The Journey

Chapter 2

Stunned by what had just happed, everyone just stared at Beckett crumpled form lying in front of the wall he had been flung into a second ago. McKay was the first to gather his bearings and rush forwards to their fallen colleague. Before he even bent down and reached out a hand to feel the other man pulse, he knew that there would be nothing they could do. The sheer force of the impact against unyielding stone wall, followed by the sound of crushing bones had told him all he needed to know. Extending his arm to feel the other man's neck, he felt a very weak pulse that seemed to fade away beneath his touch.

"Carson, damn it, somebody help!" Rodney shouted in panic, not knowing what to do. In spite of her own reopened wounds, Teyla had come running to his side. She placed a hand on Beckett's chests which seemed very still. To her surprise, she could still feel shallow movements, but they were slow and far between. Life was draining from Dr. Beckett and they could only watch helplessly. Blood was pooling underneath his head, examining outwards in a crimson sea against the colourful mosaic floor.

"He still breathing, but I'm afraid he won't last for long." Teyla said, speaking out loud what they all knew since the moment the blast had struck the doctor.

John struggled to get back to his feet and join his friends at Beckett's side. Even though he didn't quite know what had happened yet, he knew that if Teyla hadn't thrown him to the ground he would be the one dying now. The bitter irony was that he was dying anyways. The blast would just have sped things up a bit, but if they didn't find a cure soon, he would be dead within a few days at the best.

Not being able to get to his feet, he crawled over to the wall, where Teyla and Rodney were couched on the ground, refusing to leave Beckett alone during his last moments. As he sat down on the ground next to Teyla, he heard her whisper in Ancient, probably in Athosian prayer to prepare for death. Rodney just said on Beckett's other side, his expression blank, still reeling from the shock of the sudden tragedy. John found himself equally stunned how a harmless situation had suddenly turned deadly; he just had better training to deal with it. He felt angry. Angry at the needless death, angry at the too early death of a good friend and valuable member of Atlantis, angry at himself for insisting to go to Athos and consequently setting the fatal chain of events into motion, angry that yet another live had been lost in the name of exploration, an endeavour lined with graves already.

Teyla's melodically whispering ended, and he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"There is nothing we can do. He is gone." She said softly. "We need to inform the rest of the exploration team. They will need to contact Atlantis."

John just looked at her, his mind still trying to comprehend the loss of a friend. Part of him understood how Teyla could be all business now. She had grown up with violent death as a constant threat. To survive her people had not been in the position to have the luxury to mourn their dead. They had to move. He had done the same in war. In a combat situation you had to move on or you could get your men and yourself killed. But this wasn't a combat situation. Beckett hadn't been in the military, he should never have been on the planet in the first place, especially not while they messed around with technologies that they had no clue about. John needed to know for himself and reached out for Beckett's neck. The skin under his hand was still warm, but there was no pulse, he was truly gone. Physically and mentally at the limit, John slumped against the wall and drifted into oblivion himself.

----------

Teyla had tried to radio the rest of the team, but had been unable to reach anyone outside the enclosure of the wall. Having tried McKay's radio as well, she was sure that it was not a problem with the device but that something else was going on. Only when she turned back around, she saw that John was no longer sitting upright on the ground, but had fallen asleep or worse, passed out again. Even though she still great faith that in the end, they were going to find a cure here in the city, she grew more and more worried. The prophecy had spoken of sacrifices and trials that they would have to go through on while they learned to use their gift. She had been ready to make sacrifices, but she had never expected that her friends might be the ones suffering for them.

There was nothing she could do for John at the moment, save for moving him into a more comfortable position. She told the still somewhat shocky Dr. McKay that she was going to be right back and made her way to the portal in the wall surrounding the temple and the garden. Teyla was hoping that from outside the wall, she would be able to reach the team guarding the gate. She had briefly worried that the lack of an ATA gene might be a problem, but so far, their experience had shown that the gene was generally only required to open doors from the outside, but not from the inside. The same applied to the portal, as soon as she touched the panel on the wall next to it, the portal slid open. But as she tried to walk out, she suddenly slammed into an invisible wall. Force field. Pain flared up across her face as she doubled back into the garden. She looked around, picked up a stone and flung it high into the air. As she had expected, the force field covered the temple and its garden like a dome. It protected them from attackers, but it also cut them off from Atlantis and kept them trapped. Their arrival most somehow have triggered it. The fact that the shield was active meant that there was probably a ZPM somewhere around in the city. The Atlantian scientists would be pleased.

----------

Dr. McKay was scanning was studying the energy readings his scan had recorded as the blast had been fired. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. The blast, although it had to have been very powerful to slam a human into a wall with such force had not registered on his scanner at all. He had nothing but the consistent energy reading from inside the temple. Cautiously, as he had seen its destructive power, but also highly intrigued as it seemed to violate the laws of physics as he knew them, he examined the crystal more closely, carefully standing aside in case, another blast was triggered. The crystal was an opaque red. Rodney reached out to touch it, aware that this might not be such a good idea. The moment he came into contact with the material the colour shifted from red to purple. He left his hand and after a few second, the crystal turned blue and a few meters from his position, the wall parted to reveal an entrance. Flabbergasted at what he had done, he withdrew his hand. But it did make sense, when someone without the ATA gene touched the crystal; it fired off a deadly blast, killing the person in front of it. It was coincidence that Teyla had stood on the side of the crystal. When someone with the gene touched the crystal it worked much like the doors on Atlantis. The Ancients must have been rather concerned about uninvited guests when they built this city.

----------

Carson was confused, the last thing he recalled was standing next to the temple building with Teyla John and Dr. McKay. He had been keeping an eye and the major, who had been putting an a brave front but was reaching his limit for the day. The next thing he knew he was standing in a desert in the middle of nowhere. Nothing but rocks, dust and sand as far as he could see. Not a Stargate insight. He had no clue how he could have gotten there. Transporter rings maybe. Maybe someone had accidentally activated them. Over the past three years he had learned that nothing was too improbably.

"What the hell are you doing here?" a familiar voice asked and Carson whirled around only to see a somewhat disturbed looking Major Sheppard standing there.

"Major, where are we and how did we get here?"

"That's what I wanted to know from you. I have ended up here a couple of times before after I passed out. Its apparently part of the whole prophecy deal. As far as I understand it, it's a sort of mental space where I end up when my body is in trouble." John tried to phrase it lightly. .It sounded insane to his own ears.

Beckett just nodded, caught up in thoughts of his own. John could imagine what was running through his head, Beckett wasn't stupid after all.

"I assume there was trouble on Athos? I only remember getting ready to leave."

"Yeah, there was. You got hit by an energy been. It smashed you into a wall."

From Johns tone there was no need for more questions. Beckett got what was implied.

"You are wondering why you are still here even if your body has died." The white robed guard that John had encountered on previous trips to the mental desert appeared out of thin air before them. John mentally sighed, while Beckett scowled, realizing that she had read his thoughts.

"You have a role to fulfil. Your friends believe you are dead, but they are mistaken. You did die indeed and were dead for a brief time. But you are no longer dead. You will soon return to your friends and help them on their journey. You will save your friend in time." The guard indicated John. "You are not well and without his help you will not survive until the sun rises the next time. Remember this."

"Why did he have to die? Why did you have to kill him? Just to have us watch?" John asked, his pent up frustration and anger at what he had gone though in the past few days threatening to come to the surface.

"Nothing happens without a reason and everything happens as it is written. It may just happen in unexpected ways. Your friend died because only his death would trigger what you would call a gene. You are both much closer to the Ancients that you know. There is still much about the link between the Ancients and the humans that you do not know about it. It is not yet time for you to know. But know this, in your journey you will grow closer to who you really are and you, Dr. Beckett will grow through your part in the journey. "

"I am not sure I understand what you mean. What gene will be activated?"

"You will find out in time. It is part of who you are."

Beckett disappeared from the scene at the hand wave of the guard. She now turned to John.

"All your friends will stand by you until the end and beyond. You just have to let them. The risk is theirs to take, not yours. ,"Major Sheppard.

TBC