Title: The Last Chance
Date: 23rd December 2007
Author: Kazavid
Chapter: 6/9
Rating: M
Pairing: John Sheppard / OFC - Alex from (Doppelgänger – Mating Instinct – Didn't think...)
Archiving: None
Warnings: Sexual Content
Spoilers: Anything up to The Seer
Feedback: Yes
Disclaimer: Stargate Atlantis and its characters do not belong to me.
Summary: Four days, five chances, to stop Atlantis from being destroyed. And he can't tell anyone what he knows, or what he's doing. Is Sheppard up to the task, can he stop the destruction of Atlantis and save everyone he cares about.
The Last Chance
Chapter 6
"Ah, you're just in time." McKay said when he saw John. As soon as he placed the last two pieces with the others, something began to happen. Everyone watched as the four, separate pieces, began to meld together, the edges joined seamlessly to become one complete piece of metal, like it had never been broken.
"Did you see that." McKay said excitedly as he pointed at the artefact.
"You're sure it's not Replicator technology?" Alex queried, alarmed at the way the artefact was behaving.
"Of course I'm sure, that was one of the first tests I ran." he assured her, he went to pick the artefact up, desperate to see what it looked like as a whole piece. But before he could touch it, it aimed a beam of light at his laptop, he quickly, pulled his hand out of the way.
"What's it doing?" Alex asked trying to see what was happening.
"It's connected with the laptop... it's writing something." McKay tried to read what was being written on the screen.
"Writing what?" Ronon asked, looking over McKay's shoulder.
"It's a mathematical formula... something about connecting it to something." McKay told him.
"It looks like a Gate address to me." Ronon remarked, looking at the symbols on the screen.
"That is a Gate address." McKay said, still trying to work out what, exactly he was supposed to connect it to.
"Right, I've seen enough." John snarled, he couldn't stand there any longer and do nothing. He wasn't about to let McKay attach that thing to Atlantis' dialling system.
Everyone looked at him, startled by his sudden outburst.
He grabbed for the artefact, intending to get rid of it. He completely forgot about being told he wasn't supposed to touch it. The moment his hand touched it, he was thrown, forcefully, back, he hit the wall behind him with a loud thud, and sank down to the floor, groaning in pain.
"John!" Alex and Ronon, both rushed over to see if he was alright.
He rolled on to his side, his body shaking with the pain, it felt like he'd been hit with a stun gun.
"Are you hurt?" Alex asked, trying to assess for herself if he was hurt.
"I'm okay," he croaked, "But you need to get rid of that thing, it's dangerous. No telling what it could do to the next person who touches it."
"It's never done anything like that before." McKay said defensively, he didn't want to stop, not now when they had all the pieces.
"It's dangerous, get rid of it." John told him, leaning up on his elbow.
"But..." McKay stammered.
"I want that thing, OFF, Atlantis." he shouted.
Ronon moved towards the artefact and reached his hand out towards it, McKay stepped between him, and it. "What are you doing?" he asked Ronon, he kept moving his body between the artefact and Ronon.
Ronon raised his eyebrows at McKay's blocking tactic, "I'm going to get rid of it." he told him.
"But you can't, this artefact could be of significant value. The designs on it are unique, we've never seen anything like them before, we need to learn more about it. Need to find out where it came from..." McKay argued while trying to block Ronon from getting his hands on it.
"It's dangerous McKay, it has to go." John told him.
Ronon moved McKay out of the way and picked the artefact up.
McKay pointed his finger at Ronon, his eyes wide as he stated, "Look, how can you say it's dangerous, it didn't do anything to him."
"Maybe it's just selective in who it zaps." John suggested, knowing just how true that statement was.
McKay, snatched the artefact out of Ronon's hands, "See it hasn't done anything to me either. It must be something to do with you." he remarked, "Maybe it's the Ancient gene you have, or maybe it's the fact that you seem to have had a problem with it since we first found it." the more McKay talked, the more John could see that Alex and Ronon were starting to listen to him, wonder if what McKay was saying could be true.
"You don't know what your talking about." John told him.
"He has a point though, you have been acting weird since we found that thing." Alex, reluctantly pointed out. His behaviour since they'd found the first piece of Haltia, had been somewhat out of character, and he was hiding something from them.
"Why don't we let Colonel Carter decide what's to be done with it." McKay announced.
John got up, and walked over to McKay, who was clutching the artefact to his chest. When he reached his hand out, McKay tightened his hold on it, he closed his eyes and waited, expecting him to grab the artefact out of his hands. But he wasn't reaching for the artefact, instead he grabbed McKay's comms from his ear and pocketed it.
He couldn't have McKay contacting Colonel Carter.
"Keep him here, do not let him leave with that thing." he told Ronon, before heading for the door
"But you can't do that." McKay spluttered.
"Where are you going?" Ronon wanted to know.
"I'll only be a few minutes. Just make sure he doesn't leave here."
Alex, watched in silence, she was curious, she wanted to know what John was up to.
"You're not going to listen to him, are you?" McKay asked Ronon.
"Let's just see what he wants to do?"
"Well I'm not staying here to find out what he wants to do." McKay went to leave the lab, but Ronon stepped in front of him.
"Just give him a few minutes." Ronon told him.
McKay glared at him, "Fine." he said, knowing he didn't have much choice, he decided to read the formula the artefact had written on the laptop while they waited to see what Sheppard was up to.
>>>>>ooooo>>>>>
As soon as John came back, Alex knew something was wrong, he looked uncomfortable. He began pacing back and forth, kept looking between her and Ronon.
"John, what's going on?" she asked him.
"I'm really sorry that it's come down to his." he told everyone, "And I apologise for doing it."
"Doing what?" Alex asked, as a foreboding sense of dread ran through her.
He pulled a stunner out and pointed it forward "Like I said, I'm sorry I have to do this, but if you knew what I knew, you wouldn't blame me."
"What do you know?" Alex asked, she couldn't believe he'd use a gun on any of them.
"He doesn't know anything, he's bluffing. He just wants to get rid of this thing, for what reason I have no idea." McKay said nervously as he eyed the gun John held.
"You can't expect us to believe you'd shoot us." Alex told him incredulously.
He looked at her with a pained expression, "Shoot you? No. I'm not going to shoot you...Stun you..." he didn't finish the sentence, the look in his eyes told her the answer.
"Sheppard, what are you doing?" Ronon felt his senses kicking in to gear as Sheppard turned to look at him.
"I'm doing what I have to." he answered him. He pointed the gun at Ronon, but he had to move out of the way quickly as Ronon lunged at him. He hadn't expected Ronon to just stand there and let him shoot him, so he'd been ready to evade whatever action Ronon took.
Ronon felt the stunner blast hit him, then sank to the floor unconscious.
"Oh, my god, he really has lost it, he's crazy." McKay screeched.
Alex was shocked that John had used the stunner on Ronon. She couldn't alert anyone because she didn't have her comms with her. She darted towards him, trying to knock the stunner from his hand, but he pulled his arm back and grabbed hold of her, she managed to twist out of his hold.
"What's wrong with you?" she shouted, backing away as he moved towards her.
"Nothing is wrong with me, I..." he stopped himself before he said too much.
While John was occupied with Alex, McKay took the opportunity to try and get out. But John saw him and moved to block his exit. McKay shrank back as the stunner was pointed at him.
She tried again to knock the stunner from his hand, she kicked her foot out and connected with his arm, but he had too firm a grip on it. This time he managed to grab hold of her, he pulled her against him, so that her back was pressed against his chest. She kept struggling to get free, twisting and turning, but he was too strong. McKay, tried again to leave the lab, but, again, John pointed the stunner at him.
"I wouldn't if I were you." he bit out, causing McKay to stop in his tracks.
"Alex, honey, stop struggling." he told her, tightening his arm around her, and clamping her arms to her sides.
"Why, so you can stun me too?" she still couldn't believe what he was doing.
"I don't want to hurt you." he told her, pressing his face against the side of her head as he tried to stop her struggling.
"Don't you think it's going to hurt if you use that stunner on me?" she bit out. She kicked her foot back against his shin, he grunted in pain, as her foot connected with his leg.
"I'm not doing this to hurt you, and in a day or so you'll understand why I did it."
"You keep saying that, but you never tell me what it means."
"I can't." he brought his other arm around her, while keeping his eyes on McKay. He kissed the side of her head, felt his heart sink as she tried to move her head out of the way.
"I'm sorry." he whispered against her ear then he let her go.
She turned around to look at him, still unable to believe he'd do it, but he did, he fired the stunner at her. As she was falling to the floor, he caught her, and laid her down, making sure that she was alright.
McKay stared open mouthed at what John had done, "What are you going to do with me?" he stammered, if he could stun Alex, and Ronon, what would he do to him, he wondered.
"I'm not going to do anything with you." he told him, but that wasn't exactly the truth. "Before we go I want you to disable the subcutaneous implants. Can't have them finding us too soon." John saw the look of horror on McKay's face.
He could imagine what McKay was thinking about him. He didn't want to put the fear of god in to McKay, but right now, at this point in time, it was a necessary evil. He looked over McKay's shoulder as he disabled the subcutaneous implants.
"Done." McKay bit out, then glared at him.
"Good. Now I want you to bring that thing, and come with me." he pointed at the artefact that McKay was still clutching.
"Why?"
"Why? Because we're going to get rid of it."
"Why don't you just get rid of it yourself?"
"As you've already seen, I can't pick the damn thing up. So I need you to do that for me."
They left the lab and headed for the Jumper bay.
>>>>>ooooo>>>>>
Ronon was the first to wake up, he looked around and saw Alex, a few feet away, still unconscious, there was no sign of McKay or Sheppard. He got up and checked on Alex.
"Alex!" he patted her face to rouse her.
"Ooh, I hurt all over." she moaned as her nerve endings, tingled, painfully.
She became aware of where she was, then she remembered what had happened. She sat up quickly and looked around the lab, "John! Is he..."
"No, he's not here, and neither is McKay." he went to alert security, but Alex stopped him, by batting his hand away from his ear.
"What are you doing?"
"I'm alerting security."
"You can't do that, he has his comms in, he'll be listening to everything. If he hears you talking, he'll know we've woken up. We don't know what's wrong with him, or what he'd do to McKay."
"So what do you suggest we do then."
"Is everything alright in here." Major Lorne asked from the doorway, he stared at the two of them sitting on the floor.
"No, it's not alright. Have you seen John." Alex asked him.
"No, you want me to try and locate him?" he went to activate his comms.
"No! Don't do that." she told him quickly.
"Why not?"
"We need to tell Sam what's going on."
>>>>>ooooo>>>>>
Sam was sitting at her desk, working, when Alex and the others came in. She looked up and smiled, "Is something wrong?" she asked, when she saw the look on their faces.
"It's John." Alex told her. She went on to explain what had happened, and how obsessed he'd been with the artefact.
"Why has he taken McKay?" Sam asked.
"I don't know."
"I've heard a couple of rumours going around, mostly about him being a little snappy, and losing temper. I just put it down to the pace and stress of the job. In fact, I was going to suggest that he take a week off, try to relax. Obviously there's more to this than just stress."
"I don't think it has anything to do with stress." Alex said, "He keeps saying in a few days we'll know what he was doing, and why."
"He hasn't given any hints as to what he's talking about."
"No nothing, he clams up every time I ask him, and won't say anything."
"Major Lorne, I need you to take a security team and apprehend Colonel Sheppard." she told him.
"Yes, ma'am, do we know where he is?" he wasn't looking forward to this.
"Knowing Sheppard, he'll probably head for the Jumper bay." Ronon said.
Sam left her office and moved in to the Gate room. "Chuck, pull up the subcutaneous implant tracking system. Lets see where Colonel Sheppard and Doctor McKay are."
He pulled up the programme and tried to access it, but it was off line.
"I can't ma'am, it's off line." he told her.
"John must have had McKay do something. He'd know that would be the first thing we'd try." Alex sighed. She was worried about what was wrong with him, she wondered just how far he'd go to do whatever it was he was trying to do. And what would he do to McKay?
"Get Doctor Zelenka up here." Sam told Chuck.
"Yes, ma'am."
>>>>>ooooo>>>>>
"Keep walking." John pressed the gun against McKay's back, nudging him along.
"Alright, I'm walking." McKay walked a little faster. "Where are we going?"
"You don't need to know that."
John knew something was up as soon as the chatter on his comms lessened. They knew about him, and were trying to keep the talk to a minimum, they didn't want to alert him. He changed direction, instead of heading for the Jumper bay, he headed towards the outer edge of the city. He knew he wouldn't be able to stay away from them for too long, they'd eventually track him down. So he had to make sure that they didn't find McKay.
He reached the place he'd been heading for and told McKay to enter one of the rooms.
"What are you going to do?" McKay asked, turning to face him.
"If you don't want to crack your head open, I suggest you lie on the floor." John told him.
McKay's eyes widened with horror, "Lie on the floor... why?"
John narrowed his eyes on him, and gave him a look that told him he should know why. He pointed the stunner at him.
"You don't have to do that, I've been cooperating with you, haven't I?" he said nervously, he held his hand out in front of him, as if by doing this he could ward off the shot.
"This has nothing to do with you, it's more to do with that thing." John told him, pointing at the artefact that McKay was still clutching to his chest.
"Okay, so here, take it." McKay held it out for John to take.
"Funny McKay, you know I can't touch the damn thing." he bit out.
"Oh, yes, sorry... but if you shoot me now, how are you going to get rid of this?"
"Enough talk. You have five seconds to lie down before I shoot you."
"But..."
"Four... three... two..."
McKay got down on the floor and laid on his back, he closed his eyes as John reached number one, waiting for the painful energy shot to hit him. As the stunner blast hit him, he shuddered with the pain and fell in to an unconscious state.
John tied him up, and gagged him, then made his way back to the Jumper bay. If they found him anywhere near this area, this would be their starting point in trying to find McKay, he didn't want that. Well, not for another 24 hours at least.
>>>>>ooooo>>>>>
John evaded Major Lorne and his team for as long as he could, which wasn't long enough in his opinion. He'd slipped down one of the corridors when he'd spotted a couple of Lorne's men, only to come face to face with Lorne himself.
"Colonel Sheppard, Sir, if you'd like to come with me." Lorne said pointing his gun at him.
"I don't have much choice do I." he said, stating the obvious.
"No Sir, I'm afraid you don't. Where's Doctor McKay?" Lorne asked him.
"Why, have you lost him?" he asked.
Lorne knew Sheppard, well enough to know that if he didn't want to tell you something, he wouldn't. So he didn't bother asking him again. He contacted Colonel Carter, "I have Colonel Sheppard in custody, ma'am."
"Is McKay alright?," she asked.
"Doctor McKay isn't with him."
"Did you ask him where he is?"
"Yes, but he doesn't want to tell me."
"Have your men search the area, see if he's locked him up somewhere. And bring Colonel Sheppard to my office."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Are Alex and Ronon alright?" John asked Lorne as they walked to Colonel Carter's office.
"They're fine."
"Good." he wasn't looking forward to having to face them, nor to all the question he'd be asked. Questions he knew he couldn't answer.
>>>>>ooooo>>>>>
As soon as he entered Colonel Carter's office, he saw Alex and Ronon, he gave them a crooked smile, then sat down in the chair by Carter's desk. "Sorry about before guys." he looked sheepishly at them as he apologised.
Ronon glared at him, and folded his arms, his look letting John know that his little stunt would definitely earn him a couple of stitches in the training room at some future point. Alex wasn't looking at him with accusation on her face, she looked more worried than anything else. He just hoped she'd forgive him when all this was over.
"Care to tell us what's going on?" Carter asked him.
He looked right at her, he'd love to tell her, "Can't." he replied.
"Can't? Or won't?" she asked.
"Like I said, I can't." he told her.
"Where's Doctor McKay?"
"Maybe you should try the mess hall." he joked, "He probably got a bit peckish and went looking for something to eat."
"Colonel Carter!" Zelenka said from the doorway of her office.
"Yes."
"I've managed to get the programme back on line." he told her.
"Thank you Doctor,"
She noticed that Sheppard didn't look too happy with what Doctor Zelenka had just told her. He hadn't expected them to get the programme back on line so soon. She walked outside to one of the consoles.
"Right let's see if we can locate McKay." she said standing by Doctor Zelenka, as he scanned Atlantis for McKay's implant.
"The programme is working, but I can't locate Rodney's signal." Zelenka told her.
"Nothing?" she questioned, "Try looking for life signs, any that are in unusual, out of the way, places, it's possible he did something to McKay's subcutaneous implant."
"I've already done a scan for any life signs in the unexplored parts of Atlantis, and I'm afraid I came up with nothing." he told her.
"You have a number of rooms on Atlantis that are shielded, don't you?" she asked.
"Yes, we have some that can't be penetrated by the sensors... ah, yes, you're thinking he might have put Rodney in one of those rooms."
"Makes sense if you don't want someone to be found.
"Major Lorne, have your team search as many of the shielded rooms as you can. Start from where you found Colonel Sheppard and work your way out. Doctor Zelenka will direct your men to each room."
"Yes, ma'am." he contacted his team and relayed what Colonel Carter wanted done.
John watched Carter come back, she sat in the chair opposite him and stared at him, "You know it won't be long before we find McKay, so why don't you save us the bother of having to search for him, and just tell us where he is."
He didn't say anything, the longer they took to find him the better, as far as he was concerned.
"John, tell her." Alex said from behind him. He didn't turn around to look at her, he just lowered his head down.
"Fine," Carter said, when he continued to stay silent. "Major Lorne, take Colonel Sheppard to a holding cell."
"Yes, ma'am." Lorne stood beside Sheppard and waited for him to stand up. When he stood up two security men flanked him, while Lorne led the way.
As he passed Alex he looked at her, his eyes begging her to keep on trusting him, even after everything he'd done.
"Colonel?" Lorne said as Sheppard stopped next to Alex.
"One minute, Major."
He could see the varying emotions that crossed her face as she looked at him. He cupped her cheek, thankful that she didn't back away from him, "Sorry about hurting you." he told her, he knew it was inadequate as an apology, but he couldn't give her anything else, not right now. He kissed her cheek, then pressed his mouth by her ear, "Trust me... please." he whispered.
Lorne tugged on his arm, "Sir... please."
He let go of Alex and followed Lorne to the holding cells.
>>>>>ooooo>>>>>
Two hours later.
"Ma'am, we've found Doctor McKay." one of Lorne's security men announced over the comms.
"Is he okay?" Sam asked.
"He's fine, just a bit dazed..."
"He shot me!" McKay's voice suddenly blurted through the comms. "He's a nut job, he needs locking up."
"McKay, nice to hear you're fine." Sam butt in before he could say anything else.
"Fine! Fine! I am not fine..." he complained.
"Captain, bring him to my office, please." she told him, cutting McKay off in mid sentence.
"Yes, ma'am."
Sam looked at Alex and Ronon, "Let's see if McKay managed to find out what Colonel Sheppard is up to." she said.
>>>>>ooooo>>>>>
"Looks like they found McKay." security officer, Grayson, told his C/O.
John clenched his jaw, as he sat in the holding cell. He wasn't sure how much time they had left.
TBC...
>>>>>>>>>>ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo>>>>>>>>>>