Chapter 38: Home isn't what it used to be
"Evan," Prue's voice broke the silence, her plea one Lorne just couldn't answer.
"Not now," he ordered, refusing to look at her. "We need to get back to Atlantis."
The atmosphere was thick with unspoken words as they quickly shifted into action, carefully removing the three ZPM's and placing them in Evan's pack. A silent climb back up the rope ladder and they were one level away from being back on the surface.
"Lorne to Coughlin," Evan radioed as soon as they were under the opening.
"Sir!" Nate's voice was heavy with relief. "I've been radioing you at five minute intervals for the past hour. This is gonna sound crazy but no matter how much we tried to get through the opening up here, we couldn't. You're okay?"
Lorne wondered for a second who was responsible for keeping his team away - Fidesia or Morgan - but then decided it didn't really matter. They'd gotten what they'd wanted from him here, by whatever means necessary. "Long story Sergeant but yes, I'm fine," he replied to Coughlin. "Drop a rope down here. We need to get back to the gate asap."
"Understood," Coughlin acknowledged.
Lorne gestured for Prue to go first, waiting until his team had pulled her up to safety before climbing up the rope himself.
When he got to the top and straightened, all three of his men let out audible gasps. "Is all that yours?" Nate asked numbly, gesturing to Evan's uniform.
Lorne glanced down at himself. Damn, that was a lot of blood, the sight reinforcing just how close he'd come to the end. "Ah – yeah," he met Nate's eyes and shrugged. "Like I said, long story, and one we don't have time for right now. We need to get these back to Atlantis," he opened his pack, showing them the ZPM's.
"Holy Moses," Reed exclaimed, wide eyed. "Doctor McKay is gonna have a fit!"
"Probably," Lorne agreed humourlessly. Ordinarily he'd have smiled over the image of Rodney McKay's reaction to getting three fully charged ZPMs but he just didn't have it in him. "Let's go," he ordered, moving forward to take point.
Coughlin watched his CO go, turning a frowning look back to Prue. "Is he ...?"
"He's fine," Prue's lips trembled and her eyes filled with tears.
"Are you okay?" Nate asked, motioning for Reed and Cheung to follow their CO while he and Prue brought up the rear.
"Not really," Prue replied. "I did something Nate ... something he won't forgive me for."
"The Boss loves you," Nate insisted. "You can forgive a lot for someone you love."
"Not this time," Prue insisted sadly. Putting a hand to Coughlin's forearm she tried to smile. "But thank you for the effort," she said softly.
Nate frowned as he watched her walking numbly beside him, turning his gaze to where Lorne strode along ahead of them, his posture stiff and imposing. He wanted to know what had happened down in that chamber but at the same time he was beginning to think he'd be better off keeping his ignorance.
Back at the gate three and a half hours later, Lorne took a few moments to consider the next steps. He had no idea how he was going to approach this but one thing he did know was that he couldn't step back through the gate covered in his own dried blood. Setting down his pack carefully, he rummaged around the ZPM's until his fingers brushed the spare t-shirt he always carried. Pulling it clear he stood, ripping his vest off, followed quickly by his jacket. There was nothing he could do about his pants – thankfully the dark colour hid some of the impact of how much blood he'd lost. Impervious to the rest of his team he drew off the ruined t-shirt and replaced it with the clean one. The vest was wearable but the rest of his stuff was beyond repair. Rolling them up in a tight bundle he re-stowed them in his pack before straightening again.
"Dial the gate," he ordered Reed.
"Yes Sir," Dan shot a worried look towards Nate before stepping forward.
"Do you want to talk about this before we head back," Nate asked Lorne in an undertone.
"No time," Lorne shook his head. He let himself look at Nate, saw the concern plain as day, felt the grief and the anger bashing against the barriers he'd raised. "I ..," he couldn't speak so instead he clasped Nate's shoulder and then stepped away, shaking his head.
Once the connection was established Lorne sent through their IDC. "Atlantis base, this is Lorne. We're heading back."
"Understood," Chuck replied briskly.
"You might want to have Doctor McKay meet us at the gate," Lorne added. "Colonel Sheppard and Doctor Weir too."
There was a pause and then John's voice came over the radio. "Everything okay?" he asked casually, sounding more like his normal self than he had when Evan had last spoken to him.
"Yes Sir," Lorne replied. "I wouldn't want to spoil the surprise though – we'll see you in a few minutes Sir."
"Right," Sheppard's tone was puzzled. "Shields are down."
Lorne waved a hand for the others to go first, wanting to be the last to step back onto the city. As soon as he cleared the wormhole, as he'd expected the static tones of the city rose sharply to greet him. Inside his mind Evan felt like he wasn't the same man who'd left the city early that day. Prue's true origins and Morgan's appearance so soon after had damaged him – if the city was capable of picking up a vibe from him Lorne was pretty sure the ones he was sending off right then would be a black flag. "Stop," he commanded the instance the city registered his mood. It was enough – by the time he'd taken a few steps to be at the head of his team he had himself under control again.
"Sir," he greeted Sheppard with his usual reserve.
"Major," John's brow rose as he took in his second's manner and Evan almost winced. Okay, so maybe that facade needed a little work.
"Enough with the greetings," McKay pushed forward impatiently. "This better be good Lorne. I left a critical experiment running in the lab to come down here for your 'surprise', although I hardly think my definition of surprise will be as easy to match as yours apparently is."
"Here," Lorne handed McKay his pack. "I think this will qualify, even by your standards."
"Major," Doctor Weir finished her descent of the main stairs, her expression quizzical.
"Ah," Lorne began.
"You found them," for once Rodney McKay was incapable of running his mouth off at double the speed of everyone else. In fact, he looked as close to speechless as anyone in the room had ever seen him.
"We did," Lorne agreed. "Ma'am," he turned to Elizabeth. "Perhaps we should ...," he gestured up the stairs.
"Yes, let's debrief in the conference room," Weir agreed.
Sheppard and McKay were joined by Teyla and Ronon, the four following Doctor Weir, Evan's team and Prue. Once everyone was seated, Lorne looked around the table, still not sure where to begin. Lucky for him Rodney quickly found his voice.
"They were there the whole time?" Rodney queried. "Not activated I presume otherwise we'd have detected them on at least one of the missions to that planet. No one is incompetent enough to miss three ZPMs more than once."
"Three ZPM's," Elizabeth exclaimed, her eyes alight with excitement at the news.
"Yes Ma'am," Lorne agreed. "We found them in a chamber a level down from the underground ruins."
"You just stumbled across them?" Sheppard queried, watching Lorne interestedly. "You seem to be more than a little lucky like that Major."
"We didn't stumble over them," Evan took a deep breath and then just blurted it out. "It was more like we fell on top of them Sir – well, I did anyway."
"You fell on top of them?" John frowned. "Maybe you should start at the beginning Lorne."
"Sure, okay," Lorne kept his eyes away from his team mates as he succinctly explained. "Since the underground ruins was around were Reed and I first picked up that energy reading we decided to start searching there Sir," he said. "We didn't find anything initially but it makes sense there'd be an alternative entrance or exit."
"There usually is," Sheppard agreed with a faint smirk.
"Yes Sir," Lorne agreed. "Doctor Darnell translated some text on the floor that suggested we'd find that exit with a mirror, if we could get some natural sunlight into the room to shine on it, so I sent Coughlin and Reed back up to the surface to dig for a window. Pretty much as soon as the light struck the mirror the floor was falling away. Doctor Darnell had just enough time to get clear but I ah ...," he stopped, looking at Prue for the first time since Morgan had disappeared.
"Major Lorne fell through the floor," Prue took up the story, her voice low and hoarse. "By the time I got back to the opening he was unresponsive. I took the ladder we'd used to descend into the chamber and used it to get to the Major. It was ...," she looked at Evan quickly before meeting Elizabeth's eyes. "He was badly injured ... unconscious. I ... there was little I could do."
"Hang on," Rodney held up a hand in protest. "If Lorne was that badly injured, how is it he's sitting here now, clearly unaffected?"
Prue exchanged a tortured glance with Evan, swallowing hard, her eyes brimming with unshed tears.
"She called in one of her ascended friends to heal me," Lorne said bluntly. He was still looking at Prue so he saw her flinch, her face pale. He felt guilty for that for a moment but reminded himself that she'd brought it on herself by lying to him for so long.
"What?" Sheppard blinked, looking at Lorne like he thought his 2IC had suddenly gone crazy.
"I know how it sounds Sir," Lorne admitted, "but I wouldn't be sitting here now if it wasn't true. Admittedly I was pretty out of it for a while there but I saw and heard enough to understand what happened."
"Perhaps Doctor Darnell should tell us in her own words what happened next," Elizabeth suggested. "Doctor?"
"I didn't intentionally call in anyone," Prue didn't look at any of them as she spoke, her eyes locked on the hands she had clenched on the table top. "I was desperate to help Evan and ... she'd been watching over him, you see, because I asked her to."
"Who?" Elizabeth asked gently.
"Fidesia," Prue replied. "Fee. We were friends so long ago, on Occulus, before ...," she stopped abruptly.
"Before the Wraith came," Lorne finished.
"Yes," Prue looked up at him and then away again. Tracing a finger over the table she smiled sadly. "Fee and I were the last to leave ... we broke the hold the Wraith had on the gate and sent all the people we could through to safety. I guess we cut it too close ... we would have been dead ... we did die but somehow we were able to ascend, both of us. We became a part of that existence willingly – there was nothing for us here anymore."
"How was it you went from that to being here on Atlantis?" Elizabeth asked, everyone keeping silent, fascinated by the story.
Evan wouldn't admit it but knowing some of what Prue had gone through was raising his sympathy. "Not Prue," he thought starkly. "Devia. She was never yours!"
"This is where it gets really interesting," Lorne broke in. "After Doctor Darnell's friend healed me we found the ZPM's – they were right there, in the chamber I fell into."
"But they weren't activated, right?" Rodney queried.
"No," Lorne agreed. "Why? You think that means something?"
"Not really," Rodney admitted. "I was just wondering how you and Airman Reed ever detected them in the first place."
"That's a good question," Sheppard agreed.
"Fidesia turned them on," Prue looked only at Evan as she continued. "She was watching over me too – she would have known that you'd be able to pin point where Kara and I were if she could draw you in the right direction. As soon as you found me I imagine she switched the ZPM's off again."
"Knowing that I'd remember those energy readings as soon as you translated that statement off the columns," Evan finished with uncharacteristic cynicism.
"If that's what you want to believe," Prue looked away, shifting in her seat as though she were uncomfortable in the space.
"And then?" Elizabeth drew them back on track with telling their story.
"We had another visit and this one was definitely an ascended Ancient," Evan revealed. "I know because I've seen her before, here in the city, except she was posing as the hologram at the time."
"Morgan Le Fey?" Weir asked incredulously.
"That's right Ma'am," Lorne agreed. "This is all going to sound more than a little crazy. According to Morgan a new group of ascended beings is forming right now and if they gain full strength as a unity the others won't be able to stop them from destroying reality itself. We were led to those ZPM's because that room we found down in the south pier tower is actually an alternative shield she believes we can use to contain them."
"An alternative shield?" Rodney zeroed in on the science with immediate interest.
"So Morgan said," Lorne confirmed. "The Ancient's were playing with drawing energy from other planes of existence and created the shield to store it. They never got around to finishing that project because the Wraith became too great a threat and they had to put all their resources into stopping them. I guess they hid the ZPMs on M4R 322 so they could come back to the project later."
"Their loss, our gain," Rodney said almost gleefully. "If this shield can do what Lorne says, it could be just what we need to hold the Wraith off indefinitely – if we can adapt it. If not then we can certainly use three ZPM's to power the cloak – maybe even work out how to both cloak and shield the city at the same time!"
"Go and check out this device," Weir ordered. Rodney shot to his feet, already on the radio requesting Zelenka join him.
"Is that all Major?" Elizabeth asked once Rodney was gone.
"No its not," Prue said before Evan could answer for himself. "What he failed to share is that Morgan and the other ascended ancients believe the only person who can successfully operate the new shield as would be needed is Major Lorne. No one else has the necessary control of the ancient systems. I'm not one hundred percent sure but I think they were the ones who carved the writings on the columns back on P88 013. They serve as a checking mechanism to ensure that events are unravelling as they are intended to do – that nothing has occurred to shift us from the true path. I think they planted the prophesies about Major Lorne amongst the other statements as a means of identifying him based on what they knew he could do. They were the ones who tested him to make sure he could handle what they needed from him."
"Prophesies ?" Sheppard leant forward, shooting his 2IC a narrow eyed glance. "Something else you forgot to mention Major?"
Resisting the urge to point out that Prue should be the one everyone was glaring at accusingly, Lorne took a moment to gather his thoughts. "It's all in Doctor Jackson's report Sir," he pointed out blandly. "And both you and Doctor Weir were aware that Doctor Darnell had been assisting me in determining whether practice was a factor in using the ATA gene with greater capability. Since I didn't believe something carved thousands of years ago was talking about me I decided that particular fact didn't bear highlighting. If I'd been made aware of certain facts," he shot Prue an angry glare, "the significance of all of this would have warranted a different approach."
"Just how much control do you have Major?" Sheppard asked.
Evan winced, looking around the table and not liking the fact that they were all watching him expectantly. With a sigh he turned back to John. "I always meant to ask you about your own interactions with the city Sir," he admitted. "It just never seemed to be the right time."
"And now it is," Sheppard finished grimly. "You can start by answering my question."
"How much control do I have Sir?" Lorne restated. "Enough to override some of the basic protocols. Enough to only switch things on when I want to."
"Things like the control chair?" Sheppard persisted.
"Ah ... yes Sir," Lorne admitted reluctantly. "I could tell you it was never my intention to mislead anyone but I know that sounds kind of empty in hindsight. When I first came here, having the gene was more an inconvenience that a tactical advantage. It's only been recently that I began to see it differently."
"How anyone interacts with the city has always been private Major," Elizabeth said reassuringly. "And to date no one has been ordered to discuss it. If you'd held back utilising your abilities I would be less inclined to understand your reticence but as far as I'm aware that hasn't been the case. The rest seems to be a natural reluctance on your part to draw attention to yourself."
"Yes ma'am," Lorne said honestly. He might not have been open about how he did things but he'd done them just the same.
"Okay, let's leave that as a separate issue for you and Colonel Sheppard to work out later," Elizabeth decided. "Did Morgan say anything further about this impending threat?"
"Only that the first place they'll head is here," Evan replied. "They know the shield exists and they know there's a chance it could be used against them." He went on to restate everything he could remember Morgan telling him, filling in some of the blanks on the prophesies until everyone knew as much as he did. It wasn't the full story – he had questions he suspected he'd never get an answer to, most of them about Prue and just how much she'd known of the mission the ascended ancients had given her.
"And what was your role in all of this?" Elizabeth questioned Prue.
"Until Ev –," she stopped, corrected herself, "until Major Lorne was injured I believed that the ascended Ancients had chosen me to survive the destruction of Occulus so that I might create the translation program your people would need to defeat a great enemy, greater than the Wraith," Prue explained. "I remembered my life there, my family and friends. I remembered training with the Ancients for many years to perfect my understanding of the language and the skills I would need to create a tool your people still do not have the skill to achieve, all in preparation for my mission. I was aware that they had given me knowledge of your planet sufficient to pass as a native despite my never having been there. I knew they'd ensured that no one would be suspicious of my true origins." She sighed, her expression regretful. "I knew that something was coming ... I knew that Major Lorne's gene was a crucial element in their plans to defeat this enemy. The truth only came back to me when Fidesia answered my plea for help. Only then did I know that most of what I believed was in fact untrue, that I had lied to all of you without intending to, believing my mission to be of greater importance than anything else. I am very sorry for my deceptions Doctor Weir. I don't know what the Ancients' intend for me now that the full truth is out, and request that you allow me to remain in the city until the threat has passed. You will still need the program I created to get the shield working – I can help you with that."
Elizabeth looked at Colonel Sheppard, the two coming to some kind of unspoken agreement. "Very well Doctor," she conceded. "I can see that you are as much a pawn of these ascended ancients as Major Lorne has been. We would be grateful for whatever expertise you can offer should this threat turn out to be real."
"Thank you," Prue said simply.
"Colonel, let's be on the lookout for any threats to the city, from any quarters," Elizabeth told John. "Major, Doctor," she added to Prue and Evan, "assist Doctor McKay to get that shield up and running when he's ready. Dismissed," she concluded, standing and leaving the room, Teyla following close behind.
Lorne got up quickly, intent on escaping somewhere to think, somewhere away from public scrutiny.
"Lorne," John's tone was an order to stop and Evan had no choice but to obey. Sheppard looked at Ronon, nodding towards Prue, another unspoken order all too clear. Now they knew that Prue had direct links to the ascended ancients they couldn't let her roam around the city by herself. Prue smiled sadly, accepting the change in her status without comment as she quickly left the room.
"You okay?" Sheppard asked as soon as they were alone.
"The woman I was planning to spend my future with turns out to be a figment of my imagination and I'm still slotted to be some kind of miraculous saviour for the ancients, so no, I'd have to say I'm not okay Sir!" Lorne blurted out tersely. He regretted the outburst almost immediately, rubbing a hand over his face tiredly. "Sorry Sir," he said weakly. "It's been a ah ... a tough day."
"It sounds like you have every right to be angry Evan," John replied. "Prue lied to you, even if she didn't really know how much at the time. I'd want to punish her for that if I were in your shoes."
"That's another thing," Lorne laughed harshly. "Her name isn't even Prue. It's Devia. Turns out I really didn't know her at all."
"You know what I don't get?" John asked conversationally.
"What's that Sir?" Lorne asked when Sheppard didn't offer anything else.
"If Prue thought she'd been given a mission by the Ancients, why did she get involved with you?" John asked.
"So they could make sure I did what they wanted," Evan retorted.
"Really?" John asked disbelievingly. "Because it seems more like she was helping you personally more than she was helping the ancients. Maybe you should think about that."
"Maybe," Lorne dismissed quickly. He didn't want to think about Prue's motives for getting so close to him – she hadn't needed to, not to fulfil her goals, and it bothered him assigning other reasons to her actions. It didn't matter anyway. Once they'd either ruled out a threat or dealt with it Prue wouldn't be staying. She'd be going back to what she'd been before coming to Atlantis. "I'm sorry I wasn't more open about my use of the gene Sir," he said again, changing the subject.
"Elizabeth's right," John dismissed with a shake of his head. "We're all private about how we actually use the gene – I'm guessing no one ever talked to you about it once you found out you had it. And I can hardly reprimand you for something I'm equally as guilty of."
"I know it's not the time Sir," Lorne began, "but once this is over I'd really appreciate the opportunity to talk to you about it."
"And I want to hear more about how you stop things from just switching on," John replied. "You have no idea how much flack I get from Rodney because of the way things just light up when I get near them."
"I'd be happy to help if I can Sir," Evan agreed, relieved to realise that his reticence hadn't damaged the friendship he'd been building with his CO.
"For now you better get yourself down to help McKay," John ordered. "And Major," he added when Lorne moved off to do just that
"Sir?" Lorne queried.
"Don't be too hard on yourself," Sheppard said simply. "Prue's true origins were a surprise to all of us."
"Yes Sir, Thank you Sir," Evan replied.