TITLE Outbreak (Part 1?)
FANDOM Stargate: Atlantis (AU) / X-Men
CHARACTERS Carson Beckett, Addison Parker (oc), John Sheppard
WARNING Not much. Bit of death.
SUMMARYAfter a mission interrupted by the Wraith, things go from bad to worse back on Atlantis.
AUTHOR'S NOTES The use of an original mutant character is for a specific purpose, although mostly in later parts. The canon Atlantis character list will be expanded as the series progresses. It's Atlantis AU, because I'm picking and choosing what I want. Sheppard's still a Major; Daedalus has brought in new people to Atlantis (Addison among them). Oh, yes. Not beta-d yet.

"Ouch."

The complaint echoed in the mostly empty infirmary.

"Well, if you'd sit still, it wouldn't hurt as much."

John Sheppard cast a glance over his shoulder at the young doctor currently cleaning out his latest battle wound – a nasty gash in the back of his shoulder thanks to a piece of shrapnel. "You're quoting a Disney film?" he asked her incredulously.

The doctor, Addison Parker, bit back a laugh. "Perhaps. But then again, you were the one who called the reference, Major Sheppard," she told him, humour tinging her voice. "Regardless, it is a medical truth that if you let your doctor do their work without moving around too much it is a lot less painful, not to mention quicker."

"Medical truth?" That prompted another raised eyebrow. "Or just something you tell all your patients?"

"Only the ones who can't sit still," she replied, not taking her eyes off what she was doing. Sheppard was perhaps one of the worst patients she'd had to deal with since arriving in Atlantis to join the current medical team, because unless he was bedridden, he didn't seem to be able to sit still long enough to let anyone do their job. Parker didn't believe it was personal, she'd heard comments about him from the nurses – who seemed to put up with him mostly because he was easy on the eyes.

At least attempting to sit still for the time being, Sheppard gripped the edge of the examining table. To distract him, while she cleaning out the dirt that had managed to find it's way into his wound, she asked him, "There weren't too many wounded when you all came back through the Stargate. How did you end up the lucky one with the most severe injuries from the attack?"

"The perks of being the team leader – Ow!"

Parker winced. "Sorry, Major. I'm almost done."

"Oh, good," he replied. His voice was laced with thinly veiled sarcasm, but again she knew it was nothing personal. Most people got along with doctors – unless they were the patient under the doctor's care. Sheppard seemed determined to keep his mind off what was being done to his shoulder, and asked, "How are you finding Atlantis?"

Behind him, Parker smiled. "Beyond anything I could have imagined," she admitted. And it was true. Atlantis was beyond her wildest dreams, and she was determined to take advantage of every minute she spent here. She'd arrived aboard the Daedalus nearly two weeks earlier to supplement the current medical staff.

Back when the Atlantis mission was still in it's planning stages, she'd been short listed on the medical roster thanks to possessing the Ancient gene. However, when the mission itself came around, and the medical team selected, Parker's name hadn't been on the list. The reasons given had been that there were too many medical personnel, and that her relative experience in her profession was less than that of some of the others. Even now, on Atlantis, she was one of the youngest on the medical staff. Instead of the Atlantis mission, the Air Force had offered her a place at Stargate Command, which she'd eagerly accepted. It wasn't what she'd hoped for, but it was a good second-best.

Privately she wondered if there had been other reasons for her being excluded from the original mission list. Granted, the reasons she'd been given were valid, and she had no reason to doubt that there were any other hidden meanings. But Parker's status as a mutant gave her pause for thought.

However, her mutation had played an integral part in her role at the SGC. As a low-level healer, Parker had been able to use her powers to help aid in the faster recovery of the base personnel. In her personnel file, it had been listed an as indispensable talent. She might not have been able to fully heal severe injuries – in fact the only injuries she'd ever been able to heal completely, on the spot, were minor cuts and bruises. For everything else, she was able to advance the rate of healing, but not complete it. Some things the body needed to heal itself.

Still, when the opportunity came up for extra personnel to travel to Atlantis, Parker had jumped at the chance. And this time it had been allowed.

Finishing up the cleaning, Parker covered the wound in Sheppard's shoulder with her gloved hand. "This might feel a little strange, Major," she told him honestly. Drawing in a deep breath, she focused on his wound. In her mind she could see the damage and began repairing it. Beneath her hand, the cut skin re-grew, slowly, but steadily. She couldn't see the expression on Sheppard's face, but she hoped it wasn't too uncomfortable for him.

When she finished, she removed her hand, and checked the skin on the back of his shoulder. "Okay," she told him. "We're nearly done here. You can put your shirt back on, now." Grabbing his chart off the examining table where she'd left it, she turned around to lean on the counter behind herself while she wrote a new entry to add to his file.

"You know, Doc," Sheppard spoke up, slipping his t-shirt back on. "That's just plain weird."

Turning slightly to look at him, she grinned. "Thanks." Finishing up with the chart, she shut it, and left it sitting on the bench. "Okay, so no heavy lifting for the next day or so. The worst of the damage is healed, but if you do anything too strenuous, you might risk tearing it again."

The major's eyes glittered with mischief. "And here I thought you'd healed me, Dr. Parker."

"Yeah, well, unfortunately it doesn't always work like that," she told him, grin still firmly in place. "If you want me to perform a miraculous healing, come to me with paper-cuts next time, Major."

"I'll keep that in mind," he told her. His face bore the irresistibly charming grin that wooed the nursing staff.

Giving him a bemused smile, she shook her head. Then she remembered. "Actually. Do you mind waiting for a minute? I think Dr. Beckett wanted a word with you." Carson Beckett was the Chief Medical officer on Atlantis, and a good friend to Parker.

Sheppard nodded, and hopped back into a sitting position on examining table. "Where is the good doctor today?"

"He's with the patients that you brought back with the survivors," she told him. "We wanted to run an MRI to try and find a reason why they've been unconscious so long. It's a bit of a mystery." She smiled. "Don't worry, he should be back any minute now."

Sheppard's latest off-world mission had been to a planet with a small population – most far away from the planet's Stargate. Originally they were there to negotiate trade with the closest settlement, but a Wraith attack forced their hand, and Sheppard brought the small settlement inhabitants back through the Stargate. Elizabeth Weir hadn't been impressed, but was becoming used to the compassion Sheppard normally displayed, and offered the services of Atlantis to help them return to their home, or help find another planet where they could start over. There were barely forty survivors from that settlement, and two of those survivors had been unconscious before Sheppard's team's arrival on the planet. Beckett had decided to take the two off-world patients for their scans, leaving Parker and a handful of nurses to check everyone else. Most of the off-world inhabitants were suffering shock, and they'd all been gathered in one of Atlantis' many conference rooms, and hot drinks distributed.

Startled out of her reverie when Beckett and two of his assistants returned to the infirmary, wheeling their two patients on gurneys, she offered him a slight wave, and pointed in the direction of Sheppard.

Nodding ever so slightly, Beckett offered her a brief grin. She recognised the look. It meant he was puzzled by something. "Thank you, Addison," he told her as he passed by, towards Sheppard.

Parker watched as he met up with Sheppard, before she turned away towards the infirmary's primary computer – a laptop set up to interface with the Ancient system. They used this primary for their main research, and for patient files. She was still coming to grips with the system they had on Atlantis – they didn't have all the luxuries of a modern, up-to-date hospital. Then again, some of those hospitals didn't have what they did. It all took some getting used to.

It took her less than ten minutes to update the Sheppard's file. When she finished, she closed the program and glanced back in Beckett's direction. He was still engrossed in conversation with Sheppard. Sighing, she headed towards the infirmary entrance. A good cup of tea sounded good right about now. And then perhaps she'd check on Atlantis' latest guests. Perhaps they could shed some light on the condition of the two men still lying unconscious on gurneys being attended to by the nursing staff.

As she passed the nurses – Cally and Rebecca – she asked if she could get anything for them while she was in the commissary. A couple of coffee requests later, she called out, "Dr. Beckett, can I get you anything?" She hated to so rudely interrupt his conversation, but she felt it ruder not to at least offer to get him something while she was out.

The delay turned out to be fateful.

Turned away from the door, Parker watched as one of their off-world patients began to convulse violently. Both nurses reacted immediately, and Parker found herself automatically walking in their direction to help them strap the man down for his own safety. It wasn't quiet, and the extra ruckus drew Beckett's gaze away from Sheppard. She heard herself automatically start giving orders, then heard Beckett's unmistakable Scottish accent join hers.

Not even half a minute later, the second patient also began convulsing, and Parker left the first patient in the hands of Beckett and Cally, while moving over to strap down the second man. "Page the emergency staff," she told Rebecca, who nodded and immediately moved off to do so. On her own, Parker struggled to get the man sedated and secured, until Sheppard stepped in to hold the man down.

Pulling the cap off the needle with her teeth, Parker administered the sedative through the intravenous drip, and adjusted its setting to release a little more into the bloodstream of the patient for the time being. Leaving Sheppard to finish strapping him down, she glanced at the bedside monitor; the readings weren't normal. Behind her, she could hear Beckett still calling out orders, and absently she acknowledged that Rebecca joined herself and Sheppard over their patient. Despite the sedatives, the convulsions weren't stopping for either patient.

Parker's patient opened his eyes, and for a minute she recoiled in horror. They were pitch black, like oil, with no iris or pupil. She heard similar gasps from behind her, but didn't turn around. The convulsions started with a new intensity, and before she knew what was happening, the straps containing the patient's arms snapped, and she felt the arm connect with her stomach with astonishing force that knocked her backwards and down. She felt her head connect with the steel frame of the first patient's gurney. The sharp pain subsided almost instantly, but she couldn't think straight.

She missed the next stage in the cycle.

Sheppard moved to try and contain the man's flailing body, while Rebecca hastened to administer a stronger sedative. For both patients, the convulsions reached critical, and strained against all remaining bonds. And then, they dissolved. Not into water, but into ash, or dust. As if their bodies were incinerated in a split-second, leaving a cloud of thick ash in the air.

All around her, Parker could hear people coughing as they inhaled the ash. Eventually she started coughing herself, when the ash started to settle. It felt like an eternity, but everything happened so quickly, she barely took it all in.

Until the dull sound of Atlantis' sirens kicked in, and the doors to the infirmary slammed shut, sealed.

Beckett crouched down next to her, and Parker smiled weakly as he examined her head. "You've a nasty gash there, Addison," he told her, and she nodded. "Can you heal it?"

She shook her head, no. It wasn't for the first time that she wished her powers didn't have so many rules.

He fetched a medical kit, and began cleaning her wound. She was surprised that he wasn't more concerned about the fact that they were sealed into the infirmary. Maybe it was just a precaution?

Sheppard crouched down on the ground beside Beckett. "Any idea on what the hell just happened, Doc?"

"Unfortunately, no," Beckett told him. "I've never seen anything like it." He had Parker hold dry gauze over the cut on her forehead while he fished the adhesive tape out from the medical kit.

Sheppard had stopped watching them now, instead looking around the infirmary. Parker couldn't tell what he was after, unless he asked. Before she could say anything, he got up and headed towards the door.

While Beckett finished up, she asked, "What's that sound?"

"I'm not entirely sure, my dear," he told her. "But I suspect it might be Atlantis quarantining the infirmary."

Parker blinked, her eyes narrowing. "Suspect?"

"Aye." Finished, Beckett packed up the kit. "When the presence of a threat is sense, Atlantis has the capacity to lockdown itself to contain the threat."

Threat? Her face scrunched up in puzzlement.

Then it dawned on her. Threat.

"Biological?" she whispered.

Beckett nodded his head once. "Perhaps. It wasn't until the bodies… disintegrated that the alarm went off. It's too much of a coincidence."

In the background, Parker could still hear the alarms sounding.