Cooper rubbed at her temples, her head leaning back against the wall. She was immensely tired, but had no inclination to sleep. After a moment, she felt a presence at her side.

"I hope you do not mind if I join you, Lieutenant," Teyla said softly.

She shook her head. "No, not at all. Are you feeling alright?"

The Athosian smiled slightly. "Yes, I am fine. I told you, we were only in the presence of the gas for a few moments before you called us back."

"That's good. I can barely handle one disabled person, I don't want to imagine what would happen if I had three."

"On the contrary, Lieutenant, I think you have faired rather well," she said gently. "It is not easy to take control in these situations, and even more difficult to know what is wise and what is not. None of us knows the dangers lurking in these halls."

Cooper nodded. "I know. Still, I'd rather we all got out of this alive."

Teyla frowned, then looked at her companion. "Am I correct in thinking that this is not the first time you have been trapped somewhere?"

She sighed, hearing her breath start to shake. "No, it's not."

She waited a moment, then said, "We having nothing more to do here. Would you like to talk about your experience?"

Cooper wanted to say no. She wanted to pretend everything was fine and that she'd put the past behind her, but that wasn't the case. She'd had nightmares about the NI7 mission, and now the nightmare had come alive. "It was a mission I had when I was stationed on Earth." Her voice sounded forced, a little too loud. "We were on a desert planet. It was supposed to be a quick mission, just to retrieve something from the people that SG1 had pursuaded them to give us. We ended up getting caught in a civil war. More of a rebellion, really." She fiddled with a piece of hair that had come loose from her bun. "We were trapped within the city walls and had to pick a side or get killed in the crossfire. My leader wanted us to back the government so that we could sustain our political ties, but I convinced him to fight for the people. I told him I thought they were going to win, so the political ties would be meaningless if we backed the loser. I wasn't completely honest, I just knew the government was cruel and I wanted them gone almost as much as the natives did."

"Did you win?" Teyla asked, her voice quiet.

Cooper nodded. "We were there for a month fighting this thing, unable to get word to the SGC. For a scary week toward the end, I thought we weren't going to make it. But we pulled through. Lost half my team in the process and got a crap load of PTSD out of it, but I gained some credibility and our ties with the people are stronger than ever."

"That does not sound so hopeless," Teyla said encouragingly.

She closed her eyes. "My leader died there. I wasn't fast enough to get him out of the way and he took some fire. He appointed me the new leader then and that's when we started losing battles. It seems like no matter what I do, when I get put in charge, I start making all the wrong decisions."

The Athosian rested a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Perhaps you must take more time to think, Lieutenant. Or perhaps you were not made to lead. Some are not. Sometimes it helps to rely on the advice of others. To be a leader does not mean you must bear your burdens alone."

"But people are looking to me for direction. What will they think if I'm asking questions like I don't know what to do?"

"Someone will be willing to give you their opinions," Teyla promised. "It is better to first listen to your peers and then make a decision rather than to force the entirety of the decision upon yourself."

She took a deep breath. "Okay. Thank you, Teyla."

"I am here if ever you need to talk."

Cooper patted her shoulder, then rose and checked once again on Sheppard. He hadn't stirred since the last bout of consciousness, but the amount of sweat seemed to be increasing. She checked and, yes, he was developing a fever. Tearing a strip of fabric from her t-shirt, she soaked it in as much water as she dared and began trying to cool his forehead. "It was your stupid fault," she muttered, and though it was meant as a bit of a joke, she still felt a slight sense of release.

"Okay, this isn't working!" cried Rodney's raised voice.

Cooper sighed and stood. "What's the problem?"

"What isn't a problem? Nothing I've been attempting is working, we've been stuck down here for who knows how long, toxic gas could come leaking in here at any minute, and I'm starving!" He sat down heavily at a panel, looking like an upset child. But, now that the lieutenant looked, she could see something less shallow in his eyes, a genuine pain at being unable to get his team to safety.

She took her two remaining power bars out of her pocket and wordlessly slid them over. He took them with only slight hesitation. "Have you tried tricking the system?"

"Yes, I've tried that, several times," he said mournfully. "I've tried making it think we're Faloans, that it was never shut down, that the protocol was a virus, and nothing works."

"What would you do if this was Atlantis?"

He looked at her, his mouth full of power bar. "What?"

"The tech works like the stuff in our city. Responding to thought and a specific gene and so forth. We don't really know the layout of this place except for some brief schematics, but we do know Atlantis." She leaned forward on the console, feeling that maybe her idea was completely stupid. "I was just thinking that since the cities were so similar in nature, you could model your actions here off of how you treat problems back home."

He straightened up slowly, an amazed, distant look coming into his eyes. "That could work. That actually makes sense, why didn't I think of that? Yes, most of the same basic principles apply, except that I can normally crack the programming code in Atlantis."

She shrugged. "That's what you have me for."

"Maybe I don't have to fool it. Maybe I can shut it off, I just have to dive in and find the original code."

"You didn't try that before?" Ronon asked skeptically.

"Of course I tried it before, I just didn't know where to look. Now I do." He tore open the second power bar, reaching for the tablet and beginning to type madly away.