This is the longest chapter in this fic...but, we've come to the end. I really enjoyed writing this piece and you guys definetely inspired me to re-read and edit this chapter. So, if you've read the original one posted in SGA Santa LJ, know that this has been modified. The story, plot and chapter is the same, but the wording has been changed a lot and hopefully it flows better and the true to the character and the emotions that I'm trying to incorporate here.
Thank you to all who have left me a review, and I hope you do enjoy the conclusion of this story.
And just for a side note, this story was well-written before the airing of Spoils of War, and I'm kind of proud of myself that this idea is somewhat similar to some of the ideas brought forth in that episode. But again, I own nothing of Stargate Atlantis or it's production, just a crazy idea that I can actually put some ideas into words for your enjoyment.
Please leave me a review, I was a bit skeptical about this ending. Thank you!
Chapter 10
Groggily, he awakened. His mind cleared with visions of her face still in his mind.
His lungs heaved; his heart ached. In reality, his body should be aching all over.
But nothing and no one else mattered.
He rushed forward, standing upright.
He felt his sides and realized he had no weapons. Nothing to be concerned about. Every part of his body had become a deadly weapon upon the first thing that moved in his sight.
"Sheppard!" a mixture of sadness and understanding was evident in the hoarsely voice.
"Ronon!" he tremored.
Clutching and holding to the railings at his side, he shot his friend a glance of cold warning.
"Sheppard, hear me. We need to get out of here!" demanded Ronon.
"Where is she?" his dry and hoarsely voice carried a threat.
"Sheppard."
John stared at him stonily,"Where is SHE?"
"There's no time, Sheppard!" his voice grated.
He noticed Ronon's eyes narrowed, and all at once John seized a desire to put an end to the charade.
"Sheppard, calm your anger and simply listen!"
He shook his head, a vein throbbing violently at his temple. John's jaw tightened until a muscle in his cheek twitched.
"She's DEAD!" His heart jammed repeatedly against his ribs.
There was a faint scrambled noise from behind Ronon, and the door hammered thrice until it forced open.
"I think I found it!" Rodney looked anxiously from John to Ronon and then back to John and then stormed out of the room.
Ronon glanced back at Sheppard, "Come on!" He pulled on his shirt and vigorously tugged John towards him.
And they ran.
John didn't understand, didn't care. But he knew that he was running, running for life.
They were in a strange ship; Similar to a hive ship, but not as big.
They ran for what seemed an eternity to John until they finally came to a halt.
"I've tapped into their systems and this should work," Rodney touched a console and suddenly two doors swished open.
He could hear Ronon's growl and felt Rodney's fear. John cursed at the sight.
Hundreds of bodies hung from the top of the ceiling encased in a pod-like structure filled with a liquid clear substance connected to several tubes injected to their bodies.
"McKay?"
"I have no clue!"
Rodney moved toward the control console and Ronon followed, his stunner at arms stretched.
John stood still. Staring at the bodies in front of him, emotions swirling all over him. He couldn't think straight.
"Okay, I think I found something," declared Rodney.
"I know you think I know exactly what I'm doing, but the truth is I don't have the slightest idea."
John started to move and without thinking he searched for an unknown.
There were men, woman, children, young, old, in different colors, shapes and sizes. Rows and rows of bodies lined up by the hundreds connected to one source, but for what purpose? Feeding?
He leaned over one woman and stared at her face. She looked normal, healthy almost.
Her eyes were closed but there was movement in them. Was she dreaming?
Moving further, he spotted a room in the far corner. He continued and opened the door.
It looked emptied. Peering in without fear, he glanced around the room and soon spotted a large casket standing, its back towards him.
He moved slowly towards the casket and noticed the similarities of the one they had found in the Aurora ship a couple of years ago which house the aged bodies of the ancient team.
He remembered that he actually laid in one of those trying to tap into the collective mind of the ships crew in order to find out how to recuperate the war ship back to life.
Gently, he inspected the pod. There were some differences. It was larger than the one he used and upon further inspection, it was connected to a master console above a large screen.
He touched the console and the screen came to life; a motion picture played.
A little boy with black messy hair held the hand of an even smaller girl with long brown locks of hair bouncing against her back as they walked arm in arm inside a room.
They were giggling uncontrollably trying to hush one another as they stopped near a door.
John moved closer and realized that these children were inside Atlantis. Scrutinizing the screen, John wondered if this was a hidden camera somewhere in Atlantis that he didn't know about. But then, who were the children?
"Would you stop disappearing on us? You are going to give me a heart attack!"
He turned around and found Rodney and Ronon staring worriedly at him.
There were no words to say.
"What is this place, McKay?" Ronon asked as he inspected the room.
"Oh, let's see. I was too busy trying to get our asses in here without being detected by the Wraith Hive Ship in our tail, and then I had to break the code to get us in here. Not to mention that I had to shut down the tracking device. Anf finally, get us in here without getting ourselves killed. Sorry, didn't have time to check out this room!" He spitted.
John shrugged his body and turned his attention back to the screen, but to his surprise the images disappeared.
He turned to the pod and Rodney approached the console.
"This is a separate pod unlike the others. Michael has really been a busy mad scientist."
"Michael?" John called out vehemently.
"Yeah! About that," he noticed the apologetic glance as Rodney spoke.
He met Rodney's gaze with a look of icy inquiry.
"Sheppard!" demanded Ronon.
Aggravated beyond bearing, John shook his head and muttered some choice of words beneath his breath. Brusquely, he moved towards Ronon's side whose eyes never left the inside of the pod.
There was no sound in the room, only John's strong breathing. And then, John's heart skipped a beat.
His body positioned slightly forward to Ronon's stance, his large frame overloaded with a sudden tension, his eyes a burning haze of blue and green in his deadthly pale face.
"Teyla!" he gasped in suffocated voice.
His hands reach the glass shield and urgently sought a way to open the pod.
"WAIT!" a frantic Rodney shouted, "We don't know what it will do to her after all this time."
John made a hoarse sound, breathing heavily as if someone had just crushed the center of his chest.
"Sheppard, our Teyla hasn't been with us for over a year."
His eyes bore into Ronon's face, the muscles of his shoulders tightly bunched.
"He's had her all this time since we came face to face with his beastly creatures." Ronon admitted.
John absorbed that for a moment and proceeded to glance at Rodney's explanation.
"It's really quite remarkable. From what we've gathered, Michael has formed an alliance with the Replicators. Somehow, he was able to access our genetic DNA strands making it possible for him to ingeniously fuse those with Nanites into a system of working Wraith DNA causing a new…"
"MCKAY!" John raged with the grimace of a man who was nearly pushed beyond the limits of sanity.
"He cloned Teyla."
Stunned, his hands brushed his unruly hair, a clear sign of his frustration.
This was too much to believe!
"No!" the blood rose higher in his face. "She was scanned by Keller numerous times. She would have detected the nanites in her body."
He paced the room,"She was PREGNANT!"
He stopped moving and blankly started at Rodney, his fury now edged with anguish.
"Well, had you let me explain…" began Rodney.
"She wasn't a Replicator!" blurted Ronon.
John swallowed hard, realization hitting, paralyzing him completely.
Hastily, he ran towards the pod again.
He uttered a curse, "Get her out of there!" his voice was savage.
Suddenly, the ship trembled.
"McKay!"
"Michael said we'd had more time!"
Blazing eyes turned towards Rodney.
Shakily, he added. "We had to concede. It was the only way he would give us her location."
Ronon moved closer to John, "We would have never found her, Sheppard. Even I agreed to the compromise."
His eyes burned with anger, confusion and finally, relief. "You can explain everything to me once we're all back home in Atlantis!"
Rodney moved to the console and pushed a series of controls.
The pod doors unlocked and soon Teyla's body stood just before John.
Motionless, he stared at her like a condemned man worshipping the face of his executioner. For him, it had only been minutes that he held her lifeless body in his arms; hers and her child.
Quickly, his eyes fell on her mid-section. Her stomach was completely flat. She wore her black tank top and black pants. The exact same outfit that she wore on the day Michael had captured her in that hell whole planet that housed his creatures a year ago.
This was simply too much to bear all in a matter of minutes.
He'd seen her die. She had died in his arms. No one could ever make him believe otherwise. Replicator, Nanite, whatever she was; it was nevertheless, Teyla.
For an entire year, he had seeing her suffer, cry, fight, and live beside him in Atlantis. Through good and bad, they had lived it all. They had admitted their feelings for one another in the midst of chaos, death, betrayal and complete agony. But they had never strayed from each other. How can he now believe that he was never with Teyla!
He was certain that she didn't know the truth.
And yet, "Hold me for a minute. There is no time. I have much to say."
An inward storm brewed inside him as he recalled Michael's words,"You wish me dead, and yet I am the only one that can bring her life again! I am not the monster you make of me!"
He had so many questions, so many unanswered questions.
His anger rose and thoughts of vengeance clouded his reasoning.
"What about Kanan? Was he working with Michael?"
"He was a figment of her imagination. All part of Michael's plan. Whatever that plan is, was, we don't really know. I mean I have my theories, but…" Rodney explained.
With a broken voice, "What about the baby?"
"He was real, just like she was." John could hear the trembling in Ronon's words.
He was so confused. Nothing made sense. Nothing.
How could he ever make it through it all? No shrink, no pills, no fighting could possibly erase this from his mind. He was completely screwed. He might as well just ask the team to strap him up to a bedpost cause nothing and no one could let these demons out of his mind.
"John?"
Teyla was right in front of him, only inches away from his face.
And all clarity came flooding back to his being.
He skidded two steps and almost joined her inside the pod.
With his hands around her waist, he swept her out of the pod and secured her into his arms.
A second wave of shots fired the ship.
"We gotta get out of here, Sheppard!"
His body willed the urged to fight, but his eyes and his heart wanted to savored the moment.
Teyla was alive.
Stepping back to see her face, their eyes locked.
He noted her bewiledered gaze.
"I was…where are the….John?" she questioned.
Leaning his head forward, his chin rested on her head, his hands anchored around her, possesively.
"We really need to go, Sheppard." Ronon bellowed.
He felt her hands roam to the side of his face and staring into her bright brown eyes, John marveled at her radiant beauty.
"Is everything all right, John?" she asked.
He'd been given a second chance, and he'd be damned if he was going to let it go to waste.
"It will be. I promise you that," he whispered reverently into her ear.
He bowed his head and pressed her warm hand against his rough stubble cheek, "A lot has happened while you were sleeping."
The ship trembled once again, and Rodney and Ronon ran towards the control console.
"A lot more is going to happen if we don't get out of here now, Sheppard!"
John didn't pay much attention.
"John, you are acting rather peculiar." Her worrisome glance filled him with hope.
Then, he looked into Teyla's eyes, and a hint of glow and something else he couldn't quite distinguish shimmered in her eyes. His eyes sparkled with the pure joy of holding her in his arms and with the vehemence of a man to whom entirely too much had happened he added, "There's been a series of unfortunate events and…" he paused.
Tightening her close against his chest, he had never encountered an agonizing blend of emotion and physical pleasure.
"I'll be damned if I let you out of my sight."
He felt her relax against him. Her smile grew wider and her arms tenderly wrapped around his neck.
Holding her firmly, he raised her chin with his fingertips. And in their eyes, there was a silent promise, an understanding of one another like never before.
And while Rodney complained of their undoubted demise; while Ronon gripped his stunner tightly; and while the Hive ship swayed with loud sirens clamoring the urgency of the moment, without hesitation, John breathed her warm scent and all his anger, fear and sorrow were instantly cast away.
With the most delicate of touches, his lips brushed her forehead. He bent, instinct reigning over his extremties indulging Teyla's form. And burying his face in the shining veil of her hair, he slid his hand over the back of her head and in defeat, he brought his mouth into the softness of her lips.
The end
Well?