Playing With The Demons

Posted on Fri Aug 5th, 2016 @ 9:04pm by Master Warrant Officer Gaius Aquila & Splendora Sage

1,547 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: Episode 92 - More Questions than Answers
Location: Mind, Body, Soul Healing
Timeline: MD3, 1900hrs

As agreed, Giaus was to have his first full session with Splendora alone, without Holly. He felt bad that Holly felt inadequate with his situation, but he did reassure her, multiple times, that she was of big help. Even though things for him have been better, he still had those nightmares. These nightmare have been cutting into his sleep pattern for months now. He made his way into the shop. "Doctor, are you home?"

Splendora had just been by the partition near the reception when she heard his voice. "Oh...Giaus. Sorry I was just putting stuff away." She straightened and wiped her hands on her jeans. "Welcome! How's the sleeping herb tea work?"

Giaus sat down. " The good news, I got some sleep. The bad news, my dreams still wake me up."

"Hmm." She said picking up her notebook and pencil once they entered the office. "It was suppose to keep dreams away. Okay so you are not going to like this but sit down and start from the beginning. I want to know what happened"

"Can you be specific Doc?" Giaus asked.

"Take me back to the even that lead to the nightmares."

Giaus looked confused, "That's the problem Doc, I have had these types of dreams years ago. The stopped eventually. The last battle we had with the Borg last year triggered the dreams to start again, but the dreams include those I got from the Dominion War as well."

She smiled. "Quit stalling soldier and start at the beginning. Its not going to be easy but we need to go through it."

"Well, the event that re-triggered the nightmares was the Battle of Grenarisa III last year. It was a ground assault against a Borg base. The Marines call it the Battle Of Death Valley, due to the terrain. The force lost a few hundred Marines, and my team lost three. My mind has been messed up ever since."

She sighed. "It's natural to grieve the loss of family and its been my experience that Marine units are stronger then family in some cases. What do you see in your nightmares?"

"Well, most of the dreams start off with the MARSOC combat jump on Grenarisa III. Then it flashed into the Borg base my team infiltrated. That's where I lost three of my friends. Then the dreams always climax to the Second Battle of AR558. That was a bad one Doc. Lost more than half our battalion in that fight. I remember the bodies of Marines being stacked like firewood all over our POD," Giaus reflected.

She wanted to burst out saying that's horrible but she knew she had to be calm for her client. "Would you be open to doing some hypnosis a detached look at that battle?"

"You can," replied Giaus, who was open to anything.

"Okay. So lay back on the sofa and close your eyes." She waited until he complied. "Now I want you to start by taking a deep breath in...hold it, hold it...release. Breath in, and out, if you notice any thoughts let your mind just acknowledge them and then let them go."

The breathing in itself was very relaxing to Giaus. In fact, the breathing started putting him on the edge of sleep. He felt as lite as a feather, "Floating like I was on the combat jump into Grenarisa III." He remembered how the darkness of space gradually became the flames of reentry. "I could feel the heat of reentry through my jump suit." The flames subsided, and now the orange sky was in his view as he descended towards the ground, hitting the release on his parachute at the last possible minute. "The impact of landing..." as he hit the ground at 20 kph. Then a flash of light skipped him past the drop zone, and "Into the Borg Base, looks like a hive...". The Brigade was fully involved in an attack on the Borg Base. Giaus' Team "was the first to enter the hive. Nothing for the first 200 meters, then "the Drones started coming out of nowhere, from the walls, the deck, the side halls, everywhere." In minutes, the "whole team was cut off from the rest of the line units. Calling for help on the comms. Spadafore, they have Spadafore! " Firing his weapon until it gets almost too hot to hold. "Brazek is down!" The fight continues...

In a flash, Giaus finds himself on a dark and barren world. There are Jem'Hadar inside the Perimeter of Defense. "Corporal, we need your team to shift fire left!," said Lieutenant Jackson. Giaus yells, "Yes Sir!" He shifts what is left of his fire team's fire. He is "tripping over bodies" as the battle rages. At this point, most of the fighting was through physical contact. Giaus' "rifle broke crushing a Lizzard's head. I'm the only one left from my Squad." His position was "being overrun" by an enemy that gave no quarter. He drew his non-regulation, but very native to him Gladius, and "started hacking Lizzards to pieces. I am going to die anyway. Here I come Mars!" He leaps, hacks, and gets pulled off the pile by "Jackson." They pull back to their DIP position. "Die In Place. That's what we are about to do." Then explosions everywhere...

Giaus stands up screaming. His face covered in sweat. His hands shaking.

Splendora stood up. She approached Giaus who was screaming but has his eyes closed. "Giaus! She shouted. Listen to my voice. Just listen to my voice. When I snap my fingers you will open your eyes." She snapped her fingers twice by his ears.

Giaus' eyes opened up, but his breathing remained rapid for a few minutes. "Wow."

"Yeah. I think we need to do emersion therapy for you Giaus. Come sit down and I will explain how that works. It's been proven very effective in PTSD."

Giaus was curious. "So how does this work Doc?"

"It's a bit rough but we need to distance you from the actual events where you can examine them and they will not give you the symptom. Emersion therapy is part one. We get you to go through what you just saw but we get you to view it through a screen using hypno therapy. Then we start dimming the screen until you can turn it off. So the theory is that when they symptoms or images hit you will have the ability to shut them off."

"I have never heard of this Doc, but when do you want to begin?"

"Next session. As for now I want you to examine what you saw." She went to the replicators. "Anything to drink or eat?"

"Late harvest riesling please," he said. The experience has left him thirsty.

She ordered two, one for him and one for her. "Okay. Now, take some time and let me know when you're ready to start and we'll dissect what happened."

Giaus took a nice sip of his wine,"I am ready now."

"Alright." She picked up her notebook and pen again. "Please tell me what you felt not emotion focus on the physical symptoms first."

Giaus gave the question some thought, "Well, it gets hard to breathe sometimes. My heart races, and my stomach starts to hurt. And I get headaches like no other."

Splendora wrote. "When you start to feel the physical symptoms do you feel as if you are there again or are you aware it's a memory?" That was important to the treatment.

"Most of the time, I am there. I could hear the sounds, I could even smell the odors of battle. Holly pulled me out of a few dreams by waking me up." Giaus answered.

"And when she pulled you out how long did it take you to realize it was her pulling you out, that it was a dream? How did you react?"

Giaus recalled, "The first few times, I reacted slowly to her voice. In fact, I was alarmed that she was in the thick of things with me. Eventually, I started to respond quickly to her voice, as far as either leaving the dream, or waking up."

She gave a nod. "But you recognized her and you knew it was her right away?"

TAG>>>>>>

"Okay. Next question. After she woke you up...this is a hard one but I need you to be honest. What were your feelings? Was there any...aggression towards her any anger, pain..."

"At first, I would keep fighting as I woke up, but it never got to a point of aggressiveness to her or the boys. Right no, no ill feeling towards her, but my body hurts for an hour or so." Giaus said.

"What's the hurt like, dull, a tired soreness, or sharp pains in the muscles. Do you continue to have tremors for that hour?"

"Some tightness in my chest, muscle aches, and soreness. The tremors only last about ten minutes currently."

"Okay. We can tackle this. I think this is okay for today. Keep taking the tea." She said walking over to the cabinet and taking more tea. "It should help you sleep and let's meet tomorrow we start with the heavy stuff. Sound like a plan?"

"Yes it does Doc. Thank you very much."

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