Title: Life Part 3

Author: JeepNY

Category: Sheppard's POV

Spoilers: everything

Disclaimer: Not mine.

SPECIAL NOTE: This is dedicated to my good friend and beta, if it wasn't for her, then this would not be here. hugs

For my rank and years of service, I have been through a lot and defiantly seen a lot of stuff. A lot of it was not so good, but I think, in my own way, I have dealt with it pretty well. I am still here aren't I?

Well that was until I came to Atlantis.

I remember being asked to fly General O'Neill to someplace in Antarctica like it was yesterday. I could do that, for I'd done that kind if thing many times before. No big deal.

Yeah right.

While I was there THIS last time, several somethings that never happened to me before, happened within the sole hour I was out there.

First, I sat in that damned chair, which in non-English promptly said I could do 'special' things. You needed to have some sort of gene, if I remember what Carson said. I thought he was nuts.

A gene?

What kind of a gene?

A special type of new blue jeans?

But when I sat down in that same blasted chair, the whole thing just lit up. It was the oddest feeling in the world. My body just took over and was homed in on controlling whatever this thing was.

Really, all it did was scare me, like nothing had ever done before…

I could not have run back to that chopper any faster then I did that day.

When General O'Neill told me about the details of the expedition, and how he wanted me to go, he said it was especially since I apparently had this 'gene' everyone was talking about.

And where exactly was this expedition?

It was literally in "a galaxy far, far away."

HA!

I thought they were all nuts.

And the second person I saw…well…really saw…was the person I am sure you can pick up on just who that was…

I met this other person, this woman there. She took charge, was very diplomatic, something that I might say, I could be better at. But that's a whole different story all together.

She was beautiful, and smart. Dr. Elizabeth Weir. She was the one who talked me into really going.

She was the reason.

I was all set to head back with the General and not look back.

But, then, I got this phone call after we returned to the base, and she single-handedly talked me into it. There was no way I could refuse her plea for me to join her…them…on the mission. Just the lull of her voice and the need in her voice was all I needed to be practically sold.

Yep. I had gone over the edge right then and there.

Already, I knew we would become fast friends. I knew that I would do anything to protect her, even it if meant putting my life on the line. I did not care; if she was alive, then that'd be all that really mattered.

XXXX

She is more important to this place that I ever was, and her life is the one that matters.

Sad, huh? I don't think she even returns the feelings really. I mean, after the last few things that have happened around here, there have been signs that she does, but then they are gone just like that, and I am left doubting that those signs ever really existed in the first place.

But in the beginning, I know that it was all one sided. It had to of been right?

When the Wraith were in the city last…oh about a few months ago, we were trying to wait out for the Daedalus; we had the idea to use the chair in the defense…and when I sat in it to fly the jumper…

Well, let's just say that it didn't work, and leave it at that, shall we?

I was up and out of that chair before my brain could really kick in. It was like my body knew what it had to do before I did.

Save Atlantis. Save her.

That is really what it all was about anyway. Atlantis. Hell! This whole expedition. It was always about her.

I knew where she would be when I made my way up to the jumper bay. I also knew there was no other way to get there then through the control room. I just had to see her one last time.

I could tell by the look on her face that she did not want me to. I did not want to leave her either, but I had to go. I was the only one to fly that jumper into the hive ship.

And she knew it.

God that last look she gave me, if we were not impending doom, I would have taken that as a sign and not run in the other direction.

I thought I was as good as dead at that point when I entered the hive ship. When I heard Colonel Caldwell's voice come over the radio asking me to de-cloak? You have no idea how happy I was.

I could go home.

It was funny, I actually thought about how I was going to radio back to Atlantis. Some sort of funny, off-the-cuff comment? Or should I just have Colonel Caldwell make the call?

But then again, I knew I had to.

I could see Elizabeth's face in my mind right then, could hear the surprise in her voice.

The happiness.

The joy.

The…I'm not sure what. I know what I want it to be.

But…

XXXX

After the ships were destroyed and Caldwell sent some more troops and myself back down to secure Atlantis, the moment I saw you walking down the stairs towards me, I didn't know what to think, do, or say.

What I wanted to do was hold you. I wanted to hold on tight and never let you go. I wanted to tell you that I was sorry, that I would never do anything like that again. Which would probably be a lie, but it is the truth in a distorted kind of way.

But, I was not sure if that was what you wanted, and I was definitely not going to push the situation.

Then, you had stopped right there in front of me, smiling that smile of yours, only it's bigger, much bigger this time, rested your hands on my arms, and told me I was home.

Home. I did not know there was such a deep meaning in that one word. I had never really had a home before Atlantis, before you.

And then you wrapped your arms around me. I was so surprised by that that I missed a few seconds where I could have actually returned the feeling.

Then, there was that weird, tingly feeling behind your actions that went shooting through me at the close contact. There was no other way to explain it really. It was like I could feel what you felt, what you thought.

All I wanted to do right then is take you somewhere and…

Well that's not exactly what I wanted to do right then and there, but… Seriously all I wanted to do is go somewhere quiet and maybe talk to you about this, because I really don't want to go through the idea of losing you again.

I can't explain how scared I was when I thought you did not get the shields up, and Atlantis had become target practice for all those Wraith darts. In those few seconds of not knowing for sure, I think my heart stopped half a million times.

We have to stop doing that to each other…There has to be a way for me to find the courage to walk up to you and just ask you to sit somewhere, so we could talk, alone, with no interruptions.

There is nothing I want more then to just be with you in every since of the word.

Help me…please?