A/N: Aaaand we're back! I'm sorry that wait was so long. If you want the full details, feel free to check out the review I left a few days ago explaining why I was MIA for a bit there. Long story short, work was unbelievably intense throughout all of December and I was frankly too exhausted when I came home to write. I hope I won't ever leave you waiting like that again.
I've got a little bit of time off now for the holidays, so I've been working on this particular chapter for the past few days. Originally it was supposed to be longer, but I've decided to save that next part for Chapter 35.
I hope I didn't lose too many of you during my hiatus, and I hope you enjoy this next chapter. Thank you for reading, reviewing, favorite-ing, and following...and also for checking up on me to make sure I was all right. I appreciate all of you, my readers, so much. Enjoy!
He glanced over his shoulder for what must have been the hundredth time in the last ten minutes. This must be how a sitting duck felt, he thought as he reflected upon the terrestrial turn of phrase; flightless, exposed on all sides, obliviously waiting for the inevitable bullet.
Rogers followed his gaze before voicing his unspoken thoughts, as though she were privy to them. "I don't like this," she whispered from his side. "It feels like we're right out in the open."
It was all too eerie, roaming the deserted corridors of the ship beneath the protection of Janus' cloak. This particular cloaking technology was theoretically no different than that of the Puddle Jumpers' or the city's; the forcefield did not obscure their surroundings as it obscured them. He could still see everything around them, could still see McKay, Teyla, and Sheppard, supposedly invisible in front of him, could still see Rogers's shock of red hair, blazing crimson like a hot coal under the blaring white light from above, as he looked down at her. The chief difference, however, was that the Puddle Jumpers and the city both had walls – and thick ones, too – to at least give those inside the illusion of shelter and protection. Ronon was discovering that he found that sort of illusion vastly more reassuring than the one currently concealing him and the others. Unarmed and unconvinced, he couldn't help but feel uneasy, and that they had yet to come across a single Wraith sentry only made that uneasiness grow. The worst part of battle, after all, was the anticipation of it beforehand.
He tried to remind himself that the absence of guards was likely attributed to the fact that Cruisers, luckily for them, were generally less heavily guarded than Hives, as well as to the assumption that a great number of drones were probably still culling the planet below. Nonetheless, his grip on the small dagger in his right hand tightened. He refused to be caught off guard.
A long, deep exhale from Rogers's direction drew his attention toward her again. Still at his side, she had brought a hand to her chest, and was taking slow, measured breaths. The portion of the asthma attack she had endured without her medication had clearly left some lingering side effects as, undoubtedly, had her unsavory encounter with the Wraith Commander. Ronon reached into his wrist guard, unsheathed another one of his many hidden knives, and extended it to her.
"Here," he whispered.
She looked up at him with surprise, but took the knife anyway.
"You'll feel better if you have something to defend yourself with, even if it is small."
At least, he hoped she would. She was a damn good shot with a pistol, but by her own appraisal, she was "no good at hand-to-hand combat." Hopefully, they wouldn't need to find out if that was true.
"Thank you."
"Aim for the neck. It's where their armor is we—"
"Will you two pipe down?" McKay hissed from the center of their flock. "As far as I can surmise, this thing only conceals the visual, not the auditory and you two are chattering like a couple of magpies back there."
"Sh!" This time the rebuke came from Sheppard; he had come to a halt, fist in the air.
"Oh, sure hush me but not the pretty girl."
"Shut up, McKay!"
Ronon looked up ahead to locate the reason for their standstill: about twenty feet ahead, armed with stunners, were three drones standing guard in front of a door. Janus was already deep in discussion with them – at least, as deep a discussion as one could be with creatures incapable of speech – Eva's loosely-bound wrists gripped firmly in his hands.
"I understand the Commander did not communicate my presence," Janus was saying, "but our Master is very busy, isn't he? Now, keep watch over our prisoner while I retrieve the item in question. I shall take but a moment."
The first Wraith leaned its stunner against the wall so it could take Eva's wrists from Janus' hands into its own. The second drone entered a code into the wall keypad to unlock the door through which the Ancient quickly disappeared, all while the third stayed on the lookout, stunner poised to shoot anyone who might intrude. As soon as the door closed, the second Wraith turned toward Eva who remained uncharacteristically docile in the other's grasp.
Even from twenty feet away, Ronon could sense her restraint, could feel her struggle to rein in her hatred and her fear. The Wraith stepped closer. She said nothing, but squared her shoulders against its advance and raised her chin into the air, nostrils flared while a scowl festered upon her lips. Standing tall, ferocious, and proud, there could be no question as to the girl's paternity. Never before had he thought that she looked more like him than in that moment. As an odd sensation of pride and concern mingled within him, he watched as the drone leaned in and sniffed at her, perhaps also sensing, even relishing that same defiance that Ronon harbored within his own bones.
There was a sharp, raspy intake of breath from Rogers next to him as she, too, watched, hand clapped over her mouth to stifle any sounds of an asthmatic aftershock the scene in front of them might provoke.
Mission be damned, weapons be damned, Janus be damned, Ronon wanted nothing more than for Eva to strike and defend herself. He knew the same thoughts were crossing her mind, knew she was debating the weight of the mission against her own personal dignity, and was ultimately crestfallen when saw her settle on compliance. Putting forth no display of resistance, she let the drone smell and prod her, she even let it lift the silver necklace from her throat and inspect it. She hardly flinched until, inevitably, the drone brought its feeding hand to her chest.
It wouldn't, Ronon thought. The Commander surely wanted her alive and unharmed for its own purposes. This drone would have to either be incredibly stupid to defy its master's orders by feeding on her before the Commander was finished with her...or incredibly hungry. Either way, he didn't want to wait and find out.
"The hell with this," he muttered.
They had to do something, he had to do something before the Wraith decided to take things any further. Plans and ideas, each more absurd than the last, raced through his head until they were all at once obliterated by the static heat of a stun blast. He looked from the scorch marks on the floor, just shy of his leg, over to its source to see that the Wraith on lookout had fired almost precisely at their allegedly invisible position. It charged toward them, its companion pausing in its taunting of Eva to follow. Several more stun blasts soared their way, all narrowly missing them on either side.
"Well, shit." Sheppard's voice wafted backward as he ducked out of the cloak's protection to meet the drones head on, Ronon and Teyla immediately behind him.
The Wraith momentarily halted in their advance, clearly unsettled by the team's almost paranormal appearance, but quickly regained their battle sense upon realizing the three humans were hurtling toward them, with no thought of quarter or mercy. All of a sudden, there were two quick flashes of light that came from the direction of the armory and before either of the drones could defend themselves, they had fallen to their knees. Confused, Ronon looked back to see the first Wraith similarly incapacitated, slumped against the wall and unconscious, the cloth Janus had pretended to bind Eva's wrists with still limp in its hand. Next to it stood Eva, holding its massive, abandoned weapon as best as one of her small stature could, still firing a volley of blasts at the backs of the remaining drones. Though their regenerative physiology made them resistant to the first few shots, eventually the cumulative potency of the recurring blasts proved too much, and the drones crumpled the rest of the way to the floor before Sheppard, Teyla, or Ronon could even lay a finger on them.
Sheppard kicked one in the gut as they approached. "Doesn't feel nice, does it?"
The armory door slid open and Janus emerged. He took one look at the fallout and his face contorted into a grimace. "You fools!" he spat as he ripped the stunner from Eva's grasp. "We were supposed to escape undetected. Now you've gone and made a mess that will only slow us down!"
"They could see us!" Sheppard said, the condemnation of Janus' invention evident from the tone of his voice.
"Impossible!" Janus said, indignant.
"What good is your device if –"
"They could see you because your legs were sticking out the sides," Eva quickly said. "Teyla's and yours and Ronon's."
Sheppard, looking sheepish, didn't have a reply to this. They had been seen due to human error, plain and simple.
"Now get back under the cloak before more see you. And increase the breadth of the field unless you wish to be detected again," Janus barked as he turned his back to them. "Hide the bodies," he ordered to Eva.
Finding their way back under the cloak was easier said than done.
"McKay?" Sheppard ventured. "Where are you?"
"Over here," a voice quietly called from some ten feet away.
Cautiously, like when walking in the dark, they made their way to the voice. First Teyla disappeared, then Sheppard, and before Ronon went too far, a hand intercepted his own to drag him into the fold. Within a split second, Rogers materialized in front of him, her cold fingers brushing the palm of his hand.
"You okay?" she asked softly as she looked up at him.
"Yeah. Fine." He glanced down at their hands and gave hers a reassuring squeeze before letting go. "You?"
She nodded, but refrained from actually saying anything.
Ronon peered curiously at her through narrowed eyes, unconvinced. Her face was ghostly pale - almost blue - and he could hear a faint whistling sound every time she exhaled. "Rogers, you sure –"
"Expand it, Rodney," Sheppard ordered, cutting off Ronon's sentence.
McKay fumbled with the device in his hands as Sheppard glared accusatorily back at him. "It's up as high as it goes, I swear," he argued. "We're pushing its limits. I highly doubt this was designed to conceal five full-grown adults."
"You sure?"
"Yes, I'm sure!" He thrust the device toward Sheppard. "Here, you wanna take a look at it? Make sure I did it right? Eh, Mensa?"
"All right, all right. I'll take your word for it, Rodney." Sheppard cleared his throat. "Looks like we gotta huddle up, everybody. Please keep your hands, arms, feet, legs and other appendages inside the personal cloaking device at all times."
Upon that order, Sheppard and Teyla drew closer to one another while McKay, logically still in the middle, took a few steps forward to close the gap between them. Ronon did the same with Rogers still at his side. Following Sheppard and Teyla's example, she pressed herself closer to him, even going so far as to wrap her arm around his lower back, gripping to him much tighter than he would have anticipated. He felt her fingers twist themselves into the fabric of his shirt, balling it up in her fist, clutching to him as though he were the only thing keeping her standing. And there he found the honest answer to his question. She wasn't okay. She was weak, she was upset, and judging by the way her shoulders involuntarily jerked upward every time she inhaled, still struggling to breathe. Not only in the name of closeness for the sake of invisibility, did he put his arm around her shoulders as they walked toward the armory. Seven years of survival without the touch of another human being had made him recognize its power and so he held her firmly to his side, hoping that some of his own strength might flow through him and into her.
While Eva dragged the bodies of the Wraith out of sight, Janus passed back their weapons and TAC vests. Ronon's particle magnum was the first weapon to be returned and since it didn't require any sort of reload, he was the first one ready to go. He waited anxiously while everyone else shrugged back into their vests, refastened their holsters, and reloaded their firearms with what little ammunition they had. Rogers was busy buckling the thigh straps of her holster when her TAC vest, the last of all the supplies, was shoved toward them. Ronon intercepted it and held onto it for her until her holster was secure. Straightening up, she turned to him and extended her hand to take the vest, but rather than hand it back, he was struck by the sudden impulse to hold it open for her. Her eyes darted from the vest between them up to his own and, upon comprehension of the gesture, he could have sworn he saw the smallest bit of color return to her ashen face. She turned her back to him and he helped her, one arm at a time, into the vest, lifting and adjusting it so that it lay properly against her shoulders. She slipped a hand between her hair and neck to free the trapped strands from underneath the collar, sending her scent up to him, stirring his already heightened senses. This was one hell of a time to get distracted, he thought with a sort of detached amusement, as their arms found their way around each other once more.
Maybe it was the comfort of being armed, maybe it was the knowledge that the cloak did, in fact, work as it was supposed to, or maybe it was the near promise of flight – whatever it was, Ronon felt his earlier unease begin to melt away with every step they took toward the fighter bay. As they rounded a particularly tight corner, Rogers's hip grazed his leg. She looked at him in silent apology and he looked back at her in silent forgiveness. Maybe it was something else.
A/N: Thanks for sticking with me and for reading. Let me know what you think! :)