John panted for breath, resisting the urge to writhe across the floor. Any movement made stabbing pain radiate from his arm into his chest, taking away his breath and making tears spring to his eyes. But there were also tearing pains in his gut, that made it hard to lie still, and he was so dizzy it was hard to even tell if he was lying still.

"Sheppard," a voice said above him. Ronon. "Come on, stay with me. Doc just needs some more time to fix the Gate, and then we're getting you help."

John made a grunting sound that he hoped would be taken as an answer. He wasn't sure if he could muster up much else. He knew Ronon was talking to him, and what he was saying was probably somewhat important, but John was having a hard time actually making the words make sense in his brain.

"Can you drink a little water?" Ronon asked.

John kind of remembered drinking water before, although he wasn't exactly sure how long ago that had been now. He was trying to keep track, more or less, of what was going on around him. He knew Ronon was taking care of him, and Zelenka was trying to fix the Gate. Granted, he couldn't remember exactly why Zelenka was trying to fix the Gate, but at least he knew it was happening. Maybe he was trying to get them more water. Clearly, the water was important for John at this point.

Water. But anyways, John remembered that he had tried drinking water earlier, and it hadn't made him feel very good. He was pretty nauseous, he thought probably from the spider bite and all the dizziness it had brought, and so he wasn't really sure if he was going to be able to successfully drink water. Was Ronon going to make him try? John groaned softly, wishing it was a little bit easier to think.

Ronon seemed to take that as a no, and some amount of time went by. It was hard for John to tell how much. He was trying his best to keep track of what was going on around him, but time kept slipping through his fingers. At one point, Zelenka came back, and he and Ronon talked for a few minutes. John couldn't track the words, but it was partially because they were so quiet. John thought maybe they were being quiet to avoid disturbing him. But it was hard to say anything for certain.

Zelenka put a palm on John's forehead, and John scrunched up his face in displeasure. "His fever's getting really high," Zelenka said. "You need to-"
John drifted out again, without ever finding out what it was Ronon needed to do.

Ronon vanished for a few moments. John wasn't sure if he was still in the room, or if he had gone...somewhere else. Maybe he had gone to do something with the spiders. John shivered - when had he gotten so cold? Maybe Ronon was getting him a blanket. That would be nice.

John was starting to feel really sick again. He wasn't sure how there was anything in his stomach, because last he checked he'd hardly eaten all day. But he thought that there was a fair chance anything that was inside his stomach was soon going to be on the outside. He panted and swallowed hard, and wondered if maybe he'd feel better if he'd taken Ronon up on the sip of water, all that time ago.

If he had to puke, he didn't want to do it before Ronon got back. That was dangerous, first off. Second off, it was gross. He swallowed again, and wished the world would stop rocking so hard.

After another little while, John didn't think he'd be able to stop himself anymore. He took one more deep breath, gagging helplessly in the middle of it. Bile seared its way up his throat, and for one horrible moment John tried to move and couldn't, and he thought he might die right then.

But when he coughed out the small mouthful of what had to be just plain stomach acid, he didn't immediately choke. Eventually, John managed to piece together that he was lying on his side, and that perhaps the reason he couldn't move was that his back was to a wall.

He was pretty sure that knowing things like that used to be easy for him. He was also pretty sure that not knowing things like that was a very bad sign indeed.

John drifted in and out for a while after that. It wasn't sleep - he was far too uncomfortable to manage rest - it was more just his mind and body beginning to give up and let go. He could feel it happening, dimly, but he couldn't make a move to stop it.

The next thing he remembered was hearing voices. Ronon and Zelenka. He thought they might sound excited, or maybe worried? It was getting hard for him to remember.

"We don't have much time. If this does not work-"

"It better work." That was Ronon, although John couldn't process the words.

"You have to be the one to go, you know that. If anything happens, you will be able to bring back Dr. Beckett much faster-"

"I know." Ronon sounded...upset, John was pretty sure. "But if anything happens here, if he…."

"I am sorry."

"Dial it." John heard footsteps, and what had to be Ronon's heavy tread. The vibrations traveled through the floor, making him feel even dizzier. He groaned softly, and the footsteps stopped.

"Hey, Shep." Ronon's hand was on the back of his neck. It felt cold on John's fever-hot skin, almost on the edge of unpleasant. "I'm gonna be right back, okay? Zelenka fixed the Gate. I just gotta go get Beckett, and he's gonna fix you. But you gotta hold on."

John nodded slightly, clenching his teeth against the sudden pain that spiked through his head at the movement. Beckett. Beckett was coming. That seemed like a great idea, although there was some reason that John thought it might not work. He was...somewhere else. Beckett wasn't the one they went to for medical emergencies anymore, that was Keller. And Keller wasn't here.

John heard the familiar whooshing sound of the Gate dialing - even as sick as he was, he would always be able to recognize that sound.

"Go!" Zelenka said, sounding agitated - suddenly, he was right above John again. The hand disappeared, and John heard footsteps. He managed to open his eyes to blurry, painful slits, and watched as Zelenka kneeled down next to him.

"Ronon will be back soon with Dr. Beckett."

"Okay," John managed. It felt like the first words he'd said in hours, and very possibly was.

Zelenka's hand was on his forehead. John squirmed and tried to pull away. It was too cold. But John was weak, and he couldn't.

"Your fever's gone up again," Zelenka said. He sounded kind of angry, which John didn't feel was fair. It wasn't John's fault his fever had gone up. "It must be close to cooking your brain."

This made John frown - he didn't want his brain to be cooked.

Zelenka vanished for a moment, and returned with a cold washcloth to drape over John's head.

"Stop that," John muttered. He would have tried to pull it off, but he knew there was no way he could move that much.

"You will keep it on," Zelenka said firmly. "And I will change it once it gets too hot. It will protect your brain a bit while we wait for the Doctor."

John sighed unhappily and let himself drift back out, until the dizziness started to get to him and he decided it was time to throw up again. He started to squirm, making a vague attempt to get into a sitting position but too weak to really even try.

"Stop that," Zelenka said. "Lie still."

In answer, John started to gag.

John heard a sharp intake of breath above him. "Oh," Zelenka said. "Oh, uh, it's alright, it's alright."

There was suddenly a soft and unexpected hand on John's shoulder. John blinked painfully once more, seeing a blurry version of Zelenka's worried face. He gagged again, and this time Zelenka's hand slid underneath his shoulders and levered him to a sitting position. Zelenka held onto his shoulders as John sagged forward and retched, his entire body weight supported by the scientist.

Somewhere in his confused, fever fogged mind, John recognized that this was pretty impressive. He also recognized that what he was doing was pretty gross, and he probably owed Zelenka, if he survived.

"S'rry," John managed, after he thought he was done.

"Nonsense," Zelenka told him, carefully lowering John back to a sitting (or possibly lying) position. "You have nothing to be sorry for."

John meant to say...something, but all he could manage was a soft whimper.

"I am the one who should be sorry," Zelenka informed him. "If I hadn't allowed a meteor to crash into Atlantis, then none of this would have happened."

At least part of John was fairly sure that he'd managed to create far bigger problems almost single-handedly, but a much larger part was too sick and too confused to figure out how to word that.

Zelenka sighed. His hand was still on John's shoulder. "Hopefully, Beckett will come soon, and I can apologize to you when you can better understand it. If not.…"

The same small part of John realized dimly that Zelenka really thought that he might be about to die. That was okay, John really thought that he might be about to die too. Hopefully, they were both wrong.

Carson still didn't really have a very good idea of what was happening on Atlantis. He had been in the middle of a scheduled dose of vaccinations on PXR-429 when a wild-eyed Ronon had appeared and demanded that he instantly return to Atlantis. Carson hadn't even had time to ask Ronon why before the Satedan was pushing him towards his makeshift medical tent, telling him to bring antivenom, of all things.

"What happened?" Carson asked, made frantic by Ronon's clear agitation. "I thought there was a two-week leave this week. Mr. Woolsey reminded me-"

"Zelenka broke Atlantis and Sheppard got bit by a spider," Ronon said bluntly, cutting across him. "You'll figure it out when you get there. All you need to know for now is that Sheppard's doin' real bad. The thing that bit him was fucking huge, and I tried to get the poison out but I guess I couldn't get it all, and his fever's out of control. He needs...I dunno, he needs you."

Carson certainly agreed that what Ronon had just described sounded like a big problem. The Head of Military dying from a spider bite was much more pressing than a scheduled vaccine dose, so Carson explained what he understood of the situation to the village leader as Ronon continued to herd him back towards the medical tent.

"John is on Atlantis?" Carson clarified, still not exactly sure what was happening. He didn't even understand why John had gone back to Atlantis in the first place.

"Yeah, he's there with Zelenka now. Come on."

Carson hurriedly packed up his medical supplies, leaving everything he needed to distribute the vaccine - he would be back - but taking his entire emergency medical kit. Thankfully, encountering venomous animals wasn't exactly out of the realm of possibility on Pegasus planets, and so the kit did contain antivenom. Carson had even done some tests on the most common ones, to make sure the Earth antivenoms would work in Pegasus too.

Ronon started to grab the medical kit from Carson, then winced and switched arms. It was then that Carson noticed the bandages peeking out from beneath his shirt, covering what looked like his whole chest and upper arm.

"What happened to you?" Carson asked as Ronon started ushering him back towards the Gate. Thankfully, it was hardly outside the bounds of the village proper.

"No time for that," Ronon growled.

"Ronon," Carson said sharply. He was obviously worried about John, but finding out why Ronon was covered in bandages wasn't going to slow them down one bit. Carson wasn't about to save one patient but lose another.

"Got burned," Ronon said, not looking at Carson.

"Burned?"

"Yeah," Ronon said. "Atlantis caught on fire for a bit. I'll explain later. Or...probably Zelenka will explain, 'cause I don't really understand it. But-"

"Are you alright?" Carson asked. "Who treated you for the burn?" Carson wasn't exactly sure who was left on Atlantis, but he was pretty sure Dr. Keller was not one of them.

"Sheppard, mostly," Ronon said with a painful-looking shrug. "I helped."

Carson made a mental note to give Ronon a thorough examination the second he was done treating John - Ronon and John were not known for their ability to provide effective medical care.

"Why didn't you call me earlier?" Carson asked, as Ronon arrived at the Gate and started dialing Atlantis. "This must have happened hours ago…."

"Days," Ronon said. "But the Gate was down."

"The Gate was what?"

"Told you. It was a long story," Ronon said, stepping back as the event horizon formed. "Go."

Now somewhat dreading what he was about to see, Carson stepped through the wormhole to Atlantis.

It was, somehow, worse than he'd expected. First of all, there was a gigantic hole in the ceiling, and much of the Gateroom was strewn with large piles of rubble. Second, there was what appeared to be fire damage on practically every wall that Carson could see. Apparently, Ronon had underexaggerated to what degree Atlantis had caught on fire. Third, but perhaps most importantly, the room was absolutely littered with pigeons. Ronon did not seem to notice this, or maybe he just didn't care, but Carson was quite preoccupied by the sheer number of birds, feathers, and droppings carpeting every square inch of available space.

And yet, none of that was nearly so horrifying as the sight of a small, limp figure curled against the base of the wall next to the stairs. Even through the commotion of feathers, Carson recognized the shock of dark hair and the fever-pale skin that could only belong to Colonel Sheppard.

"Carson, thank God," Zelenka gasped, appearing through the melee. He immediately devolved into a rapid string of panicked-sounding Czech, waving his hands periodically toward John. Carson didn't understand a word, but he got the gist.

"Is he responsive?" Carson demanded, cutting a swathe through the pigeons and kneeling down beside the incapacitated pilot.

"Barely," Zelenka answered, beginning to wring his hands. "He seemed to be awake when Ronon left, but now I can barely get anything coherent out of him, and he will not easily wake."

"Son, are you with me?" Carson asked gently, placing a hand on John's forehead and wincing at the intense heat radiating from his skin. He didn't wait for John's answer. With a fever like that, he probably wasn't going to get one.

"Where is the bite?" he asked, directing his attention back to Ronon and Zelenka.

"His left wrist," Ronon said, sounding suddenly guilty. "I, uhh, I had to get the poison out-"

Carson extracted John's wrist from its protected place against his chest and gently unwrapped the bandage, noting with some dismay that his arm and hand were badly swollen.

"I really thought he was gonna die-"

"RONON," Carson shouted, as the bandages fell away to reveal a badly infected gash running the width of John's wrist, bisecting the jagged edges of what had clearly been a fairly large bite to begin with.

"I know," Ronon said miserably, sounding quieter than Carson had possibly ever heard him.

Carson sighed. A part of him knew that Ronon was doing his best with the information he'd had. There was anti-venom in the infirmary, but Ronon couldn't have known that. Even if he had, he wouldn't have been able to identify it and administer it, certainly not in time to save John from a spider bite that large. Ronon had probably been bitten by venomous spiders, or snakes, or whatever, lots of times when he was a runner. Slicing the wound open to drain the venom had actually probably worked. Granted, Carson was sure those bites would have been a good deal smaller.

But still, as much as Carson didn't want to admit it, given the tools and knowledge that Ronon had, there was really nothing else that he could have done. He had very likely saved John's life, at least long enough for Carson to get there.

What Ronon clearly did not know, but Carson unfortunately did, was that any antivenom became significantly less effective the longer it took to be administered. While the antivenom would neutralize the venom that was currently wreaking havoc on John's body, and allow John to start fighting back, it wasn't going to undo the damage that had already been done. And now John was fighting an infection on top of the venom. He would certainly be better in Carson's hand than none at all, and Carson was expecting him to make a full recovery, but….

Ronon and Zelenka were probably expecting the Colonel to spring back up, ready for action, and that simply wasn't going to happen. Even once Carson could get him stabilized, it was going to be a long road back to normal for John.

"Get me my kit," Carson said, not taking his eyes off John. He put a finger against the side of John's neck, hoping to find his pulse.

"Here." He heard a thunk as it was deposited on the ground next to him.

"Open it." Carson resisted the urge to snap his fingers in agitation - he guessed he'd spent too much time with Rodney.

John's blood pressure actually didn't seem as bad as Carson had expected, so his first priority was the antivenom, not fluids. Carson dug around in his kit for the syringe, and then prepped it for injection. Technically, John's gluteus would be the best place for the injection, but he was lying on his back now, and Carson thought moving him would do more harm than good. His thigh would do just fine.

"Son," Carson said. "I'm giving you the antivenom now. You may feel a small pinch, but nothing more, and soon you should start to feel better."

John didn't react at all, and Carson wasn't even sure if he'd heard, but Carson had learned the hard way that it was better to be safe than sorry. John could be almost violent if he was surprised by a medical procedure, and sometimes appearances could be deceptive in terms of how capable he was of movement.

As a precaution, Carson spread a hand across John's chest, keeping him still against the floor. John still didn't react, not until Carson inserted the needle into his thigh. It wasn't the violent reaction that Carson had feared, which was almost more worrying. John just whimpered softly and tried to move, but Carson's hand kept him still until he'd removed the needle.

"Alright, lad, you should start feeling better soon," Carson told John quietly. John mumbled something incoherent, and Carson went to work quickly setting up an IV for the Colonel. He'd need a long round of fluids, especially since he was likely to remain nauseous from the aftereffects of the poison for some time. Carefully, Carson balled up his jacket and slid it beneath John's head, making sure that the pilot was as comfortable as he could make him, at least outside the infirmary.

"Is he gonna be okay?" Ronon asked anxiously, absentmindedly itching at what Carson could only assume were his burns.

"Eventually," Carson said. "Now, let's have a look at you."

"I told you, Shep fixed me up-"

"Ahh. Yes, I forgot that Colonel Sheppard has his medical degree," Carson replied. "Silly me. Sit down, Ronon."

Ronon grunted, but sat down near John, looking somewhat annoyed. Carson ignored Ronon's ruffled pride and waited as Ronon took his shirt off, wincing painfully at each new movement. All in all, it was not the most encouraging thing to witness.

Somewhat dreading what was about to be revealed, Carson carefully peeled the bandages away from Ronon's chest and arm. Much to his surprise, the burns actually…didn't seem too bad. That is to say, they looked horribly painful, but the skin was beginning to heal. Apparently, John and Ronon had managed to resist doing anything too stupid, such as trying to put butter on the burn, or letting Ronon pop the blisters.

"These...actually aren't as bad as I expected," Carson admitted. "They should heal up well enough, with the right medications."

Ronon looked pleased with himself, and Carson extracted burn ointment from his bag and handed it to Ronon.

"Put that on every couple of hours," Carson instructed him. "And if you don't, I'll have to do it for you, and neither one of us wants that."

Ronon frowned, but obediently opened the jar and began spreading the ointment across his damaged skin.

"Do you need anything for the pain?" Carson asked, having a feeling that he already knew the answer. Sure enough, Ronon shook his head.

"Nah. I had some at the beginning. Sheppard found 'em, but I'm good now."

Carson grimaced. But as much as he hated the idea of Ronon taking random pills that he hadn't been prescribed and had gotten from the Colonel, he was pretty sure John did have the ability to identify which medications were safe to take. Whatever Ronon had taken for the pain at the beginning was probably fine, and the fact that he was already off the pills was a very good sign.

"Alright," Carson said. "I'm not going to give you anything else right now, but please take Ibuprofen as needed. It doesn't make you look tougher to go without something like that, and the burns will heal better and faster if you're moving a little easier."

Ronon smirked. "Alright, Doc."

"Now that that's taken care of," Carson said, "will someone please tell me what the hell is going on?"