CHAPTER 4 – BEHIND THE LIES

John groaned as he stretched and pushed himself up off the cold, hard ground. The fire had wound down to smouldering ashes and Ronon sat, vigilant and gazing out at the forest beyond. "You know I'm too old to be sleeping on the hard ground anymore – too many nights in a soft bed..."

Ronon flicked his eyes skyward, noting that the storm had more or less abated and only a soft rain fell now. "Yeah, you've gotten soft Sheppard – forgot all your boy scout skills?"

Giving him a sharp push as he stumbled outside and out of sight of the cave, so that he could relieve himself, he wandered back to the cave, patting down his tactical vest pockets in search of food. "Damn Ronon, we did not come prepared! And no comments about boy scouts or going out into that bush to eat plants and leaves and other... stuff... I'm thinking a nice juicy McDonald's burger, some hot fries, even the shake sounds good about now."

Teyla had awoken and was looking at him quizzically. "You mean I never told you about McDonald's Teyla? Seems like a little field trip to earth might be in order in the near future. There are some food items that you really have to try."

"Like popcorn, John?" Teyla smiled, remembering movie nights and the ever present popcorn which she enjoyed very much.

"Exactly Teyla. I'm glad that you appreciate the finer things that earth has to offer. Now that we've got all talk of food out the way, and my stomach is protesting even further, perhaps you can wake Arlia up and we can move out. We're going to pay a little visit to her father, dear old dad, and have a little heart to heart with him. If you prefer her not to be privy to this chat, I suggest you keep her away from the meeting. We may get more out of him if she's not there..."

"We can't just leave her out here John. The bounty hunters are likely to find her." Ronon looked down at her, sleeping what he assumed, was the sleep of the innocent. "What do you want me do?"

"Stay here with her Ronon. Teyla and I will head back to the settlement. If Arlia can tell us a less direct route into his compound, we should be able to get to him and have a private chat with him without encountering any of the bounty hunters who are likely still holed up there. They'll be thinking that if we don't head for the stargate, we'll try and make it back to the compound and stage some sort of high noon scenario there."

Teyla started to get up, eager to be on the move and doing something and smiled at Ronon who would remain here.

"Babysitter Sheppard? Are you kidding? You need me in there man?"

"Damn it Ronon, you said it – we can't just leave her out here on her own. She trusts you and will you trust anyone else to watch out for her? Wake her up, find out if there is another way in... I'm thinking that as a child she found more than one way to hide within the compound so that she could move without being seen." Sheppard's expression grew hard and Ronon acknowledged the wisdom in what he said, and shook Arlia so that she rubbed her eyes and sat up, blinking slightly into the gray of morning.

Sheppard spoke in urgent tones to her. "We need to find a not so well know way into your father's compound – we're going in to make sure her has not been hurt..." at his ommission, Ronon looked away, not able to look at her. "Can you tell us a secret entrance, so to speak? One that those bounty hunters are unlikely to know about."

Arlia was quick to throw off the remnants of sleep. "Of course Colonel Sheppard, I know of one such way, one that we have have not had to use in my lifetime. It is small, you may have trouble in the tunnels. As a child I found it exciting to be able to go from building to building without being detected. However, I became trapped down there one day, and now... I do not go down there any more." Ronon gave her arm a gentle squeeze acknowledging the fear she must have felt as a child.

"Do you wish me to take you there? I don't know if I will be able to enter the tunnels... "She looked imploringly at Ronon as she said this and he gave Sheppard a look that said he understood the decision that he had made concerning leaving Arlia behind, even if it had not been for the ones originally voiced. It was the right decision, and he would stay here with her until they returned with information and food.

Following Arlia's directions, Teyla and John came to an entrance to a cellar in one of the buildings on the outskirts of the settlement. There had been no sign of the bounty hunters, in fact there had been little sign of any people and John began to get an uneasy feeling in his stomach. Teyla glanced at him in concern. "Your spidey senses John? It looks as though they are playing over your consciousness again?"

"Yeah Teyla... somethings not quite kosher here. Where is everyone? This should be a normal working day, a day for normal activities and even on a quiet day, there is still plenty of activity here.

Come to think of it, have you actually seen anyone?"

"No John, you are correct. It is deserted here and I cannot think of one explanation that would shed light on this. I suggest we make our way inside the compound to see whether Arlia's father is still here."

They entered the cellar that led down to a dark tunnel and John saw straight away that Arlia would not have been able to make herself enter this darkness. It was much worse than the darkness in the cave and he could easily imagine a terrified young girl becoming trapped down there.

They become lost themselves several times. It was a series of tunnels and John assumed that it had been used in the past as a means for the people to escape the wraith cullings, something that the people on this planet had not had to fear for some time now. In fact, Arlia's generation had never known a wraith culling. The wraith had stopped coming to this part of the galaxy many years ago and it was rumoured that a wraith shield that had been put in place 10,000 years ago by the ancients had been activated by a solar surge in the planet's sun. This at least, was the theory that Rodney had come up with when they had found the device. By going through the written history of what had occurred on that planet, they had learned that the ancients had indeed installed such a device, but that it had stopped working around 5000 years ago, and they had succumbed once again to wraith cullings. They also learnt that more than 100 years ago, the device had suddenly turned on again, or so they had assumed, as the wraith cullings ceased. Rodney and his science team had spent several days on the planet going over the device and through it's memory banks and the only significant event of interest had been the solar surge that had occurred at that time. Rodney had assumed that his was the event that had reenabled the device again.

The tunnels wound under the complex, and Arlia had been correct. They were small, and allowed for crouching only. John, standing at over 6 feet, found it extremely uncomfortable. The people from this world were far smaller in stature than the earth humans, and these tunnels had been built for their ease of travel,not that of the earth humans.

The came to an intersection that Arlia had told them about, and knew that the entrance to her father's quarters were just above after they had taken the right fork. Feeling very uncomfortable now, John was anxious to straighten himself out, and quickly took the right turn, locating the trapdoor overhead that would lead them into his quarters. Cautiously, he attempted to raise it and winced at the squeaking sound that it made. It had likely not been opened in a long time, probably not since Arlia's younger days when she had used these tunnels to play under the compound and spy on the adults.

John poked his head into the quarters and hearing nothing, gave the signal to Teyla who waited below in the dark for him. Raising himself up, he then reached a hand down to help here up, taking the time to dust off some of the filth and dirt that had coated him during his journey through the tunnel.

Hearing a noise coming from the room beyond, he placed a finger at this lips, telling Teyla to keep quiet and cautiously made his way to the door, waiting before taking the chance to take a look at whoever was on the other side of the room. He had his weapon held at the ready but he was not prepared for the sight that met him.

Wraith! Sitting calmly in one of the chairs with an upset Ryall in the seat opposite him. He had hunched forward in his chair and held his head in his hands and was quietly sobbing, while the wraith sat calmly and looked at him.

Steepling his hands, he spoke. "And what did you expect Chancellor? You broke our agreement. You did not deliver what you had promised to my bounty hunters. There will always be retribution when a promise is not delivered."

The sobbing man looked up now, and John could clearly see the defeat in his eyes. "The agreement was broken when your bounty hunters took my daughter. That was not part of the plan. We agreed that I would give you Sheppard and his team and in return you would give us continued immunity from the cullings. This bargain was broken!" He shouted these last word, and dashed a hand in anger across his eyes and John quietly moved further back into the room they were in, thoughts spinning through his head.

Rodney was wrong. John foremost thought was of the device. It was not the device that kept the wraith away, the device never even worked... it was a placebo. There is an agreement here, in return for certain service that they are asked to provide, the people of Arlon are given immunity from the wraith. He could not provide that last service. Then John's thought's went further. The villagers are gone. Disappeared. They have been culled... oh hell, we've got to tell Arlia... there was a deal going down, but by god, this we did not expect!

He motioned to Teyla that they needed to leave, and leave quickly. He had seen by her face that the same thoughts had been going through her head and there was suddenly a much larger picture that had to be looked at. Ronon was not going to be pleased and Arlia would feel betrayed. Her father had sacrificed his entire village.