The cave was cold, the kind of cold that set deep into your bones and made you think you might never be able to warm up again. It was cold enough to make John shiver, which pulled his injured shoulder against the chains, shooting constant twinges of pain through his body. John closed his eyes, only to open them with a start as his head snapped around.

John spat blood and looked up at the man who'd hit him. John couldn't quite make out his face, blurry as his vision was, but he didn't suppose it mattered.

"Identification code."

John just shook his head silently, gasping as the torturer kicked him in the ribs. He felt something crack, gritting his teeth to keep from crying out.

"Identification code."

"Forty two."

This time, the fist was aimed at his bad shoulder, and John lost the battle to keep silent. His breath escaped in a strangled gasp as the Genii dug his thumb into the open wound, and his vision faded out as blood began to trickle down his shoulder.

"Identification code."

It was just a haze of pain after that, blows landing again and again, the hunger and the cold growing until John barely knew where he was, and through it all, the steady voice asking for John's code.

"John?"

That was new, they'd never said his name before. Through the confusion and the pain, John felt a hand touch his shoulder - not the bad one this time - and he jerked away involuntarily.

"John."

What were they planning? They'd changed the script, and that probably meant bad news for John. He struggled frantically, one last-ditch effort to get free.

"John, open your eyes."

His eyes were closed? When had that happened? John did as the voice instructed, then squinted in utter disbelief.

"Teyla?"

It couldn't be, there was no way his team could have found him. But Teyla smiled and moved to the side slightly, and John recognized the interior of the jumper.

"You are safe, John."

John blinked, feeling the tension dissipate slightly, for the first time in who knew how long. And as it drained away, the pain hit. He remembered his shoulder hurting before, so it wasn't a surprise when he twisted slightly and the throbbing pain from the swollen, infected skin took his breath away. But what he wasn't expecting was the pins and needles that raced up and down his legs with even the smallest movement, the aching hunger gnawing at his stomach, the swirling feeling behind his eyes whenever he tilted his head.

John opened his mouth, found it was too dry to form words. Swallowed hard and tried again. "What...happened?" he whispered.

"You are safe now," Teyla whispered. "We got you out."

Teyla was still touching John, pressing gently on his uninjured shoulder, probably trying to keep him from sitting up too fast. Normally, John had no problems with that sort of gentle, friendly touch, but after at least a week of torture, even the light pressure of her hand made him squirm. He was having difficulty getting his eyes to focus for more than a second at a time, and the movement of the jumper made his stomach twist uncomfortably.

He wasn't convinced any of this was real. It felt...he couldn't possibly be here, in his jumper, with Teyla. That was too good to be true.

John's breathing sped up involuntarily. He didn't understand what was happening, and he didn't like it. He tried to sit up, forgetting about Teyla's hand on his shoulder, and was immediately pushed back down on the bench.

"Do not try to move just yet," she said.

"Is he...he's awake back there?" Rodney yelled from somewhere up in front of John.

Rodney...Rodney was here too. Had they really gotten him out? John tried to think back on his last memory in the cave, but his mind was a frustrating blank. The whole last week was just a blur of fear and pain.

John vaguely heard Teyla call out a response to Rodney, and then some small part of him registered that Rodney answered. But he knew that he was weak, and the exhaustion of his ordeal was already starting to catch up to him. He closed his eyes.

Teyla's hand on his cheek. "John, please do not fall asleep just yet. We have to know-"

John couldn't form a response. He thought he heard Rodney yelling something like "Is it really him?"from the front of the jumper but on further reflection he thought he must have imagined it.

"Teyla-" he whispered. And there had been something he wanted to say, but it was forgotten. He let himself relax slightly against the metal of the bench, and then he was out again.

By the time they made it back to Atlantis, Rodney's world had narrowed to the controls, Ford's instructions, and the pain. Even with the medication, the ache in his wrist had grown until it was a constant throb, consuming his thoughts. He thought that at one point John had awoken, but he was too focused on flying to really pay attention to what was happening in the back of the jumper. Teyla had sounded reassured rather than upset, so Rodney supposed it had been good news.

Rodney still wasn't convinced. Every time he managed to pull his eyes from the windshield display to glance towards the back of the jumper, his wrist gave a sharp twinge that Rodney couldn't possibly ignore. It wasn't John, not right now. It couldn't be. The John Sheppard that Rodney knew was loyal to a fault, surely capable of violence, but never against his teammates. John would never have been able to hurt Rodney like that, he never would have looked at any of them with murder in his eyes.

Which meant it couldn't be John. Not yet. Rodney gave an ill-disguised shudder as Atlantis approached in the viewscreen, and managed to turn his attention back to the landing at hand.

As soon as Rodney brought the jumper to a juddering halt and opened the back hatch, the small ship was filled with medical staff bustling around officiously. Rodney merely sat there at the controls, nursing his wrist and waiting for someone to notice him. Usually, he'd have demanded immediate attention by now, but he could hear Carson's worried voice saying John's name, and Rodney somehow couldn't summon the energy to get out of the seat. He felt oddly detached, as though he were floating. That was probably due to the painkillers, he thought distantly.

"Rodney also requires medical attention." That was Teyla. It took a few seconds for Rodney to process her words, but he got there eventually. He looked up to find a doctor in front of him. She took hold of his wrist, and he hissed in protest, fighting the urge to pull away.

"How did this happen?" she asked, and Rodney suddenly felt ill.

Major Sheppard, he thought. Sheppard, trying to kill me.

"I fell," he managed to say around the sudden lump in his throat.

"You'd better come to the infirmary as well," she said, gently pulling him upright. Rodney followed, still feeling as though he were moving underwater. At the back end of the jumper, John was being loaded onto a stretcher. He was still unconscious, looking awfully small and pale against the white sheets. He didn't look dangerous. He looked young, despite the week's growth of beard and the lines of pain around his eyes. He looked like someone who needed protecting.

But whenever Rodney closed his eyes, he heard the snap of his wrist breaking and saw the look in John's eyes as he tackled him. Even if it really was John on paper, if he hadn't been replaced with a copy or erased like a computer, if he had somehow avoided being brainwashed or drugged into oblivion, if there had been no wraith DNA added to him or...or anything else the Genii were able to think up, it still...couldn't be John. If this John were capable of such outbursts of sudden, destructive violence towards those who were trying to help him, then it wasn't the John that Rodney knew. The ten days of torture must have changed him, somehow. As much as Rodney wanted him to wake up, so he would know he was alright, he was also desperately afraid.

Rodney followed John's limp body towards the infirmary, still being gently guided by Teyla. But once they arrived, John was brought into one room, and one of the nurses was gesturing for Rodney to go wait in another.

Teyla froze, and looked back at Rodney with wide eyes.

"Go with the Major," Rodney said, his voice an uncomfortable, pained-sounding croak.

But, to Rodney's surprise, Teyla shook her head slightly and followed Rodney into the makeshift waiting room. Rodney caught a glimpse of Carson leaning anxiously over John's limp body, a parade of wires and tubes and beeping machines, and then the door between them was shut and Rodney and Teyla were alone.

"How is your arm?" Teyla asked, somewhat distractedly.

Rodney didn't want to take any attention away from John, not when it was clear he was still in such bad shape, but he was rather afraid that if someone didn't come in to look at him soon, he was going to pass out. He just nodded slightly, hoping that would serve as a sufficient answer.

They sat in silence for a moment. Rodney felt himself slipping, and he tried to force himself to focus on Teyla again, if only to keep himself grounded until he could be seen.

"What...what happened?" he finally asked, and he was embarrassed to find that his voice was trembling slightly. "With Sheppard?"

"I am not sure," Teyla said softly,

"But he...woke up on the jumper, right? And he seemed normal then?"

Teyla nodded. "He was confused, and...very weak. It did not seem that he remembered being rescued. But...yes. He seemed to be the John that we know."

Rodney nodded slightly. He hadn't been sure. But that made it...worse, somehow. If it had been John in the jumper, then it had been John in the cave, and Rodney didn't know him as well as he thought he had.

Rodney swallowed painfully around the sick feeling in his stomach that had nothing to do with the pain in his arm. Teyla was looking at him, concerned, but Rodney didn't think he could reassure her, not when he felt so off-balance himself.

Rodney's wrist was, in fact, broken. It was only a minor fracture, but Teyla was still horrified to think that Rodney had been injured by John, their leader and their friend. From the look in Rodney's eyes, he was equally distressed.

Teyla understood, of course. John had been missing for ten days, and judging from the way his ribs had stuck out of his chest and the half-healed bruises covering his torso and back, he must be half-dead from hunger and pain. He hadn't known where he was when they'd first found him, that much was clear. It was understandable that he'd lashed out.

Even so, it had been...frightening. And she wasn't even the one that John had attacked.

Teyla cast one last glance at Rodney before leaving to see how John was doing. The doctor had casted Rodney's wrist and given him a few painkillers before advising that he get some rest. Teyla had half-expected him to ask to see John, but Rodney had merely nodded and curled up on the bed.

Teyla winced and slipped out of the room, hoping that Rodney would work through his trepidation before John woke up. She didn't want to have to explain why Rodney wasn't there.

John's room was somewhat less crowded now, the nurses having filtered away. The only people left were Dr. Beckett, fussing over some sort of machine hooked up to John, and Ford, sitting in a chair beside John's bed.

"Will he be alright?" Teyla asked immediately, crossing the room to stand at John's side. She'd expected him to look better, once they'd gotten him back to Atlantis, but he somehow just looked smaller, more vulnerable. The grime from the cave had been cleaned off his face and arms, revealing the bruises underneath in stark colors. The tattered shirt had been replaced by a clean pair of infirmary scrubs, which Teyla had only seen him wear a handful of times, the times she'd thought they might lose him.

Teyla sighed and touched John's hand softly as she glanced up, waiting expectantly for Carson's answer.

"Aye, he should be," Carson said wearily, his voice carrying a tinge of anger. "Not for lack of trying on their part, though. He's got three broken ribs, he's severely dehydrated, and his right shoulder's been badly injured. He's developed an infection, not to mention he's lost quite a bit of weight. But our Major Sheppard's a fighter, and he'll make it through."

"How long will he need to stay in the infirmary?" Teyla asked. She knew less about medicine that she cared to admit, and she had no sense of whether John was looking at a few days in bed, or a few weeks.

Carson shrugged slightly. "It's difficult to say, not until we know how well he's responding to the treatment. And knowing Major Sheppard, he'll be here far less long than he should."

"When will he...wake up?" Teyla asked softly.

Carson shook his head. "I don't know. He's already come to once, but it didn't seem like he had any idea where he was. He just looked straight through me. Didn't say a word."

Teyla nodded slightly. She had managed to get John to answer a few simple questions when he'd woken up on the jumper, but even that had been difficult. He hadn't wanted to stay awake for more than a minute or so, and she had never really been convinced he understood who she was and where they were taking him. She could very well picture him waking up, staring at Carson for a moment, and then going back to sleep.

"Have you administered a blood test?" Teyla asked abruptly.

"Aye," Carson said. "Didn't want to give him any sort of painkillers or sedation until we knew what was already in his system. It's nothing, as far as we can tell. They didn't give him anything."

Teyla nodded slightly, trying to look encouraged, but her heart was twisting. Part of her had known John being drugged when he attacked Rodney was...a desperate hope, and something that would really probably be worse for all of them in the long run. But it was still...difficult to hear that there really was no other explanation, that it had simply been John.

"How's Mckay?" Carson asked. "Meant to check in on him, but-" He gestured vaguely at John's limp body.

"He is...alright," Teyla said, thinking it might be best not to mention how much Rodney had complained over the past hour, and how much pain he seemed to be in.

"Complaining?" Carson asked knowingly.

Teyla simply nodded.

"Aye, that sounds like Rodney," Carson said. "How'd he break it, anyway?"

Teyla sighed. She knew that Rodney had told one of the other doctors that he'd fallen, which was understandable. But at the same time, it was better that Carson knew the full extent of his patient's condition. If John woke up and was still unsure where he was….

As it turned out, she didn't need to say anything. Carson glanced towards John's very fragile and not-at-all-threatening looking figure, and his eyes widened.

"It was Major Sheppard, wasn't it?"

Ford, who'd been silent up until this point, half-rose from his chair. "He didn't know where he was, or who we were. We shoulda been more careful."

Carson looked towards Teyla quizzically.

"The Lieutenant is correct," she said carefully. "He did not seem to know us. If he awakens again and once more appears...confused…."

"Aye, that's good information to have," Carson muttered, glancing back at John once more. Ford scowled, slumping back into his chair. Teyla took the chair next to him, beginning the long vigil of waiting for John to wake up, and hoping they recognized the man who opened his eyes.

Voices, voices and light. John was lying on something soft, and he almost felt comfortable. He froze for a heartbeat, trying desperately to understand what was going on. Where was he? Did the Genii still have him? If so, why weren't they hurting him?

John felt his heartbeat speed up, his breathing increase, and the voices turned from a calm murmur into a tense-sounding buzz. John forced his eyelids opened and tensed his muscles, prepared to fight or flee.

But it was Teyla's face that met his eyes, and behind her, Ford. John blinked at them in utter confusion for a few hazy seconds before a disjointed memory of waking up in the jumper swam slowly through his mind. He'd been rescued. His team had found him.

Team. Teyla, and Ford, and...something was wrong. John's thoughts felt like they were moving through molasses, but he knew there was something missing. Teyla was talking to him, but he was too busy trying to remember what he'd forgotten to answer her, or even to understand what she was saying.

"Welcome back, John. It has been nearly two days."

"You had us worried, sir."

John abandoned any attempt to decode their words, instead grasping at the few shreds of coherent thought that remained to him.

"Rodney," he finally said triumphantly. That's what had been missing, his team was here, but Rodney was…. "Where...?"

Teyla frowned. John frowned too, a little unsure why she would be upset. Maybe he wasn't making as much sense as he thought, which wouldn't be surprising, considering that his head felt like it was floating.

"He is...in his lab," she finally answered, still frowning slightly. John still couldn't quite grasp why - McKay being in his lab was a perfectly normal thing for him to do. John thought. He wasn't really sure of anything at the moment.

"Alright," John said. It was now occurring to him that he wasn't sure how much longer he would be able to stay awake. He looked down at his arms, there was a large tube sticking out of one of them, feeding him an unknown mix of clear drugs. Probably some sort of sedation, although he supposed his exhaustion could just be a result of...whatever it was that he had gone through. Which was presumably a lot.

Either way, his eyelids felt horrifyingly heavy, and just the effort of keeping them open was making his head ache with a steady thrum. His thoughts felt muddled and slow, and he didn't think he would be able to do more than move his head even if his life depended on it.

"He was by earlier though," Ford added helpfully. "Now he's just-"

Teyla shot Ford a glance that John didn't even have hope of interpreting. "Well tell him if he wants to see me-"

John trailed off. He had meant to say that if Rodney wanted to see him he had better hurry, because he wasn't sure how much longer he was going to be able to stay awake. But he could practically feel his breathing slowing down, and he didn't think he would be able to keep his eyes open long enough for anyone to actually get a message to Rodney, let alone for him to return from the lab.

"Wait, do not sleep just yet," Teyla said. "Beckett wanted to see you when you woke up, he told me to-"

John nodded vaguely, and he heard more than saw a flurry of motion as either Ford or Teyla got up to get Carson. He let his eyes slip closed. He really was...exhausted. With all the drugs coursing through his veins, the memories of his time with the Genii were no more than a hazy blur, but they...they really must have done a number on him, for him to be feeling like this.

Carson came in some time later, and John forced his eyes open.

"Hey Doc," he said sleepily.

"Major!" Carson said. "It is good to see you awake. You were badly malnourished when they brought you in, not to mention the nasty infection in your shoulder. I hope you're not in pain now?"

No, there was no pain, but he was still so tired. He had the sense he needed to give some sort of response, so he shook his head slightly.

"I just had a few questions about what happened to you during your time with the Genii, that'll help me be able to..."

John was too exhausted for questions. He knew Carson was still talking to him, looking for answers, but he let himself drift off with Carson's voice as a faint side note in the background.