Disclaimer: We are poor enough so you can believe us we don't own any of the SGA characters, rights, yadda-yadda.

Authors' note: Story by DPB and Meagra Solace – Hubby added some remarks. Silver Pixie and her Smiley went away for the weekend and The Terrorist is being terrible. Please note too that Meagra had to fight Belvella Drake for the right to make Miko a red panda – and won! Go girl!

A day at the zoo

Elizabeth Weir and John Sheppard stood next to each other – close together, but not too close – on Elizabeth's balcony; watching Lorne and Cadman putting the younger marines through their routines. It was one of those perfect days: the day was balmy and calm, nobody was threatening Atlantis and the Daedalus was mere hours out; bringing coffee, chocolates and other supplies from home. Not even John had been able to spoil Elizabeth's mood even though he and Rodney McKay had had a scram earlier in the day. Rodney's coffee supply had run out two days ago and the scientist is suffering from withdrawal.

"I love watching Lorne working the marines," John drawled beside her. She cocked her head and smiled at him.

"Is that because you feel they are getting ready to defend the city, or because it's not you down there in the sun, yelling at the young people?" she slyly asked her military commander.

John smiled at her: that cocky half-smile she liked. "Probably the fact that I'm up here and they are down there," he admitted while pulling his shoulders back. He might joke about training, but Elizabeth was aware he set high standards for himself. He could probably outrun any of the young fitness-freaks down on the pier. Probably the only person on Atlantis that could outrun John was Ronon. But Ronon had been a runner for seven years, and the term wasn't just a pretty name.

"Fortunately the Daedalus will be here in a few hours," Elizabeth smiled, thinking how hot the marines will be after their exercise. "Caldwell had promised enough soap to last us no matter how long it took to the next supply-run."

"Yes," John slowly added. "He had also promised enough coffee to last us a while," the dark-haired man sneered.

With a smile Elizabeth looked down at the mug clasped between her hands. She really didn't mind switching to tea – in fact she rather liked the bracing Athosian blend Teyla had introduced her to.

Actually John was trying very hard to be nice today, and not even because Rodney had been an ass earlier. The problem was that that John had some troubling thoughts these past few weeks and he really didn't know how to deal with them. On any other occasion it would have been easier, but romance on Atlantis was proving to be a delicate subject.

While he stood musing – and enjoying the view of the marines hard at work – he heard a faint ripping noise, followed almost immediately by a clang. His mind was even faster than his reflexes and he identified the sound as that of Elizabeth's mug dropping to the floor. His head whipped around to see what had happened – she was not the clumsy type. But the space beside him was empty. Elizabeth had disappeared. A knot of fear suddenly made him feel breathless – almost as if a band was drawn tight around his chest.

It was then that he saw a movement out of the corner of his eye and looked down to where he had seen it. He frowned. On the ground next to him was a moving bundle of clothes. A bushy red tail with a white tuft at the end swished the fabric. Then suddenly a black nose peeked out from the collar of the top, followed by a dainty red muzzle and large ears.

"What the hell..." he growled. Growled? Why was he growling?

Confused, he looked down at his scruffy black paws resting on the railing. Carefully he looked around and found he had an equally scruffy tail attached to his behind. His pants had ripped off – so that had been the ripping sound – but his black t-shirt had stretched enough to accommodate his lupine chest, but not enough to allow easy breathing. That was the strange pressure he was experiencing.

He dropped down from the railing to find the fox grinning at him. He snapped at her, but Elizabeth the fox nimbly ducked to the side. With a slight snarl he sat down on his haunches. Haunches – great. Elizabeth had turned into a nice red fox and he had ended up as a scruffy wolf. There was a scientist or two that really was going to get it!

But more immediate was the problem of getting his t-shirt off. Breathing was becoming a problem. With an inexperienced hind leg (he sincerely hoped he did not have fleas) he tried to scratch the shirt over his head. After a few moments he had to give up though, especially as he could hear Elizabeth laughing at him. He glared at her, but still she did not seem daunted. Instead she daintily (as a fox that term really did seem to describe her) got up and took a bit of cloth at the bottom of the shirt between her teeth. With a slight sigh he bent his head and she was able to pull the garment over his head and off. For quite a while he had wondered about getting undressed by her, but that tiny fantasy had never included paws and tails.

The moment he was fully undressed he suddenly thought about something. With a snap of teeth he got on his hind legs again. As a wolf he was tall enough to peer over the rail, and if he and Elizabeth had turned into animals, then you can bet the marines on the pier had turned into animals as well. Beside him Elizabeth the fox leapt up and sat on the rail beside him.

The sight below elicited a bark of laughter. On the pier stood three neat rows of meerkats on their hind legs. A Japanese Macaque (golden monkey) was leaping up and down in front of them – obviously Lorne – chattering at them. Laura Cadman had turned into an otter and was now lying on her back in the water just off the pier; laughing, her hind legs idly flipping the water. John wondered why it seemed that the women were finding the strange transformation much funnier than the men.

With a wolfish grin he turned to look at Elizabeth, only to find her grinning back at him. Damn, naked together and they aren't even the same species!

For a moment they grinned at each other, but then – almost at he same moment – their grins faltered and without speaking a word they knew what the other was thinking. It wasn't that they were so much attuned to one another (although, working together for a while now, that was a factor as well) as that there seemed to be some limited mental link between them. If they were lucky this held true for everyone – something that seemed likely, as John had known the monkey was Lorne and the otter was Cadman. And the thought running through their heads right now was that they had a city full of confused people out there – some cute and cuddly herbivores and some fierce carnivores.

They needed to get out there and restore some kind of order. Then they needed to get Rodney to sort out what had happened and how to reverse whatever Ancient device had been triggered!

Together the two of them turned and ran back into Atlantis. Fortunately John was tall enough to swipe a paw at the control crystals and open the doors.

As they passed through Elizabeth's office into the control room, they found a sloth hanging from a pillar. With confused and tired eyes Chuck stared at the fox and the wolf and for once neither animal found the sight very amusing. It suddenly occurred to them that they were in a heap of trouble if they had no way of using the Atlantis technology.

The two of them continued on through the city; John loping smoothly and Elizabeth trotting along beside him then in front and then some way off as she leapt and glided over, under and around objects and walkways. Just looking at her made him feel tired, but she seemed to be enjoying it.

As they passed through another corridor they suddenly heard a terrible noise. Interested, they detoured to see what the ruckus was about. Both slipped around the corner in the corridor, but almost immediately skidded to a halt.

The sight just confirmed the seriousness of their situation: stuck inside one of the small toilet stalls was an elephant. Whoever the person had been, had obviously transformed as he was finishing up in the toilet. But elephants are much too big to fit through an Atlantis-doorway. In fact, the elephant was too big to fit in the stall. So now the poor creature was stuck inside the stall, with one front leg, a tusk, his trunk, one ear and a baleful eye sticking out. Tatters of clothes – a science uniform – lay on the ground or hung from the gray animal. The scientist trumpeted and Elizabeth thought she had never heard a sadder sound in the entire world. They really needed to restore everyone to the way they need to be: for one reason Atlantis was too strong even for an elephant to break out of.

The two of them finally had to turn their back on the poor elephant and continue down the corridor. They were hoping to find Teyla and Ronon in the gym. Perhaps the two of them would be able to help on their quest.

A quiet run later (their feet made almost no sound) they reached the gym. The door stood open and fearsome growling could be heard inside. Immediately John took in the alpha-male position and Elizabeth mentally rolled her eyes at him. He only grinned over his shoulder at her before carefully padding into the gym; leaving her in the hallway.

Half a second later John backed out from the gym; all the hair on his back raised. Elizabeth cocked her head at him, but he just pushed at her side with his nose. Whatever he had found in there, he did not want her to see it. Dread and curiosity raged within her and she decided she had had enough of his alpha-male attitude. At best of times he was almost insufferably mucho, but as a scruffy black wolf he seemed to be even more so.

So nimbly she leapt over him and into the gym – only to realise he might have had a point in keeping her out of the room. As a wolf John would not have been in danger, but she was a fox and much smaller. And the two incredible creatures in the gym would be able to kill her in an instant. Besides, they seemed to be caught up in their altered forms.

As she stood transfixed, the male lion leapt at the just-slightly-smaller leopard. The leopard leapt aside and clawed at the lion. It took Elizabeth another heartbeat to raise her own hackles and back out of the room: only to bump into a pissed John. She had to admit: even as a wolf his face was extremely expressive.

#####

In the gym Ronon and Teyla circled one another. Both were exhilarated by their altered forms and their fighting-training had taken on a new dimension and intimacy. Their first act as large cats had been to literally tear the clothes from each other's bodies. Well, it sounded worse than it was: human clothing weren't made to fit onto lions and leopards.

With a growl Teyla the leopard leapt at Ronon, and the lion met her attack head on. On their hind feet now they locked their front legs and snapped at one another. Ronon had the advantage of weight and he pushed her back. With a growl she fell back on all fours and nimbly leapt aside as Ronon attacked. She swiped at him with a paw and managed to rip a shallow gash in his side.

It was as she was clawing Ronon that Teyla noticed the small red fox in the doorway: her hackles raised. Recognition took a moment and in that moment of distraction Ronon jumped at her, turned her on her back and pinned her to the floor of the gym. But Teyla was not interested in the fight anymore and she could see Ronon was picking up on her thoughts. The small fox had been Elizabeth – probably out checking up on everyone. Her heightened senses picked up another scent that she recognised as John. So John and Elizabeth were together. But where was the rest of her team; where was Rodney...oh, shit, Rodney! In the lab!

With a negligent flip of her paw she pushed Ronon off and leapt at the door. She grinned as she felt Ronon's presence right behind her.

#####

Rodney McKay decided this was the utter last time that Peter Kavanagh was going to screw things up for Atlantis. Rodney had warned the scientist not to mess with the new piece of equipment that they had brought to the lab yesterday, but the wining Kavanagh had not listened and now it seemed everyone had turned into animals. If they were lucky the effects were limited to the immediate area around the device.

For a while now Rodney had ranted at the changed Kavanagh, and the effect had been rather spectacular. Rodney had turned into a large orange Maine Coon cat and as such had a complete new spectrum of sounds to express his disgruntlement in. But after a while spitting, yowling and growling seemed insufficient.

And it has to be noted that Kavanagh had turned into a mean-looking gray rat with squinty eyes.

So now Rodney decided it was time to put an end to the miserable existence of the inferior scientist. Narrowing his eyes slightly, Rodney hunched down on his front legs, nails extending. A couple of times he clawed at the floor with his front paws and followed this by wiggling his hind legs; getting into perfect position for the perfect leap. He could see the fear in the mean little eyes of the rat.

Half a heartbeat later Rodney leapt; fully intent on ending Kavanagh. As a cat he had no problem with the idea at all.

As the Maine Coon was in the middle of the perfect pounce, large jaws closed gently but firmly around the scruff of his neck. One moment he was in mid-flight; the next he was hanging miserably in his own skin like a kitten. His legs were rendered useless and even more embarrassingly his beautiful fluffy tail curled up between his legs and seemed to grin at him.

Carefully he turned his head as far as it would go to find a leopard baring her teeth at him. Ah, Teyla. And he bet the big jaws around his skin belonged to Ronon. Probably another huge-assed feline.

"Pffft-pffft-pffft," he spit at them. The only comfort to be found in this whole situation was the fearful look on Kavanagh's face before the rat had scurried away beneath a console.

Together Teyla and Ronon turned around and left the lab with Rodney still dangling from the latter's mouth. Rodney would have to take some time for a nice bath as he could feel Ronon getting slobber all over him.

The three felines made their way down the corridors and Rodney realised they were headed for the infirmary. Great, as if Beckett would know the answer!

A minute later they entered the infirmary. Inside they found a small pony and an even smaller doggie yapping at one another. The pony had to be Jennifer Keller and Rodney realised he could not imagine her being anything else – except perhaps a unicorn. And the small Scottish terrier had to be Carson Beckett. As Rodney was dropped next to the doggie (yes, taking a quick look he saw Ronon was indeed a big feline), Rodney realised not only was Carson a Scottish terrier, he was a toy breed! Rodney was at least five times as big as the doctor!

Now the Scotty was yapping at him; probably scolding him for what has happened. With a flick of his tail Rodney sat down and looked at the small – very small – dog in front of him. He realised Ford had been correct years ago: it is nearly impossible to get Carson to shut up at times.

And Rodney was feeling irritated. As the small doggie turned his back on Rodney, Rodney lifted his right front paw. Almost negligently he extended the four razor-sharp nails and took aim. Unfortunately Rodney had not waited until Ronon and Teyla had left the room, and as he got ready to swipe at Carson, a big paw hit Rodney on the shoulder. Fortunately it had been Teyla and the only thing that got bruised was Rodney's ego as he went tumbling across the floor.

"Pffft-pffft-pffft!" he spat, but the look Teyla gave him ensured the cessation of all attempted attacks on Carson. Instead he simply flicked his tail as the two big felines sat down near the door. And was it just his imagination, or was the Shetland pony laughing at him?

#####

"Colonel Caldwell," the young technician reported, "I cannot contact Atlantis on the radio."

Caldwell shifted in his seat to look at the young woman. "Try again," the bald commander of the Daedalus ordered. The Asgard-assisted ship had entered orbit around Lantea only moments ago and they needed clearance to land. If the shield was raised they would not be able to land.

"Sir, I have tried them again, but this is the only thing I can get," the young technician replied as she flipped a switch. Over the intercom came a sound that sounded rather like the bleating of a sheep.

"Lieutenant?" Caldwell asked, not really believing his ears.

#####

Elizabeth was silently keeping score of the animals – and the people beneath the fur – they had encountered so far and she was sure that though everyone had been turned into an animal, it also seemed everyone had been turned into a mammal.

Thus far the more interesting animals had been the lion and the leopard, the giraffe, the lemur, the elephant (poor guy) and the red panda. The panda had been accompanied by a goat and Elizabeth wondered at the device that had turned Radek Zelenka into such an animal. And wasn't the red panda native to the eastern parts of Asia? The geographical region Miko – the panda – had been turned into was from?

The same peculiar thought occurred to her when they entered the infirmary and found Carson had been turned into a Scottish terrier. Perhaps all of them already carried a picture in their heads around of what type of creature they would have been and this is the animal they had been turned into. After all, could you imagine John being anything else than a scruffy wolf? And Ronon and Teyla were ideal in their shapes.

Of course they had to pass between the two intimidating sentinels as they entered the infirmary, and Elizabeth felt her hackles raising. Well, at least the two of them had stopped their fighting.

As Elizabeth and John entered the infirmary, Rodney suddenly realised this was probably the only chance he was going to get to escape. So while everyone was distracted by the entrance of the wolf and the fox, Rodney leapt onto the window sill and made his bid for freedom. As a cat he was nimble enough to scamper from one niche to another and into a window two floors up. He was not about to sit around and wait for everyone to eat one another. He needed to get to Radek and figure this thing out. If he remembered correctly the scientist had been working in one of the satellite labs only a floor from where he was now.

Rodney rounded a corner and entered the lab he had been looking for. Inside he indeed found Radek and his assistant – what was the girl's name again? Milo? Mimo? No, Miko!

It seemed the red panda and the goat were already getting things together in hopes of solving this crisis. In fact, Radek had his tablet in his mouth. Just too bad he was idly chewing on the corner in his mouth. A single spark flew as he shattered the screen and started chewing on the inner part of the device. When Radek turned back into a human he was going to be pissed.

#####

The beam dispersed and left the lieutenant in its wake. After the strange sound emanating from the intercom minutes ago, Caldwell had decided to send someone down to investigate. And the poor lieutenant had been picked.

As the young man stepped forward from where the transporter beam had dropped him, three animals walked into the gate-room. As they passed through the room the cat glared at the young man, the red panda squinted at him and the goat ignored him – too intent on chewing the tablet in his mouth.

The young man stood there, alone in the room except for the sound of dying tabled drifting in from the corridor.

He tapped his earpiece. "Sir," he began.

"Report!" Caldwell barked through the intercom.

"Sir, a cat, a panda and a goat just walked into the gate-room," the poor man tried to report. The silence that followed that statement seemed loaded with demotion.

"Is this a joke?" Caldwell finally asked.

"No, sir. Really, a cat, a panda and a goat had just walked through the gate-room. And I think there is a sheep in the control-room." The lieutenant knew there was no way to explain any of this and could see the end of his career.

"I'll be right there," Caldwell sighed into the radio. Moments later Caldwell and a detachment of marines beamed down to join the young lieutenant in front of the quiet stargate.

By now another creature had entered the gate-room: some strange golden coloured monkey. It seemed to be trying to stand at attention, but the lieutenant wasn't really sure. For good measure he started lifting his hand to salute back.

Just then whatever had happened to the Lanteans became undone. Sparks flew off the golden monkey and suddenly the monkey was replaced by a very naked Evan Lorne – still trying to salute. But now the man was using his other hand to try and cover those parts that hadn't been embarrassing naked when he had been a monkey moments before.

"Welcome to Atlantis, sir," Lorne stammered.

#####

It was several hours later and everything was back to normal – as defined by the standards of Atlantis. Everyone was human and dressed again and the only casualty had been the toilet that the elephant had been stuck in. When everything had changed back John had been the one to slip a uniform into the toilet without looking to see who was stuck in there. In fact, he really didn't want to know.

But changing back had not solved every problem. The thing was that by now John was having very distracting thoughts – even more so than before.

What had happened was that the one moment everything had been fine – relatively so. He, the fox that was Elizabeth, the Ronon-lion and Teyla the leopard had been running down the corridor, intent on getting to the control-room and perhaps signalling for help. The next moment the four of them had literally bumped into one another as they changed back to their own shapes while running. It had been a moment of a lot of naked skin touching.

And that was the real problem. They were all naked and, well, they were all naked. The women had tried to be cool about it and Ronon and John had been able to try and look away. But not before they had gotten a good feel of flesh and a good eyeful of naked woman.

Truth be told, Teyla was better toned than Elizabeth, but that hadn't bothered John. He had noticed Ronon noticing the shape of Teyla's body, though. And John had noticed Ronon noticing John noticing Elizabeth. Damn, this was getting confusing! He just really hoped he had been able to hide his noticing Elizabeth from Elizabeth!

#####

Elizabeth, John, Rodney, Teyla, Ronon and Caldwell were gathered around the big table in the conference-room. Everyone seemed to try not being obvious about the fact that they felt awkward about meeting one another's eyes. Well, at least everyone had had an embarrassing moment or two. This did not make anything truly better, only a little less bad.

Even Caldwell seemed embarrassed and he had been dressed!

The purpose of the meeting was to determine the extent of damage to the city – besides one toilet – and whether the episode had truly ended or if they should expect a relapse. And who had been responsible, of course.

"I've looked at the device," Rodney explained, "and it seems to be another of those ascension devices. Only this one seemed to be the initial prototype." He smirked. "That's why we changed back after a while; it wasn't able to rewrite our DNA as much as the other device," and now his grin faltered, "I managed to trip the last time."

"Okay, but where did it come from?" Elizabeth asked, her eyes narrowed.

"Kavanagh found it in one of the abandoned labs down by pier three," Rodney explained.

"And who activated it?" John asked.

"Kavanagh," Rodney smirked.

Then Elizabeth frowned. She tapped her earpiece. "Kavanagh, could you come to the conference-room?" she demanded. But there was no answer. She tried again. "Kavanagh?"

She looked up at the rest of the people around the table. "Has anyone seen Kavanagh? I can't reach him on the radio."

As everyone looked at one another and shook their heads, Rodney reached into his pocket and withdrew something. Keeping his hand beneath the table, he slowly opened his fingers. He looked down at the purplish rat tail nestled there. Apparently any dead matter had not reverted back to its human shape.

Then he grinned and carefully put the thing back in his pocket.

#####

Somewhere deep in the bowels of the lab Kavanagh had little time to bemoan the loss of his pony tail. In fact, the only thing on his mind was getting out from behind the console he was stuck behind. He had still been hiding from McKay when he had transformed back to himself.

And as the rest of Atlantis went to bed that night, the only sound – if one listened hard enough – was the faint wimper from the lab: "Please, someone, help me!"

The end.

Authors' note: infinity noticed the trend about the situations we get Kavanagh in. we're getting therapy, but we're not very hopeful, though.

Also, we noticed the thing between John & Elizabeth and Ronon & Teyla developing, and we're working on an Infinity Sparky and Spanky.

Note from DPB: Belvella, I'm sorry about the unicorn thing. Meagra had no part in that, really. Well, mostly...

To insanity and beyond!