Chapter 10: Epilogue.
Six months later John was sitting on top of the stargate on M44- 5YN with his team. The stargate was situated on an ancient glacial flood plain. A glacier had melted due to global warming, so the plain was flooded.
They were all cold and soaking wet, but John had managed to swim down and send a message through to Woolsey asking him to send a jumper.
As he sat there waiting for the jumper, he thought back to all that had happened over the last six months.
After the mission to MX 745-217 things had quietened down again. His recovery was slow and painful, but he had his team with him every step of the way.
During his recovery he'd helped McKay catalogue and study some of the devices that they'd found in the ancient lab. They still had no idea of what many of the devices were for. It would take them years to research them all.
He was on his first mission back on active duty when they encountered an alternate version of the Daedalus. That was a strange mission, because they kept jumping from one universe to another. He even encountered a version of himself. He didn't want to think about the dead versions of his team that they had found. Rodney managed to get them out of that one using his super brain. He remembered sitting by Rodney's bed in the infirmary after that mission, (as Rodney had been shot in the shoulder by some weird alien gun). Teyla had come in and let Rodney hold Torren. That moment had given him a wonderful sense of family.
Then there was the time they were flying back from searching a planet for an Alpha site (the planet with the flying monkeys). What they had thought was a computer virus had infected their computers, causing all the jumpers systems to short out. The systems came back on line a few minutes later and they made it through the space gate.
The problems affecting the jumper soon started affecting Atlantis. They soon discovered that it was Dr Elizabeth Weir's consciousness that had infected their computer and she was trying to reach out to them. She managed to talk Woolsey into making human bodies for her group. The group was trying to reach ascension and had rid themselves of their replicator bodies. That's how Elizabeth had ended up in their computer system.
They made Replicator bodies for the group first and then the group were going to make human bodies. However one of the more forceful members of the group named Koracen, wanted to keep his replicator body as he believed it made him stronger. Koracen had tried to kill him, but Elizabeth had stepped in and destroyed Koracen. Realising that she and the other replicators were a threat, she had sacrificed herself and tricked the others through a space gate, where they would have been immediately frozen and deactivated. He felt as if he'd lost Elizabeth again that day, but his family was there to support him.
There were times over the last six months when things had been hectic, but they had always made time for one another, even if it was just sharing a meal. They had also spent many a night watching DVD's together laughing and joking together. Teyla was still busy with Kanaan and Torren, but she always made time for him.
On one such night he had vowed to himself that he would never complain about being bored again.
Coming back to the present, he stood on the stargate and looked around. There was water as far as the eye could see, but the view was magnificent.
He looked around at his team, his family and thought that no matter what the future may hold. No matter what problems they may face, they would face them together. And at that moment there was no place he'd rather be, (except maybe dry and warm on Atlantis).
The End.
I want to thank my two beautiful daughters, for encouraging me to have a go at writing this story. I want to thank them for reading my work and helping me edit it. I know that there are some things that we missed, but I will go back through at some stage and fix them.
Thank you to everyone who has read my story, you're reviews have been encouraging and helpful.