Suzotchka1 – Sorry it took me so long to get this chapter up, thanks for the review and I hope you enjoy this story.

Steph7085 – Sorry I made you cry but here's the next chapter I hope you enjoy it and thanks for the review/

Jess Sheppard-SGA – Thanks for the review, I hope you like this chapter and I'm sorry it took me so long to post it.

Alex – I'm glad you like the beginning and the plot, here's the next chapter I hope you like it and I apologise for taking so long to post this.

Whirlwind-2005 – Thanks for the review, sorry it took me so long to get this chapter up, I hope it was worth the wait.

- - -

Chapter 2

John arrived home two hours late for picking up Elizabeth, he knew this wasn't going to help their situation at all. This was one of the last chances they had to save their marriage and he was already messing it up. He had been arresting the killer he and Ronon had been after for two months and then he had to do all the work that followed. He hadn't intended to be late but in a job like his things tended to come up that meant being late was unavoidable.

He opened the front door and walked into the house looking for his wife but not locating her downstairs.

"Elizabeth," he shouted but got no response.

He went upstairs checking the bedroom, the bath room, the office and the spare room. He started to get concerned when he couldn't find her and walked back downstairs. It was then that his house phone rung.

"Sheppard," he answered as he picked it up.

"John, its Teyla where the hell have you been I've been trying to get hold of you for over an hour?"

John realised then that he had turned his cell phone off whilst he'd been interrogating Parson's and in his rush to get home he'd forgotten to turn it back on. "I've been at the station, why?"

"John I'm at the hospital, they contacted me when they couldn't reach you. Elizabeth's been in an accident." Teyla's voice sounded solemn which did nothing to help John's current feelings. He felt all the strength drain from his body and his legs went out from under him dropping him onto the couch that was behind him.

"How badly is she hurt?" he asked dreading the answer.

"It's bad, look the doctor needs to talk to me, you need to get here I'll explain everything then."

The line went dead and John had to force his body to obey his brain and get up. He quickly ran outside to his car and arrived at the hospital within twenty minutes. He asked for Elizabeth and the nurse pointed him toward her room. The sight that greeted him almost made his heart stop. Elizabeth was laid in a bed most likely unconscious, she was pale and her face was covered in cuts. She was hooked up to a respirator and the various machines around her were bleeping with a steady rhythm.

Teyla looked up from where she was sitting at the side of Elizabeth's bed and then stood up.

"John," she greeted. "She's in a coma."

Teyla's few words made John's heart break even more than it already was if that was possible. It took him a moment to put any coherent thoughts together.

"What happened?" he asked her.

"I called her at about 3.15; she said she was waiting for you because you were going to go to dinner and talk. Apparently she was walking down the street from your house when the car lost control on the slippery road. They said it must have been moving pretty fast when it hit her, she was in surgery for over an hour and now she's in a coma," Teyla explained everything as best she could.

John's legs almost went out from under him again; she had been waiting for him. He was late and she'd been waiting for him. She'd probably decided to take a walk whilst she waited and that's when she'd been hit by the car. If he'd just gone home on time she'd be fine. He walked over to her side and brushed her hair behind her ear.

She looked so fragile, there was a cut running down the right side of her face from her temple to near her lips. She had a cut down one side of her nose, several on her lips and another on the left side of her forehead. He blinked back the tears that were filling his eyes.

"I'm sorry," he whispered quietly. "I'm so sorry."

"Mrs Dex," a man's voice said from behind John and he turned to see a doctor standing in the doorway.

"Dr Beckett," Teyla greeted. "This is John Sheppard, Elizabeth's husband."

"Of course."

"John, this is Dr Beckett, he's been treating Elizabeth."

"How's she doing?" he asked.

"Well, I'm sure Mrs Dex has explained the situation to you, she's in a coma. She suffered a lot of injuries in the accident. She was bleeding internally and we're going to have to keep an eye on that. She lost a lot of blood and has a few broken ribs and a fracture to her left leg. Her head injuries are severe and the main reason she's in a coma. Now there's every chance that she'll wake up and be completely fine but there are several other possibilities that you should be prepared for," Dr Beckett explained.

John took a deep breath preparing himself for what he was about to hear and he noticed Teyla doing the exact same thing. "Perhaps we should all sit down," Carson suggested and they all did so.

"Okay," Carson began. "The first possibility is that she'll die, as I said her injuries are severe, the internal wounds and the trauma to the head are of great concern to us. The second is that she won't wake up at all; her brain might not recover from the accident. The final possibility is that she'll wake up but won't come out of this unscathed, there could be permanent side effects to the type of head injuries she's suffered. These side effects can range from Amnesia to loss of certain abilities such as speech. Now these are all very real possibilities but as I said before she may wake up and be fine."

"What are her chances?" John asked.

"It's difficult to tell at this point, all we can do right now is monitor her injuries and her vitals and hope for the best," Carson replied.

"Thank you doctor," Teyla stated calmly but her face showed how much she was affected by the situation.

"If you have any questions feel free to ask," Carson told them before standing up and leaving. John looked at Teyla both of them completely silent as they wrapped their heads around what they had been told. Teyla was Elizabeth's best friend and he knew she was going to have as much trouble dealing with this as him.

"Ronon will want to know," John stated. "Do you want me to call him?"

"No that's okay, I'll let you have some time alone with Elizabeth, I'll call him," Teyla told him and John nodded his head and watched her walk out of the room. He then turned to Elizabeth and held her lifeless hand in his own and looked at her face for a moment.

"I should have been there," he stated. "I should have come home on time and we could have gone to dinner and none of this would have happened. I am so, so sorry."

The tears filled his eyes once again except this time he let them fall without resistance. "You have to wake up do you hear me? You have to wake up because I have to put this right, I can't live with out you Lizabeth, please wake up."

Elizabeth continued to lay there motionless and John leant his head on her hand as the tears continued to fall from his eyes.

TBC