Unexpected by Oparu
Author's Chapter Notes: Elizabeth leads the memorial service for Earth. Jack helps John understand some things. Carson studies the database and starts to put together the puzzle.
Sorry it's been awhile, the holidays caught up to me and my beta. (yay Shannon!)
Sorry it's been awhile, the holidays caught up to me and my beta. (yay Shannon!)
"...any questions?" Ronon waited half a moment before he slapped the table and stood up. "No, good, alright, we'll be back."
Teyla watched him with veiled amusement as she translated his meaning. "It will take almost two days to reach the territory of Michael's hive ship. We do not know how long it may take to contact them. Hopefully we will succeed in convincing them that Atlantis has gone renegade and is ready to give up the location of Earth..."
"Think rebel thoughts," John teased her as he fidgeted with the handle of his cup.
"We'll see your team on the Daedalus in an hour?" Caldwell checked as he started to stand. "If you'll excuse me, Sir, Ma'am," he paused and nodded to Jack and Elizabeth. "I have preparations to make before takeoff. My pilot hasn't taken off from a space station before." He glanced politely around the table and left the conference room.
"I assume you have a team prepared?" Jack asked Teyla as she too started to stand up.
"Ronon, one of Doctor Beckett's medics, myself, and Colonel Sheppard volunteered to fly the jumper." Teyla answered quickly. "We thought keeping the team small would minimize the risk."
Jack coughed slightly before taking a sip of water from his cup. "I'm sorry, something in my throat," he excused easily. "It was thoughtful of you to volunteer, Colonel, but I'm going to send Major Lorne instead. Teyla, Ronon, I wish you well."
Elizabeth took her cue from the general. "You're all dismissed, thank you," she said as she stood slowly. Her hands stayed on the table; white fingers supporting her weight as she waited for her head to clear.
John had meant to let her get more sleep; start the meeting later in the day, but there was so much to do. She'd crawled into bed next to him last night and just lay there awake while he tried to finish his agenda for the day. He'd tried to talk, but she just wanted to put her head on his chest. He wasn't used to the quiet Elizabeth. The woman who only seemed to want to be near him; without speaking or even looking at his face, didn't seem to fit with the rest of her.
She touched his shoulder, smiling quietly before she left. It was a little gesture, her fingers against his arm, but it distracted him enough that he missed the glare he was getting from across the table.
"Colonel," Jack barked as John started to leave. "Have a seat."
Startled, John returned from the doorway and flopped into a chair. "Yes, Sir," he replied quickly and watched the general with confusion.
"Tell me why you thought it would be a good idea to volunteer to fly the jumper on this mission?" Jack demanded immediately after the doors sealed around them. "Actually, do it without the word 'thought' because I'm sure that was absent from your brain."
"I'm the best pilot we have, Sir," John defended himself without really know why he was under fire. His hands found their way into his lap as Jack circled behind him.
"What part of this mission is especially difficult to pilot?" Jack wondered innocently as he grabbed the back of the chair behind John's head.
Sitting forward in his chair, John started to doubt this was going to end well. "I just thought..."
"..you didn't think," Jack corrected again, more harshly than he needed too. "We covered that already."
Getting frustrated, John started out of his chair. Jack caught his shoulders and shoved him back down into the black chair.
"What do you want me to say?" Jack began softly as he circled to sit on the table and folded his hands apologetically before dropping them to his blue uniform. "When I have to look at your child and explain who you were, what do you want me to say? Got any special anecdotes you're fond of?"
"You think I'm going to die?" John returned as he stared up at the older man. He was expecting to find humor in Jack's brown eyes, but there was none.
"How many jumpers have you lost to the Wraith?" Jack asked; watching as understanding started to come into John's face.
His eyebrows tightened and John finally began to get it.
"Other people can fly jumpers," Jack pointed out with iron calm. "Do you want other people keeping an eye on Elizabeth? Teaching your kid to walk?"
John waved him quiet as he stared down at the smooth glass surface of the table. He wondered why Elizabeth hadn't fought him. She'd always been too self-sacrificial and too quick to give up what she needed. "You're right," he admitted slowly. Feeling the weight of fatherhood settle hard around his shoulders, he leaned back in his chair.
"I'm sorry," Jack said as a peace offering. "I know where you're coming from. I'd love to fly the damn thing myself."
"But you're the head of the military, Sir," John replied as everything sunk in like a shotgun blast.
"And therefore, I never get to do anything fun," Jack complained as he fidgeted with the stylus for John's laptop. "You're functionally my second-in-command, and Elizabeth's military commander. You have no business out there; professionally or personally. I just wanted to knock it into your head. You can go, Colonel."
John slipped from his chair slowly, still trying to sort it out in his head. "Elizabeth told me what you asked her," he said to the door. Not quite ready to meet the general's eyes for that thought.
"Well," Jack began, dropping the stylus to the table with a clink. "Figured it was about time, and it gives us something to look forward to after the memorial service."
"I hate-" John started, "-funerals."
"-funerals," Jack finished with him. Shrugging as he swung his feet off the edge of the table, Jack tried to make the best of it. "Lost my dress uniform."
John managed to chuckle. "That's almost the best thing I've heard all morning, Sir," he agreed quietly. "Elizabeth's agonizing over her speech."
"She is that type," Jack complimented lightly as he bounced off the table. "The perfectionist-"
"-stoic, terrible at taking care of herself..." John's voice faded before he finished. "Everyone worries about her because she doesn't worry about herself."
"Doubt she knows it though," Jack added, tucking his hands in his pockets.
"She doesn't," John agreed finally. Scratching the back of his head helped him think. "Carter's looking better."
"She's tough," Jack replied with a grin of admiration. "Can't wait to get back to her ship."
"Any word on the rest of her team?" John asked as he opened the door into the hallway.
"SG-1?" Jack asked rhetorically. Grinning mysteriously, he moved out of the way of a group of civilians being herded somewhere down the hall. "SG-1 always turns up. Usually at the last minute, with something amazing."
John had to smile slightly in response; he'd read the mission reports. He glanced up towards Elizabeth's office. He could see her pacing around her desk, trying to work out the kinks of her speech. He'd tried to tell her that there was no standard for eulogizing an entire planet; that everyone just needed some closure and a chance to grieve. "Tonight?"
"My money's on tomorrow actually," Jack teased, turning away down a different hall towards the Artemis on the north pier. "Rodney's running a pool, takes an Earth artifact to get in."
"I have the last remaining Johnny Cash poster in my bag..." John offered as they parted ways. "I'll put it on tonight, oh-three hundred?"
"Done."
~*~*~*~*~
Elizabeth was back in her black commando uniform, but it only made her look smaller as she stood in front of the crowd of people. She'd picked the eastern pier, trying to find enough space for nine hundred people wasn't the easiest to work out, but she was fairly certain everyone could see her or the projection behind her.
Zelenka had somehow found the time to rig a projector to throw her image up on the inside of the shield. As he stood beside her, John couldn't help peering back at the Elizabeth hanging in the stars. It was a good look for her.
"Thank you for coming," she started softly, hearing her voice reverberate through the public address system. "I know how difficult this is for all of you. An hour can't go by without me thinking of Earth."
John watched her hands. Her fingers were wrapped around her father's watch; the silver chain dangling against her wrist.
"The weight of what we've lost is too heavy to bear alone," she continued, keeping her voice firm and level. "It may even be too heavy to bear together, but, we will carry it. I know it seems incomprehensible. That nine hundred feels too small of a number to possibly rebuild a society. And we won't be rebuilding." She closed her eyes for a moment, letting her eyelids chase the tears that stung her eyes.
"We can't pretend we can reclaim Earth, or reassemble all that existed of ten thousand years of existence. Our homes, our families, and our collective history as a people is gone. I know many of you want to follow it into the void. To give up now and never try to tackle our new challenge before it destroys what's left of us," she paused and took a deep breath.
"We have to stop thinking that way," Elizabeth demanded with more strength than John knew she had left. "We can't think of ourselves as the remnants of Earth. We are Atlantis. We are scientists, teachers, doctors, and soldiers; we are strong. We are united because this is our home. We came from many countries, many fractured nations on a troubled little world we called home. Now we are one. We can't let what we've lost drive us apart. In our grief, we are truly united because none of us can stand without those at our sides.
"There are creatures out there in the cold that will try to destroy us," Elizabeth reminded everyone as she pointed to the blackness of the space around them. "We've only just begun to learn the workings of this city and there a thousand secrets we will unlock on our journey. We will learn. We will grow and we will understand more about what makes us human.
"We have to let go of the idea that we survived out of luck, or the cruelty of fate," she commanded the hushed crowd. "We aren't alive because we're lucky, or because we're unlucky not to have died with the ones we loved. We are alive because humanity is too tough to go out without a fight. Because the light inside every one of us is too bright to be put out by machines. I want you to look around, see the faces of the people around you and see hope.
"We aren't refugees, castaways or the lost remnants of a dead civilization," she paused again, listening to the rustling of nine hundred heads turning. "We are the beginnings of a new world. Atlantis has been waiting ten thousand years for us. As you look up into the stars around us, know that many of those stars have planets with human populations. People decimated by a war that has been without end in this galaxy. We can stop this war. We can stop the Replicators, the Wraith, the Ori, and everything out there that could haunt our nightmares.
"When you look at yourselves, don't see survivors of Earth. See the saviors of the Pegasus Galaxy. Take your anger, your grief and despair, and feel the strength of your feelings. That strength flows in all of us, binding us together. Our loved ones that we've lost will always be with us, guiding our way on our new path and reminding us that we have a greater destiny. We may be of Earth, but we are Atlantis now and no power in the universe can take that from us."
Silence hung in the air when she stopped speaking; rushing all around them like a tangible thing. Elizabeth took a step back, letting go of the force that had kept her speaking. She seemed to get smaller, fading back into herself as she took John's hand. There was sweat on her palm and she seemed relieved when the projection of her disappeared from the sky.
John just nodded to her, completely dumbfounded by her eloquence. She closed her eyes for a moment when the applause started as if it surprised her. Her step towards him was unsteady and his arm was around her back before he even thought about it.
From her right, Jack and Sam joined the applause. There were tears in Sam's eyes and John remembered she'd lost her brother and his family. Jack just smiled proudly, as if he'd known exactly what she was going to say.
John caught sight of Rodney and Jeannie in the crowd. His niece was clinging to his neck and clapping slowly. Elizabeth's head dropped to his shoulder and he felt her sigh through the roar of applause. Squeezing her waist, John stood firm. He couldn't have said what she had, nor would he have believed it if anyone else had stood up there. His whisper was lost in the waves of sound, but she felt his lips against her ear.
Closing her eyes, Elizabeth let him take her weight. Her eyelashes were wet and she wondered when she had started to cry. Her mother was there watching; she'd felt her presence. John's hand wiped her face and remained on her cheek. "Goodbye mum," she whispered into the noise of shuffling feet and muffled voices. She couldn't hold on to her grief. There was too much at stake, too many lives around her that counted on her strength. "Keep an eye on me?"
John nuzzled her neck and his hand left her face to cradle her stomach. Her hand joined his, clinging to his fingers as she felt the weight of all of her responsibilities settle like a lump of lead into her stomach. She was Atlantis, her fears reminded her. Elizabeth was every person in that audience and a tiny part of her mind despaired that she'd never be just herself again.
"-love you," John's voice drifted into her ear, bringing fresh tears to her eyes. To him she'd always be Elizabeth, and she clung to that as fiercely as she held his fingers against her stomach.
~*~*~*~*~
Asgard transporters still startled him, John thought as he chided himself for jumping back from the light as it burst into the gate room. The white light faded into four figures. Teal'c was calm as he looked over the city. John had to remind himself the tall alien hadn't seen the city before. Jack and Sam were the welcoming committee as the little group dissolved in hugs. Daniel wrapped his arms around Jack before the general could even start to protest.
John recognized Colonel Cameron Mitchell from his short stay at the SGC. The fairly gorgeous brunette with them was also an alien. She'd been to Atlantis before with Daniel, when the archeologist had studied the ancient library. He couldn't remember her name as she nearly attacked Sam. He tried to imagine thinking he'd lost his team forever. He'd probably hug McKay if he came back from the dead.
"Good to see you again," John offered with a handshake to Mitchell.
For his part Cameron just grinned. "Thor took us to Earth, the Asgard wanted to test their new satellite weapon on the Replicators, but when we got there..."
"Huge battle!" Vala interjected excitedly as she peered around the gate room. "Wraith darts everywhere, Replicator ships falling from the sky..."
"...indeed," Teal'c added with a raised eyebrow. "It was quite impressive."
"Whatever you did," Daniel started gratefully, "Was a good plan. The losses on both sides were extensive."
John smiled softly, pleased with his team. "I'll make sure to pass it along when my team returns," he replied. "In the meantime, welcome to Atlantis..." he glanced and Teal'c before the rest of the team... "Again."
"Thank you," Cameron nodded as he sighed. "The Daniel Jackson is a great ship, but it just wasn't set up for long term human habitation."
"Retired Colonel Lorne is in charge is our acting quartermaster," John explained to Cameron as he watched Elizabeth arrive from her daily science briefing with Rodney and Zelenka. "She'll get you all set up with quarters as soon as she can. We're putting all the senior officers together in the east wing."
"It'll be nice to have my own bed, instead of a sleeping bag on the floor next to Jackson..." Cameron dropped his voice conspiratorially, "...he snores."
"So does McKay," John said, shrugging. "We have a lot of space, this city was designed to house thousands."
"How many did we save?" Cameron asked softly as he shook his head. "Never thought I'd be able to count the humans left alive."
"Or have them all in the same place," John agreed darkly. Elizabeth met his gaze across the room and he found the strength to smile. "But we're going to be alright."
"Yeah," Cameron said with as much conviction as he could muster in return. "Jack and Sam?"
"Together," John offered as he followed Cameron's gaze to their intertwined hands. "The fraternization rule's pretty much out the window."
"'Bout time," Cameron decided, smiling slightly as Jack met his stare with a wink. "I suppose everyone's going to pair off eventually."
John paused; he hadn't spent much time thinking about the future. He was with Elizabeth now and he realized it only made sense that everyone else would want to settle down as well. The rules would have to change with the times. "Guess so," he agreed without really committing. He should probably tell Cameron about Elizabeth now, before she walked over and gave him away.
"Teal'c and are going to have to get a move on before everyone is snapped up," Cameron said. He was teasing, but an undercurrent of truth ran through it. Vala was holding onto Daniel's arm, and he seemed to be enjoying the gesture. Sam and Jack were openly gazing longingly at each other, and something Sam had told Daniel made the archeologist beam as he kissed her cheek.
"Maybe we'll have to start having singles nights," John joked as lightly as he could. The seriousness was still there, but everyone was trying to keep it beneath the surface.
"General O'Neill mentioned you have a pretty successful movie night," Cameron lowered himself to the stairs with a sigh. "Any James Bond?"
"Star Wars is up next," John dropped to the stairs next to the other man and watched Elizabeth shake Teal'c's hand in welcome. "Would you believe she hasn't seen it?" He titled his head towards Elizabeth, smiling as she came their way.
"The big guy will be happy, he's a connoisseur of sci-fiction," Cameron pointed out as he inclined his head towards Teal'c.
"Colonel Mitchell, welcome back to Atlantis," Elizabeth offered, extending her hand down to him.
"Wish it was under better circumstances," Cameron replied, shaking her hand firmly. "Though it's certainly nice to be here, Ma'am."
Elizabeth nodded; even exhausted she was deeply proud of her city. She caught her forehead, giving away the nagging dizziness that had been bothering her since she'd gotten up. It seemed half the time he'd watched her today; she was clinging to something for balance.
Cameron looked down at her boots politely, pretending not to notice the look John gave her. Maybe he'd spent too much time watching the looks that weren't there between Sam and Jack; now he just saw relationships everywhere, but concern was naked on John's face.
Making room on the steps, he indicated the space next to him and offered up his hand. "How was your meeting?"
"McKay and Zelenka want to lead an attack on the Replicator home world," Elizabeth sighed heavily as she sank to the steps next to him. Her hair fell in dark curls around her head as she dropped it to her hands. "They heard about the Asgard satellite you were bringing and decided they need to wipe out the Replicators in order to get all the ZPMs and technology they might have on their home world."
"One thing at a time?" John asked quietly, smirking as he imagined Rodney's excitement. "I guess it didn't take them long to hear SG-1 was bringing home a new toy before they wanted to use it to destroy things."
"I thought we were all for destroying the Replicators?" Cameron wondered as he stared up at the ornate ceiling of the gate room. He folded his hands over his chest and lay back on the steps. "Probably should be doing it regardless. You can't make the argument letting the Replicators live is good for the galaxy. No matter what galaxy we're in."
"We lost Earth without provocation or warning," Elizabeth reminded him. John's hand slipped around her back, reminding her he'd support whatever she decided. "Though we've certainly been provoked now, I wanted to wait until all three ships were ready before coming up with a battle plan."
"I heard Carter bagged herself a command," Cameron teased, trying to lighten the mood as he stared over at Elizabeth's tired green eyes with new respect.
John scuffed his boot on the floor, still fidgeting as he sat. "The Artemis is a beautiful ship, Carter's lucky to have it."
"Amongst other things," Cameron added as he watched the general very publicly kiss Sam's cheek. "Well, thank you for the welcome; I'm going to go dig myself up some quarters to put my one bag of belongings in."
Elizabeth managed to smile at him as he left the steps, and Cameron nodded respectfully. "Doctor Jackson's making a list of things he wants to study," she whispered to John. Patting his hand on her side, Elizabeth tilted her head up to meet his eyes.
"Colonel Mitchell's a good man," John returned as they watched Sam introduce Teal'c to Rodney's niece. Maddie did amazing things for Rodney; in the week she'd been with them John had already seen the changes in his friend. "Doctor Jackson's probably the biggest Ancient expert in the universe and General O'Neill and are still aren't sure who would win in a fight between Ronon and Teal'c."
"We're certainly collecting a lot of colonels," Elizabeth pointed out as she ran through them in her mind. "Caldwell, Emerson, Carter, Mitchell, you-"
"-Lorne's mom," John interjected, grinning foolishly. "Were you in the mess hall when Rodney tried to cut in front of her in the food line?"
Shaking her head slowly, Elizabeth clung to his smile.
"She made him do push-ups," John explained as he watched the crowd start to disperse from the middle of a gate room. "I guess you had to be there..." he lost his thought as dragged himself to his feet, feeling the toll of the last few days in his muscles. "...it might be something you want to keep in mind though," he remembered suddenly. "For when Rodney gets out of line."
"I'll keep it in mind," Elizabeth agreed as she waited for his hand and hoped he wouldn't pull her up too quickly. The speed didn't seem to matter when her head spun anyway from the change in elevation. Putting up her hand kept John from moving long enough for her to regain her balance. "Sorry," she offered quietly; rubbing the exhaustion out of her eyes.
"You okay?" he almost smiled at himself when he asked the redundant question.
"My head's just a little foggy today," Elizabeth excused weakly and forced a smile when he didn't like her explanation. "Don't suppose you want to sit in on my trade negotiations with Laden Radim?"
"Did Beckett clear you for off-world travel?" John jumped; surprised Carson wasn't being more protective.
"The Genii delegation arrives in ten minutes," Elizabeth assured him. "Don't worry John."
"Is this the meeting where you tell them we'll let them have P-90s if they'll let us use their factories to make them?" John remembered from the morning's agenda. "Maybe you want General O'Neill, he's better at this sort of thing..."
"I didn't think so," Elizabeth said demurely, shaking her head at him as she contemplated the steps up to her office. "See you for dinner?"
"Definitely!" John perked up, relieved to be freed from the meeting. "I'll pick you up at your office?"
Elizabeth stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. "Okay," she agreed softly. There was something in her eyes that made him pause before he left her side. John caught her chin and returned her kiss with a far superior one. Breathlessness was a state Elizabeth was entirely unused too, as were the incredulous looks from the other side of the gate room.
"Six, sharp?" John promised, winking as he swaggered past everyone in the gate room on top of the world.
Sam and Jack's footsteps echoed on the stairs as they followed her up to her office. "Is this a good time?" Sam ventured shyly.
Elizabeth checked the face of watch. "Seven minutes until the Genii," she said as she retreated to her chair. "Have a seat."
"Love what you've done with the place," Jack teased as he pulled up a crate. He patted his lap, offering it to Sam. She shook her head and pulled up a crate of her own.
"I know its short notice, but general-"
Jack coughed, interrupting Sam's habit.
"-Jack," she corrected herself with the same shy flush of color across her face. "And I think now might be the best time."
"We just need something to wear," Jack added, reaching across to take Sam's hand firmly into his own.
"The Athosians have been kind enough to help us find everything we need," Elizabeth said as she added a note on her list of things to request. "Woolsey's still with them if you want to go through him."
"I thought he'd come back?" Jack wondered. Playing with Sam's fingers as he talked made her glare at him until he stopped.
"He seems to need some time away from technology, after the Replicators and everything that happened," Elizabeth explained. Remembering how relieved Woolsey was to see trees and ground, she had been happy he'd found good friends in the Athosians. Both of them slipped out of focus for a moment when her eyes rebelled against her. When her vision corrected itself, Sam and Jack were both staring with concerned expressions.
"What?" Elizabeth asked innocently.
"You faded out there for a moment," Sam explained. Retrieving her hand from Jack's grasp, her gaze bored through Elizabeth's defenses.
"Feeling okay?" Jack coaxed as he pretended to be interested in his fingernails.
"Not for weeks," Elizabeth admitted bitterly as she stood up. The alarm announcing an incoming wormhole began just as Walter hurried over the catwalk to her office.
"Incoming wormhole, Ma'am," Walter began efficiently. "The Genii are a minute early."
"Thank you, Sergeant," Elizabeth said. Nodding to the little technician as he returned to his post, she pointed the way towards the conference room.
"You got Walter?" Jack asked as he elbowed her side gently. "Let me guess, one morning he just appeared in your control room, ready to go."
"Yesterday, when the Odyssey arrived," Elizabeth explained with a soft smile. "He told me it was his job, and he wanted to do it."
"He's the best DHD-jockey we have," Jack complimented as he followed her down the stairs towards the Genii delegation.
Grinning as Jack looked abandoned; "I'm going to go supervise the repairs on my ship," Sam said.
"Ever feel like no one wants to be with you?" Jack whispered conspiratorially to Elizabeth as the marines escorting the Genii lead them into the conference room.
"You get that too?" Elizabeth whispered back.
~*~*~*~*~
"I heard you needed something translated?" Doctor Jackson asked as he peered around the corner into Doctor Beckett's office.
"Aye, Daniel, come on in," Carson replied, waving him in. "I'm up to my ears in Ancient and I don't speak a word of it."
"What are you working on?" Daniel began as he pulled up a gray metal folding chair. Carson lifted his laptop from his legs and handed it over to the other man. "'The distribution of LK476 in the general population is controlled chromosome 23 and currently manifests as a recessive trait in forty-three percent of males and eight percent of females,'" he read from the laptop. "You need me to translate Ancient notes on genetic experimentation?"
Nodding quickly as he made his own notes on a second computer, Carson pointed to the next paragraph. "I think my patient was exposed to this experiment, or worse, she's become part of it," he explained as he waited for Daniel.
"'LK476 will become absent from the female population entirely as it becomes less likely to be expressed,'" Daniel continued to read. "'Early tests suggest is might be possible to reintroduce LK476 into the female phenotype through chromosomal manipulation and a carrier virus.'"
Snatching the laptop back as his face lit with excitement, Carson scrolled down through several years of notes as he tried to explain. "LK476 is what the Ancients dubbed what we call the ATA or the Ancient gene," he said as his fingers fly over the other keyboard. "In our current genetic structure it is incredibly rare; only thirteen original members of the expedition had it. Now that our population is considerably larger, I've been running tests on the nine hundred people on Atlantis now and only came up with forty-seven positives."
"Including Jack?" Daniel ventured.
"Aye, General O'Neill and Colonel Sheppard show the strongest expression," Carson began, pausing and turning away from his computer. "Some genes are expressed multiple times. I have what we call ATA, but based on these notes and my own blood, I only have two instances. Which is enough to turn things on or fly a jumper around, but not to have the same level of control either of them have. The retrovirus I invented to give someone the Ancient gene turns on between one and three instances."
"Jack has three?" Daniel asked as he took the laptop back and started translating the next section.
"O'Neill and Sheppard both have five," Carson looked over his blood samples data again and shook his head. "It would have taken me years, even decades, to figure out how to track the ATA on my own, but it seems completely routine to her."
Daniel looked up, amused by the tone of longing in the other man's voice. "Her?"
"Mauve," Carson explained shyly, leaning over Daniel's shoulder as he drew his attention to the personnel file open in the database behind the notes. "She was an Ancient geneticist thousands of years ago. Her eyes seem so intense."
Daniel kept his smile pointed at the laptop. "Scientists can be so passionate," he agreed as he went back to the notes. "These are a lot more technical. I'm not entirely sure I would understand this paragraph if you gave it to me in plain English. But the gist of it seems to be that her experiments were largely unsuccessful. In her projections, ATA becomes more and more rare."
"Which is unfortunately what happened to us," Carson sighed and took the laptop back. "Her notes get rather jumbled after this point so I don't know if you'll be able to help me."
Curious, Daniel raised his eyebrows and waited for the rest of the explanation.
"She went off the deep end a bit and disappeared," Carson finished with a shrug. "It was right before the end of the war with the Wraith, their record keeping wasn't the greatest."
"Does any of this help you?" Daniel asked as he looked around the infirmary. It was a brighter room than the cave in the SGC. Even with space outside them, Atlantis was full of beautiful windows and a warmer kind of lighting.
"Oh aye, thank you," Carson said gratefully, without looking up from his computer. "Can I call you back if I find something else?"
Daniel patted his shoulder as he stood to leave. "We're having a senior staff meeting after dinner," he paused and yawned into his hand, "Whenever that is."
"I can't help feeling like I'm going to get to sleep after the next apocalypse," Carson muttered darkly.
"We'll just have to hang on until then," Daniel replied as optimistically as he could. "I'll be down in the science lab."
Carson nodded but said nothing coherent as he kept studying. He didn't hear Daniel's footsteps as he left him alone to his work.
~*~*~*~*~
Elizabeth rubbed her head and stood slowly, feeling her legs protest at how long she'd kept them in the chair.
"That went well, didn't it?" Jack wondered at her elbow, watching as Laden Radim was escorted back to the gate room along with his aides and a few marines. "Have I mentioned how much more pleasant it is to listen to you talk instead of Woolsey?"
Smiling softly, Elizabeth heard him as if he was far away. "Thank you," she murmured softly, keeping her hands on the table as the room darkened slightly. "It is easier when the other party genuinely wants success." John would be disappointed. Negotiations had dragged on far past six, the face of her watch on the inside of her wrist read eight-thirty.
"Hungry?" Jack asked without expecting much of an answer as he stretched. He'd already invited the Genii to stay for dinner, but Laden was a head of state and quite busy.
Elizabeth nodded slowly, that was probably why her head felt so strange. Leaving the table seemed a bit tenuous at the moment, so she waited for her head to clear as she collected her materials. "John's going to be upset," she admitted to him sheepishly. "He's probably standing in the hallway."
"Pacing even," Jack added; his eyes glistening in amusement. "I'd be pacing. Though, I'd never admit it to Carter."
"Of course not," Elizabeth replied confidentially. She took a deep breath and let go of the table. If her stomach hadn't been so insistent on food, she would have been tempted to skip dinner and go straight to bed. She must have stumbled because Jack's hand immediately caught her elbow.
"Here," he suggested and wrapped her arm firmly around his own. "Give yourself a second or two."
"I'm okay," she insisted, even though his steadiness made the room seem warmer and less far away. "Just..."
"...its okay," Jack promised knowingly. "I've done pregnant before, not personally mind you because I'm lacking the right equipment and me in tears would scare everyone..." he waited a moment for her to smile, "...but I was there. I remember things."
"I'm dizzy," she conceded when he started walking, bringing them immediately to a halt. "It's not bad when I don't move, or try to move slowly and it's definitely better than being nauseated I just wish..."
"...you got to feel normal occasionally?" Jack finished for her sympathetically.
"Yes," she replied with a nod of her head Elizabeth immediately regretted when the room kept moving without her. "It would be nice."
Shrugging slightly, Jack reached for the door crystals. "It gets better second trimester. Sara got kinda perky, suddenly had a lot of energy for...um...things we'd been missing."
She couldn't help giggling. The conference room was fading out around the edges, and the reddish-gray walls were going black in her vision, but Elizabeth couldn't help laughing. "We might need less apocalypse to have enough time for that."
"Nasty business the end of the world, isn't it?" Jack asked softly, letting the question hang in the air as the door opened.
"Yeah," she responded automatically. The wall in front of her seemed very very far away. As if she could walk for years and never reach it. Jack's arm tugged her forward but her legs weren't listening. The foggy feeling in her head exploded into black and a wave of cold.
Jack felt her knees start to give as her weight on his arm doubled. He bent with her, catching most of her as she headed for the floor like a dead thing. "Dammit," he muttered to himself as he heard the footsteps hurry towards him. Laden and his escort had returned for something, he realized as Marines surrounded him.
"What happened?" Laden asked with concern.
"Medical team to conference room," One of the marines began over his radio.
"Oh scratch that," Jack ordered grumpily as he slipped an arm beneath her legs. "I'm not that old. I'll bring her, just tell Doctor Beckett he has incoming."
"Yes, Sir," the marine acknowledged as he amended his transmission. "Doctor Weir has collapsed-"
"-fainted," Jack corrected with a grunt as he dragged himself to his feet. It had been some time since he'd carried dead weight, but he was moderately pleased that her body wasn't too heavy for him. "She fainted, she's okay, just needs to learn the art of saying 'let's finish this tomorrow'."
"I am sorry General," Laden began to apologize as he caught up to Jack. "I had no idea she was ill."
"Oh she's not," Jack promised as he paused to shift her weight. Elizabeth's head rested against his shoulder and her arms hung limp from their sockets. "She'll be fine."
Laden peered at him, reading what was unsaid in his face. The Genii leader went a few meters with him in silence, waiting for the guards to be out of earshot. "I didn't think she was the family type," he assumed as he fell in step. "Now can't be the best time to be pregnant."
"No one said that," Jack said cautiously. He didn't really know how many people knew or how many people were supposed to know.
"I'm an observant man," Laden explained confidently. "Don't worry; we need your knowledge as much as you need our factories. I can't say I'm surprised, Sheppard's been her weakness for nearly as long as I've known her."
"Well let's try to keep this off the record," Jack said. Sweat was starting beneath his black t-shirt, but he was falling into a rhythm. "Shall we?"
Laden smiled, surprising the general with his amusement. "I'll be discreet," he promised as he turned to go. "And I think I'll bring a gift to the next set of talks."
Jack bit his lip and tackled the stairs at the end of the hall. Elizabeth was remained still in his arms, but he could feel the strength of her heart beating in her chest. He supposed they should have seen it coming. She was stubborn, that was why he'd fought so hard for her to keep her position. Good leaders were not always the best at taking care of themselves. In fact, he'd probably be in worse shape than Elizabeth was if he hadn't had Carter next to him for the last ten years at the SGC. Maybe that was why it was so easy to fall in love for both of them. Their lovers were the strength they counted on to keep them standing. How many times had Carter's smile dredged him up from his despair?
Beckett apprehended him as soon as he turned the corner into the infirmary. "What happened?" The doctor demanded. Already hovering over his patient, he led Jack to one of the few unoccupied beds.
"She fainted," Jack groaned as he set her down, feeling the aches in his muscles he wouldn't have had ten years ago. "Too much work, too little sleep."
"Did ye contact Colonel Sheppard?" Carson circled the bed, taking Elizabeth's pulse as he waited for the Ancient scanner to initialize.
~*~*~*~*~
John waited. He drummed his fingers on the table and waited as six became seven on the clock on the wall. He finished all of his paperwork, read reports and even got a head start on the next day's work. There was still no Elizabeth, so he waited. At just past seven someone dragged a chair across the floor and sat down beside him.
Sam dropped her tray to the table and started to eat listlessly. As she poked at her salad she looked over at him and caught his morose expression. "She'd be here if she could," she reminded him as she took a bite of bread.
"Negotiations take time," John agreed as he tried to ignore the delicious smell of her stew.
"You should eat," Sam suggested. Pointing at her own plate, she nudged her food with her fork. "It's good tonight."
Shrugging, he glanced over at the endless line of people getting dinner on the other side of the mess hall. "Line's moving all right," he offered without much enthusiasm. "That's usually a good sign. How are the ribs?"
Confusion flashed in her blue eyes before she realized what he was referring too. "They're all right," Sam smiled gently. "Your Doctor Beckett does good work."
"We like him," John said as he kept drumming his fingers on the table. "We'll keep him around."
Sam tossed her other piece of bread across the table without saying anything. John took it and stared at it for a moment before stuffing it into his mouth. He finished it faster than he expected and found himself staring longingly at the rest of her food. "See, pretty good," Sam teased him.
He stared at his watch again anxiously. "You'd think they'd take a break," he muttered with annoyance.
"They'll be here," Sam reminded him optimistically. Her stew was nearly gone and her fork scratched across the plate.
"Okay," John said. Standing up, he slipped into the line for dinner. Caught between a family with two young children and a set of Marines, he shuffled along as he watched Sam glance down at her watch as nervously as he had. Sergeant Ketterman gave him a grin as he passed him a plate. Nabbing an extra piece of bread to replace the one she had given him, he balanced his cup with his plate and returned.
Passing the bread across to her, John sank into his chair. He filled his fork with stew and stuffed it into his mouth. Juice ran warm and spicy down his throat and he smiled around the fork at Sam. His earpiece buzzed inside his ear, startling him as he started on his second bite.
"Sheppard?"
John wiped his mouth of his hand and hurried to answer. "Yes, Sir," he replied with a sigh.
"Don't mean to alarm you," Jack's voice started apologetically, "I need you down in the infirmary, Elizabeth's..."
His fork clattered against the plate before settling on the table and the chair teetered unsteadily at the speed he pushed it back. "I'll be right there," John replied in a rush. Feeling his heart beat in his throat, he broke into a run.
Teyla watched him with veiled amusement as she translated his meaning. "It will take almost two days to reach the territory of Michael's hive ship. We do not know how long it may take to contact them. Hopefully we will succeed in convincing them that Atlantis has gone renegade and is ready to give up the location of Earth..."
"Think rebel thoughts," John teased her as he fidgeted with the handle of his cup.
"We'll see your team on the Daedalus in an hour?" Caldwell checked as he started to stand. "If you'll excuse me, Sir, Ma'am," he paused and nodded to Jack and Elizabeth. "I have preparations to make before takeoff. My pilot hasn't taken off from a space station before." He glanced politely around the table and left the conference room.
"I assume you have a team prepared?" Jack asked Teyla as she too started to stand up.
"Ronon, one of Doctor Beckett's medics, myself, and Colonel Sheppard volunteered to fly the jumper." Teyla answered quickly. "We thought keeping the team small would minimize the risk."
Jack coughed slightly before taking a sip of water from his cup. "I'm sorry, something in my throat," he excused easily. "It was thoughtful of you to volunteer, Colonel, but I'm going to send Major Lorne instead. Teyla, Ronon, I wish you well."
Elizabeth took her cue from the general. "You're all dismissed, thank you," she said as she stood slowly. Her hands stayed on the table; white fingers supporting her weight as she waited for her head to clear.
John had meant to let her get more sleep; start the meeting later in the day, but there was so much to do. She'd crawled into bed next to him last night and just lay there awake while he tried to finish his agenda for the day. He'd tried to talk, but she just wanted to put her head on his chest. He wasn't used to the quiet Elizabeth. The woman who only seemed to want to be near him; without speaking or even looking at his face, didn't seem to fit with the rest of her.
She touched his shoulder, smiling quietly before she left. It was a little gesture, her fingers against his arm, but it distracted him enough that he missed the glare he was getting from across the table.
"Colonel," Jack barked as John started to leave. "Have a seat."
Startled, John returned from the doorway and flopped into a chair. "Yes, Sir," he replied quickly and watched the general with confusion.
"Tell me why you thought it would be a good idea to volunteer to fly the jumper on this mission?" Jack demanded immediately after the doors sealed around them. "Actually, do it without the word 'thought' because I'm sure that was absent from your brain."
"I'm the best pilot we have, Sir," John defended himself without really know why he was under fire. His hands found their way into his lap as Jack circled behind him.
"What part of this mission is especially difficult to pilot?" Jack wondered innocently as he grabbed the back of the chair behind John's head.
Sitting forward in his chair, John started to doubt this was going to end well. "I just thought..."
"..you didn't think," Jack corrected again, more harshly than he needed too. "We covered that already."
Getting frustrated, John started out of his chair. Jack caught his shoulders and shoved him back down into the black chair.
"What do you want me to say?" Jack began softly as he circled to sit on the table and folded his hands apologetically before dropping them to his blue uniform. "When I have to look at your child and explain who you were, what do you want me to say? Got any special anecdotes you're fond of?"
"You think I'm going to die?" John returned as he stared up at the older man. He was expecting to find humor in Jack's brown eyes, but there was none.
"How many jumpers have you lost to the Wraith?" Jack asked; watching as understanding started to come into John's face.
His eyebrows tightened and John finally began to get it.
"Other people can fly jumpers," Jack pointed out with iron calm. "Do you want other people keeping an eye on Elizabeth? Teaching your kid to walk?"
John waved him quiet as he stared down at the smooth glass surface of the table. He wondered why Elizabeth hadn't fought him. She'd always been too self-sacrificial and too quick to give up what she needed. "You're right," he admitted slowly. Feeling the weight of fatherhood settle hard around his shoulders, he leaned back in his chair.
"I'm sorry," Jack said as a peace offering. "I know where you're coming from. I'd love to fly the damn thing myself."
"But you're the head of the military, Sir," John replied as everything sunk in like a shotgun blast.
"And therefore, I never get to do anything fun," Jack complained as he fidgeted with the stylus for John's laptop. "You're functionally my second-in-command, and Elizabeth's military commander. You have no business out there; professionally or personally. I just wanted to knock it into your head. You can go, Colonel."
John slipped from his chair slowly, still trying to sort it out in his head. "Elizabeth told me what you asked her," he said to the door. Not quite ready to meet the general's eyes for that thought.
"Well," Jack began, dropping the stylus to the table with a clink. "Figured it was about time, and it gives us something to look forward to after the memorial service."
"I hate-" John started, "-funerals."
"-funerals," Jack finished with him. Shrugging as he swung his feet off the edge of the table, Jack tried to make the best of it. "Lost my dress uniform."
John managed to chuckle. "That's almost the best thing I've heard all morning, Sir," he agreed quietly. "Elizabeth's agonizing over her speech."
"She is that type," Jack complimented lightly as he bounced off the table. "The perfectionist-"
"-stoic, terrible at taking care of herself..." John's voice faded before he finished. "Everyone worries about her because she doesn't worry about herself."
"Doubt she knows it though," Jack added, tucking his hands in his pockets.
"She doesn't," John agreed finally. Scratching the back of his head helped him think. "Carter's looking better."
"She's tough," Jack replied with a grin of admiration. "Can't wait to get back to her ship."
"Any word on the rest of her team?" John asked as he opened the door into the hallway.
"SG-1?" Jack asked rhetorically. Grinning mysteriously, he moved out of the way of a group of civilians being herded somewhere down the hall. "SG-1 always turns up. Usually at the last minute, with something amazing."
John had to smile slightly in response; he'd read the mission reports. He glanced up towards Elizabeth's office. He could see her pacing around her desk, trying to work out the kinks of her speech. He'd tried to tell her that there was no standard for eulogizing an entire planet; that everyone just needed some closure and a chance to grieve. "Tonight?"
"My money's on tomorrow actually," Jack teased, turning away down a different hall towards the Artemis on the north pier. "Rodney's running a pool, takes an Earth artifact to get in."
"I have the last remaining Johnny Cash poster in my bag..." John offered as they parted ways. "I'll put it on tonight, oh-three hundred?"
"Done."
~*~*~*~*~
Elizabeth was back in her black commando uniform, but it only made her look smaller as she stood in front of the crowd of people. She'd picked the eastern pier, trying to find enough space for nine hundred people wasn't the easiest to work out, but she was fairly certain everyone could see her or the projection behind her.
Zelenka had somehow found the time to rig a projector to throw her image up on the inside of the shield. As he stood beside her, John couldn't help peering back at the Elizabeth hanging in the stars. It was a good look for her.
"Thank you for coming," she started softly, hearing her voice reverberate through the public address system. "I know how difficult this is for all of you. An hour can't go by without me thinking of Earth."
John watched her hands. Her fingers were wrapped around her father's watch; the silver chain dangling against her wrist.
"The weight of what we've lost is too heavy to bear alone," she continued, keeping her voice firm and level. "It may even be too heavy to bear together, but, we will carry it. I know it seems incomprehensible. That nine hundred feels too small of a number to possibly rebuild a society. And we won't be rebuilding." She closed her eyes for a moment, letting her eyelids chase the tears that stung her eyes.
"We can't pretend we can reclaim Earth, or reassemble all that existed of ten thousand years of existence. Our homes, our families, and our collective history as a people is gone. I know many of you want to follow it into the void. To give up now and never try to tackle our new challenge before it destroys what's left of us," she paused and took a deep breath.
"We have to stop thinking that way," Elizabeth demanded with more strength than John knew she had left. "We can't think of ourselves as the remnants of Earth. We are Atlantis. We are scientists, teachers, doctors, and soldiers; we are strong. We are united because this is our home. We came from many countries, many fractured nations on a troubled little world we called home. Now we are one. We can't let what we've lost drive us apart. In our grief, we are truly united because none of us can stand without those at our sides.
"There are creatures out there in the cold that will try to destroy us," Elizabeth reminded everyone as she pointed to the blackness of the space around them. "We've only just begun to learn the workings of this city and there a thousand secrets we will unlock on our journey. We will learn. We will grow and we will understand more about what makes us human.
"We have to let go of the idea that we survived out of luck, or the cruelty of fate," she commanded the hushed crowd. "We aren't alive because we're lucky, or because we're unlucky not to have died with the ones we loved. We are alive because humanity is too tough to go out without a fight. Because the light inside every one of us is too bright to be put out by machines. I want you to look around, see the faces of the people around you and see hope.
"We aren't refugees, castaways or the lost remnants of a dead civilization," she paused again, listening to the rustling of nine hundred heads turning. "We are the beginnings of a new world. Atlantis has been waiting ten thousand years for us. As you look up into the stars around us, know that many of those stars have planets with human populations. People decimated by a war that has been without end in this galaxy. We can stop this war. We can stop the Replicators, the Wraith, the Ori, and everything out there that could haunt our nightmares.
"When you look at yourselves, don't see survivors of Earth. See the saviors of the Pegasus Galaxy. Take your anger, your grief and despair, and feel the strength of your feelings. That strength flows in all of us, binding us together. Our loved ones that we've lost will always be with us, guiding our way on our new path and reminding us that we have a greater destiny. We may be of Earth, but we are Atlantis now and no power in the universe can take that from us."
Silence hung in the air when she stopped speaking; rushing all around them like a tangible thing. Elizabeth took a step back, letting go of the force that had kept her speaking. She seemed to get smaller, fading back into herself as she took John's hand. There was sweat on her palm and she seemed relieved when the projection of her disappeared from the sky.
John just nodded to her, completely dumbfounded by her eloquence. She closed her eyes for a moment when the applause started as if it surprised her. Her step towards him was unsteady and his arm was around her back before he even thought about it.
From her right, Jack and Sam joined the applause. There were tears in Sam's eyes and John remembered she'd lost her brother and his family. Jack just smiled proudly, as if he'd known exactly what she was going to say.
John caught sight of Rodney and Jeannie in the crowd. His niece was clinging to his neck and clapping slowly. Elizabeth's head dropped to his shoulder and he felt her sigh through the roar of applause. Squeezing her waist, John stood firm. He couldn't have said what she had, nor would he have believed it if anyone else had stood up there. His whisper was lost in the waves of sound, but she felt his lips against her ear.
Closing her eyes, Elizabeth let him take her weight. Her eyelashes were wet and she wondered when she had started to cry. Her mother was there watching; she'd felt her presence. John's hand wiped her face and remained on her cheek. "Goodbye mum," she whispered into the noise of shuffling feet and muffled voices. She couldn't hold on to her grief. There was too much at stake, too many lives around her that counted on her strength. "Keep an eye on me?"
John nuzzled her neck and his hand left her face to cradle her stomach. Her hand joined his, clinging to his fingers as she felt the weight of all of her responsibilities settle like a lump of lead into her stomach. She was Atlantis, her fears reminded her. Elizabeth was every person in that audience and a tiny part of her mind despaired that she'd never be just herself again.
"-love you," John's voice drifted into her ear, bringing fresh tears to her eyes. To him she'd always be Elizabeth, and she clung to that as fiercely as she held his fingers against her stomach.
~*~*~*~*~
Asgard transporters still startled him, John thought as he chided himself for jumping back from the light as it burst into the gate room. The white light faded into four figures. Teal'c was calm as he looked over the city. John had to remind himself the tall alien hadn't seen the city before. Jack and Sam were the welcoming committee as the little group dissolved in hugs. Daniel wrapped his arms around Jack before the general could even start to protest.
John recognized Colonel Cameron Mitchell from his short stay at the SGC. The fairly gorgeous brunette with them was also an alien. She'd been to Atlantis before with Daniel, when the archeologist had studied the ancient library. He couldn't remember her name as she nearly attacked Sam. He tried to imagine thinking he'd lost his team forever. He'd probably hug McKay if he came back from the dead.
"Good to see you again," John offered with a handshake to Mitchell.
For his part Cameron just grinned. "Thor took us to Earth, the Asgard wanted to test their new satellite weapon on the Replicators, but when we got there..."
"Huge battle!" Vala interjected excitedly as she peered around the gate room. "Wraith darts everywhere, Replicator ships falling from the sky..."
"...indeed," Teal'c added with a raised eyebrow. "It was quite impressive."
"Whatever you did," Daniel started gratefully, "Was a good plan. The losses on both sides were extensive."
John smiled softly, pleased with his team. "I'll make sure to pass it along when my team returns," he replied. "In the meantime, welcome to Atlantis..." he glanced and Teal'c before the rest of the team... "Again."
"Thank you," Cameron nodded as he sighed. "The Daniel Jackson is a great ship, but it just wasn't set up for long term human habitation."
"Retired Colonel Lorne is in charge is our acting quartermaster," John explained to Cameron as he watched Elizabeth arrive from her daily science briefing with Rodney and Zelenka. "She'll get you all set up with quarters as soon as she can. We're putting all the senior officers together in the east wing."
"It'll be nice to have my own bed, instead of a sleeping bag on the floor next to Jackson..." Cameron dropped his voice conspiratorially, "...he snores."
"So does McKay," John said, shrugging. "We have a lot of space, this city was designed to house thousands."
"How many did we save?" Cameron asked softly as he shook his head. "Never thought I'd be able to count the humans left alive."
"Or have them all in the same place," John agreed darkly. Elizabeth met his gaze across the room and he found the strength to smile. "But we're going to be alright."
"Yeah," Cameron said with as much conviction as he could muster in return. "Jack and Sam?"
"Together," John offered as he followed Cameron's gaze to their intertwined hands. "The fraternization rule's pretty much out the window."
"'Bout time," Cameron decided, smiling slightly as Jack met his stare with a wink. "I suppose everyone's going to pair off eventually."
John paused; he hadn't spent much time thinking about the future. He was with Elizabeth now and he realized it only made sense that everyone else would want to settle down as well. The rules would have to change with the times. "Guess so," he agreed without really committing. He should probably tell Cameron about Elizabeth now, before she walked over and gave him away.
"Teal'c and are going to have to get a move on before everyone is snapped up," Cameron said. He was teasing, but an undercurrent of truth ran through it. Vala was holding onto Daniel's arm, and he seemed to be enjoying the gesture. Sam and Jack were openly gazing longingly at each other, and something Sam had told Daniel made the archeologist beam as he kissed her cheek.
"Maybe we'll have to start having singles nights," John joked as lightly as he could. The seriousness was still there, but everyone was trying to keep it beneath the surface.
"General O'Neill mentioned you have a pretty successful movie night," Cameron lowered himself to the stairs with a sigh. "Any James Bond?"
"Star Wars is up next," John dropped to the stairs next to the other man and watched Elizabeth shake Teal'c's hand in welcome. "Would you believe she hasn't seen it?" He titled his head towards Elizabeth, smiling as she came their way.
"The big guy will be happy, he's a connoisseur of sci-fiction," Cameron pointed out as he inclined his head towards Teal'c.
"Colonel Mitchell, welcome back to Atlantis," Elizabeth offered, extending her hand down to him.
"Wish it was under better circumstances," Cameron replied, shaking her hand firmly. "Though it's certainly nice to be here, Ma'am."
Elizabeth nodded; even exhausted she was deeply proud of her city. She caught her forehead, giving away the nagging dizziness that had been bothering her since she'd gotten up. It seemed half the time he'd watched her today; she was clinging to something for balance.
Cameron looked down at her boots politely, pretending not to notice the look John gave her. Maybe he'd spent too much time watching the looks that weren't there between Sam and Jack; now he just saw relationships everywhere, but concern was naked on John's face.
Making room on the steps, he indicated the space next to him and offered up his hand. "How was your meeting?"
"McKay and Zelenka want to lead an attack on the Replicator home world," Elizabeth sighed heavily as she sank to the steps next to him. Her hair fell in dark curls around her head as she dropped it to her hands. "They heard about the Asgard satellite you were bringing and decided they need to wipe out the Replicators in order to get all the ZPMs and technology they might have on their home world."
"One thing at a time?" John asked quietly, smirking as he imagined Rodney's excitement. "I guess it didn't take them long to hear SG-1 was bringing home a new toy before they wanted to use it to destroy things."
"I thought we were all for destroying the Replicators?" Cameron wondered as he stared up at the ornate ceiling of the gate room. He folded his hands over his chest and lay back on the steps. "Probably should be doing it regardless. You can't make the argument letting the Replicators live is good for the galaxy. No matter what galaxy we're in."
"We lost Earth without provocation or warning," Elizabeth reminded him. John's hand slipped around her back, reminding her he'd support whatever she decided. "Though we've certainly been provoked now, I wanted to wait until all three ships were ready before coming up with a battle plan."
"I heard Carter bagged herself a command," Cameron teased, trying to lighten the mood as he stared over at Elizabeth's tired green eyes with new respect.
John scuffed his boot on the floor, still fidgeting as he sat. "The Artemis is a beautiful ship, Carter's lucky to have it."
"Amongst other things," Cameron added as he watched the general very publicly kiss Sam's cheek. "Well, thank you for the welcome; I'm going to go dig myself up some quarters to put my one bag of belongings in."
Elizabeth managed to smile at him as he left the steps, and Cameron nodded respectfully. "Doctor Jackson's making a list of things he wants to study," she whispered to John. Patting his hand on her side, Elizabeth tilted her head up to meet his eyes.
"Colonel Mitchell's a good man," John returned as they watched Sam introduce Teal'c to Rodney's niece. Maddie did amazing things for Rodney; in the week she'd been with them John had already seen the changes in his friend. "Doctor Jackson's probably the biggest Ancient expert in the universe and General O'Neill and are still aren't sure who would win in a fight between Ronon and Teal'c."
"We're certainly collecting a lot of colonels," Elizabeth pointed out as she ran through them in her mind. "Caldwell, Emerson, Carter, Mitchell, you-"
"-Lorne's mom," John interjected, grinning foolishly. "Were you in the mess hall when Rodney tried to cut in front of her in the food line?"
Shaking her head slowly, Elizabeth clung to his smile.
"She made him do push-ups," John explained as he watched the crowd start to disperse from the middle of a gate room. "I guess you had to be there..." he lost his thought as dragged himself to his feet, feeling the toll of the last few days in his muscles. "...it might be something you want to keep in mind though," he remembered suddenly. "For when Rodney gets out of line."
"I'll keep it in mind," Elizabeth agreed as she waited for his hand and hoped he wouldn't pull her up too quickly. The speed didn't seem to matter when her head spun anyway from the change in elevation. Putting up her hand kept John from moving long enough for her to regain her balance. "Sorry," she offered quietly; rubbing the exhaustion out of her eyes.
"You okay?" he almost smiled at himself when he asked the redundant question.
"My head's just a little foggy today," Elizabeth excused weakly and forced a smile when he didn't like her explanation. "Don't suppose you want to sit in on my trade negotiations with Laden Radim?"
"Did Beckett clear you for off-world travel?" John jumped; surprised Carson wasn't being more protective.
"The Genii delegation arrives in ten minutes," Elizabeth assured him. "Don't worry John."
"Is this the meeting where you tell them we'll let them have P-90s if they'll let us use their factories to make them?" John remembered from the morning's agenda. "Maybe you want General O'Neill, he's better at this sort of thing..."
"I didn't think so," Elizabeth said demurely, shaking her head at him as she contemplated the steps up to her office. "See you for dinner?"
"Definitely!" John perked up, relieved to be freed from the meeting. "I'll pick you up at your office?"
Elizabeth stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. "Okay," she agreed softly. There was something in her eyes that made him pause before he left her side. John caught her chin and returned her kiss with a far superior one. Breathlessness was a state Elizabeth was entirely unused too, as were the incredulous looks from the other side of the gate room.
"Six, sharp?" John promised, winking as he swaggered past everyone in the gate room on top of the world.
Sam and Jack's footsteps echoed on the stairs as they followed her up to her office. "Is this a good time?" Sam ventured shyly.
Elizabeth checked the face of watch. "Seven minutes until the Genii," she said as she retreated to her chair. "Have a seat."
"Love what you've done with the place," Jack teased as he pulled up a crate. He patted his lap, offering it to Sam. She shook her head and pulled up a crate of her own.
"I know its short notice, but general-"
Jack coughed, interrupting Sam's habit.
"-Jack," she corrected herself with the same shy flush of color across her face. "And I think now might be the best time."
"We just need something to wear," Jack added, reaching across to take Sam's hand firmly into his own.
"The Athosians have been kind enough to help us find everything we need," Elizabeth said as she added a note on her list of things to request. "Woolsey's still with them if you want to go through him."
"I thought he'd come back?" Jack wondered. Playing with Sam's fingers as he talked made her glare at him until he stopped.
"He seems to need some time away from technology, after the Replicators and everything that happened," Elizabeth explained. Remembering how relieved Woolsey was to see trees and ground, she had been happy he'd found good friends in the Athosians. Both of them slipped out of focus for a moment when her eyes rebelled against her. When her vision corrected itself, Sam and Jack were both staring with concerned expressions.
"What?" Elizabeth asked innocently.
"You faded out there for a moment," Sam explained. Retrieving her hand from Jack's grasp, her gaze bored through Elizabeth's defenses.
"Feeling okay?" Jack coaxed as he pretended to be interested in his fingernails.
"Not for weeks," Elizabeth admitted bitterly as she stood up. The alarm announcing an incoming wormhole began just as Walter hurried over the catwalk to her office.
"Incoming wormhole, Ma'am," Walter began efficiently. "The Genii are a minute early."
"Thank you, Sergeant," Elizabeth said. Nodding to the little technician as he returned to his post, she pointed the way towards the conference room.
"You got Walter?" Jack asked as he elbowed her side gently. "Let me guess, one morning he just appeared in your control room, ready to go."
"Yesterday, when the Odyssey arrived," Elizabeth explained with a soft smile. "He told me it was his job, and he wanted to do it."
"He's the best DHD-jockey we have," Jack complimented as he followed her down the stairs towards the Genii delegation.
Grinning as Jack looked abandoned; "I'm going to go supervise the repairs on my ship," Sam said.
"Ever feel like no one wants to be with you?" Jack whispered conspiratorially to Elizabeth as the marines escorting the Genii lead them into the conference room.
"You get that too?" Elizabeth whispered back.
~*~*~*~*~
"I heard you needed something translated?" Doctor Jackson asked as he peered around the corner into Doctor Beckett's office.
"Aye, Daniel, come on in," Carson replied, waving him in. "I'm up to my ears in Ancient and I don't speak a word of it."
"What are you working on?" Daniel began as he pulled up a gray metal folding chair. Carson lifted his laptop from his legs and handed it over to the other man. "'The distribution of LK476 in the general population is controlled chromosome 23 and currently manifests as a recessive trait in forty-three percent of males and eight percent of females,'" he read from the laptop. "You need me to translate Ancient notes on genetic experimentation?"
Nodding quickly as he made his own notes on a second computer, Carson pointed to the next paragraph. "I think my patient was exposed to this experiment, or worse, she's become part of it," he explained as he waited for Daniel.
"'LK476 will become absent from the female population entirely as it becomes less likely to be expressed,'" Daniel continued to read. "'Early tests suggest is might be possible to reintroduce LK476 into the female phenotype through chromosomal manipulation and a carrier virus.'"
Snatching the laptop back as his face lit with excitement, Carson scrolled down through several years of notes as he tried to explain. "LK476 is what the Ancients dubbed what we call the ATA or the Ancient gene," he said as his fingers fly over the other keyboard. "In our current genetic structure it is incredibly rare; only thirteen original members of the expedition had it. Now that our population is considerably larger, I've been running tests on the nine hundred people on Atlantis now and only came up with forty-seven positives."
"Including Jack?" Daniel ventured.
"Aye, General O'Neill and Colonel Sheppard show the strongest expression," Carson began, pausing and turning away from his computer. "Some genes are expressed multiple times. I have what we call ATA, but based on these notes and my own blood, I only have two instances. Which is enough to turn things on or fly a jumper around, but not to have the same level of control either of them have. The retrovirus I invented to give someone the Ancient gene turns on between one and three instances."
"Jack has three?" Daniel asked as he took the laptop back and started translating the next section.
"O'Neill and Sheppard both have five," Carson looked over his blood samples data again and shook his head. "It would have taken me years, even decades, to figure out how to track the ATA on my own, but it seems completely routine to her."
Daniel looked up, amused by the tone of longing in the other man's voice. "Her?"
"Mauve," Carson explained shyly, leaning over Daniel's shoulder as he drew his attention to the personnel file open in the database behind the notes. "She was an Ancient geneticist thousands of years ago. Her eyes seem so intense."
Daniel kept his smile pointed at the laptop. "Scientists can be so passionate," he agreed as he went back to the notes. "These are a lot more technical. I'm not entirely sure I would understand this paragraph if you gave it to me in plain English. But the gist of it seems to be that her experiments were largely unsuccessful. In her projections, ATA becomes more and more rare."
"Which is unfortunately what happened to us," Carson sighed and took the laptop back. "Her notes get rather jumbled after this point so I don't know if you'll be able to help me."
Curious, Daniel raised his eyebrows and waited for the rest of the explanation.
"She went off the deep end a bit and disappeared," Carson finished with a shrug. "It was right before the end of the war with the Wraith, their record keeping wasn't the greatest."
"Does any of this help you?" Daniel asked as he looked around the infirmary. It was a brighter room than the cave in the SGC. Even with space outside them, Atlantis was full of beautiful windows and a warmer kind of lighting.
"Oh aye, thank you," Carson said gratefully, without looking up from his computer. "Can I call you back if I find something else?"
Daniel patted his shoulder as he stood to leave. "We're having a senior staff meeting after dinner," he paused and yawned into his hand, "Whenever that is."
"I can't help feeling like I'm going to get to sleep after the next apocalypse," Carson muttered darkly.
"We'll just have to hang on until then," Daniel replied as optimistically as he could. "I'll be down in the science lab."
Carson nodded but said nothing coherent as he kept studying. He didn't hear Daniel's footsteps as he left him alone to his work.
~*~*~*~*~
Elizabeth rubbed her head and stood slowly, feeling her legs protest at how long she'd kept them in the chair.
"That went well, didn't it?" Jack wondered at her elbow, watching as Laden Radim was escorted back to the gate room along with his aides and a few marines. "Have I mentioned how much more pleasant it is to listen to you talk instead of Woolsey?"
Smiling softly, Elizabeth heard him as if he was far away. "Thank you," she murmured softly, keeping her hands on the table as the room darkened slightly. "It is easier when the other party genuinely wants success." John would be disappointed. Negotiations had dragged on far past six, the face of her watch on the inside of her wrist read eight-thirty.
"Hungry?" Jack asked without expecting much of an answer as he stretched. He'd already invited the Genii to stay for dinner, but Laden was a head of state and quite busy.
Elizabeth nodded slowly, that was probably why her head felt so strange. Leaving the table seemed a bit tenuous at the moment, so she waited for her head to clear as she collected her materials. "John's going to be upset," she admitted to him sheepishly. "He's probably standing in the hallway."
"Pacing even," Jack added; his eyes glistening in amusement. "I'd be pacing. Though, I'd never admit it to Carter."
"Of course not," Elizabeth replied confidentially. She took a deep breath and let go of the table. If her stomach hadn't been so insistent on food, she would have been tempted to skip dinner and go straight to bed. She must have stumbled because Jack's hand immediately caught her elbow.
"Here," he suggested and wrapped her arm firmly around his own. "Give yourself a second or two."
"I'm okay," she insisted, even though his steadiness made the room seem warmer and less far away. "Just..."
"...its okay," Jack promised knowingly. "I've done pregnant before, not personally mind you because I'm lacking the right equipment and me in tears would scare everyone..." he waited a moment for her to smile, "...but I was there. I remember things."
"I'm dizzy," she conceded when he started walking, bringing them immediately to a halt. "It's not bad when I don't move, or try to move slowly and it's definitely better than being nauseated I just wish..."
"...you got to feel normal occasionally?" Jack finished for her sympathetically.
"Yes," she replied with a nod of her head Elizabeth immediately regretted when the room kept moving without her. "It would be nice."
Shrugging slightly, Jack reached for the door crystals. "It gets better second trimester. Sara got kinda perky, suddenly had a lot of energy for...um...things we'd been missing."
She couldn't help giggling. The conference room was fading out around the edges, and the reddish-gray walls were going black in her vision, but Elizabeth couldn't help laughing. "We might need less apocalypse to have enough time for that."
"Nasty business the end of the world, isn't it?" Jack asked softly, letting the question hang in the air as the door opened.
"Yeah," she responded automatically. The wall in front of her seemed very very far away. As if she could walk for years and never reach it. Jack's arm tugged her forward but her legs weren't listening. The foggy feeling in her head exploded into black and a wave of cold.
Jack felt her knees start to give as her weight on his arm doubled. He bent with her, catching most of her as she headed for the floor like a dead thing. "Dammit," he muttered to himself as he heard the footsteps hurry towards him. Laden and his escort had returned for something, he realized as Marines surrounded him.
"What happened?" Laden asked with concern.
"Medical team to conference room," One of the marines began over his radio.
"Oh scratch that," Jack ordered grumpily as he slipped an arm beneath her legs. "I'm not that old. I'll bring her, just tell Doctor Beckett he has incoming."
"Yes, Sir," the marine acknowledged as he amended his transmission. "Doctor Weir has collapsed-"
"-fainted," Jack corrected with a grunt as he dragged himself to his feet. It had been some time since he'd carried dead weight, but he was moderately pleased that her body wasn't too heavy for him. "She fainted, she's okay, just needs to learn the art of saying 'let's finish this tomorrow'."
"I am sorry General," Laden began to apologize as he caught up to Jack. "I had no idea she was ill."
"Oh she's not," Jack promised as he paused to shift her weight. Elizabeth's head rested against his shoulder and her arms hung limp from their sockets. "She'll be fine."
Laden peered at him, reading what was unsaid in his face. The Genii leader went a few meters with him in silence, waiting for the guards to be out of earshot. "I didn't think she was the family type," he assumed as he fell in step. "Now can't be the best time to be pregnant."
"No one said that," Jack said cautiously. He didn't really know how many people knew or how many people were supposed to know.
"I'm an observant man," Laden explained confidently. "Don't worry; we need your knowledge as much as you need our factories. I can't say I'm surprised, Sheppard's been her weakness for nearly as long as I've known her."
"Well let's try to keep this off the record," Jack said. Sweat was starting beneath his black t-shirt, but he was falling into a rhythm. "Shall we?"
Laden smiled, surprising the general with his amusement. "I'll be discreet," he promised as he turned to go. "And I think I'll bring a gift to the next set of talks."
Jack bit his lip and tackled the stairs at the end of the hall. Elizabeth was remained still in his arms, but he could feel the strength of her heart beating in her chest. He supposed they should have seen it coming. She was stubborn, that was why he'd fought so hard for her to keep her position. Good leaders were not always the best at taking care of themselves. In fact, he'd probably be in worse shape than Elizabeth was if he hadn't had Carter next to him for the last ten years at the SGC. Maybe that was why it was so easy to fall in love for both of them. Their lovers were the strength they counted on to keep them standing. How many times had Carter's smile dredged him up from his despair?
Beckett apprehended him as soon as he turned the corner into the infirmary. "What happened?" The doctor demanded. Already hovering over his patient, he led Jack to one of the few unoccupied beds.
"She fainted," Jack groaned as he set her down, feeling the aches in his muscles he wouldn't have had ten years ago. "Too much work, too little sleep."
"Did ye contact Colonel Sheppard?" Carson circled the bed, taking Elizabeth's pulse as he waited for the Ancient scanner to initialize.
~*~*~*~*~
John waited. He drummed his fingers on the table and waited as six became seven on the clock on the wall. He finished all of his paperwork, read reports and even got a head start on the next day's work. There was still no Elizabeth, so he waited. At just past seven someone dragged a chair across the floor and sat down beside him.
Sam dropped her tray to the table and started to eat listlessly. As she poked at her salad she looked over at him and caught his morose expression. "She'd be here if she could," she reminded him as she took a bite of bread.
"Negotiations take time," John agreed as he tried to ignore the delicious smell of her stew.
"You should eat," Sam suggested. Pointing at her own plate, she nudged her food with her fork. "It's good tonight."
Shrugging, he glanced over at the endless line of people getting dinner on the other side of the mess hall. "Line's moving all right," he offered without much enthusiasm. "That's usually a good sign. How are the ribs?"
Confusion flashed in her blue eyes before she realized what he was referring too. "They're all right," Sam smiled gently. "Your Doctor Beckett does good work."
"We like him," John said as he kept drumming his fingers on the table. "We'll keep him around."
Sam tossed her other piece of bread across the table without saying anything. John took it and stared at it for a moment before stuffing it into his mouth. He finished it faster than he expected and found himself staring longingly at the rest of her food. "See, pretty good," Sam teased him.
He stared at his watch again anxiously. "You'd think they'd take a break," he muttered with annoyance.
"They'll be here," Sam reminded him optimistically. Her stew was nearly gone and her fork scratched across the plate.
"Okay," John said. Standing up, he slipped into the line for dinner. Caught between a family with two young children and a set of Marines, he shuffled along as he watched Sam glance down at her watch as nervously as he had. Sergeant Ketterman gave him a grin as he passed him a plate. Nabbing an extra piece of bread to replace the one she had given him, he balanced his cup with his plate and returned.
Passing the bread across to her, John sank into his chair. He filled his fork with stew and stuffed it into his mouth. Juice ran warm and spicy down his throat and he smiled around the fork at Sam. His earpiece buzzed inside his ear, startling him as he started on his second bite.
"Sheppard?"
John wiped his mouth of his hand and hurried to answer. "Yes, Sir," he replied with a sigh.
"Don't mean to alarm you," Jack's voice started apologetically, "I need you down in the infirmary, Elizabeth's..."
His fork clattered against the plate before settling on the table and the chair teetered unsteadily at the speed he pushed it back. "I'll be right there," John replied in a rush. Feeling his heart beat in his throat, he broke into a run.