Trials of Womanhood Part 1

The following week was blissfully free of tragedy, disaster and other irritants. Missions were pleasantly free of nasty surprises. Nothing blew up in the labs. Caldwell was nowhere near the galaxy.

They knew it couldn't last.

But it still seemed a cruel trick of fate/luck/karma to Mairghread when she woke up in the middle of the night early Tuesday.

Her belly and thighs were on fire. Her lower back felt like someone had fused the bone together and had thoughtfully added several spikes which were digging in to her skin and innards. Her whole body tingled and burned like she had been struck by lightning, or one of Rodney's unsuccessful experiments. She was hot and cold, shivering and sweating, nauseous and hungry.

Damn!

She scrambled out of bed and ran to the nearest place she could think of to lock herself into—the bathroom.

Mairghread punched the lock 'on' and then smashed the mechanism with the Lantean soap dish (it was a topic of great discussion why, if the Ancients were so spiritual and 'get me out of this physical form', they found expensive marble and artificial diamond soap dishes to be a 'bare necessity'). For good measure, she jammed anything movable against the door before curling up in the nook between the sink and two walls.

It hadn't worked. The hunger had come. She hadn't thought it would be this bad at first.

An invisible hand punched her low in her gut and she moaned softly. Looking down and opening her eyes, she was horrified to discover a pool of her own dark blood forming beneath her.

"Damn damn, blast and bloody hell!" she screamed. Why? Why were the Spirits letting this happen? The hunger was bad enough. Did her body have to do this? Force the point? Bleed until she had to choose between death and damnation?!

In their rooms, Teyla and Ronon heard their daughter scream. Screaming on Atlantis rarely meant anything as mundane as a nightmare.

They both rushed into her room, only to find her bed empty and the sounds of someone moaning in the bathroom.

Now, living in Atlantis for more than a few months will make the most easy-going person slightly paranoid and over-reactive to screaming, empty beds at 1 in the morning and moaning in the next room.

Neither Ronon or Teyla were terribly easy-going before they came.

They tried opening the door, but it was locked. Which meant calling someone to override.

Teyla activated her earpiece.

"Teyla to Control Room."

"Control Room. Haruki here."

"I need you to override the lock on Mairghread's bathroom please. We believe she is injured."

"Of course."

There was a pause as Haruki tried to override the lock, which should have been a simple operation.

"I am sorry, Ms. Emmagen, but I can't. The lock is not functioning."

"What do you mean you can't override it?" McKay's voice broke in over the comm. "Geez, what we pay you for if you can't override a bathroom lock?!"

"Rodney, perhaps you could help?" asked Teyla in the way she had that really said 'McKay, get down here or I will get my sticks and make you come down here'.

"Teyla? Ronon? What's up?" Sheppard interrupted.

"Sheppard? What are you doing up?" McKay demanded.

"What are you doing up?" countered John. "Did you guys put a call into Beckett yet?"

"No," growled Ronon as he attempted to stare the door into opening. He knew from experience that there was no good way to force the door without doing significant damage to the small room and its occupant beyond.

"Alright, I'll grab him on my way down. Sheppard out."

And thus it came to pass that everyone was standing in Mairghread's bedroom as 1:15 in the morning while Rodney worked to fix the busted mechanism enough to Sheppard to override.

Mairghread could hear them. She needed them to leave her alone—she was dangerous.

"Go away!" she screamed at them, trying to sound dangerous but only managing pitiful and bad-tempered.

"Mairghread, what is wrong?" Teyla spoke loudly through the door.

"Got it!" exclaimed Rodney as the crystals lit up and the door slide back to reveal the small pile of junk across the door way, which was easily pushed aside by Ronon.

"No!" she shouted as she tried to hide deeper into the corner. "Go away! I don't want to hurt you!"

Beckett knelt down in front of her, blocked from actually getting her, because the space between the sink and the wall was too small.

He noted with concern the puddle of blood seeping out from underneath her and how her hands, nightgown and legs were covered with blood. Sheppard looked over the doctor's shoulder, said "oh" and went to stand by the door with Rodney.

"Now why would ye hurt us?" asked Carson softly to the terrified girl.

"PMS," muttered Sheppard before everyone in the room shot him a glare.

"It didn't work!" she sobbed.

"What didn't?"

"The retrovirus! See!" she pointed to the blood. "It hurts so much! I don't want to feed!"

"Lass, the retrovirus worked fine. This is just your menarche," Beckett tried to reassure her. "It's perfectly normal for a girl your age and development."

She gave him a blank stare. "What?"

Teyla knelt down beside the doctor and tried to explain. "I believe what Dr. Beckett is saying is that you are having your monthly bleeding."

The light dawned. How could she have been so stupid?

"Um Doc?" muttered Sheppard to the Scotsman. "Didn't you explain the birds and the bees to her?"

"Ah dinnae think it was necessary!" Beckett muttered back, somewhat flustered. "She seemed tae know everythin' tha' was happenin' tae her!"

"I do," she broke in. They kept forgetting about her exceptional wraith hearing. "I panicked."

"That is understandable," Teyla told her soothingly. "Now," she said, taking charge once again and turning to the men. "If you would not mind leaving us…?"

They did not need to be told twice.

"It hurts," Mairghread whimpered. Just because she understood, didn't make it any less painful.

"I know," Teyla began to fill the tub with warm water. "I will return with some herbs to help ease the pain. Can you get in by yourself?"

"Yes!" cried Mairghread indignantly as she got up, blood running down her legs in indigo riverlets. "I'm not a little girl anymore!"

The Athosian smiled. "How true."

TBC

Next: Trials of Womanhood Part 2