December 14th

Three days! Lorne had been stuck in jail with Eldon for three days! By his calculations that meant someone from Atlantis should be arriving soon, although exactly when he could expect that rescue was a little fuzzy.

Sharing a cell with someone would never be on his list of things to enjoy – it was the kind of thing he'd been trained to endure, or maybe it was more that a person who'd sign his life over to the military was also the kind of person who could handle the conditions a small enclosed space forced on him.

Coughlin dug his heels in with Privic as much as Lorne had – in a show of some kind of faith or a convoluted attempt to manipulate them Privic had responded by letting Lorne and Eldon out of the cell twice a day. Once for a heavily escorted walk around the village to stretch their legs and once in the evenings to wash in the nearby river. Those outings made things much more comfortable and allowed Evan to check on his team regularly. Privic didn't let him actually talk to his men but they always made sure to be hovering outside their hut when Eldon and Lorne walked by. A few discrete hand signals and Lorne knew none of them were under immediate threat.

Those three days had given Evan a lot more time to talk to Eldon too – the younger man had relaxed in Evan's company to the point he hardly stuttered anymore. It was a different story when Privic came to talk to them – then he could barely string three words together without one of them stumbling out unevenly.

"I think even Rodney would be impressed with your gate stopping device," he commented to Eldon early on the fourth day of their joint incarceration. "Not that he'd admit it of course."

"No," Eldon smiled, looking down for a moment before speaking in a low tone. "It was an accident."

"What was?"

"My gate stopping device, it was an accident," Eldon admitted. "You know better than most people that Olesia wasn't as advanced as where you come from. The Ancestors always fascinated me – I read everything I could on them while I lived in Atlantis. Once I got back here I just kept studying."

"And the only thing Ancient around here is the Stargate," Lorne concluded. "How exactly does this device of yours work?" Evan wasn't confident he'd understand Eldon if the younger man started to get too into the geek speak but he knew Rodney and Colonel Carter would both appreciate whatever intel he could collect. The ability to lock out a Stargate was a power they didn't want getting into the wrong hands.

"When the penal colony was here, aside from creating explosives for him, Torrell was always on at me to fix the dialling device so that we could leave." Eldon explained. "I could never get him to see that without the control crystal it wasn't possible. I'd already spent hours trying to understand how dialling worked so I just continued – with the control crystal installed I could experiment."

"One of those experiments went wrong?" Evan queried.

"Y-yes," Eldon flushed. "At first I thought I'd broken the Stargate completely – I couldn't get it to dial anywhere. The system won't let you dial out if a wormhole is active – a side effect of my experiment was the system detecting a wormhole that wasn't there," Eldon explained. "Once I'd fixed everything I realised I could do the same thing whenever I wanted. All I have to do is transmit the error subroutine and the Stargate will register a wormhole as present until I transmit the corrected routine."

"When did you decide to share your new skill with Privic?"

"Torrell came back a couple of weeks later," Eldon revealed. "He took one of Elana's friends and we were powerless to stop him. Elana was devastated Major … I had to give her … give everyone some hope that we could find a way to stop Torrell from taking anyone else."

"You should have come to us as soon as you realised Torrell was a problem," Lorne admonished. "Hell, you should have told me what you were up to when you left Atlantis! If you had neither of us would be stuck in this crappy excuse for a jail right now."

"I know," Eldon agreed miserably. "It was stupid. I just never …"

"You never had anyone you could trust," Evan sighed, his momentary frustration ebbing in the face of Eldon's remorse. "If you had, you'd have known that Doctor Weir would never go back on her word – we took you in and she promised to look out for you. She took her promises very seriously Eldon. I'd be dishonouring her if I didn't uphold every one of those promises now that she'd gone."

"Do you think …," Eldon trailed off, wanting to ask something but also not wanting to hear the answer if it was negative.

"Do I think Atlantis will still help even though you went out on your own instead of trusting us?" Evan asked. Eldon nodded. "I think Colonel Sheppard will feel the same kind of responsibility I do – he'll do the right thing."

"They'll come to speak to Privic first?"

"I'd guess so," Lorne shook his head. "If Privic digs his heels in with Colonel Sheppard he won't like the response he'll get back."

"Colonel Sheppard wouldn't hurt Privic," Eldon declared.

"Of course not," Lorne smiled suddenly. "He'll just transport us all out of here before Privic can protest – and your only means of stopping Torrell will be gone."

Eldon knew about the subcutaneous transmitters so he understood immediately what Lorne was saying. He had a transmitter too but Evan knew his own safety wouldn't be what Eldon was worrying about. Saving himself wouldn't be good enough otherwise he'd never have come back to Olesia. No, he'd be on at Lorne until Evan agreed to help Elana and her family and Eldon's family, and anyone else the young man considered worthy of saving.

"We need to talk to Privic," Evan said seriously. "Get him to at least be receptive to any visitors he might get from Atlantis – without letting slip that rescue from Atlantis is more than just a possibility."

"I'll ask when the guards come to take us for our walk," Eldon promised.

Evan nodded, resting his head back against the wall. His thoughts went back to Elizabeth, and for the first time he didn't feel that rush of guilt and grief before anything else. Instead he found himself smiling slightly thinking back to how many times she'd gotten angry with Colonel Sheppard because he'd made promises off world without getting her agreement first. More than once she'd commented to Evan that John was too free with her honour – because of course any promises made by her people were the same to her as if she'd made them herself. She'd threatened to revoke John's off world exploration status a few times and then laughed with Lorne because they both knew she'd never do that in reality, no matter how amusing it was to imagine the Colonel's reaction when he got that order from Elizabeth.

It was nice to be able to remember some of his fonder moments with the city's former leader. She'd heartily approved of Evan's relationship with Jennifer too – had taken the time to tell him he'd chosen well. It amused him to learn she'd said much the same thing to Jennifer, before either of them put those first decorations on the tree last year. He'd liked that enough to remind Jennifer of Elizabeth's words in one of his advent messages.

"I don't need anyone's approval to marry you Jennifer, but it means a lot to me that Elizabeth approved. In fact she said I had excellent taste! No one gets married in isolation – the fact that we had that support and approval has to add to the reasons why you should say yes, don't you think?"

It was funny that he had no regard for anyone who might suggest he and Jennifer didn't belong together, but at the same time it did warm his heart that they had so much support from those around them. Colonel Sheppard, Teyla, Lorne's team and Jennifer's staff – their relationship had been welcomed universally. Maybe it was just that although Evan didn't believe in fate if it meant he couldn't influence the future at the same time he liked the idea of 'meant to be'.

Meant to be was just another way of saying he had no doubts he'd get off Olesia and back to Jennifer's side ... hopefully sooner rather than later.