Unexpected by Oparu
Author's Chapter Notes: Rodney has a brilliant plan. Elizabeth does something she's never done before.
yay for Shannon, who understands the mysteries of english
yay for Shannon, who understands the mysteries of english
"Area 51’s been trying to recreate the ARG on a planetary scale for years now," Rodney explained. Pacing the dark cafeteria on the edge of the pool of light from the lantern, his hands moved as fast as his thoughts, making his audience rather dizzy. "They haven't made much progress, because the delivery system's been, frankly, out of our league."
Over in the semi-circle of bodies, John wasn't paying any real attention. Instead, as he sat between Elizabeth and Teyla, he focused his thoughts on the small, cool fingers intertwined with his own. Hand-holding seemed like an elementary stage of courtship, something he should have left behind in school years ago; with Elizabeth he'd rediscovered it.
She was obviously paying more attention. "But you think you can come up with something?" Elizabeth prodded. Gently letting Rodney lead up to his brilliant idea without giving away any of the impatience she felt, she waited quietly.
"We use the jumpers as a relay," Rodney began, his eyes glinting with excitement as he started pacing again over the cafeteria floor. "We'll need four of them, stationed equally around the planet." He formed a pyramid with his fingers in front of his chest. "All four of them activate at the same time, firing at a point in the center of the planet. Now, with any luck, the crystals buried inside the planet's structure will amplify and eventually project the energy burst that kills the Replicators."
John looked around the semicircle, resting his eyes on each on of the team. "Great," he offered grimly, weakly concealing his disappointment. "We only have three pilots."
Rodney's face fell. "I thought of that," he replied as his shoulders slumped. Pinching his fingers together as if he held the idea between them, he sighed. "We could try it with three, but it's impossible to get a three-dimensional blast without a fourth jumper." Shaking his head, he fell silent for a moment. "We should probably just concentrate on getting the gate fixed. Call Earth, and see if they can help us. I might also be able to rig something with a beam weapon from an Ancient defense satellite, but it would be messy."
"What about the chair?" Elizabeth wondered suddenly. Her eyebrows narrowed as she formulated her idea. "We tried to remote control the jumpers with the chair before, and that didn't work because..."
"...Because we didn't have enough power, right, but now we do," Rodney cut her off quickly. His eyes widened thoughtfully as he puzzled it over in his head. "With a ZPM it should be easy..." he interrupted himself with a chuckle, "...Easy for me anyway." Collecting his thoughts, Rodney bent down for his toolbox and a flashlight. "I'm going to go..." he pointed down the hallway, "...work on this for awhile. See if I can get power to the chair, etcetera. You can just radio if you need me."
Nodding easily, Elizabeth wished him well before she started to yawn into her hand, "Sorry."
Only John caught her apology, "It's okay. He has that effect on me to sometimes." One of his hands snuck up behind her head, playing with a free curl of hair.
Ronan shrugged and lay back on the floor, hands neatly behind his head. "Any plan that kills the Replicators is a good plan," he mused as he shut his eyes.
Teyla sighed as she straightened their merger pile of rations. "I think it is good that we will have the gate working soon. There is not much left to eat."
"I'd settle for anything that didn't start out in a bag," Carson piped up as he settled in next to Ronan on the floor. "And a room of me own," he added as he rustled his sleeping bag. "Not that I mind yer company, but I do miss being able to be by meself."
John released his lock of Elizabeth's hair and slid his hand down to her lower back. "If we get the gate done early I can try to wire a few rooms," he offered lightly. "We might have to put up with roommates until we get more lights working. These lantern batteries are on their last legs."
"We lost another flashlight as well," Teyla added calmly as she waited for everyone to settle into their sleeping bags. "That leaves us with two."
Carson rolled over in his sleeping bag and sighed up towards the ceiling. "Is it just me or has it been getting colder in here?" he wondered to no one in particular.
"We're drifting," Ronan explained simply. "Can't you feel it? Ever since we lost power, we've lost whatever it was that anchored us in place. The currents must move northward here."
Teyla leaned down towards the lantern, shutting it off once she was sure everyone was comfortable. She agreed as she waited for her eyes to adjust, "Ronan is correct. It will only grow colder until we can reinstate the system that held us."
"Did you bring any winter clothes?" Elizabeth teased John as she moved closer to the extra warmth he provided.
One of his arms slipped over her sleeping bag, pulling her in so she spooned against him. "Didn't think of it," John responded with his voice just above a whisper.
Elizabeth's desires won out against her sense of decorum, and she hugged his arm to her stomach. "Too bad," she whispered back.
Sighing sleepily, John echoed her yawn. "Next time, when I have a little more time to pack…"
Wrapping the fingers of his hand with her own, Elizabeth sighed, "I might hold you to that."
~*~*~*~
Morning broke blue under the ocean. The five of them rose as a unit, eating and drinking their breakfast with little conversation. Rodney had worked through the night, and Teyla filled an entire canteen of tea to take to him. Ronan elected to help Rodney, promising he could keep him on task.
John headed for the last stretch between the gate and the power room. His feet dragged along the red-brown corridor. Fifteen days had left him with nearly a full beard. Scratching it as he walked, he tried to remember a time when he'd felt clean. His memory reminded him that he'd been through worse in Afghanistan. Clinging to the memories of hot, blowing grit for days on end made crawling around on the floor in Atlantis nearly pleasant by comparison.
Time faded past him, and the sea grew brighter as the day crept on. John was stretching his hands and staring out the blue window when his radio crackled to life.
"Are you finished?" Rodney demanded from the power room.
John tapped his radio, "Yeah, just waiting for you Rodney."
"Funny," Rodney shot back. "I'm going to try powering it up. Back up from the conduit and wait for my signal."
"Yes, Sir," John quipped back smartly. Sealing the floor tile he'd been working on, he left the hallway behind and headed down to the control room.
She was waiting there, perched on the edge of the stairs down to the gate. Elizabeth smiled at him and the grin crept up to her eyes. "I keep forgetting you have the beard," she teased as she scratched his chin. "Gets me every time I see it."
"I only have it to amuse you," John replied dryly as he sank down next to her. "I have a razor stashed away, but I just don't use it." He stared across at the blue-tinted windows of the Gate room. "Ready to go back to Earth?"
Sighing heavily, Elizabeth hugged her knees to her chest, "No." She ran her hand through her hair and curled tighter. "This is my home. Even when I can't take a hot shower, this city is part of me."
"Would you mind explaining to it that we would like to have all the systems back?" John teased as he stared at the darkened Stargate. "Nothing major, maybe just a nudge in the right direction."
Elizabeth chuckled softly, the low sound in the back of her throat made him smile. "I'll see what I can do," she promised as she followed his gaze.
They were rewarded with Rodney's voice on the radio instead of the familiar dialing of the gate. "I found a problem," he announced grimly. "I'm postponing the gate test and I need everyone down here."
Elizabeth got slowly to her feet, sighing as she worked the stiffness out of her back. "Want to bet what it is?" she offered along with her hand to help him to his feet.
John lowered an eyebrow and shuffled to his feet warily. "What do you want to bet?" he wondered as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Power bars?"
Laughing weakly, Elizabeth shook her head as she tried to think. Pondering for a moment, she leaned in to quickly kiss his cheek. "There," she teased, grinning wickedly.
"What kind of bet is that?" John asked in surprise, tilting his head quizzically.
"It's an ante," she explained lightly as she started down the hallway. "If you win, you get the rest of the bet." Elizabeth's dark brown curls bounced on her shoulders as she turned away.
"Okay..." John's voice trailed off as he followed her down the hallway. Licking his lips nervously, he caught up to her in a few long strides. "What happens if I lose?"
Her feet rang on the metal grating as she started down the staircase. Elizabeth paused, resting her hand on the cold railing as she beamed up at him. "I suppose you'll have to come up with something to offer," she answered.
Hurrying down the stairs after her, John caught her on the landing. Wrapping an arm firmly around her waist, he studied the familiar line of her neck and planted his lips there on the smooth white skin. "I guess I can come up with something," he teased back as he released her to lead the way to the power room.
The hallways in the bowels of the city were deep enough that the ocean outside the few, small windows was an inky blue. Neither of them toyed with being ahead of each other in the darkness. Elizabeth's hand found his and he took it, pushing the nervousness to the back of his mind.
"Should we be talking?" John ventured, as the hallway grew too long and silent.
Elizabeth kept her eyes straight ahead. "What do you want to talk about?" she baited, waiting for his response with her teeth against her lip.
"Sex?" John's eyebrows shot up in surprise as he realized he'd actually said it out loud. He stopped, turning his blushing face down towards his boots. "I meant to say something..." he broke off and wondered if his face could get any redder, "...sauve-er."
Elizabeth chuckled softly into her hand, stopping immediately when John looked up at her. "I like that you're not," she admitted calmly. Shrugging as she resisted the way his eyes begged her to clarify her answer, she watched the blood retreat back beneath his skin. "You're honest."
"I've been accused of that," John agreed with a nod of his head. "It's not usually something that comes with a smile."
His wariness made his lips curl. Elizabeth had to let her memory fill in some of the details in the darkness. She stopped walking, feeling him halt next to her. "I don't want it to be a problem," she began slowly, taking her time to form all the words. "I'm not your leader right now..."
"...but you would be if it wasn't for the Lantians," John finished for her. He twitched his hands in his pockets and searched her face. Elizabeth was more complicated than all the Tolstoy he’d been dragging himself through, he thought to himself. "And that's a problem," he finished as his stomach went cold.
"No!" It was Elizabeth's turn to lose control of her voice. "It's not," she faltered, wishing she could find a way to keep the butterflies quiet inside of her. "I'm not sorry I was with you," she finished, finally finding her strength. "I have a handful of terrible regrets in my life, but you, John..." she cupped his chin, feeling his beard crunch beneath her hand. "...will never be one of them."
Lost in thought for a moment, John pulled her hand down from his face and left it on his chest. " 'The vocation of every man and woman is to serve other people'," he quoted, drawing a nod of respect from Elizabeth. "Been reading ahead on Earth a little," he explained as he tried to put together the rest of his thoughts. "Tolstoy doesn't have to be right all the time. He's dead."
The quick smile brightened her eyes and Elizabeth nodded again. "I want you," she offered with more resolve than she thought she had to spare. Her shoulders straightened and she stared unflinchingly up into his eyes. "I'm just never sure if I can let myself have the things I want."
John wanted to look away and take the time to collect his thoughts, but he couldn't; not with her gaze locked on his. Speaking without thinking, he stopped worrying about sounding stupid. "I'm not going anywhere," he offered first. Swallowing the lump in his throat, he continued, "And I'll wait."
Elizabeth pulled back, recoiling slightly as she tried to force Simon back to his place in her memory.
John kept her hand, following her towards the gray wall of the hallway. "I didn't mean it like that, I just meant that I...I'd do anything for you." He caught her fear fading into a smile and kicked his toe against the floor. "That sounds really stupid when I say it, doesn't it?"
Elizabeth hushed him with a look, "I believe you," she said to rescue him. "John, you have to understand, I have nothing but faith in you. In your sense of honor, your dedication to your duty, in your heart..." She pulled her hand back, nervously wringing her fingers. "I trust you."
"Least one of us does," he muttered as he watched her fingers twist. "Look, forget about Earth, the SGC, and the morons over at the IOA and anything else with an acronym. We might never go back. We might have fried the crystal thingy and be trapped in Pegasus forever. We might die tomorrow." He paused his torrent of words and found the ones he really wanted. "If it was just you and me," John paused, licking dry lips with a nearly dry tongue, "then what?"
Elizabeth blinked once, slowly opening her eyes again. "I'd fall," her whisper hung in the corridor, drifting with the ocean around them. "I'd lose myself. Fall headlong and hopelessly..." Her lips finished her thought without any sound; mouthing the dangerous words instead of saying them aloud.
"You're serious?" John demanded, as he made her silence into meaning. "You really?"
"All my cards are down John," she paused, trying to remember anything she knew about football. "Fourth and goal?" she stopped again, waiting for him to confirm the metaphor was correct. "Honestly? You and me almost terrifies me more than the Wraith..."
Nodding to acknowledge her attempt to reach into his world, John cut her off. "...I don't want you to be afraid of me."
"You I am completely sure of," Elizabeth promised with as much force as she could muster.
Her eyes glistened wet as he watched her. "What about...?"
Elizabeth interrupted his thought, "Me?" Shaking her head and wrapping her arms around her chest for warmth, she sighed heavily. "Let's just say it's easy to trust you."
"Why?" he choked a back a laugh.
Something serious glimmered in her green eyes before it hid behind a smile. "Why not?" Elizabeth ended cryptically as she leaned up and in to kiss his cheek. The scruff of his beard tickled her lips as she pulled back. "Come on," she reminded him gently. "Rodney and the others have to be waiting for us by now."
~*~*~*~
Elizabeth was entirely correct. Rodney's impatience was immediately apparent in the fluttering of his hands over the console. A lantern balanced on it lit the room oddly, making the walls of silent computers look like blocks of obsidian. Ronan's hair left shadows like thick trees behind his head and John barely resisted the urge to make shadow puppets with his hands.
"Now that you're finally here," Rodney rebuked John and Elizabeth harshly, "I can explain to everyone how truly screwed we are."
Ronan rolled his eyes, but waited silently beside Teyla.
For her part, Teyla was much more considerate. "What have you discovered?" she asked with patient concern.
John pulled himself up on one of the ledges between computer banks and waited. Carson leaned over Rodney's shoulder, trying to peer at the diagrams Rodney was so concerned with.
"I was trying to activate the chair when I realized I could activate other systems, like long-range sensors, by running them through secondary conduits." Rodney continued fiddling with the controls as he explained, "Then I realized we might not have to go all the way to the Replicators home planet to rescue our people. General O'Neill has the ATA gene, so he was easier to track with ancient equipment.
"There-" Rodney activated a display and pointed at a white dot on the slightly garbled screen. "That's General O'Neill's life-sign. I widened the scan, trying to pick up Mr. Woolsey, or any of the Ancients that might still be alive." He tapped his console again and changed the diagram. Lines of noise crawled up and down over the vague outline of a ship, Elizabeth narrowed her eyes and tried to make out more, but all that she saw were two white human life-signs.
"What can we do to help them?" she asked as she tried to push the harsh memory of having her mind invaded back where it belonged. John slipped off his ledge and moved silently into his place behind her.
"I was thinking about that too," Rodney drummed his fingers on the metal as he waited for the computer to respond. "A ship is a lot smaller than a city. As far as I can tell, it's just some kind of battle cruiser."
"Just a battle cruiser?" Teyla interrupted firmly. "Would not any ship of theirs overpower a jumper immediately?"
"Yes yes," Rodney nodded impatiently and twisted a crystal beneath the panel to get it to display his grand scheme. He had to hit it with his knee to get the computer to come online. "In a fair fight we'd get destroyed before we even had time to think about being destroyed, but we're not going to fight fair."
"Okay..." John's shoulder nudged against hers, sending the cascade effect of his touch racing down her spine.
Elizabeth tightened her jaw, reminding herself to keep her mind in the situation. Rodney had a plan, and by the excitement in his eyes, it was a good one. "What are we going to cheat with?" she prompted.
"I can configure two jumpers to envelop the battle cruiser in a parabolic field that should destroy all the Replicators on board." Rodney's glee shone through his self-satisfaction.
John's eyes lit like a flare had been fired in his head. "We get their ship?" he wondered with a bounce in his knees.
"We get their ship," Rodney confirmed dryly. "And unlimited access to their technology provided that their ships are as connected as they seem to be."
"You're sure your para-thing with the jumpers will kill everyone?" Ronan interjected seriously. He turned his knife over in his hand, watching the light reflect off the blade as he flipped it.
Elizabeth buried her desire to smile. John was still nearly bouncing behind her with his desire to get at a battle cruiser. Teyla's expression was contented. It seemed her faith in Rodney's genius was resolute. Carson seemed terrified, either of the Replicators, Rodney's plan or both, she couldn't help being proud of him. However he felt about the plan, the doctor seemed ready to try it.
"Well, either it works and the Replicators are destroyed..." Rodney's expression darkened a little, and he looked down at the floor, "...or it fails and they kill us."
"Business as usual then," John replied for all of them, adding his debonair smile. "Sounds like fun."
~*~*~
"I'm going to finish connecting Rodney's device to the drive manifold, meet you in the next jumper?" John's head emerged from the panel in the ceiling of the jumper long enough for him to sneeze. Wiping his nose on the back of his hand, he came down a step on the ladder. "Ten thousand year old dust really gets to me."
"I could do it," Elizabeth offered with a smile. "You don't have to suffer."
"Dizzy spells and step ladders do not mix," John insisted as he disappeared back into the wiring in the ceiling of the jumper.
"I'm not..." Elizabeth stopped protesting, hands falling to her hips are she stared up at him in amazement. "How did you…?"
"You do this funny thing with your eyes," came his muffled reply. "Look, I just have to reach the last connection back-" he jolted out for a second, shaking his hand in pain. "Here by the damn one that keeps shocking me."
"Be careful John," Elizabeth advised gently as she tried to figure out what a 'funny thing' she did with her eyes looked like.
He grunted something into the jumper wiring, and she decided she was better off not bothering him until he'd finished and was back to his usual cheerful self. Leaving him to his work, she wandered up the ramp into the second jumper. Wishing for a moment that the lights would come on for her as they did for John, Elizabeth sank into the pilot's seat and reached for the panel release down by her knee.
Something flickered and she pulled her hand back immediately. Wondering if it was a trick of her tired mind, Elizabeth shook it off and reached again for the switch. The flicker flashed bright on the control panel just next to her head. For a moment it came with a hum, the sound of something building up.
This time she jumped entirely away from the control panel. Elizabeth could feel her heart pounding in her chest. Was she going crazy? Had it all just become too much for her mind to handle? Reminding herself she wasn't the type to hallucinate, Elizabeth crept slowly back towards the pilot seat.
"Pull yourself together," she told herself harshly. Taking a moment to tug her hair back away her face and slow the startled beating of her heart, Elizabeth sat down again in the pilot's seat. As soon as her hands gripped the control panel it came feebly to life with a rushing hum of energy. Despite her surprise, this time she kept her hands on the controls. Light ran up the cockpit window, obscuring the view of the jumper bay with the blue and yellow display.
It only remained a moment before fading, but the jumper remained on. The controls pulsed, waiting for her touch.
"John?" Her voice rang through the bay, reaching him as he finally jumped off the stepladder. Kicking it aside for good measure, John jogged down the ramp of his jumper. His first thought was just that she was getting impatient, she'd been more irritable lately, but something in her voice was different.
"What?" his voice preceded him as he jogged up the jumper ramp. "What is it?" he asked again, as soon as he looked past her head he stopped. "Oh my..." trailing off in surprise, John's hand landed on her shoulder. "You don't have the gene."
Elizabeth shook her head dumbly, "No, I don't."
"How'd you turn it on?" John wondered aloud for both of them.
"I sat down," Elizabeth couldn't move her hands from the control panel. "It just came on by itself."
"Stay there," John suggested firmly. He kept himself back from the console, making sure his presence wasn't confusing the controls. "Just don't move," he insisted. "Don't think about anything either." He backed up slowly, trying to remember where he'd left his radio. "Especially not drones!" he remembered suddenly. "Do not think about drones."
His boots thudded against the hard gray floor as he hurried away. They stopped after a moment, returning long enough for him to peek around the edge of the jumper. "Not drones. Not flying. Nothing, don't think at all," John warned as seriously as he could. "I'll be back."
"John," a hint of warning slipped into her voice and Elizabeth tried to ignore the cold sweat starting in her palms. "Just go."
~*~*~*~
How long had they been gone? Days? Weeks? She couldn't help feeling that she'd fallen into another universe where the only things left in existence were her and the flickering jumper. It would be better if it really worked, instead of struggling as if the battery was failing. Her head hurt again. Elizabeth couldn't decide if it was the strain of concentrating on not thinking, or the constant concentration of keeping the jumper online.
"How could she possibly get it to work? She doesn't have the gene; you can't spontaneously develop a gene, can you?" Rodney's mumblings carried across the huge space of the jumper bay.
"No Rodney, no one can spontaneous develop a gene," Carson's tone was the sound of reason as the footsteps approached her. "I'm sure there's a logical explanation."
"Logical?" Rodney laughed as he tried to think of something. "I'm completely out of ideas. I can't wait to see what your voodoo comes up with."
John's hands on her shoulders were her first link back to reality. "You didn't fire anything?" he wondered gently.
"I can barely get the damn thing to stay on," Elizabeth realized belatedly how harsh her tone was as she snapped at him. "I doubt I could have done anything." Perhaps her anger forced her concentration, but somewhere in the rear of the jumper the hum of power grew louder.
"It's all right," Carson soothed as he appeared at her side. "He's just a wee bit concerned. It's not everyday someone turns one of these babies on when they couldn't before." His hand caught her arm and squeezed gently. "Least you don't have any helicopters around for target practice."
Dragging over the stepladder from the other jumper, Rodney started checking the jumper controls as he agreed with Carson. "It's possibly just a malfunction," he began as he cracked open the panels in the ceiling. "A malfunction we've never seen in two and a half years of using the technology, which would be a really useful one."
"You just touched it and it came on?" Carson asked with extraordinary calm. Even after two weeks of isolation, his bedside manner was impeccable. "John wasn't anywhere near you?"
"I was in the other jumper," John answered for her as he sank into the co-pilot's chair.
Elizabeth closed her eyes and tried to let the stress out of her chest. "It just came on, like it is now, as if the switch is only flipped half-way," she explained with more exhaustion than she remembered feeling before they returned to her.
"That is weird," Rodney piped up from the back of the jumper. Getting down from his stepladder, he stopped next to Carson. "She's right, in a primitive way. The jumper's been partially powered up, as if she'd plugged it in, but not enough for it do anything."
"Can you get the display?" John wondered as he changed position in his chair. He rested his head on his hands; keeping back from the controls took a lot of will power. He finally stood up again, leaning with his arms over the headrest of his chair and fidgeting with his fingers.
Elizabeth closed her eyes and tried to coax the display up from the panel in front of her. She could see it flicker once through her eyelids, but it was short-lived.
As it faded, Carson leaned down to her shoulder, "Well love, I think I've got it figured out. Can't be a hundred percent sure until I get a chance to examine ye, but I think you've a bit of a medical condition."
"What?" Rodney wondered as he returned to the panels in the ceiling, "A mild case of some kind of ATA virus?"
"No Rodney," Carson corrected firmly. "Elizabeth, maybe we should talk in private."
"Dammit Carson!" she bolted from her chair, instantly killing the light on the panel. Her arms flew protectively over her chest and she glared at him with ice in her eyes. "Just tell me."
"Elizabeth..." he looked down her body, as if he was studying something in her posture that gave it all away, "I think it's fairly obvious that you're pregnant."
The thud in the back of the jumper was followed immediately by Rodney's desperate question; "Excuse me?"
John's expression fluttered for a moment, he tilted his head as if he were trying to remember something. Finally he turned curiously to Carson. "We only had sex two days ago," He admitted haltingly. "How could?" he paused, trying to sort his thoughts, "So soon?"
Elizabeth felt her embarrassment chase color back into her face. Her memory reminded her that she'd tried to put waking up naked with John out of her mind. That she'd tried to forget the way the dark hair of his chest clung to the muscled frame, and the way he smiled when he watched her wake up next to him. She couldn't speak, couldn't find the words to explain to John what must have happened.
Carson only had a soft smile for both of them. His hand closed warm on Elizabeth's stiff shoulder. "Why don't you and John have a little talk while Rodney teaches me how to wire his invention into the jumper?"
She looked at John as if she'd never seen him before. His face should be familiar; the hand reaching for hers should be gripped in response. John's fingers closed firm and warm around her own. Elizabeth felt her stomach leap into her throat. The jumper grew cold around her, and the ceiling seemed closer. Was it closing in?
John tugged her slowly towards the ramp, waiting with eyes wider than she'd ever seen them. His feet led and by some miracle hers followed. The jumper bay faded into the corridor without her feeling like she'd moved at all. Was she teleporting through the city? Was all of it a dream?
Finally, John stopped in a reddish hallway near the living quarters. Some of his tools still sat in a neat pile by one of the doorways. Her knees were nearly too stiff to follow him into the room. He started towards the couch by the wall, but she pulled him back. Waiting for her to lead, he just stood there. His hand started up her arm, but her arms were suddenly around his neck.
Elizabeth pressed against him, clinging to him as if she was drowning in the air around her. For a moment she was still, but when his arms closed around her shoulders they were shaking. Her chest heaved beneath his touch. John stood, rocking ever so slightly back and forth. The weight of her head against him gave way to the wet warmth of tears through his shirt.
He'd never seen her cry. Somehow, John had even wondered if she cried in front of other people at all. For the moment he held on, letting his mind wander away from the strange sounds of her crying. It hadn't even hit him yet, and he wondered what his reaction would be. How would it feel to know he'd fathered a child? What would it feel like when that realization slammed into him?
Shuddering instinctively, he wondered if he should say something. John nearly opened his mouth, but he couldn't. His mind didn't even know how to form words anymore, but he could wait. Anything he wanted to say would sound just as pathetic later when he figured out how to say it. He was sure he'd struggle later. He'd agonize over the twists in the road of fate someday, but for now, he held on.
Over in the semi-circle of bodies, John wasn't paying any real attention. Instead, as he sat between Elizabeth and Teyla, he focused his thoughts on the small, cool fingers intertwined with his own. Hand-holding seemed like an elementary stage of courtship, something he should have left behind in school years ago; with Elizabeth he'd rediscovered it.
She was obviously paying more attention. "But you think you can come up with something?" Elizabeth prodded. Gently letting Rodney lead up to his brilliant idea without giving away any of the impatience she felt, she waited quietly.
"We use the jumpers as a relay," Rodney began, his eyes glinting with excitement as he started pacing again over the cafeteria floor. "We'll need four of them, stationed equally around the planet." He formed a pyramid with his fingers in front of his chest. "All four of them activate at the same time, firing at a point in the center of the planet. Now, with any luck, the crystals buried inside the planet's structure will amplify and eventually project the energy burst that kills the Replicators."
John looked around the semicircle, resting his eyes on each on of the team. "Great," he offered grimly, weakly concealing his disappointment. "We only have three pilots."
Rodney's face fell. "I thought of that," he replied as his shoulders slumped. Pinching his fingers together as if he held the idea between them, he sighed. "We could try it with three, but it's impossible to get a three-dimensional blast without a fourth jumper." Shaking his head, he fell silent for a moment. "We should probably just concentrate on getting the gate fixed. Call Earth, and see if they can help us. I might also be able to rig something with a beam weapon from an Ancient defense satellite, but it would be messy."
"What about the chair?" Elizabeth wondered suddenly. Her eyebrows narrowed as she formulated her idea. "We tried to remote control the jumpers with the chair before, and that didn't work because..."
"...Because we didn't have enough power, right, but now we do," Rodney cut her off quickly. His eyes widened thoughtfully as he puzzled it over in his head. "With a ZPM it should be easy..." he interrupted himself with a chuckle, "...Easy for me anyway." Collecting his thoughts, Rodney bent down for his toolbox and a flashlight. "I'm going to go..." he pointed down the hallway, "...work on this for awhile. See if I can get power to the chair, etcetera. You can just radio if you need me."
Nodding easily, Elizabeth wished him well before she started to yawn into her hand, "Sorry."
Only John caught her apology, "It's okay. He has that effect on me to sometimes." One of his hands snuck up behind her head, playing with a free curl of hair.
Ronan shrugged and lay back on the floor, hands neatly behind his head. "Any plan that kills the Replicators is a good plan," he mused as he shut his eyes.
Teyla sighed as she straightened their merger pile of rations. "I think it is good that we will have the gate working soon. There is not much left to eat."
"I'd settle for anything that didn't start out in a bag," Carson piped up as he settled in next to Ronan on the floor. "And a room of me own," he added as he rustled his sleeping bag. "Not that I mind yer company, but I do miss being able to be by meself."
John released his lock of Elizabeth's hair and slid his hand down to her lower back. "If we get the gate done early I can try to wire a few rooms," he offered lightly. "We might have to put up with roommates until we get more lights working. These lantern batteries are on their last legs."
"We lost another flashlight as well," Teyla added calmly as she waited for everyone to settle into their sleeping bags. "That leaves us with two."
Carson rolled over in his sleeping bag and sighed up towards the ceiling. "Is it just me or has it been getting colder in here?" he wondered to no one in particular.
"We're drifting," Ronan explained simply. "Can't you feel it? Ever since we lost power, we've lost whatever it was that anchored us in place. The currents must move northward here."
Teyla leaned down towards the lantern, shutting it off once she was sure everyone was comfortable. She agreed as she waited for her eyes to adjust, "Ronan is correct. It will only grow colder until we can reinstate the system that held us."
"Did you bring any winter clothes?" Elizabeth teased John as she moved closer to the extra warmth he provided.
One of his arms slipped over her sleeping bag, pulling her in so she spooned against him. "Didn't think of it," John responded with his voice just above a whisper.
Elizabeth's desires won out against her sense of decorum, and she hugged his arm to her stomach. "Too bad," she whispered back.
Sighing sleepily, John echoed her yawn. "Next time, when I have a little more time to pack…"
Wrapping the fingers of his hand with her own, Elizabeth sighed, "I might hold you to that."
~*~*~*~
Morning broke blue under the ocean. The five of them rose as a unit, eating and drinking their breakfast with little conversation. Rodney had worked through the night, and Teyla filled an entire canteen of tea to take to him. Ronan elected to help Rodney, promising he could keep him on task.
John headed for the last stretch between the gate and the power room. His feet dragged along the red-brown corridor. Fifteen days had left him with nearly a full beard. Scratching it as he walked, he tried to remember a time when he'd felt clean. His memory reminded him that he'd been through worse in Afghanistan. Clinging to the memories of hot, blowing grit for days on end made crawling around on the floor in Atlantis nearly pleasant by comparison.
Time faded past him, and the sea grew brighter as the day crept on. John was stretching his hands and staring out the blue window when his radio crackled to life.
"Are you finished?" Rodney demanded from the power room.
John tapped his radio, "Yeah, just waiting for you Rodney."
"Funny," Rodney shot back. "I'm going to try powering it up. Back up from the conduit and wait for my signal."
"Yes, Sir," John quipped back smartly. Sealing the floor tile he'd been working on, he left the hallway behind and headed down to the control room.
She was waiting there, perched on the edge of the stairs down to the gate. Elizabeth smiled at him and the grin crept up to her eyes. "I keep forgetting you have the beard," she teased as she scratched his chin. "Gets me every time I see it."
"I only have it to amuse you," John replied dryly as he sank down next to her. "I have a razor stashed away, but I just don't use it." He stared across at the blue-tinted windows of the Gate room. "Ready to go back to Earth?"
Sighing heavily, Elizabeth hugged her knees to her chest, "No." She ran her hand through her hair and curled tighter. "This is my home. Even when I can't take a hot shower, this city is part of me."
"Would you mind explaining to it that we would like to have all the systems back?" John teased as he stared at the darkened Stargate. "Nothing major, maybe just a nudge in the right direction."
Elizabeth chuckled softly, the low sound in the back of her throat made him smile. "I'll see what I can do," she promised as she followed his gaze.
They were rewarded with Rodney's voice on the radio instead of the familiar dialing of the gate. "I found a problem," he announced grimly. "I'm postponing the gate test and I need everyone down here."
Elizabeth got slowly to her feet, sighing as she worked the stiffness out of her back. "Want to bet what it is?" she offered along with her hand to help him to his feet.
John lowered an eyebrow and shuffled to his feet warily. "What do you want to bet?" he wondered as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Power bars?"
Laughing weakly, Elizabeth shook her head as she tried to think. Pondering for a moment, she leaned in to quickly kiss his cheek. "There," she teased, grinning wickedly.
"What kind of bet is that?" John asked in surprise, tilting his head quizzically.
"It's an ante," she explained lightly as she started down the hallway. "If you win, you get the rest of the bet." Elizabeth's dark brown curls bounced on her shoulders as she turned away.
"Okay..." John's voice trailed off as he followed her down the hallway. Licking his lips nervously, he caught up to her in a few long strides. "What happens if I lose?"
Her feet rang on the metal grating as she started down the staircase. Elizabeth paused, resting her hand on the cold railing as she beamed up at him. "I suppose you'll have to come up with something to offer," she answered.
Hurrying down the stairs after her, John caught her on the landing. Wrapping an arm firmly around her waist, he studied the familiar line of her neck and planted his lips there on the smooth white skin. "I guess I can come up with something," he teased back as he released her to lead the way to the power room.
The hallways in the bowels of the city were deep enough that the ocean outside the few, small windows was an inky blue. Neither of them toyed with being ahead of each other in the darkness. Elizabeth's hand found his and he took it, pushing the nervousness to the back of his mind.
"Should we be talking?" John ventured, as the hallway grew too long and silent.
Elizabeth kept her eyes straight ahead. "What do you want to talk about?" she baited, waiting for his response with her teeth against her lip.
"Sex?" John's eyebrows shot up in surprise as he realized he'd actually said it out loud. He stopped, turning his blushing face down towards his boots. "I meant to say something..." he broke off and wondered if his face could get any redder, "...sauve-er."
Elizabeth chuckled softly into her hand, stopping immediately when John looked up at her. "I like that you're not," she admitted calmly. Shrugging as she resisted the way his eyes begged her to clarify her answer, she watched the blood retreat back beneath his skin. "You're honest."
"I've been accused of that," John agreed with a nod of his head. "It's not usually something that comes with a smile."
His wariness made his lips curl. Elizabeth had to let her memory fill in some of the details in the darkness. She stopped walking, feeling him halt next to her. "I don't want it to be a problem," she began slowly, taking her time to form all the words. "I'm not your leader right now..."
"...but you would be if it wasn't for the Lantians," John finished for her. He twitched his hands in his pockets and searched her face. Elizabeth was more complicated than all the Tolstoy he’d been dragging himself through, he thought to himself. "And that's a problem," he finished as his stomach went cold.
"No!" It was Elizabeth's turn to lose control of her voice. "It's not," she faltered, wishing she could find a way to keep the butterflies quiet inside of her. "I'm not sorry I was with you," she finished, finally finding her strength. "I have a handful of terrible regrets in my life, but you, John..." she cupped his chin, feeling his beard crunch beneath her hand. "...will never be one of them."
Lost in thought for a moment, John pulled her hand down from his face and left it on his chest. " 'The vocation of every man and woman is to serve other people'," he quoted, drawing a nod of respect from Elizabeth. "Been reading ahead on Earth a little," he explained as he tried to put together the rest of his thoughts. "Tolstoy doesn't have to be right all the time. He's dead."
The quick smile brightened her eyes and Elizabeth nodded again. "I want you," she offered with more resolve than she thought she had to spare. Her shoulders straightened and she stared unflinchingly up into his eyes. "I'm just never sure if I can let myself have the things I want."
John wanted to look away and take the time to collect his thoughts, but he couldn't; not with her gaze locked on his. Speaking without thinking, he stopped worrying about sounding stupid. "I'm not going anywhere," he offered first. Swallowing the lump in his throat, he continued, "And I'll wait."
Elizabeth pulled back, recoiling slightly as she tried to force Simon back to his place in her memory.
John kept her hand, following her towards the gray wall of the hallway. "I didn't mean it like that, I just meant that I...I'd do anything for you." He caught her fear fading into a smile and kicked his toe against the floor. "That sounds really stupid when I say it, doesn't it?"
Elizabeth hushed him with a look, "I believe you," she said to rescue him. "John, you have to understand, I have nothing but faith in you. In your sense of honor, your dedication to your duty, in your heart..." She pulled her hand back, nervously wringing her fingers. "I trust you."
"Least one of us does," he muttered as he watched her fingers twist. "Look, forget about Earth, the SGC, and the morons over at the IOA and anything else with an acronym. We might never go back. We might have fried the crystal thingy and be trapped in Pegasus forever. We might die tomorrow." He paused his torrent of words and found the ones he really wanted. "If it was just you and me," John paused, licking dry lips with a nearly dry tongue, "then what?"
Elizabeth blinked once, slowly opening her eyes again. "I'd fall," her whisper hung in the corridor, drifting with the ocean around them. "I'd lose myself. Fall headlong and hopelessly..." Her lips finished her thought without any sound; mouthing the dangerous words instead of saying them aloud.
"You're serious?" John demanded, as he made her silence into meaning. "You really?"
"All my cards are down John," she paused, trying to remember anything she knew about football. "Fourth and goal?" she stopped again, waiting for him to confirm the metaphor was correct. "Honestly? You and me almost terrifies me more than the Wraith..."
Nodding to acknowledge her attempt to reach into his world, John cut her off. "...I don't want you to be afraid of me."
"You I am completely sure of," Elizabeth promised with as much force as she could muster.
Her eyes glistened wet as he watched her. "What about...?"
Elizabeth interrupted his thought, "Me?" Shaking her head and wrapping her arms around her chest for warmth, she sighed heavily. "Let's just say it's easy to trust you."
"Why?" he choked a back a laugh.
Something serious glimmered in her green eyes before it hid behind a smile. "Why not?" Elizabeth ended cryptically as she leaned up and in to kiss his cheek. The scruff of his beard tickled her lips as she pulled back. "Come on," she reminded him gently. "Rodney and the others have to be waiting for us by now."
~*~*~*~
Elizabeth was entirely correct. Rodney's impatience was immediately apparent in the fluttering of his hands over the console. A lantern balanced on it lit the room oddly, making the walls of silent computers look like blocks of obsidian. Ronan's hair left shadows like thick trees behind his head and John barely resisted the urge to make shadow puppets with his hands.
"Now that you're finally here," Rodney rebuked John and Elizabeth harshly, "I can explain to everyone how truly screwed we are."
Ronan rolled his eyes, but waited silently beside Teyla.
For her part, Teyla was much more considerate. "What have you discovered?" she asked with patient concern.
John pulled himself up on one of the ledges between computer banks and waited. Carson leaned over Rodney's shoulder, trying to peer at the diagrams Rodney was so concerned with.
"I was trying to activate the chair when I realized I could activate other systems, like long-range sensors, by running them through secondary conduits." Rodney continued fiddling with the controls as he explained, "Then I realized we might not have to go all the way to the Replicators home planet to rescue our people. General O'Neill has the ATA gene, so he was easier to track with ancient equipment.
"There-" Rodney activated a display and pointed at a white dot on the slightly garbled screen. "That's General O'Neill's life-sign. I widened the scan, trying to pick up Mr. Woolsey, or any of the Ancients that might still be alive." He tapped his console again and changed the diagram. Lines of noise crawled up and down over the vague outline of a ship, Elizabeth narrowed her eyes and tried to make out more, but all that she saw were two white human life-signs.
"What can we do to help them?" she asked as she tried to push the harsh memory of having her mind invaded back where it belonged. John slipped off his ledge and moved silently into his place behind her.
"I was thinking about that too," Rodney drummed his fingers on the metal as he waited for the computer to respond. "A ship is a lot smaller than a city. As far as I can tell, it's just some kind of battle cruiser."
"Just a battle cruiser?" Teyla interrupted firmly. "Would not any ship of theirs overpower a jumper immediately?"
"Yes yes," Rodney nodded impatiently and twisted a crystal beneath the panel to get it to display his grand scheme. He had to hit it with his knee to get the computer to come online. "In a fair fight we'd get destroyed before we even had time to think about being destroyed, but we're not going to fight fair."
"Okay..." John's shoulder nudged against hers, sending the cascade effect of his touch racing down her spine.
Elizabeth tightened her jaw, reminding herself to keep her mind in the situation. Rodney had a plan, and by the excitement in his eyes, it was a good one. "What are we going to cheat with?" she prompted.
"I can configure two jumpers to envelop the battle cruiser in a parabolic field that should destroy all the Replicators on board." Rodney's glee shone through his self-satisfaction.
John's eyes lit like a flare had been fired in his head. "We get their ship?" he wondered with a bounce in his knees.
"We get their ship," Rodney confirmed dryly. "And unlimited access to their technology provided that their ships are as connected as they seem to be."
"You're sure your para-thing with the jumpers will kill everyone?" Ronan interjected seriously. He turned his knife over in his hand, watching the light reflect off the blade as he flipped it.
Elizabeth buried her desire to smile. John was still nearly bouncing behind her with his desire to get at a battle cruiser. Teyla's expression was contented. It seemed her faith in Rodney's genius was resolute. Carson seemed terrified, either of the Replicators, Rodney's plan or both, she couldn't help being proud of him. However he felt about the plan, the doctor seemed ready to try it.
"Well, either it works and the Replicators are destroyed..." Rodney's expression darkened a little, and he looked down at the floor, "...or it fails and they kill us."
"Business as usual then," John replied for all of them, adding his debonair smile. "Sounds like fun."
~*~*~
"I'm going to finish connecting Rodney's device to the drive manifold, meet you in the next jumper?" John's head emerged from the panel in the ceiling of the jumper long enough for him to sneeze. Wiping his nose on the back of his hand, he came down a step on the ladder. "Ten thousand year old dust really gets to me."
"I could do it," Elizabeth offered with a smile. "You don't have to suffer."
"Dizzy spells and step ladders do not mix," John insisted as he disappeared back into the wiring in the ceiling of the jumper.
"I'm not..." Elizabeth stopped protesting, hands falling to her hips are she stared up at him in amazement. "How did you…?"
"You do this funny thing with your eyes," came his muffled reply. "Look, I just have to reach the last connection back-" he jolted out for a second, shaking his hand in pain. "Here by the damn one that keeps shocking me."
"Be careful John," Elizabeth advised gently as she tried to figure out what a 'funny thing' she did with her eyes looked like.
He grunted something into the jumper wiring, and she decided she was better off not bothering him until he'd finished and was back to his usual cheerful self. Leaving him to his work, she wandered up the ramp into the second jumper. Wishing for a moment that the lights would come on for her as they did for John, Elizabeth sank into the pilot's seat and reached for the panel release down by her knee.
Something flickered and she pulled her hand back immediately. Wondering if it was a trick of her tired mind, Elizabeth shook it off and reached again for the switch. The flicker flashed bright on the control panel just next to her head. For a moment it came with a hum, the sound of something building up.
This time she jumped entirely away from the control panel. Elizabeth could feel her heart pounding in her chest. Was she going crazy? Had it all just become too much for her mind to handle? Reminding herself she wasn't the type to hallucinate, Elizabeth crept slowly back towards the pilot seat.
"Pull yourself together," she told herself harshly. Taking a moment to tug her hair back away her face and slow the startled beating of her heart, Elizabeth sat down again in the pilot's seat. As soon as her hands gripped the control panel it came feebly to life with a rushing hum of energy. Despite her surprise, this time she kept her hands on the controls. Light ran up the cockpit window, obscuring the view of the jumper bay with the blue and yellow display.
It only remained a moment before fading, but the jumper remained on. The controls pulsed, waiting for her touch.
"John?" Her voice rang through the bay, reaching him as he finally jumped off the stepladder. Kicking it aside for good measure, John jogged down the ramp of his jumper. His first thought was just that she was getting impatient, she'd been more irritable lately, but something in her voice was different.
"What?" his voice preceded him as he jogged up the jumper ramp. "What is it?" he asked again, as soon as he looked past her head he stopped. "Oh my..." trailing off in surprise, John's hand landed on her shoulder. "You don't have the gene."
Elizabeth shook her head dumbly, "No, I don't."
"How'd you turn it on?" John wondered aloud for both of them.
"I sat down," Elizabeth couldn't move her hands from the control panel. "It just came on by itself."
"Stay there," John suggested firmly. He kept himself back from the console, making sure his presence wasn't confusing the controls. "Just don't move," he insisted. "Don't think about anything either." He backed up slowly, trying to remember where he'd left his radio. "Especially not drones!" he remembered suddenly. "Do not think about drones."
His boots thudded against the hard gray floor as he hurried away. They stopped after a moment, returning long enough for him to peek around the edge of the jumper. "Not drones. Not flying. Nothing, don't think at all," John warned as seriously as he could. "I'll be back."
"John," a hint of warning slipped into her voice and Elizabeth tried to ignore the cold sweat starting in her palms. "Just go."
~*~*~*~
How long had they been gone? Days? Weeks? She couldn't help feeling that she'd fallen into another universe where the only things left in existence were her and the flickering jumper. It would be better if it really worked, instead of struggling as if the battery was failing. Her head hurt again. Elizabeth couldn't decide if it was the strain of concentrating on not thinking, or the constant concentration of keeping the jumper online.
"How could she possibly get it to work? She doesn't have the gene; you can't spontaneously develop a gene, can you?" Rodney's mumblings carried across the huge space of the jumper bay.
"No Rodney, no one can spontaneous develop a gene," Carson's tone was the sound of reason as the footsteps approached her. "I'm sure there's a logical explanation."
"Logical?" Rodney laughed as he tried to think of something. "I'm completely out of ideas. I can't wait to see what your voodoo comes up with."
John's hands on her shoulders were her first link back to reality. "You didn't fire anything?" he wondered gently.
"I can barely get the damn thing to stay on," Elizabeth realized belatedly how harsh her tone was as she snapped at him. "I doubt I could have done anything." Perhaps her anger forced her concentration, but somewhere in the rear of the jumper the hum of power grew louder.
"It's all right," Carson soothed as he appeared at her side. "He's just a wee bit concerned. It's not everyday someone turns one of these babies on when they couldn't before." His hand caught her arm and squeezed gently. "Least you don't have any helicopters around for target practice."
Dragging over the stepladder from the other jumper, Rodney started checking the jumper controls as he agreed with Carson. "It's possibly just a malfunction," he began as he cracked open the panels in the ceiling. "A malfunction we've never seen in two and a half years of using the technology, which would be a really useful one."
"You just touched it and it came on?" Carson asked with extraordinary calm. Even after two weeks of isolation, his bedside manner was impeccable. "John wasn't anywhere near you?"
"I was in the other jumper," John answered for her as he sank into the co-pilot's chair.
Elizabeth closed her eyes and tried to let the stress out of her chest. "It just came on, like it is now, as if the switch is only flipped half-way," she explained with more exhaustion than she remembered feeling before they returned to her.
"That is weird," Rodney piped up from the back of the jumper. Getting down from his stepladder, he stopped next to Carson. "She's right, in a primitive way. The jumper's been partially powered up, as if she'd plugged it in, but not enough for it do anything."
"Can you get the display?" John wondered as he changed position in his chair. He rested his head on his hands; keeping back from the controls took a lot of will power. He finally stood up again, leaning with his arms over the headrest of his chair and fidgeting with his fingers.
Elizabeth closed her eyes and tried to coax the display up from the panel in front of her. She could see it flicker once through her eyelids, but it was short-lived.
As it faded, Carson leaned down to her shoulder, "Well love, I think I've got it figured out. Can't be a hundred percent sure until I get a chance to examine ye, but I think you've a bit of a medical condition."
"What?" Rodney wondered as he returned to the panels in the ceiling, "A mild case of some kind of ATA virus?"
"No Rodney," Carson corrected firmly. "Elizabeth, maybe we should talk in private."
"Dammit Carson!" she bolted from her chair, instantly killing the light on the panel. Her arms flew protectively over her chest and she glared at him with ice in her eyes. "Just tell me."
"Elizabeth..." he looked down her body, as if he was studying something in her posture that gave it all away, "I think it's fairly obvious that you're pregnant."
The thud in the back of the jumper was followed immediately by Rodney's desperate question; "Excuse me?"
John's expression fluttered for a moment, he tilted his head as if he were trying to remember something. Finally he turned curiously to Carson. "We only had sex two days ago," He admitted haltingly. "How could?" he paused, trying to sort his thoughts, "So soon?"
Elizabeth felt her embarrassment chase color back into her face. Her memory reminded her that she'd tried to put waking up naked with John out of her mind. That she'd tried to forget the way the dark hair of his chest clung to the muscled frame, and the way he smiled when he watched her wake up next to him. She couldn't speak, couldn't find the words to explain to John what must have happened.
Carson only had a soft smile for both of them. His hand closed warm on Elizabeth's stiff shoulder. "Why don't you and John have a little talk while Rodney teaches me how to wire his invention into the jumper?"
She looked at John as if she'd never seen him before. His face should be familiar; the hand reaching for hers should be gripped in response. John's fingers closed firm and warm around her own. Elizabeth felt her stomach leap into her throat. The jumper grew cold around her, and the ceiling seemed closer. Was it closing in?
John tugged her slowly towards the ramp, waiting with eyes wider than she'd ever seen them. His feet led and by some miracle hers followed. The jumper bay faded into the corridor without her feeling like she'd moved at all. Was she teleporting through the city? Was all of it a dream?
Finally, John stopped in a reddish hallway near the living quarters. Some of his tools still sat in a neat pile by one of the doorways. Her knees were nearly too stiff to follow him into the room. He started towards the couch by the wall, but she pulled him back. Waiting for her to lead, he just stood there. His hand started up her arm, but her arms were suddenly around his neck.
Elizabeth pressed against him, clinging to him as if she was drowning in the air around her. For a moment she was still, but when his arms closed around her shoulders they were shaking. Her chest heaved beneath his touch. John stood, rocking ever so slightly back and forth. The weight of her head against him gave way to the wet warmth of tears through his shirt.
He'd never seen her cry. Somehow, John had even wondered if she cried in front of other people at all. For the moment he held on, letting his mind wander away from the strange sounds of her crying. It hadn't even hit him yet, and he wondered what his reaction would be. How would it feel to know he'd fathered a child? What would it feel like when that realization slammed into him?
Shuddering instinctively, he wondered if he should say something. John nearly opened his mouth, but he couldn't. His mind didn't even know how to form words anymore, but he could wait. Anything he wanted to say would sound just as pathetic later when he figured out how to say it. He was sure he'd struggle later. He'd agonize over the twists in the road of fate someday, but for now, he held on.