Chapter 41: Interlude

The bright light pierced through his closed eyelids and the hands holding him up disappeared. The sudden movement had him crumpling to the floor, hands uselessly jerking in his restraints to try to slow his fall.

Was he dead?

Had they finally shot him?

"Get him out of there!" Rodney's voice pierced through his consciousness, shattering any illusion that he might be dead right now. "You can't just leave him there!"

"I can't!" An equally aggravated voice shouted. "He didn't lift the restrictions for long enough. They have the beaming shield up."

"What part of they're going to kill him don't you understand?"

John rolled to the side, squinting into the light. Someone slipped an arm under his chest and helped him onto his knees, before yanking at the restraints on his wrists.

"I've got you, sir."

"What's—" He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to reorient himself. "Where—"

"Alex got us out of there." Pilkes. Sergeant.

Gregoria had started flashing her eyes around the time he had appeared. And then the threats to kill them all had started getting a little too real.

"I don't care!" Rodney shrieked once again, making John wince at the volume "You get us back down there, or so help me, I will—"

John pried his eyes open. Down there. He almost sagged again when he realized where they were. The Daedalus.

Rescue.

Gregoria and her people had tried to take over the city, but reinforcements had arrived.

He squinted into the light, noting the reference and the distinctly missing person. "Alex?"

"He wasn't beamed up," Pilkes said quietly. "But I saw him take out at least seven people in a two-minute span."

Dammit.

John pushed up onto his feet, swaying dangerously, belatedly remembering he wasn't supposed to put weight on his leg as sharp pains traveled up it and through his hip. He would've fallen if Pilkes hadn't gotten a tighter grip on his belt. He was sure he looked half dead, but he mustered up his strongest glare for the colonel of the ship. "You need… to get down there."

"We can't." The tech at the computer waved his hand toward the window. "Your city is blocking us. I can't work miracles unless someone brings that shield down again. And we pulled everyone with a subcue from the gate room."

"I. Don't. Care." John growled. They had left Alex down there with the Trust and they were going to tear him apart. "He's going to get himself killed." He swayed in place, fingers gripping onto Pilkes' jacket, no doubt ruining any semblance of authority he could muster.

"You," Rodney rounded on him, face pinched and red, "Are not going anywhere but the infirmary."

John tried to force himself into a more upright position, but his leg was trembling and he was pretty sure the room wasn't actually spinning.

"We'll get him," Rodney said, eyes daring anyone to argue with him, "Okay?"

John swallowed down his nausea and just nodded. He did feel like he was about to pass out. It certainly wasn't what the doctor had ordered as far as resting. "Yeah, okay…"

He didn't protest when Pilkes helped maneuver him onto a stretcher.

He didn't protest when they injected him with a painkiller.

He didn't protest when they pried his eyes open and shone the light of the sun in his eyes.

Eventually the commotion died down and John finally felt like he could breathe again. Like there wasn't a vice around his brain.

Alex was still down there. With a giant target on his back.

He might be good, but the odds were stacked against him.

"Sir?"

John squinted open an eye to stare at Pilkes, who was standing respectfully at the edge of the curtain, looking unfairly no worse for the wear. "Yes?"

"Dr. McKay and a team are going back to the city, sir. It'll take about fifteen minutes for the jumper to arrive and then they'll disable the beaming shield manually."

Fifteen minutes. That was a long time. "Nothing from the city?" It had to have been nearly fifteen minutes already. If Alex was going to be able to make contact, it would have already happened.

"No sir."

John blew out a long breath, before turning to stare at the ceiling. There were a multitude of things that could have gone wrong in the time it took to get a plan together, much less then time it took to get a puddlejumper down there. "Any news on Woolsey or Dr. Madsen?"

A dark shadow crossed Pilkes' face. "Restrained, sir. Colonel Caldwell has already ensured they won't… go missing."

Well, at least something was going right.

Getting back down the more than seventy floors was more trouble than it was worth. Alex knew his best chance would be holing up somewhere and barricading himself in, but… he wasn't going to be able to bring down the beaming shield without getting back into the command center. And if he never got it down, there was no telling how long it would take for support to come from the Daedalus. Or if they would even be able to get through the city shield when they made it down to the planet.

The life signs detectors didn't reach far enough to tell him whether they had gotten more than just the personnel in the gate room, but either way – Alex was on his own.

No, it was better to just get it over with. Take out all the key players in one fell swoop. And if he managed to get that disk in the process, well…

He checked the life signs detector one more time, then sprinted down the hall to his room. It had never seemed like a benefit or disadvantage to be housed on the sixty-fifth floor of the central tower, but it was certainly coming in handy now.

The door opened and closed with nary a thought and Alex went straight for his drawers.

Ronon's gun had done some level of damage to the woman, but the zat and bullets had bounced right off her personal shield. It was possible that Ronon had just caught her unawares and raised it after his attack, but Alex had a suspicion that it was something else. A weakness in the shield.

The blaster worked on a different frequency level than the zat. The bullets were rapid projectiles. But the goon had easily tossed the small disk in her direction. The shield had crackled, but let it through.

If it relied on the object's speed to determine deflection… a knife might just do the job.

And when this was all over, he was going to have a serious talk about Sheppard making him go around unarmed all the time.

He pulled the little locked chest out of his bottom drawer and put the combination in. Ian's hand-me-down knife was on top, along with several other little trinkets and important papers hidden underneath. There was also the little oblong metal object he had gotten from Theo that had allowed him to communicate with Sheppard. Which he was really supposed to surrender to Rodney a long time ago.

Maybe…

He weighed it in his hand before stuffing it in a pocket. As a last resort, he could always try turning it on, but there was no telling if there was a range limit or if Sheppard was even conscious at this point. It was probably a moot point.

But he took it anyway.

The Tursksama was tempting, but he had only had a handful of training sessions with Ronon and they were more likely to hinder than to help.

He tucked the knife into his waistband, before patting down his pockets to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything else. The clip on the P90 was almost empty, so really, it was more trouble than it was worth. Same with the handgun. He wouldn't be getting refills any time soon. Hopefully the zat wouldn't run out of juice – he had no idea what they ran on. Maybe if he had the chance, he would swap out with someone.

The good news was that so far, the bad guys hadn't really been using zats too much. But then, one lucky shot was pretty much all it took and he was as good as dead.

Alex pulled up the life signs detector, scanning for the nearest dot on the screen. He would have to take them out one by one until he found the lady again. And that would require at least a few good hiding places and a bit of luck on his side.

It was a good thing he was good at climbing.

Alex reactivated the cloaking device, scanned up and down the corridor, and set off for his first ambush.

He was back to the seventy-first floor. Just one level down from the gate room. Two levels down from the control center. Three more people had fallen to his zat and not one had managed to get off a warning shot.

His fingers were burning from the strain of holding his weight between the girders, but there were two goons that had just entered the corridor, slowly making their way toward him. They had swapped to zats, P90s slung over their backs, and clearly suspected that something was up. But notably, they were missing the telltale bracelets on their wrists.

No cloaking devices.

Alex swallowed and tried to lighten his breathing. Anything could give him away.

"I thought we were supposed to be the ghosts," one of the guys muttered, sweeping the space in front of him, then cautiously taking another step forward.

"Kid is a freak." The other one, shorter and rounder, poked his flashlight into one of the tiny cervices that Alex would never have fit between. "He took out seven of us in under a minute."

"Do you think Gregoria is right? That they fucked up his life?"

"I wouldn't put anything past them."

Just a little bit further…

"This is pointless. Kid will've holed up." He stopped suddenly, holding out a hand in front of the other man. "Shhh."

Alex sucked in a silent breath and held it, fingers pinching the beam as hard as possible, toes pressing for purchase.

Not making a sound.

The two guys paused right below him, turning around slowly and surveying the halls.

Not once looking up.

One even banged on the useless transporter door.

"Hearing things, man."

"Shut the fuck up." There was the thump of one of them being shoved into the wall and then they kept moving underneath him. To where Alex couldn't see them anymore. "Not like we can kill him, anyway. Tully might want to play with him, but everyone knows kid's getting snaked in the end."

Well at least his fate in the end was pretty clear.

Getting snaked, just like they had wanted months ago.

Nice to know they had their priorities in order.

Alex sucked in another short breath, then listened for their retreating footsteps. He could just leave them to continue roaming, but there was always the possibility they would circle back. Every one or two he picked off increased his chances.

Three…

Two…

One…

He dropped down, grabbing the zat as he went and shot at their backs. The short and round one managed to turn around part way before the zat connected, and Alex dropped all the way to his stomach to escape the returning zat fire.

The crackle of electricity skated over his back, but didn't make connection.

Alex pressed his face into the floor, breathing heavily. Waiting for that second shot to come. Waiting for the inevitable finish.

But it didn't come.

He lifted his head and was greeted with two limp forms further down the hall.

Success.

Alex let out another shaky breath, before shaking his arms out. He wasn't going to be able to manage too many more climbs like that. His fingers barely wanted to grip the zat as it was.

He was going to have to make his final move.

Alex rolled over onto his back and stared up at the ceiling. He was reaching the end rather quickly and there were probably only three or four more Trust operatives left in this part of the tower – one of which was the lady herself.

He held no illusions – getting to her was going to be difficult. Probably impossible.

But she hadn't used a cloaking device. Hadn't had one on her.

Presumably, there was a reason for that.

Alex sat up and pulled the life signs detector out of his pocket. There were four life signs on the seventy-third floor – the control center. No doubt they were going to notice the lack of response from the patrols sent out after him, but…

He pushed up off the floor and pried open the control panel for the transporter. No data pad meant no finesse – and Rodney would probably rant about having to fix the transporter, but it wasn't like it was doing any good right now. Alex aimed the zat at the control panel and hoped that his calculations were right.

There was a spray of sparks, but it was just enough power to get the doors partway open. He pushed the door further apart, until he could just barely fit through, then dragged the two men into the transporter. He dumped their zats and weapons in a pile in the corner, then went to work on convincing the doors to shut again.

Closing was harder than opening, since he was all but fighting against whatever systems the city used to open and close doors. In the end, there was still a good two-inch gap, but it would be enough to slow someone down.

It was as good as it was getting.

Alex took a deep breath, checked the life signs detector one more time, then plotted a route that would get him in the back door.

A/N: John is losing his mind and Alex… Alex is just doing his thing. Gregoria had better watch out.

And I've been MIA. Sorry about that – life has been hectic and had a few responses that just sucked all the remaining life out of me. We're back and hopefully on tack.