Chapter 4: Revenge

Sheppard slowly became aware of consciousness, light grinding into his eyes, and aching limbs and body making themselves known.

Peeling his eyes open proved to be quite an effort, but what he saw before quickly shutting them again was that he was back in his cell, unceremoniously dumped on the floor, and alone.

He tried to open his eyes again, this time adjusting a little better to the light. His clothes were still damp with blood, but beginning to dry in stiff folds. Tiny holes punctured his shirt and pants, but they were only noticeable in a few places. A bandage was wrapped around his right leg, but nowhere else. The familiar pulling pain in his thigh made Sheppard realize that Kolya had probably nicked an artery and they had attempted to fix it.

So they wanted him alive.

That meant that Weir hadn't given in, and he just needed to hold on a while longer.

He managed to prop himself up against the wall behind him and noticed another tray of the bread-like food and a pitcher of water. Although he wasn't hungry or thirsty, he still forced everything down, not knowing when he would next get sustenance, and knowing his body needed the energy to heal.

"Where are you, Elizabeth?" he murmured. "I'd kinda like to be rescued now."

But the silent walls didn't answer him.

Teyla read Elizabeth's report on Kolya's last transmission and was barely able to get through it all. She knew that the transmission had been recorded, but could not bring herself to watch it. She was glad that they had been off world as she did not know what she might have done had she been there.

Her anger at Kolya's treatment of John was beginning to burn a hole deep inside of her, and it was opening up a side of her that she had not imagined had existed. She was beginning to imagine all of the things she would do to the Genii once they saw him again, and this was never something she had thought of in regards to her enemies in the past.

She took out her anger first on the dummy in the training room, completely destroying it within an hour, and then she took out her anger on Rodney.

The scientist stared at her, eyes as large as an owl as she berated him for not finding the trail from Kolya's ship.

"We searched for hours with your equipment, Rodney! Is there nothing more we can do?"

Rodney stammered, hovering between wanting to reach out to her and cowering under her wrath.

"We know what kind of ship he had, Teyla, but our jumpers lost the trail. It's like he just disappeared. I'm working on it — I am. You have to give me more time—"

"John does not have more time!"

Rodney set his jaw, a look entering his eyes that Teyla had never seen before.

"I know," he answered quietly. "And all of this is in my hands."

And then Teyla folded, a sob wracking her body as she hid her face in her hands.

"I am sorry, Rodney," she cried. "I know you are trying. But I can do nothing to help you … or him."

And Rodney held her while she cried.

Sheppard was beginning to lose track of time and how many days he had been in the cell. He started scratching marks in the wall near the floor where no one would notice. The mind games that he played to keep himself sane were slowly beginning to taper off as he caught himself sitting listless, gazing at the door for ages without thinking of anything.

Thankfully, his body was slowly starting to heal, although he wasn't able to wash off all of the blood that had dried to him and his clothes.

Food and water always came while he slept. Sometimes he caught a glimpse of the door closing silently on a vanishing heel, but he never saw anyone's face, nor could he see out into the corridor beyond his cell.

A few times, they had gassed him, and when he came to, still in the cell, he found a fresh bandage on his leg. He was sure they were gassing him to make sure he couldn't tell Atlantis where he was.

Was that a clue? Would he know where he was if he was able to see outside of his cell?

And one day when they gassed him, he didn't wake in his cell. He was back in what he liked to now call the "torture room," and found himself lying on the floor, the room empty except for himself, Kolya, and five other men.

"He's awake," someone said.

Sheppard abruptly felt his arms pulled out from either side of his body and realized ropes had been wound around his wrists. He was hauled to his knees, arms outstretched between two of the men, head still reeling from the gas, but becoming more alert by the second in anticipation of what Kolya might have planned.

Kolya stood in front of him, his face unreadable.

"Not so very long ago, Colonel," he said, "you killed over sixty of my men on Atlantis. These five men here were brothers, fathers, and sons of some of these men and women. And you are here to answer to their call for justice."

Sheppard took in each of the five men and noted that they were all unarmed, but several had wrapped their hands.

And he steeled himself, because he knew what was coming.

The next transmission that Atlantis received did not come live. It arrived as a large video file via a dummy gate so it couldn't be tracked.

Elizabeth sent a team to the address just in case, but they confirmed that the signal couldn't have originated on the planet they explored.

As horrible as the transmission had been that they had last received from Kolya, Elizabeth had felt a distinct sense of camaraderie with Sheppard, knowing that everything was happening in real time. She felt that there was a connection where she could send him her strength and resilience to wherever he was, even if that feeling might have been only in her imagination.

This time, it was obvious the video had been recorded ahead of time and sent afterwards. How long afterwards was impossible to say. Carson explained in a tight voice at the debriefing that Sheppard had looked better at the beginning of the video, as though they had let him heal from his previous ordeal. But there was no way to know if the video had been recorded that day or a week in advance.

The video was only 23 minutes long.

The camera angle had changed but showed the same small empty room that they had seen twice since Sheppard's more recent capture. It was angled down to show the entire room this time. Sheppard was on his knees in front of Kolya, arms outstretched and held with a rope by two men. Three other men surrounded him.

Kolya said nothing. He looked at the camera, lifted his hand, and they began.

No one used weapons, only fists and boots, but it was brutal. And Elizabeth knew that this was an act of revenge. Maybe Kolya's men had heard of Sheppard, or maybe they had been involved with the fatal mission where Kolya had tried to take Atlantis. But it was clear that this was personal.

Sheppard fought.

Elizabeth had never seen him fight like that. Snarling and lashing out with his feet, head, and any part of his body he could move, he fought like an animal. It was only hours afterwards that she realized why. He had experienced this before. Maybe in Afghanistan, or maybe elsewhere in his Black Ops career, but he had obviously been in the same situation.

He managed to get a hand free at one point and it took all five men plus Kolya to bring him down to the floor, pin him, and they continued to lay into him.

Elizabeth had to turn away several times, along with most of Sheppard's team who had joined her in the debriefing room to watch the transmission. Only Ronon stared stoically at the screen, a snarl seeming to be permanently etched onto his face as he held back his anger, hands twisting and flexing as he tried to keep from roaring in rage.

Towards the end, Sheppard tried to get up again and someone pulled one of the ropes, wrenching his left arm completely out of the socket with an audible crack. The man who did so then stepped on his shoulder, pinning Sheppard in place while they re-secured the ropes. To his credit, Sheppard had not screamed until that point, but the sound that was ripped from his throat was not a scream but more like the cry of a wounded animal, inhuman and guttural.

The sound was enough to give the men around him pause, and Sheppard was finally given a reprieve, gasping for breath and spitting blood on the floor, curling on his side.

His face was covered in blood which was gushing from a cut on his forehead. Someone had bashed his head against the wall in trying to get him to submit earlier. The white bandage that had been wrapped around his leg at the beginning was now soaked in red.

The men around him gasped for breath, breathing hard from the exertion of the past twenty minutes. Some even braced their hands on their knees as they gulped in air, wiping sweat from their brows.

Kolya had not participated but had stepped in on occasion when Sheppard was giving the men a hard time. Now, he turned to the camera.

"Sheppard's time with me is getting shorter," he said, "as is my patience with you, Dr. Weir. The next time you see him may be the last."

He turned back to Sheppard, kicking his shoulder to flip him onto his back. Sheppard's eyes rolled, clearly fighting unconsciousness as he weakly struggled against the ropes again.

Kolya stepped around to his head and kicked again, snapping Sheppard's head brutally to the side. His whole body abruptly went limp.

The men in the room shuffled around, regaining their breath, then at Kolya's signal, each spat on Sheppard's prone body and moved back.

Looking back up at the camera, Kolya pointed to Sheppard's unconscious form. "Ladon Radim. Lest you forget."

When the video abruptly cut to black, Weir was shaking. She wasn't sure if it was in shock or anger, but she knew she had never felt rage such as she had felt in that very moment.

With effort, she said, "Ladon hasn't had contact with his man on the inside for several weeks. We have no leads. We have no idea where he is. I don't know what to do anymore. I'm sorry."

Ronon stood stiffly, his face working as he tried to keep himself in check. "Sheppard's running out of time. We have to do something!"

Teyla put her hand on his arm. "We have nothing to go on, Ronon. Kolya has been much more careful since the last time we found him. We have found no clues in the transmissions or the gate addresses they are sent from."

"He's going to die, isn't he?" McKay's voice was unusually quiet, and his face was one of dismay, eyes red and his features haggard from hours of trying to track Kolya's ship.

Elizabeth set her jaw. "We won't let him die."

But inside, her will was beginning to shrivel as she knew they had no leads, and McKay, as brilliant as he was, could not seem to find a way to track Kolya's ship. And perhaps, just perhaps, she would have to go against protocol. Sheppard would hate her, and she would most definitely be relieved of her command, but she could not leave him to suffer under Kolya's hand any longer.

Author's Note: Thanks to everyone who has stuck with me so far. I hope it hasn't gotten too dark, but there is hope ahead ... Two chapters left to go!