The team returned from their mission forty-five minutes later to report yet another disaster. Lorne, Ronon, and Teyla arrived in the infirmary first. They informed me that Carson and Rodney were giving Elizabeth an update and would be delayed a few minutes. That was fine with me. I didn't mind clearing these guys while waiting for an update of my own. This time I nabbed Ronon first, before he could sneak away to the cafeteria again. He looked a little put out, but didn't really give me a hard time. The exam went quickly, as he was uninjured, and I let him go just as I heard the voices approaching from the corridor.

"I can't believe you told me to shut up!"

"Aye. Would you like a repeat, Rodney?"

"Oh, very clever," said Rodney over his shoulder as he entered the infirmary. But I could tell his heart wasn't in it. His snark lacked its usual bite.

Carson followed him in. If I thought he looked tired before, he appeared completely exhausted now. The empty container in his hand spoke volumes. "Later, Rodney," he said firmly. Then, to me, "A word, please."

All right. I was ready, if this was how we were going to play it. We walked over to the isolation room that John had recently occupied. "Where's Colonel Sheppard?" Carson asked evenly.

"He's in his quarters. The infirmary was making him agitated, so I thought..."

"You thought? That's unique."

Now that was uncalled for. "Like I was going to say, I thought that he would be calmer there. Isn't it just possible that agitation speeds the process?"

"How do you figure that? Are you suddenly an expert in infectious diseases, then?"

"You try to keep snakebite victims calm, so that their heart rate goes down and the venom doesn't spread. So if Sheppard's not worked up, his heart rate and metabolic rate will be slower." I pointed to one of the test results, a measure of viral load. "This was from when he was in the iso room, and the next one was taken when he was in his quarters just before you returned."

"The second one's much lower," Carson admitted. Suddenly the fight went out of him and he rubbed his eyes tiredly. "Sorry."

His abrupt change in manner took me by surprise. "It's okay. I probably should have let you know as soon as you got back." We stood without speaking for several minutes. "What happened?" I finally asked.

"We never had a chance," he replied bitterly. "There must have been hundreds of those little bastards in that cave. Even the salt water barely slowed them down." He looked sick. "They got Walker and Stevens, and we didn't even get a single egg."

I'd assumed that when they didn't show up for their post-mission checks. Apparently it had been a nasty way to go. I never minded bugs before, but now I was becoming positively arachnophobic. I was also beginning to find it hard to stay angry at Carson. He'd put his own life on the line without a second thought.

Carson glanced at the lab results again. "So these are the numbers. But how does he look? What's your gestalt?"

"He's in pain," I said frankly. "And he's very aware of all the changes going on inside him. I think the Colonel's putting up one hell of a fight, but he's holding on to his identity by a thread."

Carson nodded unhappily. In a voice so low I could barely hear it, he said, "The same thing happened to Ellia. The last rational thing she did was try to save Rodney from a second Wraith. Then she just lost it and tried to kill him herself."

What could I say in response to that? In all honesty, John had probably been doomed from the moment Ellia's claws had broken through his skin. His progression wasn't as rapid as hers since he'd taken a much smaller dose, but the underlying process was the same. And we seemed to have lost our best hope of reversing it.

"I think we're going to lose him," Carson admitted. "If he's lucky, his body will shut down before the transformation is complete, but I don't even know about that." He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. "Did he say anything to you about... advanced care directives?"

It took an effort for me to even get the words out of my mouth. "He wanted me to promise to kill him if he lost what makes him human." On an abstract level, it went against every tenet of medical ethics and Jewish moral philosophy that I believed in. But I had never been faced with this Kafka-esque scenario of metamorphosis when I did my studies. Did the same rules apply here? Damned if I knew.

"What did you tell him?" Carson asked. I couldn't read the expression on his face.

"I hedged," I said, somewhat disgusted with myself. "I told him we wouldn't let him suffer, and that's true, but I'm not sure what that will actually translate into."

"It really isn't black and white, is it?" Carson asked, again with a tinge of anger in his voice. I flushed, knowing that he was right.

What was becoming an uncomfortable silence was broken by Elizabeth's voice in our earpieces. "This is Weir! We have a security breach, Colonel Sheppard's quarters!"

This was it. We were obviously nearing the endgame. I glanced at Carson, wondering if there was anything we should do. He shook his head slightly, obviously having had the same thought. It was out of our hands now.

We heard Rodney's voice a few minutes later. "Okay, we've got a lock on him."

"That can't be him. It's moving too fast." It was Caldwell, and I suddenly felt cold. If Caldwell was involved, John's chances of surviving an encounter with his own men decreased drastically. I suddenly wondered: had John intended this?

"That's him," said Ronon, speaking from experience.

"All right. Four teams. Surround him and close in. I want him stopped." Was that satisfaction in Caldwell's voice? "And gentlemen – use whatever level force you deem necessary. Move out."

Elizabeth, God bless her, was not going to allow him to blindly order the death of a good man. "You will only use such force as a last resort," she said, quietly but firmly.

"That's not Sheppard anymore." Carson looked stricken at that, and I wordlessly put a hand on his shoulder.

"You heard me." And although Caldwell was technically their commanding officer, it seemed that the men were taking their cues from Elizabeth. I don't think I ever admired her more than at that moment.

We continued to listen as the search teams tracked John. At one point, someone yelled that he was climbing up a wall. Absurdly, I flashed to Tobey Maguire in Spiderman, then remembered that this was unfortunately real. Between John's super speed and wall-climbing abilities and Ford's enhanced strength, we were seeing things that comic book writers had only dreamed of. As far as I was concerned, they were welcome to it; I just wanted our guys back to normal.

We next heard Teyla's anguished plea and the sound of gunfire. "Please – do not make me do this." I thought it was over, but then came the distinctive sound of Ronon's blaster. "Get the doctor down here. I have him."

"Oh, thank God!" Carson exclaimed. He ran out the door, then noticed that I wasn't behind him. "You heard the man, let's go!" Then I followed him, and it seemed as natural as it ever had.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The effects of the stun blast lasted almost until we reached the infirmary. John woke up and started thrashing as we were wheeling him down the last corridor. "Crap!" Carson swore as he vainly attempted to grab one of the flailing arms. Several of the marines helped us get him under control as we ran the last few steps. It took six of us, but we managed to get John into four-point restraints without anyone getting injured.

I really hated seeing John like that. The virus had robbed him of most of his human dignity, and we finished the job. He continued to fight the restraints as the nurses hooked him up to the monitoring equipment. But it wasn't until someone tried to hook up an IV that John became truly violent. He cried out, a strange hissing sound. It took me a minute to realize that he was trying to talk. I wasn't sure how much he understood any more, but I attempted to talk him down. "John, listen to me. It's Steve Schwartz. Carson and I -- we need you to calm down. You're only speeding up your own transformation."

It could have been a coincidence, but John appeared to relax a little. I continued to talk to him as we got the line started and fluids flowing. (I silently thanked anyone who was listening that we were still able to find a vein.) Before long, though, he was struggling again. His heart rate and blood pressure shot up sky high, and one of the restraint cuffs was starting to fray. I looked at Carson. "Barbiturate coma?"

He nodded. "Are you comfortable with calculating the dosage, or do you want me to call one of the anesthesiologists?"

"There isn't time for that." We worked quickly to induce the coma, and I swear I saw a look of relief on John's face just before he fell asleep.

Carson rubbed his eyes again. "I'm going back to the lab. Maybe there's something I overlooked."

I nodded. "I'll stay and keep an eye on the Colonel." Maybe Carson would be able to pull a brilliant idea out from under his kilt, but I wasn't overly optimistic.

TBC