McKay is not a hypochondriac... (Conversion)

From the first strike comes the second, then a parry – a protection from the opponent's counterattack – again, again, again, Teyla thought to herself during her sparring session with Colonel Sheppard. Usually, she only got to say again once before John was lying in pain on the floor. Not this time – John was able to defend himself against all the tried and true methods she used to send him to the floor.

Finally, John dropped one of his sticks and challenged the Athosian once more. Even with the advantage, Teyla was still unable to defeat him. She was in the middle of trying to invent a new strategy for fighting him when John suddenly grabbed her, pressed her against the wall, and planted a passionate kiss on her lips. Before Teyla knew it, John was licking the inside of her mouth with his hot wet tongue. A moment later, John got himself partially under control and pulled away from the kiss.

"That was different," John said, still not believing what he had just done.

"John? I think we should –" Teyla managed to get out of herself after partially recovering from the surprise, only to see Sheppard walking away.


On the way to his quarters, John began feeling his tongue itching slightly. The itch had grown gradually, slowly changing into a burning sensation. John thought it was his conscience, trying to make him feel guilty for something that could be called a sexual assault, but that changed as soon as he entered his quarters. In that moment, he began to feel pounding pain in his swelling tongue.

John didn't hesitate and tapped his radio to call Carson, but his tongue had already grown too big, taking John's ability to articulate. He tried to tell Carson what was going on with him, but only unintelligible noises were coming out.

"Stay where you are, Colonel, I'm taking a team to where you are." John could hear the doctor, but the intense pain coming from his tongue was dumbing him down, rendering him unable to understand what the Scot just said.

A few seconds later, a new problem appeared – one that made John forget about the pain. The swelling reached as far as the rear part of his tongue. Within moments, the swelling tongue completely blocked John's breathing paths.

John grabbed himself by the throat in a desperate effort to relieve his blocked trachea, but to no avail. His tongue has swollen to a size that didn't let a single molecule of air through.

John tried to breathe as much as he could, but he was slowly losing the battle for his life. His muscles were slowly losing strength, making him sink to his knees and then fall down on the floor. John ceased his attempts for a few seconds and gathered the last bit of his resolve. Then he tried to breathe again, but his effort was futile.


Carson arrived only three minutes after John called him and found the officer lying on the floor without movement. The doctor quickly checked John's pulse and breathing, but couldn't find any signs of life.

The moment Carson opened John's mouth to give him some air, his eyes widened with horror. "Give me some epinephrine! Now!" he yelled at the nurse that was with him and stabbed the needle into John's body the moment the nurse prepared it.

"Scalpel!" Carson kept his eyes on the Colonel and began moving his hands as soon as he felt the cold steel of the instrument on the palm of his hand. It took only moments for Carson to cut John's trachea open and give him some air through there. Another nurse was standing two feet away with a breathing aide that was applied the moment Carson finished the little operation.

"Defibrillator!" The nurses practiced the preparation of the life-saving instruments for months and it was clearly visible in the quickness of their actions. All Carson needed was to say a single word and their agile hands sprang into life. Within seconds, the two metallic pads were covered with conductive gel. "Charge!" The nurse handed the pads into Carson's waiting hands and pressed a few buttons on the machine that reacted by emitting a high-pitched noise. "Clear!" Everyone, who had their hands on the unconscious body retreated to a safe distance while Carson placed the pads on the body's chest.

"Fire!" Carson pressed the red buttons on the pads, connecting the electric circuit between the defibrillator's capacitors and John's body. The effect was almost instant – John's body jumped up and convulsed violently as its muscles reacted to the electric spike affecting them. Carson checked again, but the Colonel's body still showed no signs of life.

Carson let one of the nurses to give John a new breath of fresh air before making another attempt at starting his heart. "Again! Charge!" The defibrillator squeaked once more, indicating that its capacitors are being charged. "Fire!" John's body jumped up again, but there was still no change.

Five minutes of attempts later, Carson took the blanket from John's bed and covered his face with it. His next action was to tap his radio and say "Doctor Weir, we have a problem."


"The only thing we could find on his tongue was a small amount of saliva that was definitely not his. We tried testing it, and the results came back positive for Teyla." All the heads in the conference room turned towards the shocked Athosian as Dr. Biro reported what she had found during the autopsy. "We tried mixing the blood we took from Teyla and Colonel Sheppard as a DNA sample. It took a few moments for the samples to interact, but when they did, it was extremely violent. There is no doubt that the saliva was what caused Colonel Sheppard to suffer an extreme case of anaphylaxis that killed him."

"Are you saying he was allergic against her?" Rodney asked unbelievingly.

"Yes. And it's not just him. We have observed a similar reaction with everyone, who has the ATA gene. My theory is that it has something to do with the Wraith gene Teyla has," the pathologist added.

"But how could Teyla's saliva get on the Colonel's tongue?" Dr. Weir asked immediately.

"He kissed me." Teyla spoke up for the first time since the meeting began. The phrase love kills got a whole new and more frightening meaning to those in the room.


AN: Story was challenged by Anuna and betaed by Reiko. Thanks to the both of them