Authors Note: So this is the final chapter, it's been a long journey and I just want to thank everyone who has reviewed, you've all kept me going with this. There are spoilers for First Strike and the beginning of season four in this chapter, it would help if you'd seen them but I think it explains everything fairly well for anyone who hasn't seen them. Once again, thanks for all the reviews, you guys are awesome!
Sparkly – I'd never have guessed Pegasus Magic School was your favourite lol. I'm glad you liked the Carson and Laura scene and I love the relationship between Jack and Elizabeth, he's like her protective big brother. Yes, I'm afraid I did end the last chapter with the beginning of first strike, hope you enjoy this one, thanks for the review.
Saphire – I'm glad you're still talking to me lol. I'm also glad you liked all the shippyness in the last chapter; I had to get it all out of the way for this one. Yes I am bringing in first strike, it seemed the perfect way to bring the story to a close. Thanks for your reviews and I hope you enjoy this chapter.
Atlantis Ori Sheppard – I have killed a lot of people in this story haven't I? lol. Thanks for the review.
15AthenaPerry – Thanks for the review, not really any Malar in this chapter even though it's the last one. I'm glad you're enjoying the story and I hope you enjoy this final chapter.
Sotherngt – You'll have to read on to find out what happens to Elizabeth. I'm glad you like the story and I hope you enjoy the final chapter.
Kuroima – (tries to balance self on line) I know I'm walking a thin line lol but first strike seemed like a good place to end the story. I'm glad you liked all the shippy scenes in the last chapter and that Laura's part made you laugh. This is the final chapter so I hope you enjoy it, thanks for all your reviews.
Lia-finn – I'm glad you enjoyed the last chapter, especially the Jack and Sam part, I haven't written them in a while so it's good to know it turned out well. Final chapter here so I hope you enjoy it, thanks for your review.
Chapter 25
The mission had been successful in that they had managed to destroy the ship yards the Asurans had been using to create their fleet but it had also made the replicators mad. They'd sent some kind of vessel with a stargate at its core into orbit and were now firing a continuous beam of energy at Atlantis. According to McKay, the city's shields weren't going to last much longer like this and John really didn't want to think about what would happen when the shields finally failed.
They'd contacted the Asurans, Sam had actually had Elizabeth do the talking knowing that the woman's diplomatic skills far outmatched anyone else's in the city. It hadn't done any good though, Oberoth hadn't bee interested in talking to them. Rodney was currently working on sinking the city, something which would hopefully buy them some time to come up with a better solution.
John walked into the conference room where Colonel Ellis and two airmen were working on laptops, probably trying to find a solution to this mess. "Sir," John said as Ellis looked at him and then dismissed the two airmen.
"What can I do for you John?" he asked.
"We need to head back to the replicator planet," John stated.
"We do, do we?" Ellis questioned, raising an eyebrow at John
"If this satellite weapon is being powered by their home world, maybe we can neutralize it at the source," John explained, it was probably a long shot but they were quickly running out of options.
Elis shook his head. "Well, the Apollo is no condition to get into a battle right now. That beam took a lot out of our shield.
"We gotta do something," John said, his frustration getting the better of him, his guilt wasn't helping much either.
"We did do something," Ellis stated and John repressed a sigh.
"I'm sorry, sir, but I just can't help but think that we're somehow responsible for this," John told him. He should have listened to Elizabeth; he should have known this was a bad idea when both Sam and Elizabeth had voiced their reservations about it.
"Because Weir said so?" Ellis asked and John shook his head.
"No sir."
"John, listen to me," Ellis began. "I uh, I've been over your record. I know it's not exactly spotless but personally, I think you've done a hell of a job here."
"Thank you sir," John replied, wondering where that comment was leading.
"I know Dr Weir is supposed to retake command in three weeks but I think you should be running Atlantis. Not Dr Weir," Ellis told him and for a moment John didn't know what to say to that. He'd spent months trying to find Elizabeth and bring her back here, she belonged here and he'd stood alongside Jack and Sam to fight the IOA and make sure Elizabeth got command of the city back.
"Well then I'd be the man, who would I have rage against?" he chose to joke instead.
"Listen, because of us earth won't have to deal with an armada of replicators so whatever happens here we did the right thing today," Ellis stated and John could only nod his head in response.
Elizabeth might not be military but she was the right person to be running Atlantis, she'd come a long way from the slightly naive diplomat who had come here. She'd grown into the job just as he had and they worked well together, balanced each other out and no matter what Ellis said, Atlantis wouldn't function as well without Elizabeth there.
He had barely spoken two words to Elizabeth since the briefing; he'd barely had a chance to do anything but worry about the replicators. He didn't want to leave things the way they were, they weren't exactly mad at each other but they were happy with each other either. Elizabeth had walked off after the briefing and John hadn't been able to understand why she was so opposed to the mission when the fate of earth was at stake. The giant red beam currently firing at the city had kind of clued him into her line of reasoning now but once this was over they were going to need to sit down and talk.
Ronon watched as John left the balcony after having made some strange comment about the fantastic four. He'd never understand all his earth references but some of them were definitely stranger than others. Beside him Teyla was once again looking at the beam as it shot through the water and hit the shield above them. They'd submerged the city, hoping that it would buy them some time to come up with a more permanent solution. It hadn't bought them as much time as they'd hoped for, a few extra hours and Ronon was beginning to wonder how they were going to get out of this one.
"It almost looks beautiful," Teyla stated.
"Yeah if it wasn't about to kill us all," Ronon replied.
"You do not believe Rodney and the others will find a way to save the city?" she questioned, looking from the beam to him.
"We've managed to get ourselves out of every bad situation we've faced but sooner or later... everyone's luck runs out," Ronon stated and Teyla smiled slightly, her calm, reassuring smile that he had quickly come to love about her.
"We have become extremely adept at beating the odds," she said, glancing up at the beam again. "We have no reason to believe this time will be any different."
"Well just in case," Ronon began, walking towards her brushing her hair behind her ear. "I love you."
It was the first time he'd ever been able to tell her that, to find those three words and actually say them but there was a chance that he might not be able to say them again. She smiled and he hoped she knew how true those words were, hoped she'd always known.
"I love you," she replied, leaning up to kiss him.
This was probably one of the more insane plans they'd come up with in a while but given that it had come from the heads of both Sheppard and McKay, that wasn't really all that surprising. They were actually going to fly the city, take it off the planet and into space to find a new home. That wasn't even the most insane part of the plan; they were going to move an asteroid into the path of the energy beam to give Atlantis time to take off.
Lorne sighed as he shifted to get comfortable in the seat of his F-302; the large asteroid loomed in front of him. "Alright guys we need to get close enough to clamp onto it, get enough of us drilled in
and fly it out like a ship, a really slow ship... it's probably gonna be a real pain in the ass to steer but a ship nonetheless, " he told the squad of F-302s that were following him.
He approached the asteroid, steering his F-302 carefully until it connected with asteroid and he clamped on.
"Okay, let's take this big girl for a stroll, flights three and four begin your burn," he instructed and he was rather surprised when the asteroid actually began to respond. "Son of a bitch, we might be able to pull this off after all. Flights one and two begin your burn."
"It's actually working?" Sam asked, she was slightly surprised but given the number of crazy plans they'd pulled off as SG1, she really shouldn't be, they'd blown up a sun for crying out loud.
"It's slow going, but yes, they're bringing it toward the planet," Rodney replied and Sam was reminded again of how much the scientist had been changed by his time here on Atlantis. She'd noticed it right from the very beginning, he was still arrogant and annoying but a little less so, he'd become very much a part of the family here, a family he would fight for which she would never have expected from him when she'd known him on earth.
"It should be able to get her before our cut of time," John added and Sam nodded her head.
"So we can actually do this?" Elizabeth asked.
"I think so... yes," Rodney replied.
"Guess, we should let everyone know," Sam stated and then turned to Elizabeth. "I think you should make the announcement," Sam told her; these were her people after all.
Everyone stared at Sam for a moment but she kept her eyes on Elizabeth who smiled gratefully and turned to Chuck.
"Patch me to the PA, please," she said and Chuck did so, giving her a nod. "May I have your attention? As you all know, we have found ourselves in a spot of trouble. The reality is no matter where we try to hide on this planet the replicator satellite will be able to track us. Therefore Dr McKay and Colonel Sheppard have come up with a rather ingenious way for us to escape the satellites range all together. In the next few hours we will fire the city stardrive and head into space. Atlantis is leaving this planet."
Elizabeth watched and waited through the final preparation for the plan, in space Lorne was just arriving with the satellite, John was down in the chair room and many of Atlantis' personnel had been transported to the Apollo, despite his protests Malar had been transported up there as well.
"Are you ready Sheppard?" Rodney asked and John's voice came through the radio.
"I'm as ready as I'll ever be," he stated, there was a barely hidden nervousness in his voice and for a moment Elizabeth considered going down to the chair room, she wasn't doing much up here anyway but truth be told she needed to be here.
Rodney had a brief conversation with Lorne as Elizabeth moved to stand by on of the control stations with Sam.
"Package is away and on course, we're heading back to the Apollo...good luck," Lorne's voice told them over the radio and Elizabeth took a deep calming breath. This was either going to be very successful or spectacularly unsuccessful. Ronon and Teyla were stood to the side of the room, both of them looking a little nervous.
"Okay, calculating travel time and current speed. That's it, we're good, here goes nothing," Rodney stated, pressing several buttons and the city shuddered as it began to rise out of the water. Elizabeth put her hand onto the control station beside her to steady herself.
"The asteroid is entering the beam," Rodney informed them all. "We're on the surface, fire the stardrive," he instructed John through the radio and a different type of vibration ran through the city as the stardrive came online. "We're not flying high enough, it's stalling out," McKay said after several moments beginning to sound slightly panicked.
"This is not working," John's voice came through the radio.
"What are you doing wrong?" Rodney questioned.
"Don't you blame me," John replied in annoyance. "We don't have enough power."
"Oh sure, blame me," Rodney responded sarcastically.
"Its not working, what other reasons could there be?" John asked.
"I have no more power to give you," Rodney told him, his panic becoming a little more obvious now and Elizabeth looked to the window and then back to Rodney.
"Lower the shield," she instructed and Rodney looked at her like she'd grown another head.
"We're about to go into space, if you plan on breathing we need the shield," Rodney argued and before Elizabeth could reply, John's voice cut in through the radio.
"Turn it back on at 18,000 ft," he said and Rodney continued to look unsure.
"Do it," Sam ordered. "We just need the boost."
Rodney did as instructed. "Okay I did it, give it all you've got," Rodney said and other than the rumbling of the city there was silence throughout the control room. "That's it we're flying," McKay exclaimed, breaking the quiet.
Elizabeth heard Rodney say he was raising the shield as she approached the large window at the top of the gate room stairs. She could see the blue sky morphing into the star studded blanket of space. She saw the flash of light to late and the next thing she registered was hitting the ground.
John ran into the control room, the city had just gone into hyperspace when he'd heard Rodney's call over the radio for a medical team. The control room was in pieces, bits of control stations littered the floor and sparks were still flying out of some now open circuitry. Teyla, Ronon and Rodney were crowded around one of the stations, all of them covered in cuts. Sam was just approaching the group, looking worse of than them with several shards of glass still imbedded in her skin as one of the doctors followed her and tried to get her to stand still.
His eyes searched the room, panicking when he didn't immediately find Elizabeth but he spotted her near the door with one of the doctors. She looked like Sam did, cuts covering her face and neck as the doctor pulled a final shard of glass out of one of her cuts. "You'll need to come to the infirmary," the doctor told her and she shook her head.
"You have other patients to deal with doctor, I'll come down when I get the chance," she stated and the doctor looked about to argue but decided against it and moved on.
John made his way across the room to her, not caring at that point who else was there. She saw him coming and smiled slightly, it wasn't reassuring for him enough though so he threw his arms around her, pulling her smaller body against his own. He held her for longer than was probably appropriate given their current location but he really didn't care. When he pulled back he ran his finger gently over the cuts on her face.
"What happened?" he asked.
"The beam must have broken through the asteroid quicker than we were expecting it to, it grazed the tower. I was standing by the window," she told him gesturing toward the gate room stairs he had just run up and he turned around, having already seen the state of the window on his way here. She should be far worse off than she was if she'd been standing in front of that. "I didn't even see the beam coming until it was too late, Carter did though, she'd been standing next to me. She dragged us both to the floor so we wouldn't be hit by the worst of the explosion, we both fell part way down the stairs but she probably saved my life."
John pulled her back against his chest, he saw Sam looking at them from across the room, sending her a silent thank you and she smiled and nodded her head. He finally released Elizabeth, walking back across the room with her to where Teyla was trying to convince Ronon to get the glass removed from his shoulder and Ronon was refusing.
"Ronon go to the infirmary," John ordered as he walked passed, ignoring Ronon's glare as he was led away by one of the doctors. "You guys alright?" John asked as he reached McKay and Sam.
"All things considered, the beam grazed the tower before the shield was completely closed, we took minimal damage, I managed to get the shield up pretty quick so it took the brunt of it," Rodney explained just as there was beeping from his console. "What now?"
There was a jolt which John recognised as the city dropping out of hyperspace, a fact Rodney quickly confirmed.
"Have we reached M12 578?" Teyla questioned, appearing beside Elizabeth.
"No, it should have taken another few more hours," Sam stated, moving to stand beside Rodney and examine the console. "The hyperdrive just shut down."
"Why?" John asked.
"I don't know," Rodney replied.
"Get it back up."
"I just said I don't know what's wrong, I can't get it back up if I don't know what happened," Rodney explained in annoyance.
"Where are we?" Elizabeth asked.
"I have no idea, there's no moons, no planets," Rodney began to answer but was cut off by Sam.
"This can't be right," She said worriedly her gaze focused on the console. "At current consumption we've got only got 24 hours of power left."
"What?" Rodney questioned, looking over her shoulder. "Without the shield we have no atmosphere and without the atmosphere..."
"Can we use the stargate?" Teyla questioned, stopping Rodney before he could explain what having no atmosphere meant, none of them needed to be told.
"We'd have to be in orbit of a planet to use its address," Sam explained.
"Look," Rodney began in the tone he used when he was about to bottom line something. "We dropped out of hyperspace way too soon; I have no idea where we are."
Elizabeth thought it was rather fortunate than the three greatest scientific minds she knew of were all on Atlantis at that moment. Between them they'd managed to find ways to save powers including evacuating the city to the control tower and collapsing the shield to cover just that area. Now they were all doing something very cleaver with crystals from secondary conduits, something about interfacing them with the primary conduits that were damaged. Hopefully, between the three of them, they'd get it done before they reached the asteroid field that was looming ahead of them.
"How long until we reach it?" Elizabeth asked and the Japanese technician sighed.
"Forty five minutes."
Elizabeth nodded her head, tapping her earpiece to contact Sam and tell her the news.
"You're kidding me right?" Sam asked sounding as exasperated as Elizabeth felt.
"I'm afraid not," Elizabeth replied.
"Well we should be done here in about forty five minutes," Sam told her.
"That would be exactly how long we have," Elizabeth stated, glad that Sam had been here along with Rodney and Radek. The three of them had bounced ideas off each other and come up with solutions much faster than if any one of them hadn't been there.
"Then we'd better get this done quick," Sam finished.
"In the meantime have everyone with the gene meet me in the Jumper bay, if the science trio can't get it done in time we're gonna need to clear a path through the asteroid field," John said as he walked up beside her.
"We're done," Rodney said as he walked into the control room with Radek and Sam just as Elizabeth was about to tell John and his team to take the Jumpers and clear the asteroids out of their path. "We should be able to jump into hyperspace."
Elizabeth turned to Chuck who had been monitoring the large asteroid which would be the first the city would impact. "Two minutes ma'am."
"We'll be long gone by then," Sam said as Rodney worked at one of the consoles. Without warning Elizabeth felt the city lurch and relief flooded through her as Rodney announced they were back in hyperspace.
They had landed more or less safely on M12 578, Sam was now sitting in her office writing up her final report for the day. Carson had told her several times to go and get some rest but she needed to get this done, of all the reports she'd written since coming to Atlantis, this was by far the most important.
The city was still a mess in some areas having taken damage during their few hours floating through space. The control room and part of the gate room still looked like a disaster zone and everyone that had been there during the explosion was still covered in cuts and bruises that would have them wincing at every movement they made once the adrenaline wore off.
Her own adrenaline levels were quickly plummeting now and she could feel her bodies need for sleep. She signed the report, ready to be sent to earth in the morning and left the office, heading for her quarters.
The team had done well today; it had felt almost like being a part of SG1 again. The crazy adrenaline rush and the desperate race to get themselves out of trouble before they ended up dead, the whole thing had felt very familiar.
They'd gotten their people back from the Apollo so the more rested people were taking over running the city and cleaning up the mess while those of them who had struggled through the last twenty four hours got their injuries seen to and caught up on their sleep. She smiled to Lorne as she walked through the control room, leaving the city in his capable hands.
It had been three days since they'd reached their new home, the city was looking much better, the majority of the repairs had been done and everyone's injuries were healing. Elizabeth, Sam, Teyla and Ronon all stood in the gate room together, the four of them covered in slowly fading cuts making for a rather amusing sight. John was with them, the only person uninjured by the explosion.
Jack stepped through the gate in front of them, a smirk on his lips as he took in the sight before him. "Well don't you lot make for an interesting sight," he stated.
"It's the new fashion sir," John replied and Elizabeth tried not to roll her eyes, watching as Sam seemed to lose whatever fight she'd put up against the urge. John and Jack's sense of humour was far too similar.
"How's Atlantis doing?" he asked, looking around him at the few repairs that were still being made.
"Most of the repairs have been done, we're mostly just working on secondary systems that took some damage now," Sam told him and Jack smiled and nodded his head. A silent message seemed to pass between them, Jack's eyes darting to Elizabeth for a split second. "Why don't we take this to the briefing room?"
"I promised to have lunch with Carson and Laura, I will see you all later," Teyla stated and left, Ronon as expected following after her. It seemed that wherever the young Athosian went these days Ronon was always close by. The rest of the group made their way to the briefing room, Sam sitting on one side with Jack and John and Elizabeth sitting opposite them.
"I want to get this out of the way first," Jack began "I spoke to Dr Mathews just before I came here."
Elizabeth felt her body stiffen despite her efforts not to react; she wasn't supposed to have to deal with Mathews for another two weeks.
"He won't be coming in two weeks, he's already made his decision," Jack stated and Elizabeth held her breath. "Carter will be returning to earth with me at the end of the week and the city is yours."
Elizabeth released the breath she'd been holding, relief running through her and she couldn't quite keep the smile off her face. Beneath the table John took hold of her hand, squeezing it gently and running his thumb over her knuckles.
"What brought on that decision?" John asked and Elizabeth looked at Sam both curiously and suspiciously when the woman looked at the floor with just a little too much innocence.
"Carter wrote a rather interesting report and sent it to Mathews a few days ago; she had a lot of good things to say about your performance throughout the entire incident, your ability to run the city and how much better the city functions with you at the helm," Jack explained, smiling and seemingly taking far too much pleasure out of tattling on Sam.
Elizabeth looked at Sam, feeling slightly overwhelmed and Sam shrugged. "I may have said some of those things," she stated, trying to shrug that matter off, Jack having clearly succeeded in embarrassing her.
"The point is, Atlantis is once again your command."
Elizabeth knew she would miss the sunsets on the old planet but they were beautiful on this planet. She stared out at the ocean before her, knowing now that none of this was about to be taken from her. For the first time since they'd rescued the Ancients from the void between galaxies, life was calm and settled. No imminent threats, no IOA trying to remove her from the city, Malar had finally accepted his fate or at least he'd stopped complaining about it. He'd actually sat down and had dinner with her and John's team the other day.
She smiled inwardly when the balcony door opened and John stepped up behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist. He didn't say anything; they just stood there in silence for several minutes staring out at the massive ocean.
"Right now, we're safe," John stated. "The IOA are of our backs for now, the replicators don't know where we are, the Wraith don't know. I won't be going off world for a while since my entire team was in the control room during the explosion, I'm not letting you out of my sight until I have to," John listed and then sighed. "We don't just get to be safe very often, there's always some reason for us to be worried."
"Well, then" Elizabeth began taking her eyes off the ocean and turning in John's arms to look at him. "We'll just have to enjoy it while we can. We're starting a whole new life here and if you can manage to keep out of trouble for a while, we should enjoy this quiet while we have it."
John smiled, leaning forward to kiss her and as Elizabeth deepened the kiss they forgot all about the sunset.
THE END