A/N: Hey you, sorry it has been so long! Life… you know? I hope you guys are okay! The outbreak of COVID-19 here in Germany has led to the closing of schools, so as of tomorrow I won't have to go to work every day anymore. I sincerely hope to be able to write more, which would be the one and only upside of this disaster. Anyway. I hope you guys are taking care of yourselves and staying healthy! We're gonna get through this!
Chapter 75
2009
A Hive in orbit.
He'd meant to tell her about it. To tell her that ship was empty, but that he and his team would have to go up there to check it out.
Somehow he hadn't gotten around to it.
Her legs were wrapped tightly around his hips, holding on to him as though for dear life as she moved with him. Already his legs were shaking, his breath coming in gasps as she held him, her lips trailing down his neck.
When they finally lay still, his forehead resting against her cheek, he almost felt dizzy as he inhaled her scent. Her hand brushed through his short hair. She was holding him close. Not long now and this moment, this bubble of intimacy would be destroyed, and the thought made him hold her even tighter. Alex had only just returned from a mission with her team. He hadn't seen her in days and when she'd entered their apartment and started kissing him, he'd gone along with it.
"So," he finally breathed shakily after he managed to disentangle himself from her at least partially, "successful recon?"
"Huh," she said, nodding and turning on her side to put her head on his shoulder. "Nothing spectacular, though. Oliver's thinking about asking Parrish to check out the plants there. Looks like an ordinary rain forest, to us. And the locals had no interest in meeting with us. Friendly people, but suspicious of outsiders and unwilling to share anything."
"Great," Evan mumbled, closing his eyes. "You know my team usually has to take Parrish on missions like that. And he gets side-tracked by everything that can perform photosynthesis." It wasn't that he didn't like the botanist. He just thought his team had more important things to do sometimes. Especially when Parrish declared a leaf to be of utter importance. Really, Evan should have paid better attention in biology class. Maybe he'd be able to appreciate Parrish's excitement a little better if he had.
He closed his eyes, revelling in the warmth of her body and the aftershock of sex. They'd checked up on Caleb first, of course, who was, once more, fast asleep. At first Evan had been worried about how much time their son spent sleeping, memories of Nora flooding in every time he watched his little boy in his crib. At least until everyone who had children had assured him that this was perfectly normal. And, he had to admit, by now Caleb was awake more and more often. It was a relief to see him grow and at the same time he felt a twinge of regret in his chest. Regret that it was all happening so quickly. Not long now and Caleb would start walking. Well, alright, he was only just now starting to show signs of more controlled movement, but still!
Alex's hand trailed up his chest, making him smile. "What are you thinking about?"
"I'm thinking, that I should get going."
"Why?" She sat up on her elbow, her blue eyes boring into his. "You didn't tell me you had to leave for another mission."
"I didn't have the time exactly, did I?" he grinned up at her, pushing back a strand of hair and remembering her fierce kiss. Like she hadn't kissed him in over a year. Like she'd never let him go, and that always made him weak.
She huffed and lay back. Kissing her temple and pulling her close again, he quickly told her what had happened. They'd been tracking the Wraith ship for some time now, and it had re-emerged from hyperspace mere hours ago. Sheppard and his team had gone to check it out, because their former Wraith ally Todd had sent them a message, requesting their help. Well, and Sheppard was bound to call him and his team anytime soon now, wasn't he? After all, he was second in command here, and what was he doing? Spending time in bed with his wife.
He kissed her again and flinched when he heard the muted voice of Sheppard from the earpiece he wasn't even wearing anymore. Speak of the devil. "Time to go," he breathed, reaching for the radio on the nightstand and picking up her glasses along with it. He hesitated a moment, before gently putting them on her, his fingertips tracing the outlines of her ears as he slipped the temple tips over them. The frames were a little crooked, but he smiled down at her nonetheless, until he heard Sheppard's annoyed voice again.
With a rueful smile, he put in the earpiece and got out of bed.
"Anna?"
Her friend was massaging her temples, staring at the screen in front of them and ignoring the attempts of her son to catch her attention. Anna grunted in response and flicked her finger over the tablet, turning a page. Josh on his part hadn't paid a moment's worth of attention to either Caleb or Alex as he kept crawling around on the lab floor.
"You've been super distracted recently."
Anna nodded and shrugged. "I'm thinking about going back home. Have been for a while now."
It didn't come entirely unexpected, but Alex still felt a pang of regret as she heard her friend say this. "All of you?"
Anna shook her head, the dark hair falling into her eyes. She brushed them away impatiently and looked up at her. "Oliver says he can't leave. I think he doesn't want to. But with what's going on here… Wraith at our doorstep every other day…" Her gaze drifted off to Josh. With a sigh, she got up and lifted him up, holding him against her chest and the little guy immediately started reaching for her chin.
Alex swallowed hard. She knew Anna didn't mean it, but this statement sounded a bit like an accusation. Like Alex was willingly and knowingly keeping her son in harm's way. Biting her lip, Alex looked down at the playpen in which Caleb was again doing his best to reach the plastic toy dangling just above his head, his strikingly blue eyes trained in concentration on the anch-shaped toy which Daniel had found somewhere on the internet. It was right next to the aeroplane from O'Neill, but Caleb kept ignoring it. These guys were such nerds, but Alex couldn't have been happier with the gift the members of SG-1 had given them. It was too much, but she understood the gesture. Understood that they wished them well. Her, Evan and little Caleb. The occasional bursts of laughter made her smile, but she got what Anna was getting at. "It's not that safe on Earth either," she said quietly, repeating her firm belief for the hundredth time like a mantra, as Anna got up and started walking about the room. Alex kept turning her pen between her fingers as she watched her friend.
"It's more obvious here, though. The imminent threat."
"That it is," Alex admitted, but the thought of going back to Earth permanently, without Evan of all things, couldn't be further from her mind. They'd talked about it. Long and hard, right after their parents had left and they'd prepared boarding the Apollo. Luckily Colonel Ellis had allowed them to pack double of what they'd usually be allotted, given that they had to bring things to Atlantis that weren't there yet. They'd also taken along a couple of things for Anna and Oliver and for Teyla and Kanaan.
"I'm just not sure it's the right decision."
It's not. Alex wanted to say, but it wasn't her place. There was also nothing she could say that would make the decision easier on Anna and Oliver, though, for a brief moment, Alex wondered whether Anna wanted to leave because of Oliver. But Oliver wasn't acting any differently, so that was out of the question. And then she caught Anna's eye and the pain she saw reflected there confirmed her suspicion. She didn't want to leave Oliver behind… so what would happen next?
"I guess we'll see."
To think that a couple of months ago, he'd been nearly killed by a Wraith, only to be saved by one today, was more than just a little bit strange. But strange was every-day business when you worked for the Stargate Program.
He'd travelled billions of lightyears in what couldn't amount to more than five minutes in real time in all the time he'd been with the SGC. He'd been stranded on an alien planet more than once. He'd been in hyperspace. He'd lost his memory due to an illness. He'd flown a ship through thought-control alone. He'd been fed upon. His life force had been restored, he'd been hit and stunned by energy blasts on several occasions and he'd met his adult daughter when she couldn't have been more than three years old.
Really, he shouldn't be surprised by any of this. And he wasn't.
It was strange how used he'd become to waking up in the infirmary with a massive headache and to know that Alex would be sitting right there on his right, though this time she was holding their son.
He smiled despite himself.
"I heard," she said, returning his smile and reaching out to touch his hand and Evan nodded slightly.
"Nothing unusual," he said and felt the smile vanish from his face. Men had died on this mission and he would have to be the one to write the letters to their families. Well, he didn't have to be the one, but he wanted to be. It was a question of respect. They'd died needlessly when the Wraith, having lost their minds due to a sickness which had spread through the entire ship, had attacked them. He and everybody left would have died, too, had Todd the Wraith not managed to slow their descent in time. The crash landing had been bad enough as it was. "How's everybody else?"
Alex nodded and her fingertips brushed the inside of his wrist. Caleb struggled a bit, raising his fists in protest, and she slowly got up to put him in the crook of Evan's arm. The warmth of the living human being immediately spread to him. A stark contrast to the cold aboard the ship they'd been on. "Williams and Farrage didn't make it, did they? The Wraith?"
"No." Evan closed his eyes, trying to shut out the vivid glare of the light above.
"They weren't on the bridge when the rescue team got there."
"No."
"Everybody else is okay, though. Most of them are still out."
Another nod. He didn't have the strength to do much else, but she understood. Understood his pain. His worries and his relief. The conflicting feelings most of all. She always had. He tightened his arm around Caleb and looked up at her. At those laugh-lines and the blue eyes behind the slightly smudged glasses.
"Anna is thinking about going back to Earth," she whispered and he had to pay especially close attention to catch her words. "Soon it'll only be Jonas and me in the archaeology department."
Anna would leave… the news didn't come as a surprise exactly. After all, she didn't go on missions anymore either, but the thought still stung. And it brought something else to mind: none of them would stay here indefinitely. When they weren't fit for duty anymore at the latest, they'd be sent back home.
"I get it," Alex said, leaning over him and kissing his temple. "But I really don't want her to leave."
"No," he replied. "But things are always changing around here, aren't they?" They'd had three expedition leaders thus far. Many people left, because the commitment and the stress was too much. Some died. It wasn't always easy, but for now his place was here. And so was hers. Especially since the IOA, thanks to Landry's constant nagging, was beginning to come around to let Alex pick up her research on the steles again.
"I guess you're right… and even if she does leave, we can easily stay in contact." She said it easily enough and he nodded once more. And despite the terrible sense of flashback those words evoked, he managed a nod.
She sighed and took off her glasses to wipe her face. Carefully, she placed them on the bedside table. She'd let her hair grow even more, but she wore it tied back in a short ponytail. Just like she had at their first meeting. But she wasn't that girl anymore, yet he was almost sure he could never love her more than he already did. "When I get out, I really want to draw you again," he said quietly, ignoring the approaching footsteps. He knew it was Keller, who would tell him to stay put for another couple of hours. "You and Caleb. Haven't done that in a long time."
Alex put a strand of hair behind her ear and blushed slightly. It didn't make her look younger, but even more beautiful. She was calmer today. Calmer. More sure of herself. Even more so than she had been back then.
Caleb stirred again in his arms and began to coo softly, making almost inaudible noises which told him all to plainly that it was Alex's turn to take care of him.
Throwing a look over her shoulder, Alex got up and opened her jacket. "Hey, Doctor."
"Hey, Doctor," Keller said with something like a grin.
"Duty calls," Alex said, leaning over Evan and kissing his forehead. "I'll be back in half an hour."
"Okay," Evan said, still feeling the pressure of her soft lips on his forehead.
A/N: One more chapter to go. Sorry there was so little action in this one, but I hope you liked it anyway!
Also, I commissioned a friend to draw Alex and Evan and the first picture should be up with the next and final chapter.
The Prologue of part three is already done, so I'm gonna post it along with the final chapter.
Take care, everyone!
