Daniel set to work immediately, taking notes on wraith language, potential exploitable loopoles, and Todd's requests—this was the most difficult part, as he found himself suggesting things and then having to explain them.

Todd was very patient throughout the whole thing, though unnervingly quiet. Daniel had never had something watch him so intensely with no intention of disturbing him whatsoever, especially a person to whom nearly everything he wrote down was complete gibberish.

It took several drafts and a long discussion in the hallway away from Todd to finally be approved.

The contract was signed and Todd was moved to the medical lab. Daniel's comment that sometimes it could take even more work to get a human to agree to such things was not appreciated. He didn't mention that Todd had left the book on the table, still closed.

….

"What'd he do?" John asked after walking into Woolsey's office.

"I doubt it was his fault—for once." Woolsey said, setting his book down.

"So something did happen," John said, both proud of himself and dreading the mess he'd have to clean up. 'I told you so' isn't as gratifying when dangerous aliens were involved.

"He had a severe allergic reaction somehow. "

"He's a wraith, how bad could it be?"

"He's had arrhythmia and trouble breathing for the last three days. Dr. Keller had to cut open his chest and use open-heart massage twice. He's currently in observation, but Dr. Keller would rather you didn't bother him."

"Oh, he's always cranky," John said, literally hand waving the problem away. "He's fine now, right?"

"He's been having blackouts and showing signs of pica. Other than agreeing that he'd rather not have you around for a while, all he's said is that this is all similar to being bitten by the Iratus bug."

"What's pica?" John asked. Why couldn't medical problems have simple terms like 'heart attack' or 'severed limb' or 'dead'?

"Essentially it means 'eating strange things.'"

"Anything is strange for him," John said. Why was everything a long story when it came to Todd?

"He didn't notice he was eating a pen until he was halfway through," Woolsey said.

"So he got high," John said. "We can get more pens."

"If you want to speak to him, you can visit him in his room in a few days," Woolsey said. Todd didn't want to talk to anyone, especially the person best skilled at talking to him. Said person's only idea was to give the wraith office supplies. Meanwhile, they had a mystery concerning Todd and mysteries and wraith went together like peanut butter and napalm. If this situation was going to blow up, he'd like to know when and how so he could safely move it far, far away.

"When did he get a room?"

"He wanted one in exchange for agreeing to the medical tests. He's still under guard and he couldn't leave if he tried. If you feel the need to shoot him, try not to make too much of a mess."

….

The doors slammed shut behind Todd and he gave the room a slow, languid glance. It had been thrown together at the last minute and was minimal even for what he asked, but he was satisfied by it. It was his and it was as private as he was going to get—far more private than the infirmary or the brig at least.

He sat down on the bed and reflected on what he could remember of the past few days. He didn't understand Dr. Keller. He figured he never would. She was compassionate, which was an aspect far more complex than he'd suspected. The tests required a fairly uncompromising position and he was already uncomfortable just to be wearing the strange outfit he'd been force to wear on the Daedalus. She'd fetched him a shirt and even scolded the guards for laughing.

That had merely been convenient. He understood it even. It was everything afterwards that confused him. What she referred to as a 'lumbar puncture' was indeed intensely painful, but soon afterwards, he felt a pain in his chest and couldn't breathe. Minutes before, she turned her back to him so he could dress himself and then gently moved his hair away while trying to lessen imminent pain by talking. Suddenly she was someone else, flipping him over by his hair and shredding the shirt she'd just given him. She was screaming at people, grabbing things, violently burning him with strange devices and finally taking a knife to him.

She was there by the side of the bed, a curtain even pulled around it, after he awoke from his first 'blackout'. She was smiling, asking him how he felt, and then apologizing. All he could say was that he didn't understand what she was doing. He ignored her when she started waving a pen around in front of him, but she didn't show annoyance at having to explain the vision test before trying to get him to comply. She'd even put a new shirt on him under his coveralls at some point and put a blanket over him despite his injuries having healed. It was all in the name of compassion. It was inconsistent and forceful.

She left out of politeness, only to return to find him pulling half a pen out of his mouth just as he wondered when he'd started eating it. She yanked it away and tossed it behind her, screaming at him that he'd shredded the sleeves of his outfit in the same way. She loudly and rapidly demanded answers from him, yet told the guards to leave when they asked if there was a problem. Then she asked if he wanted John to come by, ignoring the lack of answers. It was random, irrelevant, and yet, she already knew he didn't want John to see him like that. She knew it was uncomfortable for him.

He didn't like her anymore. He didn't like her spontaneous changes in mood while claiming it was all in the name of the same emotion. He didn't like how she could get into his head so easily. He didn't like her constantly prodding him verbally and saying it was to help him. He used to like her; he'd pick her out of the crowd of humans because she was the opposite of the angry, violent, dominant queens he was used to. It wasn't her fear, but her willingness to talk to him without sounding like she wanted to kick him in the face with her boot. Now she flipped between the two and he couldn't predict when she'd change.

Something caught his eye and distracted him from contemplating the aggressive nature of compassion—or possibly the reverse. He made his way over to the object, curious as to why humans would have left anything extra in his possession.

It was the book Daniel had said he could have. He'd left it behind in the conference room. After all this time, someone had taken the time to return to him something that was essentially useless. It was no good to Daniel; he had said so. It was no good to anyone on Atlantis, they had what they wanted and they knew that as much as the book intrigued him, he wasn't going to give them anything for it. It was no use to him anyway; he could recognize the symbols on the cover, but he had no idea what they said.

After casting a quick glance at the surveillance camera, he picked up the book and sat down on the floor to do what he could in studying it. He was going to test how much of this was truly his and how much he could treat the contents of the room as his own property.

After some time, the doors opened and John walked in. Todd didn't look up or greet him as the doors closed. He wasn't in the mood for company, but he wasn't in the mood to tell John to go away either.

"Swingin' pad, dude," John said. "Let's throw a party, invite some chicks."

Todd ignored him. Wraith tended to tune out what humans said like similar to cats, even when the humans were talking at them. It took the proverbial can opener to get their attention.

"Not a fan of lightswitches, are you?" John said, looking around the room. Then he realized Todd wouldn't be able to adjust the lights if he wanted to. He also realized a wraith could see in the dark, so maybe Todd hadn't noticed. "Somehow, I'd expected more furniture," John said, cluelessly. There was only a dresser made out of storage boxes next to the door and a cot against the opposite wall. Todd's new clothes showed a bit more creativity but the same minimalistic sense of effort—that or they were picked out in the dark from a box of rags. His pants had old coffee and blood stains on them; his shirt looked like it had been used more than once to wax a car while it was on fire. The only new things were his fingerless gloves, obviously for human protection, as there were prominent bite marks on his arms and fingers. "Daniel needs to teach you about interior decorating," John said, looking at the few objects on the dresser. One was a long document written in the ancient language, probably the contract that let him stay here. There was a box of unlabeled crayons, half of them chewed on. Next to that was a small book entitled Learn Colors. "What's this?" John asked, picking up the book and flipping through it, noting that all English had been crossed out and a few short bits of ancient were written in the margins.

"Doctor Keller asked me to fill it out," Todd said. "She believes I am… 'color blinded.' I did not realize that it was here."

Most of the book was a series of color-by-numbers pictures, all of which seemed to be colored at random. "Well, the good news is you're not getting graded on this." John turned the page and this time the instructions were to draw a picture in red. Todd had scribbled a strange conglomeration of geometric shapes in purple. "You know, I think they meant a flower or a bunny or—nevermind." Why would a wraith draw a cute little bunny or a pretty flower? He was suddenly glad it resembled beginner's cubism; he didn't want to know what kind of 'pretty pictures' a wraith would draw.

"Is there a reason you are here?" Todd asked, flipping through a few pictureless pages.

"I thought… I'm usually better at this but… you've had a rough couple of days and I'm sure Dr. Keller said she didn't know it would happen, so…" John's train of thought rain out of steam and he was left wondering if fidgeting enough would push it along its tracks.

Todd finally turned from his book to watch John flounder. He wondered what was so important about waving his arms about that he needed to put the book down.

"I'm not really sure if this would even work, but… you wanna talk?"

"What do you expect me to talk about?" Todd asked. The humans were hiding something while he was the one they were overall suspicious of… again.

"Well, sometimes when…strange things happen, people want to talk about them and they feel better. I don't know how you guys handle it, so I thought I'd ask."

"I am sick," Todd said, closing the book and pushing it away.

"Um…" John said. He hadn't really planned this out. He had three days to put together a speech or make notes, but instead he hadn't even bothered to think a situation like this would impair his ability to form complete sentences. What did one say to a sick wraith?

Todd stood up and walked towards him. He shoved John aside, only to collapse after another step.

"You okay?" John asked, bending down. He realized Todd had his hand over his mouth. He grabbed Todd under his arms and did his best to lift the wraith to his feet and drag him to the small bathroom. He just barely managed to get Todd to the shower stall in time.

"Don't tell me you need another bug," John said, holding back Todd's hair as the wraith retched onto the shower floor. "Because we're all out of those."

Todd leaned back and batted John's hand away. "This is what it is like after surviving one of them," Todd said, resting against the bathroom wall.. "Only not quite as severe."

"By 'this' you mean?" John asked.

"Dr. Keller would know precisely what happened better than I would," Todd said. "It lasted for ten days before.

"You counted?"

Todd nodded.

"Having a heart attack for over a week doesn't sound like much of a cure or cancer," John said.

"Sheppard?" Todd asked in a tone that indicated there was going to be a follow-up question.

"Yeah?" John asked.

"Could you leave?"

"Sure," John said, standing up. He assured himself he was still being helpful. Then he wondered why he bothered. "I'll tell Dr. Keller, she'll want to know what happened. She wanted to know what you've been chewing on anyway; made it sound like you were a hamster."

"Would it be a serious problem if I were?" Todd asked. He was making things worse. He wondered if being whatever a hamster was qualified as having shoved things sideways. That look of expectation was back. It was almost prideful, almost satisfied.

"Forget it," John said. For someone who spent thousands of years on a ship full of other men, Todd sucked at male bonding. "I'll just tell her what colors you ate."

"What are those?" Todd asked, the expectation having left.

"Crayons?" John asked.

"Colors."

"Ask Daniel," John said. "You don't want me to leave just because I said-?"

Todd shook his head. "I do not stop you from keeping your word."

"…Right." John said, and left the bathroom. He grabbed the coloring book before standing at the door. He cast a quick glance at Todd, who just sat there. He wasn't upset, he was just thinking. Again. For the small moment he waited for the door to open, he wondered why he didn't want to leave Todd alone. As he walked down the hall, he realized Todd had been fully conscious during those ten days, which meant he'd been awake in the infirmary until he blacked out. Three days alone and in pain and when he had a chance, he refused to let John see him.

After every threat, after every trick, after several disturbing comments, now was the time his stomach was tied in knots the worst.

The only person Todd had to talk to about this, truly, was him. The only person John had to talk to about this was… no one. If he didn't know better, he'd say Todd had concocted a pretty good revenge for the threat of being shot.

"I get it, I'll fix this," he said. "Can you lighten up?" He suddenly realized how thankful he was that he was standing in an empty corridor.