John's Point Of View:
"John! John! Open up! John!" Shooting up in bed I sprinted to the door and opened it, sleep still blurring my eyes as my body tried to catch up with everything that was occuring. A grey shirt whizzed past me and slowly I spun around to face the new comer. I stared groggily at a pacing Rodney before my training kicked in and I became alert. Frowning slightly I put a hand on his shoulder to try and stop him. "J-John! John! She said it's going to happen faster now! I don't want to lose myself John!" he was panicked, crying his every word at me and making me just as jumpy as he was. My frown deepened, this was my fault, I had done this too him. If I hadn't have said yes that day then my team would never have gone on that rescue mission, and he would have been okay.
"Hey Rodney, look it's going to be alright, it's okay." I tried to soothe him, but I wasn't overly sure it had worked. Grabbing my red plaid shirt, I tossed Rodney one of my hoodies and pulled a six pack out of my mini-fridge.
"What are you doing?" Rodney asked, sounding bewildered.
"Put that on and follow me." I instructed as we walked together to my favourite pier. Sitting together, our legs swinging over the edge, we drank in silence mostly.
Looking out at the moonlight shining on the waves, I felt a sense of peace, which was something I didn't feel often anymore with the stressful job of keeping my team together as we watched Rodney fall apart. Something flew past me then, it was a chunk of...was that flesh? Turning to ask Rodney if he'd seen it, I watched in horror as he began to flake apart, large chunks of his flesh coming free and beginning to drift out to sea. His eyes widened and he turned to me, his jaw dropping as he cried my name in a panic. His jaw broke away and suddenly, Rodney was gone. He had literally drifted away from me. My heart was hammering in my chest, panic surging through my veins as I called out his name, almost as if that could magically bring him back.
"It's okay John." a gentle hand on my arm pulled me around and into a tight hug. This person was warm, and she smelt comfortingly of orange blossoms and was perhaps half a head shorter than me, but whoever she was I felt entirely comfortable with her because I was bawling like a baby as she shushed me and gently rubbed my back. "It's okay John. Rodney would be happy that it was you with him." I pulled away from the woman to look down at her, but kept my arms locked around her waist and her body as close as possible for the comfort her warmth provided.
When I looked down I was met with beautiful grey eyes, dark brown hair, and a tan complexion. I realised (with some shock) that it was Tegan. I felt like a spectator as I watched us interact. She kept her hands on my arms and my arms stayed around her waist, refusing to let go for anything as we comforted each other. It was like I was a second body, watching myself from far away with no control over what my body was doing. The thing that shocked me most, that sent a zap through my entire body, was watching me carefully press my lips against hers. They were plump and warm and I could feel how soft they were on mine.
Jolting upright in bed I swallowed. I was sweating, shaking slightly too and there was an uncomfortable feeling in my gut. What the hell had that been about? Why the hell was I kissing Tegan in my dreams? Shaking my head I tried to push the dream away and checked my alarm clock. Five twenty three in the morning. Running a hand through my hair, I pushed myself up on my elbows and swung my feet out so they hit the floor. Heaving a sigh I pushed to my feet and padded towards the bathroom, finishing my buisness and flattening my hair out as best as I could, before slipping on my workout clothes. More black sweats and a grey t-shirt with a hoodie over the top basically. Dragging my old worn sneakers onto my feet and grabbing my IPod as I went by, I started out on my morning jog to think over everything that had occured these past two weeks. Atlantis was quiet at this time, as usual. There wasn't anybody in the corridors apart from a few other people that liked to jog early in the morning like me, Lorne for example gave me a nod as he jogged back the other way. There was only a skeleton crew in the control room at this early hour. When the sun was rising and making the copper colour on the walls and floor glitter like the ocean we floated on, I was reminded how lucky I was to be here.
Stopping on the catwalk I leaned against the railing, breathing a little hard as I watched the scenery change with the sun, which rose higher in the sky to turn it a bright light blue instead of the dusty light pink of early dawn. The last two weeks had been tough. Jeannie had been called over because Rodney had deteriorated. He could barely talk now, his words were slurred and baby like and he only just about remembered who we were. It was hard to watch. Keller couldn't do anything and it was killing her as much as it was killing us. Ronon didn't show it of course, but Teyla had become quieter, preferring to spend more time with kanaan and Torren. I couldn't remember the last time I'd trained with the Bantos sticks with her. The hardest thing of all though, was watching Tegan sit beside Rodney and tell him about anything and everything that had happened in her day, and watching her leave the room with tears in her eyes when he had a moment and had to ask who she was. Tegan and I had spent most of the two weeks together. Since all of this began and Rodney started to forget she realised she wasn't going to get through this on her own. After our little conversation she seemed to be most comfortable with me, so a lot of the time we could be found sparring in the training room. Although admittedly I'd never been better at sparring, it showed me just how much anger she was really harbouring. Ronon had told us about a place he and Teyla knew of called The Shrine. His grandfarther had been through this too and after visitng that place, he'd had one more day as himself again before he died the day after. None of us were particularly keen on the idea but we had no choice in the matter because Jeannie had decided to go. It felt like we'd set Rodney a death date and despite the guilt we felt because of it, he had done so much for us that we were obligated to go there, even though I really didn't want to.
The sun had fully risen now as I jogged back to my room and showered. Then I changed into my uniform and tackled my hair so it wasn't as messy. I walked through the eerily quite hallways...it was almost as if the city itself was mourning for Rodney. I stopped in the armoury. The rest of the team were already there, geared up and ready to go. The room was deathly quiet while I pulled on my tac vest and clipped on a p-90. Ronon was holding the picnic hamper as we walked together to the jumper bay. Tegan was completely stoic, her grey eyes stormy and darker than usual. Her plump lips were pinched into a grim line, her hair pulled back in a neat ponytail. Everything about her today seemed so...angular, so prsitine, as if she'd been awake for hours and had too much time to perfect her look. She walked the slowest, as if she could delay this event but it was inevitable by now. There was no other way around it and the thought settled a heavy weight on my chest, making it damn near hard to breathe. Making a split second decision, I pressed my hand to the small of her back in what I hoped was a comforting gesture. She removed my hand quickly making me think I'd done something wrong, but before she let it go she held it and squeezed gently. I saw her jaw tremble slightly and realised she was struggling to keep her emotions at bay. Stepping into the back of a jumper we saw Keller, Rodney and Jeannie, dressed up in black like we were with their tac vests on. Only they didn't have guns, Keller had medical equipment but that was all, today was not a day for guns but they were a necessary part of our equipment.
Nobody spoke, except Rodney that is who was babbling in the back as he tried to make sense of what was going on. Tegan sat behind Teyla, who was in the passenger seat of the jumper, as I lowered us into the gate room. Her knuckles were white because of how tightly she'd clenched her fists, and it was killing me that I could do nothing about it.
"Colonel Sheppard you're clear to go, tell Doctor Mckay...tell him it's been a pleasure." Woolsey said over the radio. I didn't respond, instead I just launched us through the gate and cloaked the jumper the minute we came out on the other side. The wraith outpost there was covered in smoke that our boys had sent through and they were firing blindly, but I manuevered us so we were well out of the way before landing in a clearing not too far from the waterfall. It was slow going, we tried to make casual conversation but Rodney's childlike whining and moaning was mostly the only sound we heard, and made the whole journey seem twice as long. The birds sang of course, the insects native to the planet buzzed and the crash of the waterfall was always there but I barely heard it. Instead, I focused on making my way around fallen logs and tree roots. Rodney's steps were slow, he stumbled a lot and it slowed us down but for once none of us cared, we just wanted to get Rodney there and tell him how we really felt before he had to go.
"I w-w-want to s-st-stop." Rodney slurred and stammered. Teyla held him up onto the next rock. The waterfall was crashing infront of us and I barely even noticed, even when the spray hit my face to help cool me down. The boulders were covered in moss and lead up to a well hidden cave in the rockface behind the waterfall. Heaving ourselves up another boulder ledge, we took a breathe before we actually went into the cave. The minute we crossed the threshold, Rodney doubled over and clutched his head, screaming in pain. My eyes widened and my hands fluttered uselessly as Jeannie and Keller helped him furthur into the cave. It was a gut instinct, an impulsive reaction to hearing Rodney's cry when my arm reached out, wrapping around Tegan's shoulders and pulling her towards me. She turned and buried her face in my chest as I patted her shoulder gently. Ronon raised an eyebrow at me and I looked away, I didn't quite know what to say. I'd gone from being the tough, flagship team leader to...actually, I honestly didn't know. Recently I'd been more in tune with Tegan and her emotions than I'd care to admit. I didn't like emotions as they made me uncomfortable and I found them irritating, but it was so easy to understand her on a level that I'd never really understood anyone else. Military personnel were supposed to be able to put emotions to one side, and I knew this had to stop now but had no clue how to just break off whatever relationship we were currently in. Wait, no, that sounded weird. Rodney looked up from the floor, blinking like he was trying to focus after waking up from a deep sleep as he looked around. The shrine was a bit of a dingy place, nothing more than a circle cut out of the rock that had the waterfall crashing just outside. It was a nice enough place for a picnic though I guess.
Rodney frowned a little and slowly pushed himself to his feet as we all waited and watched with baited breathe.
"What happened?" he asked, sounding completely coherent. Looking around his frown deepened, "Jeannie? What are you doing here?" he wasn't looking too impressed as Keller and Jeannie explained the situation. "What, so you basically jsut brought me here to die!? Oh hell no! There's got to be something! Give me the data, I want to see this myself." he demanded as Keller sighed and handed him a scanner and a data pad. Tegan was talking quietly with Teyla as they unpacked the food behind us, no matter what happened I wasn't leaving this planet without being fed. Crossing my arms over my chest I tried to coax him into sitting down.
"Rodney, come on, come sit down and have a sandwhich or something, keep your strength up." the smell of damp moss reached my nose and I wrinkled it slightly. It was cool in here, kind of dark too but the natural light kept it from being pitch black at least. Instead, he just kept muttering about radiation of some sort and scanning the collumn of rock in the middle of the room. Keller was trying to talk some sense into him it seemed before finally Tegan walked over. She looked awkward, standing beside him and not knowing what to say, his face softened a bit though and he drew her into a hug.
"Hang on, I want to try something." Keller said suddenly, marching Rodney back out towards the opening. The minute he set foot outside the small cave of the shrine, he screamed in pain again, clutching his head. Jeannie quickly pulled Rodney back inside as Tegan scowled at Keller,
"What the hell's all that about?" she demanded. We all stood in a loose group as Keller explained her theory and Rodney nursed his head.
Keller stood before us, arms crossed and looking defiant and stubborn.
"This radiation the shrine's emitting. it causes the parasite to shrink. It's small enough for me to operate on Rodney without causing him any harm. We need to radio for the right medical equipment, I can save him!" Everyone's eyes lit up, including mine. The more I thought about it however, the more I realised it was impossible. There was a wraith outpost out there and the smoke through the gate trick was probably only going to work once. Guilt twinged in my stomach, because I knew that I was effectively killing Rodney before the sentence even came out of my mouth.
"We can't do that. The wraith fell for our smoke screen once but they won't again." Keller and Jeannie both dropped their jaws in shock. Teyla and Ronon quietly agreed with me I could see, but Tegan looked like she was having an internal battle between what she felt and what she knew was right, and could barely look me in the eye. Keller protested immediately.
"I can save him! He's your friend Colonel! Think about this!"
"That's my brother, we have to do something while we have the opportunity." Jeannie said fiercely. Rodney sighed a little,
"He's right." All eyes turned to him as he backed me up, and I felt my heart ache. The man was agreeing with me as I condemned him! Dammit! Why couldn't he just be mad at me? That would make it easier. "The wraith won't be fooled again, sending a second jumpers too risky. Look I...I just want to get this day over with, spend it with you guys. You don't have to save me." Rodney said quietly. Tegan shook her head viciously, looking like she was trying to clear her head.
A frown marred my face as I tried to comprehend it all. She'd need something to clean the wound with and we had a first aid kit for that, but a way to actually get into his head...she had a scalpel in her medical bag right? An idea sprang to mind and I grabbed Keller's arm, rushing us outside where I quickly lead her back to the jumper in a brisk jog and began hastily pulling things from the shelf. A power drill, some flood lights, thermal blankets...it was like a very strange DIY show.
"What if we use these? Can you operate with these?" she looked at me like I was a mad man and I waited impatiently on her answer, "Doc it's the best I can do but I am not sending for a second jumper, the risk is too great." I said firmly. Keller grimaced but nodded.
"Yeah, yeah I...it's primitive but I think I can...god there's so many things that could go wrong though!" She groaned. Picking up the stuff we lugged it back up to the shrine, and in twenty minutes we had a make shift operating theatre set up. With the flood lights shining down on a spot in the corner with the blankets on the floor, we watched Rodney lie still and Keller's open up her medical kit. She sterilised the drill bit and her other equipment while I explained the idea to Rodney, he looked reluctant but agreed. Jeannie protested immediately and he dragged both her and Tegan into the corner, speaking quietly. Jeannie was clearly trying to persuade him not to do it but Rodney was having none of it,
"Look, I'll be dead by the end of the day anyway and I'd rather have one last chance at surviving than not at all." Rodney exclaimed before the conversation grew quiet. Teyla was slowly eating her way through a sandwhich, deep in thought by the look of it.
"You and Tegan are getting close." Ronon commented, his voice gruff and quiet. Shrugging, I didn't reply. Sure she was attractive, even now my eyes were dragging themselves up and down her body...long legs, lean figure, curvy in all the right places. It wasn't just that, she was mysterious and she made me curious, she was a whole other person underneath her hard exterior that had suffered and was broken, a person that needed fixing. Something in my gut drew me to her, as if I was the one destined to fix this broken woman. So that was the answer I settled on,
"She's alright I guess, she just makes me curious." Ronon smirked and shook his head, dreadlocks swinging with each shake.
"It's more than that and you know it. She's hot, you always go for the hot ones." he replied. Rolling my eyes I opened my mouth to retort when Keller called me over. She handed me a pair of blue rubber gloves when I got there and I raised an eyebrow, my stomach suddenly going queasy.
"I need you to put these on...when I'm drilling you have to hold his head completely still, it can't move, you understand me?" she asked. Poor Keller look frazzeled and I realised that this was a lot of pressure to put on her, it was unfair of me to do it and she'd recieve a glowing report from me when this went down okay. I had faith in her abilities. I felt guilty that it was me making her do this though. I'd done so much wrong since my first day on Atlantis. I'd disobeyed orders, I'd angered those in charge, I'd make split second decisions that hadn been reckless and hadn't always worked out and now I was piling the pressure on my work colleauges. I was a terrible leader.
Tegan had drew Rodney into a tight hug before he lay down on the blankets for Keller, she'd covered his body up to the neck with another sheet too like she was tucking him into bed. Keller took a deep breath to steady her nerves and drew the markings on his head where she'd need to cut into his skull before readying a shot of sedative. Rodney's eyes met mine,
"Thanks." he said quietly, and that was all he needed to say because I knew Rodney well enough to know he was thanking me for all the times I'd saved him, for picking him for my team, for all the arguments I'd started and for all the times I'd been there and told him crappy jokes or just let him rant. Nodding once I tried to think of something to say, but the sentimental words got stuck in my throat. My team were my friends, my family, they meant a lot to me, but I'd never be able to put it into words just how much they meant. It just wasn't me.
"See you when you wake up." was what I settled on. Tegan stood across from us, arms folded across her chest as she observed the whole thing through narrowed eyes. Jeannie was pacing behind us with Teyla trying to clam her down and Ronon was stood by Tegan watching just as intently as she was, it was hard to tell if the two of them were even breathing still since they both looked so...statue like. Keller gave him the shot and his eyes fluttered close. My hands gripped his head in a gentle but firm grip, keeping it as still as I could. Picking up the drill, Keller looked me dead in the eye,
"Don't let his head move, not even an inch." she insisted. Nodding once I tried not to wince as she pushed the drill into his skull with a sickening sound of crunching bone.
The atmosphere was tense, all my muscles had tightened and the air was thick enough to cut with a knife. Nobody dared breathe as Keller cut a square flap into Rodney's skin, grabbed it with her tweezers and then handed them to me so I could keep the flap of skin out of the way. My breathe was caught in my throat behind the mask on my face when scanner Keller was using to keep an eye on Rodney's vitals beeped sudenly and my panic bubbled. Keller frowned, picking it up and looking over the readings, "The parasite, it's...moving." she informed us in a murmur. The only sound was a few panicked breathes from Jeannie and Teyla's soothing comment of 'Doctor Keller knows what she's doing'. That and the frantic beating of our hearts, of course. Rodney was blissfully unaware of it all of course, lucky bastard. "It's moving towards the hole, I..I think it's trying to get out." she said uncertainly. My mind was made up in an instant.
"Ronon, the minute that things clear of us shoot it dead."I ordered, my voice ringing with authority. Tegan had already got her glock out, and Ronon switched it for his stunner with a smirk. She rolled her eyes a little as he set it to kill.
"There you go." his voice almost teasing and she huffed,
"Yeah yeah, like you wouldn't want to kill it the minute it gets out of him if Sheppard was in Rodney's place." she muttered. Ronon just ruffled her hair in response and she scowled even more. There was a sound that was almost like the squelching noise you get when your foot sinks in the muddy puddles that are still half water, then something black began to ooze from the wound. More and more of it emerged until there was a sort of mini starfish made of a black, jelly like substance on his forehead. Grabbing it with the tweezers I quickly threw it across the room, away from any of the people I cared about and I heard Ronon's gun go off once, then again and again until the starfish parasite was nothing but a pile of ash. Tegan looked oddly satisfied in a way.
After cleaning his forehead and stitching the skin there Keller let Rodney wake up. Ten minutes after that and we were all sitting together, laughing, joking, just enjoying our picnic as if nothing had ever happened. Tegan was laughing hard with Jeannie, the loudest most genuine laugh I'd ever heard from her. Rodney look furiously embarrassed and I found myself letting loose and laughing with them, at his expense of course. We got to take Rodney home with us today, he wasn't going to die. The relief was short lived because I knew there was soon going to be another life or death situation facing us, it was just the way life in the Pegasus galaxy was, but at least we could face it together, as a team, like we always did and would continue to do so for a while. Nothing like this would ever happen to my any of my team again. That was a silent promise.