Chapter 4

Cadman made an executive decision: evacuate everyone from the city/ship. The Advisory Body agreed. The damage to their relationship was already done. Their attitude drastically changed towards the visiting Atlanteans. Gone was the enthusiastic welcome, in its place was suspicion and mistrust. Even with that, the evacuation was an easy sell. They knew they needed the help and saw the futility of staying. She gave them credit for delaying the blame game.

Her team that had gone to the Dormi chamber returned and reported, "No go sir. We don't know if anyone's still in there. We tried contacting them on the radios, but no answer. We don't even know if C-4 would open it. We tried. We set it up and retreated to a safe distance down the corridor. Nothing happened. When we returned; the C-4 was gone."

"Thank you sergeant." Cadman weighed her one and only option. "Take your team and help the Thack'eeryn to evac out, except you airman. I have another job for you. I'm afraid the Colonel and his team are on their own until we can secure the safety of the civilians."

The sergeant saluted and returned to the ship. She turned to the lone remaining airman. "Go to the Gate and contact Dr. Weir to update her. We need back-up. If you can't establish a radio link or the IDC doesn't work then come back here and help."

"Yes sir." The airman took off down the well-worn path.

She watched him go and turned back to the city. For better or worse, this was their responsibility. It was going to take all of Dr. Weir's diplomatic skills to smooth this one over. She walked back to the Advisory Body's adobe style building on top of the fake hill. The ground reverberated from the ship powering up. She was hoping that a ship this size took a while to completely prepare itself for departure. All they had to do now was get all two thousand Thack'eeryn far enough away before their home left and that would take awhile.

She looked at the defunct Puddle Jumper on her way. McKay and Sheppard were going to kill her for leaving their baby parked on top of the ship. She hoped to get the chance to hear McKay's shrill reprimand.

"Cadman! When you park a Jumper, don't let the pilot park it on top of a space ship that could possibly take off! They don't grow on trees you know. Always park in a different local than the inhabitants."

She smiled cynically and thought, whoops. She took a deep breath and went to meet with the Advisory Body. Time to go wreck some lives.

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"Orodi, you said yourself that he is integral. Your anger is misplaced." She felt the pressure from that manifested anger crushing her into the wall. "Let him be…please."

Orodi glowered at her. "Nothing but bastard children who think they can be arbiters," he verbally struck. However, he stood straight, closed his soulless eyes and relaxed. The pressure disappeared. She watched as Sheppard slumped in the slightly reclined chair. His head lolled to the side and his arms slipped off the rests. Orodi returned to the view screen and studied the controls. His shoulders rotated under the coat as he tried to further calm himself.

A sigh of relief passed her lips. Her view of Sheppard was unobstructed. He reminded her of her beloved Rel when Halling and Joss returned with him through the Gate. The limpness of the arms and the slackness of the jaw were unnerving. She had seen death so many other times and knew the Colonel was only unconscious but the similarity to death was too close on this day. It would not have ordinarily bothered her except that everything reminded her of her intended's death right now. She wished she had her sticks to club Orodi over the head.

To her people, death by the Wraith- expected. Death by the hunt- accepted. Death by a known trading partner over a foolish dispute- unexpected and unacceptable. The most disappointing thing was that Rel had not been completely innocent.

He had pointed out a discrepancy in the amount of grain they received to what they had paid in fresh meat. Rel had never been a tactful negotiator. He was successful though and this time should not have been any different. Halling reported that he called the man everything but a thief. And then he called him that.

The two men stared at each other but Rel could not keep his mouth shut. He leveled the final insult and compared the partner to a Wraith. The man drew a knife. Rel was a skilled fighter and drew his. The other man had many associates at the meeting and the Athosians were outnumbered. Halling said they barely escaped when Rel, protecting their retreat, caught the knife in his heart. When they exited the Gate, it might as well have been hers.

Now she was stuck in this place again. Each man on her team had a little something that reminded her of Rel. She had cherished it until today. She turned her eyes away from Sheppard to regain her composure. She had met this challenge before and she would do so again.

When her eyes returned to the Colonel, he twitched. His eyes raced under his lids. She glared at Orodi but his attention was not on the Colonel. Whatever was happening, he was not causing it.

"Your people are not his."

She jumped at the sound of Orodi's voice even though she was watching him. "What?"

"Your people are not his." Orodi left the console and squatted in front of her waiting for an answer.

She decided to test her theory. I am Athosian and he is from another planet, she thought.

He continued to stare at her. The stare turned into a scowl. She answered him out loud. "I am Athosian and he his from another planet." She smiled gracefully at him. "His people and ours are partners in the fight against the Wraith. We have learned much from each other. You could learn..."

"Nice try little sister, but I need nothing from you except your part in my plan."

Then you are foolish. She returned her attention back to the Colonel.

Orodi did the same. He shook his head violently and spat, "What are you doing?" He moved with such speed, Teyla's eyes could not track him. He grabbed Sheppard by the shoulders straps on his vest and aggressively yanked him from the chair. "You will follow orders!" Orodi yelled at the view screen this time.

Teyla scanned the interior of the room with awe and let out a small breath. McKay was right.

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"Class! Class! It's story time," Mrs. McCallum said as she clapped her hands and pointed to the area in front of her chair. She usually had a rocking chair but this chair looked like a fancy dentist's chair instead. It was daunting to a second grader.

"Today we have a storyteller. Her name is Tempest. Let's give her your undivided attention. Seats on the floor, eyes on her, and mouths quiet." Mrs. McCallum waved at the classroom door after everyone settled. A short, rotund, gray-haired lady entered the room. She smiled that grandmotherly smile. The one where they offer you chocolate chip cookies and milk and you greedily accept them.

"Thank you Mrs. McCallum," she said in a robust yet scratchy voice. That smile remained and gave the impression it was only for him. "I will tell you a story that happened many eons ago. It is about a race of scholars that met a greedy enemy. This race discovered how to live outside of time and manipulate it to come and go as they pleased. You should know they are not omnipotent or omniscient just very clever and very advanced."

"This race travels the Universe in great living ships who share in this temporal knowledge. Together they study the end and the beginning. They travel through the vast middle as civilizations fall, start, decay, and flourish. Always the scholars, never interfering. The ships, always there and sharing in each discovery, carry no weapons and hold no natural defenses except for their speed. There is no need. They have no enemies."

"One day…" The storyteller paused and walked carefully through the seated children. All eyes followed her as she stopped in front of him. "One day, a pair of this great race met the greedy. Ones who would steal life instead of living it. Murder in the name of self-preservation and hunger. This beautiful couple stood on a planet with a life form new to this galaxy. This life form had been observed on a planet far away. They had to study them. They had to find out how they came to be in this galaxy. From the sky came the greedy and craven race who attacked and extinguished many of this life form without warning. They took until only a few remained."

Her pale blue eyes bored into him. "John, they observed as they had always done. Intervening in the natural order never occurred to them. That is until it was time to return to the great ship. This greedy and craven race was upon them before they could step off the planet. The greedy could conceal themselves from them. Their thoughts hidden until too late the couple realized this."

"Too late it indeed was. The greedy killed the adored wife of the Captain. With a single, reactive thought, the Captain killed the greedy that surrounded them. He escaped back to his ship with her hollowed out corpse. Not one of their race had died in many eons; he knew not how to handle the death of his own adored. His grief and anguish turned to anger and hatred. The ship pleaded with him to leave this place and time, to return to the Plein and maybe they could help. The Captain would not listen."

The storyteller turned in a circle to view all the children. "The Captain let his sorrow and his rage control him. He sought out all the heartbeats of any living thing in the solar system that way he would not miss any of the greedy.He not only extinguished them, but he obliterated them all. It was an action he could not take back. And in his moment of weakness, he discovered another great race concealing themselves from their enemy. Their cries of agony filled his mind. He only sought signs of life. He did not differentiate one from another when he destroyed them all."

"From this one action, guilt formed leaving him bereft of satisfaction. What is done cannot always be undone. Time adjusts itself and moves on. He would rectify his mistake by studying the other great race. He studied their outpost hidden on another planet in the solar system. He incorporated their technology into his great ship. Again, the ship begged for him to return to the Plein, to go home. Still he would not listen. He continued his quest to eradicate the greedy. His plan was to offer the use of the great ship to this advanced race, to make her a ship of war. She could not allow this to happen. It was not her kind's way."

"For the first time in their combined history, a ship (as is her right) disagreed with her captain. But without his order to return home, she would have to wait. She has the right to disagree just not to disobey; she came up with her own plan. During his rest cycle, the ship let her captain remain asleep. She settled on a planet and became a safe haven from the greedy to the life forms that eventually lived there. She was at peace."

Shouting from the hallway outside the classroom interrupted Tempest. All heads turned to see an enraged face appear in the window of the door. John thought for a moment it was his dad. However, his dad was not pink.

"My time is up I fear," lamented the storyteller. "Until next time John."

The door flew open as the woman vanished. The pink father gripped him by the shirt and held him up to his face. "She meddles where none is needed."

He woke up to that pink face while it still clutched him by the front of his vest. His hands clasped the wrists that effortlessly suspended him in air. "Solar you will mind your own business!" The pink face called out to the ceiling.

Orodi allowed John's feet to touch the floor and forcibly pushed him backwards towards the wall and Teyla. Orodi let go and he crumpled to the base of the wall. He clumsily pushed himself to a seated position with a little help from Teyla. Still groggy, he looked up at the Captain, "I understand."

It was the wrong thing to say.

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A/N: I know, a little long winded cheese. Just hope it's not Limberger. Thanks for all the feedback!