Part Four: Traveling Companions

Ronon Dex stretched out his long limbs, noticing now that he was no longer wearing an infirmary gown, that his IV was gone with no trace of bruise or puncture. He was, in fact, dressed in his usual clothing, the practical and protective leathers he had come to Atlantis wearing. The front of his tunic was decorated with a bullet hole and blood stains, but no wound existed beneath it.

Beckett approached his patient, assessing him quickly. Last the doctor had seen, Ronon had been wavering between narcotic sleep and agony. The Satedan now appeared never to have been shot in the first place.

"You were shot," Carson stated, not bothering to hide his shock and wonder.

"I know." Ronon replied to the question that had not been asked.

"We're not wrong about this, then." He pulled down Ronon's shirt, staring at the bullet hole smack in the middle of it, at the rust-colored bloodstains that bloomed around the tear.

Beckett himself had somehow been divested of his lab coat. He wore his usual uniform and jacket.

Ronon stooped, gathered up a handful of dirt and sniffed it. Apparently unsatisfied with what he learned from that, he brushed the clod from his hand and turned to the doctor.

"Where are we?" he asked.

"I don't know."

"You think someone did something stupid again?"

The question hung in the air like a target. Of all people, Ronon Dex had the most cause to ask it.

"Maybe. You've traveled to more planets than I. You've never seen this place before?"

"No." Ronon looked upwards, as if the sky had answers. "I might know the planet, but just not this part of it."

A reasonable remark, a logical one. Beckett was not all that familiar with Ronon Dex, certainly could not count him among his good friends. Still, it was not without a certain irony that Beckett, who could perfectly balance a patient's electrolytes but lacked any skill whatsoever at erecting a rudimentary shelter for himself, was in this odd predicament with the Satedan equivalent of an Eagle Scout.

Complementing each other was a good thing, not that the doctor could do a lick of good out here, with lots of trees around but no shelves stuffed with medical supplies.

"Should we try to find our way out of this forest, then? To a town?"

Ronon looked around again, his dreads flapping about his head. "Sure," he replied.

Not wanting to take the lead by any means, Beckett held up his hand.

"You're the one who knows how to survive outdoors," he said. "Lead on or not. It's up to you."

Ronon regarded him levelly, amusement curling his lips.

"You don't know the outside world?" he asked.

"I've spent my life inside lecture halls and hospitals, son."

Ronon looked up towards the treetops, again. Carson had no idea what the behemoth was thinking; he simply trusted that a man who had spent a very long time deep in the woods would have some inkling of how to get out of them.

"This way," Ronon grumbled, pointing in a direction that seemed as unproductive as any other. Beckett shrugged submissively and followed in silence. No matter the mystery of their coming to the forest, he felt confident that somehow Ronon would lead him into the light.

….

They had stumbled about for hours, hoping to locate an end to the suffocating forest. Ronon's long legs and natural fitness kept him always ahead of the doctor. Whatever force had healed the Runner ought to have extended its effects to aging Scots, for Carson felt quite a bit older since switching galaxies.

Now Ronan sat upon a large pile of leaves and moss that he'd scooped up into a mound. He seemed at home in the dank woods, no matter what predators lurked nearby. Carson felt rather middle-class there, neither secure in the limitless but crowded space nor warm enough settled in his own bedding, gathered following Ronon's example.

They had grown weary, so they had foraged for bedding to rest upon. Neither had noticed hunger or thirst, yet, despite having gone for hours without food or water. Carson wondered if it were possible to die of dehydration without ever feeling thirsty, to starve without being hungry.

The worst place Beckett had ever lived was a bed-sit in Glasgow, which he rented for his first-year medical internship. It was cheap and drafty—a room with a hotplate—that overlooked a beige water tower. It was one flight up from an Indo-Pakistani take-away. At first he thought the cooking smells wafting up from downstairs were tempting and exotic. Within a fortnight, however, the thick aromas of curries and braised meats coming through the floorboards had settled on his clothing and in his skin. He smelled like samosas and biryanis and pappadam, like cumin and asafoetida and garam masala. Decades later he still could not stomach the smell of curry.

Now, watching the vast forest dim as night approached, Beckett realized that he'd give almost anything to be back at that flat right then. Smells and all, he didn't care, as long as he didn't have to sleep out in the cold with a silent person who seemed—no, who more or less stated—that he was unhappy with whom he was stuck.

"Thanks for saving my life."

The words seemed to come from everywhere as they bounced off thousands of rigid tree trunks. Surprised, Beckett looked up at Dex, who was casually picking at a small twig, twisting part of the thin bark until it splintered in his hands.

"When Dr. Weir shot me."

"Oh. That." Carson shuddered. He couldn't determine whether he shook from cold or from remembrance, suddenly seeing Elizabeth's ghastly expression of hate so deep nothing could reach it. "She wasn't herself. You know that, don't you?"

Ronon threw down the destroyed twig. "'Course I do. I'm not going to call her Phoebus. Atlantis seemed safe enough. Hoped I'd never get hurt there, especially with that tracking device out of my back."

He paused, in that typical reserved manner of his. Carson had realized quite a while ago that conversing with Ronon required a certain amount of patience. McKay could speak an entire novel in the time it took Ronon to utter a single sentence. He was the master of brevity, which made every word just that much more important.

He finally continued, staring at his hands rather than looking at Beckett himself. "With everything, you know, going on. It was just pretty painful. So thank you for helping me through that."

"Are you through it, then?" For it appeared as if the pain had only just begun. Ronon seemed to consider this. He searched around for something else to occupy his hands, then gave up and rubbed the tops of his thighs in a rare gesture of anxiety.

Beckett smiled ruefully. "I think I ought to have prevented the bloody mess from happening in the first place. The best way to thank me ever, lad, is to keep yourself safe."

Both men looked around them, wondering again at how they'd come to be in this place.

….

After resting in turns, the pair continued their trek at daybreak. Ronon seemed completely well, healed in every way from his grievous injury. The Sateden had grudgingly allowed Beckett to check his belly again, and the large man smiled to himself, more than a little relieved to find that the wound had healed.

Neither man openly sought to discuss whether they had both lost their minds and imagined the entire horrid event.

They let their mutual reluctance to raise the question pass silently between them, then continued to walk, as if they could leave behind in the woods the troubling ideas that were now beginning to bedevil them.

At last, the trees thinned out. This was not a simple clearing, but the edge of the forest itself. Beyond a copse of tall grasses, the land sloped down before them, revealing a lush, open valley dipping towards a river that shone as afternoon sunlight cracked and shattered on its silver surface. Beckett was delighted to be out of the stifling woods, to be in a bright place where things like hope lived. He so wanted to run to the river and stretch himself out in its gentle current.

Thus, it was unfair beyond measure when Ronon tapped his shoulder.

"We are not alone here," he said softly, holding still and staring into the vegetation directly in front of them.

Carson followed his gaze. A cool breeze caught the tall grasses, moving them gracefully about. But some patches of grass did not sway enough. Others moved in a way that the wind could not have pushed them. Even without the talented eye for the natural world that Ronon possessed, Beckett noticed these details, now that he knew to look for them, now that his life depended upon it.

He could not see them in their entirety, but they were tiny people and there were many, many of them, approaching in silence.

"They have left an opening straight up the middle," Ronon rumbled quietly. "Run!"

Beckett needed no further encouragement. If Ronon said to run, he could do that, he would do that until Ronon said to do something else. And it was particularly comforting that Ronon was running with him, rather than hanging back to make a stand against so many adversaries—however small they might be.

Gaining some distance by sheer stature, Beckett noticed a soft whooshing sound. He glanced behind to see some of his pursuers holding long, thin rods to their mouths. Darts. Damn it! He couldn't get away from the bloody darts no matter what world they landed on.

He heard a muffled grunt beside him and looked to see that Ronon had slowed.

"No! Ronon…" Beckett heaved himself back, reversing his steps, feet slipping on the matted grasses beneath them. Reaching Ronon, he grabbed his forearm and pulled with all his strength, willing the man to continue. The Runner lurched forward, determination set on his face. Two strides later, though, his legs gave way, sending him down into the grasses, where he lay, lazily staring up without seeing the clear blue sky above.

"Leave," he whispered to Beckett, an order, a plea.

Beckett never thought to comply. "Ronon! Up, man!" He panted in desperation, damning his own weakness. His terror turned to resignation faster than he ever thought it would. If this was to be the end of them both, at least neither would die alone.

He watched Ronon's eyes roll up and close, saw his body relax. Crouching, Beckett pulled from Ronon's shoulder a small barbed dart, which he threw down in disgust. He determined that Ronon still breathed and that his heart still beat, almost losing himself in this assessment.

A rustling sound nearby alerted Beckett to the presence of the others. He knew what was coming and stood to take it with a defiant pull in his heart. From behind him, a rush of air. He gasped at the pain of receiving his own dart, which he reached up and pulled from his neck. His vision dulled. He must have fallen, for the last thing he saw was a curious face peering down into his, the face of a child warrior so hateful he pitied him.