Chapter 29: Tursksama

With certain individuals successfully off the city, things had settled down considerably. The rumor mill had churned for a little while – but there were no vocal dissidents about Alex's continued existence on the city and most seemed satisfied that the Marines in question were no longer running amuck. Jamison hadn't been smart enough to keep his mouth shut and through some small mercy the court martial was going to be open and shut in short order.

And while the city was now a little shorter staffed than usual – five marines didn't make that much of a difference in the greater scheme of things. The Daedalus would be coming in a few short weeks and they would be back to full ranks in no time.

Unfortunately, John had a suspicion that O'Neill's reprimand had done little toward curbing Alex's rebellious streak, but he had hope that they would at least be able to track his movements a little bit more now that he had the subcue. There was no way the kid would be able to sneak off entirely – though John wasn't about to put it past him to try sneaking out on his own once he was back in shape. He was going to have to entice him into cooperation…

Perhaps through an off-world trip, once Alex was through the critical healing stage first. And with Carson's blessing.

Dr. Madsen was unfortunately still a problem, but Davis had taken all the pertinent clinical data to use in the court martial, so she hadn't been able to get any further information than what they told Woolsey. Ronon had been extremely helpful with keeping her away from Alex while he was recovering, since she didn't exactly like his presence. A win for all involved.

How they had ended up with a CMO that was uneasy around the natives… he wasn't quite sure. He suspected the IOA was to blame.

"Sheppard." There was a loud thump as Ronon dropped two sticks onto the table, narrowly missing John's tray. "The kid here?"

John blinked. Alex had been dubbed the kid sometime in the past few days. "Uh… no?" He threw a glance in the direction of the line for the mess, picking out the messy haired teen sticking out like a sore thumb. "He's in line." With Simmons right next to him. Rumor was that Simmons hardly even left him alone in the labs right now.

Ronon dropped into a chair across from John, before pulling the sticks toward him. They were intricately carved, bigger and heavier than the bantos rods Teyla favored. Everyone with eyes had noted Ronon's newfound penchant for carving – and John had little doubt as to who was going to be the recipient. He hadn't quite figured out the why yet.

Though he hadn't heard about any particular interactions between Alex and Ronon in the wild – so to speak – there was no missing the soft spot that had developed there.

There was a huff from beside them, before Rodney slid into the seat next to John. "What did we say about weapons at the table?"

Ronon rolled his eyes. "Not for me."

"Yes, yes. You're going to give them to our little prodigy, so he has more opportunities to bash out the few remaining brain cells he has."

John smothered a grin – Rodney had been less than impressed with Alex's little disappearing act. It was probably a good thing Radek was Alex's supervisor.

Ronon was entirely unfazed. "Kid needs more than his fists."

There was a distinct huff from Rodney, before he started digging into his food. "Not like he doesn't know—"

John elbowed him in the ribs. There was no telling who exactly was listening and well… Alex's exact abilities were still being kept under wraps. Thankfully, no one had asked too many questions.

Lieutenant Simmons appeared at the edge of the table, setting Alex's tray down. Alex was trailing behind just a little, movements a little jerky, the only sign that he had had major surgery only a week earlier. There was the faintest hint of pain lines at the edges of his eyes, but even that required looking very closely.

"Morning," Alex mumbled, before all but burying his face in the mug of lurie.

"Someone was apparently up half the night running simulations." Lieutenant Simmons slanted an amused look in Alex's direction. "Thought I was going to have to drag him out of bed." He clapped Alex on the shoulder, before turning back to rejoin the line.

John gave Alex a long hard look, but knew that this wasn't a fight he was about to win. It wouldn't stop him from tipping off Beckett and letting him give Alex an earful about taking care of himself better. And hopefully he could suss out whether there was something else they needed to be worried about aside from just interest in his simulations.

Ronon reached out and dropped the sticks next to Alex, narrowly missing his tray and jarring Rodney's precious mug of coffee.

"Weapons at the table!" Rodney shouted, grabbing his mug out of the way and nearly sloshing it over himself.

Ronon ignored him. "You're training as soon as Beckett clears you."

Alex blinked slowly, before cautiously reaching out and running his fingers over the intricate carvings.

No doubt, there was some sort of hidden meaning to each and every one of them – something the anthropologists would be falling over themselves to learn.

"For me?" Alex breathed.

"Do you see any other neanderthal sitting here wanting to hit things with sticks?" Rodney grumbled, scowling in the direction of the sticks. "Thought you were supposed to be smarter than this."

John couldn't help but smirk. "Rodney's just jealous."

Alex sent an amused smirk in Rodney's direction that seemed to do the trick of shutting him up. He pulled the pair of sticks closer, turning them over in his hands, all signs of exhaustion gone. "What are they called?"

The look Ronon had could only be described as proud. "Tursksama. For ceremonial battle."

"Ceremonial?"

"There are plain ones for training."

John had a feeling that this was a rare showing of Satedan culture. Ronon was guarded with everything involving his home world, but it seemed he had finally found someone he considered a kindred spirit.

"We will train once a week." Ronon slanted a question in John's direction. "No escort."

And well, it wasn't like he could deny that request. Though he wasn't about to let Alex wander the city alone, Ronon wouldn't let him get into trouble. And it would give Lieutenant Simmons some forced time off – a chance to rebuild connections with Sergeant Pilkes' unit. "You're going to make the Marines jealous."

Based on Ronon's smug expression, that was exactly what he wanted. John just shook his head – he wasn't going to get in the middle of this. As long as Carson cleared it…

"Is not this the season of thanks for your people, John?"

He ducked low and just barely missed the head shot Teyla had taken at him with the bantos rods. She liked keeping him on his toes. "Yeah, well—" He blocked her next strike, then tried – and failed – to make his own. "It's an American thing, so everyone just gets permission to celebrate how they want."

It was his sixth year of skipping any sort of traditional Thanksgiving celebration – through no lack of trying on the other American citizens' parts. Every year, Teyla seemed to question his sanity. He didn't see much use in celebrating holidays that were traditionally tied to a place he no longer truly called home.

He wasn't about to tell O'Neill that though. That was a great way to get recalled.

"And you do not wish to join your fellow Americans? Your men?"

John grimaced, then tried a spinning attack. All he got for his efforts were a couple of rods to his ribs.

Ouch.

He leaned over, trying to catch his breath. "Look, if you want to have a cultural debate, you should really just go bug the anthropologists."

Teyla just smiled at him serenely, before tucking her rods under her arm. "And the youngest among us have no care for this celebration either?"

It took him a moment to parse her words, before figuring out she was talking about Alex. "He's not really… American. Well, he is, but he isn't. He wasn't raised that way." And that was a whole situation John still didn't quite understand. He was pretty sure that you either had an American parent and were therefore an American citizen, or you weren't. How Alex had skated by for over 16 years with just UK citizenship and then the other suddenly appearing when he needed it most just sounded really fishy.

But then, spies were really fishy.

"I'm sure Lieutenant Simmons is keeping him well occupied." And the strangely resultant half of the Marines that seemed to treat Alex like their collective little brother. Sergeant Pilkes' unit seemed to have stepped up particularly persistently.

Very odd.

Teyla just smiled at him once more, before throwing an arm around his shoulder, clearly done with the practice. "He does keep interesting company."

In the days since he had been released from the infirmary, John had seen no less than a dozen different Marines covertly keeping an eye on Alex. Alex had only interacted personally with a few of them, from what he had seen, and usually stuck fairly close to Lieutenant Simmons.

So clearly, John's first failing had been taking Simmons off-world and leaving Alex to his own devices.

John grabbed a towel and wiped the sweat off his face. If he timed it right, he would be able catch the very end of the lunch service – just before they started setting up for the evening banquet. An event he was specifically skipping if at all possible.

He liked for his men to feel comfortable relaxing for an evening – except for those on duty, of course.

"John," Teyla sounded hesitant. "Do you know who Alex's Jack is?"

Jack.

John rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. "Only vaguely. They were… important to Alex."

"And they are… dead?"

He nodded. Alex had mentioned the name only once, briefly, when they were traveling to California. Even that brief mention though had made it clear that something tragic had happened.

"He… mentioned Jack when he was in the infirmary."

That didn't surprise him. Alex had gotten John mixed up with his apparently dead uncle while he was under the influence.

"He seemed very… distraught. But I was unsure if I should bring it up with him or not."

"No." John had his own share of dead bodies in his background. And while he may trust Teyla at this point, he hadn't exactly been thrilled when she had witnessed his Afghanistan hallucinations. He had a feeling Alex would react similarly. "That one is, fairly recent. He… wouldn't want people to know."

"Would it not be better then, that he is aware I know?" Teyla asked, frowning.

John shook his head. "He doesn't know you that well. He would be…" Embarrassed. Mortified. Ashamed. "I think it would be best if you didn't."

She studied him for a long moment, before holding out her hand. "Very well. Will you come to the mainland and see Torren, then?"

A perfect excuse to get out of the city. "Of course."

"We've got a problem." Rodney all but skidded into John's office, Zelenka close on his heels.

It was one of the rare days where John was trying to catch up on paperwork, while Lorne took a personal day. He had been productive for a whole… twenty minutes without being interrupted.

Probably a record.

Neither Rodney nor Zelenka waited for John to wave them in, just let themselves in and closed the door. Unceremoniously, Rodney pushed all the papers John had been carefully working through, to the side and plopped his laptop down.

"Hey!"

"Not important," Rodney said, typing commands into the computer, before giving a wary glance around the room. "When was the last time you swept in here?"

John just stared at him for a moment. "Assuming you're not commenting on my cleaning abilities, three days ago."

"Oh, ha ha. Do it again."

John could hear the eyeroll that accompanied it, but dutifully took out the bug sweeper and checked the room. Nothing. "Clean, as usual."

"Is never too soon to be cautious," Zelenka said, pulling out an ancient device John hadn't seen before and placed it on the desk. "On, please."

Wary of a device he had never used before, John cautiously thought on at it, and was rewarded with a gradual power up. A visible light emanated out of it, slowly spreading into a wider and wider circle, until he could just barely see the edges at the very corners of his office. "So… What does that do?"

"Works like a containment field – sound cannot pass through. Creates… barrier with high frequency sound wave to prevent transmission. Additional light frequency barrier prevents objects from passing. Specially coded frequencies can pass through with carrier permission."

John blinked. He followed the sound wave part. Maybe. But carrier permission? "Is there something—"

"No, no, Alex already set it up for us. Plug and play." Rodney kept punching buttons on the laptop, so John figured he wasn't quite ready to share what the big problem was.

Alex, though. "You've got him playing with the new toys?" He couldn't help but be slightly jealous. While he hadn't particularly liked being the on-call light switch all the time, there had been the benefit that he got to try out some of the more stubborn devices before anyone else.

"He is very intuitive." Zelenka said, by way of explanation.

As long as he wasn't getting himself into more trouble, John supposed it was probably a good thing.

"Ah, hah." Rodney pulled up a long stream of coding, then turned the laptop screen toward John. "There, you see that?"

John blinked. "Computer code?" Rodney glared at him, so he leaned closer and pretended the words made sense to him. "Nope, got nothing."

"These are the logs we've spent the last two weeks looking for and trying to decipher." Rodney flapped a hand toward the screen, as if that explained everything. "And look whose command code was utilized to authorize the deletion, then oh so carefully covered up."

He pointed to a specific line on the screen and John leaned forward to read it. Numbers. Words. Nothing that made sense, until—

John's eyes widened as he looked up at Rodney's triumphant expression. "Woolsey."

Oh, that was bad.

Fuck.

"It gets better. Time stamp is 2530," Rodney said, clicking off the strings of code and switching over to a view of the halls going to the residential quarters. "But here he is, taking a transporter and going into his personal quarters at just that time. He wouldn't have had time – or skills – to make those sorts of changes."

So, not Woolsey.

That was… a relief at least.

Rodney flipped to another camera angle, this time right outside Woolsey's office. "And look who was seen chatting with Woolsey just half an hour earlier."

John leaned closer, recognizing the science uniform but not the scientist. A recent wave, then. "One of yours?"

"Oceanic biologist, but he has a background in biotechnology, with emphasis on technology." Zelenka said, nodding at the screen. "Roger Carmichael. Joined with wave following return to Pegasus galaxy, however, just got back from three months earth leave. Mother was dying."

"Supposedly," Rodney cut in. "But then, he never mentioned any family, did he?"

"And I'm sure Carmichael would have told you details about family life," Zelenka snarked back and Rodney just huffed.

"Okay…" John drew out the word, watching the completely non-incriminating video playing out in front of him. It was just Carmichael talking with Woolsey, minutes prior to Woolsey's command codes being used to commit a crime. "Do you have any proof?"

Zelenka muttered something in Czech that John suspected was unflattering toward Carmichael. Rodney just looked smug.

"Only this." He clicked through to another video, this time of a dimly lit lab, with Carmichael working at a computer. The time stamp was 2039. "Look right—" He paused the video. "There." Carmichael had just slid a card into the reader on the computer – a slot that should have already been filled when he first logged in. "That's not his card and chip."

Fuck.

"Computer logs confirm Carmichael accessed computer with own access and verify codes. But then, Woolsey's card appears and security bypasses access codes required," Zelenka tapped the computer screen. "Very smooth and will be remedied shortly via update."

John sank back in his chair. A nearly perfect crime. Except for the part where Carmichael was going to get caught. "What's his connection to Jamison?"

"None."

"So how did…"

"Carmichael was in infirmary being treated for an allergic reaction when they brought Alex in. He has been… very interested in Alex since his arrival. This—"

"He did exactly what we did," Rodney cut in, verbally shoving Zelenka to the side. "Retraced Alex's steps and then deleted the hours of footage around Sector J. We can only guess that he was hoping Alex would get recalled, or something, with that footage missing."

John ran a hand through his hair, studying the image in front of him. There had to be a connection. Otherwise, it was two completely separate offenses. There was something that they were missing. "And Carmichael is…?"

"Working in lab 29, by himself today." Rodney glanced down at his watch. "I'd say you should have a patrol going through there within the next five or so minutes."

John glanced at his own watch, before raising an eyebrow at Rodney.

"Hey! Genius here."

"And if I radio Sergeant Pilkes, my signal will get through?"

"Do you trust Alex or not? Yes!" He added at John's expectant look.

John rolled his eyes, then put his hand up to his earpiece and switched over to the private channel he had with his officers. "Sergeant Pilkes, this is Sheppard."

"Copy that, Colonel Sheppard, sir."

"Sergeant, there's a… package in Lab 29 that is in need of pick up." John almost rolled his eyes at Rodney's smug expression. "You might want to send a team or two down. We don't want this one… damaged."

There was a long pause, before an almost hesitant reply came back. "Package in Lab 29, sir? I'll take two teams myself. Anywhere you would like this package delivered?"

"The brig should serve just fine. Please check for any nasties on the way."

"Sir, yes, sir. One package to the brig, undamaged."

Ah, he liked competent officers. "Thank you, Sergeant." He let his hand drop and caught the gaze of both Rodney and Zelenka. "So, what are we going to do about Woolsey apparently losing his access card?"

A/N: A bit of filler, but hopefully useful filler. Maybe. We'll see.