Chapter VI: Kiss and make up... sort of.

Stella heard gunfire, very far away. But then the heaviness faded away, when she opened her eyes, Bates was right in front of her. "You are really crazy, you know that? Are you ok?"

Stella nodded and looked around. The creature was lying right in front of her, dead. Shakily, she stood up and walked towards Sheppard, only to discover that he was still out cold. Stella now saw Bates approach Ford.

Taking a closer look, Stella saw that Sheppard had a cut on his left cheek and a nasty bruise on the forehead. She was afraid to touch him, fearing that something might be broken. She looked again toward where Bates was and noticed that he was helping Ford sit up.

Stella was caught off guard when Sheppard let out a small groan. She knelt beside him and touched him on the shoulder. "Major Sheppard? Can you hear me?"

-0-0-0-

John didn't know what he was feeling at first, then he gave an involuntary groan when the pain in his forehead registered. Then he heard Stella's voice, and he opened up his eyes. She was looking at him, concern in her eyes. Suddenly, he remembered what had happened. The Wraith had asked for her, and by radio she had given herself to the creature. What they had done after that was beyond him.

John sat up and touched his cheek, finding blood there. He looked through his vest and took out a small gauze pad, then looked to his side, and saw that Stella was looking pale.

She was acting as if there was nothing more interesting than her hands and the floor underneath her. John was about to ask what had happened when Ford and Bates arrived where they were.

Sheppard stared at Bates. "Sergeant... What happened?"

Bates pointed toward where the creature was lying dead, then proceeded to explain what they had done. When he was finished, Bates offered a hand to Sheppard to help him stand up. John looked now at Ford – the young lieutenant was holding one hand to the side of his chest. "Are you ok?"

"My chest hurts, but I think it was just the hit. I'll be fine."

Bates looked at Sheppard. "How about you?"

"Well, I'll have one hell of a headache for the next few days, but I don't think anything is broken."

Bates handed the life signs detector to Sheppard, who did a quick scan and placed it inside a pocket. "We need to move out, there is no point in staying here anymore."

Ford frowned. "Why?"

"Because there's more Wraith around, at least two more. That is what I was trying to tell you when this Wraith showed up. But now they're out of range of the detector and the city's sensors are no use here. I'm not going to stay here to wait until they discover that we killed this one."

As Major Sheppard pulled out his radio to fill in Dr. Weir on the situation, Stella's body finally decided to obey to her commands and she slowly stood up.

John ordered the repair team for the transport to turn around. Evidently, Sheppard had decided that it would be best to walk out of there. When finished, John ordered to Ford and Bates to remove the body of the Wraith and put it in the closest room, because he didn't want the other Wraith to find their companion.

Once they were ready, they moved out, and John took another glance at Stella. She still hadn't said a word or complained about anything, which was highly unusual on her part.

Then they started walking and they walked a lot, up some stairs down some others, trying any transport that was on their way. Most of it felt like going in circles; every now and then John would look at the life-signs detector, but still he felt that they weren't making any progress. Nightfall was approaching, so he decided to take a little rest. John checked the detector and saw the dots moving, but the creatures were at a safe distance. He now realized that, whether they stopped or not, they were going to have to confront these two Wraith.

He looked at the group around him. Sgt. Bates was on the alert, Ford was still rubbing a hand to his chest – maybe he had broken something. And Stella was sitting on the floor, her head resting on her knees. He had questions for her and some other stuff to say. Most of it would have to wait until they get out of the current situation they are. He looked right at Stella and closed in on her. Seeing the movement, Stella looked up at the Major and he asked, "How did you know that the creature would come to you so easily?"

"He said he wanted to age me, maybe they do what we do with wine. The older it is the better it tastes."

Sheppard wasn't convinced – there was something else. "Yeah, but you must've done something, for him to want to age you instead of just feeding right now."

Stella seemed to think about it and then made a disgusted expression. "You don't wanna know."

"Let's say I do."

Stella looked at the three soldiers around her, "I have an idea, but you know I could be wrong. I guess they don't like it either when someone kicks them between the legs."

Bates frowned, Ford made a disgusted look, and Sheppard stared at her in confusion. "How the hell do you know that?"

Stella repressed a smile when she saw their reaction, then continued, "Because I accidentally kicked him one time he got really close to feeding on me. After that he just got really weird."

John now made a face, and Stella couldn't identify the expression. he said then, "Ok, I think THAT now falls squarely into the realm of 'too much information'."

Stella shrugged in response. "You asked."

Then Ford decided to interrupt them. "That might not be the case now. You didn't know there were others."

Stella shook her head. "No, it was always the same one."

Now Ford just seemed to think out loud. "How the hell did they get here?"

Bates now moved closer to the group and replied, "Maybe it was the scout from the other day."

John nodded. "What we need is to get out of this area and find a working transport."

Sheppard walked toward the wall to use the panel there. He looked through the map and finally sighed, "Damn it! Transports are damaged or hallways are not fit to walk through. No way out."

Sheppard now saw Stella raise her hand, and he asked a bit more snappishly than he had intended, "What?"

"Couldn't we go outside?"

At first John didn't understand her. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, we go out on one of the balconies at sea level, get out walk along the pier, and climb up on some other section of the city. One where the transports aren't disabled."

John didn't say anything. It couldn't be that simple. He took another look at the map on the panel. Then he took out his life-signs detector – the dots were moving closer. John looked at the group. "We can't go back to sea level. If we do, we are going to run into the two other Wraith sooner than expected."

It was Bates's turn to interrupt. "Maybe we can find a closer balcony and climb down."

Ford continued, "That could work. If we manage to stay away from them, we can return later fully prepared and deal with the creatures."

Sheppard nodded. "All right, let's move it." John checked the map once again then took a look at the life-signs detector. The Wraith were now getting closer, and he would rather manage them with a full military team than with half a team with an injured soldier and a civilian. Now he turned around to face the group, "There's one at the left end of this corridor. Come on."

They all moved quickly, it was a unanimous wish to get the hell out of there. Once they arrived at the end of the hallway, Sheppard handed the life-signs detector to Ford. "Make sure they don't follow us."

"Yes, sir."

Sheppard, Bates and Stella walked out to the balcony. Stella hesitated for a moment, remembering the incident that put her in this situation.

Bates handed Sheppard a rope. The Sergeant was helping John with it when Ford's voice was heard through the door.

"I think the Wraith have spotted us."

John nodded to Bates and the Sergeant went inside to give Ford some backup.

Stella moved closer to Sheppard, just as he threw the rope out of the railing. He looked down and shouted, "Damn it! It's too short."

Stella looked down and noticed that he was right: the end of the rope was only halfway down. She suddenly remembered the items she had in her backpack and took out another rope from it.

John stared at her, confused. "Why do you carry a rope?"

Stella gave him a small smile. "I use it with my cameras. I tie them up and swing them off from balconies, for experiments."

John shook his head and retrieved the end of the first rope, so he could knot the two together. While he was at it, he thought of something, something that should have occurred to him a while ago. "Stella... about what happened with the Wraith – that was a very stupid thing to do–" She was about to retort when he held up a hand, "–but you saved Ford's life and my life... so thank you."

Stella looked a little out of place, but remained quiet once again. She really wanted to say something about their fight earlier, but the courage seemed to have abandoned her. There was silence; it was the first moment in months that they weren't at each other's throats. So Stella decided to risk it. "Does this mean that I can go near a Puddle Jumper now?"

If it hadn't been for their current situation, John would've smiled. But he gave her request a thought. "If we manage to get out of this, we'll talk about it."

Stella smiled, and John clicked his radio. "What's the situation lieutenant?"

Ford's voice came out, "They are not moving. The creatures started to show some illusions, but they seemed to have stopped. They're still really close though."

"Ok, I'm going down now." John started to ready himself to climb down the balcony.

Stella was now debating within her if this was the right moment to ask, but then again she might not have another chance after they return to the civilized part of the city. "What about weapons training?"

Without hesitation, John replied, "No."

Stella was flushed for a moment, but she really wasn't ready to take no for an answer. "What if the Wraith appear here sooner than expected? You're going to need all the help you can get. Please weapons training."

Stella knew that John was considering it. Finally, he said "Ok, if it means you'll leave me alone."

She would have screamed in that moment, but she was going to take advantage of his weak moment. "No, field training and I'll leave you alone. You won't even notice that I'm in the city."

"No way."

"Come on! It's not like I'm asking for my own team."

"No."

She was now really getting desperate. As Sheppard was starting to climb down, she looked at him and said, "I won't tell anyone that you sing in the shower."

John went deadly still. "How do you know that?"

Stella replied, "There are cameras all over the city, Major. Those cameras have audio, and my job is to sit on my ass and watch them all day."

"You have cameras in the showers?"

"No, but it appears that you get carried away sometimes; it gets pretty loud."

John seemed to think about it, but then shook his head. "No, I don't care."

Stella decided to give it another try. "I will tell about you and Dr. Weir."

Knowing what she was trying to do, John kept playing her game. "I don't care, you'll just feed the rumors. Still no."

Stella felt now that she was begging, but still, she wanted to be more productive. "Come on! It doesn't have to be with real weapons. We can practice on the mainland with my paintball guns."

Sheppard was impressed. "You have paintball guns?"

Stella nodded quickly and John seemed to really think about it, but he shook his head. "No."

Then Stella thought of something. If he said no after this one she would drop the whole thing. "I won't tell anyone about your Star Wars boxers."

Stella smiled. The look on John's face was priceless! "Deal! Now shut up!"

She gave him a mock salute. "Yes sir."

Stella knew that he hadn't liked that last one. I guess being in charge of laundry has its benefits.

But it didn't matter if he didn't speak to her again. She was going to be able to be normal in this city.