I totally didn't expect to write something this long for author's notes, but it happened. For those of you interested in my thoughts in the process of creating this story, here's a nice, long reflection.

What Dreams May Come: Author's Notes

Writing fueled by emotion: Introduction

The act of writing has always served as a way for me to cope with my emotions. I journal on a regular basis – I remember the pages of my first entry, me writing the alphabet with a lime green crayon – and as someone who is deeply in touch with her personal emotions, I also find myself drawn to people in general and everything about them: behavior, actions, motives, thoughts, feelings, relationships, conflict, backstories. While the world of SGA and its characters are fictional, I have always been greatly captivated by its characters, and I enjoy using fanfiction to explore many aspects of their characterizations and to portray their complex emotions and their deepest humanity.

I have recently been re-watching SGA after being disconnected from the show and fandom for several years. The last time that I was involved in the show and fandom, I was greatly upset with many of the casting decisions made at the end of Season 3, one of them being reducing Torri Higginson to a recurring cast member, which, for all intents and purposes, took her off the show entirely. I think that I have been wanting to write this story for a long time now, and by that, I mean that I have been wanting to write a story that addresses the aftermath of Elizabeth's capture by the Replicators on the remaining main characters in order to help me better cope with her absence in Seasons 4 and 5, since writing has always been a kind of emotional therapy for me after all. Though I didn't quite know how I would approach this objective at first, the manner in which I would find a sense of emotional peace turned out to be writing this story with three primary goals: 1) write a story that respects canon events but is realistic to the extent that it could contribute to what happened on-screen; 2) rectify what I felt were two major flaws on-screen: an inconsistency between John Sheppard's quintessential belief in not leaving people behind and the absence of an on-screen rescue mission for Elizabeth, and what I felt was a disrespectful manner in which Colonel Carter was introduced to Atlantis, both to Colonel Carter's character and her predecessor's; and 3) further acknowledge John's emotions toward Elizabeth's loss, which I would have appreciated to see more fleshed out on-screen. Not only have I been extremely excited in having completed this piece of work and sharing it with others, but I'm also grateful that in writing this story and fulfilling the aforementioned goals, I've at long last been able to accept events as they occurred on-screen, obtain a sense of emotional peace, and appreciate Seasons 4 and 5 for what they are.

Respecting canon events: The rescue mission that never happened

I most enjoy writing fanfiction that I myself would have thought realistic enough that it could have actually happened on-screen. As such, in order to respect canon, I never once considered writing a story about a successful rescue mission for Elizabeth, because that would have meant entirely repudiating the last two seasons of SGA. I personally didn't want to complete this story in a state of denial about Elizabeth's fate – I'd been there too long already, and the purpose of this story was partially to help me accept what really happened. However controversial they were, I wanted to respect canon events as they were, and I wanted to write a story that honored the actual episodes while still being something that could have contributed to on-screen events.

I had arrived at the conclusion that John went on a failed, off-screen rescue mission for Elizabeth – more on how I arrived at said conclusion in the next section. However, I realized that I also didn't want this story to be about John going back for Elizabeth, actually finding her, and failing to bring her back. There were several reasons for my hesitation to write that type of story, and one reason was that if a successful rescue mission story would have been written out of denial for really happened to Elizabeth, then a straight-forward, failed rescue mission story would have been written to spite what failed to occur on-screen. As much as I criticized the producers and writers for failing to include something so crucial in order to respect their characters and said characters' defining attributes, I didn't want to disrespect the actual events that occurred before our eyes. Another reason that I didn't want a straight-forward, failed rescue mission was that if John and his team had actually found Elizabeth, then there would have been a number of continuity issues that would have needed to be addressed – for instance, they're bound to get captured and their minds probed, so how to explain why the Replicators don't go to attack Atlantis at the beginning of Season 4, because they've discovered Atlantis' new location? Or, in "This Mortal Coil," John obtains information that leads him to believe that Elizabeth had perished on the Replicator planet shortly after her capture, and it also seemed very clear that John never found Elizabeth – so how to explain his quiet remorse at the end of the episode, when he informed Rodney that he would be approving the removal of Elizabeth's personal items the next day, if he had actually found her during a failed rescue mission, because he might have then reacted more intensely. Because I wanted this story to be something that could have contributed to the existing episodes in Season 4, it was necessary for me to take all these canon events into consideration when writing this story.

Somewhere along the process of trying to respect on-screen events, I found myself thinking about the Replicators and their mind-probing, and we have seen on-screen a few times how deception has occurred due to mind-probing, and we don't know what's real and what is not. For the purposes of incorporating suspense, I began contemplating the thought that a portion of my story isn't actually happening, but rather only a scenario played out in John's mind. And I suddenly had the idea: what if the entire mission never really happened? What if, for some reason, John and his team never made it to the Replicator planet, John fell unconscious, and the entire mission happened only in John's mind? The moment that this idea occurred to me, I was both extremely excited and apprehensive about using it. It would have been the biggest plot twist in this story; I figured that readers might have been expecting some sort of deception on part of the Replicators' mind-probing, when ironically, the Replicators would have had nothing to do with the illusion of reality caused by a dream. Initially, I felt that it seemed like too extreme of a cop-out to avoid continuity issues between my story and the actual episodes, and I was on the fence about this idea for a very long time.

However, I finally decided to go for it, one reason being that I felt it was a brilliant way to explore a hypothetical way that a rescue mission for Elizabeth might have turned out without the events actually occurring, thus avoiding any continuity issues that might have resulted had John actually found Elizabeth. Additionally, this storytelling strategy allowed me to explore one of John's deepest fears about letting his people down and his consequential emotional reactions to his failures: in his dream, he becomes so desperate to bring Elizabeth back that he even shoots her just so he could carry her back to the Jumper himself, only in the end to have failed because Elizabeth refuses to leave… and when he wakes up, not only is he devastated because he failed to bring Elizabeth back in his dream, but his shock and grief turns even more potent when he realizes that the rescue mission never actually happened, and he had never found Elizabeth in the first place. Finally, I realized that making the rescue mission only a dream was the only way to honor the episodes as they were while doing justice to the John Sheppard we know and love who did everything he could to return for one of his people. What was most important was John's motives for going back for Elizabeth and his actions that were consistent with his core values, and in this story, he did just that. In the end, the mission failed… just not in the way we expected. And that is how we get the failed rescue mission that never happened that could have occurred in early Season 4.

"We don't leave our people behind": John Sheppard's fundamental belief

When I began writing this, I knew that I wanted the story to address one matter that I felt was a serious fault on part of the producers and writers, and that was the absence of an on-screen rescue mission to bring Elizabeth back. In "Reunion," we only see John Sheppard and Colonel Carter have a brief discussion about a possible rescue mission for Elizabeth before Carter dismisses John, and the topic is never once brought up again. The main issue, for me, wasn't that Elizabeth didn't come back, but rather that no noticeable attempts were made to bring her back. I thought that this was a serious mistake on part of the producers and writers, because one of John's defining character traits is his loyalty to his people, and if nothing happened that wasn't shown on-screen, then I honestly would have thought that John had displayed a major lack of integrity in this situation in not adhering to his deeply rooted belief in not leaving his people behind.

Now, could have John actually not done anything beyond his brief conversation with Colonel Carter? When I began writing this, I found myself mulling over one question repeatedly: did John go back for Elizabeth and failed, and we just didn't see it on-screen… or did he not? For a while, I entertained the notion that he never really went back, and I considered possible motives for his lack of action, because I believed that if he truly never returned for Elizabeth, then he must have had a very critical reason for not doing so. However, the more I thought about it, the more I began to believe that there was no way that he would have done absolutely nothing, simply because he has proved so many times on-screen that he doesn't leave his people behind: 1) Before he became involved in the Atlantis expedition, he was stationed in McMurdo because of his tarnished military record, and we see him in Season 3 disobeying direct orders and flying back to Afghanistan alone for one of his fellow comrades. 2) When Colonel Sumner and the Athosians were culled by the Wraith at the beginning of the expedition, he argued with Elizabeth that it was essential that he go back for them because they don't leave their people in the hands of the enemy. 3) After Lieutenant Ford became addicted to the Wraith enzyme and escaped Atlantis, John didn't give up on trying to bring him back, despite the reality that Ford was clearly not in the right state of mind… not when he encountered Ford on the planet where he met Ronon, and not when he became involved in Ford's plan to destroy a Wraith Hive ship later on in the season. 4) In Season 3, when Ronon was recaptured by the Wraith, John employed Colonel Caldwell and the Daedalus in order to rescue his friend on Sateda, even standing up to Caldwell when Caldwell expressed skepticism over the likelihood that the rescue mission would succeed. 5) Finally, when Teyla was kidnapped by Michael toward the end of Season 4, John relentlessly pursued her over the course of several episodes, depending on information from Carson Beckett's clone, despite Colonel Carter's hesitation, because it was the only lead he had – and later disregarding his personal injuries in "Search and Rescue," insisting to Jennifer Keller and Colonel Carter that he go on the mission to Michael's cruiser to rescue Teyla, even telling Colonel Carter, "I'll surrender for court martial when I'm done."

Over and over, John has proved his loyalty to his people, and if there is any chance at all of saving them, then he refuses to give up. Elizabeth, therefore, should have been no exception, despite the reality that she could have been compromised and been a threat to the city… after all, John was willing to save Ford, who had already become dangerous when he threatened to kill people in Atlantis and stole a Jumper to escape the city, and who later became so addicted to the Wraith enzyme that he was no longer the happy-go-lucky Lieutenant that he once was. John wouldn't have not gone back for Elizabeth because of the possibility that she might be a threat to the city, and he wouldn't have not gone back for her even if Elizabeth explicitly told him not to herself, because it is his deeply rooted core belief that he doesn't leave his people behind.

As a result, I believed that John did go back for Elizabeth, and he would have done everything he could to get her back – and we just didn't see his rescue attempts on-screen. In Afghanistan, he wasn't afraid to disobey orders and go back alone for one man, and similarly, in this story, we see that he truly was ready to take off alone, against Colonel Carter and the IOA's orders, and he would do it even if he didn't have a plan, even if his teammates didn't go with him. Many times over, John has demonstrated that he doesn't leave his people behind, and he would return for them no matter the risks, no matter the costs, for Elizabeth and for anyone else. And in this story, he goes back for Elizabeth… and even though events didn't turn out as planned, the important thing is that he tried. He tried so hard, and his undying loyalty to his people is what we admire and respect him for, regardless of the final outcome.

The sympathy of a leader: Colonel Carter's arrival in Atlantis

Another issue that I wanted this story to address was the manner in which Colonel Carter was brought in as the new leader of Atlantis after "Lifeline." While I find Colonel Carter a good and respectable character, it hurt very much to see her brought on the show with Rodney acting as if nothing short of a tragedy had just happened, and it also hurt to see her not only refuse John's proposal to rescue Elizabeth, but also not even offer her assistance in planning a rescue mission – which I thought was out of character, considering that her intelligence and resourcefulness were on par with those of Rodney. I felt that the abrupt manner in which the producers introduced Colonel Carter to the show as well as their dismissal of the issue of Elizabeth's capture was extremely disrespectful, not only to the leader of Atlantis whom we had known and respected for three years, but also to Colonel Carter's character, who was in a position in which she could have helped but didn't on-screen. I believed that these crucial on-screen mistakes at the beginning of Season 4 were a great injustice to both female characters, and they left a bad taste in my mouth and made it very difficult for me to watch the entire season.

When I began writing this story, I realized that I would have been able to better accept Colonel Carter's entrance into the show had Colonel Carter addressed Elizabeth's capture on the Replicator planet more than what was shown on-screen, and I would have also appreciated her expressing more sympathy to John and his team for what they were going through emotionally in regards to Elizabeth's unknown fate. As a result, I attempted to rectify this on-screen shortcoming with a scene between John and Colonel Carter a few days after the failed rescue mission, and I hope that it came across as realistic and believable. Based on Colonel Carter's appearances in SGA and in a few episodes of SG-1 that I have watched, I feel that I can surmise that she is an intelligent and compassionate leader who respects the rules of the military while is also capable of looking at the larger picture in any given situation. She also isn't afraid of admitting her own mistakes, and she can understand people's underlying motives for their actions and sympathize with those who have experienced a tremendous loss. I feel that seeing Colonel Carter showcase her compassion and sympathy as well as acknowledge personal faults in this story has consequently allowed me to better accept her role in Season 4 of SGA, and I hope that I have done justice to her character in this story.

An unpaid debt: John Sheppard's indebtedness to Elizabeth Weir

This story was very much meant to be character-driven, and many of my aforementioned goals when writing this story had to do with respecting my characters and their individual traits and personal beliefs. While John enjoyed a number of memorable character moments on the show, a final goal of mine for this story was to highlight John's emotions and to acknowledge numerous aspects of his character development. I had already emphasized John's loyalty to his people as one of his key character traits; no matter whom he had left behind on the Replicator planet, he would have done everything he could to return for them. However, I thought it crucial that the reality was that Elizabeth was the one who had been left behind, and even though his emotional reaction toward Elizabeth's fate wasn't especially fleshed out on-screen, in this story, we see him expressing emotions that he may have been suppressing all that time: an exceptionally strong desire to return for Elizabeth; an intense frustration on the Replicator planet from Elizabeth's unwillingness to return to Atlantis; and finally a fierce grief in being unable to bring her back. When writing his dialogue with Elizabeth and depicting his internal feelings, I kept in mind major aspects of his character development over the course of the show and the unique relationship he had with Elizabeth. I believed that in this story, he would have experienced great emotional turmoil in regards to Elizabeth's loss – and I believe that he continued to mourn throughout Seasons 4 and 5 – and the reason that I believe that his emotional turmoil would have been exceptionally potent is that he feels remarkably indebted to Elizabeth for the profound impact that she has had on his life.

As John tells Teyla in this story, before he became involved in the Atlantis expedition, he was "just a damn Major who didn't know what the hell he was doing with his life." His military record was tarnished, and even though he very likely didn't regret his actions back in Afghanistan, he had to face the consequences of disobeying direct orders, and his life and future seemed bleak in McMurdo. Then he found out about the SGC and met Elizabeth, and at first glance, it would appear that she wanted him on the Atlantis expedition only because he had the Ancient gene. However, she was aware of John's questionable behavior in Afghanistan, and she was undoubtedly an intelligent enough woman to recognize that John's tendency to not follow the chain of command might prove hazardous on the expedition – yet, it would appear that she looked past that when she spoke with General O'Neill in Antarctica and emphasized that John had been trying to save the lives of three servicemen. I believe that Elizabeth saw something in John's disreputable record that she admired or at the very least considered an asset, and she wanted John on the expedition not only in spite of his past actions, but perhaps because of them.

Of course, John probably didn't know what he was getting himself into when he first stepped through the Stargate. But over the following several years, his life changed completely. It might have been a twist of fate that Colonel Sumner perished so early in the expedition, but after John was forced into the position of ranking military officer, he received the opportunity to make an incredible impact on the lives of the city's inhabitants as well as those living in the Pegasus Galaxy, protecting those in danger who couldn't help themselves. Over the years, he formed close bonds with his off-world team as well as Carson and Elizabeth, even confiding in Teyla in "Sateda" that she, Elizabeth, Ronon, Carson, and Rodney were the closest thing he had to a family… and for a man who felt that he was leaving nothing behind when he left Earth, the relationships that he found in Atlantis clearly meant a great deal to him. After the expedition's first year, John was also promoted to Lieutenant Colonel after Elizabeth insisted to the SGC back on Earth that he remain ranking military officer in Atlantis. He told Elizabeth in "Intruder," "There's a lot of people in the Air Force who never thought I'd make it past Captain," and it's clear that his unexpected promotion was very much Elizabeth's doing. Even though Elizabeth and John had their disagreements during the first year – most notably their contention during the alien nanovirus infection, when John challenged Elizabeth's authority – Elizabeth was willing to acknowledge, to a certain extent, that the ends justified the means, and she recognized John's value to the expedition and unflinchingly supported him against those who wished to replace him.

Had Elizabeth never asked John to join the expedition, none of this would have happened. John might still be in McMurdo or stationed in another remote location, unable to make an impact on the lives of others as he so fiercely desires. He was divorced back on Earth and estranged from his father and brother, and there seemed to be very few people in his life on whom he could depend for professional and personal support. It was only because Elizabeth looked past his disgraced surface, not only giving him a second chance during a time when it seemed as if he had nothing left to lose, but also continuing to stalwartly support him during the first few years of the expedition against those who didn't express considerable faith in him, that John recognized his self-worth, obtained an opportunity to make a profound impact on the lives of others, and gained invaluable relationships to support him when facing life and death.

As a result, I believe that John felt an incredible sense of indebtedness toward Elizabeth on a very personal level, which is why in this story, he becomes increasingly persistent in finding her and bringing her back. As I contemplated what might have triggered John to become so resolutely determined to go back for her, I considered Elizabeth's conversation with Teyla in "First Strike" about how she was considering stepping down because she felt that her services were no longer respected. This scene was clearly foreshadowing Elizabeth's fate of being captured by the Replicators, and I wondered how John would have reacted had he known that Elizabeth was considering resigning before the Replicator attack. Seeing as he was aware of the politics and red tape with which she had to deal with the IOA and that people had questioned her decisions in Atlantis – just as his own past actions had been questioned on Earth – I believed that John would have reacted very intensely upon learning that, in a very cruel twist of fate, the IOA and Earth's military had gotten what they wanted. He would have done anything he could to bring her back, not only because of his "we don't leave our people behind" mantra, but also to repay Elizabeth for everything that she had done for him and he now was determined to do for her. I hope that I have done John Sheppard's character justice in portraying his humanity and emotions, in addition to making this a story about a man who fiercely desires to repay a debt to someone who changed his life for the better.

(And of course, one could also argue that John was incredibly determined to bring Elizabeth back because he had unresolved feelings for Elizabeth. I think that this was definitely a possibility, and it's a very believable factor that could have compounded to his grief toward losing her, and since I ship Sparky myself, I won't dispute this claim. :)

Forward and onward: Conclusion

I began writing this story because I was, in any sense of the definition, in a state of mourning. It feels unusual to me that nine years after Elizabeth was gone from Atlantis and seven years after SGA was cancelled, the show and its characters continue to affect me on a very personal level, and I think that I needed to write this in order to fully accept what happened and move forward from the past. I had many conflicting feelings toward an incredible show whose run was tragically cut short after only five years, and I sympathized with its beautiful, complex characters who were never always done the greatest justice by the producers and writers. In the end, I needed, at the very least, to reconcile my internal feelings in order to let go of a long-lasting grief and finally accept and appreciate all the seasons for what they were.

Writing this story was an incredible journey for me, and I'm actually sad now that it's completed. This story took me only two weeks to write, but then again, I'm out of school for the summer and have had quite a lot of time to involve myself in the SGA fandom again and work on personal projects. To be honest, I began this story thinking that it would be a one-shot, a few thousand words at most, and I hadn't known that it would turn out to be a multi-chapter story, nearly 20,000 words long, and something that I would personally place into my own head canon – and then I surprised myself by writing a 4,700-word long essay detailing my entire writing process, which was a signal to me that I had subconsciously put a lot of thought into every detail of this story. I look back to my earliest ventures into fanfiction three or four years ago, and I feel like my writing has matured greatly in terms of quality, characterization, and complexity of plot, and I've also become much more confident with my writing. I would never have thought three or four years ago that I would write this one day, but now that I have, it makes me hopeful for future stories that I may tackle in the years to come.

(Edited July 2017) I wanted to say thank you to everyone who has read through this story as well as left reviews. To those of you who have left guest reviews on this story, as well as others of mine, know that I wish I could reply to them. I'm grateful that there are still people out there who are involved in the fandom and with whom I can share my work, and it means a lot when people take the time to share their thoughts about the show and my work with me. Not only does feedback encourage me to keep writing on my radar and set goals for future projects, but with this story in particular, it also makes me feel that after all that was unfortunate on the show, I have done something good in writing this story. If anything, I hope that this story has provided all of us with a bit of closure as well as brought us all a little closer together. What happened to our beloved characters and actors was nothing short of unjust, and I hope that this story has helped us viewers and readers realize that we are not alone in our anger and grief at what happened to our characters, as well as their stories that haven't been completed yet.