A/N: Written for a whump fic exchange on Tumblr. Come check out my blog the-wandering-whumper Thanks, as always, to the lovely LadyRiesling for the beta.
Not My Blood
By water4willows
Five minutes into their mad dash through the trees, Rodney trips on a root. He goes down hard, his upper body disappearing into the fronds of a massive fern as he topples forward with a yelp. John is at his side in an instant, hauling the scientist back up to his feet by the back of his tac vest. Behind them, the sounds of their pursuers rise up out of the jungle, their war cries primal and ferocious.
"Are you okay?" John asks as Rodney gingerly tries to put weight on an injured left foot. The scientist winces, then pulls his foot back up from the ground with a groan. "I think it's broken."
John does a quick survey of their surroundings. They're in a small clearing, but there's no real safe place to make a stand. It's Teyla who voices what they are all thinking: "We cannot stay here, John. We must keep moving." John glances down at Rodney's ankle, plans forming and then dying in his brain like rapid gunfire.
"I know what you're thinking, Sheppard," Rodney interrupts his thoughts with a wagging finger. He's holding onto Teyla and balancing on one foot, sweat running down his red face. "And you can forget it. Just leave me here. Leave me here to die."
John shakes his head, opens his mouth to admonish his overdramatic astrophysicist, when an elbow in the ribs by Ronon pulls his focus. Through the trees, the first of their pursuers finally appears. The man is clad all in green, painted head to toe in some kind of war paint. He practically blends into surrounding jungle, but John can see the glint of the spear he holds in one green hand.
"Sorry about this, Rodney," John apologizes, grabbing Rodney by the wrist and draping the protesting scientist's arm over his shoulders as he moves them back off into the jungle. Teyla and Ronon take up defensive positions behind them as John drags an uncooperative Rodney alongside him. The jungle is even denser here. Thick vines like the one Rodney tripped over earlier make the journey arduous and slow. Pretty soon Ronon slides in under Rodney's other arm to try and help move them along quicker.
The Stargate is only a klick or so north of their current location. If they can just get Rodney that far, then it's only a matter of defending their position and dialing home. John pictures that little clearing surrounding the gate in his mind and makes that priority number one. Letting everything else fall away, he pushes forward like the good little soldier he is, ignoring Rodney's constant protestations and his own screaming muscles as they take the last few kilometers at a jog. It's slow going. The jungle is treacherous and the very air seems to want to choke them. But eventually they do reach the edge of the jungle and John practically sags in relief when that little cleared piece of land that always seems to encircle a gate finally comes into view.
Teyla volunteers to cross the clearing first. John and Ronon hold back to cover her advance from under the shelter of the trees. She makes it to the DHD without incident and soon the blue of the event horizon is bathing the space around the gate in ethereal light. She scans the tree line, then beckons them forward when all seems to be safe. John is not two feet from the tree line when everything goes to shit.
The people of this planet are primitive. From what John could see when he inadvertently interrupted some kind of ceremony taking place in their village earlier in the day, they are armed only with spears, hand tools, and a few crudely constructed bows and arrows. They crash into the other side of the clearing, an indistinguishable mass of undulating green, and skid to a halt at the sight of the activated Stargate. Some of the party shriek and run back the way they came in fear. Others raise their weapons and fists into the air and bellow with rage in a strange language, before starting forward at a run. Teyla ducks behind the gate for cover and peppers the ground at the mob's feet with bullets. She's trying to scare them off and avoid bloodshed, John figures, but it's not working. If anything, the counterattack spurs them on and John picks up his pace towards the gate as best he can. Ronon is out ahead of them now, drawing the mob's attention away from John and Rodney and taking care of any outliers atempting to break away from the main group and head in their direction. John is so focused on reaching the gate and the ruckus Rodney is raising as he's dragged along for the ride, that he doesn't even see the rear attack coming. One moment he's nearly halfway up a tall set of stone steps leading up to the Stargate, and the next he's being attacked from behind.
The force of the impact sends Rodney sailing forward, crumpling to the stone when his injured ankle gives out beneath him. Someone wraps their arms around John's middle, stopping his forward motion and sending him bouncing back down the stairs, head cracking mercilessly against each stone step as he goes. The impacts spring stars up into his vision and break things inside as he keeps going down, down, down. He briefly thinks he hears someone scream his name before he finally stops and a green face looms over him, the figure's features contorted with rage and going in and out of focus as John tries to clear his vision. Most of the other men are just green. This particular warrior has a red stripe painted down the center of his chest.
The wild man's eyes are flashing as he straddles John and raises his arms above his head. Something glints in his hands, but John can't make out what it is, his eyes still refusing to focus. All he can do in the moment is put his arms up in an effort to protect his face against the attack... but it never comes. A gunshot echoes out across the clearing and the man hovering above him falls over on his side, a perfectly placed bullet wound to the head slowly oozing blood. John pushes the man the rest of the way off of him and struggles to sit up, trying his best to ignore the agony that ignites along every area that made contact with the stairs earlier. He finds Ronon with his wavering vision. The Satedan is standing near the gate with weapon still aimed in John's general direction. Sheppard spits out a mouthful of blood (and maybe a tooth or two) before indicating to his teammate that he's ok with a less than enthusiastic thumbs up.
Ronon nods, and then turns away to start helping Teyla with the still-advancing mob of people. John gets to his feet with a pitiful groan and makes his way back up the stairs to where Rodney is, pressing a hand to the side of his ribcage to try and alleviate some of the pain. Every time he draws in breath it hurts, like he's trying to breathe in fire, actual living fire. His lungs won't expand properly either, and he wonders what he could have done on the inside to make breathing this difficult. His tumble down the stairs had not been all that long, or particularly violent. He figures there will be plenty of time to worry about all that once they are back on Atlantis, though, so he pushes the pain to the back of his mind and takes the last few stairs up to Rodney at a sprint. Even through his slightly double vision he can see the scientist glowering at him.
John reaches down and helps Rodney back up to his feet without comment. Talking takes too much effort. Sweat is already running down his back and everything feels way too tight and too hot. He needs to get his team off this damn rock and back to Atlantis.
The green people have entirely encircled the gate now and their cries are growing louder and angrier as the intense standoff continues. There's more of them than he remembers seeing, but that could just be the double vision. Regardless, he's pretty sure these people have no idea what the gate is or how it works. They keep their distance and it affords the team the time they need to make their escape.
"This is the last time I let you drag me to a planet that's not in the Ancients database," Rodney grumbles as John pulls him up the last few steps to the Stargate. He just doesn't have the energy to remind the scientist that it was, in fact, his idea to visit this place in the first place.
Ronon and Teyla meet them up on the platform, laying down cover fire as the mob starts to advance again. Someone in the crowd hurtles a spear in John and Rodney's direction just as they're about to back into the event horizon, so John turns his body, covering Rodney with his torso as he throws them forward bodily into the blue. He closes his eyes as he's pulled through time and space and ejected from the Atlantis gate with the same velocity with which he entered it. John and Rodney collapse in a heap on the gateroom floor and Rodney lets out an indignant whoosh of air when all of John's weight lands on him. Teyla and Ronon follow not far behind, along with a shower of arrows and spears. Elizabeth has been anticipating this, though, and the shield goes up and the gate disengages before any more weapons can make it through.
"Would you get off of me!" Rodney grumbles at him from the floor, and John pushes up but doesn't roll off as he notices a dark stain on the side of Rodney's shirt.
"Are you hit?" He asks, putting a hand to the spot, only for it to come back bloody. "I need a medic over here!" He yells to no one in particular, coughing a little when his lungs protest and the pain in his side flares suddenly. Rodney's eyes have gone wide.
"Oh god! They killed me! You let them kill me!" He panics, pawing at his shirt and yanking it up from where it's tucked into his pants. "I told you we never should have gone to that stupid planet!" The skin beneath Rodney's t-shirt is discolored, but there is no wound there. Both men stare at the unmarred skin for a moment, just as a small droplet of crimson drips from the side of John's vest and lands on Rodney's stomach with a splash.
"…Not my blood," the scientist mumbles stupidly.
"Oh shit..."
It's like someone has flipped a switch. Suddenly all the air is sucked out of the room and John's arm can't support him anymore. He collapses and rolls onto his back just as something sharp and white hot ignites along his spine. He cries out, even though he doesn't mean to, and all of a sudden, more faces are looming over him, slipping in and out of focus as his vision greys and the room sways. Someone releases the straps on his vest and a minute amount of oxygen is allowed to enter his lungs. But it's not enough. Never enough. He wants to claw at his throat, but his arms are leaden and useless at his sides. He feels the world slipping away from him, and tires to hold onto it for dear life.
"He was fine," he hears Rodney say, the scientist's voice pitching upwards in that way it always tends to do when he's particularly agitated. "He was completely fine!" Strong hands roll him on to his side and he can't help but cough as his damaged insides are jostled violently. It brings up the distinct taste of blood into the back of his throat. Shit, something really is wrong with him.
"He's got a stab wound, right lower quadrant. Bloody hell, it's gone straight through the Kevlar. I need something to stop this bleeding!" Carson says, though John has no memory of the physician arriving. The white-hot pain spikes again as something is pressed into his back. He arches against it, somehow finding just enough air to cry out again.
"Colonel Sheppard, are you injured anywhere else?" Carson's concerned face appears in John's line of sight as he's rolled back over. He wants to tell him everything, explain about the pain and the trip down the stone stairs and the lungs that just won't seem to work, but he can't. Blackness is creeping in around everything, stealing his senses one by one. Someone settles an oxygen mask over his nose and mouth and he pulls on the free flowing oxygen greedily. It helps, but only just. When he coughs again, red blood spatters against the interior of the mask. Someone points this fact out to Carson as the mask is changed out for a new one and something pinches at the crook of his arm.
"We need to get him to the infirmary, now." Carson's voice fades in and out. Like his vision, his hearing wavers, sometimes sharp and, at other times, unintelligible.
"I hurt my ankle and he was helping me get back to the gate. One of those nut jobs attacked us from behind. I was able to get away, but the guy got his hands on Sheppard and threw him down the stairs. I never saw any knife." John's memory replays the moments Rodney describes in his mind as he's manhandled onto a gurney and wheeled away towards the infirmary. He doesn't remember being stabbed either, but the pain meds are muddying his thoughts. Above him, the overhead Atlantis lights speed past, and he watches them from over the oxygen mask. He's never noticed it before, but the ceilings in Atlantis are magnificent. They're vaulted in places and remind him of some ancient cathedral, with just enough strangeness to the construction to remind him that he is in an entirely different galaxy and that this place has been constructed by people so far removed from him, they might as well be aliens. He figures he's never had much reason to stare up at the ceilings before and he makes a note to himself he knows he'll never remember to pay more attention to them from now on.
When they reach the infirmary, John is barely holding on to consciousness. He feels rather than sees his uniform being removed and his limbs maneuvered into one of those godawful infirmary gowns only the most serious patients are required to wear. Normally it's a pair of scrubs for stubborn Colonel Sheppard, but not today. Today Carson orders him into something easily accessible for all the crap he's about to subject him to. John can do little more than allow it to happen through heavily lidded eyes.
"You're going to be ok, John," Teyla says from somewhere near his head. She sweeps her hand across his sweat dampened brow, brushing errant strands of dark hair away from his face with a sweet yet sad smile. His eyes close involuntarily. Everything hurts, even with the meds, and her touch is like port in a storm. He grabs for it, focuses all his strength on just holding on to it as it gets harder and harder to breathe.
"Doc?" Ronon growls as alarms begin to sound, the only outward sign of the internal battle raging on inside of him. He tries to paw at the oxygen mask, but his limbs remain uncooperative. He's floating up and away and not even Teyla's comforting presence beside his head is enough to keep him anchored any longer.
"A'right, everyone out." John hears Carson order.
"But what about me?" Rodney whines. "Someone needs to look at my ankle, so I might as well stay with him."
John tries to peel his eyes open again, but they remain obstinately closed. He's battened down and shuttered tight in anticipation of that coming storm. He wants to tell Rodney not to worry, that he'll be fine (he always is), but he can't form the words or push them past his dry, cracked lips. He's fading fast and it's scaring the hell out of him.
This is the part he's always found impossible: the letting go. He's afraid of it. Afraid of allowing the blackness to consume him. It goes against all his training, to give in. And while it's happened before, and he's always managed to wake up and pull through, John's just waiting for that one time when it doesn't work. When death gets its claws into him and refuses to let go. He figures there are only so many times one can tempt fate… So what if this is it? What if this is the one time the ancient tech isn't enough to heal him and bring him back. What if Carson's deft hands aren't good enough this time?
The alarms continue on.
"He's been stabbed in the back, Rodney. He may need surgery, so out! I'll send someone out to update you all once I know more," Carson all but yells and, for the moment, Rodney seems mollified. John hears him mumbling under his breath as he audibly limps off.
John drifts, feels someone touch his hair and the side of his face.
"It's going to be alright," Carson whispers as the blackness drags him under. He fights against it with everything he has, but the pain and the trauma and the medications are just too much. "I've got you," the physician promises, fingers still carded in John's hair. He tries to believe that it's true.
\oO0Oo/
The light is different in the infirmary when he wakes. Softer, and it's quieter, too. There are no more alarms. No more voices calling out his oxygen stats or the latest reading from his blood pressure cuff. The only noise remaining is the quiet whir of the machines surrounding him, and a low snore emanating from Rodney McKay. The scientist is asleep in a chair beside John's bed, his bum leg resting on a pillow, propped up on an empty chair, the ankle thick with a tightly-wrapped Ace bandage. John turns his head towards his friend, wincing as the movement hits sensitive spots on his scalp from where his head hit the stone stairs, and blinks over Rodney. The astrophysicist slumbers on, oblivious of the world around him.
"Yeah, they couldn't get him to leave," a low voice rumbles from the other side of him, and John carefully turns his head the other direction to find Ronon taking up a chair on the other side of him. Judging from the Satedan's rumpled clothing and dark circles beneath his eyes, no one had any luck making him leave either.
"How long was I out?" John asks, voice like sandpaper, the words catching in his throat and threatening to send him into a coughing fit.
"A couple of days." Ronon retrieves a glass of water from a table near the foot of John's bed and hands it over. The ice cold liquid calms the urge to cough for the time being, but there's an ache in his throat that wasn't there before. It whispers of things that happened while he was unconscious, of intubation and long hours on 100% oxygen. A nasal cannula is all that remains now, and he itches at it absently as Ronon refills his glass without being asked.
"Bad?" He inquires.
"Doc says it was pretty touch and go for a while there, but you're gonna be fine. Guess that knife didn't hit anything too important. You can get back to kicking ass and taking names as soon as you're outta here." John accepts the refilled cup from Ronon and smiles slightly at the euphemism. The Satedan has been spending too much time with his soldiers.
"Everyone else okay?" He settles back into his pillows once he's finished with the water, an overwhelming exhaustion sweeping over him unexpectedly. He can feel oblivion beckoning to him from the darkness again. Only this time, he's not afraid of it.
Beside him, Ronon shrugs. "Pretty much." They both look over at Rodney. The scientist is still passed out in his chair, very much alive.
His team is safe. John is safe. He's cheated death once again. Somewhere out there in the ether a check mark has appeared under his name on his scorecard with the universe. It's a victory, but as he lies there in his hospital bed, body beat to hell and agony being held at bay by chemicals tricking his brain into thinking he's perfectly fine, that victory seems bittersweet. How many more times does he get to win before he starts losing? Maybe it's just the pain meds screwing with his brain, but he can't help but wonder what that loss might look like.
"You want me to go get the doc?" Ronon asks, mistaking John's sudden silence for something else. "I was supposed to get him as soon as you woke up."
John scrubs a hand down the side of his face, surprised to find a healthy growth of stubble on his cheek. "Not yet, buddy, okay? I'm not ready for all the poking." Ronon doesn't say anything, but he doesn't get up, either. John is relieved. He's not ready to face it yet, to hear about all the internal damage that green bastard managed to do to him with that knife. For the moment, he's content with just sitting there in the silence of the infirmary with nothing but Rodney's soft snoring to underscore the quiet.
It isn't long before John's eyelids start to droop and the pain meds try to coax him back under again. Before giving himself over, he risks one final last glance around the room. His mission is complete, he realizes abruptly. The people he's responsible for are back home and safe. He can rest now. And with Ronon standing guard by the side of his bed, John Sheppard lets himself do just that.
Fin.