A/N: My apologies for how late this is being posted. It's been a long day and I've started back at Uni. Happy Reading.

Chapter 3

He rubbed warily at his eyes. His watch told him that he'd been asleep for an hour before Wilson had shook his shoulder and told him to get up and get ready to move. "What's going on?" he asked as he pulled his boots onto his feet.

The Mastery Gunny was stood by the door, eyes fixed on a single spot. She briefly glanced to him before her eyes moved back to the corridor, "A couple of Genii spies tipped them off to us being in the village."

Carson paused in pulling on his vest to stare at the woman. "What?"

Her eyes turned back to him and she nodded to him, "Hurry up Carson. I don't imagine they're too pleased to how Colonel Sheppard's team left them last time."

The Scotsman nodded and hurried through zipping his vest up. He picked his pistol up, holster still surrounding it, and felt a yank on his arm. Wilson had pulled him through the door and had stepped in front of him. The sound of gunfire caught his ears and he paled at the thought. "What's going on?"

"Healy and Pearson are distracting them. Wicki's downstairs waiting for us."

He followed behind the woman, moving down the stairs with quick ease. In the main room of the inn he could see Wicki peeking through a window, her gun trained on the door. Her eyes turned to the pair of them coming down the stairs. "We gotta use the back door," Wicki said. "Healy and Pearson can only do so much."

Wilson nodded her head, "Cover our six," Wilson said and Wicki nodded, moving to stand with her back to Carson, her gun trained on the door. The Doctor fumbled for his handgun. He wasn't an excellent shot but at least he could feel like he was doing something.

They reached the back door with the sounds of exchanging bullets behind them. Carson kept himself wedged between the two women. "This always happens when I go off-world," he muttered.

"You spend the night in a village with Genii spies?" Wilson asked and he knew, that whilst nobody could see, that there would be a smile on her face.

"Might as well do! It has the same effect."

"Shh," Wicki said.

Wilson stopped and turned her head over her shoulder to narrow her eyes at the Corporal. The younger woman stopped and Carson watched as she narrowed her eyes back. "Who is in charge Wicki?"

"You?"

"So who gives the orders?"

"You?"

Wilson continued to glare and Carson opened his mouth to try to say something, but what? What could he say? "We'll discuss this back in the city," Wilson said.

Carson could feel Wicki's eye roll and closed his mouth. There was something in Wilson's voice that made him afraid of that talk, and he wasn't even going to be there for it. He decided to keep his mouth shut as they skirted through on the inside of the tree line that surrounded the back of the village. The only sound that joined them was the sound of crunching leaves underfoot and gunshots in the distance.

Two minutes of rushing later, on the other side of the village with their eyes on the inn they stopped. Wilson took a crouched step forward and grabbed her radio, "Healy, Pearson, how are you two doing?"

"Could do with a hand," Healy said.

"Roger that Staff Sergeant." She turned to Carson and Wicki. "Corporal, take Carson to the 'gate. If there are men there you wait until Pearson can join you. Take them out and go back through to Atlantis."

Wicki turned sullen hazel eyes onto Wilson and nodded. "Yes Ma'am." Then her eyes were on the Doctor. "Doctor," she said, nodding behind her as a silent gesture.

Carson turned his eyes to Wilson, "What about you?"

The woman turned alert eyes to him and offered him a tight smile. The cut from her time in the gym with Healy wasn't so obvious and he noted only two stitches, hidden behind loose bangs of yellow. "We'll be right behind you Doc. Go."

When she turned to face the village she lifted her gun and fired. Wicki pulled on his arm and he stood and disappeared with Wicki into the trees.

They reached the area with the gate in just under five minutes. Forty seconds later and Pearson arrived, falling to his knees with barely a breath lost. "How many we got?" he said, eyes fixed on the area.

"Three."

Pearson nodded. "Flank left, I'll take right. Doc," he turned his eyes to Beckett with a soft smile, "Don't do anything. We'll have you back in Atlantis in sixty seconds."

Carson nodded and watched as Pearson disappeared right. Wicki did so left and he watched, one hand curling against the handle of his gun. Two small bursts of bullets erupted and two men fell. Another burst and the last guy was gone. Wicki moved to the DHD and Pearson waved his hand in Carson's direction.

The Doctor took that as his cue, stood and moved out into open. "You sure that's everyone?"

Wicki's eyes were on him in a manner of seconds, "I know how to count people Doc."

Pearson's face was one of tolerance. Carson knew that Wicki was a new personnel among Atlantis, fresh faced and young by the sounds of it. 'Maybe that was what the Master Gunnery a Elizabeth were talking about?' he thought to himself.

Before he could shake those thoughts the sound of gunfire erupted as the wormhole grew into existence. "Move it!" Pearson shouted, standing at the bottom of the gate's stairs with his gun trained on the tree line. Carson moved up the steps and turned to see Wilson enter the tree line. She ran into the open, stopped, turned and laid down some fire as Healy came into view. He did as she had done and so on.

"Move it Doc," Wicki called, pulling on his arm once more.

Carson nodded and let himself be pulled through the event horizon as Genii soldier's flanked the tree line. On the other side of the Stargate he took a few steps away and watched the event horizon.

Seconds passed and he turned fearful eyes up to the expedition leader as she moved to start coming down the stairs. There was a sound and Carson watched as Healy ran through the 'gate. He turned, gun raised and Pearson appeared, followed by Wilson. "Shut it down!" Elizabeth shouted. By now, the woman was coming to a stop next to Carson, eyes turning from one expedition member to the next. "What happened?"

"Genii spies were in the village," Wilson said, moving to stand one yard away from the woman. Her body was still heaving from the running she'd been doing. "Since they aren't too fond of us they must've asked for villagers to keep an eye out for people asking for land, crops and from the city of the Ancestors."

"Is everyone okay?"

Wilson turned her eyes to her team, giving them a quick once over with her eyes. Carson's eyes however were on another matter. "Your arm," he said. He didn't leave her room to say anything as he stepped up to her and took her arm in his hands, examining the fresh wound. "Looks like a graze. That'll need stitches."

"I'll go straight to the Infirmary," she muttered. "Healy, de-brief."

"Yes Ma'am," he said.

Carson started to walk back into the city where he felt at home, eyes flicking from the wound to the woman's face. It relaxed once they were out of sight of the 'gate room and she smiled at him. Briefly. "I'll be fine Beckett," her face was schooled was more. "It's just a graze."

"Aye, a graze that needs more stitches. That's six this month Master Gunnery," he said.

"Wilson," she said. Her eyes flicked to him for a moment, "Call me Wilson."

He nodded. "Well, Wilson, you must have some serious bad luck."

She nodded as they turned a corner. "I have some kind of luck, that's for sure." There was a light in her eyes that Carson frowned at. The corners of her mouth twitched, for a moment, before it was suppressed and she was back to being a military woman. As they entered the infirmary he wondered what that look meant exactly.