Time was meaningless.

Sheppard had no idea how long he sat in the chair before he felt needles being pulled from abused veins and strong hands on bruised limbs lifting him from the chair and dragging him back into unconsciousness.

He woke to darkness and found himself lying on a cold, hard floor. The darkness was absolute. He couldn't see his hand in front of his face. Carefully feeling around, he discovered the perimeter to the room he was in was around 3 meters by 3 meters. A perfect square. There was a slight depression in one wall that he felt might be a door, but beyond that, the room was featureless. There was no water, no food, no blanket. Nothing in the room but himself. He wondered if the room was indeed pitch black, or if somehow he had lost his sight.

He pressed his back to the wall facing where he thought the door was and slid down, resting his hands on his knees. If they came back for him, he would be ready.

After a while he found his breathing too loud, and he pressed his hands over his ears to dim the sound. He ached all over and felt the sting of raw skin on his bare wrists and arms where he had fought against the straps in an effort to escape.

What was worse than the physical pain, however, was the growing thirst. He was ashamed to think that he might actually do anything for a drink of water. Just one sip. Enough to wet his dry mouth and throat, sore and hoarse from screaming. But he didn't know what they wanted. They never asked.

After some time, they came again. The door in front of him opened, but he could not see it. He felt a rush of cool air and the sound of footsteps, then the strong hands were on him before he could move, dragging him out of the cell and back through more darkness until he could see the light of the chair ahead. Thank God they hadn't taken his sight.

He fought them again. He would not go back in the chair. The flashes of light subdued him, leaving him dry heaving and weak boned, his head throbbing and his joints inflamed.

"What do you want?" he screamed as they strapped him back into the chair.

The needles were re-inserted and he felt the familiar flush of warmth. They didn't answer his demands, merely melting back into the darkness. The halo of light descended and its burning fingers tore into his memories.

The first time in the chair the halo had brought only physical pain as it sifted through his mind. It mapped every nerve, every fiber in his body that could possibly bring him pain.

This time, the halo expanded on his thirst and desire for water and sent him to Afghanistan, reminding him of a desert crossing at night. He did not want to remember that night. He raged for water then as he did now. He had dragged a fellow soldier through the sand, only for the man to die on him as the sun rose in majestic glory over the beautiful landscape.

The halo played that night over and over in Sheppard's memories. The feeling of hope that they both might make it being dashed at sunrise over and over again. It wore away at him until he screamed for it to stop.

Hope. Despair. Hope. Despair.

Finally, the halo dimmed, and Sheppard, exhausted, slumped in the chair. But they didn't come to get him this time.

He could feel his wrists itching and burning where the skin had rubbed raw. The strap around his head was made of softer material, but he could feel the stickiness of dried blood from the cut on his head beginning to irritate him. The needles in his arms felt as though they had become heavy, pulling at his skin and making his stomach roil. The sickly warmth that had crept through him before the halo began its onslaught had abated, leaving behind a cold, feverish feeling that was growing in his gut.

And the thirst was building. While it had been awful before, it was terrible now. His tongue felt swollen and dry, his lips cracked.

And the halo glowed and reminded him of his thirst again. This time it didn't dredge up his memories from Afghanistan. It burrowed into his mind to light his nerves on fire. The crawling sensation under his skin grew until he was sure that there was something really crawling there, rippling through his skin and going nowhere and everywhere at once. He squirmed and twisted in the chair to no avail.

Unquenchable, insatiable, uncontrollable thirst.

The cold feeling in his gut that had begun to make him shiver grew into an unbearable heat. His skin was on fire. He could see it curling away as the tongues of flame lapped at it. He screamed, watching his arms blacken and whither away, the pain more than he was sure he could bear.

Great waves of pain engulfed him as he burned. Sheets of white-hot agony washing over him. Never ending.

He was sobbing, but the tears did not fall because the fire burned them up. He was begging for them to make it stop, but his voice was no longer working. Only wordless screams bubbled up from his ravaged throat.

Fire, ice, rage.

He was reminded of the Wraith who had taken his life from him. He was forced to relive the helplessness under the Wraith's hand over and over, feeling his life-force drained away, his body withered and wracked with pain and weakness, bringing him to the brink over and over again.

Hopelessness, weakness, desperation.

And just when he was sure he would surely go mad from the pain … it stopped. The light dimmed, and he was left, broken and trembling in the chair. Again, no one came for him, and after some time, the halo brightened and the onslaught started again.

Loneliness, darkness, turmoil.

They sifted through his memories, pulling up battles, pulling up his defiance to his commanding officers, pulling up fights he'd had with Nancy, pulling up all the negative feelings and emotions he had felt in his life. The memories sifted and poured around him like sand, wearing away at his soul. He felt he would surely go mad now.

Untrustworthy, disobedient, reckless.

And then they shifted to memories of pain. When the Iratus bug had nearly taken his life — both times. When Kolya had tortured him. When he had been a POW on Earth. All the various times he had been shot, stabbed, burned, bones broken. All of it was put together into one moment which sank deep into his bones, into his very being.

Despair, agony, torment.

But this was pain he could bear. And so he did, until the pain finally faded to nothing, and they came and took him to the eternally dark room where he could finally lay his head down, close his eyes, and sleep.