AN: Just a short note to say thank you for the reviews, great to get so much feedback, and to let you all know that there is only one more part to come (and it's already written).

Meanwhile, the team departs Atlantis for M4X-578…

"Ma'am, as chief of security, I'm advising you to stay behind," cautioned Sergeant Bates. He was holstering his nine mil, and adjusting the straps on his pack. They were going by Jumper, but this time, they'd be prepared. Sheppard's team had been caught with their proverbial pants down, not expecting the unexpected, and by the time they'd realized they were being shot at, they hadn't been able to get the shields up in time to do any good.

Elizabeth fixed Bates with the steely look he was getting to know, and he knew she was resolute, and wouldn't back down. He sighed. "In that case, take this." He handed her the spare pistol he'd brought, knowing all along that she wouldn't listen.

She took the proffered weapon, and held it awkwardly, before sliding it into position in the holster she'd buckled to her thigh earlier, feeling the solid weight pull on her leg. "Let's hope we don't need to use these, Sergeant."

"Yes, Ma'am," Bates agreed, but secretly, he was hoping to shoot the bastards, if they existed, that had caused this fiasco. He and Sheppard had their differences, but the Major was a steady officer, and when you removed their butting heads from the equation, he respected the Major's leadership. It was his job to present different opinions, and argue for even the slightest possibility if he thought it presented a danger to Atlantis. They were all doing the best job they could given the circumstances, and the Major and Doctor McKay didn't deserve to die like this…or to have their deaths faked, and kept imprisoned and stranded on M4X-578.

Sergeant Markham and Sergeant Stackhouse manned the pilot and co-pilot chairs, respectively, while Bates, Doctor Beckett and Weir settled in the back, on the bench. Bates felt the Jumper lift, and heard Markham communicating their status to Grodin. He knew the gate was being dialed, and soon they'd drop through the floor, and accelerate into the event horizon.

"You think they're really alive?" Bates asked Weir. He'd wanted to believe when she'd presented her theory at the meeting.

Elizabeth looked at him, and he realized she might not believe it, but she was staking more than her life on it. "I do," she said. He waited for her to say more, but she'd stopped there, and he guessed it'd have to do. They'd find out soon enough.

Back on M4X-578…

"John, we're here," called Marie.

John groaned, and tried to roll away, but he hit an unyielding object. He swallowed, and tried to get a grip on where he was. He cracked his eyes open, and reached out with a searching hand, feeling what he'd bumped. As he became more aware, his mind interpreted the signals it was receiving. The object was McKay, and he was still in that wagon.

"Here?" he repeated.

Marie was leaning over the back of the bench, and her face was inches away. She was staring at him with…pity? "The gate, we're at the gate, John."

The gate…an overwhelming flare of agony traced fire from his right eye, to the base of his skull, and he saw himself standing in front of a DHD. He was somewhere else…here…but not here. It was the first time! They'd gated to this planet, and returned, needing a Jumper…Jumper? His ship, they called them Puddle Jumpers. He saw his hand reaching out through a fog, and pressing the symbols for Atlantis. Atlantis! The city, with the great towering spires, it was called Atlantis.

"Major!"

John's hand hesitated in the air, as he was reaching for the third coordinate. "Rodney?"

"Don't show them the address!"

John flinched. It took all the effort he could muster to keep his hand from moving to the fourth symbol. How'd he get to the DHD? Hadn't he been in a wagon, lying beside Rodney? "What's happening?" he shouted. He couldn't see a wagon, or McKay, or anyone else. It was as if the edges of his vision had gone gray, and like an old movie picture, he had only the sight immediately in front of him. He couldn't turn his head.

"This isn't real. It's all in your head!" John heard McKay shouting behind him. But why wasn't McKay up here next to him, and why did he think this was all a trick?

"How?" John asked. "Why?"

Suddenly, a hand touched his, and he found his gaze moving up, and looked into McKay's eyes. Rodney was staring at him, horrified. "They're in your mind, Major. They've been manipulating you the entire time."

John tried to focus, but his head hurt, and he felt himself waver. "You've been here," he pointed out to the Rodney standing next to him. The one that wasn't wearing a nightgown and bandages anymore, but wore a scorched jacket, and had a reddened face.

"They used me," he spat. "They hooked me to you…think, Major. Did I ever tell you anything about what happened? Did I ever try to figure out how to get us home?"

John didn't think so. He tried to remember. His mind scrambled to put two and two together. Two plus two equals four…the factorial of seven equals five thousand and forty. "How are you here now?" he struggled to hold on to reality.

"A back door," McKay said. "Take that, you…"

"McKay," John interrupted before he could begin insulting their captors. "Do they know?"

McKay hesitated. "McKay…" John warned.

"Okay, okay. I don't know…maybe. Just…don't show them the address, whatever it takes, that's what they want."

John knew his mind was still a few bullets short of a full chamber, but why was the address secret? Wasn't there something else…some other security measure they used? "But we have a…"

"Shut up," snapped McKay.

John shut up. He turned away from Rodney, and looked again at the DHD. The first three symbols were lit. He turned back to ask McKay what should he do, only to find Rodney was gone. "McKay?" he called into thin air.

"John?" Marie whispered in his mind. "Dial the gate, John, and you can go home."

"No," he replied succinctly. He dropped his arm. The room wrinkled, and folded in on itself, and he opened his eyes, even though they'd already been opened. He was startled to find himself in some kind of lab, and he was staring at a white ceiling. He tried to get up, but found he couldn't move. His senses slowly recovered, and he realized he couldn't move because he was strapped down. A memory; he'd seen this before, in one of his flashbacks.

He heard footsteps running towards him, and he tried to raise his head to look, startled to feel wires attached to his forehead. He wanted to yank them out. Frustrated, he pulled at the straps, needing to free his hands to eradicate the technology that was in his mind.

The footsteps were upon him, and he knew it was too late. He saw Marie and Ada looking down at him, and he shuttered his panic. Never let the enemy see you sweat. "Nice little place you got here," he said glibly.

Marie had regret painted all over her pretty little face, and John could've cared less. "I'm sorry," she told him, and she reached down to grasp his hand. He struggled, not wanting her anywhere near him.

"Don't touch me," he warned, low and angry, when he realized he couldn't avoid her. Did she think he would forget, and forgive?

She stopped. "I'm sorry," she repeated.

Ada was keeping a calm face, but John could tell he wasn't pleased. Good for him, John wasn't either. "You shouldn't have done that, Major," Ada said coolly. He saw Ada step to the side, and he tried to follow with his eyes, but he had limited mobility. "And you, Doctor McKay, made things a lot worse. I see we underestimated your condition."

"People do that a lot," McKay whispered to John's right. "Underestimate me," he explained further.

John fought to get a look at Rodney, because he sounded weak, and it alarmed him. "McKay?" he called.

"Here," Rodney answered. "Can I get you anything; a drink…newspaper?"

John moved his head against the straps, and grinned with the relief of McKay's answer. "Coffee, black," John played along with McKay, knowing Rodney needed it.

He gave up trying to see where McKay was. There was something keeping his head from moving, and damned if he didn't have an itch right under his nose, on his upper lip. He worked his mouth; trying to ease it, and wished it was the worst thing he had to worry about.

Marie was still watching him, and he squirmed uneasily. "Is this where you tell us all about your evil plan, and why we have to die?" he asked dryly, striving to keep the worry out of his voice. John knew that they were in a bad spot. With no way of getting loose, the second these guys said their time was up, their time was up. There wasn't any plan B hidden up his sleeve. Was he even wearing sleeves?

"We didn't have a choice," Marie replied. "I didn't want to do this, John. You have to believe me."

"Oh great, an interrogator with a conscience," sniped McKay, from somewhere to his side.

Marie frowned at Rodney's callous words, but there was an old saying, the truth hurts. John's senses were slowly returning. He realized he wasn't wearing his uniform anymore. They'd put them in something else, almost felt like hospital scrubs, close enough he guessed. They were in a lab, so it was guinea pig clothing. Marie wasn't wearing the old fashioned dresses he'd seen in the dream world they'd been in. Dream world, virtual world, make-believe world…whatever it was called. She wore a white blouse that was tucked into a pair of black pants, and her brown hair was contrasted beautifully against the stark white. He hated her, but at the same time, he was still drawn to her. "What are you going to do with us?" he asked, finally.

Ada walked back into his line of sight. "Nothing," he answered John.

That didn't sound good. The way Ada had said it. The finality, the lack of explanation…they weren't getting out of here alive.

John was on the verge of asking for an explanation, even though he already figured out that it wasn't going to be what he wanted to hear, when he felt his bed start shaking, it was followed by a loud boom, and dust from the ceiling fell against his face. He blinked, trying to get his eyes clear of the debris. Before he could ask what was wrong, he saw Marie and Ada tense, and turn to face something he couldn't see.

"Major, Doctor McKay, are you alright?"

John felt like his body melt like butter, so strong was his relief. The cavalry to the rescue…if only he could remember who exactly was the cavalry. "Fine," he called. He didn't even recognize who'd asked if they were okay.

"Against the wall, hands up where I can see them!" Another voice ordered, low and menacing, and John knew that whoever was speaking would shoot if they gave him even the slightest provocation.

He was staring up, because he couldn't do anything else, when a face appeared over him. He tried to remember who it was, but he had nothing. "Major, we're getting you out of here. Hang on, son." The man speaking had a soft, comforting accent.

"McKay," John said. He wanted to know that Rodney was all right. He felt the straps being yanked, and unbuckled. His body rocked with the motion, and then the man was easing him up, pulling the wire off his head, and brushing off the dust that had fallen on him moments before.

"I'm fine," Rodney answered, and now John could see him. The bed he'd been strapped to was only a few feet over, and McKay was wearing a pair of white pajamas. The person helping McKay was tugging off the wires, and he met Rodney's eyes, and held them for a second, both of them sharing the relief that they'd been rescued.

He looked down, and realized he was, in fact, wearing the same thing as McKay. He also realized that the man next to him was waiting for him to say something, but he didn't know what to say. "Thanks," he said, for lack of anything better coming to mind.

There was a woman, the one he'd seen in all those flashbacks. She came up to him, and he wondered what her name was. She was smiling, but looked like she was on the verge of crying, all at the same time. He regarded her solemnly. "Atlantis?" he said.

"Home, John," she answered him.

He nodded, accepting her reply. "Home," he repeated.

A commotion drew their attention to the hole that their rescuers had blown in the laboratory wall. People dressed as Marie and Ada swarmed into the room, and they held dangerous looking weapons aloft, pointed at them. John heard McKay groan, and he looked at his friend, who had slumped against the bed he'd been released from.

Before he could formulate a thought, Marie had stepped in front of him, and was staring resolutely at her people. Ada came near, but she held her hand out, "No, Father. This is wrong."

Ada stopped moving towards his daughter. "Marie, don't do this. You know how this has to end."

Marie shook her head, and John watched as her father waved at his people to lower their weapons, at least for the time being. "No, it doesn't. We saw enough to know these people are no threat to us."

The brown haired woman beside him stepped to Marie's side. "We pose no danger to you," she reiterated. "We only want our people back."

Ada looked like he wanted to believe. But, he was already shutting it out, and sticking with his original beliefs. "You know too much. We are only alive at the expense of thousands of our own people. They gave our lives so that we could escape. Nobody knows where we went, not even the Wraith."

"You can't hide forever," Rodney said angrily. "The Wraith are out there, and they'll find you. It might take a while, but eventually they will find you. Killing us won't prevent the inevitable."

"Maybe," Ada conceded. "But if they catch you first, and read your minds, they'll know all the sooner where to come looking."

John wanted to condemn these people for what they'd done, but he knew their actions were not that unusual. Killing to protect the many wasn't a new concept. "We won't be caught by the Wraith," he said. He didn't remember much, but he did remember that they were, at the very least, equals to the Wraith when it came to fighting. He'd killed Wraith…more than once. "You saw me kill them. We won't give up without a fight."

Ada's face was torn by frustration. "There are too many of them! Don't you understand that?" he snarled. "Do you think we gave up without a fight? Nobody does, Major. We all die fighting. But we still die."

"Then let us die together, Ada. Let us go down fighting, together." John said intensely.

Marie sensed the tide shifting. "Are we going to kill them, Father? Kill them all, and when more come after these, kill them also?" she said derisively. "Then we're no better than the Wraith. At least they kill for food, we're just killing."

Ada aged in front of John's eyes, and he knew they'd won. He turned his back on John, and Marie. "Go," he said tiredly. "Just go, and don't come back."

The brown haired woman took John's arm, and started guiding him towards the forced entrance. John stumbled with her, but looked back at Marie, as they moved away. She was staring at him. He could tell she wanted to say more, but she didn't. She smiled sadly, and moved instead to her father, comforting the old man.

John sighed. There never was a happy ending. Only in fairy tales. They weren't living out a fairy tale, they were living out one of those 'and the moral of the story is' tales, where there was always a lesson to be learned out of tragedy. He felt the man with the accent near his side, and he gave him a weak smile, just because he thought the man needed to see it. Rodney was close by, and he looked as mentally damaged as John felt. His memory was still full of holes, and he knew that they wouldn't bounce back from this like a kid's rubber ball. He was back in a memory, as they led him out, led him towards home. A memory of Marie, kissing him passionately, and he couldn't help but think that hadn't been part of the game.