Disclaimers etc. in chapter 1

Author's Note: Well, here it is - last chapter. I was a little disappointed with it, but I wrote the whole story in a few hours one afternoon, so I guess I shouldn't expect it to be wonderful. Still, I present it to you. Oh, and once again, I don't know why the bad guy had to be Simon - I really don't hate him or anything.

Thank you to everyone for your reviews - I get so excited when I get an email from I'm definitely hooked on this fic thing now. :D

Elizabeth stared at John in shock. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry. She'd dragged out every embarrassing story from her life, paraded them in front of this stranger, and completely avoided the topic of her camping trip with Simon and the werewolf bite that changed her life forever, and then he blurted that out?

Well, if he could be matter of fact about it, so could she. "Yeah, me too," she said.

Now it was John's turn to be shocked. He hadn't really expected a positive answer. In fact, he'd almost expected her to laugh at him, treat it like a joke. "Oh," he said. Then, gathering his wits, he added, "I guess that's why we're a matched set, then."

"Yes," Elizabeth said, watching him warily.

They stared at each other for a few minutes, and the connection, the electricity, whatever it was between them, suddenly flared up. It had faded into the background as they spoke, but with their silence in redoubled in force. Elizabeth drew in a sharp breath, and John's eyes widened.

"So that explains the..." he trailed off.

"You feel it too?"

He nodded. "Since the lobby, day before yesterday."

"Me too." They were whispering now, as if afraid to disturb the air between them.

John was suddenly reminded of how naked they both were, and he shifted uncomfortably on the straw. Now was not the time to notice how good she looked, especially when he couldn't really hide his reaction.

Her gaze dropped briefly from his, down his body, and then snapped back to his eyes. The silence stretched, became awkward, and he was about to speak, to say anything to break it, when the door opened again.

Simon entered, still smiling. "It's nearly moonrise, my pets," he said pleasantly.

John turned to look at him. Well, Simon's appearance took care of one problem, he thought as his attention left Elizabeth's body. But it t brought that whole "kidnapped-by-a-psycho" thing to the fore again. His movement attracted Simon's attention.

With a clinical gaze (hadn't Elizabeth said he was a doctor?) he assessed John's body. "Well, you certainly keep fit. Are you in politics, too? When do you find the time to work out? Elizabeth never did, as you can tell."

John refrained from stating that workouts or not, Elizabeth looked just fine to him, and settled for glaring at Simon.

Simon smiled back at him, then turned his attention to Elizabeth. "I'm going to unlock you now, okay? But don't think about trying anything – I have my other pet ready to stop you if you do."

For the first time, John noticed the girl – girl? – standing in the doorway. At first glance, she looked like any other blond young woman, but something struck John as odd, as if she were not entirely human. She wore a silver bracelet on one wrist and carried a dart gun in on hand.

He was vaguely aware of Elizabeth trying to reason with Simon in the background, but he kept his attention on the girl. She stared dully back. Was she a willing participant? Simon had called her his pet, but then he'd called Elizabeth and John that as well. If she didn't want to serve Simon, maybe she would help them. He tried to pour a message of hope into his eyes, wishing she would read it there, afraid that doing more, moving, would attract his captor's attention.

Her eyes widened slightly, and she glanced briefly at Simon's back, before returning her gaze to John's. Yes, he thought hope flaring briefly. Somehow he was getting through to her. He had to keep trying.

He probably would have succeeded if Elizabeth hadn't cried out just then in pain.

Elizabeth kept up a running monologue as Simon approached her, hoping to reach the man he had been when he was dating her. Once or twice, as she brought up events of their shared past, she thought he faltered. If only the old Simon would appear – she could probably try to negotiate better accommodations or something they could use to escape. Maybe he would do something careless enough to give herself or John an advantage. But every time she thought she saw a flicker of the old Simon, he disappeared just as quickly.

Then she made the fatal mistake. She mentioned their camping trip, and how she wished things could have worked out after that. Simon was at her side in an instant.

"Yes," he said. "That's when I knew I had better things to collect. You were bitten by that thing, and suddenly I knew. There was a whole world of animals out there for me to collect, and no one had ever done so before. So I began to research. And did you know there are other wereanimals? I discovered secrets and stories. I started small – rats and hamsters and such. Can you imagine? Wererats and werehamsters! How lucky we are, living in a world where such things are possible! Then I moved on. I discovered that there were worlds out there, worlds we never knew about. I'd be the first to collect creatures from there, creatures like my pet back there.

But I always knew you'd be my crowning achievement. You would make my collection complete. I just had to wait until your match came along. One male, one female of each species. A perfectly complete set."

The look on his face told Elizabeth the Simon she knew was gone forever. Still, she couldn't help giving it one last try. "Simon, you don't have to – aah!" While she spoke he'd slipped a cuff over one wrist.

It burned! She clawed desperately at it with her other hand as Simon bent to unchain her legs. He looked up at her with pity in his eyes. "Silver, my pet. Very bad for werewolves, I'm told. Be good and I'll take it off once I get you in the other room."

Behind him John was lunging against his chains, growling. Elizabeth's cry of pain seemed to have sparked the wolf in him a bit early. Simon glanced uneasily at him, but spoke in that same maddeningly calm voice. "Don't worry, pet. I've got a separate cage for you, too."

At that, John redoubled his efforts. Elizabeth continued to pry at the cuff, trying to hold in the sobs that wanted to escape. This was worse than anything she'd ever experienced. She would die if it didn't stop!

A sudden weight against her leg made her look up. The girl by the door had moved closer, stopping just outside the cage. Looking down, Elizabeth noticed Simon crumpled at her feet, a tufted dart sticking out of his rear end.

John had stopped growling and was watching the girl warily. She moved into the cage slightly, reaching for Simon's pockets. She came up with a key, and moved towards John's chains.

"No," he growled. She stopped, startled. "Leave them." She nodded and turned to Elizabeth, who was gripping her wrist as tears of pain trailed down her face.

"Don't unlock her!" John barked out. "Just get the damn bracelet off!" The girl nodded again, and pried the cuff off. Dropping to her knees, Elizabeth gasped in relief, then looked up at him.

He noticed that her pupils had dilated. He could see the humanity slowly draining out of her, and he knew the same thing was happening to him.

The girl with the key looked down at Elizabeth's bracelet, then at her own. She seemed to think about it for a moment, then began to pry the silver circle from her own arm. Finally she held both of them in one palm, contemplating them. Suddenly, she threw them violently across the room.

She started to leave, but halted at John's command. "Take him," he said, nodding at Simon's prone body. He was hungry, starving even, but there was still enough of a man in him not to want to eat a fellow human being. If Simon stayed in the cage, he knew he and Elizabeth would tear e "Lock him up. Then shut the door, and don't come back until morning."

The girl slipped back into the cage and grasped Simon's body by one ankle. Dragging him as effortlessly as if he were an empty cloth sack, she pulled him out and shut the cage door behind her. At the door to the room, she paused and looked back once, before closing it and locking them in.

In front of him, Elizabeth was nearly entirely wolf now. John could sense that he was the same. He kept his eyes glued to hers as his last shred of humanity slipped away.

When John awoke the next morning, he knew instantly that he wasn't alone. He turned his head on the straw and saw Elizabeth staring back at him.

"Morning," he whispered.

"Morning," she replied.

"Yeah, morning," a third voice said, and at that John looked up.

Jack O'Neill stood outside their cage, grinning back at them. "So," he drawled. "I take it she's the reason you've been AWOL these last few nights?"

Elizabeth seemed about to retort to that, when she realized that she was still naked. Instead she burrowed into the straw. Let John deal with this.

"Not exactly," John replied, glancing over at her and thinking that he wished that were true.

"I suppose the 'exactly' involves those people who were locked in cages out there, and the unconscious guy this one wouldn't let us free?"

It was then that John noticed the otherworldly girl standing quietly behind Jack. She stepped forward, handing Jack a key, and the older man proceeded to undo their restraints. He continued speaking as he did so.

"Yeah, she wouldn't let anyone near that cage, and then local law enforcement showed up. Turns out he's wanted for three murders in Virginia. He sucks at covering his tracks – it was easy enough to find you two."

As he finished talking, he opened the last of Elizabeth's chains. Sticking out his hand, he introduced himself. "Jack O'Neill."

Elizabeth stared up at him. She was lying here buck naked in the middle of a cage and he wanted to shake hands? The absurdity of the situation struck her, and she burst into hysterical laughter.

"I'm... I'm sorry," she gasped when she finally finished. She gave Jack her hand. "Elizabeth Weir."

Jack smiled at her, and Elizabeth realized that despite his grey hair, he was still a very attractive man. Then John shifted slightly, drawing her attention, and she decided that attractive or not, Jack O'Neill couldn't hold a candle to John Sheppard. She was stuck stark naked in a room with two attractive men, she thought, and she blushed.

Jack seemed to understand the reason for the blush. "I was poking around earlier, waiting for you guys to wake up, and found some clothes in that closet thing there," he said, gesturing to the wardrobe. "I'll leave you two alone to get dressed, and then we'll talk." When John's stomach growled, Jack grinned. "And eat." With that, he let himself out, closing the door firmly behind him.

Elizabeth avoided John's eyes as they made their way over to the wardrobe. It contained a selection of men's and women's clothing, including underwear and bras. Nothing was in her size, Elizabeth noted. Their own clothing was nowhere to be found, however, so they made do as best they could.

The bra was a bit too small and the pants a bit too loose, but all in all it wasn't bad, Elizabeth thought as she buttoned up her shirt. She looked up a John, who was pulling a sweatshirt over his head.

"So," she said.

"So," he replied.

She looked back at the cage, and shivered slightly, then turned to face John again. "It's over."

No, he thought, as he looked into her eyes –eyes of the only other werewolf he'd ever met, eyes that called to him – and took her hand in his as they walked from the room. It's just beginning.

Author's Note 2: Yeah, so I feel like it's a bit anticlimactic, but I couldn't figure out how to fix it right away, so I just... didn't. Maybe I'll go back sometime and work on it, but in the mean time, I've got another fic burning away in my head, and I'm going to work on that. I won't post it until it's all done, though, so don't hold your breath. However - snippits might appear in my LJ - username "lamichelle"