Chapter 12: What's wrong with you?
"It was really weird," John said, holding out his right arm and showing me where the feeding mark should have been. "I had blood dripping on the ground but now ... nothing."
John was back from the infirmary where Doctor Beckett had given him the all clear to return to his usual activities. He'd come down to the lab to tell me what had happened on the mission he'd just returned from. I ran a hand down his arm, looking closely at where he'd said Ellia had grabbed him.
"Are you completely sure it was all your blood?" I asked even though I knew it'd be unlikely John would make a mistake like that.
"Yeah," John pulled his sleeve down over his arm, looking at me with a strangely intent gaze. "It hurt like a son of a bitch - can't make a mistake with that."
"What did Doctor Beckett say?" I could feel that horrible sense of foreboding you get when you just know something bad is about to happen ... a feeling which I studiously ignored it.
"He's running my blood work now," John seemed to be almost brimming with repressed energy. "Said it'd take half a day to get the results." Before I could say anything else John changed the subject. 'Wanna do some sparring a bit later?"
"Sure," I agreed easily. It had been a few days since our last session.
"Great," John said, heading for the door. "I'm gonna go for a run with Ronan first - I'll give you a call when I'm done."
"O-kay," I said the last part of that word to myself - John had already left.
About an hour later I walked into the gym, carrying my fighting sticks with me. John was already there, swinging his sticks in a circular motion. He was alternating in a pattern of crossed arms with sticks at shoulder height and arms outstretched at hip level much more rapidly than I'd ever seen him do before.
"Looking good," I complimented him. When he didn't acknowledge my comment I grabbed my own sticks and worked through my usual warm up routine in silence.
"Ready?" John asked intently, watching me closely.
"If you are," I agreed.
We took up fighting stances and before I could even register that the fight had begun John had leapt forward in attack, swinging his left stick toward my arm while swiping the other at hip height. I jumped back to avoid a hit to the waist but couldn't completely get clear and received a hard hit to my shoulder.
"That's gonna leave a bruise," I complained as I rubbed the spot with a grimace.
"Sorry," John said somewhat insincerely, waiting for me to resume my fighting stance.
"Have you been practising?" I asked puzzled that his skills seemed so much more ... advanced than the last time we'd sparred.
"Not really," John admitted, raising his sticks for us to begin again.
This time I was more prepared for his speed and managed to hold off his rapid attack by giving up ground. Just before I hit the wall I ducked low, running around him back to the centre of the room.
John grinned at me, throwing one of his sticks to the floor and facing me with just the one stick held out towards me. When he put his other hand behind his back I could feel my anger starting to surface. That had been just plain condescending and that wasn't like John.
"What's with the ... aggression?" I asked hotly.
"Just spar," John almost growled.
I put the full force and control I had at my disposal into my next attack - John deflected every blow with ease, again making me give ground to avoid getting hit. He feinted left when I attempted the same ducking manoeuvre and instead of escaping I found myself pinned to the wall with John's fighting stick pressed to my throat.
"John?" I was panting at the exertion while he seemed to have hardly broken a sweat. "Do you want to go again?"
John didn't back away or answer - just stared at me with an intense expression I was hard pressed to meet. I began to feel nervous at his uncharacteristic behaviour and struggled not to let him see it. "You're hurting me," I said softly, feeling the stick pressing into my neck to the point of cutting off some of my air.
John frowned slightly before lowering the stick and throwing it across the room. I put a hand to my neck, watching him closely. When he grabbed my head in both hands and started kissing me fiercely I initially thought nothing of it - it wasn't the first sparring session we'd had where we'd gotten just a little too ... passionate and resorted to a different sort of physical contest.
Only a few seconds into the kiss I realised this time was completely different. John had never treated me as though I was fragile but he'd also never been as rough as he was being then. He ground his lips against mine, starving me for air as he pinned me hard to the wall. I struggled to pull away, finally resorting to jabbing him in the stomach to break his hold.
We stood frozen a step away from each other, both breathing hard as we stared into each other's eyes.
"I'm not really sure what just happened," John said in a more normal voice. He made a move towards me and I couldn't help but flinch away from his touch. "Sabina?" his expression became pained when he realised I was struggling to hold back tears.
"What's wrong with you?" I almost whispered, still breathing hard.
"Look," John began, also panting slightly.
"Colonel Sheppard, please report to the infirmary!" Doctor Beckett's voice from the radio interrupted him.
"You okay?" John asked, making no move to leave.
"Doctor Beckett will be expecting you," I ignored his question, trying to put on a calm face.
"Yeah," John admitted. He looked at me for a few seconds, obviously torn between the desire to stay and fix things and the knowledge that whatever Carson wanted to tell him was probably urgent. Finally he turned to leave, giving me a regretful look before he disappeared out the door.
As soon as he was gone I dropped to the floor. Resting my hands over my raised knees I leant back against the wall, breathing deeply to control the desire I still had to burst into tears. My mind was racing over the contradiction of John's behaviour today with what I was used to. It was hardly a surprise therefore when Doctor Beckett called me down to the infirmary a short time later.
"Colonel Sheppard has been infected with the iratus bug retrovirus," Doctor Beckett told me.
"Retrovirus?" I looked questioningly at Carson.
"We've been working on a way to strip out the iratus bug elements from a Wraith and leave only the human elements behind," Carson revealed. "Unfortunately our first strain had the opposite effect to what we intended. When Ellia tried to feed on the Colonel she passed the virus to him."
"What does that mean? I asked in concern.
"Maybe nothing,' Carson said hopefully. "The retrovirus could just break down in his system."
"And if it doesn't?" my voice was barely above a whisper as I asked the question I wasn't sure I wanted to hear the answer to.
"Then the virus will start rewriting the Colonel's DNA,' Doctor Beckett admitted reluctantly.
"Would it alter his mood?" I asked reluctantly. "When we sparred earlier John was behaving ... strangely."
"I don't know what the effects are likely to be," Doctor Beckett said in frustration. "The virus was never designed to be given to a human."
"What can I do?" I met Carson's eyes with a pleading look.
"The Colonel's due to check in a couple of hours from now," Doctor Beckett said. "He won't show it but he'd probably pretty worried right now ... maybe he'll open up a bit more with you, let loose some of the stress he's under."
"Okay," I said. "I'll just go and ... check on him myself then."
Deciding the most likely place for John to go under the circumstances would be his quarters, I headed there straight from the infirmary. John was sitting on his bed prodding his right arm in sick fascination when I opened the door. As I got closer I realised there was a patch of scaly skin surrounded by a blue discolouration right where John said Ellia had tried to feed on him. His unguarded expression at my unexpected arrival clued me in that Carson was right - John was on the edge of freaking out. The shutters closed over his eyes immediately, leaving the usual 'John Sheppard care free wise guy' expression behind.
I raised an eyebrow at him, looking pointedly at the affected arm. Tapping his ear piece John spoke reluctantly into the radio.
"Hey, Doc? This is Sheppard."
"Yes, Colonel," Carson's voice replied straight away.
"We may have to bump up our first check-in." John admitted.
"Come on," I said, reaching for his other arm. He let me pull him up from the bed and walked quietly by my side as I escorted him back to the infirmary.
Authors Note:
Thanks for the review chevron7 - I did briefly consider leaving the Teyla kiss in as is but then I wondered how much different that aggressive dynamic would be if it took place in an established relationship ... hence this chapter. Hope it worked okay!