...

But when the captor removed his hand, the colonel kept convulsing a second or two.

And when the shock ceased to directly affect his nervous system, Sheppard was still shaking uncontrollably; he was panting really fast, his hands clenching and unclenching the armrests of the chair; his eyes wild and unfocused eying around with panic; his mind was paralysed by the too great affluence of pain signals; his body so tense and his nerves so abused it felt he was about to rip from the inside...

This secondary effect seemed to last forever and he screw his eyes shut, unable to hold a chocked groan anymore as it felt as if his entire being was throbbing, every heartbeat sending knifing pain in his whole still shuddering body. There was nothing else in this universe but his abused nerves about to be ruined; even his eyes seemed useless.

And nausea seemed to become even worst –with all the cramps that had upset his stomach, with the electroshock that overran his brain- leading the colonel into shifting restlessly in his chair and into an even faster panting in order to make sure he would not simply throw up his last meal. Although the man compulsively gagged as the disturbed muscles in his throat twitched, giving the man the cruelly lasting feeling he was truly being sick on the moment, so much he turned his head to his side and bend down the much he could toward the dusty floor to dry heaved for a few minutes.

In this moment of agony and misery -his mind just losing track from all this suffering happening at the same time- Sheppard was convinced he would be dying right on place, in this awful chair, with the damned bald asshole hovering proudly nearby; he could not take it anymore.

When the muscles of his digestive system eased off a little from exhaustion, Atlantis's CO slumped on the chair; shivering, battered, hiccupping, still panting, cut off from his surrounding.

Has he really been sick? … Maybe… No: the metallic tasting liquid in his mouth was blood… his own blood? He probably bit his tongue hard enough, but did not distinguish this feeling among so many aches. He had to find a way to get out of this place, but it seemed so impossible and futile, just like the thought that barely came to him that someone could come and save the man he was.

The worst was: for all the endless minutes Sheppard was trying to regain control over his own body, his captor watched him silently, waiting to be sure his prisoner was able to focus on him again before keeping on: after all, there still was another neural attack to come plus something else only the cavemen-looking goons could fancy.

Many times the clock rang, but at least there was no more tiles on the red shelf except the three points to go.

"Are you still with us, stranger? It is not over yet and I still have to begin interrogating you…" A dull voice said, muffled by the ringing in Sheppard's ears –though this sound was not the alarm from the clock this time- and the pounding in his head.

Gosh! How much the lt. colonel wanted to rip the bald guy's tongue from his mouth! Maybe if he just ignored that bastard he would… disappear or something, or get annoyed and leave him there so he could sleep a bit. That would piss Mr Clean off if his prey would just faint –or at least Sheppard could act as if he was unconscious- and keep him from enjoying the torture. Or maybe John could pretend that the last jolt toasted his brain for good… Ok, that possibility was too dreadful and frightening to even think about since it could quite possibly happen.

He could hear the voices of those enemies he didn't even know their names, but his mind had hard time trying to understand what was being said: John just focused on managing the lingering pain, the involuntary trembling and the slight spasms, keeping his eyes shut and trying to enjoy braving his captor.

Where was the adrenalin rush he hoped for anyway: it was supposed to be the key for his escape!

He tested his restrains once again, but was really disappointed to find that even bracing his arm in order to pull on the rope was asking for too much strength from his limbs. Sheppard faintly cracked open one eye to peer at his wrists: ok, they were still attached to his body, but there were red smears on his skin.

Did he shred his skin raw while the electroshock was wrecking havoc with his nerves? He closed his eye quickly: the sight of blood oddly worsened his nausea… or was it only the fact he was trying to focus, think and make sense of things with the hell of a headache he had?

"Wake him up, that will count as his physical abuse…"

Were the words that suddenly caught John's attention: he nearly shot his eyes open with alarm and he surely held his breath. Ok, what to do now: act as if, oh miracle!, he was awake all out of a sudden and doing well enough to be spared by the guards, but that meant the bastard Mr. Clean could immediately keep on with short-circuiting his nerves…

But if he still acted as if he was unconscious, he would be beaten up or something just as bad –because: what else can the cavemen-looking guard do?- and no matter how skilful he was for acting, they will quickly know he was not out cold… Wait, maybe that was the plan: he will pretend to be harmless, the guards will unfastened him or something and then Sheppard will take them by surprise and get rid of them!

Still here was that tiny voice in his mind ha told him his plan was silly; that he was too weak to move and would be unable to beat four large ruffians… But as concussion adds up with his usual stubbornness, Sheppard decided to ignore what could possibly harm him. So he braced himself and waited for the right moment.

Yeah, this time it will count as a point, but no a punishable one: it will be Good Guys: 2 and Bad Guys: 1…. And unfortunately it was already a score of 54 for his headache, plus the fog gaining ground on his mind, and 0 for him…

However, it hit him; his plan had a serious flaw: what if they do not unfastened him? Speaking of which, something else hit him and this time and it was way worst: the colonel did not hear them coming closer, but he surely felt the fist connecting with his midsection, forcing his eyes opened wide from the surprise and shock as well as forcing all the air out of his lungs. He struggled against his restraints to impulsively bend in half to relieve his abdominals and guts, but it did not work so well, leaving him instead even more suffocating and winded. Coughing did not help either to shoo away the stars and the flashing dots taking over his vision, nor the renewed pain in all his muscles that the sudden movement awoke.

And after what seemed hours with the breath knocked off him, he managed to suck in enough air: "Huuh Sonofa…bitch!" Sheppard growled with a hoarse and strained voice through clenched teeth, coughing again and swallowing compulsively to fight his rebellious stomach.

Yet he suddenly went quieter when he met his captor's creepy and pale unmoving eyes scrutinizing him carefully. So the colonel tried to hold back the coughs starting in his chest –only succeeding at making it look like he was hiccupping- to glower at the bald man with all the hate he could show in only one look.

"You are awake now… It is inauspicious that your specie is much weaker than I expected: I will have to revise my calculation on the amount of hours you will be lasting before being irreparably damaged by our little game." The captor said and by the as usual so monotonous tone of his voice, Atlantis's CO could only wonder if the bald man could feel any emotion.

"Oh…because you have some sort of math'matical formula especially for this?" Sheppard could not hold this sharp and ironic comment, though he could not force his voice to look less lethargic, husky and faint.

"I warn you, if you keep on answering this way, I will add tiles even if your board was not in the first place cleared." Mr Electric Eel simply said; and did not look threatening even if he was purely serious.

John frowned and did not answered immediately, wondering if he was really understanding what has been said; after all, his brain was still suffering from the tremendous blow he had straight to his temple, where the skull is thinner.

Ok, he was getting it; thinking in this haze kind of hurt, but he found the tricky detail in Mr Clean's menace.

"That… you add some now or later, what's the damn diff'rence anyway, you'll still beat me up with no reason at all!" The colonel tried to snap, but how he hated the fact it was not as impressive as it used to be when he was not aching all over!

"There is a reason; it is for the sake of my people and maybe even it will lead us into a technological development that could be very helpful for us. You cannot keep the secret of your weapons and devices only for you and the others that came through the Silver Ring of the Stars…" The captor answered and it took Sheppard a few seconds to realize the bald one was mentioning the Stargate in a very out of ordinary way.

"You took my gears, right, but the int…trogg… the interrogation part is kinda lame…" John chuckled weakly and answered sluggishly even if he tried in vain concentrating on a normal pronunciation.

Oh, crap: things were looking even more blurred and his vision seemed to be restrained to the little that was twirling right in front of him…

"The questions will come in time, when I will have curbed your riotous nature." The captor simply said.

"You know what? I'll probably die before ya could even dream of doing prog…ress this way!" Sheppard retorted, chuckling slightly even if it was in a strained way, and thought his voice sounded strange; he did not know if it was his slurring or the fact his hearing was muffled…

"Then you will suffer."

The colonel wanted to bitterly laugh at his captor's words; he wanted to point out that usually it was the point when you are torturing someone and keep on humiliating the bald man, but the whole game turned out differently. In fact, the alien man decided to show a little bit more of what he was talking about: he gave a vicious open palm punch straight to Sheppard's forehead; not only knocking badly his already injured head against the headrest, but also sending another of his cruel electroshock.

The poor man's body tensed so painfully and suddenly that his back arched even with his limbs tied down; unable to control any of his burning and agonising muscles, his nerves seeming to burn and rip all his fresh open while doing so… Sheppard let out a short strangled cry as he shook.

But about immediately after the bald man started shocking his captive, the suffering was so intense on the already battered and worn out injured man, that darkness seemed to finally claim him: the colonel quickly lost the fight and lost consciousness, still convulsing even when his eyes rolled upward in his skull.

He did not have time to think or to try to resist: his brain was already overwhelmed by the alarm signal his body was sending him all at once and chaotically…

The oxygen entirely left his lungs in a shaky sigh; he shook; his heart shuddered one last time before his entire system shut down. Definitively a point for the bad guys…

Shit, he was drowning: the awful pressure on his entire chest as if tons of water were compressing him, his inability to breathe in!!

He tried to move and to fight for his life, but there was only the dire cold and the utter pain in his entire body that were trapping him like an iron maiden… He had to know where the surface was, he had to swim back up, but everything was so dark!

His eyes, he could open them! So he did, but instead of the darkness of deep sea, he could only see a pale, but thick and brownish haze before him, along with black dots flashing around… Oh, he was no underwater… but why did he felt damp and frozen and suffocating?

What was worst: feeling as if his skull was shattered to pieces and piercing through his brain, or everything else that made him doubt he had anything as a carcass beside the agony fire shooting in every nerves… No time to think –and not enough energy and his mind was not clear enough anyway- he had to breathe… Sheppard tried to roll on his side with a miserable and faint groan that seemed to irritate his throat; as if it could relieves him from this oppressing pressure on his chest; though it was not only making the ache in his body worst, but it awoke a knifing pain right in his ribs where the strain seemed to be… and his arms and legs -his whole body in fact- only seemed to quiver epileptically; nearly unresponsive.

He man gave up on moving much, but rolling back to his lying position jarred his battered muscles and worsened the stabbing feeling. Paralysed and shocked by additional pain signals, he finally took a sharp compulsive intake of breath halfway between a panicked hiccupping shaky gasp and the choked gurgle of someone drowning.

However, he surely regretted it immediately as the acute piercing pain in his ribcage spiked with the movement; he even managed to gain enough control on his shaky limbs to sluggishly wrap his arms around his chest to secure whatever was hurting as hell. Shallow panting was all he could do for several minutes following this lousy attempt, but again he could barely think of something else than the cruel soreness as all the important matters were blocked by the thick fog of confusion.

He did not want to move, he only wanted his breathing to ease and the pain to vanish, in vain. He was staring at the sky above him, or the ceiling, or whatever I was; it did not matter, it was too blurred and unimportant right now. He was shivering and shaking, sometime unwillingly gasping or hiccupping… maybe also twitching from the jitteriness his nerves and muscles showed, he could not tell… Why was this place and the floor under him so cold, why were his fingers tingling, why were his limbs so heavy, where was this headache coming from… why was his chest hurting so much?...

Sheppard's hands shook with hesitation –or probably more because of the weakness- as he slowly lifted one arm from his torso and slipped the hand under his t-shirt -the tag vest has been removed hours ago anyway- to cautiously probe the skin of his chest. Yet he quickly found out, and hissed of pain because of that discovery, that the area above his heart was very tender.

He shot his eyes open –how could he not remember closing them?- in alarm as a few memories from the past hours flooded his mind in disjointed waves: electric shocks, painful ones… torture maybe? He thought maybe he already had his headache back then…

And he could remember some words that sounded very important… points? It was not making any sense until he remembered feeling threatened by the damaging effects of the painful… things someone did to him. So maybe he was dead, or maybe the electroshocks burned him… on the chest?! No: he remembered a pale hand going for his head, but not for his chest…

His skin was tender and his ribs on the left side –two of them at he heart level- seemed broken or cracked, hurting very badly at least. Sheppard's mind was sluggish and confused so, again, he had to try to make sense of things and to try to forget about the sound throbbing in his head…

A punch could have caused this? No: the one he received connected with his midsection and that is a bit too low to injure his ribcage…

Definitively something with his heart then. That was bad wasn't it? Except if he had been given CPR or something, but in this case, why would he need it… why would the people caring about his life leave him lying alone on the hard and cold ground?

And it seemed to him he could not remain on the floor and waste time watching the ceiling and groaning softly at the pain… Yep: even with a screwed up brain, Sheppard still had some part of his mind recalling surviving skills.

So the colonel took the deepest breath his cruelly aching ribs would allow him to take and tried again to roll on his side, very very carefully; keeping his head from moving the more he could to keep his vision from greying out because of the concussion. And slowly, the man shifted his weight; his body being a mass of pure ankylosis and soreness so much John felt as if he spend days and nights doings push-ups and jumping-jacks without even taking a single breather…

At last he was done and lying on his flank, hands clutched to his chest to secure his ribs, holding his breathe: the floor was too hard for his bony frame, his vision was blurred and quite limited because of the black dots dancing before his eyes, his stomach seemed to be angrily protesting the new position with waves of nausea, the odd fool taste in his mouth did not help… and his head was swimming and the headache was even worst!... Did it count as an attempt to escape or did he really need to stand up and explore the room in which he was?... So much for a stupid question: of course it did not count staying sprawled on the floor! But at the same time, was he able to even stand up?...

However, just as he was finally considering trying, -though before he did try anything for real- he felt something gripping firmly each of his arms and pulling abruptly and brutally; so much that whatever or whoever was holding him quickly lifted him -just like a rag doll with useless limbs and the head too foggy to understand what was happening- enough from the ground to make him stand in a poor upright position. Even if it was what he planned to do in a way, Sheppard was far from being grateful at this moment: right when he left the floor, his head started to swim even more, his vision almost went completely black, but, most of all, his abused stomach began to protest the very sudden change of equilibrium…

And as the moment before John felt frozen, now it seemed heat was flooding him all out of sudden along with the tremendous wave of nausea taking over all his senses, and the few fairly clear thoughts he still had. Instinctively, the colonel tried to curl and go down on his hands and knees, so much he felt as if his body would literally throw out his whole stomach, the only thing he wanted at this moment was to black out again, or even to know his heart was going to fail again and end this agony. The ceiling and the floor seemed to be rolling like waves on the sea during a frightening storm, just as sickening as well.

He was miserable: and not only was he only dry heaving without relieving the sickening queasiness -yet only spiking the headache and the soreness in all his body to an unimaginable level- but in addition the strong hands were not letting him go, only clutching his arms with more strength to keep the colonel upright. Damn!

The colonel wasn't even sure if he could still use his legs so much they felt weak; after all, every time he tried to bear a little of his own weight, he was stumbling and would have certainly felt ungracefully on the hard ground if it wasn't of the two guards at his side… Yeah, they were the guards: he could tell from their generic corny nondescript uniforms, the only think he could make sense out of it right now.

He tried to fight the caveman-like men, yet it was quite faintly since his brain was part confused, part numbed by the pain and only slightly aware he could not remain inactive. Ronon would have already found a way out if he was in the same situation, Teyla as well… though maybe not Rodney, except if he can get very lucky that suddenly.

As he was wondering through the haze in his mind, someone stepped right before him; so much his poor vision could only be barely focused on this person.

« You should know that what you are doing is vain and that your upper digestive system can not empty itself anymore: you pathetic being already soiled my interrogation room shortly after I revived you… for that you will start again our little game with one tile for your punishment. »

A dull voice said, and Sheppard immediately recalled the bastard with eerie fish eyes that was holding him captive. He fought to lift his head, fought against the churning of his stomach and the awful uncontrolled spasms that were worsening the knifing pain in his chest and all the stiff muscles in his whole body; having the vague intention to stare angrily at this bald man he wanted dead more than anyone else.

It wasn't so easy, and he wasn't even sure he was looking at the right man since his vision was so blurred… no, he could not be mistaken by the bald man's uniform; something just as ugly as what the others were wearing, except in a kind of pale color Sheppard decided to call "dead old rotting salmon" pink.

The colonel thought at this moment that it seemed he was always attracting the worst psychos in the galaxy…

TBC