While Evan had dozed, leaning heavily on the wraith at his side, the fire had died down to ruby embers. Neither of them had the strength to search for more wood. Instead, they sat side by side, shoulder to shoulder, looking up at the stars. Well, the wraith was looking; Evan could only just make out the blurred presence of two pallid moons. Since the crash, the twin crescents had tracked across the sky and now hovered just above the horizon to their left.
Evan wished he knew what that meant; it felt like they'd been there for a lifetime but it had probably been only a day. He'd give just about anything to see a hint of sunrise but this planet seemed determined to leave them in the heartless dark.
Another bout of coughing left his head throbbing and ribs aching again which was probably a sign that he needed to take more pills but he'd totally lost track of when he had his last dose.
He could feel the Second's concern for his breathing. Having the wraith link with his mind should have filled him with dread, but he'd been desperate to distract his companion and alleviate some of his suffering.
Instead of pain or even discomfort, he had first felt a sense of curiosity reaching towards his mind and a sort of tickling. No, tickling wasn't quite right but it was unlike anything he could compare it to. As the link connected, a torrent of raging starvation had come barrelling towards him and all he could do was steel himself against the onslaught. But as it had reached his mind, it exploded into a harmless cloud. The effect was frightening and fascinating all at once. Next to him, the wraith had whimpered in disbelief as his suffering dissipated into Evan's human mind; a mind that was not at the mercy of such ferocious hunger.
The Second's mind fired with a need to understand;
evan — evanidus [vanish] — evanesce [fade-dissolve-disappear] — evangel [verity-fact-truth]
Evan's desire to protect the Second from his own suffering swelled to something powerful that charged back down their link of its own accord. He could feel when the wraith had to reduce their connection to a faint thread, grateful for Evan's resolve but unprepared for such intensity. Even so, what remained of their link was still something intimate and profound.
In Evan's mind's eye, all he could see was a dull off-white nothingness. This thought was met with a haunting echo of nothingness — desolation — wasteland —... wrong.
Rather than feeling lost or disturbed by it, he pushed further into the nothing. The wraith's mental plane was completely devoid of ambient noise or warring images. It felt peaceful — soft — undemanding —... free. The hateful pain that had been plaguing him since their crash scraped its way down his body; temple… shoulder… ribs… hip… until it lost its grip and he was overcome with blessed relief. Gone?
yessss… for now. The voice was not rough and rasping, but sighed gracefully through his mind.
He could sense the wraith's relief at his acceptance of this space and it saddened him to think that other wraith rejected him for thinking his mind was barren and empty. But while it appeared that the wraith had laid his mind bare, he had told Evan it was all a facade. He wondered what lay beneath the surface… but he knew not to push.
Instead, Evan attempted to demonstrate what the loss of his eyesight made him fear so badly. He contemplated the blank canvas before him for a moment, letting that familiar sense of possibility soak in and take hold of his imagination. Anticipation built within their shared space as Evan began to conjure a swarm of materials and images and ideas. When he was ready, he unleashed his passion and decorated the wraith's mind with artworks made up from the whole spectrum colours, from soft hues to rich pigments.
He sensed the Second's desperate hope that some of the images might stain his mind forever. Evan opened his eyes to find the wraith staring at him. "Evan… you see all of this? These colours... all of the time?"
"What d'you mean?" Sitting so close, he noticed how the wraith's slitted pupils were edged with thin gold lines.
"In your mind… there is this, this… paint. These colours. What are you showing me?"
Evan closed his eyes and concentrated on specific pieces he had created. "Uh, this one? This is a sunset I painted. One of my favourites. And… this one's a storm, and that there is a sketch of some broken glass done in charcoal. Then there's an oil-on-canvas I did of some trees at night… the moonlight was just… And that there? That's the sea around Atlantis."
"Yesssss. There! That colour. The one you have used for the ocean."
"Well… there's a few there. Let's see, um, navy, steel, azure, sky-"
"I do not understand."
"Oh. They're all just names for different shades of blue. Do you... not see different shades?" Evan asked carefully.
The wraith thought for a moment. "What exactly do you mean by blue?"
"Wait. You're not telling me that you can't see blue? We probably just have different names for it, right? Um. Can you show me some of what you see?" The wraith obliged and sent a series of images; a sea of stars, a hiveship, their campfire… until he noticed the look of sadness on Evan's face.
"You… you're... it's kind of like you're colour blind. But not quite. Instead, everything is a little faded or washed with green or grey. There's a bit of yellow and brown but… that's it." Evan's disbelief was palpable.
He felt a moment of the wraith's crushing disappointment before a sudden wrenching pull accompanied the wraith withdrawing his mind from their link. The images and the blank nothing receded completely as he let out a strangled gasp, and swayed where he sat. To his left, the wraith had curled in on himself and he could barely feel his mental presence.
Despite the weakness of their link, Evan felt it when the wraith's body was slammed by a sudden and ferocious wave of hunger. The Second threw his head back and erupted with the thunderous roar of near-crippling emptiness. He collapsed away from Evan and writhed there in the dirt as his body was wracked with tremors and the scalding starvation threatened to burn away his tenuous grip on their link.
Evan sat frozen, helpless, as the wraith gulped at the cold night air, sucking down breath after breath in a vain effort to soothe the fire within. He pressed his thumb into his right palm and kneaded back and forth along the length of the slit in time with his panting. Breathe in, scrape back. Breathe out, press forth.
inhalum—exspiro. inhalum—exspiro. inhalum—exspiro.
"Second?" Evan placed a tentative hand on his arm but he jerked away. He realised that their connection had distracted the wraith and, for that short time, he had drifted so far from himself and into Evan's vibrant mind that his hunger had become a distant and pathetic thing.
"Second?" He tried again, leaning over to touch ever so gently, only to over-balance and tip onto his side; an instant scraping fire blazing across his ribs. He lay there groaning. "Please?"
The wraith cradled his damaged hand against his chest and peered at him over his shoulder. Evan tried to force the feeling of apology and sorry down what was left of their link. Very slowly, Evan ran his hand down the wraith's arm, pulling gently until he lay on his back, their shoulders resting against one another.
He walked his fingers towards the injured feeding hand. The Second tentatively unfurled his rigid fist just enough so that Evan could weave his fingers between them. He was careful to avoid the swollen orifice as he tightened his grip. The wraith pressed his claws into the back of his hand but he didn't care.
The filum fired between their minds, delivering him once again into their mind-link but this time the blank mindspace was shrouded with apprehension.
"I– I'm sorry, Second." Discovering that the wraith could only see such a limited range of colour, and all of them muted pale imitations, had left Evan feeling completely bereft. This ancient creature was deprived of the richness of the full colour spectrum.
"Evan Lorne," the wraith rasped. "I... believe I understand now what you mean by 'blue'."
"Yeah?" He was finding it hard to say much more, every breath delivering hot stabs of pain.
"Yes. Wraith would call it caerulus but sadly it falls short."
Closing his eyes, the wraith recalled a memory of the seas around Atlantis but they appeared drab, drained of all vibrancy save for the slightest tinge of a light blue-grey. He then conjured up Evan's ocean painting, honing in on the play of colours within one of the waves. "You called these navy and steel and…?"
"Azure and sky." He forced his mind to concentrate on the images and let the wraith's vast mind carry him away from the piercing pain in his side.
He felt the wraith draw him further into their link. "Well, now I know what I should see when I witness this."
Within his mind, each of the blue hues began to flash brightly, right before they exploded into the kawoosh of the Stargate. But as it settled into the familiar shimmering event horizon, the image changed and became something else. Evan's vision doubled, which sent his weary mind into a heady spiral.
The rasping continued. "And when I look upon these."
Evan gasped when the image finally came into focus. "My eyes?"
"Yesss," the Second whispered. "Each of those blues may not appear different to me, but the sum of those variable parts makes for a very satisfying whole. Perhaps even a… handsome one?"
Evan gently squeezed the tender hand of the Second who merely hummed in reply. Evan opened his eyes to find the wraith staring intently up at the stars. His haunted yellow eyes were glowing a little in the dark. Evan noticed how tired he looked, and how the rasp of the wraith's dual-toned voice had become more of a death rattle, joining in sombre chorus with Evan's drowning wheeze.
With Herculean effort, Evan attempted to shuffle closer on his uninjured left side but couldn't prevent a pained groan from escaping his lips. The wraith looked at him in alarm. "Come here," Evan asked, lightly tugging on his hand. "Please?"
The Second eyed him warily but shifted closer. When they were eye to eye he brought his hot forehead to rest against the wraith's cool, dry skin and closed his eyes. "Now, it's my turn."
He began by unfurling a thick white piece of parchment in the wraith's mind. Soft charcoal brushed its way across the rough paper; it was a man's form, seen from the side in profile. Sweeping strokes added long hair, then heavy shading formed a black coat. Not a man, a wraith.
The lightest touch revealed faint lines of a tattoo beneath the figure's eye. An ink of deepest black stained the sky and then gave definition to his tattoo and the vertical line of his pupil.
Diluted paint spread across the image; yellow where the fire would be, earthy brown for wood, and barely a hint of green on skin. He pushed the word watercolours across their link, followed by acrylics. Red-scarlet, he whispered and enriched the fire with this colour. He added orange-amber in short precise strokes. Grey-silver provided some fine wisps through the long white hair but then he hesitated. Evan opened his eyes and squinted up at the sky, straining to discern what hovered above them.
"It's just that..." He got stuck at this point, just like before. He couldn't finish his painting because the starry sky was just a formless blur to him now. But how could he complain about the loss of his eyesight to a being who could no longer even feed?
Cool fingers traced their way across Evan's forehead, and down to cover his eyes. Ever so gently, he coaxed him to turn his face toward his own. "Allow me."
Where their link hovered between them, Evan now felt a strange sort of overlapping, almost like a new lens had descended over his mind… but only just a little. And a little was just enough.
The wraith passed a view of the night sky through their link and they both watched in fascination as tiny silver dots and dashes scattered themselves across the black ink.
He felt Evan's head tilt back against his offhand, and, after a moment's hesitation, the wraith resumed tracing soft circles into his scalp. With every rotation of his claws, Evan mimicked the movement in his painting, spreading soft white tracks across the starry sky. The wraith felt as though he was making them move and whirl and dance around the twin moons. Evan shared the name Van Gogh though the wraith couldn't parse their meaning. But he did not mind. He was painting.
To finish, Evan added tiny flecks of colour to the tips of the flaming fire and then reflected within the Second's eye.
"Yellow," the wraith provided, his eyes still closed and a smile ghosting across his lips.
"Not quite, Second," he replied, faintly teasing, and the wraith could almost feel the presence of those charming dimples in his mind. The image zoomed in on the painting's right eye taking up most of their shared vision. "See here? Striations in yellow, green, and gold. Or, to be precise, lemon and jade and golden-sand."
Each colour glistened in turn before the image returned to its appropriate size and scale.
"You are very talented, Evan," the Second mused. "It is quite beautiful."
A sense of daring grew in Evan's mind. "Yes. You are."
The wraith's eyes snapped open to catch Evan gazing back at him. A flurry of emotions whirled between them, the wraith's thoughts swirling in confusion with beautiful… him? and then surely not. No, never this one.
Of all his brethren, he had never once been looked upon in that way. The Second realised his offhand was resting on the back of the Major's neck, and he froze in the act of rubbing the tips of his fingers along the bristles of dark hair. The fingers of his feeding hand were still loosely entwined with Evan's, who was cradling his injured limb like it was some precious thing. The back of his hand lay snug against the man's bare chest; so warm. He could feel the Major's heart fluttering fitfully in his chest.
The Second couldn't help himself; he had to ask. "Really?"
"Yeah," replied the bashful Major. "Your people are all kind of… striking. But you… ." And words like regal and poised appeared in their link, and rare-delicate-monalisa-beautiful.
The wraith closed his eyes and conjured up the image once more. He wanted to memorise every nuance, every stroke, and every colour. Lemon… jade… golden-sand. He sent his gratitude down their connection and heard the man sigh. "Thank you, Evan. I have never been named as 'handsome' or 'beautiful' nor have I ever been gifted something like this."
"Can't say I've ever painted a piece in someone's mind before," Evan replied. His mind was overwhelmed by what the wraith had given back to him.
He lay there, humbled and in awe of his friend. Evan studied the happiness that played across the angled planes of the wraith's face; a face he knew he could sketch and paint and sculpt over and over again and never lose the pleasure of discovering such wonder. He desperately wanted to run his fingers over that marbled skin, mapping out smooth cheekbones and sharp ridges, pressing his thumbs ever so softly against eyes and lips and chin…
Evan could almost feel the cool, wet clay in his hands as he moulded formlessness into the likeness of the wraith. His wraith?
Sheppard liked to compare the wraith to the Earth stories of fanged blood-suckers then proceed to laugh at his own cleverness. But the one lying before him was so fine of feature; the delicate nose and gently pointed chin, the satin fall of long white hair. Even exhausted, injured and half-starved, the wraith looked almost ethereal while resting there under the stars.
Well, Sheppard could keep his disheveled space vamp. Evan decided that celestial elf was far more suitable.
"Hey, Second? What's, um, what's the Wraith word for beautiful? Or- or handsome?"
Opalescent eyes blinked open and gazed at him. "The most common is de'ceni." The wraith pronounced the word 'dey-chen-ee'. "It means beautiful one."
Dey-chen-ee. It wasn't quite right but he hoped it would work well enough. Evan closed his eyes again and words appeared under his painting. A title, the date, and his signature;
de'Keni & the starry night.
[Mixed media on mind canvas]
'E. Lorne, 2010'.
"Dey-ken-ee?" whispered the wraith.
Blue eyes flashed open. "Handsome one. I think it fits."
"I am- I don't- I-," the wraith stuttered, shaking his head. The one known as vis mea, the Second, Bonewhite and Kenny was completely without words. Pale yellow eyes begged anxious blue ones for answers.
Evan gnawed at his lower lip. "Uh, hi. I'm Major Lorne of Earth. I've been told my name means 'young warrior'. Please call me Evan. My friends all do."
The wraith looked down at their joined hands. He slipped his good hand from around Evan's neck and grasped the wrist of his impaired hand. Though it caused sharp splinters of pain, he unfurled his rigid fingers and withdrew from the warmth of Evan's grip.
The Second stared down at his hand. "This wraith has been known as many things but none so rich as this new Naming. To my friend; the young warrior who drove away my hunger and replaced it with illustration and colour and light. To evan-mea; I greet you this day."
Evan's eyes widened in disbelief when the wraith lifted his chin and gave him a proud, unguarded smile. The Second gestured to himself, splaying his brittle fingers over his chest. "This one is... de'Keni."
The wraith, his friend - de'Keni - lifted his delicate green hand from his chest and waited. Evan slipped his hand back underneath, the wraith's fingers curling loosely around his.
He didn't need to ask; evan-mea. My Evan.
De'Keni hugged their joined hands to his chest. "I am so honoured. Until this day, my favoured memories were of meeting the Commander and receiving my Mark. But now I believe that your gifting has become my most treasured moment. My deepest thanks, Major Evan Lorne of the homeworld Earth. evan-mea."
Evan didn't know what to say. He had no idea that his efforts to simply share his love of art and colour would give the wraith something he had gone without for so long. He couldn't have wiped the grin off his face for anything.
De'Keni slid his offhand up Evan's arm and along his shoulder to cup his cheek. He stroked the pad of his thumb over the dimple and thrummed. "I like these tiny hollows. Very much."
Evan's grin grew wider still as he stared at the alien in front of him. He pulled gently on their entwined hands and brought the back of de'Keni's ruined hand to his lips.
Beside them, the last of their fire died out, leaving only thin grey wisps curling in the air. The loss of weak gold firelight revealed the wraith's pale papery skin under the moonlight, his dark green veins standing out now in stark relief. The wraith's hands trembled.
"You're cold? But… I thought that wraith had a lower core temperature than us humans?"
"Yessss," replied the wraith, his chin shivering a little. "But even we have our limits, evan-mea. And with so little remaining energy…"
"Here, look, uh, unzip the bag there." There was little Evan could do to help with his right arm strapped down to his aching side and he wasn't about to let go of de'Keni's hand. He immediately missed having the wraith's offhand against his cheek and shivered when a rush of cold air gusted down into his open sleeping bag. "Okay, now see if you can - yeah, get rid of the boots - okay, slide your legs in and, um, you're going to have to get real close, uh, sorry."
Sliding his left arm under de'Keni's neck, his fingers carding through a handful of sleek hair, Evan braced those narrow shoulders and pulled the wraith in close. His back was pressed hard against the material of the sleeping bag and the wraith's slender form was practically plastered against him from waist to feet with only their joined hands wedged between their chests.
"Evan-mea, I do not believe I can secure this... zip, but my coat is an adequate covering for my back." de'Keni's offhand found its way around his waist and then up to the space between his shoulders, claws tickling the skin on the back of his neck. Evan searched their link for any sign of discomfort but de'Keni just drew him in a little more, careful not to jostle or squeeze too tight.
Lying there together, their legs and fingers entwined, was so utterly right that Evan felt as though they could almost transcend their miserable fate and exist in this moment forever, never wanting for anything more.
Cool skin brushed his cheek as de'Keni leaned in to rest his forehead on Evan's shoulder. He responded by nuzzling his face into that silky hair, breathing in pine trees and musky-mint. The words heat-paint-nepenthe and parchment-freshair floated into his mind. The last of his energy completely spent, he closed his tired eyes and sighed his contentment against the exposed skin behind the wraith's ear.
The pain in his side and the rattle in his chest eased away as he sank into the shelter of the wraith's mind. For de'Keni, the hunger that stalked his very soul lay caged in his body but was barred from the sanctuary of their joined minds.
Evan tried to picture the stars above them, knowing he might never see them again. He couldn't remember how the sky looked above this wretched planet so he settled for the memory of the stars in his gift to de'Keni.
"I will be your eyes, evan-mea."
Within the darkness of their mental link, de'Keni lit up the heavens so that Evan could see the stars again. But the wraith didn't limit his vision just to the sky above their lonely planet. The wraith projected his mind out into the darkness and somehow Evan was pulled along in his wake.
Their minds traveled across an entire galaxy that was housed within de'Keni's long memory; a dying sun gave way to clusters of stars which then swirled to form alien constellations and distant star systems.
Evan imagined the white canvas of de'Keni's mind hovering ahead of him, but changed it to become a comet of lemon and jade and golden-sand that hurtled along with his own mind in tow; a rippling pool of caerulus-blue. de'Keni called to him across their filum, a silver thread that tethered them together as they swept through space. Their link pulsed with evan-mea and brother-friend-mine.
But lurking beneath all of the breathtaking wonders, Evan could feel that Dekeni's mind wasn't completely free of his burning need. Back on the ground, the wraith's frail body spasmed with hunger.
"I've got you." Evan tightened his grip on the wraith's feeding hand, still resting snugly between them. He felt the damaged, swollen skin around the feeding maw brush against his palm, but it just made him squeeze a little more. Relief trickled across their filum; it seemed that grasping it tightly alleviated a small amount of the pain.
"Do not let go, evan-mea."
"Not a chance."
Within their mental link, the stars slowly winked out of existence, leaving the darkness to take over their combined vision. Evan should have been afraid but he was still being held within the safe refuge of the wraith's mind.
De'Keni was thrumming with gratitude that he could spend what may be his last moments in the arms of one so rare.
"Tu es mi dextera," Dekeni whispered, and his mind revealed - you are my right hand. -
More words followed; artifex-brother-friend and protects this wraith and hive.
The wraith whispered to his human, "evan-mea".
"Yours," Evan murmured, and his own mind expressing - you are my eyes. -
Images followed; silver-hair, eyes of lemon-jade-goldensand and beautiful.
Evan breathed softly to his wraith, "de'keni".
The two figures lay by the smoking ashes, eyes closed and no longer watching the unforgiving world outside. Their soli drifted along together - marbled yellow and rippling blue - gliding out over a dark formless landscape and into its inky depths.
Two minds sailed and slipped, sinking far away from their pain and hunger. Coasting slowly along, they entered a space where the shadows slowly receded. In its place, a soft white light grew in intensity until they were surrounded by the glow of a stark white plain.
They watched as their minds drifted closer and closer - shifting, coiling, mixing - until yellow haze and blue vapour merged into one.
Somewhere, a whole galaxy away, their bodies rested palm to palm, fingers lost in long hair and claws fixed on cold skin. And in their last moments, lips pressed against lips to taste love and hive and mine and always.
It was their first kiss.
And their last.
As breathing slowed and colours paled, the faint echoes of evan-mea and de'keni faded away into pure white silence.
And then, there was no more.