Silpa had just crossed into the forest when he heard the sound of feet pounding towards him from town. He froze, his mind racing, his heart thumping. Behind him the Ring of the Ancestors began to sing with the arrival of a new connection. He shoved the stunner back into his robes, thinking quickly. He was so close. Perhaps these were only shoppers who'd spent too long in the market and realized they were late to return home...

The hope was squashed when Teyla and both remaining Atlantis soldiers – the communications officer and the guard at the door – burst around a bend and into view. Both soldiers lifted their weapons the moment they caught sight of him. With a sudden flash of daring, Silpa plastered on an expression of panic (which wasn't difficult to do) and waved his arms as if glad to see them.

"Teyla! How fortunate you have come. Your man at the Ring is ill. I can't wake him. I was just on my way to find you."

The communication officer's face flickered with alarm and then doubt and Silpa thought for a moment that his lie had been accepted. That hope also died when he looked at Teyla. Her face was flashing with fury.

"What have you done, Silpa?" she demanded.

Silpa just closed his mouth, deciding to say nothing. Teyla waved the guard towards their man on the ground and then stepped close as she had done to Pulo. Silpa fought not to take a step back.

"Tell me what you have done!" she repeated, this time with an air of panic.

It was at that moment the Ring splashed open its connection and fell into quiet flickering.

"It's too late," Silpa said softly. And he almost felt bad about the fear that spread across her face when she understood.


Teyla felt her heart clench within her. She was frozen with indecision. How quickly would the virus transmit itself to Atlantis once given the chance? Should she take the time to warn them? If she shut down the wormhole, would they be able to open it again? Would doing so prevent them from sending the cure Rodney was working on? Was this wormhole even from Atlantis?

Her radio burst into life in her ear, "Colonel Carter, this is Sgt. Banks, please come in - ."

Teyla flung herself at the DHD, interrupting the greeting, "Atlantis this is Teyla. Authentication code TangoAlphaNiner-7043. You must shut down the wormhole immediately. We have been attacked by a malicious virus capable of transmitting itself to Atlantis's computers. Do not dial P43-897 for any reason until Colonel Carter or Dr. McKay gives approval to do so. Be advised, you may already be at risk. Shut down the gate!"

She heard her voice grow loud and frantic as she spoke, and then she was slamming her hands into the DHD to force it to close the connection from her end. Rodney had shown her the code to do so once, saying it only worked on a few worlds for some reason she could not remember.

She was still smacking keys when Banks replied, "Acknowledged. Atlantis Out."

The wormhole collapsed with a slurp. Teyla leaned heavily on the DHD and tried to control her trembling hands. The communications officer had Silpa by the arms who looked like a man trying not to panic. The Sgt. was kneeling by Xiang, but didn't look alarmed.

Had she closed the gate quickly enough? Or was Atlantis also now battling the virus that threatened not only John, injured and too far away from the gate to receive the care he needed, but also the two pilots on board the jumper far above her in space?

She closed her eyes and took several deep breaths. Had she even done the right thing by closing the gate in the first place? Her hands continued to shake.


Sam flung herself at the console between Rodney and John at John's harsh cry.

"What happened?" she demanded. John hunched over the pilot's console, his eyes tightly screwed shut and his hands stiff claws upon the controls. He was too occupied or too far gone to answer, so she turned her demand on Rodney who continued slapping at keys as he answered.

"Someone opened a wormhole to Atlantis. The city automatically pings for any friendly technology and the virus is trying to use that connection to transfer a copy of itself to Atlantis. Sheppard's holding it back, for the moment."

Sam shot another look at John, who looked close to passing out.

"Rodney, he can't hold it for ever. Wipe the database. Fry it if you have to, but get rid of that program!"

"I am! I mean I did. I mean – I was almost finished when the gate opened. Sheppard's having to block all communications completely to keep it from copying itself. I can't send the reset counter-virus I just finished to wipe it off of both jumpers at the same time while it's blocked. If I clean it out of this database and leave it on the other jumper, it will just copy itself back here again the second it gets a chance and we're back to square one."

Sam bit her lip. Damn, why did it always seem like their best solutions became problems in the end.

"Wipe...virus. I'll...stop..." John gasped and Sam frowned, puzzled.

"You think you can manually handle a one-way transfer of data?" Rodney snapped, throwing a calculating look at John. He'd not only understood John's suggestion, but he sounded like he'd also trusted the answer.

"Hurry," was all John said in reply. Rodney took a deep breath.

"OK. Sam, I'll need your help."

Sam leaned closer and Rodney shoved his tablet computer in her hands.

"I need you to launch the counter-virus I've just written from here. It may take a couple of attempts to beat the thing down, so stay on top of it. As soon as it's clear, I have to re-initialize the database and run a scan to make sure we got it all."

"OK," was all Sam could think of, allowing herself to feel a bit amused at the role-reversal.

"Sheppard, you need to shepherd the counter-virus through the communications link into the database on the other jumper. Once it is attacking the 2nd copy, you'll also have to re-initialize the database before you release control of communications." Rodney threw a nervous glance at John.

"Got...it," John whispered so softly, Rodney stared a bit as if unsure he'd really spoken.

"Good, then. Go!"

Sam pounced on the tablet and executed Rodney's program that chased down and destroyed the virus entirely. It tried to slip around the attack by hiding in the sensor system, but Sam was too experienced to let that trick fool her.

"Database is clear!" she called, unable to keep the excitement out of her voice.

"Re-initializing database," Rodney answered, just as intent. "Sheppard, how's it going on the 2nd jumper? John?"

There was a pause and it took Sam a few moments to realize that John hadn't answered. She spared a glance in his direction and bit her lip again in concern. John was bent all the way over the console, his hands twitching with seemingly random motion. If it weren't for the HUD flickering above his head, she'd have thought he'd passed out.

"You can do it, John," she encouraged. "We've almost got it. Just finish this up and we can go home."


John was lost in the glowing lines. The virus was flailing as Rodney's program hunted it down and destroyed its traces from the computer, but even in its death throes, it was dangerous. As if it knew its best hope was to replicate, it attacked his defenses around the communications system with increasing fury.

He couldn't close the connection to Atlantis without also closing his connection to the 2nd jumper, so he simply put his mind across the data feed and held on to the big dog's tail as it writhed and bit and scratched to escape.

When Rodney's program tickled at his mind, asking for permission to continue its pursuit, John felt a shiver of panic. The virus was too strong on the other ship. He was slowly losing his grip as it repeatedly flung itself at the link to Atlantis. He tried to open a tiny window for Rodney's program to slip through, but the hole gaped too wide and he had to slam it closed again and give everything he had to hold it back.

As if renewed by the near success, the virus tried one more attempt, overwhelming John with a series of multiple attacks in the obvious hope that John would miss one and let it through. It was suddenly too much. The jumper he sat in was slowly coming back to life and even with his entire efforts directed at preventing the big dog on the 2nd jumper from hopping towards Atlantis, or back towards them again, it was winning. There were too many threads to counter, too many holes being nibbled into the barriers.

There was only one choice left – to disable and shut down the 2nd jumper altogether. He could send a surge of power from the only other system he controlled into the communications array and blow out the transmitter physically. It would prevent the virus from connecting with Atlantis, but it would also mean the death of his men.

Yet again, the virus almost slipped through. John stopped it by the skin of his teeth.

He couldn't risk Atlantis. He was nearly dead with the effort of wiping the virus from the simple-by-comparison computers on the tiny jumper. They'd have no hope of getting it out of Atlantis before it did whatever it was trying to do.

A cold flood of despair soaked him through and he heard his breath hitch in fury. Cursing every moment, he sent his mind to the power system, coaxed it to build up a charge that he could direct down the glowing lines. He waited until there was enough juice to be sure it would destroy the array...

With an abrupt 'pop' of mental pressure and a sudden release of tension, the connection to Atlantis closed.

John immediately bled off the extra power harmlessly into the buffers and opened a gaping hole in the link between jumpers to shepherd – as Rodney has said – the counter-virus towards the 2nd big dog.

It was a hell of a dogfight. The 2nd jumper had more of a hold, but in the end Rodney's program was just as stubborn as Rodney and the virus slunk back under the database porch where it would vanish when John re-initialized.

He realized that he'd started to shiver when he sent the command to reset the 2nd jumper's computer. He noticed, that he was laying almost across the panel in front of him when he slowly withdrew his mind from the glowing threads to find out what was going on in the real world. He discovered that he was having a really hard time breathing when the real world turned out to be filled with loud cheering and even louder pain.

"That's it. Sheppard got the 2nd jumper re-initialized. No signs of the virus on either ship." That was Rodney. John was back to listening from a dull stupor again.

"Can they talk to us?"

"Communications are open. They aren't answering, though."

John gasped and made a small attempt at sitting upright. It was an ill-advised thought, however. His back and the right side of his chest screamed a protest at any motion that even came close to the abused and literally cut up muscles.

"Wait, I take that back. Jumper 4, say again. Do you read?"

John heard the rest of the jumper go quiet.

"Um...Yeah. Yeah, this is Jumper 4. We lost power, all life support. I guess, we...passed out. We're OK, now, though. Ooops!" There was a tense silence, "We're OK, now. Had to make a course correction. Almost fried in the atmosphere. All systems seem to be responding. Um, do you know what happened, Dr. McKay?"

John sank into the control panel and let the pain wash over him. His men were safe. Atlantis was safe.

And John really wanted to take a nap.


Sam blew out a happy breath and stood up, beaming at Rodney. McKay was still running checks through the system, making sure they really had found and destroyed the virus entirely, but the relief even in the paranoid man's posture was encouraging.

"Nice job, McKay," she said, finding her voice at last.

"Sheppard pulled if off," Rodney snapped. "If that virus had used anyone else's ATA for its encryption, we never would have gotten through in time. No one else could have controlled the Ancient systems like he can."

Sam was downright shocked at the compliment, until she realized the words were really veiled jealousy.

"No one but you?" she taunted, unable to resist.

"Clearly I could have handled the technical aspects. In fact, Sheppard was pretty sloppy in his approach, but it is likely that I would have been hindered by the lag caused by the artificial ATA gene."

"Clearly."

With that Sam returned her full attention to the object of their conversation. John was sprawled across the panel, his back looking, if possible, more black and blue than before. His face was buried in his arms and he wasn't moving.

Jennifer had already shoved her way past and stood with her fingers on his neck and her scanner whirring. Ronon was nudging John with increasingly firm pokes and prods, but John didn't even twitch.

"He's finally passed out," Jennifer declared. "He's shocky. Ronon, can you help me get him out of here and back onto the table. I need to start him on fluids and antibiotics and we still need to sew him up." She turned her fierce glare on Sam as Ronon hustled to obey.

"Can we go, now?" she demanded.

Sam shot a look at Rodney who nodded with violent approval, looking very worried between sneaked peeks at John.

"We can go," Sam replied. "Let's take him home."