She was crying in her sleep again. It was the same dream. It was the same feeling of abandonment. She didn't know why she kept waking up feeling so lost and wrong. She had already been told while she'd been working for the World Health Organization she'd been exposed to some neuro toxin that had messed with her brain for a while. She had her work, she had her… coworkers, why did she feel like it was all wrong? Like she was missing something, like she didn't quite fit into her own life… but that was wishful thinking on her part. She'd always been the outsider. Too young, too smart, too shy, and too uncomfortable for others to truly get to know… so it was ridiculous to think her dreams were anything other than leftovers from some toxic chemical combination in her brain. At least she had her work.

*********

It had been a few months since Atlantis had taken up residence in the San Francisco Bay… Ronon and Sheppard were on another run… Finally the IOA had cleared Ronon and Teyla for off world missions again and so they finally got to leave Atlantis for somewhere else other than just the SGC. Ronon was going crazy, all he'd could do was train marines, exercise and try to avoid any reminders of Jen. It never worked… she was everywhere. At first she was underfoot as well, and he spent a lot of time avoiding her, unfortuneately she must have noticed this because she looked so sad the last time he'd seen her. She had getting ready to leave, he heard she was moving to a room at the SGC , closer to her new patients. She had been saying her farewells… okay he'd seen her earlier, walking out to the balconies, touching walls in remembrance, saying farewell. He'd been jogging when he saw her and he was curious what she was doing. He already hadn't really seen or talked to her in months… not since… well since she said she wasn't interested. That thought still stung. Ok, it still hurt like hell. Like someone stuck a hot poker in his chest and wrenched it. He had been so sure that it was mutual, that he'd finally found someone to understand him… Another mistake on his part. He hadn't meant to follow her, but curiosity at seeing her sad and nostalgic had made him follow her. For an hour she went from area to area, touching and lost in thought. Until she ended up in the gateroom.

Four Months ago:

"Guys… I didn't want anyone to know. What is all this?" Dr. Keller says smiling and blushing. She look around at about a dozen people and her medical staff, although her searching eyes doesn't see him. For a split second there's disappointment, but then she covers it up.

"We couldn't let our CMO leave without saying goodbye!" Sheppard says with a smirk, lifting his arms for a hug. "He'll be here" he whispers. "I don't know what happened to you to, but you can work it out."

She smiles at him and accepts the hug, "No…. I don't think he'll be here. I screwed it up, I don't want him to be uncomfortable in his own home… especially now. Don't worry about me, I'm used to it." She whispers to him, tears in her eyes. "Thank you though."

"I am next." Teyla says from John's elbow. "We shall miss you. Come back and visit…" she whispers, her eyes tightly close. As theytouch foreheads before giving each other a hug.

"Oh Teyla, I'm going to miss you" She holds tightly to Teyla's slight form.

"He'll come around, don't leave. You'll work it out." She says desperately… she knows both her friends are hurting, but both have so much feeling for the other. They had both confided in her, a little of what had happened… if only they would talk. If only Jennifer weren't so concerned with giving him the space she thinks he needs. She had started pulling away almost immediately… at first no one seemed to notice, John, Teyla and Ronon ate together and worked out together. Then one day she was missing, it had been over a month since any them had seen her outside of the infirmary.

Well, not everyone. Laura Cadman, Rodney and Evan Lorne could be seen occasionally getting her a bite to eat or forcing her to leave the infirmary. For anyone else she was too busy, or too tired, or too something. Teyla now wishes she'd forced the younger woman to open up to her, but Jennifer had been clear that Ronon needed all the support he could get, and she didn't feel he'd appreciate her hanging around.

"No, he won't. He's had plenty of opportunity, and really it's my fault. I'm just making things uncomfortable-"

"My turn, my turn!" Laura Cadman jumps up and down

"You 're escorting me!" Jennifer says loudly to her best friend.

"So, I wants some Jennifer hug time!"

"Okay." They embrace. Tears begin to slowly fall.

"Don't worry. We'll do this." Laura comforts for a second, then more loudly "Let's wrap this thing up, Jennifer has a date!" Everyone laughs at this. Hugs to everyone else with a few more tears and gentle ribbing from Lorne and his team. "Who'll look after you now?" Lorne whispers to her.

"Trust me, I won't need anyone to "look after me." I'll be fine. I'll still see you for a bit" She laughs at him, as if it's a joke. "Now you'll all need something new to bet on." She says much louder

"Its not the same and you know it." Lorne chastises her. "And that was all in fun" He whines loudly.

Rodney taps her shoulders awkwardly, "Listen Jen, If this is about…"

"Shhh, be happy with Katie. This is your second chance." She says quietly as she pulls him awkwardly in for a hug. "Don't screw it up this time. She loves you. Don't take her for granted."

"Thank you. If it weren't for you we…"

"It's okay Rodney. Leave it be." She steps away from him, sees a shadow move from the corner of her eye. By the time she looks he's gone.

She turns back to everyone else… "Take care, don't get too hurt, and I'll be seeing you around!"

That was months ago. He'd stayed in the shadows, watching her.

He had stayed hidden while she walked away. Tears and hurt in her eyes as she scanned the room one more time. Not seeing him in the shadows, but he saw her, and his chest ached all over again. This is why he ran all the time now, why even Sheppard had stopped sparring with him. He hurt and the only way he knew to deal with it was to hurt others, to lose himself in exercise and fighting... He needed to go off world, new missions, finally.

When John had cornered him in the shadows after she'd left, he'd been exasperated. He wanted explanations that he couldn't give. He'd wanted to know why he'd been avoiding her. She abandoned them, though. She left him. It was her. Why was everyone looking at him that way? Why'd she leave? He had brushed aside John's words and arm and left with a grunt. It had felt like time for a run.

Teyla later had told him she left because Atlantis was his home, and since he was avoiding her and she had hurt him. She felt she should leave. Sheppard told him Wolsey hadn't granted her transfer request, that he had loaned the good doctor out, but that when they were finally mission ready to leave the Milky Way he expected her back. After all she was his CMO. And he was hoping by then she'd have had enough down time on earth.

None of it helped though. Why didn't she love him? Was it just because he wasn't from Earth? Was it because he didn't talk much? Wasn't smart like her and the other scientists? Did she think he was a caveman, as Rodney always called him? Was his feelings too much for her? Too fast?

He had thought she'd chosen Rodney over him, and so after she left and he had seen Rodney with Katie Brown again, he'd growled and pulled McKay to the side to have a "conversation" with him. He'd stuttered out that she had set Katie and him back up. That Jen hadn't been interested in him. Not at all, ever. So who did that leave? Lorne? One of Lorne's team? Why was she looking so sad and heartbroken when she left?

He'd slept so many nights in her quarters, it no longer had the lingering smell of her shampoo. He'd first come here the evening after she'd left, he told himself it was to prove she was really gone. That she wasn't coming back. When he'd entered the empty room he'd been shocked, even knowing she had left, he hadn't expected the room to be empty. As if she had never been there. Never touched his life. Never made him feel again. Sometimes he was so angry at her, he was glad she was gone, other times... he felt so alone. It was worse than when he'd lost Melena. At least he felt a little closer to her here though. He had tried to stay away, but found this was the only place he could sleep unless he worked himself into exhaustion and even then sometimes he couldn't sleep anywhere else. Rodney had keyed the door to him so he could come and go as he pleased. Pretty much he'd moved in, anything to feel closer to her…

Staying in Atlantis without any missions, gave him way too much time to think, and he wasn't a thinker.

Why was she so sad? Could she have been lying to him when she told him she wasn't interested? A small smile of hope flitted across his face as he slipped into sleep.

*****

"Good to have you back, Chewey!" Sheppard hit his arm as they were about to go through on their first mission since being cleared... it was a diplomatic mission, but it was off world. It was something.

Grunt, "Finally. Where's McKay" He says aloud.

"Simple mission. He's on staying here, working in his lab- don't worry, he won't get into any trouble without us. Dial her up Chuck! Rodney, be alert, this may not be Pegasus, but it's still not Kansas" John says with a smirk as he walks through the event horizon.

******

"Like old times!" Sheppard says as they are sitting down to eat. The mission had been a success. So boring, but it was off world and a good start for Teyla and Ronon. He eyed the latter. Ronon's tray was ladened with food, but he was only pushing it on his plate, looking around as people came and went from the infirmary. He looked hyper alert, like he was expecting an attack, an ambush...."Relax, they are all ok, Chewey. You okay"

Grunt... push, push, bite, push. Sheppard looks worriedly at his friend and looks over at Teyla. She shrugs her shoulders a fraction and looks worried as well.

"Doesn't feel right... "Ronnon mutters. An itchy feeling between his shoulder blades telling him that something bad is coming…

"What? What do you mean? I know things were a little boring, but this isn't the Pegasus Galaxy...things here aren't so..."

Grunt "that's not it... I don't know what... arrrrahh" he abruptly gets up and leaves the table leaving a shocked Teyla and Sheppard staring at his back.

"What's wrong with the Caveman?" Rodney asks as he sets his tray in the vacated area, already digging into his food.

"Don't know. I really don't know..." Sheppard says, watching Ronon leave the room. "So how're you and Katie?"

*********

Dr. Jennifer Keller, moving back and forth in her lab, looks through a microscope to look at the results of her most recent tests. A feeling of unease creeping down her spine. She knows it's the neurotoxin, but she can't help it, even months later. Ever since she woke up again she's felt like everything is off. Some day's she feels like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, she sees people that were in her dreams the night before... only different. It's like her unconscious mind wants her to see similarities in strangers, make them feel real. She dreams of belonging, being a part of a group. Accepted. Of adventures in another place, another time... another…her. She knows the memories aren't real, but this, her real life is what feels forced, unreal. She smiles to herself... she feels like in her dreams she's Alice in Wonderland. Bunnies that have sharp feral teeth, fauna that's a little shop of horrors kind of place... and a place in a world where she's accepted as she is and has someone that cares about her. Other times she cries because she knows she did something to make it all go away... whatever the neurotoxin did to her, she feels more alive and accepted asleep then awake. The worst part of the dream is, she only remembers bits and pieces and always ends up crying... For some reason it's always with him, only not him. Ronon... only her dream Ronon is bigger, fiercer, leather clad with knives and dreads...which really isn't surprising that occasionally when she has one of those dreams it always stars this Ronon... boy it's obviously been too long since she's gone out.

The Real group of John Sheppard, Teyla, Rodney, Ronon, Evan, and Laura are all quite different from her dreams. They are a close knit group that are friendly, but not inclusive. She's an outsider looking in. Like always. They are real people, in her real world that she's adopted in her fertile imagination. They were all nice enough, but not friend material. If her work wasn't interesting she'd go back to civilian life. Working for Homeland Security with the men an women who infiltrates and disarms terrorists or worse case scenario try to minimize the damage was fascinating and ever changing. Currently, between physicals and "fixing up" her team, she was working on a virus a man simply called "Michael" had created. She was working to recreate the virus so she could create a vaccination for it. Sheppard and his team had only been able to recover partial information from a computer at a recent raid. This was a perplexing virus... ingenious and yet simple... at least what she'd been able to discern so far. Funny enough, this man and his work seemed so familiar.

2 months earlier

"Were you able to get the package?" A shadowed figure asks into his video display to his associate. "Does it look like an accident?"

"The package is in route. No one told us she'd been weapons trained, or that she'd know how to fight. We took some damage. It's a done deal, but the 'accident' scenario we developed didn't work anymore. We've currently got someone working on making everything look... normal for now. We'll reformulate how to make her disappear with the others." A tall, balding man speaks on his end of the line. His entire face a blur. The red glow of his cigar in one hand is all that could be seen clearly, his other fisted and white... thinking about the trouble the package had already caused. "Are we sure the file was correct? She looks like a little kid, even as a smart kid... maybe an assistant... not the thinker."

"Don't worry about that. We are correct. The facility has been set up and awaits her delivery. The cover has been already set up as well. Do we need to change anything? This new information shouldn't change her reactions to anything should it? I need to know now, when everything is still salvageable." The man shifted position a little into the light and his contact could see his navy suit and rotund belly. He hated not being able to see who all the associates were, he understood the need for security, but still. He'd had to jump through a lot of hoops while working for the Trust and he hated not knowing who could stab him in the back.

"She'll be told the cover story, the drugs should cloud her memories enough, that everything else is believable. After all the answer is normally the simplest explanation and we're going to give her a simpler, more believable explanation than her reality has been. With enough names, and information (tweaked of course) being the same, her natural lack of self worth, she'll believe everything we want her to." His grin is evil, and if anyone else could see it they would understand that this is a man with no conscience. Just like the Group liked their operatives.

"We'll begin right away."

"Yes sir"