"Kale is bringing your companion."

"Kale?"

Sheppard frowned, looking around to see if any of the others had a clue what a Kale was. They looked blankly back at him, and the Major was worried about the gash on Lieutenant Ford's forehead.

"Are you all right?"

The young Lieutenant nodded, his hand going to his head.

"I hit my gun when they dropped me."

"Yeah, me too."

"Kale comes," the... woman... said, turning and looking down the slope.

They all looked the same direction and saw a couple of figures coming out from around a large pile of rocks. Colonel Mitchell was easy to recognize, even at that distance. She was limping seriously and leaning against a great big creature that looked like it was more than capable of eating her without any effort.

"Colonel!"

The group headed over to intercept the pair – but stopped just shy of the range of the teeth of the creature that she was with.

"What the hell is that?" McKay asked, looking at the creature.

"Are you all right?" Sheppard asked, not missing the splinted leg and definitely not missing the bloody shoulder.

"This is... um... Kale. He's a light one."

"A light one?"

She shrugged.

"That's what he said."

"It talks?" McKay asked.

"Not in this form."

"What?"

Melony shook her head.

"I'll explain in a minute, but I really need to get off my-"

"We have prepared a place for you and your companions to recover from the journey," the woman interrupted. Melony looked over at her, seeing her for the first time. She was even taller than Kale – and just as naked.

"Who are you?"

"Aron. You?"

"Colonel Melony Mitchell."

"You are injured... we should get you off your leg before we discuss anything further."

"What happened to your leg?" Ford asked as he came over to the other side of Melony, intending to take more of her weight off the leg and realizing he couldn't drape her injured arm over his shoulder like he wanted to.

"Kale dropped me."

"We got dropped, too," Sheppard said. She noticed he was holding his wrist at an odd angle – and saw that Ford was bleeding from a wound on his head.

"How's your hand?"

"Broken, probably."

"Ford?"

The Lieutenant shrugged.

"I hit my head, but I don't think it's more serious than just a cut – I don't feel dizzy or anything. It just hurts."

"Teyla?"

"I am fine, Colonel Mitchell."

"We landed in a haystack," McKay said. "It cushioned the fall fairly well."

"Haystack?" Must be nice.

We might have been tossed into a haystack, too, if you hadn't shot Kale

You told me to.

Well, I've been wrong before...

She sighed, and hobbled next to Kale as the wolf-like creature started to follow Aron up the slope.

OOOOOOOO

The room they were taken to was pretty much a cave. It wasn't all that big – probably no larger than Mitchell's quarters back at Atlantis – but it was cozy enough with stacks of hay (or maybe straw) covered with heavy sheets of some kind of cloth to keep them from getting poked by the hay when they sat on it.

The creature that was Kale in another form stopped beside one of these piles, and Melony could have cheered with relief – or cried. She would have let him go and simply dropped to the pile of hay except that she knew that would hurt, and she didn't want to hurt any more than she already did. Instead, she waited for McKay to come in between her and Kale – which the astrophysicist did, but not all that willingly – and then took her weight off the wolf creature and eased down onto the hay with a sigh of relief.

Sheppard was beside her in an instant.

"How bad is it?"

"If I can get it set, it won't be so bad. As it is right now... Talon can't help me until the bones are in the right position. All he can do is ease the pain. How about your wrist?"

"It hurts."

"Ford!"

The Lieutenant came over and knelt down beside Sheppard and Mitchell, who gestured to her leg.

"I want you to set-"

"Holy!"

They all looked over just in time to see Kale shift from wolf form to... human. Rodney McKay had obviously been impressed – or spooked.

"Don't they have any clothes?" Ford asked when he saw that Kale was just as naked as Aron. It was kind of nice in the woman - she was attractive in an odd way - but Kale was just plain... large... and that was annoying.

"Maybe they don't transform well?" Mitchell said, leaning back a little as Kale spoke briefly with Aron and then walked over and knelt next to them.

"How is your leg?"

"I'm going to have Lieutenant Ford here try and set it," Melony told him. "Major Sheppard here broke his wrist when he was dropped, so we're going to need something to splint it with."

"I will have it supplied," Kale told her. He looked at Sheppard. "I am Kale."

"Major John Sheppard. Pleased to meet you."

Kale nodded, and looked at Ford, who introduced himself as well. Rodney and Teyla came over to be introduced as well, and then Aron introduced herself to Mitchell.

"Now that we're all friends," Sheppard said, "Could someone please tell me why the hell you decided to bring us here?"

"Apparently we were in danger," Melony told him, before Aron could say anything.

She nodded.

"You were being stalked by the Dark Ones."

"The dark ones?" Rodney asked.

Kale nodded.

"They are creatures that roam the forests wreaking havoc where they can – although it is not that often, since we also roam the forests, keeping them in check where we can."

"So... you guys are light ones? But there's also dark ones?" Sheppard asked.

Kale nodded. "We are called Light Ones, because of our abilities to transform. The Dark Ones once had this ability as well, but they were foolish, and angered the gods, and they were struck with a plague that turned them mad and made them unable to transform."

"So what do they look like?" Ford asked.

"They are like us," Aron said. "Either they are this shape," and she pointed to herself, "Or they are the form Kale was just in."

"No birds?"

She shook her head.

"There were some who were birds as well, but they have become lost to us – no doubt there were not enough to perpetuate the species and they died out."

"So..." Sheppard looked over at Mitchell and then up at Aron and Kale. "Tell me again why you grabbed us?" He requested. "Why not just move us somewhere away from the dark guys? Why bring us all the way here?"

"You were entering the outskirts of the sacred city," Kale said. "At the base of the cliff you were found on, there is a place to enter, and we could not risk you finding it and going in there."

"So there is a city out here somewhere..." Ford said, more to himself than the others.

"You've heard of it?" Kale asked.

"The people we stayed with last night told us there were rumors of an ancient city... we know of a people who were once called the Ancients, so we had hoped it might be one of their ruins left behind."

"It is not," Aron said. "The Ancients have not been seen around here for many, many centuries."

"You know of the Ancients?" Sheppard asked.

Aron looked surprised by this question, but it was Kale who spoke.

"Of course we do... we are remote and distant descendants of one of their allies – the Furlings."