A/N: Wow! So sorry it's taken this long to update. My muse ran off shortly after completing the last chapter and isn't being very cooperative even now. It may be a little while before the next chapter, too, though I do hope not as long as before.
Warning: This chapter does have some pretty graphic descriptions. I think it's still within the T range, but the squeamish may want to turn back.
Rodney sank to the ground, exhausted. The room they now found themselves in was green, a naturally soothing color, and there was a unanimous, silent agreement to rest briefly in this relatively safe place. It had been just over five hours, but it felt like days. They were all hot: Teyla, McKay, and Elizabeth had shed their Atlantis jackets and tied them around their waists; Sheppard's was missing a sleeve, which had been fashioned into a makeshift bandage for his leg; Ronon had rolled his long coat into a pack which could be tied to his back. All but Sheppard were missing at least one boot; their footwear had been sacrificed to the various traps along the way. The team had agreed that climbing around the Cube unshod would be detrimental to Sheppard's wounded leg. Their shirts were soaked with sweat and stuck to their bodies uncomfortably.
"Is anyone else thirsty?" Elizabeth asked, knowing the answer. Three pairs of eyes met hers (Rodney was still slumped in his corner) with a quiet longing. She didn't know why she had asked the question; there was nothing she could do to fill their need, or her own. As a leader, she was helpless in here. She was failing.
"Buttons," came a weary voice from the corner. The four turned toward Rodney, undoubtedly the worst off of the team. His eyes, sunken in his pale face, were rimmed by dark circles. His right arm sported a good-sized burn from one of the earliest traps; the boot throwing technique had taken several tries to perfect.
"What?" Ronon asked the question on all their minds. Rodney had the advantage (or the great disadvantage, Elizabeth thought) of somehow knowing more about this place than any of them, but he was reluctant to say anything straighforwardly. Ronon especially was having difficulty with the scientist's cryptic statements.
"Tear a button off your pants and suck on it," Rodney explained, sticking out his tongue to demonstrate. "It keeps the saliva flowing and slows down dehydration."
"You couldn't've told us this earlier?" Sheppard grumbled loudly, ripping a button from his pants as Rodney had suggested. Elizabeth, too, was a slightly annoyed at Rodney for not divulging this helpful information before, but she tried to suppress her dissonant feelings. They had to stick together.
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Teyla, uneasy in this confined area, had wandered over to one of the doors in the wall. She spun the handle, intending to open the room a bit more and give at least the illusion of more space. She leaned into the hatchway but not too far; they had encountered too many grisly traps -- and their aftermaths -- for her to believe anything outside their immediate area was safe. She shuddered as she recalled the man without a face in the orange room, dressed in the baggy brown uniform all the Grotebroers wore. His name, stitched above his left breast, had read RENNES. Even worse had been the other straw-colored room they had peered into, seeing only what appeared to be a pile of meat. Dr. Weir had commented that it looked something like dog food and that perhaps it was sustenance provided by their captors. They had all been reluctant to eat the meat raw, of course, but willing...until Colonel Sheppard had noticed one cube of bloody tissue which had fallen somewhat closer to the room they were looking from. Covering one side of the chunk of meat was a small piece of bloodstained brown cloth, the letters LDER barely legible under the gore. Dr. McKay had vomited and the entire team had grown significantly more somber.
Now Teyla was relieved to be gazing into a completely empty blue room. She had a natural aversion to the red rooms; they all did, really. Red was the color of danger, of death. The pale orange, straw-colored rooms were more bearable, but these she feared because of the mutilated bodies they had found. The white rooms had held traps only intermittently, but the early horror of Colonel Sheppard's injury would not soon be forgotten. Green seemed to be a safe color, so far; they had not yet found a trap in a green room. Blue, however, was Teyla's favorite-colored room. Though several blue rooms had held traps, she still found the cool color soothing to her raw nerves. She leaned closer to the blue.
Her fingers brushed something on the floor of the hatchway. Looking down, she noticed numbers etched into the doorway in three sets of three. Puzzled, she turned to the one person who might be able to make sense of them.
"Dr. McKay," she called. There was a sound like a hundred men unsheathing swords at the same time. Turning back toward the blue room, she found it bristling with sharp knives protruding from every wall.
"Sound activated," Colonel Sheppard muttered as Dr. McKay looked up.
"Dr. McKay," Teyla repeated, more softly, "there are numbers in this doorway."
"Numbers?" he questioned dully. He was losing heart, she saw.
"Nine numbers, in three groups of three," she reported. "They are on the door of the next room, as well. Perhaps they indicate some sort of room number?"
"There's only 17,000 some rooms," McKay reminded her. "Any room designations would be five digits, not nine. Maybe they're phone numbers," he suggested wryly, though there was no humor in his voice.
Sheppard, anxious to be doing something, strode over to Teyla to take a look. His lips moved faintly as he recited the numbers silently to himself. "Hey, McKay!" he called suddenly, re-activating the previously retracted knives in the next room. "Come tell me if I'm right; I think these are all prime numbers."
"What's the point?" McKay asked tiredly.
"The point is, maybe it means something," Sheppard growled. Tempers were wearing thin in the close quarters of the Cube. "Maybe it can help us get out of here."
"And maybe the Grotebroers just like prime numbers," McKay retorted. "Maybes won't get us anywhere, Colonel."
"What the hell's your problem, McKay?" Sheppard all but shouted. "We're all in this freakin' rat maze together; the least you could do is try to help us get out! You always give up too easy. Come on! Get over here and do something for a change!"
Elizabeth was alarmed by the nasty snarl in Sheppard's voice. He was deteriorating just as quickly as Rodney, only in a different direction. She was reminded, unpleasantly, of his brief brush with Wraith-hood last year. His current downward spiral was eerily similar. She was equally alarmed by Rodney's hopelessness, though. The scientist was prone to pessimism, it was true, but he would always -- always -- continue searching for a solution to whatever problem came their way. This defeatism was scary in him.
They were all coming apart. If they didn't escape soon, there would be no hope for them.
