The door into the hallway door whooshed open, and he froze for a couple of seconds, listening. Not a sound, apart from his own breathing. He hadn't forgotten the blur of motion he'd seen on arrival, but whoever or whatever it was, it didn't lie in wait here. If it didn't come to him, he'd have to go to it, simple as that. He pulled the life-signs detector from his pocket, doubting it would work-in addition to time, Ancient technology too had been thrown out of whack. At least that was his best guess, based on the fascinating places he'd gotten to visit between a temperamental puddle jumper and an all but dysfunctional gate system.
Much to his surprise, the detector seemed to work, and according to it, he'd been right twice over. There was somebody else here, a lone bright blip, erratically straying along the fringes of the control center. Other than that, Atlantis was completely deserted. He felt a chill streak down his back and fought the temptation of just turning around, getting into the jumper, and heading the hell back out. Wherever he ended up next, it had to be better than a dead city, him, and Unknown Life-Sign. Unfortunately, running wasn't his style.
Yeah, and look where it got you!
Frowning, he started down the hallway as quickly as he could, only braking when he got to the stairs.
"Crap!" he whispered.
Of course the Ancients had invested some thought into making this stairwell the only access from the jumper bay to the city. Any intruder wanting to get in could be picked off coming down the stairs. It had never really occurred to him that, one day, he might be the lucky schmo doing the intruding. He checked the life-signs detector again.
The blip hovered indecisively on the gallery of the control center, giving the impression that it hadn't drawn the same strategic conclusion as Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard. Then again, though its current position didn't offer a clear shot, it was a good place for watching who was coming down from the jumper bay without being seen oneself.
Okay, make it quick and pray the stairs aren't booby trapped.
He took a couple of deep breaths, ducked from cover, and flung himself down the stairs, keeping low all the way down and diving behind a shrouded console as soon as he hit the gallery. None of the nicely executed acrobatics brought a reaction from his invisible friend. So far, so weird. The life-signs detector showed the blip retreating into a corridor. That left two possibilities: either Unknown Life-Sign meant to lure him someplace more to its tactical liking, or it was as spooked as he.
Somehow he leaned toward the second option.
Time to break out the charm.
Slowly he rose from behind the console. "Don't run away! I won't hurt you. I promise!"
The blip resumed its hover. It wasn't coming any closer, but at least it had stopped heading away. Then it screamed. Going by the pitch it had to be a woman, and if he hadn't known any better, he'd swear there were three of her. The smartest course of action probably lay in catching the banshee and shutting her up before he lost his hearing.
As he ran across the gallery part of him took in his surroundings. The DHD-uncovered for some reason-with the mainframe display rearing behind, dark and inactive; what used to be Elizabeth's office; the conference room, all dead and abandoned, as though the expedition had never come here at all. And maybe it hadn't. This bracing thought carried him out into the corridor.
And then he saw her. She stood at the far end of the hallway, as if frozen in terror. Not a Wraith. She wasn't screaming now, and he forced himself to slow to a walk, to raise his hands-if she wanted to kill him, she could have done so already, and aiming a gun at her wasn't designed to put her at ease.
An ankle-length dress that must have been white at some point drooped from a too-skinny body. It was filthy and tattered, perhaps the only item of clothing she had. Her hair, unkempt for weeks or months and puffed into the wild frizz of a bag lady, was shot with gray and touched her shoulders. Somewhere between panic and madness, she stared at him, eyes wide, irises rimmed with white, and John stamped down on an urge to turn and run after all.
"You're dead," she hissed.
"Ditto." He was surprised he could speak at all.
"You're dead." This time it sounded almost plaintive. Without warning, her legs gave, and he barely caught her before she sagged to the floor.
Floor.
Sitting down.
Not a bad idea, considering that his own knees had turned a little wonky, too.
Leaning against a pillar for support, John carefully eased himself and Dr. Elizabeth Weir to the ground. He wondered if this was how it had felt for Ronon to find a handful of Satedans still alive. Then, in a wash of exhaustion, adrenaline and relief cancelled one another out, and his eyes slid shut again.
"What are you doing, Major Sheppard?" Teyla had just returned from checking the place where the villagers left their gifts for her and was stowing away a basketful of fruit and tuttleroot. She could hear him shuffle around in the back of the cave but was unable to connect the noise he made to any specific activity. Whatever it was, though, it occasioned a worrying amount of muttering and groaning. "Major?"
"I'm trying to keep your place from flooding," he grunted, words compressed by effort. "That tremor… this morning… dropped a rock… into your… stream and"-the sudden loud clatter was accompanied by splashes and enthusiastic curs- ing-"Ow! It's out now." And he evidently had overbalanced and taken a dive into the stream.
She chuckled. "I distinctly recall asking you to stay put and rest your leg."
"Teyla, it's been three weeks. If this leg gets any more rest, it'll start to ferment. Or grow fungus. Or whatever things do when they're not used."
How well she remembered it, this broken-winged impatience with a body that wouldn't do his bidding. "I believe the word you're looking for is heal, Major."
"Very funny. So, given that the quakes are a regular occurrence, why do you stay here? Aren't you afraid the cave's gonna come down on top of you one day?" He seemed to have recovered the crude crutches Wex had made for him, hoisting himself back to his feet and hobbling toward his cot.
"The cave won't collapse. You'll see why soon enough."
The cot creaked, indicating that he must have sat down. "How about now?"
"Give it time."
"My leg is fine."
"I doubt that, Major Sheppard. And even if it were, your hands surely are far from fine."
The silence that greeted her observation was answer enough. The bums on his hands had been deep and were slow to heal, and using crutches-or rolling boulders, for that matter-had to be painful. But perhaps his urgency had a reason. Perhaps he sensed something she couldn't. Perhaps they had no time.
And perhaps she simply dreaded the thought of having to send him away. She stalled. "How wet did you get? Do you require fresh clothes?"
"No. Thanks. The fire'll dry me out quickly enough."
Teyla sniffed the air, decided that he was being polite. The fire smelled as though it were about to die. She stoked it, put a couple more logs on the hearth. Then she went about squaring away the rest of her alms. Not much this time, but she wasn't complaining. Winter had been hard and the first crops were a long way off yet. The villagers had to use their remaining supplies sparingly, and since most didn't know that she had an extra mouth to feed-most wouldn't approve if they knew-her rations had dwindled, too. She'd make do. And she'd see to it that her charge got fed properly. He'd need his strength for what lay ahead.
"You haven't… shown me what happened next," he said suddenly.
No, she had not. With good reason. The linking of minds had proved more draining on both of them than she had anticipated, quite possibly because he was human, not Wraith. He simply hadn't been well enough to try again. Until now.