The Other Side of the Story: John's Point of View

Interlude 9: This way we guarantee their safety

Meeting the real Team Sheppard didn't make us feel any less ourselves, but meeting Sabina did wonders for my peace of mind. I loved her ... those feelings just as real as they'd been before I'd discovered I was a copy of the real John Sheppard. Meeting her hadn't diminished my feelings and I found myself actually happy about that, even though I knew she was lost to me. At least she was alive and well somewhere out there. I shuddered to think how my counterpart would ever handle it if Sabina were taken away permanently. Lucky for me I would never have to find out how that felt.

"You didn't tell them we had a ship in orbit?" Elizabeth questioned as I got us in position to buzz the Replicator ships.

"They wouldn't have gone for this option if they'd known," I replied casually. "This way we guarantee their safety."

"It was nice," Elizabeth said softly. "Being on a mission with you all."

"It was nice for us as well," Teyla replied graciously. "You were not gone as long for us as for the people back on Atlantis but still ... we missed you Elizabeth."

"I still say we're just as much us as they are," Ronon insisted.

"And this proves it," Teyla told him with a complacent smile.

"Get ready guys," I told them. "It's show time."

I flew the Jumper past the Stargate, showing off a bit with tight manoeuvring during a close pass. Sabina was watching somewhere down there, enough to inspire me to live up to her last comment about my piloting skills.

The Replicator ships both followed us just as planned. Lucky for the others on the ground. Sensors let us know when the Gate engaged, and then again when it shut down.

"They're through," Elizabeth commented.

"Time to get out of here," I announced, attempting to cloak. Unluckily for us the Replicators had gotten enough hits past me to damage the cloak. I tried to avoid further hits but the Jumper was damaged enough to affect manoeuvrability. Everything went downhill from there, culminating in me crash landing the Jumper into the trees.

I came to moments later, trying to raise myself from hanging over the control console to see how the others were doing. The Jumper was silent and I knew they were probably too badly damaged to recover.

We hadn't made it but Sabina and her team had ... that was all that mattered to me.

The moments passed in silence ... I could feel my injuries healing gradually but it wasn't enough.

The Replicators found us, one of them just in time to see a cut on my face healing in standard nanite assisted fashion.

"Yeah. We tricked you, but don't feel so bad," I told the Replicators with a smile. "After all, we almost had ourselves convinced."

He raised his gun. I had just enough time to register the shot ... to make my last thought an image of Sabina smiling at me before ...

Authors Note:

While I was tempted to keep Repli-John's fate unknown I decided to go with canon on this - hence this last small chapter from Repli-John's POV. Hope you liked my version of This Mortal Coil ... Be All My Sin's Remember'd will follow soon.

Next Up? Fortunate Journey Season 4 Chapter 35