Part 17 – Truth hurts
Atlantis, the present day
McKay looked up, caught Sheppard's eyes and held them in an angry glare. "I'd given up. I'd made up my mind that I had to make the most of where I was and I was trying to make myself hate you for what you'd done, for leaving me behind." Sheppard winced but his eyes did not falter and he calmly met McKay's anger.
"I'm sorry about what happened, McKay," he spoke slowly, quietly and deliberately. "We sent a team back for you and found the puddle jumper under the ice, we assumed that…."
McKay raised his hand cutting off Sheppard's apology, explanation whatever it was.
"Don't, Sheppard. I don't want to hear it yet. Let me tell you what Sora told me. What they did."
The Genii home world, five weeks ago
He started slightly and turned to look at her confusion all over his face.
"What? Why not? Isn't that what you've been working for all this time? That I accept my place is here? That I'm one of you?"
She stared deeply into his eyes and carried on speaking in an urgent whisper, "You only think that way because we have forced you to. Please try to stay calm, we don't have long to speak here and this is about the only place I can be sure that no-one is listening but we can't stay for too long. You need to listen to me, Rodney."
His eyes never leaving hers he nodded slowly.
"You mustn't give in, Rodney. Your friends did not leave you behind – we found you before they could get back to you and we faked your death."
He suddenly went still. His heart was pounding in his chest. "They didn't leave me behind?" his voice was suddenly full of hope. The resignation, defeat and acceptance of his fate suddenly fell aside and then suspicion came crashing in.
"And you are telling me this now? Why? Why didn't you tell me before?" He could feel his temper rising.
"Keep your voice down!" hissed Sora. "I have been trying to get us somewhere we could talk for weeks, this is one of the few places we can so shut up and listen to me."
"What, do you mean that everywhere else someone is listening to us?" McKay suddenly thought of everything they had said together, everything they had done together.
"They don't have film do they?" he asked suddenly worried just what might have been recorded.
"Shut up and listen," ordered Sora. Then in urgent whispers she told him exactly what had happened, how he had ended up in the hands of the Genii.
Elia, 6 months ago, the site of the accident.
They waited in the shadow of the mountain hidden by the falling snow until the two Elians had left, taking with them the wounded Lantean they had gently extracted from the puddle jumper lodged on the bank of the river. Cautiously the Genii team crept forward determined to recover anything of worth from the ship. They worked silently, an established and efficient team working in total harmony. They were cautious, afraid of disturbing the balance of the puddle jumper and tipping it further. As they entered they saw, lying towards the front of the puddle jumper, a body, a jacket draped over its head.
The leader of the group looked around assessing the situation. "Right, you and you empty the lockers. Sora, you see what you can do to extract any data you can." Two of the team moved to the lockers and Sora, stepping carefully around the inert body on the floor, went to sit in the pilot's seat to access the controls. She carefully avoided looking at the body.
One of the team bent down to access the lower lockers but the body was in the way. He pulled it away from the side of the jumper to gain free access the lower storage lockers. A wide smear of blood was left on the floor. Wiping his hands on his trousers he focussed on emptying the lockers as quickly as he could. As he turned to pass his filled kit bag to his team mate something about the body caught his eye.
The smear of blood was widening into a pool.
Curious, he knelt down and drew back the bloodied garment draped over its face. He was no stranger to injury but the torn and battered flesh of the Lantean drew a sharp breath from him. He looked closer and detected the slightest of movement behind the lids of the pallid face beneath him. He broke the silence.
"Sir!" he called out softly. The team leader turned to him with a harsh look.
"The Lantean, Sir – he's alive," he whispered.
The team leader walked slowly towards the injured man on the floor and crouched down to take a closer look.
"Not so much alive as not dead yet," he observed. Sora turned to take a closer look. A low groan came from the inert body on the floor.
Sora's eyes widened with recognition. "It's McKay," she whispered. "We have to help him."
The team leader looked at her questioningly.
She repeated, "We have to help him. He could be useful – the Lanteans will give a lot in exchange to get him back. He's their chief scientist – the one that gave us the designs for the A bombs."
She knelt down beside the unconscious figure on the floor and, reaching for a medical kit, she started trying to stem the flow of blood from the gaping wound on McKay's head.
"OK, we take him with us. But first of all we have to cover our tracks. They will come back for him and we have to make sure there's a plausible explanation for the body being gone." He turned to Sora. "You take Gillan and take him to the camp." Sora glanced up, doubt beginning to cloud her eyes and then she nodded.
The Genii home world five weeks ago.
Sora had been speaking quickly and urgently but then she paused for moment. She turned to meet McKay's eyes and then looked away, worried and anxious that what she would tell him next would change their relationship forever.
"It was my fault you were taken, Rodney. I recognised you and I said that we should take you with us. I thought that we could improve our diplomatic relationship if we rescued a key member of your expedition and returned them. I swear that was my plan." Sora's eyes were wide pleading for his understanding.
"We took you back with us and then when we got back Cowen told me that we weren't going to contact your people, we were going to attempt to integrate you instead. If I had known that is what would happen I wouldn't have said anything and we would have left you there."
"And then I would have died of hypothermia or blood loss," McKay whispered to himself.
Sora gave a low snort and shook her head before replying, "No, McKay. You wouldn't have. Your friends came back for you but they didn't find you. They didn't look for you because they thought you were dead."
McKay looked at her questioningly.
"We faked your death, McKay. We weakened the ice so that the ship would fall through then we covered our tracks." Sora's feelings of guilt were clearly written on her face.
"We took you back with us to our camp. Treated you as best we could and at the first opportunity we gated back home." Sora's face was distorted with her emotions. "I'm so sorry. When I realised what was happening I vowed I would do what I could do help you get away."
McKay sat there trying to assimilate and process the new data. He couldn't focus, all he could hear was a voice saying, "We don't leave our people behind." He could feel the solid lump of hurt and betrayal that had been present in his chest ever since he woke up in the Genii infirmary five months ago swell until it burst and disappeared. He threw back his head and looking up at the blue sky above him he smiled ignoring the tears that started to run from his eyes.
"They didn't leave me behind," he whispered. He felt like laughing, like crying, like screaming.
Sora was sitting quietly next to him watching him. "We should go back soon, McKay." She shifted as if to stand but was stopped by McKay taking hold of her hands.
"Not yet, Sora," he said. "We're not finished here." He turned so that they were sitting face to face on the jetty, their knees brushing.
"Why did you decide you had to help me?" he asked.
"I felt guilty."
McKay held Sora's eyes and repeated his question, "Why did you decide you had to help me?"
"I said I felt guilty." Sora's expression became hunted as McKay held her hands and waited for her to answer. Abruptly Sora raised her chin and her expression changed to defiant. "I felt guilty, but that is not everything. I knew that you were my best chance to get away….. When I was sent back in exchange for the bombs I saw a side of our society that I had never seen before. Even before then I had begun to have my doubts. My people are good people but our rulers are not. The end justifies the means is the only thing they understand. What they don't understand or what can't help them, they destroy… When I realised what their intention was with you, I begged to be assigned to your integration… I know you, Rodney! I knew that if anyone else was assigned they wouldn't be able to get you to bend… I knew that they would kill you. I couldn't let that happen. I had to protect you."
"Why?" McKay needed to know.
Sora swallowed and she answered, "Because I care for you, Rodney and I want to go with you."
