Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Stargate parts - that would be MGM - I only borrow the characters to play with.

Thanks to CheekyBeckett for the wonderful beta and JoaniexJony for her tweaking tipps and encouragement to post. You two rock!

Blind faith

It took her twenty minutes to talk him into it.
She knew only too well how he hated to show any weakness. He could never let himself go, not in front of his soldiers or the scientists, perhaps occasionally in front of his team and as of late when being with her.
They argued.
Loud.
"I will not let you treat me as if I were a cripple."
"No one thinks of you this way, John. But you need help."
"Why is it that suddenly everyone wants to mother hen me?"
She groaned quietly and reached out for his unbandaged shoulder. Her move was tentative, she looked around before placing her hand lightly on his neck. The coolness of her fingers made him shiver.
"They are your friends and they're just uncertain how to approach you."
"They're my team, damn it. They're smart, they only have to do what they always do – behaving frickin' normal!"
Elizabeth looked around. The colonel was the only patient in the infirmary at this time but his firm and agitated voice might get the staff looking for them; although it was Carson emerging from the next room.
"What's going on here? Elizabeth?"
John's head jerked in the direction of the door and his face followed Carson's steps until he stood in front of his bed.
"Nothing at all. No problems."
Elizabeth smiled, almost convinced of her own words.
"Apart from the fact that you all think I'm a handicapped idiot."
Carson and Elizabeth looked at each other, shrugging their shoulders. Sometimes it was hard to deal with the colonel's mood swings on a normal day so it would be wise not to answer him when he was sulking.
But the doctor knew how to handle his friend and he decided that some clear words were needed now.
"These are my last words in this matter, Colonel. I gave in to your requirement to leave my infirmary for one or two hours. You got rid of the infusions and the scrubs, but I will not allow you to leave on your own feet. You would fall down anyway. So it's the wheelchair and you're going with Elizabeth or you can stay where you are, which is what I would prefer in your current condition."
The tension was palpable and the last words hung in the air for a little while. Finally John's shoulders sagged and Elizabeth removed her hand.
"That's strict, Carson."
Was he actually whining?
"No, it's reasonable. So do we have a deal?"
"Yes."
Elizabeth took a deep breath. She looked gratefully at the doctor who began to adjust John's bandages and his dark sunglasses.
"All set, Colonel. The wheelchair is right beside you. Would you help me, lass?"
"Of course."
She took John's right arm while Carson supported his injured side but it nearly wasn't enough when the colonel tried to stand with quivering legs, doubled over to reduce the pulling on his new abrasions, scars and stitches.
Before he could tumble to the ground, the doctor managed to turn him a little sideways and let him sink into the chair.
Elizabeth saw the lines and the thin layer of sweat on John's forehead. This must have hurt him a lot. It was only two days since the colonel was out of surgery.
She understood why Carson wasn't happy that the committee of inquiry scheduled their first meeting today and even less about the colonel's demands to attend the meeting.
"Weak as a kitten" had been the good doctor's words and Elizabeth remembered smiling inwardly. She could think of several animals describing her resourceful military leader but "kitten" was not one of them.

Their journey across the hallway and into the next transporter was quiet. On their way though there were several people who greeted them with respect and sympathetic smiles.
The moment, the door of the transporter swished shut, John growled:
"Hate it. I so … hate it."
She saw his hands, holding the armrests were shaking, his knuckles white. For a second she let her fingers graze his stubbly cheek.
"I know. But they all think highly of you and only want you to get well soon.
"They will soon learn to report to Caldwell."
"You don't know …"
"Just stop, Lizabeth, please."
And she did, partly because they had arrived at their destination, partly because she knew that his concerns weren't unfounded.
She thought about her last discussion with Carson and how well he had understood her need for the truth. In the end he'd not managed to reassure her completely but he had given her hope. John's sight might improve. It might get better within the next two or three months. He could even regain full eyesight completely.
But Elizabeth also knew that the I.O.A. would never tolerate a military leader with a long-term convalescence ahead of him.
Right in front of the conference room, John suddenly placed his feet on the ground and pushed himself up into a standing position.
"John!"
Elizabeth gasped and pressed her hand against her mouth in the same moment. She only hoped nobody inside the room had heard her exclamation.
A groan escaped John's lips while he tried to steady his shaking body, using the wall and his better side for support. The pain radiating through his battered shoulder, back and head was almost too much to bear.
"What are you doing?"
He heard Elizabeth's voice very close to his left ear and knowing her so well, he sensed her anxiety as well.
"Pre … serve my dignity", he pressed through clenched teeth.
John could tell Elizabeth was furious with him for taking her by surprise again, but he knew she would eventually understand that he had to handle his last official acts on this expedition his own way.
"How can I help you?"
Oh yes, she understood already and his heart was suddenly cracking into pieces. He would miss her like no other!
"Can you just … go to my right side perhaps … take my arm, so nobody will have the pleasure to see me collapse?"
There was no answer but he heard her pushing the chair aside and then felt her at his side, taking his arm on the underside and helping him to stand.
No words needed for their mutual understanding.
Blind trust – if the shaking and aches weren't so overwhelming, he would have laughed out loud about the irony.
His left arm pressed tightly to his side and carefully drawing shallow breaths, he gave her a lopsided grin.
Ready.

The doors slid open and two men, delegates from the I.O.A., watched the leader of Atlantis, Dr. Elizabeth Weir and their subject of investigation, Colonel John Sheppard enter the room and slowly taking their seats. The pair seemed to be very close, sitting next to each other with almost no room between them.
Steve Harrison, a young lawyer and a newbie working for the government, let his gaze linger on Elizabeth's upper body.
The I.O.A. had briefed him well. He knew it would take only one pro-forma interrogation and the colonel would get the axe. You have to just look at him: shaking like a leaf, apart from some red bruises a deathly pallor and imagine that, the man was blind! Ever heard of a blind pilot?
A chuckle threatened to escape his lips and he quickly pinched his nose.
The woman though was another thing. Caldwell was one lucky bastard to be able to work with her side by side.
Harrison sat back luxuriously, smiling at the beautiful woman. For what it's worth, he would enjoy the show.
But not his colleague Howard Dr.-strictly-by-the-book Idle who naturally had to go like a bull:
"Dr. Weir, Colonel Sheppard, thanks for finally joining us, so we might begin with the interrogation authorized by the I.O.A. and Stargate Command."
He cleared his throat, shuffled his papers and then pointed with his pen in John's direction.
"Matter of investigation is the recent crash of an alien … err, aircraft on a planet named PX1-6311 and the death of a boy from the Amayarians nation, unknown name."
The pen fell to the desk with a distinct clatter.
John winced.
"Belko."
His voice was coarse and Elizabeth noticed the slight tremble.
"Colonel Sheppard?"
Harrison enjoyed seeing the colonel's furrowed brows when the piercing Idle-voice slapped his ears.
"His name was Belko."
"Ok Colonel, so we can start with this Belko guy. Why was a child of one of our most important trading partners killed in an aircraft that you, Colonel, volunteered to test?"
John straightened up, ignoring the pain searing through his back. He couldn't see his interrogators but he knew there were two and he had a rather good idea of how they looked. He did not expect any mercy but he hadn't expected his career to go downhill so fast either.
Belko had been a fine boy, fair hair, freckles and a mouth that would not stay shut. He'd reminded him of Rodney, always talking, always asking and he'd reminded him of himself as a kid with this fascination of flying.
A pleasant memory came to his mind and soothed his frayed nerves. He'd been only 12 years old when his father unintentionally had planted the seed into him. It was only intended as a simple day trip, a dad taking his sons to the new museum's opening in New York City. "Intrepid Sea, Air and Space" - what a fabulous name. He'd only been in 5 minutes and he'd been hooked. 5 minutes for little John to enter the first giant flying "insect" he'd spotted on the carrier's tarmac: a beautiful Iroquois.
Belko had worn the same look he'd had that day and he'd even been the same age.
How he wished Elizabeth had met the boy. She would have adored him right away.
The little man was innocent, unaware of the dangers of flying in an unknown aircraft and so immeasurably proud that his father had been the flight machine's engineer.
Of course he would have tried to sneak into the plane as John had into the "Huey" as a boy! So why hadn't he made one last check inside?
He was glad he'd told Elizabeth the whole story this morning. He knew she would understand and what she had said about his guilt had somewhat lighten his mood. But John Sheppard was no dreamer. He would take what the I.O.A. would provide, some deskwork after an appropriate amount of time in one of their penitentiaries or whatever, but he would never grant them the satisfaction to judge a kid.
Elizabeth looked at him. She tried to understand what was going on in his head. The turmoil in his heart she knew well enough. Nearly 3 years of working side by side and almost 3 months since John had allowed her to look into his soul.
She was unwilling to give up, to give him up and the life she always had wished to live. She knew he too wanted this life. Elizabeth knew him so well.
Now her job was to help him through this bad patch. That's all it was: a bad patch, an awkward talk with the I.O.A. to convince them that he'd done nothing wrong, some time away on earth, some time to heal and then the wonderful return to Atlantis. There wasn't anything seriously wrong. She'd have known if there was.
That's why his next sentence shocked her up to her innermost part.

"Belko asked me to take him on this flight and I agreed."