A/N: Oh Em Gee! I can't believe I forgot to tell Molly, John, Evan and Teyla's stories. Mea Culpa!

Thanks for the reminder, marmota-b!

~ Sandy

Not a Hero

Chapter 38

Epilogue II

Molly, John, Evan, and Teyla

Dr. Millicent "Molly" Donovan stepped out of the elevator and headed down the hall to the Gate Room, her steps quick with excitement. Since the day she'd been recruited for this position, her thoughts had centered on seeing the Stargate in person for the first time. Yes, she was expected in the commander's office immediately, but she figured he could wait just a few minutes while she basked in the spirits of the thousands who'd gone where no man or woman had gone before. Well, starting in 1928.

Nodding to the guards, she showed her ID and they let her pass. Once inside, her duffle bag hit the floor as she came to a stop at the end of the ramp staring at the device the Pegasus natives called the Ring of the Ancestors. She was about to step onto the ramp when alarms blared. At first, she thought she'd set them off, but the PA came to life and she realized that there were incoming travelers, confirmed moments later when the iris came to life, the force field shimmering over the opening.

"Unscheduled offworld activation!"

Looking up at the observation window, she saw a young woman tapping at a device on her wrist. "It's SG-7 coming in hot with injuries."

Right place, right time, Molly thought as medical personnel entered the room waiting at the periphery until they knew it was safe. The iris shut down and soon two men and two women in khaki uniforms came through, one of the men carrying a woman in both arms while the other woman and man seemed to be holding each other up. Bolts of energy coming through the wormhole made the occupants of the room duck instinctively and SG-7 threw themselves down out of the line of fire, their weapons clattering on the metal of the ramp.

Moaning came from all four team members as Molly led the way to offer assistance as the 'gate shut down.

Turning the unconscious woman onto her back, she found she'd been hit in the right shoulder with what looked like one of the energy bolts that had singed the walls and floors of the Gate Room. Carefully pulling the fabric of her uniform from the wound, the smell of burnt flesh reached her nose as she made a quick assessment. "She needs surgery. Get the OR prepped now!" This last was aimed at the young woman behind the glass above them. She obeyed automatically, responding to the authority in Molly's voice while the rest of the medical team also hurried to complete her orders.

The woman was lifted onto a gurney and the VS monitor attached to her upper chest just below the clavicle. The EKG leads were stuck onto her temples, the indicators on all three blinking to let them know they were communicating with the main computer in the Infirmary.

"Doctor!" One of the nurses called Molly's attention to blood on the woman's side. A pair of scissors appeared in her vision and she used them to cut away the material of the uniform shirt and t-shirt underneath, finding the skin untouched.

"There's no injury so where did the blood come from?" The answer came to her as she said the words. "Go! Get her ready for surgery."

The other woman and man who'd come through together still held onto each other. They'd been checked out, but their injuries weren't serious, so they were permitted to walk to the Infirmary under the direction of medics who took them with a firm hand and steered them in the right direction.

Molly, another doctor and a nurse turned toward the leader of SG-7, a tall, well-built African-American man about ten years her senior. He'd been walking bent over, a hand held to his side, until he noticed them watching him. Then he straightened his right arm close to his side.

She glanced at his rank insignia. "I need to examine you, Colonel."

"I'm fine. Just take care of my team."

Flipping her long braid of bright red hair out of the way, she pulled on a fresh pair of gloves. "I intend to. And since you're part of this team, you'll be taken care of too." She gave him a stare that meant business.

Deciding that giving in was preferable to acting like a child, Isaiah Cooke lifted his arm. The right side of his uniform was bloody from just under his armpit to his waist. "Grazed by a, well, doc, you aren't going to believe it, but it looked just like one of those phaser things from that old Sci-Fi vid, Star Trek."

"I believe you, Colonel. Now get on the gurney. You're gonna need a bit of stitching up too."

"But…"

"Don't make me use my doctor voice, soldier."

Isaiah sighed, the sound ending on a moan when the injured area pulled with the expanding of his chest. "Fine. But I warn you, I'm a terrible patient."

"From what I've heard, that's SOP in this operation, but I think you'll find that I always get my way. Now go!"

~~O~~

The office overlooking the Gate Room looked pretty much like any other office except for the holographic golfing range, the guitar on a stand in the corner and the Johnny Cash poster on the wall. The man sitting in the chair, feet propped on the corner of the desk, was dressed all in black himself. Such were the privileges of being The Man. Though, like many before him, now that he was The Man, he had no reason to push the boundaries of authority because he only answered to one person, the leader of Homeworld Security who in turn answered only to the President and the OAB.

At the moment, he had a cap with the logo of Stanford University over his face and was snoring softly into the quiet of the room, until the alarms sounded startling him. He almost tipped over backward, just barely managing not to fall. His feet hit the floor, the cap falling into his lap. It was tossed on the credenza behind the desk as he went to the window overlooking the Gate Room.

Below he could see the medical team swarming around Cooke and his team, a woman with red hair in charge. His first thought was that she had to be the new CMO. His next thought was that he'd seen that color of hair before and for some reason it brought a momentary feeling of sentimentality to him along with a wistful smile.

Because she was supposed to come to him-he was The Man after all-he went back to his desk and decided to put a dent in the paperwork that had piled up during the past couple of weeks before Sergeant Davis gave him another of her looks.

Paperwork was a misnomer as they seldom used actual paper anymore. It was all done digitally now, and he often wished for the days when he could hold stacks of documents and folders in his hands. And, if necessary, he could pretend that he lost the documents that someone desperately needed though he knew if they thought about the situation a while longer they'd change their mind.

Several hours later he realized that his new CMO still hadn't made an appearance so, to hammer the point home about who was in charge, he decided it was time to call on her. It made no difference that she was a civilian. The boss was the boss.

Pushing out of his chair with a grunt, he checked his look in the mirror. Even in his mid-sixties and mostly gray with some white and a few black, his hair still stuck up randomly all over his head. People who hadn't seen him since high school still recognized him because of the hair. With a grin, he straightened the front of his uniform and headed out.

The technician in charge of the control room, Senior Master Sergeant Aurora Davis, jumped to attention as he hit the bottom step. Her skin was a few shades darker than a walnut, her short black hair managing to look professional and chic at the same time. When she looked at him instead of over his shoulder, her dark brown eyes disconcerted him, and he wasn't sure why.

"What have I told you about that, Davis?"

She relaxed and gave him a sheepish smile. "Sorry, General. Some habits are hard to break."

"Well, keep trying. Have you seen the new CMO?"

"Yes, sir. She's in the Infirmary."

The lopsided grin told her he wasn't really upset. "Guess I should go down and pay my respects. If my wife calls, ask her what we're having for dinner then call me."

Now Davis was grinning. "Yes, sir."

"Oh, and it's okay to…paraphrase what she says."

"Of course, General."

~~O~~

The doors to the operating theater opened and a woman in surgical scrubs emerged stripping off her gloves and gown. Before she could remove the mask and cap, General Sheppard strode up to her, blocking her way.

"Dr. Donovan, I presume."

"Yes. And you are…?"

"Oh, no one important. I just run things around here and as such, I expected you in my office a couple of hours ago."

Molly sighed, not bothering to hide her annoyance. "Yeah, well Lieutenant Finch and Colonel Cooke needed me here. And the needs of my patients trumps whatever it is you want any day of the year."

"Fair enough."

She watched his eyes roam over what he could see of her face as if he were trying to figure out where he'd seen her before. He looked familiar to her too. When he grinned, it came to her and suddenly it was twenty-five years ago, and she was once again standing on a dam in Nevada, the hot wind in her face as she looked up at one of the tallest adults she'd ever seen. She was seven at the time and most adults had been tall to her. He just seemed taller than any she'd seen before.

~~O~~

The woman in front of him, whose insubordination was more than SOP for a doctor, civilian or military, seemed familiar somehow. Bright blue eyes held his as they engaged in a silent battle of wills. She pulled off her mask as she turned away from him and entered the glass walled office. He followed her, leaning on the doorjamb with his arms crossed as she picked up something shiny from the desk and put it on. What could be so important that it couldn't wait until she'd showered and filled out her report? Then she turned around, a gold pendant now hanging around her neck, a Celtic cross he remembered from long ago. She removed her cap, taking with it all doubt as to her identity when he saw her red hair in a bun on top of her head.

"Molly?" He recognized her at the same time because they spoke at the same time.

"John? You might not remember me, but…"

He looked her up and down. Not in a weird stalkerish way, but as someone who was trying to match the present with a long-ago memory. "You grew up!"

~~O~~

Molly laughed. "It's been twenty-five years, John. Kids have a tendency to do that." Before he could avoid it, she hugged him surprising her when he returned it. If her memory of that day was accurate, he hadn't seemed like the kind of man to engage in gestures of affection in public. Yet here he was doing exactly that. A lot had changed in that time.

"When I was told that General John Sheppard specifically requested me as the new head of medicine for the SGC, I had no idea that he and Special Agent John Sheppard were one and the same."

"And I didn't know that Dr. Millicent Donovan, formerly the head of Doctors Without Borders, was the Molly from the dam."

"Yeah. That's me."

The sat on the sofa. "How's your mom?"

Her expression turned sad. "Mom died almost two years later giving birth to my brother, Ian. He's in the Marines and posted with the SGC."

"Sorry to hear that about your mom." John's features crinkled in thought. "I don't remember an Ian Donovan on the roster."

"That's because my mother married a man named Owen Flanagan and they had Ian. I kept the Donovan name to honor my father who was killed in a construction accident when I was five."

"Lieutenant Flanagan is in Andromeda on the Stargate salvage program. Turned down a position to Hoag's Object."

Molly chuckled. "Yeah. Wanted to stay close to home."

John nodded understanding. It was the same reason he'd taken the position at the SGC. Jennifer had retired from practicing medicine and now taught at John's Hopkins. Their children and grandchildren were scattered across Earth, Pegasus and other offworld places, but they wanted to be here. "How did you get involved with Doctors Without Borders?"

A rueful smile came easily to her pretty face. "One day, I was visiting the Hoover Dam with my mother and grandparents when I met someone. He seemed sad, so I started talking to him." Her fingers touched the Celtic cross. "He gave me this pendant and said something that changed my life from that day forward."

"Oh?"

"Mm-hmm."

"And that was…?"

"He told me, well, basically, that life was an adventure and I should go out and experience it. There was also some inanity about being the change you wished to see in the world. But from that day on, I knew I wanted to be a doctor, to leave my mark. And though I had hoped to see him again one day, I never did…until today." She took his hand where it lay on this thigh and gave it a squeeze. The pressure was returned. "Thank you for those words, John. Without you, I might never have seen some of the wonders that this world has to offer. And I definitely wouldn't be here now."

Uncomfortable with the praise, he cleared his throat. "I'm, uh, glad I could help." John pushed to his feet with a grunt. "But don't think you can slack off just because you're friends with the boss."

She stood and gave him a mock salute. "Yes, sir."

With a grin, he left the Infirmary and returned to his office. On the way, he pulled out his computer and sent a message to his long-time friend General Evan Lorne, now the commander of the Stargate relocation project in Andromeda, to let him know to keep an eye on Lieutenant Flanagan.

Within two years of arriving on Atlantis, Evan and Teyla married in a combined Athosian-Earth ceremony, at which John Sheppard officiated. Three years later, Teyla gave birth to a son they named Torren John Emmagan in the Athosian tradition. TJ was followed by a daughter, Charon Elizabeth. Charon became leader of the Athosian people and Torren John now lead the military contingent on Atlantis. Both are married with two children each, surrounded by the love of family and friends. They seldom travel to Earth.

Fini

A/N: Yes, Aurora Davis is adopted and the youngest daughter of Paul and Melissa Davis.