Title: Fly Me Away
Author: Rayvin813
Chapter: 4/6
Summary: A fight. A daring rescue. Strange metaphysics. A love story. Everything is complicated in the Pegasus Galaxy. Can John and his team make it out alive?
Pairing: John/Elizabeth
Spoilers: Adrift/Lifeline.
Rating: PG/PG-13 (to be safe)
Warnings: Violence/Action Sequences
Fly Me Away
She knows they're here. They used the chip she'd passed onto John to locate her.
Good, Rodney.
She can feel them, and she wants nothing more than to jump for joy, but something tells her that it won't be such a good thing once Oberoth finds out.
He thinks he's been able to mostly reprogram her, but everything that he and the others have done has been in vain. So far, she's been able to conceal it from him, thanks to the wonderful job Rodney did when he reprogrammed the nanites within her, but she knows that it infuriates them that she hasn't been turned into another mindless machine for Oberoth to command. They can't always get inside her mind as far as they would like, and that frustrates them farther. They would like to assimilate her into the Asuran population, but she fights it every time they try, and they have always chalked their failure up to her still being half-human, not to her resistance.
She's often heard them talk amongst themselves about making her completely one of them. Every word they say echoes in her mind, but she's able to keep herself hidden behind a firewall that she had constructed on her own in the dark silence between the times that they had come for her, and John and Rodney had helped her to do that.
The testing hadn't been pleasant, to say the least. She had known about torture, had even been around people who had been tortured in her career with the United States government, but had never had the misfortune of being tortured herself. Until now.
The echoes of their harmful, bruising words still haunt her in her sleep...if she can even call it sleep. The lies that they feed her tell her that no one cares about what becomes of her, that no one is coming for her, that she would be left to die. Alone.
But she smiles as she realizes that every word Oberoth and the others had ever spoken to her had been part of a greater lie, something just as fabricated as each cell in their bodies, just as fabricated as the tiny machines in her body that were keeping her alive. She smiles because today is the day that she gets to go home.
Before Oberoth knows what's happening, she raises an eyebrow, something completely human and completely Elizabeth, and thrusts her hand into the Asuran leader's cranium. She immerses him inside a construct of the room where he thinks that he is attempting once again to reprogram her so that she might become one of them. This time, she lets him think he's winning. She can feel how overjoyed he is at the prospect of finally assimilating her, and she inwardly smirks.
If only he knew.
From out in the hallway, she hears a scuffle, and has to concentrate harder to keep her excitement from overriding her hold on Oberoth.
She resists him within the construct, and he snarls at her defiance. But eventually she knows that she will have to give in, just to keep him enthralled in this altered state. Until then, she will fight him with everything she has.
A blast from a weapon out in the hallway distracts her for a moment, and she almost loses her composure. She quickly returns her focus to the leader of the Asurans and lets him feel another blast of her unwavering resistance as she sinks completely into the construct so that she won't be distracted as the extraction team bursts in.
'Why do you fight us, Doctor Weir?' Oberoth asks her from within the construct, and she snarls at him through clenched teeth.
'You won't turn me against my people, Oberoth. You underestimate me if you think I'll just fall to my knees before you,' she growls.
He laughs at her and holds up a hand, causing her to double over as a searing pain slashes through her stomach.
'You will join us, Doctor. I do not doubt our methods.'
She separates the pain center of her brain from the construct just in time as he lashes out once again. She watches, feeling like she is hovering above her own body, as a snake-like object protrudes from his hand and then slices through her stomach like she'd experienced so many times before. The nanites heal her quickly, but she still falls to her knees in pain, holding one arm over her midsection protectively. She cries out, and he sees it for a sign of weakness. He smiles down at her wickedly, and a tear escapes from the corner of her eye.
She cowers as he reaches for her, and he pulls back curiously, gazing at his hand as if it had grown another finger. His eyes flick over to her cowering form, and he watches her curiously.
It had been years since he'd seen someone cower in fear of him, so he relishes this new development out of her. He thinks it's a good sign of her giving in. He smiles, and continues his harsh treatment of the half-human woman before him.
:x:
The door opens and his eyes lock on her instantly. His heart pounds harder than he remembers it ever pounding before, and he takes aim at the leader of the replicator race with his ARG.
"Lisbeth?" he tries, and receives no answer.
"Elizabeth? Can you hear me?" he tries again, and almost touches her shoulder, but a flick of her eyes to his hand stops him.
"Don't, John," she protests quickly, stopping his hand in midair. "He'll know you're here if you touch me."
"It's good to see you too, Lisbeth," he smirks, and the briefest of smiles flashes across her face. He hears the blast of an ARG, and looks up to find Teyla, Lorne and Ronon taking out the five frozen scientists in the room with them.
"Too bad," he hears Ronon remark. "It's not near as fun if they're frozen like that."
He smiles and turns back to the woman he's missed for the last two months, and all he wants to do is run his fingers through her hair and kiss her senseless. His fingers ache to touch her, his arms to hold her, but he resists. Because she asked him to.
"What can I do, Lisbeth?" he asks quietly.
"Kill him," she whispers, and he doesn't mistake the fear in her voice, or in her eyes.
"You got it," Ronon growls and levels his ARG at Oberoth.
"NO!" John cries out, holding up a hand to halt Ronon's firing. "If you shoot him now, it might kill her. Then what would all of this be for?"
He turns back to Elizabeth, and notes the grimace on her face. He knows she's having trouble keeping in control of the Asuran population and he wants to do something, anything, to help. He draws as close to her as he dares and leans into her ear.
"Elizabeth," he whispers, and she flicks wild eyes over to his face. "Lisbeth, I need you to stop now."
"...Can't," she chokes out. "They'll know."
He hangs his head at her stubbornness. "I came here to rescue you, Lisbeth. I'm not leaving without you!"
He nods at Ronon and reaches out, seizing Elizabeth's hands, and pulling her backward into his arms. He holds her tightly to his chest as she screams her protests at his ear, trying with all her might to kick out of his grasp. Oberoth barely shakes himself alert before Ronon blasts him with his ARG, smiling as he pulls the trigger.
The Replicator leader's face registers a shocked expression before crumbling to the floor in thousands of metallic chips. Her scream of protest pierces the humming silence, and John does all he can to keep her quiet. He knows the replicators will be coming for them now, and that they'll likely have to fight their way out.
He turns her around roughly and takes her face in his hands and looks her directly in her eyes. The panic he finds there is almost overwhelming, but he knows that if she fights them, he'll have no choice other than to hit her with a stunner blast. She would be too strong to subdue otherwise.
"Lisbeth, listen to me," he pleads quietly, trying not to startle her any more. The wild flicking of her green eyes tells him that she isn't listening, so he takes her face in his hands and forces her to look at him. "Lisbeth, we have to go. I need you to focus."
"John, you have no idea what you've done..." she whispers, her voice panicky.
Her head jerks to one side, and her eyes focus on something far away. He watches her curiously, ducking his head in an attempt to catch her eye again.
"They're coming," she announces, snapping her eyes back up to meet his. "We have to move. Now."
Ronon catches his eye, and John knows what he's asking: Is she all right? He wishes he knew.
She moves quickly throughout the room, gathering the trio of stunners from the piles of metal chips on the floor and distributing them throughout the group of her rescuers, giving one to Major Lorne and one to Teyla. She finally stops before John and hands him the last stunner, letting her hand linger over his for a moment longer than necessary. He sees the gratitude in her eyes, but it's masked by panic.
He grips her hand in his tightly in reassurance. "We'll make it out of here, Lisbeth, I promise."
She nods. "I know. But we have to go now. They're almost here."
He motions to the rest of his team and the soldiers in the room to get ready to move as he taps the comm unit on his ear.
"Rodney, this is Sheppard," he speaks quietly as they begin to mobilize.
"Sheppard?"
"We've got her, Rodney, we're on our way back to the jumper, so have it ready to go when we get there."
"You got it, Sheppard. We'll be ready. McKay out."
He nods and takes Elizabeth by the hand, leading her out into the hallway. He motions for Lorne to take point, and Ronon and Teyla bring up the rear. They all nod and take their positions, ready for anything as they begin to make their way back to the jumper.
The first few yards are simple, too simple, and something in the pit of his stomach tells him something is about to go terribly wrong.
The spurt of blood from one of the Marines' legs makes his heart leap into his throat, and the lack of the report of weapons fire worries him more than anything. He instinctively throws Elizabeth to the wall, and she sucks in a deep breath as her shoulder impacts roughly. He places himself in front of her like a shield, showing no concern for himself as he returns fire at the advancing replicators.
"John," she whispers at his ear. "I'll be fine, I promise."
"Not a chance, Lisbeth," he calls back, and suddenly he can hear everything happening. The gunfire echoes loudly in the hallway, and another Marine falls to his knees, blood pouring from his right leg. Teyla steps up and fires at the replicators who are advancing on the fallen soldier, allowing the wounded marine to quickly field dress his wound. He thanks Teyla for her efforts by firing point-blank into the face of the replicator sneaking up on her from behind, a knife in his hand.
She nods her thanks at him as she kicks the knife up into her hand and throws it, blade first, at another advancing replicator, staggering him backward for a moment so that she could get her ARG up to fire at him. He breaks up into a thousand tiny pieces before their eyes, the last piece falling and echoing in the now-silent hallway.
John pulls himself away from the wall, ARG up and at the ready, as he allows Elizabeth room to breathe.
She pushes herself off of the wall gingerly, and follows John down the hallway several more steps. As she walks, the corridors seem to grow longer and more confusing. She shakes her head to try and clear her mind, but it doesn't seem to help much, so she latches onto the back of John's tac vest. He reaches one hand around his back and squeezes her wrist reassuringly.
As soon as his hand leaves her wrist, she realizes how much her comfort level rises when he's around. Despite the situation, she smiles.
She feels a slight twitch in the back of her head, and fists the loose material on his vest. She takes the stunner from the waistband of his pants and aims it over his shoulder at nothing, but she knows something is coming.
"What is it, Lisbeth?" he whispers, but before she can reply, they are surrounded by Replicators.
John, again, presses her to the wall in a protective gesture, and aims his ARG at the nearest Replicator.
"Please, hand over Doctor Weir, and we will not terminate you or your team, Colonel Sheppard," The Replicator facing John tells him coolly.
John simply stares back into his empty eyes, and gives him his trademark smirk. "Not a chance in hell. She's coming home with me."
"If you do not comply, we will be forced to terminate all of you," The Replicator warns again as he raises his weapon and takes sight at John's head.
Elizabeth takes a deep breath and gathers all of the courage that she can muster before leaping out from behind John's protective embrace and thrusts a hand out toward the Replicator with the weapon, and concentrates with all of her might on what she had been taught by Oberoth during one of their many testing sessions. She feels the power build up in the palm of her hand, as if it were being held back by a dam, and then she allows it a small conduit to exit through. The power gives her the biggest rush she's felt in a long time as it pours down her arm and through her palm, sending the Replicator crashing against the wall. John then hits him with a blast from his ARG, making the Replicator fall in hundreds of tiny, inert pieces to the floor.
For a moment, everything is silent, and John hopes that the Replicators will back away and let them go. He knows his hopes are in vain, but he can't help but retain the sentiment. At least up until the point where the Replicators begin to raise their weapons again.
Elizabeth places a hand on his shoulder, silently telling him not to stop her. She steps out in front of him, in the middle of the melee, extends both arms outward and unleashes that power once again. She sends every Replicator within their vicinity flying backwards. The marines, Lorne, and the rest of Sheppard's team, take that opportunity to begin firing their ARG's at the prone Replicators.
Out of the corner of his eye, John catches Elizabeth collapse to the ground in a heap, and he gets off one final blast before he bends down to pull her out of the line of fire. He caresses her cheek lightly and her eyes flutter open, just the slightest amount, and she offers him a weak smile.
"You came back."
He allowed himself a small smile as he gazed into her haunted green eyes, finding only the tiniest hint of the Elizabeth he'd grown to know over the past three years.
"You think I'd just leave you here, Lisbeth?" He smirked at her, and she smiled.
"No. I never doubted you'd be stubborn enough to come back," she teased weakly, giving him a hint of a smile.
"That's my girl," he tells her before kneeling in front of her and blasting away at the remainder of the Replicators. As the last one falls, he doesn't miss a beat. He tosses the life signs detector to Lorne and scoops Elizabeth up in his arms. She takes the ARG from his shoulder and aims it in front of them as he runs.
She can feel his heart beating wildly against his chest from her position in his arms, and she knows she has to do whatever she can to keep the both of them from being hurt. Despite her head spinning like a top, she hold the ARG tightly to her shoulder, firing it at any unsuspecting Replicators that cross their path.
By the time they make it to the jumper, she's seeing a black cloud forming around the outside of her vision, and her head is lolling backwards onto John's shoulder. He shakes her awake as much as he can while running and shouts her name. She knows he's worried about her passing out, but she knows that it's an inevitability.
"It's okay, John," she tells him over the exchange of ARG and stunner fire. "I'll be all right. Just fly me away from here."
As the team makes it safely into the jumper, a little worse for wear, but miraculously without casualties, she finally lets the darkness overtake her...and the last thing that she sees is the jumper's rear hatch sealing shut, and John's worried gaze as he glances down at her, standing protectively over her, his ARG pressed tightly to his shoulder and aimed at the ever-shrinking gap of the hatch.