FIC: A Tale in Three Parts - BtVS/SGA - PG-15
Title: A Tale In Three Parts (BtVS/SGA)
Author: lyl (lyl_devil)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: I don't own either show, they belong to their respective production companies. I'm just playing in their sandboxes.
Words: 3651
Challenge: sg_btvs - Rebirth
Summary: Atlantis is more than a city. Willow is more than a witch.
Written for the sg_btvs weekly challenge (Rebirth).
~!~
Atlantis
The first time she heard it, she wasn't aware of it until much later. She couldn't be blamed for that, though.
She'd been running out of energy, trapped on the bottom of the ocean, sacrificing the outer parts of herself to stay alive. Time held no meaning for her; all she knew was that she was slowly dying, waiting for the return of her Children, as they'd promised.
But then He had come with dozens of others, and she'd been so ecstatic that she'd used what little was left of her energy to show him the wonders of who she was. He wasn't one of her long lost Children, but he was close enough that after so long without the slightest presence to walk in her halls, His arrival was a rainstorm in a desert.
This time, as she sacrificed more of herself to preserve the shield around her core, it was with a desperate need to save Them, as well.
She remembers getting weaker and weaker, until all her power fled and she fell into darkness. So it was a surprise to wake up some time later, groggy and barely functional, with a strange energy flowing through some of her systems. She didn't have nearly enough power to communicate or do anything overt to alert them to her presence - this new source of energy was more like a slow-acting drug than a true source of energy, but it was enough to allow her to survive. It also gave her the time to learn about these people who had come to live within her halls.
She called them her New Children, and she liked them. They were at times naïve and overeager, but they had a desire for life and a strength of purpose that her previous Children had lost long before she's arrived in this new galaxy. And it saddened her to realize that they were forced to deal with the unfinished business left behind by her previous Children.
So she protected them when she could, and pointed them in helpful directions when she was able, but mostly she waited. Honestly, there was little else she could do with so little power to her systems. Her consciousness was nowhere near fully awake, and so her responses were more along the lines of one of those 'computers' her New Children had interfaced with her systems.
It wasn't until a compatible energy source was plugged into her heart, that she had the ability to recall and analyze all the information she'd been gathering since her Children had abandoned her. She remembers the Abomination crawling through her halls, wanting to kill her New Children and their Allies, when the portal had once again come to life.
(That was the second time she heard it, though again, that realization wouldn't come until later.)
Then, there had been power. Not enough for her to purge the Abominations from her walls, but enough to protect the last of the New Children and Allies.
As her shield held off a barrage of energy blasts, she had the time to process, and found It. The One who would make her complete in a way she hadn't been for generations before she was abandoned.
That was when she realized the Call came from the other side of the portal - from wherever her New Children had come from. Both times the portal had opened from their world, the One's presence had come through.
So she strengthened her shields to protect these people within her walls, hoping that the next time the portal was opened, she would be in contact with the One.
After the Abominations were pushed from her solar system (using far more dramatics than were strictly called for, she thought), she found she could activate many more systems as a compatible power flowed through her circuits.
And every 5.24531948363 planetary rotations, the portal would open to the New Children's home planet.
She started answering the Call with one of her own, Calling the One to her with every spare bit of power she could throw through the portal.
A problem arose immediately, as she discovered that unlike the other portal devices, the one on the New Children's home world was damaged. It's mind had been ripped from it, and what was left was a shell of it's former self. She could no longer control it's actions; could not tell it to open for the One, so they could make their way to her.
The Call needed to be strengthened, sending instructions along with the invitation to come to her.
And then, after a return of the Abominations and their subsequent betrayal, the One arrived.
The portal activated, and she knew immediately that the One was attempting to enter the portal, through the resistance on the other end. Soon enough, though, the One slipped from the portal, through the shield she held open, to stand amidst her walls, surrounded by her New Children.
Who were all pointing those strange, black weapons that fired searing metal pins at the One.
But that was secondary, because she was here. The One.
And Atlantis screamed with joy.
~!~
Willow
The first time she felt it was while she was trying to end the world. At the time, Willow had thought it was just the magic and grief making her hear and feel things that weren't there.
So she ignored it, put it to the back of her mind, and got on with the whole 'send the world into hell' plan.
The second time she felt it, there was really no way to ignore it. There was always the old 'blame the magic', since she'd been in the process of activating all the slayers at the time, but by that point she knew what was and wasn't the magic. And that definitely wasn't the magic talking.
After Sunnydale became a giant crater, Willow had time to think about it. She analyzed what she'd felt, trying to put into words what had happened. She still didn't say anything to anyone, but that had more to do with her not being able to figure it out enough to explain to herself, let alone another person.
It was essentially a feeling of Home. Something reached out and touched her thoughts, and it felt like Home. Where it came from and what it meant, she really couldn't say. That's not to say she didn't research the phenomenon, especially once it started happening more often.
In fact, soon after Sunnydale, it started happening once a week, at about the same time of the day. Willow had no idea what that meant, except that it was predictable.
And it was calling her to it. Whatever it was, it was asking her to come to it, and Willow felt her desire to do just that increase every week. That had Willow more scared than she cared to admit.
She went traipsing through the South American jungle with Kennedy, hoping to distract herself from the call she hadn't been able to trace. After a few months, Kennedy got fed up with her constantly dodging questions, then touches, and finally flat out avoiding her.
When Kennedy left, Willow found herself actively searching out the presence in her thoughts. The feeling of Home expanded, and Willow felt Welcome and Love among a slew of other emotions.
Then the presence changed, and it wasn't just touching her thoughts, but was starting to send images and ideas, as well. Again, this scared her, but Willow soon figured out that it was a set of instructions on how to find the presence.
Willow would have continued to ponder this, if it hadn't been for the interference of Kennedy and her well-meaning friends. Apparently, the young slayer had taken Willow's change of attitude as a sign she was possessed or something, and rounded up some help to 'free' Willow of whatever had taken hold of her.
In fact, all they did was pull down the barriers she'd spent months building up. As the walls surrounding her mind and magic came crashing down, her control vanished and her mind became suddenly clear. More than just thoughts and feelings had been sent to her - so much more had been given to her, but her limited senses hadn't been able to process the data until the 'filter' was gone.
Her mind ran through the months of information, and understood what was happening. She knew instinctively who - or what - was calling to her (or was she calling to it), how to get there and why she should go.
A few tricks to escape her friends, a quick trip to Colorado and then she was there, standing in front of a giant metal ring while alarms blared around her and soldiers pointed their weapons at her. As she poured power into the ring, locking in on an address she somehow knew would take her to where she needed to go, Willow knew that this would be the last time she set foot on Earth.
Stepping through the watery-blue portal, Willow found it slightly ironic that she left one enormous room filled with gun-totting soldiers, just to enter another enormous room filled with gun-totting soldiers. But she didn't have time for them, casually knocking them aside with flicks of her hands, not even caring that her hair and eyes were blazing pure white with the magic she could no longer control.
She ignored orders to stop, pleas to talk and the bullets they fired simply dissolved in the heat of the magic, long before they could penetrate to her skin.
The voice in her head was constant now, screaming in joy at her arrival, and Willow answered in kind. Her thoughts felt full and light, as if she'd found her other half and it was divine.
But neither of them were complete, not until the joining was complete, and for that Willow knew she needed to be in the heart of Atlantis. Atlantis.
She moved through the city as if she'd been born there, the presence of Atlantis guiding her to a room in the centre of the city. The soldiers trailing her found themselves locked out, as the doors closed behind her, and she knew - as the city knew - that even their best scientific minds wouldn't be able to crack open the door.
Willow simply looked around briefly, curious as to the space that would soon be hers. A panel slid open in one of the walls, and Willow smiled.
“Anxious, aren't you?”
A pulse of amusementjoyhopelovehurry was her response, and laughing, Willow stepped into the small space behind the panel, knowing she would never be alone again.
She would always be loved.
~!~
John
John Sheppard knew there was more to Atlantis than meets the eye, but was hesitant to mention that fact to anyone. The one time he'd casually mentioned 'feeling' something from Atlantis, he'd spent the next five weeks on Heightmeyer's couch, trying to convince her that he wasn't going crazy due to stress.
No, he was going crazy for many altogether different reasons, but the 'stress of command' was not one of them. In fact, the Marines were - surprisingly - low on the list of stressful responsibilities. Dealing with the rest of the command staff, however, was right near the top, next to the Wraith.
So like a good little soldier, he kept the belief that Atlantis was more than just a city to himself. He didn't mention the odd flashes of images he'd occasionally get in his head, or that sometimes he'd feel a prickle along the back of his neck, like when he was in a sniper's sights. He completely ignored the foreign thrum of smug satisfaction he'd feel, when a new secret about the city was revealed.
He couldn't, however, ignore or brush away the overwhelming sense of anticipation coming from the city the instant an incoming wormhole connected to their gate. He had to stop himself from wincing at the shrill sounds of joy and ecstasy reverberating around his skull.
Then he found out the shield refused to activate, and panic and suspicion welled up in him. Atlantis was totally up to something.
Extra Marines were called to the gate room, and arrived just as a figure stepped through the event horizon of the wormhole. Every weapon was immediately pointed at the intruder, though John had to wonder how many of them could actually see her. He had to blink repeatedly to lose the bright spots forming in his vision after looking directly at her.
He was positive it was a her, the long hair and backlit female figure the main clues in that direction. When the glowing light died down enough for him to finally see her, John was mildly surprised at what he saw.
She was from Earth - he was almost positive of that. The wispy white shirt could mean anything, but the form-fitting jeans were what clued him in. He hadn't heard of any planet in either galaxy that had mastered the art of denim.
Not to mention the spat of weapons fire that proceeded her through the wormhole, catching two of his men in glancing blows before the connection was cut. Then they were left with this problem, which had apparently walked through the Cheyenne mountain complex, dialled the stargate and strode on through to the Pegasus galaxy without much effort.
He called out questions and orders to her, but didn't hold much hope that she'd respond. Her face was a picture of rapture, features glowing with both happiness and that strange light that seemed to follow her around yet came from nowhere. It was the same brilliant white light that shone out of her eyes, and was reflected off her pure white hair that was being blown around in a breeze that didn't exist.
He could feel Atlantis' exultation in his mind, and promised himself that after this, anyone who didn't believe him about Atlantis being more than a city was being booted back to Earth on the first available transport. Or sent to spar with Teyla and Ronon until they changed their minds.
Then she turned and left the gate room, walking with a purpose that scared even him. Panic set in and some of the Marines opened fire, only to see their bullets vaporise before getting within a foot of her. All they could do was follow her as she made her way further into the depths of Atlantis, moving down hallways and into sections still unexplored by members of the expedition.
John had grabbed a P-90 off the closest Marine, leading the envoy as they trailed this stranger down silent, dark halls. He'd ordered all the scientists back, and was just glad McKay had been in the labs when she came through, because there was no way he'd let John leave him behind for this.
“What's she doing, sir?” asked one of the marines, keeping his voice low. The woman had stopped at a blank wall, seeming to be uncertain at this point.
“I have no idea,” John replied, keeping his voice just as low. None of the wanted to spook this woman, in case vaporising bullets and walking through heavily armed bases unchallenged wasn't all she could do.
Then the wall opened to reveal a hidden room beyond, and she stepped through. Before anyone could follow, the walled sealed up, blocking them all from entering.
John cursed heavily as they lost contact with her, calling for McKay to come and open a wall when thinking at it did nothing.
While waiting, John walked up to the wall, placing a hand over the door and practically begging Atlantis to let him in.
“What the hell have you done?” he murmured questioningly.
All he got back was a blast of satisfaction and pure joy.
~!~
Three days later and the reports had come in, giving a pretty clear picture of who she was and how she'd come to Atlantis. The only real question that remained was 'why', and still, nobody could answer that one.
The entire city was on edge, the rumours and hypotheses running rampant about what was going on in Atlantis. It didn't help that Rodney was even more irate than usual; he was taking his inability to even find the hidden door as a personal insult to his genius.
John was in talking with Elizabeth when the call came in from the men he'd stationed outside the hidden room, and he took off with a flash, Elizabeth right behind him.
The sight that greeted them was not the strangest he'd ever seen, but that didn't provide any comfort. His men had their weapons pointed at the woman - Willow, he now knew - who was framed in the doorway of the room. She was dripping a clear goo, soaked in the stuff from head to toe, still in the same clothes she'd worn coming through the gate. Except she was barefoot - and apparently a red head.
“What do you want? Why are you here?” John asked, his own weapon aimed at her. Elizabeth had apparently taken exception to his demands for answers, and tried her own brand of questioning.
“My name's Dr Elizabeth Weir-” she began, speaking in her 'diplomatic voice of reason' tone that John hated so much.
“We know,” her voice resonated, sounding like it was coming through a voice synthesizer. “We regret that we could not warn you in advance. Our power levels were too low to allow for direct communication.”
“Who's this 'we'?” demanded John, moving slightly in front of Elizabeth to keep her out of a direct line of fire.
“'Direct communication'?” repeated Elizabeth, “but you did try to communicate.”
“We are the city; we are Atlantis,” she said, and John felt all kinds of horror start to build. The city was alive, “we tried to tell you in many ways what we needed. Of the few that were receptive, only you were able to hear us, yet you did not want to listen.”
She was looking directly at John as she said that, and every curse he'd ever heard or said started flying through his head. He heard Elizabeth say his name in that reprimanding way she had, and lost patience with her.
“The one time I mentioned being able to 'hear' the city, you thought I was crazy and sent me to Heightmeyer. Forgive me for not wanting a repeat of that 'pleasant' experience, when I start hearing whispers and having weird dreams.”
He couldn't tell if she was suitably remorseful or not, because he hadn't taken his eyes off the red head in front of him.
“We did not understand, either,” she said, advancing slowly but with deliberate intention, “until we merged with this body. Many human traits suddenly became clear.”
“About that body...” John added, wishing she'd changed out of that white shirt before coming out of that room. White shirt and wet goo didn't really hide anything.
“Willow. Our first in generations; since long before the Abandonment,” explained Atlantis through Willow's body.
“So you took her over?” asked Elizabeth, surprise and anger colouring her voice.
“It was consensual,” she replied, her eyes still locked to his gaze, as if answering only for him. Maybe she was.
“Can we speak to Willow, or is she gone now that you have her body?” asked John.
“She is resting. The Joining took much energy on both our parts. I am able to speak to you only because her mind is resting.”
“Why did you do this?” asked Elizabeth from behind him, a hand on his shoulder to still him as he tried to prevent her from moving closer.
“It is not in my nature to be alone,” Atlantis-Willow explained, “yet I have been by myself for so long. So long since I felt the presence of a compatible companion.”
John could hear the wistful and sad tone of her voice, and idly wondered what it must have been like to be a conscious entity stuck alone beneath a dark, cold sea for ten thousand years. She had called it 'the Abandonment', and John didn't doubt that to her, the departure of the Ancients had been that.
“So you, what? Called her up to come and 'merge' with you? How did that happen?” he asked, forcing himself to hold his ground as she moved to stand in front of him.
“My Favoured One,” she said, reaching a hand up to cup his cheek as she smiled at him, “my Bright Shining Beacon. I felt you the instant you stepped through the portal. I would not have awoken for anyone else.”
John didn't know if he should be pleased or frightened by that, and promised himself he'd ponder it later in the privacy of his quarters.
“I sensed Willow each time the portal opened to your home world. I asked and she answered.”
“Why Willow?” asked Elizabeth, who really didn't like to be left out. “what's this 'joining' that you've done?”
“A kind of avatar,” answered John, his mind running furiously through everything he'd tried to pretend Atlantis wasn't showing him, “a human interface for the city.”
“You did listen,” Atlantis-Willow smiled widely.
Closing her eyes briefly, Atlantis-Willow lowered her hand from his face and seemed to sway in place.
“I must rest. This body is not yet fully adapted to the changes.”
John watched as she turned back to the room she'd first come from, this time leaving the door open as she laid down on the bed he hadn't noticed before.
Turning to look at Elizabeth, he was taken aback by the fierce anger in her eyes.
“The city's been talking to you?”
It was going to be a long day, he just knew it.
END
Author: lyl (lyl_devil)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: I don't own either show, they belong to their respective production companies. I'm just playing in their sandboxes.
Words: 3651
Challenge: sg_btvs - Rebirth
Summary: Atlantis is more than a city. Willow is more than a witch.
Written for the sg_btvs weekly challenge (Rebirth).
~!~
Atlantis
The first time she heard it, she wasn't aware of it until much later. She couldn't be blamed for that, though.
She'd been running out of energy, trapped on the bottom of the ocean, sacrificing the outer parts of herself to stay alive. Time held no meaning for her; all she knew was that she was slowly dying, waiting for the return of her Children, as they'd promised.
But then He had come with dozens of others, and she'd been so ecstatic that she'd used what little was left of her energy to show him the wonders of who she was. He wasn't one of her long lost Children, but he was close enough that after so long without the slightest presence to walk in her halls, His arrival was a rainstorm in a desert.
This time, as she sacrificed more of herself to preserve the shield around her core, it was with a desperate need to save Them, as well.
She remembers getting weaker and weaker, until all her power fled and she fell into darkness. So it was a surprise to wake up some time later, groggy and barely functional, with a strange energy flowing through some of her systems. She didn't have nearly enough power to communicate or do anything overt to alert them to her presence - this new source of energy was more like a slow-acting drug than a true source of energy, but it was enough to allow her to survive. It also gave her the time to learn about these people who had come to live within her halls.
She called them her New Children, and she liked them. They were at times naïve and overeager, but they had a desire for life and a strength of purpose that her previous Children had lost long before she's arrived in this new galaxy. And it saddened her to realize that they were forced to deal with the unfinished business left behind by her previous Children.
So she protected them when she could, and pointed them in helpful directions when she was able, but mostly she waited. Honestly, there was little else she could do with so little power to her systems. Her consciousness was nowhere near fully awake, and so her responses were more along the lines of one of those 'computers' her New Children had interfaced with her systems.
It wasn't until a compatible energy source was plugged into her heart, that she had the ability to recall and analyze all the information she'd been gathering since her Children had abandoned her. She remembers the Abomination crawling through her halls, wanting to kill her New Children and their Allies, when the portal had once again come to life.
(That was the second time she heard it, though again, that realization wouldn't come until later.)
Then, there had been power. Not enough for her to purge the Abominations from her walls, but enough to protect the last of the New Children and Allies.
As her shield held off a barrage of energy blasts, she had the time to process, and found It. The One who would make her complete in a way she hadn't been for generations before she was abandoned.
That was when she realized the Call came from the other side of the portal - from wherever her New Children had come from. Both times the portal had opened from their world, the One's presence had come through.
So she strengthened her shields to protect these people within her walls, hoping that the next time the portal was opened, she would be in contact with the One.
After the Abominations were pushed from her solar system (using far more dramatics than were strictly called for, she thought), she found she could activate many more systems as a compatible power flowed through her circuits.
And every 5.24531948363 planetary rotations, the portal would open to the New Children's home planet.
She started answering the Call with one of her own, Calling the One to her with every spare bit of power she could throw through the portal.
A problem arose immediately, as she discovered that unlike the other portal devices, the one on the New Children's home world was damaged. It's mind had been ripped from it, and what was left was a shell of it's former self. She could no longer control it's actions; could not tell it to open for the One, so they could make their way to her.
The Call needed to be strengthened, sending instructions along with the invitation to come to her.
And then, after a return of the Abominations and their subsequent betrayal, the One arrived.
The portal activated, and she knew immediately that the One was attempting to enter the portal, through the resistance on the other end. Soon enough, though, the One slipped from the portal, through the shield she held open, to stand amidst her walls, surrounded by her New Children.
Who were all pointing those strange, black weapons that fired searing metal pins at the One.
But that was secondary, because she was here. The One.
And Atlantis screamed with joy.
~!~
Willow
The first time she felt it was while she was trying to end the world. At the time, Willow had thought it was just the magic and grief making her hear and feel things that weren't there.
So she ignored it, put it to the back of her mind, and got on with the whole 'send the world into hell' plan.
The second time she felt it, there was really no way to ignore it. There was always the old 'blame the magic', since she'd been in the process of activating all the slayers at the time, but by that point she knew what was and wasn't the magic. And that definitely wasn't the magic talking.
After Sunnydale became a giant crater, Willow had time to think about it. She analyzed what she'd felt, trying to put into words what had happened. She still didn't say anything to anyone, but that had more to do with her not being able to figure it out enough to explain to herself, let alone another person.
It was essentially a feeling of Home. Something reached out and touched her thoughts, and it felt like Home. Where it came from and what it meant, she really couldn't say. That's not to say she didn't research the phenomenon, especially once it started happening more often.
In fact, soon after Sunnydale, it started happening once a week, at about the same time of the day. Willow had no idea what that meant, except that it was predictable.
And it was calling her to it. Whatever it was, it was asking her to come to it, and Willow felt her desire to do just that increase every week. That had Willow more scared than she cared to admit.
She went traipsing through the South American jungle with Kennedy, hoping to distract herself from the call she hadn't been able to trace. After a few months, Kennedy got fed up with her constantly dodging questions, then touches, and finally flat out avoiding her.
When Kennedy left, Willow found herself actively searching out the presence in her thoughts. The feeling of Home expanded, and Willow felt Welcome and Love among a slew of other emotions.
Then the presence changed, and it wasn't just touching her thoughts, but was starting to send images and ideas, as well. Again, this scared her, but Willow soon figured out that it was a set of instructions on how to find the presence.
Willow would have continued to ponder this, if it hadn't been for the interference of Kennedy and her well-meaning friends. Apparently, the young slayer had taken Willow's change of attitude as a sign she was possessed or something, and rounded up some help to 'free' Willow of whatever had taken hold of her.
In fact, all they did was pull down the barriers she'd spent months building up. As the walls surrounding her mind and magic came crashing down, her control vanished and her mind became suddenly clear. More than just thoughts and feelings had been sent to her - so much more had been given to her, but her limited senses hadn't been able to process the data until the 'filter' was gone.
Her mind ran through the months of information, and understood what was happening. She knew instinctively who - or what - was calling to her (or was she calling to it), how to get there and why she should go.
A few tricks to escape her friends, a quick trip to Colorado and then she was there, standing in front of a giant metal ring while alarms blared around her and soldiers pointed their weapons at her. As she poured power into the ring, locking in on an address she somehow knew would take her to where she needed to go, Willow knew that this would be the last time she set foot on Earth.
Stepping through the watery-blue portal, Willow found it slightly ironic that she left one enormous room filled with gun-totting soldiers, just to enter another enormous room filled with gun-totting soldiers. But she didn't have time for them, casually knocking them aside with flicks of her hands, not even caring that her hair and eyes were blazing pure white with the magic she could no longer control.
She ignored orders to stop, pleas to talk and the bullets they fired simply dissolved in the heat of the magic, long before they could penetrate to her skin.
The voice in her head was constant now, screaming in joy at her arrival, and Willow answered in kind. Her thoughts felt full and light, as if she'd found her other half and it was divine.
But neither of them were complete, not until the joining was complete, and for that Willow knew she needed to be in the heart of Atlantis. Atlantis.
She moved through the city as if she'd been born there, the presence of Atlantis guiding her to a room in the centre of the city. The soldiers trailing her found themselves locked out, as the doors closed behind her, and she knew - as the city knew - that even their best scientific minds wouldn't be able to crack open the door.
Willow simply looked around briefly, curious as to the space that would soon be hers. A panel slid open in one of the walls, and Willow smiled.
“Anxious, aren't you?”
A pulse of amusementjoyhopelovehurry was her response, and laughing, Willow stepped into the small space behind the panel, knowing she would never be alone again.
She would always be loved.
~!~
John
John Sheppard knew there was more to Atlantis than meets the eye, but was hesitant to mention that fact to anyone. The one time he'd casually mentioned 'feeling' something from Atlantis, he'd spent the next five weeks on Heightmeyer's couch, trying to convince her that he wasn't going crazy due to stress.
No, he was going crazy for many altogether different reasons, but the 'stress of command' was not one of them. In fact, the Marines were - surprisingly - low on the list of stressful responsibilities. Dealing with the rest of the command staff, however, was right near the top, next to the Wraith.
So like a good little soldier, he kept the belief that Atlantis was more than just a city to himself. He didn't mention the odd flashes of images he'd occasionally get in his head, or that sometimes he'd feel a prickle along the back of his neck, like when he was in a sniper's sights. He completely ignored the foreign thrum of smug satisfaction he'd feel, when a new secret about the city was revealed.
He couldn't, however, ignore or brush away the overwhelming sense of anticipation coming from the city the instant an incoming wormhole connected to their gate. He had to stop himself from wincing at the shrill sounds of joy and ecstasy reverberating around his skull.
Then he found out the shield refused to activate, and panic and suspicion welled up in him. Atlantis was totally up to something.
Extra Marines were called to the gate room, and arrived just as a figure stepped through the event horizon of the wormhole. Every weapon was immediately pointed at the intruder, though John had to wonder how many of them could actually see her. He had to blink repeatedly to lose the bright spots forming in his vision after looking directly at her.
He was positive it was a her, the long hair and backlit female figure the main clues in that direction. When the glowing light died down enough for him to finally see her, John was mildly surprised at what he saw.
She was from Earth - he was almost positive of that. The wispy white shirt could mean anything, but the form-fitting jeans were what clued him in. He hadn't heard of any planet in either galaxy that had mastered the art of denim.
Not to mention the spat of weapons fire that proceeded her through the wormhole, catching two of his men in glancing blows before the connection was cut. Then they were left with this problem, which had apparently walked through the Cheyenne mountain complex, dialled the stargate and strode on through to the Pegasus galaxy without much effort.
He called out questions and orders to her, but didn't hold much hope that she'd respond. Her face was a picture of rapture, features glowing with both happiness and that strange light that seemed to follow her around yet came from nowhere. It was the same brilliant white light that shone out of her eyes, and was reflected off her pure white hair that was being blown around in a breeze that didn't exist.
He could feel Atlantis' exultation in his mind, and promised himself that after this, anyone who didn't believe him about Atlantis being more than a city was being booted back to Earth on the first available transport. Or sent to spar with Teyla and Ronon until they changed their minds.
Then she turned and left the gate room, walking with a purpose that scared even him. Panic set in and some of the Marines opened fire, only to see their bullets vaporise before getting within a foot of her. All they could do was follow her as she made her way further into the depths of Atlantis, moving down hallways and into sections still unexplored by members of the expedition.
John had grabbed a P-90 off the closest Marine, leading the envoy as they trailed this stranger down silent, dark halls. He'd ordered all the scientists back, and was just glad McKay had been in the labs when she came through, because there was no way he'd let John leave him behind for this.
“What's she doing, sir?” asked one of the marines, keeping his voice low. The woman had stopped at a blank wall, seeming to be uncertain at this point.
“I have no idea,” John replied, keeping his voice just as low. None of the wanted to spook this woman, in case vaporising bullets and walking through heavily armed bases unchallenged wasn't all she could do.
Then the wall opened to reveal a hidden room beyond, and she stepped through. Before anyone could follow, the walled sealed up, blocking them all from entering.
John cursed heavily as they lost contact with her, calling for McKay to come and open a wall when thinking at it did nothing.
While waiting, John walked up to the wall, placing a hand over the door and practically begging Atlantis to let him in.
“What the hell have you done?” he murmured questioningly.
All he got back was a blast of satisfaction and pure joy.
~!~
Three days later and the reports had come in, giving a pretty clear picture of who she was and how she'd come to Atlantis. The only real question that remained was 'why', and still, nobody could answer that one.
The entire city was on edge, the rumours and hypotheses running rampant about what was going on in Atlantis. It didn't help that Rodney was even more irate than usual; he was taking his inability to even find the hidden door as a personal insult to his genius.
John was in talking with Elizabeth when the call came in from the men he'd stationed outside the hidden room, and he took off with a flash, Elizabeth right behind him.
The sight that greeted them was not the strangest he'd ever seen, but that didn't provide any comfort. His men had their weapons pointed at the woman - Willow, he now knew - who was framed in the doorway of the room. She was dripping a clear goo, soaked in the stuff from head to toe, still in the same clothes she'd worn coming through the gate. Except she was barefoot - and apparently a red head.
“What do you want? Why are you here?” John asked, his own weapon aimed at her. Elizabeth had apparently taken exception to his demands for answers, and tried her own brand of questioning.
“My name's Dr Elizabeth Weir-” she began, speaking in her 'diplomatic voice of reason' tone that John hated so much.
“We know,” her voice resonated, sounding like it was coming through a voice synthesizer. “We regret that we could not warn you in advance. Our power levels were too low to allow for direct communication.”
“Who's this 'we'?” demanded John, moving slightly in front of Elizabeth to keep her out of a direct line of fire.
“'Direct communication'?” repeated Elizabeth, “but you did try to communicate.”
“We are the city; we are Atlantis,” she said, and John felt all kinds of horror start to build. The city was alive, “we tried to tell you in many ways what we needed. Of the few that were receptive, only you were able to hear us, yet you did not want to listen.”
She was looking directly at John as she said that, and every curse he'd ever heard or said started flying through his head. He heard Elizabeth say his name in that reprimanding way she had, and lost patience with her.
“The one time I mentioned being able to 'hear' the city, you thought I was crazy and sent me to Heightmeyer. Forgive me for not wanting a repeat of that 'pleasant' experience, when I start hearing whispers and having weird dreams.”
He couldn't tell if she was suitably remorseful or not, because he hadn't taken his eyes off the red head in front of him.
“We did not understand, either,” she said, advancing slowly but with deliberate intention, “until we merged with this body. Many human traits suddenly became clear.”
“About that body...” John added, wishing she'd changed out of that white shirt before coming out of that room. White shirt and wet goo didn't really hide anything.
“Willow. Our first in generations; since long before the Abandonment,” explained Atlantis through Willow's body.
“So you took her over?” asked Elizabeth, surprise and anger colouring her voice.
“It was consensual,” she replied, her eyes still locked to his gaze, as if answering only for him. Maybe she was.
“Can we speak to Willow, or is she gone now that you have her body?” asked John.
“She is resting. The Joining took much energy on both our parts. I am able to speak to you only because her mind is resting.”
“Why did you do this?” asked Elizabeth from behind him, a hand on his shoulder to still him as he tried to prevent her from moving closer.
“It is not in my nature to be alone,” Atlantis-Willow explained, “yet I have been by myself for so long. So long since I felt the presence of a compatible companion.”
John could hear the wistful and sad tone of her voice, and idly wondered what it must have been like to be a conscious entity stuck alone beneath a dark, cold sea for ten thousand years. She had called it 'the Abandonment', and John didn't doubt that to her, the departure of the Ancients had been that.
“So you, what? Called her up to come and 'merge' with you? How did that happen?” he asked, forcing himself to hold his ground as she moved to stand in front of him.
“My Favoured One,” she said, reaching a hand up to cup his cheek as she smiled at him, “my Bright Shining Beacon. I felt you the instant you stepped through the portal. I would not have awoken for anyone else.”
John didn't know if he should be pleased or frightened by that, and promised himself he'd ponder it later in the privacy of his quarters.
“I sensed Willow each time the portal opened to your home world. I asked and she answered.”
“Why Willow?” asked Elizabeth, who really didn't like to be left out. “what's this 'joining' that you've done?”
“A kind of avatar,” answered John, his mind running furiously through everything he'd tried to pretend Atlantis wasn't showing him, “a human interface for the city.”
“You did listen,” Atlantis-Willow smiled widely.
Closing her eyes briefly, Atlantis-Willow lowered her hand from his face and seemed to sway in place.
“I must rest. This body is not yet fully adapted to the changes.”
John watched as she turned back to the room she'd first come from, this time leaving the door open as she laid down on the bed he hadn't noticed before.
Turning to look at Elizabeth, he was taken aback by the fierce anger in her eyes.
“The city's been talking to you?”
It was going to be a long day, he just knew it.
END