Sheppard found himself in a familiar situation, sitting on the floor cross legged, and facing Aceso. This time however, his team surrounded him. Teyla had set out candles all around his room to create the right ambiance for this. Ronon had brought a wool rug from his own quarters for them to sit on.
Aceso rested in deep thought, her eyes glazed over in a sort of unsettling vacant stare. Sheppard didn't want to interrupt, but he really wanted to figure out what he needed to do. She hadn't shared much detail about her plan yet.
"So…" Sheppard started. Aceso blinked, and her eyes focused on him.
"Sorry, Colonel," Aceso said. "I have been preparing myself mentally for what I need to do. I can't exactly invade your mind in the normal way, but I still have to be able to interact with you in some capacity while your mind is in a sleep state."
"Sure." Sheppard shrugged, not fully understanding the nuance.
"What's the point of this?" Ronon asked. He had trouble sitting cross legged for any length of time. Rodney simply laid down with his arms crossed across his chest.
Aceso addressed him without eyes closed. "If we are to heal the damage done, we must find the source. When I do, I can break the cycle of thoughts and emotions that lead Sheppard into this state." She shifted around to look at Ronon. "Your presence will help him, all of you."
"What now?" Sheppard asked. "Some sort of meditation?"
"No need," Aceso said. I will put you all into a sleep state, but I need you to help by relaxing your minds.
"Relax?" McKay asked worriedly. "My mind is being messed with, how can I relax?"
"Just continue laying down and keep your mind idle." Teyla said.
McKay glanced expectantly around the room.
Aceso turned to him with impatience. "Close your eyes please."
Rodney groaned, but did as she told.
In a moment, Sheppard felt consciousness slipping away from him. At least now he had the chance to get some actual rest.
"That's weird," Sheppard said with amusement, the last utterance before he felt himself drifting off to sleep.
This seemed different from ordinary sleep. He initially felt lucid and aware of his dream surrounding, but slowly started to struggle to maintain his sense of self. The dream-scape around him swirled with light and images like smoke swirling in the wind. Nothing distinct appeared at first, but then gradually, the images coalesced into the inside of a wraith hive. All around the walls and ceiling, stasis pods glowed, their occupants unaware of his existence.
"I've been here before," Sheppard said. As he said that, he took stock of himself and saw that he had a weapon aimed somewhere down below him. He lay down on a raised platform, looking down at Colonel Sumner, being fed upon by the keeper.
"Oh god, not this." Sheppard said.
Without a second thought, he leapt down from the platform and shot the wraith guards in two swift movements. Taking a stunner, he stabbed the keeper in the chest with the sharpened end of the weapon. The keeper fell to the ground in a heap, leaving Sumner kneeling there looking very exhausted.
"Are you all right sir?" Sheppard asked.
Sumner shook his head. "I will be," he groaned. "Just as soon as I get out of here."
Sheppard helped support Sumner and both walked out of there.
As they rounded the corner, Aceso appeared suddenly.
"You have to re-live the moment," Aceso said.
"What are you waiting for, let's get out of here," Sumner ordered.
"Wait, why are you here?" Sheppard asked. His mind went into a spin, the memories and context fading in and out of lucidity. "It can't be you. It's too soon for that."
Aceso approached him. "This memory is going to continue to play out wrong until you accept what really happened."
"Why?" Sheppard asked. "Why is me altering the memory causing me such trouble?"
"It creates a conflict in your mind," Aceso explained. "You need to let go, and move on. To do that, you must confront the memory exactly as it happened."
"I can't do that again." Sheppard said, suddenly lying prone on the balcony above the scene. Somehow, Colonel Sumner knelt on the floor, again at the mercy of the keeper and still being fed upon as if the memory had re-set.
Sheppard readied his weapon, but did not fire.
Aceso knelt beside him. "Teyla has something to say," she said.
"John?"
Sheppard looked beside him to see Teyla sitting there.
"Is this really you?" Sheppard asked her.
"Yes," she said. "Aceso is guiding me to you. I just want to say that you need to acknowledge what you did. Altering your memories will not help anyone, especially not yourself."
"I…" Sheppard stammered.
The keeper still fed upon Sumner, his life almost totally gone. He did not make one single sound.
How Sheppard wished that he could turn back the clock, make different decisions on this day. He might have been able to save Sumner from this fate. There might have been something he could have done to find a way to rescue everyone.
"I killed him," Sheppard said, feeling the same despair and regret that he was so familiar with.
"I'm sorry," Aceso said. "But you'll have to do more than just say it. This process requires true acknowledgement."
It was a hopeless wish; this was just a memory, and nothing would really change that, no matter how differently he imagined events playing out. Aceso was right, he needed to acknowledge what he did, and make the decision.
He raised the weapon, and aimed. Sumner made eye contact with him, his gaze conveying the same message that he did the first time. Sheppard fired at the keeper's hand, striking Sumner in the heart.
The memory faded to a black, smoky dream-scape, leaving his friends standing around him in a circle.
Sheppard stood up.
"There are other points in your memory that we must confront," Aceso said. "I hope you're ready for this."
"I'm not," Sheppard said, feeling the stinging judgement of his team. It was one thing to tell them about these decisions, but another to play it out for them in vivid detail. "That was one of the worst moments of my life."
"We knew this would be hard for you," Teyla said. "But we're here, and we're going to support you."
Sheppard found himself on a hive ship, running through a hallway, someone ran close behind him. He glanced behind him in dismamy to see Lieutenant Ford. He looked beaten up, disheveled and bled slowly through his clothing.
"I'll cover your escape," Ford said, "Teyla and Ronon are down that way." He pointed down the hallway in which they ran.
They stopped running and Ford handed him Ronon's stun weapon.
"I'm not going to leave you behind," Sheppard said.
"I'll catch up," Ford said, starting back the way they came, deeper into the ship. "Now go!"
Sheppard raised Ronon's blaster and fired a series of stun blasts at Ford. It took three blasts before Ford went down. Sheppard walked over to the lieutenant and grabbed him by the collar, dragging him along.
Sheppard hauled Ford down the hallway several meters before arriving at the cell in front of the bars confining Teyla and Ronon, and McKay.
"Did you guys miss me?" Sheppard said blithely as he raised the stunner and blasted the cell door control panel. As the smoke cleared, the cell door retracted back.
"This isn't right Sheppard," Ronon said. "Ford wasn't with you."
Sheppard looked down to the unconscious man he was dragging by the shirt. "What are you talking about? Help me carry him out of here."
"No, John," Teyla said. "You need to go through it again, but this time remember how it really happened."
"Yeah, and I wasn't even here," McKay said. "I was supposed to be on the Daedalus."
He shook his head, becoming lucid again at the fact that this was only a memory. It seemed like his awareness of that fact was coming in and out of focus as things played out. He looked to Ford, still unconscious.
"I have to get him back home," Sheppard insisted.
"But you won't," Ronon said. "You know the truth."
Sheppard could hardly contain his anger. It wasn't fair — not to him, not to Ford, or to his family. A window appeared, something like a portal through to another memory. A thin membrane separated this new memory from the one playing out. Through it, he could see Ford reuniting with his parents and sister in front of their home. Then he understood that this was not a memory, but a fantasy — a wish.
"You have to let it go," Teyla said. "It never happened, and it never will."
Taking a deep breath, Sheppard felt prepared to try this again — this time being honest with himself, and letting go of the fantasy.
The memory re-set, and Sheppard ran beside Ford once again.
"I'll cover your escape," Ford said, "Teyla and Ronon are down that way." He pointed down the hallway in which they were running.
Ford handed him Ronon's stun weapon.
"I'm not going to leave you behind," Sheppard said.
"I'll catch up," Ford said, starting back the way they came, deeper into the ship. "Now go!"
Sheppard thought to stun Ford, but he recognized that Ford had already chosen his path. Ford's addiction to the enzyme likely influenced his decision, but even so, some part of the lieutenant genuinely wanted this. He had a wild, adventurous side to him. Whether Ford was running away from home, or toward something he thought was better, he didn't know. Ford had so many opportunities to simply come home, Sheppard knew, deep down, that he was lost to them.
Then the reality sunk in. He would never see Ford again.
The memory faded to black smoke again, and Aceso appeared. "There is one more, and then I believe we will have found all of the harmful memories."
"I don't know how much more of this I can take," he said. "I've always hated these mind games."
"You are strong," Aceso said. "I fear this last one will be the hardest to face."
With that encouragement, Sheppard nodded. "Okay." The acknowledgement was weaker this time. He knew what he was going to face next. His most recent regret, the one that caused him the most trouble.
Sheppard knelt before Ice. Naam stood beside her, crying. The queen was holding the knife against the kid's neck. Panic shocked him like lightning. He couldn't face this again, not so soon.
"Show me the address to Atlantis, and the boy will live," Ice threatened.
Sheppard shook his head. "I can't watch him die, not this time."
"Then show me," she goaded.
Sheppard looked to Naam who wept, tears running down his face in terror. "All right, I'll tell you. Please don't hurt him."
Ice lowered the knife.
"That's not how it happened," Ronon said. Ronon stood there behind Ice, who turned around and saw him, but said nothing to him, as if he weren't really there.
Sheppard looked to Naam, still alive, or apparently so. He realized with dismay that this was only part memory, part delusion. Sheppard was about to make the wrong decision — wrong for the people of Atlantis, of Earth, and of the entire Pegasus galaxy. He knew that his control over the situation was illusory. Ice may have killed Naam anyway, and the boy certainly would not have been better off if Atlantis fell to the wraith. Sheppard struggled to accept that he was a victim as well.
"The symbols?" Ice asked.
"You have to accept what happened," Ronon said. "If you don't, Aceso says it'll keep hurting you."
"No," Sheppard said, turning away and closing his eyes. "I won't tell you. I can't put my people in danger like that."
"Then the boy's life is forfeit," Ice spat coldly.
"He's already dead," Sheppard said, "and re-living this over and over again won't change it."
Ice stabbed Naam, who cried out and disappeared in a wisp of smoke.
Ice morphed into an image of Aceso, their mental landscape disappearing into a black inky fog.
Sheppard knelt down, exhausted. "Well, is that it?" he asked her.
"Did you believe you'd be rid of me so easily?" Aceso said.
"What?" Sheppard asked.
Aceso stepped forward, the blood covered knife still in her hands. "I am the reason you can't sleep, why your dreams torture you every night."
Sheppard scrambled to his feet. "What the hell are you doing?" He took a few steps back, and Aceso followed him.
This wasn't a memory — something just went horribly wrong.
"I thought you were helping me?" Sheppard yelled.
Aceso laughed menacingly. "Why would I help a pathetic human?"
Ronon appeared beside him. Sheppard sighed in relief. "Finally, are you going to help?"
"I can't," Ronon said. "This isn't really Aceso. She said this is a version of her that your mind created."
"Well where's the real one?" Sheppard demanded.
"Still here," Ronon said. "She asked me to talk to you."
"Well, what the hell do I do about this?" Sheppard asked, pointing to the image of Aceso's evil twin.
Teyla appeared beside him. "Serenity, John,"
"Right." He focused on his breathing, closing his eyes and keeping his mind calm.
"That won't work," Aceso said. She pushed him by the shoulders, sending him flying backward into a bottomless chasm.
He fell for quite some time, unaware of how to stop. The panic lasted for a time, but then he remembered that in reality he was sitting down in his quarters, surrounded by friends.
This gave him the confidence to focus his mind on again remaining calm. In short order, the spinning stopped, and the environment morphed into the inky fog.
Aceso once again appeared. Sheppard backed away, as she advanced.
The environment changed to somewhere in the hallways of one of the buildings on Atlantis. The suddenly-evil wraith queen still pursued him, and he kept running.
Sheppard kept getting blocked by locked doors. He felt corralled, led into one inevitable direction predetermined by Ice.
Finally, he arrived at an exterior doorway that led to a narrow ledge over a sheer drop.
He looked between Aceso and the ledge.
Ronon appeared beside him.
"Are you going to help me buddy?" Sheppard asked.
"I can't touch her," Ronon said. "You have to face her yourself."
"I can't," Sheppard said. "She'll kill me."
"It's in your mind, fight it." Ronon admonished before disappearing in a wisp of smoke.
Ronon was right, he needed to take a stand. "I was afraid you were going to say that."
Aceso walked right up to him. "I can still kill you," she said.
"No you can't, or you would have done it," Sheppard said.
She produced a knife and lunged at him, but this time, Sheppard didn't flinch. The blade she held turned to smoke as it touched him, followed by the rest of her. Eventually, the environment dissolved until only the mist remained.
He opened his eyes, and saw only the familiar surroundings of his quarters. Around him, the rest of his team was also waking up from a similar state.
Sheppard felt in no state to say anything. Even though his mind had been in a sleep state, he felt exhausted. McKay, Ronon, and Teyla stood up, and he followed, reluctantly.
"Did you see that?" McKay said, standing up. "What the hell was that?"
"The device created that image," Teyla said. "Somehow Sheppard's perception of the wraith morphed the memory of Aceso into — that thing."
"Okay, that's terrifying," McKay said.
Sheppard rubbed his eyes. "I can't believe how difficult that was."
"It was a challenge, but you fought and won," Teyla said.
"That took courage," Ronon said.
"Could she really have hurt me?" Sheppard asked.
Aceso had woken up, but she was sitting there with her legs curled up, avoiding looking at Sheppard.
"You all right?" Sheppard asked.
Aceso shook her head. "That — image — couldn't have hurt you directly. It was something the device created out of your own memory. If I didn't help destroy it, it might have tormented your dreams."
"Right — but it's dead now?" Sheppard clarified.
"Yes," Aceso affirmed.
Sheppard had some idea what was bothering her. "Look, I don't really see you that way."
She stared at him, her snake-like eyes scrutinizing him. "On some level you do."
"Damn," he said, shame rising. "Look, I can't help what happens in my subconscious. It's not fair to judge me for that."
Aceso nodded and stood up. "I know that," she said. She remained distant, just sitting there. It must have felt terrible to see an image of herself like that, especially after all she had done to help him.
Sheppard couldn't think of how to answer for this, until he realized that he didn't need to answer for it at all. The thing that bothered her wasn't about him at all, rather her own demons about her self-image.
"Thanks, all of you," Sheppard said, trying to smooth over the situation. The only thing he felt now was exhaustion, but time would tell if his mind would cooperate enough to go on the mission.
"Yeah, yeah, don't mention it," McKay said, standing up. "Now if I still have some time left, I need to get the rest of the jumpers inspected."
(0)
Sheppard waited in Keller's office, sitting still and feeling strangely calm. Whatever Aceso had done to his mind seemed to break him out of a very dark place. He didn't know how to describe it other than a burden being taken away. His mind no longer ran in dark circles. His memories of his regrets remained, but they seemed distant, no longer so close and personal to him.
Keller walked in and shut the door. She sat down at her desk and examined her tablet computer screen carefully, but didn't say anything at first.
"Still no remaining neurological damage," Keller said after awhile. "That just leaves the question of how you're feeling."
"A lot better," Sheppard said. "I didn't want to believe it, but — it really worked."
Keller glanced up at him skeptically. "And you've had no further panic attacks?"
Sheppard shook his head. "No doc, I feel fine — really."
They shared a silent moment, as Keller mulled over her decision. Keller knew the stakes almost as well as he did. He felt bad about pressuring her, but this mission was far too important to let go.
"Have you had any rest at all since last night?" Keller asked.
Sheppard leaned forward. "I have to go," Sheppard said. "It won't work without me."
With a sharp exhale, Keller relented. "Okay, fine — I'll approve you for active status."