Unexpected by Oparu
Author's Chapter Notes: Enter Doctor Keller. John and Simon try to be adults and Elizabeth struggles with her new world.
John crawled out of the chair six hours after the fleet had dropped out of hyper-space in orbit of Asura. He stumbled on caught the arm of the chair before lowering himself to the floor. Leaning back against the edge he tried to remind his body how to function without the city. He could still feel the tingling sensation of hyperspace travel.
The salvage teams had finally finished. Three more Replicator battleships had landed on the intact piers of the city. The Artemis and the Daedalus were flying under their own power, but none of the stolen replicator ships had been capable of flight. He was already five minutes late for the debriefing. Elizabeth already had another set of memorials to plan, if she ever gave herself the time to do so. The names of the dead were already blurred together in his mind.
He dragged himself to his feet, feeling the aching muscles of his body protest being used again. His back burned and the emptiness in his stomach he'd ignored for the last five hours demanded his attention.
Rodney would have food, John realized with a half-smile. There would be food at the meeting if he got himself up there. The hallway swam in front of his vision. He clung to the wall for a moment and then found his feet. He'd have to ask Carson about the seemingly inevitable hangover that followed after he was in the chair longer than a few hours.
He was waiting for the transporter when he remembered Carson was missing. He'd have to ask Simon, or wait for Carson to return. Waiting for Carson to return seemed like the better option; he still couldn't look at Simon without wanting, on a primitive level, to just smack him. He should be getting better, becoming more accepting of Elizabeth's past.
Simon nearly walked into him as John stepped out of the transporter.
"Sorry," John apologized quickly. There was nothing, but polite concern in the other man's eyes and he reminded himself that Elizabeth had loved this man. He had to be a good person. He gave in and let Simon help him regain his balance. "The chair gives me a bit of a hangover," he admitted when Simon's gaze turned professionally concerned. "Like too many drinks on an empty stomach."
"I'll check you out when I get a chance," Simon stopped nervously, "I mean, if that's okay with you."
John scratched his fingers through his hair and nodded sheepishly. "Okay," he agreed softly. "How were the casualties?"
"Fairly light," Simon replied with a sigh of relief. "The infirmary has a few burn victims, some people who got to close to an explosive decompression. The battle went fairly well, didn't it?" He watched the haunted look in John's eyes and corrected himself. "Other than the Odyssey, I mean," Simon hurried to add.
"This is war, Doctor," John explained as he circled the table towards his chair at Elizabeth's side. "If something good happens, don't argue with it."
Simon walked past him towards the end of the table. He'd never had to attend one of these briefings before. Doctor Coleman had volunteered to go in his place, but when Elizabeth radioed the infirmary she'd asked for him. Doctor Jackson slyly patted the table next to him.
"Doctor Wallace?" he asked expectantly.
Simon extended his hand quickly. "Yes, thank you," he replied as he shook the hand and sat. "I'm sorry though, you are?"
"Daniel Jackson," Daniel offered pleasantly. "Don't worry; Jack's the only one you really need to worry about."
General O'Neill tapped his hand on the table, quietly bringing the meeting to order. "I'll be blunt," he began, "Colonel Emerson was a good man with a fine crew and we all feel their loss." He paused a moment, looking around the table before he continued. "But this is not the time. We have three new ships. McKay, what's their status?"
"The largest one will take a bit longer to repair than the other two," Rodney explained as he called up the schematics on the screen behind him. "It's a Dreadnought, easily twice the size of the Artemis, no offense Colonel Carter," he paused for a moment as Sam shook her head and smiled. "It takes two ZPMs to power it, and as far as I can tell, it is the second largest ship in this galaxy..."
"...a few of these were probably used to destroy Earth," Zelenka interrupted when Rodney failed to say it. "Along with the Replicator's city-ship."
"Their version of the Atlantis city-ship was not on the planet," Teal'c confirmed. "Though ground teams were able to recover many crates of small arms and a total of seven ZPMs, most of the Replicator technology is useless to our purposes."
"Many of their devices emit too much radiation to be safe for human use," Zelenka explained as Rodney nodded.
"Their hand-held weapons are fairly simple to use and rather powerful," Rodney added optimistically. "The ground-based weapon that destroyed the Odyssey is in a class of energy weapons I had pervious thought were too unstable to exist. It needs to draw energy directly from subspace and produces enough exotic particles to destroy this entire solar system..."
"...why they were even using it is entirely beyond us," Zelenka piped up as he shook his head. "It is possible it was just a prototype, something they were developing and planned to use against us at a later time...."
"...what Zelenka is saying," Rodney interrupted firmly, "Is that we're all lucky to be sitting here. I suggest getting to a safe distance and using a controlled overload to destroy the planet."
"Rodney," Elizabeth's tone warned, "Destroy the planet?" Her lips thinned. "You just said that weapon produced enough exotic particles to put this entire system in danger."
"We can't chance anyone else finding it," John explained darkly as he leaned back in his chair. "We were tempted to take it, imagine something like this in the hands of the Genii, or the Wraith..."
"How far is far enough?" Jack asked practically. "Outside the solar system?"
"Maybe farther," Rodney clarified with deep apprehension. "Even a controlled overload will destroy everything within three billion kilometers of the planet."
"Scorch the fields and salt the earth?" Daniel wondered philosophically as Jack shrugged.
"Sometimes the Romans really had things right," Jack agreed with a slight sarcastic smile. The general forward, resting his arms on the table as he looked over all the grim faces around him.
"Actually there's a lot of debate whether or not they did that," Daniel replied as he straightened his glasses. "Salt would have been very expensive..."
"...okay, so we back off from the planet and destroy the weapon," John dragged the conversation back to the topic. "Wait," he turned over to Rodney, "Why aren't we destroying it from orbit?"
"Destroying it will just trigger the chain reaction," Rodney explained irritably. "This weapon is a menace; it should never have been created."
Jack tapped the table again to draw attention back to the point. "Destroy the system," he noted easily. "Doctors...what's the damage report on the city?"
"The South pier is in rough shape," Rodney started with a heavy sigh. Zelenka called up the schematic of the damage and began the dire explanation of what they'd need to do to put the city right again.
*~
Elizabeth's back hurt. Hitting the floor had been harder on her than she'd felt at the time, and the ache had been building since the battle. She sat back against the wall. It didn't matter if it was already past midnight and he'd lecture her when he came back; she needed to wait.
Ronon's proposal lay open on her computer in front of her. He'd really gone to a lot of trouble to meet the formal requirements she held her scientists to. Elizabeth couldn't help wondering if he'd had some assistance with the Earth-based formatting. That distraction only helped her avoid thinking about the heart of the proposal as she squirmed in the bed.
The ache in her back shot pain up her spine like fingers of electricity. She crossed her legs and leaned forward until it eased. Rodney had tried to get her to join the mass of people filing in and out of the infirmary but she'd avoided the subject. As far as she had been able to tell when she stripped out of her uniform all she had were a few bruises waiting beneath the skin. She didn't need to take time away from people with real injuries. With Carson missing, doctors were in short supply.
Elizabeth dragged her itchy eyes back down to the computer in front of her. Ronon's initial suggestion was concise and to the point; the rest of his report only detailed how he would carry it out. She was stuck on his thesis:
"The civilians from Earth need immediate military training," Elizabeth murmured aloud. Thinking for a moment, she tossed the computer angrily towards the end of the bed. It wasn't Ronon's fault. He brought valiant attention to something everyone from Earth seemed to be trying desperately to avoid. These people were refugees, she reminded herself as she rubbed at the dull ache in her forehead.
How many times had she delivered crates of weapons to refugees on other worlds? How many shipments of food and medical supplies had been sent to people displaced by the Wraith so they could rebuild and continue to fight for their survival? The cold knot in her stomach insisted over and over that Ronon was right.
No one had the option of simply being a refugee anymore. The three weeks since Earth had been laid to waste were more time than anyone in the war-torn Pegasus galaxy was usually allowed to grieve. The signs were all around her. The ships sitting patiently on the piers of the city didn't need parts, or power supplies to function; they needed personnel. The Dreadnought alone would need at least a hundred hands.
Leaning back until her tired eyes stared up at the quiet ceiling, Elizabeth sighed as the lead weight settled over her chest. "He's right," she reminded herself. Even in the darkest parts of his report, Ronon was right. A child could be taught to fire a hand-held stunner as soon as their hands could hold the grip. Teenagers were responsible enough to trust on ships.
The churning of her stomach was a mess of guilt and hormones. She'd talked Niam into leaving his people. She'd turned him into the monster that led the attack on Earth. Elizabeth stumbled slightly as she left the bed. She stood in the middle of their quarters for a moment and tried to convince her stomach to retain her supper.
She started to cry as she began retching. She'd been toying happily with the idea of introducing John to her mother on the next trip to SGC. Her mother would have met them in Colorado. Her eyes would have glowed with pride when the shock of becoming a grandmother had finally worn off. Barely digested bread slid mushily over her tongue as she spat it up into the toilet.
She rolled away from it, reaching up to flush the mess as tears ran rebelliously down her face. There would be no moments with her mother explaining to her that the changes in her body were nothing to fear. There would be no shared stories, no new history written between them. There was only the invisible life inside of her that she understood as poorly as she'd managed Rodney's first explanation of the quantum physics of wormhole theory.
Staring down at her own stomach, Elizabeth watched tears disappear into the black fabric of her stolen t-shirt. The dampness of them brought out the smell of John left in it. John was with her. In the darkness ahead of her, he would be with her. Her crying slowed as she stood up. Staring at the glass door of the shower in the half-light, Elizabeth pulled up John's shirt.
Her belly was only rounded outward a handful of centimeters, but she barely recognized it as her own. Running her hand slowly down her skin, she looked deeply at her own reflection. Elizabeth wasn't sure when she’d been outside. Her face was closer to white than pink. She hadn't even told John about the sudden recurrence of her nausea. He had enough to worry about. Sighing as she splashed cold water on her face, she leaned heavily against the sink.
The city had enough water, she reassured herself. The great tanks still held enough water to meet their needs for the next three months. Food was greater on her list of worries. The Athosians had been more than gracious but they could not continue to support the refugees. Nothing in her life had prepared her for this, she'd negotiated for the safety and care of refugees fleeing totalitarian regimes and natural catastrophes, but they had never been her refugees. The people of Atlantis were her people on the brink of a thousand terrible fates; her team stood between all that was left of Earth and lasting oblivion.
Turning from the sink, she vomited again. Her stomach heaved inside her ribs, leaving her gasping for air as the chill of the floor crept into her legs.
*~
"Mind if I?" Simon asked as he pointed at his bowl of stew.
"No," John replied with quietly pulling himself up onto the bed in the infirmary. "It's hard to fit the time in to do anything around here."
"I don't think I've been this busy since I was an intern," Simon mused as he took a few bites and activated the scanner. "Any headaches?"
"Nothing out of the ordinary," John sighed and scratched the back of his head. "You don't think the chair's doing something?"
"I'm afraid this Ancient technology's mostly Greek to me," Simon offered apologetically as he waited for the scanner to finish. "Carson's been trying to teach me, but I couldn't even get my computer to turn on reliably back home, Elizabeth used to always..."
For a moment the air was thick and cold between them. John felt his throat tighten while the embarrassed flush crept across the other man's face.
"...I didn't mean to," Simon struggled somewhere between apology and something darker.
"She's good with things," John bridged the gap between them with a faint smile. "Sometimes she actually understands what Rodney's talking about."
"You must love her," Simon said abruptly staring John down over his empty bowl. "It's nearly impossible not to," he added softly. "She got into parts of my heart I wasn't entirely sure I had." Running his hand nervously through his hair, he rubbed his hand against his white coat before extending it to John. "You'll take care of her," it wasn't a question.
John shook off the hazy feeling in his head before reaching out to take Simon's hand in friendship. "She does," he paused hesitating with the heat of Simon's hand in his palm. The other man's eyes were resolute and warm. He managed a wry smile before taking his hand back to rest in his lap. "She always keeps her eyes on me."
"Good," Simon replied simply. "Your electrolytes are off," he reported as he set his bowl down and turned his full attention to the display. "Here's the problem," he tapped a graph and a set of mysterious numbers. "Some neurotransmitters are severely depleted while others are elevated. It looks like the most serious shortage is in your motor cortex." Drumming his fingers on the table next to display, he knit his eyebrows thoughtfully. "How do you move the city?" he asked finally. "Do you consciously think about it? Or just move it like it was a part of you?"
"Somewhere between," John answered with a shrug. "To be honest I don't really think about it much."
"Your brain wasn't designed to run a city several kilometers across, much less fly it through space," Simon paused with a slight smile, "Though it is trying."
"So?" John waited, trying to understand what Simon was getting at. He moved his hand, trying to get the feeling back into the tips of his fingers as he wiggled them.
"You have mental fatigue," the doctor explained as he sank into his chair. Running his hands briskly across his head, Simon slid his chair back into his desk. "You need sleep; I'm also going to recommend that you limit your time in the chair to four hours before you take a break." He turned back, standing up to turn off the display and start straightening up the infirmary as he had meant to do a long time ago.
"The chair needs to be manned whenever we make a significant course-correction, and through entire battles..." John argued self-sacrificially. "If it's just my reflexes being a little wonky..."
"This could kill you," Simon interrupted as he stared John down. "Just because I can't tell you how, or why it will right now doesn't mean it couldn't. I need time to study it and until I do, you'll need to take it slowly. Switch off with everyone else, try to take turns. Come up with a schedule."
"Make it a hot seat?" John asked with a quiet smile. Staggering off the bed, he grabbed a corner of the desk and straightened himself out when his balance failed to keep him upright. His legs were weaker than he expected.
Simon's eyes flashed knowingly but he politely said nothing. "Something like that," he yawned, covering his mouth for a moment as he waited to regain his ability to speak, "Look, it's late I have a lot of work to do, don't you have something..."
John smirked and tried to come up with a witty comment, but his exhaustion won out. "Like get back to my quarters and try to decide where we're going?" he wondered sardonically.
"You don't know?" Simon asked as his eyes widened in surprise. He studied John's quiet expression for a hint that he was joking. Finding nothing he turned away, faintly stunned. "That'll teach me to ask."
"Welcome to the Pegasus Galaxy, Doc," John finished as he headed for the door.
*~
The scent of blood hung in his nostrils, metallic through the frozen air. Ronon's feet crunched through snow across the surface of M32-471. It was the third planet that night, but no one on Major Lorne's team was complaining. Zelenka pointed across the white landscape in front of them, his voice muffled by the dark scarf across his mouth.
"Over there," he yelled hopefully as he peered through the snow. "Energy readings," he explained as he struggled to keep up with Ronon.
This planet was different than the last two; Ronon could feel it in his gut that she had been here. There were no tracks in the snow; no sign of anyone in the icy wilderness, but he knew in the pit of his stomach. His eyes caught the jumper, nearly buried in a drift of snow just as Lorne's voice cut through the wind.
"We've got them," Lorne called into his radio as he followed Ronon's sprint to the craft. Snow flew up behind Ronon's feet, blending in with the rest of the blizzard as he ran through it.
Inside the jumper was silence, the wind howled around them but the jumper was still as death. Carson lay passed out on the console, frost and frozen blood covering the floor beneath him. A silver emergency blanket was around his shoulders, but they were motionless. Ronon just stood at the entrance because it was only Carson.
"Is he alive?" Ronon wondered dully. The wind whistled menacingly around the mental of the jumper as Lorne checked Carson's pulse.
"Pulse is weak, but steady," Lorne reported softly moving Carson's white fingers away from the controls. "The jumper's functional; we should probably get everyone on board, fly him back..."
"Yeah," Ronon agreed without emotion. "Get him home," he repeated reminding himself that there was a slim possibility that Teyla was still on the planet. Wraith had been here to take her; he had been able to smell the frozen traces of them near the gate.
"I got the last set of addresses dialed from the gate," Zelenka promised hopefully trying to cheer Ronon up. "We'll compile a new list; head out as soon as we get a go."
Ronon nodded quickly and turned his attention to the friend he had found. Lorne's medic, Doctor Keller, hurried in with Lieutenant Kunze as the jumper door shut out the snow. He could still see the cloud of vapor formed from his breath as Keller started to check out Carson's injuries. He knew that tight-lipped doctors were a bad sign.
"Doctor?" he prodded as he dropped a hand to her shoulder.
Keller shook her head. "Hypothermia, frostbite on his extremities, abdomen's rigid, his left pupil isn't responding to any stimuli," her voice trailed off ominously. "Help me warm him up..."
Lorne slipped into the pilot's seat and activated the controls. "He deactivated the cloak so we'd find him," he realized as started the flight systems.
"How long ago?" Ronon demanded as he helped Keller try to rub circulation back into Carson's extremities. The little doctor knelt on the floor by his feet and stripped off his shoes.
"Two hours, maybe three by the amount of power drained from the batteries," Lorne reported as the jumper took off. Taking a moment to deal with the shifting winds, he righted the craft and headed for the gate.
Staring across the white flesh at Keller's intent expression, Ronon's concern was silent in his eyes. "How are his feet?"
"As bad as his hands," Keller replied grimly as she started to rub his toes quickly between her hands. "Can we have some more heat Major?"
"Got it," Lorne replied as he maxed out the heating controls and guided the jumper towards the gate. "We'll be home soon."
Looking into Carson's glassy eyes, Ronon hoped it would be soon enough. The hand he held in his own didn't even feel like a living thing; the flesh was so cold it felt like clay in his hands. "What's wrong with his eye?" he wondered. Something in Carson's left eye had stained the pupil, leaving it grey instead of black.
"Retina bleeding," Keller replied softly. "I don't know if we'll be able to fix it, maybe if we had found him a few hours ago..."
"Will he live?" Zelenka asked for everyone in the jumper.
Keller shrank further into the console instinctively before she answered; "I don't know the extent of his injuries, someone's beaten him fairly badly."
"Teyla," Ronon interrupted as he set down Carson's hand on his lap. Running his hands over the bruises on the side of the unconscious man's face, he recognized the pattern left by one of the Athosian maneuvers she'd taught him. He could see where her hands had been and picture the quick snap of her arm as she'd hurt their friend. "The Wraith within her did this."
*~
John caught the edge of his doorway gratefully. In his exhaustion the hallway to that point had been longer than he remembered it ever being. The foggy feeling in his extremities had moved upward as the night had gone on and crawling into bed was the best idea he had ever had.
Elizabeth's computer lay open and forgotten on the bed and her shoes were abandoned near the bed on the floor. He dropped to the bed, pulling off his boots without untying them and fell back. John could have fallen asleep then without another thought, but his ears refused to let him.
There was a sound in the bathroom, a quiet, wet sound that cut at his heart. Dragging himself back up to his feet, John crossed the cool floor to the bathroom. She was curled up on the floor, spitting water into the toilet as she washed her mouth out.
"I didn't hear you," Elizabeth began softly as she wiped wet lips on the back of her hand. "When did you?"
He dropped to the floor at her side, leaning back against the wall as he settled. "Just now, don't worry," he reassured her as his slow smile crept across his face. "Rough night?" he wondered.
"I'm sending children for military training," Elizabeth answered grimly without sharing his amusement. "Children, John..."
"...we didn't ask for this war," he reminded her reaching for her shoulder and digging his fingers into it.
"John..." she warned trying to stop him for dredging up the serious side of her worries.
"...we didn't," he interrupted again. "If the Replicators had just said, go away and leave us alone, we would have, but they wanted to blow up the city, they moved on Earth. They tried to wipe us out." Pulling her towards the wall with him, they both relaxed when she snuggled into his chest. "It isn't wrong to teach a child to defend themself. The Athosians, the Genii, and everyone else in this galaxy have been teaching their children to fight for thousands of years. Innocence doesn't have to be ignorance, Elizabeth."
She turned up towards him, looking into his eyes with new respect. "I suppose you're right, we've been sheltered on Earth; all of us sitting at home watching television and worrying about our taxes while the rest of the galaxy was fighting for their lives. It was about time something bad happened to us," she broke off wiping her nose angrily as she sniffed back tears. "Is that what you think?"
Sighing as he touched her face, John shook his head. "War and death are always with us, I think we just need to stop worrying and start living. If we spend our lives teaching our children how to stay away from the business end of a P-90, at least those kids will be around to teach their kids, and someday..."
"...someday," Elizabeth repeated as she swallowed and forced her stomach back into place. "What do we do until then?" she wondered quietly letting him take over.
"I was thinking about going to bed," John offered as he started to stand. "If you’re interested."
"I'm okay,” she insisted as she caught his hand. John was less steady than he'd thought and they both had to cling to the wall. One of her eyes crept upwards in surprised concern. "What about you?"
"Chair hangover," John promised as lightly as he could. She ended up helping him more than he could assist her as they walked to the bed. "Simon says," he paused for a moment, amused as he grinned at the floor, "Sorry."
"I'm glad it's funny to you actually," she replied with the slightest chuckle. "Humor's something hard to get around here. Does this mean you and Simon are..."
"Trying to be grown-ups," John grinned up as she lowered him to the bed, "As best we can."
"Simon and I were..." Elizabeth began without knowing where she was going to finish.
Catching her arm, he pulled her close enough to feel her soft hair fall against his cheek. "You don't have to say anything," he promised as he released her, "I understand."
"I cared about him," she admitted to the wall as she turned her back on the bed. Her tongue felt ill-suited to her mouth and she fought to finish what she was saying.
"I'm not demanding you stop caring..." he offered trying to sound as calm as he could. John couldn't shake the possibility that feelings ran deeper between her and Simon than any of them would ever admit. She might stay with him until their child was born, but after that, he couldn't be sure.
"...but," Elizabeth interrupted him still without turning around. She wrapped her arms around herself and tried to find the courage to finish.
"...you don't have to..." he tried to save her keeping her from having to admit anything she wasn't ready to voice.
"Dammit John," Elizabeth snapped as she turned around. She grabbed his shoulders and kept him from standing. "Stop and let just let me..." for a moment she stopped thinking, "I love you."
The most adorable smile spread across his face, lighting green eyes from within as he let the words soak into him. "Well," John swallowed and turned his face into her hand as she nervously stroked his cheek. "I guess that's that then."
"I don't love him," she continued to explain feeling foolishly as if she owed him for his patience. "Not anymore, not after he...I couldn't," she licked her lips and ended up biting her lower one, "I thought maybe I couldn't," she sighed and sank to the bed at his side, "But I do love you."
Quietly studying her face, he rolled up on one elbow. "Yeah," he offered gently, emotion playing lightly across his face. "So, where are we going?" he stopped and something flickered behind his green eyes. "Do you want something more than this?" Elizabeth's finger over his lips cut him off.
"We're okay," she promised with her own trace of a giggle. John struggling against his desire to keep spouting gibberish was really rather attractive and she wondered if he knew it. Elizabeth smiled gently feeling the warmth in her chest. "This is more than I thought I'd have."
"The baby?" he wondered watching her twitch as he mentioned it. His hand crept out, resting on her stomach as she contemplated pulling away.
His hand was warm through her shirt from the alien market. It wasn't quite silk, but it was so much thinner than what she was used to; Elizabeth could feel the tiny movements as he settled his fingers. "I can't say it," she admitted as she nearly choked on her thoughts. "People ask me, and I can't say anything about it. I get caught..."
His hand flew up to her neck, stroking the skin that got too tight whenever she tried to talk about the baby within her. "It's just a baby, not even really that yet, it can't hurt you."
"I could," she argued as she stared down at her body before turning desperately away towards the ceiling.
"You won't," John insisted as he kissed her neck. Soft, warm lips took away the feeling of the walls closing in. Instead of tensing, Elizabeth shivered into his touch and tried to force herself to relax. "Believe me," he suggested as he nibble the skin up to her ear. "Sometimes, I kinda know what I'm talking about."
"You're very wise John, sometimes I think you forget to see that in yourself," she replied softly as her hand found its way up his side, finding the edge of his shirt and diving within. "You spend so much time looking at me," she whispered, nearly forgetting to speak out loud.
John worked his way across her face towards her pale pink lips. "You're beautiful," he insisted as she tried to giggle her way out of it. "I mean that," he affirmed as she started to blush. "Don't you believe..."
"...okay," she agreed softly watching his hand slide back down to her belly. His thumb danced along her breast, teasing the tender flesh beneath her bra. "I believe you," she finished as she lifted her head to look at him.
He chose to follow his hand with his head, moving down her body as ideas blossomed in his mind. "You believe me?"
"Not really," Elizabeth whispered as she ran her hand through his hair. "I'm trying," she defended herself as he kissed his way across her faintly rounded belly.
"This is our child," he insisted with a fervor usually reserved for arguments with Rodney. "Nothing would make you more beautiful," John promised as he rested his head there. "And Doctor Keller said it was okay," he couldn't have discussed it with Simon. There were some things that should never be discussed with an ex.
Elizabeth heard his confidence falter slightly and she shared the thrill of fear. "She did," she repeated knowing she hadn't brought it up. In fact, she'd gone two weeks without one of Carson's required examinations. Keller had promised to make time for her in her schedule, but she hadn't tried to fit it in. There were things she couldn't face yet; ultrasounds and fetal heartbeats were part of that. "Kiss me," she finally begged feeling her body ache beneath his touch. The gray sheets twisted beneath her back, and she bent a knee to lift it from the bed.
John slid quizzically up to her face, capturing her cheek as he stared at her. Her eyelashes were still damp from her time in the bathroom and he wanted to take all the fear from the tightness of her mouth. He rested his hand on the pillow, leaning closer as he felt her breath on his cheek. Kissing her first, he let her lead him into it. Her tongue parted his lips, reminding him she was just as hungry as he was.
"Okay," John answered finally raising his voice to be heard over the panting of his breath.
Elizabeth ripped his black t-shirt up and over his shoulders; shrugging out of it, he grinned wolfishly at her.
"Your turn," he demanded as his hands ran down to her waist. Elizabeth bit her lip as he eased her shirt up over her belly. John's eyes stayed focused, calm and full of desire as he studied her skin. "You're going to be gorgeous when you hit the glowing part everyone talks about," he ventured innocently.
Sitting up to help him get her shirt over her head, Elizabeth started to protest when he kissed her. "I don't know..." she sputtered through his lips.
He started to chuckle, caught up in the joy of the white flesh beneath her pale blue bra. Stopping for a moment, he studied the lace and titled his head in confusion. "This is new," he said searching for the clasp on her back.
"Carter," Elizabeth explained softly as she helped him peel it from her skin. "The black one got tight and she had a couple."
John's lips twitched and for a moment he wondered if his commanding officer had taken this bra off of his wife. He shook his head and decided to leave that idea alone. "This one's better?"
Resting a hand on his naked chest, she smiled softly in return. "It works," she answered shyly as he ran his fingers beneath her growing breasts.
"I like them better without anything," he teased with a kiss on her left breast.
"They're sore without anything," she argued burying her fingers in his unruly dark hair.
"I'll have to work on that," John growled playfully bending her back to the bed. She reached up for his pants and laughed as he kissed her attention away with a warm tongue on her nipple. Gasping in surprise, she missed him undoing his pants as he got ready to stand up and leave them on the floor. Stumbling slightly as he left the bed, John remembered his reflexes were still suffering.
He shuffled out of his pants anyway and turned his attention to hers. Elizabeth grabbed the simple blue blanket and held it against her chest as she propped herself up to watch him. They slid easily over her hips and he planted a kiss on the curving bone. "Have I mentioned how much I like you naked?" John purred as he crept beneath the blanket with her.
Laughing as she moved over to let him into the bed, Elizabeth felt his knee slip in between her legs. John's body was so hot next to hers that his skin nearly burned. He caught her waist, rolling her up over him.
"Maybe once or twice," Elizabeth replied breathily as she ran her hands down across his stomach. "You know, this is how we got into this mess."
"This mess is beautiful," he said pulling her down against him. His erection was firm against her stomach as she ground her way up his legs to grab his face. Her fingers brushed against fresh stubble and Elizabeth saw truth in his eyes.
"You really believe..." she started to whisper as she kissed him again, "...I think that's why I love you."
The admission he barely heard was the sexiest thing anyone had ever said to him, and she didn't give him time to think before she surrounded him with hot, wet Elizabeth. John watched her eyes roll in her head before he forced himself to concentrate. It had been awhile, but not long enough for him to explode inside of her like a trigger-happy teenager. He wondered if she was rushing because she was nervous, the pale flush was still on her cheeks.
Elizabeth rocked above him, feeling the pressure of him draw a moan from her throat. He was struggling, forcing his body to behave. His hands on her breasts were almost more than she could handle in their current state. Every movement of his fingers felt like he was shouting in her mind as her nerves jangled. Shivering in his hands, she rocked faster; wanting him to enjoy it.
One of his hands held the small of her back, but the other insisted on reaching around towards her clit. His finger was rough at first, then delicious as it rolled over her. Elizabeth moaned again and caught his smirk out of the corner of her eye. Leaning down to kiss his neck, she felt herself start to give in. Her body trembled in his hands and she bit down on his lip. John bit back, fighting his way into her mouth as he pushed deeper into her.
Too quickly, she came around him. The sheer force of her orgasm shocked her eyes closed, shaking her away from his lips to gaps into his neck. Surprised that he'd outlasted her by so much, he asked her permission to finish with a hand on her butt. She whispered something he didn't hear into his neck, but she rocked in rhythm with him. Absently, John wondered when they'd gotten so used to each other as her small fingers teased his chest.
A gasp and a shudder ran through his chest, panting he kissed her neck and tasted sweat. She stayed slumped over him, not bothering to extract him from her as she clung to him.
"See that wasn't so bad..." he began to tease. The face in his neck was suddenly cool and new wetness on his skin wasn't from sweat. "Elizabeth?"
Her name caught on his tongue, like it always did, and she clung tighter to his chest. John wondered if he should get used to her tears, then he wondered if it was just the pregnancy. "You okay?" he asked in his softest tone.
"Yes," she stuttered lifting her head from his neck. "I'm okay. Everything just sets me off lately," she mused apologetically. "You, you're, incredible, John..."
He grinned proudly, as if he'd known all along. "Good," he stroked damp curls of her hair down to her neck. "I mean, I strive for incredible..."
She kissed his cheek as she left the bed for the bathroom. John pushed the blanket down to his waist and let the air dry his sweat. A moment later she was back in his arms and wedged so tightly against him that they could have shared a smaller bed.
"I think you've accomplished your goals," Elizabeth teased him in her professional tone. That voice surprised him, and he jumped against his pillow just enough to make her smile.
"I love you," he finished simply. "I'll do anything..."
Elizabeth sat up, ignoring the way her hair tickled as it fell across her damp skin. "I'll meet you halfway, John. I really want this...us...to work. I don't know how this is even right..." she licked her lips nervously and contemplated pacing the room.
John's hand on her arm kept her in bed with him.
"I need this...you...us," she finally finished. "More than I think I can tell you," Elizabeth rested her hand on his chest as she tried to make her heart beat slower. "This baby needs you," the cold feeling in her stomach warmed when he took her hand.
"You have me," he promised as he encouraged her back into his arms. Lying with her head on his chest, Elizabeth closed her eyes and let herself forget everything screaming in the back of her mind. There was no Atlantis, no missing Teyla or kidnapped Carson, and no refugees ready to riot for more clothing and food. Instead, there was John's hand on her belly and the child sleeping within her. For that moment, she forgot to be afraid of anything.
*~
"Could you?" Doctor Keller asked desperately as she stared at Simon over Carson's unconscious body. "I've heard of it being done, but I don't think I could do it. I interned in surgery, but I never did eyes."
"I think I can reattach the retina, but he has vitreous bleeding," Simon sighed heavily and rested a hand on Carson shoulder. The man had been so kind to him, so careful while he explained how the world worked in the Pegasus galaxy. How could he explain that he'd never see out of his left eye again? "The fluid's too contaminated, he'll never see anything more than a blur."
"He's not going to be able to do surgery without depth perception," Keller reminded him painfully. "He'll be diagnostic only and he's the best surgeon we have..."
"...we'll have to make do," Simon reminded her pragmatically. "He's alive. His fingers and toes are going to survive their frostbite without nerve damage. The internal injuries will heal; we've both seen a lot worse come through that door." He pointed back at the door to the infirmary. "We'll make do, Carson can..."
"...handle it," Keller finished for him as she dropped her head in defeat. "Do you want me to tell him?"
"I'll stay with him," Simon offered quietly. "He's seen me through a great deal." He pulled his chair over to the desk and tossed his feet up onto it. "Any sign of Teyla?"
Keller shook her head darkly and fought angry tears. "The Wraith took her, Ronon and Major Lorne's team are going to keep looking," she took a deep breath and finished, "But I don't know where they have left to look. Doctor Zelenka said something about the crystals..."
Simon shared her confusion; he hadn't even been off-world yet and wasn't sure he was ready for that step. "Elizabeth asked me to join Colonel Mitchell's team when they need a doctor."
"Colonel Mitchell's a good man," Keller offered with a tiny smile. "Weird sense of humor," she finished as she tightened her eyebrows in thought. "You'll be okay."
"That seems to be the motto around here," Simon said thoughtfully as he reached for his bottle of water. "We'll be okay."
"Maybe we should put it above the door?" Keller ventured optimistically as she started towards the exit of the infirmary. "I'm going to go meet the major for a really late dinner, or a really early breakfast..."
Simon caught the gleam in her eye and wondered if he was seeing what he thought he was. "Enjoy," he wished fondly as he watched her wave him goodbye. Turning back to his computer, he dug into the genetic puzzle that was the Ancient gene.
*~
Major Lorne met her just inside the cafeteria with a bowl of porridge and smile. "Hey Doc, come join me," he offered cheerfully. "It's not half bad."
Keller sat down in the chair he'd pulled out for and tried not to yawn. Failing miserably she just smiled sheepishly at Lorne. "Thank you," she said as she took the porridge. "Carson's going to be okay, we got him stabilized and his extremities responded well to treatment."
Lorne saw her face fall through her optimism and reached across the table to touch the hand holding her spoon over her untouched breakfast.
"We couldn't..." Keller started dropping her spoon and pushing her chair back a bit as her nose started to sting. "We couldn't save his eye." Anger hurt, burning through her sinuses as she fought the urge to cry.
Lorne's hand closed warmly around hers, crushing her doubts with his strength. "He's alive and he's back with us," he reminded her as firmly as he held her hand. "We'll just get him an eye patch or something...I bet Scotland had pirates too."
Keller laughed painfully through the lump in her throat. "Ireland had Grainne O'Malley, but she was a pirate queen, not really the eye patch type," she tried to be as positive as he was.
His other hand slipped across the table to touch her chin. "Carson is one of the most optimistic men I know," he promised her as he smiled at her obscure knowledge of history. "If anyone can learn to be a Scottish pirate physician...he can."
Keller nodded into his hand and wondered why she hadn't noticed how beautiful his eyes were before that moment.
The salvage teams had finally finished. Three more Replicator battleships had landed on the intact piers of the city. The Artemis and the Daedalus were flying under their own power, but none of the stolen replicator ships had been capable of flight. He was already five minutes late for the debriefing. Elizabeth already had another set of memorials to plan, if she ever gave herself the time to do so. The names of the dead were already blurred together in his mind.
He dragged himself to his feet, feeling the aching muscles of his body protest being used again. His back burned and the emptiness in his stomach he'd ignored for the last five hours demanded his attention.
Rodney would have food, John realized with a half-smile. There would be food at the meeting if he got himself up there. The hallway swam in front of his vision. He clung to the wall for a moment and then found his feet. He'd have to ask Carson about the seemingly inevitable hangover that followed after he was in the chair longer than a few hours.
He was waiting for the transporter when he remembered Carson was missing. He'd have to ask Simon, or wait for Carson to return. Waiting for Carson to return seemed like the better option; he still couldn't look at Simon without wanting, on a primitive level, to just smack him. He should be getting better, becoming more accepting of Elizabeth's past.
Simon nearly walked into him as John stepped out of the transporter.
"Sorry," John apologized quickly. There was nothing, but polite concern in the other man's eyes and he reminded himself that Elizabeth had loved this man. He had to be a good person. He gave in and let Simon help him regain his balance. "The chair gives me a bit of a hangover," he admitted when Simon's gaze turned professionally concerned. "Like too many drinks on an empty stomach."
"I'll check you out when I get a chance," Simon stopped nervously, "I mean, if that's okay with you."
John scratched his fingers through his hair and nodded sheepishly. "Okay," he agreed softly. "How were the casualties?"
"Fairly light," Simon replied with a sigh of relief. "The infirmary has a few burn victims, some people who got to close to an explosive decompression. The battle went fairly well, didn't it?" He watched the haunted look in John's eyes and corrected himself. "Other than the Odyssey, I mean," Simon hurried to add.
"This is war, Doctor," John explained as he circled the table towards his chair at Elizabeth's side. "If something good happens, don't argue with it."
Simon walked past him towards the end of the table. He'd never had to attend one of these briefings before. Doctor Coleman had volunteered to go in his place, but when Elizabeth radioed the infirmary she'd asked for him. Doctor Jackson slyly patted the table next to him.
"Doctor Wallace?" he asked expectantly.
Simon extended his hand quickly. "Yes, thank you," he replied as he shook the hand and sat. "I'm sorry though, you are?"
"Daniel Jackson," Daniel offered pleasantly. "Don't worry; Jack's the only one you really need to worry about."
General O'Neill tapped his hand on the table, quietly bringing the meeting to order. "I'll be blunt," he began, "Colonel Emerson was a good man with a fine crew and we all feel their loss." He paused a moment, looking around the table before he continued. "But this is not the time. We have three new ships. McKay, what's their status?"
"The largest one will take a bit longer to repair than the other two," Rodney explained as he called up the schematics on the screen behind him. "It's a Dreadnought, easily twice the size of the Artemis, no offense Colonel Carter," he paused for a moment as Sam shook her head and smiled. "It takes two ZPMs to power it, and as far as I can tell, it is the second largest ship in this galaxy..."
"...a few of these were probably used to destroy Earth," Zelenka interrupted when Rodney failed to say it. "Along with the Replicator's city-ship."
"Their version of the Atlantis city-ship was not on the planet," Teal'c confirmed. "Though ground teams were able to recover many crates of small arms and a total of seven ZPMs, most of the Replicator technology is useless to our purposes."
"Many of their devices emit too much radiation to be safe for human use," Zelenka explained as Rodney nodded.
"Their hand-held weapons are fairly simple to use and rather powerful," Rodney added optimistically. "The ground-based weapon that destroyed the Odyssey is in a class of energy weapons I had pervious thought were too unstable to exist. It needs to draw energy directly from subspace and produces enough exotic particles to destroy this entire solar system..."
"...why they were even using it is entirely beyond us," Zelenka piped up as he shook his head. "It is possible it was just a prototype, something they were developing and planned to use against us at a later time...."
"...what Zelenka is saying," Rodney interrupted firmly, "Is that we're all lucky to be sitting here. I suggest getting to a safe distance and using a controlled overload to destroy the planet."
"Rodney," Elizabeth's tone warned, "Destroy the planet?" Her lips thinned. "You just said that weapon produced enough exotic particles to put this entire system in danger."
"We can't chance anyone else finding it," John explained darkly as he leaned back in his chair. "We were tempted to take it, imagine something like this in the hands of the Genii, or the Wraith..."
"How far is far enough?" Jack asked practically. "Outside the solar system?"
"Maybe farther," Rodney clarified with deep apprehension. "Even a controlled overload will destroy everything within three billion kilometers of the planet."
"Scorch the fields and salt the earth?" Daniel wondered philosophically as Jack shrugged.
"Sometimes the Romans really had things right," Jack agreed with a slight sarcastic smile. The general forward, resting his arms on the table as he looked over all the grim faces around him.
"Actually there's a lot of debate whether or not they did that," Daniel replied as he straightened his glasses. "Salt would have been very expensive..."
"...okay, so we back off from the planet and destroy the weapon," John dragged the conversation back to the topic. "Wait," he turned over to Rodney, "Why aren't we destroying it from orbit?"
"Destroying it will just trigger the chain reaction," Rodney explained irritably. "This weapon is a menace; it should never have been created."
Jack tapped the table again to draw attention back to the point. "Destroy the system," he noted easily. "Doctors...what's the damage report on the city?"
"The South pier is in rough shape," Rodney started with a heavy sigh. Zelenka called up the schematic of the damage and began the dire explanation of what they'd need to do to put the city right again.
*~
Elizabeth's back hurt. Hitting the floor had been harder on her than she'd felt at the time, and the ache had been building since the battle. She sat back against the wall. It didn't matter if it was already past midnight and he'd lecture her when he came back; she needed to wait.
Ronon's proposal lay open on her computer in front of her. He'd really gone to a lot of trouble to meet the formal requirements she held her scientists to. Elizabeth couldn't help wondering if he'd had some assistance with the Earth-based formatting. That distraction only helped her avoid thinking about the heart of the proposal as she squirmed in the bed.
The ache in her back shot pain up her spine like fingers of electricity. She crossed her legs and leaned forward until it eased. Rodney had tried to get her to join the mass of people filing in and out of the infirmary but she'd avoided the subject. As far as she had been able to tell when she stripped out of her uniform all she had were a few bruises waiting beneath the skin. She didn't need to take time away from people with real injuries. With Carson missing, doctors were in short supply.
Elizabeth dragged her itchy eyes back down to the computer in front of her. Ronon's initial suggestion was concise and to the point; the rest of his report only detailed how he would carry it out. She was stuck on his thesis:
"The civilians from Earth need immediate military training," Elizabeth murmured aloud. Thinking for a moment, she tossed the computer angrily towards the end of the bed. It wasn't Ronon's fault. He brought valiant attention to something everyone from Earth seemed to be trying desperately to avoid. These people were refugees, she reminded herself as she rubbed at the dull ache in her forehead.
How many times had she delivered crates of weapons to refugees on other worlds? How many shipments of food and medical supplies had been sent to people displaced by the Wraith so they could rebuild and continue to fight for their survival? The cold knot in her stomach insisted over and over that Ronon was right.
No one had the option of simply being a refugee anymore. The three weeks since Earth had been laid to waste were more time than anyone in the war-torn Pegasus galaxy was usually allowed to grieve. The signs were all around her. The ships sitting patiently on the piers of the city didn't need parts, or power supplies to function; they needed personnel. The Dreadnought alone would need at least a hundred hands.
Leaning back until her tired eyes stared up at the quiet ceiling, Elizabeth sighed as the lead weight settled over her chest. "He's right," she reminded herself. Even in the darkest parts of his report, Ronon was right. A child could be taught to fire a hand-held stunner as soon as their hands could hold the grip. Teenagers were responsible enough to trust on ships.
The churning of her stomach was a mess of guilt and hormones. She'd talked Niam into leaving his people. She'd turned him into the monster that led the attack on Earth. Elizabeth stumbled slightly as she left the bed. She stood in the middle of their quarters for a moment and tried to convince her stomach to retain her supper.
She started to cry as she began retching. She'd been toying happily with the idea of introducing John to her mother on the next trip to SGC. Her mother would have met them in Colorado. Her eyes would have glowed with pride when the shock of becoming a grandmother had finally worn off. Barely digested bread slid mushily over her tongue as she spat it up into the toilet.
She rolled away from it, reaching up to flush the mess as tears ran rebelliously down her face. There would be no moments with her mother explaining to her that the changes in her body were nothing to fear. There would be no shared stories, no new history written between them. There was only the invisible life inside of her that she understood as poorly as she'd managed Rodney's first explanation of the quantum physics of wormhole theory.
Staring down at her own stomach, Elizabeth watched tears disappear into the black fabric of her stolen t-shirt. The dampness of them brought out the smell of John left in it. John was with her. In the darkness ahead of her, he would be with her. Her crying slowed as she stood up. Staring at the glass door of the shower in the half-light, Elizabeth pulled up John's shirt.
Her belly was only rounded outward a handful of centimeters, but she barely recognized it as her own. Running her hand slowly down her skin, she looked deeply at her own reflection. Elizabeth wasn't sure when she’d been outside. Her face was closer to white than pink. She hadn't even told John about the sudden recurrence of her nausea. He had enough to worry about. Sighing as she splashed cold water on her face, she leaned heavily against the sink.
The city had enough water, she reassured herself. The great tanks still held enough water to meet their needs for the next three months. Food was greater on her list of worries. The Athosians had been more than gracious but they could not continue to support the refugees. Nothing in her life had prepared her for this, she'd negotiated for the safety and care of refugees fleeing totalitarian regimes and natural catastrophes, but they had never been her refugees. The people of Atlantis were her people on the brink of a thousand terrible fates; her team stood between all that was left of Earth and lasting oblivion.
Turning from the sink, she vomited again. Her stomach heaved inside her ribs, leaving her gasping for air as the chill of the floor crept into her legs.
*~
"Mind if I?" Simon asked as he pointed at his bowl of stew.
"No," John replied with quietly pulling himself up onto the bed in the infirmary. "It's hard to fit the time in to do anything around here."
"I don't think I've been this busy since I was an intern," Simon mused as he took a few bites and activated the scanner. "Any headaches?"
"Nothing out of the ordinary," John sighed and scratched the back of his head. "You don't think the chair's doing something?"
"I'm afraid this Ancient technology's mostly Greek to me," Simon offered apologetically as he waited for the scanner to finish. "Carson's been trying to teach me, but I couldn't even get my computer to turn on reliably back home, Elizabeth used to always..."
For a moment the air was thick and cold between them. John felt his throat tighten while the embarrassed flush crept across the other man's face.
"...I didn't mean to," Simon struggled somewhere between apology and something darker.
"She's good with things," John bridged the gap between them with a faint smile. "Sometimes she actually understands what Rodney's talking about."
"You must love her," Simon said abruptly staring John down over his empty bowl. "It's nearly impossible not to," he added softly. "She got into parts of my heart I wasn't entirely sure I had." Running his hand nervously through his hair, he rubbed his hand against his white coat before extending it to John. "You'll take care of her," it wasn't a question.
John shook off the hazy feeling in his head before reaching out to take Simon's hand in friendship. "She does," he paused hesitating with the heat of Simon's hand in his palm. The other man's eyes were resolute and warm. He managed a wry smile before taking his hand back to rest in his lap. "She always keeps her eyes on me."
"Good," Simon replied simply. "Your electrolytes are off," he reported as he set his bowl down and turned his full attention to the display. "Here's the problem," he tapped a graph and a set of mysterious numbers. "Some neurotransmitters are severely depleted while others are elevated. It looks like the most serious shortage is in your motor cortex." Drumming his fingers on the table next to display, he knit his eyebrows thoughtfully. "How do you move the city?" he asked finally. "Do you consciously think about it? Or just move it like it was a part of you?"
"Somewhere between," John answered with a shrug. "To be honest I don't really think about it much."
"Your brain wasn't designed to run a city several kilometers across, much less fly it through space," Simon paused with a slight smile, "Though it is trying."
"So?" John waited, trying to understand what Simon was getting at. He moved his hand, trying to get the feeling back into the tips of his fingers as he wiggled them.
"You have mental fatigue," the doctor explained as he sank into his chair. Running his hands briskly across his head, Simon slid his chair back into his desk. "You need sleep; I'm also going to recommend that you limit your time in the chair to four hours before you take a break." He turned back, standing up to turn off the display and start straightening up the infirmary as he had meant to do a long time ago.
"The chair needs to be manned whenever we make a significant course-correction, and through entire battles..." John argued self-sacrificially. "If it's just my reflexes being a little wonky..."
"This could kill you," Simon interrupted as he stared John down. "Just because I can't tell you how, or why it will right now doesn't mean it couldn't. I need time to study it and until I do, you'll need to take it slowly. Switch off with everyone else, try to take turns. Come up with a schedule."
"Make it a hot seat?" John asked with a quiet smile. Staggering off the bed, he grabbed a corner of the desk and straightened himself out when his balance failed to keep him upright. His legs were weaker than he expected.
Simon's eyes flashed knowingly but he politely said nothing. "Something like that," he yawned, covering his mouth for a moment as he waited to regain his ability to speak, "Look, it's late I have a lot of work to do, don't you have something..."
John smirked and tried to come up with a witty comment, but his exhaustion won out. "Like get back to my quarters and try to decide where we're going?" he wondered sardonically.
"You don't know?" Simon asked as his eyes widened in surprise. He studied John's quiet expression for a hint that he was joking. Finding nothing he turned away, faintly stunned. "That'll teach me to ask."
"Welcome to the Pegasus Galaxy, Doc," John finished as he headed for the door.
*~
The scent of blood hung in his nostrils, metallic through the frozen air. Ronon's feet crunched through snow across the surface of M32-471. It was the third planet that night, but no one on Major Lorne's team was complaining. Zelenka pointed across the white landscape in front of them, his voice muffled by the dark scarf across his mouth.
"Over there," he yelled hopefully as he peered through the snow. "Energy readings," he explained as he struggled to keep up with Ronon.
This planet was different than the last two; Ronon could feel it in his gut that she had been here. There were no tracks in the snow; no sign of anyone in the icy wilderness, but he knew in the pit of his stomach. His eyes caught the jumper, nearly buried in a drift of snow just as Lorne's voice cut through the wind.
"We've got them," Lorne called into his radio as he followed Ronon's sprint to the craft. Snow flew up behind Ronon's feet, blending in with the rest of the blizzard as he ran through it.
Inside the jumper was silence, the wind howled around them but the jumper was still as death. Carson lay passed out on the console, frost and frozen blood covering the floor beneath him. A silver emergency blanket was around his shoulders, but they were motionless. Ronon just stood at the entrance because it was only Carson.
"Is he alive?" Ronon wondered dully. The wind whistled menacingly around the mental of the jumper as Lorne checked Carson's pulse.
"Pulse is weak, but steady," Lorne reported softly moving Carson's white fingers away from the controls. "The jumper's functional; we should probably get everyone on board, fly him back..."
"Yeah," Ronon agreed without emotion. "Get him home," he repeated reminding himself that there was a slim possibility that Teyla was still on the planet. Wraith had been here to take her; he had been able to smell the frozen traces of them near the gate.
"I got the last set of addresses dialed from the gate," Zelenka promised hopefully trying to cheer Ronon up. "We'll compile a new list; head out as soon as we get a go."
Ronon nodded quickly and turned his attention to the friend he had found. Lorne's medic, Doctor Keller, hurried in with Lieutenant Kunze as the jumper door shut out the snow. He could still see the cloud of vapor formed from his breath as Keller started to check out Carson's injuries. He knew that tight-lipped doctors were a bad sign.
"Doctor?" he prodded as he dropped a hand to her shoulder.
Keller shook her head. "Hypothermia, frostbite on his extremities, abdomen's rigid, his left pupil isn't responding to any stimuli," her voice trailed off ominously. "Help me warm him up..."
Lorne slipped into the pilot's seat and activated the controls. "He deactivated the cloak so we'd find him," he realized as started the flight systems.
"How long ago?" Ronon demanded as he helped Keller try to rub circulation back into Carson's extremities. The little doctor knelt on the floor by his feet and stripped off his shoes.
"Two hours, maybe three by the amount of power drained from the batteries," Lorne reported as the jumper took off. Taking a moment to deal with the shifting winds, he righted the craft and headed for the gate.
Staring across the white flesh at Keller's intent expression, Ronon's concern was silent in his eyes. "How are his feet?"
"As bad as his hands," Keller replied grimly as she started to rub his toes quickly between her hands. "Can we have some more heat Major?"
"Got it," Lorne replied as he maxed out the heating controls and guided the jumper towards the gate. "We'll be home soon."
Looking into Carson's glassy eyes, Ronon hoped it would be soon enough. The hand he held in his own didn't even feel like a living thing; the flesh was so cold it felt like clay in his hands. "What's wrong with his eye?" he wondered. Something in Carson's left eye had stained the pupil, leaving it grey instead of black.
"Retina bleeding," Keller replied softly. "I don't know if we'll be able to fix it, maybe if we had found him a few hours ago..."
"Will he live?" Zelenka asked for everyone in the jumper.
Keller shrank further into the console instinctively before she answered; "I don't know the extent of his injuries, someone's beaten him fairly badly."
"Teyla," Ronon interrupted as he set down Carson's hand on his lap. Running his hands over the bruises on the side of the unconscious man's face, he recognized the pattern left by one of the Athosian maneuvers she'd taught him. He could see where her hands had been and picture the quick snap of her arm as she'd hurt their friend. "The Wraith within her did this."
*~
John caught the edge of his doorway gratefully. In his exhaustion the hallway to that point had been longer than he remembered it ever being. The foggy feeling in his extremities had moved upward as the night had gone on and crawling into bed was the best idea he had ever had.
Elizabeth's computer lay open and forgotten on the bed and her shoes were abandoned near the bed on the floor. He dropped to the bed, pulling off his boots without untying them and fell back. John could have fallen asleep then without another thought, but his ears refused to let him.
There was a sound in the bathroom, a quiet, wet sound that cut at his heart. Dragging himself back up to his feet, John crossed the cool floor to the bathroom. She was curled up on the floor, spitting water into the toilet as she washed her mouth out.
"I didn't hear you," Elizabeth began softly as she wiped wet lips on the back of her hand. "When did you?"
He dropped to the floor at her side, leaning back against the wall as he settled. "Just now, don't worry," he reassured her as his slow smile crept across his face. "Rough night?" he wondered.
"I'm sending children for military training," Elizabeth answered grimly without sharing his amusement. "Children, John..."
"...we didn't ask for this war," he reminded her reaching for her shoulder and digging his fingers into it.
"John..." she warned trying to stop him for dredging up the serious side of her worries.
"...we didn't," he interrupted again. "If the Replicators had just said, go away and leave us alone, we would have, but they wanted to blow up the city, they moved on Earth. They tried to wipe us out." Pulling her towards the wall with him, they both relaxed when she snuggled into his chest. "It isn't wrong to teach a child to defend themself. The Athosians, the Genii, and everyone else in this galaxy have been teaching their children to fight for thousands of years. Innocence doesn't have to be ignorance, Elizabeth."
She turned up towards him, looking into his eyes with new respect. "I suppose you're right, we've been sheltered on Earth; all of us sitting at home watching television and worrying about our taxes while the rest of the galaxy was fighting for their lives. It was about time something bad happened to us," she broke off wiping her nose angrily as she sniffed back tears. "Is that what you think?"
Sighing as he touched her face, John shook his head. "War and death are always with us, I think we just need to stop worrying and start living. If we spend our lives teaching our children how to stay away from the business end of a P-90, at least those kids will be around to teach their kids, and someday..."
"...someday," Elizabeth repeated as she swallowed and forced her stomach back into place. "What do we do until then?" she wondered quietly letting him take over.
"I was thinking about going to bed," John offered as he started to stand. "If you’re interested."
"I'm okay,” she insisted as she caught his hand. John was less steady than he'd thought and they both had to cling to the wall. One of her eyes crept upwards in surprised concern. "What about you?"
"Chair hangover," John promised as lightly as he could. She ended up helping him more than he could assist her as they walked to the bed. "Simon says," he paused for a moment, amused as he grinned at the floor, "Sorry."
"I'm glad it's funny to you actually," she replied with the slightest chuckle. "Humor's something hard to get around here. Does this mean you and Simon are..."
"Trying to be grown-ups," John grinned up as she lowered him to the bed, "As best we can."
"Simon and I were..." Elizabeth began without knowing where she was going to finish.
Catching her arm, he pulled her close enough to feel her soft hair fall against his cheek. "You don't have to say anything," he promised as he released her, "I understand."
"I cared about him," she admitted to the wall as she turned her back on the bed. Her tongue felt ill-suited to her mouth and she fought to finish what she was saying.
"I'm not demanding you stop caring..." he offered trying to sound as calm as he could. John couldn't shake the possibility that feelings ran deeper between her and Simon than any of them would ever admit. She might stay with him until their child was born, but after that, he couldn't be sure.
"...but," Elizabeth interrupted him still without turning around. She wrapped her arms around herself and tried to find the courage to finish.
"...you don't have to..." he tried to save her keeping her from having to admit anything she wasn't ready to voice.
"Dammit John," Elizabeth snapped as she turned around. She grabbed his shoulders and kept him from standing. "Stop and let just let me..." for a moment she stopped thinking, "I love you."
The most adorable smile spread across his face, lighting green eyes from within as he let the words soak into him. "Well," John swallowed and turned his face into her hand as she nervously stroked his cheek. "I guess that's that then."
"I don't love him," she continued to explain feeling foolishly as if she owed him for his patience. "Not anymore, not after he...I couldn't," she licked her lips and ended up biting her lower one, "I thought maybe I couldn't," she sighed and sank to the bed at his side, "But I do love you."
Quietly studying her face, he rolled up on one elbow. "Yeah," he offered gently, emotion playing lightly across his face. "So, where are we going?" he stopped and something flickered behind his green eyes. "Do you want something more than this?" Elizabeth's finger over his lips cut him off.
"We're okay," she promised with her own trace of a giggle. John struggling against his desire to keep spouting gibberish was really rather attractive and she wondered if he knew it. Elizabeth smiled gently feeling the warmth in her chest. "This is more than I thought I'd have."
"The baby?" he wondered watching her twitch as he mentioned it. His hand crept out, resting on her stomach as she contemplated pulling away.
His hand was warm through her shirt from the alien market. It wasn't quite silk, but it was so much thinner than what she was used to; Elizabeth could feel the tiny movements as he settled his fingers. "I can't say it," she admitted as she nearly choked on her thoughts. "People ask me, and I can't say anything about it. I get caught..."
His hand flew up to her neck, stroking the skin that got too tight whenever she tried to talk about the baby within her. "It's just a baby, not even really that yet, it can't hurt you."
"I could," she argued as she stared down at her body before turning desperately away towards the ceiling.
"You won't," John insisted as he kissed her neck. Soft, warm lips took away the feeling of the walls closing in. Instead of tensing, Elizabeth shivered into his touch and tried to force herself to relax. "Believe me," he suggested as he nibble the skin up to her ear. "Sometimes, I kinda know what I'm talking about."
"You're very wise John, sometimes I think you forget to see that in yourself," she replied softly as her hand found its way up his side, finding the edge of his shirt and diving within. "You spend so much time looking at me," she whispered, nearly forgetting to speak out loud.
John worked his way across her face towards her pale pink lips. "You're beautiful," he insisted as she tried to giggle her way out of it. "I mean that," he affirmed as she started to blush. "Don't you believe..."
"...okay," she agreed softly watching his hand slide back down to her belly. His thumb danced along her breast, teasing the tender flesh beneath her bra. "I believe you," she finished as she lifted her head to look at him.
He chose to follow his hand with his head, moving down her body as ideas blossomed in his mind. "You believe me?"
"Not really," Elizabeth whispered as she ran her hand through his hair. "I'm trying," she defended herself as he kissed his way across her faintly rounded belly.
"This is our child," he insisted with a fervor usually reserved for arguments with Rodney. "Nothing would make you more beautiful," John promised as he rested his head there. "And Doctor Keller said it was okay," he couldn't have discussed it with Simon. There were some things that should never be discussed with an ex.
Elizabeth heard his confidence falter slightly and she shared the thrill of fear. "She did," she repeated knowing she hadn't brought it up. In fact, she'd gone two weeks without one of Carson's required examinations. Keller had promised to make time for her in her schedule, but she hadn't tried to fit it in. There were things she couldn't face yet; ultrasounds and fetal heartbeats were part of that. "Kiss me," she finally begged feeling her body ache beneath his touch. The gray sheets twisted beneath her back, and she bent a knee to lift it from the bed.
John slid quizzically up to her face, capturing her cheek as he stared at her. Her eyelashes were still damp from her time in the bathroom and he wanted to take all the fear from the tightness of her mouth. He rested his hand on the pillow, leaning closer as he felt her breath on his cheek. Kissing her first, he let her lead him into it. Her tongue parted his lips, reminding him she was just as hungry as he was.
"Okay," John answered finally raising his voice to be heard over the panting of his breath.
Elizabeth ripped his black t-shirt up and over his shoulders; shrugging out of it, he grinned wolfishly at her.
"Your turn," he demanded as his hands ran down to her waist. Elizabeth bit her lip as he eased her shirt up over her belly. John's eyes stayed focused, calm and full of desire as he studied her skin. "You're going to be gorgeous when you hit the glowing part everyone talks about," he ventured innocently.
Sitting up to help him get her shirt over her head, Elizabeth started to protest when he kissed her. "I don't know..." she sputtered through his lips.
He started to chuckle, caught up in the joy of the white flesh beneath her pale blue bra. Stopping for a moment, he studied the lace and titled his head in confusion. "This is new," he said searching for the clasp on her back.
"Carter," Elizabeth explained softly as she helped him peel it from her skin. "The black one got tight and she had a couple."
John's lips twitched and for a moment he wondered if his commanding officer had taken this bra off of his wife. He shook his head and decided to leave that idea alone. "This one's better?"
Resting a hand on his naked chest, she smiled softly in return. "It works," she answered shyly as he ran his fingers beneath her growing breasts.
"I like them better without anything," he teased with a kiss on her left breast.
"They're sore without anything," she argued burying her fingers in his unruly dark hair.
"I'll have to work on that," John growled playfully bending her back to the bed. She reached up for his pants and laughed as he kissed her attention away with a warm tongue on her nipple. Gasping in surprise, she missed him undoing his pants as he got ready to stand up and leave them on the floor. Stumbling slightly as he left the bed, John remembered his reflexes were still suffering.
He shuffled out of his pants anyway and turned his attention to hers. Elizabeth grabbed the simple blue blanket and held it against her chest as she propped herself up to watch him. They slid easily over her hips and he planted a kiss on the curving bone. "Have I mentioned how much I like you naked?" John purred as he crept beneath the blanket with her.
Laughing as she moved over to let him into the bed, Elizabeth felt his knee slip in between her legs. John's body was so hot next to hers that his skin nearly burned. He caught her waist, rolling her up over him.
"Maybe once or twice," Elizabeth replied breathily as she ran her hands down across his stomach. "You know, this is how we got into this mess."
"This mess is beautiful," he said pulling her down against him. His erection was firm against her stomach as she ground her way up his legs to grab his face. Her fingers brushed against fresh stubble and Elizabeth saw truth in his eyes.
"You really believe..." she started to whisper as she kissed him again, "...I think that's why I love you."
The admission he barely heard was the sexiest thing anyone had ever said to him, and she didn't give him time to think before she surrounded him with hot, wet Elizabeth. John watched her eyes roll in her head before he forced himself to concentrate. It had been awhile, but not long enough for him to explode inside of her like a trigger-happy teenager. He wondered if she was rushing because she was nervous, the pale flush was still on her cheeks.
Elizabeth rocked above him, feeling the pressure of him draw a moan from her throat. He was struggling, forcing his body to behave. His hands on her breasts were almost more than she could handle in their current state. Every movement of his fingers felt like he was shouting in her mind as her nerves jangled. Shivering in his hands, she rocked faster; wanting him to enjoy it.
One of his hands held the small of her back, but the other insisted on reaching around towards her clit. His finger was rough at first, then delicious as it rolled over her. Elizabeth moaned again and caught his smirk out of the corner of her eye. Leaning down to kiss his neck, she felt herself start to give in. Her body trembled in his hands and she bit down on his lip. John bit back, fighting his way into her mouth as he pushed deeper into her.
Too quickly, she came around him. The sheer force of her orgasm shocked her eyes closed, shaking her away from his lips to gaps into his neck. Surprised that he'd outlasted her by so much, he asked her permission to finish with a hand on her butt. She whispered something he didn't hear into his neck, but she rocked in rhythm with him. Absently, John wondered when they'd gotten so used to each other as her small fingers teased his chest.
A gasp and a shudder ran through his chest, panting he kissed her neck and tasted sweat. She stayed slumped over him, not bothering to extract him from her as she clung to him.
"See that wasn't so bad..." he began to tease. The face in his neck was suddenly cool and new wetness on his skin wasn't from sweat. "Elizabeth?"
Her name caught on his tongue, like it always did, and she clung tighter to his chest. John wondered if he should get used to her tears, then he wondered if it was just the pregnancy. "You okay?" he asked in his softest tone.
"Yes," she stuttered lifting her head from his neck. "I'm okay. Everything just sets me off lately," she mused apologetically. "You, you're, incredible, John..."
He grinned proudly, as if he'd known all along. "Good," he stroked damp curls of her hair down to her neck. "I mean, I strive for incredible..."
She kissed his cheek as she left the bed for the bathroom. John pushed the blanket down to his waist and let the air dry his sweat. A moment later she was back in his arms and wedged so tightly against him that they could have shared a smaller bed.
"I think you've accomplished your goals," Elizabeth teased him in her professional tone. That voice surprised him, and he jumped against his pillow just enough to make her smile.
"I love you," he finished simply. "I'll do anything..."
Elizabeth sat up, ignoring the way her hair tickled as it fell across her damp skin. "I'll meet you halfway, John. I really want this...us...to work. I don't know how this is even right..." she licked her lips nervously and contemplated pacing the room.
John's hand on her arm kept her in bed with him.
"I need this...you...us," she finally finished. "More than I think I can tell you," Elizabeth rested her hand on his chest as she tried to make her heart beat slower. "This baby needs you," the cold feeling in her stomach warmed when he took her hand.
"You have me," he promised as he encouraged her back into his arms. Lying with her head on his chest, Elizabeth closed her eyes and let herself forget everything screaming in the back of her mind. There was no Atlantis, no missing Teyla or kidnapped Carson, and no refugees ready to riot for more clothing and food. Instead, there was John's hand on her belly and the child sleeping within her. For that moment, she forgot to be afraid of anything.
*~
"Could you?" Doctor Keller asked desperately as she stared at Simon over Carson's unconscious body. "I've heard of it being done, but I don't think I could do it. I interned in surgery, but I never did eyes."
"I think I can reattach the retina, but he has vitreous bleeding," Simon sighed heavily and rested a hand on Carson shoulder. The man had been so kind to him, so careful while he explained how the world worked in the Pegasus galaxy. How could he explain that he'd never see out of his left eye again? "The fluid's too contaminated, he'll never see anything more than a blur."
"He's not going to be able to do surgery without depth perception," Keller reminded him painfully. "He'll be diagnostic only and he's the best surgeon we have..."
"...we'll have to make do," Simon reminded her pragmatically. "He's alive. His fingers and toes are going to survive their frostbite without nerve damage. The internal injuries will heal; we've both seen a lot worse come through that door." He pointed back at the door to the infirmary. "We'll make do, Carson can..."
"...handle it," Keller finished for him as she dropped her head in defeat. "Do you want me to tell him?"
"I'll stay with him," Simon offered quietly. "He's seen me through a great deal." He pulled his chair over to the desk and tossed his feet up onto it. "Any sign of Teyla?"
Keller shook her head darkly and fought angry tears. "The Wraith took her, Ronon and Major Lorne's team are going to keep looking," she took a deep breath and finished, "But I don't know where they have left to look. Doctor Zelenka said something about the crystals..."
Simon shared her confusion; he hadn't even been off-world yet and wasn't sure he was ready for that step. "Elizabeth asked me to join Colonel Mitchell's team when they need a doctor."
"Colonel Mitchell's a good man," Keller offered with a tiny smile. "Weird sense of humor," she finished as she tightened her eyebrows in thought. "You'll be okay."
"That seems to be the motto around here," Simon said thoughtfully as he reached for his bottle of water. "We'll be okay."
"Maybe we should put it above the door?" Keller ventured optimistically as she started towards the exit of the infirmary. "I'm going to go meet the major for a really late dinner, or a really early breakfast..."
Simon caught the gleam in her eye and wondered if he was seeing what he thought he was. "Enjoy," he wished fondly as he watched her wave him goodbye. Turning back to his computer, he dug into the genetic puzzle that was the Ancient gene.
*~
Major Lorne met her just inside the cafeteria with a bowl of porridge and smile. "Hey Doc, come join me," he offered cheerfully. "It's not half bad."
Keller sat down in the chair he'd pulled out for and tried not to yawn. Failing miserably she just smiled sheepishly at Lorne. "Thank you," she said as she took the porridge. "Carson's going to be okay, we got him stabilized and his extremities responded well to treatment."
Lorne saw her face fall through her optimism and reached across the table to touch the hand holding her spoon over her untouched breakfast.
"We couldn't..." Keller started dropping her spoon and pushing her chair back a bit as her nose started to sting. "We couldn't save his eye." Anger hurt, burning through her sinuses as she fought the urge to cry.
Lorne's hand closed warmly around hers, crushing her doubts with his strength. "He's alive and he's back with us," he reminded her as firmly as he held her hand. "We'll just get him an eye patch or something...I bet Scotland had pirates too."
Keller laughed painfully through the lump in her throat. "Ireland had Grainne O'Malley, but she was a pirate queen, not really the eye patch type," she tried to be as positive as he was.
His other hand slipped across the table to touch her chin. "Carson is one of the most optimistic men I know," he promised her as he smiled at her obscure knowledge of history. "If anyone can learn to be a Scottish pirate physician...he can."
Keller nodded into his hand and wondered why she hadn't noticed how beautiful his eyes were before that moment.