Sparkabet - A is for Abodement
Rating - PG
Summary - Abodement: An omen or foretelling. John and Elizabeth are given a warning about what is to come.
Chapter 4
Kolya smiled with satisfaction as the stargate shut down, an eye for an eye, it was only fair after all though for everything John Sheppard had done and taken from him he didn’t feel entirely even. He supposed Sheppard felt like he was the more wronged though, it was all a matter of perception but in Kolya’s eyes he would never be even with Sheppard.
“Send the cure,” he ordered, he would honour his word. It wasn’t the people of Atlantis he had a problem with, he’d step over them to get what he wanted but there was no sense in allowing them to be wiped out by a mere virus, not when they did such a good job of killing Wraith in their travels. One of his men nodded and started to carry out his orders and Kolya turned to leave, they’d be leaving the planet in a few minutes, Atlantis would dial after them he was sure but they’d be long gone by the time they got here.
“Sir,” one of his men stopped him and Kolya turned around. It was the man still kneeling by Sheppard’s side, his face looking shocked. “He’s still alive.”
Stubborn man, well if that was how it was going to be.
“Get him ready, we’ll take him with us,” Kolya stated and his men stared at him for several moments, their eyes questioning and unsure. “Is there a problem?”
“No sir,” his man replied quickly covering his mistake and doing as he’d been told.
- - -
The cure had worked, Kolya had kept his word but losing John in the meantime had been a heavy price. The team that had been sent to the co-ordinates Kolya had been at had returned a while ago, there had been no sign of the Genii; they’d probably only used the planet for contacting Atlantis. John’s body was gone as well, only a pool of blood had been left where he’d been shot, a lot of blood, too much.
Elizabeth didn’t know what to do now; she’d known sending John to Kolya was like signing his death warrant. She’d known and she’d done it anyway but if she hadn’t a lot of people would have died, now they would live and that was thanks to the sacrifice John had made.
Sacrifice, the Overseer.
This had to have been what he was talking about, it all fit and Elizabeth felt like an idiot for not paying it more attention. Deep down she knew there was nothing she could have done differently; she couldn’t have stopped that virus being brought back to Atlantis anymore than she could have stopped John from giving himself over to Kolya. Still, she couldn’t help but feel like she should have been able to do something, prevent all of this from happening.
She heard someone walk in and looked up to see Teyla making her way to the empty chair. She looked like hell, probably felt like it too, she had a feeling Carson hadn’t cleared her to start wondering around the city yet. If there was one thing the members of John’s team had in common it was their stubborn refusal to sit around and do nothing for an extended period of time, even Rodney would ultimately wind up in his lab tinkering with one of his toys.
“Teyla, how are you?” she asked, the Athosian looked as pale as a ghost and it seemed like her whole body was trembling with the effort of walking to the chair, the question seemed stupid.
Teyla offered her a small smile as she sat in the chair, taking a moment to catch her breath and recover from her walk. “I am doing better, how are you?”
“I’m fine, Carson already cleared me for light work,” Elizabeth told her.
“That is not what I was talking about,” Teyla stated giving her a knowing look, a look of shared pain, she’d lost John today too, they all had.
“I feel like I should have done something,” Elizabeth replied, there were two people she felt comfortable being this honest with, Teyla was one of them, the other was John but seeing as that was no longer an option she was left with only Teyla.
“You could not have done more than you did,” Teyla pointed out what Elizabeth already knew.
“I know that, it doesn’t make me feel any better,” Elizabeth told her, she glanced at the Stargate where she had last seen John before he had been shot on the screen. His face, the smile and the wave he gave her were burned into her brain along with every memory she had of him. She should have stopped him, should have said or done something to make him stay, she shouldn’t have let him go.
“He would not want you to do that to yourself,” Teyla stated with the knowing look still on her face. “Stop questioning what you did, you both made the right decision. If you hadn’t done what you did many of the people here would be dead now, myself among them.”
“We were warned,” Elizabeth said quietly her eyes still on the stargate. “The Overseer, he told us this would happen.”
“I told you his predictions had never proven untrue, what did he say?” she questioned.
“That a darkness was approaching and a sacrifice might have to be made to protect the greater good,” Elizabeth summed up, examining what the old man had told her to see if there was any way she could have seen this coming, stopped it. There wasn’t and even as she went over and over it in her head, over and over what happened over the last few days she knew she couldn’t have changed anything. What the Overseer had told them had not been meant to help them prevent it from happening but to guide them through it, to help them make the right decision when the time came.
“Do not shut yourself off Elizabeth, I know that you are already heading in that direction, had John been here he would have been the first one in here to make sure it didn’t happen, he wouldn’t want it,” Teyla told her and then smiled slightly as she saw Carson coming. “I think I’m in trouble now.”
“Did I tell you that you could leave?” Carson questioned the annoyance in his voice dimmed by the exhaustion.
“I only came to speak with Elizabeth, I will return to my bed now,” Teyla placated, struggling to find the energy to stand back up again. Carson helped her despite his own wavering energy and as the two of them left he turned back to Elizabeth, he looked like he wanted to say something but then changed his mind and left.
- - -
John woke up feeling like he’d run himself over with a Jumper, his whole body ached and it was even worse when he tried to move. He didn’t recognise where he was, in fact he was sure that he shouldn’t be anywhere. Kolya had shot him, twice if he remembered correctly and he’d thought that was it, that he was dead.
“You’re awake,” a soft voice stated and John turned his head on the pillow to see the young woman approaching the side of the bed. “We were worried for a while back there.”
The blonde woman smiled, a friendly smile that John wouldn’t have associated with the Genii uniform and the knowledge that she was most likely working for Kolya. She seemed to be a doctor, she started fussing around him in the same manner Carson did when he woke up after a mission gone bad.
“Who are you?” John asked warily watching her every move.
“Lidia, Dr Lidia Alaine,” she introduced herself with another smile. “Do you want me to help you sit up?”
John shook his head, proceeding to do it himself and then regretting it when it sent a stab of pain through his chest. Alaine helped him anyway when she saw him wince, smiling for a third time though this one was an amused one. He thanked her, still wary of what she wanted, of why he was still alive, why they would help him.
“Where am I?” was his next question.
“Our base infirmary, Commander Kolya brought you back through the gate with him and ordered you to be taken care of,” she explained and John raised an eyebrow incredulously.
“Why would Kolya want to help me, he was the one who shot me in the first place?” John questioned.
“Because Colonel Sheppard,” another voice came from doorway, this one familiar and hated. “I am not quite the monster you think I am.”
“Could have fooled me Kolya,” John replied glaring at the man as he walked into the infirmary.
“You shot me, I should have died, I didn’t. I shot you, you should have died, you didn’t, I guess you could call that fate. If you hadn’t killed so many of my men I would call us even,” Kolya told him, a smug smirk on his face that seemed to be a permanent feature on the man.
“If you hadn’t tried to steal the city and held two of my friend’s hostage then I wouldn’t have had to kill your people,” John returned sarcastically. “And let’s not forget you fed me to a Wraith.”
“It was nothing personal,” Kolya replied.
“Felt personal enough to me,” John told him and Kolya smiled.
“You are alive Colonel Sheppard; I would think you should at least be grateful for that, if we had not brought you here then you would have bled to death on that planet long before anyone found you. I suggest you make yourself comfortable here, you won’t be going anywhere else,” Kolya informed him and then left without giving John the chance to say anything back. If Kolya thought he was going to just sit here and be quietly grateful to him then he had another thing coming.
- - -
At least he was no longer stuck in the bed; he supposed that was a plus. He’d tried to get to the gate a few times only to get beat up by one of guards and brought right back to the infirmary where Lidia patched him up again with another lecture. Kolya had been to see him a few time in the last couple of days, checking in on him as though he actually cared and reminding him that trying to escape was only gonna land him back here with extra injuries.
“You should just accept that you’re not getting out of here, it’d be far more beneficial to your health,” Lidia told him, exasperation filling her voice as she dabbed a cloth over the cut on his head, cleaning the wound that had been inflicted by the end of a gun during his latest escape attempt.
“As much as I enjoy your company and the frequent visits from the man I hate more than anyone else in two galaxies, I think I’d rather go home,” John replied, smiling so that she would know he meant no offence to her. He’d gotten to know her over the last few days, she was a nice girl, didn’t really fit in here but at the same time she seemed to be happy here.
“Well how about I stop fixing you up, see how well you do then,” she threatened with a raised eyebrow. “Commander Kolya isn’t going to let you go and all you’re doing is getting yourself hurt, as far as you’re concerned this is your home now.”
“No it’s not,” John told her a little more seriously and she sighed, putting the cloth down and examining the cut on his head again.
“You could make your home here,” she suggested and John repressed his own sigh. He knew Lidia liked him, more than just liked him and he didn’t want to hurt her but the interest was one way. She was pretty, she was nice but he would never see her like that, he had a feeling he knew why but for as long as he was stuck here he was better off not thinking about that.
TBC
Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3