Chapter 45: A Scapegoat

"John!"

He barely suppressed the flinch as Rodney grabbed onto his elbow and all but dragged him out onto a balcony. Eerily familiar to what had happened just a few short months earlier. Before any of this had started. The only difference was this time, Lorne was trailing behind them.

"Would you just—stop!"

John clenched his jaw and pointedly looked away, balancing precariously on his crutches. The dull throb in his leg was the only thing that kept him from trying to walk on it, but boy was he tempted to when the last thing he wanted to do was talk to Rodney.

Or get shouted at, by Rodney.

"Sit down before you hurt yourself," Rodney said, shoving him down onto the bench.

The dull change in the buzz told John all he needed to know about his chances of getting off the balcony unscathed – there were few times Atlantis liked Rodney more than him, but it seemed that this was one of them.

The traitor.

"Are you trying to alienate the best chance at a leader that we've had in the past three years?"

John dumped the crutches to the side and crossed his arms. "No."

"Then what was that in there?" Rodney jabbed a finger back toward the hall. Toward the room. "Just trying out snippy comments for the day? That's supposed to be my schtick."

John scowled down at the ground.

He couldn't help it if he felt threatened by Daniels.

Daniels, who Alex apparently cared about and was happy to see.

Daniels, who had managed to pull Alex out of fires before and had once again managed to be the white knight.

Daniels, who was just Ben.

That hadn't been a bitter realization.

And now… with everything…

John cleared his throat. "Don't you think this is a little bit too much, too fast?" Daniels had swooped in with his team and were all but dismantling the city from the ground up, it seemed. Though there still hadn't been an official statement from Alex – not for another couple of days, if John had any say in it – there was no question as to what had gone down in the city.

Infiltrators were found throughout almost all the sectors – even in areas that had been unused for months. Most had been zatted – fifty-fifty on whether they were actually dead or not – particularly in the sectors that led to and from the chair room. It left little question on who had taken them out. In other places though, there were only signs that someone had been there at some point. All that was left, was a faint residue that the scientists had come up with to confirm that yes, someone had been the victim of a triple blast.

Not everyone dead or missing had been the infiltrators though. Because while Alex had been doing his nearly-solo crusade, soldiers and scientists alike had fought back against the intruders in their areas. Not everyone had been as lucky as Alex though and there had already been too many bodies sent back to the SGC.

Perhaps the worst part though, were the ones that remained. Those who had been loyal to the Trust, but had managed to work their way in among the rest of the city inhabitants. Biding their time until the strike – but they had played their hand too early.

The only mercy so far, was that it had primarily been support staff and scientists. Not John's men.

Daniels hadn't hesitated to pull them into interrogation rooms and set his team on them. Grilling them for information. It had quickly become clear that Madsen hadn't been working alone and that the grip of the Trust had run far deeper than anyone had dared imagine.

It was a great city cleansing.

And while John had no desire for any of the co-conspirators to stick around… he knew that witch hunts sometimes took down those who were innocent. Focused on those who were too close to the target, yet not close enough.

And now it was touching his people.

"Lieutenant Simmons had nothing to do with this," John bit out.

All the evidence was circumstantial. There wasn't a single fingerprint – digital or otherwise – that pointed them in his direction.

He was just the easiest scapegoat. The only person close to Alex that didn't have a strong enough alibi – as if getting shot during the invasion wasn't a good alibi.

"You know just as well as I do that that server is a dead end." It was like a stalker's diary, but really held nothing of substance. A detailed accounting of Alex's every move over the past three months, but no detail on why. Or how it was to be used. "That could have been compiled by me. Or Zelenka. Or… or any of the Marines he's with on a daily basis. Or… Ronon." Anyone that had close contact with Alex, really.

"Ronon wouldn't have the technical know-how—" Rodney cut off at John's glare. "Right, not the point."

And Simmons didn't make any sense. He had advocated for Alex on numerous occasions. Had protected Alex from repercussions from Woolsey at the expense of his own health and wellbeing – repercussions that he would have been thrilled with had he been a Trust operative. And by all accounts, one of his closest friends had been presumed dead for a good majority of the attack – but his focus had been to get Alex to safety.

Something he had failed at, but John couldn't fault him when Alex had trapped him in a room.

Those weren't the actions of someone secretly plotting behind his back. John knew it.

"I know he's not responsible."

John jerked up, staring at Rodney. "What?"

"If you just listened for once…" Rodney grumbled. "Look, Daniels is playing bad cop. Someone has, once again, been manipulating things behind the scenes." He sounded quite put out that he hadn't yet been able to track it down. "They had access to information no one should have been able to access on the mainframe. Who knows what they did with it."

"Then why—"

"While the finer details of subterfuge are lost on me, if you read Lorne's brief, you would know that we're waiting for the next player to step up." Rodney pushed his way onto the bench next to John, before pulling out his data pad with a scowl. "And while sometimes I would rather we just do away with the whole lot of them…"

"From what we know, someone positioned as closely as Simmons was to Alex would make him a prime target." Lorne butted in, pushing away from the wall and putting off any pretenses of not paying attention. "Removal or snaking – and since one of those options was unavailable here, it was going to take time. Simmons has an impeccable record and was hand-picked by Mitchell. He has no close family connections that could've been used for blackmail. It's likely someone was looking for blackmail – waiting for him to slip up."

John raised a skeptical eyebrow, because then it would seem a daily diary of Simmons' movements would've been the better option.

"But," Lorne continued, "we haven't been able to track down who is responsible, and honestly, Simmons is probably safer with whoever thinking we have already made our decision."

"So, Simmons is the scapegoat. With a lack of suitable evidence Daniels will just ship him off because it's safer." John clenched his jaw. He knew, from interactions with Simmons and Alex's unhindered ramblings about the person he was probably closest to in the whole city, that the accusations were baseless. Strange though it was, there was nothing pointing from the detailed analysis of Alex's every movement to the plotting of the invasion or the sabotage of some of the primary structures.

But if Simmons was kept the scapegoat, sent back earth side… John knew Alex would never forgive him.

"Hey, let's back off on the Daniels hate."

John sent a glare at Lorne. It wasn't that he hated Daniels. They just… were working entirely at odds.

"Permission to speak freely sir?" Lorne hardly waited for the head nod. "I don't know what your personal beef is with the guy – seems a far shade better than Woolsey – but he is doing what's best for the city. Something you—" He gestured at John. "—seem to have forgotten about."

John flinched at that.

"I know there's been some bullshit about your past or whatever, and you've been worried about Alex, but… get it together, sir."

Get it together.

There was nothing together about any of this.

He leaned forward, fingers pressing into his temples.

There were still people he couldn't trust in his city.

Alex was going stir-crazy, but the moment he was out, John expected even more fallout.

And now….

"Right, that's enough of your useless pep talk." Rodney snapped, pushing Lorne back. "You have no idea—"

Lorne threw up his hands. "Yes, I have no idea. Because you two have locked down communication since that cryptic call from O'Neill at Christmas. I have been running interference with Woolsey for nearly a month, without even knowing what I'm trying to keep him from knowing. So yes, I have no idea what's been going on—"

"Alex is my son," John said quietly. "And O'Neill is apparently his grandfather."

Lorne froze.

"We found out at Christmas – and it's all entwined in some Trust plot that's been around for longer than Alex has been alive." It felt good to get that off his chest.

Lorne glanced between John and Rodney, incredulous expression on his face. John didn't exactly blame him. He had had weeks to get used to it and it still seemed impossible.

And that wasn't even touching the surface of the mind fuckery of the memory loss. People could just assume that he hadn't known about Alex. A one-night stand. But… it felt wrong because he had been there.

The door slid open and the last person John wanted to see at the moment stepped through.

"Right, did you fill him in?" It was pointed at Lorne, who still looked shell shocked. Daniels glanced between the three of them, all in various states of resignment. "And… did I miss something…?"

John snorted, before scrubbing a hand across his face. "Just getting Lorne up to speed on the Alex situation."

That earned him a careful head nod. "Right…"

"Wait, he knows? He knows?" Lorne demanded, looking between John and Daniels expectantly.

Daniels rolled his eyes. "Hello, ex-MI6 here. We crossed paths a few times."

"But about—" Lorne cut himself off, eyes darting to John.

"Yeah, that too," John muttered. Because how much further could this fuckery get? "Look, just…" He shook himself and tried to focus on the problem at hand. The problem of Simmons' existence. "I don't care what we do, Simmons can't take the fall for this. Alex trusts him." Unlike me, John thought bitterly to himself. That had been made clear in the past few days. "If there's any chance of Simmons getting sent off city…" There was a very real possibility that they could have a runaway on their hands – something that was a terrifying possibility when interstellar travel was as simple as walking through a gate.

"Then we need to set a trap," Daniels said, decisively. "And unfortunately, we can't tell either Simmons or Alex that there is a trap. All the evidence toward Simmons is circumstantial – but with the right words here and there, we should be able to get the message across to our target."

John crossed his arms. "We don't know who the target is." That was the whole point. If they knew who they were trying to hunt down, it would've been a sight easier.

"I've got my people on it."

My people.

Was this going to turn into a us versus them type deal?

"Your people." Rodney sounded equally skeptical.

"They're new in the city, people will talk. Nigel hasn't been visibly associated with me; he came in with the rest of the new recruits. He can get anyone to talk and will make sure the right information gets spread in the right places." Daniels glanced over his shoulder at the door. "We need to get back in there. Put Simmons in the brig and get Alex in for his statement as soon as possible. As soon as they know key players are on the move, they'll make their move."

"And who should I assign to Alex in the meantime?" Because there wasn't any way he was planning to leave him unguarded. Even if he had been in fighting condition, everyone was so used to Alex roaming the city with an escort, any change from the ordinary would be met with suspicion.

"Oh." A sneaking grin crossed Daniels' face. "I've got the perfect person in mind."

A/N: Ooh, the intrigue. You didn't think this was all going to be wrapped up nicely, did you? The real question is, who created the server and why?

I had more thoughts, but they've flown from my head – and you would probably just rather get this chapter sooner rather than later…