Date : 23.09.2007
Title : Loves' Moment of Truth
Author : ElaineDex
Chapter : 1 of ?
Rating : M
Pairings : Lt. Col. John Sheppard/Lyssa Sheppard
Major Evan Lorne/Dr Ellie Lorne
Warnings : Romance/Angst/Some Strong Language.
Spoilers : This story is part of a series and follows on from Love's Price of Freedom.
Feedback : Yes
Disclaimer : Dr Ellie Lorne, Major James Reece, Lt Franks and any OC's are mine. Lyssa Hunter-Sheppard belongs to Kazavid. Stargate Atlantis, unfortunately, has nothing to do with me.
Summary : Memories…….Who Needs Them? That's what Sheppard and Lorne's teams have to ask themselves when they lose theirs…..but is the damage permanent or can they go back to how things were before?
"McKay, what did you do this time?", Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard's voice buzzed in the Doctor's ear as the entire city of Atlantis continued to shake as it had been doing for the past ten minutes.
"It's not me", Rodney's anxious voice came back.
Sheppard and Dr Weir exchanged a glance as they began to move toward McKay's lab.
En-route Ronon joined them.
"What's goin' on?", he asked amidst the noise of the trembling walls and the screaming city-dwelling Athosians.
"McKay says its not him", Sheppard said in response, pressing his ear-piece he continued,
"Major Lorne? How's the East side looking?".
"It's shaking too Sir", Lorne's voice crackled back, interference making him hard to understand.
"Ellie's going to head to the city core to see if she can see anything".
"I'll get McKay to head that way too", Sheppard confirmed before stepping up the pace toward the lab.
From the mainland, the Athosians there watched with horror as a silvery-white light, that they had to shield their eyes from, snaked it's way around the centre turret of Atlantis.
They gasped as it reached the top and a bolt of what appeared to be lightening shot up into the sky.
Back inside the city a loud crackling noise sounded and Ronon and Sheppard exchanged a glance.
"I do not like the sound of that", Sheppard said.
"What's happening?", Lyssa asked as she joined them with Teyla.
Before Sheppard could respond though, the centre turret produced an electro-magnetic pulse that bounced outwards, through the city and out across the ocean and the mainland.
It knocked everyone in it's path off of their feet and into unconsciousness.
OOoOO
Sheppard groaned and rolled onto his back, his head aching as though he'd spent the night drinking heavily.
He opened his eyes and blinked before sitting bolt upright and reaching for his gun, that he found wasn't there and he saw a huge man with dreads staring back at him, some kind of blaster gun trained upon him.
"Who are you?", Ronon asked.
Sheppard glanced around at the surrounding unconscious people and replied,
"Who are you?".
"I asked first", Ronon said as Weir began to stir.
Ronon immediately pointed Sheppard's gun, which he'd taken from the holster on his leg, at Weir and her eyes widened as she said,
"What's going on? Who are you?".
Sheppard rubbed his eyes as Lyssa and Teyla began to wake up and they both sat up and said at the same time,
"Who are you?"
"Well I don't know about everyone else here but I'm beginning to see a definite pattern forming", Sheppard said and Ronon looked at him and he had to grudgingly concede that something was obviously very wrong here, wherever 'here' was.
OOoOO
On the East side of the city Ellie sat up and rubbed her temples. What the hell had just happened? She looked around her at several unconscious, uniformed men, all armed and she decided to get out of there.
She had no idea who they were or what they were capable of and she didn't fancy sticking around to find out.
Just as she disappeared around a corner, Lorne sat up and groaned.
"What the hell………?", he muttered, glancing at Major Reece who was also coming to.
"Who are you?", Reece asked.
"I could ask you the same thing", Lorne replied.
It was obvious that they were on the same side due to their similar clothing but as for what side that was and what they were doing in that place, they had no idea.
OOoOO
The silence that had descended upon the city following the pulse soon began to fade as more and more confused people began to wake up.
The Athosians seemed to go into blind panic mode, running around, looking for someone whom they might recognise. Children screamed and cried as they too looked for a familiar person to look after them.
"We need to do something", Teyla said as she and Lyssa tried to comfort some of the distressed people.
"Like what?", Ronon asked seeming not overly concerned with the situation.
"It's obvious that something has happened to our memories", Weir said and they all looked at her as she continued,
"We must all be at this place for a reason and we need to discover what that was………someone needs to take charge and calm these people down before they destroy it".
"Have anyone in mind?", Lyssa asked, her eyes looking over Sheppard and then Ronon as she tried to decide who looked the most capable.
Weir stepped forward and Sheppard wondered what she was doing as she reached for the chain around his neck.
"You must be Military of some kind", she said, eyeing his dog-tags before glancing at Ronon to see he had some too although his were battered and looked battle-worn.
They looked around and saw that there were other men, similarly clothed to Sheppard and Weir said,
"You two should find out who is the highest ranking amongst you and then get some order going amongst the people. We need to set up a system to see who knows what and then we need to try to find out what the hell happened to us all".
"Sounds like a plan", Sheppard said, glancing at Ronon who eyed him warily.
"How do I know I can trust you?", he asked.
"How do I know I can trust you?", Sheppard replied and Ronon glared at him.
"Just get on with it, none of us knows who we can trust at this point", Lyssa said causing Sheppard to look at her.
He wondered who the leggy blonde was, she was very attractive.
She too had on the military style combats, vest and boots but he noticed she wore no tags, neither did the smaller woman at her side.
Just then a rather disgruntled looking McKay joined them hugging a lap top to his chest as though his life depended upon it.
"Who are all these people? What the hell is going on?", he asked of no-one in particular and Ronon and Sheppard exchanged a glance.
"You look like you may know how to operate some of the equipment around here……you can come with us whilst we try and sort out some order around this place", Sheppard said to Rodney whose eyes widened with distaste at the thought of having to go with the two men who were staring at him.
"We'll keep you safe", Sheppard cajoled which seemed to swing it for the nerdy type looking man and he seemed to visibly relax as he stepped forward.
"Well now….why didn't you say that in the first place?", Rodney asked.
OOoOO
Ellie wandered around what appeared to be a city, dodging screaming and panicking men and women who appeared to be dressed as peasants and she wondered what kind of place this was.
She was obviously not on her own in the fact that she could not remember who she was or what she was doing here as she overheard many a conversation on her route that told her that everyone was in the same scary situation.
She was about to head up some stairs when a mans' voice came over the cities' comms system and she paused as did everyone around her to listen to what he had to say.
"My name is Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard…….apparently………and I'd like to try to restore some kind of normality to this place we all find ourselves in. Could you please all try to remain calm and make your way toward the main room where the large circle-looking thing is……..", Sheppard paused and looked to Rodney who shrugged as he didn't know what the huge ring was for either.
"Um…….if you think that you are Military of some kind and are wearing tags, we'd like to see you first so…….head on down here……thanks", he finished off, grimacing as the comms squeaked annoyingly.
"Large circle-looking thing?", Ronon queried as the first lot of people began to enter the gate-room and Sheppard shrugged, at a loss to what he should have said.
Ellie changed direction and followed the throng of people, some of whom looked to be the military types the man had requested.
She needed to find out if she could be of any use and possibly who she was.
OOoOO
When it was established that Sheppard was in fact the highest ranking officer there, closely followed by one Major Evan Lorne and a Major James Reece, they set up a row of tables at the top of the stairs in the gate room and Ronon formed orderly queues of people who waited in line behind him to have their tags and names written down and recorded by Sheppard, Lorne and Reece.
Each person was given a sticker with their name written on it and were told to stick it to the front of their clothing and await further instructions.
Things began to get complicated though as the non-military people began to step up to the tables.
They saw Weir, Teyla and Lyssa first.
"So……what do we call you?", Sheppard asked of Lyssa who glared at him.
"Are you trying to be funny?", she asked and he grinned up at her.
"Of course not….but if you really don't know your own name then we are going to have to think up one for you", he replied and she folded her arms and glanced across at Weir and Teyla who were having the same problems with Lorne and Reece.
Lorne looked at Weir's T-shirt.
"We could call you Red", he suggested and she shrugged so he wrote the word on a sticker and gave it to her.
Reece looked at Teyla and frowned. She looked like some kind of beautiful, exotic princess and he didn't have a clue what to call her.
"You look like quite a calm person….how about if we call you Serena?", he asked suddenly and Teyla smiled.
"I do not find that name displeasing so yes, that would be fine", she replied, taking the sticker from him and placing it above her breast, making Reece gulp and look away.
Lorne smiled at the other man's obvious attraction to the woman he had named Serena but his smirk faded as Ellie stepped up before him and she smiled disarmingly at him.
"Hi", she said and it was Reece's turn to laugh as Lorne looked up at the petite brunette.
"Hi", Lorne replied as Ellie leaned forward, her hands resting on the table in front of Lorne.
"I really don't know who I am but I get the feeling I could help so if you could just bear that in mind?", she asked and Lorne smiled and nodded. She looked like an intelligent woman and at this early stage they had to give everyone the benefit of the doubt.
"Sure…..Shorty……", he replied, handing her the sticker that he'd written her new 'name' upon.
"Shorty?", she said, then grinned at him, unable to deny the fact that she was only small in height.
"Why don't you stand over there with our Tech Guy….see if you can give him a hand", Lorne said indicating to where Rodney was messing with a console.
"Sure, okay", Ellie replied moving away and Lorne watched her go until someone else stepped up before him and took his attention.
"How about we call you Blondie?", Sheppard was saying to Lyssa who glared at him.
"Is that the best you can come up with?", she asked and he regarded her.
"Well………", he began but she snatched the sticker from his hand and placed it over one of her pert breasts, causing Sheppard to shift uncomfortably in his chair.
"It'll do", she said heading over to Weir and Teyla.
Sheppard smiled and shook his head as a man in a white coat moved in front of him.
"My name, according to this badge, is Dr. Carson Beckett but I wouldn't advise anyone to get sick because I don't remember knowing a bloody thing about medicine", Beckett said and Sheppard sighed.
"Great".
"Isn't it", Beckett agreed and Sheppard made a note of the mans' name and supposed occupation as Dr Kate Heightmeyer moved to stand before Lorne.
Time moved on and once everyone had been given a name or number to record their presence in the city, Sheppard, Lorne, Reece and Ronon began to answer questions that people began to throw at them as best they could.
Where people were to sleep was one of the things that people seemed most concerned about.
"All I can suggest is that you find a room you like and use it with respect, after all, that room and all it's contents will probably belong to someone else and when we figure out what's happened to us and we hopefully get our memories back, people are going to want their own stuff back in the same condition they left it in", Sheppard said.
"Yeah….take your time as you look around….see if the room jogs any memories before you take it and as the Colonel said, please treat personal effects with respect", Lorne added.
"If I find out anyone has damaged anything that belongs to me I'll kill them", Ronon piped up, eliciting a gasp from the room and Sheppard raised his eyebrows at Ronon who grudgingly relaxed a little.
"We'll have regular updates broadcast to you but if any of you feel the need to come and speak to us whilst we try and work on a solution to this, please don't hesitate", Sheppard said.
Eventually people began to move away, searching for something that was familiar to them.
Sheppard and Lorne moved over to where Rodney and Ellie appeared to be arguing over the console and Sheppard said,
"Hey! Cut it out you two……..have you managed to figure out how this thing works?".
"Does it look like it?", Rodney asked and Sheppard sighed.
"Well….keep at it, you may get lucky".
He turned to the others.
"We should patrol the city, make sure everyone is behaving themselves. Ronon, you're with me, Lorne you take Lieutenant Franks. Reece, sort out some other teams of two and send them out".
"Yes Sir", Reece said moving away to do Sheppard's bidding.
"What about us?", Weir asked indicating to herself, Lyssa and Teyla.
"Have a look around, see if anything comes to mind……find yourselves somewhere to sleep", Sheppard replied and the three women looked at one another.
For the time being it seemed there was little else that they could do.
End of Chapter 1
