Author's Note: Contains minor spoilers for "Critical Mass" and "The Long Goodbye."

SGA SGA SGA SGA

Anna returned to her work the next day with renewed interest. For the first time since coming to Atlantis, she confidently ignored the stares and whispers of her coworkers. Quite a few people had seen her chatting with Evan outside her room the night before, and rumors were bound to fly. Anna didn't care. She stared at the DNA profiles on her computer screen, content to let the murmurs swirl around her. She even smiled, something that wasn't common for her. Then, she looked up and found everyone in the lab either focusing too closely on their work or staring at her. "What?"

"Nothing." One of the women, Rachel Harrison, shook her head. "You just look happy."

Anna raised an eyebrow. "Is that not allowed here?"

"No." Rachel squirmed a bit on her stool, and Anna grinned. "It's just that. . . . Never mind."

Anna returned to her work, trying to locate the marker in Sheppard's DNA that set him apart from McKay and Beckett. While Beckett had the ATA gene naturally, Sheppard's gene was stronger. The strong mental component of operating Ancient technology probably figured into that, but she wanted to find out why some people weren't able to receive the ATA gene therapy.

"Dr. Travis to the briefing room." The announcement pulled her head up, and she frowned. Why would she be paged to the briefing room unless. . . . A bit of trepidation rose in her stomach. Did they want to question her about her time as a Goa'uld host? She honestly wasn't sure how she'd handle that. Rather than showing these emotions on her face, she shed her lab coat and made her way to the briefing room.

Dr. Weir, Sheppard, Ronon, Teyla, McKay, and Beckett were all present, as was an older, balding gentleman. Anna recognized him as Colonel Caldwell, the commander of the Daedalus. She nodded to Weir and slipped around the horse-shoe shaped table to take up an empty seat beside Caldwell. He nodded toward her, and she tried to smile. She failed miserably and nearly breathed a sigh of relief when Evan entered the room.

Weir leaned her elbows on the table and pressed her palms together. "Now that we're all here, we can start."

The doors to the briefing room closed behind Evan, and he settled in the seat beside her, deliberately bumping her foot in the process. Anna understood. Neither of them were ready to fully reveal anything because they weren't sure what their relationship really was. Still, with that small bump, he let her know he was there for support. He nodded to Weir. "Sorry to be late. I was in the middle of a staffing incident."

Anna didn't like the slightly angry tone in his voice.

Weir nodded. "Captain Brandt radioed in less than an hour ago. His team is pinned down by enemy fire, and they're unable to get to the gate. Major Lorne, I want your team to accompany Colonel Sheppard to P47-229 and extract Captain Brandt and his men. The reason for this briefing, however, is different." She looked at Anna and Caldwell. "I asked the two of you to be here because of your unique experience with the Goa'uld."

Anna sat up straight at that. Less than two days after revealing that she'd been a host to a Goa'uld, she was asked for information. Caldwell shifted in his seat beside her, clearly not comfortable with the conversation.

Weir continued, "Brandt doesn't know much about the current situation beyond what we know, except that they're being hunted by worshippers of Nephthys."

Anna felt her face pale and knew the others had seen it. Evan moved quickly, his hand landing gently on her shoulder and traveling toward her neck in an effort to slow the tension that gathered there. Caldwell shifted again, this time to stare at her. Ronon's eyes narrowed, and the rest of the room straightened. She tried to speak, but nothing came out. After clearing her throat, she tried again, getting her voice to work on the third attempt. "That's a name I never wanted to hear again."

Evan continued to rub her shoulders discreetly. "That was your symbiote?"

"Yeah."

Weir dropped her chin for a moment and then raised her head. "I know this is hard, Dr. Travis, but we need as much information about Nephthys as possible."

Anna nodded even as she tried to assimilate this new information. Nephthys was still alive. She should have died after the Tok'ra extracted her. How had she survived? Who had rescued her? Was that person dead? The depth of her hatred surprised her in its strength. Discussing the Goa'uld in abstract was easy compared to sharing details of her greatest nightmare. She looked around the room, and her gaze collided with that of Colonel Caldwell. At least one person understood.

Clearing her throat, she started to speak. "Nephthys is the sister to Isis and Osiris." That announcement alone sent murmurs around the room. "While she claimed to be the mother of Anubis, no one really knows where she came from. Her name literally means 'Lady of the House,' but it is more accurately translated 'Lady of the Temple Enclosure.' She was a priestess for many years. When I was around," Anna paused to clear her throat of the panic that built there, "she allied herself with Ba'al."

Caldwell shook his head. "Great."

Sheppard glanced at Weir. "We should let the SGC know of this."

"I'll take care of that, Colonel." Weir looked at him and Lorne. "Right now, you and Major Lorne just bring our guys back home."

Sheppard and Evan nodded and stood. Anna held up a hand, stopping Evan. "One more thing." Her voice stopped Sheppard. "Nephthys always opposed Isis. She loved the death process. Probably one of the reasons she killed so many people." Her voice cracked. "If she takes you captive, she'll kill you for the sheer pleasure of watching you die. And she is obsessed with the ATA gene. If she knows that any of you have it, she'll take you hostage and kill you with her experiments if she doesn't plant a symbiote in you."

Sheppard stared at Evan for a moment and then nodded toward Anna. "Got it." As the two men left the room, he spoke, "Major, we leave in ten."

"Yes, Sir." Evan never glanced back.

Anna rose slowly, not really seeing the other two people left in the room. Atlantis no longer felt safe. Part of her reasoning for coming to the Pegasus galaxy had been to put as much distance as possible between her memories and herself. Now, the subject of her nightmares had found a way to Pegasus. And Evan was leaving to face someone who worshipped that subject.

Anna tried to put her mask back in place, but she couldn't quite manage. By accepting her as he had, Evan Lorne had become closer to her than anyone on Atlantis. It went deeper than just a physical attraction to a man. He truly cared, and she wondered if she'd managed to fall in love in the first month she spent on Atlantis. Even if that wasn't the case, someone she cared about had put his life on the line. Again. Could she handle allowing him to walk through the gate?

"Hey." Evan sounded rushed, and he grabbed her elbow to pull her into a small alcove. "You okay?"

"Yeah." She tried to smile bravely, but he saw through it. "This is your job."

He nodded. "It is."

Anna took a risk and put a hand on his chest. "Go. I'll be here when you get back. Just come back. Alive."

He grinned at that last comment, but someone cleared a throat behind her. Evan straightened, gave her arm one final squeeze, and left to finish preparing for his mission. Anna turned to face the person who had interrupted them and found herself face to face with Colonel Caldwell.

She straightened unconsciously at the thought that he had witnessed a private scene between her and Evan. "Colonel."

"Please." He snorted. "You're not military, so don't go acting like it."

His brash words put her at ease. She grinned. "Sorry. I'm around so many military personnel that it kind of rubs off."

He turned to look where Evan disappeared around a corner. "I've noticed." When she blushed and tensed, he grinned. "Relax. I won't tell anyone."

"Thank you." She resisted the urge to add "Sir" at the end of the statement. Unlike Sheppard, who was a friend, Caldwell commanded respect. He motioned for her to walk along the corridor and fell into step beside her.

"I wanted to introduce myself and let you know that I'm available if you need to talk." He eyed her. "Unlike most people here, I know exactly what you're going through. It's not pretty."

"No, it's not." Anna suddenly breathed a sigh of relief. "Most of them don't have a clue and end up saying stupid things."

"And the major?"

"Never even asked me about it. He didn't know until a few days ago." She filled him in on the events surrounding Ronon's near death. "I wasn't ready to tell him, but I didn't have a choice at the time."

Caldwell nodded. "I don't talk about it much, either. We had an incident shortly after my symbiote was removed that put me in command of Atlantis. McKay, especially, wasn't thrilled by that. Anyway, alien consciousnesses had taken over Weir and Sheppard much like the Goa'uld did to us. They understand perfectly, and it makes it easy to talk about in briefings."

She thought about that. "I wish I'd known. I wouldn't have been so closed with Colonel Sheppard."

"Yes, you would have." He narrowed his eyes. "You don't strike me as the type to open up to very many people. In fact, I think the only reason you opened up to Major Lorne is because you had to."

"Did you read my file, or is that conjecture?"

"I'm a commander of a starship, Doctor." Caldwell grinned again. "Reading people is one of my specialties."

"Nephthys wasn't placed in me by someone else." Anna glanced around and considered what she was about to say. She hadn't told Evan as much as she was about to tell Caldwell. "She found her way to earth and took my boyfriend before I knew him. Then, when we were by ourselves, she jumped into me. Her obsession with the ATA gene drove her to infiltrate the SGC. She would have got away, too, if not for an unforeseen off-world mission. Odds are good that she's still searching for a host that has the gene."

He put a fatherly hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry about the major. He knows how to handle himself in a fight."

"I know." She gave him a halfhearted smile and stopped outside her lab. "It's just harder to accept when I watch him go through the gate."

Caldwell nodded. "I've heard that before." He glanced around. "Your secrets, both of them, are safe with me. If you want to talk, I'll be around Atlantis for a while. We might be removing a number of symbiotes from their hosts soon. Hermiod has quite the touch when it comes to those things."

Anna thanked him with a nod and returned to her work. Evan's new mission had destroyed her concentration, however, and she struggled to reassemble it. If this relationship with Evan continued to develop the way she hoped it would, she needed to learn to deal with his absences and the inherent danger of his job. As it turned out, that was easier said than done. She left work on time, her stomach still tied in knots over Evan's absence and the revelation that Nephthys had come to Pegasus.

~TBC~

Author's Note: All the information on Nephthys was found on Wikipedia. She was an actual goddess in the Egyptian mythology, and the stories about her varied. Some of them said she killed Apophis, while others said she was the mother of Anubis. At times, she was portrayed as the wife of Set, also known as Seth, or as the wife of Osiris. All of them agreed that she was the sister of Isis and Osiris. She was also the goddess of night and lamentation, protector of the pharaohs, and a different reflection of the same thing that Isis represented. For the sake of my story-and due to the fact that Stargate writers altered the mythology for the Goa'uld-I only used what I wanted and took creative license with the mythology. As always, let me know what you think. ~lg