Author's note- I think we can all safely say that we were totally shocked by the turn of events in Brain Storm. After much discussion on the Doc & Wildman thread at Gateworld, Rac80 came up with a brilliant solution. You might want to read her tag for Brain Storm before reading this.
SPOILERS FOR IDENTITY
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Jennifer slipped quietly out of the bed and padded silently into the nearby bathroom. She stood with her hands braced against the cold porcelain of the sink and gazed at her own familiar features. Then she closed her eyes and sighed with relief. The nightmare was over. No longer would she look into a mirror and see someone else, no longer would she have to keep her wits about her simply to stay alive. She was home at last.
She had awoken several weeks ago in an unfamiliar room, on an unfamiliar planet and, more importantly, in an unfamiliar body. One moment she had been aboard the Daedalus and the next someone had been shaking her awake shouting "Neeva, we have to go now!" They had grabbed her arms, hauled her out of a wooden shack and into dense woodland. She had protested at first but her captors had been too intent on escape to listen. They had run for miles, with her body feeling strange and unwieldy, trying to evade capture by unknown people. Then they had collapsed by a stream to drink. She had looked into the water and had stared in absolute shock. The face of a stranger had stared back at her.
She had been too astonished to even speak, but looking back, she realised that had probably saved her life. If her companions, Jannick and Bordal had realised there had been a swap, she didn't rate her chances of survival very highly. From their conversation, she had found out that they thought she was their companion, Neeva, a very cunning and ruthless thief. Over the following weeks she had tried so hard to escape detection and tried to think of some way to get back to Atlantis ... and back to him.
As it was, she had very nearly been killed.
They had all been captured by villagers incensed by Neeva's latest exploits and following a trial, during which she had protested her innocence to jeers and hoots of derision, she had been sentenced to death. But not any death – a death by beheading. She had been dragged away, nearly numb with terror, to a clearing where an executioner had stood with an axe. Her hands were tied behind her back and her head forced onto a tree stump. The executioner had raised his axe and she had waited, paralysed with fear, for it to fall. But instead of hearing the whoosh of the downward swinging axe, there had been gunfire and shouting. The men holding her arms had let her go and she had raised her head cautiously to find John, Carson, Ronon and Rodney all staring at her.
John had spoken first. "Jennifer?"
Then she had been sobbing and crying. Her hands were untied and Rodney had come to her, wrapped his arms around her and kissed her passionately on the lips.
Poor Rodney. She had been overwrought and she hadn't meant to hurt him. At the time she just couldn't understand why Rodney, whom she had only ever regarded as a friend, had decided to kiss her. So she had swung her fist at him and it had connected sharply with his jaw, laying him out flat. Then she had staggered to Ronon and collapsed into his arms. He had looked at her in total amazement and delight.
Explanations had followed. Neeva had used ancient technology to swap bodies with her and had led Rodney on, all in order to get her hands on an ancient device. He had genuinely thought the woman to whom he had made love was Jennifer Keller - as if I would have behaved in such a bizarre fashion, she thought huffily.
Jennifer splashed her face with water, dabbed it dry with a fluffy towel and headed back into her bedroom. She picked up the sheet and gingerly tried to get into the bed. There was a space about six inches wide. She sighed and poked Ronon in the ribs.
"Move over, I'm cold."
He sighed and moved infinitesimally, before suddenly swiping her off her feet with his arm, pulling her into the bed and rolling her underneath him.
She smiled up at him happily. "Remind me to order a bigger bed tomorrow."
"Yeah, but right now we need to warm you up."
"I'm sure there is nothing I would like better than to be warmed up by a red hot Ronon."
