A/N: Thank you for all the reviews! You have no idea how much they mean. And as for Aurora... Brad Wright, if you're listening, I'll forego suing you if you'll make me a staff writer? No? Freelance? Pretty please? What about the coffee girl?...

Oh well. It was good episode though. And didn't McKay and Sheppard look mighty fine in those uniforms!

Chapter Eighteen - Reason

They were back in the white space of earlier. McKay still looked shaken, but his fear seemed mixed with anger, and he paced a small spot on the floor, muttering fiercely beneath his breath. Teyla and Ford stood together, seeming pale and nervous, and Sheppard found himself repeatedly looking in their direction, confirming to his confused mind that they were still alive.

"Sorry," he offered, weakly.

Teyla lifted her gaze to him and shook her head. "That was not your fault."

"We shouldn't have split up."

"It wouldn't have made any difference," McKay said, sounding exhausted. "The outcome would have been the same, the computer makes sure of that."

"Why?" Ford demanded. "I don't get it. One minute we're walking down a street in Afghanistan and the next…" He paused, looking distinctly ill.

"There's always a problem," McKay muttered, resuming his pacing. "Damn Ancients couldn't build something that actually works like it's supposed to. Gods are supposed to be infallible. Why the hell anyone thought to worship these morons…"

"McKay," Sheppard interrupted. "Not helping." He scrubbed a hand through his hair roughly, turning away from his team, fighting a sudden desire for privacy.

"I can't keep doing this." Aiden's voice was quiet. "Sorry, sir, but I can't."

"No." He shook his head. "We'll figure this out. I just… need a minute." His throat burned, his fingers twitching spasmodically at his sides. He took several steps forward, giving in to the compulsion to hide, to seek his own space. The white space opened up before him, his feet silent against the invisible floor. Despite the infinite size of the room, he felt claustrophobic, as though slammed into a tiny corner of the space. Tiny and insignificant. He kept walking, struggling to release some of the tension trapped in his chest.

Inevitably, he was followed.

"What was all that about?"

Sheppard turned sharply, and snapped back: "Drop it, McKay."

"No." The scientist tilted his chin up. "I died back there, you'd think that would give me disclosure rights."

"Drop it," he repeated, warningly.

"No." McKay's hand reached out to grab his arm and Sheppard pulled back, violently, sharp enough to see thinly concealed hurt in his friend's eyes.

"You don't get it," Sheppard shot at him, struggling to keep his voice down to a whisper. Twenty meters away Ford was sitting on the floor, Teyla crouched beside him. They seemed not to hear him. "You and Elizabeth, none of you civilians. It's different as a soldier."

"Ford's a –" McKay started, but he waved a hand to cut him off.

"Ford's not old enough to have," he fumbled over the words, and cursed himself, "to have lost a man."

Then Sheppard turned his back, knotting his shoulders, every muscle in his body tense. "A good soldier doesn't make the best human being, McKay."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

He took a breath. "It means that I can't think like you, alright? Not me or Bates and not Ford, eventually. If you're to survive, you have to rely on your team, because that's the only real thing that stands between you and the enemy. But that doesn't mean…"

You form ties, share names. Talk about Dave's family, his girlfriend, what he's gonna call his kids, the last game he watched, give him a nickname, joke about what he'll do when he's back home. Then the next moment you've got Dave's brains all over your hands and you're lucky if there's enough to bring back to bury.

He decided to change tactic, taking another breath and it feeling it hot against his lungs. "Compartmentalize, the first rule of warfare."

McKay was staring at him. Sheppard could feel the other man's eyes on his back but he couldn't bring himself to turn, to face the pity on the scientist's face. "Make up, break up, move on." He echoed the words of his first CO, softly.

There was a short silence, and then McKay spoke, his voice barely audible. "Wipe down the blood and forget about it, right?" Then his tone shifted, became hard and coldly angry. "Because I wouldn't know a thing about that."

Sheppard still couldn't face him, finding great fascination with the floor.

"It's not like Gaul and Abrams counted."

He cursed inwardly, and looked up to find McKay hatefully glaring at him.

"The martyr complex is getting real old, Major. Pretty damn selfish too."

Sheppard struggled for a moment, still seeing McKay's lifeless eyes staring up at him, still feeling his friend's warm blood soak his pant legs. Rodney glared at him, hatefully…

Deservedly, he thought.

"Bastard."

He flinched, and corrected himself. Okay, maybe he's not entirely just angry with me.

McKay was still glaring at him, as though daring a response. Sheppard considered the s-word, the pithy apology, but suspected had he voiced it, it might result in a fist, and he wouldn't be able to assign blame.

So he deflated. "Yeah. Quite probably." Then added: "I can think of a whole host of other names too, if you want. And I'm sure you can add a few in Ancient."

The physicist pulled back a little, some of the rage dissipating into confusion. "Major…" He paused, then continued in a rush: "Don't assume that the color of your uniform picks you out of the crowd. It doesn't."

"Never said it did," Sheppard objected, petulantly, but he was ignored.

"Everyone in Atlantis is in the same position."

That little fortune cookie surprised him. "You figure that out?"

McKay shrugged, sheepishly. "Elizabeth, actually." He flicked his gaze up to meet his friend's. "More astute than you are."

"Wouldn't take much effort," Sheppard joked, but McKay didn't rise to it, and he sobered quickly. "So I'm not alone in the boat."

"No. It's pretty crowded, actually."

"Right." He glanced again at Ford and Teyla, sat watching them from a distance, nervously. "I never, ah, Gaul… you're okay?"

"I'm compartmentalizing," the scientist responded, tightly.

Sheppard released a snorted laugh. "We should write a guide book."

"It'd be an Atlantean best seller."

"Heightmeyer would kill us," he added.

"Still less painful." McKay looked at him for a moment, then turned away, moving back to Ford and Teyla.

"Major." Teyla looked towards them, her face full of concern. "You are alright?"

"Yeah. Just want an end to this, that's all."

"Me too," Ford muttered, weakly.

Sheppard followed McKay, watching him closely and feeling hopeful. "You got a way out of here?"

His friend tensed, clearly having flashbacks of his own. "Don't…" McKay took a deep breath, clearly forcing himself to uncoil. "I need more information, Major. Despite what you might think, I'm not a miracle worker."

He nudged the scientist gently in the ribs. "You'll figure it out."

"Maybe."

His voice held a note of uncertainty that pained Sheppard. Taking a deep breath, and forcing the sound of weapons fire out of his head, he asked: "What's the third rule, McKay?"

Rodney's head shot up. "What?"

"Before we…" He paused, and corrected himself: "Before, when we were talking about what might have caused the computer to act like this, you mentioned the third rule."

McKay shook his head, looking muddled. "I don't remember."

He growled, taking a step forward. "Dammit, McKay, you were practically shouting eureka! Something about the power failure, and not being able to leave."

"Try, Doctor McKay," Teyla said, softly.

For a second he saw only confusion in the scientist's eyes, but this cleared after a moment, McKay's expression lifting. "A robot must protect itself so long as it does not contradict the first or second law."

Ford looked as blank as Sheppard felt. "What?"

"The computer is designed to protect itself." He clicked his fingers rapidly, gesturing at the air. "It sustains and protects itself as long as it doesn't put the lives of the occupants at risk."

Sheppard shook his head, feeling no more enlightened. "McKay, English please?"

The scientist gave an infuriated sigh. "The AI is designed to learn from the memories of the people in it, to design new scenarios. Through them, it learns everything." He paused, pointedly, but when there were no responses he continued irritably: "That includes what will happen when the time comes for the players to wake up."

"The game will end," Ford said, frowning.

"And the computer will have fulfilled its purpose. There won't be a need for it anymore, it will be shut down, dismantled, used for spare parts. But," he lifted a finger, "the computer has been programmed to protect itself. No matter what."

"So it traps people within it?" Teyla asked. "Does that not contravene the first law, the fail safe?"

Sheppard was beginning to feel a sense of dread. "But as long as they're in the game, they're safe. They're still alive."

"Exactly." McKay grinned triumphantly. "The reason the computer won't allow anyone to exit the game is because it knows when it does, it will have served its purpose and be switched off. Permanently."

"So the system's gone haywire?" Ford asked.

"No. It's behaving exactly as it was programmed to do; protect the players, obey the instructions, and sustain itself." The physicist pulled his face into a look of disgust. "Of course, given that the system is no more refined than a pocket calculator, it can't cope with any new problems, like the power crisis. So the only way to…"

He cut off abruptly, taking a step back and closing his eyes, screwing up his face in an intense look of concentration. Confused, Sheppard blinked for several seconds, watching McKay stand perfectly still and mutter to himself.

"Uh, Rodney?"

"I'm thinking," came back the terse response.

"I can see that," he drawled, "but care to let us in?"

The scientist opened his eyes and glared at Sheppard. "You've got the strongest gene, that's why you're the only one who can pull out of the game and return us to the OS. Call up the guide."

"I thought he was a pocket calculator?"

McKay rolled his eyes. "Yes, he is, but he's still useful. Just do it, alright?"

Sheppard shrugged, and thought 'menu.'

There was a very quiet crackle, like the fizz of static, and then a dot appeared on the horizon. Sheppard blinked, and it disappeared, only to reappear a second later as the guide, fully sized and dressed in the same cream robes as earlier. It even had the same beatific smile fixed on its face.

"Greetings." The guide dipped his head in greeting, his hands clasped together. "You wish to change a playing option?"

Sheppard raised an eyebrow skeptically. "We've tried this before, McKay."

"I know that," the scientist snapped, "but we weren't using the proper language." He turned to the hologram. "What was your intended purpose?"

"The game was designed to entertain the players during their sleep. By using the memories of the participants…"

"Right, right. But we're not asleep."

The entity blinked slowly. "You are in the game."

McKay huffed, exasperated. "We know that. Look, there are many ways in which a person can play, right? As an individual, or as part of a group. But the stasis chambers aren't interconnected, are they?"

The guide shook his head. "Each capsule provides a single environment for its occupant."

"But there are rooms in which a group can play together?"

"Yes. Up to eight people can share the same space. They are placed into an artificial state of sleep. The room then generates a complex wave form of…"

"Yes," McKay interrupted quickly, waving a dismissive hand. "We know."

Ford looked from the scientist to the hologram. "Doc, no offence, but shouldn't we find out how the Ancients did it?"

"It's not important."

"It seems pretty important," Sheppard said, pointedly.

McKay glared at him. "Look, Major, you said you wanted out of here, well I'm trying to do just that, but the process would be a hell of a lot quicker if you'd keep your dumber comments to yourself, alright?"

Sheppard opened his mouth to snap back, but the scientist had already turned his attention back to the hologram.

"The group rooms, do they have any life-support?"

The hologram frowned. "They are connected to the outpost's supply of fresh oxygen and…"

"Not what I mean," McKay interrupted. "Dammit, you'd think the Ancients could have programmed you with better language skills than a Labrador. Look, are the lives of the players within a game room sustained longer than they would be usually? Are they kept in a prolonged state of hibernation, like the individual chambers keep their occupants?"

Sheppard watched McKay's interrogation of the hologram intensely, his brief anger forgotten, starting to feel a glimmer of hope.

"No," the guide stated. "Only the sleeping chambers can sustain a player's life."

"So," McKay said, clearly frustrated at having to speak so slowly when he was on the cusp of achieving his goal, "what happens when a player, when a group of players is trapped in a game without the support of a sleeping chamber?"

The guide smiled stupidly. "That is not possible."

"It is," Teyla said, firmly. "We entered the game in such a manner."

"That is not possible," it repeated.

"Yes," Sheppard snapped angrily, taking a step forward. "It is. Check your sensors, your records, whatever the hell you use to keep track of things outside of here! Something's gone wrong and we are trapped, whether you choose to believe it or not!"

The guide frowned, its visage flickering briefly. Sheppard watched its reaction closely, curling his hands into fists and fighting the urge to throttle the smug smile out of the hologram.

"Well?"

It lifted its head and blinked. "You are in the group gaming room."

"Thank you!" McKay crowed, throwing up his hands. "Finally we have progress."

"Your lives are not being sustained."

"No," Ford said, deliberately, "they're not."

"Our physical forms lie in the room waiting for us," Teyla explained.

"And they'll die if we don't wake up," McKay added. "We'll die. No food, no water - we'll starve to death in days. Our bodies need all those things!"

"The lives of the players must be sustained."

"Not to mention that I drank a lot of coffee this morning and I imagine that my body really needs to go…"

"He gets it," Sheppard interrupted quickly, with a grimace. He studied the hologram. "You do, right?"

The smile had finally vanished from the guide's face, and had been replaced by an odd, slightly quizzical expression. "You are in the group gaming room. Your bodies are not being sustained."

"Right." McKay took a deep breath. "So you have to let us out of here."

"You must finish the game to…"

"Then let us finish!" Sheppard shot back. "Take us to the last level, whatever the hell you have to do to beat this thing!"

Ford visibly paled, glancing back towards his CO. "With all due respect sir, are you sure?"

"The final level will be…" Teyla hesitated. "It will not be pleasant."

"Neither is this," Sheppard responded, grimly. "If this is the only way to end this without risking the game killing us, then I think we should do it."

McKay winced, but admitted: "I agree. I'd rather get this over with than be stuck here indefinitely while my body starves to death."

"You wish to skip to the final level?" the guide asked, politely.

"Yes."

It seemed to hesitate, the first real sign of confusion since it had first appeared to greet them. "You will leave the game."

"It's either that or we die," McKay said, simply. "But you're designed to protect the players."

"Yes…"

"So protect us."

The hologram flickered again, then nodded. "You will begin the final level."

"Group playing," Sheppard said, quickly.

"As a group," it agreed. "If any of the players fail the level then the whole group will be returned to its previous position within the game."

"We've got it," Ford said, although he sounded less than confident, glancing nervously between the hologram and his teammates.

"Very well." The guide pressed his hands together and bowed slightly from the waist. "Then you can begin."

And it disappeared.