sheppard left and Lorne glanced down to see that David was awake and staring up at him, though he hadn’t moved a muscle while he’d been talking with Sheppard.
“Are we cool?” David asked, squeezing Evan’s hand.
He squeezed back. “I think maybe we will be.”