Moments in Time, Chapter 2
Two hours and twenty minutes later, Major Sheppard once again finds himself bounding up the stair to the control room. The time had actually gone by faster than he had anticipated.
John had found Teyla in her quarters and brought up the question of one of the Athosians performing a wedding ceremony. It had taken him fifteen minutes into her explanation of the Athosian ritual to realize that Teyla was under the false impression that it was Elizabeth and him getting married. John corrected her and spent the next half hour explaining to her why, while they did love each other, it was way too early to be talking marriage. He finally got around to telling her about Kavanagh and Simpson, which of course led to a discussion around why opposites attract.
Getting back to his quarters about an hour and a half after leaving Elizabeth's office, John fell asleep with a smile on his face, thinking forward to when the time would be right for his own wedding. He woke up after his short nap only to find that Elizabeth was late. Not being the most patient of men, John decided to go looking for her.
Sheppard gets up to the control room and walks straight into Elizabeth's office. He frowns when he finds it empty. Walking back to the control room, Grodin points in the direction of the conference room before John can verbalize his question.
"She's in there with Zelenka and McKay," says Peter.
John can't keep his eyes from rolling. McKay and Zelenka, separately, will gladly take up hours of your time spouting off about one scientific theory or another. Put them in the same room together and they feed off each other like the perfect storm. Sheppard walks into the conference room and can tell by the look of relief on Elizabeth's face that she's been trapped by the two scientists for quite some time.
"What's up boys?" John asks cheerfully and the two immediately start talking over one another.
"Major! We found this great new Ancient device."
"We don't quite know what it does yet, but I think –"
"We think it has great potential for –"
Sheppard holds up both hands to quiet them down.
"I'm guessing this is one of those devices that is better seen than heard about?" he asks, already knowing their answer.
"Of course," the two scientists answer in unison.
"Then why don't you two get back to work and we'll meet you down at your lab a little later?"
McKay and Zelenka get up eagerly and walk out of the conference room, still talking a mile a minute. John can't help but grin as Elizabeth comes around the table toward him. She rests her forehead against his shoulder with a sigh. He wraps his arms around her with a little laugh.
"Been here a while?" John asks, not hiding his amusement.
"Don't laugh at me or I'll make sure you're a required attendee at all their future scientific briefings," Elizabeth responds wryly.
"Threat received loud and clear."
Elizabeth pulls away, but not out of his arms, to look up at him.
"I just do not understand why they feel the need to have anyone else present when all they do is talk to each other during these briefings."
John shrugs. "I honestly think that they expect us to learn something from all of their rambling."
"You didn't really mean it when you said we'd go down to their lab, did you?"
"Hell no. They'll forget all about us as soon as they get down there anyway."
"Good," says Elizabeth as she puts her head back on his shoulder.
John rests his cheek lightly against her hair.
"What do you say we snag some food, commandeer one of the jumpers, and spend the night under the stars on our own private island?"
"That sounds absolutely wonderf –"
Before Elizabeth can finish her sentence, there is the unmistakable sounds of the gate dialing up.
"Unscheduled off-world activation," announces Peter's voice unnecessarily.
Elizabeth stiffens and pulls herself out of John's arms to walk out of the conference room. John follows her out. She is staring intently at the gate and he has a feeling there's more to this than the standard nervousness of what's about to come through. He's learned his lesson about her intuition.
"We don't have any teams off-world," Elizabeth says more to herself than to John. She looks across the gate room to Peter for confirmation. The engineer shakes his head. No IDC.
"Raise the shield."
The shield comes up an instant before the event horizon materializes. Elizabeth still can't shake the sudden chill that came over her when she heard the gate dialing up. There's something very wrong about this. She starts to walk across to the control room with John close behind her. As they get to the top of the main stairs, another chill makes Elizabeth stop and turn toward the gate.
There's a disturbance in the event horizon and a spherical object comes through the shield into the gate room. It hovers in the air, directly across from Weir and Sheppard.
"That shouldn't have happened," says McKay. He's frozen to the spot directly behind Peter, next to Zelenka. The two had been trying to convince the engineer to help them out in the lab when the gate started to dial in.
Elizabeth can only stare at the object in front of her with wide eyes. It looks to be about the size of a basketball, but has a smooth, metallic surface broken only by a small display of lights around its center. Another chill zips down her spine and she reacts immediately.
"John! Watch out!"
Elizabeth shoves John to the ground just as a projectile is launched out of the sphere, directly towards them.
TBC...
Sorry for so much time between postings. I will also apologize for possibly having a few extra mistakes in my stories. Barely any time to write, so even less time to re-read before posting.
Anyway...hope you like this one. Will try and update again soon. The story is thought out in my head, it's just the typing it up that's taking so long. :-)