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Chapter 9: Allegiance

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Stopping his pacing in front of the nonworking main stargate, Ronon shouted up to Dr. Zelenka in the control room, "How much longer?"

It wasn't the first time the question had been growled at him and Radek Zelenka heartily wished Rodney was there to take the barbaric intimidation breathing down his neck. Knowing to not look up from his work, because looking at a highly agitated Ronon was way worse than just having to hear him, Radek answered, "I am testing each sequence of crystals as methodically and quickly as I can. Though the crystals may not have any correlation with reopening the gate. The closure more than likely has been initiated through a security subroutine that we have had no previous knowledge of with stargates. I have a program running simulations on the possible effects if we should close the second stargate before we get this gate reopened."

Though knowing that, unlike McKay, Zelenka wasn't rattling off the confusing technological words to prove he was smarter than him, Ronon still felt his temper flare at the scientist's continued failure. He bound up the steps to face off with Zelenka. "Since Dr. Weir won't let us go for Sheppard until you get this gate working, every second you waste could be costing the lives of our people!" Ronon heaped on the guilt factor as if Zelenka didn't know the cost of his continued failure. Yes, Ronon was thinking of the weakened Sheppard, but he also worried for McKay and Loren and the soldiers with them. They were all part of his family now and he was determined not to lose them.

The word "waste" had Radek's head jerking up from the gate panel and his eyes piercing Dex's across the control panels that separated them. "It has not slipped my mind how important this is! I've been working on this feverishly and you standing over me bellowing is not helpful!" Then he mumbled under his breath, "Believe me, I heartily wish Rodney was here and you were yelling at him instead of me."

Afraid Ronon might further lose his temper with Zelenka, Telya stepped to Ronon's side to be the intermediary, just as she'd had to be with Ronon and Rodney many times. "Ronon, Dr. Zelenka knows the importance of completing his task as quickly as possible."

"It's been three hours!" Ronon shouted, eyes lancing blame into Zelenka.

Surging upright, Radek shouted back at Ronon, "I know how long it's been! Maybe you want to try your hand at activating the stargate!" baited Ronon to do better than he was before he paled at just how brazen his temper had made him. Though the control console separated them, Rakek still took a retreating step back from the towering angered Satedaen.

To Ronon it was a low blow, the scientist knew full well he could never do what he and McKay did, had no head for technical things. "Forget this! I'm going through the other stargate and getting our people back!" Turning on his heels, he headed for the elevator, deftly snagged a P90 rifle he had leaned against the wall and slung it over his shoulder. He didn't usually gear up with anything other than his own gun but he had no idea of the odds he might be up against. That a very weakened and ill Sheppard was up against. He cursed himself again for not following McKay into his rebellion. He should be there instead of the scientist, who wasn't much backup for John in a fight. And Ronon almost dismissed Loren and his team because John would order them around, and prioritize getting the ZPM back instead of keeping himself safe.

As much as Teyla wanted to agree with Ronon, she knew they might be putting Atlantis at risk. But more than that, their going through the second stargate after Sheppard and the others might be pointless. It was possible that, if they only made it to the one stargate and none of their people were there, they might not be able to return to Atlantis afterwards. Not until the main stargate was functioning.

She jogged to catch up with the long legged Satedaen, scathingly said to his back, "You think I don't wish to go help John and the others?!" When Ronon didn't even acknowledge her presence, let alone her words, she snagged his arm and spun him around. "But we might make it worse if we leave, might be stuck at that other planet when John has need of us elsewhere."

"I have to try and help them," Ronon insisted, jerking his arm from her fingers and heading again for the elevator. He didn't care if he had to go alone, his conscience could no longer allow him to stay safely in Atlantis while his friends were in danger. Entering the elevator, Ronon went to order the cart to the nearest elevator to the 2nd stargate when surprisingly, Zelenka took his life in his hands and dodged into the elevator with him. Teyla too lithely made it into the small enclosure before the door closed. Then the cart was on its way.

Turning to Ronon, Radek said, his words coming off musing but there was an underlying current of cunning seriousness, "I have been thinking…If only Dr. Weir hadn't ordered us to not gate out from the second stargate. Though the gate only stays open thirty-eight minute and you can't dial into it from another location, there is nothing to say I couldn't dial out again, in let's say hour increments to that planet until you returned with our people, or you determine it's useless to be there. Of course, Dr. Weir's order is logical because to continuously open and reopen the second stargate not only depletes more power from our two ZPMs, but it most likely will impede our efforts to re-open our main stargate."

Teyla and Ronon's stunned eyes were fixated on Radek, unprepared for his downright sneaky act of disobedience. Then the soldiers exchanged looks between themselves and Ronon smirked, "I never heard that order from Dr. Weir, did you?"

Catching onto Ronon's justification, Teyla innocently drawled, "I believe her exact orders were…do not close the second gate. Her reluctance to send another team through the second stargate was because she believed that team would not be able to return. Now Dr. Zelenka has come up with a solution to prevent us being stranded."

As if realizing the full impact of what he had suggested, Radek backpedal on his bravado. "Now that a solution is available, if we present this idea to Dr. Weir, she'll give her blessings for a team to leave by the second stargate."

But now that he had Teyla on his side and a viable way to return, not only himself and Teyla to Atlantis but John and his team as well, Ronon wasn't going to delay any longer coming to his friends' aid. "I'm going, no matter what Dr. Weir's decision might be."

Teyla apparently caught the indecisive bug from Zelenka because now she hedged, "It would be better to go with Dr. Weir's blessing, Ronon. She will see the logic in this. And I know she is as concerned about getting John and the others back as we are." But Teyla's words had the opposite effect on Ronon than she intended.

"Last time Weir had Sheppard's life in her hands, we stood around and watched Koyla feed Sheppard to a Wraith," Ronon censoriously recalled with a dangerous edge to his words that he had not directed to anyone in Atlantis before. But he had lost respect for Elizabeth that day and she had not earned any of it back, certainly not with her handling of today's events. In comparison, Ronon knew full well, if the roles were reversed, that John would have never agreed to sacrifice any of them. But Elizabeth had. She had sacrificed Sheppard instead of a Genii, a stranger. And today she wanted to sacrifice Sheppard all over again. "I won't abandon him a second time," Ronon vowed, determination burning in his eyes as he moved out of the elevator and headed toward the unused wing of Atlantis that held the second stargate.

Feeling there was much truth to Ronon's words, Teyla didn't voice a protest to Ronon's plan of action, but she did however point out something important to her teammate. "Ronon, without Beckett or someone on the medical team going with us, we can't do much for Sheppard. And though Zelenka will be reopening the gate hourly, any delay in getting John medical treatment may be unacceptable if John is as ill as both of us fear he is."

"Then get Dr. Beckett," Ronon stated like it was simply a matter of calling the man and he would come running.

Again Radek had the misfortune of having to be the reasonable one in the group. "You're forgetting that he knows we've been ordered to not go off world until the main stargate is opened. He is anxiously waiting for Dr. Weir to give him the green light to go just like the rest of us."

"Regardless of Dr. Weir's orders, I believe Dr. Beckett will go with us," Teyla confidently predicted.

"And risk his career, being reassigned off Atlantis?!" Radek asked incredulously, knew that was what he risked. If he did as he'd proposed and, not only encourage Ronon and Teyla to go through the other gate, but keep reopening it so they could return to Atlantis. Not to mention shirking his duties to get the main stargate up and running.

But Teyla's conviction didn't waver as she met Radek's gaze. "He will risk all that, like you are, because John is important to him like he is to Ronon and to me."

Radek didn't, for a second, doubt the two soldiers' devotion to their military leader. But he hadn't much occasion to put Atlantis's chief medical officer in that same category. Now that it was brought up however, he found that he didn't truly doubt what the doctor would decide. John Sheppard had a way to engender unflagging loyalty. "I'll contact Dr. Beckett and then I'll reassign the team studying the second stargate to go to the main stargate and work on getting it open." For the first time, Radek nervously took off his glasses and shifted from foot to foot. "If Dr. Weir asks why I'm not working on reopening the main stargate, if she realizes I'm reopening the other gate and depleting the ZPMs…"

"She will be too late to stop us," Dex fiercely declared.

Looking at Ronon's set features, Teyla knew she nor anyone else should attempt to get between Ronon and his path to Sheppard. Suddenly but not for the first time, she was proud to have the team members that she did.

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Kannar entered his father's two room house with a hurried knock, felt some of his tension fade as his father, Sakar, greeted him with a wide smile. "I think with today's victory you will be taking my place as leader sooner than either of us thought," the blond-haired man teased as he drew his son into a fierce hug and pressed a kiss to his hair. "I am so proud of you, Kannar! You've done what generations of our people could not."

Though he returned his father's hug and love, Kannar tempered his father's praise. "No other generation had the opening that we did, Atlantis hasn't used its cloaking shield since our banishment. But this victory is a bit more muddled," he preceded as his father pulled back, nodded his head as if he knew that. "I have brought two men from Atlantis back with me."

"The town's gossip is quick," Kannar's father admitted his knowledge. "You know that I trust your judgement, but I have to confess, I don't understand your reasoning. Son, what did you hope to gain by bringing them here? The town will call for their execution."

"But you can convince them otherwise," Kannar countered, intensely believing in his father's fairness.

"First you must convince me," his father countered.

Kannar sighed, ran a hand through his dark hair in a tell of his anxiety. "We don't have to be at war with them, father." Because of what he saw of Atlantis, he knew they would indeed send others to retrieve the ZPM, and some might not offer a truce as Sheppard had, would only call for their annihilation. Then what good would the ZPM do them if they had to contend with not only the Wraith but the Lanteans. But then again, he didn't believe he was dealing with Lanteans.

"They choose the war, not us," bitterness resonated in his father's tone, in the remembered betrayal flickering in his eyes.

"I don't believe them to be Lanteans," Kannar stated and held his breath for the fallout.

"Wow, I didn't expect them to denounce who they were. They were always so proud of themselves." Sakar gave a sardonic grimace, "Guess things change in ten thousand years."

"See, that's what I mean," Kannar excitedly latched onto his father's impression of the Lantaens. "Their military leader, the man I brought here, he wanted to broker a truce between us, to join forces to go against the Wraith. That is an offer the Lanteans would never make."

"They made that offer once, to fool us," Sakar grimly reminded his son. "We worked side by side to create Atlantis, to help them build the city's technology and weapons only for them to use it all against us. We will not fall for their deception again."

Kannar knew he needed to break though the hardened perception of Lanteans, or well, the people now residing in Atlantis. "The military leader, Sheppard, he's ill. Said he took a drug to be able to track us through the stargates."

"Only a Lantean would have such abilities…"

Not letting his father finish, Kannar continued to plead his case, "He claims he only has traces of Lantean blood in his lineage, which allows him to do some of the things the original bloodline of the Lanteans could do. It clearly cost him his health to do what he did today, and a true Lantean would not be suffering so."

"Son, that doesn't change who they are," Sakar gently said, was proud of his son's good heart but he couldn't let that trait hurt him…or their people. "Maybe their abilities have been diluted through their offspring but that doesn't change who they are. They can not be trusted. They have no honor…"

Kannar disproved that statement. "Their leader, Sheppard, he sought to broker a peaceful compromise with me before more of his teams came for us. I believe he didn't want more lives lost, his own or even ours. Though I leveraged his assault team to leave through the gate, he ordered the team leader to not send anyone for him, that he would contact them when we came to a truce." Registering his father's surprise, that his father too recognized the magnitude of such an order, Kannar had hope that his dad would stop letting the past prejudice him. "One of Sheppard's men refused to leave his side, agreed instead to be captured with his leader, to face whatever fate his friend faced. That, father, is loyalty, as strong as any I've seen, even within our own people. And you told me to kill a man of honor was…"

"…Was to lose your own honor," his father finished, grimacing. "I wish I didn't instill so much nobility in you. Or the foolish notion of honor."

"It's not foolish," Kannar fervently declared. "What this man of Atlantis can offer us might not only lend us safety but allies. And we've not allowed ourselves to trust anyone since the Lanteans betrayal. Isn't this what you said you wanted? For us to make allies, to trade with others, to trust again? That all this…hatred and distrust has been killing us quicker than the Wraith can take us?"

"But the council believes allies are liabilities. And you propose to be allies with our greatest enemies? You don't ask much of my persuasive skills, do you?" Sakar drawled, but there was a lessening in the hardness in his tone…and his eyes.

"What if they aren't Lanteans at all? We have let our …fear, our hatred, our mistrust cut us off from the rest of the galaxy. And our isolation, it is a death sentence," Kannar unflinchingly announced. "Yes, we can protect ourselves now from the Wraith but our crops, our lands, our water, our animals, we have depleted them all for thousands of years. We need trade, we need new innovations, inventions, even the man who came with Sheppard, he offered us other alternatives to the power source. If we had that, we could light our homes with electricity, develop new technology, take back what the Lanteans truly stole from us: our belief in ourselves."

Sakar looked hard at his son, before he chuckled and reached out and affectionately rubbed his son's hair, "You are after my place in the community?"

"Dad!" Kannar protested like a teenager as he jerked his head of his father's reach.

Sakar grinned at his son's antics before he sobered up. "These …Atlantis people, they really got to you, didn't they?"

"They are honorable. And I don't believe they are Lanteans …or anything like them," Kannar said, standing by his convictions. "Sway the council to hear them out, consider the good that can come from an alliance with them. That we can't let our people die out because of our hardheartedness. We accused the Lanteans of being egoistical but if we don't change, accept we can no longer survive on our own, we are no better than they were."

Father looked pensive. "You talk of an alliance, but we attacked them and I doubt it was without causalities considering the council approved the use of a bomb."

"Twelve dead," Kannar grimly provided, like the deaths weight on his soul.

Sakar felt like his son did, regretting lives lost. Even if they weren't the lives of their people. "And still this Sheppard, he offered us an alliance, forgiveness?"

"He's a soldier, Father. He knows that sometimes blood must be shed before peace can be achieved. And I believe he also values human life, doesn't want more of his people to die …or ours."

With a measuring look to his son, Sakar surmised, "You admire this man, don't you."

"Kinda have to…he's my counter," Kannar smirked and his dad gave a small smile.

"That is points in his favor too. But Kannar, I don't want you to put yourself in the crosshairs of the council. You've spoken your opinion to me, and I'll take that into consideration. But the final decision will be a council vote." Didn't want his son getting on the bad side of the council, not even if he thought he was doing it to create a better future for their people. Yes, his people mattered to him, just not as much as his son did.

"I'll call for a community vote," Kannar announced, knew that fate of their people was at stake. Didn't miss his father's stiffened reaction.

"No! No matter how the council decides, you can not ask for the community vote," Sakar commanded, gripping his son's shoulders, holding his son's determined eyes with his own.

But Kannar wouldn't backdown. "I can and I will ask for that vote."

"You do that, and they might decide to execute you along with the Lanteans!" Sakar knew that his vote, regardless he was the council chairman, wouldn't sway an angry mob.

"They aren't Lanteans. And, if the council votes to execute them and I don't try and stop that…" Kannar shook his head dropping his guard, he let his emotions carry in his cracking voice. "I'll be their executioner and I've got more than enough blood on my hands. I rather die with honorable men than destroy my own soul any more than I already have."

"Damn you!" Sakar cursed his son's stubbornness and stalwart good heart. But his son's expression wasn't changed at his outburst, instead his son was smirking, like he knew already what he would do. Sighing, he proved his sons right. "Well I guess I have to make sure the council takes a real shine to these ..Atlantis people." Because there was no way he was going to let his own son die for these strangers.

Kannar's smirk blossomed into a full-blown smile. He headed to the door but turned around when he was almost outside. "Oh, I should tell you, Olpwen already tried his hand at executing our guests. So needless to say, he's gonna be a hard sell. See ya at the council meeting, make me proud, dad." And out the door he went.

"Great, nice that he let that tidbit for last," Sakar grumbled, but wasn't surprised at Olpwen's vote for execution. The man wanted his job and the quickest way to get it would be to prove himself a hero to their people. 'Too bad my son beat him to it today when he returned our power source.' Of course, the winds could easily change from a parade for Kannar to a bullet if he defended the two men from Atlantis too strongly. Being a father was never an easy job, and Kannar, he made it both an honor and a nerve wracking experience.

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Rodeny was seated beside John inside one of the bigger structures the town could boast. To Rodney's trained eye, it was a multipurpose room and right then, it wasn't set up for a potluck dinner. More like a tribunal. There was a row of chairs facing off from the table he and Sheppard had been led, a table that came with two guards. He strongly sensed this community was more of a guilty until proven innocent kind of thinkers, what with the whole knife thrown at them on the town's main street.

Anxiety raising, Rodney did his normal nervous rambling. "This reminds me of that time I was in court because I got sued. Well, technically I was the one doing the suing, but the judge had the audaciousness to tell the defendant that he had more grounds to sue me than I did to sue him. And my lawyer, he was useless. So, I had to object to every lie the judge said."

Leaning forward so he could rest his head on the table, John's voice was muffled but his sardonicism was still detectable. "You objected to the Judge?"

"Yes," Rodney emphatically defended himself. "He was clearly prejudice. As if he'd never been miffed by a school crossing guard. They have so little consideration for drivers, it's a wonder more aren't brought up on charges."

"Right, they are so tactless," John mumbled, as he lifted his head from the table and slouched back in his chair. "Throwing their bodies in front of moving vehicles to protect children. They should all be locked up."

"Clearly you're feeling better if you can be your normal sarcastic self," Rodney drawled, but it was more based on wishful thinking than facts. Because, honestly, John looked like he was one of those people living underground so long their skin was nearly translucent.

John didn't comment on Rodney's assumption. Wasn't sure if how he felt could be considered 'better'. Maybe more like a few dials closer to staying upright than passing out. But he feared the moment was simply a temporary reprieve. He planned to take full advantage of his present lucidity to ensure Rodney survived the day. "We need to offer them an allegiance with us, talk about the benefits we can offer them. It seems to me that they could use an energy source for more than weapons or a shield. If they helped build Atlantis, this place should be tricked out with the same technology but they are using candles and oil burning lamps. Their ship and their weapons are the only proof they aren't primitives."

That same incongruous had bothered Rodney. "Yes, they're going with the 'Little house on the Prairie' motif," he openly criticized, "and yet they're bragging the Ancients needed their help to construct Atlantis." Suddenly Rodney turned excitedly to Sheppard, "Our naqahdah generators, we can barter them for the ZPM. With the generators, they can come into the 22nd century. Well, unless all this generation knows how to do is thatch a roof."

"Then you offer to teach them, Rodney," John pointed out the obvious. "Clearly their intelligence is high."

"What makes you say that?"

John couldn't fight back a smirk. 'Leave it to Rodney to always be a snob.' "Rodney, they meticulously planned their entrance into Atlantis. For months they set off "false" alarms so when they made their real foray into Atlantis, we would write it off. They came through a stargate we didn't even know existed, and stole one of our most valued tech. I say they are Mensa candidates."

Rodney was about to protest that praise, but John erupted into a coughing fit. Helplessly all Rodney could do was hover. And felt all his optimism fly out the window when blood splattered onto John's lips. Resting a hand on John's back, he wished he could do something to help his best friend. Of course, that was when people wearing robes like the guy who tried to stab them entered the building. "Just great. I'm not good at getting people to like me…or change their mind about killing me. I know this sounds horribly selfish but please don't pass out and make me be the spokesman because that won't end well."

John's answer was another bout of coughing. Suddenly, Kannar was crouching by John's side, holding up a crude pottery mug for him to take a drink. "Here's some water."

John was too grateful to turn down the water, raised trembling hands to take the mug into his own grip. The cool liquid eased his cough, but it didn't wash away the coppery aftertaste of blood in his mouth.

"I'll make sure this is over quickly," Kannar pledged to Sheppard.

"The trial…or our deaths?" Rodney morosely quipped back.

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Tbc

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Thanks for every single wonderful review! And thank you to everyone reading this fic!

Have a wonderful day.

Cheryl W.