I just realized I had this chapter ready and completely forgot to upload in [checks notes] nearly a year! Oops!
John's glad Kieran seems to be settling in and keeping busy. Not just with schoolwork, but with other projects. Working with Radek on the jumpers and the—
"We have tunnels in our walls?"
That's good to know. That's very good to know. But how did she even figure that out?
Lorne shrugs. "I was on my way to lunch. I didn't ask too many questions."
"You said she crawled out of the wall."
"Yes sir," he says. "Scared the shit out of me."
For the sake of his friend and subordinate, John tries not to let how goddamn funny that is show on his face. Judging by the look on Lorne's face, he didn't completely nip that in the bud. He clears his throat. "I'll. Put teams together to map those tunnels. Make sure they're safe."
"Sounds good, sir."
"And uh. Sorry, Lorne."
"Thank you, sir."
The upcoming mission is a lowkey one. One of Teyla's off-world contacts has some intel. They're trustworthy. And frankly, more intel is good intel.
He fist bumps Kieran on his way out, telling her he figures this'll be short and sweet. A few hours, tops. Trek through the forest, get some information, get back in time for dinner, maybe watch a movie or two with Kieran.
John has a split second to register every nerve in his body catching fire before the overload snuffs itself out just as quickly.
He's out before he hits the ground.
John wakes up sitting. Judging from the way his ass his numb and his neck has a crick in it, he's been sitting there for a while. He can't see shit, and the bag on his head smells worse than shit.
Great.
The bag is ripped off, and it doesn't take much to adjust his eyes. The light isn't that bright. The ropes bite into the skin of his wrists. Really, the most uncomfortable thing is how his ass is numb. Most uncomfortable second only to the fact that these guys kidnapped him and his team.
John takes quick stock—they're in a cave. The guys towering over them are built like linebackers—cinderblocks for shoulders and with the jawline of a Lego man. Their clothes aren't uniforms or anything that suggested they were a unit. Rough patches of hard leather, rusted buckles and chains, roughly woven jackets of dry . . . whatever those fibers are. John's not a botanist.
Good news: they're not Genii. Bad news: definitely not Teyla's contacts. No idea who they are. No idea where they are.
"You guys okay?" John asks.
"Oh, yeah." McKay has enough energy to be himself, which is a good sign. "Fine."
John's eyes flick down to the dining table. It's huge, maybe the size of the one of the ones in his dad's house. The one they never used except for entertaining specific guests with specific linens and specific sets of china. "Seems like a whole lot of trouble to go through to get us to dinner. Not a talkative bunch, are you?"
One guy with dark hair and demeanor gruff enough John thinks he could munch on crayons like carrot sticks grunts. "If we release you from your bindings, do you promise not to attack us?"
"Sure," Ronon says with the most unconvincing scowl ever. John might be onto something about the crayon-munching, because the guys lurch forward like they're convinced.
"Yeah," John adds. "We promise."
The crayon munchers straighten to something almost like attention. Maybe their boss stepped into the room? Maybe they can reason or negotiate with them, but Ronon leaps to his feet—
"Before we untie them, they have to know that they're among friends."
John nearly lurches forward, the familiarity hitting his gut like a biker fist. "Ford?"
"You thought I was dead, didn't you Sheppard?"
John gets a read on his team, now that he can. They're about as shocked as he is. He knows that Wraith enzyme does to a person, but he wasn't sure how much Ford was betting against the house when he ran into the Wraith dematerialization beam. He hoped he'd run into Ford again.
He doesn't remember packing a monkey's paw in his stuff. What the hell? Kidnapping?
John doesn't really have an answer for him, and Ford jerks his chin at the table. His guys bring over plates of food. Plain meat and veggies. Guess spices are hard to come by when you're living in a cave.
"Guys, guys! Please eat!" The sunny smile on Ford's face drops, and John is staring at the hard, empty face of the young man who aimed his gun at someone in a wheelchair. "Eat."
Ford takes a bite off of Teyla's plate. Okay, so not poisoned. That's enough to get Ronon and McKay digging in. John's not hungry enough to ignore his gut feeling.
"Well, men, this used to be my team." There's a note of . . . nostalgia? Pride? John's not sure what he's hearing in Ford's voice; if he's actually hearing it or if it's just wishful thinking. Ford jerks his chin at Ronon. "Well, not this one . . . but I think he's okay too."
And then he smiles at him and everyone like they're all in on the joke. It's hilarious when you don't factor in the whole kidnapping thing.
"What is all this?" John asks. What's Ford's game. Really. He fought so hard not to come back and now . . .
"Just some local vegetables, a sort of alligator thing. It tastes like salted meat. It's good. Try it!"
"I'm not talking about the food." He knows that. He knows Aiden knows that. "What the hell is going on?"
"Who are these men?" Teyla demands. Woof. That's not a tone John hears from her often. And he would like to as little as possible, actually. "And why bring us here like this?"
"Whoa." Ford backs up, raising his hands up good-naturedly. Like he was telling a joke. Maybe it'd be funny if they weren't just kidnapped. "That's a lot of questions."
Ronon's glare only sharpens. "Pick one."
Ford snorts. "Pick one. That's good. Where'd you find him, Sheppard?"
You were there.
"Maybe you should start with how you managed to escape being culled by the Wraith dart?" It takes John a second to parse through the muffled syllables coming out of Rodney's mouth. He's working through a mouth full of food at lightspeed. "What? When I get nervous, I get hungry."
Didn't his parents ever tell him not accept food from strangers? Not that Ford is a stranger, but they're surrounded by strangers. And also—Ford had them kidnapped and brought to a goddamn cave.
Ford waves it off, like they're all friends here and they're all in on the joke. John feels more like the punchline. "I have no idea how long I was in the Dart. Next thing I knew, I was on a cruiser. And I was awake."
"It's the enzyme," Rodney says though another mouthful. "It makes you almost immune to the Wraith stunner, so when you dematerialize from the Wraith Dart, you're awake. As opposed to—"
"As opposed to dead." Ford's good-natured cheer evaporates as his face hardens. He's always on a razor's edge, disposition changing like the weather. Rodney shooting Ford probably doesn't help. "I cut open a drone's enzyme pouch, took my fill, and made my way off the ship." Ford grins again, looking at John so much like a kid. John's gut twists. Something about it . . . "You can get around pretty easy on a Wraith ship. They're not used to people making it aboard, so there's next to no security. I walked off with enough enzyme to last me a little while, tracked down the stargate, dialed the first friendly address I could remember."
Ford stands up straighter. John thinks he could be puffing his chest up a bit. He's certainly preening like a damn peacock. "I found these guys. I told them about the enzyme. How it makes you stronger, more aware, more resilient. How it would give us a fighting chance against the Wraith." He spreads his arms, gesturing to himself. "I mean, look at me. Look at me! I walked off a Wraith cruiser! It works!"
Ronon scans Ford's men before flicking back to Ford himself. "Wait a second. All your people here, all your men—they're all on the enzyme?"
"Of course," Ford says like it's the most obvious thing in the world. "As our numbers kept growing, we needed more and more of the enzyme."
"Aiden," Teyla sense with all the tense calm of having to explain to someone why they're a moron. "Do you mean to tell us that there are live Wraith here in this cave?"
"That's right."
"The Wraith can communicate with each other over a distance."
"But not between stars. They'd have to be in this solar system." Ford grins, as if there are zero flaws whatsoever in his plan and his little gotcha moment. He jabs a thumb at McKay, all friendly again. "You taught me that."
McKay mutters something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like good for me.
Ford chuckles. Yes, yes, scaring the shit out of everyone with the idea of live Wraith. That's real fucking funny. "What's the matter? They can't communicate if they're unconscious."
Yeah . . . that's only one of the issues they're working through right now. John tries not to twitch too much. "Why'd you jump us?"
Naturally, Ford waves him off. "Yeah . . . yeah, I'm sorry about that. It was the only way to get you here."
It's not . . . the only way. "Why didn't you just tell us where you were? You know we would have come."
We don't leave our people behind.
That sentiment doesn't seem to mean too much to Ford. He leans on the table, getting a bit in John's space and scoffs. "Yeah—you and a special ops team."
"No." That doesn't even sound convincing to John. "No."
Oh yeah. Nailed it.
"I know you think I'm crazy. I brought you all here to show you that you're wrong. I mean, do I look crazy? Do I seem . . . out of control?"
"Are we speaking in relative terms?" McKay asks. "Or, um . . ."
"Look . . ." Ford looks like he has to physically bite back a wave of annoyance. "Jace here has really fine-tuned the enzyme." He gestures to the gangliest member of the gang. Someone who looks smart enough to not munch on crayons, but John isn't sure how high that bar is. "We know how to administer it now, how to regulate it, refine it." Ford grins. It's an excited grin. It's like one of his grins . . . before. Now, it just feels foreboding. John doesn't like the way his gut turns, the way the hair on his arms stands on end. "We've even gotten so good, we can even lace food with it!"
The pin drops. John's stomach turns. Teyla, Ronon, and McKay freeze.
"What?" McKay goes an impressive five shades paler. He's translucent and red at the same time.
"I thought long and hard about how to show you that the enzyme was safe. Convince you that it was the first step to defeating the Wraith. So you'd convince Weir. Convince the military!"
"Are you out of your mind?" McKay's on his feet, his chair screeching on the stone floor.
"Hey," Ford says, like this is all perfectly fine. "Settle down, McKay."
"No, I will not settle down!" McKay shrieks. "I've been drugged against my will, you little punk!"
"You should not have done this, Aiden." Teyla says furiously. There's a look in her eye like she's seriously considering how many of these guys she could pull apart with her bare hands.
"Hey, be mad as you want. Couple of days, you'll be thanking me." Ford shrugs. "We'll all have a good laugh about this. Now, eat up."
Ford swaggers out, his guys shoving stunners in Ronon's face when he tries to follow.
Great. This is all just . . . great.
Unsurprisingly, McKay looks on the verge of a panic attack. Not that John can really blame him this time. "I'm itchy," he says frantically. "I'm itchy all over. This is exactly what happened when I toked pot once in college."
John's not sure how fast the enzyme is going to start kicking in. He only knows Ford got a gigantic dose to the point his body because physiologically dependent on it and—well, here they are. He feels fine for the time being."
He thinks.
Ford's guys get up and block his path, and John has to bite back his hackles rising. Him getting pissed isn't going to help anyone. Isn't going to get any of them home.
Ford lets him go, and John follows him into the cave.
"Look . . ." He's not good at this. He's not. But all John sees in front of him is a kid who needs help. Who needs to come home. And he has a kid waiting for him. "I know what you're trying to do. I get it. I do. But you're going about this all wrong. Weir isn't going to listen to us if we're all hopped up on the enzyme."
They all saw firsthand how Ford's judgement was compromised. The aggression. The paranoia. One of the kindest people John ever met, sliding into a temperamental might-makes-right mentality. The last thing they need is for more of them addicted to something like that.
The last thing Kieran needs to see is John hopped up on the enzyme. Not so soon after the bug debacle.
"Your food was clean."
"Why? Why me?" John believes him. The enzyme never made Ford dishonest. In fact, Ford always made his intentions very, very clear.
"You're going to be the witness," Ford says with perfect clarity. "You're going to be the one to tell Weir that her most trusted team has taken the enzyme and is better because of it."
Better is a relative term. And John doesn't like the silent or else hanging in the air either. It reminds John of the old videos of cult leaders like David Koresh. Ford's voice has that same half-desperate and half-assured quality of someone who thinks only they have the truth. Whatever "truth" means to Ford now.
"Look, buddy . . . why don't you come back with us? Have Beckett look you over. That's the best proof."
"No." Ford shakes his head. "No. I've thought this through. This is the plan."
"Look. I don't know what you're thinking—"
"You're free to roam around as much as you want. You're all a part of the team now."
Other than everyone shaking like kids that snuck a sip of their parent's coffee, they're fine. The guys left them alone. Gave them directions, actually. Ford's men camped themselves outside of room off-limits, but other than that, they could go wherever they wanted.
Including the exit.
Including the DHD.
Everyone's twitchy as they're waiting for McKay to work on the DHD. There's they could go anywhere they wanted, and then there's—
"Why aren't these guys watching us?" Ronon scans the meadow around them, but John doesn't think these guys really do subtle or sneaky too much. He's pretty sure he'd see their heads popping up out of the grass like woodchucks.
"Ronon is right," Teyla says. "They went to great trouble to get us here. Why would they allow us to leave?"
John has a gut feeling. He doesn't like it. "I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop."
"Oh, that little bastard." McKay crawls out of the DHD, beyond annoyed.
"There it goes."
"This is what I was afraid of."
"What'd he do?"
"He's taken all the necessary control crystals. Something I showed him how to do on a mission, I might add."
"Well, that's not good."
"That's the understatement of the year."
"All right." No gear. No radios. No way of knowing what planet they're on. Not ideal. "See what you can do."
"Why don't we just take them?" Ronon suggests. "All we've got to do is get our hands on one stunner and I can take them all."
"Yeah, maybe." If they're on the enzyme, he's not betting on them getting affected by Wraith stunners. "But if we mess it up, whatever trust we might have been given will disappear."
Normally John doesn't have a problem with the long con. He has a time limit now.
John finds the rest of his team in that dining room they were dragged to.
"Seriously—I'm getting uh . . . I'm getting chills and hot flashes, chills and hot flashes, again and again." Rodney says, pacing agitatedly. If anything, his face looks redder. Must be in his hot flash phase. "None of you are feeling that?"
Ronon is slumped over his chair, looking like he did a keg stand on an empty stomach. John makes a mental note that the sweats are a pretty persistent side effect. No thanks. "The enzyme side effects are going to be the least of his concerns if he keeps this up."
"I know." John tries for reassuring. Or at least understanding. "Just be patient."
"Historically, that hasn't been a strength for me."
Well, he's got self-awareness going for him. "I know."
Ford followed John in his heels. "Sheppard, Teyla. Kanayo's running off-world. I want you to go with him."
Oh, and ford was so generous giving them laced food and letting them wander the planet with no means of being able to leave or contact their people for help. "Why?"
"We're running an op. I thought you might want to see the men in action."
"Sure. Wherever you need us."
"Just give us some weapons, and—"
Ford cuts Teyla off with an unimpressed look. "Nice try. No, you're going to hang back and watch with Kanayo. Don't worry. You won't be in any danger."
Oh, of course. Why did John think it was going to be anything else but another opportunity to sell the enzyme to them. "That's a load of my mind."
Either the enzyme wiped Ford's sense of sarcasm out of his brain or he chose to ignore it. "Good."
"What about us?" McKay frantically points between him and Ronon. John can't exactly blame him. Ford's guys seem less and less like pleasant company. John's not a fan of getting split up, either.
"Jace will give you the grand tour, show you want we've done with the place. How does that sound?"
"It sounds delightful," McKay says through clenched fists and grit teeth.
"Okay, good." Ford beams. "Then if Sheppard tries anything off-world, you'll be nice and close for me to kill you both."
"Can't think of a better way of spending the afternoon."
Kanayo points his gun around threateningly, which infuriates John to no end. He can't afford to snap right now, not when things are tentatively . . . well, stable and calm aren't words he'd go for.
Thank god for Ronon, because no one really bats an eye when he knocks a chair over and passes Kanayo with a stink eye that would get John smacked around.
It's nighttime when Kanayo drags John and Teyla off-planet. John isn't sure how solid the plan is, not that Ford or Kanayo or anyone told them anything. He's not surprised, but boy does he wish he had more to work with. Kanayo takes them through a forest, gives them a gruff, half-hearted warning. If anything happened to John or Teyla, he's not sure how sorry Kanayo would really be.
From Ford's point of view, that's more leverage over Rodney and Ronon lost. If they don't want to deal with an angry Ronon hopped up on Wraith enzyme, then maybe there is real incentive to keep them alive. And Ford is banking on John being able to sweet-talk Elizabeth into letting everyone get a dose of Wraith enzyme.
Okay. So, they're all tentatively fine. For now. John doesn't have faith that Ford's disposition won't change like the weather.
Kanayo seems to know where he's going. It seems Ford has had this place staked for a while now.
They're ducked behind some foliage, catching glimpses of men in uniforms with caches of equipment. The uniforms are drab but distinctive gray canvas with brown edging, and John recognizes those square-toed boots anywhere.
"Are those guards Genii?" John asks.
"Yes." Kanayo says.
Ford'll pick a fight with just about anyone, huh?
"What exactly are we doing here?" Teyla asks.
"The Genii have spies all over the galaxy." Kanayo doesn't seem too put out about having to explain. Right now, he's the only way John and Teyla have to get back to Rodney and Ronon. He can indulge their questions as much as he feels like it. Or doesn't. "If, for whatever reason, one of them can't make it back to the Genii home-world, their leaders have established safe houses. If the need a place to reload on gear or hide, they come here."
"That's useful." John says.
"Yeah," Kanayo says, "We've found it to be an excellent source of information and supplies."
"How did you find them in the first place?" Teyla asks.
"I was a Genii spy."
"If you're one of them, why don't you just walk in there?" John asks.
"Well, I used to." Kanayo's lips twists into something like disdain. Or a scowl. It's a look John recognizes whenever he had a conversation with his dad. Or something like it. "Eventually, they realized I'd betrayed them."
It's a good bet that the Genii took a look at one of their own hopped up on Wraith enzyme and told him to get lost. "I can see how they would."
"We rely on raids now."
No one else wanted to play ball? Ford has some pretty good numbers, but it doesn't seem like people are coming out in full force to get shot up with the enzyme. Maybe advertising is a tall order. Even at their most stable, none of the men seemed all that . . . stable.
"Why?" John asks. "What more do you guys want?"
"We don't have all the pieces we need for the Lieutenant's plan."
The Lieutenant? Ah. So Ford is still attached to his old rank. John might have seen his dog tags hanging around his neck. It might be enough to get Ford home. Get him help.
"Right . . . and which plan would that be again?" John does his level best not to sound too skeptical. Judging by the disdainful look on Kanayo's face, he doesn't think he does a very good job.
"All will be revealed when the time is right."
"Oh good." John says with about as much fake cheer as he can muster. "I'd hate for things to be revealed too early."
Kanayo ushers them to another flank, another opening. This one seems to be in the blindspot of some guards. Though, given how eventful this posting seems to be doesn't really say a lot. Not that John has ever been too impressed with Genii operations.
"So, uh, what's the plan?" John asks.
"We take them by force." Kanayo says simply.
Oh. Right. Wraith enzyme makes for all brawn, no brain. John really shouldn't be surprised. "That's some groundbreaking strategy there."
"I think the colonel is interested in the type of attack." Teyla says.
"We plan to overpower them."
"I think it's best if we just watch."
Kanayo speaks into his comm device. "Now."
The plan is less thought-out than anything John was expecting, which only means John was either giving them too much credit, or was just hoping for the best.
"What kind of plan is that?" John asks.
"One that works." Kanayo says, like one of his own men didn't just eat shit.
"One of your men got hit."
Kanayo shrugs. "Well, it should be safe for us now."
If Kanayo isn't going to do it, John will. When he presses his fingers to the man's carotid artery . . . no pulse. Nothing. "This guy's dead."
"So you see?" Teyla says. "You are not invincible."
"We're close enough." Kanayo brushes her off.
"There are skills to the art of war, Kanayo."
Kanayo whirls around, getting in Teyla's face. John lurches to his feet, though he's not sure there's a lot he can do to a bully hopped up on Wraith enzyme.
"Don't you tell me who to run my mission." Kanayo's insistent. Defensive. John's not sure how much of that is enzyme talking or if Kanayo's own personality is just naturally that . . . difficult. "You're just here to watch."
They're saved by another one of Ford's men bringing over a metal case. Kanayo's demeanor switches from aggressive to smug in an instant. "Look familiar?"
It's Lieutenant Cadman's favorite stuff. John's mouth dries. "That's our C-4."
"We're stealing it back."
"For what purpose?" Teyla asks.
John braces himself. There's no way Ford is planning a strike on Atlantis or her people. That would defeat the purpose of getting Elizabeth to implement the enzyme. No. It's something else. Something just as big. And just as stupid.
"For the hive."
"As in hive ship?" John asks incredulously.
"Yeah. That's the lieutenant's plan. You're going to help us destroy a Wraith hive ship."
John's stomach sinks. He just wants to go home.
After a whole night of Kanayo jerking their chains around, they don't even get to rest. He and Teyla are herded into the main room. He's thankful that Rodney and Ronon look like they're in one piece. He's not excited to hear about whatever half-backed plan Ford cooked up.
He's always been a smart kid. But the Wraith enzyme makes him too sure of himself. His men don't mind letting each other die as long as they achieve whatever Ford's endgame is. That's not the kind of command John wants to bring to Atlantis.
Ford needs help. Not yes-men.
"One of the added bonuses of killing the Wraith is every now and again, you get your hands on a couple of these." Ford holds up a wraith data storage device. "Now, thanks to Jace—" Ford nods at the blond man John would take for a stoner at any college campus. "And some of the computers we borrowed from the Genii, we've been able to figure out the exact flight path of one of their hive ships."
"It's decimated all inhabited worlds in its path." Jace says.
"It has to be stopped." Ford says.
"I've been able to calculate that in the next several days, it'll be forced to make a hyperspace pause very near an uninhabited planet that happens to have a stargate."
"We gate to that planet, get on the hive ship, plant the C-4 in the dart bay, and get out," Kanayo says.
"We could save thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of lives," Jace adds.
Ford looks back at John, beaming with pride. "So?"
John's not sure whether he should be nice about this or not. "Wow."
"'Wow?'" Ford repeats incredulously.
"You heard me."
McKay huffs. "Let me see if I can couch what Colonel Sheppard mean by 'wow' in more explicit terms." He crosses his arms, which means that anyone that knows McKay is in for his . . . McKay-ness. "That is a terrible plan."
Teyla tries to diffuse the situation, but Rodney already threw a tank of gasoline into the fire. He steamrolls over her anyway.
"It's a terrible plan, made all the more frightening by the fact that you think it's a good plan."
"What's wrong with it?" Ford demands, like he can't believe anyone could possibly have an issue with it.
"What's wrong with it?" Rodney repeats. "Look. Let's, just for a second, give in to reckless abandon and assume that it would be possible to plant a single charge large enough to destroy an entire hive ship."
"We're planning on secondary explosions in the dart bay." Jace says, like a Rodney McKay that's on a roll would give a shit.
"Regardless, the hive ship will be on a hyperspace pause, yes, but it will not enter the planet's atmosphere, nor will it take up any sort of stable orbit. It will be flying through space, which means that unless your enzyme allows you to jump a lot higher than you've let on—"
"We have a spaceship," Ford says. He's got a smile on his face like he knew this was coming, that he was just letting McKay do his thing.
"Oh yeah? Really? What's it made of, huh? Bark?"
Ford laughs. "No. It's real, McKay. And in fact, it's the only ship I'd feel comfortable using on a mission like this."
They all follow Ford into an open meadow. A couple men throw off a camouflage cover of vines and leaves woven together, revealing the pointy, distinctive shape of a Wraith dart.
"Okay," John says. It's something. "Where'd you get it?"
"Does it matter?" Ford fires back.
"None of us have had much success flying it." Kanayo says. "We've banged it up pretty bad on the last couple of landings. It's in need of some repairs."
"And a real pilot."
Ah. "This is why you brought us here." John puts it together. Something . . . impressive enough to get Ford's foot in the door, something cobbled together enough it seems like it'll work. And maybe it would, but there's too many holes, too many variables. And frankly, John doesn't trust people whose dispositions change at the drop of a hat.
"It's the reason I waited till now, yes."
Kanayo nods at McKay. "Assuming this guy can get it working again."
"He can," Ford says. Something like pride or nostalgia colors his voice. "These people are the best at what they do."
Kanayo turns to John, who's entirely unexcited about being faced with his bad breath again. "Look. You fly it, you scoop us up, you take us up to the hive, you drop us all off. All we need is time to lay the charge. We'll be in and out of there before the Wraith have any idea what's going on."
"It's perfect." Ford beams.
"It is far from perfect," McKay says.
John's gears start ticking. He's not blind. He's noticed Ford has been constantly looking to him for approval. Or something like that. Whether or not he admits it, Ford misses Atlantis. Misses his family back on Earth. Ford's brain has been hijacked by the effects of the enzyme, but it's still Ford. Best case scenario, they get Ford home and get him help. Worst case scenario, it's an escape plan.
"But it is possible," John says.
"Colonel." Teyla injects as much doubt as she can into a single word. It's dangerously effective.
"Are you seriously considering this?" Rodney demands.
"It's on it's way to a culling, Rodney," John says.
"Aren't you the one not taking the enzyme?" McKay asks shrilly. "You're supposed to be the clear voice of reason here!"
"Look, can you fix it?" Ford asks impatiently.
"Even if I could, I wouldn't. I'm sorry. Drug me all you want. I'm not doing this."
John watches as McKay storms off. "Let me talk to him. He'll come around."
Ford lets him go off. John catches up to him pretty quickly. It's an open meadow, and the Atlantis expedition uniform sticks out like a sore thumb. John doesn't blame Rodney for not picking up what he's putting down, but come on, man. He usually has a plan. Most of the time.
"Look, maybe you are on the enzyme. Maybe Ford lied, because no rational person would think that was a good plan!"
"Look," John says back. "A million things can go wrong. I know that. But just—" Rodney picks up the pace, practically speed-walking off to go sulk somewhere or something and cutting John off while he's at it. "Look—stop! Shut up and listen!"
John grabs him by the shoulders and shakes him a little. McKay still looks like he's going to throw a tantrum. His shoulders are drawn to his ears. John has half a mind to box them. "If you fix that dart, we all get out of here. I know it's risky, but Ford's not thinking straight, so—"
"What are you talking about?"
"I'll insist you're all on the away team," John says. "I'll scoop you up, and instead of flying out to the hive ship, we fly to Atlantis."
"How?"
John tamps down an exasperated sigh. "That dart's got to have its own DHD, right?"
"Of course."
The fight goes out of Rodney damn near immediately. His stance relaxes. He looks less red. "You know, you see . . . I would have thought of that myself before I became a drug addict."
"I'm sure you would have."
"I'm sorry. Alright." Rodney takes a deep breath. "Okay."
John pats him on the back. He just needs to get them home.
John gets pointed in the direction of the cave Ford is using as a personal office when they get back. He's studying some kind of document. John doesn't particularly care about that.
Ford, on the other hand, looks very interested to see him back. "How'd that go?"
"Well, he'll do it." John leans against the desk. "But, we have conditions."
"What?" Ford drops the papers impatiently.
"Dial back McKay's enzyme doses."
"No!" John does his best not to flinch back. God, he does not like how Ford's moods change on a dime. Reminds him too much of his father, but more petulant. It's annoying.
"Look," John says as patiently as he can. He has to play nice. "We're under some time constraints here. I'm not saying the enzyme wouldn't help. I'm just saying we need him standing still and thinking. Not running laps because it feels good."
Ford seems to take that just fine. "Ronon and Teyla?"
John has to throw Ford a bone. He can't dig his heels in too much, otherwise Ford will just walk everything back. Maybe John really has picked up a thing or two from Elizabeth. "We stick to the plan there."
"Fine. What else?"
"I'll fly it, that's obvious. But I want McKay, Teyla, and Ronon on the strike team."
"It's not a good mission for McKay." John tries not to stare at Ford's single, solid black eye. The mottled skin around it. Tries to assure himself that he's just imagining the way Ford's eyes narrow at him. "Could get rough in there."
"Look, if suddenly we need a door open or a computer hacked, McKay should be there to do it. That's why he's on my team in the first place."
"Is that it?"
John nods. He's not going to push his luck anymore than that, but Ford shakes on it. John hopes it still means something to him.
The next several days pass in a numb blur. There's not much John can contribute to on his own besides talking Ford down from some more . . . reckless points of his plan. He's so cocksure that he has the right answers that John has to keep nudging him from doing something colossally stupid. And even then, John can't guarantee that Ford won't fly off the handle when they actually get boots on the ground.
Rodney has been working on the dart with the blond, stoner-looking guy. Jace. Right. Teyla and Ronon, hopped up on the enzyme as much as they are, have been going toe to toe with Ford's men for shits and gigs. Or maybe Ford's men can keep track of how well they match up.
Well. Ronon could go toe to toe with them before they put him on the enzyme.
As Rodney gets closer to fixing the dart, Ford seems to pull aside more often. This time, it's about the hive ship schematics. Ford goes over their points of entry and infiltration, their intel on guard patrol routes and rotations.
"It's a good plan." John admits, hopefully sounding less begrudging than he feels.
Ford seems to perk up a bit with pride. "Couldn't have done it without you, sir."
"Well." John's mouth presses into that kind-of, not-quite-a-smile he always gave his father's work friends. "I'm glad you trusted me enough to bring me here."
Something in Ford's face shifts. It's not the cocksure, unflappable, full-of-himself air he's had this whole time. Ford looks . . . unsure of himself. Small. He looks young.
"What's wrong?" John asks.
"I want to go home."
John nearly shakes Ford by the shoulders at that. Nearly yells out loud in triumph. God, John just wants to get out of this damn cave and go home.
"Well . . . then let's go!" John tries to dial back the enthusiasm. "Give McKay the DHD crystals and let's get out of here. I can have you back on Earth within an hour."
"No. We have to do this first." There's a clench in Ford's jaw, a set to his shoulder. "I have to prove to them that we can do this."
Who's them?
"You don't have to prove anything to anyone, Lieutenant. I saw your cousin and your grandparents while I was back there. They miss you . . . a lot. This whole MIA thing is killing them."
MIA . . . John's been losing the track of the days they've been stuck in this damn cave, but he wouldn't be surprised if they were reaching a week or so.
He and Kieran just worked through a rough patch, and he's sorry he's putting her through so much, so soon already. John very nearly considers playing that card. The Ford he knew would pout like a kicked puppy caught in the rain and fold immediately. The Ford now . . .
John keeps that card close to his chest.
Safe to say John isn't getting anymore words out of Ford, and he isn't interested in waxing his own life story to someone who might not even appreciate it.
Rodney is still out finishing up the last kinks on the dart. From the lack of grunting and yelling, John figures Teyla and Ronon are done with their daily sessions of beating the shit out of Ford's crayon munchers. It's lunchtime, not that John's all that hungry.
Luckily, Ford has stuck to his not wanting John on the enzyme. John knows how unpleasant he can be when he's hangry, never mind actually having aggro steroids pumping through his system.
"Well . . . part of me thinks he brought us here 'cause he knew we'd bring him back. I think subconsciously he knows what our plan is, and he's fine with it."
John looks up, because he hasn't received any responses like Wow Sheppard! There might be a chance we can drag him back to Atlantis and we can tell his family he's alive! Instead, they're posturing at each other the way John has seen Ford and his men posture at each other. Ronon snatches some food from Teyla's plate.
"Give it back."
Ronon sticks the food in his mouth, chewing obnoxiously. "Or what?"
There's a beat. Teyla smiles. And slugs Ronon in the face hard enough he stumbles back.
"Hey!" John yells. Ronon grabs Teyla by the wrist and yanks her across the table, throwing her to the floor. And then they're going at it, exchanging blows like they're kids in a school yard. Or a prison yard. "Knock it off guys! Stop—"
John is not qualified to break up fights between two roided-up teammates that can already kick his ass on a normal day. Today, he eats Ronon's elbow to the face for his efforts, and is knocked on his ass.
"What the hell's gotten into you two?" John works his way up to his feet, sitting in a chair. "Oh, right." Drugs. "Never mind."
"Are we gonna talk about this?" Ronon asks.
"About what?"
"The enzyme works. No one's saying it, but we're all thinking it. It works."
"I must admit," Teyla says, bouncing on her feet. "I have noticed an increased amount of strength."
"Maybe Ford is right. Maybe it's worth looking into, seeing what this stuff can do."
John hopes he keeps the skepticism off his face. It's not like there's a mountain of evidence on why the Wraith enzyme is a terrible idea or anything.
"They were an hour late delivering our doses yesterday, and I felt awful." Teyla paces back and forth, agitated. "It frightens me how reliant my body has become on the enzyme always being in my system. What would happen if we suddenly could not receive it?"
"If the only negative is that you've got to keep taking it, I'd want to stay on it."
Ronon didn't show any signs of an addictive personality before. Not a good sign.
"What about you?" John asks Teyla.
"The fact that I'm even considering it makes me feel—"
Teyla doesn't get to finish that sentence, because Rodney sweeps in, telling them the dart is ready to fly.
Like everything that has to do with the Wraith, the dart cockpit is creepy. The dash is bulbous in all the wrong places (every place), with browns and greens that remind John of mildew and mold, and reds that look too much like flesh. It feels like he's sitting in the Sarlacc Pit, and the ship he's supposed to fly is supposed to start digesting him.
Jace tries to talk John through things, but sometimes he talks in circles in a way that tries his patience—it's saying something, when he works with McKay on a near-daily basis.
He just wants to get home and assure Kieran she's not losing another parent again.
He's saved by McKay shoving Jace impatiently out of his way. "This is probably going to make you a little uneasy, but when the canopy forms, it's perfectly opaque."
John makes a face. What's the point of Wraith having eyes if they don't use them to fucking fly? Then again, every single drone he's ever seen has a creepy mask covering their whole face. How do they even out of those? "Then how am I going to fly this thing?"
"This whole thing is one giant heads-up display. It'll show you all the pertinent information that you need."
"Yeah, you mean in Wraith."
"Yeah, which is why I've installed an interface to translate a lot of the readouts."
John tries not to think about the probability of flying into the middle of deep space nowhere or, best case scenario, just crashing in to the hull of the hive ship in a pathetic ember of glory. "By 'a lot' do you mean 'all'? Because my Wraith's not that good."
"Enough to get you by."
John's wondering what "enough" means in McKay world when Ford comes up to the cockpit.
"I knew you could do it," Ford says. "Right on time. Kanayo will get you suited up. You should get ready."
"Right." McKay fidgets and glances back at John. He makes a valiant effort at not looking nervous. "Great."
"He seems a little nervous."
"You know McKay." John makes himself look busy, tapping the tablet and getting familiar with the readouts. "He'll be fine."
"You know how to dial the DHD on this thing?"
The buttons are in the same order as the DHD in Atlantis, more or less. "Got the addresses memorized."
"Good, good. Listen, I should probably tell you . . . there's been a slight change of plans."
John doesn't feel too concerned about it. And maybe that should have been the first red flag. "Oh, yeah?"
Ford has his men aiming guns at McKay with a word. Ronon pulls his weapon, but he's got guns aimed at him as soon as he moves.
"What the hell are you doing?" John demands.
"McKay's going to stay here while we do the op." Shit. Fuck. "Take him!"
McKay protests and keeps protesting even after Ford's goon squad drags him away by the arms.
"That wasn't part of the plan."
"Neither was you heading back to Atlantis." Ford looks at John with a sneer. "You didn't really buy the whole 'I want to go home speech, did you? Huh?"
He did. He really did.
And John really, really wants to get home.
"You're underestimating me, Sheppard," Ford continues. "You really need to stop doing that. Complete the mission, and McKay lives. You might even get to see your kid again."
John only stares. How did he even—
Ford pulls out Kieran's photograph, the one John keeps his vest pocket. It's the photo that was binder clipped onto the physical file Elizabeth gave him. It's a yearbook photo from her freshman year, before her study abroad in Japan, and she looks younger in it than she does now. He's since put it in a protective sleeve, but it's the only photo he has of her.
"Found this in your pocket when we jumped you guys," Ford says. "Didn't know you had a kid."
John didn't either until recently. "It wasn't really any of your business."
Ford shrugs, carelessly tossing the photo into John's lap. "If you had a kid, why join the expedition? But that's not my business either, right?"
John wants to believe that the kid lieutenant that jumped backwards into the stargate is still in there somewhere, beneath the bluster of the Wraith enzyme. It's just getting harder and harder to see. "No." John grits his teeth. He entertains the thought of shooting Ford and dragging him back through the gate, but that has as much a chance of succeeding as Ford's plan. "We can't complete the mission, Ford. It's a bad plan!"
"You said it was a great plan!"
John matches Ford's sneer. "You didn't buy the whole 'it's a great plan' speech, did you?"
It's a real low blow, but it seems to cut into Ford all the same. Maybe he is in there. Maybe not. John's starting to care less. Maybe he should be feeling guilty about it, but he can't bring himself to as he tucks Kieran's photo away."
He's getting home. He will.
"Get this dart in the air and come scoop us up. Oh . . . and the dart DHD only dials to the planet we're going to and back here, just in case McKay's life isn't enough to get you to do the right thing." Why does Ford have to be so goddamn smug? "You might even see your kid again."
John's jaw clenches, and Teyla steps forward to put a pause on John's fantasy of socking Ford in the jaw. "Aiden, what are you doing?"
"Just making sure you guys hold up your end of the bargain." Ford nods to his men. "It's okay. Give them back their weapons."
"Are you sure?" Kanayo asks.
"Yeah. If we're going to do this, we've all got to work together." Ford hands his pistol out to John, grip first. "Good luck to us all."
John has half a mind not to take the weapon, half a mind to take it and sock Ford with it. It's easy for Ford to talk about teamwork when his men are the ones holding weapons on Ronon, Teyla, and himself. He feels less like a teammate and more like a hostage.
John takes the pistol anyway.
He hopes he can walk away from this one alive.
The dart doesn't handle as nicely as a puddle jumper, but it's hard to match up to a ship that John is sure can read his mind half the time. Rodney wasn't kidding about the opaque canopy, but John still hates it.
He's literally flying blind.
"This is going to take some getting used to," he mutters, more for his own sanity than anything else. The canopy streams info above his head, but it's all in Wraith, and he figures McKay's program translates the necessities. Until the data stops. "Come on." John has to resist the urge the bang on the dash like an old TV. "We were getting along so well."
A big AUTOPILOT ENGAGING flashes on the screen, which is not helpful at all. For all he knows, he's being launched into the sun. He doesn't know how these systems work, or how to override them.
"R2, I need you to turn the autopilot off—Now!" He waits a beat, and really misses when a ship could read his mind. "Worth a shot . . ."
He can't steer, he can't see. He can only watch as the dart flies toward a red point on McKay's interface. He has hunch it's the hive, and the thrum and upward jolt more or less confirms they're in the hangar. So John assumes.
Rematerialize cargo? Flashes onscreen. The obvious choice is yes. John can't see or control where the ship is headed, so he hopes he gets everyone on solid ground.
"You guys okay?" John asks into his radio.
"No, we're not okay." Ford's voice is biting and accusatory. "You beamed half of us off the edge of the platform."
John's stomach drops. I just want to get my team home. "Teyla and Ronon?"
Ford scoffs. "Is that all you care about? You murdered my men!"
"I've lost all control of the dart—I had to release you blind."
"Maintain radio silence until we lay the charge."
"Negative. We need to stay in contact. They're—"
Click.
"Ford?" Maybe it's a good thing Ford turned off his radio while they're separated in enemy territory. It'll keep him from hearing all the choice words John has for him. "Damn it!"
To top it all off, the display flashes EXIT CRAFT FOR INSPECTION, and there's no Yes/No menu under it.
"I'd prefer not to."
OPENING CANOPY.
Great!
The canopy disappears to reveal two Wraith soldiers. There's a beat, and John can tell they're as dumbfounded as he feels. "You mind checking the oil?"
John doesn't give them a chance to respond, unloaded a few rounds into each of them. Nearly immediately, a high-pitched grating siren goes off.
This is not good.
John hopes he's subconsciously memorized the schematics better than he thinks he did. The last thing he needs is to get lost alone on a hive ship. Actually, the last thing he needs right now is to get found. Getting lost is problem for later John.
His radio crackles as he ducks into a corridor.
"Sheppard, you there?"
Thanks for the concern, Ford. "I think I might have set the alarm off. You guys be careful, because there's probably some guards on the way."
If the Wraith made John's position, there's probably Wraith headed for the others too. He can only dodge the foot soldiers for so long. More round the corner as John unloads. P-90 fire cuts through their armor just fine, but if more keep pouring out . . . well, he's already in trouble. He's already gone through one mag, and pops a spare in.
Finally, he gets a second to breathe. "Ford, what's your position? Ford?"
No response. Best case scenario, they're engaging with the Wraith. Worst case scenario, they're already dead. With Ronon and Teyla and everyone still hopped up on their enzyme does, dead is unlikely. Combat or capture is likely.
John's second to catch is breath is up as Wraith growls reverberate in his head like a Humvee. "Ah, damn it."
Fuck it, actually, John thinks to himself as he lobs a hand grenade around a corner, moves in, and cleans up shop. Got to keep moving.
A still target is a dead one.
A sharp but not unfamiliar pain lights up John's nervous system and everything goes white.
As John hits the ground, he remembers that a moving target can still be an unlucky one.
John comes to, blinking awake. He's lying on something . . . someone's leg? Teyla's leg. Parts of his body are dull with pins and needles, but that's pretty par for the course of getting hit with a Wraith stunner.
"Are you alright?" Teyla asks.
John works his way to sitting. Ford and his men are there too, awake and pacing restlessly in the limited real estate. The enzyme is supposed to make someone resistant to a Wraith stunner. The fact that they were hit either means that they were overwhelmed, or that their enzyme dose is wearing off already. "We're in a holding cell?"
"Yes."
"On a hive ship."
"Mmhm."
It's not the worst-case scenario, but John certainly doesn't like the situation they're in. "Well then, no, I'm not doing so good."
As John gets to his feet, Ford rounds on him. Jeez, give a guy a chance to breathe first.
"I can't believe you screwed up!"
"I did what?"
"You set off the alarm," Ford says stubbornly. John called him a kid in the past, but he's reminded of a toddler with a stinking attitude. "You ruined the mission."
If there's one thing John hates, it's getting blamed for things that aren't his fault. "The dart when on autopilot the second I got close to the hive. You're lucky I was able to get you out!"
That knocks some of the wind out of Ford's sails, but not all of the attitude. "Well, why would it do that? Why would it go on autopilot?"
John shrugs. "That's what jumpers do when they gate to Atlantis."
"Why didn't you say something?"
"Why didn't I say something?" John repeats incredulously. Like when you were dematerialized?
"You want me to fail," Ford insists. "You want me to look bad."
Something in John snaps. He never considered himself to have much of a temper. Temper means loss of control, it's ugly, it reveals your hand, et cetera. But Ford in his druggie haze can't see past his own two feet, even if there's a cliff right next to him. Ford voluntold them for a suicide mission, and John sure as hell does not want to die in a hive ship in the middle of fucking nowhere.
"That's right, you snot-nosed brat," John begins sarcastically. "I'd put my team's life on the line just to prove you wrong." He takes a step, getting in Ford's face. God, doesn't John just want to knock him to the ground. "I have a kid I'd leave an orphan just to get the last word. Yeah, I want to go home, and I don't really care if your damn suicide plan succeeds. You made the bad plan; you deal with the bad plan."
"How do you expect me to believe you cared about your team's lives when you didn't care enough about whoever you knocked up to know you had a damn kid?"
John steps into Ford's space, anger and fury coiling through his body like tempered steel. "Keep my kid out of your fucking mouth. And her mother. You don't know a damn thing about them."
He's not shaking, but he can feel the tremor underneath his skin like a damn threatening to burst.
In another life, John would be nicer. Understanding, even. In this one, wayward kid or not, Aiden Ford crossed a line. "Suck it up and shut up, Ford. You can get help or you can walk away."
John doesn't even get the pleasure of being so scathing Ford shits himself—or at least backs down.
"We've got company," Ronon says from the bars. Veins? Flesh? John doesn't want to think too hard about it.
A Wraith approaches, a higher ranking one in black robes. Ronon moves to block its line of sight.
"Move away," the Wraith says simply.
"What do you want?"
The Wraith smiles. "The one who flew the ship."
John can hear Ronon bare his teeth. "Why don't you start with me?"
The prison cell . . . veins recede into the walls without so much as a gesture or a command. A drone comes up and hits Ronon with a stunner before he can so much as lurch forward. The blast doesn't knock him out, but it's enough to make him fall forward. The blast doesn't knock him out, but it's enough to make him fall to the floor in pain.
"Wait, wait, wait." John steps forward, putting himself between the Wraith and the others. "You want me."
The Wraith in the robes steps forward and . . . sniffs John. Deeply. Like he's a well-cured sausage. A couple of guards come in and frog march John away.
He's led to a dark, empty room. Empty save for the platform in the middle, which the guards shove him onto. Maybe Wraith would benefit from watching some HGTV. John doesn't get the idea they have a strong sense of interior design.
John turns, and a Wraith queen practically materialized in front of him. He nearly jumps out of his skin, but mentally pats himself on the back for not even twitching a muscle. He swears she wasn't there before.
Before John can even get a witty quip in, the queen raises her hand to his face.
The thing about Wraith mental control is that it feels like pins and needles in the brain. Numb—until it hurts. And as much as John has had some practice resisting, it doesn't take long before John's knees hit the floor.
The Wraith queen bares her teeth.
John isn't the praying type, but he hopes to whoever might be listening that he gets home alive.
The next chapter is in it's home stretch, but who knows when I finish it up. See you then, and as always you can find me on Tumblr superwrites!