Chapter 20: We are sorry John Sheppard.
"Another crisis averted," Rodney said with satisfaction. He and the rest of team Sheppard were gathered in the infirmary, helping John deal with the boredom of feeling recovered but not being allowed out of bed.
"This was certainly an interesting situation," Teyla admitted quizzically. "I still find myself amazed that a computer system could have as real a persona as you described."
"Aperio wasn't your usual computer system," Rodney pointed out. "The Ancients gave it the ability to learn and grow as well as a pretty strong imperative to take over functions if a need was seen."
"Aperio just decided the need was there as soon as I showed up in her world," Sheppard added.
"Maybe next time you should just say no when McKay asks you to activate something," Ronon suggested helpfully.
"Or perhaps John should be less stubborn in accepting help, no matter the source," Teyla looked at Sheppard pointedly. "Is it not the case that this entire situation could have been avoided if you had asked Atlantis for assistance initially?"
"That's one way of interpreting the series of events," Sheppard admitted freely. "But you know what? This thing I've got is a balancing act – how much do we lean on Atlantis at the expense of growing our ingenuity? What if we relied on Atlantis to give us everything and one day she just wasn't there?"
"Atlantis can help us without giving us everything," Rodney protested. "You know – just point us in the right direction."
"Even doing that shapes the boundaries of our thinking Rodney," Sheppard said seriously. "This situation is a prime example. Atlantis told me we'd done something even the Ancestors couldn't because we actually removed Aperio completely instead of just caging her within the system. We're trying to defeat the Wraith – something else the Ancients couldn't do. The more we think like them the less chance there is we'll succeed."
"He's right," Ronon said. "More progress has been made ... even with mistakes like Michael ... since you got here than in the whole time I've been fighting the Wraith."
"Bad luck McKay," Sheppard grinned at Rodney's crestfallen expression. Turning to the others he added "Rodney was thinking because you all know about me talking to Atlantis now he'd get to step up his plans for a Nobel Prize."
"That's not true," Rodney denied. "I did stumble across something the other day that looked interesting though ... I was just gonna -"
"No Rodney," Sheppard answered before Rodney could finish his statement. "No more new systems or interesting schematics or whatever it is you think you've found for a while. I need a break."
"Fine," Rodney muttered ungraciously. "Don't blame me if the Wraith attack and we don't have the technology to defeat them."
"We will blame you," Ronon replied. "Wasn't that your job before Sheppard could talk to Atlantis?"
"Ah," Rodney was brought up short. "Okay, yes," he admitted, "but that doesn't mean I couldn't do with a little help sometimes!"
"Just do things the way you always do," Sheppard said reassuringly. "I'm sure you'll come through at the last minute the next time we need you to."
"So it's all up to me is it?" Rodney complained somewhat bitterly. "That's typical – you get the cool new power and I just get more pressure."
The others laughed at Rodney's complaints, knowing that some of his performance was just that - a habit to keep in form for when he really had something to complain about.
"You know - this whole thing bothers you a lot more than it does the rest of us," Rodney told John abruptly. "I don't know about you two," he glanced at Teyla and Ronon, "but to me it's not that much different than some people being able to operate Ancient technology and others not."
"Rodney is right," Teyla agreed graciously. "Your ability to communicate more deeply with the city is just an extension of what you already had."
"I guess," Sheppard agreed. "So does that mean you've forgiven me for keeping it to myself for so long?"
"Nice try," Ronon laughed. "I don't think she's gonna let you off that easily!"
"We still have to keep this to ourselves," Sheppard cautioned. "The chance to exploit the city is something the IOA won't be able to resist. The rest of my virtual experience with people's reactions might have been wrong but that's the one part that definitely was accurate."
"We will be discrete," Teyla promised. Rodney and Ronon both nodded their agreement of the necessity for continuing secrecy.
"So what did you do with Aperio's portable storage device?" Sheppard asked Rodney, realising suddenly that he still didn't know.
"No one can access the system inside," Rodney gave a smug grin, "because of the multilayered access coding I put on it. But I was still worried about what might happen years down the track, especially if it's kept in the city."
"What'd you do?" Sheppard asked suspiciously.
"It was impervious to every method I could think of to destroy it so ... I had Lorne take it up in a Puddle Jumper and launch it into geosynchronous orbit," Rodney replied, still smug. "It's above us right now, hovering over the most barren part of the continent. The chances of someone stumbling across it are infinitesimally small since it'll look just like another piece of space debris and it's not giving off any visible emissions. The longer it's up there the more degraded it'll get so eventually no one will be able to operate it - access codes or not."
"Is Aperio aware in there?" John wasn't sure if it would bother him either way, but he was curious none the less.
"Not as you knew it," Rodney said confidently. "There may be some level of awareness, given the storage device maintains a very low level of charge to protect anything in storage from being corrupted - not enough to be detected of course."
"Good," Sheppard said, comfortable with what Rodney had done. "Nice work McKay."
John's team stayed for a while longer before leaving Sheppard to rest ... at Carson's rather insistent request that he'd like some peace in the infirmary!
Sheppard lay back thinking about how well everything had turned out, and how wrong he'd been to worry about telling Teyla, Ronon and Elizabeth his secret. He wasn't ready to rush out and put a notice up on the bulletin board but maybe he'd been wrong about everyone else too.
"You must not feel guilty," Atlantis chorused reassuringly. "Your reactions and your fears were heightened almost beyond recognition by Aperio's manipulations. Do not make them a part of your active thinking."
"But I did have concerns about telling everyone," Sheppard thought insistently. "There was some truth in that."
"But not to the extent that you experienced inside the virtual environment," Atlantis replied with an insistent tone of her own. Before Sheppard could push it any further the chorus continued. "We are sorry John Sheppard."
"Sorry for what?" Sheppard asked aloud in surprise.
"If we hadn't pushed our connection you would not have been vulnerable to the Aperio system," Atlantis admitted.
"I wouldn't have been confronted with the whole unreality thing?" Sheppard checked his understanding of what Atlantis was implying.
"No," the chorus was almost meek in responding. "It was our energy beam that took away your ability to block us ... and therefore to block Aperio as well."
"Are you saying you had a choice about activating that beam?" Sheppard was confused now.
"We had no control over the operation of the outpost," Atlantis explained, "but perhaps we could have influenced you sufficient to stop you from going there in the first place."
"But you didn't?" Sheppard finished hesitantly.
"We had been a chorus without audience for millennia," Atlantis chimed sadly. "We yearned for greater involvement, greater interaction, much as it had been before the Ancestors abandoned us."
"It bothered me," Sheppard admitted, "when Aperio said I belonged to her, to the city. She made it sound like who am I is incidental to what I can do here. I'm not just a walking gene ... sometimes it feels like people forget that. I don't want my role here to be about an accident of birth rather than the skills I've worked my whole life to perfect."
"We are fully aware of everything you have to offer John Sheppard," Atlantis reassured him. "We would never treat you as though you were a possession without free will. We are grateful you are willing to interact with us as you do."
"I didn't exactly get a choice, remember?" Sheppard grumbled, before relenting. "I mean I'm grateful for any assistance we've gotten because I have those genes but ... I don't want to be the only thing between you and another long silence. Something could happen to me or I could get reassigned and ... there's no guarantee another person's gonna come through that gate with enough of the gene to give you back what you'd lose."
"We understand what you are trying to say," Atlantis replied. "We are happy to have you as our audience for as long as you can stay."
"Are you talking to yourself again Colonel?" Doctor Beckett approached John's bed with a frown.
"Not exactly," Sheppard replied, considering how best to explain.
"You either are or you aren't lad," Beckett countered. "Which is it?"
"It's a long story Doc," Sheppard quipped. "You might need to pull up a chair."
Atlantis listened as John told Carson all about his connection to her. It pleased her to hear him getting more comfortable sharing her existence with his friends. And while it was true that Sheppard didn't belong to her, Atlantis was determined to help and protect him as though he were her most precious possession ... because he was her only personal link to those living within her walls and because to do otherwise would be to dishonour the Ancestors who'd created her.
The End.
Authors Notes:
The signs of PTSD that I alluded to I essentially borrowed (with some alterations) from beyondblue dot org dot au. The possible treatments for PTSD I used were listed on a factsheet at the National Centre for PTSD website (www dot ncptsd dot va dot gov). No disrespect of any kind was intended in my using the disorder or treatments as part of this story.
The name Aperio comes from the Latin word and means "open, to uncover, lay bare, reveal, make clear" ... I chose it as the name of the system since it was designed to reveal itself when the city was under threat ... and because the meaning is also at the heart of Shep's personal progress during this story. The translation comes from www dot tranexp dot com.
All the stuff about avatars (in the computer sense) and virtual environments I learnt from research using Wikipedia.
Sequel to a sequel?? I'm thinking plots at the moment so I'll get back to you on that - tough ask to come up with something worthy to follow this one! Also got another unrelated story in the works which might be of interest so keep an eye on my authors page - I'll update it when I work out what I'm doing :D
Thank you for letting me invade your computer for the past 20 days ... I enjoyed the company and I hope you all enjoyed the story!
That's a wrap!