A/N: Ok, here goes my first try at some Atlantis fan fiction… ignoring a crossover, of course. Thanks for taking a look.

Disclaimer: I do not own Stargate Atlantis, nor do I make any money off of this fic. It's sad that I put so much time and effort into these things that don't really do anything for me… oh well, enjoy!

Chapter 1

Sheppard groaned as he came to. His head was pounding as he tried to open his eyes. The salty smell of the air and the distant sound of the sea made him think at first that he may have made it back to Atlantis. But, by the fact that he could feel rocks digging into his back he doubted very much that that was the case.

As he was finally able to pry his eyes open, his fears were confirmed. He was lying on the ground next to a DHD on a planet that he was pretty sure he hadn't seen before. The sky was gray and overcast and the ground beneath him was littered with glassy black rocks that seemed intent on digging into his backside.

He groaned again as he managed to sit up and get a better look around. He noticed a device on the ground next to him. He picked it up and pressed the button on top. "Good morning, Sheppard," a distorted voice spoke from the object. "I've left you a little recording to let you know what you're dealing with. As you no doubt can tell, you are no longer on P3X-878. I have brought you and Doctor McKay to this lovely little world."

Sheppard quickly glanced around as he stood up, looking for any sign of McKay. He was also worried about Teyla, Ronon, and Beckett. The three of them had been called out by the alliance to help with another outbreak of the plague. But when they had gotten there, there was nothing. It wasn't long before the ambush started.

He had called for them to split up. Beckett went with Teyla and Ronon while Sheppard took McKay and headed the other way. Both of them were to circle around in opposite directions and make it back to the gate. Sheppard hoped that the others had made it since there was no mention of them from this creepy voice.

Of course, there was no sight of McKay either. The only thing that he was able to spot was one of their communicators lying on the DHD. The recording droned on as he reached for it. "No doubt you have noticed that I left you a communicator by now. I thought that you might wish to talk to your friend. Unfortunately, he's not going to be much help to you in finding him. He should be just as clueless to his whereabouts as you. But, if you wish to get off this planet in one piece, then you will probably need his help.

I have taken the liberty of tampering with the dialing device. It's nothing that a man of Dr. McKay's caliber can't fix, but he's not with you at the moment. Also, there are charges set on the Stargate that will detonate thirteen hours after this message began to play. Thank you so much for arming them for me, Colonel."

Sheppard swore under his breath.

"As for the good Doctor, you better hurry. He has just under twelve hours before his current situation turns rather deadly. Don't reach him in time, you'll be trapped here, but at least you won't have to worry about him going up in flames with you, Sheppard. In fact, it will be just the opposite for him."

There was a slight laugh and then the recording cut off.

"Damn it," Sheppard muttered as he quickly placed the communicator over his ear. He tapped it and called, "McKay! McKay, you there!"

Static was all that met him.

"McKay! Talk to me!" he snapped again as he turned and looked around him. He padded himself down as he did so, realizing that he still had his TAC vest on. From the feel of it, his weapons were all gone except for a hand held wraith stunner, but most of his other equipment was still in his multiple pockets. Including a brick of C4.

Around him, it looked as if he were standing on an ancient volcanic run off. Glassy rock littered the ground for what looked like a little over a mile heading away from the Stargate. From there it looked like the ground just abruptly ended. But from the smell and sound, it probably dropped off to an ocean.

"McKay!" Sheppard called on the radio again.

There was a soft groaning coming from his ear now. "McKay, is that you? Come on buddy, you need to speak to me."

"Shhh…pard?" the voice mumbled.

"Hey McKay, glad to hear you're awake. You mind telling me where you are?"

There was a brief pause of silence where Sheppard was about to ask if he was still there before a muttered, "oh crap," came across the radio.

"McKay?"

"Sheppard, where the hell are you?" McKay's now fully awake and worried voice came across.

Sheppard started walking towards the ocean. He didn't know why, but he had a feeling that was the direction that he needed to at least start heading. "Near the gate," he responded. "Right now I need to know where you are and what the situation is."

"I don't know where the hell I am, but you better get here soon," McKay snapped back. "I'm soaking wet and the water is quickly rising and my ankle is chained to the damn rock!"

"McKay," Sheppard snapped. "Slow down! I need you to be specific. Tell me everything that you can see."

Sheppard could almost see the scientist taking several deep breaths before he tried to respond in a slightly less hysterical voice. "Alright, alright… I think I'm in the bottom of some kind of tidal cave. Though really it's more like a hole. It's all this volcanic rock around me in a roughly cylindrical formation and far above I can see gray daylight. The water is already up to my knees and is filling pretty quickly from a small opening in the rock. It's also pretty choppy so if I have to start swimming, I'm going to get pretty beat up against these rocks."

"Ok, well it sounds like I'm at least heading in the right direction," Sheppard responded as he continued to hurry across the rocky ground towards the ocean. "I can just see the ocean from where I'm at and will be there probably in about twenty minutes."

"Great," McKay huffed. "So you'll make it to the ocean… then what! You have no idea which direction this little cave of mine is in and neither do I! I don't even know how the hell I got here!"

"McKay…" Sheppard sighed. He was already dealing with a headache from whatever was used to knock him out; he didn't really want to have to deal with McKay's grating voice screaming in his ear.

"And who the hell did this? And why!" McKay gasped.

Sheppard debated how much to tell McKay, but decided that right now full disclosure was probably best. He quickly filled the scientist in on everything that the recording had told him.

"Great… that's just great," McKay huffed. "What psychopath is after us this time I wonder…?"

"The who isn't all that important right now," Sheppard said. "What is important is getting off this rock. So I'm going to need you to work with me here."

"Yeah, and what do you expect me to do?"

"First off, when I get to the water, I'll have you start calling. Maybe I can at least pinpoint the direction I need to head."

"Yes, because I haven't been yelling enough already!" McKay called across the radio.

Sheppard winced but decided not to be too harsh with the terrified man at the moment. "Do you think you might be able to climb out?" he asked.

McKay was quick to make a scoffing sound. "Even if I could find some way to grab a hold of this rock without slicing my hands to shreds, I doubt that I'll be able to reach the top. Remember? Ankle chained to the rock?"

Sheppard only vaguely remembered that part from McKay's first rant before he got him to calm down. "Just under twelve hours," Sheppard muttered as he finally figured that part out.

"What was that?" McKay demanded.

"The recording, it told me that I had thirteen hours before I went up in flames, but you had just under twelve hours before the opposite happened to you."

"Great!" McKay snapped, "That means in twelve hours, this damn chain is going to go taut and send me down, under water! Drowning! Why does it have to be drowning again!"

Sheppard could hear the beginnings of hyperventilating over the radio. "McKay!" No response. "Rodney!" he snapped. "You need to calm down. I'm not going to let you drown."

"Yeah…" came the muttered response as the breathing began to slow down again. "Yeah, right. I know… I just…"

"I know, you're scared," Sheppard said calmly. "But we've been in worse situations. I'll get you out of there, got it?"

"Got it."

"All right. Now, I've reached the edge of the cliff. I want you to switch your radio off for the moment and start calling out. Give it about two minutes and then check in with me again. Ok?"

There was a brief pause before McKay's voice spoke again. "Ok. McKay out."

There was a snap on Sheppard's radio as everything went silent besides the sound of the ocean and the wind that rushed all around him. He strained his ears for the sound of his friend's voice calling for him, but he couldn't hear anything over the wind and sea. He swore under his breath as he turned his head from side to side, listening intently. He checked his watch and saw that he had twelve and a half hours before the Stargate exploded. That meant that Rodney had just under eleven hours.

Sheppard sighed before he veered to the right and began his trek across the cliff face. He was worried that, even if it was going to be eleven hours before McKay's chain went taut, that the scientist would not be able to keep swimming for that amount of time.

He could tell from the drops of moister that the wind whipped up to him that the water was far from tropical. Cold water, plus constantly being battered against sharp rocks while fighting to keep a head above the water was a recipe for extreme fatigue rather rapidly and Rodney was not the most physically fit person in the world.

Almost two minutes on the nose, Sheppard's radio clicked back on and McKay's now somewhat scratchy voice called to him. "Sheppard?"

"Yeah McKay, I'm here," he replied.

"Did you hear me? Well I know you can hear me now, but did you hear me when I was screaming?"

Sheppard sighed and then said, "No, I can't hear much of anything over the wind and water Rodney, I'm sorry."

There was a brief pause before McKay spoke again. "Oh… well, so what are you going to do?"

"I already picked a direction and started walking. I'm going to need you to keep making noise for me, all right?"

"Wait, so you're just randomly walking about hoping you'll hear me? This is insane."

"Do you have a better idea, McKay? Because I would love to narrow this down more, but I don't have much to go on here."

"I, ah… Well there's always shadows to use as triangulation… of course we don't have a clue what the rotational rate is of this planet and it doesn't help that there isn't really a visible sun at the moment anyway. And of course me being at the bottom of a hole would kind of screw up my perspective."

"So, no then," Sheppard replied with a sigh.

"Yeah, ah, sorry. I… Sheppard?"

"Yeah McKay?"

There was another pause. "Maybe you should get back to the gate."

"I told you, the DHD is broke and you need to repair it," Sheppard replied.

"Yes, I know," McKay said quickly. "But, I was thinking, since we have the radios, maybe I could talk you through how to fix it."

"Not going to happen," Sheppard replied.

"Sheppard…"

"Drop it McKay. I'm not leaving here without you and before you even mention it, I'm sure that whoever did this has found a way to make sure that Atlantis is not a place that I will be able to dial to to get help."

There was another pause, "Sheppard, you need to at least try. You're not going to be able to find me by randomly searching the cliff face. I doubt that wherever I've been dumped is going to be all that obvious."

"And if I waist time going back to the Stargate to fix it, then I'm never going to find you."

There was an even longer span of silence. Sheppard was becoming rather concerned that his rather talkative friend wasn't saying anything for this long. "McKay?"

"Thanks, Sheppard," came a soft reply.

Sheppard was a little shocked at the words that he just heard. He wasn't sure where that was coming from. McKay should have known that he wasn't going to just abandon him. "Of course, buddy. I've told you before, we don't leave people behind."

"I know… it's just…" Sheppard could hear the fear and loneliness in his friend's voice.

"Rodney, I'm going to find you. Now, how about you switch off for a few minutes again and let's see if you can yell loud enough for me this time."

"Right… two minutes…"

XXX

"I hope you heard me th…this time, Sh…Sheppard," McKay's voice stuttered across the radio.

Sheppard frowned at the sound of his friend's voice. He was obviously shivering already and from the sound of the water and slight gasping between words, he was swimming now. "Sorry buddy. I thought that you had a loud voice, too. You must be holding out on me."

"I as…assure you, I'mm n.."

"McKay, what's your condition?" Sheppard asked in concern.

There was a little gasp before he responded. "Had to s. a minute ago. rough . too."

"Ok, that'll be a problem, but the constant movement that you're going to have to keep will help keep you warm for now."

"Thank you, c. obv.," came the bitter response.

Suddenly an idea hit Sheppard, "McKay, I still had my TAC vest with almost everything still intact. Do you have anything?"

There was a pause before he answered. "Yeah. Weapons gone, but… oh, I can't believe I didn't think to look earlier!" McKay's excited voice began to babble, losing the stutter.

"What?" Sheppard demanded.

"My Life Signs Detector! I can't believe that they left this!"

"How does that help us?" Sheppard asked. "I can't exactly use it to help me find you if you're the one that has it."

"True," came the response. "It would have been far more useful in your possession for a change. But this way, if you enter the range of the scanner, I can help lead you to me."

"I take it then that I'm not in range?" Sheppard said as he felt his heart drop. The range of those things was usually pretty far. That meant that either McKay was further away that he would have thought or he had been going in the wrong direction for nearly an hour now.

"No, nothing," McKay said. "But I think I might… oof!"

"McKay!"

"Oh…oh god," his voice muttered over the line.

"Come on McKay, tell me what's happening!" Sheppard wasn't sure he could handle much more of this. Being able to hear but not see what was happening with his man had his insides tied into knots. He needed to be there, doing something to help McKay. Not trekking across this barren rocky cliff, possibly going in the wrong direction, completely useless.

There was a slight groan before McKay spoke again. "Sorry," a slightly slurred response came. "I was so concentrated on extending the scanner's range that I kind of forgot that I needed to be avoiding the walls. Kind of hit my head pretty hard."

"McKay…" Sheppard breathed.

"It's bleeding, but I don't think it's very bad," he replied.

Now Sheppard knew that something was very wrong. McKay was bleeding and not throwing a tantrum. "Are you sure?" Sheppard asked.

"Yeah… yeah. The rocks are just pretty sharp. Just a cut is all."

Sheppard swallowed his, 'yeah right, I call bullshit,' response and decided to let McKay downplay what had just happened. Right now there wasn't anything that Sheppard could do about it anyway so why not let McKay take whatever comfort he could find right now?

"Ok, good to hear. Just, try to be a little more careful. Remember, I need that brain of yours to fix the DHD yet."

"Yeah, yeah. I know; you only want me for my mind."

"Well that and your charming personality," Sheppard replied.

"Har, har."

Sheppard was silent for a while as he kept sweeping his eyes across the rocks, looking for a hole that might lead him to his missing teammate.

"Hey, ah, Sheppard?"

"Yeah McKay?"

"How much time do you have left?"

Sheppard glanced at his watch and saw that McKay was down to ten hours. "Plenty," he responded.

McKay made a frustrated sigh before he said, "Tell me, how long before the gate blows?"

"Just over eleven," Sheppard replied.

"And how long will it take for you to reach the gate?"

"McKay…" Sheppard said in a warning tone.

"Just tell me, Sheppard."

"About a half hour from here," Sheppard caved.

"And about an hour to it, that gives you nine and a half," McKay was muttering almost to himself.

"What are you going on about?" Sheppard asked.

"Look, I'm not going to be able to swim in here forever. We both know that. I think if I don't see your little speck on my scanner in say, two hours, you need to head back to the gate. I can talk you through how to fix it and then you can see if you can get help. If not, then you still have a few hours to search in the other direction."

"It'll give me more time to search for you if you're the one to do the fixing in person and I don't make an extra trip to the gate."

"John!" McKay snapped, suddenly getting Sheppard's full attention. "If whatever bomb that is attached to the Stargate creates a chain reaction with the Naquadah, then nowhere is going to be safe for either of us. The radiation alone will kill us. But I'm pretty sure that even at the bottom of this well the explosion will be enough on its own. If you wait to the last minute to head back to the gate, I probably won't be able to think clearly enough to talk you through it. You need to do this sooner, rather than later."

Sheppard paused for a moment as he actually allowed himself to think over everything that McKay had just said. He had been automatically brushing the suggestion aside, not even contemplating it as an option. But Rodney was so insistent that this was what needed to be done. Sheppard was used to relying on McKay for the technical advice, but could he afford to take it this time? He had a point, but it didn't really matter, did it? If John couldn't get to McKay in time, he would rather get blown up anyway.

He shook his head and started walking again. "Sorry McKay. I'm not going to cut my time to search for you any shorter. Besides, I probably still wouldn't understand what you're trying to tell me to fix the DHD anyway. I need you there."

There was another frustrated sigh on the other end. "Fine, it's your funeral," McKay muttered. "How about I try some more useless yelling again for a while?"

"That sounds like a more useful suggestion," Sheppard said with a tight smile. This was getting to be one of the worst missions ever.

XXX

McKay screamed Sheppard's name over and over as loud as he could, but he never heard anything in response. He would glance at the LSD every so often, but it stubbornly remained blank of anything but his own little blue dot. He had even managed to increase the range slightly just before a wave decided to brain him again the rocks.

He had been trying to down play the incident to Sheppard, mostly because he was rather embarrassed that he allowed himself to be distracted from the obvious just because he found a piece of mostly useless technology to play with. Besides, there wasn't much that John was going to be able to do about the probable concussion that he had now.

At least the chilly water seemed to be easing the pounding in his head slightly. But it certainly wasn't helping much with keeping his muscles from cramping. God, he'd only been swimming for what, an hour and a half? Two at the most… and his arms and legs already felt like lead. There was no way that he was going to be able to keep swimming for the twelve hours that were given to him. And even if by some miracle he could, how was Sheppard going to get that chain off of him? It was pad locked in place and he doubted that the Colonel had been left with weapons either to shoot the lock off with.

And even if he could swim that long, and John was able to free him in time, there wasn't a prayer that he was going to be able to make it back to the gate and be mentally able to fix the DHD in time. John was being stubborn and stupid to not take up his idea. It was really the only way that either of them were going to get out of there alive. But Sheppard had hero issues and he was going to be self sacrificing as always, probably to his own detriment.

There was another concern that Rodney had that he hadn't bothered to voice to Sheppard yet either. He knew that he complained about it and used it as an excuse far more than he needed to, but his hypoglycemia was real. Going twelve hours, particularly twelve hours of physical intense labor, without anything to eat was certainly not what the doctor ordered. Of course, with this cold water, there wasn't much chance that he'd notice the difference between low blood sugar shakes and hypothermia shivers.

And it was obvious that whoever the sadistic bastard was that had done this, knew about Rodney's condition. The jerk had left the LSD but had taken his power bars. That was something that kept gnawing at the back of Rodney's mind. That seemed like such an asinine thing to do that it didn't make sense.

And then suddenly it clicked.

"Sheppard!" McKay suddenly called as he slapped his radio back on. "You were right, damn it!"

"Oookaaay…" Sheppard replied. "Glad to hear you say that, buddy, but you're going to have to be a little more specific."

"You were right about the Stargate," McKay explained in a rush. "Whatever bastard did this wants you to find me. He wants us to be able to get away. He's probably already locked in a set of coordinates to send us to some other hell hole!"

"Yeah, I thought as much. But what is it that confirmed it for you?"

"He left me with the LSD, but took my damn power bars!" Rodney exclaimed. "He left me with a tactical advantage but took away a basic survival need. He wants us to be able to continue on, but stay weakened."

"Sonofabitch," Rodney heard Sheppard mutter. "Well that's good though, right?" Sheppard said more loudly. "If he wants us to be able to continue on, then he must have expected me to be able to find you in time."

"Yeah, but he didn't make it very easy, did he!" Rodney snapped back. "He might have made the task improbable rather than impossible, but that doesn't guarantee that we're going to make it out of here and on to the next lovely addition of torture the Lantians."

"Well that's ok then," Sheppard said. Rodney could hear his insufferable smugness. "We do improbable all the time. Sometimes even impossible."

"We?" McKay sputtered.

"Ok, well, that's normally your department. Of course it's self proclaimed and I can't exactly back up your words most of the time."

"Whatever," Rodney grumbled. He really wasn't in the mood right now to argue about this. He was having enough trouble just keeping his head above water and away from the rocks that surrounded him. His hands were already sliced up from the sharp rocks. Luckily those same hands had gone almost completely numb by now from the cold water. Even the salt didn't sting in his cuts very much anymore.

"McKay, you ok?" Sheppard asked.

"Yeah, peachy," he grumbled back.

"You just seem to be losing some of your snark, buddy. You don't want to leave such an insult hanging do ya?"

Rodney sighed and replied, "Sheppard, I'm cold, tired, and have just figured out that even if I do make it out of this, there is probably more to come. I don't exactly have the energy to go verbal rounds with you right now."

"Does that mean you want to go physical rounds with me then?"

"If you were here, right now, I would love to. I would even let you knock me out cold so I could get a bit of rest. But since you're not here, then the question is moot."

There was a pause from Sheppard's end before a rather contrite voice replied, "Sorry buddy, I was just trying to lighten the mood. Just hang in there."

"Hanging…" Rodney sighed. Although hanging would probably have been preferable to what he was doing now. Constantly fighting the rip and pull of the water to stay above it was probably one of the most exhausting things that he had ever done. But he had to keep swimming. Ignoring his great fear of drowning, if he did slip under now, Sheppard would probably be caught on the planet when that gate blew and that was not acceptable.

"Think you're up for making some more noise, buddy?" Sheppard asked after a while.

With a tired sigh, Rodney replied, "Yeah… yeah, I'll give it another shot."

XXX

Breathe, shout, kick, shout, breathe, shout, kick, shout, breathe… That had been his mental mantra for some time now. He couldn't let himself think of anything else or he would be overcome with exhaustion, fear, and cold. He had to keep this up, but right now, he couldn't even think of why.

"John!" he shouted after another breath. He wasn't sure when he had switched from using 'Sheppard,' to 'John.' At some point he realized that one syllable took less time and energy to say than two.

"John!" kick.

His hands were now so battered that he had given up on using them for anything else but keep away from the rocky walls. He couldn't even feel the LSD that was still in his hand and he had long ago forgotten about checking it as it wasn't an essential part to keeping his head above the water.

"John!" breathe.

"Rodney!" he thought he heard a frantic voice calling to him. "Come on McKay, answer me!"

"John!" he called out again, not even registering what that voice was.

"Rodney! Are you alright? You haven't responded in over an hour. I'm getting pretty worried here, buddy."

"John!" he called again, still not understanding that voice or what he was supposed to do about it.

"Look, McKay," the voice continued. "You have to answer me. I don't know if you're stuck in some mental exercise to distract yourself or what, but I need to know that you're still with me. Rodney!"

And then suddenly it clicked… he needed to answer that voice. Unfortunately, the voice was only in his head, not outside. That meant that he hadn't been found yet.

"John?" he breathed as he tapped his communicator again.

"Ohthankgod," John said on a breath. "You nearly gave me a heart attack McKay. Why didn't you answer me?"

But Rodney's mind was drifting again. He altered his mantra slightly, realizing that he didn't need to shout now that john's voice was in his head again. Breathe, kick, breathe, kick, breathe.

"McKay?" Sheppard's anxious voice sounded again.

"Yeah… yeah, 'm here."

"McKay, what's going on? Why aren't you speaking?"

"Kinda… busy…" he muttered, though he wasn't exactly sure what he was busy with. All he had to do was kick and breathe, how hard could that be?

After a bit of a pause, Sheppard's voice sounded again. It no longer had the tight anxiety to it but was now a forced calm. "Rodney, I need you to tell me what's wrong."

"Wrong?" he muttered. He didn't understand the question. There wasn't anything wrong. He was still breathing, he was still kicking, that was all there was, right? He wasn't supposed to be shouting right now, was he?

"Rodney," the forced calm voice was speaking again. "You've been treading cold water for nearly nine hours now. That's an impressive feat for anyone and not without costs. You need to talk to me, buddy. Tell me what's going on."

"I… numb," Rodney finally managed to respond. Yes, that was the word, he was numb. He thought that he probably should be in quite a lot of pain, but he wasn't. It was all numb. He wasn't even sure when his hands came in contact with rocks anymore. It was just another automatic response now whenever he got close.

"Ok, Rodney," that voice said after a pause. "That's understandable. You just have to keep swimming, ok? I can't be far away now."

"Yeah," he breathed back. But it didn't feel like he was actually speaking to someone, it was just another automatic response. Because all that there was to his world was to kick and breathe, kick and breathe.

"Rodney, how long since you check the Life Signs?"

"Life…?" but then a picture of the small white devise that was clutched in his hand formed in his head. Yes, that had been part of his world some time ago, but he had forgotten it. "Oh…" he glanced down at it. Everything was a blur. After blinking hard a few times, he was able to see a blue dot dancing around on the screen.

Taking another breath, he closed his eyes again and then opened them, trying very hard to concentrate on that tiny little screen. Those blue dots were important somehow… wait… dots

"John, two dots… there'r two dots," he said. He knew this was significant somehow and that the voice would want to know about it, but he couldn't remember why. Why were two dots significant?

"Rodney, that's great! Tell me where mine is in relation to you."

"I…" but he didn't understand. They were dots on a screen, how could they tell the voice where he was?

"Rodney, I need you to concentrate," the voice was urgent but still in that forced calm tone. Something about that tone told Rodney that he needed to pay attention. That what the voice was saying was terribly important.

"Yes, concentrate," he managed to mumble back as he stared at the screen some more. One of the blue dots was in the center of the screen and not moving while the other one was moving at a diagonal across the screen. "Left…" he muttered, fairly certain that's what those little blue dots were telling him.

"Ok, McKay, I'm angling left. Keep directing me."

A/N: Will Sheppard find McKay in time? Will they manage to get out before the gate explodes? Stay tuned till next week for the answer to these and more…

Oh, and review… reviews help! Thanks!