Part 8
A small knot of three resolutely picked their way up the narrow ridge path. One trailed behind, stepping confidently and securely. The two in front, appeared merged together through the curtain of blowing snow.
"Do you think they survived the blast?" Ronon's voice was quiet but direct and competed with the constant howl of relentless wind. Had it been a few months ago, he would have certainly believed that the two doctors succumbed to the explosion and crushed under a couple tons of dislodged stone. Months after being with the Atlanteans, Dex could not be too sure.
He had seen the most unlikely individuals survive the most dire and dangerous circumstances, and had witnessed trained, disciplined fighters lose their lives under seemingly mundane events.
Doctors Beckett and McKay were unlikely characters, and they were certainly not trained fighters. In the confusing, structured world created by the Atlanteans, it seemed those two would likely persevere.
But even luck ran out.
Teyla wheezed, trying to follow the conversation that spun over her head. She struggled to keep her tumultuous stomach from heaving. Her feet occasionally crossed and she would stagger haphazardly into the Colonel.
"Survive? They'd better," Sheppard mumbled. He adjusted his stride, tightened his grip on Teyla and continued to pick their way up the sharp ridgeline of rock and glacier.
The wind tugged at clothing and scoured the narrow path turning snow to ice.
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Rodney lay still, staring up at the craggy rock ceiling above him. His breath came back to him in large panicked gasps. He had never had the wind knocked from him so many times since leaving high school. It was a not a sensation he had ever wanted to revisit. However, it kept getting thrust back on him since meeting up and subsequently joining Colonel Sheppard and becoming a member of his team.
The cold air needled his bare face and nipped at the tip of his nose. His breath ghosted in small plumes just before his eyes. The sand beneath him was hard and cold.
The metallic smell of gunfire filled the small area.
Movement near his head had him contemplating moving. He took a breath, felt his chest twinge and figured he'd contemplate it some more.
Then the rasping. A questioning, tentative rasping. Carson.
Rodney, for the first time ever, really, wished Beckett had his voice. Not that he had ever wished Carson never had his voice, truthfully he never contemplated it one way or another. But right now, at this very second, he wished Carson could just articulate something coherent.
"Of course I'm not alright," McKay muttered. "Some cave dwelling beast just tried to eat us." Rodney then took a moment to run a mitten hand up and down his torso searching for any tell tale rents in his person.
Nothing. Thank goodness.
More movement scratched from somewhere beyond his sight and then more rasping. "How should I know if there are any more of them?"
He didn't hear any movement for a bit. Had he turned his head, McKay would have noticed Carson staring at him in frustration and agitation.
Within moments, the physician was sitting beside him, hunched over and looking tired. Tuffs of white stuffing poked through torn gashes in his orange parka. No obvious signs of blood.
Rodney could only imagine the bruising that was hidden under layers of clothing.
"Where'd it go?" McKay asked, slowly pushing himself into a sitting position. He grimaced at the sudden explosive pain in his shoulder.
Carson merely pointed toward the tunnel to their left. McKay redirected the light to the tunnel, following the tracks that dragged themselves in that direction. The beast was nowhere to be seen.
Rodney wasn't sure if it was a good thing or not.
He turned his attention back to Beckett and scrutinized his friend.
The doctor looked fatigued and bruised. His shoulders drooped and his arms hung heavily off his bent knees. His chest seemed to work a little extra harder at dragging in air.
"Can you see?" Rodney asked. "Because your eyes still look terrible."
Snow blindness normally corrected itself within a twenty-four hour time period if attended properly. They were a little shy of a full day but medicine didn't run by a strict clock. Voodoo.
Beckett turned and stared straight at McKay, answering his question with the motion but nodding anyhow just for confirmation and wavering his hand in a 'so-so' fashion.
"It get you?" Rodney stared pointedly at Carson's torn parka. Ronon's stitches had held.
Beckett gently shook his head 'no'.
McKay nodded. The air was too thin to spark much conversation and the headache that drummed behind his eyes was slowing making itself known.
Rodney leaned against the wall of the cave and rubbed at his chest. He fished in his pocket and pulled out the bubble package of Tylenol. In the faint light created by their small flashlight, he tore open the package and downed the two gel caps.
Beckett leaned forward and gingerly stretched for the bare oxygen bottle that rested at his ankle. He rolled it with his fingertips until he could grab it and then sat back and showed it to McKay.
Rodney recognized it as 'his' bottle and scrutinized the gage. There was still well over a half tank left. He looked back up at Beckett. "What?"
Carson depressed the pressure valve and no pressurized gas was emitted.
McKay pulled the tank out of Beckett's hand and read the gage again. It read nearly six hours of air left. He depressed the pressure valve and no air emitted.
"You think someone tampered with this?"
Beckett merely nodded.
"Corporal Jones?"
Carson shook his head and then rasped a three syllable name.
McKay stared at him and then asked, "McGilly?"
Beckett nodded.
"McGilly died. That snow yeti thing got him."
Carson cocked his head to the side and stared at Rodney as if he had lost his mind.
"Corn Yeti's cousin?---Oh forget it, you were so out of it last night, you wouldn't have known your own name," McKay dismissed. "We've got to find the others. Come on."
Rodney carefully pushed himself to his feet, feeling every muscle and tendon pull. It seemed ligaments were attached to every bruised bone in his body.
He leaned wearily against the wall, favoring his leg and rubbing at his shoulder. With a touch of impatience but a hint of concern, he watched as Beckett wearily shouldered their lone back pack.
"I can't carry that you know. My shoulder and leg. You have to." McKay felt obligated to point out.
Beckett looked up at him, after snapping the last buckle across his chest and smiled in understanding.
Rodney took some comfort in Carson actually looking directly at him.
McKay turned and took a limping step forward. He shuffled his way down the right tunnel away from whatever might dwell in the left.
Carson followed without need of being led physically by Rodney.
Maybe things were going to improve.
The silence was shattered by a thunderous howl. It rolled through the dark honeycomb of caverns, bouncing off walls and saturating the area with sound.
Or perhaps not.
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Sheppard planted his foot securely on a patch of bare stone, avoiding the ice that covered three quarters of it. He pivoted on his down leg and reached for Teyla. He guided the Athosian down and around a narrow hairpin turn in the trail. Wind gusted at her back, forcing her to step more quickly than her equilibrium allowed. Her steps were unsteady, her legs trembled. She returned Sheppard's grip with a tight one of her own.
With swirling vision, Teyla maneuvered around the switch back and waited.
Sheppard patted her shoulder as he shimmied by her on the narrow trail and once again picked up the lead.
Ronon followed, his steps confident and sure. He surveyed the sweeping ice plain below. Snow skiffed the ground in fierce linear channels. Sharp, angular drifts dotted the vast open area all pointing in the same southerly direction.
There was no sign of the doctors.
He logically knew they wouldn't be down there but couldn't help but hope to expect to see them.
Atlantis had given him many things and hope, at times, was one of the more fickle and cruel gifts.
The plain lay empty and recurring sense of loss stirred his gut.
He felt a biting and woefully familiar anger grow.
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McKay and Beckett stood at the entrance of the cave and stared out over the ice plain before them. Carson kept his head tucked and his hands up trying his best to shield his rapidly blinking eyes.
The piercing sunlight seared his retinas and corneas.
"I think the gate is…." McKay gazed left and right, "in that direction."
Carson rasped a question.
"I don't know," McKay answered. "Maybe they're already at the gate."
Beckett furrowed his brow and stared at Rodney as if he had lost his mind. After a moment, the medical doctor shook his head in resignation.
Rodney ignored him for a moment and continued to stare out at the dazzling field of ice and snow. After a moment he stated, "We have to do something about your eyes." McKay turned and stared at Carson for a bit and then added, "Sit down and I'll wrap them."
Carson contemplated his friend. Trusting Rodney with anything medical railed against every ounce of common sense Carson's dear ole mum imparted to him. Beckett could not deny that his eyes incessantly burned and itched madly. Tears streamed relentlessly from the corners, freezing and cracking already dry skin. Delicate ice crystals highlighted deepening crows feet.
The stark brilliance of reflected sunlight forced his eyes to spasm closed.
Carson would have to rely on Rodney to lead them to the gate. The reliance was not the problem if truth be told, it was not being able to help that was bothersome. Nothing could be done about it.
His eyes needed protection. McKay was volunteering.
There would be little lost, other than his dignity, if he let McKay cover his eyes. There was the unfortunate side effect of listening to Rodney crow about how medicine was simply an art and a pseudoscience that any trained monkey could master if given enough time.
Maybe he should just wrap his own eyes. In doing that, there was no guarantee that Rodney would remain silent. In fact, it almost seemed a given that McKay would offer unsolicited advice and take over the job himself.
It was a lose-lose situation when Beckett thought about it.
Carson's silent musings were interrupted with the impatient, rapid staccato of snapping fingers.
The man was infuriating.
With a sigh of resignation, Beckett slipped off the backpack with a groan and settled to the sandy ground beside it.
"Keep still," McKay ordered as he opened the backpack.
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Teyla stutter stepped as a gust of wind shoved her forward. Her balance faltered as her booted toe hooked an unseen rock. She flailed forward into Sheppard.
The colonel pivoted on the ball of his right foot, trying to plant his left securely onto another grey bald faced rock. His weight was unevenly distributed. A gust of wind rammed into him, tilting his center of balance backward, arching the small of his back toward his stomach and forcing his shoulders in the direction of the ground. He threw his arms out to recapture his failing balance.
Teyla's unsteady form lurched into him. Her dropped shoulder connected solidly with his exposed midsection. What little traction he had on the ridge trail disappeared.
He waved his arms flashing out with his hands for anything to latch onto.
Teyla stumbled by him, just out of reach and tripped again and crashed to the trail. Her hands, palm down, shot over the edge of the trail, plunging her shoulders and head from sight.
Ronon lunged forward, grabbing the back of Teyla's parka, hauling the smaller woman back onto the path. Dex whipped and arm around, trying to make a grab for the Colonel. The tips of their mittens brushed one another.
Grasping empty air, arms wind milling, Sheppard fell backward.
He disappeared from sight.
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"Run, Carson! Run!" McKay hollered over the whine of the wind. The astrophysicist turned and grabbed the chest strap of Beckett's back pack and hauled the medical doctor forward.
The rope tether that connected them at the waist looped between them.
The Snow Yeti silhouette slowly took shape through the blowing snow. It lumbered after them a few hundred yards behind, cutting off their retreat back to the caves.
"Aye," Carson muttered, breathlessly. He slipped the bandages up off his eyes. Snow blindness or not, it would never get a chance to heal if they didn't make the gate. The gauze squares that slipped free were captured by the crosswind and turned loose.
There wasn't much to see, but for now Beckett could discern small shadows and roughened terrain and place a foot accordingly. With the bandages gone, his speed picked up. For a few yards or more.
Sun reflected sharply off the brilliant white. Carson's eyes spasmed closed and tears were whipped from the corner of his creased eyes by sharp wind. His ability to discern depth quickly slipped away.
The two scientists pushed and urged one another onward across the snowfield.
Everything was a blur of white to Beckett. His feet stuttered and tripped over the slight unevenness of the icy terrain. His gait suffered without the unconscious input from his eyes. Visual information was not translated by his CNS to his peripheral nervous system. His eyes remained reflexively closed. He ran blind.
His left leg stretched forward, his muscles and joints and mind pictured where the ground should be. His foot fell a little further, searching for the surface. He hadn't noted the slight dip in the ice.
Carson staggered. His stride faltered. He pitched forward, his right foot shooting out to recapture his balance. Speed was lost. He banged into Rodney, knocking him to the left.
A bullet kicked up snow just to their right.
"Faster, Carson! Faster!" McKay directed. He snapped a quick look over his shoulder and saw a lone orange coated figure flanking them just as distant as the creature. Jones or Holmes or Colmbs from Ohio or Iowa or Idaho or some such nonsense.
Snow and ice divoted the ground just to the side of Rodney as another bullet dug in. It sent his heart racing. "Carson! Move it!"
"Aye," Carson muttered again with a bit more ire. As if he was trying to run slower.
Beckett ducked, shying at the whistle of a spiraling bullet and bounced his shoulder, blindly into McKay.
A bullet burrowed into the ground just to their left.
"Carson! Move your slow ass!" McKay shouted and roughly shoved Carson forward.
"Aye," Beckett rasped. If they survived this, he'd kill Rodney with his own hands.