Title:Echo in the Memory
Character/Pairing: Nathanial Taylor/Alicia Washington
Word Count: Total: 18,000. This part: 1,400
Genre: General, some Romance
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Foul language
Spoiler alert: More fix it for the season finale.
Summary: "Dissociative amnesia occurs when a person blocks out certain information, usually associated with a stressful or traumatic event, leaving him or her unable to remember important personal information." After being shot, Alicia is in a coma for two weeks before waking up. When she finally does, she's forgotten the past twenty years.
Authors Note: This sat on my harddrive for a while, as I started it right after the season finale and then I just sort of poked at it. Took forever to finish it. Thanks to
crystalkei for betaing and helping with some of the medical stuff.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened
-T.S Eliot, "The Four Quartets"
Taylor stood outside the hospital every day at exactly 11:30 am. He used to go into the hospital, but after the first week of “hovering” he'd been told not to enter the building unless he was injured. So now he waited outside for Doc Shannon to take her lunch break.
“No news, Commander. I wish you'd take me at my word and believe me that as soon as I have news about the Lieutenant, I'll tell you.” Elisabeth didn't even slow her pace, knowing that Taylor would follow behind her.
“It's been almost two weeks. She should have woken up by now.” Taylor looked around the colony, impressed by how quickly everyone had put it back to rights. Only a few reminders still remained. It was almost like nothing had happened, but the absence of certain people was a harsh reminder.
“It's a miracle she's even alive. She's not on life support, which is also amazing.” Elisabeth slowed her pace and lowered her voice. “All we can do is wait. I don't know when or if she'll wake up. You need to prepare for the fact that even if she does, there could brain damage.”
“Can't you test for that?” grumbling and trying not to glare at the doctor, he instead glared at the fence that was still under repair.
“So far we can't see any major damage, but we won't know for certain until she wakes up. She could have memory loss, personality changes, loss of motor functions -”
“I get it, Doc,” cutting her off, Taylor opened the door to the mess hall.
“I don't think you do, to be honest.” Elisabeth pushed the door closed and pulled him aside. “I know a bit of hope is a good thing, and I know a lot of other people are also extremely upset by her coma. To help all parties involved I'm going to start letting people into her room to talk to her for short intervals. At this point it can't hurt to see if someone's voice helps trigger something. But I want to make very clear this does not mean you can hover about at all hours.”
“Give me a list of who you want in there, and I'll make sure they get time off in their schedule.” Nodding at Elisabeth, Taylor pulled open the door again. As she entered the building, he called after her. “Just make sure I'm on that list.”
- - - -
It took a bit of effort, but Taylor managed to find loopholes in Elisabeth's “no lurking” rule. Leah Marcos needed a chaperone since her family was busy during the day, so he escorted her to the hospital and waited outside Alicia's room while the little girl chattered away. Today she'd brought in a book to read out loud, and so Taylor was sitting with her in case she stumbled across any difficult words.
“What's this word?” Leah whispered, pointing to a word on the plex.
“Rhinoceros,” Taylor provided in an equally quiet voice.
“Is that a dinosaur?” She frowned at the plex.
“No, it was an animal that went extinct back in our time, but before I was born. They didn't eat people though, just plants.” Taylor smiled as her frown increased.
“This book is silly.” Looking at the plex in her hands she scowled a bit deeper. “I don't know why we have to read it.”
“I had to read it when I was your age. If you think the rhino eating people is silly, wait until you get to the talking bugs.” Smiling at her angry expression, Taylor couldn't help but laugh. “Don't give up on it so fast, you might like it.”
“Everything going alright in here?” Elisabeth appeared and started checking Alicia's vitals.
“Leah isn't a fan of 'James and the Giant Peach', apparently.” Taylor held the plex as Leah went over to the bed and put her small hand on Alicia's.
“I'll pick a better book next time. But hopefully you'll be awake by then. Otherwise I'll see you in a few days.” Nodding up at Taylor, Leah gave a sad smile and took her plex back. “Thank you Commander. I'll give the book another try, but I still think it's silly.”
“Zoe doesn't like it either.” Elisabeth offered up once the girl was out of the room. “I thought it was the best book ever written when I was little.”
“Any change so far?” Taylor stood and looked into the bed.
“No.” Resting a hand on his arm, she tried to offer support. “It's only been a few days with this new treatment.”
“I hate seeing her like this.” Reaching out to touch the hair splayed on her pillow, he let his guard down. He figured that at this point, there was no point in hiding things from the Doc, she probably had a good idea about his feelings towards his Lieutenant.
“We all do.” Squeezing his arm one last time, Elisabeth moved towards the door. “We'll see what happens tomorrow.”
“I'll be out in a minute.” Running his thumb across Alicia's cheek, Taylor sighed heavily. Two weeks and she was still unresponsive. Any hope he'd been clinging to was slowly but surely melting away.
- - - -
The footsteps outside woke him up before the banging on the door did. He'd fallen asleep on the couch, and was to the door almost before the knocking had stopped. Recognizing the voices outside, he pulled open the door without hesitation.
“Report.” Assuming something was wrong if people were banging on his door at midnight, he left the door open and reached for his holster.
“She woke up.” Reynolds sounded breathless. Reilly looked like she'd been running.
“How long?” Taylor dropped his holster back onto the table and pulled the door closed behind him as he exited.
“A few minutes ago.” Reilly fell into step behind Taylor and kept talking despite the fact Taylor was setting a brisk pace. Reynolds nodded and headed in a different direction, probably to keep spreading the news. “Doctor Shannon isn't letting anyone in right now, but she said you'd want to know.”
“You did good.” Taylor paused just inside the door to the hospital and barely registered Reilly leaving. Elisabeth was hurrying around, but the look on her face wasn't as happy as he expected. She noticed him and came over.
“I told them not to get too excited.” Elisabeth pushed him towards a chair. “Since I have a feeling I'm not getting rid of you, at least sit out of the way.”
“How is she?” Sitting obediently, he tilted his head towards Alicia's room.
“Awake. Confused.” Shrugging, Elisabeth took a deep breath. “There's some memory loss. Which is why I tried to keep Mark and Reilly from running off and telling everyone.”
“How much memory loss?” A nurse came out of Alicia's room and gave Taylor a sad smile. He frowned at Elisabeth. “Is it permanent?”
“It's tough to say. Nurse Agawa is the closest thing we have to a psychologist in the colony, so she's talking to the Lieutenant right now.” Resting a hand on Taylor's shoulder, Elisabeth gave him a stern look. “No one is allowed in until we figure out what's causing the memory loss.”
“Why do you need a shrink?” Rubbing a hand across his face, he watched the nurse go back into Alicia's room with a plex pad.
“There's no brain damage that we can find. Whatever is blocking her memory is not physical. The sonic blast could have easily caused the retrograde amnesia just from the trauma, but we're not seeing any signs of that. Nurse Agawa thinks it's more likely Dissociative Amnesia, which is completely understandable given all the traumatic events that have occurred recently.” Lowering her voice as someone went past, Elisabeth squeezed Taylor's shoulder. “We're running some more scans now that's she's awake. Once we figure out exactly what we're dealing with, we can work on it.”
“When can I see her?” Taylor nodded, hoping the doctor realized he'd actually been listening.
“Not until we know what we're dealing with.” With a gentle smile Elisabeth turned and started to leave. “I am sorry.”
“I know.” With a sigh, Taylor tried to relax in the chair. He was glad no one asked him to leave, because he wasn't planning on moving.
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